THE REIGN OF CHARLES II.
[Sidenote: The Restoration.]
[Sidenote: Great Public Rejoicings.]
Few events in English history have ever been hailed with greater
popular enthusiasm than the restoration of Charles II. On the 25th of
May, 1660, he landed near Dover, with his two brothers, the Dukes of
York and Gloucester. On the 29th of May, he made his triumphal entry
into London. It was his birthday, he was thirty years of age, and in
the full maturity of manly beauty, while his gracious manners and
captivating speech made him the favorite of the people, as well as of
the old nobility. The season was full of charms, and the spirits of
all classes were buoyant with hope. Every thing conspired to give a
glow to the popular enthusiasm. A long line of illustrious monarchs
was restored. The hateful fires of religious fanaticism were
apparently extinguished. An accomplished sovereign, disciplined in the
school of adversity, of brilliant talents, amiable temper, fascinating
manners, and singular experiences, had returned to the throne of his
ancestors, and had sworn to rule by the laws, to forget old offences,
and promote liberty of conscience. No longer should there be a
government of soldiers, nor the rule of a man hostile to those
pleasures and opinions which had ever been dear to the English people.
With the return of the exiled prince, should also return joy, peace,
and prosperity. For seventeen years, there had been violent political
and social animosities, war, tyranny, social restraints, and religious
fanaticism. But order and law were now to be reëstablished, and the
reign of cant and hypocrisy was now to end. Justice and mercy were to
meet together in the person of a king who was represented to have all
the virtues and none of the vices of his station and his times. So
people reasoned and felt, of all classes and conditions. And why
should they not rejoice in the restoration of such blessings? The ways
were strewn with flowers, the bells sent forth a merry peal, the
streets were hung with tapestries; while aldermen with their heavy
chains, nobles in their robes of pomp, ladies with their silks and
satins, and waving handkerchiefs, filling all the balconies and
windows; musicians, dancers, and exulting crowds,--all welcomed the
return of Charles. Never was there so great a jubilee in London; and
never did monarch receive such addresses of flattery and loyalty.
"Dread monarch," said the Earl of Manchester, in the House of Lords,
"I offer no flattering titles. You are the desire of three kingdoms,
the strength and stay of the tribes of the people." "Most royal
sovereign," said one of the deputations, "the hearts of all are filled
with veneration for you, confidence in you, longings for you. All
degrees, and ages, and sexes, high, low, rich and poor, men, women,
and children, join in sending up to Heaven one prayer, 'Long live King
Charles II.;' so that the English air is not susceptible of any other
sound, bells, bonfires, peals of ordnance, shouts, and acclamations of
the people bear no other moral; nor can his majesty conceive with what
joy, what cheerfulness, what lettings out of the soul, what
expressions of transported minds, a stupendous concourse of people
attended the proclamation of their most potent, most mighty, and most
undoubted king." Such was the adulatory language addressed by the
English people to the son of the king they had murdered, and to a man
noted for every frivolity and vice that could degrade a sovereign.
What are we to think of that public joy, and public sycophancy, after
so many years of hard fighting for civil and religious liberty? For
what were the battles of Naseby and Worcester? For what the Solemn
League and Covenant? For what the trial and execution of Charles I.?
For what the elevation of Cromwell? Alas! for what were all the
experiments and sufferings of twenty years, the breaking up of old and
mighty customs, and twenty years of blood, usurpation, and change?
What were the benefits of the Revolution? Or, had it no benefits? How
happened it that a whole nation should simultaneously rise and expel
their monarch from a throne which his ancestors had enjoyed for six
hundred years, and then, in so short a time, have elevated to this old
throne, which was supposed to be subverted forever, the son of their
insulted, humiliated, and murdered king? and this without bloodshed,
with every demonstration of national rejoicings, and with every
external mark of repentance for their past conduct. Charles, too, was
restored without any of those limitations by which the nation sought
to curtail the power of his father. The nation surrendered to him more
absolute power than the most ambitious kings, since the reign of John,
had ever claimed,--more than he ever dared to expect. How shall we
explain these things? And what is the moral which they teach?
[Sidenote: Reaction to Revolutionary Principles.]
One fact is obvious,--that a great reaction had taken place in the
national mind as to revolutionary principles. It is evident that a
great disgust for the government of Cromwell had succeeded the
antipathy to the royal government of Charles. All classes as ardently
desired the restoration, as they had before favored the rebellion.
Even the old parliamentarians hailed the return of Charles,
notwithstanding it was admitted that the protectorate was a vigorous
administration; that law and order were enforced; that religious
liberty was proclaimed; that the rights of conscience were respected;
that literature and science were encouraged; that the morals of the
people were purified; that the ordinances of religion were observed;
that vice and folly were discouraged; that justice was ably
administered; that peace and plenty were enjoyed; that prosperity
attended the English arms abroad; and that the nation was as much
respected abroad as it was prosperous at home. These things were
admitted by the very people who rejoiced in the restoration. And yet,
in spite of all these substantial blessings, the reign of Cromwell was
odious. Why was this?
It can only be explained on the supposition that there were
_unendurable evils_ connected with the administration of Cromwell,
which more than balanced the benefits he conferred; or, that
expectations were held out by Charles of national benefits greater
than those conferred by the republic; or, that the nation had so
retrograded in elevation of sentiment as to be unable to appreciate
the excellences of Cromwell's administration.
There is much to support all of these suppositions. In regard to the
evils connected with the republic, it is certain that a large standing
army was supported, and was necessary to uphold the government of the
protector, in order to give to it efficiency and character. This army
was expensive, and the people felt the burden. They always complain
under taxation, whether necessary or not. Taxes ever make any
government unpopular, and made the administration of Cromwell
especially so. And the army showed the existence of a military
despotism, which, however imperatively called for, or rendered
unavoidable by revolution, was still a hateful fact. The English never
have liked the principle of a military despotism. And it was a bitter
reflection to feel that so much blood and treasure had been expended
to get rid of the arbitrary rule of the Stuarts, only to introduce a
still more expensive and arbitrary government, under the name of a
republic. Moreover, the eyes of the people were opened to the moral
corruptions incident to the support of a large army, without which the
power of Cromwell would have been unsubstantial. He may originally
have desired to establish his power on a civil basis, rather than a
military one; but his desires were not realized. The parliaments which
he assembled were unpractical and disorderly. He was forced to rule
without them. But the nation could not forget this great insult to
their liberties, and to those privileges which had ever been dear to
them. The preponderance of the civil power has, for several centuries,
characterized the government; and no blessings were sufficiently great
to balance the evil, in the eye of an Englishman, of the preponderance
of a military government, neither the excellence of Cromwell's life,
nor the glory and greatness to which he raised the nation.
[Sidenote: Excellences in Charles's Government.]
Again, much was expected of Charles II., and there was much in his
character and early administration to produce content. His manners
were agreeable. He had no personal antipathies or jealousies. He
selected, at first, the wisest and best of all parties to be his
counsellors and ministers. He seemed to forget old offences. He was
fond of pleasure; was good-natured and affable. He summoned a free
parliament. His interests were made to appear identical with those of
the people. He promised to rule by the laws. He did not openly
infringe on the constitution. And he restored, what has ever been so
dear to the great body of the nation, the Episcopal Church in all its
beauty and grandeur, while he did not recommence the persecution of
Puritans until some time had elapsed from his restoration. Above all,
he disbanded the army, which was always distasteful to the
people,--odious, onerous, and oppressive. The civil power again
triumphed over that of the military, and circumstances existed which
rendered the subversion of liberty very difficult. Many adverse events
transpired during his unfortunate and disgraceful reign; but these, in
the early part of it, had not, of course, been anticipated.
[Sidenote: Failure of the Puritan Experiment.]
There is also force in the third supposition, that the nation had
retrograded in moral elevation. All writers speak of a strong reaction
to the religious fervor of the early revolutionists. The moral
influence of the army had proved destructive to the habits and
sentiments of the people. A strong love of pleasure and demoralizing
amusements existed, when Charles was recalled. A general laxity of
morals was lamented by the wisest and best of the nation. The
religious convictions of enthusiasts survived their sympathies.
Hypocrisy and cant succeeded fervor and honesty. Infidelity lurked in
many a bosom in which devotional ardor had once warmly burned.
Distrust of all philanthropy and all human virtue was as marked, as
faith in the same previously had been. The ordinances of religion
became irksome, and it was remembered with bitterness that the
Puritans, in the days of their ascendency, had cruelly proscribed the
most favorite pleasures and time-honored festivals of old England. But
the love of them returned with redoubled vigor. May-poles,
wrestling-matches, bear-baitings, puppet-shows, bowls, horse-racing,
betting, rope-dancing, romping under the mistletoe on Christmas,
eating boars' heads, attending the theatres, health-drinking,--all
these old-fashioned ways, in which the English sought merriment, were
restored. The evil was chiefly in the excess to which these pleasures
were carried; and every thing, which bore any resemblance to the
Puritans, was ridiculed and despised. The nation, as a nation, did not
love Puritanism, or any thing pertaining to it, after the deep
religious excitement had passed away. The people were ashamed of
prayer-meetings, of speaking through their noses, of wearing their
hair straight, of having their garments cut primly, of calling their
children by the name of Moses, Joshua, Jeremiah, Obadiah, &c.; and, in
short, of all customs and opinions peculiar to the Extreme Puritans.
So general was the disgust of Puritanism, so eager were all to indulge
in the pleasures that had been forbidden under the reign of Cromwell,
so sick were they of the very name of republicanism, that Puritanism
may be said to have proved, in England, a signal failure.
Such were some of the reasons of popular acclamation on the
restoration of Charles II., and which we cannot consider entirely
without force. A state of mind existed in England as favorable to the
encroachments of royalty, as, twenty years before, it had been
unfavorable.
Charles was not a high-minded, or honest, or patriotic king; and
therefore we might naturally expect the growth of absolutism during
his reign. The progress of absolutism is, indeed, one of its features.
This, for a time, demands our notice.
On the restoration of Charles II., his subjects made no particular
stipulations respecting their liberties, which were incautiously
intrusted to his hands. But, at first, he did not seem inclined to
grasp at greater powers than what the constitution allowed him. He had
the right to appoint the great officers of state, the privilege of
veto on legislative enactments, the control of the army and navy, the
regulation of all foreign intercourse, and the right of making peace
and war. But the constitution did not allow him to rule without a
parliament, or to raise taxes without its consent. The parliament
might grant or withhold supplies at pleasure, and all money bills
originated and were discussed in the House of Commons alone. These
were the great principles of the English constitution, which Charles
swore to maintain.
[Sidenote: Repeal of the Triennial Bill.]
The first form in which the encroaching temper of the king was
manifested was, in causing the Triennial Bill to be repealed. This was
indeed done by the parliament, but through the royal influence. This
bill was not that a parliament should be assembled every three years,
but that the interval between one session and another should not
exceed that period. But this wise law, which had passed by acclamation
during the reign of Charles I., and for which even Clarendon had
voted, was regarded by Charles II. as subversive of the liberty of his
crown; and a supple, degenerate and sycophantic parliament gratified
his wishes.
About the same time was passed the Corporation Act, which enjoined all
magistrates, and persons of trust in corporations, to swear that they
believed it unlawful, under any pretence whatever to take arms against
the king. The Presbyterians refused to take this oath; and they were
therefore excluded from offices of dignity and trust. The act bore
hard upon all bodies of Dissenters and Roman Catholics, the former of
whom were most cruelly persecuted in this reign.
[Sidenote: Secret Alliance with Louis XIV.]
The next most noticeable effort of Charles to extend his power
independently of the law, was his secret alliance with Louis XIV. This
was not known to the nation, and even but to few of his ministers, and
was the most disgraceful act of his reign. For the miserable stipend
of two hundred thousand pounds a year, he was ready to compromise the
interests of the kingdom, and make himself the slave of the most
ambitious sovereign in Europe. He became a pensioner of France, and
yet did not feel his disgrace. Clarendon, attached as he was to
monarchy, and to the house of Stuart, could not join him in his base
intrigues; and therefore lost, as was to be expected, the royal favor.
He had been the companion and counsellor of Charles in the days of his
exile; he had attempted to enkindle in his mind the desire of great
deeds and virtues; he had faithfully served him as chancellor and
prime minister; he was impartial and incorruptible; he was as much
attached to Episcopacy, as he was to monarchy; he had even advised
Charles to rule without a parliament; and yet he was disgraced because
he would not comply with all the wishes of his unscrupulous master.
But Clarendon was, nevertheless, unpopular with the nation. He had
advised Charles to sell Dunkirk, the proudest trophy of the
Revolution, and had built for himself a splendid palace, on the site
of the present Clarendon Hotel, in Albemarle Street, which the people
called _Dunkirk House_. He was proud, ostentatious, and dictatorial,
and was bitterly hostile to all democratic influences. He was too good
for one party, and not good enough for the other, and therefore fell
to the ground; but he retired, if not with dignity, at least with
safety. He retreated to the Continent, and there wrote his celebrated
history of the Great Rebellion, a partial and bitter history, yet a
valuable record of the great events of the age of revolution which he
had witnessed and detested.
Charles received the bribe of two hundred thousand pounds from the
French king, with the hope of being made independent of his
parliament, and with the condition of assisting Louis XIV. in his
aggressive wars on the liberties of Europe, especially those of
Holland. He was, at heart an absolutist, and rejoiced in the victories
of the "Grand Monarch." But this supply was scarcely sufficient even
for his pleasures, much less to support the ordinary pomp of a
monarchy, and the civil and military powers of the state. So he had to
resort to other means.
[Sidenote: Venality and Sycophancy of Parliament.]
It happened, fortunately for his encroachments, but unfortunately for
the nation, that the English parliament, at that period, was more
corrupt, venal, base, and sycophantic than at any period under the
Tudor kings, or at any subsequent period under the Hanoverian princes.
The House of Commons made no indignant resistance; it sent up but few
spirited remonstrances; but tamely acquiesced in the measures of
Charles and his ministers. Its members were bought and sold with
unblushing facility, and even were corrupted by the agents of the
French king. One member received six thousand pounds for his vote.
Twenty-nine of the members received from five hundred to twelve
hundred pounds a year. Charles I. attempted to rule by opposition to
the parliament; Charles II. by corrupting it. Hence it was nearly
silent in view of his arbitrary spirit, his repeated encroachments,
and his worthless public character.
Among his worst acts was his shutting up the Exchequer, where the
bankers and merchants had been in the habit of depositing money on the
security of the funds, receiving a large interest of from eight to ten
per cent. By closing the Exchequer, the bankers, unable to draw out
their money, stopped payment; and a universal panic was the
consequence, during which many great failures happened. By this base
violation of the public faith, Charles obtained one million three
hundred thousand pounds. But it undermined his popularity more than
any of his acts, since he touched the pockets of the people. The
odium, however, fell chiefly on his ministers, especially those who
received the name of the _Cabal_, from the fact that the initials of
their names spelt that odious term of reproach, not unmerited in their
case.
These five ministers were Clifford, Arlington, Buckingham, Ashley, and
Lauderdale, and they were the great instruments of his tyranny. None
of them had the talents or audacity of Strafford, or the narrowness
and bigotry of Laud; but their counsels were injurious to the nation.
Clifford and Arlington were tolerably respectable but indifferent to
the glory and shame of their country; while Buckingham, Ashley, and
Lauderdale were profligate, unprincipled, and dishonest to a great
degree. They aided Charles to corrupt the parliament and deceive the
nation. They removed all restraints on his will, and pandered to his
depraved tastes. It was by their suggestion that the king shut up the
Exchequer. They also favored restrictions on the press.
[Sidenote: Restrictions on the Press.]
These restrictions were another abomination in the reign of Charles,
but one ever peculiar to a despotic government. No book could be
printed out of London, York, or the Universities. But these were not
made wholly with a view of shackling the mind, but to prevent those
libels and lampoons which made the government ridiculous in the eyes
of the people.
Nothing caused more popular indignation, during this reign, than the
Forfeiture of the Corporation of the City of London. The power of the
democracy resided, at this time, with the corporations, and as long as
they were actuated by the spirit of liberty, there was no prospect of
obtaining a parliament entirely subservient to the king. It was
determined to take away their charters; and the infamous Judge
Jeffreys was found a most subservient tool of royalty in undermining
the liberties of the country. The corporation of London, however,
received back its charter, after having yielded to the king the right
of conferring the appointments of mayor, recorder, and sheriffs.
Among other infringements on the constitution was the fining of jurors
when they refused to act according to the direction of the judges.
Juries were constantly intimidated, and their privileges were
abridged. A new parliament, moreover, was not convoked after three
years had elapsed from the dissolution of the old one, which
infringement was the more reprehensible, since the king had nothing to
fear from the new House of Commons, the members of which vied with
each other in a base compliancy with the royal will.
But their sycophancy was nothing compared with what the bishops and
clergy of the Established Church generally evinced. Absolute
non-resistance was inculcated from the pulpits, and the doctrine
ridiculed that power emanated from the people. The divine rights of
kings, and the divine ordination of absolute power were the themes of
divines, while Oxford proclaimed doctrines worthy of Mariana and the
Jesuits.
Thus various influences contributed to make Charles II. absolute in
England--the Courts of Justice, the Parliaments, the Universities, and
the Church of England. Had he been as ambitious as he was fond of
pleasure, as capable of ruling as he was capable of telling stories at
the dinner table, he would, like Louis XIV., have reared an absolute
throne in England. But he was too easy, too careless, too fond of
pleasure to concentrate his thoughts on devising means to enslave his
subjects.
[Sidenote: Habeas Corpus Act.]
It must not, however, be supposed that all his subjects were
indifferent to his encroachments, in spite of the great reaction which
had succeeded to liberal sentiments. Before he died, the spirit of
resistance was beginning to be seen, and some checks to royal power
were imposed by parliament itself. The Habeas Corpus Act, the most
important since the declaration of Magna Charta, was passed, and
through the influence of one of his former ministers, Ashley, now
become Earl of Shaftesbury, who took the popular side, after having
served all sides, but always with a view of advancing his own
interests, a man of great versatility of genius, of great sagacity,
and of varied learning. Had Charles continued much longer on the
throne, it cannot be doubted that the nation would have been finally
aroused to resist his spirit of encroachment, for the principles of
liberty had not been proclaimed in vain.
Charles II. was a tyrant, and one of the worst kings that ever sat on
the English throne. His leading defect was want of earnestness of
character, which made him indifferent to the welfare of his country.
England, during his reign, was reduced to comparative insignificance
in the eyes of foreigners, and was neither feared nor respected. Her
king was neither a powerful friend nor an implacable enemy, and left
the Continental Powers to pursue their own ends unmolested and
unrebuked. Most of the administrations of the English kings are
interlinked with the whole system of European politics. But the reign
of Charles is chiefly interesting in relation to the domestic history
of England. This history is chiefly the cabals of ministers, the
intrigues of the court, the pleasures and follies of the king, the
attacks he made on the constitution without any direct warfare with
his parliament and the system of religious persecution, which was most
intolerant.
The king was at heart a Catholic; and yet the persecution of the
Catholics is one of the most signal events of the times. We can
scarcely conceive, in this age, of the spirit of distrust and fear
which pervaded the national mind in reference to the Catholics. Every
calumny was believed. Every trifling offence was exaggerated, and by
nearly all classes in the community, by the Episcopalians, as well as
by the Presbyterians and the Independents.
[Sidenote: Titus Oates.]
The most memorable of all the delusions and slanders of the times was
produced by the perjuries of an unprincipled wretch called Titus
Oates, who took advantage of the general infatuation to advance his
individual interests. Like an artful politician, he had only to appeal
to a dominant passion or prejudice, and he was sure of making his
fortune. Like a cunning, popular orator, he had only to inflame the
passions of the people, and he would pass as a genius and a prophet.
Few are so abstractedly and coldly intellectual as not to be mainly
governed by their tastes or passions. Even men of strong intellect
have frequently strong prejudices, and one has only to make himself
master of these, in order to lead those who are infinitely their
superiors. There is no proof that all who persecuted the Catholics in
Charles's time were either weak or ignorant. But there is evidence of
unbounded animosity, a traditional hatred, not much diminished since
the Gunpowder Plot of Guy Fawkes. The whole nation was ready to
believe any thing against the Catholics, and especially against their
church, which was supposed to be persecuting and diabolical in all its
principles and in all its practice. In this state of the popular mind,
Oates made his hideous revelations.
[Sidenote: Oates's Revelations.]
He was a broken-down clergyman of the Established Church, and had lost
caste for disgraceful irregularities. But he professed to hate the
Catholics, and such a virtue secured him friends. Among these was the
Rev. Dr. Tonge, a man very weak, very credulous, and full of fears
respecting the intrigues of the Catholics but honest in his fears.
Oates went to this clergyman, and a plan was concerted between them,
by which Oates should get a knowledge of the supposed intrigues of the
Church of Rome. He professed himself a Catholic, went to the
Continent, and entered a Catholic seminary, but was soon discharged
for his scandalous irregularities. But he had been a Catholic long
enough for his purposes. He returned to London, and revealed his
pretended discoveries, among which he declared that the Jesuits had
undertaken to restore the Catholic religion in England by force; that
they were resolved to take the king's life, and had actually offered a
bribe of fifteen thousand pounds to the queen's physician; that they
had planned to burn London, and to set fire to all the shipping in the
Thames; that they were plotting to make a general massacre of the
Protestants; that a French army was about to invade England; and that
all the horrors of St. Bartholomew were to be again acted over!
Ridiculous as were these assertions, they were believed, and without a
particle of evidence; so great was the national infatuation. The king
and the Duke of York both pronounced the whole matter a forgery, and
laughed at the credulity of the people, but had not sufficient
generosity to prevent the triumph of the libellers. But Oates's
testimony was not enough to convict any one, the law requiring two
witnesses. But, in such a corrupt age, false witnesses could easily be
procured. An infamous wretch, by the name of Bedloe, was bribed, a man
who had been imprisoned in Newgate for swindling. Others equally
unscrupulous were soon added to the list of informers, and no
calumnies, however gross and absurd, prevented the people from
believing them.
It happened that a man, by the name of Coleman, was suspected of
intrigues. His papers were searched, and some passages in them,
unfortunately, seemed to confirm the statements of Oates. To impartial
eyes, these papers simply indicated a desire and a hope that the
Catholic religion would be reëstablished, in view of the predilections
of Charles and James, and the general posture of affairs, just as some
enthusiastic Jesuit missionary in the valley of the Mississippi may be
supposed to write to his superior that America is on the eve of
conversion to Catholicism.
[Sidenote: Penal Laws against Catholics.]
But the general ferment was still more increased by the disappearance
of an eminent justice of the peace, who had taken the depositions of
Oates against Coleman. Sir Edmondsbury Godfrey was found dead, and
with every mark of violence, in a field near London, and was probably
murdered by some fanatical persons in the communion of the Church of
Rome. But if so, the murder was a great blunder. It was worse than a
crime. The whole community were mad with rage and fear. The old penal
laws were strictly enforced against the Catholics. The jails were
filled with victims. London wore the appearance of a besieged city.
The houses of the Catholics were every where searched, and two
thousand of them imprisoned. Posts were planted in the street, that
chains might be thrown across them on the first alarm. The military,
the train bands, and the volunteers were called out. Forty thousand
men were kept under guard during the night. Numerous patrols paraded
the streets. The gates of the Palace were closed, and the guards of
the city were doubled. Oates was pronounced to be the savior of his
country, lodged at Whitehall and pensioned with twelve hundred pounds
a year.
Then flowed more innocent blood than had been shed for a long period.
Catholics who were noble, and Catholics who were obscure, were alike
judicially murdered; and the courts of justice, instead of being
places of refuge, were disgraced by the foulest abominations. Every
day new witnesses were produced of crimes which never happened, and
new victims were offered up to appease the wrath of a prejudiced
people. Among these victims of popular frenzy was the Earl of
Stafford, a venerable and venerated nobleman of sixty-nine years of
age, against whom sufficient evidence was not found to convict him;
and whose only crime was in being at the head of the Catholic party.
Yet he was found guilty by the House of Peers, fifty-five out of
eighty-six having voted for his execution. He died on the scaffold,
but with the greatest serenity, forgiving his persecutors, and
compassionating their delusions. A future generation, during the reign
of George IV., however, reversed his attainder, and did justice to his
memory, and restored his descendants to their rank and fortune.
[Sidenote: Persecution of Dissenters.]
If no other illustrious victims suffered, persecution was nevertheless
directed into other channels. Parliament passed an act that no person
should sit in either House, unless he had previously taken the oath of
allegiance and supremacy, and subscribed to the declaration that the
worship of the Church of Rome was idolatrous. Catholics were disabled
from prosecuting a suit in any court of law, from receiving any
legacy, and from acting as executors or administrators of estates.
This horrid bill, which outlawed the whole Catholic population, had
repeatedly miscarried, but, under influence of the panic which Oates
and his confederates created, was now triumphantly passed. Charles
himself gave his royal assent because he was afraid to stem the
torrent of popular infatuation. And the English nation permitted one
hundred and thirty years to elapse before the civil disabilities of
the Catholics were removed, and then only by the most strenuous
exertions of such a statesman as Sir Robert Peel.
It is some satisfaction to know that justice at last overtook the
chief authors of this diabolical infatuation. During the reign of
James II., Oates and others were punished as they deserved. Oates's
credit gradually passed away. He was fined, imprisoned, and whipped at
the pillory until life itself had nearly fled. He died unlamented and
detested, leaving behind him, to all posterity an infamous notoriety.
But the sufferings of the Catholics, during this reign, were more than
exceeded by the sufferings of Dissenters, who were cruelly persecuted.
All the various sects of the Protestants were odious and ridiculous in
the eyes of the king. They were regarded as hostile in their
sympathies, and treasonable in their designs. They were fined,
imprisoned, mutilated, and whipped. An Act of Uniformity was passed,
which restored the old penal laws of Elizabeth, and which subjected
all to their penalty who did not use the Book of Common Prayer, and
adhere strictly to the ritual of the Church of England. The
oligarchical power of the bishops was restored, and two thousand
ministers were driven from their livings, and compelled to seek a
precarious support. Many other acts of flagrant injustice were passed
by a subservient parliament, and cruelly carried into execution by
unfeeling judges. But the religious persecution of dissenters was not
consummated until the reign of James under whose favor or direction
the inhuman Jeffreys inflicted the most atrocious crimes which have
ever been committed under the sanction of the law. But these will be
more appropriately noticed under the reign of James II. Charles was
not so cruel in his temper, or bigoted in his sentiments, as his
brother James. He was rather a Gallio than a persecutor. He would
permit any thing rather than suffer himself to be interrupted in his
pleasures. He was governed by his favorites and his women. He had not
sufficient moral elevation to be earnest in any thing, even to be a
bigot in religion. He vacillated between the infidelity of Hobbes and
the superstitions of Rome. He lived a scoffer, and died a Catholic.
His temper was easy, but so easy as not to prevent the persecution and
ruin of his best supporters, when they had become odious to the
nation. If he was incapable of enmity, he was also incapable of
friendship. If he hated no one with long-continued malignity, it was
only because it was too much trouble to hate perseveringly. But he
loved with no more constancy than he hated. He had no patriotism, and
no appreciation of moral excellence. He would rather see half of the
merchants of London ruined, and half of the Dissenters immured in
gloomy prisons, than lose two hours of inglorious dalliance with one
of his numerous concubines. A more contemptible prince never sat on
the English throne, or one whose whole reign was disgraced by a more
constant succession of political blunders and social crimes. And yet
he never fully lost his popularity, nor was his reign felt to be as
burdensome as was that of the protector, Cromwell, thus showing how
little the moral excellence of rulers is ordinarily appreciated or
valued by a wilful or blinded generation. We love not the rebukers of
our sins, or the opposers of our pleasures. We love those who prophesy
smooth things, and "cry peace, when there is no peace." Such is man in
his weakness and his degeneracy; and only an omnipotent power can
change this ordinary temper of the devotees to pleasure and inglorious
gains.
[Sidenote: Execution of Russell and Sydney.]
Among the saddest events during the reign of Charles, were the
executions of Lord Russell and Algernon Sydney. They were concerned,
with a few other great men, in a conspiracy, which had for its object
the restoration of greater liberty. They contemplated an insurrection,
known by the name of the _Rye House Plot_; but it was discovered, and
Russell and Sydney became martyrs. The former was the son of the Earl
of Bedford, and the latter was the brother of the Earl of Leicester.
Russell was a devoted Churchman, of pure morals, and greatly beloved
by the people. Sydney was a strenuous republican, and was opposed to
any particular form of church government. He thought that religion
should be like a divine philosophy in the mind, and had great
veneration for the doctrines of Plato. Nothing could save these
illustrious men. The Duke of York and Jeffreys declared that, if they
were not executed, there would be no safety for themselves. They both
suffered with great intrepidity, and the friends of liberty have ever
since cherished their memory with peculiar fondness.
[Sidenote: Manners and Customs of England.]
[Sidenote: Milton--Dryden.]
Mr. Macaulay, in his recent History, has presented the manners and
customs of England during the disgraceful reign of Charles II. It is
impossible, in this brief survey, to allude to all those customs; but
we direct particularly the attention of readers to them, as described
in his third chapter, from which it would appear, that a most manifest
and most glorious progress has been made since that period in all the
arts of civilization, both useful and ornamental. In those times,
travelling was difficult and slow, from the badness of the roads and
the imperfections of the carriages. Highwaymen were secreted along the
thoroughfares, and, in mounted troops, defied the law, and distressed
the whole travelling community. The transmission of letters by post
was tardy and unfrequent, and the scandal of coffee-houses supplied
the greatest want and the greatest luxury of modern times, the
newspaper. There was great scarcity of books in the country places,
and the only press in England north of the Trent seems to have been at
York. Literature was but feebly cultivated by country squires or
country parsons, and female education was disgracefully neglected. Few
rich men had libraries as large or valuable as are now common to
shopkeepers and mechanics; while the literary stores of a lady of the
manor were confined chiefly to the prayer-book and the receipt-book.
And those works which were produced or read were disgraced by
licentious ribaldry, which had succeeded religious austerity. The
drama was the only department of literature which compensated authors,
and this was scandalous in the extreme. We cannot turn over the pages
of one of the popular dramatists of the age without being shocked by
the most culpable indecency. Even Dryden was no exception to the rule;
and his poetry, some of which is the most beautiful in the language,
can hardly be put into the hands of the young without danger of
corrupting them. Poets and all literary men lived by the bounty of the
rich and great, and prospered only as they pandered to depraved
passions. Many, of great intellectual excellence, died from want and
mortification; so that the poverty and distress of literary men became
proverbial, and all worldly-wise people shunned contact with them as
expensive and degrading. They were hunted from cocklofts to cellars by
the minions of the law, and the foulest jails were often their only
resting-place. The restoration of Charles proved unfortunate to one
great and immortal genius, whom no temptations could assail, and no
rewards could bribe. He "possessed his soul in patience," and "soared
above the Aonian mount," amid general levity and profligacy. Had he
written for a pure, classic, and learned age, he could not have
written with greater moral beauty. But he lived when no moral
excellence was appreciated, and his claims on the gratitude of the
world are beyond all estimation, when we remember that he wrote with
the full consciousness, like the great Bacon, that his works would
only be valued or read by future generations. Milton was, indeed,
unmolested; but he was sadly neglected in his blindness and in his
greatness. But, like all the great teachers of the world, he was
sustained by something higher than earthly applause, and labored, like
an immortal artist, from the love which his labor excited,--labored to
realize the work of art which his imagination had conceived, as well
as to propagate ideas and sentiments which should tend to elevate
mankind. Dryden was his contemporary, but obtained a greater homage,
not because he was more worthy, but because he adapted his genius to
the taste of a frivolous and corrupt people. He afterwards wrote more
unexceptionably, composed lyrics instead of farces, and satires
instead of plays. In his latter days, he could afford to write in a
purer style; and, as he became independent, he reared the
superstructure of his glorious fame. But Dryden spent the best parts
of his life as a panderer to the vices of the town, and was an idol
chiefly, in Wills's Coffee House, of lampooners, and idlers, and
scandal-mongers. Nor were there many people, in the church or in the
state, sufficiently influential and noble to stem the torrent. The
city clergy were the most respectable, and the pulpits of London were
occupied with twelve men who afterwards became bishops, and who are
among the great ornaments of the sacred literature of their country.
Sherlock, Tillotson, Wake, Collier, Burnet, Stillingfleet, Patrick,
Fowler, Sharp, Tennison, and Beveridge made the Established Church
respected in the town; but the country clergy, as a whole, were
ignorant and depressed. Not one living in fifty enabled the incumbent
to bring up a family comfortably or respectably. The clergyman was
disdained even by the county attorney, was hardly tolerated at the
table of his patron, and could scarcely marry beyond the rank of a
cook or housekeeper. And his poverty and bondage continued so long
that, in the times of Swift, the parson was a byword and a jest among
the various servants in the households of the great. Still there were
eminent clergymen amid the general depression of their order, both in
and out of the Established Church. Besides the London preachers were
many connected with the Universities and Cathedrals; and there were
some distinguished Dissenters, among whom Baxter, Howe, and Alleine if
there were no others, would alone have made the name of Puritan
respectable.
[Sidenote: Condition of the People.]
The saddest fact, in connection with the internal history of England,
at this time, was the condition of the people. They had small wages,
and many privations. They had no social rank, and were disgraced by
many vices. They were ignorant and brutal. The wages of laborers only
averaged four shillings a week, while those of mechanics were not
equal to what some ordinarily earn, in this country and in these
times, in a single day. Both peasants, and artisans were not only ill
paid, but ill used, and they died, miserably and prematurely, from
famine and disease. Nor did sympathy exist for the misfortunes of the
poor. There were no institutions of public philanthropy. Jails were
unvisited by the ministers of mercy, and the abodes of poverty were
left by a careless generation to be dens of infamy and crime. Such was
England two hundred years ago; and there is no delusion more
unwarranted by sober facts than that which supposes that those former
times were better than our own, in any thing which abridges the labors
or alleviates the miseries of mankind. "It is now the fashion to place
the golden age of England in times when noblemen were destitute of
comforts the want of which would be intolerable to a modern footman;
when farmers and shopkeepers breakfasted on loaves the very sight of
which would raise a riot in a modern workhouse, when men died faster
in the purest country air than they now die in the most pestilential
lanes of our towns; and when men died faster in the lanes of our towns
than they now die on the coast of Guinea. But we too shall, in our
turn, be outstripped, and, in our turn, envied. There is constant
improvement, as there also is constant discontent; and future
generations may talk of the reign of Queen Victoria as a time when
England was truly merry England, when all classes were bound together
by brotherly sympathy, when the rich did not grind the faces of the
poor, and when the poor did not envy the splendor of the rich."
* * * * *
REFERENCES.--Of all the works which have yet appeared,
respecting this interesting epoch, the new History of
Macaulay is the most brilliant and instructive. Indeed, the
student scarcely needs any other history, in spite of
Macaulay's Whig doctrines. He may sacrifice something to
effect; and he may give us pictures, instead of philosophy;
but, nevertheless, his book has transcendent merit, and will
be read, by all classes, so long as English history is
prized. Mackintosh's fragment, on the same period, is more
philosophical, and possesses very great merits. Lingard's
History is very valuable on this reign, and should be
consulted. Hume, also, will never cease to please. Burnet is
a prejudiced historian, but his work is an authority. The
lives of Milton, Dryden, and Clarendon should also be read
in this connection. Hallam has but treated the
constitutional history of these times. See also Temple's
Works; the Life of William Lord Russell; Rapin's History.
Pepys, Dalrymple, Rymeri Foedera, the Commons' Journal, and
the Howell State Trials are not easily accessible, and not
necessary, except to the historian.