COMMENTARIES

ON

THE LIFE AND REIGN

OF

CHARLES THE FIRST,

KING OF ENGLAND.

BY I. D'ISRAELI.

VOL. III.

\H

LONDON :

HENRY COLBURN AND RICHARD BENTLEY,

NEW BURLINGTON STREET.

1830.

LONDON .
PRINTED BY SAMUEL BENTLEY,

Dorsel StrcU, Fleet Street.

PREFACE.

NEARLY two years have elapsed since the
publication of the preceding volumes of these
Commentaries, and they are not yet closed.* So
uncertain is the term of those literary labours,
where discovery can only be pursued through
minute research, and where by critical investi-
gation, we grapple for truth among sturdy an-
tagonists. Yet Research and Criticism, only
furnish the materials of Meditation ; it is the
philosophical spirit which forms the true sup-
plement of History. He who strikes out a
new result, has discovered a new fact.

In the whole compass of our history no sub-
ject is more difficult to treat than the present ;
it is so, because the passions of two great
parties, never to be extinct, are more interested

* One last volume will conduct Charles the First through
the Civil Wars.

A 2

IV PREFACE.

in the results, than their philosophy or their
candour. But I have not written these Com-
mentaries as a partisan ; I leave every reader to
his own adopted historian. As for myself, I
have adopted every historian, otherwise I could
not have become acquainted with the secrets
of all parties. I was attracted to the life and
reign of Charles the First because I considered
them rich in all that interests the moral spe-
culator, and I have composed these volumes
solely as the history of human nature.

On the publication of my first volumes, a
gentleman, versant in our history, formerly a
distinguished member of our diplomatic corps,
and moreover a Whig of the old school, told
me that I had misconceived the character of
Charles the First. As I am not fortunate in
impromptu replies, I hope he will not find too
tedious, these volumes, which are written to
prove, that it is probable, that he has himself
misconceived the character of this Monarch.

I must not conclude without offering my
grateful acknowledgments to the Right Hon.
LORD ELIOT for his obliging confidence in
the loan of the manuscripts of Sir John Eliot.
His Lordship called my attention to the notice
which I had taken of his memorable ancestor,
in a communication alike distinguished for its

PREFACE. V

elegance, its courteousness, and its information.
I have been enabled to throw some fresh light
upon the character of a very eminent personage
whose career has hitherto baffled the researches
of our historians.

To my ever kind and valued friend, the
Right Hon. JOHN WILSON CHOKER, whose
luminous and acute intelligence is as remark-
able in his love of literature and art, as it has
been in the course of a long, an honourable,
and distinguished public life, I stand deeply
indebted for access to the Con way papers, which
by permission of the Most noble the Marquis of
Hertford, K.G. to whom these valuable docu-
ments have descended, he afforded me.

I have received aid from other Friends, and
other Manuscripts, which I have acknowledged
in my notes. I have particularly drawn much
information from the Manuscript Negotiations
of Monsieur Melchior de SABRAN, who was
the Fi*ench Resident in P^ngland during the
years 1644 and 1645. Of these there are
two folio volumes in the later additions to our
National Library, but there are eight volumes
of these inedited Negotiations in the extra-
ordinary collection of Manuscripts of Sir THO-
MAS PHILLIPS, Bart, of Middle Hill, Broad-
way, Worcestershire ; a collection of many

VI PREFACE.

thousand Manuscripts, which must rank its
zealous owner, among the Sloanes and the
Harleys of former days.

There was one more source of information
which I was advised to seek, for the history of
Charles the First — the State-paper Office, to
which former historians have always been ad-
mitted. It would be graceless in me, not to
add that I was honoured by a promise of aid
at some distant day ; a promise, which is now,
equivalent to a refusal.

I. D'ISRAELI.

Bradenham-house,

Bucks,
May, 1830.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I.

Page

CHARLES THE FIRST CORRECTS TWO GREAT ERRORS IN
HIS CONDUCT ..... 1

CHAPTER II.

SOME OBSERVATIONS ON THE CHARACTER OF THE
KING ...... 14

CHAPTER III.

OF THE NEW ADMINISTRATION . . 21

CHAPTER IV.

THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES. SIR T. WENTWORTH —
NOY, THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL . . 38

CHAPTER V.

OF THE NEW MINISTERS.— LAUD . 61

Vlll CONTENTS.

CHAPTER VI.

Page

PRIVATE LIFE OF CHARLES THE FIRST. LOVE OF THE
ARTS ...... 78

CHAPTER VII.

THE INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN ON THE KINO'S CON-
DUCT . . . . » 119

CHAPTER VIII.

THE PERCY FAMILY. ALGERNON EARL OF NORTHUM-
BERLAND AND THE COUNTESS OF CARLISLE . 160

CHAPTER IX.

THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND . . 191

CHAPTER X.

A CRITICAL HISTORY OF THE PURITANS. — OF THEIR
ORIGIN . . . . . 211

CHAPTER XL

THE CRITICAL HISTORY OF THE PURITANS CONTINUED.
HISTORY OF THE MAR-PRELATES . . 225

CHAPTER XII.

CRITICAL HISTORY OF THE PURITANS CONTIN UED.— OF
THE POLITICAL CHARACTER OF CALVIN 252

CONTENTS. IX

CHAPTER XIII.

CRITICAL HISTORY OF THE PURITANS CONCLUDED.

OF THE PERPLEXING CONTRADICTIONS IN THEIR PO-
LITICAL CHARACTER, AND WHY THEY WERE AT ONCE
THE ADVOCATES, AND THE ADVERSARIES, OF CIVIL
AND RELIGIOUS FREEPOM . . . 269

CHAPTER XIV.

HISTORY OF ALEXANDER LEIGHTON AND OF THE
FAMOUS STATE-LIBEL OF " SION's PLEA AGAINST
PRELACY" . . . . 299

CHAPTER XV.

ON THE SABBATICAL INSTITUTIONS . . 326

CHAPTER XVI.

OF THE OBSERVATION OF THE SABBATH UPON SUN-
DAYS . . . . . . 339

CHAPTER XVII.

THE CAUSE OF THE REVIVAL BY CHARLES THE FIRST,
OF " THE BOOK OF SPORTS" FOR RECREATIONS ON
SUNDAYS . . . . 367

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS 391

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER XIX.

Page
CAUSES OF THE INACTION OF THE ENGLISH FLEETS 414

CHAPTER XX.

OF THE COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND . . 443

LIFE AND REIGN

CHARLES THE FIRST,

CHAPTER I.

CHARLES THE FIRST CORRECTS TWO GREAT
ERRORS IN HIS CONDUCT.

THE three first Parliaments of Charles the
First had been alike disturbed and interrupted,
and the last of them was violently dissolved.
Each separation had only inflamed a more
feverish jealousy on the Court side, and a more
embittered and contumacious spirit on that of
the Patriots. All these Parliaments had been
suddenly terminated, to screen two prime
Ministers from impending charges, or a threat-
ened impeachment.*

* The Duke of Buckingham and the Lord Treasurer
Weston, Earl of Portland.

VOL. III. B

2 CHARLES I. CORRECTS

Clarendon has deeply entered into the sub-
ject of these " unseasonable, unskilful, and pre-
cipitated dissolutions of Parliament." His
editors purposely, or by a false reading of the
manuscript, have altered the word " unseason-
able," to " unreasonable." Whichever reading
we adopt, may lead to the same inquiry.

When the Sovereign interposes to screen an
accused Minister, it seems an obstruction of
justice. The person thus insidiously protected,
finds the imputations of his accusers still adhere
to him ; he cannot elude the infamy he incurs, or
remove the prejudices which are raised against
him ; the calumny, if it be a calumny, thus left
alive, will outlast the calumniated. " Such a
Minister," says Clarendon, " is generally con-
cluded guilty of whatever he is charged with,
which is commonly more than the worst man
ever deserved."

But what are the common qualities of these
popular denouncements? The noble writer, with
that deep knowledge of human nature which
has stored his volumes with theoretical wisdom,
has analyzed the constituent portions of these
public accusations. They are a mixture to
which "this man contributes his malice, ano-
ther his wit, all men what they please, and
most upon hearsay, with a kind of uncharitable

TWO GREAT ERRORS. 3

delight of making the charge as heavy as may
be." It is, therefore, a consequence that " these
accusations are commonly stuffed with many
odious generalities that the proofs seldom make
good ; and when a man is found less guilty
than he is expected, he is concluded more inno-
cent than he was, it is thought but a just repara-
tion for the reproach that he deserved not, to
free him from the censure he deserved."

All this is admirable, and displays an inti-
mate acquaintance with human nature. But
when Clarendon comes to apply his generaliz-
ing views to the particular case, the result be-
comes dubious. He infers, that had these two
Ministers submitted to the proceedings design-
ed against them, it had been more for the ad-
vantage of the King, and Parliaments had then
learned to know their own bounds, by which
the extent of their power would have been
ascertained. In exempting Ministers from pro-
secution, by forcible dissolutions of Parliament,
the power of the Parliament only became the
more formidable. In frequent meetings of
Parliaments, " medicines and cures, as well as
diseases, had been discerned, and they would
easily have been applied to the uses for which
Parliaments were first instituted." Clarendon
argues in the spirit of a great lawyer jealous of

B 2

4 CHARLES I. CORRECTS

>

constitutional rights, which at that time were
unsettled, contested, and obscure. In respect
to the two accused Ministers themselves, when
Lord Clarendon, in his retirement, contemplated
on the fate of Strafford and Laud, it might have
occurred to him, that Buckingham and Weston
had only occupied the same perilous position,
and had they lived, would have had to en-
counter the same inevitable fate. The noble
historian, indeed, makes the successful result,
which had pleased his fancy, to depend on a
contingency, namely — "that Parliaments at that
moment were as they had hitherto been ; that
the Commons had never pretended to the least
part of judicature ; and that the Peers, to
whom every act was referred, deliberated with
law and equity, the King retaining the sole
power of pardoning." But this was no longer
the character of the House of Commons ; a
new sera had opened, and a revolution in the
minds of men had shown itself, even before
Charles the First ascended the throne. James
the First had good-humouredly called the
Commons " the five hundred kings ;" and lat-
terly, the popular party were called " the lower-
house lords." The Commons were assuming
the whole judicature in their own hands.
" Parliaments are as the times are," was the

TWO GREAT ERRORS. 5

observation of the intrepid Judge Jenkins.
The leaders, who are advocating the public
cause, may degenerate into factionists ; and
there is great danger that " the will of the
people" may thus become as arbitrary as the
worst despotism. As popular men advance in
power, they are liable to abuse it. The etats
generaux of France, after the battle of Poictiers,
when they got all the power into their hands,
terribly abused it ; a similar conduct of the
deputies of the people may sometimes have
occurred in our own Revolution under Charles
the First, as it undoubtedly did in the late
French Revolution. Adopting the public
cause with the intense interest of a private one,
the noble patriotism which perpetuates the
names familiar in the recollections of every
Englishman, was unhappily too often crossed
by personal infirmities ; too often their designs
seem contrary to their principles, and too often
the impulse which sprang from a public source,
took the direction of a private end. In the
ambiguous conduct of their public spirit, the
reckless management, and the practised artifices,
stamped on it the characteristics of a faction.

Of Lord Clarendon, Mr. Hallam has ob-
served, that " notwithstanding the fine remarks
occasionally scattered through his history,

6 CHARLES I. CORRECTS

he was no practical statesman, nor had any
just conception at the time of the course of
affairs.'* Who, indeed, had? It may even be
doubtful whether at first the great movers
themselves of the vast and future scene, had
any certain notions of the subsequent events.
Even as late as in 1639, England lay in deep
tranquillity. Clarendon, in noticing Scotland,
saw only that " a small, scarce discernible cloud
arose in the North." A cloud ! He never ima-
gined an earthquake ! A revolution of the
most extraordinary character, and which was
to serve, as it certainly did, for the model of
that which was to convulse England for many
years, was scarce perceivable in 1639, and the
Scots were our "dear brethren," and invaded
England in the following year. So difficult it
is, to penetrating minds, even in ages more
philosophical than that of Charles the First, to
form any just conceptions of their own contem-
poraries, and to decide on events which, while
they are passing under their eyes, yield no in-
dication of their extraordinary termination. On
the opening of the French Revolution, there
surely was no want of great and sagacious
minds, yet, perhaps, not a single one could
foresee the gulph that lay before them ; the
gulph which was not distant from the spot on

TWO GREAT ERRORS. 7

which they stood. The Count de Segur af-
fords an unexceptionable testimony of this fact.
" The year 1789, which was to close with such
a vast Revolution in France, and suddenly
separate our cabinet from the cabinets of
Europe, opened without any one of them fore-
seeing the approaching concussion. Some
flashes of lightning, indeed, during some
months, had been the precursors of the storm,
but no one surmised it ; it was considered that
some salutary reforms would terminate the
embarrassments of our Government. It was an
epoch of illusions !" * The patriots who open-
ed the National Assembly, did not view in their
perspective the Convention, nor did the dema-
gogues of the Convention imagine that their
reign of terror was to subside into the feeble
oligarchy of the Directory. Human affairs
create themselves as much as they are made
by men ; and accidents produce events, as much
as events give rise to accidents.

The course of affairs was as little detected by
other great men as by Clarendon. Strafford
could only view in the daring, unyielding
spirit of Eliot " a fantastic apparition ;" and,
at a much later period, classes the meditative
Hampden, and the active Pym, with the

* Segur, iii. 41-3.

8 CHARLES I. CORRECTS

Prynnes, the Burtons, and the Bastwickes ; and
degrades his own sagacity as much as his taste,
when alluding to Hampden, he hints that a
certain famous pedagogue might " be well em-
ployed to whip this angry boy." Strafford
could only be jocular on the curt names of
"the Pyms, the Prins, and the Bens ;"* and, with
ludicrous contempt, affects " to fence himself
as strongly as he could against the mouse-traps,
and other small engines of Mr. Prynne and his
associates." So short-sighted are politicians in
power, too deeply occupied by their own pro-
jects to contemplate on those of others, as
greatly ambitious as themselves !

Charles undoubtedly did not discern with
more clearness than Clarendon and Straf-
ford, those awful scenes in which one day
he was to be both spectator and actor. He
had dissolved his Parliaments with indignant
anger ; and an English monarch now decided
to reign without a Parliament. " A brisk re-
solution," as Clarendon terms it, but which his
wary Editors, at a distant and more temperate
day, have interpolated by " improvident." Did
the King imagine, by thus straining his pre-
rogative, that when factions were silenced, they
ceased to exist ? It is probable, however, that

* To whom did he allude by " Ben ?"

TWO GREAT ERRORS. 9

by this irregular conduct in the monarch, the
nation enjoyed ten years of prosperity before
their troubles opened on them. This fact, and
it is a very striking one, will seem paradoxical
to those who are fully impressed with the
popular opinions of the tyranny of this un-
fortunate monarch. Much, indeed, will seem
paradoxical in the conduct of the King and
the Commons in this irregular reign. Truth
changed sides continually between the parties.

Relieved from these continued struggles
with his Parliaments, Charles the First doubt-
less flattered himself that he should govern a
willing and an obedient people. This monarch
had now entered on the thirtieth year of his
age, a period of life when the maturity of the
mind begins to influence thoughtful disposi-
tions : and four years of a disturbed reign had
taught the Sovereign some lessons which no
Monarch had yet received ; nor, as we shall
find, had some of them passed away unheeded.
If the genius of the man, in unison with the ge-
nius of the age, were too contracted for the com-
prehension of the agitated and strange spirit of
a new era, which had hardly appeared during
the reign of his great predecessor, and had been
kept at bay by his good-humoured father, still,
had Charles the First discovered two errors in

10 CHARLES I. CORRECTS

his political conduct ; and, somewhat chastened
by the severity of Fortune, the Monarch had
tasted of the bitter fruits of favouritism and
of military ambition, — and Charles at once re-
linquished both.

Those Continental wars, or rather those ma-
ritime expeditions, by which Buckingham had
aspired to invest the monarchy of England
with a splendour it seemed to want in the vast
theatre of Europe, had been but the illusions
of a youthful Prince, and a Minister as young.
These wars with Spain and France, seem to
have originated in the popular reproach which
his father had endured, for having preserved
the nation in a peace of twenty years, and in
that restless desire of a change of measures
which so often torments and delights the Eng-
lish people. Charles had cast the uncertain
chances of the die of war ; a game which
princes are unwilling to quit while losers, but
he had the merit to sacrifice his wounded pride.
France and Spain gladly conceded a courteous
peace.* For them, an English war, without

* Why does Dr. Lingard depreciate the character of
Charles the First ? That is certainly taking the safe side :
but would it be difficult to assign the reason of this system-
atic conduct in this historian, usual with the members of the
Church of Rome, who, whatever the Puritans of the day

TWO GREAT ERRORS. 11

an object, became only an obstacle in the vast
opposing systems of these potent rivals ; and,
though they were alike the political enemies of
England, in state-policy, all enmity ceases when
it requires a friend. Charles now concentrated
his entire energies in his own realms, and only
looked on the affairs of the Continent with
the curiosity of an observer, rarely with the
interests of a partner in the balance of domi-
nion.

The King had no longer any favourite, nor
would he suffer that envied place to be occu-
pied. From the untimely death of Bucking-
ham, with that strength of character which I
have ascribed to him, he had resolved to act

thought, always censure Charles for his compromising and
indecisive measures. Our historian observes on this peace,
that " Philip, whether it were through generosity or con-
tempt, sent back, without ransom, the prisoners made at
Cadiz; Louis those taken in Rhe." ix. p. 413. Contempt !
Charles was never regarded with contempt by the rival pow-
ers. Both, in 1635, eagerly courted this English monarch,
whom Dr. Lingard has thus aspersed. The sensible Jesuit,
Pere Griffet, states this clearly. " L'Angleterre fut vive-
ment sollicitee d'entrer dans la querelle ; la France lui fit
les offres les plus avantageuses ; 1'Espagne n'oublia rien pour
la gagner; mais le Roi Charles demeura dans 1'inaction."
This is much for a Prince who was contemned ! — Grijftt
Hist, dc Louis XIII. ii. 560.

12 CHARLES I. CORRECTS

as his own minister, and he ceased to rest his
entire confidence in the labours and the genius
of a single person. His habits of application
seemed not to unfit him for the official duties
of sovereignty. Never was there a Monarch
who employed his pen so laboriously — few let-
ters or papers passed his revision without being
returned with marginal notes, queries for in-
quiry, and alterations, which attest the zealous
diligence with which he applied to business.
Burnet has said, that " He minded little things
too much, and was more concerned in the
drawing of a paper than in fighting a battle."
The silly antithesis carried away the writer's
careless pen. It is quite untrue ; for the King's
marginal notes are not verbal refinements, but
substantial inquiries, or decided opinions ; and
" the concern " he showed in " his battles" at
least equalled the courage with which he fought
them.

Charles might now have regretted his less
fortunate fate, when compared with that of
his rival brothers of France and Spain, whose
illustrious favourites, Richelieu and Olivarez
were maintaining the splendour of their mon-
archies.

At this moment, our youthful Monarch had

TWO GREAT ERRORS. 13

fallen into a great and unavoidable fault in his
abandonment of Parliaments, which he knew
not the art of governing, even by concessions ;
but he had the merit of correcting two errors,
and freed himself, at the same time, from war
and from favouritism.

14 SOME OBSERVATIONS ON THE

CHAPTER II.

SOME OBSERVATIONS ON THE CHARACTER
OF THE KING.

ALTHOUGH Charles would no longer listen to
single counsels, nor would allow any public pa-
pers to pass, but through his own hands, yet the
Monarch, still young, and apt to be precipitate
in his conduct, felt his incompetency in the arts
of government. This is evident, by a circum-
stance observed by Clarendon, and confirmed by
others — that the King often adopted the sug-
gestions, and yielded to the opinions of others,
of inferior judgment to himself. Of this feature
in his character we are quite certain ; for long
after the death of this unfortunate Prince, St.
John, who had been his treacherous solicitor, and
now, under the new government of Cromwell,
was Lord Chief Justice, in conversation with
Dr. Sampson, an eminent physician among
the Presbyterians, made this avowal ; " The

CHARACTER OF THE KING. 15

truth is, the King had an unhappiness in ad-
hering, and unweariedly pursuing, the advices
of others, and mistrusting his own ; though
oftentimes more safe and better than those of
other persons. If Strafford may go for a noble
Minister of State, yet the Queen, Laud, Buck-
ingham, &c. who had his ear so much to his
utter undoing, were fitter for other provinces
than that of a Cabinet or Council."* St. John,
now, since the curtain had dropped, and the tra-
gedy was over, free from passion himself, de-
livered his opinions with the temper and truth
of an historian.

This very circumstance proves rather a defi-
cient, than a perfect judgment. But at a later
period of his life, on many severe occasions, the
King discovered such a clear comprehension,
and such a promptness of decision, that when-
ever affairs depended on mere arguments, the
King never found his superior. This was con-
fessed by many, and some reflecting men ac-
knowledged, that before their interviews with
Charles, they had formed a very erroneous con-
ception of the capacity of the King.

Certain it is, however, that Charles the First
was singularly deficient in his experience of hu-

* Dr. Sampson's Day-book, folio 69, Sloane MSS. 4460.

16 SOME OBSERVATIONS ON THE

human nature, for he seems never to have discri-
minated the talents, or the dispositions, of those
about him. Hence, he so often confided to
the faithless, or the adventurous, and too often
employed the inefficient ; and while he even
courted some, who could return no sympathy,
he as strangely neglected others, who had both
the power and the inclination to serve him.

As this is one of the more remarkable de-
fects in the character of this Monarch, it de-
serves a more critical investigation.

In the history of the character of Charles the
First, two moral facts interest an observer of
human nature. One is, that the faculties of
Charles developed themselves as his troubles
multiplied on him ; and the other is, that the
strong personal attachments which Charles in-
spired, occurred only in the latter years of his
adversity. It was when he stood alone in the
world, without a throne, that he seemed to
have deserved one.

When we compare the correspondence of his
earlier days, which still exists, with that of his
later age, we perceive in the letters addressed
to his father, and afterwards, when King, to
Buckingham, that he appears to have surren-
dered up his mind to them, and that e\ren on
the throne, he was still the pupil of that first

CHARACTER OF THE KING. 17

companion, on whom he had placed his hopes
and his affections. A long interval, and mu-
table fortunes, intervene from the death of
Buckingham to the time of the King's impri-
sonments, during which a vast number of let-
ters were written by his own hand, often in
haste, often in flight. Energy and action, re-
solution and passion, kindle in those effusions ;
Charles then had to command — to exhort — to
rebuke.

It is not improbable that Charles, from va-
rious motives, was averse to the business of po-
litics — there was an ingenuity in his mind fit-
ted to more peaceful pursuits. He disliked,
too, the parade of Majesty, which, on more oc-
casions than one, he studiously avoided, and
this reserve injured him in the minds of the
populace, whose eyes are loyal when Kings are
gracious. Charles had no popular qualities for
council or for ceremony. He was a man of
few words, somewhat abrupt — there was a cold
reserve in his speech, and a stateliness in his
habits. The one may partly be ascribed to his
painful enunciation, a defect which long ac-
companied him ; and the other seems probably
to have been assumed, to avoid that loose fami-
liarity, whose inconvenience he must have fre-
quently observed in James I. Although cha-

VOL. in. c

18 SOME OBSERVATIONS ON THE

racter and habits are often hereditary, yet it is
not unusual for the son to contract the oppo-
site quality of the father : a reflecting son has
had so many opportunities to detect its infir-
mity. Thence we see the patient and thought-
ful son of a hasty and impetuous father, while
the slow-minded and phlegmatic sire contem-
plates in his heir, the fire and daring which he
admires and fears.

It is evident that the individual who, when
Prince of Wales, had been entirely resigned to
the political government of the King, and who,
when he ascended the Throne, rested as en-
tirely on Buckingham, would, at a subsequent
period, lean on the judgments of others to
guide, or to lighten the cares of State. Charles
seems willingly to have adopted the opinions of
those with whom he consulted, though his own
was oftener the eligible one, with the hope that
it would terminate difficulties which were re-
pugnant to his temper, his impatience, and his
retired habits. Hence in StrafFord, and in
Laud, in Hamilton and in Digby, he looked
for the substitutes of those whom he had lost,
and yielded without reserve to their fatal aid.
Formed for peace, and the embellishments of
life, but placed amid the raging contests of
Factions ; when he saw the elements of his go-

CHARACTER OF THE KING. 19

vernment in dissolution, without a favourite,
an adviser, or a partner in the troubles of Roy-
alty, in his last years he stood alone, and never
less vacillated in his conduct.

But he was not this being in his early years.
It seemed then that he imagined, when he
had fixed on an appointment, that the person
of his choice was necessarily the very person
the place required. He had not a single Mi-
nister about him, except Strafford, capable of
balancing any one of the leading Members of
the Opposition. The horizon of a Court is but
a contracted sphere. There precedence and
etiquette disguise the man ; there genius is
levelled to the mediocrity around ; and Kings
oftener decide by habitude than by judgment.

The character of Charles changed. It was
when the sorrows of many years had opened
his reserved nature ; when long exercised in
those hardier virtues which could not have
revealed themselves under the canopy of a
Throne, that on so many emergencies the Mo-
narch displayed that prompt sagacity, and that
deep thoughtfulness of the passing scenes, which
won the admiration of those who held with
him but an occasional intercourse. Even the
courtesy of his manners, and his fluency in
discourse, visibly improved. But they who

c 2

20 SOME OBSERVATIONS, &C.

shared in the tenderness of companionship, who
had witnessed his fugitive and^ precarious ex-
istence, and the heroic conduct of his small
army ; who had heard him treat as a statesman
with the most intricate diplomacy of the times,
and beheld his undeviating fortitude in lonely
captivity, magnanimous though subdued — with
these all other emotions melted away in the
tenderness of their personal affection, and cer-
tainly the devotion of his friends, in his latter
days, was greater than it had ever been.

OF THE NEW ADMINISTRATION. 21

CHAPTER III.

OF THE NEW ADMINISTRATION.

AT the breaking-up of the last Parliament,
it was a current opinion that " there was really
an intention to alter the form of Government
both in Church and State." A hint of this
nature had formerly menaced the Commons
from Sir Dudley Carleton, who had talked of
the necessity of " new Councils." Sir Dudley
had returned to his native country after long
embassies, with foreign notions of the regal
authority, such as he had imbibed in the Courts
in which he had lived too long for the pa-
triotism of an English Minister. The King,
by an angry Proclamation, had told his people
that " the late abuse of Parliaments had driven
his Majesty unwillingly out of that course,
and he, therefore, would account it presump-
tion for any to prescribe any time to his Ma-
jesty for the calling of a Parliament." It

22 OF THE NEW ADMINISTRATION.

closed by a vague promise that " when his Ma-
jesty should be more inclinable to meet in Par-
liament again, and the people should see more
clearly into his intents and actions — those who
had been misled, might come to a better un-
derstanding of his Majesty and themselves."*

What were these " new Councils?" The
science of Politics, perhaps, resembles that of
medicine, and is too often empirical. A new
system of Government, like a change of pre-
scriptions, is nothing more than an experiment;
and as Physicians usually adopt a contrary
curative method from the one hitherto found
unsuccessful, Charles probably meditated to
infuse a renovating vigour into his languid ad-
ministration.

On this subject, I discovered among the
pocket memorandum-books of R. Symonds, a
Chaplain in the King's army, a remarkable
anecdote. The writer, in journalizing the daily
movements of the army, in this useful itinerary
of marches, has preserved many historical par-
ticulars ; has sketched, with his pen, many
remains of our antiquities ; and often inserted
anecdotes, on the days he heard them, authen-
ticated by the names of the communicators.
The present extraordinary account seems to

* Rushworth, ii. 3.

OF THE NEW ADMINISTRATION. 23

consist of the heads of a story set down for
future recollection.

" The King had written a book with his
own hand, wherein were many things concern-
ing Government. And in it a model of go-
vernment for the nation according to that of
France, and to effect it. The bringing in the
German horse truly to settle it. Old PZarl of
Bedford had seen, or heard of the book, and
being familiar with Oliver St. John, Secretary
of Justice,* told him of it, who by all means
wrought with the Earl of Bedford that he
might see this book, which he accomplished,
and made use of it against the King, which the
King perceived, and found it to be Bedford,
whereupon he was very angry. Mr. Crisp."|

Such is the tale, never heard before, of a
book, written by the King's own hand, never
seen. Why was this extraordinary manuscript
shown to the Earl of Bedford? Had it dis-
closed such a system of arbitrary power as the
communicator imagined ; is it possible that the
Earl of Bedford, St. John, Pym, and that party,
could ever, on any terms, have acceded to such
a project ? Or would the King have even

* An unusual phrase — if it mean Solicitor-general ; or
was this title given to him in the Commonwealth ?
t Hajrleian MSS. 991.

24 OF THE NEW ADMINISTRATION.

dared to avow it? Excepting this, there is
nothing improbable in the story. Charles, as
I shall have occasion to show, was an admirer
of the great statesman Richelieu, though the
Monarch, when the national honour was at
stake, had the courage to incur his enmity.
Was Charles the First, at a moment of despair,
driven to contemplate on a system of govern-
ment which, like that of Richelieu, might have
silenced the Parliament, and have awed the
People ? If such were the fact, then the real
liberty of the English nation was put in more
jeopardy than at any other period in the whole
history of this reign. The German horse, how-
ever, never arrived, nor has this book yet
been discovered. After all, I suspect that this
very paper-book may turn out to be that fa-
mous manuscript, entitled " A Proposition for
his Majesty's service, to bridle in the imper-
tinency of Parliament."* The history of this
manuscript is curious. The original had been
traced to the great library of Sir Robert
Cotton, among his other rare literary curiosi-
ties. By the treachery of the librarian, a few
copies were clandestinely sold, till, being
brought into the Star-Chamber, it occasioned

* It is printed in Rushworth's Collections, i. — Appen-
dix 12.

OF THE NEW ADMINISTRATION. 25

the suspension of Sir Robert from the use of
his library ; his spirits sank, and it occasioned,
by his own confession, the death of our great
Collector. The original was the coinage of
Sir Robert Dudley, who lived in exile at Flo-
rence, and had projected a plan, " how a Prince
may make himself an absolute tyrant." He
addressed the scheme to James the First, with
a view of ingratiating himself. A copy came
into the hands of Strafford — and it was also
maliciously ascribed to him, in a pamphlet,
entitled " Strafford's Plot discovered, and the
Parliament vindicated." It is likewise reprint-
ed in the appendix to Ludlow's Memoirs, to
render the Earl more hateful.

Sometime after this was written, I discover-
ed that I had not erred in my last conjecture,
but I have not altered what I have said, for it
may amuse some of my readers to trace the
gradual progress of research. The circumstance
is noticed by Sir Symonds d'Ewes, in his IMS.
life, who knew the fact from his connection
with Sir Robert Cotton himself. The parti-
culars differ from the anecdote as recorded by
the Chaplain. — " St. John, then * a young stu-
dious gentleman,' paid for the loan of this
' pestilent' tract, and showed it to the Earl
of Bedford, who was the head of the Oppo-

26 OF THIT NEW ADMINISTRATION.

sition-party, and also related to, and the patron
of St. John. This was in 1629, the year in
which the third Parliament was dissolved.
Strafford had obtained a copy — and one or two
other persons."* Such was the real origin of
the tale set afloat against the King, whose
name does not however appear in the narrative
of D'Ewes, though this is no reason why
Charles might not also have procured a copy.
The artifice of the Parliamentarians is more
evident, in ascribing it to Strafford as "a plot"
of his own. Had not the correct story been
preserved by the Antiquary in his own me-
moirs, the circumstance recorded positively in
the diary of the Chaplain, some of our his-
torians would have accepted as an authentic
fact ; one, too, which could not have been dis-
proved by any positive evidence. The whole
offers a curious example of the foundation and
of the invention of many popular tales, which
are not improbable, though they may be un-
true ; and it is such ambiguous facts which
exercise the sagacity, and often baffle the re-
searches, of the historian.

But whether Charles ever transcribed this

* The passage from Sir Symonds D'Ewes' life, which is
an Harleian Manuscript, has been preserved in Kippis's
Biog. Brit. iv. 301.

OF THE NEW ADMINISTRATION. 27

" pestilent" tract, or at all studied it, it seems
certain that he meditated on the means of
strengthening his feeble and insulted Sove-
reignty. Conscious as we may believe this
Monarch felt within himself of the integrity
of his own purpose, he concluded, that by
royally maintaining the public honour in its
exterior relations, and by diffusing the pros-
perity of the people in their domestic interests,
he might still accomplish the great ends of
Government. It cannot be denied that he
fully accomplished these two important objects.
The Parliament had thrown him amidst in-
surmountable difficulties. They had denied
him even the revenues reserved for every Eng-
lish Monarch : these, indeed, the King insist-
ed on retaining ; but to raise supplies for the
State, he was compelled, without any fault of
his own, to resort to expedients which were
necessarily illegal. These unpopular modes of
taxation came forth in the repulsive shape of
arbitrary impositions : the very names which
disguised them became so odious, that one of
them, though in itself an innocent tax, and
most honourably used, has become proverbial
for its tyranny ; " Ship-money" raised up the
first of our Patriots, and proved to be one of
the most active causes in the Revolution. Yet

28 OF THE NEW ADMINISTRATION.

Charles cannot be reproached for exacting mo-
nies from his people from any wantonness of
prodigality, for he was parsimonious.* From
the death of the Duke of Buckingham he be-
came reserved in his bounty, and frugal in his
own expenses, and, by retrenchments every
year, paid a portion of his debts. f I have my-
self seen the King's Household Book : all the
monthly accounts are signed by his own hand.

* We read Oldmixon with indignation, when he exults at
the mean prudence of the Parliament in withholding the ne-
cessary supplies for carrying on the Government. " When
money is wanted to support profusion and luxury, and en-
rich favourites." p. 147. Whatever be the error of the
father in this respect, his son certainly did not inherit this
disposition. It is candidly observed by Whitelocke, that the
Ship-money was not oppressive, nor objectionable, excepting
that it was not levied by Parliament, p. 22. It was most
inviolably used .by Charles, who called these monies his
" Sea-Contributions," and was often compelled to furnish
additional supplies from his own impoverished Exchequer.
This obnoxious tax, after all the declamation against it,
even of moderate men, as were Lord Falkland, Waller, and
Clarendon himself, hardly ever exceeded the sum of two
hundred and thirty thousand pounds, by which the sove-
reignty of the sea was to be maintained ! It is an important
fact, that the ships which were built with this execrated
Ship-money, must have served in our naval victories under
Cromwell. The odium of the tax fell on the King, but, hav-
ing been faithfully used, the nation received its benefit,
f Life of Clarendon, vol. i. p. 19.

OF THE NEW ADMINISTRATION. 29

So honest was the King in his expenditure,
and so anxious to husband his limited resources,
although the clamour of his bitter enemies
has charged him with raising supplies for his
own personal conveniences. It was not dis-
covered till the times of the Commonwealth
that the demands of the Monarchy had been
very moderate.

It is probable that Charles the First con-
templated never again to call a Parliament.
We are acquainted with his forcible style con-
cerning them. In his hatred, or his contempt,
Parliaments were " like cats that grow cross
with age," and in his fear, or his horror, they
were " a hydra, which he had found cunning
as well as malicious." Charles had retained too
indelible a recollection of the past, and felt that
the Commons had ungenerously used him.
Even at a later period, when in the rough draft
of a circular letter for a voluntary contribution
in aid of the Queen of Bohemia, an object of
popular regard, the Ministers had contrived to
sweeten it by an allusion to a future Parlia-
ment, the King struck out the whole passage,
and as he was accustomed, assigned his reason
in the margin — " I have scored out these eight
lines as not judging them fit to pass."*

* It was in 1633. Clarendon's State-papers, i. 57.

30 OF THE NEW ADMINISTRATION.

Were Charles the First at heart the mere
tyrant, which the cries of a party have de-
scribed him, he would have reigned like other
despots : a tyrant ever takes the shortest course.
But the King, at least, professed his submission
to the laws in consulting the judges, and he
now sought for counsel and conduct in the
wisdom and energy of others.

The new administration of Charles the First,
this " altered form of Government, both in
Church and State," lasted during the ten years
which intervened between the dissolution of
the third Parliament and the assembling of the
famous Long Parliament. And what would
seem extraordinary, this very period may be
designated ten years of national prosperity !

While Europe was convulsed by wars and
revolts, our island, to the eye and the imagina-
tion of the foreigner, might have seemed the
fabled Halcyon, brooding a calm amidst the
turbulent waves. A more material and truer
image may describe the country as a soil cover-
ed with prodigal luxuriance, but drawing the
fatal heat from hidden fires ; so mighty was
the growing activity of the people, so gentle
the equable administration of the government.

Clarendon hardly exceeded the truth in his
description of the state of the kingdom during

OF THE NEW ADMINISTRATION. 31

this singular period, as " enjoying the greatest
calm and the fullest measure of felicity that
any people, in any age, for so long time together
have been blessed with." In confirmation of
Clarendon's view, we find in the Mercure
Francois more than one allusion to the undis-
turbed and envied happiness of the English
nation. A letter from Rome in 1633, notices
the high opinion that court entertained of " the
virtues and discreet government of Charles the
First, with the general and quiet peace his
people enjoy, all Europe being in war, — which
makes England enjoy what the rest of the
world envies at, they being the only spectators
of the rest of the world's miseries."* The de-
cription of England in 1633, by a resident
foreigner, confirms all these accounts. " It is
pleasant to reside in England, where every one
lives joyously, without other cares than those of
his profession, finding that prosperity in repose
which others are compelled to look for in action,
and divided as they are from the rest of the
world, they take the least concern possible in
its distraction s."t This sort of evidence from
foreign quarters frequently occurs. The King
himself has a pathetic passage, where he com-

* Clarendon's State-papeis, i. 152 and 182.
+ Mercure Francois, 1633, art. Angleterre.

32 OF THE NEW ADMINISTRATION.

plains of the famous remonstrance of the Com-
mons,— " Saying before us and publishing to
all the world, all the mistakes and all the mis-
fortunes which had happened from our first
coming to the crown, forgetting the blessed
condition (notwithstanding the unhappy mix-
ture) all our subjects had enjoyed in the benefit
of peace and plenty under us, to the envy of
Christendom." *

These statements seem indisputable ; but
those who have imagined that the cause of the
Parliament would suffer, should this national
felicity be acknowledged to have really existed
under " the tyrant Charles," have raised objec-
tions with the design of depreciating the cha-
racter of the Monarch, and explaining away,
without positively denying the fact, of the
general prosperity of the people. It is curious
and instructive to detect the difficulties, and to
ascertain the success of these historians.

May, the Parliamentary historian, without
contradicting the statement of Clarendon,—
of which, indeed, he could have had no know-
ledge— would limit " this greatest calm and this
fullest measure of felicity," to those classes by
whom " the pressures of the Government were
not much felt, and who enjoyed their own

* Husband's Collections, 528.

OF THE NEW ADMINISTRATION. 33

plentiful fortunes, with little, or insensible de-
triment, in the undisturbed peace of the na-
tion." But the parliamentarian insinuates some
prevalent unhappiness, for " while the king-
dom abounded with wealth, plenty, and all
kinds of elegancies, more than ever, that part
of the nation who were sensible of their birth-
rights, and the true interests of the kingdom,
would argue for their own rights, and those
oppressions that were laid upon them." " Ar-
guers for their own rights " are wanting in a
government at no period ; as for " the oppres-
sors," were they general, or were they particu-
lar? The vague style of the candid parlia-
mentary historian was seasoned to the relish of
his masters, though no one more than this ele-
gant poet could sympathise with the perished
elegancies of the vanished Court, and the peace-
ful tranquillity of a reign of ten years. We
cannot forget, however temperate be " the his-
tory of the Parliament," that the historian
himself had enjoyed the smiles and favours of
Charles the First, who loved poets ; but it
seems that May had experienced a disappoint-
ment at Court, by a preference the Queen had
bestowed on Sir William Davenant, in the
choice of her Laureat. Angried at the loss of
a pensjon which he had counted on, and the

VOL. III. D

34 OF THE NEW ADMINISTRATION.

success of a rival, whom he would not value —
he buried the gratitude of the past in the Se-
cretaryship of the Parliament.

The passage from May, Mr. Hallam has
quoted as a reply to Clarendon, by " a sort of
prophetical inspiration." But we shall disco-
ver by Mr. Hallam himself the partial view
which May has taken, and by Mr. Hallam
himself we shall confirm, even the florid de-
scription of the noble writer. But first listen
to Mr. Brodie, who labours through a long
note, to detract from the eulogy which the
philosophic Hume has dared to pronounce on
the Monarch's government during the disuse
of Parliaments. Mr. Brodie insinuates several
instances of personal severity — one merchant
imprisoned for refusing to pay his duties ; some
country gentlemen fined for not accepting a
knighthood, for which they cared not ; illegal
proclamations against fuller's-earth, and the no-
bility and gentry, residing " in town," — till the
pathos of oppression reaches to the sufferings of
" sixteen soap-boilers ! " Mr. Brodie even ima-
gines that Hume would have pondered on his
cases, and have listened to his arguments ; for
he tells us how the great sceptic aiid sophist
would have replied to him, by insisting that
these " sixteen soap-boilers," being prosecuted

OF THE NEW ADMINISTRATION. 35

at once, formed but " one case !" Too scrupu-
lous accuracy ! too candid confession ! May I
say, that such insulated instances, betray more
of the cavils of a Lawyer, than of the genius
of an Historian ? The evils of the unpopular
measures of Charles are obvious ; but Mr.
Brodie reasons on effects, as if they had been
causes. Mr. Hallam is more just, and more
philosophical ; he affords us a splendid picture
of " the remarkable prosperity and affluence
into which the kingdom had grown during
this period." The people, however, Mr. Hal-
lam tells us, did not owe their happiness to the
King's administration ; but to something, in
which Charles the First could have no concern
whatever. It was " to their own spirit and in-
dustry, to the laws, which, as between man
and man, were still fairly administered ; to the
opening of fresh channels of trade, and above
all, to the long tranquillity of the kingdom."
And he closes his own grand picture, which
emulates in the richness of its colouring, and
the greatness of its incidents, the picture which
Clarendon himself had painted ; and for which
the noble historian stands rebuked, by the un-
just corrective of a party feeling — that " it
would have been an excess of loyal stupidity
in the nation, to have attributed their riches to

D 2

36 OF THE NEW ADMINISTRATION.

the wisdom or virtue of the Government which
had injured the freedom of trade by mono-
polies, &c." — " As if freedom of trade and mo-
nopolies" were the merits or faults of the So-
vereign in the age of Charles the First, who
practised what his predecessors had been accus-
tomed to practise, what every nation in Europe
was practising, and what some to this day re-
tain. It were more just to infer, that were
Charles the First " a tyrant," a nation's grati-
tude was due to the tyrant who had left them,
independent of his tyranny, such a prodigality
of national prosperity, and equal laws between
man and man.

Thus have some of our historical writers,
biassed against this unhappy Monarch, attempt-
ed to cast a shade over ten years of national
felicity. This period only wanted a friendly
Parliament to have been the most glorious in
our annals — by the cultivation of those arts of
peace which Charles loved.

The case of this unparliamentary administra-
tion, we must confess, was sufficiently perplex-
ing for these writers to determine on, for it
was during this period of national prosperity,
that many extraordinary severities were inflict-
ed on certain individuals,* but we shall find

* Leighton, Prynne, Bastwick, and Burton.

OF THE NEW ADMINISTRATION. 37

that these were not for political crimes. They
sprang out of the age, the Sovereign himself
had no concern in them, nor was the King im-
plicated in these prosecutions even by the suf-
ferers themselves.

So paradoxical was the position into which
the Sovereign had now placed himself, that
while the English people were in this flourish-
ing state, the Monarch appeared to be swayed
by the most arbitrary councils. But the solution
of this political enigma is not difficult, if we
cast aside the vulgar prejudices of the innate
tyranny of Charles the First. The King, in
truth, was equitable and zealous, anxiously de-
voting his hours to his numerous official du-
ties ; he was desirous of the prosperity of his
people, for his own could not be separated from
theirs ; on their strength, and in their indepen-
dence, he looked to take his station among the
monarchs of Europe, resolved to maintain the
nation's eminence with the foreigner.

It is when we consider the character and. the
results of these ten years of his reign, that we
find the political enigma solved. Charles the
First exercised strong measures and a weak
government, which must necessarily subvert
each other.

38 THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES.

CHAPTER IV.

THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES.
SIR T. WENTWORTH. NOY, THE ATTORNEY-
GENERAL,

ONE of the infelicities of this Monarch was
the mediocrity of the men about him ; there
was no master-genius among the Ministers of
Charles the First. No Burleigh ruled the
councils, no Bacon illumined the law, no Drake
commanded our fleets. The privy-council was
composed of persons who themselves were less
able than their master to hold the helm of a
troubled state ; and what still reduced this
weakness, the cabinet was divided by two
opposite interests, that of the French and the
Spanish ; if sometimes from patriotic motives,
more frequently from the personal views of
pensioners of Spain.

The secretaries of state, even under his fa-
ther, were remarkable for their incapacity, and,

THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES. 39

what is less pardonable, for their negligence.*
The inept Lord Conway had been a military
man, and could rarely write a letter which did
not leave his correspondent in utter perplexity.
We have on one occasion his after-apologies,
by way of explanation, when he seemed to be
more surprised at his own confusion of ideas,
than at the misconception of his correspondent.
Secretary John Coke lingered in office till he
verged on his eightieth year, and gave no in-
dications of his retirement, till the King, with
kindness, hinted at a relief to his old age ; he
was an honest man, but the harness of routine
had rusted on his back. Having to lead on
the King's side in the Commons, this mere
man of office was often sadly put to it for a
reply on an emergency. When Mr. Brodie
criticises Lord Strafford for his coarse familiar-
ity of style in alluding to " Old Ned Coke,"f

* The Earl of Northumberland writing to the Earl of
Leicester, observes, " It is a shame that the secretaries are
so negligent in advertising you of all that passeth ; but till,
among many other reformations, the King be served by abler
men in those places, I know , not how the fault will be re-
medied, only you should take notice of it, and then it would
for ever make them your enemies." — Sidney Papers.

f In fact, there is no coarseness in these familiar appella-
tives according to the style practised at that day. The
King himself called his companions Dick, Will, &c. and so

40 THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES.

whom, indeed, he had often trusted and em-
ployed, he did not recollect that the Earl of
Northumberland, in giving an account of Coke's
resignation, designates the superannuated secre-
tary as " the Old Noddy ;" and even the grave
Clarendon, alluding to the political sacrifice of
Coke, adds, " for whom nobody cared :" so
fatal is it to be an octogenarian Secretary of
State ! The successor of Coke, Sir Henry Vane,
who, whether from treachery or carelessness,
acted a conspicuous part to the great injury of
his master's affairs, was so conscious of his own
unfitness to discharge the duties of his office,
that he used to say, " he verily believed the
Marquis of Hamilton, who was no friend of
his, had recommended him to be Secretary of
State, to expose him to censure and ridicule."
Sir Francis Windebank, a creature of Laud,
was suddenly raised to the secretaryship, with-
out passing through those gradations of office
which form the school of diplomacy. Servilely
submissive to his master, this pensioner of Spain
was at the same time with Lord Cottington,
betraying the Royal councils to the Roman
Catholic parties. When the civil wars broke
out, and Windebank offered to return from

do the most elegant personages ; the practice was continued
through the reign of Charles II.

THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES. 41

France, where he had flown from the Parlia-
ment, Charles could never be persuaded to
receive again the faithless secretary.

The other courtiers consisted of the silken
creatures who flourish in the splendour, or fade
in the decay of courts. Solely engaged in the
petty interests of their own coteries, they are
discriminated by Clarendon as " occupied in
accommodating their fortunes in which they
abounded not, or in their ease and pleasure
which they most passionately affected, having
no other consideration of the public than that
no disturbance might interrupt their quiet in
their own day." Among these courtiers there
were indeed a few, continues the noble writer,
" who had larger hearts, and more public spi-
rits." These, however, would rest satisfied " to
secure the empire at home by all peaceable arts
and advancement of trade, which might gratify
the people, and fill the empty coffers of the
impoverished crown."

One of the earliest measures which the King
adopted when he had decided to reign without
a Parliament, — unhappily for the sovereign and
the people he could not reign with one, — had
not been heretofore practised by his royal pre-
decessors,— it was to win over the popular leaders
of the Parliament by admitting them into his

42 THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES.

councils. On this apparent concession on the
Monarch's side, our philosophical historian has
acutely observed, that " it was a sure proof
that a secret revolution had happened in the
constitution, and had necessitated the Prince to
adopt new maxims of government."*

No intricate intrigues on one side, no re-
pulsive embarrassments on the other, appear to
have arisen, in inducing the opposition party to
step out of their ranks, and to fix themselves
in place and power. And we may farther
observe, that at a later and more critical period,
when the King contemplated repeating the
same measure, the resistance was as feeble by
even a more sturdy race of Patriots. Lord
Say and Sele, who, with Lord Brooke and
others, had decided to emigrate to America,
when he had terrified the courtier Cottington
to resign the Mastership of the Wards in his
favour, became the servant of the King ; and
this Lord, who was not the most compliant of
men, when in office appears to have so far
courted the King's attention, that Charles im-
plicitly trusted to his counsels. St. John, the
dark-browed and sullen St. John, Common-
wealth's-man as he was, deigned to accept the

* Hume, vi. 286.

THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES. 43

Solicitorship, and all that can be urged in his
favour is, that he was a traitor to his Sove-
reign ; for in violation of his official oath, this
Solicitor-General, when in office, assisted the
Commons to their utmost desire, with remon-
strances, and petitions, and propositions against
his master. The complete formation of this
administration was interrupted by the death of
the Earl of Bedford ; but Holies was to have
been Secretary of State ; Pym had consented
to be appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer,
which we may discover in a speech poured out
in the hour of expectation, prodigal of pro-
mises to render the King more powerful and
glorious than ever Monarch had been ; and
Hampden was to have illuminated with his
genius this new order of government, in the
anomalous character of Preceptor of the Prince
of Wales. But this new system of taking off
the popular leaders by preferment had its in-
convenience ; the King lost his confidential
servants in acquiring these new ones — and
favours thus conceded multiplied claimants.
Many were gaping for preferments which they
could not obtain, and though some of these
loud-tongued Patriots at first, we are told, were
but hypocritical republicans, their disappoint-

44 THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES.

ments would not ill-fit them to become staunch
anti-Monarchists.* After these great names
had strengthened the Ministry of Charles, a
host of vociferous Patriots of the secondary
class would not have abated their rage, and
probably had improved their talents. Such
would have been the Haselriggs, the Strodes,
the Coritons.

In the earliest attempt of Charles to abstract
some of the great leaders from the popular
party, the King, except in the single instance
of Wentworth, acquired no additional strength
to his Government. The current of the Oppo-
sition had too great a depth to be diverted
from its course by the sliding off of a few place-
hunters, who, with cautious reserve, had only
made a show of resistance in their courtly hos-
tility. Such, among others, was Sir Dudley
Digges ; the rhetorical gentleman, who apolo-
gising for the country plainness of his style,
had ransacked heaven and earth to paint the
mystical elements of the English constitution, f
but all the while he had been only flourishing
a foil, careful to hit with its guarded point.
After these plunges in air Sir Dudley sate
down a quiet Master of the Rolls. Saville of

* Sir Edmund Walker's Observations on Hamon L' Es-
trange, p. 328.
t I have noticed in vol. i. p. 32 1, the speech of Sir Dudley.

THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES. 45

Yorkshire, the rival of Went worth, who was
acting with the Court, till provoked by the
ascendency of Wentworth, he passed over to
the Opposition ; by his double-dealing with the
King and the Scots, proved himself a politi-
cal traitor, yet he was admitted into the Privy-
council, was attached to the royal household
by the office of Comptroller, and finally cre-
ated Lord Saville. The Earl of Northumber-
land, of whom we shall hereafter give a fuller
history, was ever averse to the friendship which
Charles proffered him, and even censured the
Earl of Bedford for his noble attempt to con-
ciliate parties, as one " gained over by the
King" at the very moment he was himself in
office. As Lord High -Admiral, the fleets of
England under him were inactive ; and when
the Earl was appointed to the command of the
army, he was more than once absent from sud-
den indisposition. When at length he sur-
rendered the fleet to the Parliament, and thus
abandoned his Royal Master, though he would
not act against him, Charles with tender re-
gret observed, " I have courted him as a mis-
tress, I have conversed with him as a friend."
The Earl of Leicester had been created Lord-
Lieutenant of Ireland, as a person agreeable to
the Parliament, and he was so honourable a

46 THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES.

man, that it rendered him equally indecisive
and indifferent ; concurring with the Parlia-
ment, yet never disloyal to the Sovereign.

These sudden defections, at two different
periods, have always proved a sore point with
those who will allow of nothing short of im-
maculate patriotism among the parliamentary
leaders. Oldmixon has the impudence, not un-
usual with him, to doubt the whole history of
the designed administration of the Earl of
Bedford with others, who had given as a pledge
to save Strafford. This intemperate partisan
exclaims — " Such unnatural changes may hap-
pen with your Wentworths, your Noys, Sa-
villes, and Digbys, but not with gentlemen of
solid principles and virtues." Oldmixon could
not deny that the first race of Patriots had gone
over to the Court, since they were actually in
office; but as the proposed administration of
the Earl of Bedford had not taken place, he
contrived to insinuate that it was doubtful
whether the party had ever consented to be the
Ministers of Charles : but this is as certain as
that they had made promises to the King,
which went far beyond the limits of that severe
patriotism which their names inspire. To these
practices of the Opposition the King himself
evidently alludes — his reproaches are precise.

THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES. 47

" Themselves know what overtures have been
made by them, and with what importunity,
for offices and preferments, what great services
should have been done for us, and what other
undertakings were (even to have saved the life
of the Earl of Strafford) if we would confer such
offices on them." * Will any future Oldmixon
venture to suggest that the King could have
given to the people this particular declaration
without the most certain evidence ? Clarendon
has even furnished the details of the whole
design, and pointed out the places the respect-
ive parties were to occupy.

Mrs. Macaulay has given a more ingenious
turn to this painful topic of compromising pa-
triotism. As we are quite ignorant of the
cause which made the King desist from his
original intention, the female historian is at no
loss to discover this piece of un revealed history,
—and we have it thus. " The incorruptible
virtue which was found in these men, put a stop
to most of the intended promotions ; Charles,
finding that instead of acquiring partisans, he
should be surrounded by troublesome monitors,
if the intended change took place, let the de-
sign drop. It is thought that the leaders be-
came more personally exasperated against him ;

* Husband's Collections, 534.

48 THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES.

but there are no grounds for this supposi-
tion :" nor certainly any for this entire state-
ment, which includes two pieces of secret his-
tory. Mrs. Macaulay informs us of the mo-
tive of Charles in not carrying on the pro-
jected Administration ; and also assures us,
that those who had accepted places, and might
now consider themselves as dismissed ministers,
were not at all offended. So placable were
these enraged Patriots ! In this manner is
party -history composed : the warped sugges-
tions of the writer are perpetually supplying
the absence of all real knowledge. She tells
us farther, as an excuse for place-hunting, that
the Patriots, in entering into office, had decided
to oppose the Court with the same vigour and
firmness as before ; which, she says, was the
case with St. John, who, to do him but justice,
did all man could do to betray and ruin his
royal master. We must, therefore, infer, that
these Patriots in place, expected to render op-
position to the King more agreeable to him in
their characters of confidential servants, than
those of his open adversaries. We think we
form a juster notion of the sagacity of these
able men, in not supposing that they could
hope to retain power by a systematic hostility
to him from whom they received it. If they

THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES. 49

meditated an incessant opposition to the King,
their seats in Parliament had been a fitter place
than the Privy Council. The higher motive
which influenced these patriots to accept of the
highest places, the principal offices of State,
we know not; the more ordinary one we do
know.

Mr. Brodie, alluding to this remarkable de-
fection of the patriotic party, satisfies himself
with reasons to show, that it could never have
succeeded according to the royal expectation,
which, Mr. Brodie says, was intended for a
coalition with Strafford. Incredible assertion !
Charles, to have saved the life of Strafford, was
ready to comply with any terms, even with
banishment : and, however he hurt the dignity
of the Earl, the King solemnly proposed that
" The Earl should be incapacitated by Parlia-
ment to serve even as a constable."* Mr.
Brodie then moralizes on the little use of em-
ploying popular men, when they turn apostates,
as they at that very instant lose their charac-

* Mr. Hallam, with his usual candour when he touches on
the King's character, agrees with this. " It was a main ob-
jtct with the King to save the life of Strafford ; entirely, as
I am inclined to believe, from motives of conscience and
honour, without any views of ever again restoring him to
power." i. 560.

VOL. III. E

50 THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES.

ters. The morality is good, the reasoning is
sound, but they have only served to turn aside
our attention from the subject itself. Were
these patriots apostates, or were they not ? Did
they not accept conditions and compromises ?
If some of them have escaped from incurring
Mr. Brodie's denunciation against apostates, it
must be confessed, that it was owing to their
good fortune, in the King's declining their
services.

The great man who first forsook the Op-
position, was Sir Thomas Wentworth. Went-
worth appeared an independent Country Gen-
tleman : but he had always kept up a close
intercourse with the Court at the close of
James's reign ; nor did he neglect his friends
in office in the early part of Charles's. His
letters touch playfully on political topics when
dated from " Wentworth Wood-house," where,
as he says, " his objects and thoughts are limit-
ed in looking upon a tulip, hearing a bird sing,
a rivulet murmuring, or some such petty and
innocent pastime." Innocent truly, when writ-
ing to his friend Sir George Calvert, principal
Secretary of State. He laughs at " his cousin
Wandesford, as being a Statist.* Here I

* A politician ; a person who concerns himself with State
aflairs.

THE FIKST POLITICAL APOSTATES. 51

have matters of other guess stuff to relate :
that our harvest is all in ; a most fine season
to make fish-ponds ; our plums all gone and
past; quinces and grapes almost fully ripe,
which will, I trow, hold better relish with a
Thistleworth palate, (alluding to Calvert's re-
sidence,) and approve me to have the skill to
serve every man in his right cue. These only
we countrymen muse of, hoping in such harm-
less retirements for a just defence from the
higher powers, and, possessing ourselves in con-
tentment, pray with Dryope in the poet :—

' Et siqua est pietas, ab acutae vulnere falcis
Et pecoris morsu frondes defendite nostras.' "

But our rural statesman, (for at bottom we
shall find him one,) was not so intently busied
in healing the sharp wound of the shears, and
in defending his hedges from the bite of the
sheep, as not to threaten his courtly friend the
Secretary of State, with saving subsidies from
the grasp of their royal master, when " such
unruly fellows meet in Parliament." " You
think we see nothing ; but believe it, you shall
find us legislators no fools, albeit, you of the
Court think to blear our eyes with 'your sweet
balls, and leave us in the suds when you have
done. Thus much for the Commonweal !" So

E 2

52 THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES.

airy a politician, between jest and earnest, was
hardly to be dreaded as the most stubborn of
patriots : and when " the swain Wentworth"
acknowledged that " he had leisure to pry
saucily out of his own calling into the myste-
ries of State," he assigns a sufficient reason-
being " the true effects of want of employ-
ment."

In the early part of Charles's reign, Went-
worth had not enjoyed the royal favour; for
he had been imprisoned as a Loan-Recusant,
had joined the political phalanx, and had been
pricked for Sheriff to prevent him taking his
seat in Parliament. He had even been re-
moved from an honourable appointment in his
county ; and, in his speech at a Yorkshire meet-
ing, he insinuates that " the world may well
think I knew the way which would have kept
my place. I confess, indeed, it had been too
dear a purchase." At the very moment he was
raising this tone of independence, he addressed
a confidential letter to Weston, the Chancellor
of the Exchequer, as querulous and supplica-
tory as the High Sheriff had just been bold
and public-spirited in presence of the York-
shire meeting. Here we find no allusions to
his " innocent pastimes," and " the sheep which
bite his hedges" seem to be loss of place and

THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES. 53

unrequited services. Wentworth apprehends
the weight of his Majesty's indignation, being
put out of all commissions wherein formerly
he had served : he is sensible of his misfortunes,
resting " infinitely ambitious, much rather to
live under the smile than the frown of his
Sovereign." He beseeches the Chancellor to
take some good opportunity to represent to his
Majesty his humble suit, reminding him " of
the esteem his late Majesty held him in." In
another letter, he declares his readiness to serve
the Duke as " an honest man and a gentle-
man," reminding the Chancellor of an inter-
view with the Duke, to which he had been
privy, where his Grace contracted friendship
for him, " all former mistakes laid asleep, for-
gotten." Yet, " for all this," he observes, " I
was made Sheriff, and again have been dis-
charged from the poor place of the Custos Ro-
tulorum; — this is the reward of my painful
and loyal service." We are curious to know
more precisely what Wentworth meant by " all
former mistakes laid asleep." Were these
"mistakes" the jealousies he felt towards Buck-
ingham, and the votes which he had given in
the Commons? It is evident that there was
a good deal of political coquetry in the patri-
otic independence of Sir Thomas Wentworth :

54 THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES.

and, as it is said, that in the acorn may be
discerned the mighty ramifications of the oak,
a political naturalist might have detected in the
country Baronet the rudiments of the future
branches, — the Lord President of the Council
of the North, the Viceroy of Ireland, and the
renowned Earl of Strafford. We owe to Mr.
Brodie a valuable detection in the history of
Strafford : the fierce, patriotic speeches which
have been often ascribed to Sir Thomas Went-
worth, were, in fact, delivered by a Mr. Tho-
mas Wentworth, member for Oxford, who ap-
pears to have been hunted out of that city by
the influence of the University, against whom
he had raised the townsmen. The dereliction
of Sir Thomas Wentworth is not, therefore, so
glaring as when the vehement speeches of his re-
lative were ascribed to him. His own speeches
in the House were usually moderate. Al-
though he had divided with the Opposition
members, he was hardly one of them : he af-
fected to treat contemptuously Sir John Eliot,
— for he would suffer no rival, — nor could he
find any difficulty in assigning reasons for the
desertion of his party. Whenever higher and
new interests cross the views of a politician, the
faults of his old friends become every day more
prominent ; and while his delicacy on that side

THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES. 55

becomes more and more fastidious, it is remark-
able that it grows less and less nice on the side
of his new friends. Honours and power, we
see, could bend the sternest pride in Strafford ;
and the flattery of a Court could dissolve even
the ruggedest and the most uncourtly nature
in the Attorney -general Noy.

This famous Attorney -general of Charles the
First, the inventor of ship-money, had dis-
tinguished himself among the zealous friends
of civil freedom, and had often wrestled with
the royal prerogative. An unwearying lawyer,
entrenched among statutes and records, a re-
veller in parliamentary rolls, whose searching
curiosity was insatiable, and whose subtile dis-
tinctions were perpetually altering the case.
When anagrams were in fashion descriptive of
the persons, William JVoy verified his own —

" I moyl in Law."

He had searched with incessant delight for pre-
cedents favouring the liberty of the subject;
but in this pursuit it seems he had also ferret-
ed out precedents which suited the prerogative.
These dark researches among our ancient re-
cords had cast a veil of mystery over this oracle
of Law — Good or Evil hung on his lips — and
it has been alleged, that in the pride of his

56 THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES.

recondite erudition, were precedents wanting,
Noy would value himself in " making that law
which all other men believed not to be so."

The singularity of his manners had attracted
as much notice as his eminence at the bar.
Noy was a rough humourist ; but the blunt
cynical spirit which unfitted him to flatter
others, had, it seems, the weakness of listening
to flattery ; he, who disdained to court, had
not the greatness of mind which disdains to be
courted. The government party extolled him
to his face, and to cajole him the more securely,
praised him behind his back : the bear licked
the honey which he found trickling from rocks.
" He was bewitched to become the King's,"
cried his old associates — " He suffered himself
to be made the King's Attorney-general," ob-
serves Clarendon.

When the King sent for Noy to confer on
him the office of his Attorney-general, there
were " many merry tales," says a contemporary
letter-writer. Noy, with his habitual churlish-
ness, returned no thanks for the proffered ho-
nour, but struck his bargain with his royal
client. Declaring that he was now well-client-
ed when he should be his Majesty's sworn
servant in that place, he held it very unfitting
to dishonour his Majesty, or the place, so much

THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES. 57

as to be called for, and run from bar to bar
to gain fees from other clients, and there-
fore he would know what wages should be
allowed ? When a messenger, as was usual,
was ordered to attend on the new Attorney-
general, Noy could not endure the trusty fol-
lower at his heels. This appearance of serving
him seemed an espionage ; often angrily scowl-
ing on the messenger, Noy at length ordered him
home, " lest the people," cried the cynic, " who
have always seen me walk free and alone, should
fancy me a state-prisoner."

Noy, the most profound of lawyers, is an
instance that mere knowledge is not true wis-
dom. If we are struck by the comprehension
of his understanding, we may equally be so
at the narrowness of his views ; ready at cases,
most erudite in precedents, and skilful in
arguments for his own side, he would observe
nothing but law — and passed unobserved the
temper of the times. A great lawyer may be
but a petty statesman and a smaller patriot.

Noy in fact sanctioned, and even originated
the most unpopular measures, devices contrived
to cover the odium of taxation. Frequent pro-
clamations harassed the people by new and ar-
bitrary regulations on trivial and domestic con-
cerns; Noy legalized the absurd soap-project,

58 THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES.

and contrived the odious tax of ship-money. In
times of danger from an invading enemy, our
kings had required ships to be furnished by
the several ports ; but it now appeared to the
people, that money was to be levied instead of
ships, and inland men, secure in their counties,
were to furnish invisible fleets, which only
passed through the Exchequer. This expe-
dient was considered by Noy as an unfailing
source of revenue, and, as Clarendon has forci-
bly described it, as " a spring that should have
no bottom, and for an everlasting supply."
The late advocate for guarding the property of
the subject could now only discover whatever
referred to the property of the Crown. The
affairs of the nation were now to be regulated
by two paper books, or slips of notes, which the
great lawyer had extracted from the dusty
parchments of the Tower ; and being a hu-
mourist, it is said, they were deposited in an
ample pie-crust which his mother had sent him
for a Christmas gift. The Apostate of Free-
dom, in the violent style of the times, was now
saluted as " a Papist and an Atheist ;" and in
the witty libels of that day on his death, which
happened within three years of his appoint-
ment, for he lived not to witness the calamity
he had occasioned, nor to defend his favourite
project, papers stuck on posts, announced that

THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES. 59

"the Attorney - general's body having been
opened, there was found in his head a bundle
of proclamations ; in his maw, moth-eaten re-
cords ; and in his belly, a barrel of soap."

Noy was probably himself not insensible to
that fluctuation of the moral principle, which
too often occurred, when political expedience
was strained by him into what he might have
deemed political justice ; and a rule of govern-
ment was too often made by him into a rule of
law. With at least the honesty of a lawyer,
he was as zealous a guardian of the King's
cause, as he had ever been to any of his former
clients. When he knew his Sovereign person-
ally, and witnessed the royal distresses, we can-
not now decide in what degree his place might
have warped his patriotism, or his patriotism
have melted into sympathy. Fuller, however,
has recorded an anecdote of this Attorney-ge-
neral, which happened in his presence, and
which indicates a latent feeling. Noy was at
the annual ceremony of weighing the Pix by
the Goldsmiths' Company ; a solemn custom
instituted for trying the standard-weight of
gold, as a check on the master of the mint.
The Master of the Company observed that the
scales were so perfectly true, that they would
turn with the two hundredth part of a grain.
" I would not that my actions should be

60 THE FIRST POLITICAL APOSTATES.

weighed in these scales," exclaimed the tender-
hearted cynic with his blunt honesty. The
morose sagacity of this legal humourist appear-
ed in his curt will which he left in Latin.
Having bequeathed his second son a small an-
nual stipend, and a sum in money sufficient, as
he said, to bring him up in his father's profes-
sion, the residue of his great wealth was left to
his eldest son — " to waste, for nothing better
have I ever hoped." This son was so rapidly
verifying his father's prediction, that he is call-
ed in a contemporary letter " the dissipanding
Noy ;" but he was prevented completing the
prophecy by falling in a mad duel.

Noy, with this perfect conviction of the fate
of his idle accumulations of fortune, might
have afforded more wisely to have remained a
patriot. But Noy was only a lawyer, proud of
his legal studies. Equally dexterous on ei-
ther side, it was not the cause he advocated
which he cared for, but the authorities and
precedents, the Rolls and the Records, which
maintained it, and in which he gloried. His
rough humour only concealed the strong per-
sonal vanity of the man, and when the subtile
courtiers submitted to cajole the pride of the
uncourtly man, could the cynic be sensible of
his own inferiority ?

OF THE NEW MINISTERS. 61

CHAPTER V.

OF THE NEW MINISTERS. LAUD.

AMONG the members of the new Cabinet,
there were three Ministers, who seemed to
Charles to possess the rare talent of govern-
ment. In their individual counsels he sought
for that practical wisdom, which under his own
eye, was to strengthen his feeble and irregular
conduct. To Strafford he consigned the diffi-
cult government of Ireland ; to Laud the ad-
ministration and maintenance of the Church ;
and to the Marquis of Hamilton the secret con-
duct of the affairs of his turbulent countrymen.
It is remarkable of the Monarch and his
three Ministers, that they all suffered on the
scaffold.

In the choice of these Ministers, an unity in
the design of the Monarch is obvious. His
policy was to reign by the emulative zeal of
men elevated into power only secondary to his
own, and who had each a distinct object to ac-

62 OF THE NEW MINISTERS.

complish in their scheme of government. The
Archbishop, and the Lord Lieutenant of Ire-
land, were not ordinary courtiers, they were
both earnest and laboriously active. Laud, for
his principle, offered an universal conformity to
the ecclesiastical discipline ; Strafford, an un-
disputed obedience to the civil power. Laud,
in prosecuting " Schismatics," and listening to
the accommodators of Romanism with Protes-
tantism, contemplated establishing unity by
uniformity. Strafford seems to have flattered
himself that he could gradually bring Ireland
to a conformity of religion with England ;*
and he felt the consciousness of genius in the
ability of his own administration. These Mi-
nisters of State attempted, as other Statesmen
have done, to restrain or abolish, a rival mino-

* The passage is remarkable : in a letter of Strafford to
the King, i. 367, he calls it " far the greatest service that
can be done unto your crown on this side —to make us an
happy and secure people within ourselves ;" — but there was
some mystery in the mode. " Many things will fall conti-
nually in debate at the Board, with which it will be very un-
fit any of the contrary religion (the Catholics) be acquaint-
ed." Did Strafford foresee invincible difficulties, while he
boldly attempted to face them ? Catholic emancipation has
been our sole drastic measure ; but in Charles's day it would
have occasioned the death of the Prescriber, rather than the
Patient.

OF THE NEW MINISTERS. 63

rity in the State ; neither seemed to be aware
that the same spirit which had raised up the
Reformation, so closely connected with civil
freedom, would act against those who ceased to
be reformers when they assumed the character
of persecutors, making the separation still more
wide, and driving desperate men to the martyr-
doms of infamous punishments, or cruel exiles.
But we must not so hastily condemn Laud,
who was not a genius above his age, since
Lord Bacon considered that uniformity in reli-
gion was absolutely necessary ; and though we
may smile at Laud's attempt at reconciling the
two great churches, yet a man of far more ele-
vated genius, the illustrious Grotius, meditated
the same result, and for the first step towards
reconciling this ancient family quarrel, zealously
laboured to prove that the Pope was not the
Anti-Christ ; for which Bishop Hurd, and other
good Protestants, express their astonishment,
and persist in expounding the Apocalypse.

As early as the dissolution of the last Par-
liament, Leighton, who afterwards so severely
suffered, indicated the purposes of the two
great Ministers, who, studious of each other,
accorded in their councils, and moved together
in their acts. Of these Ministers, the Puritan
Leighton observed that " They were on the

64 OF THE NEW MINISTERS.

way of a dangerous conjunction ; the ill effects
these three kingdoms had felt, like the sun and
the moon to govern day and night, religion
and state."

This then was to be " the new councils," and
" the intended alteration both in church and
state," which had spread an alarm among the
numerous parties which were now forming
against the government. Much depended on
the characters of the Ministers. The system
itself seemed wise and laudable ; but whether
the result was to produce that universal con-
formity which will always be the secret desire
of every Statesman, or whether " this sun and
moon in their dangerous conjunction" were to
cover the land with the darkness of despotic
power, could only be read in the Book of Fate.
On one side the Star Chamber, ever open to
uphold the Royal prerogative, was invested
with a vigour beyond the laws ; on the other,
the High Commission Court, to quell the hydra
of schism, with a power beyond human nature.
Awful expedient of a barbarous government to
rule a barbarous people ; but Charles found
them, he did not raise them. We might here
ask, had Charles the First, when he formed
this design of strengthening the Church arid
the State, decided to render himself absolute ?

OF THE NEW MINISTERS. 65

Did he consider that his prerogative consisted
in arbitrary power ? If he were the tyrant he
is artfully represented to have been, he cer-
tainly did. He himself, however, professed to
govern by the laws, and consulted their oracles.
Unhappily for this Monarch, he reigned at a
period when the nicest points of prerogative
and privilege came into collision ; when much
which was established, was about to be sub-
verted ; and he who could have ruled his people
in peace, had to encounter them in insurrection.

Early in his reign, the King had contem-
plated on the elevation of the temporal power
of the National Church. The hierarchy was
an arm of the regal power, and the curt axiom
of his father, against the anti-prelatists of " no
Bishop, no King !" was an authority too often
referred to by Doctors of Divinity, in the last
pressure of argument. So early in the present
period was found that strict " alliance between
Church and State," which Hooker, the favou-
rite author of Charles, had assumed to be but
different denominations of the same society.
A theory which Warburton denied by striking
out one of those paradoxes which are even
weaker than the theory they confute.

Charles had scarcely ascended the throne,
when one day he suddenly summoned the

VOL. III. F

66 OF THE NEW MINISTERS.

Bishops, and, as Laud has told us, chid them
for their silence in the cause of the church,
during the sitting of Parliament, leaving him
at a loss to know what would be useful or pre-
judicial to them. Such a reprimand was suf-
ficient to excite some activity even among the
listless, and a more stirring spirit among the
ambitious.

Churchmen were now appointed to Lay-
offices. Laud himself sate among the Com-
missioners of the Exchequer on the demise of
the Lord Treasurer Weston, the Earl of Port-
land, in a committee of Trade and Revenue.
The closet studies of the Bishop were ill-fitted
to the Customs ; he kept cautiously and per-
tinaciously to the laws, but there are occasions
which require new laws, and which render the
old ones obsolete. There were merchants on
one side, and wharfingers on the other, divided
by opposite interests : the only satisfaction
Laud appears to have found, was the many
complaints they furnished him with of the late
Lord Treasurer Weston, whom he disliked.

At length, when it became necessary to dis-
pose of the office of Lord High Treasurer, to
which the highest of the nobility looked as
their meed of honour and power, and by which,
through the last and the present reign, they

OF THE NEW MINISTERS. 67

had usually improved their own estates, more
than the Royal treasury ; all men were amazed
that the staff was consigned to another church-
man, Bishop Juxon, a private chaplain of the
King, and a name hitherto unknown to the
public. This arrangement entered into the
system of Laud, it was a splendid evidence of
his zeal for the Church, and a confirmation of
his own power. The entry in his diary records
the triumph. " William Juxon, Lord Bishop
of London, made Lord High Treasurer of
England. No churchman had it since Henry
the Seventh's time. I pray God bless him to
carry it so that the Church may have honour,
and the King and the State, service and con-
tentment by it. And now, if the Church will
not hold up themselves under God, I can do
no more."

In all this the integrity of Laud need not be
suspected, for Bishop Juxon justified his san-
guine hopes. So irreproachable was the life of
Juxon, that after having attended on the last
moments of his unhappy Sovereign, who then
so emphatically distinguished him as " the
honest man," he lived unmolested through all
the changes of the governments of England.
When the Church was unbishoped, one Bishop
was left whom the anti-prelatists could not

F a

68 OF THE NEW MINISTERS.

bring themselves to hate : Juxon had held the
crosier and the white staff with the same equa-
nimity ; and the honours which he had never
sought, he had yielded up with the same con-
tent of mind and gentleness of manners, with
which he had worn them. Whiteloeke, noti-
cing his favourite recreation, tells us that " his
pack of hounds exceeded all others in England
for their orderly and pleasant going in couples,
by his own skill and direction," and characte-
rizes the Bishop's temper with happy plea-
santry, for having " as much command of him-
self as of his hounds."*

But the policy of promoting Churchmen to
the most eminent places of public trust and

* It is amusing to detect party-writers disingenuously
eluding any point which they conceive may injure their pur-
pose. Dr. Z. Grey, in his notes on Neal, probably from
some vulgar prejudice, thought that hunting was no favour-
able characteristic of the Episcopal character ; and, having
to refer to Whitelocke's impartial statement for the Bishop's
excellent temper, he contrived an expedient, thus quoting
the words of Whiteloeke, " Juxon was a person of great
parts and temper, and had much command of himself, &c."
This &c. includes the whole pack of hounds ! Dr. Grey
might have left to some Puritan his fanatical conceit. The
healthful exercise which the Bishop practised, is one of
those indifferent actions which stand unconnected with mo-
rality, and should no more be deprecated than a Bishop's
morning ride.

OF THE NEW MINISTERS. 9

honour was fatal. Were we to become " a
Kingdom of Priests ?" It inflated the tem-
poral pride of the Prelacy, and fed their grosser
appetite of political ambition. An ill-natured
rumour of the day made Wren, Bishop of
Norwich, a Secretary of State ; and Bancroft,
Bishop of Oxford, Chancellor of the Ex-
chequer. Even "the young fry of the Clergy,"
the frivolous and the mean, grew haughty to
their neighbours when generally chosen as Jus-
tices of the Peace. Bishop Wren once let fall
an unguarded declaration, which was so fre-
quently repeated, that having been noticed in
the House of Commons, it has entered into
history. This Ecclesiastic " hoped to see the
day when a Clergyman should be as good a
man as any upstart Jack -gentleman in the
kingdom." Bishop Wren lived long enough
to witness " the upstart Jacks," those common-
ers whose wealth had spread their influence,
and whose puritanic principles were opposed
to episcopacy, tread down that hierarchy, while
he himself condemned to an imprisonment of
eighteen years by the " Jack-gentlemen," lived
long enough not to be humbled, but to repent
of a hasty and undisguised expression.

This advancement of the ecclesiastics was
never forgiven by the affronted nobility, nor

70 OF THE NEW MINISTERS.

even by the jealous lawyers : the lawyer White-
locke is sore, and the courtier Clarendon mur-
murs. The Parliamentary historian has pre-
served the prevalent feeling in the report of
•that day, that it was intended "to fix the
greatest temporal preferments upon others of
that coat ; insomuch as the people merrily,
when they saw the Treasurer with the other
Bishops riding to Westminster, called it the
Church triumphant. Doctors and parsons of
parishes were made everywhere Justices of
Peace." May candidly observes, that " the
Archbishop by the same means which he used
to preserve his clergy from contempt, exposed
them to envy, and as the wisest could then
prophesy, to a more than probability of losing
all."*

The leviathan of the church was to be Laud.
Laud had no gifted mind : his capacity was
not extensive, but his confined intellect was
quickened by subtilty, and restless in its irri-
table activity. If unequal to take far and
comprehensive views, his perception of the
objects near to him had a vividness which
looked like genius ; but in truth, he saw only
distinctly by parts. This faculty, however,
enabled him to rebut the minute and harass-

* May's History of the Parliament of England, p. 33.

OF THE NEW MINISTERS. 71

ing charges brought against him, on that day
which may emphatically be called his trial.
These vexatious charges, Laud generally an-
swered with astonishing promptitude, so reten-
tive was his memory of obscure transactions
and petty personalities, years after they had
occurred. A loftier genius, embracing more
enlarged designs, could hardly have treasured
up such incidents, or remembered such per-
sons; but to Laud, the minute seemed great.
An obscure person who had controverted a
point of Church-discipline — a Sectarian minis-
ter who had been suspended — or the occasion
of a person's dislike of him, which was often
shown by their ill-natured evidence, were never
forgotten. Even the names of some country
residents were recollected who had been cen-
sured for quarrels with churchwardens, or for
contemptuous language, as when a Puritan had
said that " the rails," which were ordered to
inclose the communion-table, " were fitter to
be set up in his garden." When very obscure
persons were giving evidence concerning cer-
tain houses which had been pulled down to
repair and enlarge St. Paul's, which, though
compensation was allowed, was alleged as one
of the grievances of his administration, who
could have imagined that the Archbishop was

72 OF THE NEW MINISTERS.

perfectly familiar with their domestic history ?
Of these complainants Laud showed how one
was sore because it had disturbed his brewery ;
and the other, because he had rented the par-
sonage-house, and made a good pennyworth by
letting it to his under-tenant. — " It was," said
JLaud, "the going down of that house which
troubled him, and not the church." Even
notes taken from an inflammatory sermon were
all remembered by him in the seventy-second
year of his age, after a three years' imprison-
ment, as the business of yesterday. If the
intellect of Laud was neither expansive nor
elevated, it was earnest, ready, and practical,
above most minds.

A mind thus deeply busied in the minuter
affairs of life was necessarily subjected to its
peculiar infirmities. Laud was petulant, pas-
sionate, and impatient of contradiction on
whatever thwarted his purposes ; as restless to
establish his own innovations as to put down
those of others. The political prescience of
James the First had early discovered his cha-
racter, arid what this Monarch said pf Laud,
which has fortunately been preserved for us,
is only one of the many splendid instances of
the sagacity of that Monarch, whose ability has
been so grossly depreciated.

OF THE NEW MINISTERS. 73

Laud, in his domestic manners, had the blunt-
ness and hastiness of a monastic character.
Abrupt in his reception of persons, and re-
markably sharp in his tones, he was often con-
sidered to speak in anger, when nothing was so
intended: he owned this often troubled him;
it was the imperfection of a thin voice, and a
want of courtesy, which he was often reminded
of by those who complained of their reception,
and resented it. The austere monastic charac-
ter was prevalent. He was one who had little
sympathy with his fellow-men when he quitted
his cell, and although he congratulated himself
in the sad years of his protracted sufferings,
that he had lived a life of celibacy, and left
neither wife nor child to inherit his griefs, yet
wanting these, or their substitute in some ar-
dent friendships to keep alive the social affec-
tions, with Laud all personal felicity terminated
in barren glory and abstract feelings, to raise
the grandeur of the hierarchy, or to endow a
college ; passions which may gratify the ima-
gination without touching the heart.

Mr. Hallarn has severely said of Laud, that
" he could not have been a good man in private
life." This cannot well be said of a man whose
sole passion was his ambition, and whose per-
sonal character was unstained by any vice. To

74 OF THE NEW MINISTERS.

be an amiable man was denied him, both by
his habits and his constitutional temper; his
petulance was sure to offend, and his impa-
tience of contradiction unfitted him either for
the council-table or the chambers of domestic
life. It is evident, even by the favourable
portrait which Clarendon has drawn of the
Archbishop, that men of another cast of mind,
the witty and politic, such as the wily Bishop
Williams, and the cool dissimulative Cotting-
ton, too often played on the simplicity of Laud.
His gravity could endure no persiflage. Laud
cruelly persecuted Williams for a contemptuous
jest, and turned out Archy, the King's fool, for
a pun. Lord Cottington delighted to prick
his warm temper into " some indecent passion ;"
when Laud, equally honest and weak, would
apologise with an afflicting sincerity, while he
who had so artfully offended laughed in his
sleeve. Cottington, we are told, often made
" an unkind use" of these occasions. He knew
how to lead on Laud into some blunder, then
drive him into choler, and then slyly expose
the artless and hasty man — often before the
King; and on the next day he would dine
with Laud, whose honest simplicity admired
the friendship which would not be offended
by some hasty words. Laud appears never

OF THE NEW MINISTERS. 75

to have detected the insidious malice which,
instead of receiving an apology, should have
offered one.*

A worldly ambition was the ruling passion
of this man of God, more than ought to have
entered into the sanctuary of the soul, where
piety should shine as the Shechinah. The pas-
sion of court preferment for many years had
haunted his very dreams, and had plunged him
into all its mean servilities ; but the pride of
rank was attended by one of its peculiar in-
firmities. Laud was often violently discom-
posed at being reminded of his plebeian origin.
This forcibly indicates his contracted spirit.
The Puritans, with whom the humble origin
of the Primate, who " was not born a gentle-
man," should have been no objection, would
sometimes put this weakness to the torture,
more sure to mortify the Prelate, by asserting
that he was born E face plebis, than by all their
other libels. He seems to have sought to
throw over the obscurity of his family a veil
of tissue, by the state and distance which he

* At the close of Lord Clarendon's first book, is a remark-
able instance of this malicious persiflage, or what we now
call quizzing, played upon Laud by Cottington. The occa-
sion was as honourable to Laud's integrity as it proved un-
favourable to his discernment.

76 OF THE NEW MINISTERS.

rigidly kept with all persons. When Mr.
Hyde, then a young man, in confidential con-
versation, touched on this delicate point, Laud
frankly replied that he considered this reserve
and dignity suitable to the place and degree he
held in the Church and the State. Doubtless
it was some satisfaction for him to allege, that
Abbot, the puritanic Archbishop, was not bet-
ter born than himself ; and Abbot's behaviour
to the highest nobility in the kingdom, was
such as to border on insolence.* Laud stood
the colossus of his own cast ; and the Court
Divines, as mundane as their great model, de-
ceived their patron by the usual practice of all
limited circles, communicating what was plea-
sant to learn, and suppressing what would have
been very disagreeable. Such a personage as
Laud is doomed to have dependents, and not
friends. Mr. Hyde has made a remarkable ob-
servation on the Archbishop. " Persons of
that condition, [he alludes to the higher order
of the clerical,] how worthy soever, have rarely
friendships with men above their own condi-
tion. They receive, for the most part, their
information from clergymen, who understand
the least, and take the worst measure of human
affairs, of all mankind that can write and read."

* The Life of Lord Clarendon, i. 15.

OF THE NEW MINISTERS. 77

There is a severity of truth in this reflection,
but it is not peculiar to the ecclesiastical cha-
racter. All men of the learned professions, who
live in one restricted circle, are liable to suffer
from the same scanty source of human feelings
and human knowledge. Their own views and
their own habits form their contracted horizon.
Had Laud been a great Serjeant, would the
lawyer, Mr. Hyde, have applied the same re-
flection ? Probably not : yet there are few
great lawyers whose minds are not wholly
warped by their habits of thinking, and who
do not judge of human nature more by cases
and precedents, than by any intimate con-
versancy with the human heart and with society
at large. And thus it is, on the reverse prin-
ciple, that Physicians have, in all ages, formed
the most enlightened class in society, because
they mingle with their fellow men.

78 PRIVATE LIFE OF

CHAPTER VI.

PRIVATE LIFE OF CHARLES THE FIRST.
LOVE OF THE ARTS.

THERE was an interval, a short interval, be-
tween the dissolution of the third Parliament
in 1628, and the rising troubles in Scotland in
1638, when we may describe the King as at
peace with himself, as no longer daily harassed
by a discontented Parliament, and as yet a
stranger to adversities unparalleled in the his-
tory of princes. During these ten years,
Charles indulged more uninterruptedly a pas-
sion for the arts of imagination. Picture,
sculpture, architecture, and music, and not less
literature, charmed these few happier years.
Nor were these tastes a late acquirement with
Charles the First : they were no feeble pursuit,
taken up as the resource of the idler; — no
cold reflected taste, caught up from others.
They were the virgin fancies of his studious

CHARLES THE FIRST. 79

days; and when banished from them, in his
wanderings, and in the camp or in the prison,
they still occupied' his musings.

Many evidences of such recollections still
exist. I have seen a written order by Charles
the First, when in confinement in the Isle of
Wight, addressed to the learned Patrick Young,
his librarian, about the books at St. James's,
and to the great antiquary, Sir Symonds D'Ewes,
the keeper of his medals, concerning their re-
spective objects ; so intent was his elegant mind
on those treasures of literature and art, of which
being deprived, he accounted these deprivations
not among the least of the many he now en-
dured. Mr. Upcott has also a note of Charles
to Secretary Nicholas, at the time the King
was with the Scots, in which he orders certain
volumes to be sent to him, and points out their
particular situation in one of his apartments at
Whitehall.

The domestic habits of this Sovereign seem
ennobled by their intellectual refinement. In-
genious himself in all the arts of ingenuity, his
sensibility to art was that of an artist, his
critical discernment that of the connoisseur.
With some Monarchs, pride or pomp have
shed a golden patronage over Art, as over one
of their lesser glories : with Charles the First,

80 PRIVATE LIFE OF

the passion was the devotion of a votary, loving
Art only for itself. Though avowedly neither
a painter nor a poet, he could handle the pencil
and compose a verse. He suggested subjects to
the two great painters of his age, to his great
architect, and to dramatic poets. Secret history
only reveals this softening feature in the grave
and king-like character of Charles the First.
A prince without art and literature is only
one of the people on the throne.

Charles the First unquestionably was the
first P^nglish monarch who opened galleries of
paintings and statues ; domiciliated the genius
of Italian architecture ; and in the ardour of
his capacious designs, meditated at no distant
day, to call around his Throne, what lay scatter-
ed in Europe, a world of glory as yet uncon-
quered by his people. To have overcome the
difficulties which the efforts of this Prince had
to contend with, is not less admirable than the
grand object which he did realise, and the still
grander ones which he has left to our imagin-
ation. Had Whitehall Palace been completed
as it was contemplated by Charles the First,
and conceived by Inigo Jones, the Louvre and
the Escurial would have found in our calum-
niated island, among " the clouds of the North,"
a more magnificent rival. The ceiling of the

CHARLES THE FIRST. 81

Banqueting-room, at Whitehall, was painted
by Rubens ; and it was the intention of Charles
that Vandyke should have covered the walls
with the history of the order of the Garter, in
a friendly emulation with his master. This
hall of audience for ambassadors, is stated to
be only the fifty-fifth part of this gorgeous
palace. But the paintings of Vandyke for the
edifice of Inigo Jones exist only in a sketch
in chiaro-scuro ; by the civil wars the nation
lost the glory of the paintings and the palace.

The first collector of the productions of the
fine arts in our country, was that Earl of
Arundel, whose memorable marbles perpetuate
his name. Before his day we cannot discover
in England any single gallery of pictures and
statues, nor cabinets of medals and engraved
gems. A collection of Queen Elizabeth's rari-
ties, exhibited the lowest tastes of elaborate
toys and frivolous curiosities. This travelled
Earl, who had repeatedly visited the Continent,
and more particularly the land of his admira-
tion and his love, Italy, exhausted his wealth
and his magnificence in the prodigality of his
fine tastes. Of this father of our arts, Walpole
tells, that " He was the first who discovered the
genius of Inigo Jones ; and in his embassy to
Vienna, he found Hollar at Prague" — and did

VOL. III. G

82 PRIVATE LIFE OF

not leave him there ! To this Earl, as Peacham
has felicitously expressed it, " This angle of the
world oweth the first sight of Grecian and
Roman statues ;" and Lily notices, that " this
Earl brought the new way of building with
brick in the city." The tastes of the noble col-
lector were caught by the aspiring genius of
Prince Henry, who left a considerable collec-
tion of medals. Thus the germs of a cultivated
taste for the arts were first scattered in the
gardens and the galleries of Arundel-house.
Charles succeeded to his brother with a more
decided propensity, and with a royal decision,
that all the arts of invention, or of imagination,
should no longer be foreign to England.

We discover Charles when Prince of Wales
deeply busied with the arts ; and at that early
period, he designed inviting great artists to
England. Offers of this nature he never ceased
to make to those great foreigners whose im-
mortal names still attest that there was no me-
diocrity in the Royal taste. The history of a
manufacture of fine gold and silver tapestry
shows this early ardour. This manufacture,
introduced into this country by Sir Francis
Crane, and established at Mortlake, in Surrey,
the young Prince not only patronised, but con-

CHARLES THE FIRST. 83

ceived the idea of improving the splendid
material by finer designs. Sir Henry Wot-
ton, our ambassador at Venice, by order of the
Prince, procured Cleyne, the painter, to reside
in England, for the purpose of inventing the
designs. Charles built a residence for the
artist, whose subjects, both in history and gro-
tesque, were a great improvement on the rude
gothic figures which they had hitherto worked
on. Fine and rich tapestries were the most, va-
lued of domestic ornaments, and to raise to the
utmost perfection the Mortlake tapestry, was so
favourite an object with the young Prince, that
when at Madrid, amidst love and revels, the
Mortlake tapestry was still in his thoughts, for
he wrote to his council to pay 700£ for some
Italian drawings for tapestry. The taste of
the youthful patron was rising faster than the
genius of Cleyne could advance ; for Charles
now sought for subjects which were of a higher
character of art than the grotesque fancy of
Cleyne invented. Rubens was afterwards em-
ployed, when Charles was King, in painting-
sketches of the history of Achilles, to be copied
in tapestry at Mortlake, and Charles purchased
the seven Cartoons of Raphael for the purpose*
of supplying more elevated subjects for this

84 PRIVATE LIFE OF

tapestry. It was no fault of Charles the First
that we did not anticipate the gobelins of
Louis XIV.

It was on the accession to his throne that
Charles made the greatest effort for the ac-
quisition of pictures and statues. The sum
may seem to us trivial for a royal purchase, yet
it was an effort which the King could never
repeat. Charles purchased the entire cabinet
of the Duke of Mantua for a sum supposed
to be under twenty thousand pounds ; which,
Mr. Dallaway observes, the King found no
very easy business to pay. It should, however,
be observed, that such noble productions of art
had not then reached the large prices which
afterwards the possessors — never the artists —
could obtain. It was the taste of Charles the
First, and the splendour of Philip the Fourth
of Spain, which first raised their value in the
estimation of Europe. At the dispersion of
the collection of paintings of Charles the First,
their number amounted to about five hundred
pictures, besides many which had been em-
bezzled. When we consider the straitened
means of the King, and the short space of
fifteen years in which that collection had been
formed, we have evidence how earnestly it
occupied the Royal attention, and the whole

CHARLES THE FIRST. 85

may be considered as his own creation. The
foundation of this royal collection of pictures
was a few Italian and Flemish paintings, which,
in the days of Henry the Eighth, had been
scattered among our palaces, lying unregarded
as old furniture, and which, we are told, had
received scarcely a single accession in the suc-
ceeding reigns. At all times Charles had in
his mind his collection, and called the attention
of his friends, or his agents, to his aid.* When
the Marquis of Hamilton was acting under the
King of Sweden, in a campaign in Germany,
the King adds this postscript to one of his
letters, " I hope shortly you will be in a pos-
sibility to perform your promise concerning
pictures and statues of Muncken ; therefore
now in earnest do not forget it."t Nor was
the Monarch less careful in their preservation ;
for when the Queen's great masque was to be
performed at Whitehall, Charles ordered a tem-
porary building to be erected for this spectacle
at a considerable charge, lest his pictures in the
Banqueting-house should be damaged by the
Iights4

* The King was always highly gratified by the present of a
painting from his ambassadors.

f Burnet's Memoirs of the Dukes of Hamilton, 22.
I Strafford's Letters, ii. 140.

86 PRIVATE LIFE OF

Charles the First acknowledged that he had
learned much by conversation. It is certain
that he encouraged a familiar intercourse with
travellers, artists, mechanics, and men of science.
With such persons he threw off the habitual
reserve of his character. The good sense of
his inquiries inspired the confidence of com-
munication, and this Monarch rarely left inge-
nious men, without himself contributing some
information on the objects of their own pur-
suits. Charles could suggest a touch, even a
hint, to the unfinished canvass of Rubens and
Vandyke. The King himself pursued with
delight the arts of design, and it has been re-
corded that Rubens corrected some of his draw-
ings, and that the King handled, not without
skill, the pencil of that great master. The
libellous author of " the None-such Charles,"
notices his general inclination to all arts and
sciences ; " his excelling so far in them as that
he might have got a livelihood by them." Lily
contents himself with telling us that Charles
was not unskilful in music— the truth is, that
his ear and his hand were musical. The King
had been taught the Viol di Gamba, and was a
pupil of Coperario, or John Cooper ; a celebrated
English musician, who, on his return from Italy,
assumed this fantastic appellative. Play ford,

CHARLES THE FIRST. 87

who had frequent opportunities to observe the
delight of Charles the First in music, tells us,
that the King would often appoint the service
and anthems himself, and accompany them,
" especially those incomparable fancies of Mr.
Coperario to the organ."

Charles could plan a palace with Inigo Jones,
and decide on the age of a medal with Selden.
Such, indeed, had been his early studies, that a
learned man has described him as " that great
antiquary Charles the First." The illustrious
Harvey, in one of his writings, recounts with
singular gratification the delight Charles re-
ceived from observations made by that great
anatomist while dissecting before the King
the deer in Hampton-court.* The numerous
works which this King suggested to authors,
and the critical judgment with which he de-
cided on works of literature, place Charles the
First among the most literary monarchs. His
critical conceptions were quick ; for when Sir
Edward Walker was reading , his manuscript
Memoirs to the King, in recording an incident
of the soldiers stripping some of the Parliamen-
tary troopers of their clothes, he had expressed
himself with levity. " Our soldiers freed them
of the burthen of their clothes." The King

* Gen. Anirn. exerc. 64, p. 422.

88 PRIVATE LIFE OF

instantly interrupted the reader, observing,
" Fie ! that is ill said, and it was worse done !"
We know that the King read the manuscript
plays, and once corrected a rant which Mas-
singer had put in the mouth of a tyrant
against the freedom of his subjects.* The
folio Shakespeare of Charles, with the motto he
frequently wrote in his books, has at length
become the possession of his present Majesty ;
the King altered some of the titles of the plays ;
and the motto, Dum Spiro Spero, was prompt-
ed at moments, perhaps, when the Monarch, in
trouble, or in prison, indulged some bright
vision. He was fond of leaving these testi-
monies of his elevated feelings among his books,
for another has been noticed—

" Rebus in adversis facile est contemnere vitam ;
Fortiter ille facit qui miser esse potest."

" In adversity it is easy to despise life; true courage can
suffer misery."

Charles suggested to the poet Shirley the plot
of " The Gamesters." May's version of Lucan
was received with all the favour of Royalty, a
circumstance alluded to by Ben Jonson, by
comparing the fate of the English bard with
Lucan *s—

* Malone,ii. 387.

CHARLES THE FIRST. 89

" Thy fame is equal, happier is thy fate,
Thou hast got Charles's love, he, Nero's hate."

There are some delightful literary anecdotes
of Charles. The King had been harassed by
the zealot Obadiah Sedgwick repeatedly press-
ing the King for his opinion on his fanatical
" Leaves of the Tree of Life ;" a mystical ex-
planation of the second verse of the twenty-
second chapter of the Revelations. The King,
having read part of the manuscript, returned
it, with his opinion, that, " After such a work,
he believed the composer stood in some need of
sleep." The happy ambiguity of this playful
criticism, accepted in the better sense, gratified
this Parliamentary preacher. There was some
Cervantic humour in Charles's gravity. When
pressed by a Parliamentary Commissioner to
conclude the treaty, the King ingeniously re-
plied, " Mr. Buckley, if you call this a treaty,
consider if it be not like the fray in the co-
medy, where the man comes out, and says,
' There has been a fray, and no fray ;' and
being asked how that could be, ' Why,' says
he, * there hath been three blows given, and I
had them all !' Look, therefore, if this be not
a parallel case." The conversation of Charles,
on many occasions, shows that he was a far

90 PRIVATE LFFE OF

superior man than his enemies have chosen to
acknowledge. The famous Oceana Harring-
ton, when commissioned by Parliament, attend-
ing on the King, his ingenuousness and his
literature attracted the King's notice. Har-
rington was a Republican in principle, and
the King and he often warmly disputed on
the principles of a good Government. One day
Charles recited to him some well-known lines
of Claudian., descriptive of the happiness of
the Government under a just King. Harring-
ton was struck by the King's abilities, and from
that -moment never ceased admiring the man
whom he had so well known. Charles dis-
played the same ability at the Treaty of the
Isle of Wight, where he conducted the nego-
tiation alone, his lords and gentlemen stand-
ing behind his chair in silence. That occasion
called forth all his capacity ; and it was said,
that the Earl of Salisbury, on the Parliament's
side, observed, that " The King was wonderfully
improved:" to which Sir Philip Warwick re-
plied, "No, iny Lord! the King was always
the same, but your Lordship has too late dis-
covered it." We cannot doubt that Charles
the First possessed a rate of talent and intel-
lectual powers, to which his historians have
rarely alluded.

CHARLES THE FIRST. 91

In a conversation on writing plays in rhyme,
one party affirming that the bondage of rhyme
would confine the fancy, and Lord Orrery
being of a contrary opinion, as arbiter, Charles
commanded his Lordship to employ some of
his leisure in a dramatic composition, in rhyme,
which produced " The Black Prince." But it
was not only in the lighter graces of poesy that
the fine taste of Charles delighted : more seri-
ous and elevated objects equally engaged his
attention. Charles was desirous that the na-
tional history should be composed by a man
of genius. He had been pleased with the his-
torical Essay of Lord Bacon's Henry VII.
With great judgment he fixed on Sir Henry
Wotton for a complete history ; and to stimu-
late that very elegant writer, granted him a
munificent pension of five hundred pounds.
Charles unquestionably was himself a writer
of the history of his own times ; and however
we may determine on the authenticity of the
much disputed Icon Basilike, there will be found
some portions, and some peculiar expressions,
which, it is not probable, perhaps possible, that
any one could have written but himself.* Cer-

* Mr. Brodie, who studies at every point to depreciate the
better qualities of Charles the First, has been particularly
anxious to assert the spuriousness of some writings assigned

92 PRIVATE LIFE OF

tain it is, that the manuscripts of the King
were numerous. No Monarch has had his pen
so constantly in his hand. During his long
confinement at Carisbrooke Castle, his life offers
a beautiful picture of the imprisonment of a
literary character. The King had his constant
hours for writing, and he read much. We
have an interesting catalogue of the books he
called for during this period. Yet there exist
no autographs of Charles, except some letters.
This seems to indicate some purposed destruc-
tion. We know that the King revised the

to the King. Of the controversy between Charles the First
and Alexander Henderson, the head of the Presbyters, re-
specting Church Government, Mr. Brodie, though he ac-
knowledges that this " so far-farmed production is never
read," (for certainly there is no occasion for it ;) yet, grudging
even the slender merit of Charles, for having produced " a
far-famed work never read," he winds up with an insinuation,
" whether Charles was really the author of the controversial
writings that pass under his name, may well be questioned."
iv. 66. That this may never hereafter be questioned, I refer
Mr. Brodie to the Lambeth Library, 679, where he will find
the MSS. and the first entirely in the hand-writing of the
King. Charles was early exercised in these studies. We
learn from one of his biographers, that " there was extant
in the hands of a worthy person, his extracts, written with
his own hand," of arguments from Laud's book against the
Jesuit Fisher, and that he was accustomed to epitomise
Hooker, and others, on the present subject.

CHARLES THE FIRST. 93

folio Memoirs of Sir Edward Walker, and that
he supplied Clarendon, from his own memo-
rials and journals, with two manuscripts, fairly
written, on the transactions of the years 1645
and 1646.* What became of these originals,
with others, which were seized in the royal
cabinet taken at Naseby ? If it be true, as it
appears, that Charles instigated Clarendon to
compose his history, posterity may admire the
King's exquisite discernment. There was not
another man of genius in the Royal circle, who
could have been more happily selected.

Charles appears to have designed that his
Court should resemble the literary Court of the
Medici. He assembled about him the great
masters of their various arts ; and while they
acquired the good fortune of the royal patron-
age, and were dignified by his honours, they
more largely participated in that sort of af-
fection which the real lovers of art experience
for the persons of great artists. We may rate
Charles's taste at the supreme degree, by ob-
serving, that this Monarch never patronized
mediocrity : the artist who was honoured by
his regard was ever a master-spirit. Father of

* Clarendon's Life, i. 103, folio. See also the opening of
the ninth book of Clarendon's History.

94 PRIVATE LIFE OF

art in our country, Charles seemed ambitious
of making English denizens of every man of
genius in Europe ; and of no monarch have
been recorded such frequent instances of the
deep personal interest entertained for indivi-
duals. Charles, with his own hand, wrote to
Albano, to invite that joyous painter of child-
hood to reside at the Court of England.*
When another artist, Torrentius, was con-
demned to perpetual imprisonment, Charles,
in the excess of his admiration for his works,
interceded for the wretched man ; pleading
only for the artist, the rarity and excellence of
his works were alone dwelt on by the King.
Rubens and Vandyke, with other illustrious
names, Charles had made his own ; and we
cannot read a history of foreign art without
meeting with the name of Charles the First,—
so closely had his patronage or his kindness
connected this Monarch with his contemporary
artists in every country.

No royal history opens domestic scenes of
equal fascination with those which occurred in
the constant intercourse of the grave and stately
Charles with his favourite companions, the ar-
tists themselves. His conversations with them
were familiar and unreserved. In the break-
* Academica Picturse, p. 282.

CHARLES THE FIRST. 95

fast-room of Charles the First were hung, by
his special order, the portraits of his three fa-
vourites, Rubens, Mytens, and Vandyke. Van-
dyke, by the desire of Charles, married an Eng-
lish lady, and resided in England. The King
would frequently go by water to the painter's
house in Blackfriars to his studio, and often
sitting to Vandyke himself, would commission
the Queen, his family, and his courtiers, to
allow no rest to his facile and unwearied pen-
cil ; they delighted to view themselves in the
unshadowy splendour of his portraits. A tra-
ditional story was floating in the last century,
the probability of which seems to authenticate
the fact. Vandyke was painting the portrait
of Charles the First, while the Monarch was
complaining in a low voice to the Duke of
Norfolk of the state of his finances. The King
perceiving that Vandyke was listening, said to
him laughingly, " And you, Sir ! do you know
what it is to want five or six thousand pounds?"
" Yes, Sir," Vandyke replied ; " an artist who
keeps open house for his friends, and whose
purse is always at the command of his mis-
tresses, feels too often the emptiness of his
strong-box." In this unreserved manner Charles
indulged himself with the artists. Beck, whose
facility in composition was extraordinary, was

96 F1UVATE LIFE OF

aptly complimented, by Charles familiarly ob-
serving to him, " 'Faith, Beck ! I believe that
you could paint riding post !" It is not won-
derful that a Monarch, who so well knew how
to maintain his personal dignity, and was even
coldly formal in the court circle, should have
been tenderly remembered by every man of
genius, who had enjoyed the flattering equality
of this language of the heart, and this sympa-
thy of companionship. A celebrated performer
on the flute, who afterwards became so emi-
nent during the Protectorate, as to be appoint-
ed music professor at the University of Oxford,
Dr. Thomas Wilson, with equal pride and
affection, remembered, that he was often in
attendance on Charles, who, in the intensity
of his delight, used to lean over his shoulder
while he played. Old Nicholas Laniere, who
subscribed one of his plates as being " done in
my youthful age of 74," was one of those
artists, as Lord Orford designates them,
" whose various talents were so happy as to
suit the taste of Charles the First, musician,
painter, and engraver!" Laniere was one of
the King's active agents for the selection of
works of art, while he himself could add to
them. He outlived the persecution of that
political period, and shed tears many years

CHARLES THE FIRST. 97

after in the funereal hymn on his royal master,
set by himself.

But if it be delightful to view Charles the
First indulging the most kindly feelings to
artists, it is more so to find that he knew
and entered into their wounded feelings, and
could even forgive their caprices. The King's
earliest " Picturer," as he is styled in the royal
warrant, was Daniel Mytens, a Flemish artist,
who has left us one of the finest heads of
Charles the First in his happier days, ere care
and thought had stamped their traces on his
majestic countenance. On the arrival of Van-
dyke, great as was Mytens' reputation and the
favour he enjoyed, the artist fancied that his
sun had set — his " Occupation had gone !" In
a sullen humour, Mytens requested his Ma-
jesty's permission to retire to his native home.
Charles having learned the cause of this sudden
attack of spleen, used the wayward genius with
all a brother's tenderness. The King healed
the infirmity of genius, assuring the jealous ar-
tist, that " He could find sufficient employment
both for him and Vandyke." It was no doubt
after this, that Charles hung the portrait of his
old artist, between the two greatest masters of
art ; and it is pleasing to record, that the bro-
thers in art, with the Monarch as their com-

VOL. III. H

98 PRIVATE LIFE OF

mon friend, became brothers in their affections;
for Vandyke painted the portrait of Mytens.
The King's constant attendance on Rubens
when that great painter was in England, the
honours he bestowed on him, and the noble
offers he made him, are not sufficiently known.
This great painter found, and felt in Charles
the First, a congenial spirit. Having painted
the history of St. George, representing Charles,
" wherein, if it be possible, he hath exceeded
himself," as a contemporary writes ; Rubens
would not part with the original, till he had
finished a copy for himself, that, as he said, the
picture might remain in his house at Antwerp,
" as a perpetual monument of his affection for
the English King." This interesting anecdote
seems authenticated by the circumstance that
such a picture appears in the mortuary cata-
logue of the collection of Rubens.

This deep sympathy for art and artists, flow-
ed from the truest source, that of consummate
knowledge. Charles the First possessed that re-
fined discernment which is the faculty of " the
Few," in detecting the manner, and the habi-
tual work of any individual master. Painters
call this " a knowledge of hands." Lord Or-
ford gives a remarkable story of Charles the
First inspecting a collection of portraits at

CHAKLES THE FIRST. 99

which were present several " picture-drawers."
The King enquired by whose hand was a par-
ticular picture ? Some attempted to guess, none
were positive. The King declared it to be the
work of such a man's hand. " I know it," said
Charles, " as well as if I had seen him draw it ;
but is there but one man's hand in this picture ?"
They did not discover this, while the King per-
sisted in asserting that " there were two hands
in it ; for I know the hand which drew the
heads, but the hand which drew the rest I
never saw before." It appears afterwards that
a gentleman, who had been at Rome, mention-
ed that he had seen this very picture with the
heads, but the rest unfinished, for the painter
dying, the widow procured another to complete
the work for sale, the best way he could. This
is but a blind story, and the gentleman was, no
doubt, a good courtier, observes our polished cy-
nic, though not unwilling to allow that Charles,
at least, was an excellent judge of the style of
the great masters. The story is probably true ;
for Charles was an admirable connoisseur, as
well as an antiquary. Another incident will
confirm the probability of this story. In one of
his unhappy flights, when passing a night at the
singular monastic institution of the family of the
Ferrars at Gidding, an illustrated Bible con-

H 2

100 PRIVATE LIFE OF

taining a vast collection of prints,* was placed
before the King and the Palsgrave. The latter
had more curiosity than knowledge. Even at
a moment when the mind of Charles could
have little ease, and when the business of the
early morning was an early flight, Charles
largely descanted on the invention of the mas-
ters, and the characters of the engravers. Their
works had long been lost to him ; but these
departed enjoyments of his cultivated tastes
lingered in his fond recollections, and could
steal an hour from five years of his sorrows.

This fervid devotion to art in Charles the
First was acknowledged abroad, as well as at
home. Cardinal Barberini, in his character of
the protector of the English at Rome, conceiv-
ed a project of obtaining, by the novel and si-
lent bribery of works of art, those concessions
in favour of the English Catholics from Charles
the First, which the King in his political capa-
city had denied. It was on this occasion that
Panzani, the secret agent of the Court of
Rome, was introduced to the King, as an agent
for procuring him pictures, statues, and curiosi-
ties ; and the earnest enquiries, and orders given

* This identical Bible, with its numerous illustrations, still
exists, and may be inspected at the British Museum.

CHARLES THE FIRST. 101

by Charles the First, evince his perfect know-
ledge of the most beautiful existing remains of
ancient arts. Once Charles expressed a wish to
purchase a particular statue of Adonis in the
villa Ludovisia. As the statue could not be
obtained for money, every exertion was made
to procure it for the protestant Monarch. But
the possessor, the Duchess of Fiano, was as in-
exorable as might have been Venus herself to
preserve her Adonis, and even the chance-con-
version of a whole nation of heretics was con-
sidered by her as not tantamount to the depri-
vation of her enamouring statue.

Had the reign of Charles the First proved
as peaceful as that of his father, this monarch,
in 1640, would have anticipated those tastes,
and inspired that enthusiasm for the world of
art, which were so long foreign to the nation,
and which have not yet reached to those ranks
of society, where they ought to be familiar;
however Institutions have been nobly opened
for the public. The mind of Charles the First
was moulded by the graces. His favourite
Buckingham was probably a greater favourite
from cherishing those congenial tastes. He
courted his monarch and his friend, by the
frequent exhibitions of those splendid masques
and entertainments, which delighted by all the

102 PRIVATE LIFE OF

rivalries of the most beautiful arts ; combining
the picture of ballet- dances with the voice of
music, the most graceful poetry of Jonson, the
scenic machinery of Inigo Jones, or the fanciful
devices of Gerbier, the Duke's architect, the
pupil and friend of Rubens, and the confiden-
tial agent of Charles the First. The costly
magnificence of the f£tes at York-house, the
Duke's residence, eclipsed the splendour of the
French court, for Bassompierre confesses that
he had never witnessed a similar magnificence.
The King himself delighted in them, but this
monarch was too poor to furnish those splendid
entertainments. They were not unusual with
the great nobility. The literary Duchess of
Newcastl^nentions one, which the Duke gave
to Charles the First, which cost five thousand
pounds. The ascetic Puritan in those peevish
times, as in our own, would indeed abhor these
scenes, but the emulous encouragement they
offered to some of the great artists, could not
fail to have infused into the national character
more cultivated feelings, and more elegant
tastes. They charmed even those fiercer Re-
publican spirits themselves in their ingenuous
youth. Milton owed his Arcades and his
Com us to a masque at Ludlow Castle, and
Whitelocke, who had been himself an actor and

CHARLES THE FIRST. 103

a manager in " a splendid royal masque of the
four Inns of Court joining together" to go to
court, at a later day when drawing up his " Me-
morials of the English affairs," and occupied
by far graver concerns, dwelt with all the fond-
ness of reminiscence on these stately shows and
masques ; and in a chronicle which contracts
many an important event into a single para-
graph, has poured forth six folio columns of
a minute description of " these dreams passed,
and these vanished pomps."

After reading these anecdotes of the private
life of Charles the First, and recollecting the
great national design which he had already
commenced, we must recollect the limited
means which contracted these noble efforts.
The King, from the earliest period of his reign,
was denied the personal enjoyments of a noble-
man : and the truth is, that it was only by
economical contrivances, with the aid of oc-
casional presents, that Charles the First ob-
tained that fine collection, which was so bar-
barously inventoried at his death, suffered to
be pillaged by the meanest hands, and dis-
persed at most blundering estimates, to furnish
the cabinets of France and Spain.* Such often

* The Harl. MS. 4718, is entitled " An Inventory of the
Goods, Jewels, Plate, &c. belonging to King Charles the

104 PRIVATE LIFE OF

was the exhausted state of his exchequer, that
it is a curious fact, that when Inigo Jones was
appointed Master of the Board of Works, the
funds were so low, that the great architect nobly
remitted his own pay ; nor is it less curious,
that Charles, amidst his distress for money,
condescended to enter into partnership for the
small purchase of some pictures. This singular
document is an evidence not only of his pru-
dential expedients, but of his love of the arts.
The monarch who entered into this humble
contract, and adopted such equality of condi-
tions, must have had some notion of that justice
which has been too often denied him. Charles

First, sold by order of the Council of State, from the year
1649 to 1652." A year was allowed to draw up the inven-
tory, and the sale proceeded during three years. Tt is a
magnificent folio of near a thousand pages, of an extraordi-
nary dimension, bound in crimson velvet, and richly gilt,
written in a fair large hand, but with little knowledge of the
subjects which the inventory- writer describes. Every article
was appraised. The medals were not valued at much more
than a shilling a piece. The highest value of the master-
pieces of art varied from 50/. to 100/. ; many are whimsically
low. By what standard they were valued it would be diffi-
cult to conjecture. I have given an account of this manu-
script in the third volume of " Curiosities of Literature,"
first series.

CHARLES THE FIRST. 105

the First was here, at least, a lion who abstain-
ed from portioning out a lion's share.*

But it was not for this unfortunate Prince,
with all these finer tastes, to mitigate the grow-
ing barbarism of the times by one short age of
taste. We had not yet emerged from our rude
and neglected state of the elegant arts. Among
the list of the grievances of the Commons in
1625, we find one complains of "the building

* Charles R. " Whereas wee understand that an excel-
lent collection of paintings are to be sold in Venice, which
are known by the name of Bartolomeo della Nave his col-
lection. Wee are desirous that our beloved servant, Mr.
William Pettye, should goe thither to make the bargaine for
them. Wee ourselves beinge resolved to goe a fourth share
in the buyinge of them (soe it exceed not the sum of eight
hundred pounds sterlinge) but that our name be concealed in
it. And if it shall please God that the same collection be
bought and come safely hither, then wee doe promise in the
word of a KINGE, that they shall be divyded with all equal-
litye in this manner, vidt. That they shall be equallie
divyded into fower parts by some men skillfull in paintinge,
and then desire one interested in the shares, or some for
them, shall throw the dice severally. And whosoever throwes
most shall take his share first, and soe in order everye one
shall choose after first, as he castes most, and shall take
their shares freelye, to their own uses, as they shall fall unto
them. In Witness whereof, wee have sett our hands this
eight daye of July, in the tenth year of our reigne, 1G34."

106 PRIVATE LIFE OF

of all houses in London in one uniform way,
with a face of brick towards the streets." To
this grievance Charles replied, that a reforma-
tion in buildings was a good reformation, and
he was resolved to proceed with that work.
No doubt the good citizens of London were
then destitute of any architectural taste ; since
even the decent appearance of bricking their
fronts, and improving the salubrity of the city,
where wooden houses were huddled together
in all inconvenient forms, nests for their
scourge the plague, which was so often breath-
ing in their faces, was considered as a national
grievance. The penurious and grave citizen,
the ascetic puritan, felt no ambition to leave
their city of brick, which they had found a city
of timber. Palladian streets never entered into
their imagination.

An affection for the fine arts was yet entirely
confined to Charles's own court. Scotland, by
her vulgar notions of " superstition" and idola-
try, seemed to have exiled the arts from her
bleak clime. The elegant poet Drummond, in
his history of Scotland, (Bishop Hacket in-
sinuates,) had in view Charles the First, when
he drew the character of James the Third.
The passage will attest that even the imagina-
tion of a Scotch poet, formed too on the most

CHARLES THE FIRST. 107

fanciful models of Italian poesy, could not
conceive any thing higher of art or its curiosi-
ties, than an idling amusement. " It is allow-
able in men that have not much to do, to be
taken with admiration of watches, clocks, dials,
automates, pictures, statues ; but the art of
princes is to give laws, and govern their people
with wisdom in peace, and glory in war; to
spare the humble, and prostrate the proud."
The public mind was vulgar, and even the
genius of the poet, which confounds the knick-
knacks of a virtuoso with pictures and statues,
had not advanced much beyond it. Drum-
mond might have learnt in better times, that
the arts would not incapacitate a great military
character, or a great legislator from excelling in
their talent ; since some of the most illustrious
have been among the earliest collectors of the
works of art. But it was now still worse at
London than at Edinburgh. Among the bar-
barians, who, like a second irruption of the
Goths and Vandals, became those of England,
the avowed enemies of art and artists; the
Puritans on one side, and the Levellers on the
other, excite our indignation as much for their
brutalising ignorance, as their calumnies. In
that remarkable, yet curious libel on Charles
the First, entitled " the None-such Charles," the

108 PRIVATE LIFE OF

writer accuses his late Sovereign, among other
enormities, of "squandering away millions of
pounds on braveries and vanities, on old rotten
pictures and broken-nosed marbles. * Millions
of pounds ! Charles was never master of a quar-
ter of one ! Such was the style and grossness of
the times, and of that people who were now to
be the rulers of England ! Even in the King's
lifetime, a puritan expressed his uneasiness
that Con, a Scotchman, caUed the Pope's Le-
gate, was enticing Charles with many various

*"The None-such Charles, his character, extracted out
of divers original Transactions, Dispatches, and the Notes of
several public ministers, as well at home as abroad, 1651,"
is an extraordinary little volume. It is composed in the
style of Sir A. Weldon's well-known libel of " The Court and
Character of James 1st," — but it is to be valued, for though
the libel is not less a libel than the other, it is evident that
the writer had obtained access to the State-paper office, and
has rummaged out many state secrets, which he turns to his
own purpose. It is said to be " published by authority,"
which indicates the parliamentary sanction. Lord Hard-
wicke committed a strange blunder when he ascribed it to
Sir Balthazar Gerbier ; he could never have read it, and was
deceived by the ironical title. In my copy I find a MS.
note, which says that it was written by Sir A. Weldon, and
of this I have no doubt. I have heard that Milton had his
eye on this book, when he wrote with such personal hatred
of Charles; that great anti-monarchist, however, required no
whetstone.

CHARLES THE FIRST. 109

baits, and whom he sought to delude " with
gifts of pictures, antique idols, and such like
trumperies brought from Rome." Alas ! how
painful will it ever be in noticing vulgar spirits
as these, to add the great name of Milton ! In
" evil times" only, indeed, would that illus-
trious man have seemed to reproach the King
of England, for having for his "closet-com-
panion," the great Bard of the nation.

Milton, in his Iconoclastes insolently wrote :
" I shall not instance an abstruse author,
wherein the King might be less conversant,
but one whom we well know was the closet
companion of these his solitudes, William
Shakespeare." Little did Milton imagine that
what at the time seemed to cast contempt on
the character of the King, would be cited, at a
more enlightened period, as a certain evidence
of the elegance of the mind of Charles the
First.

It has been said that Charles the First was
adapted to be greater as a private gentleman
than a Sovereign. There may be some truth
in the observation ; yet it is not so evident that
the domestic virtues of the man, are insufficient
to constitute an excellent Monarch. Unques-
tionably, had not peculiar difficulties arisen in
his reign, Charles the First would have been

110 PRIVATE LIFE OF

that monarch. Nor can we justly conclude
that he was destitute of kingly qualities, who
so long and so ably contended, for what he
deemed his kingly rights ; and voluntarily
perished to vindicate his sovereignty. Charles,
indeed, loved the privacy of domestic life, and
the quiet occupations of study and art. When
his troubles began, in 1637, Garrard, the cor-
respondent of the Earl of Strafford, kissed
hands on his election to the Mastership of the
Charter-house. The King bade him be a good
Governor, and impressively assured him that
he considered him the happiest man in Eng-
land. Charles appears to have alluded to his
own situation, deeming the Government of the
Charter-house, in its dominion of obedient
subjects, and in its business of literature, of-
fered a more enviable life, than the days which
were clouding over his throne.

the pangs that rend the royal breast,

Those wounds that lurk beneath the tissued vest:*

or, as Sir Philip Sidney first expressed it : —
" Tragedy openeth the greatest wounds, and
sheweth forth the ulcers that are covered with
tissue."

* Thomas Warton.

CHARLES THE FIRST. Ill

The observation of Addison, that a reader is
delighted to learn whether the person whose
story is engaging his attention, be either a
brown or a fair man, with other personal peculi-
arities, was new in its day, and since the philo-
sophy of biography has been carried to a per-
fection unknown to that pleasing writer, its
truth has often been confirmed. Nothing is
trivial in the narrative of history which assists
the reality of its scene, and places its personage
by our side. By these natural touches some-
thing of the charm of fiction is thrown into the
historical composition.

There is a fine and large portrait of Charles
the First, by his first favourite My tens, splendid-
ly engraved by Delphius, the King's engraver.
In that portrait, as well as in a miniature which
I had copied from a large picture by Vandyke,
now in the Pitti Palace at Florence, the expres-
sion is quite of another character from the por-
traits taken at a later period. No secret sor-
rows, no deepened melancholy, had yet left the
traces of painful thoughts over the countenance
whose peculiar expression afterwards was so
faithfully, perhaps so religiously, transmitted
to us. Contrast this portrait of Mytens on
Charles's accession to the throne, with the one

112 PRIVATE LIFE OF

so care-worn, so haggard and lean, when the ill-
fated Sovereign appeared at his trial,* and you
touch both the extremities of his life, — the
whole history of Charles seems told !

The intermediate period in this Monarch's
life is equally remarkable. Vandyke painted
in one picture, the head of Charles in three
positions. This was sent by the Queen to Ber-
nini, in order to model his celebrated bust.
The well-known anecdote of the sculptor is au-
thentic.f Bernini was a great physiognomist,
and after contemplating the portraits, for a
while, he exclaimed that he had never seen a
portrait, whose countenance showed so much
greatness and such marks of sadness : the man

* This portrait, little known, as well as the costume, in-
scribed " Gay wood fecit," has every appearance of having
been taken from the life. It is prefixed to Lambert Wood's
Life of Charles, 1659, which of itself is a worthless volume.
The reason which induces me to consider this portrait as an
original, is the meagreness of the countenance, which is no-
ticed by contemporaries in the latter years of Charles.

+ I find the recorded anecdote of Bernini in Evelyn's
work on Medals, and in Sir Richard Bulstrode's Memoffs, 66.
Henrietta Maria designed to have her own bust, as the com-
panion of Charles's, and portraits on the same plan were
painted by Vandyke, but whether the bust was ever executed
is not known. At that moment the troubles began. The
painting of Henrietta was at Carlton House.

CHARLES THE FIRST. 113

who was so strongly charactered, and whose de-
jection was so visible, was doomed to be unfor-
tunate ! Had the physiognomical predicter ex-
amined the two portraits of the happier days of
Charles, he might have augured a happier fate.
It is therefore evident that what was peculiar
in the countenance of Charles was not discover-
able till after his thirtieth year.

Charles the First was of a middle stature, his
complexion brown, " inclining to a paleness,"
his forehead not wide, his brows large, his eyes
grey, they were quick and penetrating, and
their vivacious glances were remarked on the
opening of his trial, for Charles, considering
himself to be a skilful physiognomist, was a
keen observer of persons : his nose was some-
what large and rather round at the tip. The
visage on the whole was long, and the lips
seem to have been thick. His stammering was
a defect which he could never entirely get rid
of, though at his trial, the intensity of his feel-
ings carried on his voice without faltering.
His hair was of a chesnut colour, falling on his
shoulders in large curls, and when young he
nourished one luxuriant lock on his left side
which floated there; this natural ornament was
a fashion abhorred by the puritanic Round-
heads; who, having read in the Testament,

VOL. III. I

114 PRIVATE LIFE OF

" If a man have long hair it is a shame,"* " cut
their hair short." This unlucky tress of roy-
alty, excited Prynne's invective against " love-
locks." His beard curtailed of ancient dimen-
sions, he wore peaked, with moustachios, in his
happier days, but in his troubles, negligent of
exterior ornament, his beard covered much of
his face. His pace in walking was quick and
hurried, somewhat indicative of the usual con-
dition of his mind. In going from St. James's
through the Park to the scaffold at Whitehall,
one of the papers of the day notices that the
King " pleasantly" called to the guard " March
apace !" It is said he was not graceful in his
motions : a coarse libeller tells us, that " He
did not ride like a Prince, but like a post-boy."
There was a good deal of earnest impetuosity
in his temper, and he seems to have preserved
his personal dignity, by a rigid decency in the
gravity of his manners and the measured style
of his speech, sparing of words.

There was a family likeness in the Stuarts,
even to their long fingers, but there was no
Stuart whose countenance resembled that of
Charles the First. Whence then the effect
which is still produced by contemplating the

* 1 Cor. xi. 14.

CHARLES THE FIRST. 115

pensive and melancholy physiognomy of this
Monarch ? It seems an ideal head.

Parallels have been more than once drawn
between the tragical afflictions of the martyred
Monarch and the tribulations of " the Saviour"
when on earth. In human records, no prince-
ly names could be found but which seemed
too low to rival his magnanimous sufferings.
Stricken by sympathies, stronger and more
elevated than they had ever experienced, some
divines dared to compare Charles to Christ.
Tickell has happily alluded to their disturbed
piety. They found

" All parallels were wrong, or blasphemy."

The difficulty of combining the ideas of a
human with a divine nature, has formed the
despair of the greatest artists. The pencil has
never yet pourtrayed the celestial head of " the
Saviour" in the form of humanity. It is, how-
ever, singular that artists of genius have consi-
dered that the head of this Monarch is the only
portrait which they could venture to place be-
fore them, as a model for the head of Christ, so
peculiar is its mixture of majesty and sadness.
Thus it happens that in looking on the por-
trait of Charles, with all its numerous associ-
ations, whether some behold " the King in

i 2

116 PRIVATE LIFE OF

chains, and the Prince bound in fetters," or
others " a man of sorrows acquainted with
grief," there is no portrait of any other Sove-
reign, which awakens such powerful emotions
as does the head of Charles the First.*

* It is mortifying to disclose the levity of feeling of men
of genius, whose political tempers seem to close up every
avenue to their heart, or their imagination. " It is," says
an able Edinburgh Reviewer, " to such considerations as
these," (alluding to some instances of Charles's good quali-
ties, as a father and a husband, which are given by one who
probably is too young to be either) " together with his Van-
dyke dress, his handsome face, and his peaked beard, that
he owes, we verily believe, most of his popularity with the
present generation." — Ed. Rev. Vol. xlii. p. 330.

But there are other " handsomer faces in a Vandyke
dress " which do not affect us as the portrait of Charles the
First. All this seems innocent, however superficial may be
the popular prejudices of the critic, compared with the
frightful barbarism of the heartless Horace Walpole. Even
the last parting moments of the King with Bishop Juxon,
afford him a most indecent parody, — (Lord Orford's Works,
v. 472) and in a letter, he writes " I was diverted with
two relics of Charles the Martyr, one the pearl you see in
his picture, taken out of his ear after his foolish head was
off ; the other the cup out of which he took the sacrament."
One could hardly have expected, as Mr. Croker has observed,
in alluding to Walpole's unfeeling observation on Charles in
his last moments, " to find him playing the Jack-pudding on
a bloody scaffold !"

I am tempted here to anticipate a passage from that po-

CHARLES THE FIRST. 117

pular criticism, which is so much to the taste of the times ;
a passage which should rather be noticed at the close of this
work. The Edinburgh Reviewer, thus describes the fate of
Charles the First. " The enemy of English liberty was not
murdered by men whom he had pardoned and loaded with
benefits. He was not stabbed in the back by those who
misled and cringed before his face. He was vanquished on
fields of stricken battle ; he was arraigned, sentenced, and
executed in the face of heaven and earth. Our liberty is
neither Greek nor Roman, but essentially English."* The
eloquence of the writer will be but a poor apology for this
misrepresentation of the real state of the affairs to which he
alludes. We shall not here stop to correct them, but we
may admire the juvenile audacity of an ardent party-writer,
who seems to conclude that we are entirely ignorant of the
mode by which the murderers of Charles the First effected
their nefarious purpose.

When a Member in the House of Commons, with that vulgar
levity we often witness from men who seem ignorant of their
national history, alluded to the immolated Monarch, Can-
ning rose, and poured out his indignant spirit. " He trust-
ed that he should never arrive at that cool contemplation,
which enabled the honourable Member to talk of the murder
of Charles the First as of a lawful act. He hoped no degree
of liberality, no respect for freedom, would ever induce him to
look back on such a transaction with any other feelings than
those of the horror and indignation which it was calculated
to excite. Could he ever bring himself to entertain such an
opinion, even in his closet, he would never utter it in that
House, and still less proclaim it to a nation struggling for
independence. In God's name, let not this country stand

* Ed. Rev. vol. xlvii. 34G.

118 CHARLES THE FIRST.

foremost in pointing out such a course as this, as the high-
road to freedom. Whatever might be the policy of giving
or withholding our aid, the suggestion of crime was at least
one of those aids which we might best withhold."

I am indebted to my very ingenious friend Mr. J. H.
Markland, for this passage in a speech of Canning's. It was
a note taken at the time, probably in March 1821.

INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN, &C. 119

CHAPTER VII.

THE INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN ON THE
KING'S CONDUCT.

THE influence of Henrietta Maria over
Charles the First is an important subject for
inquiry, not only in the private, but in the
public life of the Monarch. It claims to be
treated with some delicacy, and with more
truth. On no subject of these Commentaries,
ought I, to require more of the reader's confi-
dence that my researches are wholly prompted
by the curiosity, or the zeal, which we feel in
unravelling the perplexities in which human
nature sometimes seems enveloped. Let the
reader, for the few minutes which will be
allotted to this chapter, be patient under the
popular prejudices and the old impressions he
carries in his mind, and let him accompany me,
feeling our way, now in twilight, and now in
darkness, in these cautious gropings after truth.

120 THE INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

Charles the First is accused by all parties of
that spiritless uxoriousness and subserviency to
his Queen, which had a fatal influence over
his political conduct. This opinion was pre-
valent in his own day. But we have to en-
counter a more formidable host than contem-
poraries, whose opinions may happen to origin-
ate in passion and prejudice, in the writers of
our history, who all have echoed to each other
the same conviction of " the absolute power"
of Henrietta Maria.

Clarendon, that grave Minister, and others
who were acting with him, disliked the Queen,
her papists, and her nation. Mr. Hyde often
appears as irritably jealous of female influence,
as afterwards was Lord Clarendon, an influence
which that Statesman aptly describes as " pow-
erful and near." His Lordship has touched on
" the Queen's absolute power" over the King,
and one of the effects of this power, he tells us,
appeared in " the removal of great Ministers,"
but the noble historian is also our authority to
show that " neither the Archbishop nor the
Earl of Strafford were in any degree acceptable
to the Queen." — How then happened it that
Charles the First so entirely passive to " the
absolute power" of his wife, as Charles called

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT. 121

the Queen, never removed these " great Minis-
ters?" If Henrietta's absolute will were to
govern the State, had she no favourites to sup-
ply their places, and she too, who, as so many
assure us, was such a mistress of political in-
trigue ?

Hume sometimes sympathizing with the un-
fortunate Charles, and often taking his impres-
sions from Clarendon, tells us that Charles the
First was by the Queen " precipitated into
hasty and impetuous councils." Hume sup-
poses, we must imagine, that Charles himself
was never " hasty and impetuous." Bishop
Kennett describes the light, volatile, inconside-
rate temper of the hapless daughter of Henry
the Fourth, as " the influence of a stately Queen
over an affectionate husband." " That wicked
woman !" exclaims Warburton, in the heat of
Protestant passion. " That pernicious woman
at his side!" echoes the philosophical Hallam,
who has here considered perhaps the number of
the witnesses in court, rather than the weight
of their evidence. Gibbon, who probably had
never brought his penetrating inquiries to the
critical investigation of the history of this pe-
riod, notices how " Charles was governed by a
Catholic Queen." Authority, it might seem,

122 INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

was not wanting to establish the position, but
his philosophical genius might have been mor-
tified, could any one have succeeded in proving
to him that this opinion was at least merely vul-
gar, and that had Charles not been united to a
Roman Catholic Princess, the Romanists would
have shared the same royal protection, for the
same reasons of state, which had been adopted
by his father ; for though the nation sometimes
seemed unreasonably jealous, the Romanists,
when their day of conspiracy was over, were an
ancient, a numerous, and even a noble body of
useful subjects, whose loyalty, as was afterwards
proved, entered even into their religion.

Our history has often been composed by those
whose panics were more warranted, than we at
this day are perhaps competent to decide on.
These writers, and the nation at large, seemed
to have desired nothing short of an extermina-
tion of the Romanists. The Puritans of Eng-
land would willingly have applauded an Edict
against the English Catholics, like that of the
revocation of the Edict of Nantes, which re-
jected the French Huguenots from their father,
land. The policy of the Cabinet may happen
to be in opposition to the passions of a people,
but it is not necessarily wrong. Charles tem-
porized ; and it has been his fate to be the fa-

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT. 123

vourite of neither party. Had he dared, which
was out of his nature to do, a great coup d'etat,
by banishing every Romanist from England,
Charles would have become popular at the cost
of his better feelings.

We may judge how our history on this point
of the Queen's influence has been written, by
turning to the historian of the Puritans. " The
Queen was a very great bigot to her religion ;
her conscience was directed by her confessor,
assisted -by the Pope's Nuncio, and a secret
cabal of priests and Jesuits. These controlled
the Queen, and she the King, so that in effect
the nation was governed by popish councils till
the long parliament."* Tacitus abridged every
thing because he saw every thing; but the
presbyter Neal has abridged a chimaera ! The
whole passage reads like an abridgment of the
secret history of this reign, in the style of a
political catechism, fitted for boys in the sixth
form of puritanism. The closest researcher in
our history has yet to discover this " secret
cabal of priests and Jesuits" acting circuitously
on the Queen, and she on the King, and the
nation governed by " their popish councils."
The confessor of the Queen, Father Philip,

* Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, i. 507.

124 INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

stole about Somerset-House with the Capuchins
in dread of their lives ; and as for the Capu-
chins themselves, I, who possess their Memoirs,
can testify, that except half-a-dozen sly conver-
sions, " their popish councils" did not prosper
out of their neighbourhood. The Pope's nun-
cio did not even venture to assume his charac-
ter. In this plausible manner are party-histo-
ries composed, and the innocent appeal to them
for their authorities !

Mr. Brodie has ingeniously detected the fatal
moments when the Queen's imperious temper
gave her the ascendancy : these were when
Charles in his violent courses found his forti-
tude forsake him ; so that her influence was
greatest when circumstances were most critical.
Thus perpetually are we reminded, that every
great political error of the King, was the dic-
tation of the Queen ; and though her name
rarely appears among the incidents of our his-
tory, except when the panic of papistry breaks
out, it would seem that on the side of Charles
the greater part originated with this profound
and Political Queen.

Even the more subtile reasoners unreason
themselves on this popular prejudice of the
Queen's influence over Charles the First, Mr.
Godwin writes, " The Queen applied all the

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT. 125

vast influence she had hitherto exercised over
her husband to prevail on him to agree to the
establishment of the presbyterian form of
church government."* Doubtless to her, be-
tween two heretics, the choice was indifferent.
But what was the result of this " vast influ-
ence ?" Charles never would concede the point,
for not many pages after, Mr. Godwin tells us,
" The whole project of the Presbyterians was
defeated by the unexpected pertinacity of the
King."f Such was the Queen's vast influence !
There is a principle in historical inquiries,
which we may frequently apply. In all intri-
cate passages of history, whenever we detect an
incongruity in the character, — a discrepancy in
the incidents, — a cause assigned not commensu-
rate with the prodigious effect deduced from it,
— our suspicion may be allowed to awaken our
scepticism ; and according to the degree of our
knowledge, we may discriminate the propor-
tion in which falsehood has been mixed with
truth. In the political influence of Henrietta
over Charles, which so many historical writers
have ascribed to her, we may be struck by all
these monstrous conjunctures.

* Godwin's Hist, of the Commonwealth, ii. 137.
t Ibid, 176.

126 INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

From all these authorities, we learn that
Charles the First in the possession of his active
faculties, with his argumentative habits, and
his unchangeable dispositions, sunk into a pas-
sive being, an imbecile monarch ! Yet how
will this agree with the indisputable fact, that
Charles afterwards lived and acted several years
separated from his Queen, and on all emergent
occasions, displayed the most prompt capacity ?
Did the Queen suggest a single sentence in
that series of private correspondence with the
Marquis of Hamilton on the complicated con-
cerns of the Scottish affairs ? But to sanction
the received opinion of the predominance of
Henrietta Maria in so many intricate difficul-
ties, it is not sufficient to assert the weakness
of Charles, it is absolutely necessary that this
Queen should be endowed, like another Cathe-
rine of Medicis, with a plotting head, and a
governing hand. The Editor of Madame du
Deffand's Letters, in her " Views of the Social
Life in England and France," at once declares
that Henrietta " had been brought up amidst
all the political intrigues of her mother Mary
of Medicis." It probably never occurred to
this female philosopher of the school of Horace
Walpole, that the Queen was only sixteen years
of age when she came over here. I am un-

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT. 127

acquainted with the due term of a political
apprenticeship, but a young lady of sixteen,
who had passed most of her time in pastorals
and dances, could hardly be yet a Machiavel.

It is remarkable that a Queen, who is ima-
gined to have performed so complicate a part in
our history, scarcely ever appears in it, but to re-
ceive some courtly compliment, or to betray the
terrors in which she often lived. On one occa-
sion, to save the life of Strafford, we see Hen-
rietta appointing a midnight interview with
two or three heads of the Opposition, and hold-
ing a flambeau, pass by the back-stairs into an
apartment, alone and in secrecy, to offer any
terms ! This which looks like a political in-
trigue was really none, the whole transaction
was as simple as it proved to be inefficient. There
are three or four instances in which recourse
was had to the Queen in order to influence the
King by her tears, or her prayers, to comply
with certain measures. Mr. Hallam quotes a
letter of the Queen from Paris to Charles con-
taining political advice, but the letter was writ-
ten at the suggestion of Colepepper and Ash-
burnham : it was none of her own. In every
one of these cases, the parties were working on
the terrors of an affrighted woman, and the
Queen was but a passive instrument in their

128 INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

hands, and the simple organ of their ideas.
These incidents so far from conferring on Hen-
rietta a political character, are evidence of the
reverse, for they show that whenever she was
brought forward, nothing political ever origi-
nated with herself ; she had no other opinions
than what she listened to, no other system than
the personal safety of herself and the King.
No secret history pretends to give any account
of her influence in the Council of State, nor do
we hear of any consultations held with her Ma-
jesty. But we know that all her confidants
were of the household or of the court-circle;
the gay courtiers and younger branches of the
nobility, with two or three poets, who had no
other politics than their loyalty, their chat, and
their pleasures. We hear of no political cabi-
net of Henrietta. If she regulated the affairs
of a nation of whose very manners she was
ignorant, her genius must have lain concealed
in the depth of her own thoughts, and in the
secrecy of her own chamber. We cannot judge
of this concealed genius by many specimens we
have of her correspondence, which are always
on ordinary topics, expressed in as ordinary a
style. In her private memoirs, such as her con-
versations with Clarendon during his exile, and
her confidential intercourse with Madame de

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT.

Motteville on her final return to France, and in
other sources, we discover that Henrietta was
nothing more than a volatile woman, who had
never studied, never reflected, and whom Na-
ture had formed to be charming and haughty,
but whose vivacity could not retain even a state-
secret for an hour, and whose talents, so well
adapted to invent, with her poets at her side, a
fanciful pastoral, cast the figure of a dance, or
dress out the enchantment of a rich masque,
could never have pretended to conduct an in-
volved political intrigue. She viewed even the
characters of great men with the sensations of a
woman. Observing that the Earl of Strafford
was a great man, she dwelt with more interest
on his person ; " though not handsome," she said,
" he was agreeable enough, and he had the finest
hands of any man in the world." She betrayed
the same levity of feeling on a most serious
occasion. The Parliament's admiral was bar-
barously pointing his cannon at the house she
lodged in; several shots reaching it, her favour-
ite Jermyn requested her to fly ; she escaped
into a cavern in the fields, but recollecting that
she had left her lap-dog asleep on her bed, she
flew back, and amidst the cannon-shots returned
with this other favourite. The Queen related
this anecdote to Madame de Motteville, and

VOL. III. K

130 INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

these ladies considered it as a complete woman's
victory. It is in these memoirs we find, that
when Charles went down to the House to seize
the five leading Members of the Opposition,
the Queen could not retain her lively rest-
lessness, and impatiently babbled the secret to
Lady Carlisle. It has been recently discovered
by Monsieur Mazure, that this lady transmitted
the hasty intelligence to the French ambassador,
who pretends in his dispatches that he warned
"his friends," as he calls the five members. How
far this was the exact truth we know not; but
I have also discovered from the manuscripts of
another French agent, that Lady Carlisle always
kept up a close communication with French
ambassadors. In the present instance, as her
Ladyship had more than one confidential friend,
and particularly Pym, of whom it is said that
Lady Carlisle was the " Dame de ses pensees"
her Ladyship might have dispatched a dupli-
cate billet-doux. The well-known anecdote is
recorded on this eventful occasion. When the
Queen perceived the King wavered at the mo-
ment, she exclaimed, " Go, Poltroon! pull these
rogues out by the ears, or never see my face
more." "The submissive husband obeyed,"
adds Mrs. Macauley. This anecdote has been
held as positive proof of the ascendancy of the

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT. 131

Queen in political affairs. As far as I have
been able to trace this anecdote, it rests on the
authority of a single person ; but that she de-
livered such words, or words like these I be-
lieve, because about twenty years afterwards
Sir Arthur Haslerigg in the Commons alluded
to the fact,* but then he tells it differently, and
applies the reproval of " Poltroon" to the King
on his return. This version must be a false
one, because the Queen could not have re-
proached the King with cowardice, for having
missed the five members. The words Hen-
rietta is said to have used are in the familiar
style of a French woman who would back her
wavering husband to do what had been already
resolved. But what does this famous proof of
the Queen's ascendancy amount to ? This ap-
parent menace depends on the tone and the
gesture in which it was delivered. Suppose
she threatened with a smile, and menaced as
awfully ? At all events the anecdote affords
no proof of her Majesty's inventive politics,
and, as on other occasions of this nature, she
acted on the suggestions of others. This false
step of Charles did not originate with the
Queen.

* Burton's Diary, iii. 93.
K 2

132 INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

But if incidents like these which we have
just noticed, betray the feminine dispositions of
this Queen, we perceive that on every trying
occasion, Henrietta never forgot that she was
the daughter of Henry IV. ; that glorious affi-
nity was inherited by her with all the sexual
pride, and hence at times that energy in her
actions which was so far above her intellectual
capacity. Mr. Hallam observes that " Hen-
rietta was by no means the high-spirited wo-
man that some have fancied." I always differ
with deference from Mr. Hallam, whose know-
ledge is very extensive on this subject, but by
this expression he probably alluded to some
part of her political conduct. She latterly
lived terrified in her palace* and often entered
into her chapel in trepidation. Can we deny
her an heroic spirit when we discover her pass-
ing over to Holland, to procure aid for the
King, and on her return in the midst of a small
army partaking of the common fare of the sol-
dier in the open field as she was hastening to
join the King ? nor less can we admire the de-
termined courage when at sea in danger of
being taken by a Parliamentarian, the Queen

* Her carriage was once drawn up to take her flight from
England — when she was betrayed to the Parliament by
Goring. See Mazure, iii. 426.

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT. 133

commanded the Captain never to strike, but to
prepare at the extremity to blow up the ship,
resisting the shrieks of her females and her
domestics. Henrietta might have been con-
scious that a scaffold, with which, indeed, she
had been already threatened, awaited her
coming to Whitehall — but it proved that she
knew to choose and to face death.

Henrietta's talents were not of that order
which could influence the intrigues of a Ca-
binet and the revolutions of a nation. The
French vivacity of her manners and conversa-
tion with her natural gaiety might have al-
lowed her to become a politician of the toilette,
and she might have practised those slighter
artifices which may be considered as so many
political coquetries. Her favours, or her ca-
price, might have some influence in the Court-
circle — in an appointment in the Royal House-
hold, in the dismissal of an unwelcome courtier*

* When the Parliament, with a shameless disregard of all
decency and honour, published the Letters of Charles to the
Queen, there was one in which they pretended to show to
the people that " the eminent places in the kingdom were
disposed of by her advice." To this the King replied, that
" the places there named, in which her Majesty's advice
may seem to be desired, are not places, as they call it, of the
kingdom, but private menial places, a Treasurer of the House-

134 INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

—but she had such little discrimination in her
favourite attendants that they were always be-
traying or deserting her. A little anecdote has
been recorded of this Queen, which will convey
a different idea of those high notions of female
predominance. At Newark, having treated the
Garrison with some attentions, a certain Sem-
pronia, one of the Stateswomen of that day,
who we are told governed her husband, who in
time of peace governed the county — drew up
a petition, which she presented the Queen ac-
companied by her coterie of secondary politi-
cians— it was to pray her Majesty would not
remove from Newark-, till Nottingham should
be taken. The affair had been kept secret from
the husbands of these lady-politicians, of which
the Queen appears to have been aware. After
receiving the petition, the Queen replied, " La-
dies, affairs of this nature are not in our sphere ;
I am commanded by the King to make all the

hold, a Captain of the Pensioners, and a Gentleman of the Bed-
chamber. Concerning the other more public places, His Ma-
jesty absolutely declares himself, without leaving room for
her advice, which seems to prove the contrary to that, which
by this they intend to prove."

His Majesty s Declaration— 27 — Oxford, 1643.
This representation seems to be the exact truth, but the
reverse is the popular belief.

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT. 135

haste I can ; you will receive this advantage at
least by my answer, that although I cannot
grant your petition, you may learn by my ex-
ample to obey your husbands.*

Machiavelian principles, systematic plots, and
involved intrigues, of which she has been so
freely accused, could never have entered into
the character of a female, whose quick and light
passions were transient as the occasion.

Ere the Civil Wars broke out, she had lived
in anxiety, and even in terror. She well knew
that she and her " Papists" were odious to the
people, and it is certain that the Parliamentary
leaders most barbarously practised on the panics
of a female and a foreigner — a wretched Queen
who had already felt she sate on a deserted
throne ! She lost the bloom of her com-
plexion so early that to console herself for this
mortifying disappointment she would maintain
that women lose their beauty soon after twenty.
When she suffered the heaviest of human cala-
mities, her frame was macerated by her secret
sorrows. The dark and dazzling lustre of her
eyes frequently shone in tears, she assumed the

* This anecdote of Henrietta may be found in those cu-
rious " Memoirs of the Family of Cavendish," appended to
a Sermon at the funeral of William Duke of Devonshire by
Bishop Kennett, p. 91.

136 INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

mourning habit for ever, and frequently retired
to a religious establishment which she endowed.
Yet even then at a sally of wit, or some poig-
nant satire, Henrietta has been known to chase
away the tears trickling on her own cheek, for
a moment to return to her natural disposition.
Often she found her understanding failing her
— and was terrified lest it was approaching to
madness — an evil which the old Court Physi-
cian, Mayerne, somewhat plainly told her Ma-
jesty not to fear — for that she was already mad !
She had outlived the Revolution without com-
prehending it. Such was the unfortunate Hen-
rietta of France !

As probably I shall find no other opportunity
to record the extraordinary manner in which
Henrietta was affected on learning the unex-
pected fate rf her unfortunate consort, I shall
here preserve it. It is given by an eye-wit-
ness, with great simplicity of detail, the Pere
Gamache, one of the Capuchins who had waited
on the Queen in England, and from whose ma-
nuscript I have drawn some interesting matters
in my former volumes.

" The city of Paris was then blockaded, by
the insurgents, and in the King's minority it
was with difficulty we obtained either entrance
or egress. The Queen of England, residing at

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT. 137

the Louvre, had dispatched a gentleman to St.
Germain en laye to the French Court, to pro-
cure news from England. During her dinner,
where I assisted at the grace, I had notice to
remain there after the benediction, and not to
quit her Majesty, who might need consolation
at the sad account she was to receive of the
terrible death of the King her husband. At
this grievous intelligence, I felt my whole frame
shudder, and withdrew aside from the circle,
where during an hour the various conversations
on indifferent subjects seemed not to remove
the uneasiness of the Queen, who knew that
the gentleman she had dispatched to St. Ger-
main ought to have returned. She was com-
plaining of his delay in bringing his answer.
On which the Count of St. Alban's (Jermyn)
took this opportunity to suggest that the gen-
tleman was so faithful and so expeditious in
obeying her Majesty's commands on these oc-
casions, that he would not have failed to have
come, had he had any favourable intelligence.
* What then is the news ? I see it is known
to you,' said the Queen. The Count replied,
that in fact he did know something of it, and
when pressed, after many evasions to explain
himself, and many ambiguous words to prepare
her little by little to receive the fatal intelli-

138 INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

gence, at length he declared it to the Queen,
who seemed not to have expected any thing of
the kind. She was so deeply struck, that in-
stantly, entirely speechless, she remained voice-
less and motionless, to all appearance a statue.
A great philosopher has said that ordinary griefs
allow the heart to sigh and the lips to murmur,
but that extraordinary afflictions, terrible and
fatal, cast the soul into stupor, make the tongue
mute, and take away the senses. * Cures levies
loquuntur, graves stupent? To this pitiable
state was the Queen reduced, and to all our
exhortations and arguments she was deaf and
insensible. We were obliged to cease talking,
and we remained by her in unbroken silence,
some weeping, some sighing, and all with sym-
pathising countenances, mourning over her ex-
treme grief. This sad scene lasted till night-
fall, when the Duchess of Vendome, whom she
greatly loved, came to see her. Weeping she
took the hand of the Queen, tenderly kissing
it — and afterwards spoke so successfully, that
she seemed to have recovered this desolated
Princess from that loss of all her senses, or ra-
ther that great and sudden stupor, produced by
the surprising and lamentable intelligence of
the strange death of the King."*

* Memoires de la mission des Capucius pres la Regne de
1'Angleterre. MS.

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT. 139

Such is the pathetic and affecting narrative.
It surely proves that the affections of Hen-
rietta were riveted on those of her royal hus-
band, nor can we less admire the caution and
the delicacy with which Lord Jenny n, with no
common dexterity, gradually prepared her for
the unutterable calamity. The catastrophe ap-
pears to have come wholly unexpected. The
stupor of grief was never more forcibly de-
scribed.

Let us now endeavour to ascertain the sort
of influence which this vivacious princess could
have exercised over Charles in his political cha-
racter— and we shall not find wanting more
satisfactory evidence than preceding historians
have been aware of, or, general readers could
imagine — existing on a subject of such delicacy
and privacy as the secret influence of a wife
over her husband.

It is unquestionable that the personal af-
fections of Charles the First, once settled, were
unchangeable. With his thoughtful and re-
tired nature, friend, relative, and wife equally
shared in the devotion of the heart. Not that
the sensibility of his temper was quick ; but
with men whose feelings seemed locked up in
ice, slow and hard to move, the stream flows
deepest.

In characters such as that of Charles, there

140 INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

is an obstinacy in their very affections. The
causes of some of the heaviest misfortunes of
this ill-fated monarch may be traced to his con-
centrated domestic feelings ; they were strong
— even to weakness ! We see them in his
passion for his Queen ; in his unalterable,
though injudicious friendship for his first com-
panion Buckingham ; in his entire confidence
in the Marquis of Hamilton, even to his last
moments, and after very suspicious conduct ;
in his partiality for the sons of his sister, the
Princes Rupert, and Maurice, who as Generals
ruined his affairs. It is not perhaps difficult to
account for the absence of all judgment indi-
cated by these infirm partialities. Is it not
delightful to fancy that those who stand most
closely connected with us, and are acting with
us in the business of life, possess the talents
which we require, as they do the confidence
which they deserve — in a word, that their in-
telligence is commensurate with their inte-
grity ? This, which would have been a gene-
rous error in a private man, was a fatal one in
a sovereign.

Charles was deeply enamoured of the Queen ;
" the temperance of his youth by which he had
lived so free from personal vice," as May, the
parliamentary historian records — writing from

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT. 141

a personal knowledge of the King — had given
to his first love — and his last, as the King
avowed in his solemn farewell at the parting
hour of life — all the influence which that
Queen was privileged by nature to possess over
a husband. Charles knew not, as those persons
imply, who wrote such mean notes on his affec-
tionate letters, that a husband could love too
well ; or that he could refuse his confidence to
one so intimate with his thoughts, and so con-
stant a witness of his actions, as a beloved wife.
We may believe, too, that in desperate exi-
gencies, and there were several — such was his
tenderness for the person of a hapless princess,
a foreigner and a Catholic, her health often
yielding to her anxieties, that as Sir Philip
Warwick says — " He was always more chary
of her person, than his business." It may in-
deed be said of Charles the First, that many
years after his marriage, he did not cease to
be a lover ; and his letters to his exiled Queen,
written amidst his own deep afflictions and
personal deprivations, in haste or flight, breathe
a spirit of tenderness and passion which was
not exceeded in his romantic youth.

So late as in 1645 the King writes—" Since
I love thee above all earthly things, and that
my contentment is inseparably conjoined with

142 INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

thine, must not all my actions tend to serve
and please thee ? If thou knew what a life I
lead (I speak not in respect of the common
distractions), even in point of conversation,
which in my mind is the chief joy or vexation
of one's life, I dare say thou would pity me ; for
some are too wise, others too foolish, some too
busy, others too reserved, many fantastic. In
a word, when I knew none better (I speak not
now in relation to business) than (here he gives
a list of persons in cipher) thou may easily
judge how my conversation pleaseth me. I
confess thy company hath perhaps made me
in this hard to be pleased, but not less to be
pitied by thee, who art the only cure for this
disease. Comfort me with thy letters, and
dost not thou think that to know particulars
of thy health and how thou spendest thy time
are pleasing subjects to me, though thou hast
no other business to write of? Believe me,
sweetheart, thy kindness is as necessary to com-
fort my heart, as thy assistance is for my af-
fairs."

Such were the tender effusions of Charles
the First, beautiful in feeling and expression,
nor were they answered with inferior devotion
by the Queen, whose words were sanctioned
by her deeds. — " Assure yourself I shall be

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT. 143

wanting in nothing you shall desire, and that
I will hazard my life that is, to die by famine,
rather than not send to you." But however
active might be her zealous offices, she does
not venture to act without the permission of
Charles. On some new engagement she says,
" I thought this to be a matter of so great en-
gagement, that I dare not do it without your
command ; therefore if it please you that I
should do so, send me what you would have
me write, that I may not do more than what
you appoint, and also be confident." So that
this imperious Queen, would not act without
obeying the command of her enslaved husband!
There is a tender passage in one of the
Queen's letters, and equally pathetic. Deep
and genuine emotions give even to the sim-
plicity of mind all the force of eloquence —
Henrietta writes from Paris, " There is one
other thing in your letter which troubles me
much, where you would have me keep to my-
self your dispatches, as if you believe that I
should be capable to shew them to any, only to
Lord Jer. to uncipher them ; my head not
suffering me to do it myself ; but if it please
you, I will do it, and none in the world shall
see them ; be kind to me, or you kill me. I
have already affliction enough to bear, which

144 INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

without you I could not do, but your service
surmounts all ; farewell, my dear heart ! Be-
hold the mark which you desire to have to
know when I desire any thing in earnest X."
Such was the wife of Charles Stuart, who if
she never obtained any ascendancy at the coun-
cil-table of the King, doubtless ruled over him
by the more potent charms of every thing that
was most lovely, most tender, and most viva-
cious.

The letters, which we have here quoted,
were published by the Parliamentarians. And
who having read such passages, does not reject
with contempt the barbarous "Annotations"
of those vulgar minds, who could debase even
the cant of their patriotism by the greater cant
of their religion ? Yet we may smile at the
depth of their politics, and the delicacy of their
emotions, when we discover the note-writer's
acuteness in observing that " The King pro-
fesses to prefer her health before the exigence
and importance of his own public affairs."

But in the passion of Charles for his Queen,
the impulse of Nature was stronger than the
sterile imagination of the sour presbyterian
Harris, who furnishes a long quotation from
Cicero to prove that " the most servile of all
slaves, is the slave of a woman," and another

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT. 145

from Milton, who appears to have felt a re-
ligious conviction, that -

— " God's universal law

Gave to the man despotic power
Over his female,
Smile she, or lour."

But on this subject we smile at the apho-
risms of statesmen, and the chapter and verse
of divines ; those who write in their closets,
should also live with us in human society ; and
even Harris with his accustomed profundity,
adds to his learned authorities, that " These
things are boldly said, but women in all ages
have had great sway."

We will tell the Presbyter, and even Cicero
and Milton, that Charles the First admired in
Henrietta all those personal graces which he
himself wanted ; her vivacity and conversation
enlivened his own seriousness, and her gay vo-
lubility, the impediment of his own speech,
while the versatility of her manners relieved
his own formal habits. Bernardin de St. Pierre
has raised up a fanciful theory of love created
by contrasts, and however the French philoso-
pher may have lost himself among the details,
our reading and our experience may furnish
arguments or facts, which would illustrate this

VOL. III. L

146 INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

concord of discords in " the harmonies of na-
ture."

Of this kind was the influence of Henrietta
over Charles. And how far that influence pre-
vailed in his public affairs, remains to be deve-
loped ; and if on unquestionable evidence we
can show, that Charles could not have been, as
we are told, a weak slave to the sole will of
Henrietta, we shall furnish one more instance
of that popular delusion which is raised in its
day for party purposes, and is perpetuated by
the echoes of writers, who consult, for their
ease, what is convenient, rather than what is
just.

There is no doubt of the Catholic zeal of
Henrietta, and that if the Queen really exer-
cised this entire influence over Charles, she
would have stretched it to the utmost in that
cause which was dear to her as life itself. Yet
we find on the undeniable evidence of Panzani,
the Pope's secret agent in England, that when
he applied to the Queen, respecting the elec-
tion of a Roman Catholic Bishop for England,
and for which she was extremely anxious, Hen-
rietta would not deliver any opinion till she
had consulted the King. At their next con-
ference while she redoubled her assurance, that
she had nothing more at heart, the King was

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT. 147

against it, and therefore she must bear the mor-
tification of his refusal, and be patient. This
single fact sufficiently proves that whenever
the views of the Queen militated against the
higher interests of the Government, the sceptre
of Charles was no distaff.*

Nor can there be a doubt that at all times
Henrietta was disposed to favour the wishes of
her own family, and yet we find that on every
great national interest, Charles in his inter-
course with the French Court was decisive and
intrepid. He rose to the full conception of his
character as an English sovereign, and on re-
peated occasions asserted his own honour and
vindicated the national glory — yielding no-
thing to the importunities of his French wife.
Charles expelled a French faction from his
court, amidst the tears and the outcries of his
•impassioned Queen, while he accepted the me-
nace of war, in the justification of what he
assumed as his rights. On another occasion
when D'Estrades hastened to this country to

* This circumstance is not mentioned in Panzani's pub-
lished Memoirs, but in the curious unpublished Report of his
Mission to Urban VIII. cited by Mr. Butler in his " His-
torical Memoirs of the English Catholics," iii. 69, first edi-
tion. To Mr. Butler I am greatly indebted for the loan of
his Manuscript.

L 2

148 INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

secure the neutrality of England, however will-
ing the Queen must have felt to gratify her
brother's request, we know she declared " that
she would not concern herself with affairs of
that nature, for she had already suffered a se-
vere reprimand on that subject from the King
himself."

There was once an attempt to baptize a
prince by a Romish priest in the bed-chamber.
Did Henrietta succeed ? The King stepped in,
dismissed the priest, and commanded one of his
own chaplains to perform the office as a Pro-
testant ; so firm was Charles and so unyielding
even to the wishes of the Queen, when state-
matters interfered.*

Clarendon has said that Charles often yielded
a strange deference to minds inferior to his
own. If ever he followed female councils, as
we are told, it is probable that at least he ap-
proved of them, nor is it less probable that in
the confidential intercourse of the parties, these
very councils might have resulted from his
own suggestions. It is no unusual case with
such minds as that of Charles, to waver when
they have formed their own opinions, but to
adopt them too eagerly and imprudently, when
re-echoed by another.

* Dodd's Church Hist. iii. 3.

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT. 149

An anecdote in Madame de Motteville's Me-
moirs may show us in what manner Charles
was governed by his Queen. Henrietta and
Jermyn were consulting on the mysterious
communication with the army respecting what
is called the Army-plot,, to be managed by Gor-
ing and Wilmot. The rival jealousies of the
two commanders early appeared in this affair,
and Charles had designed to send Jermyn to
reconcile their mutual discontents. Henrietta
in communicating the King's wish to Jermyn
was equally agitated by the terror of the Parlia-
ment's discovery, and by the perilous predica-
ment in which her favourite master of the
horse would be placed ; she therefore, in dis-
closing the King's desire, forbade him to inter-
fere. At this critical moment Charles entered
her cabinet, and without knowing the object,
smilingly repeating the last words of the
Queen, playfully added, " Yes ! yes ! he shall
do it!"— "No! no!" replied the Queen, « he
shall not do it, and when I have told you what
it is, I am sure you will be of my mind." —
" Say then, Madam," rejoined the King, " what
is it, that I may know what you forbid, and I
command." Henrietta explained. The King
sympathised with her fears, acknowledging the
danger of Jermyn 's interference — but it was a
danger, he added, which could not be avoided,

150 INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

and they must run the risk. Charles com-
manded Jermyn to hasten his task — he obeyed,
and in the performance of his office was fortu-
nate enough to save himself by flight.

If ever the Queen on great emergencies had
the power so generally ascribed to her, and that
Charles was the servile and spiritless husband
he is perpetually represented to have been, we
may be certain that Henrietta, fully aware of
the imminent peril in which her favourite was
cast, would have put her higher veto, on the
royal command.

But Charles seems never to have acted in his
political character, as one accustomed to obey,
and we now bring forward the evidence of an
eminent person who in an intercourse with
their Majesties was a close observer of their
characters.

In a secret communication from the Earl of
Northumberland to the Earl of Leicester, the
King is concealed under the name of Armra-
gus, and the Queen under that of Celia.

" Celia, I find, is not hard enough to dispute
with Arviragus in a case of this nature ; for he
hath too much sophistry for her."*

But his Lordship is more explicit when he

* Sophistry is here used in a good sense ; the term for
reasoning.

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT. 151

really points out the objects where the Queen's
influence might prevail witli Charles. " Celia
will be able to serve you in things of favour ra-
ther than in what must be disputed and sifted
for reason and justice, because Arviragus is too
subtle." And again — " Our Master loves not
to hear other people give what is only fit for
him."

We can have no more positive or higher tes-
timony of the unchangeable character of Charles
I. It comes from one who was no flatterer.
We here discover all the nature of that " ma-
lignant influence " which Henrietta was allowed
to exercise over the King — it was entirely con-
fined within the Court and the Household, and
the greatest political mischief she could fall
into was her injudicious choice of faithless fa-
vourites— but Charles was too subtle, that is, he
was too firm, when matters were " to be dis-
puted or sifted for reason and justice."

Charles was sensible that his French Ca-
tholic Queen shared no friendly prepossessions ;
and that Henrietta might secure friends about
her, the King allowed her to be the medium of
" favours :" yet even of these, as we have just
seen on several occasions, he appears to have
looked on with a jealous eye. Charles too was
indignant at the artifices of the Parliamenta-
rians who had inflamed the passions of the

152 INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

vulgar against this terrified foreigner — and
however unwise it was to obtrude the Queen's
name on the people, it was an attempt to en-
dear her to their recollections, being always on
acts of grace. Hence at York he declared that
the Queen had by her letter advised him to
call the Parliament. Charles publicly gave her
an importance on such a solemn act of Go-
vernment, which he would probably not have
allowed in private.

Henrietta, we may believe, possessed all those
winning arts which a woman is born to practise.
She had at least the ambition to please her
husband after she had subdued her aversion to
the English people and to the English lan-
guage. Her desire to acquire the latter, which
must have cost her many pains, is no slight
evidence of her real affection for Charles. After
that curtain-lecture with which the reader of
my preceding volumes is acquainted, Charles
remonstrated with the French Court, and
among other matters complained that the
Queen would not conform to English customs,
and learn the English language. A few years
after we may trace her Majesty's zealous pro-
gress under her English tutor.*

* Mr. Wingate, who was a person of some name and con-
dition, for he died one of the Seniors of Gray's Inn. He

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT. 153

The history of " the Queen's Pastoral," as it
was called by way of distinction, offers an
amusing illustration of her tastes and her pro-
ficiency in the English language.

This splendid " Pastoral," during several
months, had engaged in its preparation the
deepest attention of her Majesty and all her
maids of honour. Ben Jonson had been usu-
ally destined to compose the verses and the dia-
logue of the masques and pastorals, and Inigo
Jones had combined his rich inventions in
their machinery. A fierce quarrel had however
now separated these brothers of genius in their
united arid emulative labours. This circum-
stance only appeared by two bitter lampoons
in the works of Jonson ; and as the occasion
remained unknown, the poet had incurred the
severe animadversions of several eminent mo-
dern critics, for the malignity of this per-
sonal attack on so fine a genius as that of
the architect of Whitehall. I was enabled
in the course of my researches to supply
my critical friend the late editor of Jonson,
with the singular information. The great ar-
chitect whose growing favour at Court made
him somewhat jealous of pre-eminence, had

was a mathematical writer, and a lawyer who abridged the
statutes.

154 INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

treated slightingly the part which the great
Poet had in these splendid miracles of art, and
deeming his own work more important than
the Bard's, he had insisted, against custom, that
his name should appear in the title-page before
that of Jonson. The point of etiquette could
never be reconciled, but the predominant in-
terest of Inigo Jones prevailed at Court, over
the discarded poet, who was now not only an
aged bard, but an old friend. Jonson under the
influence of personal aggression, hurled his in-
dignant invectives ; and strange to observe how
far madness may prevail over genius, when that
genius becomes inebriated by the flattery it
receives, Inigo Jones responded to the irritated
poet in vile rhimes, which I found too inept to
publish. This quarrel had produced a revolu-
tion in these Court-amusements, and the poetry
of Jonson was to be supplied by those who
would venture on it.

In every respect this splendid Pastoral was
to be as courtly, as the cost was to be princely.
The genius who was to compose the poetry
was to be a courtier, the actresses were ladies
of the highest rank, and the prime actress was
to be her Majesty herself. It was the endless
talk of the Court circle, and my Lord Cham-

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT. 155

berlain seemed to be out of his wits in giving
his orders, declaring that " No chambermaid
shall enter unless she will sit cross-legged on
the top of a bulk ; no great lady shall be kept
out, though she have but mean apparel and a
worse face ; and no inferior lady or woman
shall be let in, but such as have extreme brave
apparel and better faces." Such was to be the
enchanted audience of " Great Ladies."

The successor of old Jonson was a young
courtier whose adherence to loyalty afterwards
often appears in our history — Mr. Walter Mon-
tagu, one of the sons of the Lord Privy Seal.
Their Majesties, while the young gentleman
was indulging a most flowing vein, were amazed
at the facility of writing verses ; and one day
meeting my Lord Privy- Seal, his Lordship was
made happy to discover that his son was a fa-
vourite with Royalty, and in a fair way of mak-
ing his fortune, for their Majesties both highly
congratulated his Lordship " on the rare parts
of Master Walter Montagu, his son, for poesy,
and otherwise." As probably this was the first
pastoral by Master Walter, the successor of
Ben Jonson, unlike his great predecessor, did
not know where to stop. Every part was so
excessively long, no one knew how to shorten

156 INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

any, and the young poet had no heart to prune
even a tendril of his luxuriant genius. The
Queen, as she conned her part, complained of
its length, and " my Lady Marquis's " single
part was " as long as an ordinary play." We
may form some notion of the labour of our
courtier-poet, for the representation lasted seven
or eight hours ! The disasters which must have
happened in the progress of " The Queen's Pas-
toral " have not been chronicled, nor of those
whose memory faltered through their inter-
minable speeches, nor of those who remembered
them too well. Eight hours ! — but at Court
they are accustomed to be happy, and to be
wearied.*

One of the most extraordinary parts in the
Queen's Pastoral was that of her Majesty. The
Pastoral itself, which was in English, was de-
signed not only for her Majesty's recreation,
but " for the exercise of her English." f A
striking evidence of Henrietta's zealous studies
to gratify her husband. She had not only
learned to speak but to write English, as several
letters in her own hand attest, where the or-

* I have drawn all the particulars of " the Queen's Pas-
toral," from a variety of contemporary correspondence (1632)
in the Harl. MSS. 7000.

t Ellis's Letters, Second Series, iii. 270.

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT. 157

thoepy is curiously formed by her foreign ear.*
Some years after, we find that when the Par-
liament had frightened her away, and she in-
tended departing, they petitioned her to remain
in England, to which she graciously replied in
a speech pronounced in English. The style
might have been retouched by her English
master, Wingate, who probably assisted her
Majesty's elocution, but it was thought worthy
to be preserved in the Journals of the Lords,
and noted to have been in hcec verba. Hen-
rietta closed it by saying " You will pardon
the imperfectness of my English ; I had rather
have spoken in another language, but I thought
this would be most acceptable." It is a curious
fact, that Henrietta, in her eager desire to ac-
custom herself to the English language, as her
Royal consort wished, lost considerably, as Ma-
dame Motteville notices, her French idiom.

This picture of Charles in his intercourse
with his Queen must reverse those preconceived
notions which every reader of our history has
entertained. If I have rightly discriminated
" the malignant influence" of Henrietta, we
may now ascertain its amount of evil. The
fixed and systematic principles of the character

* See some in Evelyn's Diary, to Secretary Nicholas, and
Ellis's Letters, First Series.

158 INFLUENCE OF THE QUEEN

and government of her husband should no lon-
ger be imputed to the intrigues, or the influ-
ence, of a vivacious and volatile woman — they
must be traced to a higher source, to his own
inherited conceptions of his regal rights, con-
tested, sometimes but not always, justly — if
we seek for truth, and would read the history
of human nature in the history of Charles the
First.

We may account for this general charge
coming from all quarters, and still re-echoed
by our writers. To the gross eye of the pub-
lic, who take their impressions of distant ob-
jects from their appearances, the uxoriousness
of Charles was evident, but how they inferred
that his passion for his Queen was necessarily
connected with his political character can only
be accounted for by the ease with which popu-
lar prejudices are fostered at unhappy moments.
This odium was first industriously cast on the
character of Charles by his enemies in order to
make him contemptible; and his apologists,
with Clarendon for their leader, found it not
inconvenient to perpetuate this accusation, for
they imagined that they had discovered in a
weakness which had something amiable in it,
and which removed to another victim so many

ON THE KING'S CONDUCT. 159

of his own faults, some palliation for the King's
political errors.*

* I was gratified to find some time after this chapter was
written that my notions of Henrietta's character are confirm-
ed by Dr. Lingard in his History, x. 139. We are, I believe,
the only writers who have developed this curious passage in
the history of this period. May I flatter myself that Dr.
Lingard has adopted my sentiments ? Or has he only con-
firmed their truth ? Several years before the volume of this
historian appeared, I had given my ideas in Curiosities of
Literature, first series, in the " Secret History of Charles I.
and his Queen Henrietta." What the reader is now pre-
sented with, is a wider field of investigation, where what was
before suggested, is farther opened, and the result more
completely deduced.

160 THE PERCY FAMILY.

CHAPTER VIII.

THE PERCY FAMILY. ALGERNON EARL OF
NORTHUMBERLAND AND THE COUNTESS OF
CARLISLE.

IT was the fate of Charles the First, and his
Queen, to fix their most unreserved affections
on the son and the daughter of Henry Percy,
Earl of Northumberland ; and two of the most
fatal events of this reign originated in the dis-
affection of the son when he abandoned the
fleet to the Parliament, and in the treachery of
the daughter when she betrayed the Royal con-
fidence at a critical moment of Charles's life,
and on other occasions.

It is not always prejudice which induces us
to conceive that a family-character is inherited.
There was a taint in the blood of Northumber-
land, whose ancestors on more than one occa-
sion had suffered on the scaffold. The per-

THE PERCY FAMILY. 161

sonal feelings of renowned ancestors are trans-
mitted through a long race. Ancestral pride
comes at length to maintain what had only
originated in the first impressions of filial sym-
pathy. Not many years had elapsed since the
father of Algernon, the present Earl of North-
umberland, had been released from a long im-
prisonment in the Tower, where he had been
confined on suspicion of having had some
knowledge of the Powder Plot, and for har-
bouring one of the conspirators, his cousin
Thomas Percy. This haughty Earl valued
himself on the regal antiquity of his ancestry,
tracing the paternal line from Charlemagne :
Josceline, the son of Godfrey, Duke of Bra-
bant, having married the heiress of Percy.
The old Earl never forgave his daughter, the
celebrated Countess of Carlisle, for her mar-
riage with Lord Hay, afterwards Earl of Car-
lisle, one of the favourites of James the First.
Him, he deemed too recently noble, and other-
wise unworthy of his alliance, notwithstanding
the princely magnificence of the Earl of Car-
lisle's domestic life, and the generous nature of
the man, who had taken his celebrated but
undowered daughter for his bride. The Earl
of Northumberland had accepted with diffi-
culty, the boon of his freedom, which had

VOL. III. M

162 THE PERCY FAMILY.

lost its sweetness in coming from the hand
of his son-in-law. It was this Earl of Nor-
thumberland who on learning that Bucking-
ham drove six horses in his coach, immediately
passed through the city in a coach and eight ;
this prouder novelty attracted the town's talk
more towards the recent prisoner in the Tower,
than the minister himself.

Algernon, Earl of Northumberland, who
afterwards rose to the highest offices, both of
honour and trust, was a young nobleman, who
had been earnestly recommended by the Earl
of Strafford to Charles. His dignified quali-
ties were well adapted to win the tempered
seriousness of his royal master. The descend-
ant of a high-born race seemed no unfit com-
panion for a King. Northumberland, in the
haughtiness of early manhood, seemed to dis-
dain the daily traffic of the compliant courtier.
Solely connected with the King through the
medium of his great friend Strafford, Nor-
thumberland seems to have stood insulated
among the ministers. The reserve of his cha-
racter and the formality of his habits, threw a
coldness over the generous temper which we
look for in a noble youth. But these were not
disagreeable to Charles, who adopted this child
of his hopes, to initiate him under his own eye,

THE PERCY FAMILY. 163

through graduated honours, till the young
Earl should be fitted for the highest offices,
and worthy of his boundless confidence.
Charles had indeed conceived for him the
strongest personal affection, and this monarch
was no niggard when he once showered the
largess of his royal friendship.

There were, however, repulsive qualities la-
tent in the breast of young Northumberland,
which repeatedly developed themselves from
his first entrance into active life to the day of
his public defection. Although not a person
of extensive capacity, he seems to have under-
valued the abilities of the King, which were
far superior to his own. When Lord-High-
Admiral he conducted the navy of England
without glory ; and though he would not com-
mand the fleet against the King, he was willing
to surrender it to the Parliamentarians. Twice
when appointed Commander-in-chief, he was
seized with " a dangerous indisposition." No
sympathies could melt the coldness of his cha-
racter ; and his principles, perhaps inherited,
led him to the popular party, some of whom
were in his confidence. Northumberland, the
most affluent of our nobility, was penurious in
his loans to the King. He observes that " he
had lent the King but five thousand pounds,

M 2

164 THE PERCY FAMILY.

because he could not expect more from him,
whose house hath in these latter ages received
little or no advantage from the Crown." * We
shall find on another occasion that this noble-
man was a close calculator. It is evident that
he had taken on himself the quarrel of the
family with Royalty, by his evident allusion
" to his house in these latter ages ;" he means
the heavy Star-Chamber fine, which his father
had incurred in the former reign. Yet at this
moment the Earl had reached the highest dis-
tinctions in the State ; and his numerous titles
and honours would spread over this page.

Northumberland was serving a master for
whose service he felt no zeal ; for whose honour
he felt little concern ; and whose friendship he
rendered disastrous only to him who bestowed
it. Among the desertion of those on whom
Charles had showered his favours, and admitted
into the privacy of friendship, the King felt
no wound more deep than the defection of
Northumberland. Charles exclaimed with
tender regret, " I have courted him as a mis-
tress ; I have conversed with him as a friend !"

The Earl of Leicester, brother-in-law to the
Earl of Northumberland, seems to have shared,
in some degree, the dispositions of his family
* Sydney Papers.

THE PERCY FAMILY. 165

affinity. He had been our ambassador in
France, was made Lord Lieutenant of Ireland,
and may be deemed as the philosophic friend
of Charles ; but his impartiality and his honour
rendered him equally indecisive and indif-
ferent; concurring with the Parliament, yet
never disloyal to the Sovereign. In revo-
lutionary times the steadiest friendships are
often abruptly terminated; and the greatest
minds, like more ordinary ones, submit to
be the mere creatures of pressing events. The
younger brother Henry Percy, who distin-
guished himself in the wild scheme called
" The Army Plot," remained attached to his
royal friends, and died an emigrant at Paris
before the Restoration. But there was one of
this great family of the Percies who perhaps
may have influenced the fate of Charles, even
more than Northumberland or Leicester — it
was their sister, the much celebrated Countess
of Carlisle.

Lucy Percy, Countess of Carlisle, was at the
head of a class of females who have not yet
been noticed in the history of these times.

We have already shown that the passion of
Charles for his lovely Queen, and the personal
influence of Henrietta, were imagined by their
contemporaries to have been such, that this

166 THE PERCY FAMILY.

Queen wholly regulated bis conduct ; that the
uxorious King had recourse to her counsels,
and that she ruled the Cabinet by governing
the King ; in a word, that Henrietta Maria was
a great political character.

It is a curious fact, that so prevalent was this
popular opinion, that it actually gave rise to a
new race of ladies in this country, who may be
described as States women. The Throne is the
modeller of manners, and since the Queen was
imagined to be so profound a politician, politics
became the fashionable pursuit of aspiring la-
dies. As fashions travel from the Court to the
country, it seems that even our rural ladies
were deeply involved in political interests and
in the government of their husbands, whenever
those occupied some official station. An anec-
dote of a certain Sempronia we have given in
our preceding chapter on the influence of the
Queen over the King.

These lady -politicians were not the least ac-
tive messengers nor the least adroit negotiators
of both parties in these troubled times of po-
litical intrigue. Many of the favoured few pre-
sided at their cabinet councils, where if they
did not always deliver their sentiments, they
had the pleasure of being let into those of the
leaders of parties. We know that Lady Au-

THE PERCY FAMILY. 16?

bigny was safely delivered of a box of con-
spiracy called " Waller's plot," which proved
fatal to some, and would have to herself, had
she not as dexterously conveyed herself away.
Her Ladyship was an adept in cipher, and in
deciphering ; an admirable letter-carrier, for
with a woman's fancy, she curled up a secret
correspondence within her own curls ; curls
often admired for their luxuriance but more
particularly for their size. She contrived con-
ferences between persons who by the remote-
ness of their locality, or their want of personal
acquaintance, had never imagined that they
should ever have been brought into collision.
As her Ladyship happened to be an acquaint-
ance of Lord Clarendon, we gather more par-
ticulars than we find about other political
ladies, who appear not to have been less active
or less ingenious. These stateswomen were
living in a continued fever of state secrets.
An ingenuous anecdote told by Lady Fanshaw,
with her extreme simplicity, describes their
peculiar situation. Her husband being then
Secretary of State at Oxford, Lady Rivers, a
friend of Lady Fanshaw, one day touched on
the knowledge of state affairs, observing how
some women were very happy in acquiring it ;
such as Lady Aubigny, Lady Isabel Thynne,

168 THE PERCY FAMILY.

and divers others, " but none, Lady Rivers
thought, could be more capable than the wife
of the Secretary of State." And, added the
fair communicator, " this very night came a
post from Paris from the Queen ; and her Lady-
ship would be extremely glad to learn what
the Queen commanded the King. If Lady
Fanshaw would ask her husband privately he
would tell what he found in the packet, and
then Lady Fanshaw might tell her." All this
was very easy to do, and Lady Fanshaw was
very innocent. Imagining, that " to inquire
into public affairs being a fashionable thing
might make her more beloved by her husband,"
she watched Sir Richard on his return from
council with his papers. Her peering, startled
him ; her earnest inquiry raised a smile ; her
pouting he kissed away ; her sulkiness at sup-
per, and the renewed intreaty on retiring to
rest, her reproach the next morning that " he
loved her not ;" all he had borne, till at the
close, the good sense of Sir Richard spoke out,
perfectly satisfying Lady Fanshaw that " he
had no other secrets to conceal from her, but
his Prince's."

Had Lucy Countess of Carlisle, in some light
memoirs which only a stateswoman could freely
sketch, told us, in the felicitous style of saying

THE PERCY FAMILY. 169

the best things in the fewest words, which it is
said she excelled in, all the thoughts of the
extraordinary personages whom she so inti-
mately knew ; had she narrated those change-
ful events, in which she herself had taken so
active a part, we should have now possessed
the most interesting secret history of the reign
of Charles the First — with its appendix, the
early years of the Protectorate.

But so far from recording the acts of others,
she has not left us a word about herself.
Her nonchalance seems to have exceeded her
egotism ; and she who was the disturber of a
nation appears only to have viewed the mis-
chievous efforts as they influenced her own
circle. It is rather by good fortune, than by
successful research that I am enabled to create
a real personage out of the mysterious and
shadowy apparition which sometimes glides
into our history, and whom Warburton has
expressively designated as " The Erinnys of her
Times."

Lady Carlisle, in whose veins flowed the
blood of princely races, and the blood which
had been tainted by treason, was at once the
equal companion of sovereigns, and the most
dangerous of subjects. She too was very beau-
tiful— but she would not have become an

170 THE PERCY FAMILY.

important personage in our history had she not
aimed at something beyond rank and beauty.
Lady Carlisle seems to have conceived a fancy
of surrounding herself by a higher order of
society than she could find in the mediocrity of
the court-circle ; and busying herself in politi-
cal life, with the advantage of being placed so
close to the Queen, at once her confident and
her spy, she moved in a world of political
intrigues, and from Whitehall to the two
Houses, held the invisible chain of human
events. By what dexterity, or fortune, she
escaped from the ruin of all the parties with
whom she was concerned, we probably shall
never learn. It is perhaps a woman's privilege
to convince the most opposite parties that she
is earnestly concerned for them ; she can prac-
tise on the weak and the unsuspicious ; and
she has in reserve for the more penetrating
minds, the eye that melts into persuasion, and
the voice which confirms their hopes.

The Countess of Carlisle was a beautiful
dowager in 1636. This time is the commence-
ment of the busiest period of the present reign.
Her Ladyship was now mistress of herself,
and adoring that self; it was now that she
opened her remarkable career. Waller, one

THE PEKCY FAMILY. 171

of her admirers, has painted the Countess in
mourning,

" A Venus rising from a sea of jet."

The Queen of Charles the First was fascinated
by the Countess ; for I think it appears that
the Queen was aware that the Countess had
betrayed her famous state-secret in the very
heat of its confidence. One would imagine
that this might have interrupted their friend-
ship ; and yet, by the manuscripts of the French
Resident here in 1644, which I have examined,
I find the Countess in secret communication
with the Queen's party at Paris, requesting the
French Resident to convey letters from her
brother Percy to the Queen in France ; and
still later in 1648 the Countess was in Hen-
rietta's full confidence.* The treachery of the
Countess to the Queen had not however shown

* The intercourse of the French Resident with Lady Car-
lisle was frequent. Conversing with her Ladyship on her
brother the Earl of Northumberland being appointed Go-
vernor to the little Duke and the Princess with an allowance
of 16,000/. per annum, (he should have said 3000Z. accord-
ing to Whitelocke, 137,) the Countess observed that she did
not know that her brother had any reason to be pleased, con-
sidering the nature of that perilous office. The fate of their
great-grandfather the Protector was then the town-talk. —
MSS. of Sabran.

172 THE PERCY FAMILY.

itself on a single occasion. When Lord Hol-
land became a malcontent, from the King's re-
fusal of granting him the disposal of a Barony,
which he might have sold to some worthless
aspirant for ten thousand pounds, it was the
Countess of Carlisle who furnished Lord Hol-
land with all the words and actions of her
thoughtless royal friend; applying every ma-
licious construction, and drawing the widest in-
ferences, that Lord Holland might make terms
with the Parliament, by the services they best
liked ; criminating the unguarded remissness
of an inconsiderate Queen, who would say more
than she thought, and do more than she was
aware she had done. Henrietta never forgave
these domestic treacheries of Lord Holland,
who had been one of her favourites. She de-
clared that " she would never live in the Court
if he kept his places there." Holland was dis-
carded from his office of First Gentleman of
the Bedchamber. He seems to have betrayed
the King when a General of the Horse in the
Scottish war. Yet this unhappy man, repeat-
edly changing sides, suffered for his loyalty,
yet offering to serve again the Parliament
would they have accepted him ! His terror
was to live in poverty.

The Countess had been so confidential a per-

THE PERCY FAMILY. 173

son, that she was admitted to be present at all
the consultations held -to save the life of Straf-
ford. That Earl, in the selected circle of the
Countess was then her favourite. Her strenu-
ous exertions, at times, seemed to have been
successful, but she never forgave the King, or
the Queen, for their irresolution and their
terror. She hardly concealed her deep resent-
ment, it is said, even her contempt. From this
iiioment of her violent indignation, I would
date the commencement of that series of treache-
ries which subsequently proved so fatal to her
royal friends. I would not ascribe too great a
proportion of gratuitous maliciousness to our
" Erinnys."

Extremes were her passions. She who had
thus, in her mind, for ever quarrelled with a
King and a Queen, for her favourite Strafford,
not long afterwards became an equal admirer
of his remorseless enemy. She had usually
been inattentive to " the public exercises of
religion." As what then was considered to be
" the true religion," entered into the gossip of
the day, and even into the private correspon-
dence of letter-writers, and combined, as it was,
with the politics of the times, whether a per-
son entered the parochial church, or the Scotch
conventicle, was not an affair of indifference.

174 THE PERCY FAMILY.

Suddenly the Countess became Puritanic, and
took notes at long sermons ; and the Scandalous
Chronicle has announced that Master Pym was
placed in the situation of the Earl of Strafford.*
The intercourse between the parties was in-
timate ; and the interior of Whitehall was al-
ways better known to Pym, than that of the
Commons was to Charles the First.

The select circle of the Countess of Carlisle
was a prominent object in that day. It was a
particular sort of a coterie ; though its charac-
ter seems to have been chiefly of a political
cast, yet the men of wit, and genius, and gal-
lantry, were stars in this galaxy. There were
literary men, if the few of that day may be so
distinguished ; but the great number consisted
of leading members in both Houses, and of the
heads of the Scotch party, of eminent foreign-
ers, and particularly of ambassadors, and other
foreign residents ; and with this latter class the
Countess appears to have held an extraordinary
intercourse. Persons who had a name to make,
ambitioned the entries to this envied circle,
sure to find in the societe of the Countess of
Carlisle, those men in the country on whom
they had placed their hopes, or who had at-
tracted their admiration. It is to be regretted

* Sir Philip Warwick, 204.

THE PERCY FAMILY. 175

that such a circle has left no trace of its ex-
istence ; and that the celebrated female who
presided in it, was not her own perpetual se-
cretary. Some idea of the Countess's " cham-
ber" may be formed by the picture which one
of its haunters has transmitted to us in his
pleasing verses.

" The high in titles, and the shepherd here,
Forgets his greatness and forgets his fear.
The gay, the wise, the gallant, and the grave,
Subdued alike, all but one passion have.
No worthy mind but finds in her's there is
Something proportioned to the rule of his :
While she with cheerful but impartial grace
(Born for no one, but to delight the race
Of men) like Phoebus so divides her light,
And warms us, that she stoops not from her height.*

Something more we may learn of what was
passing in the circle of the Countess by a letter
of the Earl of Exeter which I discovered
among the Conway papers. Though the noble
writer, in the affected style of the complimen-
tary effusions of that day, strained his fancy
and his gallantry, we are enabled to form some
idea of the entertainment to which his Lordship
was accustomed, in " the Lodgings at Court"
of the Countess. The manners of her Lady-
ship seem sketched after life.
* Waller.

176 THE PERCY FAMILY.

" MADAM,

" The night is the mother of dreams and
fantoms, the winter is the mother of the
night, all this mingled with my infirmities,
have protracted this homage so due and so
vowed to your Ladyship, lest the fume and
vapours so arising should contaminate my so
sacred and pure an intention. But much more
pleasure it were to me to perform this duty in
your Lodging at Court, when you see your
perfections in the glass, adding perfection to
perfection, approving the bon-mofs there spoken
in your presence, moderating the excess of
compliments ; passing over a dull jest without
a sweet smile ; giving a wise answer to an ex-
travagant question. But why do I regret
these absent pleasures and find defects in my
condition, since it pleased God so to determine ;
were I young again I should be a most hum-
ble suitor that you would be pleased to vouch-
safe that your lodging might be my academic,
quitting to the rest both Italy and France. I
expect now within few days the approach of
the violets, from whence I begin to entertain
better thoughts with hope to enjoy the first
and latter presents of the year. But when all
is said that can be said, and all is writ that can
be writ, your perfections put in the weight of

THE PERCY FAMILY. 177

true judgment, weigh down all other delights.
In the mean time afford your servant the ho-
nour of your bonne grace, and so I rest accord-
ing to custom

" Your Ladyship's

most humble and

passionate servant,

EXETER."*

Could we turn over the visiting-book of the
Countess, we should discover a numberless cata-
logue of men of genius and gallantry. The
fanciful poet, and the ancient gallant, who
have borne their testimony to the charms of
the societe of the Countess, belong to a large
class. Sir Toby Matthews, a refined gentle-
man of the day, has offered a portrait which,
however fantastical, may still bear some re-
markable resemblances ; and Donne has ad-
dressed the Countess with the celestial flattery
of a poetical Divine. But such persons who
sought fame or pleasure, by admission into the
favoured circle, must not be imagined to have
been initiated into the higher mysteries ; for

* I have printed the letter according to modern ortho-
graphy, for the convenience of the reader. The Earl writes
in the last line, boun grasse; formerly they regulated their
orthography by their orthoepy.
VOL. III. N

178 THE PERCY FAMILY.

mysteries there were in the Esoteric doctrines
for the adepts. The phases of " the Chamber"
were mutable. In the Countess's interviews
with Lord Holland and the Earl of Essex,
with Hollis, with Pym, and some of the Com-
monwealth-men of Cromwell, other matters
were agitated than subjects fitted for the vers
de societi of the poet, or the elaborate fancies
of a gouty Reminiscent ; other matters than
" dull jests at which she would not cast a sweet
smile; extravagant questions wisely answered,
and an approval of bon-mots." The " Aca-
demic" as the travelled Earl of Exeter distin-
guishes her " Chamber," was open to the select,
but the " Cabinet councils," where her ladyship
presided, were solely opened for the elect.

In the manuscript negotiations of Sabran,
the French resident in England in 1644 and
1645, I found frequent mention of this active
agent's intercourse with Lady Carlisle. The
following passage, which I translate literally, js
from a dispatch of Sabran's to the Count de
Brienne, the Secretary of State. Sabran was at
that moment distant from London, following
Charles with his army in 1644. It tells a
great deal about the Countess.

" The Countess of Carlisle has sent to me to
say how much she rejoices at my coming ; that

THE PERCY FAMILY. 179

the Chancellor of Scotland had visited her, and
had solemnly declared to her, that he has come
to assist in settling a peace, and not for the pur-
pose of ruining the King of Great Britain, nor
royalty. She assures me that she had pene-
trated into his real designs, and she had dined
with four Lords of the Upper House, who on
this subject had avowed their desire of peace,
and the re-establishment of the person and the
affairs of the King." Here we discover that
Lady Carlisle was the centre point of commu-
nication with the Chancellor of Scotland, the
French Resident, and some of our Peers. We
see that even in the times of Charles the First
they gave diplomatic dinners, though it is still
rare to find a lady at the head of the table, not
however that our modern secret history has not
furnished some instances. Shortly after this
dispatch, I discovered the French Resident at
Lady Carlisle's house, where he found Lord
Holland, and by appointment met Hollis, and
the Lieutenant-General of the cavalry, the
Earl of Essex. Both these eminent men were
well-disposed, and greater in reputation than
ever with the Commons. The Resident de-
tails the important communications which pass-
ed between the parties on subjects deeply inter-
esting in our history. All this confidential

N 2

180 THE PERCY FAMILY.

intercourse on the most secret and delicate in-
vestigations, passed before the Countess, and
her house was always the place of appointment.
Her Ladyship's politics at this moment, had a
tendency towards the King's restoration ; but
what we are more concerned to learn, is, that
Lady Carlisle must have been deep in the
councils of that day, when we perceive that the
great political actors assembled at her call, and
communicated by her means.

In the history of a female, that of her person
forms a part. Granger has said of Lady Car-
lisle, that " she appears in the poems of Waller
to much greater advantage than she does in the
portrait of Vandyck. It was not so much the
beauty of the lady, as the sprightliness of her
wit, and the charms of her behaviour that ren-
dered her an object of general admiration."
Either Granger was not very sensible to beauty,
or the portrait he had seen had faded and lost
its likeness ; for, a very good judge, as we shall
shortly see, thought more highly of her beauty,
than of her wit or her talents. We would not
decide on female beauty by the black and white
of the graver, since a woman's loveliness lives
in the motion of far different colours. But
even in Lombart's hard engraving, we are
struck by the majesty of the figure. We may

THE PERCY FAMILY. 181

imagine voluptuousness in those eyes, with
something like pensiveness ; and a physiogno-
mist would not find it difficult to detect a
marked sense of self-sufficiency in the decided
features of her noble countenance.

But what was the real genius of this cele-
brated woman ? What the extent of her capa-
city, which had such an influence over the
greatest characters of the age ?

Let us take the unbiassed opinion of a very
intelligent foreigner, the French Secretary of
State, the Count de Brienne. Her Ladyship
had been personally known to the Count some
years past, when De Brienne had been in more
than one embassy to England ; we have referred
to his own published memoirs in our preceding
volumes. De Brienne was a person of very
lively discernment, and as Secretary of State,
he was now holding the correspondence with
Sabran. Replying to the dispatch of the Re-
sident, the Secretary of State thus notices Lady
Carlisle. " The lady, at whose house you as-
sembled, formerly piqued herself on her great
beauty and her great talents ; years must have
carried off the one, but I doubt if they have
acquired for her the latter of these qualities.
Let us know however what you can penetrate,
and the means you judge which we are to

182 THE PERCY FAMILY.

adopt." It is evident that a very able judge of
persons had formed no very favourable notion
of Lady Carlisle's superiority of talents ; but
he had seen her, and he remembered that she
was beautiful.

We have a literary portrait of Lady Carlisle,
finished with care, but in a very bad taste. It
was composed by one intimate with his ori-
ginal ; and through the affectation of his style,
many a delicate trait may be recovered. The
character of the Countess of Carlisle by Sir
Toby Matthews is hyperbolical and fantastic,
but she herself bore some resemblance to her
limner. A caricature may be reduced into a
natural resemblance, by softening down its pro-
trusions. I shall endeavour to translate Sir
Toby Matthews's ideas, into plainer language,
adopting his own present tense.

The Countess of Carlisle, with a high mind
and dignity, neither seeking, nor desirous of
any friendship, is pleased to surround herself
with persons of eminent condition, both of
power and employments ; because she chooses
to know only the fortunate, for with her, for-
tune is virtue and fame. Even her domestic
affections are restricted. Those who are re-
moved from her presence must not hope to live
in her recollections ; they are currents running

THE PERCY FAMILY. 183

too distant to participate in any warmth from
her kindness.

She prefers the conversation of men to that
of women ; not but that she can talk on the
fashions with her female friends, but she is too
soon sensible that she can set them as she wills ;
that pre-eminence shortens all equality.

She converses with those who are most dis-
tinguished for their conversational powers.
Her civility seems universal ; she likes to show
what she can do, but cares not to indulge her
nature too long among those who have nothing
very extraordinary or new in themselves. She
is apt, though in good-humour, to keep at a
distance ; and suddenly to discover scorn, when
you are fancying love.

Yet of love freely will she discourse ; listen
to all its fancies, and mark all its power; but
she ceases to comprehend them when boldly
addressed to herself. She cannot love in
earnest, but she will play with love, while love
remains a child ; she dismisses him as a master.

She has too great a heart to suffer any incli-
nation for another ; she has therefore no pas-
sions ; but as she is not unwilling to find some
entertainment to while away the hours, she will
seem to take a deep interest for persons of con-
dition and celebrity ; yet this being but a com-

184 THE PERCY FAMILY.

pulsion on her nature, withdrawing herself too
much from herself, she usually returns ill satis-
fied with others.

She has not within herself, those little ten-
dernesses which she will not allow to others ;
surely she mistakes her own heart by not
exercising it more frequently. She holds as
her surest defence, the insensibility of her
nature ; this is like giving denials before soli-
citations ; or like proclamations which forbid
what may happen, and then if they be dis-
obeyed it is to be upon peril.

You may fear to be less valued by her, for
obliging her ; for should she think that your
courtesy be merely the habit of your mind, and
not a spontaneous emotion excited by herself,
in this case, she is so unjust that she would be-
stow favours and services on strangers who cast
themselves on her generosity, in preference to
those who might urge stronger claims, but who
have not equally flattered her self-love.

She delivers her opinions of persons freely,
rather with an intention to show her under-
standing than from any disdain of the persons
themselves ; but as in most of us, there is more
to be reformed than commended, her judgment
is too apt to detect the imperfections which we
flatter ourselves we can conceal.

THE PERCY FAMILY. 185

This lady, whom both Fortune and Nature
have richly adorned, is not without a sense or
a contentment of both ; but as Fortune can
never give her so much as Nature has bestowed
on her, she joys most in the perfection of her
person. She is more esteemed than beloved by
her own sex ; her beauty putting their faces
out of countenance, as her wit their minds.

She is so great a lover of variety, that when
she cannot find it among those about her, she
will remove into her own thoughts ; or change
her opinions even of those persons most con-
sidered by her, till after this entertainment
she will settle them again into their former
places.

She has elevated thoughts, carrying her mind
above any thing within her knowledge ; she
deems nothing more worthy of her considera-
tion than her own imaginations ; and when she
is alone, she will make something worthy of her
liking, since she finds nothing in the world
worthy of her loving.

The felicity of her language is in her ex-
pressions, and in few words, adding little to
the substance, but infinitely to the manner.

She affects extremes, because she cannot
endure any mediocrity of plenty and glory.
Were she not, in possession of this certainty.

186 THE PERCY FAMILY.

she would fly to the other extreme of retire-
ment. She could submit to be obscure, but
she must be magnificent. Her physicians told
her that she was inclined to melancholy ; their
opinion was its remedy by the mirth it affords
her ; she thinks herself cheerful, but her noble
heart is ambitious — to what end ? for she is so
far from the want of any thing that it would
be a hard study, and therefore painful for her,
to imagine a desire !

Such is the portrait of the Countess of Car-
lisle, which Granger has grossly depreciated
as " Sir Toby Matthews's fantastic character."
Many refined strokes show that the limner
had studied his original by her side ; and it
seems to have admitted as much of nature as
her Ladyship allowed to enter into her dispo-
sitions.

Another exquisite judge of the female cha-
racter, who must have been familiar with the
secret history of this Countess, was St. Evre-
mond ; and he has alluded to her on a par-
ticular occasion. His patroness, the beautiful
Duchess of Mazarine, came to England to
regulate by her charms the state policy of our
voluptuous Monarch. Suddenly she betrayed
the weakness of the sex, in a violent passion
for the youthful Prince of Monaco, then at

THE PERCY FAMILY. 187

the English court. Charles the Second, im-
patient at this odious rivalry, was mean enough
to suspend her pension. As St. Evremond was
in the secret of her mission, he perceived that all
was thrown into disorder by this little Prince.
The Adonis, in perfect devotion, was inces-
santly practising his enthralling gallantries—
les petits soins — watching an open window, or
shutting a door, presenting a basket of ribbons,
or drawing on a glove, bearing, in triumph, an
Indian fan, or adjusting the flow of her tresses.
Thus, at every hour, riveting the passion of the
lovely and lost Mazarine. On this occasion,
St. Evremond in despair, more certain of being
read than listened to, addressed to the Duchess
an Essay on Friendship. There he displayed
his own personal sacrifices, and his grief for
the famous Fouquet, thus insinuating himself
into her confidence ; he confessed, however,
that no friendship is comparable with that of
a female gifted with beauty, with talents,
and with sense, could one be certain that it
would last ! Adroitly passing to the political
character this lady had to perform, he observed,
that " it had often surprised him why women
were excluded from the conduct of affairs, for
he had known many enlightened and. able as
any men. But this exclusion has neither origi-

188 THE PERCY FAMILY.

nated in our jealousy nor our interests, nor in
any indifferent opinion of their genius ; it is
merely because we find their hearts are too
weak, too inconstant, too subject to the frailty
of their nature. Monsieur le Cardinal (Maza-
rine) once said, ' A woman who governs a
kingdom prudently to-day, will take a master
to-morrow not fit to govern a poultry-yard.'
What might not Madame de Chevreuse, and
the Countess of Carlisle, have accomplished, had
they not spoilt, by the infirmities of the heart,
all that they had obtained by their mind ?
Ninon de 1'Enclos said to me once, that she
returned God thanks every night for her judg-
ment, and prayed every morning to be pre-
served from the follies of her heart." It is
superfluous to add that the amusing ethics of
our Epicurean philosopher were greatly ad-
mired, and the little Prince of Monaco was
every day more and more caressed.

For our purpose we learn, by the confession
of this contemporary, that it is evident the
Countess of Carlisle amidst her busy political in-
trigues had fallen short of his views as a great
states woman, and had failed, from becoming
the dupe of her heart, lost amidst irresistible
passions. The reported mistress of Strafford
and Pym must have betrayed an extraordinary

THE PERCY FAMILY. 189

susceptibility, which, probably, often sought
for its own security in an insensibility to ordi-
nary aspirants.

We perceive in Lady Carlisle a mind am-
bitious of higher results than she ever attained
to : St. Evremond hints at this, and De Brienne
considered her beauty more remarkable than
her talents. The perfect self-complacency of
this beautiful idol of rank and fashion, amidst
her splendid circle of the first men of the age,
was no doubt kept alive by the verses of poets
who gazed on her personal attractions, and by
the admiration of men on whom her rank re-
flected honour, while they knew to profit by
her peculiar station at Court. Placed in the
centre of this circle of excellence and great-
ness, her own genius remained in its medi-
ocrity ; for among such men, and such events,
as she had witnessed, her mind seems to have
wanted the vigour, and never once to have felt
the impulse, to perpetuate even the work of her
own hand, which, doubtless, she sometimes
flattered herself she was contemplating. Often,
with a cold heart, she sought the devotion, and
sported with the fancies of love ; little sensible
to real merit, she only admitted the fortunate
into her presence ; those whom she most ad-
mired, were most liable to fall in her opinion,

190 THE PERCY FAMILY.

for in one of those moody reveries that she
often indulged, she would compare them— with
herself! Her conceit, her self-idolatry, were
too abstract for sympathy ; in their elevation
they remained even undisturbed by the inso-
lence of a libeller !

But all we have said still leaves us unin-
formed how this beautiful stateswoman ob-
tained so powerful an influence in the political
state of the times. She has kept her own
secret. I have tracked her in some of her
active movements — Warburton has boldly de-
signated her — yet her history remains un-
written !

THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND. 191

CHAPTER IX.

THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND.

CHARLES from his accession had annually
renewed his promise of a visit to his native
Scotland and a Coronation in his ancient ca-
pital. The unsettled state of home-affairs, and
possibly that of his exchequer, had retarded
this royal inauguration ; but the delay of the
long-promised appearance of the Sovereign was
felt as neglect, and even reviled as mockery,
by his remote subjects. The ancient jealousy
of the two nations had been rekindled rather
than allayed by their common union ; and the
people who had lost their own court, and had
never seen their own Sovereign, when they re-
sorted to their happier partner, shared only
in those national unkindnesses which lowered
"the blue bonnets" into obtruders or depen-
dants ; and tales and songs, proverbs and jibes,
flew about of " the bonny Scot made a gen-

192 THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND.

tleman."* The confidential domestics of the
Royal father and the son were however Scots,
and Charles to the last retained his affection for
his countrymen ; yet it was from them that
the bewitching model of insurgency was held
out to England. The patronage however
which healed the wounded pride of the Cale-
donian irritated the feverish interests of the
Englishman. To assert the national dignity
of Scotland, Charles once proposed that its
Crown should be transferred to England, and
here, in a second coronation, be solemnly placed
on his head ; but the Scottish Lord, the keeper
of this Regalia, declared that he durst not be

* Ritson among his collections of "The North Country
Chorister." Some curious anecdotes were current in that
day of the subtilty of the Scots, indicative of the temper of
the times. Sir Toby Matthews had one of a Scotchman
without a cloak, travelling with an Englishman in the rain,
who sitting by the side of the Scotchman in the boot of a
coach, gave him a flap of his coat ; at the end of the jour-
ney the Scotchman had, little by little, got all the English-
man's cloak on his own shoulders. They had a saying in
France of the Scotch Halberdiers, " Si vous lui permettez
de mettre son Hallebarde dans votre porte, en peu de jours
il se rendra maitre de votre Maison." — These anecdotes are
found in the papers of Robert the second Earl of Leicester,
in 1636 ; so careful was the Earl to treasure up his jealousy
of the envied favourites of Charles the First.

THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND. 193

false to his trust ; yet would his Majesty be
pleased to accept of it in the land of his fathers,
he would find his people ready to yield him
the highest honours ; " but if the crown was
not worth a progress, there might be some
other way of disposing of it." The Scottish
Council were not less strenuous in their style.
When a toleration, in some degree, for the
Catholics was in agitation, and the old Marquis
of Huntley, who was an hereditary sheriff, in
concert with some Earls, neglected to attend to
the letter of the Council, to suppress the Pa-
pists, they incurred the expatriating punish-
ment of what the Scotch termed " a horning."
The herald at arms thrice winded his horn,
each time summoning the Marquis and the
Earls, who not appearing, were proclaimed re-
bels ; and to escape from the Council the old
Marquis and his colleagues took their instant
flight to the English Court, The Council of
Scotland had decided that, " when the King
comes to be crowned amongst us, he will, we
doubt not, be sworn to our laws ; meanwhile
as we are entrusted with them, we will look
they be observed."*

Such lofty remonstrances had often reminded
Charles that his appearance in his ancient and
* Hamon L'Estrange, p. 129, second edition.

VOL. III. O

194 THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND.

native kingdom became daily more urgent ;
and there were other deeper motives which
hastened the journey.

In Scotland an usurping aristocracy equally
oppressed the Sovereign and the People. The
heaviest grievance of the Scottish people was
then, the tyranny of their feudal nobility.
Weak or unprincipled Regents, preceding and
during the minority of James the First, had
not only seized upon or shared among their
adherents the patrimony of the Church, but
had wrested from the Crown some of its in-
alienable rights in the regalities and tithes
which had been annexed to the Crown by
Parliament. An Act of Revocation of these
illegal grants had been proposed by Charles,
and the Earl of Nithisdale had been sent to
open the Royal commission, but had he pro-
ceeded, the lords, to use Burnet's style, had
resolved, " to fall upon him and all his party in
the old Scottish manner, and knock them on
the head." An anecdote of the times, reveals
a striking instance of this feudal rancour and
barbarous greatness. Belhaven, an old blind
lord, prayed to be seated by the Earl of Dum-
fries, one of the Nithisdale party, that he might
make sure of him, which he seemed to do by
grasping him hard with one hand ; on Dum-

THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND. 195

fries remonstrating with his troublesome neigh-
bour, the old Lord excused himself observing
that since his blindness he was ever in fear of
falling ; meanwhile his other hand clutched a
dagger ready to plunge into his companion's
breast on the first commotion.* The insatiable
rapacity of the fathers was now to be main-
tained by the insolent tenacity of the sons.
Such was the volcanic soil which Charles was
about to tread, and the subterranean fires were
ready to burst out.

These were the cares of State brooding in
the Royal breast, not yet opened to the world.
At this time Clarendon describes* Charles the
First " as finding himself possessed of that tran-
quillity, by which he had no reason to appre-
hend any enemies from abroad and less any in-
surrections at home ; and he resolved to make
a progress to the North and be solemnly crown-
ed in his kingdom of Scotland."! In the year
1633, England appeared to be a happy land —
faction seemed to sleep — and peace guarded
our coasts.

The King's intended progress to Scotland
had furnished a topic for conversation, and the
public mind had been prepared to meet the
Royal wishes, that this great national visit

* Burnet's Memoirs, i. 34. f Clarendon, ii. 162.
O 2

196 THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND.

should be graced by all the splendour and
pomp of England ; but it was not less known
that his Exchequer was ill provided for the
charge. The King invited the chief of his
nobility to attend his Court, but required them
to join him at their own charge. At that
moment the fervour of loyalty vied with the
pride of magnificence. In May, the gorgeous
train set forward, and we owe to the resident
correspondent of the Mercure Fran9ois, the
names of the English nobility who accompa-
nied the King, each of whom brought from
forty to sixty gentlemen and as many led horses
richly caparisoned ; he adds, what seems exces-
sive in number, that more than five thousand
volunteers joined the Royal cavalcade.

The splendour of the present progress had
not hitherto been equalled in our annals. The
northern road presented one continued scene
of sumptuous festivals in the ruinous hospi-
tality of those whose seats were opened to this
travelling Court. Houses were enlarged, and
state was assumed by some never before seen
in their generations, and the feasting or ban-
quetting particularly at Welbeck by the Earl
of Newcastle, (which was however far exceeded
the following year,) at Raby Castle the seat of
the Vanes, and at Durham by Bishop Mor-

THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND. 197

ton ; were carried to such an excess that Lord
Clarendon according to his notion traces the
seeds of the commotions of a subsequent period
to the heavy debts which the nobility and the
gentry incurred by their unlimited expendi-
ture. Nor is this opinion of Clarendon, as it
would seem, at all preposterous ; for Lord
Newcastle acknowledged to the Earl of Straf-
ford that, as well as my Lord of Carlisle, he
had hurt his -estate much with waiting on the
King in his Scottish journey. " Not to be
sick in mind, body, and purse, with this weight
of debt upon me, I know no diet better than
a strict diet in the country which in time may
recover me of the prodigal diseases.*

A royal progress had always been considered
as a great annoyance to the individuals who
had the costly honour of entertaining the So-
vereign. It seemed to be a test as well as a
tax of loyalty. It was sometimes contrived not
to be at home on these occasions; a contem-
porary of one of the progresses of James the
First writes " The progress holds on towards
Northamptonshire, as unwelcome in those parts
as rain in harvest, so as the great ones begin
to remuer mesnage and to dislodge ; the Lord
Spenser to his daughter Vane in Kent, and

* Stratford's Letters, i. 101.

198 THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND.

divers other gentlemen devise other errands
other ways."* Some however, in office, were
jealous to obtain the distinction of a royal visit,
though they grudged the cost. Sir Julius
Caesar in some short memorials of himself,
while he proudly chronicles a progress of Queen
Elizabeth and laments over " five former dis-
appointments" mortifies his pride by calcu-
lating the result. Some of my readers may be
amused by the recital. " The Queen visited
me at my house at Mitcham and supped lodged
and dined there the next day. I presented
her with a gown of cloth of silver richly em-
broidered, a black net-work mantle with pure
gold, a white taffeta hat with several flowers,
and a jewel of gold set therein with rubies
and diamonds. Her Majesty removed from
my house after dinner to Nonsuch with ex-
ceeding good countenance — which entertain-
ment of her Majesty with the charges of five
former disappointments, amounted to seven
hundred pounds sterling, besides mine own
provisions and whatever was sent unto me by
my friends." Sir Julius must have acted pru-
dently notwithstanding, for some of these royal
visits cost many thousand pounds to some of

* Sloane MSS. 4173. Chamberlain's Letters.

THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND. 199

the nobility. This prodigality of the nobility
was perhaps one great source of the prosperity
of those inferior classes of the nation, who
were advancing in influence, and wealth, and
at no distant day, mingled with the bur-
gesses of Parliament. In proportion as the
nobility exhausted their revenues, they pro-
moted the future independence of the class
of citizens.

On their entrance into Scotland the magnifi-
cence was redoubled, the prodigality was ex-
haustless ; the emulation of two nations, like
opposing flames which mingle into one, now
blazed in union. The Scottish nobility vied in
the richness of their equipages, and the gran-
deur of their state. The poorer nation were
not unwilling to ruin themselves, provided the
scoffers of their poverty were confuted by a
single and fatal triumph. A whole nation is
subject to an aberration of mind, when a sud-
den contagion prevails.

On the King's entrance into Scotland the
English resigned their places to those of the
Scots, who by .their titles, or offices, were en-
titled to hold them ; the tables were kept up
with renewed profusion, the splendour of the
state was augmented, and the new guests were

200 THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND.

received in a struggle of generous courtesies.
" The King appeared with no less lustre at
Edinburgh than at Whitehall."

When Charles made his public entry into
Edinburgh, at the Western-gate, he was at-
tended by the Lord Provost and all the digni-
fied citizens and about three hundred of the
flower of Scotland in white satin, with rich
doublets, with their partisans and other arms.
As the King passed, many a well-devised pa-
geant arrested the acclamations of the people,
by their elegant harangues or poetical invoca-
tions. In the magnificent spectacle, whatever
charm the music, the poetry, and the painting
of the times could awaken, were accompanied
by the congratulatory or the pathetic senti-
ments, and the expressive gestures of the
actors. The most extraordinary pageant de-
tained them at the Tolbooth, where, personified,
the long line of one hundred and eight Scottish
monarchs was ranged from Fergus the First,
who in a prophetical oration announced that
the future line from Charles would not be less
numerous. The courtly flattery and the po-
pulous shout died away together, but the
speeches from the planets, the song of the
Muses and the lay of Caledonia — still live for

THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND. 201

those who will seek them in the poems of
Dmmmondof Haw thorn den.*

The romantic city, favoured by Nature for
the refulgent parade, and lengthened proces-
sion, is described at this time as consisting but
of a single street, spacious as it seemed to
them ; and seated on the declivity of the side
of a hill, stretching out a mile in length, from
the Castle to Holyrood-house. The King,
going in state to his coronation, issued from the
Castle followed by all his nobility, riding
through the city to the Palace, where he was
to be crowned. The eye of the spectator could
pursue the glorious pomp at once from the first
to the last, through one vast moving line. The
glory of the Monarch now seemed the pride
of his rejoicing subjects ; a burst of loyalty

* The speech of Caledonia representing the kingdom, has
these nervous lines. She

" Yet in this corner of the world doth dwell,
With her pure sisters Truth, Simplicity ;
A Mars' adoring brood is here, their wealth
Sound minds and bodies of as sound a health ;
Walls here are Men" —

There is a collection of Greek, Latin and English verses.
Some of the poems are highly poetical. The volume is en- '
titled EKBOIA Musarum Edinensium in Caroli Regis Mu-
sarum Tutani ingressu in Scotiam. Edinburgi, 1633.

202 THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND.

broke forth from the many whose eyes dwelt
with affection on the person of their Sovereign,
then held sacred — and the Scottish coronation
for a moment might have effaced from the
recollections of Charles, the almost private, and
less honoured coronation of his England.

We however must pause amidst the shouts,
the festivals and the triumphs of this day.
Could the inaugurated Sovereign surmise- even
in his most thoughtful moments, that this very
population at no distant day, were to turn from
him with the same impetuosity they now fol-
lowed his courser ? When the King counted

o

these waves of the multitude rolling on, and
beheld the regal state which seemed to fortify
his power, could he yet feel that the reality of
this passing grandeur was but a phantom of
glory ? Assuredly there was not yet in Scot-
land a solitary Judas who was calculating the
blood-money of his Monarch ; an enormous
treason could not yet seduce their hopes ;. yet
among the servile million, we are told, there
were countenances which but ill-concealed their
secret designs ; and murmurs and sedition were
amidst the pomp and the triumph.

Kings indeed by drawing their notions from
their own circle acquire but a very restricted
knowledge of men, and of affairs. James and

THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND. 203

Charles, in the love of their father-land, had
scattered their bounties on Scotchmen resident
at their Court, but the Scottish nation only
considered these, as private obligations confer-
red on persons who had the least influence in
their own country. On the contrary those
who affected popularity on the King's arrival,
and were most suspected by Charles, whenever
the King appeared in public would attend
near his person, obtruded themselves on his no-
tice, amused him by their conversation, or at-
tracted his attention to objects new to him.
By their confidence and officiousness, they im-
pressed a notion on the populace that they en-
joyed the royal favour.

Charles, whose manners were stately and for-
mal at all times, could not however repulse
these new companions. Lord Falkland quaint-
ly observed on such obtruders, that " keeping
of State was like committing adultery, there
must go two to it ;" on which Lord Clarendon,
a stern advocate for court-etiquette, makes a
curious reflection ; " A bold and confident man,
instantly demolishes the whole machine of State
by getting within it, however the most formal
man may resolve to keep his distance.''

Thus the King discovered that of all his per-
sonal friends, not one was recognised by the

204 THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND.

people but the Marquis of Hamilton, whose
ambidextrous and ambiguous conduct was even
then suspected ; the novel friendships of his
enemies were more suspicious and more to be
feared.

The Coronation was followed by a Parlia-
ment. The irritated spirits of the Aristocracy,
who not long afterwards triumphed, were not
then inactive. On the very day that the King
made his entry into Edinburgh, the Earl of
Rothes, afterwards one of the leaders of the
Covenant, undertook timely in the morning to
hasten to Dalkeith, to inform his Majesty that
a petition to his Majesty and the Parliament
had been drawn up for redress of all their griev-
ances, but before it was delivered to the Clerk
Register of the Parliament it was deemed de-
cent first to show it privately to the King.
Charles having read this extraordinary petition
returned it to Rothes, sternly saying, " No
more of this, my Lord! I command you!"*
The petition in consequence at that moment
was suppressed, — but it was not destroyed.
Charles probably did not foresee that this very
petition was the seed of that future rebellion
which not many years after was to carry in-

* Bishop Guthry's Memoirs, 9.

THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND. 205

surrection through his kingdoms. This early
mode of his reception in Scotland, must how-
ever have reminded Charles of his former un-
happy meetings with his English Parliaments.

The same Earl of Rothes even ventured to
accuse the Clerk -registers of making a false re-
turn of the votes.* The resistance and difficul-
ty with which matters passed, could only have
been overcome by the personal interference
of the King, who on that day had a list of
the names of the Lords as they were called up ;
observing, " I shall know to-day who shall do
me service." In this manner a forced and mo-
mentary success was obtained, while the seeds
of future commotion were deeply sown in the
soil.f

Hume in following Clarendon was not well-
informed of the Scottish affairs. " No one,"
says he, " could have suspected from exterior
appearances that such dreadful scenes were ap-
.proaching." Yet some contemporary historians
were not insensible to the strength of the rising
party.

In the bold scheme Charles meditated to
break down the arbitrary power of the nobility,
the measure could not be disagreeable to the

* Brodie, ii. 419.

f L' Estrange, 131. — Kennett.

206 THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND.

people, but the design of restoring Prelacy it-
self in this land of Presbyters, was raising up
all those evil spirits which were soon to mar-
shal themselves in array. It was often the fate
of Charles to be prompted by a right motive,
but to be swayed by a false suggestion. By
the side of Charles stood his evil genius — the
Kirk-party scowled, as the Bishop of London in
his rochet preached on the benefits of Confor-
mity and the sacredness of Ceremonies, from
that pulpit, whence Knox had thundered out
their eternal abolition. Was Scotland to be-
come a dependant province of England ? Were
the Presbyters to sink at the feet of the Epis-
copalians? It had been well if Laud, as he
notices in his Diary, had only startled the
Highlanders by the portentous meteor of his
coach, crossing some part of their land, a won-
der they had never seen before ; but his impro-
vident zeal for conformity, unmitigated by po-
licy or address, only left behind him hatreds
and rebellion ; terrible evils which the sagacity
of James had predicted.

Charles in returning from Scotland, notwith -
standing the flourishing accounts of our Eng-
lish writers, could have been as little pleased
with his Scots, as the Scots were with their
Sovereign. The English themselves had been

THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND. 207

feasted and complimented, and they might
have been deceived by the popular illusions of
an inspiring coronation. Laud in his Diary
declares that " He never saw more expressions
of joy than were after it ;" but Laud was too
poor a politician, in the impetuosity of his
temper, when on this very occasion he pushed
aside one of the Scottish Bishops who would
not be clad in the sacred vestment — to detect
the serpent which was sleeping under the
flowers.

Charles could not but be sensible that he
had only carried his point by his own personal
interference, a mode of which the legality was
very questionable. Cares and displeasure were
clouding over the Royal breast — the conduct
of the Monarch betrayed his secret vexation.
Those who openly dissented from the acts
which the King had carried through the Par-
liament were not a few. In one of his pro-
gresses in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh
Charles refused a Provost the usual honour of
kissing hands, because he was one of the Dis-
senters. A curious fact is related by one who
must have been well informed ; the Earl of
Rothes conceived the King had intentionally
disgraced him, when in a progress which his
Majesty made to Fife, the Earl being here-

208 THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND.

ditary Sheriff of that county, assembled all his
friends and vassals in their best equipage to
receive the King; but his Majesty either by
accident or on purpose, went another way, and
missed him ; this the Earl never forgot, and
became one of the first and most active instru-
ments in the future "Rebellion. This we are
told by Sir Edward Walker, the devoted ser-
vant of his Sovereign, merely as an evidence
of one of those slight motives which are suffi-
cient to operate so seriously on certain charac-
ters ; did Sir Edward Walker really think that
his Majesty missed him by accident ?

We may be certain with Rushworth that the
open affront was designed by the King ; the
Earl of Rothes had shown himself pre-emi-
nently at the head of the Dissenters, and if
Charles could resent Non-conformity in a poor
Provost of a town, how much more in an Earl
at the head of his county, and the first bearer
of a petition about grievances !

The King hastened home, where perhaps he
hoped for more tranquil hours. He arrived
suddenly, privately crossing the water at Black-
wall, without making his public entrance into
London ; this was designed to give the Queen,
then at Greenwich, an agreeable surprise.

Kings are doomed to have their most private

THE C011ONATION IN SCOTLAND. 209

and indifferent actions maliciously commented ;
and on this occasion there were who animad-
verted on the difference between King Charles
and . Queen Elizabeth. Such indeed on fre-
quent occasions was the popular comparison
during this reign. Elizabeth never ended her
summer progresses without wheeling about
some end of London, and never went to White-
hall without crossing the City, requiring the
Lord Mayor and Aldermen in their scarlet
robes and chains of gold to meet her, with all
the Companies. This was one of the arts she
practised to maintain Majesty, and to excite
popularity. James * brooked not the formalities
of state, and however lofty his style whenever
Majesty was his theme, no man was more care-
less of its paraphernalia. The retired character
of Charles retained his father's love of privacy,
and avoided these public occasions of engaging
the affections of his people. Both the royal
persons of the father and the son became in
time strange and neglected, and their govern-
ment lost that sympathy among the people,
whose support, at some critical moments, they
found was wanting.

But when the ill-natured spirits, on this
occasion, could mortify Charles for flying, in
the playfulness of his domestic feelings, to his

VOL. III. P

210 THE CORONATION IN SCOTLAND.

Queen, by an odious comparison with Eliza-
beth, they might have recollected that Eliza-
beth had no partner of her life to delight by a
surprise. The only enjoyment that political
Queen was capable of receiving on her return
home, was to be found in the streets, and not
in the lonely palace ; in the shouts of the peo-
ple, and not in the voice and embraces of one
beloved.

HISTORY OF THE PURITANS 211

CHAPTER X.

A CRITICAL HISTORY OF THE PURITANS.

OF THEIR ORIGIN.

No subject in modern history seems more
obscured by the views of the writers, than the
history of that considerable portion of the na-
tion so well-known under the designation of
Puritans. It is a nick-name branding with
derision or abhorrence, or it is a proud title
exalting them, to use the description of a
Scottish biographer of the Covenanters, into
" men a little too low for Heaven, and much
too high for earth."

These active enemies to the established forms
of the Government of England have been con-
demned as a captious, a moody, and a mis-
chievous race, pertinacious on indifferent mat-
ters, and inflexible in their own absolute power,
which is subversive of every other. Their sul-
len and intolerant natures paused not till their

p 2

212 . CRITICAL HISTORY

dissent had spread a general Non- conformity,
in the Monarchy and the Hierarchy of Eng-
land. By the advocates of popular freedom,
these Puritans have been elevated into the very
beatitude of their designation, as " the Salt of
the Earth," the promulgators of civil liberty,
and its martyrs. By the wits, these Puritans
have been exhibited in the grotesque shapes of
ridicule, with very changeable masks on their
faces ; and by the more philosophical, these se-
paratists, not only in dogmas and doctrines,
exhibit a more curious singularity in their
manners, their language, and their sympathies
with their fellow citizens.

What I shall say on the Puritans, will be
first on their origin ; secondly, on their attempts
in England ; thirdly, on the political character
of their founder ; and lastly, I shall account for
the perplexing contradictions in their political
character, and explain why they appear at the
same time the creators of civil and religious
liberty, and its most violent and obnoxious ad-
versaries.

The Protestants of England who flew from
the Marian persecution found a hospitable re-
ception in several towns of Switzerland and Ger-
many. At Frankfort, under the eye of the
magistrate, a church of the French Reformed

OF THE PURITANS. 213

was allowed to be alternately occupied by the
exiles of England. Attentive to the preven-
tion of future controversies and civic troubles,
the policy of the burgher senator required that
the new comers should not dissent from the
French Reformed in doctrine or ceremonies ;
and for their first public act he desired them to
subscribe to the confession of faith which the
French Reformed had not quite finished, but
were about printing ; yet so perfectly tolerant
was the chief magistrate of Frankfort, that he
allowed the English to practise any ceremonies
peculiar to themselves, provided their French
brothers did not object to them. Never was
a magistrate more tolerant, or more authori-
tative. Every thing at this period marks the
feeble infancy of the Reformation.

The miserable are compliant and the fugitive
have no home. The English emigrants raised
no objection to accommodate themselves to the
practices of the French Reformed, who were
of the presbytery of their countryman Calvin.
The Lutherans who still retained many of the
ancient dogmas and ceremonies, appear to have
been so bigoted, as to refuse receiving the
English.

The emigrants, that they might not startle
their new friends with objects strange to view

214 CRITICAL HISTORY

or with matters as yet unheard, stripped their
minister of his surplice, and threw aside the
new Liturgy or Service-book of their late Sove-
reign Edward. In the ministration of the Sa-
craments many things were omitted as " super-
stitious." In the Reformation under Edward
the Sixth some difference of opinion had arisen
from a single Bishop, Hooper, respecting wear-
ing the rochet, and other Ecclesiastical robes.
Hooper had resided in Germany, and had im-
bibed the new discipline ; but subsequently he
had conformed to the regulations laid down in
the Service-book of the English Sovereign.

These first compliant emigrants invited their
dispersed brothers at Strasburgh, Zurich, and
other cities, to join them ; but when several of
these found that they were not allowed the
entire use of what was called " the English
Book," they were on the point of leaving their
Frankfort friends.

The famous Knox now arrived from Geneva,
by invitation, as their minister. The party
who required the use of " the Book of Eng-
land" for the sake of peace, objected not to
omit certain parts of the ceremonial prescribed
in the Anglican service which " the country
could not bear," but they required at least to
have " the substance and the effect." Knox

OF THE PURITANS. 215

and Whittingham asked what they meant by
the substance of the book ? They replied that
they had not come to dispute ; but while some
of their brothers were laying down their lives
for the maintenance of King Edward's Re-
formation, their adversaries might well charge
them with inconstancy, and might well triumph
over the Protestants of England who had ta-
citly rejected their own Service-book. They
prayed for Conformity, " lest by such altering,
they should appear to condemn its chief au-
thors who were now shedding their blood for
it, as if there were imperfection in the doctrine,
and mutability in the men, which might make
even the godly doubt of the truth of which
before they were persuaded."

Knox retorted that what they could prove
of that book to stand with the word of God,
and " the country would permit," should be
granted. But Knox and Whittingham now
professed that the Book of England was " A
Mass-Book ;" and drawing up a Latin version
submitted it to their friend and master, Calvin,
as arbitrator. They were certain of his opi-
nion before they asked for it. The Father of
Dissent, replied that in the English Liturgy " I
see many tolerabiles ineptias ; I mean, that it
has not the PURITY which is to be desired."

216 CRITICAL HISTORY

Tolerabiles ineptias plainly translated was " to-
lerable fooleries," but it was more tenderly
turned into " tolerable unfitnesses." Bishop
Williams observed that, Master Calvin had his
tolerabiles morositates.

The decree of the Oracle of Reformation at
the little town of Geneva, detached some
wavering minds from the English doctrine,
who in the humility of their weakness proba-
bly imagined that they had a distinct notion
of Calvin's purity, and these enabled Knox and
his party to carry all matters in their own way,
shutting up King Edward's Service-Book.*

At this time among these emigrants arrived
from England Dr. Cox, who had been the
tutor of Edward VI. and was afterwards under
Elizabeth, the Bishop of Ely. The uncom-
promising Knox had now to encounter a spirit
dauntless as his own. Knox had voted Cox
and his friends into the church, and it was
considered very ungracious that the last comers

* We may form some idea of the convulsive emotions of
men's minds at this moment, when in one of the papers
which passed between the parties about this time, the fol-
lowing paragraph is set down as a matter of ordinary news.
— " The Bishop of Gloucester, Mr. Hooper, a man worthy
of perpetual memory, "whom -we hear tu be burnt of late"

OF THE PURITANS. 217

should thrust out those who had received them.
Dr. Cox not only had the Liturgy of his royal
pupil observed in defiance of Knox's orders,
but enforced its practice, by that single argu-
ment which resists all other arguments, Ego
volo habere ! All now was trouble and contest.
Both parties appealed to the little senate of the
burghers of Frankfort. A magistrate came
down to remind these disturbers of the town's
peace, of their first agreement — to accord with
the French church, otherwise the church-door
which had been opened might be shut. All
parties instantly consented to obey the magis-
trate. But Dr. Cox was a politician !

The democratic style of Knox, often laid
him open to the arm of " the powers that be."
In his " Admonition to Christians" where he
had called Mary of England a Jezebel, and
Philip by another nickname, he had also called
the Emperor " an idolater, and no less an ene-
my to Christ than Nero." This passage placed
before the eyes of the honest burghers of
Frankfort, in five minutes, was pronounced
to be Ltzsce Majestatis Imperatorice. The only
writer of the history of these troubles at
Frankfort, insinuates, that the party of Cox
cruelly aimed by this ruse at the life of

218 CRITICAL HISTORY

Knox.* The magistracy hinted to Knox's
friends that he had best depart quickly and
quietly — Heylin describes Knox as stealing
away by moonlight ; Neal the historian of
the Puritans records " the magistrates in a re-
spectful manner" desired his departure. Pro-
bably neither of these accounts are true ; both
are warped by the opposite feelings of the
writers. " The stealing away by moonlight"
was a malicious picturesque invention of Hey-
lin, for Knox was accompanied part of his way
by some twenty friends, and we may doubt
" the respectful manner" of the half-terrified
burghers lest the Emperor's council at that
moment sitting at Augsburgh should have the
same information of high treason laid on their
council-table, and the free city cease to be free,
for harbouring a Shimei. But what signify
such minute accidents in the lives of the great
movers of their age ? They weigh not, as the
dust on the balance. The banishment from
Frankfort might form an epoch in the history
of mediocrity, the life of some solitary Non-
conformist— it is scarcely noticeable in the
career of Knox. He who was now hurried

* This writer evidently inclines to the Knoxians, but this
history is not written without candour, and Strype refers to
it as an authentic narrative.

OF THE PURITANS. 219

out of the town of Frankfort, baffled and out-
voted, at no distant day, was to be the most
terrible man whom Scotland ever beheld ;
whose arm uplifted in prayer was to be as a
sword of fire, and the thunder of whose voice
was to convulse a kingdom.

The Nonconformists formed an inconside-
rable minority ; and it is evident that the dig-
nity of the tutor of Edward VI. had greatly
influenced the grave magistracy. After the
flight of Knox, two distinguished Puritans, we
may begin now to give them their names,
Whittingham, afterwards the Dean of Durham,
who turned the stone-coffins of the abbots into
horse-troughs, and Christopher Goodman, whose
book on "Obedience" might more aptly be
termed on " Insurrection," rigidly held to " the
French order, which is according to the order
of Geneva; the purest reformed church in
Christendom."

These fathers of English dissent offered to
dispute against the Coxites, " Coxe et gregali-
bus suis" as Calvin distinguishes them. They
would have proved that the order which these
sought to establish ought not to take place in
any reformed church. Each party looked to
the civil magistrate to protect them from the
other. Dr. Adolphus Glaubtirge a doctor of

220 CRITICAL HISTORY

law, and nephew to Mr. John Glauburge the
senator, made a plain answer, that " Disputa-
tion there should be none, it being decided
that other order than the book of England
they should not have." The nephew referring
to his noble uncle, the uncle to his learned
nephew, in this see-saw of magistracy and the-
ology, the peace of the city was not disturbed
— for the disturbers now in despair of con-
troversy, flew from " the great English book"
to Geneva ; and it was from Geneva that Puri-
tanism afterwards travelled into England.

Such was the origin of that dissent which
sprang up in the infancy of the Church of
England in Exile. It was even increased by
personal quarrels. We stay not to tell of " a
certain controversy which fell out at supper,"
but which however rent the little Anglican
church at Frankfort, by a violent schism, and
as the naive historian describes it through
many a lengthened page " so boiling hot that
it ran over on both sides and yet no fire
quenched."

But what were the simple objects which had
opened this eternal breach ? To say the most
we can for these our first Non-conformists, their
jealousy of Romanism, had inflicted on them
strange horrors of " idolatries," and " supersti-

OF THE PURITANS, 221

tions," for some points of church discipline and
certain accustomed ceremonies, which, abstract-
ed from passion and prejudice, were of them-
selves perfectly indifferent. Such was the
form of baptism ; they insisted that the water
should be taken from a basin and not a fount.
They protested against the churching of wo-
men as a Jewish custom, as if so many others
which they affected were not equally so ! And
this fastidious delicacy of Judaic ceremonies
was shown at the very time they were rejecting
all Grecian and Roman and Saxon names to
adopt the Scriptural names of Hebrew origin
which they translated with a ludicrous barba-
rism.* They would sit and not kneel at the

* This early practice of the Puritans began under Eliza-
beth, since it is noticed by Bancroft in 1595. It was re-
newed with vigour under Charles the First. They not only
adopted Scriptural names to get rid of Popery and Paganism,
but they translated the Hebrew names into English Christian
names — such as Accepted — Ashes — Joyagain — Kill Sin.
They pitched a note higher by adding whole sentences to
their names. The reader has met with " Praise-God Bare-
bones," but he may not be so well acquainted with his two
brothers who it is said assumed Christian names of a more
formidable dimension. The one calling himself " Christ
came into the world to save Barebones," and the other, " If
Christ had not died thou hadst been damned Barebones ;"
which latter for shortness and to distinguish the brothers
was familiarly curtailed to "Damned Barebones !"

222 CRITICAL HISTORY

sacrament, because it was a supper. The sign
of the cross in baptism — the ring in marriage —
the decent surplice of the minister — were not
according " to the French order." Calvin and
Bullinger and the learned in this early era of the
Reformation were distressing themselves and
their readers, with scruples of conscience, which
to this present day are carried on by vulgar
minds, with the same indecorous if not ludicrous
protests.

As men do not leap up, but climb on rocks,
they were only precise, before they were pure.
Their earliest designation was a Precisian. A
satirist of the times when they advanced farther
in their reformation, in rythmes against Martin
Mar- prelate, melts their attributes into one
verse—

" The sacred sect, and perfect pure -precise."

They became Puritans under Elizabeth,
whom in their familiar idiom they compared
to an idle slut who swept the middle of the
room, but left all the dust and filth behind the
doors. "The untamed heifer," as they called
the Queen, long considered them only as " a
troublesome sort of people." The Queen said
that she knew very well what would content
the Catholics, but that she never could learn

OF THE PURITANS. 223

what would content the Puritans. At first
confining themselves to points of ecclesiastical
discipline, they only raised disturbances at " the
candlesticks on the Queen's altar," at " the Ro-
mish rags" and ministers " conjuring robes ;" all
the solemn forms, which viewed in

" The dim religious light"

touch the mind, not polluted by vulgar associ-
ations, in the self-collectedness of its gathered
thoughts.

Who could have foreseen that some pious
men quarrelling about the Service-book of
Edward the Sixth and the square caps and
rochets of bishops, should at length attack
bishops themselves, and by an easy transition
from bishops to kings, finally close in the most
revolutionary democracy ?

After the dissensions at Frankfort, Knox
and Melville and several eminent Englishmen
resorted to Calvin. Associating with a legis-
lating enthusiast whose apostolical habits of life
vouched his own doctrines and whose solitary
contemplation was the institution of a new
order of things, men of their ardent temper
were susceptible of the contagion of his genius.
Knox on his return to Scotland preserved an
uninterrupted correspondence with Calvin; and

224 CRITICAL HISTORY

though he often acted before he consulted the
supreme pastor of Reformation, still he never
ceased with a proud submission to consult on
what had already been done. Calvin at times
had scruples and probably fears at the haste
and heat of this great missionary of revolution,
but his congratulations were more frequent
than his fears. Knox indeed had only victories
to recount, for he propagated the gospel by
demolishing as fast as he procured hands, every
religious edifice ; often leaving notice in the
evening, for the monks to quit in the morning.
Whittingham, who married Calvin's sister,
discovered on his return to England all the
force of his relationship. Christopher Good-
man, an early associate of Calvin, was one of
the heads of the Puritans, till Cartwright, who
had himself sojourned more than once at
Geneva, here became a little Calvin. These
persons with some others, were the originators
of democratical Puritanism, and they soon
opened an intestine war with episcopacy, till
at length in the struggle for supremacy, they
struck at the throne itself.

OF THE PURITANS. 225

CHAPTER XI.

THE CRITICAL HISTORY OF THE PURITANS
CONTINUED. HISTORY OF THE MAR-PRE-
LATES.

THE Ecclesiastical domination had early un-
der Constantine assumed the form of a Monar-
chy, and even in that day the elevated seat of the
Bishop was called a throne.* Every thing re-
lating to Episcopacy is regal. The house of a
Bishop is a palace, as his seat is a throne ; the
crosier is a sceptre ; the mitre a crown ; and in
the inauguration of a Bishop, he is said to be
enthroned. From the Spiritual court are is-
sued Writs in the Bishop's and not in the
King's name, and the Court of Ecclesiastical
Jurisdiction has its Chancellor. A Convocation
of Bishops is an Ecclesiastical Parliament, con-
sisting of an Upper and a Lower House, where

* Cave's Primitive Christianity, c. vi. part i. 140.
VOL. III. Q

226 CRITICAL HISTORY

the Archbishops and the Bishops form the
Aristocracy, and the Commons of the Clergy
are represented by their Deputies. In Eng-
land their title of honour is only that of " Lord."
Archbishop Grindal said that though he was
thus saluted, he did not consider himself " Lord-
ly." The Non -conformist Dr. Sampson, petu-
lantly retorted " If you whom policy hath made
a great Lord be not lordly, you are a Phoenix."
The Ecclesiastical polity seemed always to
conform itself to the Civil. It was now at-
tempted to change that Ecclesiastical polity,
the growth of fifteen centuries. Cartwright in
England maintained that the Church of Christ
was to be regulated by the standard of the
Holy Scriptures ; as in the Apostolical state
" gold and silver they had none." Archbishop
Whitgift, in reply, denied that any particular
government was laid down in the Gospel ; it
was therefore to be inferred that the Church
discipline was to accord with the Civil Govern-
ment. That Apostolical simplicity even to
rudeness, which was adapted to its infancy, had
gradually enlarged its authority and splendour
as the Church grew to its maturity under the
protection of the Civil Magistrate. We per-
ceive here that two able men arguing by two
opposite standards of judgment, may open an

OF THE PURITANS. 227

interminable controversy ; so that in spite of
reason and philosophy, there must inevitably
exist two opposite parties. The last argument
indeed may remain with either, as accident
shall determine, tt is that distinguished argu-
ment called the Ultima ratio Regum, equally
potent at Geneva or London ; the Bishops un-
der Elizabeth punished the Puritans, the Pu-
ritans under Knox and Calvin expelled the
Bishops ; and thus the sword cut the knot
which their fingers could not untie.

When the Presbyters of Calvin reminded
the Episcopalians of Apostolical times and of
primitive Christianity, reproaching their gorge-
ous State and usurped Jurisdiction, they were
reproaching not Bishops, who were but men,
but the natural progression in human affairs,
when men cease to be villagers, and become
citizens. The primeval church was built up
with unhewn trees, when Christians were pea-
sants ;* were we therefore to demolish the ca-
thedral, the magnificent work of art and wealth,
when the Christian empire embraced all Eu-
rope ? Thus too the pilgrim pastor whose sole
revenue was drawn from the alms-box, was

* A very ancient church of this rude construction is still
existing at Grinsted in the neighbourhood of Chipping-
Ongar.

Q2

228 CRITICAL HISTORY

changed into the Lord of his diocese. Churches
were endowed as well as consecrated, and eccle-
siastical lands became as inalienable, in justice,
as the lands of any citizen.

The penury and humiliations of a primitive
Bishop might have reduced the Ecclesiastical
order to the contempt of the people, who are
no reverencers of a brotherhood unguarded by
the ensigns of their authority, and dependant
on the spare bounty of a parish. The Episco-
pal order may be considered as a community
of the learned ; their independence is at once
the stimulus of their ambition, and the guaran-
tee of their literary repose and their literary
exertions. On the contrary principle we see
how the Apostolical Presbyters of Scotland,
early dispersed in remote solitudes, exiled from
the living sources of knowledge, are thrown
out of their age.* The nineteenth century has

* In the speech of the honest Sir Benjamin Rudyard he
foresaw the consequences of this state of humiliation of the
Clergy. " If we pull down Bishopricks and pull down Ca-
thedral churches, in a short time we must be forced to pull
down Colleges too ; for scholars will live and die there as in
cells, if there be no considerable preferment to invite them
abroad. This is the next way to bring in barbarism ! to
make the Clergy an unlearned contemptible vocation, not to
be desired but by the basest of the people."

Fire Speeches of Sir B. Rudyard, p. 28.

OF THE PURITANS. 229

often witnessed in the rude pastor of Knox,
the fierce ungovernable spirit of his master
combined with the traditional prejudices of his
own rude parishioners.

Actuated however by a principle of retro-
gression, these new levellers would have con-
verted a cathedral into a conventicle, and a
bishop into a parish-priest, exacting the equality
of Democracy in the Ecclesiastical Monarchy.
The Bishops in the reign of Elizabeth were
startled at the novel and extraordinary inquiry
whence they derived their power and their
superiority ? They were not only astonished
but were equally unprepared to answer an in-
quiry, which they hardly knew how to treat.

When Henry the Eighth assumed the su-
premacy of the Church, in freeing the nation
from the Papal yoke he not only invested him-
self with the inflexibility of the Papacy, but
had adroitly fitted the novel yoke to the
haughty neck of the prelacy of England. The
Sovereign now no longer dreaded a rebellious,
or a rival power, in his own Hierarchy. No
future Becket could stand at the foot of the
throne, more a sovereign than he who sate on
it. Priestly domination was under the con-
trol of the King, and the patronage, or the
creation of Bishops, being placed in the royal

230 CRITICAL HISTORY

prerogative, Episcopacy was now but a graft
on the strength of the Monarchy.

The English Bishops derived their authority
and dignity from the election of the Sovereign.
The royal supremacy remained unquestioned.
On this subject it is curious to observe that
Rome in its plenitude of power was equally
jealous of this regal privilege. Inculcating
that the Pope alone was the sole head of the
Church appointed by Heaven, all the minor
orders of the priesthood devolved from the
pontifical institution. Against this doctrine as
degrading to their sacred dignity, often had
the bishops struggled. At the Council of
Trent they disputed for their independence
with the warmth of reformers ; the Gallican
church partly emancipated itself from their
despotic pontiff. An Italian bishop having
once inscribed on a missive that he was bishop
by " the grace of God," this presumed " divine
right" was treason in the Roman ecclesiastical
polity ; and the enraged Pope exclaiming that
"the grace of God was never bestowed on
fools," instantly, to show this reformer that he
owed his bishoprick to quite a different source,
unbishopped the bishop.

The memorable controversy now opened on
the authority of the Bishops and Presbyters.

OF THE PURITANS.

It was denied that any superiority was known
in the days of Apostolical equality ; Bishop and
Presbyter denoting the same office, were but
different terms for the same identical character,
and therefore there could be no ordination
from a superior, and no subordination in the
whole order. This mode of opinion went to
establish the en tire in dependence of the Presby-
ters, freed from the sovereignty of Episcopacy.
Hitherto the Anglican Bishops had con-
tented themselves by deriving their title and
office from the royal grant. Bancroft, to put
an end to this novel assumption of parity, sud-
denly took a higher flight, by founding Episco-
pacy on a divine right.* He assumed that an
uninterrupted succession of bishops had been
preserved from the time of the Apostles. It
was the very position in other words, on which
pontifical Rome had settled her own divine
authority, and holds the keys of St. Peter in a
perpetual reversion.

* Neal points to Bancroft's famous sermon at Paul's-
cross in 1528 for this assumption. There neither Mr. Hal-
lam, nor myself, have discovered it. The anecdote however
told of Whitgift, which the reader will shortly find, confirms
the notion that the doctrine though novel, was well known.
Lord Bacon has also observed that this notice was then newly
broached, in his Tract on the Controversies of the Church of
England.

232

From this doctrine it resulted, that if no
man could be a priest without the ordination
of the Bishop's hands, all the unordained Pres-
byters were reduced to laymen, incapacitated
for ministerial functions, or subordinate to the
Bishops.

This assumption of the divine right of Epis-
copacy troubled legal heads who looked on it
suspiciously as an infringment of the royal
prerogative. Was the crosier to divide domi-
nion with the sceptre ? The boldness of the
claim even startled the Presbyters — and in
their terror of the divine right of Episcopacy
the Puritans at Court attempted to bring the
Bishop himself into a premunire. But Ban-
croft had reserved his after-blow, maintaining
that the divine right of Episcopacy was by no
means derogatory to the royal supremacy,
since it was that very supremacy which con-
firmed it. The novelty of the doctrine, even
Whitgift admitted, was what he wished rather
than what he believed to be true.

In this history of human nature, it is worthy
of observation, that those very Presbyters who
at first had so stiffly opposed the jus divinum
of Episcopacy, which seemed fatal for them, at
length assumed it themselves ! Bancroft, the
High-church Episcopalian, and Cartwright the

OF THE PURITANS. 233

Presbyter from Geneva, alike agree in elevat-
ing the Ecclesiastical jurisdiction above the tem-
poral power ; both aimed at the same predomi-
nance.

This, in regard to the Puritans, still more
remarkably appeared when their distant day of
triumph arrived, and the divine right of the
Presbytery was transferred to themselves, while
the rejected Bishops of England, such was the
mighty change ! were reduced to become them-
selves vagrants and Non-conformists ! When
Presbyters sat in Parliament the jure divino
was debated, in their Assembly of Divines at
Westminster, for thirty tedious days. Many
protested against it, dreading the arbitrary go-
vernment of these Evangelicals pretending to
a divine right; it seemed a spurious Theo-
cracy. The calm sense of Whitelocke by a
subtile inference attempted to induce them to
adjourn the interminable debate to some dis-
tant day. " If this Government," said this
judicious statesman, " be not jure divino, no
opinion of any Council can make it so ; and
if it be jure divino it continues so still, though
you do not declare it to be so." The learned
Selden on his Erastian principles, insisted on
the supreme authority of the civil magistrate
which this divine right of Presbytery was sup-

234 CRITICAL HISTORY

planting. He tired out this whole assembly
of Presbyters, perpetually confuting them in
their own learning, by appealing to the ori-
ginal text, instead of their " little gilt pocket-
Bibles" to which they were incessantly re-
ferring. This Presbyterian Assembly of Di-
vines however obtained their " divine right"
by a majority among themselves, but having
to refer the decision to the Commons, they
lost their divine right in the House. It is a
curious fact that the priests of the Calvinian
government, who should have been the oracles
of their lay-members, having only obtained
their present eminent situation at Westminster
by intrigue, and for a state-purpose that was
to destroy Episcopacy, were only on tolerance ;
so that the true genius of the Presbyterial go-
vernment was reversed ; for now the Laymen
held their ascendency over the Priests. In all
political constitutions there are unlucky changes
which legislators hardly ever foresee. The As-
sembly of Divines were at this moment en-
tirely under the thumb of their politicians in
the Commons, their lay lords and masters ! A
Parliamentary anecdote has been recorded of
these times. The Presbyters attempted to
carry their question by a very early attend-
ance in a thin House. Glyn and Whitelocke

OF THE PURITANS. 235

perceiving their drift, delayed the resolution,
each speaking for a long hour, till the House
filled.*

The times however in the following year
became more ticklish — and the Scottish Pres-
byterian army in 1645 was near enough to
create botli fear and love among the parties.
The Presbyterial Government was allowed a
probation, as a civil institution, to be reversed
or amended ; both Houses at the same time
declaring that " they found it very difficult to
make their new Apostolical settlement agree
with the laws and government of the king-
dom."t The spiritual sword once placed in
the hands of those who presumed they were
acting by divine appointment, it was soon seen,
that the laws of the land, were no laws to
those who claimed " the keys of the kingdom
of Heaven."^:

Knox and Cartwright, at the earliest period
of the Calvinistical democracy, had attempted
to raise the spiritual over the temporal power,
for although it seemed that they were aiming

* Whitelocke's Memorials, 106. Both these members re-
ceived the thanks of many " for preventing the surprisal of
the House, upon this great question."

t Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, iii. 249. 8vo.
Ibid. iii. 242. 8vo.

236 CRITICAL HIST011Y

only to dethrone Bishops under Elizabeth, by
a more circuitous way they were attempting
the subjugation of the Sovereign under " the
holy Discipline," as afterwards they sought to
reduce Charles the First to a King of " the
Covenant."

It is remarkable that in a government found-
ed on the principles of Democracy, the style
that it gradually assumed became regal. It
described its acts by perpetual allusions to the
potency, and the ensigns, of absolute Mo-
narchy. The first English Puritans abound
with such expressions as " the advancement
of Christ's sceptre"' — " this divine government"
— " the tribunal, or the throne of Jesus." This
style became traditional among the latest of
the race. In a modern volume of the Lives
of the Covenanters, we find such expressions
as " Christ then reigned gloriously in Scot-
land"— " The Crown-rights of our Redeemer"
— " The throne of the Lamb"— and " Christ's
regalia." In the army of the Covenanters in
1639 every captain had his colours flying at
his tent, bearing this inscription in letters of
gold " Christ's Crown and Covenant."* Vicars

* Lives of the Scots' Worthies, Preface. — Stevenson's
Hist, of the Church and State of Scotland, ii. 729.

OF THE PURITANS. 237

the Parliamentary chronicler called the army
of the Earl of Essex, «' Christ's army royal."

The great father of Puritanism in England
appeared in the reign of Elizabeth. Thomas
Cartwright was a person of some eminence and
doubtless of great ambition, which in early
life had been hurt by the preference which the
Queen had shown to his opponent at a phi-
losophy act in the University of Cambridge.
Elizabeth had more critically approved of those
lighter elegancies in which the grave Cart-
wright was deficient. He had expatriated him-
self several years, and returned from Calvin
endowed with a full portion of his revolu-
tionary spirit. Again was Cartwright poised
against Whitgift the Queen's Professor of Di-
vinity. As Cartwright advanced his novel
doctrines, Whitgift regularly preached them
down, but to little purpose, for whenever
Cartwright preached they were compelled to
take down the windows to make entrances for
the confluence of his auditors. Once, in the
absence of Whitgift, this master of novel doc-
trines so powerfully operated on the minds of
the youths of the college, in three sermons on
one Sunday, that in the evening, his triumph
was declared by the students of Trinity reject-

238 CRITICAL HISTORY

ing their surplices as papistical badges. Cart-
wright was now to be confuted by other means.
The University condemned him to silence, and
at length performed that last feeble act of pow-
er— expulsion ! In a heart already alienated
from the established authorities, this could only
envenom a bitter spirit ; Royalty he personally
disliked, and the University had insulted him ;
the new forms of his religion accorded with
his political feelings.

Cartwright does not scruple to declare his
purpose. While the Puritans were affecting
to annihilate the Church of England as a re-
mains of the Roman Supremacy, they proposed
to establish one according to their own fancy,
by which all Sovereigns should consider them-
selves, as " nourrisses or servants under the
Church ; so they must remember to subject
themselves unto the Church ; yea, as the pro-
phet speaketh, to lick the dust of the feet of
the Church."* Explicit ! Yet Cartwright in
a joint production with Travers, another very
eminent person, the domestic Chaplain of Cecil
and the popular Lecturer at the Temple, warm-
ed by the genius of his associate is still bolder ;
they insist that " the Monarchs of the world
should give up their sceptres and crowns unto
* Cartwright's " Defence of the Admonition."

OF THE PURITANS. 239

him (Jesus Christ) who is represented by the
officers of the Church."* Still more explicit,
and more ingenious, we may listen for a minute
to the whole art .of political Government. "The
world is now deceived that thinketh that the
Church must be framed according to the Com-
monwealth, and the Church government ac-
cording to the civil government, which is as
much as to say, as if a man should fashion his
house according to his hangings, whereas in-
deed, it is clear contrary. As the hangings are
made fit for the house, so the Commonwealth
must be made to agree with the Church, and
the government thereof with her government ;
for as the house is before the hangings, there-
fore the hangings, which come after, must be
framed to the house, which was before ; so the
Church being before there was any Common-
wealth and the Commonwealth coming after,
must be fashioned and made suitable to the
Church : otherwise God is made to give place
to man, Heaven to earth." | About eighty

* See a " Full and plain declaration of Ecclesiastical dis-
cipline."— 185.

-)• Defence of the Admonition, 181. The same feeling is
perpetuated among the Puritans; thus the Independent Cot-
ton Mather observes that the description of the whole world
by the first-born of all historians, (by which we must infer

240 CRITICAL HISTORY

years after, these saints ruled England, and in
their ordinance 1646, covered the land with
their classes, synods, and general assemblies.

From the Church, it is scarcely a single step
to the cabinet. The history of these Puritans,
exhibits the curious spectacle of a great reli-
gious body covering a political one: such as
was discovered among the Jesuits, and such as
may again distract the empire in som,e new and
unexpected shape.

Cartwright employs the very style which a
certain class of political reformers long after
have used. He declares that " an establish-
ment may be made without the magistrate,"
and he told the people that *' if every hair of
their head was a life, it ought to be offered for
such a cause." It was not therefore strange
that such notions should create a faction among
the people, which assumed the expressive de-

that the Egyptians had no historians before Moses,) is con-
tained in one or two Chapters, but the description of the
Tabernacle occupies " seven times as many chapters." And
the reason of this difference is he thinks, that the Church is
far more precious than the wurU, which indeed was created
for the use of the Church. Thus the great science of Politics
is reduced to a Tabernacle Government ; this was the true
secret of " the fiery Puritans" as Fuller distinguished the
class. — Cotton Mather's Introduction to Magnalia Christi
Americana, 84. ,

OF THE PURITANS. 241

signation of " The Mar-prelates." These new
doctrines of Cartwright echoed in their cla-
mour. One of these Revolutionists is for " re-
gistering the names of the fittest and hottest
brethren, without lingering for Parliament."
Another exults that " there are a hundred
thousand hands ready." " What a stroke," he
cries, " so many would strike together !" A
third tells, that " we may overthrow the Bishops
and all the Government in one day, but it will
not be yet in a twelvemonth and a half!"*

This was the sanguine style of " the London
Corresponding Society;" and to run the par-
allel still closer, the whole frame and consti-
tution of the Genevan discipline might have
served as the model of the modern conspiracy.

A stream of libels ran throughout the nation,
under the portentous name of Martin Mar-
prelate. This extraordinary personage in his
collective form, for he is to be split into more
than one, long terrified Church and State. He
walked about the kingdom invisibly, dropping
here a libel and there a proclamation; but wher-
ever Martinism was found, there Martin was
not. He prided himself in what he calls
" pistling the Bishops," a very ambiguous term,
but according to his own vulgar orthoepy, he

* Madox Vindication, 255.
VOL. III. R

242 CRITICAL HISTORY

pretends it only meant " Epistling them."
Sometimes he hints to his pursuers how he may
be caught, for he dates " Within two furlongs
of a bouncing Priest," or " In Europe," while
he acquaints his friends who are so often un-
easy for his safety, that " he has neither wife
nor child," and prays " they may not be anx-
ious for him, for he wishes that his head might
not go to the grave in peace." — " I come with
the rope about my neck, to save you, how-
soever it goeth with me."

His press is interrupted, and Lambeth seems
to breathe in peace. But he has " a son, nay
five hundred sons," and Martin Junior starts
up. " Why has my father been tongue-tied
these four or five months ? Good nuncles (the
Bishops) have you choked the gentleman with
a fat prebend or two ? I trow my father will
swallow down no such pills, for he would thus
soon purge away all the conscience he hath.
Do you mean to have the keeping of him?
What need that ? A meaner house than the
Tower, the Fleet, or Newgate, would serve
him well enough. He is not of that ambitious
vein that the Bishops are, in seeking for more
costly houses than ever his father built for
him." Another of these " five hundred sons"
declares himself to be " his reverend and elder

OF THE PURITANS. 243

brother, heir to the renowned Martin Mar-pre-
late the Great."

Such were the mysterious personages who
for a long time haunted the palaces of the
Bishops and the vicarages of the Clergy, dis-
appearing at the moment they were suddenly
perceived to be near. Their invectives were
well farced for the gross taste of the multitude.
The Mar-prelate productions were not the ele-
vated effusions of genius ; the authors were
grave men who affected the dialect of the
lowest of the populace to gain them over in
their own way. They were best answered by
the flowing vein of the satirical Tom Nash ;
and Martin becomes grave after having swal-
lowed some of his own sauce, and taken " his
pap with a hatchet," administered to these suck-
lings of sedition.*

* The title of one of Nash's pamphlets, against the Mar-
prelates. These libels, which enter into our national history,
are of the greatest rarity. Some of these works bear evi-
dent marks that " the pursuivants" were hunting the print-
ers— a number of little Martins were disturbed in the hour
of parturition, for we have the titles of imperfect works.
The curious collector may like to learn that there once ex-
isted, and probably may yet be found, a Presbyterian edition
of these Martinisms. I find mention of it in Bancroft's
" Dangerous Positions." " For fear that any of these rail-
ing pamphlets should perish they have printed them alto-
gether in Scotland in two or three volumes, containing three
and forty of the said libels."— Bancroft, p. 46.

R 2

244 CRITICAL HISTORY

Never did sedition travel so fast, nor hide
itself so closely ; for the family of Martin em-
ployed a moveable press, and as soon as it was
surmised that Martin was in Surrey, it was
found he had removed to Northamptonshire,
while the next account came that he was show-
ing his head in Warwickshire. Long they in-
visibly conveyed themselves, till in Lancashire
the snake was scotched by the Earl of Derby
with all its little brood.

This outrageous strain of ribaldry and ma-
lice which Martin Mar-prelate indulged, ob-
tained full possession of the minds of the popu-
lace. These revolutionary publications reach-
ed the Universities, for we have a grave admo-
nition in Latin addressed to those who never
read Latin.* Who could have imagined that
the writers of these scurrilities were scholars,!
and that their patrons were men of rank?

* Anti-Martinus sive monitio cujusdam Londinensis ad
adolescentes utriusque academiae contra personatum quen-
dam rabulam qui se Anglice Martin Mar-prelate, &c. 1589,
— 4to.

f John Penry, one of the most active of these writers, was
hanged. The learned Udall perished in prison. Udall de-
nied that he had any concern in these invectives, but in his
library some manuscript notes were considered as materials
for Martin -Mar-prelate, which Udall confessed were written
by " a friend."

OF THE PURITANS. 245

Two knights were heavily fined for secreting
these books in their cellars. The libels were
translated, and have been often quoted by the
Romanists abroad and at home, for their par-
ticular purpose, just as the revolutionary pub-
lications in this country have been concluded
abroad to be the general sentiments of the
people of England ; and thus our factions al-
ways serve the interests of our enemies.

Cartwright approved of these libels, and well
knew the concealed writers, who indeed fre-
quently consulted him. Being asked his opi-
nion of such books, he observed that " Since
the Bishops and others there touched, would
not amend by grave books, it was therefore
meet that they should be dealt withal to their
further reproach, and that some books must be
earnest, some more mild and temperate, where-
by they may be both of the spirit of Elias and
Eliseus," the one the great mocker, the other
the more solemn reprover. It must be con-
fessed that Cartwright here discovers a deep
knowledge of human nature. He knew the
force of ridicule and of invective. The art of
libelling is no inefficient prelude to revolution-
ary measures ; and it will be found often to
have preceded them.

But it was not only by a moveable press,

246 CRITICAL HISTORY

unceasing libels, and other invisible practices,
that this faction menaced the quiet of the
State, it is evident by proclamations, and by
frequent letters, from the Ministers of Eliza-
beth, that the Queen was more alarmed at
the secret and mysterious correspondence of
its members.

The secret meetings of this party, we are
told, had at first begun in private houses ; they
afterwards assembled in woods and fields, till
these assemblies became periodical, and were
held at stated places. These meetings were
kept up very secretly, their appointments being
only made known to those who belonged to
the quarter in which they were held. Some
Scottish fugitives, at length, introduced their
" discipline," and conspiracy now took a wider
circuit and moved in more intricate ways. The
holy discipline as it was termed, branched out
into the forms of a dangerous confederacy
against the Government ; and though religion
alone constituted their plea, yet the result was
perfectly political ; for some of their leaders had
urged not to keep themselves in corners, but to
show themselves publicly to defend the truth.

The whole kingdom was subdivided by these
Puritans, and placed under a graduated sur-
veillance. A national synod, or national as-

OF THE PURITANS. 247

sembly was to be their Parliament, to consist
of delegates from the provincial synods. The
provincial synods were assemblies of delegates
from the classes ; every province consisted of
twenty-four classes. And these classes were
spread through all the shires of England. Pro-
vincial synods were busied in Warwickshire,
in Northamptonshire, in Suffolk, in Essex ; the
line of communication was unbroken. This
Nile of Insurrection, in casting its waters over
the land, seemed to have many a dark source
—it was at Cambridge, or at Warwick, places
where Cartwright often abode, or at London
where Travers and others sate in a synod.
Their places of meeting were changeable, and
only known to their own party, and they were
rather to be discovered by their removals, than
by their meetings. Such secret societies, and
such clandestine practices warranted the alarms
of the cabinet of Elizabeth.

Among other devices they made a survey
of the number of churches, and of persons in
every parish. What was concluded in the
classical associations was sent upwards through
the others, till the whole centered in their pro-
vincial assemblies, which finally were deter-
mined by synods or meetings in London.
These were of the greatest authority under

248 CRITICAL HISTORY

the guidance of Cartwright, Travers, and others
whose names have come down to us. The
synods of London alone ratified the decrees
of the subaltern governments, and from the
synods of London alone emanated the orders
which regulated the members through every
county.

The Puritan faction however affirmed that
their whole system was solely directed to the
reformation of the Church, and the establish-
ment of the Presbyterial discipline. But they
were betrayed by the depositions of some faith-
less brothers ; such as one Edwards whom Ban-
croft thus designates, " then of that faction but
now a very honest man." Possibly the minis-
ters of Elizabeth had employed that usual pre-
vention of treason in sending a wolf in sheep's-
clothing, or what the French revolutionary
police termed a mouton, among this saintly
flock; for unquestionably to the eye of the
statesman, the political design of the synodical
discipline assumed all the menacing appearances
of an organized conspiracy. The civil magis-
trate was allowed to share in the common
equality, but should he refuse " admonition"
he was to be excommunicated ; nor was the
Sovereign less exempt than the ordinary magis-
trate, in this democracy of priests and elders.

OF THE PURITANS. 249

This Presbyterial government with all the ex-
terior of a popular assembly, proved to be the
horriblest tyranny which ever afflicted a com-
munity.

This monstrous government was not con-
ducted without policy. The people at large
were not as yet to be stirred up until they
were better instructed in " the discipline ;" but
the maturer and more daring spirits were to
be privately encouraged. When they ambigu-
ously mentioned in this Book of Discipline
that " other means" besides petitioning the
Sovereign and the Parliament were to be re-
sorted to for the advancement of their cause,
they found this peculiar phrase more difficult
to expound, than did the royal council. They
not only insisted on the independence of the
Church, but they declared that the chief magis-
trate was only a member of the church, as any
other citizen. Their true design, and they
were sanguine of its success, appeared in some
intercepted letters. When one of the more
innocent class, objected to their proceedings in
reviling the Anglican church and the difficulty
of beating into the heads of the common
people, their new reformation, an eminent
Puritan replied " Hold your peace ! since we
cannot compass these things by suit, nor by

250 CRITICAL HISTORY

dispute, it is the multitude and people which
must bring them to pass." As is usual in all
similar conspiracies the fiery spirits had as-
sumed that their " reformation cannot come
without blood ;" and those who afterwards
manifested to the world that they were willing
to shed theirs, could not be expected to exact
less from their adversaries.

Neal, the historian of the Puritans, as an
apology for their proceedings, urges that " they
had for several years peaceably waited for the
consent of the Magistrate ; but if after all, the
consent of the Magistrate must be expected be-
fore we follow the dictates of our conscience,
there would have been no Reformation in the
Protestant world." Neal does not deny the
secret design of this great confederacy, and ex-
cuses it on the plea of conscience. The con-
science of these saints then was to put the con-
temptible yoke of a Presbytery on the neck of
a great people, and while they were combating
with the usurpations of the Court of Rome
were converting their Father-land into the
same " Kingdom of Priests." Milton in his
anger denounced them ;

" New Presbyter is but old Priest writ large."
" That is," says Warburton, " more domineer-

OF THE PURITANS. 251

ing and tyrannical." It was indeed only a de-
thronement of the same class of Priests to trans-
fer the same plenitude of power to another
race under a different designation.

About sixty years afterwards these very Pu-
ritans triumphed and exhibited to the astonish-
ment of Europe their singular government.
They were constructing the constitution of
England by the Judaic model. The observ-
ance, or the non-observance, of the Code of
Moses, occasioned perpetual confusions among
these modern Israelites, till some of their politi-
cians hesitated to adopt what was not found
expedient ; but they ever appealed to the laws
of Moses when they thought proper to insist
on their perpetuity. We therefore know what
this party designed to have done, by what
they did.

It seemed extravagant in the days of Eliza-
beth when the writer of one of the intercepted
letters advised " Let us take our pennyworths of
them (the Bishops) and not die in their debt !"
Another more humanely apprehended that
" The Commonwealth would be pestered with
a new race of beggars— in the Bishops and the
Deans and all the Churchmen ejected from
their offices." Such sanguine politicians only
anticipated the event which occurred under
Charles the First I

252 CRITICAL HISTORY

CHAPTER XII.

CRITICAL HISTORY OF THE PURITANS CON-
TINUED.— OF THE POLITICAL CHARACTER
OF CALVIN.

THE father of Presbytery and Puritanism is
held to be CALVIN ; his admirers look on this
as his triumph ; others reproach the novel sys-
tem as incompatible with the existing state of
human affairs ; great kingdoms are to be go-
verned, and not parochial republics to be super-
intended. Dangerous principles, subversive of
established governments, were ascribed to the
Puritans, as afterwards to the famous order of
the Jesuits.

In what degree these charges attach to the
Republican polity of Calvin has not perhaps
been developed with all the impartiality that is
requisite. We must contemplate the genius
of this legislator who founded this new state of

OF THE PURITANS. 253

human affairs, before we decide on the father
by some of his sons.

The mighty Reformer of Geneva had mo-
delled a new government. Purity of doc-
trine, holiness of discipline, and the equality
of primitive Christianity were proclaimed. It
may be useful to explain what Calvin meant
by the peculiar phrase of " Purity of doc-
trine." It was religion entirely freed from all
" Superstitions," that is, the Romish ceremo-
nies and the Roman creed. The term " Su-
perstition" is perpetually recurring in his great
work of " The Institution of the Christian
Religion." The Genevan model designed to
rule the Christian world, in accordance with
the mystical origin which some legislators have
ascribed to their codes, was at first declared to
be framed on " the Pattern in the Mount," that
is, the polity which Moses by his father-in-law's
suggestion, appointed on Mount Sinai, to regu-
late the affairs of his tribes.* This the Jews
imitated in their synagogue. Every parish
now was to form a synagogue. The priest was
revived in the Pastor ; the Levites in the Doc-
tors of Divinity ; the rulers of the Synagogue
in the Lay -Elders, and the Levitical officers in
* Bancroft's Sermons at Paul's Cross, 1588, 8vo.

254 CRITICAL HISTORY

the Deacons. Such was " the tabernacle of the
congregation."*

This " Pattern in the Mount" found parti-
sans in France, in Switzerland, and in Ger-
many ; it became established in Scotland, and
had nearly decided the fate of England.

It is as a theoretical and a practical politician
and not merely as a theologian that we are
now to consider this great reformer, the founder
of a new government, we had almost said a
new theocracy.

Calvin, without question, was a Republican,
and his whole polity was framed by that of a
petty, we may say a parochial republic. It is
alleged however that, though a Republican, he
was not hostile to monarchical government, and
we find in the closing chapter of his great
work of the " Institution," which may be con-
sidered as the confession of his political faith,
the most enlightened general views of human
governments, allowing to different countries,
different forms, and rejecting with disdain the

* The counsel of Jethro, who considered it unwise in
Moses to sit alone to judge the people while they flocked to
him " from morning to evening," and for which, as Jethro
observed, " Thou shalt surely wear away," is contained in
Exodus xvii. 13 to 26. Lord Bacon thought that it was
hence that Alfred took his idea of Sheriffs and hundreders
and deciners, according to the Saxon Constitution.

OF THE PURITANS.

futile inquiry, which form is absolutely and in
itself the best ?

As a divine, Calvin acknowledged that strict
submission to monarchical government which
is enjoined in holy writ. The very able apo-
logist of Calvin indeed asserts, that Calvin could
never support " the abominable doctrine that
the misconduct of a king sets the subject free,
without contradicting the principles he lays
down in the last chapter of his * Theological
Institutions' of the duty of submission even to
the worst of kings, in things not contrary to
the express commands of God." And as Mil-
ton included the name of Calvin among the
other early Reformers, to sanction the practices
of his commonwealth, Bishop Horsley has in-
dignantly repelled the imputation.

The truth is, that the Bishop has not taken
an enlarged view of the political principles of
Calvin. His sentiments on governments are
but vague generalities, cautiously qualified,
and the whole system of his politics revolves
on the theological question, " Whether the
prince rises in rebellion against God?" This
leaves a wide gate open for the party who will
take on themselves the decision. We know
how the Puritans of England and the Pres-
byters of Scotland resolved the matter.

256 CRITICAL HISTORY

The same sacred source whence Calvin had
been taught submission, even to the govern-
ment he loved not, would also supply examples
of that holy insurrection against arbitrary
princes or tyrants, which would fall into- a
Republican's notions. And indeed at the close
of the very chapter to which Bishop Horsley
refers, to show that Calvin was not that revolu-
tionary genius which Milton proclaims, we find
a remarkable passage which tells more in fa-
vour of the political Poet than of the political
Bishop. Calvin indeed does not allow the pri-
vate man to take on himself the punishment of
tyrannical monarchs ; but the sceptres of evil
kings may be broken — kings, those vicarious
representatives of the Divinity, if their li-
centiousness pollute their authority, may be
put down by the power of magistrates, who
are constituted to defend the people ; such as
were the Ephori, among the Lacedemonians,
and the Tribunes among the Romans, and this
popular magistracy in modern times, Calvin
assigns to the assembly of the three states in a
kingdom.* Calvin too contemplates on a pow-
erful empire as a powerful evil, and censures
" the folly and madness of the people who
desire to have kings of irresistible power, which

* See his Institutions, lib. iv. — cap. xx. sect. 31.

OF THE PURITANS. 257

is just the same as to desire a river of irresisti-
ble rapidity as Isaiah describes this folly." He
explicitly says " Earthly princes divest them-
selves of their authority when they rise in
rebellion against God ; they are unworthy to
be reputed among men, it were better to spit
upon their persons than to obey them." These
sentiments strangely contrast with those of
that passive obedience which he inculcates in
the same chapter. It must be confessed that
a revolutionary writer might dexterously press
the name of Calvin into his service, though it
must remain but an ambiguous authority.

The truth seems, that the science of politics
formed but a secondary object with Calvin,
who was unceasingly occupied in founding a
new religious dominion in which Monarchists
and Republicans might equally co-operate, pro-
vided that the Church was made independent
of, and even supreme over the civil magistrate.
This new legislator was only at open war with
those Sovereigns in the Church whom Epis-
copacy had enthroned.

In the novel democracy of the Consistory of
Calvin, Ministers and Laics sate together. Cal-
vin flattered the weakness of human nature by
the appearance of a political equality.
VOL. in. s

258 CRITICAL HISTORY

But the whole system was a delusion, for the
tyrannical genius of its inventor first deprived
man of his free-will.

The Apostle of Geneva by the bewitching
terror of his dogmatic theology had enthralled
his followers for ever, by a mysterious bondage
of the mind ; out of which no human argument
could ever extricate them — an immutable ne-
cessity ! The dark imagination of the subtil-
izing divine had presumed to scan the decree
of Omnipotence, as if the Divinity had re-
vealed to his solitary ear the secret of the
Creation. He discovers in the holy scriptures,
what he himself has called "a most horrible
decree." Who has not shuddered at the fume
of the distempered fancy of the atrabilarious
Calvin ?

The exterior parity of this new Democracy,
so seductive to the vulgar, was a no less cruel
delusion. In Calvin's mingled Republic of
Presbyters and Elders, the Elders, annually
chosen, trembled before their sacred Peers, who
being permanent residents had the Elders at
all times under their eye and their inquisitorial
office. When" the Presbyterial government
was set up in England, Clarendon observed
that the Archbishop of Canterbury had never

OF THE PURITANS. 259

so great an influence as Dr. Burgess and Mr.
Marshall, nor did all the Bishops in Scotland
together so much meddle in temporal affairs as
Mr. Henderson. Even at a later period, al-
most within our own times, the moderate Non-
conformist Calamy, whose curious memoirs
have been recently published, being present at
one of the general assemblies of Scotland, was
astonished at their inquisitorial spirit, and ob-
serving their proceedings against a hapless in-
dividual, he said he did not know till then, that
there was an Inquisition established in Scot-
land. His opinion being conveyed to the
Prseses, gave great dissatisfaction to the vene-
rable Presbytery. Thus the people had only
been enchanted by an imposture of power ; for
it seemed to them that they were participating
in power which was really placed far out of
their reach.

The same fertile genius which had made
" our Father in Heaven" a human tyrant, and
raised the mortal criminal into beatitude, now
invested his own Levites and his own " Rulers
of the Synagogue" with supremacy. In this
new Papacy, as in the old, they inculcated
passive obedience, armed as they were with the
terrors of excommunication. The despotism

s 2

260 CRITICAL HISTORY

of Rome was transferred to Geneva. All was
reversed, but the nucleus of power had only
removed its locality.

Vast and comprehensive as seemed the sys-
tem of the Calvinian rule in its civil capacity,
it was in truth moulded on the meanest and
the most contracted principles ; it was the
smallest scale of dominion which ever legislator
meditated ; and Calvin, with all his ardent ge-
nius, had only adroitly adopted the polity of
the petty republic where chance had cast the
fugitive Frenchman. A genius inferior to his
own could not have imagined that kingdoms
of Protestants could be ruled like the eleven
parishes of the town of Geneva, where every
Thursday, the Ministers and the Elders were
to report all the faults of their neighbours.
" The divine simplicity of the discipline " of
the Church of Scotland is the theme of Calder-
wood's history, who however does not conceal
that some grew weary of " the lowly, but love-
ly, parity of the Presbyters." The Eldership
is watchful over his parish, but should the
offender prove still contumacious he is handed
over to the Presbytery ; and if still obstinate,
the Presbytery consign him to the subtile
heads of the Synod, and should the Synod
fail to convert the rebel into an obedient son,

OF THE PURITANS. 261

he is finally resigned to the excommunication
of the General Assembly, and one day " that
soul shall be cut off from Israel." They stran-
gled heresy, and they annihilated freedom, by
this graduated scale of tyrannical bondage.

This new scheme of human affairs, formed
of this burgher equality and this apostolical
purity, at that revolutionary period was pro-
claimed by Calvin's incessant correspondence
on doctrinal points throughout Europe. It
was no mean ambition to rule over the churches
of so many realms, and to dictate to Monarchs
how their people were to be governed. In
England the Protector under Edward VI. was
one of the royal correspondents of Calvin, and
was himself a great courter of popularity. The
Protector designed to abolish Episcopacy —
and probably his first step was the sacrilegious
seizure, without atonement or compensation, of
those Church lands on which the Duke raised
that stupendous palace the work of an Italian
architect, and of which the name has survived
the edifice.* So easy is it to combine the
pomps of this earth with even ascetic Puritan-
ism ! Calvin complained to the Duke of So-
merset of the great impurities and vices of
England — in swearing, drinking, and unclean-

* Pennant's London — 128— Somerset House.

262 CRITICAL HISTORY

ness.* It does not appear, historically, that
England was more afflicted with these moral
grievances than France or Germany ; and whe-
ther the eleven parishes of his own Geneva,
with all its " purity" and its espionage, and to
use a favourite expression of Calvin's all " the
nerves of its discipline," were, in proportion to
the population, more exempt, may be reason-
ably doubted, since some of its members are
stigmatised in the history of the Calvinian
rule, which however made dancing a crime
equal to adultery. Such minute matters, in
the moral habits of a people, like the nails and
the screws of a mighty engine, were to be
scrutinised, as holding together the machinery
of this novel government.

The fervid diligence of this extraordinary
man was commensurate with the vastness of
his genius. His life was not protracted ; he
was a martyr to constant bodily pain, and the
physical sufferings of the man are imagined to
have shown themselves in the morose and vehe-
ment character of the legislator. The purity
of doctrine, in some part at least, consisted in
dethroning bishops ; denuding ministers of the
sacerdotal vestments, and banishing from the
religious service, all the accessories of devotion.

* Burnet's Hist, of the Reformation, ii. 88. fo.

OF THE PURITANS. 263

Calvin seems to have imagined that man be-
comes more spiritualized in the degree he ceases
to be the creature of sensation and of sympathy,
as if the senses were not the real source of our
feelings. But as he who is reckless of his own
life is master of every other man's, so the great
hermit of reformation, who disdained all per-
sonal interests, seemed to think and to act only
for the world. Calvin might have founded
his supremacy on the immortality of his own
genius. His Commentaries, his Institutions, his
never-ceasing discourses, had been sufficient to
induce the Christian world to invest him with
the authority which ruled it. Conscious of
dispensing the fate of distant realms, the sick
man often in his bed, nerved his infirm frame
to the labours which consumed it. Besides
more than nine folios of his works, and several
inedited volumes, no day passed without com-
posing many elaborate letters ; and the public
library at Geneva preserves two thousand five
hundred sermons taken from his lips, by the
disciples over whom he had breathed his in-
spiration.*

The commanding genius of Calvin was saga-
cious, as well as vehement. Inflexible in his
great design, he knew when to concede and

* Histoire litteraire de Geneve par Senebier, i. 259.

264 CRITICAL HISTORY

when to temporise. At the early stage of his
career, before the expulsion of the Bishop from
Geneva, the great extirpator of episcopacy,
offered to become the subject of an episcopal
government, provided the Bishop renounced
his Sovereign-lord of Rome.* Ruthless and in-
exorable, when his theological empire was in
peril, Calvin was more, or less than man, when
his friends halted in their march. He sent
forth the amiable Castalio a fugitive and an
exile, and he burnt Servetus while he deplored
his fate.

Calvin's " Discipline" was a political legacy
shared by many of his heirs in France and in
Germany, in Scotland and in England. I
would not ascribe to a cause too unimportant in
itself, the great change which was now taking
place in public opinion — by deducing it from

* Bancroft's Dangerous Positions, 8. — Calvin's principle
then was to live under an Episcopacy, " if the Bishops re-
fuse not to submit themselves to Christ, depend upon him
as their only head ; and in their brotherly society be knit
together by no other knot than by the Truth."" The Truth !
was it at Rome or at Geneva ? On these vague yet plausible
pretexts one might have an annual insurrection at the least.
The expelled Bishops would have used the same style in ad-
dressing the Arch-Heresiarch. The Truth only appeared
when the Bernois and the Genevese beat the Bishop's
troops.

OF THE PURITANS. 265

so obscure an origin as the petty Presbytery
of Geneva. But the genius of Calvin was
universal, however confined to the city of his
adoption. In France the Calvinists long ba-
lanced the power of the state with the monar-
chy ; in Scotland they had triumphed ; and in
England the Presbyters dwelt with us. The
style of democracy was remarkable at this period,
and crowned heads were usually stigmatised
by nick-names. Knox and his ruder school
emptied their quiver of scriptural bye-names.
Mary of England was Jezebel ; Elizabeth was
" the untamed heifer." Calvin and Beza re-
tained a more classical taste in their anti-mo-
narchical bitterness. Calvin called Mary of
England, Proserpine ; and Beza, Mary of Scot-
land Medea. The Emperor of Austria was a
Pagan Nero. From calling names the democra-
tic school advanced to higher doctrines. In the
work of Christopher Goodman on " Obedience,"
to which Whittingham prefixed a preface, the
sword is placed in the hands of the people, and
consigned to any " Jonathan" who from some
secret impulse would step , forth to give the
stroke of Brutus. These sons of Calvin con-
firm their doctrines from scriptural authorities,
and they are all of that stamp which it is said
were so much in favour with the political Je-

266 CRITICAL HISTORY

suits, and afterwards with those who with us
took the title of Independents. The heroes
held out to the imitation of the world were
Phineas who in his zeal killed the adulterers
of Ahud, who in his zeal had stabbed Eglon
the fat King of Moab in his private chamber ;
or Jael, who in his zeal murdered Sisera,
or Matthias who in his zeal massacred the
King's commissioners who were sent to com-
mand the people to conformity.* Such was
the style and such were the examples familiar
with some of these novel advocates of popular
freedom.

Calvin died in 1564. The great English
Puritan Cartwright's " Admonitions," often
composed in flight and exile, appeared in Eng-
land in 1574 ; Hottoman's Franco Gallia in
1573 ; Languet's Vindicia? contra Tyrannos in
1579, and in the same year Buchanan dedicated
his fine and able political dialogue De Jure
regni apud Scotos to James the First, where
among other startling positions we find that
Populus Rege est prestantior et melior ; the
people are better than the King and of higher
authority ; an assumption in the style of de-
mocracy which expresses so much, and means
so little. All these works, composed by ele-

* Bancroft, 142.

OF THE PURITANS. 267

vated genius, first founded the authority of the
Sovereign on the consent of the people ; or on
what has been more recently, with more in-
flated nonsense, called, " the Sovereignty of the
People." The axiom itself seems but a vague
and abstract point of " the social contract ;"
that phantom of political logomachy ! The
celebrated Philip Morn ay, called by the Ro-
manists the Protestant Pope, was one of the
most illustrious sons of Calvin, and as early as
in 1566 had distinguished himself by a defence
of public liberty against the arbitrary Catho-
licism of Spain. By these and other works of
a revolutionary cast, fast following on each
other, we may judge of the rising opinions
of a new age. Surely thes'e were " the prog-
nostics of state-tempests ; hollow blasts of wind
seemingly at a distance, and secret workings
of the sea preceding the storm."

The inevitable results of these republican
politics appeared by a mighty event in the
cause of civil freedom, for in the year 1579
occurred the famous union of Utrecht, which
consolidated and established the Republic of
Holland.

Who, in this slight sketch, does not perceive
the secret connexion between the influence of
human opinions and human events ? The

268 CRITICAL HISTORY

writers of the history of the United Provinces
trace their foundation " to the prevalent opin-
ions of Luther and Calvin." The long-pro-
tracted civil war of Spain with her Provinces,
was declared against heresy and psalm-singing !
A great political revolution was now operat-
ing throughout Europe, in the establishment
of the potent Republic, which their first leaders
had never contemplated ; and in the Reform-
ation in Germany, which had penetrated far
into France. England was yet to be tried.
Religion had been converted into politics, and
politics was now inextricably connected with
religion. Whenever a party struggles for pre-
dominance in the state, it necessarily becomes
a political body. There remains one more in-
vestigation— the history of the English Pu-
ritans. They were the friends and the martyrs
Of civil liberty ; but how happened it, that
they proved to be its greatest enemies ? This
historical enigma remains to be solved, and as
we shall see, it has perplexed our most critical
historians.

01-' THE PURITANS.. 269

CHAPTER XIII.

CRITICAL HISTORY OF THE PURITANS CON-
CLUDED. OF THE PERPLEXING CONTRA-
DICTIONS IN THEIR POLITICAL CHARACTER,
AND WHY THEY WERE AT ONCE THE AD-
VOCATES, AND THE ADVERSARIES, OF CIVIL
AND RELIGIOUS FREEDOM.

RAPIN, although a foreigner, had been con-
versant with our language and our country.
He had the sagacity to detect an obscure and
indefinable line which seemed to separate these
Puritans among themselves ; and without tak-
ing the most comprehensive view of such im-
portant actors in our history, he drew this
result, that there were, as he calls them, reli-
gious Puritans and state Puritans.

A recent French writer of our history, as a
foreigner, is at a loss to adjust the contradictory
statements, and the opposite results he found
among our own writers, in regard to our Pu-

270 CRITICAL HISTORY

ritans. He is himself struck by men whose
piety was so seriously occupied by the most
frivolous objects, yet who maintained their
cause by the magnanimity of their heroic suf-
ferings. He perceived that this extraordinary
race eagerly rejected all " superstitions" with
the very spirit of superstition itself. He is
delighted at their aspirations after freedom, but
he is startled at their open avowal of intole-
rance. In truth, the history of the Puritans,
as connected with the religion and the govern-
ment of England, is a history peculiar to our-
selves ; nor is it for the foreigner to compre-
hend, what even the natives themselves have
frequently been at a loss to define.

Honest Fuller, in his Church History, felt
a peculiar tenderness in the adoption of the
very term Puritan, as being a name subject to
several senses ; much like the modern term
Evangelical ; it was ridiculous and odious in
profane mouths, yet often applicabfe to persons
who laboured for a life pure and holy. To
prevent exceptions, he requests his reader to
recollect that should the name casually slip
from his pen, he is only to understand by it,
Non-conformist. However he divides them
into two classes, the mild and moderate, and

OF THE PUUITANS. 271

the fierce and fiery.* Fuller's difficulty ex-
isted ere he wrote ; thirty years before an
honest Irish divine writing to Archbishop
Usher that " some crafty Papists safely railed
at ministers for propagating that damnable
heresy of Puritanism ; which word, though not
understood was however known to be odious
to his Majesty" (James the First.) To silence
these railers he suggests having a petition to
the King to define a Puritan ; and should his
Majesty not be at leisure, to appoint some good
man to do it for him.f Such was the exten-
sive infamy of the odious term Puritan that
it was flung about to any adverse party, or ob-
noxious person. It was not always applied to
the enemies of Episcopacy, or of Monarchy,
but to persons of rigid morals, who were solely
occupied by their private affairs, and neither
hostile to Bishops nor to Kings. An intelli-
gent contemporary said " The Papist, we see,
hates all kinds of Puritans ; the Hierarchist
another ; the Court sycophant another ; the
sensual libertine another. All hate a Puritan,
and under the same name hate a different

* Fuller's Church History, ix. 76.
t Parr's Life of Usher. Letters.

CRITICAL HISTORY

thing."* The writer makes this remarkable
observation. " Judaism appeared to Puritans
mere superstition ; Christianity seemed to the
Jews gross blasphemy ; and now amongst
Christians, Protestantism is nothing else but
heresy, and amongst Protestants, zeal is mis-
named Puritanism.!"

Amidst this diversity of opinions and prin-
ciples, the history of the Puritans would offer
to each historian, as his party inclined him, a
theme for eulogy and triumph, or a subject
for satire and obloquy. Heylin in his " His-
tory of the Presbyterians" blackens them as so
many political devils ; these were " the fierce
and fiery" of Fuller ; and Neal in his History
of the Puritans blanches them into a sweet
and almond whiteness, embracing not only the
mild and the moderate, but even the fierce and
the fiery.

The extreme perplexity of Monsieur Guizot,
to whom we have alluded, interests by the
frankness of his confession, where his philo-

* " A Discourse concerning Puritans," 1641. I have
not discovered the writer of this able tract, who affects not
to be, what some would call a Puritan. At all events, we
learn from this " the mistakes, abuse, and misapplication of
that name." 57.

t Ibid. 4.

OF THE PURITANS. 273

sophical candour, at variance with his political
inclinations, seems to have thrown some em-
barrassment into his style.

" In respect," says Monsieur Guizot, " to the
fanatical Puritans, the religious enthusiasts
whom Mr. Hallam has judged, I think, with
a little ill-humour," or as he afterwards says
" with a coldness rather inclining to irony" —
" I shall perhaps have some trouble to say ex-
actly what I think. In my opinion, and in
despite of so much impure alloy, their cause
was the good one, and it was that cause whose
defeat would have been a defeat, whose tri-
umph prepared a triumph, for reason and hu-
manity. At the same time the general cha-
racter of this party shocks and repulses one.
I have no taste for that passion so arid and
sombre, and for those minds so narrowed and
stubborn, who have no feelings in common
with mankind ; their bilious enthusiasm dis-
figures man, as I think, and shrinks him into
so diminutive a size, that in viewing his since-
rity and his moral energy they lose much of
their greatness. These Puritans however were
sincere, energetic, devoted to their faith and
their cause, though their sentiments are so
little attractive, and their opinions raise our
contempt. They first rose up against tyranny.

VOL. III. T

274 CRITICAL HISTORY

We may not like them, but we must speak of
them with esteem, and we may yield them our
gratitude, if we cannot our sympathy."

It is evident that Monsieur Guizot has re-
flected much deeper on the Puritans, than
Rapin ; but I would not decide whether they
fare better in his hands, than in Mr. Hallam's
" coldness rather inclining to irony."

A modern critic of a loftier mood writes of
these Saints with a saintly spirit. In this de-
bate of mortal Puritanism, we shall find, that
Heaven itself is evoked, and the genius of the
modern critic comes

" In a celestial panoply, all armed."

Never before, for Neal in the creeping and
slumbrous style of his history has " no thoughts
that breathe," were the Puritans so solemnly
inaugurated in an apotheosis of Puritanism.
To me is left the ungracious task of developing
mere human truths where beatitude is placed
before us.

The modern critic has discovered that " the
Puritan was made up of two different men ;
the one all self-abasement, penitence, gratitude,
passion ; the other proud, calm, inflexible, sa-
gacious." In this dual man, one was he who
would dash into pieces the idolatry of painted

OF THE PURITANS. 275

glass, break down antique crosses of rare work-
manship and burn witches — the other was he
who would " set his foot on the neck of kings,"
and, so we are told, "went on through the
world like Sir Artegale's iron man Talus with
his flail crushing and trampling down." These
Puritans " looked with contempt on the rich
and the eloquent, on every nobleman and every
priest." Yet they themselves were " rich and
eloquent ;" rich in bishops' lands, and eloquent
in a seven-hours' sermon.* They were also

* Many singular specimens might be produced. Mr.
Vynes said in his prayer, " O Lord, thou hast never given us
a victory this long while, for all our frequent fastings.
What dost thou mean, O Lord ! to fling us in a ditch and
there leave us?" Mr. Evans thus expostulates — "O Lord!
wilt thou take a chair and sit amongst the House of Peers ?
And when, O God! wilt thou vote amongst the Honourable
House of Commons who are so zealous of thine honour ?"
Another exclaimed, " O God, many are the hands that are
lift up against us, but there is one God, it is thou thyself,
O Father ! who dost us more mischief than they all." Mr.
Cradock cried out, " O Lord, do not thou stand neuter, but
take one side tha we may see which it is that is thy cause."
Another, " Lord, »ou has>t been good one year, yea, Lord,
thou hast been good to us two years ; Lord ! thou hast been
good to us fourscore ./ears, but, Lord, thou art wanting in one
thing !" A pamphlet entitled " Scotch Presbyterian Elo-
quence " will amply supply the reader with the saintly effu-
sions of these men ; these men of whom our Modern Critic

T 2

276 CRITICAL HISTORY

"noblemen and priests" in their own seraphic
way, for " they were nobles by the right of an
earlier creation and priests by the imposition of
a mightier hand." If their biblical names were
not " registered at the Heralds'-college, they
were recorded in the Book of Life" wherein the
elect could read no other names than their
own. Whenever they met a splendid train of
menials " they were haughty, that a legion of
ministering angels had charge over them ;" and
" they scorned palaces" for " houses not made
with hands." Haughty truly, for more pride
lurked under their black velvet scull-cap tipped
with white satin, with their mortified look and
their screwed-up visage, than under the mitre
of a majestic primate. We are told that " if
they were led to pursue unwise ends, they
never chose unwise means." That these novel

tells us that "if they were unacquainted with the works of
philosophers and poets they were deeply read in the oracles
of God !" Was balderdash ever inspired by " the oracles of
God ?" I dare not quote passages from the master-seer of
the Covenanters, Samuel Rutherford, from their offensive
lubricity and rank obscenity. Yet we are to be told that
such vulgar spirits, " instead of catching occasional glimpses
of the Deity through an obscuring veil," by which the writer
indicates the decent services of religion and the accessories
of devotion, " aspired to commune with him face to face." —
We have seen their style !

OF THE PURITANS. 277

citizens of the world should have been men of
such deep sense and such happy fortune, is
indeed saying a great deal — because that they
were apt to fall into frenzies, is not denied.
The more exalted Puritan of the two which
formed the one, is described. " He heard the
lyres of angels or the tempting whispers of
fiends. He caught a gleam of the beatific
vision, or woke screaming from dreams of ever-
lasting fire !"

The fairy tales of the Countess D'Anois, that
charming writer of innocent inventions, do not
equal the daring genius of the modern Critic.
The indomitable being whom we have now to
delineate, was yet unheard of in history or in
fiction. " The very meanest of them was a
being to whose fate a mysterious and terrible
importance belonged ; on whose slighest action
the spirits of light and darkness looked with
anxious interest, and who had been destined
before heaven and earth were created."* Such
were the men for " whose sake empires had
risen, and flourished, and decayed." These
were they who were appointed, according to
one of their often bellowed positions, " to bind
kings in chains and their nobles with links of
iron," and " to tread the wine-press of the wrath

* Edinburgh Review, xlii. 3,37.

278 CRITICAL HISTORY

of God till the blood rose to the bridle-reins."
This Puritan, or this Covenanter, " like Vane
thought himself intrusted with the sceptre of
the millennial year ; like Fleetwood he cried in
the bitterness of his soul that God hid his face
from him : but when he took his seat in the
hall of debate or in the field of battle," he was
no longer the Puritan, but spoke and acted as
men speak and act who call their intolerance
" a regeneration," and immolate their fellow-
beings as " a sweet sacrifice." These were the
Independents, the Jacobins of England — and
the Covenanters of Scotland, of whom one of
their chiefs, the Lord of Wariston, when he
saw the Scotch army advancing and the Eng-
lish Parliament voting monies for the Evan-
gelical Host, exclaimed, that " the business is
going on in God's old way !"

It must be confessed that if the Modern
Critic be a great poet in history, we cannot
discover an equal knowledge of history in his
poetry. It hardly became a philosopher, even
in such a playful effusion of his imagination,
to eulogise, so seriously, barbarism, intolerance,
and madness.

An important historical enigma remains to
be solved. How did it happen that " the good
cause," as Monsieur Guizot terms it, was the

OF THE PURITANS. 279

cause of these Energumenes ? I may be al-
lowed to employ a term which Monsieur
Guizot would not disapprove. How came the
great interests of mankind, the cause of civil
freedom, to originate with zealots who had no
feelings in common with mankind? An ex-
planation of this point clears up all the am-
biguity of their character, and reconciles the
discordant opinions of our historians.

When we say that the age of Charles the
First was a religious age, we might more ac-
curately style it, a Protestant age. The terror
of Romanism propelled Protestantism. The
Catholic policy was prevalent in Europe, and
the Reformed party, everywhere, for their sup-
port, looked to our insular kingdom. With
the cause of the Reformation that of civil
liberty became accidentally connected ; I say
accidentally, for certainly, it was not necessarily
so, as is usually considered. In freeing us
from the yoke of Rome, if Geneva at the same
time fettered us with one equally heavy, how-
ever altered might be the form, it cannot be
said, that we advanced in the purest principles
of civil rights. Kings might be rejected as
well as Popes, and yet the people might not be
more free. The Democracy of Calvin was in-
quisitorial,— and yet to establish this novel

280 CRITICAL HISTORY

despotism, it became absolutely necessary, at
first, to adopt the most enlarged principles of
civil freedom. The nation had to struggle for
its independence, ere it could proclaim its Pres-
bytery, and its " discipline."

It was necessary then for the cause in which
the Puritan, or the Presbyter* were really en-
gaged, to subvert the Government ; and al-
though perhaps the arbitrary measures to which
the Government had often recourse, were in
great part produced by this very opposition,
still absolute power and arbitrary rule were at
length suppressed, by the self-devotion of these
energetic characters.

Even in the great Revolution of Scotland,
though carried on by fanatical zealots, the prin-

* The inveterate controversy about Episcopus and Pres-
byter, after all, may resolve itself into a mere change of terms,
and depends on our translation of the Greek term overseers of
the religious community. Knox introduced the official title of
" Superintendents ;" it was truly a war of words.

It is curious that the Spaniards seem to be the only nation
who really have preserved the term Presbyter, in its purity,
as appears by Cobarruvias's Tesoro de la Langua Castellana.

" Presbitero, vulgarmente vale el Sacerdote clerigo de
Missa Latine Presbyter, a Grseco, Seneae, Princeps, Le-
gatus ; y porque se presupone que han de ser hombres de
Edad, de canas y seso. Presbyltrato, Sacerdocio, dignidad
de Sacerdote."

OF THE PURITANS. 281

ciples of political liberty were combined with
its progress ; before they could become Pres-
byters, I repeat, it was first necessary to estab-
lish their national independence. Their civil,
thus became inseparable from their religious
liberty. Though we may treat their real object
with indifference, and conclude that whether
a Church be governed by Episcopacy and Con-
vocations, or by a Presbytery and Synods, as
of all national objects, the most unimportant,
yet by such miserable means, great ends were
pursued ; and in the struggle of ecclesiastical
predominance, civil liberty was mediately, en-
larged and strengthened. To the English Con-
stitution were transferred some of its most
wholesome correctives — the abrogation of the
High Commission Court and the Star-Cham-
ber ; the prohibition of arbitrary proclamations;
and the institution of Triennial Parliaments.*
The discovery of these great advancements in
our political acquisitions, advanced by these
gloomy fanatics, occasioned to our historians
so many perplexing opinions and contradictory
notions.

But if the principle of civil freedom were
announced to us in the progress of this Re-
volution, the great actors themselves, Puritans

* Laing, iii. 209.

282 CRITICAL HISTORY

or Presbyters, were certainly the irreconcilable
enemies to that popular liberty which they ad-
vocated. In their grasp of power they showed
that nothing was more alien to the designs of
their democracy than the freedom of mankind.
The arbitrary will of the single tyrant; the
excesses of the prerogative ; seem light when
compared with their more intolerant, more
arbitrary, and more absolute power. When
Presbytery was our Lord, even those who had
endured the tortures of persecution, and raised
such sharp outcries for their freedom, had
hardly tasted of the Circaean cup of dominion,
ere they were transformed into the bestial
brood of political tyranny. It was curious to
see Prynne now vindicating the very doctrines
under which he had himself so signally suf-
fered, for he invested the Executive even with
that power of inflicting death on its Non-con-
formists. So the Covenanter Baillie held every
man to be worse than fool or knave who dis-
puted the jus divinum of Presbytery, and ex-
presses a wish to have such hanged ; as he
would have hanged those who asserted the
divine institution of the Bishops ! This warm
Presbyter when provoked by Selden's Erastian
principles which placed the Government of the
Church under the civil magistrate, in rage

OF THE PURITANS. 283

called this more philosophical state of religion,
*' an insolent absurdity !" The passive obe-
dience of jure divino, the rigid conformity
against which they had fought, were now in-
sisted on for themselves. Toleration which
had been a common cause with all the sectaries,
and which they had so often pathetically claim-
ed, was now condemned for its " sinfulness."
The very persons who had so long mur-
mured at the tyranny of the Licensers, when
themselves were paramount, at once extin-
guished the liberty of the press, by reviving
the odious office, and condemning every anti-
presbyterial volume to penal fires. Toleration
now seemed to their eyes a hydra, and one
of these high-flyers, in ludicrous rage, called
out against " a cursed intolerable toleration."
For these facts no sophistry can apologise, and
no statement can alter them. Thus these spu-
rious advocates for civil freedom, for which
their character has been exalted in our history,
were, in truth, its most irreconcilable enemies.

Another obscure point in the history of the
Puritans requires elucidation. The Presby-
terians have always asserted that it was not
them who dragged the Sovereign to the block.
They would have been satisfied to have lapped
the blood of the venerable Archbishop. The

284 CRITICAL HISTORY

Presbyters, after dislodging the Episcopalians,
had arrived at their " Land of Promise ;" and
while they fattened on the Bishops' lands, they
would have reposed like fed lions. They were
not hostile to monarchy ; and the monstrous
libels which issued from the school of Leighton
and Prynne, never impugn the regal authority ;
never touch on the abstract points of civil free-
dom ; never handle the nice points of the pre-
rogative ; never breathe a murmur against
forced loans, which probably did not grievously
affect this class. Many of these libellers doubt-
less would have submitted to death ere they
would have touched irreverently a hair of the
head of " the Lord's Anointed." The doctrine
of the divine and indefeasible right of Mo-
narchy, entered into their creed, since on that
was grafted their own Presbytery. These were
" the mild and moderate" Puritans of Fuller ;
yet in striking at " the root and branch" extir-
pation of the Ecclesiastical government of Eng-
land, their spirit was not less terrible, than that
of " the State Puritans," as Rapin calls those,
who were intent on republicanising England.

The Presbyterians had nursed under their
wing the monster which at length devoured
them. This was the party who called them-
selves " the Independents ;" it was a splinter

OF THE PURITANS. 285

sect from the block of " Brownism." The
Brownists were the most furious children of
Non-conformity. The curious history of these
parties is instructive ; but it is not the opinions
sane or insane, of sectarians, which we are seek-
ing, in our pursuit of the history of man.

The earliest Non-conformists, not without
reluctance, had dissented from an uniformity
with the Anglican Church ; they still kept
within its pale, dreading nothing more than
schism. They were indeed prepossessed with a
strange notion that the Church discipline was
to be found in the rude and simple practices
of the Apostolic times, when no national church
existed, and no form of Ecclesiastical Govern-
ment was prescribed. This was the first stage
of mild Puritanism. The second was the in-
testine war with the Bishops, or " the Lordly
Prelates," as the Mar-prelates called them.
The severities adopted by the Government and
the Church, to suppress these public disturb-
ers, or to reconcile them to the religious forms,
established by Act of Parliament, only pro-
duced that reaction which inflames the incom-
pliant to obstinacy. Renouncing all commu-
nion with their mother-church, which they now
assumed was no true church, these rigid sepa-
ratists formed a third state of Puritanism,

286 CRITICAL HISTORY

founded by one Robert Brown, who became so
formidable as to leave his name to a sect.

This Robert Brown was a fierce hot-brained
man, who counted his triumphs by the thirty-
two prisons in which he had been incarcerated ;
and in some of them, " he could not see his
hand at noon-day." His relationship to Lord
Burleigh had often thrown a protecting shield
over his furious doings. In that day when all
parties were insisting on " the true Religion,"
Brown announced that he would found " a per-
fect Church without a fault." He was one of
those who would exclaim " Stand farther off;
I am holier than Thou !" His friends stood
aghast at their new prophet, and referred him
with his new revelations to the Martyrologist
John Fox. The old man exclaimed that they
had sent him a madman, and thrusting Brown
out of doors, predicted that this Neophyte of
Ecclesiastical insurrection would surely prove
a fire-brand in God's church. The new apostle
journeyed about the country, like other self-
elected missionaries. Preaching and persecu-
tion however seemed to interfere with each
other, and as was then the mode, Brown and
his congregation shipped themselves off for
Middleburgh. The Hollanders were the only
people in Europe whose policy had been con-

OF THE PURITANS. 287

trived to accord with all the modes of faith
among the religionists. One might be curious
to learn, how that new government came to
adopt such an enlightened toleration ; for the
Calvinistic individuals who formed that govern-
ment, were themselves intolerant. The reverse
has also sometimes occurred; in Switzerland,
we are told, the Swiss themselves are very to-
lerant, and their government very much the
reverse.

In Holland, Brown modelled his democratical
church, without suffering the indignity of being
driven into a saw-pit, to hide him self and his au-
ditors. When once this perfect church of rigid
separatists was raised, it fell like a child's house
of cards, for the separatists separated among
themselves, calling one another very ill names,
and telling tales which " the Scorners" would
not forget.* Brown in his latter days seems
gladly to have escaped from his own church ;
and returned to Northamptonshire, where all
the while he had kept his parsonage, paid a

* One Deacon, of Mr. Johnson's party, describes another
of Mr. Robinson's with his company as " Noddy Nabalites,
dogged Doegs, fair- face d Pharisees, shameless Shimeis, mali-
cious Machiavelians." Thus saints of this class, even to the
present day, scold and pun scripturally.

Pagitt's Heresiography , 60.

288

curate, and took the tithes. It is doubtful
whether he returned to his wife ; the object
too frequently of his irascible piety. When
Father Brown was reproved for beating his
wife, which he honestly acknowledged no man
ought to do, he scholastically distinguished —
that he did not beat Mrs. Brown as his wife,
but as a cursed old woman. He died perfectly
in character ; proud, poor, and passionate ; at
the age of eighty he struck a tax-collector for
demanding a parish rate ; beloved by no one,
and too decrepit to walk to prison, the stub-
born apostle of Brownism was flung on a fea-
ther-bed into a cart, and died in a passion in
the county gaol.

The Brownists in Holland began to excom-
municate one another, often from private pique ;
till at length sons cursed their fathers, and bro-
thers their brothers, in a clash, whether the go-
verning power were to rest with the Eldership,
or in the Church ? Many seceded from their
" perfect Church,'' but never from its demo-
cracy. This " perfect Church" proved to be a
hot-bed of all dissensions, still persisting that
"the new Creature" may find perfection attain-
able in this life, amidst all the branglings and
heart-burnings of their unsettled heads and
meaner passions. Some modern sages indulge

OF THE PURITANS. 289

reveries on the perfectibility of man, but saints
advance beyond, to perfection itself.

It was one of " the perfections " of these
Brownists, that they would riot be bound by
any of their opinions, or come to any agree-
ment ; one of them insisted that the last thing
he wrote, only should be taken for his present
judgment; it therefore became doubtful whe-
ther he ever had any " present judgment ;" or
whether he would hold on Tuesday morning
the tenet of Monday night.

A Brownist, of calmer dispositions, shook off
the very name, considering it as "a brand for
the making its professors odious to the Chris-
tian world. This man was the founder of
" Independency."

This alluring title was assumed from its
grand principle that every single community
or congregation, was independent of any other.
They presumed, as their first position, that equals
have no power over equals. The clergy and
the laity mingled together, in this democracy,
allowing of no superiority. In this rude prin-
ciple of equality we detect that germ of anar-
chy, the equality of mankind, which so long
after, was as little understood. But in the sur-
prising history of mankind, for sometimes we
are surprised by unexpected results, and ob-

VOL. III. U

290 CRITICAL HISTORY

i

serve the follies of man often terminating in
wisdom, in this tenet of a mean sect, originated
the blessing of toleration. The arbitrary Pres-
byterians persevered in their hostility to liberty
of conscience, while the Independents were its
earliest advocates, from their aversion to the
establishment of any predominant power.

Few in number, and poverty-stricken, to
part with one another seemed a relief. Those
who could, transported themselves, as adven-
turers, from the shores of Holland to the wilds
of America, where they founded New Ply-
mouth. Others ventured to steal homewards.
During twenty years these latter shifted from
house to house in their humble circle, but the
eye, and sometimes the arm of Laud was upon
them. As yet they were only Religionists, and
of what stamp we may judge by one of their
distinguished pastors, called " the famous Mr.
Canne." On his principle that no human in-
ventions were to be permitted in divine wor-
ship, Mr. Canne furiously cut out of his Bible,
the contents of the chapters, the titles of the
leaves, and left his fluttering Bible without
binding or covers. This saint might however
have been reminded that the holy scriptures
could never have existed without the aid of
human inventions, in the parchment of the

OF THE PURITANS. 291

manuscript, and the print and paper of the
book. Another pastor, of not inferior fame,
was a cobbler of the name of How. Neal the
Independent describes the cobbler as a man of
learning, when the contrary is the fact. This
saint published a revelation of his, in a treatise
on " The sufficiency of the Spirit," to show that
all human learning is dangerous and hurtful.
This was the independency of Ignorance, and
which a few years after, led to a design, or a
motion in the House of Commons to shut up
the Universities and to burn our records ! The
cobbler's fame, and the danger in which the
two Universities stood from his awl, inspired
one of the flock to pun in a quaint epigram.

" Cambridge and Oxford may their glory now
Veil to a Cobbler, if they knew but How !"

Amidst the disturbances of 1640, the Inde-
pendents first made their public appearance in
Deadman's place, Southwark ! They petitioned
Parliament, piteously craving the liberty of
subsistence, " be it the poorest and the meanest
in the land." They asked only for a single
church. We seem to be chronicling the mise-
rable annals of a Tabernacle in a blind alley-
yet these men were to be, as they came to call
themselves, " the Keepers of the Liberties of

u 2

292 CRITICAL HISTORY

England !" or as the Presbyterian Clement
Walker retorted on them, " the Gaolers."

These humble creatures, too feeble to stand
alone, lurked among the Presbyterians, earn-
estly co-operating till they gathered strength
by concert. The principles of civil and reli-
gious freedom were in their system, but these
were cautiously explained, or were wholly con-
cealed. For them one great cause was always
advancing, while the Presbyterians were strik-
ing at one-half the Monarchy in the ruins of
the Hierarchy. The Presbyterians were will-
ing to have a King of their own, a covenanting
King, but the Independents thundered out the
secret they had kept for several years — that
there was to be no King on earth ! The Inde-
pendents were always found among " the fierce
and fiery Puritans" of Fuller. Their professed
independency while they had their fortune to
make, wore a mask of universal brotherhood,
and accommodated itself to all mankind.

The Independents were themselves adventu-
rers in the State, but their prospects opened as
they cleared their way by the work of demo-
lition. Every change in the State was an
approach to a Revolution. The lands of the
Church, the estates of the nobility, and of
our ancient families ; offices in the Govern-

OF THE PURITANS. 293

ment, commands in the army — all the spoils
of the nation lay before them. What leading
spirits would not enlist under their banner ? The
needy broken man who knew not how to live ;
the libertine who would live under lawless
laws ; he who feared to be questioned, and he
who had been questioned : every malcontent
now found a party — and it came to this, that
the very refuse of the people, leaving their
hammers, and their thimbles, their lasts, and
their barrels, pushing on their fortune, became
some of the Independent Members of the
House of Commons, and held those Scriptural
debates which were the mockery of Europe !
Clement Walker, a stiff Presbyterian and their
great adversary, characterises the Independent
as " a composition of Jew, Christian, and
Turk." Such a motley and desperate faction
were more to be dreaded for the decision which
would hasten extremities, reckless of all means,
than for their number ; they were but limbs
and members of a body wanting a working
brain and a guiding hand. These at length
they found in the tremendous genius of Crom-
well.

This daring and rising faction scornfully
glanced at the moderation of the Monarchical
Puritans of England, and viewed with ab-

294 CRITICAL HISTORY

horrence among some of the Presbyterians the
remains of a tenderness for the rights and the
person of the King. Equally hostile to the
Aristocracy, as to the Monarchy ; to the Pres-
bytery as to the Episcopacy ; they insisted on
that universal freedom, which long fascinated
mankind till at length these Independents lost
their name in acquiring another more sig-
nificant, and are known in history as " The
Levellers" of England and " the Jacobins" of
France. Even the victories of the Parliament-
ary armies imparted little satisfaction, while
their chiefs seemed half-royalist, and half-re-
pentant of their conquests. It was this faction
which dreaded nothing so much as a peace
between the King and the Parliament. The
true genius of Independency broke out in
Cromwell. By a stroke of political adroitness,
the Self-denying Ordinance new modelled the
army, and every officer became an Independent.
Smiling at the weakness of Charles the First,
who would have arrested five members, the
heads of a faction, his novel intrepidity emptied
all the Commons of England in one morning.

In their political character, the Independents
form a parallel with the Jacobins of France ;
this may not appear on the first view, since the
Independents clouded themselves over in their

OF THE PURITANS. 295

mystical religion, and the Jacobins seem to
have had no religion. But this circumstance,
in the language of logicians, is a mere accident,
or mode which may be taken away, without
altering the nature of the subject. The Psalm-
singing and preaching of the officers in the In-
dependent army, and the metaphysical rhodo-
montades of universal liberty of the Jacobins,
were only different means, but not different de-
signs. Cromwell himself printed a sermon :
in the French Revolution he would have jar-
gonized like Marat, or Hebert, in some " Ami
du Peuple." They moved by the same im-
pulse ; the prelude of every desperate act with
the military saints was " to seek the Lord" and
sword and pistol ; as with the Atheistic crew
it was to offer peace to every people whom they
had prepared to conquer. It has been thought
that the English Revolutionists were not as
sanguinary as the French ; I believe they pro-
posed more massacres than they executed ;
there was one, of all the Royalists and Pres-
byterians, in the true Marat style of taking
two hundred thousand heads off at one stroke.
The sale of Englishmen as slaves to America
was worse than the deportations to Cayenne.
The parallel might be run much further. It
is enough here to show that English Indepen-

296 CRITICAL HISTORY

dency was the forerunner of French Jacobin-
ism. The democratic anarchy of " these Saints
of the first grass" as the admirable Wit of their
day calls them, was precisely the same, for they

" Agreed in nothing but to abolish
Subvert, extirpate, and demolish.

and hate

Dependency on Church and State,
And scorn to have the moderatest stints
Prescribed to their peremptory hints,
But left at large to make their best on
Without being called to account or question."*

Such were the different classes of the Puri-
tans. The profound politicians, among the
Patriots, as Pym and Hampden, had allied
themselves to the Religionists. The factions at
first amalgamated, for each seemed to assist the
other, and while the contest was doubtful, their
zeal, as their labours, was in common. Reli-
gion, under the most religious of Monarchs,
was the ostensible motive, by which the Pa-
triots moved the people. All the nation was
thrown into a delirium of terror, and their con-
fused heads, some few years after, exhibited a
dreadful reaction when vulgar Atheism and
insane blasphemy raged among the multitude.

* Hudibras, part iii. co. ii. v. 606.

OF THE PURITANS. 297

When on one occasion it was observed, that
the affairs of religion seemed not so desperate
that they should wholly engross their days,
Pym replied that they must not abate their
ardour for the true religion, that being the
most certain end to obtain their purpose and
maintain their influence. So true is the ob-
servation of Hume, that " the King soon found
by fatal experience that this engine of religion,
which with so little necessity was introduced
into politics, under more fortunate manage-
ment was played with the most terrible success
against him."

That both these parties, or factions, the Re-
ligionists and the Patriots, the one having only
in view the abolition of the Hierarchy, which
was not the object of many of the Patriots,
and the other, a revolution in the Government,
which was not the design of the Religionists,
should, acting on distinct principles, with little
sympathy for each other, and secretly aiming
at two opposite objects in the state, have co-
alesced with such perfect unity as to have
melted down into one party, and by a strange
subtility in the management of their own pecu-
liar interests, and above all by a mutual sacri-
fice of their own principles, have aided each
other in their separate designs, and finally con-

298 CRITICAL HISTOEY, &C.

spired together to overthrow the Monarchy and
the Hierarchy, was in its own day a result as
mysterious as it was awful. It was a state of
national affairs on which no theorist had ever
yet speculated, or even imagined ; and it still
serves as a theme for political science, where a
new path is opened for us, untracked in the
experience of a thousand years.

So gradually matured was the vast design
of these mighty factions in the state, so extra-
ordinary the human agents and their suffer-
ings, and so complete the accomplishment of
their views, that every representative part of
the established Government was immolated in
the presence of a barbarous and a sorrowing
people. The great Minister, faithful to his
Sovereign, perished in the decapitation of
Strafford ; the Episcopacy was cut off by the
axe which struck the venerable Laud ; and
Sovereignty itself disappeared when the head
of the Monarch fell from the block.

Thus the Patriot — the Puritan — and the
Anti-monarchist — had each their sanguinary
triumph !

ALEXANDER LEIGHTON. 299

CHAPTER XIV.

HISTORY OF ALEXANDER LEIGHTON AND OF
THE FAMOUS STATE-LIBEL OF " SIGN'S PLEA
AGAINST PRELACY."

LEIGHTON may be considered as the elder
Decius of that party who were suffered to
become popular favourites by their voluntary
self-immolations.

This learned Scotchman, by the hardihood of
his pen, had become the head of the anti-pre-
latical faction ; this was now a large class of
the people who were beginning to appear among
the meaner sort. Heads which were working
more busily than their hands ; mechanics and
even prophets !

Leighton had already sounded the tocsin in
his " Looking-glass of the Holy War," which
was the project of an Evangelical crusade
against the Romanists, in the cause of that
kingless King of Bohemia the Palatine, on

300 HISTORY OF

whose boyish adventure for a coronation, some
chose to rest the great cause of Protestantism.
Leighton tells us that this effusion of his fiery
imagination " found respect from many na-
tions ;" but assuredly not from the ministers of
the respective powers who were to destroy, or
to be destroyed in this aceldama of Europe.
In this " Looking-Glass" however he had
thrown out an invective against Bishops, which
had roused their notice ; but as the writer pro-
fessed passive obedience to the divine right of
the Sovereign, and was only contesting that of
Episcopacy, James only inflicted a reprimand,
and sheathed the talons of the Ecclesiastical
Hippogriff which was one day to grasp the
Presbyter.

Leighton had now become a marked charac-
ter, as a silenced minister, and he tells us that
" some persons of the better sort of the city
and country" applied to him to draw up a
petition to Parliament of their grievances.
Their claims were moderate, looking no further
than a mitigation of the arbitrary proceedings
of the High-Commission Court. But Leigh-
ton, like another Knox, acquainted them with
his " simple opinion," which was, "for an extir-
pation of the Prelates, with all their dependencies
and supporters. The lopping of the branches

ALEXANDER LEIGHTON. 301

had done no good ; but the striking at the root
would make all fall together. Frustra fit per
plura, quod fieri potest per pandora. Many
works in one, saves labour."

In two hours, our fervid innovator drew up
that decade of propositions which afterwards
served as the ground-work of his famous State-
libel.

An extirpation of the Hierarchy itself affect-
ed the imagination of his disciples, who ac-
knowledging their master, implored Leighton
to seize the pen under this afflatus of inspira-
tion. Leighton indeed was well- fitted to be
the forlorn hope of a faction by his daring and
indomitable nature.

But notwithstanding his own eager relish for
the work itself he ruminated on the evil day
which with a melancholy sagacity, he antici-
pated. Alluding to his former " Looking-
Glass," he observed, " I was almost split upon
a former employment and none to hail me to
shore. I shall now have more fists about my
ears should this work come to light." He was
then exhorted to print beyond the seas; five
hundred names were subscribed in approbation
of his doctrine, but only fifty pounds were col-
lected, and the missionary of sedition complains
that " his expences tripled the poor pittance,

302 HISTORY OF

besides the intermission of his calling." A
manuscript letter informs me that he was now
practising as a physician.

The zealot passed over to Holland, and has-
tened two printed copies for the use of the Par-
liament ; these arrived at the moment of their
dissolution. Thus baffled, he pretended it made
him " shut up shop," pleading on his examina-
tion that he had never published " Sion's Plea"
in England ; that he had used every means to
suppress it, having addressed it solely to Par-
liament. However the tract was always pro-
curable at the price of a rare book, then twenty
shillings.* Why Leighton should suppress, as
he pretended, that which we shall find he was
willing to seal with his blood, can only be
classed among the common evasions which are
practised by a defendant at the bar.

This State-libel connected with the fate of
the author, has occasioned much discussion ;
and by an odd circumstance of bearing a double
title, and being usually quoted under the se-
cond, has often eluded the researches of histo-
rical enquirers. Even Mr. Hallam declares that
he had never met with it, and it was long
before I discovered " Sion's Plea against Pre-
lacy," in the catalogue of our national library,
* Had. MSS. 7000 ; Mede to Stuteville, Feb. 1629.

ALEXANDER LEIGHTON. 303

under the title of " An Appeal to the Par-
liament."

Leighton seems to have been the first of our
political scribes of this eventful period who in-
vented a satirical date to their state-libels ; an
ingenious device of faction, which afterwards
was carried on, somewhat amusingly by suc-
cessive parties under our mutable governments,
by Lilburn, Clement Walker, and others.
Leighton dates his publication as " printed in
the year and month wherein Rochelle was lost.''
There were also accompaniments of satirical
vignettes to attract his readers. In one a
whole conclave of bishops are viewed toppled
down topsy-turvy from a tower; and on " these
intruders upon the privileges of Christ, of the
King, and of the Commonwealth, he heartily
desireth a judgment and an execution?

Our Mar-prelate addresses the Parliament in
this extraordinary style, " You are the Elders
of Israel ; you are an army of generals ; you
are the physicians of the State; up and do
your cure ! The Prelates are the device of
man, contrary to God's commandment, and
men must remove them. Unless ye pluck up
these stumps of Dagon by the very roots, their
nails will grow ranker than ever they were ;
and they will scratch more devilishly than ever

304 HISTORY OF

they did. Will any one daub or trim, or put
a new cover upon an old rotten house that will
fall about his ears ; or will they not rather
down with it, rid away the rubbish and build a
new one ?" * Alluding to the spirited opening
of the King's speech that "the times are for
action !" he says " it is a golden apophthegm
the very best theme for your meditation, and
motive for your heroic accomplishments. The
laconic brevity of King's speeches, as Homer said
of Menalaus, is very acute and full of matter,
and so they would have themselves understood.
For a word is enough from the wise, and to
the wise. Who knows yet what a deep acel-
dama of blood our land may be ? Who is the
main impulsive cause of these evils of sin and
judgment? Even these men of blood the Pre-
lacy."f

Heylin, who was usually employed by Laud
to examine these state-libels, is supposed to
have aggravated the charge against Leigh ton,
who he says advises " to slay all the bishops by
smiting them under the fifth rib." These pre-
cise words are not found in the libel. Mr.
Brodie has well observed that this was no un-
usual phrase in the theological controversies of
the times. Heylin probably only meant, by

* An Appeal to Parliament, p. 174. -f Ib. p. 185.

ALEXANDER LEIGHTON. 305

adopting a current figure to convey his own
sense of the tendency of the libel, rather than
any particular sentence in it. The words of
Heylin were however alleged by the Laudeans
to be an incitement to assassination, particular-
ly when afterwards they were often threatened
by some of Leighton's friends. In truth, there
are many significant passages hardly ambigu-
ous, against " the men of blood." Yet with
the subtility practised by libellers, in his closing
page the writer suddenly alters his tone, pre-
tending it is the Prelacy and riot the Prelates
at which he aims. He couches his ambiguous
mercifulness in an obscure figure borrowed
from his latter avocation of medicine. " We
fear they are like pleuritic patients that can-
not spit, whom nothing but incision will cure ;
we mean of their callings, and not of their
persons." But he who had complained that
" we leave God to do all the hard work by
himself ;" who had pointed out " execution by
the word and the sword," and finally had told
us that " a word is enough from the wise to
the wise," and could not be supposed to design
less than his accusers had charged him with,
though in his closing page the artful libeller
obscures the violence of his design, he seems
perfectly intelligible in his preceding ones.

VOL. III. X

306 HISTORY OF

While in imprisonment before he received
his sentence, the Attorney-General had inqui-
sitorially tampered with Leighton to obtain
the names of the five hundred, who had in-
cited him to the work, among whom were said
to be several Members of Parliament — but he
intrepidly resisted even the offer of pardon on
the condition of declaring them. To induce
him to recant, they attempted to confute his
principles; but this was a perilous enterprise,
for it was to turn on a syllogism, too confi-
dently trusted in by the Registrar of the High-
Commission Court.

Leighton was conducted to an apartment
where he found seven or eight of the mem-
bers of that court seated at a table, with their
Registrar, Sir Henry Martin. Sir Henry under-
took to demonstrate that Bishops by divine
right should be our ministers. This Logo-
macy has been reported by the theological du-
ellist himself. It is a curious specimen of the
dialectical genius of the scholastic Puritan.

Sir Henry demanded, " Is there not supe-
riority in a Civil state ? Was there not supe-
riority in the state Ecclesiastical under the
Jews, witness Aaron's superiority over the
priests ?

" So that he reasoned thus in effect, Aaron

ALEXANDER LEIGHTON. 307

was over all the Levitical priests, ergo Bishops
by divine right, should be our ministers.

" I smiled to hear their champion while I
beat the brains out of the cause with a beam of
their own making or of the Pope's ; I told Sir
Henry, that his antecedent and consequent were
of so deep distance that all the learning of the
world could never make them meet.

" Yet he set a face to prove it by a sounder
proposition. If Aaron were over the Priests,
then Bishops should be over Ministers &c.

" I denied the connexion, and told Sir Henry
he could not of all the quiver have chosen a
deadlier shaft against themselves, as should ap-
pear by the retorting of the argument thus,

" Aaron's priesthood was superior to the rest
under the law ; ergo, no superiority in Minis-
terial function should have place under the
Gospel.

" The sequel I prove thus :

" That which was in form of a type of Christ
under the law must have no place under the
Gospel because it is done away.

" But not only the Priesthood, but also the
superiority of Priesthood, or Ministerial func-
tion, was in form of a type under the law ; ergo,
superiority in the Ministerial function must
have no place under the Gospel.

x 2

308 HISTORY OF

" The Major I cleared both from proof and
reason, as Coloss. xi. v. 17. The Minor, as it is
undeniable, so he had granted it, by way of
Quere.

" The premises being thus invincibly proved,
Sir Harry for a while was silent, but at last
broke out to his fellow-commissioners in this sort
— * Gentlemen, I can go no further, and I as-
sure you, if it be thus, you may burn all your
books !' The three Deans or Parsons, or what
they were, with the Doctor sate still, mute as
fish, not answering one word." *

Such was the impregnable syllogism, the
Major and the Minor, of the scholastic Leigh-
ton which disconcerted the learned Registrar of
the High-Commission Court, and cast the hie-
rarchical Deans into a troubled silence. Sys-
tems of religion and political axioms were then
made to depend on the fallacies of this arti-
ficial arrangement of the Aristotelian logic.
The present triumph of the Presbyter depend-
ed on a point which his adversary was com-
pelled to concede, but with a Quere — that the
new Gospel had abrogated the ancient law.
This no follower of Jesus could deny. But

* An epitome or brief discovery &c. of the many and
great troubles that Dr. Leighton suffered in his body, estate,
and family, for the space of twelve years, &c. 1646.

ALEXANDER LEIGHTON. 309

the syllogism of the Registrar might be
changed in its form, and then a new ante-
cedent would produce a new consequent. In
the present instance Leighton had assumed
that the Mosaic code and institution were but
types of the Advent, and in the accomplish-
ment of the law, that law had ceased.
Yet on many other occasions he and his
party are perpetually appealing to the sa-
cred volume which has preserved the Mosaic
revelation ; they consulted it for its polity,
they referred to it for their authorities, and
they alleged it for their conduct ; their ha-
bits of thought, and the very style of their
conversation were all impregnated by the Ju-
daic scriptures ; and the customs which they
had adopted, smacked oftener of the Syna-
gogue than the Church. The House of Com-
mons in the Protectorate of Cromwell was
chiefly filled with these intolerant Jewish-Chris-
tians ; and their gloomy austerity and stiff-
necked pride marked the race of our Puritans
and Presbyters.

Of Leighton's " five hundred" who had sub-
scribed their approbation to his " Sion's Plea
against Prelacy" the greater number were of
that humble class of the people which we have
noticed. This appeared when they flocked to

310 HISTORY OF

his prison. A button-maker, refused admit-
tance to his new apostle, was committed for
putting his mouth to the key-hole of his dun-
geon, vociferating " Stand to it, Doctor, and
shrink not !" An oatmeal maker sometime
afterwards, persisted in keeping on his hat in
the court of High-Commission as Leighton had
set the example, declaring that never would he
pull off his hat to Bishops. " But you will to
Privy-counsellors," observed a good-humoured
Lord. " Then," replied our Leightonian, " as
you are privy-counsellors I put off my hat,
but as you are rags of the Beast, lo ! I put it
on again !" When the Bishop of Winchester
would have dismissed this frantic fool, the oat-
meal maker exclaimed " Hold thy peace thou
tail of the Beast, that sittest at the lower end
of the table." Leighton — the button maker—
the oatmeal man, et hoc genus omne, sate at that
table ten years afterwards ! and though these
were often calculating the mystical number in
the Revelations about " the Beast," neither they
nor " the beast" ever imagined that approach-
ing metamorphosis.

Such were the confederating friends of the
author of " Sion's Plea." They were devoted
to the extirpator of Bishops, and sent menacing
letters to Laud to caution him that " he might

ALP:XANDER LEIGHTON. 311

expect a pistol, or something else in his belly,
if Leighton escaped not." Another was sent
to the Lord Treasurer. Fanatical arts were
practised by Leighton himself. The day be-
fore he was to have received his sentence, he
escaped from prison. In his prayer that morn-
ing he had mysteriously announced a miracle
which would shortly be manifested, and his dis-
ciples spread a rumour that the prison-doors of
their apostle would be opened, as for Peter.
This miracle was the device of one of these
people, a tailor, and it required the invention
of such a genius. One Levington, "a zelot-
ical Scotchman" and tailor, went to the Fleet-
prison accompanied by a Mr. Anderson, who
was also visiting a friend. The tailor had
craftily made a suit of grey cloth, the exact
counterpart of that worn by Mr. Anderson.
When they had entered the Fleet, each sepa-
rated to go to his friend ; the tailor hastened to
shave his apostle and dress him in the suit he
had brought. The porter at the gate, on his
returning with his friend in grey allowed the
two to pass, apparently as they had entered.
But when the real gentleman in grey after-
wards appeared he was arrested. Anderson
declared he was ignorant of the whole plot;
but both he and the tailor were heavily fined.

312 HISTORY OF

Leighton wrote a treatise to prove the lawful-
ness of his flight, authorised by similar ones
of Athanasius, Ambrose, Aquinas, and others.
But no prophet should venture to write on the
lawfulness of his flight till he had secured
himself from a hue and cry, which in a fortnight
brought back our apostle from Bedfordshire to
the Warden of the Fleet.*

In this libel Leighton professes the utmost
loyalty for the King, for whom he would lay
down his life. Leighton was not conscious of
the grievances of the Parliament — it was merely
as a silenced minister that he felt what he
considered as the grievance of the Hierarchy.
" We proclaim what we think without flattery ;
that all Christendom hath not such a King for
kingly endowments, as our Sovereign and su-
preme Governor." And in a narrative of the
inhumanity of his gaolers, who had hurried
him from a chamber down many dark steps

* Rushworth is the only writer who gives some notion of
the manner of Leighton's flight, but his account is both
obscure and imperfect. The Warden at the moment gave
a false account to Laud of Leighton's escape as he said over
the walls, either to excuse himself or from not comprehend-
ing the mysterious tale of the porter, of " the two geotlemen
in grey." I find a clear narrative in a manuscript letter of
the times : Harl. MSS. 7000. Mede to Stuteville, Feb. 27,
1629.

ALEXANDER LEIGHTON. 313

into a loathsome hole among felons, this cruel
persecution did not come as some have sup-
posed from the King, for Leighton confesses,
" I was shut up twenty and two months not-
withstanding the King's command again and
again, to replace me in my former chamber."
He had indeed offended the domestic feelings
of the Sovereign by observing that " God suf-
fered him to our heavy woe to match with the
daughter of Heth, though he missed an Egyp-
tian." This poignant allusion to the French
and Spanish matches made a great sensation.
The defence of Leighton, on this passage which
he addressed to the King, displays an odd
subterfuge, by converting the obnoxious pas-
sage into a pretended compliment to his French
Queen. " The phrase is a singular phrase,"
observed Leighton, " and is as little as could
be said if any thing were said in that parti-
cular ; for the Hittites were the kindest and
trustiest neighbours that Abraham had." Leigh-
ton, as afterwards did the Puritanic Govern-
ment, was in this manner introducing perpe-
tual allusions to Scripture history, to accom-
modate the public affairs of England to the
Kingdom of Israel !

' It was not however solely the Hierarchy
which received the deadly blow of our zealot's

314 HISTORY OF

pen, the whole government is charged with a
popular rumour which the ill conduct of public
affairs seemed to warrant — that of betraying
their country, or as Leighton forcibly expresses
it " all that pass by us spoil us," meaning
France and Spain, " and we spoil all that rely
on us," meaning the Protestant Rochellers,
whom he asserts we suffered to perish by fa-
mine. An eulogy bestowed on Felton, and
the invocation of a future Brutus startled the
pondering lawyers, who in these apostrophes
saw nothing less than high-treason.

Leighton himself has reported the conduct
of Laud at the moment of his sentence ; and
curiously characteristic it is of that casuistry
which Laud was accustomed to practise on
special and critical occasions. " All this while
this man of tongue (the Bishop) spake what he
would without controulment. At his conclu-
sion he added an apology for his presence and
assistance in this great service, where he con-
fessed that by the Canon Law no Ecclesiastical
persons ought to be present, or assist in such a
judicature where there is loss of life or mem-
ber, but, said he, to take away the ear is not
loss of hearing, and so no member lost ; so for
burning the face, or whipping, no loss of life or

ALEXANDER LEIGHTON. 315

member, and therefore he concluded he might
assent to the censure."

Neal, the historian of the Puritans, in order
to aggravate the odium of Laud's persecution
and to mark a fiend-like triumph in the Bishop
over his prostrate victim, has recorded that
while the merciless sentence was pronouncing,
" Bishop Laud pulled off his cap, and gave
God thanks for it !" This circumstance rests
on his single authority, and as we know the
side to which his prejudices would lean, it be-
comes a suspicious one. If Neal has delivered
to posterity a fugitive rumour, as an ascertain-
ed fact, he has violated the solemn duty of an
historian. This story of Neal has occasioned
more offence to Churchmen than perhaps it
may deserve.* It is not difficult to imagine
such an ebullition from the feelings of Laud
at the discomfiture of this impious Corah. In

* A recent writer of the Life of Archbishop Laud has pur-
sued an extraordinary mode of skreening Laud from this
popular odium. For concluding that " there is not the
slightest evidence that Laud was present at the trial," he
proceeds " Denying therefore that there is any evidence that
Laud was present &c. he must now be satisfied that this was
a rash ' denial.' If the circumstance which has given so
much offence had occurred, it would probably have been
noticed by Leighton himself."— Lawson's Life and Times of
Archbishop Laud. i. 530. And we see it is !

316 HISTORY OF

the tragical condemnation of the extirpator of
Prelacy, his Grace, always warm and hasty,
might only have witnessed a public demon-
stration to support the established order ; and
indulging more of hope, than of cruelty on the
new system about to be tried, have expected
that the terrible punishments which the bar-
barism of our penal code authorised, would be a
preventive of future impieties against Bishops.
Nor can we afford to Leighton, all the com-
miseration his sufferings at first awaken. The
intolerance of the enemies of the Hierarchy
far exceeded any in the Church-government.
The Genevan Divines, the sons of Calvin, as-
sumed that as the Mosaic Law punished idola-
ters with death, every Papist was involved in
the same doom ; and Leighton on his own
principle condemns the Dutch Republic for
suffering a Roman Catholic to exist in their
State. Alluding to an accident which pro-
duced a great sensation in that day, of a Rom-
ish priest and his auditory having been buried
in the fall of an old house at Blackfriars, Leigh-
ton only sees in this deadly blow, the finger
of God covering the idolaters with blood and
rubbish ; and which, he adds, " pointed out the
duty of ministers and magistrates, that they
should have followed the blow, doing execution

ALEXANDER LEIGHTON. 317

with the word and the sword. It is a great
fault in men of place that they would have
God do all the hard work by himself."* Such
was the great adversary of the Bishops ! Had
the places of the judge and the culprit been
reversed, the sentence would not have been
less merciless. And so it happened ! In some
lines by Leigh ton himself he asks,

" Why put we not imperious Prelates down,
And set Christ's sacred senate in its room ?"

When, ten years afterwards, this " Sacred Se-
nate" sat on the case of the Quaker Naylor,
they inflicted tortures as revolting in their de-
tail as those of Leighton ; it was indeed with
the most difficult contrivances, and in pro-
tracted debates of several weeks, that a few
calmer heads among the " Sacred Senate," pre-
vented them from adjudging the crack-brained
visionary to a horrible death.

A portrait of Leighton, engraved by Hollar,
is inscribed with the revolting particulars of his
tragical punishment — a picture of blood well
suited to the graphical details of the political
Spagnolets whose dark pencils have copied the

* An Appeal to the Parliament, p. 168.

318 HISTORY OF

torture stroke by stroke. Yet scarcely have
they told us all the variety of his wretchedness
during twelve long years of a troubled life in
what the enthusiast calls his " Prison-palace"-
a close dungeon ! Leighton more pathetically
describes the merciless condemnation as " hav-
ing inflicted harder things upon a man and his
family than death itself; it was a shuddering
sentence and as cruelly executed."

Leighton went to his horrible execution in
the orgasm of a wild inspiration ; he thought
and talked, even in his tortures, labouring with
the spirit of martyrdom. Some philosophers
in the calm of their cabinets, have conjectured
that the view of a vast assembly of the people
has stimulated to magnanimity, even the
trembler at death, and abated even the sensa-
tion of torture — martyrdoms have been met
with a rejoicing spirit — but far more intensely
may that sympathy affect the unshrinking suf-
ferer who listens to his triumph in the ani-
mating shouts of the people themselves. Leigh-
ton indeed required no extrinsic aid to sup-
port a failing spirit, otherwise he would have
found it in his voluble and active wife, who
marching by his side, beheld nothing less than
a glorious crucifixion in the pillory, where her
husband was to suffer nearly the pangs of one.

ALEXANDER LEIGHTON. 319

Such a woman felt the importance of her own
person. She went on before him to the ex-
ecution vociferating that " As Christ was sacri-
ficed between two thieves, so was her husband
led between two knaves," the officer and the
executioner ! The latter was made drunk to
perform this bloody work. When Leighton
put his neck into the pillory he exclaimed
" This is Christ's yoke, and the spirit of glory
rests on my head." When his ear was taken
off he cried " Blessed be God, if I had a hun-
dred I would lose them for this cause." When
they had slit his nostril and branded his cheek
he cried out " Such were the wounds which
were the wounds of Christ." The knife, the
whip, the brand, and the fire were to be re-
peated, and a sepulchral life was to close over
his miseries ! With a body macerated and a
mind bewildered, both worn out by their equal
affliction, Leighton yet lived long enough to
describe himself as " The wheat that comes
from between the two millstones, tried and
purified, — gathering grapes from thorns, and
figs from thistles." The old man who had so
often mysteriously invoked miracles which
were to happen, might at length imagine that
a great one was manifest, when his feeble eyes
viewed Lambeth Palace changed into Lambeth

320 HISTORY OF

Prison, and the Mar-prelate himself become its
querulous keeper, at the sinking age of seventy-
two. On Leighton's application to his former
disciples and now his Lords, the Parliament,
they appear to have left him to his own pover-
ty, but to have consigned to him the Archi-
episcopal Palace to range in, and make re-
prisals for his damages on those who had oc-
casioned them. Nalson tells us that " he per-
secuted their purses, with as much rigour and
severity as his masters did their persons." Laud
notices the sacrifice of his goods which were
sold at any price ; but these were but the
remainders of what Leighton did not seize
on, who usually declared, that " All was his !
Laud's goods, and all !" Yet the poor old
zealot himself on the verge of the grave, was
not so placable as usually represented. Ad-
dressing the Parliament in 1646 he could not
forbear alarming his late " Tormentors, so many
as yet live." " Though the laws of God and
man call for revenge of innocent blood, yet I
refer that to them to whom God hath com-
mitted the sword." Such were " the tender
mercies" of the Puritan, who was as zealous as
his " Tormentors" in appealing to that ulti-
mate regal argument.

With the undisguised emotions of Laud,

ALEXANDER LEIGHTON. 321

when, in that great revulsion of fortune, the
Archbishop was consigned to the hands of his
old Sectarian, we are acquainted ; for his own
hand has recorded this extremity of his fate.
Laud felt it as a studied indignity cast on him,
and the prognostic of his own doom. We
have his words in the history of his Troubles,
" Dr. Leighton came with a warrant from the
honourable House of Commons for the keys of
my house at Lambeth, that prisoners might be
sent thither. I then saw it evident that all
that could, should be done to break my pati-
ence. Had it not been so, somebody else
might be sent to Lambeth, and not Leighton
who had been censured in the Star-chamber to
lose his ears for a base and virulent libel against
Bishops and the Church-government establish-
ed by law, in which book of his were many
things which in some times might have cost him
dearer"

We may here perceive that notwithstanding
the barbarous punishment inflicted on Leigh-
ton, the Archbishop considered this extraordi-
nary libeller to have been leniently treated in
having had his life spared. Laud once said on
another libel of the same school, that " there
was treason enough in it to hang a man in any
state."

VOL. III. Y

322 HISTORY OF

What a meeting was this of Laud and Leigh-
ton ! These two old men, both grave teachers
of Christianity, and having passed their " three
score and ten," lingering on the verge of life,
were still never to be reconciled ! They should
have embraced each other on bended knees,
praying for mutual forgiveness — but the hatred
of party, and the change of fortune only filled
their narrow minds when they lifted up their
hands in amazement and horror at each other !

With regard to the inhumanity of the pu-
nishment which Leighton underwent, and which
has thrown so deep an odium on the govern-
ment, and more particularly on Laud, I think
that this odium has originated in the artifices
of party -writers, and the refinement of feeling
in those, who though no advocates for such re-
volutionary characters, turned aside in disgust
from so barbarous a scene. This severity of
punishment the philosophic Hume censures
without venturing to describe the horrible ope-
rations, but deems it " more just than pru-
dent ;" while the fierce Macaulay and her suc-
cessors, with the address peculiar to genius and
faction, have contrived to repeat the detail,
horror by horror, as " a tyranny which outwent
any example of former ages."

These exaggerations were not the real feel-

ALEXANDER LEIGHTON. 823

ings of contemporaries. Neither did the go-
vernment presume on this occasion to be " ty-
rants ;" nor did the people consider " the ty-
ranny to have outwent any former example."

In the manuscript letter already referred to,
it is said, that had not Leighton aggravated his
offence by his flight and his conduct, " his Ma-
jesty had been inclined to have pardoned all his
corporal punishments." It was so declared in
court. Lawyers are certainly not the profound-
est politicians ; they keep their immoveable
eyes on the written code. The Lords-Chief
Justices declared that had the author of such
dangerous assertions been called before another
tribunal, they would have sentenced him to the
punishment of high -treason, as lawyers, and
therefore they inflicted the severest they could,
short of life. The barbarous punishment of
Leighton, must be ascribed far more to the san-
guinary code of our jurisprudence, and the rude
manners of the times in which those laws were
passed, than to the temper of the Judges who
condemned him. Cruel punishments at the
mere recital of which we shudder — such as the
quartering alive of men condemned for treason
— were not then struck out of our penal laws.
We must weigh the value and nature of things
as well as of men, by the standard weights

Y 2

824 HISTORY OF

which were used in their own times. I believe
that the cry so often raised against the govern-
ment of Charles the First, or of the Archbi-
shop, on account of the tragical fate of Leigh-
ton, has been an artifice practised by a political
faction in recent days, who were certain that in
painting such horrors they could not fail of ex-
citing the indignation of every humane mind,
and to lay the odium on the head of Laud, was
to secure our abhorrence of that victim of State.
To me the clearest proof that the severe pu-
nishment of Leighton was not in its day consi-
dered arbitrary and inhuman, as we are apt to
conceive, is, as I have mentioned, that this very
party, when in power, had recourse to the same
penal law, and inflicted similar horrors on the
Quaker Naylor; and that in the charges of
Parliament against Laud, though the smallest
were allowed to expand their list, the sentence
passed on Leighton, was never noticed.

Truly has Hume observed that this horrid
punishment was " more just than prudent."
The Statesmen of Charles the First had not
then been taught the danger a government in-
curs when it excites strong sympathy for the
criminal. When afterwards the same experi-
ment was repeated on Prynne, Bastwick and
Burton, it produced the same effect of bad po-

ALEXANDER LEIGHTON. 325

licy. About this time, Richelieu observing the
triumphant manner in which some condemned
Protestants died for their faith, in the presence
of the people, that profound minister terrified
at this spirit, instantly ordered that no public
punishments should henceforth be practised on
heretics.

326 SABBATICAL INSTITUTIONS.

CHAPTER XV.

ON THE SABBATICAL INSTITUTIONS.

WE have now arrived at the investigation
of one of the most curious, one of the most
delicate, and one of the most misconceived
points in the history of Charles the First —
the custom of performing at Court, plays and
masques on Sundays, or as the spirit of party
afterwards emphatically designated them, on
" Sabbaths." Sunday was usually fixed on for
these recreations as the festival day of the
week — and the revival of the memorable de-
claration of James the First for promoting
lawful sports on that day, such as bowling,
wrestling, dancing, distinguished from bear-
baiting, cock-fighting, &c. was not one of the
least causes of the civil war among the
populace.

The memory of Charles is still loaded by
some persons, as well as by the Puritans of this

SABBATICAL INSTITUTIONS. 827

day, with the popular obloquy of irreligion and
profaneness in violating the Sabbath. Even
his -friends, startled by a profaneness, which
certainly never entered into the mind of the
Monarch, elude the torturing enquiry.

But it is our business to enter more parti-
cularly into the motives and conduct of Charles
the First ; to trace out the opinions of himself
and his predecessors upon this misconceived
subject ; to ascertain, we should rather say, the
notions and the practice of the whole Christian
w<irld with regard to it, since the establishment
of the Christian faith.

It may at first appear strange that a rite
ordained in the most ancient state of the an-
cient Israelites, should have no inconsiderable
influence in the modern history of Great
Britain — and in no other ! Nor can the sub-
ject be justly comprehended without investi-
gating the nature of the Sabbatic Institutions
of the Hebrews, and the history of the modes
of the observance of Sunday, as we trace them
through ecclesiastical history. It is only by
this way that we can become acquainted with
the subject, and comprehend the notions and
the design of the English Sovereign and the
English Archbishop who were dragged to the
block as Sabbath-breakers.

328 SABBATICAL INSTITUTIONS.

An entire cessation from all the affairs of
life on each seventh-day, is a Jewish institu-
tion ; it is not prescribed by the laws of any
other people.

The minutest violation of its rigid observ-
ance incurred the sentence of death. A man
gathering faggots in a wood was condemned
to the punishment of lapidation, a punishment
reserved only for the blasphemer, who in
mockery of the God of Israel dared to pro-
nounce the ineffable name. At a lower period
of the Israelitish history, Isaiah in his sublime
style impressed its extreme rigidity. " If thou
restrain thy foot from the Sabbath ; from doing
thy pleasure on my holy day ; and shalt call
the Sabbath a delight ; and the holy feast of Je-
hovah honourable ; and shalt honour it by re-
fraining from thy purpose, from pursuing thy
pleasure and from speaking vain words — then
shalt thou delight thyself in Jehovah." * So
inviolable was held the sanctity of this day, that
its uninterrupted course was preferred to the
preservation of life itself, of which history has
recorded some instances of the most solemn
nature, and some whose result has not been a
little ludicrous.

The reason of this peculiar institution has

* Lowth's Isaiah, chap. Iviii. ver. 13, 14.

SABBATICAL INSTITUTIONS. 329

been often enquired into. Moses in describing
the Creator as resting from the labours of
creation on the seventh day, and by ordaining
the strictest ceremonies of the Sabbath as a
memorial of the divine repose, only accom-
modated such figurative expressions to the
sensual comprehensions of his tribes — an in-
tellectual omnipotence whose workmanship is
not the work of hands, could not be compre-
hended by their gross conceptions.* The great
legislator of the Hebrews has also assigned
another reason for the Sabbatic Institution, for
he told the Israelites that the Sabbath comme-
morated their deliverance from Egypt.']" At

* The most enlightened of the Rabbinical writers have
usually agreed that such physical expressions, and human
emotions, have been only adopted for the vulgar — as when
in Psalms civ. 34. " The Lord rtjoices in his works." So
Aboab in his paraphrase on Genesis, p. 7. tells us on this
phrase of God rested from his labours. Y helgo, a nuestro
nwdo de hablar. " And rested, according to our mode of
speaking."

f Deut. v. 15. This double commemoration is explained
by the most learned of the Jews, to clear up any difficulties
which might arise, by a memorable event ; we are informed
that it was on a Sabbath morning that Pharaoh and his host
were overwhelmed in -the Red Sea. Such then was the
hebetude of the Israelites, that Moses appears to have con-
sidered that an insulated incident connected with their own
history, was more likely to be commemorated by them, than

330 SABBATICAL INSTITUTIONS.

a late period of their history the Jewish apolo-
gists of their people, so contemned and aspersed
by Greek and Roman, assign different motives
for the Sabbatical Institution. Philo after
some platonic fancies of the mystical number
seven, for its quietness, floridly describes the
seventh day as " the universal festival of Na-
ture" which ought not to be peculiar to any
people ; but Josephus informs us, that the
Sabbath of the Jews was instituted for the
purpose of securing a regular application to the
study of their law.

Sabbatarians, became a term of reproach for
the Jews witli the Polytheists, who could never
conceive the design of the Sabbath from its
singular observances. The blunders of Plutarch
are as ludicrous as his calumnies are malicious.*
Tacitus and Juvenal imagined that the custom
was a mere indulgence of national indolence.
Sometimes they mistook the solemn Sabbath
for a penitential fast, as did Augustus when
writing to Tiberius, alluding to his own abs-
tinence, he said that " no Jew kept so strict
a fast upon the Sabbath as he did on that

the miraculous event of the creation itself; a perpetual
miracle existing for all mankind.

* Sympos. lib. iv. where there will be found many ab-
surdities about the Hebrew people.

SABBATICAL INSTITUTIONS. 331

day."* The epigrammatic Martial, alludes to
the windy sourness of the empty stomachs of
fasting Sabbatarians.f

The ancient Polytheists were as little ac-
quainted with the customs of the insulated
Hebrews, as are most of the modern Christians.
To them nothing seemed so joyless as the aus-
terity of a Jewish Sabbath. It was a strange
abandonment of all the avocations of life. They
saw the fields of the Hebrew forsaken by the
labourer ; the ass unsaddled ; the oar laid up
in the boat ; they marked a dead stillness per-
vading the habitation of the Israelite ; the fires
all extinguished ; the accustomed meal unpre-
pared ; the man-servant and the maiden leave
their work, and the trafficker, at least one day
in the week, refusing the offered coin. The
most scrupulous superstitions had long been
superadded to the strict observance of the Mo-
saic institution, by the corrupting artifices of
the rabbinical Pharisees. The female was not
allowed to observe herself in a mirror, lest she
might be tempted to pluck a hair ; the Israelite
might not even scrape off the dirt on his shoes,
he must not lift a weight, nor touch money,
nor ride, nor bathe, nor play on an instrument ;
the most trivial act of domestic life connected
* Suet. Oct. Aug. f Lib. ix. Epig. 4.

332 SABBATICAL INSTITUTIONS.

with labour or business, was a violation of the
Sabbath. Even the distance of a Sabbath-walk
was not to exceed that space which lies between
Jerusalem and the Mount of Olives ; this was
the distance between the Temple and the Ta-
bernacle ; it had been nicely measured, and the
Hebrew in Rome on his Sabbath, was still
counting the steps of a Sabbath-day's journey. .
The Romans too might have heard that these
Hebrews when they had armies of their own,
would halt in the midst of victory, on the eve
of the Sabbath ; and that on the Sabbath-day
they ceased even to defend their walls from the
incursions of an enemy. Had not the Romans
profited by this custom in their last memorable
triumph over Jerusalem ?

But the interior delights of the habitation
of the Hebrew were invisible to the Polytheist.
He heard not the domestic salutation which
cheerfully announced " the good Sabbath," nor
the paternal benediction for the sons, and that
of the masters for his pupils. He could not
behold, in the twilight hour of the Sabbath,
the female covering the fresh loaves, prepared
for that sanctified day, with her whitest napkins,
in perpetual remembrance of that miraculous
food which had fallen from Heaven on every
day, save the Sabbath. He could not behold

SABBATICAL INSTITUTIONS. 333

the mistress of the house watching the sun set,
and then lighting up the seven wicks of the
lamp of the Sabbath, suspended during its con-
secration ; a servile office performed by her
own hand in atonement of the great mother of
mankind. For oil to fill the Sabbath-lamp the
mendicant implored an alms, which was as re-
ligiously given as it was religiously used. But
the more secret illumination of the law on the
Sabbath eve, as the Rabbins expressed it, be-
stowed a supernumerary soul on every Israelite.
The sanctity felt through the Jewish abode on
that day, was an unfailing renewal of the reli-
gious emotions of this pious race. Thus, in
the busy circle of life, was there one immove-
able point, where the weary rested, and the
wealthy enjoyed a heavenly repose ; and it was
not without some truth that Leo of Modena, a
philosophical Hebrew, called this day " the
Festival of the Sabbath."

It is beautiful to trace the expansion of an
original and vast idea, in the mind of a rare
character, who seems born to govern the human
race. Such an awful and severe genius was
the legislator of the Hebrews ! The Sabbatical
institution he boldly extended to a seventh
year, as well as he had appointed a seventh
day. At that periodical return, the earth itself

334 SABBATICAL INSTITUTIONS.

was suffered to lie fallow and at rest. In this
" Sabbath of the land," the Hebrews were not
permitted to plant, nor to prune, to sow, nor
to reap ; of the spontaneous growth of the land,
no proprietor at those seasons was allowed to
gather more than sufficed for the bare main-
tenance of his household.* In this seventh
year all debtors were to be released, a law
which would naturally check the facility of in-
creasing debts at the approach of the periodical
release. But what was the design of this great
Legislator in the extraordinary ordinance of
ceasing agricultural labours ?

We may conjecture that in the infant state
of cultivation he considered, that in the con-
fined territory which the Israelites occupied,
far inland, among woods, and mountains, and
rocks, and without any commercial intercourse
with surrounding nations, for they sought
none, and none came to them, their incessant
industry might exhaust their soil. This law
seems to have originated in a local necessity,
but the foresight which would have prevented
the evil of famine, erred even in its wisdom ;
for though Israel had been promised that " the
sixth year should bring forth fruit for three
years," and Moses would calculate on that sur-
* Levit. xxv. 3. 7.

SABBATICAL INSTITUTIONS. 335

plus to supply the Sabbatical year, yet this
refractory horde too often forfeited the Divine
favour. This Ordinance impoverished the
wealth of this agricultural people, and the Sab-
batical year was usually followed by one of
scarcity and distress. Thus it happened when
Alexander on a very singular occasion,* was
desirous of conceding to the Hebrews some
substantial mark of his Royal favour, none
seemed to them of more national importance,
than a dispensation to pay tribute in the
seventh year.

A more obvious wisdom and a more beauti-
ful moral influence appear in the still greater
Sabbatical institution of every fifty years.
Seven Sabbaths of years closed in their Jubi-
lee, or the year of Release : a name and a cere-
mony still retained in the mimicry of Judaism
by Papal Christianity, though it degenerates
into a ludicrous and unmeaning parade. On
the eventful day which hallowed a fiftieth
year, at the blowing of the horn in the Syna-
gogue, and the horn is still blown though no
longer heard in Judea, the poor man once more
ceased to want, all pledges were returned, and

* The story is delightfully told by Josephus in his His-
tory, lib. xi. c. 8.

SABBATICAL INSTITUTIONS.

all lands reverted to their original proprietors.
On that day the slave was emancipated ! The
Lord had decreed, " The land shall not be sold,
for the land is mine !"* By this Sabbatical
institution of the Jubilee, no demoralised parent
could entirely deprive his offspring of the in-
heritance of their ancestors ; the curse of des-
titution no man could entail on his posterity.
Equality of fortunes in the conditions of men,
a political reverie in all other governments,
seemed to have been realised in the small sacer-
dotal and agricultural Republic of Israel ; and
perhaps served as the model of that famous
government which the Jesuits attempted to
establish in Paraguay. The sublime legislator
of the Hebrews to prevent the oppressive ac-
cumulation of wealth, in individuals, and the
multiplication of debts without limit, and the
perpetuity of slavery, decreed that nothing
should be perpetual but the religious Republic
itself! This greater Sabbatical institution was
an expedient to check the disorders which flow
from the monopoly of property. It produced
a kind of community of goods among the peo-
ple, and in some respects combined the theo-
retical politics of Plato and Socrates with the
more practical systems of real property and per-
* Levit. xxv. 23.

ON THE SABBATICAL INSTITUTIONS. 337

sonal possessions of Aristotle and Cicero. Too
exquisitely benevolent for the selfishness, and
the pride, and the indolence of man, the pas-
sions of mankind would revolt against this code
of philanthropy, adapted to a small commu-
nity ; ,it was an Agrarian Law without its vio-
lence, and an Ostracism without its malignity.
While Israel possessed their Holy Land, all
the Sabbatical institutions were religiously ob-
served, till the destruction of the first Temple
by the Assyrians. When the captive Jews,
returning from Babylon, sought their father-
land, they beheld their tribes confused together,
and many of their brethren were wanderers in
far-distant regions. The glory of their Temple
had for ever passed away, the feelings of pa-
triotism were cold in a desolated country, — the
magic had dissolved — and the Seven Sabbaths
of Years for ever vanished !

Such is the history of the Sabbatic institu-
tions of Moses. The seventh day, consecrated
to the universal repose of all nature, may be
said to have entirely disappeared, except among
this ancient people, who still preserve it with
all its rigours. Even Mahomet in perpetuat-
ing it among his Moslems, changed it to a
weekly feast-day, and " the most excellent day
on which the sun rises" as it is described, is

VOL. III. Z

338 ON THE SABBATICAL INSTITUTIONS.

the sixth of the week. The Mohammedans
esteem it a peculiar honour to Islam, that Fri-
day has been appointed for them, and that they
alone enjoy the blessing of having first ob-
served it.*

The observance of the Sabbath-day became
a subject of controversy, only among the re-
ligious of the Protestants of our country ; a
subject which requires our investigation.

* Sale's Preliminary Discourse to the Koran, 197.

OBSERVATION OF THE SABBATH. 339

CHAPTER XVI.

OF THE OBSERVATION OF THE SABBATH
UPON SUNDAYS.

THP: superstitious discipline of the Jewish
sabbath, as practised by the tyrannical Phari-
sees, was one of those burthens of the old law
which the new removed.

The founder of the Christian Religion in the
severe reprimands to his rabbinical persecutors,
by his words and by his actions, testified that
with the abrogation of the Mosaic ritual, the
ceremonial performance of the Sabbath was dis-
solved. Jesus announced himself to be " Lord
of the Sabbath," and declared that " the sab-
bath was made for man, not man for the sab-
bath," doubtless alluding to its arbitrary super-
stitions. " This man is not God, because he
keepeth not the sabbath-day," said the haughty
Pharisees of Jesus ; and when Jesus was accused
of a breach of the sabbath, according to the pha-

z 2

340 OBSERVATION OF THE

risaical strictness, by healing a sick man on
that day, Jesus replied, " My Father worketh
hitherto, and I also work."* The Apostles
comprehended the intention of their Lord,
otherwise they would have preferred enduring
the keenest hunger rather than have plucked
the ears of corn in passing through a field on
the sabbath. This was the point of time, at
which the ceremonial of the sabbath was mani-
festly dissolved — or as Lightfoot, deep in He-
braic lore, that "Christian Rabbi" as Gibbon
happily designates this prodigy of erudition,
quaintly expressed it, this was " the shaking
of the sabbath."

Christianity was not established at once, this
miracle was denied the world ; and the chil-
dren of the Gospel required the indulgence of
tender converts whose consciences, and customs
and imaginations could not be weaned on the
sudden from those Mosaic rites which for so
many ages they had held as imprescriptible.

* A strong light is thrown on this expression of Jesus, as
well as on our present subject, by Justin Martyr in his ec-
centric dialogue with Trypho the Jew — " You see that the
Heavens are not idle nor do they observe the Sabbaths. If
before Abraham there was no need of circumcision, nor the
Sabbaths, &c. so now in like manner there is no need of them
since Jesus Christ." Sect, xxiii.

SABBATH UPON SUNDAYS. 341

The habits of these innovators, known in eccle-
siastical history as Judaising Christians, were
still clinging to the ancient faith, while their
convictions had embraced the new. These
Jewish proselytes, who are described as " cer-
tain of the sects of Pharisees which believe" *
were indulged for the first half century, in Le-
vitical ceremonies. To these Judaising Chris-
tians the antiquated sabbath and even the rite
of circumcision were still allowed. St. Paul
attended Synagogues on the Sabbath, and join-
ed in the ceremonial part, with a view to ob-
tain proselytes, and this great assertor of the
Christian Faith, who had inculcated "the cir-
cumcision made without hands," himself cir-
cumcised Timothy to humour the rooted pre-
judices of these wavering Jews.f There was
a moment even when the Judaising Christians
attempted to reconcile the Code of Moses with
the Gospel of Christ. These held a conference

* Acts xv. 5.

t The intolerant Knox was so greatly confounded at the
compliance of St. Paul with the advice of St. James in con-
forming with the Jewish customs that he might not offend
the converts of that nation — that Knox inveighs against
what he calls " a worldly-wise council" of both the Apostles,
and hardily doubts whether the command of the one and the
obedience of the other proceeded from the Holy Ghost.

Knox

OBSERVATION OF THE

with the Apostles, which like all such confer-
ences, produced "much disputing," till Peter
rising up, and having announced his successful
conversion of the Gentiles, protested against
a return to their obsolete rites. The Apostle
rested his salvation, not on a Ritual, but " on
the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ." Pro-
ceeding as they now were, with such great
success, the Apostle exclaimed, " Now there-
fore why tempt ye God to put a yoke upon the
neck of the disciples which neither our Fathers,
nor we were able to bear ?" This open confes-
sion of the Apostle is remarkable. The rites,
or rather the ceremonies of Judaism, had sunk
into an inextricable mass of the minutest and
most harassing superstitions. Religion looked
like witchcraft — and the Pharisees, ostentati-
ously austere, with inquisitorial terror, had in-
flicted on their people the brutalizing bondage
of passive obedience. The attempt to renew
these multiplied ceremonies was thwarting the
spirit of the mighty Reformation of Judaism,

Knox discovered that the Apostolical toleration was pointed
against his own unrelenting conduct to those who however
inclined to the new Reformation, yet still looked on the mass
with religious emotions. How true is it that men in parallel
situations necessarily move on similar principles. — Knox Hist.
Ref. of Scotland, i. 143. (Ed. 1814.)

SABBATH UPON SUNDAYS. 343

and would have contracted the influence of that
more beautiful system which initiated its vota-
ries on far easier terms. A baptism of blood
was changed to a baptism of water : mercy and
not sacrifice was now the hope of man ; the
Revelation which had remained incomplete was
now accomplished by " the Saviour who had
abolished death, and brought life and immor-
tality to light." The early proselytes to Chris-
tianity unquestionably would have been di-
minished in number, had they been compelled
to return to the old Jewish bondage.

The leading object of St. Paul's reform was
to do away " all the differences of days and
times," such as " Sabbaths, new moons, circum-
cision with distinctions of meat and drink. The
whole code of Moses was repealed, the rites
and ceremonies were declared to be but "a
shadow of things to come," * types of the new
Revelation, Judaism was but an adumbration
of Christianity.

In the East, Christians chiefly of Hebrew-
descent still lingered in their old customs ; the
Jewish Sabbath, and even the rite of circumci-
sion were permitted as indifferent matters, that,
as we are told, " the Mother Synagogue might

* Colossians ii. 17.

344 OBSERVATION OF THE

be laid to sleep with the greater honour."* But
in the West the Christian church condemned
as heretical the celebration of the Sabbath of
the Hebrews; it was mingling the Jewish lea-
ven with the bread of life. As the Eastern
Christians had been indulged with Judaic cere-
monies, so the Western, consisting chiefly of
Pagan converts, were favoured with more exhi-
larating festivals, instituted on a mythological
model, for the heathen proselytes experienced
the same reluctance in abandoning their own
ancient ceremonies as had the Hebrews.f Those
opposite rites and ceremonies of the earliest
proselytes to Christianity were imperceptibly
introduced into the Church ; they have been
deemed its corruptions ; and the famous letter
on the " Conformity of Popery with Pagan-
ism" requires as large a supplement on the
conformity of Popery with Judaism.

When the Sabbath departed, no new one was
substituted, no apostolical precept enforces it ;
no practice of the primitive Christians war-
rants it.

As the religious observance of the Seventh

f An expression from one of the Councils. Heylyn's
Hist, of the Sabbath, part ii. 21.
f Mosheim's Eccles. Hist. ii. 141.
Grotius in his "Truth of Christianity" has noticed the

SABBATH UPON SUNDAYS. 345

day of the week declined, the first day gradu-
ally grew into some repute.*

Of customs, whose beginnings only glimmer
in the obscurity of ages, it is hopeless to feel
about for any palpable evidence. Paley has ta-
ken an enlightened view of this subject, aware
as he was of the historical difficulties of affix-
ing the Sabbatical character to our Sunday, or
even the appellative by which it is honoured,
as " The Lord's day." St. Paul and St. Luke
only call it " the first day of the week," evi-
dently from the acknowledgment that the Sab-
bath was the seventh and last day. At first
it appears to have been fixed on as a day on
which Christians assembled to unite in solemn
prayer, perhaps as being in direct opposition to
the Jewish seventh day. St. Paul distinguish-
ed the first day of the week, and opposed the
observance of the Jewish Sabbath, and it was
for this reason that those Judaising Christians,

toleration of Jewish rites by the primitive teachers of the
Christian faith, book v. ch. 12.

* See Selden de jure naturali et Gentium juxta disciplinare
Hebrceorum, lib. iii. in the 13th and following chapter.

Prideaux " The Doctrine of the Sabbath, delivered in the
Act at Oxon, 1622. 4°.

Heylin's Hist, of the Sabbath, part ii 30. — and also,
Paley's Moral and Political philosophy, ii. 94.

346 OBSERVATION OF THE

the Ebionites, rejected his writings, accounting
the Saint to be an apostate, as we are informed
by Irenseus and Epiphanius.* The primitive
Christians abhorred the observance of the Jew-
ish Sabbath, which they held was only practised
by the contemners of " the Lord's day." Jus-
tin Martyr tells Trypho the Jew, in the full
spirit of the times, that " they would gladly
endure the most horrible tortures that men and
devils could devise to inflict on them, rather
than keep your Sabbath, and observe your so-
lemn days."

It is probable that Sunday, being considered
as the day of the Redeemer's resurrection, was
hence called " the Lord's day." The first ac-
count we find of this impressive term, is in the
Apocalypse, chap. i. v. 10, " I was in the spirit
on the Lord's day." This was written so late
as the ninety-fourth year of the Christian era.
This Lord's day can only be presumed to de-
signate Sunday. The term is frequent among
the prophetical writers, as Cruden's Concord-
ance will show at a single glance. " But," ob-
serves Paley, " we find no footsteps of any dis-
tinction of days, which could entitle any other

* Sunday no Sabbath. A Sermon by John Pocklington,
Doctor of Divinity, Chaplain to the Lord Bishop of Lincoln.
1636. p. 10.

SABBATH UPON SUNDAYS. 347

to that appellation." So obscure is even the
first introduction of the elevated designation
which hallows that day.

The Jewish Sabbath and the Lord's day were
long wrestling for the mastery ; but while the
first day in the week received the honours of
the Sabbath, it bred some confusion among
those whose faith lay in the Seventh. The
Judaising Christian, the mild Nazarene, and the
fierce Ebionite, sabbathised both days ; the Sa-
turday as the day of Creation when all Nature
began to live, and the Sunday as the day of
the Resurrection, when man was blessed with
such certain evidence of a future existence.

About the middle of the second century,
Justin Martyr noticed that " upon the day call-
ed Sunday they meet together to pray." He
styles the first day of the week, the day of the
Sun, and assigns the reason for the selection of
that day for religious worship, that in it God
began the work of creation, and Christ rose
from the dead ; this was evidently a confused
mixture of the Jewish and the Christian creeds.
It was these Sunday assemblies which induced
the Pagans to imagine that the Christians were
worshippers of the Sun, from whom that
dedicated day was named. Tertullian who
lived much later than this Father, calls Sunday

348 OBSERVATION OF THE

Dies Solis, and considered it as a festival-day
dedicated to mirth and festivity, and not wholly
to devotion. He sometimes calls it " the Eighth
day," and sometimes Dies Dominions, the Lord's
day. After divine service every one returned
to his occupations. The apostles had never en-
joined their followers to refrain from labour.
Peter who was a tent-maker, must be inferred
from a passage in the New Testament, to have
worked on his tents on a Sunday.

During the three first centuries, the Lord's
day was not considered as a Sabbath, nor was
it held as such in the fourth. At this period
indeed a remarkable circumstance occurred.
Constantine, called the Great, whom Eusebius
characterises by a single stroke, as " making
a church of his palace," enacted laws for the
equal observance of Sundays and Saturdays.
But Sunday became a more favourite day, for
his mingled army of Christians and Pagans
would willingly address on the same day, the
one in their Church, the Saviour Jesus ; the
other in the open field, Phoebus, the god of
light. No cessation from the business of life
had hitherto attended " the Lord's day." Con-
stantine for the first time closed the courts of
law, but the peasant and the artisan were seen
at their work. After prayers, Sunday was held

SABBATH UPON SUNDAYS. 349

as a day of recreation, and on Wednesdays and
Fridays they equally communicated together
by the order of this Prince, half-Christian and
half-Pagan.

In the fifth and sixth centuries when Chris-
tianity began to triumph over those anomalous
sects into which Paganism had split, " the
Lord's day" rose into the same esteem as other
festival days. Still, however, through these
and six succeeding centuries, we discover some
Judaising Christians. Gregory the Great, who
adopted so many popular ceremonies into the
Church, yet strenuously opposed those who re-
fused to attend to their occupations on the
Saturdays, or the Sundays. In their Judaising
strictness they refrained even from their baths
on Sundays, on which the Pontiff observed,
" If bathing be sinful, why then wash the face
on that day ?"

Under the Gaulish and the Northern Mo-
narchs, the barbarous Christian became more
and more Judaical in the strict observance of
the Sabbath. The writers of these times
abound with legends of miraculous punish-
ments happening to the violators of the Sab-
bath, or Sundays. We seem suddenly to enter
on a history of Israelites composed by doting
Rabbins, rather than on the annals of Christi-

OBSERVATION OF THE

anity, dictated by an Apostolical spirit. The
Rabbinical genius, in its minute tyrannies,
among their Sabbatical superstitions, had for-
bidden their Jews even making so small a noise
as that of rapping their knuckles on a table to
still a child ; or tracing a letter even in sand,
or cutting a cord, or breaking a stick. These
pitiful superstitions appear to have been re-
vived in the spurious Christianity of the mid-
dle ages, and were actually practised by those
Puritans, who emigrated to America. In 1028
Olaus King of Norway, having one Sunday
notched and whittled a stick, was reminded
that he had trespassed on the Sabbath ; the
pious King gathered the chips in the palm of
his hand, and burnt them on it that thus he
might punish the member which had, as he sup-
posed, offended the divine precept. A miller,
for mending his mill on the Lord's day, found
his hand cleaving to the hatchet. Such super-
stitious legends prove that the grossest Judaism
was a weed not easily to be extirpated from
the soil.

For three hundred years after Christ, the
most erudite researches have shown that the
Christian was bound by no law to the strict
Sabbatic observance of the Lord's day, rior was
any sort of labour interdicted on Sundays. In

SABBATH UPON SUNDAYS. 351

a Council held at Paris in 829 it was deter-
mined that " Keeping of the Lord's day had
no other ground but merely custom."* More
than a thousand years after Christ, elapsed be-
fore the Lord's day became distinguished from
the usual festivals appointed by the Church.
In 1244, in the Synod of Lyons it was in-
cluded among the holidays.

At the Reformation, Calvin and Beza were
anxious that the Sabbatical-Sunday, as a rest of
Judaism, should be considered merely as an
ecclesiastical day, originating in the appoint-
ment of the Church, but not of Divine in-
stitution. The Swiss Church in their Confes-
sion declare that one day is not more holy than
another, nor do they think that a cessation
from all labour is any way grateful to the Di-
vinity. To show the world that the Church
had authority to transfer the day, it was pro-
posed to change the seventh day to Thursday ;
a change which certainly would have occurred
in the Church of Geneva, had the Thursday
voters not formed the minority. This pro-
position, by assuming that there was no dis-
tinction of days, was designed to mark their
contempt of the Romanist's crowded Calendar.

* Heylin, part ii. c. v. p. 143. who frequently profits by
the learned inquiry of Prideaux.

352 OBSERVATION OF THE

Calvin and Beza accused the Church of Rome
of having imbued the minds of the people with
Judaism by their frequent festivals and their
saints' days.

At length we land at home. What had oc-
curred on the Continent, had been reflected
here. The first account we find of any re-
straint from labour is in the reign of Edward
the Third. The same argument then prevailed
for establishing Sunday as a Hebrew Sabbath,
and met with the same opposition ; for markets
were opened, public recreations allowed, and
trades carried on, after the hours of prayer.
At the Reformation, Tyndale remarkably ex-
presses his sentiments to Sir Thomas More,
" As for the Sabbath we be lords over the Sab-
bath and may yet change it into Monday, or
into any other day, as we see need ; or may
make every tenth day holy-day only, if we see
cause why." — " All days are Sabbath days !"
said Bishop Hooper. Edward the Sixth, our
infant Protestant, in the infancy of Protesant-
ism, appointed Sundays among other holidays
on which the people are to refrain from their
business, yet when necessity shall require, the
husbandman, the fisherman, the labourer may
work in harvest, or ride or fish at their free will.
This was but a half-measure. Elizabeth un-

SABBATH UPON SUNDAYS. 353

questionably never considered Sunday as a Sab-
bath, for she enjoins labour on that, as well
as on other festival-days after their common
prayer — her language is observable by its in-
dicating that we still harboured some Judaising
Christians. " And if for any scrupulosity or
grudge of conscience some should superstitiously
abstain from working on those days, they shall
grievously offend." I find Elizabeth granting
a licence to one John Seconton to use certain
plays and games upon nine several Sundays.'"*

It was however in the reign of Elizabeth,
during the unsettled state of the national re-
ligion, that a sect arose among those reformers
of the reformed, the first Puritans who were
known by the name of Sabbatarians. These
held the Decalogue as of perpetual obligation ;
and according to their new creed, if the Sab-
bath-day had been changed, which they doubt-
ed, the Judaic rigours of its strict observance
were still to sanctify it. labour and recrea-
tion, with those persons, equally profaned the
silence and the repose of the Sabbath. John
Knox, the great Reformer of Scotland, was
the true father of this new doctrine in Eng-
land, although Knox was the bosom friend of
Calvin.

* See T. Hearne's Preface to Camden's Elizabeth.

VOL. III. 2 A

354 OBSERVATION OF THE

Calvin deemed the Sabbath to have been a
Jewish ordinance, limited to that sacred people
with their other ceremonial laws, and only
typical of the spiritual repose of the advent of
Christ, which abolished the grosser, rejected
its rigours, and reproaches those whose Sab-
batical superstitions were carnal and gross as
the Jewish.* At Geneva a tradition exists,
that when John Knox visited Calvin on a
Sunday, he found his austere coadjutor bowl-
ing on a green. At this day, and in that place,
a Calvinist preacher after his Sunday sermon
will take his seat at the card-table. Some of
our early Puritans who had taken refuge in
Holland, after ten years in vain pressing for
the observance of the Sabbatic Sunday, re-
solved to leave the country where they had

* The passage is in the Institutes, lib. ii. c. viii. sect. 34.
" Crassa, carnalique Sabbatismi Superstitione, Ter. Judeos
superarit," or as he has given it in his own translation of the
Institute, "Ceux qui la suivent surmontent les Juifs en opinion
charnelle du Sabbath." Calvin would observe Sunday, as
a fixed day for assembling for religious communion, but
divested of all Judaism ; not that there is any distinction
between days, but the appointment of a particular one is
convenient, that all may meet together. After divine service
all are free, and he reprobates those who have imbued the
poor populace with Judaic opinions, and deprived the work-
ing classes of their recreations.

SABBATH UPON SUNDAYS. 355

been kindly received and went " to the ends of
earth" among the wildernesses of America, to
observe " the Lord's day" with the Jewish
rigours.* When Laud was charged on his
trial for the revival of the Book of Sports
allowed on that day, he thought it prudent to
deny that he had been the suggester ; he how-
ever professed his judgment in its favour,
alleging the practice of their own favourite
church of Geneva.f

* Cotton Mather, Magnalia Christi Americana, fol. 5.

f Thomas Warton in his first edition of Milton's juvenile
poems observed in a note on the Lady's speech in Comus —
verse 177, that "It is owing to the Puritans ever since
Cromwell's time that Sunday has been made in England a
day of gravity and severity ; and many a staunch observer of
the Rites of the Church of England little suspects that he
is conforming to the Calvinism of an English Sunday." In
Warton's second edition this note was wholly cancelled. It
had probably given offence to heads unfurnished with their
ovyn national history ; thus are popular errors fostered.
There was too an error, and one our critic and poet, not
versed probably in Ecclesiastical history, might have easily
fallen into, when he ascribed to Calvin, the melancholy in-
stitution of Knox's Sabbath. Calvin himself was adverse to
it. The Scottish Presbyterian who so eagerly embraced the
horrible theology of Calvin, as if that were not sufficiently
mortifying to man, dropped the only part which might soften
the cares of human life, and added to the gloom of Calvinism
the ascetism of the most rigorous Sabbath. Warton having
discovered himself surrounded by so many difficulties, and
2 A 2

356 OBSERVATION OF THE

It may surprise us that two of the great
friends of Calvin, closely connected with him,
and with his system, should have espoused a
very opposite doctrine. Knox in Scotland
after Sunday having been for 1554 years classed
among the festival days, both in the Greek and
the Latin churches, as the Anti-sabbatarians
maintain, Knox no longer calling this day the
Lord's-day, but taking some Jew for its god-
father, named it the Sabbath, and thus disguised
its nature and custom.* Knox acquired many
advocates in England. Whittingham the Puri-
tan Dean of Durham, who had resided at
Geneva and had married the sister of Calvin,
likewise differed with his brother, and on his
return home appears to have had his mind
imbued with a full portion of the spirit of his
Scottish friend. This redoubtable Puritan
evinced his zeal by defacing the antique mo-
numents in Durham Cathedral, and converting
the stone coffins of the Priors of Durham into
horse-troughs. Whittingham was a rigid Sab-
batarian, and these doctrines must have spread

having unintentionally offended the false delicacy of some,
in despair seems to have given up the note altogether, which
however only required a very minute correction.

* Pocklington's Sermon " Sunday no Sabbath," 1636.

SABBATH UPON SUNDAYS. 357

at London from a circumstance which Strype
has recorded. At Paris-garden, where public
amusements were performed on Sundays, a
crowded scaffold gave way, and by this acci-
dent some were killed and many wounded.
The Lord Mayor sent notice of it to Lord
Burleigh as a judgment of Heaven for the
violation of the Sabbath ; and the Recorder
chronicled the event in his Diary under the
head of " a punishment of the violators of the
Sabbath." This doctrine therefore must have
been general in 1582.*

The nation was therefore prepared in 1595
to receive these Sabbatic doctrines in a syste-
matic form by a Dr. Bound. The book ex-
cited a ferment among the people; the Arch-
bishop called in the copies, and the Lord Chief
Justice forbade the printing, as inculcating doc-
trines not acknowledged by the Church and
the laws of the kingdom. The suppressed
work however continued to circulate in ma-
nuscript, and, being prohibited, was the more

* Strype's Annals, iii. 140. The Puritan Neal, who al-
ludes to this transaction, profoundly observes that " the Court
paid no regard to such remonstrances, and the Queen had
her ends in encouraging the sports, pastimes and revellings
of the people on Sundays and holidays." — i. 262. 4to.

3,58 OBSERVATION OF THE

eagerly read. When Whitgift was no more,
an enlarged edition appeared in 1606. This •
book has hitherto eluded all my enquiries ; yet
it may be considered as the source of those
conflicting opinions, which in the subsequent
reigns of James and Charles, so long agitated
the nation, respecting the mode in which Sun-
day should be observed, whether with the
rigour of a Jewish Sabbath, or with the re-
creations of a Christian holiday ?

Dr. Bound's doctrine of the Sabbath reigned
paramount for several years, and as our quaint
Fuller expresses it, " not so much as the feather
of a quill in print did wag against him ;" arid
Heylin more elegantly confesses that " in very
little time it grew the most bewitching error,
the most popular deceit, that ever had been set
on foot in the Church of England." The pious
could not reasonably object to an act which at
least bears the appearance of morality and re-
ligion, though it may stand unconnected with
either ; but a serpent was imagined to have
folded itself under this " Rose of Sharon." The
Puritans having failed in their open attacks to
subvert the Hierarchy, and even the Monarchy,
from the time of the Mar-prelate faction, it was
now supposed to be striking more covertly,
and that Dr. Bound's doctrine was an arrow

SABBATH UPON SUNDAYS. 359

drawn out of their quiver.* This Doctor was
a root-and-branch Reformer, for he had thrown
out a broad hint that all other holidays might
be safely put down as Papistical institutions
which arbitrarily had raised ordinary days to
an equality with the Sabbath.

On Dr. Bound's Sabbath, scholars were forbid
opening their books, lawyers to peruse briefs,
justices to officiate, and even the throne itself
was rebuked, for it enjoyed no privilege to be
occupied on that day with temporal concerns
or idle pleasures. The whole kingdom was
thrown into this bondage of Jerusalem. Nor
did this " bewitching error" end here. Some
stood up for abrogating the Lord's day by a
positive return to the perpetual Sabbath-day,
the Judaic Saturday ; while others, in their dis-
turbed zeal, equally observed both days.

This novelty was too well adapted to seize
on the imaginations of the unthinking multi-
tude, who, naturally religious, are awed by the

* Compare Collier's Ecclesiastical History of Great Bri-
tain, ii. 643, with Neal the historian of the Puritans, i.
386, 4to edition. Collier indicates Dr. Bound's opinions in
his Index, as "Singularities touching the morality of the
Sabbath." The learned Henry Wharton in a marginal note
on Laud's Diary on the term " Sabbath," says " For so
these Puritans styled and accounted the Sunday." 214.

360 OBSERVATION OF THE

ascetic forms of religion ; they imagine that
they become more spiritual in the degree that
they remove themselves from all corporeal
humanity ; as if mortals were born to be as
if they had not been born, so dead to all
the affections of their nature ! In transfer-
ring the rigours of the Jewish Sabbath to the
Lord's day, the contrast among the people was
not only melancholy but even ridiculous ! All
the business and the recreations of life suddenly
ceased ; no cattle were led to the water, no pro-
vender was procured for the horse, no wine was
to be sold, and if a " godly" servant could be
prevailed on to prepare the Sunday dinner, she
saved herself from the sin of washing the
dishes. A Sabbatarian lady had all her days
longed to bless her eyes with the sight of royal-
ty ; when Charles and Henrietta were on a
progress, Heylin offered to procure her this
favour; but the lady refused seeing a King
and Queen on " a Sabbath-day." Dr. Bound
had proscribed all feasts and wedding dinners,
but he inserted a clause which does no honour
to the integrity of his piety, for he absolves
" Lords, knights, and gentlemen of quality."*

* Fuller's Church History, book ix. 227. Dr. Bound's
notions are accurately referred to by Fuller, whose impartial
narrative and citations are a substitute for the original.

SABBATH UPON SUNDAYS. 361

To cast a bowl, to ring even church bells more
than by a single toll, even to talk of news or
business, were sins, and ranked with murder,
and adultery, and even at a later period, a
Sabbath-breaker became as an excommunicated
man.

A gloomy and anti-social spirit was fast pre-
vailing among the people in their " preciseness,"
as this new system was termed. Puritanic
persons had deprived the populace of their
accustomed festivals and pastimes on the Sun-
day afternoons after divine service ; festivals
and pastimes, the poor man's inheritance, his
unbought enjoyments, the leisure of his servi-
tude, the common solace of the ancient friend-
ships of the village ! At a period, when the
papal Christians still maintained some political
influence, the Catholic priests were busily in-
sinuating among the lower orders that the Pro-
testant religion was nothing more than a sullen
deprivation of innocent enjoyments, and we
are told, that this argument was not unintelli-
gible, and had sometimes succeeded in " turning
the people's hearts." Scotland had already put
down " Pasche" and " Yule" and other cheerful
holidays as " superstitious times." James the
First, in one of his progresses, found the people
in Lancashire discontented, by the austerity of

362 OBSERVATION OF THE

their puritanical Sundays ; and on his return
home the King issued his " declaration" for
" liberty on the Lord's day." " With our own
ears we heard the general complaint of our
people." His native good- humour and his
deep policy, combined, to sympathise with the
querulous multitude, and to ward off this po-
pular shape of Puritanism. The Royal de-
claration is usually known as " the Book of
Sports," but it was soon contemptuously nick-
named " the Dancing Book." James had here-
tofore received a lesson in Scotland, from these
sour Sabbatarians ; and when he cast his eyes
over Christian Europe, that Monarch could not
discover any reason why in his kingdom alone
the Sundays after church-time, should become
a day of tribulation and self-denial — the peo-
ple being prohibited from their pastimes of
archery, leaping, May-games, and morris-dances,"
which encouraged the common people to a
common amity, and inured the bodies of se-
dentary artificers by athletic exercises.

Scarcely was the memorable and unlucky
" Book of Sports" thrown among the people,
than in their inquiry after the nature of the
Sabbath, they discovered, to their amazement,
that every thing concerning the nature of a
Christian Sabbath was uncertain and question-

SABBATH UPON SUNDAYS. 363

able. The Sabbatarian controversy then re-
opened.

The difficulties of the investigation rose in
proportion to the number of learned tractates
which appeared either in favour or against the
strict observance of the ancient Sabbath. What
day is the Seventh ? It is any day, after six
days. Which is the beginning and the end of
the Sabbath? Does it open at cock -crowing,
or does it last from even to even ? It was con-
sidered that neither the day, nor the hour were
material ; for Time having a circular motion,
and its divisions being themselves but artificial,
it was sufficient, if the due portion of the Sab-
bath be completed. There were who asserted,
that Sunday was a working-day, for that Satur-
day was the perpetual Sabbath ; while, in this
controversy, some disturbed at counting the
first day for a Seventh, persevered in hallowing
both days as Sabbaths. It was on the occasion
of a bill " for the better observance of the Sab-
bath called Sunday," we learn from a private
letter of the day, that a Member of the House
-presuming to sneer at the Puritans, observed
that if Saturday was dies Sabbati, it might be
entitled a bill " for the observance of Saturday
commonly called Sunday.'1 Our unlucky wit
had the good fortune to be only expelled the

364 OBSERVATION OF THE

House, whose proneness to Judaism, at a later
period, might have led them to renew the Mo-
saic lapidation.

The opinions of the Sabbatic-Sunday were so
unsettled, that when Fuller wrote his Church
history of Britain, that honest historian shrunk
from the Sabbatarian controversy, and has cu-
riously arranged his history on this subject into
three columns, of " Sabbatarians, of moderate
men, and of Anti- Sabbatarians," without inter-
posing any opinions of his own.

James and Charles were alike condemned by
the popular prejudice ; and though the present
was one of their least political errors, if truly it
were an error, heavily was it visited on the last
Sovereign. The Parliament's armies usually
chose Sundays for their battles, that the profa-
nation of that day might be expiated by a field-
sacrifice, and that the Sabbath-breakers, the
Royalists, might suffer a signal punishment !
James the First would have started with hor-
ror at his " Book of Sports," could he have pre-
sciently contemplated on the Archbishop and
the Sovereign who persisted in its revival, be-
ing dragged to the block. By what invisible
threads does fate suspend together the most re-
mote events ! It was not to be imagined that
the consciences were to be disturbed, and the

SABBATH UPON SUNDAYS. 365

opinions distracted of the English people, be-
cause they had fallen into a peculiar practice
when compared with their European neigh-
bours. Even to a much later period, the pre-
judice against these Monarchs had lost none of
its bitterness, none of its unrelenting hatred,
for the presumed impiety of sparing the peo-
ple the melancholy indolence of a Puritanic
Sunday. So late as in 1711, a writer in his
strictures on the Lower House of Convocation's
representation on the growth of Infidelity, He-
resy, and Profaneness, maintains that " this de-
luge of impiety and licentiousness must be
traced to the wicked Book of Sports of James
and Charles. Charles the First renewed that
war against Heaven which his father had im-
piously begun," and he discovers no other cause
in " the rebellion" but that of " the Sabbath-
breakers !" *

But this became no dispute of a mere theo-
logical dogma; "the Sabbath" was now a
party-term taken up in opposition to the term
" Sunday," to distinguish the Court from the
popular party ; and it seemed no longer to in-
volve a case of Ecclesiastical judicature, when

* See a folio pamphlet entitled " The Representation ex-
amined, being Remarks on the State of Religion in England."
1711.

366 OBSERVATION OF THE SABBATH.

it raised up a banner under which was to be
fought the terrible contest of civil and political
power, and to which flocked the subverters of
the government.*

* In a suppressed passage of Hume, of his first quarto
edition, p. 151. he treats with some philosophical levity the
change of the term Sunday to the Sabbath. " This is a differ-
ence about a few unmeaning syllables, but as the controversy
betwixt the Church and the Puritans, did not altogether re-
gard theological dogmas, but involved a dispute concerning
Ecclesiastical, as well as Civil power and Government, that
controversy must be allowed in some of its Articles, to have
been of much greater importance." Perhaps he erased this
passage on maturer consideration, when he found that it is
impossible to separate the theological part of the contest
from the political ; the theological being often the ostensible,
but not always the real cause of the civil war.

REVIVAL OF THE BOOK OF SPORTS. 367

CHAPTER XVII.

THE CAUSE OF THE REVIVAL BY CHARLES
THE FIRST, OF " THE BOOK OF SPORTS"
FOR RECREATIONS ON SUNDAYS.

WE must consider the Puritanism that was
spreading among all ranks, as that counter-
action which usually occurs in human affairs.
The prevalent jealousy and dread of Papistry
had forced scrupulous minds to become what
was sometimes termed "precise." This new
mode of opposing superstitions had however
many of its own. Some good men, but far
more fantastic and conceited persons, imagined
that it was wise to be " righteous over much"
rather than to revert to the Romish ceremo-
nials, as " the dog returneth to his vomit ;" yet
these very persons were fast restoring the cor-
ruptions of rabbinical Judaism.

The Prelacy had been openly attacked; a
more covert blow was now aimed, by affecting

368 CAUSE OF THE REVIVAL OF

a Judaic strictness in the observance of "the
Lord's day" which the Puritanic now began to
style emphatically " The Sabbath."

The divinity of the Lord's day was new
divinity at Court, says a contemporary his-
torian,* and it may be added was so through-
out England. At Court, so far were they
from practising any austerities on Sundays,
that it was their custom, " Time sans memorie,"
not only to hold privy councils, but to reserve
this very day for their more splendid amuse-
ments the Masque — the Pastoral — and the
Play. Even among the lower orders, Sunday
had long been held the most convenient fes-
tival day for the pastimes of the people ; and
more particularly for the celebration of those
numerous church, or parochial holidays, whose
traces still linger among our northern counties,
and were then held to commemorate the dedi-
cations of churches to their patron Saint, or
to consecrate the memory of some munificent
founder. That many of these festivals of the
people were the remains of old Pagan and He-
brew customs, was better known to a later age
of inquiry than the age of Charles the First.
They had however long been converted to
Christian purposes. The profane erudition of
* Hamond L'Estrange, Reign of Charles the First.

THE BOOK OF SPORTS. 369

the Puritans of that day was not very exten-
sive and their authorities were usually limited
to the old and the new law, which they appear
to have sadly confused between the literal and
the typical meaning. They had, it is true, a
due abhorrence of the Saints which crowded
the Romish calendar, and grudged even to
bestow on Paul and Peter their titular honour.
They now attempted to abolish these parochial
festivals, on the plea, that they were profana-
tions of " the Sabbath."

From time immemorial our rude and religi-
ous ancestors had preserved their country wakes,
festivals held through the night, and which in
fact, as their title imports, were the ancient
vigils. To strew rushes on the floors, and to
hang fresh garlands in the church were offices
pleasing to the maidens ; the swains encounter-
ed each other in their athletic recreations of
wrestling, cudgelling, and leaping, or melted
the hearts of their mistresses, by their Morris-
dances, and May-games ; above all they feasted
liberally, the rich spared not their hospitality,
all doors were opened, all comers welcomed ;
all looked forward to their wake-day, and old
friendships were renewed, and little enmities
were reconciled, at a joyous wake. Some of
these festivals were called Church-ales. The

VOL. III. 2 B

370 CAUSE OF THE REVIVAL OF

people after divine service on Sundays, resorted
to the churchyard, and after partaking in the
same common enjoyments, and copious pota-
tions of a subscription ale brewed by all the
strength and care of the district, they left some
token of their honest piety for the service of
their parish- church, to cast a bell or to repair a
tower, and dropped their mite into the alms-
box. There were Clerk-ales where the parish-
ioners sent in their provisions to the Clerk's
house and came to feast with him. The Clerk
was the vendor of his own brewings, his profit
and his reputation were at stake, and by the
zealous libations of his friends, a half-starved
Clerk, eked out his lean quarterage, by these
merry perquisites. There was also a Bid-ale,
a feast of charity, where a man decayed in his
fortunes, gathered the generous bounties of
his neighbours at this Sunday holiday. All
these holy festivals and public spectacles, well
provided with good fare and barmy ale, con-
cluded with rural games in May and a Yule-
block at Christmas. These Wakes, and Ales,
were long a singular mixture of piety, benevo-
lence, and mirth. The delightful poet, the
happy painter of our by-gone manners, and the
faithful recorder of our once country-customs,
has described the Wake in verse as exhilarating

THE BOOK OF SPORTS. 371

as these rural revels themselves. I will not
forbear their transcription.

Come Anthea ! let us two
Go to feast as others do.
Tarts and custards, creams and cakes
Are the junketts still at WAKES,
Unto which the tribes resort
Where the business is the sport.
Morris-dancers thou shalt see,
Marian too in pageantrie ;
And a mimick, to devise
Many grinning properties.
Players there will be, and those
Base in action as in clothes ;
Yet with strutting they will please
The incurious villages.
Near the dying of the day
There will be a cudgel play,
When a coxcomb will be broke
Ere a good word can be spoke.
But the anger ends all here
Drencht in ale, or drowned in beere.
Happy Rustics ! best content
With the cheapest merriment,
And possess no other fear
Than to want the WAKE next year.*

That these village Saturnalia were not always
associated with the innocent simplicity which
the Devonshire poet fancied, could only be an

* Herrick's Hesperides.
2 B 2

372 CAUSE OF THE REVIVAL OF

inevitable consequence of the revelries of an
English populace. Swains were too fortunate,
and maidens too tender ; the ales were too
potent, and the wrestlers too pugnacious. Our
own people may yet learn something from the
decencies of the populace of the Continent.
Is it still a remnant of our insular rudeness
that our rustics imagine that their boisterous
freedom is never freedom till it is proclaimed
by the Riot Act, and till the general carouse is
concluded by man-slaughter ? The comme-
morations of these festivals were charged with
such licentious acts ; the charge seems to have
been aggravated, and these disorders were but
local and occasional.

It is certainly a singular circumstance,
strangely discordant with the after-conduct of
Charles the First, that in the first and in the
third year of his reign, two statutes passed, the
one entitled, " An Act for punishing divers
abuses committed on the Lord's day called Sun-
day ;" and another for " the further reformation
of sundry abuses committed on the Lord's day
commonly called Sunday" No unlawful pas-
times were to be allowed, carriers are not to
travel, nor butchers sell their meat, &c.; cus-
toms certainly which had heretofore been prac-
tised. It is also expressly said that " the holy

THE BOOK OF SPORTS. 373

keeping of the Lord's day is a principal part of
the true service of God which is now profaned
and neglected." In no part of these statutes
can I find the term " Sabbath," otherwise this
last sentence is a remarkable specification, per-
fectly accordant with the notions, and delivered
in the style of the Puritans.

This would seem inexplicable, unless we
conjecture that when Charles the First held
his Parliaments, these statutes were contrived
by that party. Heylin declares as much; he
says that " the Commons had gained these acts."*
As they did not go so far as to abolish these
Ecclesiastical festivals, but only professed their
better regulation, at that moment no objection
was started from the Government side. It is
probable that the remarkable specification of
" the holy keeping of the Lord's-day," was
designed by those who drew up these statutes,
as a preliminary to the future introduction of
the novel term " Sabbath." That term was not
as yet to be found in the laws of England.

It is curious to observe, that when James
the First composed his advice to his son Prince
Henry, touching on the present topic, he pro-
vides that " the Sabbothes be kept holie."
This was his style in the land of John Knox.

* Cyprianus Anglicus, p. 241.

374 CAUSE OF THE REVIVAL OF

In his new dominions of England that term
was entirely thrown aside. The Puritanic
rigours of a Sunday were however gaining
ground even in the reign of the father of
Charles the First, and more particularly among
the civic corporations, as the son lived to ex-
perience. The conduct of a Lord Mayor
under James the First has been recorded as
an example of his piety, and it may be added
of his prudence. The King's carriages re-
moving to Theobalds on a Sunday morning,
raised a clatter in the time of divine service.
The Lord Mayor commanded them to be
stoppecl ; the officers returning to his Majesty
made vehement complaints. The King warm-
ed and swore he thought that there had been
no more kings in England than himself, and
dispatched a warrant to the Lord Mayor to let
them pass. The Puritanic chief magistrate
obeyed observing, " While it was in my power
I did my duty ; but that being taken away by
a higher power, it is my duty to obey." The
shrewd sense of this Lord Mayor produced a
compliment from the King.

The doctrine of the rigid Sabbath was rife
when Laud was Bishop of London. A cir-
cumstance will show the character of these city
Sabbatarians. Sir Nicholas Rainton the Lord

THE BOOK OF SPORTS. 375

Mayor, prosecuted a poor old apple-woman for
retailing her small stores on Sundays in Paul's
Church-yard ; Laud insisted that she should
continue her harmless living on Sundays in the
Church-yard, threatening, that should the Lord
Mayor again interfere in his jurisdiction, he
would complain of him to the King and coun-
cil. Another Lord Mayor in 1629 issued his
warrant against those " who profane the Sab-
bath-day by buying and selling." Laud ex-
cepted against it as intruding on his Episcopal
jurisdiction. These anecdotes are maliciously
given by Prynne, who concludes " Such was
this profane Archbishop."*

The land seemed threatened with that re-
novated Judaism which, not many years after,
triumphantly rabbinised the whole realm. Ju-
daical opinions had been broached by one John
Thraske,f who among other absurdities had
insisted that the Levitical ritual, relative to
meats, &c. was also of perpetual ordinance.
Now one Theophilus Bradbourn dedicated a
treatise to Charles the First, in which he de-
monstrated that the Jewish Sabbath was to be
kept with the rigid observances of the Hebrews,
being a perpetual and moral obligation for

* Canterbury's Doom, p. 132.

f In 1618. Fuller's Church Hist. x. 76.

376 CAUSE OF THE REVIVAL OF

mankind, while Sunday was an ordinary work-
ing-day. These Judaising Christians, whose
Bibles had disordered their heads, had their
followers ; and Heylin tells us that there was
a tendency in the people to " downright Ju-
daism."* All these theological reveries were
fostered by the novel doctrines of the Sabba-
tarians. Bradbourn however when brought
into the Court of High-Commission submit-
ted to a conference, where he had the good
fortune to discover that his arguments were
untenable, and to conform himself to quiet
and orthodoxy.

As profanations of " the Sabbath," the Pu-
ritanic party had often protested against the
Ecclesiastical festivals which we have described.
It was now attempted to sanction their opin-
ions. At the request of several country ma-
gistrates at an assize in Somersetshire, Lord
Chief- Justice Richardson issued an order for
the utter suppression of these popular festivals,
and further ordered that all ministers should
publish his order from their pulpits.

The Bishop of London, startled at this usurp-
ation of the jurisdiction of the Church, and this
abolishment of days of ecclesiastical appoint-
ment, complained to the King. The Chief-

* Cyprianus Anglicus, 243.

THE BOOK OF SPORTS. 377

Justice summoned to the Council-board, argued
as a sound lawyer; appealed to the recent
statutes, and alleged many precedents of such
assize-orders, for the suppression of these fes-
tivals from the reign of Elizabeth.* Law was
babble, when divinity was jealous. The Judge
was severely reprimanded by the Bishop for
having assumed a power over Ministers, with-
out the consent of the Bishop of the diocese ;
and commanded him to revoke that order at
the next assizes, in the same public manner in
which he had given it, as he would answer the
contrary at his peril. On leaving the Council-
board the indignant Judge, as much in rage as
in dejection, shed tears, and when asked by
Lord Dorset how he did ? replied, " Very ill,
my Lord, for I have been almost choked with
a pair of lawn sleeves." f

Laud desired the Bishop of Bath and Wells
to inquire concerning " the late noise in Somer-
setshire about wakes." The conduct of the
Lord Chief-Justice, acting without the Bishop's
consent in pretence of reformation, said Laud,

* Prynne in his " Canterbury's Doom" has collected a
number of these assize orders, which sufficiently vindicate
the proceedings of the Judge. 152.

t Heylin's Cyprianus Anglicus, 243. Prynne had already
furnished the anecdote.

378 CAUSE OF THE REVIVAL OF

had gone on a principle that " any thing that
is abused may quite be taken away ;" that dis-
orders which might have broken out in those
feasts instituted for good purposes ought to be
prevented by the Justices of Peace themselves.
Laud hints that " the Humourists were increas-
ing much in those parts, and unite themselves
in banding against the feasts, as his Majesty
has been lately informed."

That the suppression of these rural festivals
was considered as an affair of the anti-prelatic
or Puritan party, appears by the reply of the
Bishop of Bath and Wells. Having dispatched
his missives through all the deaneries of his
diocese, the Bishop received the testimonials of
his numerous clergy, from distant parts of the
county, protesting against these suppressions ;
they were desirable for the people ; the wealthy
maintaining hospitality, and the poor being
cheered by these feasts of religion and charity,
where the differences between neighbours were
often happily composed by this meeting of
their common friends, and alleging other reasons
for their continuance.* The disorders com-

* The correspondence between Laud and Pierce the
Bishop of Bath and Wells is interesting. The Bishop has
de'scribed these " Country feasts." When Prynne ransacked
the cabinet of Laud, he found these letters, and published

THE BOOK OF SPORTS. 379

plained of had been greatly exaggerated, and
worse occurred in fairs and markets, where a
constable was sufficient to put them down.

After the reprimand of Laud at the Council-
board, the Chief-Justice at the next assize,
without acknowledging any error, revoked
what he called " the good orders" which he
had formerly issued. The country magistrates
troubled at the revocation, prepared a petition.
They were evidently of the Puritanic party,
for the petition was sent up to London to be
secretly submitted to " Master Prynne," that
head of all " the Humourists !" Prynne was
waiting the arrival in town of the Lord Lieu-
tenant of the County, to have it presented to
the King ; but early intelligence had been sent
to Laud ; and it was during this interval of
twelve days, that Laud by a vigorous measure

them in his " Canterbury's Doom," signature V. ; they were
indorsed by Laud " My Lord of Bath's certificates about
wakes in Somersetshire." They reflect no discredit on either
party ; one earnestly inquired after the truth, and the other
laboriously furnished the information. Prynne according to
his notions, notes on the Clergy, seventy-two in number who
signed the certificates which they sent from their different
residences, that " they were the deboystest (the most de-
bauched) and worst in the county." We perceive the
bitterness with which this party-affair was beginning to
stir up.

380 CAUSE OF THE REVIVAL OF

induced the King to revive his father's Book of
Sports to be allowed on Sundays.

The ostensible object of these dissensions
was not the real one. With some it was not
so much the suppression of the Wakes as
the establishing the Sabbatic-Sunday ; there
were others with whom it was not so much
the establishing the Sabbatic-Sunday as the po-
litical opposition to the Government, of which
this served as one of the most popular pretexts.
So human affairs are strangely combined to-
gether ! All religion seemed now to exist in
the rip-id observance of " the Sabbath :" the

o

rising party rang this alarum, and the nation
was artfully divided into Sabbatarians, and Sab-
bath-breakers.

Neal, the historian of the Puritans, at this
point of his history, makes this reflection.
" Here we observe the laity petitioning for the
religious observation of the Lord's day, and
the Bishop with his clergy pleading for the pro-
fanation of it." This was a conclusive argu-
ment for whoever had not entered into the
history of the Sabbatic-Sunday in England.
The people would have wondered to have learnt
that Archbishop Laud accused them of super-
stition !

The motives which urged the revival of the

THE BOOK OF SPORTS. 381

Royal declaration concerning lawful sports on
Sundays, appear by some artless memoranda
which Laud never suspected would have seen
the light. They are these. " A general and
superstitious opinion conceived of that day —
a book set out by Theophilus Bradbourn * Ju-
daism upon Christian Principles' — which had
perverted many — a great distemper (disorder)
in Somersetshire upon the forbidding of the
wakes in the sourness of this opinion — an act
of a Judge that rid that circuit — his Majesty
troubled with petitions by some of that county
— his Royal father's example upon the like
occasions in Lancashire."*

Laud could not as a prescient statesman fore-
see the result of approaching events — that the
times had altered, Laud had yet hardly dis-
covered— and that at a crisis, it is not always
wise to be looking for a precedent, was a phi-
losophy too comprehensive as yet to have been
recognized. In the narrow limits of his poli-
tical experience, he did not act without pre-
meditation. He sought for an authority for
the measure he adopted by referring Charles
to his Royal father's example on a similar oc-
casion, and he was certain that the precedent
would prevail ; for Charles on many critical

* Prynne's Canterbury's Doome, numbered, p. 418.

382 CAUSE OF THE REVIVAL OF

occasions seems rarely to have acted from his
own suggestions. In the great struggle in
which Laud was now engaged in the religious
commonwealth with the rising power of Non-
conformity, he probably contemplated on a
deeper object. By commanding that the edict
should be read by the parochial ministers, he
was numbering the dutiful sons of the Church,
and marking out her disaffected members. The
" Declaration" would be a test of concealed
Puritanism. It was a strong measure ; but the
zealous Laud, as his old master James the First
had said, was at all times " tossing about" for
strong measures, and it has been his ill-fortune
to be judged of by their result.

On the issue of " the Declaration," a con-
sternation spread among the clergy ; Laud
seems not to have been aware that the opinions
of the clergy themselves had of late fluctuated
between the prevalent sectarian notions and the
former customs of the country, and indeed of
all Christian Europe, except the land of John
Knox. Some imagined that they saved the
violation of their own consciences by deputing
the clerk to promulgate the obnoxious act ; one
having read it, and afterwards the fourth com-
mandment, told his parishioners that " they had
now heard the word of God and the injunction

THE BOOK OF SPORTS. 383

of man, and they were to obey which they
pleased." If Laud by this test of Uniformity
discovered the obedient subjects of the Church,
he might have been alarmed at the considerable
number of ministers ejected, or suspended by
his authority, and against their will thrown
into the ranks of the Non- conformists.

Many extraordinary works were now sent
forth to enlighten the public mind on this ob-
scure or misconceived topic of the Sabbatarian
controversy. The most curious for their eru-
dition were on the side of the court ; indeed
the investigation could only be carried on by
the most extensive researches ; it was to ascer-
tain the customs and practices of different ages
since the foundation of Christianity. The in-
quirers who deemed the Sabbath an abrogated
institution, considered it was superstitious to
observe the extinct Sabbath of the Hebrews,
which distinguished the Jews from other na-
tions. They assumed that in its own nature it
was neither moral nor perpetual ; Jesus " had
nailed all the ceremonial law to the cross," and
the old law which had begun with Moses had
ceased with Christ. The moment the contro-
versy turned on the sentiment or the opinion
of the writer, it became fanciful and contradic-
tory. The most absurd reasonings were alleged

384 CAUSE OF THE REVIVAL OF

to extricate themselves from the perplexities in
which they were involved. Those who ap-
pealed to the fourth commandment for per-
petuating the Jewish Sabbath, yet had changed
the hallowed seventh day into the first of the
week ; this was a perplexing objection. If the
first day of the week, as the Lord's day, had
been appointed by the Church as a festival
day, by what authority was it to be regulated
by the rigid observance of the Sabbath ?

The short history of Dr. Pocklington, an
eminent divine, is a part of that of the Sab-
batarian controversy, and his fate may serve as
its close,

Dr. Pocklington had published a sermon
which had excited great attention, entitled
" Sunday no Sabbath," in 1636. Here he had
sharpened many keen passages against the pre-
vailing Puritanism. Five years afterwards in
1641, when Puritanism became parliamentary,
he was selected as the first victim. He had
articles exhibited against him, drawn from his
own writings. There is "a petition to the
Lords by J. H. of Cardington in the county
of Bedford, Gent." This puritan gentleman
has also undertaken the office of controverting
what he calls the Doctor's " Jewish and popish
superstitions and anti-christian doctrines." It

THE BOOK OF SPORTS. 385

is curious that both parties recriminate on one
another their tendency to Judaism.

Pocklington having affirmed that the day
which they nicknamed the Sabbath is either no
day at all, or not the day which they mean,
the Puritan replies to this ; " Sabbatum sig-
nifies a day of sacred rest consecrated to God,
whence all such days are in Scripture called
Sabbaths, as well as the Seventh day. There-
fore the Lord's day may be so termed, without
any danger of Judaism, as well as Easter is
still called Pasca, and Whitsunday Pentecost,
the Jewish words and institutions." The in-
genuity of the answer is superior to its logic.
By changing its first position he eludes the
question altogether. He does not prove Sun-
day to be the Sabbath, otherwise than as any
other day may be, according to his assumption.
The retention of the Israelitish terms and fes-
tivals in the Christian system was a remarkable
circumstance; they were the remains of the
early Judaising Christians.

At a committee of many JLor3s in the painted
chamber, the unfortunate Pocklington, had to
defend his theological opinions in the articles
now brought forth in judgment against him.
Our Puritan, of this trial both publisher and
commentator, assures us that " The man was

VOL. III. 2 C

386 CAUSE OF THE REVIVAL OF

not able to make any reasonable defence, for
his parts and learning had quite forsaken him,
and he had nothing left in him but anger and
passion to manage his cause, which provoked
all good Christians to praise God who had given
his Truth such a weak enemy, and error such a
foolish patron."

Pocklington before this committee of Peers,
who were sitting to decide on nice and obscure
points of historical theology, might have been
both impatient and indignant. Their sentence
deprived him not only of all his ecclesiastical
livings, dignities, and preferments, but held
him incapable hereafter of holding any place
or dignity in the Church or in the Common-
wealth. The last critic who was to take in
hand his unlucky " Sunday no Sabbath" was
to be the common executioner, and the last
copy was to flutter in the flames. The Puri-
tan " Gentleman" who has sent down to us the
discomfiture of the learned Doctor, has not
noticed the discomfiture of the Committee of
Peers who were now doing the drudge-work
of the Puritanic Commoners. It is from ano-
ther quarter I discover that when Dr. Pock-
lington was accused and censured, he was also
to perform the penance of a Recantation. Per-
sisting in his former opinion, he gave his Recan-

THE BOOK OF SPORTS. 387

tation a quaint and novel form. He said, " If
Canto be to sing, Recanto is to sing again ;" *
that is, he would only repeat what he had
first said. So that the man whose " parts and
learning" had so suddenly deserted him, at the
last, recovered all their energy. It is said, that
the party designed to have further punished
his contumacy, but as Pocklington died in the
following year, his death has afforded Walker
in his Sufferings of the Clergy, another victim,
whom he describes as dying " in a manner
heart-broken." But the honourable courage
which marked the learned Doctor when before
the Committee of the House of Lords, though
they had cruelly deprived him of the means
of existence, would hardly have forsaken him
in so short a period.

When the strength and glory of England
were placed in the hands of the Puritans, their
extravagant conduct on many national objects
was never more visible than on their Sabbatic
regulations. It seemed as if religion chiefly
consisted of the Sabbatarian rigours, and that
a British senate had been transformed into a
company of Hebrew Rabbins. In 1650 an act

* This curious anecdote may be found in " Lowth's Letter
to Edward Stillingfleet." p. 56. 4to. 1687. Neal has ac-
knowledged that Pocklington refused to recant.
2 c 2

388 CAUSE OF THE REVIVAL OF

was passed for inflicting penalties for breach of
the Sabbath, some of which included dancing
and singing, or travelling in a boat, on horse-
back, or in a coach or sedan, except to church.
This exception occurred on the remonstrance
of one of the members of the lilouse of Com-
mons complaining that " in their zeal they had
tied the Godly from going to Church by water
or coach, for that he coming from Westminster
to Somerset-house to sermon, had his boat and
waterman seized for the penalty." The per-
verted feeling and the misconception of this
race in respect to the Sabbath, had appeared as
early in the reign of Charles, as in 1637. when
many emigrated to New England. In their
code of laws, among the Sabbatic prohibitions
under severe penalties are these, " No one shall
run on the Sabbath-day, or walk in his garden,
cook victuals, make beds, sweep house, cut hair
or shave." " No woman shall kiss her child."
These were the grossest Rabbinical super-
stitions.

At length having prohibited Sundays as
days of recreation, and abolished all Saints'
days, or festivals, the common people evidently
murmured at the deprivation of their period-
ical holidays. The feelings of the people were
more natural than their Parliament, even in

THE BOOK OF SPOUTS.

the gloomy land of Puritanism. This must
have been the occasion of a remarkable ordi-
nance issued in 1647 concerning " days of re-
creation allowed unto scholars, apprentices, &c."
The second Tuesday in every month was set
apart for the holiday of these persons, when
it was ordered, that " all windows of shops and
warehouses shall be kept shut on the said day
of recreation."

Our kingdom of the Godly must have been
the scorn and ridicule of other nations, while
they were regulating the police of an Empire
as if they were dwellers in the land of Canaan.
What was the result of this spurious sanctity,
this fantastic renovation of the Israelite's Sab-
baths ? When Sectarianism bred all monstrous
shapes, and irreligion so easily assumed the garb
of piety, after having observed the Lord's day
with these Judaic rigours, a reaction took place
among those who now rejected the observance
altogether, pretending to that elevated holiness
which kept all days as Lord's day. A popular
preacher at the Temple, who was disposed to
foster a cheerful spirit among the common peo-
ple, yet desirous that the Lord's day should
not pass undistinguished, declared that " those
whose hands are ever working whilst their eyes
are waking, through the whole week, need

390 CAUSE OF THE REVIVAL, &C.

their recreations on the Lord's day," but that
Sundays should be observed with strictness
and an abstinence from all recreations, only by
" persons of quality" who had the whole week
for their amusements.

Such were the opinions and practices of the
Sabbatic Sunday, of the Government of Charles
the First, and of the Puritans.

SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS. 391

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS.

IN every history of England, the reader may
find what I shall now quote from Hume, that
in 1636 " a formidable fleet of sixty sail, the
greatest that England had ever known., was
equipped under the Earl of Northumberland,
who had orders to attack" — what, with the
greatest fleet England had ever known ? — " the
herring busses of the Dutch which fished in
what was called the British seas."

Sixty sail equipped to claim " the tenth
herring !" and which when the affrighted fisher-
men, and the States of Holland at length agreed
to compound for, by a duty or tribute for
licence to fish, amounted tp thirty thousand
pounds. This truly had been a wanton pro-
digality of the hard-wrung ship-money, for as
a financial speculation the British cabinet must
have been convinced prima facie., that they

392 SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS.

were securing a heavy loss to the Royal
treasury.

In political transactions, it is a very rare
absurdity, as runs the proverbial phrase, " to
break an egg with an axe ;" but what is not
rare, is, that the public are accustomed to decide
on public events by their obvious pretext. The
real motives, and the secret occasion which
induced Charles the First to put forth these
formidable preparations against these Dutch
fishermen, were not comprehended by the
writers who have calculated the profits of the
herring-fishery to the Dutch, and envied their
happier success in the art of curing them, and
still less have they been understood by those
depredators of the unfortunate Monarch, shortly
to be noticed, who have cast a malignant ob-
scurity 'over the magnanimity of Charles the
First in a momentous trial of the character of
a British Monarch.

This trivial incident of the herring-fishery is
connected with one of the most important sub-
jects of our foreign relations, that of the Eng-
lish monarch's claim to the sovereignty of the
sea — a claim then disputed, and often since re-
sisted.

The dispute about the herring-fishery occur-
red in 1636, but to take in the subject in all its

SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS.

true bearings, we must look for its beginning,
two years preceding that event. Dates are
often the most positive arguments in history.

It was in July 1634, that from intercepted
letters in Flanders, the Spanish Resident in
London furnished very important information
to Charles the First. In this correspondence of
the Prince of Orange with the Dutch Ambas-
sador in France there was transmitted a copy
of proposals by Cardinal Richelieu to the States.
That enterprising Minister had projected to
combine the French armies with the fleet of
Holland, in order to surprise Dunkirk and
Gravelines, two ports which Spain retained in
the Austrian Netherlands. The plan was to
be effected with such secrecy as to be concealed
from the English monarch, lest he should not
consent to it, and to be so sudden that the
Cabinet of Madrid should not have time to
frame a league with that of Whitehall.

Charles, on this information, acknowledged
without reserve, that these secret practices and
confederacies of the French and the Hollander
were dangerous to both Crowns — and that the
Dutch had grown more insolent since they had
become victorious. At this moment these new
States were powerful at sea, they had recently
taken an English merchant-ship, and had openly

394 SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS.

declared that they would confiscate any, which
traded with the subjects of Spain. Charles
was therefore ready to join with Spain to frus-
trate their designs, but it was hinted that he
was yet unprovided with the means of fitting
out a great naval armament, and the danger,
however imminent for Spain, did not press im-
mediately on England. The Spanish Resident
having by this acknowledgment felt his ground,
now showed that he was furnished with ample
powers both to supply monies and to conclude
on articles.

Of this secret treaty we have three papers, as
these passed through several variations, in their
progressive stages. They offer a striking spe-
cimen of Charles's application to business. In
each careful revision, the King with his own
hand made several material interlineations, and
he has distinctly endorsed these three papers as
•" Old— New— Newest."

The treaty was concluded in August 1634,
but the Armament was not to put to sea till
the Spring of the following year. In order
not to arouse the vigilant observation of their
neighbours, this great fleet was to be gradually
increased — and at first only twenty sail were
contemplated. It was agreed that the pretext
of this arming should be to free the coasts of

SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS.

Great Britain and Ireland from the pirates of
Barbary, and to protect the fishery. There
was a secret article that his Majesty of Great
Britain should give secret instructions to the
Commander of his ships, that should they meet
Spanish ships in an action with their enemies
at open sea, the English should aid them, in
case the Spaniards were overmatched, and to
use the words of the treaty " taking some con-
venient pretext to justify it, that the Hol-
landers may not hold it for an act of hostility."*
Such is the mysticism of politics ! This article
must have strained on tenter-hooks the under-
standings of our most dexterous diplomatists,
who when called on to explain, were to con-
vince the Hollanders, that while we were their
assailants, we were, notwithstanding, at peace
with her.

There was still a more remarkable article. In
" the Old" paper, it was mentioned that " the
English ships shall use their best means that
the subjects of the King of Spain shall receive
no wrong, and that his Majesty's Sovereignty
and dominion in these his seas, shall be preserv-
ed from violence and insolencies on both sides."
The English in fact were conscious that their
" Sovereignty of the Sea " was equally disput-

* Clarendon Papers, i. 215.

396 SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS.

able with their old ally and their new rival.
The Spaniards thus objected to the offensive
phrase — " It is certain Kings do enjoy their
Sovereignty in whatever is their's, and do
not acquire it, where they have it not, though
they use the word; but in Treaties such terms
are commonly avoided." It is curious to ob-
serve, that in this instance, treating on equal
terms with his ally, Charles the First, struck
out the words " his Majesty's sovereignty and
dominion in these his seas shall be preserved,"
and with political courtesy, reduced the regal
assumption to " his Majesty's subjects shall be
preserved." Thus while the Government was
insisting on " the Sovereignty of the Sea," from
one part of the world, and was sending forth a
vast armament " to scour the seas, and to sink,
or to be sunk, if any strike not sail to the Eng-
lish Admiral in the narrow seas,"* in the silence
and wisdom of the Cabinet, such was the deli-
cacy of the claim that it was waived in a treaty
of alliance with a friendly power; a remark-
able instance of the accommodating style of
Politico.

But claims of this nature though they are

* Such were the instructions which the Lord General de-
clared he had received, as appears by a letter from James
Howel to the Earl of Strafford.

SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS. 397

suffered to lie in abeyance, are in fact never
yielded. I find, three years afterwards, when
the state-policy of the two Courts was again
suffering a change, that on the complaint of
the Hollanders, who refused to pay the English
for a protection which the Spaniards did not
regard, when the Ambassador of Spain would
have replied to these complaints, " his Majes-
ty," writes Secretary Windebank, " fairly and
roundly answered the Ambassador that he will
maintain his sovereignty of the seas, and defend
those who acknowledge his sovereignty against
any power, or prince whatsoever."*

This then was the true cause of equipping
one of the most formidable fleets which ever
issued from our ports since the reign of Eliza-
beth, and that this was the great object of
Charles the First is confirmed by a variety of
very interesting circumstances.

The subject indeed at this moment so deeply
engaged the thoughts of Charles the First, that
having learned that Selden had formerly com-
posed a work to vindicate the maritime rights
of the English monarchy, the King desired the
author to revise it for publication, and so highly
approved of the erudition and the authority of
that illustrious antiquary, that the King com-

* Clarendon Papers, ii. 4 and 9.

398 SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS.

manded that three copies of the work should
be perpetually preserved in the Council-chest,
the Court of Admiralty, and the Court of
Exchequer, to be valued as a record.

Such was the origin of the famous Mare
Clausum (The closed Sea) of Selden. The title
is an evidence that Selden had in his mind the
Mare Liberum (The free Sea) of Grotius. But
though it was an answer to the general prin-
ciples of that other great heir of fame, the
object of Grotius was entirely different. We
are astonished to find that Whitelocke, a great
lawyer and even a statesman, has fallen into the
inconceivable error that Grotius published his
treatise of the " Mare Liberum," on the affair
of the herring-fishery, when in fact it was pub-
lished nearly thirty years before, and for a very
different purpose. Whitelocke probably only
recollected the title of the treatise of Grotius ;
as a patriotic Britain, he would confidently
appeal to the book in " the Council-chest," or
at " the Admiralty." Our Memorialist has
however sadly misled several modern writers,
who doubtless either on his authority, or
trusting to the contrasted titles of the two
works, have committed the same anachronism,
and thus repeating that the disputes on the
herring-fishery had produced the treatise of

SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS. 399

Grotius, they have ventured to perpetuate a
fact which had never occurred.

We smile that the subject of the sovereignty
of the sea should have so long formed an in-
tricate discussion among jealous nations and
philosophical jurists, since that knotty point
has long been cut by the sword. An exclusive
dominion mutable as the winds and the waves
- a desert of waters where occupancy only
could give possession, ceasing in the liquid
road with the wake of the ship — was by some
presumed to be but a chimerical empire. That
which we cannot keep, is not ours, and that
which all men can possess without our con-
sent, cannot be appropriated to any one. The
power which only begins with our presence
and ceases in our absence, can never be
deemed sovereign. Others have asserted that
we may remain masters of the sea even when
we do not actually possess it. On the plea of
maritime rights, the circumfluent waves con-
stitute a part of their own shores, and maintain
the security of a kingdom. " But whether the
law of nations warrant, any further pretensions
may be questioned," observes Hume. The
Duke of Somerset, the Protector, declared that
Britain was surrounded on all sides by the
ocean, as the securest rampart against her

400 SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS.

enemies ; hence we may infer that an insular
nation has its own policy, distinct from its
neighbours.

Our maritime dominion was protested against
by those whose national interests induced them
to claim the universal freedom of the seas.
When the Hollanders were rising into an in-
dependent empire, they became indignant at
the exclusive navigation of the Indies by the
Spaniards and the Portuguese, and aspired to
divide that world, which their old masters con-
cealed as it were in darkness from Europe.
Grotius, then the Attorney -general of Holland
and Zeland, vindicated the liberty of the seas,
and the " Mare Liberum" appeared in 1609.
The property of the sea he declared was a vio-
lation of the law of nature and of nations — the
sea and the air, like the light of the sun, could
not, as the earth, be appropriated, for their
divisions were impossible. To contest the free-
dom of navigation was to destroy navigation
itself, breaking a tie which should unite all
nations, and throwing the universe into con-
fusion. The treatise of Grotius was an ap-
peal to the feelings of those nations, whose
superiority at sea remained doubtful. They
are still employed in refuting Selden. A me-
moir in the French Institute, in the days of

SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS. 401

Napoleon, revived the controversy, and accord-
ed the palm to the declamatory Hollander, re-
sisting the colossal erudition of Great Britain's
antiquary, whom Grotius so honourably to him-
self, distinguishes as the glory of England.*

The Mare Clausum of Selden remains among
the monuments of the human mind. Pro-
found in disquisitions on the nature of domi-
nion, and stored with the inexhaustible re-
searches of all human learning, Selden explored
for his principles his own mind, and for his
precedents the history of nations. In his pa-
triotism he gave England the sovereignty of
the four seas, while his erudition furnished
them with a less disputable possession than that
ideal sovereignty in the work itself; where in
the many-coloured languages of his page, we
discover the Hebrew of Solomon Jarchi and
the Talmud, with the Arabic characters of the
Koran.

The Dutch Ambassador Joachimi appears to
have obtained an early copy of Selden's book,

* The memoir which I read at the time is I presume that
which the Biographie Universelle ascribes to Gerard de Ray-
neval, published in 1811, who we are told has invincibly
refuted the arguments of Selden. One would imagine that
the French Diplomate had sent forth a French marine, greater
than the fleets of England!

VOL. III. 2 D

402 SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS.

which was dispatched by a courier to the States-
General. It was considered tantamount to a
declaration of war, and Joachimi received secret
orders instantly to return home on pretence of
attending his wife's funeral, but really in order
to confer on a point too delicate to confide to
paper. Already the English fleet was at sea,
and the affrighted Dutch busses were flying
in all directions. Many distracted councils
were now held, and the pride of the new Re-
public painfully contended with their prudence.
It was proposed to send out a Dutch fleet to
escort their fishermen, which long after was
done, and refuse the florin duty levied for
every two barrels, — but it was considered that
negotiation might be a wiser method than bat-
tle. They resolved on seizing a favourable
opportunity which now presented itself — the
birth of a Princess — to dispatch an Ambassa-
dor extraordinary to the British Court, with
Royal gifts, not only to congratulate the Father,
but to engage the Monarch, if possible, to de-
sist from his imaginary property over the seas.*
On this occasion the States-General displayed
a more refined taste than usual in flattering

* Gerard Van Loon in his voluminous Histoire Metallique
des dix-sept Provinces Unies, has furnished some details of
this critical state of affairs.

SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS. 403

the elegant tastes of the English Monarch, pro-
bably prompted by the suggestions of their
resident Ambassador from his personal know-
ledge of Charles the First. Mr. Cornelius Be-
veren, the Lord of Stravelshock, came over to
England, and entered Whitehall not as a stern
Republican, but as a discreet courtier offering
the amicable presents of his masters. Precious
amber, transparent china vases, a chest of the
finest linen the unrivalled manufacture of Hol-
land, and the mechanical wonder of a curious
clock, which the King of Sweden had found
in the cabinet of the Duke of Bavaria when he
took Munchen and had sent to the Prince of
Orange — were trivial elegancies which Charles
instantly consigned to the Queen. But seve-
ral fine horses, and above all, four inappreciable
pictures — not from their own native and de-
preciated school but from the more classical
easels of Italy — the master-pieces of Titian
and Tintoret, were gifts no man more highly
valued than the King. Whitelocke who has
noticed a part of this little anecdote remarks,
" It is supposed they did this to ingratiate the
more with our King, in regard his fleet was so
powerful at sea, and they saw him resolved to
maintain his dominion there."

James the First had proclaimed his right
2 D 2

404 SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS.

" to restrain foreigners from the fishery on his
own coasts without his licence," but a proclama-
tion had never induced a foreigner to pay for
a licence, yet as James always liked a book,
he had read over and approved the manuscript
of the Mare Clausum, but he lost the glory of
its publication, for either his pacific measures
or some other cause, suffered the manuscript to
lie neglected many years in Selden's study.
Charles declared the Fishery to be " a right
and royalty of inheritance incident to our
Crown"* and his fleet had more explicitly as-
serted the sovereignty of the sea. The States
had remonstrated ; but the English cannon
pealed ! The Lord of Stravelshock was there-
fore but partly successful in his solemn and
courteous embassy, and if he could not get rid
of the sovereignty of the seas, he however ad-
justed an annual contribution from the States
of thirty thousand pounds for the liberty of
the fishery. The naval dominion of England
was established.

There was however no peace among the
Juris-consults, and Selden was not allowed to
partake of the triumph of his Royal master.
Graswinkel, the pupil of Grotius, had displayed

* Clarendon State Papers, ii. 9. The language of Charles
used for the same purpose, but on a different occasion.

SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS. 405

so much learning and such consummate ability
in a manuscript treatise on these contested
points, that he was pensioned for it, by the
States-General, and a new office was created for
him under the title of Advocate-General of the
Marine, but these honours were acquired on a
very singular condition ; that some of the De-
puties of the State should carefully examine
his work, and that it should not be published!
So desirous was the Republic at that moment
of terminating a discussion which had already
occasioned the annihilation of their fishing fleet,
and a tributary treaty. It was a subject, as a
statesman among them, wiser than the Juris-
consults, observed, which the pen could never
decide, but which the sword would.

It is however a curious circumstance in the
history of the human mind, that though every
judicious person was convinced of the inefficacy
of a volume to maintain, or to abrogate, the
sovereignty of the sea, still each nation looked
with a fond eye on the book which cherished
their own prejudices, and supported their own
interests. Neither the doctrines of Selden, nor
those of the suppressed Graswinkel, were neg-
lected at an after-period by their respective
nations. When the Commonwealth of Eng-
land went to war with the States of Holland,

406 SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS.

Marchmont Needham published a translation
of the " Mare Clausum," castrating the dignified
dedication to Charles and substituting his own
servile adulation of the Commonwealth. On
this occasion the States-General altered their
former opinion respecting the publication of
the manuscript of their Advocate-General of
the Marine; Graswinkel was now sent forth
to oppose Selden, as well as the fleet of Hol-
land to encounter the fleet of England,— their
fates were alike, for Selden answered, and our
cannon was fatal to Van Tromp. It may seem
strange that when two powerful nations have
decided on war, they should look to philo-
sophical theories, or the inky combats of closet-
idlers, as auxiliaries in their cause, but prac-
tised statesmen know how susceptible are the
imaginations of the people, who not always
knowing what they fight for, sharpen their pa-
triotism by intricate discussions, and carry on
a war with great spirit, when it is the result of
a system of thinking, — an assumption of arbi-
trary principles, equally passionate and tempo-
rary.

The conduct of Charles the First in vindicat-
ing the British power in the dominion of the
British seas, by requiring the foreigner to strike
his flag to the flag of England, avowing the

SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS. 40?

Sovereignty of the sea as his principle and
maintaining the principle by the deed, is one
of the most magnanimous acts of his reign, and
one which must ever constitute the peculiar
characteristic of an English monarch. In this
great incident in our history from his first step
to his last, we may justly commend his inviola-
ble honour, and his unalterable decision ; his
inviolable honour, because the moderate, if not
the scanty supply which Charles the First had
drawn from ship-money had been sacredly set
apart for its great national object : his unalter-
able decision, because the mind of Charles the
First had been fully impressed both by the
greatness and the necessity of this enterprise.
The seas were swept by our friends as well as
by our foes, and even the distant pirates of Bar-
bary had dared repeatedly to descend on the
Irish coast.

England may sometimes wisely relinquish a
military position on the Continent, but when
may she yield the royalty of her seas ? When
Venice dropped her nuptial ring into the Adri-
atic, who smiled not at the pageant hero, who
slunk away from his ravished bride ? but Eng-
land is embraced by the ocean itself — or as one
of her admirals said in Charles the Second's
reign,— married to the sea. It is our trium-

408 SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS.

phant navies which have extended a narrow in-
sular dominion, till England has risen the arbi-
ter of her neighbours, and, as it were, become
herself the neighbour of the most distant powers.
This great naval enterprise was therefore no
wild scheme of ambition, no capricious act of
power. It adjusted the political balance of
Europe, while it was achieving the secret wish
of the people who were murmuring at the ship-
money. Besides the volume of Selden, which
Charles the First held as the record of his title
to his maritime dominions, the King had shown
his earnestness to improve the state of his navy,
and to display to the world, a model of naval
architecture, worthy of him who claimed the
sovereignty of the seas. He called forth the
genius of Phineas Pett, the great shipwright
who had been patronised by his father, and
particularly by his brother Prince Henry.
Charles frequently visited the dock-yard at
Woolwich. It was in one of these visits that
the King held a private conference with Pett,
in which the King himself projected the plan
of this great ship of war, and Pett travelled to
the North to obtain timbers of an extraordinary
dimension, and manufactured materials ex-
pressly adapted to this marine citadel. In the
great dock at Woolwich at length appeared

SOVEREIGNTY OP THE SEAS. 409

" that miracle of ships," as Lilly calls it. It
exceeded in its magnitude, its workmanship,
and its magnificence, any ship which England
had put to sea, or, as it is said, in the world.
It became a popular object of curiosity, and
not only their Majesties, but multitudes flock-
ed to wonder at this floating castle. This ship
of war was a favourite object with Charles the
First, and the cost was more than royal, of
which when reminded, he gave that noble but
severe answer, and which, though I have al-
ready noticed it, deserves here to be repeated.
" While some nobles prodigally spent their pa-
trimony in luxurious courses, nothing either to
their credit, or their reputations, or beneficial
to the kingdom, as King, he might be allowed
to build that ship for his pleasure, which might
be useful for the service of the kingdom."*

* This ship of war is minutely described in StrafFord's
Letters, ii. 116. It was of 1637 ton, which by an accidental
coincidence was the very year in which it was finished. In
respect to the name of the ship some difficulties have occur-
red. It has been erroneously called " The Royal Sovereign,"
and in a passage in StrafFord's Letters I find " My Lord of
Northumberland had the happiness to light on the name
which most pleased the King, ' The Sovereign.' " Even
contemporaries differed about the name of this ship. Later
writers call it " The Sovereign." The right name is ex-
tremely important on the present subject, to show what was

410 SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS.

Two other remarkable memorials which the
King has left his country attest his own sense
of the glory, and the patriotic pride of his own
claims. Charles the First struck several me-
dals to commemorate the glorious event after
the treaty with Holland, which may still be
seen in the cabinets of the curious ;* and in St.
James's park, there stood, and doubtless now
stands, a cannon which was emphatically called
"the gun," it was cast in the year 1638, bear-
ing this inscription,

Carolus Edgceri sceptrum stabilivit Aquarum.
" The sceptre of Edgar established on the waters by Charles."

Such was the venerable antiquity of the regal

passing in the mind of Charles. And now it may be finally
ascertained, for the builder himself, in his auto-biography,
has preserved the expressive appellative. The King himself
commanded she should bear the name of " The Sovereign of
the Seas." I recollect in an evening lecture at the Royal
Institution, Mr. Knowles, F.R.S. of the Navy-office, favour-
ing us with an interesting view of our Naval architecture,
and exhibiting a draught of " The Sovereign of the Seas,"
which ship for that period he considered a master-piece of
the art. Of Phineas Pett, the great Naval architect, there
are some memoirs in the Archseologia, xii. 217. and the MS.
of his life is preserved at the British Museum.

* It is an extraordinary omission in Evelyn's rambling
work on Medals, that he should not have noticed these testi-

SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS. 411

claim. A cannon which bears an argument is
royal logic, and would seem in more than one
respect, irrefragable. It is possibly a delicate
allusion to the work of the great master of our
antiquities, who had deduced our maritime do-
minion from the first Sovereign of England.*

The pirates of Sallee, who had revolted from
the Emperor of Morocco, headed by a rebel
who was called the Saint, by their descents
and depredations on the Irish coasts, among
other disgraceful evils had carried off into cap-
tivity numbers of our countrymen. These pi-
rates were now extirpated. Charles was anx-
ious to confer particular honours on Captain
Rainsborough, the commander in this success-
ful expedition, and when this " experienced
and worthy seaman," as Secretary Coke de-
scribes him, declined the honour of knighthood
which the King himself offered, Charles order-
ed that his naval hero should be presented with
a costly gold chain, and with a medal of not
less value than three hundred pounds. This
memorial of loyal service may perhaps still

monies of the triumph of Charles the First, and of England.
Nor are they in Pinkerton's Medallic History of England.
I have seen some in the collection of British Medals at the
British Museum.

* Mare Clausum, lib. ii. cap. xii.

412 SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS.

exist, should not very opposite family feelings
have melted it down in the days of the Rump.
The Moorish Ambassador appeared mounted
on horseback, in his train four grooms led four
Barbary horses, which showed their mettle in
their paces, richly caparisoned, the saddles stud-
ded ; and the captives mostly clad in white who
now had returned free men to England, passed
through the city, where it was also known that
the Ambassador was the bearer of a treaty of
alliance and commerce. Even Strafford ima-
gined that " this action of Bailee is so full of
honour that it will bring great content to the
subject, and help much towards the ready
cheerful payment of the shipping monies."*
But doubtless there were many who like Mr.
Brodie, now that the expedition was successful,
were finding out reasons why it ought not to
have succeeded. Ancient is the cry of what
we moderns call the Opposition !| The poet

* Stafford's Letters, ii. 129 — 132.

t " The success of the measure arose entirely from an ac-
cidental event," observes Mr. Brodie ; " it is said that in-
testine commotions opportunely assisted the attack."

The plan' was concerted with the Emperor of Morocco,
who in the preceding year had sent over to England an en-
voy with a proposal that he should attack the place by land,
while the English assailed it at sea. By what licence of

SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEAS. 413

Waller may soothe the manes of Charles the
First for the insults he is doomed to receive
from our contemporary. Waller has composed
a poem on the taking of Sallee. The poet like
most persons was attracted by the novel spec-
tacle of the Moor — the mettled palfreys — the
Christian captives :

Morocco sends the Chief among his Peers
Who in his bark proportioned presents bears,

To the renowned for piety and force

Poor captives manumised, and matchless horse.

Alluding to the lawless democracy of these
pirates, a couplet more happily applies to our
present purpose.

Safely they might on other nations prey ;
Fools to provoke the Sovereign of the sea !

style can a preconcerted measure be said to have terminated
in " an accidental event ?"

We writers of history, I suspect, appear anomalous beings
to the amusing inventors who luxuriate in these idling times
in florid trifles. They who hardly allow themselves to be
influenced by the temporary passions of their own day may
well wonder at the serious interest which leads us on pur-
suing Truth through the labyrinths of Time — in plain English
— in the history of the Past. Yet were this interest not
real, and were the detection of error and prejudice not one
of the most poignant relishes of our studies, how could I
have discovered what I assert I have, that Mr. Brodie finds
pleasure in depreciating a successful bombardment of Sallee,
merely from a personal quarrel with Charles the First ?

414 CAUSES OF THE

CHAPTER XIX.

CAUSES OF THE INACTION OF THE ENGLISH
FLEETS.

CHARLES the First was doomed to war with
Fate ! The narrative of his glory must ever
terminate with that of his misfortunes. This
Monarch had first set that noble example which
his successors in government have scrupulously
followed, whether a Cromwell, a Stuart, or a
Guelph. The sovereignty of our seas will ever
remain a part of our insular policy, yet Charles
the First was himself to witness the reverse of
all his hopes. The humiliated Sovereign of
the seas was to suffer a national insult even
from those whom he had subjected.

It is worthy the curiosity of Englishmen to
become acquainted with the complicated events
by which this great naval design became utterly
frustrated. It often happens in the history of
Charles the First that his accusers have not

INACTION OF THE ENGLISH FLEETS. 415

developed the peculiarity of his situation, while
they have reproached his conduct. Even when
their reproaches may not be unjust, truth has
required a different statement than they have
afforded us. The subject of the Sovereignty
of the Sea is a remarkable instance of this.

We have shown the exertions which were
required to equip the most formidable fleet
which England had ever put to sea, and the
scrupulous honour of Charles in employing the
moderate revenue of the ship-money to this
great national object. Yet notwithstanding
these efforts, in the course of three years we
find this great fleet inactive ; our flag no longer
honoured by the French, the Hollander, and
the Spaniard, and to reach the climax of na-
tional disgrace, the English Sovereign received
the European affront of witnessing the neutral-
ity of his ports violated by two nations, in
defiance of his express command. It is only a
mind most perverted in its political feelings
which can imagine for an instant, that Charles
was tamely insensible to this national outrage-
he who had maintained with such elevation,
not only this Sovereignty of the sea, but at the
same critical moment, as we shall shortly show,
was asserting the independence of his govern-
ment against the foreigner. It is evident that

416 CAUSES OF THE

causes which have not been explored by our
historical writers, must have been secretly ope-
rating to have occasioned such a fatal reverse.

At this period two strong parties equally
balanced, divided the Cabinet. Lord Holland
and Secretary Coke had adopted the French
interest, in opposition to Lord Cottington and
Secretary Windebank, who were warmly at-
tached to the Spanish. A personage of no in-
ferior importance in the naval history of this
period must also be considered. This was the
Lord High Admiral of England, Algernon,
Earl of Northumberland.

An idea of the condition of our naval affairs
we obtain by some letters of the Earl of North-
umberland. In February 1636-7 two queru-
lous letters to Strafford represent the miserable
state in which the business of the admiralty
was conducted, which was then in commission.
Northumberland had been appointed Admiral
of the summer fleet. " It is not declared who
shall command the King's fleet. If that charge
be committed to any other body, I shall not
envy him that hath the honour of it ; for I
profess to your Lordship, to whom 1 shall ever
speak freely, that as it is now managed, it is
not an employment fit for any person of
honour."

INACTION OF THE ENGLISH FLEETS. 417

A few days after we find, " the King bath
this day told me privately that he is so well
satisfied with my carriage in his service the last
summer, that he intends again to employ me
this year, which I should willingly have de-
clined had I known handsomely how to avoid
it. I perceive some others of whom the King
is not very confident have been suitors for the
employment, and if four pounds a-day whilst
I am abroad be the only reward for my service,
truly I would have wished it in another hand.'*

This is no heroic strain ! However we learn
two months afterwards, that the King in person
at a Committee of the Admiralty, called to-
gether the officers of the Navy to answer the
abuses alleged against them by the principal
commanders — little said by them in their own
defence. Some reform was agreed on, and after
admonition from the King on " hope of their
amendment," he graciously dismissed them.

Again, " If the King have not more use of
his fleet than is yet known, he may well save
one half of the charge, and give me leave to
stay at home."

Three months after, July 1637, a letter dated
on board the Triumph in the Downs, prolongs
the same desponding tone. They were ex-
tremely idle, no directions for the disposing of

VOL. III. 2 E

418 CAUSES OF THE

the fleets. " When men go several ways and
are led by private ends, they are not only long
in coming to resolutions, but do often destroy
public designs." He continues in a nobler
strain than the former one of " four pounds
a-day when on board." " To ride in this place
at anchor a whole summer together without
hope of action, to see daily disorders in the
fleet, and not to have means to remedy them,
and to be in an employment, where a man can
neither do service to the State, gain honour to
himself, nor do courtesies to his friends, is a
condition that I think nobody will be ambi-
tious of." *

How much may be subtracted from the
amount of these querulous dispatches, or how
far they may originate in a youthful nobleman
who had not yet reached the point of his am-
bition, who shall say ? One thing appears, that
there was a strange unaccountable inaction in
the fleet. However disorderly was the gene-
ral conduct of the navy, and tedious and mys-
terious its inaction, a bright beam is suddenly
thrown over the late darkened picture, in the
mind of Northumberland, when in March 1638,
" his Majesty conferred on him an honour be-
yond his expectation," by creating him the
* Stafford's Letters, ii. 51, 67, 71.

INACTION OF THE ENGLISH FLEETS. 419

Lord High Admiral. This Royal grace, North-
umberland ascribes to a friendly conversation
which Strafford had formerly had with him
in Sion Gallery. We are now told that " the
King taking into his consideration the incon-
veniences of having his navy and sea-affairs
governed in this conjuncture by a Commission,
is pleased to think me worthy to be trusted
with that charge, and declared in Council that
hereafter he purposed to make his son the
Duke of York Admiral of England when he
should be fit for the execution of the place."
The Earl indicates the parties which then di-
vided the Court. " Till all was resolved and
concluded, very few but the Queen knew any
thing of it ; one presently retired to Kensing-
ton (Lord Holland ?) and other pretenders are
nothing well pleased to see this office thus dis-
posed of."

But the navy was no longer Sovereign !
The Cabinet was involved in the same mys-
tery, and the same indecision of measures, left
the navy of England idling in its harbours.
Sometimes we hear that the summer fleet was
in movement, dispersing here and there ; or a
squadron under the Prince Elector is gone,
God knows whither ! till it returned, after a
cruise. The only real expedition was the squad-

2 E 2

420 CAUSES OF THE

ron sent against Sallee. Meanwhile the French
were increasing their naval force, were preying
on our commerce, and returning apologies for
our remonstrances, till Lord Leicester, our Am-
bassador at Paris, strongly urged more offensive
measures on our side to balance our complaints
— " Let us complain and redress on both sides,
but while we are doing one and not the other,
we shall get no relief here.". Licences for the
fishery were now considered as superfluous by
the Hollander. The British fleet might have
exacted the tribute, but when the Dutch busses
found twenty sail of their own stout men-of-
war by their side who was to be the tax-
gatherer? One of our Captains offered, but
they fired a salute in the air, and afterwards
pretended that they had asked for licences. At
length in 1639 the honour of the British flag
was openly insulted.

Spain by a last desperate and exhausting
effort to preserve her expiring dominion in the
Netherlands, unexpectedly sent forth an Ar-
mada carrying an army of twenty-six thousand
soldiers. This formidable expedition gave rise
to the most extravagant rumours : it could
however only have been designed to reinforce
their army in Flanders and to encounter the
fleets of France and Holland. As was their

INACTION OF THE ENGLISH FLEETS. 421

usual custom, they considered that the mag-
nitude of their galleons would have rendered
them irresistible against the lighter vessels of
their enemies ; but when they met with a Dutch
fleet off the Downs, not a fourth in number,
and the Hollanders active in their move-
ments, got the wind in their favour, these
bulky sailers were found unmanageable. At
the sound of the cannon, Van Tromp hastened
to join his countrymen, and after a furious
fight, when ships had been sunk on both sides,
the shattered Spaniard retreated to the Downs,
and anchored in that road of Dover which in
the diplomatic style is called " The King of
England's Imperial Chamber," whose protec-
tion and security is to be kept inviolate from
the inroads of hostile nations. At this moment
the weaker Dutch respected it, but having been
abundantly supplied at Calais with powder by
their good friends of France, they anchored at
a convenient distance.

The Spaniards showed no disposition to quit
their retreat, secure in the protection of Eng-
land, while the Hollanders were receiving hourly
reinforcements. Each fleet was watching the
other, while the ministers of the two nations
were not less anxiously engaged in presenting
their memorials at Whitehall : the Spaniard

422 CAUSKS OF THE

imploring the King to keep off the Dutch for
two tides, and the Hollander protesting against
any aid being afforded to the Spaniard.

The case was critical — and the agitation was
extreme on all sides. Charles was only anx-
ious to preserve the neutrality of his own har-
bours. Bound as the King was in one common
amity with these powers, he sometimes exclaim-
ed, " Would to Heaven that I were well rid of
both !" The distress of the Monarch was of
a singular nature. If Charles drove out the
Spaniard from his port, he hurried them to an
unequal combat and inevitable destruction —
if he assisted the weaker party, he was himself
the violator of that sacred neutrality he claim-
ed. Meanwhile Charles was about incurring
the disgrace which he at length received, for
if he commanded them both to quit the Downs
and neither would obey, his honour was not
the less blemished than when they at length
openly violated the neutrality of his port, and
insulted the protection of the King in his
chamber.

Another perplexity, originating in the sus-
picions of party, had no little influence on the
King, who as Warwick expresses it, was ** ha-
rassed by his own subjects and the Admiral
favouring the popular party." The most mali-

INACTION OF THE ENGLISH FLEETS. 423

cious rumours had been spread by the discon-
tented party here, of the pretended design of
this Spanish fleet. These rumours must have
been very general, for the sage Whitelocke has
chronicled them. " This armada was believed
by many to have been designed for an invasion
of England, and many discourses pro and con
were vented about it." It was even said, as
Nalson tells us, that Charles was in a secret
confederacy with the Spaniard to establish the
Romish religion and arbitrary Government,
which terrified the common people out of their
wits and their allegiance. When now we read
the State Correspondence of the times, we are
struck by the strong delusion of such factious
inventions. The Spaniards who could not
defend themselves from a Dutch fleet, were
imagined to invade that kingdom in whose
ports they were imploring a refuge. Nonsense
although a base metal, soon becomes a current
coin, when the people stamp it with their
passions.

At this critical hour, the Lord High Admiral
seems not to have viewed as a statesman, the
peculiar political position into which his Royal
Master was thrown. Northumberland indeed
was by no means averse to immolate the Spa-
niard to the Hollander, who, he acknowledges,

424 CAUSES OF THE

was hourly expected " to assault the Dons."
We have seen what he and the party to whom
the Earl belonged, felt on this extraordinary oc-
casion. The scheme he suggested to the King
evinces little zeal, or deficient ability. While
he seems aware of the indignity which Charles
was likely to receive from the decision of both
parties, he advises the King to command both
fleets out of the Downs. The Earl writes,
" his Majesty's designs are a little to be won-
dered at, that he should endanger the receiving
an affront and expose his ships to much hazard,
rather than command both the Spaniard and
the Holland fleets out of the Downs. He
saith now that at his return to London on
Saturday next he will appoint a time for them
to depart out of this road." It was probably
on this advice that the King dispatched the
Earl of Arundel to the Spanish Admiral to
desire he would retire on the first fair wind,
while Vice-admiral Sir John Pennington who
lay in the Downs with thirty -four men of war
informed the Dutch Admiral that he had
orders to act in defence of either of the two
parties who should be first attacked.*

* During the three weeks of this extraordinary conjunc-
ture of affairs, a treaty had been concluded between Charles
and the Infant Cardinal at Brussels, that for the sum of

INACTION OF THE ENGLISH FLEETS. 425

But when the Spaniard was bi'd to be gone
as Northumberland suggested, did he go ? He
delayed his departure with new excuses day
after day. If the wind were favourable they
wanted powder — or masts from the King's
stores, before they could stand out at sea, while
the Hollander grew more insolent as they in-
creased in number. They had now a hundred
sail, besides fire-ships. When the Spaniards
pleaded, as one excuse for their delay, their
want of powder, that great naval hero, Van
Tromp, sent them an offer to supply them with
five hundred barrels to be paid for at the usual
rate, and if they wanted masts from Chatham
he would send his own frigates to tow them, if
they would weigh and stand out at sea ! Once
favoured by the darkness of the night, and
it was supposed under an English pilot, the
Spaniards succeeded in sending off to Dunkirk
fifteen vessels with three thousand men, which
raised a clamour both in France and Holland
as if Charles had violated his neutrality in
this instance. On this occasion Van Tromp,
who appears often to have expressed himself
in language as original and fiery, as was his

150,0001. to be paid instantly, the English Monarch would
protect the Spanish fleet, to its destination, till it was moored
in some port in Spain.

426 CAUSES OF THE

action in combat, said that " having his hands
full of flies, it was impossible but some of them
would escape through his fingers." Secretary
Windebank who records this anecdote as a
rhodomontade greater than any of the Spani-
ards, little knew then that the man who had
delivered it could not use ideas too great to
express the energy of his own deeds, and his
lofty scorn of his enemy. Van Tromp was so
popular with us, that several English gentle-
men, no doubt of the discontented party at
home, went abroad as volunteers. The Dutch
Admiral told them that he imagined the Spa-
niards were waiting for the stormy weather, to
get that by running which they despaired by
fighting, and in that case, " if they keep lying
so near the shore, the King of England would
have their guns, the country their wreck, and
the devil their men."

Such an extraordinary state of affairs could
not last ; the crisis was looked for at every
hour. The Dutch asserted that a shot from
a sentinel, possibly accidental, had been fired
by the Spaniards at the barge of Van Tromp,
and a dead body was sent to the English Ad-
miral, as evidence that the neutrality of the
King of England's harbour had been violated.
The attack soon after commenced ; few escaped

INACTION OF THK ENGLISH FLEETS. 427

of the Spanish fleet. It is said Van Tromp
appointed a squadron to keep the English at
a distance. The plea of the Dutch that they
waited till their patience was exhausted, and
the reluctant apology of their ambassador, made
for the sake of form, were mere pretexts, to
conceal what had been resolved on by the
States-General, for we now know that Van
Tromp had orders not to attack the Spaniards
till he had been joined by various squadrons,
and then in case the English would not remain
neuter, he had positive commands to fight both
one and the other. This political revelation
we draw from D'Estrades' correspondence with
Cardinal Richelieu. The Cardinal had desired
the Prince of Orange " to give orders to his
admirals to engage the Spanish fleet in the
Downs, notwithstanding the protection which
the King of England seemed inclined to give
them."

It has been a question how the English con-
ducted themselves at that moment. Dr. Lin-
gard says, " Pennington remained a quiet spec-
tator." Was the Vice- Admiral kept off by the
ships sent towards him ? Our people seemed
to have been more earnestly employed in seiz-
ing on the sinking Spaniards and saving their
wrecks from the Hollanders. They however

428 CAUSES OF THE

actually fired on the Dutch from their batteries
and their ships, for Van Tromp, writing to the
Cornte de Charost, adds, " but as far as we can
judge, the fire of the English was intended
rather for a feint than from passion."*

Thus ingloriously for Charles terminated this
singular incident, which the exulting negoci-
ator of France describes as " the most illustrious
action which could be thought of, that of de-
feating the fleet of Spain in an English port,
though assisted by English ships." And the
Infant Cardinal at Brussels told Sir Balthazar
Gerbier that his Majesty of Great Britain, by
this attempt of the Hollanders, had received a
greater blow than the King of Spain. So lofty
was the sense of Castilian honour ! In the
Council of the States-General when some ob-
jected to attack the Spaniards in an English
port, whence might ensue a rupture between
England and Holland, it was insolently answer-
ed, that the King durst not break with them,
and if he durst, they feared him not, and
rather than suffer the Spanish fleet to escape,
they would attack it though it were placed
upon his Majesty's beard ! In their ancient
style the States-General had formerly sued for
the protection of England, under the humble

* Griffet, xxi. 233.

INACTION OF THE ENGLISH FLEETS. 429

designation of " the poor distressed States," but
they had recently titled themselves " High and
Mighty."

What causes had thus fatally operated on
our maritime affairs ? How happened it that
the great fleet of England which had showed
itself in triumph, was paralysed by inaction ?
This mighty navy which had vindicated the
Sovereignty of the seas in the short period of
two years we find directed to no single point,
ingloriously lying in its harbours. To know
these causes, we must attempt to trace what
was silently operating on the mind of Charles.

Early in 1637 I find Charles, in a confiden-
tial communication to Strafford, alluding to an
approaching alteration in his foreign politics.
The object is always the same eternal dream of
the restoration of the Palatinate. Lord Arun-
del had returned from his inefficient embassy
to Vienna. Charles was now convinced that
all negociations were useless. From Austria
he got only civility, and from Spain promises,
but from the Duke of Bavaria himself, who
had taken possession of the Palatinate, the
plain stern language of a soldier, who swore
that what the sword had gained the sword
should preserve. An English Monarch who
would acquire conquests on the Continent by

430 CAUSES OF THE

the eloquence or the high rank of his ambas-
sadors, without an army, is liable to incur the
insults of even the petty military powers of
Germany. The noble Arundel, who assumed
a princely state in his embassy, was so little
considered, that he thought proper to leave
Vienna without taking leave, and an Envoy of
one of those petty Princes scornfully observed
that " our English ambassadors were fit only
to pick poultry."

Our cabinet, divided as it was into two op-
posite parties, was now more than ever con-
vulsed by its fluctuating measures. A league
was proposed with the Protestant Princes, the
allies of France ; these coalescing with Holland,
Denmark, and Sweden, were to reinstate the
sister and the nephew of Charles the First in
the Palatinate. But Charles acknowledges to
Strafford that he is quite incompetent to join
his new allies with troops. " I have professed
that all my warfare must be by sea, not by
land."

The King proceeds, " what likelihood there
is that upon this I should fall foul with Spain
you now may see as well as I, and what great
inconvenience this war may bring to me, now
that my sea-contribution is settled, and that I
am resolved not to meddle with land armies,

INACTION OF THE ENGLISH FLEETS. 431

I cannot imagine, except it be in Ireland, and
there too, I fear, not much, since I find the
country so well settled as it is by your diligent
care. Yet I thought it necessary to give you
this watch- word, both to have the more vigilant
eye over the discontented party, as also to
assure you that / am as far from a Parliament
as when you left me"

This confidential dispatch was sent in Fe-
bruary 1636-7. I do not know whether we
are to read the last lines as a patriotic regret, or
a confirmation of unalterable decision. Why
were they written ? They are not sent down
in passion. Strafford, as well as other ministers,
we know was friendly to Parliament. Were
they in reply to a suggestion of Strafford's to
call a Parliament ? I incline to think they
were dictated by a sorrowful conviction accord-
ing to his own notions, or from more recent
knowledge, that Charles could discover no re-
lenting animosity in the party who he con-
cluded were his personal enemies. One point
is here proved, that Parliaments #t least were
not utterly dismissed from the mind of
Charles.

From this period we may trace the indecisive
measures of Charles the First. He was not
yet the open friend of his new allies, nor was

432 CAUSES OF THE

he yet hostile to the ally whom he was quit-
ting ; for the treaties were sometimes retarded
by the cabinet of the Louvre, and the States-
General, or the Prince of Orange, had conflict-
ing interests with England. Spain was indeed
alarmed at this awful conjunction, and her
Ambassador hastened to Charles with offers to
restore the Lower Palatinate, and with a pro-
mise to procure the Upper, from the Duke of
Bavaria for a compensation in money. He
further proposed that if England would join
his master with twenty thousand men and her
fleet, the Spaniards would take the field with
as many Brabanters, and their combined army
should place Languedoc and Normandy in
the hands of the British Monarch. This rho-
domontade of the affrighted Don was an arti-
fice intended to decompose the elements of this
perilous combination. The projected league of
the various parties had become the subject of
public attention two months after the King
had written to StrafFord. A famous news-let-
ter writer of the day thus describes the state
of affairs. " Our new patriots and statesmen
here cry out let England, France and the Low
Countries join together, they will quickly bring
the Spaniard on his belly. 'Tis true these
truly conjoined would do much, but upon what

INACTION OF THE ENGLISH FLEETS. 433

terms doth England stand yet with either of
them? Farther off with the Low Countries
than we have been a long time, and for
France things come on much slower than we
expected." This was a true statement of poli-
tical affairs. Another season was suffered to
elapse, which however was interrupted by the
beginning of the troubles in Scotland in July
and October 1637. It was in November of
that year that Cardinal Kichelieu attempted to
seduce Charles by his offers to aid the King
against those of his subjects whom the Cardinal
called " his rebels."

But Charles' attention was now roused to his
own domestic affairs. Our fleet however still
existed, and in 1638 the sovereignty of the sea
was still present in the anxious minds of the
English. A well-informed writer of the day
observed, " The long treaties between the
French and the Spanish are now near a con-
clusion ; the Dutch will not be left out ; then
have at England for the dominion of the seas"*

But rapid was the approaching change, and
the state of affairs is strongly painted by the
Lord High Admiral in January 16^ — " I as-
sure your Lordship we are altogether in as ill
a posture to invade others as to defend our-

* Stafford's Letters, ii. 181.
VOL. III. 2 F

434 CAUSES OF THE

selves — the discontents here at home do rather
increase than lessen — the King's coffers were
never emptier than at this time, and to us that
have the honour to be near about him, no way
is yet known how he will find means either to
maintain or begin a war without the help of
his people."*

One cause of the inactivity of the fleet may
be traced to the change in the foreign policy
of the Cabinet, which prevented any decisive
measures from being adopted ; and when at
length, it became necessary to chastise the in-
dignities which England was daily incurring,
from the encroaching Gaul, the insolent Hol-
lander, and the haughty Spaniard, the Mo-
narch, seeing his honour was compromised, was
glad to accept the futile apologies of the
foreign aggressors. He who in politics accepts
apologies for wrongs, only acquiesces in the
evidence of his weakness. Harris on this ex-
claims " A spirited Prince would have had a
satisfaction as public as the injury itself, and
thereby have shown the world that he was
worthy of the sovereignty of those seas which
he claimed."

Thus Charles has sometimes incurred re-
proaches where he might rather move our com-
* Stratford's Letters, ii. 267.

INACTION OF THE ENGLISH FLEETS. 435

passion. The inextricable dilemma into which
Charles was now cast, by the course of events,
never occurred to this writer of common-place
declamation, and whose genius in all respects
is mean as his style. The personal distresses
of the King were fast gathering on him, but
the historian who does not investigate cannot
perceive them. The state of his affairs no
longer admitted of an expostulation by his own
navy ; what was just and glorious in 1637 was
no longer so in 1639. The mind of Charles
was now too deeply engaged in military pre-
parations against his own revolting subjects,
while his Exchequer was so utterly exhausted
that it became for him a direful necessity to
look to the help of his people, to gather the re-
luctant alms of their loyalty, or to submit once
more to the dubious results of those new mas-
ters of Sovereignty — the Parliament !

The troubles in Scotland were pressing on
the mind of the King, and to reduce that King-
dom to obedience, Charles had resolved to raise
an army of thirty thousand men. All foreign
affairs became matters of secondary importance,
a circumstance fatal to his character as a Sove-
reign, and which the Cabinets of Europe soon
discovered. The unpopularity of the Ship-
money continued a source of general discon-

2 F 2

436 INACTION OF THE ENGLISH FLEETS.

tent, although that tax was neither onerous nor
useless. Even those who wished no ill to the
King, allowed themselves the utmost freedom
in protesting against the decree of the Judges
which had legalised it. Waller, who addressed
so many loyal poems to Charles, and who when
the civil wars broke out, for his adherence to
the King, only saved his life by the sacrifice of
his fortune, delivered a very impressive speech
against this obnoxious tax. Sir William Mon-
son in his Naval tracts has noticed the many
factious and scandalous rumours which were
invented at the time to persuade the people
that all the naval preparations were only an
artifice to draw money from the subject. Those
who were fined and imprisoned for their con-
tumacy looked for revenge in the North ; and
the cry against Ship-money, cherished and in-
flamed by faction, was always greatest when
the Monarch was in his extreme distress.

A NOTE ON SHIP-MONEY AND ON THE SOVE-
REIGNTY OF THE SEAS.

Dr. Lingard has done justice to Charles the
First in the particular instance of the King's
disposal of the Ship-money. " By this con-
trivance the King obtained a yearly supply of

NOTE ON SHIP MONEY. 437

218,500/. and it should be observed that he
carefully devoted it to the purpose for which
it was demanded." (Lingard, x. — 29.)

The careful direction of that tax, Hume has
justly urged as a plea for Charles the First;
even the cold presbyter Harris nods his acqui-
escence. Sir Philip Warwick had stated a fact,
" The King so sincerely employed the Ship-
money that it was never mingled with that in
his own Exchequer, but kept apart with their
accounts, and yet adding considerably of his
own treasures to it."

But other more popular history may show
how the history of this period has often been
written. Oldmixon, that infamous of all his-
torians, who has degraded history into ribaldry,
and whose folio volume on the Stuarts at the
day and with a party, seems to have passed for
authentic history, condemns the great enterprise
of Charles as sheer folly. Sir Philip Warwick,
a distinguished gentleman and actor in the
events of his time, he criticises as " a writer
below reflection ; his matter, his style and in-
tegrity are all of a piece, and 'tis ridiculous to
be serious about him." " The Critical Histo-
rian," as Oldmixon calls himself, therefore ridi-
cules the notion that " The King kept all the
Ship-money in a bag by itself." All the service

438 NOTE ON SHIP MONEY.

done by the revenue from the Ship-money was
" clearing the Channel of a few Turkish rovers,
and the frighting our Protestant allies, the
Hollanders." The great State-principle of the
Sovereignty of the Sea — the tributary treaty
—and the retreat of the combined fleets of
France and Holland — are wholly dropped in
this faithless narrative.

Mrs. Macaulay was somewhat sensible to the
firm and intrepid conduct of the King ; but
the meed of glory she awards is mildewed by
a sneer ! Listen to her ! " Charles now seems
to be in the meridian of what he termed glory ;
he had fairly placed the yoke on the neck of
his own subjects, and by the seizure of their
purse had found means to humble the Holland-
ers, whose independent flourishing state had
ever been an eye-sore to the Stuarts."

With Smollet, all these transactions, the his-
torian sagaciously discovers, were founded on
mere pretences ! He ascribes the levying the
Ship-money " to a pretence of the nation's being
in danger of a league concluded between France
and the United Provinces," which we have
shown, and still have to show, assuredly existed.
And further, " that a pretence might not be
wanting for levying the tax of Ship-money all
over the kingdom, Charles published a procla-

NOTE ON SHIP MONEY. 439

mation forbidding all foreigners to fish on the
coasts of Britain." Doubtless the historian and
his readers were satisfied that in these " pre-
tences," they had discovered the whole secret
history of these public events !

At length we reach the illumination of Mr.
Brodie's history, our own contemporary who
knows far better than any of his predecessors,
how the ship-money was disposed of. " The
English had not the consolation of thinking
that the money extorted from them was des-
tined to any useful purpose ; luxury, hungry
courtiers, and the Queen's French attendants
consumed the greater part of this ill-acquired
treasure, while a portion of it was applied to-
wards overturning the liberties and religion of
Scotland." (ii. 401.) Had we not known the
moderate supply of the ship-money, and the
heavy charges of fitting out the most formida-
ble fleet which England had ever put to sea,
and farther, on the authority of Sir Philip
Warwick — though this obvious fact required
no authority — that the King was often com-
pelled to supply its deficiencies from his own
Exchequer, had we not known all this, we
might have congratulated Mr. Brodle on the
secret sources of his history of the disposal of
the ship-money. But Mr. Brodie is only mis-

440 NOTE ON SHIP MONEY.

taken in his arithmetic ! Let Mr. Brodie de-
duct from the gross receipts of the ship-money,
so much for " luxury," — so much for " hungry
courtiers" — so much for " French attendants" —
and place contra — " sixty ships of war" — and
he will find that not an obolus will remain for
" overturning the liberties and religion of Scot-
land." All this is serious truth — and every
item which Mr. Brodie has here enumerated as
having been furnished by ship-money is chi-
merical. Mr. Brodie, like Mr. Oldmixon, was
never blessed with that vision of the Sovereign-
ty of the Sea which Selden inspired, and Charles
established. 1 cannot help adding one of Mr.
Oldmixon's phrases when alluding to Claren-
don, Warwick, and others — " You see what
history they give us !"

Mr. Hallam will pardon the notice of an ex-
pression of his somewhat inaccurate in regard
to the subject. " There wanted not reasons
in the Cabinet of Charles for placing the navy
at times on a respectable footing" (i. 165.)
Thus, all that I have written on the Sove-
reignty of the Sea ; all that Selden has sent
down to posterity in his immortal " Mare Clau-
sum ;" and that miracle of our fleet, " the Sove-
reign of the Seas"-— the inscribed cannon — and
those legacies of fame — the medals of Charles
the First, with all the greatness of the noble

NOTE ON SHIP MONEY. 441

emprise, is clouded over by " a respectable
footing."

I fly to the vivacious philosophy of Monsieur
Guizot, the French historian of the reign of
Charles the First. Monsieur Guizot I find
writing too well — his emphatic style and his
tableau cles moeurs — might have occasioned an
attack of hypochrondriasm in Madame de
Stael, for one does not like to be excelled in
one's own way. I turn over page after page —
for " the Sovereignty of the Sea" — not a word !
nor of Charles's noble resistance to the seduc-
tions of Richelieu — I turn over page after page
—not a word ! Though Monsieur Guizot seems
at times to know much more than we know,
yet at others, he seems to know much less.
All this has been unlucky for Charles the
First, but the Monarch has been worse treated!

It is excessively amusing to turn to the re-
cent Biographic Universelle,* where we may
collect some instruction relative to the syste-
matic perseverance of our Government from
the days of . Charles the First to those of
George the Third, in maintaining the Sove-
reignty of the Sea.

Our Gallic contemporary tells us that " the
principles which Charles the First avowed, were
also those of Cromwell, and produced the
* Biog. Univ. xli. 502.

442 NOTE ON SHIP MONEY.

Dutch war." Here I find an omission in his
chronological view, which I shall supply. He
has not told us that Charles the Second was
once patriotic enough in 1675, to declare that
he would risk his crown rather than his Sove-
reignty at Sea, and when a French ~squadron
refused to strike to the British flag in the
English Channel, the French Captain who had
offered the insult, was sent over to implore the
pardon of the English Monarch.* He proceeds
with William the Third, who in a manifesto
reproaches Louis the Fourteenth for having
allowed his subjects to violate the rights of the
sovereignty of the English crown in the Bri-
tannic seas — and George the Third in the last
wars appears fully to have followed up the
system of his predecessors. From these facts,
which we are very far from denying, the re-
sult discovered by the French diplomate, is
" that these facts sufficiently prove how these
Monarchs had not abandoned the doctrine of
Selden !" Our critic henceforward will, I hope,
do us islanders the justice to observe our con-
sistency in attending to our own interests, and
commend us for the fearlessness which has de-
fended them — it has cost more Dutch than
French blood.

* Ralph's History of England, i. 284.

COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND. 443

CHAPTER XX.

OF THE COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND.

THE insurrection of Scotland might have
proved to Charles the First an extraordinary
source of political instruction ; but the limited
policy of this monarch, the policy of the times,
was preservative, not creative. It was to sup-
port what was established, and not to discover
what was remedial.

In the government of the Church and the
State his principle was immutable conformity ;
a principle which naturally repulsed strange
innovations which to the King appeared secret-
ly subverting the Monarchy, while they offered
no substitute for that Episcopacy which they
would abolish, but another Prelacy of a meaner
character, yet of a more audacious and turbu-
lent genius.

The time was at hand when this fated Mo-
narch was about to be hurried on through a

444 COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND.

dark labyrinth of factions and revolutions. It
was to be a struggle to which the genius of
the man was incompetent, uncongenial to his
temper, and novel to his experience. The
second Stuart was not one of those rare minds
who create an epoch in the history of nations,
and who anticipating a distant posterity, dis-
cover a wisdom not of their own age. Charles
the First could not like Henry VIII. have
passionately struck out a great revolution, or
have terminated one with the cautious decision
of Elizabeth ; in the one case Charles would
have looked in vain, for a precedent of Refor-
mation, and in the other by some hastiness
of conduct he would have been thrown into
situations whence he could only have extri-
cated himself by retraction or concession.

The commotions of Scotland are a prototype
of the Civil war which afterwards broke out
in England, and corresponded closely with all
the great points of our greater struggle. From
an early period the movements of the Cove-
nanters were regulated by their confederates,
among the patriotic party in England. Our
patriots in that secret alliance not only adopted
the principles, but even the mode of the pro-
ceedings of the Covenanters ; in a word the
English Revolution was modelled by the Scot-

COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND. 445

tish Insurrection. In the complicated question
of the progress of our Revolution under Charles
the First, this becomes an important position,
which has not fixed the attention of our his-
torians.

The Scots were our tutors in the artifices of
popular democracy, and those mysteries of in-
surgency which afterwards were systematized
by ourselves. They were the contrivers of that
terrific revolutionary engine — a mobocracy ;
and it was from them that we learnt how to
organize a people in vast masses, so as to assem-
ble or to disperse them at will. Their petitions
and remonstrances served as our models when
in a similar submissive style of loyalty, they
kept drilling throughout the whole kingdom.
This subtile party even practised the arts of
political flattery ; at the moment they were
insolent in the success of their arms, they
apologized for their invasion ; and his Majesty's
loyal subjects of Scotland were only rebellious
in their acts. In the fall of the Hierarchy,
through all its stages, the English Commons
were but the servile imitators of the Scottish
Covenanters. The leaders of faction, both at
home and in Scotland, were indeed but few ;
they had however engaged the whole people
on their side by covering their own design

446 COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND.

which was a subversion of the government,
and making religion their ostensible and na-
tional object. Fanaticism has all the charac-
teristics which faction delights in ; undismayed
by peril, and most triumphant when opposed, it
hurries on without sense to discover its folly,
and without remorse to avert its crimes. Pri-
vate interests, and personal jealousies were often
disguised by the Scottish Insurgents in the
parties which they formed. In this vast and
confused struggle the principles of constitu-
tional liberty were sometimes developed and
asserted ; the first statute for triennial Parlia-
ments originated in Scotland ; and thus the
independence of Parliaments was secured by
the prevention of their disuse.* Both parties
alike in England and in Scotland finally suc-
ceeded in objects more concealed ; the national
avarice of the Covenanters sold their Sove-
reign, and the remorseless republicanism of
the other, murdered him — and both the Pres-

* Laing's Hist, of Scotland, iii.

Rushworth iv — 188, where we find the King's Speech on
passing the act for triennial Parliaments. Feb. 15, 1640.
The Speech in many respects is remarkable ; the King ob-
serves " This is the greatest expression of my trust in your
affections to me, that before you do any thing for me I do put
such a confidence in you."

COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND. 447

byter, and the Republican, finally sank with
their victim !

The King's conduct, from first to last, in
the Scottish Revolution, was precisely similar
to that which governed him in England. We
discover in his first commands the same regal
tone of authority ; in his measures the same
indecision ; and at length in their result the
same entire concessions, but all granted how-
ever to no purpose ! Inflexible, or yielding,
the fortune of the King was alike malignant.
Baillie the able Scotch Covenanter, who pos-
sessed a personal knowledge of the Court, and
of the leaders of the parties, when the last
great scene was approaching, has thrown out
an observation which properly understood con-
veys a great truth. " It has been the King's
perpetual fault to grant his people's desires by
bits, and so late he ever lost his thanks." We
must remember, however, that " the people's
desires" in the style of a partisan, always mean
the system of that partisan. With Baillie " the
people's desires" meant the unbish oping of
Bishops and a Covenanting King of England !

Had Charles the First proved to be such a
creature of circumstance, as to have subscribed
himself a Covenanter, all Scotland, and half of
England, might have been too strong for the

448 COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND.

ruling party in Parliament. The English Par-
liament were indeed early jealous of the King's
intercourse with the Scots ; and Charles in his
mind, seems to have had some latent design of
winning over his countrymen to his side ; but
when the Scots insisted that the royal hand
should be set to their famous national covenant
whatever might be the policy of his nego-
tiations, their real object became unattainable.
Charles conceded often reluctantly. Forced to
act against his will, he could not be always sin-
cere ; but it is not less true that his inflexibility
sprang oftener from principle, than from policy.

The history of the Scottish commotions is
neither a digression, nor an episode, in the his-
tory of Charles the First, or in that of the
causes of the revolutionary measures of his
reign. The character of the Monarch develop-
ed itself in its progress, as well as the arts and
practices of the insurgents, till at length we
discover how the Scottish insurrection termi-
nated in the great revolution of England.

To comprehend the secret motives, and the
dark intrigues which prevailed in the Scottish
affairs, we must rapidly review the state of
Scotland from the Reformation ; the descend-
ants of the first actors in that busy era of re-
form and spoliation, were still performing their

COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND. 449

hereditary parts, and the same principles were
operating on their conduct.

The Reformation in Scotland had been main-
ly effected by those friars who were the popu-
lar preachers in opposition to the regular clergy.
These divine orators of the multitude, at the
same time instigated the people from their pul-
pits, and engaged in their cause those noble
reformers who were first called " The Lords of
the Congregation," by pandering to their pas-
sions of ambition or of avarice. These preach-
ers were a rabid swarm of public disturbers en-
gendered by the heat and fury of the times ;
Knox himself acknowledges that they were
blamed as " indiscreet persons, yea, some called
them railers, and worse. — Amongst others, per-
adventure, my rude plainness displeased, for
some complained that rashly I. spoke of men's
faults. But alas ! my conscience accuseth me
that I spoke not so plainly as my duty was to
have done ; for I ought to have said to the
wicked man expressly by his name, * Thou
shalt die the death !' For I find Jeremiah the
prophet to have done so to Pashur the High-
priest, and to Zedekiah the king. And not
only he, but Elijah, Elisha, Micah, Amos, Da-
niel, Christ Jesus himself, and after him his
apostles, expressly to name the blood-thirsty

VOL. III. 2 G

450 COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND.

tyrants, and abominable idolaters." Here we
have the full-length of a saint, armed with all
the terrors, if not the daggers, of his " Godli-
ness,"— and a nation was to be revolutionized by
a horde of fanatics, who imagined themselves
to be " more pure" than their brother Protes-
tants ; or who, as Knox himself declares, were
" appointed by God to be the salt of the earth.5'
In the warmth of his simplicity Knox reproaches
himself with his mildness, which he ascribes
" to the blind love that I did bear to this my
wicked carcase."*

These fanatical preachers aided by the nobles
were hurrying on the eventful revolution. The
wealth and the lands of the church lay before
these parties, an enormous body and an easy
prey ! The rapacious feudal Aristocracy pro-
fiting by the disordered state of the govern-
ment, became sole masters of the soil, sharing
among themselves the rich spoliations of ab-
beys, and monasteries, and cathedrals ; and
what they had found no difficulty to grasp,
their arm was potent to retain.

Andrew Melville brought from Geneva that
model of ecclesiastical polity which Calvin had

* The Admonition of John Knox to the true professors of
the Gospel of England.

COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND. 451

suited to his parochial republic. Knox was
disposed at first to have bishops, under the
novel title of Superintendents. By the revela-
tions of these apostles of democracy, the Scottish
people however soon discovered that Episco-
pacy was " a great chip of the old block, Po-
pery ;" and they were taught to exult, in the
words of Knox, that in regard to " the primi-
tive and apostolic church — no realm this day
upon the face of the earth hath the like purity
— for all others retain in their churches some
footsteps of Anti-Christ and dregs of Popery."*
And the mob of " the Kirk brake down the
altars and the images ;" the lands of the Eccle-
siastics were reserved for the zeal of " the Lords
of the Congregation."

Gratified at first by that reforming spirit
which had ejected their ancient masters, " the
godly ministers " possibly did not imagine that
they themselves were not to partake of that
temporal spoil, they had so spiritually spread,
or as Knox plainly called it, " the rents of the
Church." The fierce disciple of Calvin, lived
to discover this error ; for he has himself told
us that whenever he remonstrated with "the

* Knox's History of the Reformation, in the opening of
his fourth Book.

2 G 2

452 COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND.

lords of the congregation," suggesting some
reformation among themselves, such as more
leniency in the slavery of their serfs ; and more
bountifulness for the maintenance of " the
poore ministers," the gripers of abbeys and
cathedrals mocked their own fiery Apostle by
treating these rebukes as nothing but " devout
imaginations." Knox has libelled for posterity
a certain Lord Erskine, " who had a very evil
woman to his wife, and if the poor, the schools,
and the ministry of the Church had their own,
his kitchen would lack two parts and more of
that which he unjustly possesseth."

The nobility were in truth exercising the
most arbitrary power ; the peasant was crushed
by vassalage ; and during the minority of
James, the unprincipled conduct of one ambi-
tious, and one avaricious Regent, had wrested
from the Crown its inalienable rights in re-'
galities and tythes which Parliament had an-
nexed to it ; all which this usurping aristocracy
had silently shared among themselves. It was
observed that these lords exacted the tythes
with a rigour and wantonness of oppression
to which the people had never been exposed
from the Catholic clergy.*

* Even by the confession of Mr. Brodie, Hist, of the
British Empire, ii. 409. See Malcolm Laing's luminous
statement, iii. 89 — 94.

COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND. 453

The Scottish nobles considered that it was
their great interest to continue their patronage
to the popular preachers ; and indeed neither
party could exist with any security indepen-
dently of the other. While Presbytery flourish-
ed, it kept out the claims of the ancient owners
of the church-lands, whose present possessors
dreaded the horror of a returning Hierarchy ;
and the Mar-prelates themselves, although they
had resigned to the nobility the spoils of the
Church, because they were not suffered to be
partakers, were not however insensible that
they possessed no inferior dominion in lead-
ing the understandings, and rousing at will
the passions of a people, whose rudeness, just
emerging from the blindest superstition, was
so favourable to the wildest impulses of the
fanatical spirit.

This democracy of priests assumed a power,
absolute as that Papal supremacy, which while
it formed the perpetual object of their clamor-
ous invectives, they secretly aspired to transfer
to themselves. These denunciators of Popery,
were themselves Popes to a man. It was the
dangerous principle of this novel community
that the Ecclesiastical was totally separated,
and independent of the Civil power ; and that
these oracles of Heaven were not accountable
for any treason which they preached before the

454 COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND.

tribunals of man, but only to an Ecclesiastical
judicature, where the most obnoxious were
sure to receive only a gentle rebuke. Nor
were these the only tenets which they held
inconsistent with good government ; all which,
though but a vulgar mimicry of the system
which they had abrogated, the rude people
looked on with indulgence, or rather with plea-
sure, as excesses of holy zeal. * We have
shown in the history of the Puritans, that
there were among these political Rabbins some
whose doctrines soared even much higher, arid
who secretly aimed at establishing no less than
the supremacy of the Ecclesiastical power over
the civil magistrate.

These men of Parity, the Ministers of Scot-
land, continued to be a turbulent race, and
particularly the junior apostles of sedition.
These delighted the populace by their juvenile
audacity ; their stinging personalities were
libels on the Court ; and while they were ring-
ing alarums of Popery, they were rebuking the
Royal Council. James the First seems to have
known their designs as well as their pride.
His naive description of these demagogues was
thrown out in the warmth of his feelings at
the famous conference at Hampton Court,

* Burnet's Memoires of the Hamiltons, 28.

COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND. 455

where assuming his rank as Sovereign, James
reiterated to the political rabble of " Jack and
Tom, and Will and Dick" that " Le Eoy
samsera"

This government the Scottish Monarch had
patiently endured through his minority, and
his early reign — the sovereign power rested
among the aristocracy ; the people remained
under the influence of their ministers ; the mo-
narchy itself was but a shadow, in this half-
feudal and half popular government. Hence
James at a later day exclaimed " No Bishop !
No King !" Episcopacy had been condemned
as contrary to the word of God in 1580, and
when James discovered some disposition to
restore it, the party raised an army, and the
King to preserve peace, established Presbyte-
rianism by law in 1592.

By one of those eruptions to which demo-
cracy is perpetually inclining, the genius of its'
followers betrayed itself. A minister had been
prosecuted, and the privileges of their " dis-
cipline" they insisted had been violated. An
armed multitude congregated, and these war-
like apostles, impatient at the absence of their
generals, for they had their elected commanders,
had furiously leaped to their weapons with the
fanatical cry of " The sword of the Lord and

456 COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND.

of Gideon ! It shall be either their's, or our's !"
This mob streamed along the streets, and sur-
rounding the Sessions House, where the young
King sat in council, had nearly forced the gates.
A company of musketeers secretly introduced
by the back stairs, protected the King and the
Council, in their escape to the palace of Holy-
Rood; on the following day the King left
Edinburgh. This headless multitude dispersed
at the intreaty of the Provost, in the same
confused way they had assembled.

This open violence gave a fatal blow to the
audacity of these democratic assemblies ; they
were even deserted by their former patrons, the
nobles, who cared not to espouse a quarrel
which tended to strengthen a licentious pre-
dominance in the state.* James on his side,
again attempted to break down this over-grown
power of the people by taking advantage of the
odium the party had incurred.

This rebellion, as many considered it to be,
was somewhat favourable to the revival of
Episcopacy. When James ascended the throne
of England, he found many of their own party

* Bishop Guthry says, in his Scottish Gallic idiom, that
" this meschant business" was called " the seventeenth of
December" to mark their detestation of the day.

COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND. 457

to curb the insolence of these pugnacious saints,
ready to admit the establishment of Episcopacy,
without however abolishing the Presbytery
itself. Two opposing parties thus divided the
country ; the one maintaining the Presbyte-
rial Kirk of Scotland, and the other advocating
the Episcopal Church of England.

An uniformity in religion prompted James
the First to require an uniformity in worship,
that both the great Churches of his two nations
might constitute an unity in their government.
The Marquis of Hamilton, father to him who
is soon to come forward on the scene, with
great prudence and greater dexterity, conse-
quently procured the passing of the five ar-
ticles of Perth : these turned on certain cus-
toms, or Kites of the Anglican Church, as in-
nocent as may be, and the sole object of which
was to produce an uniformity in the Church
service. These acts of Parliament did not
however pass without considerable opposition,
and were accompanied by the protests of the
Presbyters. James was still anxious to press
on the Scots a Liturgy on the model of the
Church of England ; but Hamilton deemed it
more prudent to secure what he had already
obtained, by assuring the Scottish Parliament

458 COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND.

that " the King would not in his days press
any more change, or alteration, without their
consent."

In all this the pacific Monarch had acted
with cautious policy ; he had exercised no se-
verity, and had adopted a legal form in wrest-
ling with the stubborn Kirk. James relin-
quished the future attempt at conformity, a
favourite object with the statesmen of that age.
Bishop Guthry, a warm votary for Episcopacy,
seems surprised that the Bishops waived the
Royal motion, and proceeded no further in
establishing the uniformity of their Ecclesias-
tical discipline ; but this Bishop was not so well
acquainted as ourselves with the King's feel-
ings on this occasion. James, convinced that
he could not obtain all that was desirable, with
prescient sagacity observed on Laud, who was
urging him to a stricter union of the two
Churches, by introducing the Anglican Litur-
gy and drawing up the Canons, that " he was
a restless spirit who could not see when matters
are well, but loves to toss and change, and to
bring things to a pitch of reformation floating
in his own brain which may endanger the
steadfastness of that which is in a good pass,
God be praised ! I speak not at random, for he
hath made himself known to me." " When

COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND. 459

three years since," continued the King, " I had
obtained of the Assembly of Perth to consent
to five articles of order and decency in corre-
spondence with this Church of England, I
promised that I would try their obedience no
farther anent Ecclesiastical affairs, nor put them
out of their own way which custom has made
pleasing unto them." A second project of
Laud, was equally resisted by the prudential
policy of James, who observed " Laud knows
not the stomach of that people, but I ken the
story of my grandmother, the Queen Regent,
that after she was inveigled to break her pro-
mise made at a Perth meeting never saw good
day, and being much beloved before, was de-
spised by all the people."*

Charles renewed his father's scheme, and
listened to Laud, urged on by his conscience —
his policy — or his fate. To plant the Hier-
archy in a land of Presbyters ; to establish

* This remarkable conversation of James the First with
the Lord-Keeper Williams discovers that shrewdness and
sagacity often prevalent in his thoughtful hours. His pre-
diction of Laud's own character, is a very remarkable in-
stance of political foresight. When solicited for his promotion
— " Take him," said James, " since you will have him, but
ye will surely repent it." Racket's Life of Archbishop Wil-
liams, 64.

460 COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND.

that Monarchical institution among a fierce
democracy ; to exact conformity with the An-
glican Church from the sullen sons of Calvin,
proud of their opposition to England, not only
from a religious but a national feeling, was now
to be the perilous labour of Charles the First.
The King does not appear to have been aware
that he had to extirpate the nation, ere he
could abrogate its Presbytery, and he proceeded
inconscious of the conspiracies and disaffections
around him.

On his first visit to Scotland, Charles had
left no doubts of his adherence to Episcopacy.
The Presbyters baffled in their last hopes, pro-
pagated their discontents, backed by a jealous
nobility, who looked on the Bishops either as
encroachers on their own aristocratic power in
the State, or as possible reclaimers of their
ancient patrimonies.

Charles, as he had done in England, to ag-
grandise the Bishops in dignity and power,
conferred on them offices in the administration,
which the nobility had considered as the ap-
portioned objects of their ambition. Those
who had sought and missed preferment, saw
themselves supplanted by a new race of intru-
ders ; and those who occupied the highest
places cast an evil eye on the Churchmen who

COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND. 461

were designing their fall. The Lord of Lorn,
afterwards the famous Argyle who became the
head of the Covenanters, had largely partaken
of honours and emoluments ; yet he was long a
secret Covenanter, till at length he threw off
the mask, either from displeasure at the King's
refusal of the Chancellorship conferred on the
Archbishop of St. Andrew's ; or from a know-
ledge that his wiles had been detected, and
that it had been resolved by the Court, that
the Earl of Antrim should be allowed his
claims on some of Argyle's lands. At the bot-
tom of this burst of patriotism, as is too usual,
there lies no small share of private feeling.*
The Earl of Traquair though openly pro-
fessing friendship for the Bishops, and con-
forming himself to the schemes of his royal
master, was also their secret enemy. Traquair
imagined that these ecclesiastics were colleagu-
ing with Maxwell the Bishop of Ross, and
that this person the most able of the order,

* Bishop Guthry, p. 12, assigns the one motive, but whe-
ther " ill-naturedly" as the Presbyter Woodrow would say,
who shall determine ? The other we positively discover in
a letter of the Earl of Strafford, ii. 325. It had been re-
solved in council in England before Argyle declared for the
Covenanters. It was probably not unknown to Argyle.
Malcolm Laing inclines to this supposition. It is probable
that both motives combined with an equal impulse.

462 COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND.

and the most ambitious, was grasping at the
Treasurer's staff which the Earl held.

The Bishops however were divided among
themselves ; the body was composed of an old
and a new party, acting on contrary principles.
The election of the Scottish Bishops had been
wisely managed by James, who had appointed
the Archbishop of St. Andrew's to convene the
Bishops, and name three or four, from whom
the King reserved to himself the power of
nominating to the vacant see, and during his
reign, according to Bishop Guthry, none but
men well qualified were advanced. Charles
had changed this system, and transferred to his
own court at London the seat of Scottish pre-
ferment. Bishops were now the children of
court-favour, the creatures of patronage ; and
it is not surprising that in the day of trial,
several of these, when patronage was to be
sought elsewhere, hurried to apostasy. Buck-
ingham's recommendation made Lesley a Bi-
shop of the Isles ; Maxwell of the bed-chamber
procured his relative, the bishopric of Ross.
Archbishop Laud made others, and the Earl
of Sterling, Secretary of Scotland, had a mitre
for his friend. These younger Bishops, not
being indebted to their elder brethren for their
preferment, kept themselves apart, more con-

COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND. 463

stant in their correspondence with Laud, than
in concerting measures among themselves, their
sole object being to keep up their interest at
Court. More fiery, being young in office,
than the elder Bishops, they were prompt at
any enterprise suggested to them ; and with
the impolicy of heedless authority, were irri-
tating the Presbyterian Ministry with a haugh-
tiness which the elder Bishops had ever avoid-
ed. Laud at Court was easily misled by the
ardent correspondence of the younger Bishops.
The prudent Archbishop of St. Andrew's, and
the elder ecclesiastics persisted in their advice
to suppress " the Buke," as the Scotch called
the Liturgy, till a happier juncture; a counsel
which would probably have been accepted had
the Scotch Bishops been unanimous in their
opinion ; but the younger mitres were more
stirring and more sanguine. When a corpo-
rate body differ so widely in their sentiments,
it is only a great Minister whose penetrating
genius can discern the secret motives of the
men ; the Statesman of routine, will usually
adopt the opinion suitable to his own design.

The great coming evil was chiefly accom-
plished, as it appears, by the malicious manoeu-
vre of the Earl of Traquair, who intent on the
ruin of the Scottish Hierarchy concurred with

464 COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND.

Laud and his party, in promoting the most
decisive measures ; talking to them in their
own language ; blaming the phlegmatic Bishops
as timorous creatures, whose sees required to
be filled by more active spirits, and pledging
" his life" to carry them through the business
were he entrusted with its execution. Laud
confided in his young Bishops; the young
Bishops in the Earl of Traquair. The Earl
was appointed ; and finally the Earl himself
actually signed the Covenant which abolished
Episcopacy !

During the preparations for the approaching
day, the public mind was heated by the most
malicious reports respecting the Bishops. Tales
flew about from all quarters against their
worldly spirit. — -It was said that they were
heaping estates for their children ; that they
dealt in simoniacal practices ; and that these
remnants of Popery were furbishing up the
old mass. These were the rumours of Pres-
byters ; there were others from another class ;
the Bishops, it seems, were not only trampling
on the Church, but they were domineering
in the State.

An ecclesiastical spy, in gathering the secret
intelligence which occupies such men, seems

COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND. 465

to have opened one of the great sources of the
enmity of the majority of the nobility who
had now concluded on the removal of Bishops
from the third order of the State. It appears
that these Ecclesiastics had obtained a singu-
lar predominance in Parliament ; eight being
Lords of the Articles, chose eight of the no-
bility known to be friendly to the Crown, and
these sixteen the rest ; so that all depended
on them, and they upon the King.*

The same spirit had travelled from England,
and was cordially embraced by the Scottish
malcontents. The recent prosecutions in the
Star-Chamber against Prynne, Bastwick and
Burton, and the Declaration of the Book of
Sports, had at this unlucky moment kindled
new flames of discord. There was an active
Scotch party at London in close connection
with the great one at Edinburgh ; and their
sagacious and active agent, on his return from
England in giving an account of his successful
negotiations with the English Non-conform-
ists, in politics as much as in Church-disci-
pline, assured his masters that " the English

* Sir David Dalrymple, 47, observes that this is very
rational and intelligible, and yet it seems to have escaped the
observation of eminent historians.

VOL. III. 2 H

466 COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND.

had the same design of Reformation in their
Church," — he might have added in their State
— " as soon as the work should begin here."*

At length approached the evil day. — It had
been deferred by the advice of the Earl of
Traquair, on the plea that some preparatory
methods might render the people more cheer-
ful on this eventful occasion ; this had also
furnished the Opposition with full time to con-
cert their measures. It was proclaimed from
all the pulpits, that on Sunday the 23d of July
" the Service-Book" would be read in all the
churches.

But surely it never was ! though for that
reading came in solemn procession, the Chan-
cellor, the Prelates, the Lords of the Sessions,
the Provost, and the whole Council of the
City. Scarcely had the Dean of Edinburgh
opened " The Buke," than opened that memo-
rable scene in which the confusion was so sud-
den, and so various, that all the accounts give
different particulars, -f The universal hubbub
may be imagined, but the language of the
individuals can only be conceived in its Doric

» Bishop Guthry, i. 3.

f The memorable scene has been more minutely related
by Mr. Brodie in a collection of curious extracts from con-
temporary vouchers.

COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND. 467

naivete, which best shows the sort of people
here congregated. The popular axiom that
the voice of the people is the voice of God,
was happily illustrated on the present occasion
of this mobocracy, when they were afterwards
compared to Balaam's ass ; an animal, in itself
stupid and senseless, but whose mouth had
been opened by the Lord.

A terrible yelling, and clapping, intermingled
with curses and groans, and when they could
be heard, the sobbings of the soft-hearted gen-
tlewomen as they sighed that " Baal was in
the Church/' and the broad nicknames of the
insolent viragos calling the Dean, " One of a
witch's breeding, and the De'ils gette (child)"

—shook the church, in vain designed to be
raised into a cathedral !

Fearless awhile, the stout-hearted Dean sud-
denly panic-struck, slipped through his sur-
plice, leaving behind him this white trophy of
the future Covenanters. Then the Bishop
showed himself in the pulpit ; a portly person-
age, who might have urged a better excuse
than the Dean, for an " alacrity in sinking."
The vocabulary of the mob, prompt as it is co-
pious, instantly saluted the Anti-Christian Wolf

— " the beastly belly -god — the crafty fox !" The
echo reverberated " a Pape ! a Pape !" to be

468 COMMOTIONS or SCOTLAND.

stoned — or " to get the thrapple out of him,"
— that is, to cut his wind-pipe. Hardly escap-
ed the bishop with a tremulous life ; conveyed
away in the coach of the Earl of Roxburgh,
himself suspected of raising this mobocracy ;
showers of stones were flung, and the Bi-
shop narrowly escaped the martyrdom of St.
Stephen.*

This revolutionary outrage originated with
females. The High -church, now presumed to
be a cathedral, it was observed was crowded
with women, chiefly of the lower orders ; old
wives, and servant-lasses, otherwise " the godly
females," were the indomitable champions of
the Kirk. Of these an irascible crone — more
heroine than she who damaged her Bible by
thumping " the false thief," as she called the
young man who unluckily responded " Amen"
to " the Buke" — launched from her withered
hand " the thunderbolt of her zeal," in the
stool she sate on. Averted by some friendly
hand, it flew whizzing by the Bishop's ear.
This set the example of an universal rout. After
a conflict the insurgents were dislodged from
the interior — the service was hurried over—

* This tumult was called in Scotland " Stony Sunday,"
and Sir James Balfour has entitled his narrative " Stonie-
field day."

COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND. 469

amidst the rapping of the doors, the stones fly-
ing in at the windows, and the reverberating
shouts of an infuriated multitude storming the
High-church.

It seems that this old wife Janet Geddes has
secured her respectability in Scottish history ;
and she, who the week before, as tells the scan-
dalous chronicle, had sate upon the stool of
repentance, is sainted by throwing one at the
Bishop's head. Her name has been immor-
talised by Burns, and the glorious attitude of
this testy crone, hurling her stool at the Bishop
in the pulpit, is triumphantly perpetuated in a
vignette of one of the volumes of the magician
of the North. For the strength of the patriot-
ism, we may forgive the grossness of the taste,
which by a rhyme, and a print, thus gratifies
the passsions of the populace which it demora-
lises, by confounding an act of insolence done
by a base hand, with a deed which merits the
admiration of a people.

The story of a furious beldame beginning the
fray, by casting her stool at the Bishop's head,
who then retreated from the pulpit, Mr. Brodie
seems to doubt, for he could only trace it to De
Foe's memorial of the Scottish Church, and
surmises that the tale originated in the woman
who beat " the false thief" with her Bible. I

470 COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND.

have however discovered a manuscript docu-
ment of the time — it is a warrant from Secre-
tary Windebank for Rush worth riding post to
Berwick, authorising him to procure horses on
the road. On this warrant, our great noter of
the history of his times, has set down various
memoranda, as seems to have been his habit.
The present is one. — " Mdm. I was at Eden-
borough presently after the first disturbance by
the woman throwing a stoole at the Bishop's
head ; a small thing to be the beginning of a
war."*

This reflection of our great historical collec-
tor conveys to us no favourable idea of his
political sagacity. It was however the pre-
valent notion of the times, and the old Bel-
dame's stool we see has been commemorated in
Scottish history, and is still so attractive as to
furnish a popular frontispiece to a volume
which should have disdained it.

The truth however is, that this was no un-
premeditated riot — it was a concerted mea-
sure— and the names of the plotters of this
memorable scene have been recorded with par-
ticulars which sufficiently authenticate the fact.

So early as in April, the famous Alexander
Henderson, and another minister, schemed the

* Sloane MSS. 1519.

COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND. 471

whole, and having consulted Lord Balmerino,
a zealous Scotch patriot, whose zeal had once
put his head in peril, and Sir Thomas Hope
who was the King's advocate by office, but
much more the Kirk's advocate in heart, the
whole affair was arranged at a house in the
Cowgate among a senate of matrons. To en-
courage these heroines and their associates, to
this valorous onset, they were assured that the
men would afterwards take the business out
of their hands.* Having organized this odd
conspiracy, the plotters themselves left the
city, and their interference escaped detection,
by their cunning absence. No one seemed to
countenance this unexpected sedition which
was considered as a mere ebullition of the
rabble — ceasing with the hour it passed away.
It however excited surprise, that not even a
single person of the lower orders, was brought
forward to undergo even a mockery of punish-
ment ; and such was the silent understanding
of the parties, that when the Bishops were
in personal danger, they knew to what popu-
lar nobleman to apply for protection, at whose
presence they were conscious these raging
waves of the people would ebb and subside.
To us, who are better acquainted with the

* Guthry, 20.

472 COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND.

secret history of the times, than contempo-
raries, this tumult assumes a higher importance
than to those who witnessed it.

Some of these women had been tutored by
persons of superior rank and intelligence.
When one of these viragos, worthy to have
flourished in the sanguinary streets of Paris or
Lyons, expressed her ardent wish to cut the
Bishop's wind-pipe, and was told that a much
worse man might come in his stead, " No !"
she exclaimed, " when Cardinal Beaton was
sticked, we had never another Cardinal sin
syne." Such an incident and such a reflec-
tion could not have sprung from the mind of
the lowest of the rabble particularly of those
times.

That such a memorable scene of an universal
movement of public opinion should have pass-
ed away as a transient ebullition of popular
feeling may surprise us, who view in it the
awful prelude to the great Insurrection, when
" the four tables," of nobility, of gentry, of
ministers, and of burghers, were to convulse
the whole Government with a democracy, and
the shout of rebellion was to be echoed as a
hundred thousand hands were to be lifted to

* This curious fact is given by Mr. Brodie, from Sir James
Balfour's " Stonie-field Day," ii. 455.

o

COMMOTIONS OF SCOTLAND. 473

Heaven to ratify " the Covenant." But when
we consider the complicated intrigues which
had been silently preparing, unmarked and
unsuspected by the Scottish Bishops, we find
how men in power are not the most lively
observers, and often stand insulated and un-
connected with the more active spirits of the
times. One only among them saw at once
the results ; the Archbishop of St. Andrew's,
Primate and Chancellor, wofully exclaimed,
" The labour of thirty years is lost for ever
in one day !" The Bishops reposed on the
wisdom and the strength of the King's far-
distant Council, writing up to London for ad-
vice, and never advising themselves. They
only discovered the true state of affairs at the
moment of their consternation and their flight,
when they were summoned to " the Tables,"
not to take their equal seats, but to hear their
condemnation, and to learn their perpetual
ejection from the State.

END OF THE THIRD VOLUME.

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395 Commentaries on the life

D57 and reign of Charles the First

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