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The History of England from the Accession of James the Second
Volume III
(Chapters XI-XVI)
by Thomas Babington Macaulay
CHAPTER XI
William and Mary proclaimed in London--Rejoicings throughout
England; Rejoicings in Holland--Discontent of the Clergy and of
the Army--Reaction of Public Feeling--Temper of the Tories--
Temper of the Whigs--Ministerial Arrangements--William his own
Minister for Foreign Affairs--Danby--Halifax--Nottingham
Shrewsbury The Board of Admiralty; the Board of Treasury--The
Great Seal--The Judges--The Household--Subordinate Appointments--
The Convention turned into a Parliament--The Members of the two
Houses required to take the Oaths Questions relating to the
Revenue--Abolition of the Hearth Money--Repayment of the Expenses
of the United Provinces--Mutiny at Ipswich--The first Mutiny
Bill--Suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act--Unpopularity of
William--Popularity of Mary--The Court removed from Whitehall to
Hampton Court--The Court at Kensington; William's foreign
Favourites--General Maladministration--Dissensions among Men in
Office--Department of Foreign Affairs--Religious Disputes--The
High Church Party--The Low Church Party--William's Views
concerning Ecclesiastical Polity--Burnet, Bishop of Salisbury--
Nottingham's Views concerning Ecclesiastical Polity--The
Toleration Bill--The Comprehension Bill--The Bill for settling
the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy--The Bill for settling the
Coronation Oath--The Coronation--Promotions--The Coalition
against France; the Devastation of the Palatinate--War declared
against France
THE Revolution had been accomplished. The decrees of the
Convention were everywhere received with submission. London, true
during fifty eventful years to the cause of civil freedom and of
the reformed religion, was foremost in professing loyalty to the
new Sovereigns. Garter King at arms, after making proclamation
under the windows of Whitehall, rode in state along the Strand to
Temple Bar. He was followed by the maces of the two Houses, by
the two Speakers, Halifax and Powle, and by a long train of
coaches filled with noblemen and gentlemen. The magistrates of
the City threw open their gates and joined the procession. Four
regiments of militia lined the way up Ludgate Hill, round Saint
Paul's Cathedral, and along Cheapside. The streets, the
balconies, and the very housetops were crowded with gazers. All
the steeples from the Abbey to the Tower sent forth a joyous din.
The proclamation was repeated, with sound of trumpet, in front of
the Royal Exchange, amidst the shouts of the citizens.
In the evening every window from Whitechapel to Piccadilly was
lighted up. The state rooms of the palace were thrown open, and
were filled by a gorgeous company of courtiers desirous to kiss
the hands of the King and Queen. The Whigs assembled there,
flushed with victory and prosperity. There were among them some
who might be pardoned if a vindictive feeling mingled with their
joy. The most deeply injured of all who had survived the evil
times was absent. Lady Russell, while her friends were crowding
the galleries of Whitehall, remained in her retreat, thinking of
one who, if he had been still living, would have held no
undistinguished place in the ceremonies of that great day. But
her daughter, who had a few months before become the wife of Lord
Cavendish, was presented to the royal pair by his mother the
Countess of Devonshire. A letter is still extant in which the
young lady described with great vivacity the roar of the
populace, the blaze in the streets, the throng in the presence
chamber, the beauty of Mary, and the expression which ennobled
and softened the harsh features of William. But the most
interesting passage is that in which the orphan girl avowed the
stern delight with which she had witnessed the tardy punishment
of her father's murderer.1
The example of London was followed by the provincial towns.
During three weeks the Gazettes were filled with accounts of the
solemnities by which the public joy manifested itself, cavalcades
of gentlemen and yeomen, processions of Sheriffs and Bailiffs in
scarlet gowns, musters of zealous Protestants with orange flags
and ribands, salutes, bonfires, illuminations, music, balls,
dinners, gutters running with ale and conduits spouting claret.2
Still more cordial was the rejoicing among the Dutch, when they
learned that the first minister of their Commonwealth had been
raised to a throne. On the very day of his accession he had
written to assure the States General that the change in his
situation had made no change in the affection which he bore to
his native land, and that his new dignity would, he hoped, enable
him to discharge his old duties more efficiently than ever. That
oligarchical party, which had always been hostile to the
doctrines of Calvin and to the House of Orange, muttered faintly
that His Majesty ought to resign the Stadtholdership. But all
such mutterings were drowned by the acclamations of a people
proud of the genius and success of their great countryman. A day
of thanksgiving was appointed. In all the cities of the Seven
Provinces the public joy manifested itself by festivities of
which the expense was chiefly defrayed by voluntary gifts. Every
class assisted. The poorest labourer could help to set up an arch
of triumph, or to bring sedge to a bonfire. Even the ruined
Huguenots of France could contribute the aid of their ingenuity.
One art which they had carried with them into banishment was the
art of making fireworks; and they now, in honour of the
victorious champion of their faith, lighted up the canals of
Amsterdam with showers of splendid constellations.3
To superficial observers it might well seem that William was, at
this time, one of the most enviable of human beings. He was in
truth one of the most anxious and unhappy. He well knew that the
difficulties of his task were only beginning. Already that dawn
which had lately been so bright was overcast; and many signs
portended a dark and stormy day.
It was observed that two important classes took little or no part
in the festivities by which, all over England, the inauguration
of the new government was celebrated. Very seldom could either a
priest or a soldier be seen in the assemblages which gathered
round the market crosses where the King and Queen were
proclaimed. The professional pride both of the clergy and of the
army had been deeply wounded. The doctrine of nonresistance had
been dear to the Anglican divines. It was their distinguishing
badge. It was their favourite theme. If we are to judge by that
portion of their oratory which has come down to us, they had
preached about the duty of passive obedience at least as often
and as zealously as about the Trinity or the Atonement.4 Their
attachment to their political creed had indeed been severely
tried, and had, during a short time, wavered. But with the
tyranny of James the bitter feeling which that tyranny had
excited among them had passed away. The parson of a parish was
naturally unwilling to join in what was really a triumph over
those principles which, during twenty-eight years, his flock had
heard him proclaim on every anniversary of the Martyrdom and on
every anniversary of the Restoration.
The soldiers, too, were discontented. They hated Popery indeed;
and they had not loved the banished King. But they keenly felt
that, in the short campaign which had decided the fate of their
country, theirs had been an inglorious part. Forty fine
regiments, a regular army such as had never before marched to
battle under the royal standard of England, had retreated
precipitately before an invader, and had then, without a
struggle, submitted to him. That great force had been absolutely
of no account in the late change, had done nothing towards
keeping William out, and had done nothing towards bringing him
in. The clowns, who, armed with pitchforks and mounted on
carthorses, had straggled in the train of Lovelace or Delamere,
had borne a greater part in the Revolution than those splendid
household troops, whose plumed hats, embroidered coats, and
curvetting chargers the Londoners had so often seen with
admiration in Hyde Park. The mortification of the army was
increased by the taunts of the foreigners, taunts which neither
orders nor punishments could entirely restrain.5 At several
places the anger which a brave and highspirited body of men
might, in such circumstances, be expected to feel, showed itself
in an alarming manner. A battalion which lay at Cirencester put
out the bonfires, huzzaed for King James, and drank confusion to
his daughter and his nephew. The garrison of Plymouth disturbed
the rejoicings of the County of Cornwall: blows were exchanged,
and a man was killed in the fray.6
The ill humour of the clergy and of the army could not but be
noticed by the most heedless; for the clergy and the army were
distinguished from other classes by obvious peculiarities of
garb. "Black coats and red coats," said a vehement Whig in the
House of Commons, "are the curses of the nation." 7 But the
discontent was not confined to the black coats and the red coats.
The enthusiasm with which men of all classes had welcomed William
to London at Christmas had greatly abated before the close of
February. The new king had, at the very moment at which his fame
and fortune reached the highest point, predicted the coming
reaction. That reaction might, indeed, have been predicted by a
less sagacious observer of human affairs. For it is to be chiefly
ascribed to a law as certain as the laws which regulate the
succession of the seasons and the course of the trade winds. It
is the nature of man to overrate present evil, and to underrate
present good; to long for what he has not, and to be dissatisfied
with what he has. This propensity, as it appears in individuals,
has often been noticed both by laughing and by weeping
philosophers. It was a favourite theme of Horace and of Pascal,
of Voltaire and of Johnson. To its influence on the fate of great
communities may be ascribed most of the revolutions and
counterrevolutions recorded in history. A hundred generations
have elapsed since the first great national emancipation, of
which an account has come down to us. We read in the most ancient
of books that a people bowed to the dust under a cruel yoke,
scourged to toil by hard taskmasters, not supplied with straw,
yet compelled to furnish the daily tale of bricks, became sick of
life, and raised such a cry of misery as pierced the heavens. The
slaves were wonderfully set free: at the moment of their
liberation they raised a song of gratitude and triumph: but, in a
few hours, they began to regret their slavery, and to murmur
against the leader who had decoyed them away from the savoury
fare of the house of bondage to the dreary waste which still
separated them from the land flowing with milk and honey. Since
that time the history of every great deliverer has been the
history of Moses retold. Down to the present hour rejoicings like
those on the shore of the Red Sea have ever been speedily
followed by murmurings like those at the Waters of Strife.8 The
most just and salutary revolution must produce much suffering.
The most just and salutary revolution cannot produce all the good
that had been expected from it by men of uninstructed minds and
sanguine tempers. Even the wisest cannot, while it is still
recent, weigh quite fairly the evils which it has caused against
the evils which it has removed. For the evils which it has caused
are felt; and the evils which it has removed are felt no longer.
Thus it was now in England. The public was, as it always is
during the cold fits which follow its hot fits, sullen, hard to
please, dissatisfied with itself, dissatisfied with those who had
lately been its favourites. The truce between the two great
parties was at an end. Separated by the memory of all that had
been done and suffered during a conflict of half a century, they
had been, during a few months, united by a common danger. But the
danger was over: the union was dissolved; and the old animosity
broke forth again in all its strength.
James had during the last year of his reign, been even more
hated by the Tories than by the Whigs; and not without cause for
the Whigs he was only an enemy; and to the Tories he had been
a faithless and thankless friend. But the old royalist feeling,
which had seemed to be extinct in the time of his lawless
domination, had been partially revived by his misfortunes. Many
lords and gentlemen, who had, in December, taken arms for the
Prince of Orange and a Free Parliament, muttered, two months
later, that they had been drawn in; that they had trusted too
much to His Highness's Declaration; that they had given him
credit for a disinterestedness which, it now appeared, was not in
his nature. They had meant to put on King James, for his own
good, some gentle force, to punish the Jesuits and renegades who
had misled him, to obtain from him some guarantee for the safety
of the civil and ecclesiastical institutions of the realm, but
not to uncrown and banish him. For his maladministration, gross
as it had been, excuses were found. Was it strange that, driven
from his native land, while still a boy, by rebels who were a
disgrace to the Protestant name, and forced to pass his youth in
countries where the Roman Catholic religion was established, he
should have been captivated by that most attractive of all
superstitions? Was it strange that, persecuted and calumniated as
he had been by an implacable faction, his disposition should have
become sterner and more severe than it had once been thought, and
that, when those who had tried to blast his honour and to rob him
of his birthright were at length in his power, he should not have
sufficiently tempered justice with mercy? As to the worst charge
which had been brought against him, the charge of trying to cheat
his daughters out of their inheritance by fathering a
supposititious child, on what grounds did it rest? Merely on
slight circumstances, such as might well be imputed to accident,
or to that imprudence which was but too much in harmony with his
character. Did ever the most stupid country justice put a boy in
the stocks without requiring stronger evidence than that on which
the English people had pronounced their King guilty of the basest
and most odious of all frauds? Some great faults he had doubtless
committed, nothing could be more just or constitutional than that
for those faults his advisers and tools should be called to a
severe reckoning; nor did any of those advisers and tools more
richly deserve punishment than the Roundhead sectaries whose
adulation had encouraged him to persist in the fatal exercise of
the dispensing power. It was a fundamental law of the land that
the King could do no wrong, and that, if wrong were done by his
authority, his counsellors and agents were responsible. That
great rule, essential to our polity, was now inverted. The
sycophants, who were legally punishable, enjoyed impunity: the
King, who was not legally punishable, was punished with merciless
severity. Was it possible for the Cavaliers of England, the sons
of the warriors who had fought under Rupert, not to feel bitter
sorrow and indignation when they reflected on the fate of their
rightful liege lord, the heir of a long line of princes, lately
enthroned in splendour at Whitehall, now an exile, a suppliant, a
mendicant? His calamities had been greater than even those of the
Blessed Martyr from whom he sprang. The father had been slain by
avowed and mortal foes: the ruin of the son had been the work of
his own children. Surely the punishment, even if deserved, should
have been inflicted by other hands. And was it altogether
deserved? Had not the unhappy man been rather weak and rash than
wicked? Had he not some of the qualities of an excellent prince?
His abilities were certainly not of a high order: but he was
diligent: he was thrifty: he had fought bravely: he had been his
own minister for maritime affairs, and had, in that capacity,
acquitted himself respectably: he had, till his spiritual guides
obtained a fatal ascendency over his mind, been regarded as a man
of strict justice; and, to the last, when he was not misled by
them, he generally spoke truth and dealt fairly. With so many
virtues he might, if he had been a Protestant, nay, if he had
been a moderate Roman Catholic, have had a prosperous and
glorious reign. Perhaps it might not be too late for him to
retrieve his errors. It was difficult to believe that he could be
so dull and perverse as not to have profited by the terrible
discipline which he had recently undergone; and, if that
discipline had produced the effects which might reasonably be
expected from it, England might still enjoy, under her legitimate
ruler, a larger measure of happiness and tranquillity than she
could expect from the administration of the best and ablest
usurper.
We should do great injustice to those who held this language, if
we supposed that they had, as a body, ceased to regard Popery and
despotism with abhorrence. Some zealots might indeed be found who
could not bear the thought of imposing conditions on their King,
and who were ready to recall him without the smallest assurance
that the Declaration of Indulgence should not be instantly
republished, that the High Commission should not be instantly
revived, that Petre should not be again seated at the Council
Board, and that the fellows of Magdalene should not again be
ejected. But the number of these men was small. On the other
hand, the number of those Royalists, who, if James would have
acknowledged his mistakes and promised to observe the laws, were
ready to rally round him, was very large. It is a remarkable fact
that two able and experienced statesmen, who had borne a chief
part in the Revolution, frankly acknowledged, a few days after
the Revolution had been accomplished, their apprehension that a
Restoration was close at hand. "If King James were a Protestant,"
said Halifax to Reresby, "we could not keep him out four months."
"If King James," said Danby to the same person about the same
time, "would but give the country some satisfaction about
religion, which he might easily do, it would be very hard to make
head against him."9 Happily for England, James was, as usual, his
own worst enemy. No word indicating that he took blame to himself
on account of the past, or that he intended to govern
constitutionally for the future, could be extracted from him.
Every letter, every rumour, that found its way from Saint
Germains to England made men of sense fear that, if, in his
present temper, he should be restored to power, the second
tyranny would be worse than the first. Thus the Tories, as a
body, were forced to admit, very unwillingly, that there was, at
that moment, no choice but between William and public ruin. They
therefore, without altogether relinquishing the hope that he who
was King by right might at some future time be disposed to listen
to reason, and without feeling any thing like loyalty towards him
who was King in possession, discontentedly endured the new
government.
It may be doubted whether that government was not, during the
first months of its existence, in more danger from the affection
of the Whigs than from the disaffection of the Tories. Enmity can
hardly be more annoying than querulous, jealous, exacting
fondness; and such was the fondness which the Whigs felt for the
Sovereign of their choice. They were loud in his praise. They
were ready to support him with purse and sword against foreign
and domestic foes. But their attachment to him was of a peculiar
kind. Loyalty such as had animated the gallant gentlemen who
fought for Charles the First, loyalty such as had rescued Charles
the Second from the fearful dangers and difficulties caused by
twenty years of maladministration, was not a sentiment to which
the doctrines of Milton and Sidney were favourable; nor was it a
sentiment which a prince, just raised to power by a rebellion,
could hope to inspire. The Whig theory of government is that
kings exist for the people, and not the people for the kings;
that the right of a king is divine in no other sense than that in
which the right of a member of parliament, of a judge, of a
juryman, of a mayor, of a headborough, is divine; that, while the
chief magistrate governs according to law, he ought to be obeyed
and reverenced; that, when he violates the law, he ought to be
withstood; and that, when he violates the law grossly,
systematically and pertinaciously, he ought to be deposed. On the
truth of these principles depended the justice of William's title
to the throne. It is obvious that the relation between subjects
who held these principles, and a ruler whose accession had been
the triumph of these principles, must have been altogether
different from the relation which had subsisted between the
Stuarts and the Cavaliers. The Whigs loved William indeed: but
they loved him not as a King, but as a party leader; and it was
not difficult to foresee that their enthusiasm would cool fast if
he should refuse to be the mere leader of their party, and should
attempt to be King of the whole nation. What they expected from
him in return for their devotion to his cause was that he should
be one of themselves, a stanch and ardent Whig; that he should
show favour to none but Whigs; that he should make all the old
grudges of the Whigs his own; and there was but too much reason
to apprehend that, if he disappointed this expectation, the only
section of the community which was zealous in his cause would be
estranged from him.10
Such were the difficulties by which, at the moment of his
elevation, he found himself beset. Where there was a good path he
had seldom failed to choose it. But now he had only a choice
among paths every one of which seemed likely to lead to
destruction. From one faction he could hope for no cordial
support. The cordial support of the other faction he could retain
only by becoming himself the most factious man in his kingdom, a
Shaftesbury on the throne. If he persecuted the Tories, their
sulkiness would infallibly be turned into fury. If he showed
favour to the Tories, it was by no means certain that he would
gain their goodwill; and it was but too probable that he might
lose his hold on the hearts of the Whigs. Something however he
must do: something he must risk: a Privy Council must be sworn
in: all the great offices, political and judicial, must be
filled. It was impossible to make an arrangement that would
please every body, and difficult to make an arrangement that
would please any body; but an arrangement must be made.
What is now called a ministry he did not think of forming. Indeed
what is now called a ministry was never known in England till he
had been some years on the throne. Under the Plantagenets, the
Tudors, and the Stuarts, there had been ministers; but there had
been no ministry. The servants of the Crown were not, as now,
bound in frankpledge for each other. They were not expected to be
of the same opinion even on questions of the gravest importance.
Often they were politically and personally hostile to each other,
and made no secret of their hostility. It was not yet felt to be
inconvenient or unseemly that they should accuse each other of
high crimes, and demand each other's heads. No man had been more
active in the impeachment of the Lord Chancellor Clarendon than
Coventry, who was a Commissioner of the Treasury. No man had been
more active in the impeachment of the Lord Treasurer Danby than
Winnington, who was Solicitor General. Among the members of the
Government there was only one point of union, their common head,
the Sovereign. The nation considered him as the proper chief of
the administration, and blamed him severely if he delegated his
high functions to any subject. Clarendon has told us that nothing
was so hateful to the Englishmen of his time as a Prime Minister.
They would rather, he said, be subject to an usurper like Oliver,
who was first magistrate in fact as well as in name, than to a
legitimate King who referred them to a Grand Vizier. One of the
chief accusations which the country party had brought against
Charles the Second was that he was too indolent and too fond of
pleasure to examine with care the balance sheets of public
accountants and the inventories of military stores. James, when
he came to the crown, had determined to appoint no Lord High
Admiral or Board of Admiralty, and to keep the entire direction
of maritime affairs in his own hands; and this arrangement, which
would now be thought by men of all parties unconstitutional and
pernicious in the highest degree, was then generally applauded
even by people who were not inclined to see his conduct in a
favourable light. How completely the relation in which the King
stood to his Parliament and to his ministers had been altered by
the Revolution was not at first understood even by the most
enlightened statesmen. It was universally supposed that the
government would, as in time past, be conducted by functionaries
independent of each other, and that William would exercise a
general superintendence over them all. It was also fully expected
that a prince of William's capacity and experience would transact
much important business without having recourse to any adviser.
There were therefore no complaints when it was understood that he
had reserved to himself the direction of foreign affairs. This
was indeed scarcely matter of choice: for, with the single
exception of Sir William Temple, whom nothing would induce to
quit his retreat for public life, there was no Englishman who had
proved himself capable of conducting an important negotiation
with foreign powers to a successful and honourable issue. Many
years had elapsed since England had interfered with weight and
dignity in the affairs of the great commonwealth of nations. The
attention of the ablest English politicians had long been almost
exclusively occupied by disputes concerning the civil and
ecclesiastical constitution of their own country. The contests
about the Popish Plot and the Exclusion Bill, the Habeas Corpus
Act and the Test Act, had produced an abundance, it might almost
be said a glut, of those talents which raise men to eminence in
societies torn by internal factions. All the Continent could not
show such skilful and wary leaders of parties, such dexterous
parliamentary tacticians, such ready and eloquent debaters, as
were assembled at Westminister. But a very different training was
necessary to form a great minister for foreign affairs; and the
Revolution had on a sudden placed England in a situation in which
the services of a great minister for foreign affairs were
indispensable to her.
William was admirably qualified to supply that in which the most
accomplished statesmen of his kingdom were deficient. He had long
been preeminently distinguished as a negotiator. He was the
author and the soul of the European coalition against the French
ascendency. The clue, without which it was perilous to enter the
vast and intricate maze of Continental politics, was in his
hands. His English counsellors, therefore, however able and
active, seldom, during his reign, ventured to meddle with that
part of the public business which he had taken as his peculiar
province.11
The internal government of England could be carried on only by
the advice and agency of English ministers. Those ministers
William selected in such a manner as showed that he was
determined not to proscribe any set of men who were willing to
support his throne. On the day after the crown had been presented
to him in the Banqueting House, the Privy Council was sworn in.
Most of the Councillors were Whigs; but the names of several
eminent Tories appeared in the list.12 The four highest offices
in the state were assigned to four noblemen, the representatives
of four classes of politicians.
In practical ability and official experience Danby had no
superior among his contemporaries. To the gratitude of the new
Sovereigns he had a strong claim; for it was by his dexterity
that their marriage had been brought about in spite of
difficulties which had seemed insuperable. The enmity which he
had always borne to France was a scarcely less powerful
recommendation. He had signed the invitation of the thirtieth of
June, had excited and directed the northern insurrection, and
had, in the Convention, exerted all his influence and eloquence
in opposition to the scheme of Regency. Yet the Whigs regarded
him with unconquerable distrust and aversion. They could not
forget that he had, in evil days, been the first minister of the
state, the head of the Cavaliers, the champion of prerogative,
the persecutor of dissenters. Even in becoming a rebel, he had
not ceased to be a Tory. If he had drawn the sword against the
Crown, he had drawn it only in defence of the Church. If he had,
in the Convention, done good by opposing the scheme of Regency,
he had done harm by obstinately maintaining that the throne was
not vacant, and that the Estates had no right to determine who
should fill it. The Whigs were therefore of opinion that he ought
to think himself amply rewarded for his recent merits by being
suffered to escape the punishment of those offences for which he
had been impeached ten years before. He, on the other hand,
estimated his own abilities and services, which were doubtless
considerable, at their full value, and thought himself entitled
to the great place of Lord High Treasurer, which he had formerly
held. But he was disappointed. William, on principle, thought it
desirable to divide the power and patronage of the Treasury among
several Commissioners. He was the first English King who never,
from the beginning to the end of his reign, trusted the white
staff in the hands of a single subject. Danby was offered his
choice between the Presidency of the Council and a Secretaryship
of State. He sullenly accepted the Presidency, and, while the
Whigs murmured at seeing him placed so high, hardly attempted to
conceal his anger at not having been placed higher.13
Halifax, the most illustrious man of that small party which
boasted that it kept the balance even between Whigs and Tories,
took charge of the Privy Seal, and continued to be Speaker of the
House of Lords.14 He had been foremost in strictly legal
opposition to the late Government, and had spoken and written
with great ability against the dispensing power: but he had
refused to know any thing about the design of invasion: he had
laboured, even when the Dutch were in full march towards London,
to effect a reconciliation; and he had never deserted James till
James had deserted the throne. But, from the moment of that
shameful flight, the sagacious Trimmer, convinced that compromise
was thenceforth impossible, had taken a decided part. He had
distinguished himself preeminently in the Convention: nor was it
without a peculiar propriety that he had been appointed to the
honourable office of tendering the crown, in the name of all the
Estates of England, to the Prince and Princess of Orange; for our
Revolution, as far as it can be said to bear the character of any
single mind, assuredly bears the character of the large yet
cautious mind of Halifax. The Whigs, however, were not in a
temper to accept a recent service as an atonement for an old
offence; and the offence of Halifax had been grave indeed. He had
long before been conspicuous in their front rank during a hard
fight for liberty. When they were at length victorious, when it
seemed that Whitehall was at their mercy, when they had a near
prospect of dominion and revenge, he had changed sides; and
fortune had changed sides with him. In the great debate on the
Exclusion Bill, his eloquence had struck them dumb, and had put
new life into the inert and desponding party of the Court. It was
true that, though he had left them in the day of their insolent
prosperity, he had returned to them in the day of their distress.
But, now that their distress was over, they forgot that he had
returned to them, and remembered only that he had left them.15
The vexation with which they saw Danby presiding in the Council,
and Halifax bearing the Privy Seal, was not diminished by the
news that Nottingham was appointed Secretary of State. Some of
those zealous churchmen who had never ceased to profess the
doctrine of nonresistance, who thought the Revolution
unjustifiable, who had voted for a Regency, and who had to the
last maintained that the English throne could never be one moment
vacant, yet conceived it to be their duty to submit to the
decision of the Convention. They had not, they said, rebelled
against James. They had not selected William. But, now that they
saw on the throne a Sovereign whom they never would have placed
there, they were of opinion that no law, divine or human, bound
them to carry the contest further. They thought that they found,
both in the Bible and in the Statute Book, directions which could
not be misunderstood. The Bible enjoins obedience to the powers
that be. The Statute Book contains an act providing that no
subject shall be deemed a wrongdoer for adhering to the King in
possession. On these grounds many, who had not concurred in
setting up the new government, believed that they might give it
their support without offence to God or man. One of the most
eminent politicians of this school was Nottingham. At his
instance the Convention had, before the throne was filled, made
such changes in the oath of allegiance as enabled him and those
who agreed with him to take that oath without scruple. "My
principles," he said, "do not permit me to bear any part in
making a King. But when a King has been made, my principles bind
me to pay him an obedience more strict than he can expect from
those who have made him." He now, to the surprise of some of
those who most esteemed him, consented to sit in the council, and
to accept the seals of Secretary. William doubtless hoped that
this appointment would be considered by the clergy and the Tory
country gentlemen as a sufficient guarantee that no evil was
meditated against the Church. Even Burnet, who at a later period
felt a strong antipathy to Nottingham, owned, in some memoirs
written soon after the Revolution, that the King had judged well,
and that the influence of the Tory Secretary, honestly exerted in
support of the new Sovereigns, had saved England from great
calamities.16
The other Secretary was Shrewsbury.17 No man so young had within
living memory occupied so high a post in the government. He had
but just completed his twenty-eighth year. Nobody, however,
except the solemn formalists at the Spanish embassy, thought his
youth an objection to his promotion.18 He had already secured for
himself a place in history by the conspicuous part which he had
taken in the deliverance of his country. His talents, his
accomplishments, his graceful manners, his bland temper, made him
generally popular. By the Whigs especially he was almost adored.
None suspected that, with many great and many amiable qualities,
he had such faults both of head and of heart as would make the
rest of a life which had opened under the fairest auspices
burdensome to himself and almost useless to his country.
The naval administration and the financial administration were
confided to Boards. Herbert was First Commissioner of the
Admiralty. He had in the late reign given up wealth and dignities
when he found that he could not retain them with honour and with
a good conscience. He had carried the memorable invitation to the
Hague. He had commanded the Dutch fleet during the voyage from
Helvoetsluys to Torbay. His character for courage and
professional skill stood high. That he had had his follies and
vices was well known. But his recent conduct in the time of
severe trial had atoned for all, and seemed to warrant the hope
that his future career would be glorious. Among the commissioners
who sate with him at the Admiralty were two distinguished members
of the House of Commons, William Sacheverell, a veteran Whig, who
had great authority in his party, and Sir John Lowther, an honest
and very moderate Tory, who in fortune and parliamentary interest
was among the first of the English gentry.19
Mordaunt, one of the most vehement of the Whigs, was placed at
the head of the Treasury; why, it is difficult to say. His
romantic courage, his flighty wit, his eccentric invention, his
love of desperate risks and startling effects, were not qualities
likely to be of much use to him in financial calculations and
negotiations. Delamere, a more vehement Whig, if possible, than
Mordaunt, sate second at the board, and was Chancellor of the
Exchequer. Two Whig members of the House of Commons were in the
Commission, Sir Henry Capel, brother of that Earl of Essex who
died by his own hand in the Tower, and Richard Hampden, son of
the great leader of the Long Parliament. But the Commissioner on
whom the chief weight of business lay was Godolphin. This man,
taciturn, clearminded, laborious, inoffensive, zealous for no
government and useful to every government, had gradually become
an almost indispensable part of the machinery of the state.
Though a churchman, he had prospered in a Court governed by
Jesuits. Though he had voted for a Regency, he was the real head
of a treasury filled with Whigs. His abilities and knowledge,
which had in the late reign supplied the deficiencies of
Bellasyse and Dover, were now needed to supply the deficiencies
of Mordaunt and Delamere.20
There were some difficulties in disposing of the Great Seal. The
King at first wished to confide it to Nottingham, whose father
had borne it during several years with high reputation.21
Nottingham, however, declined the trust; and it was offered to
Halifax, but was again declined. Both these Lords doubtless felt
that it was a trust which they could not discharge with honour to
themselves or with advantage to the public. In old times, indeed,
the Seal had been generally held by persons who were not lawyers.
Even in the seventeenth century it had been confided to two
eminent men, who had never studied at any Inn of Court. Dean
Williams had been Lord Keeper to James the First. Shaftesbury had
been Lord Chancellor to Charles the Second. But such appointments
could no longer be made without serious inconvenience. Equity had
been gradually shaping itself into a refined science, which no
human faculties could master without long and intense
application. Even Shaftesbury, vigorous as was his intellect, had
painfully felt his want of technical knowledge;22 and, during the
fifteen years which had elapsed since Shaftesbury had resigned
the Seal, technical knowledge had constantly been becoming more
and more necessary to his successors. Neither Nottingham
therefore, though he had a stock of legal learning such as is
rarely found in any person who has not received a legal
education, nor Halifax, though, in the judicial sittings of the
House of Lords, the quickness of his apprehension and the
subtlety of his reasoning had often astonished the bar, ventured
to accept the highest office which an English layman can fill.
After some delay the Seal was confided to a commission of eminent
lawyers, with Maynard at their head.23
The choice of judges did honour to the new government. Every
Privy Councillor was directed to bring a list. The lists were
compared; and twelve men of conspicuous merit were selected.24
The professional attainments and Whig principles of Pollexfen
gave him pretensions to the highest place. But it was remembered
that he had held briefs for the Crown, in the Western counties,
at the assizes which followed the battle of Sedgemoor. It seems
indeed from the reports of the trials that he did as little as he
could do if he held the briefs at all, and that he left to the
Judges the business of browbeating witnesses and prisoners.
Nevertheless his name was inseparably associated in the public
mind with the Bloody Circuit. He, therefore, could not with
propriety be put at the head of the first criminal court in the
realm.25 After acting during a few weeks as Attorney General, he
was made Chief Justice of the Common Pleas. Sir John Holt, a
young man, but distinguished by learning, integrity, and courage,
became Chief Justice of the King's Bench. Sir Robert Atkyns, an
eminent lawyer, who had passed some years in rural retirement,
but whose reputation was still great in Westminster Hall, was
appointed Chief Baron. Powell, who had been disgraced on account
of his honest declaration in favour of the Bishops, again took
his seat among the judges. Treby succeeded Pollexfen as Attorney
General; and Somers was made Solicitor.26
Two of the chief places in the Royal household were filled by two
English noblemen eminently qualified to adorn a court. The high
spirited and accomplished Devonshire was named Lord Steward. No
man had done more or risked more for England during the crisis of
her fate. In retrieving her liberties he had retrieved also the
fortunes of his own house. His bond for thirty thousand pounds
was found among the papers which James had left at Whitehall, and
was cancelled by William.27
Dorset became Lord Chamberlain, and employed the influence and
patronage annexed to his functions, as he had long employed his
private means, in encouraging genius and in alleviating
misfortune. One of the first acts which he was under the
necessity of performing must have been painful to a man of so
generous a nature, and of so keen a relish for whatever was
excellent in arts and letters. Dryden could no longer remain Poet
Laureate. The public would not have borne to see any Papist among
the servants of their Majesties; and Dryden was not only a
Papist, but an apostate. He had moreover aggravated the guilt of
his apostasy by calumniating and ridiculing the Church which he
had deserted. He had, it was facetiously said, treated her as the
Pagan persecutors of old treated her children. He had dressed her
up in the skin of a wild beast, and then baited her for the
public amusement.28 He was removed; but he received from the
private bounty of the magnificent Chamberlain a pension equal to
the salary which had been withdrawn. The deposed Laureate,
however, as poor of spirit as rich in intellectual gifts,
continued to complain piteously, year after year, of the losses
which he had not suffered, till at length his wailings drew forth
expressions of well merited contempt from brave and honest
Jacobites, who had sacrificed every thing to their principles
without deigning to utter one word of deprecation or
lamentation.29
In the Royal household were placed some of those Dutch nobles who
stood highest in the favour of the King. Bentinck had the great
office of Groom of the Stole, with a salary of five thousand
pounds a year. Zulestein took charge of the robes. The Master of
the Horse was Auverquerque, a gallant soldier, who united the
blood of Nassau to the blood of Horn, and who wore with just
pride a costly sword presented to him by the States General in
acknowledgment of the courage with which he had, on the bloody
day of Saint Dennis, saved the life of William.
The place of Vice Chamberlain to the Queen was given to a man who
had just become conspicuous in public life, and whose name will
frequently recur in the history of this reign. John Howe, or, as
he was more commonly called, Jack Howe, had been sent up to the
Convention by the borough of Cirencester. His appearance was that
of a man whose body was worn by the constant workings of a
restless and acrid mind. He was tall, lean, pale, with a haggard
eager look, expressive at once of flightiness and of shrewdness.
He had been known, during several years, as a small poet; and
some of the most savage lampoons which were handed about the
coffeehouses were imputed to him. But it was in the House of
Commons that both his parts and his illnature were most signally
displayed. Before he had been a member three weeks, his
volubility, his asperity, and his pertinacity had made him
conspicuous. Quickness, energy, and audacity, united, soon raised
him to the rank of a privileged man. His enemies, and he had many
enemies, said that he consulted his personal safety even in his
most petulant moods, and that he treated soldiers with a civility
which he never showed to ladies or to Bishops. But no man had in
larger measure that evil courage which braves and even courts
disgust and hatred. No decencies restrained him: his spite was
implacable: his skill in finding out the vulnerable parts of
strong minds was consummate. All his great contemporaries felt
his sting in their turns. Once it inflicted a wound which
deranged even the stern composure of William, and constrained him
to utter a wish that he were a private gentleman, and could
invite Mr. Howe to a short interview behind Montague House. As
yet, however, Howe was reckoned among the most strenuous
supporters of the new government, and directed all his sarcasms
and invectives against the malcontents.30
The subordinate places in every public office were divided
between the two parties: but the Whigs had the larger share. Some
persons, indeed, who did little honour to the Whig name, were
largely recompensed for services which no good man would have
performed. Wildman was made Postmaster General. A lucrative
sinecure in the Excise was bestowed on Ferguson. The duties of
the Solicitor of the Treasury were both very important and very
invidious. It was the business of that officer to conduct
political prosecutions, to collect the evidence, to instruct the
counsel for the Crown, to see that the prisoners were not
liberated on insufficient bail, to see that the juries were not
composed of persons hostile to the government. In the days of
Charles and James, the Solicitors of the Treasury had been with
too much reason accused of employing all the vilest artifices of
chicanery against men obnoxious to the Court. The new government
ought to have made a choice which was above all suspicion.
Unfortunately Mordaunt and Delamere pitched upon Aaron Smith, an
acrimonious and unprincipled politician, who had been the legal
adviser of Titus Oates in the days of the Popish Plot, and who
had been deeply implicated in the Rye House Plot. Richard
Hampden, a man of decided opinions but of moderate temper,
objected to this appointment. His objections however were
overruled. The Jacobites, who hated Smith and had reason to hate
him, affirmed that he had obtained his place by bullying the
Lords of the Treasury, and particularly by threatening that, if
his just claims were disregarded, he would be the death of
Hampden.31
Some weeks elapsed before all the arrangements which have been
mentioned were publicly announced: and meanwhile many important
events had taken place. As soon as the new Privy Councillors had
been sworn in, it was necessary to submit to them a grave and
pressing question. Could the Convention now assembled be turned
into a Parliament? The Whigs, who had a decided majority in the
Lower House, were all for the affirmative. The Tories, who knew
that, within the last month, the public feeling had undergone a
considerable change, and who hoped that a general election would
add to their strength, were for the negative. They maintained
that to the existence of a Parliament royal writs were
indispensably necessary. The Convention had not been summoned by
such writs: the original defect could not now be supplied: the
Houses were therefore mere clubs of private men, and ought
instantly to disperse.
It was answered that the royal writ was mere matter of form, and
that to expose the substance of our laws and liberties to serious
hazard for the sake of a form would be the most senseless
superstition. Wherever the Sovereign, the Peers spiritual and
temporal, and the Representatives freely chosen by the
constituent bodies of the realm were met together, there was the
essence of a Parliament. Such a Parliament was now in being; and
what could be more absurd than to dissolve it at a conjuncture
when every hour was precious, when numerous important subjects
required immediate legislation, and when dangers, only to be
averted by the combined efforts of King, Lords, and Commons,
menaced the State? A Jacobite indeed might consistently refuse to
recognise the Convention as a Parliament. For he held that it had
from the beginning been an unlawful assembly, that all its
resolutions were nullities, and that the Sovereigns whom it had
set up were usurpers. But with what consistency could any man,
who maintained that a new Parliament ought to be immediately
called by writs under the great seal of William and Mary,
question the authority which had placed William and Mary on the
throne? Those who held that William was rightful King must
necessarily hold that the body from which he derived his right
was itself a rightful Great Council of the Realm. Those who,
though not holding him to be rightful King, conceived that they
might lawfully swear allegiance to him as King in fact, might
surely, on the same principle, acknowledge the Convention as a
Parliament in fact. It was plain that the Convention was the
fountainhead from which the authority of all future Parliaments
must be derived, and that on the validity of the votes of the
Convention must depend the validity of every future statute. And
how could the stream rise higher than the source? Was it not
absurd to say that the Convention was supreme in the state, and
yet a nullity; a legislature for the highest of all purposes, and
yet no legislature for the humblest purposes; competent to
declare the throne vacant, to change the succession, to fix the
landmarks of the constitution, and yet not competent to pass the
most trivial Act for the repairing of a pier or the building of a
parish church?
These arguments would have had considerable weight, even if every
precedent had been on the other side. But in truth our history
afforded only one precedent which was at all in point; and that
precedent was decisive in favour of the doctrine that royal writs
are not indispensably necessary to the existence of a Parliament.
No royal writ had summoned the Convention which recalled Charles
the Second. Yet that Convention had, after his Restoration,
continued to sit and to legislate, had settled the revenue, had
passed an Act of amnesty, had abolished the feudal tenures. These
proceedings had been sanctioned by authority of which no party in
the state could speak without reverence. Hale had borne a
considerable share in them, and had always maintained that they
were strictly legal. Clarendon, little as he was inclined to
favour any doctrine derogatory to the rights of the Crown, or to
the dignity of that seal of which he was keeper, had declared
that, since God had, at a most critical conjuncture, given the
nation a good Parliament, it would be the height of folly to look
for technical flaws in the instrument by which that Parliament
was called together. Would it be pretended by any Tory that the
Convention of 1660 had a more respectable origin than the
Convention of 1689? Was not a letter written by the first Prince
of the Blood, at the request of the whole peerage, and of
hundreds of gentlemen who had represented counties and towns, at
least as good a warrant as a vote of the Rump?
Weaker reasons than these would have satisfied the Whigs who
formed the majority of the Privy Council. The King therefore, on
the fifth day after he had been proclaimed, went with royal state
to the House of Lords, and took his seat on the throne. The
Commons were called in; and he, with many gracious expressions,
reminded his hearers of the perilous situation of the country,
and exhorted them to take such steps as might prevent unnecessary
delay in the transaction of public business. His speech was
received by the gentlemen who crowded the bar with the deep hum
by which our ancestors were wont to indicate approbation, and
which was often heard in places more sacred than the Chamber of
the Peers.32 As soon as he had retired, a Bill declaring the
Convention a Parliament was laid on the table of the Lords, and
rapidly passed by them. In the Commons the debates were warm. The
House resolved itself into a Committee; and so great was the
excitement that, when the authority of the Speaker was withdrawn,
it was hardly possible to preserve order. Sharp personalities
were exchanged. The phrase, "hear him," a phrase which had
originally been used only to silence irregular noises, and to
remind members of the duty of attending to the discussion, had,
during some years, been gradually becoming what it now is; that
is to say, a cry indicative, according to the tone, of
admiration, acquiescence, indignation, or derision. On this
occasion, the Whigs vociferated "Hear, hear," so tumultuously
that the Tories complained of unfair usage. Seymour, the leader
of the minority, declared that there could be no freedom of
debate while such clamour was tolerated. Some old Whig members
were provoked into reminding him that the same clamour had
occasionally been heard when he presided, and had not then been
repressed. Yet, eager and angry as both sides were, the speeches
on both sides indicated that profound reverence for law and
prescription which has long been characteristic of Englishmen,
and which, though it runs sometimes into pedantry and sometimes
into superstition, is not without its advantages. Even at that
momentous crisis, when the nation was still in the ferment of a
revolution, our public men talked long and seriously about all
the circumstances of the deposition of Edward the Second and of
the deposition of Richard the Second, and anxiously inquired
whether the assembly which, with Archbishop Lanfranc at its head,
set aside Robert of Normandy, and put William Rufus on the
throne, did or did not afterwards continue to act as the
legislature of the realm. Much was said about the history of
writs; much about the etymology of the word Parliament. It is
remarkable, that the orator who took the most statesmanlike view
of the subject was old Maynard. In the civil conflicts of fifty
eventful years he had learned that questions affecting the
highest interests of the commonwealth were not to be decided by
verbal cavils and by scraps of Law French and Law Latin; and,
being by universal acknowledgment the most subtle and the most
learned of English jurists, he could express what he felt without
the risk of being accused of ignorance and presumption. He
scornfully thrust aside as frivolous and out of place all that
blackletter learning, which some men, far less versed in such
matters than himself, had introduced into the discussion. "We
are," he said, "at this moment out of the beaten path. If
therefore we are determined to move only in that path, we cannot
move at all. A man in a revolution resolving to do nothing which
is not strictly according to established form resembles a man who
has lost himself in the wilderness, and who stands crying 'Where
is the king's highway? I will walk nowhere but on the king's
highway.' In a wilderness a man should take the track which will
carry him home. In a revolution we must have recourse to the
highest law, the safety of the state." Another veteran Roundhead,
Colonel Birch, took the same side, and argued with great force
and keenness from the precedent of 1660. Seymour and his
supporters were beaten in the Committee, and did not venture to
divide the House on the Report. The Bill passed rapidly, and
received the royal assent on the tenth day after the accession of
William and Mary.33
The law which turned the Convention into a Parliament contained a
clause providing that no person should, after the first of March,
sit or vote in either House without taking the oaths to the new
King and Queen. This enactment produced great agitation
throughout society. The adherents of the exiled dynasty hoped and
confidently predicted that the recusants would be numerous. The
minority in both Houses, it was said, would be true to the cause
of hereditary monarchy. There might be here and there a traitor;
but the great body of those who had voted for a Regency would be
firm. Only two Bishops at most would recognise the usurpers.
Seymour would retire from public life rather than abjure his
principles. Grafton had determined to fly to France and to throw
himself at the feet of his uncle. With such rumours as these all
the coffeehouses of London were filled during the latter part of
February. So intense was the public anxiety that, if any man of
rank was missed, two days running, at his usual haunts, it was
immediately whispered that he had stolen away to Saint
Germains.34
The second of March arrived; and the event quieted the fears of
one party, and confounded the hopes of the other. The Primate
indeed and several of his suffragans stood obstinately aloof: but
three Bishops and seventy-three temporal peers took the oaths. At
the next meeting of the Upper House several more prelates came
in. Within a week about a hundred Lords had qualified themselves
to sit. Others, who were prevented by illness from appearing,
sent excuses and professions of attachment to their Majesties.
Grafton refuted all the stories which had been circulated about
him by coming to be sworn on the first day. Two members of the
Ecclesiastical Commission, Mulgrave and Sprat, hastened to make
atonement for their fault by plighting their faith to William.
Beaufort, who had long been considered as the type of a royalist
of the old school, submitted after a very short hesitation.
Aylesbury and Dartmouth, though vehement Jacobites, had as little
scruple about taking the oath of allegiance as they afterwards
had about breaking it.35 The Hydes took different paths.
Rochester complied with the law; but Clarendon proved refractory.
Many thought it strange that the brother who had adhered to James
till James absconded should be less sturdy than the brother who
had been in the Dutch camp. The explanation perhaps is that
Rochester would have sacrificed much more than Clarendon by
refusing to take the oaths. Clarendon's income did not depend on
the pleasure of the Government
but Rochester had a pension of four thousand a year, which he
could not hope to retain if he refused to acknowledge the new
Sovereigns. Indeed, he had so many enemies that, during some
months, it seemed doubtful whether he would, on any terms, be
suffered to retain the splendid reward which he had earned by
persecuting the Whigs and by sitting in the High Commission. He
was saved from what would have been a fatal blow to his fortunes
by the intercession of Burnet, who had been deeply injured by
him, and who revenged himself as became a Christian divine.36
In the Lower House four hundred members were sworn in on the
second of March; and among them was Seymour. The spirit of the
Jacobites was broken by his defection; and the minority with very
few exceptions followed his example.37
Before the day fixed for the taking of the oaths, the Commons had
begun to discuss a momentous question which admitted of no delay.
During the interregnum, William had, as provisional chief of the
administration, collected the taxes and applied them to the
public service; nor could the propriety of this course be
questioned by any person who approved of the Revolution. But the
Revolution was now over: the vacancy of the throne had been
supplied: the Houses were sitting: the law was in full force; and
it became necessary immediately to decide to what revenue the
Government was entitled.
Nobody denied that all the lands and hereditaments of the Crown
had passed with the Crown to the new Sovereigns. Nobody denied
that all duties which had been granted to the Crown for a fixed
term of years might be constitutionally exacted till that term
should expire. But large revenues had been settled by Parliament
on James for life; and whether what had been settled on James for
life could, while he lived, be claimed by William and Mary, was a
question about which opinions were divided.
Holt, Treby, Pollexfen, indeed all the eminent Whig lawyers,
Somers excepted, held that these revenues had been granted to the
late King, in his political capacity, but for his natural life,
and ought therefore, as long as he continued to drag on his
existence in a strange land, to be paid to William and Mary. It
appears from a very concise and unconnected report of the debate
that Somers dissented from this doctrine. His opinion was that,
if the Act of Parliament which had imposed the duties in question
was to be construed according to the spirit, the word life must
be understood to mean reign, and that therefore the term for
which the grant had been made had expired. This was surely the
sound opinion: for it was plainly irrational to treat the
interest of James in this grant as at once a thing annexed to his
person and a thing annexed to his office; to say in one breath
that the merchants of London and Bristol must pay money because
he was naturally alive, and that his successors must receive
that money because he was politically defunct. The House was
decidedly with Somers. The members generally were bent on
effecting a great reform, without which it was felt that the
Declaration of Rights would be but an imperfect guarantee for
public liberty. During the conflict which fifteen successive
Parliaments had maintained against four successive Kings, the
chief weapon of the Commons had been the power of the purse; and
never had the representatives of the people been induced to
surrender that weapon without having speedy cause to repent of
their too credulous loyalty. In that season of tumultuous joy
which followed the Restoration, a large revenue for life had been
almost by acclamation granted to Charles the Second. A few months
later there was scarcely a respectable Cavalier in the kingdom
who did not own that the stewards of the nation would have acted
more wisely if they had kept in their hands the means of checking
the abuses which disgraced every department of the government.
James the Second had obtained from his submissive Parliament,
without a dissentient voice, an income sufficient to defray the
ordinary expenses of the state during his life; and, before he
had enjoyed that income half a year, the great majority of those
who had dealt thus liberally with him blamed themselves severely
for their liberality. If experience was to be trusted, a long and
painful experience, there could be no effectual security against
maladministration, unless the Sovereign were under the necessity
of recurring frequently to his Great Council for pecuniary aid.
Almost all honest and enlightened men were therefore agreed in
thinking that a part at least of the supplies ought to be granted
only for short terms. And what time could be fitter for the
introduction of this new practice than the year 1689, the
commencement of a new reign, of a new dynasty, of a new era of
constitutional government? The feeling on this subject was so
strong and general that the dissentient minority gave way. No
formal resolution was passed; but the House proceeded to act on
the supposition that the grants which had been made to James for
life had been annulled by his abdication.38
It was impossible to make a new settlement of the revenue without
inquiry and deliberation. The Exchequer was ordered to furnish
such returns as might enable the House to form estimates of the
public expenditure and income. In the meantime, liberal provision
was made for the immediate exigencies of the state. An
extraordinary aid, to be raised by direct monthly assessment, was
voted to the King. An Act was passed indemnifying all who had,
since his landing, collected by his authority the duties settled
on James; and those duties which had expired were continued for
some months.
Along William's whole line of march, from Torbay to London, he
had been importuned by the common people to relieve them from the
intolerable burden of the hearth money. In truth, that tax seems
to have united all the worst evils which can be imputed to any
tax. It was unequal, and unequal in the most pernicious way: for
it pressed heavily on the poor, and lightly on the rich. A
peasant, all whose property was not worth twenty pounds, was
charged ten shillings. The Duke of Ormond, or the Duke of
Newcastle, whose estates were worth half a million, paid only
four or five pounds. The collectors were empowered to examine the
interior of every house in the realm, to disturb families at
meals, to force the doors of bedrooms, and, if the sum demanded
were not punctually paid, to sell the trencher on which the
barley loaf was divided among the poor children, and the pillow
from under the head of the lying-in woman. Nor could the Treasury
effectually restrain the chimneyman from using his powers with
harshness: for the tax was farmed; and the government was
consequently forced to connive at outrages and exactions such as
have, in every age made the name of publican a proverb for all
that is most hateful.
William had been so much moved by what he had heard of these
grievances that, at one of the earliest sittings of the Privy
Council, he introduced the subject. He sent a message requesting
the House of Commons to consider whether better regulations would
effectually prevent the abuses which had excited so much
discontent. He added that he would willingly consent to the
entire abolition of the tax if it should appear that the tax and
the abuses were inseparable.39 This communication was received
with loud applause. There were indeed some financiers of the old
school who muttered that tenderness for the poor was a fine
thing; but that no part of the revenue of the state came in so
exactly to the day as the hearth money; that the goldsmiths of
the City could not always be induced to lend on the security of
the next quarter's customs or excise, but that on an assignment
of hearth money there was no difficulty in obtaining advances. In
the House of Commons, those who thought thus did not venture to
raise their voices in opposition to the general feeling. But in
the Lords there was a conflict of which the event for a time
seemed doubtful. At length the influence of the Court,
strenuously exerted, carried an Act by which the chimney tax was
declared a badge of slavery, and was, with many expressions of
gratitude to the King, abolished for ever.40
The Commons granted, with little dispute, and without a division,
six hundred thousand pounds for the purpose of repaying to the
United Provinces the charges of the expedition which had
delivered England. The facility with which this large sum was
voted to a shrewd, diligent and thrifty people, our allies,
indeed, politically, but commercially our most formidable rivals,
excited some murmurs out of doors, and was, during many years, a
favourite subject of sarcasm with Tory pamphleteers.41 The
liberality of the House admits however of an easy explanation. On
the very day on which the subject was under consideration,
alarming news arrived at Westminster, and convinced many, who
would at another time have been disposed to scrutinise severely
any account sent in by the Dutch, that our country could not yet
dispense with the services of the foreign troops.
France had declared war against the States General; and the
States General had consequently demanded from the King of England
those succours which he was bound by the treaty of Nimeguen to
furnish.42 He had ordered some battalions to march to Harwich,
that they might be in readiness to cross to the Continent. The
old soldiers of James were generally in a very bad temper; and
this order did not produce a soothing effect. The discontent was
greatest in the regiment which now ranks as first of the line.
Though borne on the English establishment, that regiment, from
the time when it first fought under the great Gustavus, had been
almost exclusively composed of Scotchmen; and Scotchmen have
never, in any region to which their adventurous and aspiring
temper has led them, failed to note and to resent every slight
offered to Scotland. Officers and men muttered that a vote of a
foreign assembly was nothing to them. If they could be absolved
from their allegiance to King James the Seventh, it must be by
the Estates at Edinburgh, and not by the Convention at
Westminster. Their ill humour increased when they heard that
Schomberg had been appointed their colonel. They ought perhaps to
have thought it an honour to be called by the name of the
greatest soldier in Europe. But, brave and skilful as he was, he
was not their countryman: and their regiment, during the fifty-
six years which had elapsed since it gained its first honourable
distinctions in Germany, had never been commanded but by a
Hepburn or a Douglas. While they were in this angry and
punctilious mood, they were ordered to join the forces which were
assembling at Harwich. There was much murmuring; but there was no
outbreak till the regiment arrived at Ipswich. There the signal of revolt was
given by two
captains who were zealous for the exiled King. The market place
was soon filled with pikemen and musketeers running to and fro.
Gunshots were wildly fired in all directions. Those officers who
attempted to restrain the rioters were overpowered and disarmed.
At length the chiefs of the insurrection established some order,
and marched out of Ipswich at the head of their adherents. The
little army consisted of about eight hundred men. They had seized
four pieces of cannon, and had taken possession of the military
chest, which contained a considerable sum of money. At the
distance of half a mile from the town a halt was called: a
general consultation was held; and the mutineers resolved that
they would hasten back to their native country, and would live
and die with their rightful King. They instantly proceeded
northward by forced marches.43
When the news reached London the dismay was great. It was
rumoured that alarming symptoms had appeared in other regiments,
and particularly that a body of fusileers which lay at Harwich
was likely to imitate the example set at Ipswich. "If these
Scots," said Halifax to Reresby, "are unsupported, they are lost.
But if they have acted in concert with others, the danger is
serious indeed."44 The truth seems to be that there was a
conspiracy which had ramifications in many parts of the army, but
that the conspirators were awed by the firmness of the government
and of the Parliament. A committee of the Privy Council was
sitting when the tidings of the mutiny arrived in London. William
Harbord, who represented the borough of Launceston, was at the
board. His colleagues entreated him to go down instantly to the
House of Commons, and to relate what had happened. He went, rose
in his place, and told his story. The spirit of the assembly rose
to the occasion. Howe was the first to call for vigorous action.
"Address the King," he said, "to send his Dutch troops after
these men. I know not who else can be trusted." "This is no
jesting matter," said old Birch, who had been a colonel in the
service of the Parliament, and had seen the most powerful and
renowned House of Commons that ever sate twice purged and twice
expelled by its own soldiers; "if you let this evil spread, you
will have an army upon you in a few days. Address the King to
send horse and foot instantly, his own men, men whom he can
trust, and to put these people down at once." The men of the long
robe caught the flame. "It is not the learning of my profession
that is needed here," said Treby. "What is now to be done is to
meet force with force, and to maintain in the field what we have
done in the senate." "Write to the Sheriffs," said Colonel
Mildmay, member for Essex. "Raise the militia. There are a
hundred and fifty thousand of them: they are good Englishmen:
they will not fail you." It was resolved that all members of the
House who held commissions in the army should be dispensed from
parliamentary attendance, in order that they might repair
instantly to their military posts. An address was unanimously
voted requesting the King to take effectual steps for the
suppression of the rebellion, and to put forth a proclamation
denouncing public vengeance on the rebels. One gentleman hinted
that it might be well to advise his Majesty to offer a pardon to
those who should peaceably submit: but the House wisely rejected
the suggestion. "This is no time," it was well said, "for any
thing that looks like fear." The address was instantly sent up to
the Lords. The Lords concurred in it. Two peers, two knights of
shires, and two burgesses were sent with it to Court. William
received them graciously, and informed them that he had already
given the necessary orders. In fact, several regiments of horse
and dragoons had been sent northward under the command of
Ginkell, one of the bravest and ablest officers of the Dutch
army.45
Meanwhile the mutineers were hastening across the country which
lies between Cambridge and the Wash. Their road lay through a
vast and desolate fen, saturated with all the moisture of
thirteen counties, and overhung during the greater part of the
year by a low grey mist, high above which rose, visible many
miles, the magnificent tower of Ely. In that dreary region,
covered by vast flights of wild fowl, a half savage population,
known by the name of the Breedlings, then led an amphibious life,
sometimes wading, and sometimes rowing, from one islet of firm
ground to another.46 The roads were amongst the worst in the
island, and, as soon as rumour announced the approach of the
rebels, were studiously made worse by the country people. Bridges
were broken down. Trees were laid across the highways to obstruct
the progress of the cannon. Nevertheless the Scotch veterans not
only pushed forward with great speed, but succeeded in carrying
their artillery with them. They entered Lincolnshire, and were
not far from Sleaford, when they learned that Ginkell with an
irresistible force was close on their track. Victory and escape
were equally out of the question. The bravest warriors could not
contend against fourfold odds. The most active infantry could not
outrun horsemen. Yet the leaders, probably despairing of pardon,
urged the men to try the chance of battle. In that region, a spot
almost surrounded by swamps and pools was without difficulty
found. Here the insurgents were drawn up; and the cannon were
planted at the only point which was thought not to be
sufficiently protected by natural defences. Ginkell ordered the
attack to be made at a place which was out of the range of the
guns; and his dragoons dashed gallantly into the water, though it
was so deep that their horses were forced to swim. Then the
mutineers lost heart. They beat a parley, surrendered at
discretion, and were brought up to London under a strong guard.
Their lives were forfeit: for they had been guilty, not merely of
mutiny, which was then not a legal crime, but of levying war
against the King. William, however, with politic clemency,
abstained from shedding the blood even of the most culpable. A
few of the ringleaders were brought to trial at the next Bury
assizes, and were convicted of high treason; but their lives were
spared. The rest were merely ordered to return to their duty. The
regiment, lately so refractory, went submissively to the
Continent, and there, through many hard campaigns, distinguished
itself by fidelity, by discipline, and by valour.47
This event facilitated an important change in our polity, a
change which, it is true, could not have been long delayed, but
which would not have been easily accomplished except at a moment
of extreme danger. The time had at length arrived at which it was
necessary to make a legal distinction between the soldier and the
citizen. Under the Plantagenets and the Tudors there had been no
standing army. The standing army which had existed under the last
kings of the House of Stuart had been regarded by every party in
the state with strong and not unreasonable aversion. The common
law gave the Sovereign no power to control his troops. The
Parliament, regarding them as mere tools of tyranny, had not been
disposed to give such power by statute. James indeed had induced
his corrupt and servile judges to put on some obsolete laws a
construction which enabled him to punish desertion capitally. But
this construction was considered by all respectable jurists as
unsound, and, had it been sound, would have been far from
effecting all that was necessary for the purpose of maintaining
military discipline. Even James did not venture to inflict death
by sentence of a court martial. The deserter was treated as an
ordinary felon, was tried at the assizes by a petty jury on a
bill found by a grand jury, and was at liberty to avail himself
of any technical flaw which might be discovered in the
indictment.
The Revolution, by altering the relative position of the prince
and the parliament, had altered also the relative position of the
army and the nation. The King and the Commons were now at unity;
and both were alike menaced by the greatest military power which
had existed in Europe since the downfall of the Roman empire. In
a few weeks thirty thousand veterans, accustomed to conquer, and
led by able and experienced captains, might cross from the ports
of Normandy and Brittany to our shores. That such a force would
with little difficulty scatter three times that number of
militia, no man well acquainted with war could doubt. There must
then be regular soldiers; and, if there were to be regular
soldiers, it must be indispensable, both to their efficiency, and
to the security of every other class, that they should be kept
under a strict discipline. An ill disciplined army has ever been
a more costly and a more licentious militia, impotent against a
foreign enemy, and formidable only to the country which it is
paid to defend. A strong line of demarcation must therefore be
drawn between the soldiers and the rest of the community. For the
sake of public freedom, they must, in the midst of freedom, be
placed under a despotic rule. They must be subject to a sharper
penal code, and to a more stringent code of procedure, than are
administered by the ordinary tribunals. Some acts which in the
citizen are innocent must in the soldier be crimes. Some acts
which in the citizen are punished with fine or imprisonment must
in the soldier be punished with death. The machinery by which
courts of law ascertain the guilt or innocence of an accused
citizen is too slow and too intricate to be applied to an accused
soldier. For, of all the maladies incident to the body politic,
military insubordination is that which requires the most prompt
and drastic remedies. If the evil be not stopped as soon as it
appears, it is certain to spread; and it cannot spread far
without danger to the very vitals of the commonwealth. For the
general safety, therefore, a summary jurisdiction of terrible
extent must, in camps, be entrusted to rude tribunals composed of
men of the sword.
But, though it was certain that the country could not at that
moment be secure without professional soldiers, and equally
certain that professional soldiers must be worse than useless
unless they were placed under a rule more arbitrary and severe
than that to which other men were subject, it was not without
great misgivings that a House of Commons could venture to
recognise the existence and to make provision for the government
of a standing army. There was scarcely a public man of note who
had not often avowed his conviction that our polity and a
standing army could not exist together. The Whigs had been in the
constant habit of repeating that standing armies had destroyed
the free institutions of the neighbouring nations. The Tories had
repeated as constantly that, in our own island, a standing army
had subverted the Church, oppressed the gentry, and murdered the
King. No leader of either party could, without laying himself
open to the charge of gross inconsistency, propose that such an
army should henceforth be one of the permanent establishments of
the realm. The mutiny at Ipswich, and the panic which that mutiny
produced, made it easy to effect what would otherwise have been
in the highest degree difficult. A short bill was brought in
which began by declaring, in explicit terms, that standing armies
and courts martial were unknown to the law of England. It was
then enacted that, on account of the extreme perils impending at
that moment over the state, no man mustered on pay in the service
of the crown should, on pain of death, or of such lighter
punishment as a court martial should deem sufficient, desert his
colours or mutiny against his commanding officers. This statute
was to be in force only six months; and many of those who voted
for it probably believed that it would, at the close of that
period, be suffered to expire. The bill passed rapidly and
easily. Not a single division was taken upon it in the House of
Commons. A mitigating clause indeed, which illustrates somewhat
curiously the manners of that age, was added by way of rider
after the third reading. This clause provided that no court
martial should pass sentence of death except between the hours of
six in the morning and one in the afternoon. The dinner hour was
then early; and it was but too probable that a gentleman who had
dined would be in a state in which he could not safely be trusted
with the lives of his fellow creatures. With this amendment, the
first and most concise of our many Mutiny Bills was sent up to
the Lords, and was, in a few hours, hurried by them through all
its stages and passed by the King.48
Thus was made, without one dissentient voice in Parliament,
without one murmur in the nation, the first step towards a change
which had become necessary to the safety of the state, yet which
every party in the state then regarded with extreme dread and
aversion. Six months passed; and still the public danger
continued. The power necessary to the maintenance of military
discipline was a second time entrusted to the crown for a short
term. The trust again expired, and was again renewed. By slow
degrees familiarity reconciled the public mind to the names, once
so odious, of standing army and court martial. It was proved by
experience that, in a well constituted society, professional
soldiers may be terrible to a foreign enemy, and yet submissive
to the civil power. What had been at first tolerated as the
exception began to be considered as the rule. Not a session
passed without a Mutiny Bill. When at length it became evident
that a political change of the highest importance was taking
place in such a manner as almost to escape notice, a clamour was
raised by some factious men desirous to weaken the hands of the
government, and by some respectable men who felt an honest but
injudicious reverence for every old constitutional tradition, and
who were unable to understand that what at one stage in the
progress of society is pernicious may at another stage be
indispensable. This clamour however, as years rolled on, became
fainter and fainter. The debate which recurred every spring on
the Mutiny Bill came to be regarded merely as an occasion on
which hopeful young orators fresh from Christchurch were to
deliver maiden speeches, setting forth how the guards of
Pisistratus seized the citadel of Athens, and how the Praetorian
cohorts sold the Roman empire to Didius. At length these
declamations became too ridiculous to be repeated. The most
oldfashioned, the most eccentric, politician could hardly, in the
reign of George the Third, contend that there ought to be no
regular soldiers, or that the ordinary law, administered by the
ordinary courts, would effectually maintain discipline among such
soldiers. All parties being agreed as to the general principle, a
long succession of Mutiny Bills passed without any discussion,
except when some particular article of the military code appeared
to require amendment. It is perhaps because the army became thus
gradually, and almost imperceptibly, one of the institutions of
England, that it has acted in such perfect harmony with all her
other institutions, has never once, during a hundred and sixty
years, been untrue to the throne or disobedient to the law, has
never once defied the tribunals or overawed the constituent
bodies. To this day, however, the Estates of the Realm continue
to set up periodically, with laudable jealousy, a landmark on the
frontier which was traced at the time of the Revolution. They
solemnly reassert every year the doctrine laid down in the
Declaration of Rights; and they then grant to the Sovereign an
extraordinary power to govern a certain number of soldiers
according to certain rules during twelve months more.
In the same week in which the first Mutiny Bill was laid on the
table of the Commons, another temporary law, made necessary by
the unsettled state of the kingdom, was passed. Since the flight
of James many persons who were believed to have been deeply
implicated in his unlawful acts, or to be engaged in plots for
his restoration, had been arrested and confined. During the
vacancy of the throne, these men could derive no benefit from the
Habeas Corpus Act. For the machinery by which alone that Act
could be carried into execution had ceased to exist; and, through
the whole of Hilary term, all the courts in Westminster Hall had
remained closed. Now that the ordinary tribunals were about to
resume their functions, it was apprehended that all those
prisoners whom it was not convenient to bring instantly to trial
would demand and obtain their liberty. A bill was therefore
brought in which empowered the King to detain in custody during a
few weeks such persons as he should suspect of evil designs
against his government. This bill passed the two Houses with
little or no opposition.49 But the malecontents out of doors did
not fail to remark that, in the late reign, the Habeas Corpus Act
had not been one day suspended. It was the fashion to call James
a tyrant, and William a deliverer. Yet, before the deliverer had
been a month on the throne, he had deprived Englishmen of a
precious right which the tyrant had respected.50 This is a kind
of reproach which a government sprung from a popular revolution
almost inevitably incurs. From such a government men naturally
think themselves entitled to demand a more gentle and liberal
administration than is expected from old and deeply rooted power.
Yet such a government, having, as it always has, many active
enemies, and not having the strength derived from legitimacy and
prescription, can at first maintain itself only by a vigilance
and a severity of which old and deeply rooted power stands in no
need. Extraordinary and irregular vindications of public liberty
are sometimes necessary: yet, however necessary, they are almost
always followed by some temporary abridgments of that very
liberty; and every such abridgment is a fertile and plausible
theme for sarcasm and invective.
Unhappily sarcasm and invective directed against William were but
too likely to find favourable audience. Each of the two great
parties had its own reasons for being dissatisfied with him; and
there were some complaints in which both parties joined. His
manners gave almost universal offence. He was in truth far better
qualified to save a nation than to adorn a court. In the highest
parts of statesmanship, he had no equal among his contemporaries.
He had formed plans not inferior in grandeur and boldness to
those of Richelieu, and had carried them into effect with a tact
and wariness worthy of Mazarin. Two countries, the seats of civil
liberty and of the Reformed Faith, had been preserved by his
wisdom and courage from extreme perils. Holland he had delivered
from foreign, and England from domestic foes. Obstacles
apparently insurmountable had been interposed between him and the
ends on which he was intent; and those obstacles his genius had
turned into stepping stones. Under his dexterous management the
hereditary enemies of his house had helped him to mount a throne;
and the persecutors of his religion had helped him to rescue his
religion from persecution. Fleets and armies, collected to
withstand him, had, without a struggle, submitted to his orders.
Factions and sects, divided by mortal antipathies, had recognised
him as their common head. Without carnage, without devastation, he
had won a victory compared with which all the victories of
Gustavus and Turenne were insignificant. In a few weeks he had
changed the relative position of all the states in Europe, and
had restored the equilibrium which the preponderance of one power
had destroyed. Foreign nations did ample justice to his great
qualities. In every Continental country where Protestant
congregations met, fervent thanks were offered to God, who, from
among the progeny of His servants, Maurice, the deliverer of
Germany, and William, the deliverer of Holland, had raised up a
third deliverer, the wisest and mightiest of all. At Vienna, at
Madrid, nay, at Rome, the valiant and sagacious heretic was held
in honour as the chief of the great confederacy against the House
of Bourbon; and even at Versailles the hatred which he inspired
was largely mingled with admiration.
Here he was less favourably judged. In truth, our ancestors saw
him in the worst of all lights. By the French, the Germans, and
the Italians, he was contemplated at such a distance that only
what was great could be discerned, and that small blemishes were
invisible. To the Dutch he was brought close: but he was himself
a Dutchman. In his intercourse with them he was seen to the best
advantage, he was perfectly at his ease with them; and from among them he had
chosen his earliest and dearest friends. But to the English he appeared in a
most unfortunate point of view. He was at once too near to them and too far from
them. He lived among them, so
that the smallest peculiarity of temper or manner could not
escape their notice. Yet he lived apart from them, and was to the
last a foreigner in speech, tastes, and habits.
One of the chief functions of our Sovereigns had long been to
preside over the society of the capital. That function Charles
the Second had performed with immense success. His easy bow, his
good stories, his style of dancing and playing tennis, the sound
of his cordial laugh, were familiar to all London. One day he was
seen among the elms of Saint James's Park chatting with Dryden
about poetry.51 Another day his arm was on Tom Durfey's shoulder;
and his Majesty was taking a second, while his companion sang
"Phillida, Phillida," or "To horse, brave boys, to Newmarket, to
horse."52 James, with much less vivacity and good nature, was
accessible, and, to people who did not cross him, civil. But of
this sociableness William was entirely destitute. He seldom came
forth from his closet; and, when he appeared in the public rooms,
he stood among the crowd of courtiers and ladies, stern and
abstracted, making no jest and smiling at none. His freezing
look, his silence, the dry and concise answers which he uttered
when he could keep silence no longer, disgusted noblemen and
gentlemen who had been accustomed to be slapped on the back by
their royal masters, called Jack or Harry, congratulated about
race cups or rallied about actresses. The women missed the homage
due to their sex. They observed that the King spoke in a somewhat
imperious tone even to the wife to whom he owed so much, and whom
he sincerely loved and esteemed.53 They were amused and shocked
to see him, when the Princess Anne dined with him, and when the
first green peas of the year were put on the table, devour the
whole dish without offering a spoonful to her Royal Highness; and
they pronounced that this great soldier and politician was no
better than a Low Dutch bear.54
One misfortune, which was imputed to him as a crime, was his bad
English. He spoke our language, but not well. His accent was
foreign: his diction was inelegant; and his vocabulary seems to
have been no larger than was necessary for the transaction of
business. To the difficulty which he felt in expressing himself,
and to his consciousness that his pronunciation was bad, must be
partly ascribed the taciturnity and the short answers which gave
so much offence. Our literature he was incapable of enjoying or
of understanding. He never once, during his whole reign, showed
himself at the theatre.55 The poets who wrote Pindaric verses in
his praise complained that their flights of sublimity were beyond
his comprehension.56 Those who are acquainted with the
panegyrical odes of that age will perhaps be of opinion that he
did not lose much by his ignorance.
It is true that his wife did her best to supply what was wanting,
and that she was excellently qualified to be the head of the
Court. She was English by birth, and English also in her tastes
and feelings. Her face was handsome, her port majestic, her
temper sweet and lively, her manners affable and graceful. Her
understanding, though very imperfectly cultivated, was quick.
There was no want of feminine wit and shrewdness in her
conversation; and her letters were so well expressed that they
deserved to be well spelt. She took much pleasure in the lighter
kinds of literature, and did something towards bringing books
into fashion among ladies of quality. The stainless purity of her
private life and the strict attention which she paid to her
religious duties were the more respectable, because she was
singularly free from censoriousness, and discouraged scandal as
much as vice. In dislike of backbiting indeed she and her husband
cordially agreed; but they showed their dislike in different and
in very characteristic ways. William preserved profound silence,
and gave the talebearer a look which, as was said by a person who
had once encountered it, and who took good care never to
encounter it again, made your story go back down your throat.57
Mary had a way of interrupting tattle about elopements, duels,
and playdebts by asking the tattlers, very quietly yet
significantly, whether they had ever read her favourite sermon,
Doctor Tillotson's on Evil Speaking. Her charities were
munificent and judicious; and, though she made no ostentatious
display of them, it was known that she retrenched from her own
state in order to relieve Protestants whom persecution had driven
from France and Ireland, and who were starving in the garrets of
London. So amiable was her conduct, that she was generally spoken
of with esteem and tenderness by the most respectable of those
who disapproved of the manner in which she had been raised to the
throne, and even of those who refused to acknowledge her as
Queen. In the Jacobite lampoons of that time, lampoons which, in
virulence and malignity, far exceed any thing that our age has
produced, she was not often mentioned with severity. Indeed she
sometimes expressed her surprise at finding that libellers who
respected nothing else respected her name. God, she said, knew
where her weakness lay. She was too sensitive to abuse and
calumny; He had mercifully spared her a trial which was beyond
her strength; and the best return which she could make to Him was
to discountenance all malicious reflections on the characters of
others. Assured that she possessed her husband's entire
confidence and affection, she turned the edge of his sharp
speeches sometimes by soft and sometimes by playful answers, and
employed all the influence which she derived from her many
pleasing qualities to gain the hearts of the people for him.58
If she had long continued to assemble round her the best society
of London, it is probable that her kindness and courtesy would
have done much to efface the unfavourable impression made by his
stern and frigid demeanour. Unhappily his physical infirmities
made it impossible for him to reside at Whitehall. The air of
Westminster, mingled with tile fog of the river which in spring
tides overflowed the courts of his palace, with the smoke of
seacoal from two hundred thousand chimneys, and with the fumes of
all the filth which was then suffered to accumulate in the
streets, was insupportable to him; for his lungs were weak, and
his sense of smell exquisitely keen. His constitutional asthma
made rapid progress. His physicians pronounced it impossible that
he could live to the end of the year. His face was so ghastly
that he could hardly be recognised. Those who had to transact
business with him were shocked to hear him gasping for breath,
and coughing till the tears ran down his cheeks.59 His mind,
strong as it was, sympathized with his body. His judgment was
indeed as clear as ever. But there was, during some months, a
perceptible relaxation of that energy by which he had been
distinguished. Even his Dutch friends whispered that he was not
the man that he had been at the Hague.60 It was absolutely
necessary that he should quit London. He accordingly took up his
residence in the purer air of Hampton Court. That mansion, begun
by the magnificent Wolsey, was a fine specimen of the
architecture which flourished in England under the first Tudors;
but the apartments were not, according to the notions of the
seventeenth century, well fitted for purposes of state. Our
princes therefore had, since the Restoration, repaired thither
seldom, and only when they wished to live for a time in
retirement. As William purposed to make the deserted edifice his
chief palace, it was necessary for him to build and to plant; nor
was the necessity disagreeable to him. For he had, like most of
his countrymen, a pleasure in decorating a country house; and
next to hunting, though at a great interval, his favourite
amusements were architecture and gardening. He had already
created on a sandy heath in Guelders a paradise, which attracted
multitudes of the curious from Holland and Westphalia. Mary had
laid the first stone of the house. Bentinck had superintended the
digging of the fishponds. There were cascades and grottoes, a
spacious orangery, and an aviary which furnished Hondekoeter with
numerous specimens of manycoloured plumage.61 The King, in his
splendid banishment, pined for this favourite seat, and found
some consolation in creating another Loo on the banks of the
Thames. Soon a wide extent of ground was laid out in formal walks
and parterres. Much idle ingenuity was employed in forming that
intricate labyrinth of verdure which has puzzled and amused five
generations of holiday visitors from London. Limes thirty years
old were transplanted from neighbouring woods to shade the
alleys. Artificial fountains spouted among the flower beds. A new
court, not designed with the purest taste, but stately, spacious,
and commodious, rose under the direction of Wren. The wainscots
were adorned with the rich and delicate carvings of Gibbons. The
staircases were in a blaze with the glaring frescoes of Verrio.
In every corner of the mansion appeared a profusion of gewgaws,
not yet familiar to English eyes. Mary had acquired at the Hague
a taste for the porcelain of China, and amused herself by forming
at Hampton a vast collection of hideous images, and of vases on
which houses, trees, bridges, and mandarins were depicted in
outrageous defiance of all the laws of perspective. The fashion,
a frivolous and inelegant fashion it must be owned, which was
thus set by the amiable Queen, spread fast and wide. In a few
years almost every great house in the kingdom contained a museum
of these grotesque baubles. Even statesmen and generals were not
ashamed to be renowned as judges of teapots and dragons; and
satirists long continued to repeat that a fine lady valued her
mottled green pottery quite as much as she valued her monkey, and
much more than she valued her husband.62 But the new palace was
embellished with works of art of a very different kind. A gallery
was erected for the cartoons of Raphael. Those great pictures,
then and still the finest on our side of the Alps, had been
preserved by Cromwell from the fate which befell most of the
other masterpieces in the collection of Charles the First, but
had been suffered to lie during many years nailed up in deal
boxes. They were now brought forth from obscurity to be
contemplated by artists with admiration and despair. The expense
of the works at Hampton was a subject of bitter complaint to many
Tories, who had very gently blamed the boundless profusion with
which Charles the Second had built and rebuilt, furnished and
refurnished, the dwelling of the Duchess of Portsmouth.63 The
expense, however, was not the chief cause of the discontent which
William's change of residence excited. There was no longer a
Court at Westminster. Whitehall, once the daily resort of the
noble and the powerful, the beautiful and the gay, the place to
which fops came to show their new peruques, men of gallantry to
exchange glances with fine ladies, politicians to push their
fortunes, loungers to hear the news, country gentlemen to see the
royal family, was now, in the busiest season of the year, when
London was full, when Parliament was sitting, left desolate. A
solitary sentinel paced the grassgrown pavement before that door
which had once been too narrow for the opposite streams of
entering and departing courtiers. The services which the
metropolis had rendered to the King were great and recent; and it
was thought that he might have requited those services better
than by treating it as Lewis had treated Paris. Halifax ventured
to hint this, but was silenced by a few words which admitted of
no reply. "Do you wish," said William peevishly, "to see me
dead?"64
In a short time it was found that Hampton Court was too far from
the Houses of Lords and Commons, and from the public offices, to
be the ordinary abode of the Sovereign. Instead, however, of
returning to Whitehall, William determined to have another
dwelling, near enough to his capital for the transaction of
business, but not near enough to be within that atmosphere in
which he could not pass a night without risk of suffocation. At
one time he thought of Holland House, the villa of the noble
family of Rich; and he actually resided there some weeks.65 But
he at length fixed his choice on Kensington House, the suburban
residence of the Earl of Nottingham. The purchase was made for
eighteen thousand guineas, and was followed by more building,
more planting, more expense, and more discontent.66 At present
Kensington House is considered as a part of London. It was then a
rural mansion, and could not, in those days of highwaymen and
scourers, of roads deep in mire and nights without lamps, be the
rallying point of fashionable society.
It was well known that the King, who treated the English nobility
and gentry so ungraciously, could, in a small circle of his own
countrymen, be easy, friendly, even jovial, could pour out his
feelings garrulously, could fill his glass, perhaps too often;
and this was, in the view of our forefathers, an aggravation of
his offences. Yet our forefathers should have had the sense and
the justice to acknowledge that the patriotism which they
considered as a virtue in themselves, could not be a fault in
him. It was unjust to blame him for not at once transferring to
our island the love which he bore to the country of his birth.
If, in essentials, he did his duty towards England, he might well
be suffered to feel at heart an affectionate preference for
Holland. Nor is it a reproach to him that he did not, in this
season of his greatness, discard companions who had played with
him in his childhood, who had stood by him firmly through all the
vicissitudes of his youth and manhood, who had, in defiance of
the most loathsome and deadly forms of infection, kept watch by
his sick-bed, who had, in the thickest of the battle, thrust
themselves between him and the French swords, and whose
attachment was, not to the Stadtholder or to the King, but to
plain William of Nassau. It may be added that his old friends
could not but rise in his estimation by comparison with his new
courtiers. To the end of his life all his Dutch comrades, without
exception, continued to deserve his confidence. They could be out
of humour with him, it is true; and, when out of humour, they
could be sullen and rude; but never did they, even when most
angry and unreasonable, fail to keep his secrets and to watch
over his interests with gentlemanlike and soldierlike fidelity.
Among his English councillors such fidelity was rare.67 It is
painful, but it is no more than just, to acknowledge that he had
but too good reason for thinking meanly of our national
character. That character was indeed, in essentials, what it has
always been. Veracity, uprightness, and manly boldness were then,
as now, qualities eminently English. But those qualities, though
widely diffused among the great body of the people, were seldom
to be found in the class with which William was best acquainted.
The standard of honour and virtue among our public men was,
during his reign, at the very lowest point. His predecessors had
bequeathed to him a court foul with all the vices of the
Restoration, a court swarming with sycophants, who were ready, on
the first turn of fortune, to abandon him as they had abandoned
his uncle. Here and there, lost in that ignoble crowd, was to be
found a man of true integrity and public spirit. Yet even such a
man could not long live in such society without much risk that
the strictness of his principles would be relaxed, and the
delicacy of his sense of right and wrong impaired. It was unjust
to blame a prince surrounded by flatterers and traitors for
wishing to keep near him four or five servants whom he knew by
proof to be faithful even to death.
Nor was this the only instance in which our ancestors were unjust
to him. They had expected that, as soon as so distinguished a
soldier and statesman was placed at the head of affairs, he would
give some signal proof, they scarcely knew what, of genius and
vigour. Unhappily, during the first months of his reign, almost
every thing went wrong. His subjects, bitterly disappointed,
threw the blame on him, and began to doubt whether he merited
that reputation which he had won at his first entrance into
public life, and which the splendid success of his last great
enterprise had raised to the highest point. Had they been in a
temper to judge fairly, they would have perceived that for the
maladministration of which they with good reason complained he
was not responsible. He could as yet work only with the machinery
which he had found; and the machinery which he had found was all
rust and rottenness. From the time of the Restoration to the time
of the Revolution, neglect and fraud had been almost constantly
impairing the efficiency of every department of the government.
Honours and public trusts, peerages, baronetcies, regiments,
frigates, embassies, governments, commissionerships, leases of
crown lands, contracts for clothing, for provisions, for
ammunition, pardons for murder, for robbery, for arson, were sold
at Whitehall scarcely less openly than asparagus at Covent Garden
or herrings at Billingsgate. Brokers had been incessantly plying
for custom in the purlieus of the court; and of these brokers the
most successful had been, in the days of Charles, the harlots,
and in the days of James, the priests. From the palace which was
the chief seat of this pestilence the taint had diffused itself
through every office and through every rank in every office, and
had every where produced feebleness and disorganization. So rapid
was the progress of the decay that, within eight years after the
time when Oliver had been the umpire of Europe, the roar of the
guns of De Ruyter was heard in the Tower of London. The vices
which had brought that great humiliation on the country had ever
since been rooting themselves deeper and spreading themselves
wider. James had, to do him justice, corrected a few of the gross
abuses which disgraced the naval administration. Yet the naval
administration, in spite of his attempts to reform it, moved the
contempt of men who were acquainted with the dockyards of France
and Holland. The military administration was still worse. The
courtiers took bribes from the colonels; the colonels cheated the
soldiers: the commissaries sent in long bills for what had never
been furnished: the keepers of the arsenals sold the public
stores and pocketed the price. But these evils, though they had
sprung into existence and grown to maturity under the government
of Charles and James, first made themselves severely felt under
the government of William. For Charles and James were content to
be the vassals and pensioners of a powerful and ambitious
neighbour: they submitted to his ascendency: they shunned with
pusillanimous caution whatever could give him offence; and thus,
at the cost of the independence and dignity of that ancient and
glorious crown which they unworthily wore, they avoided a
conflict which would instantly have shown how helpless, under
their misrule, their once formidable kingdom had become. Their
ignominious policy it was neither in William's power nor in his
nature to follow. It was only by arms that the liberty and
religion of England could be protected against the most
formidable enemy that had threatened our island since the
Hebrides were strown with the wrecks of the Armada. The body
politic, which, while it remained in repose, had presented a
superficial appearance of health and vigour, was now under the
necessity of straining every nerve in a wrestle for life or
death, and was immediately found to be unequal to the exertion.
The first efforts showed an utter relaxation of fibre, an utter
want of training. Those efforts were, with scarcely an exception,
failures; and every failure was popularly imputed, not to the
rulers whose mismanagement had produced the infirmities of the
state, but to the ruler in whose time the infirmities of the
state became visible.
William might indeed, if he had been as absolute as Lewis, have
used such sharp remedies as would speedily have restored to the
English administration that firm tone which had been wanting
since the death of Oliver. But the instantaneous reform of
inveterate abuses was a task far beyond the powers of a prince
strictly restrained by law, and restrained still more strictly by
the difficulties of his situation.68
Some of the most serious difficulties of his situation were
caused by the conduct of the ministers on whom, new as he was to
the details of English affairs, he was forced to rely for
information about men and things. There was indeed no want of
ability among his chief counsellors: but one half of their
ability was employed in counteracting the other half. Between the
Lord President and the Lord Privy Seal there was an inveterate
enmity.69 It had begun twelve years before when Danby was Lord
High Treasurer, a persecutor of nonconformists, an uncompromising
defender of prerogative, and when Halifax was rising to
distinction as one of the most eloquent leaders of the country
party. In the reign of James, the two statesmen had found
themselves in opposition together; and their common hostility to
France and to Rome, to the High Commission and to the dispensing
power, had produced an apparent reconciliation; but as soon as
they were in office together the old antipathy revived. The
hatred which the Whig party felt towards them both ought, it
should seem, to have produced a close alliance between them: but
in fact each of them saw with complacency the danger which
threatened the other. Danby exerted himself to rally round him a
strong phalanx of Tories. Under the plea of ill health, he
withdrew from court, seldom came to the Council over which it was
his duty to preside, passed much time in the country, and took
scarcely any part in public affairs except by grumbling and
sneering at all the acts of the government, and by doing jobs and
getting places for his personal retainers.70 In consequence of
this defection, Halifax became prime minister, as far any
minister could, in that reign, be called prime minister. An
immense load of business fell on him; and that load he was unable
to sustain. In wit and eloquence, in amplitude of comprehension
and subtlety of disquisition, he had no equal among the statesmen
of his time. But that very fertility, that very acuteness, which
gave a singular charm to his conversation, to his oratory and to
his writings, unfitted him for the work of promptly deciding
practical questions. He was slow from very quickness. For he saw
so many arguments for and against every possible course that he
was longer in making up his mind than a dull man would have been.
Instead of acquiescing in his first thoughts, he replied on
himself, rejoined on himself, and surrejoined on himself. Those
who heard him talk owned that he talked like an angel: but too
often, when he had exhausted all that could be said, and came to
act, the time for action was over.
Meanwhile the two Secretaries of State were constantly labouring
to draw their master in diametrically opposite directions. Every
scheme, every person, recommended by one of them was reprobated
by the other. Nottingham was never weary of repeating that the
old Roundhead party, the party which had taken the life of
Charles the First and had plotted against the life of Charles the
Second, was in principle republican, and that the Tories were the
only true friends of monarchy. Shrewsbury replied that the Tories
might be friends of monarchy, but that they regarded James as
their monarch. Nottingham was always bringing to the closet
intelligence of the wild daydreams in which a few old eaters of
calf's head, the remains of the once formidable party of Bradshaw
and Ireton, still indulged at taverns in the city. Shrewsbury
produced ferocious lampoons which the Jacobites dropped every day
in the coffeehouses. "Every Whig," said the Tory Secretary, "is
an enemy of your Majesty's prerogative." "Every Tory," said the
Whig Secretary, "is an enemy of your Majesty's title."71
At the treasury there was a complication of jealousies and
quarrels.72 Both the First Commissioner, Mordaunt, and the
Chancellor of the Exchequer, Delamere, were zealous Whigs but,
though they held the same political creed, their tempers differed
widely. Mordaunt was volatile, dissipated, and generous. The wits
of that time laughed at the way in which he flew about from
Hampton Court to the Royal Exchange, and from the Royal Exchange
back to Hampton Court. How he found time for dress, politics,
lovemaking and balladmaking was a wonder.73 Delamere was gloomy
and acrimonious, austere in his private morals, and punctual in
his devotions, but greedy of ignoble gain. The two principal
ministers of finance, therefore, became enemies, and agreed only
in hating their colleague Godolphin. What business had he at
Whitehall in these days of Protestant ascendency, he who had sate
at the same board with Papists, he who had never scrupled to
attend Mary of Modena to the idolatrous worship of the Mass? The
most provoking circumstance was that Godolphin, though his name
stood only third in the commission, was really first Lord. For in
financial knowledge and in habits of business Mordaunt and
Delamere were mere children when compared with him; and this
William soon discovered.74
Similar feuds raged at the other great boards and through all the
subordinate ranks of public functionaries. In every customhouse,
in every arsenal, were a Shrewsbury and a Nottingham, a Delamere
and a Godolphin. The Whigs complained that there was no
department in which creatures of the fallen tyranny were not to
be found. It was idle to allege that these men were versed in the
details of business, that they were the depositaries of official
traditions, and that the friends of liberty, having been, during
many years, excluded from public employment, must necessarily be
incompetent to take on themselves at once the whole management of
affairs. Experience doubtless had its value: but surely the first
of all the qualifications of a servant was fidelity; and no Tory
could be a really faithful servant of the new government. If King
William were wise, he would rather trust novices zealous for his
interest and honour than veterans who might indeed possess
ability and knowledge, but who would use that ability and that
knowledge to effect his ruin.
The Tories, on the other hand, complained that their share of
power bore no proportion to their number and their weight in the
country, and that every where old and useful public servants
were, for the crime of being friends to monarchy and to the
Church, turned out of their posts to make way for Rye House
plotters and haunters of conventicles. These upstarts, adepts in
the art of factious agitation, but ignorant of all that belonged
to their new calling, would be just beginning to learn their
business when they had undone the nation by their blunders. To be
a rebel and a schismatic was surely not all that ought to be
required of a man in high employment. What would become of the
finances, what of the marine, if Whigs who could not understand
the plainest balance sheet were to manage the revenue, and Whigs
who had never walked over a dockyard to fit out the fleet.75
The truth is that the charges which the two parties brought
against each other were, to a great extent, well founded, but
that the blame which both threw on William was unjust. Official
experience was to be found almost exclusively among the Tories,
hearty attachment to the new settlement almost exclusively among
the Whigs. It was not the fault of the King that the knowledge
and the zeal, which, combined, make a valuable servant of the
state must at that time be had separately or not at all. If he
employed men of one party, there was great risk of mistakes. If
he employed men of the other party, there was great risk of
treachery. If he employed men of both parties, there was still
some risk of mistakes; there was still some risk of treachery;
and to these risks was added the certainty of dissension. He
might join Whigs and Tories; but it was beyond his power to mix
them. In the same office, at the same desk, they were still
enemies, and agreed only in murmuring at the Prince who tried to
mediate between them. It was inevitable that, in such
circumstances, the administration, fiscal, military, naval,
should be feeble and unsteady; that nothing should be done in
quite the right way or at quite the right time; that the
distractions from which scarcely any public office was exempt
should produce disasters, and that every disaster should increase
the distractions from which it had sprung.
There was indeed one department of which the business was well
conducted; and that was the department of Foreign Affairs. There
William directed every thing, and, on important occasions,
neither asked the advice nor employed the agency of any English
politician. One invaluable assistant he had, Anthony Heinsius,
who, a few weeks after the Revolution had been accomplished,
became Pensionary of Holland. Heinsius had entered public life as
a member of that party which was jealous of the power of the
House of Orange, and desirous to be on friendly terms with
France. But he had been sent in 1681 on a diplomatic mission to
Versailles; and a short residence there had produced a complete
change in his views. On a near acquaintance, he was alarmed by
the power and provoked by the insolence of that Court of which,
while he contemplated it only at a distance, he had formed a
favourable opinion. He found that his country was despised. He
saw his religion persecuted. His official character did not save
him from some personal affronts which, to the latest day of his
long career, he never forgot. He went home a devoted adherent of
William and a mortal enemy of Lewis.76
The office of Pensionary, always important, was peculiarly
important when the Stadtholder was absent from the Hague. Had the
politics of Heinsius been still what they once were, all the
great designs of William might have been frustrated. But happily
there was between these two eminent men a perfect friendship
which, till death dissolved it, appears never to have been
interrupted for one moment by suspicion or ill humour. On all
large questions of European policy they cordially agreed. They
corresponded assiduously and most unreservedly. For though
William was slow to give his confidence, yet, when he gave it,
he gave it entire. The correspondence is still extant, and is
most honourable to both. The King's letters would alone suffice
to prove that he was one of the greatest statesmen whom Europe
has produced. While he lived, the Pensionary was content to be
the most obedient, the most trusty, and the most discreet of
servants. But, after the death of the master, the servant proved
himself capable of supplying with eminent ability the master's
place, and was renowned throughout Europe as one of the great
Triumvirate which humbled the pride of Lewis the Fourteenth.77
The foreign policy of England, directed immediately by William in
close concert with Heinsius, was, at this time, eminently skilful
and successful. But in every other part of the administration the
evils arising from the mutual animosity of factions were but too
plainly discernible. Nor was this all. To the evils arising from
the mutual animosity of factions were added other evils arising
from the mutual animosity of sects.
The year 1689 is a not less important epoch in the ecclesiastical
than in the civil history of England. In that year was granted
the first legal indulgence to Dissenters. In that year was made
the last serious attempt to bring the Presbyterians within the
pale of the Church of England. From that year dates a new schism,
made, in defiance of ancient precedents, by men who had always
professed to regard schism with peculiar abhorrence, and ancient
precedents with peculiar veneration. In that year began the long
struggle between two great parties of conformists. Those parties
indeed had, under various forms, existed within the Anglican
communion ever since the Reformation; but till after the
Revolution they did not appear marshalled in regular and
permanent order of battle against each other, and were therefore
not known by established names. Some time after the accession of
William they began to be called the High Church party and the Low
Church party; and, long before the end of his reign, these
appellations were in common use.78
In the summer of 1688 the breaches which had long divided the
great body of English Protestants had seemed to be almost closed.
Disputes about Bishops and Synods, written prayers and
extemporaneous prayers, white gowns and black gowns, sprinkling
and dipping, kneeling and sitting, had been for a short space
intermitted. The serried array which was then drawn up against
Popery measured the whole of the vast interval which separated
Sancroft from Bunyan. Prelates recently conspicuous as
persecutors now declared themselves friends of religious liberty,
and exhorted their clergy to live in a constant interchange of
hospitality and of kind offices with the separatists.
Separatists, on the other hand, who had recently considered
mitres and lawn sleeves as the livery of Antichrist, were putting
candles in windows and throwing faggots on bonfires in honour of
the prelates.
These feelings continued to grow till they attained their
greatest height on the memorable day on which the common
oppressor finally quitted Whitehall, and on which an innumerable
multitude, tricked out in orange ribands, welcomed the common
deliverer to Saint James's. When the clergy of London came,
headed by Compton, to express their gratitude to him by whose
instrumentality God had wrought salvation for the Church and the
State, the procession was swollen by some eminent nonconformist
divines. It was delightful to many good men to learn that pious
and learned Presbyterian ministers had walked in the train of a
Bishop, had been greeted by him with fraternal kindness, and had
been announced by him in the presence chamber as his dear and
respected friends, separated from him indeed by some differences
of opinion on minor points, but united to him by Christian
charity and by common zeal for the essentials of the reformed
faith. There had never before been such a day in England; and
there has never since been such a day. The tide of feeling was
already on the turn; and the ebb was even more rapid than the
flow had been. In a very few hours the High Churchman began to
feel tenderness for the enemy whose tyranny was now no longer
feared, and dislike of the allies whose services were now no
longer needed. It was easy to gratify both feelings by imputing
to the dissenters the misgovernment of the exiled King. His
Majesty-such was now the language of too many Anglican divines-
would have been an excellent sovereign had he not been too
confiding, too forgiving. He had put his trust in a class of men
who hated his office, his family, his person, with implacable
hatred. He had ruined himself in the vain attempt to conciliate
them. He had relieved them, in defiance of law and of the
unanimous sense of the old royalist party, from the pressure of
the penal code; had allowed them to worship God publicly after
their own mean and tasteless fashion; had admitted them to the
bench of justice and to the Privy Council; had gratified them
with fur robes, gold chains, salaries, and pensions. In return
for his liberality, these people, once so uncouth in demeanour,
once so savage in opposition even to legitimate authority, had
become the most abject of flatterers. They had continued to
applaud and encourage him when the most devoted friends of his
family had retired in shame and sorrow from his palace. Who had
more foully sold the religion and liberty of his country than
Titus? Who had been more zealous for the dispensing power than
Alsop? Who had urged on the persecution of the seven Bishops more
fiercely than Lobb? What chaplain impatient for a deanery had
ever, even when preaching in the royal presence on the thirtieth
of January or the twenty-ninth of May, uttered adulation more
gross than might easily be found in those addresses by which
dissenting congregations had testified their gratitude for the
illegal Declaration of Indulgence? Was it strange that a prince
who had never studied law books should have believed that he was
only exercising his rightful prerogative, when he was thus
encouraged by a faction which had always ostentatiously professed
hatred of arbitrary power? Misled by such guidance, he had gone
further and further in the wrong path: he had at length estranged
from him hearts which would once have poured forth their best
blood in his defence: he had left himself no supporters except
his old foes; and, when the day of peril came, he had found that
the feeling of his old foes towards him was still what it had
been when they had attempted to rob him of his inheritance, and
when they had plotted against his life. Every man of sense had
long known that the sectaries bore no love to monarchy. It had
now been found that they bore as little love to freedom. To trust
them with power would be an error not less fatal to the nation
than to the throne. If, in order to redeem pledges somewhat
rashly given, it should be thought necessary to grant them
relief, every concession ought to be accompanied by limitations
and precautions. Above all, no man who was an enemy to the
ecclesiastical constitution of the realm ought to be permitted to
bear any part in the civil government.
Between the nonconformists and the rigid conformists stood the
Low Church party. That party contained, as it still contains, two
very different elements, a Puritan element and a Latitudinarian
element. On almost every question, however, relating either to
ecclesiastical polity or to the ceremonial of public worship, the
Puritan Low Churchman and the Latitudinarian Low Churchman were
perfectly agreed. They saw in the existing polity and in the
existing ceremonial no defect, no blemish, which could make it
their duty to become dissenters. Nevertheless they held that both
the polity and the ceremonial were means and not ends, and that
the essential spirit of Christianity might exist without
episcopal orders and without a Book of Common Prayer. They had,
while James was on the throne, been mainly instrumental in
forming the great Protestant coalition against Popery and
tyranny; and they continued in 1689 to hold the same conciliatory
language which they had held in 1688. They gently blamed the
scruples of the nonconformists. It was undoubtedly a great
weakness to imagine that there could be any sin in wearing a
white robe, in tracing a cross, in kneeling at the rails of an
altar. But the highest authority had given the plainest
directions as to the manner in which such weakness was to be
treated. The weak brother was not to be judged: he was not to be
despised: believers who had stronger minds were commanded to
soothe him by large compliances, and carefully to remove out of
his path every stumbling block which could cause him to offend.
An apostle had declared that, though he had himself no misgivings
about the use of animal food or of wine, he would eat herbs and
drink water rather than give scandal to the feeblest of his
flock. What would he have thought of ecclesiastical rulers who,
for the sake of a vestment, a gesture, a posture, had not only
torn the Church asunder, but had filled all the gaols of England
with men of orthodox faith and saintly life? The reflections
thrown by the High Churchmen on the recent conduct of the
dissenting body the Low Churchmen pronounced to be grossly
unjust. The wonder was, not that a few nonconformists should have
accepted with thanks an indulgence which, illegal as it was, had
opened the doors of their prisons and given security to their
hearths, but that the nonconformists generally should have been
true to the cause of a constitution from the benefits of which
they had been long excluded. It was most unfair to impute to a
great party the faults of a few individuals. Even among the
Bishops of the Established Church James had found tools and
sycophants. The conduct of Cartwright and Parker had been much
more inexcusable than that of Alsop and Lobb. Yet those who held
the dissenters answerable for the errors of Alsop and Lobb would
doubtless think it most unreasonable to hold the Church
answerable for the far deeper guilt of Cartwright and Parker.
The Low Church clergymen were a minority, and not a large
minority, of their profession: but their weight was much more
than proportioned to their numbers: for they mustered strong in
the capital: they had great influence there; and the average of
intellect and knowledge was higher among them than among their
order generally. We should probably overrate their numerical
strength, if we were to estimate them at a tenth part of the
priesthood. Yet it will scarcely be denied that there were among
them as many men of distinguished eloquence and learning as could
be found in the other nine tenths. Among the laity who conformed
to the established religion the parties were not unevenly
balanced. Indeed the line which separated them deviated very
little from the line which separated the Whigs and the Tories. In
the House of Commons, which had been elected when the Whigs were
triumphant, the Low Church party greatly preponderated. In the
Lords there was an almost exact equipoise; and very slight
circumstances sufficed to turn the scale.
The head of the Low Church party was the King. He had been bred a
Presbyterian: he was, from rational conviction, a Latitudinarian;
and personal ambition, as well as higher motives, prompted him to
act as mediator among Protestant sects. He was bent on effecting
three great reforms in the laws touching ecclesiastical matters.
His first object was to obtain for dissenters permission to
celebrate their worship in freedom and security. His second
object was to make such changes in the Anglican ritual and polity
as, without offending those to whom that ritual and polity were
dear, might conciliate the moderate nonconformists. His third
object was to throw open civil offices to Protestants without
distinction of sect. All his three objects were good; but the
first only was at that time attainable. He came too late for the
second, and too early for the third.
A few days after his accession, he took a step which indicated,
in a manner not to be mistaken, his sentiments touching
ecclesiastical polity and public worship. He found only one see
unprovided with a Bishop. Seth Ward, who had during many years
had charge of the diocese of Salisbury, and who had been
honourably distinguished as one of the founders of the Royal
Society, having long survived his faculties, died while the
country was agitated by the elections for the Convention, without
knowing that great events, of which not the least important had
passed under his own roof, had saved his Church and his country
from ruin. The choice of a successor was no light matter. That
choice would inevitably be considered by the country as a
prognostic of the highest import. The King too might well be
perplexed by the number of divines whose erudition, eloquence,
courage, and uprightness had been conspicuously displayed during
the contentions of the last three years. The preference was given
to Burnet. His claims were doubtless great. Yet William might
have had a more tranquil reign if he had postponed for a time the
well earned promotion of his chaplain, and had bestowed the first
great spiritual preferment, which, after the Revolution, fell to
the disposal of the Crown, on some eminent theologian, attached
to the new settlement, yet not generally hated by the clergy.
Unhappily the name of Burnet was odious to the great majority of
the Anglican priesthood. Though, as respected doctrine, he by no
means belonged to the extreme section of the Latitudinarian
party, he was popularly regarded as the personification of the
Latitudinarian spirit. This distinction he owed to the prominent
place which he held in literature and politics, to the readiness
of his tongue and of his pert, and above all to the frankness and
boldness of his nature, frankness which could keep no secret, and
boldness which flinched from no danger. He had formed but a low
estimate of the character of his clerical brethren considered as
a body; and, with his usual indiscretion, he frequently suffered
his opinion to escape him. They hated him in return with a hatred
which has descended to their successors, and which, after the
lapse of a century and a half, does not appear to languish.
As soon as the King's decision was known, the question was every
where asked, What will the Archbishop do? Sancroft had absented
himself from the Convention: he had refused to sit in the Privy
Council: he had ceased to confirm, to ordain, and to institute;
and he was seldom seen out of the walls of his palace at Lambeth.
He, on all occasions, professed to think himself still bound by
his old oath of allegiance. Burnet he regarded as a scandal to
the priesthood, a Presbyterian in a surplice. The prelate who
should lay hands on that unworthy head would commit more than one
great sin. He would, in a sacred place, and before a great
congregation of the faithful, at once acknowledge an usurper as a
King, and confer on a schismatic the character of a Bishop.
During some time Sancroft positively declared that he would not
obey the precept of William. Lloyd of Saint Asaph, who was the
common friend of the Archbishop and of the Bishop elect,
intreated and expostulated in vain. Nottingham, who, of all the
laymen connected with the new government, stood best with the
clergy, tried his influence, but to no better purpose. The
Jacobites said every where that they were sure of the good old
Primate; that he had the spirit of a martyr; that he was
determined to brave, in the cause of the Monarchy and of the
Church, the utmost rigour of those laws with which the obsequious
parliaments of the sixteenth century had fenced the Royal
Supremacy. He did in truth hold out long. But at the last moment
his heart failed him, and he looked round him for some mode of
escape. Fortunately, as childish scruples often disturbed his
conscience, childish expedients often quieted it. A more childish
expedient than that to which he now resorted is not to be found
in all the tones of the casuists. He would not himself bear a
part in the service. He would not publicly pray for the Prince
and Princess as King and Queen. He would not call for their
mandate, order it to be read, and then proceed to obey it. But he
issued a commission empowering any three of his suffragans to
commit, in his name, and as his delegates, the sins which he did
not choose to commit in person. The reproaches of all parties
soon made him ashamed of himself. He then tried to suppress the
evidence of his fault by means more discreditable than the fault
itself. He abstracted from among the public records of which he
was the guardian the instrument by which he had authorised his
brethren to act for him, and was with difficulty induced to give
it up.79
Burnet however had, under the authority of this instrument, been
consecrated. When he next waited on Mary, she reminded him of the
conversations which they had held at the Hague about the high
duties and grave responsibility of Bishops. "I hope," she said,
"that you will put your notions in practice." Her hope was not
disappointed. Whatever may be thought of Burnet's opinions
touching civil and ecclesiastical polity, or of the temper and
judgment which he showed in defending those opinions, the utmost
malevolence of faction could not venture to deny that he tended
his flock with a zeal, diligence, and disinterestedness worthy of
the purest ages of the Church. His jurisdiction extended over
Wiltshire and Berkshire. These counties he divided into districts
which he sedulously visited. About two months of every summer he
passed in preaching, catechizing, and confirming daily from
church to church. When he died there was no corner of his diocese
in which the people had not had seven or eight opportunities of
receiving his instructions and of asking his advice. The worst
weather, the worst roads, did not prevent him from discharging
these duties. On one occasion, when the floods were out, he
exposed his life to imminent risk rather than disappoint a rural
congregation which was in expectation of a discourse from the
Bishop. The poverty of the inferior clergy was a constant cause
of uneasiness to his kind and generous heart. He was
indefatigable and at length successful in his attempts to obtain
for them from the Crown that grant which is known by the name of
Queen Anne's Bounty.80 He was especially careful, when he travelled through
his diocese, to lay no burden on them. Instead of requiring them
to entertain him, he entertained them. He always fixed his
headquarters at a market town, kept a table there, and, by his
decent hospitality and munificent charities, tried to conciliate
those who were prejudiced against his doctrines. When he bestowed
a poor benefice, and he had many such to bestow, his practice was
to add out of his own purse twenty pounds a year to the income.
Ten promising young men, to each of whom he allowed thirty pounds
a year, studied divinity under his own eye in the close of
Salisbury. He had several children but he did not think himself
justified in hoarding for them. Their mother had brought him a
good fortune. With that fortune, he always said, they must be
content: He would not, for their sakes, be guilty of the crime of
raising an estate out of revenues sacred to piety and charity.
Such merits as these will, in the judgment of wise and candid
men, appear fully to atone for every offence which can be justly
imputed to him.81
When he took his seat in the House of Lords, he found that
assembly busied in ecclesiastical legislation. A statesman who
was well known to be devoted to the Church had undertaken to
plead the cause of the Dissenters. No subject in the realm
occupied so important and commanding a position with reference to
religious parties as Nottingham. To the influence derived from
rank, from wealth, and from office, he added the higher influence
which belongs to knowledge, to eloquence, and to integrity. The
orthodoxy of his creed, the regularity of his devotions, and the
purity of his morals gave a peculiar weight to his opinions on
questions in which the interests of Christianity were concerned.
Of all the ministers of the new Sovereigns, he had the largest
share of the confidence of the clergy. Shrewsbury was certainly a
Whig, and probably a freethinker: he had lost one religion; and
it did not very clearly appear that he had found another. Halifax
had been during many years accused of scepticism, deism, atheism.
Danby's attachment to episcopacy and the liturgy was rather
political than religious. But Nottingham was such a son as the
Church was proud to own. Propositions, therefore, which, if made
by his colleagues, would infallibly produce a violent panic among
the clergy, might, if made by him, find a favourable reception
even in universities and chapter houses. The friends of religious
liberty were with good reason desirous to obtain his cooperation;
and, up to a certain point, he was not unwilling to cooperate
with them. He was decidedly for a toleration. He was even for
what was then called a comprehension: that is to say, he was
desirous to make some alterations in the Anglican discipline and
ritual for the purpose of removing the scruples of the moderate
Presbyterians. But he was not prepared to give up the Test Act.
The only fault which he found with that Act was that it was not
sufficiently stringent, and that it left loopholes through which
schismatics sometimes crept into civil employments. In truth it
was because he was not disposed to part with the Test that he was
willing to consent to some changes in the Liturgy. He conceived
that, if the entrance of the Church were but a very little
widened, great numbers who had hitherto lingered near the
threshold would press in. Those who still remained without would
then not be sufficiently numerous or powerful to extort any
further concession, and would be glad to compound for a bare
toleration.82
The opinion of the Low Churchmen concerning the Test Act differed
widely from his. But many of them thought that it was of the
highest importance to have his support on the great questions of
Toleration and Comprehension. From the scattered fragments of
information which have come down to us, it appears that a
compromise was made. It is quite certain that Nottingham
undertook to bring in a Toleration Bill and a Comprehension Bill,
and to use his best endeavours to carry both bills through the
House of Lords. It is highly probable that, in return for this
great service, some of the leading Whigs consented to let the
Test Act remain for the present unaltered.
There was no difficulty in framing either the Toleration Bill or
the Comprehension Bill. The situation of the dissenters had been
much discussed nine or ten years before, when the kingdom was
distracted by the fear of a Popish plot, and when there was among
Protestants a general disposition to unite against the common
enemy. The government had then been willing to make large
concessions to the Whig party, on condition that the crown should
be suffered to descend according to the regular course. A draught
of a law authorising the public worship of the nonconformists,
and a draught of a law making some alterations in the public
worship of the Established Church, had been prepared, and would
probably have been passed by both Houses without difficulty, had
not Shaftesbury and his coadjutors refused to listen to any
terms, and, by grasping at what was beyond their reach, missed
advantages which might easily have been secured. In the framing
of these draughts, Nottingham, then an active member of the House
of Commons, had borne a considerable part. He now brought them
forth from the obscurity in which they had remained since the
dissolution of the Oxford Parliament, and laid them, with some
slight alterations, on the table of the Lords.83
The Toleration Bill passed both Houses with little debate. This
celebrated statute, long considered as the Great Charter of
religious liberty, has since been extensively modified, and is
hardly known to the present generation except by name. The name,
however, is still pronounced with respect by many who will
perhaps learn with surprise and disappointment the real nature of
the law which they have been accustomed to hold in honour.
Several statutes which had been passed between the accession of
Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution required all people under
severe penalties to attend the services of the Church of England,
and to abstain from attending conventicles. The Toleration Act
did not repeal any of these statutes, but merely provided that
they should not be construed to extend to any person who should
testify his loyalty by taking the Oaths of Allegiance and
Supremacy, and his Protestantism by subscribing the Declaration
against Transubstantiation.
The relief thus granted was common between the dissenting laity
and the dissenting clergy. But the dissenting clergy had some
peculiar grievances. The Act of Uniformity had laid a mulct of a
hundred pounds on every person who, not having received episcopal
ordination, should presume to administer the Eucharist. The Five
Mile Act had driven many pious and learned ministers from their
houses and their friends, to live among rustics in obscure
villages of which the name was not to be seen on the map. The
Conventicle Act had imposed heavy fines on divines who should
preach in any meeting of separatists; and, in direct opposition
to the humane spirit of our common law, the Courts were enjoined
to construe this Act largely and beneficially for the suppressing
of dissent and for the encouraging of informers. These severe
statutes were not repealed, but were, with many conditions and
precautions, relaxed. It was provided that every dissenting
minister should, before he exercised his function, profess under
his hand his belief in the articles of the Church of England,
with a few exceptions. The propositions to which he was not
required to assent were these; that the Church has power to
regulate ceremonies; that the doctrines set forth in the Book of
Homilies are sound; and that there is nothing superstitious and
idolatrous in the ordination service. If he declared himself a
Baptist, he was also excused from affirming that the baptism of
infants is a laudable practice. But, unless his conscience
suffered him to subscribe thirty-four of the thirty-nine
articles, and the greater part of two other articles, he could
not preach without incurring all the punishments which the
Cavaliers, in the day of their power and their vengeance, had
devised for the tormenting and ruining of schismatical teachers.
The situation of the Quaker differed from that of other
dissenters, and differed for the worse. The Presbyterian, the
Independent, and the Baptist had no scruple about the Oath of
Supremacy. But the Quaker refused to take it, not because he
objected to the proposition that foreign sovereigns and prelates
have no jurisdiction in England, but because his conscience would
not suffer him to swear to any proposition whatever. He was
therefore exposed to the severity of part of that penal code
which, long before Quakerism existed, had been enacted against
Roman Catholics by the Parliaments of Elizabeth. Soon after the
Restoration, a severe law, distinct from the general law which
applied to all conventicles, had been passed against meetings of
Quakers. The Toleration Act permitted the members of this
harmless sect to hold their assemblies in peace, on condition of
signing three documents, a declaration against
Transubstantiation, a promise of fidelity to the government, and
a confession of Christian belief. The objections which the Quaker
had to the Athanasian phraseology had brought on him the
imputation of Socinianism; and the strong language in which he
sometimes asserted that he derived his knowledge of spiritual
things directly from above had raised a suspicion that he thought
lightly of the authority of Scripture. He was therefore required
to profess his faith in the divinity of the Son and of the Holy
Ghost, and in the inspiration of the Old and New Testaments.
Such were the terms on which the Protestant dissenters of England
were, for the first time, permitted by law to worship God
according to their own conscience. They were very properly
forbidden to assemble with barred doors, but were protected
against hostile intrusion by a clause which made it penal to
enter a meeting house for the purpose of molesting the
congregation.
As if the numerous limitations and precautions which have been
mentioned were insufficient, it was emphatically declared that
the legislature did not intend to grant the smallest indulgence
to any Papist, or to any person who denied the doctrine of the
Trinity as that doctrine is set forth in the formularies of the
Church of England.
Of all the Acts that have ever been passed by Parliament, the
Toleration Act is perhaps that which most strikingly illustrates
the peculiar vices and the peculiar excellences of English
legislation. The science of Politics bears in one respect a close
analogy to the science of Mechanics. The mathematician can easily
demonstrate that a certain power, applied by means of a certain
lever or of a certain system of pulleys, will suffice to raise a
certain weight. But his demonstration proceeds on the supposition
that the machinery is such as no load will bend or break. If the
engineer, who has to lift a great mass of real granite by the
instrumentality of real timber and real hemp, should absolutely
rely on the propositions which he finds in treatises on Dynamics,
and should make no allowance for the imperfection of his
materials, his whole apparatus of beams, wheels, and ropes would
soon come down in ruin, and, with all his geometrical skill, he
would be found a far inferior builder to those painted barbarians
who, though they never heard of the parallelogram of forces,
managed to pile up Stonehenge. What the engineer is to the
mathematician, the active statesman is to the contemplative
statesman. It is indeed most important that legislators and
administrators should be versed in the philosophy of government,
as it is most important that the architect, who has to fix an
obelisk on its pedestal, or to hang a tubular bridge over an
estuary, should be versed in the philosophy of equilibrium and
motion. But, as he who has actually to build must bear in mind
many things never noticed by D'Alembert and Euler, so must he who
has actually to govern be perpetually guided by considerations to
which no allusion can be found in the writings of Adam Smith or
Jeremy Bentham. The perfect lawgiver is a just temper between the
mere man of theory, who can see nothing but general principles,
and the mere man of business, who can see nothing but particular
circumstances. Of lawgivers in whom the speculative element has
prevailed to the exclusion of the practical, the world has during
the last eighty years been singularly fruitful. To their wisdom
Europe and America have owed scores of abortive constitutions,
scores of constitutions which have lived just long enough to make
a miserable noise, and have then gone off in convulsions. But in
the English legislature the practical element has always
predominated, and not seldom unduly predominated, over the
speculative. To think nothing of symmetry and much of
convenience; never to remove an anomaly merely because it is an
anomaly; never to innovate except when some grievance is felt;
never to innovate except so far as to get rid of the grievance;
never to lay down any proposition of wider extent than the
particular case for which it is necessary to provide; these are
the rules which have, from the age of John to the age of
Victoria, generally guided the deliberations of our two hundred
and fifty Parliaments. Our national distaste for whatever is
abstract in political science amounts undoubtedly to a fault. But
it is, perhaps, a fault on the right side. That we have been far
too slow to improve our laws must be admitted. But, though in
other countries there may have occasionally been more rapid
progress, it would not be easy to name any other country in which
there has been so little retrogression.
The Toleration Act approaches very near to the idea of a great
English law. To a jurist, versed in the theory of legislation,
but not intimately acquainted with the temper of the sects and
parties into which the nation was divided at the time of the
Revolution, that Act would seem to be a mere chaos of absurdities
and contradictions. It will not bear to be tried by sound general
principles. Nay, it will not bear to be tried by any principle,
sound or unsound. The sound principle undoubtedly is, that mere
theological error ought not to be punished by the civil
magistrate. This principle the Toleration Act not only does not
recognise, but positively disclaims. Not a single one of the
cruel laws enacted against nonconformists by the Tudors or the
Stuarts is repealed. Persecution continues to be the general
rule. Toleration is the exception. Nor is this all. The freedom
which is given to conscience is given in the most capricious
manner. A Quaker, by making a declaration of faith in general
terms, obtains the full benefit of the Act without signing one of
the thirty-nine Articles. An Independent minister, who is
perfectly willing to make the declaration required from the
Quaker, but who has doubts about six or seven of the Articles,
remains still subject to the penal laws. Howe is liable to
punishment if he preaches before he has solemnly declared his
assent to the Anglican doctrine touching the Eucharist. Penn, who
altogether rejects the Eucharist, is at perfect liberty to preach
without making any declaration whatever on the subject.
These are some of the obvious faults which must strike every
person who examines the Toleration Act by that standard of just
reason which is the same in all countries and in all ages. But
these very faults may perhaps appear to be merits, when we take
into consideration the passions and prejudices of those for whom
the Toleration Act was framed. This law, abounding with
contradictions which every smatterer in political philosophy can
detect, did what a law framed by the utmost skill of the greatest
masters of political philosophy might have failed to do. That the
provisions which have been recapitulated are cumbrous, puerile,
inconsistent with each other, inconsistent with the true theory
of religious liberty, must be acknowledged. All that can be said
in their defence is this; that they removed a vast mass of evil
without shocking a vast mass of prejudice; that they put an end,
at once and for ever, without one division in either House of
Parliament, without one riot in the streets, with scarcely one
audible murmur even from the classes most deeply tainted with
bigotry, to a persecution which had raged during four
generations, which had broken innumerable hearts, which had made
innumerable firesides desolate, which had filled the prisons with
men of whom the world was not worthy, which had driven thousands
of those honest, diligent and godfearing yeomen and artisans, who
are the true strength of a nation, to seek a refuge beyond the
ocean among the wigwams of red Indians and the lairs of panthers.
Such a defence, however weak it may appear to some shallow
speculators, will probably be thought complete by statesmen.
The English, in 1689, were by no means disposed to admit the
doctrine that religious error ought to be left unpunished. That
doctrine was just then more unpopular than it had ever been. For
it had, only a few months before, been hypocritically put forward
as a pretext for persecuting the Established Church, for
trampling on the fundamental laws of the realm, for confiscating
freeholds, for treating as a crime the modest exercise of the
right of petition. If a bill had then been drawn up granting
entire freedom of conscience to all Protestants, it may be
confidently affirmed that Nottingham would never have introduced
such a bill; that all the bishops, Burnet included, would have
voted against it; that it would have been denounced, Sunday after
Sunday, from ten thousand pulpits, as an insult to God and to all
Christian men, and as a license to the worst heretics and
blasphemers; that it would have been condemned almost as
vehemently by Bates and Baxter as by Ken and Sherlock; that it
would have been burned by the mob in half the market places of
England; that it would never have become the law of the land, and
that it would have made the very name of toleration odious during
many years to the majority of the people. And yet, if such a bill
had been passed, what would it have effected beyond what was
effected by the Toleration Act?
It is true that the Toleration Act recognised persecution as the
rule, and granted liberty of conscience only as the exception.
But it is equally true that the rule remained in force only
against a few hundreds of Protestant dissenters, and that the
benefit of the exceptions extended to hundreds of thousands.
It is true that it was in theory absurd to make Howe sign thirty-
four or thirty-five of the Anglican articles before he could
preach, and to let Penn preach without signing one of those
articles. But it is equally true that, under this arrangement,
both Howe and Penn got as entire liberty to preach as they could
have had under the most philosophical code that Beccaria or
Jefferson could have framed.
The progress of the bill was easy. Only one amendment of grave
importance was proposed. Some zealous churchmen in the Commons
suggested that it might be desirable to grant the toleration only
for a term of seven years, and thus to bind over the
nonconformists to good behaviour. But this suggestion was so
unfavourably received that those who made it did not venture to
divide the House.84
The King gave his consent with hearty satisfaction: the bill
became law; and the Puritan divines thronged to the Quarter
Sessions of every county to swear and sign. Many of them probably
professed their assent to the Articles with some tacit
reservations. But the tender conscience of Baxter would not
suffer him to qualify, till he had put on record an explanation
of the sense in which he understood every proposition which
seemed to him to admit of misconstruction. The instrument
delivered by him to the Court before which he took the oaths is
still extant, and contains two passages of peculiar interest. He
declared that his approbation of the Athanasian Creed was
confined to that part which was properly a Creed, and that he did
not mean to express any assent to the damnatory clauses. He also
declared that he did not, by signing the article which
anathematizes all who maintain that there is any other salvation
than through Christ, mean to condemn those who entertain a hope
that sincere and virtuous unbelievers may be admitted to partake
in the benefits of Redemption. Many of the dissenting clergy of
London expressed their concurrence in these charitable
sentiments.85
The history of the Comprehension Bill presents a remarkable
contrast to the history of the Toleration Bill. The two bills had
a common origin, and, to a great extent, a common object. They
were framed at the same time, and laid aside at the same time:
they sank together into oblivion; and they were, after the lapse
of several years, again brought together before the world. Both
were laid by the same peer on the table of the Upper House; and
both were referred to the same select committee. But it soon
began to appear that they would have widely different fates. The
Comprehension Bill was indeed a neater specimen of legislative
workmanship than the Toleration Bill, but was not, like the
Toleration Bill, adapted to the wants, the feelings, and the
prejudices of the existing generation. Accordingly, while the
Toleration Bill found support in all quarters, the Comprehension
Bill was attacked from all quarters, and was at last coldly and
languidly defended even by those who had introduced it. About the
same time at which the Toleration bill became law with the
general concurrence of public men, the Comprehension Bill was,
with a concurrence not less general, suffered to drop. The
Toleration Bill still ranks among those great statutes which are
epochs in our constitutional history. The Comprehension Bill is
forgotten. No collector of antiquities has thought it worth
preserving. A single copy, the same which Nottingham presented to
the peers, is still among our parliamentary records, but has been
seen by only two or three persons now living. It is a fortunate
circumstance that, in this copy, almost the whole history of the
Bill can be read. In spite of cancellations and interlineations,
the original words can easily be distinguished from those which
were inserted in the committee or on the report.86
The first clause, as it stood when the bill was introduced,
dispensed all the ministers of the Established Church from the
necessity of subscribing the Thirty-nine Articles. For the
Articles was substituted a Declaration which ran thus; "I do
approve of the doctrine and worship and government of the Church
of England by law established, as containing all things necessary
to salvation; and I promise, in the exercise of my ministry, to
preach and practice according thereunto." Another clause granted
similar indulgence to the members of the two universities.
Then it was provided that any minister who had been ordained
after the Presbyterian fashion might, without reordination,
acquire all the privileges of a priest of the Established Church.
He must, however, be admitted to his new functions by the
imposition of the hands of a bishop, who was to pronounce the
following form of words; "Take thou authority to preach the word
of God, and administer the sacraments, and to perform all other
ministerial offices in the Church of England." The person thus
admitted was to be capable of holding any rectory or vicarage in
the kingdom.
Then followed clauses providing that a clergyman might, except in
a few churches of peculiar dignity, wear the surplice or not as
he thought fit, that the sign of the cross might be omitted in
baptism, that children might be christened, if such were the wish
of their parents, without godfathers or godmothers, and that
persons who had a scruple about receiving the Eucharist kneeling
might receive it sitting.
The concluding clause was drawn in the form of a petition. It was
proposed that the two Houses should request the King and Queen to
issue a commission empowering thirty divines of the Established
Church to revise the liturgy, the canons, and the constitution of
the ecclesiastical courts, and to recommend such alterations as
might on inquiry appear to be desirable.
The bill went smoothly through the first stages. Compton, who,
since Sancroft had shut himself up at Lambeth, was virtually
Primate, supported Nottingham with ardour.87 In the committee,
however, it appeared that there was a strong body of churchmen,
who were determined not to give up a single word or form; to whom
it seemed that the prayers were no prayers without the surplice,
the babe no Christian if not marked with the cross, the bread and
wine no memorials of redemption or vehicles of grace if not
received on bended knee. Why, these persons asked, was the docile
and affectionate son of the Church to be disgusted by seeing the
irreverent practices of a conventicle introduced into her
majestic choirs? Why should his feelings, his prejudices, if
prejudices they were, be less considered than the whims of
schismatics? If, as Burnet and men like Burnet were never weary
of repeating, indulgence was due to a weak brother, was it less
due to the brother whose weakness consisted in the excess of his
love for an ancient, a decent, a beautiful ritual, associated in
his imagination from childhood with all that is most sublime and
endearing, than to him whose morose and litigious mind was always
devising frivolous objections to innocent and salutary usages?
But, in truth, the scrupulosity of the Puritan was not that sort
of scrupulosity which the Apostle had commanded believers to
respect. It sprang, not from morbid tenderness of conscience, but
from censoriousness and spiritual pride; and none who had studied
the New Testament could have failed to observe that, while we are
charged carefully to avoid whatever may give scandal to the
feeble, we are taught by divine precept and example to make no
concession to the supercilious and uncharitable Pharisee. Was
every thing which was not of the essence of religion to be given
up as soon as it became unpleasing to a knot of zealots whose
heads had been turned by conceit and the love of novelty? Painted
glass, music, holidays, fast days, were not of the essence of
religion. Were the windows of King's College Chapel to be broken
at the demand of one set of fanatics? Was the organ of Exeter to
be silenced to please another? Were all the village bells to be
mute because Tribulation Wholesome and Deacon Ananias thought
them profane? Was Christmas no longer to be a day of rejoicing?
Was Passion week no longer to be a season of humiliation? These
changes, it is true, were not yet proposed. Put if,--so the High
Churchmen reasoned,--we once admit that what is harmless and
edifying is to be given up because it offends some narrow
understandings and some gloomy tempers, where are we to stop? And
is it not probable that, by thus attempting to heal one schism,
we may cause another? All those things which the Puritans regard
as the blemishes of the Church are by a large part of the
population reckoned among her attractions. May she not, in
ceasing to give scandal to a few sour precisians, cease also to
influence the hearts of many who now delight in her ordinances?
Is it not to be apprehended that, for every proselyte whom she
allures from the meeting house, ten of her old disciples may turn
away from her maimed rites and dismantled temples, and that these
new separatists may either form themselves into a sect far more
formidable than the sect which we are now seeking to conciliate,
or may, in the violence of their disgust at a cold and ignoble
worship, be tempted to join in the solemn and gorgeous idolatry
of Rome?
It is remarkable that those who held this language were by no
means disposed to contend for the doctrinal Articles of the
Church. The truth is that, from the time of James the First, that
great party which has been peculiarly zealous for the Anglican
polity and the Anglican ritual has always leaned strongly towards
Arminianism, and has therefore never been much attached to a
confession of faith framed by reformers who, on questions of
metaphysical divinity, generally agreed with Calvin. One of the
characteristic marks of that party is the disposition which it
has always shown to appeal, on points of dogmatic theology,
rather to the Liturgy, which was derived from Rome, than to the
Articles and Homilies, which were derived from Geneva. The
Calvinistic members of the Church, on the other hand, have always
maintained that her deliberate judgment on such points is much
more likely to be found in an Article or a Homily than in an
ejaculation of penitence or a hymn of thanksgiving. It does not
appear that, in the debates on the Comprehension Bill, a single
High Churchman raised his voice against the clause which relieved
the clergy from the necessity of subscribing the Articles, and of
declaring the doctrine contained in the Homilies to be sound.
Nay, the Declaration which, in the original draught, was
substituted for the Articles, was much softened down on the
report. As the clause finally stood, the ministers of the Church
were required to declare, not that they approved of her
constitution, but merely that they submitted to it. Had the bill
become law, the only people in the kingdom who would have been
under the necessity of signing the Articles would have been the
dissenting preachers.88
The easy manner in which the zealous friends of the Church gave
up her confession of faith presents a striking contrast to the
spirit with which they struggled for her polity and her ritual.
The clause which admitted Presbyterian ministers to hold
benefices without episcopal ordination was rejected. The clause
which permitted scrupulous persons to communicate sitting very
narrowly escaped the same fate. In the Committee it was struck
out, and, on the report, was with great difficulty restored. The
majority of peers in the House was against the proposed
indulgence, and the scale was but just turned by the proxies.
But by this time it began to appear that the bill which the High
Churchmen were so keenly assailing was menaced by dangers from a
very different quarter. The same considerations which had induced
Nottingham to support a comprehension made comprehension an
object of dread and aversion to a large body of dissenters. The
truth is that the time for such a scheme had gone by. If, a
hundred years earlier, when the division in the Protestant body
was recent, Elizabeth had been so wise as to abstain from
requiring the observance of a few forms which a large part of her
subjects considered as Popish, she might perhaps have averted
those fearful calamities which, forty years after her death,
afflicted the Church. But the general tendency of schism is to
widen. Had Leo the Tenth, when the exactions and impostures of
the Pardoners first roused the indignation of Saxony, corrected
those evil practices with a vigorous hand, it is not improbable
that Luther would have died in the bosom of the Church of Rome.
But the opportunity was suffered to escape; and, when, a few
years later, the Vatican would gladly have purchased peace by
yielding the original subject of quarrel, the original subject of
quarrel was almost forgotten. The inquiring spirit which had been
roused by a single abuse had discovered or imagined a thousand:
controversies engendered controversies: every attempt that was
made to accommodate one dispute ended by producing another; and
at length a General Council, which, during the earlier stages of
the distemper, had been supposed to be an infallible remedy, made
the case utterly hopeless. In this respect, as in many others,
the history of Puritanism in England bears a close analogy to the
history of Protestantism in Europe. The Parliament of 1689 could
no more put an end to nonconformity by tolerating a garb or a
posture than the Doctors of Trent could have reconciled the
Teutonic nations to the Papacy by regulating the sale of
indulgences. In the sixteenth century Quakerism was unknown; and
there was not in the whole realm a single congregation of
Independents or Baptists. At the time of the Revolution, the
Independents, Baptists, and Quakers were a majority of the
dissenting body; and these sects could not be gained over on any
terms which the lowest of Low Churchmen would have been willing
to offer. The Independent held that a national Church, governed
by any central authority whatever, Pope, Patriarch, King, Bishop,
or Synod, was an unscriptural institution, and that every
congregation of believers was, under Christ, a sovereign society.
The Baptist was even more irreclaimable than the Independent, and
the Quaker even more irreclaimable than the Baptist. Concessions,
therefore, which would once have extinguished nonconformity would
not now satisfy even one half of the nonconformists; and it was
the obvious interest of every nonconformist whom no concession
would satisfy that none of his brethren should be satisfied. The
more liberal the terms of comprehension, the greater was the
alarm of every separatist who knew that he could, in no case, be
comprehended. There was but slender hope that the dissenters,
unbroken and acting as one man, would be able to obtain from the
legislature full admission to civil privileges; and all hope of
obtaining such admission must be relinquished if Nottingham
should, by the help of some wellmeaning but shortsighted friends
of religious liberty, be enabled to accomplish his design. If his
bill passed, there would doubtless be a considerable defection
from the dissenting body; and every defection must be severely
felt by a class already outnumbered, depressed, and struggling
against powerful enemies. Every proselyte too must be reckoned
twice over, as a loss to the party which was even now too weak,
and as a gain to the party which was even now too strong. The
Church was but too well able to hold her own against all the
sects in the kingdom; and, if those sects were to be thinned by a
large desertion, and the Church strengthened by a large
reinforcement, it was plain that all chance of obtaining any
relaxation of the Test Act would be at an end; and it was but too
probable that the Toleration Act might not long remain
unrepealed.
Even those Presbyterian ministers whose scruples the
Comprehension Bill was expressly intended to remove were by no
means unanimous in wishing it to pass. The ablest and most
eloquent preachers among them had, since the Declaration of
Indulgence had appeared, been very agreeably settled in the
capital and in other large towns, and were now about to enjoy,
under the sure guarantee of an Act of Parliament, that toleration
which, under the Declaration of Indulgence, had been illicit and
precarious. The situation of these men was such as the great
majority of the divines of the Established Church might well
envy. Few indeed of the parochial clergy were so abundantly
supplied with comforts as the favourite orator of a great
assembly of nonconformists in the City. The voluntary
contributions of his wealthy hearers, Aldermen and Deputies, West
India merchants and Turkey merchants, Wardens of the Company of
Fishmongers and Wardens of the Company of Goldsmiths, enabled him
to become a landowner or a mortgagee. The best broadcloth from
Blackwell Hall, and the best poultry from Leadenhall Market, were
frequently left at his door. His influence over his flock was
immense. Scarcely any member of a congregation of separatists
entered into a partnership, married a daughter, put a son out as
apprentice, or gave his vote at an election, without consulting
his spiritual guide. On all political and literary questions the
minister was the oracle of his own circle. It was popularly
remarked, during many years, that an eminent dissenting minister
had only to make his son an attorney or a physician; that the
attorney was sure to have clients, and the physician to have
patients. While a waiting woman was generally considered as a
help meet for a chaplain in holy orders of the Established
Church, the widows and daughters of opulent citizens were
supposed to belong in a peculiar manner to nonconformist pastors.
One of the great Presbyterian Rabbies, therefore, might well
doubt whether, in a worldly view, he should be benefited by a
comprehension. He might indeed hold a rectory or a vicarage, when
he could get one. But in the meantime he would be destitute: his
meeting house would be closed: his congregation would be
dispersed among the parish churches: if a benefice were bestowed
on him, it would probably be a very slender compensation for the
income which he had lost. Nor could he hope to have, as a
minister of the Anglican Church, the authority and dignity which
he had hitherto enjoyed. He would always, by a large portion of
the members of that Church, be regarded as a deserter. He might
therefore, on the whole, very naturally wish to be left where he
was.89
There was consequently a division in the Whig party. One section
of that party was for relieving the dissenters from the Test Act,
and giving up the Comprehension Bill. Another section was for
pushing forward the Comprehension Bill, and postponing to a more
convenient time the consideration of the Test Act. The effect of
this division among the friends of religious liberty was that the
High Churchmen, though a minority in the House of Commons, and
not a majority in the House of Lords, were able to oppose with
success both the reforms which they dreaded. The Comprehension
Bill was not passed; and the Test Act was not repealed.
Just at the moment when the question of the Test and the question
of the Comprehension became complicated together in a manner
which might well perplex an enlightened and honest politician,
both questions became complicated with a third question of grave
importance.
The ancient oaths of allegiance and supremacy contained some
expressions which had always been disliked by the Whigs, and
other expressions which Tories, honestly attached to the new
settlement, thought inapplicable to princes who had not the
hereditary right. The Convention had therefore, while the throne
was still vacant, framed those oaths of allegiance and supremacy
by which we still testify our loyalty to our Sovereign. By the
Act which turned the Convention into a Parliament, the members of
both Houses were required to take the new oaths. As to other
persons in public trust, it was hard to say how the law stood.
One form of words was enjoined by statutes, regularly passed, and
not yet regularly abrogated. A different form was enjoined by the
Declaration of Right, an instrument which was indeed
revolutionary and irregular, but which might well be thought
equal in authority to any statute. The practice was in as much
confusion as the law. It was therefore felt to be necessary that
the legislature should, without delay, pass an Act abolishing the
old oaths, and determining when and by whom the new oaths should
be taken.
The bill which settled this important question originated in the
Upper House. As to most of the provisions there was little room
for dispute. It was unanimously agreed that no person should, at
any future time, be admitted to any office, civil, military,
ecclesiastical, or academical, without taking the oaths to
William and Mary. It was also unanimously agreed that every
person who already held any civil or military office should be
ejected from it, unless he took the oaths on or before the first
of August 1689. But the strongest passions of both parties were
excited by the question whether persons who already possessed
ecclesiastical or academical offices should be required to swear
fealty to the King and Queen on pain of deprivation. None could
say what might be the effect of a law enjoining all the members
of a great, a powerful, a sacred profession to make, under the
most solemn sanction of religion, a declaration which might be
plausibly represented as a formal recantation of all that they
had been writing and preaching during many years. The Primate and
some of the most eminent Bishops had already absented themselves
from Parliament, and would doubtless relinquish their palaces and
revenues, rather than acknowledge the new Sovereigns. The example
of these great prelates might perhaps be followed by a multitude
of divines of humbler rank, by hundreds of canons, prebendaries,
and fellows of colleges, by thousands of parish priests. To such
an event no Tory, however clear his own conviction that he might
lawfully swear allegiance to the King who was in possession,
could look forward without the most painful emotions of
compassion for the sufferers and of anxiety for the Church.
There were some persons who went so far as to deny that the
Parliament was competent to pass a law requiring a Bishop to
swear on pain of deprivation. No earthly power, they said, could
break the tie which bound the successor of the apostles to his
diocese. What God had joined no man could sunder. Dings and
senates might scrawl words on parchment or impress figures on
wax; but those words and figures could no more change the course
of the spiritual than the course of the physical world. As the
Author of the universe had appointed a certain order, according
to which it was His pleasure to send winter and summer, seedtime
and harvest, so He had appointed a certain order, according to
which He communicated His grace to His Catholic Church; and the
latter order was, like the former, independent of the powers and
principalities of the world. A legislature might alter the flames
of the months, might call June December, and December June; but,
in spite of the legislature, the snow would fall when the sun was
in Capricorn, and the flowers would bloom when he was in Cancer.
And so the legislature might enact that Ferguson or Muggleton
should live in the palace at Lambeth, should sit on the throne of
Augustin, should be called Your Grace, and should walk in
processions before the Premier Duke; but, in spite of the
legislature, Sancroft would, while Sancroft lived, be the only
true Archbishop of Canterbury; and the person who should presume
to usurp the archiepiscopal functions would be a schismatic. This
doctrine was proved by reasons drawn from the budding of Aaron's
rod, and from a certain plate which Saint James the Less,
according to a legend of the fourth century, used to wear on his
forehead. A Greek manuscript, relating to the deprivation of
bishops, was discovered, about this time, in the Bodleian
Library, and became the subject of a furious controversy. One
party held that God had wonderfully brought this precious volume
to light, for the guidance of His Church at a most critical
moment. The other party wondered that any importance could be
attached to the nonsense of a nameless scribbler of the
thirteenth century. Much was written about the deprivations of
Chrysostom and Photius, of Nicolaus Mysticus and Cosmas Atticus.
But the case of Abiathar, whom Solomon put out of the sacerdotal
office for treason, was discussed with peculiar eagerness. No
small quantity of learning and ingenuity was expended in the
attempt to prove that Abiathar, though he wore the ephod and
answered by Urim, was not really High Priest, that he ministered
only when his superior Zadoc was incapacitated by sickness or by
some ceremonial pollution, and that therefore the act of Solomon
was not a precedent which would warrant King William in deposing
a real Bishop.90
But such reasoning as this, though backed by copious citations
from the Misna and Maimonides, was not generally satisfactory
even to zealous churchmen. For it admitted of one answer, short,
but perfectly intelligible to a plain man who knew nothing about
Greek fathers or Levitical genealogies. There might be some doubt
whether King Solomon had ejected a high priest; but there could
be no doubt at all that Queen Elizabeth had ejected the Bishops
of more than half the sees in England. It was notorious that
fourteen prelates had, without any proceeding in any spiritual
court, been deprived by Act of Parliament for refusing to
acknowledge her supremacy. Had that deprivation been null? Had
Bonner continued to be, to the end of his life, the only true
Bishop of London? Had his successor been an usurper? Had Parker
and Jewel been schismatics? Had the Convocation of 1562, that
Convocation which had finally settled the doctrine of the Church
of England, been itself out of the pale of the Church of Christ?
Nothing could be more ludicrous than the distress of those
controversialists who had to invent a plea for Elizabeth which
should not be also a plea for William. Some zealots, indeed, gave
up the vain attempt to distingush between two cases which every
man of common sense perceived to be undistinguishable, and
frankly owned that the deprivations of 1559 could not be
justified. But no person, it was said, ought to be troubled in
mind on that account; for, though the Church of England might
once have been schismatical, she had become Catholic when the
Bishops deprived by Elizabeth had ceased to live.91 The Tories,
however, were not generally disposed to admit that the religious
society to which they were fondly attached had originated in an
unlawful breach of unity. They therefore took ground lower and
more tenable. They argued the question as a question of humanity
and of expediency. They spoke much of the debt of gratitude which
the nation owed to the priesthood; of the courage and fidelity
with which the order, from the primate down to the youngest
deacon, had recently defended the civil and ecclesiastical
constitution of the realm; of the memorable Sunday when, in all
the hundred churches of the capital, scarcely one slave could be
found to read the Declaration of Indulgence; of the Black Friday
when, amidst the blessings and the loud weeping of a mighty
population, the barge of the seven prelates passed through the
watergate of the Tower. The firmness with which the clergy had
lately, in defiance of menace and of seduction, done what they
conscientiously believed to be right, had saved the liberty and
religion of England. Was no indulgence to be granted to them if
they now refused to do what they conscientiously apprehended to
be wrong? And where, it was said, is the danger of treating them
with tenderness? Nobody is so absurd as to propose that they
shall be permitted to plot against the Government, or to stir up
the multitude to insurrection. They are amenable to the law, like
other men. If they are guilty of treason, let them be hanged. If
they are guilty of sedition, let them be fined and imprisoned. If
they omit, in their public ministrations, to pray for King
William, for Queen Mary, and for the Parliament assembled under
those most religious sovereigns, let the penal clauses of the Act
of Uniformity be put in force. If this be not enough, let his
Majesty be empowered to tender the oaths to any clergyman; and,
if the oaths so tendered are refused, let deprivation follow. In
this way any nonjuring bishop or rector who may be suspected,
though he cannot be legally convicted, of intriguing, of writing,
of talking, against the present settlement, may be at once
removed from his office. But why insist on ejecting a pious and
laborious minister of religion, who never lifts a finger or
utters a word against the government, and who, as often as he
performs morning and evening service, prays from his heart for a
blessing on the rulers set over him by Providence, but who will
not take an oath which seems to him to imply a right in the
people to depose a sovereign? Surely we do all that is necessary
if we leave men of this sort to the mercy of the very prince to
whom they refuse to swear fidelity. If he is willing to bear with
their scrupulosity, if he considers them, notwithstanding their
prejudices, as innocent and useful members of society, who else
can be entitled to complain?
The Whigs were vehement on the other side. They scrutinised, with
ingenuity sharpened by hatred, the claims of the clergy to the
public gratitude, and sometimes went so far as altogether to deny
that the order had in the preceding year deserved well of the
nation. It was true that bishops and priests had stood up against
the tyranny of the late King: but it was equally true that, but
for the obstinacy with which they had opposed the Exclusion Bill,
he never would have been King, and that, but for their adulation
and their doctrine of passive obedience, he would never have
ventured to be guilty of such tyranny. Their chief business,
during a quarter of a century, had been to teach the people to
cringe and the prince to domineer. They were guilty of the blood
of Russell, of Sidney, of every brave and honest Englishman who
had been put to death for attempting to save the realm from
Popery and despotism. Never had they breathed a whisper against
arbitrary power till arbitrary power began to menace their own
property and dignity. Then, no doubt, forgetting all their old
commonplaces about submitting to Nero, they had made haste to
save themselves. Grant,--such was the cry of these eager
disputants,--grant that, in saving themselves, they saved the
constitution. Are we therefore to forget that they had previously
endangered it? And are we to reward them by now permitting them
to destroy it? Here is a class of men closely connected with the
state. A large part of the produce of the soil has been assigned
to them for their maintenance. Their chiefs have seats in the
legislature, wide domains, stately palaces. By this privileged
body the great mass of the population is lectured every week from
the chair of authority. To this privileged body has been
committed the supreme direction of liberal education. Oxford and
Cambridge, Westminster, Winchester, and Eton, are under priestly
government. By the priesthood will to a great extent be formed
the character of the nobility and gentry of the next generation.
Of the higher clergy some have in their gift numerous and
valuable benefices; others have the privilege of appointing
judges who decide grave questions affecting the liberty, the
property, the reputation of their Majesties' subjects. And is an
order thus favoured by the state to give no guarantee to the
state? On what principle can it be contended that it is
unnecessary to ask from an Archbishop of Canterbury or from a
Bishop of Durham that promise of fidelity to the government which
all allow that it is necessary to demand from every layman who
serves the Crown in the humblest office. Every exciseman, every
collector of the customs, who refuses to swear, is to be deprived
of his bread. For these humble martyrs of passive obedience and
hereditary right nobody has a word to say. Yet an ecclesiastical
magnate who refuses to swear is to be suffered to retain
emoluments, patronage, power, equal to those of a great minister
of state. It is said that it is superfluous to impose the oaths
on a clergyman, because he may be punished if he breaks the laws.
Why is not the same argument urged in favour of the layman? And
why, if the clergyman really means to observe the laws, does he
scruple to take the oaths? The law commands him to designate
William and Mary as King and Queen, to do this in the most sacred
place, to do this in the administration of the most solemn of all
the rites of religion. The law commands him to pray that the
illustrious pair may be defended by a special providence, that
they may be victorious over every enemy, and that their
Parliament may by divine guidance be led to take such a course as
may promote their safety, honour, and welfare. Can we believe
that his conscience will suffer him to do all this, and yet will
not suffer him to promise that he will be a faithful subject to
them?
To the proposition that the nonjuring clergy should be left to
the mercy of the King, the Whigs, with some justice, replied that
no scheme could be devised more unjust to his Majesty. The
matter, they said, is one of public concern, one in which every
Englishman who is unwilling to be the slave of France and of Rome
has a deep interest. In such a case it would be unworthy of the
Estates of the Realm to shrink from the responsibility of
providing for the common safety, to try to obtain for themselves
the praise of tenderness and liberality, and to leave to the
Sovereign the odious task of proscription. A law requiring all
public functionaries, civil, military, ecclesiastical, without
distinction of persons, to take the oaths is at least equal. It
excludes all suspicion of partiality, of personal malignity, of
secret shying and talebearing. But, if an arbitrary discretion is
left to the Government, if one nonjuring priest is suffered to
keep a lucrative benefice while another is turned with his wife
and children into the street, every ejection will be considered
as an act of cruelty, and will be imputed as a crime to the
sovereign and his ministers.92
Thus the Parliament had to decide, at the same moment, what
quantity of relief should be granted to the consciences of
dissenters, and what quantity of pressure should be applied to
the consciences of the clergy of the Established Church. The King
conceived a hope that it might be in his power to effect a
compromise agreeable to all parties. He flattered himself that
the Tories might be induced to make some concession to the
dissenters, on condition that the Whigs would be lenient to the
Jacobites. He determined to try what his personal intervention
would effect. It chanced that, a few hours after the Lords had
read the Comprehension Bill a second time and the Bill touching
the Oaths a first time, he had occasion to go down to Parliament
for the purpose of giving his assent to a law. From the throne he
addressed both Houses, and expressed an earnest wish that they
would consent to modify the existing laws in such a manner that
all Protestants might be admitted to public employment.93 It was
well understood that he was willing, if the legislature would
comply with his request, to let clergymen who were already
beneficed continue to hold their benefices without swearing
allegiance to him. His conduct on this occasion deserves
undoubtedly the praise of disinterestedness. It is honourable to
him that he attempted to purchase liberty of conscience for his
subjects by giving up a safeguard of his own crown. But it must
be acknowledged that he showed less wisdom than virtue. The only
Englishman in his Privy Council whom he had consulted, if Burnet
was correctly informed, was Richard Hampden;94 and Richard
Hampden, though a highly respectable man, was so far from being
able to answer for the Whig party that he could not answer even
for his own son John, whose temper, naturally vindictive, had
been exasperated into ferocity by the stings of remorse and
shame. The King soon found that there was in the hatred of the
two great factions an energy which was wanting to their love. The
Whigs, though they were almost unanimous in thinking that the
Sacramental Test ought to be abolished, were by no means
unanimous in thinking that moment well chosen for the abolition;
and even those Whigs who were most desirous to see the
nonconformists relieved without delay from civil disabilities
were fully determined not to forego the opportunity of humbling
and punishing the class to whose instrumentality chiefly was to
be ascribed that tremendous reflux of public feeling which had
followed the dissolution of the Oxford Parliament. To put the
Janes, the Souths, the Sherlocks into such a situation that they
must either starve, or recant, publicly, and with the Gospel at
their lips, all the ostentatious professions of many years, was a
revenge too delicious to be relinquished. The Tory, on the other
hand, sincerely respected and pitied those clergymen who felt
scruples about the oaths. But the Test was, in his view,
essential to the safety of the established religion, and must not
be surrendered for the purpose of saving any man however eminent
from any hardship however serious. It would be a sad day
doubtless for the Church when the episcopal bench, the chapter
houses of cathedrals, the halls of colleges, would miss some men
renowned for piety and learning. But it would be a still sadder
day for the Church when an Independent should bear the white
staff or a Baptist sit on the woolsack. Each party tried to serve
those for whom it was interested: but neither party would consent
to grant favourable terms to its enemies. The result was that the
nonconformists remained excluded from office in the State, and
the nonjurors were ejected from office in the Church.
In the House of Commons, no member thought it expedient to
propose the repeal of the Test Act. But leave was given to bring
in a bill repealing the Corporation Act, which had been passed by
the Cavalier Parliament soon after the Restoration, and which
contained a clause requiring all municipal magistrates to receive
the sacrament according to the forms of the Church of England.
When this bill was about to be committed, it was moved by the
Tories that the committee should be instructed to make no
alteration in the law touching the sacrament. Those Whigs who
were zealous for the Comprehension must have been placed by this
motion in an embarrassing position. To vote for the instruction
would have been inconsistent with their principles. To vote
against it would have been to break with Nottingham. A middle
course was found. The adjournment of the debate was moved and
carried by a hundred and sixteen votes to a hundred and fourteen;
and the subject was not revived.95 In the House of Lords a motion
was made for the abolition of the sacramental test, but was
rejected by a large majority. Many of those who thought the
motion right in principle thought it ill timed. A protest was
entered; but it was signed only by a few peers of no great
authority. It is a remarkable fact that two great chiefs of the
Whig party, who were in general very attentive to their
parliamentary duty, Devonshire and Shrewsbury, absented
themselves on this occasion.96
The debate on the Test in the Upper House was speedily followed
by a debate on the last clause of the Comprehension Bill. By that
clause it was provided that thirty Bishops and priests should be
commissioned to revise the liturgy and canons, and to suggest
amendments. On this subject the Whig peers were almost all of one
mind. They mustered strong, and spoke warmly. Why, they asked,
were none but members of the sacerdotal order to be intrusted
with this duty? Were the laity no part of the Church of England?
When the Commission should have made its report, laymen would
have to decide on the recommendations contained in that report.
Not a line of the Book of Common Prayer could be altered but by
the authority of King, Lords, and Commons. The King was a layman.
Five sixths of the Lords were laymen. All the members of the
House of Commons were laymen. Was it not absurd to say that
laymen were incompetent to examine into a matter which it was
acknowledged that laymen must in the last resort determine? And
could any thing be more opposite to the whole spirit of
Protestantism than the notion that a certain preternatural power
of judging in spiritual cases was vouchsafed to a particular
caste, and to that caste alone; that such men as Selden, as Hale,
as Boyle, were less competent to give an opinion on a collect or
a creed than the youngest and silliest chaplain who, in a remote
manor house, passed his life in drinking ale and playing at
shovelboard? What God had instituted no earthly power, lay or
clerical, could alter: and of things instituted by human beings a
layman was surely as competent as a clergyman to judge. That the
Anglican liturgy and canons were of purely human institution the
Parliament acknowledged by referring them to a Commission for
revision and correction. How could it then be maintained that in
such a Commission the laity, so vast a majority of the
population, the laity, whose edification was the main end of all
ecclesiastical regulations, and whose innocent tastes ought to be
carefully consulted in the framing of the public services of
religion, ought not to have a single representative? Precedent
was directly opposed to this odious distinction. Repeatedly since
the light of reformation had dawned on England Commissioners had
been empowered by law to revise the canons; and on every one of
those occasions some of the Commissioners had been laymen. In the
present case the proposed arrangement was peculiarly
objectionable. For the object of issuing the commission was the
conciliating of dissenters; and it was therefore most desirable
that the Commissioners should be men in whose fairness and
moderation dissenters could confide. Would thirty such men be
easily found in the higher ranks of the clerical profession? The
duty of the legislature was to arbitrate between two contending
parties, the Nonconformist divines and the Anglican divines, and
it would be the grossest injustice to commit to one of those
parties the office of umpire.
On these grounds the Whigs proposed an amendment to the effect
that laymen should be joined with clergymen in the Commission.
The contest was sharp. Burnet, who had just taken his seat among
the peers, and who seems to have been bent on winning at almost
any price the good will of his brethren, argued with all his
constitutional warmth for the clause as it stood. The numbers on
the division proved to be exactly equal. The consequence was
that, according to the rules of the House, the amendment was
lost.97
At length the Comprehension Bill was sent down to the Commons.
There it would easily have been carried by two to one, if it had
been supported by all the friends of religious liberty. But on
this subject the High Churchmen could count on the support of a
large body of Low Churchmen. Those members who wished well to
Nottingham's plan saw that they were outnumbered, and, despairing
of a victory, began to meditate a retreat. Just at this time a
suggestion was thrown out which united all suffrages. The ancient
usage was that a Convocation should be summoned together with a
Parliament; and it might well be argued that, if ever the advice
of a Convocation could be needed, it must be when changes in the
ritual and discipline of the Church were under consideration.
But, in consequence of the irregular manner in which the Estates
of the Realm had been brought together during the vacancy of the
throne, there was no Convocation. It was proposed that the House
should advise the King to take measures for supplying this
defect, and that the fate of the Comprehension Bill should not be
decided till the clergy had had an opportunity of declaring their
opinion through the ancient and legitimate organ.
This proposition was received with general acclamation. The
Tories were well pleased to see such honour done to the
priesthood. Those Whigs who were against the Comprehension Bill
were well pleased to see it laid aside, certainly for a year,
probably for ever. Those Whigs who were for the Comprehension
Bill were well pleased to escape without a defeat. Many of them
indeed were not without hopes that mild and liberal counsels
might prevail in the ecclesiastical senate. An address requesting
William to summon the Convocation was voted without a division:
the concurrence of the Lords was asked: the Lords concurred, the
address was carried up to the throne by both Houses: the King
promised that he would, at a convenient season, do what his
Parliament desired; and Nottingham's Bill was not again
mentioned.
Many writers, imperfectly acquainted with the history of that
age, have inferred from these proceedings that the House of
Commons was an assembly of High Churchmen: but nothing is more
certain than that two thirds of the members were either Low
Churchmen or not Churchmen at all. A very few days before this
time an occurrence had taken place, unimportant in itself, but
highly significant as an indication of the temper of the
majority. It had been suggested that the House ought, in
conformity with ancient usage, to adjourn over the Easter
holidays. The Puritans and Latitudinarians objected: there was a
sharp debate: the High Churchmen did not venture to divide; and,
to the great scandal of many grave persons, the Speaker took the
chair at nine o'clock on Easter Monday; and there was a long and
busy sitting.98
This however was by no means the strongest proof which the
Commons gave that they were far indeed from feeling extreme
reverence or tenderness for the Anglican hierarchy. The bill for
settling the oaths had just come down from the Lords framed in a
manner favourable to the clergy. All lay functionaries were
required to swear fealty to the King and Queen on pain of
expulsion from office. But it was provided that every divine who
already held a benefice might continue to hold it without
swearing, unless the Government should see reason to call on him
specially for an assurance of his loyalty. Burnett had, partly,
no doubt, from the goodnature and generosity which belonged to
his character, and partly from a desire to conciliate his
brethren, supported this arrangement in the Upper House with
great energy. But in the Lower House the feeling against the
Jacobite priests was irresistibly strong. On the very day on
which that House voted, without a division, the address
requesting the King to summon the Convocation, a clause was
proposed and carried which required every person who held any
ecclesiastical or academical preferment to take the oaths by the
first of August 1689, on pain of suspension. Six months, to be
reckoned from that day, were allowed to the nonjuror for
reconsideration. If, on the first of February 1690, he still
continued obstinate, he was to be finally deprived.
The bill, thus amended, was sent back to the Lords. The Lords
adhered to their original resolution. Conference after conference
was held. Compromise after compromise was suggested. From the
imperfect reports which have come down to us it appears that
every argument in favour of lenity was forcibly urged by Burnet.
But the Commons were firm: time pressed: the unsettled state of
the law caused inconvenience in every department of the public
service; and the peers very reluctantly gave way. They at the
same time added a clause empowering the King to bestow pecuniary
allowances out of the forfeited benefices on a few nonjuring
clergymen. The number of clergymen thus favoured was not to
exceed twelve. The allowance was not to exceed one third of the
income forfeited. Some zealous Whigs were unwilling to grant even
this indulgence: but the Commons were content with the victory
which they had won, and justly thought that it would be
ungracious to refuse so slight a concession.99
These debates were interrupted, during a short time, by the
festivities and solemnities of the Coronation. When the day fixed
for that great ceremony drew near, the House of Commons resolved
itself into a committee for the purpose of settling the form of
words in which our Sovereigns were thenceforward to enter into
covenant with the nation. All parties were agreed as to the
propriety of requiring the King to swear that, in temporal
matters, he would govern according to law, and would execute
justice in mercy. But about the terms of the oath which related
to the spiritual institutions of the realm there was much debate.
Should the chief magistrate promise simply to maintain the
Protestant religion established by law, or should he promise to
maintain that religion as it should be hereafter established by
law? The majority preferred the former phrase. The latter phrase
was preferred by those Whigs who were for a Comprehension. But it
was universally admitted that the two phrases really meant the
same thing, and that the oath, however it might be worded, would
bind the Sovereign in his executive capacity only. This was
indeed evident from the very nature of the transaction. Any
compact may be annulled by the free consent of the party who
alone is entitled to claim the performance. It was never doubted
by the most rigid casuist that a debtor, who has bound himself
under the most awful imprecations to pay a debt, may lawfully
withhold payment if the creditor is willing to cancel the
obligation. And it is equally clear that no assurance, exacted
from a King by the Estates of his kingdom, can bind him to refuse
compliance with what may at a future time be the wish of those
Estates.
A bill was drawn up in conformity with the resolutions of the
Committee, and was rapidly passed through every stage. After the
third reading, a foolish man stood up to propose a rider,
declaring that the oath was not meant to restrain the Sovereign
from consenting to any change in the ceremonial of the Church,
provided always that episcopacy and a written form of prayer were
retained. The gross absurdity of this motion was exposed by
several eminent members. Such a clause, they justly remarked,
would bind the King under pretence of setting him free. The
coronation oath, they said, was never intended to trammel him in
his legislative capacity. Leave that oath as it is now drawn, and
no prince can misunderstand it. No prince can seriously imagine
that the two Houses mean to exact from him a promise that he will
put a Veto on laws which they may hereafter think necessary to
the wellbeing of the country. Or if any prince should so
strangely misapprehend the nature of the contract between him and
his subjects, any divine, any lawyer, to whose advice he may have
recourse, will set his mind at ease. But if this rider should
pass, it will be impossible to deny that the coronation oath is
meant to prevent the King from giving his assent to bills which
may be presented to him by the Lords and Commons; and the most
serious inconvenience may follow. These arguments were felt to be
unanswerable, and the proviso was rejected without a division.100
Every person who has read these debates must be fully convinced
that the statesmen who framed the coronation oath did not mean to
bind the King in his legislative capacity.101 Unhappily, more
than a hundred years later, a scruple, which those statesmen
thought too absurd to be seriously entertained by any human
being, found its way into a mind, honest, indeed, and religious,
but narrow and obstinate by nature, and at once debilitated and
excited by disease. Seldom, indeed, have the ambition and perfidy
of tyrants produced evils greater than those which were brought
on our country by that fatal conscientiousness. A conjuncture
singularly auspicious, a conjuncture at which wisdom and justice
might perhaps have reconciled races and sects long hostile, and
might have made the British islands one truly United Kingdom, was
suffered to pass away. The opportunity, once lost, returned no
more. Two generations of public men have since laboured with
imperfect success to repair the error which was then committed;
nor is it improbable that some of the penalties of that error
may continue to afflict a remote posterity.
The Bill by which the oath was settled passed the Upper House
without amendment. All the preparations were complete; and, on
the eleventh of April, the coronation took place. In some things
it differed from ordinary coronations. The representatives of the
people attended the ceremony in a body, and were sumptuously
feasted in the Exchequer Chamber. Mary, being not merely Queen
Consort, but also Queen Regnant, was inaugurated in all things
like a King, was girt with the sword, lifted up into the throne,
and presented with the Bible, the spurs, and the orb. Of the
temporal grandees of the realm, and of their wives and daughters,
the muster was great and splendid. None could be surprised that
the Whig aristocracy should swell the triumph of Whig principles.
But the Jacobites saw, with concern, that many Lords who had
voted for a Regency bore a conspicuous part in the ceremonial.
The King's crown was carried by Grafton, the Queen's by Somerset.
The pointed sword, emblematical of temporal justice, was borne by
Pembroke. Ormond was Lord High Constable for the day, and rode up
the Hall on the right hand of the hereditary champion, who thrice
flung down his glove on the pavement, and thrice defied to mortal
combat the false traitor who should gainsay the title of William
and Mary. Among the noble damsels who supported the gorgeous
train of the Queen was her beautiful and gentle cousin, the Lady
Henrietta Hyde, whose father, Rochester, had to the last
contended against the resolution which declared the throne
vacant.102 The show of Bishops, indeed, was scanty. The Primate
did not make his appearance; and his place was supplied by
Compton. On one side of Compton, the paten was carried by Lloyd,
Bishop of Saint Asaph, eminent among the seven confessors of the
preceding year. On the other side, Sprat, Bishop of Rochester,
lately a member of the High Commission, had charge of the
chalice. Burnet, the junior prelate, preached with all his wonted
ability, and more than his wonted taste and judgment. His grave
and eloquent discourse was polluted neither by adulation nor by
malignity. He is said to have been greatly applauded; and it may
well be believed that the animated peroration in which he
implored heaven to bless the royal pair with long life and mutual
love, with obedient subjects, wise counsellors, and faithful
allies, with gallant fleets and armies, with victory, with peace,
and finally with crowns more glorious and more durable than those
which then glittered on the altar of the Abbey, drew forth the
loudest hums of the Commons.103
On the whole the ceremony went off well, and produced something
like a revival, faint, indeed, and transient, of the enthusiasm
of the preceding December. The day was, in London and in many
other places, a day of general rejoicing. The churches were
filled in the morning: the afternoon was spent in sport and
carousing; and at night bonfires were lighted, rockets
discharged, and windows lighted up. The Jacobites however
contrived to discover or to invent abundant matter for scurrility
and sarcasm. They complained bitterly, that the way from the hall
to the western door of the Abbey had been lined by Dutch
soldiers. Was it seemly that an English king should enter into
the most solemn of engagements with the English nation behind a
triple hedge of foreign swords and bayonets? Little affrays, such
as, at every great pageant, almost inevitably take place between
those who are eager to see the show and those whose business it
is to keep the communications clear, were exaggerated with all
the artifices of rhetoric. One of the alien mercenaries had
backed his horse against an honest citizen who pressed forward to
catch a glimpse of the royal canopy. Another had rudely pushed
back a woman with the but end of his musket. On such grounds as
these the strangers were compared to those Lord Danes whose
insolence, in the old time, had provoked the Anglo-saxon
population to insurrection and massacre. But there was no more
fertile theme for censure than the coronation medal, which really
was absurd in design and mean in execution. A chariot appeared
conspicuous on the reverse; and plain people were at a loss to
understand what this emblem had to do with William and Mary. The
disaffected wits solved the difficulty by suggesting that the
artist meant to allude to that chariot which a Roman princess,
lost to all filial affection, and blindly devoted to the
interests of an ambitious husband, drove over the still warm
remains of her father.104
Honours were, as usual, liberally bestowed at this festive
season. Three garters which happened to be at the disposal of the
Crown were given to Devonshire, Ormond, and Schomberg. Prince
George was created Duke of Cumberland. Several eminent men took
new appellations by which they must henceforth be designated.
Danby became Marquess of Caermarthen, Churchill Earl of
Marlborough, and Bentinck Earl of Portland. Mordaunt was made
Earl of Monmouth, not without some murmuring on the part of old
Exclusionists, who still remembered with fondness their
Protestant Duke, and who had hoped that his attainder would be
reversed, and that his title would be borne by his descendants.
It was remarked that the name of Halifax did not appear in the
list of promotions. None could doubt that he might easily have
obtained either a blue riband or a ducal coronet; and, though he
was honourably distinguished from most of his contemporaries by
his scorn of illicit gain, it was well known that he desired
honorary distinctions with a greediness of which he was himself
ashamed, and which was unworthy of his fine understanding. The
truth is that his ambition was at this time chilled by his fears.
To those whom he trusted he hinted his apprehensions that evil
times were at hand. The King's life was not worth a year's
purchase: the government was disjointed, the clergy and the army
disaffected, the parliament torn by factions: civil war was
already raging in one part of the empire: foreign war was
impending. At such a moment a minister, whether Whig or Tory,
might well be uneasy; but neither Whig nor Tory had so much to
fear as the Trimmer, who might not improbably find himself the
common mark at which both parties would take aim. For these
reasons Halifax determined to avoid all ostentation of power and
influence, to disarm envy by a studied show of moderation, and to
attach to himself by civilities and benefits persons whose
gratitude might be useful in the event of a counterrevolution.
The next three months, he said, would be the time of trial. If
the government got safe through the summer it would probably
stand.105
Meanwhile questions of external policy were every day becoming
more and more important. The work at which William had toiled
indefatigably during many gloomy and anxious years was at length
accomplished. The great coalition was formed. It was plain that a
desperate conflict was at hand. The oppressor of Europe would
have to defend himself against England allied with Charles the
Second King of Spain, with the Emperor Leopold, and with the
Germanic and Batavian federations, and was likely to have no ally
except the Sultan, who was waging war against the House of
Austria on the Danube.
Lewis had, towards the close of the preceding year, taken his
enemies at a disadvantage, and had struck the first blow before
they were prepared to parry it. But that blow, though heavy, was
not aimed at the part where it might have been mortal. Had
hostilities been commenced on the Batavian frontier, William and
his army would probably have been detained on the continent, and
James might have continued to govern England. Happily, Lewis,
under an infatuation which many pious Protestants confidently
ascribed to the righteous judgment of God, had neglected the
point on which the fate of the whole civilised world depended,
and had made a great display of power, promptitude, and energy,
in a quarter where the most splendid achievements could produce
nothing more than an illumination and a Te Deum. A French army
under the command of Marshal Duras had invaded the Palatinate and
some of the neighbouring principalities. But this expedition,
though it had been completely successful, and though the skill
and vigour with which it had been conducted had excited general
admiration, could not perceptibly affect the event of the
tremendous struggle which was approaching. France would soon be
attacked on every side. It would be impossible for Duras long to
retain possession of the provinces which he had surprised and
overrun. An atrocious thought rose in the mind of Louvois, who,
in military affairs, had the chief sway at Versailles. He was a
man distinguished by zeal for what he thought the public
interests, by capacity, and by knowledge of all that related to
the administration of war, but of a savage and obdurate nature.
If the cities of the Palatinate could not be retained, they might
be destroyed. If the soil of the Palatinate was not to furnish
supplies to the French, it might be so wasted that it would at
least furnish no supplies to the Germans. The ironhearted
statesman submitted his plan, probably with much management and
with some disguise, to Lewis; and Lewis, in an evil hour for his
fame, assented. Duras received orders to turn one of the fairest
regions of Europe into a wilderness. Fifteen years earlier
Turenne had ravaged part of that fine country. But the ravages
committed by Turenne, though they have left a deep stain on his
glory, were mere sport in comparison with the horrors of this
second devastation. The French commander announced to near half a
million of human beings that he granted them three days of grace,
and that, within that time, they must shift for themselves. Soon
the roads and fields, which then lay deep in snow, were blackened
by innumerable multitudes of men, women, and children flying from
their homes. Many died of cold and hunger: but enough survived to
fill the streets of all the cities of Europe with lean and
squalid beggars, who had once been thriving farmers and
shopkeepers. Meanwhile the work of destruction began. The flames
went up from every marketplace, every hamlet, every parish
church, every country seat, within the devoted provinces. The
fields where the corn had been sown were ploughed up. The
orchards were hewn down. No promise of a harvest was left on the
fertile plains near what had once been Frankenthal. Not a vine,
not an almond tree, was to be seen on the slopes of the sunny
hills round what had once been Heidelberg. No respect was shown
to palaces, to temples, to monasteries, to infirmaries, to
beautiful works of art, to monuments of the illustrious dead. The
farfamed castle of the Elector Palatine was turned into a heap of
ruins. The adjoining hospital was sacked. The provisions, the
medicines, the pallets on which the sick lay were destroyed. The
very stones of which Mannheim had been built were flung into the
Rhine. The magnificent Cathedral of Spires perished, and with it
the marble sepulchres of eight Caesars. The coffins were broken
open. The ashes were scattered to the winds.106 Treves, with its
fair bridge, its Roman amphitheatre, its venerable churches,
convents, and colleges, was doomed to the same fate. But, before
this last crime had been perpetrated, Lewis was recalled to a
better mind by the execrations of all the neighbouring nations,
by the silence and confusion of his flatterers, and by the
expostulations of his wife. He had been more than two years
secretly married to Frances de Maintenon, the governess of his
natural children. It would be hard to name any woman who, with so
little romance in her temper, has had so much in her life. Her
early years had been passed in poverty and obscurity. Her first
husband had supported himself by writing burlesque farces and
poems. When she attracted the notice of her sovereign, she could
no longer boast of youth or beauty: but she possessed in an
extraordinary degree those more lasting charms, which men of
sense, whose passions age has tamed, and whose life is a life of
business and care, prize most highly in a female companion. Her
character was such as has been well compared to that soft green
on which the eye, wearied by warm tints and glaring lights,
reposes with pleasure. A just understanding; an inexhaustible yet
never redundant flow of rational, gentle, and sprightly
conversation; a temper of which the serenity was never for a
moment ruffled, a tact which surpassed the tact of her sex as
much as the tact of her sex surpasses the tact of ours; such were
the qualities which made the widow of a buffoon first the
confidential friend, and then the spouse, of the proudest and
most powerful of European kings. It was said that Lewis had been
with difficulty prevented by the arguments and vehement
entreaties of Louvois from declaring her Queen of France. It is
certain that she regarded Louvois as her enemy. Her hatred of
him, cooperating perhaps with better feelings, induced her to
plead the cause of the unhappy people of the Rhine. She appealed
to those sentiments of compassion which, though weakened by many
corrupting influences, were not altogether extinct in her
husband's mind, and to those sentiments of religion which had too
often impelled him to cruelty, but which, on the present
occasion, were on the side of humanity. He relented: and Treves
was spared.107 In truth he could hardly fail to perceive that he
had committed a great error. The devastation of the Palatinate,
while it had not in any sensible degree lessened the power of his
enemies, had inflamed their animosity, and had furnished them
with inexhaustible matter for invective. The cry of vengeance
rose on every side. Whatever scruple either branch of the House
of Austria might have felt about coalescing with Protestants was
completely removed. Lewis accused the Emperor and the Catholic
King of having betrayed the cause of the Church; of having allied
themselves with an usurper who was the avowed champion of the
great schism; of having been accessary to the foul wrong done to
a lawful sovereign who was guilty of no crime but zeal for the
true religion. James sent to Vienna and Madrid piteous letters,
in which he recounted his misfortunes, and implored the
assistance of his brother kings, his brothers also in the faith,
against the unnatural children and the rebellious subjects who
had driven him into exile. But there was little difficulty in
framing a plausible answer both to the reproaches of Lewis and to
the supplications of James. Leopold and Charles declared that
they had not, even for purposes of just selfdefence, leagued
themselves with heretics, till their enemy had, for purposes of
unjust aggression, leagued himself with Mahometans. Nor was this
the worst. The French King, not content with assisting the Moslem
against the Christians, was himself treating Christians with a
barbarity which would have shocked the very Moslem. His infidel
allies, to do them justice, had not perpetrated on the Danube
such outrages against the edifices and the members of the Holy
Catholic Church as he who called himself the eldest son of that
Church was perpetrating on the Rhine. On these grounds, the
princes to whom James had appealed replied by appealing, with
many professions of good will and compassion, to himself. He was
surely too just to blame them for thinking that it was their
first duty to defend their own people against such outrages as
had turned the Palatinate into a desert, or for calling in the
aid of Protestants against an enemy who had not scrupled to call
in the aid of the Turks.108
During the winter and the earlier part of the spring, the powers
hostile to France were gathering their strength for a great
effort, and were in constant communication with one another. As
the season for military operations approached, the solemn appeals
of injured nations to the God of battles came forth in rapid
succession. The manifesto of the Germanic body appeared in
February; that of the States General in March; that of the House
of Brandenburg in April; and that of Spain in May.109
Here, as soon as the ceremony of the coronation was over, the
House of Commons determined to take into consideration the late
proceedings of the French king.110 In the debate, that hatred of
the powerful, unscrupulous and imperious Lewis, which had, during
twenty years of vassalage, festered in the hearts of Englishmen,
broke violently forth. He was called the most Christian Turk, the
most Christian ravager of Christendom, the most Christian
barbarian who had perpetrated on Christians outrages of which his
infidel allies would have been ashamed.111 A committee,
consisting chiefly of ardent Whigs, was appointed to prepare an
address. John Hampden, the most ardent Whig among them, was put
into the chair; and he produced a composition too long, too
rhetorical, and too vituperative to suit the lips of the Speaker
or the ears of the King. Invectives against Lewis might perhaps,
in the temper in which the House then was, have passed without
censure, if they had not been accompanied by severe reflections
on the character and administration of Charles the Second, whose
memory, in spite of all his faults, was affectionately cherished
by the Tories. There were some very intelligible allusions to
Charles's dealings with the Court of Versailles, and to the
foreign woman whom that Court had sent to lie like a snake in his
bosom. The House was with good reason dissatisfied. The address
was recommitted, and, having been made more concise, and less
declamatory and acrimonious, was approved and presented.112
William's attention was called to the wrongs which France had
done to him and to his kingdom; and he was assured that, whenever
he should resort to arms for the redress of those wrongs, he
should be heartily supported by his people. He thanked the
Commons warmly. Ambition, he said, should never induce him to
draw the sword: but he had no choice: France had already attacked
England; and it was necessary to exercise the right of
selfdefence. A few days later war was proclaimed.113
Of the grounds of quarrel alleged by the Commons in their
address, and by the King in his manifesto, the most serious was
the interference of Lewis in the affairs of Ireland. In that
country great events had, during several months, followed one
another in rapid succession. Of those events it is now time to
relate the history, a history dark with crime and sorrow, yet
full of interest and instruction.
CHAPTER XII
State of Ireland at the Time of the Revolution; the Civil Power
in the Hands of the Roman Catholics--The Military Power in the
Hands of the Roman Catholics--Mutual Enmity between the Englishry
and Irishry--Panic among the Englishry--History of the Town of
Kenmare--Enniskillen--Londonderry--Closing of the Gates of
Londonderry--Mountjoy sent to pacify Ulster--William opens a
Negotiation with Tyrconnel--The Temples consulted--Richard
Hamilton sent to Ireland on his Parole--Tyrconnel sends Mountjoy
and Rice to France--Tyrconnel calls the Irish People to Arms--
Devastation of the Country--The Protestants in the South unable
to resist--Enniskillen and Londonderry hold out; Richard Hamilton
marches into Ulster with an Army--James determines to go to
Ireland--Assistance furnished by Lewis to James--Choice of a
French Ambassador to accompany James--The Count of Avaux--James
lands at Kinsale--James enters Cork--Journey of James from Cork
to Dublin--Discontent in England--Factions at Dublin Castle--
James determines to go to Ulster--Journey of James to Ulster--The
Fall of Londonderry expected--Succours arrive from England--
Treachery of Lundy; the Inhabitants of Londonderry resolve to
defend themselves--Their Character--Londonderry besieged--The
Siege turned into a Blockade--Naval Skirmish in Bantry Bay--A
Parliament summoned by James sits at Dublin--A Toleration Act
passed; Acts passed for the Confiscation of the Property of
Protestants--Issue of base Money--The great Act of Attainder--
James prorogues his Parliament; Persecution of the Protestants in
Ireland--Effect produced in England by the News from Ireland--
Actions of the Enniskilleners--Distress of Londonderry--
Expedition under Kirke arrives in Loch Foyle--Cruelty of Rosen--
The Famine in Londonderry extreme--Attack on the Boom--The Siege
of Londonderry raised--Operations against the Enniskilleners--
Battle of Newton Butler--Consternation of the Irish
WILLIAM had assumed, together with the title of King of England,
the title of King of Ireland. For all our jurists then regarded
Ireland as a mere colony, more important indeed than
Massachusetts, Virginia, or Jamaica, but, like Massachusetts,
Virginia, and Jamaica, dependent on the mother country, and bound
to pay allegiance to the Sovereign whom the mother country had
called to the throne.114
In fact, however, the Revolution found Ireland emancipated from
the dominion of the English colony. As early as the year 1686,
James had determined to make that island a place of arms which
might overawe Great Britain, and a place of refuge where, if any
disaster happened in Great Britain, the members of his Church
might find refuge. With this view he had exerted all his power
for the purpose of inverting the relation between the conquerors
and the aboriginal population. The execution of his design he had
intrusted, in spite of the remonstrances of his English
counsellors, to the Lord Deputy Tyrconnel. In the autumn of 1688,
the process was complete. The highest offices in the state, in
the army, and in the Courts of justice, were, with scarcely an
exception, filled by Papists. A pettifogger named Alexander
Fitton, who had been detected in forgery, who had been fined for
misconduct by the House of Lords at Westminster, who had been
many years in prison, and who was equally deficient in legal
knowledge and in the natural good sense and acuteness by which
the want of legal knowledge has sometimes been supplied, was Lord
Chancellor. His single merit was that he had apostatized from the
Protestant religion; and this merit was thought sufficient to
wash out even the stain of his Saxon extraction. He soon proved
himself worthy of the confidence of his patrons. On the bench of
justice he declared that there was not one heretic in forty
thousand who was not a villain. He often, after hearing a cause
in which the interests of his Church were concerned, postponed
his decision, for the purpose, as he avowed, of consulting his
spiritual director, a Spanish priest, well read doubtless in
Escobar.115 Thomas Nugent, a Roman Catholic who had never
distinguished himself at the bar except by his brogue and his
blunders, was Chief Justice of the King's Bench.116 Stephen Rice,
a Roman Catholic, whose abilities and learning were not disputed
even by the enemies of his nation and religion, but whose known
hostility to the Act of Settlement excited the most painful
apprehensions in the minds of all who held property under that
Act, was Chief Baron of the Exchequer.117 Richard Nagle, an acute
and well read lawyer, who had been educated in a Jesuit college,
and whose prejudices were such as might have been expected from
his education, was Attorney General.118
Keating, a highly respectable Protestant, was still Chief Justice
of the Common Pleas: but two Roman Catholic judges sate with him.
It ought to be added that one of those judges, Daly, was a man of
sense, moderation and integrity. The matters however which came
before the Court of Common Pleas were not of great moment. Even
the King's Bench was at this time almost deserted. The Court of
Exchequer overflowed with business; for it was the only court at
Dublin from which no writ of error lay to England, and
consequently the only court in which the English could be
oppressed and pillaged without hope of redress. Rice, it was
said, had declared that they should have from him exactly what
the law, construed with the utmost strictness, gave them, and
nothing more. What, in his opinion, the law, strictly construed,
gave them, they could easily infer from a saying which, before he
became a judge, was often in his mouth. "I will drive," he used
to say, "a coach and six through the Act of Settlement." He now
carried his threat daily into execution. The cry of all
Protestants was that it mattered not what evidence they produced
before him; that, when their titles were to be set aside, the
rankest forgeries, the most infamous witnesses, were sure to have
his countenance. To his court his countrymen came in multitudes
with writs of ejectment and writs of trespass. In his court the
government attacked at once the charters of all the cities and
boroughs in Ireland; and he easily found pretexts for pronouncing
all those charters forfeited. The municipal corporations, about a
hundred in number, had been instituted to be the strongholds of
the reformed religion and of the English interest, and had
consequently been regarded by the Irish Roman Catholics with an
aversion which cannot be thought unnatural or unreasonable. Had
those bodies been remodelled in a judicious and impartial manner,
the irregularity of the proceedings by which so desirable a
result had been attained might have been pardoned. But it soon
appeared that one exclusive system had been swept away only to
make room for another. The boroughs were subjected to the
absolute authority of the Crown. Towns in which almost every
householder was an English Protestant were placed under the
government of Irish Roman Catholics. Many of the new Aldermen had
never even seen the places over which they were appointed to bear
rule. At the same time the Sheriffs, to whom belonged the
execution of writs and the nomination of juries, were selected in
almost every instance from the caste which had till very recently
been excluded from all public trust. It was affirmed that some of
these important functionaries had been burned in the hand for
theft. Others had been servants to Protestants; and the
Protestants added, with bitter scorn, that it was fortunate for
the country when this was the case; for that a menial who had
cleaned the plate and rubbed down the horse of an English
gentleman might pass for a civilised being, when compared with
many of the native aristocracy whose lives had been spent in
coshering or marauding. To such Sheriffs no colonist, even if he
had been so strangely fortunate as to obtain a judgment, dared to
intrust an execution.119
Thus the civil power had, in the space of a few months, been
transferred from the Saxon to the Celtic population. The transfer
of the military power had been not less complete. The army,
which, under the command of Ormond, had been the chief safeguard
of the English ascendency, had ceased to exist. Whole regiments
had been dissolved and reconstructed. Six thousand Protestant
veterans, deprived of their bread, were brooding in retirement
over their wrongs, or had crossed the sea and joined the standard
of William. Their place was supplied by men who had long suffered
oppression, and who, finding themselves suddenly transformed from
slaves into masters, were impatient to pay back, with accumulated
usury, the heavy debt of injuries and insults. The new soldiers,
it was said, never passed an Englishman without cursing him and
calling him by some foul name. They were the terror of every
Protestant innkeeper; for, from the moment when they came under
his roof, they ate and drank every thing: they paid for nothing;
and by their rude swaggering they scared more respectable guests
from his door.120
Such was the state of Ireland when the Prince of Orange landed at
Torbay. From that time every packet which arrived at Dublin
brought tidings, such as could not but increase the mutual fear
and loathing of the hostile races. The colonist, who, after long
enjoying and abusing power, had now tasted for a moment the
bitterness of servitude, the native, who, having drunk to the
dregs all the bitterness of servitude, had at length for a moment
enjoyed and abused power, were alike sensible that a great
crisis, a crisis like that of 1641, was at hand. The majority
impatiently expected Phelim O'Neil to revive in Tyrconnel. The
minority saw in William a second Over.
On which side the first blow was struck was a question which
Williamites and Jacobites afterwards debated with much asperity.
But no question could be more idle. History must do to both
parties the justice which neither has ever done to the other, and
must admit that both had fair pleas and cruel provocations. Both
had been placed, by a fate for which neither was answerable, in
such a situation that, human nature being what it is, they could
not but regard each other with enmity. During three years the
government which might have reconciled them had systematically
employed its whole power for the purpose of inflaming their
enmity to madness. It was now impossible to establish in Ireland
a just and beneficent government, a government which should know
no distinction of race or of sect, a government which, while
strictly respecting the rights guaranteed by law to the new
landowners, should alleviate by a judicious liberality the
misfortunes of the ancient gentry. Such a government James might
have established in the day of his power. But the opportunity had
passed away: compromise had become impossible: the two infuriated
castes were alike convinced that it was necessary to oppress or
to be oppressed, and that there could be no safety but in
victory, vengeance, and dominion. They agreed only in spurning
out of the way every mediator who sought to reconcile them.
During some weeks there were outrages, insults, evil reports,
violent panics, the natural preludes of the terrible conflict
which was at hand. A rumour spread over the whole island that, on
the ninth of December, there would be a general massacre of the
Englishry. Tyrconnel sent for the chief Protestants of Dublin to
the Castle, and, with his usual energy of diction, invoked on
himself all the vengeance of heaven if the report was not a
cursed, a blasted, a confounded lie. It was said that, in his
rage at finding his oaths ineffectual, he pulled off his hat and
wig, and flung them into the fire.121 But lying Dick Talbot was
so well known that his imprecations and gesticulations only
strengthened the apprehension which they were meant to allay.
Ever since the recall of Clarendon there had been a large
emigration of timid and quiet people from the Irish ports to
England. That emigration now went on faster than ever. It was not
easy to obtain a passage on board of a well built or commodious
vessel. But many persons, made bold by the excess of fear, and
choosing rather to trust the winds and waves than the exasperated
Irishry, ventured to encounter all the dangers of Saint George's
Channel and of the Welsh coast in open boats and in the depth of
winter. The English who remained began, in almost every county,
to draw close together. Every large country house became a
fortress. Every visitor who arrived after nightfall was
challenged from a loophole or from a barricaded window; and, if
he attempted to enter without pass words and explanations, a
blunderbuss was presented to him. On the dreaded night of the
ninth of December, there was scarcely one Protestant mansion from
the Giant's Causeway to Bantry Bay in which armed men were not
watching and lights burning from the early sunset to the late
sunrise.122
A minute account of what passed in one district at this time has
come down to us, and well illustrates the general state of the
kingdom. The south-western part of Kerry is now well known as the
most beautiful tract in the British isles. The mountains, the
glens, the capes stretching far into the Atlantic, the crags on
which the eagles build, the rivulets brawling down rocky passes,
the lakes overhung by groves in which the wild deer find covert,
attract every summer crowds of wanderers sated with the business
and the pleasures of great cities. The beauties of that country
are indeed too often hidden in the mist and rain which the west
wind brings up from a boundless ocean. But, on the rare days when
the sun shines out in all his glory, the landscape has a
freshness and a warmth of colouring seldom found in our latitude.
The myrtle loves the soil. The arbutus thrives better than even
on the sunny shore of Calabria.123 The turf is of livelier hue
than elsewhere: the hills glow with a richer purple: the varnish
of the holly and ivy is more glossy; and berries of a brighter
red peep through foliage of a brighter green. But during the
greater part of the seventeenth century, this paradise was as
little known to the civilised world as Spitzbergen or Greenland.
If ever it was mentioned, it was mentioned as a horrible desert,
a chaos of bogs, thickets, and precipices, where the she wolf
still littered, and where some half naked savages, who could not
speak a word of English, made themselves burrows in the mud, and
lived on roots and sour milk.124
At length, in the year 1670, the benevolent and enlightened Sir
William Petty determined to form an English settlement in this
wild district. He possessed a large domain there, which has
descended to a posterity worthy of such an ancestor. On the
improvement of that domain he expended, it was said, not less
than ten thousand pounds. The little town which he founded, named
from the bay of Kenmare, stood at the head of that bay, under a
mountain ridge, on the summit of which travellers now stop to
gaze upon the loveliest of the three lakes of Killarney. Scarcely
any village, built by an enterprising band of New Englanders, far
from the dwellings of their countrymen, in the midst of the
hunting grounds of the Red Indians, was more completely out of
the pale of civilisation than Kenmare. Between Petty's settlement
and the nearest English habitation the journey by land was of two
days through a wild and dangerous country. Yet the place
prospered. Forty-two houses were erected. The population amounted
to a hundred and eighty. The land round the town was well
cultivated. The cattle were numerous. Two small barks were
employed in fishing and trading along the coast. The supply of
herrings, pilchards, mackerel, and salmon was plentiful, and
would have been still more plentiful, had not the beach been, in
the finest part of the year, covered by multitudes of seals,
which preyed on the fish of the bay. Yet the seal was not an
unwelcome visitor: his fur was valuable,; and his oil supplied
light through the long nights of winter. An attempt was made with
great success to set up iron works. It was not yet the practice
to employ coal for the purpose of smelting; and the manufacturers
of Kent and Sussex had much difficulty in procuring timber at a
reasonable price. The neighbourhood of Kenmare was then richly
wooded; and Petty found it a gainful speculation to send ore
thither. The lovers of the picturesque still regret the woods of
oak and arbutus which were cut down to feed his furnaces. Another
scheme had occurred to his active and intelligent mind. Some of
the neighbouring islands abounded with variegated marble, red and
white, purple and green. Petty well knew at what cost the ancient
Romans had decorated their baths and temples with many coloured
columns hewn from Laconian and African quarries; and he seems to
have indulged the hope that the rocks of his wild domain in Kerry
might furnish embellishments to the mansions of Saint James's
Square, and to the choir of Saint Paul's Cathedral.125
From the first, the settlers had found that they must be prepared
to exercise the right of selfdefence to an extent which would
have been unnecessary and unjustifiable in a well governed
country. The law was altogether without force in the highlands
which lie on the south of the vale of Tralee. No officer of
justice willingly ventured into those parts. One pursuivant who
in 1680 attempted to execute a warrant there was murdered. The
people of Kenmare seem however to have been sufficiently secured
by their union, their intelligence and their spirit, till the
close of the year 1688. Then at length the effects of the policy
of Tyrconnel began to be felt ever, in that remote corner of
Ireland. In the eyes of the peasantry of Munster the colonists
were aliens and heretics. The buildings, the boats, the machines,
the granaries, the dairies, the furnaces, were doubtless
contemplated by the native race with that mingled envy and
contempt with which the ignorant naturally regard the triumphs of
knowledge. Nor is it at all improbable that the emigrants had
been guilty of those faults from which civilised men who settle
among an uncivilised people are rarely free. The power derived
from superior intelligence had, we may easily believe, been
sometimes displayed with insolence, and sometimes exerted with
injustice. Now therefore, when the news spread from altar to
altar, and from cabin to cabin, that the strangers were to be
driven out, and that their houses and lands were to be given as a
booty to the children of the soil, a predatory war commenced.
Plunderers, thirty, forty, seventy in a troop, prowled round the
town, some with firearms, some with pikes. The barns were robbed.
The horses were stolen. In one foray a hundred and forty cattle
were swept away and driven off through the ravines of Glengariff.
In one night six dwellings were broken open and pillaged. At last
the colonists, driven to extremity, resolved to die like men
rather than be murdered in their beds. The house built by Petty
for his agent was the largest in the place. It stood on a rocky
peninsula round which the waves of the bay broke. Here the whole
population assembled, seventy-five fighting men, with about a
hundred women and children. They had among them sixty firelocks,
and as many pikes and swords. Round the agent's house they threw
up with great speed a wall of turf fourteen feet in height and
twelve in thickness. The space enclosed was about half an acre.
Within this rampart all the arms, the ammunition and the
provisions of the settlement were collected, and several huts of
thin plank were built. When these preparations were completed,
the men of Kenmare began to make vigorous reprisals on their
Irish neighbours, seized robbers, recovered stolen property, and
continued during some weeks to act in all things as an
independent commonwealth. The government was carried on by
elective officers, to whom every member of the society swore
fidelity on the Holy Gospels.126
While the people of the small town of Kenmare were thus
bestirring themselves, similar preparations for defence were made
by larger communities on a larger scale. Great numbers of
gentlemen and yeomen quitted the open country, and repaired to
those towns which had been founded and incorporated for the
purpose of bridling the native population, and which, though
recently placed under the government of Roman Catholic
magistrates, were still inhabited chiefly by Protestants. A
considerable body of armed colonists mustered at Sligo, another
at Charleville, a third at Marlow, a fourth still more formidable
at Bandon.127 But the principal strongholds of the Englishry
during this evil time were Enniskillen and Londonderry.
Enniskillen, though the capital of the county of Fermanagh, was
then merely a village. It was built on an island surrounded by
the river which joins the two beautiful sheets of water known by
the common name of Lough Erne. The stream and both the lakes were
overhung on every side by natural forests. Enniskillen consisted
of about eighty dwellings clustering round an ancient castle. The
inhabitants were, with scarcely an exception, Protestants, and
boasted that their town had been true to the Protestant cause
through the terrible rebellion which broke out in 1641. Early in
December they received from Dublin an intimation that two
companies of Popish infantry were to be immediately quartered on
them. The alarm of the little community was great, and the
greater because it was known that a preaching friar had been
exerting himself to inflame the Irish population of the
neighbourhood against the heretics. A daring resolution was
taken. Come what might, the troops should not be admitted. Yet
the means of defence were slender. Not ten pounds of powder, not
twenty firelocks fit for use, could be collected within the
walls. Messengers were sent with pressing letters to summon the
Protestant gentry of the vicinage to the rescue; and the summons
was gallantly obeyed. In a few hours two hundred foot and a
hundred and fifty horse had assembled. Tyrconnel's soldiers were
already at hand. They brought with them a considerable supply of
arms to be distributed among the peasantry. The peasantry greeted
the royal standard with delight, and accompanied the march in
great numbers. The townsmen and their allies, instead of waiting
to be attacked, came boldly forth to encounter the intruders. The
officers of James had expected no resistance. They were
confounded when they saw confronting them a column of foot,
flanked by a large body of mounted gentlemen and yeomen. The
crowd of camp followers ran away in terror. The soldiers made a
retreat so precipitate that it might be called a flight, and
scarcely halted till they were thirty miles off at Cavan.128
The Protestants, elated by this easy victory, proceeded to make
arrangements for the government and defence of Enniskillen and of
the surrounding country. Gustavus Hamilton, a gentleman who had
served in the army, but who had recently been deprived of his
commission by Tyrconnel, and had since been living on an estate
in Fermanagh, was appointed Governor, and took up his residence
in the castle. Trusty men were enlisted, and armed with great
expedition. As there was a scarcity of swords and pikes, smiths
were employed to make weapons by fastening scythes on poles. All
the country houses round Lough Erne were turned into garrisons.
No Papist was suffered to be at large in the town; and the friar
who was accused of exerting his eloquence against the Englishry
was thrown into prison.129
The other great fastness of Protestantism was a place of more
importance. Eighty years before, during the troubles caused by
the last struggle of the houses of O'Neil and O'Donnel against
the authority of James the First, the ancient city of Derry had
been surprised by one of the native chiefs: the inhabitants had
been slaughtered, and the houses reduced to ashes. The insurgents
were speedily put down and punished: the government resolved to
restore the ruined town: the Lord Mayor, Aldermen, and Common
Council of London were invited to assist in the work; and King
James the First made over to them in their corporate capacity the
ground covered by the ruins of the old Derry, and about six
thousand English acres in the neighbourhood.130
This country, then uncultivated and uninhabited, is now enriched
by industry, embellished by taste, and pleasing even to eyes
accustomed to the well tilled fields and stately manor houses of
England. A new city soon arose which, on account of its
connection with the capital of the empire, was called
Londonderry. The buildings covered the summit and slope of a hill
which overlooked the broad stream of the Foyle, then whitened by
vast flocks of wild swans.131 On the highest ground stood the
Cathedral, a church which, though erected when the secret of
Gothic architecture was lost, and though ill qualified to sustain
a comparison with the awful temples of the middle ages, is not
without grace and dignity. Near the Cathedral rose the palace of
the Bishop, whose see was one of the most valuable in Ireland.
The city was in form nearly an ellipse; and the principal streets
formed a cross, the arms of which met in a square called the
Diamond. The original houses have been either rebuilt or so much
repaired that their ancient character can no longer be traced;
but many of them were standing within living memory. They were in
general two stories in height; and some of them had stone
staircases on the outside. The dwellings were encompassed by a
wall of which the whole circumference was little less than a
mile. On the bastions were planted culverins and sakers presented
by the wealthy guilds of London to the colony. On some of these
ancient guns, which have done memorable service to a great cause,
the devices of the Fishmongers' Company, of the Vintners'
Company, and of the Merchant Tailors' Company are still
discernible.132
The inhabitants were Protestants of Anglosaxon blood. They were
indeed not all of one country or of one church but Englishmen and
Scotchmen, Episcopalians and Presbyterians, seem to have
generally lived together in friendship, a friendship which is
sufficiently explained by their common antipathy to the Irish
race and to the Popish religion. During the rebellion of 1641,
Londonderry had resolutely held out against the native
chieftains, and had been repeatedly besieged in vain.133 Since
the Restoration the city had prospered. The Foyle, when the tide
was high, brought up ships of large burden to the quay. The
fisheries throve greatly. The nets, it was said, were sometimes
so full that it was necessary to fling back multitudes of fish
into the waves. The quantity of salmon caught annually was
estimated at eleven hundred thousand pounds' weight.134
The people of Londonderry shared in the alarm which, towards the
close of the year 1688, was general among the Protestants settled
in Ireland. It was known that the aboriginal peasantry of the
neighbourhood were laying in pikes and knives. Priests had been
haranguing in a style of which, it must be owned, the Puritan
part of the Anglosaxon colony had little right to complain, about
the slaughter of the Amalekites, and the judgments which Saul had
brought on himself by sparing one of the proscribed race. Rumours
from various quarters and anonymous letters in various hands
agreed in naming the ninth of December as the day fixed for the
extirpation of the strangers. While the minds of the citizens
were agitated by these reports, news came that a regiment of
twelve hundred Papists, commanded by a Papist, Alexander
Macdonnell, Earl of Antrim, had received orders from the Lord
Deputy to occupy Londonderry, and was already on the march from
Coleraine. The consternation was extreme. Some were for closing
the gates and resisting; some for submitting; some for
temporising. The corporation had, like the other corporations of
Ireland, been remodelled. The magistrates were men of low station
and character. Among them was only one person of Anglosaxon
extraction; and he had turned Papist. In such rulers the
inhabitants could place no confidence.135 The Bishop, Ezekiel
Hopkins, resolutely adhered to the doctrine of nonresistance,
which he had preached during many years, and exhorted his flock
to go patiently to the slaughter rather than incur the guilt of
disobeying the Lord's Anointed.136 Antrim was meanwhile drawing
nearer and nearer. At length the citizens saw from the walls his
troops arrayed on the opposite shore of the Foyle. There was then
no bridge: but there was a ferry which kept up a constant
communication between the two banks of the river; and by this
ferry a detachment from Antrim's regiment crossed. The officers
presented themselves at the gate, produced a warrant directed to
the Mayor and Sheriffs, and demanded admittance and quarters for
his Majesty's soldiers.
Just at this moment thirteen young apprentices, most of whom
appear, from their names, to have been of Scottish birth or
descent, flew to the guard room, armed themselves, seized the
keys of the city, rushed to the Ferry Gate, closed it in the face
of the King's officers, and let down the portcullis. James
Morison, a citizen more advanced in years, addressed the
intruders from the top of the wall and advised them to be gone.
They stood in consultation before the gate till they heard him
cry, "Bring a great gun this way." They then thought it time to
get beyond the range of shot. They retreated, reembarked, and
rejoined their comrades on the other side of the river. The flame
had already spread. The whole city was up. The other gates were
secured. Sentinels paced the ramparts everywhere. The magazines
were opened. Muskets and gunpowder were distributed. Messengers
were sent, under cover of the following night, to the Protestant
gentlemen of the neighbouring counties. The bishop expostulated
in vain. It is indeed probable that the vehement and daring young
Scotchmen who had taken the lead on this occasion had little
respect for his office. One of them broke in on a discourse with
which he interrupted the military preparations by exclaiming, "A
good sermon, my lord; a very good sermon; but we have not time to
hear it just now."137
The Protestants of the neighbourhood promptly obeyed the summons
of Londonderry. Within forty-eight hours hundreds of horse and
foot came by various roads to the city. Antrim, not thinking
himself strong enough to risk an attack, or not disposed to take
on himself the responsibility of commencing a civil war without
further orders, retired with his troops to Coleraine.
It might have been expected that the resistance of Enniskillen
and Londonderry would have irritated Tyrconnel into taking some
desperate step. And in truth his savage and imperious temper was
at first inflamed by the news almost to madness. But, after
wreaking his rage, as usual, on his wig, he became somewhat
calmer. Tidings of a very sobering nature had just reached him.
The Prince of Orange was marching unopposed to London. Almost
every county and every great town in England had declared for
him. James, deserted by his ablest captains and by his nearest
relatives, had sent commissioners to treat with the invaders, and
had issued writs convoking a Parliament. While the result of the
negotiations which were pending in England was uncertain, the
Viceroy could not venture to take a bloody revenge on the
refractory Protestants of Ireland. He therefore thought it
expedient to affect for a time a clemency and moderation which
were by no means congenial to his disposition. The task of
quieting the Englishry of Ulster was intrusted to William
Stewart, Viscount Mountjoy. Mountjoy, a brave soldier, an
accomplished scholar, a zealous Protestant, and yet a zealous
Tory, was one of the very few members of the Established Church
who still held office in Ireland. He was Master of the Ordnance
in that kingdom, and was colonel of a regiment in which an
uncommonly large proportion of the Englishry had been suffered to
remain. At Dublin he was the centre of a small circle of learned
and ingenious men who had, under his presidency, formed
themselves into a Royal Society, the image, on a small scale, of
the Royal Society of London. In Ulster, with which he was
peculiarly connected, his name was held in high honour by the
colonists.138 He hastened with his regiment to Londonderry, and
was well received there. For it was known that, though he was
firmly attached to hereditary monarchy, he was not less firmly
attached to the reformed religion. The citizens readily permitted
him to leave within their walls a small garrison exclusively
composed of Protestants, under the command of his lieutenant
colonel, Robert Lundy, who took the title of Governor.139
The news of Mountjoy's visit to Ulster was highly gratifying to
the defenders of Enniskillen. Some gentlemen deputed by that town
waited on him to request his good offices, but were disappointed
by the reception which they found. "lily advice to you is," he
said, "to submit to the King's authority." "What, my Lord?" said
one of the deputies; "Are we to sit still and let ourselves be
butchered?" "The King," said Mountjoy, "will protect you." "If
all that we hear be true," said the deputy, "his Majesty will
find it hard enough to protect himself." The conference ended in
this unsatisfactory manner. Enniskillen still kept its attitude
of defiance; and Mountjoy returned to Dublin.140
By this time it had indeed become evident that James could not
protect himself. It was known in Ireland that he had fled; that
he had been stopped; that he had fled again; that the Prince of
Orange had arrived at Westminster in triumph, had taken on
himself the administration of the realm, and had issued letters
summoning a Convention.
Those lords and gentlemen at whose request the Prince had assumed
the government, had earnestly intreated him to take the state of
Ireland into his immediate consideration; and he had in reply
assured them that he would do his best to maintain the Protestant
religion and the English interest in that kingdom. His enemies
afterwards accused him of utterly disregarding this promise: nay,
they alleged that he purposely suffered Ireland to sink deeper
and deeper in calamity. Halifax, they said, had, with cruel and
perfidious ingenuity, devised this mode of placing the Convention
under a species of duress; and the trick had succeeded but too
well. The vote which called William to the throne would not have
passed so easily but for the extreme dangers which threatened the
state; and it was in consequence of his own dishonest inactivity
that those dangers had become extreme.141 As this accusation
rests on no proof, those who repeat it are at least bound to show
that some course clearly better than the course which William
took was open to him; and this they will find a difficult task.
If indeed he could, within a few weeks after his arrival in
London, have sent a great expedition to Ireland, that kingdom
might perhaps, after a short struggle, or without a struggle,
have submitted to his authority; and a long series of crimes and
calamities might have been averted. But the factious orators and
pamphleteers, who, much at their ease, reproached him for not
sending such an expedition, would have been perplexed if they had
been required to find the men, the ships, and the funds. The
English army had lately been arrayed against him: part of it was
still ill disposed towards him; and the whole was utterly
disorganized. Of the army which he had brought from Holland not a
regiment could be spared. He had found the treasury empty and the
pay of the navy in arrear. He had no power to hypothecate any
part of the public revenue. Those who lent him money lent it on
no security but his bare word. It was only by the patriotic
liberality of the merchants of London that he was enabled to
defray the ordinary charges of government till the meeting of the
Convention. It is surely unjust to blame him for not instantly
fitting out, in such circumstances, an armament sufficient to
conquer a kingdom.
Perceiving that, till the government of England was settled, it
would not be in his power to interfere effectually by arms in the
affairs of Ireland, he determined to try what effect negotiation
would produce. Those who judged after the event pronounced that
he had not, on this occasion, shown his usual sagacity. He ought,
they said, to have known that it was absurd to expect submission
from Tyrconnel. Such however was not at the time the opinion of
men who had the best means of information, and whose interest was
a sufficient pledge for their sincerity. A great meeting of
noblemen and gentlemen who had property in Ireland was held,
during the interregnum, at the house of the Duke of Ormond in
Saint James's Square. They advised the Prince to try whether the
Lord Deputy might not be induced to capitulate on honourable and
advantageous terms.142 In truth there is strong reason to believe
that Tyrconnel really wavered. For, fierce as were his passions,
they never made him forgetful of his interest; and he might well
doubt whether it were not for his interest, in declining years
and health, to retire from business with full indemnity for all
past offences, with high rank and with an ample fortune, rather
than to stake his life and property on the event of a war against
the whole power of England. It is certain that he professed
himself willing to yield. He opened a communication with the
Prince of Orange, and affected to take counsel with Mountjoy, and
with others who, though they had not thrown off their allegiance
to James, were yet firmly attached to the Established Church and
to the English connection.
In one quarter, a quarter from which William was justified in
expecting the most judicious counsel, there was a strong
conviction that the professions of Tyrconnel were sincere. No
British statesman had then so high a reputation throughout Europe
as Sir William Temple. His diplomatic skill had, twenty years
before, arrested the progress of the French power. He had been a
steady and an useful friend to the United Provinces and to the
House of Nassau. He had long been on terms of friendly confidence
with the Prince of Orange, and had negotiated that marriage to
which England owed her recent deliverance. With the affairs of
Ireland Temple was supposed to be peculiarly well acquainted. His
family had considerable property there: he had himself resided
there during several years: he had represented the county of
Carlow in parliament; and a large part of his income was derived
from a lucrative Irish office. There was no height of power, of
rank, or of opulence, to which he might not have risen, if he
would have consented to quit his retreat, and to lend his
assistance and the weight of his name to the new government. But
power, rank, and opulence had less attraction for his Epicurean
temper than ease and security. He rejected the most tempting
invitations, and continued to amuse himself with his books, his
tulips, and his pineapples, in rural seclusion. With some
hesitation, however, he consented to let his eldest son John
enter into the service of William. During the vacancy of the
throne, John Temple was employed in business of high importance;
and, on subjects connected with Ireland, his opinion, which might
reasonably be supposed to agree with his father's, had great
weight. The young politician flattered himself that he had
secured the services of an agent eminently qualified to bring the
negotiation with Tyrconnel to a prosperous issue.
This agent was one of a remarkable family which had sprung from a
noble Scottish stock, but which had long been settled in Ireland,
and which professed the Roman Catholic religion. In the gay crowd
which thronged Whitehall, during those scandalous years of
jubilee which immediately followed the Restoration, the Hamiltons
were preeminently conspicuous. The long fair ringlets, the
radiant bloom, and the languishing blue eyes of the lovely
Elizabeth still charm us on the canvass of Lely. She had the
glory of achieving no vulgar conquest. It was reserved for her
voluptuous beauty and for her flippant wit to overcome the
aversion which the coldhearted and scoffing Grammont felt for the
indissoluble tie. One of her brothers, Anthony, became the
chronicler of that brilliant and dissolute society of which he
had been one of the most brilliant and most dissolute members. He
deserves the high praise of having, though not a Frenchman,
written the book which is, of all books, the most exquisitely
French, both in spirit and in manner. Another brother, named
Richard, had, in foreign service, gained some military
experience. His wit and politeness had distinguished him even in
the splendid circle of Versailles. It was whispered that he had
dared to lift his eyes to an exalted lady, the natural daughter
of the Great King, the wife of a legitimate prince of the House
of Bourbon, and that she had not seemed to be displeased by the
attentions of her presumptuous admirer.143 The adventurer had
subsequently returned to his native country, had been appointed
Brigadier General in the Irish army, and had been sworn of the
Irish Privy Council. When the Dutch invasion was expected, he
came across Saint George's Channel with the troops which
Tyrconnel sent to reinforce the royal army. After the flight of
James, those troops submitted to the Prince of Orange. Richard
Hamilton not only made his own peace with what was now the ruling
power, but declared himself confident that, if he were sent to
Dublin, he could conduct the negotiation which had been opened
there to a happy close. If he failed, he pledged his word to
return to London in three weeks. His influence in Ireland was
known to be great: his honour had never been questioned; and he
was highly esteemed by the Temple family. John Temple declared
that he would answer for Richard Hamilton as for himself. This
guarantee was thought sufficient; and Hamilton set out for
Ireland, assuring his English friends that he should soon bring
Tyrconnel to reason. The offers which he was authorised to make
to the Roman Catholics and to the Lord Deputy personally were
most liberal.144
It is not impossible that Hamilton may have really meant to
perform his promise. But when he arrived at Dublin he found that
he had undertaken a task which was beyond his power. The
hesitation of Tyrconnel, whether genuine or feigned, was at an
end. He had found that he had no longer a choice. He had with
little difficulty stimulated the ignorant and susceptible Irish
to fury. To calm them was beyond his skill. Rumours were abroad
that the Viceroy was corresponding with the English; and these
rumours had set the nation on fire. The cry of the common people
was that, if he dared to sell them for wealth and honours, they
would burn the Castle and him in it, and would put themselves
under the protection of France.145 It was necessary for him to
protest, truly or falsely, that he had never harboured any
thought of submission, and that he had pretended to negotiate
only for the purpose of gaining time. Yet, before he openly
declared against the English settlers, and against England
herself, what must be a war to the death, he wished to rid
himself of Mountjoy, who had hitherto been true to the cause of
James, but who, it was well known, would never consent to be a
party to the spoliation and oppression of the colonists.
Hypocritical professions of friendship and of pacific intentions
were not spared. It was a sacred duty, Tyrconnel said, to avert
the calamities which seemed to be impending. King James himself,
if he understood the whole case, would not wish his Irish friends
to engage at that moment in an enterprise which must be fatal to
them and useless to him. He would permit them, he would command
them, to submit to necessity, and to reserve themselves for
better times. If any man of weight, loyal, able, and well
informed, would repair to Saint Germains and explain the state of
things, his Majesty would easily be convinced. Would Mountjoy
undertake this most honourable and important mission? Mountjoy
hesitated, and suggested that some person more likely to be
acceptable to the King should be the messenger. Tyrconnel swore,
ranted, declared that, unless King James were well advised,
Ireland would sink to the pit of hell, and insisted that Mountjoy
should go as the representative of the loyal members of the
Established Church, and should be accompanied by Chief Baron
Rice, a Roman Catholic high in the royal favour. Mountjoy
yielded. The two ambassadors departed together, but with very
different commissions. Rice was charged to tell James that
Mountjoy was a traitor at heart, and had been sent to France only
that the Protestants of Ireland might be deprived of a favourite
leader. The King was to be assured that he was impatiently
expected in Ireland, and that, if he would show himself there
with a French force, he might speedily retrieve his fallen
fortunes.146 The Chief Baron carried with him other instructions
which were probably kept secret even from the Court of Saint
Germains. If James should be unwilling to put himself at the head
of the native population of Ireland, Rice was directed to request
a private audience of Lewis, and to offer to make the island a
province of France.147
As soon as the two envoys had departed, Tyrconnel set himself to
prepare for the conflict which had become inevitable; and he was
strenuously assisted by the faithless Hamilton. The Irish nation
was called to arms; and the call was obeyed with strange
promptitude and enthusiasm. The flag on the Castle of Dublin was
embroidered with the words, "Now or never: now and for ever:" and
those words resounded through the whole island.148 Never in
modern Europe has there been such a rising up of a whole people.
The habits of the Celtic peasant were such that he made no
sacrifice in quitting his potatoe ground for the camp. He loved
excitement and adventure. He feared work far more than danger.
His national and religious feelings had, during three years, been
exasperated by the constant application of stimulants. At every
fair and market he had heard that a good time was at hand, that
the tyrants who spoke Saxon and lived in slated houses were about
to be swept away, and that the land would again belong to its own
children. By the peat fires of a hundred thousand cabins had
nightly been sung rude ballads which predicted the deliverance of
the oppressed race. The priests, most of whom belonged to those
old families which the Act of Settlement had ruined, but which
were still revered by the native population, had, from a thousand
altars, charged every Catholic to show his zeal for the true
Church by providing weapons against the day when it might be
necessary to try the chances of battle in her cause. The army,
which, under Ormond, had consisted of only eight regiments, was
now increased to forty-eight: and the ranks were soon full to
overflowing. It was impossible to find at short notice one tenth
of the number of good officers which was required. Commissions
were scattered profusely among idle cosherers who claimed to be
descended from good Irish families. Yet even thus the supply of
captains and lieutenants fell short of the demand; and many
companies were commanded by cobblers, tailors and footmen.149
The pay of the soldiers was very small. The private had only
threepence a day. One half only of this pittance was ever given
him in money; and that half was often in arrear. But a far more
seductive bait than his miserable stipend was the prospect of
boundless license. If the government allowed him less than
sufficed for his wants, it was not extreme to mark the means by
which he supplied the deficiency. Though four fifths of the
population of Ireland were Celtic and Roman Catholic, more than
four fifths of the property of Ireland belonged to the Protestant
Englishry. The garners, the cellars, above all the flocks and
herds of the minority, were abandoned to the majority. Whatever
the regular troops spared was devoured by bands of marauders who
overran almost every barony in the island. For the arming was now
universal. No man dared to present himself at mass without some
weapon, a pike, a long knife called a skean, or, at the very
least, a strong ashen stake, pointed and hardened in the fire.
The very women were exhorted by their spiritual directors to
carry skeans. Every smith, every carpenter, every cutler, was at
constant work on guns and blades. It was scarcely possible to get
a horse shod. If any Protestant artisan refused to assist in the
manufacture of implements which were to be used against his
nation and his religion, he was flung into prison. It seems
probable that, at the end of February, at least a hundred
thousand Irishmen were in arms. Near fifty thousand of them were
soldiers. The rest were banditti, whose violence and
licentiousness the Government affected to disapprove, but did not
really exert itself to suppress. The Protestants not only were
not protected, but were not suffered to protect themselves. It
was determined that they should be left unarmed in the midst of
an armed and hostile population. A day was fixed on which they
were to bring all their swords and firelocks to the parish
churches; and it was notified that every Protestant house in
which, after that day, a weapon should be found should be given
up to be sacked by the soldiers. Bitter complaints were made that
any knave might, by hiding a spear head or an old gun barrel in a
corner of a mansion, bring utter ruin on the owner.150
Chief Justice Keating, himself a Protestant, and almost the only
Protestant who still held a great place in Ireland, struggled
courageously in the cause of justice and order against the united
strength of the government and the populace. At the Wicklow
assizes of that spring, he, from the seat of judgment, set forth
with great strength of language the miserable state of the
country. Whole counties, he said, were devastated by a rabble
resembling the vultures and ravens which follow the march of an
army. Most of these wretches were not soldiers. They acted under
no authority known to the law. Yet it was, he owned, but too
evident that they were encouraged and screened by some who were
in high command. How else could it be that a market overt for
plunder should be held within a short distance of the capital?
The stories which travellers told of the savage Hottentots near
the Cape of Good Hope were realised in Leinster. Nothing was more
common than for an honest man to lie down rich in flocks and
herds acquired by the industry of a long life, and to wake a
beggar. It was however to small purpose that Keating attempted,
in the midst of that fearful anarchy, to uphold the supremacy of
the law. Priests and military chiefs appeared on the bench for
the purpose of overawing the judge and countenancing the robbers.
One ruffian escaped because no prosecutor dared to appear.
Another declared that he had armed himself in conformity to the
orders of his spiritual guide, and to the example of many persons
of higher station than himself, whom he saw at that moment in
Court. Two only of the Merry Boys, as they were called, were
convicted: the worst criminals escaped; and the Chief justice
indignantly told the jurymen that the guilt of the public ruin
lay at their door.151
When such disorder prevailed in Wicklow, it is easy to imagine
what must have been the state of districts more barbarous and
more remote from the seat of government. Keating appears to have
been the only magistrate who strenuously exerted himself to put
the law in force. Indeed Nugent, the Chief justice of the highest
criminal court of the realm, declared on the bench at Cork that,
without violence and spoliation, the intentions of the Government
could not be carried into effect, and that robbery must at that
conjuncture be tolerated as a necessary evil.152
The destruction of property which took place within a few weeks
would be incredible, if it were not attested by witnesses
unconnected with each other and attached to very different
interests. There is a close, and sometimes almost a verbal,
agreement between the description given by Protestants, who,
during that reign of terror, escaped, at the hazard of their
lives, to England, and the descriptions given by the envoys,
commissaries, and captains of Lewis. All agreed in declaring that
it would take many years to repair the waste which had been
wrought in a few weeks by the armed peasantry.153 Some of the
Saxon aristocracy had mansions richly furnished, and sideboards
gorgeous with silver bowls and chargers. All this wealth
disappeared. One house, in which there had been three thousand
pounds' worth of plate, was left without a spoon.154 But the
chief riches of Ireland consisted in cattle. Innumerable flocks
and herds covered that vast expanse of emerald meadow, saturated
with the moisture of the Atlantic. More than one gentleman
possessed twenty thousand sheep and four thousand oxen. The
freebooters who now overspread the country belonged to a class
which was accustomed to live on potatoes and sour whey, and which
had always regarded meat as a luxury reserved for the rich. These
men at first revelled in beef and mutton, as the savage invaders,
who of old poured down from the forests of the north on Italy,
revelled in Massic and Falernian wines. The Protestants described
with contemptuous disgust the strange gluttony of their newly
liberated slaves. The carcasses, half raw and half burned to
cinders, sometimes still bleeding, sometimes in a state of
loathsome decay, were torn to pieces and swallowed without salt,
bread, or herbs. Those marauders who preferred boiled meat, being
often in want of kettles, contrived to boil the steer in his own
skin. An absurd tragicomedy is still extant, which was acted in
this and the following year at some low theatre for the amusement
of the English populace. A crowd of half naked savages appeared
on the stage, howling a Celtic song and dancing round an ox. They
then proceeded to cut steaks out of the animal while still alive
and to fling the bleeding flesh on the coals. In truth the
barbarity and filthiness of the banquets of the Rapparees was
such as the dramatists of Grub Street could scarcely caricature.
When Lent began, the plunderers generally ceased to devour, but
continued to destroy. A peasant would kill a cow merely in order
to get a pair of brogues. Often a whole flock of sheep, often a
herd of fifty or sixty kine, was slaughtered: the beasts were
flayed; the fleeces and hides were carried away; and the bodies
were left to poison the air. The French ambassador reported to
his master that, in six weeks, fifty thousand horned cattle had
been slain in this manner, and were rotting on the ground all
over the country. The number of sheep that were butchered during
the same time was popularly said to have been three or four
hundred thousand.155
Any estimate which can now be framed of the value of the property
destroyed during this fearful conflict of races must necessarily
be very inexact. We are not however absolutely without materials
for such an estimate. The Quakers were neither a very numerous
nor a very opulent class. We can hardly suppose that they were
more than a fiftieth part of the Protestant population of
Ireland, or that they possessed more than a fiftieth part of the
Protestant wealth of Ireland. They were undoubtedly better
treated than any other Protestant sect. James had always been
partial to them: they own that Tyrconnel did his best to protect
them; and they seem to have found favour even in the sight of the
Rapparees.156 Yet the Quakers computed their pecuniary losses at
a hundred thousand pounds.157
In Leinster, Munster and Connaught, it was utterly impossible for
the English settlers, few as they were and dispersed, to offer
any effectual resistance to this terrible outbreak of the
aboriginal population. Charleville, Mallow, Sligo, fell into the
hands of the natives. Bandon, where the Protestants had mustered
in considerable force, was reduced by Lieutenant General
Macarthy, an Irish officer who was descended from one of the most
illustrious Celtic houses, and who had long served, under a
feigned name, in the French Army.158 The people of Kenmare held
out in their little fastness till they were attacked by three
thousand regular soldiers, and till it was known that several
pieces of ordnance were coming to batter down the turf wall which
surrounded the agent's house. Then at length a capitulation was
concluded. The colonists were suffered to embark in a small
vessel scantily supplied with food and water. They had no
experienced navigator on board: but after a voyage of a
fortnight, during which they were crowded together like slaves in
a Guinea ship, and suffered the extremity of thirst and hunger,
they reached Bristol in safety.159 When such was the fate of the
towns, it was evident that the country seats which the Protestant
landowners had recently fortified in the three southern provinces
could no longer be defended. Many families submitted, delivered
up their arms, and thought themselves happy in escaping with
life. But many resolute and highspirited gentlemen and yeomen
were determined to perish rather than yield. They packed up such
valuable property as could easily be carried away, burned
whatever they could not remove, and, well armed and mounted, set
out for those spots in Ulster which were the strongholds of their
race and of their faith. The flower of the Protestant population
of Munster and Connaught found shelter at Enniskillen. Whatever
was bravest and most truehearted in Leinster took the road to
Londonderry.160
The spirit of Enniskillen and Londonderry rose higher and higher
to meet the danger. At both places the tidings of what had been
done by the Convention at Westminster were received with
transports of joy. William and Mary were proclaimed at
Enniskillen with unanimous enthusiasm, and with such pomp as the
little town could furnish.161 Lundy, who commanded at
Londonderry, could not venture to oppose himself to the general
sentiment of the citizens and of his own soldiers. He therefore
gave in his adhesion to the new government, and signed a
declaration by which he bound himself to stand by that
government, on pain of being considered a coward and a traitor. A
vessel from England soon brought a commission from William and
Mary which confirmed him in his office.162
To reduce the Protestants of Ulster to submission before aid
could arrive from England was now the chief object of Tyrconnel.
A great force was ordered to move northward, under the command of
Richard Hamilton. This man had violated all the obligations which
are held most sacred by gentlemen and soldiers, had broken faith
with his friends the Temples, had forfeited his military parole,
and was now not ashamed to take the field as a general against
the government to which he was bound to render himself up as a
prisoner. His march left on the face of the country traces which
the most careless eye could not during many years fail to
discern. His army was accompanied by a rabble, such as Keating
had well compared to the unclean birds of prey which swarm
wherever the scent of carrion is strong. The general professed
himself anxious to save from ruin and outrage all Protestants who
remained quietly at their homes; and he most readily gave them
protections tinder his hand. But these protections proved of no
avail; and he was forced to own that, whatever power he might be
able to exercise over his soldiers, he could not keep order among
the mob of campfollowers. The country behind him was a
wilderness; and soon the country before him became equally
desolate. For at the fame of his approach the colonists burned
their furniture, pulled down their houses, and retreated
northward. Some of them attempted to make a stand at Dromore, but
were broken and scattered. Then the flight became wild and
tumultuous. The fugitives broke down the bridges and burned the
ferryboats. Whole towns, the seats of the Protestant population,
were left in ruins without one inhabitant. The people of Omagh
destroyed their own dwellings so utterly that no roof was left to
shelter the enemy from the rain and wind. The people of Cavan
migrated in one body to Enniskillen. The day was wet and stormy.
The road was deep in mire. It was a piteous sight to see, mingled
with the armed men, the women and children weeping, famished, and
toiling through the mud up to their knees. All Lisburn fled to
Antrim; and, as the foes drew nearer, all Lisburn and Antrim
together came pouring into Londonderry. Thirty thousand
Protestants, of both sexes and of every age, were crowded behind
the bulwarks of the City of Refuge. There, at length, on the
verge of the ocean, hunted to the last asylum, and baited into a
mood in which men may be destroyed, but will not easily be
subjugated, the imperial race turned desperately to bay.163
Meanwhile Mountjoy and Rice had arrived in France. Mountjoy was
instantly put under arrest and thrown into the Bastile. James
determined to comply with the invitation which Rice had brought,
and applied to Lewis for the help of a French army. But Lewis,
though he showed, as to all things which concerned the personal
dignity and comfort of his royal guests, a delicacy even
romantic, and a liberality approaching to profusion, was
unwilling to send a large body of troops to Ireland. He saw that
France would have to maintain a long war on the Continent against
a formidable coalition: her expenditure must be immense; and,
great as were her resources, he felt it to be important that
nothing should be wasted. He doubtless regarded with sincere
commiseration and good will the unfortunate exiles to whom he had
given so princely a welcome. Yet neither commiseration nor good
will could prevent him from speedily discovering that his brother
of England was the dullest and most perverse of human beings. The
folly of James, his incapacity to read the characters of men and
the signs of the times, his obstinacy, always most offensively
displayed when wisdom enjoined concession, his vacillation,
always exhibited most pitiably in emergencies which required
firmness, had made him an outcast from England, and might, if his
counsels were blindly followed, bring great calamities on France.
As a legitimate sovereign expelled by rebels, as a confessor of
the true faith persecuted by heretics, as a near kinsman of the
House of Bourbon, who had seated himself on the hearth of that
House, he was entitled to hospitality, to tenderness, to respect.
It was fit that he should have a stately palace and a spacious
forest, that the household troops should salute him with the
highest military honours, that he should have at his command all
the hounds of the Grand Huntsman and all the hawks of the Grand
Falconer. But, when a prince, who, at the head of a great fleet
and army, had lost an empire without striking a blow, undertook
to furnish plans for naval and military expeditions; when a
prince, who had been undone by his profound ignorance of the
temper of his own countrymen, of his own soldiers, of his own
domestics, of his own children, undertook to answer for the zeal
and fidelity of the Irish people, whose language he could not
speak, and on whose land he had never set his foot; it was
necessary to receive his suggestions with caution. Such were the
sentiments of Lewis; and in these sentiments he was confirmed by
his Minister of War Louvois, who, on private as well as on public
grounds, was unwilling that James should be accompanied by a
large military force. Louvois hated Lauzun. Lauzun was favourite
at Saint Germains. He wore the garter, a badge of honour which
has very seldom been conferred on aliens who were not sovereign
princes. It was believed indeed at the French Court that, in
order to distinguish him from the other knights of the most
illustrious of European orders, he had been decorated with that
very George which Charles the First had, on the scaffold, put
into the hands of Juxon.164 Lauzun had been encouraged to hope
that, if French forces were sent to Ireland, he should command
them; and this ambitious hope Louvois was bent on
disappointing.165
An army was therefore for the present refused; but every thing
else was granted. The Brest fleet was ordered to be in readiness
to sail. Arms for ten thousand men and great quantities of
ammunition were put on board. About four hundred captains,
lieutenants, cadets and gunners were selected for the important
service of organizing and disciplining the Irish levies. The
chief command was held by a veteran warrior, the Count of Rosen.
Under him were Maumont, who held the rank of lieutenant general,
and a brigadier named Pusignan. Five hundred thousand crowns in
gold, equivalent to about a hundred and twelve thousand pounds
sterling, were sent to Brest.166 For James's personal comforts
provision was made with anxiety resembling that of a tender
mother equipping her son for a first campaign. The cabin
furniture, the camp furniture, the tents, the bedding, the plate,
were luxurious and superb. Nothing, which could be agreeable or
useful to the exile was too costly for the munificence, or too
trifling for the attention, of his gracious and splendid host. On
the fifteenth of February, James paid a farewell visit to
Versailles. He was conducted round the buildings and plantations
with every mark of respect and kindness. The fountains played in
his honour. It was the season of the Carnival; and never had the
vast palace and the sumptuous gardens presented a gayer aspect.
In the evening the two kings, after a long and earnest conference
in private, made their appearance before a splendid circle of
lords and ladies. "I hope," said Lewis, in his noblest and most
winning manner, "that we are about to part, never to meet again
in this world. That is the best wish that I can form for you.
But, if any evil chance should force you to return, be assured
that you will find me to the last such as you have found me
hitherto." On the seventeenth Lewis paid in return a farewell
visit to Saint Germains. At the moment of the parting embrace he
said, with his most amiable smile: "We have forgotten one thing,
a cuirass for yourself. You shall have mine." The cuirass was
brought, and suggested to the wits of the Court ingenious
allusions to the Vulcanian panoply which Achilles lent to his
feebler friend. James set out for Brest; and his wife, overcome
with sickness and sorrow, shut herself up with her child to weep
and pray.167
James was accompanied or speedily followed by several of his own
subjects, among whom the most distinguished were his son Berwick,
Cartwright Bishop of Chester, Powis, Dover, and Melfort. Of all
the retinue, none was so odious to the people of Great Britain as
Melfort. He was an apostate: he was believed by many to be an
insincere apostate; and the insolent, arbitrary and menacing
language of his state papers disgusted even the Jacobites. He was
therefore a favourite with his master: for to James unpopularity,
obstinacy, and implacability were the greatest recommendations
that a statesman could have.
What Frenchman should attend the King of England in the character
of ambassador had been the subject of grave deliberation at
Versailles. Barillon could not be passed over without a marked
slight. But his selfindulgent habits, his want of energy, and,
above all, the credulity with which he had listened to the
professions of Sunderland, had made an unfavourable impression on
the mind of Lewis. What was to be done in Ireland was not work
for a trifler or a dupe. The agent of France in that kingdom must
be equal to much more than the ordinary functions of an envoy. It
would be his right and his duty to offer advice touching every
part of the political and military administration of the country
in which he would represent the most powerful and the most
beneficent of allies. Barillon was therefore passed over. He
affected to bear his disgrace with composure. His political
career, though it had brought great calamities both on the House
of Stuart and on the House of Bourbon, had been by no means
unprofitable to himself. He was old, he said: he was fat: he did
not envy younger men the honour of living on potatoes and whiskey
among the Irish bogs; he would try to console himself with
partridges, with champagne, and with the society of the wittiest
men and prettiest women of Paris. It was rumoured, however that
he was tortured by painful emotions which he was studious to
conceal: his health and spirits failed; and he tried to find
consolation in religious duties. Some people were much edified by
the piety of the old voluptuary: but others attributed his death,
which took place not long after his retreat from public life, to
shame and vexation.168
The Count of Avaux, whose sagacity had detected all the plans of
William, and who had vainly recommended a policy which would
probably have frustrated them, was the man on whom the choice of
Lewis fell. In abilities Avaux had no superior among the numerous
able diplomatists whom his country then possessed. His demeanour
was singularly pleasing, his person handsome, his temper bland.
His manners and conversation were those of a gentleman who had
been bred in the most polite and magnificent of all Courts, who
had represented that Court both in Roman Catholic and Protestant
countries, and who had acquired in his wanderings the art of
catching the tone of any society into which chance might throw
him. He was eminently vigilant and adroit, fertile in resources,
and skilful in discovering the weak parts of a character. His own
character, however, was not without its weak parts. The
consciousness that he was of plebeian origin was the torment of
his life. He pined for nobility with a pining at once pitiable
and ludicrous. Able, experienced and accomplished as he was, he
sometimes, under the influence of this mental disease, descended
to the level of Moliere's Jourdain, and entertained malicious
observers with scenes almost as laughable as that in which the
honest draper was made a Mamamouchi.169 It would have been well
if this had been the worst. But it is not too much to say that of
the difference between right and wrong Avaux had no more notion
than a brute. One sentiment was to him in the place of religion
and morality, a superstitious and intolerant devotion to the
Crown which he served. This sentiment pervades all his
despatches, and gives a colour to all his thoughts and words.
Nothing that tended to promote the interest of the French
monarchy seemed to him a crime. Indeed he appears to have taken
it for granted that not only Frenchmen, but all human beings,
owed a natural allegiance to the House of Bourbon, and that
whoever hesitated to sacrifice the happiness and freedom of his
own native country to the glory of that House was a traitor.
While he resided at the Hague, he always designated those
Dutchmen who had sold themselves to France as the well
intentioned party. In the letters which he wrote from Ireland,
the same feeling appears still more strongly. He would have been
a more sagacious politician if he had sympathized more with those
feelings of moral approbation and disapprobation which prevail
among the vulgar. For his own indifference to all considerations
of justice and mercy was such that, in his schemes, he made no
allowance for the consciences and sensibilities of his
neighbours. More than once he deliberately recommended wickedness
so horrible that wicked men recoiled from it with indignation.
But they could not succeed even in making their scruples
intelligible to him. To every remonstrance he listened with a
cynical sneer, wondering within himself whether those who
lectured him were such fools as they professed to be, or were
only shamming.
Such was the man whom Lewis selected to be the companion and
monitor of James. Avaux was charged to open, if possible, a
communication with the malecontents in the English Parliament;
and he was authorised to expend, if necessary, a hundred thousand
crowns among them.
James arrived at Brest on the fifth of March, embarked there on
board of a man of war called the Saint Michael, and sailed within
forty-eight hours. He had ample time, however, before his
departure, to exhibit some of the faults by which he had lost
England and Scotland, and by which he was about to lose Ireland.
Avaux wrote from the harbour of Brest that it would not be easy
to conduct any important business in concert with the King of
England. His Majesty could not keep any secret from any body. The
very foremast men of the Saint Michael had already heard him say
things which ought to have been reserved for the ears of his
confidential advisers.170
The voyage was safely and quietly performed; and, on the
afternoon of the twelfth of March, James landed in the harbour of
Kinsale. By the Roman Catholic population he was received with
shouts of unfeigned transport. The few Protestants who remained
in that part of the country joined in greeting him, and perhaps
not insincerely. For, though an enemy of their religion, he was
not an enemy of their nation; and they might reasonably hope that
the worst king would show somewhat more respect for law and
property than had been shown by the Merry Boys and Rapparees. The
Vicar of Kinsale was among those who went to pay their duty: he
was presented by the Bishop of Chester, and was not ungraciously
received.171
James learned that his cause was prospering. In the three
southern provinces of Ireland the Protestants were disarmed, and
were so effectually bowed down by terror that he had nothing to
apprehend from them. In the North there was some show of
resistance: but Hamilton was marching against the malecontents;
and there was little doubt that they would easily be crushed. A
day was spent at Kinsale in putting the arms and ammunition out
of reach of danger. Horses sufficient to carry a few travellers
were with some difficulty procured; and, on the fourteenth of
March, James proceeded to Cork.172
We should greatly err if we imagined that the road by which he
entered that city bore any resemblance to the stately approach
which strikes the traveller of the nineteenth century with
admiration. At present Cork, though deformed by many miserable
relics of a former age, holds no mean place among the ports of
the empire. The shipping is more than half what the shipping of
London was at the time of the Revolution. The customs exceed the
whole revenue which the whole kingdom of Ireland, in the most
peaceful and prosperous times, yielded to the Stuarts. The town
is adorned by broad and well built streets, by fair gardens, by a
Corinthian portico which would do honour to Palladio, and by a
Gothic college worthy to stand in the High Street of Oxford. In
1689, the city extended over about one tenth part of the space
which it now covers, and was intersected by muddy streams, which
have long been concealed by arches and buildings. A desolate
marsh, in which the sportsman who pursued the waterfowl sank deep
in water and mire at every step, covered the area now occupied by
stately buildings, the palaces of great commercial societies.
There was only a single street in which two wheeled carriages
could pass each other. From this street diverged to right and
left alleys squalid and noisome beyond the belief of those who
have formed their notions of misery from the most miserable parts
of Saint Giles's and Whitechapel. One of these alleys, called,
and, by comparison, justly called, Broad Lane, is about ten feet
wide. From such places, now seats of hunger and pestilence,
abandoned to the most wretched of mankind, the citizens poured
forth to welcome James. He was received with military honours by
Macarthy, who held the chief command in Munster.
It was impossible for the King to proceed immediately to Dublin;
for the southern counties had been so completely laid waste by
the banditti whom the priests had called to arms, that the means
of locomotion were not easily to be procured. Horses had become
rarities: in a large district there were only two carts; and
those Avaux pronounced good for nothing. Some days elapsed before
the money which had been brought from France, though no very
formidable mass, could be dragged over the few miles which
separated Cork from Kinsale.173
While the King and his Council were employed in trying to procure
carriages and beasts, Tyrconnel arrived from Dublin. He held
encouraging language. The opposition of Enniskillen he seems to
have thought deserving of little consideration. Londonderry, he
said, was the only important post held by the Protestants; and
even Londonderry would not, in his judgment, hold out many days.
At length James was able to leave Cork for the capital. On the
road, the shrewd and observant Avaux made many remarks. The first
part of the journey was through wild highlands, where it was not
strange that there should be few traces of art and industry. But,
from Kilkenny to the gates of Dublin, the path of the travellers
lay over gently undulating ground rich with natural verdure. That
fertile district should have been covered with flocks and herds,
orchards and cornfields: but it was an unfilled and unpeopled
desert. Even in the towns the artisans were very few.
Manufactured articles were hardly to be found, and if found could
be procured only at immense prices.174 The truth was that most of
the English inhabitants had fled, and that art, industry, and
capital had fled with them.
James received on his progress numerous marks of the goodwill of
the peasantry; but marks such as, to men bred in the courts of
France and England, had an uncouth and ominous appearance. Though
very few labourers were seen at work in the fields, the road was
lined by Rapparees armed with skeans, stakes, and half pikes, who
crowded to look upon the deliverer of their race. The highway
along which he travelled presented the aspect of a street in
which a fair is held. Pipers came forth to play before him in a
style which was not exactly that of the French opera; and the
villagers danced wildly to the music. Long frieze mantles,
resembling those which Spenser had, a century before, described
as meet beds for rebels, and apt cloaks for thieves, were spread
along the path which the cavalcade was to tread; and garlands, in
which cabbage stalks supplied the place of laurels, were offered
to the royal hand. The women insisted on kissing his Majesty; but
it should seem that they bore little resemblance to their
posterity; for this compliment was so distasteful to him that he
ordered his retinue to keep them at a distance.175
On the twenty-fourth of March he entered Dublin. That city was
then, in extent and population, the second in the British isles.
It contained between six and seven thousand houses, and probably
above thirty thousand inhabitants.176 In wealth and beauty,
however, Dublin was inferior to many English towns. Of the
graceful and stately public buildings which now adorn both sides
of the Liffey scarcely one had been even projected. The College,
a very different edifice from that which now stands on the same
site, lay quite out of the city.177 The ground which is at
present occupied by Leinster House and Charlemont House, by
Sackville Street and Merrion Square, was open meadow. Most of the
dwellings were built of timber, and have long given place to more
substantial edifices. The Castle had in 1686 been almost
uninhabitable. Clarendon had complained that he knew of no
gentleman in Pall Mall who was not more conveniently and
handsomely lodged than the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. No public
ceremony could be performed in a becoming manner under the
Viceregal roof. Nay, in spite of constant glazing and tiling, the
rain perpetually drenched the apartments.178 Tyrconnel, since he
became Lord Deputy, had erected a new building somewhat more
commodious. To this building the King was conducted in state
through the southern part of the city. Every exertion had been
made to give an air of festivity and splendour to the district
which he was to traverse. The streets, which were generally deep
in mud, were strewn with gravel. Boughs and flowers were
scattered over the path.
Tapestry and arras hung from the windows of those who could
afford to exhibit such finery. The poor supplied the place of
rich stuffs with blankets and coverlids. In one place was
stationed a troop of friars with a cross; in another a company of
forty girls dressed in white and carrying nosegays. Pipers and
harpers played "The King shall enjoy his own again." The Lord
Deputy carried the sword of state before his master. The Judges,
the Heralds, the Lord Mayor and Aldermen, appeared in all the
pomp of office. Soldiers were drawn up on the right and left to
keep the passages clear. A procession of twenty coaches belonging
to public functionaries was mustered. Before the Castle gate, the
King was met by the host under a canopy borne by four bishops of
his church. At the sight he fell on his knees, and passed some
time in devotion. He then rose and was conducted to the chapel of
his palace, once--such are the vicissitudes of human things--the
riding house of Henry Cromwell. A Te Deum was performed in honour
of his Majesty's arrival. The next morning he held a Privy
Council, discharged Chief Justice Keating from any further
attendance at the board, ordered Avaux and Bishop Cartwright to
be sworn in, and issued a proclamation convoking a Parliament to
meet at Dublin on the seventh of May.179
When the news that James had arrived in Ireland reached London,
the sorrow and alarm were general, and were mingled with serious
discontent. The multitude, not making sufficient allowance for
the difficulties by which William was encompassed on every side,
loudly blamed his neglect. To all the invectives of the ignorant
and malicious he opposed, as was his wont, nothing but immutable
gravity and the silence of profound disdain. But few minds had
received from nature a temper so firm as his; and still fewer had
undergone so long and so rigorous a discipline. The reproaches
which had no power to shake his fortitude, tried from childhood
upwards by both extremes of fortune, inflicted a deadly wound on
a less resolute heart.
While all the coffeehouses were unanimously resolving that a
fleet and army ought to have been long before sent to Dublin, and
wondering how so renowned a politician as his Majesty could have
been duped by Hamilton and Tyrconnel, a gentleman went down to
the Temple Stairs, called a boat, and desired to be pulled to
Greenwich. He took the cover of a letter from his pocket,
scratched a few lines with a pencil, and laid the paper on the
seat with some silver for his fare. As the boat passed under the
dark central arch of London Bridge, he sprang into the water and
disappeared. It was found that he had written these words: "My
folly in undertaking what I could not execute hath done the King
great prejudice which cannot be stopped--No easier way for me
than this--May his undertakings prosper--May he have a blessing."
There was no signature; but the body was soon found, and proved
to be that of John Temple. He was young and highly accomplished:
he was heir to an honourable name; he was united to an amiable
woman: he was possessed of an ample fortune; and he had in
prospect the greatest honours of the state. It does not appear
that the public had been at all aware to what an extent he was
answerable for the policy which had brought so much obloquy on
the government. The King, stern as he was, had far too great a
heart to treat an error as a crime. He had just appointed the
unfortunate young man Secretary at War; and the commission was
actually preparing. It is not improbable that the cold
magnanimity of the master was the very thing which made the
remorse of the servant insupportable.180
But, great as were the vexations which William had to undergo,
those by which the temper of his father-in-law was at this time
tried were greater still. No court in Europe was distracted by
more quarrels and intrigues than were to be found within the
walls of Dublin Castle. The numerous petty cabals which sprang
from the cupidity, the jealousy, and the malevolence of
individuals scarcely deserve mention. But there was one cause of
discord which has been too little noticed, and which is the key
to much that has been thought mysterious in the history of those
times.
Between English Jacobitism and Irish Jacobitism there was nothing
in common. The English Jacobite was animated by a strong
enthusiasm for the family of Stuart; and in his zeal for the
interests of that family he too often forgot the interests of the
state. Victory, peace, prosperity, seemed evils to the stanch
nonjuror of our island if they tended to make usurpation popular
and permanent. Defeat, bankruptcy, famine, invasion, were, in his
view, public blessings, if they increased the chance of a
restoration. He would rather have seen his country the last of
the nations under James the Second or James the Third, than the
mistress of the sea, the umpire between contending potentates,
the seat of arts, the hive of industry, under a prince of the
House of Nassau or of Brunswick.
The sentiments of the Irish Jacobite were very different, and, it
must in candour be acknowledged, were of a nobler character. The
fallen dynasty was nothing to him. He had not, like a Cheshire or
Shropshire cavalier, been taught from his cradle to consider
loyalty to that dynasty as the first duty of a Christian and a
gentleman. All his family traditions, all the lessons taught him
by his foster mother and by his priests, had been of a very
different tendency. He had been brought up to regard the foreign
sovereigns of his native land with the feeling with which the Jew
regarded Caesar, with which the Scot regarded Edward the First,
with which the Castilian regarded Joseph Buonaparte, with which
the Pole regards the Autocrat of the Russias. It was the boast of
the highborn Milesian that, from the twelfth century to the
seventeenth, every generation of his family had been in arms
against the English crown. His remote ancestors had contended
with Fitzstephen and De Burgh. His greatgrandfather had cloven
down the soldiers of Elizabeth in the battle of the Blackwater.
His grandfather had conspired with O'Donnel against James the
First. His father had fought under Sir Phelim O'Neill against
Charles the First. The confiscation of the family estate had been
ratified by an Act of Charles the Second. No Puritan, who had
been cited before the High Commission by Laud, who had charged
under Cromwell at Naseby, who had been prosecuted under the
Conventicle Act, and who had been in hiding on account of the Rye
House Plot, bore less affection to the House of Stuart than the
O'Haras and Macmahons, on whose support the fortunes of that
House now seemed to depend.
The fixed purpose of these men was to break the foreign yoke, to
exterminate the Saxon colony, to sweep away the Protestant
Church, and to restore the soil to its ancient proprietors. To
obtain these ends they would without the smallest scruple have
risen up against James; and to obtain these ends they rose up for
him. The Irish Jacobites, therefore, were not at all desirous
that he should again reign at Whitehall: for they could not but
be aware that a Sovereign of Ireland, who was also Sovereign of
England, would not, and, even if he would, could not, long
administer the government of the smaller and poorer kingdom in
direct opposition to the feeling of the larger and richer. Their
real wish was that the Crowns might be completely separated, and
that their island might, whether under James or without James
they cared little, form a distinct state under the powerful
protection of France.
While one party in the Council at Dublin regarded James merely as
a tool to be employed for achieving the deliverance of Ireland,
another party regarded Ireland merely as a tool to be employed
for effecting the restoration of James. To the English and Scotch
lords and gentlemen who had accompanied him from Brest, the
island in which they sojourned was merely a stepping stone by
which they were to reach Great Britain. They were still as much
exiles as when they were at Saint Germains; and indeed they
thought Saint Germains a far more pleasant place of exile than
Dublin Castle. They had no sympathy with the native population of
the remote and half barbarous region to which a strange chance
had led them. Nay, they were bound by common extraction and by
common language to that colony which it was the chief object of
the native population to root out. They had indeed, like the
great body of their countrymen, always regarded the aboriginal
Irish with very unjust contempt, as inferior to other European
nations, not only in acquired knowledge, but in natural
intelligence and courage; as born Gibeonites who had been
liberally treated, in being permitted to hew wood and to draw
water for a wiser and mightier people. These politicians also
thought,--and here they were undoubtedly in the right,--that, if
their master's object was to recover the throne of England, it
would be madness in him to give himself up to the guidance of the
O's and the Macs who regarded England with mortal enmity. A law
declaring the crown of Ireland independent, a law transferring
mitres, glebes, and tithes from the Protestant to the Roman
Catholic Church, a law transferring ten millions of acres from
Saxons to Celts, would doubtless be loudly applauded in Clare and
Tipperary. But what would be the effect of such laws at
Westminster? What at Oxford? It would be poor policy to alienate
such men as Clarendon and Beaufort, Ken and Sherlock, in order to
obtain the applause of the Rapparees of the Bog of Allen.181
Thus the English and Irish factions in the Council at Dublin were
engaged in a dispute which admitted of no compromise. Avaux
meanwhile looked on that dispute from a point of view entirely
his own. His object was neither the emancipation of Ireland nor
the restoration of James, but the greatness of the French
monarchy. In what way that object might be best attained was a
very complicated problem. Undoubtedly a French statesman could
not but wish for a counterrevolution in England. The effect of
such a counterrevolution would be that the power which was the
most formidable enemy of France would become her firmest ally,
that William would sink into insignificance, and that the
European coalition of which he was the chief would be dissolved.
But what chance was there of such a counterrevolution? The
English exiles indeed, after the fashion of exiles, confidently
anticipated a speedy return to their country. James himself
loudly boasted that his subjects on the other side of the water,
though they had been misled for a moment by the specious names of
religion, liberty, and property, were warmly attached to him, and
would rally round him as soon as he appeared among them. But the
wary envoy tried in vain to discover any foundation for these
hopes. He was certain that they were not warranted by any
intelligence which had arrived from any part of Great Britain;
and he considered them as the mere daydreams of a feeble mind. He
thought it unlikely that the usurper, whose ability and
resolution he had, during an unintermitted conflict of ten years,
learned to appreciate, would easily part with the great prize
which had been won by such strenuous exertions and profound
combinations. It was therefore necessary to consider what
arrangements would be most beneficial to France, on the
supposition that it proved impossible to dislodge William from
England. And it was evident that, if William could not be
dislodged from England, the arrangement most beneficial to France
would be that which had been contemplated eighteen months before
when James had no prospect of a male heir. Ireland must be
severed from the English crown, purged of the English colonists,
reunited to the Church of Rome, placed under the protection of
the House of Bourbon, and made, in every thing but name, a French
province. In war, her resources would be absolutely at the
command of her Lord Paramount. She would furnish his army with
recruits. She would furnish his navy with fine harbours
commanding all the great western outlets of the English trade.
The strong national and religious antipathy with which her
aboriginal population regarded the inhabitants of the
neighbouring island would be a sufficient guarantee for their
fidelity to that government which could alone protect her against
the Saxon.
On the whole, therefore, it appeared to Avaux that, of the two
parties into which the Council at Dublin was divided, the Irish
party was that which it was for the interest of France to
support. He accordingly connected himself closely with the chiefs
of that party, obtained from them the fullest avowals of all that
they designed, and was soon able to report to his government that
neither the gentry nor the common people were at all unwilling to
become French.182
The views of Louvois, incomparably the greatest statesman that
France had produced since Richelieu, seem to have entirely agreed
with those of Avaux. The best thing, Louvois wrote, that King
James could do would be to forget that he had reigned in Great
Britain, and to think only of putting Ireland into a good
condition, and of establishing himself firmly there. Whether this
were the true interest of the House of Stuart may be doubted. But
it was undoubtedly the true interest of the House of Bourbon.183
About the Scotch and English exiles, and especially about
Melfort, Avaux constantly expressed himself with an asperity
hardly to have been expected from a man of so much sense and
experience. Melfort was in a singularly unfortunate position. He
was a renegade: he was a mortal enemy of the liberties of his
country: he was of a bad and tyrannical nature; and yet he was,
in some sense, a patriot. The consequence was that he was more
universally detested than any man of his time. For, while his
apostasy and his arbitrary maxims of government made him the
abhorrence of England and Scotland, his anxiety for the dignity
and integrity of the empire made him the abhorrence of the Irish
and of the French.
The first question to be decided was whether James should remain
at Dublin, or should put himself at the head of his army in
Ulster. On this question the Irish and British factions joined
battle. Reasons of no great weight were adduced on both sides;
for neither party ventured to speak out. The point really in
issue was whether the King should be in Irish or in British
hands. If he remained at Dublin, it would be scarcely possible
for him to withhold his assent from any bill presented to him by
the Parliament which he had summoned to meet there. He would be
forced to plunder, perhaps to attaint, innocent Protestant
gentlemen and clergymen by hundreds; and he would thus do
irreparable mischief to his cause on the other side of Saint
George's Channel. If he repaired to Ulster, he would be within a
few hours' sail of Great Britain. As soon as Londonderry had
fallen, and it was universally supposed that the fall of
Londonderry could not be long delayed, he might cross the sea
with part of his forces, and land in Scotland, where his friends
were supposed to be numerous. When he was once on British ground,
and in the midst of British adherents, it would no longer be in
the power of the Irish to extort his consent to their schemes of
spoliation and revenge.
The discussions in the Council were long and warm. Tyrconnel, who
had just been created a Duke, advised his master to stay in
Dublin. Melfort exhorted his Majesty to set out for Ulster. Avaux
exerted all his influence in support of Tyrconnel; but James,
whose personal inclinations were naturally on the British side of
the question, determined to follow the advice of Melfort.184
Avaux was deeply mortified. In his official letters he expressed
with great acrimony his contempt for the King's character and
understanding. On Tyrconnel, who had said that he despaired of
the fortunes of James, and that the real question was between the
King of France and the Prince of Orange, the ambassador
pronounced what was meant to be a warm eulogy, but may perhaps be
more properly called an invective. "If he were a born Frenchman
he could not be more zealous for the interests of France."185 The
conduct of Melfort, on the other hand, was the subject of an
invective which much resembles eulogy: "He is neither a good
Irishman nor a good Frenchman. All his affections are set on his
own country."186
Since the King was determined to go northward, Avaux did not
choose to be left behind. The royal party set out, leaving
Tyrconnel in charge at Dublin, and arrived at Charlemont on the
thirteenth of April. The journey was a strange one. The country
all along the road had been completely deserted by the
industrious population, and laid waste by bands of robbers.
"This," said one of the French officers, "is like travelling
through the deserts of Arabia."187 Whatever effects the colonists
had been able to remove were at Londonderry or Enniskillen. The
rest had been stolen or destroyed. Avaux informed his court that
he had not been able to get one truss of hay for his horses
without sending five or six miles. No labourer dared bring any
thing for sale lest some marauder should lay hands on it by the
way. The ambassador was put one night into a miserable taproom
full of soldiers smoking, another night into a dismantled house
without windows or shutters to keep out the rain. At Charlemont a
bag of oatmeal was with great difficulty, and as a matter of
favour, procured for the French legation. There was no wheaten
bread, except at the table of the King, who had brought a little
flour from Dublin, and to whom Avaux had lent a servant who knew
how to bake. Those who were honoured with an invitation to the
royal table had their bread and wine measured out to them. Every
body else, however high in rank, ate horsecorn, and drank water
or detestable beer, made with oats instead of barley, and
flavoured with some nameless herb as a substitute for hops.188
Yet report said that the country between Charlemont and Strabane
was even more desolate than the country between Dublin and
Charlemont. It was impossible to carry a large stock of
provisions. The roads were so bad and the horses so weak, that
the baggage waggons had all been left far behind. The chief
officers of the army were consequently in want of necessaries;
and the ill-humour which was the natural effect of these
privations was increased by the insensibility of James, who
seemed not to be aware that every body about him was not
perfectly comfortable.189
On the fourteenth of April the King and his train proceeded to
Omagh. The rain fell: the wind blew: the horses could scarcely
make their way through the mud, and in the face of the storm; and
the road was frequently intersected by torrents which might
almost be called rivers. The travellers had to pass several fords
where the water was breast high. Some of the party fainted from
fatigue and hunger. All around lay a frightful wilderness. In a
journey of forty miles Avaux counted only three miserable cabins.
Every thing else was rock, bog, and moor. When at length the
travellers reached Omagh, they found it in ruins. The
Protestants, who were the majority of the inhabitants, had
abandoned it, leaving not a wisp of straw nor a cask of liquor.
The windows had been broken: the chimneys had been beaten in: the
very locks and bolts of the doors had been carried away.190
Avaux had never ceased to press the King to return to Dublin; but
these expostulations had hitherto produced no effect. The
obstinacy of James, however, was an obstinacy which had nothing
in common with manly resolution, and which, though proof to
argument, was easily shaken by caprice. He received at Omagh,
early on the sixteenth of April, letters which alarmed him. He
learned that a strong body of Protestants was in arms at
Strabane, and that English ships of war had been seen near the
mouth of Lough Foyle. In one minute three messages were sent to
summon Avaux to the ruinous chamber in which the royal bed had
been prepared. There James, half dressed, and with the air of a
man bewildered by some great shock, announced his resolution to
hasten back instantly to Dublin. Avaux listened, wondered, and
approved. Melfort seemed prostrated by despair. The travellers
retraced their steps, and, late in the evening, reached
Charlemont. There the King received despatches very different
from those which had terrified him a few hours before. The
Protestants who had assembled near Strabane had been attacked by
Hamilton. Under a truehearted leader they would doubtless have
stood their ground. But Lundy, who commanded them, had told them
that all was lost, had ordered them to shift for themselves, and
had set them the example of flight.191 They had accordingly
retired in confusion to Londonderry. The King's correspondents
pronounced it to be impossible that Londonderry should hold out.
His Majesty had only to appear before the gates; and they would
instantly fly open. James now changed his mind again, blamed
himself for having been persuaded to turn his face southward,
and, though it was late in the evening, called for his horses.
The horses were in a miserable plight; but, weary and half
starved as they were, they were saddled. Melfort, completely
victorious, carried off his master to the camp. Avaux, after
remonstrating to no purpose, declared that he was resolved to
return to Dublin. It may be suspected that the extreme discomfort
which he had undergone had something to do with this resolution.
For complaints of that discomfort make up a large part of his
letters; and, in truth, a life passed in the palaces of Italy, in
the neat parlours and gardens of Holland, and in the luxurious
pavilions which adorned the suburbs of Paris, was a bad
preparation for the ruined hovels of Ulster. He gave, however, to
his master a more weighty reason for refusing to proceed
northward. The journey of James had been undertaken in opposition
to the unanimous sense of the Irish, and had excited great alarm
among them. They apprehended that he meant to quit them, and to
make a descent on Scotland. They knew that, once landed in Great
Britain, he would have neither the will nor the power to do those
things which they most desired. Avaux, by refusing to proceed
further, gave them an assurance that, whoever might betray them,
France would be their constant friend.192
While Avaux was on his way to Dublin, James hastened towards
Londonderry. He found his army concentrated a few miles south of
the city. The French generals who had sailed with him from Brest
were in his train; and two of them, Rosen and Maumont, were
placed over the head of Richard Hamilton.193 Rosen was a native
of Livonia, who had in early youth become a soldier of fortune,
who had fought his way to distinction, and who, though utterly
destitute of the graces and accomplishments characteristic of the
Court of Versailles, was nevertheless high in favour there. His
temper was savage: his manners were coarse: his language was a
strange jargon compounded of various dialects of French and
German. Even those who thought best of him, and who maintained
that his rough exterior covered some good qualities, owned that
his looks were against him, and that it would be unpleasant to
meet such a figure in the dusk at the corner of a wood.194 The
little that is known of Maumont is to his honour.
In the camp it was generally expected that Londonderry would fall
without a blow. Rosen confidently predicted that the mere sight
of the Irish army would terrify the garrison into submission. But
Richard Hamilton, who knew the temper of the colonists better,
had misgivings. The assailants were sure of one important ally
within the walls. Lundy, the Governor, professed the Protestant
religion, and had joined in proclaiming William and Mary; but he
was in secret communication with the enemies of his Church and of
the Sovereigns to whom he had sworn lealty. Some have suspected
that he was a concealed Jacobite, and that he had affected to
acquiesce in the Revolution only in order that he might be better
able to assist in bringing about a Restoration: but it is
probable that his conduct is rather to be attributed to
faintheartedness and poverty of spirit than to zeal for any
public cause. He seems to have thought resistance hopeless; and
in truth, to a military eye, the defences of Londonderry appeared
contemptible. The fortifications consisted of a simple wall
overgrown with grass and weeds: there was no ditch even before
the gates: the drawbridges had long been neglected: the chains
were rusty and could scarcely be used: the parapets and towers
were built after a fashion which might well move disciples of
Vauban to laughter; and these feeble defences were on almost
every side commanded by heights. Indeed those who laid out the
city had never meant that it should be able to stand a regular
siege, and had contented themselves with throwing up works
sufficient to protect the inhabitants against a tumultuary attack
of the Celtic peasantry. Avaux assured Louvois that a single
French battalion would easily storm such defences. Even if the
place should, notwithstanding all disadvantages, be able to repel
a large army directed by the science and experience of generals
who had served under Conde and Turenne, hunger must soon bring
the contest to an end. The stock of provisions was small; and the
population had been swollen to seven or eight times the ordinary
number by a multitude of colonists flying from the rage of the
natives.195
Lundy, therefore, from the time when the Irish army entered
Ulster, seems to have given up all thought of serious resistance,
He talked so despondingly that the citizens and his own soldiers
murmured against him. He seemed, they said, to be bent on
discouraging them. Meanwhile the enemy drew daily nearer and
nearer; and it was known that James himself was coming to take
the command of his forces.
Just at this moment a glimpse of hope appeared. On the fourteenth
of April ships from England anchored in the bay. They had on
board two regiments which had been sent, under the command of a
Colonel named Cunningham, to reinforce the garrison. Cunningham
and several of his officers went on shore and conferred with
Lundy. Lundy dissuaded them from landing their men. The place, he
said, could not hold out. To throw more troops into it would
therefore be worse than useless: for the more numerous the
garrison, the more prisoners would fall into the hands of the
enemy. The best thing that the two regiments could do would be to
sail back to England. He meant, he said, to withdraw himself
privately: and the inhabitants must then try to make good terms
for themselves.
He went through the form of holding a council of war; but from
this council he excluded all those officers of the garrison whose
sentiments he knew to be different from his own. Some, who had
ordinarily been summoned on such occasions, and who now came
uninvited, were thrust out of the room. Whatever the Governor
said was echoed by his creatures. Cunningham and Cunningham's
companions could scarcely venture to oppose their opinion to that
of a person whose local knowledge was necessarily far superior to
theirs, and whom they were by their instructions directed to
obey. One brave soldier murmured. "Understand this," he said, "to
give up Londonderry is to give up Ireland." But his objections
were contemptuously overruled.196 The meeting broke up.
Cunningham and his officers returned to the ships, and made
preparations for departing. Meanwhile Lundy privately sent a
messenger to the head quarters of the enemy, with assurances that
the city should be peaceably surrendered on the first summons.
But as soon as what had passed in the council of war was
whispered about the streets, the spirit of the soldiers and
citizens swelled up high and fierce against the dastardly and
perfidious chief who had betrayed them. Many of his own officers
declared that they no longer thought themselves bound to obey
him. Voices were heard threatening, some that his brains should
be blown out, some that he should be hanged on the walls. A
deputation was sent to Cunningham imploring him to assume the
command. He excused himself on the plausible ground that his
orders were to take directions in all things from the
Governor.197 Meanwhile it was rumoured that the persons most in
Lundy's confidence were stealing out of the town one by one. Long
after dusk on the evening of the seventeenth it was found that
the gates were open and that the keys had disappeared. The
officers who made the discovery took on themselves to change the
passwords and to double the guards. The night, however, passed
over without any assault.198
After some anxious hours the day broke. The Irish, with James at
their head, were now within four miles of the city. A tumultuous
council of the chief inhabitants was called. Some of them
vehemently reproached the Governor to his face with his
treachery. He had sold them, they cried, to their deadliest
enemy: he had refused admission to the force which good King
William had sent to defend them. While the altercation was at the
height, the sentinels who paced the ramparts announced that the
vanguard of the hostile army was in sight. Lundy had given orders
that there should be no firing; but his authority was at an end.
Two gallant soldiers, Major Henry Baker and Captain Adam Murray,
called the people to arms. They were assisted by the eloquence of
an aged clergyman, George Walker, rector of the parish of
Donaghmore, who had, with many of his neighbours, taken refuge in
Londonderry. The whole of the crowded city was moved by one
impulse. Soldiers, gentlemen, yeomen, artisans, rushed to the
walls and manned the guns. James, who, confident of success, had
approached within a hundred yards of the southern gate, was
received with a shout of "No surrender," and with a fire from the
nearest bastion. An officer of his staff fell dead by his side.
The King and his attendants made all haste to get out of reach of
the cannon balls. Lundy, who was now in imminent danger of being
torn limb from limb by those whom he had betrayed, hid himself in
an inner chamber. There he lay during the day, and at night, with
the generous and politic connivance of Murray and Walker, made
his escape in the disguise of a porter.199 The part of the wall
from which he let himself down is still pointed out; and people
still living talk of having tasted the fruit of a pear tree which
assisted him in his descent. His name is, to this day, held in
execration by the Protestants of the North of Ireland; and his
effigy was long, and perhaps still is, annually hung and burned
by them with marks of abhorrence similar to those which in
England are appropriated to Guy Faux.
And now Londonderry was left destitute of all military and of all
civil government. No man in the town had a right to command any
other: the defences were weak: the provisions were scanty: an
incensed tyrant and a great army were at the gates. But within
was that which has often, in desperate extremities, retrieved the
fallen fortunes of nations. Betrayed, deserted, disorganized,
unprovided with resources, begirt with enemies, the noble city
was still no easy conquest. Whatever an engineer might think of
the strength of the ramparts, all that was most intelligent, most
courageous, most highspirited among the Englishry of Leinster and
of Northern Ulster was crowded behind them. The number of men
capable of bearing arms within the walls was seven thousand; and
the whole world could not have furnished seven thousand men
better qualified to meet a terrible emergency with clear
judgment, dauntless valour, and stubborn patience. They were all
zealous Protestants; and the Protestantism of the majority was
tinged with Puritanism. They had much in common with that sober,
resolute, and Godfearing class out of which Cromwell had formed
his unconquerable army. But the peculiar situation in which they
had been placed had developed in them some qualities which, in
the mother country, might possibly have remained latent. The
English inhabitants of Ireland were an aristocratic caste, which
had been enabled, by superior civilisation, by close union, by
sleepless vigilance, by cool intrepidity, to keep in subjection a
numerous and hostile population. Almost every one of them had
been in some measure trained both to military and to political
functions. Almost every one was familiar with the use of arms,
and was accustomed to bear a part in the administration of
justice. It was remarked by contemporary writers that the
colonists had something of the Castilian haughtiness of manner,
though none of the Castilian indolence, that they spoke English
with remarkable purity and correctness, and that they were, both
as militiamen and as jurymen, superior to their kindred in the
mother country.200 In all ages, men situated as the Anglosaxons
in Ireland were situated have had peculiar vices and peculiar
virtues, the vices and virtues of masters, as opposed to the
vices and virtues of slaves. The member of a dominant race is, in
his dealings with the subject race, seldom indeed fraudulent,--
for fraud is the resource of the weak,--but imperious, insolent,
and cruel. Towards his brethren, on the other hand, his conduct
is generally just, kind, and even noble. His selfrespect leads
him to respect all who belong to his own order. His interest
impels him to cultivate a good understanding with those whose
prompt, strenuous, and courageous assistance may at any moment be
necessary to preserve his property and life. It is a truth ever
present to his mind that his own wellbeing depends on the
ascendency of the class to which he belongs. His very selfishness
therefore is sublimed into public spirit: and this public spirit
is stimulated to fierce enthusiasm by sympathy, by the desire of
applause, and by the dread of infamy. For the only opinion which
he values is the opinion of his fellows; and in their opinion
devotion to the common cause is the most sacred of duties. The
character, thus formed, has two aspects. Seen on one side, it
must be regarded by every well constituted mind with
disapprobation. Seen on the other, it irresistibly extorts
applause. The Spartan, smiting and spurning the wretched Helot,
moves our disgust. But the same Spartan, calmly dressing his
hair, and uttering his concise jests, on what he well knows to be
his last day, in the pass of Thermopylae, is not to be
contemplated without admiration. To a superficial observer it may
seem strange that so much evil and so much good should be found
together. But in truth the good and the evil, which at first
sight appear almost incompatible, are closely connected, and have
a common origin. It was because the Spartan had been taught to
revere himself as one of a race of sovereigns, and to look down
on all that was not Spartan as of an inferior species, that he
had no fellow feeling for the miserable serfs who crouched before
him, and that the thought of submitting to a foreign master, or of
turning his back before an enemy, never, even in the last
extremity, crossed his mind. Something of the same character,
compounded of tyrant and hero, has been found in all nations
which have domineered over more numerous nations. But it has
nowhere in modern Europe shown itself so conspicuously as in
Ireland. With what contempt, with what antipathy, the ruling
minority in that country long regarded the subject majority may
be best learned from the hateful laws which, within the memory of
men still living, disgraced the Irish statute book. Those laws
were at length annulled: but the spirit which had dictated them
survived them, and even at this day sometimes breaks out in
excesses pernicious to the commonwealth and dishonourable to the
Protestant religion. Nevertheless it is impossible to deny that
the English colonists have had, with too many of the faults, all
the noblest virtues of a sovereign caste. The faults have, as was
natural, been most offensively exhibited in times of prosperity
and security: the virtues have been most resplendent in times of
distress and peril; and never were those virtues more signally
displayed than by the defenders of Londonderry, when their
Governor had abandoned them, and when the camp of their mortal
enemy was pitched before their walls.
No sooner had the first burst of the rage excited by the perfidy
of Lundy spent itself than those whom he had betrayed proceeded,
with a gravity and prudence worthy of the most renowned senates,
to provide for the order and defence of the city. Two governors
were elected, Baker and Walker. Baker took the chief military
command. Walker's especial business was to preserve internal
tranquillity, and to dole out supplies from the magazines.201 The
inhabitants capable of bearing arms were distributed into eight
regiments. Colonels, captains, and subordinate officers were
appointed. In a few hours every man knew his post, and was ready
to repair to it as soon as the beat of the drum was heard. That
machinery, by which Oliver had, in the preceding generation, kept
up among his soldiers so stern and so pertinacious an enthusiasm,
was again employed with not less complete success. Preaching and
praying occupied a large part of every day. Eighteen clergymen of
the Established Church and seven or eight nonconformist ministers
were within the walls. They all exerted themselves indefatigably
to rouse and sustain the spirit of the people. Among themselves
there was for the time entire harmony. All disputes about church
government, postures, ceremonies, were forgotten. The Bishop,
having found that his lectures on passive obedience were derided
even by the Episcopalians, had withdrawn himself, first to
Raphoe, and then to England, and was preaching in a chapel in
London.202 On the other hand, a Scotch fanatic named Hewson, who
had exhorted the Presbyterians not to ally themselves with such
as refused to subscribe the Covenant, had sunk under the well
merited disgust and scorn of the whole Protestant community.203
The aspect of the Cathedral was remarkable. Cannon were planted
on the summit of the broad tower which has since given place to a
tower of different proportions. Ammunition was stored in the
vaults. In the choir the liturgy of the Anglican Church was read
every morning. Every afternoon the Dissenters crowded to a
simpler worship.204
James had waited twenty-four hours, expecting, as it should seem,
the performance of Lundy's promises; and in twenty-four hours the
arrangements for the defence of Londonderry were complete. On the
evening of the nineteenth of April, a trumpeter came to the
southern gate, and asked whether the engagements into which the
Governor had entered would be fulfilled. The answer was that the
men who guarded these walls had nothing to do with the Governor's
engagements, and were determined to resist to the last.
On the following day a messenger of higher rank was sent, Claude
Hamilton, Lord Strabane, one of the few Roman Catholic peers of
Ireland. Murray, who had been appointed to the command of one of
the eight regiments into which the garrison was distributed,
advanced from the gate to meet the flag of truce; and a short
conference was held. Strabane had been authorised to make large
promises. The citizens should have a free pardon for all that was
past if they would submit to their lawful Sovereign. Murray
himself should have a colonel's commission, and a thousand pounds
in money. "The men of Londonderry," answered Murray, "have done
nothing that requires a pardon, and own no Sovereign but King
William and Queen Mary. It will not be safe for your Lordship to
stay longer, or to return on the same errand. Let me have the
honour of seeing you through the lines."205
James had been assured, and had fully expected, that the city
would yield as soon as it was known that he was before the walls.
Finding himself mistaken, he broke loose from the control of
Melfort, and determined to return instantly to Dublin. Rosen
accompanied the King. The direction of the siege was intrusted to
Maumont. Richard Hamilton was second, and Pusignan third, in
command.
The operations now commenced in earnest. The besiegers began by
battering the town. It was soon on fire in several places. Roofs
and upper stories of houses fell in, and crushed the inmates.
During a short time the garrison, many of whom had never before
seen the effect of a cannonade, seemed to be discomposed by the
crash of chimneys, and by the heaps of ruin mingled with
disfigured corpses. But familiarity with danger and horror
produced in a few hours the natural effect. The spirit of the
people rose so high that their chiefs thought it safe to act on
the offensive. On the twenty-first of April a sally was made
under the command of Murray. The Irish stood their ground
resolutely; and a furious and bloody contest took place. Maumont,
at the head of a body of cavalry, flew to the place where the
fight was raging. He was struck in the head by a musket ball, and
fell a corpse. The besiegers lost several other officers, and
about two hundred men, before the colonists could be driven in.
Murray escaped with difficulty. His horse was killed under him;
and he was beset by enemies: but be was able to defend himself
till some of his friends made a rush from the gate to his rescue,
with old Walker at their head.206
In consequence of the death of Maumont, Hamilton was once more
commander of the Irish army. His exploits in that post did not
raise his reputation. He was a fine gentleman and a brave
soldier; but he had no pretensions to the character of a great
general, and had never, in his life, seen a siege.207 Pusignan
had more science and energy. But Pusignan survived Maumont little
more than a fortnight. At four in the morning of the sixth of
May, the garrison made another sally, took several flags, and
killed many of the besiegers. Pusignan, fighting gallantly, was
shot through the body. The wound was one which a skilful surgeon
might have cured: but there was no such surgeon in the Irish
camp; and the communication with Dublin was slow and irregular.
The poor Frenchman died, complaining bitterly of the barbarous
ignorance and negligence which had shortened his days. A medical
man, who had been sent down express from the capital, arrived
after the funeral. James, in consequence, as it should seem, of
this disaster, established a daily post between Dublin Castle and
Hamilton's head quarters. Even by this conveyance letters did not
travel very expeditiously: for the couriers went on foot; and,
from fear probably of the Enniskilleners, took a circuitous route
from military post to military post.208
May passed away: June arrived; and still Londonderry held out.
There had been many sallies and skirmishes with various success:
but, on the whole, the advantage had been with the garrison.
Several officers of note had been carried prisoners into the
city; and two French banners, torn after hard fighting from the
besiegers, had been hung as trophies in the chancel of the
Cathedral. It seemed that the siege must be turned into a
blockade. But before the hope of reducing the town by main force
was relinquished, it was determined to make a great effort. The
point selected for assault was an outwork called Windmill Hill,
which was not far from the southern gate. Religious stimulants
were employed to animate the courage of the forlorn hope. Many
volunteers bound themselves by oath to make their way into the
works or to perish in the attempt. Captain Butler, son of the
Lord Mountgarret, undertook to lead the sworn men to the attack.
On the walls the colonists were drawn up in three ranks. The
office of those who were behind was to load the muskets of those
who were in front. The Irish came on boldly and with a fearful
uproar, but after long and hard fighting were driven back. The
women of Londonderry were seen amidst the thickest fire serving
out water and ammunition to their husbands and brothers. In one
place, where the wall was only seven feet high, Butler and some
of his sworn men succeeded in reaching the top; but they were all
killed or made prisoners. At length, after four hundred of the
Irish had fallen, their chiefs ordered a retreat to be
sounded.209
Nothing was left but to try the effect of hunger. It was known
that the stock of food in the city was but slender. Indeed it was
thought strange that the supplies should have held out so long.
Every precaution was now taken against the introduction of
provisions. All the avenues leading to the city by land were
closely guarded. On the south were encamped, along the left bank
of the Foyle, the horsemen who had followed Lord Galmoy from the
valley of the Barrow. Their chief was of all the Irish captains
the most dreaded and the most abhorred by the Protestants. For he
had disciplined his men with rare skill and care; and many
frightful stories were told of his barbarity and perfidy. Long
lines of tents, occupied by the infantry of Butler and O'Neil, of
Lord Slane and Lord Gormanstown, by Nugent's Westmeath men, by
Eustace's Kildare men, and by Cavanagh's Kerry men, extended
northward till they again approached the water side.210 The river
was fringed with forts and batteries which no vessel could pass
without great peril. After some time it was determined to make
the security still more complete by throwing a barricade across
the stream, about a mile and a half below the city. Several boats
full of stones were sunk. A row of stakes was driven into the
bottom of the river. Large pieces of fir wood, strongly bound
together, formed a boom which was more than a quarter of a mile
in length, and which was firmly fastened to both shores, by
cables a foot thick.211 A huge stone, to which the cable on the
left bank was attached, was removed many years later, for the
purpose of being polished and shaped into a column. But the
intention was abandoned, and the rugged mass still lies, not many
yards from its original site, amidst the shades which surround a
pleasant country house named Boom Hall. Hard by is the well from
which the besiegers drank. A little further off is the burial
ground where they laid their slain, and where even in our own
time the spade of the gardener has struck upon many sculls and
thighbones at a short distance beneath the turf and flowers.
While these things were passing in the North, James was holding
his court at Dublin. On his return thither from Londonderry he
received intelligence that the French fleet, commanded by the
Count of Chateau Renaud, had anchored in Bantry Bay, and had put
on shore a large quantity of military stores and a supply of
money. Herbert, who had just been sent to those seas with an
English squadron for the purpose of intercepting the
communications between Britanny and Ireland, learned where the
enemy lay, and sailed into the bay with the intention of giving
battle. But the wind was unfavourable to him: his force was
greatly inferior to that which was opposed to him; and after some
firing, which caused no serious loss to either side, he thought
it prudent to stand out to sea, while the French retired into the
recesses of the harbour. He steered for Scilly, where he expected
to find reinforcements; and Chateau Renaud, content with the
credit which he had acquired, and afraid of losing it if he
staid, hastened back to Brest, though earnestly intreated by
James to come round to Dublin.
Both sides claimed the victory. The Commons at Westminster
absurdly passed a vote of thanks to Herbert. James, not less
absurdly, ordered bonfires to be lighted, and a Te Deum to be
sung. But these marks of joy by no means satisfied Avaux, whose
national vanity was too strong even for his characteristic
prudence and politeness. He complained that James was so unjust
and ungrateful as to attribute the result of the late action to
the reluctance with which the English seamen fought against their
rightful King and their old commander, and that his Majesty did
not seem to be well pleased by being told that they were flying
over the ocean pursued by the triumphant French. Dover, too, was
a bad Frenchman. He seemed to take no pleasure in the defeat of
his countrymen, and had been heard to say that the affair in
Bantry Bay did not deserve to be called a battle.212
On the day after the Te Deum had been sung at Dublin for this
indecisive skirmish, the Parliament convoked by James assembled.
The number of temporal peers of Ireland, when he arrived in that
kingdom, was about a hundred. Of these only fourteen obeyed his
summons. Of the fourteen, ten were Roman Catholics. By the
reversing of old attainders, and by new creations, seventeen more
Lords, all Roman Catholics, were introduced into the Upper House.
The Protestant Bishops of Meath, Ossory, Cork, and Limerick,
whether from a sincere conviction that they could not lawfully
withhold their obedience even from a tyrant, or from a vain hope
that the heart even of a tyrant might be softened by their
patience, made their appearance in the midst of their mortal
enemies.
The House of Commons consisted almost exclusively of Irishmen and
Papists. With the writs the returning officers had received from
Tyrconnel letters naming the persons whom he wished to see
elected. The largest constituent bodies in the kingdom were at
this time very small. For scarcely any but Roman Catholics dared
to show their faces; and the Roman Catholic freeholders were then
very few, not more, it is said, in some counties, than ten or
twelve. Even in cities so considerable as Cork, Limerick, and
Galway, the number of persons who, under the new Charters, were
entitled to vote did not exceed twenty-four. About two hundred
and fifty members took their seats. Of these only six were
Protestants.213 The list of the names sufficiently indicates the
religious and political temper of the assembly. Alone among the
Irish parliaments of that age, this parliament was filled with
Dermots and Geohagans, O'Neils and O'Donovans, Macmahons,
Macnamaras, and Macgillicuddies. The lead was taken by a few men
whose abilities had been improved by the study of the law, or by
experience acquired in foreign countries. The Attorney General,
Sir Richard Nagle, who represented the county of Cork, was
allowed, even by Protestants, to be an acute and learned jurist.
Francis Plowden, the Commissioner of Revenue, who sate for
Bannow, and acted as chief minister of finance, was an
Englishman, and, as he had been a principal agent of the Order of
Jesuits in money matters, must be supposed to have been an
excellent man of business.214 Colonel Henry Luttrell, member for
the county of Carlow, had served long in France, and had brought
back to his native Ireland a sharpened intellect and polished
manners, a flattering tongue, some skill in war, and much more
skill in intrigue. His elder brother, Colonel Simon Luttrell, who
was member for the county of Dublin, and military governor of the
capital, had also resided in France, and, though inferior to
Henry in parts and activity, made a highly distinguished figure
among the adherents of James. The other member for the county of
Dublin was Colonel Patrick Sarsfield. This gallant officer was
regarded by the natives as one of themselves: for his ancestors
on the paternal side, though originally English, were among those
early colonists who were proverbially said to have become more
Irish than Irishmen. His mother was of noble Celtic blood; and he
was firmly attached to the old religion. He had inherited an
estate of about two thousand a year, and was therefore one of the
wealthiest Roman Catholics in the kingdom. His knowledge of
courts and camps was such as few of his countrymen possessed. He
had long borne a commission in the English Life Guards, had lived
much about Whitehall, and had fought bravely under Monmouth on
the Continent, and against Monmouth at Sedgemoor. He had, Avaux
wrote, more personal influence than any man in Ireland, and was
indeed a gentleman of eminent merit, brave, upright, honourable,
careful of his men in quarters, and certain to be always found at
their head in the day of battle. His intrepidity, his frankness,
his boundless good nature, his stature, which far exceeded that
of ordinary men, and the strength which he exerted in personal
conflict, gained for him the affectionate admiration of the
populace. It is remarkable that the Englishry generally respected
him as a valiant, skilful, and generous enemy, and that, even in
the most ribald farces which were performed by mountebanks in
Smithfield, he was always excepted from the disgraceful
imputations which it was then the fashion to throw on the Irish
nation.215
But men like these were rare in the House of Commons which had
met at Dublin. It is no reproach to the Irish nation, a nation
which has since furnished its full proportion of eloquent and
accomplished senators, to say that, of all the parliaments which
have met in the British islands, Barebone's parliament not
excepted, the assembly convoked by James was the most deficient
in all the qualities which a legislature should possess. The
stern domination of a hostile caste had blighted the faculties of
the Irish gentleman. If he was so fortunate as to have lands, he
had generally passed his life on them, shooting, fishing,
carousing, and making love among his vassals. If his estate had
been confiscated, he had wandered about from bawn to bawn and
from cabin to cabin, levying small contributions, and living at
the expense of other men. He had never sate in the House of
Commons: he had never even taken an active part at an election:
he had never been a magistrate: scarcely ever had he been on a
grand jury. He had therefore absolutely no experience of public
affairs. The English squire of that age, though assuredly not a
very profound or enlightened politician, was a statesman and a
philosopher when compared with the Roman Catholic squire of
Munster or Connaught.
The Parliaments of Ireland had then no fixed place of assembling.
Indeed they met so seldom and broke up so speedily that it would
hardly have been worth while to build and furnish a palace for
their special use. It was not till the Hanoverian dynasty had
been long on the throne, that a senate house which sustains a
comparison with the finest compositions of Inigo Jones arose in
College Green. On the spot where the portico and dome of the Four
Courts now overlook the Liffey, stood, in the seventeenth
century, an ancient building which had once been a convent of
Dominican friars, but had since the Reformation been appropriated
to the use of the legal profession, and bore the name of the
King's Inns. There accommodation had been provided for the
parliament. On the seventh of May, James, dressed in royal robes
and wearing a crown, took his seat on the throne in the House of
Lords, and ordered the Commons to be summoned to the bar.216
He then expressed his gratitude to the natives of Ireland for
having adhered to his cause when the people of his other kingdoms
had deserted him. His resolution to abolish all religious
disabilities in all his dominions he declared to be unalterable.
He invited the houses to take the Act of Settlement into
consideration, and to redress the injuries of which the old
proprietors of the soil had reason to complain. He concluded by
acknowledging in warm terms his obligations to the King of
France.217
When the royal speech had been pronounced, the Chancellor
directed the Commons to repair to their chamber and to elect a
Speaker. They chose the Attorney General Nagle; and the choice
was approved by the King.218
The Commons next passed resolutions expressing warm gratitude
both to James and to Lewis. Indeed it was proposed to send a
deputation with an address to Avaux; but the Speaker pointed out
the gross impropriety of such a step; and, on this occasion, his
interference was successful.219 It was seldom however that the
House was disposed to listen to reason. The debates were all rant
and tumult. Judge Daly, a Roman Catholic, but an honest and able
man, could not refrain from lamenting the indecency and folly
with which the members of his Church carried on the work of
legislation. Those gentlemen, he said, were not a Parliament:
they were a mere rabble: they resembled nothing so much as the
mob of fishermen and market gardeners, who, at Naples, yelled and
threw up their caps in honour of Massaniello. It was painful to
hear member after member talking wild nonsense about his own
losses, and clamouring for an estate, when the lives of all and
the independence of their common country were in peril. These
words were spoken in private; but some talebearer repeated them
to the Commons. A violent storm broke forth. Daly was ordered to
attend at the bar; and there was little doubt that he would be
severely dealt with. But, just when he was at the door, one of
the members rushed in, shouting, "Good news: Londonderry is
taken." The whole House rose. All the hats were flung into the
air. Three loud huzzas were raised. Every heart was softened by
the happy tidings. Nobody would hear of punishment at such a
moment. The order for Daly's attendance was discharged amidst
cries of "No submission; no submission; we pardon him." In a few
hours it was known that Londonderry held out as obstinately as
ever. This transaction, in itself unimportant, deserves to be
recorded, as showing how destitute that House of Commons was of
the qualities which ought to be found in the great council of a
kingdom. And this assembly, without experience, without gravity,
and without temper, was now to legislate on questions which would have tasked to
the utmost the capacity of the greatest statesmen.220
One Act James induced them to pass which would have been most
honourable to him and to them, if there were not abundant proofs
that it was meant to be a dead letter. It was an Act purporting
to grant entire liberty of conscience to all Christian sects. On
this occasion a proclamation was put forth announcing in boastful
language to the English people that their rightful King had now
signally refuted those slanderers who had accused him of
affecting zeal for religious liberty merely in order to serve a
turn. If he were at heart inclined to persecution, would he not
have persecuted the Irish Protestants? He did not want power. He
did not want provocation. Yet at Dublin, where the members of his
Church were the majority, as at Westminister, where they were a
minority, he had firmly adhered to the principles laid down in
his much maligned Declaration of Indulgence.221 Unfortunately for
him, the same wind which carried his fair professions to England
carried thither also evidence that his professions were
insincere. A single law, worthy of Turgot or of Franklin, seemed
ludicrously out of place in the midst of a crowd of laws which
would have disgraced Gardiner or Alva.
A necessary preliminary to the vast work of spoliation and
slaughter on which the legislators of Dublin were bent, was an
Act annulling the authority which the English Parliament, both as
the supreme legislature and as the supreme Court of Appeal, had
hitherto exercised over Ireland.222 This Act was rapidly passed;
and then followed, in quick succession, confiscations and
proscriptions on a gigantic scale. The personal estates of
absentees above the age of seventeen years were transferred to
the King. When lay property was thus invaded, it was not likely
that the endowments which had been, in contravention of every
sound principle, lavished on the Church of the minority would be
spared. To reduce those endowments, without prejudice to existing
interests, would have been a reform worthy of a good prince and
of a good parliament. But no such reform would satisfy the
vindictive bigots who sate at the King's Inns. By one sweeping
Act, the greater part of the tithe was transferred from the
Protestant to the Roman Catholic clergy; and the existing
incumbents were left, without one farthing of compensation, to
die of hunger.223 A Bill repealing the Act of Settlement and
transferring many thousands of square miles from Saxon to Celtic
landlords was brought in and carried by acclamation.224
Of legislation such as this it is impossible to speak too
severely: but for the legislators there are excuses which it is
the duty of the historian to notice. They acted unmercifully,
unjustly, unwisely. But it would be absurd to expect mercy,
justice, or wisdom from a class of men first abased by many years
of oppression, and then maddened by the joy of a sudden
deliverance, and armed with irresistible power. The
representatives of the Irish nation were, with few exceptions,
rude and ignorant. They had lived in a state of constant
irritation. With aristocratical sentiments they had been in a
servile position. With the highest pride of blood, they had been
exposed to daily affronts, such as might well have roused the
choler of the humblest plebeian. In sight of the fields and
castles which they regarded as their own, they had been glad to
be invited by a peasant to partake of his whey and his potatoes.
Those violent emotions of hatred and cupidity which the situation
of the native gentleman could scarcely fail to call forth
appeared to him under the specious guise of patriotism and piety.
For his enemies were the enemies of his nation; and the same
tyranny which had robbed him of his patrimony had robbed his
Church of vast wealth bestowed on her by the devotion of an
earlier age. How was power likely to be used by an uneducated and
inexperienced man, agitated by strong desires and resentments
which he mistook for sacred duties? And, when two or three
hundred such men were brought together in one assembly, what was
to be expected but that the passions which each had long nursed
in silence would be at once matured into fearful vigour by the
influence of sympathy?
Between James and his parliament there was little in common,
except hatred of the Protestant religion. He was an Englishman.
Superstition had not utterly extinguished all national feeling in
his mind; and he could not but be displeased by the malevolence
with which his Celtic supporters regarded the race from which he
sprang. The range of his intellectual vision was small. Yet it
was impossible that, having reigned in England, and looking
constantly forward to the day when he should reign in England
once more, he should not take a wider view of politics than was
taken by men who had no objects out of Ireland. The few Irish
Protestants who still adhered to him, and the British nobles,
both Protestant and Roman Catholic, who had followed him into
exile, implored him to restrain the violence of the rapacious and
vindictive senate which he had convoked. They with peculiar
earnestness implored him not to consent to the repeal of the Act
of Settlement. On what security, they asked, could any man invest
his money or give a portion to his children, if he could not rely
on positive laws and on the uninterrupted possession of many
years? The military adventurers among whom Cromwell portioned out
the soil might perhaps be regarded as wrongdoers. But how large a
part of their estates had passed, by fair purchase, into other
hands! How much money had proprietors borrowed on mortgage, on
statute merchant, on statute staple! How many capitalists had,
trusting to legislative acts and to royal promises, come over
from England, and bought land in Ulster and Leinster, without the
least misgiving as to the title! What a sum had those capitalists
expended, during a quarter of a century, in building; draining,
inclosing, planting! The terms of the compromise which Charles
the Second had sanctioned might not be in all respects just. But
was one injustice to be redressed by committing another injustice
more monstrous still? And what effect was likely to be produced
in England by the cry of thousands of innocent English families
whom an English king had doomed to ruin? The complaints of such a
body of sufferers might delay, might prevent, the Restoration to
which all loyal subjects were eagerly looking forward; and, even
if his Majesty should, in spite of those complaints, be happily
restored, he would to the end of his life feel the pernicious
effects of the injustice which evil advisers were now urging him
to commit. He would find that, in trying to quiet one set of
malecontents, he had created another. As surely as he yielded to
the clamour raised at Dublin for a repeal of the Act of
Settlement, he would, from the day on which he returned to
Westminster, be assailed by as loud and pertinacious a clamour
for a repeal of that repeal. He could not but be aware that no
English Parliament, however loyal, would permit such laws as were
now passing through the Irish Parliament to stand. Had he made up
his mind to take the part of Ireland against the universal sense
of England? If so, to what could he look forward but another
banishment and another deposition? Or would he, when he had
recovered the greater kingdom, revoke the boors by which, in his
distress, he had purchased the help of the smaller? It might seem
an insult to him even to suggest that he could harbour the
thought of such unprincely, of such unmanly, perfidy. Yet what
other course would be left to him? And was it not better for him
to refuse unreasonable concessions now than to retract those
concessions hereafter in a manner which must bring on him
reproaches insupportable to a noble mind? His situation was
doubtless embarrassing. Yet in this case, as in other cases, it
would be found that the path of justice was the path of
wisdom.225
Though James had, in his speech at the opening of the session,
declared against the Act of Settlement, he felt that these
arguments were unanswerable. He held several conferences with the
leading members of the House of Commons, and earnestly
recommended moderation. But his exhortations irritated the
passions which he wished to allay. Many of the native gentry held
high and violent language. It was impudent, they said, to talk
about the rights of purchasers. How could right spring out of
wrong? People who chose to buy property acquired by injustice
must take the consequences of their folly and cupidity. It was
clear that the Lower House was altogether impracticable. James
had, four years before, refused to make the smallest concession
to the most obsequious parliament that has ever sat in England;
and it might have been expected that the obstinacy, which he had
never wanted when it was a vice, would not have failed him now
when it would have been a virtue. During a short time he seemed
determined to act justly. He even talked of dissolving the
parliament. The chiefs of the old Celtic families, on the other
hand, said publicly that, if he did not give them back their
inheritance, they would not fight for his. His very soldiers
railed on him in the streets of Dublin. At length he determined
to go down himself to the House of Peers, not in his robes and
crown, but in the garb in which he had been used to attend
debates at Westminster, and personally to solicit the Lords to
put some check on the violence of the Commons. But just as he was
getting into his coach for this purpose he was stopped by Avaux.
Avaux was as zealous as any Irishman for the bills which the
Commons were urging forward. It was enough for him that those
bills seemed likely to make the enmity between England and
Ireland irreconcileable. His remonstrances induced James to
abstain from openly opposing the repeal of the Act of Settlement.
Still the unfortunate prince continued to cherish some faint hope
that the law for which the Commons were so zealous would be
rejected, or at least modified, by the Peers. Lord Granard, one
of the few Protestant noblemen who sate in that parliament,
exerted himself strenuously on the side of public faith and sound
policy. The King sent him a message of thanks. "We Protestants,"
said Granard to Powis who brought the message, "are few in
number. We can do little. His Majesty should try his influence
with the Roman Catholics." "His Majesty," answered Powis with an
oath, "dares not say what he thinks." A few days later James met
Granard riding towards the parliament house. "Where are you
going, my Lord?" said the King. "To enter my protest, Sir,"
answered Granard, "against the repeal of the Act of Settlement."
"You are right," said the King: "but I am fallen into the hands
of people who will ram that and much more down my throat."226
James yielded to the will of the Commons; but the unfavourable
impression which his short and feeble resistance had made upon
them was not to be removed by his submission. They regarded him
with profound distrust; they considered him as at heart an
Englishman; and not a day passed without some indication of this
feeling. They were in no haste to grant him a supply. One party
among them planned an address urging him to dismiss Melfort as an
enemy of their nation. Another party drew up a bill for deposing
all the Protestant Bishops, even the four who were then actually
sitting in Parliament. It was not without difficulty that Avaux
and Tyrconnel, whose influence in the Lower House far exceeded
the King's, could restrain the zeal of the majority.227
It is remarkable that, while the King was losing the confidence
and good will of the Irish Commons by faintly defending against
them, in one quarter, the institution of property, he was
himself, in another quarter, attacking that institution with a
violence, if possible, more reckless than theirs. He soon found
that no money came into his Exchequer. The cause was sufficiently
obvious. Trade was at an end. Floating capital had been withdrawn
in great masses from the island. Of the fixed capital much had
been destroyed, and the rest was lying idle. Thousands of those
Protestants who were the most industrious and intelligent part of
the population had emigrated to England. Thousands had taken
refuge in the places which still held out for William and Mary.
Of the Roman Catholic peasantry who were in the vigour of life
the majority had enlisted in the army or had joined gangs of
plunderers. The poverty of the treasury was the necessary effect
of the poverty of the country: public prosperity could be
restored only by the restoration of private prosperity; and
private prosperity could be restored only by years of peace and
security. James was absurd enough to imagine that there was a
more speedy and efficacious remedy. He could, he conceived, at
once extricate himself from his financial difficulties by the
simple process of calling a farthing a shilling. The right of
coining was undoubtedly a flower of the prerogative; and, in his
view, the right of coining included the right of debasing the
coin. Pots, pans, knockers of doors, pieces of ordnance which had
long been past use, were carried to the mint. In a short time
lumps of base metal, nominally worth near a million sterling,
intrinsically worth about a sixtieth part of that sum, were in
circulation. A royal edict declared these pieces to be legal
tender in all cases whatever. A mortgage for a thousand pounds
was cleared off by a bag of counters made out of old kettles. The
creditors who complained to the Court of Chancery were told by
Fitton to take their money and be gone. But of all classes the
tradesmen of Dublin, who were generally Protestants, were the
greatest losers. At first, of course, they raised their demands:
but the magistrates of the city took on themselves to meet this
heretical machination by putting forth a tariff regulating
prices. Any man who belonged to the caste now dominant might walk
into a shop, lay on the counter a bit of brass worth threepence,
and carry off goods to the value of half a guinea. Legal redress
was out of the question. Indeed the sufferers thought themselves
happy if, by the sacrifice of their stock in trade, they could
redeem their limbs and their lives. There was not a baker's shop
in the city round which twenty or thirty soldiers were not
constantly prowling. Some persons who refused the base money were
arrested by troopers and carried before the Provost Marshal, who
cursed them, swore at them, locked them up in dark cells, and, by
threatening to hang them at their own doors, soon overcame their
resistance. Of all the plagues of that time none made a deeper or
a more lasting impression on the minds of the Protestants of
Dublin than the plague of the brass money.228 To the recollection
of the confusion and misery which had been produced by James's
coin must be in part ascribed the strenuous opposition which,
thirty-five years later, large classes, firmly attached to the
House of Hanover, offered to the government of George the First
in the affair of Wood's patent.
There can be no question that James, in thus altering, by his own
authority, the terms of all the contracts in the kingdom, assumed
a power which belonged only to the whole legislature. Yet the
Commons did not remonstrate. There was no power, however
unconstitutional, which they were not willing to concede to him,
as long as he used it to crush and plunder the English
population. On the other hand, they respected no prerogative,
however ancient, however legitimate, however salutary, if they
apprehended that he might use it to protect the race which they
abhorred. They were not satisfied till they had extorted his
reluctant consent to a portentous law, a law without a parallel
in the history of civilised countries, the great Act of
Attainder.
A list was framed containing between two and three thousand
names. At the top was half the peerage of Ireland. Then came
baronets, knights, clergymen, squires, merchants, yeomen,
artisans, women, children. No investigation was made. Any member
who wished to rid himself of a creditor, a rival, a private
enemy, gave in the name to the clerk at the table, and it was
generally inserted without discussion. The only debate of which
any account has come down to us related to the Earl of Strafford.
He had friends in the House who ventured to offer something in
his favour. But a few words from Simon Luttrell settled the
question. "I have," he said, "heard the King say some hard things
of that lord." This was thought sufficient, and the name of
Strafford stands fifth in the long table of the proscribed.229
Days were fixed before which those whose names were on the list
were required to surrender themselves to such justice as was then
administered to English Protestants in Dublin. If a proscribed
person was in Ireland, he must surrender himself by the tenth of
August. If he had left Ireland since the fifth of November 1688,
he must surrender himself by the first of September. If he had
left Ireland before the fifth of November 1688, he must surrender
himself by the first of October. If he failed to appear by the
appointed day, he was to be hanged, drawn, and quartered without
a trial, and his property was to be confiscated. It might be
physically impossible for him to deliver himself up within the
time fixed by the Act. He might be bedridden. He might be in the
West Indies. He might be in prison. Indeed there notoriously were
such cases. Among the attainted Lords was Mountjoy. He had been
induced by the villany of Tyrconnel to trust himself at Saint
Germains: he had been thrown into the Bastile: he was still lying
there; and the Irish parliament was not ashamed to enact that,
unless he could, within a few weeks, make his escape from his
cell, and present himself at Dublin, he should be put to
death.230
As it was not even pretended that there had been any inquiry into
the guilt of those who were thus proscribed, as not a single one
among them had been heard in his own defence, and as it was
certain that it would be physically impossible for many of them
to surrender themselves in time, it was clear that nothing but a
large exercise of the royal prerogative of mercy could prevent
the perpetration of iniquities so horrible that no precedent
could be found for them even in the lamentable history of the
troubles of Ireland. The Commons therefore determined that the
royal prerogative of mercy should be limited. Several regulations
were devised for the purpose of making the passing of pardons
difficult and costly: and finally it was enacted that every
pardon granted by his Majesty, after the end of November 1689, to
any of the many hundreds of persons who had been sentenced to
death without a trial, should be absolutely void and of none
effect. Sir Richard Nagle came in state to the bar of the Lords
and presented the bill with a speech worthy of the occasion.
"Many of the persons here attainted," said he, "have been proved
traitors by such evidence as satisfies us. As to the rest we have
followed common fame."231
With such reckless barbarity was the list framed that fanatical
royalists, who were, at that very time, hazarding their property,
their liberty, their lives, in the cause of James, were not
secure from proscription. The most learned man of whom the
Jacobite party could boast was Henry Dodwell, Camdenian Professor
in the University of Oxford. In the cause of hereditary monarchy
he shrank from no sacrifice and from no danger. It was about him
that William uttered those memorable words: "He has set his heart
on being a martyr; and I have set my mind on disappointing him."
But James was more cruel to friends than William to foes. Dodwell
was a Protestant: he had some property in Connaught: these crimes
were sufficient; and he was set down in the long roll of those
who were doomed to the gallows and the quartering block.232
That James would give his assent to a bill which took from him
the power of pardoning, seemed to many persons impossible. He
had, four years before, quarrelled with the most loyal of
parliaments rather than cede a prerogative which did not belong
to him. It might, therefore, well be expected that he would now
have struggled hard to retain a precious prerogative which had
been enjoyed by his predecessors ever since the origin of the
monarchy, and which had never been questioned by the Whigs. The
stern look and raised voice with which he had reprimanded the
Tory gentlemen, who, in the language of profound reverence and
fervent affection, implored him not to dispense with the laws,
would now have been in place. He might also have seen that the
right course was the wise course. Had he, on this great occasion,
had the spirit to declare that he would not shed the blood of the
innocent, and that, even as respected the guilty, he would not
divest himself of the power of tempering judgment with mercy, he
would have regained more hearts in England than he would have
lost in Ireland. But it was ever his fate to resist where he
should have yielded, and to yield where he should have resisted.
The most wicked of all laws received his sanction; and it is but
a very small extenuation of his guilt that his sanction was
somewhat reluctantly given.
That nothing might be wanting to the completeness of this great
crime, extreme care was taken to prevent the persons who were
attainted from knowing that they were attainted, till the day of
grace fixed in the Act was passed. The roll of names was not
published, but kept carefully locked up in Fitton's closet. Some
Protestants, who still adhered to the cause of James, but who
were anxious to know whether any of their friends or relations
had been proscribed, tried hard to obtain a sight of the list;
but solicitation, remonstrance, even bribery, proved vain. Not a
single copy got abroad till it was too late for any of the
thousands who had been condemned without a trial to obtain a
pardon.233
Towards the close of July James prorogued the Houses. They had
sate more than ten weeks; and in that space of time they had
proved most fully that, great as have been the evils which
Protestant ascendency has produced in Ireland, the evils produced
by Popish ascendancy would have been greater still. That the
colonists, when they had won the victory, grossly abused it, that
their legislation was, during many years, unjust and tyrannical,
is most true. But it is not less true that they never quite came
up to the atrocious example set by their vanquished enemy during
his short tenure of power.
Indeed, while James was loudly boasting that he had passed an Act
granting entire liberty of conscience to all sects, a persecution
as cruel as that of Languedoc was raging through all the
provinces which owned his authority. It was said by those who
wished to find an excuse for him that almost all the Protestants
who still remained in Munster, Connaught, and Leinster were his
enemies, and that it was not as schismatics, but as rebels in
heart, who wanted only opportunity to become rebels in act, that
he gave them up to be oppressed and despoiled; and to this excuse
some weight might have been allowed if he had strenuously exerted
himself to protect those few colonists, who, though firmly
attached to the reformed religion, were still true to the
doctrines of nonresistance and of indefeasible hereditary right.
But even these devoted royalists found that their heresy was in
his view a crime for which no services or sacrifices would atone.
Three or four noblemen, members of the Anglican Church, who had
welcomed him to Ireland, and had sate in his Parliament,
represented to him that, if the rule which forbade any Protestant
to possess any weapon were strictly enforced, their country
houses would be at the mercy of the Rapparees, and obtained from
him permission to keep arms sufficient for a few servants. But
Avaux remonstrated. The indulgence, he said, was grossly abused:
these Protestant lords were not to be trusted: they were turning
their houses into fortresses: his Majesty would soon have reason
to repent his goodness. These representations prevailed; and
Roman Catholic troops were quartered in the suspected
dwellings.234
Still harder was the lot of those Protestant clergymen who
continued to cling, with desperate fidelity, to the cause of the
Lord's Anointed. Of all the Anglican divines the one who had the
largest share of James's good graces seems to have been
Cartwright. Whether Cartwright could long have continued to be a
favourite without being an apostate may be doubted. He died a few
weeks after his arrival in Ireland; and thenceforward his church
had no one to plead her cause. Nevertheless a few of her prelates
and priests continued for a time to teach what they had taught in
the days of the Exclusion Bill. But it was at the peril of life
or limb that they exercised their functions. Every wearer of a
cassock was a mark for the insults and outrages of soldiers and
Rapparees. In the country his house was robbed, and he was
fortunate if it was not burned over his head. He was hunted
through the streets of Dublin with cries of "There goes the devil
of a heretic." Sometimes he was knocked down: sometimes he was
cudgelled.235 The rulers of the University of Dublin, trained in
the Anglican doctrine of passive obedience, had greeted James on
his first arrival at the Castle, and had been assured by him that
he would protect them in the enjoyment of their property and
their privileges. They were now, without any trial, without any
accusation, thrust out of their house. The communion plate of the
chapel, the books in the library, the very chairs and beds of the
collegians were seized. Part of the building was turned into a
magazine, part into a barrack, part into a prison. Simon
Luttrell, who was Governor of the capital, was, with great
difficulty and by powerful intercession, induced to let the
ejected fellows and scholars depart in safety. He at length
permitted them to remain at large, with this condition, that, on
pain of death, no three of them should meet together.236 No
Protestant divine suffered more hardships than Doctor William
King, Dean of Saint Patrick's. He had been long distinguished by
the fervour with which he had inculcated the duty of passively
obeying even the worst rulers. At a later period, when he had
published a defence of the Revolution, and had accepted a mitre
from the new government, he was reminded that he had invoked the
divine vengeance on the usurpers, and had declared himself
willing to die a hundred deaths rather than desert the cause of
hereditary right. He had said that the true religion had often
been strengthened by persecution, but could never be strengthened
by rebellion; that it would be a glorious day for the Church of
England when a whole cartload of her ministers should go to the
gallows for the doctrine of nonresistance; and that his highest
ambition was to be one of such a company.237 It is not improbable
that, when he spoke thus, he felt as he spoke. But his
principles, though they might perhaps have held out against the
severities and the promises of William, were not proof against
the ingratitude of James. Human nature at last asserted its
rights. After King had been repeatedly imprisoned by the
government to which he was devotedly attached, after he had been
insulted and threatened in his own choir by the soldiers, after
he had been interdicted from burying in his own churchyard, and
from preaching in his own pulpit, after he had narrowly escaped
with life from a musketshot fired at him in the street, he began
to think the Whig theory of government less unreasonable and
unchristian than it had once appeared to him, and persuaded
himself that the oppressed Church might lawfully accept
deliverance, if God should be pleased, by whatever means, to send
it to her.
In no long time it appeared that James would have done well to
hearken to those counsellors who had told him that the acts by
which he was trying to make himself popular in one of his three
kingdoms, would make him odious in the others. It was in some
sense fortunate for England that, after he had ceased to reign
here, he continued during more than a year to reign in Ireland.
The Revolution had been followed by a reaction of public feeling
in his favour. That reaction, if it had been suffered to proceed
uninterrupted, might perhaps not have ceased till he was again
King: but it was violently interrupted by himself. He would not
suffer his people to forget: he would not suffer them to hope:
while they were trying to find excuses for his past errors, and
to persuade themselves that he would not repeat these errors, he
forced upon them, in their own despite, the conviction that he
was incorrigible, that the sharpest discipline of adversity had
taught him nothing, and that, if they were weak enough to recall
him, they would soon have to depose him again. It was in vain
that the Jacobites put forth pamphlets about the cruelty with
which he had been treated by those who were nearest to him in
blood, about the imperious temper and uncourteous manners of
William, about the favour shown to the Dutch, about the heavy
taxes, about the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act, about the
dangers which threatened the Church from the enmity of Puritans
and Latitudinarians. James refuted these pamphlets far more
effectually than all the ablest and most eloquent Whig writers
united could have done. Every week came the news that he had
passed some new Act for robbing or murdering Protestants. Every
colonist who succeeded in stealing across the sea from Leinster
to Holyhead or Bristol, brought fearful reports of the tyranny
under which his brethren groaned. What impression these reports
made on the Protestants of our island may be easily inferred from
the fact that they moved the indignation of Ronquillo, a Spaniard
and a bigoted member of the Church of Rome. He informed his Court
that, though the English laws against Popery might seem severe,
they were so much mitigated by the prudence and humanity of the
Government, that they caused no annoyance to quiet people; and he
took upon himself to assure the Holy See that what a Roman
Catholic suffered in London was nothing when compared with what a
Protestant suffered in Ireland.238
The fugitive Englishry found in England warm sympathy and
munificent relief. Many were received into the houses of friends
and kinsmen. Many were indebted for the means of subsistence to
the liberality of strangers. Among those who bore a part in this
work of mercy, none contributed more largely or less
ostentatiously than the Queen. The House of Commons placed at the
King's disposal fifteen thousand pounds for the relief of those
refugees whose wants were most pressing, and requested him to
give commissions in the army to those who were qualified for
military employment.239 An Act was also passed enabling beneficed
clergymen who had fled from Ireland to hold preferment in
England.240 Yet the interest which the nation felt in these
unfortunate guests was languid when compared with the interest
excited by that portion of the Saxon colony which still
maintained in Ulster a desperate conflict against overwhelming
odds. On this subject scarcely one dissentient voice was to be
heard in our island. Whigs, Tories, nay even those Jacobites in
whom Jacobitism had not extinguished every patriotic sentiment,
gloried in the glory of Enniskillen and Londonderry. The House of
Commons was all of one mind. "This is no time to be counting
cost," said honest Birch, who well remembered the way in which
Oliver had made war on the Irish. "Are those brave fellows in
Londonderry to be deserted? If we lose them will not all the
world cry shame upon us? A boom across the river! Why have we not
cut the boom in pieces? Are our brethren to perish almost in
sight of England, within a few hours' voyage of our shores?"241
Howe, the most vehement man of one party, declared that the
hearts of the people were set on Ireland. Seymour, the leader of
the other party, declared that, though he had not taken part in
setting up the new government, he should cordially support it in
all that might be necessary for the preservation of Ireland.242
The Commons appointed a committee to enquire into the cause of
the delays and miscarriages which had been all but fatal to the
Englishry of Ulster. The officers to whose treachery or cowardice
the public ascribed the calamities of Londonderry were put under
arrest. Lundy was sent to the Tower, Cunningham to the Gate
House. The agitation of the public mind was in some degree calmed
by the announcement that, before the end of the summer, an army
powerful enough to reestablish the English ascendency in Ireland
would be sent across Saint George's Channel, and that Schomberg
would be the General. In the meantime an expedition which was
thought to be sufficient for the relief of Londonderry was
despatched from Liverpool under the command of Kirke. The dogged
obstinacy with which this man had, in spite of royal
solicitations, adhered to his religion, and the part which he had
taken in the Revolution, had perhaps entitled him to an amnesty
for past crimes. But it is difficult to understand why the
Government should have selected for a post of the highest
importance an officer who was generally and justly hated, who had
never shown eminent talents for war, and who, both in Africa and
in England, had notoriously tolerated among his soldiers a
licentiousness, not only shocking to humanity, but also
incompatible with discipline.
On the sixteenth of May, Kirke's troops embarked: on the twenty-
second they sailed: but contrary winds made the passage slow, and
forced the armament to stop long at the Isle of Man. Meanwhile
the Protestants of Ulster were defending themselves with
stubborn courage against a great superiority of force. The
Enniskilleners had never ceased to wage a vigorous partisan war
against the native population. Early in May they marched to
encounter a large body of troops from Connaught, who had made an
inroad into Donegal. The Irish were speedily routed, and fled to
Sligo with the loss of a hundred and twenty men killed and sixty
taken. Two small pieces of artillery and several horses fell into
the hands of the conquerors. Elated by this success, the
Enniskilleners soon invaded the county of Cavan, drove before
them fifteen hundred of James's troops, took and destroyed the
castle of Ballincarrig, reputed the strongest in that part of the
kingdom, and carried off the pikes and muskets of the garrison.
The next incursion was into Meath. Three thousand oxen and two
thousand sheep were swept away and brought safe to the little
island in Lough Erne. These daring exploits spread terror even to
the gates of Dublin. Colonel Hugh Sutherland was ordered to march
against Enniskillen with a regiment of dragoons and two regiments
of foot. He carried with him arms for the native peasantry; and
many repaired to his standard. The Enniskilleners did not wait
till he came into their neighbourhood, but advanced to encounter
him. He declined an action, and retreated, leaving his stores at
Belturbet under the care of a detachment of three hundred
soldiers. The Protestants attacked Belturbet with vigour, made
their way into a lofty house which overlooked the town, and
thence opened such a fire that in two hours the garrison
surrendered. Seven hundred muskets, a great quantity of powder,
many horses, many sacks of biscuits, many barrels of meal, were
taken, and were sent to Enniskillen. The boats which brought
these precious spoils were joyfully welcomed. The fear of hunger
was removed. While the aboriginal population had, in many
counties, altogether neglected the cultivation of the earth, in
the expectation, it should seem, that marauding would prove an
inexhaustible resource, the colonists, true to the provident and
industrious character of their race, had, in the midst of war,
not omitted carefully to till the soil in the neighbourhood of
their strongholds. The harvest was now not far remote; and, till
the harvest, the food taken from the enemy would be amply
sufficient.243
Yet, in the midst of success and plenty, the Enniskilleners were
tortured by a cruel anxiety for Londonderry. They were bound to
the defenders of that city, not only by religious and national
sympathy, but by common interest. For there could be no doubt
that, if Londonderry fell, the whole Irish army would instantly
march in irresistible force upon Lough Erne. Yet what could be
done? Some brave men were for making a desperate attempt to
relieve the besieged city; but the odds were too great.
Detachments however were sent which infested the rear of the
blockading army, cut off supplies, and, on one occasion, carried
away the horses of three entire troops of cavalry.244 Still the
line of posts which surrounded Londonderry by land remained
unbroken. The river was still strictly closed and guarded. Within
the walls the distress had become extreme. So early as the eighth
of June horseflesh was almost the only meat which could be
purchased; and of horseflesh the supply was scanty. It was
necessary to make up the deficiency with tallow; and even tallow
was doled out with a parsimonious hand.
On the fifteenth of June a gleam of hope appeared. The sentinels
on the top of the Cathedral saw sails nine miles off in the bay
of Lough Foyle. Thirty vessels of different sizes were counted.
Signals were made from the steeples and returned from the mast
heads, but were imperfectly understood on both sides. At last a
messenger from the fleet eluded the Irish sentinels, dived under
the boom, and informed the garrison that Kirke had arrived from
England with troops, arms, ammunition, and provisions, to relieve
the city.245
In Londonderry expectation was at the height: but a few hours of
feverish joy were followed by weeks of misery. Kirke thought it
unsafe to make any attempt, either by land or by water, on the
lines of the besiegers, and retired to the entrance of Lough
Foyle, where, during several weeks, he lay inactive.
And now the pressure of famine became every day more severe. A
strict search was made in all the recesses of all the houses of
the city; and some provisions, which had been concealed in
cellars by people who had since died or made their escape, were
discovered and carried to the magazines. The stock of cannon
balls was almost exhausted; and their place was supplied by
brickbats coated with lead. Pestilence began, as usual, to make
its appearance in the train of hunger. Fifteen officers died of
fever in one day. The Governor Baker was among those who sank
under the disease. His place was supplied by Colonel John
Mitchelburne.246
Meanwhile it was known at Dublin that Kirke and his squadron were
on the coast of Ulster. The alarm was great at the Castle. Even
before this news arrived, Avaux had given it as his opinion that
Richard Hamilton was unequal to the difficulties of the
situation. It had therefore been resolved that Rosen should take
the chief command. He was now sent down with all speed.247
On the nineteenth of June he arrived at the head quarter of the
besieging army. At first he attempted to undermine the walls; but
his plan was discovered; and he was compelled to abandon it after
a sharp fight, in which more than a hundred of his men were
slain. Then his fury rose to a strange pitch. He, an old soldier,
a Marshal of France in expectancy, trained in the school of the
greatest generals, accustomed, during many years, to scientific
war, to be baffled by a mob of country gentlemen, farmers,
shopkeepers, who were protected only by a wall which any good
engineer would at once have pronounced untenable! He raved, he
blasphemed, in a language of his own, made up of all the dialects
spoken from the Baltic to the Atlantic. He would raze the city to
the ground: he would spare no living thing; no, not the young
girls; not the babies at the breast. As to the leaders, death was
too light a punishment for them: he would rack them: he would
roast them alive. In his rage he ordered a shell to be flung into
the town with a letter containing a horrible menace. He would,
he said, gather into one body all the Protestants who had
remained at their homes between Charlemont and the sea, old men,
women, children, many of them near in blood and affection to the
defenders of Londonderry. No protection, whatever might be the
authority by which it had been given, should be respected. The
multitude thus brought together should be driven under the walls
of Londonderry, and should there be starved to death in the sight
of their countrymen, their friends, their kinsmen. This was no
idle threat. Parties were instantly sent out in all directions to
collect victims. At dawn, on the morning of the second of July,
hundreds of Protestants, who were charged with no crime, who were
incapable of bearing arms, and many of whom had protections
granted by James, were dragged to the gates of the city. It was
imagined that the piteous sight would quell the spirit of the
colonists. But the only effect was to rouse that spirit to still
greater energy. An order was immediately put forth that no man
should utter the word Surrender on pain of death; and no man
uttered that word. Several prisoners of high rank were in the
town. Hitherto they had been well treated, and had received as
good rations as were measured out to the garrison. They were now,
closely confined. A gallows was erected on one of the bastion;
and a message was conveyed to Rosen, requesting him to send a
confessor instantly to prepare his friends for death. The
prisoners in great dismay wrote to the savage Livonian, but
received no answer. They then addressed themselves to their
countryman, Richard Hamilton. They were willing, they said, to
shed their blood for their King; but they thought it hard to die
the ignominious death of thieves in consequence of the barbarity
of their own companions in arms. Hamilton, though a man of lax
principles, was not cruel. He had been disgusted by the
inhumanity of Rosen, but, being only second in command, could not
venture to express publicly all that he thought. He however
remonstrated strongly. Some Irish officers felt on this occasion
as it was natural that brave men should feel, and declared,
weeping with pity and indignation, that they should never cease
to have in their ears the cries of the poor women and children
who had been driven at the point of the pike to die of famine
between the camp and the city. Rosen persisted during forty-eight
hours. In that time many unhappy creatures perished: but
Londonderry held out as resolutely as ever; and he saw that his
crime was likely to produce nothing but hatred and obloquy. He at
length gave way, and suffered the survivors to withdraw. The
garrison then took down the gallows which had been erected on the
bastion.248
When the tidings of these events reached Dublin, James, though by
no means prone to compassion, was startled by an atrocity of
which the civil wars of England had furnished no example, and was
displeased by learning that protections, given by his authority,
and guaranteed by his honour, had been publicly declared to be
nullities. He complained to the French ambassador, and said, with
a warmth which the occasion fully justified, that Rosen was a
barbarous Muscovite. Melfort could not refrain from adding that,
if Rosen had been an Englishman, he would have been hanged. Avaux
was utterly unable to understand this effeminate sensibility. In
his opinion, nothing had been done that was at all reprehensible;
and he had some difficulty in commanding himself when he heard
the King and the secretary blame, in strong language, an act of
wholesome severity.249 In truth the French ambassador and the
French general were well paired. There was a great difference
doubtless, in appearance and manner, between the handsome,
graceful, and refined diplomatist, whose dexterity and suavity
had been renowned at the most polite courts of Europe, and the
military adventurer, whose look and voice reminded all who came
near him that he had been born in a half savage country, that he
had risen from the ranks, and that he had once been sentenced to
death for marauding. But the heart of the courtier was really
even more callous than that of the soldier.
Rosen was recalled to Dublin; and Richard Hamilton was again left
in the chief command. He tried gentler means than those which had
brought so much reproach on his predecessor. No trick, no lie,
which was thought likely to discourage the starving garrison was
spared. One day a great shout was raised by the whole Irish camp.
The defenders of Londonderry were soon informed that the army of
James was rejoicing on account of the fall of Enniskillen. They
were told that they had now no chance of being relieved, and were
exhorted to save their lives by capitulating. They consented to
negotiate. But what they asked was, that they should be permitted
to depart armed and in military array, by land or by water at
their choice. They demanded hostages for the exact fulfilment of
these conditions, and insisted that the hostages should be sent
on board of the fleet which lay in Lough Foyle. Such terms
Hamilton durst not grant: the Governors would abate nothing: the
treaty was broken off; and the conflict recommenced.250
By this time July was far advanced; and the state of the city
was, hour by hour, becoming more frightful. The number of the
inhabitants had been thinned more by famine and disease than by
the fire of the enemy. Yet that fire was sharper and more
constant than ever. One of the gates was beaten in: one of the
bastions was laid in ruins; but the breaches made by day were
repaired by night with indefatigable activity. Every attack was
still repelled. But the fighting men of the garrison were so much
exhausted that they could scarcely keep their legs. Several of
them, in the act of striking at the enemy, fell down from mere
weakness. A very small quantity of grain remained, and was doled
out by mouthfuls. The stock of salted hides was considerable, and
by gnawing them the garrison appeased the rage of hunger. Dogs,
fattened on the blood of the slain who lay unburied round the
town, were luxuries which few could afford to purchase. The price
of a whelp's paw was five shillings and sixpence. Nine horses
were still alive, and but barely alive. They were so lean that
little meat was likely to be found upon them. It was, however,
determined to slaughter them for food. The people perished so
fast that it was impossible for the survivors to perform the
rites of sepulture. There was scarcely a cellar in which some
corpse was not decaying. Such was the extremity of distress, that
the rats who came to feast in those hideous dens were eagerly
hunted and greedily devoured. A small fish, caught in the river,
was not to be purchased with money. The only price for which such
a treasure could be obtained was some handfuls of oatmeal.
Leprosies, such as strange and unwholesome diet engenders, made
existence a constant torment. The whole city was poisoned by the
stench exhaled from the bodies of the dead and of the half dead.
That there should be fits of discontent and insubordination among
men enduring such misery was inevitable. At one moment it was
suspected that Walker had laid up somewhere a secret store of
food, and was revelling in private, while he exhorted others to
suffer resolutely for the good cause. His house was strictly
examined: his innocence was fully proved: he regained his
popularity; and the garrison, with death in near prospect,
thronged to the cathedral to hear him preach, drank in his
earnest eloquence with delight, and went forth from the house of
God with haggard faces and tottering steps, but with spirit still
unsubdued. There were, indeed, some secret plottings. A very few
obscure traitors opened communications with the enemy. But it was
necessary that all such dealings should be carefully concealed.
None dared to utter publicly any words save words of defiance and
stubborn resolution. Even in that extremity the general cry was
"No surrender." And there were not wanting voices which, in low
tones, added, "First the horses and hides; and then the
prisoners; and then each other." It was afterwards related, half
in jest, yet not without a horrible mixture of earnest, that a
corpulent citizen, whose bulk presented a strange contrast to the
skeletons which surrounded him, thought it expedient to conceal
himself from the numerous eyes which followed him with cannibal
looks whenever he appeared in the streets.251
It was no slight aggravation of the sufferings of the garrison
that all this tune the English ships were seen far off in Lough
Foyle. Communication between the fleet and the city was almost
impossible. One diver who had attempted to pass the boom was
drowned. Another was hanged. The language of signals was hardly
intelligible. On the thirteenth of July, however, a piece of
paper sewed up in a cloth button came to Walker's hands. It was a
letter from Kirke, and contained assurances of speedy relief. But
more than a fortnight of intense misery had since elapsed; and
the hearts of the most sanguine were sick with deferred hope. By
no art could the provisions which were left be made to hold out
two days more.252
Just at this time Kirke received a despatch from England, which
contained positive orders that Londonderry should be relieved. He
accordingly determined to make an attempt which, as far as
appears, he might have made, with at least an equally fair
prospect of success, six weeks earlier.253
Among the merchant ships which had come to Lough Foyle under his
convoy was one called the Mountjoy. The master, Micaiah Browning,
a native of Londonderry, had brought from England a large cargo
of provisions. He had, it is said, repeatedly remonstrated
against the inaction of the armament. He now eagerly volunteered
to take the first risk of succouring his fellow citizens; and his
offer was accepted. Andrew Douglas, master of the Phoenix, who
had on board a great quantity of meal from Scotland, was willing
to share the danger and the honour. The two merchantmen were to
be escorted by the Dartmouth frigate of thirty-six guns,
commanded by Captain John Leake, afterwards an admiral of great
fame.
It was the thirtieth of July. The sun had just set: the evening
sermon in the cathedral was over; and the heartbroken
congregation had separated, when the sentinels on the tower saw
the sails of three vessels coming up the Foyle. Soon there was a
stir in the Irish camp. The besiegers were on the alert for miles
along both shores. The ships were in extreme peril: for the river
was low; and the only navigable channel Tan very near to the left
bank, where the head quarters of the enemy had been fixed, and
where the batteries were most numerous. Leake performed his duty
with a skill and spirit worthy of his noble profession, exposed
his frigate to cover the merchantmen, and used his guns with
great effect. At length the little squadron came to the place of
peril. Then the Mountjoy took the lead, and went right at the
bottom. The huge barricade cracked and gave way: but the shock
was such that the Mountjoy rebounded, and stuck in the mud. A
yell of triumph rose from the banks: the Irish rushed to their
boats, and were preparing to board; but the Dartmouth poured on
them a well directed broadside, which threw them into disorder.
Just then the Phoenix dashed at the breach which the Mountjoy had
made, and was in a moment within the fence. Meantime the tide was
rising fast. The Mountjoy began to move, and soon passed safe
through the broken stakes and floating spars. But her brave
master was no more. A shot from one of the batteries had struck
him; and he died by the most enviable of all deaths, in sight of
the city which was his birthplace, which was his home, and which
had just been saved by his courage and self-devotion from the
most frightful form of destruction. The night had closed in
before the conflict at the boom began; but the flash of the guns
was seen, and the noise heard, by the lean and ghastly multitude
which covered the walls of the city. When the Mountjoy grounded,
and when the shout of triumph rose from the Irish on both sides
of the river, the hearts of the besieged died within them. One
who endured the unutterable anguish of that moment has told
that they looked fearfully livid in each other's eyes. Even after
the barricade had been passed, there was a terrible half hour of
suspense. It was ten o'clock before the ships arrived at the
quay. The whole population was there to welcome them. A screen
made of casks filled with earth was hastily thrown up to protect
the landing place from the batteries on the other side of the
river; and then the work of unloading began. First were rolled on
shore barrels containing six thousand bushels of meal. Then came
great cheeses, casks of beef, flitches of bacon, kegs of butter,
sacks of Pease and biscuit, ankers of brandy. Not many hours
before, half a pound of tallow and three quarters of a pound of
salted hide had been weighed out with niggardly care to every
fighting man. The ration which each now received was three pounds
of flour, two pounds of beef, and a pint of Pease. It is easy to
imagine with what tears grace was said over the suppers of that
evening. There was little sleep on either side of the wall. The
bonfires shone bright along the whole circuit of the ramparts.
The Irish guns continued to roar all night; and all night the
bells of the rescued city made answer to the Irish guns with a
peal of joyous defiance. Through the whole of the thirty-first of
July the batteries of the enemy continued to play. But, soon
after the sun had again gone down, flames were seen arising from
the camp; and, when the first of August dawned, a line of smoking
ruins marked the site lately occupied by the huts of the
besiegers; and the citizens saw far off the long column of pikes
and standards retreating up the left bank of the Foyle towards
Strabane.254
So ended this great siege, the most memorable in the annals of
the British isles. It had lasted a hundred and five days. The
garrison had been reduced from about seven thousand effective men
to about three thousand. The loss of the besiegers cannot be
precisely ascertained. Walker estimated it at eight thousand men.
It is certain from the despatches of Avaux that the regiments
which returned from the blockade had been so much thinned that
many of them were not more than two hundred strong. Of thirty-six
French gunners who had superintended the cannonading, thirty-one
had been killed or disabled.255 The means both of attack and of
defence had undoubtedly been such as would have moved the great
warriors of the Continent to laughter; and this is the very
circumstance which gives so peculiar an interest to the history
of the contest. It was a contest, not between engineers, but
between nations; and the victory remained with the nation which,
though inferior in number, was superior in civilisation, in
capacity for selfgovernment, and in stubbornness of
resolution.256
As soon as it was known that the Irish army had retired, a
deputation from the city hastened to Lough Foyle, and invited
Kirk to take the command. He came accompanied by a long train of
officers, and was received in state by the two Governors, who
delivered up to him the authority which, under the pressure of
necessity, they had assumed. He remained only a few days; but he
had time to show enough of the incurable vices of his character
to disgust a population distinguished by austere morals and
ardent public spirit. There was, however, no outbreak. The city
was in the highest good humour. Such quantities of provisions had
been landed from the fleet, that there was in every house a
plenty never before known. A few days earlier a man had been glad
to obtain for twenty pence a mouthful of carrion scraped from the
bones of a starved horse. A pound of good beef was now sold for
three halfpence. Meanwhile all hands were busied in removing
corpses which had been thinly covered with earth, in filling up
the holes which the shells had ploughed in the ground, and in
repairing the battered roofs of the houses. The recollection of
past dangers and privations, and the consciousness of having
deserved well of the English nation and of all Protestant
Churches, swelled the hearts of the townspeople with honest
pride. That pride grew stronger when they received from William a
letter acknowledging, in the most affectionate language, the debt
which he owed to the brave and trusty citizens of his good city.
The whole population crowded to the Diamond to hear the royal
epistle read. At the close all the guns on the ramparts sent
forth a voice of joy: all the ships in the river made answer:
barrels of ale were broken up; and the health of their Majesties
was drunk with shouts and volleys of musketry.
Five generations have since passed away; and still the wall of
Londonderry is to the Protestants of Ulster what the trophy of
Marathon was to the Athenians. A lofty pillar, rising from a
bastion which bore during many weeks the heaviest fire of the
enemy, is seen far up and far down the Foyle. On the summit is
the statue of Walker, such as when, in the last and most terrible
emergency, his eloquence roused the fainting courage of his
brethren. In one hand he grasps a Bible. The other, pointing down
the river, seems to direct the eyes of his famished audience to
the English topmasts in the distant bay. Such a monument was well
deserved: yet it was scarcely needed: for in truth the whole city
is to this day a monument of the great deliverance. The wall is
carefully preserved; nor would any plea of health or convenience
be held by the inhabitants sufficient to justify the demolition
of that sacred enclosure which, in the evil time, gave shelter to
their race and their religion.257 The summit of the ramparts
forms a pleasant walk. The bastions have been turned into little
gardens. Here and there, among the shrubs and flowers, may be
seen the old culverins which scattered bricks, cased with lead,
among the Irish ranks. One antique gun, the gift of the
Fishmongers of London, was distinguished, during the hundred and
five memorable days, by the loudness of its report, and still
bears the name of Roaring Meg. The cathedral is filled with
relics and trophies. In the vestibule is a huge shell, one of
many hundreds of shells which were thrown into the city. Over the
altar are still seen the French flagstaves, taken by the garrison
in a desperate sally. The white ensigns of the House of Bourbon
have long been dust: but their place has been supplied by new
banners, the work of the fairest hands of Ulster. The anniversary
of the day on which the gates were closed, and the anniversary of
the day on which the siege was raised, have been down to our own
time celebrated by salutes, processions, banquets, and sermons:
Lundy has been executed in effigy; and the sword, said by
tradition to be that of Maumont, has, on great occasions, been
carried in triumph. There is still a Walker Club and a Murray
Club. The humble tombs of the Protestant captains have been
carefully sought out, repaired, and embellished. It is
impossible not to respect the sentiment which indicates itself by
these tokens. It is a sentiment which belongs to the higher and
purer part of human nature, and which adds not a little to the
strength of states. A people which takes no pride in the noble
achievements of remote ancestors will never achieve any thing
worthy to be remembered with pride by remote descendants. Yet it
is impossible for the moralist or the statesman to look with
unmixed complacency on the solemnities with which Londonderry
commemorates her deliverance, and on the honours which she pays
to those who saved her. Unhappily the animosities of her brave
champions have descended with their glory. The faults which are
ordinarily found in dominant castes and dominant sects have not
seldom shown themselves without disguise at her festivities; and
even with the expressions of pious gratitude which have resounded
from her pulpits have too often been mingled words of wrath and
defiance.
The Irish army which had retreated to Strabane remained there but
a very short time. The spirit of the troops had been depressed by
their recent failure, and was soon completely cowed by the news
of a great disaster in another quarter.
Three weeks before this time the Duke of Berwick had gained an
advantage over a detachment of the Enniskilleners, and had, by
their own confession, killed or taken more than fifty of them.
They were in hopes of obtaining some assistance from Kirke, to
whom they had sent a deputation; and they still persisted in
rejecting all terms offered by the enemy. It was therefore
determined at Dublin that an attack should be made upon them from
several quarters at once. Macarthy, who had been rewarded for his
services in Munster with the title of Viscount Mountcashel,
marched towards Lough Erne from the east with three regiments of
foot, two regiments of dragoons, and some troops of cavalry. A
considerable force, which lay encamped near the mouth of the
river Drowes, was at the same time to advance from the west. The
Duke of Berwick was to come from the north, with such horse and
dragoons as could be spared from the army which was besieging
Londonderry. The Enniskilleners were not fully apprised of the
whole plan which had been laid for their destruction; but they
knew that Macarthy was on the road with a force exceeding any
which they could bring into the field. Their anxiety was in some
degree relieved by the return of the deputation which they had
sent to Kirke. Kirke could spare no soldiers; but he had sent
some arms, some ammunition, and some experienced officers, of
whom the chief were Colonel Wolseley and Lieutenant Colonel
Berry. These officers had come by sea round the coast of Donegal,
and had run up the Line. On Sunday, the twenty-ninth of July, it
was known that their boat was approaching the island of
Enniskillen. The whole population, male and female, came to the
shore to greet them. It was with difficulty, that they made their
way to the Castle through the crowds which hung on them, blessing
God that dear old England had not quite forgotten the Englishmen
who upheld her cause against great odds in the heart of Ireland.
Wolseley seems to have been in every respect well qualified for
his post. He was a stanch Protestant, had distinguished himself
among the Yorkshiremen who rose up for the Prince of Orange and a
free Parliament, and had, if he is not belied, proved his zeal
for liberty and pure religion, by causing the Mayor of
Scarborough, who had made a speech in favour of King James, to be
brought into the market place and well tossed there in a
blanket.258 This vehement hatred of Popery was, in the estimation
of the men of Enniskillen, the first of all qualifications for
command: and Wolseley had other and more important
qualifications. Though himself regularly bred to war, he seems to
have had a peculiar aptitude for the management of irregular
troops. He had scarcely taken on himself the chief command when
he received notice that Mountcashel had laid siege to the Castle
of Crum. Crum was the frontier garrison of the Protestants of
Fermanagh. The ruins of the old fortifications are now among the
attractions of a beautiful pleasureground, situated on a woody
promontory which overlooks Lough Erne. Wolseley determined to
raise the siege. He sent Berry forward with such troops as could
be instantly put in motion, and promised to follow speedily with
a larger force.
Berry, after marching some miles, encountered thirteen companies
of Macarthy's dragoons commanded by Anthony, the most brilliant
and accomplished of all who bore the name of Hamilton, but much
less successful as a soldier than as a courtier, a lover, and a
writer. Hamilton's dragoons ran at the first fire: he was
severely wounded; and his second in command was shot dead.
Macarthy soon came up to support Hamilton; and at the same time
Wolseley came up to support Berry. The hostile armies were now in
presence of each other. Macarthy had above five thousand men and
several pieces of artillery. The Enniskilleners were under three
thousand; and they had marched in such haste that they had
brought only one day's provisions. It was therefore absolutely
necessary for them either to fight instantly or to retreat.
Wolseley determined to consult the men; and this determination,
which, in ordinary circumstances, would have been most unworthy
of a general, was fully justified by the peculiar composition and
temper of the little army, an army made up of gentlemen and
yeomen fighting, not for pay, but for their lands, their wives,
their children, and their God. The ranks were drawn up under
arms; and the question was put, "Advance or Retreat?" The
answer was an universal shout of "Advance." Wolseley gave out the
word, "No Popery." It was received with loud applause. He
instantly made his dispositions for an attack. As he approached,
the enemy, to his great surprise, began to retire. The
Enniskilleners were eager to pursue with all speed: but their
commander, suspecting a snare, restrained their ardour, and
positively forbade them to break their ranks. Thus one army
retreated and the other followed, in good order, through the
little town of Newton Butler. About a mile from that town the
Irish faced about, and made a stand. Their position was well
chosen. They were drawn up on a hill at the foot of which lay a
deep bog. A narrow paved causeway which ran across the bog was
the only road by which the cavalry of the Enniskilleners could
advance; for on the right and left were pools, turf pits, and
quagmires, which afforded no footing to horses. Macarthy placed
his cannon in such a manner as to sweep this causeway.
Wolseley ordered his infantry to the attack. They struggled
through the bog, made their way to firm ground, and rushed on the
guns. There was then a short and desperate fight. The Irish
cannoneers stood gallantly to their pieces till they were cut
down to a man. The Enniskillen horse, no longer in danger of
being mowed down by the fire of the artillery, came fast up the
causeway. The Irish dragoons who had run away in the morning were
smitten with another panic, and, without striking a blow,
galloped from the field. The horse followed the example. Such was
the terror of the fugitives that many of them spurred hard till
their beasts fell down, and then continued to fly on foot,
throwing away carbines, swords, and even coats as incumbrances.
The infantry, seeing themselves deserted, flung down their pikes
and muskets and ran for their lives. The conquerors now gave
loose to that ferocity which has seldom failed to disgrace the
civil wars of Ireland. The butchery was terrible. Near fifteen
hundred of the vanquished were put to the sword. About five
hundred more, in ignorance of the country, took a road which led
to Lough Erne. The lake was before them: the enemy behind: they
plunged into the waters and perished there. Macarthy, abandoned
by his troops, rushed into the midst of the pursuers and very
nearly found the death which he sought. He was wounded in several
places: he was struck to the ground; and in another moment his
brains would have been knocked out with the butt end of a musket,
when he was recognised and saved. The colonists lost only twenty
men killed and fifty wounded. They took four hundred prisoners,
seven pieces of cannon, fourteen barrels of powder, all the drums
and all the colours of the vanquished enemy.259
The battle of Newton Butler was won on the same afternoon on
which the boom thrown over the Foyle was broken. At Strabane the
news met the Celtic army which was retreating from Londonderry.
All was terror and confusion: the tents were struck: the military
stores were flung by waggon loads into the waters of the Mourne;
and the dismayed Irish, leaving many sick and wounded to the
mercy of the victorious Protestants, fled to Omagh, and thence to
Charlemont. Sarsfield, who commanded at Sligo, found it necessary
to abandon that town, which was instantly occupied by a
detachment of Kirke's troops.260 Dublin was in consternation.
James dropped words which indicated an intention of flying to the
Continent. Evil tidings indeed came fast upon him. Almost at the
same time at which he learned that one of his armies had raised
the siege of Londonderry, and that another had been routed at
Newton Butler, he received intelligence scarcely less
disheartening from Scotland.
It is now necessary to trace the progress of those events to
which Scotland owes her political and her religious liberty, her
prosperity and her civilisation.
CHAPTER XIII.
The Revolution more violent in Scotland than in England--
Elections for the Convention; Rabbling of the Episcopal Clergy--
State of Edinburgh--Question of an Union between England and
Scotland raised--Wish of the English Low Churchmen to preserve
Episcopacy in Scotland--Opinions of William about Church
Government in Scotland--Comparative Strength of Religious Parties
in Scotland--Letter from William to the Scotch Convention--
William's Instructions to his Agents in Scotland; the Dalrymples-
-Melville--James's Agents in Scotland: Dundee; Balcarras--Meeting
of the Convention--Hamilton elected President--Committee of
Elections; Edinburgh Castle summoned--Dundee threatened by the
Covenanters--Letter from James to the Convention--Effect of
James's Letter--Flight of Dundee--Tumultuous Sitting of the
Convention--A Committee appointed to frame a Plan of Government--
Resolutions proposed by the Committee--William and Mary
proclaimed; the Claim of Right; Abolition of Episcopacy--Torture-
-William and Mary accept the Crown of Scotland--Discontent of the
Covenanters--Ministerial Arrangements in Scotland--Hamilton;
Crawford--The Dalrymples; Lockhart; Montgomery --Melville;
Carstairs--The Club formed: Annandale; Ross--Hume; Fletcher of
Saltoun--War breaks out in the Highlands; State of the Highlands-
-Peculiar Nature of Jacobitism in the Highlands--Jealousy of the
Ascendency of the Campbells--The Stewarts and Macnaghtens--The
Macleans; the Camerons: Lochiel--The Macdonalds; Feud between the
Macdonalds and Mackintoshes; Inverness--Inverness threatened by
Macdonald of Keppoch--Dundee appears in Keppoch's Camp--
Insurrection of the Clans hostile to the Campbells--Tarbet's
Advice to the Government--Indecisive Campaign in the Highlands--
Military Character of the Highlanders--Quarrels in the Highland
Army--Dundee applies to James for Assistance; the War in the
Highlands suspended--Scruples of the Covenanters about taking
Arms for King William--The Cameronian Regiment raised--Edinburgh
Castle surrenders--Session of Parliament at Edinburgh--Ascendancy
of the Club--Troubles in Athol--The War breaks out again in the
Highlands--Death of Dundee--Retreat of Mackay--Effect of the
Battle of Killiecrankie; the Scottish Parliament adjourned--The
Highland Army reinforced--Skirmish at Saint Johnston's--Disorders
in the Highland Army--Mackay's Advice disregarded by the Scotch
Ministers--The Cameronians stationed at Dunkeld--The Highlanders
attack the Cameronians and are repulsed--Dissolution of the
Highland Army; Intrigues of the Club; State of the Lowlands
THE violence of revolutions is generally proportioned to the
degree of the maladministration which has produced them. It is
therefore not strange that the government of Scotland, having
been during many years far more oppressive and corrupt than the
government of England, should have fallen with a far heavier
ruin. The movement against the last king of the House of Stuart
was in England conservative, in Scotland destructive. The English
complained, not of the law, but of the violation of the law. They
rose up against the first magistrate merely in order to assert
the supremacy of the law. They were for the most part strongly
attached to the Church established by law. Even in applying that
extraordinary remedy to which an extraordinary emergency
compelled them to have recourse, they deviated as little as
possible from the ordinary methods prescribed by the law. The
Convention which met at Westminster, though summoned by irregular
writs, was constituted on the exact model of a regular
Parliament. No man was invited to the Upper House whose right to
sit there was not clear. The knights and burgesses were chosen by
those electors who would have been entitled to choose the members
of a House of Commons called under the great seal. The franchises
of the forty shilling freeholder, of the householder paying scot
and lot, of the burgage tenant, of the liveryman of London, of
the Master of Arts of Oxford, were respected. The sense of the
constituent bodies was taken with as little violence on the part
of mobs, with as little trickery on the part of returning
officers, as at any general election of that age. When at length
the Estates met, their deliberations were carried on with perfect
freedom and in strict accordance with ancient forms. There was
indeed, after the first flight of James, an alarming anarchy in
London and in some parts of the country. But that anarchy nowhere
lasted longer than forty-eight hours. From the day on which
William reached Saint James's, not even the most unpopular agents
of the fallen government, not even the ministers of the Roman
Catholic Church, had any thing to fear from the fury of the
populace.
In Scotland the course of events was very different. There the
law itself was a grievance; and James had perhaps incurred more
unpopularity by enforcing it than by violating it. The Church
established by law was the most odious institution in the realm.
The tribunals had pronounced some sentences so flagitious, the
Parliament had passed some acts so oppressive, that, unless those
sentences and those Acts were treated as nullities, it would be
impossible to bring together a Convention commanding the public
respect and expressing the public opinion. It was hardly to be
expected, for example, that the Whigs, in this day of their
power, would endure to see their hereditary leader, the son of a
martyr, the grandson of a martyr, excluded from the Parliament
House in which nine of his ancestors had sate as Earls of Argyle,
and excluded by a judgment on which the whole kingdom cried
shame. Still less was it to be expected that they would suffer
the election of members for counties and towns to be conducted
according to the provisions of the existing law. For under the
existing law no elector could vote without swearing that he
renounced the Covenant, and that he acknowledged the Royal
supremacy in matters ecclesiastical.261 Such an oath no rigid
Presbyterian could take. If such an oath had been exacted, the
constituent bodies would have been merely small knots of
prelatists: the business of devising securities against
oppression would have been left to the oppressors; and the great
party which had been most active in effecting the Revolution
would, in an assembly sprung from the Revolution, have had not a
single representative.262
William saw that he must not think of paying to the laws of
Scotland that scrupulous respect which he had wisely and
righteously paid to the laws of England. It was absolutely
necessary that he should determine by his own authority how that
Convention which was to meet at Edinburgh should be chosen, and
that he should assume the power of annulling some judgments and
some statutes. He accordingly summoned to the parliament house
several Lords who had been deprived of their honours by sentences
which the general voice loudly condemned as unjust; and he took
on himself to dispense with the Act which deprived Presbyterians
of the elective franchise.
The consequence was that the choice of almost all the shires and
burghs fell on Whig candidates. The defeated party complained
loudly of foul play, of the rudeness of the populace, and of the
partiality of the presiding magistrates; and these complaints
were in many cases well founded. It is not under such rulers as
Lauderdale and Dundee that nations learn justice and
moderation.263
Nor was it only at the elections that the popular feeling, so
long and so severely compressed, exploded with violence. The
heads and the hands of the martyred Whigs were taken down from
the gates of Edinburgh, carried in procession by great multitudes
to the cemeteries, and laid in the earth with solemn respect.264
It would have been well if the public enthusiasm had manifested
itself in no less praiseworthy form. Unhappily throughout a large
part of Scotland the clergy of the Established Church were, to
use the phrase then common, rabbled. The morning of Christmas day
was fixed for the commencement of these outrages. For nothing
disgusted the rigid Covenanter more than the reverence paid by
the prelatist to the ancient holidays of the Church. That such
reverence may be carried to an absurd extreme is true. But a
philosopher may perhaps be inclined to think the opposite extreme
not less absurd, and may ask why religion should reject the aid
of associations which exist in every nation sufficiently
civilised to have a calendar, and which are found by experience
to have a powerful and often a salutary effect. The Puritan, who
was, in general, but too ready to follow precedents and analogies
drawn from the history and jurisprudence of the Jews, might have
found in the Old Testament quite as clear warrant for keeping
festivals in honour of great events as for assassinating bishops
and refusing quarter to captives. He certainly did not learn from
his master, Calvin, to hold such festivals in abhorrence; for it
was in consequence of the strenuous exertions of Calvin that
Christmas was, after an interval of some years, again observed by
the citizens of Geneva.265 But there had arisen in Scotland
Calvinists who were to Calvin what Calvin was to Laud. To these
austere fanatics a holiday was an object of positive disgust and
hatred. They long continued in their solemn manifestoes to reckon
it among the sins which would one day bring down some fearful
judgment on the land that the Court of Session took a vacation in
the last week of December.266
On Christmas day, therefore, the Covenanters held armed musters
by concert in many parts of the western shires. Each band marched
to the nearest manse, and sacked the cellar and larder of the
minister, which at that season were probably better stocked than
usual. The priest of Baal was reviled and insulted, sometimes
beaten, sometimes ducked. His furniture was thrown out of the
windows; his wife and children turned out of doors in the snow.
He was then carried to the market place, and exposed during some
time as a malefactor. His gown was torn to shreds over his head:
if he had a prayer book in his pocket it was burned; and he was
dismissed with a charge, never, as he valued his life, to
officiate in the parish again. The work of reformation having
been thus completed, the reformers locked up the church and
departed with the keys. In justice to these men it must be owned
that they had suffered such oppression as may excuse, though it
cannot justify, their violence; and that, though they were rude
even to brutality, they do not appear to have been guilty of any
intentional injury to life or limb.267
The disorder spread fast. In Ayrshire, Clydesdale, Nithisdale,
Annandale, every parish was visited by these turbulent zealots.
About two hundred curates--so the episcopal parish priests were
called--were expelled. The graver Covenanters, while they
applauded the fervour of their riotous brethren, were
apprehensive that proceedings so irregular might give scandal,
and learned, with especial concern, that here and there an Achan
had disgraced the good cause by stooping to plunder the
Canaanites whom he ought only to have smitten. A general meeting
of ministers and elders was called for the purpose of preventing
such discreditable excesses. In this meeting it was determined
that, for the future, the ejection of the established clergy
should be performed in a more ceremonious manner. A form of
notice was drawn up and served on every curate in the Western
Lowlands who had not yet been rabbled. This notice was simply a
threatening letter, commanding him to quit his parish peaceably,
on pain of being turned out by force.268
The Scottish Bishops, in great dismay, sent the Dean of Glasgow
to plead the cause of their persecuted Church at Westminster. The
outrages committed by the Covenanters were in the highest degree
offensive to William, who had, in the south of the island,
protected even Benedictines and Franciscans from insult and
spoliation. But, though he had, at the request of a large number
of the noblemen and gentlemen of Scotland, taken on himself
provisionally the executive administration of that kingdom, the
means of maintaining order there were not at his command. He had
not a single regiment north of the Tweed, or indeed within many
miles of that river. It was vain to hope that mere words would
quiet a nation which had not, in any age, been very amenable to
control, and which was now agitated by hopes and resentments,
such as great revolutions, following great oppressions, naturally
engender. A proclamation was however put forth, directing that
all people should lay down their arms, and that, till the
Convention should have settled the government, the clergy of the
Established Church should be suffered to reside on their cures
without molestation. But this proclamation, not being supported
by troops, was very little regarded. On the very day after it was
published at Glasgow, the venerable Cathedral of that city,
almost the only fine church of the middle ages which stands
uninjured in Scotland, was attacked by a crowd of Presbyterians
from the meeting houses, with whom were mingled many of their
fiercer brethren from the hills. It was a Sunday; but to rabble a
congregation of prelatists was held to be a work of necessity and
mercy. The worshippers were dispersed, beaten, and pelted with
snowballs. It was indeed asserted that some wounds were inflicted
with much more formidable weapons.269
Edinburgh, the seat of government, was in a state of anarchy. The
Castle, which commanded the whole city, was still held for James
by the Duke of Gordon. The common people were generally Whigs.
The College of justice, a great forensic society composed of
judges, advocates, writers to the signet, and solicitors, was the
stronghold of Toryism: for a rigid test had during some years
excluded Presbyterians from all the departments of the legal
profession. The lawyers, some hundreds in number, formed
themselves into a battalion of infantry, and for a time
effectually kept down the multitude. They paid, however, so much
respect to William's authority as to disband themselves when his
proclamation was published. But the example of obedience which
they had set was not imitated. Scarcely had they laid down their
weapons, when Covenanters from the west, who had done all that
was to be done in the way of pelting and hustling the curates of
their own neighbourhood, came dropping into Edinburgh, by tens
and twenties, for the purpose of protecting, or, if need should
be, of overawing the Convention. Glasgow alone sent four hundred
of these men. It could hardly be doubted that they were directed
by some leader of great weight. They showed themselves little in
any public place: but it was known that every cellar was filled
with them; and it might well be apprehended that, at the first
signal, they would pour forth from their caverns, and appear
armed round the Parliament house.270
It might have been expected that every patriotic and enlightened
Scotchman would have earnestly desired to see the agitation
appeased, and some government established which might be able to
protect property and to enforce the law. An imperfect settlement
which could be speedily made might well appear to such a man
preferable to a perfect settlement which must be the work of
time. Just at this moment, however, a party, strong both in
numbers and in abilities, raised a new and most important
question, which seemed not unlikely to prolong the interregnum
till the autumn. This party maintained that the Estates ought not
immediately to declare William and Mary King and Queen, but to
propose to England a treaty of union, and to keep the throne
vacant till such a treaty should be concluded on terms
advantageous to Scotland.271
It may seem strange that a large portion of a people, whose
patriotism, exhibited, often in a heroic, and sometimes in a
comic form, has long been proverbial, should have been willing,
nay impatient, to surrender an independence which had been,
through many ages, dearly prized and manfully defended. The truth
is that the stubborn spirit which the arms of the Plantagenets
and Tudors had been unable to subdue had begun to yield to a very
different kind of force. Customhouses and tariffs were rapidly
doing what the carnage of Falkirk and Halidon, of Flodden and of
Pinkie, had failed to do. Scotland had some experience of the
effects of an union. She had, near forty years before, been
united to England on such terms as England, flushed with
conquest, chose to dictate. That union was inseparably associated
in the minds of the vanquished people with defeat and
humiliation. And yet even that union, cruelly as it had wounded
the pride of the Scots, had promoted their prosperity. Cromwell,
with wisdom and liberality rare in his age, had established the
most complete freedom of trade between the dominant and the
subject country. While he governed, no prohibition, no duty,
impeded the transit of commodities from any part of the island to
any other. His navigation laws imposed no restraint on the trade
of Scotland. A Scotch vessel was at liberty to carry a Scotch
cargo to Barbadoes, and to bring the sugars of Barbadoes into the
port of London.272 The rule of the Protector therefore had been
propitious to the industry and to the physical wellbeing of the
Scottish people. Hating him and cursing him, they could not help
thriving under him, and often, during the administration of their
legitimate princes, looked back with regret to the golden days of
the usurper.273
The Restoration came, and changed every thing. The Scots regained
their independence, and soon began to find that independence had
its discomfort as well as its dignity. The English parliament
treated them as aliens and as rivals. A new Navigation Act put
them on almost the same footing with the Dutch. High duties, and
in some cases prohibitory duties, were imposed on the products of
Scottish industry. It is not wonderful that a nation eminently
industrious, shrewd, and enterprising, a nation which, having
been long kept back by a sterile soil and a severe climate, was
just beginning to prosper in spite of these disadvantages, and
which found its progress suddenly stopped, should think itself
cruelly treated. Yet there was no help. Complaint was vain.
Retaliation was impossible. The Sovereign, even if he had the
wish, had not the power, to bear himself evenly between his large
and his small kingdom, between the kingdom from which he drew an
annual revenue of a million and a half and the kingdom from which
he drew an annual revenue of little more than sixty thousand
pounds. He dared neither to refuse his assent to any English law
injurious to the trade of Scotland, nor to give his assent to any
Scotch law injurious to the trade of England.
The complaints of the Scotch, however, were so loud that Charles,
in 1667, appointed Commissioners to arrange the terms of a
commercial treaty between the two British kingdoms. The
conferences were soon broken off; and all that passed while they
continued proved that there was only one way in which Scotland
could obtain a share of the commercial prosperity which England
at that time enjoyed.274 The Scotch must become one people with
the English. The Parliament which had hitherto sate at Edinburgh
must be incorporated with the Parliament which sate at
Westminster. The sacrifice could not but be painfully felt by a
brave and haughty people, who had, during twelve generations,
regarded the southern domination with deadly aversion, and whose
hearts still swelled at the thought of the death of Wallace and
of the triumphs of Bruce. There were doubtless many punctilious
patriots who would have strenuously opposed an union even if they
could have foreseen that the effect of an union would be to make
Glasgow a greater city than Amsterdam, and to cover the dreary
Lothians with harvests and woods, neat farmhouses and stately
mansions. But there was also a large class which was not disposed
to throw away great and substantial advantages in order to
preserve mere names and ceremonies; and the influence of this
class was such that, in the year 1670, the Scotch Parliament made
direct overtures to England.275 The King undertook the office of
mediator; and negotiators were named on both sides; but nothing
was concluded.
The question, having slept during eighteen years, was suddenly
revived by the Revolution. Different classes, impelled by
different motives, concurred on this point. With merchants, eager
to share in the advantages of the West Indian Trade, were joined
active and aspiring politicians who wished to exhibit their
abilities in a more conspicuous theatre than the Scottish
Parliament House, and to collect riches from a more copious
source than the Scottish treasury. The cry for union was swelled
by the voices of some artful Jacobites, who merely wished to
cause discord and delay, and who hoped to attain this end by
mixing up with the difficult question which it was the especial
business of the Convention to settle another question more
difficult still. It is probable that some who disliked the
ascetic habits and rigid discipline of the Presbyterians wished
for an union as the only mode of maintaining prelacy in the
northern part of the island. In an united Parliament the English
members must greatly preponderate; and in England the bishops
were held in high honour by the great majority of the population.
The Episcopal Church of Scotland, it was plain, rested on a
narrow basis, and would fall before the first attack. The
Episcopal Church of Great Britain might have a foundation broad
and solid enough to withstand all assaults.
Whether, in 1689, it would have been possible to effect a civil
union without a religious union may well be doubted. But there
can be no doubt that a religious union would have been one of the
greatest calamities that could have befallen either kingdom. The
union accomplished in 1707 has indeed been a great blessing both
to England and to Scotland. But it has been a blessing because,
in constituting one State, it left two Churches. The political
interest of the contracting parties was the same: but the
ecclesiastical dispute between them was one which admitted of no
compromise. They could therefore preserve harmony only by
agreeing to differ. Had there been an amalgamation of the
hierarchies, there never would have been an amalgamation of the
nations. Successive Mitchells would have fired at successive
Sharpes. Five generations of Claverhouses would have butchered
five generations of Camerons. Those marvellous improvements which
have changed the face of Scotland would never have been effected.
Plains now rich with harvests would have remained barren moors.
Waterfalls which now turn the wheels of immense factories would
have resounded in a wilderness. New Lanark would still have been
a sheepwalk, and Greenock a fishing hamlet. What little strength
Scotland could under such a system have possessed must, in an
estimate of the resources of Great Britain, have been, not added,
but deducted. So encumbered, our country never could have held,
either in peace or in war, a place in the first rank of nations.
We are unfortunately not without the means of judging of the
effect which may be produced on the moral and physical state of a
people by establishing, in the exclusive enjoyment of riches and
dignity a Church loved and reverenced only by the few, and
regarded by the many with religious and national aversion. One
such Church is quite burden enough for the energies of one
empire.
But these things, which to us, who have been taught by a bitter
experience, seem clear, were by no means clear in 1689, even to
very tolerant and enlightened politicians. In truth the English
Low Churchmen were, if possible, more anxious than the English
High Churchmen to preserve Episcopacy in Scotland. It is a
remarkable fact that Burnet, who was always accused of wishing to
establish the Calvinistic discipline in the south of the island,
incurred great unpopularity among his own countrymen by his
efforts to uphold prelacy in the north. He was doubtless in
error: but his error is to be attributed to a cause which does
him no discredit. His favourite object, an object unattainable
indeed, yet such as might well fascinate a large intellect and a
benevolent heart, had long been an honourable treaty between the
Anglican Church and the Nonconformists. He thought it most
unfortunate that one opportunity of concluding such a treaty
should have been lost at the time of the Restoration. It seemed
to him that another opportunity was afforded by the Revolution.
He and his friends were eagerly pushing forward Nottingham's
Comprehension Bill, and were flattering themselves with vain
hopes of success. But they felt that there could hardly be a
Comprehension in one of the two British kingdoms, unless there
were also a Comprehension in the other. Concession must be
purchased by concession. If the Presbyterian pertinaciously
refused to listen to any terms of compromise where he was strong,
it would be almost impossible to obtain for him liberal terms of
compromise where he was weak. Bishops must therefore be allowed
to keep their sees in Scotland, in order that divines not
ordained by Bishops might be allowed to hold rectories and
canonries in England.
Thus the cause of the Episcopalians in the north and the cause of
the Presbyterians in the south were bound up together in a manner
which might well perplex even a skilful statesman. It was happy
for our country that the momentous question which excited so many
strong passions, and which presented itself in so many different
points of view, was to be decided by such a man as William. He
listened to Episcopalians, to Latitudinarians, to Presbyterians,
to the Dean of Glasgow who pleaded for the apostolical
succession, to Burnet who represented the danger of alienating
the Anglican clergy, to Carstairs who hated prelacy with the
hatred of a man whose thumbs were deeply marked by the screws of
prelatists. Surrounded by these eager advocates, William remained
calm and impartial. He was indeed eminently qualified by his
situation as well as by his personal qualities to be the umpire
in that great contention. He was the King of a prelatical
kingdom. He was the Prime Minister of a presbyterian republic.
His unwillingness to offend the Anglican Church of which he was
the head, and his unwillingness to offend the reformed Churches
of the Continent which regarded him as a champion divinely sent
to protect them against the French tyranny, balanced each other,
and kept him from leaning unduly to either side. His conscience
was perfectly neutral. For it was his deliberate opinion that no
form of ecclesiastical polity was of divine institution. He
dissented equally from the school of Laud and from the school of
Cameron, from the men who held that there could not be a
Christian Church without Bishops, and from the men who held that
there could not be a Christian Church without synods. Which form
of government should be adopted was in his judgment a question of
mere expediency. He would probably have preferred a temper
between the two rival systems, a hierarchy in which the chief
spiritual functionaries should have been something more than
moderators and something less than prelates. But he was far too
wise a man to think of settling such a matter according to his
own personal tastes. He determined therefore that, if there was
on both sides a disposition to compromise, he would act as
mediator. But, if it should prove that the public mind of England
and the public mind of Scotland had taken the ply strongly in
opposite directions, he would not attempt to force either nation
into conformity with the opinion of the other. He would suffer
each to have its own church, and would content himself with
restraining both churches from persecuting nonconformists, and
from encroaching on the functions of the civil magistrate.
The language which he held to those Scottish Episcopalians who
compla |
