be deemed so imperfect: he was desirous of obtaining a more express
declaration of the public consent. A judicious expedient was fallen on
for that purpose. All the members who had sitten in the house of commons
during any parliament of Charles II., (the only parliaments whose
election was regarded as free,) were invited to meet; and to them were
added the mayor, aldermen, and fifty of the common council. This was
regarded as the most proper representative of the people that could be
summoned during the present emergence. They unanimously voted the same
address with the lords: and the prince, being thus supported by all
the legal authority which could possibly be obtained in this critical
juncture, wrote circular letters to the counties and corporations of
England; and his orders were universally complied with. A profound
tranquillity prevailed throughout the kingdom; and the prince’s
administration was submitted to, as if he had succeeded in the most
regular manner to the vacant throne. The fleet received his orders: the
army, without murmur or opposition, allowed him to new model them: and
the city supplied him with a loan of two hundred thousand pounds.
{1689.} The conduct of the prince with regard to Scotland, was founded
on the same prudent and moderate maxims. Finding that there were many
Scotchmen of rank at that time in London, he summoned them together,
laid before them his intentions, and asked their advice in the present
emergency. This assembly, consisting of thirty noblemen and about
four-score gentlemen, chose Duke Hamilton president; a man who, being
of a temporizing character, was determined to pay court to the present
authority. His eldest son, the earl of Arran, professed an adherence to
King James; a usual policy in Scotland, where the father and son, during
civil commotions, were often observed to take opposite sides, in order
to secure in all events the family from attainder. Arran proposed to
invite back the king upon conditions; but as he was vehemently opposed
in this motion by Sir Patrick Hume, and seconded by nobody, the assembly
made an offer to the prince of the present administration, which
he willingly accepted. To anticipate a little in our narration; a
convention, by circular letters from the prince, was summoned at
Edinburgh on the twenty-second of March, where it was soon visible
that the interest of the malecontents would entirely prevail. The more
zealous royalists, regarding this assembly as illegal, had forborne to
appear at elections; and the other party were returned for most places.
The revolution was not in Scotland, as in England, effected by a
coalition of whig and tory: the former party alone had overpowered the
government, and were too much enraged, by the past injuries which they
had suffered, to admit of any composition with their former masters.
As soon as the purpose of the convention was discovered, the earl of
Balcarras and Viscount Dundee, leaders of the tories, withdrew from
Edinburgh; and the convention having passed a bold and decisive vote,
that King James, by his maleadministration, and his abuse of power,
had forfeited all title to the crown, they made a tender of the royal
dignity to the prince and princess of Orange.
The English convention was assembled; and it immediately appeared, that
the house of commons, both from the prevailing humor of the people, and
from the influence of present authority, were mostly chosen from among
the whig party.
After thanks were unanimously given by both houses to the prince of
Orange for the deliverance which he had brought them, a less decisive
vote than that of the Scottish convention was in a few days passed by
a great majority of the commons, and sent up to the peers for their
concurrence. It was contained in these words: “That King James II.,
having endeavored to subvert the constitution of the kingdom by breaking
the original contract between king and people; and having, by the advice
of Jesuits and other wicked persons, violated the fundamental laws, and
withdrawn himself out of the kingdom; has abdicated the government, and
that the throne is thereby vacant.” This vote, when carried to the upper
house, met with great opposition; of which it is here necessary for us
to explain the causes.
The tories and the high church party, finding themselves at once menaced
with a subversion of the laws and of their religion, had zealously
promoted the national revolt, and had on this occasion departed from
those principles of non-resistance, of which, while the king favored
them, they had formerly made such loud professions. Their present
apprehensions had prevailed over their political tenets; and
the unfortunate James, who had too much trusted to those general
declarations, which never will be reduced to practice, found, in the
issue, that both parties were secretly united against him. But no sooner
was the danger past, and the general fears somewhat allayed, than party
prejudices resumed, in some degree, their former authority; and the
tories were abashed at that victory which their antagonists, during
the late transactions, had obtained over them. They were inclined,
therefore, to steer a middle course; and, though generally determined
to oppose the king’s return, they resolved not to consent to dethroning
him, or altering the line of succession. A regent with kingly power
was the expedient which they proposed; and a late instance in Portugal
seemed to give some authority and precedent to that plan of government.
In favor of this scheme, the tories urged that, by the uniform tenor of
the English laws the title to the crown was ever regarded as sacred, and
could on no account, and by no maleadministration, be forfeited by the
sovereign: that to dethrone a king and to elect his successor, was a
practice quite unknown to the constitution, and had a tendency to
render kingly power entirely dependent and precarious: that where the
sovereign, from his tender years, from lunacy, or from other natural
infirmity, was incapacitated to hold the reins of government, both the
laws and former practice agreed in appointing a regent, who, during the
interval, was invested with the whole power of the administration: that
the inveterate and dangerous prejudices of King James had rendered him
as unfit to sway the English sceptre, as if he had fallen into lunacy;
and it was therefore natural for the people to have recourse to the same
remedy: that the election of one king was a precedent for the election
of another; and the government, by that means, would either degenerate
into a republic, or, what was worse, into a turbulent and seditious
monarchy: that the case was still more dangerous, if there remained a
prince who claimed the crown by right of succession, and disputed, on so
plausible a ground, the title of the present sovereign: that though the
doctrine of non-resistance might not, in every possible circumstance,
be absolutely true, yet was the belief of it very expedient; and to
establish a government which should have the contrary principle for
its basis, was to lay a foundation for perpetual revolutions and
convulsions: that the appointment of a regent was indeed exposed to many
inconveniencies; but so long as the line of succession was preserved
entire, there was still a prospect of putting an end, some time or
other, to the public disorders: and that scarcely an instance occurred
in history, especially in the English history, where a disputed title
had not, in the issue, been attended with much greater ills, than all
those which the people had sought to shun by departing from the lineal
successor.
The leaders of the whig party, on the other hand, asserted that if
there were any ill in the precedent, that ill would result as much from
establishing a regent, as from dethroning one king and appointing his
successor; nor would the one expedient, if wantonly and rashly embraced
by the people, be less the source of public convulsions than the other:
that it the laws gave no express permission to depose the sovereign,
neither did they authorize resisting his authority, or separating the
power from the title: that a regent was unknown, except where the king,
by reason of his tender age or his infirmities, was incapable of a will;
and in that case, his will was supposed to be involved in that of the
regent; that it would be the height of absurdity to try a man for acting
upon a commission received from a prince whom we ourselves acknowledge
to be the lawful sovereign; and no jury would decide so contrary both to
law and common sense, as to condemn such a pretended criminal: that even
the prospect of being delivered from this monstrous inconvenience was,
in the present situation of affairs, more distant than that of putting
an end to a disputed succession: that allowing the young prince to be
the legitimate heir, he had been carried abroad; he would be educated in
principles destructive of the constitution and established religion: and
he would probably leave a son liable to the same insuperable objection:
that if the whole line were cut off by law, the people would in time
forget or neglect their claim; an advantage which could not be hoped
for while the administration was conducted in their name, and while they
were still acknowledged to possess the legal title: and that a nation
thus perpetually governed by regents or protectors, approached much
nearer to a republic, than one subject to monarchs whose hereditary
regular succession, as well as present authority, was fixed and
appointed by the people.
This question was agitated with great zeal by the opposite parties in
the house of peers. The chief speakers among the tories were Clarendon,
Rochester, and Nottingham; among the whigs, Halifax and Danby. The
question was carried for a king by two voices only, fifty-one against
forty-nine. All the prelates, except two, the bishops of London
and Bristol, voted for a regent. The primate, a disinterested but
pusillanimous man, kept at a distance both from the prince’s court and
from parliament.
The house of peers proceeded next to examine piecemeal the votes sent
up to them by the commons. They debated, “Whether there were an original
contract between king and people?” and the affirmative was carried by
fifty-three against forty-six: a proof that the tories were already
losing ground. The next question was, “Whether King James had broken
that original contract?” and, after a slight opposition, the affirmative
prevailed. The lords proceeded to take into consideration the word
abdicated; and it was carried that deserted was more proper. The
concluding question was, “Whether King James having broken the original
contract, and deserted the government, the throne was thereby vacant?”
This question was debated with more heat and contention than any of the
former; and upon a division, the tories prevailed by eleven voices, and
it was carried to omit the last article with regard to the vacancy of
the throne. The vote was sent back to the commons with these amendments.
The earl of Danby had entertained the project of bestowing the crown
solely upon the princess of Orange, and of admitting her as hereditary
legal successor to King James[*] passing by the infant prince, as
illegitimate or supposititious. His change of party in the last question
gave the tories so considerable a majority in the number of voices.
The commons still insisted on their own vote, and sent up reasons
why the lords should depart from their amendments. The lords were not
convinced; and it was necessary to have a free conference, in order
to settle this controversy. Never surely was national debate more
important, or managed by more able speakers; yet is one surprised to
find the topics insisted on by both sides so frivolous; more resembling
the verbal disputes of the schools, than the solid reasonings of
statesmen and legislators. In public transactions of such consequence,
the true motives which produce any measure are seldom avowed. The whigs,
now the ruling party, having united with the tories in order to bring
about the revolution had so much deference for their new allies, as not
to insist that the crown should be declared forfeited on account of the
king’s maleadministration: such a declaration, they thought, would
imply too express a censure of the old tory principles, and too open a
preference of their own. They agreed, therefore, to confound together
the king’s abusing his power, and his withdrawing from the kingdom;
and they called the whole an abdication; as if he had given a virtual,
though not a verbal, consent to dethroning himself. The tories took
advantage of this obvious impropriety, which had been occasioned merely
by the complaisance or prudence of the whigs; and they insisted upon the
word desertion, as more significant and intelligible. It was retorted
on them, that, however that expression might be justly applied to the
king’s withdrawing himself, it could not with any propriety be extended
to his violation of the fundamental laws. And thus both parties, while
they warped their principles from regard to their antagonists, and
from prudential considerations, lost the praise of consistence and
uniformity.
The managers for the lords next insisted, that even allowing the king’s
abuse of power to be equivalent to an abdication, or, in other words,
to a civil death, it could operate no other-*wise than his voluntary
resignation, or his natural death; and could only make way for the next
successor. It was a maxim of English law, that the throne was never
vacant; but instantly, upon the demise of one king, was filled with his
legal heir, who was entitled to all the authority of his predecessor.
And however young or unfit for government the successor, however
unfortunate in his situation, though he were even a captive in the hands
of public enemies, yet no just reason, they thought, could be assigned
why, without any default of his own, he should lose a crown, to which
by birth he was fully entitled. The managers for the commons might have
opposed this reasoning by many specious and even solid arguments. They
might have said, that the great security for allegiance being merely
opinion, any scheme of settlement should be adopted in which it was most
probable the people would acquiesce and persevere: that though, upon the
natural death of a king whose administration had been agreeable to
the laws, many and great inconveniences would be endured, rather than
exclude his lineal successor, yet the case was not the same when the
people had been obliged, by their revolt, to dethrone a prince whose
illegal measures had, in every circumstance, violated the constitution:
that in these extraordinary revolutions, the government reverted, in
some degree, to its first principles, and the community acquired a
right of providing for the public interest by expedients which, on other
occasions, might be deemed violent and irregular: that the recent use of
one extraordinary remedy reconciled their minds to such licenses, than
if the government had run the people to the practice of another, and
more familiarized on in its usual tenor: and that King James, having
carried abroad his son, as well as withdrawn himself, had given such
just provocation to the kingdom, had voluntarily involved it in such
difficulties, that the interests of his family were justly sacrificed
to the public settlement and tranquillity. Though these topics seem
reasonable, they were entirely forborne by the whig managers;
both because they implied an acknowledgment of the infant prince’s
legitimacy, which it was agreed to keep in obscurity, and because they
contained too express a condemnation of tory principles. They were
content to maintain the vote of the commons by shifts and evasions; and
both sides parted at last without coming to any agreement.
But it was impossible for the public to remain long in the present
situation. The perseverance, therefore, of the lower house obliged the
lords to comply; and, by the desertion of some peers to the whig party,
the vote of the commons, without any alteration, passed by a majority of
fifteen in the upper house, and received the sanction of every part of
the legislature which then subsisted.
It happens unluckily for those who maintain an original contract between
the magistrate and people, that great revolutions of government, and
new settlements of civil constitutions, are commonly conducted with such
violence, tumult, and disorder, that the public voice can scarcely
ever be heard; and the opinions of the citizens are at that time less
attended to than even in the common course of administration. The
present transactions in England, it must be confessed, are a singular
exception to this observation. The new elections had been carried on
with great tranquillity and freedom: the prince had ordered the troops
to depart from all the towns where the voters assembled: a tumultuary
petition to the two houses having been promoted, he took care, though
the petition was calculated for his advantage, effectually to suppress
it: he entered into no intrigues, either with the electors or the
members: he kept himself in a total silence, as if he had been nowise
concerned in these transactions: and so far from forming cabals with the
leaders of parties, he disdained even to bestow caresses on those whose
assistance might be useful to him. This conduct was highly meritorious,
and discovered great moderation and magnanimity; even though the prince
unfortunately, through the whole course of his life, and on every
occasion, was noted for an address so cold, dry, and distant, that it
was very difficult for him, on account of any interest, to soften or
familiarize it.
At length the prince deigned to break silence, and to express, though in
a private manner, his sentiments on the present situation of affairs. He
called together Halifax, Shrewsbury, Danby, and a few more; and he told
them, that, having been invited over to restore their liberty, he
had engaged in this enterprise, and had at last happily effected his
purpose: that it belonged to the parliament, now chosen and assembled
with freedom, to concert measures for the public settlement; and he
pretended not to interpose in their determinations: that he heard of
several schemes proposed for establishing the government: some insisted
on a regent; others were desirous of bestowing the crown on
the princess: it was their concern alone to choose the plan of
administration most agreeable or advantageous to them: that if they
judged it proper to settle a regent, he had no objection: he only
thought it incumbent on him to inform them, that he was determined not
to be the regent, nor ever to engage in a scheme which, he knew, would
be exposed to such insuperable difficulties: that no man could have a
juster or deeper sense of the princess’s merit than he was impressed
with; but he would rather remain a private person, than enjoy a crown
which must depend on the will or life of another: and that they must
therefore make account, if they were inclined to either of these two
plans of settlement, that it would be totally out of his power to
assist them in carrying it into execution: his affairs abroad were too
important to be abandoned for so precarious a dignity, or even to allow
him so much leisure as would be requisite to introduce order into their
disjointed government.
These views of the prince were seconded by the princess herself; who, as
she possessed many virtues, was a most obsequious wife to a husband who,
in the judgment of the generality of her sex, would have appeared so
little attractive and amiable. All considerations were neglected, when
they came in competition with what she deemed her duty to the prince.
When Danby and others of her partisans wrote her an account of their
schemes and proceedings, she expressed great displeasure; and even
transmitted their letters to her husband, as a sacrifice to conjugal
fidelity. The princess Anne also concurred in the same plan for the
public settlement; and being promised an ample revenue, was content to
be postponed in the succession to the crown. And as the title of her
infant brother was, in the present establishment, entirely neglected,
she might, on the whole, deem herself, in point of interest, a gainer by
this revolution.
The chief parties, therefore, being agreed, the convention passed a
bill, in which they settled the crown on the prince and princess of
Orange, the sole administration to remain in the prince: the princess of
Denmark to succeed after the death of the prince and princess of Orange;
her posterity after those of the princess, but before those of the
prince by any other wife. The convention annexed to this settlement of
the crown a declaration of rights, where all the points which had of
late years been disputed between the king and people, were finally
determined; and the powers of royal prerogative were more narrowly
circumscribed and more exactly defined, than in any former period of the
English government.
Thus have we seen, through the course of four reigns, a continual
struggle maintained between the crown and the people: privilege and
prerogative were ever at variance: and both parties, beside the present
object of dispute, had many latent claims, which, on a favorable
occasion, they produced against their adversaries. Governments too
steady and uniform as they are seldom free, so are they, in the judgment
of some attended with another sensible inconvenience: they abate the
active powers of men; depress courage, invention, and genius; and
produce a universal lethargy in the people. Though this opinion may be
just, the fluctuation and contest, it must be allowed, of the English
government, were, during these reigns, much too violent both for the
repose and safety of the people. Foreign affairs, at that time, were
either entirely neglected, or managed to pernicious purposes: and in the
domestic administration there was felt a continued fever, either secret
or manifest; sometimes the most furious convulsions and disorders.
The revolution forms a new epoch in the constitution; and was probably
attended with consequences more advantageous to the people, than barely
freeing them from an exceptionable administration. By deciding many
important questions in favor of liberty, and still more by that great
precedent of deposing one king, and establishing a new family, it gave
such an ascendant to popular principles, as has put the nature of
the English constitution beyond all controversy. And it may justly be
affirmed, without any danger of exaggeration, that we in this island
have ever since enjoyed, if not the best system of government, at least
the most entire system of liberty, that ever was known amongst mankind.
To decry with such violence, as is affected by some, the whole line
of Stuart; to maintain, that their administration was one continued
encroachment on the incontestable rights of the people; is not giving
due honor to that great event, which not only put a period to
their hereditary succession, but made a new settlement of the whole
constitution. The inconveniencies suffered by the people under the two
first reigns of that family, (for in the main they were fortunate,)
proceeded in a great measure from the unavoidable situation of affairs;
and scarcely any thing could have prevented those events, but such vigor
of genius in the sovereign, attended with such good fortune, as might
have enabled him entirely to overpower the liberties of his people.
While the parliaments in those reigns were taking advantage of the
necessities of the prince, and attempting every session to abolish, or
circumscribe, or define, some prerogative of the crown, and innovate
in the usual tenor of government, what could be expected, but that the
prince would exert himself in defending, against such inveterate enemies
an authority which, during the most regular course of the former English
government, had been exercised without dispute or controversy? And
though Charles II., in 1672, may with reason be deemed the aggressor,
nor is it possible to justify his conduct, yet were there some motives,
surely, which could engage a prince so soft and indolent, and at the
same time so judicious, to attempt such hazardous enterprises. He felt
that public affairs had reached a situation at which they could not
possibly remain without some further innovation. Frequent parliaments
were become almost absolutely necessary to the conducting of public
business; yet these assemblies were still, in the judgment of the
royalists, much inferior in dignity to the sovereign, whom they seemed
better calculated to counsel than control. The crown still possessed
considerable power of opposing parliaments; and had not as yet acquired
the means of influencing them. Hence a continual jealousy between
these parts of the legislature: hence the inclination mutually to take
advantage of each other’s necessities: hence the impossibility,
under which the king lay, of finding ministers who could at once be
serviceable and faithful to him. If he followed his own choice in
appointing his servants, without regard to their parliamentary interest,
a refractory session was instantly to be expected: if he chose them
from among the leaders of popular assemblies, they either lost their
influence with the people by adhering to the crown, or they betrayed
the crown in order to preserve their influence. Neither Hambden, whom
Charles I. was willing to gain at any price; nor Shaftesbury, whom
Charles II., after the Popish plot, attempted to engage in his counsels,
would renounce their popularity for the precarious, and, as they
esteemed it, deceitful favor of the prince. The root of their authority
they still thought to lie in the parliament; and as the power of that
assembly was not yet uncontrollable, they still resolved to augment it,
though at the expense of the royal prerogatives.
It is no wonder that these events have long, by the representations of
faction, been extremely clouded and obscured. No man has yet arisen, who
has paid an entire regard to truth, and has dared to expose her, without
covering or disguise, to the eyes of the prejudiced public. Even that
party amongst us which boasts of the highest regard to liberty, has not
possessed sufficient liberty of thought in this particular; nor has been
able to decide impartially of their own merit, compared with that
of their antagonists. More noble perhaps in their ends, and highly
beneficial to mankind they must also be allowed to have often been less
justifiable in the means, and in many of their enterprises to have paid
more regard to political than to moral considerations. Obliged to court
the favor of the populace, they found it necessary to comply with
their rage and folly; and have even, on many occasions, by propagating
calumnies, and by promoting violence, served to infatuate as well as
corrupt that people to whom they made a tender of liberty and justice.
Charles I. was a tyrant, a Papist, and a contriver of the Irish
massacre: the church of England was relapsing fast into idolatry:
Puritanism was the only true religion, and the covenant the favorite
object of heavenly regard. Through these delusions the party proceeded,
and, what may seem wonderful, still to the increase of law and liberty;
till they reached the imposture of the Popish plot, a fiction which
exceeds the ordinary bounds of vulgar credulity. But however singular
these events may appear, there is really nothing altogether new in any
period of modern history: and it is remarkable, that tribunitian arts,
though sometimes useful in a free constitution, have usually been
such as men of probity and honor could not bring themselves either to
practise or approve. The other faction, which, since the revolution, has
been obliged to cultivate popularity, sometimes found it necessary to
employ like artifices.
The whig party, for a course of near seventy years, has, almost without
interruption, enjoyed the whole authority of government; and no honors
or offices could be obtained but by their countenance and protection.
But this event, which in some particulars has been advantageous to
the state, has proved destructive to the truth of history, and has
established many gross falsehoods, which it is unaccountable how
any civilized nation could have embraced with regard to its domestic
occurrences. Compositions the most despicable, both for style and
matter, have been extolled, and propagated, and read; as if they had
equalled the most celebrated remains of antiquity.[*]
* Such as Rapin Thoyras, Locke, Sidney, Hoadley, etc.
And forgetting that a regard to liberty, though a laudable passion,
ought commonly to be subordinate to a reverence for established
government, the prevailing faction has celebrated only the partisans of
the former, who pursued as their object the perfection of civil
society, and has extolled them at the expense of their antagonists, who
maintained those maxims that are essential to its very existence. But
extremes of all kinds are to be avoided; and though no one will ever
please either faction by moderate opinions, it is there we are most
likely to meet with truth and certainty.
We shall subjoin to this general view of the English government some
account of the state of the finances, arms trade, manners, arts, between
the restoration and revolution.
The revenue of Charles II., as settled by the long parliament, was put
upon a very bad footing. It was too small, if they intended to make
him independent in the common course of his administration: it was too
large, and settled during too long a period, if they resolved to keep
him in entire dependence. The great debts of the republic, which were
thrown upon that prince; the necessity of supplying the naval and
military stores, which were entirely exhausted;[*] that of repairing
and furnishing his palaces: all these causes involved the king in great
difficulties immediately after his restoration; and the parliament
was not sufficiently liberal in supplying him. Perhaps, too, he
had contracted some debts abroad; and his bounty to the distressed
cavaliers, though it did not correspond either to their services or
expectations, could not fail, in some degree, to exhaust his treasury.
The extraordinary sums granted the king during the first years did not
suffice for these extraordinary expenses; and the excise and customs,
the only constant revenue, amounted not to nine hundred thousand pounds
a year, and fell much short of the ordinary burdens of government. The
addition of hearth money in 1662, and of other two branches in 1669
and 1670, brought up the revenue to one million three hundred and
fifty-eight thousand pounds, as we learn from Lord Danby’s account: but
the same authority informs us, that the yearly expense of government was
at that time one million three hundred and eighty-seven thousand seven
hundred and seventy pounds.[**]
* Lord Clarendon’s speech to the parliament, Oct. 9, 1665.
* Ralph’s History, vol. i. p. 288.
We learn from that lord’s Memoirs, (p. 12,) that the receipts of
the exchequer, during six years, from 1673 to 1679, were about eight
millions two hundred thousand pounds or one million three hundred
and sixty-six thousand pounds a year. See likewise p. 169. mentioning
contingencies, which are always considerable, even under the most
prudent administration. Those branches of revenue granted in 1669 and
1670, expired in 1680, and were never renewed by parliament: they were
computed to be above two hundred thousand pounds a year. It must be
allowed, because asserted by all contemporary authors of both parties,
and even confessed by himself, that King Charles was somewhat profuse
and negligent. But it is likewise certain, that a very rigid frugality
was requisite to support the government under such difficulties. It is
a familiar rule in all business, that every man should be paid in
proportion to the trust reposed in him, and to the power which he
enjoys; and the nation soon found reason, from Charles’s dangerous
connections with France, to repent their departure from that prudential
maxim. Indeed, could the parliaments in the reign of Charles I. have
been induced to relinquish so far their old habits, as to grant that
prince the same revenue which was voted to his successor, or had those
in the reign of Charles II. conferred on him as large a revenue as was
enjoyed by his brother, all the disorders in both reigns might easily
have been prevented, and probably all reasonable concessions to liberty
might peaceably have been obtained from both monarchs. But these
assemblies, unacquainted with public business, and often actuated by
faction and fanaticism, could never be made sensible, but too late and
by fatal experience, of the incessant change of times and situations.
The French ambassador informs his court, that Charles was very well
satisfied with his share of power, could the parliament have been
induced to make him tolerable easy in his revenue.[*]
If we estimate the ordinary revenue of Charles II. at one million two
hundred thousand pounds a year during his whole reign, the computation
will rather exceed than fall below the true value. The convention
parliament, after all the sums which they had granted the king towards
the payment of old debts, threw, the last day of their meeting, a debt
upon him amounting to one million seven hundred and forty-three thousand
two hundred and sixty-three pounds.[**] All the extraordinary sums which
were afterwards voted him by parliament, amounted to eleven millions
four hundred and forty-three thousand four hundred and seven pounds;
which, divided by twenty-four, the number of years which that king
reigned, make four hundred and seventy-six thousand eight hundred
and eight pounds a year. During that time, he had two violent wars to
sustain with the Dutch; and in 1678, he made expensive preparations for
a war with France. In the first Dutch war, both France and Denmark were
allies to the United Provinces, and the naval armaments in England were
very great; so that it is impossible he could have secreted any part,
at least any considerable part, of the sums which were then voted him by
parliament.
* Dalrymple’s Appendix, p. 142.
** Journals, 29th of December, 1660.
To these sums we must add about one million two hundred thousand pounds,
which had been detained from the bankers on shutting up the exchequer in
1672. The king paid six per cent. for this money during the rest of his
reign.[*] It is remarkable that, notwithstanding this violent breach of
faith, the king, two years after, borrowed money at eight per cent.; the
same rate of interest which he had paid before that event;[**] a proof
that public credit, instead of being of so delicate a nature as we are
apt to imagine, is, in reality, so hardy and robust, that it is very
difficult to destroy it.
The revenue of James was raised by the parliament to about one million
eight hundred and fifty thousand pounds;[***] and his income as duke of
York being added, made the whole amount to two millions a year; a sum
well proportioned to the public necessities, but enjoyed by him in too
independent a manner. The national debt at the revolution amounted
to one million fifty-four thousand nine hundred and twenty-five
pounds.[****]
The militia fell much to decay during these two reigns, partly by the
policy of the kings, who had entertained a diffidence of their subjects,
partly by that ill-judged law which limited the king’s power of
mustering and arraying them. In the beginning, however, of Charles’s
reign, the militia was still deemed formidable. De Wit having proposed
to the French king an invasion of England during the first Dutch war,
that monarch replied, that such an attempt would be entirely fruitless,
and would tend only to unite the English. In a few days, said he, after
our landing, there will be fifty thousand men at least upon us.[v]
* Danby’s Memoirs, p. 7.
** Danby’s Memoirs, p. 65.
*** Journ. 1st of March, 1689.
**** Journ. 20th of March, 1689.
v D’Estrades, 20th of October. 1666.
Charles in the beginning of his reign had in pay near five thousand
men, of guards and garrisons. At the end of his reign, he augmented this
number to near eight thousand. James, on Monmouth’s rebellion, had on
foot about fifteen thousand men; and when the prince of Orange invaded
him, there were no fewer than thirty thousand regular troops in England.
The English navy, during the greater part of Charles’s reign, made a
considerable figure, for number of ships, valor of the men, and conduct
of the commanders. Even in 1678, the fleet consisted of eighty-three
ships;[*] besides thirty which were at that time on the stocks. On the
king’s restoration, he found only sixty-three vessels of all sizes.[**]
During the latter part of Charles’s reign, the navy fell somewhat to
decay, by reason of the narrowness of the king’s revenue: but James,
soon after his accession, restored it to its former power and glory; and
before he left the throne, carried it much further. The administration
of the admiralty under Pepys, is still regarded as a model for order
and economy. The fleet at the revolution consisted of one hundred and
seventy-three vessels of all sizes, and required forty-two thousand
seamen to man it.[***] That king, when duke of York, had been the first
inventor of sea signals. The military genius during these two reigns
had not totally decayed among the young nobility. Dorset, Mulgrave,
Rochester, not to mention Ossory, served on board the fleet, and were
present in the most furious engagements against the Dutch.
The commerce and riches of England did never, during any period,
increase so fast as from the restoration to the revolution. The two
Dutch wars, by disturbing the trade of that republic, promoted the
navigation of this island; and after Charles had made a separate peace
with the states, his subjects enjoyed unmolested the trade of Europe.
The only disturbance which they met with, was from a few French
privateers, who infested the channel; and Charles interposed not in
behalf of his subjects with sufficient spirit and vigor.
* Pepys’s Memoirs, p. 4.
** Memoirs of English Affairs, chiefly naval.
*** Lives of the Admirals, vol. ii. p. 476.
The recovery or conquest of New York and the Jerseys was a considerable
accession to the strength and security of the English colonies; and,
together with the settlement of Pennsylvania and Carolina which was
effected during that reign, extended the English empire in America. The
persecutions of the dissenters, or, more properly speaking, the
restraints imposed upon them contributed to augment and people these
colonies. Dr. Davenant affirms,[*] that the shipping of England more
than doubled during these twenty-eight years. Several new manufactures
were established; in iron brass, silk, hats, glass, paper, etc. One
Brewer, leaving the Low Countries when they were threatened with a
French conquest, brought the art of dying woollen cloth into England,
and by that improvement saved the nation great sums of money. The
increase of coinage during these two reigns was ten millions two hundred
and sixty-one thousand pounds. A board of trade was erected in 1670; and
the earl of Sandwich was made president. Charles revived and supported
the charter of the East India Company; a measure whose utility is by
some thought doubtful: he granted a charter to the Hudson’s Bay Company;
a measure probably hurtful.
We learn from Sir Josiah Child,[**] that in 1688 there were on the
Change more men worth ten thousand pounds than there were in 1650 worth
a thousand; that five hundred pounds with a daughter was, in the latter
period, deemed a larger portion than two thousand in the former; that
gentlewomen, in those earlier times, thought themselves well clothed in
a serge gown, which a chambermaid would, in 1688, be ashamed to be seen
in; and that, besides the great increase of rich clothes, plate, jewels,
and household furniture, coaches were in that time augmented a hundred
fold.
* Discourse on the Public Revenues, part ii. p. 29, 33, 36.
** Brief Observations, etc.
The duke of Buckingham introduced from Venice the manufacture of glass
and crystal into England. Prince Rupert was also an encourager of useful
arts and manufactures: he himself was the inventor of etching.
The first law for erecting turnpikes was passed in 1662: the places of
the turnpikes were Wadesmill, Caxton, and Stilton: but the general and
great improvement of highways took not place till the reign of George
II.
In 1663 was passed the first law for allowing the exportation of foreign
coin and bullion.
In 1667 was concluded the first American treaty between England and
Spain: this treaty was made more general and complete in 1670. The two
states then renounced all right of trading with each other’s colonies;
and the title of England was acknowledged to all the territories in
America of which she was then possessed.
The French king, about the beginning of Charles’s reign, laid some
impositions on English commodities: and the English, partly displeased
with this innovation, partly moved by their animosity against France,
retaliated, by laying such restraints on the commerce with that kingdom
as amounted almost to a prohibition. They formed calculations, by which
they persuaded themselves that they were losers a million and a half or
near two millions a year by the French trade. But no good effects were
found to result from these restraints, and in King James’s reign they
were taken off by parliament.
Lord Clarendon tells us, that, in 1665, when money, in consequence of a
treaty, was to be remitted to the bishop of Munster, it was found, that
the whole trade of England could not supply above a thousand pounds a
month to Frankfort and Cologne, nor above twenty thousand pounds a month
to Hamburgh: these sums appear surprisingly small.[*]
* Life of Clarendon, p. 237.
At the same time that the boroughs of England were deprived of their
privileges, a like attempt was made on the colonies. King James recalled
the charters, by which their liberties were secured; and he sent over
governors invested with absolute power. The arbitrary principles of that
monarch appear in every part of his administration.
The people, during these two reigns, were in a great measure cured of
that wild fanaticism by which they had formerly been so much agitated.
Whatever new vices they might acquire, it may be questioned, whether by
this change they were, in the main, much losers in point of morals.
By the example of Charles II. and the cavaliers, licentiousness and
debauchery became prevalent in the nation. The pleasures of the table
were much pursued. Love was treated more as an appetite than a passion.
The one sex began to abate of the national character of chastity,
without being able to inspire the other with sentiment or delicacy.
The abuses in the former age, arising from overstrained pretensions to
piety, had much propagated the spirit of irreligion; and many of the
ingenious men of this period lie under the imputation of Deism. Besides
wits and scholars by profession, Saftesbury, Halifax, Buckingham,
Mulgrave, Sunderland Essex, Rochester, Sidney, Temple, are supposed to
have adopted these principles.
The same factions which formerly distracted the nation were revived,
and exerted themselves in the most ungenerous and unmanly enterprises
against each other. King Charles, being in his whole deportment a model
of easy and gentleman-like behavior, improved the politeness of the
nation; as much as faction, which of all things is most destructive
to that virtue, could possibly permit. His courtiers were long
distinguishable in England by their obliging and agreeable manners.
Till the revolution, the liberty of the press was very imperfectly
enjoyed in England, and during a very short period. The star chamber,
while that court subsisted, put effectual restraints upon printing.
On the suppression of that tribunal in 1641, the long parliament, after
their rupture with the king, assumed the same power with regard to the
licensing of books; and this authority was continued during all the
period of the republic and protectorship.[*]
* Scobell i. 44, 134; ii. 88, 230.
Two years after the restoration, an act was passed reviving the
republican ordinances. This act expired in 1679; but was revived in the
first of King James. The liberty of the press did not even commence with
the revolution. It was not till 1694 that the restraints were taken
off; to the great displeasure of the king and his ministers, who, seeing
nowhere, in any government, during present or past ages, any example
of such unlimited freedom, doubted much of its salutary effects; and
probably thought, that no books or writings would ever so much improve
the general understanding of men, as to render it safe to intrust them
with an indulgence so easily abused.
In 1677, the old law for burning heretics was repealed; a prudent
measure, while the nation was in continual dread of the return of
Papery.
Amidst the thick cloud of bigotry and ignorance which overspread the
nation during the commonwealth and protectorship, there were a few
sedate philosophers, who, in the retirement of Oxford, cultivated their
reason, and established conferences for the mutual communication of
their discoveries in physics and geometry. Wilkins, a clergyman, who
had married Cromwell’s sister, and was afterwards bishop of Chester,
promoted these philosophical conversations. Immediately after the
restoration, these men procured a patent, and having enlarged their
number, were denominated the Royal Society. But this patent was all
they obtained from the king. Though Charles was a lover of the sciences,
particularly chemistry and mechanics, he animated them by his example
alone not by his bounty. His craving courtiers and mistresses, by whom
he was perpetually surrounded, engrossed all his expense, and left him
neither money nor attention for literary merit. His contemporary Lewis,
who fell short of the king’s genius and knowledge in this particular,
much exceeded him in liberality. Besides pensions conferred on learned
men throughout all Europe, his academies were directed by rules and
supported by salaries; a generosity which does great honor to his
memory; and, in the eyes of all the ingenious part of mankind, will be
esteemed an atonement for many of the errors of his reign. We may be
surprised that this example should not be more followed by princes;
since it is certain that that bounty, so extensive, so beneficial, and
so much celebrated, cost not this monarch so great a sum as is often
conferred on one useless, overgrown favorite or courtier.
But though the French Academy of Sciences was directed, encouraged, and
supported by the sovereign, there arose in England some men of superior
genius, who were more than sufficient to cast the balance, and who drew
on themselves and on their native country the regard and attention of
Europe. Besides Wilkins, Wren, Wallis, eminent mathematicians, Hooke,
an accurate observer by microscopes, and Sydenham, the restorer of true
physic, there flourished during this period a Boyle and a Newton; men
who trod with cautious, and therefore the more secure steps, the only
road which leads to true philosophy.
Boyle improved the pneumatic engine, invented by Otto Guericke, and was
thereby enabled to make several new and curious experiments on the air,
as well as on other bodies: his chemistry is much admired by those who
are acquainted with that art: his hydrostatics contain a greater mixture
of reasoning and invention with experiment than any other of his works;
but his reasoning is still remote from that boldness and temerity which
had led astray so many philosophers. Boyle was a great partisan of the
mechanical philosophy; a theory which by discovering some of the secrets
of nature, and allowing us to imagine the rest, is so agreeable to the
natural vanity and curiosity of men. He died in 1691, aged sixty-five.
In Newton this island may boast of having produced the greatest and
rarest genius that ever arose for the ornament and instruction of the
species. Cautious in admitting no principles but such as were founded on
experiment, but resolute to adopt every such principle, however new or
unusual; from modesty, ignorant of his superiority above the rest of
mankind, and thence less careful to accommodate his reasonings to common
apprehension; more anxious to merit than acquire fame; he was from these
causes long unknown to the world; but his reputation at last broke out
with a lustre which scarcely any writer, during his own lifetime, had
ever before attained. While Newton seemed to draw off the veil from some
of the mysteries of nature, he showed at the same time the imperfections
of the mechanical philosophy; and thereby restored her ultimate secrets
to that obscurity, in which they ever did and ever will remain. He died
in 1727, aged eighty-five.
This age was far from being so favorable to polite literature as to the
sciences. Charles, though fond of wit, though possessed himself of a
considerable share of it, though his taste in conversation seems to have
been sound and just, served rather to corrupt than improve the poetry
and eloquence of his time. When the theatres were opened at the
restoration, and freedom was again given to pleasantry and ingenuity,
men, after so long an abstinence, fed on these delicacies with less
taste than avidity, and the coarsest and most irregular species of wit
was received by the court as well as by the people. The productions
represented at that time on the stage were such monsters of extravagance
and folly, so utterly destitute of all reason or even common sense, that
they would be the disgrace of English literature, had not the nation
made atonement for its former admiration of them by the total oblivion
to which they are now condemned. The duke of Buckingham’s Rehearsal,
which exposed these wild productions, seems to be a piece of ridicule
carried to excess; yet in reality, the copy scarcely equals some of the
absurdities which we meet with in the originals.[*]
* The duke of Buckingham died on the 16th of April 1688.
This severe satire, together with the good sense of the nation,
corrected, after some time, the extravagancies of the fashionable wit;
but the productions of literature still wanted much of that correctness
and delicacy which we so much admire in the ancients, and in the French
writers, their judicious imitators. It was, indeed, during this
period chiefly, that that nation left the English behind them in the
productions of poetry, eloquence, history, and other branches of
polite letters; and acquired a superiority which the efforts of English
writers, during the subsequent age, did more successfully contest with
them. The arts and sciences were imported from Italy into this island as
early as into France; and made at first more sensible advances. Spenser,
Shakspeare, Bacon, Jonson, were superior to their contemporaries who
flourished in that kingdom. Milton, Waller, Denham, Cowley, Harvey, were
at least equal to their contemporaries. The reign of Charles II., which
some preposterously represent as our Augustan age, retarded the progress
of polite literature in this island; and it was then found, that the
immeasurable licentiousness, indulged or rather applauded at court, was
more destructive to the refined arts, than even the cant, nonsense, and
enthusiasm of the preceding period.
Most of the celebrated writers of this age remain monuments of genius,
perverted by indecency and bad taste; and none more than Dryden, both by
reason of the greatness of his talents and the gross abuse which he made
of them. His plays, excepting a few scenes, are utterly disfigured by
vice or folly, or both. His translations appear too much the offspring
of haste and hunger: even his fables are ill-chosen tales, conveyed
in an incorrect, though spirited versification. Yet amidst this great
number of loose productions, the refuse of our language, there are found
some small pieces, his Ode to St. Cecilia, the greater part of Absalom
and Achitophel, and a few more, which discover so great genius, such
richness of expression, such pomp and variety of numbers, that they
leave us equally full of regret and indignation, on account of the
inferiority or rather great absurdity of his other writings. He died in
1701, aged sixty-nine.
The very name of Rochester is offensive to modest ears, yet does his
poetry discover such energy of style and such poignancy of satire, as
give ground to imagine what so fine a genius, had he fallen in a more
happy age, and had followed better models, was capable of producing. The
ancient satirists often used great liberties in their expressions; but
their free-* *dom no more resembles the licentiousness of Rochester,
than the nakedness of an Indian does that of a common prostitute.
Wycherley was ambitious of the reputation of wit and libertinism, and he
attained it: he was probably capable of reaching the fame of true
comedy and instructive ridicule. Otway had a genius finely turned to the
pathetic; but he neither observed strictly the rules of the drama, nor
the rules, still more essential, of propriety and decorum. By one single
piece, the duke of Buckingham did both great service to his age and
honor to himself. The earls of Mulgrave, Dorset, and Roscommon wrote in
a good taste; but their productions are either feeble or careless. The
marquis of Halifax discovers a refined genius; and nothing but leisure
and an inferior station seem wanting to have procured him eminence in
literature.
Of all the considerable writers of this age, Sir William Temple is
almost the only one that kept himself altogether unpolluted by that
inundation of vice and licentiousness which overwhelmed the nation. The
style of this author, though extremely negligent, and even infected with
foreign idioms, is agreeable and interesting. That mixture of vanity
which appears in his works, is rather a recommendation to them. By means
of it we enter into acquaintance with the character of the author, full
of honor and humanity; and fancy that we are engaged, not in the perusal
of a book, but in conversation with a companion. He died in 1698, aged
seventy.
Though Hudibras was published, and probably composed, during the reign
of Charles II., Butler may justly, as well as Milton, be thought to
belong to the foregoing period. No composition abounds so much as
Hudibras in strokes of just and inimitable wit; yet are there many
performances which give as great or greater entertainment on the whole
perusal. The allusions in Butler are often dark and far-fetched; and
though scarcely any author was ever able to express his thoughts in
so few words, he often employs too many thoughts on one subject, and
thereby becomes prolix after an unusual manner. It is surprising how
much erudition Butler has introduced with so good a grace into a work
of pleasantry and humor: Hudibras is perhaps one of the most learned
compositions that is to be found in any language. The advantage which
the royal cause received from this poem, in exposing the fanaticism and
false pretences of the former parliamentary party, was prodigious. The
king himself had so good a taste as to be highly pleased with the merit
of the work, and had even got a great part of it by heart: yet was he
either so careless in his temper, or so little endowed with the virtue
of liberality, or, more properly speaking, of gratitude, that he allowed
the author, a man of virtue and probity, to live in obscurity, and die
in want.[*]
* Butler died in 1680, aged sixty-eight.
Dryden is an instance of a negligence of the same kind. His Absalom
sensibly contributed to the victory which the tories obtained over the
whigs, after the exclusion parliaments; yet could not this merit, aided
by his great genius, procure him an establishment which might exempt
him from the necessity of writing for bread. Otway, though a professed
royalist, could not even procure bread by his writings; and he had the
singular fate of dying literally of hunger. These incidents throw a
great stain on the memory of Charles; who had discernment, loved genius,
was liberal of money, but attained not the praise of true generosity.
NOTES.
[Footnote 1: NOTE A, p. 58. The articles were, that he had advised
the king to govern by military power, without parliaments; that he had
affirmed the king to be a papist, or popishly affected; that he had
received great sums of money, for procuring the Canary patent, and
other illegal patents; that he had advised and procured divers of his
majesty’s subjects to be imprisoned against law, in remote islands and
garrisons, thereby to prevent their having the benefit of the law; that
he had procured the customs to be farmed at under rates; that he had
received great sums from the vintners’ company, for allowing them to
enhance the price of wines; that he had in a short time gained a greater
estate than could have been supposed to arise from the profits of
his offices; that he had introduced an arbitrary government into
his majesty’s plantations; that he had rejected a proposal for the
preservation of Nevis and St. Christopher’s, which was the occasion of
great losses in those parts; that when he was in his majesty’s service
beyond sea, he held a correspondence with Cromwell and his accomplices;
that he advised the sale of Dunkirk; that he had unduly altered letters
patent under the king’s seal; that he had unduly decided causes in
council, which should have been brought before chancery; that he
had issued quo warrantos against corporations, with an intention of
squeezing money from them; that he had taken money for passing the bill
of settlement in Ireland; that he betrayed the nation in all foreign
treaties, and that he was the principal adviser of dividing the fleet in
June, 1666.]
[Footnote 2: NOTE B, p. 80. The abstract of the report of the Brook
House committee (so that committee was called) was first published by
Mr. Ralph (vol. i. p. 177), from Lord Halifax’s collections, to which I
refer. If we peruse their apology, which we find in the subsequent page
of the same author, we shall find that they acted with some malignity
towards the king. They would take notice of no services performed before
the first of September, 1664. But all the king’s preparations preceded
that date, and, as Chancellor Clarendon told the parliament, amounted
to eight hundred thousand pounds; and the computation is very probable.
This sum, therefore, must be added. The committee likewise charged seven
hundred thousand pounds to the king, on account of the winter and summer
guards, saved during two years and ten months that the war lasted.
But this seems iniquitous. For though that was an usual burden on the
revenue, which was then saved, would not the diminution of the customs
during the war be an equivalent to it? Besides, near three hundred and
forty thousand pounds are charged for prize money, which perhaps the
king thought he ought not to account for. These sums exceed the million
and a half.]
[Footnote 3: NOTE C, p. 85. Gourville has said in his Memoirs, (vol. ii.
p. 14, 67,) that Charles was never sincere in the triple alliance;
and that, having entertained a violent animosity against De Wit, he
endeavored by this artifice to detach him from the French alliance, with
a view of afterwards finding an opportunity to satiate his vengeance
upon him. This account, though very little honorable to the king’s
memory, seems probable from the events, as well as from the authority of
the author.]