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HALLAM'S   WORKS. 

VOLUME    III. 


THE 
CONSTITUTIONAL 

HISTORY     OF     ENGLAND 

FBOM  THE  ACCESSION  OF  HENRY  VII.  TO 
THE  DEATH  OF  GEORGE  II. 

VOLUME    I. 


THE 


CONSTITUTIONAL 

HISTORY    OF   ENGLAND 


FROM  THE  ACCESSION  OF  HENRY  VH.  TO 
THE  DEATH  OF  GEORGE  II. 


BY  HENRY  HALLAM,  LL.D.,  F.R.A.S., 

FOREIGN  ASSOCIATE  OF  THE  INSTITUTE  OF  FRANCE. 


IN  TWO  VOLUMES. 
VOLUME  I. 


NEW    YORK 

A.    C.    ARMSTRONG   AND    SON 

714  BROADWAY 

1880 


of 

ROCKWELL      AND      CHURCHILL, 

39  Arch  Street,  Boston. 


'M 


IN  TOKEN  OF  HIGH  ESTEEM 

AND    SINCERE  REGARD, 

THIS   WORK  IS  RESPECTFULLY  INSCRIBED 
BY 

THE    AUTHOR. 


559210 


PREFACE. 


THE  origin  and  progress  of  the  English  constitution,  down 
to  the  extinction  of  the  house  of  Plantagenet,  formed  a  con- 
siderable portion  of  a  work  published  by  me  some  years 
since,  on  the  history,  and  especially  the  laws  and  institutions, 
of  Europe  during  the  period  of  the  middle  ages.  It  had 
been  my  first  intention  to  have  prosecuted  that  undertaking 
in  a  general  continuation ;  and  when  experience  taught  me 
to  abandon  a  scheme  projected  early  in  life  with  very  inad- 
equate views  of  its  magnitude,  I  still  determined  to  carry  for- 
ward the  constitutional  history  of  my  own  country,  as  both 
the  most  important  to  ourselves,  and,  in  many  respects,  the 
most  congenial  to  my  own  studies  and  habits  of  mind. 

The  title  which  I  have  adopted  appears  to  exclude  all 
matter  not  referrible  to  the  state  of  government,  or  what  is 
loosely  denominated  the  constitution.^  I  have,  therefore,  gen- 
erally abstained  from  mentioning,  except  cursorily,  either 
military  or  political  transactions,  which  do  not  seem  to  bear 
on  this  primary  subject.  It  must,  however,  be  evident  that 
the  constitutional  and  general  history  of  England,  at  some 
periods,  nearly  coincide ;  and  I  presume  that  a  few  occasional 
deviations  of  this  nature  will  not  be  deemed  unpardonable, 
especially  where  they  tend,  at  least  indirectly,  to  illustrate 
the  main  topic  of  inquiry.  Nor  will  the  reader,  perhaps,  be 
of  opinion  that  I  have  forgotten  my  theme  in  those  parts  of 
the  following  work  which  relate  to  the  establishment  of  the 
English  church,  and  to  the  proceedings  of  the  state  with  re- 
spect to  those  who  have  dissented  from  it ;  facts  certainly  be- 
longing to  the  history  of  our  constitution,  in  the  large  sense 
of  the  word,  and  most  important  in  their  application  to  mod- 
ern times,  for  which  all  knowledge  of  the  past  is  principally 
valuable.  Still  less  apology  can  be  required  for  a  slight  ver- 


viii  PREFACE. 

bal  inconsistency  with  the  title  of  these  volumes  in  the  addi- 
tion of  two  supplemental  chapters  on  Scotland  and  Ireland. 
This  indeed  I  mention  less  to  obviate  a  criticism  which  pos- 
sibly might  not  be  suggested,  than  to  express  my  regret  that, 
on  account  of  their  brevity,  if  for  no  other  reasons,  they  are 
both  so  disproportionate  to  the  interest  and  importance  of 
their  subjects. 

During  the  years  that,  amidst  avocations  of  different  kinds, 
have  been  occupied  in  the  composition  of  this  work,  several 
others  have  been  given  to  the  world,  and  have  attracted  con- 
siderable attention,  relating  particularly  to  the  periods  of  the 
Reformation  and  of  the  civil  wars.  It  'seems  necessary  to 
mention  that  I  had  read  none  of  these  till  after  I  had  writ- 
ten such  of  the  following  pages  as  treat  of  the  same  subjects. 
The  three  first  chapters  indeed  were  finished  in  1820,  before 
the  appearance  of  those  publications  which  have  led  to  so 
much  controversy  as  to  the  ecclesiastical  history  of  the  six- 
teenth century ;  and  I  was  equally  unacquainted  with  Mr. 
Brodie's  "  History  of  the  British  Empire  from  the  Accession 
of  Charles  I.  to  the  Restoration,"  while  engaged  myself  on 
that  period.  I  have,  however,  on  a  revision  of  the  present 
work,  availed  myself  of  the  valuable  labors  of  recent  au- 
thors, especially  Dr.  Lingard  and  Mr.  Brodie ;  and  in  several 
of  my  notes  I  have  sometimes  supported  myself  by  their 
authority,  sometimes  taken  the  liberty  to  express  my  dissent ; 
but  I  have  seldom  thought  it  necessary  to  make  more  than  a 
few  verbal  modifications  in  my  text. 

It  would  perhaps,  not  become  me  to  offer  any  observations 
on  these  contemporaries ;  but  I  cannot  refrain  from  bearing 
testimony  to  the  work  of  a  distinguished  foreigner,  M.  Gui- 
zot,  "  Histoire  de  la  Revolution  d'Angleterre,  depuis  1'Avene- 
ment  de  Charles  I.  jusqu'k  la  Chute  de  Jacques  II.,"  the  first 
volume  of  which  was  published  in  1826.  The  extensive 
knowledge  of  M.  Guizot,  and  his  remarkable  impartiality, 
have  already  been  displayed  in  his  collection  of  memoirs 
illustrating  that  part  of  English  history  ;  and  I  am  much  dis- 
posed to  believe  that,  if  the  rest  of  his  present  undertaking 
shall  be  completed  in  as  satisfactory  a  manner  as  the  first 
volume,  he  will  be  entitled  to  the  preference  above  any  one, 
perhaps,  of  our  native  writers,  as  a  guide  through  the  great 
period  of  the  seventeenth  century. 

In  terminating  the   Constitutional  History  of  England  at 


PREFACE.  ix 

the  accession  of  George  in.  I  have  been  influenced  by  un- 
willingness to  excite  the  prejudices  of  modem  politics,  espe- 
cially those  connected  with  personal  character,  which  extend 
back  through  at  least  a  large  portion  of  that  reign.  It  is  in- 
deed vain  to  expect  that  any  comprehensive  account  of  the 
two  preceding  centuries  can  be  given  without  risking  the 
disapprobation  of  those  parties,  religious  or  political,  which 
originated  during  that  period;  but  as  I  shall  hardly  incur 
the  imputation  of  being  the  blind  zealot  of  any  of  these,  I 
have  little  to  fear,  in  this  respect,  from  the  dispassionate 
public,  whose  favor,  both  in  this  country  and  on  the  conti- 
nent, has  been  bestowed  on  my  former  work,  with  a  liber- 
ality less  due  to  any  literary  merit  it  may  possess  than  to  a 
regard  for  truth,  which  will,  I  trust,  be  found  equally  char- 
acteristic of  the  present. 
June,  1827. 


ADVERTISEMENT  TO   THE   THIRD   EDITION. 

THE  present  edition  has  been  revised,  and  some  use  made 
of  recent  publications.  The  note  on  the  authenticity  of  the 
Icon  Basilike,  at  the  end  of  the  second  volume  of  the  two 
former  editions,  has  been  withdrawn  ;  not  from  the  slightest 
doubt  in  the  author's  mind  as  to  the  correctness  of  its  argu- 
ment, but  because  a  discussion  of  a  point  of  literary  criti- 
cism, as  this  ought  to  be  considered,  seemed  rather  out  of  ita 
place  in  the  Constitutional  History  of  England. 

April,  1832. 


ADVERTISEMENT  TO  THE  FIFTH  EDITION. 

MANY  alterations  and  additions  have  been  made  in  this 
edition,  as  well  as  some  in  that  published  in  1842.     They 
are  distinguished,  when  more  than  verbal,  by  brackets  and 
by  the  date. 
January,  1846. 


The  following  Editions  have  been  used  for  the  References  in 
these  Volumes. 

STATUTES  at  Large,  by  Ruffhead,  except  where  the  late  edition  of  Statutes 

of  the  Eealm  is  expressly  quoted. 
State  Trials,  by  Howell. 
Rymer's  Fcedera,  London,  20  vols. 

The  paging  of  this  edition  is  preserved  in  the  margin  of  the  Hague 

edition  in  10  vols. 

Parliamentary  History,  new  edition. 
Burnet's  History  of  the  Reformation,  3  vols.  folio,  1681. 
Strype's  Ecclesiastical  Memorials,  Annals  of  Reformation,  and  Lives  of 
Archbishops  Cranmer,  Parker,  Grindal,  and  Whitgift,  folio. 
The  paging  of  these  editions  is  preserved  in  those  lately  published 

in  8vo. 

Hall's  Chronicles  of  England.  "\ 

Holingshed's  Chronicles  of  England,  Scotland,  and  Ireland.  V 
The  edition  in  4to.  published  in  1808.  ) 

Somers  Tracts,  by  Sir  Walter  Scott,  13  vols.  4to. 
Harleian  Miscellany,  8  vols.  4to. 
Neal's  History  of  the  Puritans,  2  vols.  4to. 
Bacon's  Works,  by  Mallet,  3  vols.  folio,  1753. 
Rennet's  Complete  History  of  England,  3  vols.  folio,  1719. 
Wood's  History  of  University  of  Oxford,  by  Gutch,  4  vols.  4to. 
Lingard's  History  of  England,  10  vols.  8vo. 
Butler's  Memoirs  of  English  Catholics,  4  vols.  1819. 
Harris's  Lives  of  James  I.,  Charles  L,  Cromwell,  and  Charles  II.,  5  vola. 

1814. 
Clarendon's  History  of  the  Rebellion,  8  vols.  8vo.  Oxf.  1826. 

It  is  to  be  regretted  that  the  editor  has  not  preserved  the  paging  of 
the  folio  in  his  margin,  which  is  of  great  convenience  in  a  book 
so  frequently  referred  to;  and  still  more   so,  that  he  has  not 
thought  the  true  text  worthy  of  a  better  place  than  the  bottom 
of  the  page,  leaving  to  the  spurious  readings  the  post  of  honor. 
Clarendon's  Life,  folio. 
Rushworth  Abridged,  6  vols.  8vo.  1703. 

This  edition  contains  many  additions  from  works  published  since  the 

folio  edition  in  1680. 
Whitelock's  Memorials,  1732. 
Memoirs  of  Col.  Hutchinson,  4to .  1806. 
May's  History  of  the  Parliament,  4to.  1812. 
Baxter's  Life,  folio. 


xii  EDITIONS  USED  FOR  REFERENCE. 

Rapin's  History  of  England,  3  vols.  folio,  1732. 
Burnet's  History  of  his  own  Times,  2  vols.  folio. 

The  paging  of  this  edition  is  preserved  in  the  margin  of  that  printed 

at  Oxford,  1823,  which  is  sometimes  quoted,  and  the  text  of  which 

has  always  been  followed. 

Life  of  William  Lord  Russell,  by  Lord  John  Russell,  4to. 
Temple's  Works,  2  vols.  folio,  1720. 
Coxe's  Life  of  Marlborough,  3  vols.  4to. 
Coxe's  Memoirs  of  Sir  Robert  Walpole,  3  vols.  4to. 
Robertson's  History  of  Scotland,  2  vols.  8vo.  1794. 
Laing's  History  of  Scotland,  4  vols.  8vo. 
Dalrymple's  Annals  of  Scotland,  2  vols.  4to. 
Leland's  History  of  Ireland,  3  vols.  4to. 

Spenser's  Account  of  State  of  Ireland,  in  8th  volume  of  Todd's  edition  of 
Spenser's  Works. 

These  are,  I  believe,  almost  all  the  works  quoted  in  the  following  volumes, 
concerning  which  any  uncertainty  could  arise  from  the  mode  of  reference. 


CONTENTS 

OF 

THE   FIRST  VOLUME. 


CHAPTER   L 

ON  THE  ENGLISH   CONSTITUTION  FKOM   HENRY  VII.  TO  MART. 

ANCIENT  Government  of  England  —  Limitations  of  Royal  Authority — 
Difference  in  the  effective  Operation  of  these  —  Sketch  of  the  State  of 
Society  and  Law  —  Henry  VII. — Statute  for  the  Security  of  the  Sub- 
ject under  a  King  de  facto —  Statute  of  Fines  —  Discussion  of  its  Effect 
and  Motive  —  Exactions  of  Money  under  Henry  VII.  —  Taxes  demanded 
by  Henry  VIII.  —  Illegal  Exactions  of  Wolsey  in  1523  and  1525  —Acts 
of  Parliament  releasing  the  King  from  his  Debts  — A  Benevolence  again 
exacted  —  Oppressive  Treatment  of  Reed  —  Severe  and  unjust  Execu- 
tions for  Treason  —  Earl  of  Warwick  —  Earl  of  Suffolk  —  Duke  of  Buck- 
ingham —  New  Treasons  created  by  Statute  —  Executions  of  Fisher  and 
More  —  Cromwell  —  Duke  of  Norfolk  —  Anne  Boleyn  —  Fresh  Statutes 
enacting  the  Penalties  of  Treason  — Act  giving  Proclamations  the  Force 
of  Law  —  Government  of  Edward  VI.'s  Counsellors  —  Attainder  of  Lord 
Seymour  and  Duke  of  Somerset  —  Violence  of  Mary's  Reign  —  The 
House  of  Commons  recovers  Part  of  its  independent  Power,  in  these  two 
Reigns  —  Attempt  of  the  Court  to  strengthen  itself  by  creating  new 
Boroughs — Causes  of  the  High  Prerogative  of  the  Tudors  —  Jurisdic- 
tion of  the  Council  of  Star-Chamber  —  This  not  the  same  with  the  Court 
erected  by  Henry  VII.  —  Influence  of  the  Authority  of  the  Star-Chamber 
in  enhancing  the  Royal  Power  —  Tendency  of  Religious  Disputes  to  the 
same  end Page  17 

CHAPTER  II. 

ON  THE  ENGLISH  CHURCH  UNDER  HENRY  VIII.,  EDWARD  VI., 
AND  MARY. 

State  of  Public  Opinion  as  to  Religion  —  Henry  VIII.'s  Controversy  with 
Luther  —  His  Divorce  from  Catherine  —  Separation  from  the  Church  of 
Rome  —  Dissolution  of  Monasteries  —  Progress  of  the  Reformed  Doctrine 


;iv  CONTENTS  OF  TIIE  FIRST  VOLUME. 

in  England  —Its  Establishment  under  Edward  —  Sketch  of  the  chief 
Points  of  Difference  between  the  two  Religions  —  Opposition  made  by 
Part  of  the  Nation  —  Cranmer — His  Moderation  in  introducing  Changes 
not  acceptable  to  the  Zealots — Mary  —  Persecution  under  her  —  Its 
Effect  rather  favorable  to  Protestantism Page  70 


CHAPTER  III. 

ON  THE  LAWS  OF   ELIZABETH'S   REIGN   RESPECTING   THE   ROMAH 
CATHOLICS. 

Change  of  Religion  on  the  Queen's  Accession — Acts  of  Supremacy  and 
Uniformity  —  Restraint  of  Roman  Catholic  Worship  in  the  first  years  of 
Elizabeth  —  Statute  of  1562  —  Speech  of  Lord  Montague  against  it  — 
This  Act  not  fully  enforced  —  Application  of  the  Emperor  in  behalf  of 
the  English  Catholics  —  Persecution  of  this  Body  in  the  ensuing  Period 
—  Uncertain  Succession  of  the  Crown  between  the  Families  of  Scotland 
and  Suffolk  —  The  Queen's  unwillingness  to  decide  this,  or  to  marry  — 
Imprisonment  of  Lady  Catherine  Grey  —  Mary  Queen  of  Scotland  — 
Combination  in  her  favor —  Bull  of  Pius  V.  —  Statutes  for  the  Queen's 
Security  —  Catholics  more  rigorously  treated  —  Refugees  in  the  Nether- 
lands —  Their  Hostility  to  the  Government  —  Fresh  Laws  against  the 
Catholic  Worship  —  Execution  of  Campian  and  others  —  Defence  of  the 
Queen  by  Burleigh  —  Increased  Severity  of  the  Government — Mary  — 
Plot  in  her  favor  —  Her  Execution  —  Remarks  upon  it  —  Continued 
Persecution  of  Roman  Catholics  —  General  Observations 117 

CHAPTER  IV. 

ON  THE  LAWS  OF   ELIZABETH'S   REIGN   RESPECTING  PROTESTANT 
NONCONFORMISTS. 

Orig'n  of  the  Differences  among  the  English  Protestants  —  Religious  Incli- 
nations of  the  Queen  —  Unwillingness  of  many  to  comply  with  the 
established  Ceremonies  —  Conformity  enforced  by  the  Archbishop  — 
Against  the  Disposition  of  others  —  A  more  determined  Opposition, 
about  1570,  led  by  Cartwright — Dangerous  Nature  of  his  Tenets  — 
Puritans  supported  in  the  Commons  —  and  in  some  measure  by  the 
Council  —  Prophesyings  —  Archbishops  Grindal  and  Whitgift  —  Conduct 
of  the  latter  in  enforcing  Conformity  —  High  Commission  Court  —  Lord 
Burleigh  averse  to  Severity  —  Puritan  Libels  —  Attempt  to  set  up  a 
Presbyterian  System  —  House  of  Commons  averse  to  Episcopal  Author- 
ity—  Independents  liable  to  severe  Laws  —  Hooker's  Ecclesiastical 
Polity — its  Character — Spoliation  of  Church  Revenues  —  General  Re- 
marks—  Letter  of  Walsingham  in  Defence  of  the  Queen's  Govern- 
ment   .  175 


CONTENTS  OF  THE  REST  VOLUME.        ^v 
CHAPTER  V. 

ON  THE   CIVIL   GOVERNMENT   OF   ELIZABETH. 

General  Remarks  —  Defective  Security  of  the  Subject's  Liberty — Trials 
for  Treason  and  other  Political  Offences  unjustly  conducted — Illegal 
Commitments  —  Remonstrance  of  Judges  against  them  —  Proclamations 
unwarranted  by  Law  —  Restrictions  on  Printing -r  Martial  Law  —  Loans 
of  Money  not  quite  voluntary  —  Character  of  Lord  Burleigh's  Adminis- 
tration —  Disposition  of  the  House  of  Commons  —  Addresses  concerning 
the  Succession  —  Difference  on  this  between  the  Queen  and  Commons 
in  1566  —  Session  of  1571  —  Influence  of  the  Puritans  in  Parliament  — 
Speech  of  Mr.  Wentworth  in  1576  —  The  Commons  continue  to  seek 
Redress  of  Ecclesiastical  Grievances  —  Also  of  Monopolies,  especially  in 
the  Session  of  1601  —  Influence  of  the  Crown  in  Parliament  —  Debate  on 
Election  of  non-resident  Burgesses — Assertion  of  Privileges  by  Com- 
mons—  Case  of  Ferrers,  under  Henry  VIII.  —  Other  Cases  of  Privilege 

—  Privilege  of  determining  contested  Elections  claimed  by  the  House  — 
The  English  Constitution  not  admitted  to  be  an  Absolute  Monarchy  — 
Pretensions  of  the  Crown Page  230 

CHAPTER   VI. 

ON  THE  ENGLISH   CONSTITUTION  UNDER  JAMES  I. 

Quiet  Accession  of  James  —  Question  of  his  Title,  to  the  Crown — Legiti- 
macy of  the  Earl  of  Hertford's  Issue  —  Early  Unpopularity  of  the  King 

—  Conduct  towards  the  Puritans  —  Parliament  convoked  by  an  irregular 
Proclamation  —  Question  of  Fortescue  and  Goodwin's  Election  —  Shir- 
ley's Case  of  Privilege  —  Complaints  of  Grievances  —  Commons'  Vindi- 
cation of  themselves  —  Session  of  1605  —  Union  with  Scotland  debated 

—  Continual  Bickerings  between  the  Crown  and  Commons  —  Impositions 
on  Merchandise  without  Consent  of  Parliament  —  Remonstrances  against 
these  in  Session  of  1610  —  Doctrine  of  King's  absolute  power  inculcated 
by  Clergy  —  Articuli  Cleri  —  Cowell's  Interpreter  —  Renewed  Complaints 
of  the  Commons  —  Negotiation  for  giving  up  the  Feudal  Revenue  —  Dis- 
solution of  Parliament  —  Character  of  James  —  Death  of  Lord  Salisbury 

—  Foreign  Politics  of  the  Government— Lord  Coke's  Alienation  from 
the  Court  — Illegal  Proclamations  — Means  resorted  to  in  order  to  avoid 
the  Meeting  of  Parliament  —  Parliament  of  1614  —  Undertakers  —  It  is 
dissolved  without  passing  a  single  Act  —  Benevolences  —  Prosecution  of 
Peacham  —  Dispute  about  the  Jurisdiction  of  the  Court  of  Chancery  — 

—  Case  of  Commendams  —  Arbitrary  Proceedings  in  Star-Chamber — 
Arabella  Stuart— Somerset  and  Overbury  — Sir  Walter  Raleigh  — Par- 
liament of  1621  —  Proceedings  against  Mompesson  and  Lord  Bacon  — 
Violence  in  the  case  of  Floyd  —  Disagreement  between  the  King  and 
Commons  —  Their  Dissolution  after  a  strong  Remonstrance  —  Marriage 
Treaty  with    Spain  —  Parliament  of  1624  —  Impeachment  of  Middle- 
sex..!   Page283 


tvi  CONTENTS  OF  THE  FIRST  VOLUME. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

ON  THE    ENGLISH    CONSTITUTION  FKOM  THE  ACCESSION  OF   CHARLES  I. 
TO  THE   DISSOLUTION  OF  HIS  THIRD   PARLIAMENT. 

Parliament  of  1625  —  Its  Dissolution  —  Another  Parliament  called  —  Prose- 
cution of  Buckingham  —  Arbitrary  Proceedings  towards  the  Earls  of 
Arundel  and  Bristol  —  Loan  demanded  by  the  King  —  several  committed 
for  Refusal  .to  contribute  —  They  sue  for  a  Habeas  Corpus  —  Arguments 
on  this  Question,  which  is  decided  against  them— A  Parliament  called  in 
1628  —Petition  of  Right—  King's  Reluctance  to  grant  it—  Tonnage  and 
Poundage  disputed— King  dissolves  Parliament  — Religious  Differences 

—  Prosecution  of  Puritans  by  Bancroft  —  Growth  of  High-Church  Tenets 
Differences  as  to  the  Observance  of  Sunday  —  Arminian  Controversy 

—  State  of   Catholics   under  James  — Jealousy  of   the  Court's  favor 
towards  them  —  Unconstitutional   Tenets  promulgated  by   the  High- 
Church  Party  —  General  Remarks 367 

CHAPTER   VIII. 

FROM  THE  DISSOLUTION  OF  CHARLES'S  THIRD  PARLIAMENT  TO   THE 
MEETING  OF  THE  LONG  PARLIAMENT. 

Declaration  of  the  King  after  the  Dissolution  —  Prosecutions  of  Eliot  and 
others  for  conduct  in  Parliament —  Of  Chambers  for  refusing  to  pay 
Customs  —  Commendable  Behavior  of  Judges  in  some  instances  —  Means 
adopted  to  raise  the  Revenue  —  Compositions  for  Knighthood  —  Forest 
Laws  —  Monopolies — Ship-Money  —  Extension  of  it  to  inland  Places  — 
Hampden's  Refusal  to  pay  —  Arguments  on  the  Case  —  Proclamations  — 
Various  arbitrary  Proceedings  —  Star-Chamber  Jurisdiction  —  Punish- 
ments inflicted  by  it  —  Cases  of  Bishop  Williams,  Prynne,  &c.  —  Laud, 
his  Character  —  Lord  Strafford  —  Correspondence  between  these  two  — 
Conduct  of  Laud  in  the  Church-Prosecution  of  Puritans  —  Favor  shown 
to  Catholics  —  Tendency  to  their  Religion  —  Expectations  entertained  by 
them  —  Mission  of  Panzani  —  Intrigue  of  Bishop  Montagu  with  him  — 
Chillingworth  —  Hales  —  Character  of  Clarendon's  Writings  — Animad- 
versions on  his  Account  of  this  Period  —  Scots  Troubles  and  Distress  of 
the  Government  —  Parliament  of  April,  1640  —  Council  of  York — Con- 
rocation  of  Long  Parliament 411 

CHAPTER    IX. 

FROM  THB  MEETING  OF  THE  LONG  PARLIAMENT  TO  THE  BEGINNING 
OF  THE  CIVIL  WAR. 

Character  of  Long  Parliament  —  Its  salutary  Measures—  Triennial  Bill  — 
Other  beneficial  Laws  —  Observations  —  Impeachment  of  Strafford  — 
Discussion  of  its  Justice  —  Act  against  Dissolution  of  Parliament  without 


CONTENTS  OF  THE  FIRST  VOLUME. 

its  Consent— Innovations  meditated  in  the  Church  —  Schism  in  the 
Constitutional  Party  —  Remonstrance  of  November,  1641  —  Suspicions 
of  the  King's  Sincerity  —  Question  of  the  Militia  —  Historical  Sketch  of 
Military  Force  in  England  —  Encroachments  of  the  Parliament — Nine- 
teen Propositions  —  Discussion  of  the  respective  Claims  of  the  two  Parties 
to  Support  —  Faults  of  both Page  498 

CHAPTER  X. 

FROM  THE  BREAKING  OUT  OF  THE  CIVIL  WAR  TO  THE  RESTORATION. 

PABT  I. 

Success  of  the  King  in  the  first  part  of  the  War — Efforts  by  the  Moderate 
Party  for  Peace  —  Affair  at  Brentford  —  Treaty  of  Oxford  —  Impeach- 
ment of  the  Queen  —  Waller's  Plot  —  Secession  of  some  Peers  to  the 
King's  Quarters  —  Their  Treatment  there  impolitic  —  The  Anti-pacific 
Party  gain  the  Ascendant  at  Westminster — The  Parliament  makes  a 
new  Great  Seal  —  and  takes  the  Covenant  —  Persecution  of  the  Clergy 
who  refuse  it  —  Impeachment  and  Execution  of  Laud  —  Decline  of  the 
King's  Affairs  in  1644  —  Factions  at  Oxford  —  Royalist  Lords  and  Com- 
moners summoned  to  that  City  —  Treaty  of  Uxbridge  —  Impossibility  of 
Agreement  —  The  Parliament  insist  on  unreasonable  Terms  —  Miseries 
of  the  War  —  Essex  and  Manchester  suspected  of  Lukewarmness  —  Self- 
denying  Ordinance  —  Battle  of  Naseby  —  Desperate  Condition  of  the 
King's  Affairs — He  throws  himself  into  the  hands  of  the  Scots  —  His 
Struggles  to  preserve  Episcopacy,  against  the  Advice  of  the  Queen  and 
others — Bad  Conduct  of  the  Queen  —  Publication  of  Letters  taken  at 
Naseby  —  Discovery  of  Glamorgan's  Treaty —  King  delivered  up  by  the 
Scots  —  Growth  of  the  Independents  and  Republicans  —  Opposition  to 
the  Presbyterian  Government  —  Toleration  —  Intrigues  of  the  Army  with 
the  King — His  Person  seized  —  The  Parliament  yield  to  the  Army  — 
Mysterious  Conduct  of  Cromwell  —  Imprudent  Hopes  of  the  King —  He 
rejects  the  Proposals  of  the  Army  —  His  Flight  from  Hampton  Court  — 
Alarming  Votes  against  him  —  Scots  Invasion  —  The  Presbyterians 
regain  the  Ascendant  —  Treaty  of  Newport  —  Gradual  Progress  of  a 
Republican  Party  —  Scheme  among  the  Officers  of  bringing  Charles  to 
Trial — This  is  finally  determined  —  Seclusion  of  Presbyterian  Members 
—  Motives  of  some  of  the  King's  Judges  —  Question  of  his  Execution 
discussed  —  His  Character  —  Icon  Basilike" 552 


THE 

CONSTITUTIONAL   HISTORY 

OF 

ENGLAND 

FROM 

HENRY    VII.    TO    GEORGE    II. 


CHAPTER   I. 

ON   THE   ENGLISH    CONSTITUTION    FROM    HENRY   VII.   TO 
MARY. 

Ancient  Government  of  England  —  Limitations  of  Royal  Authority— Difference  In 
the  effective  Operation  of  these  —  Sketch  of  the  state  of  Society  and  Law  —  Hen- 
ry VII.  — Statute  for  the  Security  of  the  Subject  under  a  King  de  facto  —  Statute 
of  Fines  —  Discussion  of  its  Effect  and  Motive  —  Exactions  of  Money  under  Henry 
VII.—  Taxes  demanded  by  Henry  VIII.—  Illegal  Exactions  of  Wolsey  in  1523  and 
1525  —  Acts  of  Parliament  releasing  the  King  from  his  Dehts  —  A  Benevolence 
again  exacted  —  Oppressive  Treatment  of  Reed  —  Severe  and  unjust  Executions 
for  Treason  —  Earl  of  Warwick  —  Earl  of  Suffolk  —  Duke  of  Buckingham  —  New 
Treasons  created  hy  Statute  —  Executions  of  Fisher  and  More  —  Cromwell  — 
Duke  of  Norfolk  —  Anne  Boleyn  —  Fresh  Statutes  enacting  the  Penalties  of  Trea- 
son—  Act  giving  Proclamations  the  force  of  Law  —  Government  of  Edward  VI. 's 
Counsellors —  Attainder  of  Lord  Seymour  and  Duke  of  Somerset — Violence  of 
Mary's  reign  —  The  House  of  Commons  recovers  part  of  its  independent  power  in 
these  two  Reigns  —  Attempt  of  the  Court  to  strengthen  itself  by  creating  new 
Boroughs  —  Causes  of  the  High  Prerogative  of  the  Tudors  —  Jurisdiction  of  the 
Council  of  Star-Chamber  —  This  not  the  same  with  the  Court  erected  by  Henry 
VII. —  Influence  of  the  Authority  of  the  Star-Chamber  in  enhancing  the  Royal 
Power  —  Tendency  of  Religious  Disputes  to  the  same  end. 

THE  government  of  England,  in  all  times  recorded  by  his- 
tory, has  been  one  of  those  mixed  or  limited  mon-  Anc5ent 
archies  which  the  Celtic  and  Gothic  tribes  appear  government 
universally  to  have   established  in  preference  toof 
the  coarse  despotism  of  eastern  nations,  to  the  more  artificial 
tyranny  of  Rome  and  Constantinople,  or  to  the  various  mod- 
els of  republican  polity  which  were  tried  upon  the  coasts  of 
the  Mediterranean  Sea.     It  bore  the  same  general  features, 
it  belonged,  as  it  were,  to  the  same  family,  as  the  govern- 
ments of  almost  every   European  state,  though  less  resem- 
bling, perhaps,  that  of  France  than  any  other.     But,  in  the 
VOL.  i.  —  o.  2 


18  POLITY  OF  ENGLAND  AT  CHAP.*. 

course  of  many  centuries,  the  boundaries  which  determined 
the  sovereign's  prerogative  and  the  people's  liberty  or  power 
having  seldom  been,  very  accurately  defined  by  law,  or  at 
least  by  such  law  as  was  deemed  fundamental  and  unchange- 
able, the  forms  and  principles  of  political  regimen  in  these 
different  nations  became  more  divergent  from  each  other,  ac- 
cording to  their  peculiar  dispositions,  the  revolutions  they 
underwent,  or  the  influence  of  personal  character.  England, 
more  fortunate  than  the  rest,  had  acquired  in  the  fifteenth 
century  a  just  reputation  for  the  goodness  of  her  laws  and 
the  security  of  her  citizens  from  oppression. 

This  liberty  had  been  the  slow  fruit  of  ages,  still  waiting 
a  happier  season  for  its  perfect  ripeness,  but  already  giving 
proof  of  the  vigor  and  industry  which  had  been  employed 
in  its  culture.  I  have  endeavored,  in  a  work  of  which  this 
may  in  a  certain  degree  be  reckoned  a  continuation,  to  trace 
the  leading  events  and  causes  of  its  progress.  It  will  be 
sufficient  in  this  place  briefly  to  point  out  the  principal 
circumstances  in  the  polity  of  England  at  the  accession  of 
Henry  VII. 

The  essential  checks  upon  the  royal  authority  were  five  in 
Limitations  number.  —  1.  The  king  could  levy  no  sort  of  new 
of  royal  tax  upon  his  people,  except  by  the  grant  of  his 
parliament,  consisting  as  well  of  bishops  and  mi- 
tred abbots  or  lords  spiritual,  and  of  hereditary  peers  or  tem- 
poral lords,  who  sat  and  voted  promiscuously  in  the  same 
chamber,  as  of  representatives  from  the  freeholders  of  each 
county,  and  from  the  burgesses  of  many  towns  and  less 
considerable  places,  forming  the  lower  or  commons'  house. 
2.  The  previous  assent  and  authority  of  the  same  assembly 
were  necessary  for  every  new  law,  whether  of  a  general  or 
temporary  nature.  3.  No  man  could  be  committed  to  prison 
but  by  a  legal  warrant  specifying  his  offence ;  and  by  an 
usage  nearly  tantamount  to  constitutional  right,  he  must  be 
speedily  brought  to  trial  by  means  of  regular  sessions  of 
jail-delivery.  4.  The  fact  of  guilt  or  innocence  on  a  crimi- 
nal charge  was  determined  in  a  public  court,  and  in  the 
county  where  the  offence  was  alleged  to  have  occurred,  by  a 
jury  of  twelve  men,  from  whose  unanimous  verdict  no  ap- 
peal could  be  made.  Civil  rights,  so  far  as  they  depended 
on  questions  of  fact,  were  subject  to  the  same  decision.  5. 
The  officers  and  servants  of  the  crown,  violating  the  per- 


HEN.  VII.          THE  ACCESSION  OF  HENKY  VII.  19 

Bonal  liberty  or  other  right  of  the  subject,  might  be  sued  in 
an  action  for  damages  to  be  assessed  by  a  jury,  or,  in  some 
cases,  were  liable  to.  criminal  process  ;  nor  could  they  plead 
any  warrant  or  command  in  their  justification,  not  even  the 
direct  order  of  the  king. 

These  securities,  though  it  would  be  easy  to  prove  that 
they  were  all  recognized  in  law,  differed  much  in  Difference 
the  degree  of  their  effective  operation.     It  may  Active 
be  said  of  the  first,  that  it  was  now  completely  operation 
established.   After  a  long  contention,  the  kings  of  of  these' 
England  had  desisted  for  near  a  hundred  years  from  every 
attempt  to  impose  taxes  without  consent  of  parliament;  and 
their  recent  device  of  demanding  benevolences,  or  half-com- 
pulsory gifts,  though  very  oppressive,  and  on  that  account 
just  abolished  by  an  act  of  the  late  usurper  Richard,  was  in 
effect  a  recognition  of  the  general  principle,  which  it  sought 
to  elude  rather  than  transgress. 

The  necessary  concurrence  of  the  two  houses  of  parlia- 
ment in  legislation,  though  it  could  not  be  more  unequivo- 
cally established  than  the  former,  had  in  earlier  times  been 
more  free  from  all  attempt  at  encroachment.  We  know  not 
of  any  laws  that  were  ever  enacted  by  our  kings  without  the 
assent  and  advice  of  their  great  council ;  though  it  is  justly 
doubted  Whether  the  representatives  of  the  ordinary  free- 
holders, or  of  the  boroughs,  had  seats  and  suffrages  in  that 
assembly  during  seven  or  eight  reigns  after  the  conquest. 
They  were  then,  however,  ingrafted  upon  it  with  plenary 
legislative  authority ;  and  if  the  sanction  of  a  statute  were 
required  for  this  fundamental  axiom,  we  might  refer  to  one 
in  the  15th  of  Edward  II.  (1322),  which  declares  that  "the 
matters  to  be  established  for  the  estate  of  the  king  and  of 
his  heirs,  and  for  the  estate  of  the  realm  and  of  the  people, 
should  be  treated,  accorded,  and  established  in  parliament,  by 
the  king,  and  by  the  assent  of  the  prelates,  earls,  and  barons, 
and  the  commonalty  of  the  realm,  according  as  had  been 
before  accustomed."  * 

It  may  not  be  impertinent  to  remark  in  this  place,  that  the 

1  This  statute  is  not  even  alluded  to  in  (1819),  p.  282.    Nothing  can  be  more  evi- 

Ruffhead's edition,  and  has  been  very  lit-  dent  than  that  it  not  only  establishes  by 

tie  noticed  by  writers  on  our  law  or  his-  a  legislative  declaration  the  present  con- 

tory.     It  is  printed  in  the  late  edition,  stitution  of  parliament,  but  recognizes  it 

published  by  authority,  and  is  brought  as  already  standing   upon  a  custom  of 

forward  in  the  First  Report  of  the  Lords'  some  length  of  time. 
Ooumiitt««    on    the  Dignity  of  a  Peer 


20  KING'S  AUTHORITY  LIMITED.  CHAP.  L 

opinion  of  such  as  have  fancied  the  royal  prerogative  under 
the  houses  of  Plantagenet  and  Tudor  to  have  had  no  effect- 
ual  or  unquestioned  limitations  is  decidedly  refuted  by  the 
notorious  fact  that  no  alteration  in  the  general  laws  of  the 
realm  was  ever  made,  or  attempted  to  be  made,  without  the 
consent  of  parliament.  It  is  not  surprising  that  the  council,  in 
great  exigency  of  money,  should  sometimes  employ  force  to 
extort  it  from  the  merchants,  or  that  servile  lawyers  should 
be  found  to  vindicate  these  encroachments  of  power.  Im- 
positions, like  other  arbitrary  measures,  were  particular  and 
temporary,  prompted  by  rapacity,  and  endured  through  com- 
pulsion. But  if  the  kings  of  England  had  been  supposed  to 
enjoy  an  absolute  authority,  we  should  find  some  proofs  of  it 
in  their  exercise  of  the  supreme  function  of  sovereignty,  the 
enactment  of  new  laws.  Yet  there  is  not  a  single  instance, 
from  the  first  dawn  of  our  constitutional  history,  where  a  proc- 
lamation, or  order  of  council,  has  dictated  any  change,  how- 
ever trifling,  in  the  code  of  private  rights,  or  in  the  penalties 
of  criminal  offences.  Was  it  ever  pretended  that  the  king 
could  empower  his  subjects  to  devise  their  freeholds,  or  to 
levy  fines  of  their  entailed  lands  ?  Has  even  the  slightest 
regulation,  as  to  judicial  procedure,  or  any  permanent  pro- 
hibition, even  in  fiscal  law,  been  ever  enforced  without  stat- 
ute ?  There  was,  indeed,  «r  period,  later  than  that  of  Henry 
VII.,  when  a  control  over  the  subject's  free  right  of  doing 
all  things  not  unlawful  was  usurped  by  means  of  proclama- 
tions. These,  however,  were  always  temporary,  and  did  not 
affect  to  alter  the  established  law.  But  though  it  would  be 
difficult  to  assert  that  none  of  this  kind  had  ever  been  issued 
in  rnde  and  irregular  times,  I  have  not  observed  any  under 
the  kings  of  the  Plantagenet  name  which  evidently  trans- 
gress the  boundaries  of  their  legal  prerogative. 

The  general  privileges  of  the  nation  were  far  more  secure 
than  those  of  private  men.  Great  violence  was  often  used 
by  the  various  officers  of  the  crown,  for  which  no  adequate 
redress  could  be  procured ;  the  courts  of  justice  were  not 
strong  enough,  whatever  might  be  their  temper,  to  chastise 
euch  aggressions ;  juries,  through  intimidation  or  ignorance, 
returned  such  verdicts  as  were  desired  by  the  crown ;  and, 
in  general,  there  was  perhaps  little  effective  restraint  upon 
the  government,  except  in  the  twc  articles  of  levying  money 
and  enacting  laws. 


H.  STATE  OF  SOCIETY  AND  LAW.  21 

The  peers  alone,  a  small  body,  varying  from  about  fifty  to 
eighty  persons,  enjoyed  the  privileges  of  aristoc-  gtate  of 
racy;  which,  except  that- of  sitting  in  parliament,  society 
were  not  very  considerable,  far  less  oppressive.  and  law' 
All  below  them,  even  their  children,  were  commoners,  and 
in  the  eye  of  the  law  equal  to  each  other.  In  the  gradation 
of  ranks,  which,  if  not  legally  recognized,  must  still  sub- 
sist through  the  necessary  inequalities  of  birth  and  wealth, 
we  find  the  gentry  or  principal  landholders,  many  of  them 
distinguished  by  knighthood,  and  all  by  bearing  coat  armor, 
but  without  any  exclusive  privilege ;  the  yeomanry,  or  small 
freeholders  and  farmers,  a  very  numerous  and  respectable 
body,  some  occupying  their  own  estates,  some  those  of 
landlords ;  the  burgesses  and  inferior  inhabitants  of  trading 
towns ;  and,  lastly,  the  peasantry  and  laborers.  Of  these, 
in  earlier  times,  a  considerable  part,  though  not  perhaps  so 
very  large  a  proportion  as  is  usually  taken  for  granted,  had 
been  in  the  ignominious  state  of  villenage,  incapable  of  pos- 
sessing property  but  at  the  will  of  their  lords.  They  had, 
however,  gradually  been  raised  above  this  servitude ;  many 
had  acquired  a  stable  possession  of  lands  under  the  name  of 
copyholders ;  and  the  condition  of  mere  villenage  was  be- 
come rare. 

The  three  courts  at  Westminster  —  the  King's  Bench, 
Common  Pleas,  and  Exchequer  —  consisting  each  of  four  or 
five  judges,  administered  justice  to  the  whole  kingdom ;  the 
first  having  an  appellant  jurisdiction  over  the  second,  and 
the  third  being  in  a  great  measure  confined  to  causes  affect- 
ing the  crown's  property.  But  as  all  suits  relating  to  land, 
as  well  as  most  others,  and  all  criminal  indictments,  could 
only  be  determined,  so  far  as  they  depended  upon  oral  evi- 
dence, by  a  jury  of  the  county,  it  was  necessary  that  jus- 
tices of  assize  and  jail-delivery,  being  in  general  the  judges 
of  the  courts  at  Westminster,  should  travel  into  each  coun- 
ty, commonly  twice  a  year,  in  order  to  try  issues  of  fact,  so 
called  in  distinction  from  issues  of  law,  where  the  suitors, 
admitting  all  essential  facts,  disputed  the  rule  applicable  to 
them.1  By  this  device,  which  is  as  ancient  as  the  reign  of 

1  The  pleadings,  as  they  are  called,  or  some  established  form,  according  to  the 

written  allegations  of  both  parties,  which,  nature  of  the  case,  that  he  has  a  debt  to 

form  the  basis  of  a  judicial  inquiry,  com-  demand  from,  or  an  injury   to  be  re- 

mence  with  the  declaration,  wherein  the  dressed  by,  the  defendant.    The  latter, 

plaintiff    states,  either    specially  or  in  in  return^  puts  in  his  plea;  which,  if  it 


22 


JUSTICES  OF  ASSIZE. 


CHAP.  I 


Henry  II.,  the  fundamental  privilege  of  trial  by  jury,  and 
the  convenience  of  private  suitors,  as  well  as  accused  per- 
sons, were  made  consistent  with  an  uniform  jurisprudence  ; 
and  though  the  reference  of  every  legal  question,  however 
insignificant,  to  the  courts  above  must  have  been  inconven- 
ient and  expensive  in  a  still  greater  degree  than  at  present, 
it  had,  doubtless,  a  powerful  tendency  to  knit  together  the 
different  parts  of  England,  to  check  the  influence  of  feudality 
and  clanship,  to  make  the  inhabitants  of  distant  counties  bet- 
ter acquainted  with  the  capital  city  and  more  accustomed  to 
the  course  of  government,  and  to  impair  the  spirit  of  provin- 
cial patriotism  and  animosity.  The  minor  tribunals  of  each 
county,  hundred,  and  manor,  respectable  for  their  antiquity 
and  for  their  effect  in  preserving  a  sense  of  freedom  and  jus- 
tice, had  in  a  great  measure,  though  not  probably  so  much 
as  in  modern  times,  gone  into  disuse.  La  a  few  counties 


amount  to  a  denial  of  the  facts  alleged 
in  the  declaration,  must  conclude  to  the 
country,  that  is,  must  refer  the  whole 
matter  to  a  jury.  But  if  it  contain  an 
admission  of  the  fact,  along  with  a  legal 
justification  of  it,  it  is  said  to  conclude  to 
the  court ;  the  effect  of  which  is  to  make 
it  necessary  for  the  plaintiff  to  reply  ;  in 
which  replication  he  may  deny  the  facts 
pleaded  in  justification,  and  conclude  to 
the  country  ;  or  allege  some  new  matter 
in  explanation,  to  show  that  they  do  not 
meet  all  the  circumstances,  concluding 
to  the  court.  Either  party  also  may  de- 
mur, that  is,  deny  that,  although  true 
and  complete  as  a  statement  of  facts,  the 
declaration  or  plea  is  sufficient  according 
to  law  to  found  or  repel  the  plaintiff's 
suit.  In  the  last  case  it  becomes  an  issue 
in  law,  and  is  determined  by  the  judges, 
without  the  intervention  of  a  jury ;  it  be- 
ing a  principle  that,  by  demurring,  the 
party  acknowledges  the  truth  of  all  mat- 
ters alleged  on  the  pleadings.  But  in 
whatever  stage  of  the  proceedings  either 
of  the  litigants  concludes  to  the  country, 
(which  he  is  obliged  to  do  whenever  the 
question  can  be  reduced  to  a  disputed 
fact,)  a  jury  must  be  impanelled  to  de- 
cide it  by  their  verdict.  These  pleadings, 
together  with  what  is  called  the  postea, 
that  is,  an  indorsement  by  the  clerk  of 
the  court  wherein  the  trial  has  been,  re- 
citing that  afterwards  the  cause  was  so 
tried,  and  such  a  verdict  returned,  with 
the  subsequent  entry  of  the  judgment 
Itself,  form  the  record. 

This  is  merely  intended  to  explain 
the  phrase  in  the  text,  which  common 
readers  might  not  clearly  understand. 


The  theory  of  special  pleading,  as  it  is 
generally  called,  could  not  be  further  elu- 
cidated without  lengthening  this  note 
beyond  all  bounds.  But  it  all  rests  upon 
the  ancient  maxim  :  "  De  facto  respon- 
dent j  uratores,  de  jure  judices."  Perhaps 
it  may  be  well  to  add  one  observation  — 
that  in  many  forms  of  action,  and  those 
of  most  frequent  occurrence  in  modern 
times,  it  is  not  required  to  state  the  legal 
justification  on  the  pleadings,  but  to  givs 
it  in  evidence  on  the  general  issue  ;  that 
is,  upon  a  bare  plea  of  denial.  In  this 
case  the  whole  matter  is  actually  in  the 
power  of  the  jury.  But  they  are  gener- 
ally bound  in  conscience  to  defer,  as  to 
the  operation  of  any  rule  of  law,  to  what 
is  laid  down  on  that  head  by  the  judge  ; 
and  when  they  disregard  his  directions,  it 
is  usual  to  annul  the  verdict,  and  grant 
a  new  trial.  There  seem  to  be  some  dis- 
advantages in  the  annihilation,  as  it  may 
be  called,  of  written  pleadings,  by  their 
reduction  to  an  unmeaning  form,  which 
has  prevailed  in  three  such  important  and 
extensive  forms  of  action  as  ejectment, 
general  assumpsit,  and  trover ;  both  as  it 
throws  too  much  power  into  the  hands  of 
the  jury,  and  as  it  almost  nullifies  the 
appellant  jurisdiction,  which  can  only  be 
exercised  where  some  error  is  apparent 
on  the  face  of  the  record.  But  great  prac- 
tical convenience,  and  almost  necessity, 
has  generally  been  alleged  as  far  more 
than  a  compensation  for  these  evils. — 
[1827.]  [This  note  is  left,  but  the  last 
paragraph  is  no  longer  so  near  the  truth 
as  it  was,  in  consequence  of  the  altera- 
tions subsequently  made  by  the  judges  in 
the  rules  of  pleading.] 


HKN.  VH.  LAWS  AGAINST  THEFT.  23 

there  still  remained  a  palatine  jurisdiction,  exclusive  of  the 
king's  courts ;  but  in  these  the  common  rules  of  law.  and  the 
mode  of  trial  by  jury  were  preserved.  Justices  of  the 
peace,  appointed  out  of  the  gentlemen  of  each  county,  in- 
quired into  criminal  charges,  committed  offenders  to  prison, 
and  tried  them  at  their  quarterly  sessions,  according  to  the 
same  forms  as  the  judges  of  jail-delivery.  The  chartered 
towns  had  their  separate  jurisdiction  under  the  municipal 
magistracy. 

The  laws  against  theft  were  severe,  and  capital  punish- 
ments unsparingly  inflicted.  Yet  they  had  little  effect  in 
repressing  acts  of  violence,  to  which  a  rude  and  licentious 
state  of  manners,  and  very  imperfect  dispositions  for  preserv- 
ing the  public  peace,  naturally  gave  rise.  These  were  fre- 
quently perpetrated  or  instigated  by  men  of  superior  wealth 
and  power,  above  the  control  of  the  mere  officers  of  justice. 
Meanwhile  the  kingdom  was  increasing  in  opulence ;  the 
English  merchants  possessed  a  large  share  of  the  trade  of 
the  north ;  and  a  woollen  manufacture,  established  in  differ- 
ent parts  of  the  kingdom,  had  not  only  enabled  the  legis- 
lature to  restrain  the  import  of  cloths,  but  had  begun  to 
supply  foreign  nations.  The  population  may  probably  be 
reckoned,  without  any  material  error,  at  about  three  millions, 
but  by  no  means  distributed  in  the  same  proportions  as  at 
present ;  the  northern  counties,  especially  Lancashire  and 
Cumberland,  being  very  ill  peopled,  and  the  inhabitants  of 
London  and  Westminster  not  exceeding  sixty  or  seventy 
thousand.1 

Such  was  the  political  condition  of  England  when  Henry 
Tudor,  the  only  living  representative  of  the  house  of  Lan- 
caster, though  incapable,  by  reason  of  the  illegitimacy  of 
the  ancestor  who  connected  him  with  it,  of  asserting  a  just 
right  of  inheritance,  became  master  of  the  throne  by  the  de- 
feat and  death  of  his  competitor  at  Bosworth,  and  by   the 
general  submission  of  the  kingdom.     He  assumed 
the  royal  title  immediately  after  his  victory,  and    enry 
summoned  a  parliament  to  recognize  or  sanction  his  posses- 
sion.    The  circumstances  were  by  no  means  such  as  to  offer 

1  The  population  for  1485  is  estimated  4,400,000.    Making  some  allowance   for 

by  comparing  a  sort  of  census  in  1378,  the  more  rapid  increase  in   the  latter 

when  the  inhabitants  of  the  realm  seem  period,  three   millions  at  the  accession 

to  have   amounted  to  about  2,300,000,  of  Henry  VII.  is  probably  not  too  low  an 

with  one  still  more  loose  under  Eliza-  estimate.  —  [I  now   incline   to  rate   the 

beth,  in  1588,  which  would  give  about  population  somewhat  higher.  —  Io41.] 


24  FIKST  PARLIAMENT  OF  HENRY  VII.  CHAP.  T 

an  auspicious  presage  for  the  future.  A  subdued  party  had 
risen  from  the  ground,  incensed  by  proscription  and  elated 
by  success ;  the  late  battle  had  in  effect  been  a  contest  be- 
tween one  usurper  and  another  ;  and  England  had  little  bet- 
ter prospect  than  a  renewal  of  that  desperate  and  intermi- 
nable contention  which  pretences  of  hereditary  right  have  so 
often  entailed  upon  nations. 

A  parliament  called  by  a  conqueror  might  be  presumed  to 
be  itself  conquered.  Yet  this  assembly  did  not  display  so 
servile  a  temper,  or  so  much  of  the  Lancastrian  spirit,  as 
might  be  expected.  It  was  "  ordained  and  enacted  by  the 
assent  of  the  lords,  and  at  the  request  of  the  commons,  that 
the  inheritance  of  the  crowns  of  England  and  France,  and 
all  dominions  appertaining  to  them,  should  remain  in  Henry 
VII.  and  the  heirs  of  his  body  forever,  and  in  none  other." l 
Words  studiously  ambiguous,  which,  while  they  avoid  the 
assertion  of  an  hereditary  right  that  the  public  voice  repelled, 
were  meant  to  create  a  parliamentary  title,  before  which  the 
pretensions  of  lineal  descent  were  to  give  way.  They  seem 
to  make  Henry  the  stock  of  a  new  dynasty.  But,  lest  the 
spectre  of  indefeasible  right  should  stand  once  more  in  arms 
on  the  tomb  of  the  house  of  York,  the  two  houses  of  parlia- 
ment showed  an  earnest  desire  for  the  king's  marriage  with 
the  daughter  of  Edward  IV.,  who,  if  she  should  bear  only 
the  name  of  royalty,  might  transmit  an  undisputed  inheri- 
tance of  its  prerogatives  to  her  posterity. 

This  marriage,  and  the  king's  great  vigilance  in  guarding 
statute  for  ^'s  crown>  caused  his  reign  to  pass  with  considerable 
the  security  reputation,  though  not  without  disturbance.  He 

of  the  sub-       i     j   ,     ,  ,       f?  ,.  ,,  , 

ject  under  a  had  to  learn,  by  the  extraordinary  though  transient 
king  dt  facto,  success  of  two  impostors,  that  his  subjects  were 
still  strongly  infected  with  the  prejudice  which  had  once  over- 
thrown the  family  he  claimed  to  represent.  Nor  could  those 
who  served  him  be  exempt  from  apprehensions  of  a  change 
of  dynasty,  which  might  convert  them  into  attainted  rebels. 
The  state  of  the  nobles  and  gentry  had  been  intolerable 
during  the  alternate  proscriptions  of  Henry  VI.  and  Edward 
IV.  Such  apprehensions  led  to  a  very  important  statute  in 

l  Rot.  Parl.  vi.  270.    But  the  pope's  tinens."    Rymer,  xii.  294.    And  all  Hen- 
bull  of  dispensation  for  the  king's  mar-  ry's  own  instruments  claim  an  heredi- 
riage  speaks  of  the  realm  of  England  as  tary  right,  of  which  many  proofs  appeal 
"jure  hsereditario  ad  te  legitimum  in  illo  in  Itymer. 
prsedecessoruni  tuorum  successorem  per- 


HEA-.  VII.  AUTHORITY  OF  THE  CROWN.  25 

the  eleventh  year  of  this  king's  reign,  intended,  as  far  as  law 
could  furnish  a  prospective  security  against  the  violence 
and  vengeance  of  factions,  to  place  the  civil  duty  of  allegiance 
on  a  just  and  reasonable  foundation,  and  indirectly  to  cut 
away  the  distinction  between  governments  de  jure  and  de 
facto.  It  enacts,  after  reciting  that  subjects  by  reason  of 
their  allegiance  are  bound  to  serve  their  prince  for  the  time 
being  against  every  rebellion  and  power  raised  against  him, 
that  "  no  person  attending  upon  the  king  and  sovereign  lord 
of  this  land  for  the  time  being,  and  doing  him  true  and  faith- 
ful service,  shall  be  convicted  of  high  treason,  by  act  of 
parliament  or  other  process  of  law,  nor  suffer  any  forfeiture 
or  punishment ;  but  that  every  act  made  contrary  to  this 
statute  should  be  void  and  of  no  effect."  1  The  endeavor  to 
bind  future  parliaments  was  of  course  nugatory ;  but  the 
statute  remains  an  unquestionable  authority  for  the  con- 
stitutional maxim  that  possession  of  the  throne  gives  a 
sufficient  title  to  the  subject's  allegiance,  and  justifies  his 
resistance  of  those  who  may  pretend  to  a  better  right.  It 
was  much  resorted  to  in  argument  at  the  time  of  the  revolu- 
tion and  in  the  subsequent  period.2 

It  has  been  usual  to  speak  of  this  reign  as  if  it  formed  a 
great  epoch  in  our  constitution ;  the  king  having  by  his 
politic  measures  broken  the  power  of  the  barons  who  had 
hitherto  withstood  the  prerogative,  while  the  commons  had 
not  yet  risen  from  the  humble  station  which  they  were  sup- 
posed to  have  occupied.  I  doubt,  however,  whether  the 
change  was  quite  so  precisely  referable  to  the  time  of  Henry 
VII.,  and  whether  his  policy  has  not  been  somewhat  over- 
rated. In  certain  respects  his  reign  is  undoubtedly  an  era 
in  our  history.  It  began  in  revolution  and  a  change  in  the 
line  of  descent.  It  nearly  coincides,  which  is  more  material, 
with  the  commencement  of  what  is  termed  modern  history, 
as  distinguished  from  the  middle  ages,  and  with  the  memora- 
ble events  that  have  led  us  to  make  that  leading  distinction, 
especially  the  consolidation  of  the  great  European  monarchies, 
among  which  England  took  a  conspicuous  station.  But, 

1  Stat.  11  H.  7,  c.  1.  act  will  see  that  Hawkins,  whose  opinion 

2  Blackstone  (vol.  iv.  c.  6)  has  some  Blackstone  calls  in  question,  is   right; 
rather  perplexed  reasoning  on  this  Stat-  and  that  he  is  himself  wrOTig  in  pretend- 
ute,  leaning  a  little  towards  the  de  jure  ing  that  •'  the  statute  of  Henry  VII.  does 
doctrine,  and  at  best  confounding  moral  by  no  means  command  any  opposition  to 
with  legal  obligations.  In  the  latter  sense,  a  kii.g  dejure,  but  excuses  the  obedience 
whoeier  attends  to  the  preamble  of  the  paid  to  a  king  de  facto." 


26  STATUTE  OF  FINES.  CHAP.  1. 

relatively  to  the  main  subject  of  our  inquiry,  it  is  not  evident 
that  Henry  VII.  carried  the  authority  of  the  crown  much 
beyond  the  point  at  which  Edward  IV.  had  left  it.  The 
strength  of  the  nobility  had  been  grievously  impaired  by  the 
bloodshed  of  the  civil  wars,  and  the  attainders  that  followed 
them.  From  this  cause,  or  from  the  general  intimidation, 
we  find,  as  I  have  observed  in  anotiier  work,  that  no  laws 
favorable  to  public  liberty,  or  remedial  with  respect  to  the 
aggressions  of  power,  were  enacted,  or  (so  far  as  appears) 
even  proposed  in  parliament,  during  the  reign  of  Edward 
IV.;  the  first,  since  that  of  John,  to  which  such  a  remark 
can  be  applied.  The  commons,  who  had  not  always  been  so 
humble  and  abject  as  smatterers  in  history  are  apt  to  fancy, 
were  by  this  time  much  degenerated  from  the  spirit  they  had 
displayed  under  Edward  III.  and  Richard  II.  Thus  the 
founder  of  the  line  of  Tudor  came,  not  certainly  to  an 
absolute,  but  a  vigorous  prerogative,  which  his  cautious,  dis- 
sembling temper  and  close  attention  to  business  were  well 
calculated  to  extend. 

The  laws  of  Henry  VII.  have  been  highly  praised  by 
statute  of  Lord  Bacon  as  "  deep  and  not  vulgar,  not  made 
upon  the  spur  of  a  particular  occasion  for  the 
present,  but  out  of  providence  for  the  future,  to  make  the 
estate  of  his  people  still  more  and  more  happy,  after  the 
manner  of  the  legislators  in  ancient  and  heroical  times." 
But  when  we  consider  how  very  few  kings  or  statesmen 
have  displayed  this  prospective  wisdom  and  benevolence  in 
legislation,  we  may  hesitate  a  little  to  bestow  so  rare  a  praise 
upon  Henry.  Like  the  laws  of  all  other  times,  his  statutes 
seem  to  have  had  no  further  aim  than  to  remove  some  im- 
mediate mischief,  or  to  promote  some  particular  end.  One, 
however,  has  been  much  celebrated  as  an  instance  of  his 
sagacious  policy  and  as  the  principal  cause  of  exalting  the 
royal  authority  upon  the  ruins  of  the  aristocracy ;  I  mean  the 
statute  of  Fines  (as  one  passed  in  the  fourth  year  of  his 
reign  is  commonly  called),  which  is  supposed  to  have  given 
the  power  of  alienating  entailed  lands.  But  both  the 
intention  and  effect  of  this  seem  not  to  have  been  justly 
apprehended. 

Discussion  ^n  ^e  ^rs*  place,  it  is  remarkable  that  the  stat- 
of  its  effect  ute  of  Henry  VII.  is  merely  a  transcript,  with  very 

and  motive.      T..I  •    ,?         /•  />    T->-   i        i    -IIT         i  •   i 

little   variation,  from  one  of   Richard  111.,  which 


HEN.  VII.  STATUTE  DE  DONIS.  27 

is  actually  printed  in  most  editions.  It  was  'leenacted, 
as  we  must  presume,  in  order  to  obviate  any  doubt,  however 
ill-grounded,  which  might  hang  upon  the  validity  of  Richard's 
laws.  Thus  vanish  at  once  into  air  the  deep  policy  of  Henry 
VII.  and  his  insidious  schemes  of  leading  on  a  prodigal 
aristocracy  to  its  ruin.  It  is  surely  strange  that  those  who 
have  extolled  this  sagacious  monarch  for  breaking  the  fetters 
of  landed  property  (though  many  of  them  were  lawyers) 
should  never  have  observed  that  whatever  credit  might  be 
due  for  the  innovation  should  redound  to  the  honor  of  the 
unfortunate  usurper.  But  Richard,  in  truth,  had  no  leisure 
for  such  long-sighted  projects  of  strengthening  a  throne  for 
his  posterity  which  he  could  not  preserve  for  himself.  His 
law,  and  that  of  his  successor,  had  a  different  object  in  view. 
It  would  be  useless  to  some  readers,  and  perhaps  disgusting 
to  others,  especially  in  the  very  outset  of  this  work,  to  enter 
upon  the  history  of  the  English  law  as  to  the  power  of 
alienation.  But  I  cannot  explain  the  present  subject  with- 
out mentioning  that  by  a  statute  in  the  reign  of  Edward  I.r 
commonly  called  de  donis  conditionalibus,  lands  given  to  a 
man  and  the  heirs  of  his  body,  with  remainder  to  other  per- 
sons, or  reversion  to  the  donor,  could  not  be  alienated  by  the 
possessor  for  the  time  being,  either  from  his  own  issue  or 
from  those  who  were  to  succeed  them.  Such  lands  were 
also  not  subject  to  forfeiture  for  treason  or  felony ;  and  more, 
perhaps,  upon  this  account  than  from  any  more  enlarged 
principle,  these  entails  were  not  viewed  with  favor  by  the 
courts  of  justice.  Several  attempts  were  successfully  made 
to  relax  their  strictness ;  and  finally,  in  the  reign  of  Edward 
IV.,  it  was  held  by  the  judges  in  the  famous  case  of 
Taltarum,  that  a  tenant  in  tail  might,  by  what  is  called  suf- 
fering a  common  recovery,  that  is,  by  means  of  a  fictitious 
process  of  law,  divest  all  those  who  were  to  come  after  him 
of  their  succession,  and  become  owner  of  the  fee  simple. 
Such  a  decision  was  certainly  far  beyond  the  sphere  of 
judicial  authority.  The  legislature,  it  was  probably  sus- 
pected, would  not  have  consented  to  infringe  a  statute  which 
they  reckoned  the  safeguard  of  their  families.  The  law, 
however,  was  laid  down  by  the  judges ;  and  in  those  days 
the  appellant  jurisdiction  of  the  house  of  lords,  by  means  of 
which  the  aristocracy  might  have  indignantly  reversed  the 
insidious  decision,  had  gone  wholly  into  disuse.  It  became 


28  EXACTIONS  OF  HENRY  VII.  CHAP,  f 

by  degrees  a  fundamental  principle,  that  an  estate  in  tail  can 
be  barred  by  a  common  recovery ;  nor  is  it  possible  by  any 
legal  subtlety  to  deprive  the  tenant  of  this  control  over  his 
estate.  Schemes  were,  indeed,  gradually  devised,  which  to  a 
limited  extent  have  restrained  the  power  of  alienation ;  but 
these  do  not  belong  to  our  subject. 

The  real  intention  of  these  statutes  of  Richard  and  Henry 
was  not  to  give  the  tenant  in  tail  a  greater  power  over  his 
estate  (for  it  is  by  no  means  clear  that  the  words  enable  him 
to  bar  his  issue  by  levying  a  fine ;  and  when  a  decision  to 
that  effect  took  place  long  afterwards  (19  H.  8),  it  was  with 
such  difference  of  opinion  that  it  was  thought  necessary  to 
confirm  the  interpretation  by  a  new  act  of  parliament ;)  but 
rather,  by  establishing  a  short  term  of  prescription,  to  put  a 
check  on  the  suits  for  recovery  of  lands,  which,  after  times  of 
so  much  violence  and  disturbance,  were  naturally  springing 
up  in  the  courts.  It  is  the  usual  policy  of  governments  to 
favor  possession ;  and  on  this  principle  the  statute  enacts  that 
a  fine  levied  with  proclamations  in  a  public  court  of  justice 
shall  after  five  years,  except  in  particular  circumstances,  be  a 
bar  to  all  claims  upon  lands".  This  was  its  main  scope  ;  the 
liberty  of  alienation  was  neither  necessary,  nor  probably  in- 
tended to  be  given.1 

The  two  first  of  the  Tudors  rarely  experienced  opposition 
Exactions  of  but  when  they  endeavored  to  levy  money.  Taxa- 
Henry  vii.  tion,  in  the  eyes  of  their  subjects,  was  so  far  from 
being  no  tyranny,  that  it  seemed  the  only  species  worth  a 
complaint.  Henry  VII.  obtained  from  his  first  parliament  a 
grant  of  tonnage  and  poundage  during  life,  according  to  several 
precedents  of  former  reigns.  But  when  general  subsidies 
were  granted,  the  same  people,  who  would  have  seen  an  inno- 
cent man  led  to  prison  or  the  scaffold  with  little  attention, 
twice  broke  out  into  dangerous  rebellions ;  and  as  these,  how- 
ever arising  from  such  immediate  discontent,  were  yet  a  good 

I  For  these  observations  on  the  stat-  had  been  remarked   by  former  writers, 

nte  of  Fines  I  am  principally  indebted  and  is  indeed  obvious;  but  the  subject 

to  Reeves's  History  of  the  English  Law  was  never  put  in  so  clear  a  light  as  by 

(iv.  133),  a  work,  especially  in   the  lat-  Mr.  Reeves. 

ter  volumes,  of  great  research  and  judg-  The  principle  of  breaking  down    the 

ment;  a  continuation  of  which,  in  the  statute  tie  donis  was  so  little  established, 

Bauie  spirit  and  with  the  same  qualities,  er  consistently  acted  upon,  in  this  reign, 

would  be  a  valuable  accession  not  only  that  in  11  II.  7  the  judges  held  that  the 

to  the  lawyer's  but  philosopher's  library,  donor  of  an  estate-tail  might  restrain  the 

That  entails  had  been  defeated  by  means  tenant  from  suffering  a  recovery.     Id.  p. 

of  a  common  recovery  before  the  statute,  159,  from  the  Year-book. 


HEN.  VH.  ARCHBISHOP  MORTON.  29 

deal  connected  with  the  opinion  of  Henry's  usurpation  and  the 
claims  of  a  pretender,  it  was  a  necessary  policy  to  avoid  too 
frequent  imposition  of  burdens  upon  the  poorer  classes  of  the 
community.1  He  had  recourse  accordingly  to  the  system  of 
benevolences,  or  contributions  apparently  voluntary,  though 
in  fact  extorted  from  his  richer  subjects.  These,  having  be- 
come an  intolerable  grievance  under  Edward  IV.,  were  abol- 
ished in  the  only  parliament  of  Richard  III.  with  strong 
expressions  of  indignation.  But  in  the  seventh  year  of 
Henry's  reign,  when,  after  having  with  timid  and  parsimo- 
nious hesitation  suffered  the  marriage  of  Anne  of  Brittany 
with  Charles  VIII.,  he  was  compelled  by  the  national  spirit 
to  make  a  demonstration  of  war,  he  ventured  to  try  this  un- 
fair and  unconstitutional  method  of  obtaining  aid ;  which  re- 
ceived afterwards  too  much  of  a  parliamentary  sanction  by 
an  act  enforcing  the  payment  of  arrears  of  money  which 
private  men  had  thus  been  prevailed  upon  to  promise.2  The 
statute,  indeed,  of  Richard  is  so  expressed  as  not  clearly  to 
forbid  the  solicitation  of  voluntary  gifts,  which  of  course  ren- 
dered it  almost  nugatory. 

Archbishop  Morton  is  famous  for  the  dilemma  which  he 
.proposed  to  merchants  and  others  whom  he  solicited  to  con- 
tribute. He  told  those  who  lived  handsomely  that  their  op- 
ulence was  manifest  by  their  rate  of  expenditure.  Those, 
again,  whose  course  of  living  was  less  sumptuous,  must  have 
grown  rich  by  their  economy.  Either  class  could  well  af- 
ford assistance  to  their  sovereign.  This  piece  of  logic,  un- 
answerable in  the  mouth  of  a  privy  councillor,  acquired  the 
name  of  Morton's  fork.  Henry  doubtless  reaped  great  profit 
from  these  indefinite  exactions,  miscalled  benevolences.  But, 
insatiate  of  accumulating  treasure,  he  discovered  other  methods 
of  extortion,  still  more  odious,  and  possibly  more  lucrative. 

1  It  is  said  by  the. biographer  of  Sir  he  says,  "infringe  the  ancient  liberties 

Thomas  More   that  parliament  refused  of  that  house,  which  would   have  been 

the  king  a  subsidy  in  1502,  which  he  de-  odiously  taken."    Wordsworth's  Eccles. 

manded  on  account  of  the  marriage  of  Biography,  ii.  66.    This  story  is  also  told 

his  daughter  Margaret,  at  the  advice  of  by  Koper. 

More,  then    but  twenty-two    years  old.        2  Stat  11  H.  7,  c.  10.    Bacon  says  the 

"  Forthwith  Mr.  Tyler,  one  of  the  privy  benevolence  was  granted  by  act  of  par- 

Ihamber,  that  was  then  present,  resorted  liament,  which  Hume  shows  to  be  a  nris- 

to  the  king,  declaring  that  a  beardless  take.    The  preamble  of  11  H.  7  recite* 

boy,  called  Moro,  had  d;ne  more  harm  it  to  have  been  '•  granted  by  divers  of 

than  all  the  rest,  for  by  kis  means  all  the  your  subjects  severally;''  and  contains  a 

purpose  is  dashed  "    This  of  course  dis-  provision  that  no  heir  shall  be  charged 

pleased  Henry,  who  would  not  however  ou  account  of  his  ancestor's  promise- 


30  EMPSON  AND  DUDLEY.  CHAP.  I 

Many  statutes  had  been  enacted  In  preceding  reigns,  some- 
times rashly  or  from  temporary  motives,  sometimes  in  oppo- 
sition to  prevailing  usages  which  they  could  not  restrain,  of 
which  the  pecuniary  penalties,  though  exceedingly  sevete, 
were  so  little  enforced  as  to  have  lost  their  terror.  These 
his  ministers  raked  out  from  oblivion ;  and,  prosecuting  such 
as  could  afford  to  endure  the  law's  severity,  filled  his  treasury 
with  the  dishonorable  produce  of  amercements  and  forfeit- 
ures. The  feudal  rights  became,  as  indeed  they  always  had 
been,  instrumental  to  oppression.  The  lands  of  those  who 
died  without  heirs  fell  back  to  the  crown  by  escheat.  It  was 
the  duty  of  certain  officers  hi  every  county  to  look  after  its 
rights.  The  king's  title  was  to  be  found  by  the  inquest  of  a 
jury,  summoned  at  the  instance  of  the  escheator,  and  re- 
turned into  the  exchequer.  It  then  became  a  matter  of 
record,  and  could  not  be  impeached.  Hence  the  escheators 
taking  hasty  inquests,  or  sometimes  falsely  pretending  them, 
defeated  the  right  heir  of  his  succession.  Excessive  fines 
were  imposed  on  granting  livery  to  the  king's  wards  on  their 
majority.  Informations  for  intrusions,  criminal  indictments, 
outlawries  on  civil  process,  in  short,  the  whole  course  of  jus- 
tice, furnished  pretences  for  exacting  money ;  while  a  host 
of  dependents  on  the  court,  suborned  to  play  their  part  as 
witnesses,  or  even  as  jurors,  rendered  it  hardly  possible  for 
the  most  innocent  to  escape  these  penalties.  Empson  and 
Dudley  are  notorious  as  the  prostitute  instruments  of  Henry's 
avarice  in  the  later  and  more  unpopular  years  of  his  reign ; 
but  they  dearly  purchased  a  brief  hour  of  favor  by  an  ig- 
nominious death  and  perpetual  infamy.1  The  avarice  of 
Henry  VII.,  as  it  rendered  his  government  unpopular,  which 
had  always  been  penurious,  must  be  deemed  a  drawback 
from  the  wisdom  ascribed  to  him  ;  though  by  his  good  for- 
tune it  answered  the  end  of  invigorating  his  power.  By 
these  fines  and  forfeitures  he  impoverished  and  intimidated 
the  nobility.  The  earl  of  Oxford  compounded,  by  the  pay- 
ment of  15,000  pounds,  for  the  penalties  he  had  incurred  by 
keeping  retainers  in  livery ;  a  practice  mischievous  and  ille- 
gal, but  too  customary  to  have  been  punished  before  this 
reign.  Even  the  king's  clemency  seems  to  have  been  in- 
fluenced by  the  sordid  motive  of  selling  pardons ;  and  it  has 

1  Hall,  502 


HKN.  VIII.  ACCESSION  OF  HENKY  VIII.  31 

been  shown  that  he  made  a  profit  of  every  office  in  his  court, 
and  received  money  for  conferring  bishoprics.1 

It  is  asserted  by  early  writers,  though  perhaps  only  on 
conjecture,  that  he  left  a  sum,  thus  amassed,  of  no  less  than 
1,800,000  pounds  at  his  decease.  This  treasure  was  soon 
dissipated  by  his  successor,  who  had  recourse  to  the  assist- 
ance of  parliament  in  the  very  first  year  of  his  reign.  The 
foreign  policy  of  Henry  VIII.,  far  unlike  that  of  his  father, 
was  ambitious  and  enterprising.  No  former  king  had  in- 
volved himself  so  frequently  in  the  labyrinth  of  continental 
alliances.  And,  if  it  were  necessary  to  abandon  that  neu- 
trality which  is  generally  the  most  advantageous  and  lauda- 
ble course,  it  is  certain  that  his  early  undertakings  against 
France  were  more  consonant  to  English  interests,  as  well  as 
more  honorable,  than  the  opposite  policy,  which  he  pursued 
after  the  battle  of  Pavia.  The  campaigns  of  Henry  in 
France  and  Scotland  displayed  the  valor  of  our  English  in- 
fantry, seldom  called  into  action  for  fifty  years  before,  and 
contributed  with  other  circumstances  to  throw  a  lustre  over 
his  reign  which  prevented  most  of  his  contemporaries  from 
duly  appreciating  his  character.  But  they  naturally  drew 
the  king  into  heavy  expenses,  and,  together  with  his  profu- 
sion and  love  of  magnificence,  rendered  his  government  very 
burdensome.  At  his  accession,  however,  the  rapacity  of 
his  father's  administration  had  excited  such  universal  discon- 
tent, that  it  was  found  expedient  to  conciliate  the  nation.  An 
act  was  passed  in  his  first  parliament  to  correct  the  abuses 
that  had  prevailed  in  finding  the  king's  title  to  lands  by 
escheat.2  The  same  parliament  repealed  the  law  of  the  late 
reign  enabling  justices  of  assize  and  of  the  peace  to  deter- 
mine all  offences,  except  treason  and  felony,  against  any 
statute  in  force,  without  a  jury,  upon  information  in  the  king's 
name.8  This  serious  innovation  had  evidently  been  prompted 
by  the  spirit  of  rapacity,  which  probably  some  honest  juries 
had  shown  courage  enough  to  withstand.  It  was  a  much  less 
laudable  concession  to  the  vindictive  temper  of  an  injured 
people,  seldom  unwilling  to  see  bad  methods  employed  in 
punishing  bad  men,  that  Empson  and  Dudley,  who  might 

1  Turner's  History  of  England,  iii.  628,  lis's  Letters  illustrative  of  English  Hia 

from  a  manuscript  document.     A  vast  tory,  i.  38. 

number  of  persons   paid  fines  for  their  2  1  H.  8.  c.  8. 

Bhare  in   the  western  rebellion  of  1497,  3  11  H.  7.  c.  3.     Rep.  1  H.  8.  c  6. 
from  200/.  down  to  20i.    Hall,  486.    Kl- 


32  WAR  TAXES.  CHAP.  J, 

perhaps  by  stretching  the  prerogative  have  incurred  the  pen- 
alties of  a  misdemeanor,  were  put  to  death  on  a  frivolous 
charge  of  high  treason.1 

The  demands  made  by  Henry  VIII.  on  parliament  were 
Taxes  de-  considerable,  both  in  frequency  and  amount.  Not- 
mauded  by  withstanding  the  servility  of  those  times  it  some- 
Henry  Yin.  tjmeg  attempted  to  make  a  stand  against  these  in- 
roads upon  the  public  purse.  Wolsey  came  into  the  house 
of  commons  in  1523,  and  asked  for  800,000?.,  to  be  raised 
by  a  tax  of  one  fifth  upon  lands  and  goods,  in  order  to  pros- 
ecute the  war  just  commenced  against  France.  Sir  Thomas 
More,  then  speaker,  is  said  to  have  urged  the  house  to  ac- 
quiesce.2 But  the  sum  demanded  was  so  much  beyond  any 
precedent  that  all  the  independent  members  opposed  a  vig- 
orous resistance.  A  committee  was  appointed  to  remonstrate 
with  the  cardinal,  and  to  set  forth  the  impossibility  of  raising 
such  a  subsidy.  It  was  alleged  that  it  exceeded  all  the  cur- 
rent coin  of  the  kingdom.  Wolsey,  after  giving  an  uncivil 
answer  to  the  committee,  came  down  again  to  the  house,  on 
pretence  of  reasoning  with  them,  but  probably  with  a  hope 
of  carrying  his  end  by  intimidation.  They  received  him, 
at  More's  suggestion,  with  all  the  train  of  attendants  that 
usually  encircled  the  haughtiest  subject  who  had  ever  been 
known  in  England.  But  they  made  no  other  answer  to  his 
harangue  than  that  it  was  their  usage  to  debate  only  among 
themselves.  These  debates  lasted  fifteen  or  sixteen  days.  A 
considerable  part  of  the  commons  appears  to  have  consisted 
of  the  king's  household  officers,  whose  influence,  with  the 
utmost  difficulty,  obtained  a  grant  much  inferior  to  the  car- 
dinal's requisition,  and  payable  by  instalments  in  four  years. 
But  Wolsey,  greatly  dissatisfied  with  this  imperfect  obe- 

1  They  were  convicted  by  a  jury,  and  speech,  which  he  seems  to  ascribe  to 
afterwards  attainted  by  parliament,  but  More,  arguing  more  acquaintance  with 
not  executed  for  more  than  a  year  after  sound  principles  of  political  economy 
the  king's  accession.  If  we  may  believe  than  was  usual  in  the  supposed  speaker's 
Holingshed,  the  council  at  Henry  VlII.'s  age,  or  even  in  that  of  the  writer.  But 
accession  made  restitution  to  some  who  it  is  more  probable  that  this  is  of  his  own 
had  been  wronged  by  the  extortion  of  the  invention.  He  has  taken  a  similar  lib- 
late  reign ;  —  a  singular  contrast  to  their  erty  on  another  occasion,  throwing  his 
subsequent  proceedings !  This,  indeed,  own  broad  notions  of  religion  into  an  im- 
had  been  enjoined  by  Henry  VII. 'a  will,  aginary  speech  of  some  unnamed  mem- 
But  he  had  excepted  from  this  restitu-  ber  of  the  commons,  though  manifestly 
tion  "  what  had  been  done  by  the  course  unpuited  to  the  character  of  the  times. 
and  order  of  our  laws;"  which,  as  Mr.  That  More  gave  satisfaction  to  Wolsey 
Astle  observes,  was  the  common  mode  of  by  his  conduct  in  the  chair,  appears  by 
his  oppressions.  a  letter  of  the  latter  to  the  king,  in  State 
2  Lord  Herbert  inserts  an  acute  Papers,  temp.  H.  8,  p.  124. 


HEN.  VHI.        ILLEGAL  EXACTIONS  OF  WOLSEY.  33 

dience,  compelled  the  people  to  pay  up  the  whole  subsidy  at 
once.1 

No  parliament  was  assembled  for  nearly  seven  years  after 
this  time.     Wolsey  had  already  resorted  to  more  illegal  ex- 
arbitrary  methods  of  raising  money  by  loans  and  ?£tions  ?f 
benevolences.2  The  year  before  this  debate  in  the  l^Jn^ 
commons  he  borrowed  twenty  thousand  pounds  of  1525- 
the  city  of  London ;  yet  so  insufficient  did  that  appear  for 
the  king's  exigencies,  that  within  two  months  commissioners 
were  appointed  throughout  the  kingdom  to  swear  every  man 
to  the  value  of  his  possessions,  requiring  a  ratable  part  ac- 
cording to  such  declaration.     The  clergy,  it  is  said,  were  ex- 

1  Roper's    Life    of  More.     Hall,  656,  matter,  yesterday  the  more   part  being 

672.     This  chronicler,  who  wrote  under  the    king's   servants,    gentlemen,   were 

Edward  VI.,  is  our  best  witness  for  the  there  assembled  ;  and  so  they,  being  the 

events  of  Henry's  reign.     Grafton  is  so  more   part,  willed  and  gave  to  the  king 

literally  a  copyist  from  him,  that  it  was  two  shillings  of  the  pound  of  goods  or 

a  great  mistake  to  republish  this  part  of  lands,  the  best  to  be  taken  for  the  king, 

his  chronicle  in  the  late  expensive,  and  All  lands   to   pay    two  shillings  of   the 

therefore  incomplete,  collection  ;  since  he  pound  for  the  laity,  to  the  highest.    The 

adds  no  one  word,  and  omits  only  a  few  goods  to  pay  two  shillings  of  the  pound, 

ebullitions  of  Protestant  zeal   which  he  for   twenty   pound   upward;    and  from 

seems  to  have  considered  too  warm.  Hoi-  forty  shillings  of  goods  to  twenty  pound 

inshed,  though  valuable,  is   later  than  to  pay  sixteen  pence  of  the  pound ;  and 

Hall.     Wblsey,  the  latter  observes,  gave  under    forty  shillings,  every  person  to 

offence  to  the  commons  by  descanting  on  pay  eight  pence.     This  to  be  paid  in  two 

the    wealth   and   luxury  of  the   nation,  years.     I  have  heard  no  man  in  my  life 

"as  though  he  had  repined  or  disclaimed  that  can  remember  that  ever  there  was 

that  any  man  should  fare  well,  or  be  well  given  to  any  one  of  the  king's  ancestors 

clothed,  but  himself."  half  so  much  at  one  graunt.      Nor,  I 

But  the  most  authentic  memorial  of  think,  there  was  never  such  a  president 

what  passed  on  this  occasion  has  been  seen  before    this  time.     I  beseeke  Al- 

prefierved  in  a  letter  from  a  member  of  mighty  God  it  may  be  well  and   peace- 

the  commons  to  the  earl  of  Surrey  (soon  ably  levied,  and  surely  payd   unto  the 

after  duke  of  Norfolk),  at  that  time  the  king's  grace,  without  grudge,  and  espe- 

king's  lieutenant  in  the  north.  cially  without  loosing  the  good  will  and 

'•  Please  it  your  good  lordships  to  un-  true  hearts  of  his  subjects,  which  I  reck- 

derstand,  that  sithence  the  beginning  of  on  a  far  greater    treasure  for   the   king 

the  parliament  there  hath  been  the  great-  than  gold  and  silver.     And  the  gentle- 

est  and  sorest  hold  in  the  lower  house,  men  that  must  take  pains  to  levy  this 

for  the  payment  of  two  shillings  of  the  money  among    the    king's    subjects,  I 

pound,  that  ever  was  seen,  I   think,  in  think,  shall  have  no  little  business  about 

any  parliament.     This  matter  hath  been  the  same."     Strype's  Eccles.  Memorials, 

debated   and    beaten  fifteen   or  sixteen  vol.  i.  p.  49.     This  is  also  printed  in  El- 

days  together.      The    highest  necessity  lis's  Letters  illustrative  of  English  His- 

alleged  on  the  king's  behalf  to  us  that  tory,  i.  220. 

ever  was  heard  of;  and  on  the  contrary,  2  I  may  notice  here  a  mistake  of  Mr. 

the    highest  poverty  confessed,  as  well  Hume  and   Dr.  Liugard.     They   assert 

by  knights,  esquires  and  gentlemen  of  Henry    to    have    received    tonnage    and 

every  quarter,  as  by  the  commoners,  citi-  poundage    several  years    before   it   was 

zens,  and   burgesses.     There   hath   been  vested  in  him  by  the  legislature.     But  it 

such   hold   that   the  house  was  1  ke  to  was  granted  by  his  first  parliament,  stat 

have  1>< -en  dissevered;  that  is  to  say,  the  1  H.  8,  c.  20,  as  will  be  found  even  in 

knights  being  of  the  king's  council,  the  Ruffhead's  table  of  contents,  though  not 

kinic's  servants    and    gentlemen  of   the  in  the  body  of  his  volume ;  and  the  act 

one  party ;  which   in  so  long  time  were  is  of  course  printed  at  length  in  the  great 

spoken    with,  and   made  to  see,  yea.  it  edition    of    the    statutes.      That    which 

may    fortune,   contrary   to   their   heart,  probably  by  its  title  gave  rise  to  the  er- 

wiii,  and  conscience.     Thus  hanging  this  ror,  6  H.  8,  c.  13,  has  a  different  object. 
VOL.  1.  —  C.                               3 


ILLEGAL  EXACTIONS   OF  WOLSEY. 


CHAP.  1. 


pected  to  contribute  a  fourth ;  but  I  believe  that  benefices 
above  ten  pounds  in  yearly  value  were  taxed  at  one  third. 
Such  unparalleled  violations  of  the  clearest  and  most  im- 
portant privilege  that  belonged  to  Englishmen  excited  a  gen 
eral  apprehension.1  Fresh  commissioners,  however,  were  ap- 
pointed in  1525,  with  instructions  to  demand  the  sixth  part 
of  every  man's  substance,  payable  in  money,  plate,  or  jewels, 
according  to  the  last  valuation.2  This  demand  Wolsey  made 


1  Hall,  645.    This  chronicler  says  the 
laity  were  assessed  at  a  tenth  part.     But 
this  was  only  so  for  the  smaller  estates, 
namely,  from  20Z.  to  3001. :  for  from  SOQl. 
to  10002.  the  contribution  demanded  was 
twenty  marks  for  each  1001.,  and  for  an 
estate  of  HXXM.  two  hundred  marks,  and 
BO  in    proportion    upwards.  —  MS.     In- 
structions to  commissioners,  penes  auc- 
torem.      This    was,    "  upon     sufficient 
promise  and  assurance,  to  be  repaid  unto 
them  upon  such  grants  and  contribu- 
tions as  shall  be  given  and  granted  to 
his  grace  at  his  next  parliament."     Ib. 
— "  And  they  shall  practise  by  all  the 
means  to  them  possible   tliat  such  sums 
as  shall  be  so  granted  by  the  way  of  loan, 
be  forthwith  levied  and  paid,  or  the  most 
part,  or  at  the  least  the  moiety  thereof, 
the  same  to  be   paid  in  as  brief   time 
after  as  they  can  possibly  persuade  and 
induce  them  unto  ;  showing  unto  them 
that,  for  the  sure  payment  thereof,  they 
shall  have  writings  delivered  unto  them 
under  the  king's  privy  seal  by  such  per- 
son or  persons  as  shall  be  deputed  by  the 
king  to  receive  the  said  loan,  after  the 
form  of  a  minute  to  be  shown  unto  them 
by   the  said    commissioners,   the   tenor 
whereof  is  thus  :     We.  Henry  VIII.,  by 
the  grace  of  God,  King  of  England  and 
of  France,  Defender  of  Faith,  and  Lord 
of  Ireland,  promise  by  these  presents 
trujy  to  content  and  repay   unto  our 
trusty  and  well-beloved  subject,  A.  B., 

the  sum  of ,  which  he  hath  lovingly 

advanced  unto  us  by  way  of  loan,  for 
defence  of  our  realm,  and  maintenance 
of  our  wars  against  France  and  Scotland : 
In  witness  whereof  we  have  caused  our 
privy  seal   hereunto  to  be  set  and  an- 
nexed the day  of ,  the  fourteenth 

year  of  our  reign."  — Ib.     The  rate  fixed 
on  the  clergy  I  collect  by  analogy  from 
that  imposed  in  1525,  which  I  find  In 
another  manuscript  letter. 

2  A  letter  in  my  possession  from  the 
duke  of  Norfolk  to  Wolsey,  without  the 
date  of  the  year,  relates,  I  believe,  to  this 
commission  of  1525,  rather  than  that  of 
1522  ;  it  being  dated  on  the  10th  April, 
which  appears  from  the  contents  to  have 
be«n  before  Easter ;  whereas  Easter  did 


not  fall  beyond  that  day  in  1523  or  1524, 
but  did  so  in  1525 ;  and  the  first  coin- 
mission,  being  of  the  fourteenth  year  of 
the  king's  reign,  must  have  sat  later  thaa 
Easter,  1522.  He  informs  the  cardinal 
that  from  twenty  pounds  upwards  there 
were  not  twenty  in  the  county  of  Nor- 
folk who  nad  not  consented.  "  So  that 
I  see  great  likelihood  that  this  grant 
shall  be  much  more  than  the  loan  was." 
It  was  done,  however,  very  reluctantly, 
as  he  confesses  ;  "  assuring  your  grace 
that  they  have  not  granted  the  same 
without  shedding  of  many  salt  tears, 
only  for  doubt  how  to  find  money  to  con- 
tent the  king's  highness."  Tlie  resist- 
ance went  farther  than  the  duke  thought 
fit  to  suppose  ;  for  in  a  very  sliort  time 
the  insurrection  of  the  common  people 
took  place  in  Suffolk.  In  another  letter 
from  him  and  the  duke  of  Suffolk  to  the 
cardinal,  they  treat  this  rather  lightly, 
and  seem  to  object  to  the  remission  of  the 
contribution. 

This  commission  issued  soon  after  the 
news  of  the  battle  of  Pavia  arrived.  The 
pretext  was  the  king's  intention  to  lead 
an  army  into  France.  Warham  wrote 
more  freely  thau  the  duke  of  Norfolk  as 
to  the  popular  discontent,  in  a  letter  to 
Wolsey,  dated  April  6.  "  It  hath  been 
showed  me  in  a  secret  manner  of  my 
friends,  the  people  sore  grudgeth  and 
murmureth,  and  speaketh  cursedly 
among  themselves,  as  far  as  they  dare, 
saying  that  they  shall  never  have  rest  of 
payments  as  long  as  some  liveth,  and 
that  they  had  better  die  than  to  be  thus 
continually  handled,  reckoning  them- 
selves, their  children,  and  wives,  as 
despoulit,  and  not  greatly  caring  what 
they  do,  or  what  becomes  of  them.  *  *  * 
Further  I  am  informed  that  there  is  a 
grudge  newly  now  resuscitate  and  revived 
in  the  minds  of  the  people  ;  for  the  loan 
is  not  repaid  to  them  upon  the  first  receipt 
of  the  grant  of  parliament,  as  it  was 
promised  them  by  the  commissioners, 
showing  them  the  king's  grace's  instruc- 
tions, containing  the  same,  signed  with 
his  grace's  own  hand  in  summer,  that 
they  fear  not  to  speak,  that  they  be  con- 
tinually beguiled,  and  no  promise  is  kept 


HEN.  VIII.       ILLEGAL  EXACTIONS   OF  WOLSEY. 


35 


in  person  to  the  mayor  and  chief  citizens  of  London.  They 
attempted  to  remonstrate,  but  were  warned  to  beware,  lest 
"  it  might  fortune  to  cost  some  their  heads."  Some  were  sent 
to  prison  for  ha>ty  words,  to  which  the  smart  of  injury  ex- 
cited them.  The  clergy,  from  whom,  according  to  usage,  a 
larger  measure  of  contribution  was  demanded,  stood  upon 
their  privilege  to  grant  their  money  only  in  convocation,  and 
denied  the  right  of  a  king  of  England  to  ask  any  man's 
money  without  authority  of  parliament.  The  rich  and  poor 
agreed  in  cursing  the  cardinal  as  the  subverter  of  their  laws 
and  liberties ;  and  said,  "  if  men  should  give  their  goods 
by  a  commission,  then  it  would  be  worse  than  "the  taxes  of 
France,  and  England  should  be  bond,  and  not  free."  J  Nor 
did  their  discontent  terminate  in  complaints.  The  commis- 
sioners met  with  forcible  opposition  in  several  counties,  and 
a  serious  insurrection  broke  out  in  Suffolk.  So  menacing  a 
spirit  overawed  the  proud  tempers  of  Henry  and  his  minis- 
ter, who  found  it  necessary  not  only  to  pardon  all  those 


unto  them;  and  thereupon  some  of  them 
suppose  that  if  this  gift  and  grant  be 
once  levied,  albeit  the  king's  grace  go 
not  beyond  the  sea,  yet  nothing  shall  be 
restored  again,  albeit  they  be  showed  the 
contrary.  And  generally  it  is  reported 
unto  me.  that  for  the  most  part  every 
man  saith  he  will  be  contented  if  the 
king's  grace  have  as  much  as  he  can 
spare,  but  verily  many  gay  they  bo  not 
able  to  do  as  they  be  required.  And 
many  denieth  not  but  they  will  give  the 
king's  grace  according  to  their  power,  but 
they  will  not  anywise  give  at  any  other 
men's  appointments,  which  knoweth  not 
their  needs.  *  *  *  *  I  have  heard  say, 
moreover,  that  when  the  people  be  com- 
manded to  make  fires  and  tokens  of  joy 
for  the  taking  of  the  French  king,  divers 
of  them  have  spoken  that  they  have 
more  cause  to  weep  than  to  rejoice  there- 
at. And  divers,  as  it  hath  been  showed 
me  secretly,  have  wished  openly  that  the 
French  king  were  at  his  liberty  again,  so 
a*  there  were  a  good  peace,  and  the  king 
should  not  attempt  to  win  France,  the 
winning  whereof  should  be  more  charge- 
ful  to  England  than  profitable,  and  the 
keeping  thereof  much  more  chargeful 
thau  the  winning.  Also  it  hath  been 
told  me  secretly  that  divers  have  re- 
counted and  repeated  what  infinite  sums 
of  money  the  king's  grace  hath  spent 
already  in  invading  of  France,  once  in 
his  own  royal  ptrson,  and  two  other 
sundry  timos  by  his  i^veral  noble  cap- 
tains, and  little  01  nothing  in  comparison 


of  his  costs  hath  prevailed ;  insomuch 
that  the  king's  grace  at  this  hour  hath 
not  one  foot  of  land  more  in  France  thau 
his  most  noble  father  had,  which  lacked 
no  riches  or  wisdom  to  win  the  kingdom, 
of  France,  if  he  had  thought  it  expedi- 
ent." The  archbishop  goes  on  toobserve, 
rather  oddly,  that  "  he  would  that  the 
time  had  suffered  that  this  practising 
with  the  people  for  so  great  sums  might 
have  been  spared  till  the  cuckoo  time 
and  the  hot  weather  (at  which  time  mad 
brains  be  wont  to  be  most  busy)  had  been 
overpassed." 

Warhain  dwells,  in  another  letter,  on 
the  great  difficulty  the  clergy  had  in 
making  so  large  a  payment  as  was  re- 
quired of  them,  aud  their  unwillingness 
to  be  sworn  as  to  the  value  of  their  goods. 
The  archbishop  seems  to  have  thought  it 
passing  strange  that  people  would  be  so 
wrongheaded  about  their  money.  '•  I 
have  been,"  he  says.  liin  this  shire 
twenty  years  and  above,  and  as  yet  I 
have  not  seen  men  but  would  be  con- 
formable to  reason  and  would  be  induced 
to  good  order  till  this  time;  and  what 
shall  cause  them  now  to  fall  into  these 
wilful  and  indiscreet  ways  I  cannot  tell, 
except  poverty  and  decay  of*  substance 
be  the  cause  of  it." 

1  Hall,  696.  These  expressions,  and 
numberless  others  might  be  found,  show 
the  fallacy  of  Hume's  hasty  assertion 
that  the  writers  of  the  sixteenth  century 
do  not  speak  of  our  own  government  as 
more  free  thau  that  of  France. 


36  ACT  KELEASESTG  THE  KING  CHAJ   1. 

concerned  in  these  tumults,  but  to  recede  altogether  upon 
some  frivolous  pretexts  from  the  illegal  exaction,  revoking 
the  commissions,  and  remitting  all  sums  demanded  under 
them.  They  now  resorted  to  the  more  specious  request  of 
a  voluntary  benevolence.  This  also  the  citizens  of  London 
endeavored  to  repel,  by  alleging  the  statute  of  Richard  III. 
But  it  was  answered,  that  he  was  an  usurper,  whose  acts  did 
not  oblige  a  lawful  sovereign.  It  does  not  appear  whether 
or  not  Wolsey  was  more  successful  in  this  new  scheme  ;  but, 
generally,  rich  individuals  had  no  remedy  but  to  compound 
with  the  government. 

No  very  material  attempt  had  been  made  since  the  reign 
of  Edward  III.  to  levy  a  general  imposition  without  consent 
ol  parliament,  and  in  the  most  remote  and  irregular  times 
it  would  be  difficult  to  find  a  precedent  for  so  universal  and 
enormous  an  exaction  ;  since  tallages,  however  arbitrary,  were 
never  paid  by  the  barons  or  freeholders,  nor  by  their  tenants ; 
and  the  aids  to  which  they  were  liable  were  restricted  to  par- 
ticular cases.  If  Wolsey,  therefore,  could  have  procured  the 
acquiescence  of  the  nation  under  this  yoke,  there  would  prob- 
ably have  been  an  end  of  parliaments  for  all  ordinary  pur- 
poses, though,  like  the  states  general  of  France,  they  might 
still  be  convoked  to  give  weight  and  security  to  great  inno- 
vations. We  cannot,  indeed,  doubt  that  the  unshackled 
condition  of  his  friend,  though  rival,  Francis  I.,  afforded  a 
mortifying  contrast  to  Henry.  Even  under  his  tyrannical 
administration  there  was  enough  to  distinguish  the  king  of 
a  people  who  submitted  in  murmuring  to  violations  of  their 
known  rights  from  one  whose  subjects  had  almost  forgotten 
that  they  ever  possessed  any.  But  the  courage  and  love  of 
freedom  natural  to  the  English  commons,  speaking  in  the 
hoarse  voice  of  tumult,  though  very  ill  supported  by  their  su 
periors,  preserved  us  in  so  great  a  peril.1 

If  we  justly  regard  with  detestation  the  memory  of  those 
Acts  ot  ministers  who  have  aimed  at  subverting  the  liber- 
pariiament  ties  of  their  country,  we  shall  scarcely  approve 
theki'i"!  tne  partiality  of  some  modern  historians  towards 
from  his  cardinal  Wolsey ;  a  partiality,  too,  that  contra- 
dicts the  general  opinion  of  his  contemporaries. 
HaugUy  beyond  comparison,  negligent  of  the  duties  and  de- 

1  Hall,  699 


HEN.  VIII.  FKOM  HIS  DEBTS.  37 

corums  of  his  station,  profuse  as  well  as  rapacious,  obnoxious 
alike  to  his  own  order  and  to  the  laity,  his  fall  had  long  been 
secretly  desired  by  the  nation,  and  contrived  by  his  adver- 
saries. His  generosity  and  magnificence  seem  rather  to  have 
dazzled  succeeding  ages  than  his  own.  But,  in  fact,  his  best 
apology  is  the  disposition  of  his  master.  The  latter  years  of 
Henry's  reign  were  far  more  tyrannical  than  those  during 
which  he  listened  to  the  counsels  of  Wolsey ;  and  though 
this  was  principally  owing  to  the  peculiar  circumstances  of 
the  latter  period,  it  is  "but  equitable  to  allow  some  praise  to 
a  minister  for  the  mischief  which  he  may  be  presumed  to 
have  averted.  Had  a  nobler  spirit  animated  the  parliament 
which  met  at  the  era  of  Wolsey's  fall,  it  might  have  prompted 
his  impeachment  for  gross  violations  of  liberty.  But  these 
were  not  the  offences  that  had  forfeited  his  prince's  favor,  or 
that  they  dared  bring  to  justice.  They  were  not  absent,  per- 
haps, from  the  recollection  of  some  of  those  who  took  a  part 
in  prosecuting  the  fallen  minister.  I  can  discover  no  better 
apology  for  Sir  Thomas  More's  participation  in  impeaching 
Wolsey  on  articles  so  frivolous  that  they  have  served  to  re- 
deem -  his  fame  with  later  times  than  his  knowledge  of 
weightier  offences  against  the  common  weal  which  could  not 
be  alleged,  and  especially  the  commissions  of  1525.1  But  in 
truth  this  parliament  showed  little  outward  disposition  to  ob- 
ject any  injustice  of  such  a  kind  to  the  cardinal.  They  pro- 
fessed to  take  upon  themselves  to  give  a  sanction  to  his 
proceedings,  as  if  in  mockery  of  their  own  and  their  coun- 
try's liberties.  They  passed  a  statute,  the  most  extraordi- 
nary, perhaps,  of  those  strange  times,  wherein  "  they  do,  for 
themselves  and  all  the  whole  body  of  the  realm  which  they 
represent,  freely,  liberally,  and  absolutely,  give  and  grant  un- 
to the  king's  highness,  by  authority  of  this  present  parlia- 
ment, all  and  every  sum  and  sums  of  money  which  to  them 
and  every  of  them  is,  ought,  or  might  be  due,  by  reason  of 
any  money,  or  any  other  thing,  to  his  grace  at  any  time  here- 

1  The  word  impeachment  is  not  very  reputation."    I  am  disposed  to  conjeet- 

accurately  applicable   to  these   proceed-  ure,  from  Cromwell's  character  and  that 

in^s   ;iEc.-iinst  Wolsey ;  since  the  articles  of  the   house   of  commons,   as   well   as 

were  first  presented  to  the  upper  house,  from   some   passages  of  Henry's   subse- 

and  sent  down  to  the  commons,  where  quent  behavior    towards    the  cardinal, 

Cromwell   so    ably   defended    his  fallen  that  it  was  not   the  king's  intention  to 

master  that  nothing  was  done  upon  them,  follow  up  this  prosecution,  at   least  for 

"  Upon  this  honest  beginning,"  says  lord  the  present.    This  also  I  find  to  be  Dr. 

Herbert,  •'  Cromwell  obtained  his  first  Lingard's  opinion. 


38  ANOTHER  BENEVOLENCE  EXACTED.         CHAP.  I. 

tofore  advanced  or  paid  by  way  of  trust  or  loan,  either  up- 
on any  letter  or  letters  under  the  king's  privy  seal,  general 
or  particular,  letter,  missive,  promise,  bond,  or  obligation  of 
repayment,  or  by  any  taxation  or  other  assessing,  by  virtue 
of  any  commission  or  commissions,  or  by  any  other  mean  or 
means,  whatever  it  be,  heretofore  passed  for  that  purpose."  * 
This  extreme  servility  and  breach  of  trust  naturally  excited 
loud  murmurs ;  for  the  debts  thus  released  had  been  as- 
signed over  by  many  to  their  own  creditors,  and,  having  all 
the  security  both  of  the  king's  honor  and  legal  obligation, 
were  reckoned  as  valid  as  any  other  property.  It  is  said 
by  Hall  that  most  of  this  house  of  commons  held  offices  un- 
der the  crown.  This  illaudable  precedent  was  remembered 
in  1544,  when  a  similar  act  passed,  releasing  to  the  king  all 
moneys  borrowed  by  him  since  1542,  with  the  additional 
provision,  that  if  he  should  have  already  discharged  any  of 
these  debts,  the  party  or  his  heirs  should  repay  his  majesty.2 
Henry  had  once  more  recourse,  about  1545,  to  a  general 
Abenevo-  exaction,  miscalled  benevolence.  The  council's 
lence  again  instructions  to  the  commissioners  employed  in 
levying  it  leave  no  doubt  as  to  its  compulsory 
character.  They  were  directed  to  incite  all  men  to  a  loving 
contribution  according  to  the  rates  of  their  substance,  as 
they  were  assessed  at  the  last  subsidy,  calling  on  no  one 
whose  lands  were  of  less  value  than  40s.  or  whose  chattels 
were  less  than  151.  It  is  intimated  that  the  least  which  his 
majesty  could  reasonably  accept  would  be  twenty  pence  in 
the  pound  on  the  yearly  value  of  land,  and  half  that  sum  on 
movable  goods.  They  are  to  summon  but  a  few  to  attend 
at  one  time,  and  to  commune  with  every  one  apart,  "  lest 
some  one  unreasonable  man,  amongst  so  many,  forgetting 
his  duty  towards  God,  his  sovereign  lord,  and  his  country, 
may  go  about  by  his  malicious  frowardness  to  silence  all  the 

1  Rot.  Part.  vi.  164.     Burnet,  Appen-  caused  them  sore  to  murmur,  but  there 

dix,  No.  13.    "  When  this  release  of  the  was  no  remedy."    P.  767. 

loan,"  gays  Hall,  "  was  known   to  the  2  Stat.  35  H.  8,  c.  12.     I  find  in  a 

commons  of  the  realm,  Lord!   so  they  manuscript  which   seems  to  have  been 

grudged  and  spake  ill  of  the  whole  par-  copied  from  an  original  in  the  exchequer 

liament  ;  for  almost  every  man  counted  that  the  moneys  thus  received  by  way  of 

on  his  debt,  and  reckoned  surely  of  the  loan  in  1543  amounted  to  110.147J.  15s. 

payment  of  the  same,  and  therefore  fome  S/J.     There  was  also  a  sum  called  devotion 

made  their  wills  of  the  same,  and  some  money,  amounting  only  to  1093/.  8s.  3d., 

other  did  set  it  over  to  other  for  debt ;  levied   in  1544,  "  of  the  devotion  of  his 

and  KO  many  men  had  loss  by  it,  which  highness 's  subjects  for  Defence  of  Chris- 
tendom against  the  Turk." 


HEN.  Vin.  TREATMENT   OF  REED.  39 

rest,  be  they  never  so  well  disposed."  They  were  to  use 
"  good  words  and  amiable  behavior,"  to  induce  men  to  con- 
tribute, and  to  dismiss  the  obedient  with  thanks.  But  if  any 
person  should  withstand  their  gentle  solicitations,  alleging 
either  poverty  or  some  other  pretence  which  the  commission- 
ers should  deem  unfit  to  be  allowed,  then,  after  failure  of 
persuasions  and  reproaches  for  ingratitude,  they  were  to  com- 
mand his  attendance  before  the  privy  council,  at  such  time 
as  they  should  appoint,  to  whom  they  were  to  certify  his 
behavior,  enjoining  him  silence  in  the  mean  time,  that  his 
evil  example  might  not  corrupt  the  better  disposed.1 

It  is  only  through  the  accidental  publication  of  some  fam- 
ily papers  that  we  have  become  acquainted  with  this  docu- 
ment, so  curiously  illustrative  of  the  government  of  Henry 
VIII.  From  the  same  authority  may  be  exhibited  a  partic- 
ular specimen  of  the  consequences  that  awaited  the  refusal 
of  this  benevolence.  One  Richard  Reed,  an  alderman  of 
London,  had  stood  alone,  as  is  said,  among  his  fellow-citi- 
zens, in  refusing  to  contribute.  It  was  deemed  Oppressive 
expedient  not  to  overlook  this  disobedience ;  and  treatment 
the  course  adopted  in  punishing  it  is  somewhat  re-  ° 
markable.  The  English  army  was  then  in  the  field  on  the 
Scots  border.  Reed  was  sent  down  to  serve  as  a  soldier  at 
his  own  charge ;  and  the  general,  sir  Ralph  Ewer,  received 
intimations  to  employ  him  on  the  hardest  and  most  perilous 
duty,  and  subject  him,  when  in  garrison,  to  the  greatest 
privations,  that  he  might  feel  the  smart  of  his  folly  and  stur- 
dy disobedience.  "  Finally,"  the  letter  concludes,  "  you  must 
use  him  in  all  things  according  to  the  sharpe  disciplyne  mil- 
itar  of  the  northern  wars."  2  It  is  natural  to  presume  that 
few  would  expose  themselves  to  the  treatment  of  this  unfor- 
tunate citizen  ;  and  that  the  commissioners  whom  we  find  ap- 
pointed two  years  afterwards  in  every  county,  to  obtain  from 

1  Lodge's  Illustrations  of  British  His-  secretary  Paget,  containing  reasons  why 

tory,  i.  711.    Strype's  Eccles.  Memorials,  it  was  better  to  get  the  money  wanted  by 

Appendix,  n.  119"     The  sums  raised  from  means  of  a  benevolence   than   through 

dilTerent  counties  for   this   benevolence  parliament.     But  he  does  not  hint  at  any 

afford  a  sort  of  criterion  of  their  relative  difficulty  of  obtaining  a   parliamentary 

opulence.     Somerset  gave  6807/. ;   Kent,  grant. 

6471'.  ;  Suffolk.  4512,!. ;  Norfolk.  404IW.  ;  *  Lodge,  p.  80.  Lord  Herbert  men- 
Devon.  4")27(.  ;  Essex,  505U. ;  but  Lan-  tions  this  story,  and  observes,  that  R«ed 
caster  only  060!.,  ami"  Cumberland  574£.  having  been  taken  by  the  Scots,  was 
The  whole  produced  119,58K.  "is.  M. ,  compelled  to  pay  much  more  for  his 
besides  arrears.  In  Haynes's  State  Pa-  ransom  than  the  benevolence  required 
pers,  p.  54,  we  find  a  curious  minute  of  of  him. 


40  EARLS   OF  WARWICK  AXD   SUFFOLK.  CHAP.  I. 

the  king's  subjects  as  much  as  they  would  willingly  give,  if 
they  did  not  always  find  perfect  readiness,  had  not  to  com- 
plain of  many  peremptory  denials.1 

Such  was  the  security  that  remained  against  arbitrary  tax- 
ation under  the  two  Henries.     Were  men's  lives 
unjust an       better  protected  from  unjust  measures,  and  less  at 
executions      the  mercy  of  a  jealous  court  ?    It  cannot  be  neces- 

for  treason.  J          .    ~  ,  .  .  .  .          . 

sary  to  expatiate  very  much  on  this  subject  in  a 
work  that  supposes  the  reader's  acquaintance  with  the  com- 
mon facts  of  our  history ;  yet  it  would  leave  the  picture 
too  imperfect,  were  I  not  to  recapitulate  the  more  striking 
instances  of  sanguinary  injustice,  that  have  cast  so  deep  a 
shade  over  the  memory  of  these  princes. 

The  duke  of  Clarence,  attainted  in  the  reign  of  his  broth- 
Eari  of  er  Edward  IV.,  left  one  son,  whom  his  uncle  re- 
Warwick.  stored  to  the  title  of  earl  of  Warwick.  This  boy, 
at  the  accession  of  Henry  VII.,  being  then  about  twelve 
years  old,  was  shut  up  in  the  Tower.  Fifteen  years  of  cap- 
tivity had  elapsed,  when,  if  we  trust  to  the  common  story, 
having  unfortunately  become  acquainted  with  his  fellow-pris- 
oner Perkin  AVarbeck,  he  listened  to  a  scheme  for  their  es- 
cape, and  would  probably  not  have  been  averse  to  second  the 
ambitious  views  of  that  young  man.  But  it  was  surmised, 
with  as  much  likelihood  as  the  character  of  both  parties 
could  give  it,  that  the  king  had  promised  Ferdinand  of  Ar- 
agon  to  remove  the  earl  of  Warwick  out  of  the  way,  as 
the  condition  of  his  daughter's  marriage  with  the  prince  of 
Wales,  and  the  best  means  of  securing  their  inheritance. 
Warwick  accordingly  was  brought  to  trial  for  a  conspiracy 
to  overturn  the  government ;  which  he  was  induced  to  con- 
fess, in  the  hope,  as  we  must  conceive,  and  perhaps  with  an 
assurance,  of  pardon,  and  was  immediately  executed. 

The  nearest  heir  to  the  house  of  York,  after  the  queen 
Karl  of  and  her  children  and  the  descendants  of  the  duke 
Suffolk.  of  Clarence,  was  a  son  of  Edward  IV.'s  sister, 
the  earl  of  Suffolk,  whose  elder  brother,  the  earl  of  Lincoln, 
had  joined  in  the  rebellion  of  Lambert  Simnel,  and  perished 
at  the  battle  of  Stoke.  Suffolk,  having  killed  a  man  in  an 
affray,  obtained  a  pardon,  which  the  king  compelled  him  to 
plead  in  open  court  at  his  arraignment.  This  laudable  im- 

1  RTBier,  xv.  84.    These  commissions  bear  date  5th  Jan.  1546. 


HEN.  VHI.  DUKE  OF  BUCKINGHAM.  41 

partiality  is  said  to  have  given  him  offence,  and  provoked  his 
flight  into  the  Netherlands  ;  whence,  being  a  man  of  a  turbu- 
lent disposition,  and  partaking  in  the  hatred  of  his  family 
towards  the  house  of  Lancaster,  he  engaged  in  a  conspiracy 
with  some  persons  at  home,  which  caused  him  to  be  attainted 
of  treason.  Some  time  afterwards,  the  archduke  Philip,  hav- 
ing been  shipwrecked  on  the  coast  of  England,  found  himself 
in  a  sort  of  honorable  detention  at  Henry's  court.  On  con- 
senting to  his  departure,  the  king  requested  him  to  send  over 
the  earl  of  Suffolk  ;  and  Philip,  though  not  insensible  to  the 
breach  of  hospitality  exacted  from  him,  was  content  to-  satis- 
fy his  honor  by  obtaining  a  promise  that  the  prisoner's  life 
should  be  spared.  Henry  is  said  to  have  reckoned  this  en- 
gagement merely  personal,  and  to  have  left  as  a  last  injunc- 
tion to  his  successor,  that  he  should  carry  into  effect  the  sen- 
tence against  Suffolk.  Though  this  was  an  evident  violation 
of  the  promise  in  its  spirit,  yet  Henry  VIII.,  after  the  lapse 
of  a  few  years,  with  no  new  pretext,  caused  him  to  be  exe- 
cuted. 

The  duke  of  Buckingham,  representing  the  ancient  family 
of  Stafford,  and  hereditary  high  constable  of  Eng-  Duke  of 
land,  stood  the  first  in  rank  and  consequence,  per-  Bucking- 
haps  in  riches,  among  the  nobility.  But  being  too 
ambitious  and  arrogant  for  the  age  in  which  he  was  born,  he 
drew  on  himself  the  jealousy  of  the  king  and  the  resentment 
of  Wolsey.  The  evidence  on  his  trial  for  high  treason  was 
almost  entirely  confined  to  idle  and  vaunting  language,  held 
with  servants  who  betrayed  his  confidence,  and  soothsayers 
whom  he  had  believed.  As  we  find  no  other  persons  charged 
as  parties  with  him,  it  seems  manifest  that  Buckingham  was 
innocent  of  any  real  conspiracy.  His  condemnation  not  only 
gratified  the  cardinal's  revenge,  but  answered  a  very  con- 
stant purpose  of  the  Tudor  government,  that  of  intimidating 
the  great  families  from  whom  the  preceding  dynasty  had  ex- 
perienced so  much  disquietude.1 

The  execution,  however,  of  Suffolk  was  at  least  not  con- 

1  Hall,  622.    Hume,  who  is  favorable  adds,  that  his  crime  proceeded  more  from 

to  Wolsey  says,  "  There  is  no  reason  to  indiscretion  than  deliberate  malice.     Tn 

think  the  sentence  against  Buckingham  fa;  t,  the    condemnation    of     this    great 

unjust."   But  no  one  who  reads  the  trial  noble   was    owing   to     Wolsey's   ivsi'iit 

will  find  any  evidence  to  satisfy  a  reason-  ment,  acting  on   the    savage   temper  of 

able  niind  ;  and  Huine  himself  soon  after  Henry. 


42  FISHER  AND  MORE.  CHAP.  I. 

New  treason  trai7  to  law  ;  and  even  Buckingham  was  attainted 
created  by  on  evidence  which,  according  to  the  tremendous 
statutes.  latitude  with  which  the  law  of  treason  had  been 
construed,  a  court  of  justice  could  not  be  expected  to  disre- 
gard. But  after  the  fall  of  Wolsey,  and  Henry's  breach  with 
the  Roman  see,  his  fierce  temper,  strengthened  by  habit  and 
exasperated  by  resistance,  demanded  more  constant  supplies 
of  blood ;  and  many  perished  by  sentences  which  we  can 
hardly  prevent  ourselves  from  considering  as  illegal,  because 
the  statutes  to  which  they  might  be  conformable  seem,  from 
their  temporary  duration,  their  violence,  and  the  passiveness 
of  the  parliaments  that  enacted  them,  rather  like  arbitrary 
invasions  of  the  law  than  alterations  of  it.  By  an  act  of 
1534  not  only  an  oath  was  imposed  to  maintain  the  succes- 
sion in  the  heirs  of  the  king's  second  marriage,  in  exclusion 
of  the  princess  Mary,  but  it  was  made  high  treason  to  deny 
that  ecclesiastical  supremacy  of  the  crown,  which,  till  about 
two  years  before,  no  one  had  ever  ventured  to  assert.1  Bish- 
Executions  °P  Fisher,  the  most  inflexibly  honest  churchman 
of  Fisher  who  filled  a  high  station  in  that  age,  was  beheaded 
and  More.  for  thig  Denial.  Sir  Thomas  More,  whose  name 
can  ask  no  epithet,  underwent  a  similar  fate.  He  had  offered 
to  take  the  oath  to  maintain  the  succession,  which,  as  he 
justly  said,  the  legislature  was  competent  to  alter ;  but  pru- 
dently avoided  to  give  an  opinion  as  to  the  supremacy,  till 
Rich,  solicitor-general,  and  afterwards  chancellor,  elicited,  in 
a  private  conversation,  some  expressions  which  were  thought 
sufficient  to  bring  him  within  the  fangs  of  the  recent  statute. 
A  considerable  number  of  less  distinguished  persons,  chiefly 
ecclesiastical,  were  afterwards  executed  by  virtue  of  this  law. 
The  sudden  and  harsh  innovations  made  by  Henry  in  re- 
ligion, as  to  which  every  artifice  of  concealment  and  delay  is 
required,  his  destruction  of  venerable  establishments,  his  tyr- 

1  [25  H.  8,  c.  22.  This  is  not  accu-  legislative  enactment,  were  convicted  and 
ratelj-  stated.  This  act  does  not  make  imprisoned.  But  a  subsequent  statute, 
it  treason  to  deny  the  ecclesiastical  su-  26  H.  8,  c.  13,  made  it  high  treason  to 
premacy.  which  is  not  hinted  in  any  part  -wish  by  words  to  deprive  the  king  of  his 
of  it ;  but  makes  a  refusal  to  take  the  title,  mime,  or  dignity  ;  and  the  appella- 
oath  to  maintain  the  succession  in  the  tiou  Supreme  Head,  being  part  of  this 
issue  of  the  king's  marriage  with  Anne  title,  not  only  More  and  Fisher,  but  sev- 
Boleyn  misprisionof  treasrn  ;  and  on  this  eral  others,  suffered  death  on  this  con- 
Wore  and  Fisher,  who  scrupled  the  pre-  struotion.  See  this  fully  explained  in 
anilile  to  the  oath,  denying  the  pope's  the  27th  volume  of  the  Archaologia,  by 
right  of  ilisj.pnsation.  though  they  would  Mr.  Bruce.  1845.] 
bave  sworn  to  the  succession  itself,  as  a 


HEN.  VIII.  REBELLIONS.  43 

anny  over  the  recesses  of  the  conscience,  excited  so  danger- 
ous a  rebellion  in  the  north  of  England  that  his  own  gener- 
al, the  duke  of  Norfolk,  thought  it  absolutely  necessary  to 
employ  measures  of  conciliation.1  The  insurgents  laid  down 
their  arms  on  an  unconditional  promise  of  amnesty.  But 
another  rising  having  occurred  in  a  different  quarter,  the  king 
made  use  of  this  pretext  to  put  to  death  some  persons  of  su- 
perior rank,  who,  though  they  had,  voluntarily  or  by  compul- 
sion, partaken  in  the  first  rebellion,  had  no  concern  in  the 
second,  and  to  let  loose  military  law  upon  their  followers. 
Nor  was  his  vengeance  confined  to  those  who  had  evidently 
been  guilty  of  these  tumults.  It  is,  indeed,  unreasonable  to 
deny  that  there  might  be,  nay,  there  probably  were,  some 
real  conspirators  among  those  who  suffered  on  the  scaffolds 
of  Henry.  Yet  in  the  proceedings  against  the  countess  of 
Salisbury,  an  aged  woman,  but  obnoxious  as  the  daughter  ol 
the  duke  of  Clarence  and  mother  of  Reginald  Pole,  an  ac- 
tive instrument  of  the  pope  in  fomenting  rebellion,2  against 
the  abbots  of  Reading  and  Glastonbury,  and  others  who 
were  implicated  in  charges  of  treason  at  this  period,  we  find 
so  much  haste,  such  neglect  of  judicial  forms,  and  so  blood- 
thirsty a  determination  to  obtain  convictions,  that  we  are  nat- 
urally tempted  to  reckon  them  among  the  victims  of  revenge 
or  rapacity. 

It  was  probably  during  these  prosecutions  that  Cromwell, 
a  man  not  destitute  of  liberal  qualities,  but  who  is  liable  to 

1  Several  letters  that  passed  between  families  ;  nor  were  there  wanting  rery 
the  council  and  duke  of  Norfolk  (Hard-  good  reasons  for  this,  even  if  the  public 
wicke  State  Papers,  i.  23,  &c.)  tend  to  weal  had  been  the  sole  object  of  Henry 'a 
confirm  what  some  historians  have  hint-  council.  See  also,  for  the  subject  of  this 
ed,  that  he  was  suspected  of  leaning  too  note,  the  State  Papers  Hen.  8,  p.  518  et 
favorably  towards  the  rebels.  The  king  alibi.  They  contain  a  good  deal  of  inter 
•was  most  unwilling  to  grant  a  free  par-  esting  matter  as  to  the  northern  rebel- 
don.  Norfolk  is  told,  "  If  you  could,  by  lion,  which  gave  Henry  a  pretext  for 
any  good  means  or  possible  dexterity,  great  severities  towards  the  monasteries 
reserve  a  very  few  persons  for  punish-  in  that  part  of  England, 
ments,  you  should  assuredly  administer  2  Pole,  at  his  own  solicitation,  was 
the  greatest  pleasure  to  his  highness  that  appointed  legate  to  the  Low  Countries  in 
could  be  imagined,  and  much  in  the  same  1537,  with  the  sole  objee*  of  keeping  alive 
advance  your  own  honor."  —  P.  32.  He  the  flame  of  the  northern  rebellion,  and 
must  have  thought  himself  in  danger  exciting  foreign  powers,  as  well  as  the 
from  some  of  these  letters  which  indicate  English  nation,  to  restore  religion  by 
the  king's  distrust  of  him.  He  had  rec-  force,  if  not  to  dethrone  Henry.  Itisdiffl- 
ommunded  the  employment  of  men  of  cult  not  to  suspect  that  he  was  influenced 
high  rank  as  lords  of  the  marches,  instead  by  ambitious  views  in  a  proceeding  so 
of  the  rather  inferior  persons  whom  the  treasonable,  and  so  little  in  conformity 
king  had  lately  chosen.  This  called  down  with  his  polished  manners  and  temper- 
on  him  rather  a  warm  reprimand  (p.  39);  ate  life.  Phillips,  his  able  and  artful 
for  it  wns  the  natural  policy  of  a  despotic  biographer,  both  proves  and  glories  in 
court  to  restrain  the  ascendency  of  great  the  treason.  Life  of  Pole,  sect.  3. 


44  CEOMWELL.  CHAP.  I 

Cromwell  ^e  one  g1"68*  reproach  of  having  obeyed  too  im- 
plicitly a  master  whose  commands  were  crimes,  in- 
quired of  the  judges  whether,  if  parliament  should  condemn 
a  man  to  die  for  treason  without  hearing  him,  the  attainder 
could  ever  be  disputed.  They  answered  that  it  was  a  dan- 
gerous question,  and  that  parliament  should  rather  set  an 
example  to  inferior  courts  by  proceeding  according  to  justice. 
But  being  pressed  to  reply  by  the  king's  express  command- 
ment, they  said  that  an  attainder  in  parliament,  whether  the 
party  had  been  heard  or  not  in  his  defence,  could  never  be 
reversed  in  a  court  of  law.  No  proceedings,  it  is  said,  took 
place  against  the  person  intended,  nor  is  it  known  who  he 
was.1  But  men  prone  to  remark  all  that  seems  an  appro- 
priate retribution  of  Providence,  took  notice  that  he  who 
had  thus  solicited  the  interpreters  of  the  law  to  sanction  such 
a  violation  of  natural  justice,  was  himself  its  earliest  exam- 
ple. In  the  apparent  zenith  of  favor  this  able  and  faithful 
minister,  the  king's  vicegerent  in  his  ecclesiastical  suprem- 
acy, and  recently  created  earl  of  Essex,  fell  so  suddenly, 
and  so  totally  without  offence,  that  it  has  perplexed  some 
writers  to  assign  the  cause.  But  there  seems  little  doubt 
that  Henry's  dissatisfaction  with  his  fourth  wife,  Anne  of 
Cleves,  whom  Cromwell  had  recommended,  alienated  his 
selfish  temper,  and  inclined  his  ear  to  the  whisperings  of 
those  courtiers  who  abhorred  the  favorite  and  his  measures. 
An  act  attainting  him  of  treason  and  heresy  was  hurried 
through  parliament,  without  hearing  him  in  his  defence.2 
The  charges,  indeed,  were  so  ungrounded  that  had  he  been 

1  Coke's  4th  Institute,  37.    It  is  how-  expedite  est."     And  at  the  close  of  the 
ever  said  by  lord   Herbert  and  others,  session   we  find  a  still  more  remarkable 
that  the  countess  of  Salisbury  and  the  testimony  to  the  unanimity  of  parliament 
marchioness  of  E>eter  were   not  heard  in  the  following  words  :  "Hoc  animad- 
in  their  defence.     The  acts  of  attainder  vertendum  est,  quod  in  hacsessione  cum 
against    them    were     certainly   hurried  proceres  darent  suffragia,  et  dicerent  sen- 
tbrough  parliment ;  but  whether  with-  tentias  super  actibus  praedictis,  ea  erat 
out  hearing  the  parties  does  not  appear,  concordia  et  sententiarum  conformitas, 

2  Burnet  observes,  that  Cranmer  was  ut  singuli  iis  et  eorum  singulis  assense- 
obsent  the  first  day  the  bill   was  read,  rint.   nemine  discrepante.      Thomas  de 
17th   June,   1540;    and  by   his     silence  Souiemont,     Cleric.     Parliamentorum." 
leaves   the   reader   to  infer  that  he  was  As  far  therefore  as  entries  on   the  jour- 
fo  likewise  on   19th  June,  when  it  was  nals  are  evidence,  Cranmer  was  placed 
read  a  second  and  third  time.     But  this,  in  the  painful  and  humiliating  pmliea- 
I  fear,  cannot  be  asserted.     He  is  marked  ment  of  voting  for  the  death  of  his  in uo- 
in  the  journal  as  present  on  the   latter  cent  friend.     He  had  gone  as  far  as  he 
dav:  and  there  is  the  following  entry  :  dared  in  writinga  letter  to  Henry,  which 
'•  Hodie  Iccta  est  pro  secnndo  et  tertio,  might  be  construed  into  an  apology  lor 
bill*  attinoturae  Tliomae  Comitis  Essex,  Cromwell,  though  it  was  full  as  much  so 
et  communi  omnium  prooerum  tune  prae-  for  himself. 

«entium  concessu,  nemine  discrepante, 


HEN.  VIII.      DUKE  OF  NORFOLK  —  ANNE  BOLEYN.  45 

permitted  to  refute  them,  his  condemnation,  though  not  less 
certain,  might,  perhaps,  have  caused  more  shame.  This 
precedent  of  sentencing  men  unheard,  by  means  of  an  act 
of  attainder,  was  followed  in  the  case  of  Dr.  Barnes,  burned 
not  long  afterwards  for  heresy. 

The  duke  of  Norfolk  had  been  throughout  Henry's  reign 
one  of  his  most  confidential  ministers.  But  as  Duke  of 
the  king  approached  his  end,  an  inordinate  jeal-  Norfolk- 
ousy  of  great  men  rather  than  mere  caprice  appears  to  have 
prompted  the  resolution  of  destroying  the  most  conspicuous 
family  in  England.  Norfolk's  son,  too,  the  earl  of  Surrey, 
though  long  a  favorite  with  the  king,  possessed  more  talents 
and  renown,  as  well  as  a  more  haughty  spirit,  than  were 
compatible  with  his  safety.  A  strong  party  at  court  had  al- 
ways been  hostile  to  the  duke  of  Norfolk ;  and  his  ruin  was 
attributed  especially  to  the  influence  of  the  two  Seymours. 
No  accusations  could  be  more  futile  than  those  which  sufficed 
to  take  away  the  life  of  the  noblest  and  most  accomplished 
man  in  England.  Surrey's  treason  seems  to  have  consisted 
chiefly  in  quartering  the  royal  arms  in  his  escutcheon  ;  and 
this  false  heraldry,  if  such  it  were,  must  have  been  consid- 
ered as  evidence  of  meditating  the  king's  death.  His  father 
ignominiously  confessed  the  charges  against  himself,  in  a 
vain  hope  of  mercy  from  one  who  knew  not  what  it  meant. 
An  act  of  attainder  (for  both  houses  of  parliament  were 
commonly  made  accessory  to  the  legal  murders  of  this  reign) 
was  passed  with  much  haste,  and  perhaps  irregularly ;  but 
Henry's  demise  ensuing  at  the  instant  prevented  the  execu- 
tion of  Norfolk.  Continuing  in  prison  during  Edward's 
reign,  he  just  survived  to  be  released  and  restored  in  blood 
under  Mary. 

Among  the  victims  of  this  monarch's  ferocity,  as   we  be- 
stow most  of  our  admiration  on  Sir  Thomas  More,  Anne 
so  we  reserve  our  greatest  pity  for  Anne   Boleyn.  Boleyn. 
Few,  very  few,  have  in  any  age  hesitated  to  admit  her  inno- 
cence.1    But  her  discretion  was  by  no  means  sufficient   to 

1  Burnet  has  taken  much  pains  with  haps  (but  this  worst  charge  is  not  fully 

the  subject,  and  Ret  her  innocence  in  a  authenticated)    exasperated     the     king 

very  clear  light: — i.  197,  and  iii.  114.  See  against  More.     A  remarkable  passage  in 

also  Strype,  i.  280,  and  Kllis'p   Letters,  Cavendish's  Life  of  Wolsey,  p.  103,  edit. 

ii.  52.     Hut  Anne  had  all  the  failings  of  1667,  strongly  displays  her  indiscretion, 

a  vain,  \voak  woman  raised  suddenly  to  A  late  writer,  whose  acutciiess  arid  in- 

preatness      She  behaved  with  unamiable  dustry  would  raise  him  to  a  very  respect- 

viudictiveuess  towards  W'olsey,  and  per-  able  place  among  our  historians  if  he 


46 


TRIAL  OF  ANNE  BOLEYN. 


CHAP.  I. 


preserve  her  steps  on  that  dizzy  height,  which  she  had  as- 
cended with  more  eager  ambition  than  feminine  delicacy 
could  approve.  Henry  was  probably  quicksighted  enough 
to  perceive  that  he  did  not  possess  her  affection?,  and  his 
own  were  soon  transferred  to  another  object.  Nothing  in 
this  detestable  reign  is  worse  than  her  trial.  She  was  in- 
dicted, partly  upon  the  statute  of  Edward  III.,  which,  by  a 
just  though  rattier  technical  construction,  has  been  held  to 
extend  the  guilt  of  treason  to  an  adulterous  queen  as  well 
as  to  her  paramour,  and  partly  on  the  recent  law  for  preser- 
vation of  the  succession,  which  attached  the  same  penalties 
to  anything  done  or  said  in  slander  of  the  king's  issue.  Her 
levities  in  discourse  were  brought  within  this  strange  act  by 
a  still  more  strange  interpretation.  Nor  was  the  wounded 
pride  of  the  king  content  with  her  death.  Under  the  fear,  as 
is  most  likely,  of  a  more  cruel  punishment,  which  the  law 
affixed  to  her  offence,  Anne  was  induced  to  confess  a  pre- 
contract with  Lord  Percy,  on  which  her  marriage  with  the 
king  was  annulled  by  an  ecclesiastical  sentence,  without 
awaiting  its  certain  dissolution  by  the  axe.1  Henry  seems 


could  have  repressed  the  inveterate  par- 
tiality of  his  profession,  has  used  every 
oblique  artifice  to  lead  his  readers  into  a 
belief  of  Anne  Boleyn's  guilt,  while  he 
affects  to  hold  the  balance,  and  state  both 
sides  of  the  question  without  determin- 
ing it.  Thus  he  repeats  what  he  must 
have  known  to  be  the  strange  and  ex- 
travagant lies  of  Sanders  about  her  birth ; 
without  vouching  for  them  indeed,  but 
without  any  reprobation  of  their  absurd 
malignity.  Lingard's  Hist,  of  England, 
vi.  153,  (8vo.  edit.)  Thus  he  intimates 
that  "  the  records  of  her  trial  and  con- 
viction have  pterished,  perhaps  by  the 
hands  of  those  who  respected  her  mem- 
ory." p.  316,  though  the  evidence  is 
given  by  Burnet,  and  the  record  (in  the 
technical  sense)  of  a  trial  contains  noth- 
ing from  which  a  party's  guilt  or  in- 
nocence can  be  inferred.  Thus  he  says 
that  those  who  were  executed  on  the 
game  charge  with  the  queen,  neither  ad- 
mitted nor  denied  the  offence  for  which 
they  suffered;  though  the  best  informed 
writers  assert  that  Norris  constantly  de- 
clared the  queen's  innocence  and  his 
own. 

Dr.  Lingard  can  hardly  be  thought 
serious  when  he  takes  credit  to  himself, 
In  the  commencement  of  a  note  at  the 
end  of  the  same  volume,  for  "  not  ren- 
dering his  book  more  interesting  by 
representing  her  as  an  innocent  and  in- 


jured woman,  falling  a  victim  to  the  in- 
trigues of  a  religious  faction."  He  well 
knows  that  he  could  not  have  done  so 
without  contradicting  the  tenor  of  his 
entire  work,  without  ceasing,  as  it  were, 
to  be  himself.  All  the  rest  of  this  note 
is  a  pretended  balancing  of  evidence,  in 
the  style  of  a  judge  who  can  hanlly  bear 
to  put  for  a  moment  the  possibility  of  a 
prisoner's  innocence. 

I  regret  very  much  to  be  compelled  to 
add  the  name  of  Mr.  Sharon  Turner  to 
those  who  have  countenanced  the  sup- 
position of  Anne  Boleyn's  guilt.  But 
Mr.  Turner,  a  most  worthy  and  pains- 
taking man,  to  whose  earlier  writings 
our  literature  is  much  indebted,  haj»,  in 
his  history  of  Henry  VIII.,  gone  upon 
the  strange  principle  of  exalting  that 
tyrant's  reputation  at  the  expense  of 
every  one  of  his  victims,  to  whatever 
party  they  may  have  belonged.  Odit 
damnatos.  Perhaps  he  is  the  first,  and 
will  be  the  last,  who  has  defended  the 
attainder  of  Sir  Thomas  More.  A  verdict 
of  a  jury,  an  assertion  of  a  statesman,  a 
recital  of  an  act  of  parliament,  are,  with 
him,  satisfactory  proofs  of  the  most  im- 
probable accusations  against  the  most 
blameless  character. 

1  The  lords  pronounced  a  singular 
sentence,  that  she  should  be  burned  or 
beheaded  at  the  king's  pleasure.  Bur- 
net  says,  the  judges  comrlained  of  this 


HEN.  VIII. 


FEESH  STATUTES. 


47 


to  have  thought  his  honor  too  much  sullied  by  the  infidelity 
of  a  lawful  wife.  But  for  this  destiny  he  was  yet  reserved. 
I  shall  not  impute  to  him  as  an  act  of  tyranny  the  execu- 
tion of  Catherine  Howard,  since  it  appears  probable  that  the 
licentious  habits  of  that  young  woman  had  continued  after 
her  marriage  ; 1  and  though  we  might  not  in  general  applaud 
the  vengeance  of  a  husband  who  should  put  a  guilty  wife  to 
death,  it  could  not  be  expected  that  Henry  VIII.  should  lose 
so  reasonable  an  opportunity  of  shedding  blood.2  It  was 
after  the  execution  of  this  fifth  wife  that  the  celebrated  la\v 
was  enacted,  whereby  any  woman  whom  the  king  should 
marry  as  a  virgin  incurred  the  penalties  of  treason  if  she 
did  not  previously  reveal  any  failings  that  had  disqualified 
her  for  the  service  of  Diana.8 

These  parliamentary  attainders,  being  intended  rather  as 
judicial  than  legislative  proceedings,  were  viola-  Fresh 
tions  of  reason  and  justice  in  the  application  of  statutes 

i  T>    .  i  f  ,  i  •  enacting  the 

law.     But  many  general  enactments  of  this  reign  penalties  of 
bear  the  same  character  of  servility.     New  politi-  treasoa- 


as  unprecedented.  Perhaps  in  strictness 
the  king's  right  to  alter  a  sentence  is 
questionable  ;  or  rather  would  be  so,  if 
a  few  precedents  were  out  of  the  way. 
In  hifrh  treason  committed  by  a  man, 


2  It  is  often  difficult  to  understand 
the  grounds  of  a  parliamentary  attainder, 
for  which  any  kind  of  evidence  was 
thought  sufficient  ;  and  the  strongest 
proofs  against  Catherine  Howard  un- 


the  beheading  was  part  of  the  sentence,  doubtedly   related    to  her   behavior  be- 

and   the    king  only  remitted   the  more  fore  marriage,  which  could   be  no   legal 

cruel   preliminaries.     Women,  till  1791,  crime.     But  some  of  the  depositions  ex- 

were  condemned  to  be  burned.     But  the  tend  farther. 

two  queens  of  Henry,  the   countess  of        Dr.   Lingard  has  made  a  curious  ob- 

Sulisbury,  lady  Ilochford,  lady  Jane  Grey,  servation   on    this   case:     il  A   plot  was 

and,  in  later  times,  Mrs.   Lisle  were  be-  woven  by  the  industry  of  the  reformers, 

headed.      Poor     Mrs.    Gaunt    was     not  which  brought  the  young  queen  to  the 

thought    noble  enough    to  be    rescued  scaffold,  and  weakened   the   ascendency 

from  the  fire.     In  felony,  where  behead-  of  the  reigning  party."  —  p.  407.     TliU 

ing  is   no   part  of  the  sentence,  it  has  is  a  very  strange  assertion;  for  he  pro- 

been  substituted  by  the  king's  warrant  ceeds   to  admit   her    antenuptial    guilt, 

in  tlie  cases  of  the  duke  of  Somerset  and  which  indeed  she  is  well   known  to  have 

Lord  Audley.     I  know  not  why  the  latter  confessed,  and  does  not  give  the  slight- 

olifained    this   favor  ;    for    it  had    been  est  proof   of   any    plot.      Yet   he   adds, 

refused    to   Lord    Stourton,   hanged   for  speaking  of  the  queen  and   lady  Koch- 

murder  under  Mary,  as  it  was  afterwards  ford,  "I  fear   [i.  e.   wish   to  insinuate] 
to  K-irl  Ferrers. 

l  [The  letters  published  in  State 
I'.ipi  rs,  temp.  Henry  8,  vol.  i.  p.  689  et 
post,  by  no  means  increase  this  proba- 


both  were  sacrificed  to  the  inanes  of  Anue 
Boleyn." 

s  Stat.  26  H.  8,  c.  13. 
It  may  be  here  observed,  that  the  act 

bility;  Catherine  Howard's  post-nuptial    attainting  Catherine  Howard  of  treason 
guilt    must    remain   very  questionable,     proceeds  to  declare  that  the  king's  assent 
which  makes  her  execution,  and  that  of 
others  who  sutfered  with  her.  another  of 
Henry's  murders.     There   is   too   much 


to  bills  by  commission  under  the  great 
seal  is  as  valid  as  if  he  were  personally 
present,  any  custom  or  use  to  the  con- 
appearance  that  Cranmer,  by  the  king's  trary  notwithstanding.  33  H.  8,  c.  21. 
order,  promised  that  her  life  should  be  This  may  be  presumed,  therefore,  to  be 
spared,  with  a  view  of  obtaining  a  con-  the  earliest  instance  of  the  king's  passing 
fession  of  a  pre-contract  with  Derham.  bills  in  this  manner. 
-1845.] 


48  ACT  GIVING  PROCLAMATIONS  CHAP.  I. 

cal  offences  were  created  in  every  parliament,  against  which 
the  severest  penalties  were  denounced.  The  nation  had 
scarcely  time  to  rejoice  in  the  termination  of  those  long 
debates  between  the  houses  of  York  and  Lancaster,  when 
the  king's  divorce,  and  the  consequent  illegitimacy  of  his 
eldest  daughter,  laid  open  the  succession  to  fresh  questions. 
It  was  needlessly  unnatural  and  unjust  to  bastardize  the 
princess  Mary,  whose  title  ought  rather  to  have  had  the  con- 
firmation of  parliament.  But  Henry,  who  would  have 
deemed  so  moderate  a  proceeding  injurious  to  his  cause  in 
the  eyes  of  Europe,  and  a  sort  of  concession  to  the  adver- 
saries of  the  divorce,  procured  an  act  settling  the  crown  on 
his  children  by  Anne  or  any  subsequent  wife.  Any  person 
disputing  the  lawfulness  of  the  king's  second  marriage  might, 
by  the  sort  of  construction  that  would  be  put  on  this  act, 
become  liable  to  the  penalties  of  treason.  In  two  years 
more  this  very  marriage  wa^  annulled  by  sentence  ;  and  it 
would,  perhaps,  have  been  treasonable  to  assert  the  princess 
Elizabeth's  legitimacy.  The  same  punishment  was  enacted 
against  such  as  should  marry  without  license  under  the  great 
seal,  or  have  a  criminal  intercourse  with,  any  of  the  king's 
children  "  lawfully  born,  or  otherwise  commonly  reputed  to 
be  his  children,  or  his  sister,  aunt,  or  niece."1 

Henry's  two  divorces  had  created  an  uncertainty  as  to  the 
Act  giving  ^me  °f  succession,  which  parliament  endeavored 
prociama-  to  remove,  not  by  such  constitutional  provisions  in 

tions  the  .,/    ,,  •    i_ \     i    /•  i 

force  of  concurrence  with  the  crown  as  might  define  the 
course  of  inheritance,  but  by  enabling  the  king, 
on  failure  of  issue  by  Jane  Seymour,  or  any  other  lawful 
wife,  to  make  over  and  bequeath  the  kingdom  to  any  persons 
at  his  pleasure,  not  even  reserving  a  preference  to  the 
descendants  of  former  sovereigns.2  By  a  subsequent  statute, 
the  princesses  Mary  and  Elizabeth  were  nominated  in  the 
entail,  after  the  king's  male  issue,  subject,  however,  to  such 
conditions  as  he  should  declare,  by  non-compliance  with 
which  their  right  was  to  cease.8  This  act  still  left  it  in  his 
power  to  limit  the  remainder  at  his  discretion.  In  execution 
of  this  authority,  he  devised  the  crown,  upon  failure  of  issue 
from  his  three  children,  to  the  heirs  of  the  body  of  Mary 
duchess  of  Suffolk,  the  younger  of  his  two  sisters ;  postpon- 

»28H.8,c.l8.  «28H.8,c..7.  »  35  H.  8,  c.  1. 


HEN.  Vin.  THE  FORCE  OF  LAW.  49 

ing  at  least,  if  not  excluding,  the  royal  family  of  Scotland, 
descended  from  his  elder  sister  Margaret.  In  surrendering 
the  regular  laws'  of  the  monarchy  to  one  man's  caprice,  this 
parliament  became  accessory,  so  far  as  in  it  lay,  to  disposi- 
tions which  might  eventually  have  kindled  the  flames  of  civil 
war.  But  it  seemed  to  aim  at  inflicting  a  still  deeper  injury 
on  future  generations,  in  enacting  that  a  king,  after  he  should 
have  attained  the  age  of  twenty -four  years,  might  repeal  any 
statutes  made  since  his  accession.1  Such  a  provision  not 
only  tended  to  annihilate  the  authority  of  a  regency,  and  to 
expose  the  kingdom  to  a  sort  of  anarchical  confusion  during 
its  continuance,  but  seemed  to  prepare  the  way  for  a  more 
absolute  power  of  abrogating  all  acts  of  the  legislature. 
Three  years  afterwards  it  was  enacted  that  proclamations 
made  by  the  king  and  council,  under  penalty  of  fine  and 
imprisonment,  should  have  the  force  of  statutes,  so  that  they 
should  not  be  prejudicial  to  any  person's  inheritance,  offices, 
liberties,  goods  and  chattels,  nor  infringe  the  established  laws. 
This  has  been  often  noticed  as  an  instance  of  servile  com- 
pliance. It  is,  however,  a  striking  testimony  to  the  free 
constitution  it  infringed,  and  demonstrates  that  the  prerogative 
could  not  soar  to  the  heights  it  aimed  at,  till  thus  imped  by 
the  perfidious  hand  of  parliament.  It  is  also  to  be  observed, 
that  the  power  given  to  the  king's  proclamations  is  consider- 
ably limited.2 

A  government  administered  with  so  frequent  violations 
not  only  of  the  chartered  privileges  of  Englishmen,  but  of 
those  still  more  sacred  rights  which  natural  Taw  has  estab- 
lished, must  have  been  regarded,  one  would  imagine,  with 
just  abhorrence,  and  earnest  longings  for  a  change.  Yet 

1  28  H.  8,  c.  17.  and  the  dishonor  of  the  king's  majesty, 

*  31  H.  8,  c.  8.    Burnet,  i.  263,  ex-  "  who  might  full  ill  bear  it,"  &c.     See 

plains    the    origin  of    this  act.    Great  this  act  at  length  in  the  great  edition  of 

exceptions  had   been   taken  to  some  of  the   statutes.     There  was  one   singular 

the  king's  ecclesiastical  proclamations,  provision :  the  clause  protecting  all  per- 

wliirti  altered  laws,  and   laid   taxes  on  sous  as  mentioned,  in  their  inheritance 

spiritual    persons.      He   justly  observes  or  other  property,  proceeds,  "  nor  shall 

that  the  restrictions  contained  in  it  gave  by  virtue  of  the  said  act  suffer  any  pains 

p-cut  power  to  the  judges,  who  had  the  of  death."     But  an  exception  is   afti-r- 

pciwur   of   expounding   in   their    hands,  wards  made  for  "such   persons    which 

The  preamble  i.s  full  as  offensive  as  the  shall  offend  against  any  proclamation  to 

bodv  of  the  act ;  reciting  the  contempt  be  made   by    the   king:s    highness,    his 

and  disobedience  of  the  king's  proclama-  heirs  or  successors,   for  or  concerning 

tions   by  some    "  who   did  not  consider  any   kind  of  heresies  against   Christian 

what  a  king  hy  his  royal  power  mig/it  doctrine."     Thus  it  seems  that  the  kiug 

rfo,"  which,  if  it  continued,  would  tend  claimed    a  power   to  declare   heresy  by 

to  the  disobedience  of  the  laws  of  God,  proclamation,  under  penalty  of  death. 
VOL.  I.  —  C.                               4 


50  CHARACTER  OF  HENRY  Till.  CHAP.  I. 

contemporary  authorities  by  no  means  answer  to  this  expecta- 
tion. Some  mention  Henry  after  his  death  in  language  of 
eulogy ;  and,  if  we  except  those  whom  attachment  to  the 
ancient  religion  had  inspired  with  hatred  towards  his  memory, 
very  few  appear  to  have  been  aware  that  his  name  would 
descend  to  posterity  among  those  of  the  many  tyrants  and 
oppressors  of  innocence,  whom  the  wrath  of  Heaven  has 
raised  up,  and  the  servility  of  men  has  endured.  I  do  not 
indeed  believe  that  he  had  really  conciliated  his  people's  af- 
fection. That  perfect  fear  which  attended  him  must  have 
cast  out  love.  But  he  had  a  few  qualities  that  deserve 
esteem,  and  several  which  a  nation  is  pleased  to  behold  in  a 
sovereign.  He  wanted,  or  at  least  did  not  manifest  in  any 
eminent  degree,  one  usual  vice  of  tyrants,  dissimulation :  his 
manners  were  affable,  and  his  temper  generous.  Though  his 
schemes  of  foreign  policy  were  not  very  sagacious,  and  his 
wars,  either  with  France  or  Scotland,  productive  of  no 
material  advantage,  they  Avere  uniformly  successful,  and 
retrieved  the  honor  of  the  English  name.  But  the  main 
cause  of  the  reverence  with  which  our  forefathers  cherished 
this  king's  memory  was  the  share  he  had  taken  in  the  Ref- 
ormation. They  saw  in  him,  not  indeed  the  proselyte  of 
their  faith,  but  the  subverter  of  their  enemies'  power,  the 
avenging  minister  of  Heaven,  by  whose  giant  arm  the  chain 
of  superstition  had  been  broken,  and  the  prison  gates  burst 
asunder.1 

The  ill-assorted  body  of  councillors  who  exercised  the  func- 
tions of  regency  by  Henry's  testament  were  sen- 
ment'of  Ed-    sible  that  they  had  not  sinews  to  wield  his  iron 
ward  vi.'s      sceptre,  and  that  some  sacrifice  must  be  made  to  a 

councillors.  .  .     ,  ,,  -  ,    .        ^, 

nation  exasperated  as  well  as  overawed  by  the 
violent  measures  of  his  reign.  In  the  first  session,  accord- 
ingly,  of  Edward's  parliament,  the  new  treasons  and  felonies 

'  Gray  has  finely  glanced  at  this  bright  and  he  should  have  blushed  to  excuse, 

point  of  Henry's  character,  in  that  beau-  by  absurd  and  unworthy  sophistry,  the 

tiful    stanza   where    he    has    made    the  punishment  of   those   who    refused    to 

founders  of  Cambridge   pass   before  our  swear  to  the  king's  supremacy,     p.  351- 

eyes,  like  shadows  over  a  magic  glass  :  After  all,   Henry   was  every  whit  as 

the  maiestic  lord  good   a  bing    aud  man   as   Franc'B  J-> 

Who  brofce  tht  bonds  of  Rome.  »£»  «£?  ™J™  SSfJSSS 

In  a  poet,  this  was  a  f:iir  employment  extol  ;   not  in  the  least  more  tyrannical 

of  his  art ;  but  the  partiality  of  Burnet  and  sanguinary,  and  of  better  faith  tow- 

towards  Ilenry  VIII.  is  less  warrantable  ;  ards  his  neighbors. 


EDW.  VI.  STANDARD  OF  HIGH  TREASON.  51 

which  had  been  created  to  please    his  father's  sanguinary 
disposition  were  at  once  abrogated.1 

The  statute  of  Edward  III.  became  again  the  standard 
of  high  treason,  except  that  the  denial  of  the  king's  suprem- 
acy was  still  liable  to  its  penalties.  The  same  act,  which 
relieves  the  subject  from  these  terrors,  contains  also  a  repeal 
of  that  which  had  given  legislative  validity  to  the  king's  proc- 
lamations. These  provisions  appear  like  an  elastic  recoil 
of  the  constitution  after  the  extraordinary  pressure  of  that 
despotic  reign.  But,  however  they  may  indicate  the  temper 
of  .parliament,  we  must  consider  them  but  as  an  unwilling 
and  insincere  compliance  on  the  part  of  the  government. 
Henry,  too  arrogant  to  dissemble  with  his  subjects,  bad 
stamped  the  law  itself  with  the  print  of  his  despotism.  The 
more  wily  courtiers  of  Edward's  council  deemed  it  less  ob- 
noxious to  violate  than  to  new-mould  the  constitution.  For, 
although  proclamations  had  no  longer  the  legal  character  of 
statutes,  we  find  several  during  Edward's  reign  enforced  by 
penalty  of  fine  and  imprisonment.  Many  of  the  ecclesiastical 
changes  were  first  established  by  no  other  authority,  though 
afterwards  sanctioned  by  parliament.  Rates  were  thus  fixed 
for  the  price  of  provisions  ;  bad  money  was  cried  down, 
with  penalties  on  those  who  should  buy  it  under  a  certain 
value,  and  the  melting  of  the  current  coin  prohibited  on  pain 
of  forfeiture.2  Some  of  these  might  possibly  have  a  sanc- 
tion from  precedent,  and  from  the  acknowledged  prerogative 
of  the  crown  in  regulating  the  coin.  But  no  legal  apology 
can  be  made  for  a  proclamation  in  April,  1549,  addressed  to 
all  justices  of  the  peace,  enjoining  them  to  arrest  sowers  and 
tellers  abroad  of  vain  and  forged  tales  and  lies,  and  to  com- 
mit them  to  the  galleys,  there  to  row  in  chains  as  slaves  dur- 
ing the  king's  pleasure.8  One  would  imagine  that  the  late 

1  1   Edw.  6,  c.  12.    By  this  act  it  is  their  king.      See  the  form  observed  at 
provided  that  a  lord  of  parliament  shall  Richard    the    Second's    cononation     in 
have   the  benefit  of   clergy  though  he  Rymer,  vii.  158.    But  at  Edward's  cor- 
cannot  read.     Sect.   14.     Yet  one  can  onation   the  archbishop    presented    the 
hardly  believe   that  this  provision  was  king  to  the  people,  as  rightful  and  un- 
necessary at  so  late  an  era.  doubted  inheritor  by  the  laws  of  God 

2  2  Strype,  147,  341,  491.  and  man  to  the  royal  dignity  and  crown 
8  Id.  149.    Dr.  Lingard  has  remarked    imperial  of  this  realm,  &c.,  and  asked  if 

»n   important  change  in  the  coronation  they  would  serve  him  and  assent  to  his 

ceremony  of  Edward  VI.     Formerly  the  coronation,  as  by  their  duty  of  allegiance 

king  had  taken  an  oath  to  preserve  the  they  were  bound  to  do.     All  this  was  be- 

ubertie.^   of    the  realm,   and    especially  fore    the  oath.      2    Buruet,   Appendix, 

those  granted  by  Edward  the  Confessor,  p.  93. 

&c.,  before  the  people  were  asked  wheth-  Few  will  pretend  that  the  coronation, 

or  they  would  consent  to  hare  him  as  or  the  coronation  oath,  was  essential  to 


52  ATTAINDER  OF  LORD  SEYMOUR.  CHAP.  L 

statute  had  been  repealed,  as  too  far  restraining  the  royal 
power,  rather  than  as  giving  it  an  unconstitutional  exten- 
sion. 

It  soon  hecame  evident  that  if  the  new  administration  had 
Attainder  not  ^v  im^^e(^  tne  sanguinary  spirit  of  their 
of  lord  late  master,  they  were  as  little  scrupulous  in  bend- 
Seymour.  jng  j.jie  ru]es  of  }aw  an(j  justice  to  their  purpose 
in  cases  of  treason.  The  duke  of  Somerset,  nominated  by 
Henry  as  one  only  of  his  sixteen  executors,  obtained  almost 
immediately  afterwards  a  patent  from  the  young  king,  con- 
stituting him  sole  regent  under  the  name  of  protector,  with 
the  assistance,  indeed,  of  the  rest  as  his  councillors,  but  with 
the  power  of  adding  any  others  to  their  number.  Conscious 
of  his  own  usurpation,  it  was  natural  for  Somerset  to 
dread  the  aspiring  views  of  others ;  nor  was  it  long  before 
he  discovered  a  rival  in  his  brother,  lord  Seymour,  of  Sude- 
ley,  whom,  according  to  the  policy  of  that  age,  he  thought 
it  necessary  to  destroy  by  a  bill  of  attainder.  Seymour  was 
apparently  a  dangerous  and  unprincipled  man ;  he  had 
courted  the  favor  of  the  young  king  by  small  presents  of 
money,  and  appears  beyond  question  to  have  entertained  a 
hope  of  marrying  the  princess  Elizabeth,  who  had  lived 
much  in  his  house  during  his  short  union  with  the  queen 
dowager.  It  was  surmised  that  this  lady  had  been  poisoned 
to  make  room  for  a  still  nobler  consort.1  But  in  this  there 
could  be  no  treason  ;  and  it  is  not  likely  that  any  evidence 
was  given  which  could  have  brought  him  within  the  statute 
of  Edward  III.  In  this  prosecution  against  lord  Seymour 
it  was  thought  expedient  to  follow  the  very  worst  of  Henry's 
precedents,  by  not  hearing  the  accused  in  his  defence.  The 
bill  passed  through  the  upper  house,  the  natural  guardian  of 
a  peer's  life  and  honor,  without  one  dissenting  voice.  The 

the  legal  succession  of  the  crown,  or  the  elder    historians,  which  I  have    found 

exercise  of   its   prerogatives.     But  this  attested   by  foreign  writers   of  that  age 

alteration  in  the  form  is  a  curious  proof  (though  Burnet  has  thrown  doubts  upon 

of  the  solicitude  displayed  by  the  Tudors,  it),    that    some   differences  between  the 

as  it  was  much  more  by  the  next  family,  queen-dowager  and  the  duchess  of  Som- 

to  suppress  every  recollection  that  could  erset  aggravated  at  least  those  of   their 

make  their  sovereignty  appear  to  be  of  husbands.     P.  61,  69.     It  is  alleged  with 

popular  origin.  absurd    exaggeration,    in     the    articles 

1  Haynes's  State  Papers  contain  many  against  lord  Seymour,  that,  had  the  for- 

curious   proofs   of  the  incipient  amour  mer  proved  immediately  with  child  after 

between   lord   Seymour  and    Elizabeth,  her  marriage  with   him,  it  might   have 

and  show  much  indecent  familiarity  on  passed   for   the   king's.     This    marriage, 

one  side,  with  a  little  childish  coquetry  however,  did  not  take  place  before  June, 

on   the   other.      These   documents  also  Henry  having  died  in  January.     Ellis's 

rather  tend  to  confirm  the  story  of  our  Letters,  ii.  150. 


EDW.  VI.   ATTAINDER  OF  DUKE  OF  SOMERSET.       53 

commons  addressed  the  king  that  they  might  hear  the  wit- 
ne-ses,  and  also  the  accused.  It  was  answered  that  the  king 
did  not  think  it  necessary  for  them  to  hear  the  latter ;  but 
that  those  who  had  given  their  depositions  before  the  lords 
might  repeat  their  evidence  before  the  lower  house.  It 
rather  appears  that  the  commons  did  not  insist  on  this  any 
further ;  but  the  bill  of  attainder  was  carried  with  a  few  neg- 
ative voices.1  How  striking  a  picture  it  affords  of  the  six- 
teenth century,  to  behold  the  popular  and  well-natured  duke 
of  Somerset,  more  estimable  at  least  than  any  other  states- 
man employed  under  Edward,  not  only  promoting  this  unjust 
condemnation  of  his  brother,  but  signing  the  warrant  under 
which  he  was  beheaded  ! 

But  it  was  more  easy  to  crush  a  single  competitor  than  to 
keep  in  subjection  the  subtle  and x  daring  spirits  trained  in 
Henry's  councils,  and  jealous  of  the  usurpation  of  Attainder 
an  equal.  The  protector,  attributing  his  success,  of  <i»ke  of 
as  is  usual  with  men  in  power,  rather  to  skill  than 
fortune,  and  confident  in  the  two  frailest  supports  that  a  min- 
ister can  have,  the  favor  of  a  child  and  of  the  lower  people, 
was  stripped  of  his  authority  within  a  few  months  after  the 
execution  of  lord  Seymour,  by  a  confederacy  which  he  had 
neither  the  discretion  to  prevent  nor  the  firmness  to  resist. 
Though  from  this  time  but  a  secondary  character  upon  the 
public  stage,  he  was  so  near  the  throne  as  to  keep  alive  the 
suspicions  of  the  duke  of  Northumberland,  who,  with  no  os- 
tensible title,  had  become  not  less  absolute  than  himself.  It 
is  not  improbable  that  Somerset  was  innocent  of  the  charge 
imputed  to  him,  namely,  a  conspiracy  to  murder  some  of  the 
privy  councillors,  which  had  been  erected  into  felony  by  a 
recent  statute  ;  but  the  evidence,  though  it  may  have  been 
false,  does  not  seem  legally  insufficient.  He  demanded  on 
his  trial  to  be  confronted  with  the  witnesses,  a  favor  rarely 
granted  in  that  age  to  state  criminals,  and  which  he  could 
not  very  decently  solicit  after  causing  his  brother  to  be 
condemned  unheard.  Three  lords,  against  whom  he  was 
charged  to  have  conspired,  sat  upon  his  trial ;  and  it  was 
thought  a  sufficient  reply  to  his  complaints  of  this  breach  of 
a  known  principle  that  no  challenge  could  be  allowed  in  the 
case  of  a  peer. 

1  Journals,  Feb.  27.  March  4, 1548-9.    against    Seymour,   which     Burnet    and 
From  these  1  am  led  to  douht  whether    Strype  have  taken  for  granted, 
the  commons  actually  heard  witnesses 


54  VIOLENCE  OF  MARY'S  REIGN.  CHAT  I 

From  this  designing  and  unscrupulous  oligarchy  no  meas> 
ure  conducive  to  liberty  and  justice  could  be  expected  to 
spring.  But  among  the^  commons  there  must  have  been 
men,  although  their  names  have  not  descended  to  us,  who, 
animated  by  a  purer  zeal  for  these  objects,  perceived  on 
how  precarious  a  thread  the  life  of  every  man  was  sus< 
pended,  when  the  private  deposition  of.  one  suborned  wit- 
ness, unconfronted  with  the  prisoner,  could  suffice  to  obtain  a 
conviction  in  cases  of  treason.  In  the  worst  period  of  Ed- 
ward's reign  we  find  inserted  in  a  bill  creating  some  new 
treasons  one  of  the  most  important  constitutional  provisions 
which  the  annals  of  the  Tudor  family  afford.  It  is  enacted 
that  "  no  person  shall  be  indicted  for  any  manner  of  treason 
except  on  the  testimony  of  two  lawful  witnesses,  who  shall  be 
brought  in  person  before  the  accused  at  the  time  of  his  trial, 
to  avow  and  maintain  what  they  have  to  say  against  him, 
unless  he  shall  willingly  confess  the  charges." l  This  salu- 
tary provision  was  strengthened,  not  taken  away,  as  some 
later  judges  ventured  to  assert,  by  an  act  in  the  reign  of 
Mary.  In  a  subsequent  part  of  this  work  I  shall  find  an 
opportunity  for  discussing  this  important  branch  of  consti- 
tutional law. 

It  seems  hardly  necessary  to  mention  the  momentary  usur- 
vioience  pation  of  lady  Jane  Grey,  founded  on  no  pretext 
of  Mary's  of  title  which  could  be  sustained  by  any  argument. 
She  certainly  did  not  obtain  that  degree  of  actual 
possession  which  might  have  sheltered  her  .adherents  under 
the  statute  of  Henry  VII. ;  nor  did  the  duke  of  Northumber- 
land allege  this  excuse  on  his  trial,  though  he  set  up  one  of 
a  more  technical  nature,  that  the  great  seal  was  a  sufficient 
protection  for  acts  done  by  its  authority.2  The  reign  that  im- 

1  Stat.  6  &  8  Edw.  6,  c.  11,  8.  12.  then  to  the  lady  Jane  and  her  heirs  male; 


to  c 

which  some  doubt  had  arisen.     1  Mary,     Cranuier,  Append.  164.     A  late  author, 
Bess.  2,  c.  4.     It  is  said    in   this  statute,     on  consulting  the  original  MS.,  in  the 


fi'->.    4,  u.   *±.        Xb  la    >.llil       IN       Ull>     DKMIUU3.        UU     UUUOUiUIJg     l!)t;     OllglUili     OtLO*,     III      Lilt* 

"her  highness's  most  lawful  possession    king's   handwriting,  found   that   it  had 
was  for  a  time  disturbed  and  disquieted    been  at   first  written  ':  the  lady  Jane's 


queeu,  if  she  have  any  before  his  doath ; 


MAKT.  VIOLENCE  OF  MART'S  REIGN.  55 

mediately  followed  is  chiefly  remembered  as  a  period  of  san- 
guinary persecution  ;  but  though  I  reserve  for  the  next  chap- 
ter all  mention  of  ecclesiastical  disputes,  some  of  Mary's  pro- 
ceedings in  reestablishing  popery  belong  to  the  civil  history 
of  our  constitution.  Impatient  under  the  existence,  for  a  mo- 
ment, of  rights  and  usages  which  she  abhorred,  this  bigoted 
woman  anticipated  the  legal  authority  which  her  parliament 
was  ready  to  interpose  for  their  abrogation  ;  the  Latin  litur- 
gy was  restored,  the  married  clergy  expelled  from  their  liv- 
ings, and  even  many  protestant  ministers  thrown  into  prison 
for  no  other  crime  than  their  religion,  before  any  change  had 
been  made  in  the  established  laws.1  The  queen,  in  fact,  and 
those  around  her,  acted  and  felt  as  a  legitimate  government 
restored  after  an  usurpation,  and  treated  the  recent  statutes 
as  null  and  invalid.  But  even  in  matters  of  temporal  gov- 
ernment the  stretches  of  prerogative  were  more  violent  and 
alarming  than  during  her  brother's  reign.  It  is  due,  indeed, 
to  the  memory  of  one  who  has  left  so  odious  a  name,  to  re- 
mark that  Mary  was  conscientiously  averse  to  encroach  upon 
what  she  understood  to  be  the  privileges  of  her  people.  A 
wretched  book  having  been  written  to  exalt  her  prerogative, 
on  the  ridiculous  pretence  that,  as  a  queen,  she  was  not 
bound  by  the  laws  of  former  kings,  she  showed  it  to  Gar- 
diner, and  on  his  expressing  indignation  at  the  sophism, 
threw  it  herself  into  the  fire.  An  act  passed,  however,  to 
settle  such  questions,  which  declares  the  queen  to  have  all 
the  lawful  prerogatives  of  the  crown.2  But  she  was  sur- 
rounded by  wicked  councillors,  renegades  of  every  faith,  and 
ministers  of  every  tyranny.  We  must,  in  candor,  attribute 
to  their  advice  her  arbitrary  measures,  though  not  her  per- 
secution of  heresy,  which  she  counted  for  virtue.  She  is 
said  to  have  extorted  loans  from  the  citizens  of  London,  and 
others  of  her  subjects.8  This,  indeed,  was  not  more  than  had 
been  usual  with  her  predecessors.  But  we  find  one  clear  in- 

1  Burnet.   Strype,  Hi.  50,  63.    Carte,  the  king's  pleasure,  for  which  was  after- 

290.     I  doubt  whether  we  have  anything  wards  substituted  "  during  good  behav- 

in  our  history  more  like  conquest  than  ior."    Burnet.   App.   257.  Collier,  218. 
the  administration  of  1553.     The  queen,        2  Burnet,  ii.  278.  Stat.l  Mary,  Bess.  3, 

in  the  month  only  of  October,  presented  c.  1.     Dr.  Lingard  rather  strangely  tells 

to  256  livings,  restoring  all  those  turned  this  story  on  the  authority  of  father  Per- 

out  under  the  acts  of  uniformity.     Yet  sons,  whom  his  readers  probably  do  not 

the  deprivation  of  the  bishops  might  be  esteem  quite  as  much  as  he  does.     If  If 

justified   probably   by  the  terms  of  the  had  attended  to  Burnet,  he  would  har» 

commission   they  had  taken  out  ;n  Ed-  found  a  more  sufficient  Toucher, 
ward's  reign,  to  hold  their  sees  .luring        3  Carte.  330. 


56  VIOLENCE  OF  MAEY'S  REIGN.  CHAP.  I. 

stance  during  her  reign  of  a  duty  upon  foreign  cloth,  imposed 
without  assent  of  parliament ;  an  encroachment  unprece- 
dented since  the  reign  of  Richard  II.  Several  proofs  might 
be  adduced  from  records  of  arbitrary  inquests  for  offences 
and  illegal  modes  of  punishment.  The  torture  is,  perhaps, 
more  frequently  mentioned  in  her  short  reign  than  in  all  for- 
mer ages  of  our  history  put  together,  and,  probably  from  that 
imitation  of  foreign  governments,  which  contributed  not  a  lit- 
lle  to  deface  our  constitution  in  the  sixteenth  century,  seems 
deliberately  to  have  been  introduced  as  part  of  the  process 
in  those  dark  and  uncontrolled  tribunals  which  investigated 
offences  against  the  state.1  A  commission  issued  in  1557, 
authorizing  the  persons  named  in  it  to  inquire,  by  any  means 
they  could  devise,  into  charges  of  heresy  or  other  religious  of- 
fences, and  in  some  instances  to  punish  the  guilty,  in  others 
of  a  graver  nature  to  remit  them  to  their  ordinaries,  seems 
(as  Burnet  has  well  observed)  to  have  been  meant  as  a  pre- 
liminary step  to  bringing  in  the  inquisition.  It  was  at  least 
the  germ  of  the  high-commission  court  in  the  next  reign.2 
One  proclamation  in  the  last  year  of  her  inauspicious  admin- 
istration may  be  deemed  a  flight  of  tyranny  beyond  her  fa- 
ther's example,  which,  after  denouncing  the  importation  of 
books  filled  with  heresy  and  treason  from  beyond  sea,  pro- 
ceeds to  declare  that  whoever  should  be  found  to  have  such 
books  in  his  possession  should  be  reputed  and  taken  for  a 
rebel,  and  executed  according  to  martial  law.8  This  had 
been  provoked  as  well  by  a  violent  libel  written  at  Geneva 
by  Goodman,  a  refugee,  exciting  the  people  to  dethrone  the 
queen,  as  by  the  recent  attempt  of  one  Stafford,  a  descend- 
ant of  the  house  of  Buckingham,  who,  having  landed  with  a 
small  force  at  Scarborough,  had  vainly  hoped  that  the  gener- 
al disaffection  would  enable  him  to  overthrow  her  govern- 
ment.4 

1  Haynes.  195.  Burnet,  ii.  Appendix,  ligion,  both  parties  being  weary  of  Mary's 

Spanish  counsels.  The  important  letters 

i  Burnet,  ii.  347.  Collier,  ii.  404,  and  of  Noailles,  the  French  ambassador,  to 

Liugard,  vii.  266  (who,  by  the  way,  con-  which  Carte  had  access,  and  which  have 

founds  this  commission  with  something  since  been  printed,  have  afforded  informa- 

different  two  years  earlier),  will  not  hear  tion  to  Dr.  Lingard,  and  with  those  of 

of  this  allusion  to  the  inquisition.  But  the  imperial  ambassador,  Renard.  which 

Burnet  has  said  nothing  that  is  not  per-  I  have  not  had  an  opportunity  of  ."wing, 

fectly  just.  throw  much  light  on  this  reign.  They 

*  Strype,  iii.  459.  certainly  appear  to  justify  the  restraint 

*  See     Stafford's     proclamation    from  put   on    Elizabeth,   who,   if  not  herself 
Scarborough  castle,  Strype,  iii.  Appendix,  privy  to  the  conspiracies  planned  iu  he* 
No.  71.    It  contains   no  allusion  to  re-  behalf  (which  is,  however,  very  probable). 


Einv.  VI.  &  MARY.     POWER  OF  COMMONS.  57 

Notwithstanding,  however,  this  apparently  uncontrolled 
career  of  power,  it  is  certain  that  the  children  of  Henry 
VIII.  did  not  preserve  his  almost  absolute  dominion  over 
parliament.  I  have  only  met  with  one  instance 

i  •          •  i  f        j  ,.  The  house 

m  his  reign  where  the  commons  refused  to  pass  a  Of  C0m- 
bill  recommended  by   the  crown.     This  was   in  mons  re' 

i  rnc\      i  •         i  i       i       •   i      •        covers  part 

LiioZ  ;  but  so  unquestionable  were  the  legislative  of  its  m- 
rights  of  parliament,  that,  although  much  dis-  J^tT* 
pleased,  even  Henry  was  forced  to  yield.1  We  these  two 
find  several  instances  during  the  reign  of  Edward,  re 
and  still  more  in  that  of  Mary,  where  the  commons  rejected 
bills  sent  down  from  the  upper  house  ;  and  though  there  was 
always  a  majority  of  peers  for  the  government,  yet  the  dis- 
sent of  no  small  number  is  frequently  recorded  in  the  former 
reign.  Thus  the  commons  not  only  threw  out  a  bill  creating 
several  new  treasons,  and  substituted  one  of  a  more  moderate 
nature,  with  that  memorable  clause  for  two  witnesses  to  be 
produced  in  open  court,  which  I  have  already  mentioned ; a 
but  rejected  one  attainting  Tunstal  bishop  of  Durham 
for  misprision  of  treason,  and  were  hardly  brought  to  grant  a 
subsidy.8  Their  conduct  in  the  two  former  instances,  and 
probably  in  the  third,  must  be  attributed  to  the  indignation 
that  was  generally  felt  at  the  usurped  power  of  Northumber- 
land, and  the  untimely  fate  of  Somerset.  Several  cases  of 
similar  unwillingness  to  go  along  with  court  measures  oc- 
curred under  Mary.  She  dissolved,  in  fact,  her  two  first  par- 
liaments on  this  account.  But  the  third  was  far  from  obse- 
quious, and  rejected  several  of  her  favorite  bills.4  'Two 

was  at  least  too  dangerous  to  be  left  after  her  resolution  was  taken,  became 

at  liberty.    Noailles  intrigued  with  the  its  strenuous  supporter  in  public.     For 

malecontents,  and  instigated  the  rebellion  the  detestation  in  which  the  queen  was 

of  Wyatt,  of  which  Dr.  Lingard  gives  a  hold,  see  the  letters  of  Noailles,  passim; 

very  interesting  account.    Carte,  indeed,  but  with   some  degree  of  allowance  for 

differs  from  him   iti  many  of  these  eir-  his  own  antipathy  to  her. 

cumstances,   though    writing    from   the  l  Burnet,   i.   117.      The  king  refused 

same  source,  and  particularly  denies  that  his  assent  to  a  bill  which  had  passed  both 

Noailles    gave    any     encouragement    to  houses,  but  apparently  not  of  a  political 

Wyatt.     It  is,  however,  evident  from  the  nature.     Lords'  Journals,  p.  162. 

tenor  of  his  despatches  that  he  had  gone  8  Burnet,  190. 

great  lengths  in  fomenting  the  discon-  3  Id.  195,  215.  This  was  the  par- 
tent,  and  was  evidently  desirous  of  the  liament,  in  order  to  secure  favorable 
Success  of  the  insurrection,  iii.  36,48,  &c.  elections  for  which  the  council  had  writ- 
THs  critical  state  of  the  government  may  ten  letters  to  the  sheriffs.  These  do  not 
furnish  the  usual  excuse  for  its  rigor,  appear  to  have  availed  so  much  as  they 
But  its  unpopularity  was  brought  on  by  might  hope. 

Mary's  breach  of  her  word  as  to  religion,  *  Carte,  311,  322.   Noailles.  v.  252.    He 

and  still  more  by  her  obstinacy  in  form-  says  that  she  committed  some   knights 

ing  her  union  with   Philip,  against  the  to  the  Tower  for  their  language  in  the 

general   voice    of   the   nation,  and    the  house.  Id.  247.  Burnet,  p.  324,  mentions 

opposition  of  Gardiner  j  who.  however,  the  same. 


58  COURT  ERECTS   NEW  BOROUGHS.  CHAP.  I. 

reasons  principally  contributed  to  this  opposition  :  the  one, 
a  fear  of  entailing  upon  the  country  those  numerous  exac- 
tions of  which  so  many  generations  had  complained,  by  re- 
viving the  papal  supremacy,  and  more  especially  of  a  resto- 
ration of  abbey  lands ;  the  other,  an  extreme  repugnance  to 
the  queen's  Spanish  connection.1  If  Mary  could  have  ob- 
tained the  consent  of  parliament,  she  would  have  settled  the 
crown  on  her  husband,  and  sent  her  sister,  perhaps,  to  the 
scaffold.2 

There  cannot  be  a  stronger  proof  of  the  increased  weight 
Attempt        °f  tue  commons  during  these  reigns  than  the  anx- 
iety of  the  court  to    obtain    favorable    elections, 
strengthen     Many  ancient  boroughs,  undoubtedly,  have  at  no 
itself  by         period  possessed  sufficient  importance  to  deserve 

creating  *"  f  . 

new  the  elective  franchise  on  the   score  of  their  riches 

roughs.  or  population ;  and  it  is  most  likely  that  some 
temporary  interest  or  partiality,  which  cannot  now  be  traced, 
first  caused  a  writ  to  be  addressed  to  them.  But  there  is 
much  reason  to  conclude  that  the  councillors  of  Edward 
VI.,  in  erecting  new  boroughs,  acted  upon  a  deliberate  plan 
of  strengthening  their  influence  among  the  commons.  Twen- 
ty-two boroughs  were  created  or  restored  in  this  short  reign  ; 
some  of  them,  indeed,  places  of  much  consideration,  but  not 
less  than  seven  in  Cornwall,  and  several  others  that  appear 
to  have  been  insignificant.  Mary  added  fourteen  to  the 
number ;  and  as  the  same  course  was  pursued  under  Eliza- 
beth, we  in  fact  owe  a  great  part  of  that  irregularity  in  our 
popular  representation,  the  advantages  or  evils  of  which  we 
need  not  here  discuss,  less  to  changes  wrought  by  time,  than 
tc  deliberate  and  not  very  constitutional  policy.  Nor  did  the 
government  scruple  a  direct  and  avowed  interference  with 
elections.  A  circular  letter  of  Edward  to  all  the  sheriffs 
commands  them  to  give  notice  to  the  freeholders,  citizens, 
and  burgesses,  within  their  respective  counties,  "  that  our 

1  Burnet,  322.     Carte,  296.    Noailles  putatione  aerf,  et  summo  labore  fidelium 

gays  that  a  third  part  of  the  commons  in  factuin   est."     Lingard,  Carte,    Philips's 

Mary's  first  parliament  was  hostile  to  the  Life  of  Pole.     Noailles  speaks  repeatedly 

repeal  of  Edward's   laws  about  religion,  of  the  strength  of  the  protestant  party, 

unii  that,  t.he  iii.tmtn<  laatort  a  week,  U.  and  of  the  enmity  which   the   English 


HEN.  VII.  TO  MARY.     TUDOR  PREROGATIVE.  59 

pleasure  and  commandment  is,  that  they  shall  choose  and  ap- 
point, as  nigh  as  they  possibly  may,  men  of  knowledge  and 
experience  within  the  counties,  cities,  and  boroughs;"  but 
nevertheless,  that  where  the  privy  council  should  "  recom- 
mend men  of  learning  and  wisdom,  in  such  case  their  di- 
rections be  regarded  and  followed."  Several  persons  ac- 
cordingly were  recommended  by  letters  to  the  sheriffs,  and 
elected  as  knights  for  different  shires  ;  all  of  whom  belonged 
to  the  court,  or  were  in  places  of  trust  about  the  king.1  It 
appears  probable  that  persons  in  office  formed  at  all  times  a 
very  considerable  portion  of  the  hou?e  of  commons.  An- 
other circular  of  Mary  before  the  parliament  of  1554,  direct- 
ing the  sheriffs  to  admonish  the  electors  to  choose  good 
catholics  and  "  inhabitants,  as  the  old  laws  require,"  is  much 
less  unconstitutional;  but  the  earl  of  Sussex,  one  of  her 
most  active  councillors,  wrote  to  the  gentlemen  of  Norfolk, 
and  to  the  burgesses  of  Yarmouth,  requesting  them  to  re- 
serve their  voices  for  the  person  he  should  name.2  There^ 
is  reason  to  believe  that  the  court,  or  rather  the  imperial 
ambassador,  did  homage  to  the  power  of  the  commons,  by 
presents  of  money,  in  order  to  procure  their  support  of  the 
unpopular  marriage  with  Philip  ; 8  and  if  Noailles,  the  ambas- 
sador of  Henry  II.,  did  not  make  use  of  the  same  means  to 
thwart  the  grants  of  subsidy  and  other  measures  of  the  ad- 
ministration, he  was  at  least  very  active  in  promising  the 
succor  of  France,  and  animating  the  patriotism  of  those  un- 
known leaders  of  that  assembly,  who  withstood  the  design 
of  a  besotted  woman  and  her  unprincipled  councillors  to 
transfer  this  kingdom  under  the  yoke  of  Spain.4 

It  appears  to  be  a  very  natural  inquiry,  after  beholding  the 
course  of  administration  under  the  Tudor  line,  by  what 
means  a  government  so  violent  in  itself,  and  so  plainly 
inconsistent  with  the  acknowledged  laws,  could  be  main- 
tained ;  and  what  had  become  of  that  English  causes  of 
spirit  which  had  not  only  controlled  such  injudicious  tae  hish 

•  T   i  i  T»-    i        j   TT     v.    .1       -j.il.       j  j.i      prerogative 

princes  as  John  and  liichard  II.,  but  withstood  the  Of  the 
first  and    third  Edward  in    the  fulness  of  their  Tudors- 

1  Strype,  ii.  394.  Mary's  counsellors,  the  Pagets  and  Arun- 

2  Id.  iii.  155.     Burnet,  ii.  228.  dels,  the  most  worthless  of  mankind.  We 
*  Burnet,  ii.  262,  277.  are,  in  fact,  greatly  indebted  to  Noailles 
<  Nosiillcs,   v.   190.     Of  the  truth  of     for  his  spirited  activity,  which   contrib- 

this  plot  there  can  be  no  rational  ground  uted,  in  a  high  degree,  to  secure  both 
to  doubt ;  even  Dr.  Lingard  has  nothing  the  protestant  religion  and  the  national 
to  advance  against  it  but  the  assertion  of  independence  of  our  ancestors. 


60  TUDOR  PREROGATIVE.  CHAP.  I 

pride  and  glory.  Not,  indeed,  that  the  excesses  of  preroga- 
tive had  ever  been  thoroughly  restrained,  or  that,  if  the 
memorials  of  earlier  ages  had  been  as  carefully  preserved 
as  those  of  the  sixteenth  century,  we  might  not  possibly  find 
in  them  equally  flagrant  instances  of  oppression ;  but  still 
the  petitions  of  parliament  and  frequent  statutes  remain  on 
record,  bearing  witness  to  our  constitutional  law,  and  to  the 
energy  that  gave  it  birth.  There  had  evidently  been  a  ret- 
rograde tendency  towards  absolute  monarchy  between  the 
reigns  of  Henry  VI.  and  Henry  VIII.  Nor  could  this  be 
attributed  to  the  common  engine  of  despotism,  a  military 
force.  For,  except  the  yeomen  of  the  guard,  fifty  in  num- 
ber, and  the  common  servants  of  the  king's  household,  there 
was  not,  in  time  of  peace,  an  armed  man  receiving  pay 
throughout  England.1  A  government  that  ruled  by  intim- 
idation was  absolutely  destitute  of  force  to  intimidate.  Hence 
risings  of  the  mere  commonalty  were  sometimes  highly  dan- 
gerous, and  lasted  much  longer  than  ordinary.  A  rabble  of 
Cornishmen,  in  the  reign  of  Henry  VII.,  headed  by  a  black- 
smith, marched  up  from  their  own  county  to  the  suburbs  of 
London  without  resistance.  The  insurrections  of  1525  in 
consequence  of  "Wolsey's  illegal  taxation,  those  of  the  north 
ten  years  afterwards,  wherein,  indeed,  some  men  of  higher 
quality  were  engaged,  and  those  which  broke  out  simultane- 
ously in  several  counties  under  Edward  VI.,  excited  a  well- 
grounded  alarm  in  the  country,  and  in  the  two  latter  in- 
stances were  not  quelled  without  much  time  and  exertion. 
The  reproach  of  servility  and  patient  acquiescence  under 
usurped  power  falls  not  on  the  English  people,  but  on  its 
natural  leaders.  We  have  seen,  indeed,  that  the  house  of 
commons  now  and  then  gave  signs  of  an  independent  spirit, 
and  occasioned  more  trouble,  even  to  Henry  VIII.,  than  his 
compliant  nobility.  They  yielded  to  every  mandate  of  his 
imperious  will ;  they  bent  with  every  breath  of  his  capri- 
cious humor;  they  are  responsible  for  the  illegal  trial,  for 
the  iniquitous  attainder,  for  the  sanguinary  statute,  for  the 
tyranny  which  they  sanctioned  by  law,  and  for  that  which 
they  permitted  to  subsist  without  law.  Nor  was  this  selfish 
and  pusillanimous  subserviency  more  characteristic  of  the 

1  Henry  VII.  first  established  a  band  the  gendarmerie  of  France  ;  but  on  ac- 

of  fifty  archers  to  wait  on  him.     Henry  count,  probably,  of  the  expense  it  occa- 

VIII.  had  fifty  horse-guards,  each  with  sioned,  their  equipment  being  too  mag- 

au  archer,  demilance,  and  couteiller,  like  nificent,  this  soon  was  given  up. 


HEN.  VII.  TO  MARY.         STAE-CHAMBER.  61 

minions  of  Henry's  favor,  the  Crom wells,  the  Riches,  the 
Pagets,  the  Russells,  and  the  Powletts,  than  of  the  repre- 
sentatives of  ancient  and  honorable  houses,  the  Howards, 
the  Fitz-Allans,  and  the  Talbots.  We  trace  the  noble  states- 
men of  those  reigns  concurring  in  all  the  inconsistencies  of 
their  revolutions,  supporting  all  the  religions  of  Henry,  Ed- 
ward, Mary,  and  Elizabeth  ;  adjudging  the  death  of  Somer- 
set to  gratify  Northumberland,  and  of  Northumberland  to 
redeem  their  participation  in  his  fault,  setting  up  the  usur- 
pation of  lady  Jane,  and  abandoning  her  on  the  first  doubt 
of  success,  constant  only  in  the  rapacious  acquisition  of  es- 
tates and  honors,  from  whatever  source,  and  in  adherence  to 
the  present  power. 

I  have  noticed  in  a  former  work  that  illegal  and  arbitrary 
jurisdiction  exercised  by  the  council,  which,  in  jurisdiction 
despite  of  several  positive  statutes,  continued  in  a  of  the., 

i  i  j.1.  u      11    ^i  •     i      j?  council  of 

greater  or  less  degree,  through  all  the  period  of  star- 
the  Plantagenet  family,  to  deprive  the  subject,  in  chamber- 
many  criminal  charges,  of  that  sacred  privilege,  trial  by 
his  peers.1  This  usurped  jurisdiction,  carried  much  further, 
and  exercised  more  vigorously,  was  the  principal  grievance 
under  the  Tudors ;  and  the  forced  submission  of  our  fore- 
fathers was  chiefly  owing  to  the  terrors  of  a  tribunal  which 
left  them  secure  from  no  infliction  but  public  execution,  or 
actual  dispossession  of  their  freeholds.  And,  though  it  was 
beyond  its  direct  province  to  pass  sentence  on  capital  charges, 
yet,  by  intimidating  jurors,  it  procured  convictions  which  it 
was  not  authorized  to  pronounce.  We  are  naturally  aston- 
ished at  the  easiness  with  which  verdicts  were  sometimes 
given  against  persons  accused  of  treason,  on  evidence  insuf- 
ficient to  support  the  charge  in  point  of  law,  or  in  its  nature 
not  competent  to  be  received,  or  unworthy  of  belief.  But 
this  is  explained  by  the  peril  that  hung  over  the  jury  in  case 
of  acquittal.  "  If,"  says  Sir  Thomas  Smith,  in  his  Treatise 
on  the  Commonwealth  of  England,  "  they  do  pronounce  not 
guilty  upon  the  prisoner,  against  whom  manifest  witness  is 
brought  in,  the  petitioner  escapeth,  but  the  twelve  are  not 
only  rebuked  by  the  judges,  but  also  threatened  of  punish- 
ment, and  many  times  commanded  to  appear  in  the  star- 

i  View  of  Middle  Ages,  ch.  8.     I  must  and   the  concilium  ordinarium,  as  lord 

here  acknowledge  that  I  did  not  make  the  Hale  calls  it,   which  alone  exercised  ju- 

requiMte  distinction  between  the  conoili-  ri.sdiction. 
um  secretuiu,  or  privy  council  of  state, 


62  STAR-CHAMBER.  CHAT.  L 

chamber,  or  before  the  privy  council,  for  the  matter.  But 
this  threatening  chanceth  oftener  than  the  execution  thereof; 
and  the  twelve  answer  with  most  gentle  words,  they  did 
it  according  to  their  consciences,  and  pray  the  judges  to 
be  good  unto  them;  they  did  as  they  thought  right,  and 
as  they  accorded  all;  and  so  it  passeth  away  for  the 
most  part.  Yet  I  have  seen  in  my  time,  but  not  in  the 
reign  of  the  king  now  [Elizabeth],  that  an  inquest,  for 
pronouncing  one  not  guilty  of  treason  contrary  to  such  evi- 
dence as  was  brought  in,  were  not  only  imprisoned  for  a 
space,  but  a  large  fine  set  upon  their  heads,  which  they 
were  fain  to  pay;  another  inquest,  for  acquitting  another, 
beside  paying  a  fine,  were  put  to  open  ignominy  and  shame. 
But  these  doings  were  even  then  accounted  of  many  for  vio- 
lent, tyrannical,  and  contrary  to  the  liberty  and  custom  of 
the  realm  of  England."1  One  of  the  instances  to  which  he 
alludes  was  probably  that  of  the  jury  who  acquitted  Sir 
Nicholas  Throckmorton  in  the  second  year  of  Mary.  He 
had  conducted  his  own  defence  with  singular  boldness  and 
dexterity.  On  delivering  their  verdict,  the  court  committed 
them  to  prison.  Four,  having  acknowledged  their  offence, 
were  soon  released  ;  but  the  rest,  attempting  to  justify  them- 
selves before  the  council,  were  sentenced  to  pay  some  a  fine 
of  two  thousand  pounds,  some  of  one  thousand  marks ;  a  part 
of  which  seems  ultimately  to  have  been  remitted.2 

It  is  here  to  be  observed  that  the  council  of  which  we 
have  iust  heard,  or  as  lord   Hale  denominates  it 

This  not  ,  ,         J.  ,  TIT  /•         i  i  r.    -, 

the  same  (though  rather,  I  believe,  for  the  sake  of  disfanc- 
courtthe  ti°n  than  upon  any  ancient  authority),  the  king's 
erected  by  ordinary  council,  was  something  different  from  the 
privy  council,  with  which  several  modern  writers 
are  apt  to  confound  it;  that  is,  the  court  of  jurisdiction  is  to 
be  distinguished  from  the  deliberative  body,  the  advisers  of  the 

1  Commonwealth  of  England,  book  3,  wicke  Papers,  i.  46)  at  the  time  of  th« 

c.  1.    The  statute  26  H.  8,  c.  4,  enacts  Yorkshire    rebellion  in  1536,  he  is  di- 

that  if  a  jury  in  Wales  acquit  a  felon,  rected   to   question   the   jury   who   had 

contrary  to  good  and  pregnant  evidence,  acquitted  a  particular  person,  in  order  to 

or  otherwise  misbehave  themselves,  the  discover  their  motive.     Norfolk  sceuis  to 

ju<l<,'i'  may  bind  thorn  to  appear  before  have  objected   to  this  fora  good  reason, 

the  president  and  council  of  the  Welsh  "  least   the  fear   thereof  might   trouble 

marches.    The  partiality  of  Welsh  jurors  others  in  the  like  case."    But  it  may  not 

was  notorious  in  that  age ;  and  the  re-  be  uncandid  to  ascribe  this   rather  to  a 

proach  has  not  quite  ceased.  leaning  towards  the  insurgents  than  a 

-  Stiite  Trials,  i    901.    Strype,  ii.  120.  constitutional  principle. 
In  a  latter  to  the  Duke  of  Norfolk  (Hard- 


HEN.  VII.  TO  MART.         STAR-CHAMBER.  63 

crown.  Every  privy  councillor  belonging  to  the  concilium 
ordinariimi  ;  but  the  chief  justices,  and  perhaps  several 
others  who  sat  in  the  latter  (not  to  mention  all  temporal  and 
spiritual  peers,  who,  in  the  opinion  at  least  of  some,  had 
a  right  of  suffrage  therein),  were  not  necessarily  of  the 
former  body.1  This  cannot  be  called  in  question,  without 
either  charging  lord  Coke,  lord  Hale,  and  other  writers  on 
the  subject,  with  ignorance  of  what  existed  in  their  own  age, 
or  gratuitously  supposing  that  an  entirely  novel  tribunal 
sprang  up  in  the  sixteenth  century,  under  the  name  of  the 
star-chamber.  It  has  -  indeed  been  often  assumed,  that  a 
statute  enacted  early  in  the  reign  of  Henry  VII,  gave  the 
first  legal  authority  to  the  criminal  jurisdiction  exercised  by 
that  famous  court,  which  in  reality  was  nothing  else  but  an- 
other name  for  the  ancient  concilium  regis,  of  which  our 
records  are  full,  and  whose  encroachments  so  many  statutes 
had  endeavored  to  repress ;  a  name  derived  from  the  cham- 
ber wherein  it  sat,  and  which  is  found  in  many  precedents 
before  the  time  of  Henry  VII.,  though  not  so  specially  ap- 
plied to  the  council  of  judicature  as  afterwards.2  The  statute 
of  this  reign  has  a  much  more  limited  operation.  I  have 

1  Hale's    Jurisdiction    of  the    Lords'  the  calling  of  them  in  that  case  was  not 

House,  p.  5.     Coke,  4th  Inst.  65,  where  made  legitimate  by  any  act  of  parliament; 

we   have    the  following   passage: — "So  neither  without   their    right   were   they 

this  court,  [the  court  of  star-chamber,  as  more  apt  to  be  judges  than  any  other  in 

the  concilium   was   then  called,]  being  ferior  persons  in  the  kingdom  ;  and  yet 

holden  corain  rege  et  concilio,  it  is,  or  I  doubt  not  but  it  resteth  in  the  king's 

may   be,   compounded  of   three  several  pleasure  to  restrain  any  man  from  that 

councils  ;  that  is  to  say,  of  the  lords  and  table,  as  well  as  he  may  any  of  his  council 

others  of    his   majesty's   privy   council,  from  the  board."     Collectanea  Juridica, 

always  judges  without  appointment,  as  ii.  p.  24.     He  says  also,  that  it  was  de- 

before  it  appeareth.     2.  The  judges  of  murrablefor  a  bill  to  pray  process  against 

either  bench  and  barons  of  the  exchequer  the  defendant,  to  appear  before  the  king 

are  of  the  king's  council,  for  matters  of  and  his  privy  council.     Ibid, 
law,  &c. ;  and  the  two  chief  justices,  or        2  The  privy  council  sometimes  met  in 

in  their  absence  other  two  justices,  are  the  star-chamber,  and  made  orders.    Sea 

standing  judges  of  this  court.     3.  The  one  in  18  H.  6.     Harl.  MSS.   Catalogue, 

lords  of  parliament  are  properly  de  magno  N.  1878,  fol.  20.     So  the  statute  21  H.  8, 

concilio   regis  ;    but  neither   those,   not  c.  16,  recites  a  decree  by  Ike  king's  council 

being  of  the  king's  privy  council,  nor  any  in  his  star-chamber,  that  no  alien  artifice! 

of  the  rest  of  the  judges  or  barons  of  the  shall  keep  more  than  two  alien  servants, 

exchequer,   are   standing  judges   of  the  and  other  matters  of   the   same   kind, 

court."    But  Hudson,  in  his  Treatise  of  This  could  no  way  belong  to  the  court 

the  Court  of  Star-Chain  her,  written  about  of  star-chamber,   which  was  a  judicial 

the  end    of    James's  reign,   inclines   to  tribunal. 

think  that  all  peers  had  a  right  of  sitting        It  should  be  remarked,  though  not  to 

in  the  court  of  star-chamber;  there  being  our  immediate  purpose,  that  this  decree 

several   instances  where  some  who  were  was  supposed  to  require  an  act  of  par- 

not  of  the  council  of  state  were  present  liament  for  its  confirmation  :  so  far  was 

and  gave  judgment  as  in  the  case  of  Mr.  the  government  of  Hcury  VIII.  from  ar- 

DavUon,   "and  how  they  were  complete  rogating  a  legislative  power  in  matters 

judges  unsworn,  it"  not  by   their   native  of  private  right. 
right,  I  cannot  comprehend;  for  surely 


64         •  STAR-CHAMBER.  CHAP.  I. 

observed  in  another  work,  that  the  coercive  jurisdiction  of 
the  council  had  great  convenience,  in  cases  where  the  or- 
dinary course  of  justice  was  so  much  obstructed  by  one 
party,  through  writs,  combinations  of  maintenance,  or  over- 
awing influence,  that  no  inferior  court  would  find  its  process 
obeyed ;  and  that  such  seem  to  have  been  reckoned  necessary 
exceptions  from  the  statutes  which  restrain  its  interference. 
The  act  of  3  II.  7,  c:  1,  appears  intended  to  place  on  a  law- 
ful and  permanent  basis  the  jurisdiction  of  the  council,  or 
rather  a  part  of  the  council,  over  this  peculiar  class  of 
offences  ;  and  after  reciting  the  combinations  supported  by 
giving  liveries,  and  by  indentures  or  promises,  the  partiality 
of  sheriffs  in  making  panels,  and  in  untrue  returns,  the  taking 
of  money  by  juries,  the  great  riots  and  unlawful  assemblies, 
which  almost  annihilated  the  fair  administration  of  justice, 
empowers  the  chancellor,  treasurer,  and  keeper  of  the  privy 
seal,  or  any  two  of  them,  with  a  bishop  and  temporal  lord  of 
the  council,  and  the  chief  justices  of  king's  bench  and  com- 
mon pleas,  or  two  other  justices  in  their  absence,  to  call  be- 
fore them  such  as  offended  in  the  before-mentioned  respects, 
and  to  punish  them  after  examination  in  such  manner  as  if 
they  had  been  convicted  by  course  of  law.  But  this  statute, 
if  it  renders  legal  a  jurisdiction  which  had  long  been  exercised 
with  much  advantage,  must  be  allowed  to  limit  the  persons 
in  whom  it  should  reside,  and  certainly  does  not  convey  by 
any  implication  more  extensive  functions  over  a  different 
description  of  misdemeanors.  By  a  later  act,  21  H.  8,  c.  20, 
the  president  of  the  council  is  added  to  the  judges  of  this 
court ;  a  decisive  proof  that  it  still  existed  as  a  tribunal  per- 
fectly distinct  from  the  council  itself.  But  it  is  not  styled  by 
the  name  of  star-chamber  in  this,  any  more  than  in  the  pre- 
ceding statute.  It  is  very  difficult,  I  believe,  to  determine  at 
what  time  the  jurisdiction  legally  vested  in  this  new  court, 
and  still  exercised  by  it  forty  years  afterwards,  fell  silently 
into  the  hands  of  the  body  of  the  council,  and  was  extended 
by  them  so  far  beyond  the  boundaries  assigned  by  law,  under 
the  appellation  of  the  court  of  star-chamber.  Sir  Thomas 
Smith,  writing  in  the  early  part  of  Elizabeth's  reign,  while 
he  does  not  advert  to  the  former  court,  speaks  of  the  ju- 
risdiction of  the  latter  as  fully  established,  and  ascribes  the 
whole  praise  (and  to  a  certain  degree  it  was  matter  of  praise) 
to  Cardinal  Wolsey. 


HEN.  VII.  TO  MARY. 


STAR-CHAMBER. 


65 


The  celebrated  statute  of  31  H.  8,  c.  8,  which  gives  the 
king's  proclamations,  to  a  certain  extent,  the  force  of  acts  of 
parliament,  enacts  that  offenders  convicted  of  breaking  such 
proclamations  before  certain  persons  enumerated  therein 
(being  apparently  the  usual  officers  of  the  privy  council,  to- 
gether with  some  bishops  and  judges),  "in  the  star-chamber 
or  elsewhere,"  shall  suffer  s«ch  penalties  of  fine  and  im- 
prisonment as  they  shall  adjudge.  "It  is  the  effect  of  this 
court,"  Smith  says,  "to  bridle  such  stout  noblemen  or  gen- 
tlemen which  would  offer  wrong  by  force  to  any  manner  of 
men,  and  cannot  be  content  to  demand  or  defend  the  right  by 
order  of  the  law.  It  began  long  before,  but  took  augmenta- 
tion and  authority  at  that  time  that  cardinal  Wolsey,  arch- 
bishop of  York,  was  chancellor  of  England,  who  of  some 
was  thought  to  have  first  devised  that  court,  because  that  he, 
after  some  intermission,  by  negligence  of  time,  augmented 
the  authority  of  it, 1  which  was  at  that  time  marvellous  ne- 


1  Lord  Hale  thinks  that  the  jurisdiction 
of  the  council  was  gradually  "  brought 
Into  great  disuse,  though  there  remain 
some  straggling  footsteps  of  their  pro- 
ceedings till  near  3  H.  7,"  p.  88.  "  The 
continual  complaints  of  the  commons 
against  the  proceedings  before  the  council 
in  causes  civil  or  criminal,  although  they 
did  not  always  attain  their  concession, 
yet  brought  a  disreputation  upon  the 
proceedings  of  the  council,  as  contrary 
to  Magua  Chartaaud  the  known  laws,'' 
p.  39.  He  seems  to  admit  afterwards, 
however,  that  many  instances  of  pro- 
ceedings before  them  in  criminal  causes 
might  be  added  to  those  mentioned  by 
lord  Coke,  p.  43. 

The  paucity  of  records  about  the  time 
of  Edward  IV.  renders  the  negative  ar- 
gument rather  weak :  but  from  the  ex- 
pression of  sir  Thomas  Smith  in  the 
text,  it  may  perhaps  be  inferred  that  the 
council  had  intermitted  in  a  considerable 
degree,  though  not  absolutely  disused, 
their  exercise  of  jurisdiction  for  some 
time  before  the  accession  of  the  house  of 
Tudor. 

Mr.  Brodie,  in  his  History  of  the 
British  Empire  under  Charles  I.,  i.  158, 
has  treated  at  considerable  length,  and 
with  much  acuteness,  this  subject  of  the 
antiquity  of  the  star-chamber.  I  do  not 
coincide  in  all  his  positions ;  but  the 
only  one  very  important  is  that  wherein 
we  fully  agree  that  its  jurisdiction  was 
chiefly  usurped,  as  well  as  tyrannical. 

I  will  here  observe  that  this  part  of 
curaucientcoustitutioual  history  is  likely 
VOL.  I.  —  0.  5 


to  be  elucidated  by  a  friend  of  my  own, 
who  has  already  given  evidence  to  the 
world  of  his  singular  competence  for  such 
an  undertaking,  and  who  unites,  with  all 
the  learning  and  diligence  of  Spelman, 
Prvnno.  and  Maddox.  an  acuteness  and 
vivacity  of  intellect  which  none  of  those 
writers  possessed.  —  [1827.]  [This  has 
since  been  done  in  "  An  Essay  upon  tho 
Original  Authority  of  the  King's  Coun- 
cil, by  sir  Francis  Palgrave,  K.  H.," 
1834.  The  "  Proceedings  and  Ordinances 
of  the  Privy  Council  of  England,"  pub- 
lished by  sir  Harris  Nicolas,  contain  the 
transactions  of  that  body  from  10  Kic.  II. 
(1387)  to  13  Hen.  VI.  (1435),  with  some 
scattered  entries  for  the  rest  of  the  lat- 
ter reign.  They  recommence  in  1540. 
And  a  material  change  appears  to  have 
occurred,  doubtless  through  \Volsey,  in 
the  latter  years  of  the  interval  ;  the 
privy  council  exercising  the  same  arbi- 
trary and  penal  jurisdiction,  or  nearly 
such,  as  the  concilium  ordinarium  had. 
done  with  so  much  odium  under  Edw. 
III.  and  Kic.  II.  There  may  possibly  be 
a  very  few  instances  of  this  before,  to  be 
traced  in  the  early  volumes  of  the  Pro- 
ceedings ;  but  from  1540  to  1547  the 
course  of  the  privy  council  is  just  like 
that  of  the  star-chamber,  as  sir  Tuonias 
Smith  intimates  in  the  passage  above 
quoted  (p.  48);  and  in  fact  considerably 
more  unconstitutional  and  dangerous, 
from  there  being  no  admixture  of  the 
judges  to  keep  up  some  regard  to  law.  — 
1845.] 


G6  STAR-CHAMBER.  CHAP-  L 

cessary  to  do  to  repress  the  insolency  of  the  noblemen  and 
gentlemen  in  the  north  parts  of  England,  who  being  far  from 
the  king  and  the  seat  of  justice,  made  almost,  as  it  were,  an 
ordinary  war  among  themselves,  and  made  their  force  their 
law,  binding  themselves,  with  their  tenants  and  servants,  to 
do  or  revenge  an  injury  one  against  another  as  they  listed. 
This  thing  seemed  not  supportable  to  the  noble  prince  Henry 
VIII. ;  and  sending  for  them  one  after  another  to  his  court, 
to  answer  before  the  persons  before  named,  after  they  had 
remonstrance  showed  them  of  their  evil  demeanor,  and  been 
well  disciplined,  as  well  by  words  as  by  fleeting  [confinement 
in  the  Fleet  prison]  a  while,  and  thereby  their  pride  and 
courage  somewhat  assuaged,  they  began  to  range  themselves 
in  order,  and  to  understand  that  they  had  a  prince  who  would 
rule  his  subjects  by  his  law  and  obedience.  Since  that  time 
this  court  has  been  in  more  estimation,  and  is  continued  to 
this  day  in  manner  as  I  have  said  before."1  But,  as  the 
court  erected  by  the  statute  of  Henry  VII.  appears  to  have 
been  in  activity  as  late  as  the  fall  of  cardinal  Wolsey,  and 
exercised  its  jurisdiction  over  precisely  that  class  of  of- 
fences which  Smith  here  describes,  it  may  perhaps  be  more 
likely  that  it  did  not  wholly  merge  in  the  general  body  of 
the  council  till  the  minority  of  Edward,  when  that  oligarchy 
became  almost  independent  and  supreme.  It  is  obvious  that 
most,  if  not  all,  of  the  judges  in  the  court  held  under  that 
statute  were  members  of  the  council ;  so  that  it  might,  in  a 
certain  sense,  be  considered  as  a  committee  from  that  body, 
who  had  long  before  been  wont  to  interfere  with  the  punish- 
ment of  similar  misdemeanors.  And  the  distinction  was  so 
soon  forgotten,  that  the  judges  of  the  king's  bench  in  the 
13th  of  Elizabeth  cite  a  case  from  the  year-book  of  8  H.  7, 
as  "  concerning  the  star-chamber,"  which  related  to  thr.  lim- 
ited court  erected  by  the  statute.2 

In  this  half-barbarous  state  of  manners  we  certainly  dis- 
cover an  apology,  as  well  as  motive,  for  the  council's  iuter- 

1  Commonwealth  of  England,  book  3,  the  year-book  itself,  8  H.  7,  pi.  ult.,  the 

c.  4.  We  find  sir  Robert  Sheffield  in  word  star-chamber  is  not  used.  It  is 

1517  "  put  into  the  Tower  again  for  the  held  in  this  case,  that  the  chancellor, 

complaint  he  made  to  the  king  of  my  treasurer,  and  privy  seal  were  the  only 

lord  Cardinal."  Lodge's  Illu stra tions.  i.,  judges,  and  the  rest  but  assistants.  Coke 

p.  27.  See  also  Hall,  p.  585,  for  Wol-  4  lust.  62,  denies  this  to  be  law  ;  but  ou 

sey's  strictness  in  punishing  the  "  lords,  no  better  grounds  than  that  the  practice 

knights,  and  men  of  all  sorts,  for  riots,  of  the  star-chamber,  that  is,  of  a  different 

bearing  and  maintenance."  tribunal,  was  uot  such. 

*  Plowden's  Commentaries,  393.      In 


HEN.  VII.  TO  MARY.        STAR-CHAMBER.  67 

ference  ;  for  it  is  rather  a  servile  worshipping  of  names  than 
a  rational  love  of  liberty  to  prefer  the  forms  of  trial  to  the 
attainment  of  justice,  or  to  fancy  that  verdicts  obtained  by 
violence  or  corruption  are  at  all  less  iniquitous  than  the  vio- 
lent or  corrupt  sentences  of  a  court.  But  there  were  many 
cases  wherein  neither  the  necessity  of  circumstances  nor  the 
legal  sanction  of  any  statute  could  excuse  the  jurisdiction 
habitually  exercised  by  the  court  of  star-chamber.  Lord 
Bacon  takes  occasion  from  the  act  of  Henry  VII.  to  descant 
on  the  sage  and  noble  institution,  as  he  terms  it,  of  that  court 
whose  walls  had  been  so  often  witnesses  to  the  degradation 
of  his  own  mind.  It  took  cognizance  principally,  he  tells  us, 
of  four  kinds  of  causes,  "  forces,  frauds,  crimes,  various  of 
stellionate,  and  the  indications  or  middle  acts  towards  crimes, 
capital  or  heinous,  not  actually  committed  or  perpetrated."  1 
Sir  Thomas  Smith  uses  expressions  less  indefinite  than  these 
last ;  and  specifies  scandalous  reports  of  persons  in  power, 
and  seditious  news,  as  offences  which  they  were  accustomed 
to  punish.  We  shall  find  abundant  proofs  of  this  department 
of  their  functions  in  the  succeeding  reigns.  But  this  was  in 
violation  of  many  ancient  laws,  and  not  in  the  least  sup- 
ported by  that  of  Henry  VII.2 

A  tribunal   so  vigilant   and   severe  as   that  of  the  star- 
chamber,  proceeding   by  modes  of  interrogatory  Influence 
unknown   to   the   common  law,  and  possessing  a  of  the 

j-          ..  n  n  j  •          •  authority 

discretionary  power  of  fine  and  imprisonment,  was  Of  the  star- 
easily  able  to  quell  any  private  opposition  or  con-  chamber  in 
tumacy.   We  have  seen  how  the  council  dealt  with  the  royal 
those  who  refused  to  lend  money  by  way  of  be-  P°wer- 
nevolence,  and  with  the  juries  who  found  verdicts  that  they 
disapproved.     Those   that   did  not  yield   obedience  to  their 
proclamations  were  not  likely  to  fare  better.     I  know  not 
whether  menaces  were  used  towards  members  of  the  com- 
mons who  took  part  against  the  crown ;  but  it  would  not  be 
unreasonable  to  believe  it,  or  at  least  that  a  man  of  moderate 

•    1  Hist,    of    Henry  VII.    in    Bacon's  reign,  but  not  long  afterwards  went  into 

Works,  ii.  p.  290.     "  disuse.     3.  The  court  of  star-chamber 

2  The  result  of  what  has  been  said  in  was    the     old     concilium     ordinarium, 

the  last  pages  may   be  summed  up   in  a  against  whose  jurisdiction  many  statutes 

few  propositions.     1.   The  court  erected  had  been  enacted  from  the  time   of  Ed- 

by  the  statute  of  3  Henry  VII.,  was  not  ward  III.     4.  No  part  of  the  jurisdiction 

the  court  of  star-chamber.     2.  This  court  exercised  by  the  star-chamber  could  hi 

by  the  statute  subsisted  in  full  force  till  maintained  on  the  authority  of  the  st? 

beyoud    the    middle   of   ilenry    VIII. 's  ute  of  Henry  VII. 


68  STAR-CHAMBER.  CHAP.  L 

courage  would  scarcely  care  to  expose  himself  to  the  resent- 
ment 'which  the  council  might  indulge  after  a  dissolution.  A 
knight  was  sent  to  the  Tower  by  Mary  for  his  conduct  in  par- 
liament;1 and  Henry  VIII.  is  reported,  not,  perhaps,  on  very 
certain  authority,  to  have  talked  of  cutting  off  the  heads  of 
refractory  commoners. 

In  the  persevering  struggles  of  earlier  parliaments  against 
Edward  III.,  Richard  II.,  and  Henry  IV.,  it  is  a  very  prob- 
able conjecture  that  many  considerable  peers  acted  in  union 
with,  and  encouraged  the  efforts  of,  the  commons.  But  in 
the  period  now  before  us  the  nobility  were  precisely  the  class 
most  deficient  in  that  constitutional  spirit  which  was  far  from 
being  extinct  in  those  below  them.  They  knew  what  havoc 
had  been  made  among  their  fathers  by  multiplied  attainders 
during  the  rivalry  of  the  two  roses.  They  had  seen  terrible 
examples  of  the  danger  of  giving  umbrage  to  a  jealous  court, 
in  the  fate  of  lord  Stanley  and  the  duke  of  Buckingham,  both 
condemned  on  slight  evidence  of  treacherous  friends  and  ser- 
vants, from  whom  no  man  could  be  secure.  Though  rigor 
and  cruelty  tend  frequently  to  overturn  the  government  of 
feeble  princes,  it  is  unfortunately  too  true  that,  steadily  em- 
ployed and  combined  with  vigilance  and  courage,  they  are 
often  the  safest  policy  of  despotism.  A  single  suspicion  in 
the  dark  bosom  of  Henry  VII.,  a  single  cloud  of  wayward 
humor  in  his  son,  would  have  been  sufficient  to  send  the 
proudest  peer  of  England  to  the  dungeon  and  the  scaffold. 
Thus  a  life  of  eminent  services  in  the  field,  and  of  unceasing 
compliance  in  council,  could  not  rescue  the  duke  of  Norfolk 
from  the  effects  of  a  dislike  which  we  cannot  even  explain. 
Nor  were  the  nobles  of  this  age  more  held  in  subjection  by 
terror  than  by  the  still  baser  influence  of  gain.  Our  law  of 
forfeiture  was  well  devised  to  stimulate  as  well  as  to  deter  ; 
and  Henry  VHL,  better  pleased  to  slaughter  the  prey  than 
to  gorge  himself  with  the  carcass,  distributed  the  spoils  it 
brought  him  among  those  who  had  helped  in  the  chase.  The 
dissolution  of  monasteries  opened  a  more  abundant  source  of 
munificence;  every  courtier,  every  peer,  looked  for  an  in- 
crease of  wealth  from  grants  of  ecclesiastical  estates,  and 
naturally  thought  that  the  king's  favor  would  most  readily  be 
gained  by  an  implicit  conformity  to  his  will.  Nothing,  how- 

1  Buroet,  ii.  324. 


HEX.  VII.  TO  MARY.    JEALOUSY  OF  RELIGIOUS  PARTIES.     69 

ever,  seems  more  to  have  sustained  the  arbitrary  rule  of 
Henry  VIII.  than  the  jealousy  of  the  two  religious  parties 
formed  in  his  time,  and  who,  for  all  the  latter  years  Tendency 
of  his  life,  were  maintaining  a  doubtful  and  emu-  ^.^'j^0™ 
lous  contest  for  his  favor.    But  this  religious  contest,  the  same 
and  the  ultimate  establishment  of  the  reformation  end< 
are  events  far  too  important,  even  in  a  constitutional  history, 
to  be  treated  in  a  cursory  manner ;  and  as,  in  order  to  avoid 
transitions,  I  have  purposely  kept  them  out  of  sight  in  the 
present  chapter,  they  will   form  the  proper  subject  of  the 
next 


70  LOLLARDS.  CHAP.  II. 


CHAPTER  II. 

OK  THE  ENGLISH  CHURCH  UNDER  HENRY  VIII.,  EDWARD 
VI.,  AND  MARY. 

Btate  of  Public  Opinion  as  to  Religion  —  Henry  VIII.'s  Controversy  with  Luther  — 
His  Divorce  from  Catherine —  Separation  from  the  Church  of  Rome  —  Dissolution 
of  Monasteries  — Progress  of  the  Reformed  Doctrine  in  England  —  Its  Establish- 
ment under  Edward  —  Sketch  of  the  chief  points  of  Difference  between  the  two 
Religions  —  Opposition  made  by  part  of  the  Nation  —  Cranmer  —  His  Moderation 
in  introducing  changes  not  acceptable  to  the  Zealots—  Mary  —  Persecution  under 
her  —  Its  effect  rather  favorable  to  Protestantism. 

No  revolution  has  ever  been  more  gradually  prepared  than 

that  which  separated  almost  one  half  of  Europe 

p^ic1         from  the  communion  of  the  Roman  see  ;  nor  were 

opinion  as      Luther  and  Zwingle  any  more  than  occasional  in- 

rehgion.  struments  of  that  change,  which,  had  they  never 
existed,  would  at  no  great  distance  of  time  have  been  ef- 
fected under  the  names  of  some  other  reformers.  At  the 
beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century  the  learned  doubtfully 
and  with  caution,  the  ignorant  with  zeal  and  eagerness,  were 
tending  to  depart  from  the  faith  and  rites  which  authority 
prescribed.  But  probably  not  even  Germany  was  so  far 
advanced  on  this  course  as  England.  Almost  a  hundred 
and  fifty  years  before  Luther  nearly  the  same  doctrines  as  he 
taught  had  been  maintained  by  Wicliffe,  whose  disciples, 
usually  called  Lollards,  lasted  as  a  numerous,  though  obscure 
and  proscribed  sect,  till,  aided  by  the  confluence  of  foreign 
streams,  they  swelled  into  the  Protestant  Church  of  England. 
We  hear,  indeed,  little  of  them  during  some  part  of  the 
fifteenth  century,  for  they  generally  shunned  persecution ; 
and  it  is  chiefly  through  records  of  persecution  that  we 
learn  the  existence  of  heretics.  But  immediately  before  the 
name  of  Luther  was  known  they  seem  to  have  become  more 
numerous,  or  to  have  attracted  more  attention  ;  since  several 
persons  were  burned  for  heresy,  and  others  abjured  their  er- 
rors, in  the  first  years  of  Henry  VIII.'s  reign.  Some  of 
these  (as  usual  among  ignorant  men  engaging  in  religious 


REFORMATION.  IMMUNITY  OF  CLEKGY.  71 

speculations)  are  charged  with  very  absurd  notions ;  but  it 
is  not  so  material  to  observe  their  particular  tenets  as  the 
general  fact  that  an  inquisitive  and  sectarian  spirit  had  be- 
gun to  prevail. 

Those  who  took  little  interest  in  theological  questions,  or 
who  retained  an  attachment  to  the  faith  in  which  they  had 
been  educated,  were  in  general  not  less  offended  than  the 
Lollards  themselves  with  the  inordinate  opulence  and  en- 
croaching temper  of  the  clergy.  It  had  been  for  two  or 
three  centuries  the  policy  of  our  lawyers  to  restrain  these 
within  some  bounds.  No  ecclesiastical  privilege  had  occa- 
sioned such  dispute  or  proved  so  mischievous  as  the  immu- 
nity of  all  tonsured  persons  from  civil  punishment  for  crimes. 
It  was  a  material  improvement  in  the  law  under  Henry  VI. 
that,  instead  of  being  instantly  claimed  by  the  bishop  on  their 
arrest  for  any  criminal  charge,  they  were  compelled  to  plead 
'their  privilege  at  their  arraignment,  or  after  conviction.  Henry 
VII.  carried  this  much  farther,  by  enacting  that  clerks  con- 
victed of  felony  should  be  burned  in  the  hand.  And  in  1513 
(4  H.  8),  the  benefit  of  clergy  was  entirely  taken  away  from 
murderers  and  highway  robbers.  An  exemption  was  still 
preserved  for  priests,  deacons,  and  subdeacons.  But  this 
was  not  sufficient  to  satisfy  the  church,  who  had  been  accus- 
tomed to  shield  under  the  mantle  of  her  immunity  a  vast 
number  of  persons  in  the  lower  degrees  of  orders,  or  without 
any  orders  at  all ;  and  had  owed  no  small  part  'of  her  influ- 
ence to  those  who  derived  so  important  a  benefit  from  her 
protection.  Hence,  besides  violent  language  in  preaching 
against  this  statute,  the  convocation  attacked  one  Dr.  Stand- 
ish,  who  had  denied  the  divine  right  of  clerks  to  their  ex- 
emption from  temporal  jurisdiction.  The  temporal  courts 
naturally  defended  Standish ;  and  the  parliament  addressed 
the  king  to  support  him  against  the  malice  of  his  persecu- 
tors. Henry,  after  a  full  debate  between  the  opposite  par- 
ties in  his  presence,  thought  his  prerogative  concerned  in 
taking  the  same  side,  and  the  clergy  sustained  a  mortifying 
defeat.  About  the  same  time  a  citizen  of  London,  named 
Hun.  having  been  confined  on  a  charge  of  heresy  in  the 
bishop's  prison,  was  found  hanged  in  his  chamber ;  and 
though  this  was  asserted  to  be  his  own  act,  yet  the  bishop's 
chancellor  was  indicted  for  the  murder  on  such  vehement 
presumptions  that  he  would  infallibly  have  been  convicted. 


72  HENRY  VIII.  AND  LUTHER.  CHAP.  II. 

had  the  attorney-general  thought  fit  to  proceed  in  the  trial. 
This  occurring  at  the  same  time  with  the  affair  of  Standish, 
furnished  each  party  with  an  argument ;  for  the  clergy  main- 
tained that  they  should  have  no  chance  of  justice  in  a  tem- 
poral court ;  one  of  the  bishops  declaring  that  the  London 
juries  were  so  prejudiced  against  the  church  that  they  would 
find  Abel  guilty  of  the  murder  of  Cain.  Such  an  admission 
is  of  more  consequence  than  whether  Hun  died  by  his  own 
hands  or  those  of  a  clergyman ;  and  the  story  is  chiefly 
worth  remembering,  as  it  illustrates  the  popular  disposi- 
tion towards  those  who  had  once  been  the  objects  of  rev- 
erence.1 

Such  was  the  temper  of  England  when  Martin    Luther 
Henry  threw  down  his  gauntlet  of  defiance  against  the 

yni.'scon-    ancient  hierarchy  of  the    Catholic  church.     But, 

troversy  .  *'./.,  1-11 

with  ripe  as  a  great  portion  of  the  people  might  be  to 

applaud  the  efforts  of  this  reformer,  they  were 
viewed  with  no  approbation  by  their  sovereign.  Henry  had 
acquired  a  fair  portion  of  theological  learning,  and  on  read- 
ing one  of  Luther's  treatises,  was  not  only  shocked  at  its 
tenets,  but  undertook  to  refute  them  in  a  formal  answer.2 
Kings  who  divest  themselves  of  their  robes  to  mingle  among 
polemical  writers  have  not  perhaps  a  claim  to  much  defer- 
ence from  strangers ;  and  Luther,  intoxicated  with  arrogance, 
and  deeming  himself  a  more  prominent  individual  among 
the  human  species  than  any  monarch,  treated  Henry,  in  re- 
plying to  his  book,  with  the  rudeness  that  characterized  his 
temper.  A  few  years  afterwards  indeed  he  thought  proper 
to  write  a  letter  of  apology  for  the  language  he  had  held  tow- 
ards the  king ;  but  this  letter,  a  strange  medley  of  abjectness 
and  impertinence,  excited  only  contempt  in  Henry,  and  was 
published  by  him  with  a  severe  commentary.8  Whatever 

1  Bumet,  Reeves's  History  of  the  Law,  the  same  opinion.     The  king,  however, 

Iv.  p.  308.    The  contemporary  authority  in   his  answer  to  Luther's  apologetical 

is  Keilwey's  Reports.     Collier  disbelieves  letter,  where  this  was  insinuated,  declares 

the  murder  of  Hun  on  the  authority  of  it  to  be  his  own.     From  Henry's  general 

sir  Thomas  More ;  but  he  was  surely  a  character  and  proneness    to  theological 

prejudiced  apologist  of  the  clergy,  and  disputation,  it  may  be  inferred  that  he 

this  historian  is  hardly  less  so.  An  entry  had  at   least  a  considerable  share  in  the 

a  the  journals,  7  U.  8,  drawn  of  course  work,  though  probably  with  the  assist- 

1  some  ecclesiastic,   particularly  com-  ance  of  some  who  had  more  command  of 

Standish  as  the  author  of  peri-  the  Latin  language.     Burnet  mentions  in 

ssimae  seditiones  inter  clericam  et  another  place,  that  he  had  seen  a  copy  of 

secularem  potestatem.  the  Necessary  Erudition  of  a  Christian 


REFOEMATIOX. 


HENRY'S  DIVORCE. 


73 


apprehension,  therefore,  for  the  future  might  be  grounded  on 
the  humor  of  the  nation,  no  king  in  Europe  appeared  so 
steadfast  in  his  allegiance  to  Rome  as  Henry  VIII.  at  the 
moment  when  a  storm  sprang  up  that  broke  the  chain  for- 
ever. 

It  is  certain  that  Henry's  marriage  with  his  brother's 
widow  was  unsupported  by  any  precedent,  and  Hisdivorce 
that  although  the  pope's  dispensation  might  pass  from 
for  a  cure  of  all  defects,  it  had  been  originally  e 
considered  by  many  .persons  in  a  very  different  light  from 
those  unions  which  are  merely  prohibited  by  the  canons. 
He  himself,  on  coming  to  the  age  of  fourteen,  entered  a  pro- 
test against  the  marriage  which  had  been  celebrated  more 
than  two  years  before,  and  declared  his  intention  not  to  con- 
firm it ;  an  act  which  must  naturally  be  ascribed  to  his  fa- 
ther.1 It  is  true  that  in  this  very  instrument  we  find  no 
mention  of  the  impediment  on  the  score  of  affinity  ;  yet  it 
is  hard  to  suggest  any  other  objection,  and  possibly  a  common 
form  had  been  adopted  in  drawing  up  the  protest.  He  did 
not  cohabit  with  Catherine  during  his  father's  lifetime. 
Upon  his  own  accession  he  was  remarried  to  her ;  and  it 
does  not  appear  manifest  at  what  time  his  scruples  began, 
nor  whether  they  preceded  his  passion  for  Anne  Boleyn.3 


date  at  Wittenberg,  Sept.  1,  1525.  It 
had  no  relation,  therefore,  to  Heury's 
quarrel  with  the  pope,  though  probably 
Luther  imagined  that  the  king  \ms  be- 
coming more  favorably  disposed.  After 
Baying  that  he  had  written  against  the 
king,  "  stultus  ac  praoceps,"  which  was 
true,  he  adds,  "  invitantibus  iis  qui  ma- 
jestati  tuse  parum  favebant,"  which  was 
surely  a  pretence ;  since  who,  at  Witten- 
berg, in  1521,  could  have  any  motive  to 
wish  that  Henry  should  be  so  scur- 
rilously  treated?  lie  then  bursts  out 
into  the  most  absurd  attack  on  Wolsey ; 
"illuil  monstrum  et  publicum  odium 
Dei  ethominum,  Cardinalis  Eboracensis, 
pestis  ilia  regni  tui."  This  was  a  singu- 
lar style  to  adopt  in  writing  to  a  king, 
whom  he  affected  to  propitiate ;  Wolsey 
being  nearer  than  any  man  to  Henry's 
heart.  Thence  relapsing  into  his  tone 
of  abasement,  he  says,  "  ita  ut  vehemen- 
ter  nunc  pudefuctus,  metuam  oculos 
coram  majestate  tui  levare,  qui  passus 
aim  levitate  istSl  me  moveri  iiv  talein  tan- 
tumque  regem  per  malignos  istos  opera- 
rios;  pi-fesertim  cum  sini  feex  et  vermis, 
quern  solo  contemptu  oportuit  victumaut 


neglectum  esse,"  &c.  Among  the  many 
strange  things  which  Luther  said  and 
wrote,  I  know  not  one  more  extravagant 
than  this  letter,  which  almost  justifies 
the  supposition  that  there  was  a  vein 
of  insanity  in  his  very  remarkable  char- 
acter. 

1  Collier,   vol.    ii.    Appendix,    No.    2. 
In  the  Hardwicke  Papers,  i.  13,  we  have 
an  account  of   the    ceremonial  of   the 
first  marriage  of  Henry  with  Catherine 
in  1503.    It  is  remarkable  that  a  person 
was  appointed  to  object  publicly  in  Latin 
to  the  marriage  as  unlawful,  for  reasons 
he  should  there  exhibit ;    ''  whereunto 
Mr.  Doctor  Barnes  shall  reply,  and  de- 
clare solemnly,  also   in   Latin,   the  said 
marriage  to  be  good  and  effectual  in  the 
law  of  Christ's  church,  by  virtue   of  a 
dispensation,  which   he  shall  havt  then 
to  be  openly  jead."    There  seems  to  be 
something  in  this  of  the  tortuous  policy  ot 
Henry  VII.;  but  it  shows  that  the  mar- 
riage  had  given  offence  to  scrupulous 
minds. 

2  See  Burnet,  Lingard,  Turner,  and  the 
letters   lately   printed    in   State  Papers, 
temp.  Henry  VIII.  pp.  19-1,  196 


74  HENRY'S  DIVORCE  CHAP.  II 

This,  however,  seems  the  more  probable  supposition;  yet 
there  can  be  little  doubt  that  weariness  of  Catherine's  per- 
son, a  woman  considerably  older  than  himself,  and  unlikely 
to  bear  more  children,  had  a  far  greater  effect  on  his  con- 
science than  the  study  of  Thomas  Aquinas  or  any  other  the- 
ologian. It  by  no  means  follows  from  hence  that,  according 
to  the  casuistry  of  the  Catholic  church  and  the  principles  of 
the  canon  law,  the  merits  of  that  famous  process  were  so 
much  against  Henry,  as,  out  of  dislike  to  him  and  pity  for  his 
queen,  we  are  apt  to  imagine,  and  as  the  writers  of  that  per- 
suasion have  subsequently  assumed. 

It  would  be  unnecessary  to  repeat  what  is  told  by  so  many 
historians,  the  vacillating  and  evasive  behavior  of  Clement 
VII.,  the  assurances  he  gave  the  king,  and  the  arts  with 
•which  he.  receded  from  them,  the  unfinished  trial  in  England 
before  his  delegates,  Campeggio  and  Wolsey,  the  opinions 
obtained  from  foreign  universities  in  the  king's  favor,  not 
always  without  a  little  bribery,1  and  those  of  the  same  im- 
port at  home,  not  given  without  a  little  intimidation,  or  the 
tedious  continuance  of  the  process  after  its  adjournment  to 
Rome.  More  than  five  years  had  elapsed  from  the  first 
application  to  the  pope,  before  Henry,  though  by  nature  the 
most  uncontrollable  of  mankind,  though  irritated  by  per- 
petual chicanery  and  breach  of  promise,  though  stimulated 
by  impatient  love,  presumed  to  set  at  nought  the  jurisdiction 
to  which  he  had  submitted,  by  a  marriage  with  Anne.  Even 
this  -was  a  furtive  step  ;  and  it  was  .not  till  compelled  by  the 
consequences  that  he  avowed  her  as  his  wife,  and  was  finally 
divorced  from  Catherine  by  a  sentence  of  nullity,  which 
would  more  decently  no  doubt  have  preceded  his  second 
marriage.2  But,  determined  as  his  mind  had  become,  it  was 

1  Burnet  wishes  to  disprove  the  bribery  writer,  was  enough  to  terrify  his  readers. 

of  these  foreign  doctors.     But  there  are  Vol.  iii.  Append,   p.  25.     These  probably 

Btrong  presumptions  that  some  opinions  Burnet  did  not  know  when  he  published 

were  got  by  money  (Collier,  ii.  58) ;  and  his  first  volume. 

the  greatest  difficulty  was  found,  where  2  The  king's  marriage  is  related  by  the 
corruption  perhaps  had  least  influence,  earlier  historians  to  have  taken  place 
in  the  Sorbonne.  Burnet  himself  proves  Nov.  14,  1532.  Burnet,  however,  is  con- 
that  some  of  the  cardinals  were  bribed  by  vinced  by  a  letter  of  Cranmer,  who,  he 
the  kind's  ambassador,  botb  in  1528  and  says,  could  not  be  mistaken,  though  he 
1532.  Vol.1.  Append,  pp.  30, 110.  See,  too,  was  not  apprised  of  the  fact  till  some 
Strype,  i.  Append.  No.  40.  time  afterwards,  that  it  was  not  solem- 

The  game  writer  will  not  allow  that  nized  till    about   the    25th   of  January 

Henry  menaced  the  university  of  Oxford  (vol.  iii.  p.  70).     This   letter  ha«   since 

in  <-;i-c  of  non-compliance ;  yet  there  are  been  published  in  the  Arch.xologia,  vol. 

three  letters  of  hi.s  to  them,  a  tenth  part  xviii.,    and    in    Ellis's    Letters,   ii.    34. 

*f  which,  considering  the  nature  of  the  Elizabeth  was  boru  September  7,   1533, 


REFORMATION.  FROM  CATHERINE.  75 

plainly  impossible  for  Clement  to  have  conciliated  him  by 
anything  short  of  a  decision  which  he  could  not  utter  without 
the  loss  of  the  emperor's  favor,  and  the  ruin  of  his  own  fam- 
ily's interests  in  Italy.  And  even  for  less  selfish  reasons  it 
was  an  extremely  embarrassing  measure  for  the  pope,  in  the 
critical  circumstances  of  that  age,  to  set  aside  a  dispensation 
granted  by  his  predecessor ;  knowing  that,  however  some 
erroneous  allegations  of  fact  contained  therein  might  serve 
for  aii  outward  pretext,  yet  the  principle  on  which  the  di- 
vorce was  commonly  supported  in  Europe  went  generally  to 
restrain  the  dispensing  power  of  the  holy  see.  Hence  it 
may  seem  very  doubtful  whether  the  treaty  which  was  after 
wards  partially  renewed  through  the  mediation  of  Francis  L, 
during  his  interview  with  the  pope  at  Nice  about  the  end  of 
1533,  could  have  led  to  a  restoration  of  amity  through  the 
only  possible  means ;  when  we  consider  the  weight  of  the 
imperial  party  in  the  conclave,  the  discredit  that  so  notorious 
a  submission  would  have  thrown  on  the  church,  and,  above 
all,  the  precarious  condition  of  the  Medici  at  Florence  in 
case  of  a  rupture  with  Charles  V.  It  was  more  probably  the 
aim  of  Clement  to  delude  Henry  once  more  by  his  promises  ; 
but  this  was  prevented  by  the  more  violent  measure  into 
which  the  cardinals  forced  him,"  of  a  definitive  sentence  in 
favor  of  Catherine,  whom  the  king  was  required  under  pain 
of  excommunication  to  take  back  as  his  wife.  This  sentence 
of  the  23d  of  March,  1534,  proved  a  declaration  of  inter- 
minable war ;  and  the  king,  who,  in  consequence  of  the  hopes 
held  out  to  him  by  Francis,  had  already  despatched  an  envoy 
to  Rome  with  his  submission  to  what  the  pope  should  decide, 
now  resolved  to  break  off  all  intercourse  forever,  and  trust 
to  his  own  prerogative  and  power  over  his  subjects  for 


for  though  Burnet,  on  the  authority,  he  of  her,  "  she  was  cunning  in  her  chas- 
says,  of  Cranmer,  places  her  birth  on  tity,"  was  surprised  at  the  end  of  this 
Bept.  14,  the  former  date  is  decisively  long  courtship.  I  think  a  prurient  cu- 
conflrmed  hy  letters  in  Harl.  MSS.  vol.  riosity  about  such  obsolete  scandal  very 
CCLXXXIII.  22,  and  vol.  DCOLXxxvn.  1.  unworthy  of  history.  But  when  this 
(both  set  down  incorrectly  in  the  cata-  author  asserts  Henry  to  have  cohabited 
logue).  If  a  late  historian  therefore  had  with  her  for  three  years,  and  repeatedly 
contented  himself  with  commenting  on  calls  her  his  mistress,  when  he  attributes 
these  dates  and  the  clandestine  nature  Henry's  patience  with  the  pope's  chi- 
ef the  marriage,  he  would  not  have  gone  canery  to  "  the  infecundity  of  Anne," 
beyond  the  limits  of  that  character  of  an  and  all  this  on  no  other  authority  than  a 
advocate  for  one  party  which  he  has  letter  of  the  French  ambassador,  which 
chosen  to  assume  It  may  not  be  un-  amounts  hardly  to  evidence  of  a  transient 
likely,  though  by  no  means  evident,  that  rumor,  we  cannot  but  complain  of  a 
Anne's  prudence,  though,  as  Fuller  says  great  deficiency  in  historical  caudoi. 


70  RUPTURE  WITH  ROME.         CHAP.  IL 

securing  the  succession  to  the  crown  in  the  line  which  he 
designed.  It  was  doubtless  a  regard  to  this  consideration 
that  put  him  upon  his  last  overtures  for  an  amicable  settle- 
ment with  the  court  of  Home.1 

But  long  before  this  final  cessation  of  intercourse  with  that 
court,  Henry  had  entered  upon  a  course  of  measures  which 
would  have  opposed  fresh  obstacles  to  a  renewal  of  the  con- 
nection. He  had  found  a  great  part  of  his  subjects  in  a  dis- 
position to  go  beyond  all  he  could  wish  in  sustaining  his 
quarrel,  not  in  this  instance  from  mere  terror,  but  because  a 
jealousy  of  ecclesiastical  power  and  of  the  Roman  court  had 
long  been  a  sort  of  national  sentiment  in  England.  The 
pope's  avocation  of  the  process  to  Rome,  by  which  his  du- 
plicity and  alienation  from  the  king's  side  were  made  evident, 
and  the  disgrace  of  Wolsey,  took  place  in  the  summer  of 
1529.  The  parliament  which  met  soon  afterwards  was  con- 
tinued through  several  sessions  (an  unusual  circumstance), 
till  it  completed  the  separation  of  this  kingdom  from  the  su- 
premacy of  Rome.  In  the  progress  of  ecclesiastical  usurpa- 
tion, the  papal  and  episcopal  powers  had  lent  mutual  support 
to  each  other ;  both  consequently  were  involved  in  the  same 

1  The  principal  authority  on  the  story  presence  as  well  as  his  own,  on  June  21, 
of  Henry's  divorce  from  Catherine  is  and  greatly  corroborating  the  popular 
Burnet,in  the  first  and  third  volumes  of  account.  To  say  the  truth,  there  is  no 
his  History  of  the  Reformation  ;  the  lat-  small  difficulty  in  choosing  between  two 
ter  correcting  the  former  from  additional  authorities  so  considerable,  if  they  can- 
documents.  Strype,  in  his  Ecclesiastical  not  be  reconciled,  which  seems  impossi- 
Memorials,  adds  some  particulars  not  ble ;  but,  upon  the  whole,  the  preference 
contained  in  Burnet,  especially  as  to  the  is  due  to  Henry's  letter,  dated  June  23, 
negotiations  with  the  pope  in  1528  ;  and  as  he  could  not  be  mistaken,  and  had  no 
a  very  little  may  be  gleaned  from  Collier,  motive  to  misstate. 

Carte,  and  other  writers.     There  are  few  This  is  not  altogether  immaterial ;  for 

parts  of  history,  on  the  whole,  that  have  Catherine's  appeal  to  Henry,  de  integri- 

been  better  elucidated.     One  exception  tate  corporis  usque  ad  secundas  nuptias 

perhaps  may  yet  be  made.   The  beautiful  servata,  without  reply  on  his  part,  is  an 

and  affecting    story  of   Catherine's  be-  important  circumstance  as  to  that  part  of 

havior  before  the  legates  at  Dunstable  is  the   question.     It  is,   however,   certain, 

told  by  Cavendish  and  Hall,  from  whom,  that,  whetner  ou  this  occasion  or  not, 

later  historians  have  copied  it.     Bui-net,  she  did  constantly  declare  this ;  and  the 

iwever,  in  his  third  volume,  p.  46,  dis-  evidence  adduced  to  prove  the  contrary 

!    truth,  and  on  what  should  is  very  defective,  especially  as  opposed 

seem   conclusive   authority,  that  of  the  to  the  assertion  of  so  virtuous  a  woman. 

il    register,  from  which   it  appears  Dr.  Lingard  says  that  all  the  favorable 

tie  queen  never  came  into  court  but  answers  which  the  king  obtained  from 

once,  June  18.  1529,  to  read  a  paper  pro-  foreign  universities  went  upon  the  sup- 

ig  against  the  jurisdiction,  and  that  position  that   the  former  marriage   had 

ig  never  entered  it.     Carte  accord-  been  consummated,  and  were  of  no  avail 


Lingard  has  pointed  out  a  letter  of  the    Henry  VIII.  p.  194;  whence  it  appears 
ornet  himself  had  printed,    that  the  queen  had  been  consistent  in  her 
VOL  1.  Append.  ( 8,  mentioning  the  queen's    denial. 


REFORM  ATION.  EUPTUKE   WITH  ROME.  77 

odium,  and  had  become  the  object  of  restrictions  in  a  similar 
spirit.  Warm  attacks  were  made  on  the  clergy  by  speeches 
in  the  commons,  which  bishop  Fisher  severely  reprehended 
in  the  upper  house.  This  provoked  the  commons  to  send  a 
complaint  to  the  king  by  their  speaker,  demanding  repara- 
tion ;  and  Fisher  explained  away  the  words  that  had  given 
offence.  An  act  passed  to  limit  the  fees  on  probates  of  wills, 
a  mode  of  ecclesiastical  extortion  much  complained  of,  and 
upon  mortuaries.1  The  next  proceeding  was  of  a  far  more 
serious  nature.  It  was  pretended  that  Wolsey's  exercise  of 
authority  as  papal  legate  contravened  a  statute  of  Richard 
II.,  and  that  both  himself  and  the  whole  body  of  the  clergy, 
by  their  submission  to  him,  had  incurred  the  penalties  of  a 
prasmunire,  that  is,  the  forfeiture  of  their  movable  estate, 
besides  imprisonment  at  discretion.  These  old  statutes  in 
restraint  of  the  papal  jurisdiction  had  been  so  little  regarded, 
and  so  many  legates  had  acted  in  England  without  objection, 
that  Henry's  prosecution  of  the  church  on  this  occasion  was 
extremely  harsh  and  unfair.  The  clergy,  however,  now  felt 
themselves  to  be  the  weaker  party.  In  convocation  they  im- 
plored the  king's  clemency,  and  obtained  it  by  paying  a  large 
sum  of  money.  In  their  petition  he  was  styled  the  protector 
and  supreme  head  of  the  church  and  clergy  of  England. 
Many  of  that  body  were  staggered  at  the  unexpected  intro- 
duction of  a  title  that  seemed  to  strike  at  the  supremacy  they 
had  -always  acknowledged  in  the  Roman  see.  And  in  the 
end  it  passed  only  with  a  very  suspicious  qualification,  "  so 
far  as  is  permitted  by  the  law  of  Christ."  Henry  had 
previously  given  the  pope  several  intimations  that  he  could 
proceed  in  his  divorce  without  him.  For,  besides  a  strong 
remonstrance  by  letter  from  the  temporal  peers  as  well  as 
bishops  against  the  procrastination  of  sentence  in  so  just  a 
suit,  the  opinions  of  English  and  foreign  universities  had 
been  laid  before  both  houses  of  parliament  and  of  convoca- 
tion, and  the  divorce  approved  without  difficulty  in  the  for- 
mer, and  by  a  great  majority  in  the  latter.  These  proceed- 
ings took  place  in  the  first  months  of  1531,  while  the  king's 
ambassadors  at  Rome  were  still  pressing  for  a  favorable  sen- 
tence, though  with  diminished  hopes.  Next  year  the  annates, 

1  Stat.   21   lien.   8,  cc.   6,  6;  Strype,  much  augmented  by  Wolsey,  who  inter- 

I.   73;  Burnet,  83.    It  cost  a  thousand  fered,  as  legate,   with    the    prerogative 

murks  to  prove   Sir  William  Cuuipton's  court, 
will  in  1528.     Those  exactions  had   been 


78  ABOLITION  OF  AXNATES.  CHAP.  II. 

or  first  fruits  of  benefices,  a  constant  source  of  discord  be- 
tween the  nations  of  Europe  and  their  spiritual  chief,  were 
taken  away  by  act  of  parliament ;  but  with  a  remarkable 
condition,  that  if  the  pope  would  either  abolish  the  payment 
of  annates,  or  reduce  them  to  a  moderate  burden,  the  king 
might  declare  before  the  next  session,,  by  letters  patent, 
whether  this  act,  or  any  part  of  it,  should  be  observed.  It 
was  accordingly  confirmed  by  letters  patent  more  than  a  year 
after  it  received  the  royal  assent 

It  is  difficult  for  us  to  determine  whether  the  pope,  by 
conceding  to  Henry  the  great  object  of  his  solicitude,  could 
in  this  stage  have  not  only  arrested  the  progress  of  the 
schism,  but  recovered  his  former  ascendency  over  the  Eng- 
lish church  and  kingdom.  But  probably  he  could  not  have 
done  so  in  its  full  extent.  Sir  Thomas  More,  who  had 
rather  complied  than  concurred  with  the  proceedings  for  a 
divorce  (though  his  acceptance  of  the  great  seal  on  Wolsey's 
disgrace  would  have  been  inconsistent  with  his  character, 
had  he  been  altogether  opposed  in  conscience  to  the  king's 
measures),  now  thought  it  necessary  to  resign,  when  the  pa- 
pal authority  was  steadily,  though  gradually,  assailed.1  In 
the  next  session  an  act  was  passed  to  take  away  all  appeals 
to  Rome  from  ecclesiastical  courts,  which  annihilated  at  one 
stroke  the  jurisdiction  built  on  long  usage  and  on  the  author- 
ity of  the  false  decretals.  This  law  rendered  the  king's 
second  marriage,  which  had  preceded  it,  secure  from  being 
annulled  by  the  papal  court.  Henry,  however,  still  ad- 
vanced very  cautiously,  and  on  the  death  of  Warham,  arch- 
bishop of  Canterbury,  not  long  before  this  time,  applied  to 
Rome  for  the  usual  bulls  in  behalf  of  Cranmer,  whom  he 

i  It  a  hard  to  say  what  were  More's  universities.  In  this  he  perhaps  thought 

original  sentiments  about  the  divorce,  himself  acting  ministerially.  But  there 

In  a  letter  to  Cromwell  (Strype.  i.  183,  can  be  no  doubt  that  he  always  con- 

and  App.  No.  48;  Burnet,  App.  p.  280)  sidered  the  divorce  as  a  matter'wholly 

:;s  of  himself  as  always  doubtful,  of  the  pope's  competence,  and  which  no 

But  if  his  disposition  had  not  been  rather  other  party  could  take  out  of  his  hands, 

favorable  to  the  king,  would  he  have  though  he  had  gone  along  cheerfully,  aa 

been  offered,  or  have  accepted,  the  great  Burnet  says,  with  the  prosecution  agaiust 

We  do  not  indeed  find  his  name  the  clergy,  and  wished  to  cut  off  the  illegal 

in  the  letter  of  remonstrance  to  the  jurisdiction  of  the  Roman  see.  The  king 

pope,  signed  by  the  nobility  and  chief  did  not  look  upon  him  as  hostile;  for 

commoners  in  1530,  which  Wolsey,  even  so  late  as  1532,  Dr.  Bennet,  the 

though  then  in  dNgrace,  very  willingly  envoy  at  Rome,  proposed  to  the  pope 

sul.srritied.  But  in  March."  1531,  he  that  the  cause  should  be  tried  by  four 

went  down  to  the  house  of  commons,  commissioners,  of  whom  the  kiug  should 

attended  by  several  lords,  to  declare  the  name  one,  either  sir  Thomas  More,  or 

kin,-  s  scruple?  about  his  marriage,  and  Stokesly,  bishop  of  London.  Burnet,  i 

to  lay  before  them  the  opinions  of  126. 


REFORMATION.      AVERSION  TO  THE  DIVORCE.  79 

nominated  to  the  vacant  see.  These  were  the  last  bulls  ob- 
tained, and  probably  the  last  instance  of  any  exercise  of  the 
papal  supremacy  in  this  reign.  An  act  followed  in  the  next 
session,  that  bishops  elected  by  their  chapter  on  a  royal  rec- 
ommendation should  be  consecrated,  and  archbishops  receive 
the  pall,  without  suing  for  the  pope's  bulls.  All  dispensations 
and  licenses  hitherto  granted  by  that  court  were  set  aside  by 
another  statute,  and  the  power  of  issuing  them  in  lawful 
cases  transferred  to  the  archbishop  of  Canterbury.  The  king 
is  in  this  act  recited  to  be  the  supreme  head  of  the  church  of 
England,  as  the  clergy  had  two  years  before  acknowledged 
in  convocation.  But  this  title  was  not  formally  declared  by 
parliament  to  appertain  to  the  crown  till  the  ensuing  session 
of  parliament.1 

By  these  means  was  the  church  of    England  altogether 
emancipated  from  the  superiority  of  that  of  Rome. 
For  as  to  the  pope's  merely  spiritual  primacy  and  from  th* 
authority  in  matters  of  faith,  which  are,  or   at  ^meh  °f 
least  were,  defended  by  Catholics  of  the  Gallican 
or  Cisalpine  school  on  quite  different  grounds  from  his  juris- 
diction or  his  legislative  power  in  points  of  discipline,  they 
seem  to  have   attracted  little  peculiar  attention  at  the  time, 
and  to  have  dropped  off  as  a  dead  branch,  when  the  axe  had 
lopped  the  fibres  that  gave  it  nourishment.     Like  other  mo- 
mentous revolutions  this  divided  the  judgment  and  feelings 
of  the  nation.     In  the  previous  affair  of  Catherine's  divorce, 
generous  minds  were  more  influenced  by  the  rigor  and  indig- 
nity of  her  treatment  than  by  the   king's  inclinations,  or  the 
venal  opinions  of  foreign  doctors  in  law.     Bellay,  bishop  of 
Bayonne,  the  French  ambassador  at  London,  wrote  home  in 
1528  that  a  revolt  was  apprehended  from  the  general  unpop 
ularity  of  the  divorce.2     Much  difficulty  was  found  in  pro- 
curing the  judgments  of  Oxford  and  Cambridge  against  the 
marriage ;  which  was  effected  in  the  former  case,  as  is  said, 

1  Dr.   Lingard    has    pointed    out,    as  by    the    king,  if,   after    pronouncing  a 

Burnei.   had   done   leas    distinctly,   that  decree  in   favor   of  the  divorce,  he  bad 

the  bill  abrogating  the  papal  supremacy  found  it  too   late    to   regain   his    juris- 

was   brought   into  the  commons  in   the  diction  in  England.     On  the  other  hand, 

beginning   of  March,  and    received   the  so  flexible  were  the  parliaments  of  this 

royal   assent   on   the   30th  ;  whereas  the  reign,  that  if  Henry  had  made  terms  with 

determination  of  the  conclave  at  Rome  the   pope,    the   supremacy    might    hav« 

against  the  divorce  was  on  the  23d;  so  revived  again  as  easily  as   it  had  been 

that  the  latter  could  not  have  been  the  extinguished, 

cause  of  this  final  rupture.   Clement  VII.  2  Buruet,  iii.  44,  and  App.  24. 
might  have  been  outwitted  in  his  turn 


60  AVERSION  TO  THE  DIVORCE  CHAP.  II. 

by  excluding  the  masters  of  arts,  the  younger  and  less 
worldly  part  of  the  university,  from  their  right  of  suffrage. 
Even  so  late  as  1532,  in  the  pliant  house  of  commons  a 
member  had  the  boldness  to  move  an  address  to  the  king 
that  he  would  take  back  his  wife.  And  this  temper  of  the 
people  seems  to  have  been  the  great  inducement  with  Henry 
to  postpone  any  sentence  by  a  domestic  jurisdiction,  so  long 
as  a  chance  of  the  pope's  sanction  remained. 

The  aversion  entertained  by  a  large  part  of  the  commu- 
nity, and  especially  of  the  clerical  order,  towards  the  divorce, 
was  not  perhaps  so  generally  founded  upon  motives  of  jus- 
tice and  compassion  as  on  the  obvious  tendency  which  its 
prosecution  latterly  manifested  to  bring  about  a  separation 
from  Rome.  Though  the  principal  Lutherans  of  Germany 
were  far  less  favorably  disposed  to  the  king  in  their  opinions 
on  this  subject  than  .the  catholic  theologians,  holding  that  the 
prohibition  of  marrying  a  brother's  widow  in  the  Levitical 
law  was  not  binding  on  Christians,  or  at  least  that  the  mar- 
riage ought  not  to  be  annulled  after  so  many  years'  contin- 
uance,1 yet  in  England  the  interests  of  Anne  Boleyn  and  of 
the  Reformation  were  considered  as  the  same.  She  was  her- 
self strongly  suspected  of  an  inclination  to  the  new  tenets  ; 
and  her  friend  Cranmer  had  been  the  most  active  person 
both  in  promoting  the  divorce  and  the  recognition  of  the 
king's  supremacy.  The  latter  was,  as  I  imagine,  by  no 

1  Conf.  Burnet,  i.94,  and  App.No.35;  Jenkins's  edition,  i.  303-1     Clement  VII., 

Strype,   i.    230;    Sleidan,     Hist,    de     la  however,  recommended  the  king  to  marry 

Reformation,  par  Courayer,  1.  10.     The  immediately,  and  then  prosecute  his  suit 

notions  of  these  divines,  as  here  stated,  for  a  divorce,  which   it  would  be  easier 

are  not  very  consistent  or  intelligible,  for  him  to  obtain  in  such  circumstances. 

The   Swiss  reformers   were  in   favor  of  This  was    as    early    as    January,   1528. 

the   divorce,  though   they  advised   that  (Burnet.  i.  App.  p.  27.)    But  at  "a  much 

tin- ]>rmci-ss  Mary  should  not  be  declared  later    period,   September,   1530,   he    ex- 

Illegitimate.     Luther  seems  to  have  in-  pressly  suggested  the  expedient  of  allovr- 

ciined    towards    compromising    the   dif-  ing     the    king    to    retain     two     wives 


quoted  at  length  by — 

rendered  not  improbable  by  the  well-  unquestionable  veracity,  lord  Herbert, 
authenticated  fact  that  these  divines,  Henry  had  himself,  at  one  time,  favored 
tether  with  Bucer,  signed  a  permission  this  scheme,  according  to  Burnet.  who 
o  the  landgrave  of  Hesse  to  take  a  wife  does  not,  however,  produce  any  authority 
or  concubine,  on  account  of  the  drunken-  for  the  instructions  to  that  effect  said  to 


REFORMATION.     DISSOLUTION  OF  MONASTERIES.  81 

means  unacceptable  to  the  nobility  and  gentry,  who  saw  in 
it  the  only  effectual  method  of  cutting  off  the  papal  exactions 
that  had  so  long  impoverished  the  realm ;  nor  yet  to  the 
citizens  of  London  and  other  large  towns,  who,  with  the  same 
dislike  of  the  Roman  court,  had  begun  to  acquire  some  taste 
for  the  Protestant  doctrine.  But  the  common  people,  espe- 
cially in  remote  countries,  had  been  used  to  an  implicit  rev- 
erence for  the  holy  see,  and  had  suffered  comparatively 
little  by  its  impositions.  They  looked  up  also  to  their 
own  teachers  as  guides  in  faith ;  and  the  main  body  of 
the  clergy  were  certainly  very  reluctant  to  tear  themselves 
at  the  pleasure  of  a  disappointed  monarch,  in  the  most 
dangerous  crisis  of  religion,  from  the  bosom  of  catholic 
unity.1  They  complied  indeed  with  all  the  measures  of 
government  far  more  than  men  of  rigid  conscience  could 
have  endured  to  do ;  but  many,  who  wanted  the  courage 
of  More  and  Fisher,  were  not  far  removed  from  their  way 
of  thinking.2  This  repugnance  to  so  great  an  alteration 
showed  itself  above  all  in  the  monastic  orders,  some  of  whom 
by  wealth,  hospitality,  and  long-established  dignity,  others  by 
activity  in  preaching  and  confessing,  enjoyed  a  very  consider- 
ble  influence  over  the  poorer  class^  But  they  had  to  deal 
with  a  sovereign  whose  policy  as  well  as  temper  dictated  that 
he  had  no  safety  but  in  advancing ;  and  their  disaffection  to 
his  government,  while  it  overwhelmed  them  in  ruin,  pro- 
duced a  second  grand  innovation  in  the  ecclesiastical  polity 
of  England. 

The  enormous,  and  in  a  great  measure  ill-gotten,  opulence 
of  the  regular  clergy  had  long  since  excited  jeal-  Di8g0iut;on 
ousy  in  every  part  of  Europe.     Though  the  statutes  of  monas- 
of  mortmain  under  Edward  I.  and  Edward  III. 
had  put  some  obstacle  to  its  increase,  yet,  as  these  were  eluded 
by  licenses  of  alienation,  a  larger  proportion  of  landed  wealth 
was  constantly  accumulating  in  hands  which  lost  nothing  that 
they  had  grasped.8     A  writer  much  inclined  to  partiality  tow- 

1  Strype,  i.  151  et  alibi.  and  Strype  on  the  one  hand,  and  lately 

2  Strype,  passim.    Tunstal,  Gardiner,  by  Dr.  Lingard  on  the  other,  that  it  is 
and  Bonner  wrote  in  favor  of  the  royal  almost  amusing  to  find  the  most  opposite 
supremacy  ;  all  of  them,  no  doubt,  in-  conclusions   and   general   results    from 
sincerely.     The  first  of  these  has  escaped  nearly      the     same    premises.      Collier, 
severe  censure  by    the   mildness  of  his  though  with  many  prejudices  of  his  own, 
general  character,  but  was  full  as  mu  h  is,  all  things  considered,  the  fairest  of 
a  temporizer  as  Cranmer.     But  the  his-  our  ecclesiastical  writers  as  to  this  reign, 
tory  of  this  period  has  been  written  with  8  Burnet,  188.     For   the  methods  by 
such  undisguised  partiality  by    Burnet  which  the  regulars  acquired  wealth,  fafir 

VOL.  1. —  C.  6 


82  WOLSEY'S  VISITATION.  CHAP.  IJ 

ards  the  monasteries  says  that  they  held  not  one  fifth  part  of 
the  kingdom;  no  insignificant  patrimony!  He  adds,  what 
may  probably  be  true,  that  through  granting  easy  leases  they 
did  not  enjoy  more  than  one  tenth  in  value.1  These  vast 
possessions  were  very  unequally  distributed  among  four  or 
five  hundred  monasteries.  Some  abbots,  as  those  of  Read- 
ing, Glastonbury,  and  Battle,  lived  in  princely  splendor,  and 
were  in  every  sense  the  spiritual  peers  and  magnates  of  the 
realm.  In  other  foundations  the  revenues  did  little  more 
than  afford  a  subsistence  for  the  monks,  and  defray  the  need- 
ful expenses.  As  they  were  in  general  exempted  from 
episcopal  visitation,  and  intrusted  with  the  care  of  their  own 
discipline,  such  abuses  had  gradually  prevailed  and  gained 
strength  by  connivance,  as  we  may  naturally  expect  in  cor- 
porate bodies  of  men  leading  almost  of  necessity  useless  and 
indolent  lives,  and  in  whom  very  indistinct  views  of  moral 
obligations  were  combined  with  a  great  facility  of  violating 
them.  The  vices  that  for  many  ages  had  been  supposed  to 
haunt  the  monasteries  had  certainly  not  left  their  precincts  in 
that  of  Henry  VHI.  Wolsey,  as  papal  legate,  at  the  instiga- 
tion of  Fox,  bishop  of  Hereford,  a  favorer  of  the  Reforma- 
tion, commenced  a  visitation  of  the  professed  as  well  as 
secular  clergy  in  1523,  in  consequence  of  the  general 
complaint  against  their  manners.2  This  great  minister, 
though  not  perhaps  very  rigid  as  to  the  morality  of  the 
church,  was  the  first  who  set  an  example  of  reforming  mo- 
nastic foundations  in  the  most  efficacious  manner,  by  convert- 
ing their  revenues  to  different  purposes.  Full  of  anxious 
zeal  for  promoting  education,  the  noblest  part  of  his  charac- 
ter,-he  obtained  bulls  from  Rome  suppressing  many  convents 
(among  which  was  that  of  St.  Frideswide  at  Oxford),  in 
order  to  erect  and  endow  a  new  college  in  that  university, 
his  favorite  work,  which  after  his  fall  was  more  completely 
established  by  the  name  of  Christ  Church.8  A  few  more 
were  afterwards  extinguished  through  his  instigation  ;  and 
thus  the  prejudice  against  interference  with  this  species  of 
property  was  somewhat  worn  off,  and  men's  minds  gradually 

and  unfair,  I  may  be  allowed  to  refer  to  *  Strype,  i.  App.  19. 

the  View  of  the  Middle  Ages,  ch.  7,  or  s  Burnet;  Strype.     Wolsey  alleged  as 

rather  to  the    sources  from  which  the  the  ground  for  this  suppression,  the  great 

Bketeh  there  given  was  derived.  wickedness  that  prevailed  therein.  Strype 

l  Hiinuer's    Specimens    of  Errors    in  Bays  the   number  was  twenty ;  but  Col- 

Burnet.  lie"rj  u.  19,  reckons  them  at  forty. 


REFORMATION.      PROCEEDINGS  OF  CROMWELL.  83 

prepared  for  the  sweeping  confiscations  of  Cromwell.  The 
king  indeed  was  abundantly  willing  to  replenish  his  exchequer 
by  violent  means,  and  to  avenge  himself  on  those  who  gatn- 
sayed  his  supremacy ;  but  it  was  this  able  statesman  who, 
prompted  both  by  the  natural  appetite  of  ministers  for  the 
subject's  money,  and,  as  has  been  generally  surmised,  by  a 
secret  partiality  towards  the  Reformation,  devised  and  carried 
on  with  complete  success,  if  not  with  the  utmost  prudence,  a 
measure  of  no  inconsiderable  hazard  and  difficulty.  For 
such  it  surely  was  under  a  system  of  government  which 
rested  so  much  on  antiquity,  and  in  spite  of  the  peculiar 
sacredness  which  the  English  attach  to  all  freehold  property, 
to  annihilate  so  many  prescriptive  baronial  tenures,  the  pos- 
sessors whereof  composed  more  than  a  third  part  of  the 
house  of  lords,  and  to  subject  so  many  estates  which  the  law 
had  rendered  inalienable,  to  maxims  of  escheat  and  forfeiture 
that  had  never  been  held  applicable  to  their  tenure.  But 
for  this  purpose  it  was  necessary,  by  exposing  the  gross  cor- 
ruptions of  monasteries,  both  to  intimidate  the  regular  clergy 
and  to  excite  popular  indignation  against  them.  It  is  not  to 
be  doubted  that  in  the  visitation  of  these  foundations  under 
the  direction  of  Cromwell,  as  lord  vicegerent  of  the  king's 
ecclesiastical  supremacy,  many  things  were  done  in  an 
arbitrary  manner,  and  much  was  unfairly  represented.1  Yet 
the  reports  of  these  visitors  are  so  minute  and  specific  that  it 
is  rather  a  preposterous  degree  of  incredulity  to  reject  their 
testimony  whenever  it  bears  hard  on  the  regulars.  It  is 
always  to  be  remembered  that  the  vices  to  which  they  bear 
witness  are  not  only  probable  from  the  nature  of  such  founda- 
tions, but  are  imputed  to  them  by  the  most  respectable 
writers  of  preceding  ages.  Nor  do  I  find  that  the  reports 
of  this  visitation  were  impeached  for  general  falsehood  in 
that  age,  whatever  exaggeration  there  might  be  in  particular 
cases.  And  surely  the  commendation  bestowed  on  some 
religious  houses  as  pure  and  unexceptionable,  may  afford  a 
presumption  that  the  censure  of  others  was  not  an  indiscrim- 
inate prejudging  of  their  merits.2 

1  Collier,  though  not  implicitly  to  be  violent  proceedings  of  a  doctor  Loudon 

trusted,   tails    some    hard    truths,  and  towards  the  monasteries.     This  man  waa 

charges   Cromwell  with  receiving  bribes  of  infamous  character,  and  became  after- 

from   several  abbeys,  in  order  to  spare  wards  a  conspirator  against  Cranmer  and 

them,  p.  159.    This  is  repeated  by  Lin-  a  persecutor  of  protestants. 

gard,  on  the  authority  of  some  Cottonian  2  Burnet.  190;Strype,   i.  ch.   35,  see 

manuscripts.   Even  Burnet  speaks  of  the  especially  p.  2o7j  Ellis's  Letters,  ii.  71. 


84  SURRENDER  OF  GREAT  FOUNDATIONS.     CHAP.- II. 

The  dread  of  these  visitors  soon  induced  a  number  of 
abbots  to  make  surrenders  to  the  king;  a  step  of  very 
questionable  legality.  But  in  the  next  session  the  smaller 
convents  whose  revenues  were  less  than  2001.  a  year,  were 
suppressed  by  act  of  parliament  to  the  number  of  three 
hundred  and  seventy-six,  and  their  estates  vested  in  the 
crown.  This  summary  spoliation  led  to  the  great  northern 
rebellion  soon  afterwards.  It  was,  in  fact,  not  merely  to 
wound  the  people's  strongest  impressions  of  religion,  and 
especially  those  connected  with  their  departed  friends  for 
whose  souls  prayers  were  offered  in  the  monasteries,  but  to 
deprive  the  indigent  in  many  places  of  succor,  and  the  better 
rank  of  hospitable  reception.  This  of  course  was  experi- 
enced in  a  far  greater  degree  at  the  dissolution  of  the  larger 
monasteries,  which  took  place  in  1540.  But,  Henry  having 
entirely  subdued  the  rebellion,  and  being  now  exceedingly 
dreaded  by  both  the  religious  parties,  this  measure  produced 
no  open  resistance,  though  there  seems  to  have  been  less 
pretext  for  it  on  the  score  of  immorality  and  neglect  of 
discipline  than  was  found  for  abolishing  the  smaller  convents.1 
These  great  foundations  were  all  surrendered  ;  a  few  ex- 
cepted,  which,  against  every  principle  of  received  law,  were 
held  to  fall  by  the  attainder  of  their  abbots  for  high  treason. 

We  should  be  on  our  guard  against  the  lished  by  the  Camden  Society,  and  edited 
Romanizing  high-church  men,  such  as  by  Mr.  Thomas  Wright,  1843,  contain  a 
Collier  and  the  whole  class  of  antiquaries,  part  only  of  extant  documents  illustra- 
Wood,  Hearne,  Drake,  Browne,  Willis,  tive  of  this  great  transaction.  There 
&c.,  &c.,  who  are,  with  hardly  an  excep-  seems  no  reason  for  setting  aside  their 
tion,  partial  to  the  monastic  orders,  and  evidence  as  wholly  false,  though  some 
sometimes  scarce  keep  on  the  mask  of  lovers  of  mouachism  raised  a  loud  clam- 
protestantism'.  No  one  fact  can.be  better  or  at  their  publication.  1845.] 
supported  by  current  opinion,  and  that  l  The  preamble  of  27  H.  8,  .c.  28, 
general  testimony  which  carries  convic-  which  gives  the  smaller  monasteries  to 
tion,  than  the  relaxed  and  vicious  state  the  king,  after  reciting  that  "  manifest 
of  those  foundations  for  many  ages  before  sin,  vicious,  carnal  and  abominable  liv- 
their  fall.  Ecclesiastical  writers  had  not  ing,  is  daily  used  and  committed  corn- 
then  learned,  as  they  have  since,  the  trick  monlyin  such  little  and  small  abbeys, 
of  suppressing  what  might  excite  odium  priories,  and  other  religious  houses  of 
against  their  church,  but  speak  out  boldly  monks,  canons,  and  nuns,  where  the 
*ntl  Bitterly.  Thus  we  find  in  Wilkins,  congregation  of  such  religious  persons  is 


life.     And  this  is  followed   by  a  severe  mate  that  their  fate  was  so  near  at  hand, 

monition  from  archbishop  Morton  to  the  Nor  is  any  misconduct  alleged  or  insinu- 

abbot  of  St.  Alban's,  imputing  all  kinds  ated  against  the  greater  monasteries  in 

scandalous  vices  to  him  and  his  monks,  the  act  31  H.  8,  c.  13,  that    abolishes 

i  who  reject  at  once  the  reports  of  them  ;  which  is  rather  more  remarkable, 

leury  s  visitors,  will  do  well  to  consider  as  in  some   instances   the  religious  had 

also  Fosbrook's  British  Moua-  been  induced  to  confess   their  evil  lives 

(Warn,  passim.   [The  "  Letters  relating  to  and  ill  deserts.    Burnet.  236. 
toe  mpplaufen  of  Monasteries,"  pub- 


REFORMATION. 


FALL  OF  MITRED  ABBOTS. 


85 


Parliament  had  only  to  confirm  the  king's  title  arising  out  of 
these  surrenders  and  forfeitures.  Some  historians  assert  the 
monks  to  have  been  turned  adrift  with  a  small  sum  of  money. 
But  it  rather  appears  that  they  generally  received  pensions 
not  inadequate,  and  which  are  said  to  have  been  pretty  faith- 
fully paid.1  These  however  were  voluntary  gifts  on  the  part 
of  the  crown.  For  the  parliament  which  dissolved  the  mo- 
nastic foundations,  while  it  took  abundant  care  to  preserve 
any  rights  of  property  which  private  persons  might  enjoy 
over  the  estates  thus  escheated  to  the  crown,  vouchsafed  not 
a  word  towards  securing  the  slightest  compensation  to  the  dis- 
possessed owners. 

The  fall  of  the  mitred  abbots  changed  the  proportions  of 
the  two  estates  which  constitute  the  upper  house  of  parlia- 
ment. Though  the  number  of  abbots  and  priors  to  whom 
writs  of  summons  were  directed  varied  considerably  in  differ- 
ent parliaments,  they  always,  joined  to  the  twenty-one  bish- 
ops, preponderated  over  the  temporal  peers.2  It  was  no 
longer  possible  for  the  prelacy  to  offer  an  efficacious  opposi- 
tion to  the  reformation  they  abhorred.  Their  own  baronial 
tenure,  their  high  dignity  as  legislative  councillors  of  the 
land,  remained ;  but,  one  branch  as  ancient  and  venerable  as 
their  own  thus  lopped  off,  the  spiritual  aristocracy  was  re- 
duced to  play  a  very  secondary  part  in  the  councils  of  the 
nation.  Nor  could  the  Protestant  religion  have  easily  been 


1  Td.  ibid,  and  Append,  p.  151;  Col- 
lier, 167.  The  pensions  to  the  superiors 
of  the  dissolved  greater  monasteries,  says 
a  writer  not  likely  to  spare  Henry's  gov- 
ernment, appear  to  have  varied  from 
266/.  to  61.  per  annum.  The  priors  of 
cells  received  generally  13J.  A  few, 
whose  services  had  merited  the  distinc- 
tion, obtained  2(K.  To  the  other  monks 
were  allotted  pensions  of  six,  four,  or 
two  pounds,  with  a  small  sum  to  each 
at  his  departure,  to  provide  for  his  im- 
mediate wants.  The  tensions  to  nuns 
averaged  about  4Z.  Lingard,  vi.  341.  He 
admits  that  these  were  ten  times  their 
present  value  in  money ;  and  surely  they 
were  not  unreasonably  small.  Corny-are 
them  with  those,  generally  and  justly 
thought  munificent,  which  this  country 
bestows  on  her  veterans  of  Chelsea  and 
Greenwich.  The  monks  had  no  risjht  to 
expect  more  than  the  means  of  that  hard 
fere  to  which  they  ought  by  their  rules 
to  have  been  confined  in  the  convents. 
The  whole  revenues  were  not  to  be  shared 


among  them  as  private  property.  It  can- 
not of  course  be  denied  that  the  com- 
pulsory change  of  life  was  to  many  a  se- 
vere and  an  unmerited  hardship  ;  but  no 
great  revolution,  and  the  Reformation  as 
little  as  any,  could  be  achieved  without 
much  private  suffering. 

2  The  abbots  sat  till  the  end  of  the 
first  session  of  Henry's  sixth  parliament, 
the  act  extinguishing  them  not  having 
passed  till  the  last  day.  In  the  next 
session  they  do  not  appear,  the  writ  of 
summons  not  being  supposed  to  give 
them  personal  seats.  There  are  indeed 
so  many  parallel  instances  among  spir- 
itual lords,  and  the  principle  is  so  obvi- 
ous, that  it  would  not  be  worth  noticing, 
but  for  a  strange  doubt  said  to  be  thrown 
out  by  some  legal  authorities,  near  the 
beginning  of  George  III.'s  reign,  in  the 
case  of  Pearce,  bishop  of  Rochester, 
whether,  after  resigning  his  see.  he 
would  not  retain  his  seat  as  a  lord  of 
parliament ;  in  consequence  of  which 
his  resignation  was  not  accepted. 


86  POLICY  OF  THE  DISSOLUTION.  CHAP.  II. 

established  by  legal  methods  under  Edward  and  Elizabeth 
without  this  previous  destruction  of  the  monasteries.  Those 
who,  professing  an  attachment  to  that  religion,  have  swollen 
the  clamor  of  its  adversaries  against  the  dissolution  of  foun- 
dations that  existed  only  for  the  sake  of  a  different  faith  and 
worship,  seem  to  me  not  very  consistent  or  enlightened  rea- 
soners.  In  some  the  love  of  antiquity  produces  a  sort  of 
fanciful  illusion ;  and  the  very  sight  of  those  buildings,  so 
magnificent  in  their  prosperous  hour,  so  beautiful  even  in 
their  present  ruin,  begets  a  sympathy  for  those  who  founded 
and  inhabited  them.  In  many,  the  violent  courses  of  confis- 
cation and  attainder  which  accompanied  this  great  revolution 
excite  so  just  an  indignation,  that  they  either  forget  to  ask 
whether  the  end  might  not  have  been  reached  by  more  laud- 
able means,  or  condemn  that  end  itself  either  as  sacrilege, 
or  at  least  as  an  atrocious  violation  of  the  rights  of  properly. 
Others  again,  who  acknowledge  that  the  monastic  discipline 
cannot  be  reconciled  with  the  modern  system  of  religion,  or 
with  public  utility,  lament  only  that  these  ample  endowments 
were  not  bestowed  upon  ecclesiastical  corporations,  freed  "from 
the  monkish  cowl,  but  still  belonging  to  that  spiritual  profes- 
sion to  whose  use  they  were  originally  consecrated.  And  it 
was  a  very  natural  theme  of  complaint  at  the  time,  that  such 
abundant  revenues  as  might  have  sustained  the  dignity  of  the 
crown  and  supplied  the  means  of  public  defence  without 
burdening  the  subject,  had  served  little  other  purpose  than 
that  of  swelling  the  fortunes  of  rapacious  courtiers,  and  had 
left  the  king  as  necessitous  and  craving  as  before. 

Notwithstanding  these  various  censures,  I  must  own  my-: 
self  of  opinion,  both  that  the  abolition  of  monastic  institutions 
might  have  been  conducted  in  a  manner  consonant  to  justice 
as  well  as  policy,  and  that  Henry's  profuse  alienation  of  the 
abbey  lands,  however  illaudable  in  its  motive,  has  proved 
upon  the  whole  more  beneficial  to  England  than  any  other 
disposition  would  have  turned  out.  I  cannot»until  some  broad 
principle  is  made  more  obvious  than  it  ever  has  yet  been,  do 
such  violence  to  all  common  notions  on  the  subject,  as  to  at- 
tach an  equal  inviolability  to  private  and  corporate  property. 
The  law  of  hereditary  succession,  as  ancient  and  universal 
as  that  of  property  itself,  the  law  of  testamentary  disposition, 
the  complement  of  the  former,  so  long  established  in  most 
countries  as  to  seem  a  natural  right,  have  invested  the  indi 


REFORMATION.     CHARACTER  OF   CORPORATE  PROPERTY.      87 

vidual  possessor  of  the  soil  with  such  a  fictitious  immortality, 
such  anticipated  enjoyment,  as  it  were,  of  futurity,  that  his 
perpetual  ownership  could  not  be  limited  to  the  term  of  his 
own  existence,  without  what  he  would  justly  feel  as  a  real 
deprivation  of  property.  Nor  are  the  expectancies  of  chil- 
dren, or  other  probable  heirs,  less  real  possessions,  which  it 
is  a  hardship,  if  not  an  absolute  injury,  to  defeat.  Yet  even 
this  hereditary  claim  is  set  aside  by  the  laws  of  forfeiture, 
which  have  almost  everywhere  prevailed.  But  in  estates 
held,  as  we  call  it,  in  mortmain,  there  is  no  intercommunity, 
no  natural  privity  of  interest,  between  the  present  possessor 
and  those  who  may  succeed  him ;  and  as  the  former  cannot 
have  any  pretext  for  complaint,  if,  his  own  rights  being  pre- 
served, the  legislature  should  alter  the  course  of  transmission 
after  his  decease,  so  neither  is  any  hardship  sustained  by 
others,  unless  their  succession  has  been  already  designated  or 
rendered  probable.  Corporate  property  therefore  appears  to 
stand  on  a  very  different  footing  from  that  of  private  indi- 
viduals ;  and  while  all  infringements  of  the  established  privi- 
leges of  the  latter  are  to  be  sedulously  avoided,  and  held  jus- 
tifiable only  by  the  strongest  motives  of  public  expediency, 
we  cannot  but  admit  the  full  right  of  the  legislature  to  new- 
mould  and  regulate  the  former,  in  all  that  does  not  involve 
existing  interests,  upon  far  slighter  reasons  of  convenience. 
If  Henry  had  been  content  with  prohibiting  the  profession 
of  religious  persons  for  the  future,  and  had  gradually  diverted 
their  revenues  instead  of  violently  confiscating  them,  no  Prot- 
estant could  have  found  it  easy  to  censure  his  policy. 

It  is  indeed  impossible  to  feel  too  much  indignation  at  the 
spirit  in  which  these  proceedings  were  conducted.  Besides 
the  hardship  sustained  by  so  many  persons  turned  loose  upon 
society,  for  whose  occupations  they  were  unfit,  the  indiscrim- 
inate destruction  of  convents  produced  several  "public  mis- 
chiefs. The  visitors  themselves  strongly  interceded  for  the 
nunnery  of  God^tow,  as  irreproachably  managed,  and  an  ex- 
cellent place  of  education ;  and  no  doubt  some  other  foun- 
dations should  have  been  preserved  for  the  same  reason. 
Latimer,  who  could  not  have  a  prejudice  on  that  side,  begged 
earnestly  that  the  priory  of  Malvern  might  be  spared  for 
the  maintenance  of  preaching  and  hospitality.  It  was  urged 
for  Hexham  abbey  that,  there  not  being  a  house  for  many 
miles  in  that  part  of  England,  the  country  would  be  in 


88  YEARLY  VALUE  OF  THE  MONASTERIES.     CHAP.  II. 

danger  of  going  to  waste.1  And  the  total  want  of  inns  in 
many  parts  of  the  kingdom  must  have  rendered  the  loss  of 
these  hospitable  places  of  reception  a  serious  grievance. 
These,  and  probably  other  reasons,  ought  to  have  checked 
the  destroying  spirit  of  reform  in  its  career,  and  suggested 
to  Henry's  counsellors,  that  a  few  years  would  not  be  ill  con- 
sumed in  contriving  new  methods  of  attaining  the  beneficial 
effects  which  monastic  institutions  had  not  failed  to  produce, 
and  in  preparing  the  people's  minds  for  so  important  an  inno- 
vation. 

The  suppression  of  monasteries  poured  in  an  instant  such 
a  torrent  of  wealth  upon  the  crown  as  has  seldom  been 
equalled  in  any  country  by  the  confiscations  following  a 
subdued  rebellion.  The  clear  yearly  value  was  rated  at 
131, 607/. ;  but  was  in  reality,  if  we  believe  Burnet,  ten  times 
as  great ;  the  courtiers  undervaluing  those  estates  in  order  to 
obtain  grants  or  sales  of  them  more  easily.  It  is  certain, 
however,  that  Burnet's  supposition  errs  extravagantly  on  the 
other  side.2  The  movables  of  the  smaller  monasteries  alone 
were  reckoned  at  100,000£.  ;  and  as  the  rents  of  these  were 
less  than  a  fourth  of  the  whole,  we  may  calculate  the  aggre- 
gate value  of  movable  wealth  in  the  same  proportion.  All 
this  was  enough  to  dazzle  a  more  prudent  mind  than  that  of 
Henry,  and  to  inspire  those  sanguine  dreams  of  inexhaustible 
affluence  with  which  private  men  are  so  often  filled  by  sudden 
prosperity. 

The  monastic  rule  of  life  being  thus  abrogated,  as  neither 
conformable  to  pure  religion  nor  to  policy,  it  is  to  be  con- 
sidered to  what  uses  these  immense  endowments  ought  to 
have  been  applied.  There  are  some,  perhaps,  who  may  be 
of  opinion  that  the  original  founders  of  monasteries,  or  those 
who  had  afterwards  bestowed  lands  on  them,  having  annexed 
to  their  grants  an  implied  condition  of  the  continuance  of 

1  Burnet,  i. ;  Append.  96.  sessed  above  one  fifth  of  the  kingdom; 

*  P.  268.  Dr.  Lingard,  on  the  authority  and  in  value,  by  reason  of  their  long 

Of  Nasmith'a  edition  of  Tanner's  Notitia  leases,  not  one  tenth.  But,  on  this  sup- 

Monastica,  puts  the  annual  revenue  of  position,  the  crown's  gain  was  enormous, 

all  the  monastic  houses  at  142,914!.  This  According  to  a  valuation  in  Speed's 

would  only  be  one  twentieth  part  of  the  Catalogue  of  Religious  Houses,  apud 

rental  of  the  kingdom,  if  Hume  were  Collier,  Append,  p.  34,  sixteen  mitred 

right  in  estimating  thatat  three  millions,  abbots  had  revenues  above  1000/.  per 

But  this  is  certainly  by  much  too  high,  annum.  St.  Peter's,  Westminster,  wag 

The  author  of  Banner's  Observations  on  the  richest,  and  valued  at3a77/.,  Glas- 

Burnet.  as  I  have  mentioned  above,  says  tonbury  at  350&.,  St.  Alban's  at  2511M., 

the  monks  will  be  found  not  to  have  pos-  &c. 


REFORMATION.  LMPEOPRIATIONS.  89 

certain  devotional  services,  and  especially  of  prayers  for  the 
repose  of  their  souls,  it  were  but  equitable  that,  if  the  legis- 
lature rendered  the  performance  of  this  condition  impossible, 
their  heirs  should  reenter  upon  the  lands  that  would  not 
have  been  alienated  from  them  on  any  other  account.  *  But, 
without  adverting  to  the  difficulty  in  many  cases  of  ascer- 
taining the  lawful  heir,  it  might  be  answered  that  the  donors 
had  absolutely  divested  themselves  of  all  interest  in  their 
gcants,  and  that  it  was  more  consonant  to  the  analogy  of  law 
to  treat  these  estates  as  escheats  or  vacant  possessions, 
devolving  to  the  sovereign,  than  to  imagine  a  right  of  rever- 
sion that  no  party  had  ever  contemplated.  There  was  indeed 
a  class  of  persons  very  different  from  the  founders  of  mon- 
asteries, to  whom  restitution  was  due.  A  large  proportion 
of  conventual  revenues  arose  out  of  parochial  tithes,  diverted 
from  the  legitimate  object  of  maintaining  the  incumbent  to 
swell  the  pomp  of  some  remote  abbot.  These  impropriations 
were  in  no  one  instance,  I  believe,  restored  to  the  parochial 
clergy,  and  have  passed  either  into  the  hands  of  laymen, 
or  of  bishops  and  other  ecclesiastical  persons,  who  were 
frequently  compelled  by  the  Tudor  princes  to  take  them  in 
exchange  for  lands.1  It  was  not  in  the  spirit  of  Henry's 
policy,  or  in  that  of  the  times,  to  preserve  much  of  these 
revenues  to  the  church,  though  he  had  designed  to  allot 
18,000/.  a  year  for  eighteen  new  sees,  of  which  he  only 
erected  six  with  far  inferior  endowments.  Nor  was  he  much 
better  inclined  to  husband  them  for  public  exigencies, 
although  more  than  sufficient  to  make  the  crown  independent 
of  parliamentary  aid.  It  may  perhaps  be  reckoned  a  prov- 
idential circumstance,  that  his  thoughtless  humor  should 
have  rejected  the  obvious  means  of  establishing  an  uncon- 
trollable despotism,  by  rendering  unnecessary  the  only  exer- 
tion of  power  which  his  subjects  were  likely  to  withstand. 
Henry  VII.  would  probably  have  followed  a  very  different 
course.  Large  sums,  however,  are  said  to  have  been  ex- 
pended in  the  repair  of  highways,  and  in  fortifying  ports  in 

I  An  act  entitling  the  queen  to  take  (1  Eliz.  c.  19).    This  bill  passed  on  a 

into  her  hands,  on  the  avoidance  of  any  division    in     the    commons    by   104    to 

bishopric,  so  much  of  the  lands  belong-  90.  and  was  ill   taken   by   some  of  the 

ing  to  it  as  should  be  equal  in  value  to  bishops,    who   saw    themselves    reduced 

the  impropriate  rectories,  &c.  within  the  to  live   on     the     lawful     subsistence    of 

same,   belonging   to   the  crown,  and  to  the  parochial  clergy.     Strype's   Annals, 

give  the  latter  in  exchange,  was  made  i.  68.  97. 


-       90     MOTIVES  FOR  PARTITION  OF  CHURCH  LANDS.   CHAP.  II 

the  channel.1  But  the  greater  part  was  dissipated  in  profuse 
grants  to  the  courtiers,  who  frequently  contrived  to  veil  their 
acquisitions  under  cover  of  a  purchase  from  the  crown.  It 
has  been  surmised  that  Cromwell,  in  his  desire  to  promote 
the  Reformation,  advised  the  king  to  make  this  partition  of 
abbey  lands  among  the  nobles  and  gentry,  either  by  grant, 
or  by  sale  on  easy  terms,  .that,  being  thus  bound  by  the  sure 
ties  of  private  interest,  they  might  always  oppose  any  re- 
turn towards  the  dominion  of  Rome.2  In  Mary's  reign,  ac- 
cordingly, her  parliament,  so  obsequious  in  all  matters  of 
religion,  adhered  with  a  firm  grasp  to  the  possession  of 
church  lands  ;  nor  could  the  papal  supremacy  be  reestab- 
lished until  a  sanction  was  given  to  their  enjoyment.  And 
we  may  ascribe  part  of  the  zeal  of  the  same  class  in  bringing 
back  and  preserving  the  reformed  church  under  Elizabeth  to 
a  similar  motive  ;  not  that  these  gentlemen  were  hypocritical 
pretenders  to  a  belief  they  did  not  entertain,  but  that,  ac- 
cording to  the  general  laws  of  human  nature,  they  gave  a 
readier  reception  to  truths  which  made  their  estates  more 
secure. 

But,  if  the  participation  of  so  many  persons  in  the  spoils 
of  ecclesiastical  property  gave  stability  to  the  new  religion, 
by  pledging  them  to  its  support,  it  was  also  of  no  slight 
advantage  to  our  civil  constitution,  strengthening,  and  as  it 
were  infusing  new  blood  into,  the  territorial  aristocracy,  who 
were  to  withstand  the  enormous  prerogative  of  the  crown. 
For  if  it  be  true,  as  surely  it  is,  that  wealth  is  power,  the 
distribution  of  so  large  a  portion  of  the  kingdom  among  the 
nobles  and  gentry,  the  elevation  of  so  many  new  families, 
and  the  increased  opulence  of  the  more  ancient,  must  have 
sensibly  affected  their  weight  in  the  balance.  Those  families 
indeed,  within  or  without  the  bounds  of  the  peerage,  which 
are  now  deemed  the  most  considerable,  will  be  found,  with 
no  great  number  of  exceptions,  to  have  first  become  con- 
spicuous under  the  Tudor  line  of  kings ;  and  if  we  could 

1  Burnet,  268,  339.    In  Strype,  i.  211,  marks.     His  highness  may  assign  to  the 

we  have  a  paper  drawn  up  by  Cromwell  yearly  reparation  of  highways  in  sundry 

r  the  king's  inspection,   setting   forth  parts,  or  the  doing  of  other  good  deedn 

what  might  be  done  with  the  revenues  for  the  common  wealth  ,5000  marks."    In 

the  lesser  monasteries.     Among  a  few  such  scant  proportion  did  the  claims  of 

er  particulars  are   the  following:  —  public  utility  come  after  those  of  selfish 

grace  may  furnish  200  gentlemen  pomp,  or  rather  perhaps,  looking  more 

ittend  on   his   person,  every  one   of  attentively,  of  cunning  corruption, 

them  to  have  100  marks  yearly  —  20,000  a  Burnot,  i.  223 


EEFORMATION.      ITS  EFFECTS   ON  THE  CONSTITUTION.       91 

trace  the  titles  of  their  estates,  to  have  acquired  no  small  por- 
tion of  them,  mediately  or  immediately,  from  monastic  or 
other  ecclesiastical  foundations.  And  better  it  has  been  that 
these  revenues  should  thus  from  age  to  age  have  been  ex- 
pended in  liberal  hospitality,  in  discerning  charity,  in  the  pro- 
motion of  industry  and  cultivation,  in  the  active  duties  or 
even  generous  amusements  of  life,  than  in  maintaining  a 
host  of  ignorant  and  inactive  monks,  in  deceiving  the  pop- 
ulace by  superstitious  pageantry,  or  in  the  encouragement  of 
idleness  and  mendicity.1 

A  very  ungrounded  prejudice  had  long  obtained  currency, 
and  notwithstanding  the  contradiction  it  has  experienced  in 
our  more  accurate  age,  seems  still  not  eradicated,  that  the 
alms  of  monasteries  maintained  the  indigent  throughout  the 
kingdom,  and  that  the  system  of  parochial  relief,  now  so 
much  the  "topic  of  complaint,  was  rendered  necessary  by  the 
dissolution  of  those  beneficent  foundations.  There  can  be 
no  doubt  that  many  of  the  impotent  poor  derived  support 
from  their  charity.  But  the  blind  eleemosynary  spirit  incul- 
cated by  the  Romish  church  is  notoriously  the  cause,  not  the 
cure,  of  beggary  and  wretchedness.  The  monastic  founda- 
tions, scattered  in  different  counties,  but  by  no  means  at 
regular  distances,  and  often  in  sequestered  places,  could 
never  answer  the  end  of  local  and  limited  succor,  meted  out 

1  It  is  a  favorite  theory  with  many  maintain  a  grammar-school  than  that 
who  regret  the  absolute  secularization  of  they  should  escheat  to  the  crown.  But 
conventual  estates,  that  they  might  have  to  waive  this,  and  to  revert  to  the  prin- 
been  rendered  useful  to  learning  and  ciple  of  public  utility,  it  may  possibly  be 
religion  by  being  bestowed  on  chapters  true  that,  in  one  instance,  such  a£  Whal- 
and  colleges.  Thomas  Whitaker  has  ley,  a  more  beneficial  disposition  could 
sketched  a  pretty  scheme  for  the  abbey  have  been  made  in  favor  of  a  college 
of  Whalley,  wherein,  besides  certain*  than  by  granting  away  the  lands.  But 
opulent  prebendaries,  he  would  provide  the  question  is,  whether  all,  or  even  a 
for  schoolmasters  and  physicians.  I  sup-  great  part,  of  the  monastic  estates  could 
pose  this  is  considered  an  adherence  to  have  been  kept  in  mortmain  with  ad- 
the  donor's  intention,  and  no  sort  of  vio-  vantage.  We  may  easily  argue  that  the 
lation  of  property  ;  somewhat  on  the  Derwentwater  property,  applied  as  it  has 
principle  called  cy  pris.  adopted  by  the  been,  has  done  the  state  more  service  than 
court  of  chancery  in  cases  of  charitable  if  it  had  gone  to  maintain  a  race  of  Rat- 
bequests  ;  according  to  which,  that  tri-  cliffes,  and  been  squandered  at  White's 
bunal,  if  it  holds  the  testator's  intention  or  Newmarket.  But  does  it  follow  that 
unfit  to  be  executed,  carries  the  bequest  the  kingdom  would  be  the  mote  pros- 
into  effect  by  doing  what  it  presumes  to  perous  if  all  the  estates  of  the  peerage 
come  next  in  his  wishes  though  some-  were  diverted  to  similar  endowments? 
times  very  far  from  them.  It  might  be  And  can  we  seriously  believe  that,  if 
difficult  indeed  to  prove  that  a  Norman  such  a  plan  had  been  adopted  at  the  sup- 
baron,  who,  not  quite  easy  about  his  pression  of  monasteries,  either  religion  or 
future  prospects,  took  comfort  iu  his  last  learning  would  have  been  the  better  for 
hours  from  the  anticipation  of  daily  such  an  inundation  of  prebendaries  and 
masses  for  his  soul,  would  have  been  schoolmasters  ? 
better  satisfied  that  his  lands  should 


92  POWER  OF  CLERGY  BROKEN.  CHAP.  II. 

in  just  proportion  to  the  demands  of  poverty.  Their  gates 
might  indeed  be  open  to  those  who  knocked  at  them  for 
alms,  and  came  in  search  of  streams  that  must  always  be 
too  scanty  for  a  thirsty  multitude.  Nothing  could  have 
a  stronger  tendency  to  promote  that  vagabond  mendicity, 
which  unceasing  and  very  severe  statutes  were  enacted  to 
repress.  It  was  and  must  always  continue  a  hard  problem, 
to  discover  the  means  of  rescuing  those  whom  labor  cannot 
maintain  from  the  last  extremities  of  helpless  suffering.  The 
regular  clergy  were  in  all  respects  ill  fitted  for  this  great 
office  of  humanity.  Even  while  the  monasteries  were  yet 
standing,  the  scheme  of  a  provision  for  the  poor  had  been 
adopted  by  the  legislature,  by  means  of  regular  collections, 
which  in  the  course  of  a  long  series  of  statutes,  ending  in 
the  43d  of  Elizabeth,  were  almost  insensibly  converted  into 
compulsory  assessments.1  It  is  by  no  means  probable  that, 
however  some  in  particular  districts  may  have  had  to  lament 
the  cessation  of  hospitality  in  the  convents,  the  poor  in  gen- 
eral, after  gome  time,  were  placed  in  a  worse  condition  by 
their  dissolution ;  nor  are  we  to  forget  that  the  class  to  whom 
the  abbey  lands  have  fallen  have  been  distinguished  at  all 
times,  and  never  more  than  in  the  first  century  after  that 
transference  cf  property,  for  their  charity  and  munificence. 

These  two  great  political  measures  —  the  separation  from 
the  Roman  see,  and  the  suppression  of  monasteries  —  so  broke 
the  vast  power  of  the  English  clergy,  and  humbled  their 
spirit,  that  they  became  the  most  abject  of  Henry's  vassals, 
and  dared  not  offer  any  steady  opposition  to  his  caprice,  even 
when  it  led  him  to  make  innovations  in  the  essential  parts 
of  their  religion.  It  is  certain"  that  a  large  majority  of  that 
order  would  gladly  have  retained  their  allegiance  to  Rome, 
and  that  they  viewed  with  horror  the  downfall  of  the  monas- 
teries. In  rending  away  so  much  that  had  been  incorpora- 
ted with  the  public  faith  Henry  seemed  to  prepare  the  road 
for  the  still  more  radical  changes  of  the  reformers.  These, 
a  numerous  and  increasing  sect,  exulted  by  turns  in  the  in- 
novations he  promulgated,  lamented  their  dilatoriness  and  im- 

i  The  first  act  for  the  relief  of  the  speaking,  began  in  1572  (14  Eliz.  c.  5). 

impotent  poor  passed  in  1535  (27  H.  8.  But  by  an  earlier  statute,  1  Edw.  6.  c.  3, 

c.   25).     By  this  statute   no  alms  were  the  bishop  was  empowered  to  proceed  in 

allowed  to  bo  given  to  beggars,  on   pain  his  court  against  such  as  should  refuse 

citing  ten  times  the  value ;  but  a  to  contribute,  or  dissuade   others   from 

collection  was  to  be  made  in  every  parish,  doing  so. 
The  compulsory  contributions,  properly 


REFORMATION.  POWER  OF  CLERGY  BROKEX.  93 

perfection,  or  trembled  at  the  reaction  of  his  bigotry  against 
themselves.  Trained  in  the  school  of  theological  contro- 
versy, and  drawing  from  those  bitter  waters  fresh  aliment  for 
his  sanguinary  and  imperious  temper,  he  displayed  the  im- 
partiality of  his  intolerance  by  alternately  persecuting  the 
two  conflicting  parties.  We  all  have  read  how  three  persons 
convicted  of  disputing  his  supremacy,  and  three  deniers  of 
transubstantiation,  were  drawn  on  the  same  hurdle  to  exe- 
cution. But  the  doctrinal  system  adopted  by  Henry  in  the 
latter  years  of  his  reign,  varying,  indeed,  in  some  measure 
from  time  to  time,  was  about  equally  removed  from  popish 
and  protestant  orthodoxy.  The  corporal  presence  of  Christ 
in  the  consecrated  elements  was  a  tenet  which  no  one  might 
dispute  without  incurring  the  penalty  of  death  by  fire ;  and 
the  king  had  a  capricious  partiality  to  the  Romish  practice 
in  those  very  points  where  a  great  many  real  catholics  on  the 
Continent  were  earnest  for  its  alteration,  the  communion  of 
the  laity  by  bread  alone,  and  the  celibacy  of  the  clergy.  But 
in  several  other  respects  he  was  wrought  upon  by  Cranmer 
to  draw  pretty  near  to  the  Lutheran  creed,  and  to  permit 
such  explications  to  be  given  in  the  books  set  forth  by  his 
authority,  the  Institution,  and  the  Erudition  of  a  Christian 
Man,  as,  if  they  did  not  absolutely  proscribe  most  of  the  an- 
cient opinions,  threw  at  best  much  doubt  upon  them,  and 
gave  intimations  which  the  people,  now  become  attentive  to 
these  questions,  were  acute  enough  to  interpret.1 

It  was  natural  to  suspect,  from  the  previous  temper  of  the 
nation,  that  the  revolutionary  spirit  which  blazed  progress 
out  in  Germany  would  spread  rapidly  over  Eng-  offthe  * 

i       ,         „.  •  .    .  „"        .         r       J        if  t          o    reformed 

Jand.      1  he    enemies  of    ancient  superstition    at  doctrine  in 
home,  by  frequent  communication   with  the  Lu-  Ensland- 
theran  and  Swiss  reformers,  acquired  not  only  more  enliven- 
ing confidence,  but  a  surer  and  more  definite  system  of  belief. 
Books  printed  in   Germany  or  in  the  Flemish    provinces, 
where  at  first  the  administration  connived  at  the  new  relig- 
ion, were  imported  and  read  with  that  eagerness  and  delight 
which   always   compensate   the    risk  of  forbidden  studies.2 

1  The  Institution  was  printed  in  1537 ;  trine,  and  under  the  eye  of  the  king  him- 

tho  Erudition,  according  to   Burnet,   in  self.      Collier.  137,  189.      The  doctrinal 

1640;  but  in  Collier  and  Strype's  opinion,  variations  in   these   two   summaries    of 

not   till  1543.      They  are  both  artfully  royal  faith  are  by  no  means  inconsider- 

dniwn,  probably   in  the  main   by  Gran-  able. 

nier,   but  not  without  the  interference  2  Strype,   i.   165.      A   statute   enacted 

Of  some  less  favorable  to  the  new  doc-  in  1534  (25  H.  8,  c.  15),  after  reciting 


94  PROGRESS  OF  REFORMED  DOCTRINE          CHAP.  H 

Wolsey,  who  had  no  turn  towards  persecution,  contented  him- 
self  with  ordering  heretical  writings  to  be  burned,  and  strictly 
prohibiting  their  importation.  But  to  withstand  the  course 
of  popular  opinion  is  always  like  a  combat  against  the  ele- 
ments in  commotion  ;  nor  is  it  likely  that  a  government  far 
more  steady  and  unanimous  than  that  of  Henry  VIII.  could 
have  effectually  prevented  the  diffusion  of  protestantism. 
And  the  severe  punishment  of  many  zealous  reformers  in  the 
subsequent  part  of  this  reign  tended,  beyond  a  doubt,  to  ex 
cite  a  favorable  prejudice  for  men  whose  manifest  sincerity, 
piety,  and  constancy  in  suffering,  were  as  good  pledges  for  the 
truth  of  their  doctrine,  as  the  people  had  been  always  taught 
to  esteem  the  same  qualities  in  the  legends  of  the  early  martyrs. 
Nor  were  Henry's  persecutions  conducted  upon  the  only  ra- 
tional principle,  that  of  the  inquisition,  which  judges  from 
the  analogy  of  medicine,  that  a  deadly  poison  cannot  be  ex- 
tirpated but  by  the  speedy  and  radical  excision  of  the  dis- 
eased part ;  but  falling  only  upon  a  few  of  a  more  eager  and 
officious  zeal,  left  a  well-grounded  opinion  among  the  rest, 
that  by  some  degree  of  temporizing  prudence  they  might 
escape  molestation  till  a  season  of  liberty  should  arrive. 

One  of  the  books  originally  included  in  the  list  of  pro- 
scription among  the  writings  of  Luther  and  the  foreign 
Protestants  was  a  translation  of  the  New  Testament  into 
English  by  Tyndale,  printed  at  Antwerp  in  1526.  A  com- 
plete version  of  the  Bible,  partly  by  Tyndale,  and  partly 
by  Coverdale,  appeared,  perhaps  at  Hamburg,  in  1535 ; 
a  second  edition,  under  the  name  of.  Matthews,  following 
in  1537 ;  and  as  Cranmer's  influence  over  the  king  be- 
came greater,  and  his  aversion  to  the  Roman  church  more 
inveterate,  so  material  a  change  was  made  in  the  eccle- 
siastical policy  of  this  reign  as  to  direct  the  Scriptures 
in  this  translation  (but  with  corrections  in  many  places)  to 
be  set  up  in  parish  churches,  and  permit  them  to  be  publicly 
sold.1  This  measure  had  a  strong  tendency  to  promote  the 

that  "  at  this  day  there  be  within  this  1  The  accounts  of  early  editions  of  the 

realraagreatnumbercunuingand  expert  English  Bible  in  Burnet,  Collier,  Strype, 

in  printing,  and  as  able  to  execute  the  and   an   essay  by  Johnson  in  Watson's 

said  craft  as  any  stranger,'' proceeds   to  Theological  Tracts,  vol.   iii,,  are  errone- 

forbid  the  sale  of  bound  books  imported  ous  or  defective.     A  letter  of  Strype,  in 

from   the  Continent.      A   terrible    blow  Harleian    MSS.   3782,    which    has    been 

was   thus  levelled  both  against  general  printed, is  better;  but  the  most  complete 

literature  and  the  reformed  religion  ;  but,  enumeration  is  in  Cotton's  list  of  edi- 

like  many  other  bad  laws,  produced  very  tions,  1821.   The  dispersion  of  the  Script- 
ures, with  full  liberty  to  read  theni,  was 


REFOS31ATIOX.  IN  ENGLAND.  95 

Reformation,  especially  among  those  who  were  capable  of 
reading;  not,  surely,  that  the  controverted  doctrines  of  the 
Romish  church  are  so  palpably  erroneous  as  to  bear  no  sort 
of  examination,  but  because  such  a  promulgation  of  the 
Scriptures  at  that  particular  time  seemed  both  tacitly  to  ad- 
mit the  chief  point  of  contest,  that  they  were  the  exclusive 
standard  of  Christian  faith,  and  to  lead  the  people  to  inter- 
pret them  with  that  sort  of  prejudice  which  a  jury  would  feel 
in  considering  evidence  that  one  party  in  a  cause  had  at- 
tempted to  suppress ;  a  danger  which  those  who  wish  to  re- 
strain the  course  of  free  discussion  without  very  sure  means 
of  success  will  in  all  ages  do  well  to  reflect  upon. 

The  great  change  of  religious  opinions  was  not  so  much 
effected  by  reasoning  on  points  of  theological  controversy, 
upon  which  some  are  apt  to  fancy  it  turned,  as  on  a  persua- 
sion that  fraud  and  corruption  pervaded  the  established  church. 
The  pretended  miracles,  which  had  so  long  held  the  under- 
standing in  captivity,  were  wisely  exposed  to  ridicule  and  in- 
dignation by  the  government.  Plays  and  interludes  were 
represented  in  churches,  of  which  the  usual  subject  was  the 
vices  and  corruptions  of  the  monks  and  clergy.  These  were 
disapproved  of  by  the  graver  sort,  but  no  doubt  served  a 
useful  purpose.1  The  press  sent  forth  its  light  hosts  of  libels ; 

greatly  due  to  Cromwell,  as  is  shown  by  Greek  were  very  little  known  in  England 

Burnet.     Even  after  his    fall,  a   procla-  at  that  time. 

mation,  dated  May  6,  1542,  referring  to  The  edition  of  1537,  called  Matthews's 
the  king's  former  injunctions  for  the  Bible,  printed  by  Grafton,  contains  mar- 
same  purpose,  directs  a  large  Bible  to  ginal  notes  reflecting  on  the  corruptions 
be  set  up  in  every  parish  church.  But,  of  popery.  These  it  was  thought  expe 
next  year  the  duke  of  Norfolk  and  Gar-  dient  to  suppress  in  that  of  1539,  com- 
diiier  prevailing  over  Cranuaer,  Henry  monly  called  Oranmer's  Bible  as  having 
retraced  a  part  of  his  steps ;  and  the  act  been  revised  by  him,  and  in  later  editions. 
84  H.  8,  c.  1,  forbids  the  sale  of  Tyn-  In  all  these  editions  of  Henry's  reign, 
dale's  "false  translation,"  and  the  read-  though  the  version  is  properly  Tyndale's, 
ing  of  the  Bible  in  churches,  or  by  yeo-  there  are,  as  I  am  informed,  considerable 
men,  women,  and  other  incapable  persons,  variations  and  amendments.  Thus,  in 
The  popish  bishops,  well  aware  how  Cranmer's  Bible,  the  word  ecclesia  is 
much  turned  on  this  general  liberty  of  always  rendered  congregation,  instead  of 
reading  the  Scriptures,  did  all  in  their  church ;  either  as  the  primary  meaning, 
power  to  discredit  the  new  version.  Gar-  or,  more  probably,  to  point  out  that  the 
diner  made  a  list  of  about  one  hundred  laity  had  a  share  in  the  government  of  a 
words  which  he  thought  unfit  to  be  trans-  Christian  society. 

lated,  and  which,  in  case  of  an  authorized  !  Burnet,  318;  Strype's  Life  of  Par 
version  (whereof  the  clergy  in  convoca-  ker,  18.  Collier  (187)  is  of  course  much 
tion  had  reluctantly  admitted  the  expe-  scandalized.  In  his  view  of  things,  it 
diency),  ought,  in  his  opinion,  to  be  left  had  been  better  to  give  up  the  Kefonna 
in  Latin.  Tyndale's  translation  may,  tion  entirely  than  to  suffer  one  reflection 
I  apprehend,  be  reckoned  the  basis  of  on  the  clergy.  These  dramatic  satire? 
that  now  in  use.  but  has  undergone  on  that  order  had  also  an  effect  in  pro- 
several  corrections  before  the  last.  It  moting  the  Reformation  in  Holland, 
has  been  a  matter  of  dispute  whether  it  Brandt's  History  of  Reformation  in  Lovi 
were  made  from  the  original  languages  Countries,  Vol.  i.  p.  128. 
or  from  the  Vulgate.  Hebrew  and  even 


96  EDWARD  VI.  CHAP.  II 

and  though  the  catholic  party  did  not  fail  to  try  the  same 
means  of  influence,  they  had  both  less  liberty  to  write  as 
they  pleased,  and  fewer  readers  than  their  antagonists.1 
In  this  feverish  state  of  the  public  mind  on  the  most  inter- 
esting subject  ensued  the  death  of  Henry  VIII., 
tohme^t"  who  had  excited  and  kept  it  up.  More  than  once,  •• 
during  the  latter  part  of  his  capricious  reign,  the 
popish  party,  headed  by  Norfolk  and  Gardiner,  had 
gained  an  ascendant,  and  several  persons  had  been  burned 
for  denying  transubstantiation.  But  at  the  moment  of  his 
decease  Norfolk  was  a  prisoner  attainted  of  treason,  Gardi- 
ner in  disgrace,  and  the  favor  of  Cranmer  at  its  height.  It 
is  said  that  Henry  had  meditated  some  further  changes  in 
religion.  Of  his  executors,  the  greater  part,  as  their  subse- 
quent conduct  evinces,  were  nearly  indifferent  to  the  two 
systems,  except  so  far  as  more  might  be  gained  by  innova- 
tion. But  Somerset,  the  now  protector,  appears  to  have  in- 
clined sincerely  towards  the  Reformation,  though  not  wholly 
uninfluenced  by  similar  motives.  His  authority  readily 
overcame  all  opposition  in  the  council;  and  it  was  soon 
perceived  that  Edward,  whose  singular  precocity  gave  his 
opinions  in  childhood  an  importance  not  wholly  ridiculous,  had 
imbibed  a  steady  and  ardent  attachment  to  the  new  religion, 
which  probably,  had  he  lived  longer,  would  have  led  him 
both  to  diverge  farther  from  what  he  thought  an  idolatrous 
superstition,  and  to  have  treated  its  adherents  with  severity.2 
Under  his  reign,  accordingly,  a  series  of  alterations  in  the 

1  ["  In  place  of  the  ancient  reverence  a  royal  plant  of  such  natural  vigor ;  and 

which  was  entertained  for  the  pope  and  his  letters  to  his  young  friend  Barnaby 

the  Romish  chair,  there  was  not  a  mas-  Fitzpatrick,  published  by  II.  Walpole  in 

querade  or  other  pastime  in  which  some  1774,  are  quite  unlike  the  style  of  a  boy. 

one  was  not  to  be  seen  going   about  in  One  could  wish  this   journal  not  to  be 

thf  dress  of  a  pope  or  cardinal.     Even  genuine;   for   the   manner  in  which  he 

tho  women  jested  incessantly  at  the  pope  speaks  of  both  his  uncles'  executions  does 

and  his  servants,  and  thought  they  could  not  show  a  good  heart.     Unfortunately, 

do  no  greater  disgrace  to  any  man  than  however,  there  is  a  letter  extant  of  the 

by  calling  him    priest   of  the  pope,  or  king    to    Fitzpatrick,    which    must   be 

papist."     Extract  from   an  anonymous  genuine,  and  is  in  the  same  strain.     He 

French  MS.  by  a  person  resident  at  the  treated  his  sister  Mary   harshly  about 

English  court,  about  1540,  in  Raumer's  her  religioji,  and  had,  I  suspect,  too  much 

History  of  16th  and  17th  centuries  illus-  Tudor  blood  in  his  veins.     It  is  certain 

tnitoil,  vol.  ii.  p.  66.     1845.]  that  he  was  a  very  extraordinary  boy,  or, 

^  -  1  c:m  hardly  avoid  doubting  whether  as  Cardan  calls  him,  monstrincus  puel- 

Edward  VI. 's  Journal,  published  in  the  lus ;  and  the  reluctance  with  which  he 

second  volume  of  Burnet,  be  altogether  yielded,  on  the  solicitations  of  Cranmer, 

his  own;   because  it  is  strange  for  a  boy  to   sign   the  warrant  for   burning  Joan 

of  ten  years  old  to  write  with  the  precise  Boucher,  is  as  much   to   his  honor  aa 

brevity  of  a  man  of  business.     Yet  it  is  it  is  against  the  archbishop's.     [But  see 

hard  to  say  how  far  an  intercourse  with  p.  106.] 
able  men  on  serious  subjects  may  force 


REFORMATION.    DIFFERENCE  OF  THE  TWO   RELIGIONS.         97 

tenets  and  homilies  of  the  English  church  were  made,  the 
principal  of  which  I  shall  point  out,  without  following  a 
chronological  order,  or  adverting  to  such  matters  of  contro- 
versy as  did  not  produce  a  sensible  effect  on  the  people. 

I.  It  was  obviously  among  the  first  steps  required  in  order 
to  introduce  a  mode  of  religion  at  once  more  rea- 
sonable and  more  earnest  than  the  former,  that  the  the  chieff 
public  services  of  the  church  should  be  expressed  ??~nts  of 

in  the  mother  tongue  of  the  congregation.  The  between 
Latin  ritual  had  been  unchanged  ever  since  the 
age  when  it  was  vernacular ;  partly  through  a 
sluggish  dislike  of  innovation,  but  partly  also  because  the 
mjsteriousness  of  an  unknown  dialect  served  to  impose  on 
the  vulgar,  and  to  throw  an  air  of  wisdom  around  the  priest- 
hood. Yet  what  was  thus  concealed  would  have  borne  the 
light.  Our  own  liturgy,  so  justly  celebrated  for  its  piety, 
elevation,  and  simplicity,  is  in  great  measure  a  translation 
from  the  catholic  services,  or  more  properly  from  those 
which  had  been  handed  down  from  a  more  primitive  age ; 
those  portions,  of  course,  being  omitted  which  had  relation 
to  different  principles  of  worship.  In  the  second  year  of 
Edward's  reign,  the  reformation  of  the  public  service  was 
accomplished,  and  an  English  liturgy  compiled,  not  essential- 
ly different  from  that  in  present  use.1 

II.  No  part  of  exterior  religion  was  more  prominent  or 
more  offensive  to  those  who  had  imbibed  a  protestant  spirit 
than  the  worship,  or  at  least  veneration,  of  images,  which  in 
remote  and  barbarous  ages  had  given  excessive  scandal  both 
in  the  Greek  and  Latin  churches,  though  long  fully  estab- 
lished in  the  practice  of  each.     The  populace  in  towns  where 
the  reformed  tenets  prevailed  began  to  pull  them  down  in 
the  very  first  days  of  Edward's  reign;  and  after  a  little  pre- 
tence at  distinguishing  those  which  had  not  been  abused, 
orders  were  given  that  all  images  should  be  taken  away  from 
churches.     It  was,  perhaps,  necessary   thus  to   hinder  the 
zealous  protestants  from  abating  them  as  nuisances,  which 
had  already  caused  several  disturbances.2     But  this  order 

1  The  litany  had  been  translated  into  book.    Strype's  Annals,  ii.  39 ;  Holling- 

Kntr'.ish  in  1542.    Burnet,  i.  331 ;  Collier,  shed.  iii.  921.  (4to.  edition.) 

Ill;    where    it   may  be  read,  not  much  2  ;l  It  was  observed."  says  Strype,  ii.  79, 

differing  from  that  now  in  use.     It  was  "  that  where  images  were  left  there  was 

always  held  out  by  our  church,  when  the  most  contest,  and  most  peace  where  they 

object  was  conciliation,  that  the  liturgy  were  all  sheer  pulled  down,  as  they  were 

\fa.s  essentially  the  same  with  the  mass-  in  some  places." 

VOL.  I c>  7 


98  POINTS  OF  DIFFERENCE  CHAP.  H. 

was  executed  with  a  rigor  which  lovers  of  art  and  antiquity 
have  long  deplored.  Our  churches  bear  witness  to  the  dev- 
astation committed  in  the  wantonness  of  triumpharft  reform 
by  defacing  statues  and  crosses  on  the  exterior  of  buildings 
intended  for  worship,  or  windows  and  monuments  within. 
Missals  and  other  books  dedicated  to  superstition  perished  in 
the  same  manner.  Altars  were  taken  down,  and  a  great 
variety  of  ceremonies  abrogated,  such  as  the  use  of  incense, 
tapers,  and  holy  water  ;  and  though  more  of  these  were  re- 
tained than  eager  innovators  could  approve,  the  whole  sur- 
face of  religious  ordinances,  all  that  is  palpable  to  common 
minds,  underwent  a  surprising  transformation. 

III.  But  this  change  in  ceremonial  observances  and  out- 
ward show  was  trifling  when  compared  to  that  in  the  objects 
of  wors*hip,  and  in  the  purposes  for  which    they  were  ad- 
dressed.     Those  who  have  visited    some  catholic  temples, 
and  attended  to  the  current  language  of  devotion,  must  have 
perceived,  what  the  writings  of  apologists  or  decrees  of  coun- 
cils will  never  enable  them  to  discover,*that  the  saints,  but 
more  especially  the  Virgin,  are  almost  exclusively  the  popu- 
lar deities  of  that  religion.     All  this  polytheism  was   swept 
away  by  the  reformers ;  and  in  this  may  be  deemed  to  con- 
sist the  most  specific  difference  of  the  two  systems.     Nor  did 
they  spare  the  belief  in  purgatory,  that  unknown  land  which 
the  hierarchy  swayed  with  so  absolute  a  rule,  and  to  which 
the  earth  had  been  rendered  a  tributary  province.     Yet  in 
the  first  liturgy  put  forth  under  Edward  the  prayers  for  de- 
parted souls  were  retained ;  whether  out  of  respect  to  the 
prejudices  of  the  people  or  to  the  immemorial  antiquity  of 
the  practice.     But  such  prayers,  if  not  necessarily  implying 
the  doctrine  of  purgatory  (which  yet  in   the  main  they  ap- 
pear to  do),  are  at  least  so  closely  connected  with  it  that 
the  belief  could  never  be  eradicated  while  they  remained. 
Hence,  in  the  revision  of  the  liturgy,  four  years  afterwards, 
they  were  laid  aside ; l  and  several   other  changes  made,  to 
eradicate  the  vestiges  of  the  ancient  superstition. 

IV.  Auricular  confession,  as  commonly  called,  or  the  pri 

1  Collier,  p.  257,  enters  into  a  yindi-  which  the  reformers  set  up  exclusive!, 
fttion  of  the  practice,  which  appears  to  of  all  tradition,  it  contradicted  the  doc- 
have  prevailed  in  the  church  from  the  trine  of  justification  by  mere  faith 
second  century.  It  was  defended  in  in  the  strict  sense  which  they  affixed 
general  by  the  nonjnrorg  and  the  whole  to  that  tenet.  See  preamble  of  the 
ichool  of  Andrews.  ]!ut,  independently  act  for  dissolution  of  chantries,  1  Edw, 
of  it*  wanting  the  authority  of  Scripture,  6,  c.  14. 


REFORMATION.      BETWEEN  THE  TWO  RELIGIONS.  99 

vate  and  special  confession  of  sins  to  a  priest  for  the  purpose 
of  obtaining  his  absolution,  an  imperative  duty  in  the  church 
of  Rome,  and  preserved  as  such  in  the  statute  of  the  six  ar- 
ticles, and  in  the  religious  codes  published  by  Henry  VIIL, 
was  left  to  each  man's  discretion  in  the  new  order;  a  judi- 
cious temperament,  which  the  reformers  would  have  done 
well  to  adopt  in  some  other  points.  And  thus,  while  it  has 
never  been  condemned  in  our  church,  it  went  without  dispute 
into  complete  neglect.  Those  who  desire  to  augment  the  in- 
fluence of  the  clergy  regret,  of  course,  its  discontinuance; 
and  some  may  conceive  that  it  would  serve  either  for  whole- 
some restraint  or  useful  admonition.  It  is  very  difficult,  or, 
perhaps,  beyond  the  reach  of  any  human  being,  to  determine 
absolutely  how  far  these  benefits,  which  cannot  be  reasonably 
denied  to  result  in  some  instances  from  the  rite  of  confession, 
outweigh  the  mischiefs  connected  with  it.  There  seems  to  be 
something  in  the  Roman  catholic  discipline  (and  I  know 
nothing  else  so  likely)  which  keeps  the  balance,  as  it  were  of 
moral  influence  pretty  even  between  the  two  religions,  and 
compensates  for  the  ignorance  and  superstition  which  the  el- 
der preserves ;  for  I  -am  not  sure  that  the  protestant  system 
in  the  present  age  has  any  very  sensible  advantage  in  this 
respect ;  or  that  in  countries  where  the  comparison  can  fairly 
be  made,  as  in  Germany  or  Switzerland,  there  is  more  hon- 
esty in  one  sex,  or  more  chastity  in  the  other,  when  they  be- 
long to  the  reformed  churches.  Yet,  on  the  other  hand,  the 
practice  of  confession  is  at  the  best  of  very  doubtful  utility, 
when  considered  in  its  full  extent  and  general  bearings.  The 
ordinary  confessor,  listening  mechanically  to  hundreds  of  pen- 
itents, can  hardly  preserve  much  authority  over  most  of 
them.  But  in  proportion  as  his  attention  is  directed  to  the 
secrets  of  conscience,  his  influence  may  become  dangerous; 
men  grow  accustomed  to  the  control  of  one  perhaps  more  fee- 
ble and  guilty  than  themselves,  but  over  whose  frailties  they 
exercise  no  reciprocal  command ;  and,  if  the  confessors  of 
kings  have  been  sometimes  terrible  to  nations,  their  ascen- 
dency is  probably  not  less  mischievous,  in  proportion  to  its 
extent,  within  the  sphere  of  domestic  life.  In  a  political  light, 
and  with  the  object  of  lessening  the  weight  of  the  ecclesiasti- 
cal order  in  temporal  affairs,  there  cannot  fee  the  least  hesi- 
tation as  to  the  expediency  of  discontinuing  the  usage.1 

1  Coilier,  p.  218,  descauts,  in  the  true  spirit  of  a  high,  churchman,  on  the  im- 


100  POINTS   OF  DIFFERENCE  ,         CHAI>.  IL 

V.  It  has  very  rarely  been  the  custom  of  theologians  to 
measure  the  importance  of  orthodox  opinions  by  their  effect 
on  the  lives  and  hearts  of  those  who  adopt  them ;  nor  was 
this  predilection  for  speculative  above  practical  doctrines 
ever  more  evident  than  in  the  leading  controversy  of  the 
sixteenth  century,  that  respecting  the  Lord's  Supper.  No 
errors  on  this  point  could  have  had  any  influence  on  men's 
moral  conduct,  nor  indeed  much  on  the  general  nature  of 
their  faith ;  yet  it  was  selected  as  the  test  of  heresy ;  and 
most,  if  not  all,  of  those  who  suffered  death  upon  that  charge, 
whether  in  England  or  on  the  Continent,  were  convicted  of 
denying  the  corporal  presence,  in  the  sense  of  the  Roman 
church.  It  had  been  well  if  the  reformers  had  learned,  by 
abhorring  her  persecution,  not  to  practise  it  in  a  somewhat 
less  degree  upon  each  other;  or,  by  exposing  the  absurdities 
of  transubstantiation,  not  to  contend  for  equal  nonsense  of 
their  own.  Four  principal  theories,  to  say  nothing  of  sub- 
ordinate varieties,  divided  Europe  at  the  accession  of  Edward 
VI.  about  the  sacrament  of  the  Eucharist.  The  church  of 
Rome  would  not  depart  a  single  letter  from  transubstantiation, 
or  the  change  at  the  moment  of  consecration  of  the  sub- 
stances of  bread  and  wine  into  those  of  Christ's  body  and 
blood ;  the  accidents,  in  school  language,  or  sensible  qualities 
of  the  former  remaining,  or  becoming  inherent  in  the  new 
substance.  This  doctrine  does  not,  as  vulgarly  supposed,  con- 
tradict the  evidence  of  our  senses ;  since  our  senses  can 
report  nothing  as  to  the  unknown  being,  which  the  school- 
men denominated  substance,  and  which  alone  was  the  subject 
of  this  conversion.  But  metaphysicians  of  later  ages  might 
inquire  whether  material  substances,  abstractedly  considered, 
exist  at  all,  or,  if  they  exist,  whether  they  can  have  any 
specific  distinction  except  their  sensible  qualities.  This, 
perhaps,  did  not  suggest  itself  in  the  sixteenth  century  ;  but 
it  was  strongly  objected  that  the  simultaneous  existence  of  a 
body  in  many  places,  which  the  Romish  doctrine  implied, 
was  inconceivable,  and  even  contradictory.  Luther,  partly, 
as  it  seems,  out  of  his  determination  to  multiply  differences 
with  the  church,  invented  a  theory  somewhat  different, 
usually  called  consubstantiation,  which  was  adopted  in  the 
confession  of  Augsburg,  and  to  which,  at  least  down  to  the 

portance  of  confession.    This  also,  as  is    his  party  disagreed  with  the  generality  of 
ill  known,  is  one  of  the  points  on  which    protestant? 


REFORMATION.      BETWEEN  THE  TWO  RELIGIONS. 

middle  of  the  eighteenth  century,  the  divines  of  that 
munion  were  much  attached.  They  imagined  the  two  sub- 
stances to  be  united  in  the  sacramental  elements,  so  that  they 
might  be  termed  bread  and  wine,  or  the  body  and  blood, 
with  equal  propriety.1  But  it  must  be  obvious  that  there  is 
little  more  than  a  metaphysical  distinction  between  this  doc- 
trine and  that  of  Rome  ;  though,  when  it  suited  the  Luther- 
ans to  magnify  rather  than  dissemble  their  deviations  fron? 
the  mother  church,  it  was  raised  into  an  important  difference 
A  simpler  and  more  rational  explication  occurred  to  Zwingla 
and  CEcolampadius,  from  whom  the  Helvetian  protestants 
imbibed  their  faith.  Rejecting  every  notion  of  a  real  pres- 
ence, and  divesting  the  institution  of  all  its  mystery,  they 
saw  only  figurative  symbols  in  the  elements  which  Christ 
had  appointed  as  a  commemoration  of  his  death.  But  this 
novel  opinion  excited  as  much  indignation  in  Luther  as  in 
the  Romanists.  It  was  indeed  a  rock  on  which  the  Reforma- 
tion was  nearly  shipwrecked ;  since  the  violent  contests  which 
it  occasioned,  and  the  narrow  intolerance  which  one  side  at 
least  displayed  throughout  the  controversy,  not  only  weak- 
ened on  several  occasions  the  temporal  power  of  the  protes- 
tant  churches,  but  disgusted  many  of  those  who  might  have 
inclined  towards  espousing  their  sentiments.  Besides  these 
three  hypotheses,  a  fourth  was  promulgated  by  Martin  Bucer 
of  Strasburg,  a  man  of  much  acuteness,  but  prone  to  meta- 
physical subtilty,  and  not,  it  is  said,  of  a  very  ingenuous 
character.2  Bucer,  as  I  apprehend,  though  his  expressions 
are  unusually  confused,  did  not  acknowledge  a  local  presence 
of  Christ's  body  and  blood  in  the  elements  after  consecra- 
tion —  so  far  concurring  with  the  Helvetians ;  while  he  con- 
tended that  they  were  really,  and  without  figure,  received  by 
the  worthy  communicant  through  faith,  so  as  to  preserve  the 
belief  of  a  mysterious  union,  and  of  what  was  sometimes 

t  Nostra  sententia   est,   says  Luther,  Martyr  was  of  another  judgment,  and 

apud  Burnet,  111,  Appendix,  194,  corpus  affected  to  speak  of  the  sacrament  with 

ita  cum  pane,  seu  in  pane  ease,  ut  revera  all  plainness  and  perspicuity."     Strype, 

cum  pane  manducetur,  et  quemcunque  ii.  121.     The  truth  is,  that   there  were 

motum  velactionem  panishabet,  eundem  but  two  opinions  at  bottom  as  to  this 

et  corpus  Christ!.  main  point  of  the  controversy ;  nor  in 

2  "  Bucer  thought,  that  for  avoiding  the  nature  of  things  was  it  possible  that 

contention,  and  for  maintaining   peace  there  should  be  more;  for  what  can  be 

and  quietness  in  the  church,  somewhat  predicated  concerning  a  body,  in  its  re- 

inore  ambiguous  words  should  be  used,  lation  to  a  given  space,  but  presence  and 

that  might  have  a  respect  to  both  per-  absence? 
suasions  concerning  the  presence.     But 


102          DIFFERENCE  OF  THE  TWO  RELIGIONS.        CHAP.  II. 

called  a  real  presence.  Bucer  himself  came  to  England 
early  in  the  reign  of  Edward,  and  had  a  considerable  share 
in  advising  the  measures  of  reformation.  But  Peter  Mar- 
tyr, a  disciple  of  the  Swiss  school,  had  also  no  small  in- 
fluence. In  the  forty-two  articles  set  forth  by  authority,  the 
real  or  corporal  presence,  using  these  words  as  synonymous, 
is  explicitly  denied.  This  clause  was  omitted  on  the  re- 
vision of  the  articles  under  Elizabeth.1 

VI.  These  various  innovations  were  exceedingly  inimical 
to  the  influence  and  interests  of  the  priesthood.  But  that 
order  obtained  a  sort  of  compensation  in  being  released  from 
its  obligation  to  celibacy.  This  obligation,  though  unwar- 
ranted by  Scripture,  rested  on  a  most  ancient  and  universal 
rule  of  discipline ;  for  though  the  Greek  and  Eastern 
churches  have  always  permitted  the  ordination  of  married 
persons,  yet  they  do  not  allow  those  already  ordained  to  take 
wives.  No  very  good  reason,  however,  could  be  given  for 
this  distinction ;  and  the  constrained  celibacy  of  the  Latin 
clergy  had  given  rise  to  mischiefs,  of  which  their  general 
practice  of  retaining  concubines  might  be  reckoned  among 
the  smallest.2  The  German  protestants  soon  rejected  this 
burden,  and  encouraged  regular  as  well  as  secular  priests  to 
marry.  Cranmer  had  himself  taken  a  wife  in  Germany, 
whom  Henry's  law  of  the  six  articles,  one  of  which  made 
the  marriage  of  priests  felony,  compelled  him  to  send  away. 
In  the  reign  of  Edward  this  was  justly  reckoned  an  indis- 
pensable part  of  the  new  Reformation.  But  the  bill  for  that 
purpose  passed  the  lords  with  some  little  difficulty,  nine 
bishops  and  four  peers  dissenting ;  and  its  preamble  cast  such 
an  imputation  on  the  practice  it  allowed,  treating  the  mar- 
riage of  priests  as  ignominious  and  a  tolerated  evil,  that 
another  act  was  thought  necessary  a  few  years  afterwards, 
when  the  Reformation  was  better  established,  to  vindicate 
this  right  of  the  protestant  church.3  A  great  number  of  the 
clergy  availed  themselves  of  their  liberty  ;  which  may  prob- 
ably have  had  as  extensive  an  effect  in  conciliating  the  eccle- 


j«»   fiv«>tuv*o   in      DIBICTJ  ,  ivji    i<    eeriiio    uuu&wjr     Limt/    iimi* 

riages  of  priests  were  ever  solemnized  at 

It  appears  to  have  been  common  for    so   late  a  period;  or  if  they   were,   they 
the  clergy,  by  license  from  their  bishops,     were  invalid. 

to  retain  concubines,  who  were,  Collier        3  gtat.   2   &  3  Edw.  6    c.  21:  5   &   6 
•ajs,  for  the  most  part   their  wives,  p      Edw.  6,  c.  12;  Buruet,  89. 


REFORMATION.      OPPOSITION   TO   THE  REFORMATION.  103 

sinstical  profession,  as  the  suppression  of  monasteries  had  iu 
rendering  the  gentry  favorable  to  the  new  order  of  religion. 
But  great  as  was  the  number  of  those  whom  conviction 
or  self-interest  enlisted  under  the  protestant  ban-  opposition 
ner,  it  appears  plain  that  the  Reformation  moved  p^6^ 
on  with  too  precipitate  a  step  for  the  majority,  the  nation. 
The  new  doctrines  prevailed  in  London,  in  many  large  towns, 
and  in  the  eastern  counties.  But  in  the  north  and  west  of 
England  the  body  of  the  people  were  strictly  catholics. 
The  clergy,  though  not  very  scrupulous  about  conforming  to 
the  innovations,  were  generally  averse  to  most  of  them.1 
And,  in  spite  of  the  church  lands,  I  imagine  that  most  of  the 
nobility,  if  not  the  gentry,  inclined  to  the  same  persuasion  ; 
not  a  few  peers  having  sometimes  dissented  from  the  bills 
passed  on  the  subject  of  religion  in  this  reign,  while  no  sort 
of  disagreement  appears  in  the  upper  house  during  that  of 
Mary.  In  the  western  insurrection  of  1549,  which  partly 
originated  in  the  alleged  grievance  of  enclosures,  many  of 
the  demands  made  by  the  rebels  go  to  the  entire  reestablish- 
ment  of  popery.  Those  of  the  Norfolk  insurgents,  in  the 
same  year,  whose  political  complaints  were  the  same,  do  not, 
as  far  as  I  perceive,  show  any  such  tendency.  But  an  his- 
torian, whose  bias  was  certainly  not  unfavorable  to  protes- 
tantism, confesses  that  all  endeavors  were  too  weak  to  over- 
come the  aversion  of  the  people  towards  Reformation,  and 
even  intimates  that  German  troops  were  sent  for  from  Calais 
on  account  of  the  bigotry  with  which  the  bulk  of  the  nation 
adhered  to  the  old  superstition.2  This  is  somewhat  an  hu- 
'miliating  admission,  that  the  protestant  faith  was  imposed 
upon  our  ancestors  by  a  foreign  army.  And  as  the  reform- 
ers, though  still  the  fewer,  were  undeniably  a  great  and 
increasing  party,  it  may  be  natural  to  inquire  whether  a 

1  2  Strype,  53.     Latimer  pressed  the  men  make  outwardly  to  please  them  in 

necessity  of  expelling  these  temporizing  whom    they    see    the    power    resteth." 

conformists,  —  "out  with  them  all!    I  Strype,  ii.;  Appendix,  H.  H.    This  seems 

require  it  in  God's  behalf;  make  them  rather  to  refer  to  the  upper  classes  than 

qunnrJams,  all  the  pack  of  them."    Id.  to  the  whole  people.     But  at  any  rate  it 

204  ;  2  Burnet,  143.  was  an  exaggeration  of  the  fact,  the  prot- 


th 


- 

ment  of  some  of  the  gentry  and  partiality  1549,   which,  however,  was  in  order   to 

to  the  commons,  "  is  forbidden  by  a  law,  quell  a  seditious  spirit  in  the  nation,  not 

and  the  use  of  the  new  is  not  yet  printed  by  any  means  wholly  founded  upon  re- 

in the  stomachs  of  eleven  out  of  twelve  ligious  grounds.     Strype,  xi.  169. 
parts  of  the  realm,  whatever  countenance 


104         RAPACITY  OF  THE  COURTIERS.     CHAP.  II. 

regard  to  policy  as  well  as  equitable  considerations  should 
not  have  repressed  still  more,  as  it  did  in  some  measure,  the 
zeal  of  Cranmer  and  Somerset  ?  It  might  be  asked  whether 
in  the  acknowledged  coexistence  of  two  religions,  some  pref- 
erence were  not  fairly  claimed  for  the  creed  which  all  had 
once  held,  and  which  the  greater  part  yet  retained ;  whether 
it  were  becoming  that  the  councillors  of  an  infant  king  should 
use  such  violence  in  breaking  up  the  ecclesiastical  constitu- 
tion ;  whether  it  were  to  be  expected  that  a  free-spirited 
people  should  see  their  consciences  thus  transferred  by  proc- 
lamation, and  all  that  they  had  learned  to  venerate  not  only 
torn  away  from  them,  but  exposed  to  what  they  must  reckon 
blasphemous  contumely  and  profanation  ?  The  demolition 
of  shrines  and  images,  far  unlike  the  speculative  disputes  of 
theologians,  was  an  overt  insult  on  every  catholic  heart. 
Still  more  were  they  exasperated  at  the  ribaldry  which  vul- 
gar protestants  uttered  against  their  most  sacred  mystery. 
It  was  found  necessary  in  the  very  first  act  of  the  first  prot- 
estant  parliament  to  denounce  penalties  against  such  as  spoke 
irreverently  of  the  sacrament,  an  indecency  not  unusual  with 
those  who  held  the  Zwinglian  opinion  in  that  age  of  coarse 
pleasantry  and  unmixed  invective.1  Nor  could  the  people 
repose  much  confidence  in  the  judgment  and  sincerity  of 
their  governors,  whom  they  had  seen  submitting  without  out- 
ward repugnance  to  Henry's  various  schemes  of  religion,  and 
whom  they  saw  every  day  enriching  themselves  with  the 
plunder  of  the  church  they  affected  to  reform.  There  was  a 
sort  of  endowed  colleges  or  fraternities,  called  chantries,  con- 
sisting of  secular  priests,  whose  duty  was  to  say  daily  masses 
for  the  founders.  These  were  abolished  and  given  to  the 
king  by  acts  of  parliament  in  the  last  year  of  Henry  and 
the  first  of  Edward.  It  was  intimated  in  the  preamble  of 
the  latter  statute  that  their  revenues  should  be  converted  to 
the  erection  of  schools,  the  augmentation  of  the  universities, 
and  the  sustenance  of  the  indigent.2  But  this  was  entirely 
neglected,  and  the  estates  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  courtiers. 
Nor  did  they  content  themselves  with  this  escheated  wealth 
of  the  church.  Almost  every  bishopric  was  spoiled  by  their 

1  '2  Edw.  6,  c.  1 ;  Strype,  xi.  81.  would  be  paid  to  its  intention,    In  the 

2  37  H.  8,  c.  2  ;  1  Edw.  6,  c.  14  ;  Strype,  latter  part  of  the  young  king's  reign,  as 
ii.  63 ;  Burnet,  &c.     Cranmer,  as  well  as  he  became  more  capable  of  exerting  his 
the   catholic   bishops,  protested  against  own  power,  he  endowed,  as  is  well  known, 
this  act,  well  knowing  how  little  regard  several  excellent  foundations. 


KEFOKMATION.  PERSECUTION.  1 05 

ravenous  power  in  this  reign,  either  through  mere  aliena- 
tions, or  long  leases,  or  unequal  exchanges.  Exeter  and 
Llandaff,  from  being  among  the  richest  sees,  fell  into  the 
class  of  the  poorest.  Lichfield  lost  the  chief  part  of  its 
lands  to  raise  an  estate  for  lord  Paget.  London,  Winchester, 
and  even  Canterbury,  suffered  considerably.  The  duke  of 
Somerset  was  much  beloved ;  yet  he  had  given  no  unjust 
offence  by  pulling  down  some  churches  in  order  to  erect 
Somerset  House  with  the  materials.  He  had  even  projected 
the  demolition  of  Westminster  Abbey,  but  the  chapter 
averted  this  outrageous  piece  of  rapacity,  sufficient  of  itself 
to  characterize  that  age,  by  the  usual  method,  a  grant  of  some 
of  theii  estates.1 

Tolerance  i»  religion,  it  is  well  known,  so  unanimously 
admitted  (at  least  verbally)  even  by  theologians  in  the  pres- 
ent century,  was  seldom  considered  as  practicable,  much  less 
as  a  matter  of  right,  during  the  period  of  the  Reformation. 
The  difference  in  this  respect  between  the  catholics  and  prot- 
estants  was  only  in  degree,  and  in  degree  there  was  much 
less  difference  than  we  are  apt  to  believe.  Persecution  is 
the  deadly  original  sin  of  the  reformed  churches ;  that  which 
cools  every  honest  man's  zeal  for  their  cause  in  proportion 
as  his  reading  becomes  more  extensive.  The  Lutheran 
princes  and  cities  in  Germany  constantly  refused  to  tolerate 
the  use  of  the  mass  as  an  idolatrous  service  ;2  and  this  name 
of  idolatry,  though  adopted  in  retaliation  for  that  of  heresy, 

'  Strype,  Burned,  Collier,  passim  ;  Har-  regulars.    Burnet,  iii.141.    But  the  gross 

mer's  specimens,  100.     Sir  Philip  Hobby,  selfishness  of  the  great  men  in  Edward's 

our  minister  in  Germany,  writes  to  the  reign  justly  made  him  anxious  to  save 

protector,  in  1548,  that  the  foreign  prot-  what  he  could  for  the  church,  that  seemed 

estants  thought  our  bishops  too  rich,  and  on   the  brink  of  absolute  ruin.     Collier 

advises  him  to  reduce  them  to  a  conipe-  mentions  a  characteristic   circumstance 

tent  living ;  he  particularly  recommends  So  great  a  quantity  of  church  plate  had 

his  taking  away  all  the  prebends  in  Eng-  been     stolen,    that    a    commission    was 

land.     Strype,  88.     These  counsels,  and  appointed  to  inquire  into  the  facts   and 

tlie  acts  which  they  prompted,  disgust  us,  compel  its  restitution.     Instead  of  this, 

from  the  spirit  of  rapacity  they  breathe,  the  commissioner^  found  more  left  than 

Yet  it  might  be  urged,  with  some  force,  they  thought  ?afficient,  and  seized  tho 

that  the  enormous  wealth  of  the  superior  greater  part  to  the  king's  use. 

ecclesiastics  had  been  the  main  cause  of  2  They   declared  in   the  famous   pro- 

those  corruptions  which  it  was  sought  to  testation  of  Spire,  which  gave  them  the 

cast  away,  and  that  most  of  the  digni-  name  of  protestants,  that  their  preachers 

turies  were  very  averse  to   the  new  re-  having  confuted  the  mass  by  passages  in 

ligion.     Even  Cranmer  had  written  some  Scripture,  they   could   not  permit  their 

jours  before  to  Cromwell,  deprecating  the  subjects  to  go  thither;   since  it   would 

establishment  of  any  prebends  out  of  the  afford  a  bad  example  to  suffer  two  sorts 

conventual  estates,  and  speaking  of  the  of  service,  directly  opposite  to  each  other, 

collegiate  clergy  as  an  idle,  ignorant,  and  in   their  churches.     Schmidt,  Hist   dtts 

gormandizing  race,  who  might,  without  Allcmauds,  vi.  394,  vii.  24. 
any  harm,  be  extinguished  along  with  the 


10b*  EXECUTIONS  FOR  HERESY.  CHAP.  II. 

answered  the  same  end  as  the  other,  of  exciting  animosity 
an  1  uncharitableness.  The  Roman  worship  was  equally  pro- 
scribed in  England.  Many  persons  were  sent  to  prison  tor 
hearing  mass,  and  similar  offences.1  The  princess  Mary  sup- 
plicated in  vain  to  have  the  exercise  of  her  own  religion  at 
home,  and  Charles  V.  several  times  interceded  in  her  behalf' 
but  though  Cranmer  and  Ridley,  as  well  as  the  council, 
would  have  consented  to  this  indulgence,  the  young  king, 
whose  education  had  unhappily  infused  a  good  deal  of  big- 
otry into  his  mind,  could  not  be  prevailed  upon  to  connive  at 
such  idolatry.2  Yet  in  one  memorable  instance  he  had 
shown  a  milder  spirit,  struggling  against  Cranmer  to  save  a 
fanatical  woman  from  the  punishment  of  heresy.8  This  is  a 
stain  upon  Cranmer's  memory  which  nothing  but  his  own 
death  could  have  lightened.  In  men  hardly  escaped  from  a 
similar  peril,  in  men  who  had  nothing  to  plead  but  the  right 
of  private  judgment,  in  men  who  had  defied  the  prescriptive 
authority  of  past  ages  and  of  established  power,  the  crime 
of  persecution  assumes  a  far  deeper  hue,  and  is  capable  of 
far  less  extenuation,  than  in  a  Roman  inquisitor.  Thus  the 
death  of  Servetus  has  weighed  down  the  name  and  memory 
of  Calvin.  And  though  Cranmer  was  incapable  of  the  ran- 
corous malignity  of  the  Genevan  lawgiver,  yet  I  regret  to 
say  that  there  is  a  peculiar  circumstance  of  aggravation  in 
his  pursuing  to  death  this  woman,  Joan  Boucher,  and  a 
Dutchman  that  had  been  convicted  of  Arianism.  It  is  said 
that  he  had  been  accessory  in  the  preceding  reign  to  the  con- 
demnation of  Lambert,  and  perhaps  some  others,  for  opinions 

1  Stat.  2  &  3  Edw.  6,  c.  1;  Strype's  correspondent,  that  Mr.  Bruce,  in  his 

Cranmer,  p.  233.  edition  of  Roger  Hutchinson's  works 

«  Burnet,  192.  Somerset  had  always  (Parker  Society,  1842,  preface,  p.  8),  has 

allowed  her  to  exercise  her  religion,  given  strong  reasons  for  questicning  ;,his 

though  censured  for  this  by  Warwick,  remonstrance  of  Edward  with  Cranmer, 

who  died  himself  a  papist,  but  had  pre-  which  rests  originally  on  no  authority 

tended  to  fell  in  with  the  young  king's  but  that  of  Fox.  In  some  of  its  circum- 

prejndices.  Her  ill  treatment  was  subse-  stances  the  story  told  by  Fox  is  certainly 

quent  to  the  protector's  overthrow.  It  disproved  ;  but  it  is  not  impossible  that 

is  to  be  observed  that,  in  her  father's  the  young  king  may  have  expressed  his 

life,  she  had  acknowledged  his  suprem-  reluctance  to  have  the  sentence  carried 

acy,  and  the  justice  of  her  mother's  into  execution,  though  his  signature  of 

Strype,  285  ;  2  Burnet,  241 ;  the  warrant  was  not  required.  This, 

Linganl,  vi.  326.  It  was,  of  course,  by  however,  is  mere  conjecture  ;  and  per- 

Inrimiilation ;  but  that  excuse  might  be  haps  it  may  be  better  that  the  whole 

made  for  others.  Craumer  is  said  to  anecdote  should  vanish  from  history 

have  persuaded  Henry  not  to  put  her  to  This,  of  course,  mitigates  the  censure  on 

draUi,  which,  we  must  in  charity  hope  she  Cranmer  in  the  text  to  an  indefinite 

did  not  know.  degree.  1845.] 

*  [It  has  been  pointed  out  to  me  t>r  a 


REFORMATION.      RIDLEY  —  CRANMER" —  GARDINER. 


107 


concerning  the  Lord's  Supper  which  he  had  himself  after- 
wards embraced.1  Such  an  evidence  of  the  fallibility  of 
human  judgment,  such  an  example  that  persecutions  for 
heresy,  how  conscientiously  soever  managed,  are  liable  to  end 
in  shedding  the  blood  of  those  who  maintain  truth,  should 
have  taught  him,  above  all  men,  a  scrupulous  repugnance  to 
carry  into  effect  those  sanguinary  laws.  Compared  with 
these  executions  for  heresy,  the  imprisonment  and  depriva- 
tion of  Gardiner  and  Bonner  appear  but  measures  of  ordinary 
severity  towards  political  adversaries  under  the  pretext  of 
religion  ;  yet  are  they  wholly  unjustifiable,  particularly  in  the 
former  instance ;  and  if  the  subsequent  retaliation  of  those 
bad  men  was  beyond  all  proportion  excessive,  we  should  re- 
member that  such  is  the  natural  consequence  of  tyrannical 
aggressions.2 

The  person  most  conspicuous,  though  Ridley  was  perhaps 
the  most  learned  divine,  in  moulding  the  faith  and  Cranmer 
discipline-  of  the  English  church,  which  has  not 


1  When  Joan  Boucher  was  condemned, 
Bhe  said  to  her  judges,  "  It  was  not  long 
ago  since  you  burned  Anne  Askew  for  a 
piece  of  bread,  and  yet  came  yourselves 
soon  after  to  believe  and  profess  the  same 
doctrine  for  which  you  burned  her ;  and 
now  you  will  needs  burn  me  for  a  piece 
of  flesh,  and  in  the  end  you  will  come  to 
believe   this  also,  when  you  have  read 
the  Scriptures  and  understand   them." 
Strype,  ii.  214. 

2  Gardiner    had    some    virtues,    and 
entertained  sounder  notions  of  the  civil 
constitution  of  England  than  his  adver- 
saries.    In  a  letter  to  Sir  John  Qodsalve, 
giving  his  reasons  for  refusing  compliance 
with  the  injunctions  issued  by  the  coun- 
cil to    the  ecclesiastical  visitors   (which, 
Burnet  says,  does  him  more  honor  than 
anything  else  in  his  life),  he  dwells  on  the 
king's  wanting  power  to  command  any- 
thing contrary  to  common  law,  or  to  a 
statute,  and  brings  authorities  for  this. 
Burnet,  ii.     Append.  112.     See  also  Lin- 
gard,  vi.  387,  for  another  instance.    Nor 
was   this  regard  to.the  constitution  dis- 
played only  when  out  of  the  sunshine ; 
for  in  the  next  reign    he  was  against 
despotic  counsels,  of  which  an  instance 
has  been  given  in  the  last  chapter.    His 
conduct,    indeed,   with    respect    to    the 
Spanish    connection    is    equivocal.    He 
Wiis  much  against  the  marriage  at  first, 
and  took  credit  to  himself  for  the  securi- 
ties exacted  in  the  treaty  with  Philip, 
and  established  by  statute.     Burnet,  ii. 
207.     But  afterwards,  if  we  may  trust 


Noailles,  he  fell  in  with  the  Spanish 
party  in  the  council,  and  even  suggested 
to  parliament  that  the  queen  should 
hive  the  same  power  as  her  father  to 
dispose  of  the  succession  by  will.  Am- 
bassades  de  Noailles,  iii.  153,  &c.,  &c. 
Yet,  according  to  Dr.  Lingard,  on  the 
imperial  ambassador's  authority,  he 
saved  Elizabeth's  life  against  all  the 
council.  The  article  GARDINER,  in  the 
Biographia  Britannica.  contains  an  elab- 
orate and  partial  apology,  at  great 
length;  and  the  historian  just  quoted 
has  of  course  said  all  he  could  in  favor 
of  one  who  labored  so  strenuously  for 
the  extirpation  of  the  northern  heresy. 
But  he  was  certainly  not  an  honest  man, 
and  had  been  active  in  Henry's  reign 
against  his  real  opinions. 

Even  if  the  ill  treatment  of  Gardiner 
and  Bonner  by  Edward's  council  couii 
be  excused  (and  the  latter  by  his  rude- 
ness might  deserve  some  punishment), 
what  can  be  said  for  the  imprisonment 
of  the  bishops  Heath  and  Day,  worthy 
and  moderate  men,  who  had  gone  a  great 
way  with  the  Reformation,  but  objected 
to  the  removal  of  altars,  an  innovation 
by  no  means  necessary,  and  which 
should  have  been  deferred  till  the  people 
had  grown  ripe  for  further  change  ?  Mr. 
Southey  says,  "  Gardiner  and  Bonner 
were  deprived  of  their  sees,  and  imp"ris- 
oned;  but  no  rigor  was  used  towards 
them."  Book  of  the  Church,  ii.  Ill 
Liberty  and  property  being  trifles  ! 


108  CRAXMER.  CHAP-  ri 

been  very  materially  altered  since  his  time,  was  archbishop 
Cranmer.1  Few  men,  about  whose  conduct  there  is  so  little 
room  for  controversy  upon  facts,  have  been  represented  in 
more  opposite  lights.  We  know  the  favoring  colors  of  prot- 
estant  writers ;  but  turn  to  the  bitter  invective  of  Bossuet, 
and  the  patriarch  of  our  reformed  church  stands  forth  as  the 
most  abandoned  of  time-serving  hypocrites.  No  political 
factions  affect  the  impartiality  of  men's  judgment  so  grossly 
or  so  permanently  as  religious  heats.  Doubtless,  if  we  should 
reverse  the  picture,  and  imagine  the  end-  and  scope  .of  Cran- 
mer's  labor  to  have  been  the  establishment  of  the  Roman 
catholic  religion  in  a  protestant  country,  the  estimate  formed 
of  his  behavior  would  be  somewhat  less  favorable  than  it  is 
at  present.  If,  casting  away  all  prejudice  on  either  side,  we 
weigh  the  character  of  this  prelate  in  an  equal  balance,  he 
will  appear  far  indeed  removed  from  the  turpitude  imputed 
to  him  by  his  enemies,  yet  not  entitled  to  any  extraordinary 
veneration.  Though  it  is  most  eminently  true  of  Cranmer, 
that  his  faults  were  always  the  effect  of  circumstances,  and 
not  of  intention,  yet  this  palliating  consideration  is  rather 
weakened  when  we  recollect  that  he  consented  to  place  him- 
self in  a  station  where  those  circumstances  occurred.  At 
the  time  of  Cranmer's  elevation  to  the  see  of  Canterbury, 
Henry,  though  on  the  point  of  separating  forever  from  Rome, 
had  not  absolutely  determined  upon  so  strong  a  measure ; 
and  his  policy  required  that  the  new  archbishop  should  solicit 
the  usual  bulls  from  the  pope,  and  take  the  oath  of  canonical 
obedience  to  him.  Cranmer,  already  a  rebel  from  that  do- 
minion in  his  heart,  had  recourse  to  the  disingenuous  shift 
of  a  protest,  before  his  consecration,  that  "  he  did  not  intend 
to  restrain  himself  thereby  from  anything  to  which  he  was 

1  The  doctrines  of  the  English  church  universities.    His  death,  however,  ensued 

were  set  forth  in  forty-two  articles,  drawn  before  they  could  be  actually  subscribed. 

up,  as  is  generally  believed,  by  Cranmer  [The    late    editor    of   Cranmer's    works 

an.  1  Ridley,  with  the  advice  of  Bucer  and  thinks  him   mainly  responsible  for   the 

Martyr,  aud  perhaps  of  Cox.     The  three  forty-two  articles  :  he  probably  took  the 

last  of  these,   condemning   some   novel  advice  of  Ridley.     A  considerable  portiou 

opinions,  were  not  renewed  under  Eliz-  of   them,   including  those  of  chief  im- 

abeth,  and  a  few  other  variations  were  portance,    is     taken,    almost     literally, 

wade ;  but  upon  the  whole  there  is  little  either  from  the  Augsburg  Confession  or 

difference,  and  none   perhaps   in   those  a  set  of   articles  agreed  upon  by  some 

tenets  which  have  been  most  the  object  German  and  English  divines  at  a  coufer- 

of  discussion.     See  the  original  Articles  ence  in  1538.     Jenkins's  Craniuer,  pref- 

m  Burnet,  ii.,  App.  N.  65.     They  were  ace,   xxiii.   3,   c.    vii..  also  vol.  iv.  273, 

never  confirmed  by  a  convocation  or  a  where     these    articles    are     printed    at 

parliament,  but  imposed  by  the  king's  length     1845.] 
supremacy  on  all  the  clergy,  and  on  the 


REFORMATION.  CRANMER.  109 

bound  by  his  duty  to  God  or  the  king,  or  from  taking  part  in 
any  reformation  of  the  English  church  which  he  might  judge 
to  be  required."  l  This  first  deviation  from  integrity,  as  is 
almost  always  the.  case,  drew  after  it  many  others,  and  began 
that  discreditable  course  of  temporizing  and  undue  compliance 
to  which  he  was  reduced  for  the  rest  of  Henry's  reign. 
Cranmer's  abilities  were  not  perhaps  of  a  high  order,  or  at 
least  they  were  unsuited  to  public  affairs ;  but  his  principal 
dofcct  was  in  that  firmness  by  which  men  of  more  ordinary 
talents  may  insure  respect.  Nothing  could  be  weaker  than 
his  conduct  in  the  usurpation  of  lady  Jane,  which  he  might 
better  have  boldly  sustained,  like  Ridley,  'as  a  step  necessary 
for  the  conservation  of  protestantism,  than  given,  into  against 
his  conscience,  overpowered  by  the  importunities  of  a  mis- 
guided boy.  Had  the  malignity  of  his  enemies  been  directed 
rather  against  his  reputation  than  his  life,  had  he  been  per- 
mitted to  survive  his  shame  as  a  prisoner  in  the  Tower,  it 
must  have  seemed  a  more  arduous  task  to  defend  the  memory 
of  Cranmer,  but  his  fame  has  brightened  in  the  fire  that 
consumed  him.2 

Those  who,  with  the  habits  of  thinking  that  prevail  in  our 
times,  cast  back  their  eyes  on  the  reign  of  Edward  Hismodera 
VI.,  will  generally  be  disposed  to  censure  the  pre-  Educing" 
cipitancy,  and  still  more  the  exclusive  spirit,  of  changes  not 
our  principal   reformers.     But  relatively  to   the  toTiTe 
course  that  things  had  taken  in  Germany,  and  to  K^1018- 
the  feverish  zeal  of  that  age,  the  moderation  of  Cranmer 
and  Ridley,  the  only  ecclesiastics  who  took  a  prominent  share 

1  Strype's  Cranmer,  Appendix,  p.  9.—  intentions,  which  he  very  soon  carried 

J  am  sorry  to  find  a  respectable  writer  into  effect,  were  irreconcilable  with  any 

inclining  to  vindicate  Cranmer  in  this  pro-  sort  of  obedience  to   the  pope;  and  if, 

testation,  which  Buriiet  admits  to  agree  under  all  the  circumstances,  his  conduct 

better  with  the  maxims  of  the  casuists  was  justifiable,  there  would  be  an  end  of 

than  with  the  prelate's  sincerity  :  Todd's  all  promissory  obligations  whatever. 

Introduction   to   Cranmer's    Defence  of  2  The  character  of  Cranmer  is  summed 

the    True    Doctrine  of   the    Sacrament  up  fn  no  unfair  manner  by  Mr.  C.  Butler, 

(1825),  p.  40.     It  is  of  no  importance  to  Memoirs  of  English  Catholics,  vol.  i.  p 

inquire  whether  the  protest  were  made  139;  except  that  his  obtain! ug  from  Anne 

publicly  or  privately.     Nothing  can  pos-  Boleyn  an  acknowledgment  of  her  sup- 

silily  turn  upon  this.     It  was,  on  either  posed  pre-contract  of  marriage,   having 

supposition,  unknown  to  the  promisee,  proceeded  from    motives  of   humanity, 

the   pope  at   Home.      The    question   is,  ought  not  to  incur  much  censure,  though 

whether,  having  obtained  the  bulls  from  the  sentence  of  nullity  was  a  mere  mock- 

Kome  on  an  express  stipulation  that  he  ery  of  law. — Poor  Cranmer  was  compelled 

should   take  a  certain  oath,    he   had  a  to  subscribe  not  less  than  .six  recantations, 

right  to  offer  a  limitation,  not  explan-  Strype  (iii.. 232)  had  the  integrity  to  pub- 

aiory,  but  utterly  inconsistent  with  it  ?  lish  all  these,  which  were  not  fully  known 

We  are  sure  that  Craumer's  views  aad  before. 


110  CRANMER.  CHAP.  II. 

in  these  measures,  was  very  conspicuous,  and  tended  above 
everything  to  place  the  Anglican  church  in  that  middle  posi- 
tion which  it  has  always  preserved  between  the  lioman  hie- 
rarchy and  that  of  other  protestant  denominations.  It  is 
manifest,  from  the  history  of  the  Reformation  in  Germany, 
that  its  predisposing  cause  was  the  covetous  and  arrogant 
character  of  the  superior  ecclesiastics,  founded  upon  vast 
temporal  authority ;  a  yoke  long  borne  with  impatience,  and 
which  the  unanimous  adherence  of  the  prelates  to  Rome  in 
the  period  of  separation  gave  the  Lutheran  princes  a  good 
excuse  for  entirely  throwing  off.  Some  of  the  more  temper- 
ate Reformers,  as  Melanchthon,  would  have  admitted  a  limited 
jurisdiction  of  the  episcopacy  ;  but  in  general  the  destruction 
of  that  order,  such  as  it  then  existed,  may  be  deemed  as  fun- 
damental a  principle  of  the  new  discipline  as  any  theological 
point  could  be  of  the  new  doctrine.  But  besides  that  the 
subjection  of  ecclesiastical  to  civil  tribunals,  and  possibly 
other  causes,  had  rendered  the  superior  clergy  in  England 
less  obnoxious  than  in  Germany,  there  was  this  important 
difference  between  the  two  countries,  that  several  bishops 
from  zealous  conviction,  many  more  from  pliability  to  self- 
interest,  had  gone  along  with  the  new  modelling  of  the 
English  church  by  Henry  and  Edward ;  so  that  it  was  per- 
fectly easy  to  keep  up  that  form  of  government  in  the  regu- 
lar succession  which  had  usually  been  deemed  essential ; 
though  the  foreign  reformers  had  neither  the  wish,  nor  pos- 
sibly the  means,  to  preserve  it.  Cranmer  himself,  indeed, 
during  the  reign  of  Henry,  had  bent,  as  usual,  to  the  king's 
despotic  humor,  and  favored  a  novel  theory  of  ecclesiastical 
authority,  which  resolved  all  its  spiritual  as  well  as  temporal 
powers  into  the  royal  supremacy.  Accordingly,  at  the  acces- 
sion of  Edward,  he  himself,  and  several  other  bishops,  took 
out  commissions  to  hold  their  sees  during  pleasure.1  But 
when  the  necessity  of  compliance  had  passed  by,  they  showed 
a  disposition  not  only  to  oppose  the  continual  spoliation  of 
church  property,  but  to  maintain  the  jurisdiction  which  the 
canon  law  had  conferred  upon  them.2  And  though,  as  this 

1  Burnet,  ii.  6.  pro  potestate  suii  administrate,  eo  quod 

2  There  are  two  curious  entries  in  the  per    publicas    quasdam     denuntiationes 
Lords'  Journ.  14th  and  18th  of  Nov.  1549,  quas  proclamations  vocant,  sublata  esset 
which  point  out  the  origin  of  the   new  penitus  sua  jurisdictio,  adeo  ut  nemiuem 
code  of  ecclesiastical  law  mentioned  in  the  judicio  sistere,   nullum    scelus1  punire, 

.t  note :  "Uodie  questi  sunt  episcopi,     neminem  ad  aedem  sacram  cogere,  neque 
oonteiuni  se  a  plebe,  audere  autem  nihil    csetera  id  geuus  munia  ad  eos  pertiiientia 


REFORMATION.        CRANMER —  NEW  CANONS. 


Ill 


papal  code  did  not  appear  very  well  adapted  to  a  protestant 
church,  a  new  scheme  of  ecclesiastical  laws  was  drawn  up, 
which  the  king's  death  rendered  abortive,  this  was  rather 
calculated  to  strengthen  the  hands  of  the  spiritual  courts 
than  to  withdraw  any  matter  from  their  cognizance.1 


exequi  auderent.  Hsec  querela  ab  omni- 
bus proeeribus  non  sine  moerore  audita 
est ;  et  ut  quam  citissiine  huic  raalo  sub- 
veniretur,  injunctum  est  episcopis  ut 
formulam  aliquam  statuti  hac  de  re 
scriptam  traderent :  quae  si  concilio  postea 
praelecta  omnibus  ordinibus  probaretur, 
pro  lege  omnibus  sententiis  sauciri  pos- 
set. 

"  18  Nov.  Hodie  Icctaest  billa  pro  juris- 
dictione  episcoporuin  et  aliorum  ecclesi- 
asticorum,  quss  cum  proeeribus.  eo  quod 
episcnjri  nimis  sibi  arrogare  viderentur, 
non  placeret,  visum  est  deligere  prudentes 
aliquot  viros  utriusque  ordinis,  qui  habita 
ruatura  tantas  rei  inter  se  deliberatione, 
referrent  tofci  consilio  quid  pro  ratione 
temporis  et  rei  necessitate  in  hac  causa 
agi  expediret."  Accordingly,  the  lords 
appoint  the  archbishop  of  Canterbury, 
the  bishops  of  Ely,  Durham,  and  Lich- 
field,  lords  Dorset,  Wharton,  and  Stafford, 
with  chief  justice  Montague. 

i  It  had  been  enacted,  3  Edw.  6.  o.  11, 
that  thirty-two  commissioners,  half 
clergy,  half  lay,  should  be  appointed  to 
draw  up  a  collection  of  new  canons. 
But  these,  according  to  Strype,  ii.  303 
(though  I  do  not  find  it  in  the  act), 
might  be  reduced  to  eight,  without  pre- 
serving the  equality  of  orders;  and  of 
those  nominated  in  Nov.  1551,  five  were 
ecclesiastics,  three  laymen.  The  influ- 
ence of  the  former  shows  itself  in  the 
collection,  published  with  the  title  of 
Reformatio  Legum  Ecclesiasticum,  and 
intended  as  a  complete  code  of  protestant 
canon  law.  This  was  referred  for  revisal 
to  a  new  commission;  but  the  king's 
death  ensued,  and  the  business  was 
never  again  taken  up.  Burnet,  ii.  197. 
Collier,  326.  The  Latin  style  is  highly 
praised;  Cheke  and  Haddon,  the  most 
elegant  scholars  of  that  age,  having  been 
concerned  in  it.  This,  however,  is  of 
small  importance.  The  canons  are 
founded  on  a  principle  current  among 
the  clergy,  that  a  rigorous  discipline  en- 
forced by  church  censures  and  the  aid 
of  the  civil  power  is  the  best  safeguard  of 
a  Christian  commonwealth  against  vice. 
But  it  is  easy  to  perceive  that  its  severity 
would  nevei  have  been  endured  in  this 
country,  and  that  this  was  the  true 
reason  why  it  was  laid  aside :  not,  accord- 
Ing  to  the  improbable  refinement  with 
which  Warburton  has  furnished  Kurd, 
because  the  old  canon  law  was  thought 


more  favorable  to  the  prerogative  of  the 
crown.  Compare  Warburtou's  Letters  to 
Hurd,  p.  192,  with  the  lattor's  Moral 
and  Political  Dialogues,  p.  308,  4tU 
edit. 

The  canons  trench  in  several  places  on 
the  known  province  of  the  common  law, 
by  assigning  specific  penalties  and  for- 
feitures to  offences',  as  in  the  case  of 
adultery  ;  and  though  it  is  true  that  this 
was  all  subject  to  the  confirmation  of 
parliament,  yet  the  lawyers  would  look 
with  their  usual  jealousy  on  such  pro- 
visions in  ecclesiastical  canons.  But  the 
great  sin  of  this  protestant  legislation  is 
its  extension  of  the  name  and  penalties 
of  herpsy  to  the  wilful  denial  of  any  part 
of  the  authorized  articles  of  faith."  This 
is  clear  from  the  first  and  second  titles. 
But  it  has  been  doubted  whether  capital 
punishments  for  this  offence  were  in- 
tended to  be  preserved.  Burnet,  always 
favorable  to  the  reformers,  asserts  that 
they  were  laid  aside.  Collier  and  Lin- 
gard,  whose  bias  is  the  other  way,  main 
tain  the  contrary.  There  is,  it  appears 
to  me,  some  difficulty  in  determining 
this.  That  all  persons  denying  any  one 
of  the  articles  might  be  turned  over  to 
the  secular  power  is  evident.  Yet  it 
rather  seems  by  one  passage  in  the  title, 
de  judiciis  contra  haereses,  c.  10,  that 
infamy  and  civil  disability  were  the  only 
punishments  intended  to  be  kept  up, 
except  in  case  of  the  denial  of  the  Chris- 
tian religion.  For  if  a  heretic  were,  as  a 
matter  of  course,  to  be  burned,  it  seems 
needless  to  provide,  as  in  this  chapter, 
that  he  shmild  be  incapable  of  being  a 
witness,  or  of  making  a  will.  Dr.  Lin- 
gard,  on  the  other  hand,  says,  "  It  regu- 
lates the  delivery  of  the  obstinate  heretic 
to  the  civil  magistrate,  that  he  may 
suffer  death  according  to  law."  Ths 
words  to  which  he  refers  are  these  :  Cum 
sic  penitus  insederit  error,  et  tarn  alte 
radices  egerit,  ut  nee  sententia  quldem 
excommunicationis  ad  veritatem  reus 
inflecti  possit,  turn  consumptis  omnibus 
aliis  remediis,  ad  extremum  ad  civile* 
magistratus  ablegetur  pumendus.  Id. 
tit.  c.  4. 

It  is  generally  best,  where  the  words 
are  at  all  ambiguous,  to  give  the  reader 
the  power  of  judging  for  himself.  But  I 
by  no  means  pretend  that  Dr.  Lingard  is 
mistaken.  On  the  contrary,  the  lan- 
guage of  this  passage  leads  to  a  strong 


112 


CRANMER  —  NEW  CANONS. 


CHAP.  II 


The  policy,  or  it  may  be  the  prejudices,  of  Cranmer  in- 
duced him  also  to  retain  in  the  church  a  few  ceremonial 
usage?,  which  the  Helvetic,  though  not  the  Lutheran,  re- 
formers had  swept  away,  such  as  the  copes  and  rochets  of 
bishops,  and  the  surplice  of  officiating  priests.  It  should 
seem  inconceivable  that  any  one  could  object  to  these  vest- 
ments, considered  in  themselves ;  far  more,  if  they  could 
answer  in  the  slightest  degree  the  end  of  conciliating  a  reluc- 
tant people.  But  this  motive  unfortunately  was  often  disre- 
garded in  that  age ;  and  indeed  in  all  ages  an  abhorrence  of 
concession  and  compromise  is  a  never-failing  characteristic 
of  religious  factions.  The  foreign  reformers  then  in  Eng- 
land, two  of  whom,  Bucer  and  Peter  Martyr,  enjoyed  a 
deserved  reputation,  expressed  their  dissatisfaction  at  seeing 
the^e  habits  retained,  and  complained,  in  general,  of  the 
backwardness  of  the  English  reformation.  Calvin  and  Bui- 
linger  wrote  from  Switzerland  in  the  same  strain.1  Nor  was 
this  sentiment  by  any  means  confined  to  strangers.  Hooper, 


suspicion  that  the  rigor  of  popish  per- 
secution was  intended  to  remain,  espe- 
cially as  the  writ  de  haeretico  couiburendo 
was  in  force  by  law,  and  there  is  no  hint 
of  taking  it  away.  Vet  it  feems  mon- 
strous to  conceive  that  the  denial  of  pre- 
destination (which  by  the  way  is  asserted 
in  this  collection,  tit.  de  hseresibus,  c. 
22,  with  a  shade  more  of  Calvinism  than 
in  the  articles)  was  to  subject  any  one  to 
be  burned  alive.  And  on  the  other  hand 
there  is  this  difficulty,  that  Arianism, 
Pelagianism,  popery,  anabaptism,  are 
all  put  on  the  same  footing;  so  that,  if 
we  deny  that  the  papist  or  free-wilier 
was  to  be  burned,  we  must  deny  the 
game  of  the  anti-trinitarian,  which  con- 
tradkts  the  principle  and  practice  of 
that  age.  Upon  the  whole,  I  cannot 
form  a  decided  opinion  as  to  this  matter. 
Dr.  Lingard  does  not  hesitate  to  say, 
"  Cranuier  and  his  associates  perished  in 
the  flames  which  they  had  prepared  to 
kindle  for  the  destruction  of  their  oppo- 
nents." 

Upon  further  consideration.  I  incline 
to  suspect  that  the  temporal  punishment 
of  heresy  was  intended  to  be  fixed  by 
act  of  parliament ;  and  probably  with 
various  degrees,  which  will  account  for 
the  indefinite  word  "  puniendus."  [A. 
manuscript  of  the  Reformatio  Legum  in 
the  British  Museum  (Harl  426)  has  the 
following  clause  after  the  word  puni- 
tndus:  "Vel  ut  in  perpetuum  pellatur 
c xilium,  vel  ad  seternas  careens  deprima- 
tur  teoebras,  vel  alioqui  pro  magistrates 


prndenti  consideratione  plectendus,  ut 
maxime  illius  conversion!  expedire  vi- 
dentur.'  Jenkins's  edition  of  Cranmer, 
vol.  i.  preface,  ex.  This  seems  to  prove 
that  capital  penalties  were  not  designed 
by  the  original  compilers  of  this  ecclesi- 
astical code.  1845.] 

The  language  of  Dr.  Lingard,  as  I  have 
since  observed,  about  "  suffering  death." 
is  taken  from  Collier,  who  puts  exactly 
the  same  construction  on  the  canon. 

Before  I  quit  these  canons,  one  mis- 
take of  Dr.  Lingard's  may  be  corrected. 
Ho  says  that  divorces  were  allowed  by 
them  not  only  for  adultery,  but  cruelty, 
desertion,  and  incompatibility  of  temper. 
But  the  contrary  may  be  clearly  shown, 
from  tit.  de  matrimonio.  c.  11,  and  tit. 
de  divortiis.  c.  12.  Divorce  was  allowed 
for  something  more  than  incompatibility 
of  temper,  namely,  capitalet  Inirnicitio', 
meaning,  as  I  conceive,  attempts  by  one 
party  on  the  other's  life.  In  this  respect 
their  scheme  of  a  very  important  branch 
of  social  law  seems  far  better  than  our 
own.  Nothing  can  he  more  absurd  than 
our  modern  privtiegia,  our  acts  of  parlia- 
ment to  break  the  bond  between  an 
adulteress  and  her  husband.  Nor  do  I 
see  how  we  can  justify  the  denial  of  re- 
dress to  women  in  every  case  of  adultery 
and  desertion.  It  does  not  follow  that 
the  marriage  tie  ought  to  be  dissolved  as 
easily  as  it  is  in  the  Lutheran  states  of 
German}'. 

l  Strvpe.  passim.  Burnet.  ii.  154"  iii. 
Append.  200.  Collier,  294,  303. 


REFORMATION.      PERSECUTION  UNDER  MARY.  113 

an  eminent  divine,  having  been  elected  bishop  of  Gloucester, 
refused  to  be  consecrated  in  the  usual  dress.  It  marks, 
almost  ludicrously,  the  spirit  of  those  times,  that,  instead  of 
permitting  him  to  decline  the  station,  the  council  sent  him  to 
prison  for  some  time,  until  by  some  mutual  concessions  the 
business  was  adjusted.1  These  events  it  would  hardly  be 
worth  while  to  notice  in  such  a  work  as  the  present  if  they 
bad  not  been  the  prologue  to  a  long  and  serious  drama. 

It  is  certain  that  the  reestablishment  of  popery  on  Mary* 
accession  must  have  been  acceptable  to  a  large  M 
part,  or  perhaps  to  the  majority,  of  the  nation.  Persecution 
There  is  re«son,  however,  to  believe  that  the  re-  ur 
formed  doctrine  had  made  a  real  progress  in  the  few  years 
of  her  brother's  reign.  The  counties  of  Norfolk  and  Suf- 
folk, which  placed  Mary  on  the  throne  as  the  lawful  heir, 
were  chiefly  protestant,  and  experienced  from  her  the  usual 
gratitude  and  good  faith  of  a  bigot.2  Noailles  bears  witness, 
in  many  of  his  despatches,  to  the  unwillingness  which  great 
numbers  of  the  people  displayed  to  endure  the  restoration  of 
popery,  and  to  the  queen's  excessive  unpopularity,  even 
before  her  marriage  with  Philip  had  been  resolved  upon.8 
As  for  the  higher  classes,  they  partook  far  less  than  their 
inferiors  in  the  religious  zeal  of  that  age.  Henry,  Edward, 
Mary,  Elizabeth,  found  almost  an  equal  compliance  with 
their  varying  schemes  of  faith.  Yet  the  larger  proportion 
of  the  nobility  and  gentry  appear  to  have  preferred  the 
catholic  religion.  Several  peers  opposed  the  bills  for  refor- 
mation under  Edward ;  and  others,  who  had  gone  along  with 
the  current,  became  active  counsellors  of  Mary.  Not  a  few 
persons  of  family  emigrated  in  the  latter  reign  ;  but  with  the 
exception  of  the  second  earl  of  Bedford,  who  suffered  a 
short  imprisonment  on  account  of  religion,  the  p'rotestant 
martyrology  contains  no  confessor  of  superior  rank.4  The 

1  Strype,  Burnet.  The  former  is  the  whose  first  wife  was  sister  to  Henry  VIII. 

more  accurate.  In  the  parliament  of  1555,  a  bill  seques- 

»  Burnet,  237,  246.  3  Strype,  10,  341.  tering  the  property  of  "the  duchess  of 

No  part  of  England  suffered  so  much  in  Suffolk  and  others,  contemptuously  gone 

the  persecution.  over  the  seas,''  was  rejected  by  the  com- 

3  Ambassades  de  Noaillea,  v.  ii.  passim,  mons  on  the  third  reading.    Journals, 
8  Strype,  100.  6th  Dec.     • 

4  Strvpe,    iii.    107.      He    reckons    the  It  must  not  be  understood  that  all  the 
emigrants  at  800.    Life  of  Cranmer,  314.  aristocracy     were     supple     hypocrites, 
Of  these    the   most   illustrious   was  the  though  they  did  not  expose  themselves 
duchess  of  Suffolk,  —  not  the  first  cousin  voluntarily  to  prosecution.     Noailles  tells 
of  the  queen,  but, "as  has  been  .suggested  us  that   the  earls  of  Oxford  and  West- 
to  me,   the  sister  of    Charles  Brandon,  moreland,    and    lord   Willoughby,  were 

VOL    1.  —  0.  8 


114  PERSECUTION  UNDER  MARY.  CHAP.  II 

Bame  accommodating  spirit  characterized,  upon  the  whole, 
the  clergy ;  and  would  have  been  far  more  general,  if  a  con- 
siderable number  had  not  availed  themselves  of  the  permis- 
sion to  marry  granted  by  Edward ;  which  led  to  their  expul- 
sion from  their  cures  on  his  sister's  coming  to  th'e  throne.1 
Yet  it  was  not  ihe  temper  of  Mary's  parliaments,  whatever 
pains  had  been  taken  about  their  election,  to  second  her 
bigotry  in  surrendering  the  temporal  fruits  of  their  recent 
schism.  The  bill  for  restoring  first  fruits  and  impropriations 
in  the  queen's  hands  to  the  church  passed  not  without  diffi- 
culty ;  and  it  was  found  impossible  to  obtain  a  repeal  of  the 
act  of  supremacy  without  the  pope's  explicit  confirmation  of 
the  abbey  lands  to  their  new  proprietors.  Even  this  confir- 
mation, though  made  through  the  legate  cardinal  Pole,  by 
virtue  of  a  full  commission,  left  not  unreasonably  an  appre- 
hension that,  on  some  better  opportunity,  the  imprescriptible 
nature  of  church  property  might  be  urged  against  the  pos- 
sessors.2 With* these  selfish  considerations  others  of  a  more 
generous  nature  conspired  to  render  the  old  religion  more 
obnoxious  than  it  had  been  at  the  queen's  accession.  Her 
marriage  with  Philip,  his  encroaching  disposition,  the  arbi- 
trary turn  of  his  counsels,  the  insolence  imputed  to  the 
Spaniards  who  accompanied  him,  the  unfortunate  loss  of 
Calais  through  that  alliance,  while  it  thoroughly  alienated 
the  kingdom  from  Mary,  created  a  prejudice  against  the 


his   title  (more   probably  his  hereditary  the  eminent  protestantism  of  that  dis- 

office  of  chamberlain),  which  would  be  trict,  is  not  probable:  and  Dr.  Lingard, 

conferred  on  the  earl  of  Pembroke,  v.  319.  on  Wharton's  authority,  who  h:is  taken 

Michele,  the  Venetian  ambassador,  in  his  his  ratio  from  the  diocese  of  Canterbury, 

Rplazione  del  Stato  d'  Inghilterra,  Lans-  thinks  they  did  not  amount  to  more  than 

•iowne  MSS.  840,  does  not  speak  favor-  about  1500. 

ably   of   the   general    affection    towards  2  Burnet,    ii.   298.   iii.    245.     But   ?ee 

popery.     "The  English  in  general,"  he  Philips's  Life  of  Pole,  sect,  ix.,  contra; 

says,  '_'would  turn  Jews  or  Turks  if  their  and  Ridley's  answer  to  this,  p.  272.     In 

sovereign  pleased ;  but  the  restoration  of  fact  no  scheme  of  religion  would  on  the 

the  abbey  lands  by  the  crown  keeps  alive  whole  have  been  so  acceptable  to  the  na- 

a  constant  fear  among  those  who  possess  tiou  as  that  which  Henry  left  established, 

them."     Fol.   176.     This  restitution  of  consisting    chiefly    of    what  was  called 

church  lands  in  the  hands  of  the  crown  catholic  in  doctrine,  but  free  from    the 

cost  the  queen  60,000i.  a  year  of  reve-  grosser  abuses  and  from  all  connection 

nue.  with  the  see  of  Rome.     Arbitrary   and 


the 

Bu                                 ,       .     .       .       u  eve,   n  a    grea   pons,    o      as   o  wa 

upon   this  computation  they   formed  a  he  renounced    and    what    he    retained. 

very  considerable  hody  on  the  protestant  Michele  (Kelazione,  &c.)  is  of  this   opin- 

side.     Burnet's  calculation,  however,  is  ion. 

made  by  assuming  the  ejected  ministers 


REFORMATION.       PERSECUTION  UNDER  MARY.  115 

religion  which  the  Spanish  court  so  steadily  favored.1  So 
violent  indeed  was  the  hatred  conceived  by  the  English 
nation  against  Spain  during  the  short  period  of  Philip's  mar- 
riage with  their  queen,  that  it  diverted  the  old  channel  of 
public  feelings,  and  almost  put  an  end  to  that  dislike  and 
jealousy  of  France  which  had  so  long  existed.  For  at  least 
a  century  after  this  time  we  rarely  find  in  popular  writers 
any  expressions  of  hostility  towards  that  country  ;  though 
their  national  manners,  so  remote  from  our  own,  are  not 
unfrequently  the  object  of  ridicule.  The  prejudices  of  the 
populace,  as  much  as  the  policy  of  our  councillors,  were  far 
more  directed  against  Spain. 

But   what   had   the    greatest    efficacy   in   disgusting   the 
English   with    Mary's  system   of  faith,  was  the  Itg  effect 
cruelty  by  which  it  was  accompanied.     Though  ™ther, 
the  privy  council  were  in  fact  continually  urging  to  prot- 
the  bishops  forward  in  this  prosecution,2  the  latter  estantlsm- 
bore  the  chief  blame,  and   the  abhorrence  entertained  for 
them  naturally  extended  to  the  doctrine  they  professed.     A 
sort  of  instinctive  reason  told  the  people,  what  the  learned 
on  neither  side  had  been  able  to  discover,  that  the  truth  of 
a  religion  begins  to  be  very  suspicious  when  it  stands  in  need 
of  prisons  and  scaffolds  to  eke  out  its  evidences.     And  as 
the  English  were  constitutionally  humane,  and  not  hardened 
by  continually  witnessing  the  infliction  of  barbarous  punish- 


1  No  one  of  our  historians  has  been  so    rable  successor  to  its  ancient  prosperity 


and  suppressed,  till  this  queen  appears    Scots. 

honest  aud  even  amiable.    But,admitting        2  Strype,  ii.  17;  Burnet,  iii.  203,  and 

that  the  French  ambassador  had  a  tempta-    Append.  285,  where  there  is  a  letter  from 


wi^-icuiuiuie  iii.uicumenc ,    anu  mat   uie     mure  were  put  tuueatu  umuyiu  maii-jA 
words  with  which  Carte  has  concluded    ologists  have  discovered.     And  the  pre 


jua«. laivvlUJ^  ltUUl:L*U  LUC  IlllLlUU   liU   I«llt3         AJUIMCL,     11.     t»VI.          I      I  'J' 

brink  of  ruin,  she  left  it,  by  her  season-    the  lower  statements. 
»ble  decease,  to  be  restored  by  her  adrni- 


116 


PERSECUTION  UNDER  MARY. 


CHAP. 


monts,  there  arose  a  sympathy  for  men  suffering  torments 
with  such  meekness  and  patience,  which  the  populace  of 
some  other  nations  were  perhaps  less  apt  to  display,  espe- 
cially in  executions  on  the  score  of  heresy.1  The  theologian 
indeed  and  the  philosopher  may  concur  in  deriding  the 
notion  that  either  sincerity  or  moral  rect'tude  can  be  the  test 
of  truth  ;  yet  among  the  various  species  of  authority  to 
which  recourse  had  been  had  to  supersede  or  to  supply  the 
deficiencies  of  argument,  I  know  not  whether  any  be  more 
reasonable,  and  none  certainly  is  so  congenial  to  unsophisti- 
cated minds.  Many  are  said  to  have  become  protestants 
under  Mary,  who,  at  her  coming  to  the  throne,  had  retained 
the  contrary  persuasion.2  And  the  strongest  proof  of  this 
may  be  drawn  from  the  acquiescence  of  the  great  body  of 
the  kingdom  in  the  reestablishment  of  protestantism  by 
Elizabeth,  when  compared  with  the  seditions  and  discontent 
on  that  account  under  Edward.  The  course  which  this 
famous  princess  steered  in  ecclesiastical  concerns;  during  her 
long  reign,  will  form  the  subject  of  the  two  ensuing  chapters. 


1  Burnet  makes  a  very  just  observation 
on  the  cruelties  of  this  period,  that  "  they 
raised  that  horror  in  the  whole  nation, 
that  there  seems  ever  since  that  time  such 
an  abhorrence  to  that  religion  to  be  de- 
rived ilown  from  father  to  son.  that  it  is 
no  wonder  an  aversion  so  deeply  rooted, 
mul  raised  upon  such  grounds,  does,  upon 
every  new  provocation  or  jealousy  of  re- 
turning to  it,  break  out  in  most  violent 
inn!  convulsive  symptoms,"  p.  388.  "De- 
licta  majoriim  immeritus  luis,  Romanr." 
}Uit  those  who  would  diminish  this  aver- 
sion and  prevent  these  convulsive  symp- 
toms will  do  better  by  avoiding  for  the 
future  either  such  panegyrics  on  Mary 
and  her  advisers,  or  such  insidious  ex- 
tenuations of  her  persecution,  as  we  have 
lately  read,  and  which  do  not  raise  a 
I'avorable  impression  of  their  sincerity 
in  the  principles  of  toleration  to  which 
they  profess  to  have  been  converted. 

Noaillcs.  who,  though  an  enemy  to 
Mar\'s  government,  must,  as  a  catholic, 
lie  reckoned  an  unsuspicious  witness,  re- 
markably confirm*  tha  account  given  by 


Fox,  and  since  by  all  our  writers,  of  the 
death  of  Rogers,  the  proto-martyr,  and 
its  effect  on  the  people.  "  Oejour  d'huy 
a  este  faite  la  confirmation  de  1'alliauce 
entre  le  pape  et  ce  royaume  par  uu  sacri- 
fice publique  et  solemnel  d'un  docteur 
predicant  nomine  Kogerus,  lequel  a  ete 
bruletout  vif  pourestre  Lutherien  ;  mai3 
il  est  mort  persistant  en  son  opinion.  A 
quoy  le  plus  grand  partie  de  ce  peuple  a 
pris  tel  plaisir,  qu'ils  u'ont  eu  rrainto 
de  luy  faire  plusieurs  acclamations  pour 
comforter  son  courage;  et  me' me  ses  en- 
fans  y  ont  assiste.  le  cousolant  de  telle 
facon  qu'il  semblait  qu'on  le  meuait  aux 
noces."  V.  173. 

[The  execration  with  which  Mary's 
bishops  were  met  in  the  next  reign  is 
attested  in  a  letter  of  1'arkhurst  to  Con- 
rad Gesner.  "Jam  et  Deo  et  hominibus 
sunt  exosi.  nee  usquam  nisi  iuviti  prore- 
punt,  ne  forte  fiat  tumultus  in  populo- 
Mu'ti  coram  cos  vocant  carnificcs.' 
Zurich  Letters,  by  Parker  Society,  p.  18. 
1846.] 

*  Strype,  iii.  295. 


ELIZ.  — Catholics.     ACCESSION  OF  ELIZABETH.  117 


CHAPTER  III. 

ON   THE   LAWS    OF   ELIZABETH'S   REIGN   RESPECTING    THK 
ROMAN    CATHOLICS. 

Change  of  Religion  on  the  Queen's  Accession  —  Acts  of  Supremacy  and  Uniformity 

—  Restraint  of  Roman  Catholic  Worship  in  the  first  years  of  Elizabeth  —  Statute 
of  1562  —  Speech  of  Lord  Montague  against  it  —  This  Act  not  fully  enforced  — 
Application  of  the  Emperor  in  behalf  of  the  English  Catholics  —  Persecution  of 
this  Body  in  the  ensuing  Period  —  Uncertain  Succession  of  the  Crown  between 
the  Families  of  Scotland  and  Suffolk  —  the  Queen's  unwillingness  to  decide  this, 
or  to  marry  —  Imprisonment  of  Lady  Catherine  Grey — Mary  Queen  of  Scotland 

—  Combination  in  her  Favor  —  Bull  of  Pious   V.  —  Statutes  for  the  Queen's 
Security  —  Catholics  more  rigorously  treated — Refugees  in  the  Netherlands — • 
Their  Hostility  to  the  Government  —  Fresh  Laws  against  the  Catholic  Worship 

—  Execution  of  Carnpian  and  others  —  Defence  of  the   Queen   by   Burleigh  — 
Increased  Severity  of  the  Government  —  Mary  —  Plot  in  her  Favor  —  Her  Execu- 
tion—  Remarks  upon  it — Continued  Persecution  of  Roman  Catholics  —  General 
Observations. 

THE  accession  of  Elizabeth,  gratifying  to  the  whole  nation 
on  account  of  the  late  queen's  extreme  unpopularity,  infused 
peculiar  joy  into  the  hearts  of  all  well-wishers  to  the  Ref- 
ormation.    Child  of  that  famous  marriage  which  had  sev- 
ered the  connection  of  England  with  the  Roman  see,  and 
trained  betimes  in  the  learned  and  reasoning  discipline  of 
protestant  theology,  suspected  and  oppressed  for  that  very 
reason  by  a  sister's  jealousy,  and  scarcely  preserved  from  the 
death  which  at  one  time  threatened  her,  there  was  every 
ground  to  be  confident,  that,  notwithstanding  her  forced  com- 
pliance with  the  catholic  rites  during  the  late  reign,  her  in- 
clinations had  continued  steadfast  to  the  opposite 
side.1     Nor  was  she  long  in  manifesting  this  dis-  ^sgion  on 
position  sufficiently  to  alarm  one  party,  though  not  the  queen's 
entirely  to  satisfy  the  other.     Her  great  prudence, 
and  that  of  her  advisers,  which  taught  her  to  move  slowly, 

i  Elizabeth  was  much  suspected  of  a  shire,  who  is  proved  by  the   letters  of 

concern  in  the  conspiracy  of  1554,  which  Noailles  tc  have  been  engaged,  his  testi- 

was  more  extensive  than  appeared  from  mony  is  of  less  value.   Nothing,  however, 

Wyatt's   insurrection,   and  had  in  view  appears  in  these  letters,  I  believe,  to  criin- 

the  placing  her  on  the  throne,  with  the  inate   Elizabeth.      Her   life  was    saved, 

earl    of   Devonshire    for  her    husband,  against  the  advice  of  the  imperial  court, 

Wyatt  indeed  at  his  execution  acquitted  and  of  their  party  in  the  cabinet,especially 

her ;  hut  as  he  said  as  much  for  Devon-  lord  Paget,  by  the  influence  of  Gardiner, 


118 


NOTIFIES  PAUL  IV. 


CHAP.  III. 


while  the  temper  of  the  nation  was  still  uncertain,  and  her 
government  still  embarrassed  with  a  French  war  and  a  Span- 
ish alliance,  joined  with  a  certain  tendency  in  her  religious 
sentiments  not  so  thoroughly  protestant  as  had  been  expected, 
produced  some  complaints  of  delay  from  the  ardent  reformers 
just  returned  from  exile.  She  directed  sir  Edward  Carne, 
her  sister's  ambassador  at  Rome,  to  notify  her  accession  to 
Paul  IV.  Several  catholic  writers  have  laid  stress  on  this 
circumstance  as  indicative  of  a  desire  to  remain  in  his  com- 
munion ;  and  have  attributed  her  separation  from  it  to  his 
arrogant  reply,  commanding  her  to  lay  down  the  title  of  roy- 
alty, and  to  submit  her  pretensions  to  his  decision. 1  But  she 


according  to  Dr.  Lingard,  writing  on  the 
authority  of  Renard's  despatches.  Bur- 
net,  who  had  no  access  to  that  source  of 
information,  imagines  Gardiner  to  hare 
been  her  most  inveterate  enemy.  She 
was  even  released  from  prison  for  the 
time,  though  soon  afterwards  detained 
again,  and  kept  in  custody,  as  is  well 
known,  for  the  rest  of  this  reign.  Her 
inimitable  dissimulation  was  all  required 
to  save  her  from  the  penalties  of  heresy 
and  treason.  It  appears  by  the  memoir 
of  the  Venetian  ambassador,  in  1557 
(Lansdowne  MSS.  840),  as  well  as  from 
the  letters  of  Noailles,  that  Mary  was 
desirous  to  change  the  succession,  and 
would  hare  done  so,  had  it  not  been  for 
Philip's  reluctance,  and  the  impractica- 
bility of  obtaining  the  consent  of  parlia- 
ment. Though  herself  of  a  dissembling 
character,  she  could  not  conceal  the 
hatred  she  bore  to  one  who  brought  back 
the  memory  of  her  mother's  and  her 
own  wrongs ;  especially  when  she  saw  all 
eyes  turned  towards  the  successor,  and 
felt  that  the  curse  of  her  own  barrenness 
was  to  fall  on  her  beloved  religion.  Eliz- 
abeth had  been  not  only  forced  to  have 
a  chapel  in  her  house,  and  to  give  all  ex- 
terior signs  of  conformity,  but  to  protest 
on  oath  her  attachment  to  the  catholic 
faith ;  though  Hume,  who  always  loves  a 
popular  story,  gives  credence  to  the  well- 
known  verses  ascribed  to  her,  in  order  to 
elude  a  declaration  of  her  opinion  on  the 
sacrament.  The  inquisitors  of  that  age 
were  not  go  easily  turned  round  by  an 
equivocal  answer.  Yet  Elizabeth's  faith 
was  constantly  suspected.  "  Accresce 
oltro  qur-sto  1'  odio,"  says  the  Venetian, 
"  il  sapore  che  sia  aliena  dalla  religione 
presente,  per  essere  non  pur  nata,  ma 
dotta  ed  allevata  nell'  altra,  che  se  bene 
con  la  esteriore  ha  mostrato,  e  mostra  di 
essersi  ridotta,  vivendo  cattolicamente, 


pure  e  opinione  che  dissimuli  e  nell'  in- 
teriore  la  ritenga  piii  che  mai." 

1  [This  remarkable  fact,  which  runs 
through  all  domestic  and  foreign  his- 
tories, has  been  disputed,  and,  as  far  as 
appears,  disproved,  by  the  late  editor  of 
Dodd's  Church  History  of  England,  vol. 
iv.  preface,  on  the  authority  of  Game's 
own  letters  in  the  State  Paper  Office. 
It  is  at  least  highly  probable,  not  to  say 
evident,  from  these,  that  Elizabeth  never 
contemplated  so  much  intercourse  with 
the  pope,  even  as  a  temporal  sovereign, 
or  to  notify  her  accession  to  him ;  and 
it  had  before  been  shown  by  Strype, 
that,  on  Dec.  1,  1558,  an  order  was  de- 
spatched to  Carne,  forbidding  him  to  pro- 
ceed in  an  ecclesiastical  suit,  wherein,  as 
English  ambassador,  he  had  been  engaged. 
Strype's  Annals,  i.  34.  Carne,  on  his  own 
solicitation,  was  recalled.  Feb.  10;  though 
the  pope  would  not  suffer  him,  nor,  when 
he  saw  what  was  going  forward  at  home, 
was  he  willing,  to  return.  Mr.  Tierney, 
the  editor  of  Dodd,  conceives  the  story  of 
Paul  IV.'s  intemperate  language  to  have 
been  coined  by  "  the  inventive  powers 
of  Paul  Sarpi,"  who  first  published  it 
in  his  History  of  the  Council  of  Trent, 
in  1619.  From  him  Mr.  T.  supposes 
Spondanus  and  Pallavicino  to  have  taken 
it ;  and  from  them  it  has  passed  to  a 
multitude  of  catholic  as  well  as  protestant 
historians.  It  may,  however,  seem  rather 
doubtful  whether  Spondanus  would  have 
taken  this  simply  on  the  authority  of 
Sarpi;  and  we  may  perhaps  conjecture 
that  the  anecdote  had  been  already  in 
circulation,  even  if  it  had  never  appeared 
in  print,  (a  negative  hard  to  establish,) 
before  the  publication  of  the  History  of 
the  Council  of  Trent.  Nor  is  it  improb- 
able that  Paul,  according  to  the  violence 
of  his  disposition,  had  uttered  some  such 
language,  and  even  to  Carne  himself, 


ELIZ.  — Catholics.     FIRST  PARLIAMENT  OF  ELIZABETH.       119 

had  begun  to  make  alterations,  though  not  very  essential,  in 
the  church  service,  before  the  pope's  behavior  could  have 
become  known  to  her  ;  and  the  bishops  must  have  been  well 
aware  of  the  course  she  designed  to  pursue,  when  they  adopt- 
ed the  violent  and  impolitic  resolution  of  refusing  to  officiate 
at  her  coronation.1  Her  council  was  formed  of  a  very  few 
catholics,  of  several  pliant  conformists  with  all  changes,  and 
of  some  known  friends  to  the  protestant  interest.  But  two 
of  these,  Cecil  and  Bacon,  were  so  much  higher  in  her  con- 
fidence, and  so  incomparably  superior  in  talents  to  the  other 
councillors,  that  it  was  evident  which  way  she  must  incline.2 
The  parliament  met  about  two  months  after  her  accession. 
The  creed  of  parliament  from  the  time  of  Henry  VIII.  had 
been  always  that  of  the  court ;  whether  it  were  that  elections 
had  constantly  been  influenced,  as  we  know  was  sometimes 
the  case,  or  that  men  of  adverse  principles,  yielding  to  the 
torrent,  had  left  the  way  clear  to  the  partisans  of  power. 
This  first,  like  all  subsequent  parliaments,  was  to  the  full  as 
favorable  to  protestantism  as  the  queen  could  desire :  the  first- 
fruits  of  benefices,  and,  what  was  far  more  important,  the 
supremacy  in  ecclesiastical  affairs,  were  restored  to  the 
crown  ;  the  laws  made  concerning  religion  in  Edward's  time 
were  reenacted.  These  acts  did  not  pass  without  consider- 
able opposition  among  the  lords  ;  nine  temporal  peers,  beside 
all  the  bishops,  having  protested  against  the  bilFof  uniformity 
establishing  the  Anglican  liturgy,  though  some  pains  had 
been  taken  to  soften  the  passages  most  obnoxious  to  cath-- 

though  not,  as  the  story  represents  it,  in  From  the  dates  of  these  and  other  facts, 

reply  to  an  official  communication.    But  it  may  be  fairly  inferred  that  Elizabeth's 

it    is    chiefly  material    to   observe,  that  resolution  was  formed  independently  of 

Elizabeth  displayed  her  determination  to  the  pope's  behavior  towards  sir  Edward 

keep  aloof  from  Rome  in  the  very  begin-  Carne  ;  though  that  might  probably  ex- 

ning  of  her  reign.    1845.]  asperate  her  against  the  adherents  of  the 

1  Eliatbeth  ascended   the   throne  No-  Roman  see,  and  make  their  religion  ap- 

vember   17,  1558.     On   the   5th  of  De-  pear  more  inconsistent  with   their  civil 

comber  Mary  was  buried  ;   and   on  this  allegiance.     If,  indeed,  the  refusal  of  the 

occasion  White,  bishop  of  Winchester,  in  bishops    to  officiate    at  her  coronation 

preaching  her  funeral  sermon,  spoke  with  (Jan.  14,  1558-9)  were   founded   in  any 

virulem-e  against  the   protestant  exiles,  degree  on  Paul  IV/s  denial  of  her  title,  it 

and  expressed  apprehension  of  their  re-  must  have  seemed  in  that  age  within  a 

turn.     Burnet,   iii.   272.    Directions   to  hair's  breadth  of  high  treason.    But  it 

read  )iurt  of  the  service  in  English,  and  more  probably  arose  from  her  order  that 

forbidding  the  elevation  of  the  host,  were  the  host  should  not  be  elevated,  which  in 

issued  prior  to  the  proclamation  of  De-  truth  was  not  legally  to  be  justified, 

cember  27,  against  innovations  without  2  See  a   paper   by  Cecil    on   the  best 

authority.      Tlie   great  seal   was    taken  means  of  reforming  religion,  written  at 

from  archbishop  Heath  early  in  January,  this  time  with  all  his  cautious  wisdom, 

and  given  to  sir  Nicholas  Bacon.     Parker  in  Burnet,  or  in  Strype's 'Annals  of  the 

was   pitched    upon   to   succeed  Pole   at  Reformation,  or  in  the  Somers  Tracts. 
Canterbury   in    the    preceding    month. 


120  ECCLESIASTICAL  VISITATION.  CHAP.  in. 

olics.1  But  the  act  restoring  the  royal  supremacy  met  with 
less  resistance ;  whether  it  were  that  the  system  of  Henry 
retained  its  hold  over  some  minds,  or  that  it  did  not  encroach, 
like  the  former,  on  the  liberty  of  conscience,  or  that  men  not 
over-scrupulous  were  satisfied  with  the  interpretation  which 
the  queen  caused  to  be  put  upon  the  oath. 

Several  of  the  bishops  had  submitted  to  the  Reformation 
under  Edward  VI.  But  they  had  acted,  in  general,  so  con- 
spicuous a  part  in  the  late  restoration  of  popery,  that,  even 
amidst  so  many  examples  of  false  profession,  shame  restrained 
them  from  a  second  apostasy.  Their  number  happened  not 
to  exceed  sixteen,  one  of  whom  was  prevailed  on  to  conform  ; 
while  the  rest,  refusing  the  oath  of  supremacy,  were  deprived 
of  their  bishoprics  by  the  court  of  ecclesiastical  high  com- 
mission. Jn  the  summer  of  1559  the  queen  appointed  a 
general  ecclesiastical  visitation,  to  compel  the  observance  of 
the  protestant  formularies.  It  appears  from  their  reports  that 
only  about  one  hundred  dignitaries,  and  eighty  'parochial 
priests,  resigned  their  benefices,  or  were  deprived.2  Men 
eminent  for  their  zeal  in  the  protestant  cause,  and  most  of 
them  exiles  during  the  persecution,  occupied  the  vacant  sees. 
And  thus,  before  the  end  of  1559,  the  English  church,  so 
long  contended  for  as  a  prize  by  the  two  religions,  was  lost 
forever  to  that  of  Rome. 

These  two  statutes,  commonly  denominated  the  Acts  of 

Supremacy  and  Uniformity,  form  the  basis  of  that 
Supremacy     restrictive  code 'of  laws,  deemed  by  some  one  of 

the  fundamental  bulwarks,  by  others  the  reproach 

fonmty.  „     '  .  .  .   , '     •> 

01  our  constitution,  which  pressed  so  heavily  tor 

1  Parl.  Hist.  vol.   i.  p.  394.     In  the  »  Burnet;  Strype's  Annals,  169.     Pen- 

rei^n  of  Edward  a  prayer  had  been  in-  sions  were  reserved  for  those  who  quitted 

K-rtvil  in  the  liturgy  to  deliver  us  "  from  their  benefices   on  account  of  religion. 

the  bishop  of  Rome  and  all  his  detestable  Burnet,  ii.  398.    This  was  a  very  liberal 

enormities."     This  was  now  struck  out  ;  measure,  and  at  the  same  time  a  politic 

and,  what  was  more  acceptable  to   the  check  on  their  conduct.     Lingard  thinks 

nation,  the  words  used  in   distributing  the    number    must    have    been    much 

the   elements    were    so    contrived,    by  greater;  but  the  visitors'   reports  seem 

blending    the     two    forms     successively  the    best    authority.      It    is,    however, 

adopts   under    Edward,   as  neither   to  highly    probable    that    others    resigned 

offend  the  popish  or  Lutheran,  nor  the  their  preferments  afterwards,  when  the 

Zuinglian   communicant.     A  rubric  di-  casuistry   of   their    church    grew    more 

•ected  against  the  doctrine  of  the  real  scrupulous.     It  may  be  added,  that  ttie 

or  corporal  presence  was  omitted.     This  visitors  restored  the'  married  clergy  who 

w:is  replaced  after  the  Restoration.     Bur-  had  been  dispossessed  in  the  preceding 

et  owns  that  the   greater  part  of  the  reign  ,  whicli  would  of  course  consider- 

natiou  still  adhered  to  this  tenet,  though  ably  augment  the  number  of  sufferer* 

it  was  not  the  opinion  of  the  rulers  of  for  popery, 
the  church,    ii.  390,  406. 


ELIZ.  —  Catholics.         ACTS    )F   SUPREMACY.  121 

more  than  two  centuries  upon  the  adherents  to  the  Romish 
church.  By  the  former  all  beneficed  ecclesiastics,  and  all 
laymen  holding  office  under  the  crown,  were  obliged  to  take 
the  oath  of  supremacy,  renouncing  the  spiritual  as  well  as 

temporal  jurisdiction  of  every  foreign  prince  or  prelate,  on 
pain  of  forfeiting  their  office  or  benefice  ;  and  it  was  rendered 
highly  penal,  and  for  the  third  offence  treasonable,  to  main- 
tain such  supremacy  by  writing  or  advised  speaking.1  The 

1  1  Eliz.  c.  1.     The  oath  of  supremacy  over  all  manner  of  persons  born  with- 

was  expressed  as  follows: — "I,  A.  B.,  in     these    her    realms,   dominions,   and 

do  utterly  testify  and  declare,  that  the  countries,  of  what  estate,  either  ecclesi- 

queen's  highness   is   the   only  supreme  astica!  or  temporal,  soever  they  be,  so  as 

governor  of   this   realm,   and   all   other  no  other  foreign  power  shall  or  ought  to 

her  highness's  dominions  and  countries,  have  any  superiority  over  them.     And  if 

as  well  in  all  spiritual  and  ecclesiastical  any  person  that  hath  conceived  any  other 

things  or  causes  as  temporal  ;  and  that  sense  of  the  form  of  the  said  oath  shall 

no  foreign  prince,  person,  prelate,  state,  accept  the  same  with  this  interpretation, 

or  potentate,  hath  or  ought  to  have  any  sense  or  meaning,   her  majesty  is    well 

Jurisdiction,  power,  superiority,  preemi-  pleased  to  accept  every  such  in  that  be- 

nence,  or  authority,  ecclesiastical  or  spir-  half,  as  her  good  and  obedient  subjects, 

itual,  within  this  realm;  and  therefore  and  shall  acquit  them  of  all  manner  of 

I   do  utterly  renounce  and  forsake  all  penalties  contained  in  the  said  act,  against 

foreign  jurisdictions,  powers,  ^superiori-  such  as  shall  peremptorily  or  obstinately 

ties,   and  authorities,  and   do    promise  refuse  to  take  the  same  oath."     1  Somers 

that  from  henceforth  I  shall  bear  faith  Tracts,  edit.  Scott,  73. 
and  true  allegiance  to  the  queen's  high-        This  interpretation  was  afterwards  giv- 

ness,  her  heirs  and  lawful  successors,  en  in  one  of  the  thirty-nine  articles,  which 

and  to  my  power  shall  assist  and  defend  having  been  confirmed  by  parliament,  it 

all    jurisdictions,    preeminences,    privi-  is  undoubtedly  to  be  reckoned  the  true* 

leges,  and  authorities,  granted  or  belong-  sense  of  the  oath.     Mr    Butler,  in   his 

ing  to  the  queen's  highness,  her  heirs  Memoirs  of  English  Catholics,  vol.  i.  p. 

and  successors,  or  united  and  annexed  157,  enters  into  a  discussion  of  the  ques- 

to  the  imperial  crown  of  this  realm."  tion,   whether    Roman    catholics    might 

A  remarkable  passage  in  the  injunc-  concientiously  take  the  oath  of  supremacy 
tions  to  the  ecclesiastical  visitors  of  1559,  in  this  sense.  It  appears  that  in  the  sev 
which  may  be  reckoned  in  the  nature  of  enteenth  century  some  contended  for  the 
a  contemporaneous  exposition  of  the  law,  affirmative ;  and  this  seems  to  explain 
restrains  the  royal  supremacy  established  the  fact  that  several  persons  of  that  per- 
by  this  act,  and  asserted  in  the  above  suasion,  besides  peers,  from  whom  the 
oath,  in  the  following  words:  "Her  oath  was  not  exacted,  did  actually  hold 
majesty  forbiddeth  all  manner  her  sub-  offices  under  the  Stuarts,  and  even  enter 
jects  to  give  ear  or  credit  to  such  per-  into  parliament,  and  that  the  test  act 
verse  and  malicious  persons,  which  most  and  declaration  against  transubstantia- 
Biuisterly  and  maliciously  labor  to  tion  were  thus  rendered  necessary  to 
notify  to  her  loving  subjects  how  by  make  their  exclusion  certain.  Mr.  B. 
words  of  the  said  oath  it  may  be  col-  decides  against  taking  the  oath,  but  on, 
lected  that  the  kings  or  queens  of  this  grounds  by  no  means  sufficient ;  and 
realm,  possessors  of  the  crown,  may  oddly  overlooks  the  decisive  objection, 
challenge  authority  and  power  of  minis-  that  it  denies  in  toto  the  jurisdiction  and 
try  of  divine  service  in  the  church ;  ecclesiastical  authority  of  the  pope.  No 
wherein  her  said  subjects  be  much  writer,  as  far  as  my  slender  knowledge 
abused  by  such  evil  disposed  persons,  extends,  of  the  Gallican  or  German  school 
For  certainly  her  majesty  neither  doth,  of  discipline,  has  gone  to  this  length; 
nor  ever  will,  challenge  any  other  certainly  not  Mr.  Butler  himself,  who  in 
authority  than  that  was  challenged  and  a  modern  publication,  Book  of  the  Roman 
lately  used  by  the  said  noble  kings  of  Catholic  Church,  p.  120,  seems  to  con- 
famous  memory,  king  Henry  VIII.  sider  even  the  appellant  jurisdiction  in 
and  king  Kdward  VI.,  which  is,  and  ecclesiastical  causes  as  vested  in  the  holy 
was  of  ancient  time,  due  to  the  imperial  see  by  divine  right, 
crown  of  this  realm;  that  is,  under  As  to  the  exposition  before  given  of  the 
God  to  have  the  sovereignty  and  rule  oath  of  supremacy,  I  conceive  that  it  was 


122  INTEKDICTION  OF  CATHOLIC  EITES.     CHAP.  III. 

latter  statute  trenched  more  on  the  natural  rights  of  con- 
science ;  prohibiting,  under  pain  of  forfeiting  goods  and  chat- 
tels for  the  first  offence,  of  a  year's  imprisonment  for  the 
second,  and  of  imprisonment  during  life  for  the  third,  the 
use  by  a  minister,  whether  beneh'ced  or  not,  of  any  but  the 
established  liturgy  ;  and  imposed  a  fine  of  one  shilling  on  all 
who  should  absent  themselves  from  church  on  Sundays  and 
holydays.1 

This  act  operated  as  an  absolute  interdiction  of  the  catholic 
Restraint  rites,  however  privately  celebrated.  It  has  fre- 
°f thoilc*11  quently  been  asserted,  that .  the  government  con- 
worship  in  nived  at  the  domestic  exercise  of  that  religion 
yeara'of  during  these  first  years  of  Elizabeth's  reign. 
Elizabeth.  This  may  possibly  have  been  the  case  with  re- 
spect to  some  persons  of  very  high  rank  whom  it  was  inex- 
pedient to  irritate.  But  we  find  instances  of  severity  towards 
catholics,  even  in  that  early  period ;  and  it  is  evident  that 
their  solemn  rites  were  only  performed  by  stealth,  and  at 
much  hazard.  Thus  sir  Edward  Waklgrave  and  his  lady 
were  sent  to  the  Tower  in  1561,  for  hearing  mass  and  hav- 
ing a  priest  in  their  house.  Many  others  about  the  same 
time  were  punished  for  the  like  offence.2  Two  bishops,  one 
of  whom,  I  regret  to  say,  was  Grindal,  write  to  the  council 
in  1562,  concerning  a  priest  apprehended  in  a  lady's  house, 
that  neither  he  nor  the  servants  would  be  sworn  to  answer 
to  articles,  saying  they  would  not  accuse  themselves ;  and, 
after  a  wise  remark  on  this,  that  "  papistry  is  like  to  end  in 
anabaptistry,"  proceed  to  hint,  that  "  some  think  that  if  this 
priest  might  be  put  to  some  kind  of  torment,  and  so  driven 
to  confess  what  he  knoweth,  he  might  gain  the  queen's  maj- 
esty a  good  mass  of  money  by  the  masses  that  he  hath  said  ; 
but  this  we  refer  to  your  lordships'  wisdom." 8  This  com- 
mencement of  persecution  induced  many  catholios  to  fly 
beyond  sea,  and  gave  rise  to  those  reunions  of  disaffected 

intended  not  only  to  relieve  the  scruples  seemed    to  bring  the    church  of  Eng- 

of  catholics,  but  of  those  who  had  im-  land, 

bibed  from  the  school  of  Calvin  an  appre-  i  1  Eliz.  c.  2. 

hension  of  what  is  sometimes,   though  2  Strype's  Annals,  i.  233,  241. 

rather  improperly,  called  Erastianism, —  »Haynes,395.    The  penalty  for  causing 

the  merging  of  all  spiritual  powers,  even  mass  to  be  said,  by  the  act  of  uniformity, 

t!.o,v  of  ordination  and  of  preaching,  in  was  only  100  marks  for  the  first  offence, 

the   paramount  authority  of  the  state,  These  imprisonments  were   probably   in 

towards  which  the  despotism  of  Henry,  many  cases  illegal,  and  only  sustained  by 

obsequiousness    cf    Cranmer,  had  the  arbitrary  power  of  the  High.  Commis- 
sion court. 


ELIZ.  —  Catholics.    CONCESSIONS  OF  PIUS  *V.  123 

exiles,  which  never  ceased  to  endanger  the  throne  of  Eliza- 
beth. 

It  cannot,  as  far  as  appears,  be  truly  alleged  that  any  greater 
provocation  had  as  yet  been  given  by  the  catholics  than  that 
of  pertinaciously  continuing  to  believe  and  worship  as  their 
fathers  had  done  before  them.  I  request  those  who  may 
hesitate  about  this,  to  pay  some  attention  to  the  order  of 
time,  before  they  form  their  opinions.  The  master  mover, 
that  became  afterwards  so  busy,  had  not  yet  put  his  wires 
into  action.  Every  prudent  man  at  Rome  (and  we  shall  not 
at  least  deny  that  there  were  such)  condemned  the  precip- 
itate and  insolent  behavior  of  Paul  IV.  towards  Elizabeth, 
as  they  did  most  other  parts  of  his  administration.  Pius  IV., 
the  successor  of  that  injudicious  old  man,  aware  of  the  ines- 
timable importance  of  reconciliation,  and  suspecting  probably 
that  the  queen's  turn  of  thinking  did  not  exclude  all  hope  of 
it,  despatched  a  nuncio  to  England,  with  an  invitation  to  send 
ambassadors  to  the  council  at  Trent,  and  with  powers,  as  is 
said,  to  confirm  the  English  liturgy,  and  to  permit  double 
communion ;  one  of  the  few  concessions  which  the  more  in- 
dulgent Romanists  of  that  age  were  not  very  reluctant  to 
make.1  But  Elizabeth  had  taken  her  line  as  to  the  court  of 
Rome ;  the  nuncio  received  a  message  at  Brussels,  that  he 
must  not  enter  the  kingdom ;  and  she  was  too  wise  to  coun- 
tenance the  impartial  fathers  of  Trent,  whose  labors  had 
nearly  drawn  to  a  close,  and  whose  decisions  on  the  contro- 
verted points  it  had  never  been  very  difficult  to  foretell.  I 
have  not  found  that  Pius  IV.,  more  moderate  than  most 
other  pontiffs  of  the  sixteenth  century,  took  any  measures 
hostile  to  the  temporal  government  of  this  realm :  but  the 
deprived  ecclesiastics  were  not  unfairly  anxious  to  keep  alive 
the  faith  of  their  former  hearers,  and  to  prevent  them  from 
eliding  into  conformity,  through  indifference  and  disuse  of 
their  ancient  rites.3  The  means  taken  were  chiefly  the  same 
as  had  been  adopted  against  themselves,  the  dispersion  of 
Brnall  papers  either  in  a  serious  or  lively  strain ;  but  the  re- 
markable position  hi  which  the  queen  was  placed  rendering 

1  Strype,  220.  though  it  seemed  very  atrocious  to  bigota. 

2  Questions  of  conscience  were  circu-  Mr.  Butler  says,  that  some  theologians  at 
lated,  with  answers  all  tending  to  show  Trent  were  consulted  as  to  the  lawfulness 
the  unlawfulness  of  conformity.   Strype,  of  occasional  conformity  to  the  Anglican 
228.     There   was   nothing   more  in  this  rites,  who  pronounced  against  it.    Mem. 
than  the  catholic  clergy  were  hound  in  of  Catholics,  i.  171. 

consistency  with  their  principles  to  do, 


124  .STATUTE  OF   1562.  CHAP.  IIL 

her  death  a  most  important  contingency,  the  popish  party 
made  use  of  pretended  conjurations  and  prophecies  of  that 
event,  in  order  to  unsettle  the  people's  minds,  and  to  dispose 
them  to  anticipate  another  reaction. 1  Partly  through  these 
political  circumstances,  but  far  more  from  the  hard  usage 
they  experienced  for  professing  their  religion,  there  seems  to 
have  been  an  increasing  restlessness  among  the  catholics 
about  1562,  which  was  met  with  new  rigor  by  the  paiiia 
inent  of  that  year.2 

The  act  entitled,  "  for  the  assurance  of  the  queen's  royal 
statute  of  power  over  all  estates  and  subjects  within  her  do- 
1562.  minions,"  enacts,  with  an  iniquitous  and  sanguin- 

ary retrospect,  that  all  persons,  who  had  ever  taken  holy 
orders  or  any  degree  in  the  universities,  or  had  been  admit- 
ted to  the  practice  of  the  laws,  or  held  any  office  in  their  ex- 
ecution, should  be  bound  to  take  the  oath  of  supremacy, 
when  tendered  to  them  by  a  bishop,  or  by  commissioners 
appointed  under  the  great  seal.  The  penalty  for  the  first 
refusal  of  this  oath  was  that  of  a  pramunire  ;  but  any  person 
who,  after  the  space  of  three  months  from  the  first  tender, 
should  again  refuse  it  when  in  like  manner  tendered,  in- 
curred the  pains  of  high  treason.  The  oath  of  supremacy  was 
imposed  by  the  statute  on  every  member  of  the  House  of 
Commons,  but  could  not  be  tendered  to  a  peer ;  the  queen 
declaring  her  full  confidence  in  those  hereditary  council- 
lors. Several  peers  of  great  weight  and  dignity  were  still 
catholics.8 

This  harsh  statute  did  not  pass  without  opposition.     Two 

speeches  against  it  have  been  preserved ;  one  by 

iJrxT  lord  Montagu  in  the   House  of  Lords,  the  other 

Montagu        by  jyjr-  Atkinson  in  the  Commons,  breathing  such 

against  it.  J  .  ' 

generous  abhorrence  of  persecution  as  some  erro- 

1  The  trick   of  conjuration  about   the  were  arraigned,  and  we  know  no  details 

queen's   death  began  very  early  in  her  of  the  case,  it  may  be  doubted  whether 

reign  (Strype,  i.  7),  and  led  to  a  penal  their  intentions  were  altogether  so  crira- 

Btiitute   against   "fond  and   fantastical  inal  as   was  charged.      Strype,    i.  333; 

prophecies."    5  Eliz.  c.  15.  Camden,  388  (in  Kennel). 

*  I  know  not  how  to  charge  the  catho-  Strype  tells  us  (i.  374)  of  resolutions 

lies  with  the  conspiracy  of  the  two  Poles,  adopted  against  thequeen  in  a  consistory 

ncp'.K.-wsof  the  cardinal,  and  some  others,  held  by  Pius  IV.  in  1563;  one  of  these  i"s 

to  obtain  five  thousand  troops  from  the  a  pardon  to  any  cook,  brewer,  vintner,  or 

duke  of  Guise,  and  proclaim  Mary  queen,  other,  that  would  poison  her.     But  this 

TiiU    skeins   however   to   have  been  the  is    so   unlikely,   and    so    little    in   that 

Immediate  provocation  for  the  statute  5  pope's  character,  that  it  makes  us  sus- 

Kliz. ;  mid  it  may  be  thought  to  indicate  pect  the  rest,  as  false   information  of  a 

a  good  deal  of  discontent  in  that  party  spy. 

upon  which  the  conspirators  relied.     But  3  5  Eliz.  c.  l. 
as  Elizabeth,  spared  the  lives  of  all  who 


ELIZ.  — Catholics.      SPEECH  OF  LOED  MONTAGU.  125 

neously  imagine  to  have  been  unknown  to  that  age,  because 
we  rarely  meet  with  it  in  theological  writings.  "  This  law," 
said  lord  Montagu,  "  is  not  necessary ;  forasmuch  as  the 
catholics  of  this  realm  disturb  not,  nor  hinder  the  public  affairs 
of  the  realm,  neither  spiritual  nor  temporal.  They  dispute 
not,  they  preach  not,  they  disobey  not  the  queen  ;  they  cause 
no  trouble  nor  tumults  among  the  people ;  so  that  no  man  can 
say  that  thereby  the  realm  doth  receive  any  hurt  or  damage 
by  them.  They  have  brought  into  the  realm  no  novelties  in 
doctrine  and  religion.  This  being  true  and  evident,  as  it  is 
indeed,  there  is  no  necessity  why  any  new  law  should  be 
made  against  them.  And  where  there  is  no  sore  nor  grief, 
medicines  are  superfluous,  and  also  hurtful  and  dangerous. 
I  do  entreat,"  he  says  afterwards,  "  whether  it  be  just  to 
make  this  penal  statute  to  force  the  subjects  of  this  realm  to 
receive  and  believe  the  religion  of  protestants  on  pain  of 
death.  This  I  say  to  be  a  thing  most  unjust ;  for  that  it 
is  repugnant  to  the  natural  liberty  of  men's  understanding. 
For  understanding  may  be  persuaded  but  not  forced."  And 
farther  on  :  "  It  is  an  easy  thing  to  understand  that  a  thing 
so  unjust,  and  so  contrary  to  all  reason  and  liberty  of  man, 
cannot  be  put  in  execution  but  with  great  incommodity 
and  difficulty.  For  what  man  is  there  so  without  courage 
and  stomach,  or  void  of  all  honor,  that  can  consent  or  agree 
to  receive  an  opinion  and  new  religion  by  force  and  compul- 
sion ;  or  will  swear  that  he  thinketh  the  contrary  to  what  he 
thinketh  ?  To  be  still,  or  dissemble,  may  be  borne  and  suf- 
fered for  a  time  —  to  keep  his  reckoning  with  God  alone : 
but  to  be  compelled  to  lie  and  to  swear,  or  else  to  die  there- 
fore, are  things  that  no  man  ought  to  suffer  and  endure. 
Arid  it  is  to  be  feared  rather  than  to  die  they  will  seek  how 
to  defend  themselves ;  whereby  should  ensue  the  contrary 
of  what  every  good  prince  and  well  advised  commonwealth 
ought  to  seek  and  pretend,  that  is,  to  keep  their  kingdom  and 
government  in  peace."  * 

I  am  never  very  willing  to  admit  as  an  apology  for  unjust 

1  Strype,  Collier,  Parliament.  History.  "  They  say  it  touches  conscience,  and  it 
The  original  source  is  the  manuscript  is  a  thing  wherein  a  man  ought  to  have 
collections  of  Fox  the  martyrologist,  a  a  scruple;  but  if  any  hath  a  conscience 
very  unsuspicious  authority  ;  so  that  in  it,  these  four  years'  space  might  have 
there  seems  every  reason  to  consider  this  settled  it.  Also,  after  his  first  refusal, 
speech,  as  well  as  Mr.  Atkinson's  authen-  he  hath  three  months'  respite  foi  con- 
tic.  The  following  is  a  specimen  of  the  ference  and  settling  of  his  conscieuce." — 
sort  of  uuswer  given  to  these  arguments:  Strype,  270. 


12G  STATUTE  NOT  FULLY  ENFORCED.         CHAP.  Ill 

or  cruel  enactments,  that  they  are  not  designed  to 
Smart*  be  generally  executed ;  a  pretext  often  insidious, 
fuiiy  en-  always  insecure,  and  tending  to  mask  the  ap- 
proaches of  arbitrary  government.  But  it  is  cer- 
tain that  Elizabeth  did  not  wish  this  act  to  be  enforced  in  its 
full  severity.  And  archbishop  Parker,  by  far  the  most  pru- 
dent churchman  of  the  time,  judging  some  of  the  bishops 
too  little  moderate  in  their  dealings  with  the  papists,  warned 
them  privately  to  use  great  caution  in  tendering  the  oath  of 
supremacy  according  to  the  act,  and  never  to  do  so  the  second 
time,  on  which  the  penalty  of  treason  might  attach,  without 
his  previous  approbation.1  The  temper  of  some  of  his  col- 
leagues was  more  narrow  and  vindictive.  Several  of  the 
deprived  pi'elates  had  been  detained  in  a  sort  of  honorable 
custody  in  the  palaces  of  their  successors.2  Bonner,  the 
most  justly  obnoxious  of  them  all,  was  confined  in  the  Mar- 
shalsea.  Upon  the  occasion  of  this  new  statute,  Horn,  bishop 
of  Winchester,  indignant  at  the  impunity  of  such  a  man,  pro- 
ceeded to  tender  him  the  oath  of  supremacy,  with  an  evident 
intention  of  driving  him  to  high  treason.  Bonner,  however, 
instead  of  evading  this  attack,  intrepidly  denied  the  other  to 
be  a  lawful  bishop  ;  and,  strange  as  it  may  seem,  not  only 
escaped  all  further  molestation,  but  had  the  pleasure  of 
seeing  his  adversaries  reduced  to  pass  an  act  of  parliament, 
declaring  the  present  bishops  to  have  been  legally  conse- 
crated.8 This  statute,  and  especially  its  preamble,  might 
lead  a  hasty  reader  to  suspect  that  the  celebrated  story  of 
an  irregular  consecration  of  the  first  protestant  bishops  at 
the  Nag's-head  tavern  was  not  wholly  undeserving  of  credit. 
That  tale,  .however,  has  been  satisfactorily  refuted  ;  the  only 
irregularity  which  gave  rise  to  this  statute  consisted  in  the 
use  of  an  ordinal,  which  had  not  been  legally  reestablished. 
It  was  not  long  after  the  act  imposing  such  heavy  pen- 
alties on  catholic  priests  for  refusing  the  oath  of  supremacy 
that  the  emperor  Ferdinand  addressed  two  letters  to  Eliza 

1  Strype's  Life  of  Parker,  125.  honest  but  narrow-spirited  and  peevish 

Strype's  Annals,  149.    TunstaU  was  man,)  and  at  last  was  sent  to  Wisbeach 

treated  in  a  very  handsome  manner  by  jail  for  refusing  the  oath  of  supremacy. 

Parker,  whose  guest  he  was.      But  Feck-  Strype,  i.  457,  ii.  526;  Fullers  Church 

enham.  abbot  of  Westminster,  met  with  History.  178. 

r.ither  unkind  usage,  though  he  had  been  »  8  Eliz.  c.  1.     Eleven  peers  dissented, 

active  in  saving  the  lives  of  protestauts  all  noted  catholics   except    the    earl  of 

under  Mary,  from  bishops  Horn  and  Cox,  Sussex.     Strype,  i.  492. 
(the  latter  of  whom  seems  to  have  been  an 


ELIZ.—  Catholics.      INTERCESSION  OF  THE  EMPEROR.          127 
beth,  interceding  for  the  adherents  to  that  religion, 

,     ,1         .,,  .,.  °,  .   ,    Application 

Doth  with  respect  to  those  new  severities  to  which  Of  the  em- 
they  might  become  liable  by  conscientiously  de-  j^Tif  of 
clining  that  oath,  and  to  the  prohibition  'of  the  the  English 
free  exercise  of  their  rites.  He  suggested  that  it  cathohca- 
might  be  reasonable  to  allow  them  the  use  of  one  church  in 
every  city.  And  he  concluded  with  an  expression,  which 
might  possibly  be  designed  to  intimate  that  his  own  conduct 
towards  the  protestants  in  his  dominions  would  be  influenced 
by  her  concurrence  in  his  request.1  Such  considerations 
were  not  without  great  importance.  The  protestant  religion 
was  gaining  ground  in  Austria,  where  a  large  proportion  of 
the  nobility  as  well  as  citizens  had  for  some  years  earnestly 
claimed  its  public  toleration.  Ferdinand,  prudent  and  averse 
from  bigoted  counsels,  and  for  every  reason  solicitous  to  heal 
the  wounds  which  religious  differences  had  made  in  the  em- 
pire, while  he  was  endeavoring,  not  absolutely  without  hope 
of  success,  to  obtain  some  concessions  from  the  pope,  had 
shown  a  disposition  to  grant  further  indulgences  to  his  prot- 
estant subjects.  His  son  Maximilian,  not  only  through  his 
moderate  temper,  but  some  real  inclination  towards  the  new 
doctrine,  bade  fair  to  carry  much  farther  the  liberal  policy 
of  the  reigning  emperor.2  It  was  consulting  very  little  the 
general  interests  of  protestantism,  to  disgust  persons  so  ca- 
pable and  so  well  disposed  to  befriend  it.  But  our  queen, 
although  free  from  the  fanatical  spirit  of  persecution  which 
actuated  part  of  her  subjects,  was  too  deeply  imbued  with 
arbitrary  principles  to  endure  any  public  deviation  from  the 
mode  of  worship  she  should  prescribe.  And  it  must  perhaps 
be  admitted  that  experience  alone  could  fully  demonstrate 
the  safety  of  toleration,  and  show  the  fallacy  of  apprehen- 
sions that  unprejudiced  men  might  have  entertained.  In  her 
answer  to  Ferdinand,  the  queen  declares  that  she  cannot 
grant  churches  to  those  who  disagree  from  her  religion,  being 

1    Nobia  vero  factura    est    rem    adeo  2  For    the    dispositions  of   Ferdinand 

gratam,  ut  omnem  simus  daturi  operam,  and  Maximilian  towards  religious  tolera 

quo  possitnus  earn  rem  serenitati  vestra  tion  in  Austria,  which  indeed  for  a  tim* 

mutuis  betievolentia;    et   fraterni  animi  existed,  see   F.  Paul,  Concile  de  Trente 

studiis  cumulatissime  compensare.      See  (par  Courayer),    ii.   72,  197,    220,    &o. 

the  letter  in   the  additions   to   the  first  Schmidt,  Hist,  des  Allemanda,  viii.  120, 


*tte  24th  Sept.  1563.  centuries.  ] 


128          CONNIVANCE  OF  ROMAN  CATHOLICS.          CHAP.  III. 

against  the  laws  of  her  parliament,  and  highly  dangerous  to 
the  state  of  her  kingdom ;  as  it  would  sow  various  opinions 
in  the  nation  to  distract  the  minds  of  honest  men,  and  would 
cherish  parties  and  factions  that  might  disturb  the  present 
tranquillity  of  the  commonwealth.  Yet  enough  had  already 
occurred  in  France  to  lead  observing  men  to  suspect  that 
severities  and  restrictions  are  by  no  means  an  infallible  spe- 
cific to  prevent  or  subdue  religious  factions. 

Camden  and  many  others  have  asserted  that  by  systematic 
connivance  the  Roman  catholics  enjoyed  a  pretty  free  use  of 
their  religion  for  the  first  fourteen  years  of  Elizabeth's  reign. 
But  this  is  not  reconcilable  to  many  passages  in  Strype's  col- 
lections. We  find  abundance  of  persons  harassed  for  re- 
cusancy, that  is,  for  not  attending  the  protestant  church,  and 
driven  to  insincere  promises  of  conformity.  Others  were 
dragged  before  ecclesiastical  commissioners  for  harboring 
priests,  or  ^or  sending  money  to  those  who  had  fled  beyond 
sea.1  Students  of  the  inns  of  court,  where  popery  had  a 
strong  hold  at  this  time,  were  examined  in  the  star-chamber 
as  to  their  religion,  and  on  not  giving  satisfactory  answers 
were  committed  to  the  Fleet.2  The  catholic  party  were  not 
always  scrupulous  about  the  usual  artifices  of  an  oppressed 
people,  meeting  force  by  fraud,  and  concealing  their  heart- 
felt wishes  under  the  mask  of  ready  submission,  or  even  of 
zealous  attachment.  A  great  majority  both  of  clergy  and 
laity  yielded  to  the  times  ;  and  of  these  temporizing  con- 
formists it  cannot  be  doubted  that  many  lost  by  degrees  all 
thought  of  returning  to  their  ancient  fold.  But  others,  while 
they  complied  with  exterior  ceremonies,  retained  in  their 
private  devotions  their  accustomed  mode  of  worship.  It  is 
an  admitted  fact,  that  the  catholics  generally  attended  the 
church,  till  it  came  to  be  reckoned  a  distinctive  sign  of  their 
having  renounced  their  own  religion.  They  persuaded  them 
selves  (and  the  English  priests,  uninstructed  and  accustomed 
to  a  temporizing  conduct,  did  not  discourage  the  notion)  that 
the  private  observance  of  their  own  rites  would  excuse  a 
formal  obedience  to  the  civil  power.8  The  Romish  scheme 

>  Strype,  513,  et  alibi.  ligio  in  Anglia  mutaret,  post  episcopos 

'-'  Strype,  522.     He  says  the  lawyers  in  et  praelatos  catholicos  captos  et  fugatos, 

most  eminent   places  were   generally  fa-  populus  velut  ovium   grex   sine  pastore 

vorers    of   popery,    p.   269.      But  if  he  in  maguis  tenebris  et  caligine  animarum 

means  tbe  judges,  they  did  not  long  eon-  suarura  oberravit.      Unde  etiam  factum 

tiui"  est  multi  ut  catholicorum  guperstitinui- 

8  Ouui  rcgiun  Maria  moreretur,  et  re-  bus  iiupiis  uiBsiiuulationibus  et  ^ravibu* 


ELIZ.  —  Catholics.          ITINERANT  PRIESTS.  129 

of  worship,  though  it  attaches  more  importance  to  cere- 
monial rites,  has  one  remarkable  difference  from  the  protes- 
tant,  that  it  is  far  less  social ;  and  consequently  the  preven- 
tion of  its  open  exercise  has  far  less  tendency  to  weaken 
men's  religious  associations,  so  long  as  their  individual  in- 
tercourse with  a  priest,  its  essential  requisite,  can  be  pre- 
served. Priests  therefore  travelled  the  country'  in  various 
disguises,  to  keep  alive  a  flame  which  the  practice  of  out- 
ward conformity  was  calculated  to  extinguish.  There  was 
not  a  county  throughout  England,  says  a  Catholic  historian, 
where  several  of  Mary's  clergy  did  not  reside,  commonly 
called  the  old  priests.  They  served  as  chaplains  in  private 
families.1  By  stealth,  at  the  dead  of  night,  in  private  cham- 
bers, in  the  secret  lurking-places  of  an  ill-peopled  coun- 
try, with  all  the  mystery  that  subdues,  the  imagination, 
with  all  the  mutual  trust  that  invigorates  constancy,  these 
proscribed  ecclesiastics  celebrated  their  solemn  rites,  more 
impressive  in  such  concealment  than  if  surrounded  by  all 
their  former  splendor.  The  strong  predilection  indeed  of 
mankind  for  mystery,  which  has  probably  led  many  to  tam- 
per in  political  conspiracies  without  much  further  motive,  will 
suffice  to  preserve  secret  associations,  even  where  their  pur- 
poses are  far  less  interesting  than  those  of  religion.  Many 
of  these  itinerant  priests  assumed  the  character  of  protestant 
preachers ;  and  it  has  been  said,  with  some  truth,  though  not 
probably  without  exaggeration,  that,  under  the  directions  of 
their  crafty  court,  they  fomented  tke  division  then  springing 

juramentis  contra  sanctse  sedis  apostolicse  mulabant.    Nunc  autem  per  Dei  miseri- 

auotoritatem,  cum  admodum  parvo  aut  cordiam  omnes  catholici  intelligutit,  ut 

plane  nullo  conscieutiarum  suarum  scru-  salveutur  non  satis  ease  corde  fideni  ca- 

pulo  assuescerent.     Frequentabant  ergo  tholicam  credere,  Bed  eandem  etiam  ore 

hasreticorumsynagogasjintereranteorum  oportere  confiteri.     Ribadeneira  de  Schis- 

conrionibus,  atque  ad  easdem  etiam  audi-  mate,  p.  53.     See  also   Butler's  English 

fnilis  filios  et  familiam  suam  compella-  Catholics,  vol.  iii.  p.  156.    [There  is  noth- 

bant.    Videbatur  illis  ut  catholici  essent,  ing  in  this  statement  of  the  fact,  which 

mffirereunacumhaereticiaeorum  templa  serves  to  countenance  the   very   unfair 

Don  adire,  ferri  autem  posse  si  ante  vel  misrepresentations  lately  given,  as  if  the 

post  illus  eadem  intrasseut.     Communi-  Roman  catholics  generally  had  acquiesced 

cabatur   de    sacrilegi  Calvini  coena,   vel  in  the  Anglican  worship,  believing  it  to 

'fcecreto  et  clanculum  intra  privates  pari-  be  substantially  the  same  as  their  own. 

etes.     Missam  qui  audiverant,  ac  postea  They  frequented  our  churches,  because 

Calvinianos  se  haberi  volebant,  sic  se  de  the  law  compelled  them  by  penalties  so 

prsecepto  satisfecisse  existimabant.     De-.  to  do,  not  out  of  a  notion  that  very  litUe 

ferebantur   filii  catholicorum  ad  baptis-  change  had  been  made  by  the  K«forma- 

tcvia  ha'rvHcorum,  ac  inter  illorum   ma-  tion.     It  is  true,  of  course,  that  many 

nus    niatrimoiiia    eontrahebnn.t.     Atque  became  real  protestants.  by  habitual  at- 

haec   omuia  sine  omni  scrupulo  fiebant,  tendance  on  our  rites,  and  by  disuse   ol 

facta  projit«r   '•nMiolicoruiii   sacerdotum  their  own.    But  these  were  not  the  recu- 

tgBOrantiani,  qui  talia  vel   licere  credo-  sants  of  a  later  period. —  1845.] 
bant,  vel  timore  quodain  praepediti  dissi-        1  Dodd's  Church  Hist.  vol.  ii.  p.  8. 

VOL.  i.  —  c.  & 


130 


EFFECT  OF  PERSECUTION. 


CHAI>.  III. 


up,  and  mingled  with  the  anabaptists  and  other  sectaries,  in 
the  hope  both  of  exciting  dislike  to  the  establishment,  and  of 
instilling  their  own  tenets,  slightly  disguised,  into  the  minds 
of  unwary  enthusiasts.1 

It  is  my  thorough  conviction  that  the  persecution,  for  it 
Persecution  CSin  obtain  no  better  name,2  carried  on  against  the 
of  the  English  catholics,  however  it  might  serve  to  delude 

catholics  in        ,     {  ,    ,  , 

the  ensuing  the  government  by  producing  an  apparent  con- 
period,  formity,  could  not  but  excite  a  spirit  of  disloyalty 
in  many  adherents  of  that  faith.  Nor  would  it  be  safe  to  as- 
sert that  a  more  conciliating  policy  would  have  altogether 
disarmed  their  hostility,  much  less  laid  at  rest  those  busy 
hopes  of  the  future,  which  the  peculiar  circumstances  of 
Elizabeth's  reign  had  a  tendency  to  produce.  This  remark- 
able posture  of  affairs  affected  all  her  civil,  and  still  more 
her  ecclesiastical  policy.  Her  own  title  to  the  crown  depend- 
ed absolutely  on  a  parliamentary  recognition.  The  act.  of 
35  H.  8,  c.  1,  had  settled  the  crown  upon  her,  and  thus  far 
restrained  the  previous  statute,  28  H.  8,  c.  7,  which  had 
empowered  her  father  to  regulate  the  succession  at  his  pleas- 
ure. Besides  this  legislative  authority,  his  testament  had 
bequeathed  the  kingdom  to  Elizabeth  after  her  sister  Mary ; 
and  the  common  consent  of  the  nation  had  ratified  her  pos- 
session. But  the  queen  of  Scots,  niece  of  Henry  by  Mar- 

i  Thomas  Heath,  brother  to  the  late 
archbishop  of  York,  was  seized  at  Roches- 
ter ;ibout  1570,  well  provided  with  ana- 
baptist and  Ariau  tracts  for  circulation. 
Strype.  i.  521.  For  other  instances,  see 
pp.  281,  484;  Life  of  Parker,  244;  Nal- 
BOU'S  Collections,  vol.  i.  Introduction,  p. 
89,  &c.,  from  a  pamphlet,  written  also  by 
Nalson,  entitled  foxes  and  Firebrands. 
It  wa.s  surmised  that  one  Henry  Nicolas, 
cniefof  a  set  of  fanatics,  called  the  Fami- 
ly of  Love,  of  whom  we  read  a  great  deal 
in  this  reign,  and  who  sprouted  up  again 
about  the  time  of  Cromwell,  was  secretly 
employed  by  the  popish  party.  Strype, 
ii.  37,  589,  595.  But  these  conjectures 
were  very  often  ill  founded,  and  possibly 
so  in  this  instance,  though  the  passages 
quoted  by  Strype  (589)  are  suspicious. 
Brandt,  however  (Hist,  of  Reformation  in 
Low  Countries,  vol.  i.  p.  105),  does  not 
suspect  Nicolas  of  being  other  than  a 
fanatic.  His  sect  appeared  in  the  Neth- 
erlands about  1555. 

"  '•  That  church  [of  England]  and  the 
queen,  its  re-founder,  are  clear  of  perse- 
cution, as  regards  the  catholics.  No 
church,  no  sect,  iioindhidual  even,  had 


yet  professed  the  principle  of  toleration." 
Southey's  Book  of  the  Church,  vol.  ii.  p. 
285.  If  the  second  of  these  sentences  is 
intended  as  a  proof  of  the  first,  I  must 
say  it  is  little  to  the  purpose.  But  it  is 
not  true  in  this  broad  way  of  assertion 
Not  to  mention  Sir  Thomas  More's  Uto- 
pia, the  principle  of  toleration  had  been 
avowed  by  the  chancellor  1'Hospital,  and 
many  others  in  France.  I  mention  him 
as  on  the  stronger  side  ;  for  in  fact  the 
weaker  had  always  professed  the  general 
principle,  and  could  demand  toleration 
from  those  of  different  sentiments  on  no 
other  plea.  And  as  to  capital  inflictions 
for  heresy,  which  Mr.  S.  seems  chiefly  to 
have  in  his  mind,  there  is  reason  to  be-, 
lieve  that  many  protestants  never  ap- 
proved them.  Sleidan  intimates,  vol.  iii. 
p.  263,  that  Calvin  incurred  odium  by 
the  death  of  Servetus.  AndMelanchthon 
says  expressly  the  same  thing,  in  the 
letter  which  he  unfortunately  wrote  to 
the  reformer  of  Geneva,  declaring  his 
own  approbation  of  the  crime  ;  and  which 
I  am  willing  to  ascribe  rather  to  his  con- 
stitutional fear  of  giving  otfeuce,  than  tf 
sincere  conviction. 


ELIZ.  —  Catholics.  UNCERTAIN  SUCCESSION  OF  CROWN.     131 

garet,  his  elder  sister,  had  a  prior  right  to  the  throne  during 
Elizabeth's  life,  in  the  eyes  of  such  catholics  as  preferred  an 
hereditary  to  a  parliamentary  title,  and  was  reckoned  by  the 
far  greater  part  of  the  nation  its  presumptive  heir  after  her 
decease.     There  could  indeed  be  no  question  of  this,  had  the 
succession  been  left  to  its  natural  course.     But    uncertain 
Henry  had  exercised  the  power  with  which  his  succession 
parliament,  in  too  servile  a  spirit,  yet  in  the  plen-  crown  be- 
itude  of  its  sovereign  authority,  had  invested  him,  f^"^^ 
by  settling  the  succession  in  remainder  upon  the  Scotland 
house  of  Suffolk,  descendants  of  his  second  sister  an 
Mary,  to  whom    he  postponed  the  elder  line  of  Scotland. 
Mary  left  two  daughters,  Frances  and  Eleanor.     The  for- 
mer became  wife  of  Grey,  marquis  of  Dorset,  created  duke 
of  Suffolk    by   Edward ;  and   had  three  daughters,  —  Jane, 
whose   fate  is  well  known,  Catherine,  and  Mary.     Eleanor 
Brandon,  by  her  union  with  the  earl  of  Cumberland,  had  a 
daughter,  who  married  the  earl  of  Derby.     At  the  begin- 
ning of  Elizabeth's  reign,  or  rather  after  the  death  of  the 
duchess  of  Suffolk,  lady  Catherine  Grey  was  by  statute  law 
the  presumptive  heiress  of  the  crown  ;  but  according  to  the 
rules  of  hereditary  descent,  which  the  bulk  of  mankind  do 
not  readily  permit  an  arbitrary  and  capricious  enactment  to 
disturb,  Mary  queen  of  Scots,  grand-daughter  of  Margaret, 
was  the  indisputable  representative  of  her  royal  progenitors, 
and  the  next  in  succession  to  Elizabeth. 

This  reversion,  indeed,  after  a  youthful  princess,  might 
well  appear  rather  an  improbable  contingency.    It  Elizabeth's 
was  to  be  expected  that  a  fertile  marriage  would  unwilling- 
defeat  all  speculations  about  her  inheritance ;  nor  decide°the 
had  Elizabeth  been  many  weeks  on   the  throne,  succession, 

i     c        '  XL  •      L  -L  i  •      ,   »       •     i    i  or  to  niarry. 

before  this  began  to  occupy  her  subjects  minds. 
Among  several  who  were  named,  two  very  soon  became  the 
prominent  candidates  for  her  favor,  the  archduke  Charles, 
son  of  the  emperor  Ferdinand,  and  lord  Robert  Dudley, 
some  time  after  created  earl  of  Leicester  ;  one  recommended 
by  his  dignity  and  alliances,  the  other  by  her  own  evident 
partiality.  She  gave  at  the  outset  so  little  encouragement  to 
the  former  proposal,  that  Leicester's  ambition  did  not  appear 
extravagant.3  But  her  ablest  councillors,  who  knew  hia 

1  The  address  of  the  house  of  commons,  begging  the  queen  to  marry,  was  on 
Feb.  6, 1559.  a  Ilaynes,  233. 


132  ELIZABETH'S   PASSION  FOE  LEICESTER.     CHAP.  III. 


vices,  and  her  greatest  peers,  who  thought  his  nobility  recent 
ami  ill  acquired,  deprecated  so  unworthy  a  connection.1  Few 
will  pretend  to  explore  the  labyrinths  of  Elizabeth's  heart ; 
yet  we  may  almost  conclude  that  her  passion  for  this  favor- 
ite kept  up  a  struggle  against  her  wisdom  for  the  first  seven 
or  eight  years  of  her  reign.  Meantime  she  still  continued 
unmarried;  and  those  expressions  she  had  so  early  used,  of 
her  resolution  to  live  and  die  a  virgin,  began  to  appear  less 
like  coy  affectation  than  at  first.  Never  had  a  sovereign's 
marriage  been  more  desirable  for  a  kingdom.  Cecil,  aware 
how  important  it  was  that  the  queen  should  marry,  but 
.dreading  her  union  with  Leicester,  contrived,  about  the  end 
of  1564,  to  renew  the  treaty  with  the  archduke  Charles.'2 
During  this  negotiation,  which  lasted  from  two  to  three 
years,  she  showed  not  a  little  of  that  evasive  and  dissembling 
coquetry  which  was  to  be  more  fully  displayed  on  subsequent 
occasions.8  Leicester  deemed  himself  so  much  interested  as 
to  quarrel  with  those  who  manifested  any  zeal  for  the  Aus- 


1  See  particularly  two  letters  in  the 
Harclwicke  State  Papers,  i.  122  and  163, 
dated  in  October  and  November,  1560, 
vrhich   show  the   alarm   excited  by  the 
queen's  ill-placed  partiality. 

2  Cecil's  earnestness  for  the  Austrian 
marriage  appears  plainly  in  Haynes,  430; 
and  still  more  in  a  remarkable  minute, 
•where  he  has  drawn  up  in   parallel  col- 
umns, according  to  a  rather   formal  but 
perspicuous  method  he  much  used,  his 
reasons  in   favor    of  the  archduke,  and 
against  the  earl  of  Leicester.     The  for- 
mer chiefly  relate  to  foreign  politics,  and 
may  be  conjectured  by  those  acquainted 
•with  history.     The  latter  are  as  follows : 
1.  Nothing  is  increased  by  marriage  of 
him,  either    in    riches,    estimation,  or 
power.     2.  It  will  be  thought  that  the 
glanderous  speeches  of  the  queen  with 
the  earl  have  been  true.      3.  He   shall 
study  nothing  but  to  enhance  his  own 
particular  friends  to  wealth,  to  offices,  to 
lands;   and  to  offend  others.     4.  He   is 
iiifuuied  by  death  of  his  wife.    5.  He  is 
far  in  debt.    6.  He  is  likely  to  be  unkind, 
and  jealous  of  the  queen's  majesty.     Id. 
444.     These  suggestions,  and  especially 
the  second,  if  actually  laid  before   the 
queen,  show  the  plainness  and  freedom 
which  this  great  statesman  ventured  to 
use   towards   her.     The  allusion  to  the 
death    of    Leicester's    wife,   which    had 
occurred  in  a  very  suspicious  manner,  at 
Cumiior  near  Oxford,  and  is  well  known 
as  tlie  foundation  of  the  novel  of  Kenil- 
worth,  though  related  there  with  great 


anachronism  and  confusion  of  persons, 
may  be  frequently  met  with  in  contem- 
porary documents.  By  the  above-quoted 
letters  in  the  Hardwicke  Papers  it 
appears  that  those  who  disliked  Leicester 
had  spoken  freely  of  this  report  to  the 
queen. 

3  Elizabeth  carried  her  dissimulation 
so  far  as  to  propose  marriage  articles, 
which  were  formally  laid  before  the  im- 
perial ambassador.  These,  though  copied 
from  what  had  been  agreed  on  Mary's 
marriage  with  Philip,  now  seemed  highly 
ridiculous,  when  exacted  from  a  younger 
brother  without  territories  or  revenues. 
Jura  et  leges  regni  conserventur,  neque 
quicquam  mutetur  in  religione  aut  in 
statu  publico.  Offieia  et  magistratus  ex- 
erceantur  per  naturales.  Neque  regina, 
neque  liberi  sui  educantur  ex  regno  sine 
concensu  regni,  &c.  Haynes,  438. 

Cecil  was  not  too  wise  a  man  to  give 
some  credit  to  astrology.  The  stars  were 
consulted  about  the  queen's  marriage; 
and  those  veracious  oracles  gave  response 
that  she  should  be  married  in  the  thirty- 
first  year  of  her  age  to  a  foreigner,  and 
have  one  son,  who  would  be  ?  great 
prince,  and  a  daughter,  &c.  &c.  Strype, 
ii.  16,  and  Appendix  4,  where  the  non- 
sense may  be  read  at  full  length.  •Per- 
haps, however,  the  wily  minister  was  no 
dupe,  but  meant  that  his  mistress  should 
be.  [See,  as  to  Elizabeth's  intentions  to 
marry  at  this  time,  th«  extracts  from 
despatches  of  the  French  ambassador,  in 
Kaumer,  vol.  ii.  p.  85.] 


ELIZ.  —  Catholics.  SURMISED  IMPEDIMENTS  TO  MARRIAGE.  133 

trian  marriage;  b»t  his  mistress  gradually  overcame  her 
misplaced  inclinations ;  and  from  the  time  when  that  con- 
nection was  broken  off,  his  prospects  of  becoming  her  hus- 
band seem  rapidly  to  have  vanished  away.  The  pretext 
made  for  relinquishing  this  treaty  with  the  archduke  was 
Elizabeth's  constant  refusal  to  tolerate  the  exercise  of  his 
religion ;  a  difficulty  which,  whether  real  or  ostensible, 
recurred  in  all  her  subsequent  negotiations  of  a  similar 
nature.1 

In  every  parliament  of  Elizabeth  the  house  of  commons 
was  zealously  attached  to  the  protestant  interest.  This,  as 
well  as  an  apprehension  of  disturbance  from  a  contested  suc- 
cession, led  to  those  importunate  solicitations  that  she  would 
choose  a  husband,  which  she  so  artfully  evaded.  A  deter- 
mination so  contrary  to  her  apparent  interest,  and  to  the 
earnest  desire  of  her  people,  may  give  some  countenance  to 
the  surmises  of  the  time,  that  she  was  restrained  from  mar- 
riage by  a  secret  consciousness  that  it  was  unlikely  to  be 
fruitful.2  Whether  these  conjectures  were  well  founded,  of 
which  I  know  no  evidence ;  or  whether  the  risk  of  experi- 
encing that  ingratitude  which  the  husbands  of  sovereign 
princesses  have  often  displayed,  and  of  which  one  glaring 
example  was  immediately  before  her  eyes,  outweighed  in 
her  judgment  that  of  remaining  single;  or  whether  she 
might  not  even  apprehend  a  more  desperate  combination 
of  the  catholic  party  at  home  and  abroad  if  the  birth  of  any 

1  The   council   appear  in   general  to  repeating  what  the  countess  of  Shrews- 
have  been  as  resoluta  against  tolerating  bury    had    said,   she   utters    everything 
the   exercise  of  the  catholic  religion  in  that  female  spite  and  ungovernable  inal- 
any  husband  the  queen  might  choose,  as  ice  could  dictate.      But  in  the  long  and 
herself.      We  find  however  that  several  confidential     correspondence    of    Cecil, 
divines  wore  consulted  on  two  questions:  Walsingham,   and    sir    Thomas   Smith, 
1.  Whether   it  were   lawful   to   marry  a  about    the  queen's  marriage  with    the 
papist.     2.    Whether    the   queen  might  duke  of  Anjou,  in  1571,  for  which  they 
permit    mass    to    be    said.      To  which  were  evidently  most  anxious,  I  do  not 
answers  were  given,  not   agreeing  with  perceive  the  slightest  intimation  that  the 
each   other.      Str.vpe,  ii.  150 ;   and    Ap-  prospect  of  her  bearing  children  was  at 
pcndix  31,  33.      When  the  earl  of  Wor-  all  less  favorable  than  in  any  other  case, 
cester  was  sent  over  to  Paris  in  1571,  as  The  council  seem,  indeed,  in  the  subse- 
proxy    for    the  queen,   who    had    been  quent  treaty  with   the  other    duke  of 
made  sponsor   for  Charles   IX. 's    infant  Anjou,  in  1579,  when  she  was  forty-six, 
daughter,   she  would   not   permit   him,  to  have  reckoned  on  something  rather 
though  himself  a  catholic,  to  be  present  beyond   the  usual  laws  of  nature  in  this 
at  the  mass  on  that  occasion,     ii.  171.  respect;  for  in  a  minute  by  Cecil  of  the 

2  ''  The  people,"  Cauiden  says, ''  cursed  reasons  for  and  against  this  marriage,  he 
Huic,  the   queen's  physician,  as  having  sets  down  the  probability  of  issue  on  the 
dissuaded  the  queen  from  marrying  on  favorable     side.      "  By    marrying    with 
account  of  some  impediment  and  defect  Monsieur  she  is  likely  to  have  children, 
In  her."    Many  will  recollect  the  allu-  because  of  k'a  youth, ; "  as  if  her  age  were 
aion  to  this  in  Mary's  scandalous  letter  no  objection. 

to  Klizabeth,  wherein,  under  pretence  of  , 


134  ADDRESSES  BY  THE  COMMONS.          CHAP.  Ill 

issue  from  her  should  shut  out  their  hopes  of  Mary's  succes- 
sion, it  is  difficult  for  us  to  decide. 

Though  the  queen's  marriage  were  the  primary  object  of 
these  addresses,  as  the  most  probable  means  of  securing  an 
undisputed  heir  to  the  crown,  yet  she  might  have  satisfied 
the  parliament  in  some  degree  by  limiting  the  succession  to 
one  certain  line.  But  it  seems  doubtful  whether  this  would 
have  answered  the  proposed  end.  If  she  had  taken  a  firm 
resolution  against  matrimony,  which,  unless  on  the  supposi- 
tion already  hinted,  could  hardly  be  reconciled  with  a  sincere 
regard  for  her  people's  welfare,  it  might  be  less  dangerous  to 
leave  the  course  of  events  to  regulate  her  inheritance. 
Though  all  parties  seem  to  have  conspired  in  pressing  her 
to  some  decisive  settlement  on  this  subject,  it  would  not  have 
been  easy  to  content  the  two  factions,  who  looked  for  a  suc- 
cessor to  very  different  quarters.1  It  is  evident  that  any 
confirmation  of  the  Suffolk  title  would  have  been  regarded 
by  the  queen  of  Scots  and  her  numerous  partisans  as  a  fla- 
grant injustice,  to  which  they  would  not  submit  but  by  com- 
pulsion ;  and  on  the  other  hand,  by  reestablishing  the 
hereditary  line,  Elizabeth  would  have  lost  her  check  on 
one  whom  she  had  reason  to  consider  as  a  rival  and  com- 
petitor, and  whose  influence  was  already  alarmingly  exten- 
sive among  her  subjects. 

1  Camden,  after  telling  us  that  the  thrown  abroad  against  the  queen's  maj- 

queen's  disinclination  to  marry  raised  esty  for  not  assenting  to  have  the  matter 

great  clamors,   and   that    the    earls  of  of  succession  proved  in  parliament ;  and 

Pembroke  and  Leicester   had   professed  bills  also  to  charge  sir  W.  Cecil  the  secre- 

their  opinion  that  she  ought  to  be  obliged  tary  with  the  occasion  thereof, 

to  take  a  husband,  or  that  a  successor  "  27.   Certain  lords,  viz.  the  earls  of 

should  be  declared  by  act  of  parliament  Pembroke  and  Leicester,  were  excluded 

even  against  her  will,  asserts  some  time  the  presence-chamber,  for  furthering  th« 

after,   as    inconsistently  as  improperly,  proposition  of  the  succession  to  be  de- 

tli-.it    "  very  few  but   malecontents  and  clared  by  parliament  without  the  queen's 

traitors  appeared  very  solicitous  in  the  allowance. 

business  of  a  successor."      P.  401,  (in  "  Nov.  12.    Messrs.  Bell  and  Monson 

Kennet's    Complete  Hist,   of   England,  moved  trouble  in  the  parliament  about 

vol.  ii.)    This,  however,  from  Camden's  the  succession. 

known  proneness  to  flatter  James,  seems  "  14.  The  queen  had  before  her  thirty 

to  indicate  that  the  Suffolk  party  were  lords  and  thirty  commoners   to   receive 

more  active  than  the  Scots  upon  this  oc-  her  answer  concerning  their  petition  for 

casion.      Their  strength  lay  in  the  house  the  succession  and  for  marriage.     Dalton 

of  commons,   which  was  wholly  protes-  was  blamed  for  speaking  in  the  commons' 

tant,  and  rather  puritan.  house. 

At  the  end  of  Murden's  State  Papers  is  '•  24.  Command  given  to  the  parliament 

a  short  journal  kept  by  Cecil,  containing  not  to  treat  of  the  succession. 

a  succinct   and   authentic  summary  of  "  Nota :   in   this  parliament  time  the 

events  in  Elizabeth's  reign.     1  extract  as  queen's  majesty  did  remit  a  part  of  the 

a  specimen  such  passages  as  bear  on  the  offer  of  a  subsidy  to  the  commons,  who 

present  subject.  offered  largely,  to  the  end  to  have  hart 

'  Oct     «j,    1666.      Certain    lewd   bills  the  succession  established."    P.  702 


Euz.— Catholics.      LADY   CATHERINE  GREY.  135 

She  had,  however,  in  one  of  the  first  years  of  her  reign, 
without  any  better  motive  than  her  own  jealous  imprison- 
and  malignant  humor,  taken  a  step  not  only  harsh  m*nt  of 
and  arbitrary,  but  very  little  consonant  to  policy,  Catherine 
which  had  almost  put  it  out  of  her  power  to  defeat  Grey- 
the  queen  of  Scots'  succession.  Lady  Catherine  Grey,  who 
has  been  already  mentioned  as  next  in  remainder  of  the  house 
of  Suffolk,  proved  with  child  by  a  private  marriage,  as  they 
both  alleged,  with  the  earl  of  Hertford.  The  queen,  always 
envious  of  the  happiness  of  lovers,  and  jealous  of  all  who 
could  entertain  any  hopes  of  the  succession,  threw  them  both 
into  the  Tower.  By  connivance  of  their  keepers,  the  lady 
bore  a  second  child  during  this  imprisonment.  Upon  this, 
Elizabeth  caused  an  inquiry  to  be  instituted  before  a  com- 
mission of  privy  councillors  and  civilians ;  wherein,  the 
parties  being  unable  to  adduce  proof  of  their  marriage, 
archbishop  Parker  pronounced  that  their  cohabitation  was 
illegal,  and  that  they  should  be  censured  for  fornication.  He 
was  to  be  pitied  if  the  law  obliged  him  to  utter  so  harsh  a 
sentence,  or  to  be  blamed  if  it  did  not.  Even  had  the  mar- 
riage never  been  solemnized,  it  was  impossible  to  doubt  the 
existence  of  a  contract,  which  both  were  still  desirous  to 
perform.  But  there  is  reason  to  believe  that  there  had  been 
an  actual  marriage,  though  so  hasty  and  clandestine  that  they 
had  not  taken  precautions  to  secure  evidence  of  it.  The  in- 
jured lady  sank  under  this  hardship  and  indignity  ;  *  but  the 
legitimacy  of  her  children  was  acknowledged  by  general 
consent,  and,  in  a  distant  age,  by  a  legislative  declaration. 
These  proceedings  excited  much  dissatisfaction ;  generous 
minds  revolted  from  their  severity,  and  many  lamented  to 
see  the  reformed  branch  of  the  royal  stock  thus  bruised  by 
the  queen's  unkind  and  impolitic  jealousy.2  Hales,  clerk  of 

1  Catherine,  after  her  release  from  the  some    public    employments    under    her 

Tower,  was  placed  in  the  custody  of  her  successor.    He  was  twice  afterwards  rnav- 

uncle  lord  John  Grey,  but  still  suffering  ried,  and  lived  to  a  very  advanced  age, 

the  queen's  displeasure,  and  separated  not  dying  till  1621,  near  sixty  years  after 

from  her  husband.    Several  interesting  his  ill-starred  and  ambitious  love.    It  is 

letters  from  her  and  her  uncle  to  Cecil  worth  while  to  read  the  epitaph  on  his 

are  among  the  Lansdowne  MSS.,  vol.  vi.  monument  in  the  S.E.  aisle  of  Salisbury 

They  cannot  be  read  without  indignation  cathedral,  an  affecting  testimony  to  tha 

at  Elizabeth's  unfeeling  severity.     Sor-  purity  and  faithfulness  of  an  attachment 

row  killed  this  poor  young  woman  the  rendered  still  more  sacred  by  misfortune 

next  year,  who  was  never  permitted  to  and  time.     Quo  desiderio  veteres   revo- 

see  her  husband  ag.-iin.     Strype,  i.  391.  cavit  amores  !  I  shall  revert  to  the  quea- 

The  earl  of  Hertford  underwent  a  long  tion  of  this  marriage  in  a  subsequent 

imprisonment,  and  continued  in  obscu-  chapter, 

rity  during  Elizabeth's   reign;  but  had  8  Haynes,  396. 


136  LADY  CATHERIXE  GREY.  CHAP.  Ill 

the  hanaper,  a  zealous  protestant,  having  written  in  favor  of 
lady  Catherine's  marriage,  and  of  her  title  to  the  .succession, 
was  sent  to  the  Tower.1  The  lord  keeper,  Bacon  him-elf,  a 
known  friend. to  the  house  of  Suffolk,  being  suspected  of' 
having  prompted  Hales  to  write  this  treatise,  lost  much  of 
his  mistress's  favor.  Even  Cecil,  though  he  had  taken  a 
share  in  prosecuting  lady  Catherine,  perhaps  in  some  degree 
from  an  apprehension  that  the  queen  might  remember  he  had 
once  joined  in  proclaiming  her  sister  Jane,  did  not  always 
escape  the  same  suspicion ; 2  and  it  is  probable  that  he  felt 
the  imprudence  of  entirely  discountenancing  a  party  from 
which  the  queen  and  religion  had  nothing  to  dread.  There 
is  reason  to  believe  that  the  house  of  Suffolk  was  favored  in 
parliament ;  the  address  of  the  commons  in  1503,  imploring 
the  queen  to  settle  the  succession,  contains  several  indications 
of  a  spirit  unfriendly  to  the  Scottish  line ; 8  and  a  speech  is 
extant,  said  to  have  been  made  as  late  as  1571,  expressly 
vindicating  the  rival  pretension.4  If  indeed  we  consider 
with  attention  the  statute  of  13  Eliz.  c.  1,  which  renders  it 
treasonable  to  deny  that  the  sovereigns  of  this  kingdom,  with 
consent  of  parliament,  might  alter  the  line  of  succession,  it 
will  appear  little  short  of  a  confirmation  of  that  title  which 
the  descendants  of  Mary  Brandon  derived  from  a  parlia- 
mentary settlement.  But  the  doubtful  birth  of  lord  Beau- 
champ  and  his  brother,  as  well  as  an  ignoble  marriage,  which 

1  Id.  41b.    Strype,  410.    Hales's  trea-  A  papist  writer,  under  the  name   of 
tise    in    favor    of   the    authenticity    of  Andreas  Philopater,  gives  an  account  of 
Henry's    will    is    among    the    Harleian  this  confederacy   against   Cecil   at  some 
MS3.,  n.  537  and  655,  and  has  also  been  length.     Norfolk  and  Leicester  belonged 
printed  in   the  Appendix  to  Hereditary  to  it;  and  the  object  was  to  defeat  the 
Kight  Asserted,  fol.  1713.  Suffolk  succession,  which  Cecil  and  Bacon 

2  Cam  Jen,  p.  416,  ascribes  the  power-  favored.     Leicester  betrayed  his  assooi- 
ful  coalition  formed  against  him  in  1569,  ates  to  the  queen.     It  had  been  intended 
i-  herein  Norfolk  and  Leicester  were  com-  that  Norfolk  should  accuse  the  twocoun- 
bii.ed  with  all  the  catholic  peers,  to  his  cillors  before  the  lords,  ei  ratione  ut  e 
predilection  for   the   house   of   Suffolk,  senatu  regiiqueabreptos  ad  curias  januas 
But  it  was  more  probably  owing  to  their  in  erucem  agi  praeciperet,  eoque  perfecto 
knowledge  of  his  integrity  and  attach-  rectd  deinceps  ad  forum  progressus  ex- 
m«-nt  to  his  sovereign,  which  would  stead-  plicaret  populo  turn  hujus  facti  mtionem, 
fastly    oppose    their  wicked    design    of  turn  succes.-.ionis  etiam  regnandi  legiti- 
bringing  about  Norfolk's  marriage  with  mam   seriem,  si   quid  forte  reginae  hu- 
Hary,  as  well  as  to  their  jealousy  of  his  manitns  accideret.     P.  43. 

influence.    Carte  reports,  on  the  author-  3  D'  Ewes,  81. 

ity  of  the  despatches  of  Fenelou,   the  *  Strype,  11.     Append.     This  speech 

French  ambassador,  that  they  intended  seems  to  have  been  nride  while  Catherine 

to  bring  him  to  account  for  breaking  off  Grey   was  living  ;    perhaps   therefore   it 

the  ancient  league   with   the  house  of  was    in    a    former    parliament,   for    no 

Burgundy,  or,  in  other  words,  for  main-  account  that  I  have  seen  represents  her 

taining  the  protestant  interest.     Vol.  iii.  as  having  been  alive  so  late  as  1571 


ELIZ.  — Catholics.      MARY,  QUEEN  OF  SCOTLAND.  137 

Frances,  the  younger  sister  of  lady  Catherine  Grey,  had 
thought  it  prudent  to  contract,  deprived  this  party  of  all 
political  consequence  much  sooner,  as  I  conceive,  than  the 
wisest  of  Elizabeth's  advisers  could  have  desired  ;  and  gave 
rise  to  various  other  pretensions,  which  failed  not  to  occupy 
speculative  or  intriguing  tempers  throughout  this  reign. 

We  may  well  avoid  the  tedious  and  intricate  paths  of 
Scottish  history,  where  each  fact  must  be  sustained  Mar 
by  a  controversial  discussion.  Every  one  will  queen  of 
recollect  that  Mary  Stuart's  retention  of  the  arms  Scotland- 
and  style  of  England  gave  the  first,  and,  as  it  proved,  inex- 
piable provocation  to  Elizabeth.  It  is  indeed  true  that  she 
was  queen  consort  of  France,  a  state  lately  at  war  with 
England,  and  that,  if  the  sovereigns  of  the  latter  country, 
even  in  peace,  would  persist  in  claiming  the  French  throne, 
they  could  hardly  complain  of  this  retaliation.  But,  although 
it  might  be  difficult  to  find  a  diplomatic  answer  to  this,  yet 
every  one  was  sensible  of  an  important  difference  between  a 
title  retained  through  vanity,  and  expressive  of  pretensions 
long  since  abandoned,  from  one  that  several  foreign  powers 
were  prepared  to  recognize,  and  a  great  part  of  the  nation 
might  perhaps  only  want  opportunity  to  support.1  If,  how- 
ever, after»  the  death  of  Francis  II.  had  set  the  queen  of 
Scots  free  from  all  adverse  connections,  she  had  with  more 
readiness  and  apparent  sincerity  renounced  a  pretension 

1  There  was    something    peculiar   in  Unum  dos  Mariae  cogit  imperium. 

Mary's   mode    of    blazonry.     She    bore  Ergo  pace  potes,  Francisco  quod  omnibus 

Scotland    and    England    quarterly,    the  arniis, 

former  being  first ;   but  over  all  was  a  Mille  patres  annis  non  potuere  tui. 

half-scutcheon    of     pretence    with     the  _,.  .       _      .       .    ,      .         ,    .      „ 

arms  of  England,  the  sinister  half  being  Thls  offeM1™  behavior  of  the  French 


Th-  despatches  of  Throckmorton,  the  «annot  be  denied  by  any  o 

English  ambassador  in  France,  bear  con-  ™ad  thef  c°llect^n  V?*"  ^^ '  *  W1 

tinual   testimony  to  the  insulting   and  l  do  n.ot  ^"lk  Dr.  Lingard  warranted  1U 

hostile  manner  in  which  Francis  II.  and  <f"f> ."£  her  P^vity  to  the  consp.racy  of 

hi*  queen  displayed  their  pretensions  to  Ambowe  as  a  proved  fact      Throckmor- 

our  crown.     Forbes's  State  Papers,  vol.  .ton -wa« '»  man  very  likely  to  exceed  his 

i.  passim.     The  following  is  an  instance.  ">s'ru. ctl°™5  a°d  ^fe  ls  ™uch  reaT 

At  the  entrance  of  the  king  and  queen  t°be!1.ev.e  that  h.e  d"j-,  so'  , lf  '?  rem"k, 

into  Chatelherault,  23d  Nov.  1559,  these  ab'e  tllat  no  m°dern  ^"ch  wnters  that 

lines  formed  the  inscription  over  one  of  J  ,have  steen-    Anquetit    Garmer,  Laj-re- 

the  eates  • '  or  editors  of  the   General  Col 

lection  of  Memoirs,  seem   to  have  been 

Qallia  perpetuis    pugnaxque    Britannia  aware  of  Elisabeth's  secret  intrigues  with 

bellis  the  king  of  Navarre  and  other  protestaut 

Olim  odio  inter  se  dimicuere  part.  chiefs  in  1559,  which  these  letters,  pub 

Nunc  Gallos  totoque  remotes  orbe  Bri-  lished  by  Forbes  in  1740.  demonstrate. 

taimos 


138  ELIZABETH'S  REVENGE.  CHAP.  IIL 

which  could  not  be  made  compatible  with  Elizabeth's  friend- 
ship, she  might  perhaps  have  escaped  some  of  the  conse- 
quences of  that  powerful  neighbor's  jealousy.  But,  whether 
it  were  that  female  weakness  restrained  her  from  unequivo- 
cally abandoning  claims  which  she  deemed  well  founded,  and 
which  future  events  might  enable  her  to  realize  even  in 
Elizabeth's  lifetime,  or  whether  she  fancied  that  to  drop  the 
arms  of  England  from  her  scutcheon  would  look  like  a 
dereliction  of  her  right  of  succession,  no  satisfaction  was 
fairly  given  on  this  point  to  the  P^nglish  court.  Elizabeth 
took  a  far  more  effective  revenge,  by  intriguing  with  all  the 
malecontents  of  Scotland.  But  while  she  was  endeavoring 
to  render  Mary's  throne  uncomfortable  and  insecure,  she 
did  not  employ  that  influence  against  her  in  England,  which 
lay  more  fairly  in  her  power.  She  certainly  was  not  un- 
favorable to  the  queen  of  Scots'  succession,  however  she 
•might  decline  compliance  with  importunate  and  injudicious 
solicitations  to  declare  it.  She  threw  both  Hales  and  one 
Thornton  into  prison  for  writing  against  that  title.  And 
when  Mary's  secretary,  Lethington,  urged  that  Henry's  tes- 
tament, which  alone  stood  in  their  way,  should  be  examined, 
alleging  that  it  had  not  been  signed  by  the  king,  she  paid  no 
attention  to  this  imprudent  request.1 

The  circumstances  wherein  Mary  found  herself  placed  on 
her  arrival  in  Scotland  were  sufficiently  embarrassing  to 
divert  her  attention  from  any  regular  scheme  against  Eliza- 
beth, though  she  may  sometimes  have  indulged  visionary 
hopes ;  nor  is  it  probable  that,  with  the  most  circumspect 
management,  she  could  so  far  have  mitigated  the  rancor  of 
some,  or  checked  the  ambition  of  others,  as  to  find  leisure 
for  hostile  intrigues.  But  her  imprudent  marriage  with 
Darnley,  and  the  far  greater  errors  of  her  subsequent  be- 
havior, by  lowering  both  her  resources  and  reputation  as 
far  as  possible,  seemed  to  be  pledges  of  perfect  security 
from  that  quarter.  Yet  it  was  precisely  when  Mary  was 

i  Burnet,  i.    Append.  266.    Many  let-  that,  whatever  reason  there  mi<*ht  be  for 

*rs,  both  of  Mary  herself  and  of  her  that,   "  if  the  succession  had  remained 

wcretary,   the  famous   Maitland  of  Le-  untouched   according   to   the   law,  yet, 

hmgton,  occur  in   Haynes-s  State  Pa-  where   by  a   limitation   men   had   gone 

•s,  about  the  end  of  1561.    In  one  of  about  to  prevent  the  providence  of  God. 

il.  he  urges,  in  answer  to  what  and    shift 


ELIZ.  — Catholics.     HER  TITLE  TO   THE  THRONE.  139 

become  most  feeble  and  helpless  that  Elizabeth's  apprehen- 
sions grew  most  serious  and  well-founded. 

At  the  time  when  Mary,  escaped  from  captivity,  threw 
herself  on  the  protection  of  a  related,  though  rival  queen, 
three  courses  lay  open  to  Elizabeth,  and  were  discussed  in 
her  councils.  To  restore  her  by  force  of  arms,  or  rather,  by 
a  mediation  which  would  certainly  have  been  effectual,  to  the 
throne  which  she  had  compulsorily  abdicated,  was  the  most 
generous,  and  would  perhaps  have  turned  out  the  most 
judicious,  proceeding.  Reigning  thus  with  tarnished  honor 
and  diminished  power,  she  must  have  continually  depended 
on  the  support  of  England,  and  become  little  better  than  a 
vassal  of  its  sovereign.  Still  it  might  be  objected  by  many, 
that  the  queen's  honor  was  concerned  not  to  maintain  too 
decidedly  the  cause  of  one  accused  by  common  fame,  and 
even  by  evidence  that  had  already  been  made  public,  of 
adultery  and  the  assassination  of  her  husband.  To  have 
permitted  her  retreat  into  France  would  have  shown  an 
impartial  neutrality ;  and  probably  that  court  was  too  much 
occupied  at  home  to  have  afforded  her  any  material  assist- 
ance. Yet  this  appeared  rather  dangerous  ;  and  policy  was 
supposed,  as  frequently  happens,  to  indicate  a  measure  abso- 
lutely repugnant  to  justice,  that  of  detaining  her  in  per- 
petual custody.1  Whether  this  policy  had  no  other  fault 
than  its  want  of  justice  may  reasonably  be  called  in 
question. 

The  queen's  determination  neither  to  marry  nor  limit 
the  succession  had  inevitably  turned  every  one's  thoughts 
towards  the  contingency  of  her  death.  She  was  young 
indeed;  but  had  been  dangerously  ill,  once  in  1562y2  and 
again  in  1568.  Of  all  possible  competitors  for 

Combma- 

the   throne,   Mary   was   incomparably   the   most  tiqn  in 
powerful,  both  among  the  nobility  and  the  people.  ^™£ of 
Besides  the  undivided  attachment  of  all  who  re- 
tained any  longings  for  the  ancient  religion,  and  many  such 

1  A  very  remarkable  letter  of  the  earl  a  great  deal  to  his  ability.    Yet  he  after- 

of  Sussex,  Oct.  22,  1568,  contains  these  wards  became  an  advocate  for  the  duke 

words  :  "  I  think  surely  no  end  can  be  of     Norfolk's     marriage     with     Mary, 

made  good  for  England,  except  the  per-  Lodge's  Illustrations,  vol.  ii.  p.  4. 
son  of  the  Scottish  queen  be  detained,        2  Hume  and  Carte  say,  this  first  illness 

by  one  means  or  other,  in   England."  was  the  small-pox.     But  it  appears  by  a 

The  whole  letter  manifests  the  spirit  of  letter  from  the  queen   to   lord  Shrews- 

Elizivbeth'8  advisers,  and  does  no  great  bury,   Lodge,   279,    that  her  attack  in 

credit  to  Sussex's  &ense  of  justice,  but  1571  was  suspected  to  be  that  disorder. 


]40  HER  TITLE  TO   THE  THRONE.  CHAF  TIL 

were  to  be  found  at  Elizabeth's  court  and  chapel,  she  had 
the  stronghold  of  hereditary  right,  and  the  general  senii- 
meut  that  revolts  from  acknowledging  the  omnipotency  of  a 
servile  parliament.  Cecil,  whom  no  one  could  suspect  of 
partiality  towards  her,  admits,  in  a  remarkable  minute  on  the 
state  of  the  kingdom  in  1569,  that  "  the  queen  of  Scots' 
strength  standeth  by  the  universal  opinion  of  the  world  for 
the  justice  of  her  title,  as  coming  of  the  ancient  line." *  This 
was  no  doubt  in  some  degree  counteracted  by  a  sense  of  the 
danger  which  her  accession  would  occasion  to  the  protestant 
church,  and  which,  far  more  than  its  parliamentary  title, 
kept  up  a  sort  of  party  for  the  house  of  Suffolk.  The  crimes 
imputed  to  her  did  not  immediately  gain  credit  among  the 
people ;  and  some  of  higher  rank  were  too  experienced  poli- 
ticians to  turn  aside  for  such  considerations.  She  had  al- 
ways preserved  her  connections  among  the  English  nobility, 
of  whom  many  were  catholics,  and  others  adverse  to  Cecil, 
by  whose  councils  the  queen  had  been  principally  directed 
in  all  her  conduct  with  regard  to  Scotland  and  its  sovereign.8 
After  the  unfinished  process  of  inquiry  to  which  Mary  sub- 
mitted at  York  and  Hampton  Court,  when  the  charge  of  par- 
ticipation in  Darnley's  murder  had  been  substantiated  by  ev- 
idence at  least  that  she  did  not  disprove,  and  the  whole 
course  of  which  proceedings  created  a  very  unfavorable  im- 
pression both  in  England  and  on  the  Continent,  no  time  was 
to  be  lost  by  those  who  considered  her  as  the  object  of  their 
dearest  hopes.  She  was  in  the  kingdom  ;  she  might,  by  a 
bold  rescue,  be  placed  at  their  head ;  every  hour's  delay  in- 
creased the  danger  of  her  being  delivered  up  to  the  rebel 
Scots  ;  and  doubtless  some  eager  protestants  had  already  be- 
gun to  demand  her  exclusion  by  an  absolute  decision  of  the 
legislature. 

Elizabeth  must  have  laid  her  account,  if  not  with  the  dis- 
affection of  the  catholic  party,  yet  at  least  with  their  attach- 
ment to  the  queen  of  Scots.  But  the  extensive  combination 

1  Haynes,  580.  better  hope  of  this,  for  that  she  thought 

»  In  a  conversation  which  Mary  had  them  to  be  all  of  the  old  religion,  which 

mth  one  IJooksby,  a  spy  of  Cecil's,  about  she  meant  to  restore  again  with  all  expe- 

the    spring    of   1566,    she    imprudently  dition,  and  thereby  win  the  hearts  of  tho 

named    several  of  her    friends,   and  of  common  people.""  The  whole  passage  is 

others  whom  she  hoped  to  win,  such  as  worth    notice.     Haynes,    447.     See    also 

luke  of  Norfolk,  the  earls  of  Derby,  Melvil's    Memoirs,  'for    the    dispositions 

Northumberland,    Westmoreland,  Cum-  of  an   English   party  towards  Mary   in 

berland,   Shrewsbury.    '.'She    had    the  1566. 


ELIZ.  —  Catholics.     FATE  OF  THE  DUKE  OF  NORFOLK.        141 

that  appeared,  in  1569,  to  bring  about  by  force  the  duke  of 
Norfolk's  marriage  with  that  prim.ess,  might  well  startle  her 
cabinet.  In  this  combination  Westmoreland  and  Northum- 
berland, avowed  catholics,  Pembroke  and  Arundel,  suspected 
ones,  were  mingled  with  Sussex  and  even  Leicester,  unques- 
tioned protestants.  The  duke  of  Norfolk  himself,  greater 
and  richer  than  any  English  subject,  had  gone  such  lengths 
in  this  conspiracy,  that  his  life  became  the  just  forfeit  of  his 
guilt  and  folly.  It  is  almost  impossible  to  pity  this  unhappy 
man,  who,  lured  by  the  most  criminal  ambition,  after  pro- 
claiming the  queen  of  Scots  a  notorious  adulteress  and  mur- 
derer, would  have  compassed  a  union  with  her  at  the  hazard 
of  his  sovereign's  crown,  of  the  tranquillity  and  even  indepen- 
dence of  his  country,  and  of  the  reformed  religion.1  There 
is  abundant  proof  of  his  intrigues  with  the  duke  of  Alva,  who 
had  engaged  to  invade  the  kingdom.  His  trial  was  not  in- 
deed conducted  in  a  manner  that  we  can  approve  (such  was 
the  nature  of  state  proceedings  in  that  age)  ;  nor  can  it,  I 
think,  be  denied  that  it  formed  a  precedent  of  construc- 
tive treason  not  easily  reconcilable  with  the  statute;  but 
much  evidence  is  extant  that  his  prosecutors  did  not  adduce, 
and  no  one  fell  by  a  sentence  more  amply  merited,  or  the 
execution  of  which  was  moi-e  indispensable.2 

Norfolk  was  the  dupe  throughout  all  this  intrigue  of  more 
artful  men :  first  of  Murray  and  Lethington,  who  had  filled 
his  mind  with  ambitious  hopes,  and  afterwards  of  Italian 
agents  employed  by  Pius  V.  to  procure  a  combination  of 
the  catholic  party.  Collateral  to  Norfolk's  conspiracy,  but 
doubtless  connected  with  it,  was  that  of  the  northern  earls 
of  Northumberland  and  Westmoreland,  long  prepared,  and 
perfectly  foreseen  by  the  government,  of  which  the  osten- 
eible  and  manifest  aim  was  the  reestablishment  of  popery.8 

1  Murden's  State  Papers,  134, 180,  Nor-  written    depositions    of    witnesses  who 
folk  was  a  very  weak  man,  the  dupe  of  might  have  been  called,  contrary  to  the 
gome  very  cunning  ones.     We  may  ob-  statute  of  Edward  VI.   But  the  Burghley 
serve  that  his  submission  to  the  queen,  Papers,  published  by  Haynes  and  Mur- 
id.  103,  is    expressed  iu   a  style   which  den,  contain  amass  of  documents  relative 
would   now  be  thought  most   pusillaui-  to  this  conspiracy,  which  leave  no  doubt 
uious  in  a  man  of  much  lower  station;  as  to  the  most  heinous  charge,  that  of 
yet  he  died  with  great  intrepidity.     But  inviting  the  duke  of  Alva  to  invade  the 
such  was  the  tone  of  those  times;  an  ex-  kingdom.      There   is   reason   to  suspect 
airgeriited   hypocrisy  prevailed  in  every-  that    he   feigned  himself  a  catholic   in 
thing.  order  to  secure  Alva's  assistance.  —  Mur- 

2  State  Trials,  i.  957.     He  was  inter-  den,  p.  10. 

rogated  by  the  queer's  counsel  with  the  3  The  northern  counties  were  at  this 
most  insidious  questions.  All  the  mate-  time  chiefly  catholic.  "  There  are  not  " 
rial  evidence  was  read  to  the  lords  from  says  Sadler,  writing  from,  tuence,  ''  ten 


142  BULL  OF  Pros  V.  CHAP.  III. 

Bun  of  Pi"8  V.,  who  took  a  far  more  active  part  than  liis 
Pius  v.  predecessor  in  English  affairs,  and  had  secretly 
instigated  this  insurrection,  now  published  his  celebrated  bull, 
excommunicating  and  deposing  Elizabeth,  in  order  to  second 
the  efforts  of  her  rebellious  subjects.1  This  is,  perhaps, 
with  the  exception  of  that  issued  by  Sixtus  V.  against  Hen- 
ry IV.  of  France,  the  latest  blast  of  that  trumpet  which  had 
thrilled  the  hearts  of  monarchs.  Yet  there  was  nothing  in 
the  sound  that  bespoke  declining  vigor ;  even  the  illegitimacy 
of  Elizabeth's  birth  is  scarcely  alluded  to;  and  the  pope 
seems  to  have  chosen  rather  to  tread  the  path  of  his  prede- 
cessors, and  absolve  her  subjects  from  their  allegiance,  as 
the  just  and  necessary  punishment  of  her  heresy. 

Since  nothing  so  much  strengthens  any  government  as  an 
unsuccessful  endeavor  to  subvert  it,  it  may  be  thought  that 
the  complete  failure  of  the  rebellion  under  the  earls  of  Nor- 
thumberland and  Westmoreland,  with  the  detection  and  pun- 
ishment of  the  duke  of  Norfolk,  rendered  Elizabeth's  throne 
more  secure.  But  those  events  revealed  the  number  of  her 
enemies,  or  at  least  of  those  in  whom  no  confidence  could  be 
reposed.  The  rebellion,  though  provided  against  by  the  min- 
istry, and  headed  by  two  peers  of  great  family  but  no  person- 
al weight,  had  not  only  assumed  for  a  time  a  most  formid- 
able aspect  in  the  north,  but  caused  many  to  waver  in  other 
parts  of  the  kingdom.2  Even  in  Norfolk,  an  eminently  prot- 
estant  county,  there  was  a  slight  insurrection  in  1570,  out 
of  attachment  to  the  duke.8  If  her  greatest  subject  could 
thus  be  led  astray  from  his  faith  and  loyalty,  if  others  not  less 
near  to  her  councils  could  unite  with  him  in  measures  so  con- 
trary to  her  wishes  and  interests,  on  whom  was  she  firmly  to 
rely  ?  Who,  especially,  could  be  trusted,  were  she  to  be 
snatched  away  from  the  world,  for  the  maintenance  of  the 
protestant  establishment  under  a  yet  unknown  successor  ? 
This  was  the  manifest  and  principal  danger  that  her  coun- 


xt  was  consequently  tne  great  resort  or  Irom   meronymo  catena's    L/ite  01  1'ius 

the  priests  from  the  Netherlands,  and  in  V.,  published,  at   Rome  in    1578,   which 

the  feeble  state  of  the  protestant  church  illustrates  the  evidence  to  the  same  effect 

there  wanted  sufficient  ministers  to  stand  contained  in   the  Burghley  Papers,  and 

up  in  its  defence.     Strype,  i.  509,  et  post ;  partly  adduced  on  the  duke  of  Norfolk's 

Si.  183.     Many  of  the  gentry  indeed  were  trial. 

Btill  disaffected  in  other  parts  towards  the  2  Strype,  i.  546,  553,  556. 

uc\v  ivlisrion.    A  profession  of  conformity  3  Strvpe,  i.  578;  Camden,  428 ;  Lodge, 

was  required  in  1569  from  all  justices  of  ii.  45. 


ELIZ.  —  Catholics.     LEAGUE  OF  CATHOLIC  PRINCES.  143 

cillcrs  had  to  dread.  Her  own  great  reputation,  and  the  re- 
spectful attachment  of  her  people,  might  give  reason  to  hope 
that  no  machinations  would  be  successful  against  her  crown  ; 
but  let  us  reflect  in  what  situation  the  kingdom  would  have 
been  left  by  her  death  in  a  sudden  illness  such  as  she  had 
more  than  once  experienced  in  earlier  years,  and  again  in 
1571.  "You  must  think,"  lord  Burleigh  writes  to  Walsiug- 
ham  on  that  occasion,  "  such  a  matter  would  drive  me  to 
the  end  of  my  wits."  And  sir  Thomas  Smith  expresses  his 
fears  in  equally  strong  language.1  Such  statesmen  do  not 
entertain  apprehensions  lightly.  Whom,  in  truth,  could  her 
privy  council,  on  such  an  event,  have  resolved  to  proclaim  ? 
The  house  of  Suffolk,  had  its  right  been  more  generally 
recognized  than  it  was  (lady  Catherine  being  now  dead), 
presented  no  undoubted  heir.  The  young  king  of  Scotland, 
an  alien  and  an  infant,  could  only  have  reigned  through  a 
regency ;  and  it  might  have  been  difficult  to  have  selected 
from  the  English  nobility  a  fit  person  to  undertake  that  of- 
fice, or  at  least  one  in  whose  elevation  the  rest  would  have 
acquiesced.  It  appears  most  probable  that  the  numerous 
and  powerful  faction  who  had  promoted  Norfolk's  union  with 
Mary  would  have  conspired  again  to  remove  her  from  her 
prison  to.  the  throne.  Of  such  a  revolution  the  disgrace  of 
Cecil  and  Elizabeth's  wisest  ministers  must  have  been  the 
immediate  consequence ;  and  it  is  probable  that  the  resto- 
ration of  the  catholic  worship  would  have  ensued.  These 
apprehensions  prompted  Cecil,  Walsingham,  and  Smith  to 
press  the  queen's  marriage  with  the  duke  of  Anjou  far  more 
earnestly  than  would  otherwise  have  appeared  consistent 
with  her  interest  A  union  with  any  member  of  that  perfid- 
ious court  was  repugnant  to  genuine  protestant  sentiments. 
But  the  queen's  absolute  want  of  foreign  alliances,  and  the 
secret  hostility  both  of  France  and  Spain,  impressed  Cecil 
with  that  deep  sense  of  the  perils  of  the  time  which  his  pri- 
vate letters  so  strongly  bespeak.  A  treaty  was  believed  to 
have  been  concluded  in  1567,  to  which  the  two  last-men- 
tioned powers,  with  the  emperor  Maximilian  and  some  other 
catholic  princes,  were  parties,  for  the  extirpation  of  the  prot- 
estant religion.2  No  alliance  that  the  court  of  Charles  IX., 

1  Strype,  ii.  88.    Life  of  Smith,  152.         in   Strype,   which  seems  to  have   been 

2  Strype,  i.  502.      I  do  not  give  any    fabricated  by  some  of  the  queen's  emis- 
credit  whatever  to  this  league,  as  printed    saries.     There  had  boen,  not  perhaps  a 


144  STATUTES  FOR  QUEEN'S   SECURITY.        CHAP.  Ill 

could  have  formed  with  Elizabeth  was  likely  to  have  divert- 
ed it  from  pursuing  this  object ;  and  it  may  have  been  fortu- 
nate that  her  own  insincerity  savetl  her  from  being  the  dupe 
of  those  who  practised  it  so  well.  Walsingham  himself,  sa- 
gacious as  he  was,  fell  into  the  snares  of  that  den  of  treach- 
ery, giving  credit  to  the  young  king's  assurances  almost  on 
the  very  eve  of  St.  Bartholomew.1 

The  bull  of  Pius  V.,  far  more  injurious  in  its  consequences 
to  those  it  was  designed  to  serve  than  to  Elizabeth,  forms  a 
leading  epoch  in  the  history  of  ojur  English  catholics.  It 
vested  upon  a  principle  never  universally  acknowledged,  and 
regarded  with  much  jealousy  by  temporal  governments,  yet 
maintained  in  all  countries  by  many  whose  zeal  and  ability 
rendered  them  formidable,  —  the  right  vested  in  the  supreme 
poniiff  to  depose  kings  for  heinous  crimes  against  the  church. 
One  Felton  affixed  this  bull  to  the  gates  of  the  bishop  of  Lon- 
don's palace,  and  suffered  death  for  the  offence.  So  audacious 
a  manifestation  of  disloyalty  was  imputed  with  little  justice 
to  the  catholics  at  large,  but  might  more  reasonably  lie  at  the 
door  of  those  active  instruments  of  Rome,  the  English  refugee 
priests  and  Jesuits  dispersed  over  Flanders,  and  lately  estab- 
lished at  Douay,  who  were  continually  passing  into  the  king- 
dom, not  only  to  keep  alive  the  precarious  faith  of.  the  laity, 
but,  as  was  generally  surmised,  to-  excite  them 
for  the  against  their  sovereign.2  This  produced  the  act 

Sa^rity.  °f  13  Eliz.  c>  2 »  wllicn>  after  reciting  these  mis- 
chiefs, enacts  that  all  persons  publishing  any  bull 
from  Rome,  or  absolving  and  reconciling  any  one  to  the  Ro- 
mish church,  or  being  so  reconciled,  should  incur  the  penalties 
of  high  treason ;  and  such  as  brought  into  the  realm  any 
crosses,  pictures,  or  superstitious  things  consecrated  by  the 
pope  or  under  his  authority,  should  be  liable  to  a  praemunire. 
Those  who  should  conceal  or  connive  at  the  offenders  were  to 


ne  e  suppresson  o     proes-  pu        s  even  severa  years  ater.     nnas, 

tantism  in  France  and  the  Netherlands,  ii.  630.     It  was  dissolved  by  Kequesens, 

Had  they  succeeded  however  in  this,  the  while  governor  of  Flanders,  but  revived 

next   blow  would    have   been   struck  at  at  Kheims  in  1575,  under  the  protection 

England.      It  seems  very  unlikely  that  of  the  cardinal  of  Lorntin,  and  returned 

Maximilian  was    concerned    in  Buch  a  to  Douay  in  1593.     Similar  collc-gcs  wore 

league,  founded' at  Koine  in  1579,  at  Valladolid  in 

Strype,  vol  ii.  1589,  at  St.  Omer  in  1596,  and  at  Louvain 

'  Tue   college    of   Douay  for  English  in  1606. 


ELIZ.  —  Catholics.      ACT   13    ELIZABETH   C.   2.  145 

be  held  guilty  of  misprision  of  treason.  This  statute  exposed 
the  catholic  priesthood,  and  in  great  measure  the  laity,  to  the 
continual  risk  of  martyrdom ;  for  so  many  had  fallen  away 
from  their  faith  through  a  pliant  spirit  of  conformity  with  the 
times,  that  the  regular  discipline  would  exact  their  absolution 
and  reconciliation  before  they  could  be  reinstated  in  the 
church's  communion.  Another  act  of  the  same  session,  mani- 
festly levelled  against  the  partisans  of  Mary,  and  even  against 
herself,  makes  it  high  treason  to  affirm  that  the  queen  ought 
not  to  enjoy  the  crown,  but  some  other  person  ;  or  to  publish 
that  she  is  a  heretic,  schismatic,  tyrant,  infidel,  or  usurper  of 
the  crown  ;  or  to  claim  right  to  the  crown,  or  to  usurp  the 
same  during  the  queen's  life  ;  or  to  affirm  that  the  laws  and 
statutes  do  not  bind  the  right  of  the  crown,  and  the  descent, 
limitation,  inheritance,  or  governance  thereof.  And  whoso- 
ever should,  during  the  queen's  life,  by  any  book  or  work 
written  or  printed,  expressly  affirm,  before  the  same  had  been 
established  by  parliament,  that  any  one  particular  person  was 
or  ought  to  be  heir  and  successor  to  the  queen,  except  the 
same  be  the  natural  issue  of  her  body,  or  should  print  or 
utter  any  such  book  or  writing,  was  for  the  first  offence  to  be 
imprisoned  a  year,  and  to  forfeit  half  his  goods  ;  and  for  the 
second  to  incur  the  penalties  of  a  prasmunire.1 

It  is  impossible  to  misunderstand  the  chief  aim  of  this 
statute.  But  the  house  of  commons,  in  which  the  zealous 
protestants,  or,  as  they  were  now  rather  denominated,  puri- 
tans, had  a  predominant  influence,  were  not  content  with 
these  demonstrations  against  the  unfortunate  captive.  Fear, 
as  often  happens,  excited  a  sanguinary  spirit  amongst  them  ; 
they  addressed  the  queen  upon  what  they  called  the  great 
cause,  that  is,  the  business  of  the  queen  of  Scots,  presenting 
by  their  committee  reasons  gathered  out  of  the  civil  law  to 
prove  that  "  it  standeth  not  only  with  justice,  but  also  with 
the  queen's  majesty's  honor  and  safety,  to  proceed  criminally 
against  the  pretended  Scottish  queen."  2  Elizabeth,  who  could 
not  really  dislike  these  symptoms  of  hatred  towards  her  rival, 

1  13  Eliz.  c.  1.    This  act  was  made  at  lords.     So  little  notion  had  men  of  ob- 

first  retrospective,  so  as   to  affect  every  serving    the    first  principles    of  equity 

one   who  had  at  any   time  denied  the  towards  their  enemies!     There  is  much 

queen's  title.     A  member  objected  to  this  reason  from  the  debate  to  suspect  that 

in  debate  "as  a  precedent  most  perilous."  the  ex  post  facto  words  were  levelled  at 

But   sir   Francis    Knollys,   Mr.   Norton,  Mary. 

aud   others,  defended  it.     D'Ewes,  162.  8  Strype,  ii.  133.    D'Ewes,  207. 
It  seems  to  have  been  amended  by  the 

VOL.  I. C.  10 


146  VIOLENT  MEASURES  AGAINST  MARY.      CHAP.  III. 

took  the  opportunity  of  simulating  more  humanity  than  the 
commons ;  and  when  they  sent  a  bill  to  the  upper  house  at- 
tainting Mary  of  treason,  checked  its  course  by  proroguing 
the  parliament.  Her  backwardness  to  concur  in  any  meas- 
ures for  securing  the  kingdom,  as  far  as  in  her  lay,  from  those 
calamities  which  her  decease  might  occasion,  could  not  but 
displease  lord  Burleigh.  "All  that  we  labored  for,"  he 
writes  to  Walsingham  in  1572,  "and  had  with  full  consent 
brought  to  fashion,  I  mean  a  law  to  make  the  Scottish  queen 
unable  and  unworthy  of  succession  to  the  crown,  was  by  her 
majesty  neither  assented  to  nor  rejected,  but  deferred."  Some 
of  those  about  her,  he  hints,  made  herself  her  own  enemy,  by 
persuading  her  not  to  countenance  these  proceedings  in  par- 
liament.1 I  do  not  think  it  admits  of  much  question  that,  at 
this  juncture,  the  civil  and  religious  institutions  of  England 
would  have  been  rendered  more  secure  by  Mary's  exclusion 
from  the  throne,  which  indeed,  after  all  that  had  occurred,  she 
could  not  be  endured  to  fill  without  national  dishonor.  But 
the  violent  measures  suggested  against  her  life  were  hardly, 
under  all  the  circumstances  of  her  case,  to  be  reconciled  with 
justice ;  even  admitting  her  privity  to  the  northern  rebellion 
and  to  the  projected  invasion  by  the  duke  of  Alva.  These, 
however,  were  not  approved  merely  by  an  eager  party  in  the 
commons :  archbishop  Parker  does  not  scruple  to  write  about 
her  to  Cecil — "If  that  only  [one]  desperate  person  were 
taken  away,  as  by  justice  soon  it  might  be,  the  queen's  maj- 
esty's good  subjects  would  be  in  better  hope,  and  the  papists 
daily  expectation  vanquished."  2  And  Walsingham,  during 
his  embassy  at  Paris,  desires  that  "  the  queen  should  see  how 
much  they  (the  papists)  built  upon  the  possibility  of  that 
dangerous  woman's  coming  to  the  crown  of  England, 
whose  life  was  a  step  to  her  majesty's  death ; "  adding  that 
•'  she  was  bound,  for  her  own  safety  and  that  of  her  subjects, 
to  add  to  God's  providence  her  own  policy,  so  far  as  might 
stand  with  justice."  8 

We  cannot  wonder  to  read  that  these  new  statutes  increased 
the  dissatisfaction  of  the  Roman  catholics,  who  perceived  a 
Catholics  systematic  determination  to  extirpate  their  relig- 
rigorousiy  *on'  Governments  ought  always  to  remember 
treated.  that  the  intimidation  of  a  few  disaffected  person? 

1  Strype,  ii.  135.  a  Life  of  Parker,  354 

8  Strype's  Annals,  ii.  48. 


ELIZ  —Catholics.    PROCEEDINGS  OF  PURITAN  FACTION.    147 

is  dearly  bought  by  alienating  any  large  portion  of  the 
community.1  Many  retired  to  foreign  countries,  and,  re- 
ceiving for  their  maintenance  pensions  from  the  court  of 
Spain,  became  unhappy  instruments  of  its  ambitious  enter- 
prises. Those  who  remained  at  home  could  hardly  think 
their  oppression  much  mitigated  by  the  precarious  indulgences 
which  Elizabeth's  caprice,  or  rather  the  fluctuation  of  differ- 
ent parties  in  her  councils,  sometimes  extended  to  them. 
The  queen  indeed,  so  far  as  we  can  penetrate  her  dissimula- 
tion, seems  to  have  been  really  averse  to  extreme  rigor 
against  her  catholic  subjects ;  and  her  greatest  minister,  as  we 
shall  more  fully  see  afterwards,  was  at  this  time  in  the  same 
sentiments.  But  such  of  her  advisers  as  leaned  towards  the 
puritan  faction,  and  too  many  of  the  Anglican  clergy,  whether 
puritan  or  not,  thought  no  measure  of  charity  or  compassion 
should  be  extended  to  them.  With  the  divines  they  were 
idolaters ;  with  the  council  they  were  a  dangerous  and  dis- 
affected party ;  with  the  judges  they  were  refractory  trans- 
gressors of  statutes ;  on  every  side  they  were  obnoxious  and 
oppressed.  A  few  aged  men  having  been  set  at  liberty, 
Sampson,  the  famous  puritan,  himself  a  sufferer  for  con- 
science' sake,  wrote  a  letter  of  remonstrance  to  lord  Burleigh. 
He  urged  in  this  that  they  should  be  compelled  to  hear  ser- 
mons, though  he  would  not  at  first  oblige  them  to  communi- 
cate.2 A  bill  having  been  introduced  in  the  session  of  1571, 
imposing  a  penalty  for  not  receiving  the  communion,  it  was 
objected  that  consciences  ought  not  to  be  forced.  But  Mr. 
Strickland  entirely  denied  this  principle,  and  quoted  authori- 

1  Murden'f*    Papers,    p.    43,  contain  landed  in  any  part  of  the  realm,  on  pur- 
proofs  of  the  increased  discontent  among  pose    to  suppress   the  whole    religion." 
the  catholics  in  consequence  of  the  penal  M'Orie's  Life  of  Knox,  vol.  ii.  p.  24.     In 
laws.  a  conversation  with  Maitland  he  asserted 

2  Strype,  ii.  330.     See  too,  in  vol.  iii.  most    explicitly    the    duty   of    putting 
Appendix   68,  a   series   of   petitions   in-  idolaters  to  death.    Id.  p.  120.     Nothing 
tended  to  be   offered  to  the  queen   and  can   be  more  sanguinary   than   the   re- 
parliuinimt    about    1583-       These    came  former's  spirit  in  this  remarkable  inter- 
froni  the  puritanical  mint,  and  show  the  view.     St.  Dominic  could  not  have  sur- 
dread   that   party  entertained  of  Mary's  passed   him.     It  is  strange  to  see  men, 
succession,  and  of  a  relapse  into  popery,  professing    all    the   while    our    modern 
It  is  urged  in  these  that   no   toleration  creed  of    charity  and   toleration,   extol 
Should  be  granted  to  the  popish  worship  these  sanguinary  spirits  of  the  «ixteenth 
in  private  houses.   Nor.  in  fitct.  had  they  century.     The  English  puritans,  though 
much   cause   to    complain   that    it  was  I  cannot  cite  any  passages  so  strong  as 
BO.     Knox's   famous  intolerance  is  well  the  foregoing,  were  much  the  bitterest 
known.  enemies  of  the  catholics.    When  we  read 

"  One  mass,"  he  declared  in  preaching  a  letter  from  any  one,  such  as  Sir.  Top- 

against   Mary's  private  chapel  at  Holy-  elide,  very  fierce  against   the  latter,  we 

rood  house,  "  was  more  fearful  unto  him  may  expect  to  find  him  put  in  a  word  iu 

thuu  if  ten  thousand  armed  euumies  were  favor  of  silenced  ministers. 


148  INDULGENCE  SHOWN  BY  ELIZABETH.   CHAP.  III. 

ties  against  it.1  Even  Parker,  by  no  means  tainted  with  pu- 
ritan bigotry,  and  who  had  been  reckoned  moderate  in  his 
proceedings  towards  catholics,  complained  of  what  he  called 
"  a  Machiavel  government ;  "  that  is,  of  the  queen's  lenity  in 
not  absolutely  rooting  them  out.2 

This  indulgence,  however,  shown  by  Elizabeth,  the  topic 
of  reproach  in  those  times,  and  sometimes  of  boast  in  our 
own,  never  extended  to  any  positive  toleration,  nor  even  to 
any  general  connivance  at  the  Romish  worship  in  its  most 
private  exercise.  She  published  a  declaration  in  1570,  that 
she  did  not  intend  to  sift  men's  consciences,  provided  they 
observed  her  laws  by  coming  to  church  ;  which,  as  she  well 
knew,  the  strict  catholics  deemed  inconsistent  with  their  in- 
tegrity.8 Nor  did  the  government  always  abstain  from  an 
inquisition  into  men's  private  thoughts.  The  inns  of  court 
were  more  than  once  purified  of  popery  by  examining  their 
members  on  articles  of  faith.  Gentlemen  of  good  families 
in  the  country  were  harassed  in  the  same  manner.4  One  sir 
Richard  Shelley,  who  had  long  acted  as  a  sort  of  spy  for 
Cecil  on  the  Continent,  and  given  much  useful  information, 
requested  only  leave  to  enjoy  his  religion  without  hindrance ; 
but  the  queen  did  not  accede  to  this  without  much  reluctance 
and  delay.5  She  had  indeed  assigned  no  other  ostensible 
pretext  for  breaking  off  her  own  treaty  of  marriage  with  the 
archduke  Charles,  and  subsequently  with  the  dukes  of  Anjou 
and  Alenfon,  than  her  determination  not  to  suffer  the  ma,ss 
to  be  celebrated  even  in  her  husband's  private  chapel.  It  is 
worthy  to  be  repeatedly  inculcated  on  the  reader,  since  so 
false  a  color  has  been  often  employed  to  disguise  the  ecclesias- 
tical tyranny  of  this  reign,  that  the  most  clandestine  exercise 
of  the  Romish  worship  was  severely  punished.  Thus  we  read 
in  the  Life  of  Whitgift,  that,  on  information  given  that  some 
ladies  and  others  heard  mass  in  the  house  of  one  Edwards 
by  night,  in  the  county  of  Denbigh,  he,  being  then  bishop  of 
Worcester  and  vice-president  of  Wales,  was  directed  to  make 
inquiry  into  the  facts ;  and  finally  was  instructed  to  commit 
Edwards  to  close  prison ;  and  as  for  another  person  impli 
cated,  named  Morice,  "  if  he  remained  obstinate  he  might 
cause  some  kind  of  torture  to  be  used  upon  him  ;  and  the  like 

1  D'Efres,  161,  177.  never  in  the  wrong,  calls  this  "a  notable 

3  Strype's  Life  of  Parker,  354.  piece  of  favor." 

»  Strype's  Ann  Us.  i.  582.      Honest  old  «  Strvpe's  Annals,  U.  110,  408. 

8tr>pe,   who  Uiiaks    cliurcb.    and  state  *  Id.  iii.  127 


ELIZ.  —  Catholics.    CASES  OF  EDWAEDS  AND  ROCKWOOD.     149 

order  they  prayed  him  to  use  with  the  others."  1  But  this  is 
one  of  many  instances,  the  events  of  every  day,  forgotten  on 
the  morrow,  and  of  which  no  general  historian  takes  account. 
Nothing  but  the  minute  and  patient  diligence  of  such  a  com- 
piler as  Strype,  who  thinks  no  fact  below  his  regard,  could 
have  preserved  this  from  oblivion.2 

It  will  not  surprise  those  who  have  observed  the  effect  of 

1  Life  of  Whitgift,  83.     See  too  p.  99;  sudden  from  hell  by  conjuring,  than  the 

and  Annals  of  Reformation,  ii.  631,  &c. ;  picture  for  whom   it  had  beeu  so  often 

also  Hollingshed,  ann.  1574,  ad  init.  and  so  long  abused.     Her  majesty  com- 

-  An  almost  incredible    specimen  of  manded  it    to  the  fire,   which    in    her 

ungracious  behavior   towards  a  Roman  sight  by  the  country   folks  was  quickly 

catholic   gentleman  is    mentioned  in   a  done,  to  her  content,  and  unspeakable 

letter  of  Topclilfe,  a  man  whose  daily  oc-  joy  of  every  one   but  some  one  or  two 

cupatioti  was   to  hunt  out   and  molest  who  had  sucked  of  the  idol's   poisoned 

men  for  popery.     u  The  next  good  news.  milk. 

but  in  account  the  highest,  her  majesty  "Shortly  after,  a  great  sort  of  good 
hath  served  God  -with  great  zeal  and  preachers,  who  had  been  long  corn- 
comfortable  examples ;  for  by  her  coun-  manded  to  silence  for  a  little  niceness, 
cil  two  notorious  papists,  young  Rock-  were  licensed,  and  again  commanded  to 
wood,  the  master  of  Euston-hall,  where  preach  ;  a  greater  and  more  universal 
her  majesty  did  lie  upon  Sunday  now  a  joy  to  the  countries,  and  the  most  of 
fortnight,  and  one  Downes,  a  gentleman,  the  court,  than  the  disgrace  of  the 
were  botli  committed,  the  one  to  the  papists :  and  the  gentlemen  of  those 
town  prison  at  Norwich,  the  other  to  parts,  being  great  and  hot  protestants, 
the  county  prison  there,  for  obstinate  almost  before  by  policy  discredited  and 
papistry  ;  and  seven  more  gentlemen  of  disgraced,  were  greatly  countenanced, 
worship  were  committed  to  several  "  I  was  so  happy  lately,  amongst  other 
houses  in  Norwich  as  prisoners;  two  of  good  graces,  that  her  majesty  did  tell  me 
the  Levels,  another  Downes.  one  Bening-  of  sundry  lewd  papist  beasts  that  have 
field,  one  Parry,  and  two  others  not  resorted  to  Buxton,"  &c.  Lodge,  ii.  188. 
worth  memory,  for  badness  of  belief.  30  Aug.  1578. 

"  This  Rockwood  is  a  papist  of  kind  This  Topcliffe  was  the  most  implacable 

[family]  newly  crept    out    of    his    late  persecutor  of  his  age.    In  a  letter  to  lord 

wardship.     Her  majesty,  by  some  meaus  Burleigh  (Strype,  iv.  39)  he  urges  him  to 

I  know  not,  was   lodged  at  his  house,  imprison  all  the  principal  recusants,  and 

Euston,  far  unmeet  for  her  highness;  especially  women,  "  the  farther  off  from 

nevertheless,    the     gentleman     brought  their  own  family  and  friends  the  better." 

into  her  presence    by    like  device,   her  The  whole  letter  is  curious,  as  a  specimen 

majesty  gave   him   ordinary  thanks   for  of  the  prevalent  spirit,  especially  among 

his  bad  house,  and  her  fair  hand  to  kiss  :  the   puritans,   whom    Topcliffe    favored, 

but    my   lord    chamberlain,  nobly  and  Instances  of  the  ill-treatment  experienced 

gravely    understanding    that   Rockwood  by  respectable  families  (the  Fitzherberts 

was  excommunicated  for  papistry,  called  and  Foljambes),  and  even  aged  ladies, 

him  before  him,  demanded  of  him  how  without    any    other    provocation    than 

he  durst  presume  to  attempt  her  royal  their  recusancy,  may  be  found  in  Lodge, 

presence,   he,   unfit   to  accompany  any  ii.  372,  462;  iii.  22.     [See  also  Dodd's 

Christian  person;  forthwith  said  he  was  Church  History,   vol.  iii.   passim,  with 

fitter  for  a  pair  of  stocks,  commanded  the  additional  facts  contributed  by  the 

him  out  of  the  court,  and  yet  to  attend  last  editor.]    But  those  farthest  removed 

her  council's  pleasure  at  Norwich  he  was  from  puritanism   partook  sometimes  of 

committed.     And  to  dissyffer   [sic]   the  the    same    tyrannous    spirit.     Aylmer, 

gentleman   to   the  full,  a  piece  of  plate  bishop    of    London,  renowned    for    his 

being  missed  in  the  court,  and  searched  persecution   of  nonconformists,   is   said 

for  in  his  hay-house,  in  the  hay-rick,  by   Rishton,   de    Schismate,   p.   319,   to 

such   un   image  of  our  lady  was   there  have  sent  a  young  catholic  lady  to  be 

found,  as  for  greatness,  for  gayness,  and  whipped    in    Bridewell   for  refusing    to 

Workmanship.  I  did  never  see  a  match;  conform.    If  the  authority  is  suspicious 

and  after  a  sort  of  country  dances  ended,  (and  yet  I  do  not  perceive  that  Kishton 

in  her  majesty's  sight  the  idol  was  set  is  a  liar  like  Sanders),  the  fact  is  rendered 

behind    the    people    who    avoided;    she  hardly   improbable  by  Aylmer's   harsh 

rather   seemed   a  beast    raised  upon  a  character. 


150  REFUGEES  IN  FLANDERS.       CHAP.  III. 

all  persecution  for  matters  of  opinion  upon  the  human  mind, 
that  during  this  period  the  Romish  party  continued  such  in 
numbers  and  in  zeal  as  to  give  the  most  lively  alarm  to  Eliz- 
abeth's administration.  One  cause  of  this  was  beyond  doubt 
the  connivance  of  justices  of  the  peace,  a  great  many  of 
whom  were  secretly  attached  to  the  same  interest,  though  it 
was  not  easy  to  exclude  them  from  the  commission,  on  ac- 
count of  their  wealth  and  respectability.1  The  facility  with 
which  catholic  rites  can  be  performed  in  secret,  as  before 
observed,  was  a  still  more  important  circumstance, 
in  th?  Nor  did  the  voluntary  exiles  established  in  Flan- 

Theirrhosttt  ders  remit  their  diligence  in  filling  the  kingdom 
ity  to  the  with  emissaries.  The  object  of  many  at  least 
ent'  among  them,  it  cannot  for  a  moment  be  doubted, 
from  the  era  of  the  bull  of  Pius  V.,  if  not  earlier,  was  noth- 
ing less  than  to  subvert  the  queen's  throne.  They  were 
closely  united  with  the  court  of  Spain,  which  had  passed 
from  the  character  of  an  ally  and  pretended  friend,  to  that 
of  a  cold  and  jealous  neighbor,  and  at  length  of  an  implacable 
adversary.  Though  no  war  had  been  declared  between  Eliz- 
abeth and  Philip,  neither  party  had  scrupled  to  enter  into 
leagues  with  the  disaffected  subjects  of  the  other.  Such 
sworn  vassals  of  Rome  and  Spain  as  an  Allen  or  a  Persons 
were  just  objects  of  the  English  government's  distrust ;  it  is 
the  extension  of  that  jealousy  to  the  peaceful  and  loyal  which 
we  stigmatize  as  oppressive,  and  even  as  impolitic.2 


1  Strype's  Life  of  Smith,  171;  Annals,    ed  by  their  priests,  when  even  in  the  six- 
ii.  631,  636,  iii.  479,  and  Append.  170.     teenth  century  the  efforts  of  these  able 


those  who  conceive  the  political    of  Dr.  Lingard  to  represent  it  as  perfectly 
conduct  of  catholics  to  be  entirely  sway-    Machiavelian,  and  without  any  motive 


EMZ.  — Catholics.    LAWS  AGAINST  CATHOLIC  WORSHIP.    151 

In  concert  with  the  directing  powers  of  the  Vatican  and 
Escurial,  the  refugees  redoubled   their  exertions 

T        ,    ,1  -.  *n/\       -.«•  .  Fresh  laws 

about  the  year  lobO.  Maiy  was  now  wearing  out  against  the 
her  years  in  hopeless  captivity ;  her  son,  though  ^j^j0 
they  did  not  lose  hope  of  him,  had  received  a 
strictly  protestant  education  ;  while  a  new  generation  had 
grown  up  in  England,  rather  inclined  to  diverge  more  widely 
from  the  ancient  religion  than  to  suffer  its  restoration.  Such 
were  they  who  formed  the  house  of  commons  that  met  in 
1581,  discontented  with  the  severities  used  against  the  puri- 
tans, but  ready  to  go  beyond  any  measures  that  the  court 
might  propose  to  subdue  and  extirpate  popery.  Here  an  act 
was  passed,  which,  after  repeating  the  former  provisions  that 
had  made  it  high  treason  to  reconcile  any  of  her  majesty's 
subjects,  or  to  be  reconciled,  to  the  church  of  Rome,  imposes 
a  penalty  of  20L  a  month  on  all  persons  absenting  them- 
selves from  church,  unless  they  shall  hear  the  English  ser- 
vice at  home  :  such  as  could  not  pay  the  same  within  three 
months  after  judgment  were  to  be  imprisoned  until  they 
should  conform.  The  queen,  by  a  subsequent  act,  had  the 
power  of  seizing  two  thirds  of  the  party's  land,  and  all  his 
goods,  for  default  of  payment.1  These  grievous  penalties  on 
recusancy,  as  the  wilful  absence  of  catholics  from  church 
came  now  to  be  denominated,  were  doubtless  founded  on  the 
extreme  difficulty  of  proving  an  actual  celebration  of  their 
own  rites.  But  they  established  a  persecution  which  fell  not 
at  all  short  in  principle  of  that  for  which  the  inquisition  had 
become  so  odious.  Nor  were  the  statutes  merely  designed 
for  terror's  sake,  to  keep  a. check  over  the  disaffected,  as  some 
wouW  pretend.  They  were  executed  in  the  most  sweeping 
and  indiscriminating  manner,  unless  perhaps  a  few  families 
of  high  rank  might  enjoy  a  connivance.2 

It  had  certainly  been  the  desire  of  Elizabeth  to  abstain 
from  capital  punishments  on  the  score  of  religion.  Execution 
The  first  instance  of  a  priest  suffering  death  by  of  campian 
her  statutes  was  in   1577,  when  one  Mayne  was  an 
hanged  at  Launceston,  without  any  charge  against  him  ex- 
cept his  religion ;  and  a  gentleman  who  had  harbored  him 

but  wanton  malignity,  that,  with  respect  always  adhere  more  scrupulously  to  good 

to  France  and  Spain,  and  even  Scotland,  faith  than  her  enemies. 

it  was  strictly  defensive,  and  justified  by  l  23  Eliz.  c.  1,  and  29  Fliz.  c.  6. 

the  law  of  self-preservation ;  though,  in  2  Str.vpe's  Whitgift,  p    117,  and  other 

some  of  the  menus  employed,  she  did  uot  authorities,  passing. 


152  EXECUTION  OF  CAMPIAtf  CHAP.  III. 

was  sentenced  to  imprisonment  for  life.1  In  the  next  year, 
if  we  may  trust  the  zealous  catholic  writers,  Thomas  Sher- 
wood, a  hoy  of  fourteen  years,  was  executed  for  refusing  to 
deny  the  temporal  power  of  the  pope,  when  urged  hy  his 
judges.2  But  in  1581,  several  seminary  priests  from  Flan- 
ders having  been  arrested,  whose  projects  were  supposed 
(perhaps  not  wholly  without  foundation)  to  be  very  incon- 
sistent with  their  allegiance,  it  was  unhappily  deemed  neces- 
sary to  hold  out  some  more  conspicuous  examples  of  rigor. 
Of  those  brought  to  trial,  the  most  eminent  was  Campian, 
formerly  a  protestant,  but  long  known  as  the  boast  of  Douay 
for  his  learning  and  virtues.8  This  man,  so  justly  respected, 
was  put  to  the  rack,  and  revealed  through  torture  the  names 
of  some  catholic  gentlemen  with  whom  he  had  conversed.4 
He  appears  to  have  been  indicted  along  with  several  other 
priests,  not  on  the  recent  statutes,  but  on  that  of  25  Edvv. 
JII.,  for  compassing  and  imagining  the  queen's  death.  Noth- 
ing that  I  have  read  affords  the  slightest  proof  of  Campian's 
concern  in  treasonable  practices,  though  his  connections,  and 
profession  as  a  Jesuit,  render  it  by  no  means  unlikely.  If 
we  may  confide  in  the  published  trial,  the  prosecution  was  as 
unfairly  conducted,  and  supported  by  as  slender  evidence,  as 
any  perhaps  which  can  be  found  in  our  books.5  But  as  this 
account,  wherein  Campian's  language  is  full  of  a  dignified  elo- 
quence, rather  seems  to  have  been  compiled  by  a  partial 
hand,  its  faithfulness  may  not  be  above  suspicion.  For  the 
same  reason  I  hesitate  to  admit  his  alleged  declarations  at 
the  place  of  execution,  where,  as  well  as  at  his  trial,  he  is 
represented  to  have  expressly  acknowledged  Elizabeth,  and 
to  have  prayed  for  her  as  his  queen  de  facto  and  de  'jure. 
For  this  was  one  of  the  questions  propounded  to  him  before 
his  trial,  which  he  refused  to  answer,  in  such  a  manner  as 
betrayed  his  way  of  thinking.  Most  of  those  interrogated  at 
the  same  time,  on  being  pressed  whether  the  queen  was  their 

1  Camden.     Lingard.     Two  others  suf-    of  Sherwood's  age  is  not  mentioned  by 
fered  at  Tyburn  not  long  afterwards  for  ^  Stowe ;   nor  does  Dr.  Lingard  advert  to 
the    same    offence.      Hollingshed.    344.  "it.     No  woman  was  put  to  death  under 
See  in  Butler's  Mem.  of  Catholics,  vol.     the  penal   code,  so  far  as  I  remember; 
iii.  p.  382,  an  affecting  narrative  from     which  of  itself  distinguishes  the  perse- 
Dodd's  Church  History,  of  the  sufferings    cution  from   that  of  Mary,  and  of  the 
of  Mr.  Tregian  and  hi*  family,  the  geu-    house    of    Austria    in    Spain    and    the 
tleinan  whose  chaplain  Mayne  had  been.     Netherlands. 

I  see  no  cause  to  doubt  its  truth.  3  Strype's  Parker,  375. 

2  Kibadeneira,  Continuatio  Sanderi  et        *  Strype's  Annals,  ii.  644. 

Rishtoni  de  Sehismate  Anglicano,  p.  111.  5  State  Trials,  i.  1050  ;  from  the  PhoeniT 
Philopater,  p.  247.  This  circumstance  Britannicus. 


ELIZ.  — Catholics.    EXPLANATION  OF  BULL   OF  PIUS  V.      153 

lawful  sovereign,  whom  they  were  bound  to  obey,  notwith- 
standing any  sentence  of  deprivation  that  the  pope  might 
pronounce,  endeavored,  like  Campian,  to  evade  the  snare. 
A  few,  who  unequivocally  disclaimed  the  deposing  power  of 
the  Roman  see,  were  pardoned.1  It  is  more  honorable  to 
Campian's  memory  that  we  should  reject  these  pretended 
declarations  than  imagine  him  to  have  made  them  at  the 
expense  of  his  consistency  and  integrity.  For  the  pope's 
right  to  deprive  kings  of  their  crowns  was  in  that  age  the 
common  creed  of  the  Jesuits,  to  whose  order  Campian  be- 
longed ;  and  the  Continent  was  full  of  writings  published  by 
the  English  exiles,  by  Sanders,  Bristow,  Persons,  and  Allen, 
against  Elizabeth's  unlawful  usurpation  of  the  throne.  But 
many  availed  themselves  of  what  was  called  an  explanation 
of  the  bull  of  Pius  V.,  given  by  his  successor  Gregory  XIII., 
namely,  that  the  bull  should  be  considered  as  always  in  force 
against  Elizabeth  and  the  heretics,  but  should  only  be  bind- 
ing on  catholics  when  due  execution  of  it  could  be  had.2 

i  State  Trials,  i.  1078.   Butler's  English  p.  30.    The  writer  quoted  before  by  the 

Catholics,  i.  184.  244.     Lingard,  vii.  182;  name  of   Andreas    Philopater  (Persons, 

whose  remarks  are  just  and  candid.     A  translated    by    Cresswell,    according    to 

tract,  of  which  I  have  only  seen  an  Italian  Mr.  Butler,  vol.  iii.  p.  236),  after  justi- 

translation,  printed  at  Blacerata  in  1586,  fying  at  length    the  resistance   of   the 

entitled  Historia  del  glorioso  martirio  di  League  to  Henry  IV.,  adds  the  following 

diciotto    sacerdoti   e   un    secolans,    fatti  remarkable    paragraph :      "  tlinc   etiam 

morire  in  Inghilterra  per  la  confessione  infert  universa  theologorum  et  juriscon- 

e  difensione  della   fede  cattolica,  by  no  sultorum  schola,  et  est  certum  et  de  fide, 

means    asserts     that     he    acknowledged  quemcunque  principem  christianum,  si  a 

Elizabeth    to    be    queen    de    jure,    but  religione  catholica   manifesto  dettexerit, 

rather  that  he  refused  to  give  an  opinion  et  alios  avocare  voluerit,  excidere  statim 

as  to  her  right.     He  prayed  however  for  omni  potestate  et  dignitate,  ex  ipsa  vi 

her  as  a  queen.     "  lo  ho  pregato.  e  prego  juris  turn  divini  turn   humani,  hocque 

per  lei.     All'  ora  il  Signer   Howardo   li  ante  omnem  sententiam  supremi  pastoris 

domando  per  qual  regina  egli  pregasse,  ac   judicis    contra   ipsum    prolatam  ;    et 

Be  per  Eli<iabetta  ?     Al  quale  rispose,  Si,  subditos    quoscunque     liberos    esse    ab 

per  Elisabetta."     Mr.  Butler  quotes  this  omni  juramenti  obligation,  quod  ei  de 

tract  in  English.  obedientia    tanquam    principi    legitimo 

The  trials  and  deaths  of  Campian  and  prsestitissent ;    posseque    et    debere    (si 

his  associates  are  told  in  the  continuation  vires  habeant)  istiustnodi  hominern,  tan- 

of  Hollingshed   with  a  savageness  and  quam  apostatam,  hsereticum,  ao  Christ! , 

bigotry  which,  I  am  Tery  sure,  no  scribe  domini  desertorem,  et  inimicum  reipub- 


as  queen      See  particularly  p.  448,  for  fide  avertat."  —  p.  149.     He  quote^  four 

the    insulting    manner    in   which    this  authorities  for  this,  in  the  margin,  from 

writer  describes   the  pious  fortitude  of  the  works  of  divines  or  canonists, 

these  butchered  ecclesiastics.  This  broad  duty,   however,  of  expell- 

2  Strype,     ii.     637.        Butler's     Eng.  ing  a  heretic  sovereign,   he  qualifies  by 

Catholics,   i.   196.      The  earl  of  South-  two  conditions ;  first,  that  the  subjects 

ampton  asked  Mary's  ambassador,  bishop  should     have    the  -power,     "  ut    vires 

Lesley,  whether,  after  the  bull,  he  could  habeant     idoneas     ad     hoc     subditi ;" 

in    conscience    obey   Elizabeth.      Lesley  secondly,  that   the  heresy  be   undonia- 

answered,  that  as  long  as  she  was  the  ble.     There  can,  in  truth,  be  no  doubt 

Stronger  he  ought  to  obey  her.    Murden,  that    the    allegiance    professed    to    the 


154  USE  OF  TORTURE.  CHAP.  III. 

This  was  designed  to  satisfy  the  consciences  of  some  papists 
in  submitting  to  her  government,  and  taking  the  oath  of  al- 
legiance. But  in  thus  granting  a  permission  to  dissemble, 
in  hope  of  better  opportunity  for  revolt,  this  interpretation 
was  not  likely  to  tranquillize  her  council,  or  conciliate  them 
towards  the  Romish  party.  The  distinction,  however,  be- 
tween a  king  by  possession  and  one  by  right  was  neither 
heard  for  the  first  nor  for  the  last  time  in  the  reign  of  Eliza- 
beth. It  is  the  lot  of  every  government  that  is  not  founded 
on  the  popular  opinion  of  legitimacy  to  receive  only  a  pre- 
carious allegiance.  Subject  to  this  reservation,  which  was 
pretty  generally  known,  it  does  not  appear  that  the  priests 
or  other  Roman  catholics,  examined  at  various  times  during 
this  reign,  are  more  chargeable  with  insincerity  or  dissimula-" 
tion  than  accused  persons  generally  are. 

The  public  executions,  numerous  as  they  were,  scarcely 
form  the  most  odious  part  of  this  persecution.  The  common 
law  of  England  has  always  abhorred  the  accursed  mysteries 
of  a  prison-house,  and  neither  admits  of  torture  to  extort  con- 
fession, nor  of  any  penal  infliction  not  warranted  by  a  ju- 
dicial sentence.  But  this  law,  though  still  sacred  in  the 
courts  of  justice,  was  set  aside  by  the  privy  council  under 
the  Tudor  line.  The  rack  seldom  stood  idle  in  the  Tower 
for  all  the  latter  part  of  Elizabeth's  reign.1  To  those  who 
remember  the  annals  of  their  country,  that  dark  and  gloomy 
pile  affords  associations  not  quite  so  numerous  and  recent  as 
the  Bastile  once  did,  yet  enough  to  excite  our  hatred  and 
horror.  But  standing  as  it  does  in  such  striking  contrast  to 
the  fresh  and  flourishing  constructions  of  modern  wealth,  the 
proofs  and  the  rewards  of  civil  and  religious  liberty,  it  seems 
like  a  captive  tyrant,  reserved  to  grace  the  triumph  of  a  vie- 

queen     by    the    seminary    priests    and  the  puritans,  eager  as  they  were  to  exert 

Jesuit*,  and,  as  far  as   their  influence  the  utmost  severity  of  the  law  against 

extended,  by  all  catholics,  was  with  this  the  professors  of  the  old  religion,  had 

reservation — till   they  should  be  strong  more  regard  to  civil  liberty  than  to  ap- 

enough   to  throw  it  off.     See  the  same  prove  such  a  violation  of  it.     Beal,  clerk 

trv.t^p.  229.     But.  after  all,  when  we  of    the    council,   wrote,   about   1585,   a 

come  fairly  to  consider  it,  is  not  this  the  vehement    book    against    the    e-clesias- 

case  with  every  disaffected  party  in  every  tical  system,  from  which  Whitgift  picks 

state?  a  good  reason  for  watchfulness,  out  various  enormous  propositions,  .-is  ha 

but  none  for  extermination.  thinks  them;  one  of  which  is.   "  that  he 

*  Rishton   and  Ribadeneira.      See    in  condemns,    without    exception   of    any 

i.  note  U,  a»speciflcation  of  the  cause,  racking  of  grievous  offenders,  aa 

aitic-ront  kinds  of  torture   used  in  this  being  cruel,  barbarous,  contrary  to  law, 

reign,  and   unto   the   liberty  of    English  sub- 

The  government   did   not   pretend  to  jects."     Strype's  Whitgift,  p.  212. 
deny  the  employment  of  torture.    But 


ELIZ.  -Catholics.     DEFENCE  OF  THE  QUEEN.  155 

torious  republic,  and  should  teach  us  to  reflect  in  thankful- 
ness how  highly  we  have  been  elevated  in  virtue  and  hap- 
piness above  our  forefathers. 

Such  excessive  severities  under  the  pretext  of  treason,  but 
sustained  by  very  little  evidence  of  any  other  offence  than 
the  exercise  of  the  catholic  ministry,  excited  indignation 
throughout  a  great  part  of  Europe.  The  queen  was  held 
forth  in  pamphlets,  dispersed  everywhere  from  Rome  and 
Douay,  not  only  as  a  usurper  and  heretic,  but  a  tyrant  more 
ferocious  than  any  heathen  persecutor,  for  inadequate  paral- 
lels to  whom  they  ransacked  all  former  history.1  These 
exaggerations,  comingVfrom  the  very  precincts  of  the  In- 
quisition, required  the  unblushing  forehead  of  bigotry;  but 
the  charge  of  cruelty  stood  on  too  many  facts  to  be  passed 
over,  and  it  was  thought  expedient  to  repel  it  by  two  re- 
markable pamphlets,  both  ascribed  to  the  pen  of  lord  Bur- 
leigh.  One  of  these,  entitled  "  The  Execution  of  ^ 

DefciiC6  or 

Justice  in  England  for  Maintenance  of  public  and  the  queen, 
private  Peace,"  appears  to  have  been  published  in  £?  ^ur~ 
1583.     It  contains  an  elaborate  justification  of  the 
late  prosecutions  for  treason,  as  no  way  connected  with  re- 
ligious tenets,  but  grounded  on  the  ancient  laws  for  protec- 
tion of  the  queen's  person  and  government  from  conspiracy.- 

1  The  persecution  of  catholics  in  Eng-  note.    Surely  what  was  congenial  to  the 

land  was  made  use  of  as  an  argument  dark  malignity  of  Persons,  and  the  blind 

against  permitting  Henry  IV.  to  reign  in  frenzy  of  \Vhitaker,  does  not  become  the 

France,    as    appears    by  the  title  of   a  good  sense,  I  cannot  say  the  candor,  of 

tract  published  in  1586 :   Avertissement  this  writer. 

des    catholiques    Anglois    aux  Francois  It  is  true  that  some,  not  prejudiced 

catholiques,   du  danger  ou   ils  sont  de  against  Elizabeth,  have  doubted  whether 

perdre  leur  religion,  et  d'experimenter,  ''  Cupid's  fiery  dart "  was  as  effectually 

commeen  Angleterre,  la  cruaute  des  min-  "quenched  in  the  chaste  beams  of  the 

istres,  s'ils  recoivent  a  la  couronne  un  watery   moon"    as   her  poet  intimates, 

roy  qui  soit  heretique.    It  is  in  the  Brit-  This  I  must  leave  to  the  reader's  judg- 

ish  Museum,  ment.  She  certainly  went  strange  lengths 

One  of  the  attacks  on  Elizabeth  de-  of  indelicacy.    But,  if  she  might  sacrifice 

serves  some  notice,  as  it  has  lately  been  herself  to  the  queen  of  Cnidus  and  Pa/, 

revived.    In  the  statute  13  Eliz.  an  ex-  phos,  she  was  unmercifully  severe  to  those 

pression  is  used,  "  her  majesty,  and  the  about  her,  of  both  sexes,  who  showed  any 

natural  issue  of  her  body,"  instead  of  the  inclination  to  that  worship,  though  un- 

more  common  legak  phrase,  "  lawful  is-  der  the  escort  of  Hymen.     Miss  Aikin,  in 

sue."     This  probably  was  adopted  by  the  her  well-written  and  interesting  Memoirs 

queen  out  of  prudery,  as  if  the  usual  of  the  Court  of  Elizabeth,  has  collected 

term  implied  'the  possibility  of  her  having  several  instances  from  Harrington  and 

unlawful  issue.    But  the  papistical  libel-  Birch.     It  is  by  no  means  true,  as  Dr. 

lers,  followed  by  an  absurd  advocate  of  Lingard    asserts,   on    the    authority  of 

Mary  iu  later  times,  put  the  mast  absurd  one  Faunt,  an  austere  puritan,  that  her 

interpretation  on  the  word  "  natural,"  as  court   was    dissolute,   comparatively    at 

if  it  wore  meant  to  secure  the  succession  least  with  the  general  character  of  courts; 

for  some  imaginary  bastards  by  Leicester,  though  neither  was  it  so  virtuous  as  the 

And  Dr.  Lingard  is  not  ashamed  to  insin-  enthusiasts  of  the    Elizabethan    period 

uate  the  game  suspicion,  rol.  viii.  p.  81,  suppose. 


156  LORD  BURLEIGH.  CHAP.  Ill, 

It  is  alleged  that  a  vast  number  of  catholics,  whether  of  the 
laity  or  priesthood,  among  whom  the  deprived  bishops  are 
particularly  enumerated,  had  lived  unmolested  on  the  score 
of  their  faith,  because  they  paid  due  temporal  allegiance  to 
their  sovereign.'  Nor  were  any  indicted  for  treason  but  such 
as  obstinately  maintained  the  pope's  bull  depriving  the  queen 
of  her  crown.  And  even  of  these  offenders,  as  many  as 
after  condemnation  would  renounce  their  traitorous  principles 
had  been  permitted  to  live  ;  such  was  her  majesty's  unwilling- 
ness, it  is  asserted,  to  have  any  blood  spilled  without  this  just 
and  urgent  cause  proceeding  from  themselves.  But  that  any 
matter  of  opinion  not  proved  to  hav^g  ripened  into  an  overt 
act,  and  extorted  only,  or  rather  conjectured,  through  a  com- 
pulsive inquiry,  could  sustain  in  law  or  justice  a  conviction 
for  high  treason,  is  what  the  author  of  this  pamphlet  has  not 
rendered  manifest.1 

A  second  and  much  shorter  paper  bears  for  title,  "A  Dec- 
laration of  the  favorable  dealing  of  her  Majesty's  Commis- 
sioners appointed  for  the  examination  of  certain  traitors,  and 
of  tortures  unjustly  reported  to  be  done  upon  them  for  mat- 
ter of  religion."  Its  scope  was  to  palliate  the  imputation  of 
excessive  cruelty  with  which  Europe  was  then  resounding. 
-Those  who  revere  the  memory  of  lord  Burleigh  must  blush 
for  this  pitiful  apology.  "It  is  affirmed  for  truth,"  he  says, 
"  that  the  forms  of  torture  in  their  severity  or  rigor  of  exe- 
cution have  not  been  such  and  in  such  manner  performed  as 
the  slanderers  and  seditious  libellers  have  published.  And 
that  even  the  principal  offender,  Campian  himself,  who  was 
sent  and  came  from  Rome,  and  continued  here  in  sundry 
corners  of  the  realm,  having  secretly  wandered  in  the  great- 
er part  of  the  shires  of  England  in  a  disguised  suit,  to  the  in- 
tent to  make  special  preparation  of  treasons,  was  never  so 
racked  but  that  he  was  perfectly  able  to  walk  and  to  write, 
and  did  presently  write  and  subscribe  all  his  confessions. 
The  queen's  servants,  the  warders,  whose  office  and  act  it  is 
to  handle  the  rack,  were  ever  by  those  that  attended  the  ex- 
aminations specially  charged  to  use  it  in  so  charitable  a  man- 

1  Sowers  Tracts,  1.  189.  Strype.  iii.  lost  his  right  hand.  An  Italian  transla- 
205.265.480.  Strype  says  that  he  had  tion  of  the  Execution  of  Justice  was  pub- 
seen  the  manuscript  of  this  tract  in  lord  Hshed  at  London  in  1584.  This  shows 
Burleigh's  handwriting.  It  was  an-  how  anxious  the  queen  was  to  repel  the 
swered  by  cardinal  Allen,  to  whom  a  re-  charges  of  cruelty,  which  she  must  have 
ply  was  made  by  poor  Stubbe  after  he  had  felt  to  be  not  wholly  unfounded. 


ELIZ.  —  Catholics.        OATH  OF  SUPREMACY.  157 

ner  as  such  a  thing  might  be.  None  of  those  who  were  at 
any  time  put  to  the  rack,"  he  proceeds  to  assert,  "  were  asked, 
during  their  torture,  any  question  as  to  points  of  doctrine,  but 
merely  concerning  their  plots  and  conspiracies,  and  the  per- 
sons with  whom  they  had  had  dealings,  and  what  was  their 
own  opinion  as  to  the  pope's  right  to  deprive  the  queen  of  her 
crown.  Nor  was  any  one  so  racked  until  it  was  rendered 
evidently  probable,  by  former  detections  or  confessions,  that 
he  was  guilty ;  nor  was  the  torture  ever  employed  to  wring 
out  confessions  at  random ;  nor  unless  the  party  had  first 
refused  to  declare  the  truth  at  the  queen's  commandment." 
Such  miserable  excuses  serve  only  to  mingle  contempt  with 
our  detestation.1  But  it  is  due  to  Elizabeth  to  observe  that 
she  ordered  the  torture  to  be  disused ;  and  upon  a  subse- 
quent occasion,  the  quartering  of  some  concerned  in  Babing- 
ton's  conspiracy  having  been  executed  with  unusual  cruelty, 
gave  directions  that  the  rest  should  not  be  taken  down  from 
the  gallows  until  they  were  dead.2 

I  should  be  reluctant,  but  for  the  consent  of  several  au- 
thorities, to  ascribe  this  little  tract  to  lord  Burleigh  for  his 
honor's  sake.  But  we  may  quote  with  more  satisfaction  a 
memorial  addressed  by  him  to  the  queen  about  the  same 
year,  1583,  full  not  only  of  sagacious,  but  just  and  tolerant 
advice.  "  Considering,"  he  says,  "  that  the  urging  of  the 
oath  of  supremacy  must  needs,  in  some  degree,  beget  de- 
spair, since,  in  the  taking  of  it,  he  [the  papist]  must  eithef 
think  he  doth  an  unlawful  act,  as  without  the  special  grace 
of  God  he  cannot  think  otherwise,  or  else,  by  refusing  it, 
must  become  a  traitor,  which  before  some  hurt  done  seemeth 
hard ;  I  humbly  submit  this  to  your  excellent  consideration, 
whether,  with  as  much  security  of  your  majesty's  person  and 
state,  and  more  satisfaction  for  them,  it  were  not  better  to 
leave  the  oath  to  this  sense,  that  whosoever  would  not  bear 
arms  against  all  foreign  princes,  and  namely  the  pope,  that 
should  any  way  invade  your  majesty's  dominions,  he  should 
be  a  traitor.  For  hereof  this  commodity  will  ensue,  that  those 
papists,  as  I  think  most  papists  would,  that  should  take  this 
oath,  would  be  divided  from  the  great  mutual  confidence  which 
is  now  between  the  pope  and  them,  by  i-eason  of  their  afflic- 
tions for  him ;  and  such  priests  as  would  refuse  that  oath, 

1  Somers  Tracts,  p.  209  »  State  Trials,  1.  1160. 


158  MEANS  FOR  KEEPING  DOWN  POPEKY.     CHAP.  III. 

then  no  tongue  could  say  for  shame  that  they  suffer  for  re- 
ligion, if  they  did  suffer. 

"  But  here  it  may  be  objected,  they  would  dissemble  and 
equivocate  with  this  oath,  and  that  the  pope  would  dispense 
with  them  in  that  case.  Even  so  may  they  with  the  present 
oath  both  dissemble  and  equivocate,  and  also  have  the  pope's 
dispensation  for  the  present  oath  as  well  as  for  the  other. 
But  this  is  certain,  that  whomsoever  the  conscience,  or  fear 
of  breaking  an  oath,  doth  bind,  him  would  that  oath  bind. 
And  that  they  make  conscience  of  an  oath,  the  trouble,  losses, 
and  disgraces  that  they  suffer  for  refusing  the  same  do  suffi- 
ciently testify ;  and  you  know  that  the  perjury  of  either 
oath  is  equal." 

These  sentiments  are  not  such  as  bigoted  theologians  were 
then,  or  have  been  since,  accustomed  to  entertain.  "  I  ac- 
count," he  says  afterwards,  "  that  putting  to  death  does  no 
ways  lessen  them  ;  since  we  find  by  experience  that  it  work- 
eth  no  such  effect,  but,  like  hydro's  heads,  upon  cutting  off 
one,  seven  grow  up,  persecution  being  accounted  as  the 
badge  of  the  church :  and  therefore  they  should  never  have 
the  honor  to  take  any  pretence  of  martyrdom  in  England, 
where  the  fulness  of  blood  and  greatness  of  heart  is  such  that 
they  will  even  for  shameful  things  go  bravely  to  death,  much 
more  when  they  think  themselves  to  climb  heaven ;  and  this 
vice  of  obstinacy  seems  to  the  common  people  a  divine  con- 
stancy ;  so  that  for  my  part  I  wish  no  lessening  of  their 
number  but  by  preaching  and  by  education  of  the  young- 
er under  schoolmasters."  And  hence  the  means  he  recom- 
mends for  keeping  down  popery,  after  the  encouragement  of 
diligent  preachers  and  schoolmasters,  are,  "  the  taking  order 
that,  from  the  highest  counsellor  to  the  lowest  constable, 
none  shall  have  any  charge  or  office  but  such  as  will  really 
piv.y  and  communicate  in  their  congregation  according  to  the 
doctrine  received  generally  into  this  realm  ; "  and  next  the 
protection  of  tenants  against  their  popish  landlords,  "  that 
they  be  not  put  out  of  their  living  for  embracing  the  estab- 
lished religion."  "  This,"  he  says,  "  would  greatly  bind  the 
commons'  hearts  unto  you,  in  whom  indeed  consisteth  the 
power  and  strength  of  your  realm ;  and  it  will  make  them 
less,  or  nothing  at  all,  depend  on  their  landlords.  And,  al- 
though there  may  hereby  grow  some  wrong,  which  the  ten- 
ants upon  that  confidence  may  offer  to  their  landlords,  yet 


ELIZ.  — Catholics.        INCREASED  SEVEKITY.  159 

those  wrongs  are  very  easily,  even  with  one  wink  of  your 
majesty's,  redressed ;  and  are  nothing  comparable  to  the 
danger  of  having  many  thousands  depending  on  the  adverse 
"party."  1 

The  strictness  used  with  recusants,  which  much  increased 
from  1579  or  1580,  had  the  usual  consequence  of 
persecution,  that  of  multiplying  hypocrites.  For,  severity  of 
in  fact,  if  men  will  once  bring  themselves  to  com-  the  g°vern- 
ply,  to  take  all  oaths,  to  practise  all  conformity,  to 
oppose  simulation  and  dissimulation  to  arbitrary  inquiries,  it 
is  hardly  possible  that  any  government  should  not  be  baffled. 
Fraud  becomes  an  over-match  for  power.  The  real  danger 
meanwhile,  the  internal  disaffection,  remains  as  before  or  is 
aggravated.  The  laws  enacted  against  popery  were  pre- 
cisely calculated  to  produce  this  result.  Many  indeed,  espe- 
cially of  the  female  sex,  whose  religion,  lying  commonly 
more  in  sentiment  than  reason,  is  less  ductile  to  the  sophisms 
of  worldly  wisdom,  stood  out  and  endured  the  penalties. 
But  the  oath  of  supremacy  was  not  refused,  the  worship  of 
the  church  was  frequented  by  multitudes  who  secretly  re- 
pined for  a  change ;  and  the  council,  whose  fear  of  open 
enmity  had  prompted  their  first  severities,  were  led  on  by 
the  fear  of  dissembled  resentment  to  devise  yet  further  meas- 
ures of  the  same  kind.  Hence,  in  1584  a  law  was  enacted, 
enjoining  all  Jesuits,  seminary  priests,  and  other  priests, 
whether  ordained  within  or  without  the  kingdom,  to  depart 
from  it  within  forty  days,  on  pain  of  being  adjudged  traitors. 
The  penalty  of  fine  and  imprisonment  at  the  queen's  pleasure 
was  inflicted  on  such  as,  knowing  any  priest  to  be  within  the 
realm,  should  not  discover  it  to  a  magistrate.  This  seemed 
to  fill  up  the  measure  of  persecution,  and  to  render  the 
longer  -  preservation  of  this  obnoxious  religion  absolutely 
impracticable.  Some  of  its  adherents  presented  a  petition 
against  this  bill,  praying  that  they  might  not  be  suspected  of 
djsloyalty  on  account  of  refraining  from  the  public  worship, 
which  they  did  to  avoid  sin ;  and  that  their  priests  might 
not  be  banished  fr«m  the  kingdom.2  And  they  all  very 
justly  complained  of  this  determined  oppression.  The 
queen,  without  any  fault  of  theirs,  they  alleged,  had  been 

1  Somers  Tracts,  J.C4.  p  oyed  by  Burleigh,  was  taken  up  and 

*  Strype,   iii.    298.      Shelley,    though    examined  before  the  council  for  prepar 
notoriously   loyal,   and    frequently  em-    ing  this  petition. 


160  CONSPIRACIES  AGAINST  ELIZABETH.      CHAP.  III. 

alienated  by  the  artifices  of  .Leicester  and  Walsingham. 
Snares  were  laid  to  involve  them  unawares  in  the  guilt  of 
treason ;  their  steps  were  watched  by  spies ;  and  it  was 
become  intolerable  to  continue  in  England.  Camden  indeed 
asserts  that  counterfeit  letters  were  privately  sent  in  the 
name  of  the  queen  of  Scots  or  of  the  exiles,  and  left  in 
papists'  houses.1  A  general  inquisition  seems  to  have  been 
made  about  this  time ;  but  whether  it  was  founded  on  suffi- 
cient grounds  of  previous  suspicion  we  cannot  absolutely 
determine.  The  earl  of  Northumberland,  brother  of  him 
who  had  been  executed  for  the  rebellion  of  1570,  and  the 
earl  of  Arundel,  son  of  the  unfortunate  duke  of  Norfolk, 
were  committed  to  the  Tower,  where  the  former  put  an  end 
to  his  own  life  (for  we  cannot  charge  the  government  with 
an  unproved  murder)  ;  and  the  second,  after  being  condemned 
for  a  traitorous  correspondence  with  the  queen's  enemies, 
died  in  that  custody.  But  whether  or  no  some  conspiracies 
(I  mean  more  active  than  usual,  for  there  was  one  perpetual 
conspiracy  of  Rome  and  Spain  during  most  of  the  queen's 
reign)  had  preceded  these  severe  and  unfair  methods  by 
which  her  ministry  counteracted  them,  it  was  not  long  before 
schemes  more  formidable  than  ever  were  put  in  action 
against  her  life.  As  the  whole  body  of  catholics  was  irri- 
tated and  alarmed  by  the  laws  of  proscription  against  their 
clergy,  and  by  the  heavy  penalties  on  recusancy,  which,  as 
they  alleged,  showed  a  manifest  purpose  to  reduce  them  to 
poverty ; 2  so  some  desperate  men  saw  no  surer  means  to 
rescue  their  cause  than  the  queen's  assassination.  One 
Somerville,  half  a  lunatic,  and  Parry,  a  man  who,  long  em- 

1  P.  591.     Proofs  of  the  text  are  too  than   the  charges.     But  ministers  who 

numerous  for  quotation,  and  occur  con-'  employ  spies,  without   the  utmost  dis- 

tinually  to  a  reader  of  Strype's  2d  and  trust  of  their  information,  are  sure  to 

8'1   volumes.      In  vol.  iii.  Append.  158,  become  their  dupes,  and  end  by  the  mos 

we  have  a  letter  to  the  queen  from  cue  violent  injustice  and  tyranny. 
Antony  Tyrrel,  a  priest,  who   seems  to        2  The   rich   catholics  compounded  for 

have  'acted  as  an  informer,  wherein  he  their    recusancy   by  annual    payments, 

declares  all  his  accusations  of  catholics  which   were  of   some    consideration    ta 

to  be  false.     This  man  had  formerly  pro-  the   queen's  rather  scanty  revenue.     A 

fessed  himself  a  protestant,  and  returned  list  of  such  recusants,  and  of  the  annual 

afterwards  to  the  same  religion  ;  so  that  fines  p;vid  by  them  in  1594,  is  published 

his  veracity  may  be  dubious.     So,  a  little  in  Strype,  iv.  197;   but  is  plainly  very 

further  on,  we  find  in  the  same  collec-  imperfect.     The  total  was  332$.  Is.  lOrf 

tion,  p.  250,  a  letter  from  one  Bennet,  a  A  few  paid  as  much  as  1401.  per  annum, 

priest,  to   lord  Arundel,  lamenting   the  The  average  seems  however  to  have  been 

false  accusations  he  had  given  in  against  about  20/.      Vol.   iii.  Append.   153;   see 

him,  and  craving  pardon.     It  is  always  also   p.   258.      Probably   these  composi- 

possible,  as   I   have   just    hinted,   that  tions,  though  oppressive,  were  not  quite 

these    retractations  may  be   more  false  so  serious  as  the  catholics  pretended. 


ELIZ.  —  Catholics.    SOMERVILLE  AND  PARRY. 


1G1 


ployed  as  a  Fpy  upon  the  papists,  had  learned  to  serve  with 
(sincerity  those  he  was  sent  to  betray,  were  the  first  who  suf- 
fered death  for  unconnected  plots  against  Elizabeth's  life.1 
More  deep-laid  machinations  were  carried  on  Hby  several 
catholic  laymen  at  home  and  abroad,  among  whom  a  brother 
of  lord  Paget  was  the  most  prominent.2  These  had  in  view 
two  objects,  the  deliverance  of  Mary  and  the  death  of  her 
enemy.  Some  perhaps  who  were  engaged  in  the  former 
project  did  not  give  countenance  to  the  latter.  But  few, 


1  Parry  seems  to  have  been  privately 
reconciled  to  the  church  of  Rome  about 
1580;  after  which  he  continued  to  cor- 
respond with  Cecil,  but  generally  recom- 
mending some  catholics  to  mercy.  He 
Bays,  in  one  letter,  that  a  book  printed 
at  Home.  De  Persecutione  Auglieana, 
h;id  raised  a  barbarous  opinion  of  our 
cruelty ;  and  that  he  could  wish  that  in 
those  cases  it  might  please  her  majesty 
to  pardon  the  dismembering  and  draw- 
ing. Strype,  iii.  260.  lie  sat  afterwards 
in  the  parliament  of  1584,  taking  of 
course  the  oath  of  supremacy,  where  he 
alone  opposed  the  act  against  catholic 
priests.  Parl.  Hist.  822.  Whether  he 
were  actually  guilty  of  plotting  against 
the  queen's  life  (for  this  part  of  his 
treason  he  denied  at  the  scaffold),  I  can- 
not say ;  but  his  speech  there  made  con- 
tained some  very  good  advice  to  her. 
The  ministry  garbled  this  before  its 
publication  in  Hollingshed  and  other 
books;  but  Strype  has  preserved  a 
genuine  copy  ;  vol.  iii.  Append.  102.  It 
is  plain  that  Parry  died  a  catholic; 
though  some  late  writers  of  that  com- 
munion have  tried  to  disclaim  him.  Dr. 
Lingard,  it  may  be  added,  admits  that 
there  were  many  schemes  to  assassinate 
Elizabeth,  though  he  will  not  confess 
any  particular  instance.  "  There  exist," 
he  says,  *'  in  trie  archives  at  Simancas 
several  notices  of  such  offers. "  P.  384. 

4  It  might  be  inferred  from  some  au- 
thorities tiiat  the  catholics  had  become 
in  a  great  degree  disaffected  to  the  queen 
about  1584,  in  consequence  of  the  ex- 
treme rigor  practised  against  them.  In 
a  memoir  Of  one  Crichton,  a  Scots 
Jesuit,  intended  to  show  the  easiness  of 
invading  England,  tie  says  that  "all  the 
catholics  without  exception  favor  the 
enterprise ;  first,  for  the  sake  of  the 
restitution  of  the  catholic  faith;  sec- 
ondly, for  the  right  and  interest  which 
the  queen  of  Scots  has  to  the  kingdom, 
and  to  deliver  her  out  of  prison ;  thirdly, 
for  the  great  trouble  and  misery  the}7  en- 
dured more  and  more,  being  kept  out 
of  all  employments,  and  dishonored  in 
VOL.  I. C.  11 


their  own  countries,  and  treated  with 
great  injustice  and  partiality  when  they 
have  need  to  recur  to  law ;  and  also  tor 
the  execution  of  the  laws  touching  the 
confiscation  of  their  goods  in  such  sort 
as  in  so  short  time  would  reduce  the 
catholics  to  extreme  poverty."  Strype, 
iii.  415.  And  in  the  report  of  the  earl 
of  Northumberland's  treasons,  laid  be- 
fore the  star-chamber,  we  read  that 
"  Throckmorton  said  that  the  bottom 
of  this  enterprise,  which  was  not  to  be 
known  to  many,  was,  that  if  a  toleration 
of  religion  might  not  be  obtained  with- 
out alteration  of  the  government,  that 
then  the  government  should  be  altered, 
and  the  queen,  removed."  Somers 
Tracts,  vol.  i.  p.  206.  Further  proofs 
that  the  rigor  used  towards  the  catholics 
was  the  great  means  of  promoting 
Philip's  designs,  occur  in  Birch's  Me- 
moirs of  Elizabeth,  i.  82,  et  alibi. 

We  have  also  a  letter  from  Persons  in 
England  to  Allen  in  1586,  giving  a  good 
account  of  the  zeal  of  the  catholics, 
though  a  very  bad  one  of  their  con- 
dition through  severe  imprisonment  and 
other  ill  treatment.  Strype,  iii.  412, 
arid  Append.  151.  Rishtou  and  Riba- 
deneira  bear  testimony  that  the  persecu- 
tion had  rendered  the  laity  more  zealous 
and  sincere.  De  Schismate,  1,  iii.  S20, 
and  1,  iv.  53. 

Yet  to  all  this  we  may  oppose  their 
good  conduct  in  the  year  of  the  Spanish 
Armada,  and  in  general  during  the 
queen's  reign ;  which  proves  that  the 
loyalty  of  the  main  body  was  more  firm 
than  their  leaders  wished,  or  their 
enemies  believed.  However,  if  any  of 
my  readers  should  incline  to  suspect 
that  there  was  more  disposition  among 
this  part  of  the  community  to  throw  off 
their  allegiance  to  the  queen  altogether 
than  I  have  admitted,  he  may  pos.Mbly 
be  in  the  right ;  and  I  shall  not  impugn 
his  opinion,  provided  he  concurs  in 
attributing  the  whole,  or  nearly  thfi 
whole,  of  this  disaffection  to  her  un- 
just aggressious  on  the  liberty  of  con- 
science. 


1 62  PROTESTANT  HATRED   OF  MARY.          CHAP.  TIL 

if  any,  ministers  have  been  better  served  by  their  spies  than 
Cecil  and  Walsingham.  It  is  surprising  to  see  how  every 
letter  seems  to  have  been  intercepted,  every  thread  of  these 
conspiracies  unravelled,  every  secret  revealed  to  these  wise 
councillors  of  the  queen.  They  saw  that,  while  one  lived 
whom  so  many  deemed  the  presumptive  heir,  and  from 
whose  succession  they  anticipated,  at  least  in  possibility,  an 
entire  reversal  of  all  that  had  been  wrought  for  thirty 
years,  the  queen  was  as  a  mark  for  the  pistol  or  dagger  of 
every  zealot.  And  fortunate,  no  question,  they  thought  it, 
that  the  detection  of  Babington's  conspiracy  enabled  them 
with  truth,  or  a  semblance  of  truth,  to  impute  a  participation 
in  that  crime  to  the  most  dangerous  enemy  whom,  for  their 
mistress,  their  religion,  or  themselves,  they  had  to  appre- 
hend. 

Mary  had  now  consumed  the  best  years  of  her  life  in 
custody,  and,  though  still  the  perpetual  object  of 
the  queen's  vigilance,  had  perhaps  gradually  be- 
come somewhat  less  formidable  to  the  protestant  interest. 
Whether  she  would  have  ascended  the  throne  if  Elizabeth 
had  jdied  during  the  latter  years  of  her  imprisonment  must 
appear  very  doubtful  when  we  consider  the  increasing 
strength  of  the  puritans,  the  antipathy  of  the  nation  to 
Spain,  the  prevailing  opinion  of  her  consent  to  Darnley's 
murder,  and  the  obvious  expedient  of  treating  her  son,  now 
advancing  to  manhood,  as  the  representative  of  her  claim. 
The  new  projects  imputed  to  her  friends,  even  against  the 
queen's  life,  exasperated  the  hatred  of  the  protestants  against 
Mary.  An  association  was  formed  in  ]  584,  the  members  of 
which  bound  themselves  by  oath  "  to  withstand  and  pursue, 
as  well  by  force  of  arms  as  by  all  other  means  of  revenge, 
all  manner  of  persons,  of  whatsoever  state  they  shall  be, 
and  their  abettors,  that  shall  attempt  any  act,  or  counsel  or 
consent  to  anything,  that  shall  tend  to  the  harm  of  her  maj- 
esty's royal  person;  and  never  to  desist  from  all  manner 
of  forcible  pursuit  against  such  persons,  to  the  utter  exter- 
mination of  them,  their  counsellors,  aiders,  and  abettors. 
And  if  any  such  wicked  attempt  against  her  most  royal  per- 
son shall  be  taken  in  hand  or  procured,  whereby  any  that 
'  have,  may,  or  shall  pretend  title  to  come  to  this  crown  by 
the  untimely  death  of  her  majesty  so  wickedly  procured 
(which  God  of  his  mercy  forbid !),  that  the  same  may  be 


ELIJ,.-- Catholics.    VOLUNTARY  ASSOCIATION  OF  1584.     163 

avenged,  we  do  not  only  bind  ourselves  both  jointly  and 
severally  never  to  allow,  accept,  or  favor  any  such  pretended 
successor,  by  whom  or  for  whom  any  such  detestable  act 
shall  be -attempted  or  committed,  as  unworthy  of  all  govern 
ment  in  any  Christian  realm  or  civil  state,  but  do  also  further 
vow  and  promise,  as  we  are  most  bound,  and  that  til  the 
presence  of  the  eternal  and  everlasting  God,  to  prosecute  such 
person  or  persons  to  death  with  our  joint  and  particular 
forces,  and  to  act  the  utmost  revenge  upon  them  that  by  any 
means  we  or  any  of  us  can  devise  and  do,  or  cause  to  be 
devised  and  done,  for  their  utter  overthrow  and  extirpa- 
tion."1 

The  pledge  given  by  this  voluntary  association  received 
the  sanction  of  parliament  in  an  act  "  for  the  security  of  the 
queen's  person  and  continuance  of  the  realm  in  peace." 
This  statute  enacts,  that  if  any  invasion  or  rebellion  should 
be  made  by  or  for  any  person  pretending  title  to  the  crown 
after  her  majesty's  decease,  or  if  anything  be  confessed  or 
imagined  tending  to  the  hurt  of  her  person,  with  the  privity 
of  any  such  person,  a  number  of  peers,  privy  councillors,  and 
judges,  to  be  commissioned  by  the  queen,  should  examine 
and  give  judgment  on  such  offences,  and  all  circumstances 
relating  thereto ;  after  which  judgment  all  persons  against 
whom  it  should  be  published  should  be  disabled  forever  to 
make  any  such  claim.2  I  omit  some  further  provisions  to 
the  same  effect  for  the  sake  of  brevity.  But  we  may  remark 
that  this  statute  differs  from  the  associators'  engagement  in 
omitting  the  outrageous  threat  of  pursuing  to  death  any  per- 
son, whether  privy  or  not  to  the  design,  on  whose  behalf  an 
attempt  against  the  queen's  life  should  be  made.  The  main 
intention  of  the  statute  was  to  procure,  in  the  event  of  any 
rebellious  movements,  what  the  queen's  councillors  had  long 
ardently  desired  to  obtain  from  her,  an  absolute  exclusion  of 
Mary  from  the  succession.  But  if  the  scheme  of  assassina- 
tion devised  by  some  of  her  desperate  partisans  had  taken 
effect,  however  questionable  might  be  her  concern  in  it,  I 
have  little  doubt  that  the  rage  of  the  nation  would,  with  or 
without  some  process  of  law,  have  instantly  avenged  it  in 
her  blood.  This  was,  in  the  language  of  parliament,  their 
great  cause ;  an  expression  which,  though  it  may  have  an 

1  State  Trials,  i.  1162.  *  27  Elis.  c.  I. 


164  EXECUTION  OF  MARY.  CHAP.  III. 

ultimate  reference  to  the  general  interest  of  religion,  is  never 
applied,  so  far  as  I  remember,  but  to  the  punishment  of 
Mary,  which  they  had  demanded  in  1572,  and  now  clamored 
for  in  1586.  The  addresses  of  both  houses  to  the  queen  to 
carry  the  sentence  passed  by  the  commissioners  into  effect, 
her  evasive  answers  and  feigned  reluctance,  as  well  as  the 
strange  scenes  of  hypocrisy  which  she  acted  afterwards,  are 
well-known  matters  of  history  upon  which  it  is  unnecessary 
to  dwell.  No  one  will  be  found  to  excuse  the  hollow  affecta- 
tion of  Elizabeth;  but  the  famous  sentence  that  brought 
Execution  Mary  to  the  scaffold,  though  it  has  certainly  left 
of  Mary.  jn  popular  opinion  a  darker  stain  on  the  queen's 
memory  than  any  other  transaction  of  her  life,  if  not  capa- 
ble of  complete  vindication  has  at  least  encountered  a  dis- 
proportioned  censure. 

It  is  of  course  essential  to  any  kind  of  apology  for  Eliza- 
Remarks  beth  in  this  matter  that  Mary  should  have  been 
upon  it.  assenting  to  a  conspiracy  against  her  life.  For  it 
could  be  no  real  crime  to  endeavor  at  her  own  deliverance ; 
nor,  under  the  circumstances  of  so  long  and  so  unjust  a  de- 
tention, would  even  a  conspiracy  against  the  aggressor's 
power  afford  a  moral  justification  for  her  death.  But  though 
the  proceedings  against  her  are  by  no  means  exempt  from 
the  shameful  breach  of  legal  rules  almost  universal  in  trials 
for  high  treason  during  that  reign  (the  witnesses  not  having 
been  examined  in  open  court),  yet  the  depositions  of  her  two 
secretaries,  joined  to  the  confessions  of  Babington  and  other 
conspirators,  form  a  body  of  evidence,  not  indeed  irresistibly 
convincing,  but  far  stronger  than  we  find  in  many  instances 
•where  condemnation  has  ensued.  And  Hume  has  alleged 
sufficient  reasons  for  believing  its  truth,  derived  from  the 
great  probability  of  her  concurring  in  any  scheme  against 
her  oppressor,  from  the  certainty  of  her  long  correspondence 
•with  the  conspirators  (who,  I  may  add,  had  not  made  any 
difficulty  of  hinting  to  her  their  designs  against  the  queen's 
life),1  and  from  the  deep  guilt  that  the"  falsehood  of  the 


ELIZ.  — Catholics,     AMENABILITY  TO  JURISDICTION.  165 

charge  must  inevitably  attach  to  sir  Francis  Walsingham.1 
Those  at  least  who  cannot  acquit  the  queen  of  Scots  of  her 
husband's  murder,  will  hardly  imagine  that  she  would  scruple 
to  concur  in  a  crime  so  much  more  capable  of  extenuation, 
and  so  much  more  essential  to  her  interests.  But  as  the 
proofs  are  not  perhaps  complete,  we  must  hypothetically 
assume  her  guilt,  in  order  to  set  this  famous  problem  in  the 
casuistry  of  public  law  upon  its  proper  footing. 

It  has  been  said  so  often  that  few  perhaps  wait  to  reflec 
whether  it  has  been  said  with  reason  that  Mary,  as  an  inde- 
pendent sovereign,  was  not  amenable  to  any  English  juris- 
diction. This,  however,  does  not  appear  unquestionable. 
By  one  of  those  principles  of  law  which  may  be  called 
natural,  as  forming  the  basis  of  a  just  and  rational  jurispru- 
dence, every  independent  government  is  supreme  within  its 
own  territory.  Strangers,  voluntarily  resident  within  a  state, 
owe  a  temporary  allegiance  to  its  sovereign,  and  are  amena- 
ble to  the  jurisdiction  of  its  tribunals ;  and  this  principle, 
which  is  perfectly  conformable  to  natural  law,  has  been  ex- 
tended by  positive  usage  even  to  those  who  are  detained  in 
it  by  force.  Instances  have  occurred  very  recently  in  Eng- 
land when  prisoners  of  war  have  suffered  death  for  criminal 
offences ;  and,  if  some  have  doubted  the  propriety  of  carry- 
ing such  sentences  into  effect,  where  a  penalty  of  unusual 
severity  has  been  inflicted  by  our  municipal  law,  few,  I  be- 
lieve, would  dispute  the  fitness  of  punishing  a  prisoner  of 
war  for  wilful  murder  in  such  a  manner  as  the  general  prac- 
tice of  civil  societies  and  the  prevailing  sentiments  of  man- 
advert  to  this  hint,  hut  mentions  Babing-  tioned  (though  it  is  so  in  the  Biog.  Brit., 
ton  as  in  correspondence  with  her.  At  art.  WALSINGHAM,  note  0),  it  will  be  dif- 
her  trial  she  denied  all  communication  ficult  to  give  him  credit  for  any  scrupu- 
with  him.  [In  a  letter  from  Persons  to  lousness  with  respect  to  Mary.  But, 
a  Spanish  nobleman,  in  1597,  it  is  said  without  entirely  justifying  this  letter,  it 
that  Mary  had  reproved  the  duke  of  is  proper  to  remark,  what  the  Marian 
Quise  and  archbishop  of  Glasgow  for  party  choose  to  overlook,  that  it  was  writ- 
oniitting  to  supply  a  sum  of  money  to  ten  after  the  sentence,  during  the  queen's 
a  young  English  gentleman  who  had  odious  scenes  of  grimace,  when  some 
promised  to  murder  Elizabeth.  This,  might  argue,  though  erroneously,  that, 
however,  rests  only  on  Person's  author-  a  legal  trial  having  passed,  the  formal 
Sty.  Dodd's  Church  History  of  Catholics,  method  of  putting  the  prisoner  to  death 
by  Tierney  :  the  editor  gives  the  letter  might,  in  so  peculiar  a  case,  be  dispensed 
from  a  manuscript  in  his  own  possession,  with.  This  was  Elizabeth's  own  wish,  in 
Vol.  iii.  Append,  lix.  — 1845.]  order  to  save  her  reputation,  and  enable 

1  It  may  probably  be  answered  to  this,  her  to  throw  the  obloquy  on  her  ser- 
that  if  the  letter  signed  by  Walsingham  vants;  which,  by  Paulet's  prudence  and 
as  well  as  Davison  to  sir  AmiasPaulet,  urg-  honor  in  refuging  to  obey  her  by  privately 
ing  him  "  to  find  out  some  way  to  shorten  murdering  his  prisoner,  she  was  reduced 
the  life  of  the  Scots  queen,"  be  genuine,  to  do  in  a  very  bungling  and  scaudaloui 
which  cannot  perhaps  be  justly  ques-  manner. 


166  EmOLABILITY  OF  SOVEREIGNS.         CHAP.  IH 

kind  agree  to  point  out.  It  is  certainly  true  that  an  exception 
to  this  rule,  incorporated  with  the  positive  law  of  nations, 
and  established  no  doubt  before  the  age  of  Elizabeth,  hag 
rendered  the  ambassadors  of  sovereign  princes  exempt,  in 
all  ordinary  cases  at  least,  from  criminal  process.  Whether, 
however,  an  ambassador  may  not  be  brought  to  punishment 
for  such  a  flagrant  abuse  of  the  confidence  which  is  implied 
by  receiving  him,  as  a  conspiracy  against  the  life  itself  of  the 
prince  at  whose  court  he  resides,  has  been  doubted  by  those 
writers  who  are  most  inclined  to  respect  the  privileges  with 
which  courtesy  and  convenience  have  invested  him.1  A 
sovereign,  during  a  temporary  residence  in  the  territories  of 
another,  must  of  course  possess  as  extensive  an  immunity  as 
his  representative ;  but  that  he  might,  in  such  circumstances, 
frame  plots  for  the  prince's  assassination  with  impunity, 
seems  to  take  for  granted  some  principle  that  I  do  not 
understand. 

But  whatever  be  the  privilege  of  inviolability  attached  to 
sovereigns,  it  must,  on  every  rational  ground,  be  confined  to 
those  who  enjoy  and  exercise  dominion  in  some  independent 
territory.  An  abdicated  or  dethroned  monarch  may  preserve 
his  title  by  the  courtesy  of  other  states,  but  cannot  rank  with 
sovereigns  in  the  tribunals  where  public  law  is  administered. 
I  should  be  rather  surprised  to  hear  any  one  assert  that  the 
parliament  of  Paris  was  incompetent  to  try  Christina  for 
the  murder  of  Monaldeschi.  And,  though  we  must  admit 
that  Mary's  resignation  of  her  crown  was  compulsory,  and 
retracted  on  the  first  occasion  ;  yet,  after  a  twenty  years'  loss 
of  possession,  when  not  one  of  her  former  subjects  avowed 
allegiance  to  her,  when  the  king  of  Scotland  had  been  so 
long  acknowledged  by  England  and  by  all  Europe,  is  it  pos- 
sible to  consider  her  as  more  than  a  titular  queen,  divested 
of  every  substantial  right  to  which  a  sovereign  tribunal  could 

1  Questions  were  put  to  civilians  by  the  his  public  authority,  and  another  sub- 
queen's  order  in  1570  concerning  the  ex-  stituted  in  his  stead,  the  agent  of  such  a 
tent  of  Lesley  bishop  of  Ross's  privilege  prince  cannot  challenge  the  privileges  of 
as  Mary's  ambassador.  Murden  Papers,  an  ambassador;  since  none  but  absolute 
p.  18.  Somers  Tracts,  i.  188.  They  an-  princes,  and  such  as  snjoy  a  royal  pre- 
swered,  first,  that  an  ambassador  that  rogative,  can  constitute  ambassadors, 
raises  rebellion  against  the  prince  to  These  questions  are  so  far  curious,  that 
whojn  he  is  gent,  by  the  law  of  nations  they  show  the  jus  gentium  to  have  been 
and  the  civil  law  of  the  Romans,  has  for-  already  reckoned  a  matter  of  science,  in 
feited  the  privileges  of  an  ambassador,  which  a  particular  class  of  lawyers  waa 
and  is  liable  to  punishment;  secondly,  conversant, 
that,  if  a  prince  be  lawfully  deposed  from 


ELIZ.  —  Catholics.      INJUSTICE  OF  MARY'S  DEATH.  167 

have  regard  ?  She  was  styled  accordingly,  in  the  indictment, 
"  Mary,  daughter  and  heir  of  James  the  Fifth,  late  king  of 
Scots,  otherwise  called  Mary  queen  of  Scots,  dowager  of 
France."  We  read  even  that  some  lawyers  would  have  had 
her  tried  by  a  jury  of  the  county  of  Stafford,  rather  than  by 
the  special  commission ;  which  Elizabeth  noticed  as  a  strange 
indignity.  The  commission,  however,  was  perfectly  legal 
under  the  recent  statute.1* 

But  while  we  can  hardly  pronounce  Mary's  execution  to 
have  been  so  wholly  iniquitous  and  unwarrantable  as  it  has 
been  represented,  it  may  be  admitted  that  a  more  generous 
nature  than  that  of  Elizabeth  would  not  have  exacted  the 
law's  full  penally.  The  queen  of  Scots'  detention  in  Eng- 
land was  in  violation  of  all  natural,  public,  and  municipal 
law ;  and  if  reasons  of  state  policy  or  precedents  from  the 
custom  of  princes  are  allowed  to 'extenuate  this  injustice,  it 
is  to  be  asked  whether  such  reasons  and  such  precedents 
might  not  palliate  the  crime*  of  assassination  imputed  to  her. 
Some  might  perhaps  allege,  as  was  so  frequently  urged  at 
the  time,  that,  if  her  life  could  be  taken  with  justice,  it  could 
not  be  spared  in  prudence ;  and  that  Elizabeth's  higher  duty 
to  preserve  her  people  from  the  risks  of  civil  commotion 
must  silence  every  feeling  that  could  plead  for  mercy.  Of 
this  necessity  different  judgments  may  perhaps  be  formed. 
It  is  evident  that  Mary's  death  extinguished  the  best  hope 
of  popery  in  England :  but  the  relative  force  of  the  two  re- 
ligions was  greatly  changed  since  Norfolk's  conspiracy  ;  and 
it  appears  to  me  that  an  act  of  parliament  explicitly  cutting 
her  off  from  the  crown,  and  at  the  same  time  entailing  it  on 
her  son,  would  have  afforded  a  very  reasonable  prospect  of 
securing  the  succession  against  all  serious  disturbance.  But 
this  neither  suited  the  inclination  of  Elizabeth  nor  of  some 
among  those  who  surrounded  her. 

As  the   catholics  endured  without  any  open   murmuring 
the  execution  of  her  on  whom  their  fond  hopes 
had  so  long  rested,  so  for  the  remainder  of  the  pe'reJcutlon 
queen's   reign   they  by  no  means  appear,  when  °f  Roman 

,     J       J  Ifr  catholics. 

considered  as  a  body,  to  have  furnished  any  spe- 
cious pretexts  for  severity.     In  that  memorable  year,  when 
the  dark  cloud  gathered  around  our  coasts,  when  Europe 

i  Strype,  360,  362.  Civilians  were  consulted  about  the  legality  of  trying  Mary. 
Idem,  Append.  138. 


168  CONTINUED  PERSECUTION.  CHAP.  Ill 

stood  by  in  fearful  suspense  to  behold  what  should  be  the 
result  of  that  great  cast  in  the  game  of  human  politics,  what 
the  craft  of  Rome,  the  power  of  Philip,  the  genius  of  Far- 
nese,  could  achieve  against  the  island-queen  with  her  Drakes 
and  Cecils,  —  in  that  agony  of  the  protestant  faith  and 
English  name,  they  stood  the  trial  of  their  spirits  without 
swerving  from  their  allegiance.  It  was  then  that  the  catho- 
lics in  every  county  repaired  to .  the  standard  "of  the  lord- 
lieutenant,  imploring  that  they  might  not  be  suspected  of 
bartering  the  national  independence  for  their  religion  itself. 
It  was  then  that  the  venerable  lord  Montague  brought  a 
troop  of  horse  to  the  queen  at  Tilbury,  commanded  by  him- 
self, his  son,  and  grandson.1  It  would  have  been  a  sign  of 
gratitude  if  the  laws  depriving  them  of  the  free  exercise  of 
their  religion  had  been,  if  not  repealed,  yet  suffered  to  sleep, 
after  these  proofs  of  loyalty.  But  the  execution  of  priests 
and  of  other  catholics  became  on  the  contrary  more  frequent, 
and  the  fines  for  recusancy  were  exacted  as  rigorously  as 
before.2  A  statute  was  enacted,  restraining  popish  recusants, 
a  distinctive  name  now  first  imposed  by  law,  to  particular 
places  of  residence,  and  subjecting  them  to  other  vexatious 
provisions.8  All  persons  were  forbidden  by  proclamation  to 
harbor  any  of  whose  conformity  they  were  not  assured.4 
Some  indulgence  was  doubtless  shown  during  all  Elizabeth's 
reign  to  particular  persons,  and  it  was  not  unusual  to  release 

1  Butler's    English   Catholics,  i.  259;  trust  and    toleration   are  two  different 

Hume.     This  is  strongly  confirmed  by  a  things.     And  even   with   respect  to  tne 

letter  printed  not  long  after,  and  repub-  former,  I  believe  it  fir  better  to  leave  the 

lished  in  the  Harleian  Miscellany,  vol.  i.  matter  in   the   hands   of  the  executive 

p.  142,  with  the  name  of  one  Leigh,  a  government,  which  will  not  readily  suffer 

seminary  priest,  but  probably  the  work  itself  to  be  betrayed,  than  to  proscribe, 

of  some  protestant.     He  says,  "  for  con-  as  we  have  done,  whole  bodies  by  -a  legis- 

tributions  of  money,   and  for  all  other  lative  exclusion.     Whenever,  indeed,  the 

warlike  actions,  there  was  no  difference  government  itself  is  not  to  be  trusted, 

between   the   catholic  and  the    heretic,  there  arises  a  new  condition  of  the  prob- 

Bnt  in  this  case  [of  the  Armada],  to  with-  lein. 

stand  the  threatened  conquest,  yea,  to  de-  »  Strype,  vols.  iii.  and  iv.  passim.  Life 
fend  the  person  of  the  queen,  there  ap-  of  Whitgift,  401,  505.  Murden,  607. 
jic;ire.l  such  asympathy,  concourse,  and  Birch's  Memoirs  of  Elizabeth.  Lingard, 
consenc  of  all  st>rts  of  persons,  without  &c.  One  hundred  and  ten  catholics  suf- 
respect  of  religion,  as  they  all  appeared  to  fered  death  between  1688  and  1603.  Liu- 
be  ready  to  fight  against  all  strangers,  as  gard,  513. 
it  were  with  one  heart  and  one  body."  3  23  Eliz.  c.  2. 

Notwithstanding    this,   I    am    far  from        <  Caniden,  566.     Strype,  iv.  56.     This 

thinking  that  it  would  have  been  safe  to  was    the    declaration   of  October,  1591, 

place  the  catholics,  generally  speaking,  which     Andreas     Philopater     answered. 

in  command.     Sir  \Villiam  Stanley's  re-  Itibadeiieira    also    inveighs     against    it. 

cent  treachery  in  giving  up  Deventer  to  According  to  them,  its   publication  was 

the  Spaniards  made  it  unreasonable  for  delayed   till  after   the  death  of  llatton. 

them  to  complain  of  exclusion  from  trust,  when  the  persecuting  part  of  the  quewi's 

Nor  do  I  know  that  they  did  so.    But  council  gained  the  ascendency. 


ELIZ.— Catholics.     NUMBER  OF  CATHOLIC  MARTYRS.  109 

priests  from  confinement;  but  such  precarious  and  irregular 
connivance  gave  more  scandal  to  the  puritans  than  comibrt 
to  the  opposite  party. 

The  catholic  martyrs  under  Elizabeth  amount  to  no  incon- 
siderable number.  Dodd  reckons  them  at  191  ;  General 
Milner  has  raised  the  list  to  204.  Fifteen  of  these,  observa- 
according  to  him,  suffered  for  denying  the  queen's  tlon8' 
supremacy,  126  for  exercising  their  ministry,  and  the  rest 
for  being  reconciled  to  the  Romish  church.  Many  others 
died  of  hardships  in  prison,  and  many  were  deprived  of  their 
property.1  There  seems  nevertheless,  to  be  good  reason  for 
doubting  whether  any  one  who  was  executed  might  not  have 
saved  his  life  by  explicitly  denying  the  pope's  power  to  de- 
pose the  queen.  It  was  constantly  maintained  by  her  min- 
isters that  no  one  had  been  executed  for  his  religion.  This 
would  be  an  odious  and  hypocritical  subterfuge  if  it  rested 
on  the  letter  of  these  statutes,  which  adjudge  the  mere  man- 
ifestation of  a  belief  in  the  Roman  catholic  religion,  under 
certain  circumstances,  to  be  an  act  of  treason.  But  both  lord 
Burleigh,  in  his  Execution  of  Justice,  and  Walsingham,  in  a 
letter  published  by  Burnet,2  positively  assert  the  contrary ; 
and  I  am  not  aware  that  their  assertion  has.  been  disproved. 
This  certainly  furnishes  a  distinction  between  the  persecution 
under  Elizabeth  (which,  unjust  as  it  was  in  its  operation, 
yet,  as  far  as  it  extended  to  capital  inflictions,  had  in  view 
the  security  of  the  government)  and  that  which  the  prot- 
estants  had  sustained  in  her  sister's  reign,  springing  from 
mere  bigotry  and  vindictive  rancor,  and  not  even  shielding 
itself  at  the  time  with  those  shallow  pretexts  of  policy  which 

1  Butler,  178.    In  Coke's  famous  speech  is  reason  to  believe  the  disgusting  cruel- 

in  opening  the  case  of  the   Powder-plot,  ties  of  the  legal  sentence  to  have   been 

he  says  that  not  more  than  thirty  priests  frequently  inttict-ed.     In  an  anonymous 

and  five  receivers  had  beeu  executed  in  memorial  among  lord  Burleigh's  papers, 

the  whole  of  the  queeu's  reign,  and  for  written  about  1586,  it  is  recommended 

religion  not  any  one.    State  Trials,  ii.  that  priests  persisting  in  their  treason- 

179.  able  opinion  should  be  hanged,  "  and  the 

Dr.  Lingard  says  of  those  who  were  manner  of  drawing  and  quartering  for- 

executed  between  1588  and  the  queen's  borne."    Strype,  iii.  620.    This  seems  to 

death,  "  the  butchery,  with  a  tew  excep-  imply  that  it  had  been  usually  practised 

tions,  was  performed  on  the  victim  while  on  the  living.    And  lord  Bacon,  in    his 

he  was  in  full  possession  of  his  senses."  observations   on  a  libel  written  against 

Vol.  viii.  p.  35!J.     I  should  be  glad  to  lord  Burleigh  in  1592,  does  not  deny  the 

think  that  the  few  exceptions  were  the  "  bowellings  "  of  catholics;  but  makes  a 

other  way.     Much  would  depend  on  the  sort  of  apology  for  it.  as  "  less  cruel  than 

humanity  of  the  sheriff,  which  one  might  the  wheel   of  forcipution,  or  even   siia- 

hope  to  be  stronger  in  an  English  gentle-  pie  burning."     Bacon's  Works,  vol.  i.  p 

man  than  his  zeal  against  popery.     But  534. 
I  cannot  help  acknowledging  that  there        -  Burnet,  ii.  418. 


170  ORDER  OF  JESUITS.  CHAP.  Ill 

it  "has  of  late  been  attempted  to  set  up  in  its  extenua- 
tion. But  that  which  renders  these  condemnations  of  popish 
priests  so  iniquitous  is,  that  the  belief  in,  or  rather  the  refusal 
to  disclaim,  a  speculative  tenet,  dangerous  indeed,  and  incom- 
patible with  loyalty,  but  not  coupled  with  any  overt  act,  was 
construed  into  treason  ;  nor  can  any  one  affect  to  justify  these 
sentences  who  is  not  prepared  to  maintain  that  a  refusal  of 
the  oath  of  abjuration,  while  the  pretensions  of  the  house  of 
Stuart  subsisted,  might  lawfully  or  justly  have  incurred  the 
same  penalty.1 

An  apology  was  always  deduced  for  these  measures, 
whether  of  restriction  or  punishment,  adopted  against  all  ad- 
herents to  the  Roman  church,  from  the  restless  activity  of 
that  new  militia  which  the  Holy  See  had  lately  organized. 
The  mendicant  orders  established  in  the  thirteenth  century 
•  had  lent  former  popes  a  powerful  aid  towards  subjecting  both 
the  laity  and  the  secular  priesthood,  by  their  superior  learn- 
ing and  ability,  their  emulous  zeal,  their  systematic  concert, 
their  implicit  ooedience.  But,  in  all  these  requisites  for  good 
and  faithfurjanizaries  of  the  church,  they  were  far  excelled 
by  the  new  order  of  Ignatius  Loyola.  Rome,  I  believe,  found 
in  their  services  what  has  stayed  her  fall.  They  contributed 
in  a  very  material  degree  to  check  the  tide  of,  the  Reforma- 

1  "  Though  no  papists  were  in  this  they  were  as  truly  punished  for  their 
reign  put  to  death  purely  on  account  of  religion  as  if  they  had  been  convicted 
their  religion,  as  numberless  protestants  of  heresy?  A  man  is  punished  for  re- 
had  been  in  the  woful  days  of  queen  ligion  when  he  incurs  a  penalty  for  its 
Mary,  yet  many  were  executed  for  trea-  profession  or  exercise  to  which  he  was 
son."  Churton's  Life  of  Nowell,  p.  147.  not  liable  on  any  other  account. 
Mr.  Southey,  whose  abandonment  of  the  This  is  applicable  to  the  great  majority 
oppressed  side  I  sincerly  regret,  holds  of  capital  convictions  on  this  score  under 
the  same  language;  and  a  later  writer,  Elizabeth.  The  persons  convicted  could 
Mr.  Townseni,  in  his  Accusations  of  His-  not  be  traitors  in  any  fair  sense  of  the 
tory  against  the  Church  of  Rome,  has  word,  because  they  were  not  charged 
labored  to  defend  the  capital,  as  well  as  with  anything  properly  denominated 
other  punishments,  of  catholics  under  treason.  It  certainly  appears  that  Cam- 
beth,  on  the  same  preteuce  of  their  plan  and  some  other  priests  about  the 
treason.  game  t;me  were  jndjcted  on  the  statute 

Treason,  by  the  law  of  England,  and  of    Edward     III.    for    compassing     the 

irding  to    the  common   use  of  Ian-  queen's   death,  or  intending   to   depose 

guage,  is  the  crime  of  rebellion  or  con-  her.     But   the  only  evidence,  so  far  as 

spiraoy  against  the  government.     If  a  we  know  or  have  reason  to  suspect,  that 

statute  is  made,  by  which  the  celebration  could    be    brought    against    them,   was 

of  certain  religious  rites  is  subjected  to  their  own  admission,  at  least  by  refusing 

e  same  penalties  as  rebellion  or  con-  to  abjure  it,   of    the    pope's    power  to 


convicted  on  such  a  statute  as  guilty  of     upon    this   principle,  it  could    not  fall 
treason,    without   expressing    in    what    within  the  statute, 
sense  he  uses  the  words,  or  deny  that 


ELIZ.  —  Catholics.         ENGLISH  CATHOLICS.  171 

tion.  Subtle  alike  and  intrepid,  pliant  in  their  direction, 
unshaken  in  their  aim,  the  sworn,  implacable,  unscrupulous 
enemies  of  protestant  governments,  the  Jesuits  were  a  legiti- 
mate object  of  jealousy  and  restraint.  As  every  member  of 
that  society  enters  into  an  engagement  of  absolute,  unhesitat- 
ing obedience  to  its  superior,  no  one  could  justly  complain 
that  he  was  presumed  capable  at  least  of  committing  any 
crimes  that  the  policy  of  his  monarch  might  enjoin.  But  if 
the  Jesuits  by  their  abilities  and  busy  spirit  of  intrigue  pro- 
moted the  interests  of  Rome,  they  raised  up  enemies  by  the 
same  means  to  themselves  within  the  bosom  of  the  church  j 
and  became  little  less  obnoxious  to  the  secular  clergy,  and  to 
a  great  proportion  of  the  laity,  than  to  the  protestants  whom 
they  were  commissioned  to  oppose.  Their  intermeddling 
character  was  shown  in  the  very  prisons  occupied  by  catho- 
lic recusants,  where  a  schism  broke  out  between  the  two 
parties,  and  the  secular  priests  loudly  complained  of  their 
usurping  associates.1  This  was  manifestly  connected  with 
the  great  problem  of  allegiance  to  the  queen,  which  the  one 
side  being  always  ready  to  pay,  did  not  relish  the  sharp 
usage  it  endured  on  account  of  the  other's  disaffection.  The 
council  indeed  gave  some  signs  of  attending  to  this  distinc- 
tion, by  a  proclamation  issued  in  1602,  ordering  all  priests  to 
depart  from  the  kingdom,  unless  they  should  come  in  and 
acknowledge  their  allegiance,  with  whom  the  queen  would 
take  further  order.2  Thirteen  priests  came  forward  on  this, 
with  a  declaration  of  allegiance  as  full  as  could  be  devised. 
Some  of  the  more  violent  papists  blamed  them  for  this ;  and 
the  Louvain  "divines  concurred  in  the  censure.8  There  were 
now  two  parties  among  the  English  catholics  ;  and  those  who, 
goaded  by  the  sense  of  long  persecution,  and  inflamed  by 
obstinate  bigotry,  regarded  every  heretical  government  as 
unlawful  or  unworthy  of  obedience,  used  every  machination 
to  deter  the  rest  from  giving  any  test  of  their  loyalty.  These 
were  the  more  busy,  but  by  much  the  less  numerous  class 

1  Watson's  Quodlibets.    True  Relation  all  the  discord  in  the  English  nation.' 

•of  the  Faction  begun  at  Wisbech,  1601.  P.  74.    I  have  seen  several  other  patn 

These  tracts  contain   rather   an    unin-  phlets  of  the  time  relating  to  this  differ 

teresting  account  of   the    squabbles  in  ence.     Some  account  of  it  may  be  found 

Wisbech  castle  among  the  prisoners,  but  in  Camden,  648,  and  Strype,  iv.  194.  as 

cast  heavy  reproaches  on  the  Jesuits,  as  well  as  in  the  catholic  historians,  Dodd 

the  "  fire-brands  of  all  sedition,  seeking  and  Ljngard. 

by  right  or  wrong  simply  or  absolutely  a  Rymer,  rv.  473,  488. 

the  monarchy  of  all  England,  enemies  8  Butler's  Engl.  Catholics,  p.  261. 
to  all  secular  priests,  and  the  causes  of 


172  LEXITY  OF  SIR  C.  HATTON.  CHAP.  111. 

and  their  influence  was  mainly  derived  from  the  laws  of  se- 
verity, which  they  had  braved  or  endured  with  fortitude.  It 
is  equally  candid  and  reasonable  to  believe  that,  if  a  fair  and 
legal  toleration,  or  even  a  general  connivance  at  the  exercise 
of  their  worship,  had  been  conceded  in  the  first  part  of  Eliz- 
abeth's reign,  she  would  have  spared  herself  those  perpetual 
terrors  of  rebellion  which  occupied  all  her  later  years. 
Rome  would  not  indeed  have  been  appeased,  and  some  des 
perate  fanatic  might  have  sought  her  life  ;  but  the  Englisl 
catholics  collectively  would  have  repaid  her  protection  by  an 
attachment  which  even  her  rigor  seems  not  wholly  to  have 
prevented. 

It  is  not  to  be  imagined  that  an  entire  unanimity  prevailed 
in  the  councils  of  this  reign  as  to  the  best  mode  of  dealing 
with  the  adherents  of  Rome.  Those  temporary  connivances 
or  remissions  of  punishment  which,  though  to  our  present 
view  they  hardly  lighten  the  shadows  of  this  persecution,  ex- 
cited loud  complaints  from  bigoted  men,  were  owing  to  the 
queen's  personal  humor,  or  the  influence  of  some  advisers 
more  liberal  than  the  rest.  Elizabeth  herself  seems  always 
to  have  inclined  rather  to  indulgence  than  extreme  severity. 
Sir  Christopher  Hatton,  for  some  years  her  chief  favorite, 
incurred  odium  for  his  lenity  towards  papists,  and  was,  in 
their  own  opinion,  secretly  inclined  to  them.1  Whitgift  found 
enough  to  do  with  an  opposite  party.  And  that  too  noble 
and  high-minded  spirit,  so  ill  fitted  for  a  servile  and  dissem- 
bling court,  the  earl  of  Essex,  was  the  consistent  friend  of 
religious  liberty,  whether  the  catholic  or  the  puritan  were 
to  enjoy  it.  But  those  councillors,  on  the  other  hand,  who 
favored  the  more  precise  reformers,  and  looked  coldly  on  the 
established  church,  never  failed  to  demonstrate  their  protes- 
tantism by  excessive  harshness  towards  the  old  religion's 
adherents.  That  bold,  bad  man,  whose  favor  is  the  great 
reproach  of  Elizabeth's  reign,  the  earl  of  Leicester,  and 
the  sagacious,  disinterested,  inexorable  Walsingham,  were 
deemed  the  chief  advisers  of  sanguinary  punishments.  But, 
after  their  deaths,  the  catholics  were  mortified  to  discover 

1  Ribadeneira  gaya  that  Hatton  "  ani-  was  published  after  his  death  in  1591. 

mo    Catholicus,    nihil    perinde     quam  De  Schismatc  Anglic,  c.  9.     This  must 

Innocentem     illorum     sanguinem    adeo  have  been  the  proclamation  of  29th  Nov. 

cru  leliler  perfundi  dolebat.v     He  pre-  1591,  forbidding  all  persons   to   harbor 

•rev  ted  Cecil  from  promulgating  a  more  any     one    of     whose    conformity    they 

abocious  edict  than  any  other,  which  should   not  be  well  assured. 


ELIZ  -Catholics.     EESTKAINTS  AND  PENALTIES.  173 

that  lord  Burleigh,  from  whom  they  had  hoped  for  more 
moderation,  persisted  in  the  same  severities;  contrary,  I  think, 
to  the  principles  he  had  himself  laid  down  in  the  paper  from 
which  I  have  above  made  some  extracts.1 

The  restraints  and  penalties  by  which  civil  governments 
have  at  various  times  thought  it  expedient  to  limit  the  relig- 
ious liberties  of  their  subjects  may  be  arranged  in  something 
like  the  following  scale.  The  first  and  slightest  degree  is 
the  requisition  of  a  test  of  conformity  to  the  established  re- 
ligion, as  the  condition  of  exercising  offices  of  civil  trust. 
The  next  step  is  to  restrain  the  free  promulgation  of  opinions, 
especially  through  the  press.  All  prohibitions  of  the  open 
exercise  of  religious  worship  appear  to  form  a  third  and  more 
severe  class  of  restrictive  laws.  They  become  yet  more  rig- 
orous when  they  afford  no  indulgence  to  the  most  private  and 
secret  acts  of  devotion  or  expressions  of  opinion.  Finally, 
the  last  stage  of  persecution  is  to  enforce  by  legal  penalties 
a  conformity  to  the  established  church,  or  an  abjuration  of 
heterodox  tenets. 

The  first  degree  in  this  classification,  or  the  exclusion  of 
dissidents  from  trust  and  power,  though  it  be  always  incum- 
bent on  those  who  maintain  it  to  prove  its  necessity,  may, 
under  certain  rare  circumstances,  be  conducive  to  the  polit- 
ical well-being  of  a  state  ;  and  can  then  only  be  reckoned  an 
encroachment  on  the  principles  of  toleration  when  it  ceases 
to  produce  a  public  benefit  sufficient  to  compensate  for  the 
privation  it  occasions  to  its  objects.  Such  was  the  English 
test  act  during  the  interval  between  1672  and  1688.  But, 
in  my  judgment,  the  instances  which  the  history  of  mankind 
affords,  where  even  these  restrictions  have  been  really  conso- 
nant to  the  soundest  policy,  are  by  no  means  numerous. 
Cases  may  also  be  imagined  where  the  free  discussion  of 
controverted  doctrines  might,  for  a  time,  at  least,  be  subject- 
ed to  some  limitation  for  the  sake  of  public  tranquillity.  I 
can  scarcely  conceive  the  necessity  of  restraining  an  open 
exercise  of  religious  rites  in  any  case,  except  that  of  glaring 
immorality.  In  no  possible  case  can  it  be  justifiable  for  the 
temporal  power  to  intermeddle  with  the  private  devotions  or 
doctrines  of  any  man.  But  least  of  all  can  it  carry  its  in- 
quisition into  the  heart's  recesses,  and  bend  the  reluctant  con- 

i  Birch,  I.  84. 


174  RESTRAINTS  UNDER  ELIZABETH.         CHAP.  m. 

science  to  an  insincere  profession  of  truth,  or  extort  from  it 
an  acknowledgment  of  error,  for  the  purpose  of  inflicting  pun- 
ishment. The  statutes  of  Elizabeth's  reign  comprehend 
every  one  of  these  progressive  degrees  of  restraint  and  perse- 
cution. And  it  is  much  to  be  regretted  that  any  writers  wor- 
thy of  respect  should,  either  through  undue  prejudice  against 
an  adverse  religion,  or  through  timid  acquiescence  in  what- 
ever has  been  enacted,  have  offered  for  this  odious  code  the 
false  pretext  of  political  necessity.  That  necessity,  I  am 
persuaded,  can  never  be  made  out:  the  statutes  were,  in 
many  instances,  absolutely  unjust ;  in  others,  not  demanded 
by  circumstances;  in  almost  all,  prompted  by  religious  big- 
otry, by  excessive  apprehension,  or  by  the  arbitrary  spirit 
with  which  our  government  was  administered  under  Eliz- 
abeth. 


EMZ.— Puritans.     DIFFERENCES  AMONG  PROTESTANTS.      175 


CHAPTER  IV. 

• 

ON   THE   LAWS    OF   ELIZABETH'S   REIGN   RESPECTING 
PROTESTANT   NONCONFORMISTS. 

Origin  of  the  Differences  among  the  English  Protestants  —  Religions  Inclinations  oi 
the  Queen  —  Unwillingness  of  many  to  comply  with  the  established  Ceremonies  — 
Conformity  enforced  by  the  Archbishop  —  Against  the  Disposition  of  others  —  A 
more  determined  Opposition,  about  1570,  led  by  Cartwright  —  Dangerous  Nature 
of  his  Tenets  —  Puritans  supported  in  the  Commons  —  and  in  some  measure'by 
the  Council  —  Prophesyings —  Archbishops  Grindal  and  VVhitgift —  Conduct  of 
the  latter  in  enforcing  Conformity  —  High  Commission  .Court — Lord  Burleign. 
averse  to  Severity  —  Puritan  Libels  —  Attempt  to  set  tip  Presbyterian  System  — 
House  of  Commons  averse  to  Episcopal  Authority  —  Independents  liable  to  severe 
Laws  —  Hooker's  Ecclesiastical  Polity — Its  Character  —  Spoliation  of  Church 
Revenues  —  General  Remarks  —  Letter  of  Walsingham  in  Defence  of  the  Queen's 
Government. 

THE  two  statutes,  enacted  in  the  first  year  of  Elizabeth, 
commonly  called  the  acts  of  supremacy  and  uni- 

f  ii_  -i-i         r-xi.       *        i-  v         i_   Puritans. 

formity,  are  the  mam  links  of  the  Anglican  church 
with  the  temporal  constitution,  and  establish  the  subordina- 
tion and  dependency  of  the  former ;  the  first  abrogating  all 
jurisdiction  and  legislative  power  of  ecclesiastical  rulers,  ex- 
cept under  the  authority  of  the  crown ;  and  the  second  pro- 
hibiting all  changes  of  rites  and  discipline  without  the  ap- 
probation of  parliament.  It  was  the  constant  policy  of  this 
queen  to  maintain  her  ecclesiastical  prerogative  and  the  laws 
she  had  enacted.  But  in  following  up  this  principle  she 
found  herself  involved  in  many  troubles,  and  had  to  contend 
with  a  religious  party  quite  opposite  to  the  Romish,  less  dan- 
gerous indeed  and  inimical  to  her  government,  but  full  as 
vexatious  and  determined. 

I  have  in  another  place  slightly  mentioned  the  differences 
that  began  to  spring  up  under  Edward  VI.  be-  o.Jn  of 
tween    the  moderate   reformers   who   established  the  dif- 
the  new  Anglican  church,  and  those  who  accused  a^u^g'the 
them  of  proceeding  with  too  much  forbearance  in  Engifon 

a*  .  .  i        t  m.  ,.     prjtestants. 

casting  on   superstitions  and   abuses,     ihese  di- 
versities of  opinion  were  not  without  some  relation  to  those 
which  distinguished  the  two  great  families  of  protestantism 


176  ORIGIX  OF  DIFFERENCES.  CHAP.  IV. 

in  Europe.  Luther,  intent  on  his  own  system  of  dogmatic 
theology,  had  shown  much  indifference  about  retrenching 
exterior  ceremonies,  and  had  even  favored,  especially  in  the 
first  years  of  his  preaching,  that  specious  worship  which  some 
ardent  reformers  were  eager  to  reduce  to  simplicity.1  Cru- 
cifixes and  images,  tapers  and  priestly  vestments,  even  for 
a  time  the  elevation  of  the  host  and  the  Latin  mass-book, 
continued  in  the  Lutheran  churches;  while  the  disciples 
of  Zuingle  and  Calvin  were  carefully  eradicating  them  as 
popish  idolatry  and  superstition.  Cranmer  and  Ridley,  the 
founders  of  the  English  Reformation,  justly  deeming  them- 
selves independent  of  any  foreign  master,  adopted  a  middle 
course  between  the  Lutheran  and  Calvinistic  ritual.  The 
general  tendency  however  of  protestants,  even  in  the  reign 
of  Edward  VI.,  was  towards  the  simpler  forms;  whether 
through  the  influence  of  those  foreign  divines  who  coopera- 
ted in  our  Reformation,  or  because  it  was  natural  in  the  heat 
of  religious  animosity  to  recede  as  far  as  possible,  especially 
in  such  exterior  distinctions,  from  the  opposite  denomination. 
The  death  of  Edward  seems  to  have  prevented  a  further  ap- 
proach to  the  scheme  of  Geneva  in  our  ceremonies,  and  per- 
haps in  our  church-government.  During  the  persecution  of 
Mary's  reign  the  most  eminent  protestant  clergymen  took 
refuge  in  various  cities  of  Germany  and  Switzerland.  They 
were  received  by  the  Calvinists  with  hospitality  and  fraternal 
kindness ;  while  the  Lutheran  divines,  a  narrow-minded  in- 
tolerant faction,  both  neglected  and  insulted  them.2  Divis- 
ions soon  arose  among  themselves  about  the  use  of  the 
English  service,  in  which  a  pretty  considerable  party  was 
disposed  to  make  alterations.  The  chief  scene  of  these  dis- 
turbances was  Frankfort,  where  Knox,  the  famous  reformer 
of  Scotland,  headed  the  innovators ;  while  Cox,  an  eminen 
divine,  much  concerned  in  the  establishment  of  Edward  VI., 
and  afterwards  bishop  of  Ely,  stood  up  for  the  original  litur- 
gy. Cox  succeeded  (not  quite  fairly,  if  we  may  rely  on  the 
only  narrative  we  possess)  in  driving  his  opponents  from  the 
city ;  but  these  disagreements  were  by  no  means  healed  when 
the  accession  of  Elizabeth  recalled  both  parties  to  their  own 
country,  neither  of  them  very  likely  to  display  more  mutual 

1  Sleidan,  Hist,  de  la  Reformation,  par  Courayer,  ii.  74. 
»  Strype's  Cranmer,  354. 


.-- Puritans.      THE  QUEEN'S  INCLINATIONS.  177 

charity  in  their  prosperous  hour  than  they  had  been  able  to 
exercise  in  a  common  persecution.1 

The  first  mortification  these  exiles  endured  on  their  return 
was  to  find  a  more  dilatory  advance  towards  public  reforma- 
tion of  religion,  and  more  of  what  they  deemed  lukewarm- 
ness,  than  their  sanguine  zeal  had  anticipated.  Most  part  of 
this  delay  was  owing  to  the  greater  prudence  of  the  queen's 
councillors,  who  felt  the  pulse  of  the  nation  before  they  ven- 
tured on  such  essential  changes.  But  there  was  yet  another 
obstacle,  on  which  the  reformers  had  not  reckoned. 
Elizabeth,  though  resolute  against  submitting  to 
the  papal  supremacy,  was  not  so  averse  to  all  of  tlie 
the  tenets  abjured  by  protestants,  and  loved  also  a  ^ 
more  splendid  worship  than  had  prevailed  in  her  brother's 
reign  ;  while  many  of  those  returned  from  the  Continent  were 
intent  on  copying  a  still  simpler  model.  She  reproved  a 
divine  who  preached  against  the  real  presence,  and  is  even 
said  to  have  used  prayers  to  the  Virgin.2  But  her  great 
struggle  with  the  reformers  was  about  images,  and  particu- 
larly the  crucifix,  which  she  retained,  with  lighted  tapers 
before  it,  in  her  chapel ;  though  in  the  injunctions  to  the 
ecclesiastical  visitors  of  1559  they  are  directed  to  have  them 
taken  away  from  churches.8  This  concession  she  must  have 
made  very  reluctantly,  for  we  find  proofs  the  next  year  of  her 
inclination  to  restore  them  ;  and  the  question  of  their  lawful- 
ness was  debated,  as  Jewell  writes  word  to  Peter  Martyr, 

1  These  transactions  have  been  per-  appendix  to  Burnet's  third  volume,  and 
petuatedby  a  tract,  entitled  Discourse  of  htely  published  more  accurately,  with 
the  Troubles  at  Frankfort,  first  published  many  of  other  reformers,  by  the  Parker 
in  1575,  and  reprinted  in  the  well-known  Society  [1845],  throw  considerable  light 
collection  entitled  the  Phoenix.  It  is  on  the  first  two  years  of  Elizabeth's 
fairly  and  temperately  written,  though  reign ;  and  show  that  famous  prelate  to 
with  an  avowed  bias  towards  the  puritan  have  been  what  afterwards  would  have 
party.  Whatever  we  read  in  any  his-  been  called  a  precisian  or  puritan.  He 
torian  on  the  subject  is  derived  from  this  even  approved  a  scruple  Elizabeth  en- 
authority;  but  the  refraction  is  of  course  tertained  about  her  title  of  head  of  the 
very  different  through  the  pages  of  Col-  church,  as  appertaining  only  to  Christ. 
lier  and  of  Neal.  But  the  unreasonableness  of  the  discon- 

-  Strype's  Annals,  ii.  1.    There  was  a  tented  party,  and  the  natural  tendency 

Lutheran  party  at  the  beginning  of  her  of  a  man  who  has  joined  the  side  of  pow- 

reign,  to  which   the  queen  may  be  said  er  to  deal  severely  with  those  he  has  left, 

to  have   inclined,   not   altogether    from  made  him  afterwards  their  enemy, 

rcliu'lnii,  but  from  policy.    Id.  i.  53.    Her  3   Roods  and  relics  accordingly  were 

situation  was  very  hazardous  ;    and,  in  broken  to  pieces  and  burned  throughout 

oi-.lri-    to  connect    herself  with   sincere  the  kingdom,  of   which   Collier    makes 

:illii"i,  she  had   thoughts  of  joining  the  loud  complaint.     This,  Strype  says  gave 

Snialcaldic  league  of  the  German  princes,  much  offence  to  the  catholics  ;  anil  it  was 

whose   bigotry    would  admit    none   but  not  the  most  obvious  method  of  induo- 

members   of  the   Augsburg  Confession,  ing  them  to  conform. 
Jewi'M'ii  letters  to  Peter  Martyr,  in  the 
VOL.  1.  —  C.                                    12 


178 


MARRIAGE  OF  THE  CLERGY. 


CHAP.  IV. 


by  himself  and  Grindal  on  one  side,  against  Parker  and  Cox, 
who  had  been  persuaded  to  argue  in  their  favor.1  But  the 
strenuous  opposition  of  men  so  distinguished  as  Jewell,  San- 
dys, and  Grindal,  of  whom  the  first  declared  his  intention  of 
resigning  his  bishopric  in  case  this  return  towards  supersti- 
tion should  be  made,  compelled  Elizabeth  to  relinquish  her 
project.2  The  crucifix  was  even  for  a  time  removed  from 
her  own  chapel,  but  replaced  about  1570.8 

There  was,  however,  one  other  subject  of  dispute  between 
the  old  and  new  religions  upon  which  her  majesty  could  not 
be  brought  to  adopt  the  protestant  side  of  the  question. 
This  was  the  marriage  of  the  clergy,  to  which  she  expressed 
so  great  an  aversion,  that  she  would  never  consent  to  repeal 
the  statute  of  her  sister's  reign  against  it4  Accordingly  the 
bishops  and  clergy,  though  they  married  by  connivance,  or 
rather  by  an  ungracious  permission,6  saw  with  very  just  dis- 
satisfaction their  children  treated  by  the  law  as  the  offspring 


1  Burnet,  iii.  Appendix,  290.  Strype's 
Parker,  46. 

-  Quantum  auguror,  non  scribam  ad 
te  posthac  episcopus.    Eo  enim  jam  res 
pervenit,  nt  aut  cruces  argentese  et  stan- 
iieae,  quas  nos  ubique  confregimus,  resti- 
tuendae  sint,  aut  episcopatus  relinqueudi. 
Burnet,  2941     I  conceive  that  by  cruets 
we   are    to    understand    crucifixes,   not 
mere  crosses ;  though  I  do  not  find  the 
word,  even  in  Du  Cange,  used  in  the  for- 
mer sense.     Sandys  writes   that  he  had 
nearly  been  deprived  for  expressing  him- 
self warmly  against  images.     Id.     296. 
Other  proofs  of  the  text  may  be  found  in 
the  same  collection,  as  well  as  in  Strype's 
Annals,  and  his  Life  of  Parker.     Even 
Parker  seems,  on  one  occasion,  to  have 
expected  the  queen   to  make  such  a  ret- 
r"Lrr.iile  movement  in  religion  as  would 
compel  them  all  to  disobey  her.     Life  of 
Parker,  Appendix,   29  ;  a  very  remark- 
able letter. 

a  Strype's  Parker,  310.  The  arch- 
bishop seems  to  disapprove  this  as  inex- 
pedient, but  rather  coldly :  he  was  far 
from  sharing  the  usual  opinions  on  this 
subject.  A  puritan  pamphleteer  took  the 
liberty  to  name  the  queen's  chapel  as 
"  the  pattern  and  precedent  of  all  super- 
stition."  Strype's  Annals,  i.  471 

*  Burnet.  if.  395. 

6  One  of  the  injunctions  to  the  visitors 
of  1559,  reciting  the  offence  and  slander 
to  the  church  that  had  arisen  by  lack  of 
discreet  and  sober  behavior  in  many 
ministers,  both  in  choosing  of  their  wives 
»ad  in  living  witii  them,  directs  that  no 


priest  or  deacon  shall  marry  without  the 
allowance  of  the  bishops,  and  two  justices 
of  the  peace  dwelling  near  the  woman's 
abode,  nor  without  the  consent  of  her 
parents  or  kinsfolk,  or,  for  want  of  these, 
of  her  master  or  mistress,  on  pain  of  not 
being  permitted  to  exercise  the  ministry 
or  hold  any  benefice ;  and  that  the  mar- 
riages of  bishops  should,  be  approved  by 
the  metropolitan,  and  also  by  commis- 
sioners appointed  by  the  queen.  Som- 
ers  Tracts,  i.  65.  Burnet.  ii.  398.  It 
is  reasonable  to  suppose  that  when  a  host 
of  low-bred  and  illiterate  priests  were  at 
once  released  from  the  obligation  to  celi- 
bacy, many  of  them  would  abuse  their 
liberty  improvidently.  or  even  scanda- 
lously ;  and  this  probably  had  increased 
Elizabeth's  prejudice  against  clerical 
matrimony.  But  I  do  not  suppose  that 
this  injunction  was  ever  much  regarded. 
Some  time  afterwards  (Aug.  1561)  .she 
put  forth  another  extraordinary  injunc- 
tion, that  no  member  of  a  college  or 
cathedral  should  have  his  wife  living 
within  its  precints,  under  pain  of  forfeit- 
ing all  his  preferments.  Cecil  sent  this 
to  Parker,  telling  him  at  the  same  time 
that  it  was  with  great  difficulty  he  had 
prevented  the  queen  from  altogether  for- 
bidding the  marriage  of  priests.  Life  of 
P.  107.  And  the  archbishop  himself 
says,  in  the  letter  above  mentioned,  "I 
was  in  a  horror  to  hear  such  words  to 
come  from  her  mild  nature  and  Chris- 
tianly  lesxned  conscience  as  she  spake 
concerning  God's  holy  ordinance  and  in- 
stitution of  matrimony." 


ELIZ.  — Puritans.     WORSHIP  AT  ZURICH  AND   GENEVA.      179 

of  concubinage.1  This  continued,  in  legal  strictness,  till  the 
first  year  of  James,  when  the  statute  of  Mary  was  explicitly 
repealed  ;  though  I  cannot  help  suspecting  that  clerical  mar- 
riages had  been  tacitly  recognized,  even  in  courts  of  justice, 
long  before  that  time.  Yet  it  appears  less  probable  to  derive 
Elizabeth's  prejudice  in  this  respect  from  any  deference  to 
the  Roman  discipline,  than  from  that  strange  dislike  to  the 
most  lawful  union  between  the  sexes  which  formed  one  of 
the  singularities  of  her  character. 

Such  a  reluctance  as  the  queen  displayed  to  return  in 
every  point  even  to  the  system  established  under  Edward 
was  no  slight  disappointment  to  those  who  thought  that  too 
little  had  been  effected  by  it.  They  had  beheld  at  Zurich 
and  Geneva  the  simplest  and,  as  they  conceived,  the  purest 
form  of  worship.  They  were  persuaded  that  the  vestments 
still  worn  by  the  clergy,  as  in  the  days  of  popery,  though  in 
themselves  indifferent,  led  to  erroneous  notions  among  the 
people,  and  kept  alive  a  recollection  of  former  superstitions, 
which  would  render  their  return  to  them  more  easy  in  the 
event  of  another  political  revolution.2  They  disliked  some 
other  ceremonies  for  the  same  reason.  These  objections 
were  by  no  means  confined,  as  is  perpetually  insinuated,  to 
a  few  discontented  persons.  Except  archbishop  Parker, 
who  had  remained  in  England  during  the  late  reign,  and  Cox, 
bishop  of  Ely,  who  had  taken  a  strong  part  at  Frankfort 
against  innovation,  all  the  most  eminent  churchmen,  such  as 
Jewell,  Grindal,  Sandys,  Nowell,  were  in  favor  of  leaving 
off*  the  surplice  and  what  were  called  the  popish  ceremonies.8 

1  Sandys  writes  to  Parker,  April.  1559,  at-law,  though  she  left  children.  But  ths 

;'  The  queen's  majesty  will  wink  at  it,  archbishop  procured  letters  of  legitima- 

but    not    stablish    it    by    law,  which  is  tion,  in  order  to  render  theni  capable  of 

nothingelse  but  to  bastard  our  children."  inheritance.     Life  of   Parker,    p.    511. 

And  decisive  proofs  are  brought  by  Strype  Others  did  the  same.     Annals,  i.  8.    Yet 

that  the  marriages  of  the  clergy  were  not  such  letters  were,  I  conceive,  beyond  the 

held  legal  in  the  first  part,  at  least,  of  queen's  power  to  grant,  and  could  not 

the  queen's   reign.      Elizabeth    herself,  have  obtained  any  regard  in  a  court  of 

after   having  been   sumptuously   enter-  law. 

tained  by  the  archbishop  at  Lambeth,  In  the  diocese  of  Bangor  it  was  usual 
took  leave  of  Mrs.  Parker  with  the  follow-  for  the  clergy,  some  years  after  Eliza- 
ing  courtesy  :  "Madam  (the  style  of  a  beth's  accession,  to  pay  the  bishop  fora 
married  lady)  I  may  not  call  you  ;  mis-  license  to  keep  a  concubine.  Strype's 
frw(the  appellation  at  that  time  of  an  Parker,  203. 
unmarried  woman)  I  am  loath  to  call  you  ;  *  Burnet.  iii.  305. 

but  however  I  thank  you  for  your  good  8  Jewell's  letters  to  Bullinger,  in  Bur- 
cheer."  This  lady  is  styled,  in  deeds  net,  are  full  of  proofs  of  his  dissatist'as- 
mado  while  her  hushand  was  archbishop,  tion;  and  those  who  feel  any  doubts 
/Vir/vr  alias  Ifurlfflati,  which  was  her  may  easily  satisfy  themselves  from  the 
maiden  name.  And  she  dying  before  her  same  collection,  and  from  Strype  as  to 
husband,  her  brother  is  called  her  heir-  the  others.  The  current  opinion,  that 


180 


CLERICAL  VESTMENTS. 


CHAP.  IV. 


Whether  their  objections  are  to  be  deemed  narrow  and  frivo- 
lous or  otherwise,  it  is  inconsistent  with  veracity  to  dissemble 
that  the  queen  alone  was  the  cause  of  retaining  those  ob- 
servances to  which  the  great  separation  from  the  Anglican 
establishment  is  ascribed.  Had  her  influence  been  with- 
drawn, surplices  and  square  caps  would  have  lost  their  stead- 
iest friend  ;  and  several  other  little  accommodations  to  the 
prevalent  dispositions  of  protestants  would  have  taken  place. 
Of  this  it  seems  impossible  to  doubt,  when  we  read  the  pro- 
ceedings of  the  convocation  in  1562,  when  a  proposition  to 
abolish  most  of  the  usages  deemed  objectionable  was  lost 
only  by  a  vote,  the  numbers  being  59  to  58.1 

In  thus  restraining  the  ardent  zeal  of  reformation,  Eliz- 
abeth may  not  have  been  guided  merely  by  her  own  prej- 
udices, without  far  higher  motives  of  prudence  and  even  of 
equity.  It  is  difficult  to  pronounce  in  what  proportion  the 
two  conflicting  religions  were  blended  on  her  coming  to  the 
throne.  The  reformed  occupied  most  large  towns,  and  were 
no  doubt  a  more  active  and  powerful  body  than  their  oppo- 
nents. Nor  did  the  ecclesiastical  visitors  of  1559  complain 
of  any  resistance,  or  even  unwillingness,  among  the  people.3 


these  scruples  were  imbibed  during  the 
banishment  of  our  reformers,  must  be 
received  with  great  allowance.  The  dis- 
like to  some  parts  of  the  Anglican  ritual 
had  begun  at  home ;  it  had  broken  out 
at  Frankfort ;  it  is  displayed  in  all  the 
parly  documents  of  Elizabeth's  reign  by 
the  English  divines,  far  more  warmly 
than  by  their  Swiss  correspondents. 
Grindal,  when  first  named  to  the  see  of 
London,  had  his  scruples  about  wearing 
the  episcopal  habits  removed  by  Peter 
Martyr.  Strype  ~s  Grindal,  29. 

1  It  was  proposed  on  this  occasion  to 
abolish  all  saints'  days,  to  omit  the  cross 
in  baptism,  to  leave  kneeling  at  the  com- 
munion to  the  ordinary's  discretion,  to 
take  away  organs,  and  one  or  two  more 
of  the  ceremonies  then  chiefly  in  dispute. 
Burnet,     iii.    303,     and     Append.    319. 
Strype,  i.  297,  299.     Nowell  voted  in  the 
minority.      It  can  hardly  be  going  too 
far  to  suppose  that  some  of  the  majority 
were  attached  to  the  old  religion. 

2  Jewell,  one  of  these  visitors,  writes 
afterwards  to  Martyr,  "  Invenimus  ubi- 
que  animos  multitudinis  satis  propensos 
ad  religionem  ;  ibi  etiam,  ubi  omnia  pu- 

tabantur  fore  difficiUima Si  quid 

erat  obstinate  malitise.  id  totum  erat  in 
pnsbyteris,    illis     praesertim.     qui    all 
quauJo  stotisseut  a  nostri  seutentii.'' 


Burnet,  iii.  Append.  289.  The  common 
people  in  London  and  elsewhere,  Strype 
says,  took  an  active  part  in  demolishing 
images  ;  the  pleasure  of  destruction,  I 
suppose,  mingling  with  their  abhorrence 
of  idolatry.  And  during  the  confer- 
ences held  in  Westminster  Abbey.  Jan. 
1559,  between  the  catholic  and  protestant 
divines,  the  populace,  who  had  been 
admitted  as  spectators,  testified  such 
disapprobation  of  the  former,  that  they 
made  it  a  pretext  for  breaking  off  the 
argument.  There  was  indeed  such  a 
tendency  to  anticipate  the  government 
in  reformation  as  necessitated  a  procla- 
mation, Dec.  28, 1558,  silencing  preachers 
on  both  sides. 

Mr.  Butler  says,  from  several  circum- 
stances it  is  evident  that  a  great  majority 
of  the  nation  then  inclined  to  the  Roman 
catholic  religion.  Mem.  of  English  Catho- 
lics, i.  146.  But  his  proofs  of  this  are 
extremely  weak.  The  attachment  he 
supposes  to  have  existed  in  the  laity 
towards  their  pastors  may  well  be 
doubted;  it  could  not  be  founded  on 
the  natural  grounds  of  esteem ;  and  if 
Kishton,  the  continuator  of  Sanders  de 
Schismate,  whom  he  quotes,  says  tliat 
one  third  of  the  nation  was  protestant, 
we  may  surely  double  the  calculation  of 
so  determined  a  papist.  As  to  the  In- 


ELIZ.— Puritans.      PROPORTION  OF  RELIGIONS. 


181 


Still  the  Romish  party  was  extremely  numerous :  it  compre- 
hended the  far  greater  portion  of  the  beneficed  clergy,  and 
all  those  who,  having  no  turn  for  controversy,  clung  with 
pious  reverence  to  the  rites  and  worship  of  their  earliest  as- 
sociations. It  might  be  thought  perhaps  not  very  repugnant 
to  wisdom  or  to  charity  that  such  persons  should  be  won  over 
to  the  reformed  faith  by  retaining  a  few  indifferent  usages, 
which  gratified  their  eyes,  and  took  off  the  impression,  so 
unpleasant  to  simple  minds,  of  religious  innovation.  It 
might  be  urged  that,  should  even  somewhat  more  of  super- 
stition remain  awhile  than  rational  men  would  approve,  the 
mischief  would  be  far  less  than  to  drive  the  people  back  into 
the  arms  of  popery,  or  to  expose  them  to  the  natural  conse- 
quences of  destroying  at  once  all  old  landmarks  of  rever- 
ence, —  a  dangerous  fanaticism,  or  a  careless  irreligion.  I 
know  not  in  what  degree  these  considerations  had  weight 
with  Elizabeth  ;  but  they  were  such  as  it  well  became  her  to 
entertain. 

We  live,  however,  too  far  from  the  period  of  her  accession 


fluence  which  Mr.  B.  alleges  the  court  to 
have  employed  in  elections  for  Eliza- 
beth's first  parliament,  the  argument 
would  equally  prove  that  the  majority 
was  protestant  under  Mary,  since  she 
had  recourse  to  the  same  means.  The 
whole  tenor  of  historical  documents  in 
Elizabeth's  reign  proves  that  the  catho- 
lics soon  became  a  minority,  and  still 
more  among  the  common  people  than 
the  gentry.  The  north  of  England, 
where  their  strength  lay,  was  in  every 
respect  the  least  important  part  of  the 
kingdom.  Even  according  to  Dr.  Lin- 
gard,  who  thinks  fit  to  claim  half  the 
nation  as  catholic  in  the  middle  of  this 
rei^n,  the  number  of  recusants  certified 
to  the  council  uuder  23  Eliz.  c.  1, 
amounted  ouly  to  fifty  thousand ;  and, 
if  we  can  trust  the  authority  of  other 
lists,  they  were  much  fewer  before  the 
accession  of  James.  This  writer,  I  may 
observe  in  passing,  has,  through  haste 
acd  thoughtlessness,  misstated  a  passage 
he  cites  from  Murden's  State  Papers,  p. 
605,  and  confounded  the  persons  sus- 
pected for  religion  in  the  city  of  London, 
about  the  time  of  the  Armada,  with  the 
whole  number  of  men  fit  for  arms;  thus 
making  the  former  amount  to  seventeen 
thousand  and  eighty-three. 

Mr.  Butler  has  taken  up  so  paradox- 
ical a  notion  on  this  subject,  that  he 
literally  maintains  the  catholics  to  have 
been  at  least  one  half  of  the  people  at 


the  epoch  of  the  Gunpowder-plot.  Vol. 
i.  p.  295.  We  should  be  glad  to  know 
at  what  time-  he  supposes  the  grand 
apostasy  to  have  been  consummated. 
Cardinal  Bentivoglio  gives  a  very  differ- 
ent account ;  reckoning  the  real  catho- 
lics, such  as  did  not  make  profession  of 
heresy,  at  only  a  thirtieth  part  of  the 
whole ;  though  he  supposes  that  four 
fifths  might  become  such,  from  secret 
inclination  or  general  indifference,  if  it 
were  once  established.  Opere  di  Benti- 
voglio, p.  83.  edit.  Paris,  1645.  But  I 
presume  neither  Mr.  Butler  nor  Dr. 
Lingard  would  own  these  adiaphorists 
The  latter  writer,  on  the  other  hand 
reckons  the  Hugonots  of  France,  soon 
after  1560,  at  only  one  hundredth  part  of 
the  nation,  quoting  for  this  Castelnau 
an  useful  memoir-writer,  but  no  au 
thority  on  a  matter  of  calculation.  The 
stern  spirit  of  Coligni,  atrox  animus 
Catonis,  rising  above  all  misfortune,  and 
unconquerable  except  by  the  darkest 
treachery,  is  sufficiently  admirable  with- 
out reducing  his  party  to  BO  miserable  a 
fraction.  The  Calvinists  at  this  time 
are  reckoned  by  some  at  one  fourth,  but 
more  frequently  at  one  tenth,  of  the 
French  nation.  Even  in  the  beginning 
of  the  next  century,  when  proscription 
and  massacre,  luke'.varnmcss  and  self- 
interest,  had  thinned  their  ranks,  they 
are  estimated  by  Bel  tivoglio  (ubi  supia 
at  one  fifteenth. 


182  DEVIATIONS   FROM  CEREMONIES.          CHAP.  IV. 

to  pass  an  unqualified  decision  on  the  course  of  policy  which 
it  was  best  for  the  queen  to  pursue.  The  difficulties  of  ef- 
fecting a  compromise  between  two  intolerant  and  exclusive 
sects  were  perhaps  insuperable.  In  maintaining  or  altering 
a  religious  establishment,  it  may  be  reckoned  the  general 
duty  of  governments  to  respect  the  wishes  of  the  majority. 
But  it  is  also  a  rule  of  human  policy  to  favdr  the  more  effi- 
cient and  determined,  which  may  not  always  be  the  more  nu- 
merous, party.  I  am  far  from  being  convinced  that  it  would 
not  have  been  practicable,  by  receding  a  little  from  that 
uniformity  which  governors  delight  to  prescribe,  to  have  pal- 
liated in  a  great  measure,  if  not  put  an  end  for  a  time  to,  the 
discontent  that  so  soon  endangered  the  new  establishment. 
The  frivolous  usages,  to  which  so  many  frivolous  objections 
were  raised,  such  as  the  tippet  and  surplice,  the  sign  of  the 
cross  in  baptism,  the  ring  in  matrimony,  the  posture  of  kneel- 
ing at  the  communion,  might  have  been  left  to  private  dis- 
cretion, not  possibly  without  some  inconvenience,  but  with 
less,  as  I  conceive,  than  resulted  from  rendering  their  observ- 
ance indispensable.  Nor  should  we  allow  ourselves  to  be 
turned  aside  by  the  common  reply,  that  no  concessions  of  this 
kind  would  have  ultimately  prevented  the  disunion  of  the 
church  upon  more  essential  differences  than  these  litigated 
ceremonies ;  since  the  science  of  policy,  like  that  of  medi- 
cine, must  content  itself  with  devising  remedies  for  immedi- 
ate danger,  and  can  at  best  only  retard  the  progress  of  that 
intrinsic  decay  which  seems  to  be  the  law  of  all  things  hu- 
man, and  through  which  every  institution  of  man,  like  his 
earthly  frame,  must  one  day  crumble  into  ruin. 

The  repugnance  felt  by  a  large  part  of  the  protestant 
Unwilling-  c^ergy  to  the  ceremonies  with  which  Elizabeth 
ness  of  many  would  not  consent  to  dispense,  showed  itself  in  ir- 
witnThf/  regular  transgressions  of  the  uniformity  prescribed 
ceremon^s  ^7  statute.  Some  continued  to  wear  the  habits, 
others  laid  them  aside ;  the  communicants  received 
the  sacrament  sitting,  or  standing,  or  kneeling,  according  to 
the  minister's  taste ;  some  baptized  in  the  font,  others  in  a 
basin  ;  some  with  the  sign  of  the  cross,  others  without  it. 
The  people  in  London  and  other  towns,  siding  chiefly  with 
the  malecontents,  insulted  such  of  the  clergy  as  observed 
the  prescribed  order. l  Many  of  the  bishops  readily  con- 

i  Strype'g  Parker,  152,  153.     Collier,  508.    In  the  Lansdowne  Collection,  yol. 


Ettz.  —  Puritans.      INCREASE  OF  MALECONTENTS.  183 

nived  at  deviations  from  ceremonies  which  they  disapproved. 
Some,  who  felt  little  objection  to  their  use,  were  against  im- 
posing them  as  necessary.1  And  this  opinion,  which  led  to 
very  momentous  inferences,  began  so  much  to  prevail,  that 
we  soon  find  the  objections  to  conformity  more  grounded  on 
the  unlawfulness  of  compulsory  regulations  in  the  church 
prescribed  by  the  civil  power,  than  on  any  special  impro- 
priety in  the  usages  themselves.  But  this  principle,  which 
perhaps  the  scrupulous  party  did  not  yet  very  fully  avow, 
was  altogether  incompatible  with  the  supremacy  vested  in 
the  queen,  of  which  fairest  flower  of  her  prerogative  she  was 
abundantly  tenacious.  One  thing  was  evident,  that  the  puri- 
tan malecontents  were  growing  every  day  more  numerous, 
more  determined,  and  more  likely  to  win  over  the  generality 
of  those  who  sincerely  favored  the  protestant  cause.  There 
were  but  two  lines  to  be  taken ;  either  to  relax  and  modify 
the  regulations  which  gave  offence,  or  to  enforce  a  more 
punctual  observation  of  them.  It  seems  to  me  far  more  prob- 
able that  the  former  course  would  have  prevented  a  great  deal 
of  that  mischief  which  the  second  manifestly  aggravated. 
For  in  this  early  stage  the  advocates  of  a  simpler  ritual 
had  by  no  means  assumed  the  shape  of  an  embodied  faction, 
which  concessions,  it  must  be  owned,  are  not  apt  to  satisfy, 
but  numbered  the  most  learned  and  distinguished  portion  of 
the  hierarchy.  Parker  stood  nearly  alone  on  the  other  side, 
but  alone  more  than  an  equipoise  in  the  balance,  through  his 
high  station,  his  judgment  in  matters  of  policy,  and  his  knowl- 
edge of  the  queen's  disposition.  He  had  possibly  reason  to 
apprehend  that  Elizabeth,  irritated  by  the  prevalent  humor 
for  alteration,  might  burst  entirely  away  from  the  protestant 
side,  or  stretch  her  supremacy  to  reduce  the  church  into  a 
slavish  subjection  to  her  caprice.2  This  might  induce  a 
man  of  his  sagacity,  who 'took  a  far  wider  view  of  civil 
affairs  than  his  brethren,  to  exert  himself  according  to  her 
peremptory  command  for  universal  conformity.  But  it  is 
not  easy  to  reconcile  the  whole  of  his  conduct  to  this  sup- 
position ;  and  in  the  copious  memorials  of  Strype  we  find 
the  archbishop  rather  exciting  the  queen  to  rigorous  meas- 

Tiii.  47,  is  a  letter  from  Parker,  April,        «  This  apprehension  of  Elizabeth's  tak- 
1565,   complaining  of  Turner,   dean  of  ing  a  disgust  to  protestantism  is  intimated 
Wells,    for     having     made    a    man    do  in  a  letter  of  bishop  Cox,  Strype's  Par- 
penance  for  adultery  in  a  square  cap  ker,  229. 
1  Strype's  Parker,  157, 173 


184        ENFORCEMENT  OF  CONFORMITY.    CHAP.  IV. 

ures  against   the    puritans    than   standing   in   need   of  her 
admonition.1 

The  unsettled  state  of  exterior  religion  which  has  been 
mentioned  lasted  till  1565.  In  the  beginning  of  that  year 
Conformity  a  determination  was  taken  by  the  queen,  or  rather 
theTrch-by  perhaps  the  archbishop,  to  put  a  stop  to  all  irregu- 
bishop  larities  in  the  public  service.  He  sent  forth  a 

deposition*  book  called  Advertisements,  containing  orders  and 
of  others.  regulations  for  the  discipline  of  the  clergy.  This 
modest  title  was  taken  in  consequence  of  the  queen's  with- 
holding her  sanction  of  its  appearance,  through  Leicester's 
influence.2  The  primate's  next  step  was  to  summon  before 
the  ecclesiastical  commission  Sampson,  dean  of  Christchurch, 
and  Humphrey,  president  of  Magdalen  college,  Oxford,  men 
of  signal  nonconformity,  but  at  the  same  time  of  such  emi- 
nent reputation  that,  when  the  law  took  its  course  against 
•them,  no  other  offender  could  hope  for  indulgence.  On  refus- 
ing to  wear  the  customary  habits,  Sampson  was  deprived  of 
his  deanery ;  but  the  other  seems  to  have  been  tolerated.8 
This  instance  of  severity,  as  commonly  happens,  rather  irri- 
tated than  intimidated  the  puritan  clergy,  aware  of  their 
numbers,  their  popularity,  and  their  powerful  friends,  but 
above  all  sustained  by  their  own  sincerity  and  earnestness. 
Parker  had  taken  his  resolution  to  proceed  in  the  vigorous 
course  he  had  begun.  He  .obtained  from  the  queen  a  proc- 
lamation, peremptorily  requiring  a  conformity  in  the  use  of 
the  clerical  vestments  and  other  matters  of  discipline.  The 
London  ministers,  summoned  before  himself  and  their  bishop 
Grindal,  who  did  not  very  willingly  cooperate  with  his  met- 
ropolitan, were  called  upon  for  a  promise  to  comply  with  the 
legal  ceremonies,  which  thirty-seven  out  of  ninety-eight  re- 
fused to  make.  They  were  in  consequence  suspended  from 

i  Parker  sometimes  declares  himself  the  puritans  to  extremities.  But,  on  the 
willing  to  see  some  indulgence  as  to  review  of  his  whole  behavior,  he  must  te 
the  habits  and  other  matters;  but  the  reckoned,  and  always  has  been  reckoned, 
queen's  commands  being  peremptory,  he  the  most  severe  disciplinarian  of  .Eliza- 
had  thought  it  his  duty  to  obey  them,  beth's  first  hierarchy,  though  more  vio- 
though  forewarning  her  that  the  puritan  lent  men  came  afterwards. 
ministers  would  not  give  way  :  225,  227.  2  Strype's  Annals.  416.  Lifeof  Parker, 
Tills,  however,  is  not  consistent  with  other  159.  Some  years  after  these  Advertise- 
l>.i— .i_'rs,  where  he  appears  to  importune  ments  obtained  the  queen's  sanction,  and 
the  queen  to  proceed.  Her  wavering  got  the  name  of  Articles  and  Ordinances, 
conduct,  partly  owing  to  caprice,  partly  Id.  160. 

to  insincerity,  was   naturally  vexatious  » Strype's  Annals,   416,   430.     Life   oj 

to  a  man  of  his  firm  and  ardent  temper.  Parker",   184.      Sampson   had   refused  a 

Possibly  he  might  dissemble  a  little  in  bishopric  on  account  of  these  ceremonies 

writing  to  Cecil,  who  was  against  driving  Buraet,  iii.  292. 


.  — Puritans.      SEPARATE  CONVENTICLES.  185 

their  ministry,  and  their  livings  put  in  sequestration.  But 
these  unfortunately,  as  was  the  case  in  all  this  reign,  were 
the  most  conspicuous  both  for  their  general  character  and  for 
their  talent  in  preaching.1 

Whatever  deviations  from  uniformity  existed  within  the 
pale  of  the  Anglican  church,  no  attempt  had  hitherto  been 
made  to  form  separate  assemblies ;  nor  could  it  be  deemed 
necessary  while  so  much  indulgence  had  been  conceded  to 
the  scrupulous  clergy.  But  they  were  now  reduced  to  deter- 
mine whether  the  imposition  of  those  rites  they  disliked 
would  justify,  or  render  necessary,  an  abandonment  of  their 
ministry.  The  bishops  of  that  school  had  so  far  overcome 
their  repugnance,  as  not  only  to  observe  the  ceremonies  of 
the  church,  but,  in  some  instances,  to  employ  compulsion  tow- 
ards others.2  A  more  unexceptionable,  because  more  dis- 
interested, judgment  was  pronounced  by  some  of  the  Swiss 
reformers,  to  whom  our  own  paid  great  respect — Beza,  Gual- 
ter,  and  Bullinger;  who,  while  they  regretted  the  continuance 
of  a  few  superfluous  rites,  and  still  more  the  severity  used 
towards  good  men,  dissuaded  their  friends  from  deserting 
their  vocation  on  that  account.  Several  of  the  most  respect- 
able opponents  of  the  ceremonies  were  equally  adverse  to 
any  open  schism.8  But  the  animosities  springing  from  heat- 
ed zeal,  and  the  smart  of  what  seemed  oppression,  would  not 
suffer  the  English  puritans  generally  to  acquiesce  in  such 
temperate  counsels.  They  began  to  form  separate  conventi- 
cles in  London,  not  ostentatiously  indeed,  but  of  course  with- 
out the  possibility  of  eluding  notice.  It  was  doubtless  worthy 
of  much  consideration  whether  an  established  church-govern- 
ment could  wink  at  the  systematic  disregard  of  its  discipline 
by  those  who  were  subject  to  its  jurisdiction  and  partook  of 

1  Life  of  Parker,   214.      Strype  says,  volved  a  thet  logical  tenet  differing  from 
p.  223.   that    the    suspended   ministers  their  own,  as  to  the  necessity  of  baptism, 
preached  again  after  a  little  time  by  con-  In   Strvpe's   Annals,   501,   we  have   the 
nivance.  form  of  an  oath  taken  by  all  midwives  to 

2  Jewell  is  said  to  have  become  strict  exercise  their  calling  without  sorcery  or 
In  enforcing  the  use  of  the  surplice.     An-  superstition,   and    to    baptize   with    the 
unls,  421.  proper    words.      It    was    abolished    by 

»  Strvpe's  Annals,  i.  423,  ii.  316;  Life  James  I. 

of  Parker,  243,   318.      Burnet,   iii.  310,         Beza  was   more   dissatisfied   than    the 

825,   337.      Bishops   Grindal   and   Horn  Helvetic  divines  with   the   state  of    the 

wrote  to  Zurich,  saying  plainly  it  was  not  English  church  —  Annals,  i.  452  ;  Collier 

their  fault  that  the  habits  were  not  laid  503  — but  dissuaded  the  puritans  from 

aside,  with  the  cross  in  baptism,  the  use  separation,    and    advised    them    rathel 

of  organs,   baptism  by  women,-  &c..  p.  to   comply   with  the  ceremonies.      Id. 

814.     This  last  usage  was  much  inveighed  611. 
against  by  the  Calvinists.  because  it  in- 


186  AFFAIR  AT  PLUMMER'S  HALL.  CHAP.  IV. 

its  revenues.  And  yet  there  were  many  important  consider- 
ations, derived  from  the  posture  of  religion  and  of  the  state, 
which  might  induce  cool-headed  men  to  doubt  the  expediency 
of  too  much  straitening  the  reins.  But  there  are  few,  I 
trust,  who  can  hesitate  to  admit  that  the  puritan  clergy,  after 
being  excluded  from  their  benefices,  might  still  claim  from  a 
just  government  a  peaceful  toleration  of  their  particular  wor- 
ship. This  it  was  vain  to  expect  from  the  queen's  arbitrary 
spirit,  the  imperious  humor  of  Parker,  and  that  total  disre- 
gard of  the  rights  of  conscience  which  was  common  to  all 
parties  in  the  sixteenth  century.  The  first  instance  of  actual 
punishment  inflicted  on  protestant  dissenters  was  in  June, 
1567,  when  a  company  of  more  than  one  hundred  were 
seized  during  their  religious 'exercises  at  Plummer's  Hall, 
which  they  had  hired  on  pretence  of  a  wedding,  and  fourteen 
or  fifteen  of  them  were  sent  to  prison.1  They  behaved  on 
their  examination  with  a  rudeness,  as  well  as  self-sufficiency, 
that  had  already  begun  to  characterize  the  puritan  faction. 
But  this  cannot  excuse  the  fatal  error  of  molesting  men  for 
the  exercise  of  their  own  religion. 

These  coercive  proceedings  of  the  archbishop  were  feebly 
seconded,  or  directly  thwarted,  by  most  leading  men  both  in 
church  and  state.  Grindal  and  Sandys,  successively  bishops 
of  London  and  archbishops  of  York,  were  naturally  reck- 
oned at  this  time  somewhat  favorable  to  the  nonconforming 
ministers,  whose  scruples  they  had  partaken.  Parkhurst  and 
Pilkington,  bishops  of  Norwich  and  Durham,  were  openly 
on  their  side.2  They  had  still  more  effectual  support  in  the 
queen's  council.  The  earl  of  Leicester,  who  possessed  more 
power  than  any  one  to  sway  her  wavering  and  capricious 
temper,  the  earls  of  Bedford,  Huntingdon,  and  Warwick,  re- 
garded as  the  steadiest  protestants  among  the  aristocracy, 
the  wise  and  grave  lord  keeper  Bacon,  the  sagacious  Wal- 
singham,  the  experienced  Sadler,  the  zealous  Knollys,  con- 
sidered these  objects  of  Parker's  severity  either  as  demanding 
a  purer  worship  than  had  been  established  in  the  church,  or 
at  least  as  worthy  by  their  virtues  and  services  of  more  in- 
dulgent treatment.8  Cecil  himself,  though  on  intimate  terms 

i  Strype's  Life  of  Parker,  242.  Life  of  »  Id.  226.  The  church  ha^hut  two  01 

Grindiil,  114.  three  friends,  Strype  says,  in  the  council 

"Burntt,  iii.  316.  Strype'g  Parker,  about  1572,  of  whom  Cecil  was  the  cbiel. 

165,  et  alibi.  Id.  388. 


ELIZ.— Puritans.       APPOINTMENT  OF  LAYMEN. 


187- 


with  the  archbishop,  and  concurring  generally  in  his  meas- 
ures, was  not  far  removed  from  the  latter  way  of  thinking,  if 
his  natural  caution  and  extreme  dread  at  this  juncture  of 
losing  the  queen's  favor  had  permitted  him  more  unequivo 
cally  to  express  it.  Those  whose  judgment  did  not  incline 
them  towards  the  puritan  notions  respected  the  scruples  of 
men  in  whom  the  reformed  religion  could  so  implicitly  con- 
fide. They  had  regard  also  to  the  condition  of  the  church. 
The  far  greater  part  of  its  benefices  were  supplied  by  con- 
formists of  very  doubtful  sincerity,  who  would  resume  their 
mass-books  with  more  alacrity  than  they  had  cast  them  aside.1 
Such  a  deficiency  of  protestant  clergy  had  been  experienced 
at  the  queen's  accession,  that  for  several  years  it  was  a  com- 
mon practice  to  appoint  laymen,  usually  mechanics,  to  read 
the  service  in  vacant  churches.2  These  were  not  always 
wholly  illiterate ;  or  if  they  were,  it  was  no  more  than  might 
be  said  of  the  popish  clergy,  the  vast  majority  of  whom  were 
destitute  of  all  useful  knowledge,  and  c*ould  read  little  Latin.8 


1  Burnet  says,  on  the  authority  of  the 
visitors'  reports,  that,  "  out  of  9400  bene- 
ficed  clergymen,  not  more  than  about 
200  refused  to  conform.    This  caused  for 
some  years  just  apprehensions  of  the 
danger  into  which  religion  was  brought 
by  their  retaining  their  affections  to  the 
old  superstition;  so  that,"  he  proceeds, 
"  if  queen   Elizabeth   had  not   lived  so 
long  as  she  did,  till  all  that  generation 
•was  dead  and  a  new  set  of  men  bettef 
educated  and  principled  were  grown  up 
and  put  in  their  rooms  ;  and  if  a  prince 
of  another  religion  had  succeeded  before 
that    time,  they   had    probably    turned 
about  again  to  the  old  superstition  as 
nimbly  as  they  had  done  before  in  queen 
Mary's  days."    Vol.  ii.  p.  401.    It  would 
be  easy  to  multiply  testimonies  out  of 
Strype  to  the  papist  inclinations  of  a  great 
part  of  the  clergy  in  the  first  part  of 
this  reign.     They  are  said  to  have  been 
sunk  in  superstition  and  looseness  of 
living.    Annals,  i.  166. 

2  Strype's  Annals,  138,  177.     Collier, 
436,  465.    This  seems  to  show  that  more 
churches  were  empty  by  the  desertion  of 
popish    incumbents  than  the  foregoing 
note  would  lead  us  to  suppose.    I  believe 
that  many  went  off  to  foreign  parts  from 
time  to  time  who  had  complied  in  1559, 
and  others  were  put  out  of  their  livings. 
The  Roman  catholic  writers    make  out 
a  longer  list  than  Burnet's  calculation 
allows. 

It  appears  from  an  account  sent  in  to 
the  privy  council  by  Parkhurst,  bishop 


of  Norwich,  in  1562,  that  in  his  diocese 
more  than  one  third  of  the  benefices  were 
•vacant.  Annals,  i.  323.  But  in  Ely, 
out  of  152  cures,  only  52  were  served  in 
1560.  L.  of  Parker,  72. 

3  Parker  wrote  in  1561  to  the  bishops 
of  his  province,  enjoining  them  to  send 
him  certificates  of  the  names  and  quali- 
ties of  all  their  clergy  ;  one  column,  in 
the  form  of  certificate,  was  for  learning : 
"  And  this,"  Strype  says,  "  was  com- 
monly set  down  —  Latine  aliqua  verba 
intelligit,  Latine  utcunque  intelligit, 
Latine  pauca  intelligit,"  &c.  Sometimes, 
however,  we  find  doctus.  L.  of  Parker, 
95.  But  if  the  clergy  could  not  read  the 
language  in  which  their  very  prayers 
were  composed,  what  other  learning  or 
knowledge  could  they  have?  Certainly 
none ;  and  even  those  who  had  gone  far 
enough  to  study  the  school  logic  and 
divinity  do  not  deserve  a  much  higher 
place  than  the  wholly  uninstructed.  The 
Greek  tongue  was  never  generally  taught 
in  the  universities  or  public  schools  till 
the  Reformation,  and  perhaps  not  so 
soon. 

Since  this  note  was.  written,  a  letter 
of  Gibson  has  been  published  in  Pepys' 
Memoirs,  vol.  ii.  p.  154,  mentioning  a 
catalogue  he  had  found  of  the  clergy  in 
the  archdeaconry  of  Middlesex,  A.D.  1563, 
with  their  qualifications  annexed.  Three 
only  are  described  as  docti  Latine  et 
Greece;  twelve  are  called  docti  simply; 
nine  Latine  docti;  thirty  one  Latin* 
mediocriter  intelligeutes ;  forty-two  !«• 


188  STATE  OF  THE  TWO  UNIVERSITIES.      CHAP.  FV. 

Of  the  two  universities,  Oxford  had  become  so  strongly  at- 
tached to  the  Romish  side  during  the  late  reign,  that,  after 
the  desertion  or  expulsion  of  the  most  zealous  of  that  party 
had  almost  emptied  several  colleges,  it  still  for  many  years 
abounded  with  adherents  to  the  old  religion.1  But  at  Cam- 
bridge, which  had  been  equally  popish  at  the  queen's  acces- 
sion, the  opposite  faction  soon  acquired  the  ascendant.  The 
younger  students,  imbibing  ardently  the  new  creed  of  eccle- 
siastical liberty,  and  excited  by  puritan  sermons,  began  to 
throw  off  their  surplices,  and  to  commit  other  breaches  of 
discipline,  from  which  it  might  be  inferred  that  the  genera- 
tion to  come  would  not  be  less  apt  for  innovation  than  the 
present.2 

tine  perperam,  ntcunque  aliquid,  pauca  university  had  not  been  Anglican,  but 

verba,  &c.,  intelligences;   seventeen  are  popish;  which  Wood  liked  much  better 

non  docti  or  indocti.     If  this  was  the  than  the  first,  and  nearly  as  well  as  the 

case  in   London,  what  can  we  think  of  second, 
more  remote  parts?  A  letter  from  the  university  of  Oxford 

i  In  the  struggle  made  for  popery  at  to  Elizabeth  on  her  accession   (Ilerne's 

the  queen 's  accession,  the  lower  house  of  edition  of  Roper's  Life  of  More.  p.  173) 

convocation  sent  up  to  the  bishops  five  shows  the  accommodating  character  of 

articles    of    faith,  all    strongly    Homan  these  academies.      They  extol    Mary  as 

catholic.     These    had    previously   been  an  excellent  queen,  but  are  consoled  by 

transmitted  to  the  two  universities,  and  the  thought  of  her  excellent  successor, 

returned  with  the  hands  of  the  greater  One  sentence  is  curious  :  ''  Cum  patri, 

part  of  the  doctors  to  the  first  four.    The  fratri,  sorori,  nihil  fuerit  republic^  cari- 

fifth  they  scrupled,  as  trenching  too  much  us,  religione  optatius,  vera  gloria  dulcius ; 

on  the  queen's  temporal  power.  Buruet,  cum  in  hac  fauiilia  hae  laudes  floruerint 

ii.  388,  iii.  269.  vehementer  confidimus,  &c.,  quee  ejus- 

Strype  says  the  universities  were  so  dem  stirpis  sis,  easdem  cupidissiuie  prose- 
addicted  to  popery,  that  for  some  years  cuturam."  It  was  a  singular  train  of 
few  educated  in  them  were  ordained,  complaisance  to  praise  Henry's,  Ed- 
Life  of  Grrindal,  p.  60.  And  Wood's  ward's,  and  Mary's  religious  sentiments 
Antiquities  of  the  University  of  Oxford  in  the  same  breath;  but  the  queen  might 
contains  many  proofs  of  its  attachment  to  at  least  learn  this  from  it,  that,  whether 
the  old  religion.  In  Exeter  College,  as  she  fixed  on  one  of  their  creeds,  or  de- 
Jate  as  1578,  there  were  not  above  four  vised  a  new  one  for  herself,  she  was  sure 
protestants  out  of  eighty,  "all  the  rest  of  the  acquiescence  of  this  ancient  and 
secret  or  open  Unman  aflectionaries."  learned  body.  A  preceding  letter  to 
These  chiefly  came  from  the  west,  "  where  cardinal  Pole,  in  which  the  times  of 
popery  greatly  prevailed,  and  the  gentry  Henry  and  Edward  are  treated  more 
were  bred  up  in  that  religion."  Strype's  cavalierly,  seems  by  the  style,  which  it 
Annals,  ii.  539.  But  afterwards  Wood  very  elegant,  to  have  been  the  production, 
complains,  "  through  the  influence  of  of  the  same  pen. 

Humphrey  and  Reynolds  (the  latter  of        2  The    fellows    and    scholars    of    St. 

whom  became  divinity  lecturer  on  secre-  John's  College,  to   the  number  of  three 

tury  Walsinghain's  foundation  in  1586),  hundred,  threw  o£f  their  hoods  and  sur- 

the  disposition  of  the  times,  and  the  long  plices,  in  1565,  without  any  opposition 

continuance  of  theeirlof  Leicester,  the  from   their  master,  till    Cecil,  as  chau- 

l>rinrip;il  patron  of  the  puritanical  fac-  cellor  of   the   university,   took    up    the 

tioii.iii  the  place  of  chancellor  of  Oxford,  matter,  and  insisted  on  their  conformity 

the  face  of  the  university  was  so  much  to    the    established     regulations.      This 

altered  that  there  w.-is  little  to  be  seen  in  gave  much  dissatisfaction  to  the  univer- 

it  of  the  church  of  England,  according  to  sity;    not   only   the    more    intemperate 

the  principles  and  positions  upon  which  party,  but  many  heads  of  colleges  and 

it  was  first  reformed."     Hist,  of  Oxford,  grave  men,  among  whom  we  are  rather 

vol.  ii.  p.  228.     Previously,  however,  to  surprised   to  find  the  name  of  Whitgift, 

this   change    towards    puritanism,    the  interceding    with    their    chancellor   fo* 


ELIZ.—  Puritans.         THOMAS   CARTWK1GHT.  189 

The  first  period  in  the  history  of  puritanism  includes  the 
time  from  the  queen's  accession  to  1570,  during  Amore 
which  the  retention  of  superstitious  ceremonies  in  determined 
the  church  had  been  the  sole  avowed  ground  of  aboufisro, 
complaint.     But  when  these  obnoxious  rites  came  led  by  . 
to  be  enforced  with  unsparing  rigor,  and  even  those 
who  voluntarily  renounced  the  temporal  advantages  of  the 
establishment  were  hunted  from  their  private  conventicles, 
thjy  began  to  consider  the  national  system  of  ecclesiastical 
regimen  as  itself  in  fault,  and  to  transfer  to  the  institution  of 
episcopacy  that  dislike  which  they  felt  for  some  of  the  prel- 
ates.    The  ostensible    founder  of  this   new  school  (though 
probably  its  tenets  were  by  no  means  new  to  many  of  the 
sect)  was  Thomas  Cartwright,  the  Lady  Margaret's  professor 
of  divinity  at  Cambridge.    He  began  about  1570  to  inculcate 
the  unlawfulness  of  any  form  of  church-government,  except 
what  the  apostles  had  instituted,  namely,  the  presbyterian. 
A  deserved  reputation  for  virtue,  learning,  and  acuteness,  an 
ardent  zeal,  an  inflexible    self-confidence,  a  vigorous,  rude, 
and  arrogant  style,  marked  him  as  the  formidable  leader  of  a 
religious  faction.1     In  1572  he  published  his  celebrated  Ad- 
monition to  the  Parliament,  calling  on  that  assembly  to  re- 
fcnn  the  various  abuses  subsisting  in  the  church.  Dan(,eroU8 
In  this  treatise  such  a  hardy  spirit  of  innovation  nature  of 
was  displayed,  and  schemes  of  ecclesiastical  policy 
so  novel  and  extraordinary  were  developed,  that  it  made  a 
most  important  epoch  in  the  contest,  and  rendered  its  ter- 
mination far  more  improbable.     The  hour  for  liberal  conces- 
sions had  been  suffered  to  pass  away ;  the  archbishop's  intol- 
erant temper  had  taught  men  to  question  the  authority  that 
oppressed  them,  till  the  battle  was  no  longer  to  be  fought  for 
a  tippet  and  a  surplice,  but  for  the  whole  ecclesiastical  hie- 
rarchy, interwoven  as  it  was  with  the  temporal  constitution 
of  England. 

It  had  been  the  first  measure  adopted  in  throwing  off  tha 
yoke  of  Rome  to  invest  the  sovereign  with  an  absolute  con- 

Bome  mitigation  as  to  these  unpalatable  Cambridge,  Leicester  and  Cecil,  kept  a 

observances.      Strvpe's   Annals,   i.   441.  very  strict  hand  over   them,  especially 

Life  of   Parker,   194.     Cambridge    had,  the  latter,  who  seems  to  have  acted  as 

however  her  catholics,   as    Oxford   had  paramount    visitor    over    every  college, 

her     puritans,    of    whom      Dr.     Caius,  making  them  reverse  any  :iot  which  hi 

Bounder  of   the  college   that  bears   his  disapproved.     Strype,  passim. 
name,  was  mnong  the  most  remarkable.         l  Strype's    Annals,    i.    583.      Life    of 

Id.  200.    The  chancellors  of  Oxford  and  Parker,  312,  347.     Life  of  Whitgift,  27 


190  ECCLESIASTICAL  INDEPENDENCE.          CHAP.  IV. 

trol  over  the  Anglican  church ;  so  that  no  part  of  its  coercive 
discipline  could  be  exercised  but  by  his  authority,  nor  any 
laws  enacted  for  its  governance  without  his  sanction.  This 
supremacy,  indeed,  both  Henry  VIII.  and  Edward  VI.  had 
carried  so  far,  that  the  bishops  were  reduced  almost  to  the 
rank  of  temporal  officers  taking  out  commissions  to  rule  their 
dioceses  during  the  king's  pleasure  ;  and  Cranmer  had  pros- 
trated at  the  feet  of  Henry  those  spiritual  functions  which 
have  usually  been  reckoned  inherent  in  the  order  of  clergy. 
Elizabeth  took  some  pains  to  soften,  and  almost  explain 
away,  her  supremacy,  in  order  to  conciliate  the  catholics ; 
while,  by  means  of  the  High  Commission  court,  established 
by  statute  in  the  first  year  of  her  reign,  she  was  practically 
asserting  it  with  no  little  despotism.  But  the  avowed  oppo- 
nents of  this  prerogative  were  hitherto  chiefly  those  who 
looked  to  Rome  for  another  head  of  their  church.  The  dis- 
ciples of  Cartwright  now  learned  to  claim  an  ecclesiastical 
independence,  as  unconstrained  as  any  that  the  Romish 
priesthood  in  the  darkest  ages  had  usurped.  "  No  civil  mag- 
istrate in  councils  or  assemblies  for  church  matters,"  he  says 
in  his  Admonition,  "  can  either  be  chief-moderator,  over- 
ruler,  judge,  or  determiner ;  nor  has  he  such  authority  as 
that,  without  his  consent,  it  should  not  be  lawful  for  eccle- 
siastical persons  to  make  any  church  orders  or  ceremonies. 
Church  matters  ought  ordinarily  to  be  handled  by  church 
officers.  The  principal  direction  of  them  is  by  God's  ordi- 
nance committed  to  the  ministers  of  the  church  and  to  the 
ecclesiastical  governors.  As  these  meddle  not  with  the  mak- 
ing civil  laws,  so  the  civil  magistrate  ought  not  to  ordain 
ceremonies,  or  determine  controversies  in  the  church,  as  long 
as  they  do  not  intrench  upon  his  temporal  authority.  'Tis 
the  prince's  province  to  protect  and  defend  the  councils  of 
his  clergy,  to  keep  the  peace,  to  see  their  decrees  executed, 
and  to  punish  the  contemners  of  them ;  but  to  exercise  no 
spiritual  jurisdiction."1  "It  must  be  remembered,"  he  says 
in  another  place,  "that  civil  magistrates  must  govern  the 
church  according  to  the  rules  of  God,  prescribed  in  his  word  ; 
and  that,  as  they  are  nurses,  so  they  be  servants  unto  the 
church ;  and  as  they  rule  in  the  church,  so  they  must  re- 
member to  submit  themselves  unto  the  church,  to  subif't 

1  Cartwright's  Admonition,  quoted  in  Neal's  Hist,  of  Puritans,  i.  88. 


ELIZ.  — Puritans.       INFATUATED  ARROGANCE.  191 

their  sceptres,  to  throw  down  their  crowns  before  the 
church,  yea,  as  the  prophet  speaketh,  to  lick  the  dust  off  the 
feet  of  the  church."  1  It  is  difficult  to  believe  that  I  am  tran- 
scribing the  words  of  a  protestant  writer ;  so  much  does  this 
passage  call  to  mind  the  tones  of  infatuated  arrogance  which 
had  been  heard  from  the  lips  of  Gregory  VII.  and  of  those 
who  trod  in  his  footsteps.2 

The  strength  of  the  protestant  party  had  been  derived, 
both  in  Germany  and  in  England,  far  less  from  their  superi- 
ority in  argument,  however  decisive  this  might  be,  than  from 
that  desire  which  all  classes,  and  especially  the  higher,  had 
long  experienced  to  emancipate  themselves  from  the  thral- 
dom of  ecclesiastical  jurisdiction.  For  it  is  ever  found  that 
the  generality  of  mankind  do  not  so  much  as  give  a  hearing 
to  novel  systems  in  religion,  till  they  have  imbibed,  from 
some  cause  or  other,  a  secret  distaste  to  that  in  which  they 
have  been  educated.  It  was  therefore  rather  alarming  to 
such  as  had  an  acquaintance  with  ecclesiastical  history,  and 
knew  the  encroachments  formerly  made  by  the  hierarchy 
throughout  Europe,  encroachments  perfectly  distinguishable 
from  those  of  the  Roman  see.  to  perceive  the  same  preten- 
sions urged,  and  the  same  ambition  and  arrogance  at  work, 
which  had  imposed  a  yoke  on  the  necks  of  their  fathers. 
With  whatever  plausibility  it  might  be  maintained  that  a 
connection  with  temporal  magistrates  could  only  corrupt  the 
purity  and  shackle  the  liberties  of  a  Christian  church,  this 
argument  was  not  for  them  to  urge  who  called  on  those  mag- 
istrates to  do  the  church's  bidding,  to  enforce  its  decrees,  to 

1  Madox's  Vindication  of  Church  of  of  prophet-king  at  Geneva.     And  Collie? 
England   against    Neal,    p.    122.      This  quotes    passages    from     Knox's    Second 
writer   quotes  several  very  extravagant  Blast  inconsistent  with  any  government, 
passages  from  Cartwright,  which   go  to  except  one  slavishly  subservient  to  tha 
prove    irresistibly  that  he  would    have  church.     P.   444.     The  non-juring   his- 
made  no  compromise  short  of  the  over-  torian  holds  out  the   hand  of  fellowship 
throw  of  the  established  church  (p.  Ill,  to  the  puritans  he  abhors,  when  they 
&c. )    "  As  to  you,  dear  brethren,"  he  preach    up   ecclesiastical    independence, 
said  in  a  puritan  tract  of  1570,   "  whom  Collier    liked    the    royal    supremacy   aa 
God  hath  called  into  the  brunt  of  the  little  as  Cartwright ;   and   in   giving  an 
battle,  the  Lord  keep  you  constant,  that  account  of  Bancroft's  attack  on  the  non- 
ye  yield  neither  to  toleration,  neither  to  conformists  for  denying  it,  enters  upon  a 
any  other  subtle  persuasions  of  dispen-  long  discussion  in  favor  of  an  absolute 
nations    and     licenses,    which    were    to  emancipation   from    the  control  of  lay- 
fortify  their  Romish    practices  ;  .but,  as  men.    P.  610.     He  does  not  even  approve 
you  tight  the   Lord's  fight,  be  valiant."  the  determination  of  the  judges  in  Caw 
Madox,  p.  287.  drey's  case  (5  Coke's  Ik-ports),  though 

2  These    principles   had   already   been  against  the   nonconformists,  as  proceed- 
\>ro;u'hed    by   those   who    called    Calvin  ing  on  a  wrong  principle  of  setting  up 
master;  he   had  himself  become  a  sort  the  state  above  the  church.     P.  634 


192       SCOPE  OF   CART  WRIGHT'S   DECLARATION.      CHAP.  IV. 

punish  its  refractory  members;  and  while  they  disdained  to 
accept  the  prince's  cooperation  as  their  ally,  claimed  his  ser- 
vice as  their  minister.  The  protestant  dissenters  since  the 
revolution,  who  have  almost  unanimously,  and,  I  doubt  not, 
sincerely,  declared  their  averseness  to  any  religious  establish- 
ment, especially  as  accompanied  with  coercive  power,  even 
in  favor  of  their  own  sect,  are  by  no  means  chargeable  with 
these  errors  of  the  early  puritans.  But  the  scope  of  Cart- 
wright's  declaration  was  not  to  obtain  a  toleration  for  dissent; 
not  even,  by  abolishing  the  whole  ecclesiastical  polity,  to 
place  the  different  professions  of  religion  on  an  equal  footing ; 
but  to  substitute  his  own  model  of  government,  the,  one,  ex- 
clusive, unappealable  standard  of  obedience,  with  all  the  en- 
dowments, so  far  as  applicable  to  its  frame,  of  the  present 
church,  and  with  all  the  support  to  its  discipline  that  the  civil 
power  could  afford.1 

We  are  not  however  to  conclude  that  every  one,  or  even 
the  majority,  of  those  who  might  be  counted  on  the  puritan 
side  in  Elizabeth's  reign,  would  have  subscribed  to  these  ex- 
travagant sentences  of  Cartwright,  or  desired  to  take  away 
the  legal  supremacy  of  the  crown.2  That  party  acquired 
strength  by  the  prevailing  hatred  and  dread  of  popery,  and 
by  the  disgust  which  the  bishops  had  been  unfortunate 
enough  to  excite.  If  the  language  which  I  have  quoted  from 
the  puritans  breathed  a  spirit  of  ecclesiastical  usurpation  that 
might  one  day  become  dangerous,  many  were  of  opinion  that 
a  spirit  not  less  mischievous  in  the  present  hierarchy,  under 

1  The    school  of  Cartwright   were  as  our  reformers  at  Zurich,  Bullinger  and 

little  disposed  as  the  episcopalians  to  see  Gualter,  however  they  had   favored  the 

the    laity   fatten    on   church    property,  principles   of  the   first    nonconformists, 

Bancroft,  in  his  famous  sermon  preached  write  in   strong    disapprobation   of   the 

at   1'uul's  Cross  in  1588  (p.  24),  divides  innovators  of  1574.     Strvpe's  Annals,  ii. 

the  ;?uritans  into  the  clergy  Cictious  and  316.     And   Fox,  the  martyrologist.  a  rc- 

the  lay  factious.     The  former,  he  says,  fuser  to  conform,  speaks,  in  a  remarkable 

contend  and  lay  it  down  in  their  suppli-  letter  quoted   by  Fuller  in  his   Church 

cation  to  parliament  in  1585,  that  things  History,    p.  107,  of  factiosa  ilia  Purita- 

once  dedicated  to  a  sacred  use  ought  so  norum  capita,  saying  that  he  is  totus  ab 

to  remain  forever,  and  not   to  be  con-  Us  alienus,  and  unwilling  perbacchari  in 

verted  to  any  private  use.     The  lay,  on  episcopos.     The  same  is  true  of  Bernard 

le  contrary,  think  it  enough  for   the  Gilpin,  who  disliked  some  of  the  cere- 

tem  to  fare  as  the  apostles  did.     Cart-  monies,  and  had  subscribed  the  articles 

ht  did  not  spare  those  who  longed  with  a  reservation,  "so  far  as  agreeable 

to  pull  down  bishoprics  for  the  sake  of  to  the  word  of  God ;"  but  was   wholly 

plundering    them,    and    charged    those  opposed   to  the   new  reform   of  church 


epor 
ter  faithfully. 
Ine   old   friends  and  protectors  of 


ELIZ.— Puritans.  STATE  OF  PARTIES.  193 

the  mask  of  the  queen's  authority,  was  actually  manifesting 
itself  in  deeds  of  oppression.  The  upper  .ranks  among  the 
laity,  setting  aside  courtiers,  and  such  as  took  little  interest 
in  the  dispute,  were  chiefly  divided  between  those  attached 
to  the  ancient  church  and  those  who  wished  for  further  alter- 
ations in  the  new.  I  conceive  the  church  of  England  party, 
that  is  the  party  adverse  to  any  species  of  ecclesiastical 
change,  to  have  been  the  least  numerous  of  the  three  during 
this  reign ;  still  excepting,  as  I  have  said,  the  neutrals,  who 
commonly  make  a  numerical  majority,  and  are  counted  along 
with  the  dominant  religion.1  But  by  the  act  of  the  fifth  of 
Elizabeth,  Roman  catholics  were  excluded  from  the  house  of 
commons  ;  or,  if  some  that  way  affected  might  occasionally 
creep  into  it,  yet  the  terror  of  penal  laws  impending  over 
their  heads  would  make  them  extremely  cautious  of  betray- 
ing their  sentiments.  This  contributed,  with  the  prevalent 
tone  of  public  opinion,  to  throw  such  a  weight  into  the  puri- 
tanical scale  in  the  commons,  as  it  required  all  the  queen's 
energy  to  counterbalance. 

In  the  parliament  that  met  in  April,  1571,  a  few  days 
only  after  the  commencement  of  the  session,  Mr. 
Strickland,  "  a  grave  and   ancient  man  of  great  snorted 
zeal,"  as  the  reporter  styles  him,  began  the  attack  ''a  the 

•  Commons; 

by  a  long  but  apparently  temperate  speech  on  the 

abuses  of  the  church,  tending  only  to  the  retrenchment  of  a 

1  "The  puritan,"  says  Persons  the  sons,  but  because  they  coincide  with 
Jesuit,  in  1594,  "  is  more  generally  much  besides  that  has  occurred  to  me  in 
favored  throughout  the  realm  with  all  reading,  and  especially  with  the  parlia- 
those  which  are  not  of  the  Roman  religion  mentary  proceedings  of  this  reign.  The 
than  is  the  protestant,  upon  a  certain  following  observation  will  confirm  (what 
general  persuasion  that  his  profession  may  startle  some  readers)  that  the  puri- 
is  the  more  perfect,  especially  in  great  tans,  or  at  least  those  who  rather  favored 
towns,  where  preachers  have  made  more  them,  had  a  majority  among  the  protes- 
impression  in  the  artificers  and  burghers  tant  gentry  in  the  queen's  days.  It  is 
thin  in  the  country  people.  And  among  agreed  on  all  hands,  and  is  quite  mani- 
the  protestants  themselves,  all  those  that  fest,  that  they  predominated  in  the  house 
were  less  interested  in  ecclesiastical  liv-  of  commons.  But  that  house  was  com- 
ings, or  other  preferments  depending  on  posed,  as  it  has  ever  been,  of  the  principal 
the  state,  are  more  affected  commonly  to  landed  proprietors,  and  as  much  repre- 
the  puritans,  or  easily  are  to  be  induced  aented  the  general  wish  of  the  community 
to  jmsj  that  way  for  the  same  reason."  when  it  demanded  a  further  reform  in 
boleinan's  Conference  about  the  next  religious  matters  as  on  any  other  subject. 
Succession  to  the  Crown  of  England,  p.  One  would  imagine,  by  the  manner  in 
242.  And  again  :"  The  puritan  party  at  which  some  express  themselves,  that 
home,  in  England,  is  thought  to  be  most  the  discontented  were  a  small  faction, 
-  nf  any  other,  that  is  to  say,  most  who  by  some  unaccountable  means, 
in  <lr:it.  quick,  bold,  resolute,  and  to  have  in  despite  of  the  government  and  the 
a  great  part  of  the  best  captains  and  sol-  nation,  formed  a  majority  of  all  par- 
(HiTs  on  *ueir  side,  which  is  a  point  of  no  liaments  under  Elizabeth  and  her  two 
small  moment."  P.  244.  I  do  not  quote  successors. 
these  passages  out  of  trust  in  father  I'er- 
.  \<JL.  1. C.  13 


194  PLURALITIES.  CHAP.  IV. 

few  superstitions,  as  they  were  thought,  in  the  liturgy,  and 
to  some  reforms  in  the  disposition  of  benefices.  He  proceed- 
ed to  bring  in  a  bill  for  the  reformation  of  the  common 
prayer,  which  was  read  a  first  time.  Abuses  in  respect  to 
benefices  appear  to  have  been  a  copious  theme  of  scandal. 
The  power  of  dispensation,  which  had  occasioned  so  much 
clamor  in  former  ages,  instead  of  being  abolished  or  even  re- 
duced into  bounds  at  the  Reformation,  had  been  transferred 
entire  from  the  pope  to  the  king  and  archbishop.  And,  after 
the  council  of  Trent  had  effected  such  considerable  reforms 
in  the  catholic  discipline,  it  seemed  a  sort  of  reproach  to  the 
protestant  church  of  England  that  she  retained  all  the  dis- 
pensations, the  exemptions,  the  pluralities,  which  had  been 
deemed  the  peculiar  corruptions  of  the  worst  times  of  pop- 
ery.1 In  the  reign  of  Edward  VI.,  as  I  have  already  men- 
tioned, the  canon  law  being  naturally  obnoxious  from  its 
origin  and  character,  a  commission  was  appointed  to  draw  up 
a  code  of  ecclesiastical  laws.  This  was  accordingly  compiled, 
but  never  obtained  the  sanction  of  parliament :  and  though 
some  attempts  were  made,  and  especially  in  the  commons  at 
this  very  time,  to  bring  it  again  before  the  legislature,  our 
ecclesiastical  tribunals  have  been  always  compelled  to  bor- 
row a  great  part  of  their  principles  from  the  canon  law  :  one 
important  consequence  of  which  may  be  mentioned  by  way 
of  illustration  ;  that  they  are  incompetent  to  grant  a  divorce 
from  the  bond  of  marriage  in  cases  of  adultery,  as  had  been 
provided  in  the  reformation  of  ecclesiastical  laws  compiled 
under  Edward  VI.  A  disorderly  state  of  the  church,  arising 
partly  from  the  want  of  any  -fixed  rules  of  discipline,  partly 
from  the  negligence  of  some  bishops  and  simony  of  others, 
but  above  all  from  the  rude  state  of  manners  and  general  ig- 
norance of  the  clergy,  is  the  common  theme  of  complaint  in 
this  period,  and  aggravated  the  increasing  disaffection  tow- 
ards the  prelacy.  A  bill  was  brought  into  the  commons  to 
take  away  the  granting  of  licenses  and  dispensations  by  the 

1  Burnet,  iii.  335.    Pluralities  are  still  body,  any  pluralities  of  benefices  with 

the  great  abuse  of  the  church  of  England;  cure  of  souls  ought  to  remain,  except  of 

and  the  rules  on  this  head  are  so  com-  small  contiguous  parishes.     But  with  a 

plicated  and  unreasonable  that  scarce  any  view  to  the   interests   of  some   hundred 

one  can  remember  them.      It  would  be  well-connected  ecclesiastics,  the  difficulty 

difficult  to   prove   that,  with   a   view  to  is  none  at  all.     [1827.]     The  case  is  now 

the  interests  of  religion  among  the  people,  far  from  the  same. — 1845. 
or  of  the  clergy  themselves,  taken  as  a 


ELIZ.  — Puritans.  MR.   WENTWORTH.  195 

archbishop  of  Canterbury.     But  the  queen's  interference  put 
a  stop  to  this  measure.1 

The  house  of  commons  gave,  in  this  session,  a  more  forci- 
ble proof  of  its  temper  in  ecclesiastical  concerns.  The  arti- 
cles of  the  English  church,  originally  drawn  up  under 
Edward  VI.,  after  having  undergone  some  alteration,  were 
finally  reduced  to  their  present  form  by  the  convocation  of 
1562.  But  it  seems  to  have  been  thought  necessary  that  they 
should  have  the  sanction  of  parliament,  in  order  to  make  them 
binding  on  the  clergy.  Of  these  articles  the  far  greater  por- 
tion relate  to  matters  of  faith,  concerning  which  no  difference 
of  opinion  had  as  yet  appeared.  Some  few,  however,  declare 
the  lawfulness  of  the  established  form  of  consecrating  bishops 
and  priests,  the  supremacy  of  the  crown,  and  the  power  of 
the  church  to  order  rites  and  ceremonies.  These  involved 
the  main  questions  at  issue  ;  and  the  puritan  opposition  was 
strong  enough  to  withhold  the  approbation  of  the  legislature 
from  this  part  of  the  national  symbol.  The  act  of  13  Eliz. 
c.  12,  accordingly  enacts  that  every  priest  or  minister  shall 
subscribe  to  all  the  articles  of  religion  which  only  concern  the 
confession  of  the  true  Christian  faith,  and  the  doctrines  of  the 
sacraments,  comprised  in  a  book  entitled  "  Articles  whereupon 
it  was  agreed,"  &c.  That  the  word  only  was  inserted  for  the 
sake  of  excluding  the  articles  which  established  church 
authority  and  the  actual  discipline,  is  evident  from  a  remark- 
able conversation  which  Mr.  Wentworth,  the  most  distin- 
guished asserter  of  civil  liberty  in  this  reign,  relates  himself 
in  a  subsequent  session  (that  of  1575)  to  have  held  on  the 
subject  with  archbishop  Parker.  "  I  was,"  he  says,  "  among 
others,  the  last  parliament,  sent  for  unto  the  archbishop  of 
Canterbury,  for  the  articles  of  religion  that  then  passed  this 
house.  He  asked  us,  'Why  we  did  put  out  of  the  book 
the  articles  for  the  homilies,  consecration  of  bishops,  and  such 
like  ?  '  '  Surely,  sir,'  said  I,  '  because  we  were  so  occupied  in 
other  matters  that  we  had  no  time  to  examine  them  how  they 
agreed  with  the  word  of  God.'  '  What ! '  said  he,  '  surely 
you  mistake  the  matter;  you  will  refer  yourselves  wholly  to 
us  therein  ! '  '  No  ;  by  the  faith  I  bear  to  God,'  said  I,  '  we 
will  pass  nothing  before  we  understand  what  it  is  ;  for  that 
were  but  to  make  you  popes :  make  you  popes  who  list/  said 

1  D'Ewes,  p.  156.    Parliament.  Hist.  i.  733,  &o. 


196        FIRST  CLAUSE  OF  TWENTIETH  ARTICLE.     CHAP.  17 


I,  '  for  we  will  make  you  none.'  And  sure,  Mr.  Speaker,  the 
speech  seemed  to  me  to  be  a  pope-like  speech,  and  I  fear 
least  our  bishops  do  attribute  this  of  the  pope's  canons  unto 
themselves ;  Papa  non  potest  errare."  1  The  intrepid  asser- 
tion of  the  right  of  private  judgment  on  one  side,  and  the 
pretension  to  something  like  infallibility  on  the  other,  which 
have  been  for  more  than  two  centuries  since  so  incessantly 
repeated  are  here  curiously  brought  into  contrast.  As  to  the 
reservation  itself,  obliquely  insinuated  rather  than  expressed 
in  this  statute,  it  proved  of  little  practical  importance,  the 
bishops  having  always  exacted  a  subscription  to  the  whole 
thirty -nine  articles.8 


1  D'Ewes,    p.    239.    Parl.    Hist.    790. 
Strype's  Life  of  Parker,  394. 

In  a  debate  between  cardinal  Carvajal 
and  Rockisade.  the  famous  Calixtin 
archbishop  of  Prague,  at  the  council  of 
Basle,  the  former  said  he  would  reduce 
the  whole  argument  to  two  syllables  — 
Crede.  The  latter  replied  he  would  do 
the  same,  and  confine  himself  to  two 
others  —  Proba.  Lenfant  makes  a  very 
just  observation  on  this  :  "  Si  la  gravite 
de  1'histoire  le  permettoit,  on  diroit  avec 
le  comique,  C'est  tout  comme  ici.  II  y 
a  long  terns  que  le  premier  de  ces  mots 
est  le  langage  de  ce  qu'on  appelle 
PEglise,  et  que  le  second  est  le  laugage 
de  ce  qu'on  appelle  I'heresie."  Concile 
de  Basle,  p.  193. 

2  Several  ministers  were  deprived,  in 
1572,   for    refusing    to    subscribe    the 
articles.    Strype,  ii.   186.    Unless  these 
were    papist,    which  indeed  is   possible, 
their  objection  must  have   been  to  the 
articles    touching     discipline;    for    the 
puritans  liked  the  rest  very  well.     [The 
famous  dispute  about  the  first  clause  of 
the  20th  article,  which  was  idly  alleged 
by  the  puritans  to  have  been  interpolated 
by  Laud,  is  settled  conclusively  enough 
in  Cardwell'g  Synodalia,  vol.  i.  p.  38,  53. 
—  The  questions  are,   1,  Whether  this 
clause  was  formally  accepted  by  convo- 
cation ;    and,  2,    Whether  it  was  con- 
firmed by  parliament.     It  is  not  found 
In  the  manuscript,  being  a  rough  draft 
of  the    articles   bequeathed   by    Parker 
to  Corpus   Christi    College,   Cambridge, 
signed  by  all  the  convocation  of  1562; 
•which,  notwithstanding   the  interlinea- 
tions, must  be  taken  as  a  final  docu- 
ment, so  far  as  their  intentions  prevailed. 
Nor  is  it   found    in    the    first    English 
edition,  that  of  1563.     It  is  found,  how- 
ever, in  a   Latin   edition  of  the    same 
year,  of  which  one   copy  exists  in  the 
Bodleian    Library,   which    belonged    to 
Belden,  and  is  said  to  have  been  obtained 


by  him  from  Laud's  library;  though  I 
am  not  aware  how  this  is  proved.  To 
this  copy  is  appended  a  parchment,  with 
the  signatures  of  the  lower  house  of 
convocation  in  1571,  "  but  not  in  such  a 
manner,"  says  Dr.  C.,  "  as  to  prove  that 
it  originally  belonged  to  the  book."  This 
would  of  course  destroy  its  importance 
in  evidence ;  but  I  must  freely  avow 
that  my  own  impression  on  inspection 
was  different,  though  it  is  very  possible 
that  I  was  deceived.  It  seems  certainly 
strange  that  the  lower  house  of  convoca- 
tion should  have  thus  attested  a  single 
copy  of  a  printed  book. 

The  supposition  of  Dr.  Lamb,  dean  of 
Bristol,  which  Dr.  Cardwell  seerns  to 
adopt,  is  that  the  queen,  by  her  own 
authority,  caused  this  clause  to  be  in- 
serted after  the  dissolution  of  the  convo- 
cation, and,  probably,  to  be  entered  on 
the  register  of  that  assembly,  to  which 
Laud  refers  in  his  speech  in  the  Star- 
Chamber,  1637,  but  which  was  burned  in 
the  fire  of  London.  We  may  conjecture 
that  Parker  had  urged  the  adoption  of 
it  upon  the  convocation  without  success, 
and  had  therefore  recourse  to  the  su- 
premacy of  his  sovereign.  But,  accord- 
ing to  any  principles  which  have  been 
recognized  in  the  church  of  England,  the 
arbitrary  nature  of  that  ecclesiastical 
supremacy,  so  as  to  enact  laws  with- 
out consent  either  of  convocation  or  of 
parliament,  cannot  be  admitted ;  and 
this  famous  clause  may  be  said  to  have 
wanted  legal  authority  as  a  constitution 
of  the  church. 

But  there  seems  no  doubt  that  it 
wanted  still  more  the  confirmation  of 
the  temporal  legislature.  The  statute 
establishing  the  articles  (13  Eliz.  c.  12) 
refers  to  '•  a  book  imprinted,  intituled 
Articles,  whereupon  it  was  agreed  by 
the  archbishops  and  bishops  of  both 
provinces,  &c,"  following  the  title  of  the 
English  edition  of  1563,  the  only  one 


ELIZ.  — Puritans.      CONDUCT   OF  WALSINGHAM.  197 

It  was  not  to  be  expected  that  the  haughty  spirit  of  Parker, 
which  had  refused  to  spare  the  honest  scruples  of  Sampson  and 
Coverdale,  would  abate  of  its  rigor  towards  the  daring  para- 
doxes of  Cartwright,  His  disciples,  in  truth,  from  dissatisfied 
subjects  of  the  church,  were  become  her  downright  rebels, 
with  whom  it  was  hardly  practicable  to  make  any  compromise 
that  would  avoid  a  schism,  except  by  sacrificing  the  splendor 
and  jurisdiction  of  an  established  hierarchy.  The  archbishop 
continued,  therefore,  to  harass  the  puritan  ministers,  suppress 
ing  their  books,  silencing  them  in  churches,  prosecuting  them 
in  private  meetings.1  Sandys  and  Grindal,  the  moderate  re- 
formers of  our  spiritual  aristocracy,  not  only  withdrew  their 
countenance  from  a  party  who  aimed  at  improvement  by  sub- 
version, but  fell,  according  to  the  unhappy  temper  of  their 
age,  into  courses  of  undue  severity.  Not  merely  the  preach- 
ers, to  whom,  as  regular  ministers,  the  rules  of  canonical 
obedience  might  apply,  but  plain  citizens,  for  listening  to  their 
sermons,  were  dragged  before  the  high  commission,  and  im- 
prisoned upon  any  refusal  to  conform.2  Strange  that  these 
prelates  should  not  have  remembered  their  own  magnanimous 
readiness  to  encounter  suffering  for  conscience'  sake  in  the 
days  of  Mary,  or  should  have  fondly  arrogated  to  their  par- 
ticular church  that  elastic  force  of  resolution  which  disdains 
to  acknowledge  tyrannous  power  within  the  sanctuary  of  the 
soul,  and  belongs  to  the  martyrs  of  every  opinion  without 
attesting  the  truth  of  any  ! 

The  puritans  meanwhile  had  not  lost  all  their  friends  in  the 
council,  though  it  had  become  more  difficult  to  pro-  and  5n  gome 
tect   them.      One   powerful   reason    undoubtedly  measure  by 
operated  on  Walsingham  and  other  ministers  of  *' 
Elizabeth's  court  against  crushing  their  party ;  namely,  the 

•which  then  existed,  besides  the  Latin  of  ciently  secured   from  misinterpretation 

the  same  year.     And  from  this  we  may  by   the    context,   as  well    as    by  other 

infer  that  the  commons  either  knew  of  articles.  —  1845.] 

no  such  clause,  or  did  not  mean  to  con-  1  Neal,    187.      Strype's    Parker,    825. 

firm  it;  which  is  consonant  to  the  temper  Parker  wrote   to   Lord   Burleigh  (June, 

they  showed  on  this  subject,  as  may  be  1573),   exciting  the  council   to   proceed 

seen  in  the  text.  against  some  of  those  men  who  had  beo.n 

In  a  great  majority  of  editions  subse-  called    before    the  star-chamber.     "  He 

quent  to  1571  the  clause  was  inserted  ;  knew  them,"  he  said,  "  to  be  cowards  " 

and  it  had  doubtless  obtained  universal  — a  very  great  mistake  —  "and  if  they 

reception  long  before  Laud.     The  act  of  of  the   privy   council    gave    over,   they 

uniformity,  13  &  14  Car.  2,  c.  4,  merely  would  hinder  her  majesty's  government 

refers  to  13  Eliz.,  and  leaves  the  legal  more  than  they  were  aware,  and  much 

operation  as  before.  abate     the     estimation     of    their    own 

It  is  only  to  be  added  that  the  clause  authorities."    &c.      Id.    p.   421.      Cart- 
contains  little  that  need  alarm  any  one,  Wright's  Admonition  was  now  prohibited 
being  in  one  part  no  more  than  the  34th  to  be  sold.     Ibid, 
article,  and  in    the    other   being  suffl-  2  Neal,  210. 


198  INTOLERANCE  OF  THE  BISHOPS.  CHAI-.  IV. 

precariousness  of  the  queen's  life,  and  the  unsettled  prospects 
of  succession.  They  had  already  seen  in  the  duke  of  Nor- 
folk's conspiracy  that  more  than  half  the  superior  nobility 
had  committed  themselves  to  support  the  title  of  the  queen  of 
Scots.  That  title  was  sacred  to  all  who  professed  the  catho- 
lic religion,  and  respectable  to  a  large  proportion  of  the  rest. 
But  deeming,  as  they  did,  that  queen  a  convicted  adulteress 
and  murderer,  the  determined  enemy  of  their  faith,  and  con- 
scious that  she  could  never  forgive  those  who  had  counselled 
her  detention  and  sought  her  death,  it  would  have  been  un- 
worthy of  their  prudence  and  magnanimity  to  have  gone  as 
sheep  to  the  slaughter,  and  risked  the  destruction  of  protes- 
tantism under  a  second  Mary,  if  the  intrigues  of  ambititus 
men,  the  pusillanimity  of  the  multitude,  and  the  specious 
pretext  of  hereditary  right,  should  favor  her  claims  on  a 
demise  of  the  crown.  They  would  have  failed  perhaps  in 
attempting  to  resist  them ;  but  upon  resistance  I  make  no 
question  that  they  had  resolved.  In  so  awful  a  crisis,  to 
what  could  they  better  look  than  to  the  stern,  intrepid, 
uncompromising  spirit  of  puritanism ;  congenial  to  that  of 
the  Scottish  reformers,  by  whose  aid  the  lords  of  the  con- 
gregation had  overthrown  the  ancient  religion  in  despite 
of  the  regent  Mary  of  Guise?  Of  conforming  churchmen, 
in  general,  they  might  well  be  doubtful,  after  the  oscilla- 
tions of  the  three  preceding  reigns ;  but  every  abhorrer  of 
ceremonies,  every  rejecter  of  prelatical  authority,  might 
be  trusted  as  protestant  to  the  heart's  core,  whose  sword 
would  be  as  ready  as  his  tongue  to  withstand  idolatry.  Nor 
had  the  puritans  admitted,  even  in  theory,  those  extravagant 
notions  of  passive  obedience  which  the  church  of  England 
had  thought  fit  to  mingle  with  her  homilies.  While  the  vic- 
tory was  yet  so  uncertain,  while  contingencies  so  incalculable 
might  renew  the  struggle,  all  politic  friends  of  the  Reforma- 
tion would  be  anxious  not  to  strengthen  the  enemy  by  dis- 
union in  their  own  camp.  Thus  sir  Francis  Walsingham, 
who  had  been  against  enforcing  the  obnoxious  habits,  used 
his  influence  with  the  scrupulous  not  to  separate  from  the 
church  on  account  of  them ;  and  again,  when  the  schism  had 
already  ensued,  thwarted,  as  far  as  his  credit  in  the  council 
extended,  that  harsh  intolerance  of  the  bishops  which  aggra- 
vated its  mi.~cb.iefs. l 

l  Strype's  Annals,  i.  433. 


ELIZ.  —  Puritans.     OBJECT  OF  THE  MINISTERS.  199 

We  should  reason  in  as  confined  a  manner  as  the  puritans 
themselves,  by  looking  only  at  the  captious  frivolousness  of 
their  scruples,  and  treating  their  sect  either  as  wholly  con- 
temptible or  as  absolutely  mischievous.  We  do  injustice  to 
these  wise  councillors  of  the  maiden  queen  when  we  con- 
demn (I  do  not  mean  on  the  maxims  only  of  toleration,  but 
of  civil  prudence)  their  unwillingness  to  crush  the  noncon- 
torming  clergy  by  an  undeviating  rigor.  It  may  justly  be 
said  that,  in  a  religious  sense,  it  was  a  greater  good  to  pos- 
sess a  well-instructed  pious  clergy,  able  to  contend  against 
popery,  than  it  was  an  evil  to  let  some  prejudices  against 
mere  ceremonies  gain  a  head.  The  old  religion  was  by  no 
means,  for  at  least  the  first  half  of  Elizabeth's  reign,  gone 
out  of  the  minds  of  the  people.  The  lurking  priests  had 
great  advantages  from  the  attractive  nature  of  their  faith, 
and  some,  no  doubt,  from  its  persecution.  A  middle  system, 
like  the  Anglican,  though  it  was  more  likely  to  produce  ex- 
terior conformity,  and  for  that  reason  was,  I  think,  judicious- 
ly introduced  at  the  outset,  did  not  afford  such  a  security 
against  relapse,  nor  draw  over  the  heart  so  thoroughly,  as 
one  which  admitted  of  no  compromise.  Thus  the  sign  of  the 
cross  in  baptism,  one  of  the  principal  topics  of  objection,  may 
well  seem  in  itself  a  very  innocent  and  decorous  ceremony. 
But  if  the  perpetual  use  of  that  sign  is  one  of  the  most  strik- 
ing superstitions  in  the  church  of  Rome,  it  might  be  urged, 
in  behalf  of  the  puritans,  that  the  people  were  less  likely  to 
treat  it  with  contempt  when  they  saw  its  continuance,  even 
in  one  instance,  so  strictly  insisted  upon.  I  do  not  pretend 
to  say  that  this  reasoning  is  right,  but  that  it  is  at  least  plau- 
sible, and  that  we  must  go  back  and  place  ourselves,  as  far  as 
we  can,  in  those  times  before  we  determine  upon  the  whole 
of  this  controversy  in  its  manifold  bearings.  The  great  ob- 
ject of  Elizabeth's  ministers,  it  must  be  kept  in  mind,  was 
the  preservation  of  the  protestant  religion,  to  which  all  cere- 
monies of  the  church,  and  even  its  form  of  discipline,  were 
subordinate.  An  indifferent  passiveness  among  the  people, 
a  humble  trust  in  authority,  however  desirable  in  the  eyes  of 
churchmen,  was  not  the  temper  which  would  have  kept  out 
the  right  heir  from  the  throne,  or  quelled  the  generous  ardor 
of  the  catholic  gentry  on  the  queen's  decease. 

A  matter  very  much  connected  with  the  present  subject 
will  illustrate  the  different  schemes  of  ecclesiastical  policy 


200  PROPHESYINGS.  CHAP.  IV. 

pursued  by  the  two  parties  that  divided  Elizabeth's  council. 
Prophesy-  The  clergy  in  several  dioceses  set  up,  with  encour- 
ings.  agement  from  their  superiors,  a  certain  religious 

exercise,  called  prophesyings.  They  met  at  appointed  times 
to  expound  and  discuss  together  particular  texts  of  Scripture, 
under  the  presidency  of  a  moderator  appointed  by  the  bish- 
op, who  finished  by  repeating  the  substance  of  their  debate, 
with  his  own  determination  upon  it.  These  discussions  were 
in  public,  and  it  was  contended  that  this  sifting  of  the 
grounds  of  their  faith  and  habitual  argumentation  would  both 
tend  to  edify  the  people,  very  little  acquainted  as  yet  with 
their  religion,  and  supply  in  some  degree  the  deficiencies  of 
learning  among  the  pastors  themselves.  These  deficiencies 
were  indeed  glaring,  and  it  is  not  unlikely  that  the  prophesy- 
ings might  have  had  a  salutary  effect  if  it  had  been  possible 
to  exclude  the  prevailing  spirit  of  the  age.  It  must,  however, 
be  evident  to  any  one  who  had  experience  of  mankind,  that 
the  precise  clergy,  armed  not  only  with  popular  topics,  but 
with  an  intrinsic  superiority  of  learning  and  ability  to  sup- 
port them,  would  wield  these  assemblies  at  their  pleasure, 
whatever  might  be  the  regulations  devised  for  their  control. 
The  queen  entirely  disliked  them,  and  directed  Parker  to 
put  them  down.  He  wrote  accordingly  to  Parkhurst,  bishop 
of  Norwich,  for  that  purpose.  The  bishop  was  unwilling  to 
comply;  and  some  privy-councillors  interfered  by  a  letter, 
enjoining  him  not  to  hinder  those  exercises  so  long  as  noth- 
ing contrary  to  the  church  was  taught  therein.  This  let- 
ter was  signed  by  sir  Thomas  Smith,  sir  Walter  Mildmay, 
bishop  Sandys,  and  sir  Francis  Knollys.  It  was,  in  effect,  to 
reverse  what  the  archbishop  had  done.  Parker,  however, 
who  was  uot  easily  daunted,  wrote  again  to  Parkhurst,  that, 
understanding  he  had  received  instructions  in  opposition  to 
the  queen's  orders  and  his  own,  he  desired  to  be  informed 
what  they  were.  This  seems  to  have  checked  the  council- 
lors, for  we  find  that  the  prophesyings  were  now  put  down.1 
Though  many  will  be  of  opinion  that  Parker  took  a  states- 
manlike view  of  the  interests  of  the  church  of  England  in 
discouraging  these  exercises,  they  were  generally  regarded 
as  so  conducive  to  instruction  that  he  seems  to  have  stood  al- 
most alone  in  his  opposition  to  them.  Sandys's  name  appears 

1  Strype's  Annals,  ii.  219,  322  ;  Life  of  Parker,  461. 


EI.IZ.  — Puritans. 


PROPHESYIXGS. 


to  the  above-mentioned  letter  of  the  council  to   Parkhurst. 
Cox,  also,  was  inclined  to  favor  the  prophesyings  ; 

i  V.   •     i   i         i        •       -i  -T  i    j    Ti     i          •      Qnndal. 

and  Grmdal,  who  in  Io7o  succeeded  Parker  m 
the  see  of  Canterbury,  bore  the  whole  brunt  of  the  queen's 
displeasure  rather  than  obey  her  commands  on  this  subject. 
He  conceived  that,  by  establishing  strict  rules  with  respect 
to  the  direction  of  those  assemblies,  the  abuses,  which  had 
already  appeared,  of  disorderly  debate  and  attacks  on  the 
discipline  of  the  church,  might  be  got  rid  of  without  entirely 
abolishing  the  exercise.  The  queen  would  hear  of  no  mid- 
dle course,  and  insisted  both  that  the  prophesyings  should  be 
discontinued  and  that  fewer  licenses  for  preaching  should  be 
granted.  For  no  parish  priest  could,  without  a  license, 
preach  any  discourse  except  the  regular  homilies ;  and  this 
was  one  of  the  points  of  contention  with  the  puritans.1 
Grindal  steadily  refused  to  comply  with  this  injunction,  and 
was  in  consequence  sequestered  from  the  exercise  of  his  juris- 
diction for  the  space  of  about  five  years,  till,  on  his  making 
a  kind  of  submission,  the  sequestration  was  taken  off  not 
long  before  his  death.  The  queen,  by  circular  letters  to  the 
bishops,  commanded  them  to  put  an  end  to  the  prophesyings, 
which  were  never  afterwards  renewed.2 


1  [In  one  of  the  canons  enacted  by  con- 
»oc;ition  in  1571,  and  on  'which  rather  an 
undue  stress  hasbeeu  laid  in  late  contro- 
verts, we  find  a  restraint  laid  on  the 
teaching  of  the  clergy  in  their  sermons, 
who  were  enjoined  to  preach  nothing  but 
what  was  agreeable  to  scripture,  and  had 
been  collected  out  of  scripture  by  the 
catholic  fathers  and  ancient  bishops.  Im- 
primis videbunt  concionatores,  ne  quid 
unquam  doceant  pro  concione,  quod  a 
populo  religiose  teneri  et  credi  velint, 
nisi  quod  consentaneum  sit  doctrinae 
Teteris  aut  novi  testament!,  quodque  ex 
ilia  ipsi  doctrini  Catholici  patres  et  Te- 
teris episcopi  collegerint.  This  appears 
to  hare  been  directed,  in  the  first  place, 
against  those  who  made  use  of  scholastic 
authorities  and  the  doctors  of  the  last 
four  or  five  ages,  to  whom  the  church 
of  Rome  was  fond  of  appealing;  and. 
secondly,  against  those  who,  with  little 
learning  or  judgment,  set  up  their  own 
interpretations  of  scripture.  Against  both 
these  it  seeme-l  wise  to  guard,  by  direct- 
ing preachers  to  the  early  fathers,  wiiose 
authority  was  at  least  better  than  that  of 
Romish  schoolmen  or  modsrn  sciolists. 
It  is  to  be  remembered  that  the  exegeti- 
cal  part  of  divinity  was  not  in  the  state 
in  which  it  ia  at  present.  Moot  of  the 


writers  to  whom  a  modern  preacher  has 
recourse  were  unborn.  But  that  the  con- 
temporary reformers  were  not  held  in  low 
estimation  as  guides  in  scriptural  inter- 
pretation, appears  by  the  injunction  giv- 
en some  years  afterwards  that  every  cler- 
gyman should  provide  himself  with  a 
copy  of  Bullinger's  decades.  The  author- 
ity given  in  the  above  canon  to  the  fa- 
thers was  certainly  but  a  presumptive 
one;  and,  such  as  it  was,  it  was  given  to 
each  individually,  not  to  the  whole  body, 
on  any  notion  of  what  has  been  called 
catholic  consent :  since  how  was  a  poor 
English  preacher  to  ascertain  this  ?  The 
real  question  as  to  the  authority  of  th« 
fathers  in  our  church  is  not  whether  they 
are  not  copiously  quoted,  but  whether 
our  theologians  surrendered  their  own 
opinion,  or  that  of  their  side,  in  defereuco 
to  such  authority  when  it  made  against 
them.  — 1845.] 

2  Strype's  Life  of  Grindal.  219,  230, 
272.  The  archbishop's  letter  to  the  queen, 
declaring  his  unwillingness  to  obey  her 
requisition,  is  in  a  far  bolder  strain  than 
the  prelates  were  wont  to  use  in  this 
reign,  and  perhaps  contributed  to  the 
severity  she  showed  towards  him.  Grin- 
dal was  a  very  honest,  conscientious  man. 
but  too  little  of  a  courtier  or  statesman 


202  ARCHBISHOP  WHITGIFT.  CHAP.  IV. 

"Whitgift,  bishop  of  Worcester,  a  person  of  a  very  opposite 
disposition,  was  promoted,  in  1583,  to  the  primacy 
on  Grindal's  decease.  He  had  distinguished  him- 
pelf  some  years  before  by  an  answer  to  Cartwright's  Admo- 
nition, written  with  much  ability,  but  not  falling  short  of  the 
work  it  undertook  to  confute  in  rudeness  and  asperity.1  It  is 
seldom  good  policy  to  confer  such  eminent  stations  in  the 
church  on  the  gladiators  of  theological  controversy,  who, 
from  vanity  and  resentment,  as  well  as  the  course  of  their 
studies,  will  always  be  prone  to  exaggerate  the  importance 
of  the  disputes  wherein  they  have  been  engaged,  and  to  turn 
whatever  authority  the  laws  or  the  influence  of  their  place 
may  give  them  against  their  adversaries.  This  was  fully 
illustrated  by  the  conduct  of  archbishop  Whitgift,  whose  ele- 
vation the  wisest  of  Elizabeth's  counsellors  had  ample  reason 
His  conduct  *°  regre':-  ^n  a  ^ew  months  after  his  promotion  he 
to  enforcing  gave  an  earnest  of  the  rigor  he  had  determined  to 
ml  y'  adopt  by  promulgating  articles  for  the  observance 
of  discipline.  One  of  these  prohibited  all  preaching,  read- 
ing, or  catechising  in  private  houses,  whereto  any  not  of  the 
same  family  should  resort,  "  seeing  the  same  was  never  per- 
mitted as  lawful  under  any  Christian  magistrate."  But  that 
which  excited  the  loudest  complaints  was  the  subscription  to 
three  points,  the  queen's  supremacy,  the  lawfulness  of  the 
common  prayer  and  ordination  service,  and  the  truth  of  the 
whole  thirty-nine  articles,  exacted  from  every  minister  of  the 
church.2  These  indeed  were  so  far  from  novelties  that  it 
might  seem  rather  supererogatory  to  demand  them  (if  in  fact 
the  law  required  subscription  to  all  the  articles)  ;  yet  it 
is  highly  probable  that  many  had  hitherto  eluded  the  legal 
subscriptions,  and  that  others  had  conceived  their  scruples 
after  having  conformed  to  the  prescribed  order.  The  arch- 
bishop's peremptory  requisition  passed,  perhaps  justly,  for  an 
illegal  stretch  of  power.3  It  encountered  the  resistance  of 

for  the  place  he  filled.    He  was  on  the  our   anonymous    libellers   have   hardly 

point  of  resigning  the  archbishopric  when  matched.      Whitgift  was   not   of   much 

he  died;  there  had  at  one  time  been  some  learning,  if  it  be  true,  as  the  editors  of 

thoughts  of  depriving  him.  the  Biographia  Britannica  intimate,  that 

i  Strype's  Whitgift,  27,    et  alibi.     He  he  had  no  acquaintance  with  the  Greek 

flid  not  disdain  to  reflect  on  Cartwright  language.      This  must  seem  strange  to 

for  his    poverty,  the  consequence  of  a  those  who  have  an  exaggerated  notion  of 

scrupulous  adherence  to  his  principles,  the  scholarship  of  that  age. 

But  the  controversial  writers  of  every  side  2  Stry  pe's  Whitgift,  115. 

in  the  sixteenth  century  display  a  want  8  Neil,  266.     Birch's  Memoirs  of  Eliza- 

of  decency  and    humanity  which  even  beth,  vol.  i.  p.  42,  47,  &c 


ELIZ.  — Puritans.     HIGH  COMMISSION  COURT.  203 

men  pertinaciously  attached  to  their  own  tenets,  and  ready  to 
suffer  the  privations  of  poverty  rather  than  yield  a  simulated 
obedience.  To  suffer,  however,  in  silence  has  at  no  time 
been  a  virtue  with  our  protestant  dissenters.  The  kingdom 
resounded  with  the  clamor  of  those  who  were  suspended  or 
deprived  of  their  benefices  and  of  their  numerous  abettors.1 
They  appealed  from  the  archbishop  to  the  privy  council. 
The  gentry  of  Kent  and  other  counties  strongly  interposed 
in  their  behalf.  They  had  powerful  friends  at  court,  espe- 
cially Knollys,  who  wrote  a  warm  letter  to  the  archbishop.* 
But,  secure  of  the  queen's  support,  who  was  now  chiefly 
under  the  influence  of  Sir  Christopher  Hatton,  a  decided 
enemy  to  the  puritans,  Whitgift  relented  not  a  jot  of  his 
resolution,  and  went  far  greater  lengths  than  Parker  had  ever 
ventured,  or  perhaps  had  desired,  to  proceed. 

The  act  of  supremacy,  while  it  restored  all  ecclesiastical 
jurisdiction  to  the  crown,  empowered  the  queen  to  execute  it 
by  commissioners  appointed  under  the  great  seal,  H.  h  com 
in  such  manner  and  for  such  time  as  she  should  mission 
direct,  whose  power  should  extend  to  visit,  correct,  court- 
and  amend  all  heresies,  schisms,  abuses,  and  offences  what- 
ever, which  fall  under  the  cognizance  and  are  subject  to  the 
correction  of  spiritual  authority.     Several   temporary  com- 
missions had  sat  under  this  act  with  continually  augmented 
powers  before  that  appointed  in  1583,  wherein  the  jurisdic- 
tion of  this  anomalous  court  almost  reached  its  zenith.     It 
consisted  of  forty-four  commissioner's,  twelve  of  whom  were 
bishops,  many  more  privy-councillors,  and  the  rest  either 

1  According  to  a  paper  in  the  appen-  the  preachers  being  a  majority  only  in 

dix  to  Strype's  Life  of  Whitgift,  p.  60,  London.     Id.  p.  320. 

the  number  of  conformable  ministers  in  This  may  be  deemed  by  some  an  in- 

eleven  dioceses,  not  including   those  of  stance  of    Neal's  prejudice.     But   that 

London   and   Norwich,   the  strongholds  historian  is  not  so  ill-informed  as  they 

of  puritanism,   was   786;    that   of  non-  suppose;  and  the  fact  is  highly  probable, 

compilers,  49.     But  Neal   says  that  233  Let  it  be  remembered  that  there  existed 

ministers   were  suspended    in  only   six  few  books  of  divinity  in  English;  that  all 

counties.  64  of  whom  in  Norfolk,  60  in  books  were,  comparatively  to  the  value  of 

Suffolk,  38  in  Essex:  p.  268.  Thepuritaas  money,  far  dearer  than  at  present;  that 

formed  so  much  the  more   learned  and  the  majority  of  the  clergy  were  nearly 

diligent  part  of  the  clergy,  that  a  great  illiterate,  and  many  of  them  addicted  to 

scarcity  of   preachers  was    experienced  drunkenness  and  low  vices;   above  all, 

throughout  this  reign,  in  consequence  of  that    they  had   no  means  of  supplying 

silencing  so  many  of  the  former.     Thus  their  deficiencies  by  preaching    the  dU- 

in   Cornwall,  about  the  year  1578.  out  courses  of  others;  and  we  shall  see  little 

of  140  clergymen,  not  one  was  capable  cause    for    doubting    Neal's  statement, 

of  preaching.     Neal,   p     245.      And,  in  though  founded  on  a  puritan  document. 

general,  the  number  of  those  who  could  2  Life  of  Whitgift,  137,  et  alibi;    An- 

not  preach,  but  ouly  read   the  service,  nals,  iii.  183. 
was  to  the  others  nearly  as  four  to  one  — 


204  POWER  OF  HIGH  COMMISSION  COURT.     CH.U>.  IV 

clergymen  or  civilians.  This  commission,  after  reciting  the 
act*  of  supremacy,  uniformity,  and  two  others,  directs  them 
to  inquire  from  time  to  time,  as  well  by  the  oaths  of  twelve 
good  and  lawful  men  as  by  witnesses  and  all  other  means  they 
can  devise,  of  all  offences,  contempts,  or  misdemeanors  done 
and  committed  contrary  to  the  tenor  of  the  said  several  acts 
and  statutes ;  and  also  to  inquire  of  all  heretical  opinions, 
seditious  books,  contempts,  conspiracies,  false  rumors  or  talks, 
slanderous  words  and  sayings,  &c.,  contrary  to  the  afore.-aid 
laws.  Power  is  given  to  any  three  commissioners,  of  whom 
one  must  be  a  bishop,  to  punish  all  persons  absent  from 
church,  according  to  the  act  of  uniformity,  or  to  visit  and  re- 
form heresies  and  schisms  according  to  law ;  to  deprive  all 
beneficed  persons  holding  any  doctrine  contrary  to  the  thirty- 
nine  articles ;  to  punish  incests,  adulteries,  and  all  offences 
of  the  kind ;  to  examine  all  suspected  persons  on  their  oaths, 
and  to  punish  all  who  should  refuse  to  appear  or  to  obey 
their  orders  by  spiritual  censure,  or  by  discretionary  fine  or 
imprisonment ;  to  alter  and  amend  the  statutes  of  colleges, 
cathedrals,  schools,  and  other  foundations,  and  to  tender 
the  oath  of  supremacy  according  to  the  act  of  parlia- 
ment.1 

Master  of  such  tremendous  machinery,  the  archbishop  pro- 
ceeded to  call  into  action  one  of  its  powers,  contained  for  the 
first  time  in  the  present  commission,  by  tendering  what  was 
technically  styled  the  oath  ex  officio  to  such  of  the  clergy  as 
were  surmised  to  harbor*  a  spirit  of  puritanical  disaffection. 
This  procedure,  which  was  wholly  founded  on  the  canon  law, 
consisted  in  a  series  of  interrogations,  so  comprehensive  as  to 
embrace  the  whole  scope  of  clerical  uniformity,  yet  so  pre- 
cise and  minute  as  to  leave  no  room  for  evasion,  to  which  the 

i  Neal,  274;  Strype's  Annals,  iii.  180.  ii.  347.     But  the  primary  model  was  the 

The  germ  of  the   high  commission  court  inquisition  itself. 

seems  to  hare  been  a  commission  granted  It  was  questioned  whether  the  powei 

by  Mary  (Feb.  1557)  to  certain   bishops  of  deprivation  for  not  reading  the  com- 

and  others  to  iuquire  after  all  heresies,  mon  prayer,  granted  to  the  high  cominis- 

punish  persons  misbehaving  at  church,  sioners,  were  legal — the  act  of  uniformity 

a.nd  such  as  refused    to  come    thither,  having  annexed  a  much  smaller  penalty, 

either  by  means  of  presentments  by  wit-  But  it  was  held  by  the  judges  in  the  case 

was,  or  any  other  politic  way  they  could  ofCawdrey   (5  Coke's   Reports)   that  the 

devise  ;  with   full   power  to  proceed    as  act  did  not  take  away   the   ecclesiastical 

their  discretions  and  consciences  should  jurisdiction   and  supremacy  which  had 

direct  them  ;  and  to  use  all  such  means  ever  appertained  to  the  crown,  and  by 

as  they  could  invent  for  the  searching  of  virtue    of  which   it  might  erect  courts 

the  premises,  to  call  witnesses,  and  force  with  as  full  spiritual  jurisdiction  as  the 

them  to  make  oath  of  such  things  as  might  archbishops  and  bishops  exercised, 
discover  what  they  sought  after.  Buruet, 


ELIZ.  —  Puritans.    DISSATISFACTION  OF  BURLEIGH.  205 

suspected  party  was  bound  to  answer  upon  oath.1  So  repug 
mint  was  this  to  the  rules  of  our  English  law  and  to  the 
principles  of  natural  equity,  that  no  species  of  ecclesiastical 
tyranny  seems  to  have  excited  so  much  indigna- 
tion. Lord  Burleigh,  who,  though  at  first  rather  J^  Bur" 
friendly  to  Whitgift,  was  soon  disgusted  by  his  to  severity. 
intolerant  and  arbitrary  behavior,  wrote  in  strong 
terms  of  remonstrance  against  these  articles  of  examination, 
as  "so  curiously  penned,  so  full  of  branches  and  circumstances, 
as  he  thought  the  inquisitors  of  Spain  used  not  so  many 
questions  to  comprehend  and  to  trap  their  preys."  The  pri- 
mate replied  by  alleging  reasons  in  behalf  of  the  mode  of 
examination,  but  very  frivolous,  and  such  as  a  man  deter- 
mined to  persevere  in  an  unwarrantable  course  of  action  may 
commonly  find.2  They  had  little  effect  on  the  calm  and 
sagacious  mind  of  the  treasurer,  who  continued  to  express 
his  dissatisfaction,  both  individually  and  as  one  of  the  privy 
council.8  But  the  extensive  jurisdiction  improvidently  grant- 
ed to  the  ecclesiastical  commissioners,  and  which  the  queen 
was  not  at  all  likely  to  recall,  placed  Whitgift  beyond  the 
control  of  the  temporal  administration. 

The  archbishop,  however,  did  not  stand  alone  in  this  im- 
practicable endeavor  to  overcome  the  stubborn  sectaries  by 
dint  of  hard  usage.  Several  other  bishops  were  engaged  in 
the  same  uncharitable  course,*  but  especially  Aylmer  of  Lon- 
don, who  has  left  a  worse  name 'in  this  respect  than  any  prel- 
ate of  Elizabeth's  reign.5  The  violence  of  Aylmer's  tem- 
per was  not  redeemed  by  many  virtues ;  it  is  impossible  to 
exonerate  his  character  from  the  imputations  of  covetousness 
and  of  plundering  the  revenues  of  his  see :  faults  very  prev- 
alent among  the  bishops  of  that  period.  The  privy  council 
wrote  sometimes  to  expostulate  with  Aylmer  in  a  tone  which 
could  hardly  have  been  employed  towards  a  man  in  his  sta- 
tion who  had  not  forfeited  the  general  esteem.  Thus,  upon 
occasion  of  one  Benison,  whom  he  had  imprisoned  without 
cause,  we  find  a  letter  signed  by  Burleigh,  Leicester,  Wal- 
singham,  and  even  Hatton,  besides  several  others,  urging  the 

>  J  Strype's  Whitgift,  135 ;  and  Appen-  copacy  was  lawful  by  the  word  of  God, 

dix,  45.  which  Burleigh  prevented. 

n  Strype's  Whitgift,  157, 160.  *  Neal.  325,  385. 

3  Id.  1*33. 166,  et  alibi ;  Birth's  Memoirs,  6  Id.  290;  Strype's  Life  of  Aylmer, 

i.  62.  There  was  said  to  be  a  scheme  on  p.  59,  &c.  His  biographer  is  here,  sis  in 

foot,  about  1590,  to  make  all  persons  in  all  his  writings,  too  partial  to  condemn, 

office  subscribe  a  declaration  that  epis-  but  too  honest  to  conceal. 


206  BUELEIGH'S  MEMORIAL.  CHAP.  IV 

bishop  to  give  the  man  a  sum  of  money,  since  he  would  re- 
cover damages  at  law,  which  might  hurt  his  lordship's  credit. 
Aylraer,  however,  who  was  of  a  stout  disposition,  especially 
when  his  purse  was  interested,  objected  strongly  to  this  sug- 
gestion, offering  rather  to  confer  on  Benisou  a  small  living, 
or  to  let  him  take  his  action  at  law.  The  result  does  not  ap- 
pear, but  probably  the  bishop  did  not  yield.1  He  had  worse 
success  in  an  information  laid  against  him  for  felling  his 
woods,  which  ended  not  only  in  an  injunction  but  a  sharp 
reprimand  from  Cecil  in  the  star-chamber.2 

What  lord  Burleigh  thought  of  these  proceedings  may  be 
seen  in  the  memorial  to  the  queen  on  matters  of  religion  and 
state,  from  which  1  have,  in  the  last  chapter,  made  an  ex- 
tract to  show  the  tolerance  of  his  disposition  with  respect  to 
catholics.  Protesting  that  he  was  not  in  the  least  addicted 
to  the  preciser  sort  of  preachers,  he  declares  himself  "  bold 
to  think  that  the  bishops,  in  these  dangerous  times,  take  a 
very  ill  and  unadvised  course  in  driving  them  from  their 
cures  ; "  first,  because  it  must  discredit  the  reputation  of  her 
majesty's  power,  when  foreign  princes  should  perceive  that 
even  among  her  protestant  subjects,  in  whom  consisted  all 
her  force,  strength,  and  power,  there  was  so  great  a  heart- 
burning and  division ;  and  secondly,  "  because,"  he  says, 
"  though  they  were  over-squeamish  and  nice  in  their  opin- 
ions, and  more  scrupulous  than  they  need,  yet,  with  their 
careful  catechising  and  diligent  preaching,  they  bring  forth 
that  fruit  which  your  most  excellent  majesty  is  to  desire  and 
wish,  namely,  the  lessening  and  diminishing  the  papistical  num- 
bers." 8  But  this  great  minister's  knowledge  of  the  queen's 
temper,  and  excessive  anxiety  to  retain  her  favor,  made  him 
sometimes  fearful  to  act  according  to  his  own  judgment.  "  It 
is  well  known,"  lord  Bacon  says  of  him,  in  a  treatise  published 
in  1591,  "that,  as  to  her  majesty,  there  was  never  a  counsel- 
lor of  his  lordship's  long  continuance  that  was  so  appliable 
to  her  majesty's-  princely  resolutions,  endeavoring  always 
after  faithful  propositions  and  remonstrances,  and  these  in 

1  Neal,  294.  and  had  above  4000J.  awarded   to  him ; 

*  Strype's*Aylmer,  71.    When  he  grew  but  the  crafty  old  man  having  laid  out 

eld,  and  reflected  that  a  large  sum  of  his  money  in   land,  this  sum  was  never 

money  would  be  due  from  hia  family  for  paid.     Bancroft  tried  to  get  an  act  of 

dilapidations  of  the   palace  at  Fulhain,  parliament  i»  order  to  render  the  real 

&c.,   he   literally   proposed    to   sell    his  estate  liable,  but  without  success.     P. 

bishopric   to  Bancroft.      Id.   169.     The  194. 

other,  however,   waited  for    hia  death,  3  Somers  Tracts,  i.  166. 


ELIZ.— Puritans.  PURITAN  LIBELS.  207 

the  best  words  and  the  most  graceful  manner,  to  rest  upon 
such  conclusions  as  her  majesty  in  her  own  wisdom  deter 
mineth,  and  them  to  execute  to  the  best ;  so  far  hath  he  been 
from  contestation,  or  drawing  her  majesty  into  any  of  his 
own  courses." 1  Statesmen  who  betray  this  Unfortunate  in- 
firmity of  clinging  too  fondly  to  power  become  the  slaves  of 
the  princes  they  serve.  Burleigh  used  to  complain  of  the 
harshness  with  which  the  queen  treated  him.2  And  though, 
more  lucky  than  most  of  his  class,  he  kept  the  white  staff'  of 
treasurer  down  to  his  death,  he  was  reduced  in-  his  latter 
years  to  court  a  rising  favorite  more  submissively  than  be- 
came his  own  dignity.3  From  such  a  disposition  we  could 
not  expect  any  decided  resistance  to  those  measures  of  sever- 
ity towards  the  puritans  which  fell  in  so  entirely  with  Eliz- 
abeth's temper. 

There  is  no  middle  course,  in  dealing  with  religious  sec- 
taries, between  the  persecution  that  exterminates  and  the  tol- 
eration that  satisfies.  They  were  wise  in  their  generation, 
the  Loaisas  and  Valdes  of  Spain,  who  kindled  the  fires  of  the 
inquisition,  and  quenched  the  rising  spirit  of  protestantism  in 
the  blood  of  a  Seso  and  a  Cazalla.  But,  sustained  by  the 
favoring  voice  of  his  associates,  and  still  more  by  that  firm 
persuasion  which  bigots  never  know  how  to  appreciate  in 
their  adversaries,  a  puritan  minister  set  at  nought  the  vexa- 
tious and  arrogant  tribunal  before  which  he  was  summoned. 
Exasperated,  not  overawed,  the  sectaries  threw  off  what  lit- 
tle respect  they  had  hitherto  paid  to  the  hierarchy.  They 
had  learned,  in  the  earlier  controversies  of  the  Reformation, 
the  use,  or,  more  truly,  the  abuse,  of  that  powerful  lever  of 
human  bosoms,  the  press.  He  who  in  Saxony  had  sounded 
the  first  trumpet-peal  against  the  battlements  of  Rome  had 
often  turned  aside  from  his  graver  labors  to  excite  the  rude 
passions  of  the  populace  by  low  ribaldry  and  exaggerated 
invective ;  nor  had  the  English  reformers  ever  scrupled  to 
win  proselytes  by  the  same  arts.  What  had  been  accounted 
holy  zeal  in  the  mitred  Bale  and  martyred  Latimer,  might 
plead  some  apology  from  example  in  the  ag-  puritan 
grieved  puritan.  Pamphlets,  chiefly  anonymous,  i^eis. 
were  rapidly  circulated  throughout  the  kingdom,  inveighing 

1  Bacon's  Works,  i.  532.  the  letters  they  contain  are  from   the 

2  Birch's  Memoirs,  ii.  146.  two  Bacons,  then  engaged  in  the  Ensex 

3  Id.   ib.      Burleigh   does    not    shine  faction,  though  nephews  of   the    treas- 
much  in  these  memoirs ;    but  most  of  urer. 


208  PENKY  —  UDAL.  CHAP.  IV 

against  the  prelacy.  Of  these  libels  the  most  famous  went 
under  the  name  of  Martin  Mar-prelate,  a  vizored  knight  of 
those  lists,  behind  whose  shield  a  host  of  sturdy  puritans 
were  supposed  to  fight.  These  were  printed  at  a  movable 
press,  shifted  to  different  parts  of  the  country  as  the  pursuit 
grew  hot,  and  contained  little  serious  argument,  but  the  un- 
warrantable invectives  of  angry  men,  who  stuck  at  no  calum- 
ny to  blacken  their  enemies.1  If  these  insults  upon  author- 
ity are  apt  sometimes  to  shock  us  even  now,  when  long 
usage  has  rendered  such  licentiousness  of  seditious  and  prof- 
ligate libellers  almost  our  daily  food,  what  must  they  have 
seemed  in  the  reign  of  Elizabeth,  when  the  press  had  no 
acknowledged  liberty,  and  while  the  accustomed  tone  in  ad- 
dressing those  in  power  was  little  better  than  servile  adula- 
tion? 

A  law  had  been  enacted  some  years  before,  levelled  at  the 
books  dispersed  by  the  seminary  priests,  which  rendered  the 
publication  of  seditious  libels  against  the  queen's  government 
a  capital  felony.2  This  act,  by  one  of  those  strained  con- 
structions which  the  judges  were  commonly  ready  to  put 
upon  any  political  crime,  was  brought  to  bear  on  some  of 
these  puritanical  writings.  The  authors  6T  Martin  Mar-prel- 
ate could  not  be  traced  with  certainty ;  but  strong  suspicions 
having  fallen  on  one  Penry,  a  young  Welshman,  he  was 
tried  some  time  after  for  another  pamphlet,  containing  sharp 
reflections  on  the  queen  herself,  antl  received  sentence  of 
death,  which  it  was  thought  proper  to  carry  into  execution.8 
Udal,  a  puritan  minister,  fell  into  the  grasp  of  the  same  stat- 
ute for  an  alleged  libel  on  the  bishops,  which  had  surely  a 
very  indirect  reference  to  the  queen's  administration.  His 
trial,  like  most  other  political  trials  of  the  age,  disgraces  the 
name  of  English  justice.  It  consisted  mainly  in  a  pitiful  at 
tempt  by  the  court  to  entrap  him  into  a  confession  that  the 

i  The   first   of    Martin   Mar-prelate's  Knightley    of     Northamptonshire,     for 

libels  were   published  in  1588.     lu  the  dispersing     puritanical     libels.      State 

month  of  November  of    that   year    the  Trials,  i.  1263. 

archbishop  is  directed  by  a  letter  from  a  23  Eliz.  c.  2. 

the  council  to  search  for  and  commit  to  3  Penry's  protestation  at  his  death  ia 

prison      the      authors      and      printers,  in  a  style   of   the    most   affecting    and 

Strype's    Whitgift,    288.      These    pam-  simple    eloquence.       Life    of     Whitgift, 

phlets  are  scarce;   but  a  few  extracts  409;  and  Appendix,  176.     It  is  a  striking 

from  tliHiii  may  be  found  in  Strype  and  contrast  to  the  coarse  abuse  for  which  he 

other  authors.      The  abusive  language  suffered.     The  authors  of  Martin  Mar- 

of  the  puritan  pamphleteers  had  begun  prelate  were  never  fully  discovered;  but 

several  years   before.     Strvpe's  Annals,  Penry   seems   not   to   deny  his  concern 

li.   193.     See  the    trial  of  Sir  Kichard  in  it. 


ELIZ.  — Puritans.       PRESBYTERIAN  SYSTEM. 


209 


imputed  libel  was  of  his  writing,  as  to  which  their  proof  was 
deficient.  Though  he  avoided  this  snare,  the  jury  did  not 
fail  to  obey  the  directions  they  received  to  convict  him.  So 
far  from  being  concerned  in  Martin's  writings,  Udal  professed 
his  disapprobation  of  them,  and  his  ignorance  of  the  author. 
This  sentence  appeared  too  iniquitous  to  be  executed  even 
in  the  eyes  of  Whitgift,  who  interceded  for  his  life ;  but  he 
died  of  the  effects  of  confinement.1 

If  the  libellous  pen  of  Martin  Mar-prelate  was  a  thorn  to 
the  rulers  of  the  church,  they  had  still  more  cause  to  take 
alarm  at  an  overt  measure  of  revolution  which  the  discon- 
tented party  began  to  effect  about  the  year  1590.     They  set 
up,  by  common  agreement,  their  own  platform  of  government 
by  synods  and  classes ;  the  former  being  a  sort  of  general 
assemblies,  the  latter  held  in  particular  shires  or  Attempt  to 
dioceses,   agreeably   to    the    presby terian    model set  "p a 
established  in  Scotland.     In   these   meetings  de-  terian 
bates  were  had,  and  determinations  usually  made,  svstem- 
sufficiently   unfavorable   to   the    established    system.      The 
ministers  composing  them  subscribed  to  the  puritan  book  of 
discipline.      These  associations  had  been  formed  in  several 
counties,  but  chiefly  in  those  of  Northampton  and  Warwick, 
under   the   direction  of  Cartwright,  the  legislator  of  their 
republic,  who  possessed,  by  the  earl  of  Leicester's  patronage, 
the  mastership  of  a  hospital  in  the  latter  town.2     It  would  be 


1  State  Trials,  1271.  It  may  be  re- 
marked, on  this  as  on  other  occasions, 
that  Udal'a  trial  is  evidently  published 
by  himself;  and  a  defendant,  especially 
in  a  political  proceeding,  is  apt  to  give  a 
partial  color  to  his  own  case.  Life  of 
Whitgift,  314;  Annals  of  Reformation, 
iv.  21;  Fuller's  Church  History,  122; 
Neal,  340.  This  writer  says  —  "  Among 
the  divines  who  suffered  death  for  the 
libels  above  mentioned,  was  the  Rev.  Mr. 
Udal."  This  is  no  doubt  a  splenetic 
mode  of  speaking.  But  Warburton.  in 
his  short  notes  on  Neal's  history,  treats 
it  as  a  wilful  and  audacious  attempt  to 
impose-  on  the  reader  —  as  if  the  ensuing 
piiges  did  not  let  him  into  all  the  circum- 
stances. I  will  here  observe  that  War- 
burton,  in  his  self-conceit,  has  paid  a 
much  higher  compliment  to  Neal  than 
he  intended,  speaking  of  his  own  com- 
ments as  a  "  full  confutation  (I  quote 
from  memory)  of  that  historian's  false 
facts  and  misrepresentations."  But 
when  we  look  at  these,  we  find  a  good 
VOL.1.  —  C.  14 


deal  of  wit  and  some  pointed  remarks, 
but  hardly  anything  that  can  be  deemed 
a  material  correction  of  iacts. 

Neal's  History  of  the  Puritans  is 
almost  wholly  compiled,  as  far  as  this 
reign  is  concerned,  from  Strype,  and 
from  a  manuscript  written  by  gome 
puritan  about  the  time.  It  was  an 
swered  by  Madox,  afterwards  bishop  ol 
Worcester,  in  a  Vindication  of  th« 
Church  of  England,  published  anony- 
mously in  1733.  Neal  replied  with, 
tolerable  success;  but  Madox's  book  is 
still  an  useful  corrective.  Both  however 
were,  like  most  controversialists,  preju- 
diced men,  loving  the  interests  of  their 
respective  factions  better  than  truth, 
and  not  very  scrupulous  about  mis- 
representing an  adversary.  But  Neal 
had  got  rid  of  the  intolerant  spirit  of 
the  puritans,  while  Madox  labors  to 
justify  every  act  of  Whitgift  and 
Parker. 

2  Life  of  Whitgift,  328. 


210  PREDILECTION  FOR  MOSAIC  POLITY.     CHAP.  IV. 

unjust  to  censure  the  archbishop  for  interfering  to  protect  the 
discipline  of  his  church  against  these  innovators,  had  but  the 
means  adopted  for  that  purpose  been  more  consonant  to 
equity.  Cartwright  with  several  of  his  sect  were  summoned 
before  the  ecclesiastical  commission ;  where,  refusing  to  in- 
culpate themselves  by  taking  the  oath  ex  ofncio,  they  were 
committed  to  the  Fleet.  This  punishment  not  satisfying  the 
rigid  churchmen,  and  the  authority  of  the  ecclesiastical  com- 
mission being  incompetent  to  inflict  any  heavier  judgment,  it 
was  thought  fit  the  next  year  to  remove  the  proceedings  into 
the  court  of  star-chamber.  The  judges,  on  being  consulted, 
gave  it  as  their  opinion,  that,  since  far  less  crimes  had  been 
punished  by  condemnation  to  the  galleys  or  perpetual  banish- 
ment, the  latter  would  be  fittest  for  their  offence.  But  sev- 
eral of  the  council  had  more  tender  regards  to  sincere  though 
intractable  men ;  and  in  the  end  they  were  admitted  to  bail 
upon  a  promise  to  be  quiet,  after  answering  some  interroga- 
tories respecting  the  queen's  supremacy  and  other  points, 
with  civility  and  an  evident  wish  to  avoid  offence.1  It  may 
be  observed  that  Cartwright  explicitly  declared  his  disappro- 
bation of  the  libels  under  the  name  of  Martin  Mar-prelate.2 
Every  political  party,  however  honorable  may  be  its  objects 
and  character,  is  liable  to  be  disgraced  by  the  association  of 
such  unscrupulous  zealots.  But  though  it  is  an  uncandid 
sophism  to  charge  the  leaders  with  the  excesses  they  profess 
to  disapprove  in  their  followers,  it  must  be  confessed  that  few 
chiefs  of  faction  have  had  the  virtue  to  condemn  with  suffi- 
cient energy  the  misrepresentations  which  are  intended  for 
their  benefit. 

It  was  imputed  to  the  puritan  faction  with  more  or  less  of 
truth,  that,  not  content  with  the  subversion  of  episcopacy  and 
of  the  whole  ecclesiastical  polity  established  in  the  kingdom, 
they  maintained  principles  that  would  essentially  affect  its 
civil  institutions.  Their  denial,  indeed,  of  the  queen's  suprem- 
acy, carried  to  such  lengths  as  I  have  shown  above,  might 
justly  be  considered  as  a  derogation  of  her  temporal  sover- 
eignty. Many  of  them  asserted  the  obligation  of  the  judicial 
law  of  Moses,  at  least  in  criminal  cases  ;  and  deduced  from 
this  the  duty  of  putting  idolaters  (that  is,  papists),  adulterers, 
witches,  and  demoniacs,  sabbath-breakers,  and  several  other 

i  Id.  336,  360,  366 ;    Append.  142, 159. 
*  Id.  j  Append.  135;  Annals    iv.  52 


.  — Puritans.  CIVIL  GOVERNMENT.  211 

• 

classes  of  offenders,  to  death.1  They  claimed  to  their  ecclesi- 
astical assemblies  the  right  of  determining  "  all  matters 
wherein  breach  of  charity  may  be,  and  all  matters  of  doctrine 
and  manners,  so  far  as  appertatneth  to  conscience."  They  took 
away  the  temporal  right  of  patronage  to  churches,  leaving  the 
choice  of  ministers  to  general  suffrage.2  There  are  even  pas- 
sages in  Cartvvright's  Admonition  which  intimate  that  the  com- 
monwealth ought  to  be  fashioned  after  the  model  of  the 
church.8  But  these  it  would  not  be  candid  to  press  against  the 
more  explicit  declarations  of  all  the  puritans  in  favor  of 
a  limited  monarchy,  though  they  grounded  its  legitimacy 
on  the  republican  principles  of  popular  consent.4  And 
with  respect  to  the  former  opinions,  they  appear  to  have  been 
by  no  means  common  to  the  whole  puritan  body  ;  some  of  the 
deprived  and  imprisoned  ministers  ever  acknowledging  the 
queen's  supremacy  in  as  full  a  manner  as  the  law  conferred  it 
on  her,  and  as  she  professed  to  claim  it.6 

The  pretensions  advanced  by  the  school  of  Cartwright  did 
not  seem  the  less  dangerous  to  those  who  cast  their  eyes  upon 
what  was  passing  in  Scotland,  where  they  received  a  practical 
illustration.  In  that  -kingdom  a  form  of  polity  very  nearly 
conforming  to  the  puritanical  platform  had  become  estab- 
lished at  the  reformation  in  1560;  except  that  the  office  of 
bishop  or  superintendent  still  continued,  but  with  no  para- 
mount, far  less  arbitrary  dominion,  and  subject  even  to  the 

1  This  predilection  for  the  Mosaic  least  some  of  their  friends,  retaliated 

polity  was  not  uncommon  among  the  this  charge  of  denying  the  queen's 

reformers.  Collier  quotes  passages  from  supremacy  on  their  adversaries.  Sir 

Martin  Bucer  as  strong  as  could  well  be  Francis  Knollys  strongly  opposed  the 

found  in  the  puritan  writings.  P.  303.  .  claims  of  episcopacy  as  a  divine  iustitu- 

4  Life  of  \Vhitgift,  p.  «51,  333,  and  tion,  which  had  been  covertly  insinuated 

Append.  138;  Annals,  iv.  140.  As  I  by  Bancroft,  on  the  ground  of  its  ineom- 

have  not  seen  the  original  works  in  patibility  with  the  prerogative,  and  urged 

which  these  tenets  are  said  to  be  pro-  lord  Burleigh  to  make  the  bishops  ac- 

mulgated,  I  cannot  vouch  for  the  fair-  knowledge  they  had  no  superiority  over 

ness  of  the  representation  made  by  the  clergy,  except  by  statute,  as  the  only 

hostile  pens,  though  I  conceive  it  to  be  means  to  save  her  majesty  from  the 

not  very  far  from  the  truth.  extreme  danger  into  which  she  was 

3  Ibid;    Madox's   Vindication    of    the  brought    by   the    machinations    of    the 
Ch.    of     Eng.    against    Neal.    p.    212 ;  pope  and  king  of  Spain. 

Strype's  Annals,  iv.  142.  Life  of  Whitgift,  p.  350,  361,  389.     He 

4  The  large  views  of  civil  government  wrote   afterwards    to    lord    Burleigh    in 
entertained  by  the  puritans  were  some-  1591,  that,   if  he  might   not   speak  his 
times  imputed  to  them  as  a  crime  by  mind  freely  against   the   power  of   the 
their     more     courtly     adversaries,   who  bishops,  and  prove  it   unlawful,  by  th« 
reproached  them  with   the  writings   of  laws  of  this  realm,  and  not  by  the  canon 
Buchanan  and  Languet.     Life  of  Whit-  law,  he  hoped  to  be  allowed  to  become  a 
gift,  258  ;  Anuals,  iv.  142.  private  man.     This  bold  letter  he  desires 

5  See  a  declaration   to  this  effect,  at  to  have  shown  to  the  queen.     Catalogue 
which   no  one  could  cavil,  in  Strype's  of   Lansdowne   MSS.,  British  Museum, 
Annals,   iv    85       The    puritans,  or   at  Ixviii.  84. 


212  AVERSION  TO  EPISCOPACY.  CHAP.  IV. 

• 

provincial  synod,  much  more  to  the  general  assembly  of  the 
Scottish  church.  Even  this  very  limited  episcopacy  was 
abolished  in  1592.  The  presbyterian  clergy,  individually  and 
collectively,  displayed  the  intrepid,  haughty,  and  untractable 
spirit  of  the  English  puritans.  Though  Elizabeth  had  from 
policy  abetted  the  Scottish  clergy  in  their  attacks  upon  the  civil 
administration,  this  connection  it-elf  had  probably  given  her 
such  an  insight  into  their  temper  as  well  as  their  influence 
that  she  must  have  shuddered  at  the  thought  of  seeing  a 
republican  assembly  substituted  for  those  faithful  satraps  her 
bishops,  so  ready  to  do  her  bidding,  and  so  patient  under  the 
hard  usage  sometimes  bestowed  on  them. 

These  prelates  did  not,  however,  obtain  so  much  support 
House  of  from  the  house  of  commons  as  from  their  sover- 
commons  eign.  In  that  assembly  a  determined  band  of 

averse  to  °  .  „  •     i     i  • 

episcopal  puritans  frequently  carried  the  victory  against  the 
.uthonty.  courtiers.  Every  session  exhibited  proofs  of  their 
dissatisfaction  with  the  state  of  the  church.  The  crown's  in- 
fluence would  have  been  too  weak  without  stretches  of  its 
prerogative.  The  commons  in  1575  received  a  message  for- 
bidding them  to  meddle  with  religious  concerns.  For  five 
years  afterwards  the  queen  did  not  convoke  parliament,  of 
which  her  dislike  to  their  puritanical  temper  might  in  all 
probability  be  the  chief  reason.  But,  when  they  met  again 
in  1580,  the  same  topic  of  ecclesiastical  grievances,  which  had 
by  no  means  abated  during  the  interval,  was  revived.  The 
commons  appointed  a  committee,  formed  only  of  the  principal 
officers  of  the  crown  who  sat  in  the  house,  to  confer  with 
some  of  the  bishops,  according  to  the  irregular  and  imperfect 
course  of  parliamentary  proceedings  in  that  age,  "  touching 
the  griefs  of  this  house  for  some  things  very  requisite  to  be 
reformed  in  the  church,  as  the  great  number  of  unlearned 
and  unable  ministers,  the  great  abuse  of  excommunications 
for  every  matter  of  small  moment,  the  commutation  of  pen- 
ances, and  the  great  multitude  of  dispensations  and  pluralities, 
and  other  things  very  hurtful  to  the  church."  l  The  commit- 
tee reported  that  they  found  some  of  the  bishops  desirous  of 
a  remedy  for  the  abuses  they  confessed,  and  of  joining  in  a 
petition  for  that  purpose  to  her  majesty  ;  which  had  accord- 
ingly been  done,  and  a  gracious  answer,  promising  all  conven- 

1  D'Ewea,  302  ;  Strype's  Whitgift,  92,  Append.  32. 


ELIZ.T  Puritans.          ACTS  OF  LOWER  HOUSE.  213 

ient  reformation,  but  laying  the  blame  of  remissness  upon 
some  prelates,  had  been  received.  This  the  house  took  with 
great  thankfulness.  It  was  exactly  the  course  which  pleased 
Elizabeth,  who  had  no  regard  for  her  bishops,  and  a  real 
anxiety  that  her  ecclesiastical  as  well  as  temporal  government 
should  be  well  administered,  provided  her  subjects  would 
intrust  the  sole  care  of  it  to  herself,  or  limit  their  interference 
to  modest  petitioning. 

A  new  parliament  having  been  assembled,  soon  after  Whit- 
gift  on  his  elevation  to  the  primacy  had  begun  to  enforce  an, 
universal  conformity,  the  lower  house  drew  up  a  petition  in 
sixteen  articles,  to  which  they  requested  the  lords'  concur- 
rence, complaining  of  the  oath  ex  officio,  the  subscription  to 
the  three  new  articles,  the  abuses  of  excommunication, 
licenses  for  non-residence,  and  other  ecclesiastical  grievances. 
The  lords  replied  coolly  that  they  conceived  many  of  those 
articles  which  the  commons  had  proposed  to  be  unnecessary, 
and  that  others  of  them  were  already  provided  for ;  and  that 
the  uniformity  of  the  common  prayer,  the  use  of  which  the 
commons  had  requested  to  leave  in  certain  respects  to  the 
minister's  discretion,  had  been  established  by  parliament. 
The  two  archbishops,  Whitgift  and  Sandys,  made  a  more 
particular  answer  to  each  article  of  the  petition,  in  the  name 
of  their  brethren.1  But,  in  order  to  show  some  willingness 
towards  reformation,  they  proposed  themselves,  in  convoca- 
tion, a  few  regulations  for  redress  of  abuses,  none  of  which, 
however,  on  this  occasion,  though  they  received  the  royal  as- 
sent, were  submitted  to  the  legislature;2  the  queen  in  fact 
maintaining  an  insuperable  jealousy  of  all  intermeddling  on 
the  part  of  parliament  with  her  exclusive  supremacy  over  the 
church.  Excluded  by  Elizabeth's  jealousy  from  entertaining 
these  religious  innovations,  which  would  probably  have  met 
with  no  unfavorable  reception  from  a  free  parliament,  the 
commons  vented  their  ill-will  towards  the  dominant  hierarchy 
in  complaints  of  ecclesiastical  grievances,  and  measures  to 
redress  them  ;  as  to  which,  even  with  the  low  notions  of  par- 
liamentary right  prevailing  at  court,  it  was  impossible  to  deny 
their  competence.  Several  bills  were  introduced  this  session 
of  1584—5  into  the  lower  house,  which,  though  they  had  little 
chance  of  receiving  the  queen's  assent,  manifest  the  sense  of 

1  B'Ewes,  339,  et  post ;  Strype's  Whitgift,  176,  &c. ;  Append.  70. 
*  Strj-pe's  Annals,  iii.  228. 


211  OPPOSITION   TO   OATH  EX   OITICIO.        CgAi>.  IV. 

that  as-emblv,  and  in  all  likelihood  of  their  constituents.  One 
of  the-e  imported  that  bishops  should  he  sworn  in  one  of  the 
court-  of  ju-tiee  to  do  nothing  in  their  oiliee  contrary  to  the 
common  law.  Another  went  to  restrain  pluralities,  as  to 
which  the  prelates  would  very  reluctantly  admit  of  any  limi- 
tation.1 A  hill  of  the  same  nature  passed  the  commons  in 
L'hS'l,  though  not  without  some  opposition.  The  clergy  took 
FO  great  alarm  at  this  measure  that  the  convocation  addressed 
the  queen  in  vehement  language  against  it ;  and  the  arch- 
bishop throwing  all  the  weight  of  his  advice  and  authority 
into  the  same  scale,  the  bill  expired  in  the  upper  house.2  A 
similar  proposition  in  the  session  of  1G01  seems  to  have  mis- 
carried in  the  commons.3  In  the  next  chapter  will  be  found 
other  instances  of  the  commons'  reforming  temper  in  ecclesi- 
astical concerns,  and  the  queen's  determined  assertion  of  her 
supremacy. 

The  oath  ex  officio,  binding  the  taker  to  answer  all  ques- 
tions that  should  be  put  to  him,  inasmuch  as  it  contravened 
the  generous  maxim  of  English  law,  that  no  one  is  obliged  to 
criminate  himself,  provoked  very  just  animadversion.  Morice, 
attorney  of  the  court  of  wards,  not  only  attacked  its  legality 
with  arguments  of  no  slight  force,  but  introduced  a  bill  to 
take  it  away.  This  was  on  the  whole  well  received  by  the 
house;  and  sir  Francis  Knollys,  the  stanch  enemy  of  episco- 
pacy, though  in  high  ollice,  spoke  in  its  favor.  But  the  queen 
put  a  stop  to  the  proceeding,  and  Morice  lay  some  time  in 
prison  for  his  boldness.  The  civilians,  of  whom  several  sat 
in  the  lower  house,  defended  a  mode  of  procedure  that  had 
been  borrowed  from  their  own  jurisprudence.  This  revived 
the  ancient  animosity  between  them  and  the  common  lawyers. 
The  latter  had  always  manifested  a  great  jealousy  of  the 
spiritual  jurisdiction,  and  had  early  learned  to  restrain  its 
exorbitances  by  writs  of  prohibition  from  the  temporal  courts, 
Whitgift,  as  tenacious  of  power  as  the  most  ambitious  of  his 
predecessors,  murmured  like  them  at  this  subordination,  for 
such  it  evidently  was,  to  a  lay  tribunal.4  But  the  judges, 

1  Strype's  Annals,  iii.  186,  192.  Com-  his  dislike  to  the  lawyers.  "  The  tern- 
pare  Append.  35.  poral  lawyer,"  he  says  in  a  letter  to 

-  Strype's   Whitgift,    279;    Annals,  i.  Cecil,   "  whose   learning    is  no  learning 
fr*3.  anywhere  but  here  at  homt,  being  born 

i  Part.  Hist.   921.  to  nothing,  doth  by  his  labor  and  travel 

*  Strype's    Whitgift,    521,   537;    App.     in  that  barbarous  knowledge   purchase 
130.    The  archbishop  could  not  disguise    to  himself  and  his  heirs  forever  a  thou- 


ELIZ.— Puritans.      LAWS   TO   ENFORCE  CONFORMITY.  215 

who  found  as  much  gratification  in  exerting  their  power  as 
the  bishops,  paid  little  regard  to  the  remonstrances  of  the 
latter.  We  find  the  law  reports  of  this  and  the  succeeding 
reign  full  of  cases  of  prohibitions.  Nor  did  other  abuses 
imputed  to  these  obnoxious  judicatures  fail  to  provoke  cen- 
sure, such  as  the  unreasonable  fees  of  their  officers,  and  the 
usage  of  granting  licenses  and  commuting  penances  for 
money.1  The  ecclesiastical  courts  indeed  have  generally  been 
reckoned  more  dilatory,  vexatious,  and  expensive  than  those 
of  the  common  law.  But  in  the  present  age  that  part  of  their 
jurisdiction  which,  though  coercive,  is  professedly  spiritual, 
and  wherein  the  greatest  abuses  have  been  alleged  to  exist, 
has  gone  very  much  into  disuse.  In  matrimonial  and  testa- 
mentary causes  their  course  of  proceeding  may  not  be  open 
to  any  censure,  so  far  as  the  essential  administration  of  jus- 
tice is  concerned ;  though  in  the  latter  of  these  a  most 
inconvenient  division  of  jurisdictions,  following  not  only  the 
unequal  boundaries  of  episcopal  dioceses,  but  the  various 
peculiars  or  exempt  districts  which  the  church  of  England  has 
continued  to  retain,  is  productive  of  a  good  deal  of  trouble 
and  needless  expense.  [1827.] 

Notwithstanding  the  tendency  towards  puritanism  which 
the  house  of  commons   generally   displayed,  the 
court  succeeded  in  procuring  an  act  which  eventu-  dentfiiabie 
ally  pressed  with  very  great  severity  upon  that  j£ severe 
class.     This  passed  in  1593,  and  enacted  the  pen- 
alty of  imprisonment  against  any  person  above  the  age  of 
sixteen  who   should   forbear  for   the  space  of  a  month  to 
repair  to  some  church,  until  he  should  make  such  open  sub- 
mission and  declaration  of  conformity  as   the  act  appoints. 
Those  who  refused  to  submit  to  these  conditions  were  to  ab- 
jure the  realm,  and  if  they  should  return  without  the  queen's 
license  to  suffer  death  as  felons.2     As  this,  on  the  one  hand, 
like  so  many  former  statutes,  helped  to  crush  the  unfortunate 
adherents  to  the  Romish  faith,  so  too  did  it  bear  an  obvious 
application   to  such  protestant  sectaries  as  had  professedly 


»mi.       in    a    convocation    neiu    aunng  wnetner  tnis  were  inujiiueu  uuuu  uue  uc 

Griudal's  sequestration  (1580),  proposals  not.  it  produced  no  reformation.  Strype'a 

for    reforming    certain    abuses    in    the  Whitjrfft,  419. 

Bpiritual  courts  were    considered  ;    but  2  35  Eliz.  c.  1 ;  Parl.  Hist  863. 


216  ORIGIN  OF  INDEPENDENTS.  CHAP.  IV 

separated  from  the  Anglican  church.  But  it  is  here  worthy 
of  remark,  that  the  puritan  ministers  throughout  this  reign 
disclaimed  the  imputation  of  schism,  and  acknowledged  the 
lawfulness  of  continuing  in  the  established  church,  while 
they  demanded  a  further  reformation  of  her  discipline.1  The 
real  separatists,  who  were  also  a  numerous  body,  were  de- 
nominated Brownists  or  Barrowists,  from  the  names  of  their 
founders,  afterwards  lost  in  the  more  general  appellation  of 
Independents.  These  went  far  beyond  the  puritans  in  their 
aversion  to  the  legal  ministry,  and  were  deemed  in  conse- 
quence still  more  proper  subjects  for  persecution.  Multi- 
tudes of  them  fled  to  Holland  from  the  rigor  of  the  bishops 
in  enforcing  this  statute.2  But  two  of  this  persuasion,  Bar- 
row and  Greenwood,  experienced  a  still  severer  fate.  They 
were  indicted  on  that  perilous  law  of  the  23d  of  the  queen, 
mentioned  in  the  last  chapter,  for  spreading  seditious  writ- 
ings, and  executed  at  Bury.  They  died,  Neal  tells  us,  with 
such  expressions  of  piety  and  loyalty  that  Elizabeth  regret- 
ted the  consent  she  had  given  to  their  deaths.8 

But  while  these  scenes  of  pride  and  persecution  on  one 
hand,  and  of  sectarian  insolence  on  the  other,  were  deform- 
ing the  bosom  of  the  English  church,  she  found  a  defender 
of  her  institutions  in  one  who  mingled  in  these  vulgar  con- 
troversies like  a  knight  of  romance  among  caitiff  brawlers, 

i  Neal  asserts  in  his  summary  of  the  land  ;    according    to  the   puritans,   the 

controversy,  as  it  stood  in   this  reign,  decrees    of     provincial     and     national 

that  the  puritans  did  not  object  to  the  synods,    allowed   and    enforced    by   the 

office  of  bishop,  provided   he  was  only  civil  magistrate  ;  but  neither  party  were 

the  head  of  tne  presbyters,  and  acted  in  for  admitting  that  liberty  of  conscience 

conjunction  with  them.     P.  398.     But  and  freedom  of  profession  which  is  every 

this  was  in  effect  to  demand  everything,  man's  right,  as  far  as  is  consistent  with, 

For  if  the  office  could  be  so  far  lowered  the   peace  of  the  government  he  lives 

in  eminence,  there  were  many  waiting*to  nnder." 

clip  the  temporal  revenues  and  dignity  *  Neal,  253.  386. 

In  prooortion.  3  Strype's   Whitgift,  414  ;    Neal,   373. 

In  another  passage  Neal  states  clearly,  Several  years  before,  in  1583.  two  men 
if  not  quite  fairly,  the  main  points  of  called  anabaptists,  Thaeker  and  Copping, 
difference  between  the  church  and  non-  were  hanged  at  the  same  place  on  the 
conforming  parties  under  Elizabeth.  P.  same  statute,  for  denying  the  queen's 
147.  He  concludes  with  the  following  ecclesiasti  al  supremacy  ;  the  proof  of 
remark,  which  is  very  true.  '-Both  which  was  their  dispersion  of  Brown's 
parties  agreed  too  well  in  asserting  the  tracts,  wherein  that  was  only  owned  in 
necessity  of  an  uniformity  of  public  civil  cases.  Strype's  Annals,  iii.  186 
worship,  and  of  calling  in  the  sword  of  This  was  according  to  the  invariable 
the  magistrate  for  the  support  and  practice  of  Tudor  times :  an  oppressive 
defence  of  the  several  principles,  which  and  sanguinary  statute  was  first  made  ; 
they  made  an  ill  use  of  in  their  tnrns,  and  next,  as  occasion  might  serve,  a  con- 
as  they  could  grasp  the  power  into  their  struction  was  put  on  it  contrary  to  all 
hands.  The  standard  of  uniformity,  common  sense,  in  order  to  take  away 
according  to  the  bishops,  was  the  men's  lives, 
queen's  supremacy  and  the  laws  of  the 


ELIZ.  — Puritans.      HOOKER'S  ECCLESIASTICAL  POLITY.      217 

with  arms  of  finer  temper  and  worthy  to  be  proved  in  a 
nobler  field.  Richard  Hooker,  master  of  the  Tern-  Hooker's 
pie,  published  the  first  four  books  of  his  Ecclesi-  ^p^f1' 
astical  Polity  in  1594;  the  fifth,  three  years  af- its  chan«> 
terwards  ;  and,  dying  in  1GOO,  left  behind  three  ter- 
which  did  not  see  the  light  till  1647.  This  eminent  work 
may  justly  be  reckoned  to  mark  an  era  in  our  literature  ;  for 
if  passages  of  much  good  sense  and  even  of  a  vigorous  elo- 
quence are  scattered  in  several  earlier  writers  in  prose,  yet 
none  of  these,  except  perhaps  Latimer  and  Ascham,  and  sir 
Philip  Sidney  in  his  Arcadia,  can  be  said  to  have  acquired 
enough  reputation  to  be  generally  known  even  by  name, 
much  less  are  read  in  the  present  day  ;  and  it  is,  indeed,  not 
a  little  remarkable  that  England  until  near  the  end  of  the 
sixteenth  century  had  given  few  proofs  in  literature  of  that 
intellectual  power  which  was  about  to  develop  itself  with 
such  unmatchable  energy  in  Shakspeare  and  Bacon.  We 
cannot,  indeed,  place  Hooker  (but  whom  dare  we  to  place  ?) 
by  the  side  of  these  master-spirits ;  yet  he  has  abundant 
claims  to  be  counted  among  the  luminaries  of  English  litera- 
ture. He  not  only  opened  the  mine,  but  explored  the  depths, 
of  our  native  eloquence.  So  stately  and  graceful  is  the 
march  of  his  periods,  so  various  the  fall  of  his  musical  ca- 
dences upon  the  ear,  so  rich  in  images,  so  condensed  in  sen- 
tences, so  grave  and  noble  his  diction,  so  little  is  there  of 
vulgarity  in  his  racy  idiom,  of  pedantry  in  his  learned  phrase, 
that  I  know  not  whether  any  later  writer  has  more  admirably 
displayed  the  capacities  of  our  language,  or  produced  pas- 
sages more  worthy  of  comparison  with  the  splendid  monu- 
ments of  antiquity.  If  we  compare  the  first  book  of  the 
Ecclesiastical  Polity  with  what  bears,  perhaps,  most  resem- 
blance to  it  of  anything  extant,  the  treatise  of  Cicero  de 
Legibus,  it  will  appear  somewhat,  perhaps,  inferior,  through 
the  imperfection  of%  our  language,  which,  with  all  its  force 
and  dignity,  does  not  equal  the  Latin  in  either  of  these  qual- 
ities, and  certainly  more  tedious  and  diffuse  in  some  of  its 
reasonings,  but  by  no  means  less  high-toned  in  sentiment,  or 
less  bright  in  fancy,  and  far  more  comprehensive  and  pro- 
found in  the  foundations  of  its  philosophy. 

The  advocates  of  a  presbyterian  church  had  always 
thought  it  sufficient  to  prove  that  it  was  conformable  to  the 
apostolical  scheme  as  deduced  merely  from  the  scriptures. 


218  HOOKER.  CHAP.  IV. 

A  pious  reverence  for  the  sacred  writings,  which  they  made 
almost  their  exclusive  study,  had  degenerated  into  very  nar- 
row views  on  the  great  themes  of  natural  religion  and  the 
moral  law,  as  deducible  from  reason  and  sentiment.  These, 
as  most  of  the  various  families  of  their  descendants  continue 
to  do,  they  greatly  slighted,  or  even  treated  as  the  mere 
chimeras  of  heathen  philosophy.  If  they  looked  to  the  Mo- 
saic law  as  the  standard  of  criminal  jurisprudence,  if  they 
sought  precedents  from  Scripture  for  all  matters  of  temporal 
policy,  much  more  would  they  deem  the  practice  of  the 
Apostles  an  unerring  and  immutable  rule  for  the  discipline 
of  the  Christian  church.1  To  encounter  these  adversaries, 
Hooker  took  a  far  more  original  course  than  the  ordinary 
controvertists,  who  fought  their  battles  with  conflicting  inter- 
pretations of  Scriptural  texts  or  passages  from  the  fathers. 
He  inquired  into  the  nature  and  foundation  of  law  itself,  as 
the  rule  of  operation  to  all  created  beings,  yielding  thereto 
obedience  by  unconscious  necessity,  or  sensitive  appetite,  or 
reasonable  choice  ;  reviewing  especially  those  laws  that  reg- 
ulate human  agency,  as  they  arise  out  of  moral  relations, 
common  to  our  species,  or  the  institutions  of  political  so- 
cieties, or  the  intercommunity  of  independent  nations  ;  and 
having  thoroughly  established  the  fundamental  distinction 
between  laws  natural  and  positive,  eternal  and  temporary, 
immutable  and  variable,  he  came  with  all  this  strength  of 
moral  philosophy  to  discriminate  by  the  same  criterion  the 
various  rules  and  precepts  contained  in  the  Scriptures.  It 
was  a  kind  of  maxim  among  the  puritans  that  Scripture  was 
so  much  the  exclusive  rule  of  human  actions  that  whatever, 
in  matters  at  least  concerning  religion,  could  not  be  found  to 
have  its  authority,  was  unlawful.  Hooker  devoted  the  whole 
second  book  of  his  work  to  the  refutation  of  this  principle. 
He  proceeded  afterwards  to  attack  its  application  more  par- 
ticularly to  the  episcopal  scheme  of  chur-ch  government,  and 
to  the  various  ceremonies  or  usages  which  those  sectaries 


1  "The  discipline  of  Christ's  church,"  Wh'.tgift.  in  his  answer  to  Cartwrighfs 

said  Cartwright,  "  that  is  necessary  for  Admonition,   rested  the  controversy  in 

1  times,  is  delivered  by  Christ,  and  set  the  main,  as  Hooker  did.   on  the   iiulil- 

down  in  the  Holy  Scriptures.     Therefore  ferency  of   church   discipline  and  «>«•- 

the  true  and   lawful  discipline  is  to  be  mony.      It  was  not  till  afterwards  that 

tched  from   thence,  and  from   thence  the   defenders  of  the  established   order 

Hone.      And   that   which   resteth   upon  found  out  that  one  claim  of  divine  right 

any    other     foundation     ought     to     be  was  best  met  by  another, 
esteemed    unlawful    and    counterfeit." 


ELIZ.  —  Puritans.  HOOKER.  219 

treated  as  either  absolutely  superstitious,  or  at  least  as  im- 
positions without  authority.  It  was  maintained  by  this  great 
writer,  not  only  that  ritual  observances  are  variable  according 
to  the  discretion  of  ecclesiastical  rulers,  but  that  no  certain 
form  of  polity  is  set  down  in  Scripture  as  generally  indis- 
pensable for  a  Christian  church.  Far,  however,  from  con- 
ceding to  his  antagonists  the  fact  which  they  assumed,  he 
contended  for  episcopacy  as  an  apostolical  institution,  and 
always  preferable,  when  circumstances  would  allow  its  pres- 
ervation, to  the  more  democratical  model  of  the  Calvinistic 
congregations.  "  If  we  did  seek,"  he  says,  "  to  maintain  that 
which  most  advantageth  our  own  cause,  the  very  best  way 
for  us  arid  the  strongest  against  them  were  to  hold,  even  as 
they  do,  that  in  Scripture  there  must  needs  be  found  some 
particular  form  of  church  polity  which  God  hath  instituted, 
and  which  for  that  very  cause  belongeth  to  all  churches  at 
all  times.  But  with  any  such  partial  eye  to  respect  our- 
selves, and  by  cunning  to  make  those  things  seem  the  truest 
which  are  the  fittest  to  serve  our  purpose,  is  a  thing  which 
we  neither  like  nor  mean  to  follow." 

The  richness  of  Hooker's  eloquence  is  chiefly  displayed  in 
his  first  book  ;  beyond  which,  perhaps,  few  who  want  a  taste 
for  ecclesiastical  reading  are  likely  to  proceed.  The  second 
and  third,  however,  though  less  brilliant,  are  not  inferior  in 
force  and  comprehensiveness  of  reasoning.  The  eighth  and 
last  returns  to  the  subject  of  civil  government,  and  expands, 
with  remarkable  liberality,  the  principles  he  had  laid  down 
as  to  its  nature  in  the  first  book.  Those  that  intervene  are 
mostly  confined  to  a  more  minute  discussion  of  the  questions 
mooted  between  the  church  and  puritans ;  and  in  these,  as 
far  as  I  have  looked  into  them,  though  Hooker's  argument  is 
always  vigorous  and  logical,  and  he  seems  to  be  exempt  from 
that  abusive  insolence  to  which  polemical  writens  were  then 
even  more  prone  than  at  present,  yet  he  has  not  altogether 
the  terseness  or  lucidity  which  long  habits  of  literary  war- 
fare, and,  perhaps,  a  natural  turn  of  mind,  have  given  to 
some  expert  dialecticians.  In  respect  of  language,  the  three 
posthumous  books,  partly  from  having  never  received  the 
author's  last  touches,  and  partly,  perhaps,  from  his  weariness 
of  the  labor,  are  beyond  comparison  less  elegantly  written 
than  the  preceding. 

The  better  parts  of  the  Ecclesiastical  Polity  bear  a  resem- 


220  HOOKER.  CHAP.  IV. 

blance  to  the  philosophical  writings  of  antiquity,  in  their  de- 
fects as  well  as  their  excellences.  Hooker  is  often  too  vague 
in  the  use  of  general  terms,  too  inconsiderate  in  the  admis- 
sion of  principles,  too  apt  to  acquiesce  in  the  scholastic 
pseudo-philosophy,  and,  indeed,  in  all  received  tenets ;  he  is 
comprehensive  rather  than  sagacious,  and  more  fitted  to  sift 
the  truth  from  the  stores  of  accumulated  learning  than  to 
seize  it  by  an  original  impulse  of  his  own  mind ;  somewhat 
also  impeded,  like  many  other  great  men  of  that  and  the  suc- 
ceeding century,  by  too  much  acquaintance  with  books,  and 
too  much  deference  for  their  authors.  It  may  be  justly  ob- 
jected to  some  passages  that  they  elevate  ecclesiastical  au- 
thority, even  in  matters  of  belief,  with  an  exaggeration  not 
easily  reconciled  to  the  protestant  right  of  private  judgment, 
and  even  of  dangerous  consequence  in  those  times ;  as  when 
he  inclines  to  give  a  decisive  voice  in  theological  controver- 
sies to  general  councils ;  not,  indeed,  on  the  principles  of  the 
church  of  Rome,  but  on  such  as  must  end  in  the  same  con- 
clusion, the  high  probability  that  the  aggregate  judgment 
of  many  grave  and  learned  men  should  be  well  founded.1 
Nor  would  it  be  difficult  to  point  out  several  other  subjects, 
such  as  religious  toleration,  as  to  which  he  did  not  emanci- 
pate himself  from  the  trammels  of  prejudice.  But,  whatever 
may  be  tlie  imperfections  of  his  Ecclesiastical  Polity,  they 
are  far  more  than  compensated  by  its  eloquence  and  its  rea- 
soning, and  above  all  by  that  deep  pervading  sense  of  the 
relation  between  man  and  his  Creator,  as  the  groundwork  of 
all  eternal  law,  which  rendered  the  first  book  of  this  work  a 
rampart,  on  the  one  hand,  against  the  puritan  school  who 
shunned  the  light  of  nature  as  a  deceitful  meteor ;  and,  on 


presume  to  build  somewhat  upon  their  not  to  allow  enough  for   their   passions 

judgment,  what  reason  have  we  to  think  and  infirmities,  the  imperfection  of  their 

but  that,  even  in  matters  divine,  the  like  knowledge,  their  connivance  with  power, 

wits,  furnished  with  necessary  helps,  ex-  their  attachment  to  names  and  persons, 

errisc-,1  in   Scripture  with  like  diligence,  and  all  the  other  drawbacks  to  ecclesias- 

and  assisted  with  the  grace  of  Almighty  tical  authority. 

God.  may  gVow  unto  so  much  perfection  It  is  well  known  that  the  preface  to  the 

of  knowledge,  that   men  shall  have- just  Ecclesiastical   Polity  was  one  of  the  two 

cause,  when  anything  pertinent  unto  faith  books   to   which  James   II.  ascribed   his 

and  religion  is  doubted  of.  the  more  wil-  return  into  the  fold  of  Rome  ;  and  it  is 

llngly  to  incline  their  minds  towards  that  not  difficult   to  perceive  by  what  course 

which  the  sentence  of  so  grave,  wise,  and  of  reasoning  on  the  positions  it  contains 

learned  ia  that  faculty  shall  judge  most  this  was  effected. 


ELIZ.  — Puritans.      PRINCIPLES   OF  CIVIL   GOVERNMENT.     221 

the  other,  against  that  immoral  philosophy  which,  displayed 
in  the  dark  precepts  of  Machiavel,  or  lurking  in  the  desul- 
tory sallies  of  Ifontaigne,  and  not  always  rejected  by  writers 
of  more  apparent  seriousness,  threatened  to  destroy  the  sense 
of  intrinsic  distinctions  in  the  quality  of  actions,  and  to  con- 
vert the  maxims  of  state-craft  and  dissembling  policy  into 
the  rule  of  life  and  manners. 

Nothing,  perhaps,  is  more  striking  to  a  reader  of  the  Ec- 
clesiastical Polity  than  the  constant  and  even  excessive  pre- 
dilection of  Hooker  for  those  liberal  principles  of  civil 
government  which  are  sometimes  so  just  and  always  so 
attractive.  Upon  these  subjects  his  theory  absolutely  co- 
incides with  that  of  Locke.  The  origin  of  government,  both 
in  right  and  in  fact,  he  explicitly  derives  from  a  primary 
contract ;  "  without  which  consent  there  were  no  reason  that 
one  should  take  upon  him  to  be  lord  or  judge  over  another ; 
because,  although  there  be,  according  to  the  opinion  of  some 
very  great  and  judicious  men,  a  kind  of  natural  right  in  the 
noble,  wise,  and  virtuous,  to  govern  them  which  are  of  servile 
disposition,  nevertheless,  for  manifestation  of  this  their  right, 
and  men's  more  peaceable  contentment  on  both  sides,  the 
assent  of  them  who  are  to  be  governed  seemeth  necessary." 
"  The  lawful  power,"  he  observes  elsewhere,  "  of  making 
laws  to  command  whole  politic  societies  of  men,  belongeth  so- 
properly  unto  the  same  entire  societies,  that  for  any  prince 
or  potentate  of  what  kind  soever  upon  earth  to  exercise  the 
same  of  himself,  and  not  either  by  express  commission  im- 
mediately and  personally  received  from  God,  or  else  by 
authority  received  at  first  from  their  consent  upon  whose 
persons  they  impose  laws,  it  is  no  better  than  mere  tyranny. 
Laws  they  are  not,  therefore,  which  public  approbation  hath 
not  made  so.  But  approbation  not  only  they  give,  who  per- 
sonally declare  their  assent  by  voice,  sign,  or  act ;  but  also 
when  others  do  it  in  their  names,  by  right  originally,  at  the 
least,  derived  from  them.  As  in  parliaments,  councils,  and 
the  like  assemblies,  although  we  be  not  personally  ourselves 
present,  notwithstanding  our  assent  is  by  reason  of  other 
agents  there  in  our  behalf.  And  what  we  do  by  others,  no 
reason  but  that  it  should  stand  as  our  deed,  no  less  effectually 
to  bind  us  than  if  ourselves  had  done  it  in  person."  And  in 
another  place  still  more  peremptorily :  "  Of  this  thing  no 
man  doubteth,  namely,  that  in  all  societies,  companies,  and 


222   INTERPOLATIONS  IN  THE  LATTEE  BOOKS.  CHAP.  IV. 

corporations,  what  severally  each  shall  be  bound  unto,  it  must 
be  with  all  their  assents  ratified.  Against  all  equity  it  were 
that  a  man  should  suffer  detriment  at  the  hands  of  men  for 
not  observing  that  which  he  never  did  either  by  himself  or 
others  mediately  or  immediately  agree  unto." 

These  notions  respecting  the  basis  of  political  society,  so 
far  unlike  what  prevailed  among  the  next  generation  of 
churchmen,  are  chiefly  developed  and  dwelt  upon  in  Hooker's 
concluding  book,  the  eighth ;  and  gave  rise  to  a  rumor,  very 
sedulously  propagated  soon  after  the  time  of  its  publication, 
and  still  sometimes  repeated,  that  the  posthumous  portion  of 
his  work  had  been  interpolated  or  altered  by  the  puritans.1 
For  this  surmise,  however,  I  am  persuaded  that  there  is  no 
foundation.  The  three  latter  books  are  doubtless  imperfect, 
and  it  is  possible  that  verbal  changes  may  have  been  made 
by  their  transcribers  or  editors ;  but  the  testimony  that  has 
been  brought  forward  to  throw  a  doubt  over  their  authenticity 
consists  in  those  vague  and  self-contradictory  stories  which 
gossiping  compilers  of  literary  anecdote  can  easily  accumu- 
late ;  while  the  intrinsic  evidence  arising  from  the  work 
itself,  on  which  in  this  branch  of  criticism  I  am  apt  chiefly 
to  rely,  seems  altogether  to  repel  every  suspicion.  For  not 
only  the  principles  of  civil  government,  presented  in  a  more 
expanded  form  by  Hooker  in  the  eighth  book,  are  precisely 
what  he  laid  down  in  the  first ;  but  there  is  a  peculiar  chain 

1  In  the  Life  of  Hooker,  prefixed  to  the  was  ever  in  the  hands  of  the  puritans, 

edition  I  use,  fol.  1671, 1  find  an  assertion  The  strongest   probability,  however,   of 

of  Dr.  Barnard,  chaplain  to  Usher,  that  he  their  authenticity  is   from  internal  evi- 

had  seen  a.  manuscript  of  the  last  books  dence.     [But  it  has  been  proved  by  Mr. 

of  Hooker,  containing  many  things  omit-  Keble,  the  last  editor  of  the  Ecclesiastical 

ted  in  the  printed  volume.    One  passage  Polity,  that  the  sixth  book,  as  we  now 

is  quoted,  and  seems  in  Hooker's  style,  possess   it,  though    written  by   Hooker, 

But  the  question  is  rather  with  respect  to  did  not  belong  to  this  work,  and  conse- 

interpolations  than  omissions.  And  of  the  quently  that  the  real  sixth  book  has  been 

former  I  see  no  evidence  or   likelihood,  lost.  —  1841.] 

If  it  be  true,  as  is  alleged,  that  different        A  late  writer  has  produced  a  somewhat 

manuscripts  of  the  three  last  books  did  ridiculous  proof  of  the  carelessness  with 

not  agree,  if  even   these  disagreements  which  all    editions  of  the   Ecclesiastical 

were  the  result  of  fraud,  why  should  we  Polity   have    been   printed  —  a  sentence 

conclude  that  they  were  corrupted  by  the  having  slipped  into  the  text  of  the  sev- 

puritans  rather  than  the  church  ?    In  enth   book,  which  makes  nonsense,  and 

touch's   edition    of    Walton's     Life    of  which  he  very  probably  conjectures  to 

Hooker  the  reader  will   find  a  long  and  have  been  a  marginal  memorandum  of 

ill-digested  note  on  this  subject,  the  result  the  author  for  his  own  use  on  revising 

of  which   has  been  to  convince  me   that  the  manuscript.     M'Crie's  Life  of  Melvil, 

there  is   no  reason    to  believe   any  other  vol.  i.  p.  471.  [But  it  seems  on  the  whole 

than  verbal  changes  to  have  been  made  in  a   more   plausible  conjecture    that    the 

the  loose  draught  which  the  author  left,  memorandum  was  by  one  of  those  who, 

but  that,  whatever  changes  were  made,  after  Hooker's  death,  had  the  manuscript 

It  does  not  appear  that  the  manuscript  to  revise.— 1841.] 


ELIZ.— Puritans.   VINDICATION  OF  QUEEN'S  SUPREMACY.   223 

of  consecutive  reasoning  running  through  it,  wherein  it  would 
be  difficult  to  point  out  any  passages  that  could  be  rejected 
without  dismembering  the  context.  It  was  his  business  in 
this  part  of  the  Ecclesiastical  Polity  to  vindicate  the  queen's 
supremacy  over  the  church ;  and  this  he  has  done  by  identi- 
fying the  church  with  the  commonwealth  ;  no  one,  according 
to  him,  being  a  member  of  the  one  who  was  not  also  a 
member  of  the  other.  But  as  the  constitution  of  the  Chris 
tian  church,  so  far  as  the  laity  partook  in  its  government,  by 
choice  of  pastors  or  otherwise,  was  undeniably  democratical, 
he  labored  to  show,  through  the  medium  of  the  original  com- 
pact of  civil  society,  that  the  sovereign  had  received  this,  as 
well  as  all  other  powers,  at  the  hands  of  the  people.  "  Laws 
being  made  among  us,"  he  affirms,  "  are  not  by  any  of  us  so 
taken  or  interpreted  as  if  they  did  receive  their  force  from 
power  which  the  prince  doth  communicate  unto  the  parlia- 
ment, or  unto  any  other  court  under  him,  but  from  power 
which  the  whole  body  of  the  realm  being  naturally  possessed 
with  hath  by  free  and  deliberate  assent  derived  unto  him 
that  ruleth  over  them  so  far  forth  as  hath  been  declared  ;  so 
that  our  laws  made  concerning  religion  do  take  originally 
their  essence  from  the  power  of  the  whole  realm  and  church 
of  England." 

In  this  system  of  Hooker  and  Locke,  for  it  will  be  obvious 
to  the  reader  that  their  principles  were  the  same,  there  is 
much,  if  I  am  not  mistaken,  to  disapprove.  That  no  man  can 
be  justly  bound  by  laws  which  his  own  assent  has  not  ratified 
appears  to  me  a  position  incompatible  with  the  existence  of 
society  in  its  literal  sense,  or  illusory  in  the  sophistical  inter- 
pretations by  which  it  is  usual  to  evade  its  meaning.  It  will 
be  more  satisfactory  and  important  to  remark  the  views 
which  this  great  writer  entertained  of  our  own  constitution, 
to  which  he  frequently  and  fearlessly  appeals,  as  the  standing 
illustration  of  a  government  restrained  by  law.  "  I  cannot 
choose,"  he  says,  "  but  commend  highly  their  wisdom,  by 
whom  the  foundation  of  the  commonwealth  hath  been  laid ; 
wherein,  though  no  manner  of  person  or  cause  be  unsubject 
unto  the  king's  power,  yet  so  is  the  power  of  the  king  over 
all,  and  in  all,  limited,  that  unto  all  his  proceedings  the  law 
itself  is  a  rule.  The  axioms  of  our  regal  government  are 
these:  'Lex  facit  regera ' — the  king's  grant  of  any  favor 
made  contrary  to  the  law  is  void ;  — '  Rex  nihil  potest  nisi 


224  WHIG  PRINCIPLES   OF   HOOKER.  CHAP.  IV. 

quod  jure  potest '  —  what  power  the  king  hath  he  hath  it  by 
law  ;  the  bounds  and  limits  of  it  are  known,  the  entire  com- 
munity giveth  general  order  by  law  how  all  things  publicly 
are  to  be  done;  and  the  king  as  the  head- thereof,  the  highest 
in  authority  over  all,  causeth,  according  to  the  same  law, 
every  particular  to  be  framed  and  ordered  thereby.  The 
whole  body  politic  maketh  laws,  which  laws  give  power  unto 
the  king  ;  and  the  king  having  bound  himself  to  use  accord- 
ing to  law  that  power,  it  so  falleth  out  that  the  execution  of 
the  one  is  accomplished  by  the  other."  These  doctrines  of 
limited  monarchy  recur  perpetually  in  the  eighth  book ;  and 
though  Hooker,  as  may  be  supposed,  does  not  enter  upon  the 
perilous  question  of  resistance  and  even  intimates  that  he 
does  not  see  how  the  people  can  limit  the  extent  of  power 
once  granted,  unless  where  it  escheats  to  them,  yet  he  posi- 
tively lays  it  down  that  usurpers  of  power,  that  is,  lawful 
rulers  arrogating  more  than  the  law  gives  to  them,  cannot  in 
conscience  bind  any  man  to  obedience. 

It  would,  perhaps,  have  been  a  deviation  from  my  subject 
to  enlarge  so  much  on  these  political  principles  in  a  writer 
of  any  later  age,  when  they  had  been  openly  sustained  in 
the  councils  of  the  nation.  But  as  the  reigns  of  the  Tudor 
family  were  so  inauspicious  to  liberty  that  some  have  been 
apt  to  imagine  its  recollection  to  have  been  almost  effaced,  it 
becomes  of  more  importance  to  show  that  absolute  monarchy 
was,  in  the  eyes  of  so  eminent  an  author  as  Hooker,  both 
pernicious  in  itself  and  contrary  to  the  fundamental  laws  of 
the  English  commonwealth.  Nor  would  such  sentiments,  we 
may  surely  presume,  have  been  avowed  by  a  man  of  singu- 
lar humility,  and  whom  we  might  charge  with  somewhat  of 
an  excessive  deference  to  authority,  unless  they  had  obtained 
more  currency,  both  among  divines  and  lawyers,  than  the 
complaisance  of  courtiers  in  these  two  professions  might  lead 
us  to  conclude ;  Hooker  being  not  prone  to  deal  in  para- 
doxes, nor  to  borrow  from  his  adversaries  that  sturdy  repub- 
licanism of  the  school  of  Geneva  which  had  been  their  scan- 
dal. I  cannot,  indeed,  but  suspect  that  his  whig  principles 
in  the  last  book  are  announced  with  a  temerity  that  would 
have  startled  his  superiors ;  and  that  its  authenticity,  how- 
ever called  in  question,  has  been  better  preserved  by  the  cir- 
cumstance of  a  posthumous  publication  than  if  he  had  lived 
to  give  it  to  the  world.  Whitgift  would  probably  have  in- 


ELIZ.  —  Puritans.      SPOLIATION  OF  REVENUES.  225 

duced  him  to  suppress  a  few  passages  incompatible  with  the 
servile  theories  already  in  vogue.  It  is  far  more  usual  that 
an  author's  genuine  sentiments  are  perverted  by  means  of 
his  friends  and  patrons  than  of  his  adversaries. 

The  prelates  of  the  English  church,  while  they  inflicted 
so  many  severities  on  others,  had  not  always  cause  to  exult 
in  their  own  condition.  From  the  time  when  Henry  taught 
his  courtiers  to  revel  in  the  spoil  of  monasteries  Sp0iiatioa 
there  had  been  a  perpetual  appetite  for  ecclesias-  of  church 
tical  possessions.  Endowed  by  a  prodigal  super-  re 
etition  with  pomp  and  wealth  beyond  all  reasonable  measure, 
and  far  beyond  what  the  new  system  of  religion  appeared  to 
prescribe,  the  church  of  England  still  excited  the  covetous- 
ness  of  the  powerful  and  the  scandal  of  the  austere.1  I 
have  mentioned  in  another  place  how  the  bishoprics  were 
impoverished  in  the  first  reformation  under  Edward  VI. 
The  catholic  bishops  who  followed  made  haste  to  plunder, 
from  a  consciousness  that  the  goods  of  their  church  were 
speedily  to  pass  into  the  hands  of  heretics.2  Hence  the 
alienation  of  their  estates  had  gone  so  far  that  in  the  begin 
ning  of  Elizabeth's  reign  statutes  were  made  disabling  eccle- 
siastical proprietors  from  granting  away  their  lands  except 
on  leases  for  three  lives,  or  twenty -one  years.8  But  an  un- 
fortunate reservation  was  introduced  in  favor  of  the  crown. 
The  queen,  therefore,  and  her  courtiers,,  who  obtained  grants 
from  her,  continued  to  prey  upon  their  succulent  victim. 
Few  of  her  council  imitated  the  noble  disinterestedness  of 
Walsingham,  who  spent  his  own  estate  in  her  service,  and 
left  not  sufficient  to  pay  his  debts.  The  documents  of  that 
age  contain  ample  proofs  of  their  rapacity.  Thus  Cecil  sur- 
rounded his  mansion-house  at  Burleigh  with  estates  once 
belonging  to  the  see  of  Peterborough.  Thus  Hatton  built 
his  house  in  Holborn,  on  the  bishop  of  Ely's  garden.  Cox, 
on  making  resistance  to  this  spoliation,  received  a  singular 

1  The  puritans  objected  to  the  title  of  544.     This  will  not  cover  our  modern 

lord  bishop.     Sampson   wrote  a  peevish  colonial  bishops,  on  some  of  whom  the 

letter  to   Grindal  on  this,  and  received  same  title  has,  without  any  good  reason, 

a  very  good    answer.     Strype's    I'arker,  been  conferred. 

Append.  178.    Parker,  in  a  letter  to  Cecil,  2  Stryp«'s  Annals,  i.  159. 

defends  it  on  the  best  ground  ;  that  the  3  1  Eliz.  c.  19;  13  Eliz.  c.  10;  Black 

Dishops  hold  their  lands  by  barony,  and  stone's  Commentaries,  vol.  ii.  c.  28.    The 

therefore  the  giving  them  the  title  of  lords  exception  in  favor  of  the  crown  was  re 

was*  no  irregularity,  and  nothing  more  pealed  in  the  first  year  of  Jarueg. 
than  a  consequence  of  the  tenure.  (Jollier, 
VOL.  i.  — c.                      15 


226  CHARACTER  OF  THE  BISHOPS.  CHAP.  IV 

epistle  from  the  queen.1  This  bishop,  in  consequence  of  such 
vexations,  was  desirous  of  retiring  from  the  see  before  his 
death.  After  that  event  Elizabeth  kept  it  vacant  eighteen 
years.  During  this  period  we  have  a  petition  to  her  from 
lord  keeper  Puckering  that  she  would  confer  it  on  Scambler, 
bishop  of  Norwich,  then  eighty-eight  years  old,  and  notorious 
for  simony,  in  order  that  he  might  give  him  a  lease  of  part 
of  the  lands.2  These  transactions  denote  the  mercenary  and 
rapacious  spirit  which  leavened  almost  all  Elizabeth's  cour- 
tiers. 

The  bishops  of  this  reign  do  not  appear,  with  some  distin- 
guished exceptions,  to  have  reflected  so  much  honor  on  the 
established  church  as  those  who  attach  a  superstitious  rever- 
ence to  the  age  of  the  Reformation  are  apt  to  conceive.  In 
the  plunder  that  went  forward  they  took  good  care  of  them- 
selves. Charges  against  them  of  simony,  corruption,  cove- 
tousness,  and  especially  destruction  of  their  church  estates 
fo  •  the  benefit  of  their  families,  are  very  common,  —  some- 
times no  doubt  unjust,  but  too  frequent  to  be  absolutely  with- 
out foundation.8  The  council  often  wrote  to  them,  as  well  as 
concerning  them,  with  a  sort  of  asperity  which  would  aston- 
ish one  of  their  successors.  And  the  queen  never  restrained 
herself  in  treating  them  on  any  provocation  with  a  good  deal 
of  rudeness,  of  which  I  have  just  mentioned  an  egregious 
example.4  In  her  speech  to  parliament  on  closing  the  ses- 

1  It  was    couched  in  the    following  of  Whitgift,   220;     of  Aylmer,   passim, 

terms  :—  Observe  the  preamble  of  13  Eliz.  c.  10. 

"  Proud  Prelate  I'  must  be  admitted,  on  the  other  hand, 

"  You  know  what  you  were  before  Jha!;  ^,e  gentry  when  popishly  or  puri- 

I  made  you  what  you  are :  if  you  do  not  *•"**£*  affected,   were  apt   to    behave 

immediately  comply  with  my  request  by  exceedingly  ill  towards  the  bishops.    At 

Q I  will  unfrock  you.  Lambeth  and  Fulham  they  were  pretty 

"  ELIZABETH  "  sa*e '  ^ut  at  a  distance  tnev  found  it  hard 
to  struggle  with  the  rudeness  and  iniqui- 

Poor  Cox  wrote  a   very    good   letter  ty  of    the    territorial     aristocracy;    as 

before  this,  printed  in  Strype's  Annals.  Sandys  twice  experienced, 

vol.  ii.  Append.  84.    The  names  of  Hat-  *  Birch's  Memoirs,  i.   48.      Elizabeth 

ton  Garden  and  Ely  Place  (Mantua  vae  seems  to  have  fancied  -herself  entitled  by 

miserse    minium   vicina  Cremonse)   still  her  supremacy   to  dispose  of  bishops  as 

bear    witness  to  the    encroaching  lord  she  pleased,  though  they  did  not  hold 

keeper  and  the  elbowed  bishop.  commissions  durante  bene  placito,  as  in 

Strype,  iv.  246.     See  also  p.  15  of  her  brother's  time.     Thus  she  suspended 

the  same  volume.    By  an  act  in  the  first  Fletcher,  bishop  of  London,  of  her  own. 

year  of   James,    c.  3,   conveyances    of  authority,  only  for  marrying '-a  fine  lady 

bishops'  lands  to  the  crown  are  made  and  a  widow."    Strype's  Whitgift.  458. 

roid  —  a  concession  much  to  the  king's  And  Aylmer  having  preached   too  vehe- 

honor.  mently  against  female   vanity  in  dress, 

1  Harrington's  State  of  the  Church,  which  came  home  to  the  queen's  con- 
in  Nugae  Antiques,  vol.  ii.  passim;  Wil-  science,  she  told  her  Indies  that,  if  the 
kins's  Concilia,  iv.  256 ;  Strype's  Annals,  bishop  held  more  discourse  on  such  mat- 
ui.  620,  et  alibi;  Life  of  Parker,  454;  ters,  she  would  fit  him  for  heavea ;  but 


ELIZ.  — Puritans.     INCREASE  OF  PURITANISM.  227 

sion  of  1584,  when  many  complaints  against  the  rulers  of  the 
church  had  rung  in  her  ears,  she  told  the  bishops  that,  if 
they  did  not  amend  what  was  wrong,  she  meant  to  depose 
them.1  For  there  seems  to  have  been  no  question  in  that 
age  but  that  this  might  be  done  by  virtue  of  the  crown's  su- 
premacy. 

The  church  of  England  was  not  left  by  Elizabeth  in  cir- 
cumstances that  demanded  applause  for  the  policy  of  her 
rulers.  After  forty  years  of  constantly  aggravated  molesta- 
tion of  the  nonconforming  clergy,  their  numbers  were  become 
greater,  their  popularity  more  deeply  rooted,  their  enmity  to 
the  established  order  more  irreconcilable.  It  was  doubtless 
a  problem  of  no  slight  difficulty  by  what  means  so  obstinate 
and  opinionated  a  class  of  sectaries  could  have  been  managed ; 
nor  are  we,  perhaps,  at  this  distance  of  time  altogether  com- 
petent to  decide  upon  the  fittest  course  of  policy  in  that  re- 
spect2 But  it  is  manifest  that  the  obstinacy  of  bold  and 
sincere  men  is  not  to  be  quelled  by  any  punishments  that  do 
not  exterminate  them,  and  that  they  were  not  likely  to  en- 
tertain a  less  conceit  of  their  own  reason  when  they  found 
no  arguments  so  much  relied  on  to  refute  it  as  that  of  force. 
Statesmen  invariably  take  a  better  view  of  such  questions 
than  churchmen  ;  and  we  may  well  believe  that  Cecil  and 
Walsingham  judged  more  sagaciously  than  Whitgift  and 
Aylmer.  The  best  apology  that  can  be  made  fop  Elizabeth's 
tenaciousness  of  those  ceremonies  which  produced  this  fatal 
contention  I  have  already  suggested,  without  much  express 
authority  from  the  records  of  that  age ;  namely,  the  justice 
and  expediency  of  winning  over  the  catholics  to  conformity, 
by  retaining  as  much  as  possible  of  their  accustomed  rites. 
But  in  the  latter  period  of  the  queen's  reign  this  policy  had 
lost  a  great  deal  of  its  application,  or  rather  the  same  prin- 
ciple of  policy  would  have  dictated  numerous  concessions  in 
order  to  satisfy  the  people.  It  appears  by  no  means  unlikely 

he  should  walk  thither  without  a  staff,  9  Collier  says,  p.  586,  on  Heylin's 
and  leave  his  mantle  behind  him.  Har-  authority,  that  Walsingham  offered  the 
rington's  State  of  the  Church,  in  Nugte  puritans,  about  1583,  in  the  queen's 
Antiques,  i.  170;  see  too  p.  217.  It  will  name,  to  give  up  the  ceremony  of  kneel- 
of  course  not  appear  surprising  that  Hut-  ing  at  the  communion,  the  cross  in  bap- 
ton,  archbishop  of  York,  an  exceedingly  tism,  and  the  surplice;  but  that  they 
honest  prelate,  haying  preached  a  bold  answered,  "  ne  ungulam  quidem  esse 
sermon  before  the  queen,  urging  her  relinquendam."  But  I  am  not  aware 
to  settle  the  succession,  and  pointing  of  any  better  testimony  to  the  fact :  and 
strongly  towards  Scotland,  received*  a  it  is  by  no  means  agreeable  to  the  queen'* 
sharp  message,  p.  250.  <  general  conduct. 
1  D'Ewes,  328. 


228  GENERAL  REMARKS.  CHAP.  IV. 

that,  by  reforming  the  abuses  and  corruption  of  the  spiritual 
courts,  by  abandoning  a  part  of  their  jurisdiction,  so  hetero- 
geneous and  so  unduly  obtained,  by  abrogating  obnoxious 
and  at  best  frivolous  ceremonies,  by  restraining  pluralities  of 
benefices,  by  ceasing  to  discountenance  the  most  diligent 
ministers,  and  by  more  temper  and  disinterestedness  in  their 
own  behavior,  the  bishops  would  have  palliated,  to  an 
indefinite  degree,  that  dissatisfaction  with  the  established 
scheme  of  polity,  which  its  want  of  resemblance  to  that  of 
other  protestant  churches  must  more  or  less  have  produced. 
Such  a  reformation  would  at  least  have  contented  those  rea- 
sonable and  moderate  persons  who  occupy  sometimes  a  more 
extensive  ground  between  contending  factions  than  the  zeal- 
ots of  either  are  willing  to  believe  or  acknowledge. 

I  am  very  sensible  that  such  freedom  as  I  have  used  in 
General  this  chapter  cannot  be  pleasing  to  such  as  have 
remarks.  sworn  allegiance  to  either  the  Anglican  or  the 
puritan  party;  and  that  even  candid  and  liberal  minds  may 
be  inclined  to  suspect  that  I  have  not  sufficiently  admitted 
the  excesses  of  one  side  to  furnish  an  excuse  for  those  of  the 
other.  Such  readers  I  would  gladly  refer  to  lord  Bacon's 
Advertisement  touching  the  Controversies  of  the  Church  of 
England ;  a  treatise  written  under  Elizabeth,  in  that  tone 
of  dispassionate  philosophy  which  the  precepts  of  Burleigh 
sown  in  his  own  deep  and  fertile  mind  had  taught  him  to  ap- 
ply. This  treatise,  to  which  I  did  not  turn  my  attention  in 
writing  the  present  chapter,  appears  to  coincide  in  every  re- 
spect with  the  views  it  displays.  If  he  censures  the  pride 
and  obstinacy  of  the  puritan  teachers,  their  indecent  and  li- 
bellous style  of  writing,  their  affected  imitation  of  foreign 
churches,  their  extravagance  of  receding  from  everything 
formerly  practised,  he  animadverts  with  no  less  plainness  on 
the  faults  of  the  episcopal  party,  on  the  bad  example  of  some 
prelates,  on  their  peevish  opposition  to  every  improvement, 
their  unjust  accusations,  their  contempt  of  foreign  churches, 
their  persecuting  spirit.1 

1  Bacon,  il.  375.      See  also    another  Bacon  was  never  charged  with  affection 

paper  concerning  the  pacification  of  the  for   the  puritans.     In   truth.   Elizabeth 

church,  written    under  James,   p.   387  and    James  were  personally   the  great 

"The  wrongs,"  he  says,  "of  those  which  support  of  the  high-church  interest ;  it 

are  possessed  of  the  government  of  the  had  few  real  friends  among  their  :oun- 

church  towards  the  other,  may  hardly  be  cillors. 
dissembled  or  excused."    p.  382.    Yet 


.  —  Puritans.    DEFENCE  OF  THE  GOVERNMENT. 


229 


Yet,  that  we  may  not  deprive  this  great  queen's  admin  is 
tration,  in  what  concerned  her  dealings  with  the  Letter  of 
two  religious   parties   opposed   to  the  established  ^fl"8" 
church,  of  what  vindication  may  best  be  offered  defence  of 
for  it,  I  will  refer  the  reader  to  a  letter  of  sir  govenf-en'' 
Francis    Walsingham,   written    to   a    person    in ment- 
France,  after  the  year  1580.1     It  is  a  very  able  apology  for 
her  government ;  and  if  the  reader  should  detect,  as  he  doubt- 
less may,  somewhat  of  sophistry  in  reasoning,  and  of  mis 
statement  in  matter  of  fact,  he  will  ascribe  both  one  and  the 
other  to  the  narrow  spirit  of  the  age  with  respect  to  civil  and 
religious  freedom,  or  to  the  circumstances  of  the  writer,  an 
advocate  whose  sovereign  was  his  client. 


i  Burnet,  ii.  418 ;  Cabala,  part  ii.  38 
(4to  edition).  Walsiugham  grounds  the 
queen's  proceedings  upon  two  principles  : 
the  one,  that  "  consciences  are  not  to  be 
forced,  but  to  be  won  and  reduced  by 
force  of  truth,  with  the  aid  of  time,  and 
use  of  all  good  means  of  instruction  and 
persuasion  ;"  the  other,  that  "  cases  of 
conscience,  when  they  exceed  their 
bounds,  and  grow  to  be  matter  of  faction, 
lose  their  nature ;  and  that  sovereign 
princes  ought  distinctly  to  punish  their 
practices  and  contempt,  though  colored 
with  the  pretence  of  conscience  and  re- 
ligion." Bacon  has  repeated  the  same 
words,  as  well  as  some  more  of  Walsing- 
ham's  letter,  in  his  observations  on  the 
libel  on  Lord  Burleigh,  i.  522.  And  Mr. 
Southey  (Book  of  the  Church,  ii.  291) 
seems  to  adopt  them  as  his  own. 

Upon  this  it  may  be  observed  —  first, 
that  they  take  for  granted  the  funda- 
mental sophism  of  religious  intolerance, 
namely,  that  the  civil  magistrate,  or  the 
church  he  supports,  is  not  only  in  the 
right,  but  so  clearly  in  the  right,  that  no 
honest  man,  if  he  takes  time  and  pains  to 
consider  the  subject,  can  help  acknowl- 
tdiring  it ;  secondly,  that,  according  to 
the  principles  of  Christianity  as  admitted 
on  each  side,  it  does  not  rest  in  an  eso- 
teric persuasion,  but  requires  an  exterior 
profession,  evinced  both  by  social  wor- 


ship and  by  certain  positive  rites ;  and 
that  the  marks  of  this  profession,  accord- 
ing to  the  form  best  adapted  to  their  re- 
spective ways  of  thinking,  were  as  incum- 
bent upon  the  catholic  and  puritan  as 
they  had  been  upon  the  primitive 
church  ;  nor  were  they  more  chargeable 
with  faction,  or  with  exceeding  the 
bounds  of  conscience,  when  they  per- 
sisted in  the  use  of  them,  notwithstand- 
ing any  prohibitory  statute,  than  the 
early  Christians. 

The  generality  of  statesmen,  and 
churchmen  themselves  not  unfrequent- 
ly,  have  argued  upon  the  principles  of 
what,  in  the  seventeenth  century,  was 
called  Hobbism,  towards  which  the  Eras- 
tian  system,  which  is  that  of  the  church 
of  England,  though  excellent  in  some 
points  of  view,  had  a  tendency  to  gravi- 
tate, namely,  that  civil  and  religious  al- 
legiance are  so  necessarily  connected, 
that  it  is  the  subject's  duty  to  follow  the 
dictates  of  the  magistrate  in  both  alike. 
And  this  received  some  countenance 
from  the  false  and  mischievous  position 
of  Hooker,  that  the  church  and  com- 
monwealth are  but  different  denomina- 
tions of  the  same  society.  Warburton 
has  sufficiently  exposed  the  sophistry  of 
this  theory,  though  I  do  not  think  him 
equally  successful  in  what  he  substitutes 
for  it. 


230  GENERAL  REMARKS.  CHAP.  V 


CHAPTER  V.  % 

ON   THE   CIVIL    GOVERNMENT   OF   ELIZABETH. 

General  Remarks  —  Defective  Security  of  the  Subject's  Liberty  —  Trials  for  Treason 
and  other  Political  Offences  unjustly  conducted  —  Illegal  Commitments  —  Re- 
monstrance of  Judges  against -them  —  Proclamations  unwarranted  by  Law  — 
Restrictions  on  Printing —  Martial  Law  —  Loans  of  Money  not  quite  voluntary  — 
Character  of  Lord  Burleigh's  Administration  —  Disposition  of  the  House  of 
Commons — Addresses  concerning  the  Succession  —  Difference  on  this  between 
the  Queen  and  Commons  in  1566  —  Session  of  1571  —  Influence  of  the  Puritans 
in  Parliament  —  Speech  of  Mr.  Wentworth  in  1576  —  The  Commons  continue  to 
seek  Redress  of  Ecclesiastical  Grievances  —  Also  of  Monopolies,  especially  in  the 
Session  of  1601  —  Influence  of  the  Crown  in  Parliament  —  Debate  on  Election  of 
non-resident  Burgesses  —  Assertion  of  Privileges  by  Commons  —  Case  of  Ferrers, 
under  Henry  VIII.  —  Other  Cases  of  Privilege  —  Privilege  of  determining  con- 
tested Elections  claimed  by  the  House —  The  English  Constitution  not  admitted 
to  be  an  absolute  Monarchy  —  Pretensions  of  the  Crown. 

THE  subject  of  the  two  last  chapters,  I  mean  the  poli- 
Generai  cy  adopted  by  Elizabeth  for  restricting  the  two 
remarks.  religious  parties  which  from  opposite  quarters 
resisted  the  exercise  of  her  ecclesiastical  prerogatives,  has 
already  afforded  us  many  illustrations  of  what  may  more 
strictly  be  reckoned  the  constitutional  history  of  her  reign. 
The  tone  and  temper  of  her  administration  have  been  dis- 
played in  a  vigilant  execution  of  severe  statutes,  especially 
towards  the  catholics,  and  sometimes  in  stretches  of  power 
beyond  the  law.  And  as  Elizabeth  had  no  domestic  enemies 
or  refractory  subjects  who  did  not  range  under  one  or  other 
of  these  two  sects,  and  little  disagreement  with  her  people 
on  any  other  grounds,  the  ecclesiastical  history  of  this  period 
is  the  best  preparation  for  our  inquiry  into  the  civil  govern- 
ment. In  the  present  chapter  I  shall  first  offer  a  short  view 
of  the  practical  exercise  of  government  in  this  reign,  and 
then  proceed  to  show  how  the  queen's  high  assumptions  of 
prerogative  were  encountered  by  a  resistance  in  parlia- 
ment, not  quite  uniform,  but  insensibly  becoming  more 
vigorous. 

Elizabeth  ascended  the  throne  with  all  the  advantages  of 
a  veiy  extended  authority.  Though  the  jurisdiction  actually 


Enz.  —  Government.     GENERAL  REMARKS.  231 

exerted  by  the  court  of  star-chamber  could  not  be  vindicated 
according  to  statute  law,  it  had  been  so  well  established  as  to 
pass  without  many  audible  murmurs.  Her  progenitors  had  in- 
timidated the  nobility ;  and  if  she  had  something  to  fear  at  one 
season  from  this  order,  the  fate  of  the  duke  of  Norfolk  and 
of  the  rebellious  earls  in  the  north  put  an  end  forever  to 
all  apprehension  from  the  feudal  influence  of  the  aristocracy- 
There  seems  no  reason  to  believe  that  she  attempted  a  more 
absolute  power  than  her  predecessors ;  the  wisdom  of  her 
councillors,  on  the  contrary,  led  them  generally  to  shun  the 
more  violent  measures  of  the  late  reigns ;  but  she  certainly 
acted  upon  many  of  the  precedents  they  had  bequeathed  her, 
with  little  consideration  of  their  legality.  Her  own  remark- 
able talents,  her  masculine  intrepidity,  her  readiness  of  wit 
and  royal  deportment,  which  the  bravest  men  unaffect- 
edly dreaded,  her  temper  of  mind,  above  all,  at  once  fiery 
and  inscrutably  dissembling,  would  in  any  circumstances  have 
insured  her  more  real  sovereignty  than  weak  monarchs, 
however  nominally  absolute,  can  ever  enjoy  or  retain. 
To  these  personal  qualities  was  added  the  coperation  of 
some  of  the  most  diligent  and  circumspect,  as  well  as  the 
most  sagacious  councillors  that  any  prince  has  employed ; 
men  as  unlikely  to  loose  from  their  grasp  the  least  portion 
of  that  authority  which  they  found  themselves  to  possess,  aa 
to  excite  popular  odium  by  an  unusual  or  misplaced  exertion 
of  it  The  most  eminent  instances,  as  I  have  remarked,  of 
a  high-strained  prerogative  in  her  reign  have  some  relation 
to  ecclesiastical  concerns  ;  and  herein  the  temper  of  the  pre- 
dominant religion  was  such  as  to  account  no  measures  harsh 
or  arbitrary  that  were  adopted  towards  its  conquered  but 
still  formidable  enemy.  Yet  when  the  royal  supremacy  was 
to  be  maintained  against  a  different  foe  by  less  violent  acts 
of  power,  it  revived  the  smouldering  embers  of  English 
libsrty.  The  stern  and  exasperated  puritans  became  the 
depositaries  of  that  sacred  fire  ;  and  this  manifests  a  second 
connection  between  the  temporal  and  ecclesiastical  history  of 
the  present  reign. 

Civil  liberty  in  this  kingdom  has  two  direct  guarantees ; 
the  open  administration  of  justice  according  to  known  laws 
truly  interpreted,  and  fair  constructions  of  evidence ;  and 
the  right  of  parliament,  without  let  or  interruption,  to  inquire 
into  and  obtain  the  redress  of  public  grievances.  Of 


232  STATE  TRIALS  CHAP.  V 

these  the  first  is  by  far  the  most  indispensable  ;  nor  can  the 
subjects  of  any  state  be  reckoned  to  enjoy  a  real  freedom 
where  this  condition  is  not  found  both  in  its  judicial  institu- 
tions and  in  their  constant  exercise.  In  this,  much  more 
than  in  positive  law,  our  ancient  constitution,  both  under  the 
Plantagenet  and  Tudor  line,  had  ever  been  failing ;  and  it  is 
because  one  set  of  writers  have  looked  merely  to  the  letter 
of  our  statutes  or  other  authorities,  while  another  have  been 
almost  exclusively  struck  by  the  instances  of  arbitrary  gov- 
ernment they  found  on  record,  that  such  incompatible  systems 
have  been  laid  down  with  equal  positiveness  on  the  character 
of  that  constitution. 

I  have  found  it  impossible  not  to  anticipate,  in  more  places 
than  one,  some  of  those  glaring  transgressions  of 
treason  and  natural  as  well  as  positive  law  that  rendered  our 
cadences'  courts  of  justice  in  cases  of  treason  little  better 
uujustiy  than  the  caverns  of  murderers.  Whoever  was 
ted>  arraigned  at  their  bar  was  almost  certain  to 
meet  a  virulent  prosecutor,  a  judge  hardly  distinguishable 
from  the  prosecutor  except  by  his  ermine,  and  a  passive 
pusillanimous  jury.  Those  who  are  acquainted  only  with 
our  modern  decent  and  dignified  procedure  can  form  little 
conception  of  the  irregularity  of  ancient  trials ;  the  perpetual 
interrogation  of  the  prisoner,  which  gives  most  of  us  so  much 
offence  at  this  day  in  the  tribunals  of  a  neighboring  king- 
dom ;  and  the  want  of  all  evidence  except  written,  perhaps 
unattested,  examinations  or  confessions.  Habington,  one  of 
the  conspirators  against  Elizabeth's  life  in  1586,  complained 
that  two  witnesses  had  not  been  brought  against  him,  con- 
formably to  the  statute  of  Edward  VI.  But  Anderson  the 
chief  justice  told  him  that,  as  he  was  indicted  on  the  act  of 
Edward  III.,  that  provision  was  not  in  force.1  In  the  case 
of  captain  Lee,  a  partisan  of  Essex  and  Southampton,  the 
court  appear  to  have  denied  the  right  of  peremptory  chal- 
lenge.2 Nor  was  more  equal  measure  dealt  to  the  noblest 
prisoners  by  their  equals.  The  earl  of  Arundel  was  con- 
victed of  imagining  the  queen's  death,  on  evidence  which  at 
the  utmost  would  only  have  supported  an  indictment  for 
reconciliation  to  the  church  of  Rome.8 

The  integrity  of  judges  is  put  to  the  proof  as  much  by 

1  State  Triab,  i.  1148.  *  Id.  i.  1256.  8  id.,  i.  1403. 


Euz  —  Government.    UNJUSTLY  CONDUCTED.  233 

prosecutions  for  seditious  writings  as  by  charges  of  treason.  I 
have  before  mentioned  the  convictions  of  Udal  and  Penry  for  a 
felony  created  by  the  23d  of  Elizabeth ;  the  former  of  which 
especially  must  strike  every  reader  of  the  trial  as  one  of  the 
gross  judicial  iniquities  of  this  reign.  But,  before  this  sanguin- 
ary statute  was  enacted,  a  punishment  of  uncommon  severity 
had  been  inflicted  upon  one  Stubbe,  a  puritan  lawyer,  for  a 
pamphlet  against  the  queen's  intended  marriage  with  the 
duke  of  Anjou.  It  will  be  in  the  recollection  of  most  of  my 
readers  that,  in  the  year  1579,  Elizabeth  exposed  herself  to 
much  censure  and  ridicule,  and  inspired  the  justest  alarm  in 
her  most  faithful  subjects,  by  entertaining,  at  the  age  of 
forty-six,  the  proposals  of  this  young  scion  of  the  house  of. 
Valois.  Her  council,  though  several  of  them  in  their  delib- 
erations had  much  inclined  against  the  preposterous  al- 
liance, yet  in  the  end,  displaying  the  compliance  usual 
with  the  servants  of  self-willed  princes,  agreed,  "  conceiv- 
ing," as  they  say,  "  her  earnest  disposition  for  this  her 
marriage,"  to  further  it  with  all  their  power.  Sir  Philip 
Sidney,  with  more  real  loyalty,  wrote  her  a  spirited  remon- 
strance, which  she  had  the  magnanimity  never  to  resent.1 
But  she  poured  her  indignation  on  Stubbe,  who,  not  entitled 
to  use  a  private  address,  had  ventured  to  arouse  a  popular 
cry  in  his  '  Gaping  Gulph,  in  which  England  will  be  swal- 
lowed up  by  the  French  Marriage.'  This  pamphlet  is  very 
far  from  being,  what  some  have  ignorantly  or  unjustly  called 
it,  a  virulent  libel,  but  is  written  in  a  sensible  manner,  and 

1  Murden,  337.    Dr.  Lingard  has  fully  sively ;  a  method  which  would  seem  too 

established,  what  indeed  no  one  could  formal  in  our  age,  but  tending  to  give 

reasonably   have    disputed,    Elizabeth's  himself  and  others  a  clearer  view  of  the 

passion  for  Anjou  ;  and  says  very  truly,  case.     He  has  done   this   twice  in   the 

"  the  writers  who  set  all  this  down  to  present    instance  —  Murden,    322,    331 ; 

policy  cannot  have  consulted  the  original  and  it  is  evident  that  he  does   not,  and 

documents."    p.  149.    It  was  altogether  cannot,  answer  his  own  objections  to  the 

repugnant  to  sound  policy.     Persons,  the  match.      When   the  council   waited  on 

Jesuit,  indeed  says  in  his  famous  libel,  her  with  this  resolution  in  favor  of  tne 

Leicester's  Commonwealth,  written   not  marriage,   she    spoke    sharply   to    those 

long  after  this  tune,  that  it  would  have  whom    she   believed  to    be   against    it. 

been  "  honorable,  convenient,  profitable,  Yet  the  treaty  went  on  for  two  years : 

and  needful  ;  "  which  every  honest  Eng-  her  coquetry  in  this  strange  delay  breed- 

lishman  would  interpret  by  the  rule  of  ing    her,    as    Walsingham    wrote    from 

contraries.     Sussex  wrote  indeed  to  the  Paris,   •'  greater  dishonor   than   I   dar« 

queen  in  favor  of  the  marriage  (Lodge,  commit  to  paper."    Strype's  Annals,  iii. 

ii.   177);    and    Cecil    undoubtedly    pro-  2.      That    she    ultimately   broke  it  oif 

fessed  to  favor  it;  but  this  must  have  must  be  ascribed  to  the  suspiciousness 

been  out  of  obsequiousness  to  the  queen,  and  irresolution  of  her  character,  which, 

It  was  a  habit  of  this   minister  to  set  acting  for  ouce  conjointly  with  her  good 

down  briefly   the   arguments    on    both  understanding,   overcame   a  disgraceful 

aides    of     a     question,    sometimes    in  inclination, 
parallel     columns,    sometimes     succes- 


234  INJUSTICE  OF  STATE  TRIALS.  CHAP.  V. 

with  unfeigned  loyalty  and  affection  towards  the  queen. 
But,  besides  the  main  offence  of  addressing  the  people  on 
state  affairs,  he  had,  in  the  simplicity  of  his  heart,  thrown 
out  many  allusions  proper  to  hurt  her  pride,  such  as  dwelling 
too  long  on  the  influence  her  husband  would  acquire  over 
her,  and  imploring  that  she  would  ask  her  physicians  whether 
to  bear  children  at  her  years  would  not  be  highly  dangerous 
to  her  life.  Stubbe,  for  writing  this  pamphlet,  received  sen- 
tence to  have  his  right  hand  cut  off.  When  the  penalty  was 
inflicted,  taking  off  his  hat  with  his  left,  he  exclaimed,  "  Long 
live  queen  Elizabeth  !  "  Burleigh,  who  knew  that  his  fidel- 
ity had  borne  so  rude  a  test,  employed  him  afterwards  in 
answering  some  of  the  popish  libellers.1 

There  is  no  room  for  wonder  at  any  verdict  that  could  be 
returned  by  a  jury,  when  we  consider  what  means  the  gov- 
ernment possessed  of  securing  it.  The  sheriff  returned  a 
panel,  either  according  to  express  directions,  of  which  we 
have  proofs,  or  to  what  he  judged  himself  of  the  crown's 
intention  and  interest.2  If  a  verdict  had  gone  against  the 
prosecution  in  a  matter  of  moment,  the  jurors  must  have 
laid  their  account  with  appearing  before  the  star-chamber ; 
lucky  if  they  should  escape,  on  humble  retractation,  with  sharp 
words,  instead  of  enormons  fines  and  indefinite  imprisonment. 
The  control  of  this  arbitrary  tribunal  bound  down  and  ren- 
dered impotent  all  the  minor  jurisdictions.  That  primaeval 
institution,  those  inquests  by  twelve  true  men,  the  unadul- 
terated voice  of  the  people,  responsible  alone  to  God  and 
their  conscience,  which  should  have  been  heard  in  the  sanc- 
tuaries of  justice,  as  fountains  springing  fresh  from  the  lap 
of  earth,  became,  like  waters  constrained  in  their  course  by 
art,  stagnant  and  impure.  Until  this  weight  that  hung  upon 
the  constitution  should  be  taken  off,  there  was  literally  no 
prospect  of  enjoying  with  security  those  civil  privileges 
which  it  held  forth.8 

»  Strype,  iii.  480.    Stubbe  always  signed  A  letter,  inter  alia,  in  this  (folio  1),  from 

himself  Scseva  in  these  left-handed  pro-  Lord  Hunsdon  and  Walsingham  to  the 

sheriff  of   Sussex,   directs    him    not  to 

"  Lodge,  ii.  412;  iii.  49.  assist  the  creditors  of  John  Ashburnham 

UTOQ   Teral    volumes   of    the    Harleian  in  molesting  him  '•  till  such  time  as  our 

ulustrate  the  course  of  government  determination     touching    the     premises 

under  Elizabeth.     The  copious  analysis  shall  be  known,"  Ashburnham  being  to 

i  the  catalogue,  by  Humphrey  Wanley  attend  the  council  to  prefer   his  com- 


ELIZ.  — Government.    ILLEGAL  COMMITMENTS.  235 

It  cannot  be  too  frequently  repeated  that  no  power  of  arbi- 
trary detention  has  ever  been  known  to  our  constitution  since 
the  charter  obtained  at  Runnymede.  The  writ  of  I1]e  l 
habeas  corpus  has  always  been  a  matter  of  right.  commit- 
But,  as  may  naturally  be  imagined,  no  right  of  the  meuts- 
subject,  in  his  relation  to  the  crown,  was  preserved  with 
gisater  difficulty.  Not  only  the  privy  council  in  general 
arrogated  to  itself  a  power  of  discretionary  imprisonment, 
into  which  no  inferior  court  was  to  inquire,  but  commitments 
by  a  single  councillor  appear  to  have  been  frequent.  These 
abuses  gave  rise  to  a  remarkable  complaint  of  the  judges, 
which,  though  an  authentic  recognition  of  the  privilege  of 
personal  freedom  against  such  irregular  and  oppressive  acts 
of  individual  ministers,  must  be  admitted  to  leave  by  far  too 
great  latitude  to  the  executive  government,  and  to  surrender, 
at  least  by  implication  from  rather  obscure  language,  a  great 
part  of  the  liberties  which  many  statutes  had  confirmed.1 
This  is  contained  in  a  passage  from  Chief  Justice  Anderson's 
Reports.  But  as  there  is  an  original  manuscript  in  the  Brit- 
ish Museum,  differing  in  some  material  points  from  the  print, 
I  shall  follow  it  in  preference.2 

"  To  the  Rt:   hon:   our  very  good  lords  Sir  Chr.  Hatton, 
of  the  honourable  order  of  the  garter  knight,  and  Remon. 
chancellor  of  England,  and  Sir  W.  Cecill  of  the  ^™ela 
hon:  order  of  the  garter  knight,  Lord  Burleigh,  against68 
lord  high  treasurer  of  England, —  We  her  majes-  them- 
ty's  justices,  of  both  benches,  and  barons  of  the  exchequer, 
do  desire  your  lordships  that  by  your  good  means  such  order 
may  be  taken  that  her  highness's  subjects  may  not  be  commit- 
ted or  detained  in  prison,  by  commandment  of  any  nobleman 
or  councillor,  against  the  laws  of  the  realm,  to  the  grievous 
charges  and  oppression  of  her  majesty's  said  subjects :    Or 
else  help  us  to  have  access  to  her  majesty,  to  be  suitors  unto 
her  highness  for  the  same  ;  for  divers  have  been  imprisoned 
for  suing  ordinary  actions,  and  suits  at  the  common  law,  until 
they  will  leave  the  same,  or  against  their  wills  put  their  matter 
to  order,  although  some  time  it  be  after  judgment  and  accu- 
sation. 

1  Anderson's  Reports,  1.  297.    It  may  Harleian  MS.  6846  is  a  mere  transcript 
be  found  also  in  the  Biographia  Britan-  from   Anderson's    Reports,   and    conse- 
nica,  and  the  Biographical  Dictionary,  quently  of  no  value.    There  is  another 
art.  ANDERSON.  in  the  same  collection,  at  which  I  have 

2  Lausdowue    MSS.    Iviii.    87.      The  not  looked.    . 


236  REMONSTRANCES  OF  JUDGES.  CHAP.  V. 

"  Item :  Others  have  been  committed  and  detained  in 
prison  upon  such  commandment  against  the  law ;  and  upon 
the  queen's  writ  in  that  behalf,  no  cause  sufficient  hath  been 
certified  or  returned. 

"Item:  Some  of  the  parties  so  committed  and  detained 
in  prison  after  they  have,  by  the  queen's  writ,  been  lawfully 
discharged  in  court,  have  been  eftsoones  recommitted  to 
prison  in  secret  places,  and  not  in  common  and  ordinary 
known  prisons,  as  the  Marshalsea,  Fleet,  King's  Bench, 
Gatehouse,  nor  the  custodie  of  any  sheriff,  so  as,  upon  com- 
plaint made  for  their  delivery,  the  queen's  court  cannot  learn 
to  whom  to  award  her  majesty's  writ,  without  which  justice 
cannot  be  done. 

"  Item :  Divers  Serjeants  of  London  and  officers  have 
been  many  times  committed  to  prison  for  lawful  execution 
of  her  majesty's  writs  out  of  the  King's  Bench,  Common 
Pleas,  and  other  courts,  to  their  great  charges  and  oppres- 
sion, whereby  they  are  put  in  such  fear  as  they  dare  not 
execute  the  queen's  process. 

"  Item :  Divers  have  been  sent  for  by  pursuivants  for 
private  causes,  some  of  them  dwelling  far  distant  from  Lon- 
don, and  compelled  to  pay  to  the  pursuivants  great  sums 
of  money  against  the  law,  and  have  been  committed  to  pris- 
on till  they  would  release  the  lawful  benefit  of  their  suits, 
judgments,  or  executions  for  remedie,  in  which  behalf  we 
are  almost  daily'called  upon  to  minister  justice  according  to 
law,  whereunto  we  are  bound  by  our  office  and  oath. 

"  And  whereas  it  pleased  your  lordships  to  will  divers 
of  us  to  set  down  when  a  prisoner  sent  to  custody  by  her 
majesty,  her  council,  or  some  one  or  two  of  them,  is  to  be 
detained  in  prison,  and  not  to  be  delivered  by  her  majesty's 
courts  or  judges : 

"  We  think  that,  if  any  person  shall  be  c«mmitted  by  her 
majesty's  special  commandment,  or  by  order  from  the  coun- 
cil-board, or  for  treason  touching  her  majesty's  person  [a 
word  of  five  letters  follows,  illegible  to  me],Vhich  causes 
being  generally  returned  into  any  court,  is  good  cause  for 
the  same  court  to  leave  the  person  committed  in  custody. 

"  But  if  any  person  shall  be  committed  for  any  other  cause, 
then  the  same  ought  specially  to  be  returned." 

This  paper  bears  the  original  signatures  of  eleven  judges. 
It  has  no  date,  but  is  indorsed  5  June,  1591.  In  the 


ELIZ.  — Government.    PROCLAMATIONS  UNWARRANTED.       237 

printed  report  it  is  said  to  have  been  delivered  in  Eastef 
term  34  Eliz.,  that  is,  in  1592.  The  chancellor  Hatton, 
whose  name  is  mentioned,  died  in  November,  1591  ;  so  that, 
if  there  is  no  mistake,  this  must  have  been  delivered  a  sec- 
ond time,  after  undergoing  the  revision  of  the  judges.  And 
in  fact  the  differences  are  far  too  material  to  have  proceeded 
from  accidental  carelessness  in  transcription.  The  latter 
copy  is  fuller,  and  on  the  whole  more  perspicuous,  than  the 
manuscript  I  have  followed  ;  but  in  one  or  two  places  it  will 
be  better  understood  by  comparison  with  it. 

It  was  a  natural  consequence,  not  more  of  the  high  notions 
entertained  of  prerogative  than  of  the  very  irre-  Prociama- 
gular  and  infrequent  meeting  of  parliament,  that  warranted 
an  extensive  and  somewhat  indefinite  authority  by law- 
should  be  arrogated  to  proclamations  of  the  king  in  coun- 
ciL  Temporary  ordinances,  bordering  at  least  on  legis- 
lative authority,  grow  out  of  the  varying  exigencies,  of 
civil  society,  and  will  by  very  necessity  be  put  up  with  in 
silence,  wherever  the  constitution  of  the  commonwealth  does 
not  directly  or  in  effect  provide  for  frequent  assemblies  of 
the  body  in  whom  the  right  of  making  or  consenting  to  laws 
has  been  vested.  Since  the  English  constitution  has  reached 
its  zenith,  we  have  endeavored  to  provide  a  remedy  by  stat- 
ute for  every  possible  mischief  or  inconvenience  ;  and  if  this 
has  swollen  our  code  to  an  enormous  redundance,  till,  in  the 
labyrinth  of  written  law,  we  almost  feel  again  the  uncertain- 
ties of  arbitrary  power,  it  has  at  least  put  an  end  to  such 
exertions  of  prerogative  as  fell  at  once  on  the  persons  and 
properties  of  whole  classes.  It  seems,  by  the  proclamations 
issued  under  Elizabeth,  that  the  crown  claimed  a  sort  of  sup- 
plemental right  of  legislation,  to  perfect  and  carry  into  effect 
what  the  spirit  of  existing  laws  might  require,  as  well  as  a 
paramount  supremacy,  called  sometimes  the  king's  absolute 
or  sovereign  power,  which  sanctioned  commands  beyond  the 
legal  prerogative,  for  the  sake  of  public  safety,  whenever  the 
council  might  judge  that  to  be  in  hazard.  Thus  we  find 
anabaptists,  without  distinction  of  natives  or  aliens,  banished 
the  realm  ;  Irishmen  commanded  to  depart  into  Ireland  ;  the 
culture  of  woad,1  and  the  exportation  of  corn,  money,  and 

1  Hume  says  "that  the  queen  had  hibit  its  cultivation  throughout  the  king- 
taken  a  dis'like  to  the  smell  of  this  useful  dom.  The  real  motive  appears  in  several 
plant."  Hut  this  reason,  if  it  existed,  letters  of  the  Lansdowne  collection.  By 
would  hardly  have  induced  her  to  pro-  the  domestic  culture  of  woad  the  cos- 


238  RESTRICTIONS  ON  PRINTING.  CHAP.  V. 

various  commodities  prohibited ;  the  excess  of  apparel  re- 
strained. A  proclamation  in  1 580  forbids  the  erection  of 
houses  within  three  miles  of  London,  on  account  of  the  too 
great  increase  of  the  city,  under  the  penalty  of  imprisonment 
and  forfeiture  of  the  materials.1  This  is  repeated  at  other 
times,  and  lastly  (I  mean  during  her  reign)  in  1602,  with 
additional  restrictions.2  Some  proclamations  in  this  reign 
hold  out  menaces  which  the  common  law  could  never  have 
executed  on  the  disobedient.  To  trade  with  the  French 
king's  rebels,  or  to  export  victuals  into  the  Spanish  domin- 
ions (the  latter  of  which  might  possibly  be  construed  into 
assisting  the  queen's  enemies),  incurred  the  penalty  of  trea- 
son. And  persons  having  in  their  possession  goods  taken  on 
the  high  seas,  which  had  not  paid  customs,  are  enjoined 
to  give  them  up,  on  pain  of  being  punished  as  felons  and 
pirates.8  Notwithstanding  these  instances,  it  cannot  perhaps 
be  said  on  the  whole  that  Elizabeth  stretched  her  authority 
very  outrageously  in  this  respect.  Many  of  her  proclama- 
tions, which  may  at  first  sight  appear  illegal,  are  warrant- 
able by  statutes  then  in  force,  or  by  ancient  precedents. 
Thus  the  council  is  empowered  by  an  act,  28  H.  8,  c.  14,  to 
fix  the  prices  of  wines ;  and  abstinence  from  flesh  in  Lent, 
as  well  as  on  Fridays  and  Saturdays  (a  common  subject 
of  Elizabeth's  proclamations),  is  enjoined  by  several  stat- 
utes of  Edward  VI.  and  of  her  own.4  And  it  has  been 
argued  by  some  not  at  all  inclined  to  diminish  any  popular 
rights,  that  the  king  did  possess  a  prerogative  by  common 
law  of  restraining  the  export  of  corn  and  other  commod- 
ities.6 

It  is  natural  to  suppose  that  a  government  thus  arbitrary 
Restrictions  and  vigilant  must  have  looked  with  ^extreme  jeal- 
on  printing.  ousv  on  tne  dhTusion  of  free  inquiry  through  the 
press.  The  trades  of  printing  and  bookselling,  in  fact, 
though  not  absolutely  licensed,  were  always  subject  to  a  sort 
of  peculiar  superintendence.  Besides  protecting  the  copy- 

toms  on  its  importation  were  reduced ;  scattered  through  Rymer ;  and  the  whcl* 

and  this  led  to  a  project  of  levying  a  sort  have  been  collected  in  a  volume, 

of  excise  upon  it  at  home.    Catalogue  of  *  By  a  proclamation  in  1560,  butchers 

Lansdowne  MSS.  xlix.  32-60.    The  same  killing  flesh  in  Lent  are  made  subject  to 

principle  has  since  caused  the  prohibition  a  specific  penalty  of  20J. ;    which   was 

of  sowing  tobacco.  levied  upon  one  man.     Strypers  Annals, 

i  Camden,  476.  i.  235.    This  seems  to  have  been  illegal. 

*  Rymer.  xvi.  448.  6  Lord  Camden,   in  1766.      See  Har- 

*  Many    of   these    proclamations    are  grave's  preface  to  Hale  de  Jure  Coronw, 

in  Law  Tracts,  vol.  i. 


ELIZ.  — Government.     RESTRICTIONS   ON  PRINTING.  239 

right  of  authors,1  the  council  frequently  issued  proclamations 
to  restrain  the  importation  of  books,  or  to  regulate  their  sale.3 
It  was  penal  to  utter,  or  so  much  as  to  possess,  even  the  most 
learned  works  on  the  catholic  side ;  or  if  some  connivance 
was  usual  in  favor  of  educated  men,  the  utmost  strictness 
was  used  in  suppressing  that  light  infantry  of  literature,  the 
smart  and  vigorous  pamphlets  with  which  the  two  parties 
arrayed  against  the  church  assaulted  her  opposite  flanks.8 
Stow,  the  well-known  chronicler  of  England,  who  lay  under 
suspicion  of  an  attachment  to  popery,  had  his  library  searched 
by  warrant,  and  his  unlawful  books  taken  away  ;  several  of 
which  were  but  materials  for  his  history.4  Whitgift,  in  this, 
as  in  every  other  respect,  aggravated  the  rigor  of  preceding 
times.  At  his  instigation  the  star-chamber,  1585,  published 
ordinances  for  the  regulation  of  the  press.  The  preface  to 
these  recites  "  enormities  and  abuses  of  disorderly  persons 
professing  the  art  of  printing  and  selling  books"  to  have 
more  and  more  increased  in  spite  of  the  ordinances  made 
against  them,  which  it  attributes  to  the  inadequacy  of  the 
penalties  hitherto  inflicted.  Every  printer  therefore  is  en- 
joined to  certify  his  presses  to  the  Stationers'  Company,  on 
pain  of  having  them  defaced,  and  suffering  a  year's  imprison- 
ment. None  to  print  at  all,  under  similar  penalties,  except 
in  London,  and  one  in  each  of  the  two  universities.  No 
printer  who  has  only  set  up  his  trade  within  six  months  to 
exercise  it  any  longer,  nor  any  to  begin  it  in  future  until  the 
excessive  multitude  of  printers  be  diminished  and  brought 
to  such  a  number  as  the  archbishop  of  Canterbury  and 
bishop  of  London  for  the  time  being  shall  think  convenient ; 
but  whenever  any  addition  to  the  number  of  master  printers 
shall  be  required,  the  Stationers'  Company  shall  select  proper 
persons  to  use  that  calling  with  the  approbation  of  the  ec- 

1  We  find  an  exclusive  privilege  3  A  proclamation,  dated  Feb.  1589, 
granted  in  1563  to  Thomas  Cooper,  against  seditious  and  schismatical  books 
afterwards  bishop  of  Winchester,  to  and  writings,  commands  all  persons  who 
print  his  Thesaurus,  or  Latin  diction-  shall  have  in  their  custody  any  such 
ary,  for  twelve  years  —  Rymer,  xv.  620;  libels  against  the  order  and  government 
and  to  Richard  Wright  to  print  his  of  the  church  of  England,  or  the  rites 
translation  of  Tacitus  during  his  and  ceremonies  used  in  it,  to  bring  and 
natural  life,  any  one  infringing  this  deliver  up  the  same  with  convenient 
privilege  to  forfeit  40s.  for  every  printed  speed  to  their  ordinary.  Life  of  Whit- 
copy.  Id.  xvi.  97.  gift,  Appendix,  126.  This  has  probably 

4  Strype's   Parker    221.     By  the  51st  been  one  cause  of  the  extreme  scarcity 

of  the  queen's  injunctions,  in  1669,  no  of  the  puritanical  pamphlets, 

one    might    print    any    book   or    paper  *  Strype's  Grindal.  124,  and  Append, 

whatsoever    unless    the    same    be    first  43,  where  a  list  of  these  books  is  given 
licenced  by  the  council  or  ordinary. 


240  MARTIAL  LAW.  CHAP.  V. 

clesiastical  commissioners.  None  to  print  any  book,  matter, 
or  thing  whatsoever,  until  it  shall  have  been  first  seen,  pe- 
rused, and  allowed  by  the  archbishop  of  Canterbury  or 
bishop  of  London,  except  the  queen's  printer,  to  be  appointed 
for  some  special  service,  or  law-printers,  who  shall  require 
the  license  only  of  the  chief  justices.  Every  one  selling 
books  printed  contrary  to  the  intent  of  this  ordinance  to  suf- 
fer three  months'  imprisonment.  The  Stationers'  Company 
empowered  to  search  houses  and  shops  of  printers  and  book- 
sellers, and  to  seize  all  books  printed  in  contravention  of  this 
ordinance,  to  destroy  and  deface  the  presses,  and  to  arrest 
and  bring  before  the  council  those  who  shall  have  offended 
therein.1 

The  forms  of  English  law,  however  inadequate  to  defend 
the  subject  in  state  prosecutions,  imposed  a  degree  of  seem- 
ing restraint  on  the  crown,  and  wounded  that  pride  which  is 
commonly  a  yet  stronger  sentiment  than  the  lust  of  power 
with  princes  and  their  counsellors.  It  was  possible  that  ju- 
ries might  absolve  a  prisoner ;  it  was  always  necessary  that 
they  should  be  the  arbiters  of  his  fate.  Delays  too  were  in- 
terposed by  the  regular  process ;  not  such,  perhaps,  as  the 
life  of  man  should  require,  yet  enough  to  weaken  the  terrors 
of  summary  punishment.  Kings  love  to  display  the  divinity 
with  which  their  flatterers  invest  them  in  nothing  so  much 
as  the  instantaneous  execution  of  their  will,  and  to  stand  re- 
vealed, as  it  were,  in  the  storm  and  thunderbolt,  when  their 
power  breaks  through  the  operation  of  secondary  causes,  and 
awes  a  prostrate  nation  without  the  intervention  of  law. 
There  may  indeed  be  times  of  pressing  danger,  when  the 
conservation  of  all  demands  the  sacrifice  of  the  legal  rights 
of  a  few  ;  there  may  be  circumstances  that  not  only  justify, 
but  compel,  the  temporary  abandonment  of  constitutional 
forms.  It  has  been  usual  for  all  governments,  during  an 
actual  rebellion,  to  proclaim  martial  law,  or  the  suspension 
of  civil  jurisdiction.  And  this  anomaly,  I  must  admit,  is 

i  Strype's  Whitgift,  222,  and  Append,  inent    Hebrew    scholar.      This    learned 

94.     The  archbishop  exercised  his  power  divine     differed    from    Whitgift    about 

over  the  press,  as  may  be  supposed,  with  Christ's  descent  to  hell.     It  is  amusing 

little  moderation.     Not  confining  him-  to  read  that  ultimately  the  primate  came 

gulf  to  the  suppression  of  books  favoring  over  to  Broughton's  opinion  :  which,  if 

the  two  p:trtii;s  adverse  to  the  church,  he  it  proves  some  degree  of  candor,  is  also  a 

permitted  nothing  to  appear  that  inter-  glaring  evidence  of  the    advantages   of 

fered  in  the  least  with  his  own  notions,  that  free  inquiry  he  had  sought  to  sup- 

Tim*  we-  find  him  seizing  an  edition  of  press.     P.  384,  431. 
»ome  works  of  Uugh  Broughtou,  an  em- 


Euz.  —  Government.          MARTIAL  LAW.  241 

very  far  from  being  less  indispensable  at  such  unhappy  sea- 
sons, in  "countries  where  the  ordinary  mode  of  trial  is  by 
jury,  than  where  the  right  of  decision  resides  in  the  judge. 
But  it  is  of  high  importance  to  watch  with  extreme  jealousy 
the  disposition  towards  which  most  governments  are  prone, 
to  introduce  too  soon,  to  extend  too  far,  to  retain  too  long,  so 
perilous  a  remedy.  In  the  fourteenth  and  fifteenth  centuries 
the  court  of  the  constable  and  marshal,  whose  jurisdiction 
was  considered  as  of  a  military  nature,  and  whose  proceed- 
ings were  not  according  to  the  course  of  the  common  law, 
sometimes  tried  offenders  by  what  was  called  martial  law, 
but  only,  I  believe,  either  during,  or  not  long  after,  a  serious 
rebellion.  This  tribunal  fell  into  disuse  under  the  Tudors. 
But  Mary  had  executed  some  of  those  taken  in  Wyatt's  in- 
surrection without  regular  process,  though  their  leader  had 
his  trial  by  a  jury.  Elizabeth,  always  hasty  in  passion  and 
quick  to  punish,  would  have  resorted  to  this  summary  course 
on  a  slighter  occasion.  One  Peter  Burchell,  a  fanatical  pu- 
ritan, and  perhaps  insane,  conceiving  that  sir  Christopher 
Hat  ton  was  an  enemy  to  true  religion,  determined  to  assas- 
sinate him.  But  by  mistake  he  wounded  instead  a  famous 
seaman,  captain  Hawkins.  For  this  ordinary  crime  the 
queen  could  hardly  be  prevented  from  directing  him  to  be 
tried  instantly  by  martial  law.  Her  council,  however  (and 
this  it  is  important  to  observe),  resisted  this  illegal  proposi- 
tion with  spirit  and  success.1  We  have  indeed  a  proclama- 
tion some  years  afterwards,  declaring  that  such  as  brought 
into  the  kingdom  or  dispersed  papal  bulls,  or  traitorous  libels 
against  the  queen,  should  with  all  severity  be  proceeded 
against  by  her  majesty's  lieutenants  or  their  deputies  by 
martial  law,  and  suffer  such  pains  and  penalties  as  they 
should  inflict ;  and  that  none  of  her  said  lieutenants  or  their 
deputies  be  any  wise  impeached,  in  body,  lands,  or  goods,  at 
any  time  hereafter,  for  anything  to  be  done  or  executed  in 
the  punishment  of  any  such  offender,  according  to  the  said 


Burchell  capitally,  which  probably  Bug- 


242  MARTIAL  LAW.  CHAP.  V, 

martial  law,  and  the  tenor  of  this  proclamation,  any  law  or 
statute  to  the  contrary  in  any  wise  notwithstanding.1  Tin's 
measure,  though  by  no  means  constitutional,  finds  an  apology 
in  the  circumstances  of  the  time.  It  bears  date  the  1st  of 
July,  1588,  when  within  the  lapse  of  a  few  days  the  vast  ar- 
mament of  Spain  might  effect  a  landing  upon  our  coast*;  and 
prospectively  to  a  crisis  when  the  nation,  struggling  for  life 
ag-iinst  an  invader's  grasp,  could  not  afford  the  protection  of 
law  to  domestic  traitors.  But  it  is  an  unhappy  consequence 
of  all  deviations  from  the  even  course  of  law,  that  the  forced 
acts  of  overruling  necessity  come  to  be  distorted  into  prece- 
Martiai  dents  to  serve  the  purposes  of  arbitrary  power. 
Uw-  No  other  measure  of  Elizabeth's  reign  can  be  com- 

pared, in  point  of  violence  and  illegality,  to  a  commission  in 
July,  1595,  directed  to  sir  Thomas  Wilford,  whereby,  upon 
no  other  allegation  than  that  there  had  been  of  late  "  sundry 
great  unlawful  assemblies  of  a  number  of  base  people  in  riot- 
ous sort,  both  in  the  city  of  London  and  the  suburbs,  for  the 
suppression  whereof  (for  that  the  insolency  of  many  desper- 
ate offenders  is  such  that  they  care  not  for  any  ordinary  pun- 
ishment by  imprisonment)  it  was  found  necessary  to  have 
some  such  notable  rebellious  persons  to  be  speedily  sup- 
pressed by  execution  to  death,  according  to  the  justice  of  mar- 
tial law,"  he  is  appointed  provost-marshal,  with  authority,  on 
notice  by  the  magistrates,  to  attach  and  seize  such  notable 
rebellious  and  incorrigible  offenders,  and  in  the  presence  of 
the  magistrates  to  execute  them  openly  on  the  gallows.  The 
commission  empowers  him  also  "to  repair  to  all  common 
highways  near  to  the  city  which  any  vagrant  persons  do 
haunt,  and,  with  the  assistance  of  justices  and  constables,  to 
apprehend  all  such  vagrant  and  suspected  persons,  and  them 
to  deliver  to  the  said  justices,  by  them  to  be  committed  and 
examined  of  the  causes  of  their  wandering,  and,  finding  them 
notoriously  culpable  in  their  unlawful  manner  of  life,  as  in- 
corrigible, and  so  certified  by  the  said  justices,  to  cause  to  be 
executed  upon  the  gallows  or  gibbet  some  of  them  that  are 
so  found  most  notorious  and  incorrigible  offenders  ;  and  some 
such  also  of  them  as  have  manifestly  broken  the  peace  since 
they  have  been  adjudged  and  condemned  to  death  for  former 
offences,  and  had  the  queen's  pardon  for  the  same."  2 

i  Strype's  Annals,  iii.  670;  Life  of  Whitgift,  Append.  126 
»  Kymer,  xvi.  279. 


t 

ELIZ.  —  Government.         MARTIAL  LAW.  2-13 

This  peremptory  style  of  superseding  the  common  law 
was  a  stretch  of  prerogative  without  an  adequate  parallel, 
so  far  as  I  know,  in  any  former  period.  It  is  to  be  re- 
marked that  no  tumults  had  taken  place  of  any  political  char- 
acter or  of  serious  importance,  some  riotous  apprentices  only 
having  committed  a  few  disorders.1  But  rather  more  than 
usual  suspicion  had  been  excited  about  the  same  time  by  the 
intrigues  of  the  Jesuits  in  favor  of  Spain,  and  the  queen's 
advanced  age  had  begun  to  renew  men's  doubts  as  to  the 
succession.  The  rapid  increase  of  London  gave  evident  an- 
easiness,  as  the  proclamations  against  new  buildings  show,  to 
a  very  cautious  administration,  environed  by  bold  and  invet- 
erate enemies,  and  entirely  destitute  of  regular  troops  to 
withstand  a  sudden  insurrection.  Circumstances  of  which 
we  are  ignorant,  I.  do  not  question,  gave  rise  to  this  extraor- 
dinary commission.  The  executive  government  in  modern 
times  has  been  invested  with  a  degree  of  coercive  power  to 
maintain  obedience  of  which  our  ancestors,  in  the  most  ar- 
bitrary reigns,  had  no  practical  experience.  If  we  reflect 
upon  the  multitude  of  statutes  enacted  since  the  days  of 
Elizabeth  in  order  to  restrain  and  suppress  disorder,  and, 
above  all,  on  the  prompt  and  certain  aid  that  a  disciplined 
army  affords  to  our  civil  authorities,  we  may  be  inclined  to 
think  that  it  was  rather  the  weakness  than  the  vigor  of  her 
government  which  led  to  its  inquisitorial  watchfulness  and 
harsh  measures  of  prevention.  We  find  in  an  earlier  part 
of  her  reign  an  act  of  state  somewhat  of  the  same  character, 
though  not  perhaps  illegal.  Letters  were  written  to  the 
sheriffs  and  justices  of  divers  counties  in  1569,  directing 
them  to  apprehend,  on  a  certain  night,  all  vagabonds  and 
idle  persons  having  no  master  nor  means  of  living,  and 
either  to  commit  them  to  prison  or  pass  them  to  their  proper 
homes.  This  was  repeated  several  times  and  no  less  than 
13,000  persons  were  thus  apprehended,  chiefly  in  the  north, 
which,  as  Strype  says,  very  much  broke  the  rebellion  at- 
tempted in  that  year.2 

Amidst  so  many  infringements  of  the  freedom  of  com- 
merce, and  with  so  precarious  an  enjoyment  of  personal  lib- 
erty, the  English  subject  continued  to  pride  himself  in  hia 
immunity  from  taxation  without  consent  of  parliament.  This 

i  Carte,  6&3,  from  Stow.  *  Strype's  Annals,  i.  636. 


244  LOANS  OF  MONEY  CHAP.  V. 

privilege  he  had  asserted,  though  not  with  constant  success, 
against  the  rapacity  of  Henry  VII.  and  the  violence  of  hia 
son.  Nor  was  it  ever  disputed  in  theory  by  Elizabeth.  She 
retained,  indeed,  notwithstanding  the  complaints  of  the  mer- 
chants at  her  accession,  a  custom  upon  cloths,  arbitrarily  im- 
posed by  her  sister,  and  laid  one  herself  upon  sweet  wines. 
But  she  made  no  attempt  at  levying  internal  taxes,  except 
that  the  clergy  were  called  upon,  in  1586,  for  an  aid  not 
granted  in  convocation,  but  assessed  by  the  archdeacon  ac- 
cording to  the  value  of  their  benefices,  to  which  they  natu- 
rally showed  no  little  reluctance.1  By  dint  of  singular  fru- 
gality she  continued  to  steer  the  true  course,  so  as  to  keep 
her  popularity  undiminished  and  her  prerogative  unimpaired 
—  asking  very  little  of  her  subjects'  money  in  parliaments, 
and  being  hence  enabled  both  to  have  long  breathing  times 
between  their  sessions,  and  to  meet  them  without  coaxing  or 
wrangling,  till,  in  the  latter  years  of  her  reign,  a  foreign  war 
and  a  rebellion  in  IreJand,  joined  to  a  rapid  depreciation  in 
the  value  of  money,  rendered  her  demands  somewhat  higher. 
But  she  did  not  abstain  from  the  ancient  practice  of  sending 
privy-seals  to  borrow  money  of  the  wealthy.  These  were 
not  considered  as  illegal,  though  plainly  forbidden  by  the 
statute  of  Richard  III. ;  for  it  was  the  fashion  to  set  aside  the 
Loans  of  authority  of  that  act,  as  having  been  passed  by  an 
money  not  usurper.  It  is  impossible  to  doubt  that  such  loans 
voluntary.  were  so  far  obtained  by  compulsion,  that  any  gen- 
tleman or  citizen  of  sufficient  ability  refusing  com- 
pliance would  have  discovered  that  it  were  far  better  to  part 
with  his  money  than  to  incur  the  council's  displeasure.  We 
have  indeed  a  letter  from  a  lord  mayor  to  the  council,  in- 
forming them  that  he  had  committed  to  prison  some  citizens 
for  refusing  to  pay  the  money  demanded  of  them.2  But  the 

1  Strype,  iii.  Append.  147.  This  was  sants  in  custody.  This,  though  very 
exacted  in  order  to  raise  men  for  service  nearly  borne  out  by  the  letter  of  a 
Sn  the  Low  Countries.  But  the  benefic«d  recent  statute,  14th  Eliz.  c.  5,  was  con- 
clergy  were  always  bound  to  furnish  ceived  by  the  inhabitants  to  be  against 
horses  and  armor,  or  their  value,  for  law.  We  have,  in  Strype 'a  Annals,  vol. 
the  defence  of  the  kingdom  in  peril  of  iii.  Append.  56.  a  letter  from  the  privy- 
invasion  or  rebellion.  An  instance  of  council,  directing  the  charge  to  be  taken 
their  being  called  on  for  such  a  con-  off.  It  is  only  worth  noticing  as  it 
tingent  occurred  in  1569.  Strype's  illustrates  the  jealousy  which  the  peo- 
Parker.  273;  and  Rymer  will  supply  pie  entertained  of  anything  approaching 
many  others  in  earlier  times.  to  taxation  without  consent  of  parlia- 

The  magistrates  of  Cheshire  and  Lan-  ment,  and  the  caution  of  the  ministry,  iu 

jashire  had  imposed  a  charge  of  eight-  not  pushing  any  exertion  of  prerogative 

pence  a  week  on  each   parish  of  those  farther  than  would  readily  be  endured. 
counties  for  tho  uiaiuteuauce  of  recu-        n  Murdeu,  632.     That  some  degree  of 


ELIZ.  — Government.    NOT  QUITE  VOLUNTAEY. 


245 


queen  seems  to  have  been  punctual  in  their  speedy  repay- 
ment according  to  stipulation,  a  virtue  somewhat  unusual 
with  royal  debtors.  Thus  we  find  a  proclamation  in  1571, 
that  such  as  had  lent  the  queen  money  in  the  last  summer 
should  receive  repayment  in  November  and  December.1 
Such  loans  were  but  an  anticipation  of  her  regular  revenue, 
and  no  great  hardship  on  rich  merchants,  who,  if  they  got  no 
interest  for  their  money,  were  recompensed  with  knighthoods 
and  gracious  words.  And  as  Elizabeth  incurred  no  debt  till 
near  the  conclusion  of  her  reign,  it  is  probable  that  she  never 
had  borrowed  more  than  she  was  sure  to  repay. 

A  letter  quoted  by  Hume  from  Lord  Burleigh's  papers, 
though  not  written  by  him,  as  the  historian  asserts,  and 
somewhat  obscure  in  its  purport,  appears  to  warrant  the 
conclusion  that  he  had  revolved  in  his  mind  some  project 
of  raising  money  by  a  general  contribution  or  benevolence 
from  persons  of  ability,  without  purpose  of  repayment.  This 
was  also  amidst  the  difficulties  of  the  year  1569,  when  Cecil 


Intimidation  was  occasionally  made  use 
of  may  be  inferred  from  the  following 
letter  of  sir  Henry  Cholmley  to  the 
mayor  and  aldermen  of  Chester  in  1597. 
He  informs  them  of  letters  received  by 
him  from  the  council,  "whereby  I  am 
commanded  in  all  haste  to  require  you 
that  you  and  every  of  you  send  in 
your  several  sums  of  money  unto 
Torpley  (Tarporly)  on  Friday  next  the 
23d  December,  or  else  that  you  and 
every  of  you  give  me  meeting  there, 
the  said  day  and  place,  to  enter  severally 
into  bond  to  her  highness  for  your  ap- 
pearance forthwith  before  their  lord- 
ships, to  show  cause  wherefore  yon  and 
every  of  you  should  refuse  to  pay  her 
majesty  loan  according  to  her  highness' 
several  privy-seals  by  you  received 
letting  you  wit  that  I  am  now  directed 
by  other  letters  from  their  lordships  to 
pay  over  the  said  money  to  the  use  of 
her  majesty,  and  to  send  and  certify  the 
said  bonds  so  taken  ;  which  praying  you 
heartily  to  consider  of  as  the  last  direc- 
tion of  the  service,  I  heartily  bid  you 
farewell."  Harl.  MSS.  2173.  10. 

1  Strype.  ii.  102.  In  Haynes,  p.  518, 
is  the  form  of  a  circular  letter  or  privy- 
Beal,  as  it  was  called  from  passing  that 
office,  sent  in  15G9,  a  year  of  great  dif- 
ficulty, to  those  of  whose  aid  the  queen 
stood  in  need.  It  contains  a  promise  of 
repayment  at  the  expiration  of  twelve 
months.  A  similar  application  was 
made,  through  the  lord-lieutenants  in 
their  several  counties,  to  the  wealthy 


and  well-disposed,  in  1588,  immediately 
after  the  destruction  of  the  Armada. 
The  loans  are  asked  only  for  the  space 
of  a  year,  "  as  heretofore  has  been 
yielded  unto  her  majesty  in  times  of  less 
need  and  danger,  and  yet  always  fully 
repaid."  Strype,  iii.  635.  Large  sums 
of  money  are  said  to  have  been 
demanded  of  the  citizens  of  London 
in  1599.  Carte,  675.  It  is  perhaps  to 
this  year  that  we  may  refer  a  curious 
fact  mentioned  in  Mr.  Justice  Button's 
judgment  in  the  case  of  ship-money. 
"  In  the  time  of  queen  Elizabeth  (he 
says),  who  was  a  gracious  and  a  glorious 
queen,  yet  in  the  end  of  her  reign, 
whether  through  covetousness  or  by 
reason  of  the  wars  that  came  upon  her, 
I  know  not  by  what  council  she  desired 
benevolence,  the  statute  of  2d  Richard 
III,  was  pressed,  yet  it  went  so  far  that 
by  commission  and  direction  money  was 
gathered  in  every  inn  of  court ;  and  I 
myself  for  my  part  paid  twenty  shillings. 
But  when  the  queen  was  informed  by 
her  judges  that  this  kind  of  proceeding 
was  against  law,  she  gave  directions  to 
pay  all  such  sums  as  were  collected  back; 
and  so  I  (as  all  the  rest  of  our  house,  and 
as  I  think  of  other  houses  too)  had  my 
twenty  shillings  repaid  me  again;  and 
privy  councillors  were  sent  down  to  all 
parts,  to  tell  them  that  it  was  for  the 
defence  of  the  realm,  and  it  should  be 
repaid  them  again."  State  Trials,  iii. 
1199. 


246  CHARACTER  OF  CHAP.  V, 

perhaps  might  be  afraid  of  meeting  parliament,  on  account 
of  the  factions  leagued  against  himself.  But  as  nothing 
further  was  done  in  this  matter,  we  must  presume  that 
he  perceived  the  impracticability  of  so  unconstitutional  a 
scheme.1 

Those  whose  curiosity  has  led  them  to  somewhat  more 
Character  acquaintance  with  the  details  of  English  history 
BuHefh'  un(ier  Elizabeth  than  the  pages  of  Camden  or 
acTmin'u- s  Hume  will  afford,  cannot  but  have  been  struck 
with  the  perpetual  interference  of  men  in  power 
with  matters  of  private  concern.  I  am  far  from  pretending 
to  know  how  far  the  solicitations  for  a  prime  minister's  aid 
and  influence  may  extend  at  present.  Yet  one  may  think 
that  he  would  hardly  be  employed,  like  Cecil,  where  he  had 
no  personal  connection,  in  reconciling  family  quarrels,  inter- 
ceding with  a  landlord  for  his  tenant,  or  persuading  a  rich 
citizen  to  bestow  his  daughter  on  a  young  lord.  We  are 
sure,  at  least,  that  he  would  not  use  the  air  of  authority  upon 
such  occasions.  The  vast  collection  of  lord  Burleigh's  letters 
in  the  Museum  is  full  of  such  petty  matters,  too  insignificant 
for  the  most  part  to  be  mentioned  even  by  Strype.2  They 
exhibit,  however,  collectively,  a  curious  view  of  the  manner 
in  which  England  was  managed,  as  if  it  had  been  the  house- 
hold and  estate  of  a  nobleman  under  a  strict  and  prying  stew- 
ard. We  are  told  that  the  relaxation  of  this  minister's  mind 
was  to  study  the  state  of  England  and  the  pedigrees  of  its 
nobility  and  gentry  ;  of  these  last  he  drew  whole  books  with  his 
own  hands,  so  that  he  was  better  versed  in  descents  and  fam- 
ilies than  most  of  the  heralds,  and  would  often  surprise  per- 
sons of  distinction  at  his  table  by  appearing  better  acquainted 
with  their  manors,  parks,  and  woods,  than  themselves.8  Such 

1  Haynes,  518.   Hume  has  exaggerated  therefore  Sir  William  C.  will  speak  in  his 

this,  like  other  facts,  in  his  Tery  able,  but  behalf."    Feb.  4,  1566.     Id.  74.     "Lord 

partial,  sketch  of    the  constitution  in  Stafford   to  lord  Burleigh,  to  further  a 

Elizabeth's  reign.  match  between  a  certain  rich  citizen's 

8  The  following  are  a  few  specimens,  daughter  and  his  son  ;  he  requests  lord 

copied  from  the  Lansdowne  catalogue:  B.  to  appoint  the  father  to  meet  him 

1  Sir  Antony  Cooke  to  Sir  William  Cecil,  (lord   Stafford)  some  day  at  his  house, 

that  he  would  move  Mr.   Peters  to  re-  '  where  I  will  in  few  words  make  him  so 

commend  "Mr.  Edward  Stanhope  to  a  reasonable  an  offer  as  I  rrust  he  will  not 

certain  young  lady  of  Mr.  P.'s  acquaint-  disallow.'  "  Ixviii.  20.     "  Lady  Zouch  to 

ance,  whom  Mr.  Stanhope  was  desirous  lord  Burleigh,  for  his  friendly  interpo- 

to  marry."  Jan.  25,  1563,  Ixxi.  73.  "  Sir  sition  to  reconcile  lord  Zouch,  her  hus- 

John  Mason  to  Sir  William  Cecil,  that  he  band,  who    had   forsaken  her  through 

fears  his  young  landlord.  Spelman,  has  jealousy."     1593.  Ixxiv.  72. 

Intentions  of   turning  him  out  of  his  3  Biographia  Britannica,  art.  CECIL. 
nouae,  which  will  be  disagreeable ;  hopes 


ELIZ.  -  Government.     BUKLEIGH'S  ADMINISTRATION.  247 

knowledge  was  not  sought  by  the  crafty  Cecil  for  mere  di- 
version's sake.  It  was  a  main  part  of  his  system  to  keep 
alive  in  the  English  gentry  a  persuasion  that  his  eye  was 
upon  them.  No  minister  was  ever  more  exempt  from  that 
fal^e  security  which  is  the  usual  weakness  of  a  court.  His 
failing  was  rather  a  bias  towards  suspicion  and  timidity; 
there  were  times,  at  least,  in  which  his  strength  of  mind 
seems  to  have  almost  deserted  him  through  sense  of  the 
peril  of  his  sovereign  and  country.  But  those  perils  ap- 
pear less  to  us,  who  know  how  the  vessel  outrode  them, 
than  they  could  do  to  one  harassed  by  continual  informations 
of  those  numerous  spies  whom  he  employed  both  at  home 
and  abroad.  The  one  word  of  Burleigh's  policy  was  preven- 
tion ;  and  this  was  dictated  by  a  consciousness  of  wanting  an 
armed  force  or  money  to  support  it,  as  well  as  by  some  un- 
certainty as  to  the  public  spirit  in  respect  at  least  of  religion. 
But  a  government  that  directs  its  chief  attention  to  prevent 
offences  against  itself  is  in  its  very  nature  incompatible  with 
that  absence  of  restraint,  that  immunity  from  suspicion,  in 
which  civil  liberty,  as  a  tangible  possession,  may  be  said  to 
consist.  It  appears  probable  that  Elizabeth's  administration 
carried  too  far,  even  as  a  matter  of  policy,  this  precautionary 
system  upon  which  they  founded  the  penal  code  against 
popery ;  and  we  may  surely  point  to  a  contrast  very  advan- 
tageous to  our  modern  constitution  in  the  lenient  treatment 
which  the  Jacobite  faction  experienced  from  the  princes  of 
the  house  of  Hanover.  She  reigned,  however,  in  a  period 
of  real  difficulty  and  danger.  At  such  seasons  few  ministers 
will  abstain  from  arbitrary  actions,  except  those  who  are  not 
strong  enough  to  practise  them. 

I  have  traced,  in  another  work,  the  acquisition  by   the 
house  of  commons  of  a  practical  right  to  inquire 

,  ,.          -i     •    •   ,      ..  f  Disposition 

into  and  advise  upon  the  public  administration  ot  Of  the 
affairs  during  the  reigns  of  Edward  III.,  Richard  j£^°4 
H.,  and  the  princes  of  the  line  of  Lancaster.   This 
energy  of  parliament  was  quelled  by  the  civil  wars  of  the 
fifteenth  century  ;  and,  whatever  may  have  passed  in  debates 
within  its  walls  that  have  not  been  preserved,  did  not  often 
display  itself  in  any  overt  act  under  the  first  Tudors.     To 
grant  subsidies  which  could   not   be   raised   by   any  other 
course,  to  propose  statutes  which  were  not  binding  without 
their  consent,  to  consider  of  public  grievances,  and  procure 


248  DISPOSITION  OF  THE  COMMONS.  CHAP.  V. 

their  redress  either  by  law  or  petition  to  the  crown,  were 
their  acknowledged  constitutional  privileges,  which  no  sov- 
ereign or  minister  ever  pretended  to  deny.  For  this  end 
liberty  of  speech  and  free  access  to  the  royal  person  were 
claimed  by  the  speaker  as  customary  privileges  (though  not 
quite,  in  his  modern  language,  as  undoubted  rights)  at  the 
commencement  of  every  parliament.  But  the  house  of  com- 
mons in  Elizabeth's  reign  contained  men  of  a  bold  and  steady 
patriotism,  well  read  in  the  laws  and  records  of  old  time, 
sensible  to  the  dangers  of  their  country  and  abuses  of  gov- 
ernment, and  conscious  that  it  was  their  privilege  and  their 
duty  to  watch  over  the  common  weal.  This  led  to  several 
conflicts  between  the  crown  and  parliament,  wherein,  if  the 
former  often  asserted  the  victory,  the  latter  sometimes  kept 
the  field,  and  was  left  on  the  whole  a  gainer  at  the  close  of 
the  campaign. 

It  would  surely  be  erroneous  to  conceive  that  many  acts 
of  government  in  the  four  preceding  reigns  had  not  appeared 
at  the  time  arbitrary  and  unconstitutional.  If  indeed  we  are 
not  mistaken  in  judging  them  according  to  the  ancient  law, 
they  must  have  been  viewed  in  the  same  light  by  contempo- 
raries, who  were  full  as  able  to  try  them  by  that  standard. 
But,  to  repeat  what  I  have  once  before  said,  the  extant  docu- 
ments from  which  we  draw  our  knowledge  of  constitutional 
history  under  those  reigns  are  so  scanty,  that  instances  even 
of  a  successful  parliamentary  resistance  to  measures  of  the 
crown  may  have  left  no  memorial.  The  debates  of  parlia- 
ment are  not  preserved,  and  very  little  is  to  be  gained  from 
such  histories  as  the  age  produced.  The  complete  barren- 
ness indeed  of  Elizabeth's  chroniclers,  Hollingshed  and  Thin, 
as  to  every  parliamentary  or  constitutional  information,  speaks 
of  itself  the  jealous  tone  of  her  administration.  Camden, 
•writing  to  the  next  generation,  though  far  from  an  ingenuous 
historian,  is  somewhat  less  under  restraint.  This  forced 
silence  of  history  is  much  more  to  be  suspected  after  the  use 
of  printing  and  the  Reformation  than  in  the  ages  when  monks 
compiled  annals  in  their  convents,  reckless  of  the  censure  of 
courts,  because  independent  of  their  permission.  Grosser 
ignorance  of  public  transactions  is  undoubtedly  found  in  the 
chronicles  of  the  middle  ages ;  but  far  less  of  that  deliberate 
mendacity,  or  of  that  insidious  suppression,  by  which  fear, 
and  flattery,  and  hatred,  and  the  thirst  of  gain,  have,  since 


ELIZ.  —  Government.     SUCCESSION  TO  THE  CROWN.  249 

the  invention  of  printing,  corrupted  so  much  of  historical 
literature  throughout  Europe.  We  begin,  however,  to  find 
in  Elizabeth's  reign  more  .copious  and  unquestionable  docu- 
ments for  parliamentary  history.  The  regular  journals  in- 
deed are  partly  lost;  nor  would  those  which  remain  give 
us  a  sufficient  insight  into  the  spirit  of  parliament  without 
the  aid  of  other  sources.  But  a  volume  called  Sir  Simon 
D'Ewes's  Journal,  part  of  which  is  copied  from  a  manuscript 
of  Heywood  Townsend,  a  member  of  all  parliaments  from 
1580  to  1601,  contains  minutes  of  the  most  interesting  de 
bates  as  well  as  transactions,  and  for  the  first  time  renders  us 
acquainted  with  the  names  of  those  who  swayed  an  English 
house  of  commons.1 

There  was  no  peril  more  alarming  to  this  kingdom  during 
the  queen's  reign  that  the  precariousness  of  her 

T/.  .!  11  .,  .11.         •/•        i  -i     Addresses 

life  —  a  thread  whereon  its  tranquillity,  it  not  its  concerning 
religion  and  independence,  was  suspended.     Hence  the succes- 

n  i       •  •  i  i  i  Sion. 

the  commons  felt  it  an  imperious  duty  not  only  to 
recommend  her  to  marry,  but,  when  this  was  delayed,  to 
solicit  that  some  limitations  of  the  crown  might  be  enacted 
in  failure  of  her  issue.  The  former  request  she  evaded 
without  ever  manifesting  much  displeasure,  though  not  spar- 
ing a  hint  that  it  was  a  little  beyond  the  province  of  parlia- 
ment. Upon  the  last  occasion  indeed  that  it  was  preferred, 
namely,  by  the  speaker  in  1575,  she  gave,  what  from  any 
other  woman  must  have  appeared  an  assent,  and  almost  a 
promise.  But  about  declaring  the  succession  she  was  al- 
ways very  sensible.  Through  a  policy  not  perhaps  entirely 
selfish,  and  certainly  not  erroneous  on  selfish  principles,  she 
was  determined  never  to  pronounce  among  the  possible  com- 
petitors for  the  throne.  Least  of  all  could  she  brook  the 
intermeddling  of  parliament  in  such  a  concern.  The  com- 
mons first  took  up  this  business  in  1562,  when  there  had 
began  to  be  much  debate  in  the  nation  about  the  opposite 
titles  of  the  queen  of  Scots  and  lady  Catherine  Grey:  and 
especially  in  consequence  of  a  dangerous  sickness  the  queen 
had  just  experienced,  and  which  is  said  to  have  been  the 
cause  of  summoning  parliament.  Their  language  is  wary, 
praying  her  only  by  "  proclamation  of  certainty  already 
provided,  if  any  such  be,"  alluding  to  the  will  of  Henry 

i  Townsend's    manuscript    has    been    that  D'Ewes  has  omitted  anything  of 
eparately  published ;  but  I  do  not  find    consequence. 


250  DIFFERENCE  BETWEEN  CHAP.  V. 

VIII.,  "  or  else  by  limitations  of  certainty,  if  none  be,  to 
provide  a  most  gracious  remedy  in  this  great  necessity ; " l  of- 
fering at  the  same  time  to  concur  in  provisions  to  guarantee 
her  personal  safety  against  any  one  who  might  be  limited 
in  remainder.  Elizabeth  gave  them  a  tolerably  courteous 
answer,  though  not  without  some  intimation  of  her  dislike 
Difference  to  this  address.2  But  at  their  next  meeting,  which 
was  not  till  1566,  the  hope  of  her  own  marriage 
the  queen  having  grown  fainter,  and  the  circumstances  of 
monaln1"  *ne  kingdom  still  more  powerfully  demanding 
1566.  some  security,  both  houses  of  parliament  united, 

with  a  boldness  of  which  there  had  perhaps  been  no  exam- 
ple for  more  than  a  hundred  years,  to  overcome  her  repug- 
nance. Some  of  her  own  council  among  the  peers  are  said 
to  have  asserted  in  their  places  that  the  queen  ought  to  be 
obliged  to  take  a  husband,  or  that  a  successor  should  be 
declared  by  parliament  against  her  will.  She  was  charged 
with  a  disregard  to  the  state  and  to  posterity.  She  would 
prove,  in  the  uncourtly  phrase  of  some  sturdy  members  of 
the  lower  house,  a  stepmother  to  her  country,  as  being 
seemingly  desirous  that  England,  which  lived  as  it  were  in 
her,  should  rather  expire  with  than  survive  her ;  that  kings 
can  only  gain  the  affections  of  their  subjects  by  providing 
for  their  welfare  both  while  they  live  and  after  their  deaths ; 
nor  did  any  but  princes  hated  by  their  subjects,  or  faint- 
hearted women,  ever  stand  in  fear  of  their  successors.8  But 
this  great  princess  wanted  not  skill  and  courage  to  resist  this 
unusual  importunity  of  parliament.  The  peers,  who  had 
forgotten  their  customary  respectfulness,  were  excluded  the 
presence-chamber  till  they  made  their  submission.  She  pre- 
vailed on  the  commons,  through  her  ministers  who  sat  there, 
to  join  a  request  for  her  marriage  with  the  more  unpalatable 
alternative  of  naming  her  successor ;  and  when  this  request 
was  presented,  gave  them  fair  words  and  a  sort  of  assurance 
that  their  desires  should  by  some  means  be  fulfilled.4  When 

1  D'Ewes,  p.  82;  Strype,  i.  258;  from  fesses.    Her  real  answer  to  the  speaker 
which  latter  passage  it  seems  that  Cecil  in  1563  is  in  Harrington's  Nugae  Anti- 
was  rather  adverse  to  the  proposal.  quae,  vol.  i.  p.  80. 

2  D'Ewes,  p.  85.     The  speech  which        »  Camden,  p.  400. 

Hume,  on  D'Ewes 's  authority,  has  put        *  The  courtiers   told  the  house  that 

into  the  queen's  mouth  at  the  end  of  the  queen   intended   to  marry,  in  order 

ession,  is  but  an  imperfect  copy  or  to  divert   them  from  their  request  that 

abridgment  of  one  which  she  made  in  they  would  name  her  successor.    Strype, 

15toO;  as  D'Ewes  himself  afterwards  con-  vol.  i.  p.  494. 


ELIZ.  —  Government.     THE  QUEEN  AND  COMMONS.  251 

they  continued  to  dwell  on  the  same  topic  in  their  speeches, 
she  sent  messages  through  her  ministers,  and  at  length  a  pos- 
itive injunction  through  the  speaker,  that  they  should  proceed 
no  further  in  the  business.  The  house,  however,  was  not  in 
a  temper  for  such  ready  acquiescence  as  it  sometimes  dis- 
played. Paul  Wentworth,  a  bold  and  plain-spoken  man, 
moved  to  know  whether  the  queen's  command  and  inhibition 
that  they  should  no  longer  dispute  of  the  matter  of  succes- 
sion, were  not  against  their  liberties  and  privileges.  This 
caused,  as  we  are  told,  long  debates,  which  do  not  appear 
to  have  terminated  in  any  resolution.1  But,  more  probably 
having  passed  than  we  know  at  present,  the  queen,  whose 
haughty  temper  and  tenaciousness  of  prerogative  were  al- 
ways within  check  of  her  discretion,  several  days  after  an- 
nounced through  the  speaker  that  she  revoked  her  two 
former  commandments ;  "  which  revocation,"  says  the  jour- 
nal, "  was  taken  by  the  house  most  joyfully,  with  hearty 
prayer  and  thanks  for  the  same."  At  the  dissolution  of  this 
parliament,  which  was  perhaps  determined  upon  in  conse- 
quence of  their  steadiness,  Elizabeth  alluded,  in  addressing 
them,  with  no  small  bitterness  to  what  had  occurred.3 

This  is  the  most  serious  disagreement  on  record  between 
the  crown  and  the  commons  since  the  days  of  Richard  H. 
and  Henry  IV.  Doubtless  the  queen's  indignation  was 
excited  by  the  nature  of  the  subject  her  parliament  ven- 
tured to  discuss,  still  more  than  by  her  general  disapproba- 
tion of  their  interference  in  matters  of  state.  It  was  an 
endeavor  to  penetrate  the  great  secret  of  her  reign,  in  pre- 
serving which  she  conceived  her  peace,  dignity,  and  personal 
safety  to  be  bound  up.  There  were,  in  her  opinion,  as  she 
intimates  in  her  speech  at  closing  the  session,  some  under- 
hand movers  of  this  intrigue  (whether  of  the  Scots  or  Suf- 
folk faction  does  not  appear),  who  were  more  to  blame  than 
even  the  speakers  in  parliament.  And  if,  as  Cecil  seems 
justly  to  have  thought,  no  limitations  of  the  crown  could 
at  that  time  have  been  effected  without  much  peril  and 
inconvenience,  we  may  find  some  apology  for  her  warmth 
about  their  precipitation  in  a  business  which,  even  according 
to  our  present  constitutional  usage,  it  would  naturally  be  for 
the  government  to  bring  forward.  It  is  to  be  collected  from 

1  D'Ewes,  p.  128. 

»  Id.  p.  116.    Journals,  8th  Oct.,  26th  Nov.,  2d  Jan. 


252  SESSION  OF  1571.  CHAP.  V. 

Wentworth's  motion,  that  to  deliberate  on  subjects  affecting 
the  commonwealth  was  reckoned,  by  at  least  a  large  part  of 
the  house  of  commons,  one  of  their  ancient  privileges  and 
liberties.  This  was  not  one  which  Elizabeth,  however  she 
had  yielded  for  the  moment  in  revoking  her  prohibition,  ever 
designed  to  concede  to  them.  Such  was  her  frugality,  that, 
although  she  had  remitted  a  subsidy  granted  in  this  session, 
alleging  the  very  honorable  reason  that,  knowing  it  to  have 
been  voted  in  expectation  of  some  settlement  of  the  succes- 
sion, she  would  not  accept  it  when  that  implied  condition  had 
not  been  fulfilled,  she  was  able  to  pass  five  years  without 
Session  of  again  convoking  her  people.  A  parliament  met 
1571.  in  April,  1571,  when  the  lord  keeper  Bacon,1  in 

answer  to  the  speaker's  customary  request  for  freedom  of 
speech  in  the  commons,  said  that  "  her  majesty  having  ex- 
perience of  late  of  some  disorder  and  certain  offences,  which, 
though  they  were  not  punished,  yet  were  they  offences  still, 
and  so  must  be  accounted,  they  would  therefore  do  well  to 
meddle  with  no  matters  of  state  but  such  as  should  be  pro- 
pounded unto  them,  and  to  occupy  themselves  in  other  mat- 
ters concerning  the  commonwealth." 

The  commons  so  far  attended  to  this  intimation  that  no 
proceedings  about  the  succession  appear  to  have 

Influence          f  ,  xl  .  ,. 

of  the  taken   place  in   this   parliament,  except  such   as 

parliament  were  calculated  to  gratify  the  queen.  We  may 
•  perhaps  except  a  bill  attainting  the  queen  of  Scots, 
which  was  rejected  in  the  upper  housel  But  they  entered 
for  the  first  time  on  a  new  topic,  which  did  not  cease  for  the 
rest  of  this  reign  to  furnish  matter  of  contention  with  their 
sovereign.  The  party  called  puritan,  including  such  as 
charged  abuses  on  the  actual  government  of  the  church,  as 
well  as  those  who  objected  to  part  of  its  lawful  discipline, 
had,  not  a  little  in  consequence  of  the  absolute  exclusion 
of  the  catholic  gentry,  obtained  a  very  considerable  strength 
in  the  commons.  But  the  queen  valued  her  ecclesiastical 
supremacy  more  than  any  part  of  her  prerogative.  Next 
to  the  succession  of  the  crown,  it  was  the  point  she  could 
least  endure  to  be  touched.  The  house  had  indeed  resolved, 
upon  reading  a  bill  the  first  time  for  reformation  of  the  Com- 
mon Prayer,  that  petition  be  made  to  the  queen's  majesty  for 

lD'Ewes,p.l41. 


ELIZ.  —  Government.     INFLUENCE  OF  PURITANS.  253 

her  license  to  proceed  in  it  before  it  should  be  farther  dealt 
in.  But  Strickland,  who  had  proposed  it,  was  sent  for  to  the 
council,  and  restrained  from  appearing  again  in  his  place, 
though  put  under  no  confinement.  This  was  noticed  as  an 
infringement  of  their  liberties.  The  ministers  endeavored 
to  excuse  his  detention,  as  not  intended  to  lead  to  any  se- 
verity, nor  occasioned  by  anything  spoken  in  that  house, 
but  on  account  of  his  introducing  a  bill  against  the  prerog- 
ative of  the  queen,  which  was  not  to  be  tolerated.  And 
instances  were  quoted  of  animadversion  on  speeches  made 
in  parliament.  But  Mr.  Yelverton  maintained  that  all  mat- 
ters not  treasonable,  nor  too  much  to  the  derogation  of  the 
imperial  crown,  were  tolerable  there,  where  ah1  things  came 
to  be  considered,  and  where  there  was  such  fulness  of  power 
as  even  the  right  of  the  crown  was  to  be  determined,  which 
it  would  be  high  treason  to  deny.  Princes  were  to  have 
their  prerogatives,  but  yet  to  be  confined  within  reasonable 
limits.  The  queen  could  not  of  herself  make  laws,  neither 
could  she  break  them.  This  was  the  true  voice  of  English 
liberty,  not  so  new  to  men's  ears  as  Hume  has  imagined, 
though  many  there  were  who  would  not  forfeit  the  court's 
favor  by  uttering  it.  Such  speeches  as  the  historian  has 
quoted  of  sir  Humphrey  Gilbert,  and  many  such  may  be 
found  in  the  proceedings  of  this  reign,  are  rather  directed 
to  intimidate  the  house  by  exaggerating  their  inability  to 
contend  with  the  crown,  than  to  prove  the  law  of  the  land 
to  be  against  them.  In  the  present  affair  of  Strickland  it 
became  so  evident  that  the  commons  would  at  least  address 
the  queen  to  restore  him,  that  she  adopted  the  course  her 
usual  prudence  indicated,  and  permitted  his  return  to  his 
house.  But  she  took  the  reformation  of  ecclesiastical  abuses 
out  of  their  hands,  sending  word  that  she  would  have  some 
articles  for  that  purpose  executed  by  the  bishops  under  her 
royal  supremacy,  and  not  dealt  in  by  parliament.  This  did 
not  prevent  the  commons  from  proceeding  to  send  up  some 
bills  in  the  upper  house,  where,  as  was  natural  to  expect, 
they  fell  to  the  ground.1 

This  session  is  also  remarkable  for  the  first  marked 
complaints  against  some  notorious  abuses  which  defaced  the 
civil  government  of  Elizabeth.2  A  member  having  rather 

1  D'Ewes,  156,  &o.  There  is  no  *  Something  of  this  sort  seems  to 
mention  of  Strickland's  business  in  the  have  occurred  in  the  session  of  1566,  as 
Journal  may  be  inferred  from  the  lord  keeper's 


254  INFLUENCE  OF  PURITANS,  CHAP.  V, 

prematurely  suggested  the  offer  of  a  subsidy,  several  com- 
plaints were  made  of  irregular  and  oppressive  practices,  and 
Mr.  Bell  said  that  licenses  granted  by  the  crown  and  other 
abuses  galled  the  people,  intimating  also  that  the  subsidy 
should  be  accompanied  by  a  redress  of  grievances.1  This 
occasion  of  introducing  the  subject,  though  strictly  constitu- 
tional, was  likely  to  cause  displeasure.  The  speaker  informed 
them  a  few  days  after  of  a  message  from  the  queen  to  spend 
little  time  in  motions,  and  make  no  long  speeches.2  And 
Bell,  it  appears,  having  been  sent  for  by  the  council,  came 
into  the  house  "  with  such  an  amazed  countenance,  that  it 
daunted  all  the  rest,"  who  for  many  days  durst  not  enter  on 
any  matter  of  importance.8  It  became  the  common  whisper, 
that  no  one  must  speak  against  licenses,  lest  the  queen  and 
council  should  be  angry.  And,  at  the  close  of  the  session, 
the  lord  keeper  severely  reprimanded  those  audacious,  arro- 
gant, and  presumptuous  members,  who  had  called  her  maj- 
esty's grants  and  prerogatives  in  question,  meddling  with 
matters  neither  pertaining  to  them,  nor  within  the  capacity 
of  their  understanding.4 

The  parliament  of  1572  seemed  to  give  evidence  of  their 
inheriting  the  spirit  of  the  last  by  choosing  Mr.  Bell  for  their 
speaker.5  But  very  little  of  it  appeared  in  their  proceedings. 
In  their  first  short  session,  chiefly  occupied  by  the  business  of 
the  queen  of  Scots,  the  most  remarkable  circumstances  are 
the  following.  The  commons  were  desirous  of  absolutely 
excluding  Mary  from  inheriting  the  crown,  and  even  of  taking 
away  her  life,  and  had  prepared  bills  with  this  intent.  But 
Elizabeth,  constant  to  her  mysterious  policy,  made  one  of  her 
ministers  inform  them  that  she  would  neither  have  the  queen 
of  Scots  enabled  nor  disabled  to  succeed,  and  willed  that  the 
bill  respecting  her  should  be  drawn  by  her  council :  and  that 
in  the  mean  time  the  house  should  not  enter  on  any  speeches 
or  arguments  on  that  matter.6  Another  circumstance  worthy 
of  note  in  this  session  is  a  signification,  through  the  speaker, 

reproof  to  the  speaker  for  calling  her.  recommendation.    There  was  always  an 

majesty's    letters    patent    in    question,  understanding  between   this  servant  of 

D'Ewes,  115.  the  house  and  the  government.     Proofs 

1  Id.  158.    Journals,  7  Apr.  or  presumptions  of  this  are  not  unfre- 

2  Journals,  9  and  10  Apr.  quent.     In  Strype's  Annals,  vol.   iv.  p. 
*  D'Ewes,  159.  124,  we  find  instructions  for  the  speak- 
1  Id.  151.  er's  speech  in   1592,  drawn  up  by  lord 
5  Bell,  I  suppose,  had  reconciled  him-  Burleigh,   as    might  very  likely  be  the 

self  to  the    court,   which   would    have    case  on  other   occasions. 
approved  no  speaker  chosen  without  ita        6  D'Ewes,  219. 


ELIZ.  — Government.     SPEECH  OF  MR.  WENTWORTH.  255 

of  her  majesty's  pleasure  that  no  bills  concerning  religion 
should  be  received,  unless  they  should  be  first  considered  and 
approved  by  the  clergy,  and  requiring  to  see  certain  bills 
touching  rites  and  ceremonies  that  had  been  read  in  the 
house.  The  bills  were  accordingly  ordered  to  be  delivered 
to  her,  with  a  humble  prayer  that,  if  she  should  dislike  them, 
she  would  not  conceive  an  ill  opinion  of  the  house,  or  of  the 
parties  by  whom  they  were  preferred.1 

The  submissiveness  of  this  parliament  was  doubtless  owiug 
to  the  queen's  vigorous  dealings  with  the  last.  At  0 

•  •  -11    -n  Speech  of 

their  next  meeting,  which  was  not  till  r  ebruary  Mr.  went- 
1575-6,  Peter  Wentworth,  brother  I  believe  of  i^hin 
the  person  of  that  name  before-mentioned,  broke 
out,  in  a  speech  of  uncommon  boldness,  against  her  arbitra- 
ry encroachments  on  their  privileges.  The  liberty  of  free 
speech,  he  said,  had  in  the  two  last  sessions  been  so  many 
ways  infringed,  that  they  were  in  danger,  while  they  con- 
tented themselves  with  the  name,  of  losing  and  foregoing  the 
thing.  It  was  common  for  a  rumor  to  spread  through  that 
house,  "  the  queen  likes  or  dislikes  such  a  matter;  beware 
what  you  do."  Messages  were  even  sometimes  brought  down 
either  commanding  or  inhibiting,  very  injurious  to  the  liberty 
of  debate.  He  instanced  that  in  the  last  session  restraining 
the  house  from  dealing  in  matters  of  religion  ;  against  which 
and  against  the  prelates  he  inveighed  with  great  acrimony. 
With  still  greater  indignation  he  spoke  of  the  queen's  refusal 
to  assent  to  the  attainder  of  Mary  ;  and,  after  surprising  the 
house  by  the  bold  words,  "  none  is  without  fault,  no,  not  our 
noble  queen,  but  has  committed  great  and  dangerous  faults 
to  herself,"  went  on  to  tax  her  with  ingratitude  and  unkind- 
ness  to  her  subjects,  in  a  strain  perfectly  free  indeed  from 
disaffection,  but  of  more  rude  censure  than  any  kings  would 
put  up  with.2 

This  direct  attack  upon  the  sovereign  in  matters  relating 
to  her  public  administration  seems  no  doubt  unparliamentary  ; 
though  neither  the  rules  of  parliament  in  this  respect,  nor 
even  the  constitutional  principle,  were  so  strictly  understood 
as  at  present.  But  it  was  part  of  Elizabeth's  character  to 
render  herself  extremely  prominent,  and,  as  it  were,  respon- 
sible in  public  esteem  for  every  important  measure  of  her 

i  D'Kwes,  213,  214.  *  Id.  236. 


256  WEXTWORTH  SENT  TO  THE  TOWER.       CHAP.  V. 

government.  It  was  difficult  to  consider  a  queen  as  acting 
merely  by  the  advice  of  ministers  who  protested  in  parliament 
that  they  had  labored  in  vain  to  bend  her  heart  to  their 
counsels.  The  doctrine  that  some  one  must  be  responsible 
for  every  act  of  the  crown  was  yet  perfectly  unknown ;  and 
Elizabeth  would  have  been  the  last  to  adopt  a  system  so 
inglorious  to  monarchy.  But  Wentworth  had  gone  to  a 
length  which  alarmed  the  house  of  commons.  They  judged 
it  expedient  to  prevent  an  unpleasant  interference  by  seques- 
tering their  member,  and  appointing  a  committee  of  all  the 
privy  councillors  in  the  house  to  examine  him.  Wentworth 
declined  their  authority,  till  they  assured  him  that  they  sat  as 
members  of  the  commons  and  not  as  councillors.  After  a 
long  examination,  in  which  he  not  only  behaved  with  intre- 
pidity, but,  according  to  his  own  statement,  reduced  them  to 
confess  the  truth  of  all  he  advanced,  they  made  a  report  to 
the  house,  who  committed  him  to  the  Tower.  He  had  lain 
there  a  month  when  the  queen  sent  word  that  she  remitted 
her  displeasure  towards  him,  and  referred  his  enlargement 
to  the  house,  who  released  him  upon  a  reprimand  from  the 
speaker,  and  an  acknowledgment  of  his  fault  upon  his  knees.1 
In  this  commitment  of  Wentworth  it  can  hardly  be  said  that 
there  was  anything,  as  to  the  main  point,  by  which  the  house 
sacrificed  its  acknowledged  privileges.  In  later  instances, 
and  even  in  the  reign  of  George  I.,  members  have  been 
committed  for  much  less  indecent  reflections  on  the  sover- 
eign. The  queen  had  no  reason  upon  the  whole  to  be  ill- 
pleased  with  this  parliament,  nor  was  she  in  haste  to  dissolve 
it,  though  there  was  a  long  intermission  of  its  sessions.  The 
next  was  in  1581,  when  the  chancellor,  on  confirming  a  new 
speaker,  did  not  fail  to  admonish  him  that  the  house  of  com- 
mons should  not  intermeddle  in  anything  touching  her  maj- 
esty's person  or  estate,  or  church  government.  They  were 
supposed  to  disobey  this  injunction,  and  fell  under  the  queen's 
displeasure,  by  appointing  a  public  fast  on  their  own  author- 
ity, though  to  be  enforced  on  none  but  themselves.  This 
trifling  resolution,  which  showed  indeed  a  little  of  the  puri- 
tan spirit,  passed  for  an  encroachment  on  the  supremacy, 
and  was  only  expiated  by  a  humble  apology.2  It  is  not  till 
the  month  of  February,  1587-8,  that  the  zeal  for  ecclesias- 

»  D'Ewes,  260.  »  Id.  282. 


ELIZ.  — Government.     MR.   COPE'S  BILL  AND  BOOK.  257 

tical  reformation  overcame  in  some  measure  the  terrors  of 
power,  but  with  no  better  success  than  before.  A  Mr.  Cope 
offered  to  the  house,  we  are  informed,  a  bill  and  a  book,  the 
former  annulling  all  laws  respecting  ecclesiastical  government 
then  in  force,  and  establishing  a  certain  new  form  of  common 
pi-ayer  contained  in  the  latter.  The  speaker  interposed  to 
prevent  this  bill  from  being  read,  on  the  ground  that  her 
majesty  had  commanded  them  not  to  meddle  in  this  matter. 
Several  members  however  spoke  in  favor  of  hearing  it  r,ead, 
and  the  day  passed  in  debate  on  this  subject.  Before  they 
met  again  the  queen  sent  for  the  speaker,  who  delivered  up 
to  her  the  bill  and  book.  Next  time  that  the  house  sat  Mr. 
Wentworth  insisted  that  some  questions  of  his  proposing 
should  be  read.  These  queries  were  to  the  following  pur- 
port :  "  Whether  this  council  was  not  a  place  for  any  mem- 
ber of  the  same,  freely  and  without  control,  by  bill  or  speech, 
to  utter  any  of  the  griefs  of  this  commonwealth  ?  Whether 
there  be  any  council  that  can  make,  add,  or  diminish  from 
the  laws  of  the  realm,  but  only  this  council  of  parliament  ? 
Whether  it  be  not  against  the  orders  of  this  council  to  make 
any  secret  or  matter  of  weight,  which  is  here  in  hand,  known 
to  the  prince  or  any  other,  without  consent  of  the  house  ? 
Whether  the  speaker  may  overrule  the  house  in  any  matter 
or  cause  in  question  ?  Whether  the  prince  and  state  can 
continue  and  stand,  and  be  maintained,  without  this  council 
of  parliament,  not  altering  the  government  of  the  state  ?  " 
These  questions  sergeant  Pickering,  the  speaker,  instead  of 
reading  them  to  the  house,  showed  to  a  courtier,  through 
whose  means  Wentworth  was  committed  to  the  Tower.  Mr. 
Cope,  and  those  who  had  spoken  in  favor  of  his  motion,  un- 
derwent the  same  fate ;  and,  notwithstanding  some  notice 
taken  of  it  in  the  house,  it  does  not  appear  that  they  were 
set  at  liberty  before  its  dissolution,  which  ensued  in  three 
weeks.1  Yet  the  commons  were  so  set  on  displaying  an 
ineffectual  hankering  after  reform,  that  they  appointed  a  com- 
mittee to  address  the  queen  for  a  learned  ministry. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  next  parliament,  which  The  com- 
met  in  1588-9,  the  speaker  received  an  admoni-  £?°™  ™n~ 
tion  that  the  house  were  not  to  extend  their  priv-  seek 
ileges  to  any  irreverent  or  misbecoming  speech.  tica 
In  this  session  Mr.  Damport,  we  are  informed  by  *"« 

1  D'Ewes,  410. 
VOL.1. — C.  17 


258  ATTEMPTS   TO  KEDRESS  ABUSES.  CHAP.  V. 

D'Ewes,1  moved  "  neither  for  making  of  any  new  laws,  nor 
for  abrogating  of  any  old  ones,  but  for  a  due  course  of  pro- 
ceeding in  laws  already  established,  but  executed  by  some 
ecclesiastical  governors  contrary  both  to  their  purport  and 
the  intent  of  the  legislature,  which  he  proposed  to  bring  into 
discussion."  So  cautious  a  motion  saved  its  author  fi*om  the 
punishment  which  had  attended  Mr.  Cope  for  his  more  radi- 
cal reform  ;  but  the  secretary  of  state,  reminding  the  house 
of  the  queen's  express  inhibition  from  dealing  with  ecclesias- 
tical causes,  declared  to  them  by  the  chancellor  at  the  com- 
mencement of  the  session  (in  a  speech  which  does  not  ap- 
pear), prevented  them  from  taking  any  further  notice  of  Mr. 
Damport's  motion.  They  narrowly  escaped  Elizabeth's  dis- 
pleasure in  attacking  some  civil  abuses.  Sir  Edward  Hob- 
by brought  in  a  bill  to  prevent  certain  exactions  made  for  their 
own  profit  by  the  officers  of  the  exchequer.  Two  days  after 
he  complained  that  he  had  been  very  sharply  rebuked  by 
some  great  personage,  not  a  member  of  the  house,  for  his 
speech  on  that  occasion.  But  instead  of  testifying  indigna- 
tion at  this  breach  of  their  privileges,  neither  he  nor  the 
house  thought  of  any  further  redress  than  by  exculpating 
him  to  this  great  personage,  apparently  one  of  the  ministers, 
and  admonishing  their  members  not  to  repeat  elsewhere  any- 
thing uttered  in  their  debates.2  For  the  bill  itself,  as  well 
as  one  intended  to  restrain  the  flagrant  abuses  of  purveyance, 
they  both  were  passed  to  the  lords.  But  the  queen  sent  a 
message  to  the  upper  house,  expressing  her  dislike  of  them, 
as  meddling  with  abuses  which,  if  they  existed,  she  was  both 
able  and  willing  to  repress ;  and  this  having  been  formally 
communicated  to  the  commons,  they  appointed  a  committee 
to  search  for  precedents  in  order  to  satisfy  her  majesty  about 
their  proceedings.  They  received  afterwards  a  gracious 
answer  to  their  address,  the  queen  declaring  her  willingness 
to  afford  a  remedy  for  the  alleged  grievances.8 

Elizabeth,  whose  reputation  for  consistency,  which  haughty 
princes  overvalue,  was  engaged  in  protecting  the  established 
hierarchy,  must  have  experienced  not  a  little  vexation  at  the 
perpetual  recurrence  of  complaints  which  the  unpopularity 
of  that  order  drew  from  every  parliament.  The  speaker  of 

1  P.  438.    Townsend  calls  this  gentle-  a  D'Ewes,  433. 

man   Davenport,  which   no  doubt  was  a  Id.  440,  et  post 

his  true  name. 


EJ .12.  —  Government.      COMMITTAL  OF  MORICE.  259 

that  summoned  in  1593  received  for  answer  to  his  request 
of  liberty  of  speech,  that  it  was  granted,  "  but  not  to  speak 
every  one  what  he  listeth,  or  what  cometh  into  his  brain  to 
utter  ;  their  privilege  was  ay  or  no.  "Wherefore,  Mr.  Speak- 
er," continues  the  lord  keeper  Pickering,  himself  speaker  in 
the  parliament  of  1588,  "her  majesty's  pleasure  is,  that  if 
you  perceive  any  idle  heads  which  will  not  stick  to  hazard 
their  own  estates,  which  will  meddle  with  reforming  the. 
church  and  transforming  the  commonwealth,  and  do  ex- 
hibit such  bills  to  such  purpose,  that  you  receive  them 
not,  until  they  be  viewed  and  considered  by  those  who  it  is 
fitter  should  consider  of  such  things,  and  can  better  judge 
of  them."  It  seems  not  improbable  that  this  admonition, 
which  indeed  is  in  no  unusual  style  for  this  reign,  was  sug- 
gested by  the  expectation  of  some  unpleasing  debate.  For 
we  read  that  the  very  first  day  of  the  session,  though  the 
commons  had  adjourned  on  account  of  the  speaker's  illness, 
the  unconquerable  Peter  Wentworth,  with  another  member, 
presented  a  petition  to  the  lord  keeper,  desiring  "  the  lords 
of  the  upper  house  to  join  with  them  of  the  lower  in  implor- 
ing her  majesty  to  entail  the  succession  of  the  crown,  for 
which  they  had  already  prepared  a  bill."  This  step,  which 
may  seem  to  us  rather  arrogant  and  unparliamentary,  drew 
down,  as  they  must  have  expected,  the  queen's  indignation. 
They  were  summoned  before  the  council,  and  committed  to 
different  prisons.1  A  few  days  afterwards  a  bill  for  reform- 
ing the  abuses  of  ecclesiastical  courts  was  presented  by  Mor- 
ice,  attorney  of  the  court  of  wards,  and  underwent  some  dis- 
cussion in  the  house.2  But  the  queen  sent  for  the  speaker, 
and  expressly  commanded  that  no  bill  touching  matters  of 
state  or  reformation  of  causes  ecclesiastical  should  be  exhib- 
ited ;  and  if  any  such  should  be  offered,  enjoining  him  on  his 
allegiance  not  to  read  it.8  It  was  the  custom  at  that  time  for 
the  speaker  to  read  and  expound  to  the  house  all  the  bills 
that  any  member  offered.  Morice  himself  was  committed  to 
safe  custody,  from  which  he  wrote  a  spirited  letter  to  lord 
Burleigh,  expressing  his  sorrow  for  having  offended  the 
queen,  but  at  the  same  time  his  resolution  "  to  strive,"  he 
says,  "  while  his  life  should  last,  for  freedom  of  conscience, 
public  justice,  and  the  liberties  of  his  country."4  Some  days 

1  D'Ewes,  470.  *  Id.  62. 

*  Id.  474 ;  Townsend,  60.  *  See  the  letter  in  Lodge's  Illustra 


260  MONOPOLIES.  CHAP.  V. 

after,  a  motion  was  made  that,  as  some  places  might  complain 
of  paying  subsidies,  their  representatives  not  having  been 
consulted  nor  been  present  when  they  were  granted,  the 
house  should  address  the  queen  to  set  their  members  at  lib- 
erty. But  the  ministers  opposed  this,  as  likely  to  hurt  those 
whose  good  was  sought,  her  majesty  being  more  likely  to 
release  them  if  left  to  her  own  gracious  disposition.  It  does 
not  appear  however  that  she  did  so  during  the  session,  which 
lasted  above  a  month.1  We  read,  on  the  contrary,  in  an  un- 
doubted authority,  namely  a  letter  of  Antony  Bacon  to  his 
mother,  that  "  divers  gentlemen  who  were  of  the  parliament, 
and  thought  to  have  returned  into  the  country  after  the  end 
thereof,  were  stayed  by  her  majesty's  commandment,  for 
being  privy,  as  it  is  thought,  and  consenting  to  Mr.  Went- 
worth's  motion."  2  Some  difficulty  was  made  by  this  house 
of  commons  about  their  grant  of  subsidies,  which  was  uncom- 
monly large,  though  rather  in  appearance  than  truth,  so  great 
had  been  the  depreciation  of  silver  for  some  years  past.8 

The  admonitions  not  to  abuse  freedom  of  speech,  which 
had  become  almost  as  much  matter  of  course  as  the  request 
for  it,  were  repeated  in  the  ensuing  parliaments  of  1597  and 
Also  of  1601.  Nothing  more  remarkable  occurs  in  the 
monopolies,  former  of  these  sessions  than  an  address  to  the 
inPthett  S  queen  against  the  enormous  abuse  of  monopolies. 


I60i°nof  ^e  crown  either  possessed  or  assumed  the  pre- 
rogative of  regulating  almost  all  matters  of  com- 
merce at  its  discretion.  Patents  to  deal  exclusively  in  par- 
ticular articles,  generally  of  foreign  growth,  but  reaching  in 
some  instances  to  such  important  necessaries  of  life  as  salt, 
leather,  and  coal,  had  been  lavishly  granted  to  the  courtiers, 
with  little  direct  advantage  to  the  revenue.  They  sold  them 
to  companies  01  merchants,  who  of  course  enhanced  the 
price  to  the  utmost  ability  of  the  purchaser.  This  business 
seems  to  have  been  purposely  protracted  by  the  ministers 
and  the  speaker,  who,  in  this  reign,  was  usually  in  the  court's 
interests,  till  the  last  day  of  the  session  ;  when,  in  answer  to 

tions,  Tol.  iii.  34.     Townsend  says  he  in  the  parliament  of  1589  against  the 

was  committed  to  Sir  John  Fortescue's  subsidy  then  proposed.    Annals,  vol.  iii. 

keeping,  a  gentler  sort  of  imprisonment.  Append.   288.      Not  a  word  about   this 

occurs  in  D'Ewes's  Journal  ;  and  I  men- 

)  Ewes,  4/0.  tion  it  as  an  additional  proof  how  little 

Birch's  Memoirs  of  Elizabeth,  i.  96.  we  can  rely  on  negative  inferences  ad 

3  Strype    has    published,    from    lord  to    proceedings    in    parliament    at  this 

Burleigh's  manuscripts,  a  speech  made  period. 


ELIZ.  —  Government.  MONOPOLIES.  261 

his  mention  of  it,  the  lord  keeper  said  that  the  queen  "hoped 
her  dutiful  and  loving  subjects  would  not  take  away  her  pre- 
rogative, which  is  the  choicest  flower  in  her  garden,  and  the 
principal  and  head  pearl  in  her  crown  and  diadem  ;  but  would 
rather  leave  that  to  her  disposition,  promising  to  examine  all 
patents,  and  to  abide  the  touchstone  of  the  law." l  This 
answer,  though  less  stern  than  had  been  asual,  was  merely 
evasive :  and  in  the  session  of  1601  a  bolder  and  more  suc- 
cessful attack  was  made  on  the  administration  than  this  reign 
had  witnessed.  The  grievance  of  monopolies  had  gone  on 
continually  increasing ;  scarce  any  article  was  exempt  from 
these  oppressive  patents.  When  the  list  of  them  was  read 
over  in  the  house,  a  member  exclaimed,  "Is  not  bread  among 
the  number  ?  "  The  house  seemed  amazed  :  "  Nay,"  said  he, 
"  if  no  remedy  is  found  for  these,  bread  will  be  there  before 
the  next  parliament."  Every  tongue  seemed  now  unloosed  ; 
each  as  if  emulously  descanting  on  the  injuries  of  the  place 
he  represented.  It  was  vain  for  the  courtiers  to  withstand 
this  torrent.  Raleigh,  no  small  gainer  himself  by  some  mo- 
nopolies, after  making  what  excuse  he  could,  offered  to  give 
them  up.  Robert  Cecil  the  secretary,  and  Bacon,  talked 
loudly  of  the  prerogative,  and  endeavored  at  least  to  per- 
suade the  house  that  it  would  be  fitter  to  proceed  by  petition 
to  the  queen  than  by  a  bill.  But  it  was  properly  answered 
that  nothing  had  been  gained  by  petitioning  in  the  last  par- 
liament. After  four  days  of  eager  debate,  and  more  heat 
than  had  ever  been  witnessed,  this  ferment  was  suddenly 
appeased  by  one  of  those  well-timed  concessions  by  which 
skilful  princes  spare  themselves  the  mortification  of  being 
overcome.  Elizabeth  sent  down  a  message  that  she  would 
revoke  all  grants  that  should  be  found  injurious  by  fair  trial 
at  law :  and  Cecil  rendered  the  somewhat  ambiguous  gen- 
erality of  this  expression  more  •  satisfactory  by  an  assurance 
that  the  existing  patents  should  all  be  repealed,  and  no  more 
be  granted.  This  victory  filled  the  commons  with  joy,  per- 
haps the  more  from  being  rather  unexpected.2  They  ad- 
dressed the  queen  with  rapturous  and  hyperbolical  acknowl- 
edgments, to  which  she  answered  in  an  affectionate  strain, 
glancing  only  with  an  oblique  irony  at  some  of  those  movers 

1  D'Ewes,  547.  Rymer,  xvi.  540,  and  Carte,  iii.  712.     A 

»  Their  joy  and  gratitude  were  rather  list  of  them,  dated  May,  1603,  Lodge,  iii. 

premature,    lor    her    majesty    did    not  159,  seems  to  imply  that  they  were  still 

revoke   all    of    them ;     as    appears    by  existing. 


262 


MONOPOLIES. 


CHAP.  V 


in  the  debate,  whom  in  her  earlier  and  more  vigorous  years 
she  would  have  keenly  reprimanded.  She  repeated  this  a 
little  more  plainly  at  the  close  of  the  session,  but  still  with 
commendation  of  the  body  of  the  commons.  So  altered  a 
tone  must  be  ascribed  partly  to  the  growing  spirit  she  per- 
ceived in  her  subjects,  but  partly  also  to  those  cares  which 
clouded  with  listless  melancholy  the  last  scenes  of  her  illus- 
trious life.1 

The  discontent  that  vented  itself  against  monopolies  was 
not  a  little  excited  by  the  increasing  demands  which  Eliza- 
beth was  compelled, to  make  upon  the  commons  in  all  her  lat- 
ter parliaments.  Though  it  was  declared,  in  the  preamble 
to  the  subsidy  bill  of  1593,  that  "  these  large  and  unusual 
grants,  made  to  a  most  excellent  princess  on  a  most  pressing 


1  D'Ewes.  619,  644,  &c. 

The  speeches  made  in  this  parliament 
are  reported  more  fully  than  usual  by 
Heywood  Townsend,  from  whose  journal 
those  of  most  importance  have  been 
transcribed  by  D'Ewes.  Hume  has 
given  considerable  extracts,  for  the  sole 
purpose  of  inferring,  from  this  very  de- 
bate on  monopolies,  that  the  royal  pre- 
rogative was,  according  to  the  opinion 
of  the  house  of  commons  itself,  hardly 
subject  to  any  kind  of  restraint.  But 
the  passages  he  selects  are  so  unfairly 
taken  (some  of  them  being  the  mere 
language  of  courtiers,  others  separated 
from  the  context  in  order  to  distort  their 
meaning),  that  no  one  who  compares 
them  with  the  original  can  acquit  him 
of  extreme  prejudice.  The  adulatory 
strain  in  which  it  was  usual  to  speak 
of  the  sovereign  often  covered  a  strong 
disposition  to  keep  down  his  authority. 
Thus  when  a  Mr.  Davies  says  in  this 
debate.  "  God  hath  given  that  power  to 
absolute  princes  which  he  attributes  to 
himsolf  —  Dixi  quod  dii  estis,"  it  would 
have  been  seen,  if  Hume  had  quoted  the 
following  sentence,  that  he  infers  from 
hence,  that,  justice  being  a  divine  at- 
tribute, the  king  can  do  nothing  that 
is  unjust,  and  consequently  cannot 
grant  licenses  to  the  injury  of  his  sub- 
jects. Strong  language  was  no  doubt 
used  in  respect  of  the  prerogative.  But 
it  is  erroneous  to  assert,  with  Hume, 
that  it  came  equally  from  the  courtiers 
and  country  gentleman,  and  was  ad- 
mitted by  both.  It  will  chiefly  be  found 
in  the  speeches  of  secretary  Cecil,  the 
official  defender  of  prerogative,  and  of 
some  lawyers.  Hume,  after  quoting  an 
extravagant  speech  ascribed  to  sergeant 
Heyle,  that  -'all  we  have  is  her  majes- 


ty's, and  she  may  lawfully  at  any  time 
take  it  from  us;  yea,  she  hath  as  muc'a 
right  to  all  our  lands  and  goods  as  to  any 
revenue  of  her  crown,"  observes  that 
Heyle  was  an  eminent  lawyer,  a  man  of 
character.  That  Heyle  was  high  in  his 
profession  is  beyond  doubt ;  but  in  that 
age,  as  has  since,  though  from  the 
change  of  times  less  grossly,  continued 
to  be  the  case,  the  most  distinguished 
lawyers  notoriously  considered  the  court 
and  country  as  plaintiff  and  defendant 
in  a  great  suit,  and  themselves  as  their 
retained  advocates.  It  is  not  likely  how- 
ever that  Heyle  should  have  used  the 
exact  words  imputed  to  him.  He  made, 
no  doubt,  a  strong  speech  for  preroga- 
tive, but  so  grossly  to  transcend  all 
limits  of  truth  and  decency  seems  even 
beyond  a  lawyer  seeking  office.  Town- 
send  and  D'Ewes  write  with  a  sort  of 
sarcastic  humor,  which  is  not  always  to 
be  taken  according  to  the  letter.  D'Ewes, 
433 ;  Townsend,  205. 

Hume  proceeds  to  tell  us  that  it  was 
asserted  this  session  that  the  speaker 
might  either  admit  or  reject  bills  in  the 
house ;  and  remarks  that  the  very  pro- 
posal of  it  is  a  proof  at  what  a  low  ebb 
liberty  was  at  that  time  in  England. 
There  cannot  be  a  more  complete  mis- 
take. No  such  assertion  was  made ;  but 
a  member  suggested  that  the  speaker 
might,  as  the  consuls  in  the  Iloman 
senate  used,  appoint  the  order  in  which 
bills  should  be  read  ;  at  which  speech,  it 
is  added,  some  hissed.  D'Ewes,  677. 
The  present  regularity  of  parliamentary 
forms,  so  justly  valued  by  the  house, 
was  yet  unknown  ;  and  the  members 
called  confusedly  for  the  business  they 
wished  to  have  brought  forward 


ELI*.— Government.      INFLUENCE  OF  THE    CKOWN.  263 

and  extraordinary  occasion,  should  not  at  any  time  hereafter 
be  drawn  into  a  precedent,"  yet  an  equal  sum  was  obtained 
in  1597,  and  one  still  greater  in  1601,  but  money  was  al- 
ways reluctantly  given,  and  the  queen's  early  frugality  had 
accustomed  her  subjects  to  very  low  taxes ;  so  that  the 
debates  on  the  supply  in  1601,  as  handed  down  to  us  by 
Townsend,  exhibit  a  lurking  ill-humor  which  would  find  a 
better  occasion  to  break  forth. 

The   house  of  commons,  upon  a  review  of  Elizabeth's 
reio-n,  was  very  far,  on  the  one  hand  from  exer- 

J      .       .         1.1  1-11  i  Influence 

cising  those  constitutional  rights  which  have  long  Of  the 
since  belonged  to  it,  or  even  those  which  by  an-  parliament, 
cient  precedent  it  might  have  claimed  as  its  own ; 
yet,  on  the  other  hand,  was  not  quite  so  servile  and  submis- 
sive an  assembly  as  an  artful  historian  has  represented  it. 
If  many  of  its  members  were  but  creatures  of  power,  if  the 
majority  was  often  too  readily  intimidated,  if  the  bold  and 
honest,  but  not  very  judicious,  Wentworths  were  but  feebly 
supported,  when  their  impatience  hurried  them  beyond  their 
colleagues,  there  was  still  a  considerable  party,  sometimes 
carrying  the  house  along  with  them,  who  with  patient  reso- 
lution and  inflexible  aim  recurred  in  every  session  to  the 
assertion  of  that  one  great  privilege  which  their  sovereign 
contested,  the  right  of  parliament  to  inquire  into  and  suggest 
a  remedy  for  every  public  mischief  or  danger.  It  may  be 
remarked  that  the  ministers,  such  as  Knollys,  Hatton,  and 
Robert  Cecil,  not  only  sat  among  the  commons,  but  took  a 
very  leading  part  in  their  discussions :  a  proof  that  the  in- 
fluence of  argument  could  no  more  be  dispensed  with  than 
that  of  power.  This,  as  I  conceive,  will  never  be  the  case 
in  any  kingdom  where  the  assembly  of  the  estates  is  quite 
subservient  to  the  crown.  Nor  should  we  put  out  of  consid- 
eration the  manner  in  which  the  commons  were  composed. 
Sixty-two  members  were  added  at  different  times  oy  Eliza- 
beth to  the  representation,  as  well  from  places  which  had  in 
earlier  times  discontinued  their  franchise,  as  from  those  to 
which  it  was  first  granted ; x  a  very  large  proportion  of  them 

1  Parl.  Hist.  958.    In  the  session  of  assent,  that  the  burgesses  shall  remain 

1571  a  committee  was  appointed  to  confer  according  to  their  returns  ;  for  that  the 

with  the  attorney  and   solicitor-general  validity  of  the  charters  of  their  towns  is 

about  the  return  of  burgesses  from  nine  elsewhere  to  be  examined,  if  cause  be  " 

places  which  had  not  been  represented  D'Ewes,  p.  156,  159. 

In  the  last  parliament.     But  in  the  end  D'Ewes     observes     that    it    was    very 

it  was    "  ordered,    by   Mr    Attorney's  common  in  former  times,  in  order  to 


264 


INFLUENCE  OF  THE  CROWN. 


CHAP.  V 


petty  boroughs,  evidently  under  the  influence  of  the  crown 
or  peerage.  This  had  been  the  policy  of  her  brother  and 
sister,  in  order  to  counterbalance  the  country  gentlemen, 
and  find  room  for  those  dependents  who  had  no  natural 
interest  to  return  them  to  parliament.  The  ministry  took 
much  pains  with  elections,  of  which  many  proofs  remain.1 
The  house  accordingly  was  filled  with  placemen,  civilians, 
and  common  lawyers  grasping  at  preferment.  The  slavish 
tone  of  these  persons,  as  we  collect  from  the  minutes  of 


avoid  the  charge  of  paying  wages  to 
their  burgesses,  that  a  borough  which 
had  fallen  into  poverty  or  decay  either 
got  license  of  the  sovereign  for  the  time 
being  to  be  discharged  from  electing 
members,  or  discontinued  it  of  them- 
selves; but  that  of  late,  the  members 
for  the  most  part  bearing  their  own 
charges,  many  of  those  towns  which  had 
thus  discontinued  their  privilege  renewed 
it.  both  in  Elizabeth's  reign  and  that  of 
James.  P.  80.  This  could  only  have 
been,  it  is  hardly  necessary  to  say,  by 
obtaining  writs  out  of  chancery  for  that 
purpose.  As  to  the  payment  of  wages, 
the  words  of  D'Ewes  intimate  that  it 
was  not  entirely  disused.  In  the  session 
of  1586  the  borough  of  Grantham  com- 
plained that  Arthur  Hall  (whose  name 
now  appears  for  the  last  time)  had  sued 
them  for  wages  due  to  him  as  their 
representative  in  the  preceding  parlia- 
ment ;  alleging  that,  as  well  by  reason  of 
his  negligent  attendance  and  some  other 
offences  by  him  committed  in  some  of 
its  sessions,  as  of  his  promise  not  to 
require  any  such  wages,  they  ought  not 
to  be  charged  ;  and  a  committee,  having 
been  appointed  to  inquire  into  this, 
reported  that  they  had  requested  Mr. 
Hall  to  remit  his  claim  for  wages,  which 
he  had  freely  done.  D'Ewes,  p.  417. 

1  Strype  mentions  letters  from  the 
council  to  Mildmay,  sheriff  of  Essex,  in 
1559,  about  the  choice  of  knights.  An- 
nals, vol.  i.  p.  32.  And  other  instances 
of  interference  may  be  found  in  the 
Lansdowne  and  Harleian  collections. 
Thus  we  read  that  a  Mr.  Copley  used  to 
nominate  burgesses  for  Qatton,  "  for 
that  there  were  no  burgesses  in  the 
borough."  The  present  proprietor  be- 
ing a  minor  in  custody  of  the  court 
of  wards,  lord  Burleigh  directs  the 
sheriff  of  Surrey  to  make  no  return 
without  instructions  from  himself;  and 
afterwards  orders  him  to  cancel  the 
name  of  Francis  Bacon  in  his  indenture, 
he  being  returned  for  another  place,  and 
to  substitute  Edward  Brown.  Harl. 
MSS.  BCCIII.  c6. 

I  will  iuti  4uce  in  this   ylace,  though 


not  belonging  to  the  present  reign,  a 
proof  that  Henry  VIII.  did  not  trust 
altogether  to  the  intimidating  effects  of 
his  despotism  for  the  obedience  of  par- 
liament, and  that  his  ministers  looked  to 
the  management  of  elections,  as  their 
successors  have  always  done.  Sir  Robert 
Sadler  writes  to  some  one  whose  name 
does  not  appear,  to  inform  him  that  the 
duke  of  Norfolk  had  spoken  to  the  king, 
who  was  well  content  he  should  be  a 
burgess  of  Oxford  ;  and  that  he  should 
"  order  himself  in  the  said  room  ac- 
cording to  such  instructions  as  the  said 
duke  of  Norfolk  should  give  him  from 
the  king ;  "  if  he  is  not  elected  at  Ox- 
ford, the  writer  will  recommend  him 
to  some  of  •'  my  lord's  towns  of  his 
bishopric  of  Winchester."  Cotton  MSS. 
Cleopatra  E.  iv.  178.  Thus  we  see  that 
the  practice  of  our  government  h;is 
always  been  alike  :  and  we  may  add  the 
same  of  the  nobility,  who  interfered  with 
elections  full  as  continually,  and  far 
more  openly,  than  in  modern  times: 
The  difference  is,  that  a  secretary  of  the 
treasury,  or  peer's  agent,  does  that  with 
some  precaution  of  secrecy,  which  the 
council-board,  or  peer  himself,  under  the 
Tudors,  did  by  express  letters  to  the 
returning  officer;  and  that  the  operating 
motive  is  the  prospect  of  a  good  place 
in  the  excise  or  customs  for  compliance, 
rather  than  that  of  lying  some  months 
in  the  Fleet  for  disobedience. 

A  late  writer  has  asserted,  as  an  un- 
doubted fact,  which  "  historic  truth  re- 
quires to  be  mentioned,"  that  for  the 
first  parliament  of  Elizabeth  '•  five  can- 
didates were  nominated  by  the  court  for 
each  borough,  and  three  for  each  coun- 
ty; and  by  the  authority  of  the  sheriffs 
the  members  were  chosen  from  among 
the  candidates."  Butler's  Book  of  the 
Roman  Catholic  Church,  p.  225.  I 
never  met  with  any  tolerable  authority 
for  this,  and  believe  it  to  be  a  mere 
fabrication  ;  not  certainly  of  Mr.  Butler, 
who  is  utterly  incapable  of  a  wilful 
deviation  from  truth,  but  of  some  of 
those  whom  '  e  too  implicitl  •  follows. 


ELIZ.  -  Government.      DEBATE  ON  ELECTIONS.  265 

D'Ewes,  is  strikingly  contrasted  with  the  manliness  of  inde- 
pendent gentlemen.  And  as  the  house  was  by  no  means 
very  fully  attended,  the  divisions,  a  few  of  which  are  re- 
corded, running  from  200  to  250  in  the  aggregate,  it  may 
be  perceived  that  the  court,  whose  followers  were  at  hand, 
would  maintain  a  formidable  influence.  But  this  influence, 
however  pernicious  to  the  integrity  of  parliament,  is  distin- 
guishable from  that  exertion  of  almost  absolute  prerogative 
which  Hume  has  assumed  as  the  sole  spring  of  Elizabeth's 
government,  and  would  never  be  employed  till  some  defi- 
ciency of  strength  was  experienced  in  the  other. 

D'Ewes  has  preserved  a  somewhat  remarkable  debate  on 
a  bill  presented  in  the  session  of  1571,  in  order 
to  render  valid  electrons  of  non-resident  burgesses.  e]ecUon°of 
According  to  the  tenor  of  the  king's  writ,  con-  non-resident 
firmed  by  an  act  passed  under  Henry  V.,  eveiy 
city  and  borough  was  required  to  elect  none  but  members  of 
their  own  community.  To  this  provision,  as  a  seat  in  the  com- 
mons' house  grew  more  an  object  of  general  ambition,  while 
many  boroughs  fell  into  comparative  decay,  less  and  less  at- 
tention had  been  paid  ;  till,  the  greater  part  of  the  borough 
representatives  having  become  strangers,  it  was  deemed,  by 
some,  expedient  to  repeal  the  ancient  statute,  and  give  a 
sanction  to  the  innovation  that  time  had  wrought ;  while 
others  contended  in  favor  of  the  original  usage,  and  seemed 
anxious  to  restore  its  vigor.  It  was  alleged  on  the  one  hand, 
by  Mr.  Norton,  that  the  bill  would  take  away  all  pretence 
for  sending  unfit  men,  as  was  too  often  seen,  and  remove 
any  objection  that  might  be  started  to  the  sufficiency  of  the 
present  parliament,  wherein,  for  the  most  part,  ag"ainst  posi- 
tive law  strangers  to  their  several  boroughs  had  been  chosen: 
that  persons  able  and  fit  for  so  great  an  employment  ought 
to  be  preferred  without  regard  to  their  inhabitancy ;  since 
a  man  could  not  be  presumed  to  be  the  wiser  for  being  a 
resident  burgess :  and  that  the  whole  body  of  the  realm,  and 
the  service  of  the  same,  was  rather  to  be  respected  than  any 
private  regard  of  place  or  person.  This  is  a  remarkable, 
and  perhaps  the  earliest  assertion,  of  an  important  constitu- 
tional principle,  that  each  member  of  the  house  of  commong 
is  deputed  to  serve,  not  only  for  his  constituents,  but  for  the 
whole  kingdom ;  a  principle  which  marks  the  distinction  be- 
twee  i  a  modern  English  parliamc.it  and  -ucb  depiaationa 


266  DEBATE  ON  ELECTIONS.  CHAP.  V 

of  the  estates  as  were  assembled  in  several  continental  king- 
doms ;  a  principle  to  which  the  house  of  commons  is  in- 
debted for  its  weight  and  dignity,  as  well  as  its  beneficial  effi- 
ciency, and  which  none  but  the  servile  worshippers  of  the 
populace  are  ever  found  to  gainsay.  It  is  obvious  that  such 
a  principle  could  never  obtain  currency,  or  even  be  ad- 
vanced on  any  plausible  ground,  until  the  law  for  the  elec- 
tion of  resident  burgesses  had  gone  into  disuse. 

Those  who  defended  the  existing  law,  forgetting,  as  is 
often  the  case  with  the  defenders  of  existing  laws,  that  it  had 
lost  its  practical  efficacy,  urged  that  the  inferior  ranks  using 
manual  and  mechanical  arts  ought,  like  the  rest,  to  be  re- 
garded and  consulted  with  on  matters  which  concerned  them, 
and  of  which  strangers  could  less  judge.  "  We,"  said  a 
member,  "  who  have  never  seen  Berwick  or  St.  Michael's 
Mount,  can  but  blindly  guess  of  them,  albeit  we  look  on  the 
maps  that  come  from  thence,  or  see  letters  of  instruction 
sent ;  some  one  whom  observation,  experience,  and  due  con- 
sideration of  that  country  hath  taught,  can  more  perfectly 
open  what  shall  in  question  thereof  grow,  and  more  effectu- 
ally reason  thereupon,  than  the  skilfullest  otherwise  what- 
soever." But  the  greatest  mischief  resulting  from  an  aban- 
donment of  their  old  constitution  would  be  the  interference 
of  noblemen  with  elections :  lords'  letters,  it  was  said,  would 
from  henceforth  bear  the  sway ;  instances  of  which,  so  late  as 
the  days  of  Mary,  were  alleged,  though  no  one  cared  to  al- 
lude particularly  to  anything  of  a  more  recent  date.  Some 
proposed  to  impose  a  fine  of  forty  pounds  on  any  borough 
making  its  election  on  a  peer's  nomination.  The  bill  was 
committed  by  a  majority ;  but,  as  no  further  entry  appears 
in  the  Journals,  we  may  infer  it  to  have  dropped.1 

It  may  be  mentioned,  as  not  unconnected  with  this  subject, 
that  in  the  same  session  a  fine  was  imposed  on  the  borough 
of  Westbury  for  receiving  a  bribe  of  four  pounds  from 
Thomas  Long,  "  being  a  very  simple  man  and  of  small  ca- 
pacity to  serve  in  that  place ; "  and  the  mayor  was  ordered  to 
repay  the  money.  Long,  however,  does  not  seem  to  have 
been  expelled.  This  is  the  earliest  precedent  on  record  for 
the  punishment  of  bribery  in  elections.2 

We  shall  find  an  additional  proof  that  the  house  of  com- 

i  D'Ewes,  It8.  a  Journals,  p.  88. 


ELIZ.  —  Government.      ASSERTION  OF  PRIVILEGES.  267 

mons   under   the   Tudor   princes,  and  especially  Elizabeth, 
was  not  so  feeble  and  insignificant  an  assembly 
as  has  been  often  insinuated,  if  we  look  at  their  fre-  of  prm- 
quent  assertion  and  gradual  acquisition  of  those  pe-  J^J^ 
culiar  authorities  and  immunities  which  constitute 
what  is  called  privilege  of  parliament.     Of  these,  the  first, 
in  order  of  time  if  not  of  importance,  was  their  exemption 
from  arrest  on  civil  process  during  their  session.     Several 
instances  occurred  under  the  Plantagenet  dynasty  where  this 
privilege  was  claimed  and  admitted;  but  generally  by  means 
of  a  distinct  act  of  parliament,  or  at  least  by  a  writ  of  priv- 
ilege out  of  chancery.     The  house  of  commons  for  the  first 
time  took  upon  themselves  to  avenge  their  own 

..  •        te-iet          i  ,1  iii  i>  Case  of 

injury  in  Io43,  when  the  remarkable  case  of  Ferrers  un- 
George  Ferrers  occurred.  This  is  relatea  in  der  Henry 
detail  by  Hollingshed,  and  is  perhaps  the  only 
piece  of  constitutional  information  we  owe  to  him.  Without 
repeating  all  the  circumstances,  it  will  be  sufficient  here  to 
mention  that  the  commons  sent  their  sergeant  with  his  mace 
to  demand  the  release  of  Ferrers,  a  burgess  who  had  been 
arrested  on  his  way  to  the  house ;  that  the  jailers  and  sher- 
iffs of  London  having  not  only  refused  compliance,  but  ill- 
treated  the  sergeant,  they  compelled  them,  as  well  as  the 
sheriffs  of  London,  and  even  the  plaintiff  who  had  sued  the 
writ  against  Ferrers,  to  appear  at  the  bar  of  the  house,  and 
committed  them  .to  prison ;  and  that  the  king,  in  the  presence 
of  the  judges,  confirmed  in  the  strongest  manner  this  asser- 
tion of  privilege  by  the  commons.  It  was,  however,  so  far 
at  least  as  our  knowledge  extends,  a  very  important  novelty 
in  constitutional  practice ;  not  a  trace  occurring  in  any  for- 
mer instance  on  record,  either  of  a  party  being  delivered 
from  arrest  at  the  mere  demand  of  the  sergeant,  or  of  any 
one  being  committed  to  prison  by  the  sole  authority  of  the 
house  of  commons.  With  respect  to  the  first,  the  "  chancel- 
lor," says  Hollingshed,  "offered  to  grant  them  a  writ  of 
privilege,  which  they  of  the  commons'  house  refused,  being 
of  a  clear  opinion  that  all  commandments  and  other  acts  pro- 
cee.ding  from  the  nether  house  were  to  be  done  and  executed 
by  their  sergeant  without  writ,  only  by  show  of  his  mace, 
which  was  his  warrant."  It  might  naturally  seem  to  follow 
from  this  position,  if  it  were  conceded,  that  the  house  had  the 
same  power  of  attachment  for  contempt,  that  is,  of  commit- 


268  CASES   OF  PRIVILEGE.  CHAP.  V. 

ting  to  prison  persons  refusing  obedience  to  lawful  process, 
which  our  law  attributes  to  all  courts  of  justice,  as  essential 
to  the  discharge  of  their  duties.  The  king's  behavior  is 
worthy  of  notice:  while  he  dexterously  endeavors  to  insin- 
uate that  the  offence  was  rather  against  him  than  the  com- 
mons, Ferrers  happening  to  be  in  his  service,  he  displays 
that  cunning  flattery  towards  them  in  their  moment  of  ex- 
asperation which  his  daughter  knew  so  well  how  to  em- 
ploy.1 

Such  important  powers  were  not  likely  to  be  thrown 
Other  cases  away,  though  their  exertion  might  not  always  be 
of  privilege.  thought  expedient.  The  commons  had  sometimes 
recourse  to  a  writ  of  privilege  in  order  to  release  their  mem- 
bers under  arrest,  and  did  not  repeat  the  proceeding  in  Fer- 
rers's  case  till  that  of  Smalley,  a  member's  servant  in  1575, 
whom  they  sent  their  sergeant  to  deliver.  And  this  was  only 
"  after  sundry  reasons,  arguments,  and  disputations,"  as  the 
journal  informs  us ;  and,  what  is  more,  after  rescinding  a 
previous  resolution  that  they  could  find  no  precedents  for 
setting  at  liberty  any  one  in  arrest,  except  by  writ  of  privi- 
lege.2 It  is  to  be  observed  that  the  privilege  of  immunity 
extended  to  the  menial  servants  of  members,  till  taken  away 
by  the  statute  of  George  III.  Several  persons  however 
were,  at  different  times,  under  Mary  and  Elizabeth,  commit- 
ted by  the  house  to  the  Tower,  or  to  the  custody  of  their 
own  sergeant,  for  assaults  on  their  members.8  Smalley  him- 
self, above  mentioned,  it  having  been  discovered  that  he  had 
fraudulently  procured  this  arrest,  in  order  to  get  rid  of  the 
debt,  was  committed  for  a  month,  and  ordered  to  pay  the 
plaintiff  one  hundred  pounds,  which  was  possibly  the  amount 
of  what  he  owed.4  One  also,  who  had  served  a  subpoena  out 

i  Hollingshed,  vol.  iii.  p.  824.     (4to.  dents  before  the  constitution  had  been 

edit.)    Hatsell's  Precedents,  vol.  i.  p.  53.  reduced  into  a  system.     Carte,  vol.  iii. 

Mr.  Ilatsell  inclines  too  much,  in  my  p.  164,  endeavors  to  discredit  the  case  of 

opinion,  to  depreciate  the  authority  of  Ferrers   as  an  absolute  fable;   and  cer- 

this  case,  imagining  that  it  was  rather  as  tainly  points  out  some  inaccuracy  as  to 

the  king's  servant  than  as  a  member  of  dates  ;  but  it  is  highly  improbable  that 

the  house   that  Ferrers  was    delivered,  the  whole  should  be  an  invention.     He 

But,  though  Henry  artfully  endeavors  to  returns  to  the  subject  afterwards,  p.  541, 

rest  it  chiefly  on  this  ground,  it  appears  and.  with  a  folly   almost  inconceivable 

to  me  that  the  commons  claim  the  privi-  even  in  a  Jacobite,  supposes  the  puritans 

lege  as  belonging  to  themselves,  without  to  have  fabricated  the  tale,  and  prevailed 

the  least  reference  to  this  circumstance,  on  Hollingshed  to  insert  it  in  his  history. 

If  they  did  not  always  assert  it  after-  2  Journals,  Feb.  22d  and  27th. 

wards,  this  negative  presumption  is  very  3  Hatsell,  73,  92,  119. 

weak,  when  we  consider  how  common  it  5  Id.  90. 
was   to  overlook  or  recede  from  prece- 


ELIZ.  — Government.     CASES  OF  PRIVILEGE.  269 

of  the  star-chamber  on  a  member  in  the  session  of  1584,  was 
not  only  put  in  confinement,  but  obliged  to  pay  the  party's 
expenses  before  they  would  discharge  him,  making  his  hum- 
ble submission  on  his  knees.1  This  is  the  more  remarkable, 
inasmuch  as  the  chancellor  had  but  just  before  made  answer 
to  a  committee  deputed  "  to  signify  to  him  how,  by  the  an- 
cient liberties  of  the  house,  the  members  thereof  are  privi- 
leged from  being  served  with  subposnas,"  that  "  he  thought 
the  house  had  no  such  privilege,  nor  would  he  allow  any 
precedents  for  it,  unless  they  had  also  been  ratified  in  the 
court  of  chancery."  2  They  continued  to  enforce  this  sum- 
mary mode  of  redress  with  no  objection,  so  far  as  appears  by 
any  other  authority,  till,  before  the  end  of  the  queen's  reign, 
it  had  become  their  established  law  of  privilege  "  that  no 
subpoena  or  summons  for  the  attendance  of  a  member  in  any 
other  court  ought  to  be  served,  without  leave  obtained  or  in- 
formation given  to  the  house ;  and  that  the  persons  who  pro- 
cured or  served  such  process  were  guilty  of  a  breach  of 
privilege,  and  were  punishable  by  commitment  or  otherwise, 
by  the  order  of  the  house."  8  The  great  importance  of  such 
a  privilege  was  the  security  it  furnished,  when  fully  claimed 
and  acted  upon,  against  those  irregular  detentions  and  exam- 
inations by  the  council,  and  which,  in  despite  of  the  promised 
liberty  of  speech,  had,  as  we  have  seen,  oppressed  some  of 
their  most  distinguished  members.  But  it  must  be  owned 
that,  by  thus  suspending  all  civil  and  private  suits  against 
themselves,  the  commons  gave  too  much  encouragement  to 
needy  aid  worthless  men  who  sought  their  walls  as  a  place 
of  sanctuary. 

This  power  of  punishment,  as  it  were  for  contempt,  as- 
sumed in  respect  of  those  who  molested  members  of  the 
commons  by  legal  process,  was  still  more  naturally  applicable 
to  offences  against  established  order  committed  by  any  of 
themselves.  In  the  earliest  record  that  is  extant  of  their 
daily  proceedings,  the  Commons'  Journal  of  the  first  parlia- 
ment of  Edward  VI.,  we  find,  on  the  21st  January,  1547-8, 
a  short  entry  of  an  order  that  John  Storie,  one  of  the  bur- 
gesses, shall  be  committed  to  the  custody  of  the  sergeant. 
The  order  is  repeated  the  next  day ;  on  the  next,  articles  of 
accusation  are  read  against  Storie.  It  is  ordered  on  the  fol- 

1  Hateell,  97.  «  Id.  96.  »  Id.  119. 


270  CASES   OF  PKIVILEGE.  CHAP.  V. 

lowing  day  that  he  shall  be  committed  prisoner  to  the  Tower. 
His  wife  soon  after  presents  a  petition,  which  is  ordered  to  be 
delivered  to  the  protector.  On  the  20th  of  February  letters 
from  Storie  in  the  Tower  are  read.  These  probably  were 
not  deemed  satisfactory,  for  it  is  not  till  the  2d  of  March 
that  we  have  an  entry  of  a  letter  from  Mr.  Storie  in  the 
Tower  with  his  submission.  And  an  order  immediately  fol- 
lows, that  "  the  king's  privy  council  in  the  nether  house  shall 
humbly  declare  unto  the  lord  protector's  grace  that  the  reso- 
lution of  the  house  is,  that  Mr.  Storie  be  enlarged,  and  at 
liberty,  out  of  prison ;  and  to  require  the  king's  majesty  to 
forgive  him  his  offences  in  this  case  towards  his  majesty  and 
his  council." 

Storie  was  a  zealous  enemy  of  the  Reformation,  and  suf- 
fered death  for  treason  under  Elizabeth.  His  temper  ap- 
pears to  have  been  ungovernable ;  even  in  Mary's  reign  he 
fell  a  second  time  under  the  censure  of  'the  house  for  dis- 
respect to  the  speaker.  It  is  highly  probable  that  his  offence 
in  the  present  instance  was  some  ebullition  of  virulence 
against  the  changes  in  religion ;  for  the  first  entry  concerning 
him  immediately  follows  the  third  reading  of  the  bill  that 
established  the  English  liturgy.  It  is  also  manifest  that  he 
had  to  atone  for  language  disrespectful  to  the  protector's 
government,  as  well  as  to  the  house.  But  it  is  worthy  of 
notice  that  the  commons  by  their  single  authority  commit 
their  burgess  first  to  their  own  officer,  and  next  to  the  Tower ; 
and  that  upon  his  submission  they  inform  the  protector  of 
their  resolution  to  discharge  him  out  of  custody,  recommend- 
ing him  to  forgiveness  as  to  his  offence  against  the  council, 
which,  as  they  must  have  been  aware,  the  privilege  of  par- 
liament as  to  words  spoken  within  its  walls  (if  we  are  right 
in  supposing  such  to  have  been  the  case)  would  extend  to 
cover.  It  would  be  very  unreasonable  to  conclude  that  this 
is  the  first  instance  of  a  member's  commitment  by  order  of 
the  house,  the  earlier  journals  not  being  in  existence.  Nothing 
indicates  that  the  course  taken  was  unprecedented.  Yet  on 
the  other  hand  we  can  as  little  infer  that  it  rested  on  any 
previous  usage ;  and  the  times  were  just  such  in  which  a 
new  precedent  was  likely  to  be  established.  The  right  of 
the  house  indeed  to  punish  its  own  members  for  indecent 
abuse  of  the  liberty  of  speech  may  be  thought  to  result 
naturally  from  the  king's  concession  of  that  liberty ;  and  its 


.  —  Government.      CASES   OF  PRIVILEGE.  271 

right  to  preserve  order  in  debate  is  plainly  incident  to  that 
of  debating  at  all. 

In  the  subsequent  reign  of  Mary  Mr.  Copley  incurred  the 
displeasure  of  the  house  for  speaking  irreverent  words  of  her 
majesty,  and  was  committed  to  the  sergeant-at-arms  ;  but  the 
despotic  character  of  that  government  led  the  commons  to 
recede  in  some  degree  from  the  regard  to  their  own  privi- 
leges they  had  shown  in  the  former  case.  The  speaker  was 
directed  to  declare  this  offence  to  the  queen,  and  to  request 
her  mercy  for  the  offender.  Mary  answered  that  she  would 
well  consider  that  request,  but  desired  that  Copley  should  be 
examined  as  to  the  cause  of  his  behavior.  A  prorogation 
followed  the  same  day,  and  of  course  no  more  took  place  in 
this  affair.1 

A  more  remarkable  assertion  of  the  house's  right  to  inflict 
punishment  on  its  own  members  occurred  in  1581,  and, 
being  much  better  known  than  those  I  have  mentioned,  has 
been  sometimes  treated  as  the  earliest  precedent.  One  Ar- 
thur Hall,  a  burgess  for  Grantham,  was  charged  with  having 
caused  to  be  published  a  book  against  the  present  parliament, 
on  account  of  certain  proceedings  in  the  last  session,  wherein 
he  was  privately  interested,  "  not  only  reproaching  some  partic- 
ular good  members  of  the  house,  but  also  very  much  slander- 
ous and  derogatory  to  its  general  authority,  power,  and  state, 
and  prejudicial  to  the  validity  of  its  proceedings  in  making 
and  establishing  of  laws."  Hall  was  the  master  of  Smalley, 
whose  case  has  been  mentioned  above,  and  had  so  much  in- 
curred the  displeasure  of  the  house  by  his  supposed  privity 
to  the  fraud  of  his  servant,  that  a  bill  was  brought  in  and 
read  a  first  time,  the  precise  nature  of  which  does  not  ap- 
pear, but  expressed  to  be  against  him  and  two  of  his  ser- 
vants. It  seems  probable,  from  these  and  some  other  pas- 
sages in  the  entries  that  occur  on  this  subject  in  the  journal, 
that  Hall  in  his  libel  had  depreciated  the  house  of  commons 
as  an  estate  of  parliament,  and  especially  in  respect  of  its 
privileges,  pretty  much  in  the  strain  which  the  advocates  of 
prerogative  came  afterwards  to  employ.  Whatever  share 
therefore  personal  resentment  may  have  had  in  exasperating 
the  house,  they  had  a  public  quarrel  to  avenge  against  one 
of  their  members,  who  was  led  by  pique  to  betray  their  an- 

1  Journals,  5th  and  7th  March,  1557-8. 


272  OASES  OF  PKIVILEGE.  CHAP.  V, 

cient  liberties.  The  vengeance  of  popular  assemblies  is  not 
easily  satisfied.  Though  Hall  made  a  pretty  humble  sub- 
mission, they  went  on,  by  a  unanimous  vote,  to  heap  every 
punishment  in  their  power  upon  his  head.  They  expelled 
him,  they  imposed  a  fine  of  five  hundred  marks  upon  him, 
they  sent  him  to  the  Tower  until  he  should  make  a  satisfac- 
tory retraction.  At  the  end  of  the  session  he  had  not  been 
released ;  nor  was  it  the  design  of  the  commons  that  his  im- 
prisonment should  then  terminate ;  but  their  own  dissolution, 
which  ensued,  put  an  end  to  the  business.1  Hall  sat  in  some 
later  parliaments.  This  is  the  leading  precedent,  as  far  as 
records  show,  for  the  power  of  expulsion,  which  the  com- 
mons have  ever  retained  without  dispute  of  those  who  would 
most  curtail  their  privileges.  But  in  1558  it  had  been  put 
to  the  vote  whether  one  outlawed  and  guilty  of  divers  frauds 
should  continue  to  sit,  and  carried  in  his  favor  by  a  very 
small  majority ;  which  affords  a  presumption  that  the  right 
of  expulsion  was  already  deemed  to  appertain  to  the  house.2 
They  exercised  it  with  no  small  violence  in  the  session  of 
1585  against  the  famous  Dr.  Parry,  who,  having  spoken 
warmly  against  the  bill  inflicting  the  penalty  of  death  on 
Jesuits  and  seminary  priests,  as  being  cruel  and  bloody,  the 
commons  not  only  ordered  him  into  the  custody  of  the  ser- 
geant, for  opposing  a  bill  approved  of  by  a  committee,  and 
directed  the  speaker  to  reprimand  him  upon  his  knees,  but, 
on  his  failing  to  make  a  sufficient  apology,  voted  him  no 
longer  a  burgess  of  that  house.8  The  year  afterwards  Bland, 
a  currier,  was  brought  to  their  bar  for  using  what  were 
judged  contumelious  expressions  against  the  house  for  some- 
thing they  had  done  in  a  matter  of  little  moment,  and  dis- 
charged on  account  of  his  poverty,  on  making  submission, 
and  paying  a  fine  of  twenty  shillings.4  In  this  case  they 

i  D'Ewes,  291.    Hatsell,  93.    The  latter  displeasure  of  the  commons  in  the  sea- 

says,  "  I  cannot  but  suspect  that  there  sion  of  1572,  when  he  was  ordered  to  be 

was  some   private  history  in  this  affair,  warned  by  the  sergeant  to  appear  at  the 

some  particular  offence  against  the  queen,  bar,  "  to  answer  for  sundry  lewd  speeches 

with  which  we  are  unacquainted."     But  used  as  well  in  the  house  as  elsewhere." 

1   believe   the  explanation  I  have  given  Another  entry  records  him  to  have  been 

will  be    thought  more   to   the  purpose;  "charged   with    seven    several  articles, 

and,   so   far   from   having  offended    the  but,  having  humbly  submitted  himself 

queen,  Hall  seems  to  have  had  a  patron  to  the  house  and  confessed  his  folly,  to 

In    lord    Burleigh,    to    whom    he   wrote  have  been    upon   the  question   released 

many   letters,  complaining  of  the  com-  with  a  good  exhortation  from  the  speak- 

mons,   which   are   extant   in   the   Lans-  er."     D'Ewes,  207,  212. 

downe  collection.     He   appears   to    have  2  Hatsell,  80.  . 

been  a  man  of  eccentric  and  unpopular  3  D'Ewes,  341. 

character,  and  had  already  incurred  the  *  Id.  3o6.    This  case,  though  of  con- 


KLIZ.  — Government.      OF  CONTESTED  ELECTIONS.  273 

perhaps  stretched  their  power  somewhat  farther  than  in  the 
case  of  Arthur  Hall,  who,  as  one  of  their  body,  might  seem 
more  amenable  to  their  jurisdiction. 

The  commons  asserted  in  this  reign,  perhaps  for  the  first 
time,  another  and  most  important  privilege,  the  right  PriTilege  of 
of  determining  all  matters  relative  to  their  own  determining 
elections.    Difficulties  of  this  nature  had  in  former  elections 
times  been  decided  in  chancery,  from  which  the  claimed  by 

,          ,    .  i  •  i       i  ^      the  house. 

writ  issued,  and  into  which  the  return  was  made. 
Whether  no  cases  of  interference  on  the  part  of  the  house 
had  occurred  it  is  impossible  to  pronounce,  on  account  of  the 
unsatisfactory  state  of  the  rolls  and  journals  of  parliament 
under  Edward  IV.,  Henry  VII.,  and  Henry  VIII.  One 
remarkable  entry,  however,  may  be  found  in  the  reign  of 
Mary,  when  a  committee  is  appointed  "  to  inquire  if  Alexan- 
der Nowell,  prebendary  of  Westminster,  may  be  of  the 
house ; "  and  it  is  declared  next  day  by  them  that  "  Alexan- 
der Nowell,  being  prebendary  in  Westminster,  and  thereby 
having  voice  in  the  convocation  house,  cannot  be  a  member 
of  this  house ;  and  so  agreed  by  the  house,  and  the  queen's 
writ  to  be  directed  for  another  burgess  in  his  place."  * 
Nothing  further  appears  on  record  till  in  1586  the  house  ap- 
pointed a  committee  to  examine  the  state  and  circumstances 
of  the  returns  for  the  county  of  Norfolk.  The  fact  was,  that 
the  chancellor  had  issued  a  second  writ  for  thia  county,  on 
the  ground  of  some  irregularity  in  the  first  return,  and  a 
different  person  had  been  elected.  Some  notice  having  been 
taken  of  this  matter  in  the  commons,  the  speaker  received 
orders  tq  signify  to  them  her  majesty's  displeasure  that  "  the 
house  had  been  troubled  with  a  thing  impertinent  Jfor  them 
to  deal  with,  and  only  belonging  to  the  charge  and  office  of 
the  lord  chancellor,  whom  she  had  appointed  to  confer  with 
the  judges  about  the  returns  for  the  county  of  Norfolk,  and 
to  act  therein  according  to  justice  and  right."  The  house, 
in  spite  of  this  peremptory  inhibition,  proceeded  to  nominate 
a  committee  to  examine  into  and  report  the  circumstances 
of  these  returns ;  who  reported  the  whole  case,  with  their 
opinion  that  those  elected  on  the  first  writ  should  take  their 

siderable  importance,  is    overlooked  by  leges,  p.  127.    Though  he  mentions  only 

Hatsell,  who  speaks  of  that  of  Hall  as  libels,  certainly  the  punishment  of  words 

the  only  one,  before  the  long  parliament,  spoken  is  at  least  as  strong  au  exercise  of 

wlii'rriu  Mu-  commons  have  punished  the  power, 

authors  of  libfis  derogatory  to  their  privi-  l  Journals,  1  Mary,  p.  2J. 

VOL.  1.  —  C.  18 


274  CASES   OF  PRIVILEGE.  CHAP.  7 

seats,  declaring  further  that  they  understood  the  chancellor 
and  some  of  the  judges  to  be  of  the  same  opinion ;  but  that 
"  they  had  not  thought  it  proper  to  inquire  of  the  chancellor 
what  he  had  done,  because  they  thought  it  prejudicial  to  the 
privilege  of  the  house  to  have  the  same  determined  by  others 
than  such  as  were  members  thereof.  And  though  they 
thought  very  reverently  of  the  said  lord  chancellor  and 
judges,  and  knew  them  to  be  competent  judges  in  their 
places ;  yet  in  this  case  they  took  them  not  for  judges  in 
parliament  in  this  house :  and  thereupon  required  that  the 
members,  if  it  were  so  thought  good,  might  take  their  oaths 
and  be  allowed  of  by  force  of  the  first  writ,  as  allowed  by  the 
censure  of  this  house,  and  not  as  allowed  of  by  the  said  lord 
chancellor  and  judges.  Which  was  agreed  unto  by  the 
whole  house."1  This  judicial  control  over  their  elections 
was  not  lost.  A  committee  was  appointed,  in  the  session  of 
1589,  to  examine  into  sundry  abuses  of  returns,  among 
which  is  enumerated  that  some  are  returned  for  new  places.4 
And  several  instances  of  the  house's  deciding  on  elections 
occur  in  subsequent  parliaments. 

This  tenaciousness  of  their  own  dignity  and  privileges  was 
shown  in  some  disagreements  with  the  upper  house.  They 
complained  to  the  lords  in  1597  that  they  had  received  a 
message  from  the  commons  at  their  bar  without  uncovering 
or  rising  from  their  places.  But  the  lords  proved,  upon  a 
conference,  that  this,  was  agreeable  to  usage  in  the  case  of 
messages ;  though,  when  bills  were  brought  up  from  the 
lower  house,  the  speaker  of  the  lords  always  left  his  place, 
and  received  them  at  the  bar.8  Another  remonstrance  of 
the  commons,  against  having  amendments  to  bills  sent  down 
to  them  on  paper  instead  of  parchment,  seems  a  little  frivo- 
lous, but  serves  to  indicate  a  rising  spirit,  jealous  of  the 
superiority  that  the  peers  had  arrogated.4  In  one  point  more 
material,  and  in  which  they  had  more  precedent  on  their 
side,  the  commons  successfully  vindicated  their  privilege. 
The  lords  sent  them  a  message  in  the  session  of  1593,  re- 
minding them  of  the  queen's  want  of  a  supply,  and  request- 
ing that  a  committee  of  conference  might  be  appointed.  This 
was  accordingly  done,  and  sir  Robert  Cecil  reported  from  it 
that  the  lords  would  consent  to  nothing  less  than  a  grant  of 

1  D'Ewes,  393,  &c.  *  Id.  430.  *  Id.  539  *  Id.  596. 


ELIZ.  — Government.      THE  MONARCHY  NOT  ABSOLUTE.      275 

three  entire  subsidies,  the  commons  having  shown  a  reluc- 
tance to  give  more  than  two.  But  Mr.  Francis  Bacon  said, 
"  he  yielded  to  the  subsidy,  but  disliked  that  this  house  should 
join  with  the  upper  house  in  granting  it.  For  the  custom 
and  privilege  of  this  house  hath  always  been,  first  to  make 
offer  of  the  subsidies  from  hence,  then  to  the  upper  house ; 
except  it  were  that  they  present  a  bill  unto  this  house,  with 
desire  of  our  assent  thereto,  and  then  to  send  it  up  again." 
But  the  house  were  now  so  much  awakened  to  the  privilege 
of  originating  money-bills,  that,  in  spite  of  all  the  exertions 
of  the  court,  the  proposition  for  another  conference  with  the 
lords  was  lost  on  a  division  by  217  to  128.1  It  was  by  this 
opposition  to  the  ministry  in  this  session  that  Bacon,  who 
acted  perhaps  full  as  much  from  pique  towards  the  Cecils, 
and  ambitious  attachment  to  Essex,  as  from-  any  real  pa- 
triotism, so  deeply  offended  the  queen,  that,  with  all  his 
subsequent  pliancy,  he  never  fully  reinstated  himself  in  her 
favor.2 

That  the  government  of  England  was  a  monarchy  bounded 
by  law,  far  unlike  the  actual  state  of  the  principal 

,-:-,'  t     v   -  The  English 

kingdoms  on  the  continent,  appears  to  have  been  constitution 
so  obvious  and  fundamental  a  truth,  that  flattery  ^^^  b<, 
itself  did  not  venture  directly  to  contravene  it.  an  absolute 
Hume  has  laid  hold  of  a  passage  in  Raleigh's  pref-  monarehy- 
ace  to  his  History  of  the  World  (written  indeed  a  few  years 
later  than  the  age  of  Elizabeth),  as  if  it  fairly  represented 
public  opinion  as  to  our  form  of  government.     Raleigh  says 
that  Philip  II.  "  attempted  to  make  himself  not  only  an  ab- 
solute monarch  over  the  Netherlands,  like  unto  the  kings 
and  sovereigns  of  England  and  France ;  but,  Turk-like,  to 
tread  under  his  feet  all  their  national  and  fundamental  laws, 
privileges,  and  ancient  rights."     But  who,  that  was  really 
desirous  of  establishing  the  truth,  would  have  brought  Ra- 
leigh into  court  as  an   unexceptionable   witness  on  such  a 
question  ?     Unscrupulous   ambition  taught  men  in  that  age, 
who  sought  to  win  or  regain  the  crown's  favor,  to  falsify  all 

i  D'Kwes,   486.     Another    trifling  cir-  dignity  ;  and  the  secretary,  who  knew,  as 

cumstance  may  be  mentioned   to  show  later  ministers  have  done,  that  the  com- 

the  rising  spirit  of  the  age.     In  the  ses-  mons  are  never  so  unmanageable  as  on 

sion  of  1601,   sir  Robert    Cecil    having  such   points  of  honor,   made  a   proper 

proposed  that  the  speaker  should  attend  apology.     Id.  627. 

the  lord  keeper  about  some  matter,  sir  -  Birch's  Memoirs,  i.  97,  120,  152,  & 

Edward  Hobby   took    up   the  word    in  ii.  129.    Bacon's  Works,  ii.  416,  435. 
stroug  language,  as  derogatory  to  their 


276  THE  CONSTITUTION  CHAP.  V. 

law  and  fact  in  behalf  of  prerogative,  as  unblushingly  as  our 
modern  demagogues  exaggerate  and  distort  the  liberties  of 
the  people.1  The  sentence  itself,  if  designed  to  carry  the 
full  meaning  that  Hume  assigns  to  it,  is  little  better  than  an 
absurdity.  For  why  were  the  rights  and  privileges  of  the 
Netherlands  more  fundamental  than  those  of  England?  and 
by  what  logic  could  it  be  proved  more  Turk-like  to  impose 
the  tax  of  the  twentieth  penny,  or  to  bring  Spanish  troops 
into  those  provinces,  in  contravention  of  their  ancient  char- 
ters, than  to  transgress  the  Great  Charter  of  this  kingdom, 
with  all  those  unrescinded  statutes  and  those  traditional 
unwritten  liberties  which  were  the  ancient  inheritance  of  its 
subjects?  Or  could  any  one,  conversant  in  the  slightest  de- 
gree with  the  two  countries,  range  in  the  same  class  of  ab- 
solute sovereigns  the  kings  of  France  and  England  ?  The 
arbitrary  acts  of  our  Tudor  princes,  even  of  Henry  VIII., 
were  trifling  in  comparison  of  the  despotism  of  Francis  I. 
and  Henry  II.,  who  forced  their  most  tyrannical  ordinances 
down  the  throats  of  the  parliament  of  Paris  with  all  the  vio- 
lence of  military  usurpers.  No  permanent  law  had  ever 
been  attempted  in  England,  nor  any  internal  tax  imposed, 
without  consent  of  the  people's  representatives.  No  law  in 
France  had  ever  received  such  consent ;  nor  had  the  taxes, 
enormously  burdensome  as  they  were  in  Raleigh's  time, 
been  imposed,  for  one  hundred  and  fifty  years  past,  by  any 
higher  authority  than  a  royal  ordinance.  If  a  few  nobler 
spirits  had  protested  against  the  excessive  despotism  of  the 
house  of  Valois ;  if  La  Boetie  had  drunk  at  the  springs  of 
classical  republicanism ;  if  Hottoman  had  appealed  to  the 
records  of  their  freeborn  ancestry  that  surrounded  the  throne 
of  Clovis  ;  if  Languet  had  spoken  in  yet  a  bolder  tone  of  a 

1  Raleigh's  Dedication  of  his  Preroga-  pulous  about  troth.    ID  another  of  his 

tive  of  Parliaments  to  James  I.  contains  tracts,  entitled  "  The  Prince ;  or,  Thesau- 

terrible  things.     "  The  bonds  of  subjects  rus  of  State,"  he  holds,  though  not  with- 

to  their  kings  should  always  be  wrought  out  flattery  towards  James,  a  more  rea- 

out   of  iron,  the   bonds  of  kings   unto  sonable  language.      "  In  every  just  state 

subjects    but    with    cobwebs."  —  "All  some  part  of  the  government  is  or  ought 

binding   of   a   king    by   law   upon    the  to  be  imparted  to  the  people  ;    as,  in  a 

advantage  of   his   necessity   makes   the  kingdom,  a  voice  or  suffrage  in  making 

breach  itself  lawful  in  a  king;  his  char-  laws;  and  sometimes  also  in  levying  of 

ters  and  all  other  instruments  being  no  arms,   if  the    charge  be  great  and    the 

other  than  the  surviving  witnesses  of  his  prince  be   forced  to  borrow  help  of  hia 

•unconstrained  will."     The  object,   how-  subjects,  the  matter  rightly  may  be  pro- 

ever,  of  the  book  is  to  persuade  the  king  pouuded  to  a  parliament,  that  the  tas 

to  call  a  parliament  (about  1(313),  and  we  may  seeui  to  have  proceeded  from  them 

are  not  to  suppose  that  Raleigh  meant  selves." 
what  he  said.    He  was  never  very  sera- 


ELIZ.  —  Government.     NOT  AN  ABSOLUTE  MONARCHY.       277 


rightful  resistance  to  tyranny ; l  if  the  Jesuits  and  partisans 
of  the  League  had  cunningly  attempted  to  win  men's  hearts 
to  their  faction  by  the  sweet  sounds  of  civil  liberty  and  the 
popular  origin  of  politic  rule ;  yet  these  obnoxious  paradoxes 
availed  little  with  the  nation,  which,  after  the  wild  fanaticism 
of  a  rebellion  arising  wholly  from  religious  bigotry  had 
passed  away,  relapsed  at  once  into  its  patient  loyalty,  its 
self-complacent  servitude.  But  did  the  English  ever  recog- 
nize, even  by  implication,  the  strange  parallels  which  Raleigh 
has  made  for  their  government  with  that  of  France,  and 
Hume  with  that  of  Turkey?  The  language  adopted  in 
addressing  Elizabeth  was  always  remarkably  submissive. 
Hypocritical  adulation  was  so  much  among  the  vices  of  that 
age,  that  the  want  of  it  passed  for  rudeness.  Yet  Onslow, 
speaker  of  the  parliament  of  1566,  being  then  solicitor-gen- 
eral, in  addressing  the  queen,  says,  "  By  our  common  law, 
although  there  be  for  the  prince  provided  many  princely 
prerogatives  and  royalties,  yet  it  is  not  such  as  the  prince 
can  take  money  or  other  things,  or  do  as  he  will  at  his  own 
pleasure  without  order,  but  quietly  to  suffer  his  subjects  to 
enjoy  their  own,  without  wrongful  oppression ;  wherein  other 
princes  by  their  liberty  do  take  as  pleaseth  them."  2 


l  Le  Centre  Un  of  I/a  Boetie,  the  friend 
of  Montaigne,  is,  as  the  title  intimates,  a 
vehement  philippic  against  monarchy. 
It  is  subjoined  to  some  editions  of  the 
latters  essays.  The  Franco-Gallia  of 
Hottoman  contains  little  more  than 
extracts  from  Fredegarius,  Ainjoin,  and 
other  ancient  writers,  to  prove  the  ebc- 
tive  character  and  general  freedom  of 
the  monarchy  tinder  the  two  first  races. 
This  made  a  considerable  impression 
at  the  time,  though  the  passages  in 
question  have  been  so  often  quoted 
since,  that  we  are  now  almost  surprised 
to  find  the  book  so  devoid  of  novelty. 
Hubert  Languet's  Yindicise  contra  Ty- 
rannos,  published  nnder  the  name  of 
Junius  Brutus,  is  a  more  argumentative 
discussion  of  the  rights  of  governors 
»ud  their  subjects. 

*  D'Ewes,  p.  115. 

I  have  already  adverted  to  Gardiner's 
res  ilute  assertion  of  the  law  against  the 
prh.ce's  single  will,  as  a  proof  that,  in 
ipite  of  Hume's  preposterous  insinua- 
tions to  the  contrary,  the  English  mon- 
archy was  known  and  acknowledged  to 
be  limited.  Another  testimony  may  be 
adduced  from  the  words  of  a  great  prot- 
estant  churchman.  Archbishop  Parker, 
writing  to  Cecil  to  justify  himself  for  not 


allowing  the  queen's  right  to  grant  some 
dispensation  in  a  case  of  marriage,  says, 
"  he  would  not  dispute  of  the  queen's 
absolute  power,  or  prerogative  royal, 
how  far  her  highness  might  go  in  follow- 
ing the  Roman  authority ;  but  he  yet 
doubted  that,  if  any  dispensation  should 
pass  from  her  authority,  to  any  subject, 
not  avoucbable  by  laws  of  her  realm, 
made  and  established  by  herself  and  her 
three  estates,  whether  that  subject  be  in 
surety  at  all  times  afterwards  :  especially 
seeing  there  be  parliament  laws  precisely 
determining  cases  of  dispensations." 
Strype's  Parker,  177. 

Perhaps,  however,  there  is  no  morn 
decisive  testimony  to  the  established 
principles  of  limited  monarchy  in  the 
age  of  Elizabeth  than  a  circumstance 
mentioned  in  Anderson's  Reports,  154. 
The  queen  had  granted  to  Mr.  Richard 
Cavendish  an  office  for  issuing  certain 
writs,  and  directed  the  judges  to  admit 
him  to  it,  which  they  neglected  ( that  is, 
did  not  think  fit)  to  do.  Cavendish 
hereupon  obtained  a  letter  from  her 
majesty,  expressing  her  surprise  that 
he  was  not  admitted  according  to  her 
grant,  and  commanding  them  to  se- 
quester the  profits  of  the  office  for  his 
use,  or  that  of  any  other  to  whom  these 


278 


BISHOP  AYLMER 


CHAP.  7 


In  the  first  months  of  Elizabeth's  reign,  Aylmer,  after- 
wards bishop  of  London,  published  an  answer  to  a  book  by 
John  Knox,  against  female  monarchy,  or,  as  he  termed  it, 
"  Blast  of  the  Trumpet  against  the  Monstrous  Regiment  of 
Women,"  which,  though  written  in  the  time  of  Mary,  and  di- 
rected against  her,  was,  of  course,  not  acceptable  to  her  sis- 
ter. The  answerer  relies,  among  other  arguments,  on  the 
nature  of  the  English  constitution,  which,  by  diminishing  the 
power  of  the  crown,  renders  it  less  unfit  to  be  worn  by  a 
woman.  "  Well,"  he  says,  "  a  woman  may  not  reign  in 


might  appear  to  be  due,  as  soon  as  the 
controversy  respecting  the  execution  of 
the  said  office  should  be  decided.  It  is 
plain  that  some  other  persons  were  in 
possession  of  these  profits,  or  claimed  a 
right  therein.  The  judges  conceived 
that  they  could  not  lawfully  act  accord- 
ing to  the  said  letter  and  command, 
because  through  such  a  sequestration 
of  the  emoluments  those  who  claimed  a 
right  to  issue  the  writs  would  be  dis- 
seised of  their  freehold.  The  queen, 
informed  that  they  did  not  obey  the  let- 
ter, sent  another,  under  the  sign-man- 
ual, in  more  positive  language,  ending 
in  these  words  :  "  We  look  that  you  and 
every  of  you  should  dutifully  fulfil  our 
commandment  herein,  and  these  our 
letters  shall  be  your  warrant."  21st 
April,  1587.  This  letter  was  delivered 
to  the  justices  in  the  presence  of  the 
chancellor  and  lord  Leicester,  who  were 
commissioned  to  hear  their  answer, 
telling  them  also  that  the  queen  had 
granted  the  patent  on  account  of  her 
great  desire  to  provide  for  Cavendish. 
The  judges  took  a  little  time  to  consult 
what  should  be  said;  and,  returning  to 
the  lords,  answered  that  they  desired  in 
all  respects  humbly  to  obey  her  majesty ; 
but,  as  this  case  is,  could  not  do  so  with- 
out perjury,  which  they  well  knew  the 
queen  would  not  require,  and  so  went 
away.  Their  answer  was  reported  to  the 
queen,  who  ordered  the  chancellor,  chief 
justice  of  the  king's  bench,  and  master 
of  the  rolls,  to  hear  the  judges'  reasons, 
and  the  queen's  council  were  ordered  to 
attend  ;  when  the  queen's  sergeant  began 
to  show  the  queen's  prerogative  to  grant 
the  issuing  of  writs,  and  showed  pre- 
cedents. The  judges  protested  in  answer 
that  they  had  every  wish  to  assist  her 
majesty  to  all  her  rights,  but  said  that 
this  manner  of  proceeding  was  out  of 
course  of  justice;  and  gave  their  reasons, 
that  the  right  of  issuing  these  writs  and 
fees  incident  to  it  was  in  the  prothono- 
taries  and  others,  who  claimed  it  by  free- 


hold ;  who  ought  to  be  made  to  answer, 
and  not  the  judges,  being  more  in- 
terested therein.  This  was  certainly  a 
little  feeble,  but  they  soon  recovered 
themselves.  They  were  then  charged 
with  having  neglected  to  obey  these 
letters  of  the  queen  ;  which  they  con- 
fessed, but  said  that  this  was  no  offence 
or  contempt  towards  her  majesty,  be- 
cause the  command  was  against  the  law 
of  the  land  ;  in  which  case,  they  said, 
no  one  is  bound  to  obey  such  command. 
When  further  pressed,  they  said  the 
queen  herself  was  sworn  to  keep  the 
laws  as  well  as  they ;  and  that  they 
could  not  obey  this  command  without 
going  against  the  laws  directly  and 
plainly,  against  their  oaths,  and  to  the 
offence  of  God,  her  majesty,  the  country 
and  commonwealth  in  which  they  were 
born  and  live :  so  that,  if  the  fear  of 
God  were  gone  from  them,  yet  the 
examples  of  others,  and  the  punishment 
of  those  who  had  formerly  transgressed 
the  laws,  would  remind  them  and  keep 
them  from  such  an  offence.  Then  they 
cited  the  Spensers,  and  Thorp,  a  judge 
under  Edward  III.,  and  precedents  of 
Richard  II. 's  time,  and  of  Empsou,  and 
the  statutes  of  Magna  Charta,  which  show 
what  a  crime  it  is  for  judges  to  infringe 
the  laws  of  the  land  ;  and  thus,  since  the 
queen  and  the  judges  were  sworn  to  ob- 
serve them,  they  said  that  they  would 
not  act  as  was  commanded  in  these 
letters. 

All  this  was  repeated  to  her  majesty 
for  her  good  allowance  of  the  said 
reasons,  and  which  her  majesty,  as  I 
have  heard,  says  the  reporter,  took  well  ; 
but  nothing  further  was  heard  of  the 
business.  Such  was  the  law  and  the 
government,  which  Mr.  Hume  has  com- 
pared to  that  of  Turkey  !  It  is  almost 
certain  that  neither  James  nor  Charles 
would  have  made  so  discreet  a  sacrifice 
of  their  pride  and  arbitrary  temper  ;  and 
in  this  self-command  lay  the  great 
superiority  of  Elizabeth's  policy. 


ELIZ.  — Government.      ON  FEMALE  SUCCESSION  279 

England !  Better  in  England  than  anywhere,  as  it  shall 
well  appear  to  him  that  without  affection  will  consider  the 
kind  'of  'regiment.  While  I  compare  ours  with  other,  as  it 
is  in  itself,  and  not  maimed  by  usurpation,  I  can  find  none 
either  so  good  or  so  indifferent.  The  regiment  of  England 
is  not  a  mere  monarchy,  as  some  for  lack  of  consideration 
think,  nor.  a  mere  oligarchy  nor  democracy,  but  a  rule  mixed 
of  all  these,  wherein  each  one  of  these  have,  or  should  have, 
like  authority.  The  image  whereof,  and  not  the  image  but 
the  thing  indeed,  is  to  be  seen  in  the  parliament-house,  where- 
in you  shall  find  these  three  estates  —  the  king  or  queen 
which  representeth  the  monarchy,  the  noblemen  which  be 
the  aristocracy,  and  the  burgesses  and  knights  the  democ- 
racy. If  the  parliament  use  their  privileges,  the  king  can 
ordain  nothing  without  them  :  if  he  do,  it  is  his  fault  in  usurp- 
ing it,  and  their  fault  in  permitting  it.  Wherefore,  in  my 
judgment,  those  that  in  king  Henry  VIII.'s  days  would  not 
grant  him  that  his  proclamations  should  have  the  force  of  a 
statute  were  good  fathers  of  the  country,  and  worthy  com- 
mendation in  defending  their  liberty.  But  to  what  purpose 
is  all  this  ?  To  declare  that  it  is  not  in  England  so  danger- 
ous a  matter  to  have  a  woman  ruler  as  men  take  it  to  be. 
For  first,  it  is  not  she  that  ruleth,  but  the  laws,  the  executors 
whereof  be  her  judges  appointed  by  her,  her  justices,  and 
such  other  officers.  Secondly,  she  maketh  no  statutes  or 
laws,  but  the  honorable  court  of  parliament ;  she  breaketb. 
none,  but  it  must  be  she  and  they  together,  or  else  not 
If,  on  the  other  part,  the  regiment  were  such  as  all  hanged 
on  the  king's  or  queen's  will,  and  not  up"on  the  laws  writ- 
ten ;  if  she  might  decree  and  make  laws  alone  without  her 
senate  ;  if  she  judged  offences  according  to  her  wisdom,  and 
not  by  limitation  of  statutes  and  laws ;  if  she  might  dispose 
alone  of  war  and  peace ;  if,  to  be  short,  she  were  a  mere 
monarch  and  not  a  mixed  ruler,  you  might  peradventure 
make  me  to  fear  the  matter  the  more,  and  the  less  to  defend 
the  cause." l 

This  passage  affords  a  proof  of  the  doctrine  current  among 
Englishmen  in  1559,  and  may,  perhaps,  be  the  less  suspected 
as  it  does  not  proceed  from  a  legal  pen.  And  the  quotations 

l  Harborowe    of    True    and    faithful    Knox,  vol.  i.  note  BB,  to  whom  I  am  in- 
Bubjects,  1569.    Most  of  this  passage  is    debted  for  pointing  it  out. 
quoted  by  Dr.  M'Crie,  in  his   Life  of 


280  PRETENSIONS  OF  THE  CROWN.  CHAP.  V. 

I  have  made  in  the  last  chapter  from  Hooker  are  evidence 
still  more  satisfactory,  on  account  of  the  gravity  and  judi- 
ciousness of  the  writer,  that  the  same  theory  of  the'  constitu- 
tion prevailed  in  the  later  period  of  Elizabeth's  reign.  It 
may  be  observed  that  those  who  speak  of  the  limitations  of 
the  sovereign's  power,  and  of  the  acknowledged  liberties  of 
the  subject,  use  a  distinct  and  intelligible  language,  while  the 
opposite  tenets  are  insinuated  by  means  of  vague  and  ob- 
scure generalities,  as  in  the  sentence  above  quoted  from 
Raleigh.  Sir  Thomas  Smith,  secretary  of  state  to  Elizabeth, 
has  bequeathed  us  a  valuable  legacy  in  his  treatise  on  the 
commonwealth  of  England.  But  undoubtedly  he  evades,  as 
far  as  possible,  all  great  constitutional  principles,  and  treats 
them,  if  at  all,  with  a  vagueness  and  timidity  very  different 
from  the  tone  of  Fortescue.  He  thus  concludes  his  chap- 
ter on  the  parliament :  "  This  is  the  order  and  form  of 
the  highest  and  most  authentical  court  of  England,  by  virtue 
whereof  all  these  things  be  established  whereof  I  spoke  be- 
fore, and  no  other  means  accounted  available  to  make  any 
new  forfeiture  of  life,  members,  or  lands,  of  any  Englishman, 
where  there  was  no  law  ordered  for  it  before." 1  This 
leaves  no  small  latitude  for  the  authority  of  royal  proclama- 
tions, which  the  phrase,  I  make  no  question,  was  studiously 
adopted  in  order  to  preserve. 

There  was  unfortunately  a  notion  very  prevalent  in   the 
cabinet  of  Elizabeth,  though  it  was  not  quite  so 

jrretensions  '  o  ^ 

of  the  broadly  or  at  least  so  frequently  promulgated  as  in 

the  following  reigns,  that,  besides  the  common  pre- 
rogatives of  the  English  crown,  which  were  admitted  to  have 
legal  bounds,  there  was  a  kind  of  paramount  sovereignty, 
which  they  denominated  her  absolute  power,  incident,  as  they 
pretended,  to  the  abstract  nature  of  sovereignty,  and  arising 
out  of  its  primary  office  of  preserving  the  state  from  destruc- 
tion. This  seemed  analogous  to  the  dictatorial  power  which 
might  be  said  to  reside  in  the  Roman  senate,  since  it  could 
confer  it  upon  an  individual.  And  we  all  must,  in  fact, 
admit  that  self-preservation  is  the  first  necessity  of  com- 
monwealths as  well  as  persons,  which  may  justify,  in  Montes- 
quieu's poetical  language,  the  veiling  of  the  statues  of  liber- 
ty. Thus  martial  law  is  proclaimed  during  an  invasion,  and 

1  Commonwealth  of  England,  b.  ii.  c.  3. 


ELIZ.  —  Government.      PRETENSIONS   OF  THE  CROWN.          281 

houses  are  destroyed  in  expectation  of  a  siege.  But  few 
governments  are  to  be  trusted  with  this  insidious  plea  of 
necessity,  which  more  often  means  their  own  security  than 
that  of  the  people.  Nor  do  I  conceive  that  the  ministers 
of  Elizabeth  restrained  this  pretended  absolute  power,  even 
in  theory,  to  such  cases  of  overbearing  exigency.  It  was 
the  misfortune  of  the  sixteenth  century  to  see  kingly  power 
strained  to  the  highest  pitch  in  the  two  principal  Euro- 
pean monarchies.  Charles  V.  and  Philip  II.  had  crushed 
and  trampled  the  ancient  liberties  of  Castile  and  Aragon. 
Francis  I.  and  his  successors,  who  found  the  work  nearly 
done  to  their  hands,  had  inflicted  every  practical  oppression 
upon  their  subjects.  These  examples  could  not  be  without 
their  effect  on  a  government  so  unceasingly  attentive  to  all 
that  passed  on  the  stage  of  Europe.1  Nor  was  this  effect 
confined  to  the  court  of  Elizabeth.  A  king  of  England,  in 
the  presence  of  absolute  sovereigns,  or  perhaps  of  their  am- 
bassadors, must  always  feel  some  degree  of  that  humiliation 
with  which  a  young  man,  in  check  of  a  prudent  father,  re- 
gards the  careless  prodigality  of  the  rich  heirs  with  whom  he 
associates.  Good  sense  and  elevated  views  of  duty  may 
subdue  the  emotion ;  but  he  must  be  above  human  nature 
who  is  insensible  to  the  contrast. 

There  must  be  few  of  my  readers  who  are  unacquainted 
with  the  animated  sketch  that  Hume  has  delineated  of  the 
English  constitution  under  Elizabeth.  It  has  been  partly  the 
object  of  the  present  chapter  to  correct  his  exaggerated  out- 
line ;  and  nothing  would  be  more  easy  than  to  point  at  other 
mistakes  into  which  he  has  fallen  through  prejudice,  through 
carelessness,  or  through  want  of  acquaintance  with  law.  His 
capital  and  inexcusable  fault  in  everything  he  has  written 
on  our  constitution  is  to  have  sought  for  evidence  upon  one 
side  only  of  the  question.  Thus  the  remonstrance  of  the 
judges  against  arbitrary  imprisonment  by  the  council  is  in- 
finitely more  conclusive  to  prove  that  the  right  of  personal 
liberty  existed  than  the  fact  of  its  infringement  can  be  to 
prove  that  it  did  not.  There  is  something  fallacious  in  the 

i  Bodin  says  the  English  ambassador,  vu   Henry  VIIT.   avoir  toujours  use  d« 

M.  Bail   (Mr    Dale),  had   assured  him,  sa  puissance  souveraine.     ilc  admitted 

not  only  that  the  king  may  assent  to  or  however,  that  taxes  could    only  be  im- 

refuse  a  bill  as  he  pleases,  but  that  il  ne  posed  in  parliament.     Do 

laisse  pas  d'en  ordonner  4  son  plaisir.  et  1.  i.  c.  8. 
contre  la  volonte  des  estats,  coumie  ou  a 


282  THE  MONARCHY  UNDER  THE  TUDORS.     GIIAP.  V. 

negative  argument  which  he  perpetually  uses,  that,  because 
we  find  no  mention  of  any  umbrage  being  taken  at  certain 
strains  of  prerogative,  they  must  have  been  perfectly  conso- 
nant to  law.  For  if  nothing  of  this  could  be  traced,  which 
is  not  so  often  the  case  as  .he  represents  it,  we  should  re- 
member that,  even  when  a  constant  watchfulness  is  exercised 
by  means  of  political  parties  and  a  free  press,  a  nation  is 
seldom  alive  to  the  transgressions  of  a  prudent  and  success- 
ful government.  The  character  which  on  a  former  occasion 
I  have  given  of  the  English  constitution,  under  the  house  of 
Plantagenet  may  still  be  applied  to  it  under  the  line  of 
Tudor,  that  it  was  a  monarchy  greatly  limited  by  law,  but 
retaining  much  power  that  was  ill-calculated  to  promote 
the  public  good,  and  swerving  continually  into  an  irregular 
course,  which  there  was  no  restraint  adequate  to  correct. 
It  may  be  added  that  the  practical  exercise  of  authority 
seems  to  have  been  less  frequently  violent  and  oppressive, 
and  its  legal  limitations  better  understood,  in  the  reign  of 
Elizabeth  than  for  some  preceding  ages ;  and  that  suffi- 
cient indications  had  become  distinguishable  before  its  close, 
from  which  it  might  be  gathered  that  the  seventeenth  cen- 
tury had  arisen  upon  a  race  of  men  in  whom  the  spirit  of 
those  who  stood  against  John  and  Edward  was  rekindled 
with  a  less  partial  and  a  steadier  warmth.1 

i  The  misrepresentations  of  Hume  as  to  the  Restoration,  vol.  i.  c.  3.     In  some 

to  the  English  constitution  under  Eliza-  respects,  Mr.  B.  seems  to  have  gone  too 

beth.  and  the  general  administration  of  far  in  an  opposite  system,  and  to  repre- 

her  reign,  have  been  exposed,  since  the  sent  the  practical  course  of  government 

present    chapter    was  written,    by  Mr.  as  less  arbitrary  than  I  can  admit  it  to 

Brodie,  in  his    History  of   the  British  have  been. 
Empire  from  the  accession  of  Charles  I. 


JAMES  I.  ACCESSION  OF  JAMES.  283 


CHAPTER    VL 

ON   THE   ENGLISH    CONSTITUTION   UNDER  JAMES   1. 

Quiet  Accession  of  James —  Question  of  his  Title  to  the  Crown  —  Legitimacy  of  tha 
Earl  of  Hertford's  Issue  —  Early  Unpopularity  of  the  King  —  Conduct  towards  the 
Puritans  —  Parliament  convoked  by  an  irregular  Proclamation  —  Question  of 
Fortescue  and  Goodwin's  Election  —  Shirley's  Case  of  Privilege  —  Complaints  of 
Grievances  —  Commons'  Vindication  of  themselves  —  Session  of  1605  —  Union 
with  Scotland  debated  —  Continual  Bickerings  between  the  Crown  and  Commons 
—  Impositions  on  Merchandise  without  Consent  of  Parliament  —  Remonstrances 
against  these  in  Session  of  1610  —  Doctrine  of  King's  absolute  Power  inculcated 
by  Clergy  —  Articuli  Cleri — Cowell's  Interpreter  —  Renewed  Complaints  of  the 
Commons  —  Negotiation  for  giving  up  the  Feudal  Revenue  —  Dissolution  of 
Parliament  —  Character  of  James  —  Death  of  Lord  Salisbury  —  Foreign  Politics 
of  the  Government  —  Lord  Coke's  Alienation  from  the  Court  —  Illegal  Proclama- 
tions—  Means  resorted  to  in  Order  to  avoid  the  Meeting  of  Parliament  —  Parlia- 
ment of  1614  —  Undertakers — It  is  dissolved  without  passing  a  single  Act  — 
Benevolences — Prosecution  of  Peacham  —  Dispute  about  the  Jurisdiction  of  the 
Court  of  Chancery  —  Case  of  Commendams — Arbitrary  Proceedings  in  Star 
Chamber  —  Arabella  Stuart  —  Somerset  and  0 verb ury  —  Sir  Walter  Raleigh  — 
Parliament  of  1621  —  Proceedings  against  Mompesson  and  Lord  Bacon  —  Violence 
in  the  Case  of  Floyd  —  Disagreement  between  the  King  and  Commons  —  Their 
Dissolution  after  a  strong  Remonstrance  —  Marriage  Treaty  with  Spain  —  Parlia- 
ment of  1624  —  Impeachment  of  Middlesex. 

IT  might  afford  an  illustration  of  the  fallaciousness  of  polit- 
ical speculations  to  contrast  the  hopes  and  inquie-  Qu!et 
tudes  that  agitated  the  minds  of  men  concerning  accession 
the  inheritance  of  the  crown  during  Elizabeth's  °  James> 
lifetime,  while  not  less  than  fourteen  titles  were  idly  or  mis- 
chievously reckoned  up,  with  the  perfect  tranquillity  which 
accompanied  the  accession  of  her  successor.1     The  house  of 

1  Father  Persons,  a  subtle  and  lying  sovereigns,  much  more  to  exclude  the 
Jesuit,  published  in  1594,  under  the  name  right  heir,  especially  for  want  of  true 
of  Doleman,  a  treatise  entitled  "  Con-  religion.  "  I  affirm  and  hold,"  he  says, 
ference  about  the  next  Succession  to  the  "  that  for  any  man  to  give  his  help,  con- 
Crown  of  England."  This  book  is  dedi-  sent,  or  assistance  towards  the  making  of 
cated  to  Lord  Essex,  whether  from  any  a  king  whom  he  judgeth  or  believeth  to 
hopes  entertained  of  him.  or,  as  was  then  be  faulty  in  religion,  and  consequently 
supposed,  in  order  to  injure  his  fame  and  would  advance  either  no  religion,  or  the 
his  credit  with  the  queen.  Sidney  Papers,  wrong,  if  he  were  in  authority,  is  a  most 
i.  357.  Birch's  Memoirs,  i.  313.  It  is  grievous  and  damnable  sin  to  him  that 
written  with  much  art,  to  show  the  ex-  doth  it,  of  what  side  soever  the  truth  be, 
treme  uncertainty  of  the  succession,  and  or  how  good  or  bad  soever  the  party  be 
to  perplex  men's  minds  by  multiplying  that  is  preferred."  P.  216.  lie  pretends 
the  number  of  competitors.  This  how-  to  have  found  very  few  who  favor  the 
ever  is  but  the  second  part  of  his  Con-  king  of  Scots'  title ;  an  assertion  by 
ference,  the  aim  of  the  first  being  to  prove  which  we  may  appreciate  his  veracity, 
the  right  of  commonwealths  to  depose  The  protestant  party,  he  tells  us  wag 


284 


ACCESSION  OF  JAMES. 


CHAP.  VI. 


Suffolk,  whose  claim  was  legally  indisputable,  if  we  admit 
the  testament  of  Henry  VIII.  to  have  been  duly  executed, 
appear,  though  no  public  inquiry  had  been  made  into  that 
fact,  to  have  lost  ground  in  popular  opinion,  partly  through 
an  unequal  marriage  of  lord  Beauchamp  with  a  private 
gentleman's  daughter,  but  still  more  from  a  natural  dis- 
position to  favor  the  hereditary  line  rather  than  the  capri- 
cious disposition  of  a  sovereign  long  since  dead,  as  soon  as 
it  became  consistent  with  the  preservation  of  the  reformed 
faith.  Leicester  once  hoped,  it  is  said,  to  place  his  brother- 
in-law,  the  earl  of  Huntingdon,  descended  from  the  duke  of 
Clarence,  upon  the  throne  ;  but  this  pretension  had  been 
entirely  forgotten.  The  more  intriguing  and  violent  of  the 
catholic  party,  after  the  death  of  Mary,  entertaining  little 
hope  that  the  king  of  Scots  would  abandon  the  principles  of 
his  education,  sought  to  gain  support  to  a  pretended  title  in 
the  king  of  Spain,  or  his  daughter  the  infanta,  who  afterwards 
married  the  archduke  Albert,  governor  of  the  Netherlands. 
Others,  abhorring  so  odious  a  claim,  looked  to  Arabella  Stu- 
art, daughter  of  the  earl  of  Lennox,  younger  brother  of 


wont  to  favor  the  house  of  Hertford, 
but  of  late  have  gone  more  towards  Ara- 
bella, whose  claim  the  lord  Burleigh  is 
supposed  to  countenance.  P.  241.  The 
drift  of  the  whole  is  to  recommend  the 
infanta  by  means  of  perverted  history 
and  bad  law,  yet  ingeniously  contrived 
to  ensnare  ignorant  persons.  In  his 
former  and  more  celebrated  treatise, 
Leicester's  Commonwealth,  though  he 
harps  much  on  the  embarrassments  at- 
tending the  succession,  Persons  argues 
with  all  his  power  in  favor  of  the 
Scottish  title,  Mary  being  still  alive,  and 
James's  return  to  the  faith  not  desperate. 
Both  the*e  works  are  full  of  the  mendac- 
ity generally  and  justly  ascribed  to  his 
order ;  yet  they  are  worthy  to  be  read  by 
any  one  who  is  curious  about  the  secret 
politics  of  the  queen's  reign. 

Philip  II.  held  out  assurances  that,  if 
the  English  would  aid  him  in  dethroning 
Elizabeth,  a  free  parliament  should  elect 
any  catholic  sovereign  at  their  pleasure, 
not  doubting  that  their  choice  would  fall 
on  the  infanta.  He  promised  also  to  en- 
large the  privileges  of  the  people,  to  give 
the  merchants  a  free  trade  to  the  Indies, 
with  many  other  flattering  inducements. 
Birch's  Memoirs,  ii.  308.  But  most  of 
the  catholic  gentry,  it  is  just  to  observe, 
would  never  concur  in  the  invasion  of  the 
kingdom  by  foreigners,  preferring  the 
elevation  of  Arabella,  according  to  the 


pope's  project.  This  difference  of  opin- 
iou  gave  rise,  among  other  causes,  to 
the  violent  dissensions  of  that  party  in 
the  latter  years  of  Elizabeth's  reign  ; 
dissensions  that  began  soon  after  the 
death  of  Mary,  in  favor  of  whom  they 
were  all  united,  though  they  could  nev- 
er afterwards  agree  on  any  project  for 
the  succession.  Win  wood's  Memorials, 
i.  57.  Lettres  du  Cardinal  d'Ossat,  ii. 
501. 

For  the  life  and  character  of  the  fa- 
mous Father  Persons,  or  Parsons,  above 
mentioned,  see  Dodd's  Church  History, 
the  Biographia  Britannica,  or  Miss  Ai- 
kin's  James  I.,  i.  360.  Mr.  Butler  is  too 
favorably  inclined  towards  a  man  with- 
out patriotism  or  veracity.  Dodd  plainly 
thinks  worse  of  him  than  he  dares  speak. 
[Several  letters  of  considerable  historical 
importance,  relative  to  the  catholic  in- 
trigues as  to  the  succession,  are  lately 
published  in  Tierney's  edition  of  Dodd's 
Church  History,  vol.  iii.  A  considerable 
part  of  the  catholics,  especially  those  who 
had  looked  up  to  Mary  personally  as 
their  rallying  point,  adhered  to  the 
Scottish  title  ;  and  those  of  course  were 
the  best  Englishmen.  Persons  and  his 
Spanish  faction,  whose  letters  appear  in 
the  work  above  quoted,  endeavor  to  de- 
preciate them.  I  must  add  that  Mr.  T. 
does  not  by  any  means  screen  this  tast 
party.  1845.J 


JAMES  I  ACCESSION  OF  JAMES.  285 

James's  father,  and  equally  descended  from  the  stock  of 
Henry  VII.,  sustaining  her  manifest  defect  of  primogeniture 
by  her  birth  within  the  realm,  according  to  the  principle  of 
law  that  excluded  aliens  from  inheritance.  But  this  princi- 
ple was  justly  deemed  inapplicable  to  the  crown.  Clement 
VIII.,  who  had  no  other  view  than  to  secure  the  reestab- 
lishment  of  the  catholic  faith  in  England,  and  had  the  judg- 
ment to  perceive  that  the  ascendency  of  Spain  would  neither 
be  endured  by  the  nation  nor  permitted  by  the  French  king, 
favored  this  claim  of  Arabella,  who,  though  apparently  of 
the  reformed  religion,  was  rather  suspected  at  home  of  waver- 
ing in  her  faith,  and  entertained  a  hope  of  marrying  her  to 
the  cardinal  Farnese,  brother  of  the  duke  of  Parma.1  Con- 
siderations of  public  interest,  however,  unequivocally  pleaded 
for  the  Scottish  line ;  the  extinction  of  long  sanguinary  feuds, 
and  the  consolidation  of  the  British  empire.  Elizabeth  her- 
self, though  by  no  means  on  terms  of  sincere  friendship  with 
James,  and  harassing  him  by  intrigues  with  his  subjects  to 
the  close  of  her  life,  seems  to  have  always  designed  that  he 
should  inherit  her  crown.  And  the  general  expectation  of 
what  was  to  follow,  as  well  from  conviction  of  his  right  as 
from  the  impracticability  of  any  effectual  competition,  had  so 
thoroughly  paved  the  way  that  the  council's  proclamation  of 
the  king  of  Scots  excited  no  more  commotion  than  that  of  an 
heir  apparent.2  « 

1  D'Ossat,   ubi   supri.    Clement  had,  occupy  a  great  part  of  the  letters  of  other 

Borne  years  before,  indulged  the  idle  hope  intriguers,  Cecil  and  lord  Heury  Howard, 

that  France  and  Spain   might  unite  to  in  the  Secret  Correspondence  with  king 

•conquer  England,  and  either  bestow  the  James,  published  by  sir  David  Dalrym 

kingdom  on  some  catholic  prince,  or  di-  pie,  vol.  i.  passim. 

vide  it  between  themselves,  as  Louis  XII.  a  The  explicit  declaration  on  herdeath- 
and  Ferdinand  had  done  with  Naples  in  bed,  ascribed  to  her  by  Hume  and  most 
1501 ;  an  example  not  very  inviting  to  the  other  writers,  that  her  kinsman  the  king 
French.  D'Ossat,  Henry's  minister  at  of  Scots  should  succeed  her,  is  not  con- 
Rome,  pointed  out  the  difficulties  of  such  firmed  by  Carey,  who  was  there  at  the 
an  enterprise,  England  being  the  greatest  time.  "  She  was  speechless  when  the 
n;iviil  power  in  the  world,  and  the  people  council  proposed  the  king  of  Scots  to 
warlike.  The  pope  only  replied  that  the  succeed  her,  but  put  her  hand  to  her  head 
kingdom  had  been  once  conquered,  and  as  if  in  token  of  approbation."  E.  of 
Biight  be  so  again  ;  and  especially  being  Monmouth's  Memoirs,  p.  176.  But  her 
governed  by  an  old  woman,  whom  he  was  uniform  conduct  shows  her  intentions, 
ignorant  enough  to  compare  with  Joanna  See,  however,  D'Israeli's  Curiosities  of 
II.  of  Naples.  Vol.  i.  399.  Henry  IV.  Literature,  iii.  107.  [A  remarkable  ac- 
would  not  even  encourage  the  project  of  count  of  Elizabeth's  last  days  will  be 
getting  up  Arabella,  which  he  declared  to  found  in  Dodd's  Church  History  ;  it 
be  both  unjust  and  chimerical.  Mem.  de  appears  to  have  been  written  by  lady 
Sully.  1.  15.  A  knot  of  protestants  were  Southwell,  an  eye-witness,  who  had  been 
also  busy  about  the  interests  of  Arabella,  one  of  the  queen's  maids  of  honor, 
or  suspected  of  being  so;  Kalcigh.  Cob-  Tierney's  editiou  of  Dodd,  vol.  iii.  p.  70. 
bam.  Northumberland,  though  perhaps  And  this  account  is  confirmed,  so  as  to 
the  last  was  a  catholic,.  Their  intrigues  make  it  fully  trustworthy,  by  a  report 


286  QUESTION  OF  JAMES'S  TITLE  CHAP.  VI. 

The  popular  voice  in  favor  of  James  was  undoubtedly 
Question  of  raised  in  consequence  of  a  natural  opinion  that 
his  title  to  he  was  the  lawful  heir  to  the  throne.  But  this 
:rown-  was  oniy  according  to  vulgar  notions  of  right 
which  respect  hereditary  succession  as  something  indefeasi- 
ble. In  point  of  fact,  it  is  at  least  very  doubtful  whether 
James  I.  were  a  legitimate  sovereign,  according  to  the  sense- 
which  that  word  ought  properly  to  bear.  The  house  of 
Stuart  no  more  came  in  by  a  clear  title  than  the  house  of 
Brunswick ;  by  such  a  title,  I  mean,  as  the  statute  laws  of  this 
kingdom  had  recognized.  No  private  man  could  have  recov- 
ered an  acre  of  land  without  proving  a  better  right  than  they 
could  make  out  to  the  crown  of  England.  What,  then,  had 
James  to  rest  upon?  What  renders  it  absurd  to  call  him  and 
his  children  usurpers  ?  He  had  that  which  the  flatterers  of 
his  family  most  affected  to  disdain  —  the  will  of  the  people  ; 
not  certainly  expressed  in  regular  suffrage  or  declared  elec- 
tion, but  unanimously  and  voluntarily  ratifying  that  which  in 
itself  could  surely  give  no  right,  the  determination  of  the 
late  queen's  council  to  proclaim  his  accession  to  the  throne. 

It  is  probable  that  what  has  been  just  said  may  appear 
rather  paradoxical  to  those  who  have  not  considered  this  part 
of  our  history,  yet  it  is  capable  of  satisfactory  proof.  This 
proof  consists  of  four  propositions :  1.  That  a  lawful  king  of 
England,  with  the  advice  and  consent  of  parliament,  may 
make  statutes  to  limit  the  inheritance  of  the  crown,  as  shall 

from  Beaumont,  the  French  ambassador,  he  was  not  behind  her  in  some  of  the  last 

published  in   Raumer's    History  of  the  years  of  her  reign.  It  appears,  by  a  letter 

16th    and   17th    Centuries    illustrated,  from  the  Earl  of  Mar,  in   Dalrymple's 

London,  1835,  vol.  ii.  p.  188.  Secret  Correspondence,  p.  2,  that  James 

The  famous  story  of  Essex's  ring,  de-  had  hopes  of  a  rebellion  in  England  in 
livered  by  the  countess  of  Nottingham  1601,  which  he  would  have  had  no  scru- 
in  her  dying  hours  to  the  queen,  has  pie  in  abetting.  And  iu  a  letter  from  him 
been  rejected  by  modern  writers,  as  only  to  Tyrone,  in  the  Lansdowne  MSS. 
to  be  traced  to  some  memoirs  published  Ixxxiv.  36,  dated  22d  Dec.  1597,  when 
in  Holland  eighty  years  afterwards.  It  the  latter  was  at  least  preparing  for  re- 
may  be  considered,  whether  it  derives  bellion,  though  rather  cautious,  is  full  of 
any  kind  of  confirmation  from  a  passage  expressions  of  favor,  and  of  promises  to 
in  llaumer,  ii.  166. — 1845.]  receive  his  assistance  thankfully  at  tho 

It  is  impossible  to  justify  Elizabeth's  queen's  death.     This  letter,  being  found 

conduct  towards  James  in  his  own  king-  in  the  collection  once  belonging  to   sir 

dom.     What  is  best  to  be  said  for  it  is,  Michael  Hicks,  must  have  been  in  lord 

that  his  indiscretion,  his  suspicious  in-  Burleigh's  and  probably  in    Elizabeth's 

trigues  at   Home  and  Madrid,  the  dan-  hands ;  it  would  pot  make  her  less  in- 

gerous  influence  of  his  favorites,  and  the  dined  to  instigate  conspiracies  across  the 

evident  purpose  of  the  court  of  Spain  to  Tweed.      The  letter  is  not  an   original, 

make  him  its  tool,  rendered  it  necessary  and  may   have  been  communicated  by 

to  keep  a  very  strict  watch  over  his  pro-  some  one  about  tho  king  of  Scots  in  the 

ceedings.     If  she  excited   the  peers  and  pay  of  England, 
presbyters  of  Scotland  against  their  king, 


JAMES  1.  TO  THE  CKOWN.  287 

seem  fit ;  2.  That  a  statute  passed  in  the  35th  year  of  king 
Henry  VIII.  enabled  that  prince  to  dispose  of  the  succession 
by  his  last  will  signed  with  his  own  hand ;  3.  That  Henry 
executed  such  a  will,  by  which,  in  default  of  issue  from  his 
children,  the  crown  was  entailed  upon  the  descendants  of  his 
younger  sister,  Mary  duchess  of  Suffolk,  before  those  of 
Margaret  queen  of  Scots ;  4.  That  such  descendants  of  Mary 
were  living  at  the  decease  of  Elizabeth. 

Of  these  propositions,  the  two  former  can  require  no  sup- 
port ;  the  first  being  one  that  it  would  be  perilous  to  deny, 
and  the  second  asserting  a  notorious  fact.  A  question  has, 
however,  been  raised  with  respect  to  the  third  proposition  ; 
for  though  the  will  of  Henry,  now  in  the  chapter-house  at 
Westminster,  is  certainly  authentic,  and  is  attested  by  many 
witnesses,  it  has  been  doubted  whether  the  signature  was 
made  with  his  own  hand,  as  required  by  the  act  of  parlia- 
ment. In  the  reign  of  Elizabeth  it  was  asserted  by  the 
queen  of  Scots'  ministers  that,  the  king  being  at  the  last 
extremity,  some  one  had  put  a  stamp  for  him  to  the  instru- 
ment.1 It  is  true  that  he  was  in  the  latter  part  of  his  life 
accustomed  to  employ  a  stamp  instead  of  making  his  signa- 
ture. Many  impressions  of  this  are  extant ;  but  it  is  evi- 

1  See   Burnet,  vol.  i.   Appendix,  267,  false  surmises,  that  thereby  the  right  may 

for  secretary  Lethington's  letter  to  Cecil,  take  place,  notwithstanding   the   many 

where  he  tells  a  circumstantial  story  so  exemplifications  and   transcripts,  which, 

positively,  and  so  open,  if  false,  to  a  con-  being  sealed  with  the  great  seal,  do  run 

tradiction  it  never  received,  that  those  abroad  in  England."     Lesley,  bishop  of 

who  lay    too  much   stress  on   this   very  Ross,  repeats   the  same  story  with  some 

equivocal  species  of  presumption  would,  additions.      Bedford's  Hereditary  1'ight, 

if  the  will  had  perished,  have  reckoned  p.  197.     A  treatise  of  liales,  for  which 

its  forgery  beyond  question.   The  king's  he  suffered  imprisonment,  in  defence  of 

death   approaching,   he   asserts,   "some  the  Suffolk  title  under  the  will, of  which 

as  well   known  to  you  as  to  ine  caused  there  is  a  manuscript  in  the  British  Mu- 

William    Clarke,   sometimes   servant  to  seuin.  Harl.  MSS.  537,  and  which  is  also 

Thomas  Heneage,  to  sign  the  supposed  printed  in  the  appendix  to  the  book  last 

will  with  a  stamp,  for  otherwise  signed  quoted,  leads  me  to  conjecture  that  the 

it  was  never ;"  for  which  he  appeals  to  original  will  had  been  mislaid  or  rather 

an  attestation  of  the  late  lord  Paget  in  concealed  at  that  time.     For  he  certainly 

parliament,  and  requests  the  depositions  argues  on  the  supposition  that  it  was  not 

of  several  persons  now  living  to  be  taken,  forthcoming,  and  had  not  himself  seen 

He  proceeds  to  refer  him  "  to  the  orig-  it ;  but,  "  he  has  been  informed  that  the 

inal  will  surmised  to  be  signed  with  the  king's  name  is  evidently  written  with  a 

king's  own   hand,  that  thereby,  it  may  pen,   though   some  of  the    strokes   are 

most   clearly  and   evidently  appear   by  unseen,  as  if   drawn   by    a    weak  and 

gome   differences  how  the  same  was  not  trembling  hand."     Every  one  who  has 

signed  with  the  king's  hand,  but  stamped  seen  the  will  must  bear  witness  to  the 

as  aforesaid.    And  albeit  it  is  used  both  correctness  of  this  information.     The  re- 

as  an  argument  and  calumniation  against  appearance  of  this  very  remarkable  in- 

my  sovereign    by  some,   that    the  said  strument  was,  as  I  conceive,  after   the 

original  hath  been  embezzled  in  queen  Revolution  ;  for  Collier  mentions  that  he 

Mary's  time,  I  trust  God  will  and  hath  had  heard  it  was  in  existence;  and  it  is 

reserved  the  same  to  be  an  instrument  to  also  described    in  a  note    to    the  Acw 

relieve  [prove]  the  truth,  and  to  confound  llegia. 


288  LEGITIMACY  OF  THE  CHAP.  VI. 

dent  on  the  first  inspection  not  only  that  the  presumed  auto- 
graphs in  the  will  (for  there  are  two)  are  not  like  these 
impressions,  but  that  they  are  not  the  impressions  of  any 
stamp,  the  marks  of  the  pen  being  very  clearly  discernible. 
It  is  more  difficult  to  pronounce  that  they  may  not  be  feigned, 
but  such  is  not  the  opinion  of  some  who  are  best  acquainted 
with  Henry's  handwriting ; *  and  what  is  still  more  to  the 
purpose,  there  is  no  pretence  for  setting  up  such  a  possibility, 
when  the  story  of  the  stamp,  as  to  which  the  partisans  of 
Mary  pretended  to  adduce  evidence,  appears  so  clearly  to  be 
a  fabrication.  We  have,  therefore,  every  reasonable  ground 
to  maintain  that  Henry  did  duly  execute  a  will  postponing 
the  Scots  line  to  that  of  Suffolk. 

The  fourth  proposition  is  in  itself  undeniable.  There  were 
descendants  of  Mary  duchess  of  Suffolk,  by  her  two  daugh- 
ters, Frances,  second  duchess  of  Suffolk,  and  Eleanor  count- 
ess of  Cumberland.  A  story  had,  indeed,  been  circulated 
that  Charles  Brandon,  duke  of  Suffolk,  was  already  married 
to  a  lady  of  the  name  of  Mortimer  at  the  time  of  his  union 
with  the  king's  sister.  But  this  circumstance  seems  to  be 
sufficiently  explained  in  the  treatise  of  Hales.2  It  is  some- 
what more  questionable  from  which  of  his  two  daughters  we 
are  to  derive  the  hereditary  stock.  This  depends  on  the 
Le  'timac  legitimacy  of  lord  Beauchamp,  son  of  the  earl  of 
of  the  earl  Hertford  by  Catherine  Grey.  I  have  mentioned 
fort's'issue.  in  anotner  place  the  process  before  a  commission 
appointed  by  Elizabeth,  which  ended  in  declaring 
that  their  marriage  was  not  proved,  and  that  their  cohabita- 
tion had  been  illicit.  The  parties  alleged  themselves  to  have 
been  married  clandestinely  in  the  earl  of  Hertford's  house 
by  a  minister  whom  they  had  never  before  seen,  and  of 
whose  name  they  were  ignorant,  in  the  presence  only  of  a 
sister  of  the  earl  then  deceased.  This  entire  absence  of  tes- 
timony, and  the  somewhat  improbable  nature  of  the  story,  at 
least  in  appearance,  may  still,  perhaps,  leave  a  shade  of  doubt 
as  to  tiie  reality  of  the  marriage.  On  the  other  hand,  it  was 
unquestionable  that  their  object  must  have  been  a  legitimate 
union  ;  and  such  a  hasty  and  furtive  ceremony  as  they 

_'  It  is    right  to   mention  that   some  cannot  be  proved  a  forgery,  the  legal  pre- 

difference    of   opinion  exists   as    to  the  sumption  turns  much  in  its  favor, 

genuineness  of  Henry's  signature.     But  *  Bedford's      (ILirbin'g)      Hereditary 

as  it  u  attested  by  many  witnesses,  and  Right  Asserted,  p.  'JU4. 


JAMES  I.  EARL  OF  HERTFORD'S  ISSUE.  289 

asserted  to  have  taken  place,  while  it  would,  if  sufficiently 
proved,  be  completely  valid,  was  necessary  to  protect  them 
from  the  queen's  indignation.  They  were  examined  sep- 
arately upon  oath  to  answer  a  series  of  the  closest  interroga- 
tories, which  they  did  with  little  contradiction,  and  a  perfect 
agreement  in  the  main  ;  nor  was  any  evidence  worth  men- 
tioning adduced  on  the  other  side  ;  so  that,  unless  the  rules 
of  the  ecclesiastical  law  are  scandalously  repugnant  to  com- 
mon justice,  their  oaths  entitled  them  to  credit  on  the  merits 
of  the  case.1  The  earl  of  Hertford,  soon  after  the  tranquil 
accession  of  James,  having  long  abandoned  all  ambitious 
hopes,  and  seeking  only  to  establish  his  children's  legitimacy 
and  the  honor  of  one  who  had  been  the  victim  of  their  un- 
happy loves,  petitioned  the  king  for  a  review  of  the  proceed- 
ings, alleging  himself  to  have  vainly  sought  this  at  the  hands 
of  Elizabeth.  It  seems  probable,  though  I  have  not  met 
with  any  more  distinct  proof  of  it  than  a  story  in  Dugdale, 
that  he  had  been  successful  in  finding  the  person  who  sol- 
emnized the  marriage.2  A  commission  of  delegates  was 
accordingly  appointed  to  investigate  the  allegations  of  the 
earl's  petition.  But  the  jealousy  that  had  so  long  oppressed 
this  unfortunate  family  was  not  yet  at  re?t.  Questions  seem 
to  have  been  raised  as  to  the  lapse  of  time  and  other  techni- 
cal difficulties,  which  served  as  a  pretext  for  coming  to  no 
determination  on  the  merits.8  Hertford,  or  rather  his  son, 
not  long  after,  endeavored  indirectly  to  bring  forward  the 
main  question  by  means  of  a  suit  for  some  lands  against  lord 

1  A    manuscript    in     the    Cottonian  credit,  which  is,  that  the  validity  of  this 

Library,  Faustina,  A.  xi.,  written  about  marriage  was    afterwards   brought  to  a 

1562,  in  a  very  hostile  spirit,  endeavors  trial  at  the    common    law ;    when    the 

to  prove,  from   the  want  of  testimony,  minister  who  married   them  being  pres- 

and  from  some  variances  in  their  depc-  ent,  and  other  circumstances  agreeing, 

eitions   (not  very  material    oues),   that  the  jury  (whereof  John  Digby  of  Coles- 

their   allegations    of    matrimony   could  hill,   in    com.    War.,   esquire,   was    the 

not  be  admitted,  and  that  they  had  in-  foreman)  found    it  a    good   marriage." 

curred     an     ecclesiastical    censure    for  Baronage  of  England,  part  ii.  369.     Mr. 

fornication.     But  another,  which  I  have  Luders  doubts  theaccuracy  of  Dugdale's 

also  found  in  the  Museum,  Harl.  MSS.  story  y  and  I  think  it  not  unlikely  that 

6286.    contains    the    whole    proceedings  it  is  a  confused  account  of  what  hap- 

and  evidence,  from  which  I  have  drawn  pened  in  the  court  of  wards. 

the  conclusion  in  the  text.     Their  igno-  3  I  derive  this  fact  from  a  Cotton  MS. 

ranee  of  the  clergyman  who  performed  Vitellius,   C.    xvi.   412,     &c.;     but    the 

the   ceremony  is  not   perhaps  very  ex-  volume  is  much  burned,  and  the  papers 

traonlinary  ;  beseems  to  have  been  one  confused    with   others   relative  to   Lord 

Of  those  vagabond  ecclesiastics  who  till  Essex's  divorce.    See  as  to  the  same  suit, 

the    marriage  act  of  1752   were  always  or  rather  perhaps  that  mentioned  in  the 

ready  to  Jo  that  service  for  a  fee.  next  note,  Birch's  Negotiations,  p.  219, 

-  '•  lit- reupoti  I  shall  add,  what  I  have  or  Aikiu's  James  the  First,  i.  225. 
heard    related   from    persons    of    great 
VOL    I.  —  C.                           19 


290  EARL  OF  HERTFORD'S  ISSUE.  CHAP.  VI. 

Monteagle.  This  is  said  to  have  been  heard  in  the  court  of 
wards,  where  a  jury  was  impanelled  to  try  the  fact.  But 
the  law  officers  of  the  crown  interposed  to  prevent  a  verdict, 
which,  though  it  could  not  have  been  legally  conclusive  upon 
the  marriage,  would  certainly  have  given  a  sanction  to  it  in 
public  opinion.1  The  house  of  Seymour  was  now  compelled 
to  seek  a  renewal  of  its  honors  by  another  channel.  Lord 
Beauchamp,  as  he  had  uniformly  been  called,  took  a  grant 
of  the  barony  of  Beauchamp,  and  another  of  the  earldom  of 
Hertford,  to  take  effect  upon  the  death  of  the  earl,  who  is 
not  denominated  his  father  in  the  patent.2  But  after  the  re- 
turn of  Charles  II.,  in  the  patent  restoring  this  lord  Beau- 
champ's  son  to  the  dukedom  of  Somerset,  he  is  recited  to  be 
heir  male  of  the  body  of  the  first  duke  by  his  wife  Anne, 
which  establishes  (if  the  recital  of  a  private  act  of  parlia- 
ment can  be  said  to  establish  anything)  the  validity  of  the 
disputed  marriage.8 

The  descent  from  the  younger  daughter  of  Mary  Brandon, 
Eleanor,  who  married  the  earl  of  Cumberland,  is  subject  to 
no  difficulties.  She  left  an  only  daughter,  married  to  the 
earl  of  Derby,  from  whom  the  claim  devolved  again  upon 
females,  and  seems  to  have  attracted  less  notice  during  the 
reign  of  Elizabeth  than  some  others  much  inferior  in  plau- 
sibility. If  any  should  be  of  opinion  that  no  marriage  was 
regularly  contracted  between  the  earl  of  Hertford  and  lady 
Catherine  Grey,  so  as  to  make  their  children  capable  of  in- 
heritance, the  title  to  the  crown,  resulting  from  the  statute  of 
35  H.  VIII.  and  the  testament  of  that  prince,  will  have  de- 
scended at  the  death  of  Elizabeth  on  the  issue  of  the  countess 

1  "  The  same  day  a  great  cause  be-  cided."    The  same  to  the  same,  March  7. 

tween  the  Lord  Beauchamp  and  Mont-  Sloane  MSS.  4176. 

eagle  was  heard  in  the  court  of  wards,  2  Dugdale's  Baronage.  Luder's  Essay 
the  main  point  whereof  was  to  prove  the  on  the  Right  of  Succession  to  the  Orosvn 
lawfulness  of  E.  of  Hertford's  marriage,  in  the  Reign  of  Elizabeth.  This  ingen- 
The  court  sat  until  five  of  the  clock  in  ious  author  is.  I  believe,  the  first  who 
the  afternoon,  and  the  jury  had  a  week's  has  taken  the  strong  position  as  to  the 
respite  for  the  delivery  of  their  verdict."  want  of  legal  title  to  the  house  of  Stuart 
Letter  of  Sir  E.  Hoby  to  Sir  T.  Ed-  which  I  have  endeavored  to  support, 
monda,  Feb.  10,  1606.  "  For  my  lord  In  the  entertaining  letters  of  Joseph 
of  Hertford's  cause,  when  the  verdict  Mede  on  the  news  of  the  day.  Hurl. 
was  ready  to  be  given  up,  Mr.  Attorney  MSS.  389,  it  is  said  that  the  king  had 
interposed  himself  for  the  king,  and  thought  of  declaring  Hertford's  issue  by 
said  that  the  land  that  they  both  strove  lady  Catherine  Grey  illegitimate  in  the 
for  was  the  king's,  and,  until  his  title  parliament  of  1021. "and  that  lord  South- 
were  decided,  the  jury  ought  not  to  pro-  ampton's  commitment  was  for  having 
ceed  ;  not  doubting  but  the  king  will  be  searched  for  proofs  of  their  marriage, 
gracious  to  both  lords.  But  thereby  June  30, 1622. 
both  land  and  legitimate  n  remain  uude-  8  Luders,  ubi  supra. 


.AMES  I.  RECOGNITION  OF  JAMES'S   TITLE.  29] 

of  Cumberland,  the  youngest  daughter  of  the  duchess  of 
Suffolk,  lady  Frances  Keyes,  having  died  without  issue.1  In 
neither  case  could  the  house  of  Stuart  have  a  lawful  claim. 
But  I  may,  perhaps,  have  dwelled  too  long  on  a  subject 
which,  though  curious  and  not  very  generally  understood, 
can  be  of  no  sort  of  importance,  except  as  it  serves  to  cast 
ridicule  upon  those  notions  of  legitimate  sovereignty  and  ab- 
solute right  which  it  was  once  attempted  to  set  up  as  para- 
mount even  to  the  great  interests  of  a  commonwealth. 

There  is  much  reason  to  believe  that  the  consciousness  of 
this  defect  in  his  parliamentary  title  put  James  on  magnify- 
ing, still  more  than  from  his  natural  temper  he  was  prone  to 
do,  the  inherent  rights  of  primogenitary  succession  as  some- 
thing indefeasible  by  the  legislature  ;  a  doctrine  which,  how- 
ever it  might  suit  the  schools  of  divinity,  was  in  diametrical 
opposition  to  our  statutes.2  Through  the  servile  spirit  of 
those  times,  however,  it  made  a  rapid  progress ;  and,  inter- 
woven by  cunning  and  bigotry  with  religion,  became  a  dis- 
tinguishing tenet  of  the  party  who  encouraged  the  Stuarts  to 
subvert  the  liberties  of  this  kingdom.  In  James's  proclama- 
tion on  ascending  the  throne  he  set  forth  his  hereditary  right 
in  pompous  and  perhaps  unconstitutional  phrases.  It  was 
the  first  measure  of  parliament  to  pass  an  act  of  recognition, 
acknowledging  that  immediately  on  the  decease  of  Elizabeth 
u  the  imperial  crown  of  the  realm  of  England  did,  by  in- 
herent birthright  and  lawful  and  undoubted  succession,  de- 
scend and  come  to  his  most  excellent  majesty,  as  being  lin- 
eally, justly,  and  lawfully  next  and  sole  heir  of  the  blood 
royal  of  this  realm."  8  The  will  of  Henry  VIII.  it  was  tac- 
itly agreed  by  all  parties  to  consign  to  oblivion :  and  this 
most  wisely,  not  on  the  principles  which  seem  rather  too 

1 1  have  not  adverted  to  one  objection  seems  to  show  that  there  was  no  legal 
which  some  urged  at  the  time,  as  we  find  bond  remaining  between  the  parties, 
by  Persous's  treatises,  Leicester's  Com-  Camden  says  she  was  divorced  from  lord 
monwealth,  and  The  Conference,  to  the  Herbert,  "  being  so  far  gone  with  child 
legitimacy  of  the  Seymours.  Catherine  as  to  be  very  near  her  time."  But,  from. 
Grey  had  been  betrothed,  or  perhaps  her  youth  at  the  time,  and  the  silence  of 
married,  to  lord  Herbert,  son  of  the  earl  all  other  writers,  I  conclude  this  to  be 
of  Pembroke,  during  the  brilliant  days  unworthy  of  credit, 
of  her  family,  at  the  close  of  Edward's  2  Bolingbroke  is  of  this  opinion,  con- 
reign.  But,  on  her  father's  fall,  Pein-  sidering  the  act  of  recognition  as  "  the 
broke  caused  a  sentence  of  divorce  to  be  era  of  hereditary  right,  and  of  all  those 
pronounced,  the  grounds  of  which  do  exalted  notions  concerning  the  power  of 
not  appear,  but  which  was  probably  suf-  prerogative  of  kings  arid  the  sacredness 
flcient  in  law  to  warrant  her  subsequent  of  their  persons."  Disstitation  oa  Par- 
union  with  Hertford.  No  advantage  is  ties,  Letter  II. 
taken  of  this  in  the  proceedings,  which  3  Stat.  1  Jac.  c.  1. 


292  ELIZABETH'S  LOSS   OF  POPULARITY.       CHAP.  VI. 

much  insinuated  in  this  act  of  recognition,  but  on  such  sub- 
stantial motives  of  public  expediency  as  it  would  have  shown 
an  equal  want  ol"  patriotism  and  of  good  sense  for  the  de- 
scendants of  the  house  of  Suffolk  to  have  withstood. 

James  left  a  kingdom  where  his  authority  was  incessantly 
thwarted,  and  sometimes  openly  assailed,  for  one  wherein  the 
royal  prerogative  had  for  more  than  a  century  been  strained 
to  a  very  high  pitch,  and  where  there  had  not  occurred  for 
above  thirty  years  the  least  appearance  of  rebellion,  and 
hardly  of  tumult.  Such  a  posture  of  the  English  common- 
wealth, as  well  as  the  general  satisfaction  testified  at  his  ac- 
cession, seemed  favorable  circumstances  to  one  who  enter- 
tained, with  less  disguise,  if  not  with  more  earnestness,  than 
most  other  sovereigns,  the  desire  of  reigning  with  as  little 
impediment  as  possible  to  his  own  will.  Yet  some  consider- 
ations might  have  induced  a  prince  who  really  possessed  the 
king-craft  wherein  James  prided  himself,  to  take  his  meas- 
ures with  caution.  The  late  queen's  popularity  had  remark- 
ably abated  during  her  last  years.1  It  is  a  very  common  de- 
lusion of  royal  personages  to  triumph  in  the  people's  dislike 
of  those  into  whose  place  they  expect  shortly  to  come,  and  to 
count  upon  the  most  transitory  of  possessions,  a  favor  built 
on  hopes  that  they  cannot  realize,  and  discontents  that  they 
will  not  assuage.  If  Elizabeth  lost  a  great  deal  of  that  af- 
fection her  subjects  had  entertained  for  her,  this  may  be  as- 
cribed not  so  much  to  Essex's  death,  though  that  no  doubt 
had  its  share,  as  to  weightier  taxation,  to  some  oppressions 
of  her  government,  and  above  all  to  her  inflexible  tenacious- 
ness  in  every  point  of  ecclesiastical  discipline.  It  was  the 
part  of  a  prudent  successor  to  preserve  an  undeviating  econ- 
omy, to  remove  without  repugnance  or  delay  the  irritations 
of  monopolies  and  purveyance,  and  to  remedy  those  alleged 
abuses  in  the  church  against  which  the  greater  and  stronger 
part  of  the  nation  had  so  long  and  so  loudly  raised  its  voice. 

1  This  is  confirmed  by  a  curious  little  Carte  says,  "  foreigners  were  shocked  on 

tract   in   the  British   Museum,    Sloane  James's  arrival  at   the  applause  of  the 

MSS.  827.  containing  a  short  history  of  populace,  who  had  professed  to  adore  the 

the  queen's  death  and  new  king's  acces-  late  queen,  but  infect  she  had  no  huzzas 

sion.      It  affords  a  good    contemporary  after  Essex's  execution.     She  was  in  four 

illustration  of  the  various  feelings  which  days'  time  as  much  forgot  as  if  she  had 

influenced   men    at    this    crisis,  and  is  never  existed,  by  all  the  world,  and  even 

written  in  a  dispassionate  manner.     The  by  her  own  servants."     Vol.  iii.  p.  707. 

author  ascribes   the  loss  of   Elizabeth's  This   is    exaggerated,   and    what    Carte 

popularity  to  the  impoverishment  of  the  could  not  know ;  but   there  is  no  doubt 

realm,  aud  to  the  abuses  which  prevailed,  that  the  generality  were  glad  of  a  change. 


JAMES  I.  UNPOPULAKITY  OF  JAMES.  293 

The  new  king's  character,  notwithstanding  the  vicinity  of 
Scotland,  seems  to  have  been  little  understood  by  Rarly  unpop. 
the  English  at   his   accession.     But  he  was  not  uiarity  of 
long  in   undeceiving  them,  if  it  be  true  that  his 
popularity  had  vanished  away  before  his  arrival  in  London.1 
The  kingdom  was  full  of  acute  wits  and  skilful  politicians, 
quick  enough  to  have  seen  through  a  less  unguarded  charac- 
ter than- that  of  James.     It  was  soon  manifest  that  he  was 
unable  to  wield  the  sceptre  of  the  great  princess  whom  he 
ridiculously  affected  to  despise,  so  as  to  keep  under  that  ris 
ing  spirit  which  might  perhaps  have  grown  too  strong  e\  en 
for  her  control.2   He  committed  an  important  error  Conduct 
in  throwing  away  the  best  opportunity  that  had  towards  the 
offered  itself  for  healing  the  wounds  of  the  church  pur 
of  England.     In  his  way  to  London  the  malecontent  clergy 
presented  to  him  what  was  commonly  called  the  Millenary 
Petition,  as  if  signed  by   1000   ministers,  though  the  real 
number  was  not  so  great.8     This  petition  contained  no  de- 

1  Carte,  no  foe  surely  to  the  house  of  affable  manners  of  the  late  queen.  This 
Stuart,  says,  "  By  the  time  he  reached  is  confirmed  by  Wilson,  in  Kennet'a 
London  the  admiration  of  the  intelligent  Complete  History,  vol.  ii.  p.  667. 
world  was  turned  into  contempt."  On  [It  is  also  mentioned  in  the  extracts 
this  journey  he  gave  a  remarkable  proof  from  the  reports  of  Beaumont,  the  French 
of  his  hasty  temper  and  disregard  of  law,  ambassador,  published  in  Raumer's  11- 
m  ordering  a  pickpocket  taken  in  the  lustrations  of  the  History  of  the  16th 
fact  to  be  hanged  without  trial.  The  and  17th  Centuries.  (Lord  F.  Egertou's 
historian  last  quoted  thinks  fit  to  say,  in  translation,  1835,  vol.  ii.  pp.  196,  202.) 
vindication,  that  '•  all  felonies  committed  These  extracts  give  a  most  unfavorable 
within  the  verge  of  the  court  are  cog-  picture  of  the  conduct  of  James  at  his 
nizable  in  the  court  of  the  king's  house-  accession,  as  those  from  other  ambassa- 
hold,"  referring  to  33  H.  8,  c.  1.  This  dors  do  at  a  later  period.] 
act  however  contains  no  such  thing;  nor  2  Sully,  being  sent  over  to  compliment 
does  any  court  appear  to  have  been  held.  James  on  his  accession,  persisted  in  wear- 
Though  the  man's  notorious  guilt  might  ing  mourning  for  Elizabeth,  though  no 
prevent  any  open  complaint  of  so  illegal  one  had  done  so  in  the  king's  presence, 
a  proceeding,  it  did  not  fail  to  excite  ob-  and  he  was  warned  that  it  would  be 
servation.  "  I  hear  our  new  king,"  says  taken  ill  •'  dans  une  cour  ou  il  sembloifc 
sir  John  Harrington,  "  has  hanged  one  qu'on  cut  si  fort  affecte  de  mettre  en 
man  before  he  was  tried;  it  is  strangely  oublicette  grande  reine,  qu'on  n'y  faisoit 
done  :  now,  if  the  wind  bloweth  thus,  jamais  uientiqn  d'elle,  et  qu'on  evitoit 
why  may  not  a  man  be  tried  before  he  meme  de  prononcer  son  nom."  Mem. 
has  offended  ?  "  Nugse  Autiquse,  vol.  i.  de  Sully,  1.  14.  James  afterwards  spoke 
p.  180.  slightingly  to  Sully  of  his  predecessor, 

Birch  and  Carte  {ells  us,  on  the  author!-  and  said  that  he  had  long  ruled  England 

ty  of  the  French  ambassador's  despatches,  through  her  ministers, 

that  on  this  journey  he  expressed  a  great  3  It  was  subscribed  by  825  ministers 

contempt  for  women,  suffering  them  to  from  twenty -five  counties.     It  states  that 

be  presented  on  their  knees,  and  indis-  neither  as  factious  men  desiring  a  popu- 

creetly  consuring  his  own  wife;  that  he  lar  party  in  the  church,  nor  as  schismat- 

offended    the  military   men     by    telling  ics  aiming  at  the  dissolution  of  the  state 

them  they   might  sheathe  their   swords,  ecclesiastical,   they    humbly  desired  the 

since  peace  was  his  object ;  that  he  showed  redress  of  some  abuses.     Their  objections 

impatience  of  the  common  people,  who  were  chiefly  to  the  cap  and  surplice,  the 

flocked  to  see  him  while  hunting,  driving  cross  in  baptism,  baptism  by  women,  con- 

them  away  with  curses,  very  unlike  the  urination,  the  ring  in  marriage,  the  read- 


294 


HIS  CONDUCT   TO  THE  PURITANS.        CHAP.  VI. 


mand  inconsistent  with  the  established  hierarchy.  James, 
however,  who  had  not  unnaturally  taken  an  extreme  disgust 
at  the  presbyterian  clergy  of  his  native  kingdom,  by  whom 
his  life  had  been  perpetually  harassed,  showed  no  disposition 
to  treat  these  petitioners  with  favor.1  The  bishops  had 
promised  him  an  obsequiousness  to  which  he  had  been  little 
accustomed,  and  a  zeal  to  enhance  his  prerogative  which 
they  afterwards  too  well  displayed.  His  measures  towai'da 
the  nonconformist  party  had  evidently  been  resolved  upon 
before  he  summoned  a  few  of  their  divines  to  the  famous 
conference  at  Hampton  Court.  In  the  accounts  that  we  read 
of  this  meeting  we  are  alternately  struck  with  wonder  at  the 
indecent  and  partial  behavior  of  the  king,  and  at  the  abject 
baseness  of  the  bishops,  mixed,  according  to  the  custom  of 
servile  natures,  with  insolence  towards  their  opponents.2  It 
was  easy  for  a  monarch  and  eighteen  churchmen  to  claim 
the  victory,  be  the  merits  of  their  dispute  what  they  might, 
over  four  abashed  and  intimidated  adversaries.8  A  very 
few  alterations  were  made  in  the  church-service  after  this 
conference,  but  not  of  such  moment  as  to  reconcile  probably 
a  single  minister  to  the  established  discipline.4  The  king 
soon  afterwards  put  forth  a  proclamation  requiring  all  eccle- 
siastical and  civil  officers  to  do  their  duty  by  enforcing  con- 
formity, and  admonishing  all  men  not  to  expect  nor  attempt 
any  further  alteration  in  the  public  service ;  for  "  he  would 

p.  673  ;  Neal,  p.  411 :  Fuller,  part  ii.  p.  7 ; 
State  Trials,  vol.  ii.  p.  69;  Winwood, 
ii.  13.  All  these,  except  the  last,  are 
taken  from  an  account  of  the  conference 
published  by  Barlow,  and  probably  more 
favorable  to  the  king  and  bishops  than 
they  deserved.  See  what  Harrington,  an 
eye-witness,  says  in  Nugse  Antiquae, 
i.  181,  which  I  would  quote  as  the  best 
evidence  of  James's  behavior,  were  the 
passage  quite  decent. 

3  Reynolds,  the  principal  disputant  on 
the  puritan  side,  was  nearly,  if  not  alto- 
gether, the  most  learned  man  in  England. 
He  was  censured  by  his  faction  for 
making  a  weak  defence;  but  the  king's 
partiality  and  intemperance  plead  his 
apology.  He  is  said  to  have  complained 
of  unfair  representation  in  Barlow's  ac- 
count. Hist,  and  Ant.  of  Oxford,  ii.  293. 
James  wrote  a  conceited  letter  to  one 
Blake,  boasting  of  his  own  superior  logic 
and  learning.  Strype's  Whitgift,  Ap- 
pend. 239. 

*  Kyuier,  xvi.  565. 


ing  of  the  Apocrypha,  bowing  at  the 
name  of  Jesus,  &c.;  to  non-residence  and 
incapable  ministers,  the  commendams 
held  by  bishops,  unnecessary  excom- 
munications, and  other  usual  topics. 
Neal,  p.  408;  Fuller,  part  ii.  p.  22. 

1  The  puritans  seem  to  have  flattered 
themselves  that  James  would  favor  their 
Beet,  on  the  credit  of  some  strong  asser- 
tions  he   had    occasionally  made  of  his 
adherence  to  the  Scots  kirk.      Some  of 
these  were  a  good  while  before ;  but  on 
quitting    the   kingdom  he  had  declared 
that  he  left  it  in  a  state  which  he  did  not 
intend  to  alter.   Neal,  4CK>.   James  how- 
ever was  all  his  life  rather  a  bold  liar 
than  a  good  dissembler.  It  seems  strange 
that  they  should  not  have  attended  to  his 
Basilicon  Doron,  printed  three  years  be- 
fore, though  not  for  general  circulation, 
wherein  there  is  a  passage  quite  decisive 
of  his  disposition  towards    the  presby- 
terians  and  their  scheme  of  polity.     The 
Millenary  Petition  indeed  did  not  go  so 
far  as  to  request  anything  of  that  kind. 

2  Sf.rype'3    Whitgift,    p.    571;    Collier, 


JAMES  I.  TREATMENT  OF  PURITANS.  295 

neither  let  any  presume  that  his  own  judgment,  having  de- 
termined in  a  matter  of  this  weight,  should  be  swayed  to  al- 
teration by  the  frivolous  suggestions  of  any  light  spirit,  nor 
was  he  ignorant  of  the  inconvenience  of  admitting  innovation 
in  things  once  settled  by  mature  deliberation."  *  And  he 
had  already  strictly  enjoined  the  bishops  to  proceed  against 
all  their  clergy  who  did  not  observe  the  prescribed  order ; ? 
a  command  which  Bancroft,  who  about  this  time  followed 
Whitgift  in  the  primacy,  did  not  wait  to  have  repeated.  But 
the  most  enormous  outrage  on  the  civil  rights  of  these  men 
was  the  commitment  to  prison  of  ten  among  those  who  had 
presented  the  Millenary  Petition ;  the  judges  having  declared 
in  the  star-chamber  that  it  was  an  offence  finable  at  discre- 
tion, and  very  near  to  treason  and  felony,  as  it  tended  to  se- 
dition and  rebellion.8  By  such  beginnings  did  the  house  of 
Stuart  indicate  the  course  it  would  steer. 

An  entire  year  elapsed,  chiefly  on  account  of  the  un- 
healthiness  of  the  season  in  London,  Before  James  sum- 
moned his  first  parliament.  It  might  perhaps  have  been 
more  politic  to  have  chosen  some  other  city ;  for  the  length 
of  this  interval  gave  time  to  form  a  disadvantageous  esti- 
mate of  his  administration,  and  to  alienate  beyond  recovery 
the  puritanical  party.  Libels  were  already  in  circulation 
reflecting  with  a  sharpness  never  before  known  on  the  king's 
personal  behavior,  which  presented  an  extraordinary  con- 
trast to  that  of  Elizabeth.4  The  nation,  it  is  easy  to  per- 
ceive, cheated  itself  into  a  persuasion  that  it  had  borne  that 
princess  more  affection  than  it  had  really  felt,  especially  in 
her  latter  years ;  the  sorrow  of  subjects  for  deceased  mon- 

1  Strype's    Whitgift,   687.     How    de-  bled,  devising  remedies  as  fast  as  time 

girous  men  not  at  all  connected  in  faction  .  breedeth  mischief;  and  contrariwise  the 

with  the  puritans  were  of  amendments  in  ecclesiastical  state  should  still  continue 

the  church,  appears  by  a  tract  of  Bacon,  upon  the  dregs  of  time,  and  receive  no 

written,  as  it  seems,  about  the  end  of  alteration  now  for  these  forty-five  years 

1603,   vol.   i.   p.  387.  —  He    excepts    to  or  more?" 

several  matters   of  ceremony;    the  cap  «  Strype's  Whitgift,  587. 

and  surplice,  the  ring  in  marriage,  the  8  Neal,  432;  Winwood,  ii.  36. 

use  of  organs,  the  form    of  absolution,  *  See  one  of  the   Somers  Tracts,  yol. 

ay-baptism,  &c.     And  inveighs  against  ii.  p.  144,  entitled  "  Advertisements  of 

he  abuse  of  excommunication,  against  a  Loyal  Subject,  drawn  from  the  Obser- 

non-resideuts  and  pluralities,  the  oath  vation  of  the  People's  Speeches."    This 

ex-offlcio,  the  sole  exercise  of  ordination  appears  to  have  been  written  before  the 

and  jurisdiction  by  the  bishop,  conceiving  meeting    of    parliament.     The    French 

that  the  dean  and  chapter  should  always  ambassadors.    Sully    and    La    Boderie, 

assent,   ike.      And,  in  his    predominant  thought  most  contemptibly  of  the  king. 

spirit  of  improvement,  asks,  "  Why  the  Lingard,  vol.  ix.  p.  107.     His  own  cour- 

civil  state  should  be  purged  and  restored  tiers,  as  their  private  letters  show,  difl 

by  good  and  wholesome  laws  made  every  liked  and  derided  him. 
three  or  four  years  in  parliament  assem- 


296  PARLIAMENT  CONVOKED  IRREGULARLY.     CHAP.  VI. 

archs  being  often  rather  inspired  by  a  sense  of  evil  than  a 
recollection  of  good.  James,  however,  little  heeded  the  pop-, 
ular  voice,  satisfied  with  the  fulsome  and  preposterous  adu- 
lation of  his  court,  and  intent  on  promulgating  certain  max- 
ims concerning  the  dignity  and  power  of  princes,  which  he 
had  already  announced  in  his  discourse  on  the  True  Law 
of  Free  Monarchies,  printed  some  years  before  in  Scotland. 
In  this  treatise,  after  laying  it  down  that  monarchy  is  the 
true  pattern  of  divinity,  and  proving  the  duty  of  passive 
obedience,  rather  singularly,  from  that  passage  in  the  book 
of  Samuel  where  the  prophet  so  forcibly  paints  the  miseries 
of  absolute  power,  he  denies  that  the  kings  of  Scotland  owe 
their  crown  to  any  primary  contract,  Fergus,  their  progeni- 
tor, having  conquered  the  country  with  his  Irish ;  and  ad- 
vances more  alarming  tenets,  as  that  the  king  makes  daily 
statutes  and  ordinances,  enjoining  such  pains  thereto  as  he, 
thinks  meet,  without  any  advice  of  parliament  or  estates ; 
that  general  laws  made  publicly  in  parliament  may  by  the 
king's  authority  be  mitigated  or  suspended  upon  causes  only 
known  to  him  ;  and  that,  "  although  a  good  king  will  frame 
all  his  actions  to  be  according  to  the  law,  yet  he  is  not  bound 
thereto,  but  of  his  own  will  and  for  example-giving  to  his 
subjects." 1  These  doctrines,  if  not  absolutely  novel,  seem 
peculiarly  indecent,  as  well  as  dangerous,  from  the  mouth 
of  a  sovereign.  Yet  they  proceeded  far  more  from  James's 
self-conceit  and  pique  against  the  republican  spirit  of  pres- 
byterianism  than  from  his  love  of  power,  which  (in  its  ex- 
ercise I  mean,  as  distinguished  from  its  possession)  he  did 
not  feel  in  so  eminent  a  degree  as  either  his  predecessor  or 
his  son. 

In  the  proclamation  for  calling  together  his  first  parlia- 
ment,- the  king,  after  dilating,  as  was  his  favorite  practice, 
on  a  series  of  rather  common  truths  in  very  good  language, 
charges  all  persons  interested  in  the  choice  of  knights  for 
the  shire  to  select  them  out  of  the  principal  knights  or 
gentlemen  within  the  county ;  and  for  the  burgesses  that 
Parliament  choice  be  made  of  men  of  sufficiency  and  discre- 
bTan'irregu-  t'on'  witnout  desire  to  please  parents  and  friends 
larproeia-  that  often  speak  for  their  children  or  kindred; 
avoiding  persons  noted  in  religion  for  their  su- 
perstitious blindness  one  way,  or  for  their  turbulent  humor 

1  King  James's  Works,  p.  3Q7 


JAMES  I.  CONTESTED  ELECTION.  297 

other  ways.  We  do  command,  he  says,  that  no  bankrupts 
or  outlaws  be  chosen,  but  men  of  known  good  behavior 
and  sufficient  livelihood.  The  sheriffs  are  charged  not  to 
direct  a  writ  to  any  ancient  town  being  so  ruined  that  there 
are  not  residents  sufficient  to  make  such  choice,  and  of  whom 
such  lawful  election  may  be  made.  All  returns  are  to  be 
filed  in  chancery,  and  if  any  be  found  contrary  to  this  proc- 
lamation the  same  to  be  rejected  as  unlawful  and  insufficient, 
and  the  place  to  be  fined  for  making  it ;  and  any  one  elected 
contrary  to  the  purport,  effect,  and  true  meaning  of  this  proc- 
lamation, to  be  fined  and  imprisoned.1 

Such  an  assumption  of  control  over  parliamentary  elec- 
tions was  a  glaring  infringement  of  those  privi-  Question  of 
leges    which    the    house   of   commons   had    been  Fortescue 

vi  i  c  n  ii          i    i     anj  Good- 

steadily  and  successfully  asserting  in  the  late  win's 
reign.  An  opportunity  very  soon  occurred  of  electlon- 
contesting  this  important  point.  At  the  election  for  the 
county  of  Buckingham  sir  Francis  Goodwin  had  been 
chosen  in  preference  to  sir  John  Fortescue,  a  privy  coun- 
cillor, and  the  writ  returned  into  chancery.  Goodwin  hav- 
ing been  some  years  before  outlawed,  the  return  was  sent 
back  to  the  sheriff,  as  contrary  to  the  late  proclamation ; 
and,  on  a  second  election,  sir  John  Fortescue  was  chosen. 
This  matter,  being  brought  under  the  consideration  of  the 
house  of  commons  a  very  few  days  after  the  opening  of 
the  session,  gave  rise  to  their  first  struggle  with  the  new 
king.  It  was  resolved,  after  hearing  the  whole  case,  and 
arguments  by  members  on  both  sides,  that  Goodwin  was 
lawfully  elected  and  returned,  and  ought  to  be  received. 
The  first  notice  taken  of  this  was  by  the  lords,  who  re- 
quested that  this  might  be  discussed  in  a  conference  between 
the  two  houses  before  any  other  matter  should  be  proceeded 
in.  The  commons  returned  for  answer  that  they  conceived 
it  not  according  to  the  honor  of  the  house  to  give  account 
of  any  of  their  proceedings.  The  lords  replied,  that,  hav- 
ing acquainted  his  majesty  with  the  matter,  he  desired  there 
might  be  a  conference  thereon  between  the  two  houses. 
Upon  this  message  the  commons  came  to  a  resolution  that 
the  speaker  with  a  numerous  deputation  of  members  should 
attend  his  majesty  and  report  the  reasons  of  their  proceed- 
ings in  Goodwin's  case.  In  this  conference  with  the  king, 

»  Parl.  Hist.  i.  967 


298  CONTESTED  ELECTION.  CHAP.  VI. 

as  related  by  the  speaker,  it  appears  that  he  had  shown 
some  degree  of  chagrin,  and  insisted  that  the  house  ought 
not  to  meddle  with  returns,  which  could  only  be  corrected 
by  the  court  of  chancery ;  and  that,  since  they  derived  all 
matters  of  privilege  from  him  and  his  grant,  he  expected 
they  should  not  be  turned  against  him.  He  ended  by 
directing  the  house  to  confer  with  the  judges.  After  a  de- 
bate which  seems  from  the  minutes  in  the  journals  to  have 
been  rather  warm,  it  was  unanimously  agreed  not  to  have 
a  conference  with  the  judges  ;  but  the  reasons  of  the  house's 
proceeding  were  laid  before  the  king  in  a  written  statement 
or  memorial,  answering  the  several  objections  that  his  maj- 
esty had '  alleged.  This  they  sent  to  the  lords,  requesting 
them  to  deliver  it  to  the  king,  and  to  be  mediators  in  be- 
half of  the  house  for  his  majesty's  satisfaction  ;  a  message 
in  rather  a  lower  tone  than  they  had  previously  taken.  The 
king,  sending  for  the  speaker  privately,  told  him  that  he  was 
now  distracted  in  judgment  as  to  the  merits  of  the  case, 
and,  for  his  further  satisfaction,  desired  and  commanded,  as 
an  absolute  king,  that  there  should  be  a  conference  between 
the  house  and  the  judges.  Upon  this  unexpected  message, 
says  the  journal,  there  grew  some  amazement  and  silence. 
But  at  last  one  stood  up  and  said,  "  The  prince's  command 
is  like  a  thunderbolt ;  his  command  upon  our  allegiance 
like  the  roaring  of  a  lion.  To  his  command  there  is  no 
contradiction ;  but  how  or  in  what  manner  we  should  now 
proceed  to  perform  obedience,  that  will  be  the  question." l 
It  was  resolved  to  confer  with  the  judges  in  presence  of  the 
king  and  council.  In  this  second  conference  the  king,  after 
some  favorable  expressions  towards  the  house,  and  conceding 
that  it  was  a  court  of  record,  and  judge  of  returns,  though 
not  exclusively  of  the  chancery,  suggested  that  both  Good- 
win and  Fortescue  should  be  set  aside  by  issuing  a  new 
writ.  This  compromise  was  joyfully  accepted  by  the  greater 
part  of  the  commons,  after  the  dispute  had  lasted  nearly  three 
weeks.2  They  have  been  considered  as  victorious,  upon  the. 
whole,  in  this  contest,  though  they  apparently  fell  short  in 

1  Commons'  Journals,  i.  166.  house  was,  that  it  was  a  testimony  of 

2  It  appears   that  some    of  the  more  our    duty    and    no    levity."      It    was 
eager  patriots  were    dissatisfied    at  the  thought    expedient,     however,    to    save 
concession  made  hy  vacating  Goodwin's  their  honor,  that  Goodwin  should  send 
seat,  and  said  they  had  drawn  on  them-  a  letter  to   the  speaker  expresiinR   his 
selves  the  reproach  of  inconstancy  and  acquiescence.    Id.  168. 

levity       "  But  the  acclamation  of  the 


JAMES  I.  SHIRLEY'S   CASE  OF  PRIVILEGE.  299 

the  result  of  what  they  had  obtained  some  years  before.  But 
no  attempt  was  ever  afterwards  made  to  dispute  their  exclu- 
sive jurisdiction.1 

The  commons  were  engaged  during  this  session  in  the 
defence  of  another  privilege,  to  which  they  an-  ghjrley,8 
nexed  perhaps  a  disproportionate  importance.  Sir  case  of 
Thomas  Shirley,  a  member,  having  been  taken  in  Pmilese- 
execution  on  a  private  debt  before  their  meeting,  and  the 
warden  of  the  Fleet  prison  refusing  to  deliver  him  up,  they 
were  at  a  loss  how  to  obtain  his  release.  Several  methods 
were  projected ;  among  which  that  of  sending  a  party  of 
members  with  the  sergeant  and  his  mace,  to  force  open  the 
prison,  was  carried  on  a  division ;  but  the  speaker  hinting 
that  such  a  vigorous  measure  would  expose  them  individu- 
ally to  prosecution  as  trespassers,  it  was  prudently  aban- 
doned. The  warden,  though  committed  by  the  house  to  a 
dungeon  in  the  Tower,  continued  obstinate,  conceiving  that 
by  releasing  his  prisoner  he  should  become  answerable 
for  the  debt.  They  were  evidently  reluctant  to  solicit  the 
king's  interference ;  but,  aware  at  length  that  their  own 
authority  was  insufficient,  "  the  vice-chamberlain,"  accord- 
ing to  a  memorandum  in  the  journals,  "  was  privately  in- 
structed to  go  to  the  king  and  humbly  desire  that  he  would 
be  pleased  to  command  the  warden,  on  his  allegiance,  to 
deliver  up  sir  Thomas ;  not  as  petitioned  for  by  the  house, 
but  as  if  himself  thought  it  fit,  out  of  his  own  gracious 
judgment."  By  this  stratagem,  if  we  may  so  term  it,  they 
saved  the  point  of  honor  and  recovered  their  member.2  The 
warden's  apprehensions,  however,  of  exposing  himself  to  an 
action  for  the  escape  gave  rise  to  a  statute  which  empowers 
the  creditor  to  sue  out  a  new  execution  against  any  one  who 
shall  be  delivered  by  virtue  of  his  privilege  of  parliament, 
after  that  shall  have  expired,  and  discharges  from  liability 
those  out  of  whose  custody  such  persons  shall  be  delivered. 
This  is  the  first  legislative  recognition  of  privilege.8  The 
most  important  part  of  the  whole  is  a  proviso  subjoined  to 
the  act,  "  That  nothing  therein  contained  shall  extend  to 

1  Commons'  Journals,  147,  &o. ;  Parl.  Memorials,    ii.    18,    where    he    artfully 

Hist.  997  ;  Carte,  iii.  730,  who  gives,  on  endeavors  to  treat  the  matter  as  of  little 

this  .occasion,   a  review  of  the  earlier  importance. 

eases  where  the   house   had  entered  on  2  Commons'   Journals,    p.    155,    &c. ' 

matters  of  election.    See  also  a  rathei  Parl.  Hist.  1028  ;  Carce,  734. 

curious    letter    of    Cecil    in  Winwood's  3  I  jttc.  I.  c.  13. 


300  COMPLAINTS   OF  GRIEVANCES.  CHAP.  VI. 

the  diminishing  of  any  punishment  to  be  hereafter,  by  cen- 
sure in  parliament,  inflicted  upon  any  person  who  hereafter 
shall  make  or  procure  to  be  made  any  such  arrest  as  is  afore- 
said." The  right  of  commitment,  in  such  cases  at  least,  by 
a  vote  of  the  house  of  commons,  is  here  unequivocally  main- 
tained. 

It  is  not  necessary  to  repeat  the  complaints  of  ecclesiasti- 
Compiainta  ^  abuses  preferred  by  this  house  of  commons,  as 
of  griev-  by  those  that  had  gone  before  them.  James,  by 
siding  openly  with  the  bishops,  had  given  alarm 
to  the  reforming  party.  It  was  anticipated  that  he  would  go 
farther  than  his  predecessor,  whose  uncertain  humor,  as  well 
as  the  inclinations  of  some  of  her  advisers,  had  materially 
counterbalanced  the  dislike  she  entertained  of  the  innova- 
tors. A  code  of  new  canons  had  recently  been  established 
in  convocation  with  the  king's  assent,  obligatory  perhaps 
upon  the  clergy,  but  tending  to  set  up  an  unwarranted 
authority  over  the  whole  nation ;  imposing  oaths  and  exact- 
ing securities  in  certain  cases  from  the  laity,  and  aiming 
at  the  exclusion  of  nonconformists  from  all  civil  rights.1 
Against  these  canons,  as  well  as  various  other  grievances, 
the  commons  remonstrated  in  a  conference  with  the  upper 
house,  but  with  little  immediate  effect.2  They  made  a  more 
remarkable  effort  in  attacking  some  public  mischiefs  of  a 
temporal  nature,  which,  though  long  the  theme  of  general 
murmurs,  were  closely  interwoven  with  the  ancient  and 
undisputed  prerogatives  of  the  crown.  Complaints  were 
uttered,  and  innovations  projected,  by  the  commons  of  1604, 
which  Elizabeth  would  have  met  with  an  angry  message, 
and  perhaps  visited  with  punishment  on  the  proposer?. 
James,  however,  was  not  entirely  averse  to  some  of  the 
projected  alterations,  from  which  he  hoped  to  derive  a  pe- 
cuniary advantage.  The  two  principal  grievances  were  pur- 

1  By  one  of  these  canons,  all  persons  appear  to  be  true,  though  James  him- 
affl  ruling  any  of  the  thirty-nine  articles  self  had  objected  to  their  frequency.     I 
to  be  erroneous  are  excommunicated  ipso  cannot  trace  such  a  bill  in  the  journals 
facto  ;    consequently   become    incapatle  beyond  the  committee,  nor  is  it  in  the 
of  being   witnesses,   of  suing  for  their  statute-book.     The  fact  is,  that  the  king 
debts,  &c.     Neal,  428.     But  the  courts  desired  the  house  to  confer  on  the  sub- 
of  law  disregarded  these  ipso  facto  ex-  ject  with   the  convocation,  which  they 
communications.  justly  deemed  unprecedented,  and  dero- 

2  Somers  Tracts,  ii.  14  ;  Journals,  199,  gatory  to  their  privileges  ;   but  offered  to 
235,  238  ;  Parl.  Hist.  1067.    It  is  here  confer  with  the  bishops,  as  lords  of  par- 
said  that  a  bill  restraining  exoominuni-  liament.    Journals,  173. 

cations  passed  into  a  law,  which  does  not 


JAMES  I.  COMPLAINTS  OF  GRIEVANCES.  301 

veyance  and  the  incidents  of  military  tenure.  The  former 
had  been  restrained  by  not  less  than  thirty-six  statutes,  as 
the  commons  assert  in  a  petition  to  the  king ;  in  spite  of 
which  the  impressing  of  carts  and  carriages,  and  the  exac- 
tion of  victuals  for  the  king's  use,  at  prices  far  below  the 
true  value,  and  in  quantity  beyond  what  was  necessary,  con- 
tinued to  prevail  under  authority  of  commissions  from  the 
board  of  green  cloth,  and  was  enforced,  in  case  of  demur  or 
resistance,  by  imprisonment  under  their  warrant.  The  pur- 
veyors, indeed,  are  described  as  living  at  free  quarters  upon 
the  country,  felling  woods  without  the  owners'  consent,  and 
commanding  labor  with  little  or  no  recompense.1  Purvey-, 
ance  was  a  very  ancient  topic  of  remonstrance  ;  but  both 
the  inadequate  revenues  of  the  crown,  and  a  supposed  dig- 
nity attached  to  this  royal  right  of  spoil,  had  prevented  its 
abolition  from  being  attempted.  But  the  commons  seemed 
still  more  to  trench  on  the  pride  of  our  feudal  monarchy 
when  they  proposed  to  take  away  guardianship  in  chivalry  ; 
that  lucrative  tyranny,  bequeathed  by  Norman  conquerors, 
the  custody  of  every  military  tenant's  estate  until  he  should 
arrive  at  twenty-one,  without  accounting  for  the  profits. 
This,  among  other  grievances,  was  referred  to  a  committee, 
in  which  Bacon  took  an  active  share.  They  obtained  a  con- 
ference on  this  subject  with  the  lords,  who  refused  to  agree 
to  a  bill  for  taking  guardianship  in  chivalry  away,  but  offered 
to  join  in  a  petition  for  that  purpose  to  the  king,  since  it  could 
not  be  called  a  wrong,  having  been  patiently  endured  by  their 
ancestors  as  well  as  themselves,  and  being  warranted  by  the 
law  of  the  land.  In  the  end  the  lords  advised  to  drop  the 
matter  for  the  present,  as  somewhat  unseasonable  in  the 
king's  first  parliament.2 

In  the  midst  of  these  testimonies  of  dissatisfaction  with 
the  civil  and  ecclesiastical  administration,  the  house  of  com- 
mons had  not  felt  much  willingness  to  greet  the  new  sover 
eign  with  a  subsidy.  No  demand  had  been  made  upon  them, 
far  less  any  proof  given  of  the  king's  exigencies ;  and  they 
doubtless  knew  by  experience  that  an  obstinate  determina- 
tion not  to  yield  to  any  of  their  wishes  would  hardly  be 
shaken  by  a  liberal  grant  of  money.  They  had  even  passed 
the  usual  bill  granting  tonnage  and  poundage  for  life,  with 

1  Bacon's  Works,  i.  624 ;  Journals,  190,  215. 
*  Commons'  Journals,  150,  &c. 


302  COMMONS'  VINDICATION.  CHAP.  VI. 

certain  reservations  that  gave  the  court  offence,  and  which 
apparently  they  afterwards  omitted.  But  there  was  so  little 
disposition  to  do  anything  further,  that  the  king  sent  a  mes- 
sage to  express  his  desire  that  the  commons  would  not  enter 
upon  the  business  of  a  subsidy,  and  assuring  them  that  he 
would  not  take  unkindly  their  omission.  By  this  artifice, 
which  was  rather  transparent,  he  avoided  the  not  improbable 
mortification  of  seeing  the  proposal  rejected.1 

The  king's  discontent  at  the  proceedings  of  this  session, 
which  he  seems  to  have  rather  strongly  expressed 
vindication  *n  some  speech  to  the  commons  that  has  not  been 
of  them  recorded,2  gave  rise  to  a  very  remarkable  vindica- 
tion, prepared  by  a  committee  at  the  house's  com- 
mand, and  entitled  "  A  Form  of  Apology  and  Satisfaction 
to  be  delivered  to  his  Majesty,"  though  such  may  not  be 
deemed  the  most  appropriate  title.  It  contains  a  full  and 
pertinent  justification  of  all  those  proceedings  at  which 
James  had  taken  umbrage,  and  asserts,  with  respectful  bold- 
ness and  in  explicit  language,  the  constitutional  rights  and 
liberties  of  parliament.  If  the  English  monarchy  had  been 
reckoned  as  absolute  under  tfte  Plantagenets  and  Tudors  as 
Hume  has  endeavored  to  make  it  appear,  the  commons  of 
1604  must  have  made  a  surprising  advance  in  their  notions 
of  freedom  since  the  king's  accession.  Adverting  to  what 
they  call  the  misinformation  openly  delivered  to  his  majesty 
in  three  things  ;  namely,  that  their  privileges  were  not  of 
right,  but  of  grace  only,  renewed  every  parliament  on  peti- 
tion ;  that  they  are  no  court  of  record,  nor  yet  a  court  that 
can  command  view  of  records  ;  that  the  examination  of  the 
returns  of  writs  for  knights  and  burgesses  is  without  their 
compass,  and  belonging  to  the  chancery :  assertions,  they 
say,  "  tending  directly  and  apparently  to  the  utter  overthrow 
of  the  very  fundamental  privileges  of  our  house,  and  therein 
of  the  rights  and  liberties  of  the  whole  commons  of  your 
realm  of  England,  which  they  and  their  ancestors,  from  time 
immemorial,  have  undoubtedly  enjoyed  under  your  majesty's 
most  noble  progenitors  ; "  and  against  which  they  expressly 
protest,  as  derogatory  in  the  highest  degree  to  the  true  dig- 
nity and  authority  of  parliament,  desiring  "  that  such  their 
protestations  might  be  recorded  to  all  posterity  ; "  they  main- 

1  Commons'  Journals,  246.  *  Ibid.  230. 


JAMES  I.  COMMONS'  VINDICATION.  303 

tain,  on  the  contrary,  "  1.  That  their  privileges  and  liberties 
are  their  right  and  inheritance,  no  less  than  their  very  lands 
and  goods ;  2.  That  they  cannot  be  withheld  from  them, 
denied,  or  impaired,  but  with  apparent  wrong  to  the  whole 
state  of  the  realm ;  3.  That  their  making  request,  at  the 
beginning  of  a  parliament,  to  enjoy  their  privilege,  is  only 
an  act  of  manners,  and  does  not  weaken  their  right ;  4.  That 
their  house  is  a  court  of  record,  and  has  been  ever  so  es- 
teemed ;  5.  That  there  is  not  the  highest  standing  court  in 
this  land  that  ought  to  enter  into  competition,  either  for  dig- 
nity or  authority,  with  this  high  court  of  parliament,  which, 
with  his  majesty's  royal  assent,  gives  law  to  other  courts,  but 
from  other  courts  receives  neither  laws  nor  orders  ;  6.  That 
the  house  of  commons  is  the  sole  proper  judge  of  return  of 
all  such  writs,  and  the  election  of  all  such  members  as  belong 
to  it,  without  which  the  freedom  of  election  were  not  entire." 
They  aver  that  in  this  session  the  privileges  of  the  house 
have  been  more  universally  and  dangerously  impugned  than 
ever,  as  they  suppose,  since  the  beginnings  of  parliaments. 
That,  "  in  regard  to  the  late  queen's  sex  and  age,  and  much 
more  upon  care  to  avoid  all  trouble,  which  by  wicked  prac- 
tice might  have  been  drawn  to  impeach  the  quiet  of  his  maj- 
esty's right  in  the  succession,  those  actions  were  then  passed 
over  which  they  hoped  in  succeeding  times  to  redress  and 
rectify ;  whereas,  on  the  contrary,  in  this  parliament,  not 
privileges,  but  the  whole  freedom  of  the  parliament  and 
realm,  had  been  hewed  from  them."  "  What  cause,"  they 
proceed,  "  we,  your  poor  commons,  have  to  watch  over  our 
privileges,  is  manifest  in  itself  to  all  men.  The  prerogatives 
of  princes  may  easily  and  do  daily  grow.  The  privileges  of 
the  subject  are  for  the  most  part  at  an  everlasting  stand. 
They  may  be  by  good  providence  and  care  preserved ;  but, 
being  once  lost,  are  not  recovered  but  with  much  disquiet." 
They  then  enter  in  detail  on  the  various  matters  that  had 
arisen  during  the  session,  —  the  business  of  Goodwin's  elec- 
tion, of  Shirley's  arrest,  and  some  smaller  matters  of  priv- 
ilege to  which  my  limits  have  not  permitted  me  to  allude. 
"  We  thought  not,"  speaking  of  the  first,  "  that  the  judges' 
opinion,  which  yet  in  due  place  we  greatly  reverence,  being 
delivered  what  the  common  law  was,  which  extends  only  to 
inferior  and  standing  courts,  ought  to  bring  any  prejudice  to 
this  high  court  of  parliament,  whose  power,  being  above  the 


304 


COMMONS'   VINDICATION. 


CHAP.  VI. 


law,  is  not  founded  on  the  common  law,  but  have  their  rights 
and  privileges  peculiar  to  themselves."  They  vindicate  their 
endeavors  to  obtain  redress  of  religious  and  public  griev- 
ances :  "  Your  majesty  would  be  misinformed,"  they  tell 
him,  "  if  any  man  should  deliver  that  the  kings  of  England 
have  any  absolute  power  in  themselves,  either  to  alter  relig- 
ion, which  God  defend  should  be  in  the  power  of  any  mortal 
man  whatsoever,  or  to  make  any  laws  concerning  the  same, 
otherwise  than  as  in  temporal  causes,  by  consent  of  parlia- 
ment. We  have  and  shall  at  all  times  by  our  oaths  acknowl- 
edge that  your  majesty  is  sovereign  lord  and  supreme  gov- 
ernor in  both."1  Such  was  the  voice  of  the  English  com- 
mons in  1604,  at  the  commencement  of  that  great  conflict 
for  their  liberties  which  is  measured  by  the  line  of  (he 
house  of  Stuart.  But  it  is  not  certain  that  this  apology 
was  ever  delivered  to  the  king,  though  he  seems  to  allude  to 
it  in  a  letter  written  to  one  of  his  ministers  about  the  same 
time.2 

The  next  session,  which  is  remarkable  on  account  of  the 


l  Parl.  Hist.  1030,  from  Petyt's  Jus 
Parliamentarium,  the  earliest  book,  as 
far  as  I  know,  where  this  important 
document  is  preserved.  The  entry  on 
the  Journals,  p.  243,  contains  only  the 
first  paragraph.  Hume  and  Carte  have 
been  ignorant  of  it.  It  is  just  alluded 
to  by  Kapin. 

It  was  remarked  that  the  attendance 
of  members  in  this  session  was  more  fre- 
queat  than  had  ever  been  known,  so 
that,  fresh  seats  were  required.  Jour- 
nals, 141. 

a  "  My  faithful  3,  such  is  now  my  mis- 
fortune, as  I  must  be  for  this  time  secre- 
tary to  the  devil  in  answering  your 
letters  directed  unto  him.  That  the 
entering  now  into  the  matter  of  the  sub- 
sidy should  be  deferred  until  the  coun- 
cil's next  meeting  with  me,  I  think  no 
ways  convenient,  especially  for  three 
reasons.  First,  ye  see  it  has  bin  already 
longest  delayd  of  any  thing,  and  yet  yee 
gee  the  lower  house  are  ever  the  longer 
the  further  from  it ;  and  (as  in  every 
thing  that  concerns  mee)  delay  of  time 
does  never  turn  them  towards  mee.  but, 
by  the  contrary,  every  hour  breedeth 
a  new  trick  of  contradiction  amongst 
them,  and  every  day  produces  new 
matter  of  sedition,  so  fertile  are  their 
brains  in  ever  buttering  forth  venome. 
Next,  the  Parlt.  is  now  so  very  near  an 
end.  as  this  matter  can  suffer  no  longer 
'ielay.  And  thirdly,  if  this  be  not 


granted  unto  before  they  receive  my 
answer  unto  their  petition,  it  needs 
never  to  be  moved,  for  the  will  of  man 
or  angel  cannot  devise  a  pleasing  answer 
to  their  proposition,  except  I  should  pull 
the  crown  not  only  from  my  own  head, 
but  also  from  the  head  of  all  those  that 
shall  succeed  unto  mee,  and  lay  it  down 
at  their  feet.  And  that  freedom  of  utter- 
ing my  thoughts,  which  no  extremity, 
strait,  nor  peril  of  my  life  could  ever 
bereave  mee  of  in  time  past,  shall  now 
remain  with  mee  as  long  as  the  soul 
shall  with  the  body.  And  as  for  the 
Reservations  of  the  Bill  of  Tonnage  and 
Poundage,  yee  of  the  Upper  House  must 
out  of  your  Love  and  Discretion  help 
it  again,  or  otherwise  they  will  in  this, 
as  in  all  things  else  that  concern  mee, 
wrack  both  mee  and  all  my  Posterity 
Yee  may  impart  this  to  little  10  and 
bigg  Suffolk.  And  so  Farewell  from  my 
Wildernesse,  wch  I  had  rather  live  in  (as 
God  shall  judge  mee)  like  an  Hermite 
in  this  Forrest,  then  be  a  King  over 
such  a  People  as  the  pack  of  Puritans 
are  that  over-rules  the  lower-house. 
J.  R. 
(MS.  penes  autorem.) 

I  cannot  tell  who  is  addressed  in  this 
letter  by  the  numeral  3 ;  perhaps  the 
carl  of  Dunbar.  By  10  we  must  doubt- 
less understand  Salisbury. 


JAMES  I.  SESSION  OF  1605.  305 

conspiracy  of  some  desperate  men  to  blow  up  both  houses  of 
parliament  with  gunpowder  on  the  day  of  their  gessi0n 
meeting,  did  not  produce  much  worthy  of  our  notice. 1605- 
A  bill  to  regulate,  or  probably  to  suppress,  purveyance  was 
thrown  out  by  the  lords.  The  commons  sent  up  another  bill 
to  the  same  effect,  which  the  upper  house  rejected  without 
discussion,  by  a  rule  then  perhaps  first  established,  that  the 
same  bill  could  not  be  proposed  twice  in  one  session.1  They 
voted  a  liberal  subsidy,  which  the  king,  who  had  reigned 
three  years  without  one,  had  just  cause  to  require.  For 
though  he  had  concluded  a  peace  with  Spain  soon  after  his 
accession,  yet  the  late  queen  had  left  a  debt  of  400,000£,  and 
other  charges  had  fallen  on  the  crown.  But  the  bill  for  this 
subsidy  lay  a  good  while  in  the  house  of  commons,  who  came 
to  a  vote  that  it  should  not  pass  till  their  list  of  grievances 
was  ready  to  be  presented.  No  notice  was  taken  of  these 
till  the  next  session,  beginning  in  November,  1606,  when  the 
king  returned  an  answer  to  each  of  the  sixteen  articles  in 
which  matters  of  grievance  were  alleged.  Of  these  the 
greater  part  refer  to  certain  grants  made  to  particular  per- 
sons in  the  nature  of  monopolies  ;  the  king  either  defending 
these  in  his  answer,  or  remitting  the  parties  to  the  Union  ^^ 
courts  of  law  to  try  their  legality.  The  principal  Scotland 
business  of  this  third  session,  as  it  had  been  of  the  debated- 
last,  was  James's  favorite  scheme  of  a  perfect  union  between 
England  and  Scotland.  It  may  be  collected,  though  this  was 
never  explicitly  brought  forward,  that  his  views  extended  to 
a  legislative  incorporation.2  But  in  all  the  speeches  on  this 

1  Parl.  Hist.  Journals,  274,  278.  &c.  legislatures,  though  suggested  by  Bacon. 

In  a  conference  with  the  lords  on  this  Laing's  Hist,  of  Scotland,  iii.  17.    It  is 

bill,    Mr.   Hare,    a    member,    spoke    so  certain  that  his  own   speeches  on   the 

•warmly  as  to  give  their  lordships  offence  subject  do  not  mention  this  ;   nor  do  I 

and  to  incur  some  reprehension.     '•  You  know  that  it  was  ever  distinctly  brought 

would  have  thought,"  says  Sir  Thomas  forward  by  the  government;   yet  it   is 

Hoby,  "  that  Hare  and  Hyde  represented  hard  to  see  how  the  incorporation  could 

two   tribunes  of   the    people."      Sloane  have  been  complete  without  it.    Bacon 

MSS.,  4161.     But  the  commons  resented  not  only  contemplates  the  formation  of 

this    infringement    on    their  privileges,  a  single  parliament,  but  the  alterations 

and,  after  voting  that  Mr.  Hare  did  not  necessary  to  give  it  effect,  vol.  i.  p.  638; 

err   in    his  employment    in    the    com-  suggesting  that  the  previous  commission 

mittee  with  the  lords,   sent  a  message  of  lords  of  articles  might  be  adopted  for 

to  inform  the  other  house  of  their  vote,  some,  though  not  for  all,  purposes.    This 

and  to  request  that  they  would  "  forbear  of  itself  was  a  sufficient  justification  for 

hereafter  any   taxations   and  reprehen-  the  dilatoriness  of  the  English  parlia- 

sions  in  their  conferences."     Journals,  ment.     Nor  were  the  common  lawyers 

Feb.  20  and  22.  who    sat    in    the    house    much    better 

«  Journals,  816.  pleased  with    Bacon's  schemes  for   re- 

An     acute    historical     critic     doubts  modelling  all  our  laws.     See  his  speech, 

whether  James  aimed  at  an   union  of  vol.  i.  p.  654,  for  naturalizing  the  auto- 
VOL.  I. — C.                      20 


306  UNION  WITH  SCOTLAND  DEBATED.      CHAP.  VI. 

subject,  and  especially  his  own,  there  is  a  want  of  distinct- 
ness as  to  the  object  proposed.  He  dwells  continually  upon 
the  advantage  of  unity  of  laws,  yet  extols  those  of  England 
as  the  best,  which  the  Scots,  as  was  evident,  had  no  inclina- 
tion to  adopt.-  Wherefore  then  was  delay  to  be  imputed  to 
our  English  parliament,  if  it  waited  for  that  of  the  sister 
kingdom  ?  And  what  steps  were  recommended  towards  this 
measure  that  the  commons  can  be  said  to  have  declined,  ex- 
cept only  the  naturalization  of  the  ante-nati,  or  Scots  born 
before  the  king's  accession  to  our  throne,  which  could  only 
have  a  temporary  effect  ?  *  Yet  Hume,  ever  prone  to  eulo- 
gize this  monarch  at  the  expense  of  his  people,  while  he  be- 
stows merited  praise  on  his  speech  in  favor  of  the  union, 
which  is  upon  the  whole  a  well-written  and  judicious  per- 
formance, charges  the  parliament  with  prejudice,  reluctance, 
and  obstinacy.  The  code,  as  it  may  be  called,  of  interna- 
tional hostility,  those  numerous  statutes  treating  the  northern 
inhabitants  of  this  island  as  foreigners  and  enemies,  were  en- 
tirely abrogated.  And  if  the  commons,  while  both  the  theory 
of  our  own  constitution  was  so  unsettled,  and  its  practice  so 
full  of  abuse,  did  not  precipitately  give  in  to  schemes  that 
might  create  still  further  difficulty  in  all  questions  between 
the  crown  and  themselves,  schemes,  too,  which  there  was  no 
imperious  motive  for  carrying  into  effect  at  that  juncture,  we 
may  justly  consider  it  as  an  additional  proof  of  their  wisdom 
and  public  spirit.  Their  slow  progress,  however,  in  this  fa- 

nati.  In  this  he  asserts  the  kingdom  in  the  contrary  proposition.  "  Alle- 
not  to  be  fully  peopled  ;  "  the  territories  giance,"  says  lord  Bacon,  "  is  of  a»greater 
of  France,  Italy,  Flanders,  and  some  extent  and  dimension  than  laws  or  king- 
parts  of  Germany,  do  in  equal  space  of  doms,  and  cannot  consist  by  the  laws 
ground  bear  aud  rontain  a  far  greater  merely,  because  it  began  before  laws ;  it 
quantify  of  people,  if  they  were  mus-  continueth  after  laws,  and  it  is  in  vigor 
tered  by  the  poll ;  "  and  even  goes  on  when  laws  are  suspended  and  have  not 
to  assert  the  population  to  have  been  had  their  force."  Id.  596.  So  lord 
mare  considerable  under  the  heptarchy.  Coke  :  "  Whatsoever  is  due  by  the  la* 

1  It  was  held  by  twelve  judges  out  of  or  constitution  of  man  may  be  altered ; 

fourteen,  in  Calvin's  case,  that  the  post-  but  natural  legiance  or  obedience  of  the 

nati,  or  Scots  born  after  the  king's  acces-  subject  to  the  sovereign  cannot  be 

sion,  were  natural  subjects  of  the  king  altered  ;  ergo,  natural  legiance  or  obe- 

of  England.  This  is  laid  down,  and  dience  to  the  sovereign  is  not  due  by 

irresistibly  demonstrated  by  Coke,  then  the  law  or  constitution  of  man."  652. 

chief  justice,  with  his  abundant  legal  There  are  many  doubtful  positions 

learning.  State  Trials,  vol.  ii.  559.  scattered  through  the  judgment  in  thia 

It  may  be  observed  that  the  high-  famous  case.  Its  surest  basis  is  the  long 

flying  creed  of  prerogative  mingled  it-  series  of  precedents,  evincing  that  the 

self  intimately  with  this  question  of  natives  of  Jersey,  Guernsey,  Calais,  and 

naturalization  ;  which  was  much  argued  even  Normandy  and  Guienne,  while 

on  the  monarchical  principle  of  personal  these  countries  appertained  to  the  king* 

allegiance  to  the  sovereign,  as  opposed  to  of  England,  though  not  in  right  of  ita 

the  half-republican  theory  that  lurked  crown,  were  never  reputed  aliens. 


JAMES  I.    BICKERINGS  OF  CROWN  AND  COMMONS.  307 

vorite  measure,  which,  though  they  could  not  refuse  to  enter- 
tain it,  they  endeavored  to  defeat  by  interposing  delays  and 
impediments,  gave  much  offence  to  the  king,  which  he  ex- 
pressed in  a  speech  to  the  two  houses,  with  the  haughtiness, 
but  not  the  dignity,  of  Elizabeth.  He  threatened  them  to 
live  alternately  in  the  two  kingdoms,  or  to  keep  his  court 
at  York  ;  and  alluded,  with  peculiar  acrimony,  to  certain 
speeches  made  in  the  house,  wherein  probably  his  own  fame 
had  not  been  spared.1  "  I  looked,"  he  says,  "  for  no  such 
fruits  at  your  hands,  such  personal  discourses  and  speeches, 
which,  of  all  other,  I  looked  you  should  avoid,  as  not  be- 
seeming the  gravity  of  your  assembly.  I  am  your  king ;  I 
am  placed  to  govern  you,  and  shall  answer  for  your  errors  ; 
I  am  a  man  of  flesh  and  blood,  and  have  my  passions  and 
affections  as  other  men  ;  I  pray  you  do  not  too  far  move  me 
to  do  that  which  my  power  may  tempt  me  unto."  2 

It  is  most  probable,  as  experience  had  shown,  that  such  a 
demonstration  of  displeasure  from  Elizabeth  would  continual 
have   ensured   the   repentant   submission    of   the  W(*erings 

between  the 

commons.  But,  within  a  few  years  of  the  most  crown  and 
unbroken  tranquillity,  there  had  been  one  of  those  commons- 
changes  of  popular  feeling  which  a  government  is  seldom 
observant  enough  to  watch.  Two  springs  had  kept  in  play 
the  machine  of  her  administration,  affection  and  fear ;  attach- 
ment arising  from  the  sense  of  dangers  endured,  and  glory 
achieved,  for  her  people,  tempered,  though  not  subdued,  by 
the  dread  of  her  stern  courage  and  vindictive  rigor.  For 
James  not  a  particle  of  loyal  affection  lived  in  the  hearts  of 
the  nation,  while  his  easy  and  pusillanimous,  though  choleric, 
disposition  had  gradually  diminished  those  sentiments  of  ap- 
prehension which  royal  frowns  used  to  excite.  The  com- 
mons, after  some  angry  speeches,  resolved  to  make  known  to 
the  king,  through  the  speaker,  their  desire  that  he  would  listen 

1  The  house  had  lately  expelled    sir  Britain  :   p.  186.     Another,  with  more 
Christopher  Pigott  for  reflecting  on  the  astonishing    sagacity,    feared    that    the 
Scots    nation    in   a  speech.     Journals,  king     might    succeed,    by    what     the 
13th  Feb.  1607.  lawyers  call    remitter,   to   the    prero^a- 

2  Commons'1  Journals,  366.  tives  of  the  British  kings  before  Julius 
The  journals  are  full  of  notes  of  these    Caesar,   which  would    supersede  Magna 

long  discussions  about  the  union  in  1604,  Charta :  p.  185. 

1600, 1607,  and  even  1610.     It  is  easy  to  James  took  the  title  of  King  of  Great 

perceive  a  jealousy  that  the  prerogative  Britain  iu  the  second  year  of  his  reign, 

by  some  means  or  other  would   be  the  Lord  Bacon  drew  a  well-written   procla- 

gainer.      The  very  change  of   name  to  mation  on  that  occasion.     Bacon,  i.  621; 

Great    Britain    was    objected    to.      One  Rymer,  xvi.  603.     But  it  was,  not  long 

(aid,    we    cannot    legislate    for    Great  afterwards,  abandoned. 


308   JEALOUSY  OF  COMMONS'  INTERFERENCE.  CHAP.  VL 

to  no  private  reports,  but  take  his  information  of  the  house's 
meaning  from  themselves ;  that  he  would  give  leave  to  such 
persons  as  he  had  blamed  for  their  speeches  to  clear  them- 
selves in  his  hearing ;  and  that  he  would  by  some  gracious 
message  make  known  his  intention  that  they  should  deliver 
their  opinions  with  full  liberty,  and  without  fear.  The 
speaker  next  day  communicated  a  slight  but  civil  answer  ho 
had  received  from  the  king,  importing  his  wish  to  preserve 
their  privileges,  especially  that  of  liberty  of  speech.1  This, 
however,  did  not  prevent  his  sending  a  message  a  few 
days  afterwards,  commenting  on  their  debates,  and  on  some 
clauses  they  had  introduced  into  the  bill  for  the  abolition  of 
all  hostile  laws.2  And  a  petition  having  been  prepared  by  a 
committee  under  the  house's  direction  for  better  execution  of 
the  laws  against  recusants,  the  speaker,  on  its  being  moved 
that  the  petition  be  read,  said  that  his  majesty  had  taken 
notice  of  the  petition  as  a  thing  belonging  to  himself,  concern- 
ing which  it  was  needless  to  press  him.  This  interference 
provoked  some  members  to  resent  it  as  an  infringement  of 
their  liberties.  The  speaker  replied  that  there  were  many 
precedents  in  the  late  queen's  time  where  she  had  restrained 
the  house  from  meddling  in  politics  of  divers  kinds.  This, 
as  a  matter  of  fact,  was  too  notorious  to  be  denied.  A 
motion  was  made  for  a  committee  "  to  search  for  precedents 
of  ancient  as  well  as  later  times  that  do  concern  any  messages 
from  the  sovereign  magistrate,  king  or  queen  of  this  realm, 
touching  petitio»s  offered  to  the  house  of  commons."  The 
king  now  interposed  by  a  second  message,  that,  though  the 
petition  was  such  as  the  like  had  not  been  read  in  the  house, 
and  contained  matter  whereof  the  house  could  not  properly 
take  knowledge,  yet,  if  they  thought  good  to  have  it  read, 
he  was  not  against  the  reading.  And  the  commons  were  so 
well  satisfied  with  this  concession,  that  no  further  proceedings 
•were  had;  and  the  petition,  says  the  Journal,  was  at  length, 
with  general  liking,  agreed  to  sleep.  It  contained  some 
strong  remonstrances  against  ecclesiastical  abuses,  and  in 
favor  of  the  deprived  and  silenced  puritans,  but  such  as 
the  house  had  often  before  in  various  modes  brought  for- 
ward.8 

The  ministry  betrayed,  in  a  still  more  pointed  manner, 

1  Commons'  Journals,  p.  370.  *  P.  377.  »  P.  384. 


JAMES  I.         JEALOUSY  OF  COMMONS'  INTERFERENCE.     309 

their  jealousy  of  any  interference  on  the  part  of  the  com- 
mons with  the  conduct  of  public  affairs  in  a  business  of  a 
different  nature.  The  pacification  concluded  with  Spain  in 
1604,  very  much  against  the  general  wish,1  had  neither  re- 
moved all  grounds  of  dispute  between  the  governments,  nor 
allayed  the  dislike  of  the  nations.  Spain  advanced  in  that 
age  the  most  preposterous  claims  to  an  exclusive  navigation 
beyond  the  tropic,  and  to  the  sole  possession  of  the  American 
continent;  while  the  English  merchants,  mindful  of  the 
lucrative  adventures  of  the  queen's  reign,  could  not  be  re- 
strained from  trespassing  on  the  rich  harvest  of  the  Indies  by 
contraband  and  sometimes  piratical  voyages.  These  conflict- 
ing interests  led  of  course  to  mutual  complaints  of  maritime 
tyranny  and  fraud  ;  neither  likely  to  be  ill-founded,  where  the 
one  party  was  as  much  distinguished  for  the  despotic  exercise 
of  vast  power,  as  the  other  by  boldness  and  cupidity.  It  was 
the  prevailing  bias  of  the  king's  temper  to  keep  on  friendly 
terms  with  Spain,  or  rather  to  court  her  with  undisguised  and 
impolitic  partiality.2  But  this  so  much  thwarted  the  preju- 
dices of  his  subjects,  that  no  part,  perhaps,  of  his  administra- 
tion had  such  a  disadvantageous  effect  on  his  popularity. 
The  merchants  presented  to  the  commons,  in  this  session  of 
1607,  a  petition  upon  the  grievances  they  sustained  from 
Spain,  entering  into  such  a  detail  of  alleged  cruelties  as  was 
likely  to  exasperate  that  assembly.  Nothing,  however,  was 
done  for  a  considerable  time,  when,  after  receiving  the  report 
of  a  committee  on  the  subject,  the  house  prayed  a  conference 
with  the  lords.  They,  who  acted  in  this  and  the  preceding 
session  as  the  mere  agents  of  government,  intimated  in  their 
reply  that  they  thought  it  an  unusual  matter  for  the  commons 
to  enter  upon,  and  took  time  to  consider  about  a  conference. 
After  some  delay  this  was  granted,  and  sir  Francis  Bacon 
reported  its  result  to  the  lower  house.  The  earl  of  Salisbury 

1  James  entertained  the  strange  notion  this  minister,  are  said  to  have  been 
that  the  war  with  Spain  ceased  by  his  ac-  favorable  to  peace.  Id.  938. 
cession  to  the  throne.  By  a  proclama-  2  Winwood,  vol.  ii.  p.  100,  152,  &c.; 
tion  dated  23d  June,  1603,  he  permits  Birch's  Negotiations  of  Edmondes.  If 
his  subjects  to  keep  such  ships  as  had  we  may  believe  sir  Charles  Cornwallis, 
been  captured  by  them  before  the  24th  our  ambassador  at  Madrid,  "  England 
April,  but  orders  all  taken  since  to  be  never  lost  such  an  opportunity  of  win- 
restored  to  the  owners.  Rymer,  *vi.  niug  honor  and  wealth  as  by  relinquish- 
616.  He  had  been  used  to  call  the  ing  the  war."  The  Spaniards  were 
Dutch  rebels,  and  was  probably  kept  astonished  how  peace  could  have  been 
with  difficulty  by  Cecil  from  displaying  obtained  on  such  advantageous  condi- 
his  partiality  still  more  outrageously,  tions.  Winwood,  p.  75. 
Carte,  iii.  714.  All  the  council,  except 


810     JEALOUSY   OF  COMMONS'   INTERFERENCE.      CHAP.  VI. 

managed  the  conference  on  the  part  of  the  lords.  The  tenor 
of  his  speech,  as  reported  by  Bacon,  is  very  remarkable. 
After  discussing  the  merits  of  the  petition,  and  considerably 
extenuating  the  wrongs  imputed  to  Spain,  he  adverted  to  the 
circumstance  of  its  being  presented  to  the  commons.  The 
crown  of  England  was  invested,  he  said,  with  an  absolute 
power  of  peace  and  war ;  and  inferred,  from  a  series  of  pre- 
cedents which  he  vouched,  that  petitions  made  in  parliament, 
intermeddling  with  such  matters,  had"  gained  little  success ; 
that  great  inconveniences  must  follow  from  the  public  debate 
of  the  king's  designs,  which,  if  they  take  wind,  must  be  frus- 
trated ;  and  that,  if  parliaments  have  ever  been  made  ac- 
quainted with  matter  of  peace  or  war  in  a  general  way,  it 
was  either  when  the  king  and  council  conceived  that  it  was  ma- 
terial to  have  some  declaration  of  the  zeal  and  affection  of  the 
people,  or  else  when  they  needed  money  for  the  charge  of  a 
war,  in  which  case  they  should  be  sure  enough  to  hear  of 
it ;  that  the  lords  would  make  a  good  construction  of  the 
commons'  desire,  that  it  sprang  from  a  forwardness  to  assist 
his  majesty's  future  resolutions,  rather  than  a  determination 
to  do  that  wrong  to  his  supreme  power  which  haply  might 
appear  to  those  who  were  prone  to  draw  evil  inferences  from 
their  proceedings.  The  earl  of  Northampton,  who  also  bore 
a  part  in  this  conference,  gave  as  one  reason  among  others 
why  the  lords  could  not  concur  in  forwarding  the  petition  to 
the  crown,  that  the  composition  of  the  house  of  commons  was 
in  its  first  foundation  intended  merely  to  be  of  those  that 
have  their  residence  and  vocation  in  the  places  for  which  they 
serve,  and  therefore  to  have  a  private  and  local  wisdom  ac- 
cording to  that  compass,  and  so  not  fit  to  examine  or  deter- 
mine secrets  of  state  which  depend  upon  such  variety  of 
circumstances ;  and  although  he  acknowledged  that  there 
were  divers  gentlemen  in  the  house  of  good  capacity  and  in- 
.sight  into  matters  of  state,  yet  that  was  the  accident  of  the 
person,  and  not  the  intention  of  the  place ;  and  things  were 
to  be  taken  in  the  institution,  and  not  in  the  practice.  The 
commons  seem  to  have  acquiesced  in  this  rather  contemptu- 
ous treatment.  Several  precedents  indeed  might  have  been 
opposed  to  those  of  the  earl  of  Salisbury,  wherein  the  com- 
mons, especially  under  Richard  II.  and  Henry  VI.,  had 
assumed  a  right  of  advising  on  matters  of  peace  and  war. 
But  the  more  recent  usage  of  the  constitution  did  not  warrant 


JAMES  I.  ILLEGAL  IMPOSITIONS.  311 

such  an  interference.  It  was,  however,  rather  a  bold  asser- 
tion that  they  were  not  the  proper  channel  through  which 
public  grievances,  or  those  of  so  large  a  portion  of  the  com- 
munity as  the  merchants,  ought  to  be  represented  to  the 
throne.1 

During  the  interval  of  two  years  and  a  half  that  elapsed 
before  the  commencement  of  the  next  session,  a  impositions 
decision  had  occurred  in  the  court  of  exchequer  ^"^[th'out 
which  threatened  the  entire  overthrow  of  our  consent  of 
constitution.  It  had  always  been  deemed  the  in-  Parliament- 
dispensable  characteristic  of  a  limited  monarchy,  however 
irregular  and  inconsistent  might  be  the  exercise  of  some  pre- 
rogatives, that  no  money  could  be  raised  from  the  subject 
without  the  consent  of  the  estates.  This  essential  principle 
was  settled  in  England,  after  much  contention,  by  the  statute 
entitled  Conh'rmatio  Chartarum,  in  the  25th  year  of  Edward 
I.  More  comprehensive  and  specific  in  its  expression  than 
the  Great  Charter  of  John,  it  abolishes  all  "  aids,  tasks,  and 
prises,  unless  by  the  common  assent  of  the  realm,  and  for 
the  common  profit  thereof,  saving  the  ancient  aids  and 
prises  due  and  accustomed  ; "  the  king  explicitly  renouncing 
the  custom  he  had  lately  set  on  wool.  Thus  the  letter  of 
the  statute  and  the  history  of  the  times  conspire  to  prove 
.that  impositions  on  merchandise  at  the  ports,  to  which  alone 
the  word  prises  was  applicable,  could  no  more  be  levied  by 
the  royal  prerogative  after  its  enactment,  than  internal  taxes 
upon  landed  or  movable  property,  known  in  that  age  by 
the  appellations  of  aids  and  tallages.  But  as  the  former 
could  be  assessed  with  great  ease,  and  with  no  risk  of  im- 
mediate resistance,  and  especially  as  certain  ancient  customs 
were  preserved  by  the  statute,2  so  that  a  train  of  fiscal 


i  Bacon,    i.    663 ;    Journals,    p.    341.  in  general  too  little  knowledge  to  correct 

Carte    sayg,    on    the   authority  of   the  them. 

French    ambassadors    despatches,   that  2  There  was  a   duty  on  wool,   wool- 

the  ministry  secretly  put  forward  this  fels,    and    leather,    called    magua,    or 

petition  of   the  commons    in   order  to  sometimes    antiqua    costuma,   which   ia 

frighten  the  Spanish  court  into  making  said  in  Dyer  to  have  been  by  prescrip- 

compensation  to  the  merchants,  where-  tion,  and   by  the  barons  in  Bates's  case 

in    they  succeeded  :    iii.   766.      This  is  to  have  been  imposed  by  the  king's  pre- 

rendered     very     improbable     by     Salis-  rogativo.      As    this   existed    before    the 

bury's  behavior.      It,  was  Carte's  mis-  25th  Edward  I.,  it  is  not  very  material 

take  to  rely  too  much  on  the  despatches  whether  it  were  so  imposed  or  granted 

he  was  permitted  to  read  in  the  Depot  by  parliament.     During  the  discussion, 

des  Affaires  Etrangeres  ;   as  if  an  am-  however,  which  took  place  in  1610,   a 

bassador  were  not  liable  to  be  deceived  record    was    discovered  of   3    Edw.   I., 

by  rumors  in  a  country  of  which  he  has  proving  it  to  have  been  granted  par  tous 


312  IMPOSITIONS   ON"  MERCHANDISE  CHAP.  VI. 

officers,  and  a  scheme  of  regulations  and  restraints  upon  the 
export  and  import  of  goods  became  necessary,  it  was  long 
before  the  sovereigns  of  this  kingdom  could  be  induced  con- 
stantly to  respect  this  part  of  the  law.  Hence  several  re- 
monstrances from  the  commons  under  Edward  III.  against 
the  maletolts  or  unjust  exactions  upon  wool,  by  which,  if 
they  did  not  obtain  more  than  a  promise  of  effectual  redress, 
they  kept  up  their  claim,  and  perpetuated  the  recognition  of 
its  justice,  for  the  sake  of  posterity.  They  became  power- 
ful enough  to  enforce  it  under  Richard  II.,  in  whose  time 
there  is  little  clear  evidence  of  illegal- impositions  ;  and  from 
the  accession  of  the  house  of  Lancaster  it  is  undeniable  that 
they  ceased  altogether.  The  grant  of  tonnage  and  poundage 
for  the  king's  life,  which  from  the  time  of  Henry  V.  was 
made  in  the  first  parliament  of  every  reign,  might  perhaps 
be  considered  as  a  tacit  compensation  to  the  crown  for  its 
abandonment  of  these  irregular  extortions. 

Henry  VII.,  the  most  rapacious,  and  Henry  VIII.,  the 
most  despotic,  of  English  monarchs,  did  not  presume  to 
violate  this  acknowledged  right.  The  first  who  had  again 
recourse  to  this  means  of  enhancing  the  revenue  was  Mary, 
who,  in  the  year  1557,  set  a  duty  upon  cloths  exported 
beyond  seas,  and  afterwards  another  on  the  importation 
of  French  wines.  The  former  of  those  was  probably  de- 
fended by  arguing  that  there  was  already  a  duty  on  wool ; 
and  if  cloth,  which  was  \vool  manufactured,  could  pass  free, 
there  would  be  a  fraud  on  the  revenue.  The  merchants, 
however,  did  not  acquiesce  in  this  arbitrary  imposition,  and, 
as  soon  as  Elizabeth's  accession  gave  hopes  of  a  restoration 
of  English  government,  they  petitioned  to  be  released  from 
this  burden.  The  question  appears,  by  a  memorandum  in 
Dyer's  Reports,  to  have  been  extrajudicially  referred  to  the 
judges,  unless  it  were  rather  as  assistants  to  the  privy 
council  that  their  opinion  was  demanded.  This  entry  con- 
cludes abruptly,  without  any  determination  of  the  judges.1 
But  we  may  presume  that,  if  any  such  had  been  given  in 

les  grauntz  del  realms,  par  la  priere  des  1  Dyer,  fol.  165.    An  argument  of  the 

comunes  des  marchants  de  tout  Engle-  great  lawyer  Plowden  in  this  case  of  the 

terre.     Hale   146.     The  prisage  of  wines,  queen's  increasing  the  duty  on  cloths  ig 

or  duty  of  two  tuns  from  every  vessel,  in  the  British  Museum,  Hargrave  MSS 

is  considerably  more  ancient ;  but  how  32,   and  seems,   as  far  as   the   difficult 

the  crown  came  by  this  right  does  not  handwriting  permitted  me  to  judge,  ad 

appear.  verse  to  the  prerogative. 


JAMES  1.  WITHOUT  CONSENT  OF  PARLIAMENT.          313 

favor  of  the  crown,  it  would  have  been  made  public.  And 
that  the  majority  of  the  bench  would  not  have  favored  this 
claim  of  the  crown,  we  may  strongly  presume  from  their 
doctrine  in  a  case  of  the  same  description,  wherein  they  held 
the  assessment  of  treble  custom  ou  aliens  for  violation  of 
letters  patent  to  be  absolutely  against  the  law.1  The  admin- 
istration, however,  would  not  release  this  duty,  which  con- 
tinued to  be  paid  under  Elizabeth.  She  also  imposed  one 
upon  sweet  wines.  We  read  of  no  complaint  in  parliament 
against  this  novel  taxation ;  but  it  is  alluded  to  by  Bacon 
in  one  of  his  tracts  during  the  queen's  reign,  as  a  grievance 
alleged  by  her  enemies.  He  defends  it,  as  laid  only  on  a 
foreign  merchandise,  and  a  delicacy  which  might  be  for- 
borne.2 But,  considering  Elizabeth's  unwillingness  to  re- 
quire subsidies  from  the  commons,  and  the  rapid  increase 
of  foreign  traffic  during  her  reign,  it  might  be  asked  why- 
she  did  not  extend  these  duties  to  other  commodities,  and 
secure  to  herself  no  trifling  annual  revenue.  What  answer 
can  be  given,  except  that,  aware  how  little  any  unparlia- 
mentary levying  of  money  could  be  supported  by  law  or 
usage,  her  ministers  shunned  to  excite  attention  to  these 
innovations,  which  wanted  hitherto  the  stamp  of  time  to 
give  them  prescriptive  validity  ?  8 

James  had  imposed  a  duty  of  five  shillings  per  hundred- 
weight on  currants,  over  and  above  that  of  two  shillings  and 
sixpence,  which  was  granted  by  the  statute  of  tonnage  and 

1  This  case  I  have  had  the  good  for-  pleasure  of  the  merchants,  for  that  it 

tune  to  discover  iu  one  of  Mr.  Hargrave'a  was    against    the    laws,    statutes,    and 

MSS.  in   the  Museum,  132,  fol.  66.     It  customs  of   the  realm,   Magna   Charta, 

is  in  the  handwriting  of  chief  justice  c.  30  ;  9  E.  3  ;  14  E.  3  ;  25  E.  3,  c.  2  ;  27 

Hyde  (temp.  Car.  I.),  who  has  written  E.  3;  28  E.  3;  2  R.  2,  c.  1.  and  others  ; 

in  the  margin,  "  This  is  the  report  of  a  as    also    in    the    assessment    of    treble 

case  in  my  lord  Dyer's  written  original,  custom,   which,    is    merely    against    the 

but  is  not  iu  the  printed  books."    The  law;    also   the    prohibition   above    said 

reader  will  judge  for  himself  why  it  was  was  held  to  be  private,  and  not  public, 

omitted,    and    why  the    entry    of    the  But  baron  Lake  e  contra,  and  Browne  J. 

former    case    breaks    off    so    abruptly,  censuit  deliberandum.     And  after,  at  an 

"Philip  and  Mary,  granted  to  the  town  after  meeting  the  same  Easter  term  at 

of  Southampton  that  all  malmsy  wines  .Sergeants'  Inn,  it  was  resolved  as  above, 

should  be  landed  at  that  port  under  pen-  And  after  by  parliament,  5  Eliz.,  the 

alty  of  paying  treble  custom.    Some  iner-  patent    was     confirmed     and     affirmed 

chants  of  Venice   having  landed  wines  against  aliens." 

elsewhere,  an  information  was  brought  a  Bacon,  i.  521. 

against  them  in  the  exchequer,  1  Eliz.,  "  Kale's     Treatise    on    the   Customs, 

and  argued  several  times  iu  the  presence  part    3;    in    Hargrave's    Collection    of 

of  all  the  judges.     Eight  were  of  opinion  Law  Tracts.      See  also  the   preface   by 

against  the  letters  patent,  among  whom  Hargrave  to  Bates's  case,  in  the   State 

Dyer  and  Oatlin.  chief  justices,  as-  well  for  Trials,  where  this  most  important  que* 

the  principal  matter  of  restraint  in  the  tion  is  learnedly  argued, 
lauding  of   malmsies    at    the  will   and 


314  ILLEGAL  IMPOSITIONS.  CHAF.  VL 

poundage.1  Bates,  a  Turkey  merchant,  having  refused 
payment,  an  information  was  exhibited  against  him  in  the 
exchequer.  Judgment  was  soon  given  for  the  crown.  The 
courts  of  justice,  it  is  hardly  necessary  to  say,  did  not  con- 
sist of  men  conscientiously  impartial  between  the  king  and 
the  subject ;  some  corrupt  with  hopB  of  promotion,  many 
more  fearful  of  removal,  or  awe-struck  by  the  frowns  of 
power.  The  speeches  of  chief  baron  Fleming,  and  of  baron 
Clark,  the  only  two  that  are  preserved  in  Lane's  Reports, 
contain  propositions  still  worse  than  their  decision,  and 
wholly  subversive  of  all  liberty.  "  The  king's  power,"  it 
was  said,  "  is  double  —  ordinary  and  absolute ;  and  these 
have  several  laws  and  ends.  That  of  the  ordinary  is  for 
the  profit  of  particular  subjects,  exercised  in  ordinary  courts, 
and  called  common  law,  which  cannot  be  changed  in  sub- 
stance without  parliament.  The  king's  absolute  power  is 
applied  to  no  particular  person's  benefit,  but  to  the  general 
safety ;  and  this  is  not  directed  by  the  rules  of  common  law, 
but  more  properly  termed  policy  and  government,  varying 
according  to  his  wisdom  for  the  common  good ;  and  all  things 
done  within  those  rules  are  lawful.  The  matter  in  question 
is  matter  of  state,  to  be  ruled  according  to  policy  by  the 
king's  extraordinary  power.  All  customs  (duties  so  called) 
are  the  effects  of  foreign  commerce ;  but  all  affairs  of  com- 
merce and  all  treaties  with  foreign  nations  belong  to  the 
king's  absolute  power ;  he  therefore  who  has  power  over 
the  cause,  must  have  it  also  over  the  effect.  The  seaports 
are  the  king's  gates,  which  he  may  open  and  shut  to  whom 
he  pleases."  The  ancient  customs  on  wine  and  wool  are 
asserted  to  have  originated  in  the  king's  absolute  power,  and 
not  in  a  grant  of  parliament ;  a  point,  whether  true  or  not, 
of  no  great  importance,  if  it  were  acknowledged  that  many 
statutes  had  subsequently  controlled  this  prerogative.  But 
these  judges  impugned  the  authority  of  statutes  derogatory 
to  their  idol.  That  of  45  E.  3,  c.  4,  that  no  new  imposition 
should  be  laid  on  wool  or  leather,  one  of  them  maintains, 
did  not  bind  the  king's  successors ;  for  the  right  to  impose 
such  duties  was  a  principal  part  of  the  crown  of  England, 

i  He  had  previously  published  letters  intended,  no  doubt,  to  operate  as  a  pro- 
patent,  setting  a  duty  of  six  shillings  hibition  of  a  drug  lie  no  much  hated 
and  eightpence  a  pound,  iu  addition  to  Ryuier,  xvi.  602. 
twopeucu  already  payable,  on  tobacco  ; 


JAMES  I.      REMONSTRANCES  OF  THE  COMMONS.  315 

which  the  king  could  not  diminish.  They  extolled  the 
king's  grace  in  permitting  the  matter  to  be  argued,  com- 
menting at  the  same  time  on  the  insolence  shown  in  dis- 
puting so  undeniable  a  claim.  Nor  could  any  judges  be  more 
peremptory  in  resisting  an  attempt  to  overthrow  the  most 
established  precedents  than  were  these  barons  of  king 
James's  exchequer  in  giving  away  those  fundamental 
liberties  which  were  the  inheritance  of  every  Englishman. l 
The  immediate  consequence  of  this  decision  was  a  book  of 
rates,  published  in  July,  1608,  under  the  authority  of  the 
great  seal,  imposing  heavy  duties  upon  almost  all  merchan- 
dise.2 But  the  judgment  of  the  court  of  exchequer  did  not 
satisfy  men  jealous  of  the  crown's  encroachments.  The  im- 
position on  currants  had  been  already  noticed  as  a  grievance 
by  the  house  of  commons  in  1606.  But  the  king  answered, 
that  the  question  was  in  a  course  for  legal  determination ; 
and  the  commons  themselves,  which  is  worthy  of  remark,  do 
not  appear  to  have  entertained  "any  clear  persuasion  that  the 
impost  was  contrary  to  law.8  In  the  session,  how-  _ 

i_-   i     i.  •      T*I_  ij»t/ti  »i.-        i    j  Remon- 

ever,  which  began  in  February,  1610,  they  had  strances 
acquired  new  light  by  sifting  the  legal  authorities,  ^tfomTin 
and,  instead  of  submitting  their  opinions   to  the  session  of 
courts  of  law,  which  were  in  truth  little  worthy  1610' 
of  such  deference,  were  the  more  provoked  to  remonstrate 
against   the   novel   usurpation  those    servile   men    had   en- 
deavored to  prop  up.     Lawyers,  as  learned  probably  as  most 
of  the  judges,  were  not  wanting  in  their  ranks.     The  illegal- 
ity of  impositions  was  shown  in  two  elaborate  speeches  by 
Hakewill   and   Yelverton.4      And    the   country   gentlemen, 
who,  though  less  deeply  versed  in  precedents,  had  too  good 
sense  not  to  discern  that  the  next  step  would  be  to  levy  taxes 
on  their  lands,  were  delighted  to  find  that  there  had  been  an 

1  State  Trials,  ii.  371.  somewhat  a  better  defence ;  his  argument 

2  Bale's    Treatise    on    the     Customs,  is,  that  the  king  may  lay  an  embargo  on 
These  were  perpetual,   "  to   be  forever  trade,  so  as  to  prevent  it  entirely,  and 
hereafter  paid  to  the  king  and  his  sue-  consequently  may  annex  conditions  to  it. 
cessors,  on  pain  of  his  displeasure."  State  Id.  399.    But  to  this  it  was  answered, 
Trials,  481.  that  the  king  can  only  lay  a  temporary 

3  Journals,  295,  297.  embargo,   for   the  sake  of  some  public 
*  Mr.  Uakewill's  speech,  though  long,  good,   not  prohibit  foreign    trade  alto- 
will  repay  the  diligent  reader's  trouble,  gether. 

as  being  a  very  luminous  and  masterly  As  to  the  king's  prerogative  of  restrain- 

stateruent  of  this  great  argument.    State  ing    foreign    trade,    see    extracts    from 

Trials,  ii.  407.     The  extreme  inferiority  Hale's  MS.     Treatise  de  Jure  Coronae,  in, 

of  Bacon,  who  sustained  the  cause  of  Hargrave's   Preface  to  Collection  of  Law 

prerogative,  must  be  apparent   to  every  Tracts,   p.  xxx.,  &c.     It  seems  to  bar* 

one.    Id.  345.     Sir  John  Davis  makes  been  chiefly  as  to  exportation  of  corn. 


316  REMONSTRANCES  OF  THE  COMMONS.        CHAP.  VL 

old  English  constitution  not  yet  abrogated,  which  would  bear 
them  out  in  their  opposition.  When  the  king  therefore  had 
intimated  by  a  message,  and  afterwards  in  a  speech,  his  com- 
mand not  to  enter  on  the  subject,  couched  in  that  arrogant 
tone  of  despotism  which  this  absurd  prince  affected,1  they 
presented  a  strong  remonstrance  against  this  inhibition ; 
claiming  "  as  an  ancient,  general,  and  undoubted  right  of  par- 
liament to  debate  freely  all  matters  which  do  properly  con- 
cern the  subject ;  which  freedom  of  debate  being  once  fore- 
closed, the  essence  of  the  liberty  of  parliament  is  withal 
dissolved.  For  the  judgment  given  by  the  exchequer,  they 
take  not  on  them  to  review  it,  but  desire  to  know  the  reasons 
whereon  it  was  grounded ;  especially  as  it  was  generally  ap- 
prehended that  the  reasons  of  that  judgment  extended  much 
farther,  even  to  the  utter  ruin  of  the  ancient  liberty  of  this 
kingdom,  and  of  the  subjects'  right  of  property  in  their  lands 
and  goods." 2  "  The  policy  and  constitution  of  this  your 
kingdom  (they  say)  appropriates  unto  the  kings  of  this  realm, 
with  the  assent  of  the  parliament,  as  well  the  sovereign 
power  of  making  laws,  as  that  of  taxing,  or  imposing  upon 
the  subjects'  goods  or  merchandises,  as  may  not,  without  their 
consents,  be  altered  or  changed.  This  is  the  cause  that  the 
people  of  this  kingdom,  as  they  ever  showed  themselves 
faithful  and  loving  to  their  kings,  and  ready  to  aid  them  in 
all  their  just  occasions  with  voluntary  contributions,  so  have 
they  been  ever  careful  to  preserve  their  own  liberties  and 
rights  when  anything  hath  been  done  to  prejudice  or  impeach 
the  same.  And  therefore,  when  their  princes,  occasioned 
either  by  their  wars  or  their  over-great  bounty,  or  by  any 
other  necessity,  have  without  consent  of  parliament  set  im- 
positions, either  within  the  land,  or  upon  commodities  either 
exported  or  imported  by  the  merchants,  they  have,  in  open 
parliament,  complained  of  it,  in  that  it  was  done  without 
their  consents ;  and  thereupon  never  failed  to  obtain  a  speedy 
and  full  redress,  without  any  claim  made  by  the  kings,  of 

1  Aikin's  Memoirs  of  James  I.,  i.  350.  that,  if  the  practice  should  follow  the  posi- 

This  speech  justly  gave  offence.    "  The  tions,  we  are  not  likely  to  leave  to  our 

21st  of  this   present  (May,  1610)."  says  successors  that  freedom  we  received  from 

a  correspondent  of  sir  Ralph   \VTnwood,  our  forefathers  ;  nor  make  account  of 

"  he  made   another  speech   to  both  the  anything  we  have  longer  than  they  list 

houses,  but  so  little  to  their  satisfaction  that  govern."     \Vinwood,  iii.  175.    The 

that  I  hear  it  bred  generally  much  dis-  traces  of  this  discontent  appear  in  short 

comfort  to  see  our  monarchical  power  notes  of  the  debate.    Journals,  p.  430. 

and  royal  prerogative  strained  so  high,  2  Journals,  431. 
stud   made  so  transcendent  every  way, 


JAMES  I.  DOCTRINE  OF  ABSOLUTION.  317 

any  power  or  prerogative  in  that  point.  And  though  the 
law  of  property  be  original,  and  carefully  preserved  by  the 
common  laws  of  this  realm,  which  are  as  ancient  as  the 
kingdom  itself,  yet  these  famous  kings,  for  the  better  content- 
ment and  assurance  of  their  loving  subjects,  agreed  that  this 
old  fundamental  right  should  be  further  declared  and  estab- 
lished by  act  of  parliament.  Wherein  it  is  provided  that  no 
such  charges  should  ever  be  laid  upon  the  people  without 
their  common  consent,  as  may  appear  by  sundry  records  of 
former  times.  We,  therefore,  your  majesty's  most  humble 
commons  assembled  in  parliament,  following  the  example  of 
this  worthy  case  of  our  ancestors,  and  out  of  a  duty  of 
those  for  whom  we  serve,  finding  that  your  majesty,  without 
advice  or  consent  of  parliament,  hath  lately,  in  time  of 
peace,  set  both  greater  impositions,  and  far  more  in  number, 
than  any  your  noble  ancestors  did  ever  in  time  of  war,  have, 
with  all  humility,  presumed  to  present  this  most  just  and 
necessary  petition  unto  your  majesty,  that  all  impositions  set 
without  the  assent  of  parliament  may  be  quite  abolished  and 
taken  away ;  and  that  your  majesty,  in  imitation  likewise  of 
your  noble  progenitors,  will  be  pleased  that  a  law  be  made 
during  this  session  of  parliament,  to  declare  that  all  imposi- 
tions set  or  to  be  set  upon  your  people,  their  goods  or  mer- 
chandises, save  only  by  common  consent  in  parliament,  are 
and  shall  be  void."1  They  proceeded  accordingly,  after 
a  pretty  long  time  occupied  in  searching  for  precedents,  to 
pass  a  bill  taking  away  impositions;  which,  as  might  be  an- 
ticipated, did  not  obtain  the  concurrence  of  the  upper  house. 
The  commons  had  reason  for  their  apprehensions.  This 
doctrine  of  the  king's  absolute  power  beyond  the  „ 

,          ,      ,    .  J  .  .     Doctrine 

law  had  become  current  with  all  who  sought  his  of  king's 
favor,  and  especially  with  the  high  church  party.  ^^ |*_ 
The  convocation  had  in  1606  drawn  up  a  set  of  cuioated  by 
canons,   denouncing   as    erroneous   a   number   ofcergy' 
tenets  hostile  in  their  opinion  to  royal  government.     These 
canons,  though  never   authentically  published    till   a   later 
age,  could  not  have  been  secret.     They  consist  of  a  series 
of  propositions  or  paragraphs,  to  each  of  which  an  anathema 
of  the  opposite  error  is  attached ;   deducing   the  origin  of 
government  from  the  patriarchal  regimen  of  families,  to  the 

1  Seiners  Tract*,,  vol.  ii.  159 ;  in  th«  Journals  much  shorter. 


318  DOCTEINE  INCULCATED  BY  CLERGY.        CHAP.  VL 

exclusion  of  any  popular  choice.  In  those  golden  days  the 
functions  both  of  king  and  priest  were,  as  they  term  it,  "  the 
prerogatives  of  birthright,"  till  the  wickedness  of  mankind 
brought  in  usurpation,  and  so  confused  the  pure  stream  of 
the  fountain  with  its  muddy  runnels,  that  we  must  now  look 
to  prescription  for.  that  right  which  we  cannot  assign  to 
primogeniture.  Passive  obedience  in  all  cases  without  ex- 
ception to  the  established  monarch  is  inculcated.1 

It  is  not  impossible  that  a  man  might  adopt  this  theory 
of  the  original  of  government,  unsatisfactory  as  it  appears 
on  reflection,  without  deeming  it  incompatible  with  our 
mixed  and  limited  monarchy.  But  its  tendency  was  evi- 
dently in  a  contrary  direction.  The  king's  power  was  of 
God ;  that  of  the  parliament  only  of  man,  obtained  perhaps 
by  rebellion ;  but  out  of  rebellion  what  right  could  spring  ? 
Or  were  it  even  by  voluntary  concession,  could  a  king  alien- 
ate a  divine  gift,  and  infringe  the  order  of  Providence  ? 
Could  his  grants,  if  not  in  themselves  null,  avail  against  his 
posterity,  heirs  like  himself  under  the  great  feoffment  of 
creation  ?  These  consequences  were  at  least,  plausible  ;  and 
some  would  be  found  to  draw  them.  And  indeed  if  they 
were  never  explicitly  laid  down,  the  mere  difference*  of 
respect  with  which  mankind  could  not  but  contemplate  a 
divine  and  human,  a  primitive  or  paramount,  and  a  deriva- 
tive authority,  would  operate  as  a  prodigious  advantage  in 
favor  of  the  crown. 

The  real  aim  of  the  clergy  in  thus  enormously  enhancing 
the  pretensions  of  the  crown  was  to  gain  its  sanction  and 
support  for  their  own.  Schemes  of  ecclesiastical  jurisdic- 
tion, hardly  less  extensive  than  had  warmed  the  imagination 
of  Becket,  now  floated  before  the  eyes  of  his  successor  Ban- 
croft. He  had  fallen  indeed  upon  evil  days,  and  perfect 
independence  on  the  temporal  magistrate  could  no  longer  be 

1  These  canons  were  published  in  government;  and  that  therefore  they 
1690,  from  a  copy  belonging  to  bishop  chose  some  among  themselves  to  order 
Overall,  with  Bancroft's  imprimatur.  The  and  rule  the  rest,  giving  them  power  and 
title-page  runs  in  an  odd  expression:  authority  so  to  do;  and  that  consequently 
—  ''Bishop  Overall's  Convocation-Book  all  civil  power,  jurisdiction,  and  author- 
concerning  the  Government  of  God's  ity  was  first  derived  from  the  people  and 
Catholic  Church  and  the  Kingdoms  of  disordered  multitude,  or  either  is  origi- 
the  whole  World.'1  The  second  canon  nally  still  in  them,  or  else  is  deduced  by 
is  as  follows  :  —  "  If  any  man  shall  affirm  their  consent  naturally  from  them,  and 
that  men  at  the  first  ran  up  and  down  is  not  God's  ordinance,  originally  de- 
in  woods  and  fields,  &c.,  until  they  were  scending  from  him  and  depending  upon 
taught  by  experience  the  necessity  of  him,  he  doth*  greatly  err."  P.  3 


JAMES  I.  ARTICULI  CLERI.  319 

attempted  ;  but  he  acted  upon  the  refined  policy  of  making 
the  royal  supremacy  over  the  church,  which  he  was  obliged 
to  acknowledge,  and  professed  to  exaggerate,  the  very  instru- 
ment of  its  independence  upon  the  law.  The  favorite  object 
of  the  bishops  in  this  age  was  to  render  their  ecclesiastical 
jurisdiction,  no  part  of  which  had  been  curtailed  in  our  hasty 
reformation,  as  unrestrained  as  possible  by  the  courts  of  law. 
These  had  been  wont,  down  from  the  reign  of  Henry  II.,  to 
grant  writs  of  prohibition  whenever  the  spiritual  courts  trans- 
gressed their  proper  limits ;  to  the  gfeat  benefit  of  the  sub- 
ject, who  would  otherwise  have  lost  his  birthright  of  the 
common  law,  and  been  exposed  to  the  defective,  not  to  say 
iniquitous  and  corrupt,  procedure  of  the  ecclesiastical  tribu- 
nals. But  the  civilians,  supported  by  the  prelates,  loudly 
complained  of  these  prohibitions,  which  seem  to  have  been 
much  more  frequent  in  the  latter  years  of  Elizabeth  and 
the  reign  of  James  than  in  any  other  period.  Bancroft  ac- 
cordingly presented  to  the  star-chamber,  in  1605,  Articuii 
a  series  of  petitions  in  the  name  of  the  clergy,  Clen- 
which  lord  Coke  has  denominated  Articuii  Cleri,  by  analogy 
to  some  "similar '  representations  of  that  order  under  Ed- 
ward  II.1  In  these  it  was  complained  that  the  courts  of  law 
interfered  by  continual  prohibitions  with  a  jurisdiction  as 
established  and  as  much  derived  from  the  king  as  their  own, 
either  in  cases  which  were  cleai-ly  within  that  jurisdiction's 
limits,  or  on  the  slightest  suggestion  of  some  matter  belong- 
ing to  the  temporal  court.  It  was  hinted  that  the  whole 
course  of  granting  prohibitions  was  an  encroachment  of  the 
king's  bench  and  common  pleas,  and  that  they  could  regu- 
larly issue  only  out  of  chancery.  To  each  of  these  articles 
of  complaint,  extending  to  twenty-five,  the  judges  made 
separate  answers,  in  a  rough  and,  some  might  say,  a  rude 
style,  but  pointed  and  much  to  the  purpose,  vindicating  in 
every  instance  their  right  to  take  cognizance  of  every  col- 
lateral matter  springing  out  of  an  ecclesiastical  suit,  and 
repelling  the  attack  upon  their  power  to  issue  prohibitions  as 
a  strange  presumption.  Nothing  was  done,  nor,  thanks  to 
the  firmness  of  the  judges,  could  be  done,  by  the  council  in 
this  respect.  For  the  clergy  had  begun  by  advancing  that 

1  Coke's  2d  Institute,  601.  Collier,  1611  (Strype's  Life  of  Whitgift,  Append 
6S8.  State  Trials,  ii.  131.  See,  too,  an  227),  wherein  he  inveighs  against  the 
antpry  letter  of  Bancroft,  written  about  common  lawyers  and  the  parliament. 


320  OOWELL'S  INTERPRETER.  CHAP.  VI 

the  king's  authority  was  sufficient  to  reform  what  was  amiss 
in  any  of  his  own  courts,  all  jurisdiction,  spiritual  and  tem- 
poral, being  annexed  to  his  crown.  But  it  was  positively 
and  repeatedly  denied,  in  reply,  that  anything  less  than  an 
act  of  parliament  could  alter  the  course  of  justice  estab- 
lished by  law.  This  effectually  silenced  the  archbishop,  who 
knew  how  little  he  had  to  hope  from  the  commons.  By  the 
pretensions  made  for  the  church  in  this  affair  he  exasperated 
the  judges,  who  had  been  quite  sufficiently  disposed  to 
second  all  rigorous  measures  against  the  puritan  ministers, 
and  aggravated  that  jealousy  of  the  ecclesiastical  courts 
which  the  common  lawyers  had  long  entertained. 

An  opportunity  was  soon  given  to  those  who  disliked  the 
Ooweii's  civilians,  that  is,  not  only  to  the  common  lawyers, 
interpreter,  but  to  all  the  patriots  and  puritans  in  England,  by 
an  imprudent  publication  of  a  doctor  Cowell.  This  man,  in 
a  law  dictionary  dedicated  to  Bancroft,  had  thought  fit  to 
insert  passages  of  a  tenor  conformable  to  the  new  creed  of 
the  king's  absolute  or  arbitrary  power.  Under  the  title 
King,  it  is  said, —  "He  is  above  the  law  by  his  absolute 
power;  and  though  for  the  better  and  equal  course  in  mak- 
ing laws  he  do  admit  the  three  estates  unto  council,  yet  this 
in  divers  learned  men's  opinion  is  not  of  constraint,  but  of 
his  own  benignity,  or  by  reason  of  the  promise  made  upon 
oath  at  the  time  of  his  coronation.  And  though  at  his  coro- 
nation he  take  an  oath  not  to  alter  the  laws  of  the  land,  yet, 
this  oath  notwithstanding,  he  may  alter  or  suspend  any  par- 
ticular law  that  seemeth  hurtful  to  the  public  estate.  Thus 
much  in  short,  because  I  have  heard  some  to  be  of  opinion 
that  the  laws  are  above  the  king."  And  in  treating  of  the 
parliament,  Cowell  observes,  —  "  Of  these  two  one  must  be 
true,  either  that  the  king  is  above  the  parliament,  that  is,  the 
positive  laws  of  his  kingdom,  or  else  that  he  is  not  an  abso- 
lute king.  And  therefore,  though  it  be  a  merciful  policy, 
and  also  a  politic  mercy,  not  alterable  without  great  peril,  to 
make  laws  by  the  consent  of  the  whole  realm,  because  so  no 
part  shall  have  cause  to  complain  of  a  partiality,  yet  simply 
to  bind  the  prince  to  or  by  these  laws  were  repugnant  to  the 
nature  and  constitution  of  an  absolute  monarchy."  It  is  said 
again,  under  the  title  Prerogative,  that  "  the  king,  by  the 
custom  of  this  kingdom,  maketh  no  laws  without  the  consent 
of  the  three  e'states,  though  he  may  quash  any  law  concluded 


JAMES  1.  DEFICIENCY  OF  REVENUE.  321 

of  by  them ; "  and  that  he  "  holds  it  incontrollable  that  the 
king  of  England  is  an  absolute  king."  l 

Such  monstrous  positions  from  the  mouth  of  a  man  of 
learning  and  conspicuous  in  his  profession,  who  was  surmised 
to  have  been  instigated  as  well  as  patronized  by  the  arch- 
bishop, and  of  whose  book  the  king  was  reported  to  have 
spoken  in  terms  of  eulogy,  gave  very  just  scandal  to  the 
house  of  commons.  They  solicited  and  obtained  a  conference 
with  the  lords,  which  the  attorney-general,  sir  Francis  Ba- 
con, managed  on  the  part  of  the  lower  house  ;  a  remarkable 
proof  of  his  adroitness  and  pliancy.  James  now  discovered 
that  it  was  necessary  to  sacrifice  this  too  unguarded  advocate 
of  prerogative :  Cowell's  book  was  suppressed  by  proclama- 
tion, for  which  the  commons  returned  thanks,  with  great  joy 
at  their  victory.2 

It  is  the  evident  policy  of  every  administration,  in  dealing 
with  the  house  of  commons,  to  humor  them  in  everything 
that  touches  their  pride  and  tenaciousness  of  privilege,  never 
attempting  to  protect  any  one  who  incurs  their  displeasure 
by  want  of  respect.  This  seems  to  have  been  understood  by 
the  earl  of  Salisbury,  the  first  English  minister  who,  having 
long  sat  in  the  lower  house,  had  become  skilful  in  those  arts 
of  management  which  his  successors  have  always  reckoned 
so  essential  a  part  of  their  mystery.  He  wanted  a  consider- 
able sum  of  money  to  defray  the  king's  debts,  which,  on  his 
coming  into  the  office  of  lord  treasurer  after  lord  Buckhurst's 
death,  he  had  found  to  amount  to  1,300,000£,  about  one  third 
of  which  was  still  undischarged.  The  ordinary  expense  also 
surpassed  the  revenue  by  81,000£  It  was  impossible  that 
this  could  continue  without  involving  the  crown  in  such  em- 
barrassments as  would  leave  it  wholly  at  the  mercy  of  par- 
liament. Cecil  therefore  devised  the  scheme  of  obtaining  a 
perpetual  yearly  revenue  of  200,000/.,  to  be  granted  once  for 

1  Cowell's    Interpreter,    or    Law  Die-  wards  to  415.     The  authors  of  the  Par- 
tionary  :  edit.  1607.    These  passages  are  liamentary  History  say  there  is  no  fur- 
expunged   in   the  later  editions  of  this  ther  mention  of  the  business  after  the 
useful  book.     What  the  author  says  of  conference:  overlooking  the  mostimpor- 
the  writ  of  prohibition,  and  the  statutes  tant  circumstance,  the  king's  proclama- 
of  pramunire,  under  these  words,  was  tion  suppressing  the  book,  which  yet  is 
Tory  invidious  towards  the  common  law-  mentioned  by  Rapin  and  Carte,  though 
ycrs.   treating  such  restraints  upon  the  the  latter  makes  a  false  and  disingenuous 
ecclesiastical  jurisdiction  as  necessary  in  excuse  for  Cowell.     Vol.  iii.  p.  798.     Sev- 
fornu-r    ages,  but    now   become   useless  eral  passages  concerning  this  affair  occur 
eiuce   the  annexation  of  the  supremacy  in  Winwood's  Memorials,  to  which  I  refer 
to  the  crown.  the  curious    reader.      Vol.  iii    pp.  126, 

2  Commons'  Journals,  339,  and  after-  129,  131,  136. 137,  145. 

VOL.  I.  —  C.  21 


322  RENEWED  COMPLAINTS   OF  COMMONS.      CHAP.  VI. 

all  by  parliament ;  and,  the  better  to  incline  the  house  to  this 
high  and  extraordinary  demand,  he  promised  in  the  king's 
name  to  give  all  the  redress  and  satisfaction  in  his  power  for 
any  grievances  they  might  bring  forward.1 

This  offer  on  the  part  of  government  seemed  to  make 
an  opening  for  a  prosperous  adjustment  of  the  differences 
which  had  subsisted  ever  since  the  king's  accession.  The 
commons,  accordingly,  postponing  the  business  of  a  subsidy, 
to  which  the  courtiers  wished  to  give  priority, 
complaints  brought  forward  a  host  of  their  accustomed  griev- 
of  the  ances  in  ecclesiastical  and  temporal  concerns. 

commons.  l 

The  most  essential  was  undoubtedly  that  of  im- 
positions, which  they  sent  up  a  bill  to  the  lords,  as  above 
mentioned,  to  take  away.  They  next  complained  of  the  ec- 
clesiastical high  commission  court,  which  took  upon  itself  to 
fine  and  imprison,  powers  not  belonging  to  their  jurisdiction, 
and  passed  sentences  without  appeal,  interfering  frequently 
with' civil  rights,  and  in  all  its  procedure  neglecting  the  rules 
and  precautions  of  the  common  law.  They  dw.elt  on  the  late 
abuse  of  proclamations  assuming  the  character  of  laws. 
"  Amongst  many  other  points  of  happiness  and  freedom,"  it 
is  said,  "  which  your  majesty's  subjects  of  this  kingdom  have 
enjoyed  under  your  royal  progenitors,  kings  and  queens  of 
this  realm,  there  is  none  which  they  have  accounted  more 
dear  and  precious  than  this,  to  be  guided  and  governed  by 
the  certain  rule  of  the  law,  which  giveth  both  to  the  head 
and  members  that  which  of  right  belongeth  to  them,  and  not 
by  any  uncertain  or  arbitrary  form  of  government,  which,  as 
it  hath  proceeded  from  the  original  good  constitution  and 
temperature  of  this  estate,  so  hath  it  been  the  principal 
means  of  upholding  the  same,  in  such  sort  as  that  their  kings 
have  been  just,  beloved,  happy,  and  glorious,  and  the  king- 
dom itself  peaceable,  flourishing,  and  durable  so  many  ages. 
And  the  effect,  as  well  of  the  contentment  that  the  subjects 
of  this  kingdom  have  taken  in  this  form  of  government,  as 
also  of  the  love,  respect,  and  duty  which  they  have  by  rea- 
son of  the  same  rendered  unto  their  princes,  may  appear  in 
this,  that  they  have,  as  occasion  hath  required,  yielded  more 
extraordinary  and  voluntary  contribution  to  assist  their  kings 
than  the  subjects  of  any  other  known  kingdom  whatsoever. 

i  Winwood,  iii.  123. 


JAMES  I.  COMPLAINTS   OF   THE  COMMONS.  323 

Out  of  this  root  hath  grown  the  indubitable  right  of  the  peo- 
ple of  this  kingdom,  not  to  be  made  subject  to  any  punish- 
ment that  shall  extend  to  their  lives,  lands,  bodies,  or  goods, 
other  than  such  as  are  ordained  by  the  common  laws  of  this 
land,  or  the  statutes  made  by  their  common  consent  in  par> 
liament.  Nevertheless,  it  is  apparent,  both  that  proclama- 
tions have  been  of  late  years  much  more  frequent  than  here- 
tofore, and  that  they  are  extended,  not  only  to  the  liberty,  but 
also  to  the  goods,  inheritances,  and  livelihood  of  men ;  some 
of  them  tending  to  alter  some  points  of  the  law,  and  make  a 
new ;  other  some  made,  shortly  after  a  session  of  parliament, 
for  matter  directly  rejected  in  the  same  session ;  other  ap- 
pointing punishments  to  be  inflicted  before  lawful  trial  and 
conviction ;  some  containing  penalties  in  form  of  penal  stat- 
utes ;  some  referring  the  punishment  of  offenders  to  courts 
of  arbitrary  discretion,  which  have  laid  heavy  and  grievous 
censures  upon  the  delinquents ;  some,  as  the  proclamation  for 
starch,  accompanied  with  letters  commanding  inquiry  to  be 
made  against  the  transgressors  at  the  quarter-sessions  ;  and 
some  vouching  former  proclamations  to  countenance  and 
warrant  the  later,  as  by  a  catalogue  here  underwritten  more 
particularly  appeareth.  By  reason  whereof  there  is  a  gen- 
eral fear  conceived  and  spread  amongst  your  majesty's  people, 
that  proclamations  will,  by  degrees,  grow  up  and  increase  to 
the  strength  and  nature  of  laws ;  whereby  not  only  that  an- 
cient happiness,  freedom,  will  be  much  blemished  (if  not  quite 
taken  away),  which  their  ancestors  have  so  long  enjoyed ; 
but  the  same  may  also  (in  process  of  time)  bring  a  new 
form  of  arbitrary  government  upon  the  realm  ;  and  this  their 
fear  is  the  more  increased  by  occasion  of  certain  books  lately 
published,  which  ascribe  a  greater  power  to  proclamations 
than  heretofore  had  been  conceived  to  belong  unto  them  ;  as 
also  of  the  care  taken  to  reduce  all  the  proclamations  made 
since  your  majesty's  reign  into  one  volume,  and  to  print 
them  in  such  form  as  acts  of  parliament  formerly  have  been, 
and  still  are  used  to  be,  which  seemeth  to  imply  a  purpose 
to  give  them  more  reputation  and  more  establishment  than 
heretofore  they  have  had."  1 

They  proceed,  after  a  list  of  these  illegal  proclamations,  to 
enumerate  other  grievances,  such  as  the  delay  of  courts  of 

1  Somers  Tracts,  ii.  162.    State  Trials,  ii.  519. 


324  THE  FEUDAL  REVENUE.        CHAP.  VL 

law  in  granting  writs  of  prohibition  and  habeas  corpus,  the 
jurisdiction  of  the  council  of  Wales  over  the  four  bordering 
shires  of  Gloucester,  Worcester,  Hereford,  and  Salop,1  some 
patents  of  monopolies,  and  a  tax  under  the  name  of  a  license 
recently  set  upon  victuallers.  The  king  answered  these  re- 
monstrances with  civility,  making,  as  usual,  no  concession 
with  respect  to  the  ecclesiastical  commission,  and  evading 
some  of  their  other  requests  ;  but  promising  that  his  proc- 
lamations should  go  no  farther  than  was  warranted  by  law, 
and  that  the  royal  licenses  to  victuallers  should  be  revoked. 
It  appears  that  the  commons,  deeming  these  enumerated 
abuses  contrary  to  law,  were  unwilling  to  chaffer  with  the 
crown  for  the  restitution  of  their  actual  rights.  There 
were,  however,  parts  of  the  prerogative  which  they  could 
not  dispute,  though  galled  by  the  burden  —  the  incidents  of 
feudal  tenure  and  purveyance.  A  negotiation  was  accord- 
ingly commenced  and  carried  on  for  some  time  with  the  court 
Negotiation  f°r  abolishing  both  these,  or  at  least  the  former, 
forgiving  The  king,  though  he  refused  to  part  with  tenure 

11 D  tlltt  * 

feudal  by  knight's  service,  which  he  thought  connected 

revenue.  vrith  the  honor  of  the  monarchy,  was  induced,  with 
some  real  or  pretended  reluctance,  to  give  up  its  lucrative 
incidents,  relief,  primer  seisin,  and  wardship,  as  well  as  the 
right  of  purveyance.  But  material  difficulties  recurred  in 
the  prosecution  of  this  treaty.  Some  were  apprehensive  that 
the  validity  of  a  statute  cutting  off  such  ancient  branches 
of  prerogative  might  hereafter  be  called  in  question,  especially 
if  the  root  from  which  they  sprung,  tenure  in  capite,  should 
still  remain.  The  king's  demands,  too,  seemed  exorbitant. 

1  The  court  of  the  council  of  Wales  joins,  "the  commission  was  not  afte 
was  erected  by  statute  34  H.  8,  c.  26,  for  reformed  in  all  points  as  it  ought  to  have 
that  principality  and  its  marches,  with  been."  Fourth  Inst.  242.  An  elaborate 
authority  to  determine  such  causes  and  argument  in  defence  of  the  jurisdiction 
matters  as  should  be  assigned  to  them  may  be  found  in  Uacon,  ii.  122.  And 
by  the  king,  "as  heretofore  had  been  there  are  many  papers  on  this  subject 
accustomed  and  used ;  '  which  implies  a  in  Cotton  MSS.  Vitellius,  C.  i.  The 
previous  existence  of  some  such  juris-  complaints  of  this  enactment  had  begun 
diotion.  It  was  pretended  that  the  four  in  the  time  of  Elizabeth.  It  was  alleged 
counties  of  Hereford,  Worcester,  Qlou-  that  the  four  counties  had  been  reduced 
cester,  and  Salop  were  included  within  from  a  very  disorderly  state  to  tranquil- 
their  authority  as  marches  of  AVales.  lity  by  means  of  the  council's  jurisdic- 
This  was  controverted  in  the  reign  of  tion.  But  if  this  were  true,  it  did  not 
James  by  the  inhabitants  of  these  coun-  furnish  a  reason  for  continuing  to  ex- 
ties;  and  on  reference  to  the  twelve  elude  them  from  the  general  privileges 
judges,  according  to  lord  Coke,  it  was  of  the  common  law,  after  the  necessity 
resolved  that  they  were  ancient  English  had  ceased  The  king,  however,  was 
shires,  and  not  within  the  jurisdiction  of  determined  not  to  concede  this  point, 
the  council  of  Wales  j  "  and  yet,"  he  sub-  Carte,  iii.  794. 


JAMES  I.  THE  FEUDAL  REVENUE.  325 

He  asked  200,000?.  as  a  yearly  revenue  over  and  above 
100,000?.,  at  which  his  wardships  were  valued,  and  which  the 
commons  were  content  to  give.  After  some  days'  pause  upon 
this  proposition,  they  represented  to  the  lords,  with  whom, 
through  committees  of  conference,  the  whole  matter  had  been 
discussed,  that,  if  such  a  sum  were  to  be  levied  on  those  only 
who  had  lands  subject  to  wardship,  it  would  be  a  burden  they 
could  not  endure  ;  and  that,  if  it  were  imposed  equally  on  the 
kingdom,  it  would  cause  more  offence  and  commotion  in  the 
people  than  they  could  risk.  After  a  good  deal  of  haggling, 
Salisbury  delivered  the  king's  final  determination  to  accept 
of  200,000?.  per  annum,  which  the  commons  voted  to  grant 
as  a  full  composition  for  abolishing  the  right  of  wardship 
and  dissolving  the  court  that  managed  it,  and  for  taking  away 
all  purveyance ;  with  some  further  concessions,  and  particu- 
larly that  the  king's  claim  to  lands  should  be  bound  by  sixty 
years'  prescription.  Two  points  yet  remained,  of  no  small 
moment ;  namely,  by  what  assurance  they  could  secure  them- 
selves against  the  king's  prerogative,  so  often  held  up  by 
court  lawyers  as  something  uncontrollable  by  statute,  and  by 
what  means  so  great  an  imposition  should  be  levied  ;  but  the 
consideration  of  these  was  reserved  for  the  ensuing  session, 
which  was  to  take  place  in  October.1  They  were  prorogued 
in  July  till  that  month,  having  previously  granted  a  subsidy 
for  the  king's  immediate  exigencies.  On  their  meeting  again, 
the  lords  began  the  business  by  requesting  a  conference  with 
the  other  house  about  the  proposed  contract.  But  it  appeared 
that  the  commons  had  lost  their  disposition  to  comply.  Time 
had  been  given  them  to  calculate  the  disproportion  of  the 
terms,  and  the  perpetual  burden  that  lands  held  by  knights' 
service  'must  endure.  They  had  reflected,  too,  on  the  king's 
prodigal  humor,  the  rapacity  of  the  Scots  in  his  service,  and 
the  probability  that  this  additional  revenue  would  be  wasted 
without  sustaining  the  national  honor,  or  preventing  future 
applications  for  money.  They  saw  that,  after  all  the  spe- 
cious promises  by  which  they  had  been  led  on,  no  redress 
was  to  be  expected  as  to  those  grievances  they  had  most  at 
heart ;  that  the  ecclesiastical  courts  would  not  be  suffered  to 
lose  a  jot  of  their  jurisdiction  ;  that  illegal  customs  were  stili 

1  Commons'  Journals  for  1610.  passim.    Hist.  1124,  et  post.    Bacon,  i.  676.     Win 
Lords'  Journals,  7th  May,  et  post.     Parl.    wood,  iii.  119,  et  post. 


326  CHARACTER  OF  JAMES.  CIIAI-.  VI 

to  be  levied  at  the  outports ;  that  proclamations  were  still  to 
be  enforced  like  acts  of  parliament.     Great  cold- 

Dissolution  T      i          i  •      -i     •  ,<• 

of  pariia-       ness  accordingly  was  displayed  m  their  proceedings, 
and  in  a  short  time  this  distinguished  parliament, 
after  sitting  nearly  seven  years,  was  dissolved  by  proclama- 
tion.1 

It  was  now  perhaps  too  late  for  the  king,  by  any  reform  or 
Character  concession,  to  regain  that  public  esteem  which  he 
of  James.  jja(j  forfeited.  Deceived  by  an  overweening  opin- 
ion of  his  own  learning,  which  was  not  inconsiderable,  of  his 
general  abilities,  which  were  far  from  contemptible,  and  of  his 
capacity  for  government,  which  was  very  small,  and  confirmed 
in  this  delusion  by  the  disgraceful  flattery  of  his  courtiers  and 
bishops,  he  had  wholly  overlooked  the  real  difficulties  of  his 
position  —  as  a  foreigner,  rather  distantly  connected  with  the 
royal"stock,  and  as  a  native  of  a  hostile  and  hateful  kingdom 
come  to  succeed  the  most  renowned  of  sovereigns,  and  to 
grasp  a  sceptre  which  deep  policy  and  long  experience  had 
taught  her  admirably  to  wield.2  The  people  were  proud  of 
martial  glory ;  he  spoke  only  of  the  blessing  of  the  peace- 
makers :  they  abhorred  the  court  of  Spain ;  he  sought  its 
friendship  :  they  asked  indulgence  for  scrupulous  consciences ; 
he  would  bear  no  deviation  from  conformity :  they  writhed 
under  the  yoke  of  the  bishops,  whose  power  he  thought  neces- 
sary to  his  own  —  they  were  animated  by  a  persecuting  temper 
towards  the  catholics ;  he  was  averse  to  extreme  rigor :  they 
had  been  used  to  the  utmost  frugality  in  dispensing  the  public 
treasure  ;  he  squandered  it  on  unworthy  favorites :  they  had 
seen  at  least  exterior  decency  of  morals  prevail  in  the  queen's 
court ;  they  now  heard  only  of  its  dissoluteness  and  extrava- 
gance:8 they  had  imbibed  an  exclusive  fondness  for  the 

1  rt  appears  by  a  letter  of  the  king,  our    health,  wounded    our  reputation, 

In  Murden's  State  Papers,  p.  813,  that  emboldened  all   ill-natured  people,    en- 

BOme  indecent  allusions  to  himself  in  the  eroached  upon   many  of  our   privileges, 

house  of  commons  had  irritated  him  :  and  plagued  our  people  with  their  delays. 

— "  Wlierein  we  have  misbehaved  our-  It  only  resteth  now  that  you  labor  all 

pelves  we  know  not,  nor  we  can  never  yet  you  can  to  do  that  you  think  best  to  the 

learn;  but  sure  we  are  we  may  say  with  repairing  of  our  estate." 
Bellarmin  in  his  book,  that  in  all  the        2  '•  Your    queen,"  says  lord  Thomas 

lower  houses  these  seven  years  past,  espe-  Howard,   in  a   letter,  "  did   talk  of  her 

cially  these  two    last  sessions.  Ego  pun-  subjects'  love  and  good  affection,  and  in 

gor,  ego  carpor.     Our  fame  and  actions  good   truth   she   aimed   well;    our  king 

have  been  tossed  like  tennis-balls  among  talketh  of  his  subjects'  fear  and  subjee- 

thom.  ;iud  all  that  spite  and  malice  durst  tion,  and  herein  I  think  he  doth  well  too, 

do  to  disgrace  and  inflame  us  hath  been  as  long  as  it  holdeth  good."     Nugae  An- 

used.     To  be  short,  this  lower  house  by  ticiuae,  i.  395. 
their  behavior  have  perilled  and  an  uoyed        »  The  court  of  James  I.  was  incom 


JAMES  I.  DEATH  OF   SALISBURY.  3427 

common  law  as  the  source  of  their  liberties  and  privileges  ; 
his  churchmen  and  courtiers,  but  none  more  than  himself, 
talked  of  absolute  power  and  the  imprescriptible  rights  of 
monarchy.1 

James  lost  in  1611  his  son  prince  Henry,  and  in  1612  the 
lord  treasurer  Salisbury.     He  showed  little  regret  Death  f 
for  the  former,  whose  high  spirit  and  great  popu-  lord 
larity  afforded  a  mortifying  contrast,  especially  as  SaUsbury- 
the  young  prince  had  not  taken  sufficient  pains  to  disguise  hia 
contempt  for  his  father.2     Salisbury  was  a  very  able  man,  to 
whom,  perhaps,  his  contemporaries  did  some  injustice.     The 
ministers  of  weak  and  wilful  monarchs  are  made  answerable 
for  the  mischiefs  they  are  compelled  to  suffer,  and  gain  no 
credit  for  those  which  they  prevent.     Cecil  had  made  personal 
enemies  of  those  who  had  loved  Essex  or  admired  Raleigh, 
as  well  as  those  who  looked  invidiously  on  his  elevation.     It 
was  believed  that  the  desire  shown  by  the  house  of  commons 
to  abolish  the  feudal  wardships  proceeded  in  a  great  measure 
from  the  circumstance  that  this  obnoxious  minister  was  mas- 
ter of  the  court  of  wards,  an  office  both  lucrative  and  produc- 
tive of  much  influence.     But  he  came  into  the  scheme  of 
abolishing  it  with  a  readiness  that  did  him  credit. 
His  chief  praise,  however,  was  his  management  of  poiuic^of 
continental  relations.    The  only  minister  of  James's  the  sOTern- 
cabinet  who  had  been  trained  in  the  councils  of  Eliz- 
abeth, he  retained  some  of  her  jealousy  of  Spain  and  of  her  re- 
gard for  the  protestant  interests.    The  court  of  Madrid,  aware 
both  of  the  king's  pusillanimity  and  of  his  favorable  disposi- 

parably  the  most  disgraceful  scene  of  that  a  king  cannot  do  this  or  that." 
profligacy  which  this  country  has  ever  King  James's  Works,  p.  557. 
witnessed;  equal  to  that  of  Charles  II.  It  is  probable  that  his  familiar  con- 
in  the  laxity  of  female  virtue,  and  with-  versation  was  full  of  this  rhodomontade, 
out  any  sort  of  parallel  in  some  other  disgusting  and  contemptible  from  so 
respects.  Gross  drunkenness  is  imputed  wretched  a  pedant,  as  well  as  offensive 
even  to  some  of  the  ladies  who  acted  in  to  the  indignant  ears  of  those  who  knew 
the  court  pageants,  Nugae  Antiquse,  i.  and  valued  their  liberties.  The  story  of 
848,  which  Mr.  Gilford,  who  seems  ab-  bishops  Neile  and  Andrews  is  far  too 
Bolutely  enraptured  with  this  age  and  its  trite  for  repetition. 

manners,   might  as   well    have   remem-  2  Carte,  iii.   747.     Birch's  Life  of  P. 

bered.     Life  of  Ben  Jonson,  p.  231,  &c.  Henry,  405.    Rochester,  three  days  after, 

The  king's  prodigality  is  notorious.  directed  sir  Thomas  Edmondes  at   Paris 

1  "  It  is  atheism  and  blasphemy,"  he  to  commence  a  negotiation  for  a  marriage 

says,  in  a  speech  made  in  the  star-cham-  between  prince  Cbarles  and  the  second 

ber,  1616,  '•  to  dispute  what  God  can  do  ;  daughter  of  the  late  king  of  France;  but 

good  Christians  content  themselves  with  the  ambassador  had  more  sense  of  de- 

his  will  revealed  in  his  word:    so  it  is  cency.  and  declined  to  enter  on  such  an 

presumption  and  high  contempt  in  a  sub-  affair  at  that  moment, 
ject  to  dispute  what  a  king  can  do,  or  say 


328 


FOREIGN  POLITICS   OF  JAMES. 


tions,  affected  a  tone  in  the  conferences  held  in  1604  about  a 
treaty  of  peace  which  Elizabeth  would  have  resented  in  a 
very  different  manner.1  On  this  occasion  he  not  only  desert- 
ed the  United  Provinces,  but  gave  hopes  to  Spain  that  he 
might,  if  they  persevered  in  their  obstinacy,  take  part  against 
them.  Nor  have  I  any  doubt  that  his  blind  attachment  to 
that  power  would  have  precipitated  him  into  a  ruinous  con- 
nection, if  Cecil's  wisdom  had  not  influenced  his  councils. 
During  this  minister's  life  our  foreign  politics  seem  to  have 
been  conducted  w^th  as  much  firmness  and  prudence  as  his 
master's  temper  would  allow ;  the  mediation  of  England  was 
of  considerable  service  in  bringing  about  the  great  truce  of 
twelve  years  between  Spain  and  Holland  in  1 609  ;  and  in  the 
dispute  which  sprang  up  soon  afterwards  concerning  the  suc- 
cession to  the  duchies  of  Cleves  and  Juliers,  a  dispute  which 
threatened  to  mingle  in  arms  the  catholic  and  protestant 
parties  throughout  Europe,2  our  councils  were  full  of  a  vigor 
and  promptitude  unusual  in  this  reign,  nor  did  anything  but 
the  assassination  of  Henry  IV.  prevent  the  appearance  of  an 
English  army  in  the  Netherlands.  It  must  at  least  be  con- 


1  Winwood,  vol.  ii.  Carte,  iii.  749. 
Watson's  Hist,  of  Philip  III.,  Appendix. 
In  some  passages  of  this  negotiation  Cecil 
may  appear  not  wholly  to  have  deserved 
the  character  I  have  given  him  for  adher- 
ing to  Elizabeth's  principles  of  policy. 
But  he  was  placed  in  a  difficult  position, 
not  feeling  himself  secure  of  the  king's 
favor,  which,  notwithstanding  his  great 
previous  services,  that  capricious  prince, 
for  the  first  year  after  his  accession, 
rather  sparingly  afforded;  as  appears 
from  the  Memoirs  of  Sully,  i.  14,  and 
Nugae  Antiquse,  i.  345.  It  may  be  said 
that  CecH  was  as  little  Spanish,  just  as 
Wai  pole  was  as  little  Hanoverian,  as  the 
partialities  of  their  respective  sovereigns 
would  permit,  though  too  much  so  in 
appearance  for  their  own  reputation.  It 
is  hardly  necessary  to  observe  that  James 
and  the  kingdom  were  chiefly  indebted 
to  Cecil  for  the  tranquillity  thatattended 
the  accession  of  the  former  to  the  throne. 
I  will  take  this  opportunity  of  noticing 
that  the  learned  and  worthy  compiler  of 
the  catalogue  of  the  Lansdowne  manu- 
scripts in  the  Museum  has  thought  fit  not 
only  to  charge  sir  Michael  Hicks  with 
venality,  but  to  add,  —  "  It  is  certain  that 
articles  among  these  papers  contribute  to 
justify  very  strong  suspicions  that  neither 
of  the  secretary's  masters  [lord  Bur- 
leigh  and  lord  Salisbury]  was  altogether 


innocent  on  the  score  of  corruption." 
Lansd.  Cat.  vol.  xci.  p.  45.  This  is 
much  too  strong  an  accusation  to  he 
brought  forward  without  more  proof 
than  appears  It  is  absurd  to  mention 
presents  of  fat  bucks  to 'men  in  power 
as  bribes  ;  and  rather  morn,  so  to  charge 
a  man  with  being  corrupted  because  an 
attempt  is  made  to  corrupt  him.  as  the 
catalogue-maker  has  done  in  this  place. 
I  would  not  offend  this  respectable 
gentleman ;  but  by  referring  to  many 
of  the  Lansdowne  manuscripts  I  am 
enabled  to  say  that  he  has  travelled 
frequently  out  of  his  province,  and 
substituted  his  conjectures  for  an  anal- 
ysis or  abstract  of  the  document  before 
him. 

2  A  great  part  of  Winwood's  third 
volume  relates  to  this  business,  which,  as 
is  well  known,  attracted  a  prodigious 
degree  of  attention  throughout  Europe 
The  question,  as  Winwood  wrote  to  Salis- 
bury, was  "  not  of  the  succession  of 
Cleves  and  Juliers,  but  whether  the 
house  of  Austria  and  the  church  of 
Rome,  both  now  on  the  wane,  shall  re- 
cover their  lustre  and  greatness  in  these 
parts  of  Europe."  P.  378.  James 
wished  to  have  the  right  referred  to  hia 
arbitration,  and  would  have  decided  in 
favor  of  the  elector  of  Brandenburg, 
the  chief  protestant  competitor. 


JAMES  I.    COKE'S  ALIENATION  FROM  THE  COURT.  329 

fessed  that  the  king's  affairs,  both  at  home  and  abroad,  were 
far  worse  conducted  after  the  death  of  the  Earl  of  Salisbury 
than  before.1 

The  administration  found  an  important  disadvantage,  about 
this  time,  in  a  sort  of  defection  of  sir  Edward  Coke  , 

(more  usually  called  lord  Coke),  chief-justice  of  alienation 
the  king's  bench,  from  the  side  of  prerogative.  £^tthe 
He  was  a  man  of  strong  though  narrow  intellect; 
confessedly  the  greatest  master  of  English  law  that  had  ever 
appeared,  but  proud  and  overbearing,  a  flatterer  and  tool  of 
the  court  till  he  had  obtained  his  ends,  and  odious  to  the  na- 
tion for  the  brutal  manner  in  which,  as  attorney-general,  he 
had  behaved  towards  sir  Walter  Raleigh  on  his  trial.  In 
raising  him  to  the  post  of  chief-justice  the  council  had  of 
course  relied  on  finding  his  unfathomable  stores  of  precedent 
subservient  to  their  purposes.  But,  soon  after  his  promotion, 
Coke,  from  various  causes,  began  to  ste"er  a  more  indepen- 
dent course.  He  was  little  formed  to  endure  a  competitor  in 
his  own  profession,  and  lived  on  ill  terms  both  with  the  lord 
chancellor  Egerton  and  with  the  attorney-general,  sir  Francis 
Bacon.  The  latter  had  long  been  his  rival  and  enemy. 
Discountenanced  by  Elizabeth,  who,  against  the  importunity 
of  Essex,  had  raised  Coke  over  his  head,  that  great  and  as- 
piring genius  was  now  high  in  the  king's  favor.  The  chief- 
justice  affected  to  look  down  on  one  as  inferior  to  him  in 
knowledge  of  our  municipal  law,  as  he  was  superior  in  all 
other  learning  and  in  all  the  philosophy  of  jurisprudence. 
And  the  mutual  enmity  of  these  illustrious  men  never  ceased 
till  each  in  his  turn  satiated  his  revenge  by  the  other's  fall. 
Coke  was  also  much  offended  by  the  attempts  of  the  bishops 
to  emancipate  their  ecclesiastical  courts  from  the  civil  juris- 
diction. I  have  already  mentioned  the  peremptory  tone  in 
which  he  repelled  Bancroft's  Articuli  Cleri.  But  as  the  king 
and  some  of  the  council  rather  favored  these  episcopal  pre- 
tensions, they  were  troubled  by  what  they  deemed  his  obsti- 
nacy, and  discovered  more  and  more  that  they  had  to  deal 
with  a  most  impracticable  spirit. 

1  Winwood.  vols.  ii.  and  iii.  passim,  is  more  unfavorable,  and  in  that  respect 

Birch,  that  accurate  master  of  this  part  justly  :  but  what  statesman  of  that  age 

of  English  history,  has  done  justice  to  was  ready  to  admit  the  new  creed  of 

Salisbury's  character.      Negotiations  of  parliamentary  control   over   the  execu 

Edmondes,  p.  347.    Miss  Aikin,  looking  live  government?     Memoirs  of  James, 

to  his  want  of  constitutional  principle,  i.  895. 


330  ILLEGAL  PKOCLAMATIO^S.  CHAF.  VI. 

It  would  be  invidious  to  exclude  from  the  motives  that  al- 
tered lord  Coke's  behavior  in  matters  of  prerogative  his  real 
affection  for  the  kws  of  the  land,  which  novel  systems, 
broached  by  the  churchmen  and  civilians,  threatened  to  sub- 
vert.1 In  JBates's  case,  which  seems  to  have  come  in  some 
shape  extrajudicially  before  him,  he  had  delivered  an  opin- 
ion in  favor  of  the  king's  right  to  impose  at  the  outports ; 
but  so  cautiously  guarded,  and  bottomed  on  such  different 
grounds  from  those  taken  by  the  barons  of  the  exchequer, 
that  it  could  not  be  cited  in  favor  of  any  fresh  encroach- 
ments.2 He  now  performed  a  great  service  to  his  country, 
illegal  proc-  The  practice  of  issuing  proclamations,  by  way  of 
lamations.  temporary  regulation  indeed,  but  interfering  with 
the  subject's  liberty,  in  cases  unprovided  for  by  parliament, 
had  grown  still  more  usual  than  under  Elizabeth.  Coke  was 
sent  for  to  attend  some  of  the  council,  who  might  perhaps 
have  reason  to  conjecture  his  sentiments,  and  it  was  demand- 
ed whether  the  king,  by  his  proclamation,  might  prohibit  new 
buildings  about  London,  and  whether  he  might  prohibit 
the  making  of  starch  from  wheat.  This  was  during  the  ses- 
sion of  parliament  in  1C  10,  and  with  a  view  to  what  answer 
the  king  should  make  to  the  commons'  remonstrance  against 
these  proclamations.  Coke  replied  that  it  was  a  matter  of 
great  importance,  on  which  he  would  confer  with  his  breth- 
ren. "  The  chancellor  said  that  every  precedent  had  first  a 
commencement,  and  he  would  advise  the  judges  to  maintain 
the  power  and  prerogative  of  the  king ;  and  in  cases  wherein 

1  ''  On  Sunday,  before  the  king's  going  some  speech  against  sir  Thomas  Cromp- 
to  Newmarket  (which  was  Sunday  last  ton.  Had  not  my  lord  treasurer,  most 
•was  a  se'nnight),  my  lord  Coke  and  all  humbly  on  his  knee,  used  many  good 
the  judges  of  the  common  law  were  be-  words  to  pacify  his  majesty,  and  to  ex- 
fore  his  majesty  to  answer  some  com-  cuse  that  which  had  been  spoKen.  it  was 
plaints  made  by  the  civil  lawyers  for  thought  his  highness  would  have  been 
the  general  granting  of  prohibitions.  I  much  more  offended.  In  the  conclu- 
heard  that  the  lord  Coke,  amongst  other  sion,  his  majesty,  by  means  of  my  lord 
offensive  speech,  should  say  to  his  maj-  treasurer,  was  well  pacified,  and  gave  a 
esty  that  his  highness  was  defended  by  gracious  countenance  to  all  the  other 
his  laws.  At  which  saying,  with  other  judges,  and  said  he  would  maintain  the 
speech  then  used  by  the  lord  Coke,  his  common  law."  Lodge,  iii.  364.  This 
majesty  was  very  much  offended,  and  letter  is  dated  25th  November,  1608, 
told  him  he  spoke  foolishly,  and  said  which  shows  how  early  Coke  had  begun 
that  he  was  not  defended  by  his  laws,  to  give  offence  by  his  zeal  for  the  law. 
but  by  God  ;  and  so  gave  the  lord  Coke,  2  12  Reports.  In  his  Second  Institute, 
in  other  words,  a  very  sharp  reprehen-  p.  57,  written  a  good  deal  later,  he  speaks 
Bion,  both  for  that  and  other  things;  in  a  very  different  manner  of  Bates's 
and  withal  told  him  that  sir  Thomas  case,  and  declares  the  judgment  of  the 
Crompton  [judge  of  the  admiralty]  was  court  of  exchequer  to  be-  contraiy  to 
as  good  a  man  as  Coke;  my  lord  Coke  law. 
having  then,  by  way  of  exception,  used. 


JAMES  I.  ILLEGAL  PROCLAMATION  5  331 

there  is  no  authority  and  precedent,  to  leave  it  to  the  king  to 
order  in  it  according  to  his  wisdom  and  for  the  good  of  his 
subjects,  or  otherwise  the  king  would  be  no  more  than  the 
duke  of  Venice ;  *and  that  the  king  was  so  much  restrained 
in  his  prerogative  that  it  was  to  be  feared  the  bonds  would 
be  broken.  And  the  lord  privy-seal  (Northampton)  said 
that  the  physician  was  not  always  bound  to  a  precedent,  but 
to  apply  his  medicine  according  to  the  quality  of  the  disease ; 
and  all  concluded  that  it  should  be  necessary  at  that  time  to 
confirm  the  king's  prerogative  with  our  opinions,  although 
that  there  were  not  any  former  precedent  or  authority  in 
la\v,  for  every  precedent  ought  to  have  a  commencement. 
To  which  I  answered,  that  true  it  is  that  every  precedent 
ought  to  have  a  commencement ;  but,  when  authority  and 
precedent  is  wanting,  there  is  need  of  great  consideration 
before  that  anything  of  novelty  shall  be  established,  and  to 
provide  that  this  be  not  against  the  law  of  the  laud ;  for  1 
said  that  the  king  cannot  change  any  part  of  the  common 
law,  nor  create  any  offence  by  his  proclamation  which  was 
not  an  offence  before,  without  parliament.  But  at  this  time 
I  only  desired  to  have  a  time  of  consultation  and  conference 
with  my  brothers."  This  was  agreed  to  by  the  council  and 
three  judges,  besides  Coke,  appointed  to  consider  it.  They 
resolved  that  the  king,  by  his  proclamation,  cannot  create 
any  offence  which  was  not  one  before ;  for  then  he  might  al- 
ter the  law  of  the  land  in  a  high  point ;  for  if  he  may  create 
an  offence  where  none  is,  upon  that  ensues  fine  and  impris- 
onment. It  was  also  resolved  that  the  king  hath  no  preroga- 
tive but  what  the  law  of  the  land  allows  him.  But  the  king, 
for  the  prevention  of  offences,  may  by  proclamation  admon- 
ish all  his  subjects  that  they  keep  the  laws  and  do  not  offend 
them,  upon  punishment  to  be  inflicted  by  the  law ;  and  the 
neglect  of  such  proclamation,  Coke  says,  aggravates  the  of- 
feiice.  Lastly,  they  resolved  that,  if  an  offence  be  not  pun- 
ishable in  the  star-chamber,  the  prohibition  of  it  by  procla- 
mation cannot  make  it  so.  After  this  resolution,  the  report 
goes  on  to  remark,  no  proclamation  imposing  fine  and  im- 
prisonment was  made.1 

1  12  Reports.     There  were,  however,  of  being  proceeded  against  by  the  attor- 

eeveral  proclamations  afterwards  to  forbid  ney -general  in  the  star-chamber.  Rymer, 

building  within  two  miles  of  London,  ex-  xvii.  107  (1618),  144  (1619),  607  (1624). 

cept  on  old  foundations,  and  in  that  case  London  nevertheless    increased   rapidly, 

only  with  brick  or  otoue,  under  penalty  which  wad  by  means  of  licenses  to  build; 


332  ATTEMPTS  TO  RAISE  MONET.  CHAP.  VI 

By  the  abrupt  dissolution  of  parliament  James  was  left 
nearly  in  the  same  necessity  as  before  :  their  subsidy  being 
by  no  means  sufficient  to  defray  his  expenses,  far 
sorted  to"  less  to  discharge  his  debts.  He  had  frequently 
avokuhe0  betaken  himself  to  the  usual  resource  of  applying 
meeting  of  to  private  subjects,  especially  rich  merchants, 
parliament.  £or  joang  Qf  money.  These  loans,  which  bore  no 

interest,  and  for  the  repayment  of  which  there  was  no  secu- 
rity, disturbed  the  prudent  citizens,  especially  as  the  council 
used  to  solicit  them  with  a  degree  of  importunity  at  least 
bordering  on  compulsion.  The  house  of  commons  had  in  the 
last  session  requested  that  no  one  should  be  bound  to  lend 
money  to  the  king  against  his  will.  The  king  had  answered 
that  he  allowed  not  of  any  precedents  from  the  time  of  usurp- 
ing or  decaying  princes,  or  people  too  bold  and  wanton  ;  that 
he  desired  not  to  govern  in  that  commonwealth  where  the 
people  should  be  assured  of  everything  and  hope  for  nothing, 
nor  would  he  leave  to  posterity  such  a  mark  of  weakness 
on  his  reign  ;  yet,  in  the  matter  of  loans,  he  would  refuse 
no  reasonable  excuse.1  Forced  loans  or  benevolences  were 
directly  prohibited  by  an  act  of  Richard  III.,  whose  laws, 
however  the  court  might  sometimes  throw  a  slur  upon  his 
usurpation,  had  always  been  in  the  statute-book.  After  the 
dissolution  of  1610,  James  attempted  as  usual  to  obtain 
loans  ;  but  the  merchants,  grown  bolder  with  the  spirit  of  the 
times,  refused  him  the  accommodation.2  He  had  recourse  to 
another  method  of  raising  money,  unprecedented,  I  believe, 
before  his  reign,  though  long  practised  in  France,  the  sale 
of  honors.  He  sold  several  peerages  for  considerable  sums, 

the  prohibition  being  in  this,  as  in  many  houses,  and    maintain     hospitality,  on 

other  cases,  enacted  chiefly  for  the  sake  pain  of  condign    punishment.      Rymer, 

of  the  dispensations.  xvi.  517  (1604);   xvii.   41T   (K22),    332 

James  made  use  of  proclamations  to  (1624). 


must  be  confessed,  if  we  trust  to  what  which  is  decisive  as  to  the  legal  character 

those  proclamations  assert  and  theme-  of  proclamations  even  in  the  midst  of  the 

moirs  of  the  age  confirm,  neither  their  Tudor  period.  "  The  king,  it  is  said,  may 

own  l-ehavior,  nor  that  of  their  wives  make  a  proclamation,  quoad     terrorem 

and  daughters,  who  took  the  worst  means  populi,  to  put   them   in  fear  of  his  dis- 

of  re  pairing  the  ruin  their  extravagance  pleasure,  but  not  to  impose  any  fine,  for- 

had  caused,  redounded  to  their  honor,  feiture,  or  imprisonment  ;  for  no  procla- 

The  king's  comparison  of  them  to  ships  mation  can  make  a  new  law,  but  only 

in  a  ri\<ti  and  in  the  sea  is  well  known,  confirm  and  ratify  an  ancient  one."  Dal* 

Still,  in  a  constitutional  point  of  view,  we  ison's  Reports.  20- 

may  be  startled  at  proclamations  com-  1  Winwood,  iii.  193. 

manding  them  to  return  to  their  country  %  Carte,  iii.  805. 


NEW  PARLIAMENT  ADVISED.  333 

and  created  a  new  order  of  hereditary  knights,  called  baron- 
ets, who  paid  WOOL  each  for  their  patents. 1 

Such  resources,  however,  being  evidently  insufficient  and 
temporary,  it  was  almost  indispensable  to  try  once  more  the 
temper  of  a  parliament.  This  was  strongly  urged  by  Bacon, 
whose  fertility  of  invention  rendered  him  constitutionally 
sanguine  of  success.  He  submitted  to  the  king  that  there 
were  expedients  for  more  judiciously  managing  a  house  of 
commons,  than  Cecil,  upon  whom  he  was  too  willing  to  throw 
blame,  had  done  with  the  last ;  that  some  of  those  who  had 
been  most  forward  in  opposing  were  now  won  over,  such  as 
Neville,  Yelverton,  Hyde,  Crew,  Dudley  Digges ;  that  much 
might  be  done  by  forethought  towards  filling  the  house  with 
well-affected  persons,  winning  or  blinding  the  lawyers,  whom 
he  calls  "  the  literae  vocales  of  the  house,"  and  drawing  the 
chief  constituent  bodies  of  the  assembly,  the  country  gentle- 
men, the  merchants,  the  courtiers,  to  act  for  the  king's  ad- 
vantage ;  that  it  would  be  expedient  to  tender  voluntarily 
certain  graces  and  modifications  of  the  king's  prerogative, 
such  as  might  with  smallest  injury  be  conceded,  lest  they 
should  be  first  demanded,  and  in  order  to  save  more  im- 
portant points.2  This  advice  was  seconded  by  sir  Henry 
Neville,  an  ambitious  man,  who  had  narrowly  escaped  in 
the  queen's  time  for  having  tampered  in  Essex's  conspir- 
acy, and  had  much  promoted  the  opposition  in  the  late  par- 
liament, but  was  now  seeking  the  post  of  secretary  of  state. 
He  advised  the  king,  in  a  very  sensible  memorial,  to  consider 
what  had  been  demanded  and  what  had  been  promised  in 
the  last  session,  granting  the  more  reasonable  of  the  com- 
mons' requests,  and  performing  all  his  own  promises  ;  to 
avoid  any  speech  likely  to  excite  irritation ;  and  to  seem 
confident  of  the  parliament's  good  affections,  not  waiting  to 
be  pressed  for  what  he  meant  to  do.8  Neville,  and  others 
who,  like  him,  professed  to  understand  the  temper  of  the 


1  The  number  of  these  was  intended  to  The  object  of  this  was  of  course  to  raise 

be  two  hundred,  but  only  ninety-three  money  from  those  who  thought  the  hon- 

patents  were  sold  in  the  first  six  years,  or  troublesome  and  expensive,  but  such 

Lingard,  ix.  203,  from   Somers    Tracts,  as  chose  to  appear  could  not  be  refused  ; 

In  the  first  part  of  his    reign    he  had  and  this  accounts  for  his   having  made 

availed  himself  of  an  old  feudal  resource,  many  hundred  knights  in  the  first  vcnr 

calling  on  all   who   held  401.  a,  year  in  of  his  reign.      Harris's     Life  of  Junues, 

chivalry  (whether  of  the  crown  or  not,  as  69. 

it  seems)   to  receive  knighthood,  or  to  2  M.S.  Penes  autorem. 

pay  a  composition.     Kyiuer,  xvi.   580.  8  Carte,  iv.  17- 


334  PARLIAMENT   OF  1614  CHAP.  Ti. 

commons,  and  to  facilitate  the  king's  dealings  with  them, 
Under-  were  called  undertakers.1  This  circumstance,  like 

takers.  several  others  in  the  present  reign,  is  curious,  as 

it  shows  the  rise  of  a  systematic  parliamentary  influence, 
which  was  one  day  to  become  the  mainspring  of  govern- 
ment. 

Neville,  however,  and  his  associates,  had  deceived  the 
courtiers  with  promises  they  could  not  realize.  It  was  re- 
solved to  announce  certain  intended  graces  in  the  speech 
from  the  throne :  that  is,  to  declare  the  king's  readiness  to 
pass  bills  that  might  remedy  some  grievances  and  retrench 
a  part  of  his  prerogative.  These  proffered  amendments  of 
the  law,  though  eleven  in  number,  failed  altogether  of  giving 
/-he  content  that  had  been  fully  expected.  Except  the  re- 
peal of  a  strange  act  of  Henry  VIII.,  allowing  the  king  to 
make  such  laws  as  he  should  think  fit  for  the  principality  of 
Wales  without  consent  of  parliament,2  none  of  them  could 
perhaps  be  reckoned  of  any  constitutional  importance.  In 
all  domanial  and  fiscal  causes,  and  wherever  the  private  in- 
terests of  the  crown  stood,  in  competition  with  those  of  a 
subject,  the  former  enjoyed  enormous  and  superior  advanta- 
ges, whereof  what  is  strictly  called  its  prerogative  was  princi- 
pally composed.  The  terms  of  prescription  that  bound  other 
men's  right,  the  rules  of  pleading  and  procedure  established 
for  the  sake  of  truth  and  justice,  did  not  in  general  oblige 
the  king.  It  was  not  by  doing  away  a  very  few  of  these 
invidious  and  oppressive  distinctions  that  the  crown  could 
be  allowed  to  keep  on  foot  still  more  momentous  abuses. 
Parliament  The  commons  of  1614  accordingly  went  at  once 
to  the  characteristic  grievance  of  this  reign,  the 
customs  at  the  outports.  They  had  grown  so  confident  in 
their  oause  by  ransacking  ancient  records,  that  an  unanimous 
vote  passed  against  the  king's  right  of  imposition ;  not  that 
there  were  no  courtiers  in  the  house,  but  the  cry  was  too 
obstreperous  to  be  withstood.8  They  demanded  a  conference 
on  the  subject  with  the  lords,  who  preserved  a  kind  of  medi- 

1  Wilson,  in  Kennet,  ii.  696.  to  hereditary,  though  not   to  elective, 

»  This  act  (34  H.  VIII.  c.  26)  was  re-  princes.    Id.  493.     This  silly  argument 

pealed  a  few  years  afterwards.    21  J.  I.  is  only  worth   notice   as  a   proof  what 

c.  10.  erroneous  notions   of  government  were 

3  Commons'  Journals,  466,  472,  481,  sometimes  imbibed  from  an  intercourse 

486.     Sir  Henry  Wotton  at  length  mut-  with     foreign    nations.     Dudley   Digges 

tered  something  in  favor  of  the  prerog-  and  Sandys  answered  him   very   prop 

ative  of  laying  impositions,  as  belonging  erly. 


JAMES  1.  REFUSE  TO  GRANT   SUPPLIES.  335 

ating  neutrality  throughout  this  reign.1  In  the  course  of 
their  debate,  Neyle,  bishop  of  Liehfield,  threw  out  some 
aspersion  on  the  commons.  They  were  immediately  in  a 
flame,  and  demanded  reparation.  This  Neyle  was  a  man 
of  indifferent  character,  and.  very  unpopular  from  the  share 
he  had  taken  in  the  earl  of  Essex's  divorce,  and  from  his 
severity  towards  the  puritans ;  nor  did  the  house  fail  to  com- 
ment upon  all  his  faults  in  their  debate.  He  had,  however, 
the  prudence  to  excuse  himself  (  "  with  many  tears,"  as  the 
Lords'  Journals  inform  us),  denying  the  most  offensive  words 
imputed  to  him ;  and  the  affair  went  no  farther.2  This  ill- 
humor  of  the  commons  disconcerted  those  who  had  relied  on 
the  undertakers.  But  as  the  secret  of  these  men  had  not 
been  kept,  their  project  considerably  aggravated  the  prevail- 
ing discontent.8  The  king  had  positively  denied  in  his  first 
speech  that  there  were  any  such  undertakers ;  and  Bacon, 
then  attorney-general,  laughed  at  the  chimerical  notion  that 
private  men  should  undertake  for  all  the  commons  of  Eng- 
land.4 That  some  persons,  however,  had  obtained  that  name 
at  court,  and  held  out  such  promises,  is  at  present  out  of 
doubt ;  and  indeed  the  king,  forgetful  of  his  former  denial, 
expressly  confessed  it  on  opening  the  session  of  1621. 

Amidst  these  heats  little  progress  was  made ;  and  no  one 
took  up  the  essential  business  of  supply.    The  king  at  length 
sent  a  message  requesting  that  a  supply  might  be  granted, 
with  a  threat  of  dissolving  parliament  unless  it  were  done. 
But  the  days  of  intimidation   were   gone  by.     The  house 
voted  that  they  would  first  proceed  with  the  business  of 
impositions,  and  postpone  supply  till  their  griev- 
ances should  be  redressed.6     Aware  of  the  impos-  without 
sibility  of  conquering  their   resolution,  the  king  f^s}uK » 

•    ii'  n>  ?•  ^  smgleact 

earned  his  measure  into  enect  by  a  dissolution. 

1  The  judges,  having  been  called  upon  above  mentioned,  was  read  in  the  house, 

by  the   house  of  lords  to  deliver  their  May  14. 

opinions  on  the  subject  of  impositions,  *  Carte,   iv.   19,   20.      Bacon,  i.  6D5. 

previous  to  the  intended  conference,  re-  C.  J    462. 

quested,  by  the  mouth  of  chief  justice  5  C.  J.  506.     Carte,  23.    This  writer 

Coke,  to  be  excused.    This  was  probably  absurdly  defends  the  prerogative  of  lay- 

a    disappointment    to    lord    chancellor  ing  impositions  on  merchandise  as  part 

Egerton,  who  moved  to   consult  them,  of  the  law  of  nations, 

and  proceeded  from  Coke's  dislike  to  him  8  It  is  said  that,  previously  to  taking 

and  to  the  court,     it  induced  the  house  this  step,  the  king  sent  for  the  commons, 

to  decline  the  conference.     Lords'  Jour-  and  tore  all  their  bills  before  their  faces 

nals,  23d  May.  in  the   banqueting-house  at  Whitehall. 

.  2  Lords' Journals,  May  31.    Commons'  D'lsraeli's  Character  of  James,  p.  158, 

Journals,  496.  498.  on   the   authority  of    an    unpublished 

»  Cart*,  iv.'  23.      Neville's  memorial,  letter. 


836  BENEVOLENCES.  CHAP.  VI 

They  had  sat  about  two  months,  and,  what  is  perhaps  unprece- 
dented in  our  history,  had  not  passed  a  single  bill.  James 
followed  up  this  strong  step  by  one  still  more  vigorous. 
Several  members,  who  had  distinguished  themselves  by 
warm  language  against  the  government,  were  arrested  after 
the  dissolution,  and  kept  for  a  short  time  in  custody ;  a 
manifest  violation  of  that  freedom  of  speech,  without  which 
no  assembly  can  be  independent,  and  which  is  the  stipulated 
privilege  of  the  house  of  commons.1 

It  was  now  evident  that  James  could  never  expect  to  be 
Benevo-  on  terms  of  harmony  with  a  parliament,  unless  by 
lences.  surrendering  pretensions  which  not  only  were  in 

his  eyes  indispensable  to  the  lustre  of  his  monarchy,  but  from 
which  he  derived  an  income  that  he  had  no  means  of  replac- 
ing. He  went  on  accordingly  for  six  years,  supplying  his 
exigencies  by  such  precarious  resources  as  circumstances 
might  furnish.  He  restored  the  towns  mortgaged  by  the 
Dutch'  to  Elizabeth  on  payment  of  2,700,000  florins,  about 
one  third  of  the  original  debt.  The  enormous  fines  imposed 
by  the  star-chamber,  though  seldom,  I  believe,  enforced  to 
their  utmost  extent,  must  have  considerably  enriched  the 
exchequer.  It  is  said  by  Carte  that  some  Dutch  merchants 
paid  fines  to  the  amount  of  133,000^  for  exporting  gold  coin.2 
But  still  greater  profit  was  hoped  from  the  requisition  of  that 
more  than  half  involuntary  contribution,  miscalled  a  benevo- 
lence. It  began  by  a  subscription  of  the  nobility  and  princi- 
pal persons  about  the  court.  Letters  were  sent  written  to 
the  sheriffs  and  magistrates,  directing  them  to  call  on  people 
of  ability.  It  had  always  been  supposed  doubtful  whether 
the  statute  of  Richard  III.  abrogating  "  exactions,  called 
benevolences,"  should  extend  to  voluntary  gifts  at  the  solici- 
tation of  the  crown.  The  language  used  in  that  act  certainly 
implies  that  the  pretended  benevolences  of  Edward's  reign 
had  been  extorted  against  the  subjects'  will ;  yet  if  positive 
violence  were  not  employed,  it  seems  difficult  to  find  a  legal 
criterion  by  which  to  distinguish  the  effects  of  willing  loyalty 
from  those  of  fear  or  shame.  Lord  Coke  is  said  to  have  at 
first  declared  that  the  king  could  not  solicit  a  benevolence 
from  his  subjects,  but  to  have  afterwards  retracted  his  opinion 
ind  pronounced  in  favor  of  its  legality.  To  this  second 

1  Carte.     Wilson.     Camden's  Annals  of  James  I.  (in  Kennet,  ii.  643). 
*  Carte,  ir.  66. 


JAMES  1  PROSECUTION  OF  PEACHAM.  337 

opinion  he  adheres  in  his  Reports.1  While  this  business  was 
pending,  Mr.  Oliver  St.  John  wrote  a  letter  to  the  mayor  of 
Maryborough,  explaining  his  reasons  for  declining  to  con- 
tribute, founded  on  the  several  statutes  which  he  deemed 
applicable,  and  on  the  impropriety  of  particular  men  oppos- 
ing their  judgment  to  the  commons  in  parliament,  who  had 
refused  to  grant  any  subsidy.  This  argument,  in  itself  exas- 
perating, he  followed  up  by  somewhat  blunt  observations  on 
the  king.  His  letter  came  under  the  consideration  of  the 
star-chamber,  where  the  offence  having  been  severely  des- 
canted upon  by  the  attorney-general,  Mr.  St.  John  was 
sentenced  to  a  fine  of  5,0001.  and  to  imprisonment  during 
pleasure.2 

Coke,  though  still  much  at  the  council-board,  was  regarded 
with  increasing  dislike  on  account  of  his  uncom-  prosecution 
promising  humor.  This  he  had  occasion  to  dis-  of  Peacham- 
play  in  perhaps  the  worst  and  most  tyrannical  act  of  king 
James's  reign,  the  prosecution  of  one  Peacham,  a  minister  in 
Somersetshire,  for  high  treason.  A  sermon  had  been  found 
in  this  man's  study  (it  does  not  appear  what  led  to  the 
search),  never  preached,  nor,  if  judge  Coke  is  right,  intended 
to  be  preached,  containing  such  sharp  censures  upon  the 
king,  and  invectives  against  the  government,  as,  had  they 
been  published,  would  have  amounted  to  a  seditious  libel. 
But  common  sense  revolted  at  construing  it  into  treason 
under  the  statute  of  Edward  III.,  as  a  compassing  of  the 
king's  death.  James,  however,  took  it  up  with  indecent 
eagerness.  Peacham  was  put  to  the  rack,  and  examined 
upon  various  interrogatories,  as  it  is  expressed  by  secretary 
Winwood,  "  before  torture,  in  torture,  between  torture,  and 
after  torture."  Nothing  could  be  drawn  from  him  as  to  any 
accomplices,  nor  any  explanation  of  his  design  in  writing  the 
sermon  ;  which  was  probably  but  an  intemperate  effusion,  so 
common  among  the  puritan  clergy.  It  was  necessary  there- 
fore to  rely  on  this  as  the  overt  act  of  treason.  Aware  of 
the  difficulties  that  attended  this  course,  the  king  directed 
Bacon  previously  to  confer  with  the  judges  of  the  king's 
bench,  one  by  one,  in  order  to  secure  their  determination  for 
the  crown.  Coke  objected  that  "  such  particular,  and,  as  he 
called  it,  auricular  taking  of  opinions  was  not  according  to 

1  12  Reports,  119.  *  State  Trial8;  ii.  889. 

VOL.  I.  —  C.  22 


338  DISPUTED  JURISDICTION  OF  CHAF.  Yi 

the  custom  of  this  realm."  1  The  other  three  judges,  having 
been  tamprred  with,  agreed  to  answer  such  questions  con- 
cerning the  case  as  the  king  might  direct  to  be  put  to  them ; 
yielding  to  the  sophism  that  every  judge  was  bound  by  his 
oath  to  give  council  to  his  majesty.  The  chief-justice  con- 
tinued to  maintain  his  objection  to  this  separate  closeting  of 
judges  ;  yet,  finding  himself  abandoned  by  his  colleagues,  con- 
sented to  give  answers  in  writing,  which  seem  to  have  been 
merely  evasive.  Peacham  was  brought  to  trial,  and  found 
guilty,  but  not  executed,  dying  in  prison  a  few  months  after.8 
It  Avas  not  long  before  the  intrepid  chief-justice  incurred 
Dispute  again  the  council's  displeasure.  This  will  require, 
about  the  ju-  for  tjie  sake  of  p^  of  mv  readers,  some  little 

nsdiction  of  .  V  mi  •      •    -,•     • 

the  court  of  previous  explanation.  Ihe  equitable  jurisdiction, 
chancery.  &g  -j.  js  ^n^  of  j]ie  court  of  chancery  appears  to 
have  been  derived  from  that  extensive  judicial  power  which, 
in  early  times,  the  king's  ordinary  council  had  exercised. 
The  chancellor,  as  one  of  the  highest  officers  of  state,  took  a 
great  share  in  the  council's  business ;  and  when  it  was  not 
sitting,  he  had  a  court  of  his  own,  with  jurisdiction  in  many 
important  matters,  out  of  which  process  to  compel  appear- 
ance of  parties  might  at  any  time  emanate.  It  is  not  un- 
likely therefore  that  redress,  in  matters  beyond  the  legal 
province  of  the  chancellor,  was  occasionally  given  through 
the  paramount  authority  of  this  court.  We  find  the  council 
and  the  chancery  named  together  in  many  remonstrances  of 
the  commons  against  this  interference  with  private  rights, 
from  the  time  of  Richard  II.  to  that  of  Henry  VI.  It  was 
probably  in  the  former  reign  that  the  chancellor  began  to 
establish  systematically  his  peculiar  restraining  jurisdiction. 
This  originated  in  the  practice  of  feoffments  to  uses,  by 
which  the  feoifee,  who  had  legal  seisin  of  the  land,  stood 

1  There  had,  however,  been  instances  statute  of  Edward  III.,  for  saying  that 
of  it,   as  in    sir  Walter   Raleigh's  case,  "the  king,  being  excommunicated  (i.  e 
Lodge,  iii.  172,  173  ;  and  I  have  found  if  he  should  be  excommunicated)  by  th* 
proofs  of  it  in  the  queen's  reign  ;  though  pope,   might    be   lawfully   deposed    and 
1  cannot  at  present  quote  my  authority,  killed  by  any  one,  which  killing  would 
In  a  former  age  the  judges   had  refused  not  be  murder,  being  the  execution  of 
to  give  an  extrajudicial  answer  to   the  the  supreme  sentence  of  the  pope;"  a 
kiug.     Lingard,  v.  382,  from  the  Year-  position  very  atrocious,  but  not  amount- 
book,  Pasch.  1  II.  VII.  15.     Trin.  1.  ing  to   treason.      State    Trials,   ii.   879. 

2  State  Trials,  ii.  869.     Bacon,  ii.  483,  And  Williams,  another  papist,  was  con- 
&c.     Dalrymple's  Memorials  of  James  I.  victed  of  treason,  by  a  still  more  violenl 
vol.  i.  p.  56.     Some  other  very   unjusti-  stretch  of  law,  for  writing  a  book   pro 
fiable  constructions  of  the  law  of  treason  dieting  the  king's  death  in  the  year  1621 
took  place  in  this  reign.     Thomas  Owen  Id.  1085. 

WM  indicted  and  found  guilty,  under  the 


JAMES  I.  THE  COURT  OF  CHANCERY.  3-39 

bound  by  private  engagement  to  suffer  another,  called  the 
cestui  que  use,  to  enjoy  its  use  and  possession.  Such  fidu- 
ciary estates  were  well  known  to  the  Roman  jurists,  but 
inconsistent  with  the  feudal  genius  of  our  law.  The  courts 
of  justice  gave  no  redress,  if  the  feoffee  to  uses  violated  his 
trust  by  detaining  the  land.  To  remedy  this,  an  ecclesiasti- 
cal chancellor  devised  the  writ  of  subpoena,  compelling  him 
to  answer  upon  oath  as  to  his  trust.  It  was  evidently  neces- 
sary also  to  restrain  him  from  proceeding,  as  he  might  do,  to 
obtain-  possession ;  and  this  gave  rise  to  injunctions,  that  is, 
prohibitions  to  sue  at  law,  the  violation  of  which  was  punish- 
able by  imprisonment  as  a  contempt  of  court.  Other  in- 
stances of  breach  of  trust  occurred  in  personal  contracts, 
and  cases  also  wherein,  without  any  trust,  there  was  a  wrong 
cohimitted  beyond  the  competence  of  the  courts  of  law  to 
redress ;  to  all  which  the  process  of  subpoena  was  made  ap- 
plicable. This  extension  of  a  novel  jurisdiction  was  pai'tly 
owing  to  a  fundamental  principle  of  our  common  law,  that  a 
defendant  cannot  be  examined ;  so  that,  if  no  witness  or 
written  instrument  could  be  produced  to  prove  a  demand,  the 
plaintiff  was  wholly  debarred  of  justice  :  but  in  a  still  greater 
degree  to  a  strange  narrowness  and  scrupulosity  of  the 
judges,  who,  fearful  of  quitting  the  letter  of  their  prece- 
dents, even  with  the  clearest  analogies  to  guide  them,  re- 
pelled* so  many  just  suits,  and  set  up  rules  of  so  much 
hardship,  that  men  were  thankful  to  embrace  the  relief  held 
out  by  a  tribunal  acting  in  a  more  rational  spirit.  This 
error  the  common  lawyers  began  to  discover  in  time  to 
resume  a  great  part  of  their  jurisdiction  in  matters  of  con- 
tract, which  would  otherwise  have  escaped  from  them. 
They  made  too  an  apparently  successful  effort  to  recover 
their  exclusive  authority  over  real  property,  by  obtaining  a 
statute  for  turning  uses  into  possession ;  that  is,  for  annihi- 
lating the  fictitious  estate  of  the  feoffee  to  uses,  and  vesting 
the  legal  as  well  as  equitable  possession  in  the  cestui  que  use. 
But  this  victory,  if  I  may  use  such  an  expression  (since  it 
would  have  freed  them,  in  a  most  important  point,  from  the 
chancellor's  control),  they  threw  away  by  one  of  those  timid 
and  narrow  constructions  which  had  already  turned  so  much 
to  their  prejudice ;  and  they  permitted  trust  estates,  by  the 
introduction  of  a  few  more  words  into  a  conveyance,  to  main- 
tain their  ground,  contradistinguished  from  the  J^.gal  seisin, 


340       JURISDICTION  OF  COURT  OF  CHANCERY.     CHAP.  VI. 

under  the  protection  and  guarantee,  as  before,  of  the  courts 
of  equity. 

The  particular  limits  of  this  equitable  jurisdiction  were  as 
yet  exceedingly  indefinite.  The  chancellors  were  generally 
prone  to  extend  them  ;  and  being  at  the  same  time  ministers 
of  state  in  a  government  of  very  arbitrary  temper,  regarded 
too  little  that  course  of  precedent  by  which  the  other  judges 
held  themselves  too  strictly  bound.  The  cases  reckoned  cog- 
nizable in  chancery  grew  silently  more  and  more  numerous ; 
but  with  little  overt  opposition  from  the  courts  of  law  till  the 
time  of  sir  Edward  Coke.  That  great  master  of  the  com- 
mon law  was  inspired  not  only  with  the  jealousy  of  this 
irregular  and  encroaching  jurisdiction  which  most  lawyers 
seem  to  have  felt,  but  with  a  tenaciousness  of  his  own  dig- 
nity, and  a  personal  enmity  towards  Egerton,  who  held  the 
great  seal.  It  happened  that  an  action  was  tried  before  him, 
the  precise  circumstances  of  which  do  not  appear,  wherein 
the  plaintiff  lost  the  verdict  in  consequence  of  one  of  his 
witnesses  being  artfully  kept  away.  He  had  recourse  to  the 
court  of  chancery,  filing  a  bill  against  the  defendant  to  make 
him  answer  upon  oath,  which  he  refused  to  do,  and  was  com- 
mitted for  contempt.  Indictments  were  upon  this  preferred, 
at  Coke's  instigation,  against  the  parties  who  had  filed  the 
bill  in  chancery,  their  council  and  solicitors,  for  suing^in  an- 
other court  after  judgment  obtained  at  law ;  which  was  al- 
leged to  be  contrary  to  the  statute  of  prremunire.  But  the 
grand  jury,  though  pressed,  as  is  said,  by  one  of  the  judges, 
threw  out  these  indictments.  The  king,  already  incensed 
with  Coke,  and  stimulated  by  Bacon,  thought  this  too  great 
an  insult  upon  his  chancellor  to  be  passed  over.  He  first 
directed  Bacon  and  others  to  search  for  precedents  of  cases 
where  relief  had  been  given  in  chancery  after  judgment  at 
law.  They  reported  that  there  was  a  series  of  such  prece- 
dents from  the  time  of  Henry  VIII. :  and  some  where  the 
chancellor  had  eatertained  suits  even  after  execution.  The 
attorney-general  was  directed  to  prosecute  in  the  star-cham- 
ber those  who  had  preferred  the  indictments ;  and  as  Coke 
had  not  been  ostensibly  implicated  in  the  business,  the  king 
contented  himself  with  making  an  order  in  the  council-book, 
declaring  the  chancellor  not  to  have  exceeded  his  jurisdic- 
tion.1 

»  Bacon,  ii.  500,  518,  522.    Cro.  Jao.  335,  343. 


JAMES  I.  COMMENDAMS.  341 

The  chief-justice  almost  at  the  same  time  gave  another 
provocation,  which  exposed  him  more  directly  to  case  of  com 
the  court's  resentment.  A  cause  happened  to  be  mendams- 
argued  in  the  court  of  king's  bench,  wherein  the  validity  of 
a  particular  grant  of  a  benefice  to  a  bishop  to  be  held  in 
commendam,  that  is,  along  with  hJ3  bishopric,  came  into 
question  ;  and  the  council  at  the  bar,  besides  the  special 
points  of  the  case,  had  disputed  the  king's  general  preroga- 
tive of  making  such  a  grant.  The  king,  on  receiving  infor- 
mation of  this,  signified  to  the  chief-justice,  through  the  at- 
torney-general, that  he  would  not  have  the  court  proceed  to 
judgment  till  he  had  spoken  with  them.  Coke  requested 
that  similar  letters  might  be  written  to  the  judges  of  all  the 
courts.  This  having  been  done,  they  assembled,  and,  by  a 
letter  subscribed  with  all  their  hands,  certified  his  majesty 
that  they  were  bound  by  their  oaths  not  to  regard  any  let- 
ters that  might  come  to  them  contrary  to  law,  but  to  do  the 
law  notwithstanding  $  that  they  held  with  one  consent  the  at- 
torney-general's letter  to  be  contrary  to  law,  and  such  as 
they  could  not  yield  to,  and'  that  they  had  proceeded  accord- 
ing to  their  oath  to  argue  the  cause. 

The  king,  who  was  then  at  Newmarket,  returned  answer 
that  he  would  not  suffer  his  prerogative  to  be  wounded,  un- 
der pretext  of  the  interest  of  private  persons ;  that  it  had  al- 
ready been  more  boldly  dealt  with  in  Westminster  Hall  than 
in  the  reigns  of  preceding  princes,  which  popular  and  unlaw- 
ful liberty  he  would  no  longer  endure ;  that  their  oath  not  to 
delay  justice  was  not  meant  to  prejudice  the  king's  preroga- 
tive ;  concluding  that  out  of  his  absolute  power  and  authority 
royal  he  commanded  them  to  forbear  meddling  any  further 
in  the  cause  till  they  should  hear  his  pleasure  from  his  own 
mouth.  Upon  his  return  to  London  the  twelve  judges  ap- 
peared as  culprits  in  the  council-chamber.  The  king  set 
forth  their  misdemeanors,  both  in  substance  and  in  the  tone 
of  their  letter.  He  observed  that  the  judges  ought  to  check 
those  advocates  who  presume  to  argue  against  his  preroga- 
tive ;  that  the  popular  lawyers  had  been  the  men,  ever  since 
his  accession,  who  had  trodden  in  all  parliaments  upon  it, 
though  the  law  could  never  be  respected  if  the  king  were 
not  reverenced;  that  he  had  a  double  prerogative  —  whereof 
the  one  was  ordinary,  and  had  relation  to  his  private  interest, 
which  might  be  and  was  every  day  disputed  in  Westminster 


342  COMMENDAMS.  CHAP.  VI. 

Hall ;  the  other  was  of  a  higher  nature,  referring  to  his  su- 
preme and  imperial  power  and  sovereignty,  which  ought  not 
to  be  disputed  or  handled  in  vulgar  argument ;  but  that  of 
late  the  courts  of  common  law  are  grown  so  vast  and  tran- 
scendent, as  they  did  both  meddle  with  the  king's  preroga- 
tive, and  had  encroached  upon  all  other  courts  of  justice. 
He  commented  on  the  form  of  the  letter,  as  highly  indecent ; 
certifying  him  merely  what  they  had  done,  instead  of  sub- 
mitting to  his  princely  judgment  what  they  should  do. 

After  this  harangue  the  judges  fell  upon  their  knees,  and 
acknowledged  their  error  as  to  the  form  of  the  letter.  But 
Coke  entered  on  a  defence  of  the  substance,  maintaining  the 
delay  required  to  be  against  the  law  and  their  oaths.  The 
king  required  the  chancellor  and  attorney-general  to  deliver 
their  opinions ;  which,  as  may  be  supposed,  were  diametri- 
cally opposite  to  those  of  the  chief-justice.  These  being 
heard,  the  following  question  was  put  to  the  judges  :  Wheth- 
er, if  at  any  time,  in  a  case  depending  before  the  judges,  his 
majesty  conceived  it  to  concern  him  either  in  power  or  profit, 
and  thereupon  required  to  consult  with  them,  and  that  they 
should  stay  proceedings  in  the  mean  time,  they  ought  not  to 
stay  accordingly  ?  They  all,  except  the  chief-justice,  de- 
clared that  they  would  do  so,  and  acknowledged  it  to  be  their 
duty ;  Hobart,  chief-justice  of  the  common-pleas,  adding  that 
he  would  ever  trust  the  justice  of  his  majesty's  command- 
ment. But  Coke  only  answered  that,  when  the  case  should 
arise,  he  would  do  what  should  be  fit  for  a  judge  to  do.  The 
king  dismissed  them  all  with  a  command  to  keep  the  limits 
of  their  several  courts,  and  not  to  suffer  his  prerogative  to  be 
wounded ;  for  he  well  knew  the  true  and  ancient  common 
law  to  be  the  most  favorable  to  kings  of  any  law  in  the 
world,  to  which  law  he  advised  them  to  apply  their  studies.1 

The  behavior  of  the  judges  in  this  inglorious  contention 
was  such  as  to  deprive  them  of  every  shadow  of  that  confi- 
dence which  ought  to  be  reposed  in  their  integrity.  Hobart, 
Doddridge,  and  several  more,  were  men  of  much  considera- 
tion for  learning ;  and  their  authority  in  ordinary  matters  of 
law  is  still  held  high.  But,  having  been  induced  by  a  sense 
of  duty,  or  through  the  ascendency  that  Coke  had  acquired 

i  Bacon,  ii.  517,  &c.  Carte,  iv.  35.  tire  as  much  wounded  if  it  be  publicly 
Biograph.  Brit.,  art  COKE.  The  king  disputed  upon,  as  if  any  sentence  were 
told  the  judges  he  thought  his  preroga-  given  against  it. 


JAMES  I.  THE  STAR-CHAMBER.  343 

over  them,  to  make  a  show  of  withstanding  the  court,  they 
behaved  like  cowardly  'rebels  who  surrender  at  the  first  dis- 
charge of  cannon  ;  and  prostituted  their  integrity  and  their 
fume,  through  dread  of  losing  their  offices,  or  rather,  perhaps, 
of  incurring  the  unmerciful  and  ruinous  penalties  of  the  star- 
chamber. 

The  government  had  nothing  to  fear  from  such  recreants 
but  Coke  was  suspended  from  his  office,  and  not  long  after- 
wards dismissed.1  Having,  however,  fortunately  in  this 
respect,  married  his  daughter  to  a  brother  of  the  duke 
of  Buckingham,  he  was  restored  in  about  three  years  to 
the  privy  council,  where  his  great  experience  in  business 
rendered  him  useful ;  and  had  the  satisfaction  of  voting  for 
an  enormous  fine  on  his  enemy  the  earl  of  Suffolk,  late  high- 
treasurer,  convicted  in  the  star-chamber  of  embezzlement.2 
In  the  parliament  of  1621,  and  still  more  conspicuously  in 
that  of  1 628,  he  became,  not  without  some  honorable  incon- 
sistency of  doctrine  as  well  as  practice,  the  strenuous  assert- 
er  of  liberty  on  the  principles  of  those  ancient  laws,  which 
no  one  was  admitted  to  know  so  well  as  himself;  redeeming, 
in  an  intrepid  and  patriotic  old  age,  the  faults  which  we  can- 
not avoid  perceiving  in  his  earlier  life. 

The  unconstitutional  and  usurped  authority  of  the  star- 
chamber  overrode  every  personal  right,    though 
an  assembled  parliament  might  assert  its  general  proceedings 
privileges.     Several  remarkable  instances  in  his-  of  thestar- 

„      ,,  chamber. 

tory  illustrate  its  tyranny  and  contempt  of  all 
known  laws  and  liberties.  Two  puritans,  having  been  com- 
mitted by  the  high  commission  court  for  refusing  the  oath 
ex-officio,  employed  Mr.  Fuller,  a  bencher  of  Gray's  Inn,  to 
move  for  their  habeas  corpus ;  which  he  did  on  the  ground 
that  the  high  commissioners  were  not  empowered  to  commit 
any  of  his  majesty's  subjects  to  prison.  This  being  reckoned 
a  heinous  offence,  he  was  himself  committed,  at  Bancroft's 
instigation  (whether  by  the  king's  personal  warrant,  or  that 
of  the  council-board,  does  not  appear),  and  lay  in  jail  to  the 
day  of  his  death ;  the  archbishop  constantly  opposing  his 
discharge,  for  which  he  petitioned.8  Whitelock,  a  barrister 

i  See  D'lsraeli,  Character  of  James  I.  Bacon's  Works,  ii.  574.  The  fine  im- 

p.  126.  He  was  too  much  affected  by  his  posed  was  30,000/. ;  Coke  voted  foi 

dismissal  from  office.  100,0002. 

a  Ciiinden's  Annals  of  James  I.  in  3  Fuller's  Church  Hist.  60.  Neal,  i 

Kennet,  vol.  ii.  Wilson,  ibid.  704,  705.  435.  Lodge  iii.  aS4. 


314  ARABELLA  STUART.         CHAP.  VL 

and  afterwards  a  judge,  was  brought  before  Ihe  star-chamber 
on  the  charge  of  having  given  a  priva'te  opinion  to  his  client, 
that  a  certain  commission  issued  by  the  crown  was  illegal. 
This  was  said  to  be  a  high  contempt  and  slander  of  the  king's 
prerogative.  But,  after  a  speech  from  Bacon  in  aggravation 
of  this  offence,  the  delinquent  was  discharged  on  a  humble 
submission.1  Such,  too,  was  the  fate  of  a  more  distinguished 
person  on  a  still  moi'e  preposterous  accusation.  Selden,  in 
his  History  of  Tithes,  had  indirectly  weakened  the  claim  of 
divine  right,  which  the  high-church  faction  pretended,  and 
had  attacked  the  argument  from  prescription,  deriving  their 
legal  institution  from  the  age  of  Charlemagne,  or  even  a  later 
era.  Not  content  with  letting  loose  on  him  some  stanch 
polemical  writers,  the  bishops  prevailed  on  James  to  summon 
the  author  before  the  council.  This  proceeding  is  as  much 
the  disgrace  of  England  as  that  against  Galileo  nearly  at  the 
same  time  is  of  Italy.  Selden,  like  the  great  Florentine 
astronomer,  bent  to  the  rod  of  power,  and  made  rather  too 
submissive  an  apology  for  entering  on  this  purely  historical 
discussion.2 

Every  generous  mind  must  reckon  the  treatment  of  Ara- 
Arabeiia  bella  Stuart  among  the  hard  measures  of  despot- 
Stuart,  jgj-j^  even  if  jt  were  not  also  grossly  in  violation 
of  English  law.  Exposed  by  her  high  descent  and  am- 
biguous pretensions  to  become  the  victim  of  ambitious 
designs  wherein  she  did  not  participate,  that  lady  may  be 
added  to  the  sad  list  of  royal  sufferers  who  have  envied  the 
lot  of  humble  birth.  There  is  not,  as  I  believe,  the  least 
particle  of  evidence  that  she  was  engaged  in  the  intrigues 
of  the  catholic  party  to  place  her  on  the  throne.  It  was, 
however,  thought  a  necessary  precaution  to  put  her  in  con- 
finement a  short  time  before  the  queen's  death.8  At  the  trial 
of  Raleigh  she  was  present ;  and  Cecil  openly  acquitted  her 
of  any  share  in  the  conspiracy.4  She  enjoyed  afterwards  a 
pension  from  the  king,  and  might  have  died  in  peace  and 
obscurity,  had  she  not  conceived  an  unhappy  attachment  for 
Mr.  Seymour,  grandson  of  that  earl  of  Hertford,  himself  so 
memorable  an  example  of  the  perils  of  ambitious  love. 
They  were  privately  married;  but  on  the  fact  transpiring, 

i  State  Trials,  ii.  765.  8  Carte,  Hi.  698. 

-  Collier,  712,   717.     Selden's  Life  in        *  State  Trials,  ii.  23.    Lodge's  Illus- 
Biographia  Brit  tratious,  iii.  217. 


JAMES  I.  SOMERSET  AND  OVERBURT.  345 

the  council,  who  saw  with  jealous  eyes  the  possible  union  of 
two  dormant  pretensions  to  the  crown,  committed  them  to  the 
Tower.1  They  both  made  their  escape,  but  Arabella  was 
arrested  and  brought  back.  Long  and  hopeless  calamity 
broke  down  her  mind  ;  imploring  in  vain  the  just  privileges 
of  an  Englishwoman,  and  nearly  in  want  of  necessaries,  she 
died  in  prison,  and  in  a  state  of  lunacy,  some  years  after- 
wards.2 And  this  through  the  oppression  of  a  kinsman 
whose  advocates  are  always  vaunting  his  good  nature  !  Her 
husband  became  the  famous  marquis  of  Hertford,  the  faithful 
counsellor  of  Charles  L,  and  partaker  of  his  adversity. 
Lady  Shrewsbury,  aunt  to  Arabella,  was  examined  on  sus- 
picion of  being  privy  to  her  escape ;  and  for  refusing  to 
answer  the  questions  put  to  her,  or,  in  other  words,  to  accuse 
herself,  was  sentenced  to  a  fine  of  20,000/.,  and  discretionary 
imprisonment.8 

Several  events,  so  well  known  that  it  is  hardly  necessary 
to  dwell  on  them,  aggravated  the  king's  unpopularity  during 
this  parliamentary  interval.    The  murder  of  Over-  gomerget 
bury  burst  into  light,  and  revealed  to  an  indignant  and  Over- 
nation  the  king's  unworthy  favorite,  the  earl  of  bury' 
Somerset,  and  the  hoary  pander  of  that  favorite's  vices,  the 
earl  of  Northampton,  accomplices  in.  that  deep-laid  and  de- 

1  Winwood,  iii.  201,  279.  justice  where  she  ought  to  be  tried  ar^t 

*  Winwood,  iii.  178.     In  this  collection  condemned,  or  cleared,  to  remote  parts, 

are  one  or  two  letters  from   Arabella,  whose  courts  she  holds  unfitted  for  her 

which  show  her  to  have  been  a  lively  offence.     "  And  if  your  lordships  may 

and  accomplished  woman.     It  is  said,  in  not  or  will  not  grant  unto  me  the  ordi- 

a  manuscript  account  of  circumstances  nary  relief  of  a  distressed  subject,  then  1 

about  the  king's  accession,  which  seems  beseech  you  become  humble  intercessors 

entitled  to  some  credH.  that  on  its  being  to  his  majesty  that  I  may  receive  such, 

proposed  that  she  should  walk  at  the  benefit  of  justice  as  both  his  majesty  by 

queen's  funeral,  she  answered  with  spirit  his  oath  hath  promised,  and  the  laws  of 

that,  as  she  had  been  debarred  her  maj-  this  realm  afford  to  all  others,  those  of 

esty's  presence  while  living,  she  would  his  blood  not  excepted.   And  though,  un- 

not  be  brought  on  the  stage  as  a  public  fortunate  woman !  I  can  obtain  neither, 

spectacle  after  her  death.    Sloane  MSS.  yet  I  beseech  yonr  lordships  retain  me  in 

827.  your  good  opinion,  and  judge  charitably, 

Much  occurs  on  the  subject  of  this  till  I  be  proved  to  have  committed  any 

lady's  imprisonment  in  one  of  the  valu-  offence,  either  against  God  or  his  majesty 

able  volumes  in  Dr.  Birch's  handwriting,  deserving  so  long  restraint  or  separation 

among  the  same  MSS.  4161.    Those  have  from  my  lawful  husband." 

already  assisted  Mr.  D'Israeli  in  his  in-  Arabella  did  not   profess  the  Roman 

teresting  memoir  on  Arabella  Stuart,  in  catholic  religion,  but  that  party  seem  to 

the  Curiosities  of  Literature,  new  series,  have  relied  upon  her;  and  so  late  as  1610 

vol.  i.     They  cannot  be  read  (as  I  should  she  incurred  some  "  suspicion  of  being 

conceive)  without  indignation  at  James  collapsed."     Winwood,  ii.  117. 

and  his  ministers.     One  of  her  letters  is  This  had  been  also  conjectured  in  the 

addressed  to  the  two  chief  justices,  beg-  queen's  lifetime.     Secret  Correspondence 

ging  to  be  brought  before  them  by  habeas  of  Cecil  with  James  I.,  p.  118. 

corpus,  being  informed  that  it  is  designed  3  State  Trials,  ii.  769 
to  remove  her  for  from  those  courts  of 


346  SOMERSET  AND  OVERBURY.  CHAP.  VI. 

liberate  atrocity.  Nor  was  it  only  that  men  80  flagitious 
should  have  swayed  the  councils  of  this  country,  and  rioted 
in  the  king's  favor.  Strange  things  were  whispered,  as  if 
the  death  of  Overbury  was  connected  with  something  that 
did  not  yet  transpire,  and  which  every  effort  was  employed 
to  conceal.  The  people,  who  had  already  attributed  prince 
Henry's  death  to  poison,  now  laid  it  at  the  door  of  Somerset ; 
but  for  that  conjecture,  however  highly  countenanced  at  the 
time,  there  could  be  no  foundation.  The  symptoms  of  the 
prince's  illness,  and  the  appearances  on  dissection,  are  not 
such  as  could  result  from  any  poison,  and  manifestly  indicate 
a  malignant  fever,  aggravated  perhaps  by  injudicious  treat- 
ment.1 Yet  it  is  certain  that  a  mystery  hangs  over  this 
scandalous  tale  of  Overbury's  murder.  The  insolence  and 
menaces  of  Somerset  in  the  Tower,  the  shrinking  apprehen- 
sions of  him  which  the  king  could  not  conceal,  the  pains 
taken  by  Bacon  to  prevent  his  becoming  desperate,  and,  as 
I  suspect,  to  mislead  the  hearers  -by  throwing  them  on  a 
wrong  scent,  are  very  remarkable  circumstances  to  which, 
after  a  good  deal  of  attention,  I  can  discover  no  probable 
clue.  But  it  is  evident  that  he  was  master  of  some  secret 
which  it  would  have  highly  prejudiced  the  king's  honor  to 
divulge.2 

1  Sir  Charles  Cornwallis's  Memoir  of  er  his  aversion  to  popery  did  not  hasten 
Prince  Henry,  reprinted  in  the  Somers  his  death.  And  there  is  a  remarkable 
Tracts,  vol.  ii..  and  of  which  sufficient  letter  from  sir  Robert  Naunton  to  Win- 
extracts  may  be  found  in  Birch's  Life,  wood,  in  the  note  of  the  last  reference, 
contains  a  remarkably  minute  detail  of  which  shows  that  suspicions  of  some 
all  the  symptoms  attending  the  prince's  such  agency  wore  entertained  very  early, 
illness,  which  was  an  epidemic  typhus  But  the  positive  evidence  we  have  of  hia 
fever.  The  report  of  his  physicians  after  disease  outweighs  all  conjecture, 
dissection  may  also  be  read  in  many  2  The  circumstances  to  which  I  allude 
books.  Nature  might  possibly  have  over-  are  well  known  to  the  curious  in  English 
come  the  disorder,  if  an  empirical  doctor  history,  and  might  furnish  materials  for 
had  not  insisted  on  continually  bleeding  a  separate  dissertation,  had  I  leisure  to 
him.  He  had  no  other  murderer.  We  stray  in  these  by-paths.  Hunie  has 
need  not  even  have  recourse  to  Hume's  treated  them  as  quite  unimportant;  and 
acute  and  decisive  remark,  that,  if  Som-  Carte,  with  his  usual  honesty,  has  never 
erset  had  been  so  experienced  in  this  alluded  to  them.  Those  who  read  care- 
trade,  he  would  not  have  spent  five  fully  the  new  edition  of  the  State  Trials, 
months  in  bungling  about  Overbury's  and  various  passages  in  lord  Bacon's 
death.  Letters,  may  form  for  themselves  the 

Carte  says,  vol.  iv.  33.  that  the  queen  best  judgment  they  can.     A  few  conelu- 

charged  Somerset  with  designing  to  poison  sions    mav,   perhaps,   be    laid   down  as 

her,  prince  Charles,  and  the  elector  pala-  established.     1.  That  Overbury's   death 

tiue.  in  order  to  marry  the  electress  to  was    occasioned,     riot    merely    by    lady 

lord  Suffolk's  son.     But  this  is   too  ex-  Somerset's  revenge,  but  by  his  posst-s- 

trftTagant,   whatever  Anne   might   have  sion  of  important  secrets,  which  in  his 

thrown  out  in  passion  against  a  favorite  passion   he  had  threatened  Somerset  to 

she  hated.     On  Henry's  death,  the  first  divulge.      2.   That  Somerset    conceived 

•uspicion  fell  of  course  on  the  papists,  himself  to  have  a   hold  over   the   king 

Wiuwood,  iii.  410.   Burnet  doubts  wheth-  by  the  possession  of  the  same  or  some 


JAMES  I. 


SIR  WALTER  RALEIGH. 


347 


Sir  Walter  Raleigh's  execution  was  another  stain  upon  the 
reputation  of  James  I.     It  is  needless  to  mention  sir  Waiter 
that  he  fell  under  a  sentence  passed  fifteen  years  Rai«gb. 
before,  on  a  charge  of  high  treason,  in  plotting  to  raise  Ara- 
bella Stuart  to   the   throne.     It  is  very  probable   that  this 
charge  was,  partly  at  least,  founded  in  truth ; 1  but  his  con  vie- 


other  secrets,  and  used  indirect  threats 
of  revealing  them.  3.  That  the  king 
was  in  the  utmost  terror  at  hearing  of 
these  measures  ;  as  is  proved  by  a  pas- 
sage in  Weldon's  Memoirs,  p.  115,  which, 
after  being  long  ascribed  to  his  libellous 
spirit,  has  lately  received  the  most  entire 
confirmation  by  some  letters  from  More, 
lieutenant  of  the  Tower,  published  in 
the  Archaeologia,  vol.  xviii.  4.  That 
Bacon  was  in  the  king's  confidence,  and 
employed  by  him  so  to  manage  Somer- 
set's trial  as  to  prevent  him  from  mak- 
ing any  imprudent  disclosure,  or  the 
judges  from  getting  any  insight  into 
that  which  it  was  not  meant  to  reveal. 
See  particularly  a  passage  in  his  letter  to 
Coke,  vol.  ii.  614,  beginning,  "  This  crime 
•was  secend  to  none  but  the  powder- 
plot." 

Upon  the  whole,  I  cannot  satisfy  my- 
self in  any  manner  as  to  this  mystery. 
Prince  Henry's  death,  as  I  have  ob- 
served, is  out  of  the  question  ;  nor  does 
a  different  solution,  hinted  by  Harris 
and  others,  and  which  may  have  sug- 
gested itself  to  the  reader,  appear  proba- 
ble to  my  judgment  on  weighing  the 
whole  case.  Overbury  was  an  ambi- 
tious, unprincipled  man;  and  it  seems 
more  likely  than  anything  else  that 
James  had  listened  too  much  to  some 
criminal  suggestion  from  him  and  Som- 
erset,—  but  of  what  nature  I  cannot 
pretend  even  to  conjecture;  and  that, 
through  apprehension  of  this  being 
disclosed,  he  had  pusillanimously  ac- 
quiesced in  the  scheme  of  Overbury's 
murder. 

It  is  a  remarkable  fact,  mentioned  by 
Burnet.  and  perhaps  little  believed,  but 
which,  like  the  former,  has  lately  been 
confirmed  by  documents  printed  in  the 
Archaeologia,  that  James,  in  the  last  year 
of  his  reign,  while  dissatisfied  with  Buck- 
ingham, privately  renewed  his  corre- 
spondence with  Somerset,  on  whom  he 
bestowed  at  the  same  time  a  full  pardon, 
and  seems  to  have  given  him  hopes  of 
being  restored  to  his  former  favor.  A 
memorial  drawn  up  by  Somerset,  evi- 
dently at  the  king's  command,  and  most 
probably  after  the  clandestine  interview 
reported  by  Burnet,  contains  strong 
charges  against  Buckingham.  Archseolo- 
gia,  vol  xvii.  230.  But  no  consequences 


resulted  from  this  ;  James  was  either  rec- 
onciled to  his  favorite  before  his  death, 
or  felt  himself  too  old  for  a  struggle. 
Somerset  seems  to  have  tampered  a  little 
with  the  popular  party  in  the  beginning 
of  the  next  reign.  A  speech  of  sir  Robert 
Cotton's,  in  1625,  Parl.  Hist.  ii.  145, 
praises  him,  comparatively  at  least  with 
his  successor  in  royal  favor  ;  and  he  was 
one  of  those  against  whom  informations 
were  brought  in  the  star-chamber  for 
dispersing  sir  Robert  Dudley's  famous 
proposal  for  bridling  the  impertinences  of 
parliament.  Kennet,  iii.  62.  The  pa- 
triots, however,  of  that  age  had  too  much 
sense  to  encumber  themselves  with  an 
ally  equally  unserviceable  and  infamous. 
There  cannot  be  the  slightest  doubt  of 
Somerset's  guilt  as  to  the  murder,  though 
some  have  thought  the  evidence  insuffi- 
cient (Carte,  iv.  84) ;  he  does  not  deny  it 
in  his  remarkable  letter  to  James,  re- 
questing, or  rather  demanding,  mercy, 
printed  in  the  Cabala,  and  in  Bacon's 
Works. 

1  Raleigh  made  an  attempt  to  destroy 
himself  on  being  committed  to  the  Tower, 
which  of  course  affords  a  presumption  of 
his  consciousness  that  something  could 
be  proved  against  him.  Cayley's  Life  of 
Raleigh,  vol.  ii.  p.  10.  Hume  says,  it 
appears  from  Sully's  Memoirs  that  he 
had  offered  his  services  to  the  French 
ambassador.  I  cannot  find  this  in  Sully ; 
whom  Raleigh,  however,  and  his  party 
seem  to  have  aimed  at  deceiving  by 
false  information.  Nor  could  there  be 
any  treason  in  making  an  interest  with 
the  minister  of  a  friendly  power.  Carte 
quotes  the  despatches  of  Beaumont,  the 
French  ambassador,  to  prove  the  con- 
nection of  the  conspirators  with  the 
Spanish  plenipotentiary.  But  it  may  be 
questioned  whether  he  knew  any  more 
than  the  government  gave  out.  If  Ra- 
leigh had  ever  shown  a  discretion  bearing 
the  least  proportion  to  his  genius,  we 
might  reject  the  whole  story  as  improb- 
able. But  it  is  to  be  remembered  that 
there  had  long  been  a  catholic  faction, 
who  fixed  their  hopes  on  Arabella  ;  so 
that  the  conspiracy,  though  extremely 
injudicious,  was  not  so  perfectly  unintel- 
ligible as  it  appears  to  a  reader  of  Hume, 
who  has  overlooked  the  previous  circum- 
stances. It  is  also  to  be  considered  that 


348 


JAMES'S  PREDILECTION  FOR  SPAIN".         CHAP.  VI. 


tion  was  obtained  on  the  single  deposition  of  lord  Cobham,  an 
accomplice,  a  prisoner,  not  examined  in  court,  and  known  to 
have  already  retracted  his  accusation.  Such  a  verdict  was 
thought  contrary  to  law,  even  in  that  age  of  ready  convic- 
tions. It  was  a  severe  measure  to  detain  for  twelve  years  in 
prison  so  splendid  an  ornament  of  his  country,  and  to  con- 
fiscate his  whole  estate.1  For  Raleigh's  conduct  in  the 
expedition  of  Guiana  there  is  not  much  excuse  to  make 
Rashness  and  want  of  foresight  were  always  among  his  fail 
ings ;  else  he  would  not  have  undertaken  a  service  of  so 
much  hazard  without  obtaining  a  regular  pardon  for  his  for- 
mer oifence.  But  it  might  surely  be  urged  that  either  his 
commission  was  absolutely  null,  or  that  it  operated  as  a 
pardon  ;  since  a  man  attainted  of  treason  is  incapable  of  exer- 
cising that  authority  which  is  conferred  upon  him.2  Be  this 
as  it  may,  no  technical  reasoning  could  overcome  the  moral 
sense  that  revolted  at  carrying  the  original  sentence  into 
execution.  Raleigh  might  be  amenable  to  punishment  for  the 
deception  by  which  he  had  obtained  a  commission  that  ought 
never  to  have  issued ;  but  the  nation  could  not  help  seeing  in 
his  death  the  sacrifice  of  the  bravest  and  most  renowned  of 
Englishmen  to  the  vengeance  of  Spain.8 

This  unfortunate  predilection  for  the  court  of  Madrid  had 


the  king  had  shown  so  marked  a  prejudice 
against  Raleigh  on  his  coming  to  Eng- 
land, and  the  hostility  of  Cecil  was  so 
insidious  and  implacable,  as  might  drive 
a  man  of  his  rash  and  impetuous  courage 
to  desperate  courses.  See  Cayley's  Life 
of  Raleigh,  vol.  ii.;  a  work  containing 
much  interesting  matter,  but  unfortu- 
nately written  too  much  in  the  spirit  of 
an  advocate,  which,  with  so  faulty  a 
client,  must  tend  to  an  erroneous  repre- 
sentation of  facts. 

1  This  estate  was  Sherborn  castle, 
which  Raleigh  had  not  very  fairly  ob- 
tained from  the  see  of  Salisbury.  He 
settled  this  before  his  conviction  upon 
his  sen;  but  an  accidental  flaw  In  the 
deed  enabled  the  king  to  wrest  it  from 
him,  and  bestow  it  on  the  earl  of  Somer- 
set. Lady  Raleigh,  it  is  said,  solicited 
his  majesty  on  her  knees  to  spare  it ;  but 
he  only  answered,  "I  mun  have  the 
land,  I  mun  have  it  for  Carr."  He  gave 
him,  however,  12.000/.  instead.  But  the 
estate  was  worth  500W.  per  annum.  This 
ruin  of  the  prospects  of  a  man,  far  too 
intent  on  aggrandizement,  impelled  him 
ouce  more  into  the  labyrinth  of  fatal 


and  dishonest  speculations.  Cayley,  89, 
&c.;  Somers  Tracts,  ii.  22,  &c. ;  Curios- 
ities of  Literature,  new  series,  vol.  ii. 
It  has  been  said  that  Raleigh's  unjust 
conviction  made  him  in  one  day  the 
most  popular,  from  having  been  the 
most  odious,  man  in  England.  He  was 
certainly  such  under  Elizabeth.  This  is 
a  striking,  but  by  no  means  solitary, 
instance  of  the  impolicy  of  political  per- 
secution. 

2  Rymer,  xvi.  789.     He  was  empow- 
ered to  name  officers,  to  use  martial  law, 
&c. 

3  James  made  it  a   merit  with    the 
court  of  Madrid  that  he  had  put  to  death 
a  man  so  capable  of  serving  him,  merely 
to  give  them  satisfaction.    Somers  Tracts, 
ii.  437.     There  is  even  reason  to  suspect 
that  he  betrayed  the  secret  of  Raleigh's 
voyage   to   Gondomar  before   he  sailed. 
H:irdwicke,  State   Papers,  i.  393.     It  ia 
said  in  Mr.  Cayley's  Life  of  Raleigh  that 
his  fatal  mistake"  in  not  securing  a  par- 
don under  the  great  seal  was  on  account 
of  the  expense.    But  the  king  would  have 
made  some  difficulty  at  least  about  grant- 
ing it. 


JAMES  I.  PARLIAMENT  OF  1621.  349 

always  exposed  James  to  his  subjects'  jealousy.  They  con- 
nected it  with  an  inclination  at  least  to  tolerate  popery,  and 
with  a  dereliction  of  their  commercial  interests.  But  from 
the  time  that  he  fixed  his  hopes  on  the  union  of  his  son  with 
the  infanta,1  the  popular  dislike  to  Spain  increased  in  propor- 
tion to  his  hlind  preference.  If  the  king  had  not  systemati- 
cally disregarded  the  public  wishes,  he  could  never  have  set 
his  heart  on  this  impolitic  match  ;  contrary  to  the  wiser 
max.'m  he  had  laid  down  in  his  own  Basflicon  Doron,  never 
to  seek  a  wife  for  his  son  except  in  a  protestant  family.  But 
his  absurd  pride  made  him  despise  the  uncrowned  princes  of 
Germany.  This  Spanish  policy  grew  much  more  odious 
after  the  memorable  events  of  1619,  the  election  of  the  king's 
son-in-law  to  the  throne  of  Bohemia,  his  rapid  downfall,  and 
the  conquest  of  the  Upper  Palatinate  by  Austria.  If  James 
had  listened  to  some  sanguine  advisers,  he  would  in  the  first 
instance  have  supported  the  pretensions  of  Frederic.  But 
neither  his  own  views  of  public  law  nor  true  policy  dictated 
such  an  interference.  The  case  was  changed  after  the  loss 
of  his  hereditary  dominions,  and  the  king  was  sincerely  de- 
sirous to  restore  him  to  the  Palatinate ;  but  he  unreasonably 
expected  that  he  could  effect  this  through  the  friendly  media- 
tion of  Spain,  while  the  nation,  not  perhaps  less  unreasonably, 
were  clamorous  for  his  attempting  it  by  force  of  arms.  In 
this  agitation  of  the  public  mind  he  summoned  the  parliament 
that  met  in  February,  162 1.2 

The  king's  speech  on  opening  the  session  was,  like  all  he 
had  made  on  former  occasions,  full  of  hopes  and  parliament 
promises,  taking  cheerfully  his  share  of  the  blame  of  1621- 
as  to  past  disagreements,  and  treating  them  as  little  likely  to 
fecur  though  all  their  causes  were  still  in  operation.8     He 

1  This  project  began  as  early  as  1605.  whose  connections  were  such,  were  in  the 

Winwood,  vol.  ii.     The  king  had  hopes  Spanish    party.      Those  reputed    to  be 

that  the  Uni*,ed  Provinces  would  aeknow-  zealous   protestants  were  all  against  it. 

ledge   the  sovereignty  of  prince  Henry  Wilson  in  Kennet,  ii.  725.    Many  of  the 

and  the  infanta  on  their  marriage  ;  and  former  were  bribed  by  Qondomar.    Id., 

Cornwallis  was  directed   to  propose  this  and  Rushworth,  i.  19. 

formally   to  the  court  of  Madrid.     Id.  2  The  proclamation  for  this  parliament 

p.  201.     But  Spain  would  not  cede  the  contains  many  of  the   unconstitutional 

point  of  sovereignty;  nor  was  this  scheme  directions  to  the  electors,  contained,  as 

likely  to  please  either  the  states-general  has  been  seen,  in  that  of  1604,  though 

or  the  court  of  France.  shorter.     Rymer,  xvii.  270. 

In   the    later    negotiation   about    the  3  "  Deal  with  me  as  I  shall  desire  at 

marriage  of  prince  Charles,  those  of  the  your  hands,"  &c.     "  He  k,new  not,"  he 

council  who   were   known  or  suspected  told  them,  "  the  laws  and  customs  of  the 

catholics,    Arundel,   Worcester,    Digby,  land  when  he  first  came,  and  was  misled 

Westou,  Oalvert.  as  well  as  Buckingham,  by   the   old   councillors  whoa    Ihe  old 


350  PROCEEDINGS  AGAINST  MOMPESSON.       CHAP.  VI. 

displayed,  however,  more  judgment  than  usual  in  the  com- 
mencement of  this  parliament.  Among  the  methods  devised 
to  compensate  the  want  of  subsidies,  none  had  been  more  in- 
jurious to  the  subject  than  patents  of  monopoly,  including 
licenses  for  exclusively  carrying  on  certain  trades.  Though 
the  government  was  principally  responsible  for  the  exactions 
they  connived  at,  and  from  which  they  reaped  a  large  benefit, 
the  popular  odium  fell  of  course  on  the  monopolists.  Of 
Proceedings  these  the  most  obnoxious  was  sir  Giles  Mornpes- 
against  son,  who,  having  obtained  a  patent  for  gold  and 
silver  thread,  sold  it  of  baser  metal.  This  fraud 
seems  neither  very  extraordinary  nor  very  important ;  but 
he  had  another  patent  for  licensing  inns  and  alehouses, 
wherein  he  is  said  to  have  used  extreme  violence  and  op- 
pression. The  house  of  commons  proceeded  to  investigate 
Mompesson's  delinquency.  Conscious  that  the  crown  had 
withdrawn  its  protection,  he  ned  beyond  sea.  One  Michell, 
a  justice  of  peace,  who  had  been  the  instrument  of  his 
tyranny,  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  commons,  who  voted  him 
incapable  of  being  in  the  commission  of  the  peace  and  sent 
him  to  the  Tower.1  Entertaining  however,  upon  second 
thoughts,  as  we  must  presume,  some  doubts  about  their  com- 
petence to  inflict  this  punishment,  especially  the  former  part 
of  it,  they  took  the  more  prudent  course,  with  respect  to 
Mompesson,  of  appointing  Noy  and  Hakewill  to  search  for 
precedents  in  order  to  show  how  far  and  for  what  offences 
their  power  extended  to  punish  delinquents  against  the  state 
as  well  as  those  who  offended  against  that  house.  The  re- 
sult appears  some  days  after,  in  a  vote  that  "  they  must  join 
with  the  lords  for  punishing  sir  Giles  Mompesson ;  it  being 
no  offence  against  our  particular  house,  nor  any  member  of 
it,  but  a  general  grievance." 2 

The  earliest  instance  of  parliamentary  impeachment,  or  of 
a  solemn  accusation  of  any  individual  by  the  commons  at 
the  bar  of  the  lords,  was  that  of  lord  Latimer  in  the  year 

queen  had  left;"  —  he  owns  that  at  the  commons  like  a  schoolmaster.    Bacon's 

last  parliament  there  was  "  a  strange  kind  Works,  i   701. 

of  beast  called  undertaker,"  &c.  Parl.  i  Debates  of  Commons  in  1621,  vol.  i. 
Hist.  i.  1180.  Yet  this  coaxing  language  p.  84.  I  quote  the  two  volumes  pub- 
was  oddly  mingled  with  sallies  of  his  lished  at  Oxford  in  1766  :  they  are 
pride  and  prerogative  notions.  It  is  abridged  in  the  new  Parliamentary  His- 
evidently  his  own  composition,  not  Ba-  tory. 

ecu's.    The  latter,  in  granting  the  speak-  2  Debates  of  Commons  in  1621,  vol.  i. 

er's  petitions,  took  the  high  tone  so  usual  p.  103,  109. 
In  this  reign,  and  directed  the  house  of 


JAMES  I.        PROCEEDINGS  AGAINST  MOMPESSON.  «51 

1376.  The  latest  hitherto  was  that  of  the  duke  of  Suffolk 
in  1449;  fora  proceeding  against  the  bishop  of  London  in 
1534,  which  has  sometimes  been  reckoned  an  instance  of 
parliamentary  impeachment,  does  not  by  any  means  support 
that  privilege  of  the  commons.1  It  had  fallen  into  disuse, 
partly  from  the  loss  of  that  control  which  the  commons  had 
obtained  under  Richard  II.  and  the  Lancastrian  kings,  and 
partly  fiom  the  preference  the  Tudor  princes  had  given  lo 
bills  of  attainder  or  of  pains  and  penalties,  when  they  wished 
to  turn  the  arm  of  parliament  against  an  obnoxious  subject. 
The  revival  of  this  ancient  mode  of  proceeding  in  the  case 
of  Mompesson,  though  a  remarkable  event  in  our  constitu- 
tional annals,  does  not  appear  to  have  been  noticed  as  an 
anomaly.  It  was  not  indeed  conducted  according  to  all  the 
forms  of  an  impeachment.  The  commons,  requesting  a  con- 
ference with  the  other  house,  informed  them  generally  of  that 
person's  offence,  but  did  not  exhibit  any  distinct  articles  at 
their  bar.  The  lords  took  up  themselves  the  inquiry ;  and, 
having  become  satisfied  of  his  guilt,  sent  a  message  to  the 
commons  that  they  were  ready  to  pronounce  sentence.  The 
speaker  accordingly,  attended  by  all  the  house,  demanded 
judgment  at  the  bar:  when  the  lords  passed  as  heavy  a  sen- 
tence as  could  be  awarded  for  any  misdemeanor ;  to  which 
the  king,  by  a  stretch  of  prerogative  which  no  one  was  then 
inclined  to  call  in  question,  was  pleased  to  add  perpetual 
banishment.2 

The  impeachment  of  Mompesson  was  followed  up  .by 
others  against  Michell,  the  associate  in  his  iniquities;  against 
sir  John  Bennet,  judge  of  the  prerogative  court,  for  corrup- 
tion in  his  office ;  and  against  Field,  bishop  of  Llandaff,  for 
being  concerned  in  a  matter  of  bribery.8  The  first  of  these 
was  punished ;  but  the  prosecution  of  Bennet  seems  to  have 
dropped  in  consequence  of  the  adjournment,  and  that  of  the 
bishop  ended  in  a  slight  censure.  But  the  wrath  of  the  com- 
mons was  justly  roused  against  that  shameless  corruption 

1  The  commons   in   this   session  com-  any  one  in  that  plice ;  "  quod  non  con 

plained  to  the  lords  that  the  bishop  of  Bentaneum  fuit  ali^nem  proceruui  pr» 

London  (Stokesley)  had  imprisoned  one  dictorumalicui  in  eo  Itvorespjiisuriim.' 

Philips  on  suspicion   of  heresy.      Some  Lords'  Journals,  i.  71.     The  lords,  how 

time  afterwards  they  called  upon  him  to  ever,   in   1701   (State    Trials,    x-v.   27o; 

answer  their  complaint.    The  bishop  laid  seem  to  have  recognized   this  as  a  cas« 

the  matter  before  the  lords,  who  all  de-  of  impeachment, 

dared  that  it  was  unbecoming  for  any  2  Debates  in  1621,  p.  114,  22S,  229 

lord  of  Parliament   to  make  answer  to  *  id.  passim. 


352  PKOCEEDINGS  AGAINST  LOKD  BACON.     CHAF.  VI. 

which  characterizes  the  reign  of  James  beyond  every  other 
in  our  history.  It  is  too  well  known  how  deeply  the  greatest 
man  of  that  age  was  tarnished  by  the  prevailing  iniquity. 
Proceedings  Complaints  poured  in  against  the  chancellor  Ba- 
•.gaiust  con  for  receiving  bribes  from  suitors  in  his  court. 

!0n'  Some  have  vainly  endeavored  to  discover  an  ex- 
cuse which  he  did  not  pretend  to  set  up,  and  even  ascribed 
the  prosecution  to  the  malevolence  of  sir  Edward  Coke.1 
But  Coke  took  no  prominent  share  in  this  business;  and 
though  some  of  the  charges  against  Bacon  may  not  appear 
very  heinous,  especially  for  those  times,  I  know  not  whether 
the  unanimous  conviction  of  such  a  man,  and  the  conscious 
pusillanimity  of  his  defence,  do  not  afford  a  more  irresistible 
presumption  of  his  misconduct  than  anything  specially  al- 
leged. He  was  abandoned  by  the  court,  and  had  previously 
lost,  as  I  rather  suspect,  Buckingham's  favor;  but  the  king, 
who  had  a  sense  of  his  transcendent  genius,  remitted  the  fine 
of  40,000£.  imposed  by  the  lords,  which  he  was  wholly  un- 
able to  pay.2 

1  Carte.  p.  580.     He  refused  also  to  set  the  great 

2  Clarendon  speaks  of  this   impeach-  seal  to  an  office  intended  to  be  erected 
ment  as  an  unhappy  precedent,  made  to  for  enrolling  prentices,  a  speculation  ap- 
gratify  a  private  displeasure.     This  ex-  parently  of  some  monopolists  ;  writing  a 
pressiou  seems  rather  to  point  to  Buck-  very  proper  letter  to  Buckingham,  that 
ingham  than  to  Coke;  and  some  letters  there  was  no  ground  of  law  for  it.    P.  555. 
of  Bacon  to  the  favorite  at  the  time  of  I  am  very  loath  to  call  Bacon,  for  the 
his  fall  display  a  consciousness  of  having  sake  of  Pope's  antithesis,  "  the  meanest 
offended    him.      Yet    Buckingham   had  of  mankind."     Who  would  not  wish  to 
much  more  reason  to  thank  Bacon  as  his  believe  the  feeling  language  of  his  letter 
wisest  counsellor  than  to  assist,  in  crush-  to  the  king,  after  the  attack  on  him  had 
ing  him.     In  his  Works,  vol.  i.  p.  712,  already  begun  ?    "I  hope  I  shall  not  be 
is  a  tract  entitled  "Advice  to  the  Duke  found  to  have  the  troubled  fountain  of  a 
of  Buckingham,  containing  instructions  corrupt  heart,  in   a  depraved    habit  of 
for  his  governance  as  Minister."     These  taking  rewards  to  pervert  justice  ;  how- 
are  marked  by  the  deep  sagacity  and  ex-  soever  I  may  be  frail,  and  partake  of  the 
tensive  observation  of  the  writer.     One  abuses  of  the  times."     P.  589.     Yet  the 
jias<ajij  should  be  quoted  in  justice  to  general  disesteem  of  his  contemporaries 
Bacon.      "  As  far  as  it  may  lie  in  you,  speaks  forcibly  against  him.     Sir  Simon 
let  no  arbitrary  power  be  intruded ;  the  d'Ewes  and  Weldon,  both  indeed  bitter 
people   of  this  kingdom   love   the   laws  men,  give   him   the  worst  of  characters, 
thereof,   and  nothing   will   oblige  them  "Surely,"  says    the    latter,  ''never  so 
more  than  a  confidence  of  the  free  enjoy-  many  parts  and    so  base   and  abject  a 
ing  of  them ;  what  the  nobles  upon  an  spirit    tenanted    together    in    any   one 
occasion  once  said  in  Parliament,  '  Nolu-  earthen  cottage  as  in  this  man."     It  is  a 
nius  leges  Angliae  mutari,' is  imprinted  striking  proof  of  the  splendor  of  Bacon's 
in  the  hearts  of  all  the  people."     I  may  genius  that  it  was  unanimously  acknowl- 
add,  that,  with  all  Bacon's  pliancy,  there  edged  in  his  own  age  amidst  so  much 
are  fewer  overstrained  expressions  about  that  should  excite  contempt.      He  had 
the  prerogative  in  his  political  writings  indeed   ingratiated    himself  with   every 
than  we   should  expect.      His  practice  preceding  parliament  through  his  incom- 
was  servile,  but  his  principles  were  not  parable  ductility ;  having  taken  an  active 
unconstitutional.      We   have  seen   how  part  in  their  complaints  of  grievances  in 
strongly  he  urged  the  calling  of  parlia-  1604,  before  he  became  attorney-general, 
ment  in  1614  :  and  he  did  the  same,  un-  and  even  on  many  occasions  afterwards, 
happily   for  himself,   in  1621.     Vol.   ii.  while  he  held   that  office,  having  been 


JAMES  I.  VIOLENCE  OF  PARLIAMENT.  353 

There  was  much  to  commend  in  the  severity  practised  by 
the  house  towards  public  delinquents  ;  such  examples  being 
far  more  likely  to  prevent  the  malversation  of  men  iu  power 
than  any  law  they  could  enact.  But  in  the  midst  of  these 
laudable  proceedings  they  were  hurried  by  the  passions  of 
the  moment  into  an  act  of  most  unwarrantable  violence.  It 
came  to  the  knowledge  of  the  house  that  one  Floyd,  a  gen- 
tleman confined  in  the  Fleet  prison,  had  used  some  slighting 
words  about  the  elector  palatine  and  his  wife.  It  appeared, 
in  aggravation,  that  he  was  a  Roman  catholic.  Nothing 
could  exceed  the  fury  into  which  the  commons  were  thrown 
by  this  very  insignificant  story.  A  flippant  expression,  below 
the  cognizance  of  an  ordinary  court,  grew  at  once  into  a  por- 
tentous offence,  which  they  ransacked  their  invention  to 
chastise.  After  sundry  novel  and  monstrous  propositions, 
they  fixed  upon  the  most  degrading  punishment  they  could 
devise.  Next  day,  however,  the  chancellor  of  the  exchequer 
delivered  a  message,  that  the  king,  thanking  them  for  their 
zeal,  but  desiring  that  it  should  not  transport  them  to  incon- 
veniences, would  have  them  consider  whether  they  could 
sentence  one  who  did  not  belong  to  them,  nor  had  offended 
against  the  house  or  any  member  of  it ;  and  whether  they 
could  sentence  a  denying  party,  without  the  oath  of  wit- 
nesses ;  referring  them  to  an  entry  on  the  rolls  of  parliament 
in  the  first  year  of  Henry  IV.,  that  the  judicial  power  of 
parliament  does  not  belong  to  the  commons.  He  would  have 
them  consider  whether  it  would  not  be  better  to  leave  Floyd 
to  him,  who  would  punish  him  according  to  his  fault. 

This  message  put  them  into  some  embarrassment.  They 
had  come  to  a  vote  in  Mompesson's  case,  in  the  very  words 
employed  in  the  king's  message,  confessing  themselves  to 
have  no  jurisdiction,  except  over  offences  against  themselves. 
The  warm  speakers  now  controverted  this  proposition  with 
such  arguments  as  they  could  muster;  Coke,  though  from 
the  reported  debates  he  seems  not  to  have  gone  the  whole 

intrusted  with  the  management  of  con-  England,  and  shall  be  able  to  do  some 

ferences  on    the  most  delicate  subjects,  good  effect    in  rectifying   that    body  of 

In  1614  the  commons,  after  voting   that  parliament-men,  which  is  cardo  rerum. " 

the  attorney-general    ought    not    to  be  Vol.  ii.  p.  496. 

elected  to  parliament,  made  an  exception  I  shall  conclude  this  note  by  observing, 

in  ftvor  of 'Bacon.     Journals,   p.    460.  that,  if  all  lord  Bacon's  philosophy  had 

''  I  have    been,  always    gracious   in  the  never  existed,  there  would  be  enough  iu 

lower    house,"  he    writes   to   James  in  his  political  writings  to  place  him  among 

1616,  begging  for  the  post  of  chancellor :  the  greatest  men  this  country  has  pro- 

"  I  hav.:   interest  in    the    gentlemen  of  dueed. 
VOL.  l.  —  G.                          23 


354  VIOLENCE  OF  PARLIAMENT  CHAP.  VI. 

length,  contending  that  the  house  was  a  court  of  record,  and 
that  it  consequently  had  power  to  administer  an  oath.1 
They  returned  a  message  by  the  speaker,  excepting  to  the 
record  in  1  H.  IV.,  because  it  was  not  an  act  of  parliament 
to  bind  them,  and  persisting,  though  with  humility,  in  their 
first  votes.2  The  king  replied  mildly  ;  urging  them  to  show 
precedents,  which  they  were  manifestly  incapable  of  doing. 
The  lords  requested  a  conference,  which  they  managed  with 
more  temper,  and,  notwithstanding  the  solicitude  displayed 
by  the  commons  to  maintain  their  pretended  right,  succeeded 
in  withdrawing  the  matter  to  their  own  jurisdiction.3  This 
conflict  of  privileges  was  by  no  means  of  service  to  the  un- 
fortunate culprit :  the  lords  perceived  that  they  could  not  mit- 
igate the  sentence  of  the  lower  house  without  reviving  their 
dispute,  and  vindicated  themselves  from  all  suspicion  of  in- 
difference towards  the  cause  of  the  Palatinate  by  augmented 
violence  in  severity.  Floyd  was  adjudged  to  be  degraded 
the  case  of  from  his  gentility,  and  to  be  held  an  infamous  per- 
son ;  his  testimony  not  to  be  received ;  to  ride  from 
the  Fleet  to  Cheapside  on  horseback  without  a  saddle,  with 
his  face  to  the  horse's  tail,  and  the  tail  in  his  hand,  and  there 
to  stand  two  hours  in  the  pillory,  and  to  be  branded  in  the 
forehead  with  the  letter  K ;  to  ride  four  days  afterwards  in 
the  same  manner  to  Westminster,  and  there  to  stand  two 
hours  more  in  the  pillory,  with  words  in  a  paper  in  his  hat 
showing  his  offence ;  to  be  whipped  at  the  cart's  tail  from  the 
Fleet  to  Westminster  Hall ;  to  pay  a  fine  of  50001.,  and  to 
be  a  prisoner  in  Newgate  during  his  life.  The  whipping 
was  a  few  days  after  remitted  on  prince  Charles's  motion ;  but 
he  seems  to  have  undergone  the  rest  of  the  sentence.  There 
is  surely  no  instance  in  the  annals  of  our  own,  and  hardly  of 

1  Debates  in  1621,  vol.  ii.  p.  7.  Nevertheless  the  lords  did  not  scruple, 

2  Debates,  p.  14.  .  almost    immediately  afterwards,   to  de- 
8  In  a  former  parliament  of  this  reign,    nominate  their  own  house  a  court,  as 

the  commons  having  sent  up  a  message,  appears  by  memoranda  of  27th  a-id  28th 
wherein  they^entitled  themselves  the  Slay;  they  even  issued  a  habeas  corpus, 
knights,  citizens,  burgesses,  and  barons  as  from  a  court,  to  bring  a  servant  of 
of  the  commons'  court  of  parliament,  the  earl  of  Bedford  before  them.  So 
the  lords  sent  them  word  that  they  also  in  1609,  16th  and  17th  of  February; 
•would  never  acknowledge  any  man  that  and  on  April  14th  and  18th,  1614  ;  and 
eitteth  in  the  lower  house  to  have  the  probably  later,  if  search  were  made, 
right  or  title  of  a  baron  of  parliament ;  I  need  hardly  mention  that  the  barons 
nor  could  admit  the  term  of  the  com-  mentioned  above,  as  part  of  the  com- 
mons' court  of  parliament :  "  because  mons,  were  the  members  for  the  cinque 
all  your  house  together,  without  theirs,  ports,  whose  denomination  is  recognized 
doth  make  no  court  of  parliament."  in  several  statutes. 
4th  March,  1606.  Lord's  Journals. 


JAMES  I.  IN  THE  CASE  OF  FLOYD.  355 

Any  civilized  country,  where  a  trifling  offence,  if  it  were  one, 
has  been  visited  with  such  outrageous  cruelty.  The  cold- 
blooded deliberate  policy  of  the  lords  is  still  more  disgusting 
than  the  wild  fury  of  the  lower  house.1 

This  case  of  Floyd  is  an  unhappy  proof  of  the  disregard 
that  popular  assemblies,  when  inflamed  by  passion,  are  ever 
apt  to  show  for  those  principles  of  equity  and  moderation  by 
which,  however  the  sophistry  of  contemporary  factions  may 
set  them  aside,  a  calm-judging  posterity  will  never  fail  to 
measure  their  proceedings.  It  has  contributed  at  least,  along 
with  several  others  of  the  same  kind>  to  inspire  me  with  a 
jealous  distrust  of  that  indefinable,  uncontrollable  privilege 
of  parliament,  which  has  sometimes  been  asserted,  and  per- 
haps with  rather  too  much  encouragement  from  those  whose 
function  it  is  to  restrain  all  exorbitant  power.  I  speak  only 
ci  the  extent  to  which  theoretical  principles  have  been  car- 
ried, without  insinuating  that  the  privileges  of  the  house  of 
commons  have  been  practically  stretched  in  late  times  be- 
yond their  constitutional  bounds.  Time  and  the  course  of 
opinion  have  softened  down  those  high  pretensions,  which 
the  dangers  of  liberty  under  James  L,  as  well  as  the  natural 
character  of  a  popular  assembly,  then  taught  the  commons  to 
assume ;  and  the  greater  humanity  of  modern  ages  has  made 
us  revolt  from  such  disproportionate  punishments  as  were  in- 
flicted on  Floyd.2 

Everything  had  hitherto  proceeded  with  harmony  between 
the  king  and  parliament.  His  ready  concurrence  in  their 
animadversion  on^Mompesson  and  Michell,  delinquents  who 
had  acted  at  least  with  the  connivance  of  government,  and  in 
the  abolition  of  monopolies,  seemed  to  remove  all  discontent. 

1  Debates  in  1621,  vol.  i.  p.  355,  &c.  ;  carry    people    against   common    justice 
TOl.  ii.  p.  5,  &c.    Mede  writes  to  his  cor-  and  humanity."    And  again  at  the  hot- 
respondent  on  May  11,  that  the  execu-  torn :   "  For  the  honor  of  Englishmen, 
tion  had  not  taken  place;  "  bat  I  hope  and  indeed  of  human  nature,  it  were  to 
it  will."    The  king  was  plainly  averse  be  hoped  these   debates  were  not  truly 
to  it.  taken,    there    being    so   many  motions 

2  The  following  observation  on  Floyd's  contrary  to  the  laws  of  the   land,  the 
case,  written  by  Mr.  Harley,  in  a  manu-  laws  of  parliament,  and  common  justice, 
script  account  of  the  proceedings  (Harl.  Robert  Harley,  July  14, 1702."    It  la  re- 
MSS.  6274),  is  well  worthy  to  be  inserted,  markable  that  this  date  is  very  near  the 
I  copy  from  the  appendix  to  the  above-  time  when  the  writer  of  these  just  ob- 
inentioned  Debates  of  1621.    "  The  fol-  servations,  and  the  party  which  he  led, 
lowing  collection,"  he  has  written  at  the  had  been  straining  in  more  than   one 
top,    "is  an    instance    how  Jar  a  zeal  instance  the  privileges  of  the  house  of 
against  popery  and  for  one  branch  of  -commons,  not  certainly  with  such  vio- 
the  royal  family,  which  was   supposed  lence  as  in  the  case  of  Floyd,  but  much 
to  be  neglected  by  king  James,  and  con-  beyond  what  can  IB  deemed  their  legiti- 
Kquently   in   opposition    to   him,  will  mate  extent. 


356          COMMONS  ADJOURNED  BY  COMMISSION.    CHAP.  TL 

The  commons  granted  two  subsidies  early  in  the  session 
without  alloying  their  bounty  with  a  single  complaint  of 
grievances.  One  might  suppose  that  the  subject  of  imposi- 
tions had  been  entirely  forgotten,  not  an  allusion  to  them  oc- 
curring in  any  debate.1  It  was  voted  indeed,  in  the  first  days 
of  the  session,  to  petition  the  king  about  the  breach  of  their 
privilege  of  free  speech,  by  the  imprisonment  of  sir  Edwin 
Sandys,  in  1614,  for  words  spoken  in  the  last  parliament; 
but  the  house  did  not  prosecute  this  matter,  contenting  itself 
with  some  explanation  by  the  secretary  of  state.2  They 
were  going  on  with  some  bills  for  reformation  of  abuses,_to 
which  the  king  was  willing  to  accede,  when  they  received  an 
intimation  that  he  expected  them  to  adjourn  over  the  sum- 
mer. It  produced  a  good  deal  of  dissatisfaction  to  see  their 
labor  so  hastily  interrupted ;  especially  as  they  ascribed  it  to 
a  want  of  sufficient  sympathy  on  the  court's  part  with  their 
enthusiastic  zeal  for  the  elector  palatine.8  They  were  ad- 
journed by  the  king's  commission,  after  an  unanimous  decla- 
ration ("  sounded  forth,"  says  one  present,  "  with  the  voices 
of  them  all,  withal  lifting  up  their  hats  in  their  hands  so  high 
as  they  could  hold  them,  as  a  visible  testimony  of  their  unan- 
imous consent,  in  such  sort  that  the  like  had  scarce  ever  been 
seen  in  parliament")  of  their  resolution  to  spend  their  lives 
and  fortunes  for  the^ defence  of  their  own  religion  and  of  the 
Palatinate.  This  solemn  protestation  and  pledge  was  entered 
on  record  in  the  journals.4 

They  met  again  after  five  months,  without  any  change  in 
their  views  of  policy.  At  a  conference  of  the  two  houses, 
lord  Digby,  by  the  king's  command,  explained  all  that  had 
occurred  in  his  embassy  to  Germany  for  the  restitution  of 

1  In  a  much  later  period  of  the  session,  be  heard  by  counsel,  and  all  the  lawyers 

when  the  commons  had  lost  their  good  of  the  house  to  be  present.     Debates  of 

humor,  some  heat  was  very  justly  ex-  1621,  vol   ii.  252.    Journals,  p.  652.     But 

cited  by  a  petition  from  some  brewers,  nothing  farther    seenis  to    have    taken 

complaining  of  an   imposition  of  four-  place,  whether  on  account  of  the  magni- 

pence  on  the  quarter  of  malt.    The  cour-  tude  of  the  business  which  occupied  them 

tiers  defended   this  as  a  composition  in  during  the  short  remainder  of  the  ses- 

lieu  of  purveyance.    But  it  was  answered  sion,  or  because  a  bill  which  passed  their 

that  it  was  compulsory,  for  several  of  the  house  to   prevent  illegal  imprisonment, 

principal   brewers   had   been  committed  or  restraint  on  the  lawful  occupation  of 

and  lay  long  in  prison  for  not  yielding  the  subject,  was  supposed  to  meet  this 

to  it.     One  said  that  impositions  of  this  case.     It  is  a  i-emarkable   instance  of 

nature  overthrew  the  liberty  of  all  the  arbitrary  taxation,  and  preparatory  to  an 

subjects  of  this  kingdom ;  and  it'  the  king  excise. 

may  impose  such  taxes,  then  are  we  but  2  Debates   of   1621,  p.   14.      Hatsell'4 

villains,  and  lose  all  our  liberties.   It  pro-  Precedents,  i.  133. 

duceJ  an  order  that  the  matter  be  exam-  3  Debates,  p.  114,  et  alibi,  passim. 

ined  before  the  house,  the  petitioners  to  *  Vol.  ii.  p.  170, 172. 


JAMES  I.      DISAGREEMENT  OF  KING  AND  COMMONS.          357 

the  Palatinate ;  which,  though  absolutely  ineffective,  was  as 
much  as  James  could  reasonably  expect  without  a  war.1  He 
had  in  fact,  though,  according  to  the  laxity  of  those  times, 
without  declaring  war  on  any  one,  sent  a  body  of  troops 
under  sir  Horace  Vere,  who  still  defended  the  Lower  Palat- 
inate. It  was  necessary  to  vote  more  money,  lest  these 
should  mutiny  for  want  of  pay.  And  it  was  stated  to  the 
commons  in  this  conference,  that  to  maintain  a  sufficient 
army  in  that  country  for  one  year  would  require  900,OCOZ. 
which  was  left  to  their  consideration.2  But  now  it  was  seen 
that  men's  promises  to  spend  their  fortunes  in  a  cause  not 
essentially  their  own  are  written  in  the  sand.  The  commons 
had  no  reason  perhaps  to  suspect  that  the  charge  of  keeping 
30,000  men  in  the  heart  of  Germany  would  fall  much  short 
of  the  estimate.  Yet  after  long  haggling  they  voted  only 
one  subsidy,  amounting  to  70,000/. ;  a  sum  manifestly  insuffi- 
cient for  the  first  equipment  of  such  a  force.8  This  parsi- 
mony could  hardly  be  excused  by  their  suspicion  of  the 
king's  unwillingness  to  undertake  the  war,  for  which  it  af- 
forded the  best  justification. 

James  was  probably  not   much   displeased  at  finding  so 
good  a   pretext  for  evading  a  compliance   with 
their  martial  humor ;  nor  had  there  been  much 
appearance  of  dissatisfaction  on  either  side  (if  we  ting  and 

.,  .,  v~  commons. 

except  some  murmurs  at  the  commitment  of  one 
of  their  most  active  members,  sir  Edwin  Sandys,  to  the 
Tower,  which  were  tolerably  appeased  by  the  secretary  Cal- 
vert's  declaration  that  he  had  not  been  committed  for  any 
parliamentary  matter  4)  till  the  commons  drew  up  a  petition 
and  remonstrance  against  the  growth  of  popery  ;  suggesting, 

i  Journals,  vol.  ii.  p.  186.  enormously  enhanced  in  this  reign,  which 

*  P.  189.    Lord  Cranfield  told  the  com-  the  country  gentlemen  of  course  endeav- 

mons  there  were  three  reasons  why  they  ored  to  keep  up.      But  corn,  probably 

should    give  liberally.       1.   That  lands  through  good  seasons,  was  rather  lower 

were  now  a  third  better  than  when  the  in  1621  than  it  had  been  —  about  30.J 

king  came  to  the  crown.    2.  That  wools,  a  quarter, 

which  were  then  20.S.,  were  now  30*.    3.  *  P.  242,  &c. 

That  corn  had  risen  from  26s.  to  3&J.  the  *  Id.  174,  200.    Compare  also  p.  151. 

quarter.  Ibid.    There  had  certainly  been  Sir  Thomas  Wentworth  appears  to  have 

a  very  great  increase  of  wealth  under  discountenanced  the  resenting  this  as  a 

James,  especially  to  the  country  gentle-  breach  of  privilege.    Doubtless  the  house 

men  ;   of  which  their  style  of  building  showed  great  and  even  excessive  moder- 

1s   an   evident   proof.     Yet  in  this  very  ation  in  it;   for  we  can  hardly  doubt  that 

session  complaints  had  been  made  of  the  Sandys  was  really  committed  for  no  of  her 

want  of  money  and  fell  in  the  price  of  cause  than  his  behavior  in  parliament, 

lands,  vol.  i.  p.  16  ;  and  an  act  was  pro-  It  was   taken  up  again  afterwards;    p. 

posed  against  the  importation  of  corn,  269. 
rol.  ii.  p.  87.    In  fact,  rents  had  been 


358  DISAGREEMENT  BETWEEN  CHAP.  VI 

among  other  remedies  for  this  grievance,  that  the  prince 
should  marry  one  of  our  own  religion,  and  that  the  king 
would  direct  his  efforts  against  that  power  (meaning  Spain) 
which  first  maintained  the  war  in  the  Palatinate.  This  peti- 
tion was  proposed  by  sir  Edward  Coke.  The  courtiers  op- 
posed it  as  without  precedent ;  the  chancellor  of  the  duchy 
observing  that  it  was  of  so  high  and  transcendent  a  nature, 
he  had  never  known  the  like  within  those  walls.  Even  the 
mover  defended  it  rather  weakly,  according  to  our  notions, 
as  intended  only  to  remind  the  king,  but  requiring  no  an- 
swer. The  scruples  affected  by  the  courtiers,  and  the  real 
novelty  of  the  proposition,  had  so  great  an  effect,  that  some 
words  were  inserted  declaring  that  the  house  "  did  not  mean 
to  press  on  the  king's  most  undoubted  and  royal  preroga- 
tive." 1  The  petition,  however,  had  not  been  presented,  when 
the  king,  having  obtained  a  copy  of  it,  sent  a  peremptory  let- 
ter to  the  speaker,  that  he  had  heard  how  some  fiery  and 
popular  spirits  had  been  emboldened  to  debate  and  argue  on 
matters  far  beyond  their  reach  or  capacity,  and  directing 
him  to  acquaint  the  house  with  his  pleasure  that  none  there- 
in should  presume  to  meddle  with  anything  concerning  his 
government  or  mysteries  of  state ;  namely,  not  to  speak  of 
his  son's  match  with  the  princess  of  Spain,  nor  to  touch  the 
honor  of  that  king,  or  any  other  of  his  friends  and  confeder- 
ates. Sandys'  commitment,  he  bade  them  be  informed,  was 
not  for  any  misdemeanor  in  parliament.  But,  to  put  them 
out  of  doubt  of  any  question  of  that  nature  that  may  arise 
among  them  hereafter,  he  let  them  know  that  he  thought 
himself  very  free  and  able  to  punish  any  man's  misdemean- 
ors in  parliament,  as  well  during  their  sitting  as  after,  which 
he  meant  not  to  spare  upon  occasion  of  any  man's  insolent 
behavior  in  that  place.  He  assured  them  that  he  would  not 
deign  to  hear  their  petition  if  it  touched  on  any  of  those 
points  which  he  had  forbidden.2 

The  house  received  this  message  with  unanimous  firmness, 
but  without  any  undue  warmth.  A  committee  was  appoint- 
ed to  draw  up  a  petition,  which,  in  the  most  decorous  lan- 
guage and  with  strong  professions  of  regret  at  his  majesty's 
displeasure,  contained  a  defence  of  their  former  proceedings, 
and  hinted  very  gently  that  they  could  not  conceive  hia 

1  Journals,  vol.  ii.  p.  261,  &o.  s  P.  284. 


JAMES  I.  KING  AND  COMMONS.  359 

honor  and  safety,  or  the  state  ef  the  kingdom,  to  be  matters 
at  any  time  unfit  for  their  deepest  consideration  in  time  of 
parliament.  They  adverted  more  pointedly  to  that  part  of 
the  king's  message  which  threatened  them  for  liberty  of 
speech,  calling  it  their  ancient  and  undoubted  right,  and  an 
inheritance  received  from  their  ancestors,  which  they  again 
prayed  him  to  confirm.1  His  answer,  though  considerably 
milder  than  what  he  had  designed,  gave  indications  of  a  re- 
sentment not  yet  subdued.  He  dwelt  at  length  on  their 
unfitness  for  entering  on  matters  of  government,  and  com- 
mented with  some  asperity  even  on  their  present  apologeti- 
cal  petition.  In  the  conclusion  he  observed  that,  "  although 
he  could  not  allow  of  the  style  calling  their  privileges  an  un- 
doubted right  and  inheritance,  but  could  rather  have  wished 
that  they  had  said  that  their  privileges  were  derived  from 
the  grace  and  permission  of  his  ancestors  and  himself  (for 
most  of  them  had  grown  from  precedent,  which  rather  shows 
a  toleration  than  inheritance),  yet  he  gave  them  his  royal  as- 
surance that,  as  long  as  they  contained  themselves  within  the 
limits  of  their  duty,  he  would  be  as  careful  to  maintain  their 
lawful  liberties  and  privileges  .as  he  would  his  own  preroga- 
tive, so  that  their  house  did  not  touch  on  that  prerogative, 
which  would  enforce  him  or  any  just  king  to  retrench  their 
privileges."  2 

This  explicit  assertion  that  the  privileges  of  the  commons 
existed  only  by  sufferance,  and  conditionally  upon  good  be- 
havior, exasperated  the  house  far  more  than  the  denial  of 
their  right  to  enter  on  matters  of  state.  In  the  one  they 
were  conscious  of  having  somewhat  transgressed  the  boun- 
daries of  ordinary  precedents ;  in  the  other  their  individual 
security,  and  their  very  existence  as  ar  deliberative  assembly, 
were  at  stake.  Calvert,  the  secretary,  and  the  other  minis- 
ters, admitted  the  king's  expressions  to  be  incapable  of  de- 
fence, and  called  them  a  slip  of  the  pen  at  the  close  of  a  long 
answer.8  The  commons  were  not  to  be  diverted  by  any  such 
excuses  from  their  necessary  duty  of  placing  on  record  a 
solemn  claim  of  right.  Nor  had  a  letter  from  the  king,  ad- 
dressed to  Calvert,  much  influence  ;  wherein,  while  he  reit- 
erated his  assurances  of  respecting  their  privileges,  and  tacit- 
ly withdrew  the  menace  that  rendered  them  precarious,  he 

i  Journals,  Vol.  ii.  p.  289.          «  P  817.          *  P.  830. 


360  DISSOLUTION  OF  THE  COMMONS.          CHAP   VI. 

said  that  he  could  not  witlr  patience  endure  his  subjects  tc 
use  such  anti-monarchical  words  to  him  concerning  their  lib- 
erties as  "  ancient  and  undoubted  right  and  inheritance,  with- 
out subjoining  that  they  were  granted  by  the  grace  and 
favor  of  his  predecessors."  1  After  a  long  and  warm  debate 
they  entered  on  record  in  the  Journals  their  famous  protesta- 
tions of  December  18th,  1621,  in  the  following  words: — • 

"  The  commons  now  assembled  in  parliament,  being  justly 
occasioned  thereunto,  concerning  sundry  liberties,  franchises, 
privileges,  and  jurisdictions  of  parliament,  amongst  others 
not  herein  mentioned,  do  make  this  protestation  following : 
—  That  the  liberties,  franchises,  privileges,  and  jurisdictions 
of  parliament  are  the  ancient  and  undoubted  birthright 
and  inheritance  of  the  subjects  of  England ;  and  that  the 
arduous  and  urgent  affairs  concerning  the  king,  state,  and 
the  defence  of  the  realm,  and  of  the  church  of  England, 
and  the  making  and  maintenance  of  laws,  and  redress  of 
mischiefs  and  grievances  which  daily  happen  within  this 
realm,  are  proper  subjects  and  matter  of  counsel  and  debate 
in  parliament ;  and  that  in  the  handling  and  proceeding  of 
those  businesses  every  member  of  the  house  hath,  and  of 
right  ought  to  have,  freedom  of  speech  to  propound,  treat, 
reason,  and  bring  to  conclusion  the  same  ;  that  the  commons 
in  parliament  have  like  liberty  and  freedom  to  treat  of  those 
matters  in  such  order  as  in  their  judgments  shall  seem  fit- 
test :  and  that  every  such  member  of  the  said  house  hath 
like  freedom  from  all  impeachment,  imprisonment,  and  mo- 
lestation (other  than  by  the  censure  of  the  house  itself),  for 
or  concerning  any  bill,  speaking,  reasoning,  or  declaring  of 
any  matter  or  matters  touching  the  parliament  or  parlia- 
ment business  ;  and  that,  if  any  of  the  said  members  be  com- 
plained of  and  questioned  for  anything  said  or  done  in  par- 
liament, the  same  is  to  be  showed  to  the  king  by  the  advice 
and  assent  of  all  the  commons  assembled  in  parliament,  be- 
fore the  king  give  credence  to  any  private  information."  2 

This  protestation  was  not  likely  to  pacify  the  king's  anger. 

Dissolution    He  had  already  pressed  the  commons  to  make  an 

mons  after    enc*  °^  tne  Dusmess  before  them,  under  pretence 

a  strong  re-   of  wishing  to  adjourn  them  before  Christmas,  but 

QCe'  probably    looking  to  a  dissolution.      They    were 

i  Journals,  vol.  ii.  p.  339.  I  P.  359 


I.  DISSOLUTION  OF  THE  COMMONS.  361 

not  in  a  temper  to  regard  any  business,  least  of  all  to  grant 
a  subsidy,  till  this  attack  on  their  privileges  should  be  fully 
retracted.  The  king  therefore  adjourned,  and,  in  about  a 
fortnight  after,  dissolved  them.  But  in  the  interval,  having 
s?nt  for  the  journal-book,  he  erased  their  last,  protestation 
with  his  own  hand,  and  published  a  declaration  of  the  causes 
which  had  provoked  him  to  this  unusual  measure,  alleging 
the  unfitness  of  such  £  protest,  after  his  ample  assurance  of 
maintaining  their  privileges,  the  irregular  manner  in  which, 
according  to  him,  it  was  voted,  and  its  ambiguous  and  gen- 
eral wording,  which  might  serve  in  future  times  to  invade 
most  of  the  prerogatives  annexed  to  the  imperial  crown.  In 
his  proclamation  for  dissolving  the  parliament  James  reca- 
pitulated all  his  grounds  of  offences ;  but  finally  required 
his  subjects  to  take  notice  that  it  was  his  intention  to  govern 
them  as  his  progenitors  and  predecessors  had  done,  and  to 
call  a  parliament  again  on  the  first  convenient  occasion.1 
He  immediately  followed  up  this  dissolution  of  parliament 
by  dealing  his  vengeance  on  its  most  conspicuous  leaders : 
sir  Edward  Coke  and  sir  Robert  Philips  were  committed  to 
the  Tower ;  Mr.  Pym  and  one  or  two  more  to  other  prisons ; 
sir  Dudley  Digges,  and  several  who  were  somewhat  less 
obnoxious  than  the  former,  were  sent  on  a  commission  to 
Ireland,  as  a  sort  of  honorable  banishment.2  The  earls  of 
Oxford  and  Southampton  underwent  an  examination  before 
the  council,  and  the  former  was  committed  to  the  Tower  on 
pretence  of  having  spoken  words  against  the  king.  It  is 
worthy  of  observation  that,  in  this  session,  a  portion  of  the 
upper  house  had  united  in  opposing  the  court.  Nothing  of 
this  kind  is  noticed  in  former  parliaments,  except  perhaps  a 
little  on  the  establishment  of  the  Reformation.  In  this  mi- 
nority were  considerable  names :  Essex,  Southampton,  War- 
wick, Oxford,  Say,  Spencer.  Whether  a  sense  of  public 
wrongs  or  their  particular  resentments  influenced  these  no- 
blemen, their  opposition  must  be  reckoned  an  evident  sign 
of  the  change  that  was  at  work  in  the  spirit  of  the  nation, 
and  by  which  no  rank  could  be  wholly  unaffected.8  . 

1  Rymer.  ivii.  344;  Parl.  Hist. ;  Carte,  '  Wilson's  Tlistory  of  James  I.,  In  Ken 

93  ;   Wilson.  net.  ii.  247.  749.     Thirty -three  peers.  Ml 

*  Besides   the  historians,   see  Cabala,  Joseph  Mede  tells  us  in  a  letter  of  Feb.  24, 

part  ii.  p.   155  (4to.  edit.);    D'Israeli's  1621  (Uarl.  MSS.  »39),  "  signed  a  petition 

Character  of  James  I.,  p.  125 ;  and  Mede's  to  the  king  which  they  refused  to  deliver 

Letters,  Hart.  MSS.  389.  to  the  council,  as  he  desired   nor  even  to 


362 


MARRIAGE  TREATY  WITH  SPAIN. 


CHAP.  VI. 


James,  with  all  his  reputed  pusillanimity,  never  showed 
Marriage  anv  s'Sns  °^  feai'ing  popular  opinion.  His  obsti- 
treaty  with  nate  adherence  to  the  marriage  treaty  with  Spain 
was  the  height  of  political  rashness  in  so  critical 
a  state  of  the  public  mind.  But  what  with  elevated  notions 
of  his  prerogative  and  of  his  skill  in  government  on  the  one 
hand,  what  with  a  confidence  in  the  submissive  loyalty  of 
the  English  on  the  other,  he  seems  constantly  to  have  fan- 
cied that  all  opposition  proceeded  from  a  small  troublesome 
faction,  whom  if  he  could  any  way  silence,  the  rest  of  his 
people  would  at  once  repose  in  a  dutiful  reliance  on  his 
wisdom.  Hence  he  met  every  succeeding  parliament  with 
as  sanguine  hopes  as  if  he  had  suffered  no  disappointment 
in  the  last.  The  nation  was  however  wrought  up  at  this 
time  to  an  alarming  pitch  of  discontent.  Libels  were  in 
circulation  about  1621,  so  bitterly  malignant  in  their  cen- 
sures of  his  person  and  administration,  that  two  hundred 
years  might  seem,  as  we  read  them,  to  have  been  mistaken 
in  their  date.1  Heedless,  however,  of  this  growing  odium, 


the  prince,  unless  he  would  say  he  did 
not  receive  it  as  a  councillor ;  whereupon 
the  king  sent  for  Lord  Oxford,  and  asked 
him  for  it:  he,  according  to  previous 
agreement,  said  he  had  it  not :  then  he 
sent  for  another,  who  made  the  same 
answer ;  at  last  they  told  him  they  had 
resolved  not  to  deliver  it,  unless  they 
were  admitted  all  together.  Whereupon 
his  majesty,  wonderfully  incensed,  sent 
them  all  away,  re  infecta,  and  said  that 
he  would  come  into  parliament  himself, 
and  bring  them  all  to  the  har."  This 
petition,  I  believe,  did  not  relate  to  any 
general  grievances,  but  to  a  question  of 
their  own  privileges,  as  to  their  prece- 
dence of  Scots  peers.  Wilson,  ubi  supra. 
But  several  of  this  large  number  were 
inspired  by  more  generous  sentiments  ; 
and  the  commencement  of  an  aristocratic 
opposition  deserves  to  be  noticed.  lu 
another  letter,  written  in  March,  Mede 
gpeaka  of  the  good  understanding  be- 
tween the  king  and  parliament ;  he  prom- 
ised they  should  sit  as  long  as  they  like, 
and  hereafter  he  would  have  a  parlia- 
ment every  three  years.  "Is  not  this 

good  if  it  be  true  ? But 

certain  it  is  that  the  lords  stick  wonder- 
ful fast  to  the  commons,  and  all  take 
great  pains." 

The  entertaining  and  sensible  biogra- 
pher of  James  has  sketched  the  charac- 
ters of  these  Whig  peers.  Aikin's  James 
I.,  U.238. 


1  One  of  these  may  be  found  in  the 
Somers  Tracts,  ii.  470,  entitled  Tom  Tell- 
truth,  a  most  malignant  ebullition  of 
disloyalty,  which  the  author  must  have 
risked  his  neck  as  well  as  ears  in  pub- 
lishing. Some  outrageous  reflections  on 
the  personal  character  of  the  king  could 
hardly  be  excelled  by  modern  licentious- 
ness. Proclamations  about  this  time 
against  excess  of  lavish  speech  in  mat- 
ters of  state,  Rymer,  xvii.  275,  514,  and 
against  printing  or  uttering  seditious  and 
scandalous  pamphlets,  id.  522,  616,  show 
the  tone  and  temper  of  the  nation.  [See 
also  the  extracts  from  the  reports  of 
TilliereSj  the  French  ambassador,  in  Rau- 
mer's  Historv  of  16th  and  17th  Centuries 
illustrated,  vol.  ii.  p.  246,  et  alibi.  Noth- 
ing can  be  more  unfavorable  to  James  in 
every  respect  than  these  reports ;  but 
his  leaning  towards  Spanish  connections 
might  inspire  some  prejudice  into  a 
French  diplomatist.  At  a  considerably 
earlier  period,  1606,  if  we  may  trust  the 
French  ambassador,  the  players  brought 
forward  "  their  own  king  and  all  his 
favorites  in  a  very  strange  fashion.  They 
made  him  curse  and  swear  because  he 
had  been  robbed  of  a  bird,  and  beat  a 
gentleman  because  he  had  called  off  the 
hounds  from  the  scent.  They  represent 
him  as  drunk  at  least  once  a  day,  &c. 
He  has  upon  this  made  order  that  no 
play  shall  be  henceforth  acted  in  London ; 
for  the  repeal  of  which  ordei  they  hav« 


JAMES  I.  PARLIAMENT  OF  1624.  363 

James  continued  to  solicit  the  affected  coyness  of  the  court 
of  Madrid.  The  circumstances  of  that  negotiation  belong 
to  general  history.1  It  is  only  necessary  to  remind  the 
reader  that  the  king  was  induced,  during  the  residence  of 
prince  Charles  and  the  duke  of  Buckingham  in  Spain,  to 
swear  to  certain  private  articles,  some  of  which  he  had  al- 
ready promised  before  their  departure,  by  which  he  bound 
himself  to  suspend  all  penal  laws  affecting  the  catholics,  to 
permit  the  exercise  of  their  religion  in  private  houses,  and 
to  procure  from  parliament  if  possible  a  legal  toleration. 
This  toleration,  as  preliminary  to  the  entire  reestablishment 
of  popery,  had  been  the  first  great  object  of  Spain  in  the 
treaty.  But  that  court,  having  protracted  the  treaty  for 
years,  in  order  to  extort  more  favorable  terms,  and  inter- 
posed a  thousand  pretences,  became  the  dupe  of  its  own  ar- 
tifices ;  the  resentment  of  a  haughty  minion  overthrowing 
with  ease  the  painful  fabric  of  this  tedious  negotiation. 

Buckingham  obtained  a  transient  and  unmerited  popularity 
by  thus  averting  a  great  public  mischief,  which  parliament 
rendered  the  next  parliament  unexpectedly  peace-  of  1624> 
able.      The  commons  voted  three  subsidies  and  three  fif- 
teenths, in  value  about  300,000£ ; 2   but  with  a  condition, 

already  offered  100,000  livres.     Perhaps  of  Wales's  residence,  deserve  notice.    See 

the  permission  will  be  again  granted,  but  also  Wilson  in  Eennet,  p.  750,  et  post, 

upon  condition  that  they  represent  no  Dr.  Lingard  has  illustrated  the  subject 

recent  history,  nor  speak  of  the  present  lately,  ix.  271. 

time."  Kaumor,  ii.  219.  If  such  an  8  Hume,  and  many  other  writers  on 
order  was  ever  issued,  it  was  speedily  the  side  of  the  crown,  assert  the  value 
repealed  ;  for  there  is  no  year  to  which  of  a  subsidy  to  have  fallen  from  70,000/., 
new  plays  are  not  referred  by  those  who  at  which  it  had  been  under  the  Tudors, 
have  written  the  history  of  our  drama,  to  65,000i.,  or  a  less  sum.  But,  though 
But  the  offence  which  provoked  it  is  ex-  I  will  not  assert  a  negative  too  boldly, 
traordinary,  and  hardly  credible ;  though,  I  have  no  recollection  of  having  found 
coming  on  the  authority  of  a  resident  any  good  authority  for  this  ;  and  it  is 
ambassador,  we  cannot  set  it  aside.  The  surely  too  improbable  to  be  lightly 
satire  was,  of  course,  conveyed  under  the  credited.  For,  admit  that  no  change 
character  of  a  fictitious  king ;  for  other-  was  made  in  each  man's  rate  according 
wise  the  players  themselves  would  have  to  the  increase  of  wealth  and  diminu- 
been  punished.  The  tune  seems  to  have  tion  of  the  value  of  money,  the  amount 
been  in  March,  1606.  The  recent  story  must  at  least  have  been  equal  to  what 
of  the  Due  de  Biron  had  been  also  brought  it  had  been;  and  to  suppose  the  con- 
on  the  stage,  which  seems  much  less  won-  tributors  to  have  prevailed  on  the  as- 
derful.  1845.]  sessors  to  underrate  them  is  rather 
i  The  letters  on  this  subject  published  contrary  to  common  fiscal  usage. '  In 
by  lord  Hardwicke,  State  Papers,  vol.  i.,  one  of  Mede's  letters,  which  of  course 
are  highly  important ;  and,  being  un-  I  do  not  quote  as  decisive,  it  is  said  that 
known  to  Carte  and  Hume,  render  their  the  value  of  a  subsidy  was  not  above 
narratives  less  satisfactory.  Some  pam-  80,000/.  ;  and  that  the  assessors  were  di- 
phlets  of  the  time,  in  the  second  volume  reeled  (this  was  in  1621)  not  to  follow 
of  the  Somere  Tracts,  may  be  read  with  former  books,  but  value  every  man's 
Interest ;  and  Howell's  Letters,  being  estate  according  to  their  knowledge,  and 
written  from  Madrid  during  the  prince  not  his  own  confession. 


364  IMPEACHMENT  OF  MIDDLESEX.  CHAP.  VI 

proposed  by  the  king  himself,  that,  in  order  to  insure  its  ap- 
plication to  naval  and  military  armaments,  it  should  be  paid 
into  the  hands  of  treasurers  appointed  by  themselves,  who 
should  issue  money  only  on  the  warrant  of  the  council  of 
war.  He  seemed  anxious  to  tread  back  the  steps  made  in 
the  former  session,  not  only  referring  the  highest  matters  of 
state  to  their  consideration,  but  promising  not  to  treat  for 
peace  without  their  advice.  They,  on  the  other  hand,  ac- 
knowledged themselves  most  bound  to  his  majesty  for  having 
been  pleased  to  require  their  humble  advice  in  a  case  so  im- 
portant, not  meaning,  we  may  be  sure,  by  these  courteous 
and  loyal  expressions,  to  recede  from  what  they  had  claimed 
in  the  last  parliament  as  their  undoubted  right.1 

The  most  remarkable  affair  in  this  session  was  the  im- 
peackment  of  the  earl  of  Middlesex,  actually  lord 
i  °f  treasurer  of  England,  for  bribery  and  other  mis- 
demeanors. It  is  well  known  that  the  prince  of 
Wales  and  duke  of  Buckingham  instituted  this  prosecution, 
to  gratify  the  latter's  private  pique,  against  the  wishes  of  the 
king,  who  warned  them  they  would  live  to  have  their  fill  of 
parliamentary  impeachment.  It  was  conducted  by  managers 
on  the  part  of  the  commons  in  a  very  regular  form,  except 
that  the  depositions  of  witnesses  were  merely  read  by  the 
clerk ;  that  fundamental  rule  of  English  law  which  insists  on 
the  viva  voce  examination  being  as  yet  unknown,  or  dispensed 
with  in  political  trials.  Nothing  is  more  worthy  of  notice  in 
the  proceedings  upon  this  impeachment  than  what  dropped 
from  sir  Edwin  Sandys,  in  speaking  upon  one  of  the  charges. 
Middlesex  had  laid  an  imposition  of  31.  per  ton  on  French 
wines,  for  taking  off  which  he  received  a  gratuity.  Sandys 
commenting  on  this  offence,  protested,  in  the  name  of  the 
commons,  that  they  intended  not  to  question  the  power  of 
imposing  claimed  by  the  king's  prerogative :  this  they  touched 
not  upon  now ;  they  continued  only  their  claim,  and  when 
they  should  have  occasion  to  dispute  it  would  do  so  with  all 
due  regard  to  his  majesty's  state  and  revenue.2  Such  cau- 
tious and  temperate  language,  far  from  indicating  any  dispo- 

i  Parl.  Hi.it.  1383,  1388,  1390;  Carte,  and  was  very  right  in  doing  so.    On  the 

119.      The    king    seems    to    have    acted  other    hand,   the    prince  and    duke   of 

pretty  fairly  in  this  parliament,  bating  Buckingham  behaved  in  public  towards 

a   gross    falsehood    in   denying    the   in-  him  with  great   rudeness.      Parl.  Hist, 

tended  toleration  of  papists.     He  wished  1396. 

to  get  further  pledges  of  support  from  2  Parl.  Hist.  1421. 
parliament  before  he  plunged  into  a  war, 


JAMES  I.  IMPEACHMENT  OF  MIDDLESEX.  365 

Bition  to  recede  from  their  pretensions,  is  rather  a  proof  of 
such  united  steadiness  and  discretion  as  must  insure  their 
success.  Middlesex  was  unanimously  convicted  by  the  peers.1 
His  impeachment  was  of  the  highest  moment  to  the  com- 
mons, as  it  restored  forever  that  salutary  constitutional  right 
which  the  single  precedent  of  lord  Bacon  might  have  been 
insufficient  to  establish  against  the  ministers  of  the  crown. 

The  two  last  parliaments  had  been  dissolved  without  pass- 
ing a  single  act,  except  the  subsidy  bill  of  1621.  An  inter- 
val of  legislation  for  thirteen  years  was  too  long  for  any 
civilized  country.  Several  statutes  were  enacted  in  the 
present  session,  but  none  so  material  as  that  for  abolish- 
ing monopolies  for  the  sale  of  merchandise,  or  for  using  any 
trade.8  This  is  of  a  declaratory  nature,  and  recites  that  they 
are  already  contrary  to  the  ancient  and  fundamental  laws  of 
the  realm.  Scarce  any  difference  arose  between  the  crown 
and  the  commons.  This  singular  calm  might  probably  have 
been  interrupted,  had  not  the  king  put  an  end  to  the  session. 
They  expressed  some  little  dissatisfaction  at  this  step,8  and 
presented  a  list  of  grievances,  one  only  of  which  is  sufficiently 
considerable  to  deserve  notice ;  namely,  the  proclamations 
already  mentioned  in  restraint  of  building  about  London, 
whereof  they  complain  in  very  gentle  terms,  considering 
their  obvious  illegality  and  violation  of  private  right.4 

The  commons  had  now  been  engaged  for  more  than  twenty 
years  in  a  struggle  to  restore  and  to  fortify  their  own  and 
their  fellow-subjects'  liberties.  They  had  obtained  in  this 
period  but  one  legislative  measure  of  importance,  the  late 
declaratory  act  against  monopolies.  But  they  had  rescued 
from  disuse  their  ancient  right  of  impeachment.  They  had 
placed  on  record  a  protestation  of  their  claim  to  debate  all 
matters  of  public  concern.  They  had  remonstrated  against 
the  usurped  prerogatives  of  binding  the  subject  by  proclama- 
tion and  of  levying  customs  at  the  outports.  They  had 

1  Clarendon  blames  the  impeachment  worth's    Ecclesiastical    Biography,    vol. 

of  Middlesex  for  the  very  reason  which  iv.,  where  it  appears  that  that  pious  and 

makes  me  deem  it  a  fortunate  event  for  conscientious  man  was  one  of  the  treas- 

the  constitution,  and  seems  to  consider  urer's    most    forward    accusers,    having 

him  as  a  sacrifice  to  Buckingham's  re-  been  deeply  injured  by  him.    It  is  diffl- 

sentment.     Hackot  also,  the  biographer  cult  to  determine  the  question  from  the 

of  Williams,  takes  his  part.    Carte,  how-  printed  trial. 

ever,  thought  him  guilty,  p.  116 ;  and  "  21  Jac.  I.  c.  3.     See  what  lord  Coke 

the  unanimous  vote  of  the  peers  is  much  says  on  this  act,  and  on  the  general  sub- 

Against   him,  since  that  house  was  not  ject  of  monopolies,  3  lust.  181. 

wholly  governed  by  Buckingham.    See  »  P.  H.  1483. 

too  tne  Life  of  Nicholas  t'arrar  iu  Words-  *  Id.  1488. 


366         RESULTS  OF  THE  COMMONS'  STRUGGLE.     CHAP.  VI 

secured  beyond  controversy  their  exclusive  privilege  of  de- 
termining contested  elections  of  their  members.  Of  these 
advantages  some  were  evidently  incomplete,  and  it  would 
require  the  most  vigorous  exertions  of  future  parliaments  to 
realize  them.  But  such  exertions  the  increased  energy  of 
the  nation  gave  abundant  cause  to  anticipate.  A  deep  and 
lasting  love  of  freedom  had  taken  hold  of  every  class  ex- 
cept perhaps  the  clergy,  from  which,  when  viewed  together 
with  the  rash  pride  of  the  court  and  the  uncertainty  of  con- 
stitutional principles  and  precedents,  collected  through  our 
long  and  various  history,  a  calm  by-stander  might  presage 
that  the  ensuing  reign  would  not  pass  without  disturbance, 
nor  perhaps  end  without  confusion. 


CHA.  I.  — 1625-29.   CHARACTER  OF  CHARLES.         367 


CHAPTER    VIL 

ON  THE  ENGLISH  CONSTITUTION  FROM  THE  ACCESSION  OP 
CHARLES  I.  TO  THE  DISSOLUTION  OF  HIS  THIRD  PAR- 
LIAMENT. 

Parliament  of  1625  —  Its  Dissolution  — Another  Parliament  called  —  Prosecution  ot 
Buckingham  —  Arbitrary  Proceedings  towards  the  Earls  of  Arundel  and  Bristol  — 


I'lim-ii  i) iv 

IUUB  i/mtJreuues —  jrruaeuuuuu  ui   jrunuiUB   uy  -i>;uicruii  —  vjruwwiOf  High  Churcu 

Tenets  —  Differences  as  to  the  Observance  of  Sunday  —  Arminian. Controversy  — 
State  of  Catholics  under  James  —  Jealousy  of  the  Court's  Favor  towards  them  — 
Unconstitutional  Tenets  promulgated  by  the  High  Church  Party  —  General 
Remarks. 

CHARLES  I.  had  much  in  his  character  very  suitable  to 
the  times  in  which  he  lived,  and  to  the  spirit  of  the  people 
he  was  to  rule ;  a  stern  and  serious  deportment,  a  disinclina- 
tion to  all  licentiousness,  and  a  sense  of  religion  that  seemed 
more  real  than  in  his  father.1  These  qualities  we  might  sup- 
pose to  have  raised  some  expectation  of  him,  and  to  have 
procured  at  his  accession  some  of  that  popularity  which  is 
rarely  withheld  from  untried  princes.  Yet  it  does  not  appear 
that  he  enjoyed  even  this  first  transient  sunshine  of  his  sub- 
jects' affection.  Solely  intent  on  retrenching  the  excesses 
of  prerogative,  and  well  aware  that  no  sovereign  would 
voluntarily  recede  from  the  possession  of  power,  they  seem 
to  have  dreaded  to  admit  into  their  bosoms  any  sentiments  of 
personal  loyalty  which  might  enervate  their  resolution.  And 
Charles  took  speedy  means  to  convince  them  that  they  had 
not  erred  in  withholding  their  confidence. 

Elizabeth  in  her  systematic  parsimony,  James  in  his  averse- 

1  The  general  temperance  and  chastity  p.  65.    I  am  aware  that  he  was  not  the 

of  Charles,  and  the  effect  those  virtues  perfect  saint  as  well  as  martyr  which  his 

had  in  reforming  the  outward  face  of  the  panegyrists  represent  him  to  have  been ; 

court,  are  attested  by  many  writers,  and  but  it  is  an  unworthy  office,  even  for  the 

especially   by    Mrs.    Hutchinson,  whose  purpose  of   throwing  ridicule  on  exag- 

good  word  he  would  not  have  undeserv-  gerated  praise,  to  turn   the  microscope 

edlv  obtained    Mem.  of  Col.  Hutchinson,  of  history  on  private  iife. 


3  08  PARLIAMENT  OF  1625.  CHAP.  VII. 

ness  to  war,  had  been  alike  influenced  by  a  consciousness 
that  want  of  money  alone  could  render  a  parliament  formi- 
dable to  their  power.  None  of  the  irregular  modes  of  supply 
were  ever  productive  enough  to  compensate  for  the  clamor 
they  occasioned ;  after  impositions  and  benevolences  were 
exhausted,  it  had  always  been  found  necessary,  in  the  most 
arbitrary  times  of  the  Tudors,  to  fall  back  on  the  representa- 
tives of  the  people.  But  Charles  succeeded  to  a  war,  at 
least  to  the  preparation  of  a  war,  rashly  undertaken  through 
his  own  weak  compliance,  the  arrogance  of  his  favorite,  and 
the  generous  or  fanatical  zeal  of  the  last  parliament.  He 
would  have,  perceived  it  to  be  manifestly  impossible,  if  he  had 
been  capable  of  understanding  his  own  position,  to  continue 
this  war  without  the  constant  assistance  of  the  house  of  com- 
mons, or  to  obtain  that  assistance  without  very  costly  sacri- 
fices of  his  royal  power.  It  was  not  the  least  of  this  mon- 
arch's imprudences,  or  rather  of  his  blind  compliances  with 
Buckingham,  to  have  not  only  commenced  hostilities  against 
Spain  which  he  might  easily  have  avoided,1  and  persisted  in 
them  for  four  years,  but  entered  on  a  fresh  war  with  France, 
though  he  had  abundant  experience  to  demonstrate  the  im- 
possibility of  defraying  its  charges. 

The  first  parliament  of  this  reign  has  been  severely  cen- 
Pariiament  sure<l  oa  account  of  the  penurious  supply  it  doled 
of  1625.  out  for  the  exigencies  of  a  war  in  which  its  prede- 
cessors had  involved  the  king.  I  will  not  say  that  this  re- 
proach is  wholly  unfounded.  A  more  liberal  proceeding,  if 
it  did  not  obtain  a  reciprocal  concession  from  the  king,  would 
have  put  him  more  in  the  wrong.  But,  according  to  the 
common  practice  and  character  of  all  such  assemblies,  it  was 
preposterous  to  expect  subsidies  equal  to  the  occasion  until  a 
foundation  of  confidence  should  be  laid  between  the  crown 
and  parliament.  The  commons  had  begun  probably  to  re- 
pent of  their  hastiness  in  the  preceding  year,  and  to  discover 
that  Buckingham  and  his  pupil,  or  master  (which  shall  we 
say  ?),  had  conspired  to  deceive  them.2  They  were  not  to 

1  War    had    not    been    declared    at  He  observes,  on  an  assertion  of  Wilson 
Charles's  accession,  nor  at  the  dissolu-  that  Buckingham  lost  his  popularity  af- 
tion  of  the   first   parliament.     In  fact,  ter  Bristol  arrived,    because   he  proved 
he  was  much  more  set  upon  it  than  his  that  the  former,  while  iu  Spain,  had  pro- 
subjects.     Hume  aud  all  his  school  kept  fessed  himself  a  papist,  —  that  it  is  false, 
this  out  of  sight.  and  was  never  said   by  Bristol.     It   is 

2  Hume  has  disputed  this,  but  with  singular  that  Hume  should  know  so  pos- 
little  success,  even,  on  his  own  showing,  itively  what  Bristol  did  not  say  in  1624, 


CHA.  I.— 1625-29.   DISSOLUTION  OF  PARLIAMENT.  369 

forget  that  none  of  the  chief  grievances  of  the  last  reign 
were  yet  redressed,  and  that  supplies  must  be  voted  slowly 
and  conditionally  if  they  would  hope  for  reformation.  Hence 
they  made  their  grant  of  tonnage  and  poundage  to  last  but 
for  a  year  instead  of  the  king's  life,  as  had  for  two  centuries 
been  the  practice  ;  on  which  account  the  upper  house  rejected 
the  bill.1  Nor  would  they  have  refused  a  further  supply, 
beyond  the  two  subsidies  (about  140,000£)  which  they  had 
granted,  had  some  tender  of  redress  been  made  by  its  dissoiu- 
the  crown ;  and  were  actually  in  debate  upon  the  tion- 
matter  when  interrupted  by  a  sudden  dissolution.2 

Nothing  could  be  more  evident,  by  the  experience  of  the 
late  reign  as  well  as  by  observing  the  state  of  public  spirit, 
than  that  hasty  and  premature  dissolutions  or  prorogations 
of  parliament  served  but  to  aggravate  the  crown's  embarrass- 
ments. Every  successive  house  of  commons  inherited  the 
feelings  of  its  predecessor,  without  which  it  would  have  ill 
represented  the  prevalent  humor  of  the  nation.  The  same 
men,  for  the  most  part,  came  again  to  parliament  more  irri- 
tated and  desperate  of  reconciliation  with  the  sovereign  than 
before.  Even  the  politic  measure,  as  it  was  fancied  to  be, 
of  excluding  some  of  the  most  active  members  from  seats  in 
the  new  assembly,  by  nominating  them  sheriffs  for  the  year, 
failed  altogether  of  the  expected  success ;  as  it  naturally  must 
in  an  age  when  all  ranks  partook  in  a  common  enthusiasm.8 
Hence  the  prosecution  against  Buckingham,  to  avert  which 
Charles  had  dissolved  his  first  parliament,  was  commenced 
with  redoubled  vigor  in  the  second.  It  was  too  late,  after  the 
precedents  of  Bacon  and  Middlesex,  to  dispute  the  right  of 
the  commons  to  impeach  a  minister  of  state.  The  king,  how- 
ever, anticipating  their  resolutions,  after  some  sharp  speeches 
only  had  been  uttered  against  his  favorite,  sent  a  message 

when  it  is  notorious  that  he  said  in  par-  monarch  and  the  submissive  awe  and 
liament  what  nearly  comes  tc  the  same  lowliness  of  loyal  subjects,  we  cannot  but 
thing  in  1626.  See  a  curious  letter  in  receive  exceeding  comfort  and  content- 
Cabala,  p.  224,  showing  what  a  combina-  ment  in  the  frame  and  constitution  of 
tion  had  been  formed  against  Bucking-  this  highest  court,  wherein  not  only  the 
ham,  of  all  descriptions  of  malecontents.  prelates,  nobles,  and  grandees,  but  the 

1  Parl.  Hist.  vol.  ii.  p.  6.  commons  of  all  degrees,  have  their  part ; 

2  Id.  33.  and  wherein  that  high  majesty  doth  de- 
»  The  language  of  lord-keeper  Coventry  scend  to  admit,  or  rather  to  invite,  the 

in  opening   the  session  was  very  ill-cal-  humblest  of  his  subjects   to  conference 

culated  for  the  spirit  of  the  commons :  and  counsel  with  him,"   &c.     He  gave 

"  If  we  consider  aright,  and  think  of  that  them  a  distinct  hint  afterwards  that  they 

incomparable  distance   between  the  su-  must  not  expect  to  sit  long.    Parl.  Hist, 

preme  height  and  majesty  of  a  mighty  89. 
VOL.  i.  —  c.                24 


370  PROSECUTION  OF  BUCKINGHAM.          CHAI-.  VII 

that  he  would  not  allow  any  of  his  servants  to  be  questioned 
among  them,  much  less  such  as  were  of  eminent  place  and 
near  unto  him.  He  saw,  he  said,  that  some  of  them  aimed 
at  the  duke  of  Buckingham,  whom,  in  the  last  parliament  of 
his  father,  all  had  combined  to  honor  and  respect,  nor  did  he 
know  what  had  happened  since  to  alter  their  affections  ;  but 
he  assured  them  that  the  duke  had  done  nothing  without  his 
Prosecution  own  sPecia^  direction  and  appointment.  This 
of  Bucking-  haughty  message  so  provoked  the  commons,  that, 
having  no  express  testimony  against  Bucking- 
ham, they  came  to  a  vote  that  common  lame  is  a  good 
ground  of  proceeding  either  by  inquiry  or  presenting  the 
complaint  to  the  king  or  lords ;  nor  did  a  speech  from  the 
lord-keeper,  severely  rating  their  presumption,  and  requiring 
on  the  king's  behalf  that  they  should  punish  two  of  their 
members  who  had  given  him  offence  by  insolent  discourses 
in  the  house,  lest  he  should  be  compelled  to  use  his  royal  au- 
thority against  them,  —  nor  one  from  the  king  himself,  bid- 
ding them  "  remember  that  parliaments  were  altogether  in  his 
power  for  their  calling,  sitting,  and  dissolution  ;  therefore,  as 
he  found  the  fruits  of  them  good  or  evil,  they  were  to  con- 
tinue to  be  or  not  to  be,"  l  —  tend  to  pacify  or  to  intimidate 
the  assembly.  They  addressed  the  king  in  very  decorous  lan- 
guage, but  asserting  "  the  ancient,  constant,  and  undoubted 
right  and  usage  of  parliaments  to  question  and  complain  of 
all  persons,  of  what  degree  soever,  found  grievous  to  the 
commonwealth,  in  abusing  the  power  and  trust  committed  to 
them  by  their  sovereign."  The  duke  was  accordingly  im- 
peached at  the  bar  of  the  house  of  peers  on  eight  articles, 
many  of  them  probably  well  founded  ;  yet,  as  the  commons 
heard  no  evidence  in  support  of  them,  it  was  rather  unrea- 

1  ParK  Hist.  60.    I  know  of  nothing    threw  them  all,  except  with  us.    In  for- 
under  the  Tudors  of  greater  arrogance    eigu  countries  the  peo  'le  look  not  like 


rogative  ;  for  in  his  messages  he  had  told  worth, 

them  that  he  must  then  use  new  coun-  This  was  a  hint,  in  the  usual  arrogant 

cils.     In  all  Christian   kingdoms  there  style  of  courts,  that  the  liberties  of  the 

were  parliaments  anciently,  till  the  mon-  people  depended  on  favor,  and  not  on 

archs,    seeing    their    turbulent    spirits,  their   own    determination    to    maintain 

itood  upon  their  prerogatives,  and  over-  them. 


CHA.  I.  — 1625-29.     COMMITTAL  OF  ELIOT  AND  DIGGES.       371 

sonable  in  them  to  request  that  he  might  be  committed  to 
the  Tower. 

In  the  conduct  of  this  impeachment,  two  of  the  managers, 
sir  John  Eliot  and  sir  Dudley  Digges,  one  the  most  illus- 
trious confessor  in  the  cause  of  liberty  whom  that  time  pro- 
duced, the  other  a  man  of  much  ability  and  a  useful  support- 
er of  the  popular  party,  though  not  free  from  some  oblique 
views  towards  promotion,  gave  such  offence  by  words  spoken, 
or  alleged  to  be  spoken,  in  derogation  of  his  majesty's  honor, 
that  they  were  committed  to  the  Tower.  The  commons  of 
course  resented  this  new  outrage.  They  resolved  to  do  no 
more  business  till  they  were  righted  in  their  privileges. 
They  denied  the  words  imputed  to  Digges ;  and,  thirty-six 
peers  asserting  that  he  had  not  spoken  them,  the  king  admit- 
ted that  he  was  mistaken,  and  released  both  their  members.1 
He  had  already  broken  in  upon  the  privileges  of  Arbitrary 
the  house  of  lords  by  committing  the  earl  of  proceedings 

A  j    i     j.       j.i_        rn  j       •          +-L.  •  j.  towards  the 

Arundel  to  the  lower  during  the  session;  notearisof 
upon  any  political  charge,  but,  as  was  commonly  Arundel 
surmised,  on  account  of  a  marriage  which  his  son  had  made 
with  a  lady  of  royal  blood.  Such  private  offences  were  suf- 
ficient in  those  arbitrary  reigns  to  expose  the  subject  to 
indefinite  imprisonment,  if  not  to  an  actual  sentence  in  the 
star-chamber.  The  lords  took  up  this  detention  of  one  of 
their  body,  and,  after  formal  examination  of  precedents  by  a 
committee,  came  to  a  resolution,  "  that  no  lord  of  parliament, 
the  parliament  sitting,  or  within  the  usual  times  of  privilege 
of  parliament,  is  to  be  imprisoned  or  restrained  without  sen- 
tence or  order  of  the  house,  unless  it  be  for  treason  or  felony, 
or  for  refusing  to  give  surety  for  the  peace."  This  assertion 
of  privilege  was  manifestly  warranted  by  the  coextensive 
liberties  of  the  commons.  "  After  various  messages  between 
the  king  and  lords,  Arundel  was  ultimately  set  at  liberty.2 
This  infringement  of  the  rights  of  the  peerage  was  accom- 

1  Parl.  Hist.  119  ;  Hatsell,  i.  147  ;  Lingard,  ix.  328.  In  the  second,  Pern- 
Lords'  Journals.  A  few  peers  refused  broke  had  only  five,  but  the  duke  still 
to  join  in  this.  came  with  thirteen.  Lords'  Journals, 

Dr.  Lingard    has    observed    that    the  p.  491.    This  enormous  accumulation  of 

opposition    in    the   house  of  lords  was  suffrages  in  one  person  led  to  an  order  of 

headed   by   the  earl  of  Pembroke,   who  the  house,  which  is  now  its  established 

had  been  rather  conspicuous  in  the  late  regulation,  that  no  peer  can  hold  more 

reign,  and  whose  character  is  drawn  by  than  two  proxies.     Lords'   Journals,  p. 

Clarendon  in  the  first  book  of  his  history.  507. 

Be  held  ten  proxies  in  the  king's  first        *  Parl.  Hist.  125;  Hut.sell,  141 
parliament,  as  Buckingham  did  thirteen. 


572         UNFITNESS  OF  CHARLES  TO  GOVERN.       CHAP.  VII. 

panied  by  another  not  less  injurious,  the  refusal  of  a  writ  of 
and  Bristol  summons  to  the  earl  of  Bristol.  The  lords  were 
justly  tenacious  of  this  unquestionable  privilege 
of  their  order,  without  which  its  constitutional  dignity  and 
independence  could  never  be  maintained.  Whatever  irregu- 
larities or  uncertainty  of  legal  principle  might  be  found  in 
earlier  times  as  to  persons  summoned  only  by  writ  without 
patents  of  creation,  concerning  whose  hereditary  peerage 
there  is  much  reason  to  doubt,  it  was  beyond  all  controversy 
that  an  earl  of  Bristol  holding  his  dignity  by  patent  was 
entitled  of  right  to  attend  parliament.  The  house  necessa- 
rily insisted  upon  Bristol's  receiving  his  summons,  which 
was  sent  him  with  an  injunction  not  to  comply  with  it  by 
taking  his  place.  But  the  spirited  earl  knew  that  the  king's 
constitutional  will  expressed  in  the  writ  ought  to  outweigh 
his  private  command,  and  laid  the  secretary's  letter  before 
the  house  of  lords.  The  king  prevented  any  further  inter- 
ference in  his  behalf  by  causing  articles  of  charge  to  be  ex- 
hibited against  him  by  the  attorney-general,  whereon  he  was 
committed  to  the  Tower.  These  assaults  on  the  pride  and 
consequence  of  an  aristocratic  assembly,  from  whom  alone  the 
king  could  expect  effectual  support,  display  his  unfitness  not 
only  for  the  government  of  England,  but  of  any  other  nation. 
Nor  was  his  conduct  towards  Bristol  less  oppressive  than  im- 
politic. If  we  look  at  the  harsh  and  indecent  employment  of 
his  own  authority,  and  even  testimony,  to  influence  a  criminal 
process  against  a  man  of  approved  and  untainted  worth,1  and 
his  sanction  of  charges  which,  if  Bristol's  defence  be  as  true 
as  it  is  now  generally  admitted  to  be,  he  must  have  known 
to  be  unfounded,  we  shall  hardly  concur  with  those  candid 
persons  who  believe  that  Charles  would  have  been  an  ex- 
cellent prince  in  a  more  absolute  monarchy.  Nothing,  in 
truth,  can  be  more  preposterous  than  to  maintain,  like  Clar- 
endon and  Hume,  the  integrity  and  innocence  of  lord  Bris- 
tol, together  with  the  sincerity  and  humanity  of  Charles  I 
Such  inconsistencies  betray  a  determination  in  the  histo- 
rian to  speak  of  men  according  to  his  preconceived  affec* 

'  Mr.   Brodie  has   commented  rather  think  right,  or  even  though  he  might 

too  severely  on  Bristol's  conduct,  vol.  ii.  have  some  bias  towards  the  religion  of 

p.  109.     That  he  was  '-actuated  merely  Rome.       The    last,   however,    is    by   no 

by  motives  of  self-aggrandizement  "    is  means  proved  ;  for  the  king's  word  ia  no 

surely  not  apparent ;    though  he  might  proof  in  my  eyes. 
be  more  partial  to  Spain  than  we  may 


CHA.  I.  — 1625-29. 


LOAN  DEMANDED. 


373 


tion  or  prejudice,  without  so  much  as  attempting  to  recon- 
cile these  sentiments  to  the  facts  which  he  can  neither  deny 
nor  excuse.1 

Though  the  lords  petitioned  against  a  dissolution,  the  king 
was  determined  to  protect  his  favorite,  and  rescue  himself 
from  the  importunities  of  so  refractory  a  house  of  commons.2 
Perhaps  he  had  already  taken  the  resolution  of  governing 
without  the  concurrence  of  parliaments,  though  he  was  in- 
duced to  break  it  the  ensuing  year.  For,  the  commons  hav- 
ing delayed  to  pass  a  bill  for  the  five  subsidies  which  they 
had  voted  in  this  session  till  they  should  obtain  some  satis- 
faction for  their  complaints,  he  was  left  without  any  regular 
supply.  This  was  not  wholly  unacceptable  to  some  of  his 
councillors,  and  probably  to  himself,  as  affording  a  pretext 
for  those  unauthorized  demands  which  the  advocates  of 
arbitrary  prerogative  deemed  more  consonant  to  Loan  de_ 
the  monarch's  honor.  He  had  issued  letters  of  mandedty 
privy  seal,  after  the  former  parliament,  to  those  th 
in  every  county  whose  names  had  been  returned  by  the 
lord  lieutenant  as  most  capable,  mentioning  the  sum  they 
were  required  to  lend,  with  a  promise  of  repayment  in 


1  See  the  proceedings  on  the  mutual 
charges  of  Buckingham  and  Bristol  in 
Ruskworth,  or  the  Parliamentary  Histo- 
ry. Charles's  behavior  is  worth  notic- 
ing, lie  sent  a  message  to  the  house, 
desiring  that  they  would  not  comply 
with  tlie  earl's  request  of  being  allowed 
counsel;  and  yielded  ungraciously  when 
the  lords  remonstrated  against  the  pro- 
hibition. Parl.  Hist.  97,  132.  The  at- 
torney-general exhibited  articles  against 
Bristol  as  to  facts  depending  in  great 
measure  on  the  king's  sole  testimony. 
Bristol  petitioned  the  house  "  to  take 
into  consideration  of  what  consequence 
euch  a  precedent  might  be  ;  and  thereon 
most  humbly  to  move  his  majesty  for 
the  declining,  at  least,  of  his  majesty's 
accusation  and  testimony."  Id.  98. 
The  house  ordered  two  questions  on  this 
to  be  put  to  the  judges  :  1.  Whether, 
in  case  of  treason  or  felony,  the  king's 
testimony  was  to  be  admitted  or  not? 
2.  Whether  words  spoken  to  the  prince, 
who  is  after  king,  make  any  alteration  in 
the  case?  They  were  ordered  to  deliver 
their  opinions  three  days  afterwards. 
But  when  the  tiuin  came,  the  chief  jus- 
tice informed  the  house  t  lat  the  attor- 
ney-general had  communicated  to  the 
judges  his  majesty 's  pleasure  that  they 


should  forbear  to  give  an  answer.  Id. 
103,  106. 

Hume  says,  "  Charles  himself  was  cer- 
tainly deceived  by  Buckingham  when 
he  corroborated  his  favorite's  narrative 
by  his  testimony."  But  no  assertion 
can  be  more  gratuitous;  the  supposi 
tion  indeed  is  impossible. 

2  Parl.  Hist.  193.  If  the  following  let- 
ter is  accurate,  the  privy  council  them- 
selves were  against  this  dissolution :  — 
"  Yesterday  the  lords  sitting  in  council 
at  Whitehall,  to  argue  whether  the  par- 
liament should  be  dissolved  or  not,  were 
all  with  one  voice  against  the  dissolution 
of  it ;  and  to-day,  when  the  lord-keeper 
drew  out  the  commission  to  have  read  it, 
they  sent  four  of  their  own  body  to  his 
majesty  to  let  him  know  how  dangerous 
this  abruption  would  be  to  the  state,  and 
beseech  him  the  parliament  might  sit  but 
two  days  —  he  answered.  Not  a  minute." 
15  June,  1626.  Mede's  Letters,  ubi  su- 
pra. The  author  expresses  great  alarm 
at  what  might  be  the  consequence  of 
this  step.  Mode  ascribes  this  to  the 
council;  but  others,  perhaps  more  prob- 
ably, to  the  house  of  peers.  The  king's 
expression,  "  not  a  minute,"  ia  men- 
tioned by  several  writers. 


374 


LOAN  DEMANDED. 


CHAP.  VII. 


eighteen  months.1  This  specification  of  a  particular  sum 
was  reckoned  an  unusual  encroachment,  and  a  manifest 
breach  of  the  statute  against  arbitrary  benevolences  ;  espe- 
cially as  the  names  of  those  who  refused  compliance  were  to 
be  returned  to  the  council.  But  the  government  now  ven- 
tured on  a  still  more  outrageous  stretch  of  power.  They 
first  attempted  to  persuade  the  people  that,  as  subsidies  had 
been  voted  in  the  house  of  commons,  they  should  not  refuse 
to  pay  them,  though  no  bill  had  been  passed  for  that  pur- 
pose. But  a  tumultuous  cry  was  raised  in  Westminster-hall 
from  those  who  had  been  convened,  that  they  would  pay  no 
subsidy  but  by  authority  of  parliament.2  This  course,  there- 
fore, was  abandoned  for  one  hardly  less  unconstitutional.  A 
general  loan  was  demanded  from  every  subject,  according 
to  the  rate  at  which  he  was  assessed  in  the  last  subsidy. 
The  commissioners  appointed  for  the  collection  of  this  loan 
received  private  instructions  to  require  not  less  than  a  cer- 
tain proportion  of  each  man's  property  in  lands  or  goods, 
to  treat  separately  with  every  one,  to  examine  on  oath  such 
as  should  refuse,  to  certify  the  names  of  refractory  persons 
to  the  privy  council,  and  to  admit  of  no  excuse  for  abatement 
of  the  sum  required.8 

This  arbitrary  taxation  (for  the  name  of  loan  could  not 


1  Rush  worth,  Kennet. 

2  Mede's  Letters.  —  "  On  Monday  the 
judges  Bat  in  Westminster-hall   to  per- 
suade the  people  to  pay  subsidies  ;  but 
there   arose  a  great  tumultuous  shout 
amongst  them  :  '  A  parliament !  a  par- 
liament !  else  no  subsidies ! '    The  levy- 
ing of  the  subsidies,  verbally  granted  in 
parliament,    being    propounded    to    the 
subsidy-men  in  Westminster,  all  of  them, 
saving  some  thirty  among  five  thousand 
(and  they  all  the  king's  servants),  cried, 
'A  parliament !  a,  parliament! '  &c.    The 
same  was  done  in  Middlesex  on  Monday 
also,  in  five  or  six  places  ;  but  far  more 
are  said  to  have  refused  the  grant.     At 
Hicks's-hall,  the  men  of  Middlesex  as- 
sembled there,  when  they  had  heard  a 
speech    for    the     purpose,    made     their 
obeisance ;  and  so  went  out  without  any 
answer  affirmative  or  negative.     In  Kent 
the   whole 'county   denied,   saying   that 
subsidirs  were  matters  of  too  high  a  na- 
ture foi  them  to  meddle  withal,  and  that 
they  durst  not  deal  therewith,  lest  here- 
after they  might  be  called  in  question." 
July  22,  et  post.     In  Harleian  MSS.  vol. 
xxxvii.  fol.  192,  we  find  a  letter  from  the 


king  to  the  deputy-lieutenants  and  jus- 
tices of  every  county,  informing  them 
that  he  had  dissolved  the  last  parliament 
because  the  disordered  passion  of  some 
members  of  that  house,  contrary  to  the 
good  inclination  of  the  greater  and  wiser 
sort  of  them,  had  frustrated  the  grant 
of  four  subsidies  and  three  fifteenths, 
which  they  had  promised ;  he  therefore 
enjoins  the  deputy  lieutenants  to  cause 
all  the  troops  and  bands  of  the  county 
to  be  mustered,  trained,  and  ready  to 
march,  as  he  is  threatened  with  invasion; 
that  tlie  justices  do  divide  the  county 
into  districts,  and  appoint  in  each  able 
persons  to  collect  and  receive  moneys, 
promising  the  parties  to  employ  them  in 
the  common  defence ;  to  send  a  list  of 
those  who  contribute  and  those  who  re- 
fuse, "  that  we  may  hereby  be  informed 
who  are  well-affected  to  our  service,  and 
who  are  otherwise."  July  7.  1626.  It  is 
evident  that  the  pretext  of  invasion, 
which  was  utterly  improbable,  was  made 
use  of  in  order  to  shelter  the  king's  ille- 
gal proceedings. 
»  Rushworth's  Abr.  i.  270. 


CHA.  I.  — 1625-29.     COMMITTALS  FOR  REFUSAL.  375 

disguise  the  extreme  improbability  that  the  money  would 
be  repaid),  so  general  and  systematic  as  well  as  so  weighty, 
could  not  be  endured  without  establishing  a  precedent  that 
must  have  shortly  put  an  end  to  the  existence  of  parlia- 
ments. For,  if  those  assemblies  were  to  meet  only  for  the 
sake  of  pouring  out  stupid  flatteries  at  the  foot  of  the  throne, 
of  humbly  tendering  such  supplies  as  the  ministry  should 
suggest,  or  even  of  hinting  at  a  few  subordinate  grievances 
which  touched  not  the  king's  prerogative  and  absolute  con- 
trol in  matters  of  state  —  functions  which  the  Tudors  and 
Stuarts  were  well  pleased  that  they  should  exercise  —  if 
every  remonstrance  was  to  be  checked  by  a  dissolution,  and 
chastised  by  imprisonment  of  its  promoters,  every  denial  of 
subsidy  to  furnish  a  justification  for  extorted  loans,  our  free- 
born,  highminded  gentry  would  not  long  have  brooked  to 
give  their  attendance  in  such  an  ignominious  assembly,  and 
an  English  parliament  would  have  become  as  idle  a  mock- 
ery of  national  representation  as  the  cortes  of  Castile.  But 
this  kingdom  was  not  in  a  temper  to  put  up  with  tyr- 
anny. The  king's  advisers  were  as  little  disposed  to  recede 
from  their  attempt.  They  prepared  to  enforce  it  by  the 
arm  of  power.1  The  common  people  who  refused  to  con- 
tribute were  impressed  to  serve  in  the  navy.  The  gentry 
were  bound  by  recognizance  to  appear  at  the  Several  com 
council-table,  where  many  of  them  were  commit-  "f^iTo 
ted  to  prison.2  Among  these  were  five  knights,  contribute. 


1  The  321st  volume  of  Hargrave  MSS.,  timid  councillors.    The  king  pressed  it 

p.  300,  contains  minutes  of  a  debate  at  forward  much.     In  the  same  volume,  p. 

the  council-table  during  the  interval  be-  393,  we  find  other  proceedings  at   the 

tween  the  second  and  third  parliaments  council-table,  whereof   the  subject  was 

of  Charles,  taken  by  a  councillor.    It  was  the  censuring  or  punishing  of  some  one 

proposed  to  lay  an  excise  on  beer  ;  others  who  had  refused  to  contribute  to  the  loan 

suggested  that  it  should  be  on  malt,  on  of  1626,  on  the  ground  of  its  illegality, 

account  of  what  was  brewed  in  private  The  highest  language  is  held  by  some  of 

houses.     It  was  then  debated  "  how  to  the  conclave  in  this  debate, 

overcome  difficulties,  whether  by  persua-  Mr.  D'Israeli  has  collected  from  the 

Bion  or  force.    Persuasion,  it  was  thought,  same  copious  reservoir,  the  manuscripts 

would    not  gain   it  ;    and    for    judicial  of  the  British  Museum,  several  more  il- 

courses,  it  would  not  hold  against  the  lustrations  bofh"  of  the  arbitrary  proceed- 

subject  that  would  stand  upon  the  right  ings  of  the  council  and  of  the  bold  spirit 

of  his  own  property,  and  against  the  fun-  with  which  they  were  resisted.     Curiosi- 

da  mental  constitutions  of  the  kingdom,  ties   of  Literature,   new  series,  iii.  381. 

The  last  resort  was  to  a  proclamation  ;  But  this  ingenioiA  author  is  too  much 

for  in  star-chamber  it  might  be  punish-  imbued  with  "  the  monstrous  faith  of 

able,  and  thereupon  it  rested.''     There  many  made  for  one, "and  sets  the  private 

'fellows   much  more  :     it  seemed   to   be  feelings  of  Charles  for  an  unworthy  and 

agreed  that  there  was  such  a  necessity  as  dangerous  minion  above  the  liberties  and 

might  justify  the  imposition;  yet  a  sort  interests  of  the  nation, 

of  reluctance  is  visible  even  among  these  2  Rush  worth,  Kennet. 


376  ARGUMENTS  ON  QUESTION  OF  CHAP.  VII 

Darnel,  Corbet,  Earl,  Heveningliam,  and  Hampden,  who 
They  sue  for  a  sue<l  the  court  of  king's  bench  for  their  writ  of 
habeas  Corpus.  h;l]:jeas  corpus.  The  writ  was  granted;  but  the 
warden  of  the  Fleet  made  return  that  they  were  detained 
by  a  warrant  from  the  privy  council,  informing  him  of  no 
particular  cause  of  imprisonment,  but  that  they  were  com- 
mitted by  the  special  command  of  his  majesty.  This  gave 
rise  to  a  most  important  question,  whether  such  a  return  was 
sufficient  in  law  to  justify  the  court  in  remitting  the  parties 
to  custody.  The  fundamental  immunity  of  English  subjects 
from  arbitrary  detention  had  never  before  been  so  fully  can- 
vassed ;  and  it  is  to  the  discussion  which  arose  out  of  the 
case  of  these  five  gentlemen  that  we  owe  its  continual  as- 
sertion by  parliament,  and  its  ultimate  establishment  in  full 
practical  efficacy  by  the  statute  of  Charles  II.  It  was  ar- 
gued with  great  ability  by  Noy,  Selden,  and  other  eminent 
lawyers,  on  behalf  of  the  claimants,  and  by  the  attorney- 
general  Heath  for  the  crown. 

The  counsel  for  the  prisoners  grounded  their  demand  of 
.  .       liberty  on  the  original  basis  of  Magna  Charta,  the 

Arguments  J       . 

on  this  twenty-ninth  section  or  which,  as  is  well  known, 
question.  provides  that  "  no  free  man  shall  be  taken  or  im- 
prisoned unless  by  lawful  judgment  of  his  peers,  or  the  law 
of  the  land."  This  principle  having  been  frequently  trans- 
gressed by  the  king's  privy-  council  in  earlier  times,  statutes 
had  been  repeatedly  enacted,  independently  of  the  general 
confirmations  of  the  charter,  to  redress  this  material  griev- 
ance. Thus  in  the  25th  of  Edward  III.  it  is  provided  that 
"  no  one  shall  be  taken  by  petition  or  suggestion  to  the  king 
or  his  counsel,  unless  it  be  (i.  e.  but  only)  by  indictment  or 
presentment,  or  by  writ  original  at  the  common  law."  And 
this  is  again  enacted  three  years  afterwards,  with  little  varia- 
tion, and  once  again  in  the  course  of  the  same  reign.  It  was 
never  understood,  whatever  the  loose  language  of  these  old 
statutes  might  suggest,  that  no  man  could  be  kept  in  custody 
upon  a  criminal  charge  before  indictment,  which  would  have 
afforded  too  great  security  to  offenders.  But  it  was  the  reg- 
ular practice  that  every  wan-ant  of  commitment,  and  every 
return  by  a  jailer  to  the  writ  of 'habeas  corpus,  must  express 
the  nature  of  the  charge,  so  that  it  might  appear  whether  it 
were  no  legal  offence,  in  which  case  the  party  must  be  in- 
stantly set  at  liberty ;  or  one  for  which  bail  ought  to  be 


Ca&.  I.  — 1625-29.     RIGHT  TO  A  HABEAS  CORPUS.  377 

taken  ;  or  one  for  which  he  must  be  remanded  to  prison.  It 
appears  also  to  have  been  admitted  without  controversy, 
though  not  perhaps  according  to  the  strict  letter  of  law, 
that  the  privy  council  might  commit  to  prison  on  a  criminal 
charge,  since  it  seemed  preposterous  to  deny  that  power  to 
those  intrusted  with  the  care  of  the  commonwealth  which 
every  petty  magistrate  enjoyed.  But  it  was  contended  that 
they  were  as  much  bound  as  every  petty  magistrate  to  as- 
sign such  a  cause  for  their  commitments  as  might  enable  the 
court  of  king's  bench  to  determine  whether  it  should  release 
or  remand  the  prisoner  brought  before  them  by  habeas  cor- 
pus. 

The  advocates  for  this  principle  alleged  several  precedents 
from  the  reign  of  Henry  VII.  to  that  of  James,  where  per- 
sons committed  by  the  council  generally,  or  even,  by  the 
special  command  of  the  king,  had  been  admitted  to  bail  on 
their  habeas  corpus.  "  But  I  conceive,"  said  one  of  these, 
u  that  our  case  will  not  stand  upon  precedent,  but  upon  the 
fundamental  laws  and  statutes  of  this  realm ;  and  though  the 
precedents  look  one  way  or  the  other,  they  are  to  be  brought 
back  unto  the  laws  by  which  the  kingdom  is  governed."  He 
was  aware  that  a  pretext  might  be  found  to  elude  most  of  his 
precedents.  The  warrant  had  commonly  declared  the  party 
to  be  charged  on  suspicion  of  treason  or  of  felony ;  in  which 
case  he  would  of  course  be  bailed  by  the  court.  Yet  in  some 
of  these  instances  the  words  "  by  the  king's  special  com- 
mand" were  inserted  in  the  commitment ;  so  that  they  served 
to  repel  the  pretension  of  an  arbitrary  right  to  supersede  the 
law  by  his  personal  authority.  Ample  proof  was  brought 
from  the  old  law-books  that  the  king's  command  could  not 
excuse  an  illegal  act.  "  If  the  king  command  me,"  said  one 
of  the  judges  under  Henry  VI.,  "  to  arrest  a  man,  and  I  ar- 
rest him,  he  shall  have  an  action  of  false  imprisonment 
against  me,  though  it  was  done  in  the  king's  presence." 
"  The  king,"  said  chief-justice  Markham  to  Edward  IV., 
"  cannot  arrest  a  man  upon  suspicion  of  felony  or  treason,  as 
any  of  his  subjects  may ;  because,  if  he  should  wrong  a  man 
by  such  arrest,  he  can  have  no  remedy  against  him."  No 
verbal  order  of  the  king,  nor  any  under  his  sign  manual  or 
privy  signet,  was  a  command,  it  was  contended  by  Selden, 
which  the  law  would  recognize  as  sufficient  to  arrest  or  de- 
tain any  of  his  subjects,  a  writ  duly  issued  under  the  seal  of 


878  ARGUMENTS  OF  HEATH.  CHAP.  VII. 

a  court  being  the  only  language  in  which  he  could  signify 
his  will.  They  urged  further  that,  even  if  the  first  commit- 
ment by  the  king's  command  were  lawful,  yet,  when  a  party 
had  continued  in  prison  for  a  reasonable  time,  he  should  be 
brought  to  answer,  and  not  be  indefinitely  detained  —  liberty 
being  a  thing  so  favored  by  the  law  that  it  will  not  suffer 
any  man  to  remain  in  confinement  for  any  longer  time  than 
of  necessity  it  must. 

To  these  pleadings  for  liberty,  Heath,  the  attorney-gen« 
eral,  replied  in  a  speech  of  considerable  ability,  full  of  those 
high  principles  of  prerogative  which,  trampling  as  it  were  on 
all  statute  and  precedent,  seemed  to  tell  the  judges  that  they 
were  placed  there  to  obey  rather  than  to  determine.  "  This 
commitment,"  he  says,  "  is  not  in  a  legal  and  ordinary  way, 
but  by  the  special  command  of  our  lord  the  king,  which  im- 
plies not  only  the  fact  done,  but  so  extraordinarily  done,  that 
it  is  notoriously  his  majesty's  immediate  act  and  will  that  it 
should  be  so."  He  alludes  afterwards,  though  somewhat  ob- 
scurely, to  the  king's  absolute  power,  as  contradistinguished 
from  that  according  to  law  —  a  favorite  distinction,  as  I  have 
already  observed,  with  the  supporters  of  despotism.  "  Shall 
we  make  inquiries,"  he  says,  "  whether  his  commands  are 
lawful?  —  who  shall  call  in  question  the  justice  of  the  king's 
actions,  who  is  not  to  give  account  for  them  ?  "  He  argues, 
from  the  legal  maxim  that  the  king  can  do  no  wrong,  that  a 
cause  must  be  presumed  to  exist  for  the  commitment  though 
it  be  not  set  forth.  He  adverts  with  more  success  to  the 
number  of  papists  and  other  state-prisoners  detained  for 
years  in  custody  for  mere  political  jealousy.  "  Some  there 
were,"  he  says,  "in  the  Tower  who  were  put  in  it  when 
very  young ;  should  they  bring  a  habeas  corpus,  would  the 
court  deliver  them  ?  "  Passing  next  to  the  precedents  of  the 
other  side,  and  condescending  to  admit  their  validity,  how- 
ever contrary  to  the  tenor  of  his  former  argument,  he  evades 
their  application  by  such  distinctions  as  I  have  already  -men- 
tioned. 

The  judges  behaved  during  this  great  cause  with  apparent 
Which  la  moderation  and  sense  of  its  importance  to  the  sub- 
decided  ject's  freedom.  Their  decision,  however,  was  in 
thorn8  favor  of  the  crown ;  and  the  prisoners  were  re- 

manded to  custody.  In  pronouncing  this  judg- 
ment the  chief  justice,  sir  Nicholas  Hyde,  avoiding  the  more 


CHA.  I.  — 1625-29.   REFUSAL  OF  A  HABEAS  CORPUS.    379 

extravagant  tenets  of  absolute  monarchy,  took  the  narrower 
line  of  denying  the  application  of  those  precedents  which 
had  been  alleged  to  show  the  practice  of  the  court  in  bailing 
persons  committed  by  the  king's  special  command.  He 
endeavored  also  to  prove  that,  where  no  cause  had  been  ex- 
pressed in  the  warrant,  except  such  command  as  in  the  pres- 
ent instance,  the  judges  had  always  remanded  the  parties ; 
but  with  so  little  success,  that  I  cannot  perceive  more  than 
one  case  mentioned  by  him,  and  that  above  a  hundred  years 
old,  which  supports  this  doctrine.  The  best  authority  on 
which  he  had  to  rely  was  the  resolution  of  the  judges  in  the 
34th  of  Elizabeth,  published  in  Anderson's  Reports.1  For, 
though  this  is  not  grammatically  worded,  it  seems  impossible 
to  doubt  that  it  acknowledges  the  special  command  of  the 
king,  or  the  authority  of  the  privy  council  as  a  body,  to  be 
such  sufficient  warrant  for  a  commitment  as  to  require  no 
further  cause  to  be  expressed,  and  to  prevent  the  judges 
from  discharging  the  party  from  custody,  either  absolutely  or 
upon  bail.  Yet  it  was  evidently  the  consequence  of  this  de- 
cision that  every  statute  from  the  tune  of  Magna  Charta, 
designed  to  protect  the  personal  liberties  of  Englishmen,  be- 
came a  dead  letter,  since  the  insertion  of  four  words  in  a 
warrant  (per  speciale  mandatum  regis),  which  might  become 
matter  of  form,  would  control  their  remedial  efficacy.  And 
this  wound  was  the  more  deadly  in  that  the  notorious  cause 
of  these  gentlemen's  imprisonment  was  their  withstanding  an 
illegal  exaction  of  money.  Everything  that  distinguished 
our  constitutional  laws,  all  that  rendered  the  name  of  Eng- 
land valuable,  was  at  stake  in  this  issue.  If  the  judgment 
in  the  case  of  ship-money  was  more  flagrantly  iniquitous,  it 
was  not  so  extensively  destructive  as  the  present.3 

Neither  these  measures,  however,  of  illegal  severity  tow- 
ards the  uncompliant,  backed  as  they  were  by  a  timid  court 
of  justice,  nor  the  exhortations  of  a  more  prostitute  and 
shameless  band  of  churchmen,  could  divert  the  nation  from 
its  cardinal  point  of  faith  in  its  own  prescriptive  franchises. 

1  See  above,  in  chap.  v.    Coke  himself,  upon  a  certain  precedent,  which  being 
while  chief  justice,  had  held  that  one  nothing  to  the  purpose,  he  was  now  as- 
committed  by  the  privy  council  was  not  sured  his  opinion  was  as  little  to  the  pur- 
bailable  by  any  court  in  England.    Parl.  pose.     Id.  325.     State  Trials,  iii.  81. 
Hist.  810.     He  had  nothing  to  say,  when  «  State  Trials,  iii.  1-234  ;   Parl.  Hist. 
pressed  with  this  in  the  next  parliament,  246,  259,  &c. ;  Rushworth. 
but  that  he  had  misgrounded  his  opinion 


S80  PAELIAMENT  OF  1628.  CHAP.  \  1 

To  call  another  parliament  appeared  the  only  practice*  1e 
Apariia-  means  of  raising  money  for  a  war  in  which  i\& 
ment  called  king  persisted  with  great  impolicy,  or  rather  bliad 
trust  in  his  favorite.  He  consented  to  this  with 
extreme  unwillingness. 1  Previously  to  its  assembling  he  re- 
leased a  considerable  number  of  gentlemen  and  others  who 
had  been  committed  for  their  refusal  of  the  loan.  These  were 
in  many  cases  elected  to  the  new  parliament,  coming  thither 
with  just  indignation  at  their  country's  wrongs,  and  pardon- 
able resentment  of  their  own.  No  year,  indeed,  within  the 
memory  of  any  one  living  had  witnessed  such  violations  of 
public  liberty  as  1627.  Charles  seemed  born  to  carry  into 
daily  practice  those  theories  of  absolute  power  which  had 
been  promulgated  from  his  father's  lips.  Even  now,  while 
the  writs  were  out  for  a  new  parliament,  commissioners  were 
appointed  to  raise  money  "  by  impositions  or  otherwise,  as 
they  should  find  most  convenient  in  a  case  of  such  inevitable 
necessity,  wherein  form  and  circumstance  must  be  dispensed 
with  rather  than  the  substance  be  lost  and  hazarded ; " 2  and 
the  levying  of  ship-money  was  already  debated  in  the  coun- 
cil. Anticipating,  as  indeed  was  natural,  that  this  house  of 
commons  would  correspond  as  ill  to  the  king's  wishes  as  their 
predecessors,  his  advisers  were  preparing  schemes  more  con- 
genial, if  they  could  be  rendered  effective,  to  the  spirit  in 
which  he  was»to  govern.  A  contract  was  entered  into  for 
transporting  some  troops  and  a  considerable  quantity  of  arms 
from  Flanders  into  England,  under  circumstances  at  least 
highly  suspicious,  and  which,  combined  with  all  the  rest  that 
appears  of  the  court  policy  at  that  time,  leaves  no  great 
doubt  on  the  mind  that  they  were  designed  to  keep  under 
the  people  while  the  business  of  contribution  was  going  for- 
ward.8 Shall  it  be  imputed  as  a  reproach  to  the  Cokes,  the 
Seldens,  the  Glanvils,  the  Pyms,  the  Eliots,  the  Philipses  of 
this  famous  parliament,  that  they  endeavored  to  devise  more 
effectual  restraints  than  the  law  had  hitherto  imposed  on  a 
prince  who  had  snapped  like  bands  of  tow  the  ancient  stat- 
utes of  the  land,  to  remove  from  his  presence  counsellors  to 
have  been  misled  by  whom  was  his  best  apology,  and  to  sub- 

1  At  the  council-table,  some  proposing        -  Rushworth ;  Mede's  Letters  in  Harl. 
a  parliament,  the  king  said  he  did  abom-    MSS.  passim. 

inat*-   the  name.    Mede's  Letters,  30th        »  Kushworth's  Abr.  i.   304  ;    Cabala, 
Sept.  1626.  part  ii  217.    See  what  is  said  of  this  by 

Mr.  Broclie,  U.  158. 


CHA.  I.  — 1625-29.         PETITION  OF  RIGHT.  381 

ject  him  to  an  entire  dependence  on  his  people  for  the  ex- 
penditure of  government,  as  the  surest  pledge  of  his  obe- 
dience to  the  laws  ? 

The  principal  matters  of  complaint  taken  up  by  the  com- 
mons in  this  session  were,  the  exaction  of  money  under  the 
name  of  loans ;  the  commitment  of  those  who  refused  com- 
pliance, and  the  late  decision  of  the  king's  bench  remanding 
them  upon  a  habeas  corpus ;  the  billeting  of  soldiers  on  pri- 
vate persons,  which  had  occurred  in  the  last  year,  whether 
for  convenience  or  for  purposes  of  intimidation  and  annoy- 
ance ;  and  the  commissions  to  try  military  offenders  by  mar- 
tial law  —  a  procedure  necessary  within  certain  limits  to  the 
discipline  of  an  army,  but  unwarranted  by  the  constitution 
of  this  country,  which  was  little  used  to  any  regular  forces, 
and  stretched  by  the  arbitrary  spirit  of  the  king's  administra- 
tion beyond  all  bounds.1  These  four  grievances  Petition  of 
or  abuses  form  the  foundation  of  the  Petition  of  ^K^- 
Right,  presented  by  the  commons  in  the  shape  of  a  declara- 
tory statute.  Charles  had  recourse  to  many  subterfuges  in 
hopes  to  elude  the  passing  of  this  law ;  rather  per-  The  ]dn  ,g 
haps  through  wounded  pride,  as  we  may  judge  reluctance 
from  his  subsequent  conduct,  than  much  appre-  to  grant  it;' 
hension  that  it  would  create  a  serious  impediment  to  his  des- 
potic schemes.  He  tried  to  persuade  them  to  acquiesce  in  his 
royal  promise  not  to  arrest  any  one  without  just  cause,  or  in 
a  simple  confirmation  of  the  Great  Charter  and  other  stat- 
utes in  favor  of  liberty.  The  peers,  too  pliant  in  this  in- 
stance to  his  wishes,  and  half  receding  from  the  patriot  ban- 
ner they  had  lately  joined,  lent  him  their  aid  by  proposing 
amendments  (insidious  in  those  who  suggested  them,  though 
not  in  the  body  of  the  house),  which  the  commons  firmly  re- 
jected.2 Even  when  the  bill  was  tendered  to  him  for  that 

1  A  commission  addressed  to  lord  Wim-  additional  clause  adopted  by  the  lords, 
bleton,  28th  Dec.  1625,  empowers  him  to  reserving    the    king's  sovereign   power; 
proceed  against  soldiers,  or  dissolute  per-  which  very  justly  exposed  him  to  suspi- 
sons  joining    with    them,    who    should  cion  of  being  corrupted.    For  that  he 
commit  any   robberies,   &c.,   which  by  was  so  is  most  e vide ut  by  what  follows; 
martial  law  ought  to  be  punished  with  where  we  are  told  that  he  had  an  inter- 
death,   by  such  summary  course  as  is  view  with    the    duke  of    Buckingham, 
agreeable  to  martial  law,   &c.    Rymer,  when   they  were  reconciled ;  and  "  his 
xviii.  254.     Another,  in  1626,  may   be  grace  had  the  bishop's  consent,  with  a 
found,  p.  763.    It  is  unnecessary  to  point  little  asking,  that  he  would  be  his  grace's 
out  how  unlike  these  commissions  are  to  faithful  servant  in  the  next  session  of 
our  present  mutiny  bills.  parliament,  and  was  allowed  to  hold  up 

2  Bishop  Williams,  as  we  are  informed  a  seeming  enmity,  and  his  own  popular 
by  his  biographer,  though  he  promoted  estimation,  that  he  might  the  sooner  do 
the  Petition  of  Right,  stickled  for  the  the  work."    Hacketfs  Life  of  VV'illinins. 


382  PETITION  OF  RIGHT.  CHAP.  VII. 

assent  which  it  had  been  necessary  for  the  last  two  centuries 
that  the  king  should  grant  or  refu.se  in  a  word,  he  returned  a 
long  and  equivocal  answer,  from  which  it  could  only  be  col- 
lected that  he  did  not  intend  to  remit  any  portion  of  what  he 
had  claimed  as  his  prerogative.  But  on  an  address  from 
both  houses  for  a  more  explicit  answer,  he  thought  fit  to  con- 
sent to  the  bill  in  the  usual  form.  The  commons,  of  whose 
harshness  towards  Charles  his  advocates  have  said  so  much, 
immediately  passed  a  bill  for  granting  five  subsidies,  about 
350,000^  —  a  sum  not  too  great  for  the  wealth  of  the  king- 
dom or  for  his  exigencies,  but  considerable  according  to  the 
precedents  of  former  times,  to  which  men  naturally  look.1 

The  sincerity  of  Charles  in  thus  according  his  assent  to 
the  Petition  of  Right  may  be  estimated  by  the  following 
very  remarkable  conference  which  he  held  on  the  subject 
with  his  judges.  Before  the  bill  was  passed  he  sent  for  the 
two  chief  justices,  Hyde  and  Richardson,  to  Whitehall,  and 
propounded  certain  questions,  directing  that  the  other  judges 
should  be  assembled  in  order  to  answer  them.  The  first 
question  was,  "  Whether  in  no  case  whatsoever  the  king  may 
not  commit  a  subject  without  showing  cause  ? "  To  which 
the  judges  gave  an  answer  the  same  day  under  their  hands, 
which  was  the  next  day  presented  to  his  majesty  by  the  two 
chief  justices,  in  these  words  :  "  We  are  of  opinion  that,  by 
the  general  rule  of  law,  the  cause  of  commitment  by  his  maj- 
esty ought  to  be  shown ;  yet  some  cases  may  require  such 
secrecy,  that  the  king  may  commit  a  subject  without  showing 
the  cause  for  a  convenient  time."  The  king  then  delivered 
them  a  second  question,  and  required  them  to  keep  it  very 
secret,  as  the  former :  "  Whether,  in  case  a  habeas  corpus  be 
brought,  and  a  warrant  from  the  king  without  any  general  or 
special  cause  returned,  the  judges  ought  to  deliver  him  be- 
fore they  understand  the  cause  from  the  king?"  Their 

p.  77,  80.  With  such  instances  of  base-  observing  what  a  prodigious  weight  of 

ness  and  treachery  in  the  public  men  of  legal  ability  was  arrayed  on  the  side  of 

this  age.  surely  the  distrust  of  the  com-  the  petition,  very  fairly  determined  to 

rnons  was  not  so  extravagant  as  the  hear  counsel  for  the  crown.  One  of  these, 

school  of  Hume  pretend.  Serjeant  Ashley,  having  argued  in  behalf 

1  The  debates  and  conferences  on  this  of  the  prerogative  in  a  high  tone,  such 

momentous  subject,  especially  on  the  as  had  been  usual  in  the  late  reign,  was 

article  of  the  habeas  corpus,  occupy  near  ordered  into  custody  ;  and  the  lords  as- 

two  hundred  columns  in  the  New  Par-  sured  the  other  house  that  he  had  no 
liamentary  History,  to  which  I  refer  the»  authority  from  them  for  what  he  had 

reader.  "  said.  Id.  327.  A  remarkable  proof  of 

In  one  of  these  conferences  the  lords,  the  rapid  growth  of  popular  principles ' 


CHA.  I.  — 1625-29.  PETITION  OF  RIGHT.  383 

answer  was  as  follows:  "Upon  a  habeas  corpus  brought  for 
one  committed  by  the  king,  if  the  cause  be  not  specially  or 
generally  returned,  so  as  the  court  may  take  knowledge 
thereof,  the  party  ought  by  the  general  rule  of  law  to  be  de- 
livered. But,  if  the  case,  be  such  that  the  same  requireth 
secrecy,  and  may  not  presently  be  disclosed,  the  court  in  dis- 
cretion may  forbear  to  deliver  the  prisoner  for  a  convenient 
time,  to  the  end  the  court  may  be  advertised  of  the  truth 
thereof."  On  receiving  this  answer,  the  king  proposed  a 
third  question :  "  Whether,  if  the  king  grant  the  commons' 
petition,*  he  doth  not  thereby  exclude  himself  from  commit- 
ting or  restraining  a  subject  for  any  time  or  cause  whatso- 
ever without  showing  a  cause  ? "  The  judges  returned  for 
answer  to  this  important  query :  "  Every  law,  after  it  is 
made,  hath  its  exposition,  and  so  this  petition  and  answer 
must  have  an  exposition  as  the  case  in  the  nature  thereof 
shall  require  to  stand  with  justice ;  which  is  to  be  left  to  the 
courts  of  justice  to  determine,  which  cannot  particularly  be 
discovered  until  such  case  shall  happen.  And  although  the 
petition  be  granted,  there  is  no  fear  of  conclusion  as  is  inti- 
mated in  the  question."  1 

The  king,  a  very  few  days  afterwards,  gave  his  first  an- 
swer to  the  Petition  of  Right.  For  even  this  indirect  prom- 
ise of  compliance  which  the  judges  gave  him  did  not  relieve 
him  from  apprehensions  that  he  might  lose  the  prerogative 
of  arbitrary  commitment.  And  though,  after  being  beaten 
from  this  evasion,  he  was  compelled  to  accede  in  general 
terms  to  the  petition,  he  had  the  insincerity  to  circulate  one 
thousand  five  hundred  copies  of  it  through  the  country,  after 
the  prorogation,  with  his  first  answer  annexed  —  an  attempt 
to  deceive  without  the  possibility  of  success.2  But  instances 
of  such  ill  faith,  accumulated  as  they  are  through  the  life  of 
Charles,  render  the  assertion  of  his  sincerity  a  proof  either 
of  historical  ignorance,  or  of  a  want  of  moral  delicacy. 

The  Petition  of  Right,  as  this  statute  is  still  called,  from  its 
not  being  drawn  in  the  common  form  of  an  act  of  parliament, 
after  reciting  the  various  laws  which  have  established  certain 
essential  privileges  of  the  subject,  and  enumerating  the  vio- 
lations of  them  which  had  recently  occurred,  in  the  four  points 
of  illegal  exactions,  arbitrary  commitments,  quartering  of 

i  Hargrave  MSS.  xxxii.  97.  »  Parl.  Hist.  436. 


384  TONNAGE  AND  POUNDAGE.  CHAP.  VII. 

soldiers  or  sailors,  and  infliction  of  punishment  by  martial 
law,  prays  the  king,  "  That  no  man  hereafter  be  compelled 
to  make  or  yield  any  gift,  loan,  benevolence,  tax,  or  such-like 
charge,  without  common  consent  by  act  of  parliament;  and 
that  none  be  called  to  answer  or  take  such  oath,  or  to  give 
attendance,  or  be  confined  or  otherwise  molested  or  dis- 
quieted concerning  the  same,  or  for  refusal  thereof;  and  that 
no  freeman  in  any  such  manner  as  is  before  mentioned  be 
imprisoned  or  detained;  and  that  your  majesty  would  be 
pleased  to  remove,  the  said  soldiers  and  marines,  and  that 
your  people  may  not  be  so  burthened  in  time  to  coi|ie ;  and 
that  the  aforesaid  commissions  for  proceeding  by  martial  law 
may  be  revoked  and  annulled ;  and  that  hereafter  no  com- 
missions of  the  like  nature  may  issue  forth  to  any  person  or 
persons  whatever,  to  be  executed  as  aforesaid,  lest  by  color 
of  them  any  of  your  majesty's  subjects  be  destroyed  or  put 
to  death  contrary  to  the  laws  and  franchises  of  the  land."  1 

It  might  not  unreasonably  be  questioned  whether  the  lan- 
guage of  this  statute  were  sufficiently  general  to  comprehend 
duties  charged  on  merchandise  at  the  outports  as  well  as 
internal  taxes  and  exactions,  especially  as  the  former  had 
received  a  sort  of  sanction,  though  justly  deemed  contrary  to 
law,  by  the  judgment  of  the  court  of  exchequer  in  Bates's 
case.  The  comuions  however  were  steadily  determined  not 
to  desist  till  they  should  have  rescued  their  fellow-subjects 

from  a  burden  as  unwarrantably  imposed  as  those 
and'pcfund-  specifically  enumerated  in  their  Petition  of  Right. 
age  dis-  Tonnage  and  poundage,  the  customary  grant  of 

every  reign,  had  been  taken  by  the  present  king 
without  consent  of  parliament;  the  lords  having  rejected,  as 
before  mentioned,  a  bill  that  limited  it  to  a  single  year.  The 
house  now  prepared  a  bill  to  grant  it,  but  purposely  delayed 
its  passing,  in  order  to  remonstrate  with  the  king  against  hia 
unconstitutional  anticipation  of  their  consent.  They  declared 
"  that  there  ought  not  any  imposition  to  be  laid  upon  the 
goods  of  merchants,  exported  or  imported,  without  common 
consent  by  act  of  parliament ;  "  that  tonnage  and  poundage, 
like  other  subsidies,  sprung  from  the  free  grant  of  the  peo- 
ple ;  that,  "  when  impositions  had  been  laid  on  the  subjects' 

1  Stat.  3  Car.  I.  c.  1.    Hume  has  print-       brevity,  and  because  it  may  be  found  in 
ed  in  u  note  the  whole  statute  with  the       BO  common  a  book, 
preamble,  which  I  omit  for  the  sake  of 


CHA.  I.  — 1625-29.   TONNAGE  AND  POUNDAGE.        385 

goods  and  merchandises  without  authority  of  law,  which  had 
very  seldom  occurred,  they  had,  on  complaint  in  parliament, 
been  forthwith  relieved  ;  except  in  the  lase  king's  reign,  who, 
through  evil  counsel,  had  raided  the  rates  and  charges  to  the 
height  at  which  they  then  were."  They  conclude,  after  re- 
peating their  declaration  that  the  receiving  of  tonnage  and 
poundage  and  other  impositions  not  granted  by  parliament  is 
a  breach  of  the  fundamental  liberties  of  this  kingdom,  and 
contrary  to  the  late  Petition  of  Right,  with  most  humbly 
beseeching  his  majesty  to  forbear  any  further  receiving  of 
the  same,  and  not  to  take  it  in  ill  part  from  those  of  his  lov- 
ing subjects  who  should  refuse  to  make  payment  of  any  such 
charges  without  warrant  of  law.1 

The  king  anticipated  the  delivery  of  this  remonstrance  by 
proroguing  parliament.  Tonnage  and  poundage,  he  told 
them,  was  what  he  had  never  meant  to  give  away,  nor  could 
possibly  do  without.  By  this  abrupt  prorogation  while  so 
great  a  matter  was  unsettled,  he  trod  back  his  late  footsteps, 
and  dissipated  what  little  hopes  might  have  arisen  from  his 
tardy  assent  to  the  Petition  of  Right.  During  the  interval 
before  the  ensuing  session,  those  merchants,  among  whom 
Chambers,  Rolls,  and  Vassal  are  particularly  to  be  remem- 
bered with  honor,  who  gallantly  refused  to  comply  with  the 
demands  of  the  custom-house,  had  their  goods  distrained,  and, 
on  suing  writs  of  replevin,  were  told  by  the  judges  that  the 
king's  right,  having  been  established  in  the  case  of  Bates, 
could  no  longer  be  disputed.2  Thus  the  commons  reassem- 
bled, by  no  means  less  inflamed  against  the  king's  adminis- 
tration than  at  the  commencement  of  the  preceding  session. 
Their  proceedings  were  conducted  with  more  than  usual 
warmth.8  Buckingham's  death,  which  had  occurred  since 
the  prorogation,  did  not  allay  their  resentment  against  the 
advisers  of  the  crown.  But  the  king,  who  had  very  much 
lowered  his  tone  in  speaking  of  tonnage  and  poundage,  and 
would  have  been  content  to  receive  it  as  their  grant,  per- 
ceiving that  they  were  bent  on  a  full  statutory  recognition  of 
the  illegality  of  impositions  without  their  consent,  and  that 
they  had  opened  a  fresh  battery  on  another  side,  by  mingling 


i  Parl.  Hist.  431.  »  Parl.  Hist.  441,  io. 

*  Kushworth,  Abr.  i.  409. 
VOL.  i.  —  c.  25 


386  PROSECUTION  OF  PURITANS.  CHAP.  VII 

in  certain  religious  disputes  in  order  to  attack  some  of  his 
The  king  favorite  prelates,  took  the  step,  to  which  he  was 
tile'pariia-  always  inclined,  of  dissolving  this  third  parlia- 
ment, ment. 

The  religious  disputes  to  which  I  have  just  alluded  are 
Religious  chiefly  to  be  considered,  for  the  present  purpose, 
differences.  jn  their  relation  to  those  jealousies  and  resent- 
ments springing  out  of  the  ecclesiastical  administration, 
which  during  the  reigns  of  the  two  first  Stuarts  furnished 
unceasing  food  to  political  discontent.  James  having  early 
shown  his  inflexible  determination  to  restrain  the  puritans, 
the  bishops  proceeded  with  still  more  rigor  than  under  Eliz- 
abeth. No  longer  thwarted,  as  in  her  time,  by  an  unwilling 
council,  they  succeeded  in  exacting  a  general  conformity  to 
the  ordinances  of  the  church.  It  had  been  solemnly  decided 
by  the  judges  in  the  queen's  reign,  and  in  1604,  that,  al- 
though the  statute  establishing  the  high-commission  court  did 
not  authorize  it  to  deprive  ministers  of  their  benefices,  yet, 
this  law  being  only  in  affirmation  of  the  queen's  inherent 
supremacy,  she  might,  by  virtue  of  that,  regulate  all  eccle- 
siastical matters  at  her  pleasure,  and  erect  courts  with  such 
Prosecution  P°wers  as  she  should  think  fit.  Upon  this  some- 
of  puritans  what  dangerous  principle  archbishop  Bancroft  de- 
prived a  considerable  number  of  puritan  clergy- 
men ; l  while  many  more,  finding  that  the  interference  of  the 
commons  in  their  behalf  was  not  regarded,  and  that  all 
schemes  of  evasion  were  come  to  an  end,  were  content  to 
submit  to  the  obnoxious  discipline.  But  their  affections 
being  very  little  conciliated  by  this  coercion,  there  remained 
a  large  party  within  the  bosom  of  the  established  church 
prone  to  watch  for  and  magnify  the  errors  of  their  spiritual 
rulers.  These  men  preserved  the  name  of  puritans.  Austere 
in  their  lives,  while  many  of  the  others  were  careless  or  ir- 

1  Cawdrey's    Case,    5   Reports  ;    Cro.  illiterate  incumbent,  of  whom  there  wa» 

Jac.  87 ;   Neal,  p.  432.     The  latter  says  a  Tery  large  number,  being  a  noncon- 

above  three  hundred  were  deprived  ;  but  formist.      This  general   enforcement  of 

Collier  reduces  them  to  forty-nine,  p.  687.  conformity,  however  it  might  compel  the 

The    former  writer  states   the    uoncon-  majority's  obedience  rendered  the  sepa- 

formist  ministers  at  this  time  in  twenty-  ration  of  the  incompliant  more  decided, 

four  counties  to  have  been  754 ;  of  course  Neal,   446.      Many  retired    to    Holland, 

the  whole   number  was  much   greater :  especially  of   tlie    Brownist  or  Indepen- 

p.  434.     This  minority  was  considerable  ;  dent  denomination.     Id.  436.     And  Han- 

but  it  is  chiefly  to  be  noticed  that  it  con-  croft,  like  his  successor  Laud,  interfered 

tained  the  more  exemplary   portion  of  to  stop  some  who  were  setting  out.  for 

tlie  clergy  ;  no  scandalous  or  absolutely  Virginia.    Id.  454. 


CHA.  I.  — 1625-29.     GROWTH  OF  HIGH-CHURCH  TENETS.      387 

regular,  learned  as  a  body  comparatively  with  the  opposite 
party,  implacably  averse  to  everything  that  could  be  con- 
strued into  an  approximation  to  popery,  they  acquired  a 
degree  of  respect  from  grave  men  which  would  have  been 
much  more  general  had  they  not  sometimes  given  offence  by 
a  moroseness  and  even  malignity  of  disposition,  as  well  as  by 
a  certain  tendency  to  equivocation  and  deceitfulness  ;  faults, 
however,  which  so  frequently  belong  to  the  weaker  party 
under  a  rigorous  government  that  they  scarcely  afford  a 
marked  reproach  against  the  puritans.  They  naturally  fell 
in  with  the  patriotic  party  in  the  house  of  commons,  and 
kept  up  throughout  the  kingdom  a  distrust  of  the  crown, 
which  has  never  been  so  general  in  England  as  when  con- 
nected with  some  religious  apprehensions. 

The  system  pursued  by  Bancroft  and  his  imitators,  bishops 
Neile  and  Laud,  with  the  approbation  of  the  king,  Qrowth  of 
far  opposed  to  the  healing  councils  of  Burleigh  high-church 
and  Bacon,  was  just  such  as  low-born  and  little-  tel 
minded  men,  raised  to  power  by  fortune's  caprice,  are  ever 
found  to  pursue.  They  studiously  aggravated  every  differ- 
ence, and  irritated  every  wound.  As  the  characteristic  prej- 
udice of  the  puritans  was  so  bigoted  an  abhorrence  of  the 
Romish  faith  that  they  hardly  deemed  its  followers  to  de- 
serve the  name  of  Christians,  the  prevailing  high-church 
party  took  care  to  shock  that  prejudice  by  somewhat  of  a 
retrograde  movement,  and  various  seeming,  or  indeed  real, 
accommodations  of  their  tenets  to  those  of  the  abjured  re- 
ligion. They  began  by  preaching  the  divine  right,  as  it  is 
called,  or  absolute  indispensability,  of  episcopacy ;  a  doctrine 
of  which  the  first  traces,  as  I  apprehend,  are  found  about  the 
end  of  Elizabeth's  reign.1  They  insisted  on  the  necessity  of 


1  Lord  Bacon,  in  his  advertisement  re-  ment  In  England  ;  the  first  bishop  who 
upecting  the  Controversies  of  the  Church  objected  to  them  seems  to  have  been 
of  England,  written  under  Elizabeth,  Aylmer.  Instances,  however,  of  foreign- 
speaks  of  this  notion  as  newly  broached,  ers  holding  preferment  without  any  re- 
"  Ye\,  and  some  indiscreet  persons  have  ordination,  may  be  found  down  to  the 
been  bold  in  open  preaching  to  use  dis-  civil  wars.  Annals  of  Reformation,  ii. 
honourable  and  derogatory  speech  and  522,  and  Appendix,  116;  Life  of  Griudal, 
censure  of  the  churches  abroad ;  and  that  271;  Collier,  ii.  594;  Neal.  i.  258.  The 
so  far  as  some  of  our  men  ordained  in  cases  of  laymen,  such  as  Casaubon  hold- 
foreign  parts  have  been  pronounced  to  ing  prebends  by  dispensation,  are  not  in 
be  no  lawful  ministers."  Vol.  i.  p.  382.  point. 

It  is  evident,  by  some  passages  in  Strype,  The  divine  right  of  episcopacy  is  said 

attentively  considered,  that  natives 'regu-  to  have  been  laid  down  by  Bancroft,  in 

lariy  ordained  abroad  in  the  presbyterian  his  famous  sermon  at   Paul's  Cross  in 

churches  were  admitted  to  hold  prefer-  1688.    But  I  do  not  find  any  thing  in  it  to 


388  OBSERVANCE  OF  SUNDAY.  CHAP.  VII. 

episcopal  succession  regularly  derived  from  the  apostles. 
They  drew  an  inference  from  this  tenet,  that  ordinations  by 
presbyters  were  in  all  cases  null.  And  as  this  affected  all 
the  reformed  churches  in  Europe  except  their  own,  the 
Lutherans  not  having  preserved  the  succession  of  their  bish- 
ops, while  the  calvinists  had  altogether  abolished  that  order, 
thoy  began  to  speak  of  them  not  as  brethren  of  the  same 
faith,  united  in  the  same  cause,  and  distinguished  only  by 
differences  little  more  material  than  those  of  political  com- 
monwealths (which  had  been  the  language  of  the  church  of 
England  ever  since  the  Reformation),  but  as  aliens,  to  whom 
they  were  not  at  all  related,  and  schismatics,  with  whom  they 
held  no  communion ;  nay,  as  wanting  the  very  essence  of  a 
Christian  society.  This  again  brought  them  nearer  by  irre- 
sistible consequence  to  the  disciples  of  Rome,  whom,  with 
becoming  charity,  but  against  the  received  creed  of  the  pu- 
ritans, and  perhaps  against  their  own  articles,  they  all  ac- 
knowledged to  be  a  part  of  the  catholic  church,  while  they 
were  withholding  that  appellation,  expressly  or  by  inference, 
from  Heidelberg  and  Geneva. 

The  founders  of  the  English  Reformation,  after  abolishing 
_.._  most  of  the  festivals  kept  before  that  time,  had 

Differences  ,       ,.    .  ,  ' 

as  to  the  made  little  or  no  change  as  to  the  mode  of  ob- 
onsuwiny.  servance  of  those  they  retained.  Sundays  and 
holidays  stood  much  on  the  same  footing,  as  days 
on  which  no  work  except  for  good  cause  was  to  be  performed, 
the  service  of  the  church  was  to  be  attended,  and  any  law- 
ful amusement  might  be  indulged  in.1  A  just  distinction 
however  soon  grew  up ;  an  industrious  people  could  spare 
time  for  very  few  holidays ;  and  the  more  scrupulous  party, 

that   effect.    It  is  however  pretty  dis-        [A  learned  and  candid  Oxford  write! 

tinctly  asserted,  if  I  mistake  not   the  (Cardwell's  Annals  of  the  Church,  vol.  ii. 

sense,  in  the  canons  of  1606.     Overall's  p.  5)  has  supposed  me  to  have  overlooked 

Convocation  Book,  179,  &c.     Yet  Laud  a  passage  in  Bancroft's  Sermon  at  Paul'a 

had  been  reproved  by  the  university  of  Cross,  p.  97.  where  he  asserts  the  dirina 

Oxford,  in  1664,  for  maintaining,  in  his  right  of  episcopacy.     But,  on  referring 

exercise   for   bachelor  of   divinity,   that  again  to  this  passage,  it  is  perfectly  evi- 

there  could  be  no  true  church  without  dent  that  he  says  nothing  about  what 

bishops,  which  was   thought  to  cast    a  is  commonly  meant  by  the  jure  divino 

bone  of  contention  between  the  church  doctrine,  the  perpetual  and  indispensable 

of  England  and  the  reformed  upon  the  government  by  bishops,  confining  him- 

Continent.     Heylin's  Life  of  Laud,  54.  self  to  an  assertion  of  the  fact,  and  that 

Cranmer,   and    some    of    the  original  in  no  strong  terms.     1845.] 
founders  of  the  Anglican  church,  far  from        1  See  the  queen's  injunctions  of  1559, 

maintaining  the  divine  and  indispensable  Somers  Tracts,  i.  65;   and  compare  pre« 

right  of  episcopal  government,  held  bish-  amble  of  5  &  6  of  Kdw.  VI.  c.  3. 
ops  aud  uriests  to  be  the  same  order. 


CHA.  I.  — 1625-29.     OBSERVANCE  OF  SUNDAY. 


389 


while  they  slighted  the  church-festivals  as  of  human  appoint- 
ment, prescribed  a  stricter  observance  of  the  Lord's  day. 
But  it  was  not  till  about  1595  that  they  began  to  place  it 
very  nearly  on  the  footing  of  the  Jewish  sabbath,  interdict- 
ing not  only  the  slightest  action  of  worldly  business,  but  even 
every  sort  of  pastime  and  recreation  ;  a  system  which,  once 
promulgated,  soon  gained  ground  as  suiting  their  atrabilious 
humor,  and  affording  a  new  theme  of  censure  on  the  vices  of 
the  great.1  Those  who  opposed  them  on  the  high-church 
side  not  only  derided  the  extravagance  of  the  Sabbatarians, 
as  the.  others  were  called,  but  pretended  that,  the  command- 
ment having  been  confined  to  the  Hebrews,  the  modern  ob- 
servance of  the  first  day  of  the  week  as  a  season  of  rest  and 
devotion  was  an  ecclesiastical  institution,  and  in  no  degree 
more  venerable  than  that  of  the  other  festivals  or  the  season 
of  Lent,  which  the  puritans  stubbornly  despised.2  Such  a 


1  The  first  of  these  Sabbatarians  was 
a  Dr.  Bound,  whose  sermon  was  sup- 
pressed by  Whitgift's  order.  But  some 
years  before,  one  of  Martin  Mar-prelate's 
charges  against  Aylmer  was  for  playing 
at  bowls  on  Sundays  ;  and  the  word  gab- 
bath,  as  applied  to  that  day,  may  be 
found  occasionally  under  Elizabeth, 
though  by  no  means  so  usual  as  after- 
wards ;  it  is  even  recognized  in  the  Hom- 
ilies. One  of  Bound's  recommendations 
•was  that  no  feasts  should  be  given  on 
that  day,  "  except  by  lords,  knights,  and 
persons  of  quality  ;  "  for  which  unlucky 
reservation  his  adversaries  did  not  forget 
to  deride  him.  Fullers  Church  History, 
p.  227.  This  writer  describes,  in  his 
quaint  style,  the  abstinence  from  sports 
produced  by  this  new  doctrine  ;  and  re- 
marks, what  a  slight  acquaintance  with 
human  nature  would  have  taught  arch- 
bishop Laud,  that  "  the  more  liberty 
people  were  offered,  the  less  they  used  it ; 
it  was  sport  for  them  to  refrain  from 
sport."  See  also  Collier,  643;  Neal,  386 ; 
Strype's  Whitgift.  530 ;  May's  Hist,  of 
Parliament,  16. 

.2  Heylin's  Life  of  Laud,  15;  Fuller, 
part  ii.  p.  76. 

The  regulations  enacted  at  various 
times  since  the  Reformation  for  the  ob- 
servance of  abstinence  in  as  strict  a 
manner,  though  not  ostensibly  on  the 
same  grounds,  as  it  is  enjoined  in  the 
church  of  Rome,  may  deserve  some  no- 
tice. A  statute  of  1548  (2  and  3  Ed- 
ward VI.  c.  19),  after  reciting  that  one 
day  or  one  kind  of  meat  is  not  more  holy, 
pure,  or  clean  than  another,  and  much 
else  to  the  same  effect,  yet,  "  forasmuch 


as  divers  of  the  king's  subjects,  turning 
their  knowledge  therein  to  gratify  their 
sensuality,  have  of  late  more  than  in 
times  past  broken  and  contemned  such 
abstinence,  which  hath  been  used  in  this 
realm  upon  the  Fridays  and  Saturdays, 
the  embering  days,  and  other  days  com- 
monly called  vigils,  and  in  the  time 
commonly  called  Lent,  and  other  accus- 
tomed times  ;  the  king's  majesty,  con- 
sidering that  due  and  godly  abstinence 
is  a  mean  to  virtue  and  to  subdue  men's 
bodies  to  their  soul  and  spirit,  and  con- 
sidering also  especially  that  fishers  and 
men  using  the  trade  of  fishing  in  the  sea 
may  thereby  the  rather  be  set  on  work, 
and  that  by  eating  of  fish  much  flesh 
shall  be  saved  and  increased,"  enacts, 
after  repealing  all  existing  laws  on  the 
subject,  that  such  as  eat  flesh  at  the  for- 
bidden seasons  shall  incur  a  penalty  of 
ten  shillings,  or  ten  days'  imprisonment, 
without  flesh,  and  a  double  penalty  for 
the  second  offence. ' 

The  next  statute  relating  to  abstinence 
is  one  (5th  Elia.  c.  5)  entirely  for  the 
increase  of  the  fishery.  It  enacts,  $  15, 
&c.,  that  no  one,  unless  having  a  license, 
shall  eat  flesh  on  fish-days,  or  on  Wednes- 
days, now  made  an  additional  fish-day, 
under  a  penalty  of  3/.,  or  three  months' 
imprisonment.  Except  that  every  one 
having  three  dishes  of  sea-fish  at  his 
table,  might  have  one  of  flesh  also.  But, 
"  because  no  manner  of  person  shall 
misjudge  of  the  intent  of  this  statute," 
it  is  enacted  that  whosoever  shall  notify 
that  any  eating  of  fish  or  forbearing  of 
flesh  me'ntioned  therein  ia  of  any  nt«ces- 
sity  for  the  saving  of  the  soul  of  man,  or 


300 


OBSERVANCE  OF   SUNDAY. 


CHAP.  VII. 


controversy  might  well  have  been  left  to  the  usual  weapons. 
But  James  I.,  or  some  of  the  bishops  to  whom  he  likened, 
bethought  themselves  that  this  might  serve  as  a  te.=t  of  pu- 
ritan ministers.  He  published  accordingly  a  declaration  to 
be  read  in  churches,  permitting  all  lawful  recreations  on 
Sunday  after  divine  service,  such  as  dancing,  archery, 
May-games,  and  morrice-dances,  and  other  usual  sports 
but  with  a  prohibition  of  bear-baiting  and  other  unlawful 
games.  No  recusant,  or  any  one  who  had  not  attended  the 


that  it  is  the  service  of  God.  otherwise 
than  as  other  politic  laws  are  and  be ; 
that  then  such  persons  shall  be  punished 
as  spreaders  of  false  news,  §  39  and  40. 
The  act  27th  Eliz.  c.  11,  repeals  the  pro- 
hibition as  to  Wednesday  ;  and  provides 
that  no  victuallers  shall  vend  flesh  in 
Lent,  nor  upon  Fridays  or  Saturdays, 
tinder  a  penalty.  The  35th  Eliz.  c.  7, 
$  22,  reduces  the  penalty  of  SI.,  or  three 
months'  imprisonment,  enacted  by  5th 
of  Eliz.,  to  one  third.  This  is  the  latest 
statute  that  appears  on  the  subject. 

Many  proclamations  appear  to  have 
been  issued  in  order  to  enforce  an  ob- 
servance so  little  congenial  to  the  pro- 
pensities of  Englishmen.  One  of  those 
in  the  first  year  of  Edward  was  before  any 
statute ;  and  its  very  words  respecting  the 
indifference  of  meats  in  a  religious  sense 
were  adopted  by  the  legislature  the  next 
year.  (Strype's  Eccles.  Memor.  ii.  81.) 
In  one  of  Elizabeth's,  A.  D.  1572,  as  in  the 
statute  of  Edward,  the  political  motives 
of  the  prohibition  seem  in  some  measure 
associated  with  the  superstition  it  dis- 
claims ;  for  eating  in  the  season  of  Lent 
is  called  "  licentious  and  carnal  disorder, 
in  contempt  of  God  and  man,  and  only 
to  the  satisfaction  of  devilish  and  carnal 
appetite  ;  "  and  butchers,  &c.,  "  minis- 
tering to  such  foul  lust  of  the  flesh," 
were  severely  mulcted.  Strype's  Annals, 
ii.  208.  But  in  1576  another  proclama- 
tion to  the  same  effect  uses  no  such  hard 
words,  and  protests  strongly  against  any 
superstitious  interpretation  of  its  mo- 
tives. Life  of  Griudal,  p.  226.  So  also 
in  1579,  Strype's  Annals,  ii.  608,  and,  as 
far  as  I  have  observed,  in  all  of  a  later 
date,  the  encouragement  of  the  navy  and 
fishery  is  set  forth  as  their  sole  ground. 
In  1596,  Whitgift,  by  the  queen's  com- 
mand, issued  letters  to  the  bishops  of  his 
province  to  take  order  that  the  fasting- 
days,  Wednesday  and  Friday,  should  be 
kept,  and  no  suppers  eaten,  especially  on 
Friday  evens.  This  was  on  account  of 
the  great  dearth  of  that  and  the  preced- 
ing year.  Strype's  Whitgift,  p.  490.  These 
proclamations  for  the  observance  of  Lent 


continued  under  James  and  Charles,  as 
late,  I  presume,  as  the  commencement  of 
the  civil  war.  They  were  diametrically 
opposed  to  the  puritan  tenets  :  for,  not- 
withstanding the  pretext  about  the  fish- 
ery, there  is  no  doubt  that  the  dominant 
ecclesiastics  maintained  the  observance 
of  Lent  as  an  ordinance  of  the  church. 
But  I  suspect  that  little  regard  was 
paid  to  Friday  and  Saturday  as  days  of 
weekly  fast.  Rymer,  xvii.  131,  134,  349; 
xviii.  268,  282,  9'61. 

This  abstemious  system,  however,  was 
only  compulsory  on  the  poor.  Licenses 
were  easily  obtained  by  others  from  the 
privy  council  in  Edward's  days,  and 
afterwards  from  thp  bishop.  They  were 
empowered,  with  their  guests,  to  eat 
flesh  on  all  fasting-days  for  life.  Some- 
times the  number  of  guests  was  limited. 
Thus  the  marquis  of  Winchester  had 
permission  for  twelve  friends  ;  and  John 
Sandford,  draper  of  Gloucester,  for  two. 
Strype's  Memorials,  ii.  82.  The  act  above 
mentioned  for  encouragement  of  the  fish- 
ery, 5th  Eliz  c.  5,  provides  that  11. 6s  8rf. 
shall  be  paid  for  granting  every  license, 
and  fe.  8rf.  annually  afterwards,  to  the 
poor  of  the  parish.  But  no  license  was 
to  be  granted  for  eating  beef  at  any  time 
of  the  year,  or  veal  from  Michaelmas  to 
the  1st  of  May.  A  melancholy  priva- 
tion to  our  countrymen  !  but,  I  have  no 
doubt,  little  regarded.  Strype  makes 
known  to  us  the  interesting  fact  that 
Ambrose  Potter,  of  Gravesend,  and  his 
wife,  had  permission  from  archbishop 
Whitgift  ''  to  eat  flesh  and  white  meats 
in  Lent  during  their  lives ;  so  that  it  was 
done  soberly  and  frugally,  cautiously, 
and  avoiding  public  scandal  as  much  aa 
might  be,  and  giving  6s.  &d.  annually  to 
the  poor  of  the  parish.'  Life  of  Whit 
gift,  246. 

The  civil  wars  did  not  so  put  an  end  to 
the  compulsory  observance  of  Lent  and 
fish-days,  but  that  similar  proclamations 
are  found  after  the  Restoration,  I  know 
not  how  long.  Kennet's  Register,  p.  867 
and  558. 


CHA.  1.-  1625-29.     OBSERVANCE  OF  SUNDAY.  391 

church-service,  was  entitled  to  this  privilege,  which  might 
consequently  be  regarded  as  a  bounty  on  devotion.  The 
severe  puritan  saw  it  in  no  such  point  of  view.  To  his 
cynical  temper  May-games  and  morrice-dances  were  hardly 
tolerable  on  six  days  of  the  week ;  they  were  now  recom- 
mended for  the  seventh.  And  this  impious  license  was  to 
be  promulgated  in  the  church  itself.  It  is  indeed  difficult  to 
explain  so  unnecessary  an  insult  on  the  precise  clergy  but 
by  supposing  an  intention  to  harass  those  who  should  refuse 
compliance.1  But  this  intention,  from  whatever  cause,  per- 
haps through  the  influence  of  Archbishop  Abbot,  was  not 
carried  into  effect,  nor  was  the  declaration  itself  enforced  till 
the  following  reign. 

The  house  of  commons  displayed  their  attachment  to  the 
puritan  maxims,  or  their  dislike  of  the  prelatical  clergy,  by 
bringing  in  bills  to  enforce  a  greater  strictness  in  this  re- 
spect. A  circumstance  that  occurred  in  the  session  of  1621 
will  serve  to  prove  their  fanatical  violence.  A  bill  having 
been  brought  in  "  for  the  better  observance  of  the  Sabbath, 
usually  called  Sunday,"  one  Mr.  Shepherd,  sneering  at  the 
puritans,  remarked  that,  as  Saturday  was  dies  Sabbati,  this 
might  be  entitled  a  bill  for  the  observance  of  Saturday,  com- 
monly called  Sunday.  This  witticism  brought  on  his  head 
the  wrath  of  that  dangerous  assembly.  He  was  reprimanded 
on  his  knees,  expelled  the  house,  and,  when  he  saw  what 
befell  poor  Floyd,  might  deem  himself  cheaply  saved  from 
their  fangs  with  no  worse  chastisement.2  Yet  when  the 
upper  house  sent  down  their  bill  with  "  the  Lord's  day  "  sub- 
stituted for  "  the  Sabbath,"  observing  "  that  people  do  now 
much  incline  to  words  of  Judaism,"  the  commons  took  no 
exception.8  The  use  of  the  word  Sabbath  instead  of  Sunday 
became  in  that  age  a  distinctive  mark  of  the  puritan  party. 

1  Wilson,  709.  necessity  of  compliance  with  them,  re- 

2  Debates  in  Parliament,  1621,  vol.  i.  solved  to  grant  them  their  desires  in  that 
p.  45.  52.     The  king  requested  them  not  particular,  to  the  end  that  they  might 
to  pass  this  bill,  being  so  directly  against  grant  his  also  in  the  aid  required   when 
his   proclamation.     Id.  60      Shepherd's  that  obstruction  was  removed.     The  Sab- 
expulsion  is   mentioned  in  Mede's  Let-  batarians  tooli^  the  benefit  of  this  oppor- 
ters,  Harl.  MSS.,  389.  tunity  for  the  obtaining  of  this   grant, 

3  Vol.  ii.  97.      Two  acts  were  passed,  the  first  that  ever  they  obtained  by  all 
1  Car.  I.  c.  1,  and  3  Car.  I.  c.  2,  for  the  their  strugglings,  which,  of  what  conse- 
better  observance  of  Sunday ;  the  former  quence  it  was  we  shall   see    hereafter.' 
of  which  gave  great  annoyance,  it  seems,  Life  of  Laud,  p.  129.      Vet  this  statute 
to  the  orthodox  party.     "  Had  any  such  permits   the  people    lawful    sports  and 
bill,"  says  Heylin,  "  been  offered  in  king  pastimes  on  Sundays  within   their  own 
James's  time,  it  would  have  found  a  sorry  parishes. 

welcome ;  but  this  king,  being  under  a 


392  ARMINIAN  CONTROVERSY.  CHAP   VH 

A  far  more  permanent  controversy  sprang  up  about  the 
Arminian  end  of  the  same  reign,  which  afforded  a  new  pre- 
controversy.  tex{  for  intolerance,  and  a  fresh  source  of  mutual 
hatred.  Every  one  of  my  readers  is  acquainted  more  or  less 
with  the  theological  tenets  of  original  sin,  free-will,  and  pre- 
destination, variously  taught  in  the  schools,  and  debated  by 
polemical  writers  for  so  many  centuries ;  and  few  can  be 
ignorant  that  the  articles  of  our  own  church,  as  they  relate 
to  these  doctrines,  have  been  very  differently  interpreted, 
and  that  a  controversy  about  their  meaning  has  long  been 
carried  on  with  a  pertinacity  which  could  not  have  continued, 
on  so  limited  a  topic,  had  the  combatants  been  merely  in- 
fluenced by  the  love  of  truth.  Those  who  have  no  bias  to 
warp  their  judgment  will  not  perhaps  have  much  hesitation 
in  drawing  their  line  between,  though  not  at  an  equal  dis- 
tance between,  the  conflicting  parties.  It  appears,  on  the  one 
hand,  that  the  articles  are  worded  on  some  of  these  doctrines 
with  considerable  ambiguity ;  whether  we  attribute  this  to 
the  intrinsic  obscurity  of  the  subject,  to  the  additional  diffi- 
culties with  which  it  had  been  entangled  by  theological 
systems,  to  discrepancy  of  opinion  in  the  compilers,  or  to 
their  solicitude  to  prevent  disunion  by  adopting  formularies 
which  men  of  different  sentiments  might  subscribe.  It  is 
also  manifest  that  their  framers  came,  as  it  were,  with  avert- 
ed eyes  to  the  Augustinian  doctrine  of  predestination,  and 
wisely  reprehended  those  who  turned  their  attention  to  a 
system  so  pregnant  with  objections,  and  so  dangerous,  when 
needlessly  dwelt  upon,  to  all  practical  piety  and  virtue.  But, 
on  the  other  hand,  this  very  reluctance  to  inculcate  the  tenet 
is  so  expressed  as  to  manifest  their  uridoubting  belief  in  it ; 
nor  is  it  possible  either  to  assign  a  motive  for  inserting  the 
seventeenth  article,  or  to  give  any  reasonable  interpretation 
to  it,  upon  the  theory  which  at  present  passes  for  orthodox 
in  the  English  church.  And  upon  other  subjects  intimately 
related  to  the  former,  such  as  the  penalty  of  original  sin  and 
the  depravation  of  human  nature,  the  articles,  after  making 
every  allowance  for  want  of  precision,  seem  totally  irrecon- 
cilable with  the  scheme  usually  denominated  Arminian. 

The  force  of  those  conclusions  which  we  must,  in  my  judg- 
ment deduce  from  the  language  of  these  articles,  will  be 
materially  increased  by  that  appeal  to  contemporary  and 
other  early  authorities  to  which  recourse  has  been  had  in 


CHA.  I.  — 1625-29.     ARMINIAN  CONTROVERSY.  393 

order  to  invalidate  them.  Whatever  doubts  may  be  raised 
as  to  the  Calvinism  of  Cranmer  and  Ridley,  there  can  surely 
be  no  room  for  any  as  to  the  chiefs  of  the  Anglican  church 
under  Elizabeth.  We  find  explicit  proofs  that  Jewell,  Now- 
ell,  Sandys,  Cox,  professed  to  concur  with  the  reformers  of 
Zurich  and  Geneva  in  every  point  of  doctrine.1  The  works 
of  Calvin  and  Bullinger  became  text-books  in  the  English 
universities.2  Those  who  did  not  hold  the  predestinarian 
theory  were  branded  with  reproach  by  the  names  of  free- 
willers  and  Pelagians.8  And  when  the  opposite  tenets  came 
to  be  advanced,  as  they  were  at  Cambridge  about  1590,  a 
clamor  was  raised  as  if  some  unusual  heresy  had  been 
broached.  Whitgift,  with  the  concurrence  of  some  other 
prelates,  in  order  to  withstand  its  progress,  published  what- 
were  called  the  Lambeth  articles,  containing  the  broadest 
and  most  repulsive  declaration  of  all  the  Calvinistic  tenets. 
But,  lord  Burleigh  having  shown  some  disapprobation,  these 
articles  never  obtained  any  legal  sanction.4 

These  more  rigorous  tenets,  in  fact,  especially  when  so 
crudely  announced,  were  beginning  to  give  way.  They  had 
been  already  abandoned  by  the  Lutheran  church.  They  had 
long  been  opposed  in  that  of  Rome  by  the  Franciscan  order, 
and  latterly  by  the  Jesuits.  Above  all,  the  study  of  the 
Greek  fathers,  with  whom  the  first  reformers  had  been  little 
conversant,  taught  the  divines  of  a  more  learned  age  that 
men  of  as  high  a  name  as  Augustin,  s)r\d  whom  they  were 
prone  to  overvalue,  had  entertained  very  different  senti- 
ments.5 Still  the  novel  opinions  passed  for  heterodox,  and 
were  promulgated  with  much  vacillation  and  indistinctness. 
When  they  were  published  in  unequivocal  propositions  by 
Arminius  and  his  school,  James  declared  himself  with  ve- 
hemence against  this  heresy.6  He  not  only  sent  English 

*  Without  loading  the  page  with  too  tion,  adverting  especially   to  the   Pels- 
many  references  on   a  subject  so  little  gianism  of  Chrysostom  and   the  other 
connected  with    this  work,   I    mention  Greeks.    Strype's  Annals,  i.  324. 
Strype's  Annals,  vol.  i.   p.   118,  and  a  6  Wlnwood,  iii.  293.      The  intemper- 
letter  from  Jewell  to  P.  Martyr,  in  Bur-  ate  and  even   impertinent   behavior  of 
net,  vol.  iii.,  Appendix,  275.  James,  in  pressing  the  states  of  Holland 

2  Collier,  568.  to  inflict  some  censure  or  punishment  on 

8  Strype's  Annals,  i.  207,  294.  Vorstius,   is   well   known.     But   though 

*  Strype's  Whitgift,  434-472.  A'orstius  was  an  Arminian,  it  was    not 
6  It  is  admitted  on  all  hands  that  the  precisely  on  account  of  those   opinions 

Greek  fathers  did  not  inculcate  the  pre-  that  he  incurred  the  king's  peculiar  dis- 

destinarian   system.      Elizabeth    having  pleasure,  but  for  certain  propositions  an 

begun  to  read  some  of  the  fathers,  bishop  to  the  nature  of  the  Deity,  which  James 

Cox  writes  of  it  with  some  disapproba-  called  atheistical,  but  which  were  in  fact 


394 


ARMINIAN  CONTROVERSY. 


CHAP.  TIL 


diviries  to  sit  in  the  synod  of  Dort,  where  the  Calvinistic 
system  was  fully  established,  but  instigated  the  proceedings 
against  the  remonstrants  with  more  of  theological  pedantry 
than  charity  or  decorum.1  Yet  this  inconsistent  monarch 
within  a  very  few  years  was  so  wrought  on  by  one  or  two 
favorite  ecclesiastics,  who  inclined  towards  the  doctrines  con- 
demned in  that  assembly,  that  openly  to  maintain  the  Au- 
gustinian  system  became  almost  a  sure  means  of  exclusion 
from  preferment  in  our  church.  This  was  carried  to  its 
height  under  Charles.  Laud,  his  sole  counsellor  in  eccle- 
siastical matters,  advised  a  declaration  enjoining  silence  on 
the  controverted  points;  a  measure  by  no  means  unwise  if  it 
had  been  fairly  acted  upon.  It  is  alleged,  however,  that  the 
preachers  on  one  side  only  were  silenced,  the  printers  of 
books  on  one  side  censured  in  the  star-chamber,  while  full 
scope  was  indulged  to  the  opposite  sect.2 


Arian.  The  letters  on  this  subject  in 
Winwood  are  curious.  Even  at  this  time 
the  king  is  said  to  have  spoken  moder- 
ately of  predestination  as  a  dubious  point 
(p.  452),  though  he  had  treated  Arminiug 
as  a  mischievous  innovator  for  raising  a 
question  about  it ;  and  this  is  confirmed 
by  his  letter  to  the  States  in  1613. 
Brandt,  Hi.  129,  and  see  p.  138.  See 
Collier,  p.  711,  for  the  king's  sentiments 
in  1616 ;  also  Brandt,  iii.  313. 

1  Sir  Dudley   Carleton's    Letters   and 
Negotiations,  passim.    Brandt's  History 
of  Reformation  in   Low  Countries,  vol. 
Iii.      The   English   divines  sent   to   this 
synod  were  decidedly  inclined  to  Calvin- 
ism, but  they  spoke  of  themselves  as 
deputed  by  the  king,  not  by  the  church 
of  England,  which  they  did  not  repre- 
sent. 

2  There  is  some  obscurity  about  the 
rapid  transition  of  the  court  from  Cal- 
vinism to  the  opposite  side.     It  has  been 
supposed  that  the  part  taken  by  James 
at  the  synod  of  Dort  was  chiefly  politi- 
cal, with  a  view  to  support  the  house 
of  Orange  against  the  party  headed  by 
Barnevelt.    But  he  was  so  much  more 
of  a  theologian  than  a  statesman,  that  I 
much  doubt  whether  this  will  account 
satisfactorily  for  his  zeal  in  behalf  of  the 
Gomarista.     He   wrote    on   the  subject 
with    niuch    polemical    bitterness,   but 
without  reference,  so  far  as  I  have  ob- 
served, to  any  political  faction ;  though 
sir  Dudley  Carleton's  letters  show  that 
he  contemplated  the  matter  as  a  minister 
ought  to  do.     Heylin  intimates  that  the 
king  grew   "  more  moderate  afterwards, 
»ud  into  a  better  liking  of  those  opinions 


which  he  had  laboured  to  condemn  at  the 
synod  of  Dort."  Life  of  Laud,  120.  The 
court  language,  indeed,  shifted  so  very 
soon  after  this,  that  Antonio  de  Dona- 
inis,  the  famous  half-converted  arch- 
bishop of  Spalato.  is  said  to  have  in- 
vented the  name  of  doctrinal  puritans 
for  those  who  distinguished  themselves 
by  holding  the  Calviuistic  tenets.  Yet 
the  synod  of  Dort  was  in  1618,  while  De 
Dominis  left  England  not  later  than  1622. 
Buckingham  seems  to  have  gone  very 
warmly  into  Laud's  scheme  of  excluding 
the Calvinists.  The  latter  gave  hiina  list 
of  divines  on  Charles's  accession,  distin- 
guishing their  names  by  0.  and  P.,  for 
orthodox  and  puritan  ;  including  several 
tenets  in  the  latter  denomination,  be- 
sides those  of  the  quinquarticular  con- 
troversy, such  as  the  indispensable 
observance  of  the  Lord's  day,  the  indis- 
crimination of  bishops  and  presbyters, 
&c.  Life  of  Laud,  119.  Th"  influence 
of  Laud  became  so  great,  that  to  preach 
in  favor  of  Calvinism,  though  commonly 
reputed  to  be  the  doctrine  of  the  church, 
incurred  punishment  in  any  rank. 
Davenant,  bishop  of  Salisbury,  one  of 
the  divines  sent  to  Dort,  and  reckoned 
among  the  principal  theologians  of  that 
age,  was  reprimanded  on  his  knees  be 
fore  the  privy  council  for  this  offence. 
Collier,  p.  750.  But  in  James's  reign  the 
university  of  Oxford  was  decidedly  Cal- 
vinistic. A  preacher,  about  1623,  having 
used  some  suspicious  expressions,  was 
compelled  to  recant  them,  and  to  main- 
tain the  following  theses  in  the  divinity 
school :  Decretum  praedestinationis  non 
eat  conditionals  —  Gracia  sufficieus  ad 


CHA.  I.  — 1625-29.        CATHOLICS   UNDER  JAMES.  395 

The  house  of  commons,  especially  in  their  last  session, 
took  up  the  increase  of  Arminianism  as  a  public  grievance. 
It  was  coupled  in  their  remonstrances  with  popery,  as  a  new 
danger  to  religion,  hardly  less  terrible  than  the  former.  This 
bigoted  clamor  arose  in  part  from  the  nature  of  their  own 
Calvinistic  tenets,  which,  being  still  prevalent  in  the  king- 
dom, would,  independently  of  all  political  motives,  predominate 
in  any  popular  assembly.  But  they  had  a  sort  of  excuse  for 
it  in  the  close,  though  accidental  and  temporary,  connection 
that  subsisted  between  the  partisans  of  these  new  speculative 
tenets  and  those  of  arbitrary  power;  the  churchmen  who  re- 
ceded most  from  Calvinism  being  generally  the  zealots  of 
prerogative.  They  conceived  also  that  these  theories,  con- 
formable in  the  main  to  those  most  countenanced  in  the 
church  of  Rome,  might  pave  the  way  for  that  restoration  of 
her  faith  which  from  so  many  other  quarters  appeared  to 
threaten  them.  Nor  was  this  last  apprehension  so  destitute 
of  all  plausibility  as  the  advocates  of  the  two  first  Stuarts 
have  always  pretended  it  to  be. 

James,,  well  instructed  in  the  theology  of  the  reformers, 
and  inured  himself  to  controversial  dialectics,  was  _ 

f,  ,     .  .    ,       c         .    .  ,,  ,  .       State  of 

far  removed  in  point  of   opinion   from   any  bias  catholics 
towards   the    Romish  creed.     But  he  had,  while  under 

011-  •  •    •  James. 

m  Scotland,  given  rise  to  some  suspicions  at  the 
court  of  Elizabeth  by  a  little  clandestine  coquetry  with  the 
pope,  which  he  fancied  to  be  a  political  means  of  disarming 
enmity.1     Some  knowledge  of  this,  probably,  as  well  as  his 

salutem      non     conceditur     omnibus,  of  being  excommunicated,  and,  in  conse- 

Wood,  ii.  848.    And  I  suppose  it  contin-  quence,  assassinated.     In  a  proclamation, 

ued  so  in  the  next  reign,  so  far  as  the  commanding  all  Jesuits  and   priests   to 

university's  opinions  could  be  manifest-  quit  the  realm,  dated  in  1603,  he  declares 

sd.    But  Laud   took  care  that  no  one  himself  personally  "  so  much  beholden 

should  be  promoted,  as  far  as  he  could  to  the  new  bishop  of  Rome  for  his  kind 

help  it,  who  held  these  tenets.  office  and  private  temporal  carriage  tow- 

1  VVinvrood,  vol.  i.  p.  1,52,  388;  Lettres  ards  *us  in  many  things,  as  we  shall  ever 

J'Ossa;,  i.  221 ;   Birch's  Negotiations  of  be  ready  to  requite  the  same  towards  him 

Edmondes,  p.  36.     These   references  do  as  bishop  of  Rome  in  state  and  condtion 

not  relate  to  the  letter  said  to  have  been  of  a  secular  prince."    Rymer,  xvi.  573. 

forged  in  the  king's  name  and  addressed  This  is  explained  by  a  passage  in  the 

to    Clement  VIII.  by  lord    Balmerino.  Memoirs  of  Sully  (1. 15).     Clement  VIII., 

But  Laing,  Hist,  of  Scotland,  iii.  59,  and  though  before  Elizabeth's  death  he  had 

Birch's  Negotiations,  &c.,  177,  render  it  abetted  the  project  of  placing  Arabella 

almost  certain  that  this  letter  was  gen-  on    the  throne,    thought    it  expedient, 

nine,  which  indeed  has  been  generally  after  this  design  had  failed,  to  pay  some 

believed  by  men  of  sense.    James  was  a  court    to   James,  and    had    refused    to 

man  of  so  little  consistency  or  sincerity,  accept  the  dedication  of  a  work  written 

that  it  is  difficult  to  solve  the  problem  against    him,    besides,    probably,    gome 

of  this  clandestine  intercourse.     But  it  other  courtesies.     There  is  a  letter  from 

-j  likely  proceed  from  his  dread  thu    king  addressed    to   the  pope,  and 


396  JEALOUSY  OF  COURT'S  FAVOR          CHAP.  VII 

avowed  dislike  of  sanguinary  persecution,  and  a  foolish  re- 
liance on  the  trifling  circumstance  that  one  if  not  both  of 
his  parents  had  professed  their  religion,  led  the  English 
cathoiics  to  expect  a  great  deal  of  indulgence,  if  not  support, 
at  his  hands.  This  hope  might  receive  some  encouragement 
from  his  speech  on  opening  the  parliament  of  1604,  wherein 
he  intimated  his  design  to  revise  and  explain  the  penal  laws, 
"  which  the  judges  might  perhaps,"  he  said,  "  in  times  past, 
have  too  rigorously  interpreted.  But  the  temper  of  those  he 
addressed  was  very  different.  The  catholics  were  disap- 
pointed by  an  act  inflicting  new  penalties  on  recusants,  and 
especially  debarring  them  from  educating  their  children  ac- 
cording to  their  consciences.1  The  administration 

Jealousy  of  . 

the  court's  took  a  sudden  turn  towards  seventy  ;  the  prisons 
^towards  were  filled,  the  penalties  exacted,  several  suffered 
death,2  and  the  general  helplessness  of  their  con- 
dition impelled  a  few  persons  (most  of  whom  had  belonged 
to  what  was  called  the  Spanish  party  in  the  last  reign)  to 
the  gunpowder  conspiracy,  unjustly  imputed  to  the  majority 
of  catholics,  though  perhaps  extending  beyond  those  who  ap- 
peared in  it.8  We  cannot  wonder  that  a  parliament  so  nar- 

probably  written  in  1603,  among  the  Cot-  tioned  for  toleration  that  the  utmost 
tonian  MSS.,  Nero,  B.  vi.  9,  which  shows  they  could  expect  was  connivance, 
his  disposition  to  coax  and  coquet  with  Carte,  iii.  711.  This  seems  to  have  been 

the    Babylonian,   against   whom    he   so  what  he  intended  through  his  reign,  till 

much  inveighs  in  his  printed  works.     It  importuned    by   Spain    and    France    to 

seems  that  Clement  had  so  far  presumed  promise  more. 

as  to  suggest  that  the  priuce  of  Wales        1  Uac.I.  c.  4.  The  penalties  of  recusan- 

should   be   educated  a  catholic,   which  cy  were  particularly  hard  upon  women, 

the  king  refuses,  but  not  in  so  strong  a  who,  as  I  have  observed  in  another  place, 

manner  as  he  should  have  done.    I  can-  adhered  longer  to  the  old  religion  than 

not  recollect  whether  this  letter  has  been  the  other  sex ;  and  still  more  so  upon 

printed,  though  I  can  scarcely  suppose  those  who  had  to  pay  for  their  scruples, 

the  contrary.     Persons  himself  began  to  It  was  proposed  in  parliament,  but  with 

praise   the   works  of  James,   and   show  the  usual  fate  of  humane  suggestions, 

much  hope  of  what  he  would  do.     Cot-  that   husbands  going  to  church  should 

ton,  Jul.  B.  vi.  77.  not  be  liable  for  their  wives'  reeusam-y. 

The   severities  against  catholics  seem  Carte,  764.    But  they  had  the  alternative 

at  first  to  have  been  practically  mitigated,  afterwards,  by  7  Jac.  I.  c.  6,  of  letting 

Winwood,   ii.   78.      Archbishop  Button  their  wives  lie  in  prison  or  paying  10/.  a 

wrote  to  Cecil,  complaining  of  the  tol-  month, 
eration    granted    to    papists,   while   the        2  Lingard,  ix.  41.  55. 
puritans   were   severely  treated.     Id.  p.        *  From  comparing  some  passages  in  sir 

40.     Lodge,  iii.  251.     "  The  former,"  he  Charles   Cornwallis's    despatches.    Win- 

sayg,  "  partly  by  this  round  dealing  with  wood,  vol.  ii.  p.  143,  144,  153,  with  otheri 

the   puritans,  and    partly  by  some   ex-  in   Birch's  account  of   sir  Thomas    Ed- 

traordinary  favor,  had  grown  mightily  in  mondes's  negotiations,  p.  233,  et  seq.,  it 

number,  courage,  and  influence."  —  ''If  appears  that  the  English  catholics  were 

the  gospel   shall  quail,  and  popery  pre-  looking   forward  at    this   time   to  some 

Tail,  it  will  be  imputed  principally  unto  crisis  in  their  favor,  and  that  even  the 

your  great  counsellors,  who  either  pro-  court  of  Spain  was  influenced  by  their 

e&re  or  yield  to  grant  toleration  to  some."  hopes.    A  letter  from  sir  Thomas  Parry 

James   told  some  gentlemen  who  peti-  to  Bdmondes,   dated  at   laris,  10  Oct. 


CHA.  I.  — 1625-29.    TOWARDS  THE  CATHOLICS 


397 


rowly  rescued  from  personal  destruction  endeavored  to  draw 
the  cord  still  tighter  round  these  dangerous  enemies.  The 
statute  passed  on  this  occasion  is  by  no  means  more  harsh 
than  might  be  expected.  It  required  not  only  attendance  on 
worship,  but  participation  in  the  communion,  as  a  test  of  con- 
formity, and  gave  an  option  to  the  king  of  taking  a  penalty 
of  201.  a  month  from  recusants,  or  two  thirds  of  their  lands. 
It  prescribed  also  an  oath  of  allegiance,  the  refusal  of  which 
incurred  the  penalties  of  a  prsemunire.  This  imported  that, 


1605,  Is  remarkable :  "  Our  priests  are 
very  busy  about  petitions  to  be  exhibited 
to  the  king's  majesty  at  this  parliament, 
and  some  further  designs  upon  refusal. 
These  matters  are  secretly  managed  by 
intelligence  with  their  colleagues  in  those 
parts  where  you  reside,  and  with  the  two 
nuncios.  I  think  it  were  necessary  for 
his  majesty's  service  that  you  found 
means  to  have  privy  spies  amongst  them, 
to  discover  their  negotiations.  Some- 
thing is  at  present  in  hand  amongst  these 
desperate  hypocrites,  which  I  trust  God 
shall  divert  by  the  vigilant  care-  of  his 
majesty's  faithful  servants  and  friends 
abroad,  and  prudence  of  his  council  at 
home."  Birch,  p.  233.  There  seems  in- 
deed some  ground  for  suspicion  that  the 
nuncio  at  Brussels  was  privy  to  the 
conspiracy ;  though  this  ought  not  to  be 
asserted  as  an  historical  fact.  Whether 
the  offence  of  Garnet  went  beyond  mis- 
prision  of  treason  has  been  much  contro- 
verted. The  catholic  writers  maintain 
that  he  had  no  knowledge  of  the  conspir- 
acy, except  by  having  heard  it  in  confes- 
sion. But  this  rests  altogether  on  his 
word ;  and  the  prevarication  of  which  he 
lias  been  proved  to  be  guilty  (not  to  men- 
tion the  damning  circumstance  that  he 
was  taken  at  Hendlip  in  concealment 
along  with  the  other  conspirators)  makes 
It  difficult  for  a  candid  man  to  acquit 
him  of  a  thorough  participation  in  their 
guilt.  Compare  Townsend's  Accusations 
of  History  against  the  Church  of  Rome 
(1825),  p.  247,  containing  extracts  from 
some  important  documents  in  the  State 
Paper  Office,  not  as  yet  published,  with 
Suite  Trials,  vol.  ii. ;  and  see  Ungard,  ix. 
160,  &c.  Yet  it  should  be  kept  in  mind 
that  it  was  easy  for  a  few  artful  persons 
to  keep  on  the  alert  by  indistinct  com- 
munications a  credulous  multitude 
whose  daily  food  was  rumor ;  and  the 
geueral  hopes  of  the  English  Humanists 
at  the  moment  are  not  evidence  of  their 
privity  to  the  gunpowder-treason,  which 
was  probably  contrived  late,  and  im- 
parted to  very  few.  But  to  deny  that 
there  was  such  a  plot,  or,  which  is  the 


same  thing,  to  throw  the  whole  on  tha 
contrivance  and  management  of  Cecil, 
as  has  sometimes  been  done,  argues  great 
effrontery  in  those  who  lead,  and  great 
stupidity  in  those  who  follow.  The  letter 
to  lord  Monteagle,  the  discovery  of  the 
powder,  the  simultaneous  rising  in  arms 
in  Warwickshire,  are  as  indisputable  as 
any  facts  in  history.  What  then  had 
Cecil  to  do  with  the  plot,  except  that  he 
hit  upon  the  clue  to  the  dark  allusions 
in  the  letter  to  Monteagle,  of  which  he 
was  courtier  enough  to  let  the  king  take 
the  credit  ?  James's  admirers  have 
always  reckoned  this,  as  he  did  himself, 
a  vast.proof  of  sagacity ;  yet  there  seems 
no  great  acuteness  in  the  discovery,  even 
if  it  had  been  his  own.  He  might  have 
recollected  the  circumstances  of  his 
father's  catastrophe,  which  would  nat- 
urally put  him  on  the  scent  of  gun- 
powder. In  point  of  fact,  however,  the 
happy  conjecture  appears  to  be  Cecil's. 
Wiuwood,  ii.  170.  But  had  he  no  pre- 
vious hint?  See  Lodge,  iii.  301. 

The  earl  of  Northumberland  was  not 
only  committed  to  the  Tower  on  suspi- 
cion of  privity  in  the  plot,  but  lay  four- 
teen years  there,  and  paid  a  fine  of 
11,000*.  (by  composition  for  30,000*.),  be- 
fore he  was  released.  Lingard,  ix.  89.  It 
appears  almost  incredible  that  a  man  of 
his  ability,  though  certainly  of  a  danger- 
ous and  discontented  spirit,  and  rather 
destitute  of  religion  than  a  zealot  for  pop- 
ery, which  he  did  not.  I  believe,  openly 
profess,  should  have  mingled  in  so 
flagitious  a  design.  There  is  indeed  a 
remarkable  letter  in  Winwood,  vol.  iii. 
p.  287,  which  tends  to  corroborate  the 
suspicions  entertained  of  him.  But  this 
letter  is  from  Salisbury,  his  inveterate 
enemy.  Every  one  must  agree  that  the 
fine  imposed  on  this  nobleman  was  pre- 
posterous. Were  we  even  to  admit  that 
suspicion  might  justify  his  long  imprison- 
ment, a  participation  in  one  of  the  most 
atrocious  conspiracies  recorded  in  history 
was,  if  proved,  to  be  more  severely  pun- 
ished ;  if  unproved,  not  at  all. 


398  CONTEST   WITH  BELLARMINE.  CHAP.  VII. 

notwithstanding  any  sentence  of  deprivation  or  excommuni- 
cation by  the  pope,  the  taker  would  bear  true  allegiance  to 
the  king,  and  defend  him  against  any  conspiracies  which 
should  be  made  by  reason  of  such  sentence  or  otherwise,  and 
do  his  best  endeavor  to  disclose  them ;  that  he  from  his  heart 
abhorred,  detested,  and  abjured  as  impious  and  heretical  the 
damnable  doctrine  and  position  that  princes  excommunicated 
or  deprived  by  the  pope  may  be  deposed  or  murdered  by 
their  subjects,  or  any  other  whatsoever ;  and  that  he  did  not 
believe  that  the  pope  or  any  other  could  absolve  him  from 
this  oath.1 

Except  by  cavilling  at  one  or  two  words,  it  seemed  impos- 
sible for  the  Roman  catholics  to  decline  so  reasonable  a  test 
of  loyalty,  without  justifying  the  worst  suspicions  of  prot- 
estant  jealousy.  Most  of  the  secular  priests  in  England, 
asking  only  a  connivance  in  the  exercise  of  their  ministry, 
and  aware  how  much  the  good  work  of  reclaiming  their 
apostate  countrymen  was  retarded  by  the  political  obloquy 
they  incurred,  would  have  willingly  acquiesded  in  the  oath. 
But  the  court  of  Rome,  not  yet  receding  an  inch  from  her 
proudest  claims,  absolutely  forbade  all  catholics  to  abjure 
her  deposing  power  by  this  test,  and  employed  Bellarmine 
to  prove  its  unlawfulness.  The  king  stooped  to  a  literary 
controvei*sy  with  this  redoubted  champion,  and  was  prouder 
of  no  exploit  of  his  life  than  his  answer  to  the  cardinal's 
book,  by  which  he  incurred  the  contempt  of  foreign  courts 
and  of  all  judicious  men.2  Though  neither  the  murderous 
conspiracy  of  1605,  nor  this  refusal  to  abjure  the  principles 
on  which  it  was  founded,  could  dispose  James  to  persecution, 
or  even  render  the  papist  so  obnoxious  in  his  eyes  as  the 
puritan,  yet  he  was  long  averse  to  anything  like  a  general 
remission  of  the  penal  laws.  In  sixteen  instances  after  this 
time  the  sanguinary  enactments  of  his  predecessor  were  en- 
forced, but  only  perhaps  against  priests  who  refused  the 
oath ; 8  the  catholics  enjoyed  on  the  whole  somewhat  more 

1  3  Jac.  I.  c.  4,  5.  this  cannot  be   the  whole  of  the  case  : 

*  Carte,  iii.  782  ;  Collier,  690;  Butler's  it  is  notorious  that  Bellarmine  protested 

Memoirs  of  Catholics  ;    Lingard,  vol.  ix.  against  any  denial  of  the  pope's  deposing 

97;  Aikin,  i.  319.    It  is  observed  by  Col-  power. 

lier,  ii.  695,  and  indeed  by  the  king  him-        8  Lingard,  ix.  215.     Drury.  executed 

self,   in    his  Apology   for   the   Oath   of  in  1607.  was  one  of   the    twelve  priests 

Allegiance,  edit.  1619,  p.  46,  that  Bellar-  who,  in  1602,  had  signed  a  declaration 

mine  plainly  confounds  the  oath  of  alle-  of  the  queen's  right  to  the  crown,  not- 

glance  with  that  of  supremacy.     But  withstanding  her  excommunication.  But, 


CHA.  I.— 1625-29.      NEGOTIATIONS  WITH  SPAIN.  399 

indulgence  than  before  in  respect  to  the  private  exercise 
of  their  religion ;  at  least  enough  to  offend  narrow-spirited 
zealots,  and  furnish  pretext  for  the  murmurs  of  a  discon 
tented  parliament,  but  under  condition  of  paying  composi- 
tions for  recusancy — a  regular  annual  source  of  revenue, 
which,  though  apparently  trifling  in  amount,  the  king  was 
not  likely  to  abandon,  even  if  his  notions  of  prerogative  and 
the  generally  received  prejudices  of  that  age  had  not  deter- 
mined him  against  an  express  toleration.1 

In  the  course,  however,  of  that  impolitic  negotiation, 
which  exposed  him  to  all  eyes  as  the  dupe  and  tool  of  the 
court  of  Madrid,  James  was  led  on  to  promise  concessions 
for  which  his  protestant  subjects  were  ill  prepared.  That 
court  had  wrought  on  his  feeble  mind  by  affected  coyness 
about  the  infanta's  marriage,  with  two  private  aims :  to  se- 
cure his  neutrality  in  the  war  of  the  Palatinate,  and  to  obtain 
better  terms  for  the  English  catholics.  Fully  successful  in 
both  ends,  it  would  probably  have  at  length  permitted  the 
union  to  take  place,  had  not  Buckingham's  rash  insolence 
broken  off  the  treaty ;  but  I  am  at  a  loss  to  perceive  the  sin- 
cere and  even  generous  conduct  which  some  have  found  in 
the  Spanish  council  during  this  negotiation.2  The  king  acted 

though  he  evidently  wavered,  he  could  religion  he  professeth,  for  fear  of  giving 

not  be  induced  to  say  as  much  now  in  hinderance  to  the  match  thereby."  Page 

order  to  save  his  life.     State  Trials,  ii.  662.     What  a  contrast  to  the  behavior 

858.  of  this  same  king  six  years  afterwards ! 

1  Lord  Bacon,  wise  in   all  things,  al-  The  commons  were  always   dissatisfied 

ways  recommended  mildness  towards  re-  with   lenity,  and    complained   that   the 

cusants.     In  a  letter  to  Villiers,  in  1616,  lands  of  recusants  were  undervalued,  as 

he  advises  that  the  oath  of  supremacy  they  must  have  been,  if  the  king  got  only 

should  by  no  means  be  tendered  to  recu-  60CKM.  per  annum  by  the  compositions. 

Bant  magistrates  in  Ireland ;   '•  the  new  Debates  in  1621,  vol.  i.  p.  24.  91.    But 

plantation    of    protestants,"   he    says,  he  valued  those  in  England  and  Ireland 

"must  mate  the  other  party  in  time."  at  36,000f.     Lingard,  215,  from  Hard- 

Vol.   ii.  p.   580.      This  has  not  indeed  wicke  Papers. 

proved  true;  yet  as  much,  perhaps,  for        *  The  absurd    and    highly    blamable 

want  of  following  Bacon's  advice,  as  for  conduct  of  Buckingham  has  created  a 

any  other  cause.     He  wished  for  a  like  prejudice  in  favor  of  the  court  of  Madrid, 

toleration  in  England.    But  the  king,  as  That  they  desired  the  marriage  is  easy  to 

Buckingham  lets  him  know,  was   of  a  be  believed ;  but  that  they  would  have 

quite  contrary  opinion  ;   for,   "  though  ever  sincerely  cooperated  for  the  restora- 

he  would  not  by  any  means  have  a  more  tion  of  the  Palatinate,  or  even  withdrawn 

severe  course  held  than  his  laws  appoint  the  Spanish  troops  from    it,  is    neither 

in  that  case,  yet  there  are  many  reasons  rendered  probable  by  the  general  policy 

why  there  should  be  no  mitigation  above  of  that  government,  nor  by  the  conduct 

that  which  h  s  laws  have  exerted,  and  it  pursued  in  the  negotiation.    Compare 

his  own  conscience  telleth  him  to  be  fit."  Hardwicke  State  Papers,  vol.  i. ;  Cabala, 

He  afterwards  professes  "  to  account  it  a  1,  et  post;  Howell's  Letters;  Clarendon 

oaseness  in  a  prince  to  show  such  a  de-  State  Papers,  vol.  i.  ad  initium.  especially 

sire  of  the  match  [this  was  in  1617]  as  to  p.  13. 

alack  anything  in  his  course  of  govern-        A  very  curious  paper  in  the  latter  cot 

ment,  much  more  in  propagation  of  the  lection,  p.  14,  may  be  thought,  perhaps 


400 


NEGOTIATIONS  WITH  SPAIN. 


CHAP.  VII. 


with  such  culpable  weakness  as  even  in  him  excites  our  as- 
tonishment. Buckingham,  in  his  first  eagerness  for  the  mar- 
riage, on  arriving  in  Spain,  wrote  to  ask  if  the  king  would 
acknowledge  the  pope's  spiritual  supremacy,  as  the  surest 
means  of  success.  James  professed  to  be  shocked  at  this, 
but  offered  to  recognize  his  jurisdiction  as  patriarch  of  the 
west,  to  whom  ecclesiastical  appeals  might  ultimately  be 
made  :  a  concession  as  incompatible  with  the  code  of  our 
protestant  laws  as  the  former.  Yet  with  this  knowledge  of 
his  favorite's  disposition,  he  gave  the  prince  and  him  a  written 
promise  to  perform  whatever  they  should  agree  upon  with 
the  court  of  Madrid.1  On  the  treaty  being  almost  concluded, 
the  king,  prince,  and  privy  council  swore  to  observe  certain 
stipulated  articles,  by  which  the  infanta  was  not  only  to  have 
the  exercise  of  her  religion,  but  the  education  of  her  children 
till  ten  years  of  age.  But  the  king  was  also  sworn  to  private 
articles :  that  no  penal  laws  should  be  put  in  force  against 
the  catholics,  that  there  should  be  a  perpetual  toleration  of 
their  religion  in  private  houses,  that  he  and  his  son  would 


to  throw  a  light  on  Buckingham's  pro- 
jects, and  account  in  some  measure  for 
his  sudden  enmity  to  Spain.  During  his 
residence  at  Madrid  in  1623.  a  secretary 
who  had  been  dissatisfied  with  the  court 
revealed  to  him  a  pretended  secret  discov- 
ery of  gold-mines  in  a  part  of  America, 
and  suggested  that  they  might  be  easily 
possessed  by  any  association  that  could 
command  seven  or  eight  hundred  men ; 
and  that,  after  having  made  such  a  set- 
tlement, it  would  be  easy  to  take  the 
Spanish  flotilla  and  attempt  the  conquest 
of  Jamaica  and  St.  Domingo.  This  made 
so  great  an  impression  on  the  mind  of 
Buckingham,  that  loug  afterwards,  in 
1628,  he  entered  into  a  contract  with 
Gustavus  Adolphus.  who  bound  himself 
to  defend  him  against  all  opposers  in  the 
possession  of  these  mines,  as  an  absolute 
prince  and  sovereign,  on  condition  of  re- 
ceiving one  tenth  of  the  profits ;  promising 
especially  his  aid  against  any  puritans 
who  might  attack  him  from  Barbadoes  or 
elsewhere,  and  to  furnish  him  with  four 
thousand  men  and  six  ships  of  war,  to  be 
paid  out  of  the  revenue  of  the  mines. 

This  is  a  very  strange  document,  if 
genuine.  It  seems  to  show  that  Buck- 
ingham, aware  of  his  unpopularity  in 
England,  and  that  sooner  or  later  he  must 
fall,  and  led  away,  as  so  many  were  by 
the  expectation  of  immense  wealth  in 
America,  had  contrived  this  arrangement, 
which  was  probably  intended  to  take 


place  only  in  the  event  of  his  banishment 
from  England.  The  share  that  Gustavus 
appears  to  have  taken  in  so  wild  a  plan 
is  rather  extraordinary,  and  may  expose 
the  whole  to  some  suspicion.  It  is  not 
clear  how  this  came  among  the  Claren- 
don papers  ;  but  the  endorsement  runs 
—  "  Presented,  and  the  design  attempted 
and  in  some  measure  attained  by  Crom- 
well, anno  1652.''  I  should  conjecture 
therefore  that  some,  spy  of  the  king's 
procured  the  copy  from  Cromwell's 
papers. 

1  have  since  found  that  Harte  had  seen 
a  sketch  of  this  treaty,  but  he  does  not 
tell  us  by  what  means.  Hist.  Gust. 
Adolph.  i.  130.  But  that  prince,  in  1627, 
laid  before  the  diet  of  Sweden  a  plan  for 
establishing  a  commerce  with  the  Wes 
Indies  ;  for  which  sums  of  money  were 
subscribed.  Id.  143. 

i  Hardwicke  Papers,  p.  402,  411,  417 
The  very  curious  letters  in  this  collection 
relative  to  the  Spanish  match  are  the 
vouchers  for  my  text.  It  appears  by  one 
of  Secretary  Conway's,  since  published, 
Ellis,  iii.  154,  that  the  king  was  in  great 
distress  at  the  engagement  for  a  complete 
immunity  from  penal  laws  for  the  catho- 
lics, entered  into  by  the  prince  and 
Buckingham ;  but  on  full  deliberation  in 
the  council,  it  was  agreed  that  he  must 
adhere  to  his  promise.  This  rash  promise 
was  the  cause  of  his  subsequent  prevari 
cations 


CHA.  I.  — 1625-29.     NEGOTIATIONS  WITH  SPAIN.  401 

use  their  authority  to  make  parliament  confirm  and  ratify 
these  articles,  and  revoke  all  laws  (as  it  is  with  strange  lati- 
tude expressed)  containing  anything  repugnant  to  the  Roman 
catholic  religion,  and  that  they  would  not  consent  to  any  new 
laws  against  them.  The  prince  of  Wales  separately  engaged 
to  procure  the  suspension  or  abrogation  of  the  penal  laws 
within  three  years,  and  to  lengthen  the  term  for  the  mother's 
education  of  their  children  from  ten  to  twelve  years,  if  it 
should  be  in  his  own  power.  He  promised  also  to  listen  to 
catholic  divines  whenever  the  infanta  should  desire  it.1 

These  secret  assurances,  when  they  were  whispered  in 
England,  might  not  unreasonably  excite  suspicion  of  the 
prince's  wavering  in  his  religion,  which  he  contrived  to  ag- 
gravate by  an  act  as  imprudent  as  it  was  reprehensible. 
During  his  stay  at  Madrid,  while  his  inclinations  were  still 
bent  on  concluding  the  marriage,  the  sole  apparent  obstacle 
being  the  pope's  delay  in  forwarding  the  dispensation,  he 
wrote  a  letter  to  Gregory  XV.,  in  reply  to  one  received 
from  him,  in  language  evidently  intended  to  give  an  impres- 
sion of  his  favorable  dispositions  towards  the  Roman  faith. 
The  whole  tenor  of  his  subsequent  life  must  have  satisfied 
every  reasonable  inquirer  into  our  history  of  Charles's  real 
attachment  to  the  Anglican  church ;  nor  could  he  have  had 
any  other  aim  than  to  facilitate  his  arrangements  with  the 
court  of  Rome  by  this  deception.  It  would  perhaps  be  un- 
candid  to  judge  severely  a  want  of  ingenuousness  which 
youth,  love,  and  bad  counsels  may  extenuate ;  yet  I  cannot 
help  remarking  that  the  letter  is  written  with  the  precautions 
of  a  veteran  in  dissimulation  ;  and  while  it  is  full  of  what 
might  raise  expectation,  contains  no  special  pledge  that  he 
could  be  called  on  to  redeem.  But  it  was  rather  presump- 
tuous to  hope  that  he  could  foil  the  subtlest  masters  of  arti- 
fice with  their  own  weapons.2 

1  Hardwicke  Papers ;  Rushworth.  civil  answer."     Clarendon  saw  it  in  • 

2  Hardwicke  Papers,  p.  462,  where  the    different  light:    Clar.   State  Papers,   ii. 
letter  is  printed  in  Latin.     The  transla-    337. 

tion,  in  Wilton,  Rushworth,  and  Cabala,  Urban  VIII.  had  succeeded  Gregory 
p.  214,  is  uot  by  any  means  exact,  going  XV.  before  the  arrival  of  Charles's  letter 
in  several  places  much  beyond  the  origi-  He  answered  it  of  course  in  a  style  of  up 
n;il.  If  Hume  knpw  nothing  but  the  probation,  and  so  as  to  give  the  utmost 
translation,  as  is  most  probable,  we  may  meaning  to  the  prince's  compliments,  ex- 
well  be  astonished  at  his  way  of  dismiss-  pressing  his  satisfaction,  "cum  pontifi- 
jng  this  business;  that,  "the  prince  hav-  cem  Romauum  ex  offlcii  gener*  coleri 
ing  received  a  very  civil  letter  from  the  princeps  Britannus  incipcret,  &o.  Rush- 
pope,  he  was  induced  to  return  a  very  worth,  vol.  i.  p.  98. 
VOL.1.  —  C.  26 


402  STIPULATIONS  IN  FAVOR  OF  CHAP.  VII. 

James,  impatient  for  this  ill-omened  alliance,  lost  no  time 
in  fulfilling  his  private  stipulations  with  Spain.  He  pub- 
lished a  general  pardon  of  all  penalties  already  incurred  for 
recusancy.  It  was  designed  to  follow  this  up  by  a  procla- 
mation prohibiting  the  bishops,  judges,  and  other  magistrates 
to  execute  any  penal  statute  against  the  catholics.  But  the 
lord-keeper,  bishop  Williams,  hesitated  at  so  unpopular  a 
stretch  of  power.1  And,  the  rupture  with  Spain  ensuing  al- 
most immediately,  the  king,  with  a  singular  defiance  of  all 
honest  men's  opinions,  though  the  secret  articles  of  the  late 
treaty  had  become  generally  known,  declared,  in  his  first 
speech  to  parliament  in  1624,  that  "lie  had  only  thought 
good  sometimes  to  wink  and  connive  at  the  execution  of 
some  penal  laws,  and  not  to  go  on  so  rigorously  as  at  other 
times,  but  not  to  dispense  with  any,  or  to  forbid  or  alter  any, 
that  concern  religion  ;  he  never  permitted  or  yielded,  he 
never  did  think  it  with  his  heart,  nor  spoke  it  with  hia 
mouth."  2 

When  James,  soon  after  this,  not  yet  taught  by  experience 
to  avoid  a  Romish  alliance,  demanded  the  hand  of  Henrietta 
Maria  for  his  son,  Richelieu  thought  himself  bound  by  policy 
and  honor  as  well  as  religion  to  obtain  the  same  or  greater 
advantages  for  the  English  catholics  than  had  been  promised 
in  the  former  negotiation.  Henrietta  was  to  have  the  educa- 
tion of  her  children  till  they  reached  the  age  of  twelve ;  thus 
were  added  two  years,  at  a  time  of  life  when  the  mind 
becomes  susceptible  of  lasting  impressions,  to  the  term  at 
which,  by  the  treaty  with  Spain,  the  mother's  superintend- 
ence was  to  cease.8  Yet  there  is  the  strongest  reason  to 
believe  that  this  condition  was  merely  inserted  for  the  honor 
of  the  French  crown,  with  a  secret  understanding  that  it 
should  never  be  executed.4  In  fact,  the  royal  children  were 

It  is  said  by  Howell,  who  was  then  on  1  Rushworth ;  Cabala,  p.  19. 
the  spot,  that  the  prince  never  used  the  2  Parl.  Hist.  1375.    Both  houses,  how- 
service  of  the  church  of  England  while  ever,  joined  in  an  address  that  the  laws 
he  was  at  Madrid,  though  two  chaplains,  against  recusants  might  be  put  in  exe- 
church-plate,  &c.,  had    been  sent  over,  cution.      Id.   1408.     And   the  common* 
llowell's   Letters,   p.  140.     Bristol   and  returned  again  to  the  charge  afterwards 
Buckingham    charged  each  other   with  Idem,  1484. 
advising  Charles  to  embrace  the  Komish  3  Kushworth. 

religion  ;  and  he  himself,  in  a  letter  to  *  See  a  series  of  letters  from  lord  Ken- 
Bristol,  Jan.  21,  1625-6,  imputes  this  to  sington  (better  known  afterwards  as  earl 
him  in  the  most  positive  terms.  Cabala,  of  Holland),  the  king's  ambassador  at 
p.  17,  4to.  edit.  As  to  Buckingham's  Paris  for  this  marriage  treaty ;  in  the 
willingness  to  see  this  step  taken,  there  appendix  to  Clarendon  State  Papers,  roL 
can,  I  presume,  be  little  doubt.  ii.  p.  v.  viii.  is. 


CHA.  1.  — 1625-29.     THE  ROMAN  CATHOLICS. 


403 


placed  at  a  very  early  age  under  protestant  governors  of  the 
king's  appointment ;  nor  does  Henrietta  appear  to  have  ever 
insisted  on  her  right.  That  James  and  Charles  should  have 
incurred  the  scandal  of  this  engagement,  since  the  articles, 
though  called  private,  must  be  expected  to  transpire,  without 
any  real  intentions  of  performing  it,  is  an  additional  instance 
of  that  arrogant  contempt  of  public  opinion  which  distin- 
guished the  Stuart  family.  It  was  stipulated  in  the  same 
private  articles  that  prisoners  on  the  score  of  religion  should 
be  set  at  liberty,  and  that  none  should  be  molested  in  fu- 
ture.1 These  promises  were  irregularly  fulfilled,  according 

a  donnee,  et  qu'ils  auroient  en  conside- 
ration de  TOtre  uiajeste,  et  de  la  continues 
que  vous  prenez  en  sa  parole,  beaucoup 
plus  de  liberte  qu'ils  n'auroient  eu  en 
vertu  des  articles  du  traite  d'Espagne." 
The  French  advised  that  no  parliament 
should  be  called  till  Henrietta  should 
come  over,  "  de  qui  la  presence  serviroit 
de  bride  aux  puri tains."  It  is  not  won- 
derful, with  all  this  good-will  on  the  part 
of  their  court,  that  the  English  catholics 
should  now  send  a  letter  to  request  the 
granting  of  the  dispensation.  A  few  days 
after,  Dec.  26.  the  ambassador  announces 
the  king's  letter  to  the  archbishops,  di- 
recting them  to  stop  the  prosecution  of 
catholics,  the  enlargement  of  prisoners 
on  the  score  of  religion,  and  the  written 
promises  of  the  king  and  prince  to  let  the 
catholics  enjoy  more  liberty  than  they 
would  have  had  by  virtue  of  the  treaty 
with  Spain.  On  the  credit  of  this  Louis 
wrote  on  the  23d  of  January,  to  request 
six  or  eight  ships  of  war  to  employ  against 
Soubise,  the  chief  of  the  Hugonots ;  with 
which,  as  is  well  known,  Charles  complied 
in  the  ensuing  summer. 

The  king's  letter  above  mentioned  does 
not,  I  believe,  appear.  But  his  ambassa- 
dors, Carlisle  and  Holland,  had  promised 
in  his  name  that  he  would  give  a  written 
promise,  on  the  word  and  honor  of  a  king, 
which  the  prince  and  a  secretary  of  state 
should  also  sign,  that  all  his  Uouian 
catholic  subjects  should  enjoy  more  free- 
dom as  to  their  religion  than  they  could 
have  had  by  any  articles  agreed  on  with 
Spain ;  not  being  molested  in  their  per- 
sons or  property  for  their  profession  and 
exercise  of  their  religion,  provided  they 
used  their  liberty  with  moderation,  and 
rendered  due  submission  to  the  king, 
who  would  not  force  them  to  any  oath 
contrary  to  their  religion.  This  was 
signed  18th  Nov.  Hardw.  Pap.  646. 

Yet  after  this  concession  on  the  king's 
part  the  Freuch  cabinet  was  encouraged 
bv  it  to  ask  for  a  '•  direct  and  oublio 


1  Hardwicke  Papers,  I.  536.  Birch,  in 
one  of  those  volumes  given  by  him  to  the 
British  Museum  (and  which  ought  to  be 
published  according  to  his  own  inten- 
tion), has  made  several  extracts  from  the 
MS.  despatches  of  Tillieres,  the  French 
ambassador,  which  illustrate  this  nego- 
tiation. The  pope,  it  seems,  stood  off 
from  granting  the  dispensation,  requir- 
ing that  the  English  catholic  clergy 
should  represent  to  him  their  approba- 
tion of  the  marriage.  He  was  informed 
that  the  cardinal  had  obtained  terms 
much  more  favorable  for  the  catholics 
than  in  the  Spanish  treaty.  In  short, 
they  evidently  fancied  themselves  to  have 
gained  a  full  assurance  of  toleration ;  nor 
could  the  match  have  been  effected  on 
any  other  terms.  The  French  minister 
writes  to  Louis  XIII.  from  London, 
October  6,  1624,  that  he  had  obtained  a 
supersedeas  of  all  prosecutions,  more  than 
themselves  expected,  or  could  have  be- 
lieved possible  ;  en  somme,  un  acte  tres 
publique,  et  qui  fut  resolu  en  plein  con- 
Beil,  le  dit  roi  1'ayaut  assemble  expres 
pour  cela  le  jour  d'hier."  The  pope 
agreed  to  appoint  a  bishop  for  England, 
nominated  by  the  king  of  France.  Oct. 
22.  The  oath  of  allegiance,  however,  was 
a  stumbling-block ;  the  king  could  not 
change  it  by  his  own  authority  and  estab- 
lish another  in  parliament,  "ou  la  fac- 
tion des  puritains  predomme,  de  sorte 
qu'ils  peuvent  ce  qu'ils  veulent."  Buck- 
ingham however  promised  "  de  nous  faire 
obtenir  1'assurance  que  votre  majeste  de- 
siie  tant.  que  les  catholiques  de  ce  pais 
ne  seront  jauiais  inquietes  pour  la  raison 
du  sermeut  de  fidelite,  du  quel  votre  ma- 
jeste a  si  souvent  oui  parler."  Dec.  22. 
He  speaks  the  same  day  of  an  audience 
he  had  of  king  James,  who  promised 
never  to  persecute  his  catholic  subjects, 
nor  desire  of  them  any  oath  which  spoke 
of  the  pope's  spiritual  authority,  "mais 
seulement  un  acte  de  la  reconnoissance 
de  la  domination  temporellb  que  Dieu  lui 


404         APPREHENSIONS  OF  THE  PROTESTANTS.      CHAT.  VIL 

tn  the  terms  on  which  Charles  stood  with  his  brother-in-law. 
Sometimes  general  orders  were  issued  to  suspend  all  penal 
laws  against  papists ;  again,  by  capricious  change  of  policy, 
all  officers  and  judges  are  directed  to  proceed  in  their  execu- 
tion ;  and  this  severity  gave  place  in  its  turn  to  a  renewed 
season  of  indulgence.  If  these  alternations  were  not  very  sat- 
isfactory to  the  catholics,  the  whole  scheme  of  lenity  dis- 
pleased and  alarmed  the  protestants.  Tolerance,  in  any 
extensive  sense,  of  that  proscribed  worship,  was  equally  ab- 
horrent to  the  prelatist  and  the  puritan ;  though  one  would 
have  winked  at  its  peaceable  and  domestic  exercise,  which 
the  other  was  zealous  to  eradicate.  But,  had  they  been  ca- 
pable of  more  liberal  reasoning  upon  this  subject,  there  was 
enough  to  justify  their  indignation  at  this  attempt  to  sweep 
away  the  restrictive  code  established  by  so  many  statutes, 
and  so  long  deemed  essential  to  the  security  of  their  church, 
by  an  unconstitutional  exertion  of  the  prerogative,  prompted 
by  no  more  worthy  motive  than  compliance  with  a  foreign 
power,  and  tending  to  confirm  suspicions  of  the  king's  wav- 
ering between  the  two  religions,  or  his  indifference  to  either. 
In  the  very  first  months  of  his  reign,  and  while  that  parlia- 
ment was  sitting  which  has  been  reproached  for  its  parsi- 
mony, he  sent  a  fleet  to  assist  the  French  king  in  blocking 
up  the  port  of  Rochelle ;  and,  with  utter  disregard  of  the 
national  honor,  ordered  the  admiral,  who  reported  that  the 
sailors  would  not  fight  against  protestants,  to  sail  to  Dieppe, 
and  give  up  his  ships  into  the  possession  of  France.1  His 
subsequent  alliance  with  the  Hugonot  party  in  consequence 
merely  of  Buckingham's  unwarrantable  hostility  to  France, 

toleration,  not  by  connivance,  promise,  or  donnerons  des  colonels."  Id.  p.  538. 
fecrit  secret,  but  by  a  public  notification  Charles  could  hardly  be  expected  to  keep 
to  all  the  Roman  catholics,  and  that  of  his  engagements  as  to  the  catholic's, 
all  his  majesty's  kingdoms  whatsoever,  when  he  found  himself  so  grossly  out- 
confirmed  by  his  majesty's  and  the  witted. 

prince's  oath,  and  attested  by  a  public  It  was  during  this  marriage-treaty  of 
act.  whereof  a  copy  to  be  delivered  to  the  1624  that  the  archbishop  of  Embrun,  ae 
pope  or  his  minister,  and  the  same  to  he  relates  himself,  in  the  course  of  sev- 
biud  his  majosty  and  the  prince's  sue-  eral  conferences  with  the  king  on  that 
cessors  forever."  Id.  p.  552.  The  am-  subject,  was  assured  by  him  that  he  was 
bassadors  expressed  the  strongest  indig-  desirous  of  reSntering  the  fold  of  the 
nation  at  this  proposal,  on  which  the  church.  Wilson  in  Kennet,  p.  786,  not« 
French  did  not  think  fit  to  insist.  In  all  by  Wellwood.  I  have  not  seen  the  origi 
this  wretched  negotiation  James  was  as  nal  passage;  but  Dr.  Lingard  puts  by  ne 
much  the  dupe  as  he  had  been  in  the  means  so  strong  an  interpretation  on  th> 
former,  expecting  that  Prance  would  as-  king's  words,  as  related  by  the  arch- 
gist  in  the  recovery  of  the  Palatinate,  bishop  :  vol.  ix.  323. 
towards  which',  in  spite  of  promises,  she  1  Kennet,  p.  vi. ;  Rushworth ;  Lingard, 
took  no  steps.  Richelieu  had  said,  ix.  353 :  Cabala,  p.  1441 
"  Donnez-iious  des  pretres,  et  nous  vous 


CHA  L  — 1625-29.      THE  HIGH-CHURCH  PARTY.  405 

founded  on  the  most  extraordinary  motives,  could  not  re- 
deem, in  the  eyes  of  the  nation,  this  instance  of  lukewarm- 
ness,  to  say  the  least,  in  the  general  cause  of  the  reformation. 
Later  ages  have  had  means  of  estimating  the  attachment  of 
Charles  the  First  to  protestantism,  which  his  contemporaries 
in  that  early  period  of  his  reign  did  not  enjoy ;  and  this  has 
led  some  to  treat  the  apprehensions  of  parliament  as  either 
insincere  or  preposterously  unjust.  But  can  this  be  fairly 
pretended  by  any  one  who  has  acquainted  himself  with  the 
course  of  proceedings  on  the  Spanish  marriage,  the  whole 
of  which  was  revealed  by  the  earl  of  Bristol  to  the  house  of 
lords  ?  Was  there  nothing,  again,  to  excite  alarm  in  the  fre- 
quent conversions  of  persons  of  high  rank  to  popery,  in  the 
more  dangerous  partialities  of  many  more,  hi  the  evident  bias 
of  certain  distinguished  churchmen  to  tenets  rejected  at  the 
Reformation  ?  The  course  pursued  with  respect  to  relig- 
ious matters  after  the  dissolution  of  parliament  in  1629,  to 
which  I  shall  presently  advert,  did  by  no  means  show  the 
misgivings  of  that  assembly  to  have  been  ill-founded. 

It  was  neither,  however,  the  Arminian  opinions  of  the 
higher  clergy,  nor  even  their  supposed  leaning  unconstitu- 
towards  those  of  Rome,  that  chiefly  rendered  tional  tenets 
them  obnoxious  td  the  commons.  They  had  stu-  b^the  wgh- 
diously  inculcated  that  resistance  to  the  commands  cinm^  party 
of  rulers  was  in  every  conceivable  instance  a  heinous  sin  ;  a 
tenet  so  evidently  subversive  of  all  civil  liberty  that  it  can  be 
little  worth  while  to  argue  about  right  and  privilege,  wher- 
ever it  has  obtained  a  real  hold  on  the  understanding  and 
conscience  of  a  nation.  This  had  very  early  been  adopted 
by  the  Anglican  reformers,  as  a  barrier  against  the  disaifec- 
tion  of  those  who  adhered  to  the  ancient  religion,  and  in 
order  to  exhibit  their  own  loyalty  in  a  more  favorable  light, 
The  homily  against  wilful  disobedience  and  rebellion  w*s 
written  on  occasion  of  the  rising  of  the  northern  earls  in 
1569,  and  is  full  of  temporary  and  even  personal  allusions.1 

i  "God   alloweth  (it  is  said  in  this  look  over  the   chronicles   of  our   own 

homily,    among    other    passages   to  the  country,  call  to  mind  so  many  rebellions 

game  effect)  neither  the  dignity  of  any  of  old  time,  and  some  yet  fresh  in  mem- 

persou,  nor  the  multitude  of  any  people,  ory  ;    ye   shall  not   find   that  God   eve* 

nor  the  weight  of  any  cause,  as  sufficient  prospered    any   rebellion   against    their 

for  the  which  the  subjects  may  move  re-  natural  and  lawful  prince,  but  contrari- 

bellion  against  their  princes."    The  next  wise,  that   the  rebels   were  overthrown 

sentence  contains  a  bold  position.  "Turn  and  slain,  and  such  as  were  taken  pria- 

over  and  read  the  histories  of  all  nations,  oiier»    dreadfully   executed."      They  11- 


406  UNCONSTITUTIONAL  TENETS  OF        CHAT.  VII 

But  the  same  doctrine  is  enforced  in  others  of  those  compo- 
sitions, which  enjoy  a  kind  of  half  authority  in  the  English 
church.  It  is  laid  down  in  the  canons  of  convocation  in 
1606.  It  is  very  frequent  in  the  writings  of  English  di- 
vines, those  especially  who  were  much  about  the  court. 
And  an  unlucky  preacher  at  Oxford,  named  Knight,  about 
1622,  having  thrown  out  some  intimation  that  subjects  op- 
pressed by  their  prince  on  account  of  religion  might  defend 
themselves  by  arms,  that  university,  on  the  king's  highly  re- 
senting such  heresy,  not  only  censured  tne  preacher  (who 
had  the  audacity  to  observe  that  the  king  by  then  sending 
aid  to  the  French  Hugonots  of  Rochelle,  as  was  rumored  to 
be  designed,  had  sanctioned  his  position),  but  pronounced  a 
solemn  decree  that  it  is  in  no  case  lawful  for  subjects  to 
make  use  of  force  against  their  princes,  nor  to  appear  of- 
fensively or  defensively  in  the  field  against  them.  All  per- 
sons promoted  to  degrees  were  to  subscribe  this  article,  and 
to  take  an  oath  that  they  not  only  at  present  detested  the  op- 
posite opinion,  but  would  at  no  future  time  entertain  it.  A 
ludicrous  display  of  the  folly  and  despotic  spirit  of  learned 
academies ! l 

Those  however  who  most  strenuously  denied  the  abstract 
right  of  resistance  to  unlawful  commands  were  by  no  means 
obliged  to  maintain  the  duty  of  yielding  them  an  active  obe- 
dience. In  the  case  of  religion,  it  was  necessary  to  admit 
that  God  was  rather  to  be  obeyed  than  man.  Nor  had  it 
been  pretended,  except  by  the  most  servile  churchmen,  that 
subjects  had  no  positive  rights,  in  behalf  of  which  they  might 
decline  compliance  with  illegal  requisitions.  This  however 
was  openly  asserted  in  the  reign  of  Charles.  Those  who  re- 

luscrate  their  doctrine  by  the  most  pre-  very  consistent  with  the  aid  and  eouu- 
posterous  example  I  have  ever  seen  al-  tenance  given  to  the  United  Provinces, 
leged  in  any  book :  that  of  the  Virgin  Ma-  Our  learned  churchmen,  however,  cared 
ry,  who,  "  being  of  the  royal  blood  of  the  very  little  for  the  Dutch.  They  were 
ancient  natural  kings  of  Jewry,  obeyed  more  puzzled  about  the  Maccabees.  But 
the  proclamation  of  Augustus  to  go  to  that  knot  is  cut  in  bishop  Overall's  Con- 
Bethlehem.  This  obedience  of  this  most  vocation  Book  by  denying  that  Antiochus 
noble  and  most  virtuous  lady  to  a  foreign  Epiphanes  had  lawful  possession  of  Fal- 
aud  pagan  priuce  doth  well  teach  us,  estine  —  a  proposition  not  easy  to  be 
who  in  comparison  of  her  are  both  base  made  out. 

and  vile,  what  ready  obedience  we  do  owe  *   Collier,   724.      Neal,  495       Wood's 

to  our  natural  and  gracious  sovereign."  History  of  the  University  of  Oxford,  ii. 

In  another  homily,  entitled  "  On  Obe-  341.     Knight  was  sent  to  the  Gatehouse 

dience,"  the  duty  of  non-resistance,  even  prison,  where   he   remained    two   years. 

in  defence  of  religion,  is  most  decidedly  Laud  was  the  chief  cause  of  this  severity, 

maintained;  and   in  such  a  manner  a&  if  we  may  believe  Wood;    and  his  own 

might  have  been  inconvenient  in  case  of  diary  seems  to  confirm  this. 
a  popish  successor.     Nor  was  this  theory 


CHA.  I.  - 1625-29.    THE  HIGH-CHURCH  PARTY.  407 

fused  the  general  loan  of  1626  had  to  encounter  assaults 
from  very  different  quarters,  and  were  not  only  imprisoned, 
but  preached  at.  Two  sermons  by  Sibthorp  and  Mainwar- 
ing  excited  particular  attention.  These  men,  eager  for  pre- 
ferment, which  they  knew  the  readiest  method  to  attain, 
taught  that  the  king  might  take  the  subject's  money  at  his 
pleasure,  and  that  no  one  might  refuse  his  demand,  on  pen- 
alty of  damnation.  u  Parliaments,"  said  Mainwaring,  "  were 
not  ordained  to  contribute  any  right  to  the  king,  but  for  the 
more  equal  imposing  and  more  easy  exacting  of  that  which 
unto  kings  doth  appertain  by  natural  and  original  law  and 
justice,  as  their  proper  inheritance  annexed  to  their  imperial 
crowns  from  their  birth."  l  These  extravagances  of  rather 
obscure  men  would  have  passed  with  less  notice  if  the  gov- 
ernment had  not  given  them  the  most  indecent  encourage- 
ment. Abbot,  archbishop  of  Canterbury,  a  man  of  integrity, 
but  upon  that  account,  as  well  as  for  his  Calvinistic  partiali- 
ties, long  since  obnoxious  to  the  courtiers,  refused  to  license 
Sibthorp's  sermon,  alleging  some  unwarrantable  passages 
which  it  contained.  For  no  other  cause  than  this,  he  was 
sequestered  from  the  exercise  of  his  archiepiscopal  jurisdic- 
tion, and  confined  to  a  country  house  in  Kent.2  The  house 
of  commons,  after  many  complaints  of  those  ecclesiastics, 
finally  proceeded  against  Mainwaring  by  impeachment  at  the 
bar  of  the  lords.  He  was  condemned  to  pay  a  fine  of  1000£, 

1  Part.  Hist.  877,  395, 416,  &c.    Ken-  651.      Biograph.  Britann.,  art.    ABBOT. 
net,  p.  30.    Collier,  740,  743.    This  his-  Spelman's  Works,  part  2.  p.  3.    Aikin's 
torian,  though  a  nonjuror,  is  Englishman  James  I.,  ii.  259.     Williarus's  real  object 
enough  to  blame  the   doctrines  of  Sib-  was   to  succeed  the  archbishop  on  his 
thorp  and  Mainwaring,  and,  consistently  degradation. 

with  his  high-church  principles,  is  dis-        It  may  be  remarked  that  Abbot,  though 

pleased  at  the  suspension  of  Abbot  by  the  a  very  worthy  man,  had  not  always  been 

king's  authority.  untainted  by  the  air  of  a  court.    He  had 

2  State  Trials,  ii.  1449.     A  few  years  not  scrupled  grossly  to  flatter  the  king 
before  this.  Abbot   had  the  misfortune,  (see  his  article  in  Biograph.   Brit.,  and 
while  hunting  deer  in  a  nobleman's  park,  Aikin,  i.  368) ;  and  tells  us  himself  that 
to  shoot  one  of  the  keepers  with  his  cross-  he  introduced  Villiers  in  order  to  sup- 
bow.    Williams  and  Laud,  who  then  act-  plant    Somerset  ;    which,    though    well 
ed  together,  with  some  others,  affected  meant,  did    not    become   his    function, 
scruples  at  the  archbishop's  continuance  Even  in  the  delicate  business  of  promis- 
in  his  function,  on  pretence  that,  by  some  ing  toleration  to  the  catholics  by   the 
old  canon,  he  had  become  irregular  in  secret  articles  of  the  treaty  with  Spain, 
consequence  of  this  accidental  homicide;  he  gave  satisfaction  to  the  king  (Hard- 
anil  Spelman  disgraced  himself  by  writing  wicke  Papers,  i.  428),  which  could  only 
a  treatise  in  support  of  this  doctrine,  be  by  compliance.    This  shows  that  the 
James,  however,  had  more  sense  than  the  letter  in  Hush  worth,  ascribed  to  the  arch- 
antiquary,  and  less  ill-nature  than  the  bishop,  deprecating  all  such  concessions, 
churchmen ;  and   the   civilians  gave  no  is  not  genuine.     In  Cabala,  p.   13,  it  is 
countenance   to  Williams's    hypocritical  printed  with  the  name  of  the  archbishop 
scruples.    Hacket's  Life  of  Williams,  p.  of  York,  Mathews. 


408  GENERAL  REMARKS.  CHAP.  VII 

to  be  suspended  for  three  years  from  his  ministry,  and  to  be 
incapable  of  holding  any  ecclesiastical  dignity.  Yet  the  king 
almost  immediately  pardoned  Maimvaring,  who  became  in  a 
few  years  a  bishop,  as  Sibthorp  was  promoted  to  an  inferior 
dignity.1 

There  seems  on  the  whole  to  be  very  little  ground  for 
General  censure  in  the  proceedings  of  this  illustrious  par- 
remarks,  liament.  I  admit  that,  if  we  believe  Charles  I.  to 
have  been  a  gentle  and  beneficent  monarch,  incapable  of  har- 
boring any  design  against  the  liberties  of  his  people,  or 
those  who  stood  forward  in  defence  of  their  privileges,  wise 
in  the  choice  of  his  counsellors,  and  patient  in  listening  to 
them,  the  commons  may  seem  to  have  carried  their  opposi- 
tion to  an  unreasonable  length.  But,  if  he  had  shown  him- 
self possessed  with  such  notions  of  his  own  prerogative,  no 
matter  how  derived,  as  could  bear  no  effective  control  from 
fixed  law,  or  from  the  nation's  representatives  ;  if  he  was 
hasty  and  violent  in  temper,  yet  stooping  to  low  arts  of  equiv- 
ocation and  insincerity  ;  whatever  might  be  his  estimable 
qualities  in  other  respects,  they  could  act,  in  the  main,  no 
otherwise  than  by  endeavoring  to  keep  him  in  the  power  of 
parliament,  lest  his  power  should  make  parliament  but  a 
name.  Every  popular  assembly,  truly  zealous  in  a  great 
cause,  will  display  more  heat  and  passion  than  cool-blooded 
men  after  the  lapse  of  centuries  may  wholly  approve.2  But 
so  far  were  they  from  encroaching,  as  our  Tory  writers  pre- 
tend, on  the  just  powers  of  a  limited  monarch,  that  they  do 
not  appear  to  have  conceived,  they  at  least  never  hinted  at, 
the  securities  without  which  all  they  had  obtained  or  at- 

1  The    bishopa    were  many  of   them        *  Those  who  may  be  inclined  to  dissent 

mere  sycophants  of  Buckingham.  Besides  from  my  text  will*  perhaps  bow  to  their 

Laud,  Williams,   and    Neile.    one  Field,  favorite  Clarendon.     lie  says  that  in  the 

bishop  of  Llandaff,  was  an  abject  cour-  three    first    parliaments,    though    there 

tier.    See  a  letter  of  his  in  Oabala,  p.  118,  were  "several  distempered  speeches  of 

4to.  edit.     Mede  says.  (27th  May,  1626),  particular  persons,  not  fit  for   the  rev- 

"  I  am  sorry  to  hear  they  (the  bishops)  erence  due  to  his  majesty,"  yet  he  "  does 

are    so    habituated     to     flattery     that  not  know  any  formed  act  of  either  house 

they  seem  not  to  know  of  any  other  duty  (for  neither  the  remonstrance  nor  votes 

that  belongs  to  them."     See  Ellis's  Let-  of  the  last  day  were  such)  that  was  not 

ters,  iii.  228,  for  the  account  Mede  gives  agreeable  to  the  wisdom  and  justice  of 

of  the  manner  in  which   the  heads  of  great  courts   upon    those  extraordinary 

houses  forced  the  election  of  Bucking-  occasions ;   and    whoever   considers    the 

bam  as  chancellor  of  Cambridge,  while  acts  of  power  and  injustice  in   the  in- 

the  impeachment  was  pending  against  tervals  of  parliament  will  not  be  much 

him.     The  junior  masters  of  arts,  how-  scandalized  at   the  warmth  and  vivaci- 

ever,  made  a  good  stand  ;  so  that  it  was  ty    of   those  meetings."     Vol.  i.  p.   8, 

carried  against  the  earl  of  Berkshire  only  edit.  1826. 
by  three  voice* 


CHA.  I.  — 1625-29.          GENERAL  REMARKS.  409 

tempted  would  become  ineffectual.  No  one  member  of  that 
house,  in  the  utmost  warmth  of  debate,  is  recorded  to  have 
suggested  the  abolition  of  the  court  of  star-chamber,  or  any 
provision  for  the.  periodical  meeting  of  parliament.  Though 
such  remedies  for  the  greatest  abuses  were  in  reality  con- 
sonant to  the  actual  unrepealed  law  of  the  land,  yet,  as  they 
implied,  in  the  apprehension  of  the  generality,  a  retrench- 
ment of  the  king's  prerogative,  they  had  not  yet  become 
familiar  to  their  hopes.  In  asserting  the  illegality  of  arbi- 
trary detention,  of  compulsory  loans,  of  tonnage  and  pound- 
age levied  without  consent  of  parliament,  they  stood  in 
defence  of  positive  rights  won  by  their  fathers,  the  prescrip- 
tive inheritance  of  Englishmen.  Twelve  years  more  of 
repeated  aggressions  taught  the  Long  Parliament  what  a 
few  sagacious  men  might  perhaps  have  already  suspected, 
that  they  must  recover  more  of  their  ancient  constitution 
from  oblivion,  that  they  must  sustain  its  partial  weakness  by 
new  securities,  that,  in  order  to  render  the  existence  of  mon- 
archy compatible  with  that  of  freedom,  they  must  not  only 
strip  it  of  all  it  had  usurped,  but  of  something  that  was  its 
own. 


DECLARATION  OF  THE  KING.  4H 


CHAPTER  VHL 

FROM  THE  DISSOLUTION  OF  CHARLES'S  THIRD  PARLIAMENT 
TO    THE   MEETING    OF   THE   LONG   PARLIAMENT. 

Declaration  of  the  King  after  the  Dissolution  —  Prosecutions  of  Eliot  and  others 
for  Conduct  in  Parliament  —  Of  Chambers  for  refusing  to  pay  Custom!)  —  Com- 
mendable Behavior  of  Judges  in  some  Instances  —  Means  adopted  to  raise  the 
Revenue  —  Compositions  for  Knighthood  —  Forest  Laws  —  Monopolies  --  Ship- 
Money — Extension  of  it  to  inland  Places  —  Hampden's  Refusal  to  pay  — 
Arguments  on  the  Case  —  Proclamations  —  Various  arbitrary  Proceedings  — 
Star-Chamber  Jurisdiction  —  Punishments  inflicted  by  it  —  Cases  of  Bishop 
Williams,  Prynne,  &c.  —  Laud,  his  Character  —  Lord  Strafford  —  Correspondence 
between  these  two  —  Conduct  of  Laud  in  the  Church-Prosecution  of  Puritans  — 
Favor  shown  to  Catholics  —  Tendency  to  their  Religion  —  Expectations  enter- 
tained by  them  —  Mission  of  Panzani  —  Intrigue  of  Bishop  Montagu  with  him 
—  Chillingworth  —  Hales  —  Character  of  Clarendon's  Writings  —  Animadver- 
sions on  his  Account  of  this  Period  —  Scots  Troubles,  and  Distress  of  the  Govern- 
ment —  Parliament  of  April,  1640  —  Council  of  York  —  Convocation  of  Long 
Parliament. 

THE  dissolution  of  a  parliament  was  always  to  the  preroga- 
tive what  the  dispersion  of  clouds  is  to  the  sun.  _ 

.  i  «•     i  •  t  •  «     Declaration 

As  it  in  mockery  or  the  transient  obstruction,  it  of  the  king 
shone  forth  as  splendid  and  scorching  as  before,  ablution. 
Even   after   the   exertions  of  the  most  popular 
and  intrepid  house  of  commons  that  had  ever  met,  and  after 
the  most  important  statute  that  had  been  passed  for  some 
hundred   years,   Charles   found   himself  in   an   instant   un- 
shackled by  his  law  or  his  word  :  once  more  that  absolute 
king  for  whom  his  sycophants  had  preached  and  pleaded, 
as  if  awakened  from  a  fearful  dream  of  sounds  and  sights 
that  such  monarchs  hate  to  endure,  to  the  full  enjoyment  of 
an  unrestrained  prerogative.     He  announced  his  intentions 
of  government  for  the  future  in  a  long  declaration  of  the 
causes  of  the  late  dissolution  of  parliament,  which,  though 
not  without  the  usual  promises  to  maintain   the  laws  and 
liberties  of  the  people,  gare  evident  hints  that  his  own  inter- 


412  PROSECUTION'S  OF  CHAP.  VIII. 

pretation  of  them  must  be  humbly  acquiesced  in.1  This  was 
followed  up  by  a  proclamation  that  he  "  should  account  it 
presumption  for  any  to  prescribe  a  time  to  him  for  parlia- 
ment, the  calling,  continuing,  or  dissolving  of  which  was 
always  in  his  own  power ;  and  he  should  be  more  inclinable 
to  meet  parliament  again,  when  his  people  should  see  more 
clearly  into  his  intents  and  actions,  when  such  as  have  bred 
this  interruption  shall  have  received  their  condign  punish- 
ment." He  afterwards  declares  that  he  should  "  not  over- 
charge his  subjects  by  any  more  burdens,  but  satisfy  himself 
with  those  duties  that  were  received  by  his  father,  which  he 
neither  could  nor  would  dispense  with  ;  but  should  esteem 
them  unworthy  of  his  protection  who  should  deny  them."  2 

The  king  next  turned  his  mind,  according  to  his  own  and 
Prosecutions  his  father's  practice,  to  take  vengeance  on  those 
of  Eiiot  and  wno  })aci  been  most  active  in  their  opposition  to 
conduct  In  him.  A  few  days  after  the  dissolution,  sir  John 
parliament.  EUotj  Holies,  Selden,  Long,  Strode,  and  other 
eminent  members  of  the  commons,  were  committed,  some  to 
the  Tower,  some  to  the  King's  Bench,  and  their  papers 
seized.  Upon  suing  for  their  habeas  corpus,  a  return  was 
made  that  they  were  detained  for  notable  contempts,  and 
for  stirring  up  sedition,  alleged  in  a  warrant  under  the  king's 
sign  manual.  Their  counsel  argued  against  the  sufficiency 
of  this  return,  as  well  on  the  principles  and  precedents  em- 
ployed in  the  former  case  of  sir  Thomas  Daniel  and  his 
colleagues,  as  on  the  late  explicit  confirmation  of  them  in 
the  Petition  of  Right.  The  king's  counsel  endeavored,  by 
evading  the  authority  of  that  enactment,  to  set  up'anew  that 
alarming  pretence  to  a  power  of  arbitrary  imprisonment 
which  the  late  parliament  had  meant  to  silence  forever. 
u  A  petition  in  parliament,"  said  the  attorney -general  Heath, 
u  is  no  law,  yet  it  is  for  the  honor  and  dignity  of  the  king  to 
observe  it  faithfully  ;  but  it  is  the  duty  of  the  people  not  to 
stretch  it  beyond  the  words  and  intention  of  the  king.  And 
no  other  construction  can  be  made  of  the  petition  than  that 
;t  is  a  confirmation  of  the  ancient  liberties  and  rights  of  the 

1  "  It  hath  so  happened,"  he  says,  "  by  highly  contemned  as  our  kingly  offlca 

the  disobedient  and  seditious  carriage  of  cannot    bear,   nor  any  former   age  can 

those  said  ill-affected  persons  of  the  house  parallel."     Rymer.  xis.  30. 

of  commons,  that  we  and  our  regal  au-  2  jjymer,  xix.  62. 
thority  and  commandment  have  been  so 


CHA.  1.  — 1629-40.          ELIOT  AND  OTHERS.  413 

subjects.  So  that  now  the  case  remains  in  the  same  qtialitj 
and  degree  as  it  was  before  the  petition."  Thus,  by  dint  of 
a  sophism  which  turned  into  ridicule  the  whole  proceedings 
of  the  late  parliament,  he  pretended  to  recite  afresh  the  au- 
thorities on  which  he  had  formerly  relied,  in  order  to  prove 
that  one  committed  by  the  command  of  the  king  or  privy 
council  is  not  bailable.  The  judges,  timid  and  servile,  yet 
desirous  to  keep  some  measures  with  their  own  consciences, 
or  looking  forward  to  the  wrath  of  future  parliaments,  wrote 
what  Whitelock  calls  "  a  humble  and  stout  letter  "  to  the 
king,  that  they  were  bound  to  bail  the  prisoners ;  but  re- 
quested that  he  would  send  his  direction  to  do  so.1  The 
gentlemen  in  custody  were,  on  this  intimation,  removed  to 
the  Tower ;  and  the  king,  in  a  letter  to  the  court,  refused 
permission  for  them  to  appear  on  the  day  when  judgment 
was  to  be  given.  Their  restraint  was  thus  protracted 
through  the  long  vacation ;  towards  the  close  of  which, 
Charles,  sending  for  two  of  the  judges,  told  them  he  was 
content  the  prisoners  should  be  bailed,  notwithstanding  their 
obstinacy  in  refusing  to  present  a  petition  declaring  their 
sorrow  for  having  offended  him.  In  the  ensuing  Michael- 
mas term  accordingly  they  were  brought  before  the  court, 
and  ordered  not  only  to  find  bail  for  the  present  charge,  but 
sureties  for  their  good  behavior.  On  refusing  to  comply 
with  this  requisition,  they  were  remanded  to  custody. 

The  attorney-general,  dropping  the  charge  against  the  rest, 
exhibited  an  information  against  sir  John  Eliot  for  words 
uttered  in  the  house ;  namely,  That  the  council  and  judges 
had  conspired  to  trample  under  foot  the  liberties  of  the  sub- 
ject ;  and  against  Mr.  Denzil  Holler  and  Mr.  Valentine  for 
a  tumult  on  the  last  day  of  the  session ;  when  the  speaker, 
having  attempted  to  adjourn  the  house  by  the  king's  com- 
mand, had  been  forcibly  held  down  in  the  chair  by  some  of 
the  members,  while  a  remonstrance  was  voted.  They 
pleaded  to  the  court's  jurisdiction,  because  their  offences 
were  supposed  to  be  committed  in  parliament,  and  conse- 

1  Whitelock's  Memorials,  p.  14.    White-  Jones  guilty  of  delay  in  not  bailing  these 

lock's   father  was  one  of  the  judges  of  gentlemen,  they   voted  also  that    Croke 

the  king's  bench :  his  son  takes  pains  to  and   Whitelock   were  not    guilty   of   it. 

exculpate  him  from    the  charge  of   too  The  proceedings,  as  we  now  read  them, 

much  compliance,  and  succeeded  so  well  hardly  warrant  this  favorable  distinction, 

with    the  long    parliament    that,   when  Parl.  Hist.  ii.  869,  876. 
they  voted  chief-justice  Uyde  and  justice 


41  i     PROSECUTIONS   OF  ELIOT  AND  OTHERS.       CHAT.  VIII 

quently  not  punishable  in  any  other  place.  This  brought 
forward  the  great  question  of  privilege,  on  the  determination 
of  which  the  power  of  the  house  of  commons,  and  conse- 
quently the  character  of  the  English  constitution,  seemed 
evidently  to  depend. 

Freedom  of  speech,  being  implied  in  the  nature  of  a  rep- 
resentative assembly  called  to  present  grievances  and  sug- 
gest remedies,  could  not  stand  in  need  of  any  special  law  or 
privilege  to  support  it.  But  it  was  also  sanctioned  by  posi- 
tive authority.  The  speaker  demands  it  at  the  beginning 
of  every  parliament  among  the  standing  privileges  of  the 
house ;  and  it  had  received  a  sort  of  confirmation  from  the 
legislature  by  an  act  passed  in  the  fourth  year  of  Henry 
VIII.,  on  occasion  of  one  Strode,  who  had  been  prosecuted 
and  imprisoned  in  the  Stannary  court,  for  proposing  in  par- 
liament some  regulations  for  the  tinners  in  Cornwall ;  which 
annuls  all  that  had  been  done,  or  might  hereafter  be  done, 
towards  Strode,  for  any  matter  relating  to  the  parliament,  in 
words  so  strong  as  to  form,  in  the  opinion  of  many  lawyers, 
a  general  enactment.  The  judges  however  held,  on  the 
question  being  privately  sent  to  them  by  the  king,  that  the 
statute  concerning  Strode  was  a  particular  act  of  parliament 
extending  only  to  him  and  those  who  had  joined  with  him  to 
prefer  a  bill  to  the  commons  concerning  tinners ;  but  that, 
although  the  act  were  private  and  extended  to  them  alone, 
yet  it  was  no  more  than  all  other  parliament-men,  by  priv- 
ilege of  the  house,  ought  to  have ;  namely,  freedom  of 
speech  concerning  matters  there  debated.1 

It  appeared  by  a  constant  series  of  precedents,  the  counsel 
for  Eliot  and  his  friends  argued,  that  the  liberties  and  priv- 
ileges of  parliament  could  only  be  determined  therein,  and 
not  by  any  inferior  court ;  that  the  judges  had  often  declined 
to  give  their  opinions  on  such  subjects,  alleging  that  they 
were  beyond  their  jurisdiction ;  that  the  words  imputed  to 
Eliot  were  in  the  nature  of  an  accusation  of  persons  in 
power  which  the  commons  had  an  undoubted  right  to  prefer } 
that  no  one  would  venture  to  complain  of  grievances  in  par- 
liament, if  he  should  be  subjected  to  punishment  at  the  dis- 

i  Strode's  act  is  printed  in  Hatsell's  like  many  of  our  ancient  laws,  so  con- 
Precedents,  vol.  i.  p.  80,  and  in  several  fusedly  as  to  make  its  application  uncer- 
other  books,  as  well  as  in  the  great  edition  tain ;  but  it  rather  appears  to  me  not  to 
of  Statutes  of  the  Realm.  It  is  worded,  have  been  intended  as  a  public  act. 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.      JUDGMENT  OF  KING'S  BENCH.  415 

cretion  of  an  inferior  tribunal ;  that  whatever  instances  had 
occurred  of  punishing  the  alleged  offences  of  members  after 
a  dissolution  were  but  acts  of  power,  which  no  attempt  had 
hitherto  been  made  to  sanction  ;  finally,  that  the  offences 
imputed  might  be  punished  in  a  future  parliament. 

The  attorney-general  replied  to  the  last  point,  that  the 
king  was  not  bound  to  wait  for  another  parliament ;  and, 
moreover,  that  the  house  of  commons  was  not  a  court  of  jus- 
tice, nor  had  any  power  to  proceed  criminally,  except  by 
imprisoning  its  own  members.  He  admitted  that  the  judges 
had  sometimes  declined  to  give  their  judgment  upgn  matters 
of  privilege ;  but  contended  that  such  cases  had  happened 
during  the  session  of  parliament,  and  that  it  did  not  follow 
but  that  an  offence  committed  in  the  house  might  be  ques- 
tioned after  a  dissolution.  He  set  aside  the  application  of 
Strode's  case,  as  being  a  special  act  of  parliament ;  and  dwelt 
on  the  precedent  of  an  information  preferred  in  the  reign  of 
Mary  against  certain  members  for  absenting  themselves  from 
their  duty  in  parliament,  which,  though  it  never  came  to  a 
conclusion,  was  not  disputed  on  the  ground  of  right. 

The  court  were  unanimous  in  holding  that  they  had  juris- 
diction, though  the  alleged  offences  were  committed  in  par- 
liament, and  that  the  defendants  were  bound  to  answer. 
The  privileges  of  parliament  did  not  extend,  one  of  them 
said,  to  breaches  of  the  peace,  which  was  the  present  case ; 
and  all  offences  against  the  crown,  said  another,  were  pun- 
ishable in  the  court  of  king's  bench.  On  the  parties  refus- 
ing to  put  in  any  other  plea,  judgment  was  given  that  they 
should  be  imprisoned  during  the  king's  pleasure,  and  not  re- 
leased without  giving  surety  for  good  behavior,  and  making 
submission ;  that  Eliot,  as  the  greatest  offender  and  ring- 
leader, should  be  fined  in  2000/.,  Holies  and  Valentine  to  a 
smaller  amount.1 

Eliot,  the  most  distinguished  leader  of  the  popular  party, 
died  in  the  Tower  without  yielding  to  the  submission  re- 
quired. In  the  long  parliament  the  commons  came  to  sev- 
eral votes  on  the  illegality  of  all  these  proceedings,  both  as 
to  the  delay  in  granting  their  habeas  corpus,  and  the  over- 
ruling their  plea  to  the  iurisdiction  of  the  king's  bench.  But 
the  subject  was  revived  again  in  a  more  distant  and  more 

1  State  Trials,  vol.  Hi.  from  Rushwortb 


416  PROSECUTION  OF  CHAMBERS.  CHAP.  VIII 

tranquil  period.  In  the  year  1667  the  commons  resolved 
that  the  act  of  4  H  VIII.  concerning  Strode  was  a  general 
law,  "extending  to  indemnify  all  and  every  the  members  of 
both  houses  of  parliament,  in  all  parliaments,  for  and  touch- 
ing any  bills,  speaking,  reasoning,  or  declaring  of  any  mat- 
ter or  matters  in  and  concerning  the  parliament  to  be 
communed  and  treated  of,  and  is  a  declaratory  law  of  the 
ancient  and  necessary  rights  and  privileges  of  parliament." 
They  resolved  also  that  the  judgment  given  5  Car.  I.  against 
sir  John  Eliot,  Denzil  Holies,  and  Benjamin  Valentine,  is 
an  illegal  judgment,  and  against  the  freedom  and  privilege 
of  parliament.  To  these  resolutions  the  lords  gave  their  con- 
currence. And  Holies,  then  become  a  peer,  having  brought 
the  record  of  the  king's  bench  by  writ  of  error  before  them, 
they  solemnly  reversed  the  judgment.1  An  important  de- 
cision with  respect  to  our  constitutional  law,  which  has 
established  beyond  controversy  the  great  privilege  of  unlim- 
ited freedom  of  speech  in  parliament;  unlimited,  I  mean, 
by  any  authority  except  that  by  which  the  house  itself  ought 
always  to  restrain  indecent  and  disorderly  language  in  its 
members.  It  does  not,  however,  appear  to  be  a  necessary 
consequence,  from  the  reversal  of  this-judgment,  that  no  ac- 
tions committed  in  the  house  by  any  of  its  members  are  pun- 
ishable in  a  court  of  law.  The  argument  in  behalf  of  Holies 
and  Valentine  goes  indeed  to  this  length  ;  but  it  was  admit- 
ted in  the  debate  on  the  subject  in  1667  that  their  plea  to  the 
jurisdiction  of  the  king's  bench  could  not  have  been  sup- 
ported as  to  the  imputed  riot  in  detaining  the  speaker  in  the 
chair,  though  the  judgment  was  erroneous  in  extending  to 
words  spoken  in  parliament.  And  it  is  obvious  that  the 
house  could  inflict  no  adequate  punishment  in  the  possible 
case  of  treason  or  felony  committed  within  its  walls;  nor, 
if  its  power  of  imprisonment  be  limited  to  the  session,  in  that 
of  many  smaller  offences. 

The  customs  on  imported  merchandises  were  now  rigor- 
ously enforced.2  But  the  late  discussions  in  parliament,  and 
Prosecution  ^e  growmo  disposition  to  probe  the  legality  of  all 
of  chambers  acts  of  the  crown,  rendered  the  merchants  more 
torp™yUcusi?  discontented  than  ever.  Eichard  Chambers,  hav- 
toms.  ing  refused  to  pay  any  further  duty  for  a  bale 

1  Hateell,  pp.  212, 242.  »  Rushworth 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.      BEHAVIOR  OF  JUDGES.  417 

of  silks  than  might  be  required  by  law,  was  summoned  be- 
fore the  privy  counsel.  In  the  presence  of  that  board  he 
was  provoked  to  exclaim  that  in  no  part  of  the  world,  not 
even  in  Turkey,  were  the  merchants  so  screwed  and  wrung 
as  in  England.  For  these  hasty  words  an  information  was 
preferred  against  him  in  the  star-chamber;  and  the  court, 
being  of  opinion  that  the  words  were  intended  to  make  the 
people  believe  that  his  majesty's  happy  government  might 
be  termed  Turkish  tyranny,  manifested  their  laudable  ab- 
horrence of  such  tyranny  by  sentencing  him  to  pay  a  fine 
of  2000?.,  and  to  make  a  humble  submission.  Chambers,  a 
sturdy  puritan,  absolutely  refused  to  subscribe  the  form  of 
submission  tendered  to  him,  and  was  of  course  committed  to 
prison.  But  the  court  of  king's  bench  admitted  him  to  bail 
on  a  habeas  corpus ;  for  which,  as  Whitelock  tells  us,  they 
were  reprimanded  by  the  council.1 

There  were  several  instances,  besides  this  just  mentioned, 
wherein  the  judges  manifested  a  more  courageous  _ 

xiT  ui  ii  Commend- 

spirit  than  they  were  able  constantly  to  preserve  ;  able  behay- 
and  the  odium  under  which  their  memory  labors  ]Ud°efg  ln 
for  a  servile  compliance  with  the  court,  especially  some  in- 
in  the  case  of  ship-money,  renders  it  but  an  act  of  *' 
justice  to  record  those  testimonies  they  occasionally  gave  of 
a  nobler  sense  of  duty.     They  unanimously  declared,  when 
Charles  expressed  a  desire  that  Felton,  the  assassin  of  the 
duke  of  Buckingham,  might  be  put  to  the  rack  in  order  to 
make  him  discover  his  accomplices,  that  the  law  of  England 
did  not  allow  the  use  of  torture.     This  is  a  remarkable  proof 
that,  amidst  all  the  arbitrary  principles  and  arbitrary  meas- 
ures of  the  time,  a  truer  sense  of  the  inviolability  of  law 
had  begun  to  prevail,  and  that  the  free  constitution  of  Eng- 
land was  working  off  the  impurities  with  which  violence  had 
stained  it.     For,  though  it  be  most  certain  that  the  law  never 
recognized  the  use  of  torture,  there  had  been  many  instances 
of  its  employment,  and  even  within  a  few  years.2    In  this 

1  Rushworth  ;  State  Trials,  iii.  373 ;  clally  against  Roman  catholics,  under 

Whitelock,  p.  12.  Chambers  applied  Elizabeth.  Those  accused  of  the  gun- 

ieveral  times  for  redress  to  the  long  par-  powder  conspiracy  were  also  severely 

iiament  on  account  of  this  and  subse-  tortured  ;  and  others  in  the  reign  of 

quent  injuries,  but  seems  to  have  been  James.  Coke,  in  the  Countess  of  Slirows- 

cruelly  neglected,  while  they  were  voting  bury's  case,  1612,  State  Trials,  ii.  773, 

Jarge  sums  to  those  who  had  suffered  mentions  it  as  a  privilege  of  the  nobility 

much  less,  and  he  died  in  poverty.  that  '•  their  bodies  are  not  subject  to  tor- 

v  I  have  remarked  in  former  passages  ture  in  causa  crimiuis  Iwsse  inigrstutiH." 

that  the  rack  was  much  employed,  espe-  Yet,  in  his  Third  Institute,  p.  35,  he  sari 

VOL.  i.  —  c.  27 


418 


BEHAVIOR  OF  JUDGES. 


CHAP.  VIII. 


public  assertion  of  its  illegality  the  judges  conferred  an  em- 
inent service  on  their  country,  and  doubtless  saved  the  king 
and  his  council  much  additional  guilt  and  infamy  which  they 
would  have  incurred  in  the  course  of  their  career.  They 
declared  about  the  same  time,  on  a  reference  to  them  con- 
cerning certain  disrespectful  words  alleged  to  have  been 
spoken  by  one  Pine  against  the  king,  that  no  words  can  of 
themselves  amount  to  treason  within  the  statute  of  Edward 
III. 1  They  resolved,  some  years  after,  that  Prynne's, 
Burton's,  and  Bastwick's  libels  against  the  bishops  were  no 
treason.2  In  their  old  controversy  with  the  ecclesiastical 
jurisdiction  they  were  inflexibly  tenacious.  An  action  hav- 
ing been  brought  against  some  members  of  the  high-com- 
mission court  for  false  imprisonment,  the  king,  on  Laud's 
remonstrance,  sent  a  message  to  desire  that  the  suit  might 
not  proceed  till  he  should  have  conversed  with  the  judges. 
The  chief-justice  made  answer  that  they  were  bound  by  their 
oaths  not  to  delay  the  course  of  justice ;  and,  after  a  con- 
tention before  the  privy  council,  the  commissioners  were 
compelled  to  plead.8 

Such  instances  of  firmness  serve  to  extenuate  those  un- 
happy deficiencies  which  are  more  notorious  in  histoiy.  Had 
the  judges  been  as  numerous  and  independent  as  those  of 
the  parliament  of  Paris,  they  would  not  probably  have  been 


the  rack  in  the  Tower  was  brought  in  by 
the  duke  of  Exeter,  under  Henry  VI., 
and  is  therefore  familiarly  called  the 
duke  of  Exeter's  daughter;  and,  after 
quoting  Fortescue  to  prove  the  practice 
illegal,  concludes  —  "There  is  no  law  to 
warrant  tortures  in  this  land,  nor  can 
they  be  justified  by  any  prescription,  be- 
ing so  lately  brought  in."  Bacon  ob- 
serves, in  a  tract  written  in  1603,  '•  In  the 
highest  cases  of  treason,  torture  is  used 
for  discovery,  and  not  for  evidence,"  i. 
393.  See  also  Miss  Aikin's  Memoirs  of 
James  I.,  ii.  158. 

[This  subject  has  been  learnedly  elu- 
cidated by  Mr.  .lardine,  in  his  '•  Reading 
on  the  Use  of  Torture  in  the  Criminal 
Law  of  England,  1837."  The 'historical 
facts  are  very  well  brought  together  in 
this  essay  ;  but  I  cannot  agree  with  this 
highly-intelligent  author  in  considering 
the  use  of  torture  as  having  been  "  law- 
ful as  an  act  of  prerogative,  though  not  so 
by  the  common  and  statute  law."  P  59. 
The  whole  tenor  of  uiy  own  views  of  the 
coustitutiori,  as  developed  in  this  and  in 
former  works  forbids  my  acquiescence  in 


a  theory  which  does,  as  it  seems  to  me, 
go  the  full  length  of  justifying,  in  a  le- 
gal sense,  the  violent  proceedings  of  the 
crown  under  all  the  Plautagenets,  Tu- 
dors,  and  Stuarts.  1845.] 

1  State  Trials,  iii.  359.    This  was  a  very 
important  determination,  and  put  an  end 
to  such  tyrannical  persecution  of  Roman 
catholics  for  bare  expressions  of  opinion 
as  had  been  used  under  Elizabeth  and 
James. 

2  Rushworth's  Abr.,  ii.  253;  Stafford's 
Letters,  ii.  74. 

a  U'hitelock,  16;  Kennet.  63.  We  find 
in  Rymer,  xix.  279,  a  commission,  d:ited 
May  6,  1631,  enabling  the  privy  council 
at  all  times  to  come,  "  to  hear  and  ex- 
amine all  differences  which  shall  arise 
betwixt  any  of  our  courts  of  justice, 
especially  between  the  civil  and  eccle- 
siastical.jurisdictions,"  &c.  This  was  in 
all  probability  contrived  by  Laud,  or  some 
of  those  who  did  not  favor  the  common 
law.  But  I  do  not  find  that  anything 
was  done  under  this  commission,  which, 
I  need  hardly  say,  wus  as  illegal  as  most 
of  the  king's  other  proceedings. 


CHA.  I.  —  1629-40.    COMPOSITIONS  FOR  KNIGHTHOOD.         419 

wanting  in  equal  vigor.  But,  holding  their  offices  at  the 
king's  will,  and  exposed  to  the  displeasure  of  his  council 
whenever  they  opposed  any  check  to  the  prerogative,  they 
held  a  vacillating  course,  which  made  them  obnoxious  to 
those  who  sought  for  despotic  power,  while  it  forfeited  the 
esteem  of  the  nation. 

In  pursuance  of  the  system  adopted  by  Charles's  min- 
isters, they  had  recourse  to  exactions,  some  odi-  Means 
ous  and   obsolete,  some  of  very  questionable  le-  ad.°Ptf'* to 

f     n  raise  the 

gahty,  and  others  clearly  against  law.  Of  the  revenue, 
former  class  may  be  reckoned  the  compositions  for  tiomffor" 
not  taking  the  order  of  knighthood.  The  early  knighthood, 
kings  of  England,  Henry  III.  and  Edward  L,  very  little  in 
the  spirit  of  chivalry,  had  introduced  the  practice  of  sum- 
moning their  military  tenants,  holding  20/.  per  annum,  to 
receive  knighthood  at  their  '  hands.  Those  who  declined 
this  honor  were  permitted  to  redeem  their  absence  by  a  mod- 
erate fine.1  Elizabeth,  once  in  her  reign,  and  James,  had 
availed  themselves  of  this  ancient  right.  But  the  change  in 
the  value  of  money  rendered  it  far  more  oppressive  than  for- 
merly, though  limited  to  the  holders  of  40/.  per  annum  in 
military  tenure.  Commissioners  were  now  appointed  to 
compound  with  those  who  had  neglected  some  years  before 
to  obey  the  proclamation,  summoning  them  to  receive  knight- 
hood at  the  king's  coronation.2  In  particular  instances  very 
severe  fines  are  recorded  to  have  been  imposed  upon  default- 
ers, probably  from  some  political  resentment.8 

Still  greater  dissatisfaction  attended  the  king's  attempt  to 
revive  the  ancient  laws  of  the  forests  —  those  laws, 
of  which,  in  elder  times,  so  many  complaints  had 
been  heard,  exacting  money  by  means  of  pretensions  which 
long  disuse  had  rendered  dubious,  and  showing  himself  to 

1  2  Inst.  693.    The  regulations  con-  force,  which  by  express  words  exempts 
tained  in  the  statute  de  militibus,  1  Ed.  them.    See  Mr.  Brodie's  Hist,  of  British 
II.,  though  apparently  a  temporary  law,  Empire,  ii.  282.    There  is  still  some  dif- 
Beem  to  have  been  considered  by  Coke  as  ficulty  about  this,  which  I  cannot  clear 
permanently  binding.    Yet  in  this  stat-  up,  nor  comprehend  why  the  title,  if  it 
ute  the  estate  requiring  knighthood,  or  could  be  had  for  asking,  was  so  continu- 
a  composition  for  it,  is  fixed  at  201.  per  ally  declined;  unless  it  were,  as  Mr.  B. 
annum.  hints,  that  the  fees  of  knighthood  greatly 

2  According  to  a  speech  of  Mr.  Hyde  in  exceeded  the  composition.    Perhaps  none 
the  long  parliament,  not  only  military,  who  could  not  prove  their  gentility  were 
tenants,  but  all  others,  and  even  lessees  admitted  to  the  honor,  though  the  fine 
and  merchants,  were  summoned  before  was  extorted  from  them.     It  is  said  that 
the  council  on  this  account.     Part.  Hist,  the  king  got  lOO.OOW.  by  this  resource, 
ii.  948.     This  wns  evidently  illegal ;  espe-  Macaulay,  ii.  107. 

•ially  if  the  Statutum  de  railitibus  was  ia        »  Kushworth's  Abr.  ii.  102. 


420  MONOPOLIES.  CHAP.  VIII. 

those  who  lived  on  the  borders  of  those  domains  in  the  hate- 
ful light  of  a  litigious  and  encroaching  neighbor.  The  earl 
of  Holland  held  a  court  almost  every  year,  as  chief-justice 
in  eyre,  for  the  recovery  of  the  king's  forestal  rights,  which 
made  great  havoc  with  private  property.  No  prescription 
could  be  pleaded  against  the  king's  title,  which  was  to  be 
found,  indeed,  by  the  inquest  of  a  jury,  but  under  the  direc- 
tion of  a  very  partial  tribunal.  The  royal  forests  in  Essex 
were  so  enlarged  that  they  were  hyperbolically  said  to  in- 
clude the  whole  county.1  The  earl  of  Southampton  was 
nearly  ruined  by  a  decision  that  stripped  him  of  his  estate 
near  the  New  Forest.2  The  boundaries  of  Rockingham 
forest  were  increased  from  six  miles  to  sixty,  and  enormous 
fines  imposed  on  the  trespassers;  lord  Salisbury  being 
amerced  in  20,000£,  lord  Westmoreland  in  19.000?.,  Sir 
Christopher  Hatton  in  12,OOOZ.8  It  is  probable  that  a  part 
of  these  was  remitted. 

A  greater  profit  was  derived  from  a  still  more  pernicious 
Mono  olies  an(^  indefensible  measure,  the  establishment  of  a 
chartered  company  with  exclusive  privileges  of 
making  soap.  The  recent  statute  against  monopolies  seemed 
to  secure  the  public  against  this  species  of  grievance.  Noy, 
however,  the  attorney-general,  a  lawyer  of  uncommon  emi- 
nence, and  lately  a  strenuous  assertor  of  popular  rights  in  the 
house  of  commons,  devised  this  project,  by  which  he  prob- 
ably meant  to  evade  the  letter  of  the  law,  since  every  manu- 
facturer was  permitted  to  become  a  member  of  the  company. 
They  agreed  to  pay  eight  pounds  for  every  ton  of  soap  made, 
as  well  as  10,000/.  for  their  charter.  For  this  they  were 
empowered  to  appoint  searchers,  and  exercise  a  sort  of  in- 
quisition over  the  trade.  Those  dealers  who  resisted  their 
interference  were  severely  fined  on  informations  in  the  star- 
chamber.  Some  years  afterwards,  however,  the  king  re- 
ceived money  from  a  new  corporation  of  soap-makers,  and 
revoked  the  patent  of  the  former.4 

1  Stafford's  Letters,  i.  885.  cited  no  great  clamor  in  the  long  parlia- 

2  Id.  463,  467.  nient.    And  there  is  in  Kymer,  xx.  585, 
8  Id.  ii.  117.    It  is  well  known  that    a  commission  to  Cottington  and  others, 

Charles  made  Richmond  Park  by  means  directing  them  to  compound   with    the 

of  depriving  many  proprietors  not  only  owners  of  lands  within  the  intended  en- 

of  common  rights,  hut  of  their  freehold  closures.     Dec.  12.  1634. 

lands.     Clarendon,  i.  176.     It  is  not  clear  *  Rennet.  64  ;  Rushworth's  Atridg.  ii. 

that  they  were  ever  compensated  ;  but  I  132 ;  Stratford's  Letters,  i.  446 ;  Kymer, 

think,  this  probable,  as  the  matter  ex-  six.  824  j  Laud's  Diary,  51. 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.  SHIP-MONEY.  421 

This  precedent  was  followed  in  the  erection  of  a  similar 
company  of  starch-makers,  and  in  a  great  variety  of  other 
grants,  which  may  be  traced  in  Rymer's  Foedera,  and  in  the 
proceedings  of  the  long  parliament ;  till  monopolies,  in  trans- 
gression or  evasion  of  the  late  statute,  became  as  common 
as  they  had  been  under  James  or  Elizabeth.  The  king,  by 
a  proclamation  at  York,  in  1639,  beginning  to  feel  the  ne- 
cessity of  diminishing  the  public  odium,  revoked  all  these 
grants.1  He  annulled  at  the  same  time  a  number  of  com- 
missions that  had  been  issued  in  order  to  obtain  money  by 
compounding  with  offenders  against  penal  statutes.  The  cat- 
alogue of  these,  as  well  as  of  the  monopolies,  is  very  curious. 
The  former  were,  in  truth,  rather  vexatious  than  illegal,  and 
sustained  by  precedents  in  what  were  called  the  golden  ages 
of  Elizabeth  and  James,  though  at  all  times  the  source  of 
great  and  just  discontent. 

The  name  of  Noy  has  acquired  an  unhappy  celebrity  by 
a  far  more  famous  invention,  which  promised  to  „. 

7  *  i  -i   i  Ship-money. 

realize  the  most  sanguine  hopes  that  could  have 
been  formed  of  carrying  on  the  government  for  an  indefinite 
length  of  time  without  the  assistance  of  parliament.  Shaking 
off  the  dust  of  ages  from  parchments  in  the  Tower,  this  man 
of  venal  diligence  and  prostituted  learning  discovered  that 
the  seaports  and  even  maritime  counties  had  in  early  times 
been  sometimes  called  upon  to  furnish  ships  for  the  public 
service  ;  nay,  there  were  instances  of  a  similar  demand  upon 
some  inland  places.  Noy  himself  died  almost  immediately 
afterwards.  Notwithstanding  his  apostasy  from  the  public 
cause,  it  is  just  to  remark  that  we  have  no  right  to  impute  to 
him  the  more  extensive  and  more  unprecedented  scheme  of 
ship-money,  as  a  general  tax,  which  was  afterwards  carried 
into  execution.  But  it  sprang  by  natural  consequence  from 
the  former  measure,  according  to  the  invariable  course  of 
encroachment,  which  those  who  have  once  bent  the  laws  to 
their  will  ever  continue  to  pursue.  The  first  writ  issued 
from  the  council  in  October,  1634.  It  was  directed  to  the 
magistrates  of  London  and  other  seaport  towns.  Reciting 
the  depredations  lately  committed  by  pirates,  and  slightly  ad- 
verting to  the -dangers  imminent  in  a  season  of  general  war 
on  the  continent,  it  enjoins  them  to  provide  a  certain  number 
of  ships  of  war  of  a  prescribed  tonnage  and  equipage ;  em- 

1  Rymer,  xx.  310. 


422  FOREIGN  POLICY.  CHAP.  VIII 

powering  them  al?o  to  assess  all  the  inhabitants  for  a  con- 
tribution towards  this  armament  according  to  their  substance. 
The  citizens  of  London  humbly  remonstrated  that  they  con- 
ceived themselves  exempt,  by  sundry  charters  and  acts  of 
parliament,  from  bearing  such  a  charge.  But  the  council 
peremptorily  compelled  their  submission,  and  the  murmurs 
of  inferior  towns  were  still  more  easily  suppressed.  This  is 
said  to  have  cost  the  city  of  London  SSjOOO/.1 

There  wanted  not  reasons  in  the  cabinet  of  Charles  for 
placing  the  navy  at  this  time  on  a  respectable  footing.  Al- 
gerine  pirates  had  become  bold  enough  to  infest  the  Channel, 
and,  what  was  of  more  serious  importance,  the  Dutch  were 
rapidly  acquiring  a  maritime  preponderance  which  excited  a 
natural  jealousy  both  for  our  commerce  and  the  honor  of  our 
flag.  This  commercial  rivalry  conspired  with  a  far  more 
powerful  motive  at  court,  an  abhorrence  of  everything  repub- 
lican or  Calvinistic,  to  make  our  .course  of  policy  towards 
Holland  not  only  unfriendly,  but  insidious  and  inimical  in 
the  highest  degree.  A  secret  treaty  is  extant,  signed  in 
1631,  by  which  Charles  engaged  to  assist  the  king  of  Spain 
in  the  conquest  of  that  great  protestant  commonwealth,  re- 
taining the  isles  of  Zealand  as  the  price  of  his  cooperation.3 

Yet,  with  preposterous  inconsistency,  as  well  as  ill  faith, 
the  two  characteristics  of  all  this  unhappy  prince's  foreign 
policy,  we  find  him  in  the  next  year  carrying  on  a  negotiation 
with  a  disaffected  party  in  the  Netherlands,  in  some  strange 
expectation  of  obtaining  the  sovereignty  on  their  separation 
from  Spain.  Lord  Cottington  betrayed  this  intrigue  (of 
which  one  whom  we  should  little  expect  to  find  in  these 
paths  of  conspiracy,  Peter  Paul  Rubens,  was  the  negotiator) 
to  the  court  of  Madrid.8  It  was,  in  fact,  an  unpardonable 
and  unprovoked  breach  of  faith  on  the  king's  part,  and 
accounts  for  the  indifference,  to  say  no  more,  which  that  gov- 
ernment always  showed  to  his  misfortunes.  Charles,  whose 
domestic  position  rendered  a  pacific  system  absolutely  neces- 

1  Kennet,  74,  75;    Strafford's  Letters,  novelty.      But  they  were  summoned  to 

i.  358.     Some    petty  seaports   in  Sussex  London  for  this,  and   received   a  repri- 

refused  to  pay  ship-money ;  but,  finding  maud  for  their  interference.     Id.  372. 

that  the  sheriff  had  authority  to  distrain  2  Clarendon  State  Papers,  i.  49,  and  ii. 

on  them,  submitted.     The  deputy-lieu-  Append,  p.  xxvi. 

tenants  of  Devonshire  wrote  to  the  coun-  a  This    curious    intrigue,   before    un- 

cil  in  behalf  of  some  towns  a  few  miles  known,  I  believe,  to  history,  was  brought 

distant   from   the  sea,  that  they  might  to  light  by  lord  Hardwicke.   State  Payers, 

be  spared  from  this  tax,  saying  it  was  a  ii.  54. 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.  FOREIGN  POLICY.  423 

sary,  busied  himself  far  more  than  common  history  has  re- 
corded with,  the  affairs  of  Europe.  He  was  engaged  in  a 
tedious  and  unavailing  negotiation  with  both  branches  of  the 
house  of  Austria,  especially  with  the  court  of  Madrid,  for 
the  restitution  of  the  Palatinate.  He  took  a  much  greater 
interest  than  his  father  had  done  in  the  fortunes  of  his  sister 
and  her  family ;  but,  like  his  father,  he  fell  into  the  delusion 
that  the  cabinet  of  Madrid,  for  whom  he  could  effect  but 
little,  or  that  of  Vienna,  to  whom  he  could  offer  nothing, 
would  so  far  realize  the  cheap  professions  of  friendship  they 
were  always  making  as  to  sacrifice  a  conquest  wherein  the 
preponderance  of  the  house  of  Austria  and  the  catholic  re- 
ligion in  Germany  were  so  deeply  concerned.  They  drew 
him  on  accordingly  through  the  labyrinths  of  diplomacy,  as- 
sisted, no  dotibi,  by  that  party  in  his  council,  composed  at 
this  time  of  lord  Cottington,  secretary  Windebank,  and  some 
others,  who  had  always  favored  Spanish  connections.1  It 
appears  that  the  fleet  raised  in  1634  was  intended,  according 
to  an  agreement  entered  into,  with  Spain,  to  restrain  the 
Dutch  from  fishing  in  the  English  seas,  nay,  even  as  oppor- 
tunities should  arise,  to  cooperate  hostilely  with  that  of 
Spain.2  After  above  two  years  spent  in  these  negotiations, 
Charles  discovered  that  the  house  of  Austrja  were  deceiving 
him ;  and,  still  keeping  in  view  the  restoration  of  his  nephew 
to  the  electoral  dignity  and  territories,  entered  into  stricter 
relations  with  France  :  a  policy  which  might  be  deemed  con- 
genial to  the  queen's  inclinations,  and  recommended  by  her 
party  in  his  council,  the  earl  of  Holland,  sir  Henry  Vane, 
and  perhaps  by  the  earls  of  Northumberland  and  Arundel. 
In  the  first  impulse  of  indignation  at  the  duplicity  of  Spain, 

1  See  Clarendon  State  Papers.  J.  490,  for  seas,  to  satisfy  the  court  of  Spain  himself 
a  proof  of  the  manner  in  which,  through  out  of  ships  and  goods  belonging  to  the 
the  Hispano-popish  party  in  the  cabinet,  Dutch;  and  by  the  second,  to  give  secret 
the  house  of  Austria  hoped  to  dupe  and  Instructions  to  the  commanders  of  his 
dishonor  Charles.  ships,   that,   when  those  of  Spain  and 

2  Clarendon    State  Papers,   i.   109,  et  Flanders  should  encounter  their  enemies 
post.     Five  English  ships  out  of  twenty  at  open  sea,  far  from  his  coasts  and  limits, 
were  to  be  at  the  charge  of  the  king  of  .  they  should  assist  them  if  over-matched, 
Spain.   Besides  this  agreement,  according  and  should   give   the   like   help  to  the 
to  which  the  English  were  only  bound  prizes  which  they  should  meet,  taken  by 
to  protect  the  ships  of  Spain  within  their  the  Dutch,  that  they  might  be  freed  and 
own  seas,  or  the  limits  claimed  as  such,  set  at  liberty  ;    taking  some  convenient 
there  were  certain  secret  articles,  signed  pretext  to  justify  it.  that  the  Hollanders 
Dec.  16,  1634  ;  by  one  of  which  Charles  might  not  hold   it  an  act   of  hostility. 
bound  himself,  in  case  the  Dutch  should  But  no  part  of  his  treaty  wad  to  take  effect 
not   make   restitution   of  so^ne  Spanish  till  the  imperial  ban  upon    the  elector 
vessels  taken  by  them  within  the  English  palatine  should  be  removed.    Id.  216. 


424  SHIP-MONEY.  CHAP.  VIII. 

the  king  yielded  so  far  to  their  counsels  as  to  meditate  a 
declaration  of  war  against  that  power.1  But  his  own  cooler 
judgment,  or  the  strong  dissuasions  of  Strafford,  who  saw 
that  external  peace  was  an  indispensable  condition  for  the 
.security  of  despotism,2  put  an  end  to  so  imprudent  a  project ; 
though  he  preserved,  to  the  very  meeting  of  the  long  par- 
liament, an  intimate  connection  with  France,  and  even  con- 
tinued to  carry  on  negotiations,  tedious  and  insincere,  for  an 
offensive  alliance.8  Yet  he  still  made,  from  time  to  time, 
similar  overtures  to  Spain  ; 4  and  this  unsteadiness,  or  rather 
duplicity,  which  could  not  easily  be 'concealed  from  two  cab- 
inets eminent  for  their  secret  intelligence,  rendered  both  of 
them  his  enemies,  and  the  instruments,  as  there  is  much  rea- 
son to  believe,  of  some  of  his  greatest  calamities.  It  is  well 
known  that  the  Scots  covenanters  were  in  close  connection 
with  Richelieu,  and  many  circumstances  render  it  probable 
that  the  Irish  rebellion  was  countenanced  and  instigated  both 
by  him  and  by  Spain. 

This  desire  of  being  at  least  prepared  for  war,  as  well  as 
Extension  the  general  system  of  stretching  the  prerogative 
of  writs  for  beyond  all  limits,  suggested  an  extension  of  the 

ship-money      „   •"  .  ,  . 

to  inland  former  writs  from  the  seaports  to  the  whole  king- 
dom. Finch,  chief-justice  of  the  common  pleas, 
has  the  honor  of  this  improvement  on  Noy's  scheme.  He 
was  a  man  of  little  learning  or  respectability,  a  servile  tool 
of  the  despotic  cabal ;  who,  as  speaker  of  the  last  parliament, 
had,  in  obedience  to  a  command  from  the  king  to  adjourn, 
refused  to  put  the  question  upon  a  remonstrance  moved  in 
the  house.  By  the  new  writs  for  ship-money,  properly  so 
denominated,  since  the  former  had  only  demanded  the  actual 

1  Clarendon  State  Papers,  i.  721,  761.  Richelieu  in  1639  is  matter  of  notorious 

2  Strafford    Papers,  ii.    52,  53,  60,  66.  history.      It  has  lately  been  confirmed 
Richelieu  sent  d'Estrades  to  London,  in  and  illustrated  by  an  important  note  in 
1(537,  according  to  Pere  Orleans,  to  secure  Mazure.     Hist,  de  la  Revolution  en  1688, 
the  neutrality  of  England  in  case  of  his  ii.  402.     It  appears    by  the  above-meu- 
attacking  the  maritime  towns  of  Flanders  tioned  note  of  Mr.  Mazure  that  the  cele- 
conjointly  with  the  Dutch.     But  the  am-  brated  letter  of  the  Scotch  lords,  address- 
bassador  was  received  haughtily,  and  the  ed  "Au  Roy,"  was  really  sent,  and  is  ex 
neutrality  refused ;  which  put  an  end  to.  tant.     There  seems  reason  to  think  that 
the  scheme,  and  so  irritated  Richelieu,  Henrietta  joined    the  Austrian    faction 
that  he  sent  a  priest  named  Chamberlain  about  1639 ;  her   mother   being  then  in 
to  Edinburgh  the  same  year,  in  order  to  England  and  very  hostile    to  Richelieu, 
foment    troubles    in  Scotland.      Revol.  This  is  in  some  degree  corroborated  by  a 
d'Anglet.  iii.  42.     This  is  confirmed  by  passage  in  a  letter  of  lady  Carlisle.     Sid- 
d'Estrades  himself.     See  note  in  Sidney  ney  Papers,  ii.  614. 

Papers,   ii.   447,    and    Harris's   Life    of         3  Sidney  Papers,  ii.  613. 
Charles,  189  ;   also  Lingard,  x.  69.    The        *  Clarendon  State  Papers,  ii.  16. 
connection,  of  the  Scotch  leaders  with 


CHA.  L  — 1629-40.  SHIP-MONE1.  425 

• 

equipment  of  vessels,  for  which  inland  counties  were  of 
course  obliged  to  compound,  the  sheriffs  were  directed  to 
assess  every  landholder  and  other  inhabitant,  according  to 
their  judgment  of  his  means,  and  to  enforce  the  payment  by 
distress.1 

This  extraordinary  demand  startled  even  those  who  had 
hitherto  sided  with  the  court.  Some  symptoms  of  opposition 
were  shown  ip  different  places,  and  actions  brought  against 
those  who  had  collected  the  money.  But  the  greater  part 
yielded  to  an  overbearing  power,  exercised  with  such  rigor 
that  no  one  in  this  king's  reign  who  had  ventured  on  the 
humblest  remonstrance  against  any  illegal  act  had  escaped 
without  punishment.  Indolent  and  improvident  men  satis- 
fied themselves  that  the  imposition  was  not  very  heavy,  and 
might  not  be  repeated.  Some  were  content  to  hope  that 
their  contribution,  however  unduly  exacted,  would  be  faith- 
fully applied  to  public  ends.  Others  were  overborne  by  the 
authority  of  pretended  precedents,  and  could  not  yet  believe 
that  the  sworn  judges  of  the  law  would  pervert  it  to  its  own 
destruction.  The  ministers  prudently  resolved  to  secure  not 
the  law,  but  its  interpreters,  on  their  side.  The  judges  of 
assize  were  directed  to  inculcate  on  their  circuits  the  neces- 
sary obligation  of  forwarding  the  king's  service  by  complying 
with  his  writ.  But,  as  the  measure  grew  more  obnoxious, 
and  strong  doubts  of  its  legality  came  more  to  prevail,  it  was 
thought  expedient  to  publish  an  extrajudicial  opinion  of  the 
twelve  judges,  taken  at  the  king's  special  command,  accord- 
ing to  the  pernicious  custom  of  that  age.  They  gave  it  as 
their  unanimous  opinion  that,  "  when  the  good  and  safety  of 
the  kingdom  in  general  is  concerned,  and  the  whole  kingdom 
in  danger,  his  majesty  might,  by  'writ  under  the  great  seal, 
command  all  his  subjects,  at  their  charge,  to  provide  and  fur- 
nish such  number  of  ships,  with  men,  munition,  and  victuals, 
and  for  such  times,  as  he  should  think  fit,  for  the  defence  and 
safeguard  of  the  kingdom  ;  and  that  by  law  he  might  compel 
the  doing  thereof,  in  case  of  refusal  or  refractoriness ;  and 
that  he  was  the  sole  judge  both  of  the  danger,  and  when  and 
how  the  same  was  to  be  prevented  and  avoided." 

This  premature  declaration  of  the  judges,  which  was  pub- 
licly read  by  the  lord-keeper  Coventry  in  the  star-chamber, 
did  not  prevent  a  few  intrepid  persons  from  bringing  the 

1  See  the  instructions  in  Ilushworth,  ii.  214. 


426  HAMPDEN'S  REFUSAL  TO  PAY.          CHAP.  VIIL 

• 

question  solemnly  before  them,  that  the  liberties  of  their 
country  might  at  least  not  perish  silently,  nor  those  who  had 
betrayed  them  avoid  the  responsibility  of  a  public  avowal  of 
their  shame.  The  first  that  resisted  was  th.e  gallant  Richard 
Chambers,  who  brought  an  action  against  the  lord-mayor  for 
imprisoning  him  on  account  of  his  refusal  to  pay  his  assess- 
ment on  the  former  writ.  The  magistrate  pleaded  the  writ 
as  a  special  justification  ;  when  Berkley,  one  of  the  judges  of 
the  king's  bench,  declared  that  there  was  a  rule  of  law  and 
a  rule  of  government,  that  many  things  which  could  not  be 
done  by  the  first  rule  might  be  done  by  the  other,  and  would 
not  suffer  counsel  to  argue  against  the  lawfulness  of  ship- 
money.1  The  next  were  lord  Say  and  Mr.  Hampden,  both 
of  whom  appealed  to  the  justice  of  their  country  ;  but  the 
famous  decision  which  has  made  the  latter  so  illustrious  put 
an  end  to  all  attempts  at  obtaining  redress  by  course  of  law. 
Hampden,  it  seems  hardly  necessary  to  mention,  was  a 
Ham  den's  gentleman  of  good  estate  in  Buckinghamshire, 
refusal  to  whose  assessment  to  the  contribution  for  ship- 
money  demanded  from  his  county  amounted  only 
to  twenty  shillings.2  The  cause,  though  properly  belonging 
to  the  court  of  exchequer,  was  heard,  on  account  of  its  mag- 
nitude, before  all  the  judges  in  the  exchequer-chamber.8 
The  precise  question,  so  far  as  related  to  Mr.  Hampden, 
was,  Whether  the  king  had  a  right,  on  his  own  allegation  of 
public  danger,  to  require  an  inland  county  to  furnish  ships, 
or  a  prescribed  sum  of  money  by  way  of  commutation,  for 
the  defence  of  the  kingdom  ?  It  was  argued  by  St.  John  and 


1  Rushworth,  253.    The  same  judge    Bet   down  for  31s.  6rf.,  and  is  returned, 
declared  afterwards,  in  a  charge  to  the    with  many  others,  as  refusing   to   pay. 


iy 


ilrtUIUUMU   B     K.11UW1I    1'MiU*   ,    LUC      I.IA      UCIUg  BUIillllH   ~>      Ui        lilt         Mllll        1 1 1 1 II 1  f  <  1 1  U  I  f  M        111 

probably  not  much  less  than  sixpence  in  question;  it  was  assessed  only  on  a  por- 

the  pound,  it  has  been  conjectured  that  tion  of  Hampden's  lands.     1845.] 

his  property  was  purposely   rated   low.  8  There  seems  to  have  been  something 

But  it  is  hard  to  perceive  any  motive  for  unusual,  if  not  irregular,  in  this  part  of 

this  indulgence  ;  and  it  seems  more  likely  the  proceeding.    The  barons  of  the  ex- 

that  a  nominal  sum  was  fixed  upon,  in  chequer  called  in  the  other  judges,  not 

order  to  try  the  question  ;  or  that  it  was  only  by  way  of  advice  but  direction,  as 

"nly  assessed  on  a  part  of  his  estate.  the  chief  baron   declares.     State  Trials, 

[Lord   Nugent  has    published  a  fac-  1203.    And  a  proof  of  this  is,  thiir,  tha 


CIIA.  I.  — 1629-40.      ARGUMENTS  ON  THE  CASE.      •  427 

Holborne  in   behalf  of  Hampden  ;  by  the  solicitor-general 
Littleton  and  the  attorney-general  Banks  for  the  crown.1 

The  law  and  constitution  of  England,  the  former  main- 
tained, had  provided  in  various  ways  for  the  Arguments 
public  safety  and  protection  against  enemies.  on  the  case- 
First,  there  were  the  military  tenures,  which  bound  great 
part  of  the  kingdom  to  a  stipulated  service  at  the  charge  of 
the  possessors.  The  cinque  ports  also,  and  several  other 
towns,  some  of  them  not  maritime,  held  by  a  tenure  analo- 
gous to  this  ;  and  were  bound  to  furnish  a  quota  of  ships  or 
men  as  the  condition  of  their  possessions  and  privileges. 
These  for  the  most  part  are  recorded  in  Domesday-book, 
though  now  in  general  grown  obsolete.  Next  to  this  specific 
service,  our  constitution  had  bestowed  on  the  sovereign  his 
certain  revenues,  the  fruits  of  tenure,  the  profits  of  his  vari- 
ous minor  prerogatives ;  whatever,  in  short,  he  held  in  right 
of  his  crown  was  applicable,  so  far  as  it  could  be  extended, 
to  the  public  use.  It  bestowed  on  him,  moreover,  and  per- 
haps with  more  special  application  to  maritime  purposes,  the 
customs  on  importation  of  merchandise.  These  indeed  had 
been  recently  augmented  far  beyond  ancient  usage.  "  For 
these  modern  impositions,"  says  St.  John,  "  of  the  legality 
thereof  I  intend  not  to  speak ;  for  in  case  his  majesty  may 
impose  upon  merchandise  what  himself  pleaseth,  there  will 
be  less  cause  to  tax  the  inland  counties  ;  and  in  case  he  can- 
not do  it,  it  will  be  strongly  presumed  that  he  can  much  less 
tax  them." 

But  as  the  ordinary  revenues  might  prove  quite  unequal 
to  great  exigencies,  the  constitution  has  provided  another 
means  as  ample  and  sufficient  as  it  is  lawful  and  regular  — 
parliamentary  supply.  To  this  the  kings  of  England  have 
in  all  times  had  recourse  ;'  yet  princes  are  not  apt  to  ask  as  a 
concession  what  they  might  demand  of  right.  The  frequent 
loans  and  benevolences  which  they  have  required,  though 
not  always  defensible  by  law,  are  additional  proofs  that  they 
possessed  no  general  right  of  taxation.  To  borrow  on 
promise  of  repayment,  to  solicit,  as  it  were,  alms  from  their 
subjects,  is  not  the  practice  of  sovereigns  whose  prerogatives 
entitle  them  to  exact  money.  Those  loans  had  sometimes 
been  repaid  expressly  to  discharge  the  king's  conscience. 
And  a  very  arbitrary  prince,  Henry  VIII.,  had  obtained 

1  State  Trials,  iU.  826-1252. 


428  ARGUMENTS  ON  T.HE  CASE.  CHAP.  VIII. 

acts  of  parliament  to  release  him  from  the  obligation  of  re- 
payment. 

These  merely  probable  reasonings  prepare  the  way  for 
that  conclusive  and  irresistible  argument  that  was  founded  on 
statute  law.  Passing  slightly  over  the  charter  of  the  Con- 
queror, that  his  subjects  shall  hold  their  lands  free  from  all 
unjust  tallage,  and  the  clause  in  John's  Magna  Charta,  that 
no  aid  or  scutage  should  be  assessed  but  by  consent  of  the 
great  council  (a  provision  not  repeated  in  that  of  Henry 
III.),  the  advocates  of  Hampden  relied  on  the  25  E.  L,  com- 
monly called  the  Confirmatio  Chartarum,  which  forever 
abrogated  all  taxation  without  consent  of  parliament ;  and 
this  statute  itself  they  endeavored  to  prove  was  grounded  on 
requisitions  very  like  the  present,  for  the  custody  of  the  seal 
which  Edward  had  issued  the  year  before.  Hence  it  was 
evident  that  the  saving  contained  in  that  act  for  the  ac- 
customed aids  and  prizes  could  not  possibly  be  intended,  as 
the  opposite  counsel  would  suggest,  to  preserve  such  exac- 
tions as  ship-money,  but  related  to  the  established  feudal 
aids,  and  to  the  ancient  customs  on  merchandise.  They 
dwelt  less,  however  (probably  through  fear  of  having  this 
exception  turned  against  them),  on  this  important  statute 
than  on  one  of  more  celebrity,  but  of  very  equivocal  genu- 
ineness, denominated  De  Tallagio  non  Concedendo,  which  is 
nearly  in  the  same  words  as  the  Confirmatio  Chartarum,  with 
the  omission  of  the  above-mentioned  saving.  More  than  one 
law  enacted  under  Edward  III.  reasserts  the  necessity  of 
parliamentary  consent  to  taxation.  It  was  indeed  the  sub- 
ject of  frequent  remonstrance  in  that  reign,  and  the  king 
often  infringed  this  right.  But  the  perseverance  of  the  com- 
mons was  successful,  and  ultimately  rendered  the  practice 
conformable  to  the  law.  In  the  second  year  of  Richard  II., 
the  realm  being  in  imminent  danger  of  invasion,  the  privy 
council  convoked  an  assembly  of  peers  and  other  great  men, 
probably  with  a  view  to  avoid  the  summoning  of  a  parliament. 
This  assembly  lent  their  own  money,  but  declared  that  they 
could  not  provide  a  remedy  without  charging  the  commons, 
which  could  not  be  done  out  of  parliament,  advising  that 
one  should  be  speedily  summoned.  This  precedent  was  the 
more  important  as  it  tended  to  obviate  that  argument  from 
peril  and  necessity  on  which  the  defenders  of  ship-money 
were  wont  to  rely.  But  they  met  that  specious  plea  more 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.          CASE  OF  HAMPDEST.  429 

directly.  They  admitted  that  a  paramount  overruling  ne- 
cessity silences  the  voice  of  law ;  that  in  actual  invasion, 
or  its  immediate  prospect,  the  rights  of  private  men  must 
yield  to  the  safety  of  the  whole  ;  that  not  only  the  sovereign, 
but  each  man  in  respect  of  his  neighbor,  might  do  many 
things  absolutely  illegal  at  other  seasons ;  and  this  served  to 
distinguish  the  present  case  from  some  strong  acts  of  prerog- 
ative exerted  by  Elizabeth  in  1588,  when  the  liberties  and 
religion  of  the  people  were  in  the  most  apparent  jeopardy. 
But  here  there  was  no  overwhelming  danger ;  the  nation 
was  at  peace  with  all  the  world :  could  the  piracies  of  Turk- 
ish corsairs,  or  even  the  insolence  of  rival  neighbors,  be  reck- 
oned among  those  instant  perils  for  which  a  parliament  would 
provide  too  late  ? 

To  the  precedents  alleged  on  the  other  side  it  was  replied, 
that  no  one  of  them  met  the  case  of  an  inland  county ;  that 
such  as  were  before  the  25  E.  I.  were  sufficiently  repelled 
by  that  statute,  such  as  occurred  under  Edward  III.  by  the 
later  statutes,  and  by  the  remonstrances  of  parliament  dur- 
ing his  reign  ;  and  there  were  but  very  few  afterwards.  But 
that,  in  a  matter  of  statute  law,  they  ought  not  to  be  gov- 
erned by  precedents,  even  if  such  could  be  adduced.  Before 
the  latter  end  of  Edward  I.'s  reign,  St.  John  observes,  "  All 
things  concerning  the  king's  prerogative  and  the  subjects' 
liberties  were  upon  uncertainties."  "  The  government," 
says  Holborne  truly,  "  was  more  of  force  than  law."  And 
this  is  unquestionably  applicable,  in  a  less  degree,  to  many 
later  ages. 

Lastly,  the  Petition  of  Right,  that  noble  legacy  of  a  slan- 
dered parliament,  reciting  and  confirming  the  ancient  stat- 
utes, had  established  that  no  man  thereafter  be  compelled 
to  make  or  yield  any  gift,  loan,  benevolence,  tax,  or  such 
like  charge,  without  common  consent  by  act  of  parliament. 
This  latest  and  most  complete  recognition  must  sweep  away 
all  contrary  precedent,  and  could  not,  without  a  glaring  vio- 
lation of  its  obvious  meaning,  be  stretched  into  an  admis- 
sion of  ship-money. 

The  king's  counsel,  in  answer  to  these  arguments,  ap- 
pealed to  that  series  of  records  which  the  diligence  of  Noy 
had  collected.  By  far  the  greater  part  of  these  were  com- 
missions of  array.  Bat  several,  even  of  those  addressed 
to  inland  towns  (and,  if  there  were  no  service  by  tenure  in 


430  CASE  OF  HAMPDEN.  CHAP.  VIII. 

the  case,  it  does  not  seem  easy  to  distinguish  these  in  prin- 
ciple'from  counties),  bore  a  very  strong  analogy  to  the  pres- 
ent. They  were,  however,  in  early  times.  No  sufficient 
answer  could  be  offered  to  the  statutes  that  had  prohibited 
unparliamentary  taxation.  The  attempts  made  to  elude 
their  force  were  utterly  ineffectual,  as  those  who  are  acquaint- 
ed with  their  emphatic  language  may  well  conceive.  But 
the  council  of  Charles  I.,  and  the  hirelings  who  ate  their 
bread,  disdained  to  rest  their  claim  of  ship-money  (big  as  it 
was  with  other  and  still  more  novel  schemes)  on  obscure 
records,  or  on  cavils  about  the  meaning  of  statutes.  They 
resorted  rather  to  the  favorite  topic  of  the  times,  the  intrin- 
sic, absolute  authority  of  the  king.  This  the  attorney-gen- 
eral Banks  placed  in  the  very  front  of  his  argument.  "  This 
power,"  says  he,  "  is  innate  in  the  person  of  an  absolute  king, 
and  in  the  persons  of  the  kings  of  England.  All  magistracy 
it  is  of  nature,  and  obedience  and  subjection  it  is  of  nature. 
This  power  is  not  any  ways  derived  from  the  people,  but  re- 
served unto  the  king  when  positive  laws  first  began.  For 
the  king  of  England  he  is  an  absolute  monarch ;  nothing 
can  be  given  to  an  absolute  prince  but  what  is  inherent 
in  his  person.  He  can  do  no  wrong.  He  is  the  sole 
judge,  and  we  ought  not  to  question  him.  Where  the 
law  trusts  we  ought  not  to  distrust.  The  acts  of  parlia- 
ment," he  observed,  "  contained  no  express  words  to  take 
away  so  high  a  prerogative ;  and  the  king's  prerogative, 
even  in  lesser  matters,  is  always  saved  wherever  express 
words  do  not  restrain  it." 

But  this  last  argument  appearing  too  modest  for  some  of 
the  judges  who  pronounced  sentence  in  this  cause,  they  de- 
nied the  power  of  parliament  to  limit  the  high  prerogatives 
of  the  crown.  "  This  imposition  without  parliament,"  says 
Justice  Crawley,  "  appertains  to  the  king  originally,  and  to 
the  successor  ipso  facto,  if  he  be  a  sovereign  in  right  of  his 
sovereignty  from  the  crown.  You  cannot  have  a  king  with- 
out these  royal  rights,  no,  not  by  act  of  parliament."  "  Where 
Mr.  Holborne,"  says  Justice  Berkley,  "  supposed  a  funda- 
mental policy  in  the  creation  of  the  frame  of  this  kingdom, 
that,  in  case  the  monarch  of  England  should  be  inclined  to 
exact  from  his  subjects  at  his  pleasure,  he  should  be  re- 
strained, for  that  he  could  have  nothing  from  them  but  upon 
a  common  consent  in  parliament,  he  is  utterly  mistaken 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.     DECISION  OF  THE  JUDGES.  431 

herein.  The  law  knows  no  such  king-yoking  policy.  The 
law  is  itself  an  old  and  trusty  servant  of  the  king's ;  it  is  his 
instrument  or  means  which  he  useth  to  govern  his  people 
by  :  I  never  read  nor  heard  that  lex  was  rex ;  but  it  is  com- 
mon and  most  true  that  rex  is  lex."  Vernon,  another  judge, 
gave  his  opinion  in  few  words :  "  That  the  king,  pro  bono 
publico,  may  charge  his  subjects  for  the  safety  and  defence 
of  the  kingdom  notwithstanding  any  act  of  parliament,  and 
that  a  statute  derogatory  from  the  prerogative  doth  not  bind 
the  king ;  and  the  king  may  dispense  with  any  law  in  cases 
of  necessity."  Finch,  the  adviser  of  the  ship-money,  was 
not  backward  to  employ  the  same  argument  in  its  behalf. 
"  No  act  of  parliament,"  he  told  them,  "  could  bar  a  king  of 
his  regality,  as  that  no  land  should  hold  of  him,  or  bar  him 
of  the  allegiance  of  his  subjects  or  the  relative  on  his  part, 
as  trust  and  power  to  defend  his  people ;  therefore  acts  of 
parliament  to  take  away  his  royal  power  in  the  defence  of 
his  kingdom  are  void ;  they  are  void  acts  of  parliament  to 
bind  the  king  not  to  command  the  subjects,  their  persons, 
and  goods,  and  I  say  their  money  too ;  for  no  acts  of  parlia- 
ment make  any  difference." 

Seven  of  the  twelve  judges,  namely,  Finch,  chief-justice 
of  the  common  pleas,  Jones,  Berkley,  Vernon,  Crawley,  Tre- 
vor, and  Weston,  gave  judgment  for  the  crown.  Bramp- 
ston,  chief-justice  of  the  king's  bench,  and  Davenport,  chief- 
baron  of  the.  exchequer,  pronounced  for  Hampden,  but  on 
technical  reasons,  and  adhering  to  the  majority  on  the  prin- 
cipal question.  Denham,  another  judge  of  the  saine  court, 
being  extremely  ill,  gave  a  short  written  judgment  in  favor 
of  Hampden.  But  justices  Croke  and  Hutton,  men  of 
considerable  reputation  and  experience,  displayed  a  most 
praiseworthy  intrepidity  in  denying,  without  the  smallest 
qualification,  the  alleged  prerogative  of  the  crown  and  the 
lawfulness  of  the  writ  for  ship-money.  They  had  unfortu- 
nately signed,  along  with  the  other  judges,  the  above-men- 
tioned opinion  in  favor  of  the  right.  For  this  they  made 
the  best  apology  they  could,  that  their  voice  was  concluded 
by  the  majority.  But  in  truth  it  was  the  ultimate  success 
that  sometimes  attends  a  struggle  between  conscience  and 
self-interest  or  timidity.1 

1  Croke.  whose  conduct  on  the  bench    out  blemish,  had  resolved  to  give  judg- 
In  other  political  questions  was  not  with.-    ment  for  the  king,  but  was  withheld  by 


432  EFFECTS  OF  THE  DECISION.  CHAP.  VIII. 

The  length  to  which  this  important  cause  was  protracted, 
six  months  having  elapsed  from  the  opening  speech  of  Mr. 
Hampden's  council  to  the  final  judgment,  was  of  infinite  dis- 
service to  the  crown.  During  this  long  period  every  man's 
attention  was  directed  to  the  exchequer-chamber.  The  con- 
vincing arguments  of  St.  John  and  Holborne,  but  still  more 
the  division  on  the  bench,  increased  their  natural  repug- 
nance to  so  unusual  and  dangerous  a  prerogative.1  Those 
who  had  trusted  to  the  faith  of  the  judges  were  undeceived  by 
the  honest  repentance  of  some,  and  looked  with  indignation 
on  so  prostituted  a  crew.  That  respect  for  courts  of  justice 
which  the  happy  structure  of  our  judicial  administration 
has  in  general  kept  inviolate  was  exchanged  for  distrust,  con- 
tempt, and  desire  of  vengeance.  They  heard  the  speeches  of 
some  of  the  judges  with  more  displeasure  than  even  their 
final  decision.  Ship-money  was  held  lawful  by  Finch  and  sev- 
eral other  judges,  not  on  the  authority  of  precedents,  which 
must  in  their  nature  have  some  bounds,  but  on  principles 
subversive  of  any  property  or  privilege  in  the  subject.  Those 
paramount  rights  of  monarchy,  to  which  they  appealed  to- 
day in  justification  of  ship-money,  might  to-morrow  serve  to 
supersede  other  laws,  and  maintain  new  exertions  of  des- 
potic power.  It  was  manifest  by  the  whole  strain  of  the 
court  lawyers  that  no  limitations  on  the  king's  authority 
could  exist  but  by  the  king's  sufferance.  This  alarming 
tenet,  long  bruited  among  the  churchmen  and  courtiers,  now 
resounded  in  the  halls  of  justice.  But  ship-money,  in  conse- 
quence, was  paid  with  far  less  regularity  and  more  reluc- 
tance than  before.2  The  discontent  that  had  been  tolerably 
smothered  was  now  displayed  in  every  county  ;  and  though 
the  council  did  not  flinch  in  the  least  from  exacting  payment, 
nor  willingly  remit  any  part  of  its  rigor  towards  the  uncom- 

his  wife,  who  implored  him  not  to  sacri-  in  a  great  deal  more  slowly  than  they  did 

fice  his  conscience  for  fear  of  any  danger  in  former  years,  and  that  to  a  very  con- 

Or  prejudice  to  his  family,  being  content  siderable  sum..    Thirdly,  it  puts  thoughts 

to  suffer  any  misery  with  him,  rather  than  into    wise    and   moderate    men's    heads 

to  be  an  occasion  for  him  to  violate  his  which  were  better  out ;  for  they  think;  if 

integrity.     Whitelock,   p.  25.     Of  such  the   judges,  which   are  behind,  do    not 

high-minded  and  inflexible  women  our  their  parts  both  exceeding  well  and  thor- 

British  history  produces  many  examples,  oughly,  it  may  much  distemper  this  ex- 

l  Laud  writes  to  Lord  Wentworth,  that  traordinary  and  great  service."     Straf- 

Croke  and  Hutton  had  both  gone  against  ford  Letters,  ii.  170. 

the  king  very  sourly.     "The  accidents  a  It  is  notoriously  known  that  pressure 

which  have  followed  upon  it  already  are  was  borne  with  much  more  cheerfulness 

these:  First,  the  faction  are  gro,wn  very  before  the  judgment  for  the  king  than 

bold.    Secondly ,  the  king's  moneys  come  ever  it  was  after.    Clarendon,  p.  122. 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.  PROCLAMATIONS.  433 

plying,  it  was  impossible  either  to  punish  the  great  body  of 
the  country  gentlemen  and  citizens,  or  to  restrain  their  mur- 
murs by  a  few  examples.  Whether  in  consequence  of  this 
unwillingness,  or  for  other  reasons,  the  revenue  levied  in  dif- 
ferent years  under  the  head  of  shjp-money  is  more  fluctuat- 
ing than  we  should  expect  from  a  fixed  assessment ;  but  may 
be  reckoned  at  an  average  sum  of  200JOOO/.1 

It  would  doubtless  be  unfair  to  pass  a  severe  censure  on 
the  government  of  Charles  I.  for  transgressions  Prociama- 
of  law  which  a  long  course  of  precedents  might tions- 
render  dubious,  or  at  least  extenuate.  But  this  common 
apology  for  his  administration,  on  which  the  artful  defence 
of  Hume  is  almost  entirely  grounded,  must  be  admitted  cau- 
tiously, and  not  until  we  have  well  considered  how  far  such 
precedents  could  be  brought  to  support  it.  This  is  particu- 
larly applicable  to  his  proclamations.  I  have  already  pointed 
but  the  comparative  novelty  of  these  unconstitutional  ordi- 
nances, and  their  great  increase  under  James.  They  had 
not  been  fully  acquiesced  in ;  the  commons  had  remonstra- 
ted against  their  abuse ;  and  Coke,  with  other  judges,  had 
endeavored  to  fix  limits  to  their  authority  very  far  within 
that  which  they  arrogated.  It  can  hardly,  therefore,  be  said 
that  Charles's  council  were  ignorant  of  their  illegality ;  nor 
is  the  case  at  all  parallel  to  that  of  general  warrants,  or  any 
similar  irregularity  into  which  an  honest  government  may 
inadvertently  be  led.  They  serve  at  least  to  display  the 
practical  state  of  the  constitution,  and  the  necessity  of  an 
entire  reform  in  its  spirit. 

The  proclamations  of  Charles's  reign  are  far  more  numer- 
ous than  those  of  his  father.     They  imply  a  pre-  Variotls 
rogative  of  intermeddling  with  all  matters  of  trade,  arbitrary 
prohibiting  or  putting  under  restraint  the  impor-  pnx* 
tation  of  various  articles,  and  the  home  growth  of  others,  or 
establishing  regulations  for  manufactures.2     Prices  of  several 
minor  articles  were  fixed  by  proclamation ;  and  in  one  in- 
stance this  was  extended  to  poultry,  butter,  and  coals.8     The 
king  declares  by  a  proclamation  that  he  had  incorporated  aU 

1  Rushworth  Abr.  ii.  341 ;   Clarendon  mention  some  of  these.    The  best  turkey 

State  Papers,  i.  600.    It  is  said  by  Ueylin  was  to  be  sold  at  4s.  6rf. ;  the  best  goose 

that  the  clergy  were  much  spared  in  the  at  is  4d. ;  the  best  pullet  Is.  8d.  ;  thre« 

issessment  of  ship-money  :  Life  of  Laud,  eggs  for  a  penny  ;  fresh  butter  at  M.  in 

802.  summer  and  6d.  in  wiuter.     lliis  was  in 

*  Rymer,  passim.  1634. 

*  Id.  xix.  512     It  may  be  curious  to 

VOL.1. — C.  28 


434  .  ARBITRARY  PROCEEDINGS  CHAP.  VIII. 

tradesmen  and  artificers  within  London  and  three  miles 
round ;  so  that  no  person  might  set  up  any  trade  without 
having  served  a  seven  years'  apprenticeship,  and  without 
admission  into  such  corporation.1  He  prohibits,  in  like  man- 
ner, any  one  from  using  the  trade  of  a  maltster  or  that  of  a 
brewer  without  admission  into  the  corporations  of  maltsters 
or  brewers  erected  for  every  county.2  I  know  not  whether 
these  projects  were  in  any  degree  founded  on  the  alleged 
pretext  of  correcting  abuses,  or  were  solely  designed  to  raise 
money  by  means  of  these  corporations.  We  find,  however, 
a  revocation  of  the  restraint  on  malting  and  brewing  soon 
after.  The  illegality  of  these  proclamations  is  most  unques- 
tionable. 

The  rapid  increase  of  London  continued  to  disquiet  the 
court.  It  was  the  stronghold  of  political  and  religious  dis- 
affection. Hence  the  prohibitions  of  erecting  new  houses,, 
which  had  begun  under  Elizabeth,  were  continually  repeat- 
ed.8 They  had  indeed  some  laudable  objects  in  view;  to 
render  the  city  more  healthy,  cleanly,  and  magnificent,  and 
by  prescribing  the  general  use  of  brick  instead  of  wood,  as 
well  as  by  improving  the  width  and  regularity  of  the  streets, 
to  afford  the  best  security  against  fires,  and  against  those 
epidemical  diseases  which  visited  the  metropolis  with  un- 
usual severity  in  the  earlier  years  of  this  reign.  The  most 
jealous  censor  of  royal  encroachments  will  hardly  object  to 
the  proclamations  enforcing  certain  regulations  of  police  in 
some  of  those  alarming  seasons. 

It  is  probable,  from  the  increase  which  we  know  to  have 
taken  place  in  London  during  this  reign,  that  licenses  for 
building  were  easily  obtained.  The  same  supposition  is  ap- 
plicable to  another  class  of  proclamation,  enjoining  all  persons 
who  had  residences  in  the  country  to  quit  the  capital  and  re- 
pair to  them.4  Yet,  that  these  were  not  always  a  dead  letter 
appears  from  an  information  exhibited  in  the  star-chamber 
against  seven  lords,  sixty  knights,  and  one  hundred  esquires, 
besides  many  ladies,  for  disobeying  the  king's  proclamation, 

1  Rymer,  xx.  113.  ers.    It  recites  the  care  of  Elizabeth  and 

2  Id.  157.  James  to  have  the  city  built  in  an  uni- 

3  Id.  xviii.  33.  et  alibi.     A  commission  form   manner  with   brick,    and   also   to 
was  granted  to  the  earl  of  Arundel  and  clear  it  from  under-tenants  and  basepeo- 
others,  May  30,  1625,  to  inquire  what  pie  who  live  by  begging  and  stealing    Id. 
houses,  shops,  &c.,  had  been  built  for  xviii.  97. 

ten  years  past,  especially  since  the  last       *  Id.  xix.  375. 
proclamation,  and  to  commit  the  offend- 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.  OF  THE  CROWN.  435 

either  by  continuing  in  London  or  returning  to  it  after  a 
short  absence.1  The  result  of  this  prosecution,  which  was 
probably  only  intended  to  keep  them  in  check,  does  not  ap- 
pear. No  proclamation  could  stand  in  need  of  support  from 
law  while  this  arbitrary  tribunal  assumed  a  right  of  punish- 
ing misdemeanors.  It  would  have  been  a  dangerous  aggra- 
vation of  any  delinquent's  oiFence  to  have  questioned  the 
authority  of  a  proclamation,  or  the  jurisdiction  of  the  council. 
The  security  of  freehold  rights  had  been  the  peculiar 
boast  of  the  English  law.  The  very  statute  of  Henry  VIII., 
which  has  been  held  up  to  so  much  infamy,  while  it  gave  the 
force  of  law  to  his  proclamations,  interposed  its  barrier  in 
defence  of  the  subject's  property.  The  name  of  freeholder, 
handed  down  with  religious  honor  from  an  age  when  it  con- 
veyed distinct  privileges,  and  as  it  were  a  sort  of  popular 
nobility,  protected  the  poorest  man  against  the  crown's  and 
the  lord's  rapacity.  He  at  least  was  recognized  as  the  liber 
homo  of  Magna  Charta,  who  could  not  be  disseised  of  his  ten- 
ements and  franchises.  His  house  was  his  castle,  which  the 
law  respected,  and  which  the  king  dared  not  enter.  Even 
the  public  good  must  give  way  to  his  obstinacy  ;  nor  had  the 
legislature  itself  as  yet  compelled  any  man  to  part  with  his 
lands  for  a  compensation  which  he  was  loath  to  accept.  The 
council  and  star-chamber  had  very  rarely  presumed  to  med- 
dle with  his  right;  never  perhaps  wh,ere  it  was  acknowl- 
edged and  ancient.  But  now  this  reverence  of  the  common 
law  for  the  sacredness  of  real  property  was  derided  by  those 
who  revered  nothing  as  sacred  but  the  interests  of  the  church 
and  crown.  The  privy  council,  on  a  suggestion  that  the 
demolition  of  spme  houses  and  shops  in  the  vicinity  of  St. 
Paul's  would  show  the  cathedral  to  more  advantage,  directed 
that  the  owners  should  receive  such  satisfaction  as  should  seem 
reasonable ;  or,  on  their  refusal,  the  sheriff  was  required  to 
see  the  buildings  'pulled  down,  "  it  not  being  thought  fit 
the  obstinacy  of  those  persons  should  hinder  so  considera- 
ble a  work."2  By  another  order  of  council,  scarcely  less 
oppressive  and  illegal,  all  shops  in  Cheapside  and  Lombard 
Street,  except  those  of  goldsmiths,  were  directed  to  be  shut 
up,  that  the  avenue  to  St.  Paul's  might  appear  more  splen- 
did; and  the  mayor  and  aldermen  were  repeatedly  threat- 
ened for  remissness  in  executing  this  mandate  of  tyranny.8 

i  Ru8hworth  Abr.  ii.  232.  »  Id.  ii.  79.  »  Id.  p.  318 


436  ARBITRARY  PROCEEDINGS.  CHAP.  VH1 

In  the  great  plantation  of  Ulster  by  James,  the  city  of 
London  had  received  a  grant  of  extensive  lands  in  the  coun- 
ty of  Derry,  on  certain  conditions  prescribed  in  their  charter. 
The  settlement  became  flourishing,  and  enriched  the  city. 
But  the  wealth  of  London  was  always  invidious  to  the 
crown,  as  well  as  to  the  needy  courtiers.  On  an  informa- 
tion filed  in  the  star-chamber  for  certain  alleged  breaches  of 
their  charter,  it  was  not  only  adjudged  to  be  forfeited  to  the 
king,  but  a  fine  of  70,000/.  was  imposed  on  the  city.  They 
paid  this  enormous  mulct ;  but  were  kept  out  of  their  lands 
till  restored  by  the  long  parliament.1  In  this  proceeding 
Charles  forgot  his  duty  enough  to  take  a  very  active  share, 
personally  exciting  the  court  to  give  sentence  for  himself.3 
Is  it  then  to  be  a  matter  of  surprise  or  reproach  that  the  cit- 
izens of  London  refused  him  assistance  in  the  Scottish  war, 
and  through  the  ensuing  times  of  confusion  harbored  an  im- 
placable resentment  against  a  sovereign  who  had  so  deeply 
injured  them? 

We  may  advert  in  this  place  to  some  other  stretches  of 
power,  which  no  one  can  pretend  to  justify,  though  in  gen- 
eral they  seem  to  have  escaped  notice  amidst  the  enormous 
mass  of  national  grievances.  A  commission  was  issued  in 
1635  to  the  recorder  of  London  and  others,  to  examine  all 
persons  going  beyond  seas,  and  tender  to  them  an  oath  of 
the  most  inquisitorial  nature.8  Certain  privy  councillors 
were  empowered  to  enter  the  house  of  sir  Robert  Cotton, 
and  search  his  books,  records,  and  papers,  setting  down  such 
as  ought  to  belong  to  the  crown.4  This  renders  probable 
what  we  find  in  a  writer  who  had  the  best  means  of  infor- 
mation, that  secretary  Windebank,  by  virtue  of  an  order  of 
council,  entered  sir  Edward  Coke's  house  while  he  lay  on  his 
death-bed,  and  took  away  his  manuscripts,  together  with 
his  last  will,  which  was  never  returned  to  his  family.8 

1  Rushworth  Abr.  iii.  123;  Whitelock,  and  the  reproach  sometimes  thrown  on 

p.  35;  Stratford  Letters,  i.  374,  et  alibi.  England,  of  wanting  a  fit  mansion  for  ita 

gee  what  Clarendon  says,  p.  293  (ii.  151,  monarchs,  would   have  been  prevented, 

edit.  1820).     The  secoud  of  these  tells  us  But    the  exchequer  of   Charles  I.   had 

that  the  city  offered  to  build  for  the  kiug  never  been  in  such  a  state  as  to  render  it 

a  palace  in  St.  James's  park  by  way  of  at  all  probable  that  he  could  undertake 

composition,  which  was  refused.     If  this  BO  costly  a  work, 

be  true  it  must  allude  to  the  palace  al-  %  Stafford  Letters,  i.  340. 

ready  projected  by  him.  the  magnificent  8  Kymer,  xix.  699. 

designs  for  which  by  luigo  Jones  are  well  *  Id.  198. 

known.     Had    they   been  executed    the  8  Roger  Coke's  Detection  of  the  Court 

metropolis  would  have  possessed  a  splen-  of  England,  i.  309.    lie  was  sir  Hdward'8 

did  mouuiuent  of  Palladiau  architecture ;  grandson. 


CHA.I — 1629-40.     STAR-CHAMBER  JURISDICTION.  437 

The  high-commission  court  were  enabled  by  the  king's 
"  supreme  power  ecclesiastical "  to  examine  such  as  were 
charged  with  offences  cognizable  by  them  on  oath,  which 
many  had  declined  to  take,  according  to  the  known  maxims 
of  English  law.1 

It  would  be  improper  to  notice  as  illegal  or  irregular 
the  practice  of  granting  dispensations  in  particular  instances, 
either  from  general  acts  of  parliament  or  the  local  statutes 
of  colleges.  Such  a  prerogative,  at  least  in  the  former 
case,  was  founded  on  long  usage  and  judicial  recognition. 
Charles,  however,  transgressed  its  admitted  boundaries  when 
he  empowered  others  to  dispense  with  them  as  there  might 
be  occasion.  Thus,  in  a  commission  to  the  president  and 
council  of  the  North,  directing  them  to  compound  with  re- 
cusants, he  in  effect  suspends  the  statute  which  provides  that 
no  recusant  shall  have  a  lease  of  that  portion  of  his  lands 
which  the  law  sequestered  to  the  king's  use  during  his  re 
cusancy ;  a  clause  in  this  patent  enabling  the  commissioners 
to  grant  such  leases  notwithstanding  any  law  or  statute  to 
the  contrary.  This  seems  to  go  beyond  the  admitted  limits 
of  the  dispensing  prerogative.2 

The  levies  of  tonnage  and  poundage  without  authority  of 
parliament,  the  exaction  of  monopolies,  the  extension  of  the 
forests,  the  arbitrary  restraints  of  proclamations,  above  all 
the  general  exaction  of  ship-money,  form  the  principal  ar- 
ticles of  charge  against  the  government  of  Charles,  so  far  as 
relates  to  its  inroads  on  the  subject's  property.  These  were 
maintained  by  a  vigilant  and  unsparing  exercise  of  jurisdic- 
tion in  the  court  of  star-chamber.  I  have,  in  another  chap- 
ter, traced  the  revival  of  this  great  tribunal,  probably  under 
Henry  VIII.,  in  at  least  as  formidable  a  shape  as  before  the 
now  neglected  statutes  of  Edward  III.  and  Richard  II., 
which  had  placed  barriers  in  its  way.  It  was  the  great 
weapon  of  executive  power  under  Elizabeth  and  James ; 
nor  can  we  reproach  the  present  reign  with  innovation  in 
this  respect,  though  in  no  former  period  had  the  proceedings 
of  this  court  been  accompanied  with  so  much  violence  and 
tyranny.  But  this  will  require  some  fuller  explication. 

I  hardly  need  remind  the  reader  that  the  juris-  g 
diction  of  the  ancient  Concilium  regis  ordinarium,  ber  jur 
or  court  of  star-chamber,  continued  to  be  exer- 

i  Bymer,  xx.  190.  « Id.  xix.  740.    See  also  82. 


438 


JURISDICTION  OF  THE 


CHAP.  VIIL 


cised  more  or  less  frequently,  notwithstanding  the  various  stat- 
utes enacted  to  repress  it ;  and  that  it  neither  was  supported 
by  the  act  erecting  a  new  court  in  the  third  of  Henry  VIL, 
nor  originated  at  that  time.  The  records  show  the  star- 
chamber  to  have  taken  cognizance  both  of  civil  suits  and  of 
offences  throughout  the  time  of  the  Tudors.  But  precedents 
of  usurped  power  cannot  establish  a  legal  authority  in  defi- 
ance of  the  acknowledged  law.  It  appears  that  the  lawyers 
did  not  admit  any  jurisdiction  in  the  council,  except  so  far  as 
the  statute  of  Henry  VII.  was  supposed  to  have  given  it, 
"  The  famous  Plowden  put  his  hand  to  a  demurrer  to  a 
bill,"  says  Hudson,  "  because  the  matter  was  not  within  the 
statute ;  and,  although  it  was  then  overruled,  yet  Mr.  Ser- 
geant Richardson,  thirty  years  after,  fell  again  upon  the  same 
rock,  and  was  sharply  rebuked  for  it." *  The  chancellor, 
who  was  the  standing  president  of  the  court  of  star-chamber, 
would  always  find  pretences  to  elude  the  existing  statutes, 
and  justify  the  usurpation  of  this  tribunal. 

The  civil  jurisdiction  claimed  and  exerted  by  the  star- 
chamber  was  only  in  particular  cases,  as  disputes  between 
alien  merchants  and  Englishmen,  questions  of  prize  or  un- 
lawful detention  of  ships,  and  in  general  such  as  now  belong 
to  the  court  of  admiralty ;  some  testamentary  matters,  in 


1  Hudson's  Treatise  of  the  Court  of 
Star-Chamber,  p.  51.  This  valuable 
•work,  written  about  the  end  of  James's 
reign,  is  published  in  Collectanea  'Ju- 
ridica,  vol.  ii.  There  is  more  than  one 
manuscript  of  it  in  the  British  Museum. 

In  another  treatise,  written  by  a  clerk 
of  the  council  about  1590  (Hargrave 
MSS.  ccxvi.  195),  the  author  says,  — 
"  There  was  a  time  when  there  grew  a 
controversy  between  the  star-chamber 
and  the  king's  bench,  for  their  jurisdic- 
tion in  a  cause  of  perjury  concerning 
tithes,  sir  Nicholas  Bacon,  that  most 
grave  and  worthy  counsellor,  then  being 
lord-keeper  of  the  great  seal,  and  sir  Rob- 
ert Catlyn,  knight,  then  lord  chief-justice 
of  the  bench.  To  the  deciding  thereof 
Were  called  by  the  plaintiff  and  defendant 
a  great  number  of  the  learned  counsellors 
of  the  law:  they  were  called  into  the  in- 
ner star-chamber  after  dinner,  where  be- 
fore the  lords  of  the  council  they  argued 
the  cause  on  both  sides,  but  could  not 
find  the  court  of  greater  antiquity  by  all 
their  books  than  Henry  VII.  and  Richard 
III.  On  yiis  I  fell  in  cogitation  how  to 
find  some  further  knowledge  thereof." 


He  proceeds  to  inform  us  that  by  search 
into  records  he  traced  its  jurisdiction 
much  higher.  This  shows,  however,  the 
doubts  entertained  of  its  jurisdiction  in 
the  queen's  time.  This  writer,  extolling 
the  court  highly,  admits  that  "  some  of 
late  ha've  deemed  it  to  be  new,  and  put 
the  same  in  print,  to  the  blemish  of  its 
beautiful  antiquity."  He  then  discusses 
the  question  (for  such  it  seems  it  was), 
•whether  any  peer,  though  not  of  the 
council,  might  sit  in  the  star-chamber; 
and  decides  in  the  negative.  "  A°.  6'°. 
of  her  majesty,"  he  says,  in  the  case  of 
the  earl  of  Hertford,  u  there  were  as- 
sembled a  great  number  of  the  noble 
barons  of  this  realm,  not  being  of  tha 
council,  who  offered  there  to  sit ;  but  at 
that  time  it  was  declared  unto  them  by 
the  lord-keeper  that  they  were  to  give 
place,  and,  so  they  did,  and  divers  of 
them  tarried  the  hearing  of  the  cause  at 
the  bar." 

This  note  ought  to  have  been  inserted 
in  Chapter  I.,  where  the  antiquity  of  the 
star-chamber  is  mentioned,  but  was  acci- 
dentally overlooked. 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40,    COURT  OF  STAR-CHAMBER.  439 

order  to  prevent  appeals  to  Rome,  which  might  have  been 
brought  from  the  ecclesiastical  courts  ;  suits  between  corpor- 
ations, "  of  which,"  says  Hudson,  "  I  dare  undertake  to  show 
above  a  hundred  in  the  reigns  of  Henry  VII.  and  Henry 
VIII.,  or  sometimes  between  men  of  great  power  and  in- 
terest, which  could  not  be  tried  with  fairness  by  the  common 
law."  *  For  the  corruption  of  sheriffs  and  juries  furnished 
an  apology  for  the  irregular,  but  necessary,  interference  of  a 
controlling  authority.  The  ancient  remedy,  by  means  of  at- 
taint, which  renders  a  jury  responsible  for  an  unjust  verdict, 
was  almost  gone  into  disuse,  and,  inasmuch  as  it  depended  on 
the  integrity  of  a  second  jury,  not  always  sure  to  be  ob- 
tained ;  so  that  in  many  parts  of  the  kingdom,  and  especially 
in  Wales,  it  was  impossible  to  find  a  jury  who  would  return 
a  verdict  against  a  man  of  good  family,  either  in  a  civil  or 
criminal  proceeding. 

The  statutes,  however,  restraining  the  council's  jurisdic- 
tion, and  the  strong  prepossession  of  the  people  as  to  the 
sacredness  of  freehold  rights,  made  the  star-chamber  cautious 
of  determining  questions  of  inheritance,  which  they  common- 
ly remitted  to  the  judges  ;  and  from  the  early  part  of  Eliza- 
beth's reign  they  took  a  direct  cognizance  of  any  ciyil  suits 
less  frequently  than  before ;  partly,  I  suppose,  from  the  in- 
creased business  of  the  court  of  chancery  and  the  admiralty 
court,  which  took  away  much  wherein  they  had  been  wont 
to  meddle ;  partly  from  their  own  occupation  as  a  court  of 
criminal  judicature,  which  became  more  conspicuous  as  the 
other  went  into  disuse.2  This  criminal  jurisdiction  is  that 
which  rendered  the  star-chamber  so  potent  and  so  odious  an 
auxiliary  of  a  despotic  administration. 

The  offences  principally  cognizable  in  thrs  court  were 
forgery,  perjury,  riot,  maintenance,  fraud,  libel,  and  conspir- 
acy.8 But,  besides  these,  every  misdemeanor  came  within 
the  proper  scope  of  its  inquiry ;  those  especially  of  public 
importance,  and  for  which  the  law,  as  then  understood,  had 
provided  no  sufficient  punishment.  For  the  judges  interpre- 
ted the  law  in  early  times  with  too  great  narrowness  and 

1  Hudson's  Treatise  of  the  Court  of  king,"  he  gays,  "should  be  sometimes 
fitar-Chauiber,  p.  66.  present,  yet  not  too  often."    James  was 

2  P.   62.      Lord  Bacon  observes  that  too  often  present,  and    took  one  well- 
the  council  in  his  time  did  not  meddle  known  criminal  proceeding,  that  against 
with  meum  and  Imnn  as  formerly;  and  sir  Thomas  Lake  and  his  family,  entirely 
that  such  causes  ought  not  to  be  enter-  into  his  owu  hands. 

Uuneu.    Vol.  i.  720 j  Tol.  ii.  208.    "The       *  P.  82. 


440  STAR-CRA.MBER  JURISDICTION.         CHAP.  V1IL 

timidity  ;  defects  which,  on  the  one  hand,  raised  up  the  over- 
ruling authority  of  the  court  of  chancery,  as  the  necessary 
means  of  redress  to  the  civil  suitor  who  found  the  gates  of 
justice  barred  against  him  by  technical  pedantry ;  and,  on 
the  other,  brought  this  usurpation  and  tyranny  of  the  star- 
chamber  upon  the  kingdom  by  an  absurd  scrupulosity 
about  punishing  manifest  offences  against  the  public  good. 
Thus  corruption,  breach  of  trust,  and  malfeasance  in  public 
affairs,  or  attempts  to  commit  felony,  seem  to  have  been 
reckoned  not  indictable  at  common  law,  and  came  in  conse- 
quence under  the  cognizance  of  the  star-chamber.1  In  other 
cases  its  jurisdiction  was  merely  concurrent ;  but  the  greater 
certainty  of  conviction,  and  the  greater  severity  of  punish- 
ment, rendered  it  incomparably  more  formidable  than  the 
ordinary  benches  of  justice.  The  law  of  libel  grew  up  in 
this  unwholesome  atmosphere,  and  was  moulded  by  the 
plastic  hands  of  successive  judges  and  attorneys-general. 
Prosecutions  of  this  kind,  according  to  Hudson,  began  to  be 
more  frequent  from  the  last  years  of  Elizabeth,  when  Coke 
was  attorney-general ;  and  it  is  easy  to  conjecture  what  kind 
of  interpretation  they  received.  To  hear  a  libel  sung  or 
read,  says  that  writer,  and  to  laugh  at  it,  and  make  merri- 
ment with  it,  has  ever  been  held  a  publication  in  law.  The 
gross  error  that  it  is  not  a  libel  if  it  be  true,  has  long  since, 
he  adds,  been  exploded  out  of  this  court.2 

Among  the  exertions  of  authority  practised  in  the  star- 
chamber  which  no  positive  law  could  be  brought  to  warrant, 
he  enumerates  "  punishments  of  breach  of  proclamations  be- 
fore they  have  the  strength  of  an  act  of  parliament ;  which 
this  court  hath  stretched  as  far  as  ever  any  act  of  parliament 
did.  As  in  the  41st  of  Elizabeth  builders  of  houses  in  Lon- 
don were  sentenced,  and  their  houses  ordered  to  be  pulled 
down,  and  the  materials  to  be  distributed  to  the  benefit  of 
the  parish  where  the  building  was  ;  which  disposition  of  the 
goods  soundeth  as  a  great  extremity,  and  beyond  the  war- 
rant of  our  laws  ;  and  yet  surely  very  necessary,  if  anything 
would  deter  men  from  that  horrible  mischief  of  increasing 
that  head  which  is  swoln  to  a  great  hugeness  already."  8 

1  Hudson's   Treatise   of   the  Court  of  information  was  preferred  in  the  star- 

Btar-Chainber,  p.  108.  chamber  against  Griffin  and  another  for 

*  P.  100, 102.  erecting  a  tenement  in  Hog  Lane,  which 

*  P.  107.     The  following  case  in  the  he  divided  into  several  rooms,  wherein 
queen's   reign  goes  a  great  way: — An  were  inhabiting  two  poor  tenants,  that 


CHA.  I.  — 1029-40.  PUNISHMENTS.  441 

The  mode  of  process  was  sometimes  of  a  summary  nature ; 
the  accused  person  being  privately  examined,  and  his  exami- 
nation read  in  the  court,  if  he  was  thought  to  have  confessed 
sufficient  to  deserve  sentence,  it  was  immediately  awarded 
without  any  formal  trial  or  written  process.  But  the  more 
regular  course  was  by  information  filed  at  the  suit  of  the  at- 
torney-general, or,  in  certain  cases,  of  a  private  relator.  The 
party  was  brought  before  the  court  by  writ  of  subpoena ;  and 
having  given  bond  with  sureties  not  to  depart  without  leave, 
was  to  put  in  his  answer  upon  oath,  as  well  to  the  matters 
contained  in  the  information,  as  to  special  interrogatories. 
Witnesses  were  examined  upon  interrogatories,  and  their 
depositions  read  in  court.  The  course  of  proceeding  on  the 
whole  seems  to  have  nearly  resembled  that  of  the  chan- 
cery.1 

It  was  held  competent  for  the  court  to  adjudge  any  pun- 
ishment short  of  death.  Fine  and  imprisonment 

f-  ,1  i_        mi  -11  Punishment 

were   ot    course   the   most   usualv      Ihe   pillory,  inflicted  by 
wliipping,  branding,  and  cutting  off  the  ears,  grew  *^e  s'ar~ 
into  use  by  degrees.     In  the  reign  of  Henry  VII. 
and  Henry  VIII.,  we  are  told  by  Hudson,  the  fines  were  not 
so  ruinous  as  they  have  been  since,  which  he  ascribes  to  the 
number  of  bishops  who  sat  in  the  court,  and  inclined  to 
mercy  ;   "  and  I  can  well  remember,"  he  says,  "  that   the 
most  reverend  archbishop  Whitgift  did  ever  constantly  main- 
tain the  liberty  of  the  free  charter,  that  men  ought  to  be 
fined,  salvo  contenemento.     But  they  have-  been  of  late  im- 
posed according  to  the  nature  of  the  offence,  and  not  the 
estate  of  the  person.     The  slavish  punishment  of  whipping," 
he  proceeds  to  observe,  "•  was  not  introduced  till  a  great  man 

only  lived  and  were  maintained  by  the  down  other  habitations  must  be  found, 

relief  of  their  neighbors,  &c.    The  attor-  did  not,  as  requested,  order  this  to  be 

ney-general,  and  also  the  lord  mayor  and  done  for  the  present,  but  that  the  tenants 

aldermen,  prayed  some  condign  punish-  should  continue  for  their  lives  without 

ment  ou  Griffin  and  the  other,  and  that  payment  of  rent,  and  the  landlord    is 

the  court  would  be  pleased  to  set  down  directed  not  to  molest  them,  and  after 

and  decree  some  general   order  in  this  the  death  or  departure  of  the  tenants  the 

and  other  like  cases  of  new  building  and  houses  to  be  pulled  down.    Uarl.  MSS. 

division  of  tenements.     Whereupon  the  N.  299,  fol.  7. 

court,   generally   considering    the  great  !  Uarl.  MSS.  p.  142,  &c.     It  appears 

growing  evils  and    inconveniences  that  that  the  court  of  star-chamber  could  not 

continually   breed  and    happen  by  this  sentence  to  punishment  on  the  deposition 

new:erected  building  and  divisions  made  of  an  eye-witness  (Itushw.  Abr.  ii.  114) : 

and  divided    contrary  to   her    majesty's  a  rule  which  did  not  prevent  their  n-ceiv- 

gaid  proclamation,  commit  the  offenders  ing  the  moat  imperfect  and  inconclusive 

to  the  Fleet,  and  fine  them  2(M.  each;  but  testimony. 
considering  that  if  the  houses  be  pulled 


442  PUNISHMENTS  ESTFLICTEli  CHAP.  VHI. 

of  the  common  law,  and  otherwise  a  worthy  justice,  forgot 
his  place  of  session,  and  brought  it  in  this  place  too  much  in 
use."  1  It  would  be  difficult  to  find  precedents  for  the  ag- 
gravated cruelties  inflicted  on  Leighton,  Lilburne,  and  others ; 
but  instances  of  cutting  off  the  ears  may  be  found  under  Eliz- 
abeth.2 

The  reproach,  therefore,  of  arbitrary  and  illegal  juris- 
diction does  not  wholly  fall  on  the  government  of  Charles. 
They  found  themselves  in  possession  of  this  almost  unlimited 
authority.  But  doubtless,  as  far  as  the  history  of  proceed- 
ings in  the  star-chamber  are  recorded,  they  seem  much  more 
numerous  and  violent  in  the  present  reign  than  in  the  two 
preceding.  Rushworth  has  preserved  a  copious  selection  of 
cases  determined  before  this  tribunal.  They  consist  princi- 
pally of  misdemeanors,  rather  of  an  aggravated  nature  ;  such 
as  disturbances  of  the  public  peace,  assaults  accompanied 
with  a  good  deal  of  violence,  conspiracies,  and  libels.  The 
necessity,  however,  for  such  a  paramount  court  to  restrain 
the  excesses  of  powerful  men  no  longer  existed,  since  it  can 
hardly  be  doubted  that  the  common  administration  of  the 
law  was  sufficient  to  give  redress  in  the  time  of  Charles  I. ; 
though  we  certainly  do  find  several  instances  of  violence  and 
outrage  by  men  of  a  superior  station  in  life,  which  speak  un- 
favorably for  the  state  of  manners  in  the  kingdom.  But  the 
object  of  drawing  so  large  a  number  of  criminal  cases  into 
the  star-chamber  seems  to  have  been  twofold :  first,  to  inure 
men's  minds  to  an  authority  more  immediately  connected 
with  the  crown  than  the  ordinary  courts  of  law,  and  less  tied 
down  to  any  rules  of  pleading  or  evidence  ;  secondly,  to  eke 
out  a  scanty  revenue  by  penalties  and  forfeitures.  Absolute- 
ly regardless  of  the  provision  of  the  Great  Charter,  that  no 
man  shall  be  amerced  even  to  the  full  extent  of  his  means, 
the  councillors  of  the  star-chamber  inflicted  such  fines  as  no 
court  of  justice,  even  in  the  present  reduced  value  of  money, 

1  Hudson,  p.  36.  224.    Instead  of  "the  his  ears.    Harl.  MSS.  6265.  fol.  373.    So 
•lavish   punishment  of  whipping,"   the  also  the  conspirators  who  accused  arch- 
printed  book  has  il  the  slavish  speech  of  bishop  Sandys  of  adultery.  Id.  376.    And 
whispering,"  which  of  course  entirely  al-  Mr.  Pound,  a  Roman  catholic  gentleman, 
ters  the  sense,  or  rather  makes  nonsense,  who  had  suffered    much   before  for  his 
I  have  followed  a  MS.  in  the   Museum  religion,  was  sentenced  by  that  court,  in 
(Hargrave,  vol.  250),  which  agrees  with  1603,  to  lose  both   his  ears,  to  be  fined 
the  abstract  of  this  treatise  by  Rush-  1000J.,  and  imprisoned  for  life,  unless  he 
worth,  ii.  348.  declare   who    instigated    him   to  charge 

2  Vallenger,  author  of  seditious  libels,  sergeant  Philips   with  injustice  in  con- 
was  sentenced  in   the  queen's  reign  to  detuning  a  neighbor   of    his    to   deatii. 
stand  twice  in  the  pillory  and  lose  both  Winwood,  ii.  36. 


CHA.  I.  —  1629-iO.       BY  THE  STAR-CHAMBER.  443 

would  think  of  imposing.  Little  objection  indeed  seems  to 
lie,  in  a  free  country,  and  with  a  well-regulated  administra- 
tion of  justice,  against  the  imposition  of  weighty  pecuniary 
penalties,  due  consideration  being  had  of  the  offence  and  the 
criminal.  But,  adjudged  by  such  a  tribunal  as  the  star 
chamber,  where  those  who  inflicted  the  punishment  reaped 
the  gain,  and  sat,  like  famished  birds  of  prey,  with  keen  eyes 
and  bended  talons,  eager  to  supply  for  a  moment,  by  some 
wretch's  ruin,  the  craving  emptiness  of  the  exchequer,  this 
scheme  of  enormous  penalties  became  more  dangerous  and 
subversive  of  justice,  though  not  more  odious,  than  corporal 
punishment.  A  gentleman  of  the  name  of  Allington  was 
fined  12,000£  for  marrying  his  niece.  One  who  had  sent  a 
challenge  to  the  earl  of  Northumberland  was  fined  5000/. ; 
another  for  saying  the  earl  of  Suffolk  was  a  base  lord,  4000/. 
to  him,  and  a  like  sum  to  the  king.  Sir  David  Forbes,  for 
opprobrious  words  against  lord  Wentworth,  incurred  50001. 
to  the  king,  and  3000/.  to  the  party.  Oa  some  soap-boilers, 
who  had  not  complied  with  the  requisitions  of  the  newly- 
incorporated  company,  mulcts  were  imposed  of  1500/.  and 
1000?.  One  man  was  fined  and  set  in  the  pillory  for  en- 
grossing corn,  though  he  only  kept  what  grew  on  his  own 
land,  asking  more  in  a  season  of  dearth  than  the  overseers 
of  the  poor  thought  proper  to  give.1  Some  arbitrary  reg- 
ulations with  respect  to  prices  may  be  excused  by  a  well- 
intentioned  though  mistaken  policy.  The  charges  of  inns 
and  taverns  were  fixed  by  the  judges.  But  even  in  those  a 
corrupt  motive  was  sometimes  blended.  The  company  of 
vintners,  or  victuallers,  having  refused  to  pay  a  demand  of 
the  lord  treasurer,  one  penny  a  quart  for  all  wine  drunk  in 
their  houses,  the  star-chamber,  without  information  filed  or 
defence  made,  interdicted  them  from  selling  or  dressing  vict- 
uals till  they  submitted  to  pay  forty  shillings  for  each  tun  of 
wine  to  the  king.2  It  is  evident  that  the  strong  interest  of 
the  court" in  these  fines  must  not  only  have  had  a  tendency 
to  aggravate  the  punishment,  but  to  induce  sentences  of  con- 

1  The  scarcity  must  have  been  very  to  prohibit  them  to  dress  meat ;  some, 

great  this  season  (1631),  for  he  refused  what  was  required  of  them,  a  halfpenny 

2f.  18s.  for  tha  quarter  of  rye.    Rush-  a  quart  for  French  wine,  and  a  penny 

worth,  ii.  110.  for  sack  and  other  richer  wines,  for  the 

2  Kushworth,  ii.  340.    Garrard,  the  cor-  king :   the  gentlemen  vintners  grew  sul- 

respondent  of  Wentworth,  who  sent  him  len,  and  wouKl  not  give  it,  so  they  aw 

all  London  news,  writes  about  this,  "The  all  well  enough  served."    Strafford  Let- 

attorney -general  hath  seat  to  all  taverns  ters,  i.  507. 


444  BISHOP  WILLIAMS.  CHAP.  VIII. 

damnation  on  inadequate  proof.  From  all  that  remains  of 
proceedings  in  the  star-chamber,  they  seem  to  have  been 
very  frequently  as  iniquitous  as  they  were  severe.  In  many 
celebrated  instances  the  accused  party  suffered  less  on  the 
score  of  any  imputed  offence  than  for  having  provoked  the 
malice  of  a  powerful  adversary,  or  for  notorious  dissatisfac- 
tion with  the  existing  government.  Thus  Williams,  bishop 
Case  of  °f  Lincoln,  once  lord  keeper,  the  favorite  of  king 
bishop  James,  the  possessor  for  a  season  of  the  power 

Williams.          ,,     .  j  .   ,  .  .  •,     ,  r 

that  was  turned  against  him,  experienced  the  ran- 
corous and  ungrateful  malignity  of  Laud ;  who,  having  been 
brought  forward  by  Williams  into  the  favor  of  the  court,  not 
only  supplanted  by  his  intrigues,  and  incensed  the  king's 
mind  against  his  benefactor,  but  harassed  his  retirement  by 
repeated  persecutions.1  It  will  sufficiently  illustrate  the  spirit 
of  these  times  to  mention  that  the  sole  offence  imputed  to  the 
bishop  of  Lincoln  in  the  last  information  against  him  in  the 
star-chamber  was,  that  he  had  received  certain  letters  from 
one  Osbaldiston,  master  of  Westminster  school,  wherein  some 
contemptuous  nickname  was  used  to  denote  Laud.2  It  did 
not  appear  that  Williams  had  ever  divulged  these  letters. 
But  it  was  held  that  the  concealment  of  a  libellous  letter  was 
a  high  misdemeanor.  Williams  was  therefore  adjudged  to 
pay  5000L  to  the  king,  and  3000/.  to  the  archbishop,  to  be 
imprisoned  during  pleasure,  and  to  make  a  submission ;  Os- 
baldiston to  pay  a  still  heavier  fine,  to  be  deprived  of  all  his 
benefices,  to  be  imprisoned  and  make  submission,  and  more- 
over to  stand  in  the  pillory  before  his  school  in  Dean's-yard, 
with  his  ears  nailed  to  it.  This  man  had  the  good  fortune  to 
conceal  himself;  but  the  bishop  of  Lincoln,  refusing  to  make 
the  required  apolggy,  lay  about  three  years  in  the  Tower, 
till  released  at  the  beginning  of  the  long  parliament. 

It  might  detain  me  too  long  to  dwell  particularly  on  the 
punishments  inflicted  by  the  court  of  star-chamber  in  this 
reign.  Such  historians  as  have  not  written  in  order  to  pal- 
liate the  tyranny  of  Charles,  and  especially  Rushworth,  will 
furnish  abundant  details,  with  all  those  circumstances  that 
portray  the  barbarous  and  tyrannical  spirit  of  those  who 
composed  that  tribunal.  Two  or  three  instances  are  so  cel- 
ebrated that  I  cannot  pass  them  over.  Leighton,  a  Scots 

1  Racket's    Life  of   Williams.    Rush-       *  Osbaldiston  swore  that  he  did  not 
worth,  Abr.il.  315,  et post.  Brodie,  ii. 363.    mean  Laud;  au  undoubted  perjury. 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.  PRYNNE.  445 

divine,  having  published  an  angry  libel  against  the  hierar- 
chy, was  sentenced  to  be  publicly  whipped  at  Westminster 
and  set  in  the  pillory,  to  have  one  side  of  his  nose  slit,  one 
ear  cut  off,  and  one  side  of  his  cheek  branded  with  a  hot 
iron,  to  have  the  whole  of  this  repeated  the  next  week  at 
Cheapside,  and  to  suffer  perpetual  imprisonment  in  the  Fleet.1 
Lilburne,  for  dispersing  pamphlets  against  the  bishops,  was 
whipped  from  the  Fleet  prison  to  Westminster,  there  set 
in  the  pillory,  and  treated  afterwards  with  great  cruelty.8 
Prynne,  a  lawyer  of  uncommon  erudition,  and  a  case  of 
zealous  puritan,  had  printed  a  bulky  volume,  called  frytmo. 
Histriomastix,  full  of  invectives  against  the  theatre,  which 
he  sustained  by  a  profusion  of  learning.  In  the  course  of 
this  he  adverted  to  the  appearance  of  courtesans  on  the  Ro- 
man stage,  and  by  a  satirical  reference  in  his  index  seemed 
to  range  all  female  actors  in  the  class.8  The  queen,  unfor- 
tunately, six  weeks  after  the  publication  of  Prynne's  book, 
had  performed  a  part  in  a  mask  at  court.  •  This  passage  was 
accordingly  dragged  to  light  by  the  malice  of  Peter  Heylin, 
a  chaplain  of  Laud,  on  whom  the  archbishop  devolved  the 
burden  of  reading  this  heavy  volume  in  order  to  detect  its 
offences.  Heylin,  a  bigoted  enemy  of  everything  puritanical, 
and  not  scrupulous  as  to  veracity,  may  be  suspected  of  hav- 
ing aggravated,  if  not  misrepresented,  the  tendency  of  a  book 
much  more  tiresome  than  seditious.  Prynne,  however,  was 
already  obnoxious,  and  the  star-chamber  adjudged  him  to 
stand  twice  in  the  pillory,  to  be  branded  in  the  forehead,  to 
lose  both  his  ears,  to  pay  a  fine  of  5000?.,  and  to  suffer  per- 
petual imprisonment.  The  dogged  puritan  employed  the 
leisure  of  a  jail  in  writing  a  fresh  libel  against  the  hierar- 

1  Mr.  Brodie  (Hist,  of  Brit.  Emp.,  vol.  star-chamber,  some  of  the  lords  turned 

ii.  p.  309)  observes  that  he  canuot  find  up  his  hair,  and  expressed  great  indigna- 

in  Lcighton's  book  (which  I  have  never  tion  that   his   ears  had  not  been  better 

seen)    the    passage    constantly    brought  cropped.    State  Trials,  717.     The  most 

forward  by  Laud's  apologists,  wherein  he  brutal  and  servile  of  these  courtiers  seems 

is  supposed   to  have  recommended  the  to  have  been  the  earl  of  Dorset,  though 

assassination  of  the  bishops.    He  admits,  Clarendon  speaks  well  of  him.     He  was 

indeed,  as  does  Harris,  that  the  book  was  also  impudently  corrupt,  declaring  that 

violent;    but  what  can  be   said  of  the  he  thought  it  no  crime  for  a  courtier  that 

punishment  ?  lives  at  a  great  expense  in  his  attendance 

*  Rush  worth.    State  Trials.  to  receive  a  reward  to  get  a  business  done 

s  Id.    Whitelock,  p.  18.     Harris's  Life  by  a  great  man  in  favor.     Kushw.  Abr. 

of   Charles,   p.  262.     The    unfortunate  ii.  246.    It  is  to   be  observed   that  the 

words  in  the  index,  "  Women  actors  no-  star-chamber  tribunal  was  almost  as  in- 

torious   whores,"   cost  Prynne    half  his  famous  for  its  partiality  and  corruption 

ears ;    the   remainder   he   saved   by   the  as  its  cruelty.    See  proofs  of  this  iu  the 

b.anginau'8  mercy  for  a  second  harvest,  sauie  work,  p.  241. 
When  he  was  brought  again  before  the 


446  ARCHBISHOP  LAUD.  CHAP.  VIII 

chy.  For  this,  with  two  other  delinquents  of  the  same  class, 
Burton  a  divine  and  Bastwiek  a  physician,  he  stood  again  at 
the  bar  of  that  terrible  tribunal.  Their  demeanor  was  what 
the  court  deemed  intolerably  contumacious,  arising  in  fact 
from  the  despair  of  men  who  knew  that  no  humiliation  would 
procure  them  mercy.1  Prynne  lost  the  remainder  of  his  ears 
in  the  pillory ;  and  the  punishment  was  inflicted  on  them  all 
with  extreme  and  designed  cruelty,  which  they  endured,  as 
martyrs  always  endure  suffering,  so  heroically  as  to  excite  a 
deep  impression  of  sympathy  and  resentment  in  the  assem- 
bled multitude.2  They  were  sentenced  to  perpetual  confine- 
ment in  distant  prisons.  But  their  departure  from  London, 
and  their  reception  on  the  road,  were  marked  by  signal  ex- 
pressions of  popular  regard ;  and  their  friends  resorting  to 
them  even  in  Launceston,  Chester,  and  Carnarvon  castles, 
whither  they  were  sent,  an  order  of  council  was  made  to 
transport  them  to  the  isjes  of  the  Channel.  It  was  the  very 
first  act  of  the  long  parliament  to  restore  these  victims  of 
tyranny  to  their  families.  Punishments  by  mutilation,  though 
not  quite  unknown  to  the  English  law,  had  been  of  rare  oc- 
currence ;  and  thus  inflicted  on  men  whose  station  appeared 
to  render  the  ignominy  of  whipping  and  branding  more  in- 
tolerable, they  produced  much  the  same  effect  as  the  still 
greater  cruelties  of  Mary's  reign,  in  exciting  a  detestation 
for  that  ecclesiastical  dominion  which  protected  itself  by 
means  so  atrocious. 

The  person  on  whom  public  hatred  chiefly  fell,  and  who 
Character  proved  in  a  far  more  eminent  degree  than  any 
of  Laud.  other  individual  the  evil  genius  of  this  unhappy 
uovereign,  was  Laud.  His  talents,  though  enabling  him  to 
acquire  a  large  portion  of  theological  learning,  seem  to  have 
been  by  no  means  considerable.  There  cannot  be  a  more 
contemptible  work  than  his  Diary ; 8  and  his  letters  to  Straf- 
ford  display  some  smartness,  but  no  great  capacity.  He 
managed  indeed  his  own  defence,  when  impeached,  with 
some  ability ;  but  on  such  occasions  ordinary  men  are  apt 

1  The  intimidation  was  BO  great,  that  that  it  excited   general  disapprobation. 

no  counsel  dared  to  sign  Prynne's  plea;  P.  73. 

yet  the  court  refused  to  receive  it  with-  a  [This  has  lately  been  republished  at 

out  such  signature.     Rushworth,  ii.  277.  Oxford,  1839,  under  the  title   "Autobi- 

Btrafford  Letters,  ii.  74.  ography  of  Archbishop  Laud,"    with  a 

8  Id.  86.     llushw.  295.     State  Trials,  preface,  sufficiently  characteristic  of  its 

Clarendon,  who  speaks  in  a  very  unbe-  celebrated  editor ;  who  has  subjoined  th« 

coming  manner  of  this  sentence,  admits  "Acts  of  his  Martyrdom."] 


OHA.  I.  — 1629-40.          ARCHBISHOP  LAUD.  447 

to  put  forth  a  remarkable  readiness  and  energy.  Laud's 
inherent  ambition  had  impelled  him  to  court  the  favor  of 
Buckingham,  of  Williams,  and  of  both  the  kings  under  whom 
he  lived,  till  he  rose  to  the  see  of  Canterbury  on  Abbot's 
death,  in  1633.  No  one  can  deny  that  he  was  a  generous 
patron  of  letters,  and  as  warm  in  friendship  as  in  enmity. 
But  he  had  placed  before  his  eyes  the  aggrandizement,  first 
of  the  church,  and  next  of  the  royal  prerogative,  as  his  end 
and  aim  in  every  action.  Though  not  literally  destitute  of 
religion,  it  was  so  subordinate  to  worldly  interest,  and  so 
blended  in  his  mind  with  the  impure  alloy  of  temporal  pride, 
that  he  became  an  intolerant  persecutor  of  the  puritan  cler- 
gy, not  from  bigotry,  which  in  its  usual  sense  he  never  dis- 
played, but  systematic  policy.  And  being  subject,  as  his 
friends  call  it,  to  some  infirmities  of  temper,  that  is,  choleric, 
vindictive,  harsh,  and  even  cruel  to  a  great  degree,  he  not 
only  took  a  prominent  share  in  the  severities  of  the  star- 
chamber,  but,  as  his  correspondence  shows,  perpetually  la- 
mented that  he  was  restrained  from  going  further  lengths.1 

Laud's  extraordinary  favor  with  the. king,  through  which 
he  became  a  prime  adviser  in  matters  of  state,  rendered  him 
secretly  obnoxious  to  most  of  the  council,  jealous,  as  minis- 
ters must  always  be,  of  a  churchman's  overweening  ascen- 
dency. His  faults,  and  even  his  virtues,  contributed  to  this 
odium.  For,  being  exempt  from  the  thirst  of  lucre,  and, 
though  in  the  less  mature  state  of  his  fortunes  a  subtle  in- 
triguer, having  become  frank  through  heat  of  temper  and 
self-confidence,  he  discountenanced  all  schemes  to  serve  the 
private  interest  of  courtiers  at  the  expense  of  his  master's 
exhausted  treasury,  and  went  right  onward  to  his  object,  the 
exaltation  of  the  church  and  crown.  He  aggravated  the 
invidiousness  of  his  own  situation,  and  gave  an  astonishing 
proof  of  his  influence,  by  placing  Juxon,  bishop  of  London, 
a  creature  of  his  own,  in  the  greatest  of  all  posts,  that  of 
lord  high-treasurer.  Though  Williams  had  lately  been  lord- 

1  Laud's  character  is  justly  and  fairly  coat ;  which,  notwithstanding,  he  was  go 
drawn  by  May,  neither  in  the  coarse  far  from  concealing  in  a  subtle  way,  that 
caricature  style  of  Prynne,  nor  with  the  he  increased  the  envy  of  it  by  insolence, 
absurdly-flattering  pencil  of  Clarendon.  He  had  few  vulgar  and  private  vires,  :is 
"  The  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  was  a  being  neither  taxed  of  covetousncss,  in- 
main  agent  in  this  fatal  work;  a  man  temperance,  nor  incontinence ;  and  in  a 
vigilant  enough,  of  an  active  or  rather  of  word  a  man  not  altogether  so  bad  in  his 
ft  restless  mind ;  more  ambitious  to  un-  personal  character  as  unfit  for  the  state 
dertake  tnnn  politic  to  carry  on;  of  a  of  England."  History  of  Parliament,  19 
disposition  too  fierce  and  cruel  for  his 


448 


LORD  STRATFORD. 


CHAP.  VIIL 


keeper  of  the  seal,  it  seemed  more  preposterous  to  place  the 
treasurer's  staff  in  the  hands  of  a  churchman,  and  of  one 
so  little  distinguished  even  in  his  own  profession,  that  the 
archbishop  displayed  his  contempt  of  the  rest  of  the  coun- 
cil, especially  Cottington,  who  aspired  to  that  post,  by  such 
a  recommendation.1  He  had  previously  procured  the  office 
of  secretary  of  state  for  Windebank.  But,  though  overawed 
by  the  king's  infatuated  partiality,  the  faction  adverse  to 
Laud  were  sometimes  able  to  gratify  their  dislike,  or  to  man- 
ifest their  greater  discretion,  by  opposing  obstacles  to  his  im- 
petuous spirit. 

Of  these  impediments,  which  a  rash  and  ardent  man  calls 
Lord  straf-  lukewarmness,  indolence,  and  timidity,  he  fre- 
ford.  quently  complains  in  his  correspondence  with  the 

lord  deputy  of  Ireland  —  that  lord  Wentworth,  so  much 
better  krtown  by  the  title  of  earl  of  Strafford,  which  he  only 
obtained  the  year  before  his  death,  that  we  may  give  it  him 
by  anticipation,  whose  doubtful  fame  and  memorable  end 
have  made  him  nearly  the  most  conspicuous  character  of  a 
reign  so  fertile  in  recollections.  Strafford  had  in  his  early 
years  sought  those  local  dignities  to  which  his  ambition  prob- 


1  The  following  entry  appears  in  Laud's 
Diary  (March  6,  1636):  — "Sunday,  Wil- 
liam Juxon,  lord  bishop  of  London,  made 
lord  high-treasurer  of  England :  no 
churchman  had  it  since  Henry  VII. 's 
time.  I  pray  God  bless  him  to  carry  it  so 
that  the  church  may  have  honor,  and  the 
king  and  the  state  service  and  content- 
ment by  it.  And  now,  if  the  church  will 
not  hold  themselves  up  under  God,  I  can 
do  no  more." 

Those  who  were  far  from  puritanism 
could  not  digest  this  strange  elevation. 
James  Howell  writes  to  Wentworth, — 
"  The  news  that  keeps  greatest  noise 
here  at  this  present  is  that  there  is  a  new 
lord-treasurer;  audit  is  news  indeed,  it 
being  now  twice  time  out  of  mind  since 
the  white  robe  and  the  white  staff  marched 
together ;  we  begin  to  live  here  in  the 
church  triumphant;  and  there  wants  but 
one  more  to  keep  the  king's  conscience, 
which  is  more  proper  for  a  churchman 
than,  his  coin,  to  make  it  a  triumvirate." 
Straff.  Letters,  i.  522.  Garrard,  another 
correspondent,  expresses  his  surprise,  and 
thinks  Strafford  himself,  or  Cottingtou, 
would  have  done  better:  p.  523.  And 
afterwards,  vol.  ii.  p.  2,  "The  clergy  are 
so  high  here  since  the  joining  of  the 
white  sleeves  with  the  white  staff,  that 
there  is  much  talk  of  having  as  secretary 


a  bishop,  Dr.  Wren,  bishop  of  Norwich; 
and  as  chancellor  of  the  exchequer  Dr. 
Bancroft,  bishop  of  Oxford :  but  this 
comes  only  from  the  young  fry  of  the 
clergy  ;  little  credit  is  given  to  it,  but  it 
is  observed  they  swarm  mightily  about 
the  court."  The  tone  of  these  letters 
shows  that  the  writer  suspected  that 
Wentworth  would  not  be  well  pleased  at 
seeing  a  churchman  set  over  his  head. 
But  in  several  of  his  own  letters  he  posi- 
tively declares  his  aversion  to  the  office, 
and  perhaps  with  sincerity.  Ambition 
was  less  predominant  in  his  mind  than 
pride  and  impatience  of  opposition,  lie 
knew  that  as  lord-treasurer  he  would  be 
perpetually  thwarted  and  undermined 
by  Cottington  and  others  of  the  council. 
They,  on  the  other  hand,  must  have 
dreaded  that  such  a  colleague  might 
become  their  master.  Laud  himself,  in 
his  correspondence  with  Strafford,  never 
throws  out  the  least  hint  of  a  wish  that 
he  should  succeed  Weston,  which  would 
have  interfered  with  his  own  views. 

It  must  be  added  that  Juxon  redeemed 
the  scandal  of  his  appointment  by  an 
unblemished  probity,  and  gave  so  little 
offence  in  this  invidious  greatness  that 
the  long  parliament  never  attacked  him, 
and  he  remained  in  his  palace  at  i'ulhain 
without  molestation  till  1617. 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.  LORD  STRATFORD.  449 

ably  was  at  that  time  limited,  the  representation  of  the 
county  of  York  and  the  post  of  custos  rotulorum,  through 
the  usual  channel  of  court-favor.  Slighted  by  the  duke  of 
Buckingham,  and  mortified  at  the  preference  shown  to  the 
head  of  a  rival  family,  sir  John  Saville,  he  began  to  quit  the 
cautious  and  middle  course  he  had  pursued  in  parliament, 
and  was  reckoned  among  the  opposers  of  the  administration 
after  the  accession  of  Charles.1  He  was  one  of  those  who 
were  made  sheriffs  of  their  counties,  in  order  to  exclude 
them  from  the  parliament  of  1626.  This  inspired  so  much 
resentment,  that  he  signalized  himself  as  a  refuser  of  the 
arbitrary  loan  exacted  the  next  year,  and  was  committed  in 
consequence  to  prison.  He  came  to  the  third  parliament 
with  a  determination  to  make  the  court  sensible  of  his  power, 
and  possibly  with  some  real  zeal  for  the  liberties  of  his  coun- 
try. But  patriotism  unhappily,  in  his  self-interested  and 
ambitious  mind,  was  the  seed  sown  among  thorns.  He  had 
never  lost  sight  of  his  hopes  from  the  court ;  even  a  tempo- 
rary reconciliation  with  Buckingham  had  been  effected  in 
1627,  which  the  favorite's  levity  soon  broke;  and  he  kept 
up  a  close  connection  with  the  treasurer  Weston.  Always 
jealous  of  a  rival,  he  contracted  a  dislike  for  sir  John  Eliot, 
and  might  suspect  that  he  was  likely  to  be  anticipated  by 
that  more  distinguished  patriot  in  royal  favors.2  The  hour 

1  Stafford's  Letters,  i.  33,  &c.     The  second  parliament  of  Charles,  from  which 

letters  of  Wentworth  iu  this  period  of  his  it  is  notorious  that  the  former  had  been 

life  show  a  good  deal  of  ambition  and  re-  excluded. 

sentment.  but  no  great  portion  of  public  2  Harket  tells  us,  in  his  elegant  style, 
spirit.  This  collection  of  the  Strafford  that  "  sir  John  Eliot  of  the  west  and  sir 
letters  forms  a  very  important  portion  of  Thomas  Wentworth  of  the  north,  both  in 
our  historical  documents.  Hume  had  the  prime  of  their  age  and  wits,  both 
looked  at  them  very  superficially,  and  conspicuous  for  able  speakers,  clashed  so 
quotes  them  but  twice.  They  furnished  often  in  the  house,  and  cudgelled  one 
materials  to  Harris  and  Macaulay;  but  another  with  such  strong  contradictions, 
the  first  is  little  read  at  present,  and  the  that  it  grew  from  an  emulation  between 
second  not  at  all.  In  a  recent  and  de-  them  to  an  enmity.  The  lord-treasurer 
servedly  popular  publication,  Macdiar-  Weston  picked  out  the  northern  cock,  sir 
mid's  Lives  of  British  Statesmen,  the  Thomas,  to  make  him  the  king's  creature, 
•work  of  a  young  man  of  letters,  who  did  and  set  him  upon  the  first  step  of  his  ris- 
not  live  to  struggle  through  the  distresses  ing;  which  was  wormwood  in  the  taste 
of  that  profession,  the  character  of  Straf-  of  Eiiot,  who  revenged  himself  upon  the 
ford  is  drawn  from  the  best  authorities,  king  in  the  bill  of  tonnage,  and  then  fell 
and  with  abundant,  perhaps  excessive,  upon  the  treasurer,  and  declaimed  against 
candor.  Mr.  Brodie  has  well  pointed  out  him  that  he  was  the  author  of  all  the 
that  he  has  obtained  more  credit  for  the  evils  under  which  the  kingdom  was.  op- 
early  period  of  his  parliamentary  life  pressed."  He  proceeds  to  inform  us  that 
than  he  deserves,  by  being  confounded  bishop  Williams  offered  to  brint;  Kliot 
with  -Mr.  Wentworth,  member  for  Ox-  over,  for  which  Wentworth  never  forgave 
ford  :  vol.  ii.  p.  249.  Ilushworth  has  even  him.  Life  of  Williams,  p.  82.  The  dag- 
ascribed  to  sir  Thomas  Wentworth  the  nanimous  fortitude  of  Eliot  forbids  UH  to 
speeches  of  this  Mr.  Wentworth  in  the  give  credit  to  any  surmise  unfavorable  to 

VOL.  i.  —  c.  29 


450  LORD  STRAFFORD.  CHAP.  VIU. 

of  Wentworth's  glory  was  when  Charles  assented  to  the  Pe- 
tition of  Right,  in  obtaining  which,  and  in  overcoming  the 
king's  chicane  and  the  hesitation  of  the  lords,  he  had  been 
preeminently  conspicuous.  From  this  moment  he  started 
aside  from  the  path  of  true  honor ;  and,  being  suddenly  ele- 
vated to  the  peerage  and  a  great  post,  the  presidency  of  the 
council  of  the  North,  commenced  a  splendid  but  baleful 
career,  that  terminated  at  the  scaifold.1  After  this  fatal 
apostasy  he  not  only  lost  all  solicitude  about  those  liber 
ties  which  the  Petition  of  Right  had  been  designed  to  secure 
but  became  their  deadliest  and  most  shameless  enemy. 

The  council  of  the  North  was  erected  by  Henry  VIII. 
after  the  suppression  of  the  great  insurrection  of  1536.  It 
had  a  criminal  jurisdiction  in  Yorkshire  and  the  four  more 
northern  counties,  as  to  riots,  conspiracies,  and  acts  of  vio- 
lence. It  had  also,  by  its  original  commission,  a  jurisdiction 
in  civil  suits,  where  either  of  the  parties  were  too  poor  to 
bear  the  expenses  of  a  process  at  common  law ;  in  which 
case  the  council  might  determine,  as  it  seems,  in  a  summary 
manner,  and  according  to  equity.  But  this  latter  authority 
had  been  held  illegal  by  the  judges  under  Elizabeth.2  In 
fact,  the  lawfulness  of  this  tribunal  in  any  respect  was,  to 
say  the  least,  highly  problematical.  It  was  regulated  by  in- 
structions issued  from  time  to  time  under  the  great  seal. 
Wentworth  spared  no  pains  to  enlarge  the  jurisdiction  of  his 
court.  A  commission  issued  in  1632,  empowering  the  coun- 
cil of  the  North  to  hear  and  determine  all  offences,  mis- 
demeanors, suits,  debates,  controversies,  demands,  causes, 
things,  and  matters  whatsoever  therein  contained,  within 
certain  precincts,  namely,  from  the  Humber  to  the  Scots 
frontier.  They  were  specially  appointed  to  hear  and  de- 
termine divers  offences,  according  to  the  course  of  the  star 
chamber,  whether  provided  for  by  act  of  parliament  or  not 
to  hear  complaints  according  to  the  rules  of  the  court  of 
chancery,  and  stay  proceedings  at  common  law  by  injunc 
tion ;  to  attach  persons  by  their  sergeant  in  any  part  of  the 
realm. 

his  glory  upon  such  indifferent  author-  the  assassination   of  Buckingham.    Hia 

ity ;  but  several  passages  in  VVentworth's  patent  in  Kymer  bears  date  22ud  July, 

letters  to  Laud  show  his  malice  towards  1628.  a  month  previous  to  that  event. 
one  who  had  perished  in  the  great  cause        -  Fourth  last.  c.  49.     See  also  13  Re 

Which  he  had  so  basely  forsaken.  ports.  31. 
1  Wentworth  was  brought  over  before        3  Kynier,  xix.  9.    Rushworth,  ii.  127- 


CHA.  I.  —  162y-40.      STRAFFORD  IN  IRELAND.  451 

These  inordinate  powers,  the  soliciting  and  procuring  of 
which,  especially  by  a  person  so  well  versed  in  the  laws  and 
constitution,  appears  to  be  of  itself  a  sufficient  ground  for 
impeachment,  were  abused  by  Stratford  to  gratify  his  own 
pride,  as  well  as  to  intimidate  the  opposers  of  arbitrary 
measures.  Proofs  of  this  occur  in  the  prosecution  of  sir 
David  Foulis,  in  that  of  Mr.  Bellasis,  in  that  of  Mr.  Male- 
verer,  for  the  circumstances  of  which  I  refer  the  reader  to 
more  detailed  history.1 

Without  resigning  his  presidency  of  the  northern  council, 
"Wentworth  was  transplanted  in  1633  to  a  still  more  exten- 
sive sphere,  as  lord-deputy  of  Ireland.  This  was  the  great 
scene  on  which  he  played  his  part ;  it  was  here  that  he  found 
abundant  scope  for  his  commanding  energy  and  imperious 
passions.  The  Richelieu  of  that  island,  he  made  it  wealthier 
hi  the  midst  of  exactions,  and,  one  might  almost  say,  happier 
in  the  midst  of  oppressions.  He  curbed  subordinate  tyran- 
ny ;  but  his  own  left  a  sting  behind  it  that  soon  spread  a 
deadly  poison  over  Ireland.  But  of  his  merits  and  his  in- 
justice towards  that  nation  I  shall  find  a  better  occasion  to 
speak.  Two  well-known  instances  of  his  despotic  conduct  in 
respect  to  single  persons  may  just  be  mentioned :  the  depri- 
vation and  imprisonment  of  the  lord  chancellor  Loftus  for 
not  obeying  an  order  of  the  privy  council  to  make  such  a 
settlement  as  they  prescribed  on  his  son's  marriage  —  a 
stretch  of  interference  with  private  concerns  which  was  ag- 
gravated by  the  suspected  familiarity  of  the  lord-deputy  with 
the  lady  who  was  to  reap  advantage  from  it ; 2  and,  secondly, 
the  sentence  of  death  passed  by  a  council  of  war  on  lord 
Mountnorris,  in  StrafFord's  presence,  and  evidently  at  his  in- 
stigation, on  account  of  some  very  slight  expressions  which 

1  Rushworth.     Strafford's  Trial,   &c.  to  impose  upon  it."  Sept.  1632.    Somera 

Brodie,  ii.  319.     Straff.  Letters,  i.   145.  Tract*,  iv.  198. 

In  a  letter  to  lord  Doncaster,  pressing        «  Kushworth,  Abr.  iii.  85.    Clarendon, 

for  a  severe  sentence  on  Foulis,  who  had  i.  390  (1826).      The  original  editors  left 

been  guilty  of  some  disrespect  to  himself  out  some  words  which  brought  this  home 

as  president  of   the  North,  Wentworth  to  Stratford.   And  if  the  case  was  aa  there 

shows  uis  abhorrence  of  liberty  with  all  seems  every  reason  to  believe,  I  would 

the  bitterness  of  a  renegado ;  and  urges  ask  those  who  talk  of  this  man's  inno- 

the  "  seasonable  correcting  an  humour  cence  whether,  in  any  civilized  country, 

and  liberty  I  find  reign  in  these  parts,  of  a  more  outrageous  piece  of  tyranny  has 

observing  a  superior  command  no  farther  been  committed   by  a  governor  than  to 

than  they  like  themselves,  and  of  ques-  compel  a  nobleman  of  the  highest  station 

tioning  any  profit  of  the  crown,  called  to  change  the  disposition  of  his  private 

upon  by  his  majesty's  ministers,  which  estate,  because  that  governor  carried  on 

might  enable  it  to  subsist  of  itself,  with-  an  adulterous  intercourse  with  the  daugh- 

out  being  necessitated  to  accept  of  such  ter-in-law  of  the  person  whom  he  treated 

conditions  as  others  might  easily  think  thus  imperiously  ? 


452  CORRESPONDENCE  BETWEEN  CHAP,  VIII 

he  had  used  in  private  society.  Though  it  was  never  the 
deputy's  intention  to  execute  this  judgment  of  his  slaves,  but 
to  humiliate  and  trample  upon  Mountnorris,  the  violence  and 
indecency  of  his  conduct  in  it,  his  long  persecution  of  the 
unfortunate  prisoner  after  the  sentence,  and  his  gtorying  in 
the  act  at  all  times,  and  even  on  his  own  trial,  are  irrefraga- 
ble proofs  of  such  vindictive  bitterness  as  ought,  if  there 
were  nothing  else,  to  prevent  any  good  man  from  honoring 
his  memory.1 

The  haughty  and  impetuous  primate  found  a  congenial 
Correspond-  spirit  in  the  lord-deputy.  They  unbosom  to  each 
ence  be-  other,  in  their  private  letters,  their  ardent  thirst  to 

tween  Laud  •  •      «  i 

and  straf-  promote  the  king  s  service  by  measures  ot  more 
energy  than  they  were  permitted  to  exercise.  Do 
we  think  the  administration  of  Charles  during  the  interval  of 
parliaments  rash  and  violent?  They  tell  us  it  was  over- 
cautious and  slow.  Do  we  revolt  from  the  severities  of  the 
star-chamber?  To  Laud  and  Strafford  they  seemed  the 
feebleness  of  excessive  lenity.  Do  we  cast  on  the  crown- 
lawyers  the  reproach  of  having  betrayed  their  country's  liber- 
ties ?  We  may  find  that,  with  their  utmost  servility,  they 
fell  far  behind  the  expectations  of  the  court,  and  their  scru- 
ples were  reckoned  the  chief  shackles  on  the  half-emancipated 
prerogative. 

The  system  which  Laud  was  longing  to  pursue  in  England, 
and  which  Strafford  approved,  is  frequently  hinted  at  by  the 
word  Thorough.  "  For  the  state,"  says  he,  "  indeed,  my  lord, 
I  am  for  Thorough ;  for  I  see  that  both  thick  and  thin  stay 
somebody,  where  I  conceive  it  should  not,  and  it  is  impossible 
to  go  thorough  alone." 2  "I  am  very  glad "  (in  another  let- 
ter) "  to  read  your  lordship  so  resolute,  and  more  to  hear  you 

1  Clarendon  Papers,  i.  449,  543,  594.  ment,  but  to  purchase  an  estate  in  Scot- 

Kushworth,  Abridg.  iii.  43.     Clar.  Hist.  land.    Id.  511. 

i.  386  (1826).  Strafford  Letters,  i.  497,  Hume,  in  extenuating  the  conduct  of 
et  post.  This  proceeding  against  lord  Strafford  as  to  Mountnorris's  trial,  says 
Mountnorris  excited  much  dissatisfaction  that,  "  sensible  of  the  inir/uity  of  the  sen 
in  England ;  those  of  the  council  who  fence,  he  procured  his  majesty's  free  par- 
disliked  Strafford  making  it  a  pretext  to  don  to  Mountnorris."  There  is  not  the 
inveigh  against  his  arrogance.  But  the  slightest  evidence  to  warrant  the  words 
kiug.  invariably  on  the  severe  and  arbi-  in  italics  ;  on  the  contrary,  he  always  jus- 
trary  side,  justified  the  measure,  which  tified  the  sentence,  and  had  most  mani- 
silenced  the  courtiers :  p.  512.  Be  it  festly  procured  it.  The  king,  in  return 
added  that  the  virtuous  Charles  took  a  to  a  moving  petition  of  lady  Mountnorris, 
bribe  of  60CXM.  for  bestowing  Mountnor-  permitted  his  release  from  confinement, 
ris's  office  on  sir  Adam  Loftus,  not  out  of  "  on  making  such  a  submission  as  my 
distress  through  the  parsimony  of  parlia-  lord-deputy  shall  approve." 

2  Strafford  Letters,  i.  111. 


CHA.  I.  — 1029-40.     LAUD  AND  STRAFFORD.  453 

affirm  that  the  footing  of  them  that  go  thorough  for  our  mas- 
ter's service  is  not  upon  fee,  as  it  hath  been.  But  you  are 
withal  upon  so  many  Ifs,  that  by  their  help  you  may  preserve 
any  man  upon  ice,  be  it  never  so  slippery.  As  first,  if  the 
common  lawyers  may  be  contained  within  their  ancient  and 
sober  bounds ;  if  the  word  Thorough  be  not  left  out,  as  I  am 
certain  it  is ;  if  we  grow  not  faint ;  if  we  ourselves  be  not  in 
fault ;  if  we  come  not  to  a  peccatum  ex  te  Israel ;  if  others 
will  do  their  parts  as  thoroughly  as  you  promise  for  yourself, 
and  justly  conceive  of  me.  Now  I  pray,  with  so  many  and 
such  Ifs  as  these,  what  may  not  be  done,  and  in  a  brave  and 
noble  way  ?  But  can  you  tell  when  these  Ifs  will  meet,  or 
be  brought  together  ?  Howsoever  I  am  resolved  to  go  on 
steadily  in  the  way  which  you  have  formerly  seen  me  go;  so 
that  (to  put  in  one  if  too),  if  anything  fail  of  my  hearty 
desires  for  the  king  and  the  church's  service,  the  fault  shall 
not  be  mine." 1  "  As  for  my  marginal  note  "  (he  writes  in 
another  place),  "I  see  you  deciphered  it  well"  (they  fre- 
quently corresponded  in  cipher),  "  and  I  see  you  make  use 
of  it  too ;  do  so  still,  thorough  and  thorough.  Oh  that  I 
were  where  I  might  go  so  too !  but  I  am  shackled  between 
delays  and  uncertainties ;  you  have  a  great  deal  of  honor 
here  for  your  proceedings  ;  go  on  a  God's  name."  "  I  have 
done,"  he  says  some  years  afterwards,  "  with  expecting  of 
Thorough  on  this  side."  a 

It  is  evident  that  the  remissness  of  those  with  whom  he 
was  joined  in  the  administration,  in  not  adopting  or  enforcing 
sufficiently  energetic  measures,  is  the  subject  of  the  arch- 
bishop's complaint.  Neither  he  nor  Strafford  loved  the  treas- 
urer Weston,  nor  lord  Cottington,  both  of  whom  had  a  con- 
siderable weight  in  the  council.  But  it  is  more  difficult  to 
perceive  in  what  respects  the  Thorough  system  was  disre- 
garded. He  cannot  allude  to  the  church,  which  he  absolutely 
governed  through  the  high-commission  court.  The  inade- 
quate punishments,  as  he  thought  them,  imposed  on  the  re- 
fractory, formed  a  part,  but  not  the  whole,  of  his  grievance. 
It  appears  to  me  that  the  great  aim  of  these  two  persons  was 
to  effect  the  subjugation  of  the  common  lawyers.  Some  sort 
of  tenderness  for  those  constitutional  privileges,  so  indisso- 
lubly  interwoven  with  the  laws  they  administered,  adhered 

1  Strafford  Letters,  i.  155.  inefficient  system  of  the  rest  of  the  coim- 

2  P.  329.    In  other- letters  they  com-    cil,  unless  it  is  a  personal  nickname  for 
plain  of  what  they  call  the  lady  Mora,    Weston. 

which  seems  to  be  a  cant  word  for  the 


454 


CORRESPONDENCE  BETWEEN 


CHAP.  VIII 


to  the  judges,  even  while  they  made  great  sacrifices  of  their 
integrity  at  the  instigation  of  the  crown.  In  the  case  of 
habeas  corpus,  in  that  of  ship-money,  we  find  many  of  them 
display  a  kind  of  half-compliance,  a  reservation,  a  distinction, 
an  anxiety  to  rest  on  precedents,  which,  though  it  did  not 
save  their  credit  with  the  public,  impaired  it  at  court.  On 
some  more  fortunate  occasions,  as  we  have  seen,  they  even 
manifested  a  good  deal  of  firmness  in  resisting  what  was 
urged  on  them.  Chiefly,  howerer,  in  matter  of  prohibitions 
issuing  from  the  ecclesiastical  courts,  they  were  uniformly 
tenacious  of  their  jurisdiction.  Nothing  could  expose  them 
more  to  Laud's  ill-will.  I  should  not  deem  it  improbable 
that  he  had  formed,  or  rather  adopted  from  the  canonists,  a 
plan,  not  only  of  rendering  the  spiritual  jurisdiction  inde- 
pendent, but  of  extending  it  to  all  civil  causes,  unless  perhaps 
in  questions  of  freehold.1 

The  presumption  of  common  lawyers,  and  the  difficulties 
they  threw  in  the  way  of  the  church  and  crown,  are  frequent 
themes  with  the  two  correspondents.  "  The  church,"  says 
Laud,  "  is  so  bound  up  in  the  forms  of  the  common  law,  that 
it  is  not  possible  for  me  or  for  any  man  to  do  that  good  which 


•1  The  bishops,  before  the  Reformation, 
Issued  process  from  their  courts  in  their 
own  names.  By  the  statute  of  1  Edw.  VI. 
c.  2,  all  ecclesiastical  jurisdiction  is  de- 
clarVi  to  be  immediately  from  the  crown  ; 
and  it  is  directed  that  persons  exercising 
it  shall  use  the  king's  arms  in  their  seal, 
and  no  other.  This  was  repealed  under 
Mary  ;  but  her  act  is  itself  repealed  by  1 
Jac.  I.  c.  25,  §  48.  This  seems  to  revive 
the  act  of  Edward.  The  spiritual  courts, 
however,  continued  to  issue  process  in 
the  bishop's  name,  and  with  his  seal.  On 
Borne  difficulty  being  made  concerning 
this,  it  was  referred  by  the  star-chamber 
to  the  twelve  judges,  who  gave  it  under 
their  hands  that  the  statute  of  Edward 
was  repealed,  and  that  the  practice  of  the 
ecclesiastical  courts  in  this  respect  was 
agreeable  to  law.  Neal,  589.  Kennet, 
92.  Hush.  Abr.iii.  340.  Whitelock  says, 
p.  22,  that  the  bishops  all  denied  that 
they  held  their  jurisdiction  from  the 
king,  for  which  they  were  liable  to  heavy 
penalties.  This  question  is  of  little  con- 
sequence ;  for  it  is  still  true  that  ecclesi- 
astical jurisdiction,  according  to  the  law, 
emanates  from  the  crown  ;  nor  does  any- 
thing turn  on  the  issuing  of  process  in 
the  bishop's  name,  anymore  than  on  the 
holding  courts-baron  in  the  name  of  the 
lord  In  Ireland,  unless  I  am  mistaken, 
the  king's  name  is  used  in  ecclesiastical 
proceedings.  Laud,  in  hio  famous  speech 


in  the  star-chamber,  1637,  and  again  on 
his  trial,  asserts  episcopal  jurisdiction 
(except  what  is  called  in  foro  contentioso) 
to  be  of  divine  right ;  a  doctrine  not 
easily  reconcilable  with  the  crown's 
supremacy  over  all  causes  under  the' 
statute  of  Elizabeth  ;  since  any  spiritual 
censure  may  be  annulled  by  a  lay  tribu- 
nal, the  commission  of  delegates  ;  and 
how  this  can  be  compatible  with  a  divine 
authority  in  the  bishop  to  pronounce  it, 
seems  not  easy  to  prove.  Laud,  I  have 
no  doubt,  would  have  put  an  end  to  this 
badge  of  subordination  to  the  crown. 
The  judges  in  Cawdrey's  case,  6  Reports, 
held  a  very  different  language  ;  nor  would 
Elizabeth  have  borne  this  assumption  of 
the  prelates  as  tamely  as  Charles,  iu  his 
poor-spirited  bigotry,  seems  to  have  done. 
Stillingfleet,  though  he  disputes  at  great 
length  the  doctrine  of  lord  Coke,  in  his 
fifth  Report,  as  to  the  extent  of  the  royal 
supremacy  before  the  first  of  Elizabeth, 
fully  admits  that,  since  the  statute  of  that 
year,  the  authority  for  keeping  courts,  in 
whose  name  soever  they  may  be  held,  is 
derived  from  the  king.  Vol.  iii  768,  778. 
This  arrogant  contempt  of  the  lawyers 
manifested  by  Laud  and  his  faction  of 
priests  led  to  the  ruin  of  the  greatchurch- 
men,  and  of  the  church  itself — by  the 
hands,  chiefly,  of  that  powerful  body  they 
had  insulted,  as  Clarendon  has  justly 
r&aiarked 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.     LAUD  AND  STRAFFORD.  455 

he  would,  or  is  bound  to  do.  For  your  lordship  sees,  no  man 
clearer,  that  they  which  have  gotten  so  much  power  in  and 
over  the  church  will  not  let  go  their  hold ;  they  have  indeed 
fangs  with  a  witness,  whatsoever  I  was  once  said  in  a  passiou 
to  have."  *  Strafford  replies,  "  I  know  no  reason  but  you 
may  as  well  rule  the  common  lawyers  in  England  as  I,  poor 
beagle,  do  here ;  and  yet  that  I  do,  and  will  do,  in  all  that 
concerns  my  master,  at  the  peril  of  my  head.  I  am  confident 
that  the  king,  being  pleased  to  set  himself  in  the  business,  is 
able,  by  his  wisdom  and  ministers,  to  carry  any  just  and 
honorable  action  through  all  imaginary  opposition,  for  real 
there  can  be  none ;  that  to  start  aside  for  such  panic  fears, 
fantastic  apparitions,  as  a  Prynne  or  an  Eliot  shall  set  up, 
were  the  meanest  folly  in  the  whole  world ;  that,  the  debts 
of  the  crown  being  taken  off,  you  may  govern  as  you  please  ; 
and  most  resolute  I  ara  that  the  work  may  be  done  without 
borrowing  any  help  forth  of  the  king's  lodgings,  and  that  it 
is  as  downright  a  peccatum  ex  te  Israel  as  ever  was,  if  all 
this  be  not  effected  with  speed  and  ease."  2  —  Stratford's  in- 
dignation at  the  lawyers  breaks  out  on  other  occasions.  In 
writing  to  lord  Cottington  he  complains  of  a  judge  of  assize 
who  had  refused  to  receive  the  king's  instructions  to  the 
council  of  the  North  in  evidence,  and  beseeches  that  he  may 
be  charged  with  this  great  misdemeanor  before  the  council- 
board.  "  I  confess,"  he  says,  "  I  disdain  to  see  the  gown- 
men  in  this  sort  hang  their  noses  over  the  flowers  of  the 
crown."  3  It  was  his  endeavor  in  Ireland,  as  well  as  in  York- 
shire, to  obtain  the  right  of  determining  civil  suits.  "  I  find," 
he  says,  "  that  my  lord  Falkland  was  restrained  by  procla- 
mation not  to  meddle  in  any  cause  between  party  and  party, 
which  did  certainly  lessen  his  power  extremely :  I  know 
very  well  the  common  lawyers  will  be  passionately  against 
it,  who  are  wont  to  put  such  a  prejudice  upon  all  other  pro- 
fessions, as  if  none  were  to  be  trusted  or  capable  to  adminis- 
ter justice  but  themselves ;  yet  how  well  this  suits  with  mon- 
archy, when  they  monopolize  all  to  be  governed  by  their 
year-books,  you  in  England  have  a  costly  experience ;  and  I 
am  sure  his  majesty's  absolute  power  is  not  weaker  in  this 
kingdom,  where  hitherto  the  deputy  and  council-board  have 
had  a  stroke  with  them."  *  The  king  indulged  him  in  this, 
with  a  restriction  as  to  matters  of  inheritance. 

i  Strafford  Letters,  i.  111.  »  P- 129. 

t  p.  173.  « P.  201.    See  also  p.  228. 


456  PEINCIPLES  AND  ACTS  CHAP.  VHL 

•  * 

The  cruelties  exercised  on  Prynne  and  his  associates  have 
generally  been  reckoned  among  the  great  reproaches  of  the 
primate.  It  has  sometimes  been  insinuated  that  they  were 
rather  the  act  of  other  counsellors  than  his  own.  But  his 
letters,  as  too  often  occurs,  belie  this  charitable  excuse.  He 
expresses  in  them  no  sort  of  humane  sentiment  towards 
these  unfortunate  men,  but  the  utmost  indignation  at  the 
oscitancy  of  those  in  power,  which  connived  at  the  public 
demonstrations  of  sympathy.  "  A  little  more  quickness,"  he 
says,  "in  the  government  would  cure  this  itch  of  libelling. 
But  what  can  you  think  of  Thorough  when  there  shall  be 
such  slips  in  business  of  consequence  ?  What  say  you  to  it, 
that  Prynne  and  his  fellows  should  be  suffered  to  talk  what 
they  pleased  while  they  stood  in  the  pillory,  and  win  accla- 
mations from  the  people,  &c.  ?  By  that  which  I  have  above 
written,  your  lordship  will  see  that  the  Triumviri  will  be  far 
enough  from  being  kept  dark.  It  is  true  that,  when  this  busi- 
ness is  spoken  of,  some  men  speak  as  your  lordship  writes, 
that  it  concerns  the  king  and  government  more  than  me. 
But  when  anything  comes  to  be  acted  against  them,  be  it 
but  the  execution  of  a  sentence,  in  which  lies  the  honor  and 
safety  of  all  justice,  yet  there  is  little  or  nothing  done,  nor 
shall  I  ever  live  to  see  it  otherwise."  1 

The  lord-deputy  fully  concurred  in  this  theory  of  vigorous 
government.  They  reasoned  on  such  subjects  as  cardinal 
Granville  and  the  duke  of  Alva  had  reasoned  before  them. 
"  A  prince,"  he  says  in  answer,  "  that  loseth  the  force  and 
example  of  his  punishments,  loseth  withal  the  greatest  part 
of  his  dominion.  If  the  eyes  of  the  Triumviri  be  not  sealed 
so  close  as  they  ought,  they  may  perchance  spy  us  out  a 
ghrewd  turn  when  we  least  expect  it.  I  fear  we  are  hugely 
mistaken,  and  misapply  our  charity  thus  pitying  of  them, 
where  we  should  indeed  much  rather  pity  ourselves.  It  is 
strange  indeed,"  he  observes  in  another  place,  "  to  see  the 
frenzy  which  possesseth  the  vulgar  now-a-days,  and  that  the 
just  displeasure  and  chastisement  of  a  state  should  produce 
greater  estimation,  nay  reverence,  to  persons  of  no  consid- 
eration either  for  life  or  learning,  than  the  greatest  and  high- 
est trust  and  employments  shall  be  able  to  procure  for  others 
of  unspotted  conversation,  of  most  eminent  virtues  and  deep- 
est knowledge :  a  grievous  and  overspreading  leprosy !  but 

1  gtrafford  Letters,  ii.  100. 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.  OF  STRAFFORD.  457 

where  you  mention  a  remedy,  sure  it  is  not  fitted  for  the 
hand  of  every  physician ;  the  cure  under  God  must  be 
wrought  by  one  JEsculapius  alone,  and  that  in  my  weak 
judgment  to  be  effected  rather  by  corrosives  than  lenitives: 
less  than  Thorough  will  not  overcome  it ;  there  is  a  can- 
cerous malignity  in  it,  which  must  be  cut  forth,  which  long 
since  rejected  all  other  means,  and  therefore  to  God  and  him 
I  leave  it." l 

The  honorable  reputation  that  Strafford  had  earned  before 
his  apostasy  stood  principally  on  two  grounds :  his  refusal 
to  comply  with  a  requisition  of  money  without  consent  of 
parliament,  and  his  exertions  in  the  Petition  of  Right,  which 
declared  every  such  exaction  to  be  contrary  to  law.  If  any, 
therefore,  be  inclined  to  palliate  his  arbitrary  proceedings 
and  principles  in  the  executive  administration,  his  virtue  will 
be  brought  to  a  test  in  the  business  of  ship-money.  If  he 
shall  be  found  to  have  given  countenance  and  support  to  that 
measure,  there  must  be  an  end  of  all  pretence  to  integrity  or 
patriotism.  But  of  this  there  are  decisive  proofs.  He  not 
only  made  every  exertion  to  enforce  its  payment  in  York- 
shire during  the  years  1639  and  1640,  for  which  the  peculiar 
dangers  of  that  time  might  furnish  some  apology,  but  long 
before,  in  his  correspondence  with  Laud,  speaks  thus  of  Mr. 
Hampden,  deploring,  it  seems,  the  supineness  that  had  per- 
mitted him  to  dispute  the  crown's  claim  with  impunity. 
"  Mr.  Hampden  is  a  great  brother  [i.  e.  a  puritan],  and  the 
very  genius  of  that  people  leads  them  always  to  oppose,  as 
well  civilly  as  ecclesiastically,  all  that  ever  authority  ordains 
for  them ;  but  in  good  faith,  were  they  right  served,  they 
should  be  whipt  home  into  their  right  wits,  and  much  be- 
holden they  should  be  to  any  one  that  would  thoroughly 
take  pains  with  them  in  that  kind."  a  "In  truth,  I  still  wish, 
and  take  it  also  to  be  a  very  charitable  one,  Mr.  H.  and  oth- 
ers to  his  likeness  were  well  whipt  into  their  right  senses ; 
if  that  the  rod  be  so  used  as  that  it  smarts  not,  I  am  the 
more  sorry."  8 

Hutton,  one  of  the  judges  who  had  been  against  the  crown 
in  this  case,  having  some  small  favor  to  ask  of  Strafford, 
takes  occasion  in  his  letter  to  enter  on  the  subject  of  sliip- 
money,  mentioning  his  own  opinion  in  such  a  manner  as  to 
give  the  least  possible  offence,  and  with  all  qualifications  in 

l  Strafford  Letters,  ii.  136.  *  P.  138.  *  P.  168. 


458  PRINCIPLES  AND  ACTS  CHAP.  VIH. 

favor  of  the  crown ;  commending  even  lord  Finch's  argu- 
ment on  the  other  side.1  The  lord-deputy,  answering  his 
letter  after  much  delay,  says,  "  I  must  confess,  in  a  business 
of  so  mighty  importance,  I  shall  the  less  regard  the  forms 
of  pleading,  and  do  conceive,  as  it  seems  my  lord  Finch 
pressed,  that  the  power  of  levies  of  forces  at  'sea  and  land 
for  the  very,  not  feigned,  relief  and  safety  of  the  public,  is  a 
property  of  sovereignty,  as,  were  the  crown  willing,  it  could 
not  divest  it  thereof:  Salus  populi  suprema  lex  ;  nay,  in  cases 
of  extremity,  even  above  acts  of  parliament,"  &c. 

It  cannot  be  forgotten  that  the  loan  of  1626,  for  refusing 
which  Wentworth  had  suffered  imprisonment,  had  been  de- 
manded in  a  season  of  incomparably  greater  difficulty  than 
that  when  ship-money  was  levied :  at  the  one  time  war  had 
been  declared  against  both  France  and  Spain,  at  the  other 
the  public  tranquillity  was  hardly  interrupted  by  some  bick- 
erings with  Holland.  In  avowing  therefore  the  king's  right 
to  levy  money  in  cases  of  exigency,  and  to  be  the  sole  judge 
of  that  exigency,  he  uttered  a  shameless  condemnation  of  his 
former  virtues.  But  lest  any  doubt  should  remain  of  his 
perfect  alienation  from  all  principles  of  limited  monarchy,  I 
shall  produce  still  more  conclusive  proofs.  He  was  strongly 
and  wisely  against  the  war  with  Spain,  into  which  Charles's 
resentment  at  finding  himself  the  dupe  of  that  power  in  the 
business  of  the  Palatinate  nearly  hurried  him  in  1637.  At 
this  time  Strafford  laid  before  the  king  a  paper  of  considera- 
tions dissuading  him  from  this  course,  and  pointing  out  par- 
ticularly his  want  of  regular  troops.2  "  It  is  plain,  indeed," 
he  says,  "  that  the  opinion  delivered  by  the  judges,  declaring 
the  lawfulness  of  the  assessment  for  the  shipping,  is  the 
greatest  service  that  profession  hath  done  the  crown  in  my 
time.  But  unless  his  majesty  hath  the  like  power  declared 
to  raise  a  land  army  upon  the  same  exigent  of  state,  the 
crown  seems  to  me  to  stand  but  upon  one  leg  at  home,  to  be 
considerable  but  by  halves  to  foreign  powers.  Yet  this  sure 
methinks  convinces  a  power  for  the  sovereign  to  raise  pay- 
ments for  land  forces,  and  consequently  submits  to  his  wis- 
dom and  ordinance  the  transporting  of  the  money  or  men 
into  foreign  states.  Seeing,  then,  that  this  piece  well  forti- 
fied forever  vindicates  the  royalty  at  home  from  under  the 
conditions  and  restraints  of  subjects,  renders  us  also  abroad 

1  Strafford  Letters,  ii.  178.  «  P.  60 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.  OF  STRATFORD.  459 

even  to  the  greatest  kings  the  most  considerable  monarchy 
in  Christendom ;  seeing,  again,  this  is  a  business  to  be 
attempted  and  won  from  the  subject  in  time  of  peace  only, 
and  the  people  first  accustomed  to  these  levies,  when  they 
may  be  called  upon  as  by  way  of  prevention  for  our  future 
safety,  and  keep  his  majesty  thereby  also  moderator  of  the 
peace  of  Christendom,  rather  than  upon  the  bleeding  evil 
of  an  instant  and  active  war;  I  beseech  you,  what  piety  to 
alliances  is  there  that  should  divert  a  great  and  wise  king 
forth  of  a  path  which  leads  so  manifestly,  so  directly,  to  the 
establishing  his  -own  throne,  and  the  secure  and  indepen- 
dent seating  of  himself  and  posterity  in  wealth,  strength,  and 
glory,  far  above  any  their  progenitors,  verily  in  such  a  con- 
dition as  there  were  no  more  hereafter  to  be  wished  therri  in 
this  world  but  that  they  would  be  very  exact  in  their  care 
for  the  just  and  moderate  government  of  their  people,  which 
might  minister  back  to  them  again  the  plenties  and  comforts 
of  life,  that  they  would  be  most  searching  and  severe  in  pun- 
ishing the  oppressions  and  wrongs  of  their  subjects,  as  well 
in  the  case  of  the  public  magistrate  as  of  private  persons; 
and,  lastly,  to  be  utterly  resolved  to  exercise  this  power  only 
for  public  and  necessary  uses ;  to  spare  them  as  much  and 
often  as  were  possible ;  and  that  they  never  be  wantonly 
vitiated  or  misapplied  to  any  private  pleasure  or  person 
whatsoever  ?  This  being,  indeed,  the  very  only  means  to 
preserve,  as  may  be  said,  the  chastity  of  these  levies,  and  to 
recommend  their  beauty  so  far  forth  to  the  subject,  as,  be- 
ing thus  disposed,  it  is  to  be  justly  hoped  they  will  never 
grudge  the  parting  with  their  moneys 

"  Perhaps  it  may  be  asked,  where  shall  so  great  a  sum  be 
had  ?  My  answer  is,  Procure  it  from  the  subjects  of  Eng- 
land, and  profitably  for  them  too.  By  this  means  preventing 
the  raising  upon  them  a  land  army  for  defence  of  the  king- 
dom, which  would  be  by  many  degrees  more  chargeable  ;  and 
hereby  also  insensibly  gain  a  precedent,  and  settle  an  author- 
ity and  right  in  the  crown  to  levies  of  that  nature,  which 
thread  draws  after  it  many  huge  and  great  advantages,  more 
proper  to  be  thought  on  at  some  other  seasons  than  now." 

It  is,  however,  remarkable  that,  with  all  Strafford's  en- 
deavors to  render  the  king  absolute,  he  did  not  intend  to 
abolish  the  use  of  parliaments.  This  was  apparently  the 
aim  of  Charles ;  but,  whether  from  remains  of  attachment 


460  PRINCIPLES   OF  STRAFFOED.  CHAP.  VIII 

to  the  ancient  forms  of  liberty  surviving  amidst  his  hatred 
of  the  real  essence,  or  from  the  knowledge  that  a  well-gov- 
erned parliament  is  the  best  engine  for  extracting  money 
from  the  people,  this  able  minister  entertained  very  different 
views.  He  urged  accordingly  the  convocation  of  one  in 
Ireland,  pledging  himself  for  the  experiment's  success.  And 
in  a  letter  to  a  friend,  after  praising  all  that  had  been  done 
in  it,  "  Happy  it  were,"  he  proceeds,  "  if  we  might  live  to 
see  the  like  in  England :  everything  in  its  season  ;  but  in 
some  cases  it  is  as  necessary  there  be  a  time  to  forget,  as  in 
others  to  learn  ;  and  howbeit  the  peccant  (if  I  may  without 
offence  so  term  it)  humor  be  not  yet  wholly  purged  forth, 
yet  do  I  conceive  it  in  the  way,  and  that  once  rightly  cor- 
rected and  prepared,  we  may  hope  for  a  parliament  of  a 
sound  constitution  indeed  ;  but  this  must  be  the  work  of  time, 
and  of  his  majesty's  excellent  wisdom ;  and  this  time  it  be- 
comes us  all  to  pray  for  and  wait  for,  and,  when  God  sends 
it,  to  make  the  right  use  of  it."  l 

These  sentiments  appear  honorable  and  constitutional. 
But  let  it  not  be  hastily  conceived  that  Stratford  was  a  friend 
to  the  necessary  and  ancient  privileges  of  those  assemblies  to 
which  he  owed  his  rise.  A  parliament  was  looked  upon  by 
him  as  a  mere  instrument  of  the  prerogative.  Hence  he 
was  strongly  against  permitting  any  mutual  understanding 
among  its  members,  by  which  they  might  form  themselves 
into  parties,  and  acquire  strength  and  confidence  by  previous 
concert.  "  As  for  restraining  any  private  meetings  either 
before  or  during  parliament,  saving  only  publicly  in  the 
house,  I  fully  rest  in  the  same  opinion,  and  shall  be  very 
watchful  and  attentive  therein  as  a  means  which  may  rid  us 
of  a  great  trouble,  and  prevent  many  stones  of  offence,  which 
otherwise  might  by  malignant  spirits  be  cast  in  among  us."  a 
And,  acting  on  this  principle,  he  kept  a  watch  on  the  Irish 
parliament  to  prevent  those  intrigues  which  his  experience 
in  England  had  taught  him  to  be  the  indispensable  means  of 
obtaining  a  control  over  the  crown.  Thus  fettered  and  kept 
in  awe,  no  one  presuming  to  take  a  lead  in  debate  from  un- 
certainty of  support,  parliaments  would  have  become  such 
mockeries  of  their  venerable  name  as  the  joint  contempt  of 
the  court  and  nation  must  soon  have  annihilated.  Yet  so 
difficult  is  it  to  preserve  this  dominion  over  any  representa-. 

»  Strafford  Letters,  i.  420.  »  P.  246 ;  see  also  p.  370. 


CHA.  I.— 1629-40.  ABBOT  AND  LAUD:  461 

tive  body,  that  the  king  judged  far  more  discreetly  than 
Strafford  in  desiring  to  dispense  entirely  with  their  attend- 
ance. 

The  passages  which  I  have  thus  largely  quoted  will,  1 
trust,  leave  no  doubt  in  any  reader's  mind  that  the  earl  of 
Strafford  was  party  in  a  conspiracy  to  subvert  the  funda- 
mental laws  and  liberties  of  his  country.  For  here  are  not, 
as  on  his  trial,  accusations  of  words  spoken  in  heat,  uncertain 
as  to  proof,  and  of  ambiguous  interpretation  ;  nor  of  actions 
variously  reported  and  capable  of  some  explanation ;  but  the 
sincere  unbosoming  of  the  heart  in  letters  never  designed  to 
come  to  light.  And  if  we  reflect  upon  this  man's  cool- 
blooded  apostasy  on  the  first  lure  to  his  ambition,  and  on  his 
splendid  abilities,  which  enhanced  the  guilt  of  that  desertion, 
we  must  feel  some  indignation  at  those  who  have  palliated  all 
his  iniquities,  and  even  ennobled  his  memory  with  the  at- 
tributes of  patriot  heroism.  Great  he  surely  was,  since  that 
epithet  can  never  be  denied  without  paradox  to  so  much  com- 
prehension of  mind,  such  ardor  and  energy,  such  courage 
and  eloquence  ;  those  commanding  qualities  of  soul,  which, 
impressed  upon  his  dark  and  stern  countenance,  struck  his 
contemporaries  with  mingled  awe  and  hate,  and  still  live  in 
the  unfading  colors  of  Vandyke.1  But  it  may  be  reckoned 
as  a  sufficient  ground  for  distrusting  any  one's  attachment 
to  the  English  constitution,  that  he  reveres  the  name  of  the 
earl  of  Strafford. 

It  was  perfectly  consonant  to  Laud's  temper  and  principles 
of  government  to  extirpate,  as  far  as  in  him  lay,  conduct  of 
the  lurking  seeds  of  disaffection  to  the  Anglican  ^^cL"  'rose- 
church.      But   the   course  he  followed   could   in  cution  of 
nature  have  no  other  tendency  than  to  give  them  Puntans- 
nourishment.     His  predecessor  Abbot  had  perhaps  connived 
to  a  limited  extent  at  some  irregularities  of  discipline  in  the 
puritanical  clergy,  judging  not  absurdly  that  their  scruples 
at  a  few  ceremonies,  which  had  been  aggravated  by  a  vexa- 
tious rigor,  would  die  away  by  degrees  and  yield  to  that  cen- 
tripetal force,  that  moral  attraction  towards  uniformity  and 
obedience  to  custom,  which  Providence  h*as  rendered  one  of 

1   The    unfavorable    physiognomy   of  May  says,  they  were  all  on  his  side.    The 

Straftord   is   notu«d  hy  writers  of  that  portraits  by  Vandyke  at  Wentworth  and 

time.     Sotners  Tracts,  iv.  231.      It  did  Petworth  are  well  known ;  the  latter  ap- 

not  prevent  him  from  being  admired  by  pears  eminently  characteristic 
the  fair  sex,  especially  at  hid  trial,  where, 


462  •     LAUD'S  CONDUCT  IN  THE  CHAP.  VIII. 

the  great  preservatives  of  political  society.  His  hatred  to 
popery  and  zeal  for  Calvinism,  which  undoubtedly  were  nar- 
imow  and  intolerant,  as  well  as  his  avowed  disapprobation  of 
those  churchmen  who  preached  up  arbitrary  power,  gained 
for  this  prelate  the  favor  of  the  party  denominated  puritan. 
In  all  these  respects  no  man  could  be  more  opposed  to  Abbot 
than  his  successor.  Besides  reviving  the  prosecutions  for 
nonconformity  in  their  utmost  strictness,  wherein  many  of  the 
other  bishops  vied  with  their  primate,  he  most  injudicious- 
ly, not  to  say  wickedly,  endeavored,  by  innovations  of  his 
own,  and  by  exciting  alarms  in  the  susceptible  consciences 
of  pious  men,  to  raise  up  new  victims  whom  he  might  op- 
press. Those  who  made  any  difficulty  about  his  novel  cere- 
monies, or  even  who  preached  on  the  Calvinistic  side,  were 
harassed  by  the  high-commission  court  as  if  they  had  been 
actual  schismatics.1  The  most  obnoxious,  if  not  the  most 
indefensible,  of  these  prosecutions  were  for  refusing  to  read 
what  was  called  the  Book  of  Sports ;  namely,  a  proclama- 
tion, or  rather  a  renewal  of  that  issued  in  the  late  reign,  that 
certain  feasts  or  wakes  might  be  kept,  and  a  great  variety  of 
pastimes  used  on  Sundays  after  evening  service.2  This  was 
reckoned,  as  I  have  already  observed,  one  of  the  tests  of 
puritanism.  But  whatever  superstition  there  might  be  in 
that  party's  judaical  observance'  of  the  day  they  called  the 
sabbath,  it  was  in  itself  preposterous,  and  tyrannical  in  its 
intention,  to  enforce  the  reading  in  churches  of  this  license, 
or  rather  recommendation,  of  festivity.  The  precise  clergy 
refused  in  general  to  comply  with  the  requisition,  and  were 
suspended  or  deprived  in  consequence.  Thirty  of  them  were 

1  See  the  cases  of  Workman,    Peter  the    Somerset    assizes    by    chief-justice 
Smart,   &c.,  in   the  common   histories :  Richardson,  at  the  request  of  the  justices 
Rushworth,  Rapin,  Neal,  Macaulay,  Bro-  of  peace,  for  suppressing   these   feasts, 
die,  and  even  Hume,  on  one  side;  and  which  had  led  to  much  disorder  and  pro- 
for  what  can  be  said  on  the  other,  Col-  faueness.     Laud  made  the  privy  council 
lier  and  Laud's  own  defence  on  his  trial,  reprove  the  judge,  and  direct  him  to  re- 
A  number  of  persons,  doubtless  inclining  yoke  the  order.     Kennet.  p.  71;    Rushw. 
to  the  puritan  side,  had  raised  a  sum  of  Abr.  ii.  166.     Heylin  says  the  gentlemen 
money  to  buy  up  impropriations,  which  of  the  county  were  against  Richardson's 
they  vested  in  trustees  for  the, purpose  order,  which  is  one  of  his  habitual  liilse- 
of  supporting  lecturers  :  a  class  of  inin-  hoods.     See  Rushw.  Abr.  ii.  167.    I  must 
isters  to  whom  Laud  was  very   averse,  add,  however,  that  the  proclamation  was 
He  caused  the  parties  to  be  summoned  perfectly   legal,    and    according    to    the 
before  the  star-chamber,  where  their  as-  spirit  of  the  late  act,  1  Car.  I.  c.  1,  for 
eociation  was  dissolved,  and  the  im pro-  the  observance  of  the  Lord's  day.    It  has 
priations  already  purchased  were  coufis-  been  rather  misrepresented  by  those  who 
oated  to  the  crown.     Rushworth,  Abr.  have  not  attended  to  its  limitations,  as 
Ii.  17;  Neal,  i.  556.  Neal  and  Mr.  Brodie.     Dr.  Liugard,  ix. 

2  This  originated  in  an  order  made  at  422,  has  stated  the  matter  rightly. 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.     PROSECUTION  OF  THE  PURITANS.         463 

excommunicated  in  the  single  "diocese  of  Norwich  ;  but  as 
that  part  of  England  was  rather  conspicuously  puritanical, 
and  the  bishop,  one  Wren,  was  the  worst  on  the  bench,  it  is 
highly  probable  that  the  general  average  fell  short  of  this.1 

Besides  the  advantage  of  detecting  a  latent  bias  in  the 
clergy,  it  is  probable  that  the  high-church  prelates  had  a 
politic  end  in  the  Book  of  Sports.  The  morose  gloomy 
spirit  of  puritanism  was  naturally  odious  to  the  young  and  to 
men  of  joyous  tempers.  The  comedies  of  that  age  are  full 
of  sneers  at  its  formality.  It  was  natural  to  think  that,  by 
enlisting  the  common  propensities  of  mankind  to  amusement 
on  the  side  of  the  established  church,  they  might  raise  a  diver- 
sion against  that  fanatical  spirit  which  can  hardly  long  con- 
tinue to  be  the  prevailing  temperament  of  a  nation.  The 
church  of  Rome,  from  which  no  ecclesiastical  statesman 
would  disdain  to  take  a  lesson,  had  for  many  ages  perceived, 
and  acted  upon  the  principle,  that  it  is  the  policy  of  govern- 
ments to  encourage  a  love  of  pastime  and  recreation  in  the 
people,  both  because  it  keeps  them  from  speculating  on  re- 
ligious and  political  matters,  and  because  it  renders  them 
more  cheerful  and  less  sensible  to  the  evils  of  their  condition  ; 
and  it  may  be  remarked  by  the  way,  that  the  opposite  system 
so  long  pursued  in  this  country,  whether  from  a  puritanical 
spirit  or  from  the  wantonness  of  petty  authority,  has  no  such 
grounds  of  policy  to  recommend  it.  Thus  much  at  least  is 
certain,  that,  when  the  puritan  party  employed  their  authority 
in  proscribing  all  diversions,  in  enforcing  all  the  Jewish  rigor 
about  the  sabbath,  and  gave  that  repulsive  air  of  austerity  to 
the  face  of  England  of  which  so  many  singular  illustrations 
are  recorded,  they  rendered  their  own  yoke  intolerable  to  the 
youthful  and  gay  ;  nor  did  any  other  cause  perhaps  so  mate- 
rially contribute  to  bring  about  the  Restoration.  But  mankind 
love  sport  as  little  as  prayer  by  compulsion;  and  the  im- 
mediate effect  of  the  king's  declaration  was  to  produce  a  far 
more  scrupulous  abstinence  from  diversions  on  Sundays  than 
had  been  practised  before. 

The  resolution  so  evidently  taken  by  the  court  to  admit  of 
no  half-conformity  in  religion,  especially  after  Laud  had  ob- 
tained an  unlimited  sway  over  the  king's  mind,  convinced 

1  Neal,  669;  Rushworth,  Abr.  ii.  166;  his  own  account  that  no  suspension  or 

Collier.  758;  Heylin-s  Life  of  Laud,  241,  censure  was  token  off  till  the  party  con- 

290.    The  last  writer  extenuates  the  per-  formed  and  read  the  declaration. 
secuUon  by  Wnm ;  but  it  is  evident  by 


464  EMIGRATION  TO  AMERICA.  CHAP.  VUL 

the  puritans  that  England  could  no  longer  afford  them  an 
asylum.  The  state  of  Europe  was  not  such  as  to  encourage 
their  emigration,  though  many  were  well  received  in  Hol- 
land. But,  turning  their  eyes  to  the  newly-discovered  regions 
beyond  the  Atlantic  Ocean,  they  saw  a  secure  place  of 
refuge  from  present  tyranny,  and  a  boundless  prospect  for 
future  hope.  They  obtained  from  the  crown  the  charter  of 
Massachusetts  Bay  in  1629.  About  three  hundred  and  fifty 
persons,  chiefly  or  wholly  of  the  independent  sect,  sailed  with 
the  first  fleet.  So  many  followed  in  the  subsequent  years 
that  the'se  New  England  settlements  have  been  supposed  to 
have  drawn  near  half  a  million  of  money  from  the  mother- 
country  before  the  civil  wars.1  Men  of  a  higher  rank  than 
the  first  colonists,  and  now  become  hopeless  alike  of  the  civil 
and  religious  liberties  of  England,  men  of  capacious  and 
commanding  minds,  formed  to  be  the  legislators  and  generals 
of  an  infant  republic,  the  wise  and  cautious  lord  Say,  the 
acknowledged  chief  of  the  independent  sect ;  the  brave,  open, 
and  enthusiastic  lord  Brook ;  sir  Arthur  Haslerig ;  Hamp- 
den,  ashamed  of  a  country  for  whose  rights  he  had  fought 
alone  ;  Cromwell,  panting  with  energies  that  he  could  neither 
control  nor  explain,  and  whose  unconquerable  fire  was  still 
wrapped  in  smoke  to  every  eye  but  that  of  his  kinsman 
Hampden,  were  preparing  to  embark  for  America,  when 
Laud,  for  his  own  and  his  master's  curse,  procured  an  order 
of  council  to  stop  their  departure'.2  Besides  the  reflections 
which  such  an  instance  of  destructive  infatuation  must  sug- 
gest, there  are  two  things  not  unworthy  to  be  remarked : 
first,  that  these  chiefs  of  the  puritan  sect,  far  from  enter- 
taining those  schemes  of  overturning  the  government  at 
home  that  had .  been  imputed  to  them,  looked  only  in  1638 
to  escape  from  imminent  tyranny ;  and,  secondly,  that  the 
views  of  the  archbishop  were  not  so  much  to  render  the 
church  and  crown  secure  from  the  attempts  of  disaffected 
men,  as  to  gratify  a  malignant  humor  by  persecuting  them. 

1  Neal,  p.  546.    I  do  not  know  how  he  in  a,  letter  to  Strafford,  ii.  169,  complains 
makes  his  computation.  of  men  running  to  New  England  when 

2  A  proclamation,  dated  May  1.  1638,  there  was  a  want  of  them   in  Ireland. 
reciting  that  the  king  was  informed  that  And  why  did  they  so,  but  that  any  track- 
many  persons  went  yearly  to  New  Eng-  less  wilderness  seemed  better   than    his 
land,  in  order  to  be  out  of  the  reach  of  own  or  his  friend's  tyranny?    In  this  let- 
ecclesiastical  authority,  commands  that  ter  he  laments  that  he  is  left  alone  iu  the 
no  one  shall  pass  without  a  license  and  a  envious  and   thorny  part  of  the  work, 
testimonial  of  conformity  from  the  minis-  and  has  no  encouragement. 

ter  of  his  parish.  Rymer,  xx.  223.   Laud, 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.      HOPES  OF  THE  CATHOLICS.  465 

These  severe  proceedings  of  the  court  and  hierarchy  be- 
came more  odious  on  account  of  their  suspected  leaning,  or 
at  least  notorious  indulgence,  towards  popery.     With  some 
fluctuations,  according  to  circumstances  or  changes  Favor 
of  influence  in  the  council,  the  policy  of  Charles  shown  to 
was  to  wink  at  the  domestic  exercise  of  the  cath-  Tendency" 
olic    religion,  and  to  admit  its  professors  to  pay  to  the5r 

.  "          r.  ,  .   ,  r    J    religion. 

compositions  for  recusancy  which  were  not  regu- 
larly enforced.1     The  catholics  willingly  submitted  to  this 
mitigated  rigor,  in  the  sanguine  expectation  of  far  E    ectatioM 
more  prosperous  days.     I  shall,  of  course,  not  cen-  entertained 
sure  this  part  of  his  administration.      Nor  can  we  by  them' 
say  that  the   connivance  at  the  resort  of  catholics   to  the 
queen's  chapel  in  Somerset  House,  though  they  used  it  with 
much  ostentation,  and  so  as  to  give  excessive  scandal,  was  any 
more   than  a  just  sense  of  toleration  would  have  dictated.8 
Unfortunately  the    prosecution   of    other   sectaries    renders 
it  difficult  to  ascribe  such  a  liberal  principle  to  the  council 
of  Charles  I.     It  was  evidently  true,  what  the  nation  saw 
with  alarm,  that  a  proneness  to  favor  the  professors  of  this 
religion,  and   to  a  considerable  degree  the  religion  itself,  was 
at  the  bottom  of  a  conduct  so  inconsistent  with  their  system 
of  government.       The  king  had  been   persuaded  in    1635, 
through  the  influence  of  the  queen,  and  probably  of  Laud,* 
to  receive  privately,  as  an  accredited  agent  from  the  court  of 
Rome,  a  secular  priest,  named  Panzani,  whose  os-  Mission  of 
tensible  instructions  were  to  effect  a  reconciliation  Panzani. 
of  some  violent  differences  that  had  long  subsisted  between 

I  In  thirteen  years,  ending  with  1640,  don,  1.  261,  conflrms  the  systematic  in- 

but  40802.  was  levied  on  recusants  by  pro-  diligence  shown  to  catholics,  which  Dr. 

cess  from   the  exchequer,  according  to  Lingard  seems,  reluctantly  and  by  silence, 

Commons'  Journals.  1  Dec.  1640.     But  to  admit. 

it  cannot  be  denied  that  they  paid  con-  *  Strafford  Letters,  i.  505,  624  ;  ii.2,67. 

giderable  sums  by   way  of  composition,  *  Heylin,  286.  The  very  day  of  Abbot's 

though   less    probably   than    in   former  death  an  offer  of  a  cardinal's  hat  was 

tunes.     Lingard,  ix.  424,  &<;.,  note  G.  made  to  Laud,  as  he  tells  us  in  his  Diary, 

Weston  is  said   by   Clarendon    to   have  "  by  one  that  avowed  ability  to  perform 

offended  the  catholics  by  enforcing  pen-  it."     This  was  repeated  some  days  af- 

alties  to  raise  the  revenue.     One  priest  terwards ;   Aug.  4th  and  ITtli,  1633.     It 

only  was  executed  for  religion  before  the  seems   very    questionable   whether   tliia 

meeting  of  the  long  parliament.    Butler,  came  from  authority.    The  new  primate 

iv.  97.    And,    though,  for  the   sake   of  made  a  strange  answer  to  the  first  appli- 

appearance,  proclamations  for  arresting  cation,  which   might  well  encourage  a 

priests   and  recusants  sometimes   came  second ;  certainly  not  what  might  have 

forth,  they  were  always  discharged  in  a  been  expected  from  a  steady  prote.staut. 

short   time.     The   number  pardoned   in  If  we  did  not  read  this  in  his  own  Diary 

the  first  sixteen  years  of  the  king  is  said  we  should  not  believe  it.    The  offer  at 

to  have  amounted,  in  twenty-nine  coun-  least  proves  that  he  was  supposed  capable 

ties  only,  to  11,970.    Neal,  604.  —  Olaren-  of  acceding  to  it. 
VOL.  I.  — C.                          30 


466  MISSION  OF  PANZANI.  CHAJ>.  VI1L 

the  secular  and  regular  clergy  of  his  communion.  The 
chief  motive,  however,  of  Charles  was,  as  I  believe,  so  far 
to  conciliate  the  pope  as  to  induce  him  to  withdraw  his  op- 
position to  the  oath  of  allegiance,  which  had  long  placed  the 
catholic  laity  in  a  very  invidious  condition,  and  widened  a 
breach  which  his  majesty  had  some  hopes  of  closing.  For 
this  purpose  he  offered  any  reasonable  explanation  which 
might  leave  the  oath  free  from  the  slightest  appearance  of 
infringing  the  papal  supremacy.  But  it  was  not  the  policy 
of  Rome  to  make  any  concession,  or  even  enter  into  any 
treaty,  that  might  tend  to  impair  her  temporal  authority.  It 
was  better  for  her  pride  and  ambition  that  the  English  cath- 
olics should  continue  to  hew  wood  and  draw  water,  their 
bodies  the  law's  slaves,  and  their  souls  her  own,  than,  by 
becoming  the  willing  subjects  of  a  protestant  sovereign,  that 
they  should  lose  that  sense  of  dependency  and  habitual 
deference  to  her  commands  in  all  worldly  matters,  which 
states  wherein  their  faith  stood  established  had  ceased  to 
display.  She  gave,  therefore,  no  encouragement  to  the  pro- 
posed explanations  of  the  oath  of  allegiance,  and  even  in- 
structed her  nuncio  Con,  who  succeeded  Panzani,  to  check 
the  precipitance  of  the  English  catholics  in  contributing  men 
and  money  towards  the  army  raised  against  Scotland  in 
1639.1  There  might  indeed  be  some  reasonable  suspicion 
that  the  court  did  not  play  quite  fairly  with  this  body,  and 
was  more  eager  to  extort  what  it  could  from  their  hopes  than 
to  make  any  substantial  return. 

The  favor  of  the  administration,  as  well  as  the  antipathy 
that  every  parliament  had  displayed  towards  them,  not  un- 
naturally rendered  the  catholics,  for  the  most  part,  assertors 
of  the  king's  arbitrary  power.2  This  again  increased  the 

1  Clarendon  State  Papers,  ii.  44.     It  is  as  to  the  oath  of  allegiance  ;   one  party 
always  important   to  distinguish   dates,  maintaining  that  the  king  had  a  right  to 
By  the  year  1639  the  court  of  Rome  had  put  his  own  explanation  on  that  oath, 
Been  the  fallacy  of  those  hopes  she  had  which  was  more  to  be  regarded  than  the 
previously  been  led  to  entertain,  that  the  sense  of  parliament ;  while  another  denied 
king  and  church  of  England  would  re-  that  they  could  conscientiously  admit  the 
turn  to  her  fold.     This  might  exasperate  king's  interpretation   against  what  they 
her  against  him,  as  it  certainly  did  against  knew  to  have  been  the  intention  of  the 
Laud  ;   besides  which,  I  should  suspect  legislature  who  imposed  it.    A  Mr.  Court- 
the  influence  of  Spain  in  the  conclave.  ney,  who  had  written  on  the  later  side, 

2  Proofs   of  this  abound  in   the   first  was  imprisoned  in  the  Tower,  on  pretext 
volume  of  the  collection  just  quoted,  as  of  recusancy,  but  really  for  having  pro- 
well  as  in  other  books.     The  catholics  mulgated  so  obnoxious  an  opinion.     P. 
were  not  indeed  unanimous  in  the  view  258,  et  alibi ;  Memoirs  of  Panzani,  p.  140. 
they  took  of  the  king's  prerogative,  which  The  Jesuits  were  much  against  the  oath, 
became  of  importance  in  the  controversy  and,  from  whatever  cause,  threw  all  the 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.    CONVERSIONS  TO  POPERY.  467 

popular  prejudice.  But  nothing  excited  so  much  alaim  as 
the  perpetual  conversions  to  their  faith.  These  had  not 
been  quite  unusual  in  any  age  since  the  Reformation, 
though  the  balance  had  been  very  much  inclined  to  the 
opposite  side.  They  became,  however,  under  Charles  the 
news  of  every  day;  protestant  clergymen  in  several  in- 
stances, but  especially  women  of  rank,  becoming  proselytes 
to  a  religion  so  seductive  to  the  timid  reason  and  suscepti- 
ble imagination  of  that  sex.  They  whose  minds  have  never 
strayed  into  the  wilderness  of  doubt  vainly  deride  such  as 
sought  out  the  beaten  path  their  fathers  had  trodden  in  old 
times  ;  they  whose  temperament  gives  little  play  to  the  fancy 
and  sentiment  want  power  to  comprehend  the  charm  of 
superstitious  illusions,  the  satisfaction  of  the  conscience  ia 
the  performance  of  positive  rites,  especially  with  privation 
or  suffering,  the  victorious  self-gratulation  of  faith  in  its 
triumph  over  reason,  the  romantic  tenderness  that  loves  to 
rely  on  female  protection,  the  graceful  associations  of  devo- 
tion with  all  that  the  sense  or  the  imagination  can  require,  — 
the  splendid  vestment,  the  fragrant  censer,  the  sweet  sounds 
of  choral  harmony,  and  the  sculptured  form  that  an  intense 
piety  half  endows  with  life.  These  springs  were  touched,  as 
the  variety  of  human  character  might  require,  by  the  skil- 
ful hands  of  Romish  priests,  chiefly  Jesuits,  whose  numbers 
in  England  were  about  250,1  concealed  under  a  lay  garb, 
and  combining  the  courteous  manners  of  gentlemen  with  a 
refined  experience  of  mankind,  and  a  logic  in  whose  laby 
rinths  the  most  practical  reasoner  was  perplexed.  Against 
these  fascinating  wiles  the  puritans  opposed  other  weapons 
from  the  same  armory  of  human  nature ;  they  awakened  the 
pride  of  reason,  the  stern  obstinacy  of  dispute,  the  names, 
so  soothing  to  the  ear,  of  free  inquiry  and  private  judgment. 
They  inspired  an  abhorrence  of  the  advez'se  party  that  served 
as  a  barrier  against  insidious  approaches.  But  far  different 
principles  actuated  the  prevailing  party  in  the  church  of 
England.  A  change  had  for  some  years  been  wrought  in  its 

obstacles  they  could  in  the  way  of  a  good  trifling  for  onr  notice  in  this  place.   More 

understanding  between  the  king  and  the  than  half  Panzani's  Memoirs  relate  to  it. 

pope.     One  reason  was  their  apprehension  1  Memoirs  of  Pauzani,  p.  207.     This  is 

that  an  article  of  the  treaty  would  be  the  a  statement  by  father  Leander  ;    in  a»- 

appointmeut  of  a  catholic  bishop  in  Eng-  other  place,   p.  140,  they  are  reckoned 

land;  a  matter  about  which  the  members  at  360.     There  were  about  180  other  retf 

of  that  church  have  been  quarrelling  ever  ulars,   and  five  or  six  hundred  secular 

eiuce   the   reign  of  Elizabeth,    but  too  priests. 


468  TENDENCY  TO  POPERY  OF  CHAP.  VIII. 

tenets,  and  still  more  in  its  sentiments,  which,  while  it 
brought  the  whole  body  into  a  sort  of  approximation  to 
Rome,  made  many  individuals  shoot  as  it  were  from  their 
own  sphere,  on  coming  within  the  stronger  attraction  of  an- 
other. 

The  charge  of  inclining  towards  popery,  brought  by  one 
of  our  religious  parties  against  Laud  and  his  colleagues  with 
invidious  exaggeration,  has  been  too  indignantly  denied  by 
another.  Much  indeed  will  depend  on  the  definition  of  that 
obnoxious  word  ;  which  one  may  restrain  to  an  acknowl- 
edgment of  the  supremacy  in  faith  and  discipline  of  the 
Roman  see  ;  while  another  comprehends  in  it  all  those  tenets 
which  were  rejected  as  corruptions  of  Christianity  at  the 
Reformation  ;  and  a  third  may  extend  it  to  the  ceremonies 
and  ecclesiastical  observances  which  were  set  aside  at  the 
same  time.  In  this  last  and  most  enlarged  sense,  which  the 
vulgar  naturally  adopted,  it  is  notorious  that  all  the  innova- 
tions of  the  school  of  Laud  were  so  many  approaches,  in  the 
exterior  worship  of  the  church,  to  the  Roman  model.  Pic- 
tures were  set  up  or  repaired  ;  the  communion-table  took  the 
name  of  an  altar  ;  it  was  sometimes  made  of  stone  ;  obei- 
sances were  made  to  it  ;  the  crucifix  was  sometimes  placed 
upon  it  ;  the  dress  of  the  officiating  priests  became  more 
gaudy  ;  churches  were  consecrated  with  strange  and  mystical 
pageantry.1  These  petty  superstitions,  which  would  of  them- 
selves have  disgusted  a  nation  accustomed  to  despise  as  well 
as  abhor  the  pompous  rites  of  the  catholics,  became  more 
alarming  from  the  evident  bias  of  some  leading  churchmen 
to  parts  of  the  Romish  theology.  The  doctrine  of  a  real 
presence,  distinguishable  only  by  vagueness  of  definition 
from  that  of  the  church  of  Rome,  was  generally  held.2  Mon- 


1  Kennet,  73:  Harris's  Life  of  Charles,    soon  afterwards,  "Nobis  Tobiscum  deob- 


wor,      ewoo.  an          ers.       au    sa  rss    oy    s  acually  preen 

in  his  defence  that  he  borrowed  the  cere-  sacramental  elements,  in   the  same  sense 

monies   from  Andrews,  who  had  found  as  you  use  the  word  ;  but  we  see  no  cause 

them  in  gome  old  liturgy.  for  determining  the  precise  mode,  whether 
' 


CHA.  I.— 1629-40.       LAUD  AND  HIS  PARTY.  4G9 

tagu,  bishop  of  Chichester,  already  so  conspicuous,  and  justly 
reckoned  the  chief  of  the  Romanizing  faction,  went  a  consid- 
erable length  towards  admitting  the  invocation  of  saints ; 
prayers  for  the  dead,  which  lead  naturally  to  the  tenet  of 
purgatory,  were  vindicated  by  many :  in  fact,  there  was 
hardly  any  distinctive  opinion  of  the  church  of  Rome  which 
had  not  its  abettors  among  the  bishops,  or  those  who  wrote 
dnder  their  patronage.  The  practice  of  auricular  confession, 
which  an  aspiring  clergy  must  so  deeply  regret,  was  fre~ 
qucntly  inculcated  as  a  duty.  And  Laud  gave  just  offence 
by  a  public  declaration  that  in  the  disposal  of  benefices  he 
should,  in  equal  degrees  of  merit,  prefer  single  before  mar- 
ried priests.1  They  incurred  scarcely  less  odium  by  their 
dislike  of  the  Calvinistic  system,  and  by  what  ardent  men 
construed  into  a  dereliction  of  the  protestant  cause,  a  more 
reasonable  and  less  dangerous  theory  on  the  nature  and 
reward  of  human  virtue  than  that  which  the  fanatical  and 
presumptuous  spirit  of  Luther  had  held  forth  as  the  most 
fundamental  principle  of  his  Reformation. 

It  must  be  confessed  that  these  English  theologians  were 
less  favorable  to  the  papal  supremacy  than  to  most  other 
distinguishing  tenets  of  the  catholic  church.  Yet  even  this 
they  were  inclined  to  admit  in  a  considerable  degree,  as  a 
matter  of  positive,  though  not  divine,  institution  ;  content  to 
make  the  doctrine  and  discipline  of  the  fifth  century  the  rule 
of  their  bastard  reform.  An  extreme  reverence  for  what 
they  called  the  primitive  church  had  been  the  source  of  their 

James,  through  Andrews,  Casaubon,  and  I  believe,  used  by  our  writers  of  the  16th 

others,  who  deferred  wholly  to  antiquity,  age,  but  as  synonymous  with  corporal, 

In   fact,  as   I  have  elsewhere  observed,  and  consequently  is  condemned  by  them, 

there  can  be  but  two  opinions,  neglecting  Cranmer  calls  it  '•  that  error  of  the  real 

subordinate  differences,  on  this   famous  presence,"  i.  Ixxv.    Jewel  challenges  his 

controversy.     It  is  clear  to  those  who  adversary  to  produce  any  authority  for 

have  attended  to   the  subject  that  the  those  words  from  the  fathers.     I  do  not 

Anglican  reformers  did  not  hold  a  local  know  when  it  came  into  use ;  probably 

presence  of  Christ's  human  body  in  the  under   James,    or,    it   may    be,   rather 

consecrated  bread  itself,  independent  of  earlier.] 

the  communicant,  or,  aa  the  technical  1  Heylin's  Life  of  Laud,  p.  212.    He 

phrase  was,  extra  usum  :  and  it  is  also  probably  imbibed  this,  like  many  other 

clear  that  the  divines  of  the  latter  school  of  his  prejudices,  from  bishop  Andrews, 

did  so.    This  question  is  rendered  intri-  whose  epitaph    in    the    church    of  St. 

cate  at  first  sight,  partly  by  the  strong  Saviours  in  Southwark  speaks  of  him  as 

figurative  language  which  the  early  re-  having  received    a  superior   reward   in 

formers  employed  in  order  to  avoid  shock-  heaven  on  account  of  his  celibacy ;  cce- 

Ing  the  prejudices   of  the  people;    and  lebs    migravit    ad    aureolam    coelestem- 

partly  by  tbe   incautious  and  even  ab-  Biog.  Britannica.     Aureola,  a  word  of  n 

surd   use  of  the  word  real  presence   to  classical  authority,  means,  in 'the  style 

mean    real  absence  ;   which  is  common  of  popish  divinity  which  the  author  ot 

with  modern  theologians.  this  epitaph  thought  fit  to  employ,  the 

[The  phrase  '•  real  presence"  is  never,  crown  of  virginity.  See  Du  Cange  in  voo. 


470  BISHOP  ANDREWS.  CHAP.  YIIL 

errors.  The  first  reformers  had  paid  little  regard  to  that 
authority.  But  as  learning,  by  which  was  then  meant  an 
acquaintance  with  ecclesiastical  antiquity,  grew  more  general 
in  the  church,  it  gradually  inspired  more  respect  for  itself; 
and  men's  judgment  in  matters  of  religion  came  to  be  meas- 
ured by  the  quantity  of  their  erudition.1  The  sentence  of 
the  early  writers,  including  the  fifth  and  perhaps  sixth  centu- 
ries, if  it  did  not  pass  for  infallible,  was  of  prodigious  weight 
in  controversy.  No  one  in  the  English  church  seems  'to 
have  contributed  so  much  towards  this  relapse  into  supersti- 
tion as  Andrews,  bishop  of  Winchester,  a  man  of  eminent 
learning  in  this  kind,  who  may  be  reckoned  the  founder  of 
the  school  wherein  Laud  was  the  most  prominent  disciple.2 

A  characteristic  tenet  of  this  party  was,  as  I  have  already 
observed,  that  episcopal  government  was  indispensably  requi- 
site to  a  Christian  church.8  Hence  they  treated  the  presby- 
terians  with  insolence  abroad  and  severity  at  home.  A  brief 
to  be  read  in  churches  for  the  sufferers  in  the  Palatinate 
having  been  prepared,  wherein  they  were  said  to  profess 
the  same  religion  as  ourselves,  Laud  insisted  on  this  being 
struck  out.4  The  Dutch  and  Walloon  churches  in  England, 
which  had  subsisted  since  the  Reformation,  and  which  va- 
rious motives  of  policy  had  led  Elizabeth  to  protect,  were 
harassed  by  the  primate  and  other  bishops  for  their  want  of 
conformity  to  the  Anglican  ritual.5  The  English  ambassa- 
dor, instead  of  frequenting  the  Hugonot  church  at  Charenton, 
as  had  been  the  former  practice,  was  instructed  to  disclaim 

1  See    Life    of  Hammond  in  Words-  writings  against  Perron  he  throws  away 
worth's   Eccles.  Biography,  vol.  v.  343.  a  great  part  of  what  have  always  been 
It  had  been  usual  to  study  divinity  in  considered  the  protestant  doctrines, 
compendiums,  chiefly  drawn  up  in  the  3  Hall,  bishop  of  Exeter,  a  very  con 
sixteenth  century.      King  James  was  a  giderable  person,  wrote  a  treatise  on  the 
great  favorer  of  antiquity,  and  prescribed  Divine  Institution  of  Episcopacy,  which, 
the  study  of  the  fathers  in  his  Instruc-  according  to  an  analysis  given  by  Heylin 
tions  to  the  Universities  in  1616.  and  others  of  its  leading  positions,  is  so 

2  Andrews  gave  scandal  in  the  queen's  much  in  the  teeth  of  Hooker's  Ecclesi 
reign  by  preaching  at  court  ''  that  con-  astical  Polity,  that  it  might  pass  for  an 
trition,  without  confession  and  absolu-  answer  to  it.     Yet  it  did  not  quite  come 
tion,   and  deeds  worthy  of  repentance,  up  to  the  primate's  standard,  who  made 
was  not  sufficient;  that  the  ministers  had  him  alter  some  passages  which  looked  too 
the  two  keys  of  power  and  knowledge  de-  like  concessions.     Heylin's  Life  of  Laud, 
livered  unto  them;  that  whose  sins  so-  374;   Collier,  789.     One  of  his  offences 
ever  they  remitted  upon  earth  should  be  was  the  asserting  the  pope    to  be  Anti- 
remitted  in  heaven.  —  The  court  is  full  Christ,  which  displeased  the  king  as  well 
of  it,  for  such  doctrine  was  not  usually  as  primate,  though  it  had  been  orthodox 
taught  th.ere."     Sidney,  Letters,  ii.  185.  under  James. 

Harrington  also  censures  him.  for  an  at-        *  Collier,  764  :  Neal,  582  ;  Heylin,  288. 
tempt  to  bring  in  auricular  confession.        8  Collier,  753    Heylin,  260 
Nugae  Antiquae,  ii.  192.      In  his  own 


CHA.  L  — 1620-40.     FOREIGN  REFORMED  CHURCHES.  471 

all'fraternity  with  their  sect,  and  set  up  in  his  own  chapel 
the  obnoxious  altar  and  the  other  innovations  of  the  hier- 
archy.1 These  impolitic  and  insolent  proceedings  gave  the 
foreign  protestants  a  hatred  of  Charles,  which  they  retained 
through  all  his  misfortunes. 

This  alienation  from  the  foreign  churches  of  the  reformed 
persuasion  had  scarcely  so  important  an  effect  in  begetting  a 
predilection  for  that  of  Koine,  as  the  language  frequently 
held  about  the  Anglican  separation.  It  became  usual  for 
our  churchmen  to  -lament  the  precipitancy  with  which  the 
Reformation  had  been  conducted,  and  to  inveigh  against  its 
principal  instruments.  The  catholic  writers  had  long  des- 
canted on  the  lust  and  violence  of  Henry,  the  pretended 
licentiousness  of  Anne  Boleyn,  the  rapacity  of  Cromwell,  the 
pliancy  of  Cranmer:  sometimes  with  great  truth,  but  with 
much  of  invidious  misrepresentation.  These  topics,  which 
have  no  kind  of  operation  on  men  accustomed  to  sound 
reasoning,  produce  an  unfailing  effect  on  ordinary  minds. 
Nothing  incurred  more  censure  than  the  dissolution  of  the 
monastic  orders,  or  at  least  the  alienation  of  their  endow- 
ments ;  acts  accompanied,  as  we  must  all  admit,  with  great 
rapacity  and  injustice,  but  which  the  new  school  branded 
with  the  name  of  sacrilege.  Spelman,  an  antiquary  of  emi- 
nent learning,  was  led  by  bigotry  or  subserviency  lo  compose 
a  wretched  tract  called  the  History  of  Sacrilege,  with  a  view 
to  confirm  the  vulgar  superstition  that  the  possession  of  es- 

1  Clarendon,  iii.  366 ;  State  Papers,  i.  "  To  think  well  of  the  reformed  re- 
838.  "  Lord  Scudamore,  the  English  ligion,"  says  Northumberland,  in  1640, 
ambassador,  set  up  an  altar,  &c.,  in  the  "is  enough  to  make  the  archbishop  an 
Laudean  style.  His  successor,  lord  Lei-  enemy ;  and  though  he  cannot  for  shame 
cester,  spoke  to  the  archbishop  about  go-  do  it  in  public,  yet  in  private  he  will  do 
ing  to  Charenton  ;  and  telling  him  lord  Leicester  all  the  mischief  he  can."  Col- 
Scudamore  did  never  go  thither,  Laud  lins's  Sidney  Papers,  ii.  623. 
answered.  "  He  is  the  wiser."  Leicester  Such  was  the  opinion  entertained  of 
requested  his  advice  what  he  should  do,  Laud  by  those  who  could  not  reasonably 
In  order  to  sift  his  disposition,  being  be  called  puritans,  except  by  such  as 
nunself  resolved  how  to  behave  in  that  made  that  word  a  synonym  for  protes- 
matter.  But  the  other  would  only  say  tant.  It  would  bo  easy  to  add  other 
that  he  left  it  to  his  discretion.  Leicester  proofs.  The  prosecution  in  the  star- 
nays,  he  has  many  reasons  to  think  that  chamber  against  Shcrfield,  recorder  of 
for  his  going  to  Charenton  the  archbishop  Salisbury,  for  destroying  some  supersti- 
did  him  all  the  ill  offices  he  could  to  the  tious  pictures  in  a  church,  led  to  a  dis- 
king* representing  him  as  a  puritan,  and  play  of  the  aversion  many  of  the  council 
consequently  in  his  method  an  enemy  to  entertained  for  popery  and  their  jealousy 
monarchical  government,  though  he  had  of  the  archbishop's  bias.  They  were  with 
not  been  very  kind  before.  The  said  arch-  difficulty  brought  to  condemn  Sherfield, 
bishop,  he  adds,  would  not  countenance  and  passed  a  sentence  at  lagt  very  unlike 
Blondel's  book  against  the  usurped  power  those  to  which  they  were  accustomed, 
of  the  pope."  Blencowe's  Sidney  Papers,  Kushworth;  State  Trials.  Hume  miarep 
261.  resents  the  case 


472  LAUD'S  OBJECT.  CHAP.  VIII. 

tates  alienated  from  the  church,  entailed  a  sure  curse  on  the 
usurper's  posterity.  There  is  some  reason  to  suspect  that 
the  king  entertained  a  project  of  restoring  all  iinpropriated 
hereditaments  to  the  church. 

It  is  alleged  by  one  who  had  much  access  to  Laud,  that 
his  object  in  these  accommodations  was  to  draw  over  the 
more  moderate  Romanists  to  the  English  church,  by  exten- 
uating the  differences  of  her  faith,  and  rendering  her  worship 
more  palatable  to  her  prejudices.1  There  was,  however,  good 
reason  to  suspect,  from  the  same  writer's  account,  that  some 
leading  ecclesiastics  entertained  schemes  of  a  complete  re- 
union ; 2  and  later  discoveries  have  abundantly  confirmed  this 
suspicion.  Such  schemes  have  doubtless  been  in  the  minds 
of  men  not  inclined  to  offer  every  sacrifice ;  and  during  this 
very  period  Grotius  was  exerting  his  talents  (whether  judi- 
ciously or  otherwise  we  need  not  inquire)  to  make  some  sort 
of  reconciliation  and  compromise  appear  practicable.3  But 
we  now  know  that  the  views  of  a  party  in  the  English 
church  were  much  more  extensive,  and  went  almost  to  an 
entire  dereliction  of  the  protestant  doctrine. 

The  catholics  did  not  fail  to  anticipate  the  most  favorable 
consequences  from  this  turn  in  the  church.  The  Clarendon 
State  Papers,  and  many  other  documents,  contain  remarka- 
ble proofs  of  their  sanguine  and  not  unreasonable  hopes. 
Weston  the  lord  treasurer,  and  Cottington,  were  already  in 
secret  of  their  persuasion ;  though  the  former  did  not  take 
much  pains  to  promote  their  interests.  No  one,  however, 
showed  them  such  decided  favor  as  secretary  Windebank, 
through  whose  hands  a  correspondence  was  carried  on  with 
the  court  of  Rome  by  some  of  its  agents.4  They  exult  in 
the  peaceful  and  flourishing  state  of  their  religion  in  England 
as  compared  with  former  times.  The  recusants,  they  write, 
were  not  molested ;  and  if  their  compositions  were  enforced, 

1  Heylin's  Life  of  Laud.  390.  Windebank,  1633.  to  have  a  case  of  books 

2  Id.  388.   The  passage  is  very  remark-  restored,  that  had  been  carried  from  the 
able,  but  too  long  to  be  extracted  in  a  custom-house    to    archbishop  Abbot.  — 
work   not   directly    ecclesiastical.     It   is  "  Now  he  is  dead  I  make  this   demand 
rather  ambiguous ;  but  the  Memoirs  of  upon   his  effects  and   library  that  .they 
Panzani  atford  the  key.  may  be  restored  to  me;  as  his  majesty's 

a  [I  should  now  think  less  favorably  order  at  that  time  was  ineffectual,  as  well 

of  Grotius,  and  suspect  that  he  would  as  its  appearing  that  there  was  nothing 

ultimately  have  made  every  sacrifice,  contraband  or  prohibited."  A  list  of 

See  IJist.  of  Literature  of  15th,  16th,  and  these  books  follows,  and  is  curious.  They 

17th  centuries,  vol.  Ui.  p.  58  (first  edi-  consisted  of  English  popish  tracts  by 

tioii).  1845. j  wholesale,  intended,  of  course,  for  circu- 

*  The  Spanish  ambassador  applies  to  lation.    Clar.  State  Papers,  66. 


CHA.  I  —1629-4(5.       MISSION  OF  PANZAItt.  473 

it  was  rather  from  the  king's  want  of  money  than  any  desire 
to  injure  their  religion.  Their  rites  were  freely  exercised  in 
the  queen's  chapel  and  those  of  ambassadors,  and,  more  pri- 
vately, in  the  houses  of  the  rich.  The  church  of  England 
was  no  longer  exasperated  against  them;  if  there  was  ever 
any  prosecution,  it  was  to  screen  the  king  from  the  reproach 
of  the  puritans.  They  drew  a  flattering  picture  of  the  res- 
ipiscence  of  the  Anglican  party ;  who  are  come  to  acknowl- 
edge the  truth  in  some  articles,  and  differ  in  others  rather 
verbally  than  in  substance,  Or  in  points  not  fundamental ; 
who  hold  all  other  protestants  to  be  schismatical,  and  confess 
the  primacy  of  the  holy  see,  regretting  the  separation  al- 
ready made,  and  wishing  for  reunion  ;  who  profess  to  pay 
implicit  respect  to  the  fathers,  and  can  best  be  assailed  on 
that  side.1 

These  letters  contain,  no  doubt,  a  partial  representation ; 
that  is,  they  impute  to  the  Anglican  clergy  in  general  what 
was  only  true  of  a  certain  number.  Their  aim  was  to  in- 
spire the  court  of  Rome  with  more  favorable  views  of  that 
of  England,  and  thus  to  pave  the  way  for  a  permission  of 
the  oath  of  allegiance,  at  least  with  some  modification  of  its 
terms.  Such  flattering  tales  naturally  excited  the  hopes  of 
the  Vatican,  and  contributed  to  the  mission  of  Panzani,  who 
was  instructed  to  feel  the  pulse  of  the  nation,  and  communi- 
cate more  unbiased  information  to  his  court  than  could  be 
expected  from  the  English  priests.  He  confirmed,  by  his 
letters,  the  general  truth  of  the  former  statements,  as  to  the 
tendency  of  the  Anglican  church,  and  the  favorable  disposi- 
tions of  the  court.  The  king  received  him  secretly,  but  with 
much  courtesy ;  the  queen  and  the  catholic  ministers,  Cot- 
tington  and  Windebank,  with  unreserved  confidence.  It 
required  all  the  adroitness  of  an  Italian  emissary  from  the 
subtlest  of  courts  to  meet  their  demonstrations  of  friendship 
without  too  much  committing  his  employers.  Nor  did  Pan- 
zani altogether  satisfy  the  pope,  or  at  least  his  minister,  car- 
dinal Barberini,  in  this  respect.8 

1  Clarendon  State  Papers,  197,  &c.  pendent   or  person   In    his    confidence. 

2  Id.  249.     The  Memoirs  of  Panzani,  Their    truth,    as    well   as    authenticity, 
after  furnishing  some  materials  to  Dodd's  appears  to  me  quite  beyond  controveny  ; 
Church  History,  were  published  by  Mr.  they  coincide,  in  a  remarkable  wanner, 
Berington.  in  1/94.     They  are,  however,  with    all    our    other    information  ;    the 
become  scarce,  and  have  not  been  much  names  and  local  details  are  particularly 
quoted.     It  ts  plain  that  they  were  not  accurate  for  the  work  of  a  foreigner :  in 
bis  own,  work,  but  written  by  some  de-  short,  they  contain  no  one  fact  01  any 


474 


INTRIGUE  OF  BISHOP  MONTAGU.      CHAP.  YIH, 


During  the  residence  of  Panzani  in  England,  an  extraor- 
dinary negotiation  was  commenced  for  the  reconciliation  of 
the  church  of  England  with  that  of  Rome  ;  and,  as  this  fact, 
though  unquestionable,  is  very  little  known,  I  may  not  be 
thought  to  digress  in  taking  particular  notice  of  it.  Winde- 
bank  and  lord  Cottington  were  the  first  movers  in  that  busi- 
ness ;  both  calling  themselves  to  Panzani  catholics,  as  in  fact 
they  were,  but  claiming  all  those  concessions  from  the  see  of 
Home  which  had  been  sometimes  held  out  in  the  preceding 
intrigue  century.  Bishop  Montagu  soon  made  himself  a 
Montah(uP  Partyj  an(^  na(^  several  interviews  with  Panzani. 
•with  Pan-  He  professed  the  strongest  desire  for  a  union,  and 
added,  that  he  was  satisfied  both  the  archbishops, 
the  bishop  of  London,  and  several  others  of  that  order,  be- 
sides many  of  the  inferior  clergy,  were  prepared  to  acknowl- 


consequence  which  there  is  reason  to 
distrust.  Some  account  of  them  may 
be  found  in  Butler's  Engl.  Ca*h.  vol.  iv. 

A  small  tract,  entitled  "  The  Pope's 
Nuncio,"  printed  in  1643,  and  said  to  be 
founded  on  the  information  of  the  Vene- 
tian ambassador,  is,  as  I  conceive,  derived 
in  some  direct  or  indirect  manner  from 
these  Memoirs.  It  is  republished  in  the 
Somers'  Tracts,  vol.  iv. 

Mr.  Butler  has  published,  for  the  first 
time,  a  long  and  important  extract  from 
Panzani 's  own  report  to  the  pope  con- 
cerning the  state  of  the  catholic  religion 
in  England.  Mem.  of  Catholics,  iv.  55. 
He  reckons  them  at  150,000;  many  of 
them,  however,  continuing  so  outwardly 
to  live  as  not  to  be  known  for  such, 
among  whom  are  many  of  the  first  no- 
bility. From  them  the  neighboring  cath- 
olics have  no  means  of  hearing  mass  or 
going  to  the  sacraments.  Others,  more 
bold,  give  opportunity,  more  or  less,  to 
their  poorer  neighbors  to  practise  their 
duty.  Besides  these  there  are  others, 
•who,  apprehensive  of  losing  their  proper- 
ty or  places,  live  in  appearance  as  protes- 
tants,  take  the  oaths  of  supremacy  and 
allegiance,  frequent  the  churches,  and 
speak  occasionally  against  catholics ;  yet 
in  their  hearts  are  such,  and  sometimes 
keep  priests  in  their  houses,  that  they 
may  not  be  without  help  if  necessary. 
Among  them  he  includes  some  of  the  first 
nobility,  secular  and  ecclesiastical,  and 
many  of  every  rank.  While  he  was  in 
London,  almost  all  the  nobility  who  died, 
though  reputed  protestants,  died  catho- 
lics. Tlie  bishops  are  protestants,  except 
four,  Durham,  Salisbury,  Rochester,  and 
Oxford,  who  are  puritans.  The  latter 
are  most  numerous  among  the  people, 


and  are  more  hated  by  moderate  protes- 
tants than  are  the  catholics.  A  great 
change  is  apparent  in  books  and  sermons 
compared  with  former  times  ;  auricular 
confession  praised,  images  well  spoken  of, 
and  altars.  The  pope  is  owned  as  patri- 
arch of  the  West;  and  wishes  are  ex- 
. pressed  for  reunion.  The  queen  has  a 
public  chapel  besides  her  private  one, 
where  service  is  celebrated  with  much 
pomp:  also  the  ambassadors;  and  there 
are  others  in  London.  The  laws  against 
recusants  are  much  relaxed ;  though 
sometimes  the  king,  being  in  want  of 
money,  takes  one  third  of  their  incomes 
by  way  of  composition.  The  catholics 
are  yet  molested  by  the  pursuivants,  who 
enter  their  houses  in  search  of  priests  or 
Bacred  vessels  ;  and  though  this  evil  was 
not  much  felt  while  he  was  in  London, 
they  might  be  set  at  work  at  an}-  tiuie. 
He  determined  therefore,  to  obtain,  if 
possible,  a  general  order  from  the  king  to 
restrain  the  pursuivants  ;  and  the  busi- 
ness was  put  into  the  hands  of  some 
councillors,  but  not  settled  at  his  depar- 
ture. The  oath  of  allegiance  divided  the 
ecclesiastics,  the  major  part  refusing  to 
take  it.  After  a  good  deal  about  the  ap- 
pointment of  a  catholic  bishop  in  Eng- 
land, he  mentions  father  Davenport  or 
Sancta  Clara's  book,  entitled  Deus,  Na- 
tura,  Gratia,  with  which  the  king,  he 
says,  had  been  pleased,  and  wa-s  therefore 
disappointed  at  finding  it  put  in  the  In- 
dex Expurgatorius  at  Rome.  — This  book, 
which  made  much  noise  at  the  time,  was 
an  attempt  to  show  the  compatibility  of 
the  Anglican  doctrines  with  those  of  the 
catholic  church  ;  the  usual  trick  of  popish 
intriguers.  See  an  abstract  of  it  In  Stil- 
lingfleet's  Works,  vol.  v.  p.  176. 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.     THREE  GREAT  POINTS  OF  DISCIPLINE.  475 

edge  the  spiritual  supremacy  of  the  holy  see ;  there  being  no 
method  of  ending  controversies  but  by  recurring  to  some 
centre  of  ecclesiastical  unity.  For  himself,  he  knew  no  tenet 
of  the  Roman  church  to  which  he  would  not  subscribe,  unless 
it  were  that  of  transubstantiation,  though  he  had  some  scruples 
as  to  communion  in  one  kind.  But  a  congress  of  moderate 
and  learned  men,  chosen  on  each  side,  might  reduce  the  dis- 
puted points  into  small  compass,  and  confer  upqn  them. 

This  overture  being  communicated  to  Rome  by  its  agent, 
was,  of  course,  too  tempting  to  be  disregarded,  though  too 
ambiguous  to  be  snatched  at.  The  reunion  of  England  to 
the  catholic  church,  in  itself  a  most  important  advantage, 
might,  at  that  particular  juncture,  during  the  dubious  strug- 
gle of  the  protestant  religion  in  Germany,  and  its  still  more 
precarious  condition  in  France,  very  probably  reduce  its  ad- 
herents throughout  Europe  to  a  proscribed  and  persecuted 
sect.  Panzani  was,  therefore,  instructed  to  flatter  Montagu's 
vanity,  to  manifest  a  great  desire  for  reconciliation,  but  not  to 
favor  any  discussion  of  controverted  points,  which  had  always 
proved  fruitless,  and  which  could  not  be  admitted  till  the  su- 
preme authority  of  the  holy  see  was  recognized.  As  to  all 
usages  founded  on  positive  law,  which  might  be  disagreeable 
to  the  English  nation,  they  should  receive  as  much  mitigation 
as  the  case  would  bear.  This,  of  course,  alluded  to  the  three 
great  points  of  discipline,  or  ecclesiastical  institution  —  the 
celibacy  of  the  clergy,  the  exclusion  of  the  laity  from  the 
eucharistical  cup,  and  the  Latin  liturgy. 

In  the  course  of  the  bishop's  subsequent  interviews,  he 
again  mentioned  his  willingness  to  acknowledge  the  pope's 
supremacy ;  and  assured  Panzani  that  the  archbishop  was 
entirely  of  his  mind,  but  with  a  great  mixture  of  fear  and 
caution.1  Three  bishops  only,  Morton,  Hall,  and  Davenant, 
were  obstinately  bent  against  the  church  of  Rome ;  the  rest 
might  be  counted  moderate.2  The  agent,  however,  took  care 

1  If  we  may  believe  Heylin,  the  queen  thority,  in  a  late  work,  be  true,  he  was 

prevailed  on  Laud  to  use  his  influence  at  that  time  sufficiently  inclined  to  have 

with  the  king  that  Panzani  might  come  accepted  a  cardinal's  hat,  and  made  in- 

.  to  London,  promising  to  be  his  friend,  terest  for  it.    Blencowe's  Sidney  Papers, 

Life  of  Laud.  286.  p.  262.    One  bishop,  Goodman  of  Olou- 

*  P.  246.     It  may  seem  extraordinary  cester,  was  undoubtedly  a  Roman  catho- 

that  he  did  not  mention  Williams ;  but  I  lie,  and  died  in  that  communion.    He 

presume  he  took  that  political  bishop's  refused,  for  a  long  time,  to  subscribe  the 

geal  to  be  insincere.     Williams  had  been,  canons  of  1640,  on  account  of  one  that  - 

while  in  power,  a  great  favorer  of  the  contained  a  renunciation  of  popery ;  but 

toleration  of  papists.    If,  indeed,  a  story  yielded  at  length  for  fear  of  suspension, 

told  of  him,  on  Endymion  Porter's  au-  and  charged  Montagu  with  having  instt- 


476 


CONSTANCY  OF  THE  KING. 


CHAP.  VIII. 


to  obtain  from  another  quarter  a  more  particulai  account  of 
each  bishop's  disposition,  and  transmitted  to  Rome  a  report, 
which  does  not  appear.  Montagu  displayed  a  most  un- 
guarded warmth  in  all  this  treaty ;  notwithstanding  which, 
Panzani  suspected  him  of  still  entertaining  some  notions  in- 
compatible with  the  catholic  doctrine.  He  behaved  with 
much  greater  discretion  than  the  bishop  ;  justly,  I  suppose, 
distrusting  the  influence  of  a  man  who  showed  so  little 
capacity  for  a  business  of  the  utmost  delicacy.  It  appears 
almost  certain  that  Montagu  made  too  free  with  the  name  of 
the  archbishop,  and  probably  of  many  others  ;  and  it  is  well 
worthy  of  remark,  that  the  popish  party  did  not  entertain 
any  sanguine  hopes  of  the  king's  conversion.  They  ex- 
pected doubtless  that,  by  gaining  over  the  hierarchy,  they 
should  induce  him  to  follow  ;  but  he  had  evidently  given  no 
reason  to  imagine  that  he  would  precede.  A  few  casual 
words,  not  perhaps  exactly  reported,  might  sometimes  elate 
their  hopes,  but  cannot  excite  in  us,  who  are  better  able  to 
judge  than  his  contemporaries,  any  reasonable  suspicion  of 
his  constancy.  Yet  it  is  not  impossible  that  he  might  at  one 
time  conceive  a  union  to  be  more  practicable  than  it  feally 
was.1 

The  court  of  Rome,  however,  omitted  no  token  of  civility 
or  good-will  to  conciliate  our  king's  favor.  Besides  expres- 
sions of  paternal  kindness  which  Urban  lavished  on  him, 


gated  his  refusal,  though  he  subscribed 
himself.  Nalson,  i.  371 ;  Rushw.  Abr.  iii. 
168;  Collier,  793;  Laud's  defence  on  his 
trial. 

i  Henrietta  Maria,  in  her  communica- 
tio'n  to  Madame  de  Motteville,  has  the 
following  passage,  which  is  not  unde- 
serving of  notice,  though  she  may  have 
been  deceived :  —  "  Le  Koi  Jacques  .  .  . 
composadeux  livres  pour  la  defense  de 
la  fausse  religion  d'Angleterre,  et  fit  re- 
ponse  i  ceux  que  le  cardinal  du  Perron 
ecrivit  centre  lui.  En  defendant  le  men- 
songe,  il  con9Ut  de  1'amour  pour  la  verite, 
et  souhaita  de  se  retirer  de  1'erreur.  Ce 
fut  en  voulant  accorder  les  deux  reli- 
gions, la  notre  et  la  sienne  ;  niais  il 
mourut  avant  que  d'exeeuteV  ce  louable 
dessein.  Le  Iloi  Charles  Stuard,  son  fils, 
qua nd  il  vint  a  la  couronne,  se  trouva 
presque  dans  les  memes  sentimens.  11 
avoit  aupres  de  lui  1'archeveque  de  Can- 
torbcvi,  qui,  dans  son  coeur  etant  tres-bon 
catuclique,  inspira  au  roi  son  maitre  uu 
grand  desir  d*?  retablir  la  liturgie,  croyant 


que  s'il  pouvoit  arriver  a  ce  point,  il  y 
auroit  si  peu  de  difference  de  la  foi  ortho- 
doxe  4  la  leur,  qu'il  seroit  aise  peu  4  peu 
d'y  conduire  le  roi.  Pour  travailler  i  ce 
(*rand  ouvrage,  que  ne  paroissoit  au  roi 
d'Angleterre  que  leretablissemeut  parfait 
de  la  liturgie.  et  qui  est  le  seul  dessein 
qui  ait  ete  dans  le  coeur  de  ce  prince, 
1'archeveque  de  Cautorberi  lui  conseilla 
de  cornmencer  par  1' Kcos.se,  com  me  plus 
eloignee  du  coeur  du  royauine;  lui  disant, 
que  leur  remueme tit  seroit  moins  a  crain- 
dre.  Le  roi,  avant  que  de  partir.  voulant 
envoyer  cette  liturgie  en  1'Eeosse,  1'nppor- 
ta  un  soir  dans  la  chambre  de  la  reine,  et 
la  pria  de  lire  ce  livre,  lui  disunt,  qu'il 
seroit  hien  aise  qu'elle  le  vit,  ufin  qu'elle 
sut  combien  ilsapprochoient  decreance." 
Mem.  de  Motteville,  i.  242.  A  well-in- 
formed writer,  however,  says  Charles  was 
a  protestant  and  never  liked  the  catholic 
religion  P.Orleans,  Revolut.  d'Anglet. 
iii.  35.  He  says  the  same  of  Laud,  but 
refers  to  Vittorio  Siri  for  an  opposite 
story. 


CHA.  I. -1629-40.        CON,  POPE'S  LEGATE.  477 

cardinal  Barberini  gratified  his  well-known  taste  by  a  present 
of  pictures.  Charles  showed  a  due  sense  of  these  courtesies. 
The  prosecutions  of  recusants  were  absolutely  stopped,  by 
cashiering  the  pursuivants  who  had  been  employed  in  the 
odious  office  of  detecting  them.  It  was  arranged  that  re- 
ciprocal diplomatic  relations  should  be  established,  and  conse- 
quently that  an  English  agent  should  constantly  reside  at  the 
court  of  Rome,  by  the  nominal  appointment  of  the  queen, 
but  empowered  to  conduct  the  various  negotiations  in  hand. 
Through  the  first  person  who  held  this  station,  a  gentleman 
of  the  name  of  Hamilton,  the  king  made  an  overture  on  a 
matter  very  near  to  his  heart,  the  restitution  of  the  Palati- 
nate. I  have  no  doubt  that  the  whole  of  his  imprudent 
tampering  with  Rome  had  been  considerably  influenced  by 
this  chimerical  hope.  But  it  was  apparent  to  every  man  of 
less  unsound  judgment  than  Charles,  that  except  the  young 
elector  would  renounce  the  protestant  faith,  he  could  expect 
nothing  from  the  intercession  of  the  pope. 

After  the  first  preliminaries,  which  she  could  not  refuse  to 
enter  upon,  the  court  of  Rome  displayed  no  eagerness  for  a 
treaty  which  it  found,  on  more  exact  information,  to  be  em 
barrassed  with  greater  difficulties  than  its  new  allies  had  con- 
fessed.1 Whether  this  subject  continued  to  be  discussed 
during  the  mission  of  Con,  who  succeeded  Panzani,  is  hard, 
to  determine :  because  the  latter's  memoirs,  our  unquestiona- 
ble authority  for  what  has  been  above  related,  cease  to  afford 
us  light.  But  as  Con  was  a  very  active  intriguer  for  his 
court,  it  is  by  no  means  unlikely  that  he  proceeded  in  the 
same  kind  of  parley  with  Montagu  and  Windebank.  Yet 
whatever  might  pass  between  them  was  intended  rather  with 
a  view  to  the  general  interests  of  the  Roman  church,  than  to 
promote  a  reconciliation  with  that  of  England,  as  a  separate 
contracting  party.  The  former  has  displayed  so  systematic 
a  policy  to  make  no  concession  to  the  reformers,  either  in 
matters  of  belief,  wherein,  since  the  council  of  Trent,  she 
could  in  fact  do  nothing,  or  even,  as  far  as  possible,  in  points 
of  discipline,  as  to  which  she  judged,  perhaps  rightly,  that 

1  Cardinal    Barberini  wrote  word    to  tives  for  it,  and  that  the  whole  world  wa» 

Panzani,  that  the  proposal  of  Windebank  against    them    on    the    first-mentioned 

that  the  church  of  Home  should  sacrifice  points  :  p.  173.     This  is  exactly  what  any 

communion  in  one  kind,  the  celibacy  of  one  might  predict  who  kuew   the  long 

the  clergy,   &c.,  would    never    please  ;  discussions  on  the  subject  with  Austria 

that  the  English  ought  to  look  back  on  and  France  at  the  time  of  the  council  cf 

the  breach  they  had  made,  and  their  mo-  Trent 


478          BOLDNESS  OF  THE  CATHOLIC  PAETY.      CHAT.  VID 

her  authority  would  be  impaired  by  the  precedent  of  conces- 
sion without  any  proportionate  advantage ;  so  unvarying  in 
all  cases  has  been  her  determination  to  yield  nothing  except 
through  absolute- force,  and  to  elude  force  itself  by  every 
subtlety ;  that  it  is  astonishing  how  honest  men  on  the  op- 
posite side  (men,  that  is,  who  seriously  intended  to  preserve 
any  portion  of  their  avowed  tenets),  could  ever  contemplate 
the  possibility  of  reconciliation.  Upon  the  present  occasion 
she  manifested  some  alarm  at  the  boasted  approximation  of 
the  Anglicans.  The  attraction  of  bodies  is  reciprocal ;  and 
the  English  catholics  might,  with  so  m'uch  temporal  interest 
in  the  scale,  be  impelled  more  rapidly  towards  the  established 
church  than  that  church  towards  them.  "  Advise  the  clergy," 
say  the  instructions  to  the  nuncio  in  1639,  "to  desist  from 
that  foolish,  nay  rather  illiterate  and  childish,  custom  of  dis- 
tinction in  the  protestant  and  puritan  doctrine  ;  and  especial- 
ly this  error  is  so  much  the  greater,  when  they  undertake  to 
prove  that  protestantism  is  a  degree  nearer  to  the  catholic 
faith  than  the  other.  For  since  both  of  them  be  without  the 
verge  of  the  church,  it  is  needless  hypocrisy  to  speak  of  it, 
yea,  it  begets  more  malice  than  it  is  worth."  * 

This  exceeding  boldness  of  the  catholic  party,  and  their 
success  in  conversions,  which  were,  in  fact,  less  remarkable 
for  their  number  than  for  the  condition  of  the  persons,  roused 
the  primate  himself  to  some  apprehension.  He  pi'eferred  a 
formal  complaint  to  the  king  in  council  against  the  resort  of 
papists  to  the  queen's  chapel,  and  the  insolence  of  some  ac- 
tive zealots  about  the  court.2  Henrietta,  who  had  courted 
his  friendship,  and  probably  relied  on  his  connivance,  if  not 

1  "  Begets  more  malice  "  is  obscure —  the  Roman  catholics  seems  to  be,  that, 
perhaps  it  means  ''  irritates  the  puritans  with  a  view  of  gaining  them  over  to  hia 
more.'1     Clar.  Papers,  ii.  44.  own  half-way  protestantism,  and  also  of 

2  Heylin,  p.  338  ;  Laud's  Diary,  Oct.  ingratiating  himself  with  the  queen,  ha 
1637  ;  Strafford  Letters,  i.  426.     Garrard,  had  for  a  time  gone  along  with  the  tide, 
a  dependent  friend  whom   Strafford  re-  till  he  found  there  was  a  real  danger  of 
tained,  as  was  usual  with  great  men,  to  being  carried  farther  than  he  intended, 
communicate  the  news  of  the  court,  fre-  This  accounts  for  the  well-knowa  story 
quently  descants  on  the  excessive  bold-  told  by  Erelyn,  that  the  Jesuits  at  Rome 
ness  of  the  papists.    "  Laud,"  he  says,  spoke  of  him  as  their  bitterest  enemy, 
vol.  ii.  p.  74,  "  does  all  he  can  to  beat  He  is  reported   to  have  said   that  they 
down  the  general  fear  conceived  of  bring-  and  the  puritans  were  the  chief  obstacles 
ing  on  popery."    So  in  p.  165  and  many  to  a  reunion  of  the  churches.     There  is 
other  places.  an  obscure  story  of  a  plot  carried  on  by 

It  is  manifest,  by  a  letter  of  Laud  to  the  pope's  legate  Con  and  the  English 

Strafford  in  11538,  that  he  was  not  satis-  Jesuits   against   Laud,   and   detected   in 

fied  with  the  systematic  connivance  at  1640  by  one  Andrew  Habernfield.  which 

recusarcy.    Id.  171.    The  explanation  of  some  have   treated    as   a    mere  fiction, 

the  arcLb'shop's  conduct  with  respect  to  Rush  worth,  iii.  232. 


CHA.  I.  -1629-40.       SIR  THOMAS  BROTTKE.  479 

support,  seems  never  to  have  forgiven  this  unexpected  attack. 
Laud  gave  another  testimony  of  his  unabated  hostility  to 
popery  by  republishing  with  additions  his  celebrated  conference 
with  the  Jesuit  Fisher,  a  work  reckoned  the  great  monument 
of  his  learning  and  controversial  acumen.  This  conference 
had  taken  place  many  years  before,  at  the  desire  and  in  the 
presence  of  the  countess  of  Buckingham,  the  duke's  mother. 
Those  who  are  conversant  with  literary  and  ecclesiastical 
anecdote  must  be  aware,  that  nothing  was  more  usual  in  the 
seventeenth  century  than  such  single  combats  under  the  eye 
of  some  fair  lady,  whose"  religious  faith  was  to  depend  upon 
the  victory.  The  wily  and  polished  Jesuits  had  great  advan- 
tages in  these  duels,  which  almost  always,  I  believe,  ended 
in  their  favor.  After  fatiguing  their  gentle  arbitress  for 
a  time  with  the  tedious  fencing  of  text  and  citation,  till  she 
felt  her  own  inability  to  award  the  palm,  they  came,  with 
her  prejudices  already  engaged,  to  the  necessity  of  an  infal- 
lible judge  ;  and  as  their  adversaries  of  the  English  church 
had  generally  left  themselves  vulnerable  on  this  side,  there 
was  little  difficulty  in  obtaining  success.  Like  Hector  in  the 
spoils  of  Patroclus,  our  clergy  had  assumed  to  themselves 
the  celestial  armor  of  authority ;  but  found  that,  however  it 
might  intimidate  the  multitude,  it  fitted  them  too  ill  to  repel 
the  spear  that  had  been  wrought  in  the  same  furnace.  A 
writer  of  this  school  in  the  age  of  Charles  I.,  and  incompa- 
rably superior  to  any  of  the  churchmen  belonging  to  it,  in  the 
brightness  and  originality  of  his  genius,  sir  Thomas  Browne, 
whose- varied  talents  wanted  nothing  but  the  controlling  su- 
premacy of  good  sense  to  place  him  in  the  highest  rank  of  our 
literature,  will  furnish  a  better  instance  of  the  prevailing  bias 
than  merely  theological  writings.  He  united  a  most  acute 
and  skeptical  understanding  with  strong  devotional  sensibility, 
the  temperament  so  conspicuous  in  Pascal  and  Johnson,  and 
which  has  a  peculiar  tendency  to  seek  the  repose  of  implicit 
faith.  "  Where  the  Scripture  is  silent,"  says  Browne  in  his 
Beligio  Medici,  "  the  church  is  my  text ;  where  it  speaks,  'iia 
but  my  comment."  That  Jesuit  must  have  been  a  disgrace 
to  his  order,  who  would  have  asked  more  than  such  a 
concession  to  secure  a  proselyte  —  the  right  of  interpret- 
ing whatever  was  written  and  of  supplying  whatever  was 
not. 

At  this  time,  however,  appeared  one  man  in  the  field  of 
religious  debate,  who  struck  out  from  that  insidious  track,  of 


480  CHILLINGWORTH.  CHAP.  VIIL 

which  his  own  experience  had  shown  him  the  perils.  Chil- 
Chming-  lingworth,  on  whom  nature  had  bestowed  some- 
thing like  the  same  constitutional  temperament  as 
that  to  which  I  have  just  adverted,  except  that,  the  reasoning 
power  having  a  greater  mastery,  his  religious  sensibility  rather 
gave  earnestness  to  his  love  of  truth  than  tenacity  to  his  prej- 
udices, had  been  induced,  like  so  many  others,  to  pass  over 
to  the  Roman  church.  The  act  of  transition,  it  .may  be  ob- 
served, from  a  system  of  tenets  wherein  men  had  been  edu- 
cated, was  in  itself  a  vigorous  exercise  of  free  speculation, 
and  might  be  termed  the  suicide  of  private  judgment.  But 
in  Chillingworth's  restless  mind  there  was  an  inextinguish- 
able skepticism  that  no  opiates  could  subdue ;  yet  a  skepti- 
cism of  that  species  which  belongs  to  a  vigorous,  not  that 
which  denotes  a  feeble,  understanding.  Dissatisfied  with 
his  new  opinions,  of  which  he  had  never  been  really  con- 
vinced, he  panted  to  breathe  the  freer  air  of  protestantism, 
and,  after  a  long  and  anxious  investigation,  returned  to  the 
English  church.  He  well  redeemed  any  censure  that  might 
have  been  thrown  on  him,  by  his  great  work  in  answer  to 
the  Jesuit  Knott,  entitled  The  Religion  of  Protestants  a  Safe 
Way  to  Salvation.  In  the  course  of  his  reflections  he  had 
perceived  the  insecurity  of  resting  the  Reformation  on  any 
but  its  original  basis,  the  independency  of  private  opinion. 
This,  too,  he  asserted  with  a  fearlessness  and  consistency 
hitherto  little  known,  even  within  the  protestant  pale ;  com- 
bining it  with  another  principle,  which  the  zeal  of  the  early 
reformers  had  rendered  them  unable  to  perceive,  and  for 
want  of  which  the  adversary  had  perpetually  discomfited 
them,  namely,  that  the  errors  of  conscientious  men  do  not 
forfeit  the  favor  of  God.  This  endeavor  to  mitigate  the 
dread  of  forming  mistaken  judgments  in  religion  runs  through 
the  whole  work  of  Chillingworth,  and  marks  him  as  the  foun- 
der, in  this  country,  of  what  has  been  called  the  latitudina- 
rian  school  of  theology.  In  this  view,  which  has  practically 
been  the  most  important  one  of  the  controversy,  it  may  pass 
for  an  anticipated  reply  to  the  most  brilliant  performance  on 
the  opposite  side,  the  History  of  the  Variations  of  Protestant 
Churches ;  and  those  who  from  a  delight  in  the  display  of 
human  intellect,  or  from  more  serious  motives  of  inquiry,  are 
led  to  these  two  masterpieces,  will  have  seen,  perhaps,  the 
utmost  strength  that  either  party,  in  the  great  schism  of 
Christendom,  has  been  able  to  put  forth. 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.  HALES.  481 

This  celebrated  work,  which  gained  its  author  the  epithet 
of  immortal,  is  now,  I  suspect,  little  studied  even  by  the 
clergy.  It  is  no  doubt,  somewhat  tedious,  when  read  con- 
tinuously, from  the  frequent  recurrence  of  the  same  strain  of 
reasoning,  and  from  his  method  of  following,  sentence  by  sen- 
tence, the  steps  of  his  opponent;  a  method  which,  while  it 
presents  an  immediate  advantage  to  controversial  writers,  as 
it  heightens  their  reputation  at  the  expense  of  their  adver- 
sary, is  apt  to  render  them  very  tiresome  to  posterity.  But 
the  closeness  and  precision  of  his  logic,  which  this  mode  of 
incessant  grappling  with  his  antagonist  served  to  display,  are 
so  admirable,  perhaps,  indeed,  hardly  rivalled  in  any  book 
beyond  the  limits  of  strict  science,  that  the  study  of  Chil- 
lingworth  might  tend  to  chastise  the  verbose  and  indefi- 
nite declamation  so  characteristic  of  the  present  day.  His 
style,  though  by  no  means  elegant  or  imaginative,  has  much 
of  a  nervous  energy  that  rises  into  eloquence.  He  is  chiefly, 
however,  valuable  for  a  true  liberah'ty  and  tolerance ;  far  re- 
moved from  indifference,  as  may  well  be  thought  of -one 
whose  life  was  consumed  in  searching  for  truth,  but  diametri- 
cally adverse  to  those  pretensions  which  seem  of  late  years 
to  have  been  regaining  ground  among  the  Anglican  divines. 

The  latitudinarian  principles  of  Chillingworth  appear  to 
have  been  confirmed  by  his  intercourse  with  a  ^^ 
man,  of  whose  capacity  his  contemporaries  enter- 
tained so  high  an  admiration,  that  he  acquired  the  distinctive 
appellation  of  the  Ever-memorable  John  Hales.  This  tes- 
timony of  so  many  enlightened  men  is  not  to  be  disregarded, 
even  if  we  should  be  of  opinion  that  the  writings  of  Hales, 
though  abounding  with  marks  of  an  unshackled  mind,  do  not 
quite  come  up  to  the  promise  of  his  name.  He  had,  as  well 
as  Chillingworth,  borrowed  from  Leyden,  perhaps  a  little 
from  Racow,  a  tone  of  thinking  upon  some  doctrinal  points, 
as  yet  nearly  unknown,  and  therefore  highly  obnoxious,  in 
England.  More  hardy  than  his  friend,  he  wrote  a  short 
treatise  on  schism,  which  tended,  in  pretty  blunt  and  unlim- 
ited language,  to  overthrow  the  scheme  of  authoritative 
decisions  in  any  church,  pointing  at  the  imposition  of  unne- 
cessary ceremonies  and  articles  of  faith  as  at  once  the  cause 
and  the  apology  of  separation.  This,  having  been  circulated 
in  manuscript,  came  to  the  knowledge  of  Laud  who  sent  for 
Hales  to  Lambeth,  and  questioned  him  as  to  his  opinions  on 
VOL,,  i.— c.  31 


482  TREATISE  ON  SCHISM.  CHAP.  VIII. 

that  matter.  Hales,  though  willing  to  promise  that  he  would 
not  publish  the  tract,  receded  not  a  jot  from  his  free  notions 
of  ecclesiastical  power  ;  which  he'again  advisedly  maintained 
in  a  letter  to  the  archbishop,  now  printed  among  his  works. 
The  result  was  equally  honorable  to  both  parties  ;  Laud  be- 
stowing a  canonry  of  Windsor  on  Hales,  which,  after  so  bold 
an  avowal  of  his  opinion,  he  might  accept  without  the  slight- 
est reproach.  A  behavior  so  liberal  forms  a  singular  con- 
trast to  the  rest  of  this  prelate's  history.  It  is  a  proof,  no 
doubt,  that  he  knew  how  to  set  such  a  value  on  great  abilities 
and  learning,  as  to  forgive  much  that  wounded  his  pride. 
But  besides  that  Hales  had  not  made  public  this  treatise  on 
schism,  for  which  I  think  he  could  not  have  escaped  the  high- 
commission  court,  he  was  known  by  Laud  to  stand  far  aloof 
from  the  Calvinistic  sectaries,  having  long  since  embraced  in 
their  full  extent  the  principles  of  Episcopius,  and  to  mix  no 
alloy  of  political  faction  with  the  philosophical  hardiness  of 
his  speculations.1 

These  two  remarkable  ornaments  of  the  English  church, 
who  dwelt  apart  like  stars,  to  use  the  fine  expression  of  a 
living  poet,  from  the  vulgar  bigots  of  both  her  factions,  were 
accustomed  to  meet,  in  the  society  of  some  other  eminent 
persons,  at  the  house  of  lord  Falkland,  near  Burford.  One 
of  those,  who,  then  in  a  ripe  and  learned  youth,  became 
afterwards  so  conspicuous  a  name  in  our  annals  and  our  lit- 
erature, Mr.  Hyde,  the  chosen  bosom-friend  of  his  host,  has 
dwelt  with  affectionate  remembrance  on  the  conversations  of 
that  mansion.  His  marvellous  talent  of  delineating  character 
—  a  talent,  I  think,  unrivalled  by  any  writer  (since,  combin- 
ing the  bold  outline  of  the  ancient  historians  with  the  ana- 
lytical minuteness  of  De  Retz  and  St.  Simon,  it  produces  a 
higher  effect  than  either)  —  is  never  more  beautifully  dis- 
played than  in  that  part  of  the  memoirs  of  his  life  where. 
Falkland,  Hales,  Chillingworth,  and  the  rest  of  his  early 
friends,  pass  over  the  scene. 

For  almost  thirty  ensuing  years  Hyde  himself  becomes 
the  companion  of  our  historical  reading.  Seven  folio  vol- 

1  Heylin,  in  his  Life  of  Laud,  p.  340,  as  his  treatise  on  schism,  proves  that 

tells  this  story  as  if  Hales  had  recanted  Heylin's  narrative  is   one  of  his   many 

his  opinions  and  owned    Laud's   supe-  wilful  falsehoods;   for,  by  making  him- 

riority  over  him  in  argument.      This  is  self  a  witness  to  the  pretended  circum- 

ludicrous,  considering  the  relative  abili-  stances,  he  has  precluded  the  excuse  of 

ties  of  the  two  men.    And  Hales's  letter  error, 
to  the  archbishop,  which  is  full  as  bold 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40. 


CLARENDON. 


483 


umes  contain  his  History  of  the  Rebellion,  his  Life,  and  the 
Letters,  of   which   a   large  portion  are  his  own. 
We  contract  an  intimacy  with  an  author  who  has  of  cnarerf- 
poured  out  to  us  so  much  of  his  heart.     Though  don'8  writ- 
lord  Clarendon's  chief  work  seems  to  me  not  quite  mg8' 
accurately  styled  a  history,  belonging  rather  to  the  class  of 
memoirs,1  yet  the  very  reasons  of  this  distinction,  the  long 
circumstantial  narrative  of  events  wherein  he  was  engaged, 
and  the  slight  notice  of  those  which  he  only  learned  from 
others,  render   it   more  interesting,  if  not  more  authentic. 
Conformably  to  human  feelings,  though  against  the  rules  of 
historical  composition,  it  bears  the  continual  impress  of  an 
intense  concern  about  what  he  relates.     This  depth  of  per- 
sonal interest  united  frequently  with  an   eloquence  of  the 
heart  and  imagination  that   struggles  through  an  involved, 
incorrect,  and  artificial  diction,  makes  it,  one  would  imagine, 
hardly  possible  for  those  most  alien  from  his  sentiments  to 

deavors,  not  quite  necessarily,  to  excuse 
or  justify  the  original  editors  (who  seem 
to  have  been  Sprat  and  Aldrich,  with  the 
sanction  probably  of  lords  Clarendon  and 
Rochester,  the  historian's  sons)  for  what 
they  did,  and  even  singularly  asserts 
that  "  the  present  collation  satisfactorily 
proves  that  they  have  in  no  one  instance 
added,  suppressed,  or  altered  any  histori- 
cal fact"  (Adver.  to  edit.  1826,  p.  v.),  yet 
it  is  certain  that,  besides  the  perpetual 
impertinence  of  mending  the  style,  there 
are  several  hundred  variations  which, 
affect  the  sense,  introduced  from  one  mo- 
tive or  another,  and  directly  contrary  to 
the  laws  of  literary  integrity.  The  long 
passages  inserted  in  the  appendixes  to 
several  volumes  of  this  edition  contain 
surely  historical  facts  that  had  been  sup- 
pressed. And,  even  with  respect  to  sub- 
ordinate alterations,  made  for  the  purposa 
of  softening  traits  of  the  author's  angry 
temper,  or  correcting  .his  mistakes,  tha 
general  effect  of  taking  such  liberties 
with  a  work  is  to  give  it  an  undue  credit 
in  the  eyes  of  the  public,  and  to  induce 
men  to  believe  matters  upon  the  writer's 
testimony,  which  they  would  not  have 
done  so  readily  if  his  errors  had  been 
fairly  laid  before  them.  Clarendon  iu- 
deed  is  so  strangely  loose  in  expression 
as  well  as  incorrect  in  statement,  that  it 
would  have  been  impossible  to  remove 
his  faults  of  this  kind  without  writing 
again  half  the  History  ;  but  it  is  certain 
that  great  trouble  was  very  unduly  tak- 
en to  lighten  their  impression  upon  the 
world. 


1  It  appears  by  the  late  edition  at  Ox- 
ford (1826)  that  lord  Clarendon  twice 
altered  his  intention  as  to  the  nature  of 
his  work,  having  originally  designed  to 
write  the  history  of  his  time,  which  he 
changed  to  memorials  of  his  own  life, 
and  again  returned  to  his  first  plan. 
The  consequence  has  been  that  there 
are  two  manuscripts  of  the  History  and 
of  the  Life,  which,  in  a  great  degree,  are 
transcripts  one  from  the  other,  or  con- 
tain the  same  general  fact  with  varia- 
tions. That  part  of  the  Life,  previous  to 
1660,  which  is  not  inserted  in  the  History 
of  the  Rebellion,  is  by  no  means  exten- 
sive. 

The  genuine  text  of  the  History  has 
only  been  published  in  1826.  A  story, 
as  is  well  known,  obtained  circulation 
within  thirty  years  after  its  first  appear- 
ance, that  the  manuscript  had  been  ma- 
terially altered  or  interpolated.  This 
was  positively  denied,  and  supposed  to 
be  wholly  disproved.  It  turns  out  how- 
ever that,  like  many  other  anecdotes,  it 
had  a  considerable  basis  of  truth,  though 
with  various  erroneous  additions,  and 
probably  wilful  misrepresentations.  It  is 
nevertheless  surprising  that  the  worthy 
editor  of  the  original  manuscript  should 
say,  '•  that  the  genuineness  of  the  work 
has  rashly,  and  for  party  purposes,  been 
called  in  question,"  when  no  one,  I  be- 
lieve, has  ever  disputed  its  genuineness  ; 
and  the  anecdote  to  which  I  have  alluded, 
and  to  which,  no  doubt,  he  alludes,  has 
been  by  his  own  industry  (and  many 
thanks  we  owe  him  for  it)  perfectly  con- 
firmed in  substance.  For  though  he  en- 


484      ANIMADVERSIONS  ON  HIS  FIRST  BOOK.     CHAP.  VIII. 

read  his  writings  without  some  portion  of  sympathy.  But 
they  are  on  this  account  not  a  little  dangerous  to  the  sound- 
ness of  our  historical  conclusions ;  the  prejudices  of  Clar- 
endon, and  his  negligence  as  to  truth,  being  full  as  striking 
as  his  excellencies,  and  leading  him  not  only  into  many  er- 
roneous judgments,  but  into  frequent  inconsistencies. 

These  inconsistencies  are  nowhere  so  apparent  as  in  the 
first  or  introductory  book  of  his  History,  which  professes  to 
give  a  general  view  of  the  state  of  affairs  before  the  meeting 

of  the  long  parliament.  It  is  certainly  the  most 
BtanTionTer~  defective  part  of  his  work.  A  strange  mixture 
clarendon's  of  honesty  and  disingenuousness  pervades  all  he 
thS'period.  Das  written  of  the  early  years  of  the  king's  reign ; 

retracting,  at  least  in  spirit,  in  almost  every  page 
what  has  been  said  in  the  last,  from  a  constant  fear  that  he 
may  have  admitted  so  much  against  the  government  as  to 
make  his  readers  impute  too  little  blame  to  those  who  op- 
posed it.  Thus,  after  freely  censuring  the  exactions  of  the 
crown,  whether  on  the  score  of  obsolete  prerogative  or  with- 
out any  just  pretext  at  all,  especially  that  of  ship-money, 
and  confessing  that  "  those  foundations  of  right,  by  which 
men  valued  their  security,  were  never,  to  the  apprehension 
and  understanding  of  wise  men,  in  more  danger  of  being 
destroyed,"  he  turns  to  dwell  on  the  prosperous  state  of  the 
kingdom  during  this  period,  "  enjoying  the  greatest  calm  and 
the  fullest  measure  of  felicity  that  any  people  in  any  age  for 
so  long  time  together  have  been  blessed  with,"  till  he  works 
himself  up  to  a  strange  paradox,  that  "many  wise  men 
thought  it  a  time  wherein  those  two  adjuncts,  which  Nerva 
was  deified  for  uniting,  Imperium  et  Libertas,  were  as  well 
•reconciled  as  is  possible." 

Such  wisdom  was  not,  it  seems,  the  attribute  of  the  nation. 
u  These  blessings,"  he  says,  "  could  but  enable,  not  compel, 
us  to  be  happy ;  we  wanted  that  sense,  acknowledgment,  and 
value  of  our  own  happiness  which  all  but  we  had,  and  took 
pains  to  make,  when  we  could  not  find,  ourselves  miserable. 
There  was,  in  truth,  a  strange  absence  of  understanding  in 
most,  and  a  strange  perverseness  of  understanding  in  the 
rest ;  the  court  full  of  excess,  idleness,  and  luxury;  the  coun- 
try full  of  pride,  mutiny,  and  discontent ;  every  man  more 
troubled  and  perplexed  at  that  they  called  the  violation  of 
the  law  lhan  delighted  or  pleased  with  the  observation  of  all 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.  INCONSISTENCIES.  485 

the  rest  of  the  charter;  never  imputing  the  increase  of  their 
receipts,  revenue,  and  plenty  to  the  wisdom,  virtue,  and 
merit  of  the  crown,  but  objecting  every  small  imposition  to 
the  exorbitancy  and  tyranny  of  the  government." 

This  strange  passage  is  as  inconsistent  with  other  parts  of 
the  same  chapter,  and  with  Hyde's  own  conduct  at  the  be- 
ginning of  the  parliament,  as  it  is  with  all  reasonable  notions 
of  government.1  For  if  kings  and  ministers  may  plead  in 
excuse  for  violating  one  law  that  they  have  not  transgressed 
the  rest  (though  it  would  be  difficult  to  name  any  violation 
of  law  that  Charles  had  not  committed)  ;  if  this  were  enough 
to  reconcile  their  subjects,  and  to  make  dissatisfaction  pass  for 
a  want  of  perversion  of  understanding,  they  must  be  in  a 
very  different  predicament  from  all  others  who  live  within 
the  pale  of  civil  society,  whose  obligation  to  obey  its  dis- 
cipline is  held  to  be  entire  and  universal.  By  this  great 
writer's  own  admissions,  the  decision  in  the  case  of  ship- 
money  had  shaken  every  man's  security  for  the  enjoyment 
of  his  private  .inheritance.  Though  as  yet  not  weighty 
enough  to  be  actually  very  oppressive,  it  might,  and,  ac- 

i  May  thus  answers,  by  a  sort  of  pro-  in  any  kingdom,  and  yet  that  Prance 

phetic  anticipation,  this  passage  of  Clar-  flourished,  and    the   gentry  lived  well ; 

endon :  — "  Another   sort  of    men,"  he  that  the  Austrian  princes,  especially  in 

gays,  "and  especially  lords  and  gentle-  Spain,  laid    heavy  hurdens  upon  their 

men,  by   whom   the  pressures    of    the  subjects.    Thus  did  many  of  the  English 

government  were  not  much  felt,  who  en-  gentry,  by  way  of  comparison,  in  ordi- 

joyed  their  own  plentiful  fortunes,  with  nary  discourse,  plead  for  their  own  servi- 

little  or  insensible  detriment,  looking  no  tude. 

farther  than  their  present  safety  and  "  The  courtiers  would  begin  to  dispute 
prosperity,  and  the  yet  undisturbed  against  parliaments,  in  their  ordinary 
peace  of  the  nation,  whilst  other  king-  discourse,  that  they  were  cruel_  to  thfce 
doins  were  embroiled  in  calamities,  and  whom  the  king  favored,  and  too  injurious 
Germany  sadly  wasted  by  a  sharp  war,  to  his  prerogative ;  that  the  late  parlia- 
did  nothing  but  applaud  the  happiness  ment  stood  upon  too  high  terms  with  the 
of  England,  and  called  those  ungrateful  king,  and  that  they  hoped  the  king 
factious  spirits  who  complained  of  the  should  never  need  any  more  parliaments, 
breach  of  laws  and  liberties;  that  the  Some  of  the  greatest  statesmen  and  privy- 
kingdom  abounded  with  wealth,  plenty,  councillors  would  ordinarily  laugh  at  the 
and  all  kinds  of  elegancies,  more  than  ancient  language  of  England  when  the 
ever ;  that  it  was  for  the  honor  of  a  word  liberty  of  the  subject  was  named, 
people  that  the  monarch  should  live  But  these  gentlemen,  who  seemed  so  for- 
gplendidly,  and  not  be  curbed  at  all  in  ward  in  taking  up  their  own  yoke,  were 
his  prerogative,  which  would  bring  him  but  a  small  part  of  the  nation  (though  a 
into  greater  esteem  with  other  princes,  number  considerable  enough  to  make  a 
and  more  enable  him  to  prevail  in  trea-  reformation  hard)  compared  with  those 
ties ;  that  what  they  suffered  by  monop-  gentlemen  who  were  sensible  of  their 
olies  was  insensible,  and  not  grievous,  birthrights  and  the  true  interests  of  the 
if  compared  with  other  states;  that  the  kingdom;  on  which  side  the  common 
dukp  of  Tuscany  sat  heavier  upon  his  people  in  the  generality  and  the  country 
pccple  in  that  very  kind;  that  the  French  freeholders  stood,  who  would  rationally 
king  had  made  himself  an  absolute  lord,  argue  of  their  own  rights,  and  those  op- 
and  quite  depressed  tin  power  of  parlia-  pressions  that  were  laid  upon  them, 
meiits,  which  had  beei  there  as  great  as  Hist,  of  Parliament,  p.  12  (edit.  loll). 


486  PROSPERITY  OF  ENGLAND.  CHAP.  VIII. 

cording  to  the  experience  of  Europe,  undoubtedly  would, 
become  such  by  length  of  time  and  peaceable  submission. 

We  may  acknowledge  without  hesitation  that  the  kingdom 
had  grown  during  this  period  into  remarkable  prosperity  and 
affluence.  The  rents  of  land  were  very  considerably  in- 
creased, and  large  tracts  reduced  into  cultivation.  The  man- 
ufacturing towns,  the  seaports,  became  more  populous  and 
flourishing.  The  metropolis  increased  in  size  with  a  rapid- 
ity that  repeated  proclamations  against  new  buildings  could 
not  restrain.  The  country-houses  of  the  superior  gentry 
throughout  England  were  built  on  a  scale  which  their  de- 
scendants, even  in  days  of  more  redundant  affluence,  have 
seldom  ventured  to  emulate.  The  kingdom  was  indebted  for 
this  prosperity  to  the  spirit  and  industry  of  the  people,  to 
the  laws  which  secure  the  commons  from  oppression,  and 
which,  as  between  man  and  man,  were  still  fairly  adminis- 
tered ;  to  the  opening  of  fresh  channels  of  trade  in  the  east- 
ern and  western  worlds  (rivulets,  indeed,  as  they  seem  to  us 
who  float  in  the  full  tide  of  modern  commerce,  yet  at  that 
time  no  slight  contributions  to  the  stream  of  public  wealth)  ; 
but,  above  all,  to  the  long  tranquillity  of  the  kingdom,  igno- 
rant of  the  sufferings  of  domestic,  and  seldom  much  affected 
by  the  privations  of  foreign,  war.  It  was  the  natural  course 
of  things  that  wealth  should  be  progressive  in  such  a  land. 
Extreme  tyranny,  such  as  that  of  Spain  in  the  Netherlands, 
might,  no  doubt,  have  turned  back  the  current.  A  less  vio- 
lent but  long-continued  despotism,  such  as  has  existed  in 
several  European  monarchies,  would,  by  the  corruption  and 
incapacity  which  absolute  governments  engender,  have  re- 
tarded its  advance.  The  administration  of  Charles  was 
certainly  not  of  the  former  description.  Yet  it  would  have 
been  an  excess  of  loyal  stupidity  in  the  nation  to  have 
attributed  their  riches  to  the  wisdom  or  virtue  of  the  court, 
which  had  injured  the  freedom  of  trade  by  monopolies  and 
arbitrary  proclamations,  and  driven  away  industrious  manu- 
facturers by  persecution. 

If  we  were  to  draw  our  knowledge  from  no  other  book 
than  lord  Clarendon's  History  it  would  still  be  impossible  to 
avoid  the  inference  that  misconduct  on  the  part  of  the  crown, 
and  more  especially  of  the  church,  was  the  chief,  if  not  the 
Bole,  cause  of  these  prevailing  discontents.  At  the  time 
when  Laud  unhappily  became  archbishop  of  Canterbury, 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.     CAUSE  OF  PREVAILING  DISCONTENTS.  487 

"  the  general  temper  and  humor  of  the  kingdom,"  he  tells 
us,  "  was  little  inclined  to  the  papist,  and  less  to  the  puritan. 
There  were  some  late  taxes  and  impositions  introduced, 
which  rather  angered  than  grieved  the  people,  who  were 
more  than  repaid  by  the  quiet  peace  and  prosperity  they 
enjoyed  ;  and  the  murmur  and  discontent  that  was,  appeared 
to  be  against  the  excess  of  power  exercised  by  the  crown, 
and  supported  by  the  judges  in  Westminster  Hall.  The 
church  was  not  repined  at,  nor  the  least  inclination  to  alter 
the  government  and  discipline  thereof,  or  to  change  the  doc- 
trine. Nor  was  there  at  that  time  any  considerable  number 
of  persons  of  any  valuable  condition  throughout  the  kingdom 
who  did  wish  either  ;  and  the  cause  of  so  prodigious  a  change 
in  so  few  years  after  was  too  visible  from  the  effects."  This 
cause,  he  is  compelled  to  admit,  in  a  passage  too  diffuse  to 
be  extracted,  was  the  passionate  and  imprudent  behavior  of 
the  primate.  Can  there  be  a  stronger  proof  of  the  personal 
prepossessions  which  forever  distort  the  judgment  of  this 
author  than  that  he  should  blame  the  remissness  of  Abbot, 
who  left  things  in  so  happy  a  condition,  and  assert  that  Laud 
executed  the  trust  of  solely  managing  ecclesiastical  affairs 
u  infinitely  to  the  service  and  benefit "  of  that  church  which 
be  brought  to  destruction  ?  Were  it  altogether  true,  what  is 
doubtless  much  exaggerated,  that  in  1633  very  little  discon- 
tent at  the  measures  of  the  court  had  begun  to  prevail,  it 
would  be  utterly  inconsistent  with  experience  and  observa- 
tion of  mankind  to  ascribe  the  almost  universal  murmurs  of 
1639  to  any  other  cause  than  bad  government.  But  Hyde, 
attached  to  Laud  and  devoted  to  the  king,  shrunk  from  the 
conclusion  that  his  own  language  would  afford  ;  and  his  piety 
made  him  seek  in  some  mysterious  influences  of  Heaven,  and 
in  a  judicial  infatuation  of  the  people,  for  the  causes  of  those 
troubles  which  the  fixed  and  uniform  dispensations  of  Provi- 
dence were  sufficient  to  explain.1 


the  case  of  ship-money.  In  this  bespeaks  discontent. 

very  strongly  as  to  the  illegality  of  the        The  fact  is,  that  when  he  sat  down  in 

proceedings  of  the  judges  in  Rolls  and  Jersey   to  begin    his   History,   irritated. 

Vassal's  cases,  though  in  his  History  he  disappointed,  afflicted   at  all   that    had 

endeavors  to  insinuate  that  the  king  had  passed  in  the  last  five  years,  he  could  not 

a  right  to  tonnage  and  poundage  ;  he  in-  bring  his  mind  back  to  the  state  in  which 

veighs  also  agaiuat  the  decision  in  Bates's  it  had  been  at  the  meeting  of  the  long 


488  DISTRESS  OF  THE  GOVERNMENT.      CHAP.  VIII. 

It  is  difficult  to  pronounce  how  much  longer  the  nation's 
Scots  troub-  signal  forbearance  would  have  held  out,  if  the 
distres^of  Scots  had  not  precipitated  themselves  into  rebel- 
the  govern-  lion.  There  was  still  a  confident  hope  that  parlia- 
ment must  soon  or  late  be  assembled,  and  it  seemed 
equally  impolitic  and  unconstitutional  to  seek  redress  by  any 
violent  means.  The  patriots,  too,  had  just  cause  to  lament 
the  ambition  of  some  whom  the  court's  favor  subdued,  and 
the  levity  of  many  more  whom  its  vanities  allured.  But  the 
unexpected  success  of  the  tumultuous  rising  at  Edinburgh 
against  the  service-book  revealed  the  impotence  of  the  Eng- 
lish government.  Destitute  of  money,  and  neither  daring  to 
ask  it  from  a  parliament,  nor  to  extort  it  by  any  fresh  demand 
from  the  people,  they  hesitated  whether  to  employ  force  or 
to  submit  to  the  insurgents.  In  the  exchequer,  as  lord 
Northumberland  wrote  to  Strafford,  there  was  but  the  sum 
of  200/. ;  with  all  the  means  that  could  be  devised,  not  above 
110,OOOZ.  could  be  raised;  the  magazines  were  all  unfur- 
nished, and  the  people  were  so  discontented  by  reason  of  the 
multitude  of  projects  daily  imposed  upon  them,  that  he  saw 
reason  to  fear  a  great  part  of  them  would  be  readier  to  join 
with  the  Scots  than  to  draw  their  swords  in  the  king's  ser- 
vice.1 "  The  discontents  at  home,"  he  observes  some  months 
afterwards,  "  do  rather  increase  than  lessen,  there  being  no 
course  taken  to  give  any  kind  of  satisfaction.  The  king's 
coffers  were  never  emptier  than  at  this  time  ;  and  to  us  that 
have  the  honor  to  be  near  about  him  no  way  is  yet  known 
how  he  will  find  means  either  to  maintain  or  begin  a  war 
without  the  help  of  his  people."  2  Strafford  himself  dissuaded 
a  war  in  such  circumstances,  though  hardly  knowing  what 

parliament ;  and  believed  himself  to  have  people  to  submit  to  the  fury  of  this  par- 
partaken  far  less  in  the  sense  of  abuses  liameut),  as  an  offence  and  scandal  to 
and  desire  of  redress  than  he  had  really  religion,  in  the  same  degree  that  ship- 
done.  There  may,  however,  be  reason  money  was  to  liberty  and  property." 
to  suspect  that  he  had,  in  some  respects,  State  Papers,  ii.  386.  But  when  we  turn 
gone  farther  in  the  first  draught  of  his  to  the  passage  in  the  History  of  the  Re- 
History  than  appears  at  present ;  that  is,  bellion,  p.  268,  where  this  is  mentioned, 
I  conceive,  that  he  erased  himself  some  we  do  not  find  a  single  expression  reflect- 
passages  or  phrases  unfavorable  to  the  ing  on  the  court,  though  the  catholics 
court.  Let  the  reader  judge  from  the  themselves  are  censured  for  imprudence, 
following  sentence  in  a  letter  to  Nicholas  This  may  serve  to  account  for  several  of 
relating  to  his  work,  dated  Feb.  12, 1647 :  Clarendon's  inconsistencies,  for  nothing 
—  "  I  will  offer  no  excuse  for  the  enter-  renders  an  author  so  inconsistent  with 
taining  of  Con,  who  came  after  Panzani,  himself  as  corrections  made  in  a  different 
and  was  succeeded  by  Rosetti;  which  was  temperof  mind  from  that  which  actuated 
a  business  of  so  much  folly,  or  worse,  him  in  the  first  composition, 
that  I  have  mentioned  it  in  my  prolegom-  1  Strafford  Lotters,  ii.  186. 
ena  (of  those  distempers  and  exorbi-  2  id.  267. 
tances  in  government  which  prepared  the 


CHA.  I.  — 162940.    CONTRIBUTIONS  BY  CATHOLICS.  489 

other  course  to  advise.1  He  had  now  awaked  from  the 
dreams  of  infatuated  arrogance  to  stand  appalled  at  the  per- 
ils of  his  sovereign  and  his  own.  In  the  letters  that  passed 
between  him  and  Laud  after  the  Scots  troubles  had  broken 
out  we  read  their  hardly-concealed  dismay,  and  glimpses  of 
"  the  two-handed  engine  at  the  door."  Yet  pride  forbade 
them  to  perceive  or  confess  the  real  causes  of  this  porten- 
tous state  of  affairs.  They  fondly  laid  the  miscarriage  of 
the  business  of  Scotland  on  failure  in  the  execution,  and  an 
"  over-great  desire  to  do  all  quietly."  a 

In  this  imminent  necessity  the  king  had  recourse  to  those 
who  had  least  cause  to  repine  at  his  administration.  The 
catholic  gentry,  at  the  powerful  interference  of  their  queen, 
made  large  contributions  towards  the  campaign  of  1639. 
Many  of  them  volunteered  their  personal  service.  There 
was,  indeed,  a  further  project,  so  secret  that  it  is  not  men- 
tioned, I  believe,  till  very  lately,  by  any  historical  writer. 
This  was  to  procure  10,000  regular  troops  from  Flanders,  in 
exchange  for  so  many  recruits  to  be  levied  for  Spain  in  Eng- 
land and  Ireland.  These  troops  were  to  be  for  six  months 
in  the  king's  pay.  Colonel  Gage,  a  catholic  and  the  nego- 
tiator of  this  treaty,  hints  that  the  pope  would  probably  con- 
tribute money,  if  he  had  hopes  of  seeing  the  penal  laws 
repealed ;  and  observes  that  with  such  an  army  the  king 
might  both  subdue  the  Scots,  and  at  the  same  time  keep  his 
parliament  in  check,  so  as  to  make  them  come  to  his  condi- 
tions.8 The  treaty,  however,  was  never  concluded.  Spain 
was  far  more  inclined  to  revenge  herself  for  the  bad  faith 
she  imputed  to  Charles  than  to  lend  him  any  assistance. 
Hence,  when,  in  the  next  year,  he  offered  to  declare  war 
against  Holland,  as  soon  as  he  should  have  subdued  the 
Scots,  for  a  loan  of  1,200,000  crowns,  the  Spanish  ambassa- 
dor haughtily  rejected  the  proposition.4 

1  Stratford  Letters,  ii.  191.  such  like."    Laud  answers  In  the  same 

a  Id.  250.     "  It  was  ever  clear  in  my  strain :  —  "  Indeed,  my  lord,  the  business 

judgment,"  says    Strafford,  "that    the  of  Scotland,  I  can  be  bold  to  say  without 

business    of  Scotland,  so   well  laid,  so  vanity,  was  well   laid,  and  was  a  great 

pleasing  to  God  and  man,  had    it   been  service  to  the  crown  as  well  as  to  God 

effected,  was  miserably  lost  in   the  exe-  himself.    And  that  it  should  so  fatally 

cution  ;  yet  could  never  have  so  fatally  fail  iu  the  execution  is  a  great  blow  aa 

miscarried  if  there  had  not  been  a  fail-  well  to  the  power  as  honor  of  the  king," 

ure  likewise  in  this  direction,  occasioued  &c.    He  lays  the  blame  in  a  great  degree 

either    by  over-great    desires  to  do   all  on  lord  Traquair.    P.  264. 

quietly  without  noise,  by  the  state  of  3  Clarendon  State  Papers,  u.  19. 

the  business  misrepresented,  by  oppor-  *  Id.  84,  and  Appendix,  xzvi. 
t unities  and  seasons  slipped,  or  by  some 


490  SHIP-MONEY.  CHAP.  VIII. 

The  pacification,  as  it  was  termed,  of  Berwick,  in  the  sum- 
mer of  1639,  has  been  i-epresented  by  several  historians  as  a 
measure  equally  ruinous  and  unaccountable.  That  it  was  so 
far  ruinous  as  it  formed  one  link  in  the  chain  that  dragged 
the  king  to  destruction,  is  most  evident ;  but  it  was  both  in- 
evitable and  easy  of  explanation.  The  treasury,  whatever 
Clarendon  and  Hume  may  have  said,  was  perfectly  bank- 
rupt.1 The  citizens  ^of  London,  on  being  urged  by  the  coun- 
cil for  a  loan,  had  used  as  much  evasion  as  they  dared.2  The 
writs  for  ship-money  were  executed  with  greater  difficulty, 
several  sheriffs  willingly  acquiescing  in  the  excuses  made  by 
their  counties.8  Sir  Francis  Seymour,  brother  to  the  earl  of 
Hertford,  and  a  man,  like  his  brother,  of  very  moderate  prin- 
ciples, absolutely  refused  to  pay  it,  though  warned  by  the 
council  to  beware  how  he  disputed  its  legality.4  Many  of 
the  Yorkshire  gentry,  headed  by  sir  Marmaduke  Langdale, 
combined  to  refuse  its  payment.5  It  was  impossible  to  rely 
again  on  catholic  subscriptions,  which  the  court  of  Rome,  as 
I  have  mentioned  above,  instigated  perhaps  by  that  of  Ma- 
drid, had  already  tried  to  restrain.  The  Scots  were  enthusi- 
astic, nearly  unanimous,  and  entire  masters  of  their  country. 
The  English  nobility  in  general  detested  the  archbishop,  to 
whose  passion  they  ascribed  the  whole  mischief,  and  feared 
to  see  the  king  become  despotic  in  Scotland.  If  the  terms 
of  Charles's  treaty  with  his  revolted  subjects  were  unsatis- 
factory and  indefinite,  enormous  in  concession,  and  yet  afford- 

1  Hume  says  that  Charles  had  an  ac-  Lest  it  should  seem  extraordinary  that  I 
cumulated  treasure  of  200,OOOJ.  at  this  sometimes  contradict  lord  Clareudou  on 
time.  I  know  not  his  authority  for  the  the  authority  of  his  own  collection  of 
particular  sum ;  but  Clarendon  pretends  papers,  it  may  be  necessary  to  apprise 
that  "  the  revenue  had  been  so  well  im-  the  reader  that  none  of  these,  anterior 
proved,  and  so  wisely  managed,  that  there  to  the  civil  war,  had  come  in  his  posses- 
was  money  in  the  exchequer  proportion-  sion  till  he  had  written  this  part  of  his 
able  for  the  undertaking  any  noble  en-  History. 

terprise."    This  is,  at  the  best,  strangely  3  The  grand  jury  of  Northampton  pre- 

hyperbolical ;  but,  in  fact,  there  was  an  sented  ship-money  as  a  grievance.    But 

absolute  want  of  everything.  Ship-money  the    privy-council  wrote    to   the  sheriff 

would  have  been  a  still  more  crying  sin  that  they  would  not  admit  his  affected 

than  it  was,  if  the  produce  had  gone  be-  excuses  ;  and  if  he  neglected  to  execute 

yond  the  demands  of  the  state  :  nor  was  the  writ,  a  quick  and  exemplary  repara- 

this  ever  imputed  to  the  court.     This  is  tion  would  be  required  of  him.     Ilushw. 

one  of  lord  Clarendon's  capital  mistakes  ;  Abr.  iii.  93. 

for  it  leads  him  to  speak  of  the  treaty  of  *  Rushw.  Abr.  iii.  47.  The  king  writes 
Berwick  as  a  measure  that  might  have  in  the  margin  of  Windebank's  letter,  in- 
been  avoided,  and  even,  in  one  place,  to  forming  him  of  Seymour's  refusal,  — 
ascribe  it  to  the  king's  excessive  lenity  "  You  must  needs  make  him  an  example, 
and  aversion  to  shedding  blood  ;  wherein  not  only  by  distress,  but,  if  it  be  possible,- 
a  herd  of  superficial  writers  have  followed  an  information  in  some  court,  as  Mr.  At 
him.  torney  shall  advise." 

a  Clarendon  State   Papers,  il.  46,  54.  &  Strafiord  Letters,  ii.  308. 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.     CONVOCATION  OF  PARLIAMENT.  491 

ing  a  pretext  for  new  encroachments,  this  is  no  more  than 
the  common  lot  of  the  weaker  side. 

There  was  one  possible,  though  not  under  all  the  circum- 
stances very  likely,  method  of  obtaining  the  sinews  of  war 
—  the  convocation  of  parliament.  This  many,  at  least,  of 
the  king's  advisers  appear  to  have  long  desired,  could  they 
but  have  vanquished  his  obstinate  reluctance.  This  is  an  im- 
portant observation :  Charles,  and  he  perhaps  alone,  unless 
we  reckon  the  queen,  seems  to  have  taken  a  resolution  of 
superseding  absolutely  and  forever  the  legal  constitution  of 
England.  The  judges,  the  peers,  lord  Strafford,  nay,  if  we 
believe  his  dying  speech,  the  primate  himself,  retained  enough 
of  respect  for  the  ancient  laws  to  desire  that  parliaments 
should  be  summoned  whenever  they  might  be  expected  to 
second  the  views  of  the  monarch.  They  felt  that  the  new 
scheme  of  governing  by  proclamations  and  writs  of  ship- 
money  could  not  and  ought  not  "to  be  permanent  in  England. 
The  king  reasoned  more  royally,  and  indeed  much  better. 
He  well  perceived  that  it  was  vain  to  hope  for  another  par- 
liament so  constituted  as  those  under  the  Tudors.  He  was 
ashamed  (and  that  pernicious  woman  at  his  side  would  not 
fail  to  encourage  the  sentiment)  that  his  brothers  of  France 
and  Spain  should  have  achieved  a  work  which  the  sovereign 
of  England,  though  called  an  absolute  king  by  his  courtiers, 
had  scarcely  begun.  All  mention,  therefore,  of  calling  par- 
liament grated  on  his  ear.  The  declaration  published  at  the 
dissolution  of  the  last,  that  he  should  account  it  presumption 
for  any  to  prescribe  a  time  to  him  for  calling  parliaments, 
was  meant  to  extend  even  to  his  own  counsellors.  He  rated 
severely  lord-keeper  Coventry  for  a  suggestion  of  this  kind.1 
He  came  with  much  reluctance  into  Wentworth's  proposal 
of  summoning  one  in  Ireland,  though  the  superior  control  of 
the  crown  over  parliaments  in  that  kingdom  was  pointed  out 
to  him.  "  The  king,"  says  Cottington,  "  at  the  end  of  1638, 
will  not  hear  of  a  parliament ;  and  he  is  told  by  a  committee 
of  learned  men  that  there  is  no  other  way."  a  This  repug- 

1  "  The  king  hath  so  rattled  my  lord-  banished ;  so  many  oppressions  had  been, 

keeper,  that  he  is  now  the  most  pliable  set  on  foot,  so  many  illegal  actions  done, 

man  in  England,  and   all  thoughts  of  that  the  only  way  to  justify  the  mischiefs 

parliaments  are  quite  out  of  his  pate."  already  done  was  to  do  that  one  greater ; 

Cottington  to  Strafford,  29th  Oct.  1633,  to  take  away  the  means  which  were  or- 

vol.  i.  p.  141.  dained  to  redress  them,  the  lawful  gov- 

»  Vol.  ii.  p.  246.     "So  by  this  time,"  ernment  of  England  by   parliaments." 

says  a  powerful  writer,  •'  all  thoughts  of  May,  History  of  Parliament,  p.  11 
ever  having  a  parliament  again  was  quite 


492 


PARLIAMENT  OF  APRIL,  1640. 


CHAP.  YUI. 


nance  to  meet  his  people,  and  liis  inability  to  carry  on  the 
war  by  any  other  methods,  produced  the  ignominious  pacifi- 
cation at  Berwick.  But  as  the  Scots,  grown  bolder  by  suc- 
cess, had,  after  this  treaty,  almost  thrown  off  all  subjection, 
and  the  renewal  of  the  war,  or  loss  of  the  sovereignty  over 
that  kingdom,  appeared  necessary  alternatives,  overpowered 
by  the  concurrent  advice  of  his  council,  and  especially  of 
Strafford,  he  issued  writs  for  that  parliament  which  met  in 
April  1640.1  They  told  him  that,  making  trial  once  more 
of  the  ancient  and  ordinary  way,  he  would  leave  his  people 
without  excuse  if  that  should  fail ;  and  have  wherewithal  to 
justify  himself  to  God  and  the  world,  if  he  should  be  forced 
contrary  to  his  inclinations  to  use  extraordinary  means,  rather 
than  through  the  peevishness  of  some  factious  spirit  to  suffer 
his  state  and  government  to  be  lost.2 

It  has  been  universally  admitted  that  the  parliament  which 
Parliament  met  on  ^e  l^th  of  April,  1640,  was  as  favorably 
of  Apru,  disposed  towards  the  king's  service,  and  as  little 
influenced  by  their  many  wrongs,  as  any  man  of 
ordinary  judgment  could  expect.8  But  though  cautiously 
abstaining  from  any  intemperance,  so  much  as  to  reprove  a 
member  for  calling  ship-money  an  abomination  (no  very  out- 


1  Sidney  Papers,  ii.  623.     Clarendon 
Papers,  ii.  81. 

2  Id.  ibid.     The  attentive  reader  will 
not  fail  to  observe  that  this  is  the  iden- 
tical language  of  the  famous  advi"e  im- 
puted   to    Strafford,    though    used    on 
another  occasion. 

8  May.  Clarendon.  The  latter  says, 
upon  the  dissolution  of  this  parliament, 
—  "It  could  never  be  hoped  that  so 
many  sober  and  dispassionate  men  would 
ever  meet  again  in  that  place,  or  fewer 
•who  brought  ill  purposes  with  them." 
This,  like  so  many  other  passages  in  the 
noble  historian,  is  calculated  rather  to 
mislead  the  reader.  All  the  principal 
men  who  headed  the  popular  party  in 
the  long  parliament  were  members  of 
this  ;  and  the  whole  body,  so  far  as  their 
subsequent  conduct  shows,  was  not  at 
all  constituted  of  different  elements  from 
the  rest;  for  I  find,  by  comparison  of  the 
list  of  this  parliament,  in  Nalsou's  Col- 
lections, with  that  of  the  long  parlia- 
ment, in  the  Parliamentary  History, 
that  eighty,  at  most,  who  had  not  sat  in 
the  former,  took  the  covenant ;  and  that 
BCT  *nty-three,  in  the  same  circumstances, 
*a(  in  the  king's  convention  at  Oxford. 
Tile  difference,  therefore,  was  not  so 


much  in  the  men  as  in  the  times  :  the 
bad  administration  and  bad  success  of 
1640,  as  well  as  the  dissolution  of  the 
short  parliament,  having^  greatly  aggra- 
vated the  public  discontents. 

The  court  had  never  augured  well  of 
this  parliament.  "  The  elections,"  as 
lord  Northumberland  writes  to  lord  Lei- 
cester at  Paris  (Sidney  Papers,  ii.  641), 
"  that  are  generally  made  of  knights  and 
burgesses  in  this  kingdom,  give  us  cause 
to  fear  that  the  parliament  will  not  sit 
long  |  for  such  as  have  dependence  upon 
the  court  are  in  divers  places  refused, 
and  the  most  refractory  persons  chosen." 

There  are  some  strange  things  said  by 
Clarendon  of  the  ignorance  of  the  com- 
mons as  to  the  value  of  twelve  subsidies, 
which  Hume,  who  loves  to  depreciate  the 
knowledge  of  former  times,  implicitly 
copies.  But  they  cannot  be  true  of  that 
enlightened  body,  whatever  blunders  one 
or  two  individuals  might  commit.  The 
rate  at  which  every  man's  estate  was 
assessed  -to  a  subsidy  was  perfectly  noto- 
rious; and  the  burden  of  twelve  sub- 
sidies, to  be  paid  in  three  years,  was  more 
than  the  charge  of  ship-money  they  had 
been  enduring. 


CHA  I.  — 1629-40.  JUDGMENT  AGAINST  MR.  HAMPDEN.   4§3 

rageous  expression),  they  sufficiently  manifested  a  determi- 
nation not  to  leave  their  grievances  unredressed.  Petitions 
against  the  manifold  abuses  in  church  and  state  covered  their 
table  ;  Pym,  Rudyard,  Waller,  lord  Digby,  and  others  more 
conspicuous  afterwards,  excited  them  by  vigorous  speeches ; 
they  appointed  a  committee  to  confer  with  the  lords,  accord- 
ing to  some  precedents  of  the  last  reign,  on  a  long  list  of 
grievances,  divided  into  ecclesiastical  innovations,  infringe- 
ments of  the  propriety  of  goods,  and  breaches  of  the  privi- 
lege of  parliament.  -They  voted  a  request  of  the  peers, 
who,  Clarendon  says,  were  more  entirely  at  the  king's  dis- 
posal, that  they  would  begin  with  the  business  of  supply,  and 
not  proceed  to  debate  on  grievances  till  afterwards,  to  be  a 
high  breach  of  privilege.1  There  is  not  the  smallest  reason 
to  doubt  that  they  would  have  insisted  on  redress  in  all  those 
particulars  with  at  least  as  much  zeal  as  any  former  parlia- 
ment, and  that  the  king,  after  obtaining  his  subsidies,  would 
have  put  an  end  to  their  remonstrances,  as  he  had  done  be- 
fore.2 In  order  to  obtain  the  supply  he  demanded,  namely, 
twelve  subsidies,  to  be  paid  in  three  years,  which,  though 
unusual,  was  certainly  not"  beyond  his  exigencies,  he  of- 
fered to  release  his  claim  to  ship-money  in  any  manner  they 
should  point  out.  But  this  the  commons  indignantly  re- 
pelled. They  deemed  ship-money  the  great  crime  of  his 
administration,  and  the  judgment  against  Mr.  Hampden  the 
infamy  of  those  who  pronounced  it.  Till  that  judgment 
should  be  annulled,  and  those  judges  punished,  the  national 
liberties  must  be  as  precarious  as  ever.  Even  if  they  could 
hear  of  a  compromise  with  so  flagrant  a  breach  of  the  con- 
stitution, and  of  purchasing  their  undoubted  rights,  the  doc- 
trine asserted  in  Mr.  Hampden's  case  by  the  crown  lawyers, 
and  adopted  by  some  of  the  judges,  rendered  all  stipulations 
nugatory.  The  right  of  taxation  had  been  claimed  as  an  ab- 
solute prerogative  so  inherent  in  the  crown  that  no  act  of 
parliament  could  take  it  away.  All  former  statutes,  down  to 
the  Petition  of  Right,  had  been  prostrated  at  the  foot  of  the 
throne ;  by  what  new  compact  were  the  present  parliament 
to  give  a  sanctity  more  inviolable  to  their  own  ?  8 

It  will  be  in  the  recollection  of  my  readers  that,  while  the 

1  Journals.    Parl.  Hist.    Nalson.  Clar-    "  parliaments  are  like  cats :    they  grow 
endon.  curnt  with  age." 

a  The  king  had  long  before  said  that        8  See  Mr.  Waller's  speecn  on  Crawley'B 

impeachment.     Nalson,  ii.  368. 


494  THE  TWELVE  SUBSIDIES.  CHAP.  VIIL 

commons  were  deliberating  whether  to  promise  any  supply 
before  the  redress  of  grievances,  and  in  what  measure,  sir 
Henry  Vane,  the  secretary,  told  them  that  the  king  would 
accept  nothing  less  than  the  twelve  subsidies  he  had  required  ; 
in  consequence  of  which  the  parliament  was  dissolved  next 
day.  Clarendon,  followed  by  several  others,  has  imputed 
treachery  in  this  to  Vane,  and  told  us  that  the  king  regretted 
so  much  what  he  had  done,  that  he  wished,  had  it  been  prac- 
ticable, to  recall  the  parliament  after  its  dissolution.  This  is 
confirmed,  as  to  Vane,  by  the  queen  herself,  in  that  interest- 
ing narrative  which  she  communicated  to  madame  de  Motte- 
ville.1  Were  it  not  for  such  authorities,  seemingly  inde- 
pendent of  each  other,  yet  entirely  tallying,  I  should  have 
deemed  it  more  probable  that  Vane,  with  whom  the  solicitor- 
general  Herbert  had  concurred,  acted  solely  by  the  king's 
command.  Charles,  who  feared  and  hated  all  parliaments, 
had  not  acquiesced  in  the  scheme  of  calling  the  present  till 
there  was  no  other  alternative  ;  an  insufficient  supply  would 
have  left  him  in  a  more  difficult  situation  than  before  as  to 
the  use  of  those  extraordinary  means,  as  they  were  called, 
which  his  disposition  led  him  to  prefer:  the  intention  to 
assail  parts  of  his  administration  more  dear  to  him  than  ship- 

i  Mem.  de  Mottevffle,  i.  238-278.     P.  ords  ;  and  he  admits  himself  that  they 

Orleans,  Rev.  de  1'Angleterre,  tome  iii.,  were  resolute  against  granting  subsidies 

Bays  the  same  of  Vane  ;  but  his  testimony  as  a  consideration  for  the  abandonment 

may  resolve  itself  into  the  former.    It  is  of  that  grievance.     Besides.  Hyde  him- 

to  be  observed  that  ship-money,  which  self  not  only  jnvcighs  most  severely  in, 

the  king  offered  to  relinquish,  brought  in  his  History  against  ship-money,  but  was 

200,OOW.  a  year,  and  that  the  proposed  himself  one  of  the  managers  of  the  iin- 

tvvelve  subsidies  would  have  amounted,  peachment  against  six  judges  for  their 

at  most,  to  840.00(M.,  to  be  paid  in  three  conduct  in  regard  to  it;  and  his  speech 

years.      Is  it  surprising  that,  when  the  before  the  house  of  lords  on  that  occa- 

hou?e  displayed  an  intention  not  to  grant  sion  is  extant.   Rushw.  Abr.  ii.  477.    But 

the  whole  of  this,  as  appears  by  Claren-  this  is  merely  one  instance  of  his  eternal 

don's  own  story,  the  king  and  his  advis-  inconsistency. 

ers  should  have  thought  it  better  to  break  "  It  seems  that  the  lord-lieutenant  of 
off  altogether?  I  see  no  reason  for  im-  Ireland  wished  from  the  beginning  that 
puting  treachery  to  Vane,  even  if  he  did  matters  should  thus  be  driven  to  the 
not  act  merely  by  the  king's  direction,  utmost.  For  he  wished  the  king  to  insist 
Clarendon  says  he  and  Herbert  persuaded  on  a  grant  of  money  before  any  progress 
the  king  that  the  house  "  would  pass  should  he  made  in  the  removal  of  the 
such  a  vote  against  ship-money  as  would  abuses  which  had  grown  up — a  proceed- 
blast  that  revenue  and  other  branches  of  ing  at  variance  with  that  of  the  preceding 
the  receipt ;  which  others  believed  they  parliament.  No  less  did  he  vote  for  the 
would  not  have  the  confidence  to  have  violent  measure  of  demanding  twelve 
attempted,  and  very  few  that  they  would  subsidies,  only  five  at  the  utmost  having 
have  had  the  credit  to  have  compassed."  been  previously  granted.  He  either  en- 
P.  245.  The  word  they  is  as  inaccurate  tertained.  the  view  of  thus  gaining  con- 
as  is  commonly  the  case  with  this  writer's  sideration  with  the  king,  or  of  moving 
language.  But  does  he  mean  that  the  him  to  an  alliance  with  the  Spaniards, 
/louse  would  not  have  passed  a  vote  in  whose  confidence  he  is."  Montreuil's 
against  ship-money  t  They  had  already  despatches,  iii  Raumer,  ii.  308 
entered  on  the  subject,  and  sent  for  rec- 


CHA.  I.  — 1629-40.      DISSOLUTION  OF  PARLIAMENT.  495 

money,  and  especially  the  ecclesiastical  novelties,  was  ap- 
parent. Nor  can  we  easily  give  him  credit  for  this  alleged 
regret  at  the  step  he  had  taken,  when  we  read  the  declaration 
he  put  forth,  charging  the  commons  with  entering  on  exam- 
ination of  his  government  in  an  insolent  and  audacious  man- 
ner, traducing  his  administration  of  justice,  rendering  odious 
his  officers  and  ministers  of  state,  and  introducing  a  way  of 
bargaining  and  contracting  with  the  king,  as  if  nothing  ought 
to  be  given  him  by  them  but  what  he  should  purchase,  either 
by  quitting  somewhat  of  his  royal  prerogative,  or  by  dimin- 
ishing and  lessening  his  revenue.1  The  unconstitutional 
practice  of  committing  to  prison  some  of  the  most  prominent 
members,  and  searching  their  houses  for  papers,  was  re- 
newed. And  having  broken  loose  again  from  the  restraints 
of  law,  the  king's  sanguine  temper  looked  to  such  a  triumph 
over  the  Scots  in  the  coming  campaign  as  no  prudent  man 
could  think  probable. 

This  dissolution  of  parliament  in  May,  1640,  appears  to 
have  been  a  very  fatal  crisis  for  the  king's  popularity.  Those 
who,  with  the  loyalty  natural  to  Englishmen,  had  willingly 
ascribed  his  previous  misgovernment  to  evil  counsels,  could 
not  any  longer  avoid  perceiving  his  mortal  antipathy  to  any 
parliament  that  should  not  be  as  subservient  as  the  cortes  of 
Castile.  The  necessity  of  some  great  change  became  the 
common  theme.  "  It  is  impossible,"  says  lord  Northumber- 
land, at  that  time  a  courtier,  "  that  things  can  long  continue 
in  the  condition  they  are  now  in ;  so  general  a  defection  in 
this  kingdom  hath  not  been  known  in  the  memory  of  any  ! "  a 
Several  of  those  who  thought  most  deeply  on  public  affairs 
now  entered  into  a  private  communication  with  the  Scots  in- 
surgents. It  seems  probable,  from  the  well-known  story  of 
lord  Saville's  forged  letter,  that  there  had  been  very  little 
connection  of  this  kind  until  the  present  summer.8  And  we 
may  conjecture  that,  during  this  ominous  interval,  those  great 
projects  which  were  displayed  in  the  next  session  acquired 
consistence  and  ripeness  by  secret  discussions  in  the  houses 
of  the  earl  of  Bedford  and  lord  Say.  The  king  meanwhile 

1  Parl.  Hist.    Rash  worth.    Nalson.  ticularly  by  the  earl  of  Manchester,  In 

a  June  4,  1640.    Sidney  Papers,  ii.  654.  his  unpublished  Memorials,  from  which 

»  A  late  writer  has  spoken  of  this  cele-  Nalson    has    made   extracts  ;    and   who 

brated  letter  as  resting  on  very  question-  could  neither  be  mistaken  nor  have  any 

able  authority.    J.ingard,  x.  43.    It  is,  apparent  motive,  in  this  private  narra- 

however,  mentioned  as  a  known  fact  by  tive,  to  deceive.    Nalson,  U.  42 1. 
several  contemporary  writers,  and  par- 


496  COUNCIL  OF  YORK.  CHAP.  VIII 

experienced  aggravated  misfortune  and  ignominy  in  his  mili- 
tary operations.  Ship-money  indeed  was  enforced  with 
greater  rigor  than  before,  several  sheriffs  and  the  lord  mayor 
of  London  being  prosecuted  in  the  star-chamber  for  neglect- 
ing to  levy  it.  Some  citizens  were  imprisoned  for  refusing  a 
loan.  A  new  imposition  was  laid  on  the  counties,  under  the 
name  of  coat-and-conduct-money,  for  clothing  and  defraying 
the  travelling  charges  of  the  new  levies.1  A  state  of  actual 
invasion,  the  Scots  having  passed  the  Tweed,  might  excuse 
some  of  these  irregularities,  if  it  could  have  been  forgotten 
that  the  war  itself  was  produced  by  the  king's  impolicy,  and 
if  the  nation  had  not  been  prone  to  see  friends  and  deliverers 
rather  than  enemies  in  the  Scottish  army.  They  were,  at 
the  best  indeed,  troublesome  and  expensive  guests  to  the 
northern  counties  which  they  occupied ;  but  the  cost  of  their 
visit  was  justly  laid  at  the  king's  door.  Various  arbitrary 
resources  having  been  suggested  in  the  council,  and  aban- 
doned as  inefficient  and  impracticable  —  such  as  the  seizing 
the  merchants'  bullion  in  the  Mint,  or  issuing  a  debased  coin 
—  the  unhappy  king  adopted  the  hopeless  scheme  of  conven- 
Councii  of  ing  a  great  council  of  all  the  peers  at  York,  as  the 
York.  oniy  alternative  of  a  parliament.2  It  was  foreseen 

that  this  assembly  would  only  advise  the  king  to  meet  his  peo- 
ple in  a  legal  way.  The  public  voice  could  no  longer  be  sup- 
pressed. The  citizens  of  London  presented  a  petition  to  the 
king,  complaining  of  grievances,  and  asking  for  a  parliament. 
This  was  speedily  followed  by  one  signed  by  twelve  peers  of 
Convocation  popular  character.8  The  lords  assembled  at  York 
of  the  long  almost  unanimously  concurred  in  the  same  advice, 
to  which  the  king,  after  some  hesitation,  gave  his 
assent.  They  had  more  difficulty  in  bringing  about  a  settle- 

1  Rymer,  xx.  432.      Rushworth,  Abr.  had  partly  forgotten,  partly  never  known, 
lii.163,  &c.    Nalson,  i.  389,  &c.    Kaumer,  the  state  of  England  before  the  opening 
ii  318.  of  the  long  parliament.     In  fact,  the  dis- 

2  Lord  Clarendon  seems  not  to  have  affection,  or  at  least  discontent,  had  pro- 
well  understood  the  secret  of  this  great  ceeded  so  far  in  1640  that  no  human  skill 
council,  and  supposes  it  to  have  been  could  have  averted  a  great  part  of  the 
suggested  by  those  who  wished  for  a  par-  consequences.   But  Clarendon's  partiality 
liameut ;  whereas  the  Hardwicke  Papers  to  the  king,  and  to  some  of  his  advisers, 
show  the  contrary :    pp.   116   and   118.  leads  him  to  see  in  every  event  particular 
His  notions  about  the  facility  of  com-  causes,  or  an  overruling  destiny,  rather 
posing  the  public  discontent  are  strangely  than  the  sure  operation  of  impolicy  and 
mistaken.    -"Without  doubt,"  he  says,  misgovernment. 

"  that  fire  at  that  time,  which  did  shortly  <*  These  were  Hertford,  Bedford,  Essex, 

after  burn  the  whole    kingdom,  might  Warwick,  Paget,  Wharton,  Say,  Brook, 

have  bcon  covered  under  a  bushel."    But  Kimbolton,    Saville,    Mulgrave,    Boling- 

the  whole  of  this  introductory  book  of  broke.    Nalson,  436,  437- 
bis  History  abounds  with  proof*  that  he 


.  I.  — 1629-40.    CONVOCATION  OF  LONG  PARLIAMENT.  497 


ment  with  the  Scots :  the  English  army,  disaffected  and  un- 
disciplined, had  already  made  an  inglorious  retreat ;  and  even 
Strafford,  though  passionately  against  a  treaty,  did  not  venture 
to  advise  an  engagement.1  The  majority  of  the  peers,  how- 
ever, overruled  all  opposition ;  and  in  the  alarming  posture  of 
his  affairs,  Charles  had  no  resource  but  the  dishonorable  paci- 
fication of  Ripon.2  Anticipating  the  desertion  of  some  who 
had  partaken  in  his  councils,  and  conscious  that  others  would 
more  stand  in  need  of  his  support  than  be  capable  of  af- 
fording any,  he  awaited  in  fearful  suspense  the  meeting  of 
parliament. 


1  This  appears  from  the  minutes  of  the 
council  (Uardwicke  Papers),  and  contra- 
dicts the  common  opinion.    Lord  Con- 
way's  disaster  at  Newburn  was^toy  no 
means  surprising:    the  English  troops, 
who  had  been  lately  pressed  into  service, 
were    perfectly    mutinous ;    some    regi- 
ments had  risen  and  even  murdered  their 
officers  on  the  road.    Rymer,  414,  425. 

2  The  Hardwicke  State  Papers^  ii.  168, 
&c.,  contain  much  interesting  informa- 
tion about  the  council  of  York.    See  also 
the  Clarendon  Collection  for  some  curious 


letters,  with  marginal  notes  by  the  king 
In  one  of  these  he  says,  "The  mayov 
now,  with  the  city,  are  to  be  flattered* 
not  threatened."  P.  123.  Windebank 
writes  to  him  in  another  (Oct.  16, 1640) 
that  the  clerk  of  the  lower  house  of  par- 
liament had  come  to  demand  the  journal- 
book  of  the  last  assembly  and  some 
petitions,  which,  by  the  king's  command, 
he  ( Windebank)  had  taken  into  his  cus- 
tody, and  requests  to  know  if  they  should 
be  given  up.  Charles  writes  on  the  mar- 
gin— "  Ay,  by  all  means."  P.  132. 


VOL.  i. — a 


32 


498  CHARACTER  OF  LONG  PARLIAMENT.        CHAP.  IX- 


CHAPTER    IX. 

FROM   THE   MEETING    OF   THE    LONG    PARLIAMENT   TO   THE 
BEGINNING    OF   THE    CIVIL    WAR. 

Character  of  Long  Parliament  —  Its  salutary  Measures  —  Triennial  Bill  —  Other 
beneficial  Laws  —  Observations  —  Impeachment  of  Stratford  —  Discussion  of  its 


the  Militia  —  Historical  Sketch  of  Military  Force  in  England — Encroachments 
of  the  Parliament  —  Nineteen  Propositions  —  Discussion  of  the  respectiye  Claim  s 
of  the  two  Parties  to  Support  —  Faults  of  both. 

WE  are  now  arrived  at  that  momentous  period  in  our  his- 
tory which  no  Englishman   ever  regards  without 

CflJirfictcr          ,      •*  t    /*  *  t  •     i  •  i  • 

of  the  long  interest,  and  tew  without  prejudice ;  the  period 
ent'  from  which  the  factions  of  modern  times  trace  their 
divergence,  which,  after  the  lapse  of  almost  two  centuries, 
still  calls  forth  the  warm  emotions  of  party-spirit,  and  affords 
a  test  of  political  principles ;  at  that  famous  parliament,  the 
theme  of  so  much  eulogy  and  of  so  much  reproach ;  that 
synod  of  inflexible  patriots  with  some,  that  conclave  of  trai- 
torous rebels  with  others  ;  that  assembly,  we  may  more  truly 
say,  of  unequal  virtue  and  checkered  fame,  which,  after  hav- 
ing acquired  a  higher  claim  to  our  gratitude,  and  effected 
more  for  our  liberties,  than  any  that  had  gone  before  or  that 
has  followed,  ended  by  subverting  the  constitution  it  had 
strengthened,  and  by  sinking  in  its  decrepitude,  and  amidst 
public  contempt,  beneath  a  usurper  it  had  blindly  elevated 
its  salutary  to  power.  It  seems  agreeable  to  our  plan,  first  to 
measures.  bring  together  those  admirable  provisions  by  which 
this  parliament  restored  and  consolidated  the  shattered  fab-  ' 
ric  of  our  constitution,  before  we  advert  to  its  measures  of 
more  equivocal  benefit,  or  its  fatal  errors ;  an  arrangement 
not  very  remote  from  that  of -mere  chronology,  since  the  for- 
mer were  chiefly  completed  within  the  first  nine  months  of 
its  session,  before  the  king's  journey  to  Scotland  in  the  sum- 
mer of  1641. 


CHA.  I.  — 1640-42.     ITS  SALUTARY   MEASURES.  499 

It  must,  I  think,  be  admitted  by  every  one  who  concurs  in 
the  representation  given  in  this  work,  and  especially  in  the 
last  chapter,  of  the  practical  state  of  our  government,  that 
some  new  securities  of  a  more  powerful  efficacy  than  any 
which  the  existing  laws  held  forth  were  absolutely  indispen- 
sable for  the  preservation  of  English  liberties  and  privileges. 
These,  however  sacred  in  name,  however  venerable  by  pre- 
scription, had  been  so  repeatedly  transgressed,  that  to  obtain 
their  confirmation,  as  had  been  done  in  the  Petition  of  Right, 
and  that  as  the  price  of  large  subsidies,  would  but  expose  the 
commons  to  the  secret  derision  of  the  court.  The  king,  by 
levying  ship-money  in  contravention  of  his  assent  to  that 
petition,  and  by  other  marks  of  insincerity,  had  given  too 
just  cause  for  suspicion  that,  though  very  conscientious  in 
his  way,  he  had  a  fund  of  casuistry  at  command  that  would 
always  release  him  from  any  obligation  to  respect  the  laws. 
Again,  to  punish  delinquent  ministers  was  a  necessary  piece 
of  justice ;  but  who  could  expect  that  any  such  retribution 
would  deter  ambitious  and  intrepid  men  from  the  splendid 
lures  of  power?  Whoever,  therefore,  came  to  the  parlia- 
ment of  November,  1640,  with  serious  and  steady  purposes 
for  the  public  weal,  and  most,  I  believe,  except  mere  cour- 
tiers, entertained  such  purposes  according  to  the  measure  of 
their  capacities  and  energies,  must  have  looked  to  some  es- 
sential change  in  the  balance  of  government,  some  important 
limitations  of  royal  authority,  as  the  primary  object  of  his 
attendance. 

Nothing  could  be  more  obvious  than  that  the  excesses  of 
the  late  unhappy  times  had  chiefly  originated  in  the  long  in- 
termission of  parliaments.  No  lawyer  would  have  dared  to 
suggest  ship-money  with  the  terrors  of  a  house  of  commons 
before  his  eyes.  But  the  king's  known  resolution  to  govern 
without  parliaments  gave  bad  men  more  confidence  of  im- 
punity. This  resolution  was  not  likely  to  be  shaken  by  the 
unpalatable  chastisement  of  his  servants  and  redress  of 
abuses,  on  which  the  present  parliament  was  about  to  enter. 
A  statute  as  old  as  the  reign  of  Edward  IIL  had  already 
provided  that  parliaments  should  be  held  "  every  year,  or 
oftener  if  need  be."  l  But  this  enactment  had  in  no  age 

1  4  E.  3,  c.  14.  It  appears  by  the  holding  of  parliaments.  It  seems  to 
Journals,  30th  Dec.  1640,  that  the  trien-  have  been  altered  in  the  committee  ;  at 
nial  bill  was  originally  for  the  yearly  least  we  find  tne  title  changed,  Jan.  19. 


500  TRIENNIAL  BILL.  CHAP.  IX. 

been  respected.  It  was  certain  that,  in  the  present  temper  of 
the  administration,  a  law  simply  enacting  that  the  interval 
'  between  parliaments  should  never  exceed  three  years  would 
Triennial  prove  wholly  ineffectual.  In  the  famous  act  there- 
fore for  triennial  parliaments,  the  first  fruits  of 
the  commons'  laudable  zeal  for  reformation,  such  provisions 
were  introduced  as  grated  harshly  on  the  ears  of  those  who 
valued  the  royal  prerogative  above  the  liberties  of  the  sub- 
ject, but  without  which  the  act  itself  might  have  been  dis- 
pensed with.  Every  parliament  was  to  be  ipso  facto  dissolved 
at  the  expiration  of  three  years  from  the  first  day  of  its  ses- 
sion, unless  actually  sitting  at  the  time,  and  in  that  case  at  its 
first  adjournment  or  prorogation.  The  chancellor  or  keeper 
of  the  great  seal  was  to  be  sworn  to  issue  writs  for  a  new 
parliament  within  three  years  from  the  dissolution  of  the  last, 
under  pain  of  disability  to  hold  his  office,  and  further  pun- 
ishment :  in  case  of  his  failure  to  comply  with  this  provision, 
the  peers  were  enabled  and  enjoined  to  meet  at  Westminster, 
and  to  issue  writs  to  the  sheriffs  ;  the  sheriffs  themselves, 
should  the  peers  not  fulfil  this  duty,  were  to  cause  elections 
to  be  duly  made  ;  and,  in  their  default,  at  a  prescribed  time 
the  electors  themselves  were  to  proceed  to  choose  their  rep- 
resentatives. No  future  parliament  was  to  be  dissolved  or 
adjourned  without  its  own  consent  in  less  than  fifty  days 
from  the  opening  of*  its  session.  It  is  more  reasonable  to 
doubt  whether  even  these  provisions  would  have  afforded 
an  adequate  security  for  the  periodical  assembling  of  parlia- 
ment, whether  the  supine  and  courtier-like  character  of  the 
peers,  the  want  of  concert  and  energy  in  the  electors  them- 
selves, would  not  have  enabled  the  government  to  set  the 
statute  at  nought,  than  to  censure  them  as  derogatory  to  the 
reasonable  prerogative  and  dignity  of  the  crown.  To  this 
important  bill  the  king,  with  some  apparent  unwillingness, 
gave  his  assent.1  It  effected,  indeed,  a  strange  revolution  in 
the  system  of  his  government.  The  nation  set  a  due  value  on 
this  admirable  statute,  the  passing  of  which  they  welcomed 
with  bonfires  and  every  mark  of  joy. 

After  laying  this  solid  foundation  for  the  maintenance  of 
Beneficial  such  laws  as  they  might  deem  necessary,  the 
laws-  house  of  commons  proceeded  to  cut  away  the 

more  flagrant  and  recent  usurpations  of  the  crown.     They 

1  Parl.  Hist.  702,  717.    Stat.  16  Car.  I.,  c.  1. 


CHA.  I.  — 1640-42.          BENEFICIAL  LAWS.  501 

passed  a  bill  declaring  ship-money  illegal,  and  annulling  the 
judgment  of  the  exchequer  chamber  against  Mr.  Hampden.1 
They  put  an  end  to  another  contested  prerogative,  which, 
though  incapable  of  vindication  on  any  legal  authority,  had 
more  support  from  a  usage  of  fourscore  years  —  the  levying 
of  customs  on  merchandise.  In  an  act  granting  the  king 
tonnage  and  poundage  it  is  "  declared  and  enacted  that  it  is, 
and  hath  been,  the  ancient  right  of  the  subjects  of  this  realm, 
that  no  subsidy,  custom,  impost,  or  other  charge  whatsoever, 
ought  or  may  be  laid  or  imposed  upon  any  merchandise  ex- 
ported or  imported  by  subjects,  denizens,  or  aliens,  without 
common  consent  in  parliament." 2  This  is  the  last  statute 
that  has  been  found  necessary  to  restrain  the  crown  from 
arbitrary  taxation,  and  may  be  deemed  the  complement  of 
those  numerous  provisions  which  the  virtue  of  ancient  times 
had  extorted  from  the  first  and  third  Edwards. 

Yet  these  acts  were  hardly  so  indispensable,  nor  wrought 
so  essential  a  change  in  the  character  of  our  mon-  obserw- 
archy,  as  that  which  abolished  the  star-chamber. tions- 
Though  it  was  evident  how  little  the  statute  of  Henry  VII. 
could  bear  out  that  overweening  power  it  ha'd  since  arrogated, 
though  the  statute-book  and  parliamentary  records  of  the  best 
ages  were  irrefragable  testimonies  against  its  usurpations ; 
yet  the  course  of  precedents  under  the  Tudor  and  Stuart 
families  was  so  invariable  that  nothing  more  was  at  first  in- 
tended than  a  bill  to  regulate  that  tribunal.  A  suggestion, 
thrown  out,  as  Clarendon  informs  us,  by  one  not  at  all  con- 
nected with  the  more  ardent  reformers,  led  to  the  substitu- 
tion of  a  bill  for  taking  it  altogether  away.8  This  abrogates 

1  Stat.  16  Car.  I.,  c.  14.  Berkshire,  were  zealous  royalists  during 
*  G.  8.  The  king  had  professed,  In  the  subsequent  war.  Parl.  Hist.  722. 
lord-keeper  Finch's  speech  'on  opening  But  he  is  not,  I  presume,  the  person  to 
the  parliament  of  April,  1640,  that  he  whom  Clarendon  alludes.  This  author 
had  only  taken  tonnage  and  poundage  de  insinuates  that  the  act  for  taking  away 
facto,  without  claiming  it  as  a  right,  and  the  star-chamber  passed  both  houses 
had  caused  a  bill  to  be  prepared  grant-  without  sufficient  deliberation,  and  that 
ing  it  to  him  from  the  commencement  of  the  peers  did  not  venture  to  make  any 
bis  reign.  Parl.  Hist.  533.  See  preface  opposition  ;  whereas  there  were  two  con- 
to  Hargrave's  Collection  of  Law  Tracts,  ferences  between  the  houses  on  the  sub- 
p.  195,  and  Rymer,  xx.  118,  for  what  ject,  and  several  amendments  aud  pro- 
Charles  did  with  respect  to  impositions  visos  made  by  the  lords  and  agreed  to  by 
on  merchandise.  The  long  parliament  the  commons.  Scarce  any  bill,  during 
called  the  farmers  to  account.  this  session,  received  so  much  attention, 
s  16  Car.  I.  c.  10.  The  abolition  of  The  ki;ig  made  some  difficulty  about  as- 
the  star-chamber  was  first  moved,  March  senting  to  the  bills  taking  away  the  star- 
6th,  1641,  by  lord  Andover,  in  the  house  chamber  aud  high-commission  courts, 
of  lords,  to  which  he  had  been  called  by  but  soon  gave  way.  Parl.  Hist.  858 
Writ.  Both  he  and  his  father,  the  earl  of 


502  ABOLITION  OF  CHAP.  IX, 

all  exercise  of  jurisdiction,  properly  so  called,  whether  of  a 
civil  or  criminal  nature,  by  the  privy  council  as  well  as  the 
star-chamber.  The  power  of  examining  and  committing 
persons  charged  with  oifences  is  by  no  means  taken  away  ; 
but,  with  a  retrospect  to  the  language  held  by  the  judges  and 
crown  lawyers  in  gome  cases  that  have  been  mentioned,  it  is 
enacted,  that  every  person  committed  by  the  council  or  any 
of  them,  or  by  the  king's  special  command,  may  have  his 
writ  of  habeas  corpus ;  in  the  return  to  which  the  officer  in 
whose  custody  he  is  shall  certify  the  true  cause  of  his  com- 
mitment, which  the  court  from  whence  the  writ  has  issued 
shall  within  three  days  examine,  in  order  to  see  whether  the 
cause  thus  certified  appear  to  be  just  and  legal  or  not,  and  do 
justice  accordingly  by  delivering,  bailing,  or  remanding  the 
party.  Thus  fell  the  great  court  of  star-chamber,  and  with 
it  the  whole  irregular  and  arbitrary  practice  of  government, 
that  had  for  several  centuries  so  thwarted  the  operation  and 
obscured  the  light  of  our  free  constitution,  that  many  have 
been  prone  to  deny  the  existence  of  those  liberties  which 
they  found  so  often  infringed,  and  to  mistake  the  violations 
of  law  for  its  standard. 

With  the  court  of  star-chamber  perished  that  of  the  high- 
commission,  a  younger  birth  of  tyranny,  but  perhaps  even 
more  hateful,  from  'the  peculiar  irritation  of  the  times.  It 
had  stretched  its  authority  beyond  the  tenor  of  the  act  of 
Elizabeth  whereby  it  had  been  created,  and  which  limits  its 
competence  to  the  correction  of  ecclesiastical  offences  ac- 
cording to  the  known  boundaries  of  ecclesiastical  jurisdiction, 
assuming  a  right  not  only  to  imprison,  but  to  fine,  the  laity, 
which  was  generally  reckoned  illegal.1  The  statute  repealing 
that  of  Elizabeth,  under  which  the  high  commission  existed, 
proceeds  to  take  away  from  the  ecclesiastical  courts  all  power 
of  inflicting  temporal  penalties,  in  terms  so  large,  and  doubt- 
less not  inadvertently  employed,  as  to  render  their  juris- 
diction nugatory.  This  part  of  the  act  was.  repealed  after 
the  Restoration ;  and,  like  the  other  measures  of  that  time, 
with  little  care  to  prevent  the  recurrence  of  those  abuses 
which  had  provoked  its  enactments.2 

I  Coke  has  strongly  argued  the  ille-  Hams,  "  nothing  but  the  old  rusty  sword 

gality  of  fining  and  imprisoning  by  the  of  the  church,  excommunication."     Ca- 

high  commission  ;  4th  Inst.  324.    And  he  bala,  p.  103.    Care  was  taken  to  restore 

omitted  this  power  in  a  commission  he  this  authority  in  the  reign  of  Charles, 

drew,   "  leaving  us,"  says  bishop   Wil-  2  16  Car.  I.  c.  11. 


CHA.  I.  — 1640-42.     IRREGULAR  TRIBUNALS.  503 

A  single  clause  in  the  act  that  abolished  the  star-chamber 
was  sufficient  to  annihilate  the  arbitrary  jurisdiction  of  sev- 
eral other  irregular  tribunals,  grown  out  of  the  despotic 
temper  of  the  Tudor  dynasty:  —  the  court  of  the  president 
and  council  of  the  North,  long  obnoxious  to  the  common 
lawyers,  and  lately  the  sphere  of  Strafford's  tyrannical  ar- 
rogance;1 the  court  of  the  president  and  council  of  Wales 
and  the  Welsh  marches,  which  had  pretended,  as  before 
mentioned,  to  a  jurisdiction  over  the  adjacent  counties  of 
Salop,  Worcester,  Hereford,  and  Gloucester ;  with  those  of 
the  duchy  of  Lancaster  and  county  palatine  of  Chester. 
These,  under  various  pretexts,  had  usurped  so  extensive  a 
cognizance  as  to  deprive  one  third  of  England  of  the  privi- 
leges of  the  common  law.  The  jurisdiction,  however,  of  the 
two  latter  courts  in  matters  touching  the  king's  private  estate 
has  not  been  taken  away  by  the  statute.  Another  act  afford- 
ed remedy  for  some  abuses  in  the  stannary  courts  of  Corn- 
wall and  Devon.2  Others  retrenched  the  vexatious  prerog- 
ative of  purveyance,  and  took  away  that  of  compulsory 
knighthood.3  And  one  of  greater  importance  put  an  end  to 
a  fruitful  source  of  oppression  and  complaint  by  determining 
forever  the  extent  of  royal  forests,  according  to  their  boun- 
daries in  the  twentieth  year  of  James,  annulling  all  the 
perambulations  and  inquests  by  which  they  had  subsequently 
been  enlarged.4 

I  must  here  reckon,  among  the  beneficial  acts  of  this  par- 
liament, one  that  passed  some  months  afterwards,  after  the 
king's  return  from  Scotland,  and  perhaps  the  only  measure 
of  that  second  period  on  which  we  can  bestow  unmixed  com- 
mendation. The  delays  and  uncertainties  of  raising  troops 
by  voluntary  enlistment,  to  which  the  temper  of  the  English 
nation,  pacific  though  intrepid,  and  impatient  of  the  strict 
control  of  martial  law,  gave  small  encouragement,  had  led  to 
the  usage  of  pressing  soldiers  for  service,  whether  in  Ireland 
or  on  foreign  expeditions.  This  prerogative  seeming  dan- 
gerous and  oppressive,  as  well  as  of  dubious  legality,  it  is 

1  Hyde  distinguished  himself  as  chair-  however,  softened  a  little  what  he  did 

man  of  the  committee  which  brought  in  s&y  in  one  or  two  places  ;  as  where  he 

the  bill  for  abolishing  the  court  of  York,  uses  the  word  tyranny  in  speaking  of 

In  his  speech  on  presenting  this  to  the  lord  Mountnorris's  case, 

lords  he  alludes  to  the  tyranny  of  Straf-  2  C,  15. 

ford,  not  rudely,  but  in  a  style  hardly  .  19,  20. 

consistent    with    that    of   his    History.  «  16  Oar.  I.  c.  18. 
Part.  Hist.  766.     The  editors  of  this, 


504  IMPEESSMENT.  CHAP.  IX. 

recited  in  the  preamble  of  an  act  empowering  the  king  to 
levy  troops  by  this  compulsory  method  for  the  special  exi- 
gency of  the  Irish  rebellion,  that,  "  by  the  laws  of  this  realm, 
none  of  his  majesty's  subjects  ought  to  be  impressed  or  com- 
pelled to  go  out  of  his  country  to  serve  as  a  soldier  in  the 
wars,  except  in  case  of  necessity  of  the  sudden  coming  in  of 
strange  enemies  into  the  kingdom,  or  except  they  be  other- 
wise bound  by  the  tenure  of  their  lands  or  possessions."  * 
The  king,  in  a  speech  from  the  throne,  adverted  to  this 
bill  while  passing  through  the  houses,  as  an  invasion  of  his 
prerogative.  This  notice  of  a  parliamentary  proceeding  the 
commons  resented  as  a  breach  of  their  privilege  ;  and  having 
obtained  the  consent  of  the  lords  to  a  joint  remonstrance,  the 
king,  who  was  in  no  state  to  maintain  his  objection,  gave  his 
assent  to  the  bill.  In  the  reigns  of  Elizabeth  and  James  we 
have  seen  frequent  instances  of  the  crown's  interference  as 
to  matters  debated  in  parliament.  But  from  the  time  of  the 
long  parliament  the  law  of  privilege,  in  this  respect,  has 
stood  on  an  unshaken  basis.2 

These  are  the  principal  statutes  which  we  owe  to  this  par- 
liament. They  give  occasion  to  two  remarks  of  no  slight 
importance.  In  the  first  place,  it  will  appear,  on  comparing 
them  with  our  ancient  laws  and  history,  that  they  made 
scarce  any  material  change  in  our  constitution  such  as  it 
had  been  established  and  recognized  under  the  house  of 
Plantagenet :  the  law  for  triennial  parliaments  even  receded 
from  those  unrepealed  provisions  of  the  reign  of  Edward 
III.,  that  they  should  be  assembled  annually.  The  court 
of  star-chamber,  if  it  could  be  said  to  have  a  legal  jurisdic- 
tion at  all  which,  by  that  name  it  had  not,  traced  it  only  to 
the  Tudor  period  ;  its  recent  excesses  were  diametrically  op- 
posed to  the  existing  laws  and  the  protestations  of  ancient 
parliaments.  The  court  of  ecclesiastical  commission  waa 
an  offset  of  the  royal  supremacy,  established  at  the  Refor- 
mation. The  impositions  on  merchandise  were  both  plainly 
illegal,  and  of  no  long  usage.  That  of  ship-money  was  fla- 
grantly, and  by  universal  confession,  a  strain  of  arbitrary 
power  without  pretext  of  right.  Thus,  in  by  far  the  greater 

1  C.  28.  commons,  does  not  censure  their  explicit 

*  Journals,  16th  Dec.     Parl.  Hist.  968.  assertion  of  this  privilege.     He  lays  the 

Nalson,  750.    It  is  remarkable  that  Clar-  blame  of  the  king's  interference  on  St. 

endon,  who  is  sufficiently  jealous  of  all  John's  advice  j   which  is  very  improba* 

that  he  thought  encroachment  in   the  ble. 


CHA.  I.— 1640-42.      TRIENNIAL  PARLIAMENTS.  505 

part  of  the  enactments  of  1641,  the  monarchy  lost  nothing 
that  it  had  anciently  possessed;  and  the  balance  of  our 
constitution  might  seem  rather  to  have  been  restored  to  its 
former  equipoise  than  to  have  undergone  any  fresh  change. 

But  those  common  liberties  of  England  which  our  fore- 
fathers had,  with  such  commendable  perseverance,  extorted 
from  the  grasp  of  power,  though  by  no  means  so  merely 
theoretical  and  nugatory  in  effect  as  some  would  insinuate, 
were  yet  very  precarious  in  the  best  periods,  neither  well 
defined,  nor  exempt  from  anomalous  exceptions,  or  from  oc- 
casional infringements.  Some  of  them,  such  as  the  statute 
for  annual  sessions  of  parliament,  had  gone  into  disuse. 
Those  that  were  most  evident  could  not  be  enforced  ;  and  the 
new  tribunals  that,  whether  by  law  or  usurpation,  had  reared 
their  heads  over  the  people,  had  made  almost  all  public  and 
personal  rights  dependent  on  their  arbitrary  will.  It  was 
necessary,  therefore,  to  infuse  new  blood  into  the  languid 
frame,  and  so  to  renovate  our  ancient  constitution  that  the 
present  era  should  seem  almost  a  new  birth  of  liberty.  Such 
was  the  aim,  especially,  of  those  provisions  which  placed  the 
return  of  parliaments  at  fixed  intervals,  beyond  the  power  of 
the  crown  to  elude.  It  was  hoped  that  by  their  means,  so 
long  as  a  sense  of  public  spirit  should  exist  in  the  nation 
(and  beyond  that  time  it  is  vain  to  think  of  liberty),  no 
prince,  however  able  and  ambitious,  could  be  free  from  re- 
straint for  more  than  three  years ;  an  interval  too  short  for 
the  completion  of  arbitrary  projects,  and  which  few  ministers 
would  venture  to  employ  in  such  a  manner  as  might  expose 
them  to  the  wrath  of  parliament. 

It  is  to  be  observed,  in  the  second  place,  that  by  these 
salutary  restrictions,  and  some  new  retrenchments  of  per- 
nicious or  abused  prerogative,  the  long  parliament  formed 
our  constitution  such  nearly  as  it  now  exists.  Laws  of  great 
importance  were  doubtless  enacted  in  subsequent  times,  par- 
ticularly at  the  Revolution ;  but  none  of  them,  perhaps,  were 
strictly  necessary  for  the  preservation  of  our  civil  and  politi- 
cal privileges;  and  it  is  rather  from  1641  than  any  other 
epoch,  that  we  may  date  their  full  legal  establishment.  That 
single  statute  which  abolished  the  star-chamber  gave  every 
man  a  security  which  no  other  enactments  could  have  af- 
forded, and  which  no  government  could  essentially  impair. 


506  CHARACTER  OF  LONG  PARLIAMENT.      CHAP.  EX. 

Though  the  reigns  of  the  two  latter  Stuarts,  accordingly,  are 
justly  obnoxious,  and  were  marked  by  several  illegal  meas- 
ures, yet,  whether  we  consider  the  number  and  magnitude  of 
their  transgressions  of  law,  or  the  practical  oppression  of 
their  government,  these  princes  fell  very  short  of  the  des- 
potism that  had  been  exercised,  either  under  the  Tudors  or 
the  two  first  of  their  own  family. 

From  this  survey  of  the  good  works  of  the  long  parlia- 
ment we  must  turn  our  eyes  with  equal  indifference  to  the 
opposite  picture  of  its  errors  and  offences ;  faults  which, 
though  the  mischiefs  they  produced  were  chiefly  temporary, 
have  yet  served  to  obliterate  from  the  recollection  of  too 
many  the  permanent  blessings  we  have  inherited  through  its 
exertions.  In  reflecting  on  the  events  which  so  soon  clouded 
a  scene  of  glory,  we  ought  to  learn  the  dangers  that  attend 
all  revolutionary  crises,  however  justifiable  or  necessary ; 
and  that,  even  when  posterity  may  have  cause  to  rejoice  in 
the  ultimate  result,  the  existing  generation  are  seldom  com- 
pensated for  their  present  loss  of  tranquillity.  The  very 
enemies  of  this  parliament  confess  that  they  met  in  Novem- 
ber 1640  with  almost  unmingled  zeal  for  the  public  good, 
and  with  loyal  attachment  to  the  crown.  They  were  the 
chosen  representatives  of  the  commons  of  England,  in  an 
age  more  eminent  for  steady  and  scrupulous  conscientious- 
ness in  private  life  than  any,  perhaps,  that  had  gone  before 
or  has  followed ;  not  the  demagogues  or  adventurers  of 
transient  popularity,  but  men  well-born  and  wealthy,  than 
whom  there  could  perhaps  never  be  assembled,  five  hundred 
more  adequate  to  redress  the  grievances,  or  to  fix  the  laws, 
of  a  great  nation.  But  they  were  misled  by  the  excess 
of  two  passions,  both  just  and  natural  in  the  circumstances 
wherein  they  found  themselves,  resentment  and  distrust ; 
passions  eminently  contagious,  and  irresistible  when  they 
seize  on  the  zeal  and  credulity  of  a  popular  assembly.  The 
one  betrayed  them  into  a  measure  certainly  severe  and 
sanguinary,  and  in  the  eyes  of  posterity  exposed  to  greater 
reproach  than  it  deserved,  the  attainder  of  lord  Strafford, 
and  some  other  proceedings  of  too  much  violence  ;  the  other 
gave  a  color  to  all  their  resolutions,  and  aggravated  their 
differences  with  the  king  till  there  remained  no  other  arbi- 
trator but  the  sword. 


CHA.  I.  -  1640-42.    IMPEACHMENT  OF  STKAFFORD.  507 

Those  who  know  the  conduct  and  character  of  the  earl 
of  Strafford,  his  abuse  of  power  in  the  North,  his  Impeach. 
far  more  outrageous  trangressions  in  Ireland,  his  ment  of 
dangerous  influence  over  the  king's  counsels,  can-  strafford- 
not  hesitate  to  admit,  if  indeed  they  profess  any  regard  to 
the*  constitution  of  this  kingdom,  that  to  bring  so  great  a 
delinquent  to  justice  according  to  the  known  process  of  law 
was  among  the  primary  duties  of  the  new  parliament.  It 
was  that  which  all,  with  scarce  an  exception  but  among  his 
own  creatures  (for  most  of  the  court  were  openly  or  in 
secret  his  enemies  *),  ardently  desired ;  yet  which  the  king's 
favor  and  his  own  commanding  genius  must  have  rendered 
a  doubtful  enterprise.  He  came  to  London,  not  unconscious 
of  the  danger,  by  his  master's  direct  injunctions.  The  first 
days  of  the  session  were  critical ;  and  any  vacillation  or 
delay  in  the  commons  might  probably  have  given  time  for 
some  strong  exertion  of  power  to  frustrate  their  designs. 
We  must  therefore  consider  the  bold  suggestion  of  Pym,  to 
carry  up  to  the  lords  an  impeachment  for  high  treason 
against  Strafford,  not  only  as  a  master-stroke  of  that  policy 
which  is  fittest  for  revolutions,  but  as  justifiable  by  the 
circumstances  wherein  they  stood.  Nothing  short  of  a  com- 
mitment to  the  Tower  would  have  broken  the  spell  that  so 
many  years  of  arbitrary  dominion  had  been  working.  It 
was  dissipated  in  the  instant  that  the  people  saw  him  in 
the  hands  of  the  usher  of  the  black  rod :  and  with  his  power 
fell  also  that  of  his  master ;  so  that  Charles,  from  the  very 
hour  of  Strafford's  impeachment,  never  once  ventured  to 
resume  the  high  tone  of  command  congenial  to  his  disposi- 
tion, or  to  speak  to  the  commons  but  as  one  complaining  of  a 
superior  force.2 


ter   to  L/eicescer,  J.NOV.  10,  low  ^laney    myn,  newcusue,  »nu  tTa.ii.er  luuuuigue. 
Papers,  ii.  663),  "  was  never  contracted        2  Clarendon,  i.  305.     No  one  opposed 
by  any  person  than  he  has  drawn  upon    the  resolution  to  impeach  the  lord-lieu- 


508 


DISCUSSION  OF  THE  JUSTICE 


CHAP.  IX. 


The  articles  of  Strafford's  impeachment  relate  principally 
Discussion  *°  n^s  conduct  in  Ireland.  For  though  he  had 
of  its  jus-  begun  to  act  with  violence  in  the  court  of  York,  as 
lord-president  of  the  North,  and  was  charged  with 
having  procured  a  commission  investing  him  with  exorbitant 
power,  yet  he  had  too  soon  left  that  sphere  of  dominion  for 
the  lieutenancy  of  Ireland  to  give  any  wide  scope  for  prose- 
cution. But  in  Ireland  it  was  sufficiently  proved  that  he  had 
arrogated  an  authority  beyond  what  the  crown  had  ever  law- 
fully enjoyed,  and  even  beyond  the  example  of  former  vice- 
roys of  that  island,  where  the  disordered  state  of  society,  the 
frequency  of  rebellions,  and  the  distance  from  all  control,  had 
given  rise  to  such  a  series  of  arbitrary  precedents  as  would 
have  almost  excused  any  ordinary  stretch  of  power.1  Not- 


information  as  to  this  period,  and  for 
several  subsequent  years.  Baillie  was 
one  of  the  Scots  commissioners  deputed 
to  London  at  the  end  of  1640,  and  took 
an  active  share  in  promoting  the  destruc- 
tion of  episcopacy.  His  correspondence 
breathes  all  the  narrow  and  exclusive 
bigotry  of  the  presbyterian  school.  The 
following  passage  is  so  interesting,  that, 
notwithstanding  its  length,  it  may  find  a 
place  here :  — 

*'  The  lieutenant  of  Ireland  came  but 
on  Monday  to  town  late,  on  Tuesday 
rested,  on  Wednesday  came  to  parliament, 
but  ere  night  he  was  caged.  Intolerable 
pride  and  oppression  cries  to  heaven  for 
a  vengeance.  The  lower  house  closed 
their  doors;  the  speaker  kept  the  keys 
till  his  accusation  was  concluded.  There- 
after Mr.  Pym  went  up,  with  a  number 
at  his  back,  to  the  higher  house  ;  and,  in 
»  pretty  short  speech,  did,  in  the  name  of 
che  lower  house,  and  in  the  name  of  the 
commons  of  all  England,  accuse  Thomas 
earl  of  Strafford,  lord-lieutenant  of  Ire- 
land, of  high  treason  ;  and  required  his 
person  to  be  arrested  till  probation  might 
be  heard ;  BO  Mr.  Pym  and  his  back  were 
removed.  The  lords  began  to  consult 
on  that  strange  and  unexpected  motion. 
The  word  goes  in  haste  to  the  lord-lieu- 
tenant, where  he  was  with  the  king ;  with 
speed  he  comes  to  the  house ;  he  calls 
rudely  at  the  door;  James  Maxwell, 
keeper  of  the  black  rod,  opens :  his  lord- 
ship, with  a  proud  glooming  countenance, 
makes  towards  his  place  at  the  board 
head  :  but  at  once  many  bid  him  void 
the  house ;  so  he  is  forced,  in  confusion, 
to  go  to  the  door  till  he  was  called.  After 
consultation,  being  called  in,  he  stands, 
but  is  commanded  to  kneel,  and  on  his 
knees  to  hear  the  sentence.  Being  ou 


his  knees,  he  is  delivered  to  the  keeper  of 
the  black  rod,  to  be  prisoner  till  he  was 
cleared  of  these  crimes  the  house  of  com- 
mons had  charged  him  with.  He  offered 
to  speak,  but  was  commanded  to  be  gone 
without  a  word.  In  the  outer  room, 
James  Maxwell  required  him,  as  prisoner, 
•to  deliver  his  sword.  When  he  had  got 
it,  he  cries  with  a  loud  voice  for  his  man 
to  carry  my  lord-lieu  tenant's  sword.  This 
done,  he  makes  through  a  number  of 
people  towards  his  coach  ;  all  gazing,  no 
man  capping  to  him,  before  whom,  that 
morning,  the  greatest  of  England  would 
have  stood  uncovered,  all  crying,  '  What 
is  the  matter  ?  '  He  said,  '  A  small  mat- 
ter, I  warrant  you.'  They  replied,  '  Yes, 
indeed,  high-treason  is  a  small  matter.' 
Coming  to  the  place  where  he  expected 
his  coach,  it  was  not  there ;  so  he  behoved 
to  return  that  same  way,  through  a  world 
of  gazing  people.  When  at  last  he  had 
found  his  coach,  and  was  entering,  James 
Maxwell  told  him,  '  Your  lordship  is  my 
prisoner,  and  must  go  in  my  coach ; '  and 
so  he  behoved  to  do."  P.  217. 

i  The  trial  of  Strafford  is  best  to  be 
read  in  Rush  worth  or  Nalson.  The  ac- 
count in  the  new  edition  of  the  State 
Trials,  I  know  not  whence  taken,  is 
curious,  as  coming  from  an  eye-witness, 
though  very  partial  to  the  prisoner  ;  but 
it  can  hardly  be  so  accurate  as  the  others. 
His  famous  peroration  was  printed  at  the 
time  in  a  looso  sheet.  It  is  in  the  Seiners 
Tracts.  Many  of  the  charges  seem  to 
have  been  sufficiently  proved,  and  would 
undoubtedly  justify  a  severe  sentence  on 
an  impeachment  for  misdemeanors.  It 
was  not  pretended  by  the  managers  that 
more  than  two  or  three  of  them  amount' 
ed  to  treason  ;  but  it  is  the  unquestion- 
able right  of  the  commons  to  blend  of- 


CHA.  L  — 1640-42.    OF  STRATFORD'S  IMPEACHMENT. 


509 


withstanding  thi«,  however,  when  the  managers  came  to  state 
and  substantiate  their  articles  of  accusation,  though  some  were 
satisfied  that  there  was  enough  to  warrant  the  severest  judg- 
ment, yet  it  appeared  to  many  dispassionate  men  that,  even 
supposing  the  evidence  as  to  all  of  them  to  be  legally  convinc- 
ing, they  could  not,  except  through  a  dangerous  latitude  of 
construction,  be  aggravated  into  treason.  The  law  of  Eng- 
land is  silent  as  to  conspiracies  against  itself.  St.  John  and 
Maynard  struggled  in  vain  to  prove  that  a  scheme  to  over- 
turn the  fundamental  laws  and  to  govern  by  a  standing  army, 
though  as  infamous  as  any  treason,  could  be  brought  within 
the  words  of  the  statute  of  Edward  III.,  as  a  compassing  of 
the  king's  death.  Nor,  in  fact,  was  there  any  conclusive  evi- 
dence against  Strafford  of  such  a  design.  The  famous  words 
imputed  to  him  by  sir  Henry  Vane,  though  there  can  be  little 
reason  to  question  that  some  such  were  spoken,  seem  too  im- 
perfectly reported,1  as  well  as  uttered  too  much  in  the  heat 
of  passion,  to  furnish  a  substantive  accusation ;  and  I  should 
rather  found  my  conviction  of  Strafford's  systematic  hostility 
to  our  fundamental  laws  on  his  correspondence  since  brought 
to  light,  as  well  as  on  his  general  conduct  in  administration, 
than  on  any  overt  acts  proved  on  his  impeachment.  The 
presumption  of  history,  to  whose  mirror  the  scattered  rays  of 
moral  evidence  converge,  may  be  irresistible,  when  the  legal 
inference  from  insulated  actions  is  not  only  technically,  but 


fences  of  a  different  degree  in  an  im- 
peachment. 

It  has  been  usually  said  that  the  com- 
mons had  recourse  to  the  bill  of  attainder 
because  they  found  it  impossible  to  sup- 
port the  impeachment  for  treason.  But 
St.  John  positively  denies  that  it  was 
intended  to  avoid  the  judicial  mode  of 
proceeding.  Nalson,  ii.  162.  And,  what 
is  stronger,  the  lords  themselves  voted 
upon  the  articles  judicially,  and  not  as 
if  they  were  enacting  a  legislative  meas- 
ure. As  to  the  famous  proviso  in  the 
bill  of  attainder,  that  the  judges  should 
determine  nothing  to  be  treason  by 
virtue  of  this  bill  which  they  would  not 
have  determined  to  be  treason  otherwise 
(on  which  Hume  and  many  others  have 
relied  to  show  the  consciousness  of  par- 
liament that  the  measure  was  not  war- 
ranted by  the  existing  law),  it  seoras  to 
have  been  introduced  in  order  to  quiet 
the  apprehensions  of  some  among  the 
peers,  who  had  gone  great  lengths  with 
the  late  government,  and  were  astonished 


to  find  that  their  obedience  to  the  king 
could  be  turned  into  treason  against 
him. 

1  They  were  confirmed,  in  a  consider- 
able degree,  by  the  evidence  of  Northum- 
berland and  Bristol,  and  even  of  Usher 
and  Juxon,  Rushw.  Abr.  iv.  455,  659, 
686 ;  Baillie,  284.  But  are  they  not  al=o 
exactly  according  to  the  principles  always 
aTOwed  and  acted  upon  by  that  minister, 
and  by  the  whole  phalanx  of  courtiers, 
that  a  king  of  England  does  very  well  to 
ask  his  people's  consent  in  the  first  in- 
stance, but,  if  that  is  frowardly  refused, 
he  has  a  paramount  right  to  maintain 
his  government  by  any  means  ? 

It  may  be  remarked  that  Clarendon 
says  "  the  law  was  clear  that  less  than 
two  witnesses  ought  not  to  be  received 
in  a  case  of  treason."  Yet  I  doubt 
whether  any  one  had  been  allowed  the 
benefit  of  that  law  ;  and  the  contrary 
had  been  asserted  repeatedly  by  UM 
judges. 


510  DISCUSSION  OF  THE  JUSTICE  CHAP.  IX. 

substantially,  inconclusive.  Yet  we  are  not  to  suppose  that 
the  charges  against  this  minister  appeared  so  evidently  to  fall 
short  of  high  treason,  according  to  the  apprehension  of  that 
age,  as  in  later  times  has  usually  been  taken  for  granted. 
Accustomed  to  the  unjust  verdicts  obtained  in  cases  of  trea- 
son by  the  court,  the  statute  of  Edward  having  been  perpet- 
ually stretched  by  constructive  interpretations,  neither  the 
people  nor  the  lawyers  annexed  a  definite  sense  to  that  crime. 
The  judges  themselves,  on  a  solemn  reference  by  the  house 
of  lords  for  theiropinion  whether  some  of  the  articles  charged 
against  Strafford  amounted  to  treason,  answered  unanimous- 
ly, that,  upon  all  which  their  lordships  had  voted  to  be 
proved,  it  was  their  opinion  the  earl  of  Strafford  did  deserve 
to  undergo  the  pains  and  penalties  of  high  treason  by  law.1 
And,  as  an  apology,  at  least,  for  this  judicial  opinion,  it  may 
be  remarked  that  the  fifteenth  article  of  the  impeachment, 
charging  him  with  raising  money  by  his  own  authority,  and 
quartering  troops  on  the  people  of  Ireland,  in  order  to  com- 
pel their  obedience  to  his  unlawful  requisitions  (upon  which, 
and  one  other  article,  not  on  the  whole  matter,  the  peers 
voted  him  guilty),  does,  in  fact,  approach  very  nearly,  if  we 
may  not  say  more,  to  a  substantive  treason  within  the  statute 
of  Edward  III.,  as  a  levying  war  against  the  king,  even  with- 
out reference  to  some  Irish  acts  of  parliament  upon  which 
the  managers  of  the  impeachment  relied.  It  cannot  be  ex- 
travagant to  assert  that,  if  the  colonel  of  a  regiment  were  to 
issue  an  order  commanding  the  inhabitants  of  the  district 
where  it  is  quartered  to  contribute  certain  sums  of  money, 
and  were  to  compel  the  payment  by  quartering  troops  on  the 
houses  of  those  who  refused,  in  a  general  and  systematic 
manner,  he  would,  according  to  a  warrantable  construction 
of  the  statutes,  be  guilty  of  the  treason  called  levying  war  on 
the  king ;  and  that,  if  we  could  imagine  him  to  do  this  by  an 
order  from  the  privy  council  or  the  war-office,  the  case  would 
not  be  at  all  altered.  On  the  other  hand,  a  single  act  of  such 

1  Lords'  Journals,  May  6 ;  "Parl.  Hist,  to  the  mouth  of  Williams.  Parr's  Life 
757-  This  ogjnion  of  the  judges,  which  of  Usher,  p.  45  ;  Racket's  Life  of  Wil- 
ls not  mentioned  by  Clarendon.  Hume,  Hams,  p.  160.  Juxon  is  said  to  have 
and  other  common  historians,  seems  to  stood  alone,  among  five  bishops,  in  ad- 
have  cost  Strafford  his  life.  It  was  relied  vising  the  king  to  follow  his  conscience, 
on  by  some  bishops,  especially  Usher,  Clarendon,  indeed,  does  not  mention  this, 
whom  Charles  consulted  whether  he  though  he  glances  at  Usher  with  some  re- 
ehould  pass  the  bill  of  attainder,  though  proach,  p.  451 ;  but  the  story  is  as  old  aa 
Clarendon  puts  much  worse  casuistry  in-  the  Icon  Uaciliku,  in  which  it  is  alluded  to 


CHA.  I.  — 1640-42.  OF  STRATFORD'S  IMPEACHMENT.    511 

violence  might  be  (in  technical  language)  trespass,  misde- 
meanor, or  felony,  according  to  circumstances;  but  would 
want  the  generality  which,  as  the  statute  has  been  construed, 
determines  its  character  to  be  treason.  It  is  however  mani- 
fest that  Stafford's  actual  enforcement  of  his  order,  by 
quartering  soldiers,  was  not  by  any  means  proved  to  be  so 
frequently  done  as  to  bring  it  within  the  line  of  treason ;  and 
the  evidence  is  also  open  to  every  sort  of  legal  objection. 
But  in  that  age  the  rules  of  evidence,  so  scrupulously  de- 
fined since,  were  either  very  imperfectly  recognized,  or  con 
tinually  transgressed.  If  then  Strafford  could  be  brought 
within  the  letter  of  the  law,  and  if  he  were  also  deserving  of 
death  for  his  misdeeds  towards  the  commonwealth,  it  might 
be  thought  enough  to  justify  his  condemnation,  although  he 
had  not  offended  against  what  seemed  to  be  the  spirit  and  in- 
tention of  the  statute.  This  should,  at  least,  restrain  us  from 
passing  an  unqualified  censure  on  those  who  voted  against 
him,  comprehending  undoubtedly  the  far  more  respectable 
portion  of  the  commons,  though  only  twenty-six  peers  against 
nineteen  formed  the  feeble  majority  on  the  bill  of  attainder,1 
It  may  be  observed  that  the  house  of  commons  acted  in  one 

1  The  names  of  the  fifty-nine  members  have  come  into  this.    But  the  sudden  and 

of  the  commons  who  voted  against  the  ill-timed  death  of  that  eminent  peer  put 

bill  of  attainder,  and  which  were  placarded  an  end  to  the  negotiation  for  bringing  the 

as  Strafibrdians,  may  be  found  in  the  parliamentary  leaders  into  office,  wherein 

Parliamentary  History  and  several  other  it  was  a  main  object  with  the  king  to 

books.    It  is  remarkable  that  few  of  them  save  the  life  of  Strafford  —  entirely,  as  I 

are  distinguished  persons,  none  so  much  am  inclined  to  believe,  from  motives  of 

so  as  Selden,  whose  whole  parliamentary  conscience  and  honor,  without  any  views 

career,  notwithstanding  the  timidity  not  of  ever  again  restoring  him  to  power, 

very  fairly  imputed  to  him,  was  eminently  Charles  had  no  personal  attachment  to 

honorable   and    independent.      But    we  Strafford  ;  and  the  queen's  dislike  of  him 

look  in  vain  for  Hyde,  Falkland,   Cole-  (according    to    Clarendon    and    Buruet, 

pepper,  or  Palmer.     The  first,  probably,  though  it  must  be  owned  that  Madame 

did  not  vote ;  the  others  may  have  been  de  Motteville  does  not  confirm  this),  or 

in  the  majority  of  204  by  whom  the  bill  at  least  his  general  unpopularity  at  court, 

was  passed ;  indeed,  I  have  seen  a  MS.  would  have  determined  the  king  to  lay 

account  of  the  debate,  where  Falkland  him  aside. 

and    Colepepper    appear    to    have    both        It  is  said  by  Burnet  that  the  queen 

spoken  for  it.    As  to  the  lords,  we  have,  prevailed  on  Charles  to  put  that  strange 

BO  far  as  I  know,  no  list  of  the  nineteen  postscript  to  his  letter  to  the  lords,  in  be- 

who  acquitted  Strafford.   It  does  not  com-  half  of  Strafford,  "  If  he  must  die,  it  were 

prehend  Hertford,   Bristol,  or  Holland,  charity  to  reprieve  him  till  Saturday  ;  " 

who  were  absent  (Nalson,  316),  nor  any  by  which  he  manifestly  surrendered  him 

of  the  popish  lords,  whether  through  fear  up,  and  gave  cause  to  suspect  his  own 

or  any  private  influence.     Lord  Clare,  his  sincerity.     Doubts  have  been  thrown  nut 

brother-in-law,  and  lord  Saville,  a  man  of  by  Carte  as  to  the  genuineness  of  Straf- 

the  most  changeable  character,  were  his  ford's    celebrated  letter    requesting    the 

prominent  advocates  during  the    trial ;  king  to  pass  the  bill  of  att:iindor.     They 

though  Bristol,  Hertford,  and  even  Say,  do  not  appear  to  be  founded  on  much 

desired    to    have    had    his    life    spared  evidence  ;  but  it  is  certain,  by  the  manner 

(Baillie,  243,  247,  271,  292) ;  and  the  earl  in  which  he  received  the  news,  that  he  did 

of  Bedford,  according  to  Clarendon,  would  not  expect  to  bo  sacrificed  by  his  master. 


512  DISCUSSION  OF  THE  JTJSTICE  CHAP.  IX. 

respect  with  a  generosity  which  the  crown  had  never  shown 
in  any  case  of  treason,  by  immediately  passing  a  bill  to  re- 
lieve his  children  from  the  penalties  of  forfeiture  and  corrup- 
tion of  blood. 

It  is  undoubtedly  a  very  important  problem  in  political 
ethics,  whether  great  offences  against  the  commonwealth  may 
not  justly  incur  the  penalty  of  death  by  a  retrospective  act 
of  the  legislature,  which  a  tribunal  restrained  by  known  laws 
is  not  competent  to  inflict.  Bills  of  attainder  had  been  by 
no  means  uncommon  in  England,  especially  under  Henry 
VIII. ;  but  generally  when  the  crime  charged  might  have 
been  equally  punished  by  law.  They  are  less  dangerous  than 
to  stretch  the  boundaries  of  a  statute  by  arbitrary  construction. 
Nor  do  they  seem  to  differ  at  all  in  principle  from  those  bills 
of  pains  and  penalties  which,  in  times  of  comparative  moder- 
ation and  tranquillity,  have  sometimes  been  thought  neces- 
sary to  visit  some  unforeseen  and  anomalous  transgression 
beyond  the  reach  of  our  penal  code.  There  are  many,  in- 
deed, whose  system  absolutely  rejects  all  such  retrospective 
punishment,  either  from  the  danger  of  giving  too  much  scope 
to  vindictive  passion,  or  on  some  more  abstract  principle  of 
justice.  Those  who  may  incline  to  admit  that  the  moral  com- 
petence of  the  sovereign  power  to  secure  itself  by  the  punish- 
ment of  a  heinous  offender,  even  without  the  previous  warn- 
ing of  law,  is  not  to  be  denied,  except  by  reasoning  which 
would  shake  the  foundation  of  its  right  to  inflict  punishment 
in  ordinary  cases,  will  still  be  sensible  of  the  mischief  which 
any  departure  from  stable  rules,  under  the  influence  of  the 
most  public-spirited  zeal,  is  likely  to  produce.  The  attainder 
of  Strafford  could  not  be  justifiable,  unless  it  were  necessary ; 
nor  necessary,  if  a  lighter  penalty  would  have  been  sufficient 
for  the  public  security. 

This  therefore  becomes  a  preliminary  question,  upon  which 
the  whole  mainly  turns.  It  is  one  which  does  not  seem  to 
admit  of  a  demonstrative  answer;  but  with  which  we  can 
perhaps  deal  better  than  they  who  lived  at  that  time.  Their 
distrust  of  the  king,  their  apprehension  that  nothing  less  than 
the  delinquent  minister's  death  could  insure  them  from  his 
return  to  power,  rendered  the  leaders  of  parliament  obstinate 
against  any  proposition  of  a  mitigated  penalty.  Nor  can  it 
be  denied  that  there  are  several  instances  in  history  where 
the  favorites  of  monarchs,  after  a  transient  exile  or  impris- 


CHA.  I.  — 1640-42.     OF  STKAFFORD'S  IMPEACHMENT.  513 

onment,  have  returned,  on  some  fresh  wave  of  fortune,  to 
mock  or  avenge  themselves  upon  their  adversaries.  Yet  the 
prosperous  condition  of  the  popular  party,  which  nothing-but 
intemperate  passion  was  likely  to  impair,  rendered  this  contin- 
gency by  no  means  probable ;  and  it  is  against  probable  dan- 
gers that  nations  should  take  precautions,  without  aiming  at 
more  complete  security  than  the  baffling  uncertainties  of 
events  will  permit.  Such  was  Strafford's  unpopularity,  that 
he  could  never  have  gained  any  sympathy,  but  by  the  harsh- 
ness of  his  condemnation  and  the  magnanimity  it  enabled  him 
to  display.  These  have  half  redeemed  his  forfeit  fame,  and 
misled  a  generous  posterity.  It  was  agreed  on  all  hands  that 
any  punishment  which  the  law  could  award  to  the  highest 
misdemeanors,  duly  proved  on  impeachment,  must  be  justly 
inflicted.  "  I  am  still  the  same,"  said  lord  Digby,  in  his  fa- 
mous speech  against  the  bill  of  attainder,  "  in  my  opinions 
and  affections,  as  unto  the  earl  of  Strafford ;  I  confidently 
believe  him  to  be  the  most  dangerous  minister,  the  most  in- 
supportable to  free  subjects,  that  can  be  charactered.  I  be- 
lieve him  to  be  still  that  grand  apostate  to  the  commonwealth, 
who  must  not  expect  to  be  pardoned  in  this  world  till  he  be 
despatched  to  the  other.  And  yet  let  me  tell  you,  Mr.  Speak 
er,  my  hand  must  not  be  to  that  despatch."1  These  senti- 
ments, whatever  we  may  think  of  the  sincerity  of  him  who 
uttered  them,  were  common  to  many  of  those  who  desired 
most  ardently  to  see  that  uniform  course  of  known  law  which 
neither  the  court's  lust  of  power  nor  the  clamorous  indigna- 
tion of  a  popular  assembly  might  turn  aside.  The  king, 
whose  conscience  was  so  deeply  wounded  by  his  acquiescence 
in  this  minister's  death,  would  gladly  have  assented  to  a  bill 
inflicting  the  penalty  of  perpetual  banishment ;  and  this,  ac- 
companied, as  it  ought  to  have  been,  by  degradation  from  the 
rank  for  which  he  had  sold  his  integrity,  would  surely  have 
exhibited  to  Europe  an  example  sufficiently  conspicuous  of 
just  retribution.  Though  nothing  perhaps  could  have  re- 
stored a  tolerable  degree  of  confidence  between  Charles  and 
the  parliament,  it  is  certain  that  his  resentment  and  aversion 
were  much  aggravated  by  the  painful  compulsion  they  had 
put  on  him,  and  that  the  schism  among  the  constitutional  par- 
ty began  from  this,  among  other  causes,  to  grow  more  sensi- 
ble, till  it  terminated  in  civil  war.2 

I  Parliamentary  History,  U.  750.  *  See  some  judicious  remarks  on  thl» 

VOL.  i.  —  o.  33 


514  APPKEHENSIONS   OF  THE  COMMONS.      CHAP.  IX 

But,  if  we  pay  such  regard  to  the  principles  of  clemency 
and  moderation,  and  of  adherence  to  the  fixed  rules  of  law, 
as  to  pass  some  censure  on  this  deviation  from  them  in  the 
attainder  of  lord  Stratford,  we  must  not  yield  to  the  clamor- 
ous invectives  of  his  admirers,  or  treat  the  prosecution  as  a 
scandalous  and  flagitious  excess  of  party  vengeance.  Look 
round  the  nations  of  the  globe,  and  say  in  what  age  or  coun- 
try would  such  a  man  have  fallen  into  the  hands  of  his  ene- 
mies without  paying  the  forfeit  of  his  offences  against  the 
commonwealth  with  his  life.  They  who  grasp  at  arbitrary 
power,  they  .who  make  their  fellow-citizens  tremble  before 
them,  they  who  gratify  a  selfish  pride  by  the  humiliation  and 
servitude  of  mankind,  have  always  played  a  deep  stake ; 
and  the  more  invidious  and  intolerable  has  been  their  pre- 
eminence, their  fall  has  been  more  destructive  and  their  pun- 
ishment more  exemplary.  Something  beyond  the  retirement 
or  the  dismissal  of  such  ministers  has  seemed  necessary  to 
"  absolve  the  gods,"  and  furnish  history  with  an  awful  lesson 
of  retribution.  The  spontaneous  instinct  of  nature  has  called 
for  the  axe  and  the  gibbet  against  such  capital  delinquents. 
If,  then,  we  blame  in  some  measure  the  sentence  against 
Strafford,  it  is  not  for  his  sake,  but  for  that  of  the  laws  on 
which  he  trampled,  and  of  the  liberty  which  he  betrayed. 
He  died  justly  before  God  and  man,  though  we  may  deem 
the  precedent  dangerous,  and  the  better  course  of  a  magnan- 
imous lenity  unwisely  rejected ;  and  in  condemning  the  bill 
of  attainder  we  cannot  look  upon  it  as  a  crime. 

The  same  distrustful  temper,  blamable  in  nothing  but  its 
Act  against  excess,  drew  the  house  of  commons  into  a  meas- 
dissoiution  of  ure  more  unconstitutional  than  the  attainder  of 

parliament        _         .„ 

without  its     btranord,  the  bill   enacting  that  they  should  not 
be  dissolved  without  their  own  consent.     Whether 

by  May,  p.  64,  who  generally  shows  a  found,  because  they  are  beasts  of  prey." 
good  deal  of  impartiality  at  this  period  Nor  was  this  a  mere  burst  of  passionate 
of  history.  The  violence  of  individuals,  declamation,  but  urged  as  a  serious  argu- 
especially  When  of  considerable  note,  de-  ment  for  taking  away  Strafford's  life 
serves  to  be  remarked  as  characteristic  of  without  sufficient  grounds  of  law  or  tes- 
thetemper  that  influenced  the  house,  and  timony.  Itushworth,  Abr.  iv.  61.  Clar- 
as accounting  for  the  disgust  of  moderate  endon,  i.  407.  Strode  told  the  house  that, 
men.  "  Why  should  he  have  law  him-  as  they  had  charged  Stratford  with  high 
self  ?  "  said  St.  John,  in  arguing  the  bill  treason,  it  concerned  them  to  charge  as 
of  attainder  before  the  peers,"  who  would  conspirators  in  the  same  treason  all  who 
not  that  others  should  have  any?  We  had  before,  or  should  hereafter,  plead  in 
indeed  give  laws  to  hares  and  deer,  be-  that  cause.  Baillie,  252.  This  monstrous 
cause  they  are  beasts  of  chase  ;  but  we  proposal  seems  to  please  the  presbj  terian 
give  none  to  wolves  and  foxes,  but  knock  bigot.  "  If  this  hold,"  he  observes, 
them  on  the  head  wherever  they  are  "Strafford's  counsel  will  be  rare." 


CHA.  I.  — 1640-42.     APPREHENSIONS  OF  THE  COMMONS.    515 


or  not  this  had  been  previously  meditated  by  the  leaders 
is  uncertain;  but  the  circumstances  under  which  it  was 
adopted  display  all  the  blind  precipitancy  of  fear.  A  scheme 
for  bringing  up  the  army  from  the  north  of  England  to  over- 
awe parliament  had  been  discoursed  of,  or  rather  in  a  great 
measure  concerted,  by  some  young  courtiers  and  military  men. 
The  imperfection  and  indefiniteness  of  the  evidence  obtained 
respecting  this  plot  increased,  as  often  happens,  the  appre- 
hensions of  the  commons.  Yet,  difficult  as  it  might  be  to  fix 
its  proper  character  between  a  loose  project  and  a  deliberate 
conspiracy,  this  at  least  was  hardly  to  be  denied,  that  the  king 
had  listened  to  and  approved  a  proposal  of  appealing  from 
the  representatives  of  his  people  to  a  military  force.1  Their 
greatest  danger  was  a  sudden  dissolution.  The  triennial  bill 
afforded,  indeed,  a  valuable  security  for  the  future.  Yet,  if 
the  present  parliament '  had  been  broken  with  any  circum- 
stances of  violence,  it  might  justly  seem  very  hazardous  to 
confide  in  the  right  of  spontaneous  election  reserved  to  the 
people  by  that  statute,  which  the  crown  would  have  three 
years  to  defeat.  A  rapid  impulse,  rather  than  any  concerted 


1  Clarendon  and  Hume  of  course  treat 
this  as  a  very  trifling  affair,  exaggerated 
for  factious  purposes.  But  those  who  judge 
from  the  evidence  of  persons  unwilling  to 
accuse  themselves  or  the  king,  and  from 
the  natural  probabilities  of  the  case,  will 
suspect,  or  rather  be  wholly  convinced, 
that  it  had  gone  much  farther  than  these 
writers  admit  See  the  accounts  of  this 
plot  in  Rush  worth  and  Nalson,  or  in  the 
Parliamentary  History,  also  what  is  said 
by  Montreuil  in  Raumer,  p.  324.  The 
strongest  evidence,  however,  is  furnished 
by  Henrietta,  whose  relation  of  the  cir- 
cumstances to  Madame  de  Motteville 
proves  that  the  king  and  herself  had  the 
strongest  hopes  from  the  influence  of 
Goring  and  Wilmot  over  the  army,  by 
means  of  which  they  aimed  at  saving 
Strafford's  life;  though  the  jealousy  of 
those  ambitious  intriguers,  who  could 
not  both  enjoy  the  place  to  which  each 
aspired,  broke  the  whole  plot.  Mem.  de 
Motteville,  i.  253.  Compare  with  this 
passage  Percy's  letter  and  Goring's  depo- 
sition (Nalson,  ii.  286,  294),  for  what  is 
said  of  the  king's  privity  by  men  who 
did  not  lose  his  favor  by  their  evidence. 
Mr.  Brodie  has  commented  in  a  long  note 
(iii.  189)  on  Clarendon's  apparent  mis- 
representations of  this  business.  But 
what  has  escaped  the  acuteness  of  this 
writer  is,  that  the  petition  to  the  king 
and  parliament,  drawn  up  for  the  army's 


subscription,  and  asserted  by  Clarendon 
to  have  been  the  only  stepVtaken  by  those 
engaged  in  the  supposed  conspiracy 
(though  not,  as  Mr.  Brodie  too  rashly 
conjectures,  a  fabrication  of  his  own),  is 
most  carelessly  referred  by  him  to  that 
period,  or  to  the  agency  of  Wilmot  and 
his  coadjutors  —  having  been,  in  fact,  pre- 
pared about  the  July  following,  at  the 
instigation  of  Daniel  O'Neale  and  some 
others  of  the  royalist  party.  This  is 
manifest,  not  only  from  the  allusions  it 
contains  to  events  that  had  not  occurred 
In  the  months  of  March  and  April,  when 
the  plot  of  \Vilmot  and  Goring  was  on 
foot,  especially  the  bill  for  triennial  par- 
liaments, but  from  evidence  given  before 
the  house  of  commons  in  October,  1641, 
and  which  Mr.  Brodie  has  published  in 
the  appendix  to  his  third  volume,  though, 
with  an  inadvertence  of  which  he  is  sel- 
dom guilty,  overlooking  its  date  and  pur- 
port. This,  however,  is  of  itself  sufficient 
to  display  the  inaccurate  character  of 
Clarendon's  History ;  for  I  can  scarcely 
ascribe  the  present  incorrectness  to  de- 
sign. There  are,  indeed,  so  many  mis- 
takes as  to  dates  and  other  matters  in 
Clarendon's  account  of  this  plot,  that, 
setting  aside  his  manifest  disposition  to 
suppress  the  truth,  we  can  place  not  the 
least  reliance  on  his  memory  as  to  those 
points  which  we  may  not  be  well  able  to 
bring  to  a  test. 


516  INNOVATIONS  IN  THE  CHURCH.          CHAP.  IX. 

resolution,  appears  to  have  dictated  this  hardy  encroachment 
on  the  prerogative.  The  bill  against  the  dissolution  of  the 
present  parliament  without  its  own  consent  was  resolved  in  a 
committee  on  the  fifth  of  May,  brought  in  the  next  day,  and 
sent  to  the  lords  on  the  seventh.  The  upper  house,  in  a  con- 
ference the  same  day,  urged  a  very  wise  and  constitutional 
amendment,  limiting  its  duration  to  the  term  of  two  years. 
But  the  commons  adhering  to  their  original  provisions,  the 
bill  was  passed  by  both  houses  on  the  eighth.1  Thus,  in  the 
space  of  three  days  from  the  first  suggestion,  an  alteration 
was  made  in  the  frame  of  our  polity  which  rendered  the 
house  of  commons  equally  independent  of  the  sovereign  and 
their  constituents  ;  and,  if  it  could  be  supposed  capable  of 
being  maintained  in  more  tranquil  times,  would,  in  the  theory 
at  least  of  speculative  politics,  have  gradually  converted  the 
government  into  something  like  a  Dutch  aristocracy.  The 
ostensible  pretext  was,  that  money  could  not  be  borrowed  on 
the  authority  of  resolutions  of  parliament  until  some  security 
was  furnished  to  the  creditors  that  those  whom  they  were  to 
trust  should  have  a  permanent  existence.  This  argument 
would  have  gone  a  great  way,  and  was  capable  of  an  answer ; 
since  the  money  might  have  been  borrowed  on  the  authority  of 
the  whole  legislature.  But  the  chief  motive,  unquestionably, 
was  a  just  apprehension  of  the  king's  intention  to  overthrow 
the  parliament,  and  of  personal  danger  to  those  who  had 
stood  most  forward  from  his  resentment  after  a  dissolution. 
His  ready  acquiescence  in  this  bill,  far  more  dangerous  than 
any  of  those  at  which  he  demurred,  can  only  be  ascribed  to 
his  own  shame  and  the  queen's  consternation  at  the  discovery 
of  the  late  plot:  and  thus  we  trace  again  the  calamities  of 
Charles  to  their  two  great  sources  ;  his  want  of  judgment  in 
affairs,  and  of  good  faith  towards  his  people. 

The  parliament  had  met  with  as  ardent  and  just  an  indig- 

innovations    nati°n  against  ecclesiastical  as  tempoi'al  grievances. 

meditated  in   The  tyranny,  the  folly,  and  rashness  of  Charles's 

rch'    bishops  were  still  greater  than  his  own.      Jt  waa 

1  Journals ;  Parliamentary  Hist.  784 ;  the  conference  with  the  lords.    But  in 

May,  67  ;  Clarendon.     According  to  Mrs.  sir  Ralph  Verney's  manuscript  notes  I 

Hutchinson,  p.  97,  this  bill   originated  find  Mr.  Whitelock  mentioned  as  being 

with  Mr.  Pierpoint.     If  we  should  draw  ordered  by  the  house  to  prepare  the  bill ; 

any  inference  from  the  Journals,  sir  John  which  seems  to  imply  that  he  had  moved 

Colepepper  seems  to  have  been  the  most  it,  or  at  least  been  very  forward  in  it. 

prominent  of  its  supporters.    Mr.  Hyde  Yet  all  these  were  moderate  men. 
and  lord  Falkland  were  also  managers  of 


CHA.  ].  — 1640-42.     MODERATE  EPISCOPACY.  517 

evidently  an  indispensable  duty  to  reduce  the  overbearing 
ascendency  of  that  order  which  had  rendered  the  nation,  in 
regard  to  spiritual  dominion,  a  great  loser  by  the  Reforma- 
tion. They  had  been  so  blindly  infatuated  as,  even  in  the 
year  1 640,  amidst  all  the  perils  of  the  times,  to  fill  up  the 
measure  of  public  wrath  by  enacting  a  series  of  canons  in 
convocation.  These  enjoined,  or  at  least  recommended, 
some  of  the  modern  innovations,  which,  though  many  ex- 
cellent men  had  been  persecuted  for  want  of  compliance 
with  them,  had  not  got  the  sanction  of  authority.  They  im- 
posed an  oath  on  the  clergy,  commonly  called  the  "  et  csetera 
oath,"  binding  them  to  attempt  no  alteration  "  in  the  govern- 
ment of  the  church  by  bishops,  deans,  archdeacons,  &c." 
This  oath  was  by  the  same  authority  enjoined  to  such  of  the 
laity  as  held  ecclesiastical  offices.1  The  king,  however,  on 
the  petition  of  the  council  of  peers  at  York,  directed  it  not 
to  be  taken.  The  house  of  commons  rescinded  these  canons, 
with  some  degree  of  excess  on  the  other  side ;  not  only  de- 
nying the  right  of  convocation  to  bind  the  clergy,  which  had 
certainly  been  exercised  in  all  periods,  but  actually  impeach- 
ing the  bishops  for  a  high  misdemeanor  on  that  account.3 
The  lords,  in  the  month  of  March,  appointed  a  committee 
of  ten  earls,  ten  bishops,  and  ten  barons,  to  report  upon  the 
innovations  lately  brought  into  the  church.  Of  this  commit- 
tee Williams  was  chairman.  But  the  spirit  which  now  pos- 
sessed the  commons  was  not  to  be  exorcised  by  the  sacrifice 
of  Laud  and  Wren,  or  even  by  such  inconsiderable  altera- 
tions as  the  moderate  bishops  were  ready  to  suggest.8 

There  had  always  existed  a  party,  though  by  no  means 
coextensive  with  that  bearing  the  general  name  of  puritan, 
who  retained  an  insuperable  aversion  to  the  whole  scheme 
of  episcopal  discipline,  as  inconsistent  with  the  ecclesiastical 
parity  they  believed  to  be  enjoined  by  the  apostles.  It  is 
not  easy  to  determine  what  proportion  these  bore  to  the  com- 
munity. They  were  certainly  at  the  opening  of  the  parlia- 
ment by  far  the  less  numerous,  though  an  active  and  increas- 
ing party.  Few  of  the  house  of  commons,  according  to 

1  Neal,  p.  632,  has  printed  these  can-    canons,  however,  were  carried,  ne.m.  con. 
ons  imperfectly.    They  may  be  found  at    Journals,  16th  Dec.  1640. 

length  in  Nalson,  i.  542.     '  3  Neal,    709.      Laud   and  Wren  were 

2  Clarendon  ;    Parl.    Hist.    678,    896  ;    both  impeached  pec.  18 ;  the  latter  en- 
Neal,  647.  720.     Thesi  votes  as  to  the    tirely  for  introducing  superstitions.    Parl. 

Hist.  861.    He  lay  in  the  Tower  till  1659. 


518  ANTI-EPISCOPACY.  CHAP.  IX, 

Clarendon  and  the  best  contemporary  writers,  looked  to  a 
destruction  of  the  existing  hierarchy.1  The  more  plausible 
scheme  was  one  which  had  the  sanction  of  Usher's  learned 
judgment,  and  which  Williams  was  said  to  favor,  for  what 
was  called  a  moderate  episcopacy ;  wherein  the  bishop,  re- 
duced to  a  sort  of  president  of  his  college  of  presbyters,  and 
differing  from  them  only  in  rank,  not  in  order  (gradu,  nou 
ordine),  should  act,  whether  in  ordination  or  jurisdiction,  by 
their  concurrence.2  This  intermediate  form  of  church-gov- 
ernment would  probably  have  contented  the  popular  leaders 
of  the  commons,  except  two  or  three,  and  have  proved  ac- 
ceptable to  the  nation.  But  it  was  hardly  less  offensive  to 
the  Scottish  presbyterians,  intolerant  of  the  smallest  devia- 
tion from  their  own  model,  than  to  the  high-church  episcopa- 
lians ;  and  the  necessity  of  humoring  that  proud  and  preju- 
diced race  of  people,  who  began  already  to  show  that  an 
alteration  in  the  church  of  England  would  be  their  stipulated 
condition  for  any  assistance  they  might  afford  to  the  popular 
party,  led  the  majority  of  the  house  of  commons  to  give 
more  countenance  than  they  sincerely  intended  to  a  bill 
preferred  by  what  was  then  called  the  root-and-branch  party, 
for  the  entire  abolition  of  episcopacy  This  party,  composed 
chiefly  of  presbyterians,  but  with  no  small  admixture  of  other 
sectaries,  predominated  in  the  city  of  London.  At  the  in- 
stigation of  the  Scots  commissioners,  a  petition  against 
episcopal  government,  with  15,000  signatures,  was  presented 
early  in  the  session  (Dec.  11,  1640),  and  received  so  favor- 
ably as  to  startle  those  who  bore  a  good  affection  to  the 
church.8  This  gave  rise  to  the  first  difference  that  was 

1  Neal  says  that  the  major  part  of  the  8  Parl.  Hist.  673 ;    Clarendon,  i.  356  ', 
parliamentarians  at  the  beginning  of  the  Baillie's  Letters,  218,  &c.     Though  san- 
war  were  for  moderated  episcopacy  (ii.  4),  guiue  as  to  the  progress  of  his  sect,  he 
and  asserts  the  same  in  another  place  admits  that  it  was  very  difficult  to  pluck 
(i.  715)  of  the  puritans,  in  contradiction  of  up  episcopacy  b.v  the  roots  ;  for  this  reason 
Kapiu.     "  How  this  will  go,"  says  Baillie,  they  did  not  wish   the  house  to  give  a 
hi  April,  1641,  "  the  Lord  knows ;  all  are  speedy  answer  to  the  city  petition :  p.  241. 
for  the  creating  of  a  kind  of  presbytery,  It  was  carried  by  36  or  37  voices,  he  says, 
and  for  bringing  down  the  bishops,  in  all  to  refer  it  to  the  committee  of  religion : 
things  spiritual  and  temporal,  so  low  as  p.  245.    No  division  appears  on  the  Jour- 
can  be  with  any  subsistence  ;  but  their  nals. 

utter  abolition,  which  is  the  only  ami  of  The  whole  influence  of  the  Scots  com- 

the  most  godly,  is  the  knot  of  the  ques-  missioners  was  directed  to  this  object ;  as 

tion."  i.  245.  not  only  Baillie's  Letters,  but   those  of 

2  Neal,  666,  672,    713;    Collier,    805;  Johnstone  of  Wariston  (Dairy rnple's  Me- 
Baxter's  Life,  p.  62.     The  ministers'  peti-  morials  of  James  and  Charles  I.,  ii.  114, 
tion,  as  it  was  called,  presented  Jan.  23,  &c.),  show.     Besides  their  extreme  bigo- 
1641,  with  tlie  signatures  of  700  beneficed  try,  which  was  the  predominant  motive, 
clergymen,  went  to  this  extent  of  refor-  they  had  a  better  apology  for  interfering 
mat  ion.     Neal,  679  with  church-government  in  England,  with 


CHA.  I.  — 1040-42.      AXTI-EPISCOPAL  PARTY.  5 ID 

expressed  in  parliament:  Digby  speaking  warmly  against 
the  reference  of  this  petition  to  a  committee,  and  Falkland, 
though  strenuous  for  reducing  the  prelates'  authority,  showing 
much  reluctance  to  abolish  their  order.1  A  bill  was,  how- 
ever, brought  in  by  sir  Edward  Dering,  an  honest  but  not 
Tery  enlightened  or  consistent  man,  for  the  utter  extirpation 
of  episcopacy,  and  its  second  reading  carried  on  a  division  by 
139  to  108.2  This,  no  doubt,  seems  to  show  the  anti-episco- 
pal party  to  have  been  stronger  than  Clarendon  admits. 
Yet  I  suspect  that  the  greater  part  of  those  who  voted  for 
it  did  not  intend  more  than  to  intimidate  the  bishops.  Peti- 
tions, very  numerously  signed,  for  the  maintenance  of  epis- 
copal government,  were  presented  from  several  counties;8 
nor  is  it,  I  think,  possible  to  doubt  that  the  nation  sought 
only  the  abridgment  of  that  coercive  jurisdiction  and  tem- 
poral power  by  which  the  bishops  had  forfeited  the  reverence 
due  to  their  function,  as  well  as  that  absolute  authority  over 
presbyters,  which  could  not  be  reconciled  to  the  customs  of 
the  primitive  church.4  This  was  the  object  both  of  the  act 
abolishing  the  high  commission,  which  by  the  largeness  of  its 

•which  the  archbishop  had  furnished  ment  of  the  church  we  are  most  thankful 
them  ;  it  was  the  only  sure  means  of  to  God,  believing  it  in  our  hearts  to  be 
preserving  then-  own.  the  most  pious  and  the  wisest  that  any 
1  Kushworth  ;  Nalson.  people  or  kingdom  upon  earth  hath  been 
-  Parl.  Hist.  814,  822,  828.  Clarendon  withal  since  the  apostles'  days ;  though 
tells  us  that,  being  chairman  of  the  com-  we  may  not  deny  but,  through  the  frailty 
mittee  to  whom  this  bill  was  referred,  of  men  and  corruption  of  times,  some 
he  gave  it  so  much  interruption,  that  no  things  of  ill  consequence,  and  other  need- 
progress  could  be  made  before  the  ad-  less,  are  stolen  or  thrust  into  it ;  which 
journment.  The  house  came,  however,  we  heartily  wish  may  be  reformed,  and 
to  a  resolution,  that  the  taking  away  the  the  church  restored  to  its  former  purity, 
offices  of  archbishops,  bishops,  chancel-  And,  to  the  end  it  may  be  the  better 
lors,  and  commissaries  out  of  this  church  preserved  from  present  and  future  iuno- 
and  kingdom,  should  be  one  clause  of  the  vation,  we  wish  the  wittingly  and  mali- 
bill.  June  12.  Commons'  Journals.  ciously  guilty,  of  what  condition  soever 
3  Lord  Hertford  presented  one  to  the  they  be}  whether  bishops  or  inferior 
lords,  from  Somersetshire,  signed  by  clergy,  may  receive  condign  punishment. 
14,350  freeholders  and  inhabitants.  Nal-  But,  for  the  miscarriage  of  governors,  to 
son,  ii.  727.  The  Cheshire  petition,  for  destroy  the  government,  we  trust  it  shall 
preserving  the  Common  Prayer,  was  never  enter  into  the  hearts  of  this  wise 
signed  by  near  10,000  hands.  Id.  758.  I  and  honorable  assembly." 
have  a  collection  of  those  petitions  now  *  The  house  came  to  a  vote  on  July 
before  me,  printed  in  1642,  from  thirteen  17,  according  to  Whitelock,  p.  46,  in 
English  and  five  Welsh  counties,  and  all  favor  of  Usher's  scheme,  that  each 
very  numerously  signed.  In  almost  every  county  should  be  a  diocese,  and  that  there 


_a __,__.  ,  . 

lition  of  episcopacy  and  the  liturgy.   Thus  spoke  in  "favor  of  this,"  though  his  own 

It  seems  that  the  presbyterians  were  very  bill  went  much  further.     Nalson,  ii.  2!M  ; 

far  from  having  the  nation  on  their  side.  Neal,  703.     I  cannot  find  the  vote  in  tlie 

The  following  extract  from  the  Somerset-  Journals  ;  it  passed,  therefore,  I  suppose 

shire  petition  is  a  good  sample  of  the  in  the  committee,  and  was  not  reported 

general  tone:  "For  the  present  govern-  to  the  bouse. 


520 


BISHOPS  EXCLUDED  PARLIAMENT.        CHAP.  IX. 


expressions  seemed  to  take  away  all  coercive  jurisdiction 
from  the  ecclesiastical  courts,  and  of  that  for  depriving  the 
bishops  of  their  suffrages  among  the  peers ;  which,  after 
being  once  rejected  by  a  large  majority  of  the  lords,  in 
June,  1641,  passed  into  a  law  in  the  month  of  February 
following,  and  was  the  latest  concession  that  the  king  made 
before  his  final  appeal  to  arms.1 

This  was  hardly,  perhaps,  a  greater  alteration  of  the  es- 
tablished constitution  than  had  resulted  from  the  suppression 
of  the  monasteries  under  Henry ;  when,  by  the  fall  of  the 
mitred  abbots,  the  secular  peers  acquired  a  preponderance 
in  number  over  the  spiritual,  which  they  had  not  previously 
enjoyed.  It  was  supported  by  several  persons,  especially 
lord  Falkland,  by  no  means  inclined  to  subvert  the  episcopal 
discipline  ;  whether  from  a  hope  to  compromise  better  with 
the  opposite  party  by  this  concession,  or  from  a  sincere  belief 
that  the  bishops  might  be  kept  better  to  the  duties  of  their 
function  by  excluding  them  from  civil  power.  Considered 
generally,  it  may  be  reckoned  a  doubtful  question  in  the  the- 
ory of  our  government  whether  the  mixture  of  this  ecclesias- 
tical aristocracy  with  the  house  of  lords  is  advantageous  or 
otherwise  to  the  public  interests,  or  to  those  of  religion. 


i  Parl.  Hist.  774,  794,  817,  910,  1087. 
The  lords  had  previously  come  to  resolu- 
tions that  bishops  should  sit  in  the  house 
of  lords,  but  not  in  the  privy  council, 
nor  be  in  any  commission  of  the  peace. 
Id.  814. 

The  king  was  very  unwilling  to  give 
his  consent  to  the  bill  excluding  the 
bishops  from  parliament,  and  was,  of 
course,  dissuaded  by  Hyde  from  doing 
BO.  He  was  then  at  Newmarket,  on  his 
way  to  the  north,  and  had  nothing  but 
war  in  his  head.  The  queen,  however, 
and  sir  John  Colepepper,  prevailed  on 
hkii  to  consent.  Clarendon,  History,  ii. 
247  (1826) ;  Life,  51.  The  queen  could 
not  be  expected  to  have  much  tenderness 
for  a  protestant  episcopacy  ;  and  it  is  to 
be  said  in  favor  of  Oolepepper's  advice, 
who  was  pretty  indifferent  in  ecclesias- 
tical matters,  that  the  bishops  had  ren- 
dered themselves  odious  to  many  of  those 
who  wished  well  to  the  royal  cause.  See 
the  very  remarkable  conversation  of  Hyde 
with  sir  Edward  Verney,  who  was  killed 
at  the  battle  of  Edgehill,  where  the  latter 
declares  his  reluctance  to  fight  for  the 
bishops,  whose  quarrel  he  took  it  to  be, 
though  bound  by  gratitude  not  to  desert 
the  king.  Clarendon's  Life,  p.  68. 

This  author  represents  lord  Falkland 


as  having  been  misled  by  Hampden  to 
take  an  unexpected  part  in  favor  of  the 
first  bill  for  excluding  the  bishops  from 
parliament.  "  The  house  was  so  mar- 
vellously delighted  to  see  the  two  insep- 
arable friends  divided  in  so  important  a 
point  that  they  could  not  contain  from  a 
kind  of  rejoicing ;  and  the  more  because 
they  saw  Mr.  Hyde  was  much  surprised 
with  the  contradiction,  as  in  truth  he 
was,  having  never  discovered  the  least 
inclination  in  the  other  towards  such  a 
compliance:"  i.  413.  There  is,  however, 
an  earlier  speech  of  Falkland  in  print 
against  the  London  petition ;  wherein, 
while  objecting  to  the  abolition  of  tlie 
order,  he  intimates  his  willingness  to 
take  away  their  votes  in  parliament,  with 
all  other  temporal  authority.  Speeches 
of  the  Happy  Parliament,  p.  188  (pub- 
lished in  1641).  Johnstone  of  \Variston 
says  there  were  but  four  or  five  votes 
against  taking  away  civil  places  and  seats 
in  parliament  from  the  bishops.  Dal- 
rymple's  Memorials,  ii.  116.  Hut  in  the 
Journals  of  the  commons,  10th  March, 
1640-41,  it  is  said  to  be  resolved,  after  a 
long  and  mature  debate,  that  the  legis- 
lative power  of  bishops  is  a  hinderance  tc 
their  function. 


CHA.  I.  —1640-42.      PURITAN  DEVASTATIONS.  521 

Their  great  revenues,  and  the  precedence  allotted  them, 
seem  naturally  to  place  them  on  this  level ;  and  the  general 
property  of  the  clergy,  less  protected  than  that  of  other  classes 
against  the  cupidity  of  an  administration  or  a  faction,  may 
perhaps  require  this  peculiar  security.  In  fact,  the  disposi- 
tion of  the  English  to  honor  the  ministers  of  the  church,  as 
well  as  to  respect  the  ancient  institutions  of  their  country, 
has  usually  been  so  powerful,  that  the  question  would  hardly 
have  been  esteemed  dubious  if  the  bishops  themselves  (I 
speak  of  course  with  such  limitations  as  the  nature  of  the  case 
requires)  had  been  at  all  times  sufficiently  studious  to  main- 
tain a  character  of  political  independence,  or  even  to  conceal 
a  spirit  of  servility,  which  the  pernicious  usage  of  continual 
translations  from  one  see  to  another,  borrowed,  like  many 
other  parts  of  our  ecclesiastical  law,  from  the  most  corrupt 
period  of  the  church  of  Borne,  has  had  so  manifest  a  ten- 
dency to  engender.1 

This  spirit  of  ecclesiastical,  rather  than  civil,  democracy, 
was  the  first  sign  of  the  approaching  storm  that  alarmed  the 
Hertfords  and  Southamptons,  the  Hydes  and  Falklands. 
Attached  to  the  venerable  church  of  the  English  reformation, 
they  were  loath  to  see  the  rashness  of  some  prelates  avenged 
by  her  subversion,  or  a  few  recent  innovations  repressed  by 
incomparably  more  essential  changes.  Full  of  regard  for 
established  law,  and  disliking  the  puritan  bitterness,  aggra- 
vated as  it  was  by  long  persecution,  they  revolted  from  the 
indecent  devastation  committed  in  churches  by  the  populace, 
and  from  the  insults  which  now  fell  on  the  conforming  min- 
isters. The  lords  early  distinguished  their  temper  as  to  those 
points  by  an  order  on  the  16th  of  January  for  the  perform- 
ance of  divine  service  according  to  law.  in  consequence  of 
the  tumults  that  had  been  caused  by  the  heated  puritans 
under  pretence  of  abolishing  innovations.  Little  regard  was 
shown  to  this  order ; 2  but  it  does  not  appear  that  the  com- 
mons went  further  on  the  opposite  side  than  to  direct  some 
ceremonial  novelties  to  be  discontinued,  and  to  empower  one 
of  their  members,  sir  Robert  Harley,  to  take  away  all  pic- 

2  "  The  higher  house,"  says  Baillie,  does  not  discourage  any  one."    P.  237. 

"  have  made  an  order,  which  was  read  in  Some  rioter.",  however,  who  had  pulled, 

the  churches,  that  none  presume  of  their  down  rails  about   the  altar,  &c.,  were 

own  head  to  alter  any  customs  estab-  committed  by  crder  of  the  lords  m  Juue 

lished  by  law :  this  procured  ordiuance  Nalson,  ii.  276. 


522  SCHISM  IN  CONSTITUTIONAL  PARTY.       CHAP.  IX. 

tures,  crosses,  and  superstitious  figures  within  churches  or 
without.1  But  this  order,  like  many  of  their  other  acts,  was 
a  manifest  encroachment  on  the  executive  power  of  the 
crown.2 

It  seems  to  have  been  about  the  time  of  the  summer  recess, 
during  the  king's  absence  in  Scotland,  that  the  apprehension 
of  changes  in  church  and  state,  far  beyond  what  had  been 
Schism  in  dreamed  of  at  the  opening  of  parliament,  led  to  a 
theconstitu-  final  schism  in  the  constitutional  party.8  Charles, 
>ar  y'  by  abandoning  his  former  advisers,  and  yielding, 
with  just  as  much  reluctance  as  displayed  the  value  of  the 
concession,  to  a  series  of  laws  that  abridged  his  prerogative, 
had  recovered  a  good  deal  of  the  affection  and  confidence 
of  some,  and  gained  from  others  that  sympethy  which  is  sel- 
dom withheld  from  undeserving  princes  in  their  humiliation. 
Though  the  ill-timed  death  of  the  earl  of  Bedford  in  May 
had  partly  disappointed  an  intended  arrangement  for  bring- 
ing the  popular  leaders  into  office,  yet  the  appointments  of 
Essex,  Holland,  Say,  and  St.  John  from  that  party,  were  ap- 
parently pledges  of  the  king's  willingness  to  select  his  advisers 
from  their  ranks ;  whatever  cause  there  might  be  to  suspect 
that  their  real  influence  over  him  would  be  too  inconsid- 
erable.4 Those  who  were  still  excluded,  and  who  distrusted 

1  Parl.  Hist.  868.     By  the  hands  of     ship  of  God  and  peace  of  the  realm." 
this  zealous    knight  fell    the   beautiful     See  Nalson,  ii.  484. 

crosses  at  Charing  and  Cheap,  to  the  8  May,  p.  75.  See  this  passage,  which 
lasting  regret  of  all  faithful  lovers  of  is  very  judicious.  The  disunion,  how- 
antiquities  and  architecture.  ever,  had  in  some  measure  begun  not 

2  Parl.    Hist.   907.      Commons'   Jour-  long  after  the  meeting  of  parliament  ; 
nals,  Sept.  1,  1641.     It  was  carried  at  the  court  wanted,  in  December  1640,  tc 
the  time,  on  a  division^  by  55  to  37,  that  have  given  the  treasurers  staff  to  Hert- 
the  committee  "  should  propound  an  ad-  ford,  whose  brother  was  created  a  pepr 
dition  to  this   order  for   preventing  all  by  the  title  of  Lord  Seymour.     Bedford 
contempt  and  abuse  of  the  Bock  of  Com-  was  the  favorite  with  the  commons  for 
mon  Prayer  and  all  tumultuous  disorders  the  same  office,  and  would  doubtless  have 
that  might  arise  in  the  churoh  there-  been  a  fitter  man  at  the  time,  notwith- 
upon."     This  is  a  proof  that  the  church  standing   the    other's    eminent   virtues, 
party  were  sometimes  victorious  in  the  Sidney  Letters,   ii.   665,   666.      See  also 
house.     But   they  did  not  long  retain  what  Baillie  says  of  the  introduction  of 
this   casual  advantage.      For,  the  lords  seven  lords,  "  all  commonwealth's  men," 
having  sent  down  a  copy  of  their  order  into   the  council,  though,  as   generally 
of  16th  January  above   mentioned,   re-  happens,  he  is  soon   discontented  with 
questing     the    commons'    concurrence,  some  of  them.     P.  246,  247.     There  was 
they  resolved,  Sept.  9.  "  that  the  house  even  some  jealousy  of  Say,  as  favoring 
do  not  consent  to  this  order;   it  being  Strafford. 

thought   unreasonable  at    this   time   to  *  Whitelock.   p.  46.   "  Bedford  was   to 

urge   the   severe  execution   of  the  said  have    been    lord    treasurer,   with   Pym, 

laws."     They  contented  themselves  with  whom  he  had  brought  into   parliament 

"  expecting   that   the  commons  of  this  for  Tavistock.  as  his  chancellor  of  the 

realm  do,  in  the  mean  time,  quietly  at-  exchequer ;    Hollis    secretary    of    state 

tend  the  reformation  intended,  without  Hampden   is  said,  but  not  perhaps  on 

any  tumultuous  disturbance  of  the  wor-  good  authority,  to  have  sought  the  ofllc* 


CHA.  I.  — 1640-42.    REMONSTRANCE  OF  NOVEMBER,  1641.       523 

the  king's  intentions  as  well  towards  themselves  as  the  pub- 
lic cause,  of  whom  Pym  and  Hampden,  with  the  assistance 
of  St.  John,  though  actually  solicitor-general,  were  the  chief, 
found  no  better  means  of  keeping  alive  the  animosity  that 
was  beginning  to  subside,  than  by  framing  the  Remonstrance 
on  the  state  of  the  kingdom,  presented  to  the  king  in  Novem- 
ber, 1641.     This  being  a  recapitulation  of  all  the  grievances 
and  rnisgovernment  that  had  existed  since  his  ac- 
cession, which  his  acquiescence  in  so  many  meas-  ^™^c°"Cf 
ures  of  redress  ought,  according  to  the   common  November, 
courtesy  due  to  sovereigns,  to  have  cancelled,  was  ' 
hardly  capable  of  answering  any  other  purpose  than  that  of 
reanimating  discontents  almost  appeased,  and  guarding  the 
people  against  the  confidence  they  were  beginning  to  place 
in  the  king's  sincerity.     The  promoters  of  it  might  also  hope, 
from  Charles's  proud  and  hasty  temper,  that  he  would  reply 
in  such  a  tone  as  would  more  exasperate  the  commons.     But 
he  had  begun  to  use  the  advice  of  judicious '  men,  Falkland, 
Hyde,  and  Colepepper,  and  reined  in  his  natural  violence  so 
as  to  give  his  enemies  no  advantage  over  him. 

The  jealousy  which  nations  ought  never  to  lay  aside  was 
especially  required  towards  Charles,  whose  love  of  arbitrary 
dominion  was  much  better  proved  than  his  sincerity  in 
relinquishing  it.  But  if  he  were  intended  to  reign  at  all, 
and  to  reign  with  any  portion  either  of  the  prerogatives 
of  an  English  king,  or  the  respect  claimed  by  every  sov- 
ereign, the  Remonstrance  of  the  commons  could  but  prolong 
an  irritation  incompatible  with  public  tranquillity.  It  admits, 
indeed,  of  no  question,  that  the  schemes  of  Pym,  Hampden, 
and  St.  John,  already  tended  to  restrain  the  king's  personal 
exercise  of  any  effective  power,  from  a  sincere  persuasion 

of  governor   to    the   prince  of  Wales  ;  acted,  as  he  thought,  very  ungratefully, 

which  Hume,  not  very  candidly,  brings  Say  being  a  taiown  enemy  to  episcopacy, 

as  a  proof  of  his  ambition.    It  seems  and  Essex,  though  of  the  highest  honor, 

probable   that,  if  Charles   had  at   that  not  being  of  a  capacity  to  retain  much 

time  (May  1641)  carried  these  plans  into  influence  over  the  leaders  of  the  other 

execution,  and  ceased  to  listen  to   the  house.    Clarendon  insinuates  that,  even 

queen,  or  to  those  persons  about  his  bed-  as    late  as   March,  1642,    the   principal 

chamber  who  were   perpetually  leading  patriots,  with  a   few   exceptions,   would 

him  astray,  he  would  have  escaped  the  have  been  content   with   coming  them- 

exorbitant   demands  which   were   after-  selves  into  power  under  the  king,  and  on 

wards  made  upon  him,  and  even  saved  this  condition  would  have  left  his  remain- 

his  favorite  episcopacy.     But,  after  the  ing  prerogative  untouched  (ii.  326).    But 

death  of   the  earl  of  Bedford,  who  bad  it  seems  more  probable  that,   after  the 

not  been  hostile  to  the  church,  there  was  accusation     of    the    five     members,   no 

no  man  of  rank  in  that  party  whom  he  measure  of  this  kind  would   have  been 

liked  to  trust ;  Northumberland  having  of  any  service  to  Charles. 


524 


THE  REMONSTRANCE  CARRIED. 


CHAP.  IX. 


that  no  confidence  could  ever  be  placed  in  him,  though  not  to 
abolish  the  monarchy,  or  probably  to  abridge  in  the  same 
degree  the  rights  of  his  successor.  Their  Remonstance  was 
put  forward  to  stem  the  returning  tide  of  loyalty,  which  not 
only  threatened  to  obstruct  the  further  progress  of  their 
endeavors,  but,  as  they  would  allege,  might,  by  gaining 
strength,  wash  away  some  at  least  of  the  bulwarks  that  had 
been  so  recently  constructed  for  the  preservation  of  liberty. 
It  was  carried  in  a  full  house  by  the  small  majority  of  159 
to  148.1  So  much  was  it  deemed  a  trial  of  strength,  that 
Cromwell  declared  after  the  division  that,  had  the  question 
been  lost,  he  would  have  sold  his  estate,  and  retired  to 
America. 

It  may  be  thought  rather  surprising  that,  with  a  house  of 
commons  so  nearly  balanced  as  they  appear  on  this  vote,  the 


1  Commons'  Journals.  22d  November. 
On  a  second  divisioft  the  same  night, 
whether  the  Remonstrance  should  be 
printed,  the  popular  side  lost  it  by  124 
to  101.  But  on  the  15th  December  the 
printing  was  carried  by  135  to  83.  Sev- 
eral divisions  on  important  subjects 
about  tnis  time  show  that  the  royalist 
minority  was  very  formidable.  But  the 
attendance,  especially  on  that  side,  seems 
to  have  been  irregular;  and,  in  general, 
when  we  consider  the  immense  impor- 
tance of  these  debates,  we  are  surprised 
to  find  the  house  so  deficient  in  numbers 
as  many  divisions  show  it  to  have  been. 
Clarendon  frequently  complains  of  the 
supineness  of  his  party  ;  a  fault  invari- 
ably imputed  to  their  friends  by  the  zeal- 
ous supporters  of  established  authority, 
who  forget  that  sluggish,  lukewarm,  and 
thoughtless  tempers  must  always  exist, 
and  that  such  will  naturally  belong  to 
their  side.  I  find  in  the  short  pencil 
notes  taken  by  sir  Ralph  Verney,  with  a 
copy  of  which  I  have  been  favored  by 
Mr.  Sergeant  D'Oyly,  the  following  entry 
on  the  7th  of  August,  before  the  king's 
journey  to  Scotland  :  —  "A.  remonstrance 
to  be  made  how  we  found  the  kingdom 
and  the  church,  and  how  the  state  of  it 
now  stands."  This  is  not  adverted  to  in 
Nalson  nor  in  the  journals  at  this  time. 
JJut  Clarendon  says,  in  a  suppressed  pas- 
sage, vol.  ii.  Append.  591,  that,  "  at  the 
beginning  of  the  parliament,  or  shortly 
after,  when  all  men  were  inflamed  with 
the  pressures  and  illegalities  which  had 
been  exercised  upon  them,  a  committee 
was  appointed  to  prepare  a  remonstrance 
of  the  state  of  the  kingdom,  to  be  pre- 
sented to  his  majesty,  in  which  the  several 


grievances  might  be  recited  ;  which  com 
mittee  had  never  brought  any  report  to 
the  house;  most  men  conceiving,  and 
very  reasonably,  that  the  quick  and  ef- 
fectual progress  his  majesty  made  for  the 
reparation  of  those  grievances,  and  pre- 
vention of  the  like  for  the  future,  had 
rendered  that  work  needless.  But  aa 
soon  as  the  intelligence  came  of  his 
majesty  being  on  his  way  from  Scot- 
land towards  London,  that  committee  was, 
with  great  earnestness  and  importunity, 
called  upon  to  bring  in  the  draft  of  such 
remonstrance,"  &c.  I  find  a  slight  no- 
tice of  this  origin  of  the  Remonstrance  in 
the  Journals,  Nov.  17,  1640. 

In  another  place,  also  suppressed  in 
the  common  editions,  Clarendon  says,  — 
"This  debate  held  many  hours  in  which 
the  framers  and  contrivers  of  the  decla- 
ration said  very  little,  or  answered  any 
reasons  that  were  alleged  to  the  con- 
trary ;  the  only  end  of  passing  it,  which 
was  to  incline  the  people  to  sedition, 
being  a  reason  not  to  be  given  ;  fcut 
called  still  for  the  question,  presuming 
their  number,  if  not  their  reason,  would 
serve  to  carry  it ;  and  after  two  in  the 
morning  (for  so  long  the  debate  contin 
ued,  if  that  can  be  called  a  debate  when 
those  only  of  one  opinion  argued).  &c.,  it 
was  put  to  the  question. "  What  a 
strange  memory  this  author  had !  I  have 
now  before  me  sir  Ralph  Verney's  MS. 
note  of  the  debate,  whence  it  appears 
that  Pym,  Hampdpn,  Hollis,  Glyn.  and 
Maynard  spoke  in  favor  of  the  Remon- 
strance ;  nay,  as  far  as  these  brief  mem- 
oranda go,  Hyde  himself  seems  not  to 
have  warmly  opposed  it. 


CHA.  I.  — 1640-42.     DOUBTS  OF  THE  KING'S  SINCERITY.      525 

king  should  have  new  demands  that  annihilated  his  authority 
made  upon  him,  and  have  found  a  greater  ma-  gnspicion8 
jority  than  had  voted  the  Remonstrance  ready  to  °f  the  king's 
oppose  him  by  arms ;  especially  as  that  paper su 
contained  little  but  what  was  true,  and  might  rather  be 
censured  as  an  ill-timed  provocation  than  an  encroachment 
on  the  constitutional  prerogative.  But  there  were  circum- 
stances, both  of  infelicity  and  misconduct,  which  aggravated 
that  distrust  whereon  every  measure  hostile  to  him  waa 
grounded.  His  imprudent  connivance  at  popery,  and  the 
far  more  reprehensible  encouragement  given  to  it  by  his 
court,  had  sunk  deep  in  the  hearts  of  his  people.  His  ill- 
wishers  knew  how  to  irritate  the  characteristic  sensibility 
of  the  English  on  this  topic.  The  queen,  unpopular  on  the 
score  of  her  imputed  arbitrary  counsels,  was  odious  as  a 
maintainer  of  idolatry.1  The  lenity  shown  to  convicted 
popish  priests,  who,  though  liable  to  capital  punishment,  had 
been  suffered  to  escape  with  sometimes  a  very  short  impris- 
onment, was  naturally  (according  to  the  maxims  of  those 
times)  treated  as  a  grievance  by  the  commons,  who  peti- 
tioned for  the  execution  of  one  Goodman  and  others  in 
Similar  circumstances,  perhaps  in  the  hope  that  the  king 
would  attempt  to  shelter  them.  But  he  dexterously  left  it 
to  the  house  whether  they  should  die  or  not ;  and  none  of 
them  actually  suffered.2  Rumors  of  pretended  conspiracies 
by  the  catholics  were  perpetually  in  circulation,  and  rather 
unworthily  encouraged  by  the  chiefs  of  the  commons.  More 
substantial  motives  for  alarm  appeared  to  arise  from  the 

1  The  letters  of  sir  Edward  Nicholas,  at  Westminster  the  appellation  of  a  par- 
published  as  a  supplement  to  Evelyn's  liament :  p.  90. 

Diary,  show  how  generally  the  apprehen-  2  ihe  king's  speech  about  Goodman, 
Bions  of  popish  influence  were  entertained.  Baillie  tells  us,  gave  great  satisfaction  to 
It  is  well  for  superficial  pretenders  to  lay  all  ;  "  with  much  humming  was  it  re- 
these  on  calumny  and  misrepresentation;  ceived."  P.  240.  Goodman  petitioned 
but  such  as  have  read  our  historical  docu-  the  house  that  he  might  be  executed 
ments  know  that  the  royalists  were  al-  rather  than  become  the  occasion  of  differ- 
most  as  jealous  of  the  king  in  this  respect  ences  between  the  king  and  parliament. 
as  the  puritans.  See  what  Nicholas  says  This  -was  earlier  in  time,  and  at  Itnst 
to  the  king  himself,  pp.22,  25,29.  Indeed  equal  in  generosity,  to  lord  Strafford  8 
he  gives  several  hints  to  a  discerning  famous  letter;  or  perhaps  rather  more 
reader  that  he  was  not  satisfied  with  the  so.  since,  though  it  turned  out  otherwise, 
soundness  of  the  king's  intentions,  espe-  he  had  greater  reason  to  expect  that  he 
cially  as  to  O'Neale's  tampering  with  the  should  be  taken  at  his  word.  It  i.«  re- 
army  :  p.  77.  Xicholas»however,  became  markable  that  the  king  says,  in  his  an- 
afterwards  a  very  decided  supporter  of  swer  to  the  commons,  that  no  priest  had 
the  royal  cause  ;  and  in  the  council  at  been  executed  merely  for  religion,  either 
Oxford,  just  before  the  treaty  of  Oxbridge,  by  his  father  or  Elizabeth ;  which,  though 
•was  the  only  one  who  voted  according  to  well  meant,  was  quite  uutrue.  1'arl 
the  king's  wish,  not  to  give  the  member*  Hist.  712;  Butler,  U.  5. 


526  ffilSH  REBELLION.  CHAP.  IX. 

obscure  transaction  in  Scotland,  commonly  called  the  Inci- 
dent, which  looked  so  like  a  concerted  design  against  the 
two  great  leaders  of  the  constitutional  party,  Hamilton  and 
Argyle,  that  it  was  not  unnatural  to  anticipate  something 
similar  in  England.1  In  the  midst  of  these  apprehensions, 
as  if  to  justify  every  suspicion  and  every  severity,  burst  out 
the  Irish  rebellion  with  its  attendant  massacre.  Though 
nothing  could  be  more  unlikely  in  itself,  or  less  supported  by 
proof,  than  the  king's  connivance  at  this  calamity,  from 
which  every  man  of  common  understanding  could  only  ex- 
pect, what  actually  resulted  from  it,  a  terrible  aggravation  of 
his  difficulties,  yet,  with  that  distrustful  temper  of  the  Eng- 
lish, and  their  jealous  dread  of  popery,  he  was  never  able  to 
conquer  their  suspicions  that  he  had  either  instigated  the 
rebellion,  or  was  very  little  solicitous  to  suppress  it ;  suspi- 
cions, indeed,  to  which,  however  ungrounded  at  this  particular 
period,  some  circumstances  that  took  place  afterwards  gave 
an  apparent  confirmation.2 

It  was,  perhaps,  hardly  practicable  for  the  king,  had  he 
given  less  real  excuse  for  it  than  he  did,  to  lull  that  dis- 
quietude which  so  many  causes  operated  to  excite.  The 
most  circumspect  discretion  of  a  prince  in  such  a  difficult 
posture  cannot  restrain  the  rashness  of  eager  adherents,  or 
silence  the  murmurs  of  a  discontented  court.  Those  nearest 
Charles's  person,  and  who  always  possessed  too  much  of  his 
confidence,  were  notoriously  and  naturally  averse  to  the 
recent  changes.  Their  threatening  but  idle  speeches,  and 
impotent  denunciations  of  resentment,  conveyed  with  malig- 
nant exaggeration  among  the  populace,  provoked  those  tu- 

1  See  what  Clarendon  says  of  the  effect  have  been  the  medium  between  the  par 
produced  at  Westminster  by   the  Inci-  liamentary  chiefs  and  the  French  court, 
dent,  in  one  of  the  suppressed  passages,  signified  how  much  this  would  be  dreaded 
Vol.  ii.  Append,  p.  575,  edit.  1826.  by  the  former  ;  and  Kichelieu  took  care 

2  Nalson,  ii.  788.  792,  804;   Clarendon,  to  keep  her  away,  of  which  she  bitterly 
ii.  84.     The  queen's  behavior  had  been  complained.   This  was  in  February.    Her 
extraordinarily  imprudent  from  the  very  majesty's  letter,  which   M.   Mazure    has 
beginning.     So  early  as  Feb.  17,  1641,  been  malicious  enough  to  print  verbatim, 
the  French  ambassador  writes  word, —  is  a  curious  specimen  of  orthography. 
"  I/a  reine  d'Angleterre  dit  publiqueraent  Id.  p.  416.     Her  own  party  were  equally 
qu'il  y  a  une  treve  arrestee  pour  trois  ana  averse  to  this  step,  which  was  chiefly  the 
entre  la  France  et  1'Espagne,  et  que  ces  effect  of  cowardice  ;  for  Henrietta  was  by 
deux   couronnes  vont  unir  leurs  forces  no  means  the  high-spirited  woman  that 
pour  la  defendre  et  pour  venger  lea  cath-  some  have   fancied.      It  is  well   known 
cliques.''     Mazure,  Hist,  de  la  Kevol.  en  that  a  few  months  afterwards  she  pre- 
1688,  ii  419.    She  was  very  desirous  to  tended  to  require  the  waters  of  Spa  for 
go  to  France,  doubtless  to  interest  her  her  health  ;  but  was  induced  to  give  up 
brother  ind  the  queen  in  the  cause  of  her  journey. 

royalty      Lord  Holland,  who  seems   to 


CHA.  i.  — 1640-42.      TUMULTUOUS  ASSEMBLAGES. 


52V 


multuous  assemblages  which  afforded  the  king  no  bad  pre- 
text for  withdrawing  himself  from  a  capital  where  his 
personal  dignity  was  so  little  respected.1  It  is  impossible 
however  to  deny  that  he  gave  by  his  own  conduct  no  trifling 
reasons  for  .suspicion,  and  last  of  all  by  the  appointment  of 
Lunsford  to  the  government  of  the  Tower ;  a  choice  for 
which,  as  it  would  never  have  been  made  from  good  motives, 
it  was  natural  to  seek  the  worst.  But  the  single  false  step  a 


1  Clarendon,   ii.  81.     This  writer  in- 
timates that  the  Tower  was  looked  upon 
by  the  court  as  a  bridle  upon  thfe  city. 

2  Nalson,   ii.   810,  and   other  writers, 
ascribe  this  accusation  of  lord  Kimbolton 
in  the  peers,  and  of  the  five  members,  as 
they  are  commonly  called,  Pym,  Ilollis, 
Hampden,   Haslerig,  and  Strode,  to   se- 
cret information  obtained  by  the  king  in 
Scotland  of  their  former  intrigues  with 
that  nation.    This  is  rendered  in  some 
measure  probable  by  a  part  of  the  written 
charge  preferred  by  the  attorney-general 
before  the  house  of  lords,  and  by  expres- 
sions that  fell  from  the  king;   such  as 
'•  it  was  a  treason  which  they  should  all 
thank  him  for  discovering."    Clarendon, 
however,  hardly  hints  at  this  ;  and  gives 
at  least  a  hasty  reader  to   understand 
that  the  accusation  was  solely  grounded 
on  their  parliamentary  conduct.     Proba- 
bly he  was  aware  that  the  act  of  oblivion 
passed  last  year  afforded  a  sufficient  legal 
defence  to  the  charge  of  corresponding 
with  the  Scots  in  1640.     In  my  judg- 
ment they  had  an  abundant  justification 
in  the  eyes  of  their  country  for  intrigues 
which,   though  legally  treasonable,  had 
been  the  means  of  overthrowing  despotic 
power.    The  king  and  courtiers  had  been 
elated  by  the  applause  he  received  when 
he  went  into  the  city  to  dine  with  the 
lord  mayor  on  his  return  from  Scotland ; 
and  Madame  de  Motteville  says  plainly 
that  he  determined  to  avail  himself  of  it 
in  order  to  seize  the  leaders  in  parlia- 
ment,   (i.  264.) 

Nothing  could  be  more  irregular  than 
the  mode  of  Charles's  proceedings  in  this 
case.  He  sent  a  message  by  the  ser- 
geant-at-anns  to  require  of  the  speaker 
that  five  members  should  be  given  up  to 
him  on  a  charge  of  high  treason  ;  no 
magistrate's  or  councillor's  warrant  ap-' 
peared  ;  it  was  the  king  acting  singly, 
without  the  intervention  of  the  law.  It 
is  iile  to  allege,  like  Clarendon,  that 
privilege  of  parliament  does  not  extend 
to  treason  ;  the  breach  of  privilege,  and 
of  all  constitutional  law,  was  in  the  mode 
of  proceeding.  In  fact,  the  king  was 
guided  by  bad  private  advice,  and  cared 
not  to  let  aoy  of  his  privy  council  know 


his  intentions  lest  he  should  encounter 
opposition. 

The  following  account  of  the  king's 
coming  to  the  house  on  this  occasion  ia 
copied  from  the  pencil-notes  of  sir  R. 
Verney.  It  has  been  already  printed  by 
Mr.  Hatsell  (Precedents,  iv.  106),  but 
with  no  great  correctness.  What  sir  R. 
V.  says  of  the  transactions  of  Jan.  3  is 
much  the  same  as  we  read  in  the  Jour- 
nals. He  thus  proceeds  :  —  "  Tuesday, 
January  4,  1641.  The  five  gentlemen 
which  were  to  be  accused  came  into  the 
house,  and  there  was  information  that 
they  should  be  taken  away  by  force. 
Upon  this  the  house  sent  to  the  lord 
mayor,  aldermen,  and  common  council, 
to  let  them  know  how  their  privileges 
were  likely  to  be  broken  and  the  city  put 
into  danger,  and  advised  them  to  look  to 
their  security. 

"  Likewise  some  members  were  sent 
to  the  inns  of  court  to  let  them  know 
how  they  heard  they  were  tampered 
withal  to  assist  the  king  against  them, 
and  therefore  they  desired  them  not  to 
come  to  Westminster. 

"  Then  the  house  adjourned  to  one  of 
the  clock. 

"  As  soon  as  the  house  met  again  it 
was  moved,  considering  there  was  an  in- 
tention to  take  these  five  members  away 
by  force,  to  avoid  all  tumult,  let  them  be 
commanded  to  absent  themselves  ;  upon 
this  the  house  gave  them  leave  to  absent 
themselves,  but  entered  no  order  for  it. 
And  then  the  five  gentlemen  went  out  of 
the  house. 

"  A  little  after  the  king  came  with  all 
his  guard,  and  all  his  pensioners,  and 
two  or  three  hundred  soldiers  and  gen- 
tlemen. The  king  commanded  the  sol- 
diers to  stay  in  the  hall,  and  sent  us 
word  he  was  at  the  door.  The  speaker 
was  commanded  to  sit  still  with  the  mare 
lying  before  him,  and  then  the  king 
came  to  the  door  and  took  the  palsgrave 
in  with  him,  and  commanded  all  that 
came  with  him  upon  their  lives  not  to 
come  in.  So  the  doors  were  kept  open, 
and  the  earl  of  Roxburgh  stood  within 
the  door,  leaning  upon  it.  Then  the 
king  caine  upwards  towards  the  ".hair 


528      ATTEMPT  TO  ARREST  THE  FIVE  MEMBERS.      CHAP.  IX. 


which  rendered  his  affairs  irretrievable  by  anything  short  of 
civil  war,  and  placed  all  reconciliation  at  an  insuperable 
distance,  was  his  attempt  to  seize  the  five  members  within 
the  walls  of  the  house  ;  an  evident  violation,  not  of  common 
privilege,  but  of  all  security  for  the  independent  existence 
of  parliament  in  the  mode  of  its  execution,  and  leading  to 
a  very  natural  though  perhaps  mistaken  surmise,  that  the 
r jarge  itself  of  high  treason  made  against  these  distinguished 
leaders,  without  communicating  any  of  its  grounds,  had  no 
other  foundation  than  their  parliamentary  conduct.  And  we 
are  in  fact  warranted  by  the  authority  of  the  queen  herself 
to  assert  that  their  aim  in  this  most  secret  enterprise  was  to 
strike  terror  into  the  parliament,  and  regain  the  power  that 
had  been  wrested  from  their  grasp.1  It  is  unnecessary  to 
dwell  on  a  measure  so  well  known,  and  which  scarce  any 
of  the  king's  advocates  have  defended.  The  only  material 

with  his  hat  off,  and  the  speaker  stepped 
out  to  meet  him  ;  then  the  king  stepped 
up  to  his  place,  and  stood  upon  the  step, 
but  sat  not  down  in  the  chair. 

"  And  after  he  had  looked  a  great 
while  he  told  us  he  would  not  break  our 
privileges,  but  treason  had  no  privilege  ; 
he  came  for  those  five  gentlemen,  for  he 
expected  obedience  yesterday,  and  not 
an  answer.  Then  he  called  Mr.  Pym 
and  Mr.  Hollis  by  name,  but  no  answer 
•was  made.  Then  he  asked  the  speaker 
if  they  were  here,  or  where  they  were  ? 
Upon  this  the  speaker  fell  on  his  knees, 
and  desired  his  excuse,  for  he  was  a  ser- 
vant to  the  house,  and  had  neither  eyes 
nor  toiigue  to  see  or  say  anything  but 
what  they  commanded  him  :  then  the 
king  told  him  he  thought  his  own  eyes 
were  as  good  as  his,  and  then  said  his 
birds  had  flown,  but  he  did  expect  the 
house  should  send  them  to  him  ;  and  if 
they  did  not,  he  would  seek  them  him- 
self, for  their  treason  was  foul,  and  such 
a  one  as  they  would  all  thank  him  to 
discover :  then  he  assured  us  they  should 
have  a  fair  trial ;  and  so  went  out, 
pulling  off  his  hat  till  he  came  to  the 
door. 

"  Upon  this  the  house  did  instantly  re- 
solve to  adjourn  till  to-morrow  at  one  of 
the  clock,  and  in  the  interim  they  might 
consider  what  to  do. 

"  Wednesday,  5th  January.  1641. 

"  The  house  ordered  a  committee  to 
sit  at  Guildhall  in  London,  and  all  that 
would  come  had  voices.  This  was  to 
consider  and  advise  how  to  right  the 
house  in  point  of  privilege  broken  by  the 
king's  coin'ng  yesterday  with  a  force  to 


take  members  out  of  our  house.  They 
allowed  the  Irish  committee  to  sit,  but 
would  meddle  with  no  other  business  till 
this  were  ended;  they  acquainted  the 
lords  in  a  message  with  what  they  had 
done,  and  then  they  adjourned  the  house 
till  Tuesday  next." 

The  author  of  these  memoranda  in 
pencil,  which  extend,  at  intervals  of 
time,  from  the  meeting  of  the  parliament 
to  April,  1642,  though  mistaken  by  Mr. 
Hatsell  for  sir  Edward  Verney,  member 
for  the  county  of  Bucks,  and  killed  at 
the  battle  of  Edgehill,  has  been  ascer- 
tained by  my  learned  friend,  Mr.  Ser- 
geant D'03'ly,  to  be  his  brother,  sir 
Ralph,  member  for  Aylesbury.  He  con- 
tinued at  Westminster,  and  took  the 
covenant;  but  afterwards  retired  to 
France,  and  was  disabled  to  sit  by  a 
vote  of  the  house,  Sept.  22,  1645. 

l  Mem/de  Motteville,  i.  264.  Claren- 
don has  hardly  been  ingenuous  in  throw- 
ing so  much  of  the  blame  of  this  affair 
on  lord  Digby.  Indeed,  he  insinuates  in 
one  place  that  the  queen's  apprehension 
of  being  impeached,  with  which  some 
one  in  the  confidence  of  the  parliamen- 
tary leaders  (either  lord  Holland  or  lady 
Carlisle)  had  inspired  her,  led  to  the 
scheme  of  anticipating  them.  (ii.  232.) 
It  has  been  generally  supposed  that  lady 
Carlisle  gave  the  five  members  a  hint  to 
absent  themselves.  The  French  ambas- 
sador, however,  Montereuil,  takes  the 
credit  to  himself:  —  "J'avois  preveuu 
mes  amis,  et  ils  s'etoient  mis  en  surete." 
Mazure,  p  429.  It  is  probable  that  he 
was  in  communication  with  that  intrigu- 
ing lady. 


CHA.  I.  — 1640-42.  THE  MILITIA.  529 

subject  it  affords  for  reflection  is,  how  far  the  manifest 
hostility  of  Charles  to  the  popular  chiefs  might  justify  them 
in  rendering  it  harmless  by  wresting  the  sword  out  of  his 
hands.  No  man  doubtless  has  a  right,  for  the  sake  only  of 
his  own  security,  to  subvert  his  country's  laws,  or  to  plunge 
her  into  civil  war:  But  Hampden,  Hollis,  and  Pym  might 
not  absurdly  consider  the  defence  of  English  freedom  bound 
up  in  their  own,  assailed  as  they  were  for  its  sake  and  by  its 
enemies.  It  is  observed  by  Clarendon  that  "  Mr.  Hampden 
was  much  altered  after  this  accusation ;  his  nature  and 
courage  seeming  much  fiercer  than  before."  And  it  is 
certain  that  both  he  and  Mr.  Pym  were  not  only  most  for- 
ward in  all  the  proceedings  which  brought  on  the  war,  but 
among  the  most  implacable  opponents  of  all  overtures  to- 
wards reconciliation;  so  that,  although,  both  dying  in  1643, 
we  cannot  pronounce  with  absolute  certainty  as  to  their 
views,  there  can  be  little  room  to  doubt  that  they  would  have 
adhered  to  the  side  of  Cromwell  and  St.  John,  in  the  great 
separation  of  the  parliamentary  party. 

The  noble  historian  confesses  that  not  Hampden  alone, 
but  the  generality  of  those  who  were  beginning  to  judge 
more  favorably  of  the  king,  had  their  inclinations  alienated 
by  this  fatal  act  of  violence.1  It  is  worthy  of  remark  that 
each  of  the  two  most  striking  encroachments  on  the  king's 
prerogative  sprang  directly  from  the  suspicions  roused  of  an 
intention  to  destroy  their  privileges :  the  bill  perpetuating 
the  parliament  having  been  hastily  passed  on  the  discovery 
of  Percy's  and  Jermyn's  conspiracy,  and  the  present  attempt 
on  the  fiye  members  inducing  the  commons  to  insist  peremp- 
torily on  vesting  the  command  of  the  militia  in  Question  of 
persons  of  their  own  nomination ;  a  security,  in-  the  Dliutia- 
deed,  at  which  they  had  been  less  openly  aiming  from  the 
time  of  that  conspiracy,  and  particularly  of  late.2  Every 

1  p.  159,  180.  names  to  the  house,  and  who  are  the 

2  The  earliest  proof  that  the  commons  governors  of   forts  and  castles  in   theii 
gave  of  their  intention  to  take  the  militia  counties.   Commons' Journals.    Not  long 
into  their  bauds  was  immediately  upon  afterwards,  or  at  least  before  the  kind's 
the  discovery  of  Percy's  plot,  5th  May,  journey  to  Scotland^  sir  Arthur  Ha«lrri[:. 
1641,  when  an  order  was  made  that  the  as  Clarendon  informs  us,  proposed  a  bill 
members   of  each   county.   &c.,   should  for  settling  the  militia  in  such  hands  as 
meet  to  consider  in  what  state  the  places  they  should  nominate,  which    was  sec- 
for  which  they  serve  are  in  respect   of  ended  by  St.  John,  and  read  once,  '•  I 
anus  and  ammunition,  and  whether  the  with  so  universal  a  dislike,  that  it  was 
deputy-lieutenants    and  lord-lieutenants  never  called  upon  a  second  time.       (  lur- 
are  persons  well  affected  to  the  religion  endon,  i.  488.     I  can  find  nothing  of  tin* 
and  the  public  peace,  and  to  present  their  in  the  Journals,  and  believe  it  to  be  oue 

VOL.  i.  —  c.  34 


530 


MILITARY  FORCE  IN  ENGLAND. 


CHAP.  IX. 


one  knows  that  this  was  the  grand  question  upon  which  the 
quarrel  finally  rested ;  but  it  may  be  satisfactory  to  show, 
more  precisely  than  our  historians  have  generally  done,  what 
was  meant  by  the  power  of  the  militia,  and  what  was  the 
exact  ground  of  dispute  in  this  respect  between  Charles  I. 
and  his  parliament. 

The  military  force  which  our  ancient  constitution  had 
Historical  placed  in  the  hands  of  its  chief  magistrate  and 
sketch  of  those  deriving  authority  from  him,  may  be  classed 

the  military  ~  *  '         J 

force  in  under  two  descriptions :  one  principally  designed 
England.  ^Q  majnj;ajn  t}ie  king's  and  the  nation's  rights 
abroad,  the  other  to  protect  them  at  home  from  attack  or 
disturbance.  The  first  comprehends  the  tenures  by  knight's 
service,  which,  according  to  the  constant  principles  of  a  feu- 
dal monarchy,  bound  the  owners  of  lands,  thus  held  from 
the  crown,  to  attend  the  king  in  war,  within  or  without  the 
realm,  mounted  and  armed,  during  the  regular  term  of  ser- 
vice. Their  own  vassals  were  obliged  by  the  same  law  to 
accompany  them.  But  the  feudal  service  was  limited  to 
forty  days,  beyond  which  time  they  could  be  retained  only 
by  their  own  consent,  and  at  the  king's  expense.  The  mili- 
tary tenants  were  frequently  called  upon  in  expeditions 
against  Scotland,  and  last  of  all  in  that  of  1640  ;  but  the 
short  duration  of  their  legal  service  rendered  it,  of  course, 
nearly  useless  in  continental  warfare.  Even  when  they 


of  the  anachronisms  into  which  this 
author  has  fallen,  in  consequence  of 
•writing  at  a  distance  from  authentic 
materials.  The  bill  to  which  he  alludes 
must,  I  conceive,  be  that  brought  in  by 
Haslerig  long  after,  7th  December,  1641, 
not,  as  he  terms  it,  for  settling  the  mili- 
tia, but  for  making  certain  persons,  leav- 
ing their  names  in  blank,  "  lords  general 
of  all  the  forces  within  England  and 
Wales,  and  lord  admiral  of  England." 
The  persons  intended  seem  to  have  been 
Essex,  Holland,  and  Northumberland. 
The  commons  had  for  some  time  planned 
to  give  the  two  former  earls  a  supreme 
command  over  the  trained  bands  north 
and  south  of  Trent  (Journals,  Nov.  15 
and  16),  which  was  afterwards  changed 
into  the  scheme  of  lord-lieutenants  of 
their  own  nomination  for  each  county. 
The  bill  above  mentioned  having  been 
once  read,  it  was  moved  that  it  be  re- 
jected, which  was  negatived  by  158  to 
125.  Commons'  Journals,  7th  Dec.  Nal- 
son,  ii.  719,  has  made  a  mistake  about 


these  numbers.  The  bill,  however,  was 
laid  aside,  a  new  plan  having  been  de- 
vised. It  was  ordered,  31st  Dec.  1641, 
"that  the  house  be  resolved  into  a  com- 
mittee on  Monday  next  (Jan.  3),  to  take 
into  consideration  the  militiaof  the  king- 
dom." That  Monday,  Jan.  3,  was  the 
famous  day  of  the  kiug's  message  about 
the  five  members ;  and  on  Jan.  13,  a 
declaration  for  putting  the  kingdom  in  a 
state  of  defence  passed  the  commons,  by 
which  all  officers,  magistrates,  &c.,  were 
enjoined  to  take  care  that  no  soldiers  be 
raised,  nor  any  castles  or  arms  given  up, 
without  his  majesty's  pleasure  signified 
by  both  houses  of  parliament.  Commons' 
Journals.  Pafl.  Hist.  1035.  The  lords 
at  the  time  refused  to  concur  in  this  dec- 
laration, which  was  afterwards  changed 
into  the  ordinance  for  the  militia;  but 
32  peers  signed  a  protest  (id.  1049).  and 
the  house  not  many  days  afterwards 
came  to  an  opposite  vote,  joining  with  the 
commons  in  their  demand  of  the  militia. 
Id.  1072,  1091. 


CMA.  I.  -1640-42.     LAWS  AGAINST  COMPULSORY  LEVIES.  531 

formed  the  battle,  or  line  of  heavy-armed  cavalry,  it  was 
necessary  to  complete  the  army  by  recruits  of  foot-soldiers, 
whom  feudal  tenure  did  not  regularly  supply,  and  whose 
importance  was  soon  made  sensible  by  their  skill  in  our  na- 
tional weapon,  the  bow.  "What  was  the  extent  of  the  king's 
lawful  prerogative  for  two  centuries  or  more  after  the  Con- 
quest as  to  compelling  any  of  his  subjects  to  serve  him  in 
foreign  war,  independently  of  the  obligations  of  tenure,  is  a 
question  scarcely  to  be  answered ;  since,  knowing  so  imper- 
fectly the  boundaries  of  constitutional  law  in  that  period,  we 
have  little  to  guide  us  but  precedents;  and  precedents,  in 
such  times,  are  apt  to  be  much  more  records  of  power  than 
of  right.  We  find  certainly  several  instances  under  Edward 
I.  and  Edward  II.,  sometimes  of  proclamations  to  the  sher- 
iffs, directing  them  to  notify  to  all  persons  of  sufficient  estate 
that  they  must  hold  themselves  ready  to  attend  the  king 
whenever  he  should  call  on  them,  sometimes  of  commissions 
to  particular  persons  in  different  counties,  who  are  enjoined 
to  choose  and  array  a  competent  number  of  horse  and  foot 
for  the  king's  service.1  But  these  levies  being,  of  course, 
vexatious  to  the  people,  and  contrary  at  least  to  the  spirit  of 
those  immunities  which,  under  the  shadow  of  the  great  char- 
ter, they  were  entitled  to  enjoy,  Edward  III.,  on  the  petition 
of  his  first  parliament,  who  judged  that  such  compulsory 
service  either  was  or  ought  to  be  rendered  illegal,  passed 
a  remarkable  act,  with  the  simple  brevity  of  those  times: 
"  That  no  man  from  henceforth  should  be  charged  to  arm 
himself,  otherwise  than  he  was  wont  in  the  tiine  of  his  pro- 
genitors, the  kings  of  England;  and  that  no  man  be  com- 
pelled to  go  out  of  his  shire,  but  where  necessity  requireth, 
and  sudden  coming  of  strange  enemies  into  the  realm ;  and 
then  it  shall  be  done  as  hath  been  used  in  times' past  for  the 
defence  of  the  realm."  2 

This  statute,  by  no  means  of  inconsiderable  importance  in 

our  constitutional  history,  put  a  stop  for  some  ages  to  these 

„  arbitrary  conscriptions.     But  Edward  had  recourse  to  an' 

other  means  of  levying  men  without  his  own  cost,  by  calling 

1  Rymer,  sub  Edw.  I.  et  II.  passim,  probarent  indilate  ;  Haquodsint  promptl 
Thus,  in  1297,  a  writ  to  the  sheriff  of  et  parati  ad  veniendum  ad  noseteuiidum 
Yorkshire  directs  him  to  make  known  to  cuin  propria  persona  noatra,  pro  defen- 
all,  qui  habent  20  libratas  terrte  et  reditus  sione  ipsorum  et  totius  regni  uostri  pro- 
per annum,  tarn  illis  qui  nou  tenent  de  dicti,  quandocunque  pro  ipsis  duxerimu* 
nobis  in  capite  quaui  illis  qui  teneut,  ut  demandandum  :  ii.  864. 
de  equifl  et  armis  sibi  proyideant  et  se  *  Stat.  1  Edw.  111.  o.  6 


532  LAWS  AGAINST  COMPULSORY  LEVIES.     CHAP.  IX. 

on  the  counties  and  principal  towns  to  furnish  a  certain  num- 
ber of  troops.  Against  this  the  parliament  provided  a  rem- 
edy by  an  act  in  the  25th  year  of  his  reign :  "  That  no  man 
shall  be  constrained  to  find  men-at-arms,  hoblers,  nor  arch- 
ers, other  than  those  who  hold  by  such  service,  if  it  be  not 
by  common  consent  and  grant  in  parliament."  Both  these 
statutes  were  recited  and  confirmed  in  the  fourth  year  of 
Henry  IV.1 

The  successful  resistance  thus  made  by  parliament  appears 
to  have  produced  the  discontinuance  of  compulsory  levies  for 
foreign  warfare.  Edward  III.  and  his  successors,  in  their 
long  contention  with  France,  resorted  to  the  mode  of  recruit- 
ing by  contracts  with  men  of  high  rank  or  military  estima- 
tion, whose  influence  was  greater  probably  than  that  of  the 
crown  towards  procuring  voluntary  enlistments.  The  pay 
of  soldiers,  which  we  find  stipulated  in  such  of  those  con- 
tracts as  are  extant,  was  extremely  high  ;  but  it  secured  the 
service  of  a  brave  and  vigorous  yeomanry  1  Under  the  house 
of  Tudor,  in  conformity  to  their  more  despotic  scheme  of 
government,  the  salutary  enactments  of  former  times  came 
to  be  disregarded ;  Henry  VIII.  and  Elizabeth  sometimes 
compelling  the  counties  to  furnish  soldiers :  and  the  preroga- 
tive of  pressing  men  for  military  service,  even  out  of  the 
kingdom,  having  not  only  become  as  much  established  as 
undisputed  usage  could  make  it,  but  acquiring  no  slight  de- 
gree of  sanction  by  an  act  passed  under  Philip  and  Mary, 
which,  without  repealing  or  adverting  to  the  statutes  of  Ed- 
ward III.  and  Henry  IV.,  recognizes,  as  it  seems,  the  right 
of  the  crown  to  levy  men  for  service  in  war,  and  imposes 
penalties  on  persons  absenting  themselves  from  musters  com- 
manded by  the  king's  authority  to  be  held  for  that  purpose.3 
Clarendon,  whose  political  heresies  sprang  in  a  great  meas- 
ure from  his  possessing  but  a  very  imperfect  knowledge  of 
our  ancient  constitution,  speaks  of  the  act  that  declared  the 
pressing  of  soldiers  illegal,  though  exactly  following,  even  in 
its  language,  that  of  Edward  III.,  as  contrary  to  the  usage 
and  custom  of  all  times. 

1  25  Edw.  HI.  c.  8 ;  4  H.  IV.  c.  13.  tion.  See  yols.  309, 1926, 2219.  and  others. 

2  4  &  5  Philip  and  Mary,  c.  3.    The  Thanks  to  Humphrey  Wanley's  diligence, 
Harleian   manuscripts  are  the  best  au-  the  analysis  of  these  papers  in  the  cata- 
thority  for  the  practice  of  pressing  sol-  logue  will  save  the  inquirer  the  trouble 
fliers   to  serve   in    Ireland  or  elsewhere,  of  reading,  or  the  mortification  of  finding 
and  are  full  of  instances.     The  Mouldys  he  cannot   read,  the   terrible  scrawl  iu 
and  BullcaLfs  were  in  frequent  req.uisi-  which  they  are  generally  written. 


CHA.  I.  — 1640-42.     NO  REGULAR  ARMY  IN  ENGLAND.        533 

It  is  scarcely  perhaps  necessary  to  observe  that  there  had 
never  been  any  regular  army  kept  up  in  England.  Henry 
VII.  established  the  yeomen  of  the  guard  in  1485,  solely  for 
the  defence  of  his  person,  and  rather  perhaps,  even  at  that 
time,  to  be  considered  as  the  king's  domestic  servants  than 
as  soldiers.  Their  number  was  at  first  fifty,  and  seems  never 
.to  have  exceeded  two  hundred.  A  kind  of  regular  troops, 
however,  chiefly  accustomed  to  the  use  of  artillery,  was  main- 
tained in  the  very  few  fortified  places  where  it  was  thought 
necessary  or  practicable  to  keep  up  the  show  of  defence ;  the 
Tower  of  London,  Portsmouth,  the  castle  of  Dover,  the  fort 
of  Tilbury,  and,  before  the  union  of  the  crowns,  Berwick  and 
some  other  places  on  the  Scottish  border.  I  have  met  with 
very  little  as  to  the  nature  of  these  garrisons.  But  their 
whole  number  must  have  been  insignificant,  and  probably 
at  no  time  equal  to  resist  any  serious  attack. 

We  must  take  care  not  to  confound  this  strictly  military 
force,  serving,  whether  by  virtue  of  tenure  or  engagement, 
wheresoever  it  should  be  called,  with  that  of  a  more  domestic 
and  defensive  character  to  which  alone  the  name  of. militia 
was  usually  applied.  By  the  Anglo-Saxon  laws,  or  rather 
by  one  of  the  primary  and  indispensable  conditions  of  politi- 
cal society,  every  freeholder,  if  not  every  freeman,  was  bound 
to  defend  his  country  against  hostile  invasion.  It  appears 
that  the  alderman  or  earl,  while  those  titles  continued  to  im- 
ply the  government  of  a  county,  was  the  proper  commander 
of  this  militia.  Henry  H.,  in  order  to  render  it  more  effec- 
tive in  cases  of  emergency,  and  perhaps  with  a  view  to  ex- 
tend its  service,  enacted,  by  consent  of  parliament,  that  every 
freeman,  according  to  the  value  of  his  estate  or  movables, 
should  hold  himself  constantly  furnished  with  suitable  arms 
and  equipments.1  By  the  statute  of  Winchester,  in  the  13th 
year  of  Edward  L,  these  provisions  were  enforced  and  ex- 
tended. Every  man,  between  the  ages  of  fifteen  and  sixty, 
was  to  be  assessed,  and  sworn  to  keep  armor  according  to 
the  value  of  his  lands  and  goods  ;  for  fifteen  pounds  and  up- 
wards in  rent,  or  forty  marks  in  goods,  a  hauberk,  an  iron 
breastplate,  a  sword,  a  knife,  and  a  horse ;  for  smaller  prop- 
erty, less  extensive  arms.  A  view  of  this  armor  was  to  be 
taken  twice  in  the  year  by  constables  chosen  in  every  hun- 

1  Wilkins's  Leges  Anglo-Saxonioe,  p.  333;  Lyttleton's  Henry  H.,  iii.  364. 


534  COMMISSIONS  OF  ARRAY.  CHAP.  IX, 

dred.1  These  regulations  appear  by  the  context  of  the  whole 
statute  to  have  more  immediate  regard  to  the  preservation  of 
internal  peace,  by  suppressing  tumults  and  arresting  robbers, 
than  to  the  actual  defence  of  the  realm  against  hostile  inva- 
sion ;  a  danger  not  at  that  time  very  imminent.  The  sheriff, 
as  chief  conservator  of  public  peace  and  minister  of  the  law, 
had  always  possessed  the  right  of  summoning  the  posse  com- 
itatus ;  that  is,  of  calling  on  all  the  king's  liege  subjects 
within  his  jurisdiction  for  assistance,  in  case  of  any  rebellion 
or  tumultuous  rising,  or  when  bands  of  robbers  infested  the 
public  ways,  or  when,  as  occurred  very  frequently,  the  exe- 
cution of  legal  process  was  forcibly  obstructed.  It  seems  to 
have  been  the  policy  of  that  wise  prince,  to  whom  we  are 
indebted  for  so  many  signal  improvements  in  our  law,  to  give 
a  more  effective  and  permanent  energy  to  this  power  of  the 
sheriff.  The  provisions,  however,  of  the  statute  of  Winches- 
ter, so  far  as  they  obliged  every  proprietor  to  possess  suitable 
arms,  were  of  course  applicable  to  national  defence.  In  sea- 
sons of  public  danger,  threatening  invasion  from  the  side  of 
Scotland  or  France,  it  became  customary  to  issue  commissions 
of  array,  empowering  those  to  whom  they  were  addressed  to 
muster  and  train  all  men  capable  of  bearing  arms  in  the 
counties  to  which  their  commission  extended,  and  hold  them 
in  readiness  to  defend  the  kingdom.  The  earliest  of  these 
commissions  that  I  find  in  Rymer  is  of  1324,  and  the  latest 
of  1557. 

The  obligation  of  keeping  sufficient  arms  according  to  each 
man's  estate  was  preserved  by  a  statute  of  Philip  and  Mary, 
which  made  some  changes  in  the  rate  and  proportion  as  well 
as  the  kind  of  arms.2  But  these  ancient  provisions  were 
abrogated  by  James  in  his  first  parliament.8  The  nation, 
become  forever  secure  from  invasion  on  the  quarter  where 
the  militia  service  had  been  most  required,  and  freed  from 
the  other  dangers  which  had  menaced  the  throne  of  Eliza- 
beth, gladly  saw  itself  released  from  an  expensive  obligation. 
The  government  again  may  be  presumed  to  have  thought 

1  Stat  13  E.  1.  estate  to  furnish  a  lance  at  the  discretion 

*  6  Philip  and  Mary,c.  2.  of  the  lord-lieutenant,  was  unwarranted 

*  1  Jae.  c.  26,  f  46.    An  order  of  coun-  by  any  existing  law,  and  must  be  reck- 
cii  in  Dec.  1638,  that  every  man  having  oned  among  the  violent  stretches  of  pre- 
land.'j  of  inheritance  to  the  clear  yearly  rogative  at  that  time.    Kushw.  Abr.  ii. 
value  of  200/.  should  be  chargeable  to  fur-  600. 

nish  a  light  horseman,  every  one  of  3002. 


CHA.  I.  — 1640-42.     OFFICE  OF  LORD-LIEUTENANT.  535 

that  weapons  of  offence  were  safer  in  its  hands  than  in  those 
of  its  subjects.  Magazines  of  arms  were  formed  in  different 
places,  and  generally  in  each  county : 1  but,  if  we  may  rea- 
son from  the  absence  of  documents,  there  was  little  regard  to 
military  array  and  preparation  ;  save  that  the  citizens  of 
London  mustered  their  trained  bands  on  holidays,  an  institu- 
tion that  is  said  to  have  sprung  out  of  a  voluntary  association, 
called  the  Artillery  Company,  formed  in  the  reign  of  Henry 
VIII.  for  the  encouragement  of  archery,  and  acquiring  a 
more  respectable  and  martial  character  at  the  time  of  the 
Spanish  Armada.2 

The  power  of  calling  to  arms,  and  mustering  the  popula- 
tion of  each  county,  given  in  earlier  times  to  the  sheriff  or 
justices  of  the  peace,  or  to  special  commissioners  of  array, 
began  to  be  intrusted,  in  the  reign  of  Mary,  to  a  new  officer, 
entitled  the  lord-lieutenant.  This  was  usually  a  peer,  or  at 
least  a  gentleman  of  large  estate  within  the  county,  whose 
office  gave  him  the  command  of  the  militia,  and  rendered 
him  the  chief  vicegerent  of  his  sovereign,  responsible  for  the 
maintenance  of  public  order.  This  institution  may  be  con- 
sidered as  a  revival  of  the  ancient  local  earldom  ;  and  it  cer- 
tainly took  away  from  the  sheriff  a  great  part  of  the  dignity 
and  importance  which  he  had  acquired  since  the  discontinu- 
ance of  that  office.  Yet  the  lord-lieutenant  has  so  peculiarly 
military  an  authority,  that  it  does  not  in  any  degree  control  the 
civil  power  of  the  sheriff  as  the  executive  minister  of  the  law. 
In  certain  cases,  such  as  a  tumultuous  obstruction  of  legal 
authority,  each  might  be  said  to  possess  an  equal  power ;  the 
sheriff  being  still  undoubtedly  competent  to  call  out  the  posse 
comitatus  in  order  to  enforce  obedience.  Practically,  how- 
ever, in  all  serious  circumstances,  the  lord-lieutenant  has 
always  been  reckoned  the  efficient  and  responsible  guardian 
of  public  tranquillity. 

From  an  attentive  consideration  of  this  sketch  of  our  mili- 
tary law,  it  will  strike  the  reader  that  the  principal  ques- 
tion to  be  determined  was,  whether,  in  time  of  peace,  without 
pretext  of  danger  of  invasion,  there  were  any  legal  authority 
that  could  direct  the  mustering  and  training  to  arms  of  the 
able-bodied  men  in  each  county,  usually  denominated  the 
militia.  If  the  power  existed  at  all,  it  manifestly  resided  in 

1  Rymer,  xix.  310.  The  word  artillery  WM  used  In  that  age 

*  Grose's  Military  Antiquities,  i.  150.'  for  the  long  bow. 


536  ENCROACHMENTS  OF  PARLIAMENT.        CHAP.  EX. 

the  king.  The  notion  that  either  or  both  houses  of  parlia- 
ment, who  possess  no  portion  of  executive  authority,  could 
take  on  themselves  one  of  its  most  peculiar  and  important 
functions,  was  so  preposterous  that  we  can  scarcely  give 
credit  to  the  sincerity  of  any  reasonable  person  who  ad- 
vanced it.  In  the  imminent  peril  of  hostile  invasion,  in  the 
case  of  intestine  rebellion,  there  seems  to  be  no  room  for 
doubt  that  the  king,  who  could  call  on  his  subjects  to  bear 
arms  for  their  country  and  laws,  could  oblige  them  to  that 
necessary  discipline  and  previous  training,  without  which 
their  service  would  be  unavailing.  It  might  also  be  urged 
that  he  was  the  proper  judge  of  the  danger.  But  that,  in  a 
season  of  undeniable  tranquillity,  he  could  withdraw  his  sub- 
jects from  their  necessary  labors  against  their  consent,  even 
for  the  important  end  of  keeping  up  the  use  of  military  disci- 
pline, is  what,  with  our  present  sense  of  the  limitations  of 
royal  power,  it  might  be  difficult  to  affirm.  The  precedents 
under  Henry  VIII.  and  Elizabeth  were  numerous ;  but  not 
to  mention  that  many,  perhaps  most,  of  these  might  come  un- 
der the  class  of  preparations  against  invasion,  where  the  royal 
authority  was  not  to  be  doubted,  they  could  be  no  stronger 
than  those  other  precedents  for  pressing  and  mustering  sol- 
diers, which  had  been  declared  illegal.  There  were  at  least 
so  many  points  uncertain,  and  some  wherein  the  prerogative 
was  plainly  deficient,  such  as  the  right  of  marching  the  mili- 
tia out  of  their  own  counties,  taken  away,  if  it  had  before  ex- 
isted, by  the  act  just  passed  against  pressing  soldiers,  that  the 
concurrence  of  the  whole  legislature  seemed  requisite  to  place 
so  essential  a  matter  as  the  public  defence  on  a  secure  and 
permanent  footing.1 

The  aim  of  the  houses  however  in  the  bill  for  regulating 
the  militia,    presented   to    Charles   in    February, 

Encroach-  j    i  •  c        i    *  i  •   i     i    j   •  -j 

mentsof  1642,  and  his  refusal  to  pass  which  led  by  rapid 
mentarlia  steps  to  the  civil  war,  was  not  so  much  to  remove 
those  uncertainties  by  a  general  provision  (for  in 
effect  they  left  them  much  as  before),  as  to  place  the  com- 
mand of  the  sword  in  the  hands  of  those  they  could  control; 
—  nominating  in  the  bill  the  lords-lieutenant  of  every  county, 
who  were  to  obey  the  orders  of  the. two  houses,  and  to  be  ir- 

1  Whitelock  maintained,  both  on  this  129.  This,  though  not  Tery  well  ex- 
occasion  and  at  the  treaty  of  Uxbridge,  pressed,  can  only. mean  that  it  required 
that  the  power  of  the  militia  resided  in  an  act  of  parliament  to  determine  and 
the  king  and  two  houses  jointly :  p.  55,  regulate  it. 


CHA.1.— 1640-42.      CHARLES'S  CONCESSIONS.  537 

removable  by  the  king  for  two  years.  No  one  can  pretend 
that  this  was  not  an  encroachment  on  his  prerogative.1  It 
can  only  find  a  justification,  in  the  precarious  condition,  as 
the  commons  asserted  it  to  be,  of  those  liberties  they  had  so 
recently  obtained,  in  their  just  persuasion  of  the  king's  in- 
sincerity, and  in  the  demonstrations  he  had  already  made  of 
an  intention  to  win  back  his  authority  at  the  sword's  point.3 
But  it  is  equitable,  on  the  other  hand,  to  observe  that  the 
commons  had  by  no  means  greater  reason  to  distrust  the 
faith  of  Charles,  than  he  had  to  anticipate  fresh  assaults 
from  them  on  the  power  he  had  inherited,  on  the  form  of 
religion  which  alone  he  thought  lawful,  on  the  counsellors 
who  had  served  him  most  faithfully,  and  on  the  nearest  of 
his  domestic  ties.  If  the  right  of  self-defence  could  be  urged 
by  parliament  for  this  demand  of  the  militia,  must  we  not 
admit  that  a  similar  plea  was  equally  valid  for  the  king's 
refusal?  However  arbitrary  and  violent  the  previous  gov- 
ernment of  Charles  may  have  been,  however  disputable  his 
sincerity  at  present,  it  is  vain  to  deny  that  he  had  made  the 
most  valuable  concessions,  and  such  as  had  cost  him  very 
dear.  He  had  torn  away  from  his  diadem  what  all  monarchs 
would  deem  its  choicest  jewel  —  that  high  attribute  of  un- 
controllable power,  by  which  their  flatterers  have  in  all  ages 
told  them  they  resemble  and  represent  the  Divinity.  He 
had  seen  those  whose  counsels  he  had  best  approved  reward- 
ed with  exile  or  imprisonment,  and  had  incurred  the  deep 
reproach  of  his  own  heart  by  the  sacrifice  of  Stratford.  He 
had  just  now  given  a  reluctant  assent  to  the  extinction  of 
one  estate  of  parliament,  by  the  bill  excluding  bishops  from 
the  house  of  peers.  Even  in  this  business  of  the  militia  he 
would  have  consented  to  nominate  the  persons  recommended 
to  him  as  lieutenants,  by  commissions  revocable  at  his  pleas- 
ure :  or  would  have  passed  the  bill  rendering  them  irremov- 

1  See  the  list  of  those  recommended,  ado  accepted,  and  first  read,  then»  were 

Parl.  Hist.  1083.  Some  of  these  were  few  men  who  imagined  it  would  ever 

royalists  :  but,  on  the  whole,  three-fourths  receive  further  countenance;  but  now 

of  the  military  force  of  England  would  there  were  very  few  who  did  not  believe 

have  been  in  the-  hands  of  persons  who,  it  to  be  a  very  necessary  provi.-ion  for  the 

though  men  of  rank  and  attached  to  the  peace  and  safety  of  the  kingdom.  Sn 

monarchy,  had  given  Charles  no  reason  great  an  impression  hal  the  Inti-  proceed- 

to  hope  that  they  would  decline  to  obey  ings  made  upon  them,  that  with  littlo 

any  order  which  the  parliament  might  opposition  it  passed  the  common*,  and 

issue,  however  derogatory  or  displeasing  was  sent  up  to  the  lords.'1  Clarendon, 

to  himself.  ii-  180. 

a  "  When  this  bill  had  been  with  much 


538  THE  NINETEEN  PKOPOSITIONS.  CHAP.  IX, 

able  for  one  year,  provided  they  might  receive  their  orders 
from  himself  and  the  two  houses  jointly.1  It  was  not  unrea- 
sonable for  the  king  to  pause  at  the  critical  moment  which 
was  to  make  all  future  denial  nugatory,  and  inquire  whether 
the  prevailing  majority  designed  to  leave  him  what  they  had 
Nineteen  not  taken  away.  But  he  was  not  long  kept  in 
propositions,  uncertainty  upon  this  score.  The  nineteen  prop- 
ositions tendered  to  him  at  York  in  the  beginning  of  June, 
and  founded  upon  addresses  and  declarations  of  a  consider- 
ably earlier  date,2  went  to  abrogate  in  spirit  the  whole  exist- 
ing constitution,  and  were  in  truth  so  far  beyond  what  the 
king  could  be  expected  to  grant,  that  terms  more  intolerable 
were  scarcely  proposed  to  him  in  his  greatest  difficulties,  not 
at  Uxbridge,  nor  at  Newcastle,  nor  even  at  Newport. 

These  famous  propositions  import  that  the  privy  council 
and  officers  of  state  should  be  approved  by  parliament,  and 
take  such  an  oath  as  the  two  houses  should  prescribe ;  that 
during  the  intervals  of  parliament  no  vacancy  in  the  council 
should  be  supplied  without  the  assent  of  the  major  part, 
subject  to  the  future  sanction  of  the  two  houses ;  that  the 
education  and  marriages  of  the  king's  children  should  be 
under  parliamentary  control;  the  votes  of  popish  peers  be 
taken  away ;  the  church  government  and  liturgy  be  reformed 
as  both  houses  should  advise;-  the  militia  and  all  fortified 
places  put  in  such  hands  as  parliament  should  approve ; 
finally,  that  the  king  should  pass  a  bill  for  restraining  all 
peers  to  be  made  in  future  from  sitting  in  parliament,  unless 

1  Clarendon,  ii.  375  :  Parl.  Hist.  1077,  work  does  not  notice  that  it  had  passed 
1106,  &c.  It  may  be  added,  that  the  the  commons  on  Feb.  19,  before  the  king 
militia  bill,  as  originally  tendered  to  the  had  begun  to  move  towards  the  north, 
king  by  the  two  houses,  was  ushered  in  Commons' Journals.  It  seems  not  to  have 
by  a  preamble  asserting  that  there  had  pleased  the  housp  of  .lords,  who  post- 
been  a  most  dangerous  and  desperate  de-  poned  its  consideration,  and  was  much 
sign  on  the  house  of  commons,  the  effect  more  grievous  to  the  king  than  the  nine- 
of  the  bloody  counsels  of  the  papists  and  teen  propositions  themselves.  One  pro- 
other  ill-affected  persons,  who  had  al-  posal  was  to  remove  all  papists  from 
ready  raised  a  rebellion  in  Ireland.  Clar.  about  the  queen ;  that  is,  to  deprive  her 
p.  836.  Surely  he  could  not  have  passed  of  the  exercise  of  her  religion,  guaranteed 
this,  especially  the  last  allusion,  without  by  her  marriage  contract.  To  this  ob- 
recording his  own  absolute  dishonor;  but  jection  Pym  replied  that  the  house  of 
it  must  be  admitted,  that  on  the  king's  commons  had  only  to  consider  the  law  of 
objection  they  omitted  this  preamble,  and  God  and  the  law  of  the  land ;  that  they 
also  materially  limited  the  powers  of  the  must  resist  idolatry,  lest  they  incur  the 
lords-lieutenant  to  be  appointed  under  divine  wrath,  and  must  see  the  laws  of 
the  bill.  this  kingdom  executed  ;  that  the  public 

*  A  declaration  of  the  grievances  of  faith  is  less  than  that  they  owe  to  God, 

the  kingdom,  and  the  remedies  proposed,  against  which  no  contract  can  oblige, 

dated  April  1,  may  be  found  iu  the  Par-  neither  can  any  bind  us  against  the  law 

liauieiitary  History,  p.  1155.  But  that  of  the  kingdom.  Parl.  Hist.  1162. 


CHA.  I  —1640-42.        CLARIS  OF  SUPPORT.  539 

they  be  admitted  with  the  consent  of  both  houses.  A  few  more 
laudable  provisions,  such  as  that  the  judges  should  hold  their 
offices  during  good  behavior,  which  the  king  had  long  since 
promised,1  were  mixed  up  with  these  strange  demands. 
Even  had  the  king  complied  with  such  unconstitutional  req- 
uisitions, there  was  one  behind  which,  though  they  had  not 
advanced  it  on  this  occasion,  was  not.  likely  to  be  forgotten. 
It  had  been  asserted  by  the  house  of  commons  in  their  last 
remonstrance,  that,  on  a  right  construction  of  the  old  corona- 
tion oath,  the  king  was  bound  to  assent  to  all  bills  which 
the  two  houses  of  parliament  should  offer.2  It  has  been  said 
by  some  that  this  was  actually  the  constitution  of  Scotland, 
where  the  crown  possessed  a  counterbalancing  influence ; 
but  such  a  doctrine  was  in  this  country  as  repugnant  to  the 
whole  history  of  our  laws  as  it  was  incompatible  with  the 
subsistence  of  the  monarchy  in  anything  more  than  a  nom- 
inal preeminence. 

In  weighing  the  merits  of  this  great  contest,  in  judging 
whether  a   thoroughly    upright   and    enlightened  Discuggion  of 
man  would  rather  have  listed  under  the  royal  or  the  respec- 
parliamentary   standard,   there   are   two   political  ^th^ewo* 
postulates,  the  concession   of  which  we  may  re-  parties  to 

...  .  i  i        •.  support. 

quire :  one,  that  civil  war  is  such  a  calamity  as 
nothing  but  the  most  indispensable  necessity  can  authorize 
any  party  to  bring  on  ;  the  other,  that  the  mixed  government 
of  England  by  king,  lords,  and  commons,  was  to  be  main- 
tained in  preference  to  any  other  form  of  polity.  The  first 
of  these  can  hardly  be  disputed ;  and  though  the  denial  of  the 
second  would  certainly  involve  no  absurdity,  yet  it  may 
justly  be  assumed  where  both  parties  avowed  their  adher- 

1  Parl  Hist.  702.  tf  the  former  were  right,  as  to  the  point 

*  Clarendon,  p.  452.     Upon  this  pas-  of  Latin  construction,  though  consuetu- 

sage  in  the  remonstrance  a  division  took  dines  seems  naturally  to   imply   a   past 

place,  when  it  was  carried  by  103  to  61.  tense,  I  should  by  no  means  admit  the 

Parl  Hist  1302.    The  words  in  the  old  strange    inference    that    the    R 


earning  which  this  grammatico-political  expression,  -quw 

contention  arose,  are  the  following:—  was  introduced,  on  the  hypothesis 

"  Coiicedis  iustas  leges  et  consuetudines  word  being  in  the  future  teuse,  as 

psse  tenendas,  et  promittis  per  te  eas  esse  curity    against    his    legisli 


l-ue     lULUre     WJUBC,     VTHJIG     wi«7    vi/nci    vv»»  •  . 

tended  for  the  prasterperfect.    But  even    of  this  your  kingdom  tiavif 


540  FAULTS  OF  BOTH.  CHAP.  IX. 

ence  to  it  as  a  common  principle.  Such  as  prefer  a  despotic 
or  a  republican  form  of  government  will  generally,  without 
much  further  inquiry,  have  made  their  election  between 
Charles  I.  and  the  parliament.  We  do  not  argue  from  the 
creed  of  the  English  constitution  to  those  who  have  aban- 
doned its  communion. 

There  was  so  much  in  the  conduct  and  circumstances  of 
Faults  of  both  parties  in  the  year  1642  to  excite  disappro- 
both.  bation  and  distrust,  that  a  wise  and  good  man 

could  hardly  unite  cordially  with  either  of  them.  On  the 
one  hand  he  would  entertain  little  doubt  of  the  king's  desire 
to  overthrow  by  force  or  stratagem  whatever  had  been 
effected  in  parliament,  and  to  establish  a  plenary  despotism ; 
his  arbitrary  temper,  his  known  principles  of  government, 
the  natural  sense*  of  wounded  pride  and  honor,  the  instiga- 
tions of  a  haughty  woman,  the  solicitations  of  favorites,  the 
promises  of  ambitious  men,  were  all  at  work  to  render  his 
new  position  as  a  constitutional  sovereign,  even  if  unaccom- 
panied by  fresh  indignities  and  encroachments,  too  grievous 
and  mortifying  to  be  endured.  He  had  already  tampered  in 
a  conspiracy  to  overawe,  if  not  to  disperse,  the  parliament : 
he  had  probably  obtained  large  promises,  though  very  little 
to  be  trusted,  from  several  of  the  presbyterian  leaders  in 
Scotland  during  his  residence  there  in  the  summer  of  1641  : 
he  had  attempted  to  recover  his  ascendency  by  a  sudden 
blow  in  the  affair  of  the  five  members;  he  had  sent  the 
queen  out  of  England,  furnished  with  the  crown  jewels,  for 
no  other  probable  end  than  to  raise  men  and  procure  arms 
in  foreign  countries : 1  he  was  now  about  to  take  the  field 
with  an  army,  composed  in  part  of  young -gentlemen  disdain- 
ful of  a  puritan  faction  that  censured  their  license,  and  of 
those  soldiers  of  fortune,  reckless  of  public  principle,  and 
averse  to  civil  control,  whom  the  war  in  Germany  had 
trained ;  in  part  of  the  catholics,  a  wealthy  and  active  body, 
devoted  to  the  crown,  from  which  alone  they  had  experienced 
justice  or  humanity,  and  from  whose  favor  and  gratitude 
they  now  expected  the  most  splendid  returns.  Upon  neither 
of  these  parties  could  a  lover  of  his  country  and  her  liber- 

1  See  what  is  said  as  to  this  by  P.  ly  suspicious.    The  house,  it  appears,  had 

Orleans,  iii.  87,  and  by  Madame  de  Motte-  received  even  then  information  that  the 

ville.   i.  26.      Her  intended  journey   to  crown  jewels  were  to  be  carried  away. 

6pa,  July,  1641,  which  was  given  up  on  Nalson,  ii.  391. 
the  remonstrance  of  parliament,  is  high- 


fnA.  I.  — 1640-42.    CONDUCT  OF  THE  COMMONS.  541 

ties  look  without  alarm  ;  and  though  he  might  derive  more 
hope  from  those  better  spirits  who  had  withstood  the  preroga- 
tive in  its  exorbitance,  as  they  now  sustained  it  in  its  decline, 
yet  it  could  not  be  easy  to  foretell  that  they  would  preserve 
sufficient  influence  to  keep  steady  the  balance  of  power,  in 
the  contingency  of  any  decisive  success  of  the  royal  arms. 

But,  on  the  other  hand,  the  house  of  commons  presented 
still  less  favorable  prospects.  We  should  not  indeed  judge 
over-severely  some  acts  of  a  virtuous  indignation  in  the  first 
moments  of  victory,1  or  those  heats  of  debate,  without  some 
excess  of  which  a  popular  assembly  is  in  danger  of  falling 
into  ths  opposite  extreme  of  phlegmatic  security.  But,  after 
every  allowance  has  been  made,  he  must  bring  very  heated 
passions  to  the  records  of  those  times  who  does  not  perceive 
in  the  conduct  of  that  body  a  series  of  glaring  violations, 
not  only  of  positive  and  constitutional,  but  of  those  higher 
principles  which  are  paramount  to  all  immediate  policy. 
Witness  the  ordinance  for  disarming  recusants  passed  by 
both  houses  in  August,  1 641,  and  that  in  November  author- 
izing the  earl  of  Leicester  to  raise  men  for  the  defence  of 
Ireland  without  warrant  under  the  great  seal,  both  manifest 
encroachments  on  the  executive  power ; 2  and  the  enormous 
extension  of  privilege,  under  which  every  person  accused  on 
the  slightest  testimony  of  disparaging  their  proceedings,  or 
even  of  introducing  new-fangled  ceremonies  in  the  church, 

1  The  impeachments  of  lord  Finch  and  rod  to  the  court  of  king's  bench,  while 
of  judge  Berkeley  for  high  treason  are  at  the  judges  were  sitting,  who  took  him 
least  as  little  justifiable  in  point  of  law  away  to  prison,  "  which  struck  a  great 
as  that  of  Strafford.  Yet,  because  the  terror,"  says  Whitelock,  "  in  the  rest  of 
former  of  these  was  moved  by  lord  Falk-  his  brethren  then  sitting  in  Westminster- 
land,  Clarendon  is  so  far  from  objecting  hall,  and  in  all  his  profession."  Tlifl  im- 
to  it  that  he  imputes  as  a  fault  to  the  peachuient  against  Berkeley  for  high 
parliamentary  leaders  their  lukewarm-  treason  ended  in  his  paying  a  fine  of 
ness  in  this  prosecution,  and  insinuates  10,OOW.  But  what  appears  strange  and 
that  they  were  desirous  to  save  Finch,  unjustifiable  is,  that  the  houses  suffered 
See  especially  the  new  edition  of  Claren-  him  to  sit  for  some  terms  as  a  judge 
don,  vol.  i.  Appendix.  But  they  might  with  this  impeachment  oter  his  head, 
reasonably  think  that  Finch  was  not  of  The  only  excuse  for  this  is  that  there 
sufficient  importance  to  divert  their  at-  were  a  great  many  vacancies  oh  that 
tention  from  the  grand  apostate,  whom  bench. 

they  were  determined  to  punish.    Finch  *  Journals,  Aug.  30  and  Nov.  9.     J 

fled  to  Holland ;  so  that  then  it  would  may  be  urged  in  behalf  of  these  ordi- 

have  been  absurd  to  take  much  trouble  nances,  that  the  king  had  gone  into  Scot- 

about  his  impeachment :  Falkland,  how-  land  against  the  wish  of  the  two  houses, 

ever,  opened  it  to  the  lords,  14  Jan.  1641,  and  after  refusing  to  appoint  a  custoa 

in  a  speech  containing  full  as  many  ex-  regni  at  their  request.     But  if  the  exi- 

travagant    propositions    an    any    ot   St.  geucy  of  the  case  might  justify,  under 

John's.     Berkeley,  besides  his  forward.-  those  circumstances,  the  assumption  of 

ness  about  ship-money,  had  been  notori-  an  irregular  power,  it  ought  to  have  been 

oas  for  subserviency  to  the  prerogative,  limited  to  the  period  of  the  iOTerei(jnJ 

The  house  seut  the  usher  of  the  black  absence. 


542 


COXDUCT  OF  THE  COMMONS. 


CHAP.  IX. 


a  matter-  wholly  out  of  their  cognizance,  was  dragged  before 
them  as  a  delinquent,  and  lodged  in  their  prison.1  Witness 
the  outrageous  attempts  to  intimidate  the  minority  of  their 
own  body  in  the  commitment  of  Mr.  Palmer,  and  afterwards 
of  sir  Ralph  Hopton  to  the  Tower,  for  such  language  used 
in  debate  as  would  not  have  excited  any  observation  in  or- 
dinary times  ;  —  their  continual  encroachments  on  the  rights 
and  privileges  of  the  lord?,  as  in  their  intimation  that  if  bills 
thought  by  them  necessary  for  the  public  good  should  fall 
in  the  upper  house,  they  must  join  with  the  minority  of  the 
lords  in  representing  the  same  to  the  king ; 2  or  in  the  im- 
peachment of  the  duke  of  Richmond  for  words,  and  those 
of  the  most  trifling  nature,  spoken  in  the  upper  house ; 8  — 
their  despotic  violation  of  the  rights  of  the  people,  in  im- 
prisoning those  who  presented  or  prepared  respectful  petitions 
in  behalf  of  the  established  constitution;4  while  they  encour- 
aged those  of  a  tumultuous  multitude  at  their  bar  in  favor  of 


1  Parl.  Hist.  671,  et  alibi.     Journals 
passim.      Clarendon,  i.  475,    says,   this 
began  to  pass  all   bounds  after  the  act 
rendering  them  indissoluble.      "  It  had 
never,"  he  says,  "  been  attempted  before 
this  parliament  to  commit  any  one  to 
prison,  except  for  some  apparent  breach 
of  privilege,  such  as  the  arrest  of  one  of 
their  members,  or  the  like."     Instances 
of  this,  however,  had  occurred  before, 
of  which  I  have   mentioned  in  another 
place  the  grossest,  that  of  Floyd,  in  1621. 
The   lords,  in  March,  1642,  condemned 
one  Sandford,  a  tailor,  for  cursing  the 
parliament,  to  be  kept  at  work  in  Bride- 
well during  his  life,  besides  some  minor 
Inflictions.   Rushworth.   A  strange  order 
was  made  by  the  commons,  Dec.  10. 1641, 
that  sir  William  Earl  having  given  infor- 
mation of  some  dangerous  words  spoken 
by  certain  persons,  the  speaker  shall  issue 
a  warrant  to  apprehend  such,  persons  as 
tir  William  Earl  should  point  out. 

2  The  entry  of  this  in  the  Journals  is 
too  characteristic  of  the  tone  assumed  in 
the    commons    to    be  omitted.      "  This 
committee    [after  naming  some  of  the 
warmest  men]   is  appointed   to  prepare 
heads  for  a  conference  with  the  lords,  and 
to  acquaint  them  what  bills  this  house 
hath  passed  and  sent  up  to  their  lord- 
tihips,  which  much  concern  the  safety  of 
the  kingdom,  but  have  had  no  consent  of 
their  lordships  unto  them ;  and  that  this 
house  being  the  representative  body  of 
the  whole  kingdom,  and  their  lordships 
being    but    as    particular    persons,  and 
coming  to  parliament  in  a  particular  ca- 
pacity, that  if  they  shall  not  be  pleased 


to  consent  to  the  passing  of  those  acts 
and  others  necessary  to  the  preservation 
and  safety  of  the  kingdom,  that  then  this 
house,  together  with  such  of  the  lords 
that  are  more  sensible  of  the  safety  of 
the  kingdom,  may  join  together  and  rep- 
resent the  «ame  unto  his  majesty."  This 
was  on  December  3,  1641,  before  the 
argument  from  necessity  could  be  pre- 
tended, and  evidently  contains  the  germ 
of  the  resolution  of  February,  1649,  that 
the  house  of  lords  was  useless. 

The  resolution  was  moved  by  Mr.  Pym ; 
and  on  Mr.  Godolphin's  objecting,  very 
sensibly,  that  if  they  went  to  the  king 
with  the  lesser  part  of  the  lords,  the 
greater  part  of  the  lords  might  go  to  the 
king  with  the  lesser  part  of  them,  he  was 
commanded  to  withdraw  (Verney  MS.) ; 
and  an  order  appears  on  the  Journals, 
that  on  Tuesday  next  the  house  would 
take  into  consideration  the  offence  now 
given  by  words  spoken  by  Mr.  Godolphin. 
Nothing  further,  however,  seems  to  have 
taken  place. 

3  This  was  carried  Jan.  27,  1642,  by  a 
majority  of  223  to  123,  the  largest  num- 
ber, I  think,  that  voted  for  any  question 
during  the  parliament.  Richmond  was 
an  eager  courtier,  and,  perhaps,  an  enemy 
to  the  constitution,  which  may  account 
for  the  unusual  majority  in  favor  of  hia 
impeachment,  but  cannot  justify  it.  He 
had  merely  said,  on  a  proposition  to  ad- 
journ, "  Why  should  we  not  adjourn  for 
six  months  1 " 

«  Parl.  Hist.  1147, 1150, 1188.  Claren- 
don,  ii.  284,  346 


CHA.  I.  — 1640-42.    CONDUCT  OF  THE  COMMONS. 


543 


innovation  ;  *  —  their  usurpation  at  once  of  the  judicial  and 
legislative  powers  in  all  that  related  to  the  church,  particu- 
larly by  their  committee  for  scandalous  ministers,  under 
which  denomination,  adding  reproach  to  injury,  they  subjected 
all  who  did  not  reach  the  standard  of  puritan  perfection  to 
contumely  and  vexation,  and  ultimately  to  expulsion  from 
their  lawful  property.2  Witness  the  impeachment  of  the 
twelve  bishops  for  treason,  on  account  of  their  protestation 
against  all  that  should  be  done  in  the  house  of  lords  during 
their  compelled  absence  through  fear  of  the  populace ;  a 
protest  not  perhaps  entirely  well  expressed,  but  abundantly 
justifiable  in  its  argument  by  the  plainest  principles  of 
law.8  These  great  abuses  of  power,  becoming  daily  more 
frequent,  as  they  became  less  excusable,  would  make  a  sober 
man  hesitate  to  support  them  in  a  civil  war,  wherein  their 
success  must  not  only  consummate  the  destruction  of  the 
crown,  the  church,  and  the  peerage,  but  expose  all  who  had 
dissented  from  their  proceedings,  as  it  ultimately  happened, 
to  an  oppression  less  severe  perhaps,  but  far  more  sweeping, 
than  that  which  had  rendered  the  star-chamber  odious. 

But  it  may  reasonably  also  be  doubted  whether,  in  staking 
their  own  cause  on  the  perilous  contingencies  of  war,  the 
house  of  commons  did  not  expose  the  liberties  for  which  they 
professedly  were  contending  to  a  far  greater  risk  than  they 


1  Clarendon,  322.    Among  other  peti- 
tions presented   at   this  time  the  noble 
author  inserts  one  from  the  porters  of 
London.     Mr.  Brodie  asserts  of  this  that 
"  it  is  nowhere  to  be  found  or  alluded  to, 
BO  far  as  I  recollect,  except  in  Clarendon's 
History ;    and  I  have  no  hesitation   in 
pronouncing  it  a  forgery  by  that  author 
to  disgrace  the  petitions  which  so  galled 
him  and  his  party.    The  journals  of  the 
commons  give  an  account  of  every  peti- 
tion ;  and  I  have  gone  over  them  ICT'M  the 
utmost  care,  in  order  to  ascertain  whether 
such  a  petition  ever  was  presented,  and 
yet  cannot  discover  a  trace  of  it."    (iii. 
806  )    This  writer  is  here  too  precipitate. 
No  sensible  man  will  believe  Clarendon 
to  have  committed  so  foolish  and  useless 
a  forgery  ;  and  this  petition  is  fully  no- 
ticed, though  not  inserted  at  length,  in 
the  journal  of  February  3d. 

2  Nalson,  ii.  234,  246. 

3  The   bishops   had   so  few  friends  in 
the  house  of  commons  that  in  the  debate 
arising  out  of  this  protest  all  agreed  that 
they  should  be  charged  with  treason,  ex- 
cept one  gentleman,  who  said  he  thought 


them  only  mad,  and  proposed  that  they 
should  be  sent  to  Bedlam  instead  of  the 
Tower.  Even  Clarendon  bears  rather 
hard  on  the  protest,  chiefly,  as  is  evident, 
because  it  originated  with  Williams.  In 
fact,  several  of  these  prelates  had  not 
courage  to  stand  by  what  they  had  done, 
and  made  trivial  apologies.  1'arl.  lli-t. 
996.  Whether  the  violence  was  such  as 
to  form  a  complete  justification  for  their 
absenting  them  selves  is  a  question  of  fact 
which  we  cannot  well  determine.  Threw 
bishops  continued  at  their  posts,  and  voted 
against  the  bill  for  removing  them  from 
the  house  of  lords.  See  a  passage  from 
Hall's  Hard  Measure,  in  Wordsworth'* 
Eccles.  Biogr.,  v.  317.  The  king  always 
entertained  a  notion  that  this  act  was 
null  in  itself;  and  in  one  of  his  procla- 
mations from  York  not  very  judiciously 
declares  his  intention  to  preserve  the 
privileges  of  the  three  estates  of  parlia- 
ment. The  lords  admitted  the  twelve 
bishops  to  bail  ;  but,  with  their  usual 
pusillanimity,  recommitted  them  on  the 
commons'  expostulation.  Parl.  Hist. 
1092. 


544  CONDUCT  OF  THE  COMMONS.  CHAP.  IX. 

could  have  incurred  even  by  peace  with  an  insidious  court. 
For  let  any  one  ask  himself  what  would  have  been  the  con- 
dition of  the  parliament  if  by  the  extension  of  that  panic 
which  in  fact  seized  upon  several  regiments,  or  by  any  of 
those  countless  accidents  which  determine  the  fate  of  battles, 
the  king  had  wholly  defeated  their  army  at  Edgehill  ?  Is  it 
not  probable,  nay,  in  such  a  supposition,  almost  demonstrable, 
that  in  those  first  days  of  the  civil  war,  before  the  parliament 
had  time  to  discover  the  extent  of  its  own  resources,  he 
would  have  found  no  obstacle  to  his  triumphal  entry  into 
London  ?  And,  in  such  circumstances,  amidst  the  defection 
of  the  timid  and  lukewarm,  the  consternation  of  the  brawling 
multitude,  and  the  exultation  of  his  victorious  troops,  would 
the  triennial  act  itself,  or  those  other  statutes  which  he  had 
very  reluctantly  conceded,  have  stood  secure  ?  Or,  if  we  be- 
lieve that  the  constitutional  supporters  of  his  throne,  the  Hert- 
fords,  the  Falklands,  the  Southamptons,  the  Spencers,  would 
still  have  had  sufficient  influence  to  shield  from  violent  hands 
that  palladium  which  they  had  assisted  to  place  in  the  build- 
ing, can  there  be  a  stronger  argument  against  the  necessity  of 
taking  up  arms  for  the  defence  of  liberties,  which,  even  in 
the  contingency  of  defeat,  could  not  have  been  subverted  ? 

There  were  many  indeed  at  that  time,  as  there  have  been 
ever  since,  who,  admitting  all  the  calamities  incident  to  civil 
war,  of  which  this  country  reaped  the.  bitter  fruits  for  twenty 
years,  denied  entirely  that  the  parliament  went  beyond  the 
necessary  precautions  for  self-defence,  and  laid  the  whole  guilt 
of  the  aggression  at  the  king's  door.  He  had  given,  it  was 
said,  so  many  proofs  of  a  determination  to  have  recourse  to 
arms,  he  had  displayed  so  insidious  an  hostility  to  the  privi- 
leges of  parliament,  that  if  he  should  be  quietly  allowed  to 
choose  and  train  soldiers  under  the  name  of  a  militia,  through 
hired  servants  of  his  own  nomination,  the  people  might  find 
themselves  either  robbed  of  their  liberties  by  surprise,  or 
compelled  to  struggle  for  them  in  very  unfavorable  circum- 
stances. The  commons,  with  more  loyal  respect  perhaps  than 
policy,  had  opposed  no  obstacle  to  his  deliberate  journey  to- 
wards the  north,  which  they  could  have  easily  prevented,1 
though  well  aware  that  he  had  no  other  aim  but  to  collect 

1  May,  p.  187,  insinuates  that  the  civil  been  in  their  power  to  have  secured  the 

war  should  have  been  prevented  by  more  king's  person   before  he   reached  York, 

vigorous   measures   on   the   part  of  the  But  the  inanity  were  not  ripe  for  suoh 

parliament.    And  it  might  probably  have  violent  proceedings. 


CHA.  I.  — 1640-42.      CONDUCT  OF  THE  COMMONS.  545 

an  array  ;  was  it  more  than  ordinary  prudence  to  secure  the 
fortified  town  of  Hull  with  its  magazine  of  arms  from  his 
grasp,  and  to  muster  the  militia  in  each  county  under  the 
command  of  lieutenants  in  whom  they  could  confide,  and  to 
whom,  from  their  rank  and  personal  character,  he  could 
frame  no  just  objection? 

These  considerations  are  doubtless  not  without  weight,  and 
should  restrain  such  as  may  not  think  them  sufficient  from  too 
strongly  censuring  those  who,  deeming  that  either  civil  liberty 
or  the  ancient  constitution  must  be  sacrificed,  persisted  in  de- 
priving Charles  I.  of  every  power  which,  though  pertaining 
to  a  king  of  England,  he  could  not  be  trusted  to  exercise. 
We  are,  in  truth,  after  a  lapse  of  ages,  often  able  to  form  a 
better  judgment  of  the  course  that  ought  to  have  been  pur- 
sued in  political  emergencies  than  those  who  stood  nearest 
to  the  scene.  Not  only  have  we  our  knowledge  of  the  event 
to  guide  and  correct  our  imaginary  determinations,  but  we 
are  free  from  those  fallacious  rumors,  those  pretended  secrets, 
those  imperfect  and  illusive  views,  those  personal  preposses- 
sions, which  in  every  age  warp  the  political  conduct  of  the 
most  well-meaning.  The  characters  of  individuals,  sp  fre- 
quently misrepresented  by  flattery  or  party  rage,  stand  out 
to  us  revealed  by  the  tenor  of  their  entire  lives,  or  by  the 
comparison  of  historical  anecdotes,  and  that  more  authentic 
information  which  is  reserved  for  posterity.  Looking  as  it 
were  from  an  eminence,  we  can  take  a  more  comprehensive 
range,  and  class  better  the  objects  before  us  in  their  due  pro- 
portions and  in  their  bearings  on  one  another.  It  is  not  easy 
for  us  even  now  to  decide,  keeping  in  view  the  maintenance 
of  the  entire  constitution,  from  which  party  in  the  civil  war 
greater  mischief  was  to  be  apprehended  ;  but  the  election 
was,  I  am  persuaded,  still  more  difficult  to  be  made  by  con- 
temporaries. No  one,  at  least,  who  has  given  any  time  to 
the  study  of  that  history  will  deny  that  among  those  who 
fought  in  opposite  battalions  at  Edgehill  and  Newbury,  or 
voted  in  the  opposite  parliaments  of  Westminster  and  Oxford, 
there  were  many  who  thought  much  alike  on  general  theories 
of  prerogative  and  privilege,  divided  only  perhaps  by  some 
casual  prejudices,  which  had  led  these  to  look  with  greater 
distrust  on  courtly  insidiousness,  and  those  with  greater  in- 
dignation at  popular  violence.  We  cannot  believe  that  Falk- 
land and  Colepepper  differed  greatly  in  their  constitutional 
VOL.  i.  —  c.  35 


546  CONCESSIONS  OF  THE  KING.  CHAP.  IX. 

principles  from  Whitelock  and  Pierpoint,  or  that  Hertford 
and  Southampton  were  less  friends  to  a  limited  monarchy 
than  Essex  and  Northumberland. 

There  is,  however,  another  argument  sometimes  alleged  of 
late,  in  justification  of  the  continued  attacks  on  the  king's  au- 
thprity,  which  is  the  most  specious,  as  it  seems  to  appeal  to 
what  are  now  denominated  the  Whig  principles  of  the  con 
stitution.  It  has  been  said  that,  sensible  of  the  maladministra- 
tion the  nation  had  endured  for  so  many  years  (which,  if  the 
king  himself  were  to  be  deemed  by  constitutional  fiction  igno- 
rant of  it,  must  at  least  be  imputed  to  evil  advisers),  the 
house  of  commons  sought  only  that  security  which,  as  long 
as  a  sound  spirit  continues  to  actuate  its  members,  it  must 
ever  require  —  the  appointment  of  ministers  in  whose  fidelity 
to  the  public  liberties  it  could  better  confide  ;  that  by  carry- 
ing frankly  into  effect  those  counsels  which  he  had  unwisely 
abandoned  upon  the  earl  of  Bedford's  death,  and  bestowing 
the  responsible  offices  of  the  state  on  men  approved  for 
patriotism,  he  would  both  have  disarmed  the  jealousy  of  his 
subjects  and  insured  his  own  prerogative,  which  no  ministers 
are  prone  to  impair. 

Those  who  are  struck  by  these  considerations  may  not,  per- 
haps, have  sufficiently  reflected  on  the  changes  which  the 
king  had  actually  made  in  his  administration  since  the  begin- 
ning of  the  parliament.  Besides  those  already  mentioned, 
Essex,  Holland,  Say,  and  St.  John,  he  had,  in  the  autumn  of 
1641,  conferred  the  post  of  secretary  of  state  on  lord  Falk- 
land, and  that  of  master  of  the  rolls  on  sir  John  Colepepper, 
both  very  prominent  in  the  redress  of  grievances  and  punish- 
ment of  delinquent  ministers  during  the  first  part  of  the  ses- 
sion, and  whose  attachment  to  the  cause  of  constitutional  lib- 
erty there  was  no  sort  of  reason  to  distrust.  They  were  in- 
deed in  some  points  of  a  different  way  of  thinking  from  Pym 
and  Hampden,  and  had  doubtless  been  chosen  by  the  king  on 
that  account.  But  it  seems  rather  beyond  the  legitimate 
bounds  of  parliamentary  opposition  to  involve  the  kingdom 
in  civil  war,  simply  because  the  choice  of  the  crown  had  not 
fallen  on  its  leaders.  The  real  misfortune  was,  that  Charles 
did  not  rest  in  the  advice  of  his  own  responsible  ministers, 
against  none  of  whom  the  house  of  commons  had  any  just 
cause  of  exception.  The  theory  of  our  constitution  in  this 
respect  was  very  ill  established ;  and,  had  it  been  more  so, 


CHA  I.  — 1640-42.  RELUCTANCE  OF  ROYALISTS  TO  ARM.  547 

there  are  perhaps  few  sovereigns,  especially  in  circumstances 
of  so  much  novelty,  who  would  altogether  conform  to  it.  But 
no  appointment  that  he  could  have  made  from  the  patriotic 
band  of  parliament  would  have  furnished  a  security  against 
the  intrigues  of  his  bedchamber,  or  the  influence  of  the 
queen. 

The  real  problem  that  we  have  to  resolve,  as  to  the  politi- 
cal justice  of  the  civil  war,  is  not  the  character,  the  past  actions, 
or  even  the  existing  designs  of  Charles ;  not  even  whether 
he  had  as  justly  forfeited  his  crown  as  his  son  was  deemed  to 
have  done  for  less  violence  and  less  insincerity ;  not  even,  I 
will  add,  whether  the  liberties  of  his  subjects  could  have  been 
absolutely  secure  under  his  government ;  but  whether  the  risk 
attending  his  continuance  upon  the  throne  with  the  limited 
prerogatives  of  an  English  sovereign  were  great  enough  to 
counterbalance  the  miseries  of  protracted  civil  war,  the  perils 
of  defeat,  and  the  no  less  perils,  as  experience  showed,  of 
victory.  Those  who  adopt  the  words  spoken  by  one  of  our 
greatest  orators,  and  quoted  by  another,  "  There  was  ambi- 
tion, there  was  sedition,  there  was  violence ;  but  no  man  shall 
persuade  me  that  it  was  not  the  cause  of  liberty  on  one  side, 
and  of  tyranny  on  the  other,"  have  for  themselves  decided 
this  question.1  But  as  I  know  (and  the  history  of  eighteen 
years  is  my  witness)  how  little  there  was  on  one  side  of  such 
liberty  as  a  wise  man  would  hold  dear,  so  I  am  not  yet  con- 
vinced that  the  great  body  of  the  royalists,  the  peers  and 
gentry  of  England,  were  combating  for  the  sake  of  tyranny. 
I  cannot  believe  them  to  have  so  soon  forgotten  their  almost 
unanimous  discontent  at  the  king's  arbitrary  government  in 
1640,  or  their  general  concurrence  in  the  tirst  salutary  meas- 
ures of  the  parliament.  I  cannot  think  that  the  temperate 
and  constitutional  language  of  the  royal  declarations  and  an- 
swers to  the  house  of  commons  in  1642,  known  to  have  pro- 
ceeded from  the  pen  of  Hyde,  and  as  superior  to  those  on 
the  opposite  side  in  argument  as  they  are  in  eloquence,  was 
intended  for  the  willing  slaves  of  tyranny.  I  cannot  discover 
in  the  extreme  reluctance  of  the  royalists  to  take  up  anus, 
and  their  constant  eagerness  for  an  accommodation  (1  speak 
not  of  mere  soldiers,  but  of  the  greater  and  more  important 

i  These  words  are    ascribed    to    lord    on  the  History  of  the  English  Govern- 
Chatham,  in  a  speech  of  Sir.  Orattan,  ac-    ment,  p.  56. 
cording  to  lord  John  Russell,  iu  his  Essay 


548 


EFFECT  OF  THE  KING'S   CONCESSIONS.       CHAP.  IX. 


portion  of  that  party),  that  zeal  for  the  king's  reestablish- 
ment  in  all  his  abused  prerogatives  which  some  connect  with 
the  very  names  of  a  royalist  or  a  cavalier.1 

It  is  well  observed  by  Burnet,  in  answer  to  the  vulgar 
notion  that  Charles  I.  was  undone  by  his  concessions,  that, 
but  for  his  concessions,  he  would  have  had  no  party  at  all. 
This  is,  in  fact,  the  secret  of  what  seems  to  astonish  the 
parliamentary  historian,  May,  of  the  powerful  force  that  the 
king  was  enabled  to  raise,  and  the  protracted  resistance  he 
opposed.  He  had  succeeded,  according  to  the  judgment  of 
many  real  friends  of  the  constitution,  in  putting  the  house 
of  commons  in  the  wrong.  Law,  justice,  moderation,  once 
ranged  against  him,  had  gone  over  to  his  banner.  His  arms 
might  reasonably  be  called  defensive,  if  he  had  no  other 
means  of  preserving  himself  from  the  condition,  far  worse 
than  captivity,  of  a  sovereign  compelled  to  a  sort  of  suicide 
upon  his  own  honor  and  authority.  For,  however  it  may  be 
alleged  that  a  king  is  bound  in  conscience  to  sacrifice  his 
power  to  the  public  will,  yet  it  could  hardly  be  inexcusable 
not  to  have  practised  this  disinterested  morality ;  especially 
while  the  voice  of  his  people  was  by  no  means  unequivocal, 


1  Clarendon  has  several  remarkable 
passages,  chiefly  towards  the  end  of  the 
fifth  book  of  his  History,  on  the  slowness 
and  timidity  of  the  royalist  party  before 
the  commencement  of  the  civil  war.  The 
peers  at  York,  forming,  in  fact,  a  majority 
of  the  upper  houf  e  —  for  there  were  nearly 
forty  of  them  —  displayed  much  of  this. 
Want  of  political  courage  was  a  charac- 
teristic of  our  aristocracy  at  this  period, 
bravely  as  many  behaved  in  the  field. 
But  I  have  no  doubt  that  a  real  jealousy 
of  the  king's  intentions  had  a  consider- 
able effect. 

They  put  forth  a  declaration,  signed 
by  all  their  hands,  on  the  15th  of  June, 
1642,  professing  before  God  their  full  per- 
suasion that  the  king  had  no  design  to 
make  war  on  the  parliament,  and  that 
they  saw  no  color  of  preparations  or 
counsels  that  might  reasonably  beget  a 
belief  of  any  such  designs  ;  but  that  all 
his  endeavors  tended  to  the  settlement 
of  the  protestant  religion,  the  just  privi- 
leges of  parliament,  the  liberty  of  the 
subject,  &c.  This  was  an  ill-judged  and 
eveuabsurd  piece  of  hypocrisy,  calculated 
to  degrade  the  subscribers,  since  the 
design  of  raising  troops  was  hardly  con- 
cealed, and  every  part  of  the  king's  con- 
duct since  his  arrival  at  York  manifested 
it.  The  commission  of  array,  authoriz- 


ing certain  persons  in  each  county  to 
raise  troops,  was  in  fact  issued  imme- 
diately after  this  declaration.  It  is  rather 
mortifying  to  find  lord  Falkland's  name, 
not  to  mention  others,  in  this  list;  but 
he  probably  felt  it  impossible  to  refuse  his 
signature,  without  throwing  discredit  on 
the  king ;  and  no  man  engaged  in  a  party 
ever  did,  or  ever  can,  act  with  absolute 
sincerity  ;  or  at  least  he  can  be  of  no  use 
to  his  friends  if  he  does  adhere  to  this 
uncompromising  principle. 

The  commission  of  array  was  ill  re- 
ceived by  many  of  the  king's  friends,  as 
not  being  conformable  to  law.  Claren- 
don, iii.  91.  Certainly  it  was  not  so;  but 
it  was  justifiable  as  the  means  of  opposing 
the  parliament's  ordinance  for  the  militia, 
at  least  equally  illegal.  This,  however, 
shows  very  strongly  the  cautious  and 
constitutional  temper  of  many  of  the 
royalists,  who  could  demur  about  the 
legality  of  a  measure  of  necessity,  since 
no  other  method  of  raising  an  army 
would  have  been  free  from  similar  excep- 
tion. The  same  reluctance  to  enter  on 
the  war  was  displayed  in  the  propositions 
for  peace,  which  the  king,  inconsequence 
of  his  council's  importunity,  sent  to  the 
two  houses  through  the  earl  of  South- 
ampton, just  before  he  raised  his  stand- 
ard at  Nottingham. 


CHA.  I.  — 1640-42.       CLARENDON'S  OPINION.  549 

and  while  the  major  part  of  one  house  of  parliament  adhered 
openly  to  his  cause.1 

It  is  indeed  a  question  perfectly  distinguishable  from  that 
of  the  abstract  justice  of  the  king's  cause,  whether  he  did 
not  too  readily  abandon  his  post  as  a  constitutional  head  of 
the  parliament ;  whether,  with  the  greater  part  of  the  peers 
and  a  very  considerable  minority  in  the  commons,  resisting 
in  their  places  at  Westminster  all  violent  encroachments  on 
his  rights,  he  ought  not  rather  to  have  sometimes  persisted  in 
a  temperate  though  firm  assertion  of  them,  sometimes  had  re- 
course to  compromise  and  gracious  concession,  instead  of  call- 
ing away  so  many  of  his  adherents  to  join  his  arms  as  left 
neither  numbers  nor  credit  with  those  who  remained.  There 
is  a  remarkable  passage  in  lord  Clarendon's  Life,  not  to 
quote  Whitelock  and  other  writers  less  favorable  to  Charles, 
where  he  intimates  his  own  opinion  that  the  king  would 
have  had  a  fair  hope  of  withstanding  the  more  violent 
faction,  if,  after  the  queen's  embarkation  for  Holland,  in 
February,  1642,  he  had  returned  to  Whitehall;  admitting, 
at  the  same  time,  the  hazards  and  inconveniences  to  which 
this  course  was  liable.2  That  he  resolved  on  trying  the 
fortune  of  arms,  his  noble  historian  insinuates  to  have  been 
the  effect  of  the  queen's  influence,  with  whom  before  hei 
departure  he  had  concerted  his  future  proceedings.  Yet,  not- 
withstanding the  deference  owing  to  contemporary  opinions, 
I  cannot  but  suspect  that  Clarendon  has,  in  this  instance  as 
in  some  other  passages,  attached  too  great  an  importance  to 
particular  individuals,  measuring  them  rather  by  their  rani:, 
in  the  state  than  by  that  capacity  and  energy  of  mind, 
which,  in  the  levelling  hour  of  revolution,  are  the  only  real 
pledges  of  political  influence.  He  thought  it  of  the  utmost 
consequence  to  the  king  that  he  should  gain  over  the  earl* 
of  Essex  and  Northumberland,  both,  or  at  least  the  former, 
wavering  between  the  two  parties,  though  voting  entirely 
with  the  commons.  Certainly  the  king's  situation  required 
every  aid,  and  his  repulsive  hardness  towards  all  who  hai 
ever  given  him  offence  displayed  an  obstinate  unconciliatin,* 

1  According  to  a  list    made    by  the  mencement  of  the  war,  and  five  or  ttx 

house  of  lords,  May  25,  1642,  the  peers  afterwards;  two  or  three  of  those  at  Yc«»k 

•with  the  king  at  York  were  thirty-two  ;  returned.     During  the  war  there  wer*  ,t 

those    who    remained    at   Westminster,  the  outside  thirty  peers  who  sat  in  t  w 

forty-two.     But  of  the  latter,  more  than  parliament. 

t«D  joined  the  others  before  the  com-  *  Life  of  Clarendon,  p.  66. 


550      .  COMMENCEMENT  OF  CIVIL  WAR.         CHAP.  IX. 

character  which  deprived  him  of  some  support  he  might 
have  received.  But  the  subsequent  history  of  these  two 
celebrated  earls,  and  indeed  of  all  the  moderate  adherents  to 
the  parliament,  will  hardly  lead  us  to  believe  that  they 
could  have  afforded  the  king  any  protection.  Let  us  sup- 
pose that  he  had  returned  to  Whitehall  instead  of  proceeding 
towards  the  north.  It  is  evident  that  he  must  either  have 
passed  the  bill  for  the  militia  or  seen  the  ordinances  of  both 
houses  carried  into  effect  without  his  consent.  He  must 
have  consented  to  the  abolition  of  episcopacy,  or  at  least 
have  come  into  some  compromise  which  would  have  left  the 
bishops  hardly  a  shadow  of  their  jurisdiction  and  pre- 
eminence. He  must  have  driven  from  his  person  those 
whom  he  best  loved  and  trusted.  He  would  have  found 
it  impossible  to  see  again  the  queen  without  awakening 
distrust  and  bringing  insult  on  them  both.  The  royalist 
minority  of  parliament,  however  considerable  in  numbers, 
was  lukewarm  and  faint-hearted.  That  they  should  have 
gained  strength  so  as  to  keep  a  permanent  superiority  over 
their  adversaries,  led  as  they  were  by  statesmen  so  bold 
and  profound  as  Hampden,  Pym,  St.  John,  Cromwell,  and 
Vane,  is  what,  from  the  experience  of  the  last  twelve  months, 
it  was  unreasonable  to  anticipate.  But  even  if  the  commons 
had  been  more  favorably  inclined,  it  would  not  have  been  in 
their  power  to  calm  the  mighty  waters  that  had  been  moved 
from  their  depths.  They  had  permitted  the  populace  to 
mingle  in  their  discussions,  testifying  pleasure  at  its  paltry 
applause,  and  encouraging  its  tumultuous  aggressions  on  the 
minority  of  the  legislature.  What  else  could  they  expect 
than  that,  go  soon  as  they  ceased  to  satisfy  the  city 
apprentices,  or  the  trained  bands  raised  under  their  militia 
bill,  they  must  submit  to  that  physical  strength  which  is  the 
ultimate  arbiter  of  political  contentions  ? 

Thus,  with  evil  auspices,  with  much  peril  of  despotism  on 
the  one  hand,  with  more  of  anarchy  on  the  other,  amidst  the 
apprehensions  and  sorrows  of  good  men,  the  civil  war  com- 
menced in  the  summer  of  1642.  I  might  now  perhaps  pass 
over  the  period  that  intervened,  until  the  restoration  of 
Charles  II.,  as  not  strictly  belonging  to  a  work  which  under- 
takes to  relate  the  progress  of  the  English  constitution.  But 
this  would  have  left  a  sort  of  chasm  that  might  disappoint 
the  reader ;  and  as  I  have,  already  not  wholly  excluded  our 


CHA.  I.  — 1640-42.     COMMENCEMENT  OF  CIVIL  WAR.  551 

more  general  political  history,  without  a  knowledge  of  which 
the  laws  and  government  of  any  people  must  be  unin- 
telligible, it  will  probably  not  be  deemed  an  unnecessary 
digression,  if  I  devote  one  chapter  to  the  most  interesting 
and  remarkable  portion  of  British  story. 


552  THE  CIVIL  WAR.  CHAP.  X 


CHAPTER    X. 

FROM    THE    BREAKING    OUT    OF   THE    CIVIL   WAR    TO    THE 

RESTORATION. 


PART  I. 

Success  of  the  King  in  the  first  part  of  the  War  —  Efforts  by  the  Moderate  Party 
for  Peace  —  Affair  at  Brentford — Treaty  of  Oxford — Impeachment  of  the  Queen 

—  Waller's  Plot  —  Secession  of  some  Peers  to  the  King's  Quarters  —  Their  Treat- 
ment there  impolitic  —  The  Anti-pacific  Party  gain  the  ascendant  at  Westminster 

—  The  Parliament  makes  a  new  Great  Seal  —  And  takes  the  Covenant  —  Persecu- 
tion of  the  Clergy  who  refuse  it — Impeachment  and  Execution  of  Laud  —  Decline 
of  the   King's  Affairs  in  1644 — Factions  at  Oxford — Royalist  Lords  and  Com- 
moners summoned  to  that  City  —  Treaty  of  Uxbridge  —  Impossibility  of  Agree- 
ment—  The  Parliament  insist  on  unreasonable  Terms  —  Miseries  of  the  War  — 
Essex  and  Manchester  suspected  of  Lukewarmness  —  Self-denying  Ordinance-— 
Battle  of  Naseby  —  Desperate  Condition  of  the  King's  Affairs  —  He  throws  him- 
self into  the  hands  of  the  Scots  —  His  Struggles  to  preserve  Episcopacy,  against 
the  advice  of  the  Queen  and  others  —  Bad  Conduct  of  the  Queen  —  Publication  of 
Letters  taken  at  Naseby  —  Discovery  of  Glamorgan's  Treaty  —  King  delivered  up 
by  the  Scots  —  Growth  of  the  Independents  and  Republicans  —  Opposition  to  the 
Presbyterian  Government  —  Toleration  — Intrigues  of  the  Army  with  the  King  — 
His  Person  seized  —  The  Parliament  yield  to  the  Army  —  Mysterious  Conduct  of 
Cromwell  —  Imprudent   Hopes  of  the   King — He  rejects  the   Proposals  of  the 
Army  —  His  Flight  from  Hampton  Court  —  Alarming  Votes  against  him  —  Scots' 
Invasion  —  The   Presbyterians   regain   the   Ascendant  —  Treaty   cf    Newport  — • 
Gradual  Progress  of  a  Republican  Party  —  Scheme  among  the  Officers  of  bringing 
Charles  to  Trial  —  This  is  finally  determiaed — Seclusion  of  Presbyterian  Mem- 
bers—  Motives  of  some  of  the  King's  Judges —  Question  of  his  Execution  Dis- 
cussed—  His  Chariicter  —  Icon  Basilike. 

FACTIONS  that,  while  still  under  some  restraint  from  the 
forms  at  least  of  constitutional  law,  excite  our  disgust  by  their 
selfishness  or  intemperance,  are  little  likely  to  redeem  their 
honor  when  their  animosities  have  kindled  civil  warfare.  If 
it  were  difficult  for  an  upright  man  to  enlist  with  an  entire 
willingness  under  either  the  royalist  or  the  parliamentarian 
banner  at  the  commencement  of  hostilities  in  1642,  it  became 
far  less  easy  for  him  to  desire  the  complete  success  of  one  or 
the  other  cause,  as  advancing  time  displayed  the  faults  of 
both  in  darker  colors  than  they  had  previously  worn.  Of 
the  parliament  —  to  begin  with  the  more  powerful  and  vic- 
torious party  —  it  may  be  said,  I  think,  with  not  greater  se- 
verity than  truth,  that  scarce  two  or  three  public  acts  of  jus- 
tice, humanity,  or  generosity,  and  very  few  of  political  wisdom 


CHA.  I.  — 1042-49.       THE  KING'S  SUCCESS.  553 

or  courage,  are  recorded  of  them  from  their  quarrel  with  the 
king  to  their  expulsion  by  Cromwell. 

Notwithstanding  the  secession  from  parliament  before  the 
commencement  of  the  war  of  nearly  all  the  peers  who  could 
be  reckoned  on  the  king's  side,  and  of  a  pretty  considerable 
part  of  the  commons,  there  still  continued  to  sit  at  Westmin- 
ster many  sensible  and  moderate  persons,  who  thought  that 
they  could  not  serve  their  country  better  than  by  remaining 
at  their  posts,  and  labored  continually  to  bring  about  a  paci- 
fication by  mutual  concessions.  Such  were  the  earls  of  Nor- 
thumberland, Holland,  Lincoln,  and  Bedford,  among  the 
peers ;  Selden,  Whitelock,  Hollis,  Waller,  Pierpoint,  and 
Rudyard,  in  the  commons.  These,  however,  would  have 
formed  but  a  very  ineffectual  minority  if  the  war  itself,  for 
at  least  twelve  months,  had  not  taken  a  turn  little  expected 
by  the  parliament.  The  hard  usage  Charles  seemed  to  en- 
dure in  so  many  encroachments  on  his  ancient  prerogative 
awakened  the  sympathies  of  a  generous  aristocracy,  accus- 
tomed to  respect  the  established  laws,  and  to  love  monarchy, 
as  they  did  their  own  liberties,  on  the  score  of  its  prescrip- 
tive title  ;  averse  also  to  the  rude  and  morose  genius  of  puri- 
tanism,  and  not  a  little  jealous  of  those  upstart .  demagogues 
who  already  threatened  to  subvert  the  graduated  pyramid  of 
English  society.  Their  zeal  placed  the  King  at  the  head  of 
a  far  more  considerable  army  than  either  party  had  antici- 
pated.1 In  the  first  battle,  that  of  Edgehill,  though 
he  did  not  remain  master  of  the  field,  yet  all  the  the  ktng°iQ 
military  consequences  were  evidently  in  his  favor.2  * ^e^rst  ***** 
In  the  ensuing  campaign  of  1643,  the  advantage 
was  for  several  months  entirely  his  own,  nor  could  he  be  said 
to  be  a  loser  on  the  whole  result,  notwithstanding  some  re- 
verses that  accompanied  the  autumn.  A  line  drawn  from 
Hull  to  Southampton  would  suggest  no  very  incorrect  idea 
of  the  two  parties,  considered  as  to  their  military  occupation 

1  May.  p.  165.  Its  consequences  :  "  Our  army,  after  Bom« 

2  Both  sides  claimed  the  victory.   May,  refreshment    at   Warwick,    retunii-1    to 
•who  thinks  that  Essex,  by  his  injudicious  London,  not  like  men  that  had  obtained 
conduct  after  the  battle,  lost  the  advan-  a  victory,  but  as  if  they  had  been  be»t- 
tage  he  had  gained  in  it,  admits  that  the  en,'r  p.  62.    This  shows  that  they  had 
effect  was  to  strengthen  the  king's  side,  not,  in  fact,  obtained  much  of  a  victory  ; 
"Those  who  thought  his  success  impos-  and  lord  Wharton's  report  to  pnrli.-Liiu-nt 
Bible  began  to  look  upon  him  as  one  who  almost  leads  us  to  think  the  advantage, 
might  be  a  conqueror,  and  many  neuters  upon  the  whole,  to  have  been  with  the 
joined  him."  p.  176.     Ludlow'is  of  the  king.    Parl.  Hist.  ii.  1495. 

same  opinion  as  to  Essex's  behavior  and 


554  EFFORTS  FOR  PEACE.  CHAP.  X. 

of  the  kingdom,  at  the  beginning  of  September,  1643  ;  for  if 
the  parliament,  by  the  possession  of  Gloucester  and  Ply- 
mouth, and  by  some  force  they  had  on  foot  in  Cheshire  and 
other  midland  parts,  kept  their  ground  on  the  west  of  this 
line,  this  was  nearly  compensated  by  the  earl  of  Newcastle's 
possession  at  that  time  of  most  of  Lincolnshire,  which  lay 
within  it.  Such  was  the  temporary  effect,  partly  indeed  of 
what  may  be  called  the  fortune  of  war,  but  rather  of  the  zeal 
and  spirit  of  the  royalists,  and  of  their  advantage  in  a  more 
numerous  and  intrepid  cavalry.1 

It  has  been  frequently  supposed,  and  doubtless  seems  to 
have  been  a  prevailing  opinion  at  the  time,  that  if  the  king, 
instead  of  sitting  down  before  Gloucester  at  the  end  of  Au- 
gust, had  marched  upon  London,  combining  his  operations 
with  Newcastle's  powerful  army,  he  would  have  brought  the 
war  to  a  triumphant  conclusion.2  In  these  matters  men 
judge  principally  by  the  event.  Whether  it  would  have 
been  prudent  in  Newcastle  to  have  left  behind  him  the  strong 
garrison  of  Hull  under  Fairfax,  and  an  unbroken  though  in- 
ferior force  commanded  by  lord  Willoughby  and  Cromwell  in 
Lincolnshire,  I  must  leave  to  military  critics  ;  suspecting, 
however,  that  he  would  have  found  it  difficult  to  draw  away 
the  Yorkshire  gentry  and  yeomanry,  forming  the  strength  of 
his  army,  from  their  unprotected  homes.  Yet  the  parliamen- 
tary forces  were  certainly,  at  no  period  of  the  war,  so  deficient 
in  numbers,  discipline,  and  confidence ;  and  it  may  well  be 
thought  that  the  king's  want  of  permanent  resources,  with 
his  knowledge  of  the  timidity  and  disunion  which  prevailed 
in  the  capital,  rendered  the  boldest  and  most  forward  game 
his  true  policy. 

It  was  natural   that   the   moderate  party  in   parliament 


1  May,  212.    Baillie,  373,  391  such  as  the  king's  army,  with  its  weak 

*  May,  Baillie,  Mrs.   Hutchinson,  are  cavalry  and    bad    artillery,    could    not 

UA  much  of  this  opinion  as  sir   Philip  easily  have  carried.     Lord  Sunderland, 

Warwick  and  other  royalist  writers.     It  four  days  before  the  battle  of  Newbury, 

is   certain   that  there  was  a  prodigious  wherein  he  was  killed,  wrote  to  his  wife, 

alarm,  and  almost  despondency,  among  that  the  king's  affairs  had  never  been  in 

the  parliamentarians.     They  immediate-  a  more  prosperous  condition  ;  that  sitting 

ly  began  to  make  intrenehinents  about  down   before   Gloucester  had   prevented 

London,  which  were  finished  in  a  month,  their  finishing  the  mar  that  yrar,  '•  which 

May,  p.  214.     In  the  Somers  Tracts,  iv.  nothing  could  keep  us  from  doing,  if  we 

634,  is  an  interesting  letter  from  a  Scots-  had    a    month's    more    time."      Sidney 

man  then  in  London,  giving  an  account  Letters,  ii.  671.     He  alludes  in  the  same 

of  these  fortifications,  which,  considering  letters  to  the  divisions  in  the  royalist 

the  short  time  employed  about  them,  party, 
teem  to  have  been  very  respectable,  and 


CHA.  L  — 1642-49.    TEEATY  AT  OXFORD.  555 

should  acquire   strength    by  the   untoward   fortune  of  its 
arras.     Their  aim,  as  well  as  that  of  the  constitu- 
tional royalists,  was  a  speedy  pacification  ;  neither  fh^oderato 
party  so  much  considering  what  terms  might  be  party  for 
most  advantageous  to  their  own  side,  as  which  way 
the  nation  might  be  freed  from  an  incalculably  protracted 
calamity.     On  the  king's  advance  to  Colnbrook,  in  Novem- 
ber, 1642,  the  two  houses  made  an  overture  for  negotiation,  on 
which  he  expressed  his  readiness  to  enter.     But,  Aflair  at 
during  the  parley,  some  of  his  troops  advanced  to  Brentford. 
Brentford,  and  a  sharp  action  took  place  in  that  town.     The 
parliament  affected  to  consider  this  such  a  mark  of  perfidy  and 
blood-thirstiness  as  justified  them  in  breaking  off  the  treaty,  a 
step  to  which  they  were  doubtless  more  inclined  by  the  king's 
retreat,  and  their  discovery  that  his  army  was  less  formidable 
than  they  had  apprehended.     It  is  very  probable,  or  rather 
certain,  even  from  Clarendon's  account,  that  many  about  the 
king,  if  not  himself,  were  sufficiently  indisposed  to  negotiate ; 
yet,  as  no  cessation  of  arms  had  been  agreed  upon,  or  even 
proposed,  he  cannot  be  said  to  have  waived  the  unquestion- 
able right  of  every  belligerent  to  obtain  all  possible  advan- 
tage by  arms,  in  order  to  treat  for  peace  in  a  more  favorable 
position.     But,  as  mankind  are  seldom  reasonable  in  admit- 
ting such  maxims  against  themselves,  he  seems  to  have  in- 
jured his  reputation  by  this  affair  of  Brentford. 

A  treaty,  from  which  many  ventured  to  hope  much,  was 
begun  early  in  the  next  spring  at  Oxford,  after  a  Treaty  at 
struggle  which  had  lasted  through  the  winter  within  Oxford, 
the  walls  of  parliament.1  But  though  the  party  of  Pym  and 
Hampden  at  Westminster  were  not  able  to  prevent  negotia- 
tion against  the  strong  bent  of  the  house  of  lords,  and  even 
of  the  city,  which  had  been  taught  to  lower  its  tone  by  the 
interruption  of  trade,  and  especially  of  the  supply  of  coals 
from  Newcastle,  yet  they  were  powerful  enough  to  make  the 
houses  insist  on  terms  not  less  unreasonable  than  those  con- 
tained in  their  nineteen  propositions  the  year  before.8  The 

1  Parl.    Hist.   iii.  45,   48.      It   seems  Is  to  be  considered,  on  the  other  hand, 

natural  to  think  that,  if  the  moderate  that  the  king  could  never  have  niiM'.l  un 

party    were    able    to    contend    so    well  army,  if  he  had  not  been  able  to  rally 

against  their  opponents,  after  the  deser-  the  peers  and  gentry  round  his  brumcr, 

ticm  of  a  great  many  royalist  members  and  that  in  his  army  lay  the  rc;il  MeiM 

who  had  joined  the  king,   they  would  of  the  temporary  strength  of  the  pacific 

have  maintained  a  decisive  majority,  had  party, 
these  continued  in  their  places.    But  it       »  Parl.  lliflt.  Ui.  68,  94.      Clarendon, 


556  TREATY  AT  OXFORD.         CHAP.  X. 

king  could  not  be  justly  expected  to  comply  with  these  ;  but, 
had  they  been  more  moderate,  or  if  the  parliament  would 
have  in  some  measure  receded  from  them,  we  have  every 
reason  to  conclude,  both  by  the  nature  of  the  terms  he  pro- 
posed in  return,  and  by  the  positive  testimony  of  Clarendon, 
that  he  would  not  have  come  sincerely  into  any  scheme  of 
immediate  accommodation.  The  reason  assigned  by  that 
author  for  the  unwillingness  of  Charles  to  agree  on  a  cessa- 
tion of  arms  during  the  negotiation,  though  it  had  been  orig- 
inally suggested  by  himself  (and  which  reason  would  have 
been  still  more  applicable  to  a  treaty  of  peace),  is  one  so 
strange  that  it  requires  all  the  authority  of  one  very  unwilling 
to  confess  any  weakness  or  duplicity  of  the  king  to  be  be- 
lieve.d.  He  had  made  a  solemn  promise  to  the  queen  on  her 
departure  for  Holland  the  year  before,  "  that  he  would  re- 
ceive no  person  who  had  disserved  him  into  any  favor  or 
trust,  without  her  privity  and  consent ;  and  that,  as  she  had 
undergone  many  reproaches  and  calumnies  at  the  entrance 
into  the  war,  so  he  would  never  make  any  peace  but  by  her 
interposition  and  mediation,  that  the  kingdom  might  receive 
that  blessing  only  from  her."  *  Let  this  be  called,  as  the 
reader  may  please,  the  extravagance  of  romantic  affection,  or 
rather  the  height  of  pusillanimous  and  criminal  subserviency, 
we  cannot  surely  help  acknowledging  that  this  one  marked 
weakness  in  Charles's  character,  had  there  been  nothing  else 
to  object,  rendered  the  return  of  cordial  harmony  between 
himself  and  his  people  scarce  within  the  bounds  of  natural 
possibility.  In  the  equally  balanced  condition  of  both  forces 


May,  Whitelock.  If  we  believe  the  last  urged  by  Hyde.  That  peer  was,  at  this 
(p.  68),  the  king,  who  took  as  usual  a  time,  and  for  several  months  afterwards, 
very  active  part  in  the  discussions  upon  inclining  to  come  over  to  the  king  ;  but, 
this  treaty,  would  frequently  have  been  on  the  bad  success  of  Holland  and  Bod- 
inclined  to  come  into  an  adjustment  of  ford  in  their  change  of  sides,  he  gave 
terms ;  if  some  of  the  more  warlike  into  the  opposite  course  of  politics,  and 
spirits  about  him  (glancing  apparently  joined  the  party  of  lords  Say  and  Whar- 
at  Rupert)  had  not  over-persuaded  his  ton,  in  determined  hostility  to  the  king, 
better  judgment.  This,  however,  does  Dr.  Lingard  has  lately  thrown  doubts 
not  accord  with  what  Clarendon  tells  us  upon  this  passage  in  Clarendon,  but 
of  the  queen's  secret  influence,  nor  in-  upon  grounds,  which  I  do  not  clearly 
deed  with  all  we  have  reason  to  believe  understand.  Hist,  of  England,  x.  208, 
of  the  king's  disposition  during  the  note.  That  no  vestige  of  its  truth 
war.  should  appear,  as  he  observes,  in  the 
1  Life  of  Clarendon,  p.  79.  This  in-  private  correspondence  between  Charles 
duced  the  king  to  find  pretexts  for  avoid-  and  his  consort  (if  he  means  the  letters 
>ng  the  cessation,  and  was  the  real  cause  taken  at  Naseby,  and  I  know  no  other), 
of  his  refusal  to  restore  the  earl  of  Nor-  is  not  very  singular ;  as  the  whole  of 
thumberland  to  his  post  of  lord  admiral  that  correspondence  is  of  a  much  later 
during  this  treaty  of  Oxford,  which  was  date. 


CHA.  I.  — 1642-49.     IMPEACHMENT  OF  THE  QUEEN.  557 

at  this  particular  juncture,  it  may  seem  that  some  compromise 
on  the  great  question  of  the  militia  was  not-  impracticable, 
had  the  king  been  truly  desirous  of  accommodation ;  for  it  is 
only  just  to  remember  that  the  parliament  had  good  reason  to 
demand  some  security  for  themselves,  when  he  had  so  peremp- 
torily excluded  several  persons  from  amnesty.  Both  parties, 
in  truth,  were  standing  out  for  more  than  either  according  to 
their  situation  as  belligerents,  or  even  perhaps  according 
to  the  principles  of  our  constitution,  they  could  reasonably 
claim ;  the  two  houses  having  evidently  no  direct  right  to 
order  the  military  force,  nor  the  king,  on  the  other  hand, 
having  a  clear  prerogative  to  keep  on  foot  an  army,  which  is 
not  easily  distinguishable  from  a  militia,  without  consent  of 
parliament.  The  most  reasonable  course  apparently  would 
have  been  for  the  one  to  have  waived  a  dangerous  and  dis- 
puted authority,  and  the  other  to  have  desisted  from  a  still 
more  unconstitutional  pretension,  which  was  done  by  the  bill 
of  rights  in  1689.  The  kingdom  might  have  well  dispensed, 
in  that  age,  with  any  military  organization,  and  this  seems  to 
have  been  the  desire  of  Whitelock,  and  probably  of  other 
reasonable  men.  But,  unhappily,  when  swords  are  once 
drawn  in  civil  war,  they  are  seldom  sheathed  till  experience 
has  shown  which  blade  is  the  sharper. 

Though  this  particular  instance  of  the  queen's  prodigious 
ascendency  over  her  husband  remained  secret  till  the  publi- 
cation of  lord  Clarendon's  Life,  it  was  in  general  well  known, 
and  put  the  leaders  of  the  commons  on  a  remarkable  stroke 
of  policy,  in  order  to  prevent  the  renewal  of  negotiations. 
On   her  landing   in  the  north,  with  a  supply  of  Impeach. 
money  and  arms,  as  well  as  with  a  few  troops  she  ment  of 
had  collected  in  Holland,  they  carried  up  to  the 
lords  an  impeachment   for  high  treason  against  her.     This 
measure  (so  obnoxious  was  Henrietta)  met  with  a  less  vig- 
orous opposition  than  might  be  expected,  though  the  moder- 
ate party  was  still  in  considerable  force.1     It  was  not  only 

1  I  cannot  discover  in   the  Journals  Martin  with  his  usual  fury  and  rudeness, 

any  division  on  this  impeachment.     But  The  first  of  these  carried  up  the  impeach- 

Ilollis  inveighs  against  it  in  his  memoirs  ment  to  the  house  of  lords, 
as  one  of  the  flagrant  acts  of  St.  John's        This  impeachment  was  not  absolutely 

party:  and  there  is  an  account  of  the  lost  sight  of  for  some  time.    In  January, 

debate  on   this  subject  in   the    Somers  1644,  the  lords  appointed  a  coin  in  it  too 

Tracts,  v.  500;  whence  it  appears  that  to   consider   what    mode  of   proceeding 

it    was    opposed    by   May  nurd,    Waller,  for  bringing  the  queen  to  trial  was  most 

Whitelock,  and  others;   but  supported  agreeable  to  a  parliamentary   way,  ai: 

by  Pym,  Strode,  Long,  Olrnn,  and  by  to  peruse  precedents,     larl.  Hist.  1J1. 


558  WALLER'S  PLOT.  CHAP.  X. 

an  insolence  which  a  king,  less  uxorious  than  Charles,  could 
never  pardon,  but  a  violation  of  the  primary  laws  and  moral 
sentiments  that  preserve  human  society,  to  which  the  queen 
was  acting  in  obedience.  Scarce  any  proceeding  of  the  long 
parliament  seems  more  odious  than  this ;  whether  designed 
by  way  of  intimidation,  or  to  exasperate  the  king,  and  render 
the  composure  of  existing  differences  more  impracticable. 

The  enemies  of  peace  were  strengthened  by  the  discovery 
Waller's  of  what  is  usually  called  Waller's  plot,  a  scheme 
plot.  for  making  a  strong  demonstration  of  the  royalist 

party  in  London,  wherein  several  members  of  both  houses 
appear  to  have  been  more  or  less  concerned.  Upon  the  de- 
tection of  this  conspiracy,  the  two  houses  of  parliament  took 
an  oath  not  to  lay  down  arms,  so  long  as  the  papists  now  in 
arms  should  be  protected  from  the  justice  of  parliament ;  and 
never  to  adhere  to,  or  willingly  assist,  the  forces  raised  by 
the  king,  without  the  consent  of  both  houses.  Every  individ- 
ual member  of  the  peers  and  commons  took  this  oath ;  some 
of  them  being  then  in  secret  concert  with  the  king,  and  others 
entertaining  intentions,  as  their  conduct  very  soon  evinced, 
of  deserting  to  his  side.1  Such  was  the  commencement  of  a 
system  of  perjury,  which  lasted  for  many  years,  and  belies 
the  pretended  religion  of  that  hypocritical  age.  But  we  may 
always  look  for  this  effect  from  oppressive  power,  and  the 
imposition  of  political  tests. 

The  king  was  now  in  a  course  of  success,  which  made  him 
rather  hearken  to  the  sanguine  courtiers  of  Oxford,  where, 
according  to  the  invariable  character  of  an  exiled  faction, 
every  advantage  or  reverse  brought  on  a  disproportionate 
exultation  or  despondency,  than  to  those  better  counsellors 
who  knew  the  precariousness  of  his  good  fortune.  He  pub- 
lished a  declaration,  wherein  he  denied  the  two  houses  at 
Westminster  the  name  of  a  parliament;  which  he  could  no 
more  take  from  them,  after  the  bill  he  had  passed,  than  they 
could  deprive  him  of  his  royal  title,  and  by  refusing  which 
he  shut  up  all  avenues  to  an  equal  peace.2  This  was  soon 
followed  by  so  extraordinary  a  political  error  as  manifests 
the  king's  want  of  judgment,  and  the  utter  improbability  that 


1  Part.  Hist.  129. 

2  Id.    133,   June   20;    Clarendon,  IT.  containing  full  assurances  of  his  deter- 
155.     lie  published,  however,  a  declara-  mination  to  govern  by  the  known  laws. 
tion  soon   after  the   taking  of   Bristol,  Parl.  Hist.  144. 


CHA.  I.  — 1642-49.  SECESSION  OF  PEERS  TO  THE  KING.   559 

any  event  of  the  war  could  have  restored  to  England  the 
blessings  of  liberty  and  repose.     Three  peers  of 
the  moderate  party,  the  earls  of  Holland,  Bedford,  8<^Tpeera 
and  Clare,  dissatisfied  with  the  preponderance  of  ^/J^"8'8 
a  violent  faction  in  the  commons,  left  their  places 
at  Westminster,  and  came  into  the  king's  quarters.     It  might 
be  presumed,  from  general  policy  as  well  as  from  his  con- 
stant declarations  of  a  desire  to  restore  peace,  that  they  would 
have   been    received  with   such  studied   courtesy  as  migh 
serve  to  reconcile   to  their  own  mind  a  step  which,  when 
taken  with  the  best  intentions,  is  always  equivocal  and  hu- 
miliating.    There  was  great  reason  to  believe  that  the  earl 
of  Northumberland,  not  only  the  first  peer  then  in  England 
as  to  family  and  fortune,  but  a  man  highly  esteemed  for  pru- 
dence, was  only  waiting  to  observe  the  reception  of  those 
who  went   first  to  Oxford    before  he  followed   their  steps. 
There  were  even  well-founded  hopes  of  the  earl  of  Essex, 
who,  though  incapable  of  betraying  his  trust  as  commander 
of  the  parliament's  army,  was,  both  from  personal  and  public 
motives,  disinclined  to  the  war-party  in  the  commons.    There 
was  much  to  expect  from  all  those  who  had  secretly  wished 
well  to  the  king's  cause,  and  from  those  whom  it  is  madness 
to  reject  or  insult,  the  followers  of  fortune,  the  worshippers 
of  power,  without  whom  neither  fortune  nor  power  can  long 
subsist.    Yet  such  was  the  state  of  Charles's  coun-  Their  treat_ 
cil-board  at  Oxford  that  some  were  for  arresting  ment  there 
these  proselyte  earls  ;  and  it  was  carried  with  dif- 
ficulty, after  they  had  been  detained,  some  time  at  Wai  ling- 
ford,  that  they  might  come  to  the  court.     But  they  met  there 
with  so  many  and  such  general  slights,  that,  though  they 
fought  in  the  king's  army  at  Newbury,  they  found  their  posi- 
tion intolerably  ignominious,  and,  after  about  three  months, 
returned  to  the  parliament  with  many  expressions  of  repent- 
ance, and  strong  testimonies  to  the  evil  counsels  of  Oxford.1 

1  Clarendon,  iv.  192,  262  ;  Whitelock,  commoner,  who  had  been  in  the  ktng]a 

70.     They  met  with  a  worse  reception  at  quarters,  should  be  admitted  again  to  .sit 

'Westminster  than  at  Oxford,  as  indeed  in  either  house.    Parl.  Hist.  271      This 

they  had  reason   to  expect.     A  motion  severity  was  one  cause  of  Essex'*  <li.-rc>n- 

that  the  earl  of  Holland  should  be  sent  tent,  which  was  increased  when  the  com- 

to  the  Tower  was  lost  in  the  commons  by  mona  refused  him  leave  to  take  HolUod 

only  cue  voice.     Parl.  Hist.  180.     They  with  him  on  his  expedition  into  the  w.-st 

were    provoked    at  his   taking   his   seat  that  summer.      Haillir.    i.   420  ;    \\  bite- 

without  permission.    After  long  refusing  lock.  87.     IfitbeaskedwhytlusKniiK.il 

to  consent,  the  lords  agreed  to  an  ordi-  rigor  was  less  impolitic  in  the  parliament 

nance,  June  29,  1644,  that  no  peer  or  than  iu  the  liiug,  1  can  only  answer  that 


560        ADVERSE2STESS  TO  OVERTURES  OF  PEACE.      CHAP.  X. 

The  king  seems  to  have  been  rather  passive  in  this  strange 
piece  of  impolicy,  but  by  no  means  to  have  taken  the  line 
that  became  him,  of  repressing  the  selfish  jealousy  or  petty 
revengefulness  of  his  court.  If  the  earl  of  Holland  was  a 
man  whom  both  he  and  the  queen,  on  the  score  of  his  great 
obligations  to  them,  might  justly  reproach  with  some  ingrati- 
tude, there  was  nothing  to  be  objected  against  the  other  two, 
save  their  continuance  at  Westminster,  and  compliance  in 
votes  that  he  disliked.  And  if  this  were  to  be  visited  by 
neglect  and  discountenance,  there  could,  it  was  plain,  be  no 
reconciliation  between  him  and  the  parliament.  For  who 
could  imagine  that  men  of  courage  and  honor,  while  pos- 
sessed of  any  sort  of  strength  and  any  hopes  of  preserving  it, 
would  put  up  with  a  mere  indemnity  for  their  lives  and  for- 
tunes, subject  to  be  reckoned  as  pardoned  traitbrs,  who  might 
thank  the  king  for  his  clemency,  without  presuming  to  his 
favor?  Charles  must  have  seen  his  superiority  consolidated 
by  repeated  victories,  before  he  could  prudently  assume  this 
tone  of  conquest.  Inferior  in  substantial  force,  notwithstand- 
ing his  transient  advantages,  to  the  parliament,  he  had  no 
probability  of  regaining  his  station  but  by  defections  from 
their  banner ;  and  these,  with  incredible  folly,  he  seemed  to 
decline ;  far  unlike  his  illustrious  father-in-law,  who  had 
cordially  embraced  the  leaders  of  a  rebellion  much  more  im- 
placable than  the  present.  For  the  Oxford  counsellors  and 
courtiers,  who  set  themselves  against  the  reception  of  the 
three  earls,  besides  their  particular  animosity  towards  the 
earl  of  Holland,1  and  that  general  feeling  of  disdain  and  dis- 
trust which,  as  Clarendon  finely  observes,  seems  by  nature 
attached  to  all  desertion  and  inconstancy,  whether  in  politics 
or  religion  (even  among  those  who  reap  the  advantage  of  it, 
and  when  founded  upon  what  they  ought  to  reckon  the 
soundest  reasons),  there  seem  grounds  to  suspect  that  they 

the  Btrpnger  and  (he  weaker  have  differ-  tallied  no  resentment  against  him.     As 

ent  measures  to  pursue.     But  relatively  to  Bedford  and  Clare,  they  would  proba- 

to  the  pacification  of  the  kingdom,  upon  bly  have  been  better  received,  if  not  ac- 

such   terms  as  fellow-citizens  ought   to  companied  by  so  obnoxious  an  intriguer 

ru<juire  from  each  other,  it  was  equally  of  the  old  court.     This  seems  to  account 

blamable    in    both    parties,    or    rather  for  the  unanimity  which  the   historian 

more  so  in  that  possessed  of  the  greater  describes   to  have    been    shown  in   the 

power.  council  against  their  favorable  reception, 

i  It  is  intimated  by  Clarendon   that  Light  and  'passionate  tempers,  like  that 

soine  at  Oxford,  probably  Jermyn  and  of   Henrietta,   are    prone   to   forget    iu- 

Digby,  were  jealous  of  Holland's  recov-  juries ;    serious  and   melancholic   ones, 

ering    the  influence   he   had    possessed  like  that  of  Charles,  m  ver  lose  sight  of 

with  the  queeu,  who  seems  to  have  re-  them. 


CHA.  I.  — 1642-49.        ANTI-PACIFIC  PARTY.  561 

had  deeper  and  more  selfish  designs  than  they  cared  to  mani- 
fest. They  hfed  long  beset  the  king  with  solicitations  for 
titles,  offices,  pensions ;  but  these  were  necessarily  too  lim- 
ited for  their  cravings.  They  had  sustained,  many  of  them, 
great  losses ;  they  had  performed  real  or  pretended  services 
for  the  king ;  and  it  is  probable  that  they  looked  to  a  confis 
cation  of  enemies'  property  for  their  indemnification  or  re- 
ward. This  would  account  for  an  adverseness  to  all  over- 
tures for  peace,  as  decided,  at  this  period,  among  a  .great 
body  of  the  cavaliers,  as  it  was  with  the  factions  of  Pyui  or 
Vane.  f 

These  factions  were  now  become  finally  predominant  at 
Westminster.     On  the  news  that  prince  Rupert 
had  taken  Bristol,  the  last  and  most  serious  loss  pacific  part> 
that  the  parliament  sustained,  the  lords  agreed  on  f^endant 
propositions  for  peace  to  be  sent  to  the  king,  of  an  at  West- 
unusually  moderate   tone.1     The  commons,  on  a  mi 
division  of  94  to  65,  determined  to  take  them  into  considera 
tion ;  but  the  lord-mayor   Pennington  having   procured  an 
address  of  the  city  against  peace,  backed  by  a  tumultuous 
mob,  a  small  majority  was  obtained  against  concurring  with 
the  other  house.2    It  was  after  this  that  the  lords  above  men- 
tioned, as  well  as  many  of  the  commons,  quitted  Westmin- 
ster.   The  prevailing  party  had  no  thoughts  of  peace  till  they 
could  dictate  its  conditions.     Through  Essex's  great  success 
in  raising  the   siege  of  Gloucester,  the  most  distinguished 
exploit  in  his  military  life,  and  the  battle  of  Newbury,  where- 
in the  advantage  was  certainly  theirs,  they  became  secure 
against  any  important  attack  on  the  king's  side,  the  war  turn- 
ing again    to   endless  sieges   and    skirmishes   of  partisans. 
And  they  now  adopted  two  important  measures,  one  of  which 
gave  a  new  complexion  to  the  quarrel. 

1  Baillie  deplores  at  this  time  "the  Hist.  156,  &c.;  Clarendon,  iv.  183 ;  Hoi- 
horrible  fears  and  confusions  in  the  city,  lis's  Memoirs.  Hollis  was  a  teller  lor  the 
the  king  everywhere  being  victorious,  majority  on  the  first  occasion  ;  he  hail  It'll 
In  the  city  a  strong  and  insolent  party  the  warlike  party  some  months  (I'.aillic, 
for  him."  P.  391.  "The  malignants  i.  356);  and  his  name  is  in  the  Journal* 
stirred  a  multitude  of  women  of  the  repeatedly,  from  November.  1642,  as  !<•]  Icr 
meaner  and  more  infamous  rank  to  come  against  them,  though  he  is  charged  witli 
to  the  door  of  both  houses,  and  cry  tu-  having  said  the  year  before  that  lie  ab- 
multuously  for  peace  on  any  terms.  This  horred  the  name  of  nrcouimodatioii. 
tumult  could  not  be  suppressed  but  by  Hutchinson,  p.  296.  Though  a  very 
violence,  and  killing  some  three  or  four  honest,  and  to  a  certain  extent  an  able 
women,  and  hurting  some  of  them,  and  man,  he  was  too  much  carried  away  by 
imprisoning  many."  P.  300.  personal  animosities  ;  and  as  these  shifted 

*  Lords'  and  Commons'  Journals ;  Parl.  his  principles  shifted  ako. 

VOL.  i.  —  c.  36 


562  A  NEW  GREAT  SEAL.  CHAP.  X. 

Littleton,  the  lord-keeper  of  the  great  seal,  had  carried  it 
away  with  him  to  the  king.  This  of  itself  put  a  stop  to  the 
regular  course  of  the  executive  government,  and  to  the  ad- 
ministration of  justice  within  the  parliament's  quarters.  No 
employments  could  be  filled  up,  no  writs  for  election  of  mem- 
bers issued,  no  commissions  for  holding  the  assizes  completed, 
without  the  indispensable  formality  of  affixing  the  great  seal. 
It  must  surely  excite  a  smile,  that  men  who  had  raised  ar- 
mies, and  fought  battles  against  the  king,  should  be  perplexed 
how  to  get  over  so  technical  a  difficulty.  But  the  great  seal, 
in  the  eyes  of  the  English  lawyers,  has  a  sort  of  mysterious 
efficacy,  and  passes  for  the  depository  of  royal  authority  in  a 
higher  degree  than  the  person  of  the  king.  The 
mentPmakes  commons  prepared  an  ordinance  in  July  for  mak- 
a  new  great  jng  a  new  great  seal,  in  which  the  lords  could  not 
be  induced  to  concur  till  October.  The  royalists, 
and  the  king  himself,  exclaimed  against  this  as  the  most  au- 
dacious treason,  though  it  may  be  reckoned  a  very  natural 
consequence  of  the  state  in  which  the  parliament  was  placed ; 
and  in  the  subsequent  negotiations  it  was  one  of  the  minor 
points  in  dispute,  whether  he  should  authorize  the  proceed- 
ings under  the  great  seal  of  the  two  houses,  or  they  consent 
to  sanction  what  had  been  done  by  virtue  of  his  own. 

The  second  measure  of  parliament  was  of  greater  moment 
and  more  fatal  consequences.  I  have  already  mentioned  the 
stress  laid  by  the  bigoted  Scots  presbyterians  on  the  es- 
tablishment of  their  own  church-government  in  England. 
Chiefly  perhaps  to  conciliate  this  people,  the  house  of  com- 
mons had  entertained  the  bill  for  abolishing  episcopacy  ;  and 
this  had  formed  a  part  of  the  nineteen  propositions  that  both 
houses  tendered  to  the  king.1  After  the  action  at  Brentford 
they  concurred  in  a  declaration  to  be  delivered  to  the  Scots 
commissioners,  resident  in  London,  wherein,  after  setting 
forth  the  malice  of  the  prelatical  clergy  in  hindering  the 
reformation  of  ecclesiastical  government,  and  professing  their 
own  desire  willingly  and  affectionately  to  pursue  a  closer 
union  in  such  matters  between  the  two  nations,  they  request 
their  brethren  of  Scotland  to  raise  such  forces  as  they  should 
judge  sufficient  for  the  securing  the  peace  of  their  own  bor- 

1  The  resolution,  that  government  by  1642.    Parl.  Hist.  ii.  1465.    But  the  ordi- 

archbishops,  bishops,  &c.,  was  inconven-  nance  to  carry  this  fully  into  effect  was 

lent  and  ought  to  be  taken  away,  passed  not   made  till  October,  1616.    Scobell's 

both  houses  unanimously,  September  10,  Ordinances. 


CHA.  I.  — 1G42-49.  SOLEMN  LEAGUE  AND  COVENANT.    563 

ders  against  ill-affected  persons  there ;  as  likewise  to  assist 
them  in  suppressing  the  army  of  papists  and  foreigners 
which,  it  was  expected,  would  shortly  be  on  foot  in  Eng- 
land.1 

This  overture  produced  for  many  months  no  sensible 
effect.  The  Scots,  with  all  their  national  wariness,  suspected 
that,  in  spite  of  these  general  declarations  in  favor  of  their 
church  polity,  it  was  not  much  at  heart  with  most  of  the  par- 
liament, and  might  be  given  up  in  a  treaty,  if  the  king  would 
concede  some  other  matters  in  dispute.  Accordingly,  when 
the  progress  of  his  arms,  especially  in  the  north,  during  the 
ensuing  summer,  compelled  the  parliament  to  call  in  a  more 
pressing  manner,  and  by  a  special  embassy,  for  their  aid, 
they  resolved  to  bind  them  down  by  such  a  compact  as  no 
wavering  policy  should  ever  rescind.  They  insisted  therefore 
on  the  adoption  of  the  solemn  league  and  covenant,  founded 
on  a  similar  association  of  their  own  five  years  before, 
through  which  tkey  had  successfully  resisted  the  king  and 
overthrown  the  prelatic  government.  The  covenant  con- 
sisted in  an  oath  to  be  subscribed  by  all  sorts  of  persons  in 
both  kingdoms,  whereby  they  bound  themselves  to  preserve 
the  reformed  religion  in  the  church  of  Scotland,  in  doctrine, 
worship,  discipline,  and  government,  according  to  the  word 
of  God  and  practice  of  the  best  reformed  churches ;  and  to 
endeavor  to  bring  the  churches  of  God  in  the  three  kingdoms 
to  the  nearest  conjunction  and  uniformity  in  religion,  con 
fession  of  faith,  form  of  church-government,  directory  for 
worship,  and  catechizing;  to  endeavor,  without  respect  of 
persons,  the  extirpation  of  popery,  prelacy  (that  is,  church- 
government  by  archbishops,  bishops,  their  chancellors,  and 
commissaries,  deans  and  chapters,  archdeacons,  and  all  other 
ecclesiastical  officers  depending  on  that  hierarchy),  and 
whatsoever  should  be  found  contrary  to  sound  doctrine  and 
the  power  of  godliness ;  to  preserve  the  rights  and  privileges 
of  the  parliaments  and  the  liberties  of  the  kingdoms,  and  the 
king's  person  and  authority,  in  the  preservation  and  defence 
of  the  true  religion  and  liberties  of  the  kingdoms;  to  en- 
deavor the  discovery  of  incendiaries  and  malignants,  who 
hinder  the  reformation  of  religion,  and  divide  the  king  from 
his  people,  that  they  may  be  brought  to  punishment ;  finally; 
to  assist  and  defend  all  such  as  should  enter  into  this  cove- 

1  Parl.  Ilist.  iii.  15. 


564 


PARLIAMENT  ACCEPTS  THE  COVENANT.      CHAP.  X. 


nant  and  not  suffer  themselves  to  be  withdrawn  from  it, 
whether  to  revolt  to  the  opposite  party,  or  to  give  in  to  a 
detestable  indifference  or  neutrality.  In  conformity  to  the 
strict  alliance  thus  established  between  the  two  kingdoms, 
the  Scots  commissioners  at  Westminster  were  intrusted, 
jointly  with  a  committee  of  both  houses,  with  very  exten- 
sive powers  to  administer  the  public  affairs.1 

Every  member  of  the  commons  who  remained  at  West- 
The  par-  minster,  to  the  number  of  228,  or  perhaps  more, 
liament  and  from  20  to  30  peers  that  formed  their  upper 
to^he"^6'  house,2  subscribed  this  deliberate  pledge  to  over- 
covenant.  turn  tne  established  church ;  many  of  them  with 
extreme  reluctance,  both  from  a  dislike  of  the  innovation, 
and  from  a  consciousness  that  it  raised  a  most  formidable 
obstacle  to  the  restoration  of  peace  ;  but  with  a  secret  re- 
serve, for  which  some  want  of  precision  in  the  language  of 
this  covenant  (purposely  introduced  by  Vane,  as  is  said,  to 
shelter  his  own  schemes)  afforded  them  a  sort  of  apology.8 
It  was  next  imposed  on  all  civil  and  military  officers,  and 
upon  all  the  beneficed  clergy.*  A  severe  persecution  fell  on 


1  This  committee,  appointed  in  Feb- 
ruary, 1644,  consisted  of  the    following 
persons,  the  most  conspicuous,  at  that 
time,  of  the  parliament :   the  earls  of 
Northumberland,   Essex,  Warwick,   and 
Manchester ;   lords   Say,   Wharton,    and 
Roberts  ;    Sir.    Pierpoint,    the    two    sir 
Henry  Vanes,  sir  Philip  Stapylton,  sir 
AVilliam  Waller,  sir  Gilbert  Gerrard^  sir 
William   Armyn,   sir  Arthur   Haslerig  ; 
Messrs.  Crew,  Wallop,  St.  John,  Crom- 
well, Brown,  and  Glynn.    Parl.  Hist.  iii. 
248. 

2  Somers  Tracts,  iv.  533.    The  names 
marked  in  the  Parliamentary  History  as 
having  taken  the  covenant  are  236. 

The  earl  of  Lincoln  alone,  a  man  of 
groat  integrity  and  moderation,  though 
only  conspicuous  in  the  Journals,  refused 
to  take  the  covenant,  and  was  excluded  in 
consequence  from  his  seat  in  the  house; 
but,  on  his  petition  next  year,  though,  as 
far  as  appears,  without  compliance,  was 
restored,  and  the  vote  rescinded.  Parl. 
Hist.  393.  He  regularly  protested  against 
all  violent  measures ;  and  we  still  find 
his  name  in  the  minority  on  such  occa- 
sions after  the  Restoration. 

Baillie  says,  the  desertion  of  about  six 
peers  at  this  time  to  the  king  was  of 
great  use  to  the  passing  of  the  covenant 
In  a  legal  wiy.  Vol.  i.  p.  390. 

s  Buraet's  Mem.  of  Duke  of  Hamilton, 


p.  239.  I  am  not  quite  satisfied  as  to 
this,  which  later  writers  seem  to  have 
taken  from  Buruet.  It  may  well  be  sup- 
posed that  the  ambiguity  of  the  covenant 
was  not  very  palpable;  since  the  Scota 
presbyterians,  a  people  not  easily  coz- 
ened, were  content  with  its  expression. 
According  to  fair  and  honest  rules  of  in- 
terpretation, it  certainly  bound  the  sub- 
scribers to  the  establishment  of  a  church- 
government  conformed  to  that  of  Scot- 
land; namely,  the  presbyterian,  exclu- 
sive of  all  mixture  with  any  other.  But 
Selden,  and  the  other  friends  of  moderate 
episcopacy  who  took  the  covenant,  justi- 
fied it,  I  suppose,  to  their  consciences, 
by  the  pretext  that,  in  renouncing  the 
jurisdiction  of  bishops,  they  meant  the 
unlimited  jurisdiction  without  concur- 
rence of  any  presbyters.  It  was  not, 
however,  an  action  on  which  they  could 
reflect  with  pleasure.  Baxter  says  that 
Gataker,  and  some  others  of  the  assem- 
bly, would  not  subscribe  the  covenant, 
but  on  the  understanding  that  they  did 
not  renounce  primitive  episcopacy  by  it. 
Life  of  Baxter,  p.  48.  These  controver- 
sial subtleties  elude  the  ordinary  reader 
of  history. 

*  After  the  war  was  ended  none  of  the 
king's  party  were  admitted  to  compound 
for  their  estates  without  taking  the  cove- 
nant. This  Clarendon,  in  one  of  his  let 


CHA.  I.  — 1642-49.  CLERGY  REFUSE  TO  SUBSCRIBE.    5G5 

the  faithful  children  of  the  Anglican  church.  Many  had  al- 
ready been  sequestered  from  their  livings,  or  even  subjected 
to  imprisonment,  by  the  parliamentary  committee  for  scan- 
dalous ministers,  or  by  subordinate  committees  of  the  same 
kind  set  up  in  each  county  within  their  quarters ;  sometimes 
on  the  score  of  immoralities  or  false  doctrine,  more  frequent- 
ly for  what  they  termed  malignity,  or  attachment  to  the  king 
and  his  party.1  Yet  wary  men,  who  meddled  not 
with  politics,  might  hope  to  elude  this  inquisition.  ^thtTcie'r^y 
But  the  covenant,  imposed  as  a  general  test,  who  refuse 
drove  out  all  who  were  too  conscientious  to  pledge 
themselves  by  a  solemn  appeal  to  the  Deity  to  resist  the 
polity  which  they  generally  believed  to  be  of  his  institution. 
What  number  of  the  clergy  were  ejected  (most  of  them  but 
for  refusing  the  covenant,  and  for  no  moral  offence  or  imputed 
superstition)  it  is  impossible  to  ascertain.  Walker,  in  his 
Sufferings  of  the  Clergy,  a  folio  volume  published  in  the 
latter  end  of  Anne's  reign,  with  all  the  virulence  and  par- 
tiality of  the  high-church  faction  in  that  age,  endeavored  to 
support  those  who  had  reckoned  it  at  8000 ;  a  palpable  over- 
statement upon  his  own  showing,  for  he  cannot  produce  near 
2000  names  after  a  most  diligent  investigation.  Neal,  how- 
ever, admits  1600,  probably  more  than  one  fifth  of  the  bene- 
ficed  ministers  in  the  kingdom.2  The  biographical  collections 
furnish  a  pretty  copious  martyrology  of  men  the  most  dis- 

tera,  calls  "  making  haste  to  buy  damna-  on  the  score  of  prejudice,  is  at  least  bet- 

tion  at  two  years'  purchase."  Vol.  ii.p.  286.  ter  than  Walker's. 

1  Neal,  ii.  19,   &c.,  is  fair  enough  in  The  king's  party  were  not  less  oppres- 

censuring      the    committees,    especially  give  towards  ministers  whom  they  reck- 

those  in  the  country.     "The  greatest  oned  puritan;  whicn  unluckily  com  pre- 

part  [of  the  clergy]  were  cast  out  for  ma-  hendeil  most  of  those  who  were  of  strict 

lignity  [attachment  to  the  royal  cause];  lives,  especially  if  they  preached  Citlviu- 

superstition  and  false  doctrine  were  hard-  istically,  unless  they  redeemed  that  auspi- 

ly  ever  objected  ;  yet  the  proceedings  of  cion  by  strong  demonstrations  of  loyalty. 

the  sequestrators  were  not  always  Justin-  Neal,  p.  21.    Baxter's  Life,  p.  42.    And,  if 

able;  for,  whereas  a  court  of  judicature  they  put  themselves  forward  ou  this  side, 

should  rather  be  counsel  for  the»prisoner  they  were  sure  to  suffer  most  severely  for 

than  the  prosecutor,  the  commissioners  it  on  the  parliament's  success ;  an  ordi- 

considered  the  king's  clergy  as  their  most  nance  of  April  1. 1643,  having  sequestered 

dangerous  enemies,  and  were  ready  to  lay  the  private  estates  of  all  the  clergy  who 

hold  of   all  opportunities   to   discharge  had  aided  the  king.     Thus  the  condition 

them  their  pulpits."     P.  24.     But  if  we  of  the  English  clergy  was  every  way  most 

can  rely  at  all  on  White's  Century  of  Ma-  deplorable;  and  in  fact  they  were  utterly 

lignant  Ministers  (and  I  do  not  perceive  ruined. 

that  Walker  has  been  able-  to  controvert  3  Neal,  p.  93.  He  gays  it  was  not  ten- 
it),  there  were  a  good  many  cases  of  irreg-  dered,  by  fivor,  to  some  of  the  clergy 
nlar  life  in  the  clergy,  so  far  at  least  as  who  had  not  been  active  against  the  p;<r- 
haunting ale-houses;  which,  however, was  liauient  and  were  reputed  Oiivini-t-..  P. 
much  more  common,  and  consequently  69.  Sanderson  is  said  to  be  one  in 
less  indecent,  in  that  age  thau  at  present.  This  historian,  an  honest  and  woU- 
See  also  Baxter's  Life,  p.  74;  whose  au-  natured  man  at  bottom,  justly  centrum* 
fhoritv,  though  open  to  some  exceptions  ita  imposition. 


566  IMPEACHMENT  OF  LAUD.  CHAP.  X. 

tinguished  by  their  learning  and  virtues  in  that  age.  The 
remorseless  and  indiscriminate  bigotry  of  presbyterianism 
might  boast  that  it  had  heaped  disgrace  on  Walton,  and 
driven  Lydiat  to  beggaiy ;  that  it  trampled  on  the  old  age 
of  Hales,  and  embittered  with  insult  the  dying  moments  of 
Chillingworth. 

But  the  most  unjustifiable  act  of  these  zealots,  and  one  of 

the  greatest   reproaches  of  the  long  parliament, 

Saand       was  the  death  of  archbishop  Laud.     In  the  first 

execution       days  of  the    session,  while   the   fall   of  Strafford 

of  Laud.  -*_'  i  •  ?!  -i 

struck  every  one  with  astonishment,  the  commons 
had  carried  up  an  impeachment  against  him  for  high  treason, 
in  fourteen  articles  of  charge ;  and  he  had  lain  ever  since  in 
the  Tower,  his  revenues  and  even  private  estate  sequestered, 
and  in  great  indigence.  After  nearly  three  years'  neglect, 
specific  articles  were  exhibited  against  him  in  October,  1 643, 
but  not  proceeded  on  with  vigor  till  Decembei',  1644;  when, 
for  whatever  reason,  a  determination  was  taken  to  pursue 
this  unfortunate  prelate  to  death.  The  charges  against  him, 
which  Wild,  Maynard,  and  other  managers  of  the  impeach- 
ment were  to  aggravate  into  treason,  related  partly  to  those 
papistical  innovations  which  had  nothing  of  a  political 
character  about  them,  partly  to  the  violent  proceedings  in 
the  star-chamber  and  high-commission  courts,  wherein  Laud 
was  very  prominent  as  a  councillor,  but  certainly  without 
any  greater  legal  responsibility  than  fell  on  many  others. 
He  defended  himself,  not  always  prudently  or  satisfac- 
torily, but,  with  courage  and  ability ;  never  receding  from 
his  magnificent  notions  of  spiritual  power,  but  endeavor- 
ing to  shift  the  blame  of  the  sentences  pronounced  by  the 
council  on  those  who  concurred  with  him.  The  imputa- 
tion of  popery  he  repelled  by  a  list  of  the  converts  he 
had  made ;  but  the  word  was  equivocal,  and  he  could  not 
deny  the  difference  between  his  protestantism  and  that 
of  our  Reformation.  Nothing  could  be  more  monstrous 
than  the  allegation  of  treason  in  this  case.  The  judges,  on  a 
reference  by  the  lords,  gave  it  to  be  understood,  in  their 
timid  way,  that  the  charges  contained  no  legal  treason.1 
But,  the  commons  having  changed  their  impeachment  into 

1  "  All  the  judges  answered  that  they  pressed   to  be  treason  in  the  statute  of 

could  deliver  no  opinion  in  this  case,  in  25  E.  III.,  and  so  referred  it  wholly  to 

point  of  treason  by  the  law  :  because  they  the  judgment  of  this   house."     Lords' 

could  not  deliver  any  opinion  in  point  of  Journals,  17th  December,  1644. 
treason  but  what   was    particularly   ex- 


CHA.  I. -1642-49.    DECLINE  OF  THE  KING'S  AFFAIRS.       567 

an  ordinance  for  his  execution,  the  peers  were  pusillanimous 
enough  to  comply.  It  is  said  by  Clarendon  that  only  seven 
lords  were  in  the  house  on  this  occasion :  but  the  Journals 
unfortunately  bear  witness  to  the  presence  of  twenty.1  Laud 
had  amply  merited  punishment  for  his  tyrannical  abuse  of 
power;  but  his  execution  at  the  age  of  seventy,  without  the 
slightest  pretence  of  political  necessity,  was  a  far  more  un- 
justifiable instance  of  it  than  any  that  was  alleged  against 
him. 

Pursuant  to  the  before-mentioned  treaty,  the  Scots  army 
of  21,000  men  marched  into  England  in  January, 
1 644.  This  was  a  very  serious  accession  to 
Charles's  difficulties,  already  sufficient  to  dissipate 
all  hopes  of  final  triumph,  except  in  the  most  san- 
guine minds.  His  successes,  in  fact,  had  been  rather  such  as 
to  surprise  well-judging  men  than  to  make  them  expect  any 
more  favorable  termination  of  the  war  than  by  a  fair  treaty. 
From  the  beginning  it  may  be  said  that  the  yeomanry  and 
trading  classes  of  towns  were  generally  hostile  to  the  king's 
Bide,  even  in  those  counties  which  were  in  his  military 
occupation ;  except  in  a  few,  such  as  Cornwall,  Worcester, 
Salop,  and  most  of  Wales,  where  the  prevailing  sentiment 
was  chiefly  royalist ; 2  and  this  disaffection  was  prodigiously 
increased  through  the  license  of  his  ill-paid  and  ill-dis- 
ciplined army.  On  the  other  hand,  the  gentry  were  in  a 
great  majority  attached  to  his  cause,  even  in  the  parts  of 
England  which  lay  subject  to  the  parliament.  But  he  was 

1  Lords'  Journals,  4th  January.     It  ia  But  the  Worcestershire  populace,  he  sayi, 

not  said  to  be  done  netn.  con.  were  violent  royalists  :  p.  ;;.).     Clarendon 

*  "  The  difference  in  the  temper  of  the  observes  in  another  place,  iii.  41,  "  There 
common  people  of  both  sides  was  so  great  was  in  this  county  (Cornwall),  as  througb- 
that  they  who  inclined  to  the  parliament  out  the  kingdom,  a  wonderful  and  super- 
left  nothing  unperformed  that  might  stitious  reverence  towards  the  name  of  a 
Advance  the  cau.se  ;  whereas  they  who  parliament,  and  a  prejudice  to  the  power 
wished  well  to  the  king  thought  they  had  of  the  court."  He  afterwards,  p.  438, 
performed  their  duty  in  doing  so,  and  calls  "  an  implicit  reverence  to  th«  name 
that  they  had  done  enough  for  him  in  of  a  parliament  the  fatal  disease  of  the 
that  they  had  done  nothing  against  him."  whole  kingdom."  So  prevalent  was  the 
Clarendon,  p.  3,  452.  *'  Most  of  the  gen-  sense  of  the  king's  arbitrary  governuit- nt, 
try  of  the  county  (Nottinghamshire),"  especially  in  the  case  of  ship-money, 
says  Mrs.  Hutchinson,  "  were  disaffected  \Varburton  remarks  that  he  ntirr  <-x- 
to  the  parliament;  most  of  the  middle  pressed  any  repentance,  or  made  any  o  in- 
sert, the  able  substantial  freeholders  and  fession  in  his  public  declaration*,  that  his 
the  other  commons,  who  had  not  their  former  administration  had  been  ilJppil. 
dependence  upon  the  malignant  nobility  Notes  on  Clarendon,  p.  S&i.  But  this 
and  gentry,  adhered  to  the  parliament."  was  not,  perhaps,  to  be  expected  ;  and 
P.  81.  This  I  conceive  to  have  been  the  his  repeated  promises  to  govern  according 
case  in  much  the  greater  part  of  England,  to  law  might  be  construed  iuto  tacit  ao 
Baxter,  in  his  Life,  p.  30,  says  just  the  knowledgiueuts  of  past  errors, 
fame  thing  in  a  passage  worthy  of  notice. 


5G8  FACTIONS  AT  OXFORD.        CHAP.  X. 

never  able  to  make  any  durable  impression  on  wbat  were 
called  the  associated  counties,  extending  from  Norfolk  to 
Sussex  inclusively,  within  which  no  rising  could  be  attempted 
with  any  effect ; 1  while,  on  the  other  hand,  the  parliament 
possessed  several  garrisons,  and  kept  up  considerable  forces, 
in  that  larger  portion  of  the  kingdom  where  he  might  be 
reckoned  superior.  Their  resources  were  far  greater;  and 
the  taxes  imposed  by  them,  though  exceedingly  heavy,  were 
more  regularly  paid  and  less  ruinous  to  the  people  than  the 
sudden  exactions,  half  plunder  half  contribution,  of  the  rav- 
enous cavaliers.  The  king  lost  ground  during  the  winter. 
He  had  built  hopes  on  bringing  over  troops  from  Ireland  ; 
for  the  sake  of  which  he  made  a  truce,  then  called  the  cessa- 
tion, with  the  rebel  catholics.  But  this  reinforcement  having 
been  beaten  and  dispersed  by  Fairfax  at  Namptwich,  he  had 
the  mortification  of  finding  that  this  scheme  had  much  in- 
creased his  own  unpopularity,  and  the  distrust  entertained  of 
him  even  by  his  adherents,  without  the  smallest  advantage. 
The  next  campaign  was  marked  by  the  great  defeat  of 
Rupert  and  Newcastle  at  Marston  Moor,  and  the  loss  of  the 
north  of  England ;  a  blow  so  terrible  as  must  have  brought 
on  his  speedy  ruin,  if  it  had  not  been  in  some  degree  miti- 
gated by  his  strange  and  unexpected  success  over  Essex  in 
the  west,  and  by  the  tardiness  of  the  Scots  in  making  use  of 
their  victory.  Upon  the  result  of  the  campaign  of  1644,  the 
king's  affairs  were  in  such  bad  condition  that  nothing  less 
than  a  series  of  victories  could  have  reinstated  them ;  yet 
not  so  totally  ruined  as  to  hold  out  much  prospect  of  an 
approaching  termination  to  the  people's  calamities. 

There  had  been,  from  the  very  commencement  of  the  war, 
Factions  all  that  distraction  in  the  king's  councils  at  Oxford, 
at  oxford.  an(j  an  those  bickerings  and  heart-burnings  among 
his  adherents,  which  naturally  belong  to  men  embarked  in  a 
dangerous  cause  with  different  motives  and  different  views. 
The  military  men,  some  of  whom  had  served  with  the  Swedes 
in  Germany,  acknowledged  no  laws  but  those  of  war  ;  and 
could  not  understand  that,  either  in  annoying  the  enemy  or 
providing  for  themselves,  they  were  to  acknowledge  any  re- 

1   The  associated    counties,    properly  but  it  was  equally  within  the  parliamen- 
ppeaking,  were  at  first  Norfolk,  Suffolk,  tary   pale,    though   the  gentry  were   re- 
Essex,  Hertford,  Cambridge  ;     to   which  markably  loyal  in  their  inclinations.    Tho 
some  others  were  added.     Sussex,  I  be-  same  was  true  of  Kent, 
lieve,  was  not  a  part  of  the  association : 


<^HA.  I.  — 1642-49.     PARLIAMENT  AT  OXFORD.  569 

straints  of  the  civil  power.  The  lawyers,  on  the  other  hand, 
and  the  whole  constitutional  party,  labored  to  keep  up,  in  the 
midst  of  arms,  the  appearances  at  least  of  legal  justice  and 
that  favorite  maxim  of  Englishmen,  the  supremacy  of  civil 
over  military  authority,  rather  more  strictly  perhaps  than  the 
nature  of  their  actual  circumstances  would  admit.  At  the 
head  of  the  former  party  stood  the  king's  two  nephews,  Ru- 
pert and  Maurice,  the  younger  sons  of  the  late  unfortunate 
elector  palatine,  soldiers  of  fortune  (as  we  may  truly  call 
them),  of  rude  and  imperious  characters,  avowedly  despising, 
the  council  and  the  common  law,  and  supported  by  Charles, 
with  all  his  injudiciousness  and  incapacity  for  affairs,  against 
the  greatest  men  of  the  kingdom.  Another  very  powerful 
and  obnoxious  faction  was  that  of  the  catholics,  proud  of 
their  services  and  sacrifices,  confident  in  the  queen's  protec- 
tion, and  looking  at  least  to  a  full  toleration  as  their  just 
reward.  They  were  the  natural  enemies  of  peace,  and  little 
less  hated  at  Oxford  than  at  Westminster.1 

At  the  beginning  of  the  winter  of  1643  the  king  took  the 
remarkable  step  of  summoning  the  peers  and  com-  RoyaUst 
moners  of  his  party  to  meet  in  parliament  at  Oxford.  lords  and 

mi  •  •!       /i  x    j it      J.L.  i-x    ..•          commoners 

This  was  evidently  suggested  by  the  constitution-  summoned 
alists  with  the  intention  of  obtaining  a  supply  by  to  that  Clty- 
more  regular  methods  than  forced  contribution,  and  of  oppos- 
ing a  barrier  to  the  military  and  popish  interests.2  Whether  it 

1  Clarendon,  passim.  May,  160.  Baillie,        Sari  la  compagnia  malvagia  e  ria, 
i  416.    See,  in  the  Somers  Tracts,  v.  495,        Nella  quel  tu  cadrai  in  questa  valle. 
a  dialogue   between  a  gentleman  and   a 

citizen,  printed  at  Oxford,  1643.   Though  We  know  too  little  of  this  excellent  man, 

of  course  a  royalist  pamphlet,  it  shows  whose  talents  however  and  early  pursuits 

the  disunion  that  prevailed  in  that  un-  do  not  seem  to  have  particularly  qualified 

fortunate  party,  and  inveighs  against  the  him  for  public  life.     It  is  evident  that  he 

influence  of  the  papists,  in  consequence  did  not  plunge  into  the  loyal  cause  with 

of  which  the  marquis  of  Hertford  is  said  all  the  zeal  of  his  friend  Hyde;  and  the 

to  have  declined  the  king's  service.     Ru-  king  doubtless  had  no  great  regard  for 

pert  is  praised,  and  Newcastle  struck  at.  the   counsels  of  one    who   took  HO  very 

It  is  written,  on  the  whole,  in  rather  a  different  a  view  of  some  important  mat- 

lukewarm  stylo  of  loyalty.     The  earl  of  ters  from  himself.    Life  of  Clarendon,  48. 

Holland  and  sir  Edward  Dering  gave  out  He  had  been  active  against  StmflDrd,  and 

their  reason  for  quitting  the  king's  side  probably  had  a  bad  opinion  of  Laud. 

iat  there  was  great  danger  of  popery,  prosecution  of  Finch  for  high  trt 


to  name  them  ;  and  I  doubt  not  but  you 
have  heard  their  names." 
E  quel  che  pto  ti  graveri  le  spalle  « It  appears  by  the  late  edition  of 


570  PARLIAMENT  AT  OXFOKD.  CHAP.  X. 

were  equally  calculated  to  further  the  king's  cause  may 
admit  of  some  doubt.  The  royalist  convention  indeed,  which 
name  it  ought  rather  to  have  taken  than  that  of  parliament, 
met  in  considerable  strength  at  Oxford.  Forty-three  peers, 
and  one  hundred  and  eighteen  commoners,  subscribed  a  letter 
to  the  earl  of  Essex,  expressing  their  anxiety  for  a  treaty 
of  peace ;  twenty-nine  of  the  former,  and  fifty-seven  of  the 
latter,  it  is  said,  being  then  absent  on  the  king's  service,  or 
other  occasions.1  Such  a  display  of  numbers,  nearly  double 
in  one  house  and  nearly  half  in  the  other,  of  those  who  re- 
mained at  Westminster,  might  have  an  effect  on  the  nation's 
prejudices,  and  at  least  redeem  the  king  from  the  charge  of 
standing  singly  against  his  parliament.  But  they  came  in 
no  spirit  of  fervid  loyalty,  rather  distrustful  of  the  king, 
especially  on  the  score  of  religion ;  averse  to  some  whom 
he  had  injudiciously  raised  to  power,  such  as  Digby  and  Cot- 
tington  ;  and  so  eager  for  pacification  as  not  perhaps  to  have 
been  unwilling  to  purchase  it  by  greater  concessions  than  he 
could  prudently  make.2  Peace  however  was  by  no  means 
brought  nearer  by  their  meeting;  the  parliament,  jealous  and 
alarmed  at  it,  would  never  recognize  their  existence,  and 
were  so  provoked  at  their  voting  the  lords  and  commons 
at  Westminster  guilty  of  treason,  that,  if  we  believe  a 
writer  of  some  authority,  the  two  houses  unanimously  passed 
a  vote  on  Essex's  motion,  summoning  the  king  to  appear 

endon,  iv.  351,  that  he  was  the  adviser  ting,  if  attentively  considered,  a  little 

of  calling  the  Oxford  parliament.      The  apprehension   of   popery   aud    arbitrary 

former  editors  omitted  his  name.  power.     Baillie  says,  in   one  of  his  let- 

1  Parl.   Hist.  218.      The  number  who  ters:"The  first  day  the  Oxford   parlia- 
took  the  covenant   in   September,  1643,  ment  met,  the  king  made  a  long  speech ; 
appears  by  a  list  of  the  long  parliament  but  many  being  ready  to  give  in  papers 
iu  the  same  work,  vol.  ii.,  to  be  236  ;  but  for  the  removing  of  Digby,  Cottington, 
twelve  of  these  are  included  in  both  lists,  and    others    from    court,    the    meeting 
having   gone  afterwards  into  the  king's  was  adjourned  for  some  da.ys."     i.  429. 
quarters.      The    remainder,   about    100,  Indeed,   the  restoration    of   Cottington, 
were  either  dead  since  the  beginning  of  and  still    more  of    Windebank,   to   the 
the  troubles,  or  for  some  reason  absented  king's  councils,  was  no  pledge  of  protes- 
themselves  from  both  assemblies.      Pos-  tant  or  constitutional  measures.     This 
eibly  the  list  of  those  who  took  the  cove-  opposition,  so  natural  to  parliaments  in 
nant  is   not  quite   complete;    nor  do  I  any  circumstances,    disgusted    Charles, 
think   the   king   had   much    more  than  In  one  of  his  letters  to  the  queen  he  con- 
about  sixty  peers  on  his  side.     The  par-  gratulates  himself  on  being  "freed  from 
liament  however  could  not  have  prod  need  the  place  of  all  mutinous  motions,  his 
thirty.     Lords'  Journals,  Jan.  22.  1644.  mongrel   parliament  "     It  may  be  pre- 
Whitelock,  p.  80,  says  that  two  hundred  sumed  that  some  of  those  wuo  obeyed 
aud  eighty  appeared  in  the  house  of  com-  the  king's  summons  to  Oxford  were  in- 
inons,   Jan.   1644,  besides  one  hundred  fluenced  less  by  loyalty  than  a  cousider- 
absent  in  the  parliament's  service ;   but  ation  that  their  estates  lay  in  parts  oc- 
this  cannot  be  quite  exact.  cupied  by  his  troops ;  of  course  the  same 

2  Kushworth,   Abr.   v.   266  and   296  ;  is  applicable  to  the  Westminster  parlia- 
where  is  an  address  to  the  king,  iutiuia-  ment. 


CHA.  I.  — 1642-49.      TREATY  OF  UXBRIDGE. 


571 


by  a  certain  day.1  But  the  Scots  commissioners  had  force 
enough  to  turn  aside  such  violent  suggestions,  and  ultimately 
obtained  the  concurrence  of  both  houses  in  propositions  for 
a  treaty.2  They  had  begun  to  find  themselves  less  likely  to 
sway  the  counsels  of  Westminster  than  they  had  expected, 
and  dreaded  the  rising  ascendency  of  Cromwell.  The  treaty 
was  opened  at  Uxbridge  in  January,  1645.  But  Treaty  of 
neither  the  king  nor  his  adversaries  entered  on  it  Uxbridge. 
with  minds  sincerely  bent  on  peace  :  they,  on  the  one  hand, 
resolute  not  to  swerve  from  the  utmost  rigor  of  a  conqueror's 
terms,  without  having  conquered ;  and  he,  though  more 
secretly,  cherishing  illusive  hopes  of  a  more  triumphant 
restoration  to  power  than  any  treaty  could  be  expected  to 
effect.8 

The  three  leading  topics  of  discussion  among  the  negotia- 
tors at  Uxbridge  were  the  church,  the  militia,  and  impossj. 
the  state  of   Ireland.     Bound  by  their  unhappy  i*»"ty  °f 
covenant,  and  watched  by  their  Scots  colleagues,  ag 
the  English  commissioners  on  the  parliament  side  demanded 
the  complete  establishment  of  a  presbyterian  polity,  and  the 
substitution  of  what  was  called  the  directory  for  the  Angli- 
can  liturgy.     Upon  this  head  there  was  little  prospect  of 
a   union.      The  king  had  deeply  imbibed   the  tenets  of 


1  Baillie,  441.  I  can  find  no  mention 
of  this  in  the  Journals ;  but,  as  Baillie 
was  then  in  London,  and  in  constant  in- 
tercourse with  the  leaders  of  parliament, 
there  must  hate  been  some  foundation 
for  his  statement,  though  he  seems  to 
have  been  inaccurate  as  to  the  fact  of 
the  vote. 

»  Part.  Hist.  299.  et  post.  Clarendon, 
y.  16.  Whitelock,  110,  &c.  Rush.  Abr. 
T.  449,  &c. 

3  It  was  impossible  for  the  king  to 
avoid  this  treaty.  Not  only  his  Oxford 
parliament,  as  might  naturally  be  ex- 
pected, were  openly  desirous  of  peace, 
but  a  great  part  of  the  army  had,  in 
August,  1644,  while  opposed  to  that  of 
Essex  in  the  west,  taken  the  extraor- 
dinary step  of  sending  a  letter  to  that 
general,  declaring  their  intentions  for  the 
rights  and  liberties  of  the  people,  privi- 
leges of  parliament,  and  protestant  re- 
ligion against  popish  innovations ;  and 
that,  on  the  faith  of  subjects,  the  honor 
and  reputation  of  gentlemen  and  sol- 
diers, they  would  with  their  lives  main- 
tain that  which  his  majesty  should  pub- 
licly promise  in  order  to  a  bloodless 
peace;  they  went  on  to  reouest  that 


Essex,  with  six  more,  would  meet  the 
general  (earl  of  Brentford),  with  six 
more,  to  consider  of  all  means  possible 
to  reconcile  the  unhappy  differences  and 
misunderstandings  that  have  so  long  af- 
flicted the  kingdom.  Sir  Edward  Walk 
er's  Historical  Discourses,  59.  The  king 
was  acquainted  with  this  letter  before  it 
was  sent,  but  after  some  hands  had  been 
subscribed  to  it.  He  consented,  but  evi- 
dently witb  great  reluctance,  and  even 
indignation ;  as  his  own  expressions  testi 
fy  in  this  passage  of  Walker,  whose  man- 
uscript here,  as  in  many  other  places, 
contains  interlineations  by  Charles  him 
self.  It  was  doubtless  rather  in  a  muti- 
nous spirit,  which  had  spread  widely 
through  the  army,  and  contributed  to 
its  utter  ruin  in  the  next  campaign.  I 
presume  it  was  at  the  king's  desire  that 
the  letter  was  signed  by  the  general  as 
well  as  by  prince  Maurice,  and  all  the 
coionels,  I  believe,  in  his  army,  to  take 
off  the  appearance  of  a  faction  ;  but  it 
certainly  originated  with  Wiluiot,  IViry, 
and  some  of  those  whom  he  thought  ill 
affected.  See  Clarendon,  IT.  627,  et  post 
Kushw.  Abr.  v.  848,  358. 


572  IMPOSSIBILITY  OF  AGREEMENT.  CHAP.  2L 

Andrews  and  Laud,  believing  an  episcopal  government  indis- 
pensably necessary  to  the  valid  administration  of  the  sacra- 
ments, and  the  very  existence  of  a  Christian  church.  The 
Scots,  and  a  portion  of  the  English  clergy,  were  equally 
confident  that  their  presbyterian  form  was  established  by  the 
apostles  as  a  divine  model,  from  which  it  was  unlawful  to 
depart.1  Though  most  of  the  laity  in  this  kingdom  enter- 
tained less  narrow  opinions,  the  parliamentary  commissioners 
thought  the  king  ought  rather  to  concede  such  a  point  than 
themselves,  especially  as  his  former  consent  to  the  abolition 
of  episcopacy  in  Scotland  weakened  a  good  deal  the  force  of 
his  plea  of  conscience ;  while  the  royalists,  even  could  they 
have  persuaded  their  master,  thought  episcopacy,  though  not 
absolutely  of  divine  right  (a  notion  which  they  left  to  the 
churchmen),  yet  so  highly  beneficial  to  religion  and  so  im- 
portant to  the  monarchy,  that  nothing  less  than  extreme 
necessity,  or  at  least  the  prospect  of  a  signal  advantage, 
could  justify  its  abandonment.  They  offered,  however, 
what  in  an  earlier  stage  of  their  dissensions  would  have 
satisfied  almost  every  man,  that  limited  scheme  of  episcopal 
hierarchy,  above  mentioned  as  approved  by  Usher,  rendering 
the  bishop  among  his  presbyters  much  like  the  king  in  par- 
liament, not  free  to  exercise  his  jurisdiction,  nor  to  confer 
orders  without  their  consent,  and  offered  to  leave  all  cere- 
monies to  the  minister's  discretion.  Such  a  compromise 
would  probably  have  pleased  the  English  nation,  averse  to 
nothing  in  their  established  church  except  its  abuses ;  but 
the  parliamentary  negotiators  would  not  so  much  as  enter 
into  discussion  upon  it.2 

They  were  hardly  less  unyielding  on  the  subject  of  the 
militia.  They  began  with  a  demand  of  naming  all  the  com- 
manders by  sea  and  land,  including  the  lord-lieutenant  of  Ire- 

1  The    king's    doctors,    Steward    and  lish  parliament:  and,  if  this  offer  wag 

Sheldon,  argued  at  Uxbridge  that  epis-  sincerely  made,  it  must  have  been  from 

copacy  was  jure  diviuo ;  Henderson  and  a  couvictioa  that  he  could  not  become 

others,  that  presbytery  was  so.     White-  such. 

lock,    132.      These    churchmen    should  8    Rush  worth,   Whitelock,   Clarendon, 

hay?  been  locked  up  like  a  jury,  without  The  latter  tells  in  his  Life,  which  reveals 

food  or  fire,  till  they  agreed.  several  things  not  found  in  his  History, 

If  we  may  believe  Clarendon,  the  earl  that  the  king  was  very  angry  with  some 
of  London  offered  in  the  name  of  the  of  his  Uxbridge  commissioners,  especially 
Scots  that,  if  the  king  would  give  up  Mr.  Bridgman,  for  making  too  great  con- 
episcopacy,  they  would  not  press  any  of  cessions  with  respect  to  episcop.-icy.  He 
the  other  demands.  It  is  certain  ho\v-  lived,  however,  to  make  himself  much 
ever  that  they  would  never  have  suffered  greater, 
him  to  become  the  master  of  the  EUR- 


CHA.  I.  — 1642-49.     DEMANDS   OF  THE  PARLIAMENT.  573 

land,  and  all  governors  of  garrisons,  for  an  unlimited  time 
The  king,  though  not  very  willingly,  proposed  that  the  com- 
mand should  be  vested  in  twenty  persons,  half  to  be  named 
by  himself,  half  by  the  parliament,  for  the  term  of  three 
years,  -which  he  afterwards  extended  to  seven,  at  the  expira- 
tion of  which  time  it  should  revert  to  the  cjown.  But  the  ut- 
most concession  that  could  be  obtained  from  the  other  side 
was  to  limit  their  exclusive  possession  of  this  power,  to  seven 
years,  leaving  the  matter  open  for  an  ulterior  arrangement 
by  act  of  parliament  at  their  termination.1  Even 
if  this  treaty  had  been  conducted  between  two  menuList 
belligerent  states,  whom  rivalry  or  ambition  often  abi"tei^n" 
excite  to  press  every  demand  which  superior  power 
can  extort  from  weakness,  there  yet  was  nothing  in  the  con- 
dition of  the  king's  affairs  which  should  compel  him  thus  to 
pass  under  the  yoke,  and  enter  his  capital  as  a  prisoner. 
But  we  may  also  remark  that,  according  to  the  great  princi- 
ple that  the  English  constitution,  in  all  its  component  parts, 
was  to  be  maintained  by  both  sides  in  this  contest,  the  ques- 
tion for  parliament  was  not  what  their  military  advantages  or 
resources  for  war  entitled  them  to  ask,  but  what  was  required 
for  the  due  balance  of  power  under  a  limited  monarchy. 
They  could  rightly  demand  no  further  concession  from  the 
king  than  was  indispensable  for  their  own  and  the  people's 
security ;  and  I  leave  any  one  who  is  tolerably  acquainted 
with  the  state  of  England  at  the  beginning  of  1645  to  decide 
whether  their  privileges  and  the  public  liberties  incurred  a 
greater  risk  by  such  an  equal  partition  of  power  over  the 
sword  as  the  king  proposed,  than  his  prerogative  and  per- 
sonal freedom  would  have  encountered  by  abandoning  it  al- 
together to  their  discretion.  I  am  far  from  thinking  that  the 
acceptance  of  the  king's  propositions  at  Uxbridge  would  have 
t-estored  tranquillity  to  England.  He  would  still  have  re- 
pined at  the  limitations  of  monarchy,  and  others  would  have 
conspired  against  its  existence.  But  of  the  various  conse- 
quences which  we  may  picture  to  ourselves  as  capable  of  re- 
sulting from  a  pacification,  that  which  appears  to  me  the  least 
likely  is,  that  Charles  should  have  reestablished  that  arbitrary 
power  which  he  had  exercised  in  the  earlier  period  of  his 
reign.  "Whence,  in  fact,  was  he  to  look  for  assistance  ?  Waa 
it  with  suoh  creatures  of  a  court  as  Jermyn  or  Ashburnham, 

1  WMtelock,  133- 


574          PEOBABLE  RESULTS  OF  A  PACIFICATION.    CHAP.  X. 

or  with  a  worn-out  veteran  of  office  like  Cottington,  or  a  rash 
adventurer  like  Digby,  that  he  could  outwit  Vane,  or  over- 
awe Cromwell,  or  silence  the  press  and  the  pulpit,  or  strike 
with  panic  the  stern  puritan  and  the  confident  fanatic? 
Some  there  were,  beyond  question,  both  soldiers  and  court- 
iers, who  hated  the  very  name  of  a  limited  monarchy,  and 
murmured  at  the  constitutional  language  which  the  king, 
from  the  time  he  made  use  of  the  pens  of  Hyde  and  Falk 
land,  had  systematically  employed  in  his  public  declarations. 
But  it  is  as  certain  that  the  great  majority  of  his  Oxford 
parliament,  and  of  those  upon  whom  he  must  have  depended 
either  in  the  field  or  in  council,  were  apprehensive  of  any 
victory  that  might  render  him  absolute,  as  that  Essex  and 
Manchester  were  unwilling  to  conquer  at  the  expense  of  the 
constitution.2  The  catholics,  indeed,  generally  speaking, 
.would  have  gone  great  lengths  in  asserting  his  authority. 
Nor  is  this  any  reproach  to  that  body,  by  no  means  naturally 
less  attached  to  their  country  and  its  liberties  than  other  Eng- 
lishmen, but  driven  by  an  unjust  persecution  to  see  their  only 
hope  of  emancipation  in  the  nation's  servitude.  They  could 
not  be  expected  to  sympathize  in  that  patriotism  of  the  seven- 
teenth century,  which,  if  it  poured  warmth  and  radiance  on 
the  protestant,  was  to  them  as  a  devouring  fire.  But  the 
king  could  have  made  no  use  of  the  catholics  as  a  distinct 
body  for  any  political  purpose  without  uniting  all  other  par- 
ties against  him.  He  had  already  given  so  much  offence, 
at  the  commencement  of  the  war,  by  accepting  the  services 

1  The  creed  of  this  party  is  set  forth  to  consult.    Father  Orleans,  in  a  passage 
In  the  Behemoth  of  Hobbes ;   which  is,  •with  which  the  bishop  probably  was  ac- 
in  other  words,  the  application  of  those  quainted,  confirms  this  ;  and  his  author- 
principles  of  government  which  are  laid  ity  is  very  good   as  to  the  secret  of  the 
down  in  the  Leviathan  to  the  constitu-  court.     Rupert,   he    says,  proposed    to 
tion  and  state   of  England  in   the  civil  march  to  London.  "  Mais  1'esprit  Anglois, 
war.  It  is  repuhlished  in  baron  Maseres's  qui  ne  se  dement  point   mejne  dans  les 
Tracts,  ii.  565,  567.     Sir  Philip  Warwick,  plus  attaches  a  la  royaute,  1'esprit  An- 
in  his  Memoirs,  198,  hints  something  of  glois,  dis-je,  toujours  entete  de  ces  libertez 
the  same  kind.  si  funestes  au  repos  de  la  nation,  porta  la 

2  Warburton,  in   the  notes  subjoined  plus  grande  partie  du  conseil  i  s'opposer 
to  the  late  edition  of  Clarendon,  vii.  563,  a  ce  dessein.    Le  pretexte  fut  qu'il  etoit 
mentions  a  conversation  he  had  with  the  dangereux  pour  le  roy  de  1'entreprendre, 
duke  of  Argyle  and  lord  Cobham  (both  et   pour  la  ville   que  le  prince   Robert 
soldiers,  and  the  first  a  distinguished  one)  1'executast,  jeune  comme  il  etoit,  em- 
as  to  the  conduct  of  the  king  and  the  porte,  et  capable  d'y  mettre  le  feu.    La 
earl  of  Essex  after  the  battle  of  Edgehill.  vraie  raison  etoit  qu'ils  craignoient  quo, 
They  agreed  it  was  inexplicable  on  both  si  le  roy  entroit  dans  Londres  les  anues  a 
sides  by  any  military  principle.    Warbur-  la  main,  il  ne  pretendist  sur  la  nation  une 
ton  explained  it  by  the  unwillingness  to  espece  de  droit  de  couquete,  qui  le  ren- 
be  too  victorious,  felt  by  Essex  himself,  dist  trop  ahsolu."  Revolut.  drAngleterre, 
and  by  those  whom  the  king  was  forced  iii.  104. 


CHA.  I.— 1642-49.      THE  KING'S  PROSPECTS.  575 

which  the  catholic  gentry  were  forward  to  offer,  that,  instead 
of  a  more  manly  justification,  which  the  temper  of  the  times, 
he  thought,  did  not  permit,  he  had  recourse  to  the  useless 
subterfuges  of  denying  or  extenuating  the  facts,  and  even  to 
a  strangely  improbable  recrimination,  asserting  on  several 
occasions  that  the  number  of  papists  in  the  parliament's  army 
was  much  greater  than  in  his  own.1 

It  may  still  indeed  be  questioned  whether,  admitting  the 
propositions  tendered  to  the  king  to  have  been  unreasonable 
and  insecure,  it  might  not  yet  have  been  expedient,  in  the  per- 
ilous condition  of  his  affairs,  rather  to  have  tried  the  chances 
of  peace  than  those  of  war.  If  he  could  have  determined 
frankly  and  without  reserve  to  have  relinquished  the  church, 
and  called  the  leaders  of  the  presbyterian  party  in  both 
houses  to  his  councils,  it  is  impossible  to  prove  that  he  might 
not  both  have  regained  his  power  over  the  militia  in  no  long 
course  of  time,  and  prevailed  on  the  parliament  to  consent  to 
its  own  dissolution.  The  dread  that  party  felt  of  the  repub- 
lican spirit  rising  amongst  the  independents  would  have  in- 
duced them  to  place  in  the  hands  of  any  sovereign  they 
could  trust  full  as  much  authority  as  our  constitution  permits. 
But  no  one  who  has  paid  attention  to  the  history  of  that 
period  will  conclude  that  they  could  have  secured  the  king 
against  their  common  enemy,  had  he  even  gone  wholly  into 
their  own  measures.2  And  this  were  to  suppose  such  an  entire 
change  in  his  character  and  ways  of  thinking  as  no  external 
circumstances  could  produce.  Yet  his  prospects,  from  a  con- 
tinuance of  hostilities,  were  so  unpromising,  that  most  of  the 
royalists  would  probably  have  hailed  his  almost  unconditional 
submission  at  Uxbridge.  Even  the  steady  Richmond  and 

1  Rushworth,  Abr.  iv.  650.  At  the  of  about  fire  hundred  gentlemen  who 
very  time  that  he  was  publicly  denying  lost  their  lives  for  Charles  in  the  civil 
his  employment  of  papists  he  wrote  to  war,  one  hundred  and  ninety-four  were 
Newcastle,  commanding  him  to  make  catholics.  They  were,  doubtless,  a  very 
use  of  all  his  subjects'  services,  without  powerful  faction  iu  the  court  anil  army, 
examining  their  consciences,  except  as  to  Lord  Spencer  (afterwards  earl  of  Sun- 
loyalty.  Ellis's  Letters,  iii.  291,  from  an  derland),  in  some  remarkable  letters  to 
original  in  the  Museum.  No  one  can  his  wife  from  the  king's  quarters  i 
rationally  blame  Charles  for  anything  in  Shrewsbury,  in  September,  1642,  speaks 
this  but  his  inveterate  and  useless  habit  of  the  insolency  of  the  papists  with  mat 
of  falsehood.  See  Clarendon,  iu.  610.  dissatisfaction.  Sidney  Papers,  n.  807. 

It  is  probable  that  some  foreign  cath-        «  It  cannot  be  doubted,  and  is  MiniMj 

olics   were   in  the   parliament's  service,  in  a.  remarkable   conversation  of  I 

But  Dodd  says,  with  great  appearance  of  and  Whitelock  with  the  king  at  OxiuiM, 

truth   that  no  one  English  gentleman  of  in  November,  1644,  that  the  exorl.it:. i.t 

that  persuasi  in  was  in  arms  on  their  side,  terms  demanded  at  Uxbridge  ». 

Church  History  of  England,  iii.  28.     He  ried  by  the  violent  party    who  .hsl.kea 

reports  as  a  matter  of  hearsay,  that,  out  all  pacification.     Whitelock,  p.  113. 


576  MISERIES   OF  THE  WAR.  CHAP.  X. 

Soutnampton,  it  is  said,  implored  him  to  yield,  and  deprecated 
his  misjudging  confidence  in  promises  of  foreign  aid  or  in  the 
successes  of  Montrose.1  The  more  lukewarm  or  discontented 
of  his  adherents  took  this  opportunity  of  abandoning  an  al- 
most hopeless  cause :  between  the  breach  of  the  treaty  of 
Uxbridge  and  the  battle  of  Naseby,  several  of  the  Oxford 
peers  came  over  to  the  parliament,  and  took  an  engagement 
never  to  bear  arms  against  it.  A  few  instances  of  such  de- 
fection had  occurred  before.2 

It  remained  only,  after  the  rupture  of  the  treaty  at  Ux 
Miseries  of  bridge,  to  try  once  more  the  fortune  of  war.  The 
the  war.  people,  both  in  the  king's  and  parliament's  quar- 
ters, but  especially  the  former,  heard  with  dismay  that 
peace  could  not  be  attained.  Many  of  the  perpetual  skir- 
mishes and  captures  of  towns,  which  made  every  man's  life 
and  fortune  precarious,  have  found  no  place  in  general  his- 
tory, but  may  be  traced  in  the  journal  of  Whitelock,  or  in 
the  Mercuries  and  other  fugitive  sheets,  great  numbers  of 
which  ar-e  still  extant.  And  it  will  appear,  I  believe,  from 
these,  that  scarcely  one  county  in  England  was  exempt,  at 
one  time  or  other  of  the  war,  from  becoming  the  scene  of 
this  unnatural  contest.  Compared,  indeed,  with  the  civil 
wars  in  France  in  the  preceding  century,  there  had  been 
fewer  acts  of  enormous  cruelty,  and  less  atrocious  breaches 
of  public  faith.  But  much  blood  had  been  wantonly  shed, 
and  articles  of  capitulation  had  been  very  indifferently  kept. 
"  Either  side,"  says  Clarendon,  "  having  somewhat  to  object 
to  the  other,  the  requisite  honesty  and  justice  of  observing 
conditions  was  mutually,  as  it  were  by  agreement,  for  a  long 
time  violated."  8  The  royalist  army,  especially  the  cavalry, 
commanded  by  men  either  wholly  unprincipled,  or  at  least 
regardless  of  the  people,  and  deeming  them  ill  affected,  the 

1   Baillie,   ii.   91.       He    adds,    "  That  indeed  the  earls  of  Holland  and  Bedford) 

which  has  been  the  greatest  snare  to  the  was  sir  Edward  Dering,  who  came  into 

king  is  the   unhappy  success    of    Mon-  the  parliament's  quarters,  Feb.  1044.    He 

trofe  in  Scotland."    There  seems,  indeed,  was  a  weak  man,  of  some  learning,  who 

great  reason   to  think  that  Charles,  al-  had  already   played  a  very  changeable 

ways  sanguine,  and  incapable  of  calcu-  part  before  the  war. 

lating    probabilities,    was    unreasonably  3  A   flagrant  instance  of  this  was  the 

elated  by  victories  from  which  no  per-  plunder  of  Bristol  by  Rupert,  In  breach  of 

niiineut  advantage  ought  to  have  been  the  capitulation.     I  suspect  that  it  was 

expected.     Burnet  confirms  this  on  good  the  policy  of  one  party  to  exaggerate  the 

authority.     Introduction  to  History  of  cruelties  of   the  other ;    but    the    short 

his  Times,  51.  narratives  dispersed  at    the  time  give  a 

a  \Vhitelock,   109,   137,   142.     Rushw.  wretched  picture  of  slaughter  and  devas 

A.br.  v.  163.    The  first  deserter  (except  tntion. 


CHA.  I.  — 1642-49.       MISERIES   OF  THE  WAR. 


577 


princes  Rupert  and  Maurice,  Goring  and  Wilmot,  lived  with- 
out restraint,  or  law,  or  military  discipline,  and  committed 
every  excess  even  in  friendly  quarters.1  An  ostentatious 
dissoluteness  became  characteristic  of  the  cavalier,  as  a 
formal  austerity  was  of  the  puritan :  one  spoiling  his  neighbor 
in  the  name  of  God,  the  other  of  the  king.  The  parliament's 
troops  were  not  quite  free  from  these  military  vices,  but  dis- 
played them  in  a  much  less  scandalous  degree,  owing  to  theu 
more  religious  habits  and  the  influence  of  their  presbyterian 
chaplains,  to  the  better  example  of  their  commanders,  and  to 
the  comparative,  though  not  absolute,  punctuality  of  their 
pay.2  But  this  pay  was  raised  through  unheard-of  assess- 
ments, especially  an  excise  on  liquors,  a  new  name  in  Eng- 
land, and  through  the  sequestration  of  the  estates  of  all  the 
king's  adherents:  resources  of  which  he  also  had  availed 
himself,  partly  by  the  rights  of  war,  partly  by  the  grant  of 
his  Oxford  parliament.8 


1  Clarendon  and  Whitelock,  passim. 
Baxter's  Life,  pp.  44,  55.  This  license 
of  Maurice's  and  Goring's  armies  in  the 
west  first  led  to  the  defensive  insurrec- 
tion, if  so  it  should  be  called,  of  the  club- 
men ;  that  is,  of  yeomen  and  country 
people,  armed  only  with  clubs,  who 
hoped,  by  numbers  and  concert,  to  resist 
effectually  the  military  marauders  of  both 
parties,  declaring  themselves  neither  for 
king  nor  parliament,  but  for  their  own 
liberty  and  property.  They  were  of  course 
regarded  with  dislike  on  both  sides  ;  by 
the  king's  party  when  they  first  appeared 
in  1644,  because  they  crippled  the  royal 
army's  operations,  and  still  more  openly 
by  the  parliament  next  year,  when  they 
opposed  Fairfax's  endeavor  to  carry  on 
the  war  in  the  counties  bordering  on  the 
Severn.  They  appeared  at  times  in  great 
strength ;  but  the  want  of  arms  and  dis- 
cipline made  it  not  vary  difficult  to  sup- 
press them.  Clarendon,  v.  197;  White- 
lock,  137  ;  Parl.  Ilist.  379,  390. 

The  king  himself,  whose  disposition  was 
very  harsh  and  severe,  except  towards  the 
few  he  took  into  his  bosom,  can  hardly  be 
exonerated  from  a  responsibility  for  some 
acts  of  inhumanity  (see  Whitelock,  67, 
ami  Seiners  Tracts,  iv.  502,  v.  369  ; 
Maseres's  Tracts,  i.  144,  for  the  ill  treat- 
ment of  prisoners) ;  and  he  might  proba- 
bly have  chocked  the  outrages  which  took 
place  at  the  storming  of  Leicester,  where 
he  was  himself  present.  Certainly  no 
imputation  of  this  nature  can  bo  laid  at 
the  door  of  the  parliamentary  command- 
ers, though  some  of  them  were  guilty  of 

VOL.  i.  —  c.  87 


the  atrocity  of  putting  their  Irish  prison- 
ers to  death,  in  obedience,  however,  to  an 
ordinance  of  parliament.  Parl.  Hist  iii. 
295 ;  Rushworth's  Abridgment,  v.  402. 
It  passed  October  24, 1644,  and  all  remlss- 
ness  in  executing  it  was  to  be  reckoned  a 
favoring  of  the  Irish  rebellion.  When 
we  read,  as  we  do  perpetually,  these  vio- 
lent and  barbarous  proceedings  of  the  par- 
liament, is  it  consistent  with  honesty  or 
humanity  to  hold  up  that  assembly  to 
admiration,  while  the  faults  on  the  king's 
side  are  studiously  aggravated  ?  The 
partiality  of  Oldmixon,  Ilarris,  Macaulay, 
and  now  of  Mr.  Brodie  and  Mr.  Godwin, 
is  full  as  glaring,  to  say  the  very  least,  aa 
that  of  1 1  u  mi'. 

2  Clarendon  and  Baxter. 

3  The  excise  was  first  imposed  by  an 
ordinance  of  both  houses  in  July,  1648 
(Husband's  Collection  of  Ordinances,  p. 
267),  and  afterwards  by  the  king's  con- 
vention at  Oxford.     See  a  view  of  the 
financial    expedients    adopted    by    both 
parties,  in  Lingard,  x.  243.     The  pint* 
Drought  in  to  the  parliament's  coinniiH- 
gioners  at  Guildhall,  in  1642.  for  which 
they  allowed  the  value  of  the  silver,  and 
one  shilling  per  ounce  more,  is  stated  by 
Neal     at    1,287.3262.,   an    extraordinary 
proof  of  the  wealth  of  London  ;  yet  I  do 
not  know  his  authority,  though  it  is  prob- 
ably good.      The    university  of   Oxford 
gave  all  they  had  to  the  king,  but  could 
not,  of  course,  vie  with  the  citizens. 

The  sums  raised  within  the  parlia- 
ment's quarters,  from  the  beginning  of 
the  war  to  1647,  are  reckoned  in  a  pom- 


578 


ITS  PROTRACTION. 


CHAP.  X 


A  war  so  calamitous  seemed  likely  to  endure  till  it  had 
exhausted  the  nation.  With  all  the  parliament's  superiority, 
they  had  yet  to  subdue  nearly  half  the  kingdom.  The  Scots 
had  not  advanced  southward,  content  with  reducing  New- 
castle and  the  rest  of  the  northern  counties.  These  they 
treated  almost  as  hostile,  without  distinction  of  parties,  not 
only  exacting  contributions,  but  committing,  unless  they  are 
much  belied,  great  excesses  of  indiscipline ;  their  presbyte- 
rian  gravity  not  having  yet  overcome  the  ancient  national  pro- 
pensities.1 In  the  midland  and  western  parts  the  king  had 
just  the  worse,  without  having  sustained  material  loss ;  and 
another  summer  might  pass  away  in  marches  and  counter- 
marches, in  skirmishes  of  cavalry,  in  tedious  sieges  of  paltry 
fortifications,  some  of  them  mere  country-houses,  which  noth- 
ing but  an  amazing  deficiency  in  that  branch  of  military 
science  could  have  rendered  tenable.  This  protraction  of 
Essex  and  the  war  had  long  given  rise  to  no  unnatural  discon- 
tent with  its  management,  and  to  suspicions,  first 
of  Essex,  then  of  Manchester  and  others  in  com- 
mand, as  if  they  were  secretly  reluctant  to  complete 
the  triumph  of  their  employers.  It  is,  indeed,  not  impossible 
that  both  these  peers,  especially  the  former,  out  of  their  de- 
sire to  see  peace  restored  on  terms  compatible  with  some 
degree  of  authority  in  the  crown,  and  with  the  dignity  of 
their  own  order,  did  not  always  press  their  advantages 
against  the  king  as  if  he  had  been  a  public  enemy.2  They 


Manchester 
suspected 
of  luke-    - 
warm  ness. 


phlet  of  that  year,  quoted  in  Sin- 
clair's Hist,  of  the  Revenue,  i.  283,  at 
17,512,400/.  But,  on  reference  to  the 
tract  itself,  I  find  this  written  at  random. 
The  contributions,  however,  were  really 
very  great ;  and,  if  we  add  those  to  the 
king,  and  the  loss  hy  waste  and  plunder, 
we  may  form  some  judgment  of  the 
effects  of  the  civil  war. 

1  The  independents  raised  loud  clam- 
ors  against    the    Scots    army ;    and  the 
northern  counties  naturally  complained 
of  the   burden    of  supporting    them,  as 
well  as  of  their  excesses.     Many  passages 
in  Whitelock's  journal  during- 1(545  and 
1646  relate  to  this.       Hollis  endeavors 
to  deny  or  extenuate  the  charges  ;  but  he 
is  too  prejudiced  a  writer ;    and   Baillie 
himself  acknowledges  a  great  deal.     Vol. 
ii.  138,  142,  106. 

2  The  chief  imputation  against  Man- 
chester was  for  not  following  up  his  vic- 
tory in  the  second   battle  of  Newbury, 
with  which  Cromwell  openly  taxed  him. 


See  I/udlow,  i.  133.  There  certainly  ap- 
pears to  have  been  a  want  of  military 
energy  on  this  occasion ;  but  it  is  said 
by  Baillie -(ii.  76)  that  all  the  general 
officers,  Cromwell  not  exeepted,  con- 
curred in  Manchester's  determination. 
Essex  had  been  suspected  from  the  time 
of  the  affair  at  Brentford,  or  rather  from 
the  battle  of  Edgehill  (Baillie  and  Lud- 
low);  and  his  whole  conduct,  except  in 
the  celebrated  march  to  relieve  Glouces- 
ter, confirmed  a  reasonable  distrust  either 
of  his  military  talents,  or  of  his  zeal  in 
the  cause,  "lie  loved  monarchy  and 
nobility,"  says  Whitelock,  p.  108,  •'  and 
dreaded  those  who  had  a  design  to  destroy 
both."  Yet  Essex  was  too  much  a  man 
of  honor  to  enter  on  any  private  in- 
trigues with  the  king.  The  other  peers 
employed  under  the  parliament,  Stam- 
ford. Denbigh.  Willoughby.  were  not  suc- 
cessful enough  to  redeem  the  suspicions 
that  fell  upon  their  zeal. 
All  our  republican  writers,  such  as 


CHA.  I.  -  1642-49.     SELF-DENYING  ORDINANCE.  579 

might  have  thought  that,  having  drawn  the  sword  avowedly 
for  the  preservation  of  his  person  and  dignity  as  much  a?  for 
the  rights  and  liberties  of  the  people,  they  were  no  further 
bound  by  their  trust  than  to  render  him  and  his  adherents 
sensible  of  the  impracticability  of  refusing  their  terms  of 
accommodation.  » 

There  could,  however,  be  no  doubt  that  Fairfax  and  Crom- 
well were  far  superior,  both  by  their  own  talents  self-denying 
for  war  and  the  discipline  they  had  introduced  ordinance- 
into  their  army,  to  the  earlier  parliamentary  commanders ; 
and  that,  as  a  military  arrangement,  the  self-denying  ordi- 
nance was  judiciously  conceived.  This,  which  took  from  all 
members  of  both  houses  their  commands  in  the  army,  or  civil 
employments,  was,  as  is  well  known,  the  first  great  victory  of 
the  independent  party  which  had  grown  up  lately  in  parlia- 
ment under  Vane  and  Cromwell.1  They  carried  another 
measure  of  no  less  importance,  collateral  to  the  former;  the 
new-modelling,  as  it  was  called,  of  the  army  ;  reducing  it  to 
twenty-one  or  twenty-two  thousand  men ;  discharging  such 
officers  and  soldiers  as  were  reckoned  unfit,  and  completing, 
their  regiments  by  more  select  levies.  The  ordinance,  after 
being  once  rejected  by  the  lords,  passed  their  house  with 
some  modifications  in  April.2  But  many  joined  them  on 

Ludlow  and  Mrs.  Hutchinson  in  that  blamed  as  they  for  not  pressing  his  ad- 
age. Mrs.  Macaulay  and  Mr.  Brodie  more  vantages  with  vigor. 
of  late,  speak  acrimoniously  of  Essex.  *  It  had  been  voted  by  the  lords  a  year 
'•  Most  will  be  of  opinion."  says  Mr.  B.  before,  Dec.  12,  1643,  "  That  the  opinion 
(History  of  British  Empire,  iii.  565),  and  resolution  of  this  house  is  from 
"  that,  as  ten  thousand  pounds  a-year  henceforth  not  to  admit  the  members  of 
out  of  the  sequestered  lands  were  settled  either  house  of  parliament  into  any  place 
upon  him  for  his  services,  he  was  re-  or  office,  excepting  such  places  of  great 
warded  infinitely  beyond  his  merits."  trust  as  are  to  h«  executed  by  persons  of 
The  reward  was  doubtless  magnificent ;  eminency  and  known  integrity,  and  are 
but  the  merit  of  Essex  was  this,  that  he  necessary  for  the  government  and  safety 
made  himself  the  most  prominent  object  of  the  kingdom."  But  a  motion  to  make 
of  vengeance  in  case  of  failure,  by  taking  this  resolution  into  an  ordinance  was  car- 
the  command  of  an  army  to  oppose  the  ried  in  the  negative.  Lords'  Journals  ; 
king  in  person  at  Edgehill ;  a  command  Parl.  Hist.  187.  The  first  motion  had 
of  which  no  other  man  in  his  rank  was  been  for  a  resolution  without  this  ex- 
capable,  and  which  could  not,  at  that  eeption,  that  no  place  of  profit  should 
time,  have  been  intrusted  to  any  man  of  be  executed  by  the  members  of  either 
inferior  rank,  without  dissolving  the  house. 

whole  confederacy  of  the  parliament.  *  Whitelock,  pp.  118, 120.  It  was  op- 
It  is  to  be  observed,  moreover,  that  the  posed  by  him,  but  supported  by  Pier- 
two  battles  of  Newbury,  like  that  of  point,  who  carried  it  up  to  the  lords. 
Edgehiil,  were  by  no  means  decisive  vie-  The  lords  were  chiefly  of  the  pr»»>y- 
tories  on  the  side  of  the  parliament ;  terian  party  ;  though  Say,  Wtuuton, 
and  that  it  is  not  clear  whether  either  and  a  few  more,  were  connected  with 
Essex  or  Manchester  could  have  pushed  the  independents.  They  added  a  jir-ivi.-o 
the  king  much  more  than  they  did.  Even  to  the  ordinance  raising  forces  to  be 
after  Naseby  his  party  made  a  pretty  commanded  by  Fairfax,  that  no  officer 
long  resistance,  and  he  had  been  as  much  refusing  the  covenant  should  be  capablt 


580  DESPERATE  CONDITION  OF  CHAP.  X. 

this  occasion  for  those  military  reasons  which  I  have  men- 
tioned, deeming  almost  any  termination  of  the  war  better 
than  its  continuance.  The  king's  rejection  of  their  terms  at 
Uxbridge  had  disgusted,  however  unreasonably,  some  of  the 
men  hitherto  accounted  moderate,  such  as  the  earl  of  Nor- 
thumberland and  Pierpoint,  who  deeming  reconciliation  im- 
practicable, took  from  this  time  a  different  line  of  politics 
from  that  they  had  previously  followed,  and  were  either  not 
alive  to  the  danger  of  new-modelling  the  army,  or  willing  to 
hope  that  it  might  be  disbanded  before  that  danger  could  be- 
come imminent.  From  Fairfax,  too,  the  new  general,  they 
saw  little  to  fear  and  much  to  expect ;  while  Cromwell,  as  a 
member  of  the  house  of  commons,  was  positively  excluded 
by  the  ordinance  itself.  But,  through  a  successful  intrigue 
of  his  friends,  this  great  man,  already  not  less  formidable 
to  'the  presbyterian  faction  than  to  the  royalists,  was  permit- 
ted to  continue  lieutenant-general.1  The  most  popular  justi- 
fication for  the  self-denying  ordinance,  and  yet  perhaps  its 
Battle  of  real  condemnation,  was  soon  found  at  Naseby ;  for 
Naseby.  there  Fairfax  and  Cromwell  triumphed  not  only 
over  the  king  and  the  monarchy,  but  over  the  parliament 
and  the  nation. 

It  does  not  appear  to  me  that  a  brave  and  prudent  man, 

in  the  condition  of  Charles  L,  had,  up  to  that 
condition  of  unfortunate  day,  any  other  alternative  than  a  vig- 
afiau^ngs  orous  prosecution  of  the  war,  in  hope  of  such 

decisive  success  as,  though  hardly  within  proba- 
ble calculation,  is  not  unprecedented  in  the  changeful  tide  of 
fortune.  I  cannot  therefore  blame  him  either  for  refusing 
unreasonable  terms  of  accommodation  or  for  not  relinquish- 
ing altogether  the  contest.  But  after  his  defeat  at  Naseby 
his  affairs  were,  in  a  military  sense,  so  irretrievable  that,  in 
prolonging  the  war  with  as  much  obstinacy  as  the  broken 
state  of  his  party  would  allow,  he  displayed  a  good  deal  of 

of  serving,  which  was  thrown  out  in  the  tied,  the  measure  was  not  made  prospeo- 

lower  house.     But  another  proviso  was  tive.     This,  which  most  historians  have 

carried  in  the  commons  by  82  to  63,  that  overlooked,  is  well  pointed  out  by  Mr. 

the   officers,   though  appointed   by   the  Godwip.      By  virtue  of  this  alteration, 

general,   should    be   approved    by   both  many  officers  were  elected  in  the  coursa 

houses   of   parliament.      Cromwell    was  of  1645  and  1646;  and  the  effect,  what- 

one  of  the  tellers  for  the  minority.    Com-  ever  might  be  designed,  was  very  advau- 

nions'  Journals.  Feb.  7  and  13,  1645.  tageous  to  the  republican  and  indepen 

In  the  original  ordinance  the  members  dent  factions, 

of  both  houses  were  excluded  during  the  1  Whitelock,  p  145. 
war;  but  iu  the  second,  which  was  car- 


Cni.  I.  — 1642-49.        THE  KING'S  AFFAIRS.  581 

that  indifference  to  the  sufferings  of  the  kingdom  and  of  his 
own  adherents  which  has  been  sometimes  imputed  to  him. 
There  was,  from  the  hour  of  that  battle,  one  only  safe  and 
honorable  course  remaining.  He  justly  abhorred  to  reign, 
if  so  it  could  be  named,  the  slave  of  parliament,  with  the 
sacrifice  of  his  conscience  and  his  friends.  But  it  was  by 
no  means  necessary  to  reign  at  all.  The  sea  was  for  many 
months  open  to  him  ;  in  France,  or  still  better  in  Holland, 
he  would  have  found  his  misfortunes  respected,  and  an  asy- 
lum in  that  decent  privacy  which  becomes  an  exiled  sov- 
ereign. Those  very  hopes  which  he  too  fondly  cherished, 
and  which  lured  him  to  destruction  —  hopes  of  regaining 
power  through  the  disunion  of  his  enemies  —  might  have 
been  entertained  with  better  reason,  as  with  greater  safety, 
in  a  foreign  land.  It  is  not  perhaps  very  probable  that  he 
would  have  been  restored ;  but  his  restoration  in  such  cir- 
cumstances seems  less  desperate  than  through  any  treaty 
that  he  could  conclude  in  captivity  at  home.1 

Whether  any  such  thoughts  of  abandoning  a  hopeless  con- 
test were  ever  entertained  by  the  king  during  this  particular 
period,  it  is  impossible  to  pronounce ;  we  should  infer  the 
contrary  from  all  his  actions.  It  must  be  said  that  many  of 
his  counsellors  seem  to  have  been  as  pertinacious  as  himself, 
having  strongly  imbibed  the  same  sanguine  spirit,  and  look- 
ing for  deliverance,  according  to  their  several  fancies,  from 
the  ambition  of  Cromwell  or  the  discontent  of  the  Scots. 
But,  whatever  might  have  been  the  king's  disposition,  he 
would  not  have  dared  to  retire  from  England.  That  sinis- 
ter domestic  rule  to  which  he  had  so  long  been  subject  con- 
trolled every  action.  Careless  of  her  husband's  happiness, 
and  already  attached  probably  to  one  whom  she  afterwards 
married,  Henrietta  longed  only  for  his  recovery  of  a  power 
which  would  become  her  own.2  Hence,  while  she  constantly 

1  [It  was  the  opinion  of  Montreuil  that  *  Whether  there  are  sufficient  grounds 

the    plan  of  flight  which  the  king  was  for  concluding  that  Henrietta's  conoe&- 

meditating  before  he  took  refuge  with  the  tion  with  Jermyn  was  crimiual  I  will  not 

Scots  "  is  by  far  the  best,  and  in  every  pretend  to  decide ;   though  Warburtoa 

point  of  view  necessary  ;  for  the  parlia-  has  settled  the  matter  In  a  very  sutu- 

ment  will  by  that  time  have  fallen  into  mary   style.     See  one   of   bis   notes  on 

dissensions,  and  the  throne  will  be  far  Clarendon,  vol.  vii.  p.  636.    But  I  Uoubt 

more  easily  restored,  if  the  king   come  whether   the    bishop   had   authority  for 

back  to  it  from  abroad,  than  if  he  were  what  he  there  says,  though  it  is  likely 

to  issue  from  a  prison.     I  only  fear  that  enough  to  be  true.     See  also  a  note  of 

flight  will,  perhaps,  be  no  longer  possi-  lord  Dartmouth  on  Burnet,  i.  68. 
blei"    Jan.  10,  1646.    Raumer,  p.  840.] 


582 


CHARLES  TAKES  REFUGE 


CHAP.  X. 


laid  her  injunctions  on  Charles  never  to  concede  anything  as 
to  the  militia  or  the  Irish  catholics,  she  became  desirous, 
when  no  other  means  presented  itself,  that  he  should  sacri- 
fice what  was  still  nearer  to  his  heart,  the  episcopal  church- 
government.  The-  queen-regent  of  France,  whose  sincerity 
in  desiring  the  king's  restoration  there  can  be  no  ground  to 
deny,1  was  equally  persuaded  that  he  could  hope  for  it  on  no 
less  painful  conditions.  They  reasoned  of  course  very  plau- 
sibly from  the  great  precedent  of  flexible  consciences,  the 
reconciliation  of  Henrietta's  illustrious  father  to  the  catholic 
church.  As  he  could  neither  have  regained  his  royal  power 
nor  restored  peace  to  France  without  this  compliance  with 
his  subjects'  prejudices,  so  Charles  could  still  less  expect,  in 
circumstances  by  no  means  so  favorable,  that  he  should  avoid 
The  king  a  concession,  in  the  eyes  of  almost  all  men  but 
throws  Wm-  hjmseif,  of  incomparably  less  importance.  It  was 

Bell  into  the      .  .  .  -•  l    .  „ 

hands  of  in  expectation,  or  perhaps  rather  in  the  hope,  of 
the  Scots.  thjs  sacrjfice  tnat  tiie  French  envoy  Montreuil 

entered  on  his  ill-starred  negotiation  for  the  king's  taking 
shelter  with  the  Scots  army.  And  it  must  be  confessed  that 
several  of  his  best  friends  were  hardly  less  anxious  that  he 
should  desert  a  church  he  could  not  protect.2  They  doubted 


l  Clarendon  speaks  often  in  his  His- 
tory, and  still  more  frequently  in  his 
private  letters,  with  great  resentment  of 
the  conduct  of  France,  and  sometimes  of 
Holland,  during  our  civil  wars.  I  must 
confess  that  I  see  nothing  to  warrant 
this.  The  States-General,  against  whom 
Charles  had  so  shamefully  been  plotting, 
interfered  as  much  for  the  purpose  of 
mediation  as  they  could  with  the  slight- 
est prospect  of  success,  and  so  as  to  give 
offence  to  the  parliament  (Rushworth 
Abridged,  v.  567;  Baillie,  ii.  78;  White- 
lock,  141, 148  ;  Harris's  Life  of  Cromwell, 
246) ;  and  as  to  France,  though  Richelieu 
had  instigated  the  Scots  malecontents, 
and  possibly  those  of  England,  yet  after 
his  death,  in  1642,  no  sort  of  suspicion 
ought  to  lie  on  the  French  government ; 
the  whole  conduct  of  Anne  of  Austria 
having  been  friendly,  and  both  the  mis- 
sion of  Harcourt  in  1643,  and  the  present 
negotiations  of  Montreuil  and  Bellievre, 
perfectly  well  intended.  That  Mazarin 
made  promises  of  assistance  which  he  had 
no  design,  nor  perhaps  any  power,  to 
fulfil,  is  true  ;  but  this  is  the  common 
trick  of  such  statesmen,  and  argues  no 
malevolent  purpose.  But  Hyde,  t>ut  of 
his  just  dislike  of  the  queen,  hated  all 


French  connections  ;  and  his  passionate 
loyalty  made  him  think  it  a  crime,  or  at 
least  a  piece  of  base  pusillanimity,  in 
foreign  states,  to  keep  on  any  terms  with 
the  rebellious  parliament.  The  case  wag 
altered  after  the  retirement  of  the  regent 
Anne  from  power  :  Mazarin 's  latter  con- 
duct was,  as  is  well  known,  exceedingly 
adverse  to  the  royal  cause. 

The  account  given  by  Mr.  D'Israeli  of 
Tabran's  negotiations  in  the  fifth  volume 
of  his  Commentaries  on  the  Keign  of 
Charles  I.,  though  it  does  not  contain 
anything  very  important,  tends  to  show 
Mazarin's  inclination  towards  the  royal 
cause  in  1644  and  1645. 

2  Colepepper  writes  to  Ashburnham, 
in  February,  1646,  to  advance  the  Scots 
treaty  with  all  his  power.  "  It  is  th« 
only  way  left  to  save  the  crown  and  the 
kingdom  ;  all  other  tricks  will  deceiv* 
you.  ...  It  is  no  time  to  dally  on  dis 
tinctions  and  criticisms.  All  the  world 
will  laugh  at  them  when  a  crown  is  in 
question."  Clar.  Papers,  ii.  207. 

The  king  had  positively  declared  hia 
resolution  not  to  consent  to  the  estab- 
lishment of  presbytery.  This  had  so 
much  disgusted  both  the  Scots  and  Eng- 
lish prcsbyterians  (for  the  latter  had  been 


CHA.  I.  —  1642-49.  WITH  THE  SCOTS.  583 

not,  reasoning  from  their  own  characters,  that  he  would  ul- 
timately give  way.  But  that  Charles,  unchangeably  resolved 
on  this  head,1  should  have  put  himself  in  the  power  of  men 
fully  as  bigoted  as  himself  (if  he  really  conceived  that  the 
Scots  presbyterians  would  shed  their  blood  to  reestablish 
the  prelacy  they  abhorred),  was  an  additional  proof  of  that 
delusion  which  made  him  fancy  that  no  government  could  be 
established  without  his  concurrence  ;  unless  indeed  we  should 
rather  consider  it  as  one  of  those  desperate  courses  into 
which  he  who  can  foresee  nothing  but  evil  from  every  cal- 
culable line  of  action  will  sometimes  plunge  at  a  venture, 
borrowing  some  ray  of  hope  from  the  uncertainty  of  their 
consequences.8 

It  was  an  inevitable  effect  of  this  step  that  the  king  sur- 
rendered his  personal  liberty,  which  he  never  afterwards 
recovered.  Considering  his  situation,  we  may  at  first  think 
the  parliament  tolerably  moderate  in  offering  nearly  the  same 
terms  of  peace  at  Newcastle  which  he  had  rejected  at  Ux- 
bridge  ;  the  chief  difference  being  that  the  power  of  the 
militia,  which  had  been  demanded  for  commissioners  nomi- 
nated and  removable  by  the  two  houses  during  an  indefinite 
period,  was  now  proposed  to  reside  in  the  two  houses  for  the 
space  of  twenty  years;  which  rather  more  unequivocally 
indicated  their  design  of  making  the  parliament  perpetual.* 


concerned  In  the  negotiation),  that  Mon-    to    Ormond,    which    was    intercepted, 
treuil  wrote    to    say   he    thought   they    wherein  he  assured  him  of  his  expecta- 


,  .  - 

M.  se  doit  hater  d'envoyer  aux  deux  par-    tion   of  his  rights.     Whitelock,  p.  208. 


>        l    ii.-.-uru   juu,      LIB  YiriLca  i<»  i/apt;i,  m>;    "i    |'ini'<*>.    wuuiu   imvt>  truiei  uiuit  u 

Hopton.   &c.,  Feb.  2,  1646,   •'  whatever  an  idea  that  the  Scots  presbyteran  army 

paraphrases  or  prophecies  may  be  made  would  cooperate  with   Moutrose,  whom 

up«Mi  my  last  message '(pressing  the  two  they  abhorred,  and  very  justly,  for  his 

ho ises  to  consent  to  a  personal  treaty),  I  treachery  and  cruelty,  above  all    men 

ghall  never  part  with  the  church,  the  living  ? 

essentials  of  my  crown,  or  my  friends."  »  Parl.Hist  499.    Whitelock,  215,218. 

P.  206.      Baillie  could  not  believe  the  It  was  voted,  17th  June,  that  after  tlie-« 

report  that  the  king  intended  to  take  twenty  years  the  king  was  to  ex. 

refuge  in   the    Scots   iirmy,  as    "  there  power  over  the  militia  without  the  pre- 

would  be  no  shelter  there  for  him,  un-  vious  consent  of  parliament,  who  were  to 

less  he  would  take  the  covenant,  and  fol-  pass  a  bill  at  any  time  respecting  it.  if 

«ow  the  advice  of  his  parliament.     Hard  they  should  judge  the  kingdom's  safety 

pills  to  be  swallowed  by  a  wilful  and  an  to  be  concerned,  which  should  be  valid 

unadvised  prince."    Vol.  ii.  p.  203.  without  the  king's  assent.     Comment' 

*  Not  long  after  the  king  had  taken  Journal, 
shelter  with  the  Scots  he  wrote  a  letter 


584  CHARLES'S  STRUGGLES  CHAP.  X. 

But  in  fact  they  had  so  abridged  the  royal  prerogative  by 
their  former  propositions,  that,  preserving  the  decent  sem- 
blance of  monarchy,  scarce  anything  further  could  be  exacted. 
The  king's  circumstances  were,  however,  so  altered  that  by 
persisting  in  his  refusal  of  those  propositions  he  excited  a 
natural  indignation  at  his  obstinacy  in  men  who  felt  their 
own  right  (the  conqueror's  right)  to  dictate  terms  at  pleas- 
ure. Yet  this  might  have  had  a  nobler  character  of  firmness 
if,  during  all  the  tedious  parleys  of  the  last  three  years  of 
his  life,  he  had  not  by  tardy  and  partial  concessions  given  up 
so  much  of  that  for  which  he  contended,  as  rather  to  appear 
like  a  peddler  haggling  for  the  best  bargain  than  a  sovereign 
unalterably  determined  by  conscience  and  public  spirit.  We 
must,  however,  forgive  much  to  one  placed  in  such  unparal- 
leled difficulties.  Charles  had  to  contend,  during  his  unhappy 
residence  at  Newcastle,  not  merely  with  revolted  subjects  in 
Charles's  tne  P^^e  of  conquest,  and  with  bigoted  priests,  as 
struggles  to  blindly  confident  in  one  set  of  doubtful  proposi- 
epTscopacy,  tions  as  he  was  in  the  opposite,  but  with  those  he 
agamst  the  ha(j  trusted  the  most  and  loved  the  dearest.  We 

advice  of  _,  0  - 

the  queen  have  in  the  Clarendon  btate  .Papers  a  series  of 
and  others.  ]etters  from  Paris,  written,  some  by  the  queen, 
others  jointly  by  Colepepper,  Jermyn,  and  Ashburnham,  or 
the  two  former,  urging  him  to  sacrifice  episcopacy,  as  the 
necessary  means  of  his  restoration.  We  have  the  king's 
answers,  that  display  in  an  interesting  manner  the  struggles 
of  his  mind  under  this  severe  trial.1  No  candid  reader,  I 
think,  can  doubt  that  a  serious  sense  of  obligation  was  pre- 
dominant in  Charles's  persevering  fidelity  to  the  English 
church.  For  though  he  often  alleges  the  incompatibility  of 
presbyterianism  with  monarchy,  and  says  very  justly,  "  I 
am  most  confident  that  religion  will  much  sooner  regain  the 
militia  than  the  militia  will  religion,"  2  yet  these  arguments 

1  P.  248.     "  Show  me  any  precedent,"  antimonarchical."    P.  260.    See  also  p. 

he  gays    in   another    place,   "  wherever  273. 

presbyterian  government  and  regal  was  2  "  The   design  is  to  unite  you  with 

together  without    perpetual    rebellions,  the  Scots  nation  and  the   presbytemus 

which  was  the  cause  that  necessitated  the  of  England  against  the  antiinoijaruiiif.il 

king  my  father  to  change  that  govern-    party,  the  independents If  by  coa- 

ment  in  Scotland.  And  even  in  France,  science  it  is  intended  to  assert  that  epis- 
where  they  are  but  on  tolerance,  which  copacy  is  jure  divino  exclusive,  where- 
in likelihood  shall  cause  moderation,  did  by  no  protestant,  or  rather  Christian, 
they  ever  sit  still  so  long  as  they  had  church  can  be  acknowledged  for  such 
power  to  rebel  ?  And  it  cannot  be  other-  without  a  bishop,  we  must  therein  crave 
wise  ;  for  the  ground  of  their  doctrine  is  leave  only  to  differ.  And  if  we  be  in 


CIIA.  I.  — 1642-49.     TO  PRESERVE  EPISCOPACY.  585 

seem  rather  intended  to  weigh  with  those  who  slighted  his 
scruples  than  the  paramount  motives  of  his  heart.  He 
could  hardly  avoid  perceiving  that,  as  Colepepper  told  him 
in  his  rough  style,  the  question  was  whether  he  would  choose 
to  be  a  king  of  presbytery  or  no  king.  But  the  utmost 
length  which  he  could  prevail  on  himself  to  go  was  to  offer 
the  continuance  of  the  presbyterian  discipline,  as  established 
by  the  parliament,  for  three  years,  during  which  a  conference 
of  divines  might  be  had,  in  order  to  bring  about  a  settlement. 
Even  this  he  would  not  propose  without  consulting  two 
bishops,  Juxon  and  Duppa,  whether  he  could  lawfully  do  so. 
They  returned  a  very  cautious  answer,  assenting  to  the 
proposition  as  a  temporary  measure,  but  plainly  endeavoring 
to  keep  the  king  fixed  in  his  adherence  to  the  episcopal 
church.1 

Pressed  thus  on  a  topic  so  important  above  all  others  m 
his  eyes,  the  king  gave  a  proof  of  his  sincerity  by  greater 
concessions  of  power  than  he  had  ever  intended.  He  had 
some  time  before  openly  offered  to  let  the  parliament  name 
all  the  commissioners  of  the  militia  for  seven  years,  and  all 
the  officers  of  state  and  judges  to  hold  their  places  for  life.2 

an  error,  we  are  in  good  company,  there  after  by  virtue  of  the  ordinance  directing 

not  being,  as  we  have  cause  to  believe,  the  sale  of  bishops'  lands,  Nov.  16, 1646. 

six  persona  of  the  protestant  religion  of  Parl.  Hist.  528.      A  committee  was  ap- 

the  other  opinion.  .  .  .  Come,  the  ques-  pointed,  Nov.  2,  1646,  to  consider  of  a 

tion  in  short  is,  whether  you  will  choose  fitting  maintenance    to   be   allowed  the 

to  be  a  king  of  presbytery,  or  no  king,  bishops,  both  those  who   had  remained 

and  yet  presbytery  or  perfect  indepen-  under  the  parliament,  and  those  who  had 

dency  to  be  ?"    P.  263.    They  were,  how-  deserted  it.    Journals.    I  was  led  to  this 

ever,  as  much  against  his  giving  up  the  passage  by  Mr.  Godwin,  Hist,  of  Com- 

militia  or  his  party,  as  in  favor  of  his  monwealth,  ii.  250.     Whether  anything 

abolishing  episcopacy.  further  was   doue  I  have  not   observed. 

Charles  was  much  to  be  pitied  through-  But  there  is  an  order  in  the  Journals,  1st 

out  all  this  period;   none  of  his  corre-  May.  1647,  that,  whereas  divers  of  the  late 

spomleuts  understood  the  state  of  affairs  tenants  of  Dr.  JUXOH,  late  bishop  of  Lou- 

so  well  as  himself:  he  was  with  the  Scots,  don.  have  refused  to  pay  the  rentsorother 

and  saw  what  they  were  made  of,  while  sums  of  money  due  to  him  as  bishop  nf 

the  others  fancied  absurdities   through  London,  at  or  before  the  1st  of  NOV.-HI her 

their  own   private  self-interested  views,  last,  the  trustees  of  bishops  lands  are  di- 

It  is  very  certain  that  by  sacrificing  epis-  reeled  to  receive  the  same,  and  pay  them 

copacy  he  would  not  have  gained  a  step  over  to  Dr.  Juxon.    Though  this  was  only 

with  the  parliament :  and  as  to  reigning  justice,  it  shows  that  justice  was  done, 

in   Scotland  alone,  suspected,   insulted,  at   least  in  this  instance,  to  a  bishop, 

degraded,  this  would,  perhaps,  just  have  Juxon  must  have  been  a  very  praam! 

been   possible  for  himself,   but   neither  and  judicious  man,  though  not  learned; 

Henrietta  nor  her  friends   would  have  which  probably  was  all  the  better, 

found  an  asylum  there.  2  Jan.  29, 1646.    Parl.  Hist.  436.    Wliite- 

1  Juxon.  had  been  well  treated  by  the  lock  says,  •'  Many  rober  men  and  lov.-rs 

parliament,  in  consequence  of  his  prudent  of  peace  were  earnest  to  have  complied 

abstinence  from  politics,  and  residence  in  with   what  the  kiug  proposed  ;    but  tho 

their  quarters.     He  dates  his  answer  to  major  part  of  the  house  was  contrary, 

the  king  from  his-palace  at  Fulham.    He  and  the  new-elected  members  joined  those 

was,  however,  dispossessed  of  it  not  long  who  were  averse  to  compliance."    l>.  4)7. 


586 


BAD  CONDUCT  OF  THE  QUEEN 


CHAP.  X. 


He  now  empowered  a  secret  agent  in  London,  Mr.  William 
Murray,  privately  to  sound  the  parliamentary  leaders,  if  they 
would  consent  to  the  establishment  of  a  moderated  episco- 
pacy after  three  or  five  years,  on  condition  of  his  departing 
from  the  right  of  the  militia  during  his  whole  life.1  This 
dereliction  of  the  main  ground  of  contest  brought  down  the 
queen's  indignation  on  his  head.  She  wrote  several  letters, 
in  an  imperious  and  unfeeling  tone,  declaring  that  she  would 
never  set  her  foot  in  England  as  long  as  the  parliament 
should  exist.2  Jermyn  and  Colepepper  assumed  a  style 
hardly  less  dictatorial  in  their  letters,8  till  Charles  withdrew 
the  proposal,  which  Murray  seems  never  to  have  communi- 
cated.4 It  was  .indeed  the  evident  effect  of  despair  and  a 
natural  weariness  of  his  thorny  crown.  He  now  began  to 
express  serious  thoughts  of  making  his  escape,5  and  seems 
even  to  hint  more  than  once  at  a  resignation  of  his  government 
to  the  prince  of  Wales.  But  Henrietta  forbade  him  to  think 
of  an  escape,  and  alludes  to  the  other  with  contempt  and 
Bad  conduct  indignation.6  With  this  selfish  and  tyrannical 
of  the  queen.  WOman,  that  life  of  exile  and  privacy  which  religion 
and  letters  would  have  rendered  tolerable  to  the  king,  must 
have  been  spent  in  hardly  less  bitterness  than  on  a  dishon- 


1  Clar.  Papers,  p.  275. 

*  Id    pp.  294,  297,  300.    She  had  said 
as  much  before  (King's  Cabinet  Opened, 
p.  28) ;  so  that  this  was  not  a  burst  of 
passion.     "  Conservez-vous  la  militia," 
she    says    in    one    place    (p.   271),   4i  et 
n'abaodonnez  jaruais  ;   et  par  cela  tout 
reviendra."   Charles,  however,  disclaimed 
all  idea  of  violating  his  faith  in  case  of  a 
treaty  (p.  273);  but  observed  as  to  the 
militia,  with  some  truth,  that  li  the  re- 
taining of  it  is  not  of  so  much  conse- 
quence—  I  am  far  from  saying  none  — 
as  is  thought,  without  the  concurrence  of 
other  things  ;  because  the  militia  here  is 
not,  as  in  France  and  other  countries,  a 
formed  powerful  strength ;   but  it  serves 
more  to  hold  off  ill   than  to  do  much 
good.    And  certainly  if  the  pulpits  teach 
not  obedience  (which  will   never  be,  if 
presbyterian  government  be  absolutely 
settled),  the  crown  will  have  little  com- 
fort of  the  militia."   P.  296. 

»  P.  301. 

*  P.  313. 

*  Pp.  245,  247,  278.  314.    In  one  place 
he  says   that  he   will  go  to  France  to 
cl'ar  his  reputation  to  tlie  queen;  p.  265. 
He  wrote  in  great    distress  of  mind   to 
Jermyn  and  Colepepper,  on  her  threat- 
ening to  retire  from  all  business  into  a 


monastery,  in  consequence  of  his  refusal 
to  comply  with  her  wishes  :  p.  270.  See 
also  Montreuil's  Memoir  in  Thurloe's 
State  Papers,  i.  85,  whence  it  appears 
that  the  king  had  thoughts  of  making 
his  escape  in  Jan.  1647. 

6  "  For  the  proposition  to  Bellievre  (a 
French  agent  at  Newcastle,  after  Mon- 
treuil's recall),  I  hate  it.  If  any  such 
thing  should  be  made  public,  you  are 
undone  ;  your  enemies  will  make  a  mali- 
cious use  of  it.  Be  sure  you  never  own 
it  again  in  any  discourse,  otherwise  than 
as  intended  as  a  foil,  or  an  hyperbole,  or 
any  other  ways,  except  in  sober  earnest," 
&c.  p.  304.  The  queen  and  her  counsel- 
lors, however,  seem  afterwards  to  havs 
retracted  in  some  measure  what  they 
had  said  about  his  escape  ;  and  advised 
that,  if  he  could  not  be  suffered  to  go 
into  Scotland,  he  would  try  Ireland  or 
Jersey ;  p.  312. 

Her  dislike  to  the  king's  escape  showed 
itself,  according  to  Clarendon,  vi.  192, 
even  at  a  time  when  it  appeared  the  only 
means  to  secure  his  life,  during  his  con- 
finement in  the  Isle  of  \Vight.  Some  may 
suspect  that  Henrietta  had  consoled  her- 
self too  well  with  lord  Jermyn  to  wish  for 
her  husband's  return. 


CHA.  1  -1642-49.      LETTERS  TAKEN  AT  NASEBY.  587 

ored  throne.  She  had  displayed  in  France  as  little  virtue 
as  at  home :  the  small  resources,  which  should  have  been 
frugally  dispensed  to  those  who  had  lost  all  for  the  royal 
cause,  were  squandered  upon  her  favorite  and  her  French 
servants.1  So  totally  had  she  abandoned  all  regard  to  Eng- 
lish interests,  that  Hyde  and  Capel,  when  retired  to  Jersey, 
the  governor  of  which,  sir  Edward  Carteret,  still  held  out 
for  the  king,  discovered  a  plan  formed  by  the  queen  and 
Jermyn  to  put  that  island  into  the  hands  of  France.2  They 
were  exceedingly  perplexed  at  this  discovery,  conscious  of 
the  impossibility  of  defending  Jersey,  and  yet  determined 
not  to  let  it  be  torn  away  from  the  sovereignty  of  the  British 
crown.  No  better  expedient  occurred  than,  as  soon  as  the 
project  should  be  ripe  for  execution,  to  despatch  a  message  "  to 
the  earl  of  Northumberland  or  some  other  person  of  honour," 
asking  for  aid  to  preserve  the  island.  This  was  of  course, 
in  other  words,  to  surrender  it  into  the  power  of  the  par- 
liament, which  they  would  not  name  even  to  themselves. 
But  it  was  evidently  more  consistent  with  their  loyalty  to 
the  king  and  his  family  than  to  trust  the  good  faith  of  Maz- 
arin.  The  scheme,  however,  was  abandoned,  for  we  hear  no 
more  of  it. 

It  must,  however,  be  admitted  at  the  present  day,  that 
there  was  no  better  expedient  for  saving  the  king's  life,  and 
some  portion  of  the  royal  authority  for  his  descendants  (a 
frank  renunciation  of  episcopacy  perhaps  only  excepted), 
than  such  an  abdication,  the  time  for  which  had  come  before 
he  put  himself  into  the  hands  of  the  Scots.  His  own  party 
had  been  weakened,  and  the  number  of  his  well-wishers  dimin- 
ished, by  something  more  than  the  events  of  war.  The  last 
unfortunate  year  had,  in  two  memorable  instances,  revealed 
fresh  proofs  of  that  culpable  imprudence,  speaking  mildly, 
which  made  wise  and  honest  men  hopeless  of  any  permanent 
accommodation.  At  the  battle  of  Naseby  copies 

i   •     n  ••!  l_         i    PuDliCaUO* 

of  some  letters  to  the  queen,  chiefly  written  about  Of  letters 
the  tune  of  the  treaty  of  Uxbridge,  and  strangely  £££{,** 
preserved,  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  enemy,  and 
were  instantly  published.8     No  other  losses  of  that  fatal  day 

1  Clar.  Papers,  p.  344.  whole  rabble  of  Charles's  admirers.    But 

*  P.  279.  1'  could  not  reasonably  be  expected  that 

»  Clarendon  and  Hume  inveigh  against  such  material    papers   should    be    kept 

the  parliament  for  this  publication;  in  back:  nor  were  the  parliament  undera 

which  they  are  of  course  followed  by  the  obligation  to  do  to.    The  former  wrltei 


588 


LETTERS  TAKEN  AT  NASEBY. 


CHAP.  X 


were  more  injurious  to  his  cause.  Besides  many  proofs  of 
a  contemptible  subserviency  to  one  justly  deemed  irreconcil- 
able to  the  civil  and  religious  interests  of  the  kingdom,  and 
many  expressions  indicating  schemes  and  hopes  inconsistent 
with  any  practicable  peace,  and  especially  a  design  to  put  an 
end  to  the  parliament,1  he  gave  her  power  to  treat  wilh  the 
English  catholics,  promising  to  take  away  all  penal  laws 
against  them  as  soon  as  God  should  enable  him  to  do  so,  in 
consideration  of  such  powerful  assistance  as  might  deserve  so 
great  a  favor,  and  enable  him  to  effect  it.a  Yet  it  was  cer- 


insin  dates  that  they  were  garbled  ;  but 
Charles  himself  never  pretended  this  (see 
Supplement  to  Evelyn's  Diary,  p.  101); 
nor  does  there  seem  any  foundation  for 
the  surmise.  His  own  friends  garbled 
them,  however,  after  the  Restoration: 
gome  passages  are  omitted  in  the  edition 
of  King  Charles's  Works  ;  so  that  they 
can  only  be  read  accurately  in  the  origi- 
nal publication,  called  the  King's  Cabinet 
Opened,  a  small  tract  in  quarto  ;  or  in  the 
modern  compilations,  such  as  the  Par- 
liamentary History,  which  have  copied  it. 
Ludlow  says  he  has  been  informed  that 
Borne  of  the  letters  taken  at  Naseby  were 
suppressed  by  those  intrusted  with  them, 
who  since  the  king's  restoration  have 
been  rewarded  for  it.  Memoirs,  i.  156. 
But  I  should  not  be  inclined  to  believe 
this. 

There  is,  however,  an  anecdote  which 
may  be  mentioned  in  this  place :  a  Dr. 
Hickman,  afterwards  bishop  of  Derfy, 
wrote  in  1690  the  following  letter  to  Sprat, 
bishop  of  Rochester,  a  copy  of  which,  in 
Dr.  Birch's  handwriting,  may  be  found 
in  the  British  Museum.  It  was  printed 
by  him  in  the  Appendix  to  the  "  Inquiry 
into  the  Share  K.  Charles  I.  had  in  Gla- 
morgan's Transactions,"  and  from  thence 
by  Harris  in  his  Life  of  Charles  I.  p.  144. 

«  My  Lord, 

''  Last  week  Mr.  Bennet  [a  bookseller] 
left  with  me  a  manuscript  of  letters  from 
king  Charles  I.  to  his  queen  ;  and  said  it 
was  your  lordship's  desire  and  Dr.  Pell- 
ing's  that  my  lord  Rochester  should  read 
them  over,  and  see  what  was  fit  to  be 
left  out  in  the  intended  edition  of  them. 
Accordingly,  my  lord  has  read  them  over, 
and  upon  the  whole  matter  says  he  is 
very  much  amazed  at  the  design  of  print- 
ing them,  and  thinks  that  the  king'sene- 
mies  could  not  have  done  him  a  greater 
discourtesy.  He  showed  me  many  pas- 
sages which  detract  very  much  from  the 
reputation  of  the  king's  prudence,  and 
something  from  his  integrity ;  and  in 
short  he  can  find  nothing  throughout 


the  whole  collection  but  what  will  lessen 
the  character  of  the  king  and  offend  all 
those  who  wish  well  to  his  memory.  He 
thinks  it  very  unfit  to  expose  any  man's 
conversation  and  familiarity  with  his 
wife,  but  especially  that  king's ;  for  it 
was  apparently  his  blind  side,  and  his 
enemies  gained  great  advantage  by  show- 
ing it.  But  my  lord  hopes  his  friends 
will  spare  him  ;  and  therefore  he  has  or- 
dered me  not  to  deliver  the  book  to  the 
bookseller,  but  put  it  into  your  lordship's 
hands  ;  and  when  you  have  read  it,  he 
knows  you  will  be  of  his  opinion.  If 
your  lordship  has  not  time  to  read  it  all, 
my  lord  has  turned  down  some  leaves 
where  he  makes  his  chief  objections.  If 
your  lordship  sends  any  servant  to  town, 
I  beg  you  will  order  him  to  call  here  for 
the  book,  and  that  you  would  take  care 
about  it." 

Though  the  description  of  these  letters 
answers  perfectly  to  those  in  the  King's 
Cabinet  Opened,  which  certainly  •'  de- 
tract much  from  the  reputation  of 
Charles's  prudence,  and  something  from 
his  integrity,"  it  is  impossible  that  Roch- 
ester and  the  others  could  be  ignorant 
of  so  well-known  a  publication  ;  and  we 
must  consequently  infer  that  some  let- 
ters injurious  to  the  king's  character 
have  been  suppressed  by  tha  caution  of 
his  friends. 

1  The   king   had    long    entertained  a 
notion,  in  which  he  was  encouraged  by 
the  attorney-general  Herbert,   that  the 
act  against  the  dissolution  of  the  parlia- 
ment without  its  own  consent  was  void 
in  itself.     Life  of  Clarendon,  p.  86.     This 
high  monarchical  theory  of  the  nullity 
of  statutes  in  restraint  of  the  prerogative 
was  never  thoroughly  eradicated  till  the 
Revolution,  and  in  all   contentions   be- 
tween  the  crown    s-id    parliament    de- 
stroyed the  confidence  without  which  no 
accommodation  could  be  durable. 

2  '-There  is  little  or  no  appearance  but 
that  this  summer  will  be  the  hottest  for 
war  of  any  that  hatn  been  yet ;  and  be 


CHA  i.  — 1642-49.      GLAMORGAN'S  TREATY. 


589 


tain  that  no  parliament,  except  in  absolute  duress,  would  con- 
sent to  repeal  these  laws.  To  what  sort  of  victory  therefore 
did  he  look  ?  It  was  remembered  that,  on  taking  the  sacra- 
ment at  Oxford  some  time  before,  he  had  solemnly  protested 
that  he  would  maintain  the  protestant  religion  of  the  church 
of  England,  without  any  connivance  at  popery.  "What  trust 
could  be  reposed  in  a  prince  capable  of  forfeiting  so  solemn 
a  pledge  ?  Were  it  even  supposed  that  he  intended  to  break 
his  word  with  the  catholics,  after  obtaining  such  aid  as  they 
could  render  him,  would  his  insincerity  be  less  flagrant  ? 1 

These  suspicions  were  much  aggravated  by  a  second  dis- 
covery that  took  place  soon  afterwards,  of  a  secret  J)iscove 
treaty  between  the  earl  of  Glamorgan  and  the  Glamorgan's 
confederate  Irish  catholics,  not  merely  promising  treatJr- 
the  repeal  of  the  penal  laws,  but  the  establishment  of  their 
religion  in  far  the  greater  part  of  Ireland.2     The  marquis  of 
Ormond,  as  well  as   lord  Digby,  who  happened  to  be  at 
Dublin,  loudly  exclaimed  against  Glamorgan's  presumption 
in  concluding  such  a  treaty,  and  committed  him  to  prison  on 


confident  that,  in  making  peace  I  shall 
ever  show  my  constancy  in  adhering  to 
bishops  and  all  our  friends,  not  forgetting 
to  put  a  short  period  to  this  perpetual 
parliament."  King's  Cabinet  Opened,  p. 
7.  ''  It  being  presumption,  and  no  piety, 
so  to  trust  to  a  good  cause  as  not  to  use 
all  lawful  means  to  maintain  it,  I  have 
thought  of  one  means  more  to  furnish 
thee  with  for  my  assistance  than  hitherto 
thou  hast  had :  it  is,  that  I  give  thee 
power  to  promise  in  my  name,  to  whom 
thou  thinkest  most  fit,  that  I  will  bike 
away  all  the  penal  laws  against  the  Ro- 
man catholics  in  England  as  goon  as  God 
shall  enable  me  to  do  it;  so  as  by  their 
means,  or  in  their  favours,  I  may  have 
BO  powerful  assistance  as  may  deserve 
so  great  a  favour  and  enable  me  to  do  it. 
But  if  thou  ask  what  I  call  that  assist- 
ance, I  answer  that,  when  thou  knowest 
what  may  be  done  for  it,  it  will  be  easily 
seen  if  it  deserve  to  be  so  esteemed.  1 
need  not  tell  thee  what  secrecy  this  busi- 
ness requires;  yet  this  I  will  say,  that 
this  is  the  greatest  point  of  confidence  I 
can  express  to  thee;  for  it  is  no  thanks 
to  me  to  trust  thee  in  anything  else  but 
in  this,  which  is  the  only  point  of  differ- 
ence in  opinion  betwixt  us :  and  yet  I 
know  thou  wilt  make  as  good  a  bargain 
for  me.  even  in  this,  as  if  thou  wert  a 
protestant."  Id.  ibid.  "As  to  my  call- 
ing those  at  London  a  parliament,  I 
shall  refer  thee  to  Digby  for  particular 


satisfaction  ;  this  in  generU  —  if  there 
had  been  but  two,  besides  myself,  of  my 
opinion,  I  had  not  done  it;  and  the  ar- 
gument that  prevailed  with  me  was,  that 
the  calling  did  noways  acknowledge  them 
to  be  a  parliament,  upon  which  condition 
and  construction  I  did  it,  and  no  other- 
wise, and  accordingly  it  is  registered  in 
the  council-books,  with  the  council's 
unanimous  approbation."  Id.  p.  4.  The 
one  councillor  who  concurred  with  the 
king  was  secretary  Nicholas.  Supple- 
ment to  Evelyn's  Memoirs,  p.  90. 

1  The  queen  evidently  suspected  that 
he  might  be  brought  to  abandon  the 
catholics.  King's  Cabinet  Opened,  p.  90, 
81.  And,  if  fear  of  her  did  not  prevent 
him.  I  make  no  question  that  he  would 
have  done  so,  could  he  but  have  carried 
his  other  points. 

*  Part.  Hist.  428;  Somers  Tractn,  T. 
542.  It  appears  by  several  letters  of  the 
king,  published  among  those  taken  at 
Naseby.  that  Ormond  had  power  to  prom- 
ise the  Irish  a  repeal  of  the  penal  law* 
and  the  use  of  private  chapels,  as  well  a* 
a  suspension  of  Poyninjr's  law.  King's 
Cabinet  Opened,  pp.  16, 19 ;  Rushw.  Abr. 
v.589.  Glamoixan's  treaty  granted  them 
all  the  churches,  with  the  revenues  thi-re- 
of,  of  which  they  had  at  any  time  since 
October,  1641,  been  in  possession  :  tli:it 
is.  the  reestablishment  of  their  religion  : 
they,  on  the  other  hand,  were  to  furnish 
a  very  large  army  to  the  kiug  in  EuglMid. 


590 


DISCOVERY  OF 


CHAP.  X. 


a  charge  of  treason.  He  produced  two  commissions  from 
the  king,  secretly  granted  without  any  seal  or  the  knowledge 
of  any  minister,  containing  the  fullest  powers  to  treat  with 
the  Irish,  and  promising  to  fulfil  any  conditions  into  which 
he  should  enter.  The  king,  informed  of  this,  disavowed 
Glamorgan  ;  and  asserted  in  a  letter  to  the  parliament  that 
he  had  merely  a  commission  to  raise  men  for  his  service,  but 
no  power  to  treat  of  anything  else,  without  the  privity  of  the 
lord-lieutenant,  much  less  to  capitulate  anything  concerning 
religion  or  any  property  belonging  either  to  church  or  laity.1 
Glamorgan,  however,  was  soon  released  and  lost  no  portion 
of  the  king's  or  his  family's  favor. 

This  transaction  has  been  the  subject  of  much  historical 
controversy.  The  enemies  of  Charles,  both  in  his-  own  and 
later  ages,  have  considered  it  as  a  proof  of  his  indifference 
at  least  to  the  protestant  religion,  and  of  his  readiness  to 
accept  the  assistance  of  Irish  rebels  on  any  conditions.  His 
advocates  for  a  long  time  denied  the  authenticity  of  Glamor- 
gan's commissions.  But  Dr.  Birch  demonstrated  that  they 
were  genuine ;  and,  if  his  dissertation  could  have  left  any 
doubt,  later  evidence  might  be  adduced  in  confirmation.3 


1  Rushw.  Abr.  v.  582,  594.  This,  as 
well  as  some  letters  taken  on  lord  Digby's 
route  at  Sherborne  about  the  same  time, 
made  a  prodigious  impression.  "  Many 
good  men  were  sorry  that  the  king's 
actions  agreed  no  better  with  his  words  ; 
that  he  openly  protested  before  God  with 
horrid  imprecations  that  he  endeavored 
nothing  so  much  as  the  preservation  of 
the  protestant  religion,  and  rooting  out 
of  popery  ;  yet  in  the  mean  time,  under- 
hand, he  promised  to  the  Irish  rebels  an 
abrogation  of  the  laws  against  them, 
which  was  contrary  to  his  late  expressed 
promises  in  these  words,  '  I  will  never 
abrogate  the  laws  against  the  papists.' 
And  again  he  said,  '  I  abhor  to  think  of 
bringing  foreign  soldiers  into  the  king- 
dom,' and  yet  he  solicited  the  duke  of « 
Lorrain,  the  French,  the  Danes,  and  the 
very  Irish,  for  assistance."  May's  Bre- 
viate  of  Hist,  of  Parliament  in  Maseres's 
Tracts,  i.  61.  Charles  had  certainly 
never  scrupled  (I  do  not  say  that  he 
ought  to  have  done  so)  to  make  applica- 
tion in  every  quarter  for  assistance  ;  and 
began  in  1642  with  sending  a  col.  Coch- 
rati  on  a  secret  mission  to  Denmark,  in 
the  hope  of  obtaining  a  subsidiary  force 
from  that  kingdom.  There  was  at  least 
no  danger  to  the  national  independence 
from  such,  allies.  "  We  fear  this  shall 


undo  the  king  forever,  that  no  repent- 
ance shall  ever  obtain  a  pardon  of  thia 
act,  if  it  be  true,  from  his  parliaments." 
Baillie.  ii.  185.  Jan.  20. 1646.  The  king's 
disavowal  had  some  effect;  it  seems  as  if 
even  those  who  were  prejudiced  against 
him  could  hardly  believe  him  guilty  of 
such  an  apostasy  as  it  appeared  in  their 
eyes.  P.  175.  And,  in  fact,  though  the 
catholics  had  demanded  nothing  unrea- 
sonable either  in  its  own  nature  or  ac- 
cording to  the  circumstances  wherein 
they  stood,  it  threw  a  great  suspicion  oa 
the  king's  attachment  to  his  own  faith, 
when  he  was  seen  to  abandon  altogether, 
as  it  seemed,  the  protestant  cause  in 
Ireland,  while  he  was  struggling  so  tena- 
ciously for  a  particular  form  of  it  in 
Britain.  Nor  was  his  negotiation  less 
impolitic  than  dishonorable.  Without 
depreciating  a  very  brave  and  injured 
people,  it  may  be  said  with  certainty 
that  an  Irish  army  could  not  have  had 
the  remotest  chance  of  success  against 
Fairfax  and  (Iromwell ;  the  courage  being 
equal  on  our  side,  the  skill  and  discipline 
incomparably  superior.  And  it  was  evi- 
dent that  Charles  could  never  reign  in 
England  but  on  a  protestant  interest. 

2  Birch's  Inquiry  into  the  Share  which 
King  Charles  I.  had  in  the  Transactions 
of  the  Earl  of  Glamorgan,  1747.  1'out 


CHA.  I.  — 1642-49.       GLAMORGAN'S  TREATY. 


591 


Hume,  in  a  very  artful  and  very  unfair  statement,  admitting 
the  authenticity  of  these  instruments,  endeavors  to  show 
that  they  were  never  intended  to  give  Glamorgan  any  power 
to  treat  without  Ormond's  approbation.  But  they  are  word- 
ed in  the  most  unconditional  manner,  without  any  reference 
to  Ormond.  No  common  reader  can  think  them  consistent 
with  the  king's  story.  I  do  not,  however,  impute  to  him  aay 
intention  of  ratifying  the  terms  of  Glamorgan's  treaty.  His 
wain  of  faith  was  not  to  the  protestant,  but  to  the  catholic. 
Upon  weighing  the  whole  of  the  evidence,  it  appears  to  me 
that  he  purposely  gave  Glamorgan,  a  sanguine  and  injudi- 
cious man,  whom  he  could  easily  disown,  so  ample  a  commis- 
sion as  might  remove  the  distrust  that  the  Irish  were  likely 
to  entertain  of  a  negotiation  wherein  Ormond  should  be 
concerned ;  while,  by  a  certain  latitude  in  the  style  of  the 


letters  of  Charles  to  Glamorgan,  now  in 
the  British  Museum  (Sloane  MSS.  4161), 
in  Birch's  handwriting,  but  of  which  he 
was  not  aware  at  the  time  of  that  publi- 
cation, decisively  show  the  king's  duplic- 
ity. In  the  first,  which  was  meant  to 
be  seen  by  Digby,  dated  Feb.  3,  1646,  he 
blames  him  for  having  been  drawn  to 
consent  to  conditions  much  beyond  his 
instructions.  — li  If  you  had  advised  with 
my  lord-lieutenant,  as  you  promised  me, 
all  this  had  been  helped  ;  "  and  tells  him 
he  had  commanded  as  much  favor  to  be 
shown  him  as  might  possibly  stand  with 
his  service  and  safety.  On  Feb.  28  he 
writes,  by  a  private  hand,  sir  John 
Winter,  that  he  is  every  day  more  and 
more  confirmed  in  the  trust  that  he  had 
of  him.  In  a  third  letter,  dated  April  5, 
he  says,  in  a  cipher,  to  which  the  key  is 
given,  "  you  cannot  be  but  confident  of 
my  making  good  all  instructions  and 
promises  to  you  and  nuncio."  The  fourth 
letter  is  dated  April  6,  and  is  in  these 
words  :  —  '•  Herbert,  as  I  doubt  not  but 
you  have  too  much  courage  to  be  dis- 
mayed or  discouraged  at  the  usage  like 
you  have  had,  so  I  assure  you  that  my 
estimation  of  you  is  nothing  diminished 
by  it.  but  rather  begets  in  me  a  desire  of 
revenge  and  reparation  to  us  both  (for 
in  tLis  I  hold  myself  equally  interested 
with  you),  whereupon,  not  doubting  of 
your  accustomed  care  and  industry  in 
my  service,  I  assure  you  of  the  continu- 
ance of  my  favor  and  protection  to  you, 
and  that  in  deeds  more  than  in  words  I 
shall  show  myself  to  be  your  most  as- 
sured constant  friend.  C.  R." 

These  letters  have  lately  bet>n  repub- 
lished  by  Dr  Lingard,  Hist,  of  Eng.  x. 
note  B,  from  Warner's  Hist,  of  the  Civil 


War  in  Ireland.  The  cipher  may  be 
found  in  the  Biographia  Britannica,  under 
the  article  BALKS.  Dr.  L.  endeavors  tc 
prove  that  Glamorgan  acted  all  along 
with  Ormond's  privity :  and  it  must  be 
owned  that  the  expression  in  the  king's 
last  letter  about  revenge  and  reparation, 
which  Dr.  L.  does  not  advert  to,  has  a 
very  odd  appearance. 

The  controversy  is,  I  suppose,  com- 
pletely at  an  end ;  so  that  it  is  hardly 
necessary  to  mention  a  letter  from  Gl/v- 
morgan,  then  marquis  of  Worcester,  to 
Clarendon,  after  the  Restoration,  which 
has  every  internal  mark  of  credibility, 
and  displays  the  king's  unfairness.  Clar. 
State  Pap.  ii.  201;  and  Lingard,  ubi 
supra.  It  is  remarkable  that  the  trans- 
action is  never  mentioned  in  the  History 
of  the  Rebellion.  The  noble  author  was, 
however,  convinced  of  the  genuineness  of 
Glamorgan's  commission,  as  appears  by 
a  letter  to  secretary  Nicholas :  —  "I  must 
tell  you,  I  care  not  how  little  I  say  in 
that  business  of  Ireland,  since  those 
strange  powers  and  instructions  given  to 
your  favorite  Glamorgan,  which  ajijirar 
to  be  so  inexcusable  to  justice,  piety,  and 
prudence.  And  I  fear  there  is  very  much 
in  that  transaction  of  Ireland,  both  before 
and  since,  that  you  and  I  were  m-ver 
thought  wise  enough  to  be  advised  with 
in.  Oh!  Mr.  Secretary,  those  stratagems 
have  given  me  more  sad  hours  than  all 
the  misfortunes  in  war  which  have  be- 
fallen the  king,  and  look  like  the  rfTi-rfs 
of  God's  anger  towards  us."  Id.  P.  237. 
See  also  a  note  of  Mr.  Laing,  Hist,  of 
Scotland,  ili.  667,  for  another  letter  of 
the  king  to  Glamorgan,  from  Newcastle, 
in  July,  1646,  not  less  explicit  than  the 
foregoing. 


592  CHARLES   GIVEN  UP  BY  THE  SCOTS.      CHAP.  X. 

instrument,  and  by  his  own  letters  to  the  lord-lieutenant 
about  Glamorgan's  errand,  he  left  it  open  to  assert,  in  case  of 
necessity,  that  it  was  never  intended  to  exclude  the  formei-'s 
privity  and  sanction.  Charles  had  unhappily  long  been  in 
the  habit  of  perverting  his  natural  acuteness  to  the  mean 
subterfuges  of  equivocal  language. 

By  these  discoveries  of  the  king's  insincerity,  and  by 
what  seemed  his  infatuated  obstinacy  in  refusing  terms  of 
accommodation,  both  nations  became  more  and  more  alienated 
from  him ;  the  one  hardly  restrained  from  casting  him  off, 

the  other  ready  to  leave  him  to  his  fate.1  This  ill 
delivered  opinion  of  the  king  forms  one  apology  for  that 
up  by  the  action  which  has  exposed  the  Scots  nation  to  so 

much  reproach  —  their  delivery  of  his  person  to 
the  English  parliament.  Perhaps,  if  we  place  ourselves  in 
their  situation,  it  will  not  appear  deserving  of  quite  such  in- 
dignant censure.  It  would  have  shown  more  generosity  to 
have  offered  the  king  an  alternative  of  retiring  to  Holland ; 
and,  from  what  we  now  know,  he  probably  would  not  have 
neglected  the  opportunity.  But  the  consequence  might  have 
been  his  solemn  deposition  from  the  English  throne ;  and, 
however  we  may  think  such  banishment  more  honorable 
than  the  acceptance  of  degrading  conditions,  the  Scots,  we 
should  remember,  saw  nothing  in  the  king's  taking  the  cove- 
nant, and  sweeping  away  prelatic  superstitions,  but  the  boun- 
den  duty  of  a  Christian  sovereign,  which  only  the  most 
perverse  self-will  induced  him  to  set  at  nought.2  They  had 

1  Burnet's  Mem.  of  Dukes  of  Hamil-  with  both  parties,  the  presbyterians  and 

ton,  284.     Baillie's  letters,    throughout  independents,  were  now  known  ;  and  all 

1646,   indicate  his  apprehension   of  the  sides  seem  to  have  been  ripe  for  deposing 

prevalent    spirit,   which   he   dreaded  as  him:  245.      These  letters  are  a  curious 

implacable,  not  only  to  monarchy,  but  to  contrast  to  the  idle  fancies  of  a  speedy 

presbytery  and  the  Scots  nation.     "  The  and  triumphant  restoration,  which  Clar- 

leaders   of  the  people   seem  inclined  to  endon  himself,  as  well  as  others  of  less 

have  no  shadow  of  a  king,  to  have  liberty  judgment,  seem  to  have  entertained, 

for  all  religions,  a  lame  Erastian  presby-  2  "Though  he  should  swear  it."  says 

tery,  to  be  so  injurious  to  us  as  to  chase  Baillie,   '•  no  man   will   believe   that   he 

us  hence  with  the  sword."  — 148,  March  sticks    upon    episcopacy    for    any  con- 

31,  1646.     "The  common  word  is,  that  science,"  ii.  205.     And  again  :"  It  is  pity 

they  will  have  the  king  prisoner.     Pos-  that  base  hypocrisy,  when  it  is  pellucid. 

Bibly  they  may  grant  to  the  prince  to  be  shall  still  be  entertained.     No  oaths  did 

a  duke  of  Venice.     The  militia  must  he  ever   persuade  me   that   episcopacy  was 

absolutely,  for  all  time  to  come,  in  the  ever  adhered  to  on  any  conscience."  224. 

power  of  the  parliament  alone."  &c.  200.  This   looks   at  first    like   mere   bigotry. 

On  the  king's  refusal  of  the  propositions  But,  when  we  remember  that  Charles  had 

sent  to   Newcastle,  the  Soots  took  great  abolished  episcopacy  in  Scotland,  and  was 

pains  to  prevent  a  vote  against  him  :  226.  ready  to  abolish  protestantism  in  Ireland, 

There  was  still,  however,  danger  of  this  :  Baillie's  prejudices  will  appear  less  un- 

236,  Oct.  13,  and  p.  243.     His  intrigues  reasonable.    The  king's  private  letters  in 


CHA.  I.  -1642-49.     CHARLES  GIVEN  UP  BY  THE  SCOTS.      593 

a  right  also  to  consider  the  interests  of  his  family,  which  the 
threatened  establishment  of  a  republic  in  England  would 
defeat.  To  carry  him  back  with  their  army  into  Scotland, 
besides  being  equally  ruinous  to  the  English  monarchy,  would 
have  exposed  their  nation  to  the  most  serious  dangers.  To 
undertake  his  defence  by  arms  against  England,  as  the  ardent 
royalists  desired,  and  doubtless  the  determined  republicans  no 
less,  would  have  been,  as  was  proved  afterwards,  a  mad  and 
culpable  renewal  of  the  miseries  of  both  kingdoms.1  He 
had  voluntarily  come  to  their  camp  ;  no  faith  was  pledged  to 
him  ;  their  very  right  to  retain  his  person,  though  they  had 
argued  for  it  with  the  English  parliament,  seemed  open  to 
much  doubt.  The  circumstance,  unquestionably,  which  has 
always  given  a  character  of  apparent  baseness  to  this  trans- 
action, is  the  payment  of  400,000^  made  to  them  so  nearly 
at  the  same  time  that  it  has  passed  for  the  price  of  the  king's 
person.  This  sum  was  part  of  a  larger  demand  on  the  score 
of  arrears  of  pay,  and  had  been  agreed  upon  long  before  we 
have  any  proof  or  reasonable  suspicion  of  a  stipulation  to 
deliver  up  the  king.2  That  the  parliament  would  never  have 
actually  paid  it  in  case  of  a  refusal  to  comply  with  this 

the  Clarendon  Papers  have  convinced  me  in  all  his  maxims,  a  full  Canterburian, 

of  his   conscientiousness  about  church  both  in  matters  of  religion  and  state,  he 

government;  but  of  this  his  contempo-  still  inclined  to  a  new  war;  and  for  that 

raries  could  not  be  aware.  end  resolved   to  go  to  Scotland.    Some 

1  Hollis  maintains  that  the  violent  great  men  there  pressed  the  equity  of 
party  were  very  desirous  that  the  Scots  Scotland's  protecting  of  him  on  any  terms, 
should  carry  the  king  with  them,  and  This  untimeous  excess  of  friendship  has 
that  nothing  could  have  been  more  in-  ruined  that  unhappy  prince;  for  the  bet- 
jurious  to  his  interests.  If  we  may  be-  ter  party  finding  the  conclusion  of  the 
lieve  Berkley,  who  is  much  confirmed  by  king's  coming  to  Scotland,  and  thereby 
Baillie,  the  presbyterians  had  "secretly  en-  their  own  present  ruin,  and  the  ruin  of 
gaged  to  the  Scots  that  the  army  should  the  whole  cause,  the  making  the  ma- 
be  disbanded,  and  the  king  brought  up  ligimnts  masters  of  church  and  state,  the 
to  London  with  honor  and  safety.  Me-  drawing  the  whole  force  of  England  upon 
moirs  of  sir  J.  Berkley,  in  Maseres's  Scotland  for  their  perjurioiis  violation  of 
Tracts,  i.  358.  Baillie,  ii.  257.  This  af-  their  covenant,  they  resolved  ty  all  means 
fords  no  bad  justification  of  the  Scots  for  to  cross  that  design."  P.  253. 
delivering  him  up  "  The  votes  for  payment  of  the  sum  of 

li  It  is  very  like,"  says  Baillie,  "  if  he  400.000/.  to  the  Scots  are  on  Aug.  21,  27, 

had  done  any  duty,  though  he  had  never  and   Sept.  1  ;   though  it   was   not  fully 

taken  the  covenant,  but  permitted  it  to  agreed  between  the  two  nation*  ti 

have  been  put  in  an  act  of  parliament  in  8.    Whitelock.  220,  229.     But  VVhitclock 

both  kingdoms,  and  given  so  satisfactory  dates  the  commencement  of  the  under- 


spositio 

embraced  him,  that  no  man,  for  his  life,    great  attention  has  been  paid  to  the  or- 
durst  have  muttered  against  his  present    der  of  time. 
restitution.     But  remaining  what  he  was 

VOL.  i.  —  c.  38 


594  INDEPENDENTS  AND  REPUBLICANS.        CHAP  X 

requisition,  there  can  be,  I  presume,  no  kind  of  doubt ;  and 
of  this  the  Scots  must  have  been  fully  aware.  But  whether 
there  were  any  such  secret  bargain  as  had  been  supposed,  or 
whether  they  would  have  delivered  him  up  if  there  had 
been  no  pecuniary  expectation  in  the  case,  is  what  I  cannot 
perceive  sufficient  grounds  to  pronounce  with  confidence, 
though  I  am  much  inclined  to  believe  the  affirmative  of  the 
latter  question.  And  it  is  deserving  of  particular  observa- 
tion that  the  party  in  the  house  of  commons  which  sought 
most  earnestly  to  obtain  possession  of  the  king's  person,  and 
carried  all  the  votes  for  payment  of  money  to  the  Scots,  was 
that  which  had  no  further  aim  than  an  accommodation  with 
him,  and  a  settlement  of  the  government  on  the  basis  of  its 
fundamental  laws,  though  doubtless  on  terms  very  derogatory 
to  his  prerogative ;  while  those  who  opposed  each  part  of 
the  negotiation  were  the  zealous  enemies  of  the  king,  and, 
in  some  instances  at  least,  of  the  monarchy.  The  Journals 
bear  witness  to  this.1 

Whatever  might  have  been  the  consequence  of  the  king's 
Growth  of      accepting  the  propositions  of  Newcastle,  his  chance 

of  restoration  upon  any  terms  was  now  in  all  ap- 
and  repub-  pearance  very  slender.  Pie  had  to  encounter 

enemies  more  dangerous  and  implacable  than  the 
presbyterians.  That  faction,  which  from  small  and  insensi- 
ble beginnings  had  acquired  continued  strength,  through  am- 
bition in  a  few,  through  fanaticism  in  many,  through  a 
despair  in  some  of  reconciling  the  pretensions  of  royalty 
with  those  of  the  people,  was  now  rapidly  ascending  to  su- 
periority. Though  still  weak  in  the  house  of  commons,  it 
had  spread  prodigiously  in  the  army,  especially  since  its 
new-modelling  at  the  time  of  the  self-denying  ordinance.3 
The  presbyterians  saw  with  dismay  the  growth  of  their  own 
and  the  constitution's  enemies.  But  the  royalists,  who  had 


CHA.  I.  — 1642-49. 


TOLEBATION. 


595 


less  to  fear  from  confusion  than  from  any  settlement  that  the 
commons  would  be  brought  to  make,  rejoiced  in  the  increas- 
ing disunion,  and  fondly  believed,  like  their  master,  that  one 
or  other  party  must  seek  assistance  at  their  hands.1 

The  independent  party  comprehended,  besides  the  mem- 
bers of  that  religious  denomination,2  a  countless  brood  of 
fanatical  sectaries,  nursed  in  the  lap  of  presbyterianism,  and 
fed  with  the  stimulating  aliment  she  furnished,  till 
their  intoxicated  fancies  could  neither  be  restrained  tothepn*- 
within  the  limits  of  her  creed  nor  those  of  her  b> teria"  K°T- 

.  „  eminent. 

discipline.8    Ihe  presbytenan  zealots  were  system- 
atically intolerant      A  common  cause   made  toleration  the 
doctrine  of  the  sectaries.     About  the  beginning  of  „ 

.A   ,      ,    ,  ,.  Toleration. 

the  war  it  had  been  deemed  expedient  to  call  to- 
gether an  assembly  of  divines,  nominated  by  the  parliament, 
and  consisting  not  only  of  clergymen,  but,  according  to  the 
presbyterian  usage,  of  lay  members,  peers  as  well  as  common- 
ers, by  whose  advice  a  general  reformation  of  the  church  was 
to  be  planned.4  These  were  chiefly  presbyterian,  though  a 


1  The  independent  party,  or  at  least 
Borne  of  its  most  eminent  members,  as 
lord  Say  and  Mr.  St.  John,  were  in  a  se- 
cret correspondence  with  Oxford,  through 
the  medium  of  lord  Saville,  in  the  spring 
of  1645,  if  we  believe  Hollis,  who  asserts 
that  he  had  seen  their  letters,  asking 
offices  for  themselves.  Mem.  of  Hollis, 
Beet.  43.  Baillie  refers  this  to  an  earlier 
period,  the  beginning  of  1644  (i.  427} ; 
and  I  conceive  that  Hollis  has  been  in- 
correct as  to  the  date.  The  king,  how- 
ever, was  certainly  playing  a  game  with 
them  in  the  beginning  of  1646,  as  well  as 
with  the  presbyterians,  so  as  to  give  both 
parties  an  opinion  of  his  insincerity. 
Clarendon  State  Papers,  214 ;  and  see 
two  remarkable  letters  written  by  his 
order  to  sir  Henry  Vane,  226.  urging  a 
union,  in  order  to  overthrow  the  presby- 
terian government. 

*  The  principles  of  the  independents 
are  set  forth  candidly,  and  even  favor- 
ably, by  Collier,  829  ;  as  well  as  by  Neal, 
ii.  98.  For  those  who  are  not  much  ac- 
quainted with  ecclesiastical  distinctions, 
it  may  be  useful  to  mention  the  two 
essential  characteristics  of  this  sect,  by 
which  they  differed  from  the  presbyte- 
rians. The  first  was,  that  all  churches  or 
separate  congregations  were  absolutely 
independent  of  each  other  as  to  jurisdic- 
tion or  discipline  ;  whence  they  rejected 
all  synods  and  representative  assemblies 
as  possessing  authority  ;  though  they 


generally  admitted,  to  a  very  limited 
degree,  the  alliance  of  churches  for  mut- 
ual counsel  and  support.  Their  second 
characteristic  was  the  denial  of  spiritual 
powers  communicated  in  ordination  by 
apostolical  succession  ;  deeming  the  call 
of  a  congregation  a  sufficient  warrant  for 
the  exercise  of  the  ministry.  See  Ornie's 
Life  of  Owen  for  a  clear  view  and  able 
defence  of  the  principles  maintained  by 
this  party.  I  must  add  that  Neal  seems 
to  have  proved  that  the  independents,  aa 
a  body,  were  not  systematically  adverse 
to  monarchy. 

a  Kdwards's  Gangrsena,  a  noted  book  in 
that  age,  enumerates  one  hundred  and 
seventy-six  heresies,  which  however  are 
reduced  by  him  to  sixteen  heads ;  and 
these  seem  capable  of  further  consolida- 
tion. Neal,  249.  The  house  ordered  a 
general  fast,  Feb.  1647,  to  beseech  God 
to  stop  the  growth  of  heresy  and  blas- 
phemy :  Whitelock,  236:  a  presbyterian 
artifice  to  alarm  the  nation. 

«  Parl.  Hist.  ii.  1479.  They  did  not 
meet  till  July  1.  1643;  Rush.  Abr.  v. 
123;  Neal,  42  j  Collier,  823.  Though  thU 
assembly  showed  abundance  of  bigotry 
and  narrowness,  they  were  by  no  means 
so  contemptible  as  Clarendon  representa 
them,  ii.  423 ;  and  perhaps  equal  iu 
learning,  good  Reuse,  and  other  merits, 
to  any  lower  house  of  convocation  thai 
ever  made  a  figure  in  .England 


596 


PKESBYTERIAN  ORDINANCE 


CHAP.  X. 


small  minority  of  independents,  and  a  few  moderate  episcopa- 
lians, headed  by  Selden,1  gave  them  much  trouble.  The  gen- 
eral imposition  of  the  covenant,  and  the  substitution  of  the 
directory  for  the  common  prayer  (which  was  forbidden  to  be 
used  even  in  any  private  family,  by  an  ordinance  of  August, 
1654),  seemed  to  assure  the  triumph  of  presbyterianism, 
which  became  complete,  in  point  of  law,  by  an  ordinance  of 
February  1646,  establishing  for  three  years  the  Scots'  model 
of  classes,  synods,  and  general  assemblies  throughout  Eng- 
land.2 But  in  this  very  ordinance  there  was  a  reservation 
which  wounded  the  spiritual  arrogance  of  that  party.  Their 
favorite  tenet  had  always  been  the  independency  of  the 
church.  They  had  rejected,  with  as  much  abhorrence  as 
the  catholics  themselves,  the  royal  supremacy,  so  far  as  it 
controlled  the  exercise  of  spiritual  discipline.  But  the  house 
of  commons  were  inclined  to  part  with  no  portion  of  that  pre- 
rogative which  they  had  wrested  from  the  crown.  Besides 
the  independents,  who  were  still  weak,  a  party  called  Eras- 
tians,8  and  chiefly  composed  of  the  common  lawyers,  under 


1  Whitelock,   71 ;   Neal,  103.     Selden, 
•who  owed  no  gratitude  to  the  episcopal 
church,  was  from  the  beginning  of  its 
dangers  a  steady  and  active  friend,  dis- 
playing, whatever  may   have   been  said 
of   his   timidity,  full   as   much   courage 
as  could  reasonably  be  expected  from  a 
studious  man  advanced  in  years.    Baillie, 
in  1641,  calls  him  '•  the  avowed  proctor 
of  the  bishops,"  i.  245  ;  and,  when  pro- 
voked by  his  Erastian  opposition  in  1646, 
presumes  to  talk  of  his  "insolent  absur- 
dity,'' ii.  96.     Selden  sat  in  the  assembly 
of  divines;  and  by  his  great  knowledge 
of  the  ancient  languages  and  of  ecclesi- 
astical   antiquities,   as   well    as    by   his 
sound  logic  and  calm  clear  judgment,  ob- 
tained an  undeniable  superiority,  which 
he  took  no  pains  to  conceal. 

2  Scobell;  Hush.  Abr.  v.  576;    Parl. 
Hist.  iii.  444 ;  Neal,  199.    The  latter  says 
this  did  not  pass  the  lords  till  June  6. 
But  this  is  not  so.  Whitelock  very  rightly 
opposed  the  prohibition  of  the  use  of  the 
common  prayer,  and  of  the  silencing  epis- 
copal ministers,  as  contrary  to  the  prin- 
ciple of  liberty  of  conscience  avowed  by 
the  parliament,  and  like  what  had  been 
complained  of  in  the  bishops :  226,  239, 
281.     But,  in  Sept.  1647,   it  was  voted 
that  the  indulgence  in  favor  of  tender 
consciences  should  not  extend  to  tolerate 
the  common  prayer.     Id.  274. 

3  The  Erastians  were  named  from  Eras- 
tus,  a  German  physician  in  the  sixteenth 
century.     The  denomination  isoften  used 


in  the  present  age  ignorantly,  and  there- 
fore indefinitely ;  but  I  apprehend  that 
the  fundamental  principle  of  his  followers 
was  this  :  —  That,  in  a  commonwealth 
where  the  magistrate  professes  Christian- 
ity, it  is  not  convenient  that  offences 
against  religion  and  morality  should  be 
punished  by  the  censures  of  the  church, 
especially  by  excommunication.  Prob- 
ably he  may  have  gone  farther,  as  Selden 
seems  to  have  done  (Neal,  194).  and  de- 
nied the  right  of  exclusion  from  church 
communion,  even  without  reference  to 
the  tern  poral  power ;  but  the  limited  prop- 
osition was  of  course  sufficient  to  raise 
the  practical  controversy.  The  Helvetic 
divines,  Gualter  and  Bullinger,  strongly 
concurred  in  this  with  Erastus  :  "  Con- 
teudiinus  disciplinam  esse  debere  in  ec- 
clesiu,  sed  satis  esse,  si  ea  administretur 
a  magistratu."  Erastus,  de  Excommu- 
nicatione,  p.  350  ;  and  a  still  stronger  pas- 
sage in  p.  379.  And  it  is  said  that  arch- 
bishop Whitgift  caused  Erastus's  book  to 
be  printed  at  his  own  expense.  See  one 
of  Warburton's  notes  on  Neal.  Calvin, 
and  the  whole  of  his  school,  held,  as  is 
well  known,  a  very  opposite  tenet.  See 
Erasti  Theses  de  Excouimunicatione,  4to. 
1579. 

The  ecclesiastical  constitution  of  Eng- 
land is  nearly  Erastian  in  theory,  and 
almost  wholly  so  in  practice.  Every  sen- 
tence of  the  spiritual  judge  is  liable  to 
be  reversed  by  a  civil  tribunal,  the  court 
of  delegates,  by  virtue  of  the  king's  su 


CHA.  I.  — 1642-49.  STRENGTH  OF  PRESBYTERIAN  PARTY.  597 

the  guidance  of  Selden,  the  sworn  foe  of  every  ecclesiastical 
usurpation,  withstood  the  assembly's  pretensions  with  success. 
They  negatived  a  declaration  of  the  divine  right  of  presby- 
terian  government  They  voted  a  petition  from  the  assembly, 
complaining  of  a  recent  ordinance  as  an  encroachment  on 
spiritual  jurisdiction,  to  be  a  breach  of  privilege.  The  pres- 
byterian  tribunals  were  made  subject  to  the  appellant  control 
of  parliament,  as  those  of  the  Anglican  church  had  been  to 
that  of  the  crown.  The  cases  wherein  spiritual  censures 
could  be  pronounced,  or  the  sacrament  denied,  instead  of 
being  left  to  the  clergy,  were  denned  by  law.1  Whether 
from  dissatisfaction  on  this  account,  or  some  other  reason, 
the  presbyterian  discipline  was  never  carried  into  effect 
except  to  a  certain  extent  in  London  and  in  Lancashire. 
But  the  beneficed  clergy  throughout  England,  till  the  return 
of  Charles  II.,  were  chiefly,  though  not  entirely,  of  that  de- 
nomination.2 

This  party  was  still  so  far  predominant,  having  the  strong 
support  of  the  city  of  London  and  its  corporation,8  with 


premacy  over  all  causes.  And,  practi- 
cally, what  is  called  church  discipline,  or 
the  censures  of  ecclesiastical  governors 
for  offences,  has  gone  so  much  into  dis- 
use, and  what  remains  is  so  contemptible, 
that  I  believe  no  ono,  except  those  who 
derive  a  little  profit  from  it,  would  regret 
its  abolition. 

"  The  most  part  of  the  house  of  com- 
mons," says  Baillie,  U.  149,  "  especially 
the  lawyers,  whereof  there  are  many,  and 
divers  of  them  very  able  men,  arc  either 
half  or  whole  Erastians,  believing  no 
church  government  to  be  of  divine  right, 
but  all  to  be  a  human  constitution,  de- 
pending on  the  will  of  the  magistrate." 
"  The  pope  and  king,"  he  says  in  another 
place,  196,  "  were  never  more  earnest  for 
the  headship  of  the  cfiurch  than  the  plu- 
rality of  this  parliament."  See  also  p. 
183;  and  Whitelock,  169. 

1  Parl.  Hist.  459,  et  alibi ;  Rushw.  Abr. 
v.  578,  et  alibi ;  Whitelock,  165, 169,  173, 
176,  et  post ;   Baillie's  Letters,  passim  ; 
Neal,  23,  &c.  194,  et  post;  Collier,  841. 
The  assembly  attempted  to  sustain  their 
own   cause  by  counter  votes ;  and,  the 
minority  of  independents  and  Erastians 
having  withdrawn,  it  was  carried,  with 
the  single  dissent  of  Lightfoot,  that  Christ 
had    established    a   government    iu   his 
church  independent  of  the  civil  magis- 
trate.    Neal,  223. 

2  Neal,  228.      Warburton  says,  in  his 
note  OLL  this  passage,  that  '•  the  presby- 


terian was  to  all  intents  and  purposes  the 
established  religion  during  the  time  of 
the  commonwealth."  But.  as  coercive 
discipline  and  synodical  government  are 
no  small  intents  and  purposes  of  that 
religion,  this  assertion  requires  to  be 
modified,  as  it  has  been  in  my  text.  Be- 
sides which  there  were  many  ministers  of 
the  independent  sect  in  benefices,  some 
of  whom  probably  had  never  received  or- 
dination. "  Both  baptists  and  indepen- 
dents," says  a  very  well-informed  writer 
of  the  latter  denomination,  "  were  in  the 
practice  of  accepting  the  livings,  that  is, 
the  temporalities  of  the  church.  They 
did  not,  however,  view  themselves  as 
parish  ministers  and  bound  to  administer 
all  the  ordinances  of  religion  to  the  parish 
population.  They  occupied  the  parochial 
edifices  and  received  a  portion  of  the 
tithes  for  their  maintenance  ;  but  in  all 
other  respects  acted  according  to  their 
own  principles."  Orme's  Life  of  Owen, 
136.  This  he  thinks  would  have  produced 
very  serious  evils  if  not  happily  chcrkr.l 
by  the  Kestoration.  "  During  the  com- 
monwealth," he  observes  afterwards,  245, 
"no  system  of  church  government  can 
be  considered  as  having  been  properly  or 
fully  established.  Tlio  presbyterians,  if 
any,  enjoyed  this  distinction." 

a  The  city  began  to  petition  for  tin 
establishment  of  presbytery,  and  against 
toleration  of  sectaries,  early  in  1»46 ;  and 
not  long  after  came  to  assume  what 


598 


STRENGTH  OF  PRESBYTERIAN  PARTY.      CHAP.  X. 


almost  all  the  peers  who  remained  in  their  house,  that  the 
independents  and  other  sectaries  neither  opposed  this  ordi- 
nance for  its  temporary  establishment,  nor  sought  anything 
further  than  a  toleration  for  their  own  worship.  The  ques- 
tion, as  Neal  well  observes,  was  not  between  presbytery  and 
independency,  but  between  presbytery  with  a  toleration  and 
without  one.1  Not  merely  from  their  own  exclusive  bigotry, 
but  from  a  political  alarm  by  no  means  ungrounded,  the  pres- 
byterians  stood  firmly  against  all  liberty  of  conscience.  But 
in  this  again  they  could  not  influence  the  house  of  commons 
to  suppress  the  sectaries,  though  no  open  declaration  in  favor 


seemed  to  the  commons  too  dictatorial  a 
tone.  This  gave  much  offence,  and  con- 
tributed to  drive  some  members  into  the 
opposite  faction.  Neal,  193,  221,  241; 
Whitelock,  207,  240. 

i  Vol.  ii.  268.  See  also  207  and  other 
places.  This  is  a  remark  that  requires 
attention ;  many  are  apt  to  misunder- 
stand the  question.  "  For  this  point 
(toleration)  both  they  and  we  contend," 
BaysBaillie, ''  tanquam  pro  aris  et  focis," 
ii.  175.  "  Not  only  they  praise  your  mag- 
istrate" (writing  to  a  Mr.  Spang  in  Hol- 
land), •'  who  for  policy  gives  some  secret 
tolerance  to  divers  religions,  wherein,  as 
I  conceive,  your  divines  preach  against 
them  as  great  sinners,  but  avow  that,  by 
God's  command,  the  magistrate  is  dis- 
charged to  put  the  least  discourtesy  on 
any  man,  Jew,  Turk,  Papist,  Socinian,  or 
whatever,  for  his  religion  :"  18.  See  also 
61.  and  many  other  passages.  '•  The 
army  "  (says  Hugh  Peters,  in  a  tract  en- 
titled A  Word  for  the  Army,  and  Two 
Words  to  the  People.  1647)  "  never  hin- 
dered the  state  from  a  state  religion, 
having  only  wished  to  enjoy  now  what 
the  puritans  begged  under  the  prelates ; 
when  we  desire  more,  blame  us,  and 
shame  us."  In  another,  entitled  Vox 
Militaris,  the  author  says,  "  We  did 
never  engage  against  this  platform,  nor 
for  that  platform,  nor  ever  will,  except 
better  informed  ;  and,  therefore,  if  the 
state  establisheth  presbytery,  we  shall 
never  oppose  it." 

The  question  of  toleration,  in  its  most 
important  shape,  was  brought  at  this 
time  before  parliament,  on  occasion  of 
one  Paul  Best  who  had  written  against 
the  doctrine  of  the  trinity.  According  to 
the  common  law,  heretics,  on  being  ad- 
judged by  the  spiritual  court,  were  de- 
livered over  to  be  burned  under  the  writ 
de  haeretico  comburendo.  This  punish- 
ment had  been  inflicted  five  times  under 
Elizabeth ;  ot  Wielmacker  and  Ter  Wort, 
two  Dutch  anabaptists,  who.  like  many 
of  that  sect,  entertained  Arian  tenets, 


and  were  burned  in  Smithfield  in  1575; 
on  Matthew  Hammond  in  1579,  Thomas 
Lewis  in  1583,  and  Francis  Ket  in  1588 ; 
all  burned  by  Scambler,  bishop  of  Nor- 
wich. It  was  also  inflicted  on  Bartholo- 
mew Legat  and  Edward  \Vightman,  under 
James,  in  1614  ;  the  first  burned  by  King, 
bishop  of  London,  the  second  by  Neyle 
of  Lichfield.  A  third,  by  birth  a  Span- 
iard, incurred  the  same  penalty  ;  but  the 
compassion  of  the  people  showed  itself  so 
strongly  at  Legat's  execution,  that  James 
thought  it  expedient  not  to  carry  the  sen- 
tence into  effect.  Such  is  the  venomous 
and  demoralizing  spirit  of  bigotry,  that 
Fuller,  a  writer  remarkable  for  good  na- 
ture and  gentleness,  expresses  his  indig- 
nation at  the  pity  which  was  manifested 
by  the  spectators  of  Legat's  sufferings. 
Church  Hist,  part  ii.  p.  62.  In  the  pres- 
ent case  of  Paul  Best,  the  old  sentence  of 
fire  was  not  suggested  by  any  one  ;  but 
an  ordinance  was  brought  in,  Jan.  1646, 
to  punish  him  with  death.  Whitelock, 
190.  Best  made,  ac  length,  such  an  ex- 
planation as  was  accepted ;  Neal,  214 ;  but 
an  ordinance  to  suppress  blasphemies  and 
heresies  as  capital  offences  was  brought  in. 
Commons'  Journals,  April,  1646.  The 
independents  gaining  strength,  this  was 
long  delayed  ;  but  the  ordinance  passed 
both  houses,  May  2. 1648.  Id.  303.  Neal, 
338,  justly  observes  that  it  shows  the  gov- 
erning presbyterians  would  have  made  a 
terrible  use  of  their  power,  had  they  been 
supported  by  the  sword  of  the  civil  magis- 
trate. The  denial  of  the  trinity,  incarna- 
tion, atonement,  or  inspiration  of  any 
book  of  the  Old  or  New  Testament,  was 
made  felony.  Lesser  offences,  such  as 
anabaptism,  or  denying  the  lawfulness 
of  presbyterian  government,  were  pun- 
ishable by  imprisonment  till  the  party 
should  recant.  It  was  much  tpppsed, 
especially  by  Whitelock  The  writ  de 
hseretico  comburendo,  as  is  well  known, 
was  taken  away  by  act  of  parliament  in 
1677. 


CHA.  I.  -1642-49.     CHAKLES'S  ILL-GROUNDED  HOPES.       599 

of  indulgence  was  as  yet  made.  It  is  still  the  boast  of  the 
independents  that  they  first  brought  forward  the  great  prin- 
ciples of  religious  toleration  (I  mean  as  distinguished  from 
maxims  of  political  expediency)  which  had  been  confined  to 
a  few  philosophical  minds  —  to  sir  Thomas  More,  in  those 
days  of  his  better  judgment  when  he  planned  his  republic  of 
Utopia,  to  Thuanus,  or  L'Hospital.  Such  principles  are, 
indeed,  naturally  congenial  to  the  persecuted  ;  and  it  is  by 
the  alternate  oppression  of  so  many  different  sects  that  they 
have  now  obtained  their  universal  reception.  But  the  inde- 
pendents also  assert  that  they  first  maintained  them  while  in 
power  —  a  far  higher  praise,  which,  however,  can  only  be 
allowed  them  by  comparison.  Without  invidiously  glancing 
at  their  early  conduct  in  New  England,1  it  must  be  admi£ 
ted  that  the  continuance  of  the  penal  laws  against  catho- 
lics, the  prohibition  of  the  episcopalian  worship,  and  the 
punishment  of  one  or  two  anti-trinitarians  under  Cromwell, 
are  proofs  that  the  tolerant  principle  had  not  yet  acquired 
perfect  vigor.  If  the  independent  sectaries  were  its  earliest 
advocates,  it  was  the  Anglican  writers,  the  school  of  Chil- 
lingworth,  Hales,  Taylor,  Locke,  and  Hoadley,  that  rendered 
it  victorious.2 

The  king,  as  I  have  said,  and  his  party  cherished  too  san- 
guine hopes  from  the  disunion  of  their  opponents.8     Though 

1  "  In  all  New  England,  no  liberty  of  •without  imbibing  its  spirit  in  the  fullest 
living  fora  presbyterian.    Whoever  there,  measure.     The  great  work   of  Jeremy 
were  they  angels  for  life  and  doctrine,  Taylor,  on  the  Liberty  of  Prophesying, 
will  essay  to  set  up  a  different  way  from  was  published  in  1647  ;  and,  if  we  except 
them  [the  independents],  shall  be  sure  of  a  few  concessions   to  the  temper  of  the 

? resent  banishment."   Baillie,  ii.  4 ;  also  times,  which  are  not  reconcilable  to  its 

I.     I  am  surprised  to  find  a  late  writer  general  principles,  has  left  little  for  those 

of  that  country  (Dwight's  Travels  in  New  who    followed   him.     Mr.   Onne  admits 

England)  attempt  to  extenuate  at  least  that  the  remonstrants  of  Holland  inain- 

the  intolerance  of  the  independents  tow-  tained  the  principles  of  toleration  very 

ards  the  quakers  who  came  to  settle  there;  early  (p.  50);  but  refers  to  a  tract  by 

and  which,  we  see,  extended  also  to  the  Leonard  Busher.  an  independent,  in  1614. 

presbyterians.    But  Mr.  Onne,  with  more  aa  "  containing  the  most  enlightened  and 

judgment,  observes  that  the  New  Eng-  scriptural  views  of  religious  liberty  "  (p. 

land  congregations  did   not  sufficiently  99).  He  quotes  other  writings  of  the  same 

adhere  to  the  principle  of  independency,  Beet  under  Charleg  I. 
and  acted  too  much  as  a  body ;  to  which        8  Several   proofs  of  this  occur  in  tho 

he  ascribes  their  persecution  of  the  quak-  Clarendon  State  Papers.    A  letter,  in  par- 

ers  and  others.      Life  of  Owen,  p.  335.  ticular,  from    Colepepper   to  Digby,   in 

It    is  certain    that    the    congregational  Sept.  1645,  is  so  extravagantly  sanguine, 

scheme  leads   to  toleration,  as   the  na-  considering  the  posture  of  the  king's  af- 

tional  church  scheme  is  adverse  to  it,  for  lairs  at  that  time,  that,  if  it  was  perfectly 

manifold  reasons  which  the  reader  will  sincere,  Colepepper  must  have  been  a  man 

discover.  of  less  ability  than   has  generally  been 

2  Though  the  writings  of  Chillingworth  supposed.   Vol.  ii.  p.  188.    Neal  has  some 
and  Hales  are  not  directly  in  behalf  of  sensible  remarks  on  the  king's  mistake  in 
toleration,   no   one    could   relish    them  supposing  that  any  party  which  he  diii 


GOO 


CONCLUSION  OF  THE  WAR. 


CHAP.  X. 


warned  of  it  by  the  parliamentary  commissioners  at  Uxbridge, 
though,  in  fact,  it  was  quite  notorious  and  undisguised,  they 
seem  never  to  have  comprehended  that  many  active  spirits 
looked  to  the  entire  subversion  of  the  monarchy.  The  king 
in  particular  was  haunted  by  a  prejudice,  natural  to  his  ob- 
stinate and  undiscerning  mind,  that  he  was  necessary  to  the 
settlement  of  the  nation  ;  so  that,  if  he  remained  firm,  the 
whole  pailiament  and  army  must  be  at  his  feet.  Yet  during 
the  negotiations  at  Newcastle  there  was  daily  an  imminent 
danger  that  the  majority  of  parliament,  irritated  by  hia 
delays,  would  come  to  some  vote  excluding  him  from  the 
throne.  The  Scots  Presbyterians,  whatever  we  may  think 
of  their  behavior,  were  sincerely  attached,  if  not  by  loyal 
affection,  yet  by  national  pride,  to  the  blood  of  their  ancient 
kings.  They  thought  and  spoke  of  Charles  as  of  a  head- 
strong child,  to  be  restrained  and  chastised,  but  never  cast 
off'.1  But  in  England  he  had  absolutely  no  friends  among 
the  prevailing  party  ;  many  there  were  who  thought  mon- 
archy best  for  the  nation,  but  none  who  cared  for  the  king. 
This  schism,  nevertheless,  between  the  parliament  and  the 
army  was  at  least  in  appearance  very  desirable  for  Charles, 
and  seemed  to  afford  him  an  opportunity  which  a  discreet 
prince  might  improve  to  great  advantage,  though  it  unfortu- 
nately deluded  him  with  chimerical  expectations.2  At  the 


not  join  must  in  the  end  be  ruined  :  p. 
268.  He  had  not  lost  this  strange  confi- 
dence after  his  very  life  had  become  des- 
perate;  and  told  Sir  John  Bowriug,  when 
he  advised  him  not  to  spin  out  the  time 
at  the  treaty  of  Newport,  that  ''any  in- 
terests would  be  glad  to  come  in  with 
him."  See  Bowring's  Memoirs  in  Hali- 
fax's Miscellanies,  132. 

i  Uaillie's  letters  are  full  of  this  feel- 
ing, and  must  be  reckoned  fair  evidence, 
since  no  man  could  be  more  bigoted  to 
presbytery,  or  more  bitter  against  the 
royalist  party.  I  have  somewhere  seen 
Baillie.  praised  for  his  mildness.  His  let- 
ters give  no  proof  of  it.  Take  the  follow- 
ing specimens  :  —  "  Mr.  Maxwell  of  Ross 
bus  printed  at  Oxford  so  desperately  mali- 
cious an  invective  against  our  assemblies 
and  presbyteries,  that,  however  I  could 
hardly  consent  to  the  hanging  of  Canter- 
bury or  of  any  Jesuit,  yet  I  could  give 
my  sentence  freely  against  that  unhappy 
man's  life."  —  ii.  99.  ''God  has  struck 
Colemau  with  death  ;  he  fell  in  an  ague, 
and,  after  three  or  four  days,  expired. 
It  is  not  good  to  stand  in  Christ's  way." 
P.  199. 


Baillie's  judgment  of  men  was  not  more 
conspicuous  than  his  moderation.  "  Vane 
and  Cromwell  are  of  horrible  hot  fancies 
to  put  all  in  confusion,  but  not  of  any 
deep  reach.  St.  John  and  Pierpoint  are 
more  stayed,  but  not  great  heads."  P. 
258.  The  drift  of  all  his  letters  is,  that 
every  man  who  resisted  the  jus  divinum 
of  presbytery  was  knave  or  fool,  if  not 
both.  They  are  however  eminently  ser- 
viceable as  historical  documents. 

2  "  Now  for  my  own  particular  reso- 
lution," he  says  in  a  letter  to  Digby, 
March  26,  1646.  "  it  is  this.  I  am  en- 
deavouring to  get  to  London,  so  that  the 
conditions  may  be  such  as  a  gentleman 
may  own,  and  that  the  rebels  may  ac- 
knowledge me  king;  being  not  without 
hope  that  I  shall  be  able  so  to  draw  either 
the  presbyterians  or  independents  to  side 
with  me  for  extirpating  the  one  cr  the 
other,  that  I  shall  be  really  king  again.'' 
Carte's  Ortnond,  iii.  452  ;  quoted  by  Mr. 
Brodie,  to  whom  I  am  indebted  for  the 
passage.  I  have  mentioned  already  hid 
overture  about  this  time  to  sir  lleurj 
Vane  through  Ashburuham. 


CHA  I.-  1642-49.      INTRIGUES  OF  THE  ARMY 


601 


conclusion  of  the  war,  which   the  useless  obstinacy  of  the 
royalists  had  protracted  till  the  beginning  of  1647,1  the  com- 
mons began  to  take  measures  for  breaking  the  force  of  their 
remaining  enemy.     They  resolved  to  disband  a  part  of  the 
army,  and   to  send   the  rest   into    Ireland.2     They  formed 
schemes  for  getting  rid  of  Cromwell,  and  even  made  some 
demur  about  continuing  Fairfax  in  command.8    But  in  all 
measures  that  exact  promptitude  and  energy,  treachery  and 
timidity  are  apt  to  enfeeble  the  resolutions  of  a  popular 
assembly.     Their  demonstrations  of  enmity  were 
however  so  alarming  to  the  army,  who  knew  them-  of  thfarmy 
selves  disliked  by  the  people,  and  dependent  for  ^h  the 
their   pay   on   the  parliament ;  that   as   early  as 
April,  1647,  an  overture  was  secretly  made  to  the  king,  that 
they  would  replace  him  in  his  power  and  dignity.     He  cau- 
tiously answered  that  he  would  not  involve  the  kingdom  in  a 
fresh  war,  but  should  ever  feel  the  strongest  sense  of  this 
offer  from  the  army.*     Whether  they  were  discontented  at 


1  Clarendon,  followed  by  Hume   and 
several  others,  appears  to  Bay  that  Rag- 
lan castle  in  Monmouthshire,  defended  by 
thfi  marquis  of  Worcester,  was  the  last 
that  surrendered ;   namely,   in   August, 

1646.  I   use   the  expression   appears  to 
say,  because  the  last  edition,  which  exhib- 
its his  real  text,  shows  that  he  paid  this 
compliment  to  Pendennis  castle  in  Corn- 
wall,  and    that  his  original    editors  (I 
suppose  to  do  honor  to  a  noble  family) 
foisted  in  the  name  of  Raglan.    It  is  true 
however  of  neither.     The  North  Welsh 
castles    held   out    considerably   longer  ; 
that  of  Harlech  was  not  taken  till  April, 

1647,  which    put   an  end    to  the  war. 
Whitelock. 

Clarendon,  still  more  unyielding  than 
his  master,  extols  the  long  resistance  of 
his  party,  and  says  that  those  who  sur- 
rendered at  the  first  summons  obtained 
no  better  terms  than  they  who  made  the 
stoutest  defence;  as  if  that  were  a  suffi- 
cient justification  for  prolonging  a  civil 
war.  In  fact,  however,  they  did  the  king 
Borne  harm  ;  inasmuch  as  they  impeded 
the  efforts  made  in  parliament  to  disband 
the  army.  Several  votes  of  the  commons 
show  this  ;  see  the  Journals  of  12th  May 
and  31st  July,  1646. 

2  The  resolution  to  disband   Fairfax's 
regiment    next  Tuesday   at    Chelmsford 
passed  16th  May,  1647,  by  136  to  115; 
Algernon   Sidney   being  a   teller  of  the 
noes.  Commons'  Journals.  In  these  votes 
the  house,  that  is,  the  presbyteriati  major- 
ity, acted  with  extreme  imprudence  j  not 


having  provided  for  the  payment  of  the 
army's  arrears  at  the  time  they  were  thus 
disbanding  them.  Whitelock  advised 
Hollis  and  his  party  not  to  press  the  dis- 
banding ;  and  on  finding  them  obstinate, 
drew  off,  as  he  tells  us,  from  that  connec- 
tion, and  came  nearer  to  Cromwell.  P. 
248.  This,  however,  he  had  begun  to  do 
rather  earlier.  Independently  of  the 
danger  of  disgusting  the  army,  it  is  prob- 
able that,  as  soon  as  it  was  disbanded,  the 
royalists  would  have  been  up  in  arms. 
For  the  growth  of  this  discontent,  day  bv 
day,  peruse  Whitelock 's  journals  for 
March  and  the  three  following  months, 
as  well  as  the  Parliamentary  History. 
•  s  it  was  only  carried  by  169  to  147, 
March  5, 1647,  that  the  forces  should  be 
commanded  by  Fairfax.  But  on  the  8th 
the  house  voted,  without  a  division,  that 
no  officer  under  him  should  be  above  the 
rank  of  a  colonel,  and  that  no  member  of 
the  house  should  have  any  command  in 
the  army.  It  is  easy  to  see  at  whom  thin 
was  levelled.  Commons'  Journals.  They 
voted  at  the  same  time  that  the  officer* 
should  all  take  the  covenant,  which  had 
been  rejected  two  years  before ;  and.  bv  a 
majority  of  136  to  108,  that  they  should 
all  conform  to  the  government  of  the 
church  established  by  both  houses  of 
parliament. 

<  Clar.  State  Papers,  ii.  365.  The  army, 
in  a  declaration  not  long  after  the  king 
fell  into  their  power,  June  24,  use  these 
expressions  :  —  •'  We  clearly  profes*  that 
we  do  not  see  how  there  cau  bo  any 


602  PREPONDERANCE  OF  THE  ARMY.  CHAP.  X. 

the  coldness  of  this  reply,  or,  as  is  more  probable,  the  offer 
had  only  proceeded  from  a  minority  of  the  officers,  no  further 
overture  was  made,  till  not  long  afterwards  the  bold  man- 
His  person  oBuvre  of  Joyce  had  placed  the  king's  person  in 
seized.  their  power. 

The  first  effect  of  this  military  violence  was  to  display  the 
_,  ..  parliament's  deficiency  in  political  courage.  It  con- 
ment  yield  tained,  we  well  know,  a  store  of  energetic  spirits, 
to  the  army.  not  apt  to  swerve  from  tiiejr  attachments.  But, 

where  two  parties  are  almost  equally  balanced,  the  defection, 
which  external  circumstances  must  produce  among  those 
timid  and  feeble  men  from  whom  no  assembly  can  be  free, 
even  though  they  should  form  but  a  small  minority,  will  of 
course  give  a  character  of  cowardice  and  vacillation  to  coun- 
sels, which  is  imputed  to  the  whole.  They  immediately  ex- 
punged, by  a  majority  of  96  to  79,  a  vote  of  reprehension 
passed  some  weeks  before,  upon  a  remonstrance  from  the 
army  which  the  presbyterians  had  highly  resented,  and  gave 
other  proofs  of  retracing  their  steps.  But  the  army  was  not 
inclined  to  accept  their  submission  in  full  discharge  of  the 
provocation.  It  had  schemes  of  its  own  for  the  reformation 
and  settlement  of  the  kingdom,  more  extensive  than  those  of 
the  presbyterian  faction.  It  had  its  own  wrongs  also  to  re- 
venge. Advancing  towards  London,  the  general  and  council 
of  war  sent  up  charges  of  treason  against  eleven  principal 
members  of  that  party,  who  obtained  leave  to  retire  beyond 
sea.  Here  may  be  said  to  have  fallen  the  legislative  power 
and  civil  government  of  England  ;  which  from  this  hour  till 
that  of  the  Restoration  had  never  more  than  a  momentary 
and  precarious  gleam  of  existence,  perpetually  interrupted  by 
the  sword. 

Those  who  have  once  bowed  their  knee  to  force,  must  ex- 
pect that  force  will  be  forever  their  master.  In  a  few  weeks 
after  this  submission  of  the  commons  to  the  army,  they  were 
insulted  by  an  unruly,  tumultuous  mob  of  apprentices,  en- 
gaged in  the  presbyterian  politics  of  the  city,  who  compelled 
them  by  actual  violence  to  rescind  several  of  their  late  votes.1 

peace  to  this  kingdom,  firm  or  lasting,  army  from  this  mob ;  the  riot  being  "  a 

without  a  due  provision  for  the  rights,  sudden  tumultuous  thing  of  young  idle 

quiet,  and  immunity  of  his  majesty,  his  people  without  design."      Possibly    this 

rovnl    family,  and   his  late  partakers."  might  be  the  case;  but  the  tumult  at  the 

Parl.  Hist.  647.  door  of  the  house,  26th  July,  was  such 

i  Hollis  censures  the  speakers  of  the  that  it  could  not  be  divided.    Their  votes 

two  houses  and  others  who  fled  to   the  were  plainly  null,  as  being  made  undex 


CHA.  I.  — 1642-49.      CONDUCT  OF  CROMWELL. 


603 


Trampled  upon  by  either  side,  the  two  speakers,  several 
peers,  and  a  great  number  of  the  lower  house,  deemed  it 
somewhat  less  ignominious,  and  certainly  more  politic,  to 
throw  themselves  on  the  protection  of  the  army.  They  were 
accordingly  soon  restored  to  their  places,  at  the  price  of  a 
more  complete  and  irretrievable  subjection  to  the  military 
power  than  they  had  already  undergone.  Though  the  pres- 
byterians  maintained  a  pertinacious  resistance  within  the 
walls  of  the  house,  it  was  evident  that  the  real  power  of 
command  was  gone  from  them,  and  that  Cromwell  with  the 
army  must  either  become  ai'biters  between  the  king  and  par- 
liament, or  crush  the  remaining  authority  of  both.1 

There  are  few  circumstances  in  our  history  which  have 
caused  more  perplexity  to  inquirers  than  the  con-  My8terlous 
duct  of  Cromwell  and  his  friends  towards  the  king  conduct  of 
in  the.  year  1647.     Those  who  look  only  at  the  CromweU- 
ambitious  and  dissembling  character  of  that  leader,  or  at  the 
fierce  republicanism  imputed  to  Ireton,  will  hardly  believe 
that  either  of  them  could  harbor  anything  like  sincere  de- 
signs of  restoring  him  even  to  that  remnant  of  sovereignty 
which  the  parliament  would  have  spared.     Yet,  when  we 
consider  attentively  the  public  documents  and  private  me- 


duress.  Yet  the  presbyterians  were  so 
strong  in  the  commons,  that  a  resolution 
to  annul  all  proceedings  during  the 
speaker's  absence  was  lost  by  97  to  95, 
alter  his  return  ;  and  it  was  only  voted 
to'  repeal  them.  A  motion  to  declare 
that  the  houses,  from  26th  July  to  6th 
August,  had  been  under  a  force,  was  also 
lost  by  78  to  75.  Journals,  9th  and  17th 
August.  The  lords,  however,  passed  an 
ordinance  to  this  effect;  and,  after  once 
more  rejecting  it,  the  commons  agreed  on 
August*  20,  with  a  proviso  that  no  one 
should  be  called  in  question  for  what  had 
been  done. 

1  These  transactions  are  best  read  in 
the  Commons'  Journals  and  the  Parlia- 
mentary Uistory,  and  next  to  those  in 
Whitelock.  Hollis  relates  them  with 
great  passion  ;  and  Clarendon,  as  he  does 
everything  else  that  passed  in  London, 
very  imperfectly.  He  accounts  for  the 
earl  of  Manchester  and  the  speaker  Len- 
thal's  retiring  to  the  army  by  their  per- 
suasion that  the  chief  officers  had  nearly 
concluded  a  treaty  with. the  king,  and  re- 
solved to  have  their  shares  In  it.  This  is 
a  very  unnecessary  surmise.  Lenthal  was 
a  poor-spirited  man,  always  influenced 
Dy  those  whom  ho  thought  the  strongest, 
and  in  this  instance,  according  to  Ludlow, 


p.  206,  persuaded  against  his  will  by 
Haslerig  to  go  to  the  army.  Manchester 
indeed  had  more  courage  and  honor ;  but 
he  was  not  of  much  capacity,  and  his  par- 
liamentary conduct  was  not  systematic. 
But  upon  the  whole  it  is  obvious,  on 
reading  the  list  of  names  (Parl.  Hist.  757), 
that  the  king's  friends  were  rather  among 
those  who  stayed  behind,  especially  in  the 
lords,  than  amoncr  those  who  went  to  the 
army.  Seven  of  eight  peers  who  continued 
to  sit  from  26th  July  to  6th  of  August, 
1647,  were  impeached  for  it  afterwards 
(Parl.  Hist.  764),  and  they  were  all  of  the 
most  moderate  party.  If  the  king  had 
any  previous  connection  with  the  city,  he 
acted  very  disingenuously  in  his  letter  to 
Fairfax,  Aug.  3,  while  the  contest  was  still 
pending;  wherein  he  condemns  the  tu- 
mult, and  declares  his  unwillingness  that 
his  friends  should  join  with  the  city 
against  the  army,  whose  proposals  he  hud 
rejected  the  day  before  with  an  impru- 
dence of  which  he  was  now  sensible  This 
letter,  as  actually  sent  to  Fiiirfax,  is  in 
the  Parliamentary  History,  7ot.  .Mini  HKIV 
be  compared  with  a  rough  draft  of  tha 
same,  preserved  in  Clarendon  Papers,  378, 
from  which  it  materially  differ*,  being 
much  sharper  against  the  r.ltr. 


604  IMPKUDENT  HOPES  OF  THE  KING.         CHAP.  X. 

moirs  of  that  period,  it  does  appear  probable  that  their  first 
intentions  towards  the  king  were  not  unfavorable,  and  so  far 
sincere  that  it  was  their  project  to  make  use  of  his  name 
rather  than  totally  to  set  him  aside.  But  whether  by  grati- 
fying Cromwell  and  his  associates  with  honors,  and  throwing 
the  whole  administration  into  their  hands,  Charles  would 
have  long  contrived  to  keep  a  tarnished  crown  on  his  head, 
must  be  very  problematical. 

The  new  jailers  of  this  unfortunate  prince  began  by  treat- 
imprudent  *nS  k'rn  w^h  unusual  indulgence,  especially  in  per- 
hopes  of  milting  his  episcopal  chaplains  to  attend  him.  This 
was  deemed  a  pledge  of  what  he  thought  an  in- 
valuable advantage  in  dealing  with  the  army,  that  they  would 
not  insist  upon  the  covenant,  which  in  fact  was  nearly  as 
odious  to  them  as  to  the  royalists,  though  for  very  different 
reasons.  Charles,  naturally  sanguine,  and  utterly  incapable 
in  every  part  of  his  life  of  taking  a  just  view  of  affairs,  was 
extravagantly  elated  by  these  equivocal  testimonials  of  good- 
will. He  blindly  listened  to  private  insinuations  from  rash 
or  treacherous  friends,  that  the  soldiers  were  with  him,  just 
after  his  seizure  by  Joyce.  "  I  would  have  you  to  know, 
sir,"  he  said  to  Fairfax,  "  that  I  have  as  good  an  interest  in 
the  army  as  yourself;"  an  opinion  as  injudiciously  uttered 
as  it  was  absurdly  conceived.1  These  strange  expectations 

1  Fairfax's  Memoirs  in  Maseres's  Collec-  people,  after  he  could  no  longer  uphold 

tion  of  Tracts,  vol.  i.  p.  447.    "  By  this,"  his  own  violent  will ;  but  upon  some  dis- 

says  Fairfax,  who  had  for  once  found  a  courses  with  him,  the  king  uttering  these 

man  less  discerning  of  the  times  than  him-  words  to  him,  'I  shall  play  my  game  as 

self,  "I  plainly  saw  the  broken  reed  he  well  as  I  can,'  Ireton  replied,  'If  your 

leaned  on.      The  agitators  had  brought  majesty  have  a  game,  you  must  give  us 

the  king  into  an  opinion  that  the  army  also  the  liberty  to  play  ours.'  .  Colonel 

was  for  him."     Ireton  said  plainly  to  the  Hutchinson   privately    discoursing   with 

king,  •'  Sir,  you  have  an  intention  to  be  his  cousin  about  the  communications  he 

the   arbitrator    between   the   parliament  had  had  with  the  king,  Ireton's  expres- 

and  us ;  and  we  mean  to  be  so  between  sions  were  these :  —  'He  gave  us  words, 

yourmajesty  and  the  parliament."   Berk-  and  we  paid  him  in  his  own  coin,  when 

ley's  Memoirs.    Ibid.  p.  SCO.  we  found  he  had  no  real  intention  to  the 

This  folly  of  the  king,  if  Mrs.  Hutch-  people's  good,  but  to  prevail,  by  our  fac- 

inson  is  well  informed,  alienated  Ireton,  tions,  to  regain  by  art  what  he  had  lost 

who  had  been  more  inclined  to  trust  him  in  fight.'  "     P.  274. 

than  is  commonly  believed.   "  Cromwell,"        It  must  be  said  for  the  king  that  he 

she  says,  •'  was  at  that  time  so  incorrup-  was  by  no  means  more  sanguine  or  more 

tibly  faithful  to  his  trust  and  the  people's  blind  than  bis  distinguished  historian  and 

interest,  that  he  cculd  not  be  drawn  in  to  minister.     Clnrendon's  private  letters  are 

practise  even  his  own  usual  and  natural  full  of  strange  and  absurd  expectations. 

dissimulation  on  this  occasion.     His  son-  Even  so  late  as  October,  1647,  he  writes 

in-law  Ireton,  that  was  as  faithful  as  he,  to  Berkley  in  high  hopes  from  the  army, 

was  not  so  fully  ot  the  opinion,  till  he  bad  and  presses  him  to  make  no  concessions 

tried  it  and  found  to  the  contrary,  but  except  as  to  persons.     ''  If  they  see  you 

that  the  king  might  have  been  managed  will  not  yield,  they  must;  for  sure  they 

to  comply  with  the  public  good  of  his  have  as  much  or  more  need  of  the  king 


CHA.  I. —1642-49.      PROPOSALS  OF  THE  ARMY.  605 

account  for  the  ill  reception  which  in  the  hasty  irritation  of 
disappointment  he  gave  to  the  proposals  of  the  HO  rejects 
army,  when  they  were  actually  tendered  to  him  at  ^,e=^ph^ 

TT        '  f~*  l          1    • 

Hampton  Court,  and  which  seems  to  have  eventu-  army, 
ally  cost  him  his  life.  These  proposals  appear  to  have  been 
drawn  up  by  Ireton,  a  lawyer  by  education,  and  a  man  of 
much  courage  and  capacity.  He  had  been  supposed,  like  a 
large  proportion  of  the  officers,  to  aim  at  a  settlement  of  the 
nation  under  a  democratical  polity.  But  the  army,  even  if 
their  wishes  in  general  went  so  far,  which  is  hardly  evident, 
were  not  yet  so  decidedly  masters  as  to  dictate  a  form  of  gov- 
ernment uncongenial  to  the  ancient  laws  and  fixed  prejudices 
of  the  people.  Something  of  this  tendency  is  discoverable 
in  the  propositions  made  to  the  king,  which  had  never  ap- 
peared in  those  of  the  parliament.  It  was  proposed  that 
parliaments  should  be  biennial ;  that  they  should  never  sit 
less  than  a  hundred  and  twenty  days,  nor  more  than  two 
hundred  and  forty ;  that  the  representation  of  the  commons 
should  be  reformed,  by  abolishing  small  boroughs  and  in- 
creasing the  number  of  members  for  counties,  so  as  to  rendei 
the  house  of  commons,  as  near  as  might  be,  an  equal  repre- 
sentation of  the  whole.  In  respect  of  the  militia  and  some 
other  points,  they  either  followed  the  parliamentary  proposi- 
tions of  Newcastle,  or  modified  them  favorably  for  the  king. 
They  excepted  a  very  small  number  of  the  king's  adherents 
from  the  privilege  of  paying  a  composition  for  their  estates, 
and  set  that  of  the  rest  considerably  lower  than  had  been 
fixed  by  the  parliament.  They  stipulated  that  the  royalists 
should  not  sit  in  the  next  parliament.  As  to  religion,  they 
provided  for  liberty  of  conscience,  declared  against  the  impo- 
sition of  the  covenant,  and,  by  insisting  on  the  retrenchment 

than  he  of  them."    P.  879.    The  whole  that  Providence  would  Interfere  to  sup- 
tenor,  indeed,  of  Clarendon's  correspond-  port  what  seems  to  them  the  best,  that  la, 
euce  demonstrates,  that,  notwithstanding  their  own  cause.     The  following  Pa.ssage 
the   fine  remarks  occasionally  scattered  Is  a  specimen:  —  "  Truly  I  am  so  unfit  to 
through  his  History,  he  was  no  practical  bear  a  part  in  carrying  OD  this  new 
statesman,  nor  had  any  just  conception,  tentlon  [by  negotiation  and  conc.-x-.on], 
it  the  time,  of  the  course  of  affairs      He  that  I  would  not.  to  preserve  myself,  wita. 
never   flinched   from  one   principle,  not  and  children  from  the  ^^eatho* 
very  practicable  or  rational^   the  cir-  want  by  farninelforasudOen  death  wo 
cumstances  of  the   king -that  nothing  require  no  courage)  conse «t  to  the    e«- 
was  to  be  receded  from  which  had  ever  sening  any  part  which  I  take  te .be in t 
been    demanded.       This   maybe   called  function  of  a  bishop   or 
magnanimity  ;  but  no  foreign  or  domestic  the  smallest  prebendary  in  the  «hurch, 
dSon  could   be  settled    if  all    men  or  to  be  bound  not  to  endeavour .^alte, 
were  to  act  upon  it,  or  if  all  men,  like  any  such  alteration.       Id.  vol.  til.  p.  ft 
Chi.iea  and  Clarendon,  were  to  expect  Feb.  4,  IWfc. 


606  CHARLES  REJECTS  THE  CHAP.  X.. 

of  the  coercive  jurisdiction  of  bishops  and  the  abrogation  of 
penalties  for  not  reading  the  common  prayer,  left  it  to  be 
implied  that  both  might  continue  established.1  The  whole 
tenor  of  these  propositions  was  in  a  style  far  more  respectful 
to  the  king,  and  lenient  towards  his  adherents,  than  had  ever 
been  adopted  since  the  beginning  of  the  war.  The  sincerity 
indeed  of  these  overtures  might  be  very  questionable  if  Crom- 
well had  been  concerned  in  them ;  but  they  proceeded  from 
those  elective  tribunes  called  Agitators,  who  had  been  estab- 
lished in  every  regiment  to  superintend  the  interests  of  the 
army.2  And  the  terms  were  surely  as  good  as  Charles  had 
any  reason  to  hope.  The  severities  against  his  party  were 
mitigated.  The  grand  obstacles  to  all  accommodation,  the 
covenant  and  presbyterian  establishment,  were  at  once  re- 
moved ;  or,  if  some  difficulty  might  occur  as  to  the  latter,  in 
consequence  of  the  actual  possession  of  benefices  by  the  pres- 
byterian clergy,  it  seemed  not  absolutely  insuperable.  For 
the  changes  projected  in  the  constitution  of  parliament,  they 
were  not  necessarily  injurious  to  the  monarchy.  That  par- 
liament should  not  be  dissolved  until  it  had  sat  a  certain  time 
was  so  salutary  a  provision,  that  the  triennial  act  was  hardly 
complete  without  it. 

It  is  however  probable,  from  the  king's  extreme  tenacious- 
ness  of  his  prerogative,  that  these  were  the  conditions  that 
he  found  it  most  difficult  to  endure.  Having  obtained, 
through  sir  John  Berkley,  a  sight  of  the  propositions  before 
they  were  openly  made,  he  expressed  much  displeasure  ;  and 
said  that,  if  the  army  were  inclined  to  close  with  him,  they 
would  never  have  demanded  such  hard  terms.  He  seems  to 
have  principally  objected,  at  least  in  words,  to  the  exception 
of  seven  unnamed  persons  from  pardon,  to  the  exclusion  of 

1  Parl.  Hist.  738.    Clarendon  talks  of  nominal  chief  of  an   aristocratical  or  a 

these  proposals  as  worse  than  any  the  democratical  republic.    In  a  well-written 

king  had  ever  received  from  the  parlia-  tract,  called  Vox  Militaris,  containing  a 

ment;   and  Hollis  says  they  "dissolved  defence  of  the  army's  proceedings  and 

the  whob  frame  of  the  monarchy."    It  intentions,  and  published  apparently  in 

is  hard  to  fcse,  however,  that  they  did  so  July,  1647,  their  desire  to  preserve  the 

in  a  greater  degree  than  those  which  he  king's  rights,  according  to  their  notion 

had  himself  endeavored  to  obtain  as  a  of    them   and   the  general   laws  of   the 

commissioner  at   Uxbridgp.     As   to   the  realm,  is  strongly  asserted. 
church,   they  were   manifestly  the   best        a  The   precise  meaning  of   this   word 

that  Charles  had  ever  seen.    As  to  his  seems  obscure.    Some  have  supposed  it 

prerogative  and  the  power  of  the  nion-  to  be  a  corruption  cf  adjutators,  as  if 

archy,    he   was    so    thoroughly  beaten,  the  modern  terms  adjutant  meant  the 

that  no  treaty  could  do  him  any  essential  same  thing.     But  I  find  agitator  always 

service ;   and  he  had,  in   truth,  only  to  so     spelled    in     the   pamphlets    of    th« 

make  his  election,  whether  to  be  the  time. 


CHA.  I.  — 1642-49.       PROPOSALS   OF  THE  ARMY. 


607 


his  party  from  the  next  parliament,  and  to  the  want  of  any 
articles  in  favor  of  the  church.  Berkley  endeavored  to  show 
him  that  it  was  not  likely  that  the  army,  if  meaning  sincerely, 
would  ask  less  than  this.  But  the  king,  still  tampering  with 
the  "Scots,  and  keeping  his  eyes  fixed  on  the  city  and  parlia- 
ment, at  that  moment  came  to  an  open  breach  with  the  army, 
disdainfully  refused  the  propositions  when  publicly  tendered 
to  him,  with  such  expressions  of  misplaced  resentment  and 
preposterous  confidence  as  convinced  the  officers  that  they 
could  neither  conciliate  nor  trust  him.1  This  unexpected 
haughtiness  lost  him  all  chance  with  those  proud  and  repub- 
lican spirits ;  and  as  they  succeeded  about  the  same  time  in 
bridling  the  presbyterian  party  in  parliament,  there  seemed 
no  necessity  for  an  agreement  with  the  kihg,  and  their 
former  determinations  of  altering  the  frame  of  government 
returned  with  more  revengeful  fury  against  his  person.2 


1  Berkley's  Memoirs,  366.  He  told 
lord  Capel  about  this  time  that  he  ex- 
pected a  war  between  Scotland  and  Eng- 
land :  that  the  Scots  hoped  for  the  assist- 
ance of  the  presbyterians;  and  that  he 
wished  his  own  party  to  rise  in  arms  on 
a  proper  conjuncture,  without  which  he 
could  not  hope  for  much  benefit  from  the 
others.  Clarendon,  v.  476. 

a  Berkley,  368,  &c.  Compare  the  let- 
ter of  Ashburnhain,  published  in  1648, 
and  reprinted  in  1V64;  also  the  memoirs 
of  Ilollis,  Huntingdon,  and  Fairfax, 
which  are  all  in  Maseres's  Collection ; 
also  Ludlow,  Hutchinson,  Clarendon, 
Burnet's  Memoirs  of  Hamilton,  and 
some  despatches  in  1647  and  1648,  from 
a  royalist  in  London,  printed  in  the  Ap- 
pendix to  the  second  volume  of  the  Clar- 
endon Papers.  This  correspondent  of 
secretary  Nicholas  believes  Cromwell  and 
Iretou  to  have  all  along  planned  the 
king's  destruction,  and  set  the  levellers 
on,  till  they  proceeded  so  violently  that 
they  were  forced  to  restrain  them.  This 
also  is  the  conclusion  of  major  Hunting- 
don, in  his  Reasons  for  laying  down  his 
Commission.  But  the  contrary  appears 
to  me  more  probable. 

Two  anecdotes,  well  known  to  those 
conversant  in  English  history,  are  too 
remarkable  to  be  omitted.  It  is  said  by 
the  editor  of  lord  Orrery's  Memoirs,  as  a 
relation  which  he  had  heard  from  that 
noble  person,  that,  in  a  conversation  with 
Cromwell  concerning  the  king's  death, 
the  latter  told  him  he  and  his  friends 
had  once  a  mind  to  have  closed  with  the 
king,  fearing  that  the  Scots  and  presby- 
terian*  might  do  so,  when  one  of  their 


spies,  who  was  of  thek  ing's  bedcham- 
ber, gave  them  information  of  a  letter 
from  his  majesty  to  the  queen,  sewed  up 
in  the  skirt  of  a  saddle,  and  directing 
them  to  an  inn  where  it  might  be  found. 
They  obtained  the  letter  accordingly,  in 
which  the  king  said  that  he  was  courted 
by  both  factions,  the  Scots  prrsbyteriaus 
and  the  army ;  that  tho,se  which  bade 
fairest  for  him  should  have  him  ;  but  he 
thought  he  should  rather  close  with  the 
Scots  than  the  other.  Upon  this,  find- 
ing themselves  unlikely  to  get  good 
terms  from  the  king,  they  from  that 
time  vowed  his  destruction.  Carte's 
Ormond,  ii.  12. 

A  second  anecdote  is  alluded  to  by 
some  earlier  writers,  but  is  particularly 
told  in  the  following  words  by  Richard- 
son,  the  painter,  author  of  some  anec- 
dotes of  Pope,  edited  by  Speni'O  :  — 
"  Lord  Bolingbroke  told  us,  June  12. 
1742  (Mr.  Pope,  lord  Marchmont,  and 
myself),  that  the  second  earl  of  Oxford 
had  often  told  him  that  he  had  sot-n, 
and  had  in  his  hands,  an  original  letter 
that  Charles  the  First  wrote  to  his  queen, 
in  answer  to  one  of  hers  that  had  been 
intercepted,  and  then  forwarded  to  him, 
wherein  she  had  reproached  him  for  hav- 
ing made  those  villains  too  givat  conrcs. 
sions,  viz.,  that  Cromwell  should  be  lunl- 
lieutenant  of  Ireland  for  life  without 
account;  that  that  kingdom  should  1* 
in  the  hands  of  the  party,  with  an  nriny 
there  kept  which  should  know  no  tit-ad 
but  the  lieutenant  j  that  Cnmiui-ll 
should  have  a  garter,  &c.  That  in  tiiis 
letter  of  the  king's  it  was  said  that  die 
should  leave  him  to  manage,  who  was 


608  ESCAPE  OF  CHARLES.  CHAP.  X. 

Charles's  continuance  at  Hampton  Court,  there  can  be 
nis  flight  ^tt;^e  doubt,  would  have  exposed  him  to  such 
from  Hamp-  immineni  risk  that,  in  escaping  from  thence,  he 
urt'  acted  on  a  reasonable  principle  of  self-preserva- 
tion. He  might  probably,  with  due  precautions,  have  reached 
France  or  Jersey.  But  the  hastiness  of  his  retreat  from 
Hampton  Court  giving  no  time,  he  fell  again  into  the  toils 
through  the  helplessness  of  his  situation  and  the  unfortunate 
counsels  of  one  whom  he  trusted.1  The  fortitude  of  his  own 
mind  sustained  him  in  this  state  of  captivity  and  entire  seclu- 
sion from  his  friends.  No  one,  however  sensible  to  the  in- 
firmities of  Charles's  disposition  and  the  defects  of  his  under- 
standing, can  refuse  admiration  to  that  patient  firmness  and 
unaided  acuteness  which  he  displayed  throughout  the  last 
and  most  melancholy  year  of  his  life.  He  had  now  aban- 
doned all  expectation  of  obtaining  any  present  terms  for  the 
church  or  crown.  He  proposed,  therefore,  what  he  had  pri- 
vately empowered  Murray  to  offer  the  year  before,  to  con- 
firm the  presbyterian  government  for  three  years,  and  to  give 
up  the  militia  during  his  whole  life,  with  other  concessions  of 
importance.2  To  preserve  the  church  lands  from  sale,  to 
shield  his  friends  from  proscription,  to  obtain  a  legal  security 

better    informed    of   all    circumstances  the  parliament  in  that  month.     Herbert 

than  she  could  be;    but  she  might  be  mentions  an   intercepted    letter  of   the 

entirely  easy  as  to  whatever  concessions  queen  (Memoirs,  60) ;  and  even  his  story 

he  should  make  them  ;  for  that  he  should  proves  that  Cromwell  and  his  party  broke 

know  in  due  time  how  to  deal  with  the  off  with  Charles  from  a  conviction  of  his 

rogues,  who,  instead  of  a  silken  garter,  dissimulation.    See  Laing's  note,  iii.  562; 

should  be  fitted  with  a  hempen   cord,  and  the  note  by  Strype,  therein  referred 

So   the   letter  ended ;   which  answer  as  to,  on  Kennet's  Complete  Hist,  of  Eng- 

they  waited  for  so  they  intercepted  ac-  land,  iii.  170,  which  speaks  of  a  "  coti- 

cordingly,   and  it   determined   his   fate,  stant  tradition "  about  this  story,  and  is 

This  letter  lord  Oxford  said  he  had  of-  more  worthy  of  notice,   because  it  was 

fered  500i.  for."  written   before   the    publication   of   lord 

The  authenticity  of  this  latter  story  has  Orrery's  Memoirs,  or  of  the  Kichardson- 

been   constantly  rejected  by  Hume  and  iana. 

the  advocates  of  Charles  in  general ;  and  l  Ashburnham  gives  us  to  understand 
for  one  reason  among  others,  tha*'  it  looks  that  the  king  had  made  choice  of  the 
like  a  misrepresentation  of  that  told  by  Isle  of  Wight  previously  to  his  leaving 
lord  Orrery,  which  both  stands  on  good  Hampton  Court,  but  probably  at  his 
authority,  and  is  perfectly  conformable  own  suggestion.  This  seems  confirmed 
to  all  the  memoirs  of  the  time.  I  have,  by  the  king's  letter  in  Burnet's  Mem.  of 
however,  been  informed  that  a  memoran-  Dukes  of  Hamilton,  326.  Clarendon's 
dum  nearly  conformable  to  Richardson's  account  is  a  romance,  with  a  little  mix- 
anecdote  is  extant,  in  the  handwriting  of  ture,  probably,  of  truth.  But  Ashburn- 
lord  Oxford.  ham's  Narrative,  published  in  1830, 

It  is  possible  that  this  letter  is  the  same  proves  that  he  suggested  the  Isle  of 
with  that  mentioned  by  lord  Orrery;  Wight  in  consequence  of  the  king's 
and  in  that  case  was  written  in  the  being  forced  to  abandon  a  design  he  had 
mouth  of  October.  Cromwell  seems  to  formed  of  going  to  London,  the  Scots 
have  been  in  treaty  with  the  king  as  late  commissioners  retracting  their  engage- 
as  September  ;  and  advised  him,  accord-  ment  to  support  him. 
ing  to  Berkley,  to  reject  the  proposals  of  *  Pail.  Hist.  799. 


CHA.  I.  — 1642-49.        VOTES  AGAINST  HIM.  609 

for  the  restoration  of  the  monarchy  in  his  son,  were  from 
henceforth  the  main  objects  of  all  his  efforts.  It  was,  how- 
ever, far  too  late,  even  for  these  moderate  conditions  of 
peace.  Upon  his  declining  to  pass  four  bills  tendered  to  him 
as  preliminaries  of  a  treaty,  which,  on  that  very  account,  be- 
sides his  objections  to  part  of  their  contents,  he  justly  consid- 
ered as  unfair,  the  parliament  voted  that  no  more  addresses 
should  be  made  to  him,  and  that  they  would  re-  A1 

.  ,       __  ,  *      ,   .  alarming 

ceive  no  more  messages.1     He  was  placed  in  close  ™tes 
and  solitary  confinement ;  and  at  a  meeting  of  the  agaiD 
principal  officers  at  Windsor  it  was  concluded  to  bring  him 
to  trial,  and  avenge  the  blood  shed  in  the  war  by  an  awful 
example  of  punishment;  Cromwell  and  Ireton,  if  either  of 
them  had  been  ever  favorable  to  the  king,  acceded  at  this 
time  to  the  severity  of  the  rest. 

Yet,  in  the  midst  of  this  peril  and  seeming  abandonment, 
his  affairs  were  really  less  desperate  than  they  had  been; 
and  a  few  rays  of  light  broke  for  a  time  through  the  clouds 
that  enveloped  him.  From  the  hour  that  the  Scots  delivered 
him  up  at  Newcastle  they  seem  to  have  felt  the  discredit  of 
such  an  action,  .and  longed  for  the  opportunity  of  redeeming 
their  public  name.  •  They  perceived  more  and  more  that  a 
well-disciplined  army,  under  a  subtle  chief  inveterately  hos- 
tile to  them,  were  rapidly  becoming  masters  of  England. 
Instead  of  that  covenanted  alliance,  that  unity  in  church  and 
state  they  had  expected,  they  were  to  look  for  all  the  jealousy 
and  dissension  that  a  complete  discordance  in  civil  and 
spiritual  polity  could  inspire.  Their  commissioners  therefore 
in  England,  the  earl  of  Lanark,  always  a  moderate  royalist, 
and  the  earl  of  Lauderdale,  a  warm  pres.byterian,  had  kept 

'  Jan.  15.    This  vote  was  carried  by  Sidney  and  Evelyn  tellers  for  the  ayea, 

141  to  92.     Id.  831 ;  and  see  Append,  to  Martin  and  Morley  for  the  noes.     The 

2d  vol.  of  Clar.  State  Papers.     Cromwell  increase  of  the  minority  is  reinurkalile, 

was    now   vehement   against   the    king,  and  shows  how  much  the  king's  refusal 

though   he  hud  voted  in  his  favor  on  of  the  terms  offered  him  in  September, 

Sept.  22.    Journals ;  and  Berkley,  372.  and   his  escape  from    Hampton  Court, 

A  proof  that  the  king  was  meant  to  be  had  swollen  the  commonwealth   party  ; 

wholly  rejected  is,  that  at  this  time,  In  to  which,  by  the  way,  colonel  Sidney  ut 

the  list  of  the  navy,  tb"  expression  "  hifl  this  time  seems  not  to  have  belonged, 

majesty's  ship"  was  changed  to  "the  Ludlow  says,  that  party  hoped  the  king 

parliament's  ship  "     Whitelock.  291.  would  not  grant  the  four  bill*  : 

The  four  bills  were  founded  on  four  The  commons  published  a  declaration  of 

propositions  (for  which  I  refer  to  Hume  their  reasons  for  making  no  further  ad- 

or    the    Parliamentary   History,  not   to  dresses  to  the  king,  wherein  they  more 

Clarendon,  who  has  misstated  them)  sent  than  insinuate  his  participation     i  tb* 

down  from  the  lords.    The  lower  house  murder  of  his  father  by  Buckingham 

Voted  to  agree  with  them  by  115  to  106 ;  Parl.  Hist.  847. 

VOL.  i.  —  c.  3i) 


CIO  ASCENDENCY  OF  THE  PRESBYTERIANS.      CHAP.  X 

up  a  secret  intercourse  with  the  king  at  Hampton  Court. 
Scots  in-  After  his  detention  at  Carisbrook,  they  openly  de- 
vaswn.  clared  themselves  against  the  four  bills  proposed 

by  the  English  parliament,  and  at  length  concluded  a  private 
treaty  with  him,  by  which,  on  certain  terms  quite  as  favor- 
able as  he  could  justly  expect,  they  bound  themselves  to 
enter  England  with  an  army  in  order  to  restore  him  to  his 
freedom  and  dignity.1  This  invasion  was  to  be  combined 
with  risings  in  various  parts  of  the  country :  the  presbyterian 
and  royalist,  though  still  retaining  much  of  animosity  towards- 
each  other,  concurring  at  least  in  abhorrence  of  military 
usurpation ;  and  the  common  people  having  very  generally 
returned  to  that  affectionate  respect  for  the  king's  person, 
which  sympathy  for  his  sufferings,  and  a  sense  how  little 
they  had  been  gainers  by  the  change  of  government,  must 
naturally  have  excited.2  The  unfortunate  issue  of  the  Scots 
expedition  under  the  duke  of  Hamilton,  and  of  the  various 
insurrections  throughout  England,  quelled  by  the  vigilance 
and  good  conduct  of  Fairfax  and  Cromwell,  is  well  known. 
But  these  formidable  manifestations  of  the  public 
byteriam"  sentiment  in  favor  of  peace  with  the  king  on  hon- 
regainthe  orable  conditions,  wherein  the  city  of  London, 

ascendant.  7  i 

ruled  by  the  presbyterian  ministers,  took  a  share, 
compelled  the  house  of  commons  to  retract  its  measures. 
They  came  to  a  vote,  by  165  to  99,  that  they  would  not  alter 
the  fundamental  government  by  king,  lords,  and  commons ;  * 
they  abandoned  their  impeachment  against  seven  peers,  the 
most  moderate  of  the  upper  house,  and  the  most  obnoxious 

1  Clarendon,  whose   aversion    to    the  July  25,  1648,  the  commons  gave  as  a 
Scots  warps  his  judgment,  says  that  this  reason  for  insisting  on  the   king's  sur- 
treaty  contained  many  things  dishonor-  render  of  the  militia  as  a  preliminary  to 
able  to  the  English  nation.     Hist.  v.  532.  a  treaty,  that  such  was  the  disaffection 
The  king  lost  a  good  deal  in  the  eyes  of  to  the  parliament  on  all  sides  that  with- 
this  uncompromising  statesman  by  the  out  the  militia  they  could  never  be  se- 
concessions    he    made    in    the    Isle    of  cure.     Rush.  Abr.  vi.  444.     "  The  chief 
Wight.     State   Papers,   387.     I  cannot,  citizens  of  London,"  says  May,  122,  "and 
for  niy  own  part,  see  anything  deroga-  others  called  presbyterians,  though  the 
tory  to  England  in  the  treaty;  for  the  presbyterian  Scots  abominated  this  army, 
temporary  occupation  of  a  few  fortified  wished   good  success    to  these   Scots  no 
towns  in  the  north  can  hardly  be  called  less  than  the  malignants  did.     Whence 
BO.      Charles,   there  is  some   reason   to  let  the  reader  judge  of  the  times."     The 
think,  had  on  a  former  occasion  made  fugitive  sheets  of  this  year,  such  as  the 
offers  to  the  Scots  far  more  inconsistent  Mercurius  Aulicus,  bear  witness  to  the 
with  his  duty  to  this  kingdom.  exulting  and  insolent  tone  of  the  royal- 

2  Clarendon.      May,    Breviate    of   the  ists.      They   chuckle  over    Fairfax   and 
Hist,   of   the    Parliament,   in   Maseres's  Cromwell  as  if  they  had  caught  a  couple 
Tracts,  i.  113  ;  Whitelock.  307,  317,  &c.  of  rats  in  a  trap. 

In  a  conference  between  the  two  houses,        3  April  28,  1648.     Parl.  Hist.  883. 


CHA.  I.  - 1642-49.      TREATY  OF  NEWPORT.  611 

to  the  army ; *  they  restored  the  eleven  members  to  their 
seats ; 2  they  revoked  their  resolution  against  a  personal 
treaty  with  the  king,  and  even  that  which  required  his  assent 
by  certain  preliminary  articles.8  In  a  word,  the  party  for 
distinction's  sake  called  presbyterian,  but  now  rather  to  be 
denominated  constitutional,  regained  its  ascendency.  This 
change  in  the  councils  of  parliament  brought  on  the  treaty 
of  Newport. 

The  treaty  of  Newport  was  set  on  foot  and  managed  by 
those  politicians  of  the  house  of  lords  who,  having  Treaty  of 
long  suspected  no  danger  to  themselves  but  from  NewP°rt- 
the  power  of  the  king,  had  discovered,  somewhat  of  the  lat- 
est, that  the  crown  itself  was  at  stake,  and  that  their  own 
privileges  were  set  on  the  same  cast.  Nothing  was  more  re- 
mote from  the  intentions  of  the  earl  of  Northumberland  or 
lord  Say  than  to  see  themselves  pushed  from  their  seats 
by  such  upstarts  as  Ireton  and  Harrison ;  and  their  present 
mortification  afforded  a  proof  how  men  reckoned  wise  in 
their  generation  become  the  dupes  of  their  own  selfish,  craf- 
ty, and  pusillanimous  policy.  They  now  grew  anxious  to 
see  a  treaty  concluded  with  the  king.  Sensible  that  it  was 
necessary  to  anticipate,  if  possible,  the  return  of  Cromwell 
from  the  north,  they  implored  him  to  comply  at  once  with  all 
the  propositions  of  parliament,  or  at  least  to  yield  in  the  first 
instance  as  far  as  he  meant  to  go.4  They  had  not,  however, 

1  June  6.    These  peers  were  the  earls  appear  from  the  following  short  review  of 
Of  Suffolk,  Middlesex,  and  Lincoln,  lords  what  had  been  done.    1.  At  Newmarket, 
Willoughby  of  Parham,  Berkley,  Huns-  in  June,  1642,  he  absolutely  refused  the 
don,  and  Mayuard.  They  were  impeached  nineteen  propositions  tendered  to  him  by 
for  sitting  in  the  house  during  the  tu-  the  lords  and  commons.    2.  In  the  treaty 
mults  from  26th  of  July  to  6th  of  August,  of  Oxford.  March,  1643.  he  seems  tc 
1647.    The  earl  of  Pembroke,  who  had  made  no  concessions,  not  even  pr 

also  continued  to  sit,  merely  because  he  an  amnesty  to  those  he  had  already  ex- 
was  too  stupid  to  discover  which  party  eluded  from  pardon.  A.  In  the  treaty  or 
was  likely  to  prevail,  escaped  by  truck-  Dxbridge  no  mention  was  made  on  nil 
ling  to  the  new  powers.  side  of  exclusion  from  pardon;  hoeOmd 

2  June  8  to  vest  the  n»mi»  for  seven  years  in  OCHII- 
s  See  Parl.  Hist.  823, 892.  904  921,  924,  missioned  jointly  appointed  by  li 

959,  996,  for  the  different  votes  on  this  and  parliament,  so  that  it  ghoul.!  aft. 

subject,  wherein  the  presbyterians  grad-  wards  return  to  him,  an. 

ually  beat  the  independent  or  republican  jurisdiction   of  the   bishops.     4.  In 

party,  but  with  very  small  and  precarious  winter  of  1645  he  not  only  offered  to, 

majorities  band  his  forces,  but  to  let  the  militia  be 

'Clarendon,  vi.  155.   He  is  very  absurd  vested  for  seven  years  in  comm 

in  imagining  that  anv  of  the  parliamen-  to  be  appointed  by  the  two  bOMH 

tary    commissioners  -  would    have    been  afterwards  to  be  settled  by  biU ,  also  to 

satisfied  with  "an  act  of  indemnity  and  give  the  nomination  of  officer*  of 

oblivion."  and  judges  pro  Me  vice  to  the  h. 


612 


TREATY  OF  NEWPORT. 


CHAP.  X 


mitigated  in  any  degree  the  rigorous  conditions  so  often  pro- 
posed ;  nor  did  the  king  during  this  treaty  obtain  any  recip- 
rocal concession  worth  mentioning  in  return  for  his  surrender 
of  almost  all  that  could  be  demanded.  Did  the  positive 
adherence  of  the  parliament  to  all  these  propositions,  in  cir- 
cumstances so  perilous  to  themselves,  display  less  unreason- 
able pertinacity  than  that  so  often  imputed  to  Charles  ?  Or 
if,  as  was  the  fact,  the  majority  which  the  pVesbyterians  had 
obtained  was  so  precarious  that  they  dared  not  hazard  it  by 
suggesting  any  more  moderate  counsels,  what  rational  secu- 
rity would  the  treaty  have  afforded  him,  had  he  even  come  at 
once  into  all  their  requisitions  ?  His  real  error  was  to  have 
entered  upon  any  treaty,  and  still  more  to  have  drawn  it  out 
by  tardy  and  ineffectual  capitulations.  There  had  long  been 
only  one  course  either  for  safety  or  for  honor,  the  abdication 
of  his  royal  office ;  now  probably  too  late  to  preserve  his  life, 

copacy,  and  the  continuance  of  presby- 
terian  government  for  three  years  ;  the 
whole  matter  to  be  afterwards  settled  by 
bill  on  the  advice  of  the  assembly  of  di- 
vines, and  twenty  more  of  his  own  nomi- 
nation .  6.  In  his  letter  from  Carisbrook, 
Nov.  1647,  he  gave  up  the  militia  for  his 
life.  This  was  in  etfect  to  sacrifice  almost 
everything  as  to  immediate  power  ;  but 
he  struggled  to  save  the  church  lands 
from  confiscation,  which  would  have 
rendered  it  hardly  practicable  to  restore 
episcopacy  in  future.  His  future  con- 
cessions in  the  treaty  of  Newport,  though 
very  slowly  extorted,  were  comparatively 
trifling. 

What  Clarendon  thought  of  the  treaty 
of  Newport  may  be  imagined.  "  You 
may  easily  conclude,"  he  writes  to  Digby, 
"  how  fit  a  counsellor  I  am  like  to  be, 
when  the  best  that  is  proposed  is  that 
which  I  would  not  consent  unto  to  pre- 
serve the  kingdom  from  ashes.  I  can  tell 
you  worse  of  myself  than  this ;  which  is, 
that  there  may  be  some  reasonable  ex- 
pedients which  possibly  might  in  truth 
restore  and  preserve  all,  in  which  I  could 
bear  no  part."  P.  459.  See  also  pp.  351 
and  416.  I  do  not  divine  what  he  means 
by  this,  unless  it  were  the  king's  abdica- 
tion. But  what  he  could  not  have  ap- 
proved was,  that  the  king  had  no 
thoughts  of  dealing  sincerely  with  the 
parliament  in  this  treaty,  and  gave  Or- 


pj\ ^ _u  ^     „. , „  VM. 

niond  directions  to  obey  all  his  wife's 
commands,  but  not  to  obey  any  further 
orders  he  might  send,  nor  to  be  startled 
at  his  great  concessions  respecting  Ire- 
land, for  they  would  come  to  nothing. 
Carte's  Papers,  i.  185.  See  Mr.  Biodie's 
remarks  ou  this,  iv.  143-146.  lie  had 


agreed  to  give  up  the  government  of  Ire- 
land for  twenty  years  to  the  parliament. 
In  his  letter  sent  from  Holmby  in  May, 
1647,  he  had  declared  that  he  would  give 
full  satisfaction  with  respect  to  Ireland. 
But  he  thus  explains  himself  to  the 
queen  :  —  "I  have  so  couched  that 
article  that,  if  the  Irish  give  me  cause, 
I  may  interpret  it  enough  to  their  ad- 
vantage. For  I  only  say  that  I  will  give 
them  (the  two  houses)  full  satisfaction  as 
to  the  management  of  the  war,  nor  do  I 
promise  to  continue  the  war ;  so  that,  if 
I  find  reason  to  make  a  good  peace  there, 
my  engagement  is  at  an  end.  Wherefore 
make  this  my  interpretation  known  to 
the  Irish."  "  AVhat  reliance,"  says  Mr. 
Laing,  from  whom  I  transcribe  this  pas- 
sage (which  I  cannot  find  in  the  Claren- 
don State  Papers  quoted  by  him),  "  could 
parliament  place  at  the  beginning  of  the 
dispute,  or  at  any  subsequent  period,  on 
the  word  or  moderation  of  a  prince  whose 
solemn  and  written  declarations  were  so 
full  of  equivocation?"  Hist,  of  Scot- 
land, iii.  409.  It  may  here  be  added 
that,  though  Charles  had  given  his 
parole  to  colonel  Hammond,  and  had  the 
sentinels  removed  in  consequence,  he 
was  engaged  during  most  part  of  his 
stay  at  Carishrook  in  schemes  for  an 
escape.  See  Col.  Cooke's  Narrative, 
printed  with  Herbert's  Memoirs  ;  and 
in  Hush.  Abr.  vi.  684.  But  his  enemies 
were  apprised  of  this  intention,  and  even 
of  an  attempt  to  escape  by  removing  a  bar 
of  his  window,  as  appears  by  the  letters 
from  the  committee  of  Derby  House, 
Cromwell  and  others,  to  col.  Hammond, 
published  in  1664. 


CHA.  I.  — 1642-49.     SCHEMES  OF  PARLIAMENT-MEN.  613 

but  still  more  honorable  than  the  treaty  of  Newport.  Yet 
though  he  was  desirous  to  make  his  escape  to  France,  I  have 
not  observed  any  hint  that  he  had  thoughts  of  resigning  the 
crown ;  whether  from  any  mistaken  sense  of  obligation,  or 
from  an  apprehension  that  it  might  affect  the  succession  of 
his  son. 

There  can  be  no  more  erroneous  opinion  than  that  of  such 
as  believe  that  the  desire  of  overturning  the  monarchy  pro- 
duced the  civil  war,  rather  than  that  the  civil  war  brought 
on  the  former.  In  a  peaceful  and  ancient  kingdom  like 
England  the  thought  of  change  could  not  spontaneously 
arise.  A  very  few  speculative  men,  by  the  study  of  antiq- 
uity, or  by  observation  of  the  prosperity  of  Venice  and 
Holland,  might  be  led  to  an  abstract  preference  of  republi- 
can politics ;  some  fanatics  might  aspire  to  a  Jewish  the- 
ocracy ;  but  at  the  meeting  of  the  long  parliament  we  have 
not  the  slightest  cause  to  suppose  that  any  party,  or  any 
number  of  persons  among  its  members,  had  formed  what 
must  then  have  appeared  so  extravagant  a  conception.1  The 
insuperable  distrust  of  the  king's  designs,  the  irritation  ex- 
cited by  the  sufferings  of  the  war,  the  impracticability,  which 
every  attempt  at  negotiation  displayed,  of  obtaining  his  ac- 
quiescence to  terms  deemed  indispensable,  gradually  created 
a  powerful  faction,  whose  chief  bond  of  union  was  a  deter- 
mination to  set  him  aside.2  What  further  scheme  they  had 
planned  is  uncertain :  none  probably  in  which  any  number 
were  agreed :  some  looked  to  the  prince  of  Wales,  others, 
perhaps,  at  one  time  to  the  elector  palatine ; 8  but  necessity 

1  Clarendon  mentions   an   expression  these  exceptions,  I  know  not  that  we  can 

that  dropped  from  Henry  Martin  in  con-  fix  on  any  individual  member  of  parlia- 

versation,  not  long  after  the  meeting  of  nient  the  charge  of  an  intention  to  sub- 

the  parliament :  "  I  do  not  think  one  man  vert  the  constitution  till  1646  or  1647. 

wise  enough  to  govern  us  all."   This  may  «  Pamphlets  may  be  found  as  early  aa 

doubtless  be  taken  in  a  sense  perfectly  1643  which  breathe  this  spirit ;  but  they 


lingworth  had  before  incurred  the  same  »  Charles  Louis,  elector  palatine,  eldur 

punishment  for  a  like  offence,  December  brother  of  the  princes  Rupert  and  Slau- 

1.  1641.   Nelson,  ii.  714.     Sir  Henry  Lud-  rice,  gave  cause  to  suspect  that  he  was 

low,  father  of  the  regicide,  was  also  cen-  looking  towards  the  throne.    Ho  left  the 

Bured  on  the  same  account.    As  the  op-  king's  quarters,  where  he  had  been  at  the 


surne,  took  up  republican  principles  pret-    parliament,  disclaiming  and  renouncing 
ty  early ;  perhaps  also  Uaslerig.     With    prince  Rupert,  and  begging  their  own 


614:       PROGRESS  OF  REPUBLICAN  PARTY.    CHAP.  X. 

itself  must  have  suggested  to  many  the  idea  of  a  republican 
settlement.  In  the  new-modelled  army  of  1645,  composed 
of  independents  and  enthusiasts  of  every  denomination,  a 
fervid  eagerness  for  changes  in  the  civil  polity,  as  well  as  in 
religion,  was  soon  found  to  predominate.  Not  checked,  like 
the  two  houses,  by  attachment  to  forms,  and  by  the  influence 
of  lawyers,  they  launched  forth  into  varied  projects  of  re- 
form, sometimes  judicious,  or  at  least  plausible,  sometimes 
wildly  fanatical.  They  reckoned  the  king  a  tyrant,  whom, 
as  they  might  fight  against,  they  might  also  put  to  death,  and 
whom  it  were  folly  to  provoke  if  he  were  again  to  become 
their  master.  Elated  with  their  victories,  they  began  already 
in  imagination  to  carve  out  the  kingdom  for  themselves ; 
and  remembered  that  saying  so  congenial  to  a  revolutionary 
army,  "  that  the  first  of  monarchs  was  a  successful  leader, 
the  first  of  nobles  were  his  followers."  * 

The  knowledge  of  this  innovating  spirit  in  the  army  gave 
confidence  to  the  violent  party  in  parliament,  and 

Gradual  .  -,  ..  ,  i_        i_  •  n 

progress  of  increased  its  numbers  by  the  accession  of  some  of 
a  repub-  those  to  whom  nature  has  given  a  fine  sense  for 

lican  party.       ,.  .     .  ,  °  _ 

discerning  their  own  advantage.     It  was  doubtless 
swollen  through  the  publication  of  the  king's  letters,  and  his 

pensions  might  be  paid.  He  came  over  more  than  all  their  discourses  of  destroy- 
to  London  in  August,  1644,  took  the  cov-  ing  monarchy  ;  and  that  towards  this  end 
enant,  and  courted  the  parliament.  They  they  find  assistance  from  those  who  from 
showed,  however,  at  first,  a  good  deal  of  their  hearts  abhor  their  confusions."  P. 
jealousy  of  him  ;  and  intimated  that  his  308.  These  expressions  seem  more  ap- 
affairs  would  prosper  better  by  his  leaving  plicable  by  far  to  the  elector  than  to 
the  kingdom.  Whitelock,  101.  Rush.  Cromwell.  But  the  former  was  not  dan- 
Abr.  iv.  359.  He  did  not  take  this  hint,  gerous  to  the  parliament,  though  it  was 
and  obtained  next  year  an  allowance  of  deemed  fit  to  treat  him  with  respect.  In 
8000Z.  per  annum.  Id.  145.  Lady  Kane-  March,  1647,  we  find  a  committee  of  both 
lagh,  in  a  letter  to  Hyde,  March,  1644,  houses  appointed  to  receive  some  intel- 
conjuring  him,  by  his  regard  for  lord  ligence  which  the  prince  elector  desired  to 
Falkland's  memory,  to  use  all  his  infill-  communicate  to  the  parliament  of  great 
ence  to  procure  a  message  from  the  king  importance  to  the  protestant  religion, 
for  a  treaty,  adds,  "Methiuks  what  I  Whitelock,  241.  Nothing  further  appears 
have  informed  my  aister,  and  what  she  about  this  intelligence ;  which  looks  as  if 
will  inform  you,  of  the  posture  the  he  were  merely  afraid  of  being  forgotten, 
prince  elector's  affairs  are  in  here,  should  He  left  England  in  1649.  and  died  in  1680. 
be  a  motive  to  hasten  away  this  message."  1  Baxter's  Life,  50.  '  He  ascribes  the 
Clar.  State  Papers,  ii.  167.  Clarendon  increase  of  enthusiasm  in  the  army  to 
himself,  in  a  letter  to  Nicholas,  Dee.  12,  the  loss  of  its  presbyterian  chaplains, 
1646  (where  he  gives  his  opinion  that  the  who  left  it  for  their  benefices,  on  the  re- 
Independents  look  more  to  a  change  of  duction  of  the  king's  party  and  the  new- 
the  king  and  his  line  than  of  the  monar-  modelling  of  the  troops.  The  officers 
ehy  itself,  and  would  restore  the  full  pre-  then  took  on  them  to  act  as  preachers, 
rogative  of  the  crown  to  one  of  their  own  Id.  54 ;  and  Neal,  183.  I  conceive  that 
choice),  proceeds  in  these  remarkable  the  year  1645  is  that  to  which  we  must 
words :  "  And  I  pray  God  they  have  not  refer  the  appearance  of  a  republican 
euch  a  nose  of  wax  ready  for  their  im-  party  in  considerable  numbers,  though 
This  it  is  makes  me  tremble  not  yet  amoug  the  house  of  commons. 


CHA.  I.  —  1642-49.  PROGRESS  OF  REPUBLICAN  PARTY.   615 

pertinacity  in  clinging  to  his  prerogative.  And  the  com- 
plexion of  the  house  of  commons  was  materially  altered  by 
the  introduction  at  once  of  a  large  body  of  fresh  members. 
They  had  at  the  beginning  abstained  from  issuing  writs  to 
replace  those  whose  death  or  expulsion  had  left  their  seats 
vacant.  These  vacancies,  by  the  disabling  votes  against  all 
the  king's  party,1  became  so  numerous  that  it  seemed  a  glar- 
ing violation  of  the  popular  principles  to  which  they  appealed 
to  carry  on  the  public  business  with  so  maimed  a  representa- 
tion of  the  people.  It  was,  however,  plainly  impossible  to 
have  elections  in  many  parts  of  the  kingdom  while  the  royal 
army  was  in  strength ;  and  the  change,  by  filling  up  nearly 
two  hundred  vacancies  at  once,  was  likely  to  become  so  im- 
portant, that  some  feared  that  the  cavaliers,  others  that  the 
independents  and  republicans,  might  find  their  advantage  in 
it.2  The  latter  party  were  generally  earnest  for  pew  elec- 
tions ;  and  carried  then*  point  against  the  presbyterians  in 
September,  1645,  when  new  write  were  ordered  for  all  the 
places  which  were  left  deficient  of  one  or  both  representa- 
tives.8 The  result  of  these  elections,  though  a  few  persons 
rather  friendly  to  the  king  came  into  the  house,  was  on  the 
whole  very  favorable  to  the  army.  The  self-denying  ordi- 
nance no  longer  being  in  operation,  the  principal  officers 
were  elected  on  every  side  ;  and,  with  not  many  exceptions, 
recruited  the  ranks  of  that  small  body  which  had  already 
been  marked  by  implacable  dislike  of  the  king,  and  by  zeal 
for  a  total  new-modelling  of  the  government4  In  the  sum- 
mer of  1646  this  party  had  so  far  obtained  the  upper  hand, 
that,  according  to  one  of  our  best  authorities,  the  Scots  com- 

1  These  passed  against  the  royalist  *  That  the  house  of  commons  in  De- 
members  separately,  and  for  the  most  cember,  1646,  entertained  no  views  of 
part  in  the  first  months  of  the  war.  altering  the  fundamental  cont,titution, 

*  "  The  best  friends  of  the  parliament  appears  from  some  of  their  resolutions  as 
were  net  without  fears  what  the  issue  of  to  conditions  of  peace  :  "  That  Fwrfij* 
the  new  elections  might  be ;  for  though  should  hare  an  earldom,  with  6000/. 
the  people  durst  not  choose  such  as  were  a-year;  Cromwell  and  Waller  baronies, 
open  enemies  to  them,  yet  probably  they  with  half  that  estate ;  Essex,  North- 
would  such  as  were  most  likely  to  be  for  umberland,  and  two  more,  be  mad* 
a  peace  on  any  terms,  corruptly  prefer-  dukes;  Manchester  and  Salisbury  mar- 
ring the  fruition  of  their  estates  and  quises;  and  other  peers  of  their  party 
sensual  enjoyments  before  the  public  be  elevated  to  higher  ranks;  lliisleng, 
iuterest,"  &.c.  Ludlow.  i.  168.  This  is  Stapylton,  and  Skipton  to  have  pen- 
a  fair  confession  how  little  the  common-  sions."  Par).  Ilist.  403.  WmttlOCK,UH. 
wealth  party  had  the  support  of  the  These  votes  do  not  speak  much  for  the 
nation  magnanimity  and  disinterestedness  ol 
'  3  C.  'journals.  Whitelock,  168.  The  that  assembly,  though  it  may  suit  pollt. 
borough  01  Southwark  had  just  before  ical  romancers  to  declaim  about  it. 
petitioned  for  a  new  writ,  its  member 
beiug  daad  or  disabled. 


616       PROGEESS  OF  REPUBLICAN  PARTY.    CHAP.  X. 

missioners  had  all  imaginable  difficulty  to  prevent  his  deposi- 
tion. In  the  course  of  the  year  1647  more  overt  proofs  of 
a  design  to  change  the  established  constitution  were  given  by 
a  party  out  of  doors.  A  petition  was  addressed  "  to  the 
supreme  authority  of  this  nation,  the  commons  assembled  in 
parliament."  It  was  voted  upon  a  division  that  the  house 
dislikes  this  petition,  and  cannot  approve  of  its  being  deliv- 
ered ;  and  afterwards,  by  a  majority  of  only  94  to  86,  that 
it  was  seditious  and  insolent,  and  should  be  burnt  by  the 
hangman.1  Yet  the  first  decisive  proof,  perhaps,  which  the 
journals  of  parliament  afford  of  the  existence  of  a  republi- 
can party,  was  the  vote  of  22d  September,  1647,  that  they 
would  once  again  make  application  to  the  king  for  those 
things  which  they  judged  necessary  for  the  welfare  and  safe- 
ty of  the  kingdom.  This  was  carried  by  70  to  23.2  Their 
subsequent  resolution  of  January  4, 1 648,  against  any  further 
addresses  to  the  king,  which  passed  by  a  majority  of  141  to 
91,  was  a  virtual  renunciation  of  allegiance.  The  lords,  after 
a  warm  debate,  concurred  in  this  vote.  And  the  army  had 
in  November,  1647,  before  the  king's  escape  from  Hampton 
Court,  published  a  declaration  of  their  design  for  the  settle- 
ment of  the  nation  under  a  sovereign  representative  assem- 
bly, which  should  possess  authority  to  make  or  repeal  laws, 
and  to  call  magistrates  to  account. 

We  are  not  certainly  to  conclude  that  all  who,  in  1648, 
had  made  up  their  minds  against  the  king's  restoration,  were 
equally  averse  to  all  regal  government.  The  prince  of  Wales 

1  Commons'  Journals,  May  4  and  18,  the  minority.    I  suppose  it  is  from  some 
1647.    This  minority  were  not,  in  gen-  of  these  divisions  that  baron  Maseres  has 
eral,  republican  ;  but  were  unwilling  to  reckoned   the    republican  party  in  the 
increase  the  irritation  of  the  army  by  so  house  not  to  exceed  thirty. 

strong  a  vote.  It  was  resolved  on  Nov.  6, 1647,  that 

2  Commons'  Journals.   Whitelock,  271.  the  king  of  England,  for  the  time  being, 
Parl.  Hist.  781.    They  had  just  been  ex-  was  bound,  injustice  and  by  the  duty  of 
asperated  by  his  evasion  of  their  propo-  his  office,  to  give  his  assent  to  all  such 
eitions.   Id.  778.    By  the  smallness  of  the  laws  as  by  the  lords  and  commons  in  par- 
numbers,  and  the  names  of  the  tellers,  it  liament  shall  be  adjudged  to  be  for  the 
seems  as  if  the  presbyterian  party  had  good  of  the  kingdom,  and  by  them  ten- 
been  almost  entirely  absent;   which  may  dered  unto  him  for  his  assent.     But  the 
be  also  inferred  from  other  parts  of  the  previous  question  was  carried  on  the  fol- 
Journals.    See  October  9,  for.  a  long  list  lowing  addition  :  '•  And  in  case  the  laws 
of  absentees.     Haslerig  and  Evelyn,  both  so  offered  unto  him  shall  not  thereupon 
of  the  army  faction,  told  the  ayes,  Mar-  be  assented  unto  by  him,  that  neverthe- 
tin  and  sir  Peter  Wentworth  the  noes,  less  th^y  are  as  valid  to  all  intents  and 
The  house  had  divided  the  day  before  on  purpose  as  if  his  assent  had  been  there- 
the  question  for  going  into  a  committee  unto  had  and  obtained,  which  they  do 
to  take  this  matter  into  consideration,  84  insist    upon    as  an   undoubted    right." 
to  34 ;  Cromwell  and  Evelyn  telling  the  Commons'  Journals. 

majority,  Went  worth  and  Kainsborough 


CHA.  I.  — 1642-49.   SCHEME  FOR  TRIAL  OF  CHARLES    617 

had  taken  so  active,  and,  for  a  moment,  so  successful  a  share 
in  the  war  of  that  year,  that  his  father's  enemies  were  become 
his  own.  Meetings  however  were  held,  where  the  military 
and  parliamentary  chiefs  discussed  the  schemes  of  raising  the 
duke  of  York,  or  his  younger  brother  the  duke  of  Glocester, 
to  the  throne.  Cromwell  especially  wavered,  or  pretended 
to  waver,  as  to  the  settlement  of  the  nation  ;  nor  is  there  any 
evidence,  so  far  as  I  know,  that  he  had  ever  professed  himself 
averse  to  monarchy,  till,  dexterously  mounting  on  the  wave 
which  he  could  not  stem,  he  led  on  those  zealots  who  had 
resolved  to  celebrate  the  inauguration  of  their  new  common- 
wealth with  the  blood  of  a  victim  king.1 

It  was  about  the  end  of  1647,  as  I  have  said,  that  the 
principal  officers  took   the  determination,  which  Scheme 
had  been  already  menaced  by  some  of  the  agi-  oaS  of* 
tators,  of  bringing  the  king,  as  the  first  and  great-  bringing 
est   delinquent,   to   public   justice. a      Too   stern  trf^168 


1  Ludlow  says  that  Cromwell,  "  finding 
the  king's  friends  grow  strong  in  1648,  be- 
gan to  court  the  commonwealth's  party. 
The  latter  told  him  he  knew  how  to  cajole 
and  give  them  good  words  when  he  had 
occasion  to  make  use  of  them;  whereat, 
breaking  out  into  a  rage,  he  said  they 
were  a  proud  sort  of  people,  and  only 
considerable  in  their  own  conceits."  P. 
240.  Does  this  look  as  if  he  had  been 
reckoned  one  of  them  ? 

*  Clarendon  says  that  there  were  many 
consultations  ameng  the  officers  about  the 
best  mode  of  disposing  of  the  king ;  some 
were  for  deposing  him,  others  for  poison 
or  assassination,  which,  he  fancies,  would 
liave  been  put  in  practice  if  they  could 
have  prevailed  on  Hammond.  But  this 
is  not  warranted  by  our  better  authori- 
ties. 

It  is  hard  to  say  at  what  time  the  first 
bold  man  dared  to  talk  of  bringing  the 
king  to  justice.  But  in  a  letter  of  Baillie 
to  Alexander  Henderson,  May  19,  1646, 
he  says,  •'  If  God  have  hardened  him,  so 
for  as  I  can  perceive,  this  people  will 
strive  to  have  him  in  their  power,  and 
make  an  example  of  him ;  I  abhor  to  think 
what  they  speak  of  execution;"  ii.  20; 
published  also  in  Dalrymple's  Memorials 
of  Charles  I.,  p.  166.  Proofs  may  also  be 
brought  from  pamphlets  by  Lilburne  and 
others  in  1647,  especially  towards  the  end 
of  that  year ;  and  the  remonstrance  of  the 
Scots  parliament,  dated  Aug.  13,  alludes 
to  such  language.  Rush.  Abr.  vi.  245. 
Berkley  indeed  positively  assures  us  that 
the  resolution  was  taken  at  Windsor,  in 
a  council  of  officers,  soon  after  the  king's 


confinement  at  Carisbrook ;  and  this  with 
so  much  particularity  of  circumstance 
that,  if  we  reject  his  account,  we  must  set 
aside  the  whole  of  his  memoirs  at  the 
same  time.  Maseres' Tracts,  i.  383.  But 
it  is  fully  confirmed  by  an  independent 
testimony,  William  Allen,  himxelf  one  of 
the  council  of  officers  and  adjutant-gen- 
eral of  the  army,  who,  in  a  letter  ad- 
dressed to  Fleetwood,  and  published  in 
1659,  declares  that,  after  much  consulta- 
tion and  prayer  at  Windsor  Castle,  in  the 
beginning  of  1648,  they  had  "  come  to  a 
very  clear  and  joint  resolution  that  it 
was  their  duty  to  call  Charles  Stuart,  that 
man  of  blood,  to  an  account  for  the  blood 
he  had  shed,  and  mischief  he  had  done  to 
his  utmost  against  the  Lord's  cause  and 
people  in  these  poor  nations."  This  in  to 
be  found  in  Somers'  Tracts,  vi.  499.  The 
only  discrepancy,  if  it  is  one,  between  him 
and  Berkley,  is  as  to  the  precise  time, 
which  the  other  seems  to  place  in  the  end 
of  1647.  But  this  might  be  lapse  of 
memory  in  either  party ;  nor  is  it  clear, 
on  looking  attentively  at  Berkley's  narra- 
tion, that  he  determines  the  time.  Ash- 
buruham  says.  "  For  some  days  before 
the  king's  remove  from  Hampton  Court, 
there  was  scarcely  a  day  in  which  several 
alarms  were  not  brought  him  by  and 
from  several  considerable  persons,  both 
well-affected  to  him  and  likely  to  know 
much  of  what  was  then  in  agitation,  of 
the  resolution  which  a  violent  party  in 
the  army  had  to  take  away  his  life.  And 
that  such  a  design  there  was,  there  were 
strong  insinuations  to  persuade."  See 
also  his  Narrative,  published  iu  1830 


618  WHICH  IS  FINALLY  DETERMINED.  CHAP.  X. 

and  haughty,  too  confident  of  the  righteousness  of  their 
actions,  to  think  of  private  assassination,  they  sought  to 
gratify  their  pride  by  the  solemnity  and  notoriousness,  by  the 
very  infamy  and  eventual  danger,  of  an  act  unprecedented 
in  the  history  of  nations.  Throughout  the  year  1648,  this 
This  is  design,  though  suspended,  became  familiar  to  the 

finally  de-  people's  expectation.1  The  commonwealth's  men 
ied'  and  the  levellers,  the  various  sectaries  (admitting 
a  few  exceptions),  grew  clamorous  for  the  king's  death. 
Petitions  were  presented  to  the  commons,  praying  for  justice 
on  all  delinquents,  from  the  highest  to  the  lowest.2  And  not 
long  afterwards  the  general  officers  of  the  army  came  forward 
with  a»long  remonstrance  against  any  treaty,  and  insisting 
that  the  capital  and  grand  author  of  their  troubles  be  speed- 
ily brought  to  justice,  for  the  treason,  blood,  and  mischief 
whereof  he  had  been  guilty.8  This  was  soon  followed  by  the 
vote  of  the  presbyterian  party,  that  the  answers  of  the  king 
to  the  propositions  of  both  houses  are  a  ground  for  the  house 
to  proceed  upon  for  the  settlement  of  the  peace  of  the  king- 
Seciusionof  dom,4  by  the  violent  expulsion,  or,  as  it  was  called, 
presbyterian  seclusion,  of  all  the  presbyterian  members  from 
the  house,  and  the  ordinance  of  a  minority,  consti- 
tuting the  high  court  of  justice  for  the  trial  of  the  king.8 

A  very  small  number  among  those  who  sat  in  this  strange 
tribunal  upon  Charles  I.  were  undoubtedly  capable  of  taking 
statesmanlike  views  of  the  interests  of  their  party,  and  might 
consider  his  death  a  politic  expedient  for  consolidating  the 
new  settlement.  It  seemed  to  involve  the  army,  which  had 
openly  abetted  the  act,  and  even  the  nation  by  its  passive 
consent,  in  such  inexpiable  guilt  towards  the  royal  family, 
that  neither  common  prudence  nor  a  sense  of  shame  would 
permit  them  to  suffer  its  restoration.  But  by  far  the  greater 
part  of  the  regicides  such  considerations  were  either  over- 
looked or  kept  in  the  background.  Their  more  powerful 

1  Somers'  Tracts,  v.  160,  162.  ble  that  this  remonstrance  itself  is  rather 

2  Sept.   11.     Parl.  Hist.   1077.    May's  against  the  king  than  absolutely  against 
Breviate  in  Maseres'  Tracts,  vol.  i.  p.  127.  all  monarchy  ;  for  one  of  the  proposals 
Whitclock.  335.  contained  in  it  is  that  kings  should  be 

8  Nov.  17.     Parl.  Hist.  1077.     White-  chosen  by  the  people,  and  have  no  iiega- 

lock,   p.  865.     A  motion,  Nov.  30,  that  tive  voice. 

the  house  do  now  proceed  on  the  remon-  *  The  division  was   on    the    previous 

Btrance  of  the  army,  was  lost  by  125  to  question,  which  was  lost  by  129  to  83. 

68  (printed  53  in    Parl.   Hist.).      Com-  5  No  division  took  place  on  auy  of  the 

inous'  Journals.    So  weak  was  still  the  votes  respecting  jhe  king's  trial. 
republican  party.    It  is  indeed  remarka- 


CHA.  1.  — 1642-49.     MOTIVES  OF  THE  KING'S  JUDGES.        619 

motive  was  that  fierce  fanatical  hatred  of  the  king,  the 
natural  fruit  of  long  civil  dissension,  inflamed  by  preachers 
more  dark  and  sanguinary  than  those  they  addressed,  and  by 
a  perverted  study  of  the  Jewish  scriptures.  They  had  been 
wrought  to  believe,  not  that  his  execution  would  be  justified 
by  state  necessity  or  any  such  feeble  grounds  of  human  rea- 
soning, but  that  it  was  a  bounden  duty,  which  with  a  safe 
conscience  they  could  not  neglect.  Such  was  the  persuasion 
of  Ludlow  and  Hutchinson,  the  most  respectable  names 
among  the  regicides  ;  both  of  them  free  from  all  suspicion  of 
interestedness  or  hypocrisy,  and  less  intoxicated 
than  the  rest  by  fanaticism.  "I  was  fully  per-  someof0 
suaded,"  says  the  former,  "  that  an  accommodation  *u^ng'8 
with  the  king  was  unsafe  to  the  people  of  England, J" 
and  unjust  and  wicked  in  the  nature  of  it.  The  former, 
besides  that  it  was  obvious  to  all  men,  the  king  himself  had 
proved,  by  the  duplicity  of  his  dealing  with  the  parliament, 
which  manifestly  appeared  in  his  own  papers,  taken  at  the 
battle  of  Naseby  and  elsewhere.  Of  the  latter  I  was  con- 
vinced by  the  express  words  of  God's  law :  '  that  blood 
defileth  the  land,  and  the  land  cannot  be  cleansed  of  the 
blood  that  is  shed  therein,  but  by  the  blood  of  him  that  shed 
it.'  (Numbers,  c.  xxxv.  v.  33.)  And  therefore  I  could  not 
consent  to  leave  the  guilt  of  so  much  blood  on  the  nation,  and 
thereby  to  draw  down  the  just  vengeance  of  God  upon  us  all, 
when  it  was  most  evident  that  the  war  had  been  occasioned 
by  the  invasion  of  our  rights  and  open  breach  of  our  laws 
and  constitution  on  the  king's  part."  1  "  As  for  Mr,  Hutchin- 
son,"  says  his  high-souled  consort,  "although  he  was  very 
much  confirmed  in  his  judgment  concerning  the  cause,  yet, 
being  here  called  to  an  extraordinary  action,  whereof  many 
were  of  several  minds,  he  addressed  himself  to  God  by 
prayer,  desiring  the  Lord  that,  if  through  any  human  frailty 
•he  were  led  into  any  error  or  false  opinion  in  those  great 
transactions,  he  would  open  his  eyes,  and  not  suffer  him  to 
proceed,  but  that  he  would  confirm  his  spirit  in  the  truth,  and 
lead  him  by  a  right-enlightened  conscience ;  and  finding  no 
check,  but  a  confirmation  in  his  conscience  that  it  was  his 
duty  to  act  as  he  did,  he,  upon  serious  debate,  both  privately 
and  in  his  addresses  to  God,  and  in  conferences  with  conscien- 
tious, upright,  unbiased  persons,  proceeded  to  sign  the  sen- 

i  Ludlow,  i.  267. 


620  QUESTION  OF  CHAELES'S  EXECUTION.        CHAP.  X. 

tence  against  the  king.  Although  he  did  not  then  believe 
but  it  might  one  day  come  to  be  again  disputed  among  men, 
yet  both  he  and  others  thought  they  could  not  refuse  it  with- 
out giving  up  the  people  of  God,  whom  they  had  led  forth 
and  engaged  themselves  unto  by  the  oath  of  God,  into  the 
hands  of  God's  and  their  enemies ;  and  therefore  he  cast 
himself  upon  God's  protection,  acting  according  to  the  dic- 
tates of  a  conscience  which  he  had  sought  the  law  to  guide ; 
and  accordingly  the  Lord  did  signalize  his  favor  afterward  to 
him."1 

The  execution  of  Charles  I.  has  been  mentioned  in  later 
ages  by  a  few  with  unlimited  praise  —  by  some 

Questionof        °..,    ?  J.    .         ,          ,  .  ,  J  .        .,, 

his  execu-  with  faint  and  ambiguous  censure  —  by  most  with 
tion  dis-  vehement  reprobation.  My  own  judgment  will 
possibly  be  anticipated  by  the  reader  of  the  pre- 
ceding pages.  I  shall  certainly  not  rest  it  on  the  imaginary 
sacredness  and  divine  origin  of  royalty,  nor  even  on  the 
irresponsibility  with  which  the  law  of  almost  every  country 
invests  the  person  of  its  sovereign.  Far  be  it  from  me  to 
contend  that  no  cases  may  be  conceived,  that  no  instances 
may  t>e  found  in  history,  wherein  the  sympathy  of  mankind 
and  the  sound  principles  of  political  justice  would  approve  a 
public  judicial  sentence  as  the  due  reward  of  tyranny  and 
perfidiousness.  But  we  may  confidently  deny  that  Charles  I. 
was  thus  to  be  singled  out  as  a  warning  to  tyrants.  His 
offences  were  not,  in  the  worst  interpretation,  of  that  atro- 
cious character  which  calls  down  the  vengeance  of  insulted 
humanity,  regardless  of  positive  law.  His  government  had 
been  very  arbitrary ;  but  it  may  well  be  doubted  whether 
any,  even  of  his  ministers,  could  have  suffered  death  for 
their  share  in  it,  without  introducing  a  principle  of  barbar- 
ous vindictiveness.  Far  from  the  sanguinary  misanthropy 
of  some  rnonarchs,  or  the  revengeful  fury  of  others,  he  had 
in  no  instance  displayed,  nor  does  the  minutest  scrutiny  since 
made  into  his  character  entitle  us  to  suppose,  any  malevolent 
dispositions  beyond  some  proneness  to  anger,  and  a  consid- 
erable degree  of  harshness  in  his  demeanor.2  As  for  the 

1  Hutchinson,  p.  303.  He  once  forgot  himself  so  far  as  to  cane 

2  The  king's  manners  were  not  good,  the  younger  sir  Henry  Vane  for  coming 
He  spoke  and  behaved   to   ladies  with  into  a  room  of  the  palace  reserved  for 
indelicacy  in  public.    See  Warburton's  persons  of   higher   rank.      Carte's    Or- 
Notes    on    Clarendon,  vii.   629  ;    and  a  mond,  i.  356,  where  other  instances  are 
passage  in  Milton's  Defensio  pro  Populo  mentioned  by  that  friendly  writer.     He 
Anglicano,  quoted  by  Harris  and  Brodie  had  in  truth  none  who  loved  him,  till  lua 


CHA.  I.  — 1642-49.       WHO  THE  FIRST  AGGRESSOR.  621 

charge  of  having  caused  the  bloodshed  of  the  war,  upon 
which,  and  not  on  any  former  misgovernment,  his  condem- 
nation was  grounded,  it  was  as  ill-established  as  it  would 
have  been  insufficient.  Well  might  the  earl  of  Northum- 
berland say,  when  the  ordinance  for  the  king's  trial  was 
before  the  lords,  that  the  greatest  part  of  the  people  of 
England  were  not  yet  satisfied  whether  the  king  levied  war 
first  against  the  houses,  or  the  houses  against  him.1  The 
fact,  in  my  opinion,  was  entirely  otherwise.  It  is  quite  an- 
other question  whether  the  parliament  were  justified  in  their 
resistance  to  the  king's  legal  authority.  But  we  may  contend 
that,  when  Hotham,  by  their  command,  shut  the  gates  of 
Hull  against  his  sovereign,  when  the  militia  was  called  out 
in  different  counties  by  an  ordinance  of  the  two  houses,  both 
of  which  preceded  by  several  weeks  any  levying  of  forces 
for  the  king,  the  bonds  of  our  constitutional  law  were  by 
them  and  their  servants  snapped  asunder ;  and  it  would  be 
the  mere  pedantry  and  chicane  of  political  casuistry  to  in- 
quire, even  if  the  fact  could  be  better  ascertained,  whether 
at  Edgehill,  or  in  the  minor  skirmishes  that  preceded,  the 
first  carbine  was  discharged  by  a  cavalier  or  a  roundhead. 
The  aggressor  in  a  war  is  not  the  first  who  uses  force,  but 
the  first  who  renders  force  necessary. 

But,  whether  we  may  think  this  war  to  have  originated  in 
the  king's  or  the  parliament's  aggression,  it  is  still  evident 
that  the  former  had  a  fair  cause  with  the  nation,  a  cause 
which  it  was  no  plain  violation  of  justice  to  defend.  He 
was  supported  by  the  greater  part  of  the  peers,  by  full  one 
third  of  the  commons,  by  the  principal  body  of  the  gentry, 

misfortune  softened  his  temper  and  ex-  mixon,  Hist,  of  the  Stuarts,  p.  140.    It 

cited  sympathy.  was  brought  forward  on   Burnet's  au- 

An  anecdote,  strongly  intimating  the  thority,  and  also  on  that  of  the  duke  of 

violence  of  Charles's  temper,  has   been  Hamilton,  killed  in  1712,  by  Dr.  liirch, 

rejected    by  his  advocates.      It   is  said  no  incompetent  judge  of  histori'Ml   rvi- 

that  Burnet,  in  searching  the  Hamilton  dence :  it  seems  confirmed  by  an  intiina- 

papers,  found  that  the  king,  on  discover-  tion  given  by  Burnet  himself  in  his  Me- 

ing   the  celebrated   letter  of   the  Scots  moirs  of  the  duke  of  Hamilton,  p.  161. 

covenanting  lords  to  the  king  of  France,  It  is  also  mentioned  by  Soott  <>i 

was  so  incensed  that  he  sent  an  order  to  tarvet,  a  contemporary  writer.     Harris, 

sir  William  Balfour,  lieutenant-governor  p.  850,  quotes  other  authorities,  earlier 

of  the  Tower,  to  cut  off  the  head  of  his  than  the  anecdote  told  of  Burnet ;  and 

prisoner,   lord    Loudon  ;    but   that   the  upon  the  whole  I  think  the  story  deserv- 

marquis  of  Hamilton,  to  whom  Balfour  ing  credit,  and  by  no  means  so  much  to 

immediately  communicated   this,   urged  be  slighted  as  the  Oxford  editor  of  Bur- 

eo  strongly  on   the  king  that   the  city  net  has  thought  fit  to  do. 

would  be  up  in  arms  on  this  violence,  1  Clement  \Valker,  Ilia*    of  Indepen- 

that   with   reluctance   he  withdrew   the  dency,  part  ii.  p.  66. 
warrant.     Tliia    story   in    told    by   Old- 


622  CHARLES'S  CHARACTER.  CHAP.  X. 

and  a  large  proportion  of  other  classes.  If  his  adherents  did 
not  form,  as  I  think  they  did  not,  the  majority  of  the  people, 
they  were  at  least  more  numerous,  beyond  comparison,  than 
those  who  demanded  or  approved  of  his  death.  The  steady 
deliberate  perseverance  of  so  considerable  a  body  in  any 
cause  takes  away  the  right  of  punishment  from  the  con- 
querors,  beyond  what  their  own  safety  or  reasonable  indem- 
nification may  require.  The  vanquished  are  to  be  judged 
by  the  rules  of  national,  not  of  municipal  law.  Hence,  if 
Charles,  after  having  by  a  course  of  victories  or  the  defec- 
tion of  the  people  prostrated  all  opposition,  had  abused  his 
triumph  by  the  execution  of  Essex  or  Hampden,  Fairfax  or 
Cromwell,  I  think  that  later  ages  would  have  disapproved  of 
their  deaths  as  positively,  though  not  quite  as  vehemently,  as 
they  have  of  his  own.  The  line  is  not  easily  drawn,  in 
abstract  reasoning,  between  the  treason  which  is  justly  pun- 
ished, and  the  social  schism  which  is  beyond  the  proper 
boundaries  of  law ;  but  the  civil  war  of  England  seems 
plainly  to  fall  within  the  latter  description.  These  objec- 
tions strike  me  as  unanswerable,  even  if  the  trial  of  Charles 
had  been  sanctioned  by  the  voice  of  the  nation  through  its 
legitimate  representatives,  or  at  least  such  a  fair  and  full 
convention  as  might,  in  great  necessity,  supply  the  place  of 
lawful  authority.  But  it  was,  as  we  all  know,  the  act  of  a 
bold  but  very  small  minority,  who,  having  forcibly  expelled 
their  colleagues  from  parliament,  had  usurped,  under  the 
protection  of  a  military  force,  that  power  which  all  England 
reckoned  illegal.  I  cannot  perceive  what  the.re  was  in  the 
imagined  solemnity  of  this  proceeding,  in  that  insolent  mock- 
ery of  the  forms  of  justice,  accompanied  by  all  unfairness 
and  inhumanity  in  its  circumstances,  which  can  alleviate  the 
guilt  of  the  transaction  ;  and  if  it  be  alleged  that  many  of 
th/e  regicides  were  firmly  persuaded  in  their  consciences  of 
the  right  and  duty  of  condemning  the  king,  we  may  surely 
remember  that  private  murderers  have  often  had  the  same 
apology. 

In  discussing  each  particular  transaction  in  the  life  of 
His  char-  Charles,  as  of  any  other  sovereign,  it  is  required 
acter.  kv  fljg  t,ruth  of  history  to  spare  nc  just  animad- 

version upon  his  faults  ;  especially  where  much  art  has  been 
employed  by  the  writers  most  in  repute  to  carry  the  stream 
of  public  prejudice  in  an  opposite  direction.  But  when  we 


CHA.  I.  — 1642-49.  CHARLES'S  CHARACTER.  623 

come  to  a  general  estimate  of  his  character,  we  should  act 
unfairly  not  to  give  their  full  weight  to  those  peculiar  cir- 
cumstances of  his  condition  in  this  worldly  scene  which  tend 
to  account  for  and  extenuate  his  failings.  The  station  of 
kings  is,  in  a  moral  sense,  so  unfavorable,  that  those  who  are 
least  prone  to  servile  admiration  should  be  on  their  guard 
against  the  opposite  error  of  an  uncandid  severity.  There 
seems  no  fairer  method  of  estimating  the  intrinsic  worth  of 
a  sovereign  than  to  treat  him  as  a  subject,  and  to  judge,  so 
far  as  the  history  of  his  life  enables  us,  what  he  would  have 
been  in  that  more  private  and  happier  condition  from  which 
the  chance  of  birth  has  excluded  him.  Tried  by  this  test, 
we  cannot  doubt  that  Charles  I.  would  have  been  not  alto- 
gether an  amiable  man,  but  one  deserving  of  general  esteem ; 
his  firm  and  conscientious  virtues  the  same,  his  deviations 
from  right  far  less  frequent  than  upon  the  throne.  It  is  to 
be  pleaded  for  this  prince,  that  his  youth  had  breathed  but 
the  contaminated  air  of  a  profligate  and  servile  court  —  that 
he  had  imbibed  the  lessons  of  arbitrary  power  from  all  who 
surrounded  him  —  that  he  had  been  betrayed  by  a  father's 
culpable  blindness  into  the  dangerous  society  of  an  ambitious, 
unprincipled  favorite.  To  have  maintained  so  much  correct- 
ness of  morality  as  his  enemies  confess,  was  a  proof  of 
Charles's  virtuous  dispositions ;  but  his  advocates  are  com- 
pelled also  to  own  that  he  did  not  escape  as  little  injured 
by  the  poisonous  adulation  to  which  he  had  listened.  Of  a 
temper  by  nature,  and  by  want  of  restraint,  too  passionate, 
though  not  vindictive,  and,  though  not  cruel,  certainly  defi- 
cient in  gentleness  and  humanity,  he  was  entirely  unfit  for 
the  very  difficult  station  of  royalty,  and  especially  for  that 
of  a  constitutional  king.  It  is  impossible  to  excuse  his  vio- 
lations of  liberty  on  the  score  of  ignorance,  especially  alti-r 
the  Petition  of  Right ;  because  his  impatience  of  opposition 
from  his  council  made  it  unsafe  to  give  him  any  advice  that 
thwarted  his  determination.  His  other  great  fault  was  want 
of  sincerity  —  a  fault  that  appeared  in  all  parts  of  his  life, 
and  from  which  no  one  who  has  paid  the  subject  any  atten- 
tion will  pretend  to  exculpate  him.  Those  indeed  who  know 
nothing  but  what  they  find  in  Hume  may  believe,  on  Hume's 
authority,  that  the  king's  contemporaries  never  deemed  of 
imputing  to  him  any  deviation  from  good  faith  ;  as  if  the 
whole  conduct  of  the  parliament  had  not  been  evidently 


624  ICON  BASILIKfi.  CHAP.  X. 

founded  upon  a  distrust  which  on  many  occasions  they  very 
explicitly  declared.  But,  so  far  as  this  insincerity  was 
shown  in  the  course  of  his  troubles,  it  was  a  failing  which 
untoward  circumstances  are  apt  to  produce,  and  which  the 
extreme  hypocrisy  of  many  among  his  adversaries  might 
sometimes  palliate.  Few  personages  in  history,  we  should 
recollect,  have  had  so  much  of  their  actions  revealed,  and 
commented  upon,  as  Charles ;  it  is  perhaps  a  mortifying  truth 
that  those  who  have  stood  highest  with  posterity  have  seldom 
been  those  who  have  been  most  accurately  known. 

The  turn  of  his  mind  was  rather  peculiar,  and  laid  him 
open  with  some  justice  to  very  opposite  censures  —  for  an 
extreme  obstinacy  in  retaining  his  opinion,  and  for  an  exces- 
sive facility  in  adopting  that  of  others.  But  the  apparent 
incongruity  ceases,  when  we  observe  that  he  was  tenacious  of 
ends  and  irresolute  as  to  means  ;  better  fitted  to  reason  than 
to  act ;  never  swerving  from  a  few  main  principles,  but  diffi- 
dent of  his  own  judgment  in  its  application  to  the  course  of 
affairs.  His  chief  talent  was  an  acuteness  in  dispute ;  a 
talent  not  usually  much  exercised  by  kings,  but  which  the 
strange  events  of  his  life  called  into  action.  He  had,  unfor- 
tunately for  himself,  gone  into  the  study  most  fashionable  in 
that  age,  of  polemical  theology ;  and,  though  not  at  all 
learned,  had  read  enough  of  the  English  divines  to  maintain 
their  side  of  the  current  controversies  with  much  dexterity. 
But  this  uukingly  talent  was  a  poor  compensation  for  the 
continual  mistakes  of  his  judgment  in  the  art  of  government 
and  the  conduct  of  his  affairs.1 

It  seems  natural  not  to  leave  untouched  in  this  place  the 
icon  famous  problem  of  the  Icon  Basilike,  which  has 

Basiiike.  been  deemed  an  irrefragable  evidence  both  of  the 
virtues  and  the  talents  of  Charles.  But  the  authenticity  of  this 
work  can  hardly  be  any  longer  a  question  among  judicious 

1    Clarendon,    Collier,  and  the    high-  losopher,  who  said  he  had  no  shame  in 

church  writers  in  general,  are  very  proud  yielding  to  the   master  of  fifty  legions, 

of  the    superiority  they  fancy  the   king  But  those  who  take  the  trouble  to  read 

to  have  obtained  in  a  long  argumenta-  these  papers  will  probably  not  think  one 

tion  held  at  Newcastle  with  Henderson,  party  so  much  the  stronger  as  to  shorten 

a  Scots  minister,  on  church  authority  and  the  other's  days.   They  show  that  Charles 

government.      This    was    conducted   in  held  those  extravagant  tenets  about  the 

writing,  and  the  papers  afterwards  pub-  authority    of    the    church    and  of   the 

lished.     They  may  be  read  in  the  king's  fathers,   which    are    irreconcilable    with 

Works,    and    in    Collier,    p.   842.     It   is  protestantism  in  any  oountry  where  it  is 

more    than   insinuated   that    Henderson  not  established,  and  are  likely  to  drive  it 

died  of  mortification  at  his  defeat.     He  out  where  it  is  so. 
certainly  had  not  the  excuse  of  the  phi- 


CHA.  1.— 1642-49.       THE  KING'S  LETTERS.  02.") 

men.  We  have  letters  from  Gauden  and  his  family  asserting 
it  as  his  own  in  the  most  express  terms,  and  making  it  the 
ground  of  a  claim  for  reward.  We  know  that  the  king's  sons 
were  both  convinced  that  it  was  not  their  father's  composition, 
and  that  Clarendon  was  satisfied  of  the  same.  If  Gauden 
not  only  set  up  a  false  claim  to  so  famous  a  work,  but  per- 
suaded those  nearest  to  the  king  to  surrender  that  precious 
record,  as  it  had  been  reckoned,  of  his  dying  sentiments,  it 
was  an  instance  of  successful  impudence  which  has  hardly  a 
parallel.  But  I  should  be  content  to  rest  the  case  on  that 
internal  evidence  which  has  been  so  often  alleged  for  its  au- 
thenticity. The  Icon  has,  to  my  judgment,  all  the  air  of  a 
fictitious  composition.  Cold,  stiff,  elaborate,  without  a  single 
allusion  that  bespeaks  the  superior  knowledge  of  facts  which 
the  king  must  have  possessed,  it  contains  little  but  those  rhe- 
torical commonplaces  which  would  suggest  themselves  to  any 
forger.  The  prejudices  of  party,  which  exercise  a  strange 
influence  in  matters  of  taste,  have  caused  this  book  to  be 
extravagantly  praised.  It  has  doubtless  a  certain  air  of  grave 
dignity,  and  the  periods  are  more  artificially  constructed  than 
was  usual  in  that  age  (a  circumstance  not  in  favor  of  its  au- 
thenticity) ;  but.  the  style  is  encumbered  with  frigid  meta- 
phors, as  is  said  to  be  the  case  in  Gauden's  acknowledged 
writings  ;  and  the  thoughts  are  neither  beautiful  nor  always 
exempt  from  affectation.  The  king's  letters  during  his  im- 
prisonment, preserved  in  the  Clarendon  State  Papers,  and 
especially  one  to  his  son,  from  which  an  extract  is  given  in 
the  History  of  the  Rebellion,  are  more  satisfactory  proofs  of 
his  integrity  than  the  labored  self-panegyrics  of  the  Icon 
Basilike".1 

1  The  note  on  this  passage,  which,  on  connected  with  the  general  objects  of  this 

account  of  its  length,  was  placed  at  the  work.      It  is  needless  to  add   that  the 

end  of  the  volume  in  the  two  first  edi-  author  entertains  not  the  smallest  doubt 

tions,  is  withdrawn  in  this,  as  relating  to  about  the  justness  of  the  arguments  be 

a  matter  of  literary  controversy,  little  had  employed.  —  NoU  to  the  $d  edit. 

VOL.  I.  — C.  40 


END    OF   THE   FIRST   VOLUME. 


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