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■j. ■ 'f * I'

A SHORT HISTORY

OF THE

ENGLISH PEOPLE

■ x -

Lmad
End

tari^crd'f ueofirazfhicatSjtablLthnmt.

London MicmLUaji St Tc.

SHORT HISTORY

OF THE

ENGLISH PEOPLE

JOHN RICHARD GREEN

HONOK.HV ,H..0W OK JESUS COLLEGE. OXPOKO

WITH MAPS AND TABLES

^^PT EDITJON^ THOROUGHLY REVISED

TORONTO;
THE COPP, CLARK COMPANY. L.M.XKa

Kawrwl M ieawllim; l3 Aa* of th« Pftriiainent of OmuuU, In th* jrwu ^m tbeoMUid titrht handrtd
•utX *ttflil^'«iKhi. by MACMILLAM * \JM., Id Um uAm of th« Minister of Afrktulturo.

i>i/ m; II

I M( 'i

I I

./■ ).', (

INTRODUCTION.

lUltUf*-

The story of how the Short History of the EngHsh People came to
be written would be the story of Mr. Green's life, from the time when
his boyish interest was first awakened by the world beyond himself
until his work was done. So closely are the work and the worker
bound together that unless the biography be fully written no real
account of the growth of the book can indeed be given. But in
issuing a Revised Edition of the History, a slight sketch of the
historical progress of the writer's mind, and of the gradual way in
which the plan of his work grew up, may not seem out of place.

John Richard Green, who was born at Oxford in December 1837,
was sent at eight years old to Magdalen Grammar School, then held
in a small room within the precincts of the College. The Oxford world
about him was full of suggestions of a past which very early startled
his curiosity and fired his imagination. The gossiping tales of an old
dame who had seen George the Third drive through the town in a
coach and six were his first lessons in history. Year after year he took
part with excited fancy in the procession of the Magdalen choir boys
to the College tower on May Day, to sing at the sunrising a Hymn to
the Trinity which had replaced the Mass chanted in pre-Reformation
days, and to "jangle" the bells in recognition of an immemorial
festival. St. Giles* fair, the " beating of the bounds," even the name
of " Pennyfarthing Street," were no less records of a mysterious past
than Chapel or College or the very trees of Magdalen Walk ; and he
once received, breathless and awe-struck, a pri.^2 from thz Y:z.r.dz of
the centenarian President of the College, Dr. Routh, the last man wha
ever wore a wig in Oxford, a man who had himself seen Dr. Johnson.

INTRODUCTION.

.( ■ i

stand in the High Street with one foot on either side of the kennel
that ran down the middle of the way, the street boys standing
round, "none daring to interrupt the meditations of the great
lexicographer." "You are a clever boy," said the old man as he
gave the prize and shook him by the hand.

His curiosity soon carried him beyond Oxford ; and in very early
days he learned to wander on Saints' days and holidays to the
churches of neighbouring villages, and there shut himself in to rub
brasses and study architectural mouldings. Other interests followed
on his ecclesiastical training. He remembered i' j excitement which
was produced in Oxford by Layard's discovery of the Nestorians in
the Euphrates valley. One dny Mr. Ramsay g-^thered round him the
boys who were at play in Magdalen Walk ar 1 told them of his
journey to see these people ; and one at least of his hearers plunged
eagerly into problems then much discussed of the relations of
orthodox believers to Monophysites, and the distinctions between
heresy and schism, questions which occupied him many years.
Knowledge of this kind, he said long afterwards, had been a real gain
to him. " The study of what the Monophysites did in Syria, and
the Monothelites in Egypt, has taught me what few historians know
— the intimate part religion plays in a nation's history, and how
closely it joins itself to a people's life."

Living ir a strictly Conservative atmosphere, he had been very
diligently brought up as a Tory and a High Churchman. But when
he was about fourteen, orthodox Conservatism and school life came
to a close which then seemed to him very tragic. A school essay
was set on Charles the First ; and as the boy read earnestly every
book he could find on the subject, it suddenly burst on him that
Charles was wrong. The essay, written with a great deal of feeling
under this new and strong conviction, gained the prize over the heads
of boys older and till then reputed abler ; but it drew down on him
unmeasured disapproval. Canon Mozley, who examined, remonstrated
in his grave way : "Your essay is very good, but remember I do not
agree with your conclusions, and you will in all probability see reason
to change them as you grow older." The head-master took a yet more
severe view of such a change of political creed. But the impulse

le kennel

standing

;he great

an as he

k'ery early
rs to the
in to rub
s followed
lent which
storians in
id him the
em of his
rs plunged
jlations of
IS between
any years,
a real gain
Syria, and
•ians know
and how

[been very
But when
life came
lool essay
^stly every
him that
of feeling
1 the heads
^n on him
lonstrated
|r I do not
pee reason
yet more
impulse

INTRODUCTION.

to Liberalism had been definitely given ; and had indeed brought
with it many other grave questionings. When at the next examina-
tion he shot up to the head of the school, his master advised that he
should be withdrawn from Magdalen, to the dismay both of himself
and of the uncle with whom he lived. The uncle indeed had his own
grounds of alarm. John had one day stood at a tailor's window in
Oxford where Lord John Russell's Durham Letter was spread out to
view, and, as he read it, had come to his own conclusions as to its
wisdom. He even declared the Ecclesiastical Titles Act to be
absurd. His uncle, horrified at so extreme a heresy, with angry
decision ordered him to find at once another home ; and when after
a time the agitation had died away and he was allowed to come
back, it was on the condition of never again alluding to so painful
a subject. The new found errors clung to him, however, when he
went shortly afterwards to live in the country wit' n tutor. " I
wandered about the fields thinking," he said, " but x never went
back from the opinions I had begim to form."

It was when he was about sixteen that Gibbon fell into his
hands ; and from that moment the enthusiasm of history took hold
of him. " Man and man's history " became henceforth the dominant
interest of his life. When he returned to Oxford with a scholarship
to Jesus College, an instinct of chivalrous devotion inspired his
resolve that the study of history should never become with him
" a matter of classes or fellowships," nor should be touched by the
rivalries, the conventional methods, the artificial limitations, and
the utilitarian aims of the Schools. College work and history work
went on apart, with much mental friction and diflSculty of adjust
ment and sorrow of heart. Without any advisers, almost witho'T
friends, he groped his way, seeking in very solitary fashion after his
own particular vocation. His first historical eflTorts were spent on
that which lay immediately about him ; and the series of papers which
he sent at this time to the Oxford Chronicle on " Oxford in the last
Century " are instinct with all the vivid imagination of his later work,
and tell their tale after a method and in a style which was already
perfectly natural to him. He read enormously, but history was
never to him wholly a matter of books. The Town was still his

Yiii

INTRODUCTION.

teacher. There was then little help to be had for the history of
Oxford or any other town. " So wholly had the story of the towns,"
he wrote later, " passed out of the minds of men that there is still
not a history of our country which devotes a single page to it, and
there is hardly an antiquary who has cared to disentomb the tragic
records of fights fought for freedom in this narrow theatre from
the archives which still contain them. The treatise of Brady written
from a political, that of Madox from a narrow antiquarian, point of
view ; the summaries of charters given by the Commissioners under
the Municipal Reform Act ; the volumes of Stephens and Mere-
wether ; and here and there a little treatise on isolated towns are the
only printed materials for th., study of the subject." Other materials
were abundant. St. Giles' Fair was full of lessons for him. He
has left an amusing account of how, on a solemn day which came
about once in eight years, he marched with Mayor and Corporation
round the city boundaries. He lingered over the memory of St.
Martin's Church, the centre of the town life, the folk-mote within
its walls, the low shed outside where mayor and bailiff administered
justice, the bell above which rang out its answer to the tocsin of
the gownsmen in St. Mary's, the butchery and spicery and vintnery
which clustered round in the narrow streets. " In a walk through
Oxford one may find illustrations of every period of our annals.
The cathedral still preserves the memory of the Mercian St. Frides-
wide ; the tower of the Norman Earls frowns down on the w ters
of the Mill ; around Merton hang the memories of the birth <^f oui
Constitution ; the New Learning and the Reformation mingle in
Christ Church ; a ' grind ' along the Marston Road follows the trad
of the army of Fairfax ; the groves of Magdalen preserve the living,
traditions of the last of the Stewarts."

Two years, however, of solitary effort to work out problems o
education, of life, of history, bft him somewhat disheartened an<
bankrupt in energy. A mere accident at last brought the first counse
and encouragement he had ever known. Some chance led him om
day to the lecture-room where Stanley, then Canon of Christ Church,
was speaking on the history of Dissent. Startled out of the in-
difference with which he had entered the room, he suddenly found

INTRODUCTION.

listory of
e towns,"
ere is still
to it, and
the tragic
atre from
dy written
, point of
lers under
md Mere-
^ns are the
r materials
him. He
hich came
!orporation
lory of St.
lOte within
ministered
tocsin of
id vintnery
ilk through
iur annals.
1st. Frides-
he w'ters
rth ^f oui
ingle in
the trad
the living.

|)blems o
lened an<
3t counse
him one
Church,
\f the in-
ily found

himself listening with an interest and wonder which nothing in
Oxford hir.d awakened, till the lecturer closed with the words,
*' ' Magna est Veritas et pravaiebit,' words so great that I could
almost prefer them to the motto of our own University, ' Dominus
illuminatio mea' " In his excitement he exclaimed, as Stanley,
on leaving the hall, passed close by him, " Do you know, sir, that
the words you quoted, ''Magna est Veritas et prcevalebit^ are the
motto of the Town ? " " Is it possible ? How interesting ! When
will you come and see me and talk about it ? " cri.,d Stanley ; and
from that moment a warm friendship sprang up. " Then and after,"
Mr. Green wrote, "I heard you speak of work, not as a thing of
classes and fellowships, but as something worthy for its own sake,
worthy because it made us like the great Worker. ' If you cannot
or will not work at the work which Oxford gives you, at any rate
work at Sf^mething.' I took up my old boy-dreams of history again.
I think I have been a steady worker ever since."

It was during these years at Oxford that his first large 'historical
schemes were laid. His plan took the shape of a History of the Arch-
bishops of Canterbury ; and seeking in Augustine and his followers a
clue through the m^ze of fifteen centuries, he proposed under this title
to write in fact the whole story of Christian civilization in England.
" No existing historians help me," he declared in his early days of
planning ; " rather I have been struck by the utter blindness of one
and all to the subject which they profess to treat — the national growth
and developement of our country." When in i86o he left Oxford
for the work he had chosen as curate in one of the poorest parishes
of East London, he carried with him thoughts of history. Letters,
full of ardent discussion of the theological and social problems about
him still tell of hours saved here and there for the British Museum, of
work done on Cuthbert, on Columba, on Irish Church History — of a
scheme for a history of Somerset, which bid fair to extend far, and
which led direct to Glastonbury, Dunstan, and Early English matters.
Out of his poverty, too, he had gathered books about him, books
won at a cost which made them the objects of a singular affection •,.
and he never opened a volume of his " Acta Sanctorum " without
a lingering memory of the painful efforts by which he had brought

;

INTRODUCTION.

together the volumes one by one, and how many days he had gone
without dinner when there was no other way of buying them.

But books were not his only sources of knowledge. To the last
he looked on his London life as hr,vi ig given him his be: t lessons in
history. It was with his churchwardens, his schoolmasters, in vestry
meetings, in police courts, at boards of guardians, in rervice in chapel
or church, in the daily life of the dock-labourer, t" - tradesman, the
costermonger, in the cummer visitation of cholera, in ' e winter misery
thr.t followed economic changes, that he learnt v.hr.t the life of the
people meant as perhaps no historian had ever learnt it before. Con-
stantly struck down as he was by illness, even the days of sickness were
turned Jo use. Every drive, every railway journey, every town he
passec'. through in brief excursions for health's sake, added something
to his knowledge ; if he was driven to recover strength to a seaside
lodging he could still note a description of Ebbsfleet or Richbc rough
or Minster, so that there is scarcely a picture of scenery or of geo-
^aphicaJ conditions in his book which is not the record of a victory
over the overwhelming languor of disease.

After two years of observation, of reading, and of thought, the
Archbishops no longer seemed very certain guides through the
<:enturies of England's growth. They filled the place, it would
appear, no better than the Kings. If some of them were great
leaders among the people, others were of little account ; and after
the sixteenth century the upgrowth of the Nonconformists broke
the history of the people, taken from the merely ecclesiastical point
of view, into two irreconcilable fractions, and utterly destroyed any
possibility of artistic treatment of the story as a whole. In a new
plan he looked far behind Augustine and Canterbury, and threw
himself into geology, the physical geography of our island in pre-
historic times, and the study of the cave-men and the successive races
that peopled Britain, as introductory to the later history of England.
,But his first and dominating idea quickly thrust all others aside. It
ivas of the English People itself that he must write if he would write
-after his own heart. The nine years spent in the monotonous reaches
of dreary streets that make up Hoxton and Stepney, the clcse con-
tact with sides of life little known to students, had only deepened the

INTRODUCTION.

; had gone

ro the last

lessons in
s, in vestry
e in chapel
iesman, the
nter misery

life of the
ifore. Con-
ckness were
ry town he
i something
to a seaside
lichbc rough
•y or of geo-

of a victory

impressions with which the idea of a people's life had in Oxford struck
on his imagination. " A State," he would say, " is accidental ; it can
be made or unmade, and is no real thing to me. But a nation is very
real to me. That you can neither make nor destroy." All his writings,
the historical articles which he sent to the Saturday Reineiv and letters
to his much-honoured friend, Mr. Freeman, alike tended in the same
direction, and show how persistently he was working out his philosophy
of history. The lessons which years before he had found written in the
streets and lanes of his native town were not forgotten. " History,"
he wrote in 1869, "we are told by publishers, is the most unpopular of
all branches of literature at the present day, but it is only unpopular
because it seems more and more to sever itself from, all that can touch
the heart of a people. In mediaeval history, above all, the narrow
ecclesiastical character of the annals which serve as its base, instead
of being corrected by a wider research into the i.icmorials which sur-
round us, has been actually intensified by the partial method of their
study, till the story of a great people seems likely to be lost in the
mere squabbles of priests. Now there is hardly a better corrective
for all this to be found than to set a man frankly in the streets of a
simple English town, and to bid him work out the history of the men
who had lived and died there. The mill by the stream, the tolls in
the market place, the brasses of its burghers in the church, the
names of its streets, the lingering memory of its guilds, the mace of its
mayor, tell us more of the past of England than the spire of Sarum
or the martyrdom of Canterbury. We say designedly of the past of
England, rather than of the past of English towns. ... In England
the history of the town and of the country are one. The privilege of
the burgher has speedily widened into the liberty of the people at
large. The municipal charter has merged into the great charter of
the realm. All the little struggles over toll and tax, all the little
claims of * custom ' and franchise, have told on the general advance
of liberty and law. The townmotes of the Norman reigns tided free
discussion and self-government over from the Witanagemot of the old
England to the Parliament of the new. The busting court, with its
resolute assertion of justice by one's peers, gave us the whole fabric
cf our judicial legislation. The Continental town lost its individuality

xii

INTRODUCTION.

by sinking to the servile level of the land from which it had isolated
itself. The EnglPsh town lost its individuality by lifting the country
at large to its own level of freedom and law."

The earnestness, however, with which he had thrown himself into
his parish work left no time for any thought of working out his
cherished plans. His own needs were few, and during nearly three
years he spent on the necessities of schools and of the poor more
than the whole of the income he drew from the Church, while he
provided for his own support by writing at night, after his day's
work was done, articles for the Saturday Revieiv. At last, in
1869, the disease which had again and again attacked him fell
with renewed violence on a frame exhausted with labours and
anxieties. All active work was for ever at an end — the doctors
told him there was little hope of prolonging his life six months.
It was at this moment, the first moment of leisure he had ever
known, that he proposed "to set down a few notions which
I have conceived concerning history," which " might serve as an
introduction to better things if I lived, and iixight stand for some
work done if I did not." The "Short History" was thus begun.
When the six months had passed he had resisted the first severity
of the attack, but he remained with scarcely a hold on life ; and
incessantly vexed by the suffering and exhaustion of constant ill-
ness, perplexed by questions as to the mere means of livelihood,
thwarted and hindered by difficulties about books in. the long winters
abroad, he still toiled on at his task. " I wonder," he said once in
answer to some critic, " how in those years of physical pain and
despondency I could ever have written the book at all." Nearly
five years were given to the work. The sheets were written
and re-written, corrected and cancelled and begun again till it
seemed as though revision would never have an end. "The
book is full of faults," he declared sorrowfully, "which make
me almost hopeless of ever learning to write well." As the work
went on his friends often remonstrated with much energy. Dean
Stanley could not forgive its missing so dramatic an opening as Caesar's
landing would have afforded. Others judged severely his style, his
method, his view of history, his selection and rejection of facts.

ad isolated
he country

limself into
ng out his
nearly three
poor more
:h, while he
;r his day's
At last, in
td him fell
labours and
-the doctors
six months,
le had ever
)tions which
serve as an
^nd for some
thus begun,
first severity
m life ; and
iconstant ill-
jf livelihood,
long winters
;aid once in
;al pain and
[ll." Nearly
ere written

till it
"The

igam

Ind.

^hich make

Is the work

INTRODUCTION.

xiii

rgy-

Dean

as Cae^ s
lis style, his
in of facts.

Their judgement left him " lonely," he said ; and with the sensitive-
ness of the artistic nature, its quick apprehension of unseen danger,
its craving for sympathy, he saw with perhaps needless clearness of
vision the perils to his chance of winning a hearing which were pro-
phesied. He agreed that the " faults " with which he was charged
might cause the ruin of his hopes of being accepted either by historians
or by the public ; and yet these very " faults," he insisted, were bound
up with his faith. The book was in fact, if not in name, the same
as that which he had planned at Oxford ; to correct its " faults "
he must change his whole conception of history ; he must renounce
his belief that it was the great impulses of national feeling, and
not the policy of statesmen, that formed the ground-work and basis
of the history of nations, and his certainty that political history
could only be made intelligible and just by basing it on social
history in its largest sense.

" I may be wrong in my theories," he wrote, " but it is better for
me to hold to what I think true, and to work it out as I best can,
even if I work it out badly, than to win the good word of some people
I respect and others I love " by giving up a real conviction. Amid
all his fears as to the failings of his work he still clung to the
belief that it went on the old traditional lines of English historians.
However Gibbon might err in massing together his social facts in
chapters apart, however inadequate Hume's attempts at social history
might be, however Macaulay might look at social facts merely as
bits of external ornament, they all, he maintained, professed the faith
he held. He used to protest that even those English historians who
desired to be merely "external and pragmatic " could not altogether
reach their aim as though they had been " High Dutchmen," The
free current of national life in England was too strong to allow
them to become ever wholly lost in State-papers ; and because he
believed that Englishmen could therefore best combine the love of
accuracy and the appreciation of the outer aspects of national or
political life with a perception of the spiritual forces from which these
mere outer phenomena proceed, he never doubted that " the English
ideal of history would in the long run be what Gibbon made it in
his day — the first in the world."

When at last, by a miracle of resolution and endurance, the

-3rr

' I

\^y

INTRODUCTION.

" Short History " was finished, discouraging reports reached him
from critics whose judgement he respected ; and his despondency
increased. " Never mind, you mayn't succeed this time," said one
of his best friends, " but you are sure to succeed some day." He
never forgot that in this time of depression there were two friends,
Mr. Stopford Brooke and his publisher, who were unwavering in
their belief in his work and in hopefulness of the result.

The book was published in 1874, when he was little more than 36
years of age. Before a month was over, in the generous welcome
given it by scholars and by the English people, he found the reward of
his long endurance. Mr. Green in fact was the first English historian
who had either conceived or written of English history from the side
of the principles which his book asserted ; and in so doing he had
given to his fellow-citizens such a story of their Commonwealth as
has in fact no parallel in any other country. The opposition and
criticism which he met with were in part a measure of the originality
of his conception. Success, however, and criticism alike came to
him as they come to the true scholar. " I know," he said in this
first moment of unexpected recognition, " what men will say of me,
* He died learning.'

> »

I know of no excuse which I could give for attempting any
revision of the " Short History," save that this was my husband's last
charge to me. Nor can I give any other safeguard for the way in
which I have performed the work than the sincere and laborious
effort I have made to carry out that charge faithfully. I have been
very careful not to interfere in any way with the plan or structure
of the book, and save in a few exceptional cases, in which I knew
Mr. Green's wishes, or where a change of chronology made some
slight change in arrangement necessary, I have not altered its order.
My work has been rather that of correcting mistakes of detail which
must of a certainty occur in a story which covers so vast a field ;
and in this I have been mainly guided throughout by the work of
revision done by Mr. Green himself in his larger " History." In
this History he had at first proposed merely to prepare a library
edition of the " Short History " revised and corrected. In his hands,
however, it became a wholly different book, the chief p?rt of it having

reached him
despondency
e," said one
s day." He

two friends^
iwavering in
jlt.

lore than 3d
)us welcome
he reward of
ish historian
•om the side
oing he had
onwealth as
)osition and
- originality
ke came to
said in this

say of me,

npting any
sband's last
the way in
I laborious
have been
r structure
ch I knew
lade some
1 its order.
Jtail which
St a field ;
le work of
tory." In
a library
his handSy
f it having

y SUCH books as the ]^«f f ^^^ ^^^^^ of detiil

/ were not the mistakpc >i,„* 1 errors m the " Shr^r*.

'he like dJv^h •^''"a«eristics, and thai s! ^'^"^ « 'he

^^tt s finance. « Tf ^« ^ turned away to cnttr^r^ •

It was in fK.-o * D"ght, but I think T ri;^ • , ^ ^^^^

*vds in jjjjg temper thaf nii u- ^ ^^^ "ghtlv "

h I

INTRODUCTION.

measure all the gifts that contribute to the making of a great his-
torian. He combined, so far as the history of England is concerned,
a complete and firm grasp of the subject in its unity and integrity
with a wonderful command of details, and a thorough sense of per-
spective and proportion. All his work was real and original work ;
iew people besides those who knew him well would see under the
charming ease and vivacity of his style the deep research and sus-
tained industry of the laborious student. But it was so ; there was
no department of our national records that he had not studied and,
I think I may say, mastered. Hence I think the unity of his
•dramatic scenes and the cogency of his historical arguments. Like
other people he made mistakes sometimes ; but scarcely ever does
the correction of his mistakes affect either the essence of the picture
or the force of the argument. And in him the desire of stating and
pointing the truth of history was as strong as the wish to make both
his pictures and his arguments telling and forcible. He never treated
An opposing view with intolerance or contumely; his handling of
■controversial matter was exemplary. And then, to add still more to
the debt we owe him, there is the wonderful simplicity and beauty
of the way in which he tells his tale, which more than anything else
"has served to make English history a popular, and as it ought to be,
if not the first, at least the second study of all Englishmen."

I have to thank those friends of Mr. Green, the Bishop of
Chester, Canon Creighton, Professor Bryce, and Mr. Lecky, who, out
of their regard for his memory, have made it a pleasure to me to
ask their aid and counsel. I owe a special gratitude to Professor
Gardiner for a ready help which spared no trouble and counted no
cost, and for the rare generosity which placed at my disposal the
results of his own latest and unpublished researches into such
matters as the pressing of recruits for the New Model, and the origin
of the term Ironside as a personal epithet of Cromwell. Mr. Osmund
Airy has very kindly given me valuable suggestions for the Restora-
tion period; and throughout the whole work Miss Norgate has
rendered services which the most faithful and affectionate loyalty
could alone have prompted.

. . . Alice S. Green.

PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION.

The aim of the following work is defined by its title ; it is a history,
not of English Kings or English Conquests, but of the English
People. At the risk of sacrificing much that was interesting and
attractive in itself, and which the constant usage of our historians
has made familiar to English readers, I have preferred to pass lightly
and briefly over the details of foreign wars and diplomacies, the
personal adventures of kings and nobles, the pomp of courts, or the
intiigues of favourites, and to dwell at length on the incidents of
that constitutional, intellectual, and social advance in which we read
the history of the nation itself. It is with this purpose that I have
devoted more space to Chaucer than to Cressy, to Caxton than to
the petty strife of I'orkist and Lancastrian, to the Poor Law of
Elizabeth than to her victory at Cadiz, to the Methodist revival
than to the escape of the Young Pretender.

Whatever the worth of the present work may be, I have striven
throughout that it should never sink into a "drum and trumpet
history." It is the reproach of historians that they have too often
turned history into a mere record of the butchery of men by their
fellow-men. But war plays a small part in the real story of European
nations, and in that of England its part is smaller than in any. The
only war which has profoundly affected English society and English
government is the Hundred Years' War with France, and of that

xvm*

PREFACE.

war the results were simply evil. If I have said little of the glories
of Cressy, it is because I have dwelt much on the wrong and misery
which prompted the verse of Longland and the preaching of Ball.
But on the other hand, I have never shrunk from telling at lengtn
the triumphs of peace. I have restored to their place among the
achievements of Englishmen the *' Faerie Queen" and the "Novum
Organ um." I have set Shakspere among the heroes of the Eliza-
bethan age, and placed the scientific inquiries of the Royal Society
side by side with the victories of the New Model. If some of the
conventional figures of military and political history occupy in
my pages less than the space usually given them, it is because I
have had to find a place for figures little heeded in common history
— the figures of the missionary, the poet, the printer, tae merchant,
or the philosopher.

In England, more than elsewhere, constitutional progress has
been the result of social development In a brief summary of our
history such as the present, il was impossible to dwell as I could
have wished to dwell on every phase of this development; but
I have endeavoured to point out at great crises, such as those of
the Peasant Revolt or the Rise of the New Monarchy, how much
of our political history is the outcome of social changes; and
throughout I have drawn greater attention to the religious, intel-
lectual, and industrial progress of the nation itself than has, so far
as I remember, ever been done in any previous history of the
same extent.

The scale of the present work has hindered me from giving in
detail the authorities for every statement. But I have prefixed to
each section a short critical account of the chief contemporary autho-
rities for the period it represents as well as of the most useful modem
works in which it can be studied. As I am writing for English
readers of a general class, I have thought it better to restrict myself
in the latter case to English books, or to English translations of
foreign works where they exist. This is a rule which I have only
broken in the occasional mention of French books, such as those
of Guizot or Mignet, well known ar within reach of ordinary
students. I greatly regret that the publication of the first volume
of the invaluable Constitutional History of Professor Stubbs came

jf the glories
5 and misery
liing of Ball.
ng at lengtn
^ among the
lie "Novum
( the Eliza-
Dyal Society-
some of the
occupy in
; because I
tnon history
J merchant^

rogress has
nary of our
as I could
ment ; but
is those of
how much
nges; and
ious, intel-
has, so far
ry of the

PKEFACE.

^oo late for me iT^Z^T;; — -^ "*'''

'S ;trr "^:^''^''^ °" -^^^^^^^^ n,T,:r ^'- ^ ^-

"• 1 nanks for like fr enrllv h^i , "" counsel anH

and Professor Bryce. and in lite'arv ' ? '"' '" ^^'"'"-rS ubS
Bn^oke, whose ,vide knowledge aTd„7 7' '° "'^ ^'^- Stopford
Sparest service to «e. I fnT^dlfC'" '"^'^ '«ve been of thf

giving in
>refixed to
•ary autho-
ul modem
>r English
ict myself
ilations of
liave only
as those
ordinary
It volume
bbs came

CONTENTS

PAOB

CHRONOLOGICAL ANNALS Xxi— XXxii

GENEALOGICAL TAULES XXXUi— xlvii

Sect.

I*
If

CHAPTER I.

THK ENGLISH KINGDOMS, 607— IOI3.

I. — Britain and the English i

2.— The English Conquest, 449—577 7

3. —The Northumbrian Kingdom, 588 — 68$ 16

4.— The Three Kingdoms, 685—828 36

5. — Wessex and the Danes, 802—880 44

6.— The West-Saxon Realm, 893—1013 53

Sect,

CHAPTER n.

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS, IOI3— 1204.

I. — The Danish Kings, 1013— 1042 63

2. — The English Restoration, 1042 — 1066 67

3. — Normandy and the Normans, 912 — 1066 Ji

4. — The Conqueror, 1042 — 1066 74

5. — The Norman Conquest, 1068 — 1071 81

6.— The Enp'ish Revival, 1071— 1127 87

7. — England and Anjou, 870 — 1154 98

8. — Henry the Second, 1154 — 1189 . .' 104

9. — The fall of the Angevins, 1189— 12'-4 112

xviii

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER III.

THE GREAT CHARTER, 1204 — 1265.

PAGE

Sect. I. — English Literature under the Norman and Angevin Kings .... 117

2.— John, 1204 — 1215 122

3.— The Great Charter, 1 21 5— 12 1 7 128

4. — The Universities 132

5.— Henry the Third, 1216— 1257 141

6.— The Friars 147

7.— The Barons' War, 1258—1265 152

CHAPTER IV.

THE THREE EDWARDS, I265 — 1360. 7, / 1

Sect. I.— The Conquest of Wales, 1265— 1284 161

,, 2.— The English Parliament, 1283— 1295 169

,, 3.— The Conquest of Scotland, 1290— 1305 181

„ 4.— The English Towns 193

„ 5.— The King and the Baronage, 1290— 1327 201

„ 6.— The Scotch War of Independence, 1306— 1342 211

CHAPTER V. • .

THE HUNDRED VEARs' WAR, I336— I43I. ^ i

Sect. I.— Edward the Third, 1336— 1360 217

„ 2.— The Good Parliament, 1360— 1377 231

„ 3.— John Wyclif , 235

,, 4 —The Peasant Revolt, 1377— 1381 244

,, 5.— Richard the Second, 1381— 1399 255

„ 6.— The House of Lancaster, 1399— 1422 264

CONTENTS.

XIX

»■

PAGE
117
122

128

CHAPTER VI.

.' THE NEW MONARCHY, I422— I54O.

FACE

Sect. I. — Joan of Arc, 1422 — 1451 271

,, 2. — The Wars of the Roses, 1450 — 1471 281

,, 3.— The New Monarchy, 147 1 — 1509 288

,, 4. — The Ntv/ Learning, 1509 — 1520 303

„ 5.— Wolsey, 1515—1531 320

,, 6. — Thomas Cromwell, 1530 — 1540 331

CHAPTER Vn.

161

169

181

193

201

•

211

217

231

235

244

255

264

THE REFORMATION.

Sect. I.— The Protestants, 1540—1553 349

2.— The Martyrs, I5S3— ISS^ 361

3. —Elizabeth, 1558—1560 , 369

4. — England and Mary Stuart, 1560 — 1572 382

5. — The England of Elizabeth 392

6. — The Armada, 1572—1588 405

7. — The Elizabethan Poets 420

8.— The Conquest of Ireland, 1588 — 1610 442

»
CHAPTER VIII.

PURITAN ENGLAND.

Sect. 1.— The Puritans, 1583— 1603 460

,, 2. — The First of the Stuarts, 1604 — 1623 474

„ 3. — The King and the Parliament, 1623 — 1629 493

„ 4. — New England 505

,, S.—lne Personal Government, 1629 — 1640 514

,, 6. — The Long Parliament, 1640 — 1644 534

,, 7.— The Civil War, July 1642— August 1646 . • 547

,, 8. — The Army and the Parliament, 1646— 1649 559

„ 9.— The Commonwealth, 1649— 1653 572

„ 10.— The Fall of Puritanism, 1653—1660 583

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER IX.

Sect

>>
»»

M
»»
tt
H
ft

THE REVOLUTION.

FAGB

, I . — England and the Revolution 605

2.— The Restoration, 1660— 1667 616

3. — Charles the Second, 1667 — 1673 629

4.— Danby, 1673— 1678 ... • 642

5.— Shaftesbury, 1679— 1682 652

6.— The Second Stuart Tyranny, 1682— 1688 661

7. — William of Orange 672

8.— The Grand Alliance, 1689— 1697 684

9. — Marlborough, 1698 — 1712 701

lo. — Walpole, 1712— 1742 720

)

CHAPTER X.

MODERN ENGLAND. ,

Sect. I.— William Pitt, 1742— 1762 735

„ 2. — The Independence of America, 1 76 1 — 1782 757

,, 3.— The Second Pitt, 1783— 1793 786

„ 4. — The War with France, 1793 — 1815 806

Epilogue, 1815— 1873 837

LIST OF MAPS.

1. England Fronf.

2. Britain in the midst of the English Conquest 12

3. England in the Ninth Century 44

4. Empire of the Angevins 104

5. France at the Treaty of Bretigny , 217

6. The American Colonies in 1640 507

CHRONOLOGICA

L ANNALS

Off

ENGLISH HISTO

449

457

477

491

495

519

520

547

1552

[560

568

1 571

1 577

584

588

1593

West

B26

En«rii.h land m Britain.

Kent conquered by English.
Landing of South Saxons,
siege of Anderida.

Landing of West Saxons.
Cerdic and Cynric «:.„„ r
Saxons. ' ^'"«' °^

British vjtory at Mount Badon.
Wa founds k.ngdo.n of Bernicia.

«thelberht. King of Kent, died 6x6

— dnven back by West Saxons. '■
VVest Saxons march into Mid-Britain
-conquer at Deorham.

— defeated at Faddiley.

'u^^: -'-''- ^-^^- or North.

*l'd?r' ^^"^ o' Northumbria.

"^^Sustine converfs Kent

Battle of Dae^castan. ' .

Battle of Chester. '

E»dwta.. King of NoHhumbH., dUd
—- overlord of Brittin.

-— slain at Hatfield.

^^J^- ^fttUs at Holy Island
Conversion of Wessex.

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.
•449^1016.

64j»

651

655

658

659

661

664

668

670

675

681

68a

685

688

715

716
733
735
753
754

756

758

775

779

786

787

Os,vaId slain at Maserfeld.

^nci?:;^^',^-— rTha.es.
Ciedmon at Whitby

C™.«neofw.,s„co„,„e."'^i,.So„„.
EciOjeh defeased a,.d.W„„N^^..

^''^^'^f Boniface.

Wes^x recovers freedom in battle of Bur.

!^3:^M-:t--yd.

_: 7J^"«, Kentish men at Otford

796

8oa

803
808

815

821
885

827
828

837

839

849

851

853

855

857

860

866

867

868

870

871

874
876
877
878

883

CHRONOLOGICAL ANNALS.

Cenwulf, King of Mercia, died 821.
ECgberllt becomes King in Wessex, died

839.

Cenwulf suppresses Archbishopric of Lich-
field.

Charles the Great restores Eardwulf in
Northumbria.

Ecgberht subdues the West Welsh to the
Tamar.

Civil war in Mercia.

Ecgberht defeats Mercians at EUandun.

overlord of England south of

Thames.

Revolt of East Anglia against Mercia.

Defeat of Mercians by East Anglians.

Mercia and Northumbria submit to Ecg-
berht.

Ecgberht overlord of all English kingdoms.

— - invades Wales.

■ defeats Danes at Hengestesdun.

JBthellxrulf, King of Wessex, died 858.

iElfred born.

Danes defeated at Aclea.

yElfred sent to Rome.

i'Ethelwulf goes to Rome.

JEthelbald, King of Wessex, died 860.

JEthelberhti King of Wessex, died 866.

JEthelred, King of Wessex, died 871.

Danes conquer rJorthumbria.

Peace of Nottingham with Danes.

Danes conquer and settle in East Anglia.

Danes invade Wessex.

JElfred, King of Wessex, died 901.

Danes conquer Mercia.

Danes settle in Northumbria.

vElfred defeats Danes at Exeter,

Danes overrun Wessex.

iElfred victor at Edington.

Peace of Wed more.

vElfred sends envoys to Rome and India.

886
893
894
895
896
897

901

9ia

913 \
918)
921
924

925
936
934

937

940
943
945

946
954
955
956
957
958
959
975
978

987

1040

994

1002

1003

1012

1013

1016

i'Elfred takes and refortifies London.
Danes reappear in Thames and Kent.
M\{red drives Hasting from Wessex.
Hasting invades Mercia.
y'Elfred drives Danes from Essex.
Hasting quits England,
i^^lfred creates a fleet.
EadTirard the Elder, died 925.
Northmen settle in Normandy.

i'F^thelflxd conquers Danish Mercia.

Eadward subdues East Anglia and Essex.

owned as overlord by Nortlmmbria,

Scots, and Stratliclyde.
JEthelstan, died 940.

drives Welsh from Exeter.

invades Scotland.

Victory of Brunauburh.

Eadmund, died 946.

Dunstan made Abbot of Glastonbury.

Cumberland granted to Malcolm, King of

Scots.
Eadred, died 955.

makes Northumbria an Earldom.

Ead^rlg, died 959.

Banishment of Dunstan.

Revolt of Mercia under Eadgar. "^ ^'**

Eadgrar, died 975.

Dunstan A rchbishop of Canterbury.

Eadinrard the Martyr, d^ed 978.

JEthelred the Unready, died 1016.

I Fulk the Black, Count of Anjou.

Invasion of Swein.

Massacre of Danes.

Swein harries Wessex.

Murder of Archbishop iClf heah.

All England submits to Swein.

Flight of ^thelred to Normandy.

Eadmund Ironside, King, and dies.

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.
1016-1204.

1016
1020
1027

1035
1037
1040

1040
1060
1042
1045

}

Csiut, King, died 1035.

Godw-.ne made Earl of Wessex.

Cniit goes to Rome.

Birth of William of Normandy.

Harald and Harthacnut divide England.

Harald, King, died 1040.

Harthacnut, King, died 1042.

Geoffry Martel, Count of Anjou.

Eadvt-ard the Confessor, died 1066.
Lanfra nc at Bee.

1047 Victory of William at Val-es-dunes.

1051 Banishment of God wine.

William of Normandy visits England.

1052 Return of Godwine.

1053 Death of Godwine.

Harold made Earl of West Saxons.

1054 William's victory at Mortemer.

1055 Harold s first campaign in Wales.

1060 I Norman conquest of Southern Italy.
1058 William's victory at the Dive.

113
113
113

laoj

120(

jiaoc

laio

CHRONOLOGICAL ANNALS.

XXIU

•tifies Loudon.

ames and Kent.

; from Wessex.

:ia.

from Essex.

id.

Ider, died 925.
Normandy.

Danish Mercia.

ast Anglia and Essex.

lord by Northambria,

Lratliclyde.

i940-

rom Exeter.

ad.

urh.

946.

,ot of Glastonbury.

A to Malcolm, King of

jmbria an Earldom.

59-

instan.

under Eadgar.

[hop of Canterbury.
Martyr, d'ed 978.
Unready, died 1016.

lount of Anjou.

Issex. ■'-■*^

lishop iElf heah.

[lits to Swein.

Ld to Normandy.

[n«lde, King, and dies,

1060
1063
1066

1068 \
1071 i
1070

1075
1081
1085
1086
1087
1093
1094

1095
1096
1097

1098
1100

1101
1106

1109\

1129/

1110

1111

1113

1114.

1120

1121

1123

1124.

1128

1134

11135

1138

Normans invade Sicily. • , .

Harold conquers Wales. ^

Harold, King.

conquers at Stamford Bridge.

— — defeated at Senlac or Hastings.
William of Normandy, King, died 1087.

Norman Conquest of England.

Reorganization of the Church.
Lanfranc Archbishop of Canterbury.
Rising of Roger Fitz-Osbern.
William invades Wales.
Failure of Danish invasion.
Completion of Domesday Book.
William the Red, died noo.
Anselm, Archbishop.
Revolt of Wales against the Norman

Marchers.
Revolt of Robert de Mowbray.
Normandy left in pledge to William.
William invades Wales.
Anselm leaves England.
War with France.

Henry the First, died 1135.

Henry's Charter.

Robert of Normandy invades England.
Settlement of question of investitures.
English Conquest of Normandy.

Fulk of Jerusalem, Count of Anjou.

War with France.

War with Anjou.

Peace of Gisors.

Marriage of Matilda with Henry V.

Wreck of White Ship.

Henry's campaign in Wales.

Revolt of Norman baronage.

France and Anjou support William Clito.

Matilda married to Geoffry of Anjou.

Death of the Clito in Flanders.

Revolt of Wales.

Stephen of Blois, died 1 1 54.

Normandy repulses the Angevins.

1138

1139

1141
1147
1148

1149

1151

1152

1153

1154

1159

1162
1164

1166
1170

1172

1173 \

1174;

1176

1178

1181

1189

1190\

1194/

1194\

1196/

1194 \

1246/

1197

1199

1200

1&03
1204

Revolt of Earl Robert.

Battle of the Standard.

Seizure of the Bishops.

Landing of Matilda.

Battle of Lincoln. . , ,

Birth of Gerald of Wales.

Matilda withdraws to Normandy.

Archbishop Thi;obald driven into exile.

Henry of Anjou in England.

Henry becomes Duke of Normandy.

Henry marries Eleanor of Guienne.

Henry in England. Treaty of Wallingford.

Henry the Second, died 1189.

Expedition against Toulouse.

The Great Scutag .

Thomas made Archbishop of Canfrbury.

Consti'utlons of Clarendon.

Council of Northampton.

Flight of Archbishop Thomas.

Af '^ of Clarendon.

St v-.igbow's .'.ivasion of Ireland.

Inquest of Sheriffs,

Death of Archbishop Thomas. '

Henry's Conquest of Ireland.

Rebellion of Henry's sons.

Assize of Northampton.

Reorganization of Curia Regis.

Assize of Arms.

Revolt of Richard.

Richard the First, died 1199.

Richard's Crusade.

War with Philip Augustus.

Llewelyn ap-Jorwerth in North Wales.

Ric'.ard builds Chateau Gaillard.
•Tohn, dies 1216.

recovers Anjou and Maine.

Layamon writes the Bnit.

Murder of Arthur.

French conquest of Anjou and Normandy

at Val-es-dunes.
bdwine.
mdy visits England.

[le.

of West Saxons,
jt Mortemer.
iaign in Wales.

jf Southern Italy.

It the Dive.

THE GREAT CHARTER.
1204-1295.

11205 Barons refuse to fight for recovery of
Normandy.

11206 Stephen Langton Archbishop of Canter-
bury.

11208 Innocent III. puts England under Inter-
dict.
1210 John divides Irish Pale S^'io counties.

1211 John reduces Llewelyn • ap - Jorwerth to
submission.

1213 John becomes the Popt's vassal.

1214 Battle of Bouvines.
Birth of Roger Bacon.

1215 The Great Charter.

1216 Lewis of France called in by the Barons.

XXIV

laie
iai7

laai
laaa
iaa4
laas
ilias
laao
laao
laai
laaa
ia37
laas

ia4a

ia4e\

lasa/
ia48

lasa
lass
ia«4

CHRONOLOGICAL ANNALS.

Henry tlie Third, died 1372.

iae4

Battle of Lewes.

Confirmation of the Charter.

laes

Commons summoned to Parliament.

Lewis returns to France.

Battle of Evesham.

Charter again confirmed.

iae7

Roger Bacon writes his " Opus Maj'us."

Hubert de Burgh, Justiciar.

Llewelyn-ap-GrufTydd owned as Prince of

Friars land in England.

Wales.

Charter again confirmed at London.

ia7o

Edward goes on Crusade.

Revolt of Faukes de Breaut<.

ia7a

Edward the Flrat, died 1307.

Fresh confirmation of Charter.

ia77

Edward reduces L,lewelyn-ap-GruiTydd to

Stephen Langton's death.

submission.

Papal exactions.

ia79

Statute of Mortmain.

Failure of Henry's campaign in Poitou.

lasa

Conquest of Wales.

Conspiracy against the Italian clergy.

laaa

Statute of Merchants.

Fall of Hubert de Burgh.

lass

Statute of Winchester.

Charter again confirmed.

laao

Statute "Quia Emptores."

Earl Simon of Leicester marries Henry's

Expulsion of the Jews.

sister.

Marriage Treaty of Brigham.

Defeat of Henry at Taillebourg.

laoi

Parliament at Norham concerning Scotch

Barons refuse subsidies.

succession.

Llewelyn-ap-Gruffydd, Prince in North

laaa

Edward claims appeals from Scotland.

Wrles.

Death of Roger Bacon.

Irish refusal of subsidies.

ia94

Seizure of Guienne by Philip of France.

Earl Simon in Gascony.

ia95

French fleet attacks Dover.

Earl Simon returns to England.

Final organization of the English Parlia-

Provisions of Oxford.

ment.

Mise of Amiens.

' ^

THE WAR WITH SCOTLAND AND FRANCE.

ia96-1485.

f 1

ia96 Edward conquers Scotland.

1997 Victory of Wallace at Stirling.
Outlawry of the Clergy.
Barons refuse to serve in Guienne.

1998 Edward conquers Scots at Falkirk.
Truce with France.

1301 Barons demand nomination of Ministers
by Parliament.
Barons exact fresh Confirmation of the
Charters.

1304 Submission of Scotland.

1305 Parliament of Perth.
laOO Rising of Robert Bruce.

1307 Parliament of Carlisle.
Edivard the Second, died 1327.

1308 Gaveston exiled.

1310 The Lords Ordainers draw up Articles of

Reform.
1319 Death of Gaveston.
1314 Battle of Bannockbum.
1316 Battle of Athenree.
1318 Edward accepts the Ordinances.
13aa Death of Earl of Lancaster. Ordinances

annulled. ^,

1393 Truce with the Scots

1334
13a5

13a6
1337

1338

1339
1330
1333
1333

1335 \
1336/
1336

1337 \
1338/

1339

1340

1341 \
1343/

1346

French attack Aquitaine.

The Queen and Prince Edward in

France.
Queen lands in England.
Deposition of Edward II.
Edward the Third, died 1377.
Treaty of Northampton recognizes inde-

pendence of Scotland.
Death of Robert Bruce.
Death of Roger Mortimer.
Edward Balliol invades Scotland.
Battle of Halidon Hill.
Balliol does homage to Edward.

Edward invades Scotland.

France again declares war.

War with France and Scotland.

Edward claims crown of France.
Balliol driven from Scotland.
Edward attacks France from Brabant.
Battle of Sluys.

War in Britanny and Guienne.

Battles of Crecy and Neville's Cross.

CHRONOLOGICAL ANNALS.

XXV

Parliament.

I J '* opus Maj'us."
owned as Prince of

.de.

it I died i307«

ilyn-ap-Gruflfydd to

jres." ,

Irigham.

n concerning Scotch

lis from Scotland.

on,

y Philip of France.

Dover.

f the English Parlia-

1347

1348

1349 \

1351 ;

1351

1353

1355

1356

1366

1367

1368

1370

1379

1374

1376

1377

1378

1380
1381

1389

■^.■•'.

1 1384

1 1386

•«.

1 1389

1 1394

I 1396

ine.

Prince Edward in

1 1397

■ 1398

ind.

■ 1399

dll.

ird, died 1377-

I 1400

(ton recognizes inde

■ 1401

land.

■ 1402

ce.

■ 1403

timer.

■ 1403\

■ 1405.

les Scotland.

111.

■ 1405

lo Edward.

■ 1407

land.

Iwar.

1 Scotland.

lof France.

Hotland.

He from Brabant.

■ 1485

■ 1487

■ 1490

■ 1492

^■}uienne.

■ 1497

H^eville's Cross.

Capture of Calais. ■ : <

Truce with France.

First api)earancc of the Plack Death.

Statutes of Labourers.

First Statute of Provisors.

First Statute of Pra;munire.

Renewal of French War.

Battle of Poitiers.

Statute of Kilkenny.

The Black Prince victorious at Navarete.

Wyclif's treatise ^' De Dominio."

Storm of Limoges. ^

Victory of Spanish fleet ofT Rochelle.

Revolt of Aquitaine.

The Good Parliament.

Its work undone by the Duke of Lancaster

Wyclif before the Bishop of London.

Richard the Second, died 1399.

Gregory XL denounces Wyclif's heresy.

Longiand's "Piers the Ploughman."

Wyclif's declaration against Transubstan-

tiation.
The Peasant Revolt.
Condemnation of Wyclif at Blackfriars.
Suppression of the Poor Preachers.
Death of Wyclif.
Barons force Richard to dismiss the Earl

of Suffolk.
Truce with France.
Richard in Ireland.
Richard marries Isabella of France.
Truce with France prolonged.
Murder of the Duke of Gloucester.
Richard's plans of tyranny.
Deposition of Richard.
Henry the Fourth, died 1413.
Revolt of Owen Glyndwr in Wales.
Statute of Heresy.
Battle of Homildon Hill.
Revolt of the Percies.

French descents on England.

Revolt of Archbishop Scrope.
French attack Gascony.

1411 English force 5ent to aid Duke of Bur-
gundy ill France.

1413 Henry the Fifth, died 1433.

1414 Lollard Conspiracy.

1415 Battle of Agir court.
1417 Henry invade > Normandy.

1419 Alliance with Duke of Burgundy.

1420 Treaty of Trjyes.

1422 Henry tbe Sixth, died 1471.

1424 Battle of Verneuil.

1429 } S'^Se of Orleans.

1430 County Suffrage restricted.

1431 Deathof Joanof Arc.
1435 Congress of Arras.

1445 Marriage of Margaret of Anjou.
1447 Death of Duke of Gloucester.

1450 Impeach; aent and death of Duke of

SufTo'k.
Cade's Insurrection.
Loss of Normandy.

1451 Loss of Guienne.

1454 Duke of York named Protector.

1455 First Battle of St. Albans.

1456 End of York's Protectorate.

1459 Failure of Yorkist revolt.

1460 Battle of Northampton.

York acknowledged as successor.
Battle of Wakefield.

1461 Secoid Battle of St. Albans.
Battle of Mortimer's Cross.
Edward the Fourth, died 1483.
Battle of Towton.

J^S| j Warwick the King-maker.

1464
1470

1471
1475
1476
1483

1485

Edward marries Lady Grey.
Wzirwick driven to France.
Flight of Edward to Flanders.
Battles of Barnet and Tewkesbury.
Edward invades France.
Caxton settles in England.
Murder of Ed^eard the Fifth.
Richard the Third, died 1485.
Buckingham's Insurrection.
Battle cf Bosworth.

THE TUDORS.
1485-1603.

Henry the Seventh, died 1509.

Conspiracy of Lambert Simnel.

Treaty with Ferdinand and Isabella.

Henry invades France.

Cornish rebellion.

Perkin Warbeck captured.

1497 Sebastian Cabot lands in America.

1499 Colet and Erasmus at Oxford.

1501 ArthurTudor marries Catharine of Aragon.

1 502 Margaret Tudor marries James the Fourth.
1 505 Colet Dean of S. Paul's.

1509 Henry the Eighth, died 1547.

XXVI

CHRONOLOGICAL ANNALS.

1509

Erasmus writes tht '* Praise of Folly."

1562

i5ia

War with France.

1513

Battles of the Spurs and of Flodden.

1563

Wolsey becomes chief Minister.

1515

More's " Utopia."

1517

Luther denounces Indulgences.

1565

15flO

Field of Cloth of Gold.
Luther burns the Pope's Bull.

1566

15fll

Quarrel of Luther with Henry the Eighth.

1567

15flfl

Renewal of French war.

15fl3

Wolsey quarrels with the Commons.

1568

1525

Exaction of Benevolences defeated.

1569

Peace with France.

1570

Tyndale translates the Ne^v Testament.

1571

1526

Henry resolves on a Divorce. Persecution
of Protestants.

1572

1529

Fall of Wolsey. Ministry of Norfolk and

More.

1575

1531

King acknowledged as " Supreme Head of
the Church of England."

1576

1532

Statute of Appeals.

1577

1534

Acts of Supremacy and Succession.

1579

1535

Cromwell Vicar-General.

Death of More.

Overthrow of the Geraldines in Ireland.

1580

1536

Dissolution of lesser Monasteries.

1537

Pilgrimage of Grace.

1583

1538

English Bible issued.

1539

Execution of Lord Exeter.

Law of Six Articles.

1584

Suppression of greater Abbeys.

1542

Completion of the Tudor Conquest of

Ireland.

1585

1544

War with France.

1547

Execution of Earl of Surrey.
Edward the Sixth, died i553-

1586

Battle of Pinkie Cleugh.

1587

Suppression of Chantries.

1548

English Book of Common Prayer.

1549

Western Rebellion. End of Somerset's

Protectorate.

1588

1551

Death of Somerset.

1553

Mary, died 1558.

1589

Chancellor (^ scovers Archangel.

1590

1554

Mary marrLcs Philip of Spain.

1593

England absolved by Cardinal Pole.

1594

1555

Persecution of Protestants begins.

1596

1556

Burning of Archbishop Cranmer.

1557

War with France.

1597

1558

Loss of Calais.

Elizabeth, died 1603.

1598

1559

— — restores Royal Supremacy and

1599

English Prayer Book.

1601

1560

War in Scotland.

1603

1561

Mary Stuart lands in Scotland.

1562

Rebellion of Shane O'Neill in Ulster.

Elizabeth supports French Huguenots.

Hawkins begins Slave Trade with Africa.

First penal statute against Catholics.

English driven out of Havre.

Thirty-nine Articles imposed on cler^.

Mary marries Darnley.

Darnley murders Rizzio.

Royal Exchange built. . ^ < i '

Murder of Darnley. . . • ■

Defeat and death of Shane O'Nfiill.

Mary flies to England.

Revolt of the northern Earls.

Bull of Deposition published.

Conspiracy and death of Norfolk.

Rising of the Low Countries against Alva.

Cartwright's •• Admonition to the Parlin
ment."

Queen refuses Netherlands.

First public Theatre in Blackfriars.

Landing of the Seminary Priests.

Drake sets sail for the Pacific.

Lyly's "Euphues."

Spenser publishes''*ShepheritsCalenilar."

Campian and Parsons in England.

Revolt of the Desmonds.

Massacre of Smerwick.

Plots to assassinate Elizabeth.

New powers given to Ecclesiastical Com-
mission.

Murder of Piince of Orange.

Armada gathers in the Tagus.

Colonization of Virginia.

English Army sent to Netherlands.

Drake on the Spanish Coast.

Battle of Zutphen.

Babington's Plot. . t'l

Shakspere in London.

Death of Mary Stuart.

Drake burns Spanish fleet at Cadiz.

Marlowe* s " Tamburlaine."

Defeat of the Armada.

Martin Marprelate ^racts.

Drake plunders Corunna.

Publication of the * ' Faerie Queen."

Shakspere' s " Venus and Adonis'*

Hooker's "Ecclesiastical Polity."

Jonson's *' Every Man in his Humour.'

Descent upon Cadiz.

Ruin of the Second Armada.

Bacon's "Essays."

Revolt of Hugh O'Neill.

Expedition of Earl of Essex in Ireland.

Execution of Essex.

Mountjoy completes the conquest of Ire |
land.

Death of Elizabeth.

CHRONOLOGICAL ANNALS.

XXVll

ich Huguenots.

Trade with Africa.

inst Catholics.

Havre.

iponed on clergy.

io. .

ihane O'Neill.

n Earls,
iblished.
1 of Norfolk,
untries against Alva,
jnition to the Parlin

rlands.

? in Black friars.
inary Priests,
le Pacific.

THE STUARTS.

ieo3-ie88.

1603
1604

1605

1610

1613
1614
1616

1617

1617
1618

^hephenVs Calendar."

1618

ns in England. ^

1620

?monds.

vick.

Elizabeth. j

1621

to Ecclesiastical Com- ■

»f Orange.

the Tagus. ;

1623

Iginia.

1624

[to Netherlands.

1625

ish Coast.

' 1

1626

mOft.

ftart.

1627

Ih fleet at Cadiz.

Winrlaine."

1628

Iida.

B« ^Tracts.

Hninna.

1629

M" Faerie Queen."

l;/f and Adonis."

Bastical Polity."

1630

Ka» in his Humour:'

1633

H Armada.

iNeill.

1634

H of Essex in Ireland.

1636

, the conquest of Irer

James the Flrat| died 1635.

Millenary Petition.

Parliament claims to deal with both

Church and State.
Hampton Court Conference.
Gunpowder Plot.

Bacon s ^'Advancement of Learning."
Parliament's Petition of Grievances.
Plantation of Ulster.
Marriage of the Elector Palatine.
First quarrels with the Parliament.
Trial of the Earl and Countess of Somerset.
Dismissal of Chief Justice Coke.
Death of Shakspere. - '

Bacon Lord Keeper.
Proposals for the Spanish Marriage.
The Declaration of Sports.

[ Expedition and death of Ralegh. ' '

Beginning of Thirty Years' War.

Invasion of the Palatinate.

Landing of the Pilgrim- Fathers in New

England.
Bacon's ^' Noimtn Organum,"
Impeachment of Bacon.
James tears out the Protestation of the

Commons.
Journey of Prince Charles to Madrid.
Resolve of War against Spain.
Charles the First, died 1649.
First Parliament dissolved.
Failure of expedition against Cadiz.
Buckingham impeached.
Second Parliament dissolved.
Levy of Benevolence and Forced Loan.
Failure of expedition to kochelle.
The Petition of Right.
Murder of Buckingham.
Laud Bishop of London.
Dissolution of Third Parliament.
Charter granted to Massachusetts.
Wentworth Lord President of the North.
Puritan Emigration to New England.
Wentworth Lord Deputy in Ireland.
Laud A rchbishop of Canterbury.
Milton's "Allegro" and " Penseroso."
Prynne's " Histrio-mastix."
Milton's "Comus."
Juxon Lord Treasurer.
Book of Canons and Common Prayer

issued for Scotland.
Hampden refuses to pay Ship-money.

1637
1638
1639
1640

1641

1642

1643

1644

1645

1646
1647

Revolt of Edinburgh.

Trial of Hampden.

Milton's "Lycidas."

The Scotch Covenant.

Leslie at Dunse Law.

Pacification of Berwick.

The Short Parliament.

The Bishops' War.

Great Council of Peers at York.

Long Parliament meets, Noi\

Pym leader of the Commons.

Execution of Strafford, May.

Charles visits Scotland.

Hyde organizes royalist party.

The Irish Massacre, Oct.

The Grand Remonstrance, l^ov.

Impeachment of Five Members, /««.

Charles before Hull, April.

Royalists withdraw from Parliament.

Charles raises Standara at Nottingham,

August 22.

Battle of Edgehill, Oct. 23.

Hobbes writes the " De Cive."

Assembly of Divines at Westminster.

Rising of the Cornishmen, May.

Death of Hampden, fune.

Battle of Roundway Down, fuly.

Siege of Gloucester, A ug.

Death of 'Falkland, Sept.

Charles negotiates with Irish Catholics.

Taking of the Covenant, Sept. 25.

Fight at Cropredy Bridge, fune.

Battle of Marston Moor, fuly 2.

Surrender of Parliamentary Army in Corn-
wall, Sept. 2.

Battle of Tippermuir, Sept. 2.

Battle of Ntwbury, Oct.

Milton's * ' A reopagitica. ' '

Self-denying Ordinance, April,

New Model raised.

Battle of Naseby, fune 14.

Battle of Philiphaugh, Sept.

Charles surrenders to the Scots, May.

Scots surrender Charles to the Houses,
fan. 30.

Army elects Agitators, April.

The King seized at Holmby House, fune.

"Humble Representation" of the Army,
fune.

Expulsion of the Eleven Members.

Army occupies London, Aug.

Flight of the King, Nov.

XXVlll

CHRONOLOGICAL ANNALS.

1647 Secret Treaty of Charles with the Soots,

Dec.
1048 Outbreak of the Royalist Revolt, Ftb.

Revolt of the Fleet, and of Kent, Afay.

Fairfax and Cromwell in Essex and
Wales, June— July.

Battle of Preston, ^wiT. 17.

Surrender of Colchester, A ug. 37

Pride's Purge, Dec.

Royal Society begins at Oxfoni.
1040 Execution of Charles I., /aM. 30.

Scotland proclaims Charles II. King.

England proclaims itself a Commonwealth.

Ci-omwell storms Drogheda, Sept. 1 1.
lOAO Cromwell enters Scotland.

Battle of Dunbar, Sept. 3.
1651 Battle of Worcester, Sept. 3.

Ifobbes's " Leviathan."

1058 Union with Scotland.
Outbreak of Dutch War, May.
Victory of Tromp, Nov,

1653 Victory of Blake, Feb.

Cromwell drives out the Parliament,
April 20.

Constituent Convention (Barebones Par-
liament), July.

Convention dissolves, Dec.

The Instrument of Government.

Oliver Cromwell, Lord Pro-
tector, died 1658.

1054 Peace concluded with Holland.
First Protectorate Parliament, Sefit.

1055 Dissolution of the Pkirliament, /aw.
The Major-Generals.
Settlement of Scotland and Ireland.
Settlement of the Church. , .
Blake in the Mediterranean.

War with Spain and Conquest of Jamaica.
Second Protectorate Parliament, Sept.
Blake's victory at Santa Cruz.
Cromwell refuses title of King.
Act of Government.
Parliament dissolved, Feb.
Battle of the Dunes.
Capture of Dunkirk.
Death of Cromwell, Sept. 3.
Richard Cromwell, Iiord Pro-
tector, died 1712.

1059 Third Protectorate Parliament.
Parliament dissolved.

Long Parliament recalled.
Long Parliament again driven out.
1000 Monk enters London.

The "Convention" Pariiament.
Charles the Second,Iandsat Dover,
May, died 1685.

1050
1057

1058

1000
1001
100a

1003
1004
1005

1000
1007

1008

107O
1071

107A
1073

1074

1075
1077

1078
1079

1680

Union of Scotland and Ireland undone.

Cavalier Parliament begins.

Act of Uniformity re-enacted.

Puritan clergy driven out.

Royal Society at Lomiott,

Dispensing Bill fails.

Conventicle Act.

Dutch War begins.

Five Mile Act.

Plague of London.

Newton's Theory of Fluxions,

Fire of London.

The Dutch in the Medway.

Dismissal of Clarendon,

Peace of Breda.

Lewis attacks Flanders. 1

Milton's '• Paradise Lost."

The Triple Alliance.

Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle.

Ashley shrinks back from toleration to

Catholics.
Treaty of Dover.

Bunyan's '^Pilgrim's Progress " written'
Milton's "Paradise Regained" and

*' Samson Agonistes."
Nejvton's Theory of Light.
Closing of the Exchequer.
Declaration of Indulgence.
War begins with Holland.
Ashley made Chancellor.
Declaration of Indulgence withdrawn.
The Test Act.
Shaftesbury dismissed.
Shaftesbury takes the lead of the Country

Party.
Bill of Protestant Securities fails.
Charles makes Peace with Holland.
Danby Lord Treasurer.
Treaty of mutual aid between Charles and

Lewis.
Shaftesbury sent to the Tower.
Bill for Security of the Church fails.
Address of the Houses for War with

France.
Prince of Orange marries Mary.
Peace of Nimeguen.
Oates invents the Popish Plot.
New Parliament meets.
Fall of Danby.

1 ■ iw Ministry with Shaftesbury at its head. |
Temple's plan for a new Council.
Habeas Corpus Act passed.
Exclusion Bill introduced.
Parliament dissolved.
Shaftesbury dismissed.
Conunittee for agitation formed.

CHKONOLOGICAL ANNALS.

XXIX I

leso

1681

■ 1682

Fluxions.

1 1683

dway.

on.

■

♦

■ 1684

ers.

■

- Lost,"

■ 168A

pelle.

;k from toleration to

Monmouth pretends to th<5 throne.

Petitioners and Abljorrcrs.

Exclusion Bill thrown out by the Lords.

Trial of Ix)rd SLifford.

Parliament at Oxford.

Treaty with France.

Limitation Hill rejected.

Shaftesbury and Monmouth arrested.

Conspiracy and flight of Si.ifte.sbury.

Penn founds Pennsylvani.i.

Death of Shaftesbury.

Rye-house Plot.

Kxecution of I<ord Russell and Algernon

Sidney.
Town charters quashed.
Army increased.

James the Secondi died 1701.
Insurrection of Argyll and Monmouth.
Battle of Ssdgemoor, July 6.
The Bloody Circuit.
Army raised to 30,000 men.

1685 Revocation of Edict of Nantes.
1688 Test Act dispensed with by royal authority.
Ecclesiastical Commission set up.

1 687 Navlon's ' ' Pritu .jfia. ' '

Expulsion of the Fellows of Magdalen.

Dismissal of I^rds Rochester and Cla-
rendon.

Declaration of Indulgence.

The Boroughs regulated.

William of Orange protests against the
Declaration.

Tyrconnell made Lord Deputy in Ireland.

1688 Clergy refuse to read the new Declaration

of Indulgence.
Birth of James's son.
Invitation to William.
Trial of the Seven Bishops.
Irish troops brought over to England.
Lewis attacks Germany.
William of Orange lands at Torbay.
Flight of James.

MODERN ENGLAND.

1689

[he lead of the Country

securities fails.

^ce with Holland.

lurer.

lid between Charks and

, the Tower,
the Church fails,
louses for War with

1690

1691

1692

1693
1694

1696
1697
1698

1700
1701

1689-

1874.

Convention Parliament.

1701

Declaration of Rights.

1702

William and Mary made King

1704

and Queen.

William forms the Grand Alliance against

1705

Lewis.

1706

Battle of Killiecrankie, July 27.

1707

Siege of Londonderry.

1708

Mutiny Bill.

Toleration Bill.

1709

Bill of Rights.

1710

Secession of the Non-jurors.

Abjuration Bill and Act of Grace. '■

1712

Battle of Beachy Head, June 30,

1713

Battle of the Boyne, July 1.

1714

William repulsed from Limerick.

Battle of Aughrim, July.

1715

Capitulation and Treaty of Limerick.

1716

Massacre of Glencoe.

1717

Battle of La Hogue, May 19.

Sunderland's plan of a Ministry.

1718

Bank of England set up.

1720

Death of Mary.

Currency restored. \ •

1721

Peace of Ryswick.

1723

First Partition Treaty.

1727

Second Partition Treaty.

Duke of Anjou becomes King of Spain.

1729

Act of Settlement passed.

1730

Death of James II,

Anne^ died 1714.

Battle of Blenheim, August 13.

Harley and St. John take office.

Victories of Peterborough in Spain.

Battle of Ramillies, May 23.

Act of Union with Scotland.

Dismissal of Harley and St. John.

Battle of Oudenarde.

Battle of Malplaquet.

Trial of Sacheverell.

Tory Minis! ry of Harley and St. John.

Dismissal of Marlborough.

Treaty of Utrecht.

George the First, died 1727.

Ministry of Townshend and Walpole.

Jacobite Revolt under Lord Mar.

The Septennial Bill. '

The Triple Alliance.

Ministry of Lord Stanhope.

The Quadruple Alliance.

Failure of the Peerage Bill

The South Sea Company.

Ministry of Sir Robert Walpole.

E;<ile of Bishop Atterbury.

War with Austria and Spain.

George the Second, died 1760.

Treaty of Seville.

Free exportation of American rice allowed

XXX

1731
1733

1737
1738
1739
1740
174fl
1743
1745

CIIRONOLOGICAI, ANNALS.

Ill

1743

1748

1751

1754

1755

1756

1757

1758
1759

1760
1761

1763

1764

1765

1766
1768

Treaty of Vtenna.

Wnlpole's Kxcise Rill.

War of the Polish Succession.

Family compact between France and
Spain.

Death of Queen Caroline.

The Mtthoiiists af>f>tnr in London,

War declared with Spain.

War of the Austrian Succession.

Resignation of Walpole.

Hattle of Dettingen, June aj.

Ministry of Henry Pelham.

Battle of Fontenoy, Afay 31.

Charles Edward lands in Scotland.

Battle of Prestonpans, Se/t. ai.

Charles Edward reaches Derby, Dec. 4.

Battle of Falkirk, Jan. 23.

Battle of Culloden, A/rtU 16.

Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle.

Clivc's surprise of Arcot.

Death of Henry Pelham.

Ministry of Duke of Newcastle.

The Seven Years' War.

Defeat of General Braddock.

Loss of Port Mahon.

Retreat of Admiral Byng.

Convention of Closter-Seven.

Ministry of William Pitt.

Battle of Plassey, June 23.

Capture of Louisburg and Cape Breton.

Capture of Fort Duquesne.

Battle of Minden, August i.

Capture of Fort Niagara and Ticonderoga.

Wolfe's victory on H VKts of Abraham.

Battle of Quiberon Bay, Nov. ao.

Oeorgre the Third died tSao.

Battle of Wandewash.

Pitt resigns office.

Ministry of Lord Bute.

BrindUys Canal over the Irwell.

Peace of Paris.

Ministry of George Grenville.

Wedgwood establishes potteries.

First expulsion of Wilkes from House of
Commons.

Hargreaves invents Spinning Jenny.

Stamp Act passed.

Ministry of Lord Rockingham.

Meeting and Protest of American Con-
gress.

Watt invents Steam Engine,

Repeal of the Stamp Act. ^

Ministry of Lord Chatham.

Ministry of the Duke of Grafton.

Second expulsion of Wilkes.

Arkwright invents Spinning Machine.

1769 Wilkcit three times elected for Middle

sex.
House of Commons seats Col. Luttrell.
Oc< 'ipation of Boston by British trofjps.
Let ten 0/ Junius.

1770 Chatham's proposal of Parliamentary Re

form.
Ministry of Lord North.

1771 Last attempt to prevent Parliamentary

reporting.
Beginning 0/ the great English Journals,

1773 Hastings appointed GovernorGenci'al.
Bostoii t«:>v riots.

1774 Mili ary occupation of Boston.
Its port closed.

Massachusetts Charter altered.
Congress assembles at Philadelphia.

1 775 Rejection of Chatham's plan of conciliation.
Skirmish at I^exington.

Americans, under Washington, besiege

Boston.
Batile of Bunker's Hill.
Southern Colonies expel their Governors.

1776 Crowpton invents the Mule.
Arnold invades Canada.
Evacuation of Boston.
Declaration of Independence, July 4.
Battles of Brooklyn and Trenton.
Adam Smith's " Wealth of Nations."

1777 Battle of Brandywine.
Surrender of Saratoga, Oct. 17.
Chatham proposes Federal Union.
Washington at Valley Forge.

1778 Alliance of France and Spain with United

States.
Death of Chatham.

1779 Siege of Gibraltar.

Armed Neutrality of Northern Powers.
The Irish Volunteers.

1780 Capture of Charlestown.

Descent of Hyder AH on the Camatic.

1781 Defeat of Hyder at Porto Novo.
Surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown.

178& Ministry of Lord Rockingham.
Victories of Rodney.
Repeal of Poynings' Act.
Pitt's Bill for Parliamentary Reform.
Burke's Bill of Economical Reform.
Shelbume Ministry.
Repulse of Allies from Gibraltar.

1783 Treaties of Paris and Versailles.
Coalition Ministry of Fox and North.
Fox's India Bill.

^Ministry of Pitt.

1784 Pitt's India Bill.
Financial Reforms.

CHRONOLOGICAL ANNALS.

XXXI

ecled for Middle

I'arliamentary Re

vent Parliamentary

\t English Jourtials.
;ovcrnor-Gencia'.

1785

1786
1787

1788
1789

170O

1701

1792

Washington, besiege

If Northern Powers.

lown.

ill on the Camatic.

I Porto Novo.

lUis at Yorktown.

ackingham.

1793

1794

1796
1797

11798

L799
1800

1801

1802

L803

i804
805

1806

807

Parliamentary Reform Hill.

Free Trade Kill between KngLnd and

Ireland.
Trial of Warren tlastingn.
Troaty of Coii\nierco with France.
The Regency liill.

Meeting of States-General at Versailles.
New French Coiislitutiun.
Triple Alliance for defence of Turkey.
(Quarrel over Nootka Sound.
Pitt defends Poland.
Burke's ^^Reflections on the French

RevolntioH."
Representative Government set up in

Canada.
Fox's Libel Act.
Burke's '' Appeal from the Ne^v to the

Old IVhigs."
Pitt hinders Holland from joining the

Coalition.
France opens the Scheldt.
Pitt's efforts for peace.
The United Irishmen.
France declares War on England.
Part of Whigs join Pitt.
English army lands in Flanders.
English driven from Toulon.
English driven from Holland.
Suspension of Habeas Corpus Act.
Victory of Lord Howe, June i.
Burke's *' Letters on a Regicide Peace."
England alone in the War with France.
Battle of Camperdown.
Battle of Cape St. Vincent.
Irish revolt crushed at Vinegar Hill.
Battle of the Nile.

Pitt revives the Coalition against France.
Conquest of Mysore.
Surrender of Malta to English Fleet.
Armed Neutrality of Northern Powers.
Act of Union with Ireland.
George the Third rejects Pitt's Plan of

Catholic Emancipation.
Administration of Mr. Addington.
Surrender of French army in Egypt.
Battle of Copenhagen.
Peace of Amiens.

Publication of ^^-Edinburgh Review."
War declared against Laon*) parte.
Battle of Assaye.
Second Ministry of Pitt.
Battle of Trafalgar, Oct. 21.
Death of Pitt, Jan. 23.
Ministry of Lord Grenville.
Death of Fox.
Orders in Council.

1807

1808

1810
1811

1812

1813

1814.

1815

1810

1820

1822
1823
1826

1827

1828
1829

1830

1831
1832

Abolition of Slave Trade.

Ministry of Duke of Portland.

Seizure of Danish Fleet.

Battle of Vimicra, and Convention ul

Cintra.
America passes Non- Intercourse Act.
Battle of Corunna, Jan. 16.
Wellesley drives Soult from Oporto.
Battle of Talavera, July a8.
Expedition against Walchcren.
Ministry of Spencer Percev.!!.
Revival of Pari*' imentary Reform.
Battle of Busaco.
Lines of Torres Vodras.
Prince of Wales b«:comes Regent.
Battle of Fuentes d'Onore, May 5.
Luddite Riots.

Assassination of Spencer Perceval.
Ministry of Lord Liverpool.
Storm of Ciudad Rodrigo and Badajo/.
America declares War against England.
Battle of Salamanca, July 23.
Wellington retreats from Burgos.
Victories of American Frigates.
Battle of Vitoria, June ai.
Battles of the Pyrenees.
Wellington enters France, Oct,
Americans attack Canada.
Battle of Orthes.
Battle of Toulouse, April 10.
Battle of Chippewa, July.
Raid upon Washington.
British repulses at Plattsburg and New

Orleans.
Battle of Quatre Bras, June 16.
Battle of Waterloo, June 18.
Treaty of Vienna.
Manchester Massacre.
Cato Street Conspiracy.
Georce the Fourth, died 1830.
Bill for the Queen's Divorce.
Canning Foreign Minister.
Mr. Huskisson joins the Ministry.
Expedition to Portugal.
Recognition of South American States.
Ministry of Mr. Canning.
Ministry of Lord Goderich.
Battle of Navarino.
Ministry of Duke of Wellington.
Catholic Emancipation Bill.
VTiUiam the Fourth, died 183;.
M iiistry of Lord Grey.
Opening of Liverpool and Manchester

Railway.
Reform Agitation.
Parliament.-vry Reform Bill passed,/««* 7.

XXXII

CHRONOLOGICAL ANNALS.

1833

Suppression of Colonial Slavery.

1848

Suppn sion of the Chartists and Irish

East Indian trade thrown open.

rebels.

1834.

Ministry of Lord Melbourne.

1849

Victory of Goojerat.

New Poor Law.

Annexation of the Punjaub.

System of National Education begun.

1852

Ministry of Lord Derby.

Ministry of Sir Robert Peel.

Ministry of Lord Aberdeen.

1835

Ministry of Lord Melbourne replaced.

1854

Alliance with France againsi Russia.

Municipal Corporation Act.

Siege of Sebastopol.

1836

General Registration Act.

Battle of Inkermann, Nov. 5.

Civil Marriages Act.

1855

Ministry of Lord Palmerston.

1837

Victoria.

Capture of Sebastopol.

1838

Formation of Anti-Com-Law League.

1856

Peace of Paris with Russia.

1838

Committee of Privy Council for Education

1857

Sepoy Mutiny in Bengal.

instituted.

1858

Sovereignty of India transferred to the

Demands for a People's Charter.

Crown.

Revolt in Canada.

Volunteer movement.

War with China.

Second Ministry of Lord Derby.

Occupation of Cabul.

1859

Second Ministry of Lord Palmerston.

1840

Quadruple Alliance with France, Portugal

1865

Ministry of Lord Russell.

and Spain.

1866

Third Ministry of Lord Derby.

Bombardment of Acre.

1867

Parliamentary Reform Bill.

1841

Ministry of Sir Robert Peel.

1868

Ministry of Mr. Disraeli.

1848

Income Tax revived.

Ministry 0/ Mr. Gladstone.

Peace with China.

1869

Disestablishment of Episcopal Church in

Massacre of English Army in AfTghanistan.

Ireland.

Victories of Pollock in AfTghanistan.

1870

Irish T^nd Bill.

Annexation of Scinde.

Education Bill.

1845

Battles of Moodkee and Ferozeshah.

IB7\

Abolition of religious tests in Universities.

1846

Battle of Sobraon.

Army Bill.

Repeal of the Corn Laws.

1878

Ballot Bill.

Ministry of Lord John Russell.

1874

Second Ministry of Mr. Disraeli.

he Chartists and Irish

at.

! Punjaub.

Derby.

Aberdeeii.

nee against Russia.

ol.

,nn, Nov. 5.

Palmerston.

opol.

th Russia.

Bengal.

idia transferred to the

nt.

f Lord Derby.

f Lord Palmerston.

Russell.

Lord Derby.

brm Bill.

'Israeli.

ladstone.

>f Episcopal Church in

us tests in Universities.

Mr. Disraeli.

GENEALOGICAL TABLES.

II!

Ill

XXXIV

GENEALOGICAL TABLES.

KINGS OP THE HOUSE OF CERDIC, FROM ECGBERHT.

ECGBERHT,

r. 802-839.

iETHELWULF,
r. 839-857.

I I I ^

iETHELBALD, ^THELBERHT, iETHELRED I. ^LFRED=-£"a/AKf/M.
r. 857-860. r. 860-866. r. 866-871. r. 871-90X. |

EADWARD

THE ELDEK,

r. 901-925.

iETHELSTAN, EADMUND = y^lfgifu. EADRED,
r. 925-940. r. 940-946. I r. 946-955.

I 1

EADWIG, I. /Ethelflced = EADGAR =2. JElfthr^'ili.

r. 955-959- r. 959-975.

(
EADWARD

THE MARTYR,

r. 975-978.

1. Name = .ETHELRED II. =2. Evnna of

uncertain

r. 978-1016.

Normandy = 2. Cnut,

i. 1016-1035.

EADMUND IRONSIDE,
r. Ap. 23-Nov. 30,
1016,
in. Ealdgyth.

1 I ,

iElfred, EADWARD Harthacnut,

killed 1036. THE r. 1040-1042.

CONFESSOR,

r. 1042-1066.

Eadmund.

Eadward,

d. 1057,

m. Agatha.

Eadgar,

elected

King in

io56.

Margaret,
d. 1093.
;«. Malcolm III.
King of Scots.

Matilda,

d. 1118,

ni. Henry I.

King of

England.

Christina,
a nun.

;CGBERHT.

DANISH KINGS.

XXXV

'K'ET>=Ealhsvjitk.

[-901. j

^HE DANISH KINGS.

'.a of

xndy = 2. Cnut,

». 1016 -1035.

R,
56.

I
Harthacnut,
r. 1040-1042.

SWEIN FORKBEARD

1014.

CNUT z?

Swegen.

-'• / 'f^-lnrSi&l^

HARALD,

flJf35-i04o.

red II,

HARTHACNUT

r. li

'40-t042.

XXXVl

GENEALOGICAL TABLES.

DUKES OF THE NORMANS.

HROLF,

ist Duke of the Normans,

r. 911-927.

WILLIAM

LONGSWORD,

X. 927-943-
RICHARD

THE FEARLESS.

r. 943-996.

RICHARD

THE GOOD,

r. 996-1026.

Emma,
f/i. 1. ^thelred II. of

England.

VI. 2. Cnut of England

and Denmark,

RICHARD in.

r. 1026-1028.

ROBERT

THE MAGNIFICENT,

r. 1028-1035.
WILLIAM

THE CONQUEROR,

r. 1035-1087.

ROBERT IL

r. 1087-1096

(from 1096 to 1100

the Duchy was

held by his

brother Williaia),

and I 100-1106
(when he was over-
thrown at Tinche-
brai by his
brother Henry).

I
WILLIAM

RUFUS,

r. 1096-1100.

HENRY L

r. 1106-11 35.

Matilda,
nt. GEOFFREY,

COUNT OK ANJOU
AND MAINE

(who won the

Duchy from

Stephen).

^ HENRY IL

invested with the

Duchy 1151,

d. 1 189.

Adela,

m. Stephen,

Count of Blois.

STEPHEN

OF BLOIS,

s. 1135.

RICHARD

THE LION HEART,

r. 1 189-1199.

)

JOHN,
r. 1199-1204
(when Normandy was conquered
by France).

!' I: I-

_EDWARDm. HENRV

IV.

xxxvii

Claim of EDWARD m ,„ ,^

'"• *° ^'^e French Crown.

LEWIS X.
•■• '314-1316.

15 N0V.-19 Nov.
1316.

PHlLlP IV

THE FAIR,

PHILIP III.

THE BOLD,
r. 1270-1285.

PHILIP V

THE LONG, *

r- 1316-1322.

CHARLES IV

THE FAIR,
•■• 1322-1328.

Isabel,
w. Edrvard //
of England.

Edward III
of England.'

of Valois,
d. 1325.

PHILIP VI

O"" VALOIS, '

r. 1328-X3S0.
JOHN IL

THE GOOD,
*■• 1350-1364.

Adela,
vt. Stephen,
'omit of Blois.

STEPHEN

OF BLOIS,

s. 1135.

)HN,

9-1204

ly was conquered

ranee).

ED Ward i,

Descent of henry

HENRV in.

IV,

Earl of Lancaster.

. Thomas,

Earl of Lancaster,
beheaded 1322. '

John of Gaunt - r,.
I>"ke of Lancaster. T of^^^'^he

01 J-ancaster.

EarlofS'aster.
^"I^eofScaster.

'R^^K'i IV.

xxxvm

GENEALOGICAL TABLES.

I i

i! |l

III

(filly
I

HOUSE OF

EDWARD

■

Lionel, Duke

of Clarence.

Philippa,

m. Edmund

Mortimer,

Earl 0/ March,

Roger Mortimer,
Earl of March.

•\

Edmund Anne Morti-
Mortimer,
Earl of March,
d. 1424.

Richard
Duke of .
slain at

EDWj

\RD IV.

Edmund,
Farl of Rutland
slain at Wake-
field, 1460.

George,
Duke of
Clarence,
m. Isabel Neville.

EDWARD
V.

Richard, Elizabeth.
Duke of m. HENRY
York. VIL

■ • - /

1 ' "

Katl

Wil

Court

Man

of Ex

behea

Edw
Courte
Earl of
d. 15

1 .

tarine,

Sir

Ham

'enay.

iry

enay,

ijuis

eter,

ided

ard

nay,

Devon,

56.

r 1

Edward, Margaret,
Earl of Countess of
Warwick, Salisbury,
beheaded beheaded

1499- ^.^541- ,
;«. Str Richard
Pole.

.•; '■'

I
Henry Pole,

Lord

Moptacute,

beheaded

1539.

Hi!

HOUSE OF YORK.

xxxix

HOUSE OF

YORK.

EDWARD

J II.

Lionel, Duke

of Clarence.

Philippa,

m. Edmund

Mortimer,

Earl of March.

^oger Mortimer,
EaH of March.

ch,

Anne MortJ-

Richard
Duke of
slain at

George,
Duke of
•larence,
mbel Neville.

Margaret,
Countess of
Salisbury,
beheaded

m. Sir Richard
Pole.

nry Pole,

Lord

iptacute,

headed

1539.

Edmund of
DukeSf'a^^.^

r^i-f Richard.

Earl of Cam.
bridge,

'beheaded 141-
fJantagenet, * ^•
Vork,

Wakefield, 1460.

RICHARD III
'"' ^""f Seville.

Elizabeth -=/,,« ^;;;-^

. Edward. r , { ^—

Margdret

"'' C^^rles, Duke of
^»^gnndy.

Richard de Ja Pole

«'amat;hebat5r
of Pavia, 1525.

Reginald Pole
Archbishop of'
Canterbury
and Cardinal,

•^-•558.

ill;

GENEALOGICAL TABLES.

VIII'

inij

a
m

D
O
X

P O u-3

t:2

—Mr

_Mc^

a V

^^C

s V e

o «

I"* ?

o
II —

eq «

>•

(1 ^0

a o *j H
3 <u rt

WQ.-3

,o V

1 6"^
la's J "

C^ 3 J3

4rf

•-s

Od O 2

§^ OT3TJ C

-a So rt-a 2
WPS vM JJ^

O t •!-" 'T

55,3

3i2

-gl3

6|^

-Pi S c-

o
•o

EW!§

:^"TERS OK HEKRY

««1

if »- I:
3 «« « >

Wis

rtu-

•o

u^^

xlii

GENEALOGICAL TABLES.

THE SOVEREIGNS

Since the

Robert,

Duke of Normandy,

b. about 1056,

d. 1134-

William.

Count of Flanders,

b. iioi, d. 1 128.

I
WILLIAM II.

b. about 1060,
d. 1 100.

WILLIAM I.
/;/. Matilda

r~"'

Henry,
b. 1155, d. 1183.

RICHARD I.

b. 1 157, d. 1199.

•^OVEREICNS OF ekgland.

xliii

FHE SOVEREIGNS MoF ENGLAND.

Sime the mNoman Conquest,

WILLIAM I.
«/. Matilda

\y^^LTj^ ^' -87.

: n.

60,

> I.

199.

HENRY I

b. ro68.

'"• »• ^T^tilda of
'Scotland.

Matilda,
d- 1 167.

HENRv II

''• "33. d. 1189.
^"'Eleanor 0/
■^ynitaine.

Geoffrey,
^- "S8, d. 1 186.

^'*- LoHstance,
neiress of
^^itanny.

Arthur,

Duke of

Bntanny,

b. 1 1 87.

Euseace,
Count of
iipulogne,
d- 1153.

. JOHN.

''• "66, d. 12x6.

"'•^' Isabel 0/

-^ttgoulSpne.

heWy in.

b. 1206, d. 127.
'"■Eleanor If

EDwArd J
'^- J 239. d. I
"''J.Eleanor
"J Castile.

KDWARD II

b. 1284, *
•mirdered 1327
'n. Isabel of '
Erance.

EDWARD III
b- 1312, d. i„.*

■"ainault.

^^eenc.vtpage.1

Ade/a,

''• "37.

»>i. Stephen,

(-ount of

Blois.

step'hen.

'"'Matilda
<y J^oulogne.

WiJJiam,

Count of

Boulogne,

d. 1160.

■\

x?!v

GENEALOGICAL TABLES.

' i w

Edward,

Prince of

Wales.

b. 1330,

d. 1376.

RICH. II.

b. 1366.

deposed

1399.

THE SOVEREIGNS

EDV,'\RD

Lionel,
Duke of
Clarence,
b. 1338.
d. 1368.

Philippa,

M. Etitnumi

Mortimer,

Earl of

Ma*-cn.

Ro^er

Mortimer,

Earl of

March.

I. Blanche, = John of Gaunt, =s

daughter of

Henry, Duke of

Lancaster,

Edmund

Mortimer,

Earl of

March,

d. 1424.

)
Anne
Mortimer,
in. Richard,
Earl of
Cam-
bridge,
who was
beheaded,
1415.

I. Katharine
0/ Aragon.

Duke of

Lancaster,

b. about 1340.

d. 1399.

3. Katharine
Swynford,

HENRY IV.

b. 1366, d. 1413.

m. T. Maty de

Bohnn.

HENRY V.

b. 1^88, d. 1433.
m. Katharine of
France, who = a. Owen Tudor.

I ,

HENRY VI. Edmund

b. 1421, Tudor. Earl

d. 1471. of Ricnmond.

m. Margaret of
AnjoH,

John Beaufort,
E^ikrl uf Somerset.

John Beaufort,
Duke of
Somerset.

Margaret
Beaufort.

Edward,

Prince of Wales,

b. 1453.

slain at

Tewkesbury,

1471.

HENRY VII.
b. 1456, d. 1509.

/
HENRY VIII.

b. 1491, d. 1547.

=■ 2. Anne Boleyn.

— 3. Jane Seymour.

MARY,

b. 1516, d. 1558.
m. Philip of Spain.

ELIZABETH,

b. i533i d. 1603.

EDWARD VI.

b. 1537. d. 1553-

SOVERKIONS OF ENGLAND.

THE SOVEREIGNS

EDV,'\RD

== 3. Katharine
Swynford,

dor.

2arl

lond.

John Beaufort,
Earl uf Somerset.

John Beaufort,
Duke of
Somerset.

Margaret
Beaufort.

HENRY VII.

b. 1456, d. 1509.

3. Jane Seymour.

iD VI.

d. 1553.

OP ENQLAND-contl„u.d.

IIII.

Eliziibeth,
^- 1503.

EDWARD IV

^- M42, d. 148,*

»t. Elizahe,k

EDWARD
V.

b. 1470.

Margaret,
^- 1489, d. 1541.
^"•}- James I y.
^tng of Scots.

James V.

King of Scots,

d- 1542.

Queen of Scots,
oeheaded, 1587.

, JAMES I.

D; 1566, d. 162.;.
'"' Anne of Denmark.

^^ee next ^age.\

Edmund of

Ungley,

Duke of York,

»403.

b- 1341. d.

_ , Richard,

E«rJ of Cambridge,
beheaded 14,5 '

w. Anne

Mortimer.

Richarri Ptnntagenet,
Duke of Vorl-

Wakefield. 1460.

(ieorge, Duke of
<-Iarence, b. 1449

Richard,
Duke of
Vork,
b- 1472.

d. 1478.

fes- at?;'

'499. m. Sir'
Richard
Pole.

b- 1498, d. 1533.
.. '"• 2. C/4«r/„
hrandon, Duke of
SuJTolk. -^

Frances ferandon,
'"■^enryGrey
^"ke of Suffolk.

Jane Grey,
beheaded, ir,-.

'"' -Lord Guif^ord
■Oitdley.

RICHARD III

b- ifSs, d. 1485.
»'. Anne iV*l.V/..

. Edward,
Prince of Wales,
b- 1473, d. 1484.

xlvi

GENEALOGICAL TABLES.

''I

THE SOVEREIGNS

JAMES

CHARLE'3 I.

b. 1600, beheaded 1649.
in. I I cnHetta Maria of France.

)

CHARLES II.

I, Anne Hyde -

-- JAMES II. ^

r 2. Mary of

Mary,

b 1630, d. 1635.

b. 1633,
d. 1 70 1.

Modena.
nes Francis

b. 1631, died 1660,

m. William,
Prince of Orange

1 \
MARY, AmE, Jar

WILLIAM III.

b. 1662,

b. 1665, Edward Stuart,

b. 1650, d. 1702.

d. 1694.

d. 1714. the Old

;«. MARY OF

Pretender,

ENGLAND.

WILLIAM

b, i638, d. 1766.

in.

1 1
Charles Henry

'■ ■ •

Edward Benedict

Stuart, the Stuart,

Young Cardinal

Pretender, York.

b. 1720, b. 1725,

d. i78£

i. d. 1807.

SOVEREIGNS OF ENGLAND.

xlvii

SOVEREIGNS

OF ENGLAND — continued.

1631, died 1660.
;«. IVilliani,
Hnce of Orange.

ILLIAM III.

1650, d. 1702,
t. MARY OF
ENGLAND.

Elizabeth,

b. 1596, d. 1662.

111. Frederick,

Elector Palatine.

Sophia,

d. 1714.
m. Ernest Augustus,
Elector of Hanover.

GEORGE I.

b. 1660, d. 1727.

in. Sophia Dorothea

of Z ell.

GEORGE II.

b. 1683, d. 1760.

m. Caroline of

Brandenburg-

Anspach,

Frederick,
Prince of Wales,
b. 1707, d. 1751.

GEORGE III.

b. 1738, d. 1820,

in. Charlotte of

Mecklenbnrg-

Strelitz.

GEORGE IV.

b. 1762, d. 1830.

in. Caroline of

Brjtns^utck-

WolfenbUttel.

Charlotte,
b. 1796, d. 1817.

WILLIAM IV.

b. 1765, d. 1837.

Edward,

Duke of Kent,

b. 1767, d. 1820.

VICTORIA,

b. 1819.
nt. Prince Albert of
Saxe-Coburg and
Gotha.

Ernest Augustus.

King of Hanover.

b. 1771, d. 1851.

Kenr
|of E
I Com

sketc
I the
"Th

lEng]

jcoun

JEng]

[the!

tseas.

[little

[a will

[wood

the 1

[seem

the I

(midd

jSiesw

[still ]

A SHORT HISTORY

THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

CHAPTER L
THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS y 607—1013.

Section I.— Britain aiud the En^rlish.

{Authorities. — For the constitution and settlement of the English, see
Kemble's "Saxons in England" and especially the "Constitutional History

I of England " by Dr. Stubbs. Sir Francis Palgrave's History of the English
Commonwealth is valuable, but to be used with care. A vigorous and accurate
sketch of the early constitution may be found in Mr. Freeman's History of

[the Norman Conquest, vol. i. See also "The Making of England" and

I "The Conquest of England" by J. R. Green.]

For the fatherland of the English race we must look far away from
JEngland itself. In the fifth century after the birth of Christ, the one
country which we know to have borne the name of Angeln or the
jEngleland lay in the district which we i?ow call Sleswick, a district in
[the heart of the peninsula which parts the Baltic from the northern
[seas. Its pleasant pastures, its black-timbered homesteads, its prim
jlittle townships looking down on inlets of purple water, were then but
|a wild waste of heather and sand, girt along the coast with sunless
jwoodland, broken here and there by meadows which crept down to
the marshes and the sea. The dwellers in this district, however,
jseem to have been merely an outlying fragment of what was called
[the Engle or English folk, the bulk of whom lay probably along the
Imiddle Elbe and on the Weser. To the north of the English in their
jSieswick home lay another kindred tribe, the Jutes, whose name is
Istill preserved in their district of Jutland. To the south of them

(S B

Old
England

Sec. I.
Britain

AND TH3

English

III]

iiiii

The
English
People

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

lli

a number of (ierman tribes had drawn together in their home-
land between the Elbe and the Ems, and in a wide tract across the
Ems to the Rhine, into the people of the Saxons. Engle, Saxon,
and Jute all belonged to the same Low German branch of the Teutonic
family ; and at the moment when history discovers them, they were
being drawn together by the ties of a common blood, common speech,
common social and political institutions. Each of them was destined
to share in the conquest of the land in which we live ; and it is from
the union of all of them when its conquest was complete that the
English people has sprung.

Of the temper and life of the folk in this older England we know
little. But, from the glimpses which we catch of them when conquest
had brought them to the shores of Britain, their political and social
organization must have been that of the German race to which they
belonged. The basis of their society was the free man. He alone
was known as " the man," or " the churl ; " and two phrases set his
freedom vividly before us. He was " the free-necked man," whose
long hair floated over a neck that had never bent to a lord. He was
" the weaponed man," who alone bore spear and sword, for he alone
possessed the right which in such a state of society formed the main
check upon lawless outrage, the right of private war. Among the
English, as among all the races of mankind, justice had originally
sprung from each man's personal action. There had been a time
when every freeman was his ov^n avenger. But even in the earliest
forms of English society of which we catch traces this right of self-
defence was being modified and restricted by a growing sense of public
justice. The "blood-wite," or compensation in money for personal
wrong, was the first effort of the tribe as a whole to regulate private
revenge. The freeman's life and the freeman's limb had each on this
system its legal price. " Eye for eye/' ran the rough customary code,
and " limb for limb," or for each fair damages. We see a further step
towards the recognition of a wrong as done not to the individual man,
but to the people at large, in another custom of early date. The price
of life or limb was paid, not by the wrong-doer to the man he wronged,
but by the family or house of the wrong-doer to the family or house
of the wronged. Order and law were thus made to rest in each little
group of English people upon the blood-bond which knit its families
together ; every outrage was held to have been done by all who were
linked by blood to the doer of it, every crime to have been done
against all who were linked by blood to the sufferer from it. From
this sense of the value of the family bond, as a means of restraining^
the wrong-doer by forces which the tribe as a whole did not as yet:|
possess, sprang the first rude forms of English justice. Each kinsman j
was his kinsman's keeper, bound to protect him from wrong, to hinder I
him from wrong-doing, and to suffer with and pay for him, if wrong j

I.]

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

a their home-
ract across the
Engle, Saxon,
)f the Teutonic
hem, they were
ommon speech,
m was destined
; and it is from
mplete that the

ngland we know
1 when conquest
iitical and social
ce to which they
nan. He alone
> phrases set his
ed man," whose
a lord. He was
ord, for he alone
formed the main
rar. Among the
:e had originally
lad been a time
en in the earliest
his right of self-
ig sense of public
[ney for personal
> regulate private
had each on this
customary code,
iee a further step
individual man,
Idate. The price
iian he wronged,
family or house
est in each little
knit its families
by all who were
ave been done
from it. From
s of restraining j
did not as yet'i
Each kinsman I
wrong, to hinder I
r him, if wrong |

were done. So fully was this principle recognized that, even if any
man was charged before his fellow-tribesmen with crime, his kinsfolk
still remained in fact his sole judges ; for it was by their solemn oath
of his innocence or his guilt that lie had to stand or fall.

The blood-bond gave both its military and social form to Old English
society. Kinsmen fought side by side in the hour of battle, and the
feelings of honour and discipline which held the host together were
drawn from the common duty of evvjiy man in each little group of
warriors to his house. And as they fought side by side on the field,
so they dwelled side by side on the soil. Harling abode by Harling.
and Billing by Billing ; and each "wick" or "ham" or "stead" or
" tun " took its name from the kinsmen who dwelt together in it. The
home or "ham" of the Billings would be Billingham, and the "tun"
or township of the Harlings would be Harlington. But in such
settlements, the tie of blood was widened into the larger tie of land.
Land with the German race seems at a very early time to have become
the accompaniment of full freedom. The freeman was strictly the
freeholder, and the exercise of his full rights as a free member of the
community to which he belonged was inseparable from the possession
of his " holding." The landless man ceased for all practical purposes to
be free, though he was no man's slave. In the very earliest 'glimpse
we get of the German race we see them a race of land-holders and
land-tillers. Tacitus, the first Roman who sought to know these
destined conquerors of Rome, describes them as pasturing on
jthe forest glades around their villages, and ploughing their village
[fields. A feature which at once struck him as parting them from the
civilized world to which he himself belonged, was their hatred of cities,
and their love even within their little settlements of a jealous indepen-
dence. "They live apart," he says, "each by himself, as woodside,
plain, or fresh spring attracts him," And as each dweller within the
Isettlement was jealous of his own isolation and independence among
Ibis fellow settlers, so each settlement was jealous of its independence
jamong its fellow settlements. Ot the character of their life in this
[early world, however, we know little save what may be gathered from
Ithe indications of a later time. Each little farmer commonwealth was
jirt in by its own borc'er or " mark," a belt of forest or waste or fen
I'hich parted it from its fellow villages, a ring of common ground
/hich none of its settlers might tak2 for his own, but which sometimes
served as a death-ground where cr'minals met their doom, and was
leld to be the special dwelling-place of the nixie and the will-o'-the-
[vvisp. If a stranger came through this wood, or over this waste.
:ustom bade him blow his horn as he came, for if he stole through
secretly he was taken for a foe, and any man might lawfully slay him.
Inside this boundary the " township," as the village was then called
(rom the " tun " or rough fence and trench that served as its simple

B 2

Sec. I.
Britain

ANU THK

English

The
English
Society

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

F-sc. I.

i Britain

;| AND THE

1 English

i ' ■ '

1 iii<i

1 li ''

The
I \, Engrlish
; iijl ; Religion

: |i

:l|'i

fortification, formed a ready-made fortress in war, while in peace its
entrenchments were serviceable in the feuds of village w'th village, or
house with house. Within the village we find from the first a marked
social difference between two orders of its indwellcrs. The bulk of
its homesteads were those of its frrcnien or "ccorls ;" but amongst
these were the larger homes of " eorls,'' or men distinguished among
their fellows by noble blood, who were held in an hereditary reverence,
and from whom the leaders of the village were chosen in war time,
or rulers in time of peace. But the choice was a purely voluntary
one, and the man of noble blood enjoyed no legal privilege among
his fellows. The holdings of the freemen clustered round a moot-
hill or sacred tree where the community met from time to time to
order its own industry and to frame its own laws. Here plough-land
and meadow-land were shared in due lot among the villagers, and
field and homestead passed from man to man. Here strife of farmer
with farmer was settled according to the " customs " of the township
as its "elder men" stated them, and the wrong-doer was judged and
his fine assessed by the kinsfolk ; and here men were chosen to follow
headman or ealdorman to hundred court or war. It is with a reverence
such as is stirred by the sight of the head-waters of some mighty
river that one looks back to these tiny moots, where the men of the
village met to order the village life and the village industry, as their
descendants, the men of a later England, meet in Parliament at
Westminster, to frame lavs and do justice for the great empire
which has sprung from this little body oi farmer-commonwealths in
Sleswick.

The religion of the English was the same as that of the whole
German family. Christianity, which had by this time brought about
the conversion of the Roman Empire, had not penetrated as yet among
the forests of the North. Our own names for the days of the week still
recall to us the gods whom our fathers worshipped. Wednesday
is the day of Woden, the war-god, the guardian of ways and boundaries,
the inventor of letters, the common god of the whole conquering people,
whom every tribe held to be the first ancestor of its kings. Thursday
is the day of Thunder, or, as the Northmen called him, Thor, the god
of air and storm and rain ; as Friday is Frea's-day, the god of peace
and joy and fruitfulness, whose emblems, borne aloft by dancing
maidens, brought increase to every field and stall they visited. Saturday
may commemorate an obscure god StCtere ; Tuesday the dark god,
Tiw, to meet whom was death. Behind these floated dim shapes of an
older mythology ; Eostre, the goddess of the dawn, or of the spring, who
lends her name to the Christian festival of the Resurrection; *'Wyrd,''
the death-goddess, whose memory lingered long in the " weird " of |
northern superstition ; or the Shield-Maidens, the " mighty women "
who, an old rime tells us, " wrought on the battle-field their toil, and

" '« L 'i .J. ' .WL ' i » ** 'J

[chap.

1.]

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

ile in peace its
wUh viilajre, or
3 first a marked
s. The bulk of
;" but amongst
iguished among
Hilary reverence,
sen in war time,
Hirely voluntary
privilege among
. round a moot-
time to time to
I ere plough-land
tie villagers, and
I strife of farmer
of the township
was judged and
chosen to follow
with a reverence
of some mighty
; the men of the
ndustry, as their
n Parliament at
he great empire
mmonwealths in

at of the whole

lie brought about

|ted as yet among

of the week still

id. Wednesday

and boundaries, |
Inquering people,
lings. Thursday
V Thor, the god
[he god of peace
loft by dancing
tsited. Saturday
]y the dark god,
iini shapes of an
the spring, who
iction;"Wyrd,"
Ithe " weird " of I
Inighty women "
Id their toil, and

hurled the thrilling javelins." Nearer tr ♦he popular fancy lay deities
of wood and fell, or the hero-gods of legend and song ; " Nicor," the
water-sprite, who gave us our water-nixies and "Old Nick"; "Weland,"
the forger of mighty shields and sharp-biting swords, whose memory
lingers in the stories of " Wcyland's Smithy" in Berkshire ; while the
n ime of Ailesbury may preserve the last trace of the legend of Weland's
bi other, the sun-archer ALgW. But it is only in broken fragments
that this mass of early faith and early poetry still lives for us, in a
r.ame, in the grey stones of a cairn, or in snatches of our older song :
.Hid the faint traces of worship or of priesthood which we find in later
hisiory show how lightly it clung to the national life.

From Sleswick and the shores of the Northern Sea we must pass,
before opening our story, to a land which, dear as it is now to Eng-
lishmen, had not as yet been trodden by English feet. The island of
Britain had for nearly four hundred years been a province of the Empire.
A descent of Julius Crcsar revealed it (B.C. 55) to the Roman world, but
nearly a century elapsed before the Emperor Claudius attempted its
definite conquest. The victories of Julius Agricola (a.d. 78 — 84) carried
the Roman frontier to the Firths of Forth and of Clyde, and the work
of Roman civilization followed hard upon the Roman sword. Popula-
tion was grouped in cities such as York or Lincoln, cities governed by
their own municipal officers, guarded by massive walls, and linked
together by a network of roads, which extended from one end of the
island to the other. Commerce sprang up in ports like that of London ;
agriculture flourished till Britain was able at need to supply the
necessities of Gaul ; its mineral resources were explored in the tin
mines of Cornwall, the lead mines of Somerset ana Northumberland,
and the iron mines of the Forest of Dean. The wealth of the island
grew fast during centuries of unbroken peace, but the evils which were
slowly sapping the strength of the Roman Empire at large must hz 'e
told heavily on the real wealth of the province of Britain. Here, as in
Italy or Gaul, the population probably declined as the estates of the
landed proprietors grew larger, and the cultivators sank into serfs whose
cabins clustered round the luxurious villas of their lords. The mines,
if worked by forced labour, must have been a source of endless oppres-
sion. Town and country were alike crushed by heavy taxation, while
industry was fettered by laws that turned every trade into an hereditary
caste. Above all, the purely despotic system of the Roman Govern-
ment, by crushing all local independence, crushed all local vigour.
Men forgot how to fight for their country when they forgot how to
govern it.

Such causes of decay were common to every province of the Empire ;
but there were others that sprang from the peculiar circumstances of
Britain itself. The island was weakened by a disunion within, which
[arose from the partial character of its civilization, It was only in the

Sec. \.
Britaim

AND Tin.

English

Britain

\\\

'Ill

niSTORV OF THK fOXCUSH PEOPLE.

friTAP.

Sec. I.
Britain

AND THE

English

Britain
and the
Engliflh

♦jwns that the conquered Britons became entirely Romanized. Over
h\rgc tracts of country the rural Britons seemed to have remained
apart, speaking their own tongue, owning some traditional allegiance
to their native chiefs, and even retaining their native laws. The use
of the Roman language may be taken as marking the progress of
Roman civilization, and though Latin had wholly superseded the
language of the conquered peoples in Spain or Gaul, its use seems to
have been confined in Britain to the townsfolk and the wealthier
landowners without the towns. The dangers that sprang from such a
severance between the two elements of the population must have been
stirred into active life by the danger which threatened Britain from the
North. The Picts who had been sheltered from Roman conquest by
the fastnesses of ihe Highlands were roused in their turn to attack by
the weakness of the province and the hope of plunder. Their inva-
sions penetrated to the heart of the island. Raids so extensive could
hardly have been effected without help from within, and the dim
history of the time allows us to see not merely an increase of disunion
between the Romanized and un-Romanized population of Britain, but
even an alliance between the last and their free kinsfolk, the Picts.
The struggles of Britain, however, lingered on till dangers nearer
home forced the Ei>ipire to recall its legions and leave the province
to itself. Ever since the birth of Christ the countries which lay round
the Mediterranean Sea, and which then comprehended the whole of
the civilized world, had rested in peace beneath the rule of Rome.
During four hundred years its frontier had held at bay the barbarian
world without — the Parthian of the Euphrates, the Numidian of the
African desert, the German of the Danube or the Rhine. It was this
mass of savage barbarism that at last broke in on the Empire as it
sank into decay. In the western dominions of Rome the triumph of
the invaders was complete. The Franks conquered and colonized
Gaui. The West-Goths conquered and colonized Spain. The Vandals
founded a kingdom in Africa. The Burgundians encamped in the
border-land between Italy and the Rhone. The East-Goths ruled at
last in Italy itself. And now that tVe fated hour was come, the Saxon
and the Engle loo ti^sed upon tb'ur pre)

1 1 was to defend Ital) against the Goths that Rome in 410 recalled I
her legions from Ikitain. The province, thus left unaided, seems to |
have fought bravely against its pssailants, and once at least to have
driven back tha Picts to thei' Uijuntains in a rising of despair. But
the threat of fresh inroads found Britain torn with civil quarrels which
made a united resistance impossible, while its Pictish enemies
strengthei.ed themselves by a league with marauders from Ireland,
(Scots as they were ihen called), whose pirate-boats were harrying the
western coast of the island, and with a yet more formidable race of I
pirates who had long been pillaging along the British Channel. These

- fV-

friiAP.

1.1

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

naniz^d. Over
have remained
ional allegiance
laws. The use
:he progress of
superseded the
ts use seems to
:l the wealthier
ing from such a
must have been
Britain from the
iian conquest by
urn to attack by
er. Their inva-
) extensive could
n, and the dim
rease of disunion
n of Britain, but
nsfolk, the Picts.
dangers nearer
ive the province
3 which lay round
ied the whole of
e rule of Rome.
ay the barbarian
|n umidian of the
line. It was this
;he Empire as it
the triumph of
;d and colonized
n. The Vandals
|ncamped in the
,t-Goths ruled at
ome, the Saxon

. in 410 recalled
liaided, seems to
lat least to have
if despair. But
ll quarrels which
^ictish enemies
from Ireland,
lere harrying the
Imidable race of
fhannel. These

were the English. We do not know whether it was the pressure of
other tribes or the example of their German brethren who were now
moving in a general attack on the Empire from their forest homes, or
simply the barrenness of their coast, which drov? the hunters, farmers,
fishermen, of the English tribes to sea. Hut the daring spirit of their
race already broke out in the secresy and suddenness of their swoop,
in the fierceness of their onset, in the careless glee with which they
seized either sword or oar. " Foes are they," sang a Roman poet of
the time, "fierce beyond other foes, and cunning as they are fierce ;
the sea is their school of war, and the storm their friend ; they are sea-
wolves that live on the pillage of the world." To meet the league of
Plot, Scot, and Saxon by the forces of the province itself became im-
possible ; and the one course left was to imitate the fatal policy by
which the Empire had invited its own doom while striving to avert it,
the policy of matching barbarian against barbarian. The rulers of
Britain resolved to break the league by detachir., from it the free-
I hooters who were harrying her eastern coast, and to use their new allies
against the Pict. By the usual promises of land and pay, a band of
I warriors from Jutland were drawn for this purpose in 449 to the shores
t of Britain, with their chiefs, Hengest and Horsa, at their head.

Section II.— The English Conquest. 449—577.

[Authorities for the Conquest of Britain. — The only extanf. British account is

I that of the monk Gildas, diffuse and inflated, but valuable as the one authority

jfor the state of the island at the time, and as giving, in the conclusion of his

Iwork, the native story of the conquest of Kent. I have examined his

[general character, and the objections to his authenticity, &c., in two papers

lin the Saturday Review for April 24 and May 8, 1 869. The conquest of Kent

lis the only one of which we have any record from the side of the conquered.

JThe English conquerors have left brief jottings of the conquest of Kent,

jSussex, and Wessex, in the curious annals which form the opening of the

Icompilation now known as the *' English Chronicle." They are undoubtedly

listoric, though with a slight mythical intermixture. We possess no materials

for the history of the English in their invasion of Mid-Britain or Mercia, and a

fragment of the annals of Northumbria embodied in the later compilation

k-hidi bears the name of Nennius alone throws light upon their actions in

the North. Dr. Guest's papers in the "Origines Celticae " are the best

modern narratives of the conquest. The story has since been told by Mr.

"ireen in "The Making of England.]

It is with the landing of Hengest and his war-band at Ebbsfleet
)n the shores of the Isle of Thanet that English history begins. No
5pot in Britain can be so sacred to Englishmen as that which first felt
^he tread of English feet. There is little indeed to catch the eye in
^bbsfleet itself, a mere lift of higher ground, with a few grey cottages
lotted over it, cut off nowadays from the sea by a reclaimed meadow

9ec. I.
Britain

AND THE

English

The
EnsUsh

Thanet

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.

The

English

Conquest

440

577

I'll <\

III . I

The
Enarlish
Attack

and a sea-wall. But taken as a whole, the scene has a wild beauty of
its own. To the right the white curve of Ramsgate cliffs looks down
on the crescent of Pegwell Bay ; far away to the left, across grey
marsh-levels, where smoke-wreaths mark the sites of Kichborough
and Sandwich, the coast-line bends dimly to the fresh rise of clifis
beyond Deal. Everything in the character of the ground confirms the
national tradition which fixed here the first landing-place of our English
fathers, for great as the physical changes of the country have been
since the fifth century, they have told little on its main features. It is
easy to discover in the misty level of the present Minster marsh what
was once a broad inlet of sea parting Thanct from the mainland of
Britain, through which the pirate-boats of the first Englishmen came
sailing with a fair wind to the little gravel-spit of Ebbsfleet ; and
Richborough, a fortress whose broken ramparts still rise above the
grey flats which have taken the place of this older sea-channel, was
the common landing-place of travellers from Gaul. If the war-ships
of the pirates therefore were cruising off the coast at the moment
when the bargain with the Britons was concluded, their disembarka-
tion at Ebbsfleet almost beneath the walls of Richborough would be
natural enough. But the after-current of events serves to show that
the choice of this landing-place was the result of a settled design.
Between the Briton and his hireling soldiers there could be little trust.
Quarters in Thanet would satisfy the followers of Hengest, who still
lay in sight of their fellow-pirates in the Channel, and who felt them-
selves secured against the treachery which had so often proved fatal to
the barbarian by the broad inlet which parted their camp from the
mainland. Nor was the choice less satisfactory to the provincial,
trembling — and, az the event proved, justly trembling — lest in his zeal
against the Pict he had introduced an even fiercer foe into Britain.
His dangerous allies were cooped up in a corner of the land, and
parted from it by a sea-channel which was guarded by the strongest
fortresses of the coast.

The need of such precautions was seen in the disputes which arose
as soon as the work for which the mercenaries had been hired was
done. The Picts were hardly scattered to the winds in a great battle
when danger came from the Jutes themselves. Their numbers probably
grew fast as the news of the settlement spread among the pirates in the
Channel, and with the increase of their number must have grown the
difficulty of supplying rations and pay. The dispute which rose over
these questions was at last closed by Hengest's men with a threat of
war. The threat, however, as we have seen, was no easy one to carry
out. Right across their path in any attack upon Britain stretched
the inlet of sea that parted Thanet from the mainland, a strait which
was then traversable only at low water by a long and dangerous ford,
and guarded at either mouth by the fortresses of Richborough and

1.]

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

a wild beauty of
cliffs looks down
left, across grey
of Kichborough
esh rise of clifis
und confirms the
CO of our English
3untry have been
n features. It is
ister marsh what
the mainland of
Englishmen came
■ Ebbsfleet ; and
ill rise above the
sea-channel, was
If the war-ships
t at the moment
their disembarka-
Dorough would be
:rves to show that
a settled design.
Duld be little trust,
iengest, who still
nd who felt them-
[en proved fatal to
r camp from the
o the provincial,
; — lest in his zeal
foe into Britain,
of the land, and
by the strongest

Reculver. The channel of the Mcdway, with the forest of the Weald
bending round it from the south, furnished another line of defence in
the rear, while strongholds on the sites of our Canterbury and Rochester
guarded the road to London ; and all around lay the soldiers placed
at the command of the Count of the Saxon .Shore, to hold the coast
against the barbarian, (ireat however as these difficulties were, they
failed to check the sudden onset of the Jutes. The inlet seems to
have been crossed, the coast-road to London seized, before any force
could be collected to oppose the English advance ; and it was only
when they passed the Swale and looked to their right over the
potteries whose refuse still strews the mudbanks of Upchurch, that
their march seems to have swerved abruptly to the south. The guarded
walls of Rochester probably forced them to turn southwards along the
ridge of low hills which forms the eastern boundary of the Medway
valley. Their way led them through a district full of memories of a
past which had even then faded from the minds of men ; for the hill-
slopes which they traversed were the grave-ground of a vanished race,
and scattered among tne boulders that strewed the ground rose the
cromlechs and huge barrows of the dead. One mighty relic survives
in the monument now called Kit's Coty House, which had been linked
in old days by an avenue of huge stones to a burial-ground near
Addington. It was from a steep knoll on which the grey weather-
beaten stones of this monument are reared that the view of their first
battle-field would break on the English warriors ; and a lane which still
leads down from it through peaceful homesteads would guide them
across the ford Mhich has left its name in the little village of Aylesford.
The Chronicle of the conquering people tells nothing of the rush that
may have carried the ford, or of the fight that went struggling up
through the village. It only tells that Horsa fell in the moment of
victory ; and the flint-heap of Horsted, which has long preserved his
name, and was held in after-time to mark his grave, is thus the earliest
of those monuments of English valour of which Westminster is the
last and noblest shrine.

The victory of Aylesford did more than give East Kent to the English ;
it struck the key-note of the whole English conquest of Britain. The
massacre which followed the battle indicated at once the merciless
nature of the struggle which had begun. While the wealthier Kentish
landowners fled in panic over sea, the poorer Britons took refuge in
hill and forest till hunger drove them from their lurking-places to be
cut down or enslaved by their conquerors. It was in vain that some
sought shelter within the walls of their churches ; for the rage of the
English seems to have burned fiercest against the clergy. The priests
were slain at the altar, the churches fired, the peasants driven by the
flames to fling themselves on a ring of pitiless steel. It is a picture
such as this which distinguishes the conquest of Britain from that of

Sec. II.
The

r'NCiLISII

CoNyUEST

440

577

455

Exter-
mination

of the
Britons

HISTORY OV THK ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.

Thr

F.N(;i.isii

577

Conquest
of the
Saxon
Shore

.457

473

the other provinces of Rome. The conquest of Ciaul by the Frank, or
of Italy by the Lombard, proved httle more than a forcible settlement
of the one or the other amonj,^ tributary subjects who were destined in
a long course of ajjes to absorb their conquerors. French is the tongue,
not of the Frank, but of the (Jaul whom he overcame ; and the fair
hair of the Lombard is now all but unknown in Lombardy. But the
Fnglish conquest for a hundred and fifty years was a sheer disposses-
sion and driving back of the people whom the English conquered. In
the world-wide struggle between Rome and the German invaders no
land was so stubbornly fought for or so hardly won. The conquest of
Britain was indeed only partly wrought out after two centuries of bitter
warfare. But it was just through the long and merciless nature of the
struggle that of all the German conquests this proved the most thorough
and complete. So far as the English sword in these earlier days
reached, Britain became England, a land, that is, not of Britons, but
of Englishmen. It is possible that a few of the vanquished people
may have lingered as slaves round the homesteads of their English
conquerors, and a few of their household words (if these were not
brought in at a later time) mingled oddly with the English tongue.
But doubtful exceptions such as these leave the main facts untouched.
When the steady progress of English conquest was stayed for a while
by civil wars a century and a half after Aylesford, the Briton had dis-
appeared from half of the land which had been his own, and the tongue,
the religion, the laws of his English conqueror reigned without a rival
from Essex to the Peak of Derbyshire and the mouth of the Severn,
and from the British Channel to the Firth of Forth.

Aylesford, however, was but the first step in this career of conquest.
How stubborn the contest was may be seen from the fact that it took
sixty years to complete the conquest of Southern Britain alone. It was
twenty years before Kent itself was won. After a second defeat at
the passage of the Cray, the Britons " forsook Kent-land and fled with
much fear to London ; " but the ground was soon won back again, and
it was not until 465 that a series of petty conflicts made way for a
decisive struggle at Wippedsfleet. Here however the overthrow was
so terrible that all hope of saving the bulk of Kent seems to have been
abandoned, and it was only on its southern shore that the Britons held
their ground. Eight years later the long contest was over, and with
the fall of Lymne, whose broken walls look from the slope to which
they cling over the great flat of Romney Marsh, the work of the first
conqueror was done. But the greed of plunder drew fresh war-bands
from the German coast. New invaders, drawn from among .he Saxon
tribes that lay between the Elbe and the Rhine, were seen in 477,
only four years later, pushing slowly along the strip of land which lay
westward *" Kent between the Weald and the sea. Nowhere has the
physical a.3pect of the country been more utterly changed. The vast

[chap.

y the Frank, or
:ible settlement
^cre destined in
:h is the tongue,
I ; and the fair
)ardy. But the
sheer disposses-
conquered. In
I an invaders no
The conquest of
:nturies of bitter
:ss nature of the
ic most thorough
ese earher days
t of Britons, but
iiquished people
of their EngUsh
f these were not
English tongue,
facts untouched,
tayed for a while
; Briton had dis-
^, and the tongue,
d without a rival
h of the Severn,

reer of conquest,
ifact that it took
lin alone. It was
iecond defeat at
ind and fled with
back again, and
made way for a
overthrow was
[ms to have been
the Britons held
ls over, and with
slope to which
Iwork of the first
J fresh war-bands
Imong .he Saxon
^re seen in 477,
land which lay
I o where has the
liged. The vast

i.l

TFIK ENCiLISIl KINODOMS.

sheet of scrub, woodland, and waste whicii then bore the name of the
Aiulrcdswcald stretched for more than a hundred miles from the
borders of Kent to the Ham))shirc Downs, extending norliiward
almost to the Thames, and leaving only a thin strip of coast along its
scnithcrn edge. This coast was guarded by a great fortress which
occupied the spot now called I'evensey, the future landing-jjlacc of the
Norman Conqueror. The fall of this fortress of Andericla in 491
established the kingdom of the South-Saxons ; "/EUc and Cissa," ran
the pitiless record of the conquerors, " beset Anderida, and slew
all that were therein, nor was there afterwards one Briton left."
Another tribe of Saxons was at the same time conquering on the other
side of Kent, to the north of the estuary of the Thames, and had
founded the settlement of the East-Saxons, as these warriors came to
be called, in the valleys of the Colne and the Stour. To the north-
ward of the Stour, the work of conquest was taken up by the third of
the tribes whom we have seen dwelling in their German homeland,
whose name was destined to absorb that of Saxon or Jute, and to
stamp itself on the land they won. These were the f^ngle, or English-
men. Their first descents seem to have fallen on the great district
which was cut off from the rest of Britain by the Wash and the Fens
and long reaches of forest, the later East Anglia, where the conquerors
settled as the North-folk and the South-folk, names still preserved to
us in the modern counties. With this settlement the first stage in the
conquest was complete. By the close of the fifth centui y the whole
coast of Britain, from the Wash to Southampton Water, was in the
hands of the invaders. As yet, however, the enemy had Vouched little
more than the coast ; great masses of woodland or of fen still prisoned
the Engle, the Saxon, and the Jute alike within P'^rrow limits. But
the sixth century can hardly have been long begun when each of the
two peoples who had done the main work of conquest opened a fresh
attack on the flanks of the tract they had won. On its northern flank
the Engle appeared in the estuaries of the Forth and of the Humber.
On its western flank, the Saxons appeared in the Southampton
Water.

The true conquest of Southern Britain was reserved for a fresh band

of Saxons, a tribe whose older name was that of the Gewissas, but

who were to be more widely known as the West-Saxons. Landing

westward of the strip of coast which had been won by the war-bands

I of /Elle, they struggled under Cerdic and Cynric up from Southampton

Water in 495 to the great iowns where Winchester offered so rich a

prize. Five thousand Britons fell in a fight which opened the country

jto these invaders, and a fresh victory at Charford in 519 set the crown

|of the Wcst-Saxons on the head of Cerdic. We know little of the

[incidents of these conquests; nor do we know why at this juncture

they seem to have been suddenly interrupted. But it is certain that a

.Src. II.
Thk

F,N(;i.isH

("UNQUKST

440

577

Conquest

Southern

Britain

508

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

fcIIAP.

Sec. II.

I The

i| English
ji; Conquest

I ; TO

1; 577

552

568

583

Conquert

of Mid.

Britain

and the

North

victory of the Britons at Mount Badon in the year 520 checked the
progress of the West- Saxons, and was followed by a long pause in
their advance ; foi thirty years the great belt of woodland which then
curved round from Dorset to the valley of the Thames seems to have
barred the way of the assailants. What finally broke their inaction we
cannot tell. We only know that Cynric, whom Cerdic's death left king of
the West-Saxons, again took up the work of invasion by a new advance
in 552. The capture of the hill-fort of Old Sarum threw open the reaches
of the Wiltshire Downs ; and pushing northward to a new battle at
Barbury Hill, they completed the conquest of the Maryborough Downs.
From the bare uplands the invaders turned eastward to the richer
valleys of our Berkshire, and after a battle with the Kentish men at
Wimbledon, the land south of the Thames which now forqis our
Surrey was added to their dominions. The road along the Thames
was however barred to them, for the district round London seems to
have been already won and colonized by the East-Saxons. But a march
of their King Cuthwulf made them masters in 571 of the districts
which now form Oxfordshire and Ikickinghamshire ; and a few years
later thej- swooped from the Wiltshire uplands on the rich prey that
lay along the Severn. Gloucester, Cirencester, and Bath, cities which
had leagued under their British kings to resist this onset, became the
spoil of a Saxon victory at Deorham in 577, and the line of the great
western river lay open to the arms of the conquerors. Under a new
king, Ceawlin, the West-Saxons penetrated to the borders of Chester,
and Uriconium, a tovvi beside the Wrekin,- recently again brought to
light, went up in flames. A British poet sings piteously the death-song
of Uriconium, " the white town in the valley," the town of white stone
gleaming among the green woodland, the hall of its chieftain left
" without fire, without light, without songs," the silence broken only
by the eagle's scream, " the eagle who has swallowed fresh drink,
heart's blood of Kyndylan the fair." The raid, however, was repulsed,
and the blow proved fatal to the power of Wessex. Though the
West-Saxons were destined in the end to win the overlordship over
every English people, their time had not come yet, and the leadership
of the English race was to fall, for nearly a century to come, to the
tribe of invaders whose fortunes we have now to follow.

Rive's were the natural inlets by which the northern pirates every-
where made thei/ way into the heart of Europe. In iJritain the
fortress of London barred their way along the Thames from its
mouth, and drove them, as we have seen, to an advance along the
southern coast and over the downs of Wiltshire, before reaching its
upper waters. But the rivers which united in the estuary of the
H umber led like open highways into the heart of Britain, and it was
by this inlet that the great mass of the invaders penetrated into the
interior of the island. Like the invaders of East Anglia, they were

LE.

:ar 520 checked the
>y a long pause in
)odIancl which then
imes seems to have
ce their inaction we
:'s death left king of
n by a new advance
:w open the reaches
to a new battle at
ariborough Downs,
mrd to the richer
he Kentish men at
h now forins our
along the Thames
I London seems to
^cons. But a march
I of the districts
; and a few years
the rich prey that
Bath, cities which
onset, became the
; line of the great
rs. Under a new
Drders of Chester,
' again brought to
sly the death-song
wn of white stone
its chieftain left
ence broken only
wed fresh drink,
ver, was repulsed,
ex. Though the
averlordship over
tid the leadership
r to come, to the
►w.

Jrn pirates every-
In Britain the
rhames from its
vance along the
jfore reaching its
e estuary of the
ritain, and it was
netrated into the
^nglia, they were

Sec. II.

552

568

5«3

';:' I Conques'

f of Mld-

;! Britain

u|| and the

:,:; I !;" North

N- -

!«

z
o
o

^ I— <

w a CO

33 "

-s

lOIIII

11 £ i « 2

a S 5 ,S; .2 4J
<C 75 "n M 0-. !«

1.]

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

of the English tribe from Slesvvick. As the storm fell in the opening
of the sixth century on the Wolds of Lincolnshire that stretch south-
ward from the H umber, the conquerors who settled in the deserted
country were known as the " Lindiswara," or " dwellers about
Lindum." A part of the warriors who had entered the H umber,
turned southward by the forest of Elmet which covered the district
around Leeds, followed the course of the Trent. Those who
occupied the wooded country between the Trent and the Humber
took from their position the name of Southumbrians. A second
division, advancing along the curve of the former river and creeping
down the line of its tributary, the Soar, till they reached Leicester,
became known as the Middle-English. The marshes of the Fen
country were settled by tribes known as the Gyrwas. The head
waters of the Trent were the seat of those invaders who penetrated j
furthest to the west, and camped round Lichfield and Repton. This {
country became the borderland between Englishmen and Britons, and
the settlers bore the name of " Mercians," men, that is, of the
March or border. We know hardly anything of this conquest of
Mid-Britain, and little more of the conquest of the North. Under
the Romans, political power had centred in the vast district
between the Humber and the Forth. York had been the capital of
Britain and the seat of the Roman prefect ; and the bulk of the
garrison maintained in the island lay cantoned along the Roman
wall. Signs of wealth and prosperity appeared everywhere ; cities
rose beneath the shelter of the Roman camps ; villas of British land-
owners studded the vale of the Ouse and the far-off uplands of the
Tweed, where the shepherd trusted for security against Pictish
marauders to the terror of the Roman name. This district was
assailed at once from the north and from the south. A part of the
invading force which entered the Humber marched over the Yorkshire
wolds to found a kingdom, which was known as that of the Deiri, in
the fens of Holderness and on the chalk downs eastward of York. But
they were soon drawn onwards, and after a struggle of which we know
nothing, York, like its neighbour cities, lay a desolate ruin, while the
conquerors spread northwa»-d, slnying and burning along the valley of
the Ouse. Meanwhile the pirates had appeared in the Forth, apd
won their way along the Tweed ; Ida and the men of fifty keels
which followed him reared the capital of the northernmost kingdom
of the English, that of Bernicia, on the rock of Bamborough, and won
their way slowly along the coast against a stubborn resistance which
formed the theme of British songs. The strife between the kingdoms
of Deira and Bernicia for supremacy in the North was closed by their
being united under King ^thelric of Bernicia ; and from this union
was formed a new kingdom, the kingdom of Northumbria.

It was this century of conquest by the English race which really

Sec. II.

The

Encjlish
Conquest

449

577

C.550

500-520

588

Gildas

c. 516-57C

Sec. II.

The

English
Conquest

449

677

The
English
Settle-
ment

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

made Britain England. In our anxietj to know more of our fathers,
we listen to the monotonous plaint of Gildas, the one writer whom
Britain has left us, with a strange disappointment. Gildas had seen
the invasion of the pirate hosts, and it is to him we owe our know-
ledge of the conquest of Kent. But we look in vain to his book for any
account of the life or settlement of the English conquerors. Across the
border of the new England that was growing up along the southern
shores of Britain, Gildas gives us but a glimpse — doubtless he had but a
glimpse himself — of forsaken walls, of shrines polluted by heathen im-
piety. His silence and his ignorance mark the character of the struggle.
No British neck had as yet bowed before the English invader, no
British pen was to record his conquest. A century after their landing
the English are still known to their British foes only as " barbarians,"
" wolves," " dogs," " whelps from the kennel of barbarism," " hateful
to God and man." Their victories seemed victories of the powers of
evil, chastisements of a divine justice for national sin. Their ravage,
terrible as it had been, was held to be almost at an end : in another
century — so ran old prophecies — their last hold on the land would be
shaken off. But of submission to, or even of intercourse with the
strangers there is not a word. Gildas tells us nothing of their fortunes,
or of their leaders.

In spite of his silence, however, we may still know something of the
way in which the new English society grew up in the conquered
country, for the driving back of the Briton was but the prelude to the
settlement of his conqueror. What strikes us at once in the new
England is, that it was the one purely German nation that rose upon
the wreck of Rome. In other lands, in Spain, or Gaul, or Italy,
though they were equally conquered by German peoples, religion,
social life, administrative order, still remained Roman. In Britain
alone Rome died into a vague tradition of the past. The whole
organization of government and society disappeared with the oeople
who used it. The villas, the mosaics, the coins which we dig up in
our fields are no relics of our English fathers, but of a Roman world
which our fathers' sword swept utterly away. Its 1; w, its literature,
its manners, its faith, went with it. The new England was a heathen
cQuntry. The religion of Woden and Thunder triumphed over the
religion of Christ. Alone among the German assailants of Rome the
English rejected the faith of the Empire they helped to overthrow.
Elsewheie the Christian priesthood served as mediators between the
barbarian and the conquered, but in the conquered part of Britain
Christianity wholly disappeared. River and homestead and boundary,
the very days of the week, bore the names of the new gods who dis-
placed Christ. But if England seemed for the moment a waste from
which all the civilization of the ^vorld had fled away, it contained
within itself the germs of a nobler life than that which had been

[chap.

I.]

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

«5

,ur fathers,
iter whom
s had seen

our know-
ook for any

Across the
le southern
,ie had but a
leathen im-
:he struggle,
invader, no
leir landing
barbarians,"
1," "hateful

tie powers of
heir ravage,
in another
nd would be
rse with the
heir fortunes,

lething of the
,e conquered
irelude to the
in the new
at rose upon
,ul, or Italy,
lies, religion.
In Britain
The whole
|h the people
we dig up in
[<oman world
[its literature,
as a heathen
ed over the
lof Rome the
[o overthrow,
between the
|rt of Britain
nd boundary,
ods who dis-
waste from
it contained
h had been

destroyed. The base of the new English society was the freeman
whom we have seen tilling, judging, or sacrificing for himself in his
far-off fatherland by the Northern Sea. However roughly he dealt
while the struggle went on with the material civilization of Britain, it
was impossible that such a man could be a mere destroyer. War was
no sooner over than the warrior settled down into a farmer, and the
home of the peasant churl rose beside the heap of goblin-haunted
stones that marked the site of the villa he had burnt. Little knots
of kinsfolk drew together in " tun " and " ham " beside the Thames
and the Trent as they had settled beside the Elbe or the Weser,
not as kinsfolk only, but as dwellers in the same plot, knit
together by their common holding within the same bounds. Each
little village-commonwealth lived the same life in Britain as itf^ farmers
had lived at home. Each had its moot hill or sacred tree as a centre,
its " mark " as a border ; each judged by witness of the kinsfolk and
made laws in the assembly of its freemen, and chose the leaders for
its own governance, and the men who were to follow headman or
ealdorman to hundred-court or war.

In more ways than one, indeed, the primitive organization of English
society was affected by its transfer to the soil of Britain. Conquest
begat the King. It is probable that the English had hitherto known
nothing of kings in their own fatherland, where each tribe lived under
the rule of its own customary Ealdorman. But in a war such as that which
they waged against the Britons it was necessary to find a common leader
whom the various tribes engaged in conquests such as those of Kent
or Wessex might follow ; and such a leader soon rose into a higher
position than that of a temporary chief. The sons of Hergest became
kings in Kent ; those of ^Elle in Sussex ; the West-Saxons chose
Cordic for their king. Such a choice at once drew the various villages
and tribes of each community closer together than of old, while the
new ruler surrounded himself with a chosen war-band of companions,
servants, or "thegns" as they were called, who were rewarded for their
service by gifts from the public land. Their distinction rested, not on
hereditary rank, but on service done to the King, and they at last
became a nobility which superseded the " eorls " of the original English
constitution. And as war begat the King and the military noble, so it
all but begat the slave. There had always been a slave class, a class
of theunfree, among the English as among all German peoples ; but
the numbers of this class, if unaffected by the conquest of Britain, were
swelled by the wars which soon sprang up among the English con-
querors. No rank saved the prisoner taken in battle from the doom
of slavery, and slavery itself was often welcomed as saving the prisoner
from death. We see this in the story of a noble warrior who had fallen
wounded in a fight between two English tribes, and was carried as a
bond-slave to the house of a thegn hard by. He declared himself a

Sec. II.

Thk

English

CONQUr.ST

449

577

England

and the

Conquest

HIS TORY OF THE ENGLISIf PEOPLE.

[chap.

*'ii
:'i"'<

Sec. II.

The

English

Conquest

449

557

peasant, but his master penetrated the disguise. " You deserve death,"
he said, " since all my brothers and kinsfolk fell i ; the fight ;" but for
his oath's sake he spared his life and sold him to . Frisian at London,
probably a merchant such as those who were carry nig.'Inglish captives
at that time to the market-piace of Rome. But v, ir was not the oily
cause of the increase of this slave class. The nui; 'ter o» the " unfree"
were swelled by debt and crime. Faniine drov. men to "bend their
heads in the evil days for r:eat ;" tie uebtor unable to dis-hcige nis
dc t flung jn the ^round the freeman's sword and spear, took up the
labourer's mattock, and placed his head as a slave within a master's
hands. The criminal whose kinsfolk would not make up his fine
becime a crime-serf of the plaintiff or the king. Sometimes a father,
pressi d by need, sold children and wife into bondage. The slave
became part of the li * e-stock of the estate, to be willed away at death
with horse or ox whose pedigree was kept as carefully as his own.
His children were bondsmen like himself; even the freeman's children
by a sla'e-mother inherited the mother's taint. " Mine is the calf that
is born of my cow," ran the English proverb. The cabins of the un-
free clustered round the home of the rich la .downer as they had
clustered round the villa of the Roman gentleman ; ploughman, shep-
herd, goatherd, swineherd, oxherd and cowherd, dairymaid, barnman,
sower, hay ward and woodward, were often slaves. It was not such a
slavery as that we have known in modern times, for stripes and bonds
were rare ; if the slave were slain, it was by an angry blow, not by the
lash. But his lord could slay him if he would ; it was but a chattel
the less. The slave had no place in the justice-court, no kinsman to
claim vengeance for his wrong. If a stranger slew him, his lord
claimed the damages ; if guilty of wrong-doing, " his skin paid for
him" under the lash. If he fled he might be chased like a strayed
beast, and flogged to death for his crime, or burned to death if the
slave were a woman.

Section III.— The Northumbrian Kingdom, 588—685.

[Authorities. — Baeda's " Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum " is the one
primary authority for this period. I have spoken fully of it and its writer in
the text. The meagre regnal and episcopal annals of the Wcst-Saxons have
been brought by numerous insertions from Boeda to the shape in which they at
present appear in the " English Chronicle." The Poem of Csedmon has been
published by Mr. Thorpe, and copious summaries of it are given by Sharon
Turner (" Hist, of Anglo-Saxons, ' vol. iii. cap. 3) and Mr. Morley ("English
Writers," vol. i.) The life of Wilfrid by Eddi, and those of Cuthbert by
Baeda and an earlier contemporary biographer, which are appended to
Mr. Stevenson's edition of the " Historia Ecclesiastica," throw great light on
the religious condition of the North. For Guthlac of Crowland, see the ** Acta

[chap.

erve death,'
ht ; " but for
I at London,
lish captives
not the oily
he"unfree"

" bend their
lis -hcige nis
, took up the
in a master's

up his fine
mes a father,
. The slave
Lway at death
' as his own.
lan's children
s the calf that
ins of the un-

as they had
ighman, shep-
aid, barnman,
vas not such a
DCS and bonds
3w, not by the

but a chattel
10 kinsman to

im, his lord
[skin paid for

like a strayed
death if the

I.]

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

1-685.

Im " is the one
|d its writer in
^t-Saxons have
which they at
Imon has been
ten by Sharon
lley (" English
|f Cuthbert by
appended to
[great light on
see the "Acta

Sanctorum " for April xi. For Theodore, and the Ei; ish Church which

he organized, see Kemble ("Saxons in England," vol. cap. 8 — lo), and

above all the invaluable remarks of Dr. Stubbs in l.i,; "Constitutional
History."

The conquest of the bulk of Britain was now complete. Eastward
of a line which may be roughly drawn along the moorlands of North-
umberland and Yorkshire, through Derbyshire and skirting the Forest
of Arden, to the mouth of the Severn, and thence by Mendip to the
sea, the island had passed into English hands. From this time the
character of the English conquest of Britain was wholly changed. The
older wars of extermination came to an end, and as the invasion pushed
westward in later times the Br ^'^s were no longer wholly driven from
the soil, but mingled with tbi^ r < nquerors. A far more important
change was that which was ;en the attitude of the English con-
querors from this time tow.>ru> each other. Freed to a great extent
from the common pressuie ^* the war against the Britons, their
energies turned to combats with one another, to a long struggle for
overlordship which was U H n bringing about a real national unity.
The West-Saxons, beaten back from their advance along the Severn
valley, and overthrown in a terrible defeat at Faddiley, were torn by
internal dissensions, even while they were battling for life against the
Britons. Strife between the two rival kingdoms of Bernicia and Deira
in the north absorbed the power of the Engle in that quarter, till in
588 the strength of Deira suddenly broke down, and the Bernician
king, iEthelric, gathered the two peoples into a realm which was to
form the later kingdom of Northumbria. Amid the confusion of north
and south, the primacy among the conquerors was seized by Kent,
where the kingdom of the Jutes rose suddenly into greatness under a
king called .^tthelberht, who before 597 es 'ished his supremacy
over the Saxons of Middlesex and Essex, as well as over the English
of East Anglia and of Mercia as far north as the Humber and the
Trent.

The overlordship of ^Ethelberht was marked by a renewal of that
intercourse of Britain with the Continent which had been broken off by
the conquests of the English. His marriage with Bertha, the daughter
of the Prankish King Charibert of Paris, created a fresh tie between
Kent and Gaul. But the union had far more important results than
those of which -^thelberht may have dreamed. Bertha, like her
Prankish kinsfolk, was a Christian. A Christian bishop accompanied
her from Gaul to Canterbury, the royal city of the kingdom of Kent ;
and a ruined Christian church, the church of St. Martin, was given
them for their worship. The marriage of Bertha was an opportunity
which was at once seized by the bishop who at this time occupied
the Roman See, and who is justly known as Gregory the Great. A
memorable story tells us how, when but a young Roman deacon,

Sec. III.

Thb

North-
umbrian
Kingdom

588

685

JEthel-
berht

584

Landing

ofAufua-

tine

c. 589

: ; .^

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.

Thb
North-
umbrian

KlNCUCM

588

685

Reunion
of Hixg-

land

and the

Western

World

Gregory had noted the white bodies, the fair faces, the golden hair of
some youths who stood bound in the market-place of Rome. " From
what country do these slaves come .'' " he a'-'vcd the traders who brought
them. " They are English, Angles ! " the slave- dealers answered. The
deacon's pity veiled itself in poetic humour. " Not Angles but Angels,"
he said, " with faces so angel-like ! From what country come they ?"
" They come," said the merchants, " from Deira." " De ira ! " was the
untranslateable reply ; " aye, plucked from God's ire, and called to
Christ's mercy ! And what is the name of their king ? '•' " i^lla," they
told him ; and Gregory seized on the words as of good omen. "Alle-
luia shall be sung in y^lla's lai.d !" he cried, and passed on, musing
how the angel-faces should be brought to sing it. Only three or four
years had gone by, when the deacon had become Bishop of Rome, and
Bertha's marriage gave him the opening he sought. After cautious
negotiations with the rulers of Gaul, he sent a Roman abbot, Augustine,
at the head of a band of monks, to preach the gospel to the English
people. The missionaries landed in 597 on the very spot where
Hengest had landed more than a century before in the Isle of Thanet ;
and the king received them sittmg in the open air on the chalk-down
above Minster, where the eye nowadays catches miles away over the
marshes the dim tower of Canterbury. He listened to the long sermon
as the interpreters whom Augustine had brought with him from Gaul
translated it. " Your words are fair," i^thelberht replied at last with
English good sense, " but they are new and of doubtful meaning ; " for
himself, he said, he refused to forsake the gods of his fathers, but he
promised shelter and protection to the strangers. The band of monks
entered Canterbury bearing before them a silver cross with a picture
of Christ, and singing in concert the strains of the litany of their
church. " Turn from this city, Lord," they sang, " Thine anger and
wrath, and turn it from Thy holy house, for we have sinned." And
then in strange contrast came the jubib.nt cry of the older Hebrew
worship, the cry which Gregory had wrested in prophetic earnestness
from the name of the Yorkshire king in the Roman market-place,
" Alleluia ! "

It is strange that the spot which witnessed the landing of Hengest
should be yet better known as the landing-place of Augustine. But
the second landing at Ebbsfleet was in no small measure the reversal
and undoing of the first. " Strangers from Rome " was the title with
which the missionaries first fronted the English king. The march of
the monks as they chanted their solemn litany was, in one sense, the
return of the Roman legions who had retired at the trumpet-call of
Alanc. It was to the tongue and the thought not of Gregory only but
of such men as his own Jutish fathers had slaughtered and driven
over, sea that /Ethelberht listened in the preaching of Augustine
Canterbury, the earliest royal city of the new England, became the

[chap.

)lden hair of
mc. " From
who brought
swered. The
but Angels,"^
come they ? "
ira ! " was the
ind called to
" M\W they
men. "Alle-
:d on, musing
r three or four
of Rome, and
\fter cautious
)ot . Augustine,
to the English
ry spot where
sle of Thanet ;
he chalk-down
away over the
he long sermon
him from Gaul
ied at last with
meaning ; " for
fathers, but he
band of monks
with a picture
litany of their
line anger and
sinned." And
older Hebrew
:ic earnestness
market-place,

ig of Hengest
jgustine. But
Ire the reversal
the title with
The march of
lone sense, the
[rumpet-call of
egory only but
bd and driven
[of Augustine
became the

T.l

THE ENCiLISH KINGDOM.S.

centre of Latin influence. The Roman tongue became again one of
the tongues of Britain, thelanguapfc of its worship, its correspondence,
its literature. But more than the tongue of Rome returned with
Augus ine. Practically his landing renewed the union with the
western world which the landing of Hengest had all but destroyed.
The new England was admitted into the older commonwealth of
nations. The civilization, arts, letters, which had fled before the sword
of the English conquest, returned with the Christian faith. The fabric
of the Roman law indeed never took root in England, but it is im-
possible not to recognize the result of the influence of the Roman
missionaries in the fact that the codes of customary English law began
to be put into writing soon after their arrival.

As yet these great results were still distant ; a year passed before
yEthelberht yielded, and though after his conversion thousands of the
Kentish men crowded to baptism, it was years before he ventured to
urge the under-kings of Essex and East Anglia to receive the creed of
their overlord. This effort of i^thelberht however only h raided a
revolution which broke the power of Kent for ever. The tribes of
Mid-Britain revolted against his supremacy, and gathered under the
overlordship of Ra::dvvald of East Anglia. The revolution clearly
marked the change which had passed over Britain. Instead of a chaos
of isolated peoples, the conquerors were now in fact gathered into three
great groups. The Englc kingdom of the north reached from the
Humber to the Forth. The southern kingdom of the West-Saxons
stretched fri)m Watling Street to the Channel. And between these
was roughly sketched out the great kingdom of Mid-Britain, which,
however i;s limits might vary, retained a substantial identity f»-om the
time of -(^thelberht till the final fall of the Mercian kings. For the
next two hundred years the history of England lies in the struggle of
Northumbrian, Mercian, and West-Saxon kin^^s to establish their
supremacy over the general mass of Englishmci.^ and unite them in a
single England.

In this struggle the lead was at once taken by Northumbria, which
was rising into a power that set all rivalry at defiance. Under ^^thel-
frith, who had followed v^thelric in 593, the work of conquest went on
rapidly. In (^v ^ forces of the northern Britons were annihilated in
a great battle at Daegsastan, and the rule of Northumbria was estab-
lished from the Humber to the Forth. Along the west of Britiiin
there stretched the unconquered kingdoms of Strathclyde and Cumbria,
which extended from the river Clyde to the Dee, and ine smaller British
states which occupied what we now call Wales. Chester formed the
link between these two bodies ; and it was Chester that yEthelfrith
chose in 613 for his next point of attack. Some miles from the city
two tl ousand monks were gathered in the monastery of Bangor, and
after imploring in a three days' fast the help of Heaven for their

C 2

Sec. III.
Thr

NORTII-

iimurian
Kingdom

588

685

Fall of
Kent

604

607

JEthel-
fritb

593-6x7

613

IITSTORV OF THE ENGUSTI PF,0?T-F.

[chap.

Skc. III.

The

North-
iimhrian
Kingdom

588

685

EadT^ine

617-633

626

country, a crowd of these ascetics followed the British army to the
field. /Rthelfrith watched the wild gestures and outstretched arms of
the stran{:(e company as it stood apart, intent upon prayer, and
took the monks for enchanters. " Rear they arms or no," said
the kinj::^, "thry war against us when they cry against us to their
God," and in the surprise and rout which followed the monks were
the first to fall.

The British kingdoms were now utterly parted from one another.
By their victory at Deorham the West-Saxons had cut off the Britons
of Devon and Cornwall from the general body of their race. By his
victory at Chester yFthclfrith broke this body again into two several
parts, by parting the Britons of Wales from those of Cumbria and
Strathclyde. From this time the warfare of Briton and Englishman
died down into a warfare of separate English kingdoms against separate
British kingdoms, of Northumbria against Cumbria and Strathclyde,
of Mercia against modern Wales, of Wessex against the tract of British
country from Mendip to the Land's End. Nor was the victory of Chester
of less importance to England itself. With it y^thelfrith was at once
drawn to new dreams of ambition as he looked across his southern
border, where Ra?d wald of East Anglia was drawing the peoples of
Mid-Britain under liis overlordship.

The inevitable struggle between East Anglia and Northumbria
seemed for a time averted by the sudden death of y^thclfrith. March-
ing in 617 against Raedwald, who had sheltered Eadwine, an exile
from the Northumbrian kingdom, he perished in a defeat at the river
Idle. Eadwine mounted the Northumbrian throne on the fall of his
enemy, and carried on the work of government with an energy as
ceaseless as that of ^^thelfrith himself. His victories over Pict and
Briton were folK wed by the winning of lordship over the English of
Mid-Britain ; Kent was bound to him in close political alliance ; and
the English conquerors of the south, the people of the West-Saxons,
alone remained independent. But revolt and slaughter had fatally
broken the power of the West-Saxons when the Northumbria is
attacked them. A story preserved by Baeda tells something of the
fierceness of the struggle which ended in the subjection of the south
to the overlordship of Northumbria. Eadwine gave audience in an
Easter court which he held in a king's town near the river Derwent
to Eumer, an envoy of Wessex, who brought a message from its king.
In the midst of the conference the envoy started to his feet, drew a
dagger from his robe, and rushed madly on the Northumbrian sovereign.
Lilla, one of the king's war-band, threw himself between Eadwine and
his assassin ; but so furious was the stroke that even through Lilla' s
body the dagger still reached its aim. The king however recovered
from his wound to march on the West-Saxons ; he slew and subdued
all who had conspired against him, and returned victorious to his

[chap.

army to the
:hcd arms of
prayer, and
r no," said
: us to their
monks were

one another,
f the Britons
ace. By his
) two several
Cumbria and
i Englishman
ainst separate
I Strathclyde,
ract of British
ory of Chester
1 was at once
I his southern
he peoples of

Northumbria
rith. March-
ine, an exile
t at the river
he fall of his
|an energy as
ver Pict and
e English of
.lliance ; and
est-Saxons,
|r had fatally
rthumbria \s
ithing of the
of the south
Idience in an
ver Derwent
[rom its king,
feet, drew a
|an sovereign,
adwine and
ough Lilla's
|er recovered
,nd subdued
rious to his

I.)

TIIK ENGLISH XINGDOMS.

own country. The greatness of Northumbria now reached its height.
Within his own dominions Eadwine displayed a genius for civil
government which shows how completely the mere ago of conquest
had passed away. With him began the Knj^lish proverb so often
applied to after kings, " A woman with her babe might walk scathe-
less from sea to sea in Kadwine's day." Peaceful communication
revived along the deserted highways ; the springs by the roadside were
marked with stakes, and a cup of brass set beside each for the traveller's
refreshment. Some faint traditions of the Roman past may have
flung their glory round this new " Empire of the English ;" some of
its majesty had at any rate come back with its long-lost peace. A
royal standard of purple and gold floated before Eadwine as he rode
through the villages ; a feather-tuft attached to a spear, the Roman
tufa, preceded him as he walked through the streets. The Northum-
brian king was in fact supreme over Britain as no king of English
blood had been before. Northward his frontier reached the Forth,
and was guarded by a city which bore his name, Edinburgh, Eadwine's
burgh, the city of Eadwine. Westward, he was master of Chester,
and the fleet he equipped there subdued the isles of Anglesey and
Man. South of the H umber he was owned as overlord by the whole
English race, save Kent ; and even Kent was bound to him by his
marriage with its king's sister.

With the Kentish queen came Paulinus, one of Augustine's followers,
whose tall stooping form, slender aquiline nose, and black hair falling
round a thin worn face, were long remembered in the north ; and the
Wise Men of Northumbria gathered to deliberate on the new faith to
which Paulinus and his queen soon converted Eadwine. To finer
minds its charm lay in the light it threw on the darkness which
encompassed men's lives, the darkness of the future as of the past.
" So seems the life of man, O king," burst forth an aged Ealdorman,
" as a sparrow's flight through the hall when you are sitting at meat
in winter-tide, with the warm fire lighted on the hearth, but the icy
rain-storm without. The sparrow flies in at one door and tarries for
a moment in the light and heat of the hearth-fire, and then flying forth
from the other vanishes into the wintry darkness whence it came. So
tarries for a moment the life of man in our sight, but what is before
it, what after it, we know not. Jf this new te.u:hing tells us aught
certainly of these, let us follow it;" Coarser a- ^.ument told on the
crowd. " None of your people, E.idv/ine, have , worshipped the gods
more busily than I," said Coifi the priest, " yet there are many more
favoured and more fortunate. Were these gods good for anything
they would help their worshippers." Then leaping on horseback, he
hurled his spear into the sacred temple at Godmanham, and with the
rest of the Witan embraced the religion of the king.

But the faith of Woden and Thunder was not to fall without a

Skc. III.

Tmk
North-

HMnKIAN

Kingdom

68a

085

Conver-
sion of
North,
umbrla

627

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.

The
North-
umbrian
Kingdom

588

685

The
Heathen
Strugrele

633

635

struggle. Even in Kent a reaction against the new creed began with
the death of .^thelberht. Rasdwald of East Anglia lesolved to serve
Christ and the older gods together ; and a pagan and Christian altar
fronted one another in the same royal temple. The young kings of the
East-Saxons burst into the church where Mellitus, the Bishop of
London, was administering the Eucharist to the people, crying, " Give
us that white bread you gave to our father Saba," and on the bishop's
refusal drove him from their realm. The tide of reaction was checked
for a time by Eadwine's conversion, until Mercia sprang into a sudden
greatness as the champion of the heathen gods. Under Eadwine
Mercia had submitted to the lordship of Northumbria ; but its king,
Penda, saw in the rally of the old religion a chance of winning back
its independence. Penda had not only united under his own rule the
I Mercians of the Upper Trent, the Middle-English of Leicester, the
Southumbrians, and the Lindiswaras, but he had even been strong
enough to tear from the West-Saxons their pos; isions along the
Severn. So thoroughly indeed was the union of these provinces
effected, that though some were detached for a time after Penda's
death, the name of Mercia from this moment must be generally taken
as covering the whole of them. Alone, however, he was as yet no
match for Northumbria. But the old severance between the English
people and the Britons was fast dying down, and Penda boldly broke
through the barrier which parted the two races, and aUied himself with
the Welsh king, Cadwalbn, in an attack on Eadwine The armies
met in 633 at Hatfield, and in the fight which followed Eadwine was
defeated and slain. The victory was turned to profit by the ambition
of Penda, while Northumbria was torn with he strife which followed
Eadwine' s fall. To complete his dominion over Mid-Britain, Penda
marched against East Anglia. The East Engle had returned to
heathendom from the oddly mingled religion of their first Christian
king, Raedvvald ; but the new faith was brought back by the present
king, Sigeberht. Before the threat of Penda's attack Sigeberht left
his throne for a monastery, but his people dra^Tged him again from his
cell on the news of Penda's invasion in 634, ii faith that his presence
would bring them the favour of Heaven. The monk-king was set in
the forefront of the battle, but he would bear no weapon save a wand,
and his fall was follower' by the rout of his army and the submission
of his kingdom. Mean .vhile Cadwallon remained harrying in the heart
of Deira, and made himself master even of York. But the triumph of
the Britons was as brief as it was strange. Oswald, a second son of
/Ethelfnth, pi.xced himself at the head of his race, and a small North-
umbrian force gathered in 635 under their new king near the Roman
Wall. Oswald set up a cross of wood as his standard, holding it with
his own hands till the hollow in which it was fixed was filled in by his
soldiers ; then throwing himself on his knees, he cried to his host to

[chap.

began with
^ed to serve
ristiaii altar
kings of the
; Bishop of
ying, " Give
the bishop's
,vas checked
ito a sudden
er Eadwine
but its king,
inning back
own rule the
eicester, the
been strong
is along the
se provinces
fter Penda's
lerally taken
IS as yet no
the English
boldly broke
himself with
The armies
adwine was
the ambition
ich followed
•itain, Penda
returned to
St Christian
the present
ligeberht left
ain from his
his presence
was set in
ave a wand,
submission
in the heart
triumph of
ond son of
Imall North-
the Roman
ding it with
d in by his
his host to

I.]

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

pray to the living God. Cadwallon, the last great hero of the British
race, fell fighting on the " Heaven's Field," as after times called the
field of battle, and for seven years the power of Oswald equalled that
of iCthelfrith and Eadwine.

It was not the Church of Paulinus which nerved Oswald to this
struggle for the Cross. Paulinus had fled from Northumbria at
Eadwine's fall ; and the Roman Church in Kent shrank into inactivity
before the heathen reartion. Its place in the conversion of England
was taken by misbionaries from Ireland. To understand, however, the
true meaning of the change, we must remember that before the landing
of the English in Britain, the Christian Church comprised every country,
save Germany, in Western Europe, as far as Ireland itself. The con-
quest of Britain by the pagan English thrust a wedge of heathendom
into the heart of this great communion and broke it into two unequal
parts. On the one side lay Italy, Spain, and Gaul, whose Churches
owned obedience to the S'^e of Rome, on the other the Church of
Ireland. But the condition of the two portions of Western Christen-
dom was very different. While the vigour of Christianity in Italy and
Gaul and Spain was exhausted in a bare struggle for life, Ireland,
which remained unscourged by invaders, drew from its conversion an
energy such as it has never known since. Christianity had been
received there with a burst of popular enthusiasm, and letters and arts
sprang up rapidly in its train. The science and Biblical knowledge
which fled from the Continent took refuge in famous schools which
made Uurrow and Armagh the universities of the West. The ntw
Christian life soon beat too strongly to brook confinement within the
bounds of Ireland itself. Patrick, the first missionary of the island,
had not been half a century dead when Irish Christianity flung itself
with a fiery zeal into battle with the mass of heathenism which was
rolling in upon the Christian world. Irish missionaries laboured among
the Picts of the Highlands and among the Frisians of the northern
seas. An Irish missionary, Columban, founded monasteries in Bur-
gundy and the Apennines. The canton of St. Gall still commemorates
in its name another Irish missionary before whom the spirits of flood
and fell fled wailing over the waters of the Lake of Constance. For a
time it seemed as if the course of the world' s history was to be changed,
as if the older Celtic race that Roman and German had swept before
them had turned to the moral conquest of their conquerors, as if Celtic
and not Latm Christianity was to mould the destinies of i.ie Churches
of the West.

On a low island of barren gneiss-rock oiTtlie west coast of Scotland
an Irish refugee, Columba, had raised the famous monastery of lona.
Oswald in youth found refuge within its walls, and on his accession to
the throne of Northumbria he called for missionaries from among its
monks. The first despatched in answer to his call obtained little

Sec. III.

The
North-
umbrian
Kingdom

588

685

The

Irish

Church

Osivald

634-642

HISTORY OK THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAr,

Sec. hi.

The

North-
umbrian
Kingdom

588

685

Penda

626-655

success. He declared on his return that among a people so stubborn
and barbarous success was impossible. " Was it their stubbornness
or your severity ? " asked Aidan, a brother sitting by ; " did you forget
God's word to give them the milk first and then the meat ?'' All eyes
turned on the speaker as fittest to undertake the abandoned mission,
and Aidan sailing at ♦^heir bidding fixed his bishop's stool or see in
tlr^; island-peninsula of Lindisfarne. Thence, from a monastery
which gave to the spot its after name of Holy Island, preachers
poured forth over the heathen realms. Boisil guided a little troop
of missionaries to the valley of the Tweed. Aidan himself wandered on
foot preaching among the peasants of Bernicia. The new religion
served as a prelude to the Northumbrian advance. If Oswald was a
saint, he was none the less resolved to build up again the realm of
Eadwine. Having extended his supremacy over the IJritons of Strath-
clyde and won the submission of the Lindiswaras, he turned to reassert
his supremacy over Wessex. The reception of the new faith became
the mark of submission to his overlordship. A preacher, Birinus, had
already penetrated from Gaul into Wessex ; in Oswal'"s presence its
king received baptism, and established with his assent a see for his
people in the royal city of Dorchester on the Thames. Oswald ruled
as wide a realm as hib predecessor ; but for after times the memory of
his greatness was lost in the legends of hie piety. A new conception of
kingship began to blend itself with that of the warlike glory of i4i!thel-
frith or the wise administration of Eadwine. The moral power which
was to reach its height in vElfred first dawns in the story of Oswald.
In his own court the king acted as interpreter to the Irish missionaries
in their efforts to convert his thegns. *' By reason of his constant
habit of praying or giving thanks to the Lord he was wont wherever
he sat to hold his hands upturned on his knees." As he feasted with
Bishop Aidan by his side, the thegn, or noble of his war-band, whom
he had set to give alms to the poor at his gate, told him of a multitude
that still waited fasting without. The king at once bade the untasted
meat before him be carried to the poor and his silver dish be divided
piecemeal among them. Aidan seized the royal hand and blessed it.
" May this hand," he cried, "never grow old."

Prisoned, however, as it was by the conversion of Wessex to the
central districts of England, heathendom fought desperately for life.
Pcnda was still its rallying-point ; but if his long reign was one
continuous battle with the new religion, it was in fact rather a struggle
against the supremacy of Northumbria than against the supremacy of
the Cross. East Anglia became at last the field of contest between the
two powers. In 642 Oswald marched to deliver it from Penda ; but in a
battle called the battle of the Maserfeld he v/as overthrown and slain.
His body was mutilated and his limbs set on stakes by the brutal con-
queror ; but legend told that when all else of Oswald had perished, the

[CHAr.

5 so stubborn
stubbornness
id you forget
;?" All eyes
)ned mission,
ool or see in
a monastery
id, preachers
a little troop
f wandered on
new religion
Oswald was a
the realm of
tons of Strath-
led to reassert
r faith became
r, Birinus, had
's presence its
t a see for his
Oswald ruled
the memory of
,v conception of
rlory of ^Ethel-
il power which
)ry of Oswald,
ih missionaries
f his constant
,vont wherever
le feasted with
r-band, whom
of a multitude
e the untasted
jish be divided
nd blessed it.

/^essex to the
^ately for life,
lign was one
lier a struggle
I supremacy of
k between the
Inda ; but in a
Iwn and slain,
le brutal con-
I perished, the

I.]

TIIK ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

"white hand" that Aidan had blessed still remained white and un-
corrupted. Tor a few years after his victory at the Maserfeld Pcnda
stood supreme in Britain. Wcssex owned his ovcrlordship as it had
owned that of Oswald, and its king threw off the Christian faith and
married Penda's sister. Even L^eira seems to have bowed to him,
and Bernicia alone refused to yield. V^ar by year Pcnda carried his
ravages over the north ; once he reached even the royal city, the im-
pregnable rock-fortress of Bamborough. Dcspaiiingof success in an
assault, he pulled down the cottages around, and, piling their wood
against its walls, fired the mass in a fiir wind that drove the flames
on the town. " See, Lord, what ill Penda is doing," cried Aidan from
his hermit cell in the islet of Fame, as he saw the smoke drifting over
the city ; and a change of wind — so rnn the legend of Norlhumbria's
agony — drove back at the words the flames on those who kindled them.
But in spite of Penda's victories, the faith which he had so often struck
down revived everywhere around him. Burnt and harried as it was,
Bernicia still cl.mg to the Cross. The East-Saxons again became
Christian. Penda's own son, whom he had set over the Middle-Eng-
lish, received brptism and teachers from Lindisfarne. The mission-
aries of the new faith appeared fearlessly among the Mercians them-
selves, and Penda gave no hindrance. Heathen to the last, he stood by
unheeding if any were willing to hear ; hating rmd scorning with a
certain grand sincerity of nature " those whom he saw not doing the
works of the faith they had received," But the track of Northumbrian
missionaries along the eastern coast marked the growth of Northum-
brian overlordship, and the old man roused himself for a last stroke
at his foes. On the death of Oswald Oswiu had been called to fill
his throne, and in 655 he met the pagan host near the river Winwaed.
It was in vain that the Northumbrians had sought to avert Penda's
attack by offers of ornaments and costly gifts. " Since the pagans
will not take our gifts," Oswiu cried at last, " let us offer them to One
that will ; " and he vowed that if successful he would dedicate his
daughter to God and endow twelve monasteries in his realm. Victory
at last declared for the faith of Christ. The river over which the
Mercians fled was swollen with a great rain ; it swept away the frag-
ments of the heathen host, Penda himself was slain, and the cause of
the older gods v/as lost for ever.

The terrible struggle was followed by a season of peace. For four
years after the battle of Winwa.^d Mercia was subject to Oswiu's
overlordship. But in 659 a general rising of the people threw off the
Northumbrian yoke. The heathendom of Mercia however was dead
with Penda. " Being thus freed," Ba?da tells us, " the Mercians with
their king rejoiced to serve the true King, Christ." Its three provinces,
the earlier Mercia, the Middle-English, and the Lindiswaras, were
united in the bishopric of Ceadda, the St. Chad to whom the Mercian

Sec. III.

The

North-
umbrian
Kingdom

588

685

652

655

Os^riu

642-670

« '•

■i

! "

Sec. III.
The

NOI-TH-
t'MDKIAN

Kingdom
588

685

651

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

see of Lichfield still looks as its founder. Ceadda was a monk of
Lindisfarne, so simple and lowly in temper that he travelled on foot
on his long mission journeys, till Archbishop Theodore in later days
with his own hands lifted him on horseback. The poetry of Christian
enthusiasm breaks out in his death- legend, as it tells us how voices of
singers singing sweetly descended f'om Heaven to the little cell beside
St. Mary's church where the bishop iay dying. Then "the same song
ascended from the roof again, and returned heavenward by the way
that it came." It was the soul of his brother, the missionary Cedd,
come with a choir of angels to solace the last hours of Ceadda. In
Northumbria the work of his fellow missionaries has almost been lost
in the glory of Cuthbert. No story better lights up for us the new
religious life of the time than the story of this apostle of the Lowlands.
It carries us at its outset into the northernmost part of Northumbria,
the country of the Teviot and the Tweed. Born on the southern edge
of the Lammermoor, Cuthbert found shelter at eight years old in a
widow's house in the little village of Wrangholm. Already in youth
there was a poetic sensibility beneath the robust fiame of the boy
which caught even in the chance word of a game a call to higher
things. Later on, a traveller coming in his white mantle over the hill-
side and stopping his horse to tend Cuthbert's in'ured knee seemed to
him an angel. The boy's shepherd life carried him to the bleak
upland, still famous as a sheep-walk, though the scant herbage scarce
veils the whinstone rock, and there meteors plunging into the night
became to him a company of angelic spirits, carrying the soul of
Bishop Aidan heavenward. Slowly Cuthbert's longings settled into a
resolute will towards a religious life, and he made his way at last to a
group of log-shanties in the midst of an untilled solitude where a few
Irish monks from Lindisfarne had settled in the mission-station of
Melrose. To-day the land is a land of poetry and romance. Cheviot
and Lammermoor, Ettrick and Teviotdale, Yarrow and .Annan-water,
are musical with old ballads and border minstrelsy. Agriculture has
chosen its valleys for her favourite seat, and drainage and steam-power
have turned sedgy marshes into farm and meadow. But to see the
Lowlands as they were in Cuthbert's day we must sweep meadow and
farm away again, and replace them by vast solitudes, dotted here and
there with clusters of woe Jen hovels, and crossed by boggy tracks over
whiv':h travellers rode spear in hand and eye kept cautiously about
them. The Northumbrian peasantry among whom he journeyed were
for ';he most part Christians only in nanie. With Teutonic indiffer-
ence they had yielded to their thegns in nominally accepting the new
Christianity, as these had yielded to the king. But they retained their
old superstitions side by side with the new worship ; plague or mishap
drove them back to a reliance on their heathen charms and amulets ;
and if trouble befell the Christian preachers who came settling among

[chap.

1.]

THE ENGLISH KIHGDOMS.

,vas a monk of
ravelled on foot
e in later days
try of Christian
IS how voices of
little cell beside
" the same song
/ard by the way
lissionary Cedd,
of Ceadda. In
almost been lost
for us the new
of the Lowlands.
3f Northumbria,
tie southern edge
t years old in a
\lready in youth
ame of the boy
a call to higher
itle over the hill-
l knee seemed to
lim to the bleak
It herbage scarce
g into the night
(Ting the soul of
:igs settled into a
5 way at last to a
ude where a few
ission-station of
nance. Cheviot
d Annan-water,
Agriculture has
,nd steam-power
But to see the
;ep meadow and
dotted here and
igojy tracks over
autiously about
journeyed were
utonic indiffer-
.cepting the new
;y retained their
.ague or mishap
s and amulets ;
settling among

them they took i*^ as proof of the wrath of the older gods. When
some log-rafts which were floating down the Tyne for the construction
of an abbey at its mouth drifted with the monks who were at work on
them out to sea, the rustic bystanders shouted, " Let nobody pray for
them ; let noboJy pity these men, who have taken away from us our
old worship ; and how their new-fangled customs are to be kept nobody
knows." On foot, on horseback, Cuthbert wandered among listeners
such as these, choosing above all the remoter mountain villages from
whose roughness and poverty other teachers turned aside. Unlike his
Irish comrades, he needed no interpreter as he passed from village to
village; the frugal, long-headed Northumbrians listened willingly to
one who was himself a peasani^ of the Lowlands, and who had caught
the rough Norfnumbrian burr along the banks of the Tweed. His
patience, h's humorous good sense, the sweetness of his look, told for
him, and not less the stout vigorous frame which fitted the peasant-
preachei' for tu'i hard life he had chosen. " Never did man die of
hunger who served God faithfully," he would say, when nightfall found
them supperless in ihe waste. " Look at the eagle overhead ! God
can feed us through him 'f He will" — and once at least he owed his meal
to a fish that the icared oird lei; fall. A snow-storm drove his boat on
the coast of Fife. "The snow closes the road along the shore,"
mourned his comrades ; "the storm bars our way over sea." "There
is still the way of He^-'-en that Mes open," said Cuthbert.

While missiouaiies were thus labouring among its peasantry,
Northumbria saw the rise of a number of monasteries, not bound
indeed by the strict ties of th Benedictine rule, but gathered on the
loose^eltic model of the fan or the clan round some noble and
wealthy person who sought d. ttional retirement. The most notable
and wealthy of these houses \\as that of Streoneshealh, where Hild, a
woman of royal race, reared ^' r abbey on the summit of the dark cliffs
of WhitbV; looking out over ttit Northern Sea. Her counsel was sought
even by nobles and kings : \vA the double monastery over which she
ruled became a seminary o jishops and priests. The sainted John of
Beverley was among her srhoiars. But the name which really throws
glory over Whitby is the nann of a lay-brother from whose lips flowed
the first great English song, ."hough well advanced in years, Caedmon
had learnt nothing of the art of verse, the alliterative jingle so common
among his fellows, "wherefore being sometimes at feasts, when all
agreed for glee's sake to sing i turn, he no sooner saw the harp come
towards him than he rose from the board and turned homewards.
C nee when he had done thus, and gone from the feast to the stable
where he had that night charge of the cattle, there appeared to him in
his sleep One who said, greeting him by name, ' Sing, Caedmon, some
.song to Me.' ' I cannot sing,' he answered ; 'for this cause left I the
feast and came hither,' He who talked with him answered, ' However

Sec. III.
The

NORTH-
IMBRIAN

Kingdom
588

685

Ceedmon

Before 68o

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap

Sec. III.

The

North-
umbrian
Kingdom

588

685

English
Songr

that be, you shall sing to Me.' ' What shall I sing ? ' rejoined C?^dmon.
'The beginning of created things/ replied He. In the morning the
cowherd stood before Ilild and told his dream. Abbess and brethren
alike concluded ' that heavenly grace had been conferred on him by
the Lord.' They translated for Caedmon a passage in Holy Writ,
* bidding him, if he could, put the same into verse.' The next morning
he gave it them composed in excellent verse, whereon the abbess,
understanding the divine grace in the man, bade him quit the secular
habit and take on him the monastic life." Piece by piece the sacred
story was thus thrown into Caedmon's poem. " He sang of the creation
of the world, of the origin of man, and of all the history of Israel ; of
their departure from Egypt and entering into the Promised Land ; of
the incarnation, passion, and resurrection of Christ, and of his ascen-
sion ; of the terror of future judgment, the horror of hell-pangs, and
the joys of heaven."

To men of that day this sudden burst of song seemed a thing
necessarily divine. " Others after him strove to compose religious
poems, but none could vie with him, for he learned the art of poetry not
from men nor of men, but from God." It was not indeed that any
change had been wrought by Caedmon in the outer form of English
song. The collection of poems which is connected with his name has
come down to us in a later West-Saxon version, and though modern
criticism is still in doubt as to their autl'orship, they are certainly the
work of various hands. The verse, wbethe; of Caedmon or of other
singers, is accented and alliterative, without conscious art or develop-
ment or the delight that springs from reflection, a verse swift and
direct, but leaving behind it a sense of strength rather than of
beauty, obscured too by harsh metaphors and involved construc-
tion. But it is eminently the verse of warriors, the brief passionate
expression of brief passionate emotions. Image after image, phrase
after phrase, in these early poems, start out vivid, harsh aiid em-
phatic. The very metre is rough with a sort of self-violence and
repression ; the verses fall like sword-strokes in the thick of battle.
The love of natural description, the background of melancholy which
gives its pathos to English verse, the poet only shared with earlier
singers. But the faith of Christ brought in, as we have seen, new
realms of fancy. The legends of the heavenly light, Baeda's story of
"The Sparrow," show the side of English temperament to which
Christianity appealed — its sense of the vague, vast mystery of the
world and of man, its dreamy revolt against the narrow bounds of
experience and life. It was this new poetic world which combined
with the old in the so-called epic of Csedmon. In its various poems
the vagueness and daring of the Teutonic imagination pass beyond
the limits of the Hebrew story to a " swart hell without light and full
of flame," swept only at dawn by the icy east wind, on whose floor lie

[CHAr.

led Cc^dmon.
morning the
and brethren
;d on him by 'c
I Holy Writ,
next morning |
1 the abbess, '
it the secular ,
ce the sacred
Df the creation
of Israel; of
sed Land ; of
1 of his ascen-
lell-pangs, and

;emed a thing
ipose religious
rt of poetry not
deed that any
rm of English
h his name has
;hough modern
:e certainly the
on or of other
art or develop-
erse swift and
ather than of
[ived construc-
ief passionate
image, phrase
arsh aiid em-
[f-violence and
ick of battle,
.ncholy which
with earlier
,ve seen, new
aeda's story of
lent to which
.ystery of the
low bounds of
ch combined
prions poems
pass beyond
light and full
hose tloor lie

THE ENGLISH KINODOMS.

bound the apostate angels. The human energy of the German race,
its sense of the might of individual manhood, transformed in English
verse the Hebrew Tempter into a rebel Satan, disdainful of vassalage
to God. " I may be a God as He," Satan cries amidst his torments.
"Evil it seems to me to cringe to Him for any good." Even in this
terrible outburst of the fallen spirit, we catch the new pathetic note
which the Northern melancholy was to give to our poetry. "This is
to me the chief of sorrow, that Adam, wrought of efirth, should hold
my strong seat — should dwell in joy while we endure this torment.
Oh, that for one winter hour I had power with my hands, then with
this host would I — but around me lie the iron bonds, and this chain
galls me." On the other hand the enthusiasm for the Christian God,
faith in whom had been bought so dearly by years of desperate
struggle, breaks out in long rolls of sonorous epithets of praise and
adoration. The temper of the poets brings them near to the earlier
fire and passion of the Hebrew, as the events of their time brough'.
them near to the old Bible history with its fights and wanderings.
" The wolves sing thrJr Hread evensong ; the fowls of war, greedy of
battle, dewy-featherc i, ;< :eam around the host of Pharaoh," as wolf
howled and eagle screamed round the host of Penda. Everywhere
we mark the new grandeur, depth, and fervour of tone which the
German race was to give to the religion of the East.

But even before Caedmon had begun to sing, the Christian Church of
Northumbria was torn in two by a strife whose issue was decided in
the same abbey of Whitby where Caedmon dwelt. The labours of
Aidan, the victories of Oswald and Oswiu, seemed to have annexec
England to the Irish Church. The monks of Lindisfarne, or of the
new religious houses whose foundation followed that of Lindisfarne,
looked for their ecclesiastical tradition, not to Rome but to Ireland ;
and quoted for their guidance the instructions, not of Gregory, but of
Columba. Whatever claims of supremacy over the whole English
Church might be pressed by the see of Canterbury, the real metropo-
litan of the Church as it existed in the north of England was the Abbot
of lona. But Oswiu's queen brought with her from Kent the loyalty
of the Kentish church to the Roman see, and a Roman party at once
formed about her. Her efforts were seconded by those of two young
thegns whose love of Rome mounted to a passionate fanaticism. The
life of Wilfrid of York was a series of flights to Rome and returns to
England, of wonderful successes in pleading the right of Rome to the
obedience of the Church of Northumbria, and of as wonderful defeats.
Benedict Biscop worked towards the same end in a quieter fashion,
coming backwards and forwards across the sea with books and relics
and cunning masons and painters to rear a great church and monastery
at Wearmouth, whose brethren -iwned obedience to the Roman See.
In 652 they first set out for a visit to the imperial city ; and the elder,

Sec. III.

The

North-
umbrian
Kingdom

588

685

Synod of
Wbltby

3°

tnSTORV OF THE ENCILISH PEOPLE.

[CHAI*

Sec. III.
The

NORTH-
I'MURIAN

Kingdom
588

685

■ 'hi

Theodore

669-690

Benedict liiscop, soon rciurncd to preach ceaselessly against the Irish
usages. Me was followed by Wilfrid, whose energy soon brought the
quarrel to a head. The strife between the two parties rose so high at last
that Oswiu was prevailed upon to summon in 664 a great council at
Whitby, where the future ecclesiastical allegiance of England should
be decided. The points actually contested were trivial enough.
Colman, Aidan's successor at Holy Island, pleaded for the Irish
fashion of the tonsure, and for the Irish time of keeping Easter ;
Wilfrid pleaded for the Roman. The one disputant appealed to the
authority of Columba, the other to that of St. Peter. "You own,"
cried the king at last to Colman, " that Christ gave to Peter the keys
of the king lorn o." heaven — has He given such power to Columba ?"
The bishop could but answer " No." "Then will I rather obey the
porter of Heaven," said Oswiu, " lest when I reach its gates he who
has the keys in his keeping turn his back on me, and there be none to
open.'' The importance of Oswiu's judgment was never doubted at
Lindisfarne, where Colman, followed by the whole of the Irish-born
brethren and thirty of their English fellows, forsook the see of Aidan
and sailed away to lona. Trivial in fact as were the actual points of
difference which severed the Roman Church from the Irish, the question
to which communion Northumbria should belong was of immense
moment to the after fortunes of England. Had the Church of Aidan
finally won, the later ecclesiastical history of England would probably
have resembled that of Ireland. Devoid of that power of organization
which was the strength of the Roman Church, the Celtic Church in its
own Irish home took the clan system of the country as the basis of
Church government. Tribal quarrels and ecclesiastical controversies
became inextricably confounded ; and the clergy, robbed of all really
spiritual influence, contributed no element save that of disorder to the
state. Hundreds of wandering bishops, a vast religious authority
wielded by hereditary chieftains, the dissociation of piety from morality,
the absence of those larger and more humanizing influences which
contact with a wider world alone can gives this is the picture which
the Irish Church of later times presents to us. It was from such a
chaos as this that England was saved by Uie victory of Rome in the
Synod of Whitby.

The Church of England, as we know it to-day, is the work, so far as
its outer form is concerned, of a (jreek monk, I heodore of Tarsus,
whom Rome, after her victory at Whitby, despatched in 669 as Arch-
bishop of Canterbury, to secure England to her sway. Theodore's work
was determined in its main outlines by the previous history of the
English people. The conquest of the Continent had been wrought
either by races such as the Goths, who were already Christian, or by
heathens like the Franks, who bowed to the Christian faith of the
nations they conquered. To this oneness of religion between the

[CHAr.

: the Irish
•ought the
ligh at hist
council at
md should
i\ enough,
the Irish
[g Easter ;
lied to the
You own,"
or the keys
Jolumba ? "
ii obey the
itcs he who
be none to
doubted at
2 Irish-born
e of Aidan
lal points of
the question
of immense
ch of Aidan
lid probably
organization
lurch in its
le basis of
ontroversies
of all really
order to the
IS authority
)m morality,
nces which
ture which
rom such a
<ome ni the

rk, so far as
of Tarsus,
169 as Arch-
)dore's work
story of the
len wrought
(stian, or by
faith of the
letween the

i.l

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

German invaders of the Empire and their Roman subjects was owing
the preservation of all that survived of the Roman world. The Church
everywhere remained untouched. The Christian bishop became the
defender of the conquered Italian or Gaul against his Gothic and
Lombard conqueror, the mediator between the German and his sub-
jects, the one bulwark against barbaric violence and oppression. To
the barbarian on the other hand he was the representative of all that
was venerable in the past, the living record of law, of letters, and
of art. But in Britain priesthood and people had been extermi-
nated together. When Theodore came to organize the Church of
England, the very memory of the older Christian Church which existed
in Roman Britain had passed away. The first Christian missionaries,
strangers in a heathen land, attached themselves necessarily to the
courts of the kings, who were their first converts, and whose conversion
was generally followed by that of their people. The English bishops
were thus at first royal chaplains, and their diocese was naturally
nothing but the kingdom. The kingdom of Kent became the r^iocese
of Canterbury, and the kingdom of Northumbria the diocese of York.
In this way too realms which are all but forgotten are commemorated
in the limits of existing sees. That of Rochester represented till of
late an obscure kingdom of West Kent, and the frontier of the original
kingdom of Mercia might be recovered by following the map of the
ancient bishopric of Lichfield. Theodore's first work was to order
the dioceses ; his second was to add many new sees to the old ones,
and to group all of them round the one centre of Canterbury. All ties
between England and the Irish Church were roughly broken. Lindis-
farne sank into obscurity with the flight of Colman and his monks.
The new prelates, gathered in ;ynod after synod, acknowledged the
authority of their one primate. The organization of the episcopate
was followed during the next hundred years by the development of the
parish system. The loose system of the mission-station, the monastery
from which priest and bishop went forth on journey after journey to
preach and baptize, as Aidan went forth from Lindisf; rne or Cuthbert
from Melrose, naturally disappeared as the land became Christian.
The missionaries became settled ckrgy. The holding of the English
noble or landowner became the parish, and his chaplain the parish
priest, as the king's chaplain had become the bishop, and the kingdom
his diocese. A source of permanent endowment for the clergy was
found at a later time in the revival of the Jewish system of tithes, and
in the annual gift to Church purposes of a tenth of the produce cf the
soil ; while discipline within the Church itself was pros^ided for by an
elaborate code of sin and penance in which the principle of compen-
sation which lay at the root of Teutonic legislation, crept into the
relations between God and the soul.

In his work of organization, in his increase of bishoprics, in his

Sec. III.

The

North-

IMllKIAN
KlNCiUUM

588

685

IirSTORY OF THE ENCT-TSM PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. Ill
The

NORTH-
UMUKIAN
KiNCiUOM

588

685

Merda

under

Wnlfhere

659-675

arrangement of dioceses, and the way in which he grouped them round
the sec of Canterbury, in his national synods and ecclesiastical canons,
Theodore was unconsciously doing a political work. The old divisions
of kingdoms and tribes about him, divisions which had sprung for the
most part from mere accidents of the conquest, were fast breaking
down. The smaller states were by this time practically absorbed by
the three larger ones, and of these three Mercia and Wesscx had for a
time bowed to the overlordship of Northumbria. The tendency to
national unity which was to cha'acterizc the new England had thus
already declared itself; but the policy of Theodore clothed with a
sacred form and surrounded with divine sanctions a unity which as yet
rested on no basis but the sword. The single throne of the one
primate at Canterbury accustomed men's minds to the thought of a
single throne for their one temporrJ overlord at York, or, as in later
days, at Lichfield or at Winchester. The regular subordination of
priest to bishop, of bishop to primate, in the administration of the
Church, supplied a mould on which the civil organization of the state
quietly shaped itself. Above all, the councils gathered by Theodore
were the first of all national gatherings for general legislation. It was
at a much later time that the Wise Men of Wessex, or Northumbria, or
Mercia, learned to come together in the Witenagemot oi all England.
It was the ecclesiastical synods which by their example led the way to
our national parliament, as it was the canons enacted in such synods
which led the way to a national system of law. But if the movement
towards national unity was furthered by the centralizing tendencies of
the Church, it was as yet hindered by the upgrowth of a great rival
power to contest the supremacy with Northumbria. Mercia, as we
have seen, had recovered from the absolute subjection in which it was
left after Penda's fall by shaking off the supremacy of Oswiu, and by
choosing Wulfhere for its king. Wulfhere was a vigorous and active
ruler, and the peaceful reign of Oswiu left him free to build up again'
during the sixteen years of his rule the power which had been lost at
Penda's death. Penda's realm in Central Britain was quickly restored,
and Wulfhere's dominion extended even over the Severn and em-
braced the lower valley of the Wye. He had even more than his
father's success. After a great victory in 661 over the West-Saxons,
his ravages were carried into the heart of Wessex, and the valley of
the Thames opened to his army. To the eastward, the East-Saxons
and London came to own his supremacy ; while southward he pushed
across the river over Surrey. In the same year, 661, Sussex, perhaps
in dread of the West- Saxons, found protection in accepting Wulfhere's
overlordship, and its king was rewarded by a gift of two outlying
settlements of the Jutes, the Isle of Wight and the lands of the
Meon-wara along the Southampton Water, which we must suppose had
been reduced by Mercian arms. The Mercian supremacy which thus

[chap.

them round
cal canons,
Id divisions
ung for the
St breaking
bsorbed by
2\ had for a
tendency to
d had thus
thcd with a
vhich as yet
of the one
bought of a
r, as in later
rdination of
ation of the
of the state
Dy Theodore
;ion. It was
rthumbria, or
all England.
:d the way to
I such synods
movement
endencies of
a great rival
ercia, as we
which it was
wiu, and by
IS and active
Id up again
been lost at
;kly restored,
rn and em-
)rc than his
v^est-Saxons,
he valley of
lEast-Saxons
Id he pushed
sex, perhaps
_ Wulfhere's
^wo outlying
lands of the
[suppose had
which thus

i.l

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

reached from the H umber to the Channel and stretched westward to
the Wye was the main political fact in Britain when Theodore landed
on its shores. In fact, with the death of Oswiu in 670 all effort was
finally abandoned by Northumbria to crush the rival states in Central
or Southern Britain.

The industrial progress of the Mercian kingdom went hand in hand
with its military advance. The forests of its western border, the
marshes of its eastern coast, were being cleared and dramed by
monastic colonies, whose success shows the hold which Christianity
had now gained over its people. Heathenism indeed still held its
own in the western woodlands ; we may perhaps see Woden-worship-
ping miners at Alcestor in the tUnemons of ilie legend of Bishop Ecgwine
of Worcester, who drowned the preacher's voice with the din of their
hammers. But in spite of their hammers Ecgwine's preaching left
one lasting mark behind it. The bishop heard how a swineherd,
coming out from the forest depths on a sunny glade, saw forms which
were possibly those of theThree Fair Women of the old German mytho-
logy, seated round a mystic bush, and singing their unearthly song.
In his fancy the fair women transformed themselves into a vision of
the Mother of Christ ; and the silent glade soon became the site
of an abbey dedicated to her, and of a • )wn which sprang up under
its shelter — the Evesham which was to be hallowed in after time
by the fall of Earl Simon of Leicester. Wilder even than the western
woodland was the desolate fen-country on the eastern border of the
kingdom, stretching from the " Holland," the sunk, hollow land of
Lincolnshire, to the channel of the Ouse, a wilderness of shallow waters
and reedy islets wrapped in its own dark mist-veil and tenanted only
by flocks of screaming wiid-fowl. Here through the libp^'^lity of King
Wulfhere rose the abbey of Medeshamstead, our later . Thorough.
On its northern border a hermit, Botulf, founded a little house which
as ages went by beca ae our Botulf s town or Boston. The abbey
of Ely was founded in the same wild fen-couT.try by the Lady /Ethel-
thryth, the wife of King Ecgfrith, who in the year 670 succeeded Oswiu
on the throne of Northumbria. Here, too, Guthlac, a youth of the
royal race of Mercia, sought a refuge from the world in the solitude
of Crowland, and so great was the reverence he won, that only two
years had passed since his death when the stately abbey of Crowland
rose over his tomb. Earth was brought in boats to form a site ; the
buildings rested on oaken piles driven into the marsh, a stone church
replaced the hermit's cell, and the toil of the new brotherhood changed
the pools around them into fertile meadow-land.

But while Mercia was building up its dominion in Mid-Britain,
Northumbria was far from having sunk from its old renown either in
government or war, Ecgfrith had succeeded his father Oswiu in 670,
and made no effort to reverse his policy, or attempt to build up again

Sec. III.

The

North.
umiikian

KiNCUOM

588

685

Progrresa

of
Mercia

The Fall

of North.

umbria

IMAGE EVALUATION
TEST TARGET (MT-3)

1.0

I.I

1^128

u 114

t 110 12.0

25
2.2

IL25 i 1.4

Photographic

Sdoices
Corporation

33 WeST MAIN STREET

WEBSTER, N.Y. MSSO

(716) •72-4503

Sfc. III.

Thk
North-
umbrian
Kingdom

388

685

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

fCHAP.

655

670-675

a supremacy rver the states of southern Britain. His ambition turned
rather to conquests over the Briton than to victories over his fellow
Englishmen. The war between Briton and Englishman, which had
languished since the battle of Chester, had been revived some twenty
years before by an advance of the West-Saxons to the south-west.
Unable to save the possessions of Wessex in the Severn valley and
on the Cotswolds from the grasp of Penda, the West-Saxon king,
Cenwealh, seized the moment when Mercia was absorbed in the last
struggle of Penda against Northumbria to seek for compensation in
an attack on his Welsh neighbours. A victory at Bradford on the
Avon enabled him to overrun the country north of Mendip which had
till then been held by the Britons ; and a second campaign in 658,
which ended in a victory on the skirts of the great forest that covered
Somerset to the east, settled the West-Saxons as conquerors round
the sources of the Parret. It may have been the example of the West-
Saxons which spurred Ecgfrith to enlarge the bounds of his kingdom
by a series of attacks upon his British neighbours in the west. His
armies chased the Britons from southern Cumbria and made the
districts of Carlisle, the Lake country, and our Lancashire English
ground. His success in this quarter was quickly followed by fresh
gain in the north, where he pushed his conquests over the Scots
beyond Clydesdale, and subdued the Picts over the Firth of Forth, so
that their territory on the northern bank of the Forth was from this
time reckoned as Northumbrian ground. The monastery of Abercorn
on the shore of the Firth of Forth, in which a few years later a
Northumbrian bishop, Trumwine, fixed the seat of a new bishopric,
was a sign of the subjection of the Picts to the Northumbrian over-
lordship. Even when recalled from the wars to his southern border
by an attack of Wulfhere's in 675, the vigorous and warlike Ecgfrith
proved a different foe from the West-Saxon or the Jute, and the defeat
of the king of Mercia was so complete that he was glad to purchase
peace by giving up to his conqueror the province of the Lindiswaras
or Lincolnshire. A large part of the conquered country of the Lake
district was bestowed upon the see of Lindisfarne, which was at this
time filled by one whom we have seen before labouring as the Apostle
of the Lowlands. After years of mission labour at Melrose, Cuthbert
had quitted it for Holy Island, and preached among the moors of
Northumberland as he had preached beside the banks of the Tweed.
He remained there through the great secession which followed on the
Synod of Whitby, and became prior of the dwindled company of
brethren, now torn with endless disputes, against which his patience
and good humour struggled in vain. Worn out at last he fled to a
little island of basaltic rock, one of a group not far from Ida's fortress
of Bamborough, strewn for the most part with kelp and seaweed, the
home of the gull and the seal. In the midst of it rose his hut of rough

stor
straj

filltj
had
was
Brit(
fatalll
whici
Mercl
and tl
peacel
of Mil
frontii
Firth
of con
by a n
of Ire
the ne
which
and Co
stood u
though
"Pcrha
the figh
questioi
more a
had tun
that Ecj
on the {.
To Ci
soon laic
the old
peace,
who stoc
light mif
tower of
of sea, a
brethren
Psalmist
also been
hast give
of Cuthb<
the gloon
Columba

I.l

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS,

stones and turf, dug deep into the rock and roofed with logr and
straw.

The reverence for his sanctity dragged Cuthbert back in old age to
fill the vacant see of Lindisfarne. He entered Carlisle, which the king
had bestowed upon the bishopric, at a moment when all Northumbria
was waiting for news of a fresh campaign of Ecgfrith's against the
Britons in the north. The power of Northumbria was already however
fatally shaken. In the south, Mercia had in 679 renewed the attempt
which had been checked by Wulf here's defeat. His successor, the
Mercian king JEihelred, again seized the province of the Lindiswaras,
and the war he thus began with Northumbria was only ended by a
peace negotiated *hrough Archbishop Theodore, which left him master
of Middle England. Old troubles too revived on Ecgfrith's northern
frontier, where a rising of the Picts forced him once more to cross the
Firth of Forth, and march in the year 685 into their land. A sense
of coming ill weighed on Northumbria, and its dread was quickened
by a memory of the curses which had been pronounced by the bishops
of Ireland on the king, when his navy, setting oir. a year before from
the newly-conquered western coast, swept the Irish shores in a raid
which seemed like sacrilege to those who loved the home of Aidan
and Columba. As Cuthbert bent over a Roman fountain which still
stood unharmed amongst the ruins of Carlisle, the anxious bystanders
thought they caught words of ill-omen falling from the old man's lips.
" Perhaps," he seemed to murmur, " at this very hour the peril of
the fight is over and done." " Watch and pray," he said, when they
questioned him on the morrow ; " watch and pray." In a few days
more a solitary fugitive escaped from the slaughter told that the Picts
had turned desperately to bay as the English army entered Fife ; and
that Ecgfrith and the flower of his nobles lay, a ghastly ring of corpses,
on the far-ofif moorland of Nectansmere.

To Cuthbert the tidings were tidings of death. His bishopric was
soon laid Jiside,and two months after his return to his island-hermitage
the old man lay dying, murmuring to the last words of concord and
peace. A signal of his death had been agreed upon, and one of those
who stood by ran with a candle in each hand to a place whence the
light might be seen by a monk who was looking out from the watch-
tower of Lindisfarne. As the tiny gleam flashed over the dark reach
of sea, and the watchman hurried with his news into the church, the
brethren of Holy Island were singing, as it chanced, the words of the
Psalmist : " Thou hast cast us out and scattered us abroad ; Thou hast
also been displeased ; Thou hast shown thy people heavy things ; Thou
hast given us a drink of deadly wine." The chant was the dirge, not
of Cuthbert only, but of his Church and his people. Over both hung
the gloom of a seeming failure. Strangers who knew not lona and
Columba entered into the heritage of Aidan and Cuthbert. As the

D 2

Sec. III.

The

Hiiiifl

North- '*

nPH

I'MBKtAN

i^kl^H

Kingdom

i^^BwI^H

588

.iHiKi?M

685

^»t hW

^Bm ~^'\'

684

685

Deatb of
Cuthbert

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

The Three
Kingdoms

685

aas

Xne of
Wessex

6S&-726

Roman communion folded England again beneath her wing, men
forgot that a Church which passed utterly away had battled with Rome
for the spiritual headship of Western Christendom, and that through-
out the great struggle with the heathen reaction of Mid-Britain the
new religion had its centre not at Canterbury, but at Lindisfame. Nor
were men long to remember that from the days of ^Ethelfrith to the
days of Ecgfrith English politics had found their centre at York.
But forgotten or no, Northumbria had done its work. By its mission-
aries and by its sword it had won England from heathendom to the
Christian Church. It had given her a new poetic literature. Its
monasteries were already the seat of whatever intellectual life the
country possessed. Above all it had first gathered together into a
loose political unity the various tribes of the English people, and by
standing at their head for half a century had accustomed them to
a national life, out of which England, as we have it now, was to
spring.

Section IV.— The Three Kingdoms, 635— 8fl8.

[Authorities. — A few incidents of Mercian history are preserved among the
meagre annals of Wessex, which form, daring this period, '* The English
Chronicle." But for the most part we are thrown upon later writers, especi-
ally Henry of Huntingdon and William of Malmesbury, both authors of the
twelfth century, but having access to older materials now lost. The letters
of Boniface and those of Alcuin, which form the most valuable contem-
porary materials for this period, are given by Dr. Giles in his '* Patres Ecclesise
Anglicanae." They have also been carefully edited by Jaffe in his series of
"Monumenta Germanica."]

The supremacy of Northumbria over the English people had fallen
for ever with the death of Oswiu, and its power over the tribes of the
north was as completely broken by the death of Ecgfrith and the
defeat of Nectansmere. To the north, the flight of Bishop Trumwine
from Abercorn announced the revolt of the Picts from her rule. In
the south, Mercia proved a formidable rival under .^^thelred, who had
succeeded Wulfhere in 675. Already his kingdom reached from the
Humber to the Channel ; and iEthelred in the first years of his reign
had finally reduced Kent beneath his overlordship. All hope of national
union seemed indeed at an end, for the revival of the West-Saxon power
at this moment completed the parting of theland into three states of nearly
equal power out of which it seemed impossible that unity could come.
Since their overthrow At Faddiley, a hundred years before, the West-
Saxons had been weakened by anarchy and civil war, and had been at
the mercyjilike of the rival English states and of the Britons. We
have seen however th^t in 652 a revival of power had enabled them
to drive back the Britons to the Parret. A second interval of order

I.]

in 682

Briton

of the

their I

early 1

carriec

he fon

pushec

fertile

fortresi

Tauntc

trict wl

saetas, ^

fen tha

Ine est

monast

its Eng

chose t]

of the I

thither

Ine's al

of man

his owr

he com

his day

which t

Frome,

code, th

shows a

siasticai

repulse

how we)

years w

showed

graduall

became

lordship

Wessex

Able ho

hush the

tells the

had feasi

as he ro(

returned

with refu

I.]

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

alien
the
the
liwine
In
had
the
reign
ional
lower
early
ome.
■Vest-
en at
We
them
rder

in 682 strengthened King Centwine again to take up war with the
Britons, and push his frontier as far as the Quantocks. A third rally
of the West-Saxons in 685 under Ceadwalla enabled them to turn on
their English enemies and conquer Sussex. Ine, the greatest of their
early kings, whose reign covered the long period from 688 to 726,
carried on during the whole of it the war for supremacy. Eastward,
he forced Kent, Essex and London to own his rule. On the west, he
pushed his way southward round the marshes of the Parret to a more
fertile territory, and guarded the frontier of his new conquests by a
fortress on the banks of the Tone, which has grown into the present
Taunton. The West- Saxons thus became master^ of the whole dis-
trict which now bears the name of Somerset, the land of the Somer-
saetas, where the Tor rose like an island out of a waste of flood-drowned
fen that stretched westward to the Channel. At the base of this hill
Ine established on the site jf an older British foundation his famous
monastery of Glastonbury. The little hamlet in which it stood took
its English name from one of the English families, the Glaestings, who
chose the spot for their settlement ; but it had long been a religious shrine
of the Britons, and the tradition that a second Patrick rested there drew
thither the wandering scholars of Ireland. The first inhabitants of
Ine's abbey found, as they alleged, " an ancient church, built by no art
of man ; " and beside this relic of its older Welsh owners, Ine founded
his own abbey-church of stone. The spiritual charge of his conquests
he committed to his kinsman Ealdhelm, the mosi: famous scholar of
his day, who became the first bishop of the new see of Sherborne,
which the king formed out of the districts west of Selwood and the
Frome, to meet the needs of the new parts of his kingdom. Ine's
code, the earliest collection of West-Saxon laws which remains to us,
shows a wise solicitude to provide for the civil as well as the eccle-
siastical needs of the mixed population over which he now ruled. His
repulse of the Mercians, when they at last attacked Wessex, proved
how well he could provide for its defence. ^Ethelred's reign of thirty
years was one of almost unbroken peace, and his activity mainly
showed itself in the planting and endowment of monasteries, which
gradually changed the face of the realm. Ceolred however, who in 709
became king of Mercia, took up the strife with Wessex for the over-
lordship of the south, and in 715 he marched into the very heart of
Wessex ; but he was repulsed in a bloody encounter at Wanborough.
Able however as Ine was to hold Mercia at bay, he was unable to
hush the civil strife that was the curse of Wessex, and a wild legend
tells the story of the disgust which drove him from the world. He
had feasted royally at one of his country houses, and on the morrow,
as he rode from it, his queen bade him turn back thither. The king
returned to find his house stripped of curtains and vessels, and foul
with refuse and the dung of cattle^ while in the royal bed where he had

Sec. IV.

The Three
Kingdoms

685

838

694
710

715

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

II'he Three
Kingdoms

685

898

JBthel-
bald of
Mercia

716-757

Beeda

673-735

slept with iCthelburh rested a so^* with her farrow of pigs. The scene
had no need of the queen's comment : " See, my lord, how the fashion
of this world passeth away ! " In 726 Ine laid down his crown, and
sought peace and death in a pilgrimage to Rome.

The anarchy that had driven Ine from the throne broke out on his
departure in civil strife which left Wessex an easy prey to the suc-
cessor of Ceolred. Amon^ those who sought Guthlac's retirement at
Crowland came -^thelbald, a son of Penda's brother, flying from
Ceolred's hate. Driven off again and again by the kinj^'s pursuit,
/Ethelbald still returned to the little hut he had built beside the
hermitage, and comforted himself in hours of despair with his com-
panion's words. " Know how to wait," said Guthlac, " and tht kingdom
will come to thee ; not by violence or rapine, but by the hand of God."
In 716 Ceolred fell frenzy-smitten at his board, and Mercia chose
^thelbald for its king. For the first ten years of his reign he shrank
fromaconflict with the victor of Wanborough; but with Ine's withdrc*wal
he took up again the fierce struggle with Wessex for the complete
supremacy of the south. He penetrated into the very heart of the
West-Saxon kingdom, and his siege and capture of the royal town of
Somerton in 733 ended the war. For twenty years the overlordship
of Mercia was recognized by all Britain south of the Humber. It
was at the head of the forces, not of Mercia only, but of East Anglia
and Kent, as well as of the West-Saxons, that y^thelbald marched
against the Welsh ; and he styled himself '* King not of the Mercians
only, but of all the neighbouring peoples who are called by the common
name of Southern English." But the aim of -<^thelbald was destined
to the same failure as that of his predecessors. For twenty years
indeed he met the constant outbreaks of his new subjects with success ;
and it was not till 754 that a general rising forced him to call his whole
strength to the field.. At the head of his own Mercians and of the
subject hosts of Kent, Essex and East Anglia, ^thelbald marched to
the field of Burford, where the West-Saxons were again marshalled
under the golden dragon of their race : but after hours of desperate
fighting in the forefront of the battle, a sudden panic seized the Mercian
king, and the supremacy of Mid- Britain passed away for ever as he
fled first of his army from the field. Three years later he was surprised
and slain in a night attack by his ealdormen ; and in the anarchy that
followed, Kent, Essex, and East Anglia threw off the yoke of Mercia.

While the two southern kingdoms were wasting their energies in this
desperate struggle, Northumbria had set aside its efforts at conquest for
the pursuits of peace. Under the reigns of Ecgfrith's successors, Aldfrith
the Learned and the four kings who followed him, the kingdom became
in the middle of the eighth century the literary centre of Western Europe.
No schools were more famous than those of Jarrow and York. The
whole learning of the age seemed to be summed up in a Northumbrian

schola
born i;
passec
which
and hil
house
from J
he say
of the
writing
in its
The qi
pleasur
Englisl]
teacher
for inst
how am
Bseda o
works tl
study h
Wilfrid
Wearmc
lingered
pretatior
plishmei
Archbisl
skill in
whom F
little the
of the s(
"thefatl
culture w
Aristotle^
over him
-^neid b
on the tn
approach
" I am m
niy own 1
attest his
temporari
and homi
the writir
theology,
threw tos:

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

tess ;
Hiole
the
;dto
tiled
srate
tcian
Is he
rised
I that
rcia.
J this
it for
frith
iame
lope.
iThe
Irian

scholar. Bseda — the Venerable Bede, as later times styled him — was
born in 673, nine years after the Synod of Whitby, on ground which
passed a year later to Benedict Biscop as the site of the great abbey
which he reared by the mouth of the Wear. His youth was trained
and his long tranquil life was wholly spent in an off-shoot of Benedict's
house which was founded by his friend Ceolfrid. Bseda never stirred
from Jarrow. " I have spent my whole life in the same monastery,"
he says, " and while attentive to the rule of my order and the service
of the Church my constant pleasure lay in learning, or teaching, or
writing." The words sketch for us a scholar's life, the more touching
in its simplicity that it is the life of the first great English scholar.
The quiet grandeur of a life consecrated to knowledge, the tranquil
pleasure that lies in learning and teaching and writing, dawned for
Englishmen in the story of Baeda. While still youn^;, he became
teacher ; and six hundred monks, besides strangers that Hocked thither
for instruction, formed his school of Jarrow. It is hard to imagine
how among the toils of the schoolmaster and the duties of the monk
Baeda could have found time for the composition of the numerous
works that made his name famous in the west. But materials for
study had accumulated in Northumbria through the journeys of
Wilfrid and Benedict Biscop and the libraries which were forming at
Wearmouth and York. The tradition of the older Irish teachers still
lingered to direct the young scholar into that path of Scriptural inter-
pretation to which he chiefly owed his fame. Greek, a rare accom-
plishment in the west, came to him from .the school which the Greek
Archbishop Theodore founded beneath the walls of Canterbury. His
skill in the ecclesiastical chant was derived from a Roman cantor
whom Pope Vita Han sent in the train of Benedict Biscop. Little by
little the young scholar thus made himself master of the whole range
of the science of his time ; he became, as Burke rightly styled him,
" the father of English learning." The tradition of the older classic
culture was first revived for England in his quotations of Plato and
Aristotle, of Seneca and Cicero, of Lucretius and Ovid. Virgil cast
over him the same spell that he cast over Dante ; verses from the
iEneid break his narratives of martyrdoms, and the disciple ventures
on the track of the great master in a little eclogue descriptive of the
approach of spring. His work was done with small aid from others.
" I am my own secretary," he writes ; " I make my own notes. I am
my own librarian." But forty-hve works remained after his death to
attest his prodigious industry. In his own eyes and those of his con-
temporaries the most important among these were the commentaries
and homilies upon various books of the Bible which he had drawn from
the writings of the Fathers. But he was far from confining himself to
theology. In treatises compiled as text-books for his scholars Bseda
threw together all that the world had then accumulated in astronomy

Skc. IV.

TiiK Thrkb
Kingdoms

685

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sbc. IV.

The Three
Kingdoms

685

Death of
Baeda

and meteorology, in physics and music, in philosophy, grammar,
rhetoric, arithmetic, medicine. But the encyclopaedic character ot his
researches left him in heart a simple Englishman. He loved his own
English tongue ; he was skilled in English song ; his last work was
a translation into English of the Gospel of St. John, and almost
the last words that broke from his lips were some English rimes
upon death.

But the noblest proof of his love of England lies in the work whicn
immortalizes his name. In his " Ecclesiastical Histoiy of the Eng.' a
Nation " Baeda became the first English historian. All that we really
know of the century and a half that follows the landing of Augustine
we know from him. Wherever his own personal observation extended
the story is told with admirable detail and force. He is hardly less
full or accurate in the portions which he owed to his Kentish friends,
Albinus and Nothelm. What he owed to no informant was his own
exquisite faculty of story-telling, and yet no story of his own telling
is so touching as the story of his death. Two weeks before the Easter
of 735 the old man was seized with an extreme weakness and loss of
breath. He still preserved, however, his usual pleasantness and
good humour, and in spite of prolonged sleeplessness continued his
lectures to the pupils about him. Verses of his own English tongue
broke from time to time from the master's lips — rude rimes that told
how before the " need-fare," Death's stern " must-go," none can enough
bethink ^'»^ wha<- is to be his doom for good or ill. The tears of
Baeda's scholais mingled with his song. "We never read without
weeping," writes one of them. So the days rolled on to Ascension-
tide, and still master and pupils toiled at their work, for Baeda longed
to bring to an end his version of St. John's Gospel inl o the English
tongue, and his extracts from Bishop Isidore. " I don't want my boys
to read a lie," he answered those who would have had him rest, " or to
work to no purpose after I am gone." A few days before Ascension-
tide his sickness grew upon him, but he spent the whole day in
teaching, only saying cheerfully to his scholars, "Learn with what
speed you may ; I know not how long I may last." The dawn broke
on another sleepless night, and again the old man cLl^^d his scholars
round him and bade them write. " There is still a chapter wanting,"
said the scribe, as the morning drew on, " and it is hard for thee to
question thyself any longer." " It is easily done," said Baeda ; " take
thy pen and write quickly." Amid tears and farewells the day wore
away to eventide. " There is yet one sentence unwritten, dear master,"
said the boy. "Wri^e it quickly," bade the dying man. **It is
finished now," said the little scribe at last. " You speak truth," said
the master ; " all is finished now." Placed upon the pavement, his
head supported in his scholars' arms, his face turned to the spot
where he was wont to pray, Baeda chanted the solemn " Glory to

I.)

God."
away.
Firs
amon^
literat
round
In his
back,
in the
how vi
Northi
like £a
might
pelled
time he
he pen
Picts, v\
capital
seemed
wards, i
only flin
bishop t
is only :
was swe;
of its tu;
scourged
during fi
part of t]
The V
seemed
settled tl
now as fi
the Hum
Mercian
with thai
to a heig
had to p£
and it w;
Otford gj
less reco
and four
quest of
Buckingh
ventured
neighbou]

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

)oys
)rto
>ion-
in
^hat
roke
)Iars

ing,"

\e to

take

^ore
, it

God." As his voice reached the close of his song he passed quietly
away.

First among English scholars, first among English theologians, first
among English historians, it is in the monk of Jarrow that English
literature strikes its roots. In the six hundred scholars who gathered
round him for instruction he is the father of our national education.
In his physical treatises he is the first figure to which our science looks
back. Bseda was a statesman as well as a scholar, and the letter which
in the last year of his life he addressed to Ecgberht of York shows
how vigorously he proposed to battle against the growing anarchy of
Northumbria. But his plans of reform came too late, though a king
like Eadberht, with his brother Ecgberht, the first Archbishop of York,
might for a time revive the fading glories of his kingdom. Eadberht re-
pelled an attack of ^thelbald on his southern border ; while at the same
time he carried on a successful war against the Picts. Ten years later
he penetrated into Ayrshire, and finally made an alliance with the
Picts, which enabled him in 756 to conquer Strathclyde and take its
capital Alcluyd, or Dumbarton. But at the moment when his triumph
seemed complete, his army was utterly destroyed as it withdrew home-
wards, and so crushing was the calamity that even Eadberht could
only fling down his sceptre and withdraw with his brother the Arch-
bishop to a monastery. From this time the history of Northumbria
is only a wild story of lawlessness and bloodshed. King after king
was swept away by treason and revolt, the country fell into the hands
of its turbulent nobles, the very fields lay waste, and the land wua
scourged by famine and plague. Isolated from the rest of the country
during fifty years of anarchy, the northern realm hardly seemed to form
part of the English people.

The work in fact of national consolidation among the English
seemed to be fatally arrested. The battle of Burford had finally
settled the division of Britain into three equal powers. Wessex was
now as firmly planted south of the Thames as Northumbria north of
the Humber. But this crushing defeat was far from having broken the
Mercian power; and under Offa, whose reign from 758 to 796 covers
with that of iCthelbald nearly the whole of the eighth century, it rose
to a height unknown since the days of Wulfhere. Years however
had to pass before the new king could set about the recovery of Kent ;
and it was only after a war of three years that in 775 a victory at
Otford gave it back to the Mercian realm. With Kent Offa doubt-
less recovered Sussex and Surrey, as well as Essex and London ;
and four years later a victory at Bensington completed the con-
quest of the district that now forms the shires of Oxford and
Buckingham. For the nine years that followed however Mercia
ventured on no further attempt to extend her power over her English
neighbours. Like her rivals, she turned on the Welsh. Pushing

Sbc. IV.

The Thrbb
aincooms

ess

aas

AnareliT

of Nortfi-

umbrla

738

Offa of
Mercia

758-796

hl'i

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISF PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. IV.

Thk Thkkk
Kingdoms

68A

Ensland

ana the
Franks

after 779 over the Severn, whose upper course had served till now as
the frontier between Briton and Englishman, Offa drove the King of
Powys from his capital, which changed its old name of Pengwyrn
for the significant English title of the Town in the Scrub or bush,
Scrobsbyryg, or Shrewsbury. The border-line he drew after his
inroad is marked by a huge earthwork which runs from the mouth of
Wye to that of Dee, and is otill called Ofifa's Dyke. A settlement of
Englishmen on the land between this dyke and the Severn served as
a military frontier for the Mercian realm. Here, as in the later
conquests of the Northumbriars and the West-Saxons, the older plan
of driving off the conquered from the soil was definitely abandoned.
The Welsh who chose to remain dwelt undisturbed among their
English conquerors ; and it was probably to regulate the mutual rela-
tions of the two races that Offa drew up the code of laws which bore
his name. In Mercia as in Northumbria attacks on the Britons
marked the close of all dreams of supremacy over the English them-
selves. Under Offa Mercia sank into virtual isolation. The anarchy
into which Northumbria sank after Eadberht's death never tempted
him to cross the Humber ; nor was he shaken from his inaction by as
tempting an opportunity which presented itself across the Thames.
It must have been in tho years that followed the battle of Burford that
the West-Saxons made themselves masters of the shrunken realm of
Dyvnaint, which still retains its old name in the form of Devon,
and pushed their frontier westward to the Tamar. But in 786 their
progress was stayed by a fresh outbreak of anarchy. The strife
between the rivals that disputed the throne was ended by the
defeat of Ecgberht, the heir of Ceawlin's line, and his flight to
Ofifa's court. The Mercian king however used his presence not so
much for schemes of aggrandizement as '.o bring about a peaceful
alliance ; and in 789 Ecgberht was driven from Mercia, while Offa
wedded his daughter to the West- Saxon king Beorhtric. The true
aim of Offa indeed was to unite firmly the whole of Mid-Britain, with
Kent as its outlet towards Europe, under the Mercian crown, and to
mark its ecclesiastical as well as its political independence by the
formation in 787 of an archbishopric of Lichfield, as a check to the
see of Canterbury in the south, and a rival to the see of York in the
north.

But while Offa was hampered in his projects by the dread of the
West-Saxons at home, he was forced to watch jealously a power
which had risen to dangerous greatness over sea, the power of the
Franks. Till now, the interests of the English people had lain wholly
within the bounds of the Britain they had won. But at this moment
our national horizon suddenly widened, and the fortunes of England
became linked to the general fortunes of Western Christendom. It
was by the work of English missionaries that Britain was first drawn

[chap.

now as
ling of
igwyrn
r bush,
ter his
outh of
ment of
rved as
le later
ler plan
idoned.
g their
lal rela-
ch bore
Britons
1 them-
inarchy
lempted
>n by as
rhames.
brd that
realm of
Devon,
86 their
e strife
by the
ight to
not so
eaceful
le Ofifa
Ihe true
in, with
and to
I by the
to the
in the

of the

power

of the

wholly

loment

[ngland

drawn

TJfE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

into political relations with the Prankish court. The Northumbrian
Willibrord, and the more famous West-Saxon Boniface or Winfrith,
followed in the track of earlier preachers, both Irish and English, who
had been labouring among the heathens of Germany, and especially
among those who had now become subject to the Franks. The
Frank king Pippin's connexion with the English preachers led to
constant intercourse with England ; a Northumbrian scholar, Alcuin,
was the centre of the literary revival at his court. Pippin's son
Charles, known in after days as Charles the Great, maintained the
same interest in English affairs. His friendship with Alcuin drew
him into close relations with Northern Britain. Ecgberht, the
claimant of the West- Saxon throne, had found a refuge with him
since Offa's league with Beorhtric in 787. With Ofifa too his relations
seem to have been generally friendly. But the Mercian king shrank
cautiously from any connexion which might imply a recognition of
Frankish supremacy. He had indeed good grounds for caution. The
costly gifts sent by Charles to the monasteries of England as of
Ireland showed his will to obtain an influence in both countries ; he
maintained relations with Northumbria, with Kent, with the whole
English Church. Above all, he harboured at his court exiles from
every English realm, exiled kings from Northumbria, East-Anglian
thegns, fugitives from Mercia itself ; and Ecgberht probably marched
in his train when the shouts of the people and priesthood of Rome
hailed him as Roman Emperor. ^Vhen the deatn of Beorhtric in 802
opened a way for the exile's return to Wesscx, the relations of Charles
with the English were still guided by the dream that Britain, lost to
the Empire at the hour > hen the rest of the western provinces were
lost, should return to the Empire now that Rome had risen again to
more than its old greatness in the west ; and the revolutions which
were distracting the English kingdoms told steadily in his favour.

The years since Ecgberht's flight had made little change in the state
of Britain. Ofifa's completion of his kingdom by thf: seizure of East
Anglia had been followed by his death in 796 ; and under his suc-
cessor Cenwulf the Mercian archbishopric was suppressed, and there
was no attempt to carry further the supremacy of the Midland king-
dom. Cenwulf stood silently by when Ecgberht mounted the West-
Saxon throne, and maintained peace with the new ruler of Wessex
throughout his reign. The first enterprise of Ecgberht indeed was not
directed against his English but his Welsh neighbours. In 815 he
marched into the heart of Cornwall, and after eight years of fighting,
the last fragment of British dominion in the west came to an end. As
a nation Britain had passed away with the victories of Deorham and
Chester ; of the separate British peoples who had still carried on
the struggle with the three English kingdoms, the Britons of Cumbria
and of Strathclyde had already bowed to Northumbrian rule ; the

Skc. IV.

Tiiic Thkimc '■
Kingdoms

«8S

aas

«^ *4

800

The Fall
of Mercia

802

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sbc. IV.
Thk Thrh

KlNCI}OMI

6«a

The
North
men

Britons of Wales had owned by tribute to Offa the supremacy of
Mercia ; the last unconquered British state of West Wales as far as
the Land's End now passed under the mastery of Wessex.

While Wessex was regaining the strength it had so long lost, its
rival in Mid-Britain was sinking into helpless anarchy. Within, Mercia
was torn by a civil war which broke out on Cenwulfs death in 821 ;
and the weakness which this left behind was seen when the old strife
with Wessex was renewed by his successor Beornwulf, who in 825
penetrated into Wiltshire, and was defeated in a bloody battle at
EUandun. All England south of the Thames at once submitted to
Ecgberht of Wessex, and East Anglia rose in a desperate revolt which
proved fatal to its Mercian rulers. Two of its kings in succession fell
fighting on East-Anglian soil ; and a third, Wiglaf, had hardly mounted
the Mercian throne when his exhausted kingdom was called on again
to encounter the West-Saxon. Ecgberht saw that the hour had come
for a decisive onset. In 828 his army marched northward without a
struggle ; Wiglaf fled helplessly before it ; and Mercia bowed to the
West-Saxon overlordship. From Mercia Ecgberht marched on North-
umbria ; but half a century of anarchy had robbed that kingdom of all
vigour, and pirates were already harrying its coast ; its nobles met him
at Dore in Derbyshire, and owned him as their overlord. The work
that Oswiu and /Ethelbald had failed to do was done, and the whole
English race in Britain was for the first time knit together under a
single ruler. Long and bitter as the struggle for independence was
still to be in Mercia and in the north, yet from the moment that
Northumbria bowed to its West- Saxon overlord, England was made
in fact if not as yet in name.

Section v.- Weasex and the Danesj 80fl— 880.

[Authorities. — Our history here rests mainly on the English (or Anglo-Saxon)
Chronicle. The earlier part of this is a compilation, and consists of (l) Annals
of the conquest of South Britain, (2) Short notices of the kings and bishops of
Wessex, expanded into larger form by copious insertions from Baeda, and after
his death by briefer additions from some northern sources. (3) It is probable
that these materials were thrown together, and perhaps translated from Latin
into English, in illfred's time, as a preface to the far fuller annals which begin
with the reign of i^thelwulf, and widen into a great contemporary history when
they reach that of i9£lfred himself. Of their character and import as a part of
English literature, I have spoken in the text. The • ' Life of i^lfred " which
bears the name of Asser is probably contemporary, or at any rate founded on
contemporary authority. There is an admirable modern life of the king by
Dr. Pauli. For the Danish wars, see "The Conquest of England" by J R.
Green.]

The effort after a national sovereignty had hardly been begun, when
the Dane struck down the short-lived greatness of Wessex. While
Britain was passing through her ages of conquest and settlement, the

^hile
the

led on
Ingby

J R- i

rhen

Sec. IV.

The Three
Kingdoms

685

.f K

The
North
men

iti

Briti
Meij
the>

riv^

wa:

wit]

pen

EUi

pro

figl;

the

to«

for

stri

un:

vij

thj

sii

sti

hi
tl
in

E
b
c
I

J6S

41 S

•SI

J g1

.1 I

"** 'St S

^1!

it I

£ri

O
>0

1 t)

4 =

r-^^rWk

(

vr.

Xlv

'WO

i>'

4 ^W

dwellers
lain hiddl
stem clii
over seal
closed, tl
Ecgberhtl
kings or *|
ing off tl
they crep|
is as if tl
years,
pirate fle^
Cerdic.
invaders
river islets
of men, w
or sold in
Britain,
of Wodei
these nort
burst of tl
unchanged
quietly int
without a s
two invasic
ent races,
between Ei
was in the
their religi
kinsmen b
the barbari
was the fi{
men of on(
of the nor
complete.

Britain 1
northmen
Orkneys, a
kinsmen wl
of Frisia a
Britain lay
close of E(
attacks wei
After havir
Thames tc

I.]

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

dwellers in the Scandinavian peninsula and the isles of the Baltic had
lain hidden from Christendom, waging their battle for existence with a
stem climate, a barren soil, and stormy seas. Forays and plunder-raids
over sea eked out their scanty livelihood, and as the eighth century
closed, these raids found a wider sphere than the waters of the north.
Ecgberht had not yet brought all Britain under his sway when the Wi-
kings or " creek-men," as the adventurers were called, were seen hover-
ing ofif the English coast, and growing in numbers and hardihood as
they crept southward to the Thames. The first sight of the northmen
is as if the hand on the dial of history had gone back three hundred
years. The Norwegian fiords, the Frisian sandbzmks, poured forth
pirate fleets such as had swept the seas in the days of Hengest and
Cerdic. There was the same wild panic as the black boats of the
invaders struck inland along the river-reaches, or moored around the
river islets, the same sights of horror, firing of homesteads, slaughter
of men, women driven off to slavery or shame, children tossed on pikes
or sold in the market-place, as when the English invaders attacked
Britain. Christian priests were again slain at the altar by worshippers
of Woden ; letters, arts, religion, government disappeared before
these northmen as before the northmen of old. But when the wild
burst of the storm was over, land, people, government reappeared
unchanged. England still remained England ; the conquerors sank
quietly into the mass of those around them ; and Woden yielded
without a struggle to Christ. The secret of this difference between the
two invasions was that the battle was no longer between men of differ-
ent races. It was no longer a fight between Briton and German,
between Englishman and Welshman. The life of these northern folk
was in the main the life of the earlier Englishmen. Their customs,
their religion, their social order were the same ; they were in fact
kinsmen bringing back to an England that had forgotten its origins
the barbaric England of its pirate forefathers. Nowhere over Europe
was the fight so fierce, because nowhere else were the combatants
men of one blood and one speech. But just for this reason the fusion
of the northmen with their foes was nowhere so peaceful and so
complete.

Britain had to meet a double attack from its new assailants. The
northmen of Norway had struck westward to the Shetlands and
Orkneys, and passed thence by the Hebrides to Ireland ; while their
kinsmen who now dwelt in the old Engle-land steered along the coasts
of Frisia and Gaul. Shut in between the two lines of their advance,
Britain lay in the very centre of their field of operations ; and at the
close of Ecgberht's reign, when the decisive struggle first began, their
attacks were directed to the two extremities of the West- Saxon realm.
After having harried East Anglia and slain in Kent, they swept up the
Thames to the plunder of London ; while the pirates in the Irish

Sec. v.
Wessbx

AND THK

Danes

8oa

880

iBX

THE
ES

787

es
I

The
Danlsli

Con-
qaests

834-837

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CTTAP.

Sec. V.
Wbssex

AND THK

Danks

8oa

880

851

853

866

870

Channel roused all Cornwall to revolt. It was in the alliance of the
northmen with the Britons that the danger of these earlier inroads lay.
Ecgberht indeed defeated the united forces of these two enemies in a
victory at Hengest-dun, but an unequal struggle was carried on for
years to come in the Wessex west of Selwood. King iEthelwulf, who
followed Ecgberht in 839, fought strenuously in the defence of his realm ;
in the defeat of Charmouth, as in the victory at Aclea, he led his troops
in person against the sea-robbers ; and he drove back the Welsh of
North Wales, who were encouraged by the invaders to rise in arms.
Northmen and Welshmen were beaten again and again, and yet the
peril grew greater year by year. The dangers to the Christian faith
from these heathen assailants roused the clergy to his aid. Swithun,
Bishop of Winchester, became /Ethelwulf s minister ; Ealhstan, Bishop
of Sherborne, was among the soldiers of the Cross, and with the
ealdormen led the fyrds of Somerset and Dorset to drive the invaders
from the mouth of the Parret. At last hard fighting gained the
realm a little respite ; in 858 ^Ethelwulf died in peace, and for eight
years the Northmen left the land in quiet. But these earlier forays had
been mere preludes to the real burst of the storm. When it broke in
its full force upon the island, it was no longer a series of plunder-raids,
but the invasion of Britain by a host of conquerors who settled as they
conquered. The work was now taken up by another people of Scan-
dinavian blood, the Danes. At the accession of iEthelred,the third of
i^thelwulf s sons, who had mounted the throne after the short reigns of
his brothers, these new assailants fell on Britain. As they came to the
front, the character of the attack wholly changed. The petty squadrons
which had till now harassed the coast of Britain made way for larger
hosts than had as yet fallen on any country in the west ; while raid and
foray were replaced by the regular campaign of armies who marched
to conquer, and whose aim was to settle on the land they won. In
866 the Danes landed in East Anglia, and marched in the next spring
across the H umber upon York. Civil strife as usual distracted the
energies of Northumbria. Its subject-crown was disputed by two
claimants, and when they united to meet this common danger both fell
in the same defeat before the walls of their capital. Northumbria at
once submitted to the Danes, and Mercia was only saved by a hasty
march of King vEthelred to its aid. But the Peace of Nottingham, by
which iCthelred rescued Mercia in 868, left the Danes free to turn to
the rich spoil of the great abbeys of the Fen. Peterborough, Crow-
land, Ely, went up in flames, and their monks fled or were slain among
the ruins. From thence they struck suddenly for East Anglia itself,
whose king, Eadmund, brought prisoner before the Danish leaders, was
bound to a tree and shot to death with arrows. His martyrdom by
the heathen made him the St. Sebastian of English legend ; in later
days his figure gleamed from the pictured windows of church after

[chap.

e of the
>ads lay.
(lies in a
i on for
'ulf, who
IS realm ;
is troops
Velsh of
in arms,
yet the
[an faith
Swithun,
1, Bishop
with the
invaders
ined the
for eight
trays had
broke in
ler-raids,
d as they
of Scan-
2 third of
reigns of
e to the
uadrons
•r larger
aid and
iiarched
on. In
It spring
ted the
by two
lothfell
bria at
a hasty
lam, by
turn to
Crow-
I among
itself,
brs, was
[om by
later
after

I.]

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

church along the eastern coast, and the stately abbey of St. Edmunds-
bury rose over his rehcs. With Eadmund ended the line of East
Anglian under-kings, for his kingdom was not only conquered, but ten
years later it was divided among the soldiers of a Danish host, whose
leader, Guthrum, assumed its crown. How great was the terror stirred
by these successive victories was shown in the action of Mercia, which,
though it was as yet still spared from actual conquest, crouched in
terror before the Danes, acknowledged them in 870 as its overlords,
and paid them tribute.

In four years the work of Ecgberht had been undone, and England
north of the Thames had been torn from the overlordship of Wessex.
So rapid a conquest as the Danish conquests of Northumbria, Mercia,
and East Anglia, had only been made possible by the temper of these
kingdoms themselves. To them the conquest was simply their transfer
from one overlord to another, and it would seem as if they preferred
the lordship of the Dane to the overlordship of the West-Saxon. It
was another sign of the enormous difficulty of welding these kingdoms
together into a single people. The time had now come for Wessex to
fight, not for supremacy, but for life. As yet it seemed paralyzed by
terror. With the exception of his one march on Nottingham, King
i^thelred had done nothing to save his under-kingdoms from the
wreck. But the Danes no sooner pushed up Thames to Reading than
the West-Saxons, attacked on their own soil, turned fiercely at bay. The
enemy penetrated indeed into the heart of Wessex as far as the
heights that overlook the Vale of White Horse. A desperate battle
drove them back from Ashdown ; but their camp in the tongue of
land between the Kennet and Thames proved impregnable, and fresh
forces pushed up the Thames to join their fellows. In the midst of
the struggle iEthelred died, and left his youngest brother ^Elfred to
meet a fresh advance of the foe. They had already encamped at
Wilton before the young king could meet them, and a series of defeats
forced him to buy the withdrawal of the pirates and win a few years'
breathing-space for his realm. It was easy for the quick eye of ^Elfred
to see that the Danes had withdrawn simply with the view of gaining
firmer footing for a new attack ; indeed, three years had hardly passed
before Mercia was invaded, and its under-king driven over sea to
make place for a tributary of the Danes. From Repton half their
host marched northwards to the Tyne, dividing a land where there
was little left to plunder, colonizing and tilling it, while Guthrum
led the rest into East Anglia to prepare for their next year's attack on
Wessex. The greatness of the contest had now drawn to Britain the
whole strength of the northmen ; and it was with a host swollen by
reinforcements from every quarter that Guthrum at last set sail for the
south. In 876 the Danish fleet appeared before Wareham, and when
a treaty with ./Alfred won their withdrawal, they threw themselves

Sfc. v.
Wessbx

AND THK

Danes
SOS

8SO

Danes

and
Weaaeac

871

875

> v..

li U'l

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

!•]

Sec. V.
Wbssbx

AND THE

Danes

8oa

880

Pfeace of
Wedmore

AJtred

871-901

into Exeter and allied themselves with the Welsh. Through the winter
yElfred girded himself for this new peril. At break of spring his
army closed round the town, while a hired fleet cruised off the coast
to guard against rescue. The peril of their brethren in Exeter forced
a part of the Danish host which had remained at Wareham to put to
sea with the view of aiding them, but they were driven by a storm on
the rocks of Swanage, and Exeter was at last starved into surrender,
while the Danes again swore to leave Wessex.

They withdrew in fact to Gloucester, but iElfred had hardly dis-
banded his troops when his enemies, roused by the arrival of fresh
hordes eager for plunder, reappeared at Chippenham, and at the
opening of 878 marched ravaging over the land. The surprise was
complete, and for a month or two the general panic left no hope of
resistance. JEKred, with his small band of followers, could only throw
himself into a fort raised hastily in the isle of Athelney, among the
marshes of the Farret. It was a position from which he could watch
closely the movements of his foes, and with the first burst of spring he
called the thegns of Somerset to his standard, .^nd still gathering his
troops as he moved, marched through Wiltshire on the Danes. He
found their host at Edington, defeated it in a great battle, and after a
siege of fourteen days forced them to surrender. Their leader, Guthrum,
was baptized as a Christian and bound by a solemn peace or " frith "
at Wedmore in Somerset. In form the Peace of Wedmore seemed
indeed a surrender of the bulk of Britain to its invaders. All North-
umbria, all East Anglia, the half of Central England was left subject to
the northmen. Throughout this Dane-law, as it was called, the con-
querors settled down among the conquered population as lords of the
soil, thickly in the north and east, more thinly in the central districts>
but everywhere guarding jealously their old isolation, and gathering in
separate " heres " or armies round towns which were only linked in
loose confederacies. The peace had in fact saved little more than
Wessex itself. But in saving Wessex it saved England. The spell of
terror was broken. The tide of invasion was turned. Only one short
struggle broke a peace of fifteen years.

With the Peace of Wedmore in 878 began a work even more noble
than this deliverance of Wessex from the Dane. " So long as I have
lived,' ' wrote yElfred in later days, " I have striven to live worthily."
He longed when death overtook him " to leave to the men that come
after a remembrance of him in good works." The aim has been more
than fulfilled. The memory of the life and doings of the noblest of
English rulers has come down to us living and distinct through the
mist of exaggeration and legend that gathered round it. Politically or
intellectually, the sphere of iElfred's action may seem too small to
justify a comparison of him with the few whom the world claims as its
greatest men. What really lifts him to uheir level is the moral graiideur

of his

instai

persoi

those

of jus

markc

with

dream

but of

goverr

Heab

lordshi

which

East-A

that he

of the

the Me

name (

kingdoi

set the

ruler w<

inroads

by the

a fleet.

hides S€

him wit]

remaine

halves, <

other ha

a hardei

but to c

force, ar

held the

Thed

its good

struggle,

weakene

alike to

In politi

was clos

public ji

of hundi

constant

that han

been jud

I.]

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

I noble

have
thily."
Icome

more
lest of
Ihthe
[lly or

ill to
las its

\deur

of his life. He lived solely for the good of his people. He is the first
instance in the history of Christendom of u ruler who put aside every
personal aim or ambition to devote himself wholly to the welfare of
those whom he ruled. In his mouth "to live worthily" meant a life
of justice, temperance, self-sacrifice. The Peace of Wedmore at once
marked the temper of the man. Warrior and conqueror as he was,
with a disorganized England before him, he set aside at thirty the
dream of conquest to leave behind him the memory not of victories
but of **good works," of daily toils by which he secured peace, good
government, education for his people. His policy was one of peace.
He abandoned all thought of the recovery of the West-Saxon over-
lordship. With England across the Watling Street, a Roman road
which ran from Chester to London, in other words with Northumbria,
East-Anglia, and the half of Mercia, /Elfred had nothing to do. All
that he retained was his own Wessex, with the upper part of the valley
of the Thames, the whole valley of the Severn, and the rich plains of
the Mersey and the Dee. Over these latter districts, to which the
name of Mercia was now confined, while the rest of the Mercian
kingdom became known as the Five Boroughs of the Danes, ^^.tfred
set the ealdorman ^Ethelred, the husband of his daughter ^thelflaed, a
ruler well fitted by his courage and activity to guard Wessex against
inroads from the north. Against invasion from the sea, he provided
by the better organization of military service, and by the creation of
a fleet. The country was divided into military districts, each five
hides sending an armed man at the king's summons and providing
him with food and pay. The duty of every freeman to join the host
remained binding as before ; bu: the host orfyrd was divided into two
halves, each of which took by turns its service in the field, while the
other half guarded its own burhs and townships. To win the sea was
a harder task than to win the land, and -Alfred had not to organize,
but to create a fleet. He steadily developed however his new naval
force, and in the reign of his son a fleet of a hundred English ships
held the mastery of the Channel.

The defence of his realm thus provided for, he devoted himself to
its good government. In Wessex itself, spent by years of deadly
stmggle, with law, order, the machinery of justice and government
weakened by the pirate storm, material and moral civilization had
alike to be revived. His work was of a simple and practical order.
In politics as in war, or in his after dealings with letters, he took what
was closest at hand and made the best of it. In the reorganization of
public justice his main work was to enforce submission to the justice
of hundred-moot and shire-moot alike on noble and ceorl, " who were
constantly at obstinate variance with one another in the folk-moots, so
that hardly any one of them would grant that to be true doom that had
been judged for doom by the ealdorman and reeves." " All the law

Sec. v.
Wessex

AND THE

Danes

8oa

880

mitred'u
Rule

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

I.]

Sec. V.
Wbssex

AND THE

Danes

8oa

880

iBlfred's
eliaractttr

dooms of his land that were given in his absence he used to keenly
question, of what sort they were, just or unjust ; and if he found any
wrongdoing in them he would call the judges themselves before him."
" Day and night," says his biographer, he was busied in the correction
of local injustice ; " for in that whole kingdom the poor had no helpers,
or few, save the king himself" Of a new legislation the king had no
thought. " Those things which I met with," he tells us, " either of the
days of Ine, my kinsman, or of Offa, king of the Mercians, or of
yEthelberht, who first among the English race received baptism, those
which seemed to me rightest, those I have gathered, and rejected the
others." But unpretending as the work might seem, its importance
was great. With it began the conception of a national law. The
notion of separate systems of tribal customs for the separate peoples
passed away ; and the codes of Wessex, Mercia, and Kent blended in
the doom-book of a common England.

The new strength which had been won for -(Alfred's kingdom
in six years of peace was shown when the next pirate onset fell
on the land. A host from Gaul pushed up the Thames and thence
to Rochester, while the Danes of Guthrum's kingdom set aside the
Peace of Wedmo'e and gave help to their brethren. The war how-
ever was short, ana ended in victory so complete on -Alfred's side that
in 886 a new peace was made which pushed the West-Saxon frontier
forward into the realm of Guthrum, and tore from the Danish hold
London and half of the old East-Saxon kingdom. From this moment
the Danes were thrown on an attitude of defence, and the change made
itself at once felt among the English. The foundation of a new national
monarchy was laid. " All the Angel-cyn turned to vElfred," says the
chronicle, " save those that were under bondage to Danish men."
Hardly had this second breathing-space been won than the king turned
again to his work of restoration. The spirit of adventure that made
him. to the last a mighty hunter, the reckless daring of his early man-
hood, took graver form in an activity that found time amidst the cares
of state for the daily duties of religion, for converse with strangers, for
study and translation, for learning poems by heart, for planning build-
ings and instructing craftsmen in gold-work, for teaching even falconers
and dog-keepers their business. But his mind was far from being
prisoned within his own island. He listened with keen attention to
tales of far-off lands, to the Norwegian Othere's account of his
journey round the North Cape to explore the White Sea, and Wulf-
stan's cruise along the coast of Esthonia ; envoys bore his presents to
the churches of India and Jerusalem, and an annual mission carried
Peter's-pence to Rome. Restless as he was, his activity was the
activity of a mind strictly practical. JElfred was pre-eminently a man
of business, careful of detail, laborious and methodical. He carried in
his bosom a little hand-book in which he jotted down things as they

ij:

1.1

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

man-
cares
trs, for
Ibuild-
:oners
1 being
lion to
J)f his
jWulf-
Ints to
irried
5 the
man
ied in
they

struck him, now a bit of family genealogy, now a prayer, now a story
such as that of Bishop Ealdhelm singing sacred songs on the bridge.
Each hour of the king's day had its peculiar task ; there was the same
order in the division of his revenue and in the arrangement of his
court. But active and busy as he was, his temper remained simple
and kindly. We have few stories of his life that are more than mere
legends, but even legend itself never ventured to depart from the outlines
of a character which men knew so well. During his months of waiting
at Athelney, while the country was overrun by the Danes, he was said
to have entered a peasant's hut, and to have been bidden by the house-
wife, who did not recognize him, to turn the cakes which were baking on
the hearth. The young King did as he was bidden, but in the sad
thoughts which came over him he forgot his task, and bore in amused
silence the scolding of the good wife, who found her cakes spoilt on
her return. This tale, if nothing more than a tale, could never have
been told of a man without humour. Tradition told of his genial
good-nature, of his chattiness over the adventures of his life, and
above all of his love for song. In his busiest days ^Elfred found time
to learn the old songs of his race by heart, and bade them be taught
in the palace-school. As he translated the tales of the heathen mytho-
logy he lingered fondly over and expanded them, and in moments of
gloom he found comfort in the music of the Psalms.

Neither the wars nor the legislation of ^^Ifred were destined to leave
such lasting traces upon England as the impulse he gave to its litera-
ture. His end indeed even in this was practical rather than literary.
What he aimed at was simply the education of his people. Letters
and civilization had almost vanished in Great Britain. In Wessex
itself learning had disappeared. " When I began to reign," said
MKredf " I cannot remember one south of Thames who could explain
his service-book in English." The ruin the Danes had wrought had
been no mere material ruin. In Northumbria the Danish sword had
left but few survivors of the school of Ecgberht or Baeda. To remedy
this ignorance -Alfred desired that at least every free-bom youth who
possessed the means should " abide at his book till he can well under-
stand English writing." He himself superintended a school which he
had established for the young nobles of his court. At home he found
none to help him in his educational efforts but a few prelates and
priests who remained in the fragment of Mercia which had been saved
from the invaders, and a Welsh bishop, Asser. " Formerly," the king
writes bitterly, " men came hither from foreign lands to seek for
instruction, and now when we desire it we can only obtain it from
abroad." He sought it among the West-Franks and the East-Franks.
A scholar named Grimbald came from St. Omer to preside over the
abbey he founded at Winchester; and John' the Old-Saxon was
fetched, it may be from the Westphalian abbey of Corbey, to rule a

E 2

Sec. V.
Wessex

AND THU

Danes

8oa

sao

JBlfred

and
Lltera.

tiu-e

» M

^vM

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. V.
Wksskx

AND TIIK

Danrs

aofl

880

JBltrtA'u

Transla-

tions

monastery that >Elfred's gratitude for his deliverance from the Danes
raised in the marshes of Athelney.

The work, however, which most told on Mnglish culture was done
not by these scholars but by the king himself, il^lfred resolved to
throw open to his people in their own tongue the knowledge which
had till then been limited to the clergy. He took his books as he
found them ; they were the popular manuals of his age ; the compila-
tion of Orosius, then the one accessible book of universal history, the
history of his own people by Baeda, the Consolation of Boethius, the
Pastoral of Pope Gregory. He translated these works into English,
but he was far more than a translator, he was an editor for the peonle.
Here he omitted, there he expanded. He enriched Orosius by a sketch
of the new geographical discoveries in the north. He gave a Wesl-
Saxon form to his selections from Bseda. In one place he stops to
explain his theory of government, his wish for a thicker population, his
conception of national welfare as consisting in a due balance of the
priest, the soldier, and the churl. The mention of Nero spurs him to
an outbreak on the abuses of power. The cold Providence of Boethius
gives way to an enthusiastic acknowledgement of the goodness of God.
As Alfred writes, his large-hearted nature flings off its royal mantle,
and he talks as a man to men. " Do not blame me," he prays with a
charming simplicity, " if any know Latin better '^han I, for every man
must say what he says and do what he does according to his ability."
But simple as was his aim, AiUred created English literature. Before
him, England possessed noble poems in the work of Caedmon, and
his fellow-singers, and a train of ballads and battle-songs. Prose she
had none. The mighty roll of the books that fill her libraries begins
with the translations of ^^Ifred, and above all with the chronicle of
his reign. It seems likely that the king's rendering of Baeda's his-
tory gave the first impulse towards the compilation of what is known
as the English or Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, which was certainly thrown
into its present form during his reign. The meagre lists of the kings
of Wessex and of the bishops of Winchester, which had been preserved
from older times, were roughly expanded into a national history by
insertions from Baeda ; but it is when it reaches the reign of i^lfred
that the Chronicle suddenly widens into the vigorous narrative, full of
life and originality, that marks the gift of a new power to the English
tongue. Varying as it does from age to age in historic value, it re-
mains the first vernacular history of any Teutonic people, the earliest
and most venerable monument of Teutonic prose. The writer of
English history may be pardoned if he lingers too fondly over the
figure of the king in whose court, at whose impulse, it maybe in whose
very words, English history begins.

[Au
period
IS eml)
Mnglis
of Wo
The •♦
fall in
are, li
aniondr
bear th(
A)', an
Saxons

S9~74)
"Code>
belongii
in one
•*Conqi

yElfre

new inv

Englan(

in whicl

in the A

Danela\

by the I

man M\

as it rod

the Seve

old quai

from a ]

once mc

^thelrei

camp on

capture

barred tl

from W

Franklai

Channel.

The la

a new de

whom a <

years hac

left the k

and activ

910 that ;

TIIK ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

•eotion VI.-The West-Saxon Realm, 893-10^.

{Authorities. — Mainly l!ic English Chronicle, which varies nuicli during this
period. Through the reign of Eadward it is copious, and a Mercian chronicle
IS embedded in it ; its entries then become scanty, and are broken\with grand
Mnglish songs till the reign of iTllthelred, when its fulness returns. '* Florence
of Worcester " is probably a translation of a copy of the Chronicl^ now lost.
The '* Laws " form the basis of our constitutional knowledge of the time, and
fall into two classes. Those of Eadward, ^Uhelstan, Eadmund, and Eadgar
are, like the earlier laws of ilLthelberht and Ine, "mainly of the nature of
amendments of custom." Those of ^Elfred, A^thelred, Cnut, with those that
bear the name of Eadward the Confessor, "aspire to the character of codes."
All are printed in Mr. Thorpe's ** Ancient Laws and Institutes of the Anglo-
Saxons;" but the extracts given by Dr. Stubbs (".Select Charters," pp.
59 — 74) contain all that directly bears on our constitution. Mr. Kemble's
"Codex Diplomaticus ^Evi Saxonici " contains a vast mass of charters, &c.,
l)elonging to this period. The lives of Dunstan are collected by Dr. Stubbs
in one of the Rolls volumes. For this period see .ilso Mr. firecn's
"Conquest of England,"]

yElfred's work of peace was however to be once more interrupted by a
new invasion which in 893 broke under the Danish leader Hasting upon
England. After a year's fruitless struggle to force the strong position
in which y^illfred covered Wessex, the Danish forces left their fastnesses
in the Andredsweald and crossed the Thames, while a rising of the
Danelaw in their aid revealed the secret of this movement. Followed
by the Londoners, the king's son Eadward and the Mercian Ealdor-
man yEthelred stormed the Danish camp in Essex, followed the host
as it rode along Thames to rouse new revolts in Wales, caught it on
the Severn, and defeating it with a great slaughter, drove it back to its
old quarters in Essex. iClfred himself held Exeter against attack
from a pirate fleet and their West- Welsh allies ; and when Hasting
once more repeated his dash upon the west and occupied Chester,
yEthelred drove him from his hold and forced him to fall back to his
camp on the Lea. Here yElfred came to his lieutenant's aid, and the
capture of the Danish ships by the two forts with which the king
barred the river virtually ended the war. The Danes streamed back
from Wales, whither they had retreated, to their old quarters in
Frankland, and the new English fleet drove the freebooters from the
Channel.

The last years of iElfred's life seem to have been busied in providing
a new defence for his realm by the formation of alliances with states
whom a common interest drew together against the pirates. But four
years had hardly passed since the victory over Hasting when his death
left the kingdom to his son Eadward. Eadward, though a vigorous
and active ruler, clung to his father's policy of rest. It was not till
910 that a rising of the Danes on his northern frontier, and an attack

Skc. VI.

Tmk Wkst.
Saxon
Rrai.m

899

1019

Merela

and the

Danes

897

.Alfred's ^

Dtaili **«

901

fe'Vi*

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

fCHAP.

Sue. VI.

Thk West-

Saxon

KRAt.4

893

T<»

1013

the lady of
Mentans

913-918

andth*
law

Eadtvard
the Elder

901-925

922

924

^^1

of a pirate fleet on the southern coast, forced him to re-open the war.
With his sister yl^.thelflacd, who was in 912 left sole ruler of Mercia by
the death of the Ealdorman yT'!thelrcd, he undertook the systematic
reduction of the Danelaw. While he bridled East Anglia by the seizure
of southern Ksscx, and the erection of the forts of Hertford and
Witham, the fame of Mercia was safe in the hands of its " Lady."
^Ethelflxd girded her strength for the conquest of the " Five Boroughs,"
the rude Danish confederacy which had taken the place of the eastern
half of the older Mercian kmgdom. Derby represented the original
Mercia on the upper Trent, Lincoln the Lindiswaras, Leicester the
Middle-English, Stamford the province of the Gyrwas — the marshmen
of the Fens — Nottingham probably that of the Southumbrians. Each
of the " Five Boroughs " seems to have been ruled by its earl with his
separate " host ; " within each twelve " lawmen " administered Danish
law, while a common justice-court existed for the whole confederacy.
In her attack upon this powerful league y^thelflaed abandoned the
older strategy of battle and raid for that of siege and fortress-building.
Advancing along the line of Trent, she fortified Tamworth and Stafford
on its head-waters, then turning southward secured the valley of the
Avon by a fort at Warwick. With the lines of the great rivers alike
secure, and the approaches to Wales on either side of Arden in her
hands, she in 917 closed on Derby. The raids of the Danes of
Middle-England failed to draw the Lady of Mercia from her prey ;
and Derby was hardly her own when, turning southward, she forced
the surrender of Leicester.

yEthelflaed died in the midst of her triumphs, and Eadward at once
annexed Mercia to Wessex. The brilliancy of her exploits had
already been matched by his own successes as he closed in on the
district of the Five Boroughs from the south. South of the Middle-
English and the Fens lay a tract watered by the Ouse and the Nen —
originally the district of a tribe known as the South-English, and now,
like the Five Boroughs of the north, grouped round the towns of Bed-
ford, Huntingdon, and Northampton. The reduction of these was
followed by that of East Anglia ; "he Danes of the Fens submitted
with Stamford, the Southumbrians with Nottingham. Lincoln, the
last of the Five Boroughs as yet unconquered, no doubt submitted at the
same time. From Mid-Britain the king advanced cautiously to an
attack on Northumbria. He had already seized Manchester, and was
preparing to complete his conquests, when the whole of the North sud-
denly laid itself at his feet. Not merely Northumbria but the Scots
and the Britons of Strathclyde " chose him to father and lord." The
submission had probably been brought about, like that of the North-
Welsh to iElfred, by the pressure of mutual feuds, and it was as value-
less as theirs. Within a year after Eadward's de^th the north was
again on fire. iSthelstan, iElfred's golden-haired grandson whom the

Kin{
agci
then
the

frifAF.

ie war.
rcia by
cmatic
seizure
rd and
Lady."
oughs,"
eastern
original
iter the
rshmen
. Each
with his
Danish
ideracy.
ned the
milding.
Stafford
y of the
ers alike
n in her
)anes of
er prey ;
forced

at once
)its had

on the
Middle-

Nen —
nd now,
of Bed-
;se was
bmitted
oln, the

d at the
to an

ind was

th sud-

Scots

The

1 North-

; value '
th was

Lorn the

i.l

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

King had girded as a child with a ^wurH set in a golden scabbard and
a gem-studded belt, incorporated Northumbria with his dominions ;
then turning westward broke a league which had been formed between
the North-Welsh and the Scots, forced them to pay annual tribute, to
march in his armies, and to attend his councils. The West -Welsh of
Co»'nwaIl were reduced to a like vassalage, and the Britons driven
from Exeter, which they had shared till then with its English in-
habitants. A league of the Scot King, Constantine with the Irish
Ostmen was punished by an army which wasted his kingdom, while a
fleet ravaged its coasts. But the revolt only heralded the formidable
confederacy in which Scotland, Cumberland, and theBr'tish and Danish
chiefs of the west and east rose at the appearance of the fleet of Olaf in
the Humber. The king's victory at Brunanburh, sung in noblest war-
song, seemed the wreck of Danish hopes, but the work of conquest was
still to be done. On yEthelstan's death and the accession of his young
brother Eadmund, the Danelaw rose again in revolt ; the men of the
Five boroughs joined their kinsmen in Northumbria, and a peace which
was negotiated by the two archbishops, Odo and Wulfstan, practically
restored the old balance of yElfred's day, and re-established Watling
Street as the boundary between Wessex and the Danes. Eadmund
however possessed the political and military ability of his house. The
Danelaw was once more reduced to submission ; he seized on an
alliance with the Scots as a balance to the Danes, and secured the aid
of their king by investing him with the fief of Cumberland. But his
triumphs were suddenly cut short by his death. As the king feasted
at Pucklechurch a robber, Leofa, whom he had banished, seated him-
self at the royal board, and drew his sword on the cupbearer who bade
him retire. Eadmund, springing to his thegn's aid, seized the robber
by his hair and flung him to the ground, but Leofa had stabbed the
king ere rescue could arrive.

The completion of the West-Saxon realm was in fact reserved for
the hands, not of a king or warrior, but of a priest. With the death of
Eadmund a new figure comes to the front in English affairs. Dunstan
stands first in the line of ecclesiastical statesmen who counted among
them Lanfranc and Wolsey, and ended in Laud. He is still more re-
markable in himself, in his own vivid personality after nine centuries
of revolution and change. He was born in the little hamlet of Glaston-
bury, beside Ine's church ; his father, Heorstan, was a man of wealth
and kinsman of three bishops of the time and of many thegns of the
court. It must have been in his father's hall that the fair diminutive
boy, with his scant but beautiAii hair, caught his love for " the vain
songs of ancient heathendom, the trifling legends, the funeral
chants," which afterwards roused against him the charge of sorcery.
Thence too he may have derived his passionate love of music, and
his custom of carrying his harp in hand on journey or visit. The

UKt. VI.

riiR west-

Saxon
Kkai.m

1013

.•Kthelstan

a ;,

925 940

burh

937

Eaiimund
940-946

'!i V'M

'■■"' ' -T 1

p'H^f

Dunstan

l^i*v

\ :f>;A|'

\ - '^0^

' '"-^

;lfffl

5^'

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

fCHAP.

-^-

Sec. VI.

The West-
Saxon
Realm

893

1016

c. 940

Dunatan's
adminis-
tration

wandering scholars of Ireland left their books in the monastery of
Glastonbury, as they left them along the Rhine and the Danube ; and
Dunstan plunged into the study of sacred and profane letters till his
brain broke down in delirium. His knowledge became famous in the
neighbourhood and reached the court of ^thelstan, but his appear-
ance there was the signal for a burst of ill-will among the courtiers,
though many of them were kinsmen of his own, and he was forced to
withdraw. Even when Eadmund recalled him to the court, his rivals
drove him from the king's train, threw him from his horse as he passed
through the marshes, and with the wild passion of their age trampled
him underfoot in the mire. The outrage ended in fever, and in the
bitterness of his disappointment and shame Dunstan rose from his
sick bed a monk. But in England at this time the monastic profes-
sion seems to have been little more than a vow of celibacy, and his
devotion took no ascetic turn. His nature was sunny, versatile,
artistic, full of strong affections and capable of inspiring others with
affections as strong. Quick-witted, of tenacious memory, a ready and
fluent speaker, gay and genial in address, an artist, a musician, he was
at the same time an indefatigable worker, busy at books, at building,
at handicraft. Throughout his life he won the love of women ; he now
became the spiritual guide of a woman of high rank, who lived only
for charity and the entertainment of pilgrims. " He ever clave to her,
and loved her in wondrous fashion." His sphere of activity widened
as the wealth of his devotee was placed unreservedly at his command ;
we see him followed by a train of pupils, busy with literature, writing,
harping, painting, designing. One morning a lady summons him to
her house to design a robe which she is embroidering. As he bends
with her maidens over their toil, his harp hung upon the wall sounds
without mortal touch tones which the startled ears around frame into
a joyous antiphon. The tie which bound him to this scholar-life was
broken by the death of his patroness ; and towards the close of
Eadmund's reign Dunstan was again called to the court. But the old
jealousies revived, and counting the game lost he prepared again to
withdraw. The King had spent the day in the chase ; the red deer
which he was pursuing dashed over Cheddar cliffs, and his horse only
checked itself on the brink of the ravine while Eadmund in the bitter-
ness of death was repenting of his injustice to Dunstan. He was at
once summoned on the King's return. " Saddle your horse," §aid
Eadmund, " and ride with me ! " The royal train swept over the
marshes to Dunstan's home ; and greeting him with the kibs of peace,
the king seated him in the priestly chair as i'^bbot of Glastonbury.

From that moment Dunstan may have exercised influence on public
affairs ; but 't was not till the accession of Eadred, Eadmund's brother,
that his influence became supreme as leading counsellor of the crown,
trace his hand in the solemn proclamation of the "

may

ing':

fCHAP.

stery of
)e ; and
till his
IS in the
appear-
ourtiers,
)rced to
is rivals
e passed
rampled
i in the
"rem his
: profes-
and his
'ersatile,
ers with
ady and
I, he was
)uilding,
i he now
/ed only
B to her,
kvidened
nmand ;
writing,
him to
e bends
sounds
ne into
ife was
ose of
the old
igain to
ed deer
se only
bitter-
was at
said
^er the
peace,
ury.
public
>rother,
crown,
king's

i-l

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

crowning. Eadred's election was the first national election where
Briton, Dane, and Englishman were alike represented ; his coronation
was the first national coronation, the first union of the primate of the
north and the primate of the south in setting the crown on the
head of one who was to rule from the Forth to the Channel. A
revolt of the north two years later was subdued ; at the outbreak of a
fresh rising the Archbishop of York, Wulfstan, was thrown into prison ;
and with the submission of the Danelaw in 954 the long work of
/Elfred's house was done. Dogged as his fight had been, the Dane at
last owned himself beaten. From the moment of Eadred's final
triumph all resistance came to an end. The north was finally
brought into the general organization of the English realm, and the
Northumbrian under-kingdom sank into an earldom under Oswulf.
The new might of the royal power was expressed in the lofty titles
assumed by Eadred ; he was not only " King of the Anglo-Saxons,"
but " Caesar of the whole of Britain."

The death of Eadred however was a signal for the outbreak of
political strife. The boy-king Eadwig was swayed by a woman of
high lineage, ^thelgifu ; and the quarrel between her and the older
counsellors of Eadred broke into open strife at the coronation feast.
On the young king's insolent withdrawal to her chamber Dunstan, at
the bidding of the Witan, drew him roughly back to the hall. But
before the year was over the wrath of the boy-king drove the abbot
over sea, and his whole system went with him. The triumph of
iCthelgifu was crowned in 957 by the marriage of her daughter to the
king. The marriage was uncanonical, and at the opening of 958
Archbishop Odo parted the kin£ from his wife by solemn sentence ;
while the Mercians and Northumbrians rose in revolt, proclaimed
Eadwig's brother Eadgar their king, and recalled Dunstan, who
received successively the sees of Worcester and of London. The
death of Eadwig restored the unity of the realm. Wessex submitted
to the king who had been already accepted by the north, and Dunstan,
now raised to the see of Canterbury, wielded for sixteen years as the
minister of Eadgar the secular and ecclesiastical powers of the realm.
Never had England seemed so strong or so peaceful. Without, a
fleet cruising round the coast swept the sea of pirates ; the Danes of
Ireland had turned from foes to friends ; eight vassal kings rowed
Eadgar (so ran the legend) in his boat on the Dee. The settlement of
the north indicated the large and statesmanhke course which Dunstan
was to pursue in the general administration of the realm. He seems
to have adopted from the beginning a national rather than a West-
Saxon policy. The later charge against his rule, that he gave too
much power to the Dane and too much love to strangers^ is the best
proof of the unprovincial temper of his administration. He employed
Danes in the royal service and promoted them to high posts in Church

Sec. VI.

The West 'j
Saxon
Realm ti

893

TO
1013

Eadred

946 955

Dunstan

the
Primate

Eadwig

956 959

Eadgar

959-975

!t '

I' .» M

(

T-

Sec. VI.

The West-
Saxon
Realm

803

1013

Decline

of
Slavery

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

and State. In the code which he promulgated he expressly reserved
to the north its old Danish rights, " with as good laws as they best
might choose." His stern hand restored justice and order, while his
care for commerce was shown in the laws which regulated the coinage
and the enactments of common weights and measures for the realm.
Thanet was ravaged when the wreckers of its coast plundered a trading
ship from York. Commerce sprang into a wider life. " Men of the
Empire," traders of Lower Lorraine and the Rhine-land, "men of
Rouen," were seen in the streets of London, and it was by the foreign
trade which sprang up in Dunstan's time that London rose to the
commercial greatness it has held ever since. But the aims of the
primate-minister reached beyond this outer revival of prosperity and
good government. The Danish wars had dealt rudely with ^Elfred's
hopes ; his educational movement had ceased with his death the
clergy had sunk back into worldliness and ignorance, not a single
book or translation had been added to those which the king had left.
Dunstan resumed the task, if not in the larger spirit of ^Elfred, at
least in the spirit of a great administrator. The reform of monasticism
which had begun in the abbey of Cluny was stirring the zeal of
English churchmen, and Eadgar showed himsell zealous in the cause
of introducing it into England. With his support, ^Ethelwold, Bishop
of Winchester, carried the new Benedictinism into his diocese, and
a few years later Oswald, Bishop of Worcester, brought monks into
his own cathedral city. Tradition ascribed to Eadgar the formation
of forty monasteries, and it was to his time that English monasticism
looked back in later days as the beginning of its continuous life.
But after all his efforts, monasteries were in fact only firmly planted
in Wessex and East Anglia, and the system took no hold in North-
umbria or in the bulk of Mercia. Dunstan himself took little part
in it, though his influence was strongly felt in the literary revival
which accompanied the revival of religious activity. He himself while
abbot was famous as a teacher. His great assistant -^thelwold raised
Abingdon into a school second only to Glastonbury. His other great
helper, Oswald, laid the first foundations of the historic school of
Worcester. Abbo, the most notable scholar in Gaul, came from
Fleury at the primate's invitation.

After times looked back fondly to " Eadgar's Law," as it was called,
in other words to the English Constitution as it shaped itself in the
hands of Eadgar's minister. A number of influences had great'y
modified the older order which had followed on the English con-
quest. Slavery was gradually disappearing before the efforts of the
Church. Theodore had denied Christian burial to the kidnapper, and
prohibited the sale of children by their parents, after the age of seven.
Ecgberht of York punished any sale of child or kinsfolk with excom-
munication. The murder of a slave by lord or mistress, though no

crime!
to the!
holyd^
only
suffer^
a newj
mutuj
thefrt
elevati
two h|
Selsej
that SI
Chelse
on thei
Usuall
and th

I.l

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

called,
in the
jreat'y
con-
lof the
^r, and
[seven.
Ixcom-
Igh no

crime in the eye of the State, became a sin for which penance was due
to the Church. The slave was exempted from toil on Sundays and
holydays ; here and there he became attached to the soil and could
only be sold with it ; sometimes he acquired a plot of ground, and was
suffered to purchase his own release. ^Cthelstan gave the slave-class
a new rank in the realm • by extending to it the same principles of
mutual responsibility for crime which were the basis of order among
the free. The Church was far from contenting herself with this gradual
elevation ; Wilfrid led the way in the work of emancipation by freeing
two hundred and fifty serfs whom he found attached to his estate at
Selsey. Manumission became frequent in wills, as the clergy taught
that such a gift was a boon to the soul of the dead. At the Synod of
Chelsea the bishops bound themselves to free at their decease all serfs
on their estates who had been reduced to serfdom by want or crime.
Usually the slave was set free before the altar or in the church-porch,
and the Gospel-book bore written on its margins the record of his
emancipation. Sometimes his lord placed him at the spot where four
I roads met, and bade him go whither he would. In the more solemn
form of the law his master took him by the hand in full shire-meeting,
showed him open road and door, and gave him the lance and sword of
the freeman. The slave-trade from English ports was prohibited by
law, but the prohibition long remained ineffective. A hundred years
later than Dunstan the wealth of English nobles was said sometimes to
spring from breeding slaves for the market. It was not till the reign
of the first Norman king that the preaching of Wulfstan and the in-
fluence of Lanfranc suppressed the trade in its last stronghold, the
port of Bristol.

But the decrease of slavery went on side by side with an increasing
degradation of the bulk of the people. Political and social changes
had long been modifying the whole structure of society ; and the very
foundations of the old order were broken up in the degradation of the
freeman, and the upgrowth of the lord with his dependent villeins.,
The political changes which were annihilating the older English liberty
were in great measure due to a change in the character of English
kingship. As the lesser English kingdcins had drawn together, the
wider dominion of the Kir.g had removed him further and further from
his people, and clothed him with a mysterious dignity. Every reign
raised him higher in the social scale. The bishop, once ranked his
equal in value of life, sank to the level of the ealdorman. The ealdor-
man himself, once the hereditary ruler of a smaller state, became a
mere delegate of the king, with an aiuthority curtailed in every shire
by that of the royal reeves — officers despatched to levy the royal
revenues and administer the royal justice. Religion deepened the
sense of awe. The king, if he was no longer sacred as the son of
Woden, was yet more sacred as " the Lord's Anointed " ; and treason

Sec. VI.

The West- i]
Saxon
Realm

893

1013

The later

English

Kingdom

{ii

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAr.

I.]

-V-

Sec. VI.

The West-
Saxon
Realm

893

1013

'!,lf

Decline

of the

Enslish

Freeman

■

against him became the worst of crimes. The older nobility of blood
died out before the new nobility of the court. From the oldest
times of Germanic history each chief or king had his war-band, his
comrades, warriors bound personally to him by their free choice, sworn
to fight for him to the death, and avenge his cause as their own.
When Cynewulf of Wessex was foully slain at Merton his comrades
" ran at once to the spot, each as he was ready and as fast as he
could," and despising all offers of life, fell fighting over the corpse of
their lord. The fidelity of the war-band was rewarded with grants from
the royal domain ; the king became their lord or hlaford, " the dispenser
of gifts ;" the comrade became his " servant " or thegn. Personal service
at his court was held not to degrade but to ennoble. " Cup-thegn," and
" horse-thegn," and " hordere," or treasurer, became great officers of
state. The thegn advanced with the advance of the king. He absorbed
every post of honour ; he became ealdorman, reeve, bishop, judge ; while
his wealth increased as the common folkland passed into the hands of
the king, and was carved out by him into estates for his dependents.

The principle of personal allegiance embodied in the new nobility
tended to widen into a theory of general dependence. From y^Clfred's
day it was assumed that no man could exist without a lord. The ravages
and the long insecurity of the Danish wars aided to drive the free
farmer to seek protection from the thegn. His freehold was sur-
rendered to be received back as a fief, laden with service to its lord.
Gradually the " lordless man " became a sort of outlaw in the realm.
The free churl sank into the villein, and changed from the freeholder
who knew no superior but God and the law, to the tenant bound to do
service to his lord, to follow him to the field, to look to his court for
justice, and render days of service in his demesne. While he lost his
older freedom he gradually lost, too, his share in the government of
the state. The life of the earlier English state was gathered up in its
folk-moot. There, through its representatives chosen in every hundred-
moot, the folk had exercised its own sovereignty in matters of justice as
of peace and war ; while beside the folk-moot, and acting with it, had
stood the Witenagemot, the group of " wise men " gathered to give
rede to the king and through him to propose a course of action to the
folk. The preliminary discussion rested with the nobler sort, the final
decision with all. The clash of arms, the " Yea " or " Nay " of the
crowd, were its vote. But when by the union of the lesser realms the
folk sank into a portion of a wider state, the folk-moot sank with it ;
political supremacy passed to the court of the far-off lord, and the
influence of the people on government came to an end. Nobles indeed
could still gather round the king ; and while the folk-moot passes out
of political notice, the Witenagemot is heard of more and more as a
royal council. It shared in the higher justice, the imposition of taxes,
the making of laws, the conclusion of treaties, the control of war, the

dispol

There

But>v

to do.l

their

dwin(

a gatl

thegn^

the ck

goveri

VVinclj

or " N|

Itisl

we mu

West-

and th<

for bitt

took th

only av

the qu(

Eadwar

the Wis

accordii

mained

the tide

of Duns

tion of

governn

who upfc

where Ik

Durin

reached

New dai

ing itsel;

drawn to

and it w

were ab

throngec

on the E

a body c

East An

forced to

the land

Norman

A fresh

[chap.

I.]

THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS.

blood
oldest
nd, his
, sworn
r own.
Tirades
as he
rpse of
ts from
ipenser
service
n," and
cers of
)Sorbed
; ; while
ands of
lents.
nobility
Alfred's
ravages
;he free
'as sur-
ts lord,
realm,
holder
Id to do
lurt for
ost his
ent of
in its
ndred-
tice as
it, had
;o give
to the
e final
of the
s the
ith it ;
d the
ndeed
les out
le as a
taxes,
the

disposal of public lands, the appointment of great officers of state.
There were times when it even claimed to elect or depose the king.
But with these powers the bulk of the nobles had really less and less
to do. The larger the kingdom the greater grew the distance from
their homes ; and their share in the general deliberations of the realm
dwindled to nothing. Practically the national council shrank into
a gathering of the great officers of Church and State with the royal
thegns, and the old English democracy passed into an oligarchy of
the closest kind. The only relic of the popular character of English
government lay at last in the ring of citizens who at London or
Winchester gathered round the wise men and shouted their "Ay"
or " Nay" at the election of a king.

It is in the degradation of the class in which its true strength lay that
we must look for the cause of the ruin which already hung over the
West-Saxon realm. Eadgar was but thirty-two when he died in 975 ;
and the children he left were mere boys. His death opened the way
for bitter political strife among the nobles of his court, whose quarrel
took the form of a dispute over the succession. Civil war was, in fact,
only averted by the energy of the primate ; seizing his cross, he settled
the question of Eadgar's successor by the coronation of his son
Eadvvard, and confronted his enemies successfully in two assemblies of
the Wise Men. In that of Calne the floor of the room gave way, and
according to monkish tradition Dunstan and his friends alone re-
mained unhart. But not even the fame of a miracle sufficed to turn
the tide. The assassination of Eadward was followed by the triumph
of Dunstan's opponents, who broke out in " great joy " at the corona-
tion of Eadward's brother ^thelred, a child of ten years old. The
government of the realm passed into the hands of the great nobles
who upheld ^thelred, and Dunstan withdrew powerless to Canterbury,
where he died nine years later.

During the eleven years from 979 to 990, when the young king
reached manhood, there is scarcely any internal history to record.
New danger however threatened from abroad. The North was gird-
ing itself for a fresh onset on England. The Scandinavian peoples had
drawn together into their kingdoms of Denmark, Sweden, and Norway ;
and it was no longer in isolated bands but in national hosts that they
were about to seek conquests in the South. The seas were again
thronged with northern freebooters, and pirate fleets, as of old, appeared
on the English coast. In 991 came the first burst of the storm, when
a body of Norwegian Wikings landed, and utterly defeated the host of
East Anglia on the field of Maldon. In the next year /Ethelred was
forced to buy a truce from the invaders and to suffer them to settle in
the land ; while he strengthened himself by a treaty of alliance with
Normandy, which was now growing into a great power over sea.
A fresh attempt to expel the invaders only proved the signal for the

Sec. VI

Thk West ';
Saxon
Realm

893

1013

Fall of
theWest-

Sr :on
Kingdom

Kadwarci
tlie Martyr

975-978

.Ethelred

the
Unready

979-1016

b \i

i n

ht'

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

n.]

Sec. VI.

The West-
Saxom
Realm

893

1013

Massacre of
Danes

% ICX)2

\
I !

IO03-IO07

gathering of pirate-hosts such as England had never seen before, under
Swein and Olaf, claimants to the Danish and Norwegian thrones.
Their withdrawal in 995 was followed by fresh attacks in 997 ; danger
threatened from Normans and from Ost-men, with wikings from Man,
and northmen from Cumberland ; while the utter weakness of the realm
was shown by ^thelred's taking into his service Danish mercenaries,
who seem to have been quartered through Wessex as a defence against
their brethren. Threatened with a new attack by Swein, who was now
king, not only of Denmark, but by the defeat and death of Olaf, of
Norway itself, vEthelred bound Normandy to his side by a marriage
with its duke's sister Emma. But a sudden panic betrayed him into
an act of basest treachery which ruined his plans of defence at home.
Urged by secret orders from the king, the West- Saxons rose on St.
Brice's day and pitilessly massacred the Danes scattered among them.
Gunhild, the sister of their king Swein, a Christian convert, and one
of the hostages for the peace, saw husband and child butchered before
her eyes ere she fell threatening vengeance on her murderers. Swein
swore at the news to wrest England from ^Ethelred. For four years
he marched through the length and breadth of southern and eastern
England, " lighting his war-beacons as he went " in blazing homestead
and town. Then for a heavy bribe he withdrew, to prepare for a later
and more terrible onset. But there was no rest for the realm. The
fiercest of the Norwegian jarls took his place, and from Wessex the war
extended over East Anglia and Mercia. Canterbury was taken and
sacked, iElfheah the Archbishop dragged to Greenwich, and there in
default of ransom brutally slain. The Danes set him in the midst of
their busting, pelting him with stones and ox-horns, till one more
pitiful than the rest clave his skull with an axe.

But a yet more terrible attack was preparing under Swein in the
North, and in 1013 his fleet entered the Humber, and called on the
Danelaw to rise in his aid. Northumbria, East Anglia, the Five
Boroughs, all England north of Watling Street, submitted to him at
Gainsborough. -^Ethelred shrank into a King of Wessex, and of a
Wessex helpless before the foe. Resistance was impossible. The war
was terrible but short. Everywhere the country was pitilessly
harried, churches plundered, men slaughtered. But with the one ex-
ception of London, there was no attempt at defence. Oxford and
Winchester flung open their gates. The thegns of Wessex submitted
to the northmen at Bath. Even London was forced at last to give
way, and ^Ethelred fled over sea to a refuge in Normandy. With the
flight of the king ended the long struggle of Wessex for supremacy
over Britain. The task which had baffled the energies of Eadwine
and Offa, and had proved too hard for the valour of Eadward and the
statesmanship of Dunstan, the task of uniting England finally into a
single nation, was now to pass to other hands.

\^Authi
ters. Tl
differ mu
garded
of a valu
Cnut see
rary biog
publishec
all matte
He is, h(
a laureati
elaborate
Danish ki
by Mr. G

?R1TA
the landi
of its cor
national
order, 1
the varic
effort of
foiled by
Wessex.
statesme
local ind
suprema<
lordship
But whai
rule mig
Dane fn
country ]

Throui
/Ethelre(
mandy t(
Denmarl
kings fn

n.]

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

give
hthe

CHAPTER II.
ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

1013-ia04.
Section I.— The Danish Kings.

[Authorities. — We are still aided by the collections of royal laws and char-
ters. The English Chronicle is here of great importance ; its various copies
differ much in tone, &c., from one another, and may to some extent be re-
garded as distinct works. Florence of Worcester is probably the translator
of a valuable copy of the Chronicle which has disappeared. For the reign of
Cnut see Green's "Conquest of England." The authority of the contempo-
rary biographer of Eadward (in Luard's " Lives of Eadward the Confessor,"
published by the Master of the Rolls) is "primary," says Mr. Freeman, "for
all matters strictly personal to the King and the whole family of Godwine.
He is, however, very distinctly not an historian, but a biographer, sometimes
a laureate." All modern accounts of this reign have been superseded by the
elaborate history of Mr. Freeman ("Norman Conquest," vol. ii.) For the
Danish kings and the House of Godwine, see the " Conquest of England,"
by Mr. Green.]

Britain had become England in the five hundred years that followed
the landing of Hengest, and its conquest had ended in the settlement
of its conquerors, in their conversion to Christianity, in the birth of a
national literature, of an imperfect civilization, of a rough political
order. But through the whole of this earlier age every attempt to fuse
the various tribes of conquerors into a single nation had failed. The
effort of Northumbria to extend her rule over all England had been
foiled by the resistance of Mercia ; that of Mercia by the resistance of
Wessex. Wessex herself, even under the guidance of great kings and
statesmen, had no sooner reduced the country to a seeming unity than
local independence rose again at the call of the Danes. The tide of
supremacy rolled in fact backwards and forwards ; now the South won
lordship over the North, now the North won lordship over the South.
But whatever titles kings might assume, or however imposing their
rule might appear, Northumbrian remained apart from West-Saxon,
Dane from Englishman. A common national sympathy held the
country roughly together, but a real national union had yet to come.

Through the two hundred years that lie between the flight of
i^Lthelred from England to Normandy and that of John from Nor-
mandy to England our story is a story of foreign rule. Kings from
Denmark were succeeded by kings from Normandy, and these by
kings from Anjou. Under Dane, Norman, or Angevin, Englishmen

The

foreign

rule

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. I.

The
Danish
Kings

1013

1042

»'f

Our
Danish

were a subject race, .onquered and ruled by foreign masters ; and
yet it was in these > ears of subjection that England first became really
England. Provincial differences were crushed into national unity by
the pressure of the stranger. The same pressure redressed the wrong
which had been done to the fabric of national society by the degrada-
tion of the free landowner at the close of the preceding age into a
feudal dependent on his lord. The English lords themselves sank
into a middle class as they were pushed from their place by the foreign
baronage who settled on English soil ; and this change was accom-
panied by a gradual elevation of the class of servile and semi-servile
cultivators which gradually lifted them into almost complete freedom.
The middle-class which was thus created was reinforced by the up-
growth of a corresponding class in our towns. Commerce and trade
were promoted by the justice and policy of the foreign kings ; and
with their advance rose the political importance of the trader. The
boroughs of England, which at the opening of this period were for the
most part mere villages, were rich enough at its close to buy liberty
frrm the Crown. Rights of self-government, of free speech, of common
deliberation, which had passed from the people at large into the hands
of its nobles, revived in the charters and councils of the towns. A
moral revival followed hard on this political developement. The occu-
pation of every see and abbacy by strangers who could only speak to
their flocks in an unknown tongue had severed the higher clergy from
the lower priesthood and the people ; but religion became a living
thing as it passed to the people themselves, and hermit and friar
carried spiritual life home to the heart of the nation at large. At the
same time the close connexion with the Continent which foreign con-
quest brought about secured for England a new communion with the
artistic and intellectual life of the world without her. The old mental
stagnation was broken up, and art and literature covered England
with great buildings and busy schools. Time for this varied progress
was gained by the long peace which England owed to the firm
government of her Kings, while their political ability gave her adminis-
trative order, and their judicial reforms built up the fabric of her law.
In a word, it is to the stern discipline of these two hundred years that we
owe not merely English wealth and ^ nglish freedom, but England itself.
The first of our foreign masters was the Dane. The countries of
Scandinavia which had so long been the mere starting-points of the
pirate-bands who had ravaged England and Ireland had now settled
down into comparative order. It was the aim of Swein to unite them
in a great Scandinavian Empire, of which England should be the head ;
and this project, interrupted for a time by his death, was resumed with
yet greater vigour by his son Cnut. Fear of the Dane was still great in
the land, and Cnut had no sooner appeared off the English coast than
Wessex, Mercia, and Northumberland joined in owning him for their

II.]

lord,

on th^

son Ei

to struj

victor

realm.

that tl

little fil

tenure

but as

necessc

the arr

Denmaj

Danish

or hus-<

support

secured

oblitera

blood sh(

startling

England

the guil<

govermr

had give

signal ; j

side, whi

by his r

suddenly

fell back

owned n(

and Engl

Northum

independ

the rulers

fied him£

The Chui

but Cnut

cause for

bishop's

costly gifi

against tl

in the sor

" Merrily

the vast

near the 1

n.]

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

friar
it the
con-
Ih the
lental
fland
[gress
firm
linis-
law.
It we
Itself,
is of
the
kttled
them
lead ;
Iwith
lat in
Ithan
their

lord, and in discarding again the rule of yEthelred, who had returned
on the death of Swein. When yEthelred's death in 1016 raised his
son Eadmund Ironside to the throne, th t loyalty of London enabled him
to struggle bravely for a few months against the Danes ; but a decisive
victory at Assandun and the death of his rival left Cnut master of the
realm. Conqueror as he was, the Dane was no foreigner in the sense
that the N6rman was a foreigner after him. His language differed
little from the English tongue. He brought in no new system of
tenure or government. Cnut ruled, in fact, not as a foreign conqueror
but as a native king. The goodwill and tranquillity of England were
necessary for the success of his larger schemes in the north, where
the arms of his English subjects aided him in later years in uniting
Denmark and Norway beneath his sway. Dismissing therefore his
Danish " host,^' and retaining only a trained body of household troops
or hus-carls to serve in sudden emergencies, Cnut boldly relied for
support within his realm on the justice and good government he
secured it. His aim during twenty years seems to have been to
obliterate from men's minds the foreign character of his rule, and the
bloodshed in which it had begun. The change in himself was as
startling as the change in his policy. When he first appears in
England, it is as the mere northman, passionate, revengeful, uniting
the guile of the savage with his thirst for blood. His first acts of
government were a series of murders. Eadric of Mercia, whose aid
had given him the crown, was felled by an axe-blow at the King's
signal ; a murder removed Eadwig, the brother of Eadmund Iron-
side, while the children of Eadmund were hunted even into Hungary
by his ruthless hate. But from a savage such as this Cnut rose
suddenly into a wise and temperate king. Stranger as he was, he
fell back on " Eadgar's law," on the old constitution of the realm, and
owned no difference between conqueror and conquered, between Dane
and Englishman. By the creation of four earldoms, those of Mercia,
Northumberland, Wessex, and East Anglia, he recognized provincial
independence, but he drew closer than of old the ties which bound
the rulers of these great dependencies to the Crown. He even identi-
fied himself with the patriotism which had withstood the stranger.
The Church had been the centre of national resistance to the Dane,
but Cnut sought above all its friendship. He paid homage to the
cause for which iElfheah had died, by his translation of the Arch-
bishop's body to Canterbury. He atoned for his father's ravages by
costly gifts to the religious houses. He protected English pilgrims
against the robber-lords of the Alps. His love for monks broke out
in the song which he composed as he listened to their chant at Ely :
" Merrily sang the monks in Ely when Cnut King rowed by " across
the vast fen-waters that surrounded their abbey. " Row, boatmen,
near the land, and hear we these monks sing."

Sec. I.

The

Danish

Kings

1013

1042

Cnut

IO16-IO35

1' i

'"'. ,

HISTORY OF TIIK RNGUSH PEOPLE.

[chap.

n.l

Six. I.

Thk

Danish

Kings

loia

104a

Enfland
at peace

III

Ciiut's letter from Rome to his English subjects marks the grandeur
of his character and the noble conception he had formed of kingship.
" I have vowed to God to lead a right life in all things," wrote the
King, "to rule justly and piously my realms and subjects, and to
administer just judgement to .ill. If heretofore I have done aught
beyond what was just, through headiness or negligence of youth, I am
ready with God's help to amend it utterly." No royal officer, either
for fear of the King or for favour of any, is to consent to injustice, none
is to do wrong to rich or poor " as they would value my friendship
and their own well-being." He especially denounces unfair exactions :
" I have no need that money be heaped together for me by unjust
demarvds." " I have sent this letter before me," Cnut ends, " that all
the people of my realm may rejoice in my well-doing ; for as you your-
selves know, never have I spared nor will I spare to spend myself and
my toil in what is needful and good for my people."

Cnut's greatest gift to his people was that of peace. With him
began the long internal tranquillity which was from this time to be
the special note of our national history. During two hundred years,
with the one terrible interval of the Norman Conquest, and the
disturbance under Stephen, England alone among the kingdoms of
Europe enjoyed unbroken repose. The wars of her Kings lay far
from her shores, in France or Normandy, or, as with Cnut, in the
more distant lands of the North. The stern justice of their government
secured order within. The absence of internal discontent under Cnut,
perhai>j too the exhaustion of the kingdom after the terrible Danish
inroads, is proved by its quiet during his periods of absence. Every-
thing witnesses to the growing wealth and prosperity of the country.
A great part of English soil was indeed still utterly uncultivated.
Wide reaches of land were covered with wood, thicket, and scrub ; or
consisted of heaths and moor. In both the ea€t and the west there
were vast tracts of marsh land ; fens nearly one hundred miles long
severed East Anglia from the midland counties ; sites like that of
Glastonbury or Athelney were almost inaccessible. The beaver still
haunted marshy hollows such as those which lay about Beverley, the
London craftsmen chased the wild boar and the wild ox in the woods
of Hampstead, while wolves prowled round the homesteads of the
North. But peace and the industry it encouraged were telling on this
waste ; stag and wolf were retreating before the face of man, the
farmer's axe was ringing in the forest, and villages were springing up
in the clearings. The growth of commerce was seen in the rich
trading-ports of the eastern coast. The main trade lay probably in
skins and ropes and ship masts ; and above all in the iron and steel
that the Scandinavian lands so long supplied to Britain. But Dane
and Norwegian were traders over a yet wider field than the northern
seas ; their barks entered the Mediterranean, while the overland rout^

throi

"Wli

dialo

"bes

and

Rhin

Than

[chap.

grandeur
kingship,
vrote the
s, and to
ne aught
uth, I am
er, either
tice, none
riendship
xactions :
by unjust
" that all
you your-
[ly self and

With him
ime to be
red years,
i, and the
igdoms of
gs lay far
mt, in the
wernment
ider Cnut,
e Danish
Every-
country,
ultivated.
scrub ; or
/est there
liles long
that of
aver still
erley, the
he woods
is of the
g on this
man, the
ging up
the rich
►bably in
,nd steel
ut Dane
orthern
4 rPUtQ

"•1

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

•r

through Russia brought the wares of Constantinople and the East.
"What do you bring to us ?" the merchant is asked in an old English
dialogue. " I bring skins, silks, costly gems, and gold," he answers,
"besides various garments, pigment, wine, oil, and ivory, with brass,
and copper, and tin, silver and gold, and such like." Men from the
Rhineland and from Normandy, too, moored their vessels along the
Thames, on whose rude wharves were piled a strange medley of goods :
pepper and spices from the far East, crates of gloves and gray cloths,
it may be from the Lombard looms, sacks of wool, iron-work from
Lidge, butts of French wine and vinegar, and with them the rural
products of the country itself— cheese, butter, lard, and eggs, with live
swine and fowls.

Cnut's one aim was to win the love of his people, and all tradition
shows how v/onderful was his success. But the greatness of his rule
hung solely on the greatness of his temper, and at his death the
empire he had built up at once fell to pieces. Denmark and England,
parted for a few years by the accession of his son Harald to the throne
of the last, were re-united under a second son, Harthacnut ; but the
love which Cnut's justice had won turned to hatred before the law-
lessness of his successors. The long peace sickened men of this
fresh outburst of bloodshed and violence. " Never was a bloodier
deed done in the land since the Danes came," ran the popular song,
when Harald's men seized ^Elfred, a brother of Eadmund Ironside,
who had returned to England from Normandy. Every tenth man was
killed, the rest sold for slaves, and -/Elfred himself blinded and left to
die at Ely. Harthacnut, more savage even than his predecessor, dug up
his brother's body and flung it into a marsh ; while a rising at Wor-
cester against his hus-carls was punished by the burning of the town
and the pillage of the shire. His death was no less brutal than his
life ; " he died as he stood at his drink in the house of Osgod Clapa
ai Lambeth." England wearied of kings like these : but their crimes
helped her to free herself from the impossible dream of Cnut. The
North, still more barbarous than herself, could give her no new element
of progress or civilization. It was the consciousness of this and the
hatred of such rulers as Harald and Harthacnut which co-operated
with the old feeling of reverence for the past in calling back the
line of /£lfred to the throne.

Section II.— The BnffUsh Restoration, 104>fl— 1066.

It is in such transitional moments of a nation's history that it
needs the cool prudence, the sensitive selfishness, the quick perception
of what is possible, which distinguished the adroit politician whom the
death of Cnut left supreme in England. Godwine is memorable in our

F 2

Skc. I.

The
Danish

KlNUS

1013

104a

Fall
of the
Danish

rule

Harald
1035-1039
Harthacnut
IO4O-IO42

GodwSne

'.i|

J i

TITSTORY OF THE ENGUSTI PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.

Thk
En<;i.ish

Kr.STllKA-
TION

104fl

loee

Badward
the Con-
fessor

1042- 1066

Fall of
Oodwlne

history as the first English statesman who was neither king nor priest.
Originally of obscure origin, his ability had raised him high in the
royal favour ; he was allied to Cnut by marriage, entrusted by him
with the earlJom of Wcssex, and at last made Viceroy or justiciar iti
the government of the realm. In the wars of Scandinavia he had
shown courage and skill at the head of a body of English troops who
supported Cnut, but his true field of action lay at home. Shrewd,
eloquent, an active administrator, Godwine united vigilance, industry,
and caution with a singular dexterity in the management of men.
During the troubled years that followed the death of Cnut he had done
his best to continue his master's policy in securing the internal union
of England under a Danish sovereign and in preserving her con-
nexion with the North. But at the death of Harthacnut Cnut's policy
had become impossible, and abandoning the Danish cause Godwine
drifted with the tide of popular feeling which called Eadward, the
son of ^.thelred, to the throne.

Eadward had lived from his youth in exile at the court of Normandy.
A halo of tenderness spread in after-time round this last King of the
old English stock ; legends told of his pious simplicity, his blitheness
and gentleness of mood, the holiness that gained him his name of
"Confessor" and enshrined him as a saint in his abbey-church at
Westminster. Gleemen sang in manlier tones of the long peace and
glories of his reign, how warriors and wise counsellors stood round his
throne, and Welsh and Scot and Briton obeyed him. His was the one
figure that stood out bright against the darkness when England lay
trodden under foot by Norman conquerors ; and so dear became his
memory that liberty and independence itself seemed incarnate in his
name. Instead of freedom, the subjects f William or Henry called for
the " good laws of Eadward the Confossor." But it was as a mere
shadow of the past that the exile really returned to the throne of
Alfred ; there was something shadow-like in the thin form, the delicate
complexion, the transparent womanly hands that contrasted with the
blue eyes and golden hair of his race ; and it is almost as a shadow
that he glides over the political stage. The work of government was
done by sterner hands. The King's weakness left Godwine master of
the realm, and he ruled firmly and wisely. Abandoning with reluctance
all interference in Scandinavian politics, he guarded England with a
fleet which cruised along the coast. Within, though the earldoms still
remained jealously independent, there were signs that a real political
unity was being slowly brought about. It was rather within than
without that Godwine's work had to be done, and that it was well
done was proved by the peace of the land.

Throughout Eadward's earlier reign England lay in the hands of its
three earls, Siward of Northumbria, Leofric of Mercia, and Godwine
of Wessex, and it seemed as if the old tendency to provincial separa-

tion wa

severant

or the a

the king

Thames

secured

lished ir

came fr

Leomins

of her hi

the realn

return to

the recor

indignati

branded

father wr

earldom.

alone in

King wa

with the

Norman

He set N

Strangers

against C

they vent

But the

Eadward

tunity. I

Boulogne

train in ]

foreigners

when the

the affron

men. Ea

widened i

marched

favourites

support.

forces to t

London I

with his

Flanders.

But the

were God^

England s

[CHAF.

priest,
in the
)y him
ciar iii
\e had
ps who
hrewd,
dustry,
f men.
id done
i union
;r COP'
5 policy
odwine
rd, the

mandy.
f of the
theness
lame of
urch at
ice and
und his
the one
and lay
ime his
e in his
lied for
a mere
one of
lelicate
ith the
shadow
;nt was
aster of
ictance
with a
ms still
olitical
n than
as well

n.]

KNGLAND UNDER FOREIC.N KINGS.

tion was to triumph with the death of Cnut. What hindered this
severance was the ambition of Godwinc. His whole mind seemed set
or the aggrandizement of his family. He had given his daughter to
the king as wife. His own earldom embraced all England south of
Thames. His son Harold was Earl of East Anglia ; his son Swein
secured an earldom in the west ; and his nephew Beorn was estab-
lished in central England. But the first blow to Godwine's power
came from the lawlessness of Swein. He seduced the abbess of
Leominster, sent her home again with a yet more outrageous demand
of her hand in marriage, and on the King's refusal to grant it fled from
the realm. Godwine's influence secured his pardon, but on his very
return to seek it Swein murdered his cousin Beorn, who had opposed
the reconciliation. He again fled to Flanders, and a storm of national
indignation followed him over sea. The meeting of the Wise Men
branded him as "nithing," the " utterly worthless," yet in a year his
father wrested a new pardon from the King and restored him to his
earldom. The scandalous inlawing of such a criminal left Godwine
alone in a struggle which soon arose with Eadward himself. The
King was a stranger in his realm, and his sympathies lay naturally
with the home and friends of his youth and exile. He spoke the
Norman tongue. He used in Norman fashion a seal for his charters.
He set Norman favourites in the highest posts of Church and State.
Strangers such as these, though hostile to the minister, were powerless
against Godwine's influence and ability, and when at a later time
they ventured to stand alone against him they fell without a blow.
But the general ill-will at Swein's inlawing enabled them to stir
Eadward to attack the Earl. A trivial quarrel brought the oppor-
tunity. On his return from a visit to the court Eustace Count of
Boulogne, the husband of the King's sister, demanded quarters for his
train in Dover. Strife arose, and many both of the burghers and
foreigners were slain. All Godwine's better nature withstood Eadward
when the King angrily bade him exact vengeance from the town for
the affront to his kinsman ; and he claimed a fair trial for the towns-
men. Eadward looked on his refusal as an outrage, and the quarrel
widened into open strife. Godwine at once gathered his forces and
marched upon Gloucester, demanding the expulsion of the foreign
favourites ; but even in a just quarrel the country was cold in his
support. The Earls of Mercia and Northumberland united their
forces to those of Eadward ; and in a gathering of the Wise Men at
London Swein's outlawry was renewed, while Ciodwine, declining
with his usual prudence a useless struggle, withdrew over-sea to
Flanders.

But the wrath of the- nation was appeased by his fall. Great as
were Godwine's faults, he was the one man who now stood between
England and the rule of the strangers who flocked to ^ the Court ; and

Sec. II.
The

1''. stW.ISH
Kl'.STOHA
TION

104fl

1006

£xi7e of
Godwine

105 1

i'«i

ii^ni

m it

v'.m

Sec. II.

The

English
Restora-
tion

1042

1066

1052

Earl
Harold

1053-1065

ii!|

Death of
EadTeard

fen, 1066

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

a year had hardly passed when at the appearance of his fleet in the
Thames Eadward was once more forced to yield. The foreign prelates
and bishops fled over-sea, outlawed by the same meeting of the Wise
Men which restored Godwine to his home. He returned only to die,
and the direction of affairs passed quietly to his son.

Harold came to power unfettered by the obstacles which had beset
his father, and for twelve years he was the actual governor of the
realm. The courage, the ability, the genius for administration, the
ambition and subtlety of Godwine were found again in his son. In the
internal government of England he followed out his father's policy
while avoiding its excesses. Peace was preserved, justice adminis-
tered, and the realm increased in wealth and prosperity. Its gold
work and embroidery became famous in the markets of Flanders and
France. Disturbances from without were crushed sternly and rapidly ;
Harold's military talents displayed themselves in a campaign against
Wales, and in the boldness and rapidity with which, arming his troops
with weapons adapted for mountain conflict, he penetrated to the heart
of its fastnesses and reduced the country to complete submission.
But it was a prosperity poor in the nobler elements of national activity,
and dead to the more vivid influences of spiritual life. Literature,
which on the Continent was kindling into a new activity, died down
in England into a few psalters and homilies. The few minsters
raised by king or earls contrasted strangely with the religious en-
thusiasm which was covering Normandy and the Rhineland with
stately buildings. The Church sank into lethargy. Stigand, the Arch-
bishop of Canterbury, was the adherent of an antipope, and the highest
dignity of the English Church was kept in a state of suspension. No
important ecclesiastical synod, no Church reform, broke the slumbers
of its clergy. Abroad Europe was waking to a new revival of litera-
ture, of art, of religion, but England was all but severed from the Con-
tinent. Like Godwine, Harold's energy seemed to devote itself wholly
to self-aggrandizement. With the gift of the Northumbrian earldom
on Siward's death to Harold's brother Tostig,all England, save a small
part of the older Mercia, lay in the hands of the house of (iodwine. As
the childless Eadward drew to the grave his minister drew closer and
closer to the throne. One obstacle after another was swept from his
path. A rev olt of the Northumbrians drove Tostig, hi-s most dangerous
opponent, to Flanders, and the Earl was able to win over the Mercian
house of Leofric to his cause by owning Morkere, the brother of ths
Mercian Earl Eadwine, as Tostig's successor. His aim was in fact
attained without a struggle, and the nobles and bishops who were
g.athered round the death-bed of the Confessor passed- quietly at once
from it to the election and coronation of Harold.

ii.J

[chap.

»et in the
I prelates
the Wise
ily to die,

had beset
or of the
ation, the
>n. In the
r's policy
adminis-
Its gold
nders and
i rapidly ;
jn against
his troops
» the heart
ibmission.
al activity,
Literature,
died down
r minsters
igious en-
land with
the Arch-
,e highest
ion. No
slumbers
of litera-
the Con-
elf wholly
earldom
e a small
wine. As
loser and
from his
langerous
Mercian
ler of ths
its in fact
^ho were
ly at once

n.J

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

Section III.— Normandy and the Normans, 912—1066.

[Authorities. — Dudo of S. Quentin, a verbose and confused writer, has pre-
served the earliest Norman traditions. His work is abridged an ^ continued by
William of Jumieges, a contemporary of the Conqueror, whose work forms the
base of the " Roman de Rou, composed by Wace in the time of Henry the
Second. The religious movement is best told by Ordericus Vitalis, a Norman
writer of the twelfth century, gossiping and confused, but full of v.iluable uifor-
mation. For Lanfranc see "Lanfranci Opera, ed. Giles," and the life in
Hook's "Archbishops of Canterbury." For Anselm see the admirable biogra-
phy by Dean Church. The general history of Normandy is told diffusely
but picturesquely by Sir F. Palgrave, "Normandy and England," more
accurately and succinctly by Mr. Freeman, " History of Norman Conquest,"
vols. i. and ii.]

The quiet of Harold's accession was at once broken by news of
danger from a land which, strange as it seemed then, was soon to
become almost a part of England itself. A walk through Normandy
teaches one more of the age of our history which we are about to
traverse than all the books in the world. The story of the Conquest
stands written in the stately vault of the minster at Caen which still
covers the tomb of the Conqueror. The name of each hamlet by the
roadside has its memories for English ears ; a fragment of castle wall
marks the home of the Bruce, a tiny little village preserves the name
of the Percy. The very look of the country and its people seem
familiar to us ; the peasant in his cap and blouse recalls the build and
features of the small English farmer ; the fields about Caen, with their
dense hedgerows, their elms, their apple-orchards, are the very picture
of an English country-side. On the windy heights around rise the square
grey keeps which Normandy handed on to the cliffs of Richmond
or the banks of Thames, while huge cathedrals lift themselves
over the red-tiled roofs of little market towns, the models of the
stately fabrics which superseded the lowlier churches of ^Elfred or
Dunstan.

Hrolf the Ganger, or Walker, a Norwegian and a pirate leader
like Guthrum or Hasting, had wrested the land on either side the
mouth of Seine from the French king, Charles the Simple, at the
moment when Alfred's children were beginning their conquest of the
English Danelaw. The treaty in which France purchased peace by
this cession of the coast was a close imitation of the peace of Wed-
more. Hrolf, like Guthrum, was baptized, received the king's daughter
in marriage, and became his vassal for the territory which now took
the name of " the Northman's land " or Normandy. But vassalage and
the new faith sat alike lightly on the pirate. No such ties of blood and
speech tended to unite the northman with the French among whom he
settled along the Seine as united him to the Englishmen among

Sec. III.
Normandy

AND THE

Normans
912

1066

Nor.
mandy

The
Norman
settle-
ment

Peace of

Clairsur-

F.pte

912

< I

11 ^ \ \

i t

i'".!

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.
Normandy

AND THE

Normans

9ia

1066

i CWUisa.
tion of
ii Nor.
I maady

945-996

Herlouiu

Bee

I Lanfranc at
I i 'bcc

\ 1045-1066

whom he settled along the Humber. William Longsword, the son
of Hrolf, though waver^g towards France and Christianity, remained
a northman in heart ; he called in a Danish colony to occupy his
conquest of the Cotentin, the peninsula which runs out from St.
Michael's Mount to the cliffs of Cherbourg, and reared his boy among
the northmen of Bayeux, where the Danish tongue and fashions most
stubbornly held their own. A heathen reaction followed his death,
and the bulk of the Normans, with the child Duke Richard, fell away
for the time from Christianity, while new pirate-fleets came swarm-
ing up the Seine. To the close of the century the whole people are
still " Pirates " to the French around them, their land the " Pirates'
land," their Duke the " Pirates' Duke."

Yet in the end the same forces which merged the Dane in the
Englishman told even more powerfully on the Dane in France. No
race has ever shown a greater power of absorbing all the nobler
characteristics of the peoples with whom they came in contact, or of
infusing their own energy into them. During the long reign of Duke
Richard the Fearless, the son of William Longsword, heathen Nor-
man pirates became French Christians, and feudal at heart. The
old Norse language lived only at Bayeux, and in a few local iLimes.
As the old northern freedom died silently away, the descendants of the
pirates became feudal nobles, and the " Pirates' land " sank into the
most loyal of the fiefs of France. The change of manners was accom-
panied by a change of faith, a change which bound the land where
heathendom had fought stubbornly for life to the cause of Christianity
and the Church. The Dukes were the first to be touched by the new
faith, but as the religious movement spread to the people it was wel-
comed with an almost passionate fanaticism. Every road was crowded
with pilgrims. Monasteries rose in every forest glade. Herlouin, a
knight of Brionne, sought shelter from the world in a little valley edged
in with woods of ash and elm, through which a beck or rivulet (to which
his house owed its after-name) runs down to the Risle. He was one
day busy building ;in oven with his own hands when a stranger greeted
him with " God save you ! " ** Are yoii a Lombard ? " asked the knight-
abbot, struck with the foreign look of the man. " I am," he replied :
and praying to be made a monk, the stranger fell down at the mouth of
the oven and kissed Herlouin's feet. The Lombard was Lanfranc of
Pavia, a scholar especially skilled in the traditions of the Roman law,
who had wandered across the Alps to found a school at Avra nches, and
was now drawn to a religious life by the fame of Herlouin's sanctity.
The religious impulse was a real one, but Lanfranc was destined to be
known rather as a great administrator and statesman than as a saint.
His teaching raised Bee in a few years into the most famous
school of Christendom : it was in fact the first wave of the intel-
lectual movement which was spreading from Italy to the ruder

[chap.

the son
smained
:upy his
from St.
f among
ns most
s death,
ell away
! swarm-
ople are
'Pirates'

le in the
;e. No
e nobler
LCt, or of
of Duke
len Nor-
•t. The
il names.
Its of the
into the
s accom-
id where
ristianity
the new
vas wel-
crowded
rlouin, a
;y edged
o which
Iwas one
[ greeted
knight-
|:eplied :
louth of
Ifranc of
^an law,
les, and
lanctity.
Id to be
saint.
Ifamous
intel-
ruder

II.]

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

countries of the West. The whole mental activity of the time seemed
concentrated in the group of scholars who gathered round him ; the
fabric of the canon law and of mediaeval scholasticism, with the philo-
sophical scepticism which first awoke under its influence, all trace their
origin to Bee.

The most famous of these scholars was Anselm of Aosta, an Italian
like Lanfranc himself, and who was soon to succeed him as Prior and
teacher at Bee. Friends as they were, no two men could be more
strangely unlike. Anselm had grown to manhood in the quiet solitude
of his mountain-valley, a tender-ncarted poet-dreamer, with a soul
pure as the Alpine snows -^bove him, and an intelligence keen and
clear as the mountain air. The whole temper of the man was painted
in a dream of his youth. It seemed to him as though heaven lay, a
stately palace, amid the gleaming hill-peaks, while the women reaping
in the corn-fields of the valley became harvest-maidens of its heavenly
King. They reaped idly, and Anselm, grieved at their sloth, hastily
climbed the mountain-side to accuse them to their lord. As he
reached the palace the King's voice called him to his feet, and he
poured forth his tale ; then at the royal bidding bread of an unearthly
whiteness was set before him, and he ate and was refreshed. The dream
passed with the morning ; but the sense of heaven's nearness to earth,
the fervid loyalty to the service of his Lord, the tender restfulness
and peace in the Divine presence which it reflected became the
life of Anselm. Wandering like other Italian scholars to Normandy,
he became a monk under Lanfranc, and op his teacher's removal to
higher duties succeeded him in the direction of the Abbey of Bee. No
teacher has ever thrown a greater spirit of love into his toil. " Force
your scholars to improve ! " he burst out to another teacher who relied
on blows and compulsion " Did you ever see a craftsman fashion a
fair image out of a golden plate by blows alone ? Does he not now
gently press it and strike it with his tools, now with wise art yet more
gently raise and shape it ? What do your scholars turn into under
this ceaseless beating?" "They turn only brutal," was the reply.
" You have bad luck," was the keen answer, " in a training that only
turns men into beasts." The worst natures softened before this ten-
derness and patience. Even the Conqueror, so harsh and terrible
to others, became another man, gracious and easy of speech, with
Anselm.

But amidst his absorbing cares as a teacher, the Prior of Bee found
time for philosophical speculations, to which we owe the great scientific
inquiries which built up the theology of the middle ages. His famous
works were the first attempts of any Christian thinker to elicit the idea
of God from the very nature of the human reason. His passion for
abstruse thought robbed him of food and sleep. Sometimes he could
hardly pray. Often the night was a long watch till he could seizo his

Sec. III.
Normandy

AND THE

Normans

1066
Anselm

I i!

1060

i ^ A

Im { n

v>?

L-W

-t'

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

I ,

Sec. IV.

i The

i Conqueror

io4a

!; TO

1066

ijii The Con-
•i qaestB of
ji the Nor-
mans

William
of Nor-
mandy

conception and write it on the wax tablets which lay beside him. But
not even a fever of intense thought such as this could draw Anselm's
heart from its passionate tenderness and love. Sick monks in the
infirmary could relish no drink save the juice which his hand had
squeezed for them from the grape-bunch. In the later days of his
archbishoprick a hare chased by the hounds took refuge under his
horse, and his voice grew loud as he forbade a huntsman to stir in the
chase while the creature darted off again to the woods. Even the
greed of lands for the Church to which so many religious men yielded
found its characteristic rebuke, as the battling lawyers saw Anselm
quietly close his eyes in court and go peacefully to sleep.

Section IV.— The Conqueror, 104fl— 1066.

[Authorities. — Primarily the **Gesta Willelmi" of his chaplain, William of
Poitiers, a violent partizan of the Duke. William of Jumi^ges is here a contem-
porary, and of great value. Orderic and Wace, with the other riming chronicle
of Benoit de Sainte-More, come in the second place. For the invasion and
Senlac we have, in addition, the contemporary '* Carmen de Bello Hastingensi,"
by Guy, Bishop of Amiens, and the invaluable pictures of the Bayeux Tapestry.
The English accounts are most meagre. The invasion and battle of Senlac
are the subject of Mr. Freeman's third volume {'* Hist, of Norman Conquest ").]

It was not this new fervour of faith only which drove Norman
pilgrims in flocks to the shrines of Italy and the Holy Land. The old
northern spirit of adventure turned the pilgrims into Crusaders, and
the flower of N orman knighthood, impatient of the stern rule of their
Dukes, followed Roger de Toesny against the Moslem of Spain, or
enlisted under the banner of the Greeks in their war with the Arabs
who had conquered Sicily. The Normans became conquerors under
Robert Guiscard, a knight who had left his home in the Cotentin with
a single follower, but whose valour and wisdom soon placed him at the
head of his fellow-soldiers in Italy. Attacking the Greeks, whom they
had hitherto served, the Norman knights wrested Apulia from them in
an overthrow at Cannae, Guiscard himself led them to the conquest of
Calabria and the great trading cities of the coast, while thirty years ot
warfare gave Sicily to the followers of his brother Roger. The two
conquests were united under a line of princes to whose munificence art
owes the splendour of Palermo and Monreale, and literature the first
outburst of Italian song. Normandy, still seething with vigorous life,
was stirred to greed and enterprize by this plunder of the South, and
the rumour of Guiscard's exploits roused into more ardent life the
daring ambition of its Duke.

William the Great, as men of his own day styled him, William the
Conqueror, as by one event he stamped himself on our history was
now Duke of Normandy. The full grandeur of his indomitable will.

hisl
out!
Buf

[chap.

n. But
inselm's
5 in the
ind had
s of his
ider his
Ir in the
ven the
yielded
Anselm

/illiam of
I contem-
chronicle
asion and
tingensi,"
Tapestry,
of Senlac
quest").]

[Norman

The old

ers, and

of their

pain, or

e Arabs

s under

tin with

n at the

)m they

them in

^uest of

rears ol

'he two

jnce art

:he first

)us life,

th, and

ife the

im the
ry was
|le will,

n.]

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

his large and patient statesmanship, the loftiness of aim which lifts him
out of the petty incidents of his age, were as yet only partly disclosed.
But there never was a moment from his boyhood when he was not
among the greatest of men. His life was one long mastering of diffi-
culty after difficulty. The shame of his birth remained in his name of
"the Bastard." His father, Duke Robert, had seen Arlotta, the
daughter of a tanner of the town, washing her linen in the little brook
by Falaise, and loving her had made her the mother of his boy.
Robert's departure on a pilgrimage from which he never returned left
William a child-ruler among the most turbulent baronage in Christen-
dom, and treason and anarchy surrounded him as he grew to manhood.
Disorder broke at last into open revolt. Surprised in his hunting-seat
at Valognes by the rising of the Bessin and Cotentin districts, in which
the pirate temper and lawlessness lingered longest, William had only
time to dash through the fords of Vire with the rebels on his track. A
fierce combat of horse on the slopes of Val-fes-dunes, to the south-east-
ward of Caen, left him master of the duchy, and the old Scandinavian
Normandy yielded for ever to the new civilization which streamed in
with French alliances and the French tongue. William was himself a
type of the transition. In the young duke's character the old world
mingled strangely with the new, the pirate jostled roughly with the
statesman. William was the most terrible, as he was the last outcome
of the northern race. The very spirit of the " sea-wolves " who had so
long "lived on the pillage of the world" seemed embodied in his gigantic
form, his enormous strength, his savage countenance, his desperate
bravery, the fury of his wrath, the ruthlessness of his revenge. " No
knight under heaven," his enemies confessed, " was William's peer."
Boy as he was, horse and man went down before his lance at Val-es-
dunes. All the fierce gaiety of his nature broke out in the chivalrous
adventures of his youth, in his rout of fifteen Angevins with but five
soldiers at his back, in his defiant ride over the ground which Geoffry
Martel claimed from him, a ride with hawk on fist as though war and
the chase were one. No man could bend his bow. His mace crashed its
way through a ring of English warriors to the foot of the Standard.
He rose to his greatest heights in moments when other men despaired.
His voice rang out like a trumpet to rally his soldiers as they fled
before the English charge at Senlac. In his winter march on Chester
he strode afoot at the head of his fainting troops, and helped with his
own hands to clear a road through the snowdrifts. With the north-
man's daring broke out the northman's pitilessness. When the towns-
men of Alen^on hung raw hides along their walls in scorn of the
baseness of his birth, with cries of " Work for the Tanner ! " William
tore out his prisoners' eyes, cut off their hands and feet, and flung them
into the town. At the close of his greatest victory he refused Harold's
body a grave. Hundreds of Hampshire men were driven from their

Sec. IV.

The
Conqueror

1049

1066

1027

103s

1047

I'i*.

' 11

Sec. IV.

I The
Conqueror

io4>a

loee

IWilliam

I and
I France

1054

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

ii.l

homes to make him a hunting-ground, and his harrying of Northunv
bria left the north of England a desolate waste. Tliere is a grim, ruth-
less ring about his very jests. In his old age Philip of France mocked
at the Conqueror's unwieldy bulk and at the sickness which confined
him to his bed at Rouen. " King William has as long a lying-in,"
laughed his enemy, " cs a woman behind her curtains ! " " When I
get up," swore William, " I will go to mass in Philip's land, and bring
a rich offering for my churching. I will offer a thousand candles for
my fee. Flaming brands shall they be, and steel shall glitter over the
fire they make." At harvest-tide town and hamlet flaring into ashes
along the French border fulfilled the Conqueror's vow. There is the
same savage temper in the loneliness of his life. He recked little of
men's love or hate. His grim look, his pride, his silence, his wild out-
bursts of passion, spread terror through his court. " So stark and
fierce was he," says the English Chronicler, " that none dared resist
his will." His graciousness to Anselm only brought out into stronger
relief the general harshness of his tone. His very wrath was solitary.
" To no man spake he, and no man dared speak to him," when the
news reached him of Harold's accession to the throne. It was only
when he passed from the palace to the loneliness of the woods that
the King's temper unbent. " He loved the wild deer as though he
had been their father. Whosoever should slay hart or hind man
should blind him." Death itself took its colour from the savage soli-
tude of his life. Priests and nobles fled as the last breath left him,
and the Conqueror's body Uy naked and lonely on the floor.

It was the genius of William which lifted him out of this mere north-
man into a great general and a great statesman. The growth of the
Norman power was jealously watched by Geoffry Martel, the Count of
Anjou, and his influence succeeded in converting France from friend to
foe. The danger changed William at once from the chivalrous knight-
errant of Val-es-dunes into a wary strategist. As the French army
crossed the border he hung cautiously on its flanks, till a division
which had encamped in the little town of Mortemer had been surprised
and cut to pieces by his soldiers. A second division was still held at
bay by the duke himself, when Ralph de Toesny, climbing up into a
tree, shouted to them the news of their comrades' fall. " Up, up,
Frenchmen ! you sleep too long : go bury your friends that lie slain
at Mortemer." A second and more formidable invasion four years
later was met with the same cautious strategy. William hung on the
'' renchmen's flank, looking coolly on while town and abbey were
plundered, the Bessin ravaged, Caen sacked, and *lie invaders pre-
pared to cross the Dive at Varaville and carry fire and sword into the
rich land of Lisieux. But only half the army was over the river when
the Duke fell suddenly upon its rear. The fight raged till the rising of
the tide cut the French forces, as William had foreseen, hopelessly in

n.l

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

77 n

up,
>lain

two. Huddled together on a narrow causeway, swept by the Norman
arrows, knights, footmen, and baggage train were involved in the
same ruin. Not a man escaped, and the French king, who had
been forced to look on helplessly from the opposite bank, fled home
to die. The death of Geoffry Martel left William without a rival
among the princes of France. Maine, the border land between
Norman and Angevin, and which had for the last ten years been
held by Anjou, submitted without a struggle to his rule. Britanny,
which had joined the league of his foes, was reduced to submission by
a single march.

All this activity abroad was far from distracting the Duke's attention
from Normandv itself. It was hard to secure peace and order in a
land filled with turbulent robber-lords. "The Normans must be trodden
down and kept under foot," said one of their poets, " for he only who
bridles them may use them at his need." William " could never love
a robber." His stern protection of trader and peasant roused the
baronage through his first ten years to incessant revolt. His very
kinsfolk headed the discontent, and summoned the French king to
their aid. But the victories of Mortemer and Varaville left the rebels
at his mercy. Some rotted in his dungeons, some were driven into
exile, and joined the conquerors of Apulia and Sicily. The land
settled down into peace and order, and William turned to the reform
of the Church. Malger, the Archbishop of Rouen, a mere hunting and
feasting prelate, was summarily deposed, and his place filled by
Maurilius, a French ecclesiastic of piety and learning. Frequent
councils under the Duke's guidance amended the morals of the clergy.
The school of Bee, as we have seen, had become a centre of educa-
tion ; and William, with the keen insight into men which formed so
marked a feature in his genius, selected its prior as his chief adviser.
In a strife with the Papacy which the Duke had provoked by his
marriage with Matilda of Flanders, Lanfranc took the side of Rome,
and his opposition had been punished by a sentence of banishment.
The Prior set out on a lame horse, the only one his house could afford,
and was overtaken by the Duke, impatient that he should quit Nor-
mandy. " Give me a better horse and I shall go the quicker," replied
the imperturbable Lombard, and the Duke's wrath passed into laughter
and good-will. From that hour Lanfranc became his minister and
counsellor, whether for affairs in the duchy itself or for the more
daring schemes of ambition which were opened up to him by the
position of England.

For half a century the two countries had been drawing nearer
together. At the close of the reign of Richard the Fearless the
Danish descents upon the English coast had found support in Nor-
mandy, and their fleet had wintered in her ports. It was to revenge
these attacks that iEthelred had despatched a fleet across the Channel

Sec. IV.

The

conqueroi •

1042

loae

1060

t :v1

WiUiMD

and Nof^
muidj

t v^,

■Mr> J

Bnffluul

and
the Nor-
mals

•I -'i

Hi fl

/.' !

1 1.

' t-

■1

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

105 1

1066

Th« ere

of the

■trovvle

to ravage the Cotentin, but the fleet was repulsed, and the strife
appeased by iEthelred's marriage with Emma, a sister of Richard the
Good, ^thelred with his children found shelter in Normandy from
the Danish kings, and, if Norman accounts are to be trusted, contrary
winds alone prevented a Norman fleet from undertaking their restora-
tion. The peaceful recall of Eadward to the throne seemed to open
England to Norman ambition, and Godwine was no sooner banished
than Duke William appeared at the English court, and received, as
he afterwards asserted, a promise of succession to its throne from the
King. Such a promise, unconfirmed by the national assembly of the
Wise Men, was utterly valueless, and for the moment Godwine's recall
put an end to William's hopes. They are said to have been revived
by a storm which threw Harold, while cruising in the Channel, on the
French coast, and William forced him to swear on the relics of
saints to support the Duke's claim as the price of his own return to
England : but the news of the King's death was at once followed by
that of Harold's accession, and after a burst of furious passion the
Duke prepared to enforce his claim by arms. Wi!liaiu did not claim
the Crown. He claimed simply the right which he afterwards used
when his sword had won it, of presenting himself for election by the
nation, and he believed himself entitled so to present himself by the
direct commendation of the Confessor. The actual election of Harold
which stood in his v/ay, hurried as it was, he did not recognize as
valid. But with this constitutional claim was inextricably mingled his
resentment at the private wrong which Harold had done him, and a
resolve to exact vengeance on the man whom he regarded as untrue
to his oath.

The difiiculties in the way of his enterprise were indeed enormous.
He could reckon on no support within England itself. At home he
had to extort the consent of his own reluctant baronage ; to gather a
motley host from every quarter of France, and to keep it together
for months ; to create a fleet, to cut down the very trees, to build,
to launch, to man the vessels ; and to find time amidst all this for the
common business of government, for negotiations with Denmark and
the Empire, with France, Britanny, and Anjou, with Flanders and with
Rome. His rival's difficulties were hardly less than his own. Harold
was threatened with invasion not only by William but by his brother
Tostig, who had taken refuge in Norway and secured the aid of its
king, Harald Hardrada. The fleet and army he had gathered lay
watching for months along the coast. His one standing force was his
body of hus-carls, but their numbers only enabled them to act as the
nucleus of an army. On the other hand the Land-fyrd, or general levy
of fighting-men, was a b^dy easy to raise for any single encounter, but
hard to keep together. To assemble such a force was to bring labour
to a standstill. The men gathered under the King's standard were the

11.]

farmei

vessel

becam

the tw

the re

Willia

flung

Kingh

invade

bourhc

host hi

off"Pev

ment.

drawin

to atta(

he was

himself

Willian

as that

His pos

forces.

starve

or ruin.

Along

men in I

It was fi

gathered

of Senla

exposed

men in :

Golden '.

the grou

flocked J

against 1

Norman

France i

charge

Taillefer

chaunte<

a blow, i

stout sto

with fier

was folk

the Duk

%ht tha

II.]

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

\ous.
le he

farmers and ploughmen of their fields. The ships were the fishing-
vessels of the coast. In September the task of holding them together
became impossible, but their dispersion had hardly taken place when
the two clouds which had so long been gathering burst at once upon
the realm. A change of wind released the landlocked armament of
William ; but before changing, the wind which prisoned the Duke had
flung the host of Harald Hardrada on the coast of Yorkshire. The
King hastened with his household troops to the north, and repulsed the
invaders in a decisive overthrow at Stamford Bridge, in the neigh-
bourhood of York ; but ere he could hurry back to London the Norman
host had crossed the sea, and William, who had anchored on the 28th
off Pevensey, was ravaging the coast to bring his rival to an engage-
ment. His merciless ravages succeeded, as they were intended, in
drawing Harold from London to the south ; but the King wisely refused
to attack with the forces he had hastily summoned to his banner. If
he was forced to give battle, he resolved to give it on ground he had
himself chosen, and advancing near enough to the coast to check
William's ravages, he entrenched himself on a hill known afterwards
as that of Senlac, a low spur of the Sussex Downs near Hastings.
His position covered London, and drove William to concentrate his
forces. With a host subsisting by pillage, to concentrate is to
starve ; and no alternative was left to William but a decisive victory
or ruin.

Along tue higher ground that leads from Hastings the Duke led his
men in the dim dawn of an October morning to the mound of Telham.
It was from this point that the Normans saw the host of the English
gathered thickly behind a rough trench and a stockade on the height
of Senlac. Marshy ground covered their right ; on the left, the most
exposed part of the position, the hus-carls or body-guard of Harold,
men in full armour and wielding huge axes, were grouped round the
Golden Dragon of Wessex and the Standard of the King. The rest of
the ground was covered by thick masses of half-armed rustics who had
flocked at Harold's summons to the fight with the stranger. It was
against the centre of this formidable position that William arrayed his
Norman knighthood, while the mercenary forces he had gathered in
France and Britanny were ordered to attack its flanks. A general
charge of the Norman foot opened the battle ; in front rode the minstrel
Taillefer, tossing his sword in the air and catching it again while he
chaunted the song of Roland. He was the first of the host who struck
a blow, and he was the first to fall. The charge broke vainly on the
stout stockade behind which the English warriors plied axe and javelin
with fierce cries of " Out, out," and the repulse of the Norman footmen
was followed by a repulse of the Norman horse. Again and again
the Duke rallied and led them to the fatal stockade. All t! e fury of
fight that glowed in his Norseman's blood, all the headlong valour

. '

Sec. IV.

The

Conqueror )

104fl f

TO i

loee f

1066 i

Sep. 28
1066

BatU* of I
••nlao

Oct. 14

\''.

t'lH

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

n.l

Sec. IV.

The

Conqueror

104a

loee

William

becomes

King

that had spurred him over the slopes of Val-ds-dunes, mingled that
day with the coolness of head, the dogged perseverance, the inex-
haustible faculty of resource which had shone at Mortemer and Vara-
ville. His Breton troops, entangled in the marshy ground on his left,
broke in disorder, and as panic spread through the army a cry
arose that the Duke was slain. " I live," shouted William, as he tore
off his helmet, " and by God's help will conquer yet." Maddened
by repulse, the Duke spurred right at the Standard ; unhorsed, his
terrible mace struck down Gyrth, the King's brother; again dismounted,
a blow from his hand hurled to the ground an unmannerly rider who
would not lend him his steed. Amidst the roar and tumult of the
battle he turned the flight he had arrested into the means of victory.
Broken as the stockade was by his desperate onset, the shield-wall of
the warriors behind it still held the Normans at bay till William by
a feint of flight drew a part of the English force from their post of
vantage. Turning on his disorderly pursuers, the Duke cut them to
pieces, broke through the abandoned line, and made himself master of
the central ground. Meanwhile the French and Bretons made good
their ascent on either flank. At three the hill seemed won, at six the
fight still raged around the Standard, where Harold's hus-carls stood
stubbornly at bay on a spot marked afterwards by the high altar of
Battle Abbey. An order from the Duke at last brought his archers to
the front, and their arrow-flight told heavily on the dense masses
crowded around the King. As the sun went down a shaft pierced
Harold's right eye ; he fell between the royal ensigns, and the battle
closed with a desperate melly over his corpse. While night covered
the flight of the English, the Conqueror pitched his tent on the very
spot where his rival had fallen, and " sate down to eat and drink
among the dead."

Securing Romney and Dover, the Duke marched by Canterbury
upon London. Faction and intrigue were doing his work for him as
he advanced. Harold's brothers had fallen with the King on the field
of Senlac, and there was none of the house of Godwine to contest the
crown ; while of the old royal line there remained but a single boy,
Eadgar the y^theling, son of the eldest of Eadmund Ironside's children,
who had fled before Cnut's persecution as far as Hungary for shelter.
Boy as he was, he was chosen king ; but the choice gave little strength
to the national cause. The widow of the Confessor surrendered
Winchester to the Duke. T he bishops gathered at London inclined to
submission. The citizens themselves faltered as William, passing by
their walls, gave Southwark to the flames. The throne of the boy-king
really rested for support on the Earls of Mercia and Northumbria,
Eadwine and Morkere ; and William, crossing the Thames at Walling-
ford and marching into Hertfordshire, threatened to cut them off from
their earldoms. The masterly movement brought about an instant

submi]
Londc
head
Duke.
" for nl
Dane, I
indeedl
into thl
a lawfil
of Arc]
Englislj
resistai
tion e>
ruling
greater
hardly
or the
stretch*
and ov
were ke
The pri
remains
archives
though i
adminis
tranquil
when W
of Bayei
to Norn

valuable
mary Enj
of the 141
settlemen
its chief i
northern
combinat
described
and Sel(
gives son
Mr. Free

It is r
his retui
queror."

n.]

ENGLAND UNDKR lOkKKlX KINGS.

submission. Eadwine and Morkere retreated hastily i.Duie from
London, and the city gave way at once. Eadgar himself was at the
head of the deputation who came to offer the crown to the Norman
Duke. "They bowed to him," says the English annalist pathetically,
" for need." They bowed to the Norman as they had bowed to the
Dane, and William accepted the crown in the spirit of Cnut. London
indeed was secured by the erection of a fortress which afterwards grew
into the Tower, but William desired to reign not as a conqueror but as '
a lawful king. He received the crown at Westminster from the hands
of Archbishop Ealdred, amidst shouts of " Yea, Yea," from his new
English subjects. Fines from the greater landowners atoned for a
resistance which was now counted as rebellion ; but with this excep-
tion every measure of the new sovereign indicated his desire of
ruling as a successor of Eadward or i^ilfred. As yet indeed the
greater part of England remained quietly aloof from him, and he can
hardly be said to have been recognized as king by Northumberland
or the greater part of Mercia. But to the east of a line which
stretched from Norwich to Dorsetshire his rule was unquestioned,
and over this portion he ruled as an English king. His soldiers
were kept in strict order. No change was made in law or custom.
The privileges of London were recognized by a royal writ which still
remains, the most venerable of its muniments, among the city's
archives. Peace and order were restored. William even attempted,
though in vain, to learn the English tongue that he might personally
administer justice to the suitors in his court. The kingdom seemed so
tranquil that only a few months had passed after the battle of Senlac
when William, leaving England in charge of his brother, Odo Bishop
of Bayeux, and his minister, William Fitz-Osbern, returned for a while
to Normandy. ,

Section v.— The Norman Conquest, 1068— 1071.

[Authorities. — The Norman writers as before, Orderic being particularly
valuable and detailed. The Chronicle md Florence of Worcester are the pri-
mary English authorities (for the so-caued " Ingulf of Croyland" is a forgery
of the 14th century). Domesday Book is of course indispensable for the Norman
settlement ; the introduction to it by Sir Henry Ellis gives a brief account of
its chief results. Among secondary authorities Simeon of Durham is useful for
northern matters, and William of Malmesbury valuable from his remarkable
combination of Norman and English feeling. The Norman Constitution is
described at length by Lingard, but best studied in the Constitutional History
and Select Charters of Dr. Stubbs. The "Anglia Judaica" of Toovey
gives some account of the Jewish colonies. Foi the history as a whole, see
Mr. Freeman's "Norma* Conquest," vol. iv.]

It is not to his victory at Senlac, but to the struggle which followed
his return from Normandy, that William owes his tit^e of the " Con-
queror." During his absence Bishop Odo's tyranny had forced the

Sel. IV.

The j

CuNQLEROK ^

104fl I

TO T

loee

C/in's/f/fiit
1066

r I

f I

The

national

revolt

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

II.]

Sec. V.

The

Norman

Conquest

loea

1071

1068

Kentishmen to seek aid from Count Eustace of Boulogne ; while the
Welsh princes supported a similar rising against Norman oppression
in the west. Hut as yet the bulk of the land held fairly to the new
king. Dover was saved from Eustace ; and the discontented fled over
sea to seek refuge in lands as far off as Constantinople, where English-
men from this time formed great part of the body-guard or Varangians
of the Eastern Emperors. William returned to take his place again
as an English King. It was with an English force that he subdued
a rising in the nouth-west led by Exeter, and it was at the head
of an English army that he completed his work by marching to the
North. His march brought Eadwine and Morkere again to submission ;
a fresh rising ended in the occupation of York, and England as far as
the Tees lay quietly at William's feet.

It was in fact only the national revolt of 1068 that transformed the
King into a Conqueror. The signal for this revolt came from without.
Swein, the king of Denmark, had for two years been preparing
to dispute England with the Norman, and on the appearance of his
fleet in the Humber all northern, all western and south-western England
rose as one man. Eadgar the iEtheling with a band of exiles who
had taken refuge in Scotland took the head of the Northumbrian
revolt ; in the south-west the men of Devon, Somerset, and Dorset
gathered to the sieges of Exeter and Montacute ; while a new Norman
castle at Shrewsbury alone bridled a rising in the west. So ably had
the revolt been planned that even William was taken by surprise.
The news of the loss of York and of the slaughter of three thousand
Normans who formed its garrison reached him as he was hunting in
the Forest of Dean ; and in a wild outburst of wrath the king swore
" by the splendour of God " to avenge himself on the North. But wrath
went hand in hand with the coolest statesmanship. WilHam saw clearly
that the cenlie of resistance lay in the Danish fleet, and pushing
rapidly to the Hximber with a handful of horsemen, he purchased by a
heavy bribe its inactivity and withdrawal. Then leaving York to the
last, William turned rapidly westward with the troops which gathered
round him, and swept the Welsh border as far as Shrewsbury, while
William Fitz-Osbern broke the rising round Exeter. His success set
the king free to fulfil his oath of vengeance on the North. After a long
delay before the flooded waters of the Aire he entered York, and
ravaged the whole country as far as the Tees with fire and sword.
Town and village were harried and burnt, their inhabitants slain or
driven over the Scotch border. The coast was especially wasted that
no hold might remain for any future invasion of the Danes. Harvest,
cattle, the very implements of husbandry were so mercilessly destroyed
that the famine which followed is said to have swept off" more than a
hundred thousand victims, and half a century later the land still lay
bare of cultire and. deserted of men for sixty miles northward of York.

The

crown.

[chap.

lile the
ression
le new
ed over
Inglish-
ingians
i again
ubdued
e head
to the
lission ;
,s far as

ned the
without,
eparing
z of his
England
lies who
ambrian
Dorset
Norman
ibly had
surprise,
lousand
inting in
[g swore
Lit wrath
clearly
pushing
ed by a
to the
athered
y, while
Icess set
r a long
|rk, and
sword,
ilain or
ed that
arvest,
stroyed
than a
|still lay
if York.

II.]

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

The work of vengeance was no sooner over than William led his
army back from the Tees to York, and thence lo Chester and the
West. Never had he shown the grandeur of his character so memor-
ably as in this terrible march. The winter was severe, the roads
choked with snowdrifts or broken by torrents ; provisions failed, and
the army, drenched with rain and forced to consume its horses for
food, broke out into open mutiny at the order to advance across the
bleak moorlands that part Yorkshire from the West. The merce
naries from Anjou and Britanny demanded their release from service,
and William granted their prayer with scorn. On foot, at the head of
the troops which remained faithful, the King forced his way by paths
inaccessible to horses, often aiding his men with his own hands to
clear the road. The last hopes of the Eiiglish ceased on his arrival
at Chester ; the King remained undisputed master of the conquered
country, and busied himself in the erection of numerous castles which
were henceforth to hold it in subjection. Two years passed quietly
ere the last act of the conquest was reached. By the withdrawal of
the Dane the hopes of England rested wholly on the aid it looked for
from Scotland, where 1 adgar the iCtheling had taken refuge, and
where his sister Margaret had become the wife of King Malcolm. It
was probably some assurance of Malcolm's aid which roused Eadwine
and Morkere to a new revolt, which was at once foiled by the vigilance
of the Conqueror. Eadwine fell in an obscure skirmish, while Morkere
found refuge for a time in the marshes of the eastern counties, where
a desperate band of patriots gathered round an outlawed leader,
Hereward. Nowhere had William found so stubborn a resistance ; but
a causeway two miles long was at last driven across the fens, and the
last hopes of English freedom died in the surrender of Ely. Malcolm
alone held out till the Conqueror summoned the whole host of the
crown, and crossing the Lowlands and the Forth penetrated into the
heart of Scotland. He had reached the Tay when the king's resistance
gave way, and Malcolm appeared in the English camp and swore fealty
at William' s feet.

The struggle which ended in the fens of Ely had wholly changed
William's position. He no longer held the land merely as elected king,
he added to his elective right the right of conquest. The system of
government which he originated was, in fact, the result of the double
character of his power. It represented neither the purely feudal system
of the Continent nor the system of the older English royalty. More
truly perhaps it may be said to have represented both. As the
successor of Eadward, William retained the judicial and administrative
organization of the older English realm. As the conqueror of England
he introduced the military organization of feudalism so far as was
necessary for the secure possession of his conquests. The ground
was already prepared for such an organization ; we lujve seen the

G 2

Sec. V.

Thk

Norman

CONyUKST

loea

1071

Last
struggle

of the

English

107 1

WilUam
and

Feudal-
ism

\ V

iir

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

II.]

Sec. V.

The

Norman
Conquest

1068

1071

beginnings of English feudalism in the warriors, the " connpanions " or
" thegns " who were personally attached to the king's war-band, and
received estates from the folk-land in reward for their personal
services. In later times this feudal distribution of estates had greatly
increased, as the bulk of the nobles followed the king's example and
bound their tenants to themselves by a similar process of subin-
feudation- On the other hand, the pure freeholders, the class which
formed the basis of the original English society, had been gradually
reduced in number, partly through imitation of the class above them,
but still more through the incessant wars and invasions which drove
them to seek protectors among the thegns at the cost of their indepen-
dence. Feudalism, in fact, was superseding the older freedom in
England even before the reign of William, as it had already superseded
it in Germany or France. But the tendency was quickened and inten-
sified by the Conquest ; the desperate and universal resistance of his
English subjects forced William to hold by the swoj d what the sword
had won, and an army strong enough to crush at any moment a
national revolt was necessary for the preservation of his throne. Such
an army could only be maintained by a vast confiscation of the soil.
The failure of the English risings cleared the way rbr its establish-
ment ; the greater part of the higher nobility fell in battle or fled into
exile, while the lower thegnhood either forfeited the whole of their
lands or redeemed a portion of them by the surrendei- of the rest. W^e
see the completeness of the confiscation in the vast estates which
William was enabled to grant to his more powerful followers. Two
hundred manors in Kent, with an equal number elsewhere, rewarded
the services of his brother Cdo. and grants almost as large fell to
William's counsellors, Fitz-Osbern and Montgomery, or to barons like
the Mc'vbrays and the Clares. But the poorest soldier of fortune
found his part in the spoil. The meanest Norman rose to wealth and
power in the new dominion of his lord. Great or small, however,
each estate thus granted was granted on condition of its holder's
service at the king's call ; and when the larger holdings were divided
by their owners into smaller sub-tenancies, the under-tenants were
bound by the same conditions of service to their lord. " Hear, my
lord," swore the feudal dependant, ; s kneeling without arms and bare-
headed he placed his hands within those of his superior : " I become
liege man of yours for life and limb and earthly regard, and I will keep
faith and loyalty to you for life and death, God help me." The kiss of
his lord invested him with land or "fief" to descend to him and his
heirs for ever. A whole army was by this means encamped upon the
soil, and William's summons could at any moment gather an over-
whelming force around his standard.

Such a force however, effective as it was against the conquered,
was hardly less formidable to the Crown itself. William u)und himself

[chap.

ns " or
d, and
jrsonal
greatly
)le and
subin-
which
adually
2 them,
1 drove
idepen-
iom in
erseded
d inten-
; of his
» sword
)ment a
;. Such
the soil,
jtablisli-
fled into
of their
;st. We
s which
Two
warded
fell to
Ions like
fortune
,1th and
|owever,
lolder's
[divided
its were
|ear, my
id bare-
Ibecome
^ill keep
: kiss of
land his
)on the
k,n over-

Iquered,
1 himself

II.]

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

fronted in his new realm by the feudal baron \ge whom he had so
hardly subdued to his will in Normandy, nobles impatient of law, as
jealous of the royal power, and as eager for unbridled military and
judicial independence within their own manors here as there. The
genius of the Conqueror was shown in his quick discernmenf of this
danger, and in the skill with which he met it. li^ availed himself of
the old legal constitution of the country to hold justice firmly in his own
hands. He retained the local courts of the hundred and the shire,
where every freeman had a place, while he subjected all to the juris-
diction of the King's Court, whic'- towards the close of the earlier
English monarchy had assuned the right of hearing appeals and of
calling up cases from any quarter to its bar. The authority of the
crown was maintained by the abolition of the great earldoms which
had overshadowed it, those of Wessex, Mercia, and Northumberland,
and by the royal nomination of sheriffs for the government of the
shires. Large as the estates he granted were, they were scattered over
the country in a way which made union between the landowners, or
the hereditary attachment of great masses of vassals to a separate lord,
equally impossible. In other countries a vassal owed fealty to his lord
against all foes, be they king or no. By a usage however which
William enacted, and which was peculiar to England, each sub-tenant,
in addition to his oath of fealty to his lord, swore fealty directly to the
Crown, and loyalty to the King was thus established as the supreme
and universal duty of all Englishmen. The feudal obligations, too,
the rights and dues owing from each esiate to the King, were enforced
with remarkable strictness. Each tenant was bound to appear if
needful thrice a year at the royal court, to pay a heavy fine or rent on
succession to his estate, to contribute an " aid " in money in case of
the King's capture in war, or the knighthood of the King's eid'jst son,
or the marriage of his eldest daughter. An heir who was still a minor
passed into the crown's wardship, and all profit from his estate went
for the time to the King. If the estate devolved upon an heiress, her
hand was at the King's disposal, and was generally sold to the highest
bidder. Over the whole face of the land most manors were burthened
with their own " customs," or special dues to the Crown : and it was
for the purpose of ascertaining and recording these that William sent
into each county the commissioners whose inquiries are preserved in
Domesday Book. A jury empanelled in each hundred declared on
oi»,th the extent and nature of each estate, the names, number, con-
dition of its inhabitants, its value before and after the Conquest, and
the sums due from it to the Crown.

William found another check on the aggressive spirit of the feudal
baronage in his organisation of the Church. One of his earliest acts
was to summon Lanfranc from Normandy to aid him in its reform; and
the deposition of Stigand, which raised Lanfranc to the see of Canter-

Sec. V.

The

Norman
Conquest

1068

1071

The

English

baronaire

'j'

The

Church

of the

Norman.'*

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAP.

11.]

Sec. V.

The

Norman
Conquest

1068

1071

Settle-

ment of

the Jews

bury, was followed by the removal of most of the English prelates and
abbots, and by the appointment jf Norman ecclesiastics in their place*
The new archbishop did much to restore discipline, and William's own
efforts were no doubt partly directed by a real desire for the rehgious
improvement of his realm. '*!n choosing abbots and bishops," says
a contemporary, " he considered not so much men's riches or power as
their holiness and wisdom. He called together bishops and abbots
and other wise counsellors in any vacancy, and by their advice inquired
very carefully who was the best and wisest man, as well in divine
things as in worldly, to rule the Church of God." But honest as they
were, the King's reforms tended directly to the increase of the royal
power. The new bishops and abbots were cut off by their foreign
origin from the flocks they ruled, while their popular influence was
lessened by the removal of ecclesiastical cases from shire or hun-
dred-court, where the bishop had sat side by side with the civil
magistrate, to the ^^eparate court of the bishop himself. The change
was pregnant with future trouble to the Crown ; but for the moment it
told mainly in removing the bishop from his traditional contact with
the popular assembly, and in effacing the memory of the original
equrxlity of the religious with the civil power. The dependence of
tlui Church on the royal power was strictly enforced. Homage was
exacted from bishop as from baron. No royal tenant could be excom-
municated without the King's leave. No synod could legislate without
his previous assent and subsequent confirmation of its decrees. No
papal letters could be received within the realm save by his permis-
sion. William firmly repudiated the claims which were now beginning
to be put forward by the court of Rome. When Gregory VII. called
on him to do fealty for his realm, the King sternly refused to admit
the claim. " Fealty I have nevir willed to do, nor do I will to do it
now. I have never promised it, nor do I find that my predecessors
did it to yours."

But the greatest safeguard of the crown lay in the wealth and
personal power of the kings. Extensive as had been his grants to
noble and soldier, William remained the greatest landowner in his
realm. His rigid exaction of feudal dues added wealth to the great
Hoard at Winchester, which had been begun by the spoil of the con-
quered. But William found a more ready source of revenue in the
settlement of the Jewish traders, who followed him from Normandy,
and who were enabled by the royal protection to establish themselves
in. separate quarters or " Jewries " of the chief towns of England. The
Jew had no right or citizenship in the land ; the Jewry in which he
lived was, like the King's forest, exempt from the common law. He
was simply the King's chattel, and his life and goods were absolutely
at the King's mercy. But he was too valuable a possession to be
lightly thrown away. A royal justiciary secured law to the Jewish

[CHAP.

tes and
r place*
n's own
eligious
5," says
lower as
I abbots
nquired
i divine
as they
tie royal
foreign
ice was
or hun-
he civil
I change
oment it
act with
original
ience of
lage was
excom-
i without
es. No
permis-
iginning
I. called
o admit
to do it
ecessors

II.]

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

merchant, who had no standing-ground in the local courts ; his bonds
were deposited for safety in a chamber of the royal palace at West-
minster ; he wa*? protected against the popular hatred in the free
exercise of his religion, and allowed to build synagogues and to direct
his own ecclesiastical affairs by means of a chief Rabbi. That the
presence of the Jew was, at least in the earlier years of his settlement,
beneficial to the kingdom at large there can be little doubt. His
arrival was the arrival of a capitalist ; and heavy as was the usury he
necessarily exacted in the general insecurity of the time, his loans gave
an impulse to industry such as England had never felt before. The
century which followed the Conquest witnessed an outburst of archi-
tectural energy which covered the land with castles and cathedrals ;
but castle and cathedral alike owed their existence to the loans of the
Jew. His own example gave a new direction to domestic architecture.
The buildings which, as at Lincoln and S. Edmundsbury, still retain
their title of "Jews' Houses" A^rere almost the first houses of stone
which superseded the mere hovels of the English burghers. Nor was
the influence of the Jews simply industrial. Through their connection
with the Jewish schools in Spain and the East they opened a way for
the revival of physical science. A Jewish medical school seems to
have existed at Oxford ; Roger Bacon himself studied under English
Rabbis. But to the kings the Jew was simply an engine of finance.
The wealth which his industry accumulated was wrung from him when-
ever the Crown had need, and tortui-e and imprisonment were resorted
to if milder entreaties failed. It was the gold of the Jew that filled
the royal exchequer at the outbreak of war or of revolt. It was in
the Hebrew coffers that the Norman kings found strength to hold their
baronage at bay.

Section VI.-The EnKlish Revival, 1071-1127.

[Authorities. — Orderic and the English chroniclers, as before. Eadmer, a
monk of Canterbury, in his " Historia Novorum " and his ** Life of Anselm,"
is the chief source of information for the reign of William the Second. William
of Malmesbury and Henry of Huntingdon "are both contemporary authorities
during that of Henry the First : the latter remains a brief but accurate annalist ;
the former is the leader of a new historic school, who treat English events as
part of the history of the world, and emulate classic models by a more philo-
sophical arrangement of their materials. See for then? the opening section of
the next chapter. On the early histoiy of our towns the reader may gain some-
thing from Mr. Thompson's "English Municipal History " (London, 1857);
more from the " Charter Rolls " (published by the Record Commissioners) ; for
S. Edmundsbury see " Chronicle of Jocelyn de Brakelond " (Camden Society).
The records of the Cistercian Abbeys of Yorkshire in " Dugdale's Monasticon,"
illustrate the religious revival. Henry's administration is admirably explained
for the first time by Dr. Stubbs in his ** Constitutional History."]

The Conquest was hardly over when the struggle between the
baronage and the Crown began. The wisdom of William's policy in

Sbc. v.

Thb

NORMAM

Conquest
1068

1071

% II

. : .i

W'i'. '■■ '!

WiUiun
and tbe
Barons

Sec. VI.

The

English
Revival

1071

1127

1075

The

English

and their

Kinffs

>o85

the destruction of the great earldoms which had overshadowed the
throne was shown in an attempt at their restoration made by Roger,
the son of his minister Wilham Fitz-Osbern, and by the Breton, Ralf
de Guader, whom the King had rewarded for his services at Senlac
with the earldom of Norfolk. The risiiig was quickly suppressed,
Roger thrown into prison, and Ralf driven over sea ; but the intrigues of
the baronage soon found another leader in William's half-brother, the
Bishop of Bayeux. Under pretence of aspiring by arms to the papacy,
Bishop Odo collected money and men, but the treasure was at once
seized by the royal officers, and the Bishop arrested in the midst of
the court. Even at the King's bidding no officer would venture to
seize on a prelate of the Church ; it was with his own hands that
William was forced to effect his arrest. " I arrest not the Bishop,
but the Earl of Kent," laughed the Conqueror, and Odo remained a
prisoner till W^illiam's death. It was in fact this vigorous personality
of William which proved the chief safeguard of his throne. " Stark
he was," says the English chronicler, " to men that withstood him.
Earls that did aught against his bidding he cast into bonds ; bishops
he stripped of their bishopricks, abbots of their abbacies. He spared
not his own brother : first he was in the land, but the King cast him
into bondage. If a man would live and hold his lands, need it were
that he followed the King's will." But stern as his rule was, it gave
peace to the land. Even amidst the sufferings which necessp "ily sprang
from the circumstances of the Conquest itself, from the erection of
castles, or the enclosure of forests, or the exactions which built up the
great hoard at Winchester, Englishmen were unable to forget "the
good peace he made in the land, so that a man might fare over his
realm with a bosom full of gold." Strange touches of a humanity
far in advance of his age contrasted with the general temper of his
government. One of the strongest traits in his character was his aver-
sion to shed blood by process of law ; he formally abolished the punish-
ment of death, and only a single execution stains the annals of his reign.
An edict yet more honourable to him put an end to the slave-trade
which had till then been carried on at the port of Bristol. The pitiless
warrior, the stern and aweful king was a tender and faithful husband,
an affectionate father. The lonely silence of his bearing broke into
gracious converse with pure and sacred souls like Anselm. If
William was " stark " to rebel and baron, men noted that he was
" mild to those that loved God."

In power as in renown the Conqueror towered high above his pre-
decessors on the throne. The fear of the Danes, which had so long
hung like a thunder-cloud over England, passed away before the host
which William gathered to meet a great armament assembled by King
Cnut. A mutiny dispersed the Danish fleet, and the murder of its
King removed all peril from the North. Scotland, already humbled by

[chap.

wed the
Roger,
3n, Ralf
: Senlac
pressed,
rigues of
her, the
papacy,
at once
midst of
iture to
ids that
Bishop,
lained a
rsonality
" Stark
>od him.
bishops
e spared
cast him
d it were
, it gave
ly sprang
»ction of
t up the
jet "the
over his
umanity
;r of his
lis aver-
punish-
is reign.
Ive-trade
pitiless
usband,
ike into
Im. If
he was

[his pre-
so long

the host
)y King

ir of its

Ibled by

H.]

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

William's invasion, was bridled by the erection of a strong fortress at
Newcastle-upon-Tyne ; and after penetrating with his army to the
heart of Wales, the King commenced its systematic reduction by
settling barons along its frontier. It was not till his closing years
that his unvarying success was disturbed by a rebellion of his son
Robert and a quarrel with France ; as he rode down the steep street
of Mantes, which he had given to the flames, his horse stumbled
among the embers, and William, flung heavily against his saddle, was
borne home to Rouen to die. The sound of the minster bell woke him
at dawn as he lay in the convent of St. Gervais, overlooking the city —
it was the hour of prime— and stretching out his hands in prayer the
Conqueror passed quietly away. With him passed the terror which
had held the ba^-onage in awe, while the severance of his dominions
roused their hopes of successful resistance to the stern rule beneath
which they had bowed. William bequeathed Normandy to his eldest
son Robert ; William, his second son, hastened with his father's
ring to England, where the influence of Lanfranc at once secured him
the c-own. The baronage seized the opportunity to rise in arms under
pretext of supporting the claims of Robert, whose weakness of character
gave full scope for the growth of feudal ind'^pendence, and Bishop Odo
placed himself at the head of the revolt. The new King was thrown
almost wholly on the loyalty of his English subjects. But the national
stamp which William had given to his kingship told at once. Bishop
Wulfstan of Worcester, the one surviving bishop of English blood,
defeated the insurgents in the West ; while the king, summoning the
freemen of country and town to his host under pain of being branded
as "nithing" or worthless, advanced with a large force against
Rochester, where the barons were concentrated. A plague which
broke out among the garrison forced them to capitulate, and as the
prisoners passed through the royal army, cries of " gallows and cord "
burst from the English ranks. At a later period of his reign a con-
spiracy was organized to place Stephen of Albemarle, a near cousin
of the royal house, upon the throne ; but the capture of Robert
Mowbray, the Earl of Northumberland, who had placed himself at its
head, and the imprisonment and exile of his fellow-conspirators, again
crushed the hopes of the baronage.

While the spirit of national patriotism rose to life again in this
struggle of the crown against the baronage, the boldness of a single
ecclesiastic revived a national opposition to the mere administrative
despotism which now pressed heavily on the land. If William the
Red inherited much of his father's energy as well as his policy towards
the conquered English, he inherited none of his moral grandeur. His
profligacy and extravagance soon exhausted the royal hoard, and the
death of Lanfranc left him free to fill it at the expense of the Church.
During the vacancy of a see or abbey its revenues went to the royal

Sec. VI.

The 1;
English •
Revival '

1071

1127

DeatJt of

the
Conqueror

1087

i:.r i-

V\-'m

The Bed , I
Kins and !
the
Church '

^ i)]

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Swc. VI.

The

English
Revival

1071

1187

Anseim

Archbishop

1093

England
' and
Henry
the First

Death of the
Red King

kftiiiii: 1 100

treasury, and so steadily did William refuse to appoint successors to
the prelates whom death removed, that at the close of his reign one
archbishoprick, four bishopricks, and eleven abbeys were found to be
without pastors. The see of Canterbury itself remained vacant cill a
dangerous illness frightened the king into the promotion of Anselm,
who happened at the time to be in England on the business of his
house. The Abbot of Bee was dragged to the royal couch and the
cross ibrced into his hands, but William had no sooner recovered from
his sickness than he found himself face to face with an opponent whose
meek and loving temper rose into firmness and grandeur when it
fronted the tyranny of the King- The Conquest, as we have seen, had
robbed the Church of all rxioral power as the representative of the
higher national interests against a brutal despotism by placing it in a
position of mere dependence on the crown ; and though the struggle
between William and the archbishop turned for the most part on
points which have no direct bearing on our history, the boldness of
Anselm's attitude not only broke the tradition of ecclesiastical servi-
tude, but infused through the nation at large a new spirit of indepen-
dence. The real character of the contest appears in the Primate's
answer, when his remonstrances against the lawless exactions from the
Church were met by a demand for a present on his own promotion, and
his first offer of five hundred pounds was contemptuously refused.
" Treat me as a free man," Anselm replied, " and I devote myself and
all that I have to your service, but if you treat me as a slave you shall
have neither me nor mine." A burst of the Red King's fury drove the
Archbishop from court, and he finally decided to quit the country, but
his example had not been lost, and the close of William's reign found
a new spirit of freedom in England with which the greatest of the
Conqueror's sons was glad to make terms.

As a soldier the Red King was little inferior to his father. Normandy
had been pledged to him by his brother Robert in exchange for a sum
which enabled the Duke to march in the first Crusade for the delivery
of the Holy Land, and a rebellion at Le Mans was subdued by the
fierce energy with which William flung himself at the news of it into
the first boat he found, and crossed the Channel in face of a storm.
" Kings never drown," he replied contemptuously to the remonstrances
of his followers. Homage was again wrested from Malcolm by a
march to the Firth of Forth, and the subsequent death of that king
threw Scotland into a disorder which enabled an army under Eadgar
iEtheling to establish Eadgar, the son of Margaret, as an English
feudatory on the throne. In Wales William was less triumphant, and
the terrible losses inflicted on the heavy Norman cavalry in ihe
fastnesses of Snowdon forced him to fai] back on the slower but wiser
policy of the Conqueror. Triumph and def'^at alike ended in a strange
and tragical close ; the Red King was found dead by peasants in a glade

[chap.

3ors to
gn one
ito be
it till a
Lnselm,

of his
ind the
id from
t whose
ivhen it
en, had
; of the

it in a
struggle
part on
Iness of
al servi-
ndepen-
rimate's
rom the
ion, and
refused,
[self and
ou shall
rove the
itry, but
n found
of the

»rnriandy
>r a sum
delivery
I by the
it into
storm,
strances
m by a
lat king
Eadgar
English
ant, and
in ihe
ut wiser
strange
a glade

n.]

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

of the New Forest, with the arrow either of a hunter or an assu.3:'i in
his breast. Robert was still on his return from the Holy Land, where
his bravery had rede*imed much of his earlier ill-fame, and the
English crown was at oice seized by his younger brother Henry, in
spite of the opposition of the baronage, who clung to the Duke of
Normandy and the union of their estates on both sides the Channel
under a single ruler. 1 heir attitude threw Henry, as it had thrown
Rufus, on the support of the English, and the two great measures
which followed his coronation, his grant of a charter, and his marriage
with Matilda, mark the new relation which was thus brought about
between the people and their King. Henry's Charter is important, not
merely as a direct precedent for the Great Charter of John, but as
the first limitation which had been imposed on the despotism esta-
blished by the Conquest. The " evil customs " by which the Red King
had enslaved and plundered the Church were explicitly renounced in
it, the unlimited demands made by both the Conqueror and his son on
the baronage exchanged for customary fees, while the rights of the
people itself, though recognized more vaguely, were not forgotten.
The barons were held to do justice to their under-tenants and to
renounce tyrannical exactions from them, the King promising to restore
order and the " law of Eadward," the old constitution of the realm,
with the changes which his father had introduced. His marriage gave
a significance to these promises which the meanest English peasant
could understand. Edith, or Matilda, was the daughter of King
Malcolm of Scotland and of Margaret, the sister of Eadgar -^^theling.
She had been brought up in the nunnery of Romsey by its abbess, her
aunt Christina, and the veil which she had taken there formed an
obstacle to her union with the King which was only removed by the
wisdom of Anselm. The Archbishop's recall had been one of Henry's
first acts after his accession, and Matilda appeared before his court to
tell her tale in words of passionate earnestness. She had been veiled
in her childhood, she asserted, only to save her from the insults of the
rude soldiery who infested the land, had flung the veil from her again
and again, and had yielded at last to the unwomanly taunts, the actual
blows of her aunt. "As often as I stood in her presence,^' the girl
pleaded, " I wore the veil, trembling as I wore it with indignation and
grief. But as soon as I could get out of her sight I used to snatch it
from my head, fling it on the ground, and trample it under foot. That
was the way, and none other, in which I was veiled. ' Anselm at once
declared her free from conventual bonds, and the shout of the English
multitude when he set the crown on Matilda's brow drowned the mur-
mur of Churchman or of baron. The taunts of the Norman nobles, who
nicknamed the King and his spouse " Godric and Godgifu," were lost
in the joy of the people at large. For the first time since the Conquest
^n Engli'-h sovereign sat on the English throne. The blood of Cerdic

Sec. VI.

The
English
Revival

1071

iia7

Henry's
Charter

Henry's
murriaze

!l.iw

oil!

\:V'M'i

I'r,

'It

I *

llf

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE,

[chap.

Sbc. VI.

The

I Encljsh
Revival

1071

1127

The

EnrliBh

towns

and i^lfred was to blend itself with that of Hrolf and the Conqueror.
Henceforth it was impossible that the two peoples should remain
parted from each other ; so quick indeed was their union that the
very name of Norman had passed away in half a century, and at
the accession of Henry's grandson it was impossible to distinguish
between the descendants of the conquerors and those of the con-
quered at Senlac.

We can dimly trace the progress of this blending of the two races
together in the case of the burgher population in the towns.

One immediate result of the Conquest had been a great immigration
into England from the Continent. A peaceful invasion of the indus-
trial and trading classes of Normandy folio vved quick on the conquest
of the Norman soldiery Every Norman noble as he quartered himself
upon English lands, every Norman ajbot as he entered his English
cloister, ^fathered French artists or French domestics around his new
castle or his new church. Around the Abbey of Battle, for instance,
which William had founded on the s't*^ of his great victory, " Gilbert
the Foreigner, Gilbert the Weaver, Benet the Steward, Hugh the
Secretary, Baldwin the Tailor," niixed with the English tenantry.
More especially was this the case with the c.tpital. Long before the
landing of William, the Normans had had mercantile establishments
in London. Such settlements however naturally formed nothing more
than a trading colony ; but London had no sooner submitted to the
Conqueror than " many of the citizens of Rouen and Caen passed over
thither, preferring to be dwellers in this city, inasmuch as it was fitter
for their trading and better stored with the merchandize in which they
were wont to traffic." In some cases, as at Norwich, the French colony
isolated itself in a separate French town, side by side with the English
borough. But in London it seems to have taken at once the position
of a governing class. Gilbert Beket, the father of the famous arch-
bishop, was believed in later days to have been one of the portreeves
of London, the predecessors of its mayors ; he held in Stephen's time
a large property in houses within the walls, and a proof of his civic
importance was preserved in the annual visi^ of each ne'vly-eUi.ted
chief magistrate to his tomb in the little chapel which he had founded
in the churchyard of S. Paul's. Yet Gilbert was one of the Norman
strangers who followed in the wake of the Conqueror ; he was by birth
a burgher of Rouen, as his wife was of a burgher fami'y uom Caen.

It was partly to this infusion of foreign blood, partly no doubt to the
long internal peace r»nd order secured by the Norman rule, that the
English towns owed the wealth and importance to which they attained
during the reign of Henry the First. In the silent growth and eleva-
tion of the English people the boroughs led the way : unnoticed and
despised by prelate and noble they had alone preserved or won back
again the full tradition of Teutonic liberty. The rights of self-govern-

ii.j

were
shop
in to^
in th(

[chap.

iqueror.
remain
that the
, and at
tinguish
the con-

,vo races

ligration
le indus-
:onquest
I himself
English
his new
instance,
" Gilbert
[ugh the
tenantry,
efore the
ishments
ing more
}d to the
sed over
vas fitter
lich they
colony
English
Dosition
us arch-
)rtreeves
in's time
lis civic
eltited
founded
Norman
by birth
Caen.
)t to the
that the
attained
d eleva-
ced and
Ion back
^govern-

ii.j

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

ment, of free speech in free meeting, of equal justice by one's equals,
were brought safely across the ages of tyranny by the burghers and
shopkeepers of the towns. In the quiet, quaintly -named streets,
in town-mead and market-place, in the lord's mill beside the stream,
in the bell that swung out its summons to the crowded borough-mote,
in merchant-gild and church-gild and craft-gild, lay the life of English-
men who were doing more than knight and baron to make England
what she is, the life of their home and their trade, of their sturdy
battle with oppression, their steady, ceaseless struggle for right and
freedom. It is difficult to trace the steps by which borough after
borough won its freedom. The bulk of them were situated in the
royal demesne, and, like other tenants, their customary rents were
collected and justice administered by a royal officer. Amongst our
towns London stood chief, and the charter which Henry granted it
became the model for the rest. The King yielded the citizens the right
of justice : every townsman could claim to be tried by his fellow-
townsmen in the town-court or hustings, whose sessions took place
every week. They were subject only to the old English trial by oath,
and exempt from the trial by battle which the Normans had intro-
duced. Their trade was protected from toll or exaction over the
length and breadth of the land. The King however still nominated in
London as elsewhere the portreeve, or magistrate of the town, nor
were the citizens as yet united together in a commune or corporation ;
but an imperfect civic organization existed in the " wards" or quarters
of the town, each governed by its own alderman, and in the "gikJs"
or voluntary associations of merchants or traders which ensured order
and mutual protection for their members. Loose too as these bonds
may seem, they were drawn firmly together by the older English tradi-
tions of freedom which the towns preserved. In London, for instance,
the burgesses gathered in town-mote when the bell swung out from
S. Paul's to deliberate freely on their own affairs under the presidency
of their aldermen. Here too they mustered in arms if danger
threatened the city, and delivered the city-banner to their captain, the
Norman baron Fitz-Walter, to lead them against the enemy. Few
boroughs had as yet attained to power such as this, but charter after
charter during Henry's reign raised the townsmen of boroughs from
mere traders, wholly at the mercy of their lord, into customary tenants,
who had purchased their freedom by a fixed rent, regulated their own
trade, and enjoyed exemption from all but their own justice.

The advance of towns which had grown up not on the royal domain
but around abbey or castle was slower and more difficult. The story
of S. Edmundsbury shows how gradual was the transition from pure
serfage to an imperfect freedom. Much that had been plough-land in
the time of the Confessor was covered with houses under the Norman
rule. The building of the great abbey-church drew its craftsmen and

S. Ed.

munds-

bury

f h

Sac. VI.

The

£nc;lish
Revival

1071

1187

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

masons to mingle with the ploughmen and reapers of the Abbot's
domain. The troubles of the time helped here as elsewhere the
progress of the town ; serfs, fugitives from justice or their lord, the
trader, the Jew, naturally sought shelter under the strong hand of
S. Edmund. But the settlers were wholly at the Abbot's mercy. Not
a settler but was bound to pay his pence to the Abbot's treasury, to
plough a rood of his land, to reap in his harvest-field, to fold his sheep
in the Abbey folds, to help bring the annual catch of eels from the
Abbey waters. Within the four crosses that bounded the Abbot's
domain land and water were his ; the cattle of the townsmen paid for
their pasture on the common ; if the fullers refused the loan of their
cloth, the cellarer would refuse the use of the stream, and seize their
cloths wherever he found them. No toll might be levied from tenants
of the Abbey farms, and customers had to wait before shop and
stall till the buyers of the Abbot had had the pick of the market.
There was little chance of redress, for if burghers complained in folk-
mote, it was before the Abbot's officers that its meeting was held ; if
they appealed to the alderman, he was the Abbot's nominee, and
received the horn, the symbol of his office, at the Abbot's hands.

Like all the greater revolutions of society, the advance from this mere
serfage was a silent one ; indeed its more galling instances of oppres-
sion seem to have slipped unconsciously away. Some, like the eel-
fishing, were commuted for an easy rent ; others, like the slavery of the
fullers and the toll of flax, simply disappeared. By usage, by omission,
by downright forgetfulness, here by a little struggle, there by a present
to a needy abbot, the town won freedom. But progress was not always
unconscious, and one incident in the hislory of S. Edmundsbury is
remarkable, not merely as indicating the advance of law, but yet
more a^ narking the part which a new moral sense of man's right
to equal justice was to play in the general advance of the realm.
Rude as the borough was, it had preserved its right of meeting in
full assembly of the townsmen for government and law. Justice was
administered in presence of the burgesses, and the accused acquitted
or condemned by the oath of his neighbours. Without the borough
bounds however the system of the Norman judicature prevailed ; and
the rural tenants who did suit and service at the Cellerar's court were
subject to the decision of the trial by battle. The execution of a farmer
named Ketel, who was subject to this feudal jurisdiction, brought the
two systems into vivid contrast. He seems to have been guiltless of
the crime laid to his charge, but the duel went against him, and he was
hanged just without the gates. The taunts of the townsmen woke his
fellow-farmers to a sense of wrong. " Had Ketel been a dweller within
the borough," said the burgesses, " he would have got his acquittal
from the oaths of his neighbours, as our liberty is ; " and even the
monks were moved to a decision that their tenants should enjoy equal

11.]

[ciiAr.

Abbot's
here the
lord, the
hand of
:y. Not
isury, to
lis sheep
from the
Abbot's
paid for
of their
lize their
1 tenants
hop and
I market,
i in folk-
held; if
nee, and
ids.

this mere

f oppres-

the eel-

»ry of the

)mission,

present

ot always

sbury is

but yet

n's right

realm.

eting in

tice was

cquitted

borough

ed ; and

urt were

a farmer

ught the

iltless of

d he was

I'ok.e his

IT within

icquittal

!ven the

)y equal

II.]

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

liberty and justice with the townsmen. The franchise of the town was
extended to the rural possessions of the Abbey without it ; the farmers
" came to the toll-house, were written in the alderman's roll, and paid
the town-penny."

The moral revolution which events like this indicate was backed by
a religious revival which forms a marked feature in the reign of Henry
the First. Pious, learned, and energetic as the bishops of William's
appointment had been, they were not Englishmen. Till the reign of
Henry the First no Englishman occupied an English see. In language,
in manner, in sympathy, the higher clergy were completely severed
from the lower priesthood and the people, and the severance went
far to paralyze the constitutional influence of the Church. Anselm stood
alone against Rufus, and when Anselm was gone no voice of eccle-
siastical freedom broke the silence of the reign of Henry the First.
But at the close of Henry's reign and throughout that of Stephen,
England was stirred by the first of those great religious movements
which it was afterv^rds to experience in the preaching of the Friars,
the Lollardism of Wyclif, the Reformation, the Puritan enthusiasm,
and the mission work of the Wesleys. Everywhere in town and
country men banded themselves together for prayer ; hermits flocked
to the woods ; noble and churl welcomed the austere Cistercians, a
reformed outshoot of the Benedictine order, as they spread over the
moors and forests of the North. A new spirit of devotion woke the
slumber of the religious houses, and penetrated alike to the home of
the noble Walter de I'Espec at Rievaulx, or of the trader Gilbert
Beket in Cheapside. London took its full share in the revival. The
city was proud of its religion, its thirteen conventual and more than a
hundred parochial churches. The new impulse changed its very
aspect. In the midst of the city Bishop Richard busied himself with
the vast cathedral church of S. Paul which Bishop Maurice had
begun ; barges came up the river with stone from Caen for the great
arches that moved the popular wonder, while street and lane were
being levelled to make space for its famous churchyard. Rahere, the
King's minstrel, raised the Priory of S. Bartholomew beside Smithfield.
Alfune built S. Giles's at Cripplegate. The old English Cnichtenagild
surrendered their soke of Aldgate as a site for the new priory of Holy
Trinity. The tale of this house paints admirably the temper of the
citizens at the time. Its founder, Prior Norman, had built church and
cloister and bought books and vestments in so liberal a fashion that at
last no money remained to buy bread. The canons were at their last
gasp when many of the city folk, looking into the refectory as they
paced round the cloister in their usual Sunday procession, saw the
tables laid but not a single loaf on them. " Here is a fine set-out,''
cried the citizens, "but where is the bread to come from?" The
women present vowed to bring a loaf every Sunday, and there was

Sec. VI.

English

4tJ

1^.1

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

Sbc. VI.

The

Engliah
Revival

1071

llfl7

Henry's
adminis-
tration

1105

i II'

[CIIAP.

II.J

soon bread enough and to spare for the priory and its priests. We
see the strength of the new movement in the new class of ecclesiastics
that it forced on the stage ; men like Anselm or John of Salisbury,
or the two great ^irelates who followed one another after Henry's
death in the see of Canterbury, Theobald and Thomas, drew what-
ever influence they wielded from a belief in their holiness of life and
unselfishness of aim. The paralysis of the Church ceased as the
new impulse bound the prelacy and people together, and its action,
when at the end of Henry's reign it started into a power strong
enough to save England from anarchy, has been felt in our history
ever since.

From this revival of English feeling Henry himself stood jealously
aloof; but the enthusiasm which his marriage had excited enabled
him to defy the claims of his brother and the disaffection of his
nobles. Robert landed at Portsmouth to find himself face to face
with an English army which Anselm's summons had gathered round
the King ; and his retreat left Henry free to deal sternly with the rebel
barons. Robert of Belesme, the son of Roger of Montgomery, was
now their chief -, but 60,000 English footmen followed the king
through the rough passes which led to Shrewsbury, and an early
surrender alone saved Robert's life. Master of his own realm and en-
riched by the confiscated lands of the revolted baronage, Henry crossed
into Normandy, where the misgovernment of Robert had alienated
the clergy and trades, and where the outrages of the Norman nobles
forced the more peaceful classes to call the King to their aid. On the
field of Tenchebray his forces met those of the Duke, and a decisive
English victory on Norman soil avenged the shame of Hastings. The
conquered duchy became a dependency of the English crown, and
Henry's energies were frittered away through a quarter of a century in
crushing its revolts, the hostility of the French, and the efforts of his
nephew, William the son of Robert, to regain the crown which his
father had lost at Tenchebray. In England, however, all was peace.
The vigorous administration of Henry the First completed in fullest
detail the system of government which the Conqueror had sketched.
The vast estates which had fallen to the crown through revolt and
forfeiture were granted out to new men dependent on royal favour.
On the ruins of the great feudatories whom he had crushed the King
built up a class of lesser nobles, whom the older barons of the Con-
quest looked down on in scorn, but who formed a counterbalancing
force and furnished a class of useful administrators whom Henry
employed as his sheriffs and judges. A new organization of justice
and finance bound the kingdom together under the royal administra-
tion. The clerks of the Royal Ch ^el were formed into a body of
secretaries or royal ministers, whose nead bore the title of Chancellor.
Above them stood the Justiciar, or lieutenant-general of the king-

[CHAP.

I. We

siastics
isbury,
lenry's
r what-
ife and

as the
action,

strong
history

ialously
enabled
of his
to face
i round
he rebel
sry, was
le king
n early
and en-
crossed
lienated
1 nobles
On the
decisive
s. The
wn, and
atury in
s of his
ich his
peace,
fullest
j:etched.
(olt and
favour,
le King
jie Con-
(lancing
Henry
justice
linistra-
)ody of
icellor.
king-

II. J

KNdl.ANP UNDKR FORKKJN KIN(;S.

dom, who in the frequent absence of the King acted as Regent,
and whose staff, selected from the barons connected with the royal
household, were formed into a Supreme Court of the realm. The
King's Court, as this was called, permanently represented the whole
court of royal vassals, which had hitherto been summoned thrice in
the year. As the royal council, it revised and registered laws, and its
"counsel and consent," though merely formal, preserved the principle
of the older popular legislation. As a court of justice it formed the
highest court of appeal : it could call up any suit from a lower tribunal
on the application of a suitor, while the union of several sheriffdoms
under some of its members connected it closely with the local courts.
As a financial body, its chief work lay in the assessment and collection
of the revenue. In this capacity it too'.c the name of the Court of
ICxcheciuer from the chequered table, much like a chess-board, at
which it sat, and on which accounts were rendered. In their financial
capacity its justices became " barons of the Exchequer." Twice every
year the sheriff of each county appeared before these barons and ren-
dered the sum of the fixed rent from royal domains, the Danegeld or
land tax, the fines of the local courts, the feudal aids from the baronial
estates, which formed the chief part of the royal revenue. Local
disputes respecting these payments or the assessment of the town-rents
were settled by a detachment of barons from the court who made the
circuit of the shires, and whose fiscal visitations led to the judicial
visitations, the "judges' circuits," which still form so marked a feature
in our legal system.

From this work of internal reform Henry's attention was called sud-
denly by one terrible loss to the question of the succession to the
throne. His son William " the y^itheling," as the English fondly styled
the child of their own Matilda, had with a crowd of nobles accom-
panied the King on his return from Normandy ; but the White Ship
in which he had embarked lingered behind the rest of the royal fleet
while the young nobles, excited with wine, hung over the ship's side
and chased away with taunts the priest who came to give the customary
benediction. At last the guards of the King's treasure pressed the
vessel's departure, and, driven by the arms of fifty rowers, it swept
swiftly out to sea. All at once the ship's side struck on a rock at
the mouth of the harbour, and in an instant it sank beneath the
waves. One terrible cry, ringing through the stillness of the night, was
heard by the royal fleet ; but it was not till the morning that the fatal
news '-'inched the King. He fell unconscious to the ground, and rose
never to smile again. Henry had no other son, and the whole circle of
his foreign foes closed round him the more fiercely that the son of
Robert was now his natural heir. The king hated William, while he
loved Matilda, the daughter who still remained to him, who had been
married to the Emperor Henry the Fifth, and whose husband's death

Sec. VI.
Tmk

I'.Nlil.lHII

Rkvivai,
1071

Tit

1127

, .\

The

White

Ship

l^reck of the
IVhite Shi/>

U20

<!l

\\\

■'o\:'''

L' -.

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

II.]

Sec. VII.
England

AND

Anjou
870

1154

The

Counts

of Aujou

now restoi ed her to her father. He recognized her as his heir, though the
succession of a woman seemed strange to the feudal baronage ; nobles
and priests were forced tc swear allegiance to her as their future mis-
tress, and Henry affianced her to the son of the one foe he really-
feared, Count Fulk of Anjou.

Section VII.— England and Anjou, 870— 1154.

[Auihorities. — The chief documents for Angevin history have been collected
in the " Chroniques d' Anjou," published by the Historical Society of France
(Paris, 1856-1871). The best known of these is the "Gesta Consulum," a
compilation of the twelfth century (given also by D'Achery, " Spicilegium," 4to.
vol. X. p. 534), in which the earlier romantic traditions are simply dressed up
into historical shape by copious quotations from the French historians. Save
for the reigns of Geoffry Martel, and Fulk of Jerusalem, it is nearly valueless.
Th^ short autobiography of Fulk Rechin is the most authentic memorial of the
earlier Angevin history ; and much can be gleaned from the verbose life of
Geoffry the Handsome by John of Marmoutier. For England, Orderic and
the Chronicle die out in the midst of Stephen's reign ; here, too, end William
of Malmesbury, Huntingdon, the "Gestp, Stephani," a record in great detail
by one of Stephen's clerks, and the Hexham Chroniclers, who are most valuable
for its opening (published by Mr. Raine for the Surtees Society). The blank
in our historical literature extends over the first years of Henry the Second.
The lives and letters of Beket have been industriously collected and published
by Canon Robertson in the Rolls Series.]

To understand the history of England under it.^ Angevin rulers, we
must first know something of the Angevins themselves. The character
and the policy of Henry the Second and his sons were as much a
heritage of their race as the broad lands of Anjou. The fortunes
of England were being slowly wrought out in every incident of the
history of the Counts, as the descendants of a Breton woodman became
masters not of Anjou only, but of Touraine, Maine, and Poitou, of
Gascony and Auvergne, of Aquitaine and Normandy, and sovereigns
at last of the great realm which Normandy had won. The legend of
the father of their race carries us back to the times of our own
/Elfred, when the Danes were ravaging along Loire as they ravaged
along Thames. In the heart of the Breton border, in the debateable
land between France and Britanny, dwelt Tortulf the Forester, half-
brigand, half-hunter as ihe gloomy days went, living in free outlaw-
fashion in the woods about Rennes. Tortulf had learned in his rough
forest school " how to strike the foe, to sleep on the bare ground, to
bear hunger and toil, summer's heat and winter's frost, how to fear
nothing save ill-fame." Following King Charles the Bald in his
struggle with the Danes, the woodman won broad lands along Loire,
and his son Ingelger, who had swept the northmen from Touraine and
the land to the west, which they had burned and wasted into a vast

ass.'

son.

[chap.

ugh the
; nobles
ire mis-
e really

II.]

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

collected
if France
ulum," a
am,"4to.
•essed up
5. Save
valueless,
ial of the
)se life of
deric and
I William
eat detail
t valuable
rhe blank
e Second,
published

ulers, we
:haracter
much a
fortunes
t of the
became
|oitou, of
vereigns
:gend of
lour own
ravaged
Ibateable
ter, half-
outlaw-
lis rough
|ound, to
to fear
in his
[g Loire,
line and
to a vast

solitude, became the first Count of Anjou. But the tale of Tortulf and
Ingelger is a mere creation of some twelfth century jongleur ^ and the
earliest Count whom history recognizes is Fulkthe Red. Fulk attached
himself to the Dukes of France who were now drawing nearer to the
throne, and received from them in guerdon the county of Anjou. The
story of his son is a story of peace, breaking like a quiet idyll the war-
storms of bis house. Alone of his race Fulk the Good waged no wars :
his delight was to sit in the choir of Tours and to be called " Can^n."
One Martinmab eve Fulk was singing there in clerkly guise when the
king, Lewis d'Outremer, entered the church. " He sings like a
priest," laughed the King, as his nobles pointed mockingly to the figure
of the Count-Canon ; but Fulk was ready with his reply. " Know, my
lord,'' wrote the Count of Anjou, '* that a king unlearned is a crowned
ass." Fulk was in fact no priest, but a busy ruler, governing, enforcing
peace, and carrying justice to every corner of the wasted land. To
him alone of his race men gave the title of '* the Good."

Himself in character little more than a bold dashing soldier, Fulk's
son, Geoffry Grey-gown, sank almost into a vassal of his powerful
neighbours, the Counts of Blois and Champagne. The vassalage was
roughly shaken off by his successor. Fulk Nerra, Fulk the Black, is
the greatest of the Angevins, the first in whom we can trace that
marked type of character which their house was to preserve with a
fatal constancy through two hundred years. He was without natural
affection. In his youth he burnt a wife at the stake, and legend
told how he led her to her doom decked out in his gayest attire. In
his old age he waged his bitterest war against his son, and exacted
from him when vanquished a humiliation which men reserved for the
deadliest of their foes. " You are conquered, you are conquered ! "
shouted the old man in fierce exultation, as Geoffry, bridled and
saddled like a beast of burden, crawled for pardon to his father's feet.
In Fulk first appeared the low type of superstition which startled even
superstitious ages in the early Plantagenets. Robber as he was of
Church lands, and contemptuous of ecclesiastical censures, the fear of
the judgement drove Fulk to the Holy Sepulchre. Barefoot and with
the strokes of the scourge falling heavily on his shoulders, the Count
had himself dragged by a halter through the streets of Jerusalem, and
courted the doom of martyrdom by his wild outcries of penitence. He
rewar 'cd the fidelity of Herbert of Le Mans, whose aid saved him
from utter ruin, by entrapping him into captivity and robbing him of
his lands. He secured the terrified friendship of the French king by
despatching twelve assassins to cut down before his eyes the minister
who had troubled it. Familiar as the age was with treason and rapine
and blood, it recoiled from the cool cynicism of his crimes, and be-
lieved the wrath of Heaven to have been revealed against the union of
the worst forms of evil in Fulk the Black. But neither the wrath of

H 2

Sec. VII. \
England |;

AND

Anjou
870

1154

:U- I

Fulk the
Black

987-1040

\ \

lil?

5. X

IOC>

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VII.

AND

Anjou
870

1154

The
yreat-

I&0BB of

Aujou

595

ioi6

1044-1060

The
Anfrevln
marriage

1109-1129

Heaven nor the cuvses of men broke with a single mishap the fifty
years of his success.

At his accession Anjou was the least important of the greatei pro-
vinces of France. At his death in 1040 it stood, if not in extent, at
least in real power, first among them a}\. Cool-headed, clear-sighted,
quick to resolve, quicker to strike, Fulk's career was one long series of
victories over all his rivals. He was a consummate general, and he
had th' gift of personal bravery, which was denied to some of his
greatest descendants. There was a moment in the first of his battles
when the day seemed lost for Anjou ; a feigned retreat of the Bretons
had drawn the Angevin horsemen into a line of hidden pitfalls, and
the Count himself was flung heavily to the ground. Dragged from the
mevlley of men and horses, he swept down almost singly on the foe
" as a storm-wind " (so rang the pasan of the Angevins) " sweeps down
on the thick corn-rows," and the field was won. To these qualities of
the warrior he added a power of political organization, a capacity for
far-reaching combinations, a faculty of statesmanship, which became
the heritage of the Angevins, and lifted them as high above the intel-
lectual level of the rulers of their time as their shameless wickedness
degraded them below the level of man. His overthrow of Britanny
on the field of Conquereux was followed by the gradual absorption of
Southern Touraine, while his restless activity covered the land with
castles and abbeys. The very spirit of the Black Count seems still to
frown from the dark tower of Durtal on the sunny valley of the Loire.
A victory at Pontlevoi crushed the rival house of Blois ; the seizure
of Saumur completed his conquests in the south, while Northern
Touraine was won bit by bit till only Tours resisted the Angevin. The
treacherous seizure of its count, Herbert Wake-dog, left Maine at his
mercy ere the old man bequeathed his unfinished work to his son. As
a warrior Geoffry Martel was hardly inferior to his father. A decisive
victory left Poitou at his mercy, a second wrested Tours from the
Count of Blois ; and the seizure of Le Mans brought him to the
Norman border. Here however his advance was checked by the
genius of William the Conqueror, and with his death the greatness of
Anjou seemed for the time to have come to an end.

Stripped of Maine by the Normans and weakened by internal dis-
sensions, the weak administrcttion of the next count, Fulk Rechin, left
Anjou powerless against its rivals. It woke to fresh energy with the
accession of his son, Fulk of Jerusalem. Now urging the turbulent
Norman nobles 10 revolt, now supporting Robert's son William against
his uncle, offering himself throughout as the loyal supporter of France,
which was now hemmed in on all sides by the forces of the Engli^ih
king and of his allies the Counts of Blois and Champagne, Fulk was the
one enemy whom Henry the First really feared. It was to disarm his
restless hostility that the king gave to his son, Geoffry the Handsome.

II.]

the hi

unpof

baroni

baron

save

tendec

A mor

from

^em's/i

"the I

ended

to the

at his

the for<

" Go

bed, "t

the Noi

departi

appean

queror'j

been br

heir, sa^

of Robe

larity.

his very

had as

when L

Neither

Council,

voice of

popular

English

the righ

counselh

ther the

of the r

deliberat

defend t

his who)

realm.

If Lot
nineteen
in our hi
of Matik
revolt.

' lil

II.]

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

the hand of his daughter Matilda. No marriage could have been more
unpopular, and the secrecy with which it was efifected was held by the
barons as freeing them from the oath which they had sworn ; for no
baron, if he was without sons, could give a husband to his daughter
save by his lord's consent, and by a strained analogy the nobles con-
tended that their own assent was necessary to the marriage of Matilda.
A more pressing danger lay in the greed of her husband Geoffry, who
from his habit of wearing the common broom of Anjou (the pianta
genista) in his helmet had acquired, in addition to his surname of
"the Handsome," the more famous title of " Plantagenet." His claims
ended at last in intrigues with the Norman nobles, and Henry hurried
to the border to meet an expected invasion ; but the plot broke down
at his presence, the Angevins retired, and the old man withdrew to
the forest of Lions to die.

" (xod give him," wrote the Archbishop of Rouen from Henry's death-
bed, " the peace he loved." With him indeed closed the long peace of
the Norman rule. An outburst of anarchy followed on the news of his
departure, and in the midst of the turmoil Earl Stephen, his nephew,
appeared at the gates of London. Stephen was a son of the Con-
queror's daughter, Adela, who had married a Count of Blois ; he had
been brought up at the English court, and his claim as nearest male
heir, save his brother, of the Conqueror's blood (for his cousin, the son
of Robert, had fallen in Flanders) was supported by his personal popu-
larity. Mere swordsman as he was, his good-humour, his generosity,
his very prodigality made him a favourite with all. No noble however
had as yet ventured to join him, nor had any town opened its gates
when London poured out to meet him with uproarious welcome.
Neither barons nor prelates were present to constitute a National
Council, but the great city did not hesitate to take their place. The
voice of her citizens had long been accepted as representative of the
popular assent in the election of a king ; but it marks the progress of
English independence under Henry that London now claimed of itself
the right of election. Undismayed by the absence of the hereditary
counsellors of the crown, its " Aldermen and wise folk gathered toge-
ther the folkmoot, and these providing at their own will for the good
of the realm, unanimously resolved to choose a king." The solemn
deliberation ended in the choice of Stephen ; the citizens swore to
defend the King with money and blood, Stephen swore to apply
his whole strength to the pacification and good government of the
realm.

If London was true to her oath, Stephen was false to his. The
nineteen years of his reign are years of a misrule and disorder unknown
in our history. Stephen had been acknowledged even by the partizans
of Matilda, but his weakness and prodigality soon gave room to feudal
revolt. In 1138 a rising of the barons, planned by Earl Robert oi

lOI

Sfc. VII.
England

ANO

Anjou
870

1154.

\ E I ■ ' " 'i.l

Death of \
Henry f

"35 I

Stephen i
of Blois H

Stephen

and the

baronage

■>*;

i': I 1

^m: %

102

HISTORY OF THE ENGTJSH PEOPLE.

[CHAIV

Sk<:. VII.
' EN(;LANn

' AND

j Anjou
870

!! TO

i 1154

Battle of the
Stantfard

1 138

1 139

II4I

1 148

Gloucester, in southern and western England was aided by the King
of Scots, who poured his forces over the northern border. Stephew
himself marched on the western rebels, and left them few strongholds
iave Bristol. The pillage and cruelties of the wild tribes of Galloway
and the Highlands roused the spirit of the north ; baron and freeman
gathered at York round Archbishop Thurstan, and marched to the
field of Northallerton to await the foe. The sacred banners of S.
Cuthbert of Durham, S. Peter of York, S. John of Beverley, and S.
Wilfrid of Ripon hung from a pole fixed in a four-wheeled car which
stood in the centre of the host. " I who wear no armour," shouted the
chief of the Galwegians, "will go as far this day as any one with
breastplate of mail ; " his men charged with wild shouts of " Albin,
Albin," and were followed by the Norman knighthood of the Lowlands.
The rout, however, was complete ; the fierce hordes dashed in vain
against the close English ranks around the Standard, and the whole
army fled in confusion to Carlisle.

But Stephen had few kingly qualities save that of a soldier's
bravery, and the realm soon began to slip from his grasp. Released
from the si.ern hand of Henry, the barons fortified their castles, and
their example was necessarily followed, in self-defence, by the great
prelates and nobles who had acted as ministers to the late King. Roger,
Bishop of Salisbury, the justiciar, and his son Roger the Chancellor,
were carried away by the panic. They fortified their castles, and
appeared at court followed by a strong force at their back. The weak
violence of the king's temper suddenly broke out. He seized Roger with
his son the Chancellor and his nephew the Bishop of Lincoln at Oxford,
and forced them to surrender their strongholds. Shame broke the justi-
ciar's heart ; he died at the close of the year, and his nephew Nigel of
Ely, the Treasurer, was driven from the realm. The fall of Roger's house
shattered the whole system of government. The King's violence, while
it cost him the support of the clergy, opened the wayfor Matilda's landing
in England ; and the country was soon divided between the adherents
of the two rivals, the West supporting Matilda, London and the East
Stephen. A defeat at Lincoln left the latter a captive in the hands of
his enemies, while Matilda was received throughout the land as its
" Lady." But the disdain with which she repulsed the claim of
London to the enjoyment of its older privileges called its burghers to
arms, and her resolve to hold Stephen a prisoner roused his party
again to life. Flying to Oxford, she was besieged there by Stephen,
who had obtained his release ; but she escaped in white robes by a
postern, and crossing the river unobserved on the ice, made her way to
Abingdon. Six years later she returned to Normandy. The war had in
fact become a mere chaos of pillage and bloodshed. The outrages of the
feudal baronage showed from what horrors the rule of the Norman kings
h.-\d saved England. No more ghastly picture of a nation's misery has

n-l

ever

last

[CHAr.

II.]

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

103

5 King
tephen
gholds
lloway
eeman
to the
s of S.
and S.
: which
ted the
ne with
• Albin,
wlands.
in vain
e whole

soldier's
.eleased
les, and
le great
Roger,
incellor,
les, and
he weak
ger with
Oxford,
hejusti-
^ligel of
's house
e, while
landing
herents
he East
ands of
d as its
aim of
[hers to
Is party
[tephen,
s by a
way to
had in
Is of the
|n kings
lery has

ever been painted than that which closes the English Chronicle, whose
last accents falter out amidst the horrors of the time. " They hanged
up men by their feet and smoked them with foul smoke. Some were
hanged up by their thumbs, others by the head, and burning things
were hung on to their feet. They put knotted strings about men's
heads and writhed them till they went into the brain. They put men into
prisons where adders and snakes and toads were crawling, and so they
tormented them. Some they put into a chest short and narrow and
not deep, and that had sharp stones within, and forced men therein so
that they broke all their limbs. In many of the castles were hateful and
grim things called rachenteges, which two or three men had enough to
do to carry. It was thus made : it was fastened to a beam and had a
sharp iron to go about a man's neck and throat, so that he might noways
sit, or lie, or sleep, but he bore all the iron. Many thousands they
starved with hunger."

England was rescued from this feudal anarchy by the efforts of the
Church. In the early part of Stephen's reign his brother Henry, the
Bishop of Winchester, acting as Papal Legate for the realm, had
striven to supply the absence of any royal or national authority by
convening synods of bishops, and by asserting the moral right of the
Church to declare sovereigns unworthy of the throne. The compact
between king and people which became a part of constitutional law in
the Charter of Henry had gathered new force in the Charter of
Stephen, but its legitimate consequence in the responsibility of the
crown for the execution of the compact was first drawn out by these
ecclesiastical councils. From their alternate depositions of Stephen
and Matilda flowed the after depositions of Edward and Richard, and
the solemn act by which the succession was changed in the case of
James. I^xtravagant and unauthorized as their expression of it may
appear, they expressed the right of a nation to good government.
Henry of Winchester, however, " half monk, half soldier," as he was
called, possessed too little religious influence to wield a really spiritual
power ; it was only at the close of Stephen's reign that the nation really
found a moral leader in Theobald, the Archbishop of Canterbury.
" To the Church," Thomas justly said afterwards, with the proud
consciousness of having been Theobald's right hanH^ " Henry owed
his crown and England her deliverance." Thomas was the son of
Gilbert Beket, the portreeve of London, the site of whose house is still
marked by the Mercers' chapel in Cheapside. His mother Rohese
was a type of the devout woman of her day ; she weighed her boy each
year on his birthday against money^ clothes, and provisions wiiich she
gave to the poor. Thomas grew up amidst the Norman barons and
clerks who frequented his father's house with a genial freedom of
character tempered by the Norman refinement ; he passed from the
school of Merton to the University of Paris, and returned to fling

Skc. VII. I

Knglanu

AND i

Anjou t

870

1154

i m

England
and the
Churcb

<!■"

Thomas of
London

i^,;C

t04

Sec VII.

England

AND

Anjou
870

1154.

I152

1153

Mil

■ !^

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

himself into the life of the young nobles of the time. Tall, handsome,
bright-eyed, ready of wit and speech, his firmness of temper showed
itself in his very sports ; to rescue his hawk which had fallen into the
water he once plunged into a millrace, and was all but crushed by the
wheel. The loss of his father's wealth drove him to the court of
Archbishop Theobald, and he soon became the Primate's confidant in
his plans for the rescue of England. Henry, the son of Matilda and
Geofifry, had now by the death of his father become master of
Normandy and Anjou, while by his marriage with its duchess, Eleanor
of Poitou, he had added Aquitaine to his dominions. Thomas, as
Theobald's agent, invited Henry to appear in England, and on the
Duke's landing the Archbishop interposed between the rival claimants
to the crown. The Treaty of Wallingford abolished the evils of the
long anarchy ; the castles were to be razed, the crown lands resumed,
the foreign mercenaries banished from the country. Stephen was
recognized as King, and in turn acknowledged Henry as his heir.
But a year had hardly passed vhen Stephen's death gave his rival
the crown.

., . -r, . . . • ^ ,, ,. ,- ■■•, .■.:,.,,:-

Section VIII.— Henry the Second, 1154-1189.

[Authorities. — Up to the death of Archbishop Thomas we have only the letters
of Beket himself, Foliot, and John of Salisbury, collected by Canon Robertson
and Dr. Giles ; but this dearth is followed by a vast outburst of historical
industry. From 1169 till 1 192 our primary authority is the Chronide known
as that of Benedict of Peterborough, whose authorship Dr. Stubbs has shown
to be more probably due to the royal treasurer, Bishop Richard Fitz-Neal. It
is continued to 1201 by Roger of Howden. Both are works of the highest
value, and have been edited for the Roll.i series by Dr. Stubbs, whose prefaces
have thrown a new light on the constitutional history of Henry's reign. The
history by William of Newburgh (which ends in 1 198) is a work of the classical
school, like William of Malmesbury, but distinguished by its fairness and good
sense. To these may be added the chronicles of Ralf Niger, with the addi-
tions of Ralf of Coggeshall, that of Gervas-i of Canterbury, and the Life of
S. Hugh of Lincoln. A mass of general literature lies behind these distinc-
tively historical sources, in the treatises of John of Salisbury, the voluminous
works of Giraldus Cambrensis, the "trifles' and satires of Walter Map,
Glanvill's treatise on Law, Fitz-Neal's '* Dialo.T[ue on the Exchequer," the
romances of Gaimar and Wace, the poem of the San Graal. Lord Lyttelton's
•' Life of Henry the Second" is a full and sober account of the time ; Canon
Robertson's Bl'-^raphy of Beket is accurate, but hostile in tone. In his
"Select Charters" Dr. Stubbs has printed the various "Assizes," and the
Dialogus de Scaccario, which explains the financial administration of the Curia
Regis. ]

Young as he was, Henry mounted the throne witi; a resolute purpose
of government which his reign carried steadily out His practical,
serviceable frame suited the hardest worker of his tin e. There was
something in his build and look, in the square stout frame, the fiery
face, the close-cropped hair, the prominent eyes, the bull neck, the

I ■:

'•fmiu

tninous

Map,

," the

lei ton's

ICanon

in his

id the

Curia

[rpese

:tical,

was

fiery

:, the

f«

I04

Sec. VII.
England

AND

Anjou
870

1154

l,\ [,

ITf2

"53

;/5

>-■*

>►

imt

«•

:^>

""' 1

■V!

f ,

V: li.

Eik

■ V.

11.

coars(
stirrinl
one w
ing til
diet, nl
clowedl
obstinl
.')ir thai
told dil
period
niarrial
people.!
barrier}
even k
was in
enable
man's i
the old
men's r
of custo
hostility
fectly n
Church
clearly
under St
barrasse
servants,
as deleg;
of judici;
of the gi
same dii
social im
them alo
under th
picture-l
wild fren
sides of
mind to
inevitabl
of Henrj
midst of
dominioi
swept av
cleverne:
seiously,

II.

knc;land under foreign kings.

coarse strong hands, the bowed legs, that marked out the keen,
stirring, coarse-fibred man of business. " He never sits down, ' saicl
one who observed him closely ; "he is always on his legs from morn-
ing till night." Orderly in business, careless in appearance, sparing in
diet, never resting or giving his servants rest, chatty, inquisitive, en-
dowed with a singular charm of address and strength of memory,
obstinate in love or hatred, a fair scholar, a great hunter, his general
jjir that of a rough, passionate, busy man, Henry's personal character
told directly on the character of his reign. His accession marks the
period of amalgamation, when neighbourhood and traffic and inter-
!r>arriage drew Englishmen and Normans rapidly into a single
people. A national feeling was thus springing up before which the
barriers of the older feudalism were to be swept away. Henry had
even less reverence for the feudal past than the men of his day ; he
was indeed utterly without the imagination and reverence which
enable men to sympathize with any past at all. He had a practical
man's impatience of the obstacles thrown in the way of his reforms by
the older constitution of the realm, nor could he understand other
men's reluctance to purchase undoubted improvements by the sacrifice
of customs and traditions of bygone days. Without any theoretical
hostility to the co-ordinate powers of the state, it seemed to him a per-
fectly reasonable and natural course to trample either baronage or
Church under foot to gain his end of good government. He saw
clearly that the remedy for such anarchy as England had endured
under Stephen lay in the establishment of a kingly government unem-
barrassed by any privileges of order or class, administered by royal
servants, and in whose public administration the nobles acted simply
as delegates of the sovereign. His work was to lie in the orgaiization
of judicial and administrative reforms which realized this idea. But
of the great currents of thought and fe-^ling which were tending in the
same direction he knew nothing. What he did for the moral and
social impulses which were telling on men about him was simply to let
them alone. Religion grew more and more identified with patriotism
under the eyes of a King who whispered, and scribbled, and looked at
picture-books during mass, who never confessed, and cursed God in
wild frenzies of blasphemy. Great peoples formed themselves on both
sides of the sea round a sovereign . "nt the whole force of his

mind to hold together an Empire which the growth of nationality must
inevitably destroy. There is throughout a tragic grandeur in the irony
of Henri's position, that of a Sforza of the fifteenth century set in the
midst of the twelfth, building up by patience and policy and craft a
dominion alitn to the deepest sympathies of his age, and fated to be
swept away in the end by popular forces to whose existence his very
cleverness and activity blinded him. But indirectly and uncon-
sciously, his policy did more than that of all his predecessors to pre-

105

Sfc. vim.

HfNRV Till

Si roNi)
1154

1189

k\v

io6

HISTORY OF tup: ENGLISH PKOPLE.

[CIIAP.

Sir«. VIII.
Hknry riiK

SK ONI)

1154

1189

Henry
and the
Otaurch

1 162

pare I'.nj^land for the imily aiul freedom which the fall of his house waj
to reveal.

He had been placed on the throne, as we have seen, by the Church.
His first work was to repair the evils which Iln^land had endured till
his accession by the restoration of the system of Henry the First ; and
it was with the aid and counsel of Theobald that the foreign marauders
were driven from the realm, the castles demolished in spite of the
opposition of the baronage, the King's Court and iCxchequcr restored.
Age and infirmity however warned the Primate to retire from the post
of minister, and his power fell into the younger and more vigorous
hands of Thomas Beket, who had long acted as his confidential ad-
viser and was now made Chancellor. Thomas won the personal
favour of the King. The two young men had, in Theobald's words,
"but one heart and mind;" Henry jested in the Chancellor's hall,
or tore his cloak from his shoulders in rough horse-play as they rode
through the streets. He loaded his favourite with riches and honours,
but there is no ground for thinking that Thomas in any degree in-
fluenced his system of rule. Henry's policy seems for good or evil to
have been throughout his own. His work of reorganization went
steadily on amidst troubles at home and abroad. Welsh outbreaks
forced him in 1 157 to lead an army across the border. The next year
saw him drawn across the Channel, where he was already master of a
third of the present France. He had inherited Anjou, Maine, and
Touraine from his father, Normandy from his mother, and the seven
provinces of the South, Poitou, Sairttongc, the Angoumois, La Marche,
the Limousin, P^rigord, and Gascony belonged to his wife. As
Duchess of Aquitaine Eleanor had claims on Toulouse, and these
Henry prepared in 11 59 to enforce by arms. He was however luck-
less in the war. King Lewis of France threw himself into Toulouse.
Conscious of the ill-compacted nature of i is wide dominions, Henry
shrank from an open contest with his suzerain ; he withdrew his forces,
and the quarrel ended in 11 60 by a formal alliance and the betrothal
of his eldest son to the daughter of Lewis. Thomas had fought
bravely throughout the campaign, at the head of the 700 knights who
formed his household. But the King had other work for him than war.
On Theobald's death he at once forced on the monks of Canterbury,
and on Thomas himself, his election as Archbishop. His purpose in
this appointment was soon revealed. Henry proposed to the bishops
that a clerk convicted of a crime should be deprived of his orders,
and handed over to the King's tribunals. The local courts of the feudal
baronage had been roughly shorn of their power by the judicial reforms
of Henry the First ; and the Church courts, as the Conqueror had
created them, with their exclusive right of justice over the clerical
order, in other words over the whole body of educated men throughout
the realm, formed the one great exception to the system which was

ii.l

concentrn
yielded, h
created t(
Thomas
part he hs
pointed w
to figure r
primate,
cism. F
told their
love me n
the Churc
doubted
piety or le
of Thoma
tage of tl
concessior
to the Cor
had appea
state thes
Salisbury,
the " Cons
provisions
election of
in the Kinj
bound to c
to hold hi
burthens o
might leav
chief or ro
under intei
lation resp
decide whe
disputed, b
was to be i
the Bishop
victed then
was left fro
justice, but
consent. '
repealed, si
passionate
tions ; but I
ment threw
hands. V

n.l

ENOT.AND UNDER FORF.TON KINGS.

107

concentrating all jurisdiction in the hands of the king. The bishops
yielded, but opposition came from the very prelate whom Henry had
created to enforce his will. From the moment of his appointment
Thomas had flung himself with the whole energy of his nature into the
part he had to play. At the first intimation of Henry's purpose he had
pointed with a laugh to his gay attire-- " You are choosing a fine dress
to figure at the head of your Canterbury monks ; " but once monk and
primate, he passed with a fevered earnestness from luxury to asceti-
cism. Kven as minister he had opposed the King's designs, and fore-
told their future opposition : ** You will soon hate me as much as you
love me now," he said, " for you assume an authority in the affairs of
the Church to which 1 shall never assent." A prudent man might have
doubted the wisdom of destroying the only shelter which protected
piety or learning against a despot like the Red King, and in the mind
of Thomas the ecclesiastical immunities were parts of the sacred heri-
tage of the Church. He stood without support ; the Pope advised
concession, the bishops forsook him, and Thomas bent at last to agree
to the Constitutions drawn up at the Council of Clarendon. The King
had appealed to the ancient " customs " of the realm, and it was to
state these "customs" that a court was held at Clarendon near
Salisbury. The report presented by bishops and barons formed
the " Constitutions of Clarendon," a code which in the bulk of its
provisions simply re-enacted the system of the Conqueror. Every
election of bishop or abbot was to take place before royal officers,
in the King's chapel, and with the King's assent. The prelate elect was
bound to do homage to the King for his lands before consecration, and
to hold his lands as a barony from the king, subject to all feudal
burthens of taxation and attendance in the King's court. No bishop
might leave the realm without the royal permission. No tenant in
chief or royal servant might be excommunicated, or their land placed
under interdict, but by the King's assent. What was new was the legis-
lation respecting ecclesiastical jurisdiction. The King's court was to
decide whether a suit between clerk and layman, whose nature was
disputed, belonged to the Church courts or the King's. A royal officer
was to be present at all ecclesiastical proceedings, in order to confine
the Bishop's courf within its own due limits, and a clerk once con-
victed there passed at once under the civil jurisdiction. An appenl
was left from the Archbishop's court to the King's court for delect of
justice, but none might appeal to the Papal court save with the King's
consent. The privilege of sanctuary in churches or church) ards was
repealed, so far as property and not persons was concerned. After a
passionate refusal the Primate at last gave h"s assent to the Constitu-
tions ; but this assent was soon retracted, and the King's savage resent-
ment threw the moral advantage of the position into the Archbishop's
hands. Vexatious charges were brought against him ; in the Council

>\'

Sk. VI II.
Kk.nuv tiik

SlCCDNIi

1164

rt>
1189

■ I

Constitu-
tions of
Clamnifon
1 164

!!•

Til

I r.

.^ '

io8

HISTORY OF THE ENOLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. VIII.

Hfnry Tiir
Sf.conii

1154.

!189

FUf^Iit of

Thomas
1 164

Beket's
■yet urn

nyo

'■: '

of Northampton a few months later his life was said to be in danger,
and all urged him to submit. Rut in the presence of danger the
courage of the man rose to its full height. Oasping his archiepiscopal
cross he entered the royal court, forbade the nobles to condemn him,
and appealed to the Papal See. Shouts of " Traitor ! traitor ! " fol-
lowed him as he retired. The Primate turned fiercely at tiie word :
" Were I a knight," he retorted, " my sword should answer that foul
taunt !" At nightfall he fled in disguise, and reached France through
Flanders. For six years the contest raged bitterly ; at Rome, at Paris, the
agents of the two powers intrigued against each other. Henry stooped
to acts of the meanest persecution in driving the Primate's kinsmen from
England, and in threats to confiscate the lands of the Cistercians that he
might force the monks of Pontigny to refuse Thomas a home ; while Beket
himself exhausted the patience of his friends by his violence and ex-
communications, as well as by the stubbornness with which he clung to
the offensive clause " Saving the honour of my order," the addition of
which would have practically neutralized the King's reforms. The Pope
counselled mildness, the French king for a time withdrew his support,
his own clerks gave way at last. " Come up," said one of them bitterly
when his horse stumbled on the road, "saving the honour of the Church
and my order." But neither warning nor desertion moved the resolu-
tion of the Primate. Henry, in dread of papal excommunication, re-
solved at last on the coronation of his son, in defiance of the privileges
of anterbury, by the Archbishop of York. But the Pope's hands
were now freed by his successes in Italy, and bis threat of an inter-
dict forced the king to a show of submission. The Archbishop was
allowed to return after a reconciliation with Henry at Freteval, and the
Kentishmen flocked around him with uproarious welcome as he entered
Canterbury. " Tiii3 is England," said his clerks, as they saw the white
headlands of the coast. " You will wish yourself elsewhere before fifty
days are gone," said Thomas sadly, and his foreboding showed his
appreciation of Henry's character. He was now in the royal power,
and orders had already been issued in the younger Henry's name for
his arrect, when four knights from the King's court, spurred to outrage
by a passionate outburst of their master's wrath, crossed the sea and
forced their way into the Archbishop's palace. After a stormy parley
with him in his chamber they withdrew to arm. Thomas was hurried
by his clerks into the cathedral, but as he rea^'lied the steps leading
from the transept to the choir his pursuers bursi. in from the cloisters.
" Where," cried Reg-nald Fitzurse in the dusk of the dimly-lighted
minster, " where is the traitor, Thomas Beket ? " The Primate turned
resolutely back : " Here am I, no traitor, but a priest of God," he re-
plied, and again descending the steps he placed himself with his back
against a pillar and fronted his foes. All the bravery, the violence of
his old knightly life seemed to revive in Thomas as he tossed back the

II.]

threat

shoute

ihe ch

"pand

ills pe

retorte

A retai

the Pr

triump

The

Christe

canonij

show o

at first

visions

liberty c

^owevei

ecclesia

King's I

bishops.

great w<

expediti

allowing

field for

mo'- 2y.

him to d

tain a fc

of the n

which roi

were res

of the ba

sheriff" w;

to the \a.\

The resc

when the

of King,

on his f;

Flanders

sons, Ric

a descent

repulsed

no soone

extent of

l^oger M

in the m;

[chap.

danger,
\ger the
piscopal
im him,
,r ! " fol-
e word :
:hat foul
through
r^aris, the
T Stooped
nen from
is that he
lileBeket
I and ex-
; clung to
Idition of
The Pope
\ support,
n bitterly
le Church
le resolu-
:ation, re-
privileges
le's hands
an inter-
ihop was
,1, and the
e entered
Ithe white
:fore fifty
iwed his
.1 power,
name for
outrage
sea and
ly parley
hurried
leading
Icloisters.
ly-lighted
te turned
," he re-
Ihis back
)lence of
Iback the

II.]

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

threats and demands of his assailants. "You are our prisoner,"
shouted Fitzurse, and the four knights seized him to drag him from
ihe church. "Do not touch me, Reginald," shouted the Primate,
" pander that you are, you owe me fealty ; " and availing himself of
his personal strength he shook him roughly off. " Strike, strike,"
retorted Fitzurse, and blow after blow struck Thomas to the ground.
A retainer of Ranulf de Broc with the point of his sword scattered
the Primate's brains on the ground. " Let us be off,"' he cried
triumphantly, " this traitor will never rise at'ain."

The brutal murder was received with a thrill of horror throughout
Christendom ; miracles were wrought at the martyr's tomb ; he was
canonized, and became the most popular of EngUsh saints ; but Henry's
show of submission to the Papacy averted the excommunication which
at first threatened to avenge the deed of blood. The judicial pro-
visions of the Constitutions of Clarendon were in form annulled, and
liberty of election was restored to bishopricks and abbacies. In reality
however the victory rested with the King. Throughout his reign
ecclesiastical appointments were practicrJly in his hands, while the
King's Court asserted its power over the spiritual jurisdiction of the
bishops. The close of the struggle left Henry free to complete his
great work of legal reform. He had already availed himself of the
expedition against Toulouse to deliver a blow at the baronage by
allowing the lower tenants to commute their personal service in the
field for a money payment under the name of " scutage," or shield-
mo'-jy. The King thus became master of resources which enabled
him to dispense with the military support of his tenants, and to main-
tain a force of mercenary soldiers in their place. The diminution
of the military power of the nobles was accompanied by measures
which robbed them of their legal jurisdiction. The circuits of the j udges
were restored, and instructions were given them to enter the manors
of the barons and make inquiry into their privileges ; while the office of
sheriff was withdrawn from the great nobles of the shire and entrusted
to the lawyers and courtiers \^ ho already furnished the staff of justices.
The resentment of the barons found an opportunity of displaying itself
when the King's eldest son, whose coronation had given him the title
of King, demanded to he put in possession of his English realm, and
on his father's refusal took refuge with Lewis of France. France,
Flanders, and Scotland joined the league against Henry ; his younger
sons, Richard and Cieoffry, look up arms in Aquitaine. In P'ngland
a descent of Flemish mercenaries under the Earl of Leicester was
repulsed by the loyal justiciars near S. Edmundsbury ; but Lewis had
no sooner entered Normandy and invested Rouen than the whoic
extent of the danger was revealed. The Scots crossed the border,
Roger Mowbray rose in revolt in Yorkshire, Ferrars, Earl of Derby,
in the midland shires, Hugh Bigod in the eastern counties, while a

109

Skc. VIII.

Hknkv the
Second

1154>

1189

Henry

and the

baronase

The great
acutitf^e

Inquest oj

shci iffs

II 70

L_ — ^

Sec. VIII.

Henkv thk
Second

1154

'lO

1189

1174

Axs/^e of
A nils

ii8i

Henry

and the

laiv

Assize of
Clarendon

ii66

Trial by
Jury

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap,

Flemish fleet prepared to support the insurrection by a descent upon
the coast. The murder of Archbishop Thomas still hung around
Henry's neck, and his first act in hurrying to England to meet these
perils was to prostrate himself before the shrine of the new martyr,
and to submit to a public scourging in expiation of his sin. But the
penance was hardly wrought when all danger was dispelled by a
series of triumphs. The Kinrj of Scotland, William the Lion, surprised
by the English under cover of a mist, fell into the hands of his
minister, Ranulf de Glanvill, and at the retreat of the Scots the
English rebels hastened to lay down their arms. With the army of
mercenaries which he had brought over sea Henry was able to return
to Normandy, to raise the siege of Rouen, and to reduce his sons to
submission. The revolt of the baronage was followed by fresh blows at
their power. A further step was Laken a few years later in the military
organization of the realm by the Assize of Arms, which restored the
national militia to the place which it had lost at the Conquest. The
substitution of scutage for military service had freed the crown from its
dependence on the baronage and its feudal retainers ; the Assize of
Arms replaced this feudal organization by the older obligation of every
freeman to serve in the defence of the realm. Every knight was bound
to appear at the King's call in coat of mail and with shield and lance,
every freeholder with lance and hauberk, every burgess and poorer
freeman with lance and helmet. The levy of an armed nation
was thus placed wholly at the disposal of the King for purposes of
defence.

The measures we have named were only part of Henry's legislation.
His i3ign, it has been truly said, "initiated the rule of law" as dis-
tinct from the despotism, whether personal or tempered by routine, of
the Norman kings. It was in successive "Assizes" or codes issued
with the sanction of great councils of barons and prelates, that he
perfected by a system of reforms the administrative measures which
Henry the First had begun. The fabric of our judicial legislation
commences with the Assize of Clarendon, the first object of which was
to provide for the order of the realm by reviving the old English
system of mutual security or frankpledge. No stranger might abide
in any place save a borough, and there but for a single night, unless
sureties were given for his good behaviour; and the list of such
strangers was to be submitted to the itinerant justices. In the pro-
visions of this assize for the repression of crime we find the origin of
trial by jury, so often attributed to earlier times. Twelve lawful men
of each hundred, with four from each township, were sworn to present
those who were known or reputed as criminals within their district for
trial by ordeal. The jurors were thus not merely witnesses, but sworn
to act as judges also in determining the value of the charge, and it is
this double character of Henry's jurors that has descended to our

II.]

"gra
crimi
Two
Edwc
quest
separ
simp]
to be
judge;
which
gation
acquit
kinsm
the ne
was foi
was pr
when 1
the ab(
which
jury"
expand
after th
the Kii
Assize '
regular
assignee
roughly
was fina
side wit
to ever)
abolitioi
chief da
judicial i
forced t
reserve ,
of Appe
gave bir
that the
derived,
the next
which thi
its judici
Committi
Appeal.
jurisdicti(

[CHAP.

t upon
around
t these
martyr,
3ut the
d by a
ir prised

of his
ots the
army of
3 return

sons to
blows at
military
ored the
it. The
L from its
\ssize of
of every
IS bound
id lance,
d poorer
nation
•poses of

rislation.
as dis-
^utine, of
js issued
that he
2s which
[gislation
lich was
English
[ht abide
[t, unless
of such
the pro-
lorigin of
>ful men
present
strict for
Lit sworn
Imd it is
to our

II.]

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

til

"grand jury," who still remain charged with the duty of presenting
criminals for trial after examination of the witnesses against them.
Two later steps brought the jury to its modern condition. Under
Edward the First witnesses acquainted with the particular fact in
question were added in each case to the general jury, and by the
separation of these two classes of jurors at a later time the bst became
simply " witnesses " without any judicial power, while the firi t ceased
to be witnesses at all, and became our modern jurors, who are only
judges of the testimony given. With this assize, too, the practice
which had prevailed from the earliest English times of " compur-
gation " passed away. Under this system the accused could be
acquitted of the charge by the voluntary oath of his neighbours and
kinsmen ; but this was abolished by the Assize of Clarendon, and for
the next fifty years his trial, after the investigation of the grand jury,
was found solely in the ordeal or "judgement of God," where innocence
was proved by the power of holding hot iron in the hand, or by sinking
when flung into the water, for swimming was a proof of guilt. It was
the abolition of the whole system of ordeil by the Council of Lateran
which led the way to the establishment of what is called a " petty
jury" for the final trial of prisoners. The Assize of Clarendon was
expanded in that of Northarrpton, which was drawn up immediately
after the rebellion of the Barons. Henry, as we have seen, had restored
the King's Court and the occasional circuits of its justices : by the
Assize of Northampton he rendered this institution permanent and
regular by dividing the kingdom into six districts, to each of which he
assigned three itinerant justices. The circuits thus defined correspond
roughly with those that still exist. The primary object of these circuits
was financial, but the rendering of the King's justice went on side by
side with the exaction of the King's dues, and this carrying of justice
to every corner of the realm was made still more effective by the
abolition of all feudal exemptions from the royal jurisdiction. The
chief danger of the new system lay in the opportunities it afforded to
judicial corruption ; and so great were its abuses that Henry was soon
forced to restrict for a time the number of justices to five, and to
reserve appeals from their court to himself in council. The Court
of Appeal which he thus created, that of the King in Council,
gave birth as time went on to tribunal after tribunal. It is from it
that the judicial powers now exercised by the Privy Council are
derived, as well as the equitable jurisdiction of the Chancellor. In
the next century it becomes the Great Council of the realm, from
which the Privy Council drew its legislative, and the House of Lords
its judicial character. The Court of Star Chamber and the Judicial
Committee of the Privy Council are later otTshoots of Henry's Court of
Appeal. The King's Court, which became inferior to this higher
jurisdiction, was divided after the Great Charter into the three distinct

Sec. VIII.

Henky the

Second

1154-

If)

1189

12i6

Assize of
North-
ampton
II76

1178

'■ *i

112

Sec. VIII.

Hknry the
Secono

1154.

1189

Deatb of
Henry

the
Second

1183- II 86

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chat

1189

Richard
the First

119a 1194

courts of the King's Bench, the Exchequer, and the Common Pleas,
which by the time of Edward the First received distinct judges, and
became for all purposes separate.

For the ten years which followed the revolt of the b?.»'ons Henry's
power was at its height ; and an invasion, which we shall tell hereafter,
had annexed Ireland to his English crown. But the course of triumph
and legislative reform was rudely broken by the quarrels and revolts
of his sons. The successive deaths of Henry and Geofifry vvere
followed by intrigues between Richard, now his father's heir, who had
been entrusted with Aquitaine, and Philip, who had succeeded Lewis
on the throne of France. The plot broke out at last in actual conflict ;
Richard did homage to Philip, and their allied forces suddenly
appeared before Le Mans, from which Henry was driven in headlong
flight towards Normandy. From a height where he halted to look
back on the burning city, so dear to him as his birthplace, the King
hurled his curse against God : " Since Thou hast taken from me the
town I loved best, where I was born and bred, and where my father
lies buried, I will have my revenge on Thee too — 1 will rob Thee of
that thing Thou lovest most in me." Death was upon him, and the
longing of a dying man drew him to the home of his race, but Tours
fell as he lay at Saumur, and the hunted King was driven to beg
mercy from his foes. They gave him the list of the conspirators
against him : at the head of them was his youngest and best-loved
son, John. " Now," he said, as he turned his face to the wall, "let
things go as they will — I care no more for myself or for the world."
He was borne to Chinon by the silvery waters of Vienne, ana muttering,
" Shame, shame on a conquered King," passed sullenly away.

Section IX —The Fall of the AngevinS; 1189— 1204.

[Aut/ioniits. — In addition to those mentioned in the last Section, the
Chronicic of Richard of Dovizes, and the " Itinerarium Regis Ricardi," edited
by Dr. Sttbbs, are useful for Richard's reign. Rigord's " Gesta Philippi," and
the "I'hilippis Willelini BritoniL," the chief authorities on the French side,
are given in Duchesne, "Hist. Franc. Scriptores," vol. v.]

We need not follow Richard in the Crusade which occupied the be-
ginning of his reign, and which left England for four years without a
r-jler, — ii\ his quarrels in Sicily, his conquest of C>prus, his victory at
Ja^lu nis iViiitless march upon Jerusalem, the truce he concluded with
Saiadin, his shipwreck as he returned, or his two imprisonments in
Gtrraan>. jL^eed at \z-x from Iiis captivity, he returned to face new
piids. During his absence, the kingdom had been entrusted to
Wi)l'aHi 0/ Longchainy , Bishop of Ely, head of Church and State, as at
OHCc: justiciar .vid Papal Legate. Longcbamp was loyal to the King
b'lt hii >; lactiCiis and scorn of Englishmen roused a fierce hatred

/I.]

amon
his bi
the F
check
Richa
missic
Richa:
clear-s
genius
was fa:
sheer
roughl
but he
his plai
care of
release,
action 1
availed
the lord
Bom.
the men
of their
firm gov
provi:ice
none ; e
steadily ;
Philip's ]
prised h
rebels of
groaned
support t
Crushi
filled the
tached F
Chartres,
against F
Otto to
knitted ai
the King
success 01
no longer
trace his
Angevin
possible f
in the Ar

[chap.

Pleas,
s, and

[enry's
•eafter,
iumph
revolts
T vvere
ho had

Lewis
Dnflict ;
iddenly
;adlong
to look
le King

me the
y father
Thee of
and the
It Tours
I to beg
ipirators
pst-loved
all, "let

world."

ittering.

lion, the

I," edited

ppi," and

ich side,

the be-
Ithout a
;tory at
led with
lents ill
Ice new
(ited to
Ite, as at
^e King
hatred

M.]

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

among the baronage, and this hatred found a head in John, traitor to
his brother as to bis father. John's intrigues with the baronage and
the French king ended at last in open revolt, which was, however,
checked by the ability of the new Primate, Hubert Walter ; and
Richard's landing in 1194 was followed by his brother's complete sub-
mission. But if Hubert Walter had secured order in England, oversea
Richard found himself face to face with dangers which he was too
clear-sighted to undervalue. Destitute of his father's administrative
genius, less ingenious in his political conceptions than John, Richard
was far from being a mere soldier. A love of adventure, a pride in
sheer physical strength, here and there a, romantic generosity, jostled
roughly with the craft, the unscrupulousness, the violence of his race ;
but he was at heart a statesman, cool and patient in the execution of
his plans as he was bold in their conception. " The devil is loose ; take
care of yourself," Philip had written *o John at the news of the king's
release. In the French king's C2.se a restless ambition was spurred to
action by insults which he had borne dui'ng the Crusade, and he had
availed himself of Richard's imprisonment io invade Normandy, while
the lords of Aquitaine rose in revolt under the t*'Oubadour Bertrand de
Born. Jealousy of the rule of strangers, wearinesi' of the turbulence of
the mercenary soldiers of the Angevins or cf the gieed and oppression
of their financial administration, combined with an impatience of their
firm government and vigorous justice to aiienate the nobles of their
provi:ices on the Continent. Loyalty among the people there was
none ; even Anjou, the home of their race^ diifted towards Philip as
steadily as Poitou. But in warlike ability Richard was more than
Philip's peer. He held him in check on the Norman fn tier and sur-
prised his treasure at Fr^teval, while he reduced to s mission the
rebels of Aquitaine. England, drained by the tax for Ri( rd's ransom,
groaned under its burdens as Hubert Walter raise* ast sums to
support the army of mercenaries which Richard led ag . 1st his foes.

Crushing taxation had wrung from England weal . which again
filled the royal treasury, and during cX short truce Richard's bribes de-
tached Flanders from the French alliance, and uni d the Counts of
Chartres, Champagne, and Boulogne with the Bretons in a revolt
against PhiUp. He won a valuable aid by the election of his nephew
Otto to the German throne, and his envoy, William Longchamp,
knitted an alliance which would bring the German lances to bear on
the King of Paris. But the security of Normandy was requisite to the
success of these wider plans, and Richard saw that its t^efence could
no longer rest on the loyalty of the Norman people, his lather might
trace his descent through Matilda from the line of Hrolf, but the
Angevin ruler was in fact a stranger to the Norman. It was im-
possible for a Norman to recognize his Duke with any real sympathy
in the Angevin prince whom he saw moving along the border at the

Sec. IX.
The Fall

OF THE

Angevins
1189

1204

If-'

Chateaci
Gaillard

Ii''

114

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IX.
The Fall

OK THE

Angevins
1189

TO
1204.

Richard's
death

head of Braban^on mercenaries, m whose camp the old names of the
Norman baronage were missing, and Merchade, a Provencal ruffian,
held supreme command. The purely military site which Richard
selected for the new fortress with which he guarded the border showed
his realization of the fact that Normandy could now only be held by
force of arms. As a monument of warlike skill his " Saucy Castle,"
Chateau-Gaillard, stands first among the fortresses of the middle ages.
Richard fixed its site where the Seine bends suddenly at Gaillon in a
great semicircle to the north, and where the valley of Les Andelys
breaks the line of the chalk cliffs along its banks. Blue masses of
woodland crown the distant .hills ; within the river curve lies a dull
reach of flat meadow, round which the Seine, broken with green islets,
and dappled with the grey and blue of the sky, flashes like a silver
bow on its way to Rouen. The castle formed a part of an entrenched
camp which Richard designed to cover his Norman capital. Approach
by the river was blocked by a stockade and a bridge of boats, by a
fort on the islet in mid stream, and by the fortified town which the
King built in the valley of the Gambon, then an impassable marsh.
In the angle between this valley and the Seine, on a spur of the
chalk hills which only a narrow neck of land connects with the
general plateau, rose at the height of 300 feet above the river the
crowning fortress of the whole. Its outworks and the walls which
connected it with the town and stockade have for the most part
gone, but time and the hand of man have done little to destroy the
fortifications themselves — the fosse, hewn deep into the soHd rack,
with casemates hollowed out along its sides, the fluted walls of the
citadel, the huge donjon looking down on the brown roofs and
huddled gables of Les Andelys. Even now in its ruin we can under-
stand the triumphant outburst of its royal builder as he saw it rising
against the sky ; " How pretty a child is mine, this child of but one
year old ! "

T)- -^ easy reduction of Normandy on the fall of Chdteau-Gailjard at
a later time proved Richard's foresight ; but foresight and sagacity
were mingled in him with a brutal violence and a callous indifference
to honour, " I would take it, were its walls of iron," Philip exclaimed
in wrath as he saw the fortress rise. " I would hold it, were its walls of
butter," was the defiant answer of his foe. It was Church land, and
the Archbishop of Rouen laid Normandy under interdict at its
seizure, but the King met the interdict with mockery, and intrigued
with Rome till the censure was withdrawn. He was just as defiant
of a " rain of blood," whose fall scared his courtiers. " Had an angel
from heaven bid him abandon his work," says a cool observer, " he
would have answered with a curse." The twelvemonth's hard work,
in fart, by securing the Norman frontier, set Richard free to deal his
long-planned blow at Philip. Money only was wanting, and the king

CHAP.

of the
uffian,
ichard
bowed
leld by
lastle,"
le ages.
»n in a
^ndelys
Lsses of
3 a dull
n islets,
a silver
rencbed
pproach
its, by a
lich the
! marsh.
ir of the
with the
river the
lis which
lost part
itroy the
|lid rock,
,s of the
lofs and
n under-
lit rising
I but one

U.]

ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS.

listened with more than the greed of his race to ti^e rumour that a
treasure had been found in the fields of the Limousin, "^wf^-lve knights
of gold seated round a golden tabic were the find, it was t aid, of the
Lord of Chains. Treasure-trove id any rate there was, and 1^ ichard
prowled around the walls, but the castle held stubbornly out till the
King's greed passed into savage menace ; he would hang all, he swore
— man, woman, the very child at the breast. In the midst of his
threats an arrow from the walls struck him down. He died as he had
lived, owning the wild passion which for seven years past had kept
him from confession lest he should be forced to pardon Philip, for-
giving with kingly generosity the archer who had shot him.

The Angevin dominion broke to pieces at his death. John was
acknowledged as king in Englaud and Normandy, Aquitaine was
secured for him by its Duchess, his mother ; but Anjou, Maine,
and Touraine did homage to Arthur, the son of his elder brother
Geoffry, the late Duke of Britanny. The ambition of Philip, who
protected his cause, turned the day against Arthur ; the Angevins
rose against the French garrisons with which the French king prac-
tically annexed the country, and John was a 1;!.:>'^ owned as master of
the whole dominion of his house. A fresh o;^;. cak of war in Poitou
was fatal to his rival ; surprised at the siege of Mirebeau by a rapid
march of the King, Arthur was taken prisoner to Rouen, and murdered
there, as men believed, by his uncle's hand. The brutal outrage at once
roused the French provinces in revolt, while the French king marched
straight on Normandy. The ease Avith which its conquest was effected
can only be explained by the utter absence of any popular resistance on
the part of the Normans themselves. Half a century before the sight
of a Frenchman in the land would have roused every peasant to arms
from Avranches to Dieppe, but town after town surrendered at the
mere summons of Philip, and the conquest was hardly over before
Normandy settled down into the most loyal of the provinces of France.
Much of this was due to the wise liberality with which Philip met the
claims of the towns to independence and self-government, as well as to
the overpowering force and military ability with which the conquest was
effected. But the utter absence of all opposition sprang from a deeper
cause. To the Norman his transfer from John to Philip was a mere
passing from one foreign master to another, and foreigner for foreigner
Philip was the less alien of the two. Between France and Normandy
there had been as many yr»ars of friendship as of strife ; between
Norman and Angevin lay a century of bitterest hate. Moreover, the
subjection to France was the realization in fact of a dependence which
had always existed in theory ; Philip entered Rouen as the over-lord of
its Dukes ; while the submission to the house of Anjou had been the
most humiliating of all submissions, the submission to an equal.

It was the consciousness of this temper in the Norman people that

Sec. IX.
The Fai.i,

OK THE

Anc.evins
1189

T(.)

1204

1 199

The loss
of Nor-
mandy

I200

1203

H'.-

Ii6

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

in.]

Sec. IX.

I'me Fai I

OK THE

Angevins
1180

lfl04

1204

forced John to abandon all hope of resistance on the failure of his
attempt to relieve Chdteau-Galllard, by the siege of which Philip com-
menced his invasion. The skill with which the combined movements for
its relief were planned proved the King's military ability. The besiegers
were parted into two masses by the Seine ; the bulk of their forces were
camped in the level space within the bend of the river, while one
division was thrown across it to occupy the valley of the Gambon, and
sweep the country around of its provisions. John proposed to cut the
French army in two by destroying the bridge of boats which formed
the only communication between the two bodies, while the whole of
his own forces flung themselves on the rear of the French division
encamped in the cul-de-sac formed by the nver-bend, and without any
exit save the bridge. Had the attack been carried out as ably as it
was planned, it must have ended in Philip's ruin \ but the two assaults
were not made simultaneously, and were successively repulsed. The
repulse was followed by the utter collapse of the military system by
which the Angevins had held Normandy ; John's treasury was ex-
hausted, and his mercenaries passed over to ♦he foe. The King's
despairing appeal to the Duchy itself came too late ; its nobles were
already treating with Philip, and the towns were incapable of resisting
the siege tram of the French. It was despair of any aid from Nor-
mandy that drove John over sea to seek it as fruitlessly from England,
but with tbf^ fall of Chateau-Gaillard, after a gallant struggle, the pro-
vince passti without a struggle into the French King's hands. In 1204
Philip turner on the south with as startling a success. Maine, Anjou,
and Touraine passed with little resistance into his hands, and the death
of Eleanor was followed by the submission of the bulk of Aquitaine.
Little was left save the country south of the Garonne ; and from the
lordship of a vast empire that stretched from the Tyne to the Pyrenees
John saw himself reduced at a blow to the realm of England. On the
loss of Chdteau-Gaillard in fact hung the destinies of England, and the
interest that attaches one to the grand ruin on the heights of Les
Andelys is, that it represents the ruin of a system as well as of a camp.
From its dark donjon and broken walls we see not merely the pleasant
vale of Seine, but the sedgy flats of our own Runnymede.

\Autk
"Englisl
prefaces i
Series gi
Map hav
Sir F. M

iTisi
we have
people M
face to ft
In his
aided hy
literary
history
and pro
under ec
the days
which fo
intellect!
the Char
greater
the chief
and illun
monastic
house of
shelte
phical at
work of
the Con(
ano. Sim<

'1^

III.]

THE GREAT CHARTER.

CHAPTER III.

THE GREAT CHARTER.

1204-1265.

Section I.—Engliali Literature under the Norman and

Anff^evin Kings.

\ Authorities. — For the general literature of this period, see Mr. Morley's
"English Writers from the Conquest to Chaucer," vol. i. part ii. The
prefaces of Mr, Brewer and Mr. Dimock to his collected works in the Rolls
Series give all that can be known of Gerald de Barri. The Poems of Walter
Map have been edited by Mr. Wright for the Camden Society ; Layamon, by
Sir F. Madden.]

It is in a review of the literature of England during the period that
we have just traversed that we shall best understand the new English
people with which John, when driven from Normandy, found himself
face to face.

In his contest with Eeket, Henry the Second had been powerfully
aided by the silent revolution which now began to part the purely
literary class from the purely clerical. During the earlier ages of our
history we have seen literature springing up in ecclesiastical schools,
and protecting itself against the ignorance and violence of the time
under ecclesiastical privileges. Almost all our writers from Baeda to
the days of the Angevins ire clergy or monks. The revival of letters
which followed the Conquest was a purely ecclesiastical revival ; the
intellectual impulse which Bee had;:iven to Normandy travelled across
the Channel with the new Norman abbots who were established in the
greater English monasteries ; and writing-rooms or scriptoria, where
the chief works of Latin literature, patristic or classical, were copied
and illuminated, the lives of saints compiled, and entries noted in the
monastic chronicle, formed from, this time a part of every religious
house of any importance. But the literature which found this religious
sbelte "as not so much ecclesiastical as secular. Even the philoso-
phical and devotional impulse given by Anselm produced no English
work of theology or metaphysics. The literary revival which followed
the Conquest took mainly the old historical form. At Durham, Turgot
and, Simeon threw into Latin ^hape the national annals to the time of

117

Tlie

literary

reyival

ii8

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. I.

English

ilR

jITERATURK

■H>

UNDER THE

Norman

AND Ange-

vin Kings

I i

\'U

«.ut e and
the Court

IVilliam of
Malmesbury

The Court
historians

III

Inll

iiHil

liiKiltt'f Ir

HUb^m

Gerald of
Wales

Henry the First with an especial regard to northern affairs, while the
earlier events of Stephen's reign were noted down by two Priors of
Hexham in the wild border-land between England and the Scots.
These however were the colourless jottings of mere annalists ; it was
in the Scriptorium of Canterbury, in Osbern's lives of the English
saints, or in Eadmer's record of the struggle of Anselm against the
Red King and his successor, that we see the first indications of a
distinctively English feeling telling on the new literature. The national
impulse is yet more conspicuous in the two historians that followed.
The war-songs of the English conquerors of Britain were preserved by
Henry, an Archdeacon of Huntingdon, who wove them into annals
compiled from Basda and the Chronicle ; while William, the librarian
of Malmesbury, as industriously collected the lighter ballads which
embodied the popular traditions of the English Kings.

It is in William above all others that we see the new tendency of
English literature. In himself, as in his work, he marks the fusion of
the conquerors and the conquered, for he was of both English and
Norman parentage, and his sympathies were as divided as his blood.
The form and style of his writings show the influence of those classical
studies which were now reviving throughout Christendom. Monk as
he is, he discards the older ecclesiastical models and the annalistic
form. P>ents are grouped together with no strict reference to time,
while the lively narrative flows rapidly and loosely along, with constant
breaks of digression over the general history of Europe and the
Church. It is in this change of historic spirit that William takes his
place as first of the more statesmanlike and philosophic school of
historians who began soon to arise in direct connection with the Court,
and amongst whom the author of the chronicle which commonly bears
the name of " Benedict of Peterborough," with his continuator Roger
of Howden, are the most conspicuous. Both held judicial offices
under Henry the Second, and it is to their position at Court that they
owe the fulness and accuracy of their information as to affairs at home
and abroad, their copious supply of official documents, and the purely
political temper with which they regard the conflict of Church and
State in their time. The same freedom from ecclesiastical bias, com-
bined with remarkable critical ability, is found in the history of
William, the CaiAon of Newburgh, who wrote far away in his Yorkshire
monastery. The English court, however, had become the centre of a
distinctly secukr literature. The treatise of Ranulf de Glanvill, the
Justiciar of Henry the Second, is the earliest work on English law, as
that of the royal treasurer, Richard Fitz-Neal, on the Exchequer is the
earliest on English government.

Still more distinctly secular than these, though the work of a priest
who claimed to be a bishop, are the writings of Gerald de Barri.
Gerald is the father of our popular literature, as he is the originator of

III.]

the pc
name
veins,
writin
in W;
bishoj
of his
and pi
in clas
better
apolog
and so
author
in vog
accoun
taken i
his rap
sense,
in the (
tone in
anecdoi
crifical
a fearle
even to
Gerald ;
of half t;
into hist
the see (
the spiri
A torn
from th(
before t;
patronaj
the Celt!
the exile
by Geof
dantry o
memorie
the Grea
whose p(
ferred G
Norman
verse. !^
tomb at <
of his soi

the
es his

lOOl of

Court,
bears

Roger

offices
they
home

purely
h and
com-
)ry of
kshire
e of a
1, the
iw, as
is the

priest
iBarri.
Iter of

HI.]

THK GREAT CtTAUTKR.

the political and ecclesiastical pamphlet. Welsh blood (as his usual
name of Giraldus Cambrensis implies) mixed with Norman in his
veins, and something of the restless Celtic rirc runs alike through his
writings and his life. A busy scholar at Paris, a reforming archdeacon
in Wales, the wittiest of Court chaplains, the meat troublesome of
bishops, Gerald became the gayest and most amusing of all the authors
of his time. In his hands the stately Latin tongue took the vivacity
and picturesqueness of the jongleur's verse. Reared as he had been
in classical studies, he threw pedantry contemptuously aside. " It is
better to be dumb than not to be understood," is his characteristic
apology for the novelty of his style : "new times require new fashions,
and so I have thrown utterly aside the old and dry method of some
authors, and aimed at adopting the fashion of speech which is actually
in vogue to-day." His tract on the conqutst. of Ireland and his
account of Wales, which are in fact reports of two journeys under-
taken in those cotmtries with John and Archbishop Baldwin, illustrate
his rapid faculty of careless observation, his audacity, and his good
sense. They are just the sort of lively, dashing letters that we find
in the correspondence of a modern journal. There is the same modern
tone in his political pamphlets J his profusion of jests, his fund of
anecdote, the aptness of his quotations, his natural shrewdness and
critical acumen, the clearness and vivacity of his style, are backed by
a fearlessness and impetuosity that made him a dangerous assa.iant
even to such a ruler as Henry the Second. The invectives in which
Gerald poured out his resentment against the Angevins are the cause
of half the scandal about Henry and his sons which has found its way
into history. His life was wasted in an ineffectual struggle to secure
the see of St. David's, but his pungent pen played its part in rousing
the spirit of the nation to its struggle with the Crcvn.

A tone of distinct hostility to the Church developed itself almost
from the first among the singers of romance. Romance had long
before taken root in the court of Henry the First, where under the
patronage of Queen Maud the dreams of Arthur, so long cherished by
the Celts of Britanny, and which had travelled to Wales in the train of
the exile Rhys ap Tevvdor, took shape in the History of the Britons
by Geoffry of Monmouth. Myth, legend, tradition, the classical pe-
dantry of the day, Welsh hopes of future triumph over the Saxon, the
memories of the Crusades and of the world-wide dominion of Charles
the Great, were mingled together by this daring fabrlist in a work
whose popularity became at once immense. Alfred of Beverley trans-
ferred Geoffry's inventions into the region of sober history, while two
Norman irouveres, Gaimar and Wace, translated them into French
verse. So complete was the credence they obtained, that Arthur's
tomb at Glastonbury was visited by Henry the Second, while the child
of his son Geoffry and of Constance of Britanny bore the name of the

119

Sec. I.
English

LiTEKATURI

under tkk

Norman

AND Ance-

viN Kings

'. *

Roman

Geoffry cf
Monmouth

:if

IMAGE EVALUATION
TEST TARGET (MT-3)

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111.1 l.-^aa

'i^.

v^**

^.'!>'*

Hiotographic

Sciences
Corporation

23 WBT MAIN STtiiT

WIBSTIR.N.Y. I4SM

(7t6)t72.4S03

120

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. I.
English

iLlTRRATURB
UKUER THE

NuRMAN
AND AnCE*

viN Kings

Walter
de Map

I BaviTal
of the

' Snslish
toaffue

Celtic hero. Out of Geoflfry's creation grew little by little the poem of
the Table Round. Britanny, which had mingled with the story of
Arthur the older and more mysterious legend of the Enchanter Merlin,
lent that of Lancelot to the wandering minstrels of the day, who
moulded it, as they wandered from hall to hall, into the familiar tale
of knighthood wrested from its loyalty by the love of woman. The
stories of Tristram and Gawayne, at firat as independent as that of
Lancelot, were drawn with it into the whirlpool of Arthurian romance.;
and when the Church, jealous of the popularity of the legends of
chivalry, invented as a counteracting influence the poem of the Sacred
Dish, the San Graal which held the blood of the Cross invisible to all
eyes but those of the pure in heart, the genius of a court poet, Walter
de Map, wove the rival legends together, sent Arthur and his knights
wandering over sea and land in the quest of the San Graal, and
crowned the work by the figure of Sir Galahad, the type of ideal
knighthood, without fear and without reproach.

Walter stands before us as the representative of a sudden outburst
of literary, social, and religious criticism which followed the growth of
romance and the appearance of a freer historical tone in the court of
the two Henries. Born on the Welsh border, a student at Paris, a
favourite with the King, a royal chaplain, justiciar, and ambassador,
the genius of Walter de Map was as various as it was prolific. He is
as much at his ease in sweeping together the chit-chat of the time in
his " Courtly Trifles " as in creating the character of Sir Galahad. But
he only rose to his fullest strength when he turned from the fields of
romance to that of Church reform, and embodied the ecclesiastical
abuses of his day in the figure of his " Bishop Goliath." The whole
spirit of Henry and his court in their struggle with Beket is reflected
and illustrated in the apocalypse and confession of this imaginary
prelate. Picture after picture strips the veil from the corruption of .ne
mediaeval Church, its indolence, its thirst for gain, its secret immorality.
The whole body of the clergy, from Pope to hedge-priest, is pa.'nted as
busy in the chase for gain ; what escapes the bishop is snapped up by
the archdeacon, what escapes the archdeacon is nosed and hunted
down by the dean, while a host of minor ofticials prowl hungrily around
these greater marauders. Out of the crowd of figures which fills the
canvas of the satirist, pluralist vicars, abbots " purple as their wines,"
monks feeding and chattering together like parrots in the refectory,
rises the Philistine Bishop, light of purpose, void of conscience, lost in
sensuality, drunken, unchaste, the Goliath who sums up the enormities
of all, and against whose forehead this new David slings his sharp
pebble of the brook.

It is only, however, as the writings of Englishmen that Latin or
French works like these can be claimed as part of English literature.
The spoken tongue of the nation at large remained of course English

re
he

III.]

as befoi
ministei
only a fi
Even E
strangei
survivec
and psa
Chronic
Chronic
ofitlfre
a legend
a native
The app
of time
island
mon ;
He dwel
seemed
mind to 1
deeds of
who first
the priest
and S.
leaves; h
Pen he to
together, j
is now A
fact an e
Historical
beyond alj
changed.
Nonnan w
the same ;
affected b
similes of
simple joy
thus wakes
between th
by the Cc
literature, j
de Map an
with John.

III.]

THE GREAT CHARTER.

121

as before ; William himself had tried to learn it that he might ad-
minister justice to his subjects ; and for a century after the Conquest
only a few new words crept in from the language of the conquerors.
Even English literature, banished as it was from the court of the
stranger and exposed to the fashionable rivalry of Latin scholars,
survived not only in religious works, in poetic paraphrases of gospels
and psalms, but in the great monument of our prose, the English
Chronicle. It was not till the miserable reign of Stephen that the
Chronicle died out in the Abbey of Peterborough. But the " Sayings
of itlfred," which embodied the ideal of an English king and gathered
a legendary worship round the great name of the English past, show
a native literature going on through the reign of Henry the Second.
The appearance of a great work of English verse coincides in point
of time with the loss of Normandy, and the return of John to his
island realm. " There was a priest in the land whose name was Laya-
mon ; he was son of Leovenath : may the Lord be gracious to him !
He dwelt at Earnley, a noble church on the bank of Severn (good it
seemed to him !) pear Radstone, where he read books. It came in
mind to him and in his chiefest thought that he would tell the noble
deeds of England, what the men were named, and whence they came,
who first had English land." Journeying far and wide over the land,
the priest of Earnley found Bseda and Wace, the books too of S. Albin
and S. Austin. " Layamon laid down these books and turned the
leaves ; he beheld them lovingly : may the Lord be gracious to him !
Pen he took with fingers and wrote a book-skin, and the true words set
together, and compressed the three books into one." Layamon's church
is now Areley, near Bewdley, in Worcestershire. His poem was in
fact an expansion of Wace's " Brut," with insertions from Bseda.
Historically it is worthless, but as a monument of our language it is
beyond all price. After Norman and Angevin English remained un-
changed. In more than thirty thousand lines not more than fifty
Norman words are to be found. Even the old poetic tradition remains
the same ; the alliterative metre of the earlier verse is only slightly
affected by riming terminations, the similes are the few natural
similes of Caedmon, the battles are painted with the same rough,
simple joy. It is by no mere accident that the English tongue
thus wakes again into written life on the eve of the great struggle
between the nation and its King. The artificial forms imposed
by the Conquest were falling away from the people as from its
literature, and a new England, quickened by the Celtic vivacity of
de Map and the Norman daring of Gerald, stood forth to its conflict
with John.

Sec. I.

Enc.msh
Literature
under tub
Norman
AND Ange-
vin Kings

Layamon

i,'il

'i:,\

t *

' • t^

1 '{.

'%kt

III.]

Sec. II.
John

iao4

iai5

John

Section II.— John. ia04-l&15.

[Authorities.— Owe chief sources of information are the Chronicle embodied
in the "Memoriale " of Walter of Coventry ; and the "Chronicle of Roger
of Wendover," the first of the published annalists of S. Alban's, whose work
was subsequently revised and continued in a more patriotic tone by another
monk of the same abbey, Matthew Paris. The Annals of Waverley, Dunstable,
and Burton are important for the period. The great series of the Royal
Rolls begin now to be of the highest value. The French authorities as
before. For Langton, see Hook's bic^aph^ in the ** Lives of the Arch-
bishops." The best modern account of tn;s reign is in Mr. Pearson's " History
of England," vol. ii.]

" Foul as it is, hell itself is defiled by the fouler presence of John."
The terrible verdict of the King's contemporaries has passed into the
sober judgement of history. Externally John possessed all the quick-
ness, the vivacity, the cleverness, the good-humour, the social charm
which distinguished his house. His worst enemies owned that he
toiled steadily and closely at the work of administration. He was
fond of learned men like Gerald of Wales. He had a strange gift of
attracting friends and of winning the love of women. But in his inner
soul John was the worst outcome of the Angevins. He united into one
mass of wickedness their insolence, their selfishness, their unbridled
lust, their cruelty and tyranny, their shamelessness, their superstition,
their cynical indifference to honour or truth. In mere boyhood he had
torn with brutal levity the beards of the Irish chieftains who came to
own him as their lord. His ingratitude and perfidy had brought
down his father with sorrow to the grave. To his brother he had
been the worst of traitors. All Christendom believed him to be the
murderer of his nephew, Arthur of Britanny. He abandoned one wife
and was faithless to another. His punishments were refinements of
cruelty — the starvation of children, the crushing old men under copes
of lead. His court was a brothel where no woman was safe from the
royal lust, and where his cynicism loved to publish the news of his
victims' shame. He was as craven in his superstition as he was
daring in his impiety. He scoffed at priests and turned his back on
the mass even amidst the solemnities of his coronation, but he never
stirred on a journey without hanging relics round his neck. But with
the supreme wickedness of his race he inherited its profound ability.
His plan for the relief of Chiteau-Gaillard, the rapid march by which
he shattered Arthur's hopes at Mirebeau, showed an inborn genius for
war. In the rapidity and breadth of his political combinations he far
surpassed the statesmen of his time. Throughout his reign we see
him quick to discern the difficulties of his position, and inexhaustible
in the resources with which he met them. The overthrow of his

continen

which al

all Engh

The clos

incapacit

The awfi

indolent

who lost

struggle

Thew

dominion

for the su

struggling

assemblec

project w

Primate a

had both i

that the a

national fr

braced hin

few weeks

the opposi

head. Joh

of Cunterbi

though infc

its sub-prio

to appeal t(

both for th<

occupied tl

Christendo]

examinatioi

was probab

from love o:

election wit

peared befc

archiepisco]

made, for i

holiness of

career place

the step was

Crown. TI

Papal threai

his see, by s

the banishn

could seize i

copes
J>m the
|of his
was
ickon
never
|t with
Ibility.
Iwhich
[us for
Ihefar
ire see
^stible
>f his

iii.l

THE GREAT CHARTER.

continental power only spurred him to the formation of a great league
which all but brought Philip to the ground ; and the sudden revolt of
all England was parried by a shameless alliance with the Papacy.
The closer study of John's history clears away the charges of sloth and
incapacity with which men tried to explain the greatness of his fall.
The awful lesson of his life rests on the fact that it was no weak and
indolent voluptuary, but the ablest and most ruthless of the Angevins
who lost Normandy, became the vassal of the Pope, and perished in a
struggle of despair against English freedom.

The whole energies of the King were bent on the recovery of ^ <s lost
dominions on the Continent. He impatiently collected money and men
for the support of the adherents of the House of Anjou who were still
struggling against the arms of France in Poitou and Guienne, and had
assembled an army at Portsmouth in the summer of 1205, when his
project was suddenly thwarted by the resolute opposition of the
Primate and the Earl of Pembroke, William Marshal. So completely
had both the baronage and the Church been humbled by his father,
that the attitude of their representatives indicated the new spirit of
national freedom which was rising around the King. John at once
braced himself to a struggle with it The death of Hubert Walter, a
few weeks after his protest, enabled him, as it seemed, to neutralize
the opposition of the Church by placing a creature of his own at its
head. John de Grey, Bishop of Norwich, was elected by the monks
of Canterbury at his bidding and enthroned as Primate. In a previous
though informal gathering, however, the convent had already chosen
its sub-prior, Reginald, as Archbishop, and the rival claimants hastened
to appeal to Rome ; but the result of their appeal was a startling one
both for themselves and for the King. Innocent the Third,, who now
occupied the Papal throne, had pushed its claims of supremacy over
Christendom further than any of his predecessors : after a careful
examination he quashed both the contested elections. The decision
was probably a just one ; but Innocent did not stop there ; whether
from love of power, or, as may fairly be supposed, in despair of a free
election within English bounds, he commanded the monks who ap-
peared before him to elect in his presence Stephen Langton to the
archiepiscopal see. Personally a better choice could not have been
made, for Stephen vras a man who by sheer weight of learning and
holiness of life had risen to the dignity of Cardinal, and whose after
career placed him in the front rank of English patriots. But in itself
the step was an usurpation of the rights both of the Church and of the
Crown. The King at once met it with resistance, and replied to the
Papal threats of interdict if Langton were any longer excluded from
his see, by a counter threat that the interdict should be followed by
the banishment of the clergy and the mutilation of every Italian he
could seize in the realm. Innocent, however, was not a man to draw

123

Sec. IL
John

iao4

1215

The -
Interdict

ii"

ii'4

t !l

' i!

'■■fit:

1208

I.':

^-'Wh

124

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.

John
lfl04

iai9

John 5

deposition

1212

back from his purpose, and the interdict fell at last upon the land.
All worship save that of a few privileged orders, all administration of
the Sacraments five that of private baptism, ceased over the length
and breadth of the country : the church-bells were silent, the dead lay
unburied on the ground. The King replied by confiscating the lands
of the clergy who observed the interdict, by subjecting them in spite
of their privileges to the royal courts, and often by leaving outrages on
them unpunished. " Let him go," said John, when a Welshman was
brought before him foi the murder of a priest, ''he has killed my
enemy ! " A year passed before the Pope proceeded to the further
sentence of excommunication. John was now formally cut off from
the pale of the Church ; but the new sentence was met with the same
defiance as the old. Five of the bishops fled over sea, and secret
disaffection was spreading widely, but there was no public avoidance
of the excommunicated King. An Archdeacon of Norwich who
withdrew from his service was crushed to death under a cope of lead,
and the hint was sufficient to prevent either prelate or noble from
following his example. Though the King stood alone, with nobles
estranged from him and the Church against him, his strength seemed
utterly unbroken. From the first moment of his rule John had defied
the baronage. The promise to satisfy their demand for redress of
wrongs in the past reign, a promise made at his election, remained
unfulfilled ; when the demand was repeated he answered it by seizing
their castles and taking their children as hostages for their loyalty.
The cost of his fruitless threats of war had been met by heavy and
repeated taxation. The quarrel with the Church and fear of their
revolt only deepened his oppression of the nobles. He drove De
Braose, one of the most powerful of the Lords Marchers, to die in
exile, while his wife and grandchildren were believed to have been
starved to death in the royal prisons. On the nobles who still clung
panic-stricken to the court of the excommunicate king John heaped
outrages worse than death. Illegal exactions, the seizure of their
castles, the preference shown to foreigners, were small provocations
compared with his attacks on the honour of their wives and daughters.
But the baronage still submitted ; and the King's vigour was seen by
the rapidity with which he crushed a rising of the nobles in Ireland,
and foiled an outbreak of the Welsh. Hated as he was the land
remained still. Only one weapon now remained in Innocent's hands.
An excommunicate king had ceased to be a Christian, or to have
claims on the obedience of Christian subjects. As spiritual heads of
Christendom, the Popes had ere now asserted their right to remove
such a ruler from his throne and to g^ve it to a worthier than he ; and
this right Innc;:ent at last felt himself driven to exercise. He issued a
bull of deposition against John, proclaimed a crusade against him,
and committed the execution of his sentence to Philip of France.

III.]

John me

suflTered t

tion to hi

call on Bi

invasion

ships, anc

But it M

and activ

political a

he met th

The baroi

John boug

The Germ

Germany t

success in

revelation (

co«itemptu(

every enem

The Welsh

again in wa

for a fresh

fresh source

plunged aln

to Philip on

only saved

refuge in N

his diplomai

his position.

and.W?.Ics, ;

sudden reve

With charai

remission of

the Pope, CO

the money he

of the King

Rome his all;

in breaking u

versatile tem

May 1213 he

to the Roma

fealty and die

In after tim

sense of natio

become the P

mured; "heh

ill

:hap.

land,
ion of
ength
id lay
lands
L spite
geson
in was
ed my
further
f from
e same
secret
>idance
h who
>f lead,
le from
nobles
seemed
1 defied
dress of
;mained
seizing
loyalty,
avy and
lof their
ove De
jo die in
Ive been
ill clung
heaped
lof their
ications
lughters.
seen by
[Ireland,
the land
hands,
to have
eads of
remove
Ihe ; and
lissued a
tst hiro,
France.

III.]

THE GREAT CHARTER.

John met it with the same scorn as before. His insolent disdain
suffered the Roman legate. Cardinal Pandulf, to proclaim his deposi-
tion to his face at Northampton. An enormous army gathered at his
call on Barham Down ; and the English fleet dispelled all danger of
invasion by crossing the Channel, by capturing a number of French
ships, and by burning Dieppe.

But it was not in England only that the King showed his strength
and activity. Vile as he was, John possessed in a high degree the
political ability of his race, and in the diplomatic efforts with which
he met the danger from France he showed himself his father's equal
The barons of Poitou were roused to attack Philip from the south.
John bought the aid of the Count of Flanders on his northern border.
The German King, Otto, pledged himself to bring the knighthood of
Germany to support an invasion of France. But at the moment of his
success in diplomacy John suddenly gave way. It was in fact the
revelation of a danger at home which shook him from his attitude of
coiitemptuous defiance. The bull of deposition gave fresh energy to
every enemy. The Scotch King was in correspondence with Innocent.
The Welsh princes who had just been forced to submission broke out
again in war. John hanged their hostages, and called his host to muster
for a fresh inroad into Wales, but the army met only to become a
fresh source of danger. Powerless to resist openly, the baronage had
plunged almost to a man into secret conspiracies ; many promised aid
to Philip on his landing. John, in the midst of hidden enemies, was
only saved by the haste with which he disbanded his army and took
refuge in Nottingham Castle. His daring self-confidence, the skill of
his diplomacy, could no longer hide from him the utter loneliness of
his position. At war with Rome, with France, with Scotland, Ireland
and Wales, at war with the Church, he saw himself disarmed by this
sudden revelation of treason in the one force left at his disposal.
With characteristic suddenness he gave way. He endeavoured by
remission of fines to win back his people. He negotiated eagerly with
the Pope, consented to receive the Archbishop, and promised to repay
the raoney he had extorted from the Church. The shameless ingenuity
of the King's temper was seen in his immediate resolve to make
Rome his ally, to turn its spiritual thunder against his foes, to use it
in breaking up the confederacy it had formed against him. His quick
versatile temper saw the momentary gain to be won. On the 15th of
May 121 3 he knelt before the legate Pandulf, surrendered his kingdom
to the Roman Sec, took it back again as a tributary vassal, swore
fealty and did liege homage to the Pope.

In after times men believed that England thrilled at the news with a
sense of national shame such as she had never felt before. "He has
become the Pope's man," the whole country vas said to have mur-
mured ; " he has forfeited the very name of King ; from a free man he

Sbc. II.

JOHM

iao4

laia

Pope's
▼aasal

■I i '^1

f H?'(

The
Battle of
BouTlnes

126

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sbc. II.

John
1A04

lfll5

1214

Stephen
Laacton

has degraded himself into a serf." But we see little trace of such a
feeling in the contemporary accounts of the time. As a political
measure indeed the success of John's submission was complete. The
French army at once broke up in impotent rage, and when Philip
turned against the enemy whom John had raised up for him in
Flanders, five hundred English ship<^ under the Karl of Salisbury fell
upon the fleet which accompaniec s army along the coast and
utterly destroyed it. The league which John had so long matured at
last disclosed itself. The King i. nself landed in Poitou, rallied its
nobles round him, crossed the Loire in triumph, and won back Angers,
the home of his race. At the same time Otto, reinforcing his German
army by the knighthood of Flanders and Boulogne as well as by a
body of English troops, threatened France from the north. For the
moment Philip seemed lost, and yet on the fortunes of Philip hung the
fortunes of English freedom. But in this crisis of her fate France was
true to herself and her King; the townsmen marched from every
borough to Philip's rescue, priests led their flocks to battle with the
Church banners flying at their head. The two armies met near the
bridge of Bouvines, between Lille and Tournay, and from the first the
day went against the allies. The Flemish were the flrst to fly ; then
the Germans in the centre were overwhelmed by the numbers of the
French ; last of all the English on the right were broken by a fierce
onset of the Bishop of Beauvais, who charged mace in hand and
struck the Earl of Salisbury to the ground. The news of this complete
overthrow reached John in the midst of his triumphs in the South, and
scattered his hopes to the winds. He was at once deserted by the
Poitevin nobles, and a hasty retreat alone enabled him to return,
baffled and humiliated, to his island kingdom.

It is to the victory of Bouvines that England owes her Great
Charter. From the hour of his submission to the Papacy, John's ven-
geance on the barons had only been delayed till he should return a
conqueror from the fields of France. A sense of their danger nerved
the baronage to resistance ; they refused to follow the King on his
foreign campaign till the excommunication were removed, and when it
was removed they s...l refused, on the plea that they were not bound
to serve in wars without the realm. Furious as he was at this new atti-
tude of resistance, the time had not yet come for vengeance, and John
sailed for Poitou with the dream of a great victory which should lay
Philip and the barons alike at his feet. He returned from his defeat
to find the nobles no longer banded together in secret conspiracies, but
openly united in a definite claim of liberty and law. The leader in
this great change was the new Archbishop whom Innocent had set on
the throne of Canterbury. From the moment of his landing in Eng-
land, Stephen Langton had assumed the constitutional position of the
Primate as champion of the old English customs and law against the

III.]

personal

the Red,

Stephen,

from the

observe t

national

sail to Pc

but by pr

ance sucl

aim to re

pledges o

Geoffrey

Albans.

governme

practise e

pledged t(

of the law

Langton :

meeting o

the First,

reforms.

paign ; the

after the K

and swore

storation c

January in

the King, 2

showed Jo

were alike

to plead hi

man would

gathered ii

they not as

the whole c

her gates 1

Fitz-Waitei

example of

of aid cam(

hastily tojc

John found

nation in ai

liege lord, 1

Nursing wr

the barons 1

III.]

THE GREAT CHARTER.

127

personal despotism of the kings. As Anselm had withstood William
the Red, as Theobald had rescued England from the lawlessness of
Stephen, r>o Langton prepared to withstant< and rescue his country
from the tyranny of John. He had already forced him to swear to
observe the laws of the Confessor, a phrase h\ which the whole of the
national liberties were summed up. When the baronage refused to
sail to Poiiou, he compelled the King to deal with them not by arms
but by process of law. Far however from being satisfied with resist-
ance such as this to isolated acts of tyranny, it was the Archbishop's
aim to restore on a formal basis the older freedom of the realm. The
pledges of Henry the First had long been forgotten when the Justiciar,
Geoffrey Fitz-Peter, brought them to light at a Council held at S.
Albans. There in the King's name the Justiciar promised good
government for the time to come, and forbade all royal officers to
practise extortion as they prized life and limb. The King's peace was
pledged to these who had opposed him in the past ; and observance
of the laws of Henry the First was enjoined upon all within the realm.
Langton saw the vast importance of such a precedent. In a fresh
meeting of the barons at S. Paul's he produced the Chartt r of Henry
the First, and it was at once welcomed as a base for the needed
reforms. All hope however hung on the fortunes of the French cam-
paign ; the victory at Bou vines gave strength to John's opponents, and
after the King's landing the barons secretly met at S. Edmundsbury,
and swore to demand from him, if needful by force of arms, the re-
storation of their liberties by Charter I'iider the King's seal. Early in
January in the year 1215 they presented themselves in arms before
the King, and preferred their claim. The few months that followed
showed John the uselessness of resistance ; nobles and Churchmen
were alike arrayed against him, and the commissioners whom he sent
to plead his cause at the shire-courts brought back the news that no
man would help him against the Charter.* At Easter the barons again
gathered in arms at Brackley, and renewed their claim. " Why do
they not ask for my kingdom ?" cried John in a burst of passion ; but
the whole country rose as one man at his refusal. London threw open
her gates to the forces of the barons, now organised under Robert
Fitz- Walter as " Marshal of the Army of God and Holy Church." The
example of the capital was followed by Exeter and Lincoln ; promises
of aid came from Scotland and Wales ; the northern barons marched
hastily to join their comrades in London. There was a moment when
John found himself with seven knights at his back, and before him a
nation in arms. He had summoned mercenaries and appealed to his
liege lord, the Pope ; but summons and appeal were alike too late.
Nursing wrath in his heart the tyrant bowed to necessity, and called
the barons to a conference at Runnymede.

'<•

Sec. II.
John

iao4

lais

I I

I2S

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sbc. III.

The Grkat
Chartbk

lfll7

1215
June IS

■•etion III.— The Ortat Charter, lfll5— lfll7.

XAHthoritks.—IYit text of the Charter is given by Dr. Stubbs, with
valuable comments, in his "Select Charters." Mr. Pearson gives a useful
analysis of it.]

An island in the Thames between Staines and Windsor had been
chosen as the place of conference : the King encamped on one bank,
while the barons covered the marshy flat, still known by the name of
Runnymede, on the other. Their delegates met in the island between
them, but the negotiations were a mere cloak to cover John's purpose
of unconditional submission. The Great Charter was discussed, agreed
to, and signed in a single day.

One copy of it still remains in the British Museum, injured by age
and fire, but with the royal seal still hanging from the brown, shrivelled
parchment. It is impossible to gaze without reverence on the earliest
monument of English freedom which we c»n see with our own eyes
and touch with our own hands, the great Charter to which from age
to age patriots have looked back as the basis of English liberty. But
in itself the Charter was no novelty, nor did it claim to establish any
new constitutional principles. The Charter of Henry the First formed
the basis of the whole, and the additions to it are for the most part
formal recognitions of the judicial and administrative changes intro-
duced by Henry the Second. But the vague expressions of the older
charter were now exchanged for precise and elaborate provisions.
The bonds of unwritten custom which the older grant did little more
than recognize had proved too weak to hold the Angevins j and the
baronage now threw them aside for the restraints of written law. It is
in this way that the Great Charter marks the transition from the age
of traditional rights, preserved in the nation's memory and ofKcially
declared by the Primate, to the age of written legislation, of Parlia-
ments and Statutes, which was soon to come. The Church had shown
its power of self-defence in the struggle over the interdict, and the
clause which recognized its rights alone retained the older and general
form. But all vagueness ceases when the Charter passes on to deal
with the rights of Englishmen at large, their right to justice, to security
of person and property, to good government " No freeman," ran the
memorable article that lies at the base of our whole judicial system,
" shall be seized or imprisoned, or dispossessed, or outlawed, or in any
way brought to ruin : we will not go against any man nor send against
him, save by legal judgement of his peers or by the law of the land."
"To no man will we sell," runs another^ "or deny, or delay, right or
justice." The great reforms of the past reigns, were now formally
recognized ; judges of assize were to hdld their circuits four times in

1
c

in.]

the year,
wanderin
of justice
exactions
the amoui
applied it
geld, or la
had seizet
and rated
scutage, a
counsel o
provision
tion of th
Crown, "
common
vided that
special wri
at least for
been the c(
a national
Parliament
The righ
for the nati
a boon for 1
feiture of th
tenement, o
his wain. '
worst. The
less exactior
protected ag
secured in tl
from arbitra
ofregulatior
ties and its f
we will and j
ports, have i
trading class
journeying a
formity of we
the realm,
difficult of all
had establish
abuses were (
the foreigner
provide meai

in.]

THE GREAT CHARTER.

129

the year, and the King's Court was no longer to follow the King in his
wanderings over the realm, but to sit in a fixed place. Hut the denial
of justice under John was a small danger compared with the lawless
exactions both of himself and his predecessor. Richard had increased
the amount of the scutage which Henry the Second had introduced, and
applied it to raise funds for his ransom. He had restored the Dane-
geld, or land-tax, so often abolished, under the new name of "carucagc,"
had seized the wool of the Cistercians and the plate of the churches,
and rated moveables as well as land. John had again raised the rate of
scutage, and imposed aids, fines, and ransoms at his pleasure without
counsel of the baronage. The Great Charter met this abuse by the
provision on which our constitutional system rests. With the excep-
tion of the three customary feudal aids which still remained to the
Crown, " no scutage or aid shall be imposed in our realm save by the
common council of the realm ; " and to this Great Council it was pro-
vided that prelates and the greater barons should be summoned by
special writ; and all tenants in chief through the sheriflfs and bailiflfs,
at least forty days before. The provision defined what had probably
been the common usage of the realm ; but the definition turned it into
a national right, a right so momentous that on it rests our whole
Parliamentary life.

The rights which the barons claimed for themselves they claimed
for the nation at large. The boon of free and unbought Justice was
a boon for all, but ii special provision protected the poor. The for-
feiture of the freeman on conviction of felony was never to include his
tenement, or that of the merchant his wares, or that of the countryman
his wain. The means of actual livelihood were to be left even to the
worst. The under-tenants or farmers were protected against all law-
less exactions of their lords in precisely the same terms as these were
protected against the lawless exactions of the Crown. The towns were
secured in the enjoyment of their municipal privileges, their freedom
from arbitrary taxation, their rights of justice, of common deliberation,
of regulation of trade. " Let the city of London have all its old liber-
ties and its free customs, as well by land as by water. Besides this,
we will and grant that all other cities, and boroughs, and towns, and
ports, have all their liberties and free customs." The influence of the
trading class is seen in two other enactments, by which freedom of
journeying and trade was secured to foreign merchants, and an uni-
formity of weights and measures was ordered to be enforced throughout
the realm. There remained only one question, and that the most
difificult of all ; the question how to secure this order which the Charter
had established in the actual government of the realm. The immediate
abuses were easily swept away, the hostages restored to their homes,
the foreigners banished from the country. But it was less easy to
provide means for the control of a King whom no man could trust,

7i..

Sec. III.

Thb Great
Charter

iai5

iai7

"^'T I

The

Charter

and the

People

t%\'i

I I;

130

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAP.

Sec. hi.

Tub Grrat
Chartkr

lais

lfll7

John
and th«
Oharttr

and a council of twenty-five barons were chosen from the general body
of their order to enforce on John the observance of the Charter, with
the right of declaring war on the King should its provisions be
infringed. Finally, the Charter was published throughout the whole
country, and sworn to at every hundred-mote and town-mote by order
from the King.

"They have given mc five-and-twenty over-kings," cried John in a
burst of fury, flinging himself on the floor and gnawing sticks and straw
in his impotent rage. But the rage soon passed into the subtle policy
of which he was a master. Some days after he left Windsor, and
lingered for months along the southern shore, waiting for news of the
aid he had solicited from Rome and from the Continent. It was not
without definite purpose that he had become the vassal of Rome.
While Innocent was dreaming of a vast Christian Empire with the
Pope at its head to enforce justice and religion on his under-kings,
John believed that the Papal protection would enable him to rule as
tyrannically as he would. The thunders of the Papacy were to be
ever at hand for his protection, as the armies of England are at hand
to protect the vileness and oppression of a Turkish Sultan or a Nizam
of Hyderabad. His envoys were already at Rome, and Innocent,
indignant that a matter which might have been brought before his
court of appeal as overlord should have been dealt with by armed
revolt, annulled the Great Charter and suspended Stephen Langton
from the exercise of his office as Primate. Autumn brought a host of
foreign soldiers from over sea to the King's standard, and advancing
against the disorganized forces of the barons, John starved Rochester
into submission and marched ravaging through the midland counties
to the North, while his mercenaries spread like locusts over the whole
face of the land. From Berwick the King turned back triumphant to
coop up his enemies in London, while fresh Papal excommunications
fell on the barons and the city. But the burghers set Innocent at
defiance. " The ordering of secular matters appertaincth not to the
Pope," they said, in words that seem like mutterings of the coming
Lollardry ; and at the advice of Simon Langton, the Archbishop's
brother, bells swung out and mass was celebrated as before. With
the undisciplined militia of the country and the towns, however, suc-
cess was impossible aga'.nst the trained forces of the King, and despair
drove the barons to seek aid from France. Philip had long been
waiting the opportunity for his revenge upon John, and his son Lewis
at once accepted the crown in spite of Innocents excommunications,
and landed in Kent with a considerable force. As the barons had
foreseen, the French mercenaries who constituted John's host refused
to fight against the French sovereign. The whole aspect of afifairs was
suddenly reversed. Deserted by the bulk of his troops, the King was
forced to fall rapidly back on the Welsh Marches, while his rival

III.)

entered

England

series of

barons a

crossed

however,

the royal

The fe

was inflai

to die. ]

was but a

the hand!

Marshal.

Papal Lei

father ha(

and the s

pended.

national j<

while the

Henry wai

the iniquii

decided th

under the

Lincoln, w

marched t(

attacked ai

hopeless re

Walter was

to London,

defeat crusl

set sail fror

forcements

a well-know

trates the n

vessels bowi

hurled quid

vessels crasl

sh-ps. The

ag. mst the I

was utterly

London, but

Lambeth Le^

a sum which

possessions, \

the prisoners

HAP.

body
with
iS be
vhole
order

1 in a

straw

policy

r, and

of the

IS not

Rome.

th the

■kings,

rule as
to be

L hand

Nizam

locent,

ore his

armed

.angton

host of

ancing

:hester

lunties

whole

ant to

Ications
ent at
to the
loming
lishop's
With
ir, suc-
iespair
been
Lewis
Rations,
is had
refused
lirs was
ig was
Is rival

III.]

THE GREAT CHARTER.

131

entered London and received the submission of the larger part of
England. Only Dover held out obstinately against Lewis. By a
series of rapid marches John succeeded in distracting the plans of the
barons and in relieving Lincoln ; then after a short stay at Lynn he
crossed the Wash in a fresh movement to the north. In crossing,
however, his army was surprised by the tide, and his baggage with
the royal treasures washed away.

The fever which seized the baffled tyrant in the abbey of Swineshcad
was inflamed by a gluttonous debauch, and John entered Newark only
to die. His death changed the whole face of affairs, for his son Henry
was but a child of nine years old, and the royal authority passed into
the hands of one who stands high among English patriots, William
Marshal. The boy-king was hardly crowned when the Earl and the
Papal Legate issued in his name the very Charter against which his
father had died fighting ; only the clauses which regulated taxation
and the summoning of Parliament were as yet declared to be sus-
pended. The nobles soon streamed away from the French camp ; for
national jealousy and suspicions of treason told heavily against Lewis,
while the pity which was excited by the youth and helplessness of
Henry was aided by a sense of injustice in burthening the child with
the iniquity of his father. One bold stroke of William Marshal
decided the struggle. A joint army of French and English barons
under the Count of Perche and Robert Fitz-Walter was besieging
Lincoln, when the Earl, rapidly gathering forces from the royal castles,
marched to its relief. Cooped up in the steep narrow streets, and
attacked at once by the Earl and the garrison, the barons fled in
hopeless rout ; the Count of Perche fell on the field ; Robert Fitz-
Walter was taken prisoner. Lewis, who was investing Dover, retreated
to London, and called for aid from France. But a more terrible
defeat crushed his remaining hopes. A small English fleet, which had
set sail from Dover under Hubert de Burgh, fell boldly on the rein-
forcements which were crossing under the escort of Eustace the Monk,
a well-known freebooter of the Channel. The fight admirably illus-
trates the naval warfare of the time. From the decks of the English
vessels bowmen poured their arrows into the crowded transports, othe'-s
hurled quicklime into their enemies' faces, while the more active
vessels crashed with their arrned prows into the sides of the Frenci,
sh'ps. The skill of the mariners of the Cinque Ports decided the day
ag.. mst the larger forces of their opponents, and the fleet of Eustace
was utterly destroyed. The royal army at once closed in upon
London, but resistance was really at an end. By the treaty of
Lambeth Lewis promised to withdraw from England on payment of
a sum which he claimed as debt ; his adherents were restored to their
possessions, the liberties of London and other towns confirmed, and
the prisoners on either side set at liberty. The expulsion of the stranger

K 2

.'<!•

Sec. III.

Thb Griat
Chartbr

iai7

The Bail
Marshal

Fair oj

Lincoln

I217

132

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

The

Univer-
sities

left English statesmen free to take up again the work of reform ; and
a fresh issue of the Charter, though in its modified form, proclaimed
clearly the temper and policy of the Earl Marshal.

Section IV. -The Universities.

[Authorities. — For the Universities we have the collection of materials
edited by Mr. Anstey under the name of " Mimimenta Academica."
I have borrowed much from two papers of my own in "Macmillan's
Magazine," on "The Early History of Oxford." For Bacon, see his
"Opera Inedita," in the Rolls Series, with Mr. Brewer's admirable intro-
duction, and Dr. Whewell's estimate of him in his " History of the Inductive
Sciences."]

From the turmoil of civil politics we turn to the more silent but
hardly less important revolution from which we may date our national
education. It is in the reign of Henry the Third that the English
universities begin to exercise a definite influence on the intellectual life
of Englishmen, Of the early history of Cambridge we know Httle or
nothing, but enough remains to enable us to trace the early steps by
which Oxford attained to its intellectual eminence. The establishment
of the great schools which bore the name of Universities was every-
where throughout Europe a special mark of the new impulse that
Christendom had gained from the Crusades. A new fervour of study
sprang up in the West from its contact with the more cultured East.
Travellers like Adelard of Bath brought back the first rudiments of
physical and mathematical science from the schools of Cordova or
Bagdad. In the twelfth century a classical revival restored Caesar and
Vergil to the list of monastic studies, and left its stamp on the pedantic
style, the profuse classical quotations of writers like William of Ma'mes-
bury or John of Salisbury. The scholastic philosophy sprang up in the
schools of Paris. The Roman law was revived by the imperialist
doctors of Bologna. The long mental inactivity of feudal Europe
broke up like ice before a summer's sun. Wandering teachers such as
Lanfranc or Anselm crossed sea and land to spread the new power of
knowledge. The same spirit of restlessness, of inquiry, of impatience
with the older traditions of mankind, either local or intellectnal, that
had hurried half Christendom to the tomb of its Lord, crowded the
roads with thousands of young scholars hurrying to the chosen seats
where teachers were gathered together. A new power had sprung up
in the midst of a world as yet under the rule of sheer brute force.
Poor as they were, sometimes even of servile race, the wandering
scholars who lectured in every cloister were hailed as " masters " by the
crowds at their feet. Abelard was a foe worthy of the menaces of

111.3

councils

Lomban

of a Kin

Theobal

the studj

once sile

jealous o

into The

At the

among I

midst of

along the

Cherwell

side, eas

sharper c

Around h

fringing 1

Bagley ck

to wen of

as comma

England 1

its militar

guarded t

network ol

of Osney.

Austin Ca;

town some

of the D'O

a palace w

councils, n-

of one ^f tl

the town i

place bette

Norman n

expansion i

Conquest.

castles, anc

Osney. In

his palace c

which still

Norman C;

and founde(

S. George.

teachers wii

where a nev

:hap.

and
imed

iterials
mica."
nillan's
lee his
I intro-
ductive

III.]

THE GREAT CHARTER.

133

nt but
ational
English
ual life
ittle or
eps by
shment
1 every-
e that
study
East,
ents of
ova or
ar and
idantic
almes-
I in the
erialist
urope
uch as
wer of
tience
,1, that
ed the
seats
mgup
force.
Idering
1 by the
ices of

councils, of the thunders of the Church. The teaching of a single
Lombard was of note enough in England to draw down the prohibition
of a King. When Vacarius, probably a guest in the court of Archbishop
Theobald, where Beket and John of Salisbury were already busy with
the study of the Civil Law, opened lectures on it at Oxford, he was at
once silenced by Stephen, who was then at war with the Church, and
jealous of the power which the wreck of the royal authority was throwing
into Theobald's hands.

At the time of the arrival of Vacarius Oxford stood in the first rank
among English towns. Its town church of S. Martin rose from the
midst of a huddled group oF houses, girt in with massive walls, that lay
along the dry upper ground of a low peninsula between the streams of
Cherwell and the upper Thames. The ground fell gently on either
side, easiward and westward, to these rivers, while on the south a
sharper descent led down across swampy meadows to the city bridge.
Around lay a wild forest country, the moors of Cowley and Bullingdon
fringing the course of Thames, the great woods of Shotover and
Bagley closing the horizon to the south and east. Though the two huge
towerr of its Norman castle marked the strategic importance of Oxford
as commanding the river valley along which the commerce of Southern
England mainly flowed, its walls formed, perhaps, the least element in
its military strength, for on every side but the north the town was
guarded by the swampy meadows along Cherwell, or by the intricate
network of streams into which the Thames breaks among the meadows
of Osney. Fr' m tlie midst of these meadows rose a mitred abbey of
Austin Canons, which, with the older priory of S. Frideswide, gave the
town some ecclesiastical dignity. The residence of the Norman house
of the D'Oillis within its castle, the frequent visits of English kings to
a palace without its walls, the presence again and again of important
councils, marked its political weight within the realm. The settlement
of one vyf the wealthiest among the English Jewries in the very heart of
the town indicated, while it promoted, Lhe activity of its trade. No
place better illustrates the transformation of the land in the hands of its
Norman masters, the sudden outburst of industrial effort, the sudden
expansion of commerce and accumulation of wealth which followed the
Conquest. To the west of the town rose one of the stateliest of English
castles, and in the meadows beneath the hardly less stately abbey of
Osney. In the fields to the north the last of the Norman kings raised
his palace of Beaumont. The canons ofS. Frideswide reared the church
which still exists as the diocesan cathedral, while the piety of the
Norman Castellans rebuilt almost all the parish churches of the city,
and founded within their new castle walls the church of the Canons of
S. George. We know nothing of the causes which drew students and
teachers within the walls of Oxford. It is possible that here as else-
where a new teacher had quickened older educational foundations, and

.' n.

Sec. IV.

The
Univer-
sities

■j

Oxford

1 I 1

'U'

134

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec IV.

The

Univer-
sities

that the cloisters of Osney and S. Frideswide already possessed schools
which burst into a larger life under the impulse of Vacarius. As yet,
however, the fortunes of the University were obscured by the glories
of Paris. English scholars gathered in thousands round the chairs of
William of Champeaux or Abelard. The English took their place as
one of the "nations" of the French University. John of Salisbury
became famous as one of the Parisian teachers. Beket wandered to
Paris from his school at Merton. But through the peaceful reign of
Henry the Second Oxford was quietly increasing in numbers and
repute. Forty years after the visit of Vacarius its educational position
was fully established. When Gerald of Wales read his amusing
Topography of Ireland to its students, the most learned and famous
of the English clergy were, he tells us, to be found within its walls.
At the opening of the thirteenth century Oxford was without a rival in
its own country, while in European celebrity it took rank with the
greatest schools of the Western world. But to realize this Oxford of
the past we must dismiss from our minds all recollections of the Oxford
of the present. In the outer aspect of the new University there was
nothing of the pomp that overawes the freshman as he first paces the
" High," or looks down from the gallery of S. Mary's. In the stead of
long fronts of venerable colleges, of stately walks beneath immemorial
elms, history plunges us into the mean and filthy lanes of a mediaeval
town. Thousands of boys, huddled in bai*e lodging-houses, clustering
round teachers as poor as themselves in church porch and house porch,
drinking, quarrelling, dicing, begging at the corners of the streets, take
the place of the brightly-coloured train of doctors and Heads. Mayor
and Chancellor struggled in vain to enforce order or peace on this
seething mass of turbulent life. The retainers who followed their young
lords to the University fought out the feuds of their houses in the
streets. Scholars from Kent and scholars from Scotland waged the
bitter struggle of North and South. At nightfall roysterer and reveller
roamed with torches through the narrow lanes, defying bailiffs, and
cutting down burghers at their doors. Now a mob of clerks plunged
into the Jewry, and wiped oflf the memory of bills and bonds by sacking
a Hebrew house or two. Now a tavern row between scholar and
townsman widened into a general broil, and the academical bell
of S. Mary's vied with the town bell of S. Martin's in clanging
to arms. Every phase of ecclesiastical controversy or political
strife was preluded by some fierce outbreak in this turbulent,
surging mob. When England growled at the exactions of the Papacy,
the students besieged a legate in the abbot's house at Osney. A
murderous town and gown row preceded the opening of the Barons'
War. '*When Oxford draws knife," ran the old rime, "England's
soon at strife."
' But the turbulence and stir was a stir and turbulence of life. A keen

III.]

thirst foi

sands re

Edmund

came to

Abingdo

that belo

refuge fn

poor to g

to wear e

hours. ]

for know

when the

crowd of

an image

Mary fori

the crowc

education

of his, be^

Western (

him so pel

but when '.

who, as th

" straights

his Virgin

popular of

introductio

which he h

ing to his f

after a sle

manner wh

knowledge

dust to dus

perhaps m

down the i

would somi

troubles ; tl:

formed his :

from whicli

some hour

room when

"What are

hand, she d]

bore the nai

these," she c

my son."

;i^

*AP.

lools

yet,

Dries

rs of

:e as

ibury

id to
of
and

sition

using

mous

walls.

val in

;h the

5rd of

)xford

re was

:es the

:ead of

morial

diaeval

5tering

porch,

s, take

[Mayor

•n this
young

I in the

|ed the

leveller
and
funged
icking
and
il bell
inging
)litical
)ulent,
lapacy,
py. A
Urons'
rland's

keen

III.]

THE GREAT CHARTER.

>3S

thirst for knowledge, a passionate poetry of devotion, gathered thou-
sands round the poorest scholar, and welcomed the barefoot friar.
Edmund Rich — Archbishop of Canterbury and saint in later days —
came to Oxford, a boy of twelve years old, from the little lane at
Abingdon that still bears his name. He found his school in an inn
that belonged to the abbey of Eynsham, where his father had taken
refuge from the world. His mother was a pious woman of the day, too
poor to give her boy much outfit besides the hair shirt that he promised
to wear every Wednesday ; but Edmund was no poorer than his neigh-
bours. He plunged at once into the nobler life of the place, its ardour
for knowledge, its. mystical piety. " Secretly," perhaps at eventide
when the shadows were gathering in the church of S. Mary's, and the
crowd of teachers and students had left its aisles, the boy stood before
an image of the Virgin, and placing a ring of gold upon its finger took
Mary for his bride. Years of study, broken by a fever that raged among
the crowded, noisome streets, brought the time for completing his
education at Paris ; and Edmund, hand in hand with a brother Robert
of his, begged his way, as poor scholars were wont, to the great school of
Western Christendom. Here a damsel, heedless of his tonsure, wooed
him so pertinaciously that Edmund consented at last to an assignation ;
but when he appeared it was in company of grave academical ofificials,
who, as the maiden declared in the hour of penitence which followed,
"straightway whipped the offending Eve out of her." Still true to
his Virgin bridal, Edmund, on his return from Paris, became the most
popular of Oxford teachers. It is to him that Oxford owes her first
introduction to the Logic of Aristotle. We see him in the little room
which he hired, with the Virgin's chapel hard by, his grey gown reach-
ing to his feet, ascetic in his devotion, falling asleep in lecture time
after a sleepless night of prayer, with a grace and cheerfulness of
manner which told of his French training, and a chivalrous love of
knowledge that let his pupils pay what they would. " Ashes' to ashes,
dust to dust," the young tutor would say, a touch of scholarly pride
perhaps mingling with his contempt of worldly things, as he threw
down the fee on the dusty window-ledge, whence a thievish student
would sometimes nm off with it. But even knowledge brought its
troubles ; the Old Testament, which with a copy of the Decretals long
formed his sole library, frowned down upon a love of secular learning
from which Edmund found it hard to wean himself. At last, in
some hour of dream, the form of his dead mother floated into the
room where the teacher stood among his mathematical diagrams.
" What are these ? " she seemed to say ; and seizing Edmund's right
hand, she drew on the palm three circles interlrxed, each of which
bore the name of one of the Persons of the Christian Trinity. " Be
these," she cried, as her figure faded away, " thy diagrams henceforth,
my son."

''f :

Sec. IV.

The
Univer-
sities

Edmund
Rich

I''

I' il

it's. 1

:^li

136

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

The
Univer-
sities

Th« UnU
▼•rsitiea
and Feu-
dalism

!..-

The story admirably illustrates the real character of the new train-
ing, and the latent opposition between the spirit of the Universities
and the spirit of the Church. The feudal and ecclesiastical order of
the old mediaeval world were both alike threatened by the power that
had so strangely sprung up in the midst of them. Feudalism rested
on local isolation, on the severance of kingdom from kingdom and
barony from barony, on the distinction of blood and race, on the
supremacy of material or brute force, on an allegiance determined by
accidents of place and social position. The University, on the other
hand, was a protest against this isolation of man from man. The
smallest school was European and not local. Not .merely every pro-
vince of France, but every people of Christendom, had its place among
the "nations" of Paris or Padua. A common language, the Latin
tongue, superseded within academical bounds the warring tongues of
Europe. A common intellectual kinship and rivalry took the place of
the petty strifes which parted province from province or realm from
realm. What the Church and Empire had both aimed at and both
failed in, the knitting of Christian nations together into a vast common-
wealth, the Universities for a time actually did. Dante felt himself as
little a stranger in the " Latin " quarter ai«.und Mont Ste. Genevieve as
under the arches of Bologna. Wandering Oxford scholars carried the
writings of Wyclif to the libraries of Prague. In England the >vork of
provincial fusion was less difficult or important than elsewhere, but
even in England work had to be done. The feuds of Northerner and
Southerner which so long disturbed the discipline of Oxford witnessed
at any rate to the fact that Northerner and Southerner had at last been
brought face to face in its streets. And here as elsewhere the spirit of
national isolation was held in check by the larger comprehensiveness
of the University. After the dissensions that threatened the prosperity
of Paris in the thirteenth century, Norman and Gascon mingled with
Englishmen in Oxford lecture-halls. At a later time the rebellion of
Owen Glyndwr found hundreds of Welshmen gathered round its
teachers. And within this strangely mingled mass, society and
government rested on a purely democratic basis. Among Oxford
scholars the son of the noble stood on precisely the same footing with
the poorest mendicant. Wealth, physical strength, skill in arms,
pride of ancestry and blood, the very grounds on which feudal society
rested, went for nothing in th^ lecture-room. The University was
a state absolutely self-governed, and whose citizens were admitted by
a purely intellectual franchise. Knowledge made the " master." To
know more than one's fellows was a man's sole claim to be a ** ruler "
in the schools : and within this intellectual aristocracy all were equal.
When the free commonwealth of the masters gathered in the aisles of
S. Mary's all had aji equal right to counsel, all had an equal vote in
the final decision. Treasury and library were at their complete dis-

III.]

posal.
and sa
had at
their o
If th
their sp
seeming
which n
educate
their
from la)
only to
This ec<
head.
Univers;
sprung i
Bishop (
then situ
only rer
sudden e
of those
hitherto ;
revival oj
and a gre
mind, in
doubt, ol
claimed f
cussed wi
he censur
in whom
Second, t
Europe as
so long c
Christians
books of t
Bacon. 1
Abelard c
science w
"Slowly,"
come into
Metaphysi
translated
1237 beca
time, and 1
the third b

III.]

THE GREAT CHARTER.

137

;eness
^perity
with
lion of
id its
and
Ixford
with
I arms,
jociety
was
ted by
To
fuler"
jqual.
lies of
lote in
le dis-

posal. It was their voice that named every officer, that proposed
and sanctioned every statute. Even the Chancellor, their head, who
had at first been an officer of the Bishop, became an elected officer of
their own.

If the democratic spirit of the Universities threatened feudalism,
their spirit of intellectual inquiry threatened the Church. To all outer
seeming they were purely ecclesiastical bodies. The wide extension
which mediaeval usage gave to the word " orders " gathered the whole
educated world within the pale of the clergy. Whatever might be
their age or proficiency, scholar and teacher were alike clerks, free
from lay responsibilities or the control of civil tribunals, and amenable
only to the rule of the Bishop and the sentence of his spiritual courts.
This ecclesiastical character of the University appeared in that of its
head. The Chancellor, as we have seen, was at first no officer of the
University, but of the ecclesiastical body under whose shadow it had
sprung into life. At Oxford he was simply the local officer of the
Bishop of Lincoln, within whose immense diocese the University was
then situated. But this identification in outer form with the Church
only rendered more conspicuous the difference of its spirit. The
sudden expansion of the field of education diminished the importance
of those purely ecclesiastical and theological studies which had
hitherto absorbed the whole intellectual energies of mankind. The
revival of classical literature, the rediscovery as it were of an older
and a greater world, the contact with a larger, freer life, whether in
mind, in society, or in politics, introduced a spirit of scepticism, of
doubt, of denial into the realms of unquestioning belief. Abelard
claimed for reason the supremacy over faith. Florentine poets dis-
cussed with a smile the immortality of the soul. Even to Dante, while
he censures these, Vergil is as sacred as Jeremiah. The imperial ruler
in whom the new culture took its most notable form, Frederic the
Second, the " World's Wonder " of his time, was regarded by half
Europe as no better than an infidel. A faint revival of physical science,
so long crushed as magic by the dominant ecclesiasticism, brought
Christians into perilous contact with the Moslem and the Jew. The
books of the Rabbis were no longer a mere accursed thing to Roger
Bacon. The scholars of Cordova were no mere Paynim swine to
Abelard of Bath. How slowly indeed and against what obstacles
science won its way we know from the witness of Roger Bacon.
" Slowly/' he tells us, " has any portion of the philosophy of Aristotle
come into use among the Latins. His Natural Philosophy and his
Metaphysics, with the Commen':aries of Averroes and others, were
translated in my time, and interdicted at Paris up to the year of grace
1237 because of their assertion of the eternity of the world and of
time, and because of the book of the divinations by dreams (which is
the third book, De Somniis et Vigiliis), and because of many passages

— - - t .

Sec. IV.

The

Univer-
sities

The Ual-

versltlea

and the

Church

■Hi

Sec. IV.

The
Univer-
sities

Roger
Bacon

I 2 14- I 292

''■I

erroneously translated. Even his Logic was slowly received and
lectured on. For St. Edmund, the Archbishop of Canterbury, was
the first in my time who read the Elements at Oxford. And I have
seen Master Hugo, who first read the book of Posterior Analytics, and
I have seen his writing. So there were but few, considering the
multitude of the Latins, who were of any account in the philosophy of
Aristotle : nay, very few indeed, and scarcely any up to this year of
grace 1292."

We shall see in a later page how fiercely the Church fought against
this tide of opposition, and how it won back the allegiance of the
Universities through the begging Friars. But it was in the ranks of
the Friars themselves that the intellectual progress of the Universities
found its highest representative. The life of Roger Bacon almost
covers the thirteenth century ; he was the child of royalist parents,
who had been driven into exile and reduced to poverty by the civil
wars. From Oxford, where he studied under Edmund of Abingdon,
to whom he owed his introduction to the works of Aristotle, he passed
to the University of Paris, where his whole heritage was spent in
costly studies and experiments. " From my youth up," h^ writes, " I
have laboured at the sciences and tongues. I have sought the friend-
ship of all men among the Latins who had any reputation for know-
ledge. I have caused youths to be instructed in languages, geometry,
arithmetic, the construction of tables and instruments, and many
needful things besides." The difficulties in the way of such studies
as he had resolved to pursue were immense. He was without instru-
ments or means of experiment. " Without mathematical instruments
no science can be mastered," he complains afterwards, " and these
instrunicnts are not to be found among the Latins, nor could they be
made for two or three hundred pounds. Besides, better tables are
indispensably necessary, tables on which the motions of the heavens
are certified from the beginning to the end of the world without daily
labour, but these tables are worth a king's ransom, and could not be
made without a vast expense. I have often attempted the composi-
tion of such tables, but could not finish them through failure of means
and the folly of those whom I had to employ." Books were difficult
and sometimes even impossible to procure. " The philosophical
works of Aristotle, of Avicenna,'of Seneca, of Cicero, and other ancients
cannot be had without great cost ; their principal works have not been
translated into Latin, and copies of others are not to be found in
ordinary libraries or elsewhere. The admirable books of Cicero de
Republica are not to be found anywhere, so far as I can hear, though I
have made anxious inquiry for them in different parts of the world,
and by various messengers. I could never find the works of Seneca,
though I made diligent search for them during twenty years and more.
And En it is with many more most useful books connected with the

111.]

scienc<
home t
Roger
record
John o
general
says Ba
nurture
aptitude
or six y
and opt
since th
who kn
produce
because
of surpa
has begi
The p
justified
Oxford,
that « th<
or elsewi
science c
seems to
friars set
mental e
against s
knowledg
promotioi
literature
of incessE
forgotten,
his wealth
laboured i
men, I ha
on accoun
acquisitioi
have mad
instructed
to the cou
became a
study wei
specially u
He had w
write, that

III.]

THE GREAT CHARTER.

science of morals." It is only words like these of his own that bring
home to us the keen thirst for knowledge, the patience, the energy of
Roger Bacon. He returned as a teacher to Oxford, and a touching
record of his devotion to those whom he taught remains in the story of
John of London, a boy of fifteeja, whose ability raised him above the
general level of his pupils. " When he came to me as a poor boy,"
says Bacon, in recommending him to the Pope, " I caused him to be
nurtured and instructed for the love of God, especially since for
aptitude and innocence I have never found so towardly a youth. Five
or six years ago I caused him to be taught in languages, mathematics,
and optics, and I have gratuitously instructed him with my own lips
since the time that I received your mandate. There is no one at Paris
who knows so much of the root of philosophy, though he has not
produced the branches, flowers, and fruit because of his youth, and
because he has had no experience in teaching. But he has the means
of surpassing all the Latins if he live to grow old and goes on as he
has begun."

The pride with which he refers to his system of instruction was
justified by the wide extension which he gave to scientific teaching in
Oxford. It is probably of himself that he speaks when he tells us
that " the science of optics has not hitherto been lectured on at Paris
or elsewhere among the Latins, save twice at Oxford." It was a
science on which he had laboured for ten years. But his teaching
seems to have fallen on a barren soil. From the moment when the
friars settled in the Universities scholasticism absorbed the whole
mental energy of the student world. The temper of the age was
against scientific or philosophical studies. The older enthusiasm for
knowledge was dying down ; the study of law was the one source of
promotion, whether in Church or state ; philosophy was discredited,
literature in its purer forms became almost extinct. After forty years
of incessant study. Bacon found himself in his own words " unheard,
forgotten, buried." He seems at one time to have been wealthy, but
his wealth was gone. " During the twenty years that I have specially
laboured in the attainment of wisdom, abandoning the path of common
men, I have spent on these pursuits more than two thousand pounds,
on account of the cost of books, experiments, instruments, tables, the
acquisition of languages, and the like. Add to all this the sacrifices I
have made to procure the friendship of the wise, and to obtain well-
instructed assistants." Ruined and baffled in his hopes, Bacon listened
to the counsels of his friend Grosseteste and renounced the world. He
became a friar of the order of S. Francis, an order where books and
study were looked upon as hindrances to the work which it had
specially undertaken, that of preaching among the masses of the poor.
He had written hardly anything. So far was he from attempting to
write, that his new superiors had prohibited him from publishing any-

139

Sec. IV.

The

Univek-

SITilCS

-'. ■rJ

il'u, m\

I 4

140

Skc. IV.

The

Univer-
sities

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

[The Opus
Majus

thing under pain of forfeiture of the book and penance of bread and
water. But we can see the craving of his mind, the passionate instinct
of creation which marks the man of genius, in the joy with which he
seized the strange opportunity which suddenly opened before him.
" Some few chapters on different subjects, written at the entreaty of
friends," seem to have got abroad, and were brought by one of his
chaplains under the notice of Clement the Fourth. The Pope af once
inyited him to write. Again difficulties stood in his way. Materials,
transcription, and other expenses for such a work as he projected
would cost at least ^60, and the Pope had not sent a penny. He
begged help from his family, but they were ruined like himself. No
one would lend to a mendicant friar, and when his friends raised the
money it was by pawning their goods in the hope of repayment from
Clement. Nor was this all ; the work itself, abstruse and scientific as
was its subject, had to be treated in a clear and popular form to gain
the Papal ear. But difficulties which would have crushed another
man only roused Roger Bacon to an almost superhuman energy. In
little more than a year the work was done. The " greater work," itself
in modern form a closely printed folio, with its successive summaries
and appendices in the " lesser " and the " third " works (which make a
good octavo more) were produced and forwarded to the Pope within
fifteen months.

No trace of this fiery haste remains in the book itself. The " Opus
Majus " is alike wonderful in plan and detail. Bacon's main plan, in
the words of Dr. Whewell, is" to urge the necessity of a reform in the
mode of philosophizing, to set forth the reasons why knowledge had
not made a greater progress, to draw back attention to sources of
knowledge which had been unwisely neglected, to discover other
sources which were yet wholly unknown, and to animate men to the
undertaking by a prospect of the vast advantages which it offered."
The developement of his scheme is on the largest scale ; he gathers
together the whole knowledge of his time on every branch of science
which it possessed, and as he passes them in review he suggests im-
provements in nearly all. His labours, both here and in his after
works, in the field of grammar and philology, his perseverance in
insisting on the necessity of correct texts, of an accurate knowledge
of languages, of an exact interpretation, are hardly less remarkable than
his scientific investigations. But from grammar he passes to mathe-
matics, from mathematics to experimental philosophy. Under the
name of mathematics was included all the physical science of the time.
'* The neglect of it for nearly thirty or forty years," pleads Bacon passion-
ately, " hath nearly destroyed the entire studies of Latin Christendom.
For he who knows not mathematics cannot know any other sciences :
and what is more, he cannot discover his ov/n ignorance or find its
proper remedies." Geography, chronology, arithmetic, music, are

III.]

brough

tion is

and ast

with gr

eye, bes

provinc

the phi

Novum

works

disentor

magnifi(

its own

look for

seems tc

more re

order.

lived, an

that hac

roll of m

graphers
his editor 1
with stron]
I have spo
Waverley,
many deta
preface, aj
opposition

The dej
the hands
returned i
It was an j
transition;
sympathy
like that <
preservatii
English d<
reluctance
Able as h
He was h
legate resi

III.]

THE GREAT CHARTER.

141

in the
had
of
other

the
red."
thers

kience
Is im-

after
Ice in
|ledge

than
[athe-
Ir the

1 time.
Bsion-
Idom.

ices :

id its

are

brought into something of scientific form, and the same rapid examina-
tion is devoted to the question of cHmate, to hydrography, geography,
and astrology. The subject of optics, his own especial study, is treated
with greater fulness ; he enters into the question of the anatomy of the
eye, besides discussing the problems which lie more strictly within the
province of optical science. In a word, the " Greater Work," to borrow
the phrase of Dr. Whewell, is " at once the Encyclopaedia and the
Novum Organum of the thirteenth century." The whole of the after
works of Roger Bacon — and treatise after treatise has of late been
disentombed from our libraries — are but developements in detail of the
magnificent conception he had laid before Clement. Such a work was
its own great reward. From the world around Roger Bacon could
look for and found small recognition. No word of acknowledgement
seems to have reached its author from the Pope. If we may credit a
more recent story, his writings only gained him a prison from his
order. " Unheard, forgotten, buried," the old man died as he had
lived, and it has been reserved for later ages to roll away the obscurity
that had gathered round his memory, and to place first in the great
roll of modern science the name of Roger Bacon.

Section v.— Henry the Third, 1216-1257.

[Authorities. — The two great authorities for this period are the historio-
graphers of St. Albans, Roger of Wendover, whose work ends in 1235, and
his editor and continuator Matthew P::ris. The first is full but inaccurate, and
with strong royal and ecclesiastical sympathies : of the charac '.er of Matthew,
I have spoken at the close of the present section. The Chronicles of Dunstable,
Waverley, and Burton (published in Mr. Luard's '* Annales Monastic! ") supply
many details. The '* Royal Letters," edited by Dr. Shirley, with an admirable
preface, are, like the Patent and Close Rolls, of the highest value. For
opposition to Rome, see ** Grosseteste's Letters," edited by Mr. Luard.]

The death of the Earl Marshal in 12 19 left the direction of affairs in
the hands of a new legate, Pandulf, of Stephen Langton who had just
returned forgiven from Rome, and of the Justiciar, Hubert de Burgh.
It was an age of transition, and the temper of the Justiciar was eminently
transitional. Bred in the school of Henry the Second, he had little
sympathy with national freedom ; his conception of good government,
like that of his master, lay in a wise personal administration, in the
preservation of order and law. But he combined with this a thoroughly
English desire for national independence, a hatred of foreigners, and a
reluctance to waste English blood and treasure in Continental struggles.
Able as he proved himself, his task was one of no common difficulty.
He was hampered by the constant interference of Rome. A Papal
legate resided at the EngUsh court, and claimed a share in the admin-

Skc. V.

Hknry thb
Third

laie

1A57

Hubert
de Burgrb

.-fe

142

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

III.]

Sec. V.

Henry thk
Third

laie

lfl57

1224

Lanefon

and the

Charter

I216

1223

istration of the realm as the '•epresentative of its over-lord, and as
guardian of the young sovereign. A foreign party, too, had still a foot-
ing in the kingdom, for William Marshal had been unable to rid him-
self of men like Peter des Roches or Faukes de Hreaut^, who
had fought on the royal side in the struggle against Lewis. Hubert
had to deal too with the anarchy which that struggle left behind
it. From the time of the Conquest the centre of England had been
covered with the domains of great nobles, whose longings were for
feudal independence, and whose spirit of revolt had been held in check,
partly by the stern rule of the Kings, and partly by their creation of a
baronaije sprung from the Court and settled for the most part in the
North. The oppression of John united both the older and these newer
houses in the struggle for the Charter. But the character of each
remained unchanged, and the close of the struggle saw the feudal party
break out in their old lawlessness and defiance of the Crown. For a
time the anarchy of Stephen's days seemed revived. But the Justiciar
was resolute to crush it, and he was backed by the strenuous efforts of
Stephen Langton. The Earl of Chester, the head of the feudal
baronage, though he rose in armed rebellion, quailed before the march
of Hubert and the Primate's threats of excommunication. A more
formidable foe remained in the Frenchman, Faukes de Breaute, the
sherifif of six counJes, with six royal castles in his hands, and allied
both with the rebel barons and Llewelyn of Wales. His castle of
Bedford was besieged for two months before its surrender, and the
stern justice of Hubert hanged the twenty-four knights and their retainers
who formed the garrison before its walls. The blow was effectual ;
the royal castles were surrendered by the barons, and the land was
once more at peace. Freed from foreign soldiery, the country was
freed also from the presence of the foreign legate. Langton wrested a
promise from Rome that so long as he lived no future legate should be
sent to England, and with Pandulfs resignation in 1221 the direct
interference of the Papacy in the government of the realm came to an
end. But even these services of the Primate were small compared
with his services to English freedom. Throughout his life the Charter
was the first objecl of his care. The omission of the articles which
restricted the royal power over taxation in the Charter which was pub-
lished at Henry's accession was doubtless due to the Archbishop's
absence and disgrace at Rome. The suppression of disorder seems to
have revived the older spirit of resistance among the royal ministers ;
when Langton demanded a fresh confirmation of the Charter in Parlia-
ment at London, William Brewer, one of the King's councillors, pro-
tested that it had been extorted by force, and was without legal validity.
" If you loved the King, William," the Primate burst out in anger, "you
would not throw a stumbling-block in the way of the peace of the
realm." The King was cowed by the Archbishop's wrath, and at once

promise

mulgati

price ol

fruitful I

to the C

The .

English

though

powerle

King.

Christer

kingdor

barons,

and sub

might tl

the Pap;

grew m

Englanc

baronag

Pope fel

ables of

murmuri

patrons

tions to

clergy w

indignat

whole b<

Romans

gathered

poor, th<

foot. T

of the m

himself v

while th(

rioters aj

the outbr

came at 1

whom h<

dominior

had bijen

armamen

dispersed

his swore

treason a

appeased

III.]

THE GREAT CHARTER.

143

promised observance of the Charter. Two years after, its solemn pro-
mulgation WAS demanded by the Archbishop and the barons as the
price of a subsidy, and Henry's assent established the principle, so
fruitful of constitutional results, that redress of wrongs precedes a grant
to the Crown.

The death of Stephen Langton in 1228 proved a heavy blow to
English freedom. In 1227 Henry had declared himself of age ; and
though Hubert still remained Justiciar, every year saw him more
powerless in his struggle with Rome and with the tendencies of the
King. In the mediaeval theory of the Papacy, the constitution of
Christendom as a spiritual realm took the feudal form of the secular
kingdoms within its pale, with the Pope for sovereign, bishops for his
barons, the clergy for his under vassals. As the King demanded aids
and subsidies in case of need from his liegemen, so it was believed
might the head of the Church from the priesthood. At this moment
the Papacy, exhausted by its long struggle with Frederick the Second,
grew more and more extortionate in its demands. It regarded
England as a vassal kingdom, and as bound to aid its overlord. The
baronage, however, rejected the demand of aid from the laity, and the
Pope fell back on the clergy. He demanded a tithe of all the move-
ables ofthe priesthood, and a threat of excommunication silenced their
murmurs. Exaction followed exaction, the very rights of the lay
patrons were set aside, and under the name of " reserves " presenta-
tions to English benefices were sold in the Papal market, while Italian
clergy were quartered on the best livings of the Church. The general
indignation found vent at last in a wide conspiracy ; letters from " the
whole body of those who prefer to die rather than be ruined by the
Romans" were scattered over the kingdom by armed men; tithes
gathered for the Pope and foreign clergy were seized and given to the
poor, the Papal commissioners beaten, and their bulls trodden under
foot. The remonstrances of Rome only revealed the national character
of the movement ; but as inquiry proceeded the hand of the Justiciar
himself was seen to have been at work. Sheriffs had stood idly by
while the viohnce was done ; royal letters had been shown by the
rioters as approving their acts ; and the Pope openly laid the charge of
the outbreak on the secret connivance of Hubert de Burgh. The charge
came at a time when Henry was in full collision with his minister, to
whom he attributed the failure of his attempts to regain the foreign
dominions of his house. An invitation from the barons of Normandy
had b^en rejected through Hubert's remonstrances, and when a great
armament gathered at Portsmouth for a campaign in Poitou, it was
dispersed for want of transport and supplies. The young King drew
his sword and rushed madly on the Justiciar, whom he charged with
treason and corruption by thegold of France ; but the quarrel was
appeased, and the expedition deferred for the year. The failure of the

Sic. V.

Hbnrv thm
Third

laie

lfl57

Hubert's
fall

Langtoti'a
death
1228

1229

>i Is?

\ A

1230

144

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

ICIIAP.

Sec. V.

Henry thk
Third

laie

T(l

laftT

H«nrj
III. and

the
aliens

1236

campaign in the foUowinj^ year, when Henry took the field in Dritanny
and Poitou, was again laid at the door of Hubert, whose opposition
was said to have prevented an engagement. The I'apal accusation
filled up the measure of Henry's wrath. Hubert was dragged from a
chapel at Mrentwood where he had taken refuge, and a smith was
ordered to shackle him. " 1 will die any death," replied the smith,
" before I put iron on the man who freed England from the stranger
and saved Dover from France." On the remonstrances of the Bishop
of London Hubert was replaced in sanctuary, but hunger compelled
him to surrender ; he was thrown a prisoner into the Tower, and
though soon released he remained powerless in the realm. His fall
left England without a check to the rule of Henry himself.

There was a certain refinement in Henry's temper which won him
affection even in the worst days of his rule. The Abbey-church of
Westminster, with which he replaced the ruder minster of the Con-
fessor, remains a monument of his artistic taste. He was a patron
and friend of artists and men of letters, and himself skilled in the
" gay science " of the troubadour. From the cruelty, the lust, the
impiety of his father he was absolutely free. But of the political
capacity which had been the characteristic of his house he had little
or none. Profuse, changeable, impulsive alike in good and ill, un-
bridled in temper and tongue, reckless in insult and wit, Henry's
delight was in the display of an empty and prodigal magnificence, his
one notion of government a dream of arbitrary power. But frivolous
as the King's mood was, he clung with a weak man's obstinacy to a
distinct line of policy. He cherished the hope of recovering his
heritage across the sea. He believed in the absolute power of the
Crown ; and looked on the pledges of the Great Charter as promises
which force had wrested from the King and which force could wrest
back again. The claim which the French kings were advancing to a
divine and absolute power gave a sanction in Henry's mind to the
claim of absolute authority which was still maintained by his favourite
advisers in the royal council. The death of Langton, the fall of Hubert
de Burgh, left him free to surround himself with dependent ministers,
mere agents of the royal will. Hosts of hungry Poitevins and Bretons
were at once summoned over to occupy the royal castles and fill the
judi-^ial and administrative posts about the Court. His marriage with
Eleanor of Provence was followed by the arrival in England of the
Queen's uncles. The " Savoy," as his house in the Strand was named,
still recalls Peter of Savoy, who arrived five years later to take for a
while the chief place at Henry's council-board ; another brother, Boni-
face, was on Archbishop Edmund's death consecrated to the highest
post in the realm save the Crown itself, the Archbishoprick of Canter-
bury. The young Primate, like his brother, brought with him foreign
fashions strange enough to English folk. His armed retainers pillaged

iii.J

the mark
of St. Ba
was rous«
crowd of
cries of v
styled hi I
was follov
queen. Is
Chester ;
the King's
lowed the
Poitevin
husbands,
wedded bj
tration pat
the princip
a mere an
robberL, ar
corruption
proved to 1:
disputed es
That mis
in defiance
and sluggis]
foreigners, ]
forth as thei
royal Coun(
defeated th«
treat for pea
of Peter des
barons were
as an Ox fore
terbury, fore
no real chan
and of Robe
the long inte
King forced
used as a me
were wrestec
quarters wh<
utterlv inpMff
sixth of the n
The debts oft
was forced tc
granted on i

III.]

TllK GREAT CHARTER

the markets. His own archiepiscop)al fist felled to the ground the prior
of St. Bartholomew-by-SmithficUl, who opposed his visitation. London
was roused by the outrajje ; on the King's refusal to do justice a noisy
crowd of citizens surrounded the Primate's house at Lambeth with
cries of vengeance, and the " handsome archbishop," as his followers
styled him, was glad to escape over sea. This brood of Proven<,*als
was followed in 1243 by the arrival of the Poitevin relatives of Jol 1 s
queen, Isabella of Angoulcme. Aymer was made Hishop of Win-
chester ; WiUiam of Valence received the earldom of Pembroke. Kven
the King's jester was a Poitevin. Hundreds of their dependants fol-
lowed these great lords lo find a fortune in the Knglish realm. The
Poitevin lords brought in their train a bevy of ladies in search of
husbands, and three English earls who were in royal wardship were
wedded by the King to foreigners. The whole machinery of adminis-
tration passed into the hands of men ignorant and contemptuous of
the principles of English government or English law. Their rule was
a mere anarchy ; the very retainers of the royal liousehold turned
robberL, and pillaged foreign merchants in the precincts of the Court ;
corruption invaded the judicature ; Henry de Bath, a justiciar, was
proved to have openly taken bribes and to have adjudged to himself
disputed estates.

That misgovernment of this kind should have gone on unchecked,
in defiance of the provisions of the Charter, was owing to the disunion
and sluggishness of the English baronage. On the first arrival of the
foreigners, R' jhitrd, the Earl Marshal, a son of the great Regent, stood
forth as their leader to demand the expulsion of the strangers from the
royal Council, and though deserted by the bulk of the nobles, he
defeated the foreign forces sent against him, and forced the King to
treat for peace. But at this moment the Earl was drawn by an intrigue
of Peter des Roches to Ireland ; he fell in a petty skirmish, and the
barons were left without a head. Edmund Rich, whom we have seen
as an Oxford teacher and who had risen to the Archbishoprickof Can-
terbury, forced the King to dismiss Peter from court ; but there was
no real change of system, and the remonstrances of the Archbishop
and of Robert Grosseteste, Bishop of Lincoln, remained fruitless. In
the long interval of misrule which followed, the financial straits of the
King forced him to heap exaction on exaction. The Forest Laws were
used as a means of extortion, sees and abbeys were kept vacant, loans
were wrested from lords and prelates, the Court itself lived at free
quarters wherever it moved. Supplies of this kind however were
utter) V ins'tfficient to defray the cost of the King's prodigality. A
sixth of the royal revenue was wasted in pensions to foreiejn favourites.
The debts of the Crown mounted to four times its annual income. Henry
was forced to appeal to the Great Council of the realm, and aid was
granted on condition that the King confirmed the Charter. The

145

Sue. V.

Hknrv tnk
Thiru

ia57

( ^H

iffi

The
Barons
and tk«
Church

i. wli

ill

\Riifv

I 1

>234

iU"'^

»237

iflW^ltl^pt

.«

146

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE,

[chap.

Sec. V.

Henry the
Third

laie

1257

1242

1246

Matthew
Paris

1200-1259

Charter was confirmed and steadily disregarded ; and the resentment
of the barons expressed itself in a determined protest and a refusal of
further subsidies. In spite of their refusal however Henry gathered
money enough for a costly expedition for the recovery of Poitou. The
attempt ended in failure and shame. At Taillebourg the forces under
Henry fled in disgraceful rout before the French as far as Saintes, and
only the sudden illness of Lewis the Ninth and a disease which scat-
tered his army saved Bordeaux from the conquerors. The treasury
was drained, and Henry was driven to make a fresh appeal to the
baronage. The growing resolution of the nobles to enforce good
government was seen in their demand that the confirmation of the
Charter was to be followed by the election of Justiciar, Chancellor,
and Treasurer in the Great Council, and that a perpetual Council was to
attend the King and devise further reforms. The plan broke against
Henry's resistance and a Papal prohibition. The scourge of Papal
taxation fell heavily on the clergy. After vain appeals to Rome and
to the King, Archbishop Edmund retired to an exile of despair at
Pontigny, and tax-gatherer after tax-gatherer with powers of excom-
munication, suspension from orders, and presentation to benefices,
descended on the unhappy priesthood. The wholesale pillage kindled
a wide spirit of resistance. Oxford gave the signal by hunting a Papal
legate out of the city, amid cries of " usurer " and " simoniac " from the
mob of students. Fulk Fitz-Warenne in the name of the barons
bade a Papal collector begone out of England. "If you tarry three
days longer," he added, "you and your company shall be cut to pieces."
For a time Henry himself was swept away by the tide of national
indignation. Letters from the King, the nobles and the prelates pro-
tested against the Papal exactions, and orders were given that no
money should be exported from the realm. But the threat of interdict
soon drove Henry back on a policy of spoliation, in which he went
h?ind in hand with Rome.

The story of this period of misrule has been preserved for us by
an annalist whose pages glow with the new outburst of patriotic
feeling which this common oppression of the people and the clergy
had produced. Matthew Paris is the greatest, as he is in reality
the last, of our monastic historians. The school of S. Alban's sur-
vived indeed till a far later time, but the writers dwindle into mere
annalists whose view is bounded by the abbey precincts, and whose
work is as colourless as it is jejune. In Matthew the breadth and
precision of the narrative, the copiousness of his information on
topics whether national or European, the general fairness and justice
of his comments, are only surpassed by the patriotic fire and enthu-
siasm of the whole. He had succeeded Roger of Wendover as
chronicler at S. Alban's ; and the Greater Chronicle with an abridge-
jment of it which has long passed under the name of Matthew of

iii.J

Westm

Earlier

attest

an histi

illustrat

like Gr

ander d

and ecc

agents 1:

He had

and exc

brought

tributed

faithfulm

one solei

sit on the

to write

Alban's

name twc

But all t

case," as

truth the^

God.^' \^

Benedict <

patriotism

same unsj

Hi: point

of an Eng

an echo c

yeomen ai

freedom fr

[Auihonil
Marrh's Letl
Franciscana '
edited by M
Milman's "I

From the
which stretc
with relief tc

^^ever. as

HAP.

nent

alof

ered

The

jidcr

I, and

scat-

asury

the
good

)f the
:ellor,
vas to
gainst
Papal
le and
)air at
jxcom-
lefices,
andled

1 Papal
om the
barons
y three

ieces."
ational
les pro-
Ihat no
iterdict
le went

us by
itriotic
clergy
I reality
's sur-
mere
I whose
[\i and
ion on
Ijustice
lenthu-
Iver as
)ridge-
kew of

HI.]

THE GREAT CHARTER.

•47

Westminster, a " History of the English," and the '* Lives of the
Earlier Abbots," were only a few among the voluminous works which
attest his prodigious industry. He was an artist as well as
an historian, and many of the manuscripts which are preserved arc
illustrated by his own hand. A large circle of correspondents — bishops
like Grosseteste, mmisters like Hubert de Burgh, officials like Alex-
ander de Swereford — furnished him with minute accounts of political
and ecclesiastical proceedings. Pilgrims from the East and Papal
agents brought news of foreign events to his scriptorium at S. Alban's.
He had access to and quotes largely from state documents, charters,
and c.vchequer rolls. The frequency of the royal visits to the abbey
brought him ?, store of political intelligence, and Henry himself con-
tributed to the great chronicle which has preserved with so terrible a
faithfulness the memory of his weakness and misgovernment. On
one solemn feast-day the King recognized Matthew, and bidding him
sit on the middle step between the floor and the throne, begged him
to write the story of the day's proceedings. While on a visit to S.
Alban's he invited him to his table and chamber, and enumerated by
name two hundred and fifty of the English baronies for his information.
But all this royal patronage has left little mark on his work. " The
case," as he says, " of historical writers is hard, for if they tell the
truth they provoke men, and if they write what is false they offend
God." With all the fulness of the school of court historians, such as
Benedict or Hoveden, Matthew Paris combines an independence and
patriotism which is strange to their pages. He denounces with the
same unsparing energy the oppression of the Papacy and the King.
Hi:, point of view is neither that of a courtier nor of a churchman, but
of an Englishman, and the new national tone of his chronicle is but
an echo of the national sentiment which at last bound nobles and
yeomen and churchmen together into a people resolute to wrest
freedom from the Crown.

Section VI.— The Friars.

[Authorities . — Kccleston's Tract on their arrival in England and Adam
Marrh's Letters, with Mr. Brewer's admirable Preface, in the " Momimenta
Franciscana " of the Rolls series. Grosseteste's Letters in the same series,
edited by Mr. Luard. For a general account of the whol«' movement, sec
Milman's ** Latin Christianity," vol. iv. caps. 9 and 10.]

From the tedious record of misgovernmeit and political weakness
which stretches over the forty years we have passed through, we turn
with relief to the story of the Friars.

Never, as we have seen, had the priesthood wielded such boundless

L 2

Sec. V.

Henry tiif
Third

1216

•10

1257

fl=

Eneland
and the

hJl

Church

e !

\ '

> «' ■ n

''4

'^Ski

!♦

<L'i{a

I4S

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

I Sec. VI.

The
Fkiars

The
Friars

power over Christendom as in the days of Innocent the Third and his
immediate successors. But its religious hold on the people was
loosening day by day. The old reverence for the Papacy was fading
away before the universal resentment at its political ambition, its lavish
use of interdict and excommunication for purely secular ends, its
degradation of the most sacred sentences into means of financial
extortion. In Italy the struggle that was opening between Rome and
Frederick the Second disclosed a spirit of scepticism which among the
Epicur«;an poets of Florence denied the immortality of the soul, and
attacked the very foundations of the faith itself. In Southern Gaul,
Languedoc and Provence had embraced the heresy of the Albigenses,
and thrown off all allegiance to the Papacy. Even in England, though
there were no signs as yet of religious revolt, and though the political
action of Rome had been in the main on the side of freedom, there was
a spirit of resistance to its interference with national concerns which
broke out in the struggle against John. " The Pope has no part in
secular matters," had been the reply of London to the interdict of
Innocent. And within the English Church itself there was much to
call for reform. Us attitude in the strife for the Charter as well as the
after work of the Primate had made it more popular than ever ; but
its spiritual energy was less than its political. The disuse of preaching,
the decline of the monastic orders into rich landowners, the non-
residence and ignorance of the parish priests, robbed the clergy of
spiritual influence. The abuses of the time foiled even the energy of
such men as Bishop Grosseteste of Lincoln. PI is constitutions forbid
the clergy to haunt taverns, to gamble, to share in drinking bouts, to
mix in the riot and debauchery of the life of the baronage. But such
prohibitions only witness to the prevalence of the evils they denounce.
Bishops and deans were withdrawn from their ecclesiastical duties to
act as ministers, judges, or ambassadors. Benefices were heaped in
hundreds at a time on royal favourites like John Mansel. Abbeys
absorbed the tithes of parishes, and then served them by half-starved
vicars, while exemptions purchased from Rome shielded the scandal-
ous lives of canons and monks from, all episcopal discipline. And
behind all this was a group of secular statesmen and scholars, waging
indeed no open warfare with the Church, but noting with bitter sarcasm
its abuses and its faults.

To bring the world back again within the pale of the Church was the
aim of two religious orders which spiang suddenly to life at the opening
of the thirteenth century. The zeal of the Spaniard Dominic was roused
at the sight of the lordly prelates who sought by fire and sword to win
the Albigensian heretics to the faith. " Zeal," he cried, " must be met
by zeal, lowliness by lowliness, false sanctity by real sanctity, preaching
lies by preaching truth." His fiery ardour and rigid orthodoxy were
seconded by the mystical piety, the imaginative enthusiasm of Francis

in.]

of Assij

the dar

Dante \

he fling!

Nature

and the

sister thi

Strangel

same — 1<

ledge wii

to be dor

personal

exchangi;

the friar.

those am<

stem real

poor, thej

which the;

of populai

it the relui

tion of the

a few year

clad in th

waist, war

heresy in

and toiled

To the I

revolution.

most ignor

lay in his

religious in;

Church's ri

graven on

burst of en

fervid apper

fair and th(

Friars of F]

orders had c

hardly lande

Oxford. In

lost their wj

of night and

Abingdon.

for hospitalit

and jugglers

III.]

THE GREAT CHARTER,

of Assisi. The life of Francis falls like a stream of tender light across
the darkness of the time. In the frescoes of Giotto or the verse of
Dante we see him take Poverty for his bride. He strips himself of all,
he flings his very clothes at his father's feet, that he may be one with
Nature and God. His passionate verse claims the Moon for his sister
and the Sun for his brother, he calls on his brother the Wind, and his
sister the Water. His last faint cry was a " Welcome, Sister Death ! "
Strangely as the two men differed from each other, their aim was the
same — to convert the heathen, to extirpate heresy, to reconcile know-
ledge with orthodoxy, to carry the Gospel to the poor. The work was
to be done by the entire reversal of the older monasticism, by seeking
personal salvation in efifort for the salvation of their fellow-men, by
exchanging the solitary of the cloister for the preacher, the monk for
the friar. To force the new " brethren " into entire dependence on
those among whom they laboured their vow of Poverty was turned into a
stem reality ; the " Begging Friars " were to subsist on the alms of the
poor, they might possess neither money nor lands, the very houses in
which they lived were to be held in trust for them by others. The tide
of popular enthusiasm which welcomed their appearance swept before
it the reluctance of Rome, the jealousy of the older orders, the opposi-
tion of the parochial priesthood. Thousands of brethren gathered in
a few years round Francis and Dominic ; and the begging preachers,
clad in their coarse frock of serge, with a girdle of rope round their
waist, wandered barefooted as missionaries over Asia, battled with
heresy in Italy and Gaul, lectured in the Universities, and preached
and toiled among the poor.

To the towns especially the coming of the Friars was a religious
revolution. They had been left for the most part to the worst and
most ignorant of the clergy, the mass-priest, whose sole subsistence
lay in his fees. Burgher and artisan were left to spell out what
religious instruction they might from the gorgeous ceremonies of the
Church's ritual, or the scriptural pictures and sculptures ^ aich were
graven on the walls of its minsters. We can hardly wonder at the
burst of enthusiasm which welcomed the itinerant preacher, whose
fervid appe^^j, coarse wit, and familiar story brought religion into the
fair and the market-place. The Black Friars of Dominic, the Grey
Friars of Francis, were received with the same delight. As the older
orders had chosen the country, the Friars chose the town. They had
hardly landed at Dover before they made straight for London and
Oxford. In their ignorance of the road the two first Grey Brothers
lost their way in the woods between Oxford and Baldon, and fearful
of night and of the floods, turned aside to a grange of the monks of
Abingdon. Their ragged clothes and foreign gestures, as they prayed
for hospitality, led the porter to take them for jongleurs, the jesters
and jugglers of the day, and the news of this break in the monotony

149

Shc. VI.

The
Friars

■'I

il-1

PI-

J i-^

' f

The

Friars

and the

ToTims

1.1 '"'I

I 22 I- 1224

it?!

150

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAP.

Sec. VI.

The
Friars

The
Friars
and the
Univer-
sities

Inii

of their lives brought prior, sacrist, and cellarer to the door to
welcome them and witness their tricks. The disappointment was too
much for the temper of the monks, and the brothers were kicked
roughly from the gate to find their night's lodging under a tree. But
the welcome of the townsmen made up everywhere for the ill-will and
opposition of both clergy and monks. The work of the Friars was
physical as well as moral. The rapid progress of population within
the boroughs had outstripped the sanitary regulations of the Middle
Ages, and fever or plague or the more terrible scourge of leprosy
festered in the wretched hovels of the suburbs. It was to haunts such
as these that Francis had pointed his disciples, and the Grey Brethren
at once fixed themselves in the meanest and poorest quarters of each
town. Their first work lay in the noisome lazar-houses ; it was
amongst the lepers that they commonly chose the site of their homes.
At London they settled in the shambles of Newgate ; at Oxford they
made their way to the swampy ground between its walls and the
streams of Thames. Huts of mud and timber, as mean as the huts
around them, rose within the rough fence and ditch that bounded the
Friary. The order of Francis made a hard fight against the iaste for
sumptuous buildings and for greater personal comfort which charac-
terized the time. " I did not enter into religion to build walls," pro-
tested an English provincial when the brethren pressed for a larger
house ; and Albert of Pisa ordered a stone cloister, which the burgesses
of Southampton had built for them, to be razed to the ground. " You
need no little mountains to lift your heads to heaven," was his scornful
reply to a claim for pillows. None but the sick went shod. An Oxford
Friar found a pair of shoes one morning, and wore them at matins.
At night he dreamt that robaers leapt on him in a dangerous pass
between Gloucester and Oxford with shouts of " Kill, kill ! " "I am a
friar," shrieked the terror-stricken brother. " You lie," was the instant
answer, " for you go shod." The Friar lifted up his foot in disproof, but
the shoe was there. In an agony of repentance he woke and flung the
pair out of window.

It was with less success that the order struggled against the passion
for knowledge. Their vow of poverty, rigidly interpreted as it was by
their founders, would have denied them the possession of books or
materials for study. " I am your breviary, I am your breviary," Francis
cried passionately to a novice who asked for a psalter. When the
news of a great doctor's reception was brought to him at Paris, his
countenance fell. ''*I am afraid, my son," he replied, "that such
doctors will be the destruction of my vineyard. They are the true
doctors who with the meekness of wisdom show forth good works for
the edification of their neighbours." At a later time Roger Bacon, as
we have seen, was suffered to possess neither ink, parchment, nor
books ; and only the Pope's injunctions could dispense with the

III.]

stringer
their wc
soon lee
after the
or lectui
and a r
The Oxf
church,
vincial o
persuade
motion t
among tl
ably secc
whom th(
out Chris
professors
to a posi
scholastic
men— Ro|
scholars ;
illustrious
But the
the wider
Universitie
only efficie
resumed ii
been so k
faith, was
the discuss
pected ally,
subtlety an
scholastic p
thinker's co
great thirst
reading anc
great advan
their errors,
demonstratii
methodical t
substitute an
rity. It wa
precision wl
trivial quest!
human mind
it to profit b>

III.]

THE GREAT CHARTER.

pass

am a

istant

)f, but

igthe

ission
[as by
Iks or

jancis
In the
Is, his
such
true
:sfor
)ii, as
nor
the

stringent observance of the rule. But one kind of knowledge indeed
their work almost forced on them. The popularity of their preaching
soon led them to the deeper study of theology. Within a short time
after their establishment in England we find as many as thirty readers
or lecturers appointed at Hereford, Leicester, Bristol, and other places,
and a regular succession of teachers provided at each University.
The Oxford Dominicans lectured on theology in the nave of their new
church, while philosophy was taught in the cloister. The first pro-
vincial of the Grey Friars built a school in their Oxford house, and
persuaded Grosseteste to lecture there. His influence after his pro-
motion to the see of Lincoln was steadily exerted to secure study
among the Friars, and their establishment in the University. He was
ably seconded by his scholar, Adam Marsh, or de Marisco, under
whom the Franciscan school at Oxford attained a reputation through-
out Christendom. Lyons, Paris, and Koln borrowed from it their
professors : it was owing, indeed, to its influence that Oxford now rose
to a position hardly inferior to that of P; : 3 itself as a centre of
scholasticism. The three most profound and original of the school-
men — Roger Bacon, Duns Scotus, and Ockham — were among its
scholars ; and they were followed by a crowd of teachers hardly less
illustrious in their day.

But the result of this powerful impulse was soon seen to be fatal to
the wider intellectual activity which had till now characterized the
Universities. Theology in its scholastic form, which now found its
only efficient rivals in practical studies such as medicine and law,
resumed its supremacy in the schools ; while Aristotle, who had
been so long held at bay as the most dangerous foe of mediaeval
faith, was now turned by the adoption of his logical method in
the discussion and definition of theological dogma into its unex-
pected ally. It was this very method that led to " that unprofitable
subtlety and curiosity" which Lord Bacon notes as the vice of the
scholastic philosophy. But " certain it is " — to continue the same great
thinker's comment on the Friars — " that if these schoolmen to their
great thirst of truth and unwearied travel of wit had joined variety of
reading and contemplation, they had proved excellent lights to the
great advancement of all learning and knowledge." What, amidst all
their errors, they undoubtedly did was to insist on the necessity of rigid
demonstration and a more exact use of words, to introduce a clear and
methodical treatment of all subjects into discussion, and above all to
substitute an appeal to reason for unquestioning obedience to autho-
rity. It was by this critical tendency, by the new clearness and
precision which scholasticism gave to enquiry, that in spite of the
trivial questions with which it often concerned itself, it trained the
human mind through the next two centuries to a temper which fitted
it to profit by the great disclosure of knowledge that brought about the

Sec. VI.

The
Friars

Scholas-
ticism

> i

152

Sec. VII.

The

Barons'

War

1858

1865

■

Simon

Montfort

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Renascence. And it is to the same spirit of fearless enquiry as well
as to the strong popular sympathies which their very constitution
necessitated that we must attribute the influence which the Friars
undoubtedly exerted in the coming struggle between the people and
the Crown. Their position is clearly and strongly marked throughout
the whole contest. The University of Oxford, which had now fallen
under the direction of their teaching, stood first in its resistance to
Papal exactions and its claim of English liberty. The classes in the
towns on whom the influence of the Friars told most directly were the
steady supporters of freedom throughout the Barons' war. Adam
Marsh was the closest friend and confidant both of Grosseteste and
Earl Simon of Montfort.

1239-1241

Section VII.— The Barons' IVar, 1858—1265.

[Atit/iorities. — At the very outset of this important period we lose the price-
less aid of Matthew Paris. He is the last of the great chroniclers ; the Chroni-
cles of his successor at S. Alban's, Rishanger (published by the Master of the
Rolls), are scant and lifeless jottings, somewhat enlarged for this period by his
fragment on the Barons' War (published by Camden Society). Something may
be gleaned from the annals of Burton, Melrose, Dunstal)le, Waverley, Osney,
and Lanercost, the Royal Letters, the (royalist) Chronic, of Wykes, and (for
London) the ** Liber de Antiquis Legibus." Mr. Blaauw has given a useful
summary of the period in his "Barons' War."]

When a thunderstorm once forced the King, as he was rowing on
the Thames, to take refuge at the palace of the Bishop of Durham,
Earl Simon of Montfort, who was a guest of the prelate, met the
royal barge with assurances that the storm was drifting away, and that
there was nothing to fear. Henry's petulant wit broke out in his reply.
" If I fear the thunder," said the King, " I fear you. Sir Earl, more than
all the thunder in the world."

The man whom Henry dreaded as the champion of English freedom
was himself a foreigner, the son of a Simon de Montfort whose name
had become memorable for his ruthless crusade against the Albigensian
heretics in Southern Gaul. Though fourth son of this crusader, Simon
became possessor of the English earldom of Leicester, which he
inherited through his mother, and a secret match with Eleanor, the
King's sister and widow of the second William Marshal, linked him
to the royal house. The baronage, indignant at this sudden alliance
with a stranger, rose in a revolt which failed only through the deser-
tion of their head. Earl Richard of Cornwall ; while the censures of
the Church on Eleanor's breach of a vow of chastity, which she had
made at her first husband's death, were hardly averted by a journey

III.]

to Rom

alienatec

the reali

took his

was app(

rule, an(

necessar

of the

Earl Sim

spent in

the King

traitor.

bearest t

utteredst

and the

come he

reputatio]

regency o

But the

taken the

to recall :

character

and seven

religious :

Grossetest

Adam Ma

in the pen

temperate

sleep. Sc

temper wa

rapid and

were in fa<

one charac

called his '

even deatl

Edward th

the device

a clear di

" thought i

as the red I

he persevc

support or

till the w(

purpose in

he had leai

III.]

THE GREAT CHARTER.

153

to Rome. Simon returned to find the changeable King quickly
alienated from him and to be driven by a burst of royal passion from
the realm. He was, however, soon restored to favour, and before long
took his stand in the front rank of the patriot leaders. In 1248 he
was appointed Governor of Gascony, where the stern justice of his
rule, and the heavy taxation which his enforcement of order made
necessary, earned the hatred of the disorderly nobles. The complaints
of the Gascons brought about an open breach with the King. To
Earl Simon's offer of the surrender of his post if the money he had
spent in the royal service were, as Henry had promised, repaid him,
the King hotly retorted that he was bound by no promise to a false
traitor. Simon at once gave Henry the lie ; " and but that thou
bearest the name of King it had been a bad hour for thee when thou
utteredst such a word ! " A formal reconciliation was brought about,
and the Earl once more returned to Gascony, but before winter had
come he was forced to withdraw to France. The g^reatness of his
reputation was shown in an offer which its nobles made him of the
regency of their realm during the absence of King Lewis on the crusade.
But the offer was refused ; and Henry, who had himself under-
taken the pacification of Gascony, was glad before the clo^e of 1253
to recall its old ruler to do the work he had failed to do. Simon's
character had now thoroughly developed. He had inherited the strict
and severe piety of his father ; he was assiduous in his attendance on
religious services whether by iiight or day ; he was the friend of
Grosseteste and the patron of the Friars. In his correspondence with
Adam Marsh we see him finding patience under his Gascon troubles
in the perusal of the Book of Job. His life was pure and singularly
temperate ; he was noted for his scant indulgence in meat, drink, or
sleep. Socially he was cheerful and pleasant in talk ; but his natural
temper was quick and ardent, his sense of honour keen, his speech
rapid and trenchant. His impatience of contradiction, his fiery temper,
were in fact the great stumbling-blocks in his after career. But the
one characteristic which overmastered all was what men at that time
called his " constancy," the firm immoveable resolve which trampled
even death under foot in its loyalty to the right. The motto which
Edward the First chose as his device, " Keep troth," was far truer as
the device of Earl Simon. We see in his correspondence with what
a clear discernment of its difficulties both at home and abroad he
" thought it unbecoming to decline the danger of so great an exploit "
as the reduction of Gascony to peace and order ; but once undertaken,
he persevered in spite of the opposition he met with, the failure of all
support or funds from England, and the King's desertion of his cause,
till the work was done. There is the same steadiness of will and
purpose in his patriotism. The letters of Grosseteste show how early
he had learned to sympathize with the bishop in his resistance to Rome,

Sec. VII.

The

Barons'

War

lfl58

laes

1248

,w.

\»H

I *l

I!'

154

IITSTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAP.

III.]

Sfc. VII.

The

Barons'

Wak

1058

11165

The Pro-
visions

of
Oxford

1254

and at the crisis of the contest he offers him his own support and that
of his associates. He sends to Adam Marsh a tract of Grossetcste's
on " the rule of a kingdom and of a tyranny," sealed with his own seal.
He listens patiently to the advice of his friends on the subject of his
household or his temper. " Better is a patient man," writes honest
Friar Adam, ** than a strong man, and he who can rule his own temper
than he who storms a city." " What use is it to provide for the peace
of your fellow-citizens and not guard the peace of your own house-
hold?" It was to secure *'the peace of his fellow-citizens" that the
Earl silently trained himself as the tide of misgovernment mounted
higher and higher, and the fruit of his discipline was seen when the
crisis came. While other men wavered and faltered and fell away,
the enthusiastic love of the people gathered itself round the stern,
grave soldier who "stood like a pillar," unshaken by promise or threat
or fear of death, by the oath he had sworn.

In England affairs were going from bad to worse. The Pope still
weighed heavily on the Church. Two solemn confirmations of the
Charter failed to bring about any compliance with its provisions. In
1248, in 1249, and again in 1255, the Great Council fruitlessly renewed
its demand for a regular ministry, and the growing resolvp of the
nobles to enforce good government was seen in their offer of a grant
on condition that the chief officers of the Crown were appointed by the
Council. Henry indignantly refused the offer, and sold his plate to
the citizens of London to find payment for his household. The barons
were mutinous and defiant. " I will send reapers and reap your fields
for you," Henry had threatened Earl Bigod of Norfolk when he refused
him aid. " And I will send you back the heads of your reapers,"
retorted the Earl. Hampered by the profusion of the court and by
the refusal of supplies, the Crown was penniless, yet new expenses were
incurred by Henry's acceptance of a Papal offer of the kingdom of
Sicily in favour of his second son Edmund. Shame had fallen on the
English arms, and the King's eldest son, Edward, had been disastrously
defeated on the Marches by Llewelyn of Wales. The tide of dis-
content, which was heightened by a grievous famine, burst its bounds
in the irritation excited by the new demands from both Henry and
R' ne with which the year 1258 opened, and the barons repaired in
arms to a Great Council summoned at London. The past half-century
had shown both the strength and weakness of the Charter : its strength
as a rallying-point for the baronage, and a definite assertion of rights
which the King could be made to acknowledge ; its weakness in pro-
viding no means for the enforcement of its own stipulations. Henry
had sworn again and again to observe the Charter, and his oath was
no sooner taken than it was unscrupulously broken. The barons had
secured the freedom of the realm ; the secret of their long patience
during the reign of Henry lay in the difficulty of securing its right

administ
to solve,
the baro
of twentj
half the
impossib
of Oxfon
thrice in
occasion
come to t
when the
wants of
hold as
nent com
negotiate
the King
cellor, anc
the advice
officers, w
to it at th
from amoi
to be exaci
A royal
since the C
Provisions,
armed den-
power was
the Great C
prohibition
to Rome, ii
the negotia
ended in th(
and in the
Within, ho\
The Provis
pressure in
furtherance
feudal privil
from attend;
returned froi
sures of refo
oath to obse
and Hugh E
party to the
a bull whic

II1.1

THE GREAT CHARTER.

administration. It was this difficulty which Earl Simon was prepared
to solve. With the Earl of Gloucester he now appeared at the head of
the baro >agc in arms, and demanded the appointment of a committee
of twenty-four to draw up terms for the reform of the state. Although
half the committee consisted of royal ministers and favourites, it was
impossible to resist the tide of popular feeling. By the " Provisions
of Oxford" it was agreed that the (}reat Council should assemble
thrice in the year, whether summoned by the King or no ; and on each
occasion "the Commonalty shall elect twelve honest men who shall
come to the Parliaments, and at other times when occasion shall be
when the King and his Council shall send for them, to treat of the
wants of the King and of his kingdom. And the Commonalty shall
hold as established that which these Twelve shall do." Three perma-
nent committees were named — one to reform the Church, one to
negotiate financial aids, and a Permanent Council of Fifteen to advise
the King in the ordinary work of government. The Justiciar, Chan-
cellor, and the guardians of the King's castles swore to act only with
the advice and assent of the Permanent Council, and the first two great
officers, with the Treasurer, were to give account of their proceedings
to it at the end of the year. Annual sheriffs were to be appointed
from among the chief tenants of the county, and no undue fees were
to be exacted for the administration of justice in their court.

A royal proclamation in the English tongue, the first in that tongue
since the Conquest which has reached us, ordered the observance of these
Provisions. Resistance came only from the foreign favourites, and an
armed demonstration drove them in flight over sea. The whole royal
power was now in fact in the hands of the committees appointed by
the Great Council ; and the policy of the administration was seen in the
prohibitions against any further payments, secular or ecclesiastical,
to Rome, in the formal withdrawal from the Sicilian enterprise, in
the negotiations conducted by Earl Simon with France, which finally
ended in the absolute renunciation of Henry's title to his lost provinces,
and in the peace which put an end to the incursions of the Welsh.
Within, however, the measures of the barons were feeble and selfish.
The Provisions of Westminster, published by them under popular
pressure in the following year, for the protection of tenants and
furtherance of justice, brought little fruit ; and a tendency to mere
feudal privilege showed itself in an exemption of all nobles and prelates
from attendance at the sheriff's courts. It was in vain that Earl Simon
returned from his negotiations in France to press for more earnest mea-
sures of reform, or that the King's son Edward remained faithful to his
oath to observe the Provisions, and openly supported him. Gloucester
and Hugh Bigod, faithless to the cause of reform, drew with the feudal
party to the side of the King ; and Henry, procuring from the Pope
a bull which annulled the Provisions and freed him from his oath

155

skc. vn.

The

IIarons'
Wak

1258

1265

Prcmhions
of O.xforil

July 1258

1259

I <\

■ fi-.^m

156

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAF.

Skc. VII.

Thk

Uarons'

War

lasa

laes

The

■tmcfle

wltb the

Grown

1263

Mtse of
Amiens

fan. 1264

to observe them, regained possession of the Tower and the other
castles, appointed a new Justiciar, and restored the old authority of the
C'rown.

Deserted as he was, the Earl of Leicester was forced to with-
draw for eighteen months to France, while Henry ruled in open
defiance of the Provisions. The confusion of the realm renewed the
disgust at his government ; and the death of Gloucester re-
moved the one barrier to action. In 1263 Simon landed again
as the unquestioned head of the baronial party. The march
of Edward with a royal army against Llewelyn of Wales was
viewed by the barons as a prelude to hostilities against them-
selves ; and Earl Simon at once swept the Welsh border, marched on
Dover, and finally appeared before London. His power was strength-
ened by the attitude of the towns. The new democratic spirit which
wc have witnessed in the Friars was now stirring the purely industrial
classes to assert a share in the municipal administration, which had
hitherto been confined to the wealthier members of the merchant gilds,
and at London and elsewhere a revolution, which will be described at
greater length hereafter, had thrown the government of the city into
the hands of the lower citizens. The " Communes," as the new city
governments were called, showed an enthusiastic devotion to Earl
Simon and his cause. The Queen was stopped in her attempt to
escape from the Tower by an angry mob, who drove her back with
stones and foul words. When Henry attempted to surprise Leicester
in his quarters in Southwark, the Londoners burst the gates which had
been locked by the richer burghers against him, and rescued him by a
welcome into the city. The clergy and Universities went in sympathy
with the towns, and in spite of the taunts of the royalists, who accused
him of seeking allies against the nobility in the common people, the
popular enthusiasm gave a strength to Earl Simon which enabled him
to withstand the severest blow which had yet been dealt to his cause.
The nobles drew to the King. The dread of civil war gave strength
to the cry for compromise, and it was agreed that the strife should be
left to the arbitration of Lewis the Ninth of France. In the Mise of
Amiens Lewis gave his verdict wholly in favour of the King. The
Provisions of Oxford were annulled. Only the charters granted
before the Provisions were to be observed. The appointment and
removal of all officers of state was to be wholly with the King, and
he was suffered to call aliens to his councils. The blow was a hard
one, and the decision of Lewis was at once confirmed by the Pope.
The barons felt themselves bound by the award ; only the ex-
clusion of aliens — a point which they had not purposed to submit
to arbitration — they refused to concede. Simon at once resolved
on resistance. Luckily, the French award had reserved the rights of
Englishmen to the liberties they had enjoyed before the Provisions

ill.]

of Oxfon

power it

Provision

its citizen

the royal

already

found hin

of ill. A d

De Mon

the King

Simon's o

as he was

end, he sa

army rein

Cinque P(

march he

Halting a

royal arm)

ter offered

the Provii

numbers w

soldier rev

seized the I

to an attac

in prayer h

fight ; his f

the bitterni

ing three tl

in the narri

left were cr

the Romar

him a castt

mangonels

himself caf

his father's

The vict(

"Now Eng

time; "the

up their he;

with almos

would be ii

himself and

of his king<

according t

the law."

re-

isions

III.]

TIIK GREAT CHARTER.

of Oxford, and it was easy for Simon to prove that the arbitrary
power it gave to the Crown was as contrary to the Charier as to the
Provisions themsolves. London was the first to reject the decision ;
its citizens mustered at the call of the town-bell at Saint Paul's, seized
the royal officials, and plundered the royal parks. Hut an army had
already mustered in great force at the King's summons, and Leicester
found himself deserted by baron after baron. Every day brought news
of ill. A detachment from Scotland joined Henry's forces. The younger
De Montfort was taken prisoner. Northampton was captured,
the King raised the siege of Rochester, and a rapid march of I-^arl
Simon's only saved London itself from a surprise by Edward, lictrayed
as he was, the Earl remained firm to the cause. He would fight to the
end, he said, even were he and his sons left to fight alone. With an
army reinforced by 15,000 Londoners, he marched to the relief of the
Cinque Ports, which were now threatened by the King. Even on the
march he w.is forsaken by many of the nobles who followed him.
Halting at Fletching in Sussex, a few miles from Lewes, where the
royal army was encamped, Earl Simon with the young Earl of Glouces-
ter ofiered the King compensation for all damage if he would observe
the Provisions. Henry's answer was one of defiance, and though
numbers were against him the Earl resolved on battle. His skill as a
soldier reversed the advantages of the ground ; marching at dawn he
seized the heights eastward of the town, and moved down these slopes
to an attack. His men, with white crosses on back and breast, knelt
in prayer before the battle opened. Edward was the first to open the
fight ; his furious charge broke the Londoners on Leicester's left, and in
the bitterness of his hatred he pursued them for four miles, slaughter-
ing three thousand men. He returned to find the battle lost. Crowded
in the narrow space with a river in their rear, the royalist centre and
left were crushed by Earl Simon ; the Earl of Cornwall, now King of
the Romans, who, as the mocking song of the victors ran, " makcde
him a castel of a mulne post " (" he weened that the mill-sails were
mangonels " goes on the sarcastic verse), was made prisoner, and Henry
himself captured. Edward cut his way into the Priory only to join in
his father's surrender.

The victory of Lewes placed Earl Simon at the head of the state.
"Now England breathes in the hope of liberty," sang a poet of the
time ; " the English were despised like dogs, but now they have lifted
up their head and their foes are vanquished." The song announces
with almost legal precision the theory of the patriots. " He who
would be in truth a king, he is a ' free king ' indeed if he rightly rule
himself and his realm. All things are lawful to him for the government
of his kingdom, but nothing for its destruction. It is one thing to rule
according to a king's duty, another to destroy a kingdom by resisting
the law." " Let the community of the realm advise, and let it be

157

Sbc. VII.

TlIK

IUkhns'
Wak

1258

1265

Battle of

Lewes

May 14,

1264

Simon's
rule

.4 '

If* '

158

HISTORY OF TllK KNCMSII rKOPLK.

[chap.

Skl. VII.

Thr

!'ah(in>,*
War

1858

lfl65

Sutnmons of

the Com-
mons to Par-
liament

The fall
of Earl
Simon

known what the generality, to whom their own laws are bcbt known,
think on the matter. Tiicy who arc ruled by the laws know those
laws best, they who make daily trial of ihem arc best acquainted with
thcin ; and since it is their own affairs which are at stake, they will
take more care, and will act with an eye to their own peace." "It
concerns the community to see what sort of men ought justly to be
chosen for the weal of the realm." The constitutional restrictions on
the royal authority, the right of the whole nation to deliberate and
decide on its own affairs, and to have a voice in the selection of the
administrators of government, had never been so clearly stated before.
Hut the moderation of the terms agreed upon in the Mise of Lewes,
a convention between the King and his captors, shows Simon's sense
of the difficulties of his position. The question of the Provisions was
again to be submitted to arbitration; and a parliament in June, to
which four knights were summoned from every county, placed the
administration till this arbitration was complete in the hands of a new
council of nine, to be nominated by the Earls of Leicester and
(Gloucester and the patriotic Bishop of Chichester. Responsibility
to the community was provided for by the declaration of a right in the
body of barons and prelates to remove either of the Three Electors,
who in turn could displace or appoint the members of the Council.
Such a constitution was of a different order from the cumbrous and
oligarchical Committees of 1258. But the plans for arbitration broke
down, Lewis refused to review his decision, and the Pope formally
condemned the barons' cause. The Earl's difficulties thickened every
day. The Queen gathered an army in France for an invasion, and
the baroni -^^ the Welsh border were still in arms. It was impossible
to make binding terms with an imprisoned King, yet to release Henry
without terms was to renew the war. A new parliament was summoned
in January, 1265, to Westminster, but the weakness of the patriotic
party among the baronage was shown in the fact that only twenty-three
earls and barons could be found to sit beside the hundred and twenty
ecclesiastics. But it was just this sense of his weakness that drove Earl
Simon to a constitutional change of mighty issue in our history. As
before, he summoned two knights from every county. But he created
a new force in English politics when he summoned to sit beside them
two citizens from every borough. The attendance of delegates from
the towns had long been usual in the county courts when any matter
respecting their interests was in question ; but it was the writ issued
by Earl Simon that first summoned the merchant and the trader to sit
beside the knight of the shire, the baron, and the bishop in the
parliament of the realm.

It is only this great event however which enables us to under-
stand the large and prescient nature of Earl Simon's designs.
Hardly a few months had passed since the victory of Lewes, and

iii.l

already, wli
government
h.id met wi
forces on B;
taincd by th
the threats <
was forbiddi
were flung ii
able every c]
the national
who always
the barons
over the spc
public peac<
he refused 1
the agreeme
though enri(
prohibition
castles by h
the Welsh r
proves the y
ment of \2(
Lewes, with
he withdrew
with Roge.-
followed hin
moved alon
Hereford, ai
the heart of
Glamorgan
and joined
chosen, and
he took ad^
Severn he s
the ships b
Bristol, and
too he place
advancing f
second force
loss within t
pensated bj
breaking thi
was, Simon
aUiance wit
turned to th

iir.l

THE r.r<FAT Clf ARTKK.

already, when the burjjhcrs took their seats at Westminster, his
},'overnmcnt was tottering' to its fall. Dan^'crs from without the Karl
h.id met with complete success ; a general muster of the national
forces on IJarham Down put an end to the projects of invasion enter-
tained by the mercenaries whom the Q"cen had collected in Flanders ;
the threats of France died away into negotiations ; the Papal Legale
was forbidden to cross the Channel, and his bulls of excommunication
were flunj^ into the sea. But the difficulties at home grew more formid-
able every day. The restraint upon Henry and Edward jarred against
the national feeling of loyalty, and estranged the mass of ICnglishmen
who always side with the weak. Small as the patriotic party among
the barons had always been, it grew smaller as dissensions broke out
over the spoils of victory. The Farl's justice and resolve to secure the
public peace told heavily against him. John Giffard left him because
he refused to allow him to exact ransom from a prisoner contrary to
the agreement made after Lewes. The young Earl Gilbert of Ciloucester,
though enriched with the estates of the foreigners, resented Leicester's
prohibition of a tournament, his naming the wardens of the royal
castles by his own authority, and his holding Edward's fortresses on
the Welsh marches by his own garrisons. Gloucester's later conduct
proves the wisdom of Leicester's precautions. In the spring Parlia-
ment of 1265 he openly charged the Earl with violating the Mise of
Lewes, with tyranny, and with aiming at the crown. Before its close
he withdrew to his own lands in the west, and secretly allied himself
with Roge.- Mortimer and the Marcher barons. Earl Simon soon
followed him to the west, taking with him the King and Edward. He
moved along the Severn, securing its towns, advanced westward to
Hereford, and was marching at the end of June along bad roads into
the heart of South Wales to attack the fortresses of Earl Gilbert in
Glamorgan when Edward suddenly made his escape from Hereford
and joined Gloucester at Ludlow. The moment had been skilfully
chosen, and Edward showed a rare ability in the movements by which
he took advantage of the Earl's position. Moving rapidly along the
Severn he seized Gloucester and the bridges across the river, destroyed
the ships by which Leicester strove to escape across the Channel to
Bristol, and cut him off altogether from England. By this movement
too he placed himself between the Eiarl and his son Simon, who was
advancing from the east to his father's relief. Turning rapidly on this
second force Edward surprised it at Kenilworth and drove it with heavy
loss within the walls of the castle. But the success was more than com-
pensated by the opportunity which his absence gave to the Earl of
breaking the line of the Severn. Taken by surprise and isolated as he
was, Simon had been forced to seek for r d and troops in an avowed
alliance with Llewelyn, and it was witu Welsh reinforcements that he
turned to the east. But the seizure of his ships and of the bridges of

159

Skc. Vll.

TlIK

Kakons*
War

lfl58

T(»

laes

1264

>»

I i !

' 'I

4 '. lit

I [ '■'
111,) ,

ill;

111!

b^n

'. 1 ' !

?■ I

r h

•a

Sit

i6o

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

IV.]

Sec. VII.

The

Karons'

War

1258

1265

Battle of
Evesham

1265

the Severn held him a prisoner in Edward's grasp, and a fierce attack
drove him back, with broken and starving forces, into the Welsh hills.
In utter despair be struck northward to Hereford ; but the absence of
Edward now enabled him on the 2nd of August to throw his troops in
boats across the Severn below Worcester. The news drew Edward
quickly back in a fruitless counter-march to the river, for the Earl had
already reached Evesham by a long night march on the morning of the
4th, while his son, relieved in turn by Edward's counter-march, had
pushed in the same night to the little town of Alcester. The two armies
were now but some ten miles apart, and their junction see;ned secured.
But both were spent with long marching, and while the Earl, listening
reluctantly to the request of the King, who accompanied him, halted at
Evesham for mass and dinner, the army of the younger Simon halted
for the same purpose at Alcester.

" Those two dinners doleful were, alas ! " sings Robert of Gloucester ;
for through the same memorable night Edward was hurrying back from
the Severn by country cross-lanes to seize the fatal gap that lay between
them. As morning broke his army lay across the road that led north-
ward from Evesham to Alcester. Evesham lies in a loop of the river
Avon where it bends to the south ; and a height on which Edward
ranged his troops closed the one outlet from it save across the river.
But a force had been thrown over the river under Mortimer to seize
the bridges, and all retreat was thus finally cut off. The approach of
Edward's army called Simon to the front, and for the moment he took
it for his son's. Though the hope soon died away a touch of soldierly
pride moved him as he recognized in the orderly advance of hir
enemies a proof of his own training. " By the arm of St. James," he
cried, " they come on in wise fashion, but it was from me that they
learnt it." A glance however satisfied him of the hopelessness of a
struggle ; it was impossible for a handful of horsemen with a mob of
half-armed Welshmen to resist the disciplined knighthood of the royal
army. " Let us commend our souls to God," Simon said to the little
group around him, "for our bodies are the foe's." He bade Hugh
Despenser and the rest of his comrades fly from the field. " If he
died," was the noble answer, " they had no will to live." In three hours
the butchery was over. The Wels'i fled at the first onset like sheep,
and were cut ruthlessly down in the cornfields and gardens where they
sought refuge. The little group of knights around Simon fought
desperately, falling one by one till the Earl was left alone. So terrible
were his sword-strokes that he had all but gained the hill-top when a
lance-thrust brought his horse to the ground, but Simon still rejected
the summons to yield, till a blow from behind felled him, mortally
wounded, to the ground. Then with a last cry of " It is God's grace"
the soul of the great patriot passed away.

brise" of
sogion," ar
Chronicle
and Warrin
affords a ge
by Lady CI
Mr. Matth(
Welsh Foe
mentioned a

While
England b
brought int
Wales.

To all ou

utterly barl

civilization

from the gej

sunk into a

the milk of

retaining no

by ruthless f

But in the h

poetic fire v

Aneurin anc

hour of its

broken by a

forth, not fr

" In every hi

arrived in th(

maidens and

race found a:

developemen

Romance tor

IV.]

THE THREE EDWARDS.

i6i

CHAPTER IV.

THE THREE EDWARDS.

1265— 1360.

Section I.— The Conquest of VTales, lfl65— 1284>.

^Authorities. — For the general state of Wales, see the '* Itinerarium Cam-
briae " of Giraldus Cambrensis : for its general history, the " Brut-y-Tywy-
sogion," and " Annales Cambrije," published by the Master of the Rolls ; the
Chronicle of Caradoc of Lancarvan, as given in the translation by Powel ;
and Warrington's ** History of Wales." Stephen's " Literature of the Cymry "
affords a general view of Welsh poetry ; the ' * M'Vuinogion " have been published
by Lady Charlotte Guest. In his essays on " The Study of Celtic Literature,"
Mr. Matthew Arnold has admirably illustrated the characteristics of the
Welsh Poetry, For English affairs the monastic annals we have befove
mentioned are supplemented by the jejune entries of Trivet and Murimuth.]

While literature and science after a brief outburst were crushed in
England by the turmoil of the Barons' War, a poetic revival had
brought into sharp contrast the social and intellectual condition of
Wales.

To all outer seeming Wales had in the thirteenth century become
utterly barbarous. Stripped of every vestige of the older Roman
civilization by ages of bitter warfare, of civil strife, of estrangement
from the general culture of Christendom, the unconquered Britons had
sunk into a mass of savage herdsmen, clad in the skins and fed by
the milk of the cattle they tended, faithless, greedy, and revengeful,
retaining no higher political organization than that of the clan, broken
by ruthless feuds, united only in battle or in raid against the stranger.
But in the heart of the wild people there still lingered a spark of the
poetic fire which had nerved it four himdred years before, through
Aneurin and Llywarch Hen, to its struggle with the Saxon. At the
hour of its lowest degradation the silence of Wales was suddenly
broken by a crowd of singers. The song of the twelfth century burst
forth, not from one bax-d or another, but from the nation at large.
'' In every house," sayc the shrewd Gerald de Barri, " strangers who
arrived in the morning were entertained till eventide with the talk of
maidens and the music of the harp." The romantic literature of the
race found an admirable means of utterance in its tongue, as real a
developement of the old Celtic language heard by Caesar as the
Romance tongues are developements of Caesar's Latin, but which at

• ' J

The
Welsh
Litera-
ture

'-\\

l62

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

fCHAK

Shc. I.

The Con-
quest OF

WAi-ES

1265

1884

a far earlier date than any other language of modern Europe had
attained to definite structure and to settled literary form. No other
mediaeval literature shows at its outset the same elaborate and com-
pleted organization as that of the Welsh. But within these settled
forms the C(;ltic fancy plays with a startling freedom. In one of the
later poems Gwion the Little transforms himself into a hare, a
fish, a bird, a grain of wheat ; but he is only the symbol of the
strange shapes in which the Celtic fancy embodies itself in the tales
or " Mabinogion " which reached their highest perfection in the
legends of Arthur. Its gay extravagance flings defiance to all fact,
tradition, probability, and revels in the impossible and unreal. When
Arthur sails into the unknown world; it is in a ship of glass. The
" descent into hell," as a Celtic poet paints it, shakes off the mediaeval
horror with the mediaeval reverence, and the knight who achieves the
quest spends his years of infernal durance in hunting and minstrelsy,
and in converse with fair women. The world of the Mabinogion is a
world of pure phantasy, a new earth of marvels and enchantments, of
dark forests whose silence is broken by the hermit^s bell, and sunny
glades where the light plays on the hero's armour. Each figure as it
moves across the poet's canvas is bright with glancing colour. " The
maiden was clothed in a robe of flame-coloured silk, and about her
neck was a collar of ruddy gold in which were precious emeralds and
rubies. Her head was of brighter gold than the flower of the broom,
her skin was whiter than the foam of the wave, and fairer were her
hands and her fingers than the blossoms of the wood-anemone amidst
the spray of the meadow fountain. The eye of the trained hawk, the
glance of the falcon, was not brighter than hers. Her bosom was
more snowy than the breast of the white swan, her cheek was redder
than the reddest roses." Everywhere there is an Oriental profusion
of gorgeous imagery, but the gorgeousness is seldom oppressive.
The sensibility of the Celtic temper, so quick to perceive beauty, so
eager in its thirst for life, its emotions, its adventures, its sorrows, its
joys, is tempered by a passionate melancholy that expresses its revolt
against the impossible, by an instinct of what is noble, by a sentiment
that discovers the weird charm of nature. Some graceful play of pure
fancy, some tender note of feeling, some magical touch of beauty,
relieves its wildest extravagance. As Kalweh's greyhounds bound
from side to side of their master's steed, they " sport round him like
two sea-swallows." His spear is " swifter than the fall of the dewdrop
from the blade of reed-grass upon the earth when the dew of June is
at the heaviest." A subtle, observant love of nature and natural beauty
takes fresh colour from the passionate human sentiment with which it
is imbued, sentiment which breaks out in Gwalchmai's cry of nature-
love, " I love the birds and their sweet voices in the lulling songs of
the wood," in his watches at night beside the fords "among the

IV. 1

untrodd

mew.

poet hat

own, he

forest b<

white se

and sub

clothed

head wa

theie is

childlikf

like the

in beaut

spray ; 1

cheeks i;

the Fren

refined i

Four wh

fancy re

delight a

It is St

history ii

fanciful s

The old i

freedom,

extravaga

intense fi

new poeti

the long i

Of the

of Britain

two had 1

Dee had

and the ;

British C

sword of

dence of

preserves

of the Bri

weakness

English s

the energ

supremacy

conquest :

between tl

IV. 1

THE THREE EDWARDS.

163

untrodden grass " to hear the nightingale and watch the play of the sea-
mew. Even patriotism takes the same picturesque form ; the Welsh
poet hates the flat and sluggish land of the Saxon ; as he dwells on his
own, he tells of "its sea-coast and its mountains, its towns on the
forest border, its fair landscape, its dales, its waters, and its valleys, its
white sea-mews, its beauteous women." But the song passes swiftly
and subtly into a world of romantic sentiment : " I love its fields
clothed with tender trefoil, I love the marches of Merioneth where my
head was pillowed on a snow-white arm." In the Celtic love of woman
theie is little of the Teutonic depth and earnestness, but in its stead a
childlike spirit of delicate enjoyment, a faint distant flush of passion
like the rose-light of dawn on a snowy mountain peak, a playful delight
in beauty. " White is my love as the apple blossom, as the ocean's
spray ; her face shines like the pearly dew oa Eryri ; the glow of her
cheeks is like the light of sunset." The buoyant and elastic temper of
the French trouvlre was spiritualized in the Welsh singers by a more
refined poetic feeling. " Whoso beheld her was filled with her love.
Four white trefoils sprang up wherever she trod." The touch of pure
fancy removes its object out of the sphere of passion into one of
delight and reverence.

It is strange, as we have said, to pass from the world of actual Welsh
history into such a world as this. But side by side with this wayward,
fanciful stream of poesy and romance ran a torrent of intenser song.
The old spirit of the earlier bards, their joy in battle, their love for
freedom, their hatred of the Saxon, broke out in ode after ode, in songs
extravagant, monotonous, often prosaic, but fused into poetry by the
intense fire of patriotism which glowed within them. The rise of the
new poetic feeling indeed marked the appearance of a new finergy in
the long struggle with the English conqueror.

Of the three Welsh states into which all that remained unconquered
of Britain had been broken bv the victories of Deorham and Chester,
two had long ceased to exist. The country between the Clyde and the
Dee had been gradually absorbed by the conquests of Northumbria
and the growth of the Scot monarchy. West Wales, between the
British Channel and the estuary of the Severn, had yielded to the
sword of Ecgberht. But a fiercer resistance prolonged the indepen-
dence of the great central portion which alone in modern language
preserves the name of Wales. In itself the largest and most powerful
of the British states, it was aided in its struggle against Mercia by the
weakness of its assailant, the youngest and least powerful of the
English states, as well as by the internal warfare which distracted
the energies of the invaders. But Mercia had no sooner risen to
supremacy among the English kingdoms than it took the work of
conquest vigorously in hand. Offa tore from Wales the border land
between the Severn and the Wye ; the raids of his successors carried

M 2

Sec. I.

The Con-
quest OF
Wales

lfl65

lfl84

Ensland
and the
Welsh

' fj

l"^

H '

1 64

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. I.

The Con-
quest OK
Wales

laes

ltt84

1063

The

ponquest

of South

Wales

1094

fire and sword into the heart of the country ; and an acknowledgement
of the Mercian over-lordship was wrested from the Welsh princes. On
the fall of Mercia this passed to the West- Saxon kings. The Laws of
Howel Dda own the payment of a yearly tribute by " the prince of
Aberfifraw " to " the King of London." The weakness of England
during her long struggle with the Danes revived the hopes of British
independence. But with the fall of the Danelaw the Welsh princes
were again brought to submission, and when in the midst of the Con-
fessor's reign the Welsh seized on a quarrel between the houses of
Leofric and Godwine to cross the border and carry their attacks into
England itself, the victories of Harold re-asserted the English sup-
remacy. His light-armed troops disembarking on the coast pene-
trated to the heart of the mountains, and the successors of the
Welsh prince Gruffydd, whose head was the trophy of the campaign,
swore to observe the old fealty and render the old tribute to the
English Crown.

A far more desperate struggle began when the wave of Norman
conquest broke on the Welsh frontier. A chain of great earldoms,
settled by William along the border-land, at once bridled the old
marauding forays. From his county palatine of Chester, Hugh the
Wolf harried Flintshire into a desert ; Robert of Belesme, in his
earldom of Shrewsbury, " slew the Welsn," says a chronicler, " like
sheep, conquered them, enslaved them, and flayed them with nails of
iron." Backed by these greater baronies a horde of lesser adventurers
obtained the royal " licence to make conquest on the Welsh."
Monmouth and Abergavenny were seized and guarded by Norman
castellans ; Bernard of Neufmarch^ won the lordship of Brecknock ;
Roger of Montgomery raised the town and fortress in Powysland
which still preserves his name. A great rising of the whole people in
the days of the second William at last recovered some of this Norman
spoil. The new castle of Montgomery was burned, Brecknock and
Cardigan were cleared of the invaders, and the Welsh poured ravaging
over the English border. Twice the Red King carried his arms
fruitlessly among the mountains, against enemies who took refuge in
their fastnesses till famine and hardship had driven his broken host
into retreat. The wiser policy of Henry the First fell back on his
father's system of gradual conquest, and a new tide of invasion flowed
along the coast, where the land was level and open and accessible
from the sea. The attack was aided by internal strife. Robert
Fitz-Hamo, the lord of Gloucester, was summoned to his aid by a
Welsh chieftain ; and the defeat of Rhys ap Tewdor, the last prince
under whom Southern Wales was united, produced an anarchy which
enabled Robert to land safely on the coast of Glamorgan, to conquer
the country round, and to divide it among his soldiers. A force of
Flemings and Englishmen followed the Earl of Clare as he landed

I v. J

near ^
a "Lit
advent!
where I
war on

It W£

race see

tide of i

province

fire, as v

suddenly

bold for

victory.

received

again He

fastnesse

Gruffydd

arose tha

standard,

from utte

storms of

flight to

English n

Gwalchmi

Abermena

Jorwerth a

independe

men. Th(

whole of t

race, and g

In consolii

assertion c

Jorwerth ai

of the Sax(

by the han

forced the

Snowdon ii

an enemy ii

The chiefta

to join the I

at last drive

before Wale

more united

removed all

to an excon

IV.]

THE THREE EDWARDS.

i6s

near Milford Haven, and pushing back the British inhabitants settled
a " Little England " in the present Pembrokeshire. A few daring
adventurers accompanied the Norman Lord of Kemeys into Cardigan,
where land might be had for the winning by any one who would " wage
war on the Welsh."

It was at this moment, when the utter subjugation of the British
race seemed at hand, that a new outburst of energy rolled back the
tide of invasion and changed the fitful resistance of the separate Welsh
provinces into a national effort to regain independence. A new poetic
fire, as we have seen, sprang into life. Every fight, every hero, had
suddenly its verse. The names of the older bards were revived in
bold forgeries to animate the national resistance and to prophesy
victory. It was in North Wales that the new spirit of patriotism
received its strongest inspiration from this burst of song. Again and
again Henry the Second was driven to retreat from the impregnable
fastnesses where the " Lords of Snowdon," the princes of the house of
Gruffydd ap Conan, claimed supremacy over Wales. Once a cry
arose that the King was slain, Henry of Essex flung down the royal
standard, and the King's desperate efforts could hardly save his army
from utter rout. In a later campaign the invaders were met by
storms of rain, and forced to abandon their baggage in a headlong
flight to Chester. The greatest of the Welsh odes, that known to
English readers in Gray's translation as " The Triumph of Owen," is
Gwalchmai's song of victory over the repulse of an English fleet from
Abermenai. The long reigns of the two Llewelyns, the sons of
Jorwerth and of Gruflfydd, which all but cover the last century of Welsh
independence, seemed destined to realize the hopes of their country-
men. The homage which the first succeeded in extorting from the
whole of the Welsh chieftains placed him openly at the head of his
race, and gave a new character to his struggle with the English King.
In consolidating his authority within his own domains, and in the
assertion of his lordship over the princes of the south, Llewelyn ap
Jorwerth aimed steadily at securing the means of striking off the yoke
of the Saxon. It was in vain that John strove to buy his friendship
by the hand of his daughter Johanna. Fresh raids on the Marches
forced the King to enter Wales ; but though his army reached
Snowdon it fell back like its predecessors, starved and broken before
an enemy it could never reach. A second attack had better success.
The chieftains of South Wales were drawn from their new allegiance
to join the English forces, and Llewelyn, prisoned in his fastnesses, was
at last driven to submit. But the ink of the treaty was hardly dry
before Wales was again on fire ; the common fear of the English once
more united its chieftains, and the war between John and his barons
removed all dread of a new invasion. Absolved from his allegiance
to an excommunicated King, and allied with the barons under Fitz-

Sec. I.

The Con-
quest OF
Walks

ia65

1S84

The
W«lali
reTiral

i -'11

"57

1194-128;

Llewelyn a/

Jonverth

1 1 94- 1 24/;

■

I2II

..£i.

M-

1 66

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

IV.]

Sec. I.

IThe Con-
quest OF
i Wales

laes

' TO

1884

dlbmralyn
ap Jor-
mrerth
and the
Bards

Walter — too glad to enlist in their cause a prince who could hold in
check the nobles of the border country, where the royalist c4use was
strongest — Llewelyn seized his opportunity to reduce Shrewsbury, to
annex Powys, where the English influence had always been powerful,
to clear the royal garrisons from Caermarthen and Cardigan, and to
force even the Flemings of Pembroke to do him homage.

The hopes of Wales rose higher and higher with each triumph of
the Lord of Snowdon. The court of Llewelyn was crowded with
bardic singers. " He pours," sings one of them, " his gold into the
lap of the bard as the ripe fruit falls from the trees." But gold was
hardly needed to wake their enthusiasm. Poet after poet sang of " the
Devastator of England," the " Eagle of men that loves not to lie nor
sleep," "towering above the rest of men with his long red lance,"
his " red helmet of battle crested with a fierce wolf" " The sound
of his coming is like the roar of the wave as it rushes to the shore,
that can neither be stayed nor appeased." Lesser bards strung
together his victories in rough jingle of rime and hounded him on
to the slaughter. " Be of good courage in the slaughter," sings Elidir,
" cling to thy work, destroy England, and plunder its multitudes."
A fierce thirst for blood runs through the abrupt, passionate verses
of the court singers. " Swansea, that tranquil town, was broken in
heaps," bursts out a triumphant poet ; " St. Clears, with its bright
white lands, it is not Saxons who hold it now ! " "In Swansea, the
key of Lloegria, we made widows of all the wives." " The dread Eagle
is wont to lay corpses in rows, and to feast with the leader of wolves
and with hovering ravens glutted with flesh, butchers with keen scent
of carcases." " Better," closes the song, " is the grave than the life of
man who sighs when the horns call him forth to the squares of battle."
But even in bardic verse Llewelyn rises high out of the mere mob of
chieftains who live by rapine, and boast as the Hirlas-horn passes from
hand to hand through the hall that " they take and give no quarter."
" Tender-hearted, wise, witty, ingenious," he was " the great Cassar "
who was to gather beneath his sway the broken fragments of the Celtic
race. Mysterious prophecies, the prophecies of Merlin the Wise,
floated from lip to lip, to nerve Wales to its last struggle with the
invaders. Medrawd and Arthur would appear once more on earth to
fight over again the fatal battle of Camlan. The last conqueror of the
Celtic race, Cadwallon, still lived to combat for his people. The sup-
posed verses of Taliesin expressed the undying hope of a restoration
of the Cymry. " In their hands shall be all the land from Britanny to
Man : . . . a rumour shall arise that the Germans are moving out of
Britain back again *^o their fatherland." Gathered up in the strange
work of Geoffry of Monmouth, these predictions made a deep impres-
sion, not on Wales only, but on its conquerors. It was to meet indeed
the dreams of a yet living Arthur that the grave of the legendary

hero-kin
But neit
in the u
Welsh c
can wit
" may be
but unle;
utterly,
this corn
this peop
Lord th(
they sha
justified
ness and
enabled ;
till the clc
supremac;
triumphs (
whose rav
his conque
in a powe
Throughoi
Even at 1
kingdom o
ment of his
till then s(
allowed the
from the ot
Near, ho
aims, he wa
a new sovei
of his homj
promise of
ruler. The
were to mal
themselves f
of their stru|
the Provisioi
into bondag
danger he di
first flush of
Edward stoc
Marcher lori
corpse of his
to the tomb.

IV.]

THE THRP:K EDWARDS.

167

ter.

hero-king at Glastonbury was found and visited by Henry the Second.
But neither trick nor conquest could shake the firm faith of the Celt
in the ultimate victory of his race. " Think you," said Henry to a
Welsh chieftain who had joined his host, " that your people of rebels
can withstand my army.?" "My people," replied the chieftain, ■
" may be weakened by your might, and even in great part destroyed,
but unless the wrath of God be on the side of its foe it will not perish |
utterly. Nor deem I that other race or other tongue will answer for j
this corner of the world before the Judge of all at the last day save i
this people and tongue of Wales." So ran the popular rime, " Their j
Lord they will praise, their speech they shall keep, their land
they shall lose — except wild Wales." Faith and prophecy seemed
justified by the growing strength of the British people. The weak-
ness and dissensions which characterized the reign of Henry the Third
enabled Llewelyn ap Jorwerth to preserve a practical independence
till the close of his life, when a fresh acknowledgement of the English
supremacy was wrested from him by Archbishop Edmund. But the
triumphs of his arms were renewed by Llewelyn the son of Gruffydd,
whose ravages swept the border to the very gates of Chester, while
his conquest of Glamorgan seemed to bind the whole people together
in a power strong enough to meet any attack from the stranger.
Throughout the Barons' war Llewelyn remained master of Wales.
Even at its close the threa;t of an attack from the now united
kingdom only forced him to submission on a practical acknowledge-
ment of his sovereignty. The chieftain whom the English kings had
till then scrupulously designated as " Prince of Aberfifraw," was now
allowed the title of" Prince of Wales," and his right to receive homage
from the other nobles of his principality was allowed.

Near, however, as Llewelyn seemed to the final realization of his
aims, he was still a vassal of the English crown, and the accession of
a new sovereign to the throne was at once followed by the demand
of his homage. The youth of Edward the First had already given
promise of the high qualities which distinguished him as an English
ruler. The passion for law, the instinct of good government, which
were to make his reign so memorable in our history, had declared
themselves from the first. He had sided with the barons at the outset
of their struggle with Henry ; he had striven to keep his father true to
the Provisions of Oxford. It was only when the Crown seemed falling
into bondage that Edward passed to the royal side ; and when the
danger he dreaded was over he returned to his older attitude. In the
first flush of victory, while the doom of Simon was yet unknown,
Edward stood alone in desiring his captivity against the cry of the
Marcher lords for his death. When all was over he wept over the
corpse of his cousin, Henry de Montfort, and followed the Earl's body
to the tomb. It was from Earl Simon, as the Earl owned with a

Src. I.
The Con-

fJUKST OF

Wales

laes

1284

t '•'

) i\

' .■ ' Mi

Llewelyn
ap Gruffydd
1 246- 1 283

1267

The
Conquest
of Vrales

t ;t

•I;

i68

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

IV.]

Sec. I.
The Con-

QUEST OF

Wales

laes

1884

1267

Death of

Henry Hi.

12^2

1277

1282

proud bitterness ere his death, that Edward had learned the skill in
warfare which distinguished him among the princes of his time. But
he had learned the far nobler lesson of a self-government which lifted
him high above them as a ruler among men. Severing himself from
the brutal triumph of the royalist party, he secured fair terms to the
conquered, and after crushing the last traces of resistance, he won
the adoption by the Crown of the constitutional system of government
for which the barons had fought. So utterly was the land at rest that
he felt free to join a crusade in Palestine. His father's death recalled
him home to meet at once the difficulty of Wales. During two years
Llewelyn rejected the King' s repeated summons to him to perform his
homage, till Edward's patience was exhausted, and the royal army
marched into North Wales. The fabric of Welsh greatness fell at a
single blow ; the chieftains of the south and centre who had so lately
sworn fealty to Llewelyn deserted him to join his English enemies ;
an English fleet reduced Anglesea, and the Prince, cooped up in his
fastnesses, was forced to throw himself on the royal mercy. With
characteristic moderation his conqueror contented himself with adding
to the English dominions the coast-district as far as Conway, and
providing that the title of Prince of Wales should cease at Llewelyn' s
death. A heavy fine which he had incurred was remitted, and Eleanor
the daughter of Simon of Montfort, who had been arrested on her
way to join him as his wife, was wedded to him at the English court.
For four years all was quiet, but the persuasions of his brother David,
who had deserted him in the previous war, and whose desertion had
been rewarded with an English lordship, roused Llewelyn to a fresh
revolt. A prophecy of Merlin had announced that when English
money became round the Prince of Wales should be crowned at
London ; and a new coinage of copper money, coupled with the
prohibition to break the silver penny into halves and quarters, as had
been usual, was supposed to have fulfilled the prediction. In the
campaign which followed the Prince held out in Snowdon with the
stubbornness of despair, and the rout of an English detachment which
had thrown a bridge across the Menai Straits into Anglesea pro-
longed the contest into the winter. Terrible however as were the
sufferings of the English army, Edward's firmness remained unbroken,
and rejecting all proposals of retreat he issued orders for the formation
of a new army at Caermarthen to complete the circle of investment
round Llewelyn. The Prince sallied from his mountain-hold for a
raid upon Radnorshire, and fell in a petty skirmish on the banks of
the Wye. With him died the independence of his race. After six
months of flight his brother David was arrested and sentenced in full
Parliament to a traitor's death. The submission of the lesser chief-
tains was followed by the building of strong castles at Conway and
Caernarvon, and the settlement of English barons on the confiscated

soil.. /
" Statut
justice
the tim
porated
Welsh
bards "
rebellior
hundred

"Modus
state and
Stubbs, ir
the presei
of our pai
"History
prejudiced
can now r
[The se(
with this
authorities

The coi
policy on
reign Edv
the foreig
trated hin
itself W(
to annex
national a
judicature
like his El
of nationa
of Edwan
which we
it from ou:
history of
to the first
these as w
we speak,
learned lik
of Chauce
historian i
national sf
and Cressi

IV,]

THE THREE EDWARDS.

Ij9

soil.. A wiser instinct of government led Edward to introduce by the
"Statute of Wales " English law and the English administration of
justice into Wales. But little came of the attempt ; and it was not till
the time of Henry the Eighth that the country was actually incor-
porated in England. What Edward had really done was to break the
Welsh resistance. His policy of justice (for the " massacre of the |
bards " is a mere fable) accomplished its end, and in spite of two later
rebellions Wales ceased to be any serious danger to England for a
hundred years.

Section II.-The EnsUsh Parliament, 1283—1205.

[Authorities. — The short treatise on the Constitution of Parliament called
" Modus tenendi Parliamenta" may be taken as a fair account of its actual
state and powers in the fourteenth century. It has been reprinted by Dr.
Stubbs, in the invaluable collection of Documents which serves as the base of
the present section. Sir Francis Palgrave has illustrated the remedial side
of our parliamentary institutions with much vigour and picturesqueness in his
•' History of the English Commonwealth," but his conclusions are often hasty and
prejudiced. On all constitutional points from the reign of Edward the First we
can now rely on the judgment and research of Mr. Hallam ('* Middle Ages ").]

[The second volume of Dr. Stubbs's " Constitutional History" which deals
with this period was published after this History was written and the list of
authorities prepared. — Ed.]

The conquest of Wales marked the adoption of a new attitude and
policy on the part of the crown. From the earliest moment of his
reign Edward the First definitely abandoned all dreams of recovering
the foreign dominions which his grandfather had lost. He concen-
trated himself on the consolidation and good government of England
itself. We can only fairly judge his annexation of Wales, or his attempt
to annex Scotland, if we regard them as parts of the same scheme of
national administration to which we owe his final establishment of our
judicature, our legislation, our Parliament. The King's English policy,
like his English name, was the sign of a new epoch. The long period
of national formation had come practically to an end. With the reign
of Edward begins modern England, the constitutional England in
which we live. It is not that any chasm separates our history before
it from our history after it, as the chasm of the Revolution divides the
history of France, for we have traced the rudiments of our constitution
to the first moment of the English settlement in Britain. But it is with
these as with our language. The tongue of yElfred is the very tongue
we speak, but in spite of its identity with modern English it has to be
learned like the tongue of a stranger. On the other hand, the English
of Chaucer is almost as intelligible as our own. In the first the
historian and philologer can study the origin and developement of our
national speech, in the last a school-boy can enjoy the story of Troilus
and Cressida, or listen to the gay chat of the Canterbury Pilgrims. In

Sec. II.

The
English
Parlia-
ment

1283

1285

The New
England

1 1 »•

li :

■'i;

■;>' ■■■ ,

y^^X

lyo

HIbTOKV OF THE ENGLISH PEOrLK.

[chap.

IV. J

Skc. II.
Thk

KNtil.ISIl

Paki.ia-

MKNT

laaa

1895

Judicial
reforms

Tfi€ three

Common

Law Courts

precisely the same way a knowledge of our earliest laws is indispensable
for the right understanding of later legislation, its origin and its
developement, while the principles of our Parliamentary system must
necessarily be studied in the Meetings of Wise Men before the Con-
quest or the Great Council of barons after it. JUit the Parliaments
which Edward gathered at the close of his reign are not merely illus-
trative of the history of later Parliaments, they are absolutely identical
with those which still sit at St. Stephen's ; and a statute of Edward, if
unrepealed, can be pleaded in our courts as formally as a statute of
Victoria. In a word, the long struggle of the constitution for actual
existence has come to an end. The contests which follow are not con-
tests which tell, like those which preceded them, on the actual fabric
of our political institutions ; they are simply stages in the rough dis-
cipline by which England has learned, and is still learning, how best to
use and how wisely to develope the latent powers of its national life, how
to adjust the balance of its social and political forces, and to adapt its
constitutional forms to the varying conditions of the time. From the
reign of Edward, in fact, we are face to face with modern England.
King, Lords, Commons, the Courts of Justice, the forms of public
administration, our local divisions and provincial jurisdictions, the
relations of Church and State, in great measure the framework of
society itself, have all taken the shape which they still essentially
retain.

Much of this great change is doubtless attributable to the general
temper of the age, whose special task and object seemed to be that
of reducing to distinct form the great principles which had sprung into
a new and vigorous life during the century that preceded it. As the
opening of the thirteenth century had been an age of founders, creators,
discoverers, so its close was an age of lawyers ; the most illustrious
men of the time were no longer such as Bacon, or Earl Simon, or
Francis of Assisi, but men such as St. Lewis of France or Alfonso the
Wise, organizers, administrators, framers of laws and institutions. It
was to this class that Edward himself belonged. He had little of
creative genius or political originality in his character, but he possessed
in a high degree the faculty of organization, and his passionate love of
law broke out even in the legal chicanery to which he sometimes
stooped. In the judicial reforms to which so much of his attention
was directed, he showed himself, if not an " English Justinian," at any
rate a clear-sighted man of business, developing, reforming, bringing
into a lasting shape the institutions of his predecessors. One of his
first cares was to complete the judicial reforms begun by Henry II.
The most important court of civil jurisdiction, the Sheriff's or County
Court, remained unchanged, both in the extent of its jurisdiction, and
the character of the Sheriff as a royal officer. But the superior courts
into which the King's Court had since the Great Charter divided itself,

those of
received
importan
of a proC(
lishment
common
the older
of Appea
gradually
judges thi
ordinary
they failed
the royal
Council
ministers,
Crown, for
correction
to repress,
especially <
which defie
with jealou
have been
followed ;
form in the
still exercise
Council. B
courts fell si
•jurisdiction
perhaps orij
charging its
independent
ing the origi
of the powe
especially tl
officials or c
fell within th
respecting tl:
equitable juri
and unbendi
redress in ca
interfered wi
common law
common law
of his powers
accident, or i

IV.]

THE THREE EDWARDS.

171

those of the King's Bench, Exchequer, and Common Pleas, now
received a distinct stafif of judges for each court. Of far greater
importance than this change, which was in effect but the completion
of a process of severance that had long been going on, was the estab-
lishment of an equitable jurisdiction side by side with that of the
common law. In his reform of 1 178 Henry the Second had broken up
the older King's Court, which had till then served as the final Court
of Appeal, by the severance of the purely legal judges who had been
gradually added to it from the general body of his councillors. The
judges thus severed from the Council retained the name and the
ordinary jurisdiction of " the King's Court," while all cases in which
they failed to do justice were reserved for the special cognizance of
the royal Council itself. To this final jurisdiction of the King in
Council Edward gave a wide developement. His assembly of the
ministers, the higher permanent officials, and the law officers of the
Crown, for the first time reserved to itself in its judicial capacity the
correction of all breaches of the law which the lower courts had failed
to repress, whether from weakness, partiality, or corruption, and
especially of those lawless outbreaks of the more powerful baronage
which defied the common authority of the judges. Though regarded
with jealousy by Parliament, the jurisdiction of the Council seems to
have been steadily put in force through the two centuries which
followed ; in the reignof Henry the Seventh it took legal and statutory
form in the shape of the Court of Star Chamber, and its powers are
still exercised in our own day by the Judicial Committee of the Privy
Council. But the same duty of the Crown to do justice where its
courts fell short of giving due redress for wrong expressed itself in the
•jurisdiction of the Chancellor. This great officer of State, who had
perhaps originally acted only as President of the Council when dis-
charging its judicial functions, acquired at a very early date an
independent judicial position of the same nature. It is by remember-
ing the origin of the Court of Chancery that we unuorstand the nature
of the powers it gradually acquired. All grievances of the subject,
especially those which sprang from the misconduct of government
officials or of powerful oppressors, fell within its cognizance, as they
fell within that of the Royal Council, and to these were added disputes
respecting the wardship of infants, dower, rent-charges, or tithes. Its
equitable jurisdiction sprang from the defective nature and the technical
and unbending rules of the common law. As the Council had given
redress in cases where law became injustice, so the Court of Chancery
interfered without regard to the rules of procedure adopted by the
common law courts, on the petition of a party for whose grievance the
common law provided no adequate remedy. An analogous extension
of his powers enabled the Chancellor to afford relief in cases of fraud,
accident, or abuse of trust, aad this side of his jurisdiction was largely

Skc. II.

Thk

Kncmsii
I'aki.ia-

MKNT
TO

1895

: ^i\

The King
in Council

The Court
ofChancay

.W;

I \

') s

> j

172

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. II.

Thk

English
Parlia-
ment

IflSS

1295

Edward's

leclsla-

flon

1279

12J;

1285

Justices of

the Peace

1285

extended at a later time through the results of legislation < \ the tenure
of land by ecclesiastical bodies. The separate powers of the Chan-
cellor, whatever was the original date at which they were first
exercised, seem to have been thoroughly established under Edward
the First.

In legislation, as in his judicial reforms, Edward renewed and con-
solidated the principles which had been already brought into practical
working by Henry the Second. Significant acts announced his deter-
mination to carry out Henry's policy of limiting the independent
jurisdiction of the Church. He was resolute to force it to become
thoroughly national by bearing its due part of the common national
burthens, and to break its growing dependence upon Rome. The
defiant resistance of the ecclesiastical body was answered in an
emphatic way. By falling into the " dead hand " or " mortmain " of the
Church land ceased to render its feudal services ; and the Statute " of
Mortmain" nowforbade the alienation of land to religious bodies in such
wise that it should cease to render its due service to the King. The
restriction was probably no beneficial one to the country at large, for
Churchmen were the best landlords, and it was soon evaded by the
ingenuity of the clerical lawyers ; but it marked the growing jealousy
of any attempt to set aside what was national from serving the general
need and profit of the nation. Its immediate effect was to stir the
clergy to a bitter resentment. But Edward remained firm, and when
the bishops proposed to restrict the royal courts from dealing with cases
of patronage or causes which touched the chattels of Churchmen he met
their proposals by an instant prohibition. His care for the trading
classes was seen in the Statute of Merchants, which provided for the
registration of the debts of traders, and for their recovery by distraint
of the debtor's goods and the imprisonment of his person. The
Statute of Winchester, the greatest of Edward's measures for the
enforcement of public order, revived and reorganized the old institu-
tions of national police and national defence. It regulated the action
of the hundred, the duty of watch and ward, and the gathering of the
fyrd or militia of the realm as Henry the Second had moulded it into
fonn in his Assize of Arms. Every man was bound to hold himself
in readiness, duly armed, for the King's service in case of invasion or
revolt, or to pursue felons when hue and cry were raised after them.
Every district was made responsible for crimes committed within its
bounds ; the gates of each town were required to be closed at night-
fall, and all strangers to give an account of themselves to its magi-
strates. As a security for travellers against sudden attacks from robbers,
all brushwood was to be destroyed for a space of two hundred feet on
either side the public highway, a provision which illustrates at once
the social and physical condition of the country at the time. To
enforce the observance of this act knights were appointed in every shire

IV.]

under th(

conveniei

their pow

still retai

common I3

legislative

in the co

diminishii

of the mo

the natioi

desire to

received

services t(

the baron;

which the)

the feudal

or of relie

the estate

passing int

was to chc

the sub-ten

of the supc

ing the trai

compelled 1

to dischargi

was now e

" tenant-rig

However sr

directly of \

grew steadi:

It is to th

ship of Edv

Meeting of

of the Ban

The first th(

at an early \

with the of

was made ii

Great Coun

who held di

character as

merge in th(

But though

assembly ws

Men " it sar

[chap.

tenure
Chan-
e first
dward

d con-
actical
, deter-
endent
)ecome
ational
The
in an
"of the
ute " of
in such
r. The
rge, for
by the
ealousy
general
stir the
id when
th cases
he met
trading
for the
istraint
The
for the
institu-
action
of the
it into
[himself
sion or
them.
Ithin its
night-
magi-
ibbers,
ifeet on
it once
ie. To
shire

IV.]

THE THREE EDWARDS.

under the name of Conservators of the Peace, a name which, as the
convenience of these local magistrates was more sensibly felt and
their powers more largely extended, was changed for that which they
still retain of "Justices of the Peace." The great measure which is
commonly known as the Statute " Quia ICmptorcs " is one of those
legislative efforts which mark the progress of a wide social revolution
in the country at large. The number of the greater barons was
diminishing every day, while the number of the country gentry and
of the more substantial yeomanry was increasing with the increase of
the national wealth. This increase showed itself in the growing
desire to become proprietors of land. Tenants of the greater barons
received under-tenants on condition of their rendering them similar
services to those which they themselves rendered to their lords ; and
the baronage, vvhile duly receiving the services in compensation for
which they had originally granted their lands in fee, saw with jealousy
the feudal profits of these new under-tenants, the profits of wardship
or of reliefs and the like, in a word the whole increase in the value of
ihe estate consequent on its subdivision and higher cultivation,
passing into other hands than their own. The purpose of the statute
was to check this process by providing that in any case of alienation
the sub-tenant should henceforth hold, not of the tenant, but directly
of the superior lord. But its result was to promote instead of hinder-
ing the transfer and subdivision of land. The tenant who was before
compelled to retain in any case so much of the estate as enabled him
to discharge his feudal services to the over-lord of whom he held it,
was now enabled by a process analogous to the modern sale of
"tenant-right," to transfer both land and services to new holders.
However small the estates thus created might be, the bulk were held
directly of the Crown ; and this class of lesser gentry and freeholders
grew steadily from this time in numbers and importance. •

It is to the same social revolution as well as to the large statesman-
ship of Edward the First that we owe our Parliament. Neither the
Meeting of the Wise Men before the Conquest, nor the Great Council
of the Barons after it, had been in any way representative bodies.
The first theoretically included all free holders of land, but it shrank
at an early time into a gathering of earls, higher nobles, and bishops,
with the officers and thegns of the royal household. Little change
was made in the composition of this assembly by the Conquest, for the
Great Council of the Norman kings was held to include all tenants
who held directly of the Crown, the bishops and greater abbots (whose
character as independent spiritual members tended more and more to
merge in their position as barons), and the great officers of the Court.
But though its composition remained the same, the character of the
assembly was essentially altered. From a free gathering of " Wise
Men " it sank to a Royal Court of feudal vassals. Its functions seem

173

Sue. II.

Thk

K.Nt.i.isii
Pakuia-

MRNT

lasa

lfl95

1290

1 1

|f!';

The

Great

Council

of the

Realm

71) < :.

.if',

1 •'»•'.'''

I-

■.I

I !!

174

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

fCHAP.

IV.]

Sfc. II.

The
English
Parlia-
ment

1283

laes

to have become almost nominal, and its powers to have been restricted
to the sanctioning, without debate or possibility of refusal, all grants
demanded from it by the Crown. Its " counsel and consent," how-
ever, remained necessary for the legal validity of every great fiscal or
political measure, and its very existence was an effectual protest against
the imperial theories advanced by the lawyers of Henry the Second,
theories which declared all legislative power to reside wholly in the
sovereign. It was in fact under Henry that these assemblies became
more regular, and their functions more importart. The reforms which
marked his reign were issued in the Great Council, and even financial
matters were suffered to be debated there. But it was not till the
grant of the Great Charter that its powers over taxation were formally
recognized, and the principle established that no burthen beyond the
customary feudal aids might be imposed " save by the Common
Council of the Realm." The same great document first expressly
regulated its form. In theory, as we have seen, the assembly con-
sisted of all who leld land directly of the Crown. But the same
causes which restricted attendance at the Witenagemot to the greater
nobles told on the actual composition of the Council of Barons.
While the attendance of the ordinary tenants in chief, the Knights or
" Lesser Barons," was burthensome from its expense to themselves,
their numbers and their dependence on the higher nobles made their
assembly dangerous to the Crown. As early, therefore, as the time of
Henry the First we find a distinction recognized between the " Greater
Barons," of whom the Council was usually composed, and the " Lesser
Barons '" who formed the bulk of the tenants of the Crown. But
though the attendance of the latter had become rare, their right of
attendance remained intact. While enacting that the prelates and
greater barons should be summoned by special writs to each gathering
of the Council, a remarkable provision of the Great Charter orders a
general summons to be issued through the Sheriff to all direct tenants
of the Crown. The provision was probably intended to rouse the
lesser baronage to the exercise of rights which had practically passed
into desuetude, bUt as the clause is omitted in later issues of the
Charter we may doubt whether the principle it embodied ever received
more than a very limited application. There are traces of the
attendance of a few of the lesser knighthood, gentry perhaps of the
neighbourhood where the assembly was held, in some of its meetings
under Henry the Third, but till a late period in the reign of his
successor the Great Council practically remained a gathering of the
greater barons, the prelates, and the officers of the Crown. The
change which the Great Charter had failed to accomplish was now,
however, brought about by the social circumstances of the time. One
of the most remarkable of these was the steady decrease in the number
of the greater nobles. The bulk of the earldoms had already lapsed

to the C

of the g

division

the poor

as to esc

ment wh

see from

earlier C

who act

rapidly c

whose ri}

was as

realm,

wool, we

well as o

noticed t

this reigr

but the s<

century, j

class of n

Charter t(

the delibe

their pres

it as a n

Great Coi

for the Ki

state as t

grant mac

prelates w

or the shi

had to be

of each tc

deacons c

tedious ar

in the late

to obtain i

of these c

The eff

lesser ban

hardly be

it more i;

difficulty

through V

knighthoo

the Shire

ight of

thering

rders a

tenants

Use the

oassed

of the

eceived

of the

eetings

of his

of the

The

s now,

, One

umber

lapsed

IV.]

THE THREE EDWARDS.

to the Crown through the extinction of the families of th^ir possessors ;
of the greater baro.-jies, many had practically ceased to exist by their
division among co-heiresses, many through the constant struggle of
the poorer barons to rid themselves of their rank by a disclaimer, so
as to escape the bu then of higher taxation and attendance in Parlia-
ment which it invol^ ed. How far this diminution had gone we may
see from the fact thut hardly more than a hundred barons sal, in the
earlier Councils of Edward's reign. But while the number of those
who actually possessed the privilege of assisting in Parliament A^as
rapidly diminishing, the numbers and wealth of the " lesser baronage,"
whose right of attendance had become a mere constitutional tradition,
was as rapidly increasing. The long peace and prosperity of the
realm, the extension of its commerce, and the increased export of
wool, were swelling the ranks and incomes of the country gentry as
well as of the freeholders and substantial yeomanry. We have already
noticed the growing passion for the possession of land which makes
this reign so critical a moment in the history of the English freeholder ;
but the same tendency had to some extent existed in the preceding
century, and it was a consciousness of the growing importance of this
class of rural proprietors which induced the barons at the time of the
Charter to make their fruitless attempt to induce them to take part in
the deliberations of the Great Council. But while the barons desired
their presence as an aid against the Crown, the Crown itself desired
it as a means of rendering taxation more efficient. So long as the
Great Coi'ncil remained a mere assembly ofmagnatesit was necessary
for the King's ministers to treat separately with the other orders of the
state as to the amount and assessment of their contributions. The
grant made in the Great Council was binding only on the barons and
prelates who made it ; but before the aids of the boroughs, the Church,
or the shires could reach the rr yal treasury, a separate negotiation
had to be conducted by the officers of the Exchequer with the reeves
of each town, the sheriff and s^hire-court of each county, and the arch-
deacons of each diocese. Bargains of this sort would be the more
tedious and disappointing as the necessities of the Crown increased
in the later years of Edward, anu it became a matter of fiscal expediency
to obtain the sanction of any proposed taxation through the presence
of these classes in the Great Council itself.

The effort, however, to re\'ive the old personal attendance of the
lesser baronage, which had broken down half a century before, could
hardly be renewed at a time when the increase of their numbers made
it more impracticable than ever ; but a means of escape from this
difficulty was fortunately suggested by the very nature of the court
through which alone a summons could be addressed to the landed
knighthood. Amidst the many judicial reforms of Henry or Edward
the Shire Court remained unchanged. The haunted mound or the

175

Sfc. II.

The
Enc.i.ish
Pakma-

MENT

1283

1295

iVi'i

KniffhtB
of the
Shire

f- ^4,,

')* w

176

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.
The

r-NULISH

Parlia-
ment

1283

1295

immemorial oak round > vhich the assembly gathered (for the court was
often held in the open air) were the relics of a time before the free
kingdom had sunk into a shire, cind its folk-moot into a County-
Court. But save that the King's reeve had taken the place of the
King, and that the Norman legislation had displaced the Bishop and
set four Coroners by the Sheriff's side, the gathering of the free-
holders remained much as of old. The local knighthood, the
yeomanry, the husbandmen of the county, were all represented in
the crowd that gathered round the Sheriff, as, guarded by his liveried
followers, he published the King's writs, announced his demand of aids,
received the presentment of criminals and the inquest of the local
jurors, assessed the taxation of each district, or listened solemnly to
appeals for justice, civil and criminal, from all who held themselves
oppressed in the lesser courts of the hundred or the soke. It was in
the County Court alone that the Sheriff could legally summon the
lesser baronage to attend the Great Council, and it was in the actual
constitution of this assembly that the Crown found a solution of the
difficulty which we have already stated. For the principle of repre-
sentation by which it was finally solved was coeval with the Shire
Court itself In all cases of civil or criminal justice the twelve sworn
assessors of the Sheriff, as members of a class, though not formally
deputed for that purpose, practically represented the judicial opinion
of the county at large. From every hundred came groups of twelve
sworn deputies, the "jurors," through whom the presentments of the
district were made to the royal officer, and with whom the assess-
ment of its share in the general taxation was arranged. The husband-
men on the outskirts of the crowd, clad in the brown smock frock
which still lingers in the garb of our carters and ploughmen, were
broken up into little knots of five, a reeve and four assistants, who
formed the representatives of the rural townships. If, in fact, we
regard the Shire Courts as lineally the descendants of our earliest
English folk-moots, we may justly claim the principle of parliamentary
representation as among the oldest of our institutions. But it was only
slowly and tentatively that this principle was applied to the recon-
stitution of the Great Council. As early as the close of John's reign
there are indications of the approaching change in the summons of
"four discreet knights'^ from every county. Fresh need of local
support was felt by both parties in the conflict of the succeeding reign,
and Henry and his barons alike summoned knights from each shire
" to meet on the common business of the realm." It was no doubt
with the same purpose that the writs of Earl Simon ordered the
choice of knights in each shire for his famous parliament of 1265.
Something like a continuous attendance may be dated from the
accession of Edward, but it was long before the knights were regarded
as more than local deputies for the assessment of taxation, or admitted

IV.]

to a sh{

" Quia

who ha

deliberz

tinuous

far grea

place tl

large.

we have

alone th

sity of

restrictic

was com

distingui

lesser ba

we find

baronage

whole bo

governme

The fii

revolutior

from the b

have seen

or share i]

the burges

of their v*

the natior

from all ]

original 1<

up, by whj

other wore

sum paid

magistrate

King legal

levying a c

name of "

necessities

appropriati

than legal ]

assuming a

rity from tl:

refuse inde(

by the royj

privileges b

aids," howe

larliest

;ntary

[s only

•econ-

reign
ms of

local
jreign,

shire
Idoubt
Id the

1265.
the
larded
liitted

IV.]

THE THREE EDWARDS.

to a share in the general business of the Great Council. The statute
" Quia Emptores," for instance, was passed in it before the knights
who had been summoned could attend. Their participation in the
deliberative power of Parliament, as well as their regular and con-
tinuous attendance, dates only from the Parliament of 1295. But a
far greater constitutional change in their position had already taken
place through the extension of electoral rights to the freeholders at
large. The one class entitled to a seat in the Great Council wasj as
we have seen, that of the lesser baronage ; and of the lesser baronage
alone the knights were in theory the representatives. But the neces-
sity of holding their election in the County Court rendered any
restriction of the electoral body physically impossible. The court
was composed of the whole body of freeholders, and no sheriff could
distinguish the " aye, aye " of the yeoman from the " aye, aye " of the
lesser baron. From the first moment therefore of their attendance
we find the knights regarded not as mere representatives of the
baronage, but as knights of the shire, and by this silent revolution the
whole body of the rural freeholders were admitted to a share in the
government of the realm.

The financial difficulties of the Crown led to a far more radical
revolution in the admission into the Great Council of representatives
from the boroughs. The presence of knights from each shire was, as we
have seen, the recognition of an older right, but no right of attendance
or share in the national " counsel and consent " could be pleaded for
the burgesses of the towns. On the other hand, the rapid developement
of their wealth made them every day more important as elements in
the national taxation. The towns had long since freed themselves
from all payment of the dues or fines exacted by the King, ^s the
original lord of the soil on which they had in most cases grown
up, by what was called the purchase of the " farm of the borough " ; in
other words, by the commutation of these uncertain dues for a fixed
sum paid annually to the Crown, and apportioned by their own
magistrates among the general body of the burghers. All that the
King legally retained was the right enjoyed by every great proprietor of
levying a corresponding taxation on his tenants in demesne under the
name of " a free aid," whenever a grant was made for the national
necessities by the barons of the Great Council. But the temptation of
appropriating the growing wealth of the mercantile class proved stronger
than legal restrictions, and we find both Henry the Third and his son
assuming a right of imposing taxes at pleasure and without any autho-
rity from the Council even over London itself. The burgesses could
refuse indeed the invitation to contribute to the " free aid " demanded
by the royal officers, but the suspension of their markets or trading
privileges brought them in the end to submission. Each of these " free
aids," however, had to be extorted after a long wrangle between the

177

Sec. H.

The
English
Parlia-

MFNT

1283

1295

■ J

' i

f ^

[ t

': : • (

1 i

[ >m

Repre-
sentation

of
Boroughs

•fi\

> 1

! ii

I ■*

t -

1)1

■■i]

) il

^^r

178

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.

The

English
Parlia-
ment

lasa

1295

]! i

borough and the officers of the Exchequer ; and if the towns were
driven to comply with whai they considered an extortion, they could
generally force the Crown by evasions and delays to a compromise and
abatement of its original demands. The same financial reasons, there-
fore, existed for desiring the presence of their representatives in the
Great Council as existed in the case of the shires; but it was the genius of
Earl Simon which first broke through the older constitutional tradition,
and dared to summon two burgesses from each town to the Parliament of
1 265. Time had, indeed, to pass before the large and statesmanlike con-
ception of the great patriot could meet with full acceptance. Through
the earlier part of Edward's reign we find a few instances of the presence
of representatives from the towns, but their scanty numbers and the
irregularity of their attendance show that they were summoned rather
to afford financial information to the Great Council than as repre-
sentatives in it of an Estate of the Realm. But every year pleaded
stronger and stronger for their inclusion, and in the Parliament of 1 295
that of 1265 found itself at last reproduced. " It was from me that he
learnt it," Earl Simon had cried, as he recognized ♦he military skill
of Edward's onset at Evesham ; "It was from me that he learnt it,"
his spirit might have exclaimed, as he saw the King gathering at last
two burgesses " from every city, borough, and leading town " within
his realm to sit side by side with the knights, nobles, and barons of
the Great Council. To the Crown the change was from the first an
advpiitageous one. The grants of subsidies by the burgesses in
Parliament proved more profitable than the previous extortions of the
Excnequer. The proportion of their grant generally exceeded that of
the other estates by a tenth. Their representatives too proved far more
compliant with the royal will than the barons or knights of the shire ;
only on one occasion du ing Edward's reign did the burgesses waver
from their general support of the Crown. It was easy indeed to con-
trol them, for the selection of boroughs to be represented remained
wholly in the King's hands, and their numbers could be increased or
diminished at the King's pleasure. The determination was left to the
sheriff, and a^ a hint from the royal Council a sheriff of Wilts would cut
down the number of represented boroughs in his shire from eleven to
three, or a sheriff of Bucks declare he could find but a single borough,
that of Wycomb, within the bounds of the county. Nor was this
exercise of the prerogative hampered by any anxiety on the part of
the towns to claim representative privileges. It was difficult to suspect
that a power before which the Crown would have to bow lay in the
ranks of soberly clad traders, summoned only to assess the contri-
butions of their boroughs, and whose attendance was as difficult to
secure as it seemed burthensome to themselves and the towns who
sent them. The mass of citizens took little or no part in their choice,
for 'hey were elected in the county court by a few of the principal

IV.]

burgl

thet)

paid

borou

no rei

troubJ

the P

a sin^

time :

the Si

any be

Nor w

their h

trader

journej

ensure

which '

horses ;

in Pari]

represe:

the Par

widenec

borough

practica

in a con

a changi

summon

admittec

orders o

The a

assembly

tion. Tl

of the R(

itself repi

legislatioi

all essent

from that

this assen

St. Stephe

from the

orders am

later time.

lay in the

nientary s

especially

AP.

^ere
Duld
and
lere-
i the
us of
Ltion,
jntof
scon-
rough
sence
d the
rather
reprc-
icaded

►f 1295
hat he
y skill
rnt it,"
at last
within
rons of
1 first an
sses in
of the
that of
ar more
shire ;
s waver
to con-
mained
ased or
;t to the
luld cut
leven to
jorough,
as this
part of
suspect
in the
contri-
icult to
■ns who
choice,
rincipal

IV.]

THE THREE EDWARDS.

burghers deputed for the purpose ; but the cost of their maintenance,
the two shillings a day paid to the burgess by his town, as four were
paid to the knight by his county, was a burthen from which the
boroughs made desperate efforts to escape. Some persisted in making
no return to the sheriff. Some bought charters of exemption from the
troublesome privilege. Of the 165 who were summoned by Edward
the First more than a third ceased to send representatives after
a single compliance with ♦he royal summons. During the whole
time from the reign of Edward the Third to the reign of Henry
the Sixth the sheriff of Lancashire declined to return the names of
any boroughs at all within that county, " on account of their poverty."
Nor were the representatives themselves more anxious to appear than
their boroughs to send them. The busy country squire and the thrifty
trader were equally reluctant to undergo \.l*e trouble and expense of a
journey to Westminster. Legal measures were often necessary to
ensure their presence. Writs still exist in abundance such as that by
which Walter le Rous is " held to bail in eight oxen and four cart-
horses to come beforff the King on the day specified " for attendance
in Parliament. But in spite of obstacles such as these the presence of
representatives from the boroughs may be regarded as continuous from
the Parlianicnt of 1295. As the representation of the lesser barons had
widened through a silent change into that of the shire, so that of the
boroughs — restricted in theory to those in royal demesne — seems
practically from Edward's time to have been extended to all who were
in a condition to pay the cost of their representatives' support. By
a. change as silent within the Parliament itself the burgess, originally
summoned to take part only in matters of taxation, was at last
admitted to a full share in the deliberations and authority of the other
orders of the State.

The admission of the burgesses and knights of the shire to the
assembly of 1295 completed the fabric of our representative constitu-
tion. The Great Council of the Barons had become the Parliament
of the Realm, a parliament in which every order of the state found
itself represented, and took part in the grant of supplies, the work of
legislation, and in the end the control of government. But though in
all essential points the character of Parliament has remained the same
from that time to this, there were some remarkable particulars in which
this assembly of 1295 differed widely from the present Parliament at
St. Stephen's. Some 01" these differences, such as those which sprang
from the increased powers and changed relations of the different
orders among themselves, we shall have occasion to consider at a
later time. But a difference of a far more startling kind than these
lay in the presence of the clergy. If there is any part in the Parlia-
mentary scheme of Edward the First which can be regarded as

especially his own, it is his

project

N 2

for the representation of the

The

early

Parlia-

mento

' i V

Representa-
tion of the
Clerg3'

>-iaic

i8o

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.

The

I English
Parlia-
ment

lasa

lfl95

Restriction
I of Parlia-
ment
to IVesl-
minster

Parliament

as Court of

Appeal

ecclesiastical order. The King had twice at least summoned its
"proctors" to Great Councils before 1295, but it was then only that
the complete representation of the Church was definitely organized by
the insertion of a clause in the writ which summoned a bishop to
Parliament requiring the personal attendance of all archdeacons,
deans, or priors of cathedral churches, of a proctor for each cathedral
chapter, and two for the clergy within his diocese. The clause is
repeated in the writs of the present day, but its practical effect was
foiled almost from the first by the resolute opposition of those to
whom it was addressed. What the towns failed in doing the clergy
actually did. Even when forced to comply with the royal summons,
as they seem to have been forced during Edward's reign, they sat
jealously by themselves, and their refusal to vote supplies in any but
their own provincial assemblies, or convocations, of Canterbury and
York left the Crown without a motive for insisting on their continued
attendance. Their presence indeed, though still occasionally granted
on some solemn occasions, became so pure a formality that by the end
of the fifteenth century it had sunk wholly into desuetude. In their
anxiety to preserve their existence as an isolated and privileged order
the clel^gy flung away a power which, had they retained it, would have
ruinously hampered the healthy developement of the state. To take a
single instance, it is difficult to see how the great changes of the
Reformation could have been brought about had a good half of the
House of Commons consisted purely of churchmen, whose numbers
would have been backed by the weight of property as possessors of a
third of the landed estates of the realm. A hardly less important
difference may be found in the gradual restriction of the meetings of
Parliament to Westminster. The names of the early statutes remind
us of its convocation at the most various quarters, at Winchester,
Acton Burnell, or Northampton. It was at a later time that Parlia-
ment became settled in the straggling village which had grown up in
the marshy swamp of the Isle of Thorns, beside the palace whose
embattled pile towered over the Thames and the great minster which
was still rising in Edward's day on the site of the older church of the
Confessor. It is possible that, while contributing greatly to its consti-
tutional importance, this settlement of the Parliament may have helped
to throw into the background its character as a supreme court of
appeal. The proclamation by which it was called together invited " all
who had any grace to demand of the King in Parliament, or any plaint
to make of matters which could not be redressed or determined by
ordinary course of law, or who had been in any way aggrieved by any
of the King's ministers or justices or sheriffs, or their iDailiffs, or any
other oil^icer, or have been unduly assessed, rated, charged, or sur-
charged to aids, subs dies, or taxes," to deliver their petitions to
receivers who sat in the Great Hall of the Palace of Westminster.

IV.]

The f

bably

rise o

the

openii

which

memo

agains

of the

the jing

of his

most in

Scotiae,'

ments o

called V

its latest

inforniat

"Foedei

illustrati

Robertsc

the ages

stated thi

see the ]

essaj on

The p
in the cc
of the hi
latter ha

In his
object of
national
passed a
lost at S(
in her ru
returned
linked hi
to the CO
sentative
of his rig
hension,
unselfish,
self-respe

IV.]

THE THREE EDWARDS.

i8i

hose
hich
the
nsti-
ped
t of
"all
aint
Iby
any
any
sur-
s to
ster.

The petitions were forwardeu Ic ♦he King's Council, and it was pro-
bably the extension of the jurisdiction of that body, and the subsequent
rise of the Court of Chancery, which reduced this ancient right of
the subject to the formal election of " Triers of Petitions " at the
opening of every new Parliament by the House of Lords, a usage
which is still continued. But it must have been owmg to some
memory of the older custom that the subject always looked for redress
against injuries from the Crown or its ministers to the Parliament
of the realm.

Section III.— The Conqnest of Scotland, 1290 -1305.

[Authorities. — Scotland itself has no contemporary chronicles for this period :
the jingling rimes of Blind Harry are two hundred years later than the death
of his hero, Wallace. Those of England are meagre and inaccurate ; the
most important are the "Annates Angliiw et Scotioe" and " Annal^s Regni
Scotiae," Rishanger's Chronicle, his •* Gesta Edwardi Primi," and three frag-
ments of annals (all published in the Rolls Series). The portion of ihe so-
called Walsingham's History which relates to this time is now attributed by
its latest editor, Mr. Riley, to Rishanger's hand. But the main source of our
information lies in the copious collection of state papers preserved in Rymer's
"Foedera," in the "Rotuli Scotiae," and in the "Documents and Records
illustrative of the History of Scotland," edited by Sir F. Palgrave. Mr.
Robertson, in his *' Scotland under her Early Kings," has admirably illustrated
the ages before the quarrel, and Mr. Burton in his History of Scotland has
stated the quarrel itself with great accuracy and fairness. For Edward's side
see the preface of Sir F. Palgrave to the work above, and Mr. Freeman's
essay on "The Relations between the Crowns of England and Scotland,"]

The personal character of Edward the First had borne a large part
in the constitutional changes which we have described, but it becomes
of the highest moment during the war with Scotland which covers the
latter half of his reign.

In his own time, and amongst his own subjects, Edward was the
object of almost boundless admiration. He was in the truest sense a
national King. At the moment when the last trace ot foreign conquest
passed away, when the descendants of tnose who won and those who
lost at Senlac blended for ever into an English people, England saw
in her ruler no stranger, but an Englishman. The national tradition
returned in more than the golden hair or the English name which
linked him to our earlier Kings. Edward's very temper was English
to the core. In good as in evil he stands out as the typical repre-
sentative of the race he ruled, like them wilful and imperious, tenacious
of his rights, indomitable in his pride, dogged, stubborn, slow of appre-
hension, narrow in sympathy, but like them, too, just in the main,
unselfish, laborious, conscientious, haughtily observant of truth and
self-respect, temperate, reverent of duty, religious. He inherited

Sbc. III.

The Con-
quest OF
Scotland

ia»o

1305

Edward
the Firai

1272-130;

! .:.•'

I82

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE'.

[chap.

IV.

Sec. III.
(The Con-

nUEST OK

' Scotland
lfl90

1305

Influ-
ence of
Chivalry

indeed from the Angevins their fierce and passionate wrath ; his
punishments, when he punished in anger, were without pity ; and a
priest who ventured at a moment of storm into his presence with a
remonstrance dropped dead from sheer fright at his feet. But for the
most part his impulses were generous, trustful, averse from cruelty,
prone to forgiveness. " No man ever asked mercy of me," he said in
his old age, " and was refused." The rough soldierly nobleness of his
nature breaks out at Falkirk, where he lay on the bare ground among
his men, or in his refusal during a Welsh campaign to drink of the one
cask of wine which had been saved Yrom marauders: "It is I who
have brought you into this strait," he said to his thirsty fellow-soldiers,
^' and I will have no advantage of you in meat or drink." A strange
tendern'^ss and sensitiveness to affection lay in fact beneath the stern
imperiousness of his outer bearing. Every subject throughout his
realm was drawn closer to the King who wept bitterly at the news of
his father's death, though it gave him a crown ; whose fiercest burst
of vengeance was called out by an insult to his mother ; whose crosses
rose as memorials of his love and sorrow at every spot where his wife's
bier rested. " I loved her tenderly in her lifetime," wrote Edward to
Eleanor's friend, the Abbot of Cluny ; " I do not cease to love her now
she is dead." And as it was with mother and wife, so it was with his
people at large. All the self-concentrated isolation of the earlier
Angevins disappears in Edward. He was the first English king since
the Conquest who loved his people with a personal love, and craved
for their love back again. To his trust in them we owe our Parlia-
ment, to his care for them the great statutes which stand in the
forefront of our laws. Even in his struggles with her England under-
stood a temper which was so perfectly her own, and the quarrels
between King and people duiing his reign are quarrels where, dog-
gedly as they fought, neither disputant doubted for a moment the
worth or affection of the other. Few scenes in our history are more
touching than that which closes the long contest jver the Charter,
when Edward stood face to face with his people in Westminster
Hall, and with a sudden burst of tears owned himself frankly in
the wrong.

But it was just this sensitiveness, this openness to outer impressions
and outer influences, that lei>' to the strange contradictions which meet
us in Edward's career. Under the first king whose temper was dis-
tinctly English a foreign influence told most fatally on our manners,
our literature, our national spirit. The rise of France into a compact
and organized monarchy from the time of Philip Augustus was now
making its influence dominant in Western Europe. The " chivalry "
so familiar in Froissart, that picturesque mimicry of high sentiment,
of heroism, love, and courtesy, before which all depth and reality of
nobleness disappeared to make room for th« coarsest profligacy, the

narrowf
was spc
nature
His life
the tim(
from th
from be
desire v\
had bee
Simon I
Welsh
wrested
charge (
him to n
old age
to empk
general s
as a kni

His fram

of limb, (

Adam Gi

Evesham

opening t

at Challo

frivolous

Kenilwort

the faded

was soon

sentiment

at the roy

Scotland t

fatal influe

in its excli

" Knight ^

massacre

nothing bi

Hardly ]

ence on E

feudality, a

ing custom

such as coi

through Fr

that the im]

this natural

Caesars was

IV.

THE THREE EDWARDS.

183

narrowest caste-spirit, and a brutal indiffere ice to human sufFering,
was specially of French creation. There was a nobleness in Edward's
nature from which the baser influences of this chivalry fell away.
His life was pure, his piety, save when it stooped to the superstition of
the time, manly and sincere, while his high sense of duty saved him
from the frivolous self-indulgence of his successors. But he was far
from being wholly free from the taint of his age. His passionate
desire was to be a model of the fashionable chivalry of his day. He
had been famous from his very youth as a consummate general ; Earl
Simon had admired the skill of his advance at Evesham, and in his
Welsh campaign he had shown a tenacity and force of will which
wrested victory out of the midst of defeat. He could head a furious
charge of horse at Lewes, or organize a commissariat which enabled
him to move army after army across the harried Lowlands. In his
old age he was quick to discover the vak. of the English archery, and
to employ it as a means of victory at Falkirk. But his fame as a
general seemed a small thing to Edward when compared with his fame
as a knight. He shared to the full his people's love of hard fighting.
His frame, indeed, was that of a bom soldier — tall, deep-chested, long
of limb, capable alike of endurance or action. WKen he encountered
Adam Gurdon, a knight of gigantic size and renowned prowess, after
Evesham he forced him single-handed to beg for mercy. At the
opening of his reigu he saved his life by sheer fighting in a tournament
at Challon. It was this love of adventure which lent itself to the
frivolous unreality of the new chivalry. At his "Round Table of
Kenilworth " a hundred lords and ladies, " c'^d all in silk," renewed
the faded glories of Arthur's Court. The fal.'ie air of romance which
was soon to turn the gravest political resolutions into outbursts of
sentimental feeling appeared in his " Vow of the Swan," when rising
at the royal boaid he swore on the dish before him to avenge on
Scotland the murder of Comyn. Chivalry exerted on him a yet more
fatal influence in its narrowing of his sympathy to the noble class, and
in its exclusion of the peasant and the craftsman from all claim to pity.
" Knight without reproach " as he was, he looked calmly on at the
massacre of the burghers of Berwick, and saw in William Wallace
nothing but a common robber.

Hardly less powerful than the French notion of chivalry in its influ-
ence on Edward's mind was the new French conception of kingship,
feudality, and law. The rise of a lawyer class was everywhere harden-
ing customary into written rights, allegiance into subjection, loose ties
such as commendation into a definite vassalage. But it was specially
through French influence, the influence of St. Lewis and his successors,
that the imperial theories of the Roman Law were brought to bear upon
this natural tendency of the time. When the " sacred majesty " of the
Caesars was transferred by a legal fiction to the royal hesid of a feudal

Sec. III.

The Con-
quest OK
Scotland

IflQO

1305

•:■ >.

Influ-
ence of
Legality

t' :;

\ "■:■

■ Mf

-r

i84

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. 111.

The Con-

QUHST OK
SCOTLANU

laeo

T©

1305

Scotland

Saxony

Cutnbn'a

baronage, every constitutional relation was changed. The " defiance"
by which a vassal renounced service to his lord became treason, his
after resistance " sacrilege." That Edward cotild appreciate what was
sound and noble in the legal spirit around him was shown in his
reforms of our judicature and our Parliament ; but there was some-
thing as congenial to his mind in its definiteness, its rigidity, its
narrow technicalities. He was never wilfully unjust, but he was too
often captious in his justice, fond of legal chicanery, prompt to take
advantage of the letter of the law. The high conception of royalty
which he had borrowed from St. Lewis united with this legal turn of
mind in the worst acts of his reign. Of rights or liberties unregistered
in charter or roll Edward would know nothing, while his own good
sense was overpowered by the majesty of his crown. It was incredible
to him that Scotland should revolt against a legal bargain which made
her national independence conditional on the terms extorted from a
claimant of her throne ; nor could he view in any other light but as
treason the resistance of his own baronage to an arbitrary taxation
which their fathers had borne. It is in the very anomalies of such a
character, in its strange union of justice and wrong-doing, of n'^ble-
ness and meanness, that we must look for any fair explanation of
much that has since been bitterly blamed in Edward's conduct and
policy.

Fairly to understand his c;;'arrel with the Scots, we must clear our
minds of the ideas which we now associate with the words " Scotland,"
or the " Scotch people." At the opening of the fourteenth century
the kingdom of the Scots was composed of four districts, each of which
had originally its different people, its different speech, or at least
dialect, and its different history. The first of these was the Lowland
district, at one time called Saxony, and which now bears the name of
Lothian and the Merse (or border land), the space, roughly speaking,
between the Forth and Tweed. We have seen that at the close of the
English conquest of Britain the kingdom of Northumbria stretched
from the Humber to the Firth of Forth, and of this kingdom the
Lowlands formed simply the northern portion. The English conquest
and the English colonization were as complete here as over the rest of
Britain. Rivers and hills indeed retained their Celtic names, but the
" tons " and " hams " scattered over the country told the story of its
Teutonic settlement. Livings and Dodings left their names to Living-
stone and Duddingstone ; Elphinstone, Dolphinstone and Edmundstone
preserved the memory of English Elphins, Dolphins, and Edmunds,
who had raised their homesteads beyond the Teviot and the Tweed.
To the northward and westward of this Northumbrian land lay the
kingdoms of the conquered. Over the "Waste" or "Desert"— the
range of barren moors which stretches from Derbyshire to the Cheviots
- the Briton had sought a refuge in the long strip of coast between the

iv.J

Clyde I
kingclor
directet
doms tc
already
was suff
of Clyde
owned t
it seeme
tribes to
originall
who seen
the coun
entries i
made a ;
greatness
of submis
became I
Abercorn
Bishop of
bria reach
over-lords
victories t
the Tay, a
Nectansm
Picts. Tl]
history of 1
being amo
ever. On
life with it
that follows
north of th(
the hour of
the Pictish
beginning ;
borne a tril
time called
indented co
these Irishr
mountains
lordship of
of the direct
Mac-Alpin,
throne. Fo
selves "Kir

ar our
land,"
mtury
iwhich
least
[wland
Line of
[aking,
of the
tched
11 the
quest
est of
lut the
of its
iving-
stone
lUnds,
weed,
ly the
I'— the
leviots
:n the

IV.]

THE THREE EDWARDS.

Clyde and the Dee which formed the earlier Cumbria. Against this
kingdom the efforts of the Northumbrian rulers had been incessantly
directed ; the victory of Chester had severed it from the Welsh king-
doms to the south ; Lancashire, Westmoreland, and Cumberland were
already subdued by the time of Ecgfrith ; while the fragment which
was suffered to remain unconquered between the Firths of Solway and
of Clyde, and to which the name of Cumbria is in its later use confined,
owned the English supremacy. At the close of the seventh century
it seemed likely that the same supremacy would extend over the Celtic
tribes to the north. The district north of the Clyde and Forth was
originally inhabited chiefly by the Picts, a Latin name for the people
who seem to have called themselves the Cruithne. To these Highlanders
the country south of the Forth was a foreign land, and significant
entries in their rude chronicles tell us how in their forays " the Ficts
made a raid upon Saxony." But during the period of Northumbrian
greatness they had begun to yield at least on their borders some kind
of submission to its kings. Kadwine had built a fort at Dunedin, which
became Edinburgh and looked menacingly across the Forth ; and at
Abercorn beside it was established an English prelate with the title of
Bishop of the Picts. Ecgfrith, in whose hands the power of Northum-
bria reached its highest point, marched across the Forth to change this
over-lordship into a direct dominion, and to bring the series of English
victories to a close. His host poured burning and ravaging across
the Tay, and skirted the base of the Grampians as far as the field of
Nectansmere, where King Bruidi awaited them at the head of the
Picts. The great battle which followed proved a turning-point in the
history of the North ; the invaders were cut to pieces, Ecgfrith himself
being among the slain, and the power of Northumbria was broken for
ever. On the other hand, the kingdom of the Picts started into new
life with its great victory, and pushed its way in the hundred years
that followed westward, eastward, and southward, till the whole country
north of the Forth and the Clyde acknowledged its supremacy. But
the hour of Pictish greatness was marked by the sudden extinction of
the Pictish name. Centuries before, when the English invaders were
beginning to harry the south coast of Britain, a fleet of coracles had
borne a tribe of the Scots, as the inhabitants of Ireland were at that
time called, from the black cliff-walls of Antrim to the rocky and
indented coast of South Argyle. The little kingdom of Scot-land which
these Irishmen founded slumbered in obscurity among the lakes and
mountains to the south of Loch Linnhe, now submitting to the over-
lordship of Northumbria, now to that of the Picts, till the extinction
of the direct Pictish line of sovereigns raised the Scot King, Kenneth
Mac-Alpin, who chanced to be their nearest kinsman, to the vacant
throne. For fifty years these rulers of Scottish blood still call them-
selves " Kings of the Picts ; " but with the opening of the tenth

~i-

I8S

Sk.:. in.
Tmk Con-

()()KSr OK

Scotland

laoo

1305

PuHaml

682

685

Scot-land

\ '!

'I'll

i 'A

If ^'

1 'n

i86

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. in.

Thr Con-

QUKST OK
ScOTLANt)

lfl90

1309

924

Grant of

Strath-clyde

to the Scot

King

Grant of

Northern

Northum-

bria

century the very name passes away, the tribe which had given its
chief to the common throne gives its designation to the common realm,
and " Pict-hind" vanishes from the page of the chronicler or annalist
to make wsiy for the "land of the Scots,"

It was even longer before the change made way among the people
itself, and the real union of the nation with its kings was only effected
by the common suffering of the Danish wars. In the north, as in the
south of Britain, the invasion of the Danes brought about political
unity. Not only were Picts and Scots thoroughly blended into a single
people, but by the annexation of Cumbria and the Lowlands, their
monarchs became rulers of the territory which we now call Scotland.
The annexation was owing to the new policy of the English Kings.
Their aim, after the long struggle of England with the northmen, was
no longer to crush the kingdom across the Forth, but to raise it into a
bulwark against the northmen who were still settled in Caithness and
the Orkneys, and for whose aggressions Scotland was the natural
highway. On the other hand, it was only in English aid that the Scot
Kings could find a support for their throne against these Norse Jarls
of Orkney and Caithness. It was probably this common hostility to
a common foe which brought about the " commendation " by which
the Scots beyond the Forth, with the Welsh of Strath-clyde, chose the
English King, Eadward the Elder, "to father and lord." The choice,
whatever weight after events may have given to it, seems to have
been little more than the renewal of the loose English supremacy
over the tribes of the North which had existed during the times of
Northumbrian greatness ; it certainly implied at the time nothing
save a right on either side to military aid, though the aid then
rendered was necessarily placed in the hands of the stronger party to
the agreement. Such a connexion naturally ceased in the event of
any war between the two contracting parties ; it was in fact by no
means the feudal vassalage of a later time, but rather a military con-
vention. But loose as was the tie which bound the two countries, a
closer tie soon bound the Scot King himself to his English overlord.
Strath-clyde, which, after the defeat of Nectansmere, had shaken off
the English yoke, and which at a later time had owned the supremacy
of the Scots, rose into a temporary independence only to be conquered
by the English Eadmund. By him it was granted to Malcolm of
Scotland on condition that he should become his " fellow- worker "
both by land and sea, and became from that time the appanage of the
eldest son of the Scottish king. At a later time, under Eadgar or Cnut,
the whole of Northern Northumbria, or what we now call the Lothians,
was ceded to the Scottish sovereigns, but whether on the same terms
of f'-idal dependence or on the same loose terms of "commendation"
as ; .eady existed for lands north of the Forth, we have no means
of deciding. The retreat, however, of the bounds of the great

IV.]

English
southward
change in
theory wo
Whatev
relation of
in a very r
realm. Oi
fixing of th
burgh ; ar
surroundec
men. A w
of Malcoli
children we
lives of the
danger gre
fresh multit
Scotch cou
formidable,
they forced
change of p(
threats of tl
again in an
with the Sco
line of much
relations wit]
the ambitiou
head of his r
Henry's brot
court, and fo
organization
marriage witl
into an Eng!
Norman and
nobles from
destined to p
time obtained
modelled on
fresh connexi
ships in Engh
times rendere
the whole Sco
during the r
Henry the Se<
the English C

English bishopric of the North, the see of St. Cuthbcrt, as far
southward as the Pcntland Hills, would seem to imply a j^rcatcr
change in the political character of the ceded district than the first
theory would allow.

Whatever change these cessions may have brought about in the
relation of the Scottish to the English Kings, they certainly affected
in a very marked way their relation both to England and to their own
realm. One result of the acquisition of the Lowlands was the ultimate
fixing of the royal residence in their new southern dominion at Edin-
burgh ; and the English civilization with which they were then
surrounded changed the Scot Kings in all but blood into English-
men. A way soon opened itself to the English crown by the marriage
of Malcolm with Margaret, the sister of Eadgar ^^.theling. Their
children were regarded by a large party within England as representa-
tives of the older royal race and as claimants of the throne, and this
danger grew as William's devastation of the North not only drove
fresh multitudes of Englishmen to settle in the Lowlands, but filled the
Scotch court with English nobles who fled thither for refuge. So
formidable, indeed, became the pretension^ of the Scot Kings, that
they forced the ablest of our Norman sovereigns into a complete
change of policy. The Conqueror and William the Red had met the
threats of the Scot sovereigns by invasions which ended again and
again in an illusory homage ; but the marriage of Henry the First
with the Scottish Matilda not only robbed the claims of the Scottish
line of much of their force, but enabled him to draw it into far closer
relations with the Norman throne. King David not only abandoned
the ambitious dreams of his predecessors to place himself later at the
head of his niece Matilda's party in her contest with Stephen, but as
Henry's brother-in-law he figured as the first noble of the English
court, and found English models and English support in the work of
organization which he attempted within his own dominions. As the
marriage with Margaret had changed Malcolm from a Celtic chieftain
into an English King, so that of Matilda converted David into a
Norman and feudal sovereign. His court was filled with Norman
nobles from the South, such as the Balliols and Bruces who were
destined to play so great a part afterwards but who now for the first
time obtained fiefs in the Scottish realm ; and a feudal jurisprudence
modelled on that of England was introduced into the Lowlands. A
fresh connexion between the countries began with the grant of lord-
ships in England to the Scot Kings or their sons. Homage was some-
times rendered, whether for these lordships, for the Lowlands, or for
the whole Scottish realm, but it was the capture of William the Lion
during the revolt of the English baronage which suggested to
Henry the Second the project of a closer dependence of Scotland on
the English Crown. To gain his freedom, William consented to hold

.Src. III.
Thr Con-

l.X'KST OK
SCMTLAND

laoo

1305

England

and tb«

Scot

Klnva

1069

1 100

David
1 124-1 1 53

1174

( .1*1

v'lJ

.=' ; J

i88

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

IV.]

Sec. III.

THir Con-
quest OK
Scotland

lfl90

1305

1286

1290

The First
Conquest

I 290- I 296

May, 1 29 1

his crown of Henry and his heirs, the prelates and lords of the Scotch
kingdom did homage to Henry as to their direct lord, and a right of
appeal in all Scotch causes was allowed to the superior court of the
English suzerain. From this bondage, however, Scotland was soon
freed by the prodigality of Richard, who allowed her to buy back the
freedom she had forfeited, and from that time the difficulties of the
older claim were evaded by a legal compromise. The Scot Kings
repeatedly did homage to the English sovereign, but with a reservation
of rights which were prudently left unspecified. The English King
accepted the homage on the assumption that it was rendered to him
as overlord of the Scottish realm, and this assumption was neither
granted nor denied. For nearly a hundred years the relations of the
two countries were thus kept peaceful and friendly, and the death of
Alexander the Third seemed destined to remove even the necessity of
protests by a closer union of the two kingdoms. Alexander had
wedded his only daughter to the King of Norway, and after long
negotiation the Scotch Parliament proposed the marriage of her child
Margaret, " the Maid of Norway," with the son of Edward the First.
It was, however, carefully provided in the marriage treaty of I^righam
that Scotland should remain a separate and free kingdom, and that its
laws and customs should be preserved inviolate. No military aid was
to be claimed by the English King, no Scotch appeal to be carried to
an English court. But" this project was abruptly frustrated by the
child's death on her voyage to Scotland, and with the rise of claimant
after claimant of the vacant throne Edward was drawn into far other
relations to the Scottish realm.

Of the thirteen pretenders to the throne of Scotland, only three
could be regarded as serious claimants. Ey the extinction of the line
of William the Lion the right of succession passed to the daughters of
his brother David. The claim of John Balliol, Lord of Galloway,
rested on his descent from the eldest of these ; that of Robert Bruce,
Lord of Annandale, on his descent from the second ; that of John
Hastings, Lord of Abergavenny, on his descent from the third. At
this crisis the Norwegian King, the Primate of St. Andrew's, and
seven of the Scotch Earls, had already appealed to Edward before
Margaret's death ; and the death itself was followed by the consent
bc(th of the claimants and the Council of Regency to refer the question
c/ the succession to his decision in a Parliament at ^^orham. But the
over-lcrdship which the Scots acknowledged was something far less
direct and definite than what Edward claimed at the opening of this
conference. His claim was supported by excerpts from English
monastic chronicles, and by the slow advance of an English army,
while the Scifch lords, taken by surprise, found little help in the delay
which was granted them, and at last, in common with nine of the
claimants themselves, formally admitted Edward's direct suzeramty.

To the n

for like t

in blood,

pensions

gathered

could be i

the Comn

quietly pa

assumed

country as

dispute w

castles de

homage t<

reduced to

Second, bi

to the thro

to be his ri

commissio

were main

the claima

of Balliol

to that of h

The cast

did homage

to him froi

Edward in

his crown.

was far fror

custom a di

tions of a d

to his sove

strict accor

the ordinar

there were (

these. Th<

council of t

to contribul

express acki

but for a ti

pendent jusi

these. It w

that of his

William the

expressly rei

the right of

King

IV.]

THE THREE EDWARDS.

To the nobles, in fact, the concession must have seemed a small one,
for like the principal claimants they were for the most part Norman
in blood, with estates in both countries, and looking for honours and
pensions from the English Court. From the Commons who were
gathered with the nobles at Norham no admission of Edward's claims
could be extorted ; but in Scotland, feudalized as it had been by David,
the Commons were as yet of little weight, and their opposition was
quietly passed by. All the rights of a feudal suzerain were at once
assumed by the English King ; he entered into the possession of the
country as into that of a disputed fief to be held by its over-lord till the
dispute was settled, his peace was sworn throughout the land, its
castles delivered into his charge, while its bishops and nobles swore
homage to him directly as their lord superior. Scotland was thus
reduced to the subjection which she had experienced under Henry the
Second, but the full discussion which followed over the various claims
to the throne showed that, while exacting to the full what he believed
to be his right, Edward desired to do justice to the country itself. The
commissioners whom he named to report on the claims to the throne
were mainly Scotch ; a proposal for the partition of the realm among
the claimants was rejected as contrary to Scotch law ; and the claim
of Balliol as representative of the elder branch was finally preferred
to that of his rivals.

The castles were at once delivered to the new monarch, and Balliol
did homage to Edward with full acknowledgement of the services due
to him from the realm of Scotland. For a time there was peace.
Edward in fact seemed to have no desire to push farther the rights of
his crown. Even allowing that Scotland was a dependent kingdom, it
was far from being an ordinary fief of the English crown. By feudal
custom a distinction had always been held to exist between the rela-
tions of a dependent king to a superior lord and those of a vassal noble
to his sovereign. At Balliol's homage Edward had disclaimed, in
strict accordance with the marriage treaty of Brigham, any right to
the ordinary incidents of a fief, those of wardship or marriage ; but
there were other customs of the realm of Scotland as incontestable as
these. The Scot King had never been held bound to attend the
council of the English baronage, to do service in English warfare, or
to contribute on the part of his Scotch realm to English aids. No
express acknowledgement of these rights had been given by Edward,
but for a time they were practically observed. The claim of inde-
pendent justice was more doubtful, as it was of higher import than
these. It was certain that no appeal from a Scotch King's court to
that of his supposed overlord had been allowed since the days of
William the Lion, and the judicial independence of Scotland had been
expressly reserved in the marriage treaty. But in feudal jurisprudence
ihe right of ultimate appeal was the test of sovereignty. This right

189

Sec. III.

The Con-
quest OF
Scotland

1390

1305

, • 'f:

I -^ i4

1293

I90

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

IV. 3

Sec. III.
The Con.

QUEST OK

Scotland

ia9o

1305

1296

of appeal Edward now determined to enforce, and Balliol at first gave
way. It was alleged, however, that the resentment of his baronage
and people forced him to resist ; and while appearing formally at
Westminster he refused to answer an appeal save by advice of his
Council. He was in fact Looking to France, which, as we shall after-
wards see, was jealously watching Edward's proceedings, and ready
to force him into war. By a new breach of customary law Edward
summoned the Scotch nobles to follow him in arms against this foreign
foe. But the summons was disregarded, and a second and formal
refusal of aid was followed by a secret alliance with France and by a
Papal absolution of Balliol from his oath of fealty.

Edward was still reluctant to begin the war, when all hope of
accommodation was ended by the refusal of Balliol to attend his
Parliament at Newcastle, the rout of a small body of English troops,
and the investment of Carlisle by the Scots. Orders were at once
given for an advance upon Berwick. The taunts of its citizens stung
the King to the quick. " Kynge Edward, waune thou havest Berwick,
pike thee ; waune thou havest geten, dike thee," they shouted from
behind the wooden stockade, which formed the only rampart of the
town. But the stockade was stormed with the loss of a sin'^le knight,
and nearly eight thousand of the citizens were mown down in a ruth-
less carnage, while a handful of Flemish traders who held the town-
ball stoutly against all assailants were burned alive in it. The massacre
only ceased when a procession of priests bore the host to the King's
presence, praying for mercy, and Edward with a sudden and character-
istic burst of tears called off his troops ; but the town was ruined for
ever, and the great merchant city of the North sank from that time
into a petty seaport. At Berwick Edward received Balliol's defiance.
"Has the fool done this folly.?" the King cried in haughty scorn.
" If he will not come to us, we will come to him." The terrible
slaughter, however, had done its work, and his march was a triumphal
progress. Edinburgh, Stirling, and Perth opened their gates, Bruce
joined the English army, and Balliol himself surrendered and passed
without a blow from his throne to an English prison. No further
punishment, however, was exacted from the prostrate realm. Edward
simply treated it as a fief, and declared its forfeiture to be the legal
consequence of Balliol's treason. It lapsed in fact to the overlord,
and its earls, barons, and gentry swore homage in Parliament at
Berwick to Edward, as their king. The sacred stone on which its
older sovereigns had been installed, an oblong block of saudstone,
which legend asserted to have been the pillow of Jacob as angels
ascended and descended upon h'm, was removed from Scone and
placed in Westminster by the shrine of the Confessor. It was enclosed
by Edward's order in a stately seat, which became from that hour the
coronation chair of Eng''sh kings.

Toth
and eas
which 1
governn
of Sum
was free
and pul
injustice
already
and by
fanned t
of feuds
caused b
of the so
The disg
selves to
of the Lc
Northum
supremac
stranger,
their smo
his daring
country a
we know '.
and enorn
the Scotc
national h
right, and
itself to ai
coast distr
of the sam
1297, enca
south, and
Warenne s
leader, " m
Wallace, a
consumma
broad enoi
army had I
at noon wh
pieces in tl
over the b(
a time he a
headed a w
Castle at la

[chap.

it gave
ronage
ally at

of his
I after-
. ready
ildward
foreign

formal
id by a

lope of
;nd his
troops,
at once
IS stung
Jerwick,
zd from
t of the
! knight,
a ruth-
le town-
nassacre
; King's
laracter-
ned for
lat time
efiance.
scorn,
terrible
iumphal
Bruce
passed
further
Edward
le legal
verlord,
nent at
hich its
dstone,
angels

IV.]

THE THREE EDWARDS.

191

Inc

lour

losed

To the King himself the whole business must have seemed another
and easier conquest of Wales, and the mercy and just government
which had followed his first success followed his second also. The
government of the new dependency was entrusted to Warenne, Earl
of Surrey, at the head of an English Council of Regency. Pardon
was freely extended to all who had resisted the invasion, and order
and public peace were rigidly enforced. But both the justice and
injustice of the new rule proved fatal to it ; the wrath of the Scots,
already kindled by the intrusion of English priests into Scotch livings,
and by the grant of lands across the border to English barons, was
fanned to fury by the strict administration of law, and the repression
of feuds and cattle-lifting. The disbanding, too, of troops, which was
caused by the penury of the royal exchequer, united with the licence
of the soldiery who remained to quicken the national sense of wrong.
The disgraceful submission of their leaders brought the people them-
selves to the front. In spite of a hundred years of peace the farmer
of the Lowlands and the artisan of the towns remained stout-hearted
Northumbrian Englishmen ; they had never consented to Edward's
supremacy, and their blood rose against the insolent rule of the
stranger. The genius of an outlaw knight, William Wallace, saw in
their smouldering discontent a hope of freedom for his country, and
his daring raids on outlying parties of the English soldiery roused the
country at last into revolt. Of Wallace himself, of his life or temper,
we know little or nothing ; the very traditions of his gigantic stature
and enormous strength are dim and unhistorical. But the instinct of
the Scotch people has guided it aright in choosing Wallace for its
national hero. He was the first to assert freedom as a national birth-
right, and amidst the despair of nobles and priests to call the people
itself to arms. At the head of an army drawn principally from the
coast districts north of the Tay, which were inhabited by a population
of the same blood as that of the Lowlands, Wallace, in September,
1297, encamped near Stirling, the pass between the north and the
south, and awaited the English advance. The offers of John of
Warenne were scornfully rejected : " We have come," said the Scottish
leader, " not to make peace, but to free our country," The position of
Wallace, a rise of hills behind a loop of Forth, was in fact chosen with
consummate skill. The one bridge which crossed the river was only
broad enough to admit two horsemen abreast ; and though the English
army had been passing from daybreak, only half its force was across
at noon when Wallace closed on it and cut it after a short combat to
pieces in the sight of its comrades. The retreat of the Earl of Surrey
over the border left Wallace head of the country he had freed, and for
a time he acted as " Guardian of the Realm " in Balliol's name, and
headed a wild foray into Northumberland. His reduction of Stirling
Castle at last called Edward to the field. The King, who marched

Sec. III.

The Con-
quest OF
Scotland

1290

1305

The

Second

Conquest

I 297-1 305

;;?;<

i ',i

Battle of

Stirling

Sept. 1297

i/ i

192

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.

The Con-
quest OF
Scotland

laoo

1305

Battle cf

Falkirk

/tdy, 1298

1300

1303

northward with a larger host than had ever followed his banner, was
enabled by treachery to surprise Wallace, as he fell back to avoid an
engagement, and to force him to battle near Falkirk. The Scotch
force consisted almost wholly of foot, and Wallace drew up his spear-
men in four great hollow circles or squares, the outer ranks kneeling,
and the whole supported by bowmen within, while a small force of
horse were drawn up as a reserve in the rear. It was the formation of
Waterloo, the first appearance in our history since the day of Senlac
of " that unconquerable British infantry," before which chivalry was
destined to go down. For a moment it had all Waterloo's success.
" I have brought you to the ring, hop (dance) if you can," are words
of rough humour that reveal the very soul of the patriot leader, and
the serried ranks answered well to his appeal. The Bishop of Durham,
who led the English van, shrank wisely from the look of the squares.
" Back to your mass, Bishop," shouted the reckless knights behind
him, but the body of horse dashed itself vainly on the wall of spears.
Terror spread through the English army, and its Welsh auxiliaries
drew off in a body from the field. But the generalship of Wallace
was met by that of the King. Drawing his bowmen to the front,
Edward riddled the Scottish ranks with arrows, and then hurled his
cavalry afresh on the wavering line. In a moment all was over, and
the maddened knights rode in and out of the broken ranks, slaying
without mercy. Thousands fell on the field, and Wallace himself
escaped with difficulty, followed by a handful of men. But ruined as
the cause of freedom seemed, his work was done. He had roused
Scotland into life, and even a defeat like Falkirk left her unconquered.
Edward remained master only of the ground he stood on ; want of
supplies forced him to retreat ; and in the following year a regency of
Scotch nobles under Bruce and Comyn continued the struggle for
independence. Troubles at home and dangers from abroad stayed
Edward's hand. The barons were pressing more and more vigorously
for redress of their grievances and the heavy taxation brought about
by the war. France was still menacing, and a claim advanced by Pope
Boniface the Eighth, at its suggestion, to the feudal superiority over
Scotland, arrested a fresh advance of the King. A quarrel, however,
which broke out between Philippe le Bel and the Papacy removed all
obstacles, and enabled Edward to defy Boniface and to wring from
France a treaty in which Scotland was abandoned. In 1304 he
resumed the work of invasion, and again the nobles flung down their
arms as he marched to the North. Comyn, at the head of the
Regency, acknowledged his sovereignty, and the surrender of Stirling
completed the conquest of Scotland. The triumph of Edward was
but the prelude to the full execution of his designs for knitting the two
countries together by a clemency and wisdom which reveal the great-
ness of his statesmanship. A general amnesty was extended to all

IV.]

who hac
of Edwj
minster
the grei
placed u
one bio
entruste<
many of
anticipat
Scotland
was sumi
a great
adopted
legis]:i;io
districts,
Highland
two justi(

[Autkori
and "Libei
communal
Stapleton f<
story in Wi
tory" (186'
Leicester w
Charter Ro
English Boi
and Merewi
full and scie
its sides, ist(
of English (

From sc
bloodshed (
of Englanc

Through
been almo;
whole char;
new class <
connection
Wat Tyler,
and the stj
older burg]
national hi

IV.]

THE THREE EDWARDS.

193

was

i^ever,
id all

from
D4 he

their
|f the
[irling
was
|e two

jreat-

to all

who had shared in the revolt. Wallace, who refused to avail himself
of Edward's mercy, was captured, and condemned to death at West-
minster on charges of treason, sacrilege, and robbery. The head of
the great patriot, crowned in mockery with a circlet of laurel, was
placed upon London Bridge. But the execution of Wallace was the
one blot on Edward's clemency. With a masterly boldness he
entrusted the government of the country to a council of Scotch nobles,
many of whom were freshly pardoned for their share in the war, and
anticipated the policy of Cromwell by allotting ten representatives to
Scotland in the Common Parliament of his realm. A Convocation
was summoned at Perth for the election of these representatives, and
a great judicial scheme which was promulgated in this assembly
adopted the amended laws of King David as the base of a new
legisl Lvion, and divided :the country for judicial purposes into four
districts, Lothian, Galloway, the Highlands, and the land between the
Highlands and the Forth, at the head of each of which were placed
two justiciars, the one English and the other Scotch.

Section IV.— The EneUsh Towns.

[Authorities. — For the general history of London see its "Liber Albus"
and "Liber Custumarum," in the series of the Master of the Rolls ; for its
communal revoluticn, the '* Liber de Antiquis Legibus," edited by Mr.
Stapleton for the Camden Society ; for the rising of William Longbeard, the
story in William of Newburgh. In his " Essay on English Municipal His-
tory" (1867), Mr. Thompson has given a useful account of the relations of
Leicester with its Earls. A great store of documents will be found in the
Charter Rolls published by the Record Commission, in Brady's work on
English Boroughs, and (though rather for Parliamentaiy purposes) in Stephen's
and Merewether's " History of Boroughs and Corporations." But the only
full and scientific examination of our early municipal history, at least on ore of
its sides, is to be found in the Essay prefixed by Dr. Brentano to the " Ordinances
of English Gilds," published by the Early English Text Society.]

From scenes such as we have been describing, from the wrong and
bloodshed of foreign conquest, we pass to the peaceful life and progress
of England itself

Through the reign uf the three Edwards two revolutions, which have
been almost ignored by our historians, were silently changing the
whole character of English society. The first of these, the rise of a
new class of tenant-farmers, we shall have to notice hereafter in its
connection with the great agrarian revolt which bears the name of
Wat Tyler. The second, the rise of the craftsmen within our towns,
and the struggle by which they won power and privilege from the
older burghers, is the most remarkable event in the period of our
national history at which we have arrived.

Sec. IV.

Thk

Knglish
Towns

f ;

1 'M

'' t

194

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

IV. J

.Skc. IV.

The

English

Towns

The Early

English

Boroughs

The English borough was originally a mere township or group of
townships whose inhabitants happened, either for purposes of trade or
protection, to cluster together more thickly than elsewhere. It is this
characteristic of our boroughs which separates them at once from the
cities of Italy and Provence, which had preserved the municipal in-
stitutions of their Roman past, from the German towns founded by
Henry the Fowler with the special purpose of sheltering industry from
the feudal oppression around them, or from the communes- of northern
France which sprang into existence in revolt against feudal outrage
within their walls. But in England the tradition of Rome had utterly
passed away, while feudal oppression was held fairly in check by
the Crown. The English town, therefore, was in its beginning simply
a piece of the general country, organized and governed precisely in
the same manner as the townships around it. The burh or borough
was probably a more defensible place than the common village ; it
may have had a ditch or mound about it instead of the quickset-hedge
or "tun" from which the township took its name. But its con-
stitution was simply that of the people at large. The obligations
of the dwellers within its bounds were those of the townships
round, to keep fence and trench in good repair, to send a con-
tingent to the fyrd, and a reeve and four men to the hundred court
and shire court ; and the inner rule of the borough lay as in the
townships about in the hands of its own freemen, gathered in "borough-
moot " or " portmannimote.'' But the social change brought about by
the Danish wars, the legal requirement that each man should have a
lord, affected the towns, as it affected the rest of the country. Some
passed into the hands of great thegns near to them ; the bulk became
known as in the demesne of the king. A new officer, the lord's or
king's reeve, was a sign of this revolution. It was the reeve who now
summoned the borough-moot and administered justice in it ; it was he
who collected the lord's dues or annual rent of the town, and who
exacted the services it owed to its lord. To modern eyes these
services would imply almost complete subjection. When Leicester,
for instance, passed from the hands of the Conqueror into those of its
Earls, its townsmen were bound to reap t/ieir lord's corn-crops, to
grind at his mill, to redeem their strayed cattle from his pound. The
great forest around was the Earl's, and it was only out of his grace
that the little borough could drive its swine into the woods or pasture
its cattle in the glades. The justice and government of th'i town lay
'"holly in its master's hands ; he appointed its bailiffs, received the
fines and forfeitures of his tenanis, and the fees and tolls of their
markets and fairs. But when once these dues were paid and thes".
services rendered the English townsman was practically free. His
rights were as rigidly defined by custom as those of his lord. Property
and person alike were secured against arbitrary seizure. He could

demand
by his n
assent o
town tov
could ex
affairs
buted tl
looked
much th
these rig
widening
history o
progress
privilege
lord of tl
thriftless
sovereigr
about an
their ma;
gave the
times a c
Leicester
English t
which ha(
by battle,
men, NicI
waged a (
had arisei
hour, eacl
other till ]
pit, and v
of the pit,
clamour a
sitting arc
castle, an(
and answ(
certain pii
little pit, ;
the other
made a cc
yearly for
tion that 1
in Leicest
and decid
niost part

IV. J

THE THREE EDWARDS.

195

is, to
The

demand a fair trial on any charge, and even if justice was administered
by his master's reeve it was administered in the presence and with the
assent of his fellow-townsmen. The bell which sv/ung out from the
town tower gathered the burgesses to a common meeting, where they
could exercise rights of free speech and free deliberation on their own
affairs. Their merchant-gild over its ale-feast regulated trade, distri-
buted the sums due from the town among the different burgesses,
looked to the due repairs of gate and wall, and acted, in fact, pretty
much the same part as a town-council of to-day. Not only, too, were
these rights secured by custom from the first, but they were constantly
widening as time went on. Whenever we get a glimpse of the inner
history of an English town, we find the same peaceful revolution in
progress, services disappearing through disuse or omission, while
privileges and immunities are being purchased in hard cash. The
lord of the town, whether he were king, baron, or abbot, was commonly
thriftless or poor, and the capture of a noble, or the campaign of a
sovereign, or the building of some new minster by a prior, brought
about an appeal to the thrifty burghers, who were ready to fill again
their master's treasury at the price of the strip of parchment which
gave them freedom of trade, of justice, and of government. Some-
times a chanric story lights up for us this work of emancipation. At
Leicester one of the chief aims of its burgesses was to regain their old
English trial by compurgation, the rough predecessor of trial by jury,
which had been abolished by the Earls in favour of the foreign trial
by battle. " It chanced," says a charter of the place, " that two kins-
men, Nicholas the son of Aeon, and Geoffrey the son of Nicholas,
waged a duel about a certain piece of land, concerning which a dispute
had arisen between them ; and they fought from the first to the ninth
hour, each conquering by turns. Then one of them fleeing from the
other till he came to a certain little pit, as he stood on the brink of the
pit, and was about to fall therein, his kinsman said to him * Take care
of the pit, turn back lest thou shouldest fall into it.' Thereat so much
clamour and noise was made by the bystanders and those who were
sitting around, that the Earl heiird these clamours as far off as the
castle, and he inquired of some how it was there was such a clamour,
and answer was made to him that two kinsmen were fighting about a
certain piece of ground, and that one had lied till he reached a certain
little pit, and that as he stood over the pit and was about to fall into it
the other warned him. Then the townsmen being moved with pity
made a covenant with the Earl that they should give him threepence
yearly for each house in the High Street that had a gable, on condi-
tion that he should grant to them that the twenty-four jurors who were
in Leicester from ancient Hmes should from that time forwiird discuss
and decide all pleas they might have among them'elves." For the
niost part the liberties of our towns were bought in this way, by sheer

o 1

Sec. IV.

The

Kn(;lisii
Towns

p'-m

190

Skl. IV.

The

Kn(;lisii
Towns

HIS'J'ORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CIIAI*,

The

hard bargaining. The earliest English charters, save that of London,
date from the years when the treasury of Henry the First was drained
by his Norman wars ; and grants of munic !>al liberty made profesbedh-
l)y the Angevins are probably the result c 'heir costly employnienL of
mercenary troops. At the close, howevet^ of the thirteen .h century,
this struggle for emancipation was nearly '^/er. The ' irger towns had
secured the administration of justice in tl ir o\\ borough-cDurts, the
privilege of self-government, and the co.\irol of their own trade, ana
their Jiiberties and charterr. iervtd as models and in -ent.ves to the
smaller cc mmunities which were struggling into life.

During the progress of this outer revolution, the inner life of the
English town was in the same quiet and hardly conscious way deve-
loping itself from the common form of the life around it into a form
especially its own. Within as without the ditch or stockade which
formed the eaiiest boundary of the borough, land was from the first the
test of freedom, and the possession of land was what constituted the
townsman. We may take, perhaps, a foreign instance to illustrate this
fundamental point in our municipal history. When Duke Berthold of
Zahringen resolved to found Freiburg, his " free town," in the Brisgau,
the mode he adopted was to gather a grr ip of traders together, and to
give each man a plot of ground for his freehold round what was des-
tined to be the market-place of the new community. In England the
landless man who dwelled in a borough had no share in its corporate
life ; for purposes of government or property the town was simply
an association of the landed proprietors within its bounds ; nor was
there anything in this association, as it originally existed, which could
be considered peculiar or exceptional. The constitution of the English
town, however different its form may have afterwards become, was at
first simply that of the people at large. We have seen that among the
German races society rested on the basis of the family, that it was the
family who fought and settled side by side, and the kinsfolk who were
bound together in ties of mutual responsibility to each other and to the
law. As society became more complex and less stationary it neces-
sarily outgrew these simple ties of blood, and in England this dissolu-
tion of the family bond seems to have taken place at the very time
when Danish incursions and the growth of a feudal temper among the
nobles rendered an isolated existence most perilous for the freeman.
His only resource was to seek protection among his fellow-freemen,
and to replace the older brotherhood of the kinsfolk by a voluntary
association of his neighbours for the same purposes of order and self-
defence. The tendency to unite in such ' frith-gilds ' or peace-clubs
became general throughout Europe during the ninth and tenth centu-
ries, but on the Continent it was roughly met and repressed. The
successors of Charles the Great enacted penalties of scourging, nose-
slittmg, and banishment against voluntary unions, and even a league

IV. I

of the pn

suppress

attitude (

time as '

was acce

recogniz(

gild ' sid

'frith gill

of Londo

Thefri

to the fri

at large.

for the t

common

hearth.

establish

share the

member <

guilt incu

of violent

romp'irgr

On the o

State, for

brother w

punished

offender n

these gild

close loca

/Ethelstar

out more <

gilds of B

side in on

dealings c

process w

naturally (

effected w

of some o

London, f

the he^d >

while its

became th

bury we fi;

the town s

as the uni(

a mere col

■*'f.

IV. J

THE THREE EDWARDS.

»97

league

of the poor peasants of Gaul aj^^ainst the inroads of the northmen was
suppressed by the swords of the Frankish nobles. In T.ngland the
attitude of the Kings was utterly different. Th; ystem known at a later
lime as ' frank-pledge,' or free engagement ( / r ighbour for neighbour,
was accepted after the Danish wars as the ha . of social order. /T-'lfrcd
recognized the common responsibility of the members of the ' frith-
gild ' side by side with that of the kinsfolk, and /Ethelstan accepted
'frith gilds' as a constituent element of borough life in the Dooms
of London.

The frith-gild, then, in the earlier English town, was precisely similar
to the frith-gilds which formed the basis of social order in the country
at large. An oath of mutual fidelity among its members was substituted
for the tie of blood, w'^^le the gild-feast, held once a month in the
common hall, replaced ic thering of the kinsfolk round their family
hearth. But within hm ■ \ family the aim of the frith-gild was to
establish a mutual re ;•[. nsi'r.?uity as close as that of the old. " Let all
share the same lot, f.<n ts law ; "if any misdo, let all bear it." A
member could look loi aid from his gild-brothers in atoning for any
guilt incurred by i"" •ha'^ He could call on them for assistance in case
of violence or wron^ : if falsely accused, they appeared in court as his
compurgators ; if poor they supported, and when dead they buried him.
On the other hand, he was responsible to them, as they were to the
State, for order and obedience to the laws. A wrong of brother against
brother was also a wrong against the general body of the gild, and was
punished by fine, or in the last resort by expulsion, which left the
offender a * lawless ' man and an outcast. The one difference between
these gilds in country and town was, that in the latter case, from their
close local nf jghbourhood, they tended inevitably to coalesce. Under
/Ethelstan tne London gilds united into one for the purpose of carrying
out more effectually their common aim's, and at a later time we find the
gilds of Berwick enacting "that wht. inany bodies are found side by
side in one place they may become one, and have one will, and in the
dealings of one with another have a strong and hearty love." The
process was probably a long and difficult one, for the brotherhoods
naturally differed much in social rank, and even after the union was
effected we see traces of the separate existence to a certain extent
of some one or more of the wealthier or more aristocratic gilds. In
London, for instance, the Cnihten-gild, which seems to have stood at
the he-" d of its fellows, retained for a long time its separate property,
while its Alderman — as the chief officer of each gdd was called —
became the Alderman of the united gild of the whole city. In Canter-
bury we find a similar gild of thegns, from which the chief officers of
the town seem commonly to have been selected. Imperfect, 'lowever,
as the union might be, when once it was effected the town pas3ed from
a mere collection of brotherhoods into a powerful and organized com-

Skc. VI.
Thk

F.NGLtSK
TOWNb

The

Merchant

aUdB

198

HISTORY OF TIIK ENGLISH PEOPLK.

[chap.

Skc. IV.

'1'mk

l''N(;i.isir
Towns

The
Craft
Gilds

t 1

munity, whose rhararler was inevitably determined by the rircum-
slances of its origin. In tlieir beginnings our boroughs rccm to have
been mainly gallierings of persons engaged in agricultural ])urr.uits ;
the first Dooms of London provide e?'))e(:ially for the recovery of cattle
belonging to the citizens. lUit as tlu increasing security of the country
invited the farmer or tlie squire to settle apart in his own fields, and
the growth of estate and trade told on the towns themselves, the
difference between tON'n and country became more sharply defined.
London, of course, took the lead in this new developement of civic life.
Kven in yEthelstan's day every London merchant who had made three
long voyages on his own account ranked as .1 '^^^^gn. Its 'lithsmcn,'
or shipmen's-gild, were of sufficient importance under Harthacnut to
figure in the election of a king, and its principal street still tells of the
rapid growth of trade, in the name of * Cheap-side,' or the bargaining
place. But at the Norman Conquest the commercial tendency had
become universal. The name given to the united brotherhood is in
almost every case no longer that of the 'town-gild,' but of the
* merchant-gild.'

This social change in the character of the townsmen produced
important results in the character of their municipal institutions.
In becoming a merchant-gild the body of citizens who formed the
' town ' enlarged their powers of civic legislation by applying them to the
control of their internal trade. It became their special business to obtain
from the Crown, or from their lords, wider commercial privileges, rights
of coinage, grants of fairs, and exemption from tolls ; while within the
town itself they framed regulations as to the sale and quality of goods,
the control of markets, and the recovery of debts. A yet more important
result sprang from the increase of population which the growth of
wealth and industry brought with it. The mass of the new settlers, com-
posed as they were of escaped serfs, of traders without landed holdings,
of families who had lost their original lot in the borough, and generally
of the arti'"ins and the poor, had no part in the actual life of the town.
The right of trade and of the regulation of trade, in common with all
other forms of jurisdiction, lay wholly in the hands of the landed
burghers whom we have described. By a natural process, too, their
superiority in wealth produced a fresh division between the ' burghers ' of
the merchant-gild and the unenfranchised mass around them. The same
change which severed at Florence the seven Greater Arts, or trades,
from the fourteen Lesser Arts, and which raised the three occupations
of banking, the manufacture and the dyeing of cloth, to a position of
superiority even within the privileged circle of the seven, told, though
with less force, on the English boroughs. The burghers of the merchant-
gild gradually concentrated themselves on the greater operations of
commerce, on trades which required a larger capital, while the meaner
employments of general -trafific were abandoned to their poorer neigh-

IV.]

hours,
severanc
from the
result of
tution of
the wealt
rose into
A seven
members
charactci
hours of
made ag;
their mei
rules of t
The war(
enforced
members,
obedience
by expuh
fund was
provided
chantries
their patr
may often
prelates a
to such a
most dififi
any succe
belonging
secondly,
to it. A 1
the grant
merchant-
trade with
gild to sec
engaged ii
the citi7er
gild.

resisting t
century, h
and the >
craft-gilds,
It is th
"greater i
general m£

'of

janer
[eigh-

IV. 1

THE TIIREF EDWARDS.

hours. This advance in the division of labour is marked by such
severances as \vc note in tiie thirteenth century of tlie chnh merchant
from the tailor, or the leather merchant frouj the butcher. J5ut the
result of this severance was all-important in its inllur ice on the consti-
tution of our towns. The members of the trades thus abandoned by
the wealthier burs^hers formed themselves into Craft-gilds, which soon
rose into dangerous rivalry with the original Merchant-gild of the town.
A seven years' apprenticeship formed the necessary prelude to full
membership of any trade-gild. Their regulations were of the minutest
character ; the quality and value of work was rigidly prescribed, the
hours of toil fixed " from day-break to curfew," and strict provision
made against competition in labour. At each meeting of these gilds
their members gathered round the Craft-box, which contained the
rules of their Society, and stood with bared heads as it was opened.
The warden and a quorum of gild-brothers formed a court which
enforced the ordinances of the gild, inspected all work done by its
members, confiscated unlawful tools or unworthy goods ; and dis-
obedience to their orders was punished by fines, or in the last resort
by expulsion, which involved the loss of right to trade. A common
fund was raised by contributions among the members, which not only
provided for the trade objects of the gild, but sufficed to found
chantries and masses, and set up painted windows in the church of
their patron saint. Even at the present day the arms of the craft-gild
may often be seen blazoned in cathedrals side by side with those of
prelates and of kings. But it was only by slow degrees that they rose
to such a height as this. The first steps in their existence were the
most difficult, for to enable a trade-gild to carry out its objects with
any success, it was first necessary that the whole body of craftsmen
belonging to the trade should be compelled to belong to it, and
secondly, that a legal control over the trade itself should be secured
to it. A royal charter was indispensable for these purposes, and over
the grant of these charters took place the first struggle with the
merchant-gild, which had till then soioi; exercised jurisdiction over
trade within the boroughs. The weavers, who were the first trade-
gild to secure royal sanction in the reign of Henry the First, were still
engaged in the contest for existence as late as the reign of John, when
the citi7ens of London bought for a time the suppression of their
gild. ^ under the house of Lancaster, Exeter was engaged in

resisting the establishment of a tailors' gild. From the eleventh
century, however, the spread of these societies went steadily on,
and the control of trade passed from the merchant-gilds to the
craft-gilds.

It is this struggle, to use the technical terms of the time, of the
" greater folk " against the " lesser folk," or of the " commune," the
general mass of the inhabitants, against the " prudhommes," or " wiser "

199

Skc. IV.

'I'lIK

I'.NIil.lSll

I'llWNS

■f 'li

' • I

The
Greater

and
I«esser

Folk

,11

^;i, ^M

•m

aoo

HISTORY OF TIIK ENGLISH PEOPLK.

[chap.

Skc. IV.

Thr

Knoi.isii
Towns

I''

1 196

few, which broujjht about, as it passed from the rc^ulation.of trade to
the j:jcneral jjovernnicnt of the town, the great civic revolution of the
thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. On the Continent, and especially
along the Rhine, the struggle was as fierce as the supremacy of the
older burghers had been complete. In Koln the craftsmen had been
reduced to all but serfage, and the merchant of Brussels might box at
his will the ears of "the man without heart or honour who lives by his
toil." Such social tyranny of class over cla>s brought a century of
bloodshed to the cities of Germany ; but v\ England the tyranny of
class over class had been restrained by the general tenor of the law,
and the revolution took for the most part a milder form. The longest
and bitterest strife of all was naturally at London. Nowhere had the
territorial constitution struck root so deeply, and nowhere had the
landed oligarchy risen to such a height of wealth and influence. The
city was divided into wards, each of which was governed by an alder-
man drawn from the ruling class. In some, indeed, the office seems
to have become hereditary. The " magnates," or " barons," of the
merchant-gild advised alone on all matters of civic government or
trade regulation, and distributed or assessed at their will the revenues
or burthens of the town. Such a position afforded an opening for cor-
ruption and oppression of the most galling kind ; and it seems to have
been the general impression of the unfair assessment levied on the
poor, and theundueburthens which were thrown on the unenfranchised
classes, which provoked the first serious discontent. William of the
Long Beard, himself one of tne governing body, placed himself at the
head of a conspiracy which numbered, in the terrified fancy of the
burghers, fifty thousand of the craftsmen. His eloquence, his bold
defiance of the aldermen in the town-mote, gained him at any rate a
wide popularity, and the crowds who surrounded him hailed him as
'* the sav'our of the poor." One of his addresses is luckily preserved to
us by a hearer of the time. In mediaeval fashion he began with a text
from the Vulgate, " Ye shall draw water with joy from the fountain of the
Saviour." " I," he began, " am the saviour of the poor. Ye poor men
who have felt the weight of rich men's hands, draw from m fountain
waters of wholesome instruction and that with joy, for the tinv" of your
visitation is at hand. For I will divide the waters from the waters. It
is the people who are the waters, and I will divide the lowly and f.tithful
folk from the proud and faithless folk ; I will part the chosen from the
reprobate as light from darkness." But it was in vain that by appeals
to the King he strove to win royal favour for the popular cause. The
support of the moneyed classes was essential to Richard in the costly
wars with Philip of France, and the Justiciar, Archbishop Hubert,
after a moment of hesitation, issued orders for his arrest. William
felled with an axe the first soldier who advanced to seize him,
and taking refuge with a few followers in the tower of St. Mary-le-

iv.J

How, su

already

right of

surrendc

as he cai

than fifi)

No fu

Barons'

with disc

ving the

rose fron

burghers.

recomme

settmg as

for their i

the secon

victory of

have ceas

formally r

liveries as

which the

power bro

of the tr^

current of

ers. This

had becon

Municipal

hands of a

nothing a<

trade-gilds

they had c

Se<

[Atit/iorit
important a
"Anglica,
(published b
bury, printci
porary in da
aspect of th(

If we tu
accession (
chequered
A great tra

IV.]

THE TFIRFF, KDWARDS.

20 1

How, summoned his adherents \i rise. Hubert, however, who had
already flooded the city with troops, with bold contempt of the
rij^ht of sanctuary, set fiio to the tower and forced William to
surrender. A Ivurj^her's son, whorie father he had slain, stabbed hiii\
as he came forth, and with ins death the (piarrel slumbered for more
than fifty years.

No further movement, in fact, took place till the outbreak of the
Harons' war, but the city had all through the interval been seething
with discontent ; the unenfranchised craftsmen, under pretext of preser-
ving the peace, had united in secret frith-gilds of their own, and mobs
rose from time to time to sack the houses of foreigners and the wealthier
burghers. But it was not till the civil war began that the open contest
recommenced. The craftsmen forced their way into the town-mote, and
settmg aside the aldermen and magnates, chose Thomas Fitz-Thomas
for their mayor. Although dissension still raged during the reign of
the second Edward, we may regard this election as marking the final
victory of the craft-gilds. Under his successor all contest seems to
have ceased : charters had been granted to every trade, their ordinances
formally recognized and enrolled in the mayor's court, and distinctive
liveries assumed to which they owed the name of "Livery Companies"
which they still retain. The wealthier citizens, who found their old
power broken, regained influence by enrolling themselves as members
of the trade-gilds, and Edward the Third himself humoured the
current of civic feeling by becoming a member of the gild of Armour-
ers. This event marks the time when the government of our towns
had become more really popular than it ever again became till the
Municipal Reform Act of our own days. It had passed from the
hands of an oligarchy into those of the middle classes, and there was
nothing as yet to foretell the reactionary revolution by which the
trade-gilds themselves became an oligarchy as narrow as that which
they had deposed.

Section v.— The Kini: and the Baronage, 1290—1327.

{Anf/iorities. — For Edward I. as before. For Edward II. we have three
important contemporaries : on the King's side, Thomas de la More (in Camden,

"Anglica, Brittanica, etc."); on thnt
(published by the Master of the Ro)';)
bury, printed by Hearne. The ;:hoit Chronic-c
porary in date. Hallam ("Niiddle Ages") ha
aspect of the time.]

of the Barons,
ltd the Life by

Sk.. IV.

The

Knclish

The Com-
mune

Trokelowe's Annals
a monk of Malmes-
by Murimuth is also contem-
illustrated the constitutional

If we turn again to the constitiuional history of England from the
accession of Edward the First we find a progress not less real but
chequered with darker viciti'.itudes than the progress of our towns.
A great transfer of power had been brought about by the long struggle

1261

r W

ft. 1 1 .

'•i ■
'■I :

'::iif

England ' f

■■

BhLlm

under

■|H

Edward I.

ff'

(

1 K

1
i

202

Sec. V.

TlIK KiNC

AND 'IIIK
liAK'ONAfil''.

1290
1327

I d

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE. [chap.

for llic Charter, by the reforms of Earl Simon, and by the earlier
lei^islation of Edward himself. His conception of kingship indeed was
that of a just and rcliL;ioiis Henry the Seco:.d, but his Ens^land was as
tlilfcrent from the Eni,dand of Henry as the Parlir.ment of the one was
d-ffercnt from the Cire.'t Council of the other, la the rough rimes of
llobert of Gloucester we read the simple politi.al creed of the people
at large.

" When the land through God's grace to good peace was brought
For to have the old laws the high men turned their thought :
For to have, as we said erst, the good old Law,
The King made his charter and granted it with sawe."

But the power which the Charter had wrested from the Crown fell not
to the people but to the Baronage. The farmer and the artisan, though
they could fight in some great crisis for freedom, had as yet no wish to
interfere in the common task of government. The vast industrial
change in both town and country, which had begun during the reign
of Henry the Third, and which continued with increasing force during
that of his son, absorbed the energy and ..tention of the trading
classes. In agriculture, the inclosure of common lands anr" he intro-
duction of the system of leases on the part of the great proprietors,
coupled with the subdivision of estates which was facilitated by
Edward's legislation, was gradually creating out of the masses of rural
bondsmen a new class of tenant farmers, whose whole energy was
absorbed in their own great rise to social freedom. The very causes
which rendered the growth of municipal liberty so difficult, increased
the wealth of the towns. To the trade with Nv way and the Hanse
towns of North Germany, the wool-trade with Flanders, and the wine
trade with Gascon y, was now added a fast increasing commerce with
Italy and Spain. The great Venetian merchant galleys appeared on
the English coast, Florentine traders settled in the southern ports,
the bankers of Florence and Lucca followed those of Cahors, who had
already dealt a death-blow to the usury of the Jews. But the wealth
and industrial energy of the country was shown, not only in the rise of
a capitalist class, but in a crowd of civil and ecclesiastical buildings
which distinguished this period. Christian architecture reached its
highest beauty in the opening of Edwai d's reign, a period marked by
the completion of the abbey church of Westminster and the exquisite
cathedral church at Salisbury. An English noble was proud to be
styled " an incor parable builder," while some traces of the art which
was rising across the Alps perhaps flowed in with the Italian ecclesi-
astics whom the Papacy was forcing on the English Church. In the
abbey of Vv'^estminiter the shrine of the Confessor, the mosaic pave-
ment, and the paintings on the walls of minster and chapter-house,
remind us of tlie schools which were springing up under Giotlo and
the Pisans.

gov

IV.]

But

classes

govern

accord

the po

King

withou

wavcri;

foreign

been r

]jcasan

and th

its nat

which

its

transfei

commit

of state

The bo(

the qui€

betweer

effective

relation

the Cro;

Council

will of tl

which tl

the mosi

towns, i

frequenc

for cour

action ;

taxation

rule of 1

efforts

From

ing infli

revolutif

were cru

despotisi

whicli th

tiie polic

com miss

on its r

these fr

IV.]

THE THREE EDWARDS.

203

reign

quisite

to be

which

cclesi-

In the

pave-

louse,

to and

wavcnnsr
foreigners

But even had this industrial distraction been wanting the tradine
classes had no mind to claim any direct part in the actual work of
government. It was a work which, in default of the Crown, fell naturally,
according to the ideas of the time, to the Baronage, Constitutionally
the position of the ICnglish nobles had now become established. A
King could no longer make laws or levy taxes or even make war
without their assent. And in the Baronage the nation reposed an un-
trust. The nobles of England were no more the brutal
from whose violence the strong hand of a Norman ruler had
been need-^d to protect his subjects ; they were as P2nglish as the
peasant or the trader. They had won English liberty by their swords,
and the tradition of their order bound them to look on themselves as
its natural guardians. At the close of the Barons' war, the problem
which had so long troubled the icahii, the problem of how to ensure
its government in accordance with the Charter, was solved by the
transfer of the business of administration into the hands of a standing
committee of the greater prelates and barons, acting as chief officers
of state in conjvmct^on with specially appointed ministers of the Crown.
The body thus composed was known as the Continual Council ; and
the quiet government of the kingdom by the Council in the long interval
between the death of Henry the Third and his son's return shows how
effective this rule of the nobles was. It is significant of the new
relation which they were to strive to establish between themselves and
the Crown that in the brief which announced Edward's accession the
Council asserted that the new monarch mounted his throne " by the
will of the peers." The very form indeed of the new Parliament, in
which the barons were backed by the knights of the shire, eh cted for
the most part under their influence, and by the representatives of the
towns, still true to the traditions of the Barons' war ; the increased
frequency of these Parliamentary assemblies which gave opportunity
for counsel, for party organization, and a distinct political base of
action ; above all, the new financial power which their control over
taxation enabled them to exert on the throne, ultimately placed the
rule of the nobles on a basis too strong to be shaken by the utmost
efforts of even Edward liimself.

From the first the King struggled fruitlessly against this overpower-
ing influence ; and his sympathies must have been stirred by the
revolution on the other side of the Channel, where the French kings
were crushing the power of the feudal baronage, and erecting a royal
despotism on its ruins. Edward watched jealously over the ground
which, the Crown had already gained against the nobles. Follow ing
the policy of Henry II., at the very outset of his reign he instituted a
commission of enquiry into the ji/'i'ial franchises still existing, and
on its report itineiant justices were sent to discover by what right
these franchises were held. The writs of "quo warranto" were

Sf.c. v.
TiiF, KiNc.

AND THIs

1!akonac;k
1290

1327

The

Baronage

and its

rule

sHi

and the j
Baronage |'

'.(■'i

I ;

127S

204

ITTSTORY OF THE ENGLTSH PEOPLE.

[CTTAP.

Sec. V.
The KiNf;

AND THE

Baronac.k
12QO

1327

i27cS

U ■:

I2S6-I2S9

roiighly met here and there. Earl Warenne bared a rusty sword, and
flung it on the justices' table. " This, sirs," he said, " is my warrant.
By the sword our fathers won their lands when they came over with
the Conqueror, and by the sword we will keep them." But the King-
was far from limiting himself to the plans of flcnry 11. ; he aimed
further at neutralizing the power of the nobles by raising the whole
body of landowners to the same level ; and a royal writ ordered all
freeholders who held land of the value of twenty pounds to receive
knighthood at the King's hands. While the political influence of
the baronage as a leading element in the nation mounted, in fact,
the personal and purely feudal power of each individual on his
estates as steadily fell. The hold Avhich the Crown had gained
on every noble family by its rights of wardship and marriage, the
circuits of the royal judges, the ever narrowing bounds within which
baronial justice was circumscribed, the blow dealt by scutage at their
military power, the prompt intervention of the Council in their feuds,
lowered the nobles more and more to the level of thc'r fellow subjects.
Much yet remained to be done. Different as the English baronage,
taken as a whole, was from a feudal noblesse like that of Germany or
France, there is in every military class a natural drift towards violence
and lawlessness, which even the stern justice of Edward found it
difficult to repress. Throughout his reign his strong hand was needed
to enforce order on warring nobles. Great earls, such as those of
Gloucester and Hereford, carried on private war ; in Shropshire the
Earl of Arundel waged his feud with Fulk Fitz Warine. To the lesser
and poorer nobles the wealth of the trader, the long wain of goods as it
passed along the highway, was a tempting prey. Once, under cover of
a mock tournament of monks against canons, a band of country
gentlemen succeeded in introducing themselves into the great
merchant fair at P)OSton ; at nightfall every booth was nn fire, the
merchants robbod and slaughtered, and the booty carried off to ships
which lay ready at the quay. Streams of gold and silver, ran the talc
of popular horror, flowed melted down the gutters to the sea ; " all the
money in England could hardly make good the loss." Even at the
close of Edward's reign lawless bands of " trail-bastons," or club-men,
maintained themselves by general outrage, aided thecountr) nobles in
their feuds, and wrested money and goods by threats from the great
tradesmen. The King was strong enough to fine and imprir>on the
Earls, to hang the chief of the Boston marauders, and to suppress the
outlaws by rigorous commissions. During Edward's absence of three
years from the realm, the judges, who were themselves drawn from
the lesser baronage, were charged with vioien. -e and corruption. After a
careful investigation the judicial abuses were recognized and amended ;
two of the chief justices were banished from the coimtry, and their
colleagues imprisoned and fined.

IV.]

THE THREE EDWARDS.

great

The next year saw a step which remains the great blot upon Edward's
reign. Under the Angevins the popular hatred of the Jew.i had grown
rapidly in intensity. But the royal protection had never wavered.
Henry the Second had granted them the right of burial outside of
every city where they dwelt. Richard had punished heavily a massacre
of the Jews at York, and organized a mixed court of Jews and Christians
for the registration of their contracts. John suffered none to plunder
them save himself, though he once wrested from them a sum equal to
a year's revenue of his realm. The troubles of the next reign brought
in a harvest greater than even the royal greed could reap ; the Jews
grew wealthy enough to acquire estates, and only a burst of popular
feeling prevented a legal decision which would have enabled them to
own freeholds. Their pride and contempt of the superstitions around
them broke out in the taunts they levelled at processions as they
pp.ssed their Jewries, sometimes as at Oxford in actual attacks upon
them. Wild stories floated about among the people of children carried
off to Jewish houses, to be circumcised or crucified, and a boy of
Lincoln who was found slain in a Jewish house was canonized by
popular leverence as " St. Hugh." The first work of the Friars was to
settle in the Hebrew quarters and attempt their conversion, but the
tide of popular fury rose too fast for these gentler means of recon-
ciliation. When the Franciscans saved seventy Jews from, death by
their prayers to Henry the Third the populace angrily refused the
brethren alms. The sack of Jewry after Jewry was the sign of popular
hatred during the Barons' war. With its close, fell on the Jews the
more terrible persecution of the law. Statute after statute hemmed
them in. They were forbidden to hold real propert^^, to employ
Christian servants, to move through the streets without the two white
tablets of wool on their breasts which distinguished their race. They
were prohibited from building new synagogues, or eating with Chris-
tians, or acting as physicians to them. Their trade, already crippled by
the rivalry of the bankers of Cahors, was annihilated by a royal order,
which bade them renounce usury under pain of death. At last perse-
cution could do no more, and on the eve of his struggle with Scotland,
Edward, eager at the moment to find supplies for his treasury, and
himself swayed by the fanaticism of his subjects, bought the grant of
a fifteenth from clergy and laity by consenting to drive the Jews from
his realm. Of the sixteen thousand who preferred exile to apostasy
few reached the shores of France. Many were wrecked, others robbed
and flung overboard. One shipmaster turned out a crew of wealthy
merchants on to a sandbank, and bade them call a new Moses to save
tiiem from the sea. From the time of Edward to that of Cromwell no
J ew touched English ground.

No share in the enormities which accompanied the expulsion of the
jews can fall upon Edward, for he not only suffered the fugitives to

205

Sec. V.
The Kino

AND THE
15ARONAGE

1290

1327

Ed-wrard

and the

Jews

1290

'1 :

Edivard

and the

Baronage

2o6

Skc. V.
Thk Kin(;

AND THK
RAKONA(;tC

1290

1327

1294

1297

2297

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

take their wealth with them, but punished with the halter those who
plundered them at sea. But the expulsion was none the less cruel, and
the grant of a fifteenth made by the grateful Parliament proved but a
poor substitute for the less which the royal treasury had sustained.
The Scotch war more than exhausted the aids granted by the Parlia-
ment. The treasury was utterly drained ; the costly fight with the
French in Gascony called for supplies, while the King was planning a
yet costlier attack on northern Fiance with the aid of Flanders. It
was sheer want which drove Edward to tyrannous extortion. His first
blow fell on the Church ; he had already demanded half their annual
income from the clergy, and so terrible was his wrath at their resist-
ance, that the Dean of St. Paul's, who had stood forth to remonstiate,
dropped dead of sheer terror at his feet. " If any oppose the King's
demand," said a royal envoy, in the midst of the Convocation, " let him
stand up that he may be noted as an enemy to the King's peace." The
outraged churchmen fell back on an untenable plea that their ai'' was
due solely to Rome, and pleaded a bull of exemption, issued by Pope
Boniface VIII., as a ground for refusing to comply with further taxa-
tion. Edward met their refusal by a general outlawry of the whole
order. The King's courts were closed, and all justice denied to those
who refused the King aid. By their actual plea the clergy had put
themselves formally in the wrong, and the outlawry soon forced them
to submission, but their aid did little 10 recruit the exhausted treasury,
while the pressure of the war steadily increased. Far v/ider measures
of arbitrary taxation were needful to equip an expedition which
Edward prepared to lead in person to Flanders.. The country gentle-
men were compelled to take up knighthood, or to compound for
exemption from the burthensome honour. Forced contributions of
cattle and corn were demanded from the counties, and the export
duty on wool — now the staple produce of the country — was raised to
six times its former amount. Though he infringed no positive charter
or statute, the work of the Great Charter and the Barons' war seemed
suddenly to have been undone. But the blow had no sooner been struck
than Edward found himself powerless within his realm. The baronage
roused itself to resistance, and the two greatest of the English nobles,
Bohun, Earl of Hereford, and Bigod, Earl of Norfolk, placed them-
selves at the head of the opposition. Their protest against the war
and the financial n: ^asures by which it was carried on, took the practical
form of a refusal to lead a force to Gascony as Edward' s lieutenants,
while he himself sailed for Flanders. They availed themselves of the
plea that they were not bound to foreign service save in attendance on
the King. " By (;od. Sir Earl," swore the King to Bigod, " you shall
either go or hang ! " " By God, Sir King," was the cool reply, " I will
neither go nor hang ! " Ere the Parliament he had convened could
meet, Edward had discovered his own powerlessness, and, with one of

[chap.

IV]

THE THREE EDWARDS.

207

those who
s cruel, and
3ved but a
sustained,
the Parlia-
lit with the
phinning a
anders. it
1. His first
heir annual
their resist-
emonstiate,
the King's
in, " let him
eace." The
eir aid was
ed by Pope
urther taxa-
f the whole
ied to those
•gy had put
forced them
;ed treasury,
er measures
ition which
ntry gentle-
11 pound for
ributions of
the export
IS raised to
tive charter
^var seemed
been struck
le baronage
lish nobles,
aced them-
ist the war
he practical
ieutenants,
:lves of the
sndance on
" you shall
)ly, " I will
ned could
,vith one of

those sudden revulsions of feeling of which his nature was capable, he
stood before his people in Westminster Hall and owned, with a bu st
of tears, th?t he had taken their substance without due warrant of law.
His passionate appeal to their loyalty wrested a reluctant assent to the
prosecution of the war, but the crisis had taught the need of further
securities against the royal power. While Edward was still struggling
in Flanders, the Primate, Winchelsey, joined the two Earls and the
citizens of London in forbidding any further levy of supplies till Edward
at Ghent solemnly confirmed the Charter with the new clauses added
to it prohibiting the King from raising taxes save by general consent
of the realm. At the demand of the barons he renewed the Confirma-
tion in 1299, when his attempt to add an evasive clause saving the
rights of the Crown proved the justice of their distrust. Two years
later a fiesh gathering of the barons in arms wrested from him tht. lUll
execution of the Charter of Forests. The bitterness of his humiliation
^rey ^d on him ; he exaded his pledge to levy no new taxes on mer-
chand.'ze by the sale to merchants of certain privileges of trading ;
and a foimal absolution from his promises which he obtained from
the Pope showed his intention of re-opening the questions he had
yielded. His hand was stayed, however, by the fatal struggle with
Scotland which levived in the lising of Robert Bruce, and the King's
death bequeathed the contest to his worthless son.

Worthless, however, as Edward the Second morally might be, he
was far fr->m being dstitute of the intellectual power which seemed
hereditary in the Plan agenets. It was his settled purpose to fling off
the yoke of the baronage, and the means by which he designed ac-
complishing his purpo: e was the choice of a minister wholly dependent
on the Crown. We ] ve aheady noticed the change by which the

pel," who had been the ministers of arbitrary
ormans and Angevins, had been quietly super-
d lords of the Continual Council. At the close
direct demand on the part of the Barons to
nominate the great c licers of state had been curtly rejected ; but the
royal choice had b'^en practically limited in the selection of its minis-
ters to the class ot >relates and nobles, and, however closely connected
with royalty, such officers always to a great extent shared the feelings
and opinions of their order. It seems to have been the aim of the
young King to undo the change which had been silently brought
about, and to imitate the policy of the contemporary sovereigns of
France by choosing as his ministers men of an inferior position,
wholly dependent on ii\e Crown for their power, and representatives of
nothing but the policy and interests of their master. Piers Gaveston,
a foreigner sprung from a family of Ckiienne, had been his friend and
companion during his father's reign, at the close of which he had been
banished from the realm for his share in intrigues which had divided

" clerks of the king's (
government under the
seded by the prelates
of his father's reign

Sec V.
The Kin(;

AND THE

Bakona(;ic
1200

1327

1297

1 301

1305
1307

the
Second

1307-13:^7

208

Siic. V.
The KiNCi

AND THE
liAKONAiaC

1290
1327

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAl*.

1307

i?o8

1309

The
IiordB
Crdainers

13"

.tf 1

Edward from his son. At the new King's accession he was at once
recalled, created Earl of Cornwall, and placed at the head of the ad-
ministration. Gay, genial, thriftless, Gaveston showed in his first acts
the quickness and audacity of Southern Gaul ; the older ministers
were dismissed, all claims of precedence or inheritance set aside in the
distribution of offices at the coronation, while taunts and defiances
goaded the proud baronage to fury. The favourite was a fine soldier,
and his lance unhorsed his opponents in tourney after tourney. His
reckless wit flung nicknames about the Court ; the Earl of Lancaster
was "the Actor," Pembroke "the Jew," Warwick " the Black Dog."
But taunt and defiance broke helplessly against the iron mass of the
baronage. After a few months of power the demand of the Parliament
for his dismissal could not be resisted, and he was formally banished
from the realm. In the following year it was only by conceding the
rights which his father had sought to establish of imposing import
duties on the merchants by their own assent, that Edward procured a
subsidy for the Scotch war. The firmness of the baronage sprang from
their having found a head in the Earl of Lancaster, son of Edmund
Crouchback. His weight proved irresistible. When Edward at the
close of the Parliament recalled Gaveston, Lancaster withdrew from
tlie royal Council, and a Parliament which met in 1310 resolved that
the affairs of the realm should be entrusted for a year to a body of
twenty-one " Ordainers."

A formidable list of " Ordinances " drawn up by the twenty-one
met Edward on his return from a fruitless warfare with the Scots.
By this long and important statute Gaveston was banished, other ad-
visers were driven from the Council, and the Florentine bankers whose
loans had enabled Edward to hold the baronage at bay sent out of the
realm. The customs duties imposed by Edward the First were de-
clared to be illegal. Parliaments were to be called every year, and in
these assemblies the King's servants were to be brought, if need were,
to justice. The great officers of state were to be appointed with the
counsel and consent of the baronage, and to be sworn in Parliament.
The same consent of the barons in Parliament was to be needful ere
the King could declare war or absent himself from the realm. As the
Ordinances show, the baronage still looked on Parliament rather as a
political organization of the nobles than as a gathering of the three
Estates of the realm. The lower clergy pass unnoticed ; the Commons
are regarded as mere tax-payers whose part was still confined to the
presentation of petitions of grievances and the grant of money. But
even in this imperfect fashion the Parliament was a real representation
of the country, and Edward was forced to assent to the Ordinances
after a long and obstinate struggle. The exile of Gaveston was the
sign of the barons' triumph ; his recall a few months later renewed a
strife which was only ended by his capture in Scarborough. The

IV. ]

" Black
teeth
of Lane
defianc
burst of
submiss
barons
which s
powerle
servanc
The six
history,
which s]
between
and the ;
such as
i'lobert
formally
belongin
The ^i
Leicestei
the King
the Engl
raised hi
charactei
lion. Ir
jealousy
and the 3
whom th
its heires
found litt
kingdom
turned tc
whom Le
unexpect
fresh stre
Despens(
a<:jain int
able negc
his preci]
At Boroi
Karl hir
tried and
King of
out a bri

[CHAV.

at once
the iid-
irst acts
linisters
ie in the
efiances
soldier,
:. His
incaster
k Dog."
s of the
rliament
•anished
ling the
import
•cured a
,ng from
Edmund
i at the
ew from
vcd that
body of

^nty-one

Scots,
her ad-
rs whose
It of the
veve de-
and in
3d were,
vith the
iament.
dful ere

As the
er as a
le three
)mmons

to the
y. But
:ntation
inances

as the
ewed a
11. The

IV.]

THE TIH<KE EDWARDS.

209

" Black Dog" of Warwick had sworn that the favourite should feel his
teeth ; and Caveston, who flung himself in vain at the feet of the llarl
of Lancaster, praying for pity " from his gentle lord," was beheaded in
defiance of the terms of his capitulation on lilacklow Hill. The King's
burst of grief was as fruitless as his threats of vengeance ; a feigned
submission of the conquerors completed the royal humiliation, and the
barons knelt before ICdward in Westminster Hall to receive a pardon
which seemed the deathblow of the royal oower. But if Edward was
powerless to conquer the baronage he could still, by evading the ob-
servance of the Ordinances, throw the whole realm into confusion.
The six years that follow Gaveston's death are among the darkest in our
history. A terrible succession of famines intensified the suffering
which sprang from the utter absence of all rule during the dissension
between the barons and the King. The overthrow of Bannockburn,
and the ravages of the Scots in the North, brought shame on England
such as it had never known. At last the capture of Berwick by
Robert Bruce forced Edward to give way, the Ordinances were
formally accepted, an amnesty granted, and a small number of -^jcers
belonging to the Barons' party added to the great officers of sf.tte.

The ^"larl of Lu.;raster, by the union of the four earldoms of Lincoln,
Leicester, Deri y, r>i;d Lancaster, as well as by his royal blood (for like
the King he was a grandson of Henry' the Third), stood at the head of
the English baronage, and the issue of the long struggle with Edward
raised him for the moment to supreme power in the realm. But his
character seems to have fallen far beneath the greatness of his posi-
tion. Incapable of governing, he could do little but regard with
jealousy the new advisers on whom the King now leaned, the older
and the younger Hugh Le Dcspenser. The rise of the younger, on
whom the King bestowed the county of Glamorgan with the hand of
its heiress, was rapid enough to excite general jealousy, and Lancaster
found little difficulty in extorting by i'orce of arms his exile from the
kingdom. But the tide of popular sympathy, already wavering, was
turned to the royal cause by an insult offered to the Queen, again^^t
whom Lady Badlesmere had closed the doors of Ledes Castle, and the
unexpected energy shown by Edward in avenging the insult gave
fresh strength to his cause. He found himself strong enough to recall
Despenser, and when Lancaster convoked the baronage to force him
again into exile, the weakness of their party was "hown by the treason-
able negotiations into which the Earl entered witn the Scots, and by
his precipitate retreat to the north on the advance of the royal army.
At Boroughbridge his forces were arrested and dispersed, and the
Karl himself, brought captive before Edward at Pontefract, was
tried and condemned to death as a traitor. " Have mercy on me,
King of Heaven," cried Lancast'ir, .. ^ Jiiounted on a grey pony with-
out a bridle he \ as hurried to execution, " for my earthly King has

Src. V.

TlIK KiNC

AND THK

liAKONAtiK

laoo

1337

1312

Iff

,1 'i

1^18

The De-
spenaers

I m

1321

/'ait 0/
f.atu aster

1322

ato

lUr^TORV OF THE KNGTJSH PFOrLK.

[CTTAP

Sec. V.
The K»ni;

AND THK

Baron, \(".K
1B90

1387

132:

1326

1327

Deposition
of Rd-ivani

forsaken ine." His dentil was followed by that of \ number of his
adherents and by the crptivity of others ; while a Parliament at
York annulled the proceedings against the Dcspensers, and repealed
the Ordinances. It is to this Parliament however, and perhaps to
the victorious confidence of the royalists, that we owe the famous
provision which reveals the policy of the Dcspensers, the provision that
all laws concerning " the estate of the Crown, or of the realm and people,
shall be treated, accorded, and established in Pinliamcnts by our
Lord the King and by the consent of the prelates, earls, barons,
and ronmionalty of the realm, according as hath been hitherto ac-
cxistoiaed." It would seem from the tenor of this remarkable enact-
ment thai much of the sudden revulsion of popular feeling had been
owing to the assumption of all legislati\c action by the baronage
alone. But the arrogance of the Dcspensers, the utter failure of a
fresh campaign against Scotland, and the humiliating truce for thir-
teen years which Edward was forced to conclude wuh Robert Bruce,
soon robbed the Crown of its temporary popularity, and led the way
to the sudden catastrophe which closed this disastrous reign. It
had been airanged that the Queen, a sister of the King of France,
should re-visit her home to conclude a treaty between the two
countries, whose quarrel was again verging upon war ; and her son,
a boy of twelve years old, followed her to do homage in his father's
stead for the duchies of Gascony and Aquitaine. Neither threats
nor prayers, however, could induce either wife or child to return to
his court ; and the Queen's connexion with a secret conspiracy of
the baronage was revealed when the primate and nobles hurried to
her standard on her landing at Orwell. Deserted by all, and re-
pulsed by the citizens of London whose aid he implored, the King
fled hastily to the west and embarked with the Dcspensers for Lundy
Isle ; but contrary winds flung the fugitives again on the Welsh
coast, where they fell into the hands of the new Earl of Lancaster.
The younger Despenser was at once hanged e a a gibbet fifty feet high,
and the King placed in ward at Kenilworth till his fate could be ie-
cided by a Parliament summone^l for that purpose at Westminster.
The Peers who assembled fearlessly revived the constitutional usage
of the earlier English freedom, and asserted their right to depose a
king who had proved himself unworthy to rule. Not a voice was
raised in Edward's behalf, and only four prelates protested when the
young Prince was proclaimed King by acclamation, and presented as
their sovereign to the multitudes without. The revolution soon took
legal form in a bill which charged the captive monarch with indolence,
incapacity, the loss of Scotland, the violation of his coronation oath,
and oppression of the Church and baronage ; and on the approval of
this it was resolved that the reign of Edward of Caernarvon had
ceased and that the crown had passed to his son, Edward of Windsor.

[CHAP

of his
nent at
epcalccl
haps lo
famous
ion that
people,
by our
barons,
erto ac-
3 enact-
ad been
aronage
Lire of a
for thir-
t Bruce,
the way
ign. It
France,
the two
her son,
i father's
^ threats
eturn to
Diracy of
irried to
and re-
ic King
r Lundy
e Welsh
mcaster.
eet high,
d be de-
iminster.
al usage
epose a
ice was
hen the
nted as
on took
dolence,
on oath,
roval of
on had
indsor.

iv.l

THK THRRK EDWARDS.

3it

A deputation of the Parliament proceeded to Kenilworth to procure
the assent of the discrowned King to his own deposition, antl Kdward,
"clad in a plain black gown," submitted quietly to his fate. Sir
William Trussel at once addressed him in words which better than
any other mark the true nature of the step whicli the Parliament had
taken. " I, William Trussel, proctor of the carls, barons, and others,
having for this full and sufficient power, do render and give bac'-. to
you, Edward, once King of England, the homage and fealty of the
persons named in my procuracy ; and acquit a ul discharge them
thereof in the best manner that law and custom will give. And I
now make protestation in their name that they will no longer be in
your fealty and allegiance, nor claim to hold anything of you as king,
but will account you hereafter as a private person, without any
manner of royal tlignity." A significant act followed these emphatic
words. Sir Thomas Blount, the steward of the household, broke his
staff of office, a ceremony only used at a king's death, and declared
that all persons engaged in the royal service were discharged. In
the following September the King was murdered in Berkeley Castle.

Section VI.- The Scotch War of Independence, 1306— 134fl.

{Aitthorifies. — Mainly the contemporary English Chroniclers and state
tlocuments for the reigns of the three Edwards. John Barbour's "Bruce,"
the great legendary storehouse for his hero's adventures, is historically worth-
less. Mr. Burton s is throughout the best modern account of the time,]

To obtain a clear view of the constitutional struggle between the
kings and the baronage, we have deferred to its close an account
of the great contest which raged throughout the whole period in the
north.

With the Convocation of Perth the conquest and settlement of
Scotland seemed complete. Edward I., in fact, was preparing for a
joint Parliament of the two nations at Carlisle, when the conquered
country suddenly sprang again to arms under Robert Bruce, the
grandson of one of the orir nal claimants of the crown. The Norman
house of Bruce formed a part of the Yorkshire baronage, but it had
acquired through intermarriages the Earldom of Carrick and the
Lordship of Annandale. Both the claimant and his son had been
pretty steadily on the English side in the contest with Balliol and
Wallace, and Robert had himself been trained in the English court,
and stood high in the King's favour. But the withdrawal of Balliol
gave a new force to his claims upon the crown, and ihe discovery of
an intrigue which he had set on foot with the Bishop of St. Andrews so
roused Edward's jealousy that Bruce fled for his life across the border.
in the church of the Grey Friars at Dumfries he met Comyn, the
Lord of Badenoch, to whose treachery he att-ributed the disclosure of

1' 3

Skc. VI.

The Scot' i\
War ok
Indepkn-

DHNCK

1306

1348

The
Scotch
Revolt

1305

1306

212

IITSTORV OF THE ENGIJSII PKOPLK.

[niAr

IV.]

S«c. VI.

ThkSiotc II
Wak (.1-
Indkikn-

1)KN( K

1306

1342

1307

Robert
Bruce

his plans, and after the interchange of a few hot words struck him
with Iiis dagger to the ground. It was an outrage that admitted of no
forgiveness, and lirucc for very saioty was forcctl to assume the crown
six weeks after in the Abbey of Scone. 'I'he news roused Scotland
again to arms, and siniimoncd Ixlward to a fresh contest with his un-
conquerable foe. ]iut the murder of Comyn had changed the King's
mood to a terrible pitilessness ; he threatened death ag.iinst all con-
cerned in the outrage, and exposed the Countess of JUichan, who jiad
set the crown on IJruce's head, in a cage or open chamber built for
the purpose in one of the towers of Berwick. At the solemn feast
which celebrated his son's knighthood Edward vowed on the swan,
which formed the chief dish at the banquet, to devote the rest of his
days to exact vengeance from the murderer himself. But even at the
moment of the vow, Bruce was already flying for his life to the
western islands. " Henceforth," he had said to his wife at their corona-
tion, "thou art queen of Scotland and I king." " I fear," replied Mary
Bruce, " we are only playing at royalty, like children in their grimes."'
The play was socn turned into bitter earnest. A small English force
under Aymer de Valence sufficed to rout the disorderly levies which
gathered round the new monarch, and the flight ot Bruce left his
followers at Edward's mercy. Noble after noble was hurried to th(>
block. The Earl of Athole pleaded kindred witli royalty ; "His only
privilege," burst forth the King, " shall be that of being hanged on a
higher gallows than the rest." Kniglits and priests were strung up
side by side by the English justiciars ; while the wife and daughter
of Robert liruce were flung into prison. Bruce himself had offered
to capitulate to Prince Edward, but the offer only roused the old
King to fury. " Who is so bold," he cried, " as to treat with our
traitors without our knowledge ?" and rising from his sick-bed he led
his army northwards to complete the conquest. But the hand of
death was upon him, and in the very sight of Scotland the old man
breathed his last at Burgh-upon-Sands.

The death of Edward arrested only for a moment the advance of
his army to the north. The Earl of Pembroke led it across the border,
and found himself master of the country without a blow. Bruce's
career became that of a desperate adventurer, for even the Highland
chiefs in whose fastnesses he found shelter were bitterly hostile to one
who claimed to be King of their foes in the Lowlands. It was this
adversity that transformed the murderer of Comyn into the noble
leader of a nation's cause. Strong and of commanding presence,
brave and genial in temper, Bruce bore the hardships of his career
with a courage and hopefulness which never failed. In the legends
which clustered round his name we see him listening in Highland glens
to the bay of the bloodhounds on his track, or holding single-handed
a pass against a crowd of savage clansmen. Sometimes the little

King's

[CHAl'.

ck him
cl of no
J crown
rotlimd
his un-
King's
ill con-
ho iiacl
xiilt for
iin feast
e swan,
it of his
1 at the
: to the
corona-
id Mary
g.'unes."'
sh force
s whicli
left his
I to the
His only
ed on a
rung up
aughter
offered
the old
ith our
d he led
land of
old man

^ancc of
border,
IJruce's
ighland
e to one
this
noble
resence,
s career
legends
d glens
■handed
■ne little

IV.]

THK rilKKK l.DVVARDS.

vas
e

band which ( hnig to him were forced to support themselves by hunting
or fishing, sometimes to break up for safety as their enemies tracked
them to the lair. JJruce himself had more than once to tling off his
shirt of mail anrl scramble barefoot for very life up the crags. Little
by little, however, thn d.irk sky cleared. The I'Jiglish pressure relaxed,
as the struggle between lu'ward and his barons grew fiercer. James
Douglas, the darling of Scotch story, was the first of the Lowland
barons to rally again to the Bruce, and his daring gave heart to the
King's cause. Once lie surj)rised his own house, which had been
given to an l-jiglishman, ate the dinner which had been preparetl foi'
its new owner, slew his captives, and tossed their bodies on to a pile
of wood gathered at the castle gate. Then he staved in the wine-
vats that the wine might mingle with their blood, and set house and
woodpile on fire. A terrible fei-»city mingled with heroism in the
work of freedom, but the revival of the country went steadily on.
Ihiice's " harrying of liuchan" after the defeat of its Karl, who had
joined the Knglish army, at last fairly turned the tide of success.
I'Minburgh, Roxburgh, Perth, and most of the Scotch fortresses fell
one by one into King Robert i. hands. The clergy met in council and
owned him as their lawful lord. Gradually the Scotch barons who still
held to the ICnglish cause were coerced into submission, and Bruce
found himself strong enough to invest Stirling, the last and the most
important of the Scotch fortress' i which held out for Mdward.

Stirling was in fact the key of Scotland, and its danger roused
England out of its civil strife to a vast effort for the recovery of its
prey. Thirty thousand horsemen formed the fighting part of the great
army which followed Edward to the north, and a host of wild marauders
had been summoned from Ireland and Wales to its support. The
army which Bruce had gathered to oppose the inroad was formed
almost wholly of footmen, and was stationed to the south of Stirling
on a rising ground flanked by a little brook, tin .nnock burn which
gave its name to the engagement. Again two sysi^.ns of warfare were
brought face t » face as they had been brought at Falkirk, for Robert,
like Wallace, drew up his force in solid squares or circles of spearmen.
The English \rere dispirited at the very outset by the failure of an
attempt to relieve Stirling, and by the issue of a single combat
between Bruce and Henry de Bohun, a knight who bore down upon
him as he was riding peacefully along the front of his army. Robert
was mounted on a small hackney and held only a light battle-axe in
his hand, but, warding off his opponent's spear, he cleft his skull with
so terrible a blow that the handle of the axe was shattered in his grasp.
At the opening of the battle the English archers were thrown forward
to rake the Scottish squares, but they were without support and were
easily dispersed by a handful of horse whom Bruce had held in reserve
for the purpose. The body of men-at-arms next flung themselves on

213

Sec. VI.

The Scotch
War ok

I.NDICrBN-

PKNCK

130.6

1342

ij»3

Bannock
burn

June 24,

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WltSTH.N.Y. 14SM

(716) •72-4903

214

Sec. VI.

The Scotch
War of
Indepen-
dence

1306

TO
134a

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

The Inde-
pendence

of
Scotland

1318
1319

1323

the Scottish front, but their charge was embarrassed by the narrow
space along which the line was forced to move, and the steady resist-
ance of the squares soon threw the knighthood into disorder. " The
horses that were stickit," says an exulting Scotch writer, " rushed and
reeled right rudely." In the moment of failure the sight of a body of
camp-followers, whom they mistook for reinforcements to the enemy,
spread panic through the English host. It broke in a headlong rout.
Its thousands of brilliant horsemen were soon floundering in pits
which had guarded the level ground to Bruce's left, or riding in wild
haste for the border. Few however were fortunate enough to reach it.
Edward himself, with a body of five hundred knights, succeeded in
escaping to Dunbar and the sea. But the flower of his knighthood fell
into the hands of the victors, while the Irishry and the footmen were
ruthlessly cut down by the country folk as they fled. For centuries
after, the rich plunder of the English camp left its traces on the
treasure and vestment rolls of castle and abbey throughout the
Lowlands.

Terrible as was the blow England could not humble herself to re-
linquish her claim on the Scottish crown. With equal pertinacity
Bruce refused all negotiation while the royal title was refused to him,
and steadily pushed on the recovery of his southern dominions.
Berwick was at last forced to surrender, and held against a desperate
attempt at its recapture ; while barbarous forays of the borderers
under Douglas wasted Northumberland. Again the strife between the
Crown and the baronage was suspended to allow the march of a great
English army to the north ; but Bruce declined an engagement till
the' wasted Lowlands starved the invaders into a ruinous retreat. The
failure forced England to stoop to a truce for thiiteen years, in the
negotiation of which Bruce was suffered to take the royal title. But
the truce ceased legally with Edward's deposition. Troops gathered
on either side, and Edward Balliol, a son of the former king John,
was solemnly received as a vassal-king of Scotland at the English
court. Robert was disabled by leprosy from taking the field in person,
but the insult roused him to hurl his marauders again over the border
under Douglas and Randolph. An eye-witness has painted for us the
Scotch army, as it appeared in this campaign : " It consisted of four
thousand men-at-arms, knights and esquires, well mounted, besides
twenty thousand men bold and hardy, armed after the manner of their
country, and mounted upon little hackneys that are never tied up or
dressed, but turned immediately after the day's march to pasture on
the heath or in the fields. . . . They bring no carriages with them on
account of the mountains they have to pass in Northumberland,
neither do they carry with them any provisions of bread and wine, for
their habits of sobriety are such in time of war that they will live for a
long time on flesh half-sodden ivithout bread, and drink the river

IV.]

water v

pans, fc

have fla

which ti

his sadc

little ba^

flesh an(

over the

put a litt

eat to ^A

perform

foe the I

the bord

in the v

disappea

made to

when fou

after a b(

intercept;

lessly up,

court to

dependen

ledged as

The pr

struggle t

the overti

by the pri

rest of thi

The first (

headed b

King's UE

before th<

the Coun<

had intro

stands, E(

execution,

restore gc

govemmei

France for

at last to 1

year after

child of bi

broke out

the late pe

held large

[chap.

larrow

resist-

"The
ed and
>ody of
enemy,
ig rout,
in pits
in wild
reach it.
eded in
lood fell
;n were
enturies

on the
lOUt the

If to re-
rtinacity
I to him,
minions,
esperate
lorderers
veen the
f a great
nent till
at. The
s, in the
le. But
gathered
ig John,
English
person,
e border
ir us the
of four
besides
of their
d up or
sture on
them on
berland,
wine, for
ive for a
he river

IV.]

THE THREE EDWARDS.

215

water without wine. They have therefore no occasion for pots or
pans, for they dress the flesh of the cattle in their skins after they
have flayed them, and being sure to find plenty of them in the country
which they invade, they carry none with them. Under the flaps of
his saddle each man carries a broad piece of metal, behind him a
little bag of oatmeal : when they have eaten too much of the sodden
flesh and their stomach appears weak and empty, they set this plate
over the fire, knead the meal with water, and when the plate is hot
put a little of the paste upon it in a thin cake like a biscuit which they
eat to warm their stomachs. It is therefore no wonder that they
perform a longer day's march than other soldiers." Against such a
foe the English troops "ho marched under their boy-king to protect
the border were utterly helpless. At one time the army lost its way
in the vast border waste ; at another all traces of the enemy had
disappeared, and an offer of knighthood and a hundred marks was
made to any who could tell where the Scots were encamped. But
when found their position behind the Wear proved unassailable, and
after a bold sally on the English camp Douglas foiled an attempt at
intercepting him by a clever retreat. The English levies broke hope-
lessly up, and a fresh foray on Northumberland forced the English
court to submit to peace. By the Treaty of Northampton the in-
dependence of Scotland was formally recognized, and Bruce acknow-
ledged as its king.

The piide of England, however, had been too much aroused by the
struggle to bear easily its defeat. The first result of the treaty was
the overthrow of the government which concluded it, a result hastened
by the pride of its head, Roger Mortimer, and by his exclusion of the
rest of the nobles from all share in the administration of the realm.
The first efforts to shake Roger's power were unsuccessful : a league
headed by the Earl of Lancaster broke up without result ; and the
King's uncle, the Earl of Kent, was actually brought to the block,
before the young King himself interfered in the struggle. Entering
the Council chamber in Nottingham Castle, with a force which he
had introduced through a secret passage in the rock on which it
stands, Edward arrested Mortimer with his own hands, hurried him to
execution, and assumed the control of affairs. His first care was to
restore good order throughout the country, which under the late
government had fallen into ruin, and to free his hands by a peace with
France for further enterprises in the North. Fortune indeed, seemed
at last to have veered to the English side ; the death of Bruce only a
year after the Treaty of Northampton left the Scottish throne to a
child of but eight years old, and the internal difficulties of the realm
broke out in civil strife. To the great barons on either side the border
the late peace involved serious losses, for many of the Scotch houses
held large estates in England, as many of the English lords held

Sec. VI.

The Scotch
War or
Indepen-

DENCE

laoe

TO
134a

. ii

1.528

Scotland

and

Edward

the Third

»33o

;sM

i \

"1^«

':m

2l6

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VI.

Thk Scotch
War ok
Indepen-

DENCB

1306

134fl

1332

1333

1337
1339
»342

large estates in Scotland ; and although the treaty had provided for
their claims, they had in each case been practically set aside. It is
this discontent of the barons at the new settlement which explains the
sudden success of Edward Balliol in his snatch at the Scottish throne.
In spite of King Edward's prohibition, he sailed from England at the
head of a body of nobles who claimed estates in the north, landed on
the shores of Fife, and, after repulsing with immense loss an army
which attacked him near Perth, was crowned at Scone, while David
Bruce fled helplessly to France. Edward had given no open aid to the
enterprise, but the crisis tempted his ambition, and he demanded and
obtained from Balliol an acknowledgement of the English suzerainty.
The acknowledgement, however, was fatal to Balliol himself. He was
at once driven from his realm, and Berwick, which he had agreed to
surrender to Edward, was strongly garrisoned against an English
attack. The town was soon besieged, but a Scotch army under the
regent Douglas, brother to the famous Sir James, advanced to its
relief, and attacked a covering force, which was encamped on the
strong position of Halidon Hill. The English bowmen, however,
vindicated the fame they had first won at Falkirk, and were soon to
crown in the victory of Crdcy ; and the Scotch only struggled through
the marsh which covered the English front to be riddled with a storm
of arrows, and to break in utter rout. The battle decided the fate of
Berwick, and from that time the town remained the one part of
Edward's conquests which was preserved by the English crown.
Fragment as it was, it was always viewed legally as representing the
realm of which it had once formed a part. As Scotland, it had its
chancellor, chamberlain, and other officers of State ; and the peculiar
heading of Acts of Parliament enacted for England " and the town of
Berwick-upon-Tweed" still preserves the memory of its peculiar
position. Balliol was restored to his throne by the conquerors, and
his formal cession of the Lowlands to England rewarded their aid.
During the next three years Edward persisted in the line of policy
he had adopted, retaining his hold over Southern Scotland, and aiding
his sub-king Balliol in campaign after campaign against the despairing
efforts of the nobles who still adhered to the house of Bruce. His
perseverance was all but crowned with success, when the outbreak of
war with France saved Scotland by drawing the strength of England
across the Channel. The patriot party drew again together. Balliol
found himself at last without an adherent and withdrew to the Court
of Edward, while David returned to his kingdom, and won back the
chief fastnesses of the Lowlands. The freedom of Scotland was, in
fact, secured. From a war of conquest and patriotic resistance the
struggle died into a petty strife between two angry neighbours, which
became a mere episrde in the larger contest between England and
France.

[chap.

led for

It is
ins the
hrone.
at the
led on
I army
David
i to the
,ed and
jrainty.
He was
reed to
English
der the
I to its
on the
owever,
soon to
through
a storm
; fate of
part of

crown.
;ing the
had its
peculiar
town of
peculiar
ors, and
leir aid.
f policy
d aiding
bpairing
:e. His
break of

;ngland

Balliol
le Court
)ack the

was, in
mce the

s, which

and and

'^1

HtANCE AT THE TREAH' OF BRETlGJTi

]Sav»vV

S PAIN,

i^ Vj^^'^'TB glffiZr

Stanfiyr^y Gtogmphieal E*tab^

London : Macmillan ^ Co .

CHAPTER V.

THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR.

1336—1431.

Section I.— Edward the Third, 1336— 1360.

[Authorities. — The concluding part of the chronicle of Walter of Hemin-
burgh or Ilemingford seems to have been jotted down as news of the passing
events reached its author ; it ends at the battle of Crecy. Ilearnc has pub-
lished another contemporary account by Robert of Avosbury, which closes in
1356. A third account by Knyghton, p canon of Leicester, will be found in
the collection of Twysden. At the end of this century and the beginning of
the next the annais that had been carried on in the Abbey of St. Albans were
thrown together by Walsingham in the ** Ilistoria Anglicana " which bears his
name, a compilation whose history is given in the prefaces to the "Chronica
Monasterii S. Albani " (Rolls Series). Rymer's Fcedera is rich in documents
fo»- this period, and from this lime we have a storehouse of political and social
information in the Parliamentary Rolls. For the French war itself our primaiy
authority is the Chronicle of Jehan le Bel, a canon of S. Lambert of Liege,
who had himself served in Edward's campaign against the Scots, and spent
the rest of his life at the court of John of I lainault. Up to the Treaty of
Bretigny, where it closes, Froissart has done little more than copy this work,
making however large additions from his own inquiries, especially in the
Flemish and Breton campaigns and the account of Crecy. ^ A Hainaulter of
Valenciennes, Froissart held a post in Queen Philippa's household from 1361 to
1369 ; and under this influence produced in 1373 the first edition of his well-
known Chronicle. A later edition is far less English in tone, and a third ver-
sion, begun by him in his old age after long absence from England, is distinctly
French in its sympathies. Froissart's vivacity and j>icturesqueness blind us to
the inaccuracy of his details ; as an historical authority he is of little value.
The incidental mention of Crecy and the later English expeditions by Villani
in his great Florentine Chronicle are important. The best modern account of
this period is that by Mr. W. Longman, '* History of Edward lU." Mr.
Morley (" English Writers ") has treated in great detail of Chaucer.]

[Dr. Stubbs' "Constitutional History" (vol. ii.), published since this
chapter was written, deals with the whole period. — Eil.'\

In the middle of the fourteenth century the great movement towards
national unity which had begun under the last of the Norman Kings
seemed to have reached its end, and the perfect fusion of conquered
and conquerors into an English people was marked by the disuse, even
amongst the nobler classes, of the French tongue. In spite of the
efforts of the grammar schools, and of the strength of fashion, English
was winning its way throughout the reign of Edward the Third to its

England

under

Edward

III.

*--. \

% i

.■*A\

If'

2l8

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

v.]

Skc. I.

Edward
riiE TiiiKu

1336

1360

final triumph in that of his grandson. " Children in school," says a
writer of the earlier reign, " against the usage and manner of all other
nations, be compelled for to leave their own language, and for to con-
st»"ue their lessons and their things in French, and so they have since
Normans first came into England. Also gentlemen's children be
taught to speak French from the time that they be rocked in their
cradle, and know how to speak and play with a chik"s toy ; and up-
landish (or country) men will liken themselves to gentlemen, and strive
with great busyness to speak French for to be more told of." " This
manner," adds a translator of Richard's time, " was much used before
the first murrain (the plague of 1349), and is since somewhat changed ;
for John Cornwal, a master of grammar, changed the lore in grammar
school and construing of French into English ; and Richard Pencrych
learned this manner of teaching of him, as others did of Pencrych. So
that now, the year of our Lord, 1385, and of the second King Richaid
after the Conquest nine, in all the grammar schools of England childien
leaveth French, and coustrueth and learneth in English." A more
formal note of the change is found when English was ordered to be
used in courts of law in 1 362 " because the French tongue is much
unknown ; " and in the following year it was employed by the Chan-
cellor in opening Parliament. Bishops began to preach in English,
and the English tracts of Wyclif made it once more a literary tongue.
This drift towards a geP'jral use of the national tongue told powerfully
on literature. 'Ihc mfluence of the French romances everywhere
tended to make French the one literary language at the opening of
the fourteenth century, and in England this influence had been backed
by the French^one of the court of Henry the Third and the three
Edwards. But at the close of the reign of Edward the Third the long
French romances needed to be translated even for knightly hearers.
" Let clerks indite in Latin," says the author of the " Testament of
Love," " and let Frenchmen in their French also indite their quaint
terms, for it is kindly to their mouths ; and let us show our fantasies
in such wordes as we learned of our mother's tongue." But the new
national life afforded nobler material than " fantasies " now for English
literature. With the completion of the work of national unity had
come the completion of the work of national freedom. Under the
first Edward the Parliament had vindicated its right to the control of
taxation, under the second it had advanced from the removal of
ministers to the deposition of a King, under the third it gave its voice
on questions of peace and war, controlled expenditure, and regelated
the course of civil administration. The vigour of English life showed
itself socially in the wide extension of commerce, in the rapid growth
of the woollen trade, and the increase of manufactures after the settle-
ment of Flemish weavers on the eastern coast ; in the progress of the
towns, fresh as they were from the victory of the craft-gilds ; and in

the deve

rise of t

its activi

ness whi

feeling,

broke th

of the L(

over the

It is tl

verse of

a Londo:

that the

seems to

career w<

he was n

first bore

to be ma

of Br^tigi

time. H

and it wa

this time

employee

with the

I374> am

brilliant (

memory

reverently

at Padua,

ofGriseld

Comptrol

member c

1 39 1 Cler

Windsor,

forked be;

gi#dle, ani

his own.

portly wa

jested at

wouldest i

" and ever

neighbour

thy own ]

another b(

although/'

abstractioj

v.]

THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR.

the developement of agriculture through the division of lands, and the
rise of the tenant farmer and the freeholder. It gave nobler signs of
its activity in the spirit of national independence and moral earnest-
ness which awoke at the call of Wyclif. New forces of thought and
feeling, which were destined to tell on every age of our later history,
broke their way through the crust of feudalism in the socialist revolt
of the Lollards, and a sudden burst of military glory threw its glamour
over the age of Cr^cy and Poitiers.

It is this new gladness of a great people which utters itself in the
verse of Geoffrey Chaucer. Chaucer was born about 1 340, the son of
a London vintner who lived in Thames Street ; and it was in London
that the bulk of his life was spent. His family, though not noble,
seems to have been of some importance, for from the opening of his
career we find Chaucer in close connexion with the Court. At sixteen
he was made page to the wife of Lionel of Clarence ; at nineteen he
first bore arms in the campaign of 1359. But he vas luckless enough
to be made prisoner ; and from the time of his release after the treaty
of Br^tigny he took no further share in the military enterprises of his
time. He seems again to have returned to service about the Court,
and it was now that his first poems made their appearance, and from
this time John of Gaunt may be looked upon as his patron. He was
employed in seven diplomatic missions which were probably connected
with the financial straits of the Crown, and three of these, in 1372,
1374, and 1378, carried him to Italy. He visited Genoa and the
brilliant court of the Visconti at Milan ; at Florence, where the
memory of Dante, the "great master" whom he commemorates so
reverently in his verse, was still living, he may have met Boccaccio ;
at Padua, like his own clerk of Oxenford, he possibly caught the story
of Griseldis from the lips of Petrarca. He was a busy, practical worker ;
Comptroller of the Customs in 1374, of the Petty Customs in 1382, a
member of the Commons in the Parliament of 1386, and from 1389 to
1 391 Clerk of the Royal Works, busy with building at Westminster,
Windsor, and the Tower. A single portrait has preserved for us his
forked beard, his dark-coloured dress, the knife and pen-case at his
gi#dle, and we may supplement this portrait by a few vivid touches of
his own. The sly, elvish face, the quick walk, the plump figure and
portly waist were those of a genial and humorous man ; but men
jested at his silence, his love of study. "Thou lookest as thou
wouldest find an hare," laughs the Host, in the " Canterbury Tales,"
" and ever on the ground I see thee stare." He heard little of his
neighbours' talk when office work was over. " Thou goest home to
thy own house anon, and also dumb as any stone thou sittest at
another book till fully dazed is thy look, and livest thus as an heremite,
although," he adds slyly, " thy abstinence is lite " (little). But of this
abstraction from his fello»vs there is no trace in his verse. No poetry

219

Sec. I.
Kdw\ki>

1336

13«0

Chancer

1340-1400

t i

^ ' 1 '■'' :si1

■f"

ill

220

Sec. I.
KnwAKU

TIIK TlllKt)

1336

1360

H ..ORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

1383

was ever more human than Chaucer's ; none ever came more frankly
and genially home to its readers. The first note of his song is a note
of freshness and gladness. " Of ditties and of songes glad, the which
he for my sake made, the land fulfilled is over all," Gower makes Love
say in his lifetime ; and the impression of gladness remains just as
fresh now that four hundred years have passed away. The historical
character of Chaucer's work lies on its surface. It stands out in vivid
contrast with the poetic literature from the heart of which it sprang.
The long French romances were the product of an age of wealth and
ease, ot" indolent curiosity, of a fanciful and self-indulgent sentiment.
Of the great passions which gave life to the Middle Ages, that of
religious enthusiasm had degenerated into the pretty conceits of
Mariolatry, that of war into the extravagances of Chivalry. Love,
indeed, remained ; it was the one theme of troubadour and trouvijre,
but it was a love of refinement, of romantic follies, of scholastic dis-
cussions, of sensuous enjoyment — a plaything rather than a passion.
Nature had to reflect the pleasant indolence of man ; the song of the
minstrel moved through a perpetual May-time ; the grass was ever
green ; the music of the lark and the nightingale rang out from field
and thicket. There was a gay avoidance of all that is serious, moral,
or reflective in man's life : life was too amusing to be serious, too
piquant, too sentimental, too full of interest and gaiety and chat. It
was an age of talk ; " mirth is none," says the Host, " to ride on by
the way dumb as a stone ; " and the trouvere aimed simply at being
the most agreeable talker of his day. His romances, his rimes of Sir
Tristram, his Romance of the Rose, are full of colour and fantasy,
endless in det^l, but with a sort of gorgeous idleness about their very
length, the minuteness of their description of ou'.er things, the vague-
ness of their touch when it passes to the subtler inner world. It was
with this literature that Chaucer had till now been familiar, and it
was this which he followed in his earlier work. But from the time of
his visits to Milan and Genoa his sympathies drew him not to the
dying verse of France, but to the new and mighty upgrowth of poetry
in Italy. Dante's eagle looks at him from the sun. " Fraunces
Petrark, the laureat poetc," is to him one " whose rethorique swe'ete
enlumyned al Itail of poetrie." The " Troilus " is an enlarged English
version of Boccaccio's " Filostrato," the Knight's Talc bears slight
traces of his Teseide. It was, indeed, the "Decameron" which
suggested the very form of the " Canterbury Tales." But even while
changing, as it were, the front of English poetry, Chaucer preserves
his own distinct personality. If he quizzes in the rime of Sir Thopaz
the wearisome idleness of the French romance, he retains all that was
worth retaining of the French temper, its rapidity and agility of
movement, its lightness and brilliancy of touch, its airy mockery, its
gaiety and good humour, its critical coolness and self-control. The

v.]

Fr( .ch

sturdy

extravagj

the othei

tale, he

Boccacci(

Troilus

ableness

on the un

But the

element

core, and

great poe

begun aft

bei .veen

tales add(

his laboui

at Westm

to Canter

tales, coni

peculiar c

and the ui

of mediae^

the wond(

allegory ai

his genius

start in t

distinct fig

the noble

knight" ir

beside hirr

faced yeon

his hand.

—the bra^\

as the ch

harpers of

and devou

first he foil

pardoner v

hot"— the

red mouth

ing is then

profits of t

busier tha

love of boc

v.l

THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR.

Fn ,ch wit quickens in him more than in any English writer the
sturdy sense and slirewdness of our national disposition, corrects its
extravagance, and relieves its somewhat ponderous morality. If, on
the other hand, he echoes the joyous carelessness of the Italian
tale, he tempers it with the ICnglish seriousness. As he follows
Hoccaccio, all his chani^^es are on the side of purity ; and when the
Troilus of the Florentine ends with the old sneer at the change-
ableness of woman, Chaucer bids us " look Godward," and dwells
on the unchangeableness of Heaven.

But the genius of Chaucer was neither French nor Italian, whatever
element it might borrow from either literature, but English to the
core, and from 1384 all trace of foreign influence dies away. The
great poem on which his fame must rest, the " Canterbury Tales," was
begun after his first visits to Italy, and its best tales were written
bel.veen 1384 and 1391. The last ten years of his life saw a few more
tales added ; but his power was lessening, and in 1400 he rested from
his labours in his last home, a house in the garden of St. Mary's Chapel
at Westminster. The framework — that of a pilgrimage from London
to Canterbury — not only enabled him to string together a number of
tales, composed at different times, but lent itself admirably to the
peculiar characteristics of his poetic temper, his dramatic versatility,
and the universality of his sympathy. His tales cover the whole field
of mediaeval poetry ; the legend of the priest, the knightly romance,
the wonder-tale of the traveller, the br>ad humour of the fabliau,
allegory and apologue are all there. He finds a yet wider scope for
his genius in the persons who te'l these stories, the thirty pilgrims who
start in the May morning fro \ the Tabard in Southwark — thirty
distinct figures, representatives of every class of English society from
the noble to the ploughman. We see the "verray perfight gentil
knight" in cassock and coat of mail, with his curly-headed squire
beside him, fresh as the May morning, and behind them the brown-
faced yeoman, in his coat and hood of green, with the good bow in
his hand. A group of ecclesiastics light up for us the mediaeval church
—the brawny hunt-loving monk, whose bridle jingles as loud and clear
as the chapel-bell — the wanton friar, first among the beggars and
harpers of the country side — the poor parson, threadbare, learned,
and devout (" Christ's lore and His apostles twelve he taught, and
first he followed it himself") — the summoner with his fiery face — the
pardoner with his wallet " bret-fuU of pardons, come from Rome all
hot" — the lively prioress with her courtly French lisp, her soft little
red mouth, and "Amor vincit omnia" graven on her brooch. Learn-
ing is there in the portly person of the doctor of physic, rich with the
profits of the pestilence — the busy serjeant-of-law, " that ever seemed
busier than he was " — the hollow-cheeked clerk of Oxford, with his
love of books, and short sharp sentences that disguise a latent tender-

231

Src. I.

KnwARn
IIIK 'riiiKD

1336

Th«
Canter-
bury
Tales

ft \

I
I

it. i

•\ 'Am

222

HISTORY or THK ENGLISH PEOPLK.

[chap.

Sfc. I.

Edward
TMit Third

1336

1360

ncss which breaks out at last in the story of (iriseldis. Around them
crowd types of English industry ; the merchant ; the franklin, in
whose house " it snowed of mca' and drink ; " the sailor fresh from
frays in the Channel ; the buxom wife of IJath ; the broad-shouldered
miller ; the haberdasher, carpenter, weaver, dyer, tapestry-maker, each
in the livery of his craft ; .ind last, the honest ploughman, who would
dyke and delve for the poor without hire. It is the first time in
English poetry that we are brought face to face not with characters or
allegories or reminiscences of the past, but with living and breathing
men, men distinct in temper and sentiment as in face or costume or
mode of speech ; and with this distinctness of each maintained
throughout the story by a thousand shades of expression and action.
It is the first time too, that we meet with the dramatic power which
not only creates each character, but combines it with its fellows, which
not only adjusts each tale or jest to the temper of the person who
utters it, but fuses all into a poetic unity. It is life in its largeness, its
variety, its complexity, which surrounds us in the " Canterbury Tales."
In some of the stories^ indeed, composed no doubt at an earlier time,
there is the tedium of the old romance or the pedantry of the school-
man ; but taken as a whole the poem is the work not of a man of
letters, but of a man of action. Chaucer has received his training
from war, courts, business, travel — a training not of books, but of life.
And it is life that he loves — the delicacy of its sentiment, the breadth
of its farce, its laughter and its tears, the tenderness of its Griseldis or
the Smollett-like adventures of the miller and the clerks. It is this
largeness of heart, this wide tolerance, which enables him to reflect
man for us as none but Shakspere has ever reflected him, and to
do this with a pathos, a shrewd sense and kindly humour, a
freshness and joyousness of feeling, that even Shakspere has not
surpassed.

It is strange that such a voice as this should have awakened no
echo in the singers who follow ; but the first burst of English song
died as suddenly and utterly with Chaucer as the hope and glory of
his age. The hundred years which follow the brief sunshine of Crdcy
and the " Canterbury Tales " are years of the deepest gloom ; no age
of our history is more sad and sombre than the age which we traverse
from the third Edward to Joan of Arc. The throb of hope and glory
which pulsed at its outset through every class of English society died
at its close into inaction or despair. Material life lingered on indeed,
commerce still widened, but its progress was dissociated from all the
nobler elements of national well-being. The towns sank again into
close oligarchies ; the bondsmen struggling forward to freedom fell
back into a serfage which still leaves its trace on the soil. Literature
reached its lowest ebb. The religious revival of the Lollard was
trodden out in blood, while the Church shrivelled into a self-seeking

secular p
but extin
ended wi
The sc
more tha
temper o
.Scotland
involved
back, a c
had begu
struggle \
cesses of
more as I
Duchy of
heritance
sooner be
than a p
between t
which cul
to 8,000 I
France, tl
defiance,
of the ms
fashion a^
that they
to make
contest c(
before his
Edward c
Guienne i
French so
war. Th(
arms, and
but the fir
Edward h
first conqi
the recov<
A truce w
even after
forsixyeai
face the E
which alio
Bruce was
quarrel o''
the reign (

was

THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR.

secular priesthood. In the clash of civil strife political freedom was all
but extinguished, and the age which began with the Ciood Parliament
ended with the despotism of the Tudors.

The secret of the change is to be found in the fatal war which for
more than a hundred years drained the strength and corrupted the
temper of the English people. We have followed the attack on
Scotland to its disastrous close, but the struggle ere it ended, had
involved England in a second contest, to which we must now turn
back, a contest yet more ruinous than that which Edward the First
had begun. From the war with .Scotland sprang the hundred years'
struggle with France. From the first France had watched the suc-
cesses of her rival in the north, partly with a natural jealousy, but still
more as likely to aflford her an opening for winning the great southern
Duchy of Guienne and Gascony — the one fragment of Eleanor's in-
heritance which remained to her descendants. Scotland had no
sooner begun to resent the claims of her over-lord, Edward the First,
than a pretext for open quarrel was found by France in the rivalry
between the mariners of Normandy and those of the Cinque Ports,
which culminated at the moment in a great lea-fight that proved fatal
to 8,000 Frenchmen. So eager was Edward to avert a quarrel with
France, that his threats roused the English seamen to a characteristic
defiance. " Be the King's Council well advised," ran the remonstrance
of the mariners, " that if wrong or grievance be done them in any
fashion against right, they will sooner forsake wives, children, and all
that they have, and go seek through the seas where they shall think
to make their profit." In spite, therefore, of Edward's efforts the
contest continued, and Philip found an opportunity to cite the King
before his court at Paris for wrongs done to him as suzerain. Again
Edward endeavoured to avert the conflict by a formal cession of
Guienne into Philip's hands during forty days, but the refusal of the
French sovereign to restore the province left no choice for him but
war. The refusal of the Scotch barons to answer his summons to
arms, and the revolt of Balliol, proved that the French outrage was
but the first blow in a deliberate and long-planned scheme of attack ;
Edward had for a while no force to waste on France, and when the
first conquest of Scotland freed his hands, his league with Flanders for
the recovery of Guienne was foiled by the strife with his baronage.
A truce with Philip set him free to meet new troubles in the north ; but
even after the victory of Falkirk Scotch independence was still saved
for six years bythe threats of France and the intervention of its ally, Boni-
face the Eighth ; and it was only the quarrel of these two confederates
which allowed Edward to complete its subjection. But the rising under
Bruce was again backed by French aid and by the renewal of the old
quarrel over Guienne — a quarrel which hampered England through
the reign of Edward the Second, and which indirectly brought about

aaa

Src. I.

Edward
THK Thiro

1336

1360

England

and
rrano*

1293

1294

1296

^1 m

1 ■ •!

"'4

iibi

1304

1305

1 l;i',

sp-tl

224

"ISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

Sec. 1.

\ EUWAKI)

\ i UK TiiiKi)
1336

1360

1332

1335

The

Openingr

of the

W^ar

1337

•338
1339

'#''';

[chap.

his terrible fall. The accession of Edward the Third secured a
momentary peace, but the fresh attack on Scotland which marked the
opening of his rei^n kindled hostility anew ; the young King David
found refuge in France, and arms, money, and men were despatched
from its ports to support his cause. It was this intervention of France
which foiled Edward's hopes of the submission of Scotland at the very
moment when success seemed in his grasp ; the solemn announcement
by Philip of Valois that his treaties bound him to give effective help to
his old ally, and the assembly of a French fleet in the Channel drew
the King from his struggle in the north to face a storm which his
negotiations could no longer avert.

From the first the war took European dimensions. The weakness
of the Empire, the captivity of the Papacy at Avignon, left France
without a rival among European powers. In numbers, in wealth, the
French people far surpassed their neighbours over the Channel.
England can hardly have counted four millions of inhabitants, France
boasted of twenty. Edward could only bring eight thousand men-at-
arms into the field. Philip, while a third of his force was busy else-
where, could appear at the head of forty thousand. Edward's whole
energy was bent on meeting the strength of France by a coalition of
powers against her ; and his plans were helped by the dread which
the great feudatories of the Empire who lay nearest to him felt of
French annexation, as well as oy the quarrel of the Empire with the
Papacy. Anticipating the later policy of Godolphin and Pitt,
Edward became the paymaster of the poorer princes of Germany ; his
subsidies purchased the aid of Hainault, Gelders, and Julich ; sixty
thousand crowns went to the Duke of Brabant, while the Emperor him-
self was induced by a promise of three thousand gold florins to furnish
two thousand men-at-arms. Negotiations and profuse expenditure,
^lOwever, brought the King little fruit save the titie of Vicar-General of
the Empire on the left of the Rhine ; now the Emperor hung back,
now the allies refused to move ; and when the host at last crossed the
border, Edward found it impossible to bring the French king to an
engagement. But as hope from the Imperial alliance faded away, a
fresh hope dawned on the King from another quarter. Flanders was
his natural ally. England was the great wool-producing country of
the west, but few woollen fabrics were woven in England. The number
of weavers' gilds shows that the trade was gradually extending,
and at the very outset of his reign Edward had taken steps for its
encouragement. He invited Flemish weavers to settle in his country,
and took the new immigrants, who chose the eastern counties
for the seat of their trade, under his royal protection. But English
manufactures were still in their infancy, and nine-tenths of the English
wool went to the looms of Bruges or of Ghent. We may see the rapid
grov/th of this export trade in the fact that the King received in a

v.]

single ye<

stoppage

Flemish t

alliance, t

of the tov

treaty wa

towns, an

gathered s

the Cham

the Frenc

proved fri

him to a t

Brittany,

claimants

dragged c

English C5

1345 prov(

indeed ha

bankers oj

overtures

he advanci

among the

difficult ei

male issu

Isabella.

daughters

Philip's so

this diflicu

right of su

son, as the

lifetime, c(

Philip in a

that only n

the right ir

to the son

mounted tl

have been

fact, did fu

and it was

his claim

Flemish to

The faih

England it

he landed i

the whole f

v.]

THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR.

single year more than ;^ 30,000 from duties levied on wool alone. A

stoppage of this export would throw half the population of the great

Flemish towns out of work ; and Flanders was drawn to the English

alliance, not only by the interest of trade, but by the democratic spirit

of the towns which jostled roughly with the feudalism of France. A

treaty was concluded with the Duke of Brabant and the Flemish

towns, and preparations were made for a new campaign. Philip

gathered a fleet of two hundred vessels at Sluys to prevent his crossing

the Channel, but Edward with a far smaller force utterly destroyed

the French ships, and marched to invest Tournay. Its siege however

proved fruitless ; his vast army broke up, and want of money forced

him to a truce for a year. A quarrel of succession to the Duchy of

Brittany, which broke out in 1341, and in which of the two rival

claimants one was supported by Philip and the other by Edward,

dragged on year after year. In Flanders things went ill for the

English cause, and the death of the great statesman Van Arteveldt in

1 345 proved a heavy blow to Edward's projects. The King's difficulties

indeed had at last reached their height. His loans from the great

bankers of Florence amounted to half a million of our money ; his

overtures for peace were contemptuously rijected ; the claim which

he advanced to the French crown found not a single adherent save

among the burghers of Ghent. To establish such a claim, indeed, was

difficult enough. The three sons of Philip the Fair had died without

male issue, and Edward claimed as the son of Philip's daughter

Isabella. But though her brothers had left no sons, they had left

daughters ; and if female succession were admitted, ♦hese daughters of

Philip's sons would precede a son of Philip's daughter. Isabella met

this difficulty by contending that though females could transmit the

right of succession they could not themselves possess it, '^nd that her

son, as the nearest living male descei^dant of Philip, and born in his

lifetime, could claim in preference to females who were related to

Philip in as near a degree. But the bulk of French jurists asserted

that only male succession gave right to the throne. On such a theory

the right inheritable from Philip was exhausted ; and the crown passed

to the son of his brother Charles of Valois, who in fact peacefully

mounted the throne as Philip the Sixth. Edward's claim seems to

have been regarded on both sides as a mere formality ; the King, in

fact, did full and liege homage to his rival for his Duchy of Guienne ;

and it was not till his hopes from Germany had been exhausted, and

his claim was found to be useful in securing the loyal aid of the

Flemish towns, that it was brought seriously to the front.

The failure of his foreign hopes threw Edward on the resources of
England itself, and it was with an army of thirty thousand men that
he landed at La Hogue, and commenced a march which was to change
the whole face of the war. The French forces were engaged in hold-

225

Sec. I.

Edward
THE Third

1336

1360

1340

'. i

1330

133I

Or^cj

< s'

226

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. I.

EOWARD
THB ThIKU

1336

1360

■H.

Crity

August 26,

1346

ing in check an English army which had landed in Guienne ; and
panic seized the French King as Edward now marched through
Normandy, and finding the bridges on the lower Seine broken, pushed
straight on Paris, rebuilt the bridge of Poissy and threatened the
capital. At this crisis, however, France found an unexpected help in
a body of German knights. The Pope having deposed the Emperor
Lewis of Bavaria, had crowned as his successor a son of King John
of Bohemia, the well-known Charles IV. of the Golden Bull. But
against this Papal assumption of a right to bestow the German Crown,
Germany rose as one man, and Charles, driven to seek help from
Philip, now found himself in France with his father and a troop of five
hundred knights. Hurrying to Paris this German force formed the
nucleus of an army which assembled at St. Denys ; and which was
soon reinforced by 1 5,000 Genoese cross-bowmen who had been hired
from among the soldiers of the Lord of Monaco on the sunny Riviera,
and arrived at this hour of need. The French troops too were called
from Guienne to the rescue. With this host rapidly gathering in
his front Edward abandoned his march on Paris, and threw himself
across the Seine to join a Flemish force gathered at Gravelines, and
open a campaign in the north. But the rivers in his path were
carefully guarded, and it was only by surprising the ford of Blanche-
Taque on the Somme, that Edward escaped the necessity of surren-
dering to the vast host which was now hastening in pursuit. His com-
munications, however, were no sooner secured than he halted at the
village of Crdcy, in Ponthieu, and resolved to give battle. Half of
his army, now greatly reduced in strength by his rapid marches, con-
sisted of the light-armed footmen of Ireland and Wales ; the bulk of
the remainder was composed of English bowmen. The King ordered
his men-at-arms to dismount, and drew up his forces on a low rise
sloping gently to the south-east, with a windmill on its summit from
which he could overlook the whole field of battle. Immediately
beneath him lay his reserve, while at the base of the slope was placed
the main body of the army in two divisions, that to ilie right com-
manded by the young Prince of Wales, Edward the Black Prince as
he was called, that to the left by the Earl of Northampton. A small
ditch protected the English front, and behind it the bowmen were
drawn up " in the form of a harrow," with small bombards between
them " which, with fire, threw little iron balls to frighten the horses" —
the first instance of the use of artillery in field warfare. The halt of
the English army took Philip by surprise, and he attempted for a time
to check the advance of his army, but the disorderly host rolled on to
the English front. The sight of his enemies, indeed, stirred the
King's own blood to fury, " for he hated them," and at vespers the
fight began. The Genoese crossbowmen were ordered to begin the
attack, but the men were weary with the march; a sudden storm

v.|

wetted an

with whicl

silence in

brought a

seemed as

as the Gei

into their 1

the head (

For the ir

send him j

help himse

is in a har

to those th

send to mt

for if God

honour ma

Edward co

The Engli

while the

brought kn

wavering i

cried the b

to the Gerr

me so far

sword of n

plunged int

ing. The

himself hu

knights an(

force — lay <

"God h£

Denys, in

great host >

the fall of P

ruin at a sir

social fabri

superiority ^

power lay

freeholders

weapon into

carried a ne

struck dow

in sheer h*

feudalism tc

day was the

, 1!

v.j

THE HUKDRED YEARS' WAR.

wetted and rendered useless their bowstrings ; and the loud shouts
with which they leapt forvvard to the encounter were met with dogged
silence in the English ranks. Their first arrow-flight, however,
brought a terrible reply. So rapid was the English shot, "that it
seemed as if it snowed." " Kill me these scoundrels," shouted Philip,
as the Genoese fell back ; and his men-at-arms plunged butchering
into their broken ranks, while the Counts of Alen^on and Flanders, at
the head of the French knighthood, fell hotly on the Prince's line.
For the instant his small force seemed lost, but Edward refused to
send him aid. " Is he dead or unhorsed, or so wounded that he cannot
help himself?" he asked the envoy. "No, Sir," was the reply, " but he
is in a hard passage of arms, and sorely needs your help." " Return
to those that sent you, Sir Thomas," said the King, " and bid them not
send to me again so long as my son lives ! Let the boy win his spurs ;
for if God so order it, I will that the day may be his, and that the
honour may be with him and them to whom I have given it in charge."
Edward could see, in fact, from his higher ground, that all went v/ell.
The English bowmen and men-at-arms held their ground stoutly,
while the Welshmen stabbed the French horses in the meMe, and
brought knight after knight to the ground. Soon the French host was
wavering in a fatal confusion. "You are my vassals, my friends,"
cried the blind King John of Bohemia, who had joined Philip's army,
to the German nobles around him : "I pray and beseech you to lead
me so far into the fight that I may strike one good blow with this
sword of mine ! " Linking their bridles together, the little company
plunged into the thick of the combat to fall as their fellows were fall-
ing. The battle went steadily against the French: at last Philip
himself hurried from the field, and the defeat became a rout: 1,200
knights and 30,000 footmen— a number equal to the whole English
force — lay dead upon the ground.

"God has punished us for our sins," cries the chronicler of St.
Denys, in a passion of bewildered grief, as he tells the rout of the
great host which he had seen mustering beneath his abbey walls. But
the fall of France was hardly so sudden or so incomprehensible as the
ruin at a single blow of a system of warfare, and of the political and
social fabric which rested on it. Feudalism depended on the
superiority of the mounted noble to the unmounted churl ; its fighting
power lay in its knighthood. But the English yeomen and small
freeholders who bore the bow in the national fyrd had raised their
weapon into a terrible engine of war ; in the English archers Edward
carried a new class of soldiers to the fields of France. The churl had
struck down the noble ; the yeoman proved more than a match
in sheer hard fighting for the knight. From the day of Crdcy
feudalism tottered slowly but surely to its grave. To Engla.id the
day was the beginning of a career of military glory, which, fatal as it

Q 2

227

Sec. I.

Edward
theThiru

i33e

1360

4- ■

!l ■ !

^ i 4 yi

Calais

22$

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. I.

Edward
The Third

laae

1360

Neville's
Cross

Oct. 1346

1347

III

was destined to prove to the higher sentiments and interests of the
nation, gave it for the moment an energy such as it had never known
before. Victory followed victory. A few months after Cr^cy a Scotch
army which had burst into the north was routed at Neville's Cross,
and its King, David Bruce, taken prisoner ; while the withdrawal of
the French from the Garonne enabled the English to recover Poitou.
Edward meanwhile turned to strike at the naval superiority of France
by securing the mastery of the Channel. Calais was a great pirate-
haven ; in one year alone, twenty-two privateers had sailed from its
port ; while its capture promised the King an easy base of com-
munication with Flanders, and of operations against France. The
siege lasted a year, and it was not till Philip had failed to relieve it
that the town was starved into surrender. Mercy was granted to the
garrison and the people on condition that six of the citizens gave
themselves unconditionally into the King's hands. " On them," said
Edward, v/ith a burst of iDitter hatred, " I will do my will." At the
sound of the town bell, Jehan le Bel tells us, the folk of Calais gathered
round the bearer of these terms, " desiring to hear their good news,
for they were all mad with hunger. When the said knight told them
his news, then began they to weep and cry so loudly that it was great
pity. Then stood up the wealthiest burgess of the town. Master
Eustache de 8. Pierre by name, and spake thus before all : *My masters,
great grief and mishap it were for all to leave such a people as this is
to die by famine or otherwise ; and great charity and grace would he
win from our Lord who could defend them from dying. For me, I
have great hope in the Lord that if I can save this people by my death,
I shall have pardon for my faults, wherefore will I be the first of the
six, and of my own will put myself barefoot in my shirt and with a
halter round my neck in the mercy of King Edward.' " The list of
devoted men was soon made up, and the six victims were led before
the King. " All the host assembled together ; there was great press,
and many bade hang them openly, and many wept for pity. The
noble King came with his train of counts and barons to the place, and
the Queen followed him, though great with child, to see what there
would be. The six citizens knelt down at once before the King, and
Master Eustache said thus : * Gentle King, here be we six who have
been of the old bourgeoisie of Calais and great merchants ; we bring
you the keys of the town and castle of Calais, and render them to you
at your pleasure. We set ourselves in such wise as you see purely at
your will, to savo the remnant of ihe people that has suffered much
pain. So may you have pity and mercy on us for your high nobleness'
sake.' Certes, there was then in that place neither lord nor knight that
wept not for pity, nor who could speak for pity ; but the King had his
heart so hardened by wrath, that for a long while he could not reply ;
then he commanded to cut off their heads. All the knights and lords

v.]

prayed hi
but he w(
de Maunj
the renow
men can !
say that y
to death t
to save th
countenar
it shall be
made so n
did the no
was great
longer stai
her lord th
day that I
for nothing
love of our
waited for
knelt befor
little, and I
you pray s(
against m>
took he the
and release
the good 1;
good cheer
Edward \
greatest vi(
states, was
A naval pi
meet a Spi
the King si
by a black
John Chanc
Germany,
begins whic
But peace v
for seven
became at I
once in Nor
paign brok(
called, alon
staved off tl
and central

CHAP.

of the
snown
Scotch
Cross,
wal of
Poitou.
France
pirate-
•om its
if com-
!. The
slieve it
: to the
IS gave
^" said
At the
gathered
d news,
lid them
as great
Master
masters,
Is this is
krould he
)r me, I
ly death,
st of the
i with a
lC list of
d before
at press,
y. The
ace, and
lat there
g, and
ho have
we bring
m to you
purely at
ed much
obleness'
light that
had his
lOt reply ;
nd lords

v.]

THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR.

prayed him with tears, as much as they could, to have pity on them,
but he would not hear. Then spoke the gentle knight. Master Walter
de Maunay, and said, * Ha, gentle sire ! bridle your wrath ; you have
the renown and good fame of all gentleness ; do not a thing whereby
men can speak any villany of you ! If you have no pity, all men will
say that you have a heart full of all cruelty to put these good citizens
to death that of their own will a* . come to render themselves to you
to save the remnant of their people.' At this point the King changed
countenance with wrath, and said, ' Hold your peace, Master Walter !
it shall be none otherwise. Call the headsman ! They of Calais have
made so many of my men die, that they must die themselves ! ' Then
did the noble Queen of England a deed of noble lowliness, seeing she
was great with child, and wept so tenderly for pity, that she could no
longer stand upright ; therefore she cast herself on her knees before
her lord the King, and spake on this wise : * Ah, gentle sire ! from the
day that I passed over sea in great peril, as you know, I have asked
for nothing : now pray I and beseech you, with folded hands, for the
love of our Lady's Son, to have mercy upon them.' The gentle King
waited for a while before speaking, and looked on the Queen as she
knelt before him bitterly weeping. Then began his heart to soften a
little, and he said, * Lady, I would rather you had been otherwhere ;
you pray so tenderly, that I dare not refuse you ; and though I do it
against my will, nevertheless take them, I give them to you.' Then
took he the six citizens by the halters and delivered them to the Queen,
and released from death all those of Calais for the love of her ; and
the good lady bade them clothe the six burgesses and make them
good cheer."

Edward now stood at the height of his renown. He had won the
greatest victory of his age. France, till now the first of European
states, was broken and dashed from her pride of place at a single blow.
A naval picture of Froissart sketches Edward for us as he sailed to
meet a Spanish fleet which was sweeping the narrow seas. We see
the King sitting on deck in his jacket of black velvet, his head covered
by a black beaver hat " which became him well," and calling on Sir
John Chandos to troll out the songs he had brought with him from
Germany, till the Spanish ships heave in sight and a furious fight
begins which ends in a victory that leaves Edward " King of the Seas."
But peace with France was as far off as ever. Even the truce which
for seven years was forced on both countries by sheer exhaustion
became at last impossible. Edward prepared three armies to act at
once in Normandy, Brittany, and Guienne, but the plan of the cam-
paign broke down. The Black Prince, as the hero of Crdcy was
called, alone won a disgraceful success. Unable to pay his troops, he
staved off their demands by a campaign of sheer pillage. Northern
and central France had by this time fallen into utter ruin ; the royal

229

Sec. I.

Edwaru
THE Third

1336

1300

' '!t

'■•

Poitiers

1347-1355

, SI

if]

230

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. I.

EUWARI)
THE TllIKI)

1336

1360

1356

Poitiers

Sept. 19,

1356

treasury was empty, the fortresses unoccupied, the troops disbanded
for want of pay, the country swept by bandits. Only the south
remained at peace, and the young Prince led his army of freebooters
up the Garonne into " what was before one of the fat countries of the
world, the people good and simple, who did not know what war was ;
indeed, no war had been waged against them till the Prince came.
The English and Gascons found the country full and gay, the rooms
adorned with carpets and draperies, the caskets and chests full of fair
jewels. But nothing was safe from these robbers. They, and especially
the Gascons, who are very greedy, carried off everything." The
capture of Narbonne loaded them with booty, and they fell back
to Bordeaux, "their horses so laden with spoil that they could hardly
move." The next year a march of the Prince's army on the Loire
pointed straight upon Paris, and a French army under John, who had
succeeded Philip of Valois on the throne, hurried to check his advance.
The Prince gave orders for a retreat, but as he approached Poitiers he
found the French, who now numbered 60,000 men, in his path. He
at once took a strong position in the fields of Ma ipertuis, his front
covered by thick hedges, and approachable only by a deep and narrow
lane which ran between vineyards. The Prince lined the vineyards
and hedges with bowmen, and drew up his small body of men-at-arms
at the point where the lane opened upon the higher plain where he
was encamped. His force numbered only 8,000 men, and the danger
was great enough to force him to offer the surrender of his prisoners
and of the places he had taken, and an oath not to fight against France
for seven years, in exchange for a free retreat. The terms were
rejected, and three hundred French knights charged up the narrow
lane. It was soon choked with men and horses, while the front ranks
of the advancing army fell back before a galling fire of arrows from the
hedgerows. In the moment of confusion a body of English horsemen,
posted on a hill to the right, charged suddenly on the P'rench flank, and
the Prince seized the opportunity to fall boldly on their front. The
English archery completed the disorder produced by this sudden
attack ; the French King was taken, desperately fighting ; and at
noontide, when his army poured back in utter rout to the gates of
Poitiers, 8,000 of their number had fallen on the field, 3,000 in the
flight, and 2,000 men-at-arms, with a crowd of nobles, were taken
prisoners. The royal captive entered London in triumph, and a truce
for two years seemed to give healing-time to France. But the mis-
erable country found no rest in itself. The routed soldiery turned into
free companies of bandits, while the captive lords procured the sums
needed for their ransom by extortion from the peasantry, who were
driven by oppression and famine into wild insurrection, butchering
their lords, and firing the castles ; while Paris, impatient of the
weakness, and misrule of the Regency, rose in arms against the

v.]

Crown. ^
been crusi
land. Fai
believe," s;
which I h
to my eyes
houses in 1
marks of <
the roads (
misery of t
treaty was
Chartres.
crown of ]
hand, his ]
Saintonge,
counties ol
from its ol
with Ponth
First, as w

\Authoriti
is printed in
ment ; anotl
1388 " (Roll!
the publicati(

If we tun
the more fr
with a mar
compositior
into a Hous
the original
each of the
deliberated,
tion, howe\
While the c
union with
the similarit
lords. The
age to an al
or counsello
little part at
related to tl

v.]

THE HUNDRKD YEARS' WAR.

Crown. The " Jacquerie," as the peasant rising was called, had hardly
been crushed, when Edward again poured ravaging over the wasted
land. Famine, however, proved its best defence. " I could not
believe," said Petrarch of this time, " that this was the same France
which I had seen so rich and flourishing. Nothing presented itself
to my eyes but a fearful solitude, an utter poverty, land uncultivated,
houses in ruins. Even the neighbourhood of Paris showed everywhere
marks of desolation and conflagration. The streets are deserted,
the roads overgrown with weeds, the whole is a vast solitude." The
misery of the land at last bent Charles to submission, and in May a
treaty was concluded at Brdtigny, a small place to the eastward of
Chartres. By this treaty the English King waived his claims on the
crown of France and on the Duchy of Normandy. On the other
hand, his Duchy of Aquitaine, which included Gascony, Poitou, and
Saintonge, the Limousin and the Angoumois, Pdrigord and the
counties of Bigorre and Rouergue, was not only restored but freed
from its obligations as a French fief, and granted in full sovereignty
with Ponthieu, Edward's heritage from th'^ second wife of Edward the
First, as well as with Guisnes and his new conquest of Calais.

Section II.— The Good Parliament, 1360—1377.

[Authorities. — As in the last period. An anonymous chronicler whose work
is printed in the *' Archoeologia " (vol. 22) gives the story of the Good Parlia-
ment ; another account is preserved in the "Chronica Anglise from 1328 to
1388 " (Rolls Series), and fresh light has been recently thrown on the time by
the pubhcation of a Chronicle by Adam of Usk from 1377 to 1404.]

If we turn from the stirring but barren annals of foreign warfare to
the more fruitful field of constitutional progress, we are at once struck
with a marked change which takes place during this period in the
composition of Parliament. The division, with which we are so familiar,
into a House of Lords and a House of Commons, formed no part of
the original plan of Edward the First ; in the earlier Parliaments,
each of the four orders of clergy, barons, knights, and burgesses met,
deliberated, and made their grants apart from each other. This isola-
tion, however, of the Estates soon showed signs of bieaking down.
While the clergy, as we have seen, held steadily aloof from any real
union with its fellow-orders, the knights of the shire were drawn by
the similarity of their social position into a close connexion with the
lords. They seem, in fact, to have been soon admitted by the baron-
age to an almost equal position with themselves, whether as legislators
or counsellors of the Crown. The burgesses, on the other hand, took
little part at first in Parliamentary proceedings, save in those which
related to the taxation of their class. But their position was raised

231

Sec. II.

The Good
Paklia-

MENT

1360

1377

Treaty of
lirHigny

May 1360

1!
I

The Two
Houses

232

Sec. II.

Thk Good
Parlia-
ment

1360

1377

1332

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

1354

by the strifes of the reign of Edward the Second, when their aid was
needed by the baronage in its struggle with the Crown ; and their
right to share fully in all legislative action was asserted in the famous
statute of 1322. Gradually too, through causes with which we are
imperfectly acquainted, the knights of the shire drifted from their older
connexion with the baronage into so close and intimate a union with
the representatives of the towns that at the opening of the reign of
Edward the Third the two orders are found grouped formally together,
under the name of " The Commons " ; and by 1341 the final decision of
Parliament into two Houses was complete. It is difficult to over-esti-
mate the importance of this change. Had Parliament remained broken
up into its four orders of clergy, barons, knights, and citizens, its power
would have been neutralized at every great crisis by the jealousies and
difficulty of co-operation among its component parts. A permanent
union of the knighthood and the baronage, on the other hand, would
have converted Parliament into a mere representative of an aristo-
cratic caste, and would have robbed it of the strength which it has
drawn from its connexion with the great body of the commercial
classes. The new attitude of the knighthood, their social connexion
as landed gentry with the baronage,, their political union with the
burgesses, really welded the three orders into one, and gave that unity
")f feeling and action to our Parliament on which its power has ever
since mainly depended. From the moment of this change, indeed, we
see a marked increase of parliamentary activity. The need of con-
tinual grants during the war brought about an assembly of Parliament
year by year ; and with each supply some step was made to greater
political influence. A crowd of enactments for the regulation of trade,
whether wise or unwise, and for the protection of the subject against
oppression or injustice, as well as the great ecclesiastical provisions of
this reign, show the rapid widening of the sphere of parliamentary
action. The Houses claimed an exclusive right to grant supplies,
and asserted the principle of ministerial responsibility to Parlia-
ment. But the Commons long shrank from meddling with purely
administrative matters. Edward in his anxiety to shift from his
shoulders the responsibility of the war with France, referred to
them for counsel on the subject of one of the numerous propositions of
peace. "Most dreaded lord," they replied, "as to your war and the
equipment necessary for it, we are so ignorant and simple that we
know not how, nor have the power, to devise ; wherefore we pray your
Grace to excuse us in this matter, and that it please you, with advice
of the great and wise persons of your Council, to ordain what seems
best to you for the honour and profit of yourself and of your king-
dom ; and whatsoever shall be thus ordained by assent and agree-
ment on the part of you and your lords we readily assent to, and
will hold it firmly established." But while shrinking from so wide an

V.J

extension

a practice

were oftei

professed

Thus mar

set aside.

royal assc

into stati

the rolls (

The po

forced on

Brittany j

which foil

the Fifth,

of renewii

by despat

into the n

victory of

penses of

necessitat(

of the trea

the Black

•* but helm

however, 1:

had laid h

of the whc

on a litter

surrendere

fame of hi

war, protrj

engage, di<

last, howe^

ance of a i

it won ove:

fatal to the

seas, and

roused to

yielded to 1

citizens. A

of Lancast<

had forbid(

the King,

English."

Auvergne,

failure was

HAP.

was

their

mous

» are

older
with

gnof

ether,

ion of

r-esti-

roken

power

;s and

lanent

would

aristo-

it has

iiercial

nexion

ith the

it unity

as ever

;ed, we

of con-

iament

greater

f trade,

against
ions of
lentary
iipplies,
Parlia-
purely
om his
rred to
tions of
and the
.hat we
ay your
advice
[t seems
ir king-
agree-
to, and
■ide an

v.]

THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR.

extension of their responsibility, the Commons wrested from the Crown
a practical reform of the highest value. As yet their petitions, if granted,
were often changed or left incomplete in the statute or ordinance which
professed to embody them, or were delayed till the session had closed.
Thus many provisions made in Parliament had hitherto been evaded or
set aside. But the Commons now met this abuse by a demand that on the
royal assent being given their petitions should be turned without change
into statutes of the realm, and derive force of law from their entry on
the rolls of Parliament.

The political responsibility which the Commons evaded was at last '
forced on them by the misfortunes of the war. In spite of quarrels in I
Brittany and elsewhere, peace wa .'airly preserved in the nine years i
which followed the treaty of Brdtigny ; but the shrewd eye of Charles |
the Fifth, the successor of John, was watching keenly for the moment i
of renewing the struggle. He had cleared his kingdom of the freebooters j
by despatching them into Spain, and the Black Prince had plunged
into the revolutions of that country only to return from his fruitless
victory of Navarete in broken health, and impoverished by the ex-
penses of the campaign. The anger caused by the taxation which this
necessitated was fanned by Charles into revolt. He listened, in spite
of the treaty, to an appeal from the lords of Aquitaine, and summoned
the Black Prince to his Court. " I will come," replied the Prince,
" but helmet on head, and with sixty thousand men at my '• ack." War,
however, had hardly been declared before the ability with which Charles
had laid his plans was seen in his seizure of Ponthieu, and in a rising
of the whole country south of the Garonne. The Black Prince, borne
on a litter to the walls of Limoges, recovered the town, which had been
surrendered to the French, and by a merciless massacre sullied the
fame of his earlier exploits ; but sickness recalled him home, and the
war, protracted by the caution of Charles, who forbade his armies to
engage, did little but exhaust the energy and treasures of England. At
last, however, the error of the Prince's policy was seen in the appear-
ance of a Spanish fleet in the Channel, and in a decisive victory which
it won over an English convoy off Rochelle. The blow was in fact
fatal to the English cause ; it wrested from Edward the mastery of the
seas, and cut off his communication with Aquitaine. Charles was
roused to new exertions. Poitou, Saintonge, and the Angoumois
yielded to his general Du Guesclin, and Rochelle was surrendered by its
citizens. A great army under the King's third son, John of Gaunt, Duke
of Lancaster, penetrated fruitlessly into the heart of France. Charles
had forbidden any fighting. " If a storm rages over the land," said
the King, coolly, " it disperses of itself ; and so will it be with the
English." "Winter, in fact, overtook the Duke in the mountains of
Auvergne, and a mere fragment of his host reached Bordeaux. The
failure was the signal for a general defection, and ere the summer of

233

.Skc. II.

TllK (JtKJD

I'AKl.tA-

MKNT

1300

to
1377

The Lobs

of Aqui-

taine

1360-1396

1366

■ \i'

1367

1369

i; " 1

»372

234

HISTORY OF THK ENOLTRH I'KOPLK.

[ciiAr.

v.]

Sec. II.

The Good
Parlia-
ment

laao

1377

1371

The Good

Parliament

^/r//,i376

1 374 had closed the two towns of Bordeaux and Bayonne were all thut
remained of the English possessions in southern France.

It was a time of shame and suffering such as England had never
known. Her conquests were lost, her shores insulted, her fleets anni-
hilated, her commerce swept from the seas ; while within she was
exhausted by the long and costly war, as well as by the ravages of
pestilence. In the hour of distress the eyes of the hard-pressed nobles
and knighthood turned greedily on the riches of the Church. Never
had her spiritual or moral hold on the nation been less ; never had her
wealth been greater. Out of a population of some three millions, the
ecclesiastics numbered between twenty and thirty thousand. Wild
tales of their riches floated about. They were said to own in landed
property alone more than a third of the soil, their " spiritualities " in
dues and offerings amounting to twice the King's revenue. The throng
of bishops round the council-board was still more galling to the feudal
baronage, flushed as it was with a new pride by the victories of Crdcy
and Poitiers. On the renewal of the war the Parliament prayed that
the chief offices of state might be placed in lay hands, William of
Wykeham, Bishop of Winchester, resigned the Chancellorship, another
prelate the Treasury, to lay dependents of the great nobles ; and the
panic of the clergy was seen in large grants which they voted in
Convocation. The baronage found a leader in John of Gaunt ; but
even the promise to pillage the Church failed to win for the Duke
and his party the goodwill of the lesser gentry and of the burgesses ;
while the corruption and the utter failure of the new administration
and the calamities of the war left it powerless before the Parliament of
1 376. The action of this Parliament marks a new stage in the cha-
racter of the national opposition to the misrule of the Crown. Till
now the task of resistance had devolved on the baronage, and had been
carried out through risings of its feudal tenantry ; but the misgovern-
ment was now that of a main part of the baronage itself in actual con-
junction with the Crown. Only in the power of the Commons lay any
adequate means of peaceful redress. The old reluctance of the Lower
House to meddle with matters of State was roughly swept away there-
fore by the pressure of the time. The Black Prince, sick as he was to
death and anxious to secure his child's succession by the removal of
John of Gaunt, the prelates with William of Wykeham at their head,
resolute again to take their place in the royal councils and to check
the projects of ecclesiastical spoliation, alike found in it a body to oppose
to the Duke's administration. Backed by powers such as these, the
action of the Commons showed none of their old timidity or self-
distrust. The knights of the shire united with the burgesses in
a joint attack on the royal council. " Trusting in God, and standing
with his followers before the nobles, whereof the chief was John, Duke
of Lancaster, whose doings were ever contrary," their speaker, Sir

Peter dc la
pressive I;
"What do
Gaunt. "
even the 1
governmen
condcmnat
self had si
mistress ni
royal serva
were preset
demanded
for the knij
by the Cro\
roads on tl
trade, the e
the powers
little son R
heir. But
sumed his
He dismiss
back Alice
Parliament
as statutes,
sessions of
attack on tl
canvassed, 1
brings us a(

[Author Hi
documents a
Wyclif and h
by Mr. T. A
"Trias." T
a valuable pr
Wyclif by Le
has given a b

Nothing i
of Wyclif 's
of him durii
earlier part
age when h
University

v.]

THE IIUNDRKI) YRARS' WAR.

Peter do la Mar*?, denounced the mismanagement of the war, the op-
pressive taxation, and demanded an account of the expenditure.
"What do these base and ignoble knights attempt?" cried John of
Gaunt. " Do they think they be kings or princes of the land ? " But
even the Duke was silenced by the charges brought against the
government, and the Parliament proceeded to the impeachment and
condemnation of two minii^ters, Latimer and Lyons. The King him-
self had sunk into dotage, and was wholly under the influence of a
mistress named Alice Perrers ; she was banished, and several of the
royal servants driven from the Court. One hundred and forty petitions
were presented which embodied the grievances of the realm. They
demanded the annual assembly of Parliament, and freedom of election
for the knights of the shire, whose choice was now often tampered with
by the Crown ; they protested against arbitrary taxation and Papal in-
roads on the liberties of the Church ; petitioned for the protection of
trade, the enforcement of the statute of labourers, and the limitation of
the powers of chartered crafts. At the death of the Black Prince his
little son Richard was brought into Parliament and acknowledged as
heir. But the Houses were no sooner dismissed than Lancasior re-
sumed his power. His haughty will flung aside all restraints of law.
He dismissed the new lords and prelates from the Council. He called
back Alice Perrers and the disgraced ministers. He declared the Good
Parliament no parliament, and did not suffer its petitions to be enrolled
as statutes. He imprisoned Peter de la Mare, and confiscated the pos-
sessions of William of Wykeham. His attack on this prelate was an
attack on the clergy at large. Fresh projects of spoliation were openly
canvassed, and it is his sunport of these plans of confiscation which now
brings us across the path of John Wyclif.

Section III.— John Wyclif.

{Authorities. — The "Fasciculi Zizaniorum" in the Rolls Series, with the
documents appended to it, is a work of primary authority for the history of
Wyclif and his followers. A selection from his English tracts has been made
by Mr, T. Arnold for the University of Oxford, which has also published his
"Trias." The version of the Bible that bears his name has been edited with
a valuable preface by Rev. J. Forshall and Sir F. Madden. There are lives of
Wyclif by Lewis and Vaughan ; and Milman (" Latin Christianity," vol. vi.)
has given a brilliant summary of the Lollard movement.]

Nothing is more remarkable than the cor' rast between the obscurity
of Wyclif 's earlier life and the fulness and vividness of our knowledge
of him during the twenty years which preceded its close. Bom in the
earlier part of the fourteenth century, he had already passed middle
age when he was appointed to the mastership of Balliol College in the
University of Oxford, and recognized as first among the schoolmen of

235

Skc. II.

Thr Guod
I'ahi.iv

MKNT

1360

1377

/uptc S
July 6

,ll

♦ 'n

i.f

f ' I. '

i;',

* \

Wyclif

* .1 'p

aw*

•

2j6

HISTORY OF THE KNGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. 111.
John

WVIXIK

li24?li(}t

Eneland
and the
Papacy

his day. Of all the scholastic doctors those of England had been
throughout the keenest and the most daring in philosophical specula-
tion ; a reckless audacity and love of novelty was the common note of
D<icon, Uuns Scotus, and Ockham, as against the sober and more
disciplined learning of the Parisian schoolmen, Albert and Aquina€.
But the decay of the University of Paris during the English wars was
transferring her intellectual supremacy to Oxford, and in Oxford
Wyclif stood without a rival. From his predecessor, Bradwardine,
whose work as a scholastic teacher he carried on in the speculative
treatises he published during this period, he inherited the tendency to
a predestinarian Augustinianism which formed the groundwork of his
later theological revolt. I lis debt to Ockham revealed itself in his
earliest efforts at Church reform. Undismayed by the thunder and
excommunications of the Church, Ockham had not shrunk in his en-
thusiasm for the Empire from attacking the foundations of the Papal
supremacy or from asserting the rights of the civil power. The spare,
emaciated frame of Wyclif, weakened by study and by asceticism,
hardly promised a Reformer who would carry on the stormy work of
Ockham ; but within this frail form lay a temper quick and restless,
an immense energy, an immovable conviction, an unconquerable pride.
The personal charm which ever accompanies real greatness only deep-
ened the influence he derived from the spotless purity of his life. As
yet indeed even Wyclif himself can hardly have suspected the immense
range of his intellectual power. It was only the struggle that lay
before him which revealed in the dry and subtle schoolman the founder
of our later English prose, a master of popular invective, of irony, of
persuasion, a dexterous politician, an audacious partisan, the organizer
of a religious order, the unsparing assailant of abuses, the boldest and
most indefatigable of controversialists, the first Reformer who dared,
when deserted and alone, to question and deny the creed of the Chris-
tendom around him, to break through the tradition of the past, and
with his last breath to assert the freedom of religious thought against
the dogmas of the Papacy. /

The attack of Wyclif began precisely at the moment when the
Church of the middle ages had sunk to its lowest point of spiritual
decay. The transfer of the Papacy to Avignon robbed it of half the
awe in which it had been held by Englishmen, for not only had the
Popes sunk into creatures of the French King, but their greed and
extortion produced almost universal revolt. The claim of first fruits
and annates from rectory and bishoprick, the assumption of a right to
dispose of all benefices in ecclesiastical patronage, the direct taxation
of the clergy, the intrusion of foreign priests into EngUsh livings, the
opening a mart for the disposal of pardons, dispensations, and in-
dulgences, and the encouragement of appeals to the Papal court
produced a widespread national irritation which never slept till the

V.J

Reforma

his legal

flouted til

the righl

dered in

by the S

of benef

foiled by

indeed hi

in which

bishopric

tinued tc

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Pope ami

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first fruits

unlearned

marks, wl

decays sc

care to se

treasure o

revenue f]

tendom.

shorn."

deaneries

terbury, m

with a ho

and pries

twenty thi

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the Papa(

large. In

of the cor

assert the

mild punii

the mass (

terference

control ov

as by dir

around the

summonei

courts. C

V.)

TIIF. HUNDRED YEARS' WAR.

Reformation. The people scorned a " French Pope," and threatened
his legates with stoning when they landed. The wit of Chaucer
flouted the wallet of" pardons hot from Rome." Parliament vindicated
the right of the State to prohibit any questioning of judgements ren-
dered in the King's courts, or any prosecution of a suit in foreign courts,
by the Statute of Praimunire ; and denied the Papal claim to dispose
of benefices by that of Provisors. But the effort was practically
foiled by the treacherous diplomacy of the Crown. The Pope waive<l
indeed his alleged right to appoint foreigners ; but by a compromise,
in which Pope and King combined for the enslaving of the Church,
bishopricks, abbacies, and livings in the gift of Churchmen still con-
tinued to receive Papal nominees who had been first chosen by the
Crown, so that the treasuries of King and Pope profited by the arrange-
ment. The protest of the Good Parliament is a record of the ill-success
of its predecessors' attempts. It asserted that the taxes levied by the
Pope amounted to five times the amount of those levied by the King,
that by reservation during the life of actual holders the Pope disposed
of the same bishoprick four or five times over, receiving each time the
first fruits. " The brokers of the sinful city o( Rome promote for money
unlearned and unworthy caitiffs to benefices of the value of a thousand
marks, while the poor and learned hardly obtain one of twenty. So
decays sound learning. They present aliens who neither see nor
care to see their parishioners, despise God's services, convey away the
treasure of the realm, and are worse than Jews or Saracens. The Pope's
revenue from England alone is larger than that of any prince in Chris-
tendom. God gave his sheep to be pastured, . ot to be shaven and
shorn." The grievances were no trifling ones. At this very tinie the
deaneries of Lichfield, Salisbury and York, the archdeaconry of Can-
terbury, which was reputed the wealthiest English benefice, together
with a host of prebends and preferments, were held by Italian cardinals
and priests, while the Pope's collector from his office in London sent
twenty thousand marks a year to the Papal treasury.

If extortion and tyranny such as this severed the English clergy from
the Papacy, their own selfishness severed. them from the nation at
large. Immense as was their wealth, they bore as little as they could
of the common burthens of the realm. They were still resolute to
assert their exemption from the common justice of the land, and the
mild punishments of the ecclesiastical courts carried little dismay into
the mass of disorderly clerks. Privileged as they were against all in-
terference from the lay world without, the clergy penetrated by their
control over wills, contracts, divorce, by the dues they exacted, as well
as by directly religious offices, into t' e v-ry heart of the social life
around them. No figure was better known or more hated than the
summoner who enforced the jurisdiction and levied the dues of their
courts. On the other hand, their moral authority was rapidly passing

«.17

Src. III.

FOHM

Wvtt,ir

> 1

Enrland
Id the

Church

1.' :il

238

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.

John
Wyci.if

^ Wycllf

and
: Church
Reform

1366

away ; the wealthiest churchmen, with curled hair and hanging sleeves,
aped the costume of the knightly society to which they really belonged.
We have already seen the general impression of their worldliness in
Chaucer's picture of the hunting monk and the courtly prioress with
her love-motto on her brooch. Over the vice of the higher classes
they exerted no influence whatever ; the King paraded his mistress as
a Queen of Beauty through London, the nobles blazoned their infamy
in court and tournament. " In those days," says a chronicler of the
time, "arose a great rumour and clamour among the people, that
wherever there was a tournament there came a great concourse of
ladies of the most costly and beautiful, but not of the best in the
kingdom, sometimes forty or fifty in number, as if they were a part of
the tournament, in diverse and wonderful male apparel, in parti-
colou'-ed tunics, with short caps and bands wound cord- wise round
their head, and girdles bound with gold and silver, and daggers in
pouches across their body, and then they proceeded on chosen coursers
to the place of tourney, and so expended and wasted their goods and
vexed their bodies with scurrilous wantonness that the rumour of the
people sounded everywhere ; and thus they neither feared God nor
blushed at the chaste voice of the people." They were not called on
to blush at the chaste voice of the Church. The clergy were in fact
rent by their own dissensions. The higher prelates were busy with
the cares of political office, and severed from the lower priesthood by
the scandalous inequality between the revenues of the wealthier eccle-
siastics and the "poor parson" of the country. A bitter hatred
divided the secular clergy from the regular ; and this strife went
fiercely on in the Universities. Fitz-Ralf, the Chancellor of Oxford,
attributed to the Friars the decline in the number of academical
students, and the University checked by statute their admission of
mere children into their orders. The older religious orders in fact had
sunk into mere landowners, while the enthusiasm of the Friars had in
great part died away and left a crowd of impudent mendicants behind
it. Wyclif could soon with general applause denounce them as sturdy
beggars, and declare that " the man who gives alms to a begging friar
is ipso facto excommunicate."

Without the ranks of the clergy stood a world of earnest
men who, like " Piers the Ploughman," denounced their worldliness
and vice, sceptics like Chaucer laughing at the jingling bells of their
hunting abbots, and the brutal and greedy baronage under John of
Gaunt, eager to drive the prelates from office and to seize on their
wealth. Worthless as the last party seems to us, it was with John of
Gaunt that Wyclif allied himself in his effi)rt for the reform of the
Church. As yet his quarrel was not with the doctrines of Rome but
with its practice^ and it was on the principles of Ockham that he de-
fended the Parliament's indignant refusal of the " tribute " which was

v.]

THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR.

239

claimed by the Papacy. But his treatise on " The Kingdom of God'*
(De Dominio Divino) shows how different his aims really were from the
selfish aims of the men with whom he acted. In this, the most famous
of his works, Wyclif bases his action on a distinct ideal of society. All
authority, to use his own expression, is " founded in grace." Dominion
in the highest sense is in God alone ; it is God who, as the suzerain
of the universe, deals out His rule in fief to rulers in their various
stations on tenure of their obedience to Himself. It was easy to object
that in such a case " dominion " could never exist, since mortal sin is a
breach of such a tenure, and all men sin. But, as Wyclif urged it, the
theory is a purely ideal one. In actual practi».2 he distinguishes be-
tween dominion and power, power which the wicked may have by
God's permission, and to which the Christian must submit from motives
of obedience to God. In his own scholastic phrase, so strangely per-
verted afterwards, here on earth " God must obey the devil." But
whether in the ideal or practical view of the matter, all power or
dominion was of God. It was granted by Him not to one person, His
Vicar on earth, as the Papacy alleged, but to all. The King was as
truly God's Vicar as the Pope. The royal power was as sacred as the
ecclesiastical, and as complete over temporal things, even the tem-
poralities of the Church, as that of the Church over spiritual things.
On the question of Church and State therefore the distinction between
the ideal and practical view of "dominion" was of little account.
Wyclif s application of the theory to the individual conscience was of
far higher and wider importance. Obedient as each Christian might be
to king or priest, he himself, as a possessor of " dominion," held im-
mediately of God. The throne of God Himself was the tribunal of
personal appeal. What the Reformers of the sixteenth century at-
tempted to do by their theory of J ustification by Faith, Wyclif
attempted to do by his theory of " dominion." It was a theory which
in establishing a direct relation between man and God swept away
the whole basis of a mediating priesthood on which the mediaeval
Church was built ; but for a time its real drift was hardly perceived.
To Wyclif s theory of Church and State, his subjection of their tem-
poralities to the Crown, his contention that like other property they
might be seized and employed for national purposes, his wish for their
voluntary abandonment and the return of the Church to its original
poverty, the clergy were more sensitive. They were bitterly galled
when he came forward as the theological bulwark of the Lancastrian
party at a time when they were writhing under the attack on Wykeham
by the nobles ; and in the prosecution of Wyclif, they resolved to return
blow for blow. He was summoned before Bishop Courtenay of
London to answer for his heretical propositions concerning the wealth
of the Church. The Duke of Lancaster accepted the challenge as
really given to himself, and stood by Wyclif s side in the Consistory

Sec. III.

John
Wyclif

C. 1368

Wmi

V. :

lit''

: :ti

.1 ■;

I 1 1 1 (

1377

^' h

240

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.

John
Wyclif

The
First
pro test-
ant

1381

Court at St. Paul's. But no trial took place. Fierce words passed
between the nobles and the prelate ; the Duke himself was said to have
threatened to drag Courtenay out of the church by the hair of his head,
and at last the London populace, to whom John of Gaunt was hateful,
burst in to their Bishop's rescue, and Wyclif s life was saved with diffi-
culty by the aid of the soldiery. But his courage only grew with the
danger. A Papal bull which was procured by the bishops, directing
the University to condemn and arrest him, extorted from him a bold
defiance. In a defence circulated widely through the kingdom and
laid before Parliament, Wyclif broadly asserted that no man could be
excommunicated by the Pope " unless he were first excommunicated
by himself." He denied the right of the Church to exact or defend
temporal privileges by spiritual censures, declared that a Church might
justly be deprived by the King or lay lords of its property for defect of
duty, and defended the subjection of ecclesiastics to civil tribunals.
Bold as the defiance was, it won the support of the people and of the
Crown. When he appeared at the close of the year in Lambeth
Chapel to answer the Archbishop's summons, a message from the Court
forbade the Primate to proceed, and the Londoners broke in and
dissolved the session.

Wyclif was still working hand in hand with John of Gaunt in advo-
cating his plans of ecclesiastical reform, when the great insurrection of
the peasants, which we shall soon have to describe, broke out under
Wat Tyler. In a few months the whole of his work was undone. Not
only was the power of the Lancastrian party on which Wyclif had
relied for the moment annihilated, but the quarrel between the baronage
and the Church, on which his action had hitherto been grounded, was
hushed in the presence of a common danger. His " poor preachers "
were looked on as missionaries of socialism. The Friars charged him
with being a " sower of strife, who by his serpent-like instigation has
set the serf against his lord," and though Wyclif tossed back the charge
with disdain, he had to bear a suspicion which was justified by the
conduct of some of his followers. John Ball, who had figured in the
front rank of the revolt, was claimed as one of his adherents, and was
alleged to have denounced in his last hour the conspiracy of the
"Wyclifites." His most prominent scholar, Nicholas Herford, was
said to have openly approved the brutal murder of Archbishop Sud-
bury. Whatever belief such charges might gain, it is certain that from
this moment all plans for the reorganization of the Church were con-
founded in the general odium which attached to the projects of the
peasant leaders, and that any hope of ecclesiastical reform at the hands
of the baronage and the Parliament was at an end. But even if the
Peasant Revolt had not deprived Wyclif of the support of the aristo-
cratic party with whom he had hitherto co-operated, their alliance
must have been dissolved by the new theological position which he had

already t

tion, he :

reformer

of a prott

upon whi

doctrine (

performai

the lowlie

denial of

in the sp

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utterly alo

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be silent.

disputatio

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the momei

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dullest mini

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Pardons, ir

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successiveh

rHAT-.

assed
(have
head,
iteful,
idiffi-
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ecting
I bold
m and
aid be
licated
defend
. might
feet of
bunals.
of the
imbeth
e Court
in and

n advo-
iction of
t under
,e. Not
clif had
iron age
ed, was
ichers "
ed him
ion has
charge
by the
in the
ind was
of the
rd, was
ap Sud-
hat from
sre con-
s of the
le hands
n if the
! aristo-
alliance
h he had

v.]

THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR.

already taken up. Some months before the outbreak of the insurrec-
tion, he had by one memorable step passed from the position of a
reformer of the discipline and political relations of the Church to that
of a protester against its cardinal beliefs. If there was one doctrine
upon which the supremacy of the Mediaeval Church rested, it was the
doctrine of Transubstantiation. It was by his exclusive right to the
performance of the miracle which was wrought in the mass that
the lowliest priest was raised high above princes. With the formal
denial of the doctrine of Transubstantiation which Wyclif issued
in the spring of 1381 began that great movement of revolt which
ended, more than a century after, in the establishment of religious
freedom, by severing the mass of the Teutonic peoples from the general
body of the Catholic Church. The act was the bolder that he stood
utterly alone. The University, in which his influence had been hitherto
all-powerful, at once condemned him. John of Gaunt enjoined him to
be silent. Wyclif was presiding as Doctor of Divinity over some
disputations in the schools of the Augustinian Canons when his
academical condemnation was publicly read, but though startled for
the moment he at once challenged Chancellor or doctor to disprove the
conclusions at which he had arrived. The prohibition of the Duke
of Lancaster he met by an open avowal of his teaching, a confession
which closes proudly with the quiet words, " I believe that in the end
the truth will conquer." For the moment his courage dispelled the
panic around him. The University responded to his appeal, and by
displacing his opponents from office tacitly adopted his cause. But
Wyclif no longer looked for support to the learned or wealthier classes
on whom he had hitherto relied. He appealed, and the appeal is
memorable as the first of such a kind in our history, to England at
large. With an amazing industry he issued tract after tract in the
tongue of the people itself. The dry, syllogistic Latin, the abstruse
and involved argument which the great doctor had addressed to his
academic hearers, were suddenly flung aside, and by a transition
which marks the wonderful genius of the man the schoolman was
transformed into the pamphleteer. If Chaucer is the father of our later
English poetry, Wyclif is the father of our later English prose. The
rough, clear, homely English of his tracts, the speech of the plough-
man and the trader of the day, though coloured with the picturesque
phraseology of the Bible, is in its literary use as distinctly a creation
of his own as the style in which he embodied it, the terse vehement
sentences, the stinging sarcasms, the hard antitheses which roused the
dullest mind like a whip. Once fairly freed from the trammels of un-
questioning belief, Wyclif 's mind worked fast in its career of scepticism.
Pardons, indulgences, absolutions, pilgrimages to the shrines of the
saints, worship of their images, worship of the saints themselves, were
successively denied. A formal appeal to the Bible as the one ground

241

Sec. III.

John
Wyclif

1381

m i

'\ ''.n

' Ml

'■■• ti

ii]

I Ml

242

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.

John
Wyclik

Oxford
and the
Lollards

1382

of faith, coupled with an assertion of the right of every instructed man
to examine the Bible for himself, threatened the very groundwork of
the older dogmatism with ruin. Nor were these daring denials confined
to the small circle of the scholars who still clung to him ; with the
practical ability which is so marked a feature of his character, Wyclif
had organized some few years before an order of poor preachers, " the
Simple Priests," whose coarse sermons and long russet dress moved
the laughter of the clergy, but who now formed a priceless organization
for the diffusion of their master's doctrines. How rapid their progress
must have been we may see from the panic-struck exaggerations of
their opponents. A few years later they complained that the followers
of Wyclif abounded everywhere and in all classes, among the baronage,
in the cities, among the peasantry of the country-side, even in the
monastic cell itself " Every second man one meets is a Lollard."

" Lollard," a word which probably means " idle babbler," was
the nickname of scorn with which the orthodox Churchmen chose
to insult their assailants. But this rapid increase changed their
scorn into vigorous action. Courtenay, now become Archbishop,
summoned a council at Blackfriars, and formally submitted twenty-four
propositions drawn from Wyclifs works. An earthquake in the midst
of the proceedings terrified every prelate but the resolute Primate ; the
expulsion of ill humours from the earth, he said, was of good omen for
the expulsion of ill humours from the Church ; and the condemnation
was pronounced. Then the Archbishop turned fiercely upon Oxford
as the fount and centre of the new heresies. In an English sermon at
St. Frideswide's, Nicholas Herford had asserted the truth of Wyclifs
doctrines, and Courtenay ordered the Chancellor to silence him and
his adherents on pain of being himself treated as a heretic. The
Chancellor fell back on the liberties of the University, and appointed
as preacher another Wyclifite, Repyngdon, who did not hesitate to
style ths Lollards "holy priests," and to affirm that they were
protected by John of Gaunt. Party spirit meanwhile ran high among
the students ; the bulk of them sided with the Lollard leaders, and
a Carmelite, Peter Stokes, who had procured the Archbishop's letters,
cowered panic-stricken in his chamber while the Chancellor, pro-
tected by an escort of a hundred townsmen, listened approvingly
to Repyngdon's defiance. " I dare go no further," wrote the poor
Friar to the Archbishop, " for fear of death ; " but he soon mustered
courage to descend into the schools where Repyngdon was now
maintaining that the clerical order was "better when it was but nine
years old than now that it has grown to a thousand years and more."
The appearance, however, of scholars in arms again drove Stokes to
fly in despair to Lambeth, while a new heretic in open Congregation
maintained Wyclifs denial of Transubstantiation. "There is no
idolatry," cried William James, " save in the Sacrament of the Altar."

" You s

Courtei

summo:

only ac

Univer;

the Cha

tion. '

the Prii

within i

injunctic

fire. T]

they wi

Henry (

calling t:

roughlv

banishm

of all Lo

The thre

vain to J

them as 1

evasion 1

Oxford ii

the deatl

disappear

is the mo

broken tii

the life ar

Nothing

the last of

as Courte]

sures agai

made no

" Pontius

comment (

the prelate

with each

easy infen

seems inde

of the final

said to hav

declare the

ment that I

forth, and

assailants, ]

tithes migh

maintained

[chap.

:d man
/ork of
onfined
ith the
Wyclif
's, " the
moved
nization
)rogress
tions of
Dllowers
ironage,
1 in the
ird."

2r," was
in chose
;d their
hbishop,
;nty-four
he midst
ate ; the
omen for
imnation
1 Oxford
ermon at
Wyclif's
him and
ic. The
ppointed
jsitate to
ley were
;h among
ders, and
's letters,
llor, pro-
jrovingly
the poor
mustered
was now
but nine
d more,"
3tokes to
regation
re is no
,e Altar."

v.]

THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR.

" You speak like a wise man," replied the Chancellor, Robert Rygge.
Courtenay however was not the man to bear defiance tamely, and his
summons to Lambeth wrested a submission from Rygge which was
only accepted on his pledge to suppress the LoUardism of the
University. " I dare not publish them, on fear of death," exclaimed
the Chancellor when Courtenay handed him his letters of condemna-
tion. " Then is your University an open /au/or of heretics," retorted
the Primate, " if it suffers not the Catholic truth to be proclaimed
within its bounds." The royal council supported the Archbishop's
injunction, but the publication of the decrees at once set Oxford on
fire. The scholars threatened death against the Friars, "crying that
they wished to destroy the University." The masters suspended
Henry Crump from teaching, as a troubler of the public peace, for
calling the Lollards " heretics." The Crown however at last stepped
roughlv in to Courtenay's aid, and a royal writ ordered the instant
banishment of all favourers of Wyclif, with the seizure and destruction
of all Lollard books, on pain of forfeiture of the University's privileges.
The threat produced its effect. Herford and Repyngdon appealed in
vain to John of Gaunt for protection ; the Duke himself denounced
them as heretics against the Sacrament of the Altar, and after much
evasion they were forced to make a formal submission. Within
Oxford itself the suppression of LoUardism was complete, but with
the death of religious freedom all trace of intellectual life suddenly
disappears. The century which followed the triumphs of Courtenay
is the most barren in its annals, nor was the sleep of the University
broken till the advent of the New Learning restored to it seme of
the life and liberty which the Primate had so roughly trodden out.

Nothing marks more strongly the grandeur of Wyclif s position as
the last of the great schoolmen, than the reluctance of so bold a man
as Courtenay even after his triumph over Oxford to take extreme mea-
sures against the head of Lollardry. Wyclif, though summoned, had
made no appearance before the " Council of the Earthquake."
" Pontius Pilate and Herod are made friends to-day," was his bitter
comment on the new union which proved to have sprung up between
the prelates and the monastic orders who had so long been at variance
with each other ; " since they have made a heretic of Christ, it is an
easy inference for them to count simple Christians heretics." He
seems indeed to have been sick at the moment, but the announcement
of the final sentence roused him to life again. " I shall not die," he is
said to have cried at an earlier time when in grievous peril, " but live and
declare the works of the Friars." He petitioned the King and Parlia-
ment that he might be allowed freely to prove the doctrines he had put
forth, and turning with characteristic energy to the attack of his
assailants, he asked that all religious vows might be suppressed, that
tithes might be diverted to the maintenance of the poor and the clergy
maintained by the free alms of their Hocks, that tlie Statutes of

R 2

Sec. III.

JOHM
WVCLII'

The

death of

Wyclif

\-'

m\'':

■u

p. I

^ u

244

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.
John

WVCLIK

1383

Dec. 31,
1384

The

Engrlivh

Manor

Provisors and Prjemunire might be enforced against the Papacy, that
churchmen might be declared incapable of secular offices, and im-
prisonment for excommunication cease. Finally, in the teeth of the
council's condemnation, he demanded that the doctrine of the Eucha-
rist which he advocated might be freely taught. If he appeared in the
following year before the Convocation at Oxford, it was to perplex his
opponents by a display of scholastic logic which permitted him to
retire without any retractation of his sacramental heresy. For the time
his opponents seemed satisfied with his expulsion from the University,
but in his retirement at Lutterworth he was forging during these troubled
years the great weapon which, wielded by other hands than his own, was
to produce so terrible an effect on the triumphant hierarchy. An earlier
translation of the Scriptures, in part of which he was aided by his scholar
Herford, was being revised and brought to the second form, which is
better known as " Wyclif s Bible," when death drew near. The appeal
of the prelates to Rome was answered at last by a brief ordering him to
appear at the Papal Court. His fr.iling strength exhausted itself in the
cold sarcastic reply which explained that his refusal to comply with the
summons simply sprang from broken health. " I am always glad," ran
the ironical answer, " to explain my faith to any one, and above all to
the Bishop of Rome ; for I take it for granted that if it be orthodox he
will confirm it, if it be erroneous he will correct it. I assume, too, that
as chief Vicar of Christ upon earth the Bishop of Rome is of all mortal
men most bound to the law of Christ's Gospel, for among the disciples
of Christ a majority is not reckoned by simply counting heads in the
fashion of this world, but according to the imitation of Christ on either
side. Now Christ during His life upon earth was of all men the
poorest, casting from Him all worldly authority. I deduce from
these premisses, as a simple counsel of my own, that the Pope
should surrender all temporal authority to the civil power and advise
his clergy to do the same." The boldness of his words sprang
perhaps from a knowledge that his end was near. The terrible strain
on energies enfeebled by age and study had at last brought its inevit-
able result, and a stroke of paralysis while Wyclif was hearing mass in
his parish church of Lutterworth was followed on the next day by his
death. , . .

Section IV.— The Peasant Revolt, 1377-1381.

[Atiihoi'ities. — For the condition of land and labour at this time see the
" History of Prices," by Professor Thorold Rogers, the "Domesday Book of
St. Paul s " (Camden Society) with Archdeacon Hale's valuable introduction,
and Mr. Seebohm's •• Essays on the Black Death " {Forltiightly Review, 1865).
Among the chroniclers Knyghton and Walsingham are the fullest and most
valuable. The great Labour Statutes will be found in the Parliamentary Rolls.]

The religious revolution which we have been describing gave fresh
impulse to a revolution of even greater importance, which had for a

V.1

long tin-
system,
land res
of inter
was usu
home-fa
were be
Alfreds
freemen
had bee
general
often di
thegn wl
payment
" villeins
and boui
older rig
lord, and
They sto
never po
the legisl
lord on \
hired lab
not his (
tinction 1
the Ange
pure " th
villein sa
was undc
geneous
the view
manor-he
court was
received
enrolled
criminal
stood his
cultivatio
was by tl
sheep sh(
services
was the r
the popu
word, wa
ploughing

that

V.1

THE HUNDRED YEARS* WAR,

long time been changing the whole face of the country. The manorial
system, on which the social organization of every rural part of Eng-
land rested, had divided the land, for the purposes of cultivation and
of internal order, into a number of large estates ; a part of the soil
was usually retained by the owner of the manor as his demesne or
home-farm, while the remainder was distributed among tenants who
were bound to render service to their lord. Under the kings of
^Ifreu's house, the number of absolute slaves, and the number of
freemen, had alike diminished. The slave class, never numerous,
had been reduced by the efforts of the Church, perhaps by the
general convulsion of the Danish wars. But these wars had
often driven the ceorl or freeman to " commend " himself to a
thegn who pledged him his protection in consideration of a labour-
payment. It is probable that these dependent ceorls are the
" villeins" of the Norman epoch, men sunk indeed from pure freedom
and bound both to soil and lord, but as yet preserving much of their
older rights, retaining their land, free as against all men but their
lord, and still sending representatives to hundred-moot and shire-moot.
They stood therefore far above the "^ landless man," the man who had
never possessed even under the old constitution political rights, whom
the legislation of the English kings had forced to attach himself to a
lord on pain of outlawry, and who served as household servant or as
hired labourer, or at the best as rent-paying tenant of land which was
not his own. The Norman knight or lawyer however saw little dis-
tinction between these classes ; and the tendency of legislation under
the Angevins was to blend all in a single class of serfs. While the
pure " theow " or absolute slave disappeared, therefore, the ceorl or
villein sank lower in the social scale. But though the rural population
was undoubtedly thrown more together and fused into a more homo-
geneous class, its actual position corresponded very imperfectly with
the view of the lawyers. All indeed were dependents on a lord. The
manor-house became the centre of every English village. The manor-
court was held in its hall ; it was here that the lord or his steward
received homage, recovered fines, held the view of frnnk- pledge, or
enrolled the villagers in their tithing. Here too, if the lord possessed
criminal jurisdiction, was held his justice court, and without its doors
stood his gallows. Around it lay the demesne or home-farm, and the
cultivation of this rested wholly with the "villeins" of the manor. It
was by them that the great barn of the lord was filled with sheaves, his
sheep shorn, his grain malted, the wood hewn for his hall fire. These
services were the labour-rent by which they held their lands, and it
was the nature and extent of this labour-rent which parted one class of
the population from another. The " villein," in the strict sense of the
word, was bound only to gather in his lord's harvest and to aid in the
ploughing and sowing of autumn and Lent. The cottar, the bordar.

245

Sec. IV.

The
Peasant
Rkvout

1377

1381

m'v.

•I

Xil

J i

( r.

"• , J-

246

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

Thb
Peasant
Revolt

1377

1381

Tbe

Fanner

and the

Labourer

i 'l

and the labourer were bound to help in the work of the home-farm
throughout the year. But these services and the time of rendering
them were strictly limited by custom, not only in the case of the ceorl
or villein, but in that of the originally meaner " landless man." The
possession of his little homestead with the ground around it, the
privilege of turning out his cattle on the waste of the manor, passed
quietly and insensibly from mere indulgences that could be granted or
withdrawn at a lord's caprice into rights that could be pleaded at law.
The number of teams, the fines, the reliefs, the services that a lord
could claim, at first mere matter of oral tradition, came to be entered
on the court-roll of the manor, a copy of which became the title-deed
of the villein. It was to this that he owed the name of " copy-holder "
which at a later time superseded his older title. Disputes were settled
by a reference to this roll or on oral evidence of the custom at issue,
but a social arrangement which was eminently characteristic of the
English spirit of compromise generally secured a fair adjustment of
the cl?ims of villein and lord. It was the duty of the lord's bailiff to
exact their due services from the villeins, but his coadjutor in this
office, the reeve or foreman of the manor, was chosen by the tenants
themselves and acted as representative of their interests and rights.

The first disturbances of the system of tenure which we have described
sprang from the introduction of leases. The lord of the manor, instead
of cultivating the demesne through his own bailiff, often found it more
convenient and profitable to let the manor to a tenant at a given rent,
payable either in money or in kind. Thus we find the manor of
Sandon leased by the Chapter of St. Paul's at a very early period on
a rent which comprised the payment of grain both for bread and ale,
of alms to be distributed at the cathedral door, of wood to be used in
its bakehouse and brewery, and of money to be spent in wages. It is
to this system of leasing, or rather to the usual term for the rent it
entailed (feorm, from the Latin yfrwa), that we owe the words, "fann"
and " farmer," the growing use of which marks the first step in the
rural revolution which we are examining. It was a revolution which
made little direct change in the manorial system, out its indirect
effect in breaking the tie on which the feudal organization of the
manor rested, that of the tenant's p -sonal dependence on his lord,
and in affording an opportunity by which the wealthier among the
tenantry could rise to a position of apparent equality with their older
masters and form a new class intermediate between the larger pro-
prietors and the customary tenants, was of the highest importance.
This earlier step, however, in the modification of the manorial system,
by the rise of the Farmer-class, was soon followed by one of a far
more serious character in the rise of the Free Labourer. Labour,
whatever right it might have attained in other ways, was as yet in the
strictest sense bound to the soil. Neither villein nor serf had any

v.]

choice, ei

his holdi

from the

recall by

outlaw.

populatic

this local

promotin

The fugii

where a

fresh ste

commute

slowly in

to all Ian

of the tei

and the s

A labour-

of wealth

dence, m

probably

for a m(

gradually

already v

case of S

"malt-sil

place of t

commuta

The luxu

cost of c;

sale of fre

an easy a

kings to<

estates fo

serfs ; an

with theii

excheque

By this

land, the

the rise

of the coi

The rise

was no Ic

itself to

would.

had been

[CIIAP.

e-farm
dering
B ceorl
' The
it, the
passed
[ited or
at law.
a lord
jntered
le-deed
lolder"
settled
t issue,
; of the
nent of
lailiff to
in this
tenants
ights.
jscribed
, instead
it more
en rent,
3nor of
iriod on
ind ale,
used in
It is
rent it
"farm"
in the
which
indirect
of the
lis lord,
ong the
ir older
jer pro-
ortance.
system,
of a far
Labour,
Bt in the
lad anv

v.]

THE HUNDRED YEARS' AVAR.

247

choice, either of a master or of a sphere of toil. He was born, in fact, to
his holding and to his lord ; he paid head-money for licence to remove
from the estate in search of trade or hire, and a refusal to return on
recall by his owner would have ended in his pursuit as a fugitive
outlaw. But the advance of society and the natural increase of
population had for a long time been silently freeing the labourer from
this local bondage. The influence of the Church had been exerted in
promoting emancipation, as a work of piety, on all estates but its own.
The fugitive bondsman found freedom in a flight to chartered towns,
where a residence during a year and a day conferred franchise. A
fresh step towards freedom was made by the growing tendency to
commute labour-services for money-payments. The population was
slowly increasing, and as the law of gavel-kind which was applicable
to all landed estates not held by military tenure divided the inheritance
of the tenantry equally among their sons, the holding of each tenant
and the services due from it became divided in a corresponding degree.
A labour-rent thus became more difficult to enforce, while the increase
of wealth among the tenantry, and the rise of a new spirit of indepen-
dence, made it more burthensome to those who rendered it. It was
probably from this cause that the commutation of the arrears of labour
for a money payment, which had long prevailed on. every estate,
gradually developed into a general commutation of services. We have
already witnessed the silent progress of this remarkable change in the
case of St. Edmundsbury, but the practice soon became universal, and
" malt-silver," " wood-silver," and " larder-silver," gradually took the
place of the older personal services on the court-rolls. The process of
commutation was hastened by the necessities of the lords themselves.
The luxury of the castle-hall, the splendour and pomp of chivalry, the
cost of campaigns, drained the purses of knight and baron, and the
sale of freedom to a serf or exemption from services to a villein afforded
an easy and tempting mode of refilling them. In this process even
kings took part. Edward the Third sent commissioners to royal
estates for the especial purpose of selling manumissions to the King's
serfs ; and we still possess the names of those who were enfranchised
with their families by a payment of hard cash in aid of the exhausted
exchequer.

By this entire detachment of the serf from actual dependence on the
land, the manorial system was even more radically changed than by
the rise of the serf into a copyholder. The whole social condition
of the country, in fact, was modified by the appearance of a new class.
The rise of the free labourer had followed that of the farmer, labour
was no longer bound to one spot or one master : it was free to hire
itself to what employer, and to choose what field of employment it
would. At the moment we have reached, in fact, the lord of a manor
had been reduced over a large part of England to the position of

Sec. IV.

Thb

Peasant
Revolt

1377

1381

•■V ■f)

! I' \

The
Black
Death

li-':,. ! i

■II

248

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[ciiAr.

v.J

Skc. IV.

The
Peasant

Rkvolt

1377

1381

1349

The
Statutes

of
Iiabour-

ers

a modern landlord, receiving a rental in money from his tenants, and
dependent for the cultivation of hi.> own demesne on paid labourers.
But a formidable difficulty now met the landowners who had been
driven by the process of enfranchisement to rely on hired labour.
Hitherto this supply had been abundant and cheap ; but this
abundance suddenly disappeared. The most terrible plague which
the world ever witnessed advanced at this juncture from the East,
and after devastating Europe from the shores of the Mediterranean
to the Baltic, swooped at the close of 1348 upon Britain. The
traditions of its destructiveness, and the panic-struck words of the
statutes wh'ch followed it, have been more than justified by
modern research. Of the three or four millions who then formed
the population of England, more than one-half were swept away
in its repeated visitations. Its ravages were fiercest in the greater
towns, where filthy and undrained streets afforded a constant haunt
to leprosy and fever. In the burial-ground which the piety of Sir
Walter Maunay purchased for the citizens of London, a spot whose
site was afterwards marked by the Charter House, more than fifty
thousand corpses are said to have been interred. Thousands of people
perished at Norwich, while in Bristol the living were hardly able to
bury the dead. But the Black Death fell on the villages almost as
fiercely as on the towns. More than one-half of the priests of York-
sb're are known to have perished ; in the diocese of Norwich two-
thirds of the parishes changed their incumbents. The whole organiza-
tion of labour was thrown out of gear. The scarcity of hands made it
difficult for the minor tenants to perform the services due for their
lands, and only a temporary abandonment of half the rent by the land-
owners induced the farmers to refrain from the abandonment of their
farms. For a time cultivation became impossible. " The sheep and
cattle strayed through the fields and corn," says a contemporary, " and
there were none left who could drive them." Even when the first burst
of panic was over, the sudden rise of wages consequent on the enormous
diminution in the supply of free labour, though accompanied by a
corresponding rise in the price of food, rudely disturbed the course of
industrial employments ; harvests rotted on the ground, and fields
were left untilled, not merely from scarcity of hands, but from the
strife which now for the first time revealed itself between capital and
labour.

While the landowners of the country and the wealthier craftsmen
of the town were threatened with ruin by what seemed to their age the
extravagant demands of the new labour class, the country itself was torn
with riot and disorder. The outbreak .of lawless self -indulgence which
followed everywhere in the wake of the plague told especially upon
the " landless men," wandering in search of work, and for the first
time masters of the labour market ; and the wandering labourer or

artizan
woods,
the CroM
in the St;
provision
within th
whereof 1
may occii
the cmpli
wages wh
he is hour
obey was
found to I
ment in
tied to th(
he lived
became a
justices oj
impossibli
at the old
support,
repeated
and the s
fines and
visions fc
were the
ordered t
harbourin
merely th
reactionai
tion of iah
the ingen
manor wa
tomrry la
exemptior
grounds o
selves fre(
The atten
the mano
interest it
growth of
in vain to
was appli'
combinati
country th

[ciiAr.

s, and
)urers.
. been
abour.
t this
which
East,
ranean
The
of the
ed by
Formed
; away
gfrcater
haunt
of Sir
; whose
an fifty
people
able to
nost as
.f York-
ch two-
■ganiza-
made it
or their
le land-
of their
»ep and
y, " and
St burst
lormous
:d by a
ourse of
d fields
cm the
ital and

aftsmen
age the
vas torn
:e which
ly upon
the first
ourer or

v.l

THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR.

artizan turned easily into the "sturdy beggar," or the bandit of the
woods. A summary redress for these evils was at once provided by
the Crown in a royal ordinance which was subsequently embodied
in the Statute of Labourers. " Every man or woman," runs this famous
provision, " of whatsoever condition, free or bond, able in body, and
within the age of threescore years, . . . and not having of his own
whereof he may live, nor land of his own about the tillage of which he
may occupy himself, and not serving any other, shall be bound to serve
the employer who shall require him to do so, and shall take only the
wages which were accustomed to be taken in the neighbourhood where
he is bound to serve " two years before the plague began. A refusal to
obey was punished by imprisonment. But sterner measures were soon
found to be necessary. Not only was the price of labour fixed by Parlia-
ment in the Statute of 1351, but the labour class was once more
tied to the soil. The labourer was forbidden to quit the parish where
he lived in search of better-paid employment ; if he disobeyed he
became a "fugitive," and subject to imprisonment at the hands of the
justices of the peace. To enforce such a law literally must have been
impossible, for corn had risen to so high a price that a day' s labour
at the old wages would not have purchased wheat enough for a man's
support. But the landowners did not flinch from the attempt. The
repeated re-enactment of the law shows the difficulty of applying it,
and the stubbornness of the struggle which it brought about. The
fines and forfeitures which were levied for infractions of its pro-
visions formed a large source of royal revenue, but so ineffectual
were the original penalties that the runaway labourer was at last
ordered to be branded with a hot iron on the forehead, while the
harbouring of serfs in towns was rigorously put down. Nor was it
merely the existing class of free labourers which was attacked by this
reactionary movement. The increase of their numbers by a commuta-
tion of labour services for money payments was suddenly checked, and
the ingenuity of the lawyers who were employed as stewards of each
manor was exercised in striving to restore to the landowners that cus-
tomrry labour whose loss was now severely felt. Manumissions and
exemptions which had passed without question were cancelled on
grounds of informality, and labour services from which they held them-
selves freed by redemption were again demanded from the villeins.
The attempt was the more galling that the cause had to be pleaded in
the manor-court itself, and to be decided by the very officer whose
interest it was to give judgement in favour of his lord. We can see the
growth of a fierce spirit of resistance through the statutes which strove
in vain to repress it. In the towns, where the system of forced labour
was applied with even more rigour than in the country, strikes and
combinations became frequent among the lower craftsmen. In the
country the free labourers found allies in the villeins whose freedom

249

Sec. IV.

The
Pkasant
Rk.voi.t

1377

1381

1349

Si:

1 1'

17. >

i ■ ■ C

' I]

u: \m

250

HISTORY OF TTTF. FNOUSII PEOPLE.

fniAP.

Sec. IV.

TllR

Pkasant
RKvoi.r

1377
1381

John
Ball

1360

from manorial service was questioned. These were often men of
position and substance, and throughout the eastern counties the
gatherings of " fugitive serfs " were supported by an organized resist-
ance and by large contributions of money on the part of the wealthier
tenantry. A statute of later date throws light on their resistance.
It tells us that " villeins and holders of lands in villeinage withdrew
their customs and services from their lords, having attached themselves
to other persons who maintained and abetted them ; and who, under
colour of exemplifications from Domesday of the manors and villages
where they dwelt, claimed to be quit of all manner of services, either of
their body or of their lands, and would suffer no distress or other course
of justice to be taken against them ; the villeins aiding their maintainers
by threatening the officers of their lords with peril to life and limb, as
well by open assemblies as by confederacico to support each other." It
would seem not only as if the villein was striving to resist the reactionary
tendency of the lords of manors to regain his labour service, but that in
the general overturning of social institutions the copyholder was strug-
gling to become a freeholder, and the farmer to be recognized as pro-
prietor of the demesne he held on lease.

A more terrible outcome of the general suffering was seen in
a new revolt against the whole system of social inequality which
had till then passed unquestioned as the divine order of the world.
The cry of the poor found a terrible utterance in the words of "a
mad priest of Kent," as the courtly Froissart calls him, who for
twenty years found audience for his sermons, in defiance of interdict
and imprisonment, in the stout yeomen who gathered in the Kentish
churchyards. " Mad " as the landowners called him, it was in the
preaching of John Ball that England first . ' 3ned to a declaration
of natural equality and the rights of man. " Good people," cried the
preacher, " things will never go well in England so long as goods be
not in commc n, and so long as there be villeins and gentlemen. By
what right are they whom we call lords greater folk than we? On
what grounds have they deserved it ? Why do they hold us in serfage?
If we all came of the same father and mother, of Adam and Eve, how
can they say or prove that they are better than we, if it be not that
they make us gain for them by our toil what they spend in their
pride ? They are clothed in velvet, and warm in their furs and their
ermines, while we are covered with rags. They have wine and spices
and fair bread ; and we oat-cake and straw, and water to drink.
They have leisure and fine houses ; we have pain and labour, the
rain and the wind in the fields. And yet it is of us and of our
toil that these men hold their state." It was the tyranny of pro-
perty that then as ever roused the defiance of socialism. A spirit
fatal to the whole system of the Middle Ages breathed in the
popular rime which condensed the levelling doctrine of John

IniAP.

men of
ties the
d resist-
vealthier
sistance.
vithdrew
emselves
lo, under
I villages

either of
er course
lintainers
I limb, as
3ther." It
actionary
)ut that in
vas strug-
»d as pro-

5 seen in
ity which
:he world,
rds of " a

who for
f interdict
e Kentish
as in the
eclaration

cried the

goods be
men. By

we? On
n serfage?

Eve, how
K not that
d in their

and their
ind spices

to drink,
abour, the
nd of our
ny of pro-
A spirit
id in the
of John

TFIF IIUNDRKO YEARS' WAR.

Ball: "When Adam delved and Eve span, who was then the
gentleman ? "

The rime was running from lip to lip when a fresh instance of
public oppression fanned the smouldering discontent into a flame.
Edward the Third died in a dishonoured old age, robbed on his
death-bed even of his finger-rings by the vile mistress to whom he had
clung ; and the accession of the child of the Black Prince, Richard
the Second, revived the hopes of what in a political sense we must
still c?ll the popular party in the Legislature. The Parliament of
1377 took up the work of reform, and boldly assumed the control
of a new subsidy by assigning two of their number to regulate
its expenditure : that of 1378 demanded and obtained an account of
the mode in which the subsidy had been spent. But the real strength
of Parliament was directed, as we have seen, to the desperate struggle
in which the proprietary classes, whom they exclusively represented,
were striving to reduce the labourer into a fresh serfage. Meanwhile
the shame of defeat abroad was added to the misery and discord at
home. The French war ran its disastrous course : one English fleet
was beaten by the Spaniards, a second sunk by a storm ; and a
campaign in the heart of France ended, like its predecessors, in dis-
appointment and ruin. It was to defray the heavy expenses of the war
that the Parliament of 1380 renewed a grant made three years before,
to be raised by means of a poll-tax on every person in the realm.
The tax brought under contribution a class which had hitherto
escaped, men such as the labourer, the village smith, thfc village
tiler ; it goaded into action precisely the class which was already
seething with discontent, and its exaction set England on fire from
sea to sea. As spring went on quaint rimes passed through the country,
and served as summons to the revolt which soon extended from the
eastern and midland counties over all England south of the Thames.
"John Ball," ran one, "greeteth you all, and doth for to understand
he hath rung your bell. Now right and might, will and skill, God
speed every dele." " Help truth," ran another, " and truth shall help
you ! Now reigneth pride in price, and covetise is counted wise, and
lechery withouten shame, and gluttony withouten blame. Envy reigneth
with treason, and sloth is take in great season. God do bote, for
now is tyme ! " We recognise Ball's hand in the yet more stirring
missives of "Jack the Miller" and "Jack the Carter." "Jack Miller
asketh help to turn his mill aright. He hath grounden small, small :
the King's Son of Heaven he shall pay for all. Look thy mill go
aright with the four sailes, and the post stand with steadfastness.
With right and with might, with skill and with will ; let might
help right, and skill go before will, and right before might, so goeth
our mill aright." "Jack Carter," ran the companion missive, "prays
you all that ye make a good end of that ye have begun, and do

251

Sue. IV.

Tmr
Peasant
Kkvolt

1377

1381

The

Peaaant

RlBlng

if J

1379

1381

ill

I 'I

':»'■

Sec. IV.

The

Peasant

Revolt

1377

1381

Feasant

revolt

f I

' 111

) '.. I

Itine 13

well, and aye better and better: for at the even men heareth the
day." " Falseness and guile," sang Jack Trewman, " have reigned too
long, and truth hath been set under a lock, and falseness and guile
rcigneth in every stock. No man may come truth to, but if he sing
* si dedero.' True love is away that was so good, and clerks for
wealth work them wee. God do bote, for now is tyme." In the rude
jingle of these lines began for England the literature of political
controversy : they are the first predecessors of the pamphlets of
Milton and of Burke. Rough as they are, they express clearly enough
the mingled passions which met in the Vevolt of the peasants : their
longing for a right rule, for plain and simple justice ; their scorn of the
immorality of the nobles and the infamy of the court ; their resentment
at the perversion of the law to the cause of oppression. The revolt
spread like wildfire over the country ; Norfolk and Suffolk, Cambridge
and Hertfordshire rose in arms ; from Sussex and Surrey the insurrec-
tion extended as far as Devon. But the actual outbreak began in Kent,
where a tiler killed a tax-collector in vengeance for an outrage on his
daughter. The county rose in arms. Canterbury, where " the whole
town was of their mind," threw open its gates to the insurgents, who
plundered the Archbishop's palace and dragged John Ball from its
prison, while a hundred thousand Kentish-men gathered round Wat
Tyler of Essex and John Hales of Mailing. In the eastern counties the
levy of the poll-tax had already gathered crowds of peasants together,
armed with clubs, rusty swords, and bows, and the royal commis-
sioners sent to repress the tumult were driven from the field. While the
Essex-men marched upon London on one side of the river, the Kentish-
men marched on the other. Their grievance was mainly political, for
villeinage was unknown in Kent ; but as they poured on to Blackheath,
every lawyer who fell into their hands was put to death ; "not till all
these were killed would the land enjoy its old freedom again," the
peasants shouted as they fired the houses of the stewards and flung
the records of the manor-courts into the flames. The whole popula-
tion joined them as they marched along, while the nobles were
paralyzed with fear. The young King — he was but a boy of fifteen-
addressed them from a boat on the river ; but the refusal of his
Council under the guidance of Archbishop Sudbury to allow him to
land kindled the peasants to fury, and with cries of "Treason''
the great mass rushed on London. Its gates were flung open by
the poorer artizans within the city, and the stately palace of John
of Gaunt at ihe Savoy, the new inn of the lawyers at the I'emple,
the houses of the foreign merchants, were soon in a blaze. But the
insurgents, as they proudly boasted, were "seekers of truth and
justice, not thieves or robbers," and a plunderer found carrying off
a silver vessel from the sack of the Savoy was flung with his spoil
into the flames. The general terror was shown ludicrously enough on

v.]

the folio
self, fon
knights
promise(
But the
King ha
the Trio
dragged
was wre
levy of t:
Tower t(
the city j
occupied
boy begc
the crisi
shouted
nor held
go home
amnesty,
day mon
emancipj
men wit!
William
head of t
deliver u
But a n:
which af
placed w
might gr:
will. Bu
from the
in churc
when the
Many
to the me
Tyler wh
ing at Sn
leader, w
brought
Walwortl
shouted t
my mastc
am your
peasants
been to fi

v.]

THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR.

^53

the following day, when a daring band of peasants, under Tyler him-
self, forced their way into the Tower, and taking the panic-stricken
knights of the royal household in rough horse-play by the beard,
promised to be their equals and good comrades in the time to come.
But the horse-play changed into dreadful earnest when they found the
King had escaped their grasp, and when Archbishop Sudb.'.ry and
the Prior of St. John were discovered in the chapel ; the primate was
dragged from his sanctuary and beheaded, and the same vengeance
was wreaked on the Treasurer and the Chief Commissioner for the
levy of the hated poll-tax. Meanwhile the King had ridden from the
Tower to meet the mass of the Essex-men, who had encamped without
the city at Mile-end, while the men of Hertfordshire and St. Albans
occupied Highbury. " I am your King and Lord, good people," the
boy began with a fearlessness which marked his bearing throughout
the crisis ; " what will ye ? " " We will that you free us for ever,"
shouted the peasants, " us and our lands ; and that we be never named
nor held for serfs." " I grant it," replied Richard ; and he bade them
go home, pledging himself at once to issue charters of freedom and
L:mnesty. A shout of joy welcomed the promise, f hroughout the
day more than thirty clerks were busied writing letters of pardon and
emancipation, and with these the mass of the Essex and Hertfordshire
men withdrew quietly to their homes. It was with such a charter that
William Grindecobbe returned to St. Albans, and breaking at the
head of the burghers into the abbey precincts, summoned the abbot to
deliver up the charters which bound the town in bondage to his house.
But a more striking proof of servitude remained in the millstones,
which after a long suit at law had been adjudged to the abbey, and
placed within its cloister as a triumphant witness that no townsman
might grind corn within the domain of the abbey save at the abbot's
will. Bursting into the cloister the burghers now tore the millstones
from the floor, and broke them into small pieces, " like blessed bread
in church," so that each might have something to show of the day
when their freedom was won again.

Many of the Kentish-men dispersed at the news of the King's pledge
to the men of Essex, but thirty thousand men still surrounded Wat
Tyler when Richard by a mere chance encountered him the next morn-
ing at Smithfield. Hot words passed between his train and the peasant
leader, who advanced to confer with the King ; and a threat from Tyler
brought on a brief struggle in which the Mayor of Loidon, William
Walworth, struck him with his dagger to the ground. " Kill, kill,"
shouted the crowd, " they have slain our captain." " What need ye,
my masters ? " cried the boy-king, as he rode boldly to the front, " I
am your Captain and your King ! Follow me." The hopes of the
peasants centred in the young sovereign : one aim of their rising had
been to free him from the evil counsellors who, as they believed, abused

Sec. IV.

The

Peasant
Revolt

1377

1381

Suppres-
sion
of the
Revolt

June 15

\:-m

'! ,

254

Sec. IV.

The
Peasant
Revolt

1377

1381

Nov. 1 38 1

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

his youth, and they now followed him with a touching loyalty and trust
till he entered the Tower. His mother welcomed him with tears of joy.
" Rejoice and praise God," the boy answered, " for I have recovered
to-day my heritage which was lost, and the realm of England." But
he was compelled to give the same pledge of freedom as at Mile-end,
and it was only after receiving his letters of pardon and emancipation
that the Kentish-men dispersed to their homes. The revolt, indeed,
was far from being at an end. South of the I'hames it spread as far
as Devonshire ; there were outbreaks in the north ; the eastern coun-
ties were in one wild turmoil of revolt. A body of peasants occupied
St. Albans. A maddened crowd fcrced the gates of St. Edmundsbury
and wrested from the trembling monks pledges for the confirmation of
the liberties of the town. John the Litster, a dyer of Norwich, headed a
mass of peasants, under the title of King of the Commons, and compelled
the jiobles he captured to act as his meat-tasters and to serve him on their
knees during his repast. But the withdrawal of the peasant armies with
their letters of emancipation gave couragi; to the nobles. The warlike
Bishop of Norwich fell lance in hand on Litster's camp, and scattered
the peasants of Norfolk at the first shock: while the King, with
an army of 40,000 men, spread terror by the ruthlessness of his
executions as he marched in triumph through Kent and Essex. At
"Waltham he was met by the display of his own recent charters and a
protest from the Essex-men that " they were so far as freedom went
the peers of their lords." But they were to learn the worth of a
king's word. "Villeins you were," answered Richard, "and villeins
you are. In bondage you shall abide, and that not your old bondage,
but a worse ! " But the stubborn resistance which he met showed
the temper of the people. The villagers of Billericay threw themselves
into the woods and fought two hard fights before they were reduced to
submission. It was only by threats of death that verdicts of guilty
could be wrung from the Essex jurors when the leaders of the revolt
were brought before them. Grindecobbe was offered his life if he
would persuade his followers at St. Albans to restore the charters
they had wrung from the monks. He turned bravely to his fellow-
townsmen and bade them take no thought for his trouble. " If I
die," he said, " I shall die for the cause of the freedom we have won,
counting myself happy to end my life by such a martyrdom. Do then
to-day as you would have done had I been killed yesterday." But the
stubborn wih of the conquered was met by as stubborn a will in their
conquerors. Through the summer and autumn seven thousand men
are said to have perished on the gallows or the field. The r0y.1I
council indeed showed its sense of the danger of a mere policy of
resistance by submitting the question of enfranchisement to the Parlia-
ment which assembled on the suppression of the revolt, with words
which suggested a compromise. " If you desire to enfranchise and

set at li
mon ass
he will
influence
letters, tl
and void
goods fn
ended, "
one day.

\AHtho)
by the Ma
St. Alban
the Life o
same viol
book of J
are vehem
plemented
"Chroniq
both the
Henry the
the Hous(
feeling in
Richard I
indispensa
illustrated
"Complai
English T(
at the time
published 1
best mode
Paris, 186,

All the
viewing, ii
of the po
fidelity ir
vividly he
severed tl
plaint of
world of
Chaucer 1
world of \\
probably i
minor ore
for his ta
earned a n
in the stat

CHAP.

^.]

THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR.

255

I trust
of joy.
)vered
But
e-end,
pation
ndeed,
as far
I coun-
cupied
dsbury
.tion of
aded a
ipelled
)n their
es with
warlike
:attered
g, with
, of his
ex. At
> and a
m went
th of a
villeins
ondage,
showed
mselves
uced to
f guilty
,e revolt
'e if he
:harters
fellow-
«lf I
ve won,
Do then
But the
in their
nd men
e royal
olicy of
Parlia-
words
ise and

set at liberty the said serfs," ran the royil message, " by your com-
mon assent, as the King has been informed that some of you desire,
he will consent to your prayer.*' But no thoughts of compromise
influenced the landowners in their reply. The King's grant and
letters, the Parliament answered with perfect truth, were legally null
and void : their serfs were their goods, and the King could not take their
goods from them but by their own consent. " And this consent," they
ended, " we have never given and never will give, were we all to die in
one day."

Section v.— Richard the Seccnd, 1381—1399.

[AntJiorltics. — The *' Annales Rica.; li Secundi et Henrici Quarti," published
by the Master of the Rolls, are our main authority. They form the basis of the
St. Albans compihiticm which bears the name of Walsingham, and from which
the Life of Richard by a monk of Evesham is for the most part derived. The
same violent Lancastrian sympathy runs through Walsingham and the fifth
book of Knyghton's Chronicle. The French authorities, on the other hand,
are vehemently on Richard's side. Froissart, who ends at this time, is sup-
plemented by the metrical history of Creton (** Archaeologia," vol. xx.) and the
"Chronique de la Traison et Mort de Richart" (English Historical Society),
both the works of French authors, and published in France in the time of
Henry the Fourth, probably with the aim of arousing French feeling against
the House of Lancaster and the war-policy it had revived. The popular
feeling in England may be seen in "Political Songs from Edward HI. to
Richard HL" (Rolls Series). The "Foedera" and Rolls of PaVliament are
indispensable for »this period : its constitutional importance has been ably
illustrated by Mr. Hallam (" Middle Ages "). William Longland's poem, the
"Complaint of Piers the Ploughman (edited by Mr. Skeat for the Early
English Text Society), throws a flood of light on the social condition of England
at the time ; a poem on "The Deposition of Richard II.," which has been
published by the Camden Society, is now ascribed to the same author. The
best modern work on Richard II. is that of M. Wallon (" Richard II."
Paris, 1864).]

All the darker and sterner aspects of the age which we have been
viewing, its social revolt, its moral and religious awakening, the misery
of the poor, the protest of the Lollard, are painted with a terrible
fidelity in the poem of William Longland. Nothing brings more
vividly home to us the social chasm which in the fourteenth century
severed the rich from the poor than the contrast between the " Com-
plaint of Piers the Ploughman " and the " Canterbury Tales." The
world of wealth and ease and laughter through which the courtly
Chaucer moves with eyes downcast as in a pleasant dream is a far-off
world of wrong and of ungodliness to the gaunt poet of the poor. Born
probably in Shropshire, where he had been put to school and received
minor orders as a clerk, " Long Will," as Longland was nicknamed
for his tall stature, found his way at an early age to London, and
earned a miserable livelihood there by singing "placebos" and "diriges"
in the stately funerals of his day. Men took the moody clerk for a

Sec. v.
Richard

THE

Second
1381

1300

Fiers the
Plough-

) '.:]

' \ : ' ' v^

'11^ :'

^■f . : I

4 '

256

Sec. V.
Richard

THE

Second
1381

1399

[ 1362-180

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE. [chap.

madman ; his bitter poverty quickened the defiant pride that made
him loth — as he tells us — to bow to the gay lords and dames who rode
decked in silver and minivere along the Cheap, or to exchange a " God
save you " with the law sergeants as he passed their new house in the
Temple. His world is the world of the poor : he dwells on the poor
man's Hfe, on his hunger and toil, his rough revelry and his despair,
with the narrow intensity of a man who has no outlook beyond it.
The narrowness, the misery, the monotony of the life he paints reflect
themselves in his verse. It is only here and there tliat a love of
nature or a grim earnestness of wrath quicken his rime into poetry ;
there is not a gleam of the bright human sympathy of Chaucer, of his
fresh delight in the gaiety, the tenderness, the daring of the world
about him, of his picturesque sense of even its coarsest contrasts, of
his delicate irony, of his courtly wit. The cumbrous allegory, the
tedious platitudes, the rimed texts from Scripture which form the
staple of Longland's work, are only broken here and there by phrases
of a shrewd common sense, by bitter outbursts, by pictures of a broad
Hogarthian humour. What chains one to the poem is its deep under-
tone of sadness : the world is out of joint and the gaunt rimer who
stalks silently along the Strand has no faith in his power to put it
right. His poem covers indeed an age of shame and suffering such as
England had never known, for if its first brief sketch appeared two
years after the Peace of Brdtigny its completion may be dated at the
close of the reign of Edward the Third, and its final issue preceded
but by a single year the Peasant Revolt. Londoner as he is, Will's
fancy flies far from the sin and suffering of the great city to a May-
morning in the Malvern Hills. " I was wery forwandered and went
me to rest under a broad bank by a burn side, and as I lay and leaned
and looked in the water I slumbered in a sleeping, it sweyved (sounded)
so merry." Just as Chaucer gathers the typical figures of the world he
saw into his pilgrim train, so the dreamer gathers into a wide field his
army of traders and chafferers, of hermits and solitaries, of minstrels,
" japers and jinglers," bidders and beggars, ploughmen that " in setting
and in sowing swonken (toil) full hard," pilgrims " with their wenches
after," weavers and labourers, burgess and bondman, lawyer and
scrivener, court-haunting bishops, friars, and pardoners "parting
the silver " with the parish priest. Their pilgrimage is not to Can-
terbury, but to Truth ; their guide to Truth neither clerk nor priest
but Peterkin the Ploughman, whom they find ploughing in his field.
He it is who bids the knight no more wrest gifts from his tenant
nor misdo with the poor. " Though he be thine underling here,
well may hap in heaven that he be worthier set and with more bliss
than thou. . . . For in charnel at church churles be evil to
know, or a knight from a knave there." The gospel of equality is
backed by the gospel of labour. .The aim of the Ploughman is to

v.]

work, and

as he warr

idlest to t

the wastei

labour Lo

political ar

which was

a famous

any rate ]

the people

claims a r;

God sends

sings as a

only in a <

trial, and t

waking life

upon— he t

in the clos

followed b

amidst the

Pride and

f ilgrim sta

The strif

the fiercer

of Laboun

employer j

their imme

restricting 1

During the

out so rapic

years after

purchase i

have been

statement ii

the workin

Longland <

disdained

or fish, friec

The market

"and but if

lie was mad

to its norn]

Hunger wa

against his

win while yi

[chap.

made

rode
"God
in the

d poor
espair,
ond it.
reflect
iove of
)oetry ;
, of his
i world
asts, of
ry, the
rm the
phrases

1 broad
• under-
ler who
D put it
such as
red two
I at the
receded
3, Will's

May-
id went
I leaned
ounded)
vorld he
field his
instrels,
1 setting
kvenches
^er and

parting
to Can-
)r priest
lis field.

tenant
ig here,
are bliss

evil to

ahty is
an is to

v.]

THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR.

457

work, and to make the world work with him. He warns the labourer
as he warns the knight. Hunger is God's instrument in bringing the
idlest to toil, and Hunger waits to work her will on the idler and
the waster. On the eve of the great struggle between wealth and
labour Longland stands alone in his fairness to both, in his shrewd
political and religious common sense. In the face of the popular hatred
which was to gather round John of Gaunt, he paints the Duke in
a famous apologue as the cat who, greedy as she might be, at
any rate keeps the noble rats from utterly devouring the mice of
the people. Though the poet is loyal to the Church, he pro-
claims a righteous life to be better than a host of indulgences, and
God sends His pardon to Piers when priests dispute it. But he
sings as a man conscious of his loneliness and without hope. It is
only in a dream that he sees Corruption, " Lady Mede," brought to
trial, and the world repenting at the preaching of Reason. In the
waking life Reason finds no listeners. The poet himself is looked
upon — he tells us bitterly — as a madman. There is a terrible despair
in the close of his later poem, where the triumph of Christ is only
followed by the reign of Antichrist ; where Contrition' slumbers
amidst the revel of Death and Sin ; and Conscience, hard beset by
Pride and Sloth, rouses himself with a last effort, and seizing his
pilgrim staff wanders over the world to find Piers Ploughman.

The strife indeed which Longland would have averted raged only
the fiercer after the repression of the Peasant Revolt. The Statutes
of Labourers, effective as they proved in sowing hatred between
employer and employed, between rich and poor, were powerless for
their immediate ends, either in reducing the actual rate of wages or in
restricting the mass of floating labour to definite areas of employment.
During the century and a half after the Peasant Revolt villeinage died
out so rapidly that it became a rare and antiquated thing. A hundred
years after the Black Death the wages of an English labourer could
purchase iwice the amount of the necessaries of life which could
have been obtained for the wages paid under Edward the Third. The
statement is corroborated by the incidental descriptions of the life of
the working classes which we find in Piers Ploughman. Labourers,
Longland tells us, " that have no land to live on but their hands
disdained to live on penny ale or bacon, but demanded fresh flesh
or fish, fried or baked, and that hot and hotter for chilling of their maw."
The market was still in fact in the labourer's hands, in spite of statutes ;
" and but if he be highly hired else will he chide and wail the time that
he was made a workman." The poet saw clearly that as population rose
to its normal rate times such as these would pass away. " Whiles
Hunger was their master here would none of them chide or strive
against /it's statute, so sternly he looked : and I warn you, workmen,
win while ye may, for Hunger hitherward hasteth him fast." But even

Sec. V.
Richard

THE

Second
1381

1399

The
Social
Strife

I.,

'^^

"H;,

t -liii^

'■ ■■'■ 4^

I'-'B^

j A-t iSa

H^'^ ii

ii. ^^'^

258

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. V.
Richard

THE

Second

laai

1399

1381

LoUardry

at the time when he wrote there were seasons of the year during which
employment for the floating mass of labour was hard to find. In the
long interval between harvest-tide and harvest-tide, work and food
were alike scarce in the mediaeval homestead. " I have no penny,"
says Piers the Ploughman in such a season, in lines which give us the
picture of a farm of the day, " pullets for to buy, nor neither geese
nor pigs, but two green cheeses, a few curds and cream, and an oaten
cake, and two loaves of beans and bran baken for my children. I
have no salt bacon, nor no cooked meat collops for to make, but I have;
parsley and leeks and many cabbage plants, and eke a cow and a
calf, and a cart-mare to draw a-field my dung while the drought
lasteth, and by this livelihood we must all live till Lammas-tide
(August), and by that I hope to have harvest in my croft." But
it was not till Lammas-tide that high wages and the new corn
bade " Hunger go to sleep," and during the long spring and summer
the free labourer, and the "waster that will not work but wander
about, that will eat no bread but me finest wheat, nor drink but
of the best and brownest ale," was a source of social and political
danger. " He grieveth him against God and grudgeth against
Reason, and then curseth he the King and all his Council after such
law to allow labourers to grieve." The terror of the landowners
expressed itself in legislation which was a fitting sequel to the Statutes
of Labourers. They forbade the child of any tiller of the soil to be
apprenticed in a town. They prayed Richard to ordain "that no
bondman or bondwoman shall place their children at school, as has
been done, so as to advance their children in the world by their going
into the Church." The new colleges which were being founded at the
two Universities at this moment closed their gates upon villeins. It
was the failure of such futile efforts to effect their aim which drove
the energy of the great proprietors into a new direction, and in the
end revolutionized the whole agricultural system of the country.
Sheep-farming required fewer hands than tillage, and the scarcity
and high price of labour tended to throw more and more land into
sheep-farms. In the decrease of personal service, as villeinage died
away, it became the interest of the lord to diminish the number of
tenants on his estate as it had been before his interest to maintain it,
and he did this by massing the small allotments together into larger
holdings. By this course of eviction the number of the free-labour
class was enormously increased while the area of employment was
diminished ; and the social danger from vagabondage and the " sturdy
beggar " grew every day greater till it brought about the despotism of
the Tudors.

This social danger mingled with the yet more formidable religious
peril which sprang from the party violence of the later LoUardry. The
persecution of Courtenay had deprived the religious reform of its

v.]

more learr
Wyclif s di
been done
ceased to 1
a general «
the times f
of the peas
hatred of tl
the fanatici
hostility tc
religion foi
of organiza
made it pe
men becan
schools, its
hand to h;
"Golias"ii
were sung
a later tim(
of the causi
London in i
a Lollard p
the pulpit o
the influen(
with the m(
ness of the
he arrestee
through the
of the new
gerous to tl
and system
which bore
itself, a fait
truth. The
a canon of '.
folk and wc
themselves,
drawing w(
declared to
priesthood,
attempted 1
cution. Th
pretension c
persecution
procured th

[chap.

g which
In the
nd food
penny,"
e us the
2r geese
in oaten
dren. I
It I have;
y and a
drought
mas-tide
ft." But
ew corn
summer
: wander
rink but
political
against
iter such
idowners
Statutes
oil to be
"that no
jl, as has
eir going
ed at the
eins. It
ch drove
id in the
country,
scarcity
land into
lage died
umber of
lintain it,
to larger
ee-labour
nent was
; " sturdy
potism of

religious
dry. The
m of its

v.]

THE HUNDUEn YEARS' WAR.

more learned adherents and of the support of the Universities, while
Wyclif s death had robbed it of its head at a moment when little had
been done save a work of destruction. From that moment I.oUardry
ceased to be in any sense an organized movement, and crumbled into
a general spirit of revolt. All the religious and social discontent of
the times floated instinctively to this new centre ; the socialist dreams
of the peasantry, the new and keener spirit of personal morality, the
hatred of the friars, the jealousy of the great lords towards the prelacy,
the fanaticism of the reforming zealot, were blended together in a common
hostility to the Church and a common resolve to substitute personal
religion for its dogmatic and ecclesiastical system. But it was this want
of organization, this looseness and fluidity of the new movement, that
made it penetrate through every class of society. Women as well as
men became the preachers of the new sect. Lollardry had its own
schools, its own books ; its pamphlets were passed everywhere from
hand to hand ; scurrilous ballads which revived the old attacks of
'* Golias " in the Angevin times upon the wealth and luxury of the clergy
were sung at every corner. Nobles, like the Earl of Salisbury, and at
a later time Sir John Oldcastle, placed themselves openly at the head
of the cause and threw open their gates as a refuge for its missionaries.
London in its hatred of tlie clergy became fiercely Lollard, and defended
a Lollard preacher who had ventured to advocate the new doctrines from
the pulpit of St. Paul's. One of its mayors, John cf Northampton, showed
the influence of the new morality by the Puritan spirit in which he dealt
with the morals of the city. Compelled to act, as he said, by the remiss-
ness of the clergy, who connived for money at every kind of debauchery,
he arrested the loose women, cut off their hair, and carted them
through the streets as an object of public scorn. But the moral spirit
of the new movement, though infinitely its grander side, was less dan-
gerous to the Church than its open repudiation of the older doctrines
and systems of Christendom. Out of the floating mass of opinion
which bore the name of Lollardry one great faith gradually evolved
itself, a faith in the sole authority of the Bible as a source of religious
truth. The translation of Wyclif did its work. Scripture, complains
a canon of Leicester, " became a vulgar thing, and more open to lay
folk and women that knew how to read than it is wont to be to clerks
themselves." Consequences which Wyclif had perhaps shrunk from
drawing were boldly drawn by his disciples. The Church was
declared to have become apostate, its priesthood was denounced as no
priesthood, its sacraments as idolatry. It was in vain that the clergy
attempted to stifle the new movement by their old weapon of perse-
cution. The jealousy entertained by the baronage and gentry of every
pretension of the Church to secular power foiled its efforts to make
persecution effective. At the moment of the Peasant Revolt, Courtenay
procured the enactment of a statute which, commissioned the sheriffs to

S 2

259

Sec. V.
Richard

THE

Second
1381

1399

•HI

i' m

*'H

III 'r

1 I

266

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. V.
Richard

THE

Second
1381

i3e9

1395

The

French

Wars

13S5

seize all persons convicted before the bishops of preaching heresy.
But the statute was repealed in the next session, and the Commons
added to the bitterness of the blow by their protest that they considered
it " in nowise their interest to be more under the jurisdiction of the
prelates or more bound by them than their ancestors had been in
times past." Heresy indeed was still a felony by the common law, and
if as yet we meet with no instances of the punishment of heretics by
the fire it was because the threat of such a death was commonly
followed by the recantation of the Lollard. But the restriction of each
bishop's jurisdiction within the limits of his own diocese made it almost
impossible to arrest the wandering preachers of the new doctrine, and
the civil punishment — even if it had been sanctioned by public opinion
— seems to have long fallen into desuetude. Experience proved to the
prelates that few sheriffs would arrest on the mere warrant of an ecclesi-
astical officer, and that no royal court would issue the writ " for the
burning of a heretic " on a bishop's requisition. But powerless as the
efforts of the Church were for purposes of repression, they were effective
in rousing the temper of the Lollards into a bitter fanaticism. The
Lollard teachers directed their fiercest invectives against the wealth
and secularity of the great Churchmen. In a formal petition to Parlia-
ment they mingled denunciations of the riches of the clergy with an open
profession of disbelief in transubstantiation, priesthood, pilgrimages,
and image worship, and a demand, which illustrates the strange medley
of opinions which jostled together in the new movement, that war
might be declared unchristian, and that trades such as those of the
goldsmith or the armourer, which were contrary to apostolical poverty,
might be banished from the realm. They contended (and it is re-
markable that a Parliament of the next reign adopted the statement)
that from the superfluous revenues of the Church, if once they were
applied to purposes of general utility, the King might maintain fifteen
earls, fifteen hundred knights, and six thousand squires, besides
endowing a hundred hospitals for the relief of the poor.

The distress of the landowners, the general disorganization of the
country, in every part of which bands of marauders were openly
defying the law, the panic of the Church and of society at large as the
projects of the Lollards shaped themselves into more daring and
revolutionary forms, added a fresh keenness to the national discontent
at the languid and inefficient prosecution of the war. The junction of
the French and Spanish fleets had made them masters of the seas ; what
fragments were left of Guienne lay at their mercy, and the northern
frontier of England itself was flung open to France by the alliance of the
Scots. The landing of a French force in the Forth roused the whole
country to a desperate t.Tort, and a large and well-equipped army of
Englishmen penetrated as far as Edinburgh in the vain hope of bringing
their enemy to battle. A more terrible blow had been struck in the re-

V.]

duction of
market foi
employed
the threat >
frontier in
right, the c
Duke had
de Vere ai
the suppre
steady pur
the depart
his son, th
lukewarm
Court, and
Parliamen
impeachec
regency fo
attempt of
measures \
in arms ; i
into exile o
had pronoi
and four 1
hardly a ye
to break d(
gled so va
tell him ho
your twent
affairs," sal
than any v
lords, but ]
For eight
into his har
he carried I
brought ah
1394 for foil
years by a
daughter oj
to rule by t
consulted i
pacified Ire
his absence
Richard sh
inconstanc;
uncle, the I

[chap.

heresy,
mmons
isidered

of the
Deen in
aw, and
etics by
iiimonly
of each
t almost
ine, and
opinion
id to the
I ecclesi-
'for the
IS as the
effective
[Ti. The
; wealth
Parlia-
i an open
primages,
e medley
that war
se of the
poverty,
is re-
atement)
hey were
in fifteen

besides

m of the
» openly
ge as the
ring and
iscontent
nction of
las ; what
northern
ice of the
he whole
army of
bringing
n the re-

V.]

THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR.

261

duction of Ghent by the French troops, and the loss of the one remaining
market for English commerce ; while the forces which should have been
employed in saving it, and in the protection of the English shores against
the threat of invasion, were squandered by John of Gaunt on the Spanish
frontier in pursuit of a visionary crown, which he claimed in his wife's
right, the daughter of Pedro the Cruel. The enterprise showed that the
Duke had now abandoned the hope of directing affairs at home. Robert
de Vere and Michael de la Pole, the Earl of Suffolk, had stood since
the suppression of the revolt at the head of the royal councils, and their
steady purpose was to drive the Duke of Lancaster from power. But
the departure of John of Gaunt only called to the front his brother and
his son, the Duke of Gloucester and the Earl of Derby ; while the
lukewarm prosecution of the war, the profuse expenditure of the
Court, and above all the manifest will of the King to free himself from
Parliamentary control, estranged the Lower House. The Parliament
impeached Suffolk for corruption, and appointed a commission of
regency for a year, of which Gloucester was the leading spirit. The
attempt of the young King at the close of the session to reverse these
measures was crushed by the appearance of Gloucester and his friends
in arms ; in the Merciless Parliament a charge of high treason hurried
into exile or to death Suffolk with his supporters, the five judges who
had pronounced the commission to be in itself illegal were banished,
and four members of the royal household sent to the block. But
hardly a year had passed when Richard found himself strong enough
to break down by a word the government against which he had strug-
gled so vainly. Entering the Council he suddenly asked his uncle to
tell him how old he was. " Your Highness," replied Gloucester, " is in
your twenty-fourth year." " Then I am old enough to manage my own
affairs," said Richard coolly. " I have been longer under guardianship
than any ward in my realm. I thank you for your past services, my
lords, but I need them no longer."

For eight years the King wielded the power which thus passed quietly

into his hands with singular wisdom and good fortune. 9n the one hand

he carried his peace policy into effect by negotiations with France, which

brought about a truce renewed year by year till it was prolonged in

1394 for four years, and this period of rest was lengthened for twenty-five

years by a subsequent agreement on his marriage with Isabella, the

daughter of Charles the Sixth. On the other he announced his resolve

to rule by the advice of his Parliament, submitted to its censure, and

consulted it on all matters of importance. In a short campaign he

pacified Ireland ; and the Lollard troubles which had threatened during

his absence died awav on his return. But the brilliant abilities which

Richard shared with the rest of the Plantagenets were marred by a fitful

inconstancy, an insane pride, and a craving for absolute power. His

uncle, the Duke of Gloucester remained at the head of the opposit; n ;

Skc. V.
Richard

THK

Sf.i.o.m>
1381

1399

. v»i

' -.Ml

I- i v:

1386

1388

1389

Richard

the
Second

1389-1397

sir*

: 111

Id ' -i. .,_, .

jKJ: ■ , Mil

:' * ' ■ ■ - ■

suarnxusmiti

Sec. V.
Richard

THK

Sf.coni)
1381

1309

1397

The
Lancas-
■trian
Revolu-
tion

while the King had secured the friendship of John of Gaunt, and of his
son Henry, Earl of Derby. The readiness with which Richard seized
on an opportunity of provoking a contest shows the bitterness with
which during the long years that had passed since the flight of Suffolk
he had brooded over his projects of vengeance. The Duke of Glou-
cester and the Earls of Arundel and Warwick were arrested on a charge
of conspiracy. A Parliament packed with royal partizans was used to
crush Richard's opponents. The pardons granted nine years before were
recalled ; the commission of regency declared to have been illegal, and
its promoters guilty of treason. The blow was ruthlessly followed up.
The Duke was saved from a trial by a sudden death in his prison at
Calais ; while his chief supporter, Arundel, the Archbishop of Canter-
bury, was impeached and banished, and the nobles of his party con-
demned to death and imprisonment. The measures introduced
into the Parliament of the following year showed that besides
his projects of revenge Richard's designs had widened into a definite
plan of absolute government. It declared null the proceedings of the
Parliament of 1388. He was freed from Parliamentary control by the
grant to him of a subsidy upon wool and leather for the term of his life.
His next step got rid of Parliament itself. A committee of twelve
peers and six commoners was appointed in Parliament, with power to
continue their sittings after its dissolution and to " examine and deter-
mine all matters and subjects which had been moved in the presence
of the King, with all the dependences of those not determined." The
aim of Richard was to supersede by means of this permanent commis-
sion the body from which it originated : he at once employed it to
determine causes and carry out his will, and forced from every tenant
of the Crown an oath to recognize the validity of its acts and to oppose
any attempts to alter or revoke them. With such an engine at his
command the King was absolute, and with the appearance of absolut-
ism the temper of his reign suddenly changed. A system of forced
loans, the sale of charters of pardon to Gloucester's adherents, the out-
lawry of seven counties at once on the plea that they had supported
his enemies and must purchase pardon, a reckless interference with the
course of justice, roused into new life the social and political discontent
which was threatening the very existence of the Crown.

By his good government and by his evil government alike, Richard
had succeeded in alienating every class of his subjects. He had
estranged the nobles by his peace policy, the landowners by his refusal
to sanction the insane measures of repression they directed against
the labourer, the merchant class by his illegal exactions, and the
Church by his want of zeal against the Lollards. Richard himself
had no sympathy with the Lollards, and the new sect as a social
danger was held firmly at bay. But the royal officers showed little
zeal in aiding the bishops to seize or punish the heretical teachers, and

v.l

Lollardry
through tl
the tracts
native Inn
earliest Ic
almost al(
hatred mi
tyranny
national d
eldest son
cousin in
his recent
these mca
the more
quarrel be
party bar
both from
of leave w
John of G
estates. /
Richard c
organizati
exile like
absence fo
French C(
handful of
by the Ea]
great hou!
which gre)
Duke of ^
forces joir
Haven he
landed, an
a second f
port alrea<
Lancaster
am betray
the hill; «
late for ret
am come h
son. You
you have i
to rule the
you, it plej
in the gov*

[chap.

d of his

:l seized

;ss with

Suffolk

^f Glou-

i charge

used to

3re were

gal, and

wed up.

rison at

Canter-

rty con-

roduced

besides

definite

js of the

►1 by the

' his life.

f twelve

Dower to

id deter-

Dresence

i." The

;ommis-

ed it to

y tenant

oppose

le at his

absolut-

f forced

the out-

pported

with the

scontent

Richard

He had

5 refusal

against

and the

himself

, social

ed little

ers, and

LoUardry found favour in the very precincts of the Court ; it was
through the patronage of Richard's first queen, Anne of Bohemia, that
the tracts and Bible of the Reformer had been introduced into i,2r
native hind, to give rise to the remarkable movement v/hich found its
earliest leaders in John Huss and Jerome of Prague. R'chard stood
almost alone in fact in his realm, but even this accumulatctl mass of
hatred might have failed to crush him hail not an act of jealousy and
tyranny placed an able and unscrupulous leader at the head of the
national discontent. Henry, Earl of Derby and Uuke of Hereford, the
eldest son of John of Gaunt, though he had taken part against his royal
cousin in the earlier troubles of his reign, had loyally supported him in
his recent measures against Gloucester. No sooner, however, were
these measures successful than Richard turned his new power against
the more dangerous House of Lancaster, and availing himself of a
quarrel between the Dukes of Hereford and Norfolk, in which each
party bandied accusations of treason against the other, banished
both from the realm. Banishment was soon followed by the annulling
of leave which had been given to Henry to receive his inheritance on
John of Gaunt's death, and the King himself seized the Lancastrian
estates. At the moment when he had thus driven his cousin to despair,
Richard crossed into Ireland to complete the work of conquest and
organization which he had begun there ; and Archbishop Arundel, an
exile like himself, urged the Duke to take advantage of the King's
absence for the recovery of his rights. Eluding the vigilance of the
French Court, at which he had taken shelter, Henry landed with a
handful of men on the coast of Yorkshire, where he was at once joined
by the Earls of Northumberland and Westmoreland, the heads of the
great houses of the Percies and the Nevilles ; and, with an army
which grew as he advanced, entered triumphantly into London. The
Duke of York, whom the King had left regent, submitted, and his
forces joined those of Henry ; and when Richard landed at Milford
Haven he found the kingdom lost. His own army dispersed as it
landed, and the deserted King fled in disguise to North Wales, to find
a second force which the Earl of Salisbury had gathered for his sup-
port already disbanded. Invited to a conference with the Duke of
Lancaster at Flint, he saw himself surrounded by the rebel forces. " I
am betrayed," he cried, as the view of his enemies burst on him from
the hill ; " there are pennons and banners in the valley." But it was too
late for retreat. Richard was seized and brought before his cousin. " I
am come before my time," said Lancaster, " but I will show you the rea-
son. Your people, my lord, complain that for the space of twenty years
you have ruled them harshly : however, if it please God, I will help you
to rule them better." " Fair - ousin," replied the King, " since it pleases
you, it pleases me well." F ut Henry's designs went far beyond a share
in the government of the realm. The Parliament which assembled in

Skc. v.

Richard

TIIK

SK(()Nr>

1381

1399

i»:!.|

1399

:|l

I \\

k^ -

M ',]

l.:ll

264

HISTORY OF THE KNGLISH rKOPLK.

[ciiAr,

Sfc. V.

KlCHAKl)

TMK
SkiOND

1381

1399

Westminster Hall received with shouts of applause a formal paper in
which Richard resigned the crown as one incapable of reigning and
worthy for his great demerits to be deposed. 'I'he resignation was con-
firmed by a solemn Act of Deposition. The coronation oath was read,
and a long impeachment, which stated the breach of the promises
made in it, >.'as followed by a solemn vote of both Houses which
removed Richard from the state and authority of King. According
to the strict rules of hereditary descent as construed by the feudal
lawyers, by an assumed analogy with the descent of ordinary estates,
the crown would now have passed to a house which had at an earlier
period played a leading part in the revolutions of the Edwards. The
great grandson of the Mortimer who brought about the deposition
of Edward the Second had married the daughter and heiress of Lionel
of Clarence, the third son of Edward the Third. The childlessness of
Richard and the death of Edward's second son without issue placed
Edmund, his grandson by this marriage, first among the claimants of
the crown ; but he was a child of six years old, the strict rule of
hereditarj^ descent had never received any formal recognition in the
case of the crown, and precedent had established the right of
Parliament to choose in such a case a successor among any other
members of the Royal House. Only one such successor was in fact
possible. Rising from his seat and crossing himself, Henry of Lancaster
solemnly challenged the crown " as that I am descended by right line
of blood coming from ti:e good lord King Henry the Third, and through
that right that God of Hii: grace hath sent me with help of my kin and
of my friends to recover it : ihe which realm was in point to be undone
for default of governance and undoing of good laws." Whatever defects
such a claim might present were more than covered by the solemn
recognition of Parliament. The two Archbishops, taking the new
sovereign by the hand, seated him upon the throne, and Henry in
emphatic words ratified the compact between himself and his people.
" Sirs," he said to the prelates, lords, knights, and burgesses gathered
round him, " I thank God and you, spiritual and temporal, and all
estates of the land : and do you to wit it is not my will that any man
think that by way of conquest I would disinherit any of his heritage,
franchises, or other rights that he ought to have, nor put him out of
the good that he has and has had by the good laws and customs of
the realm, except those persons that have been against the good
purpose and the common profit of the realm."

Section VI.— The House of Lancaster, 1399—1422.

[Authorities. — For Henry IV. the *' Annales Henrici Quarti" and Walsing-
ham, as before. For his successor, the "Acta Henrici Quinti " by Titus Livius,
a chaplain in the royal army (English Historical Society) ; a life by Elmham,
Prior of Lenton. simpler in style but identical in arrangement and facts with

v.]

the form
Elmham
meagre «
importnn
M. Puise
vigorous
in his " I

Raisec

claims o

by its v«

pendenc

effort of

were the

of Henr

compliai

successo

the CroM

constitut

the hope

Church h

The last

his reigr

ordered 1

of the wa

Statute o

provision

neutralize

they pern

fected wit

and to irr

a refusal

over the 1

enactmen

was to be

hardly pa

its first vi(

to the flai

transubstj

cantation,

offer of lif

and he w

the fierce

revolts wh

of his po\

of the Kii

of Huntin:

CIIAI*.

per in
g and
IS ron-
i read,
amises
which
ording
feudal
estates,
earlier
. The
tosition
■ Lionel
mess of
placed
lants of
rule of
in the
right of
y other
in fact
incaster
»ht line
through
kin and
undone
defects
solemn
he new
[enry in
people,
fathered
land all
[ny man
heritage,
out of
stoms of
good

v.l

THE HUNnRFD YEARS' WAR.

265

raising-

|s Livius,

i^lmham,

icts with

the former work ; a hiopraphy by Robert Re<lman ; a metrical Chronicle by
Elmham (i)ul)lislu '.in Rolls Series in " Memorials of Henry V."); and the
meagre clironicles of llardyng and Otlcrbourne. Monslrclet is the most
important French authority for this period ; for the Norman campaigns see
M. Puiseux's " Siege de Kouen " (Caen, 1867). Lord Urougham has given a
vigorous and, in a constitutional point of view, valuable slcetch of this period
in his ** History of Lngland under the House of Lancaster."]

Raised to the thror-^ by a Parliamentary revolution and resting its
claims on a Parliamentary title, the House of Lancaster was precluded
by its very jiosition from any resumption of the late struggle for inde-
pendence on the part of the Crown which had culminated in the bold
effort of Richard the Second. During no period of our early history
were the powers of the two Houses so frankly recognized. The tone
of Henry the Fourth till the very close of his reign is that of humble
compliance with the prayers of the Parliament, and even his imperious
successor shrank almost with timidity from any conflict with it. But
the Crown had been bought by other pledges less noble than that of
constitutional rule. The support of the nobles had been partly won by
the hope of a renewal of the fatal war with France. The support of the
Church had been purchased by the more terrible promise of persecution.
The last pledge was speedily redeemed. In the first Convocation of
his reign Henry declared himself the protector of the Church and
ordered the prelates to take measures for the suppression of heresy and
of the wandering preachers. His declaration was but a prelude to the
Statute of Heresy which was passed at the opening of 1401. By the
provisions of this infamous Act the hindrances which had till now
neutralized the efforts of the bishops were taken away. Not only were
they permitted to arrest all preachers of heresy, all schoolmasters in-
fected with heretical teaching, all owners and writers of heretical books,
and to imprison them, even if. they recanted, at the King's pleasure, but
a refusal to abjure or a relapse after abjuration enabled them to hand
over the heretic to the civil officers, and by these — so ran the first legal
enactment of religious bloodshed which defiled our Statute-book — he
was to be burned on a high place before the people. The statute was
hardly passed when William Sautre, a parish priest at Lynn, became
its first victim. Nine years later a layman, John Badby, was committed
to the flames in the presence of the Prince of Wales for a denial of
transubstantiation. The groans of the sufferer were taken for a re-
cantation, and the Prince ordered the fire to be plucked away ; but the
offer of life and of a pension failed to break the spirit of the Lollard,
and he was hurled back to his doom. The enmity of France, and
the fierce resentment of the Reformers, added danger to the incessant
revolts which threatened the throne of Henry. The mere maintenance
of his power through the troubled years of his reign is the best proof
of the King's ability. A conspiracy of Richard's kinsmen, the Earls
of Huntingdon and Kent, was suppressed, and was at once followed by

Skc. vi.
Tiiit

HiXsK OK
I.ANi ASIKK

1399

i4aa

The
Suppres-
sion of
LoU»rdrf:

•n

■I t li

265

Skc. VI.

The

House of
.ancastek

1399

1403
1400

1407

1410

£'eai/t of
Henrv IV.

1413

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Richard's death in prison. The Percies broke out in rebellion, and
Hotspur, tiie son of the Earl of Northumberland, leagued himself
with the Scots and with the insurgents of Wales. He was defeated
and slain in an obstinate battle near Shrewsbury ; but two years later
his father rose in a fresh insurrection, and though the seizure and
execution of his fellow-conspirator Scrope, the Archbishop of York,
drove Northumberland over the border, he remained till his death in a
later inroad a peril to the throne. Encouraged meanwhile by the
weakness of England, Wales, so long tranquil, shook off the yoke of
her conquerors, and the whole country rose at the call of Owen
Glyndwr or Glendower, a descendant of its native princes. Owen
left the invaders, as of old, to contend with famine and the mountain
storms ; but they had no sooner retired than he sallied out from his
inaccessible fastnesses to win victories which were followed by the
adhesion of all North Wales and great part of the South to his cause,
while a force of French auxiliaries was despatched by Charles of
France to his aid. It was only the restoration of peac j in England
which enabled Henry to roll back the tide of Glyndwr's success. By
slow and deliberate campaigns continued through four years the
Prince of Wales wrested from him the South ; his subjects in the
North, discouraged by successive defeats, gradually fell away from
his standard ; and the repulse of a bold descent upon Shropshire
drove Owen at last to take refuge among the mountains of Snowdon,
where he seems to have maintained the contest, single-handed, till his
death. With the close of the Welsh rising the Lancastrian throne felt
itself secure from without, but the danger from the Lollards remained
as great as ever within. The new statute and its terrible penalties
were boldly defied. The death of the Earl of Salisbury in the first of
the revolts against Henry, though his gory head was welcomed into
London by c. procession of abbots and bishops who went out singing
psalms of thanksgiving to meet it, only transferred the leadership of
the party to one of the foremost warriors of the time. Sir John Old-
castle, whose marriage raised him to the title of Lord Cobham, threw
-"pen his castle of Cowling to the Lollards as their head-quarters,
sheltered their preachers, and set the prohibitions and sentences of
the bishops at defiance. When Henry the Fourth died in 1413
worn out with the troubles of his reign, his successor was forced
to deal with this formidable question. The bishops demanded that
Cobham should be brought to justice, and though the King pleaded
for delay in the case of one who was so close a friend, his open defiance
at last forced him to act. A body of royal troops arrested Lord Cobham
and carried him to the Tower. His escape was the signal for a vast
revolt. A secret order summoned the Lollards to assemble in St.
Giles's fields outside London. We gather, if not the real aims rf the
rising, at least the terror that it caused, from Henry's statement that

v.]

Us pur
spiritu
preven
the CO
dispers
render*
LoHarc
was mc
promin
for four
last cap
With
came s
bishops
-ceded
outset c
partiall)
the eyes
peace, a
their ho]
seconde(
suffering
The inte
opportur
while its
one heac
by the 1
struggle
attempt
united tl
bitterly t
Fifth on
claim coi
title by w
right ove
Edward :
of Mortin
war itself
had been
attacks o
to secure
hand, tho
tion of th
aggressio
opponent

v.]

THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR.

267

its purpose was " to destroy himself, his brothers, and several of the
spiritual and temporal lords ; " but the vigilance of the young King
prevented the junction of the Lollards of London with their friends in
the country, and those who appeared at the place of meeting were
dispersed by the royal forces. On the failure of the rising the law was
rendered more rigorous. Magistrates were directed to arrest all
Lollards and hand them over to the bishops ; a com iction of heresy
was made to entail forfeiture of blood and of estate ; and thirty-nine
prominent Lollards were brought to execution. Cobham escaped, and
for four years longer strove to rouse revolt after revolt. He was at
last captured on the Welsh border and h 'rned as a heretic.

With the death of Oldcastle the political activity of Lollardry
came suddenly to an end, while the steady persecution of the
bishops, if it failed to extinguish it as a religious movement, suc-
ceeded in destroying the vigour and energy which it had shown at the
outset of its career. But the House of Lancaster had, as yet, only
partially accomplished the aims with which it mounted the throne. In
the eyes of the nobles, one of Richard's crimes had been his policy of
peace, and the aid which they gave to the revolution sprang partly from
their hope of a renewal of the war. The energy of the war-party was
seconded by the temper of the nation at large, already forgetful of the
sufferings of the past struggle and longing only to wipe out its shame.
The internal calamities of France offered at this moment a tempting
opportunity for aggression. Its King, Charles the Sixth, was a maniac,
while its princes and nobles were divided into two great parties, the
one headed by the Duke of Burgundy and bearing his name, the other
by the Duke of Orleans and bearing the title of Armagnacs. The
struggle had been jealously watched by Henry the Fourth, but his
attempt to feed it by pushing an English force into France at once
united the combatants. Their strife, however, recommenced more
bitterly than ever when the claim of the French crown by Henry ti>e
Fifth on his accession declared his purpose of renewing the war. No
claim could have been more utterly baseless, for the Parliamentary
title by which the House of Lancaster held England could give it no
right over France, and the strict law of hereditary succession which
Edward asserted could be pleaded, if pleaded at all, only by the House
of Mortimer. Not only the claim, indeed, but the very nature of the
war itself was wholly different from that of Edward the Third. Edward
had been forced into the struggle against his will by the ceaseless
attacks of France, and his claim of the crown was a mere afterthought
to secure the alliance of Flanders. The war of Henry, on the other
hand, though in form a renewal of the earlier struggle on the expira-
tion of the truce made by Richard the Second, was in fact a wanton
aggression on the part of a nation tempted by the helplessness of its
opponent and galled by the memory of former defeat. Its one excuse

Sec. VI.

The

House of
Lancaster

1399

1422

I418

Agin-
court

' H

ii- :

1412

' \i

'■ I

■ V

!'i

i^.

f '

r fi

A it

268

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. VI.

Thk

House of
ILancaster

1399

1422

Agincourt
Oct. 25,

I415

indeed lay in the attacks which France for the past fifteen years had
directed against the Lancastrian throne, its encouragement of every
enemy without and of every traitor within, in ihe summer of 141 5 the
King sailed for the Norman coast, and his first exploit was the capture
of HarflC'ir. Dysentery made havoc in his ranks during the siege, and
it was with a mere handful of men that he resolved to insult the enemy
by a daring march, like that of Edward, upon Calais. The discord,
however, on which he probably reckoned for security, vanished
before the actual appearance of the invaders in the heart of France ;
and when his weary and half-starved force succeeded in crossing the
Somme, it found sixty thousand Frenchmen encamped on the field of
Agincourt right across its line of march. Their position, flanked on
either side by woods, but with a front so narrow that the dense masses
were drawn up thirty men deep, was strong for purposes of defence but
ill suited for attack ; and the French leaders, warned by the experience
of Crdcy and Poitiers, resolved to await the English advance. Henry,
on the other hand, had no choice between attack and unconditional
surrender. His troops were starving, and the way to Calais lay across
the French army. But the King's courage rose with the peril. A
knight in his train wished that the thousands of stout warriors lying
idlft that night in England had been sta ding in his ranks. Henry
answered with a burst of scorn. " I would not have a single man
more,'' he replied. ' If God give us the victory, it will be plain that
we owe it to His grace. If not, the fewer we are, the less loss for
England." Starving and sick as were the handful of men whom he
led, they shared the spirit of their leader. As the chill rainy night
passed away, his archers bared their arms and breasts to give fair play
to " the crooked stick and the grey goose wing," but for which — as the
rime ran — " England were but a fling," and with a great shout sprang
forward to the attack. The sight of their advance roused the fiery
pride of the French ; the wise resolve of their leaders was forgotten,
and the dense mass of men-at-arms plunged heavily forward through
miry ground on the English front. But at the first sign of movement
Henry had halted his line, and fixing in the ground the sharpened
stakes with which each man was furnished, his archers poured their
fatal arrow flights into the hostile ranks. The carnage was terrible,
but the desperate charges of the French knighthood at last drove the
English archers to the neighbouring woods, from which they were
still able to pour their shot into the enemy's flanks, while Henry, with
the men-at-arms around him, flung himself on the French line. In the
terrible struggle which followed the King bore off the palm of bravery:
he was felled once by a blow from a French mace, and the crown on
his helmet was cleft by the sword of the Duke of Alengon ; but the
enemy was at last broken, and the defeat of the main body of the French
was followed at once by the rout of their reserve. The triumph was

V.J

more (
thousa
prince
The
Englis
Calais
for the
strife h
resume
his ain:
provide
or sim]
with w]
ofmilit
the mot
Bayeux
Duke c
Avrancl
hands, \
de-l'Arc
masterlj
the larg
defende
resolute
populati
thousan
equal to
himself
mandy,
sea, anc
the side
investme
Harfleur
the deep
perate sa
Rouen
of count
thousand
policy of
between
women
were dra
to die on
itself. A
"War,"s,

v.]

THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR.

269

more complete, as the odds were even greater, than at Crdcy. Eleven
thousand Frenchmen lay dead on the field, and more than a hundred
princes and great lords were among the fallen.

The immediate result of the battle of Agincourt was small, for the
English army was too exhausted for pursuit, and it made its way to
Calais only to return to England. The war was limited to a contest
for the command of the Channel, till the increasing bitterness of the
strife between the Burgundians and Armagnacs encouraged Henry to
resume his attempt to recover Normandy. . Whatever may have been
his aim in this enterprise — whether it were, as has been suggested, to
provide a refuge for his house, should its power be broken in England,
or simply to acquire a command of the seas — the patience and skill
with which his object was accomplished raise him high in the rank
of military leaders. Disembarking with an army of 40,000 men. near
the mouth of the Touque, he stormed Caen, received the surrender of
Bayeux, reduced Alen^on and Falaise, and detaching his brother the
Duke of Gloucester to occupy the Cotentin, made himself master of
Avranches and Domfront. With Lower Normandy wholly in his
hands, he advanced upon Evreux, captured Louviers, and, seizing Pont-
de-1'Arche, threw his troops across the Seine. The end of these
masterly movements was now revealed. Rouen was at this time
the largest and wealthiest of the towns of France ; its walls were
defended by a powerful artillery ; Alan Blanchard, a brave and
resolute patriot, infused the are of his own temper into the vast
population ; and the garrison, already strong, was backed by fifteen
thousand citizens in arms. But the genius of Henry was more than
equal to the difficulties with which he had to deal. He had secured
himself from an attack on his rear by the reduction of Lower Nor-
mandy, his earlier occupation of Harfleur severed the town from the
sea, and his conquest of Pont-de-l'Arche cut it off from relief on
the side of Paris. Slowly but steadily the King drew his lines of
investment round the doomed city ; a flotilla was brought up from
Harfleur, a bridge of boats thrown over the Seine above the town,
the deep trenches of the besiegers protected by posts, and the des-
perate sallies of the garrison stubbornly beaten back. For six months
Rouen held resolutely out, but famine told fast on the vast throng
of country folk who had taken refuge within its walls. Twelve
thousand of these were at last thrust out of the city gates, but the cold
policy of the conqueror refused them passage, and they perished
between the trenches and the walls. In the hour of their agony
women gave birth to infants, but even the new-born babes which
were drawn up in baskets to receive baptism were lowered again
to die on their mothers' breasts. It was little better within the town
itself. As winter drew on one-half of the population wasted away.
" War," said the terrible King, " has three handmaidens ever waiting

Sec. VI.
Tfe

H0US.I OF

Lancaster
1390

14>22

The
Conquest
of Nor-
mandy

1417

1418

1. ■ ,i>fe' ; 1

2J0

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

VI.]

Sec. VI.
The

Hoi/SE OF
II.ANCASTER

1399

1422

The

JConquest

iof France

1419

1420

1422

on her, Fire, Blood, and Famine, and I have chosen the meekest maid
of the three." But his demand of unconditional surrender nerveu the
citizens to a resolve of despair ; they determined to fire the city and
fling themselves in a mass on the English lines ; and Henry, fearful
lest his prize should escape him. at the last, was; driven to offer terms.
Those who rejected a foreign yoke were suffered to leave the city, bat
his vengeance reserved its victim in Alan Blanchard, and the brave
patriot was at Henry's orders put to death in cold blood.

A few sieges completed the reduction of Normandy. The King's
designs were still limited to the acquisition of that province ; and
pausing in his career of conquest, he strove to win its loyalty by a
remission of taxation and a redress of grievances, and to seal its
possession by a formal peace with the French Crown. The confer-
ences, however, which were held for this purpose at Pontoise failed
through the temporary reconciliation of the French factions, while
the length and expense of the war began to rouse remonstrance and
discontent at home. The King's difficulties were at their height
when the assassination of the Duke of Burgundy at Montereau, in
the very presence of the Dauphin with whom he had come to hold
conference, rekindled the fires of civil strife. The whole Burgundian
party, with the new Duke, Philip the Good, at its head, flung itself in
a wild thirst for revenge into Henry's hands. The mad King, Charles
the Sixth, with his Queen and daughters, were in Philip's power ; and
in his resolve to exclude the Dauphin from the throne the Duke
stooped to buy English aid by giving Catharine, the eldest of the
French princesses, in marriage to Heniy, by conferring on him the
Regency during the life of Charles, and by recognizing his succession to
the crown at that sovereign's death. The treaty was solemnly ratified
by Charles himself in a conference at Troyes, and Henry, who in his
new capacity of Regent had undertaken to conquer in the name of
his father-in-law the territory held by the Dauphin, reduced the towns
of the Upper Seine and entered Paris in triumph side by side with
the King. The States-General of the realm were solemnly convened
to the capital ; and strange as the provisions of the Treaty of Troyes
must have seemed, they were confirmed without a murmur, and
Henry was formally recognized as the future sovereign of France. A
defeat of his brother Clarence in Anjou called him back to the war.
His reappearance in the field was marked by the capture of Dreux,
and a repulse before Orleans was redeemed by his success in the
long and obstinate siege of Meaux. At no time had the fortunes of
Henry reached a higher pitch than at the moment when he felt the
touch of death. But the rapidity of his disease baffled the skill of
physicians, and with a strangely characteristic regret that he had not
lived to achieve the conquest of Jerusalem, the great conqueror
passed away.

• • r (• !

I .

"De R

give air

remains

Jeanne (

real autl

meagre t

Chronicl

favoiu- of

ator is o:

York, lh(

him fairh

copious r

but of lai

and Rymi

in his "I

at once e

the Hous

[Dr. S

pages wei

At th

greatnes:

had won

prowess,

Poitiers.

foreign c^

and of SI

estates ol

promised

But tht

veiled at

Crown wl

rity of H

father's c

after-rule,

But the P

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

... .!.

' ' CHAPTER VI.

: THE NEW MONARCHY.

*' 14-22-1540.

Section I.— Joan of Arc, 1422— 14-51.

[Authorities. — The " Wars of the English in France," and Blondel's work
**De Reductione Normannise," both published by the Master of the Rolls,
give ample information on the military side of this period. Monstrelet
remains our chief source of knowledge on the French side. The '* Proces de
Jeanne d'Arc " (published by the Societe de I'Histoire de France) is the only
real authority for her history. For English affairs we are reduced to the
meagre accounts of William of Worcester, of the Continuator of the Crowland
Chronicle, and of Fabyan. Fabyan, a London alderman with a strong bias in
favour of tue House of Lancaster, is useful for London only. The Continu-
ator is one of the best of his class, and though connected with the House of
York, the date of his work, which appeared soon after Bosworth Field, makes
him fairly impartial ; but he is sketchy and deficient in actual facts. The more
copious narrative of Polydore Vergil is far superior to these in literary ability,
but of later date and strongly Lancastrian in tone. The Rolls of Parliament
and Rymer's ' ' Foedera " are of high value. Among modern writers M. Michelet,
in his "History of France " (vol. v.), has given a portrait of the Maid of Orleans
at once exact and full of a tender poetry. Lord Brougham (" England under
the House of Lancaster") is still useful on constitutional points.]

[Dr. Stubbs' "Constitutional History," vol. iii., published since these
pages were written, illustrates this period. — Ed.'\

At the moment when death so suddenly stayed his course the
greatness of Henry the Fifth had reached its highest point. He
had won the Church by his orthodoxy, the nobles by his warlike
prowess, the whole people by his revival of the glories of Cregy and
Poitiers. In France his cool policy had transformed him from a
foreign conqueror into a legal heir to the crown ; his title of Regent
and of successor to the throne rested on the formal recognition of the
estates of the realm ; and his progress to the very moment of his death
promised a speedy mastery of the whole country.

But the glory of Agincourt and the genius of Henry the 7ifth hardly
veiled at the close of his reign the weakness and humiliation of the
Crown when the succession passed to his infant son. The long mino-
rity of Henry the Sixth, who was a boy of nine months old at his
father's death, as well as the personal weakness which m.arked his
after-rule, left the House of Lancaster at the mercy of the Parliament.
But the Parliament was fast dying down into a mere representation

27!

Ti.

ItcJ

J \\\

::i

li \

1 ' EB

r .f.

Disfran-
chise-
ment of
tbe Com.-
mons

■ '1

272

HISTORY OF' THE ENGLISH PEOPLK.

[chap.

VI.J

Sec. I.

Joan ok
Arc

1451

Restriction
^of Borough
Freedom

«''

Restriction
of County
Franchise

of the baronage and the great landowners. The Commons indeed
retained the right of granting and controlling subsidies, of joining
in all statutory enactments, and of impeaching ministers. But the
Lower House was ceasing to be a real representative of the " Com-
mons " whose name it bore. The b'^rough franchise was suffering
from the general tendency to restriction and privilege which in the
bulk of towns was soon to reduce it to a mere mockery. Up to this
time all freemen settling in a borough and paying their dues to it
became by the mere settlement its burgesses ; but from the reign of
Henry the Sixth this largeness of borough life was roughly curtailed.
The trade companies which vindicated civic freedom from the tyranny
of the older merchant gilds themselves tended to become a narrow and
exclusive oligarchy. Most of the boroughs had by this time acquired
civic property, and it was with the aim of securing their own enjoyment
of this against any share of it by "strangers" that the existing burgesses,
for the most part, procured charters of incorporation from the Crown,
which turned them into a close body, and excluded from their number
all who were not burgesses by birth or who failed henceforth to purchase
their right of entrance by a long apprenticeship. In addition to this
narrowing of the burgess-body, the internal government of the boroughs
had almost universally passed, since the failure of the Communal move-
ment in the thirteenth century, from the free gathering of the citizens
in borough-mote into the hands of Common Councils, either self-
elected or elected by the wealthier burgesses ; and it was to these
councils, or to a yet more restricted number of " select men " belonging
to them, that clauses in the new charters generally confined the right
of choosing their representatives in Parliament. It was with this
restriction that the long process of degradation began which ended
in reducing the representation of our boroughs to a mere mockery.
Great nobles, neighbouring landowners, the Crown itself seized on
the boroughs as their prey, and dictated the choice of their repre-
sentatives. Corruption did whatever force failed to do ; and from
the Wars of the Roses to the days of Pitt the voice of the people
had to be looked for, not in the members for the towns, but in
the knights of the counties. The restriction of the county franchise
on the other hand was the direct work of the Parliament itself.
Economic changes were fast widening the franchise in the counties.
The number of freeholders increased with the subdivision of estates
and the social changes which we have already examined, while the
increase of independence was marked by the "riots and divisions
between the gentlemen and other people," which the statesmen of
the day attributed to the excessive number of the voters. In many
counties the power of the great lords undoubtedly enabled them
to control elections through the number of their retainers. In Cade's
revolt the Kentisi men complained that " the people of the shire are

not allo)
the shirt
nobles <
people b
was prin
the Sixtl
holding
least iviQ.
income a
has been
" of no
equivaler
the same
in a far
convey.
Sheriff's (
but by tl
leasehold!
prived of
have had
the social
every Kni
The dea
of power,
in a counc
baronage,
a legitimal
ford. In
at this tim
section of
enoriTJous
heretics an
of the stea<
nine years
Gloucester
repressing
against the
iike a taint
with Franc
work on th(
more than
farms, the <
greed of ga
in their ran
anxiety of t

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

273

right

not allowed to have their free elections in the choosing of knights for
the shire, but letters have been sent from divers estates to the great
nobles of the county, the which enforceth their tenants and other
people by force to choose other persons than the common will is." It
was primarily to check this aiuse that a statute of the reign of Henry
the Sixth restricted in 1430 the right of voting in shires to freeholders
holding land worth forty shillings (a sum equal in our money to at
least twenty pounds) a year, a:A representing a far higher proportional
income at the present time. This "great disfranchising statute," as it
has been justly termed, was aimed, in its own words, against voters
" of no value, whereof every of them pretended to have a voice
equivalent with the more worthy knights and esquires dwelling within
the same counties." But in actual working the statute was interpreted
in a far more destructive fashion than its words were intended to
convey. Up to this time all suitors who found themselves at the
Sheriff's Court had voted without question for the Knight of the Shire,
but by the new statute the great bulk of the existing voters, every
leaseholder and every copyholder, found themselves implicitly de-
prived of their franchise. A later statute, which seems, however, to
have had no practical effect, showed the aristocratic temper, as well as
the social changes against which it struggled, in its requirement that
every Knight of the Shire should be " a gentleman born."

The death of Henry the Fifth revealed in its bare reality the secret

of power. The whole of the royal authority vested without a struggle

in a council composed of great lords and Churchmen representing the

baronage, at whose head stood Henry Beaufort, Bishop of Winchester,

a legitimated son of John of Gaunt by his mistress Catharine Swyn-

ford. In the presence of Lollardry and socialism, the Church had

at this time ceased to be a great political power and sunk into a mere

section of the landed aristocracy. Its one aim was to preserve its

enonnous wealth, which was threatened at once by the hatred of the

heretics and by vhe greed of the nobles. Lollardry still lived, in spite

of the steady persecution, as a spirit of religious and moral revolt ; and

nine years after the young King's accession we find the Duke of

Gloucester traversing England with men-at-arms for the purpose of

repressing its risings and hindering the circulation of its invectives

against the clergy. The violence and anarchy which had always clung

like a taint to the baronage had received a new impulse from the war

with France. Long before the struggle was over it had done its fatal

work on the mood of the English noble. His aim had become little

more than a lust for gold, a longing after plunder, after the pillage of

farms, the sack of cities, the ransom of captives. So intense was the

greed of gain that only a threat of death could keep the fighting men

in their ranks, and the results of victory after victory were lost by the

anxiety of the conquerors to deposit their plunder and captives safely

Sec. I.

JOAN OK

Arc

142a

1451

England

under the

Nobles

■;- w

So «J

■SI A.

:«

..K)'

274

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

vi.J

f
i

ij'

i ii

Sec. I.

Joan op
Arc

1402

1451

Joan of
Arc

at home. The moment the firm hand of great leaders such as Henry
the Fifth or Bedford was removed, the war died down into mere massacre
and brigandage. " If God had been a captain now-a-days," exclaimed
a French general, " He would have turned marauder." The nobles
were as lawless and dissolute at home as they were greedy and cruel
abroad. The Parliaments, which became mere sittings of their retainers
and partizans, were like armed camps to which the great lords came
with small armies at their backs. That of 1426 received its name of
the " Club Parliament," from the fact that when arms were prohibited
the retainers of the barons appeared with clubs on their shoulders.
When clubs were forbidden, they hid stones and balls of lead in their
clothes. The dissoluteness against which Lollardry had raised its great
moral protest reigned nor without a check. A gleam of intellectual
light was breakin^: on the darkness of the time, but only to reveal its
hideous con,bination of mental energy with moral worthlessness. The
Uuke of Gloucester, whose love of letters was shown in the noble
library he collected, was the most selfish and profligate prince of his
day. The Earl of Worcester, a patron of Caxton, and one of the
earliest scholars of the Revivpl of Letters, earned his title of
"butcher" by the cruelty which raised him t"» a pre-eminence of
infamy among the bloodstained leaders of the Wars of the Roses.
All spiritual life seemed to have been trodden out in the ruin of the
Lollards. Never had English literature fallen so low. A few tedious
moralists alone preserved the name of poetry. History died down
into the barest and most worthless fragments and annals. Even the
religious enthusiasm of the people seemed to have spent itself, or to
have been crushed out by the bishops' courts. The one belief of the
time was in sorcery and magic. Eleanor Cobham, the wife of the
Duke of Gloucester, was convicted of having practised magic against
the King's life witl' a priest, and condemned to do penance in the
streets of I ondon. The mist which wrapped the battle-field of Barnet
was a' tribute d to the incantations of Friar Bungay. The one pure
figure which rises out 01 the greed, the lust, the selfishness, and
unbelief of the time, the figure of Joan of Ar^ , was regarded by the
doctors and priests who judged her as that of a sorceress.

Jeanne d'Arc was the child of a labourer of Domrdmy, a little
village in the neighbourhood of Vaucouleurs on the borders of Lorraine
and Champagne. Just without the cottage where she was b"»rn began
the great woods of the Vosges, where the children of Domremy drank
in poetry and legend from fairy ring and haunted well, hung their
flower garlands on the sacred trees, and sang songs to the "good
people " who might not drink of the fountain because of their sins.
Jeunne loved the forest ; its birds and beasts came lovingly to her at
her childish call. But at home men saw nothing in her but " a good
girl, simple and pleasant in her ways/' spinning and sewing by her

mothi
and s
passit
by th(
of Ki
broug
Charl(
Sover(
ruled ;
forced
Scots
Loire \
brothei
genius
Henry
his alli
pleted 1
with N
the line
into the
Constat
borders
But a r€
of the F
to cross
the Duk
in Engl
Council,
invested
in the N
Countes!
married <
thejealo-
J^uke of
drawal o
his broth
struggle
remain s
to him th
Beaufort
money m
England
forward l
little help
of the alli

[CIIAP.

Henry
Lssacre
I aimed
nobles
d cruel
itainers
s came
lame of
)hibited
oulders.
in their
its great
ellectual
eveal its
5s. The
tie noble
ce of his
le of the
title of
nence of
le Roses,
lin of the
w tedious
led down
Even the
self, or to
ief of the
ife of the
ic against
ce in the
of Barnet
one pure
[ness, and
Led by the

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

275

mother's side while the other girls went to the fields, tender to the poor
and sick, fold of church, and listening to the church-bell with a dreamy
passion of delight which never left her. The quiet life was soon broken
by the storm of war as it at last came home to Domreiny. The death
of King Charles, which followed hard on that of Henry the Fifth,
brought little change. The Dauphin at once proclaimed himselif
Charles the Seventh of France : but Henry the Sixth was owned as
Sovereign over the whole of the territory which Charles had actually
ruled ; and the incursions which the partizans of Charles, now rein-
forced by Lombard soldiers from the Milanese and by four thousand
Scots under the Earl of Douglas, made with fresh vigour across the
Loire were easily repulsed by Duke John of Bedford, the late King's
brother, who had been named in his will Regent of France. In
genius for war as in political capacity John was hardly inferior to
Henry himself. Drawing closer by marriage and patient diplomacy
his alliances with the Dukes of Burgundy and Britanny, he com-
pleted the conquest of Northern France, secured his communications
with Normandy by the capture of Meulan, made himself master of
the line of the Yonne by a victory near Auxerre, and pushed forward
into the country near MAcon. It was to arrest his progress ihaX the
Constable of Buchan advanced boldly from the Loire to the very
borders of Normandy and attacked the English army at Verneuil.
But a repulse hardly less disastrous than that of Agincourt left a third
of the French knighthood on the field ; and the Regent was preparing
to cross the Loire when he was hindered by the intrigues of his brother
the Duke of Gloucester. The nomination of Gloucester to the Regency
in England by the will of the late King had been set aside by the
Council, and sick of the powerless Protectorate with which they had
invested him, the Duke sought a new opening for his restless ambition
in the Netherlands, where he supported the claims of Jacqueline, the
Countess in her own right of Holland and Hainault, whom he had
married on her divorce from the Duke of Brabant. His enterprise roused
thejealo Msyof the Duke of Burgundy, who regarded himself as heir to the
Duke of Brabant, and the efforts of Bedford were paralyzed by the with-
drawal of his Burgundian allies as they marched northward to combat
his brother. Though Gloucester soon returned to England, the ruinous
struggle went on for three years, during which Bedford was forced to
remain simply on the defensive, till the cessation of war again restored
to him the aid of Burgundy. Strife at home between Gloucester and
Beanfort had been even more fatal in diverting the supplies of men and
money needed for the war in France, but with temporary quiet in
England and peace in Holland Bedford was once more able to push
forward to the conquest of the South. The delay, however, brought
little help to France, and Charles saw Orleans invested by ten thousand
of the allies without power to march to its relief. The war had long

T 2

Sec. I.

Joan op
Akc

i4.aa

1451

r/te DukeoJ
Bedford

1424

The Duke 0/
Gloucester,

V\
'1

1428

\ '^ ^ ■ 1

276

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOI'I.E.

(CIIAF.

Skc. I.

Joan of
Akc

1451

The
Relief of
Orleans

since reached the borders of Lorraine. The north of France, indeed,
was being fast reduced to a desert. The husbandmen fled for refuge
to the towns, till these in fear of famine shut their gates against them.
Then in their despair they threw themselves into the woods and became
brigands in their turn. So terrible was the devastation, that two hostile
bodies of troops at one time failed even to find one another in the
desolate Beaucc. The towns were in hardly better case, for misery
and disease killed a hundred thousand people in Paris alone. As the
outcasts and wounded passed by Domrdmy the young peasant girl gave
them her bed and nursed them in their sickness. Her whole nature
summed itself up in one absorbing passion : she " had pity," to use the
phrase for ever on her lip, " on the fair realm of France." As her
passion grew she recalled old prophecies that a maid from the Lorraine
border should save the land; she saw visions; St. Michael appeared
to her in a flood of blinding light, and bade her go to the help of the
King and restore to him his realm. " Messire," answered the girl, " I
am but a poor maiden ; I know not how to ride to the wars, or to lead
men-at-arms." The archangel returned to give her courage, and to
tell her of " the pity " that there was in heaven for the fair realm of
France. The girl wept, and longed that the angels who appeared to
her would carry her away, but her mission was clear. It was in vain
that her father when he heard her purpose swore to drown her ere she
should go to the field with men-at-arms. It was in vain that the priest,
the wise people of the village, the captain of Vaucouleurs, doubted
and refused to aid her. " I must go to the King," persisted the peasant
girl, " even if I wear my limbs to the very knees." " I had far rather
rest and spin by my mother's side," she pleaded with a touching pathos,
" for this is no work of my choosing, but I muse go and do it, for my
Lord wills "* " " And who," they asked, " is your Lord ? " " He is
God." Words such as these touched the rough captain at last ; he
took Jeanne by the hand and swore to lead her to the King. When
she reached Chinon she found hesitation and doubt. The theologians
proved from their books that they ought not to believe her. '* 1 here
is more in God's book than in yours," Jeanne answered simply. At
last Charles received her in the midst of a throng of nobles and soldiers.
" Gentle Dauphin," said the girl, " my name is Jeanne the Maid. The
Heavenly King sends me to tell you that you shall be anointed and
crowned in the town of Rheims, and you shall be lieutenant of the
Heavenly King who is the King of France." 'i i

Orleans had already been driven by famine to offers of surrender
when Jeanne appeared in the French Court. Charles had done
nothing for its aid but shut himself up at Chinon and weep help-
lessly. The long series of English victories had in fact so demoralized
the French soldiery that a mere detachment of archers under Sir
John Fastolfe had repulsed an army, in what was called the " Battle

VI.]

of the

owed

three

new }
swarm
during
Englis
had ca
spell,
the vig
to nigh
charge)
banner
"athir
men-at-
only pr;
Hire wl
God," ]
round tl
her to IT
camp-fir
hibition
the mid£
crowded
and brin
them yoi
be just a
firm as (
Bedford,
company
you," she
"thebes
The bes
riding roi
forts whic
generals
proportioi
till only t
to adjoui
Jeanne,
men-at-ar
against th
and the
scale its
the retrea

1 .1']

leed,

;fuge

hem.

:ame

ostile

n the

\isery

lS the

i gave

\ature

se the

IS her

»rraine

peared

of the

jirl, " I

to lead

and to

;alm of

ared to

in vain

ere she

J priest,

loubted

peasant

rather

pathos,

for my

I" He is

last: he

When

)logians

Ihere

)ly. At

soldiers.

lid. The

Ited and

It of the

irrender
ltd done
|ep help-

loralized

Inder Sir

« Battle

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

277

of the Herrings," and conducted the convoy of provisions to which it
owed its name in triumph into the camp before Oilcans. Only
three thousand Englishmen remained there in the trenches after a
new withdrawal of their Burgundian allies, but though the town
swarmed with men-at-arms not a single sally had been ventured upon
during the six months' siege. The success however of the handful of
English besiegers depended wholly on the spell of terror which they
had cast over France, and the appearance of Jeanne at once broke the
spell. The girl was in her eighteenth year, tall, finely formed, with all
the vigour and activity of her peasant rearing, able to stay from dawn
to nightfall on horseback without meat or drink. As she mounted her
charger, clad in white armour from head to foot, with the great white
banner studded with fleur-de-lys waving over her head, she seemed
" a thing wholly divine, whether to see or hear." The ten thousand
men-at-arms who followed her from Blois, rough plunderers whose
only prayer was that of La Hire, " Sire Dieu, I pray you to do for La
Hire what La Hire would do for you, were you captain-at-arms and he
God," left off their oaths and foul living at her word and gathered
round the altars on their march. Her shrewd peasant humour helped
her to manage the wild soldiery, and her followers laughed over their
camp-fires at the old warrior who had been so puzzled by her pro-
hibition of oaths that she suffered him still to swear by his baton. In
the midst of her enthusiasm her good sense never left her. The people
crowded round her as she rode along, praying her to work miracles,
and bringing crosses and chaplets to be blest by her touch. " Touch
them yourself," she said to an old Dame Margaret ; "your touch will
be just as good as mine." But her faith in her mission remained as
firm as ever. " The Maid prays and requires you," she wrote to
Bedford, " to work no more distraction in France, but to come in her
company to rescue the Holy Sepulchre from the Turk." " I bring
you," she told Dunois when he sallied out of Orleans to meet her,
"the best aid ever sent to any one, the aid of the King of Heaven."
The besiegers looked on overawed as she entered Orleans, and,
riding round the walls, bade the people look fearlessly on the dreaded
forts which surrounded them. Her enthusiasm drove the hesitating
generals to engage tl:e handful of besiegers, and the enormous dis-
proportion of forces at once made itself felt. Fort after fort was taken,
till only the strongest remained, and then the council of war resolved
to adjourn the attack. "You have taken your counsel," replied
Jeanne, "and I take mine." Placing herself at the head of the
men-at-arms, she ordered the gates to be thrown open, and led them
against the fort. Few as they were, the English fought desperately,
and the Maid, who had fallen wounded while endeavouring to
scale its walls, was borne into a vineyard, while Dunois sounded
the retreat. "Wait a while!" the girl imperiously pleaded, "eat

Sec. I.

Joan ok
Arc

1451

h \-

if*

1429

27$

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLK.

tcMAP.

VI.)

Sic I.

•
Joan ok
Arc

i4aa

14A1

Death of
the Maid

1430

and drink ! so soon as my standard touches the wall you shall
enter the fort." It touched, and the assail.ints burst in. On the
next day the siege was abandoned, and the force which had con-
ducted it withdrew in good order to the north. In the midst of her
triumph Jeanne still remained the p\ne, tender-hearted peasant girl of
the Vosges. Her first visit as she entered Orleans was to the great
church, and there, as she knelt at mass, she wept in such a passion of
devotion that " all the people wept with her." Her tears burst forth
afresh at her first sight of bloodshed and of the corpses strewn over
the battle-field. She grew frightened at her first wound, and only
threw off the touch of womanly fear when she heard the signal for
retreat. Yet more womanly was the purity with which she passed
through the brutal warriors of a mediaeval camp. It was her care for
her honour that had led her to clothe herself in a soldier's dress. She
wept hot tears when told of the foul taunts of the English, and called
passionately on God to witness her chastity. " Yield thee, yield thee,
Glasdale," she cried to the English warrior whose insults had been
foulest, as he fell wc mded at her feet, " you called me harlot ! I have
great pity on your soul." But all thought of herself was lost in the
thought of her mission. It was in vain that the French generals strove
to remain on the Loire. Jeanne was resolute to complete her task,
and while the English remained panic-stricken around Paris the army
followed her from Gien through Troyes, growing in number as it
advanced, till it reached the gates of Rheims. With the coronation of
Charles, the Maid felt her errand to be over. " O gentle King, the
pleasure of God is done," she cried, as she flung herself at the feet of
Charles the Se\enth and asked leave to go home. "Would it were
His pleasure," she pleaded with the Archbishop as he forced her to
remain, " that I might go and keep sheep once more with my sisters
and my brothers : they would be so glad to see me again ! "

The policy of the French Court detained her while the cities
of the north of France opened their gates to the newly-consecrated
King. Bedford, however, who had been left without money or
men, had now received reinforcements, and Charles, after a repulse
before the walls of Paris, fell back behind the Loire ; while the towns
on the Oise submitted again to the Duke of Burgundy. In this later
struggle Jeanne fought with her usual bravery, but with the fatal
consciousness that her mission was at an end, and during the defence
of Compi^gne she fell into the power of the Bastard of Vendome, to
be sold by her captor into the hands of the Duke of Burgundy and by
the Duke into the hands of the English. To the English her triumphs

were victories of sorcery, and after a

year's

imprisonment she was

brought to trial on a charge of her* -^y before an ecclesiastical court
with the Bishop of Beauvais at i head. Throughout the long
process which followed every art was employed to entangle her in her

talk. ]
of her j
of grac
am. Go
God ha
taken,"
mit," tl
Militani
" by cor
to that I
sionatel;
They dc
your aid
"forbid
Lord firs
wonder
question
diabolica
Judge," s
the King
all that
was only
transferrc
abjuratioi
those out
first assui
was a crir
resume tli
a relapse
raised in 1
the brutal
the clergy
the stake,
from a sti(
Rouen," s
from the 1<
"Yes! m
moment ci
reached he
"Jesus !"-
broke up, •
The En
pompous c
cool wisdo]
"lanently

MAP.

shall
I the

con-
>f her
;irl of

great
ion of

forth
I over
1 only
nal for
passed
are for
. She

called
d thee,
d been

1 have

in the
5 strove
ler task,
le army
;r as it
ation of
ing, the
e feet of

it were
her to
|y sisters

le cities
Isecrated
|oney or
repulse
le towns
lis later
the fatal
defence
lome, to
and by
Jriumphs
Ishe was
kl court
[he long
ler in her

VI.]

TIIK NKW MONARCHY.

279

^ il

talk. Rut the simple shrewdness of the ,)easant jfirl foiled the efforts
of her judges. '* Do you believe," they asked, " that you are in a state
of grace ? " '* If I am not," she replied, " (Jod will put me in it. If I
am, (jod will keep me in it." Her capture, they argued, showed that
God had forsaken her. " Since it has pleased C]od that I should be
taken," she answered meekly, "it is for the best." "Will you sub-
mit," they demanded at last, " to the judgement of the Church
Militant?" "I have come to the King of France," Jeanne replied,
" by commission from God and from the Church Triumphant above :
to that Church I submit." " I had far rather die," she ended, pas-
sionately, " than renounce what I have done by my Lord's command."
They deprived her of mass. " Our Lord can make mc hear it without
your aid," she said, weeping. " Do your voices/' asked the judges,
" forbid you to submit to the Church and the Pope ?" " Ah, no ! Uur
Lord first served." Sick, and deprived of all religious aid, it was no
wonder that as the long trial dragged on and question followed
question Jeanne's firmness wavered. On the charge of sorcery and
diabolical possession she still appealed firmly to God. '' I hold to my
Judge," she said, as her earthly judges gave sentence against her, " to
the King of Heaven and Earth. God has always been my Lord in
all that I have done. The devil has never had power over me." It
was only with a view to be delivered from the military prison and
transferred to the prisons of the Church that she consented to a formal
abjuration of heresy. She feared in fact among the English soldiery
those outrages to her honour, to guard against which she had from the
first assumed the dress of a man. In die eyes of the Church her dress
was a crime and she abandoned it ; but a renewed insult forced her to
resume the one safeguard left her, and the return to it was treated as
a relapse into heresy which doomed her to death. A great pile was
raised in the market-place of Rouen where her statue stands now. Even
the brutal soldiers who snatched the hated " witch " from the hands of
the clergy and hurried her to her doom were hushed as she reached
the stake. One indeed passed to her a rough cross he had made
from a stick he held, and she clasped it to her bosom. " Oh ! Rouen,
Rouen," she was heard to murmur, as her eyes ranged over the city
from the lofty scaffold, " ! have great fear lest you suffer for my death."
" Yes ! my voices were of God ! " she suddenly cried as the last
moment came ; " they have never deceived me ! " Soon the flames
reached her, the girl's head sank on her breast, there was one cry of
" Jesus ! " — " We are lost," an English soldier muttered as the crowd
broke up, '* .. :: have burned a Saint."

The English cause was indeed irretrievably lost. In spite of a
pompous coronation of the boy-king Henry at Paris, Bedford, with the
cool wisdom of his temper, seems to have abandoned all hope of per-
manently retaining France, and to have fallen back on his brother's

Si^c. I.

Joan ok
Arc

1451

I ■ r>.

»4J1

II i ^ II

) ! il

rl-i

The Loss
of France

28o

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAf,

Sec. 1.

Joan of
Akc

1422

1451

1431

1445

1447

1449

original plan of securing Normandy. Henry's Court was established
for a year at Rouen, a university founded at Caen, and whatever rapine
and disorder might be permitted elsewhere, justice, good government,
and security for trade were steadily maintained through the favoured
provinces. At home Bedford was resolutely backed by the Bishop
of Winchester, who had been raised in 1426 to the rank of Cardinal,
and who now again governed England through the Royal Council in
spite of the fruitless struggles of the Duke of Gloucester. Even when
he had been excluded from the Council by Gloucester's intrigues, Beau-
fort's immense we^ilth was poured without stint into the exhausted
Treasury till his loans to the Crown amounted to half-a-million ; and
he had unscrupulously diverted an army which he had raised at his own
cost for the Hussite Crusade in Bohemia to the relief of Bedford after
the deliverance of Orleans. The Cardinal's diplomatic ability was
seen in the truces he wrung from Scotland, and in his personal efforts to
prevent the reconciliation of Burgundy with France. In 1435 however
the Duke of Piurgundy concluded a formal treaty with Charles ; and his
desertion was followed by a yet more fatal blow to the English cause
iit the death of Bedford. Paris rose suddenly against its English
garrison and declared for King Charier.. Henry's dominion shrank at
once to Normandy and the outlying fortresses of Picardy and Maine.
Bui veduced as they were to a niere handful, and fronted by a whole
nation in arms, the English soldiers struggled on with as desperate a
bravery as in their days of triumph. Lord Talbot, the most daring of
their chiefs, forded the Somme with the v/aters up to his chin to relieve
Crotoy, and threw his men across the Oise in the fact- of a French army
to relieve Pontoise. The Duke of York, v/ho succeeded Bedford as
Regent, by his abilities stemmed for a time the tide of ill-fortune, but
che jealousy shown to him by the King's counsellors told fatally on the
course of the war. A fresh effort for peace was made by the Earl of
Sufiolk, who swayed the Council after age forced Beaufort to retire to
Winchester, and who negotiated for his master a marriage with Mar-
garet, the daughter of Duke Rend of Anjou. Not only Anjou, of which
England possessed nothing, but Maine, the bulwark of Normandy,
were ceded to Duke Rend as the price of a match which Suffolk
regarded as the prelude to peace. But the terms of the treaty and
the delays which still averted a final peace gave new strength to the
.var-party with Gloucester at its head. The danger was roughly met.
Gloucester was arrested as he rode : > Parliament on a charge of secret
conspiracy ; and a few days later he was found dead in his lodging.
But the difficulties he had raised foiled Suffolk in his negotiations ; and
though Charles extorted the surrender of Le Mans by a threat of war,
the provisions of the treaty rem rained for the n-ost part unfulfilled. The
itrugglc, however, now became a hopeless one. In two months from
the resumption of the war half Normandy was in the hands of Dunois ;

[chap.

)lished

rapine

nment,

voured

Bishop

irdinal,

incil in

n when

3, Beau-

hausted

)n ; and

his own

)rd after

lity was

efforts to

however

; and his

3h cause
English

ihrank at

i Maine.

T a whole

isperate a

daring of

to relieve

nch army
idford as

tune, but
y on the
Earl of
retire to
ith Mar-
of which
ormandy,
Suffolk
reaty and
th to the
ghly met.
of secret
lodging;,
ons; and
at of war,
llled. The
ths from
Dunois ;

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

Rouen rose against her feeble garrison and threw open her gates to
Charles ; and the defeat of an English force at Fourmigny was the
signal for revolt throughout the rest of the province. The surrender of
Cherbourg in 1450 left Henry not a foot of Norman ground, and the
next year the last fragment of the Duchy of Guienne was lost. Gascony
indeed once more turned to the English Crown on the landing of an
English force under Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury. But ere the twenty
thousand men whose levy was voted by Parliament for his aid could
cross the Channel Shrewsbury suddenly found himself face to face with
the whole French army. His men were mown down by its guns, and
the Earl himself left dead on the field. The surrender of fortress
after fortress secured the final expulsion of the English from the soil
of France. The Hundred Years' War had ended, not only in the loss
of the temporary conquests made since the time of Edward the Third,
with the exception of Calais, but in the loss of the great southern
province which had remained in English hands ever since the marriage
of its Duchess, Eleanor, to Henry the Second, and in the building up
of France into a far greater power than it had ever been before.

Section II.— The Wars of the Roses, 14-50— 1471.

[Auihorities. — No period, save the last, is scantier in historical authorities.
We still possess William of Worcester, Fabyan, and the Crowland Continuator,
and for the struggle between Warwick and Edward, the valuable narrative of
" The Arrival of Edward IV.," edited for the Camden Society, which may be
taken as the official account on the royal side. *' The Paston Letters " (edited
by Mr. Gairdner) are the first instance in English history of a family corre-
spondence, and throw great light on the social history of the time. Cade's
rising has been illustrated in two papers, lately reprinted, by Mr. Durrani
Cooper. The Rolls of Parliament are, as before, of the highest value.]

The ruinous issue of the great struggle with France roused England
to a burst of fury against the wretched government to whose weakness
and credulity it attributed its disasters. Suffolk was impeached, and
murdered as he crossed the sea into exile. When the Bishop of
Chichester was sent to pay the sailors at Portsmouth, and strove to
put them off with less than their due, they fell on him and slew him.
In Kent, the great manufacturing district of the day, seething with a
busy population, and especially concerned with the French contests
through the piracy of the Cinque Ports, where every house showed
some spoil from the wars, the discontent broke into open revolt. The
rising spread from Kent over Surrey and Sussex. A military levy of
the yeomen of the three shires was organized ; the insurgents were
joined by more than a hundred esquires and gentlemen, and two great
landowners of Sussex, the Abbot of Battle and the Prior of Lewes,
openly favoured their cause. John Cade, a soldier of some experience
in the French wars, took the significant name of Mortimer, and placed

281

Sec. I.

Joan ok
Arc

14-22

1451

i\i i;i;

1453

'i
■I' \

Cade's
Revolt

1449

ii'l

1 'J

\ 'I

282

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

vt.]

Sec. II.
The Wars

OF THE

Roses
1450

1471

/u/te, 1450

11 ii

York and
the Beau-
forts

himself at their head ; and the army, now twenty thousand men strong,
marched on Blackheath. The " Complaint of the Commons of Kent "
which they laid before the Royal Council, is of hi^h value in the light
which it throws on the condition of the people. Not one of die
demands touches on religious reform. The question of villeinage and
serfage finds no place in the "Complaint" of 1450. In the seventy
years which had intervened since the last peasant rising, villeinage had
died natii ally away before the progress of social change. The Statutes
of Apparel, which from this time encumber the Statute-Book, show in
their anxiety to curtail the dress of the labourer and the farmer the
progress of these classes in comfort and wealth ; and from the language
of the statutes themselves, it is plain that as wages rose both farmer
and i^ibourer went on clothing themselves better in spite of sumptuary
provisions. With the exception of a demand for the repeal of the
Statute of Labourers, the programme of the Commons was now not
social, but political. The " Complaint " calls for administrative and
economical reforms, for a change of ministry, a more careful expendi-
ture of the royal revenue, and for the restoration of freedom of election,
which had been broken in upon by the interference both of the Crown
and the great landowners. The refusal of the Council to receive the
" Complaint " was followed by a victory of the Kentishmen over the
royal forces at Sevenoaks ; the entry of the insurgents into London,
coupled with the execution of Lord Say, the most unpopular of the
royal ministers, broke the obstinacy of his colleagues. The " Com-
plaint " was received, pardons were granted to all who had joined in
the rising ; and the insurgents dispersed to their homes. Cade, who
had striven in vain to retain them in arms, sought to form a new force
by throwing open the gaols ; but his men quarrelled, and Cade himself
was slain by the sheriff of Kent as he fled into Sussex. The " Com-
plaint " was quietly laid aside. No attempt was made to redress the
grievances which it stated, and the main object of popular hate, the
Duke of Somerset, took his place at the head of the Royal Council.

Beaufort, Duke of Somerset, as the grandson of John of Gaunt and
his mistress Catharine Swynford, was the representative of a junior
branch of the House of Lancaster, whose claims to the throne Henry
IV. had barred by a clause in the Act which legitimated their line,
but whose hopes of the Cro vn were roused by the childlessness of
Henry VI. He found a rival in the Duke of York, heir of the houses
of York, of Clarence, and of Mortimer, who boasted of a double descent
from Edward III. In addition to other claims which York as yet re-
frained from urging, he claimed as descendant of Edmund of Langley,
P2dvvard's fifth son, to be regarded as heir presumptive to the throne.
Popular favour seems to have been on his side, but in 1453 the birth
of the King's son promised to free the Crown from the turmoil of warring
factions ; Henry, however, at the same time sank into a state of idiotcy

which

of the

who hj

was re

audaci

the Ea

Neville

was en

the dea

renewa

restore(

reconci

war. £

the two

rapidly

the dese

rest. T

Queen,

attainde

tempora

in Kent,

amidst t

in a har

and Hen

Thepc

Edmund

the victo]

of affairs

which he

owing the

Edmund

Lancastej

John of

have alrej

of Mortin

had wedc

however,

Parliamen

the Parlia

throne the

set aside.

To moderi

at a later t

also was K

cradle; yo

1 I

CHAP.

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

a83

trong,
Kent"
e light
of die
ye and
eventy
ge had
tatutes
how in
ler the
nguage
farmer
nptuary
of the
low not
ive and
jxpendi-
slection,
z Crown
eive the
Dver the
London,
ir of the
"Corn-
oined in
ide, who
ew force
; himself
; « Com-
Iress the
ate, the
luncil.
,unt and
a junior
Henry
leir line,
sness of
|e houses
descent
yet re-
JLangley,
throne.
;he birth
warring
if idiotcy

which made his rule impossible, and York was appointed Protector
of the Realm. But on Henry's recovery the Duke of Somerset,
who had been impeached and committed to the Tower by his rival,
was restored to power, and supported with singular vigour and
audacity by the Queen. York at once took up arms, and backed by
the Earls of Salisbury and Warwick, the heads of the great House of
Neville, he advanced with 3,000 men upon St. Albans, where Henry
was encamped. A successful assault upon the town was crowned by
the death of Somerset ; and a return of the King's malady brought the
renewal of York's Protectorate. Henry's recovery, however, again
restored the supremacy of the House of Beaufort, and after a temporary
reconciliation between the two parties there was a fresh outbreak of
war. Salisbury defeated Lord Audley at Bloreheath, and York with
the two Earls raised his standard at Ludlow. The King marched
rapidly on the insurgents, and a decisive battle was only averted by
the desertion of a part of the Yorkist army and the disbanding of the
rest. The Duke himself fled to Ireland, the Earls to Calais, while the
Queen, summoning a Parliament at Coventry, pressed on their
attainder. But the check, whatever its cause, had been merely a
temporary one. In the following Midsummer the Earls again landed
in Kent, and backed by a general rising of the county, entered London
amidst the acclamations of its citizens. The royal army was defeated
in a hard-fought action at Northampton, Margaret fled to Scotland,
and Henry was left a prisoner in the hands of the Duke of York.

The position of York as heir presumptive to the crown by descent from

Edmund of Langley had ceased with the birth of a son to Henry ; but

the victory of Northampton no sooner raised him to the supreme control

of affairs than he ventured to assert the far more dangerous claims

which he had secretly cherished, and to their consciousness of which was

owing the bitter hostility of Henry and his Queen. As the descendant of

Edmund of Langley he stood only next in succession to the House of

Lancaster, but as the descendant of Lionel, the elder brother of

John of Gaunt, he stood in strict hereditary right before it. We

have already seen how the claims of Lionel had passed to the House

of Mortimer : it was through Anne, the heiress of the Mortimers, who

had wedded his father, that they passed to the Duke. There was,

however, no constitutional ground for any limitation of the right of

Parliament to set aside an elder branch in favour of a younger, and in

the Parliamentary Act which placed the House of Lancaster on the

throne the claim of the House of Mortimer had been deliberately

set aside. Possession, too, told against the Yorkist pretensions.

To modern minds the best reply to their claim lay in the words used

at a later time by Henry himself. " My father was King ; his father

also was King ; I myself have worn the crown forty years from my

cradle ; you have all sworn fealty to me as your sovereign, send your

Sec. II.
The Wars

OK THE

Roses
1450

1471

HSS

1458

Northamp-

ton

1460

The Wars
of the
Roses

284

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.
The Wars

OK THE

Roses
1450

1471

Wakefield
1460

fathers have done the like to mine. How then can my right be
disputed "i " Long and undisturbed possession, as well as a distinctly
legal title by free vote of Parliament, was in favour of the House of
Lancaster. But the persecution of the Lollards, the interference with
elections, the odium of the war, the shame of the long misgovernment,
told fatally against the weak and imbecile King, whose reign had been
a long battle of contending factions. That the misrule had been serious
was shown by the attitude of the commercial class. It was the rising
of Kent, the great manufacturing district of the realm, which brought
about the victory of Northampton. Throughout the struggle which
followed, London and the great merchant towns were steady for the
House of York. Zeal for the Lancastrian cause was found only in
Wales, in northern England, and in the south-western shires. It is
absurd to suppose that the shrewd traders of Cheapside were moved
by an abstract question of hereditary right, or that the wild
Welshmen believed themselves to be supporting the right of
Parliament to regulate the succession. But it marks the power
which Parliament had now gained that the Duke of York felt himself
compelled to convene the two Houses, and to lay his claim before
the Lords as a petition of right. Neither oaths nor the numerous
Acts which had settled and confirmed the right to the crown in the
House of Lancaster could destroy, he pleaded, his hereditary claim.
The baronage received the petition with hardly concealed reluctance,
and solved the question, as they hoped, by a compromise. They
refused to dethrone the King, but they had sworn no fealty to his child,
and at Henry' s death they agreed to receive the Duke as successor to
the crown. But the open di^^play of York's pretensions at once
united the partisans of the royal House, and the deadly struggle
which received the name of the Wars of the Roses, from the white
rose which formed the badge of the House of York and the red rose
which was the cognizance of the House of Lancaster, began in the
gathering of the North round Lord Clitford, and of the West round the
new Duke of Somerset. York, who had hurried to meet the first with
a far inferior force, was defeated and slain at Wakefield, and the
passion of civil war broke fiercely out on the field. The Earl of
Salisbury was hurried to the block, and the head of Duke Richard,
crowned in mockery with a diadem of paper, is said to have been
impaled on the walls of York. His second son. Lord Rutland, fell
crying for mercy on his knees before Clifford. But Clifford's father
had been the first to fall in the battle of St. Albans which opened the
struggle. " As your father killed mine," cried the savage baron while
he plunged his dagger in the young noble's breast, " I will kill you !"
The brutal deed was soon to be avenged. Duke Richard's eldest son,
Edward, Ea.l of March, hurried from the West, and, routing a body
of Lancastrians at Mortimer's Cross, struck boldly upon London. A

vi.l

force c

the La

St. Alb

diate a

Queen

cutions

scatten

citizens

rang ro

A coun(

promise

Lancast

not with

Lancast:

as rapid

The t

Tadcast<

of the sti

of Senlae

day had

snow-fall

either sid

stabbing

or die on

with a fre

rear turne

quarter w

morrow.

corpses 01

heavy. I

land was 1

beheaded

his Queen

Scotland.

the victor

York. A '

tion the nc

The Strugs

her adhere

of Warwic

a gleam o

difficulty fr

of the woo

child. " I

Margaret a

[chap.

ight be
istinctly
'ouse of
\ce with
irnnient,
lad been
ti serious
tie rising
brought
le which
fior the
I only in
es. It is
e moved
the wild
right of
le power
It himself
im before
numerous
wn in the
iry claim,
leluctance,
;e. They
his child,
ccessor to
at once
struggle
the white
e red rose
an in the
round the
first with
and the
J Earl of
Richard,
lave been
tland, fell
■d's father
pened the
.ron while
ill you!"
ildest son,
g a body
indon. A

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

28s

force of Kentishmen under the Earl of Warwick barred the march of
the Lancastrian army on the capital, but after a desperate struggle at
St. Albans the Yorkist forces broke under cover of night. An imme-
diate advance of the conquerors might have decided the contest, but
(2ueen Margaret paused to sully her victory by a series of bloody exe-
cutions, and the rough northerners who formed the bulk of her army
scattered to pillage, while Edward appeared before London. The
citizens rallied at his call, and cries of "Long live King Edward"
rang round the handsome young leader as he rode through the streets.
A council of Yorkist lords, hastily summoned, resolved that the com-
promise agreed on in Parliament was at an end and that Henry of
Lancaster had forfeited the throne. The final issue, however, now lay,
not with Parliament, but with the sword. Disappointed of London, the
Lancastrian army fell rapidly back on the North, and Edward hurried
as rapidly in pursuit.

The two armies encountered one another at Towton Field, near
Tadcaster. In the numbers engaged, as well as in the terrible obstinacy
of the struggle, no such battle had been seen in England since the fight
of Senlac. The armies numbered together nearly 1 20,000 men. The
day had just broken when the Yorkists advanced through a thick
snow-fall, and for six hours the battle raged with desperate bravery on
either side. At one critical moment Warwick saw his men falter, and
stabbing his horse before them, swore on the cross of his sword to win
or die on the field. The battle was turned by the arrival of Norfolk
with a fresh force. At last the Lancastrians gave way, a river in their
rear turned the retreat into a rout, and the flight and carnage, for no
quarter was given on either side, went on through the night and the
morrow. Edward's herald counted more than 20,000 Lancastrian
corpses on the field, and the losses of the conquerors were hardly less
heavy. But their triumph was complete. The Earl of Northumber-
land was slain ; the Earls of Devonshire and Wiltshire were taken and
beheaded ; the Duke of Somerset fled into exile. Henry himself with
his Queen was forced to fly over the border and to find a refuge in
Scotland. The cause of the House of Lancaster was lost : and with
the victory of Towton the crown of England passed to Edward of
York. A vast bill of attainder wrapped in the same ruin and confisca-
tion the nobles and gentry who still adhered to the House of Lancaster.
The struggles of Margaret only served to bring fresh calamities on
her adherents. A new rising in the North was crushed by the Earl
of Warwick, and a legend which Hghts up the gloom of the time with
a gleam of poetry told how the fugitive Queen, after escaping with
difficulty from a troop of bandits, found a new brigand in the depths
of the wood. With the daring of despair she confided to him her
child. " I trust to your loyalty," she said, " the son of your King."
Margaret and her child escaped over the border under the robber's

Sec. II.
The Wars

OK THE

Roses
1450

1471

1 46 1

Toivton
Field

March 29,
146 1

11 t

1463

^•i

2S6

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

.Sec II.
The Wars

OK THIC

Roses
1450

1471

The
King-
Maker

1464

guidance ; but on the defeat of a new revolt in the battle of Hexham,
Henry, after helpless wanderings, was betrayed into the hands of his
enemies. His feet were tied to the stirrups, he was led thrice round
the pillory, and then conducted as a prisoner to the Tower.

Ruined as feudalism really was by the decline of the baronage, the
extinction of the greater houses, and the break-up of the great estates,
which had been steadily going on, it had never seemed more powerful
than in the years which followed Towton. Out of the wreck of the
baronage a family which had always stood high amongst its fellows
towered into unrivalled greatness. Lord Warwick was by descent Earl
of Salisbury, a son of the great noble whose support had been mainly
instrumental in raising the House of York to the throne. He had doubled
his wealth and influence by his acquisition of the Earldom of Warwick
through a marriage with the heiress of the Beauchamps. His services to
the Yorkists were munificently rewarded by the grant of vast estates
from the confiscated lands of Lancastrians, and by his elevation to the
highest posts in the service of the State. He was captain of Calais,
admiral of the fleet in the Channel, and Warden of the Western
Marches. This personal power was backed by the power of the House
of Neville, of which he was the head. The command of the northern
border lay in the hands of his brother. Lord Montagu, who received as
his share of the spoil the forfeited Earldom of Northumberland and the
estates of his hereditary rivals, the Percies. A younger brother, George
Neville, was raised to the See of York and the post of Lord Chancellor.
Lesser rewards fell to his uncles, Lords Falconberg, Abergavenny, and
Latimer. The vast power which such an accumulation of wealth and
honours placed at the Earl's disposal was wielded with consummate
ability. In outer seeming Warwick was the very type of the feudal
baron. He could raise armies at his call from his own earldoms. Six
hundred liveried retainers followed him to Parliament. Thousands of
dependants feasted in his courtyard. But few men were really further
from the feudal ideal. Active and ruthless warrior as he was, his
enemies denied to the Earl the gift of personal daring. In war he was
rather general than soldier. His genius in fact was not so much military
as diplomatic ; what he excelled in was intrigue, treachery, the contriv-
ance of plots, and sudden desertions. And in the boy-king whom he had
raised to the throne he met not merely a consummate general, but a
politician whose subtlety and rapidity of conception was destined to
leave a deep and enduring mark on the character of the monarchy itself.
Edward was but nineteen at his accession, and both his kinship (for he
was th?j King's cousin by blood) and his recent services rendered War-
wick during the first three years of his reign all-powerful in the State.
But the final ruin of Henry's cause in the battle of Hexham gave the
signal for a silent struggle between the Earl and his young Sovereign.
Edward's first step was to avow his union with the widow of a slain

•I.]

Lancas

was ne

villes, \

father, ;

marria^

Warwic

nexion

riage of

while h(

his abs(

Margan

the Bole

by a plot

Duke of

daughtei

Edward

down. '

could loc

manded

fatal to

thrown b;

out in thi

ready for

insurgent

Clarence

Lancastrii

though he

Earl's flee

connexion

Eleventh.

alliance w!

Lancaster.

daughter i

captive wh

when Edw

had dispei

threw hims

northward,

trusted, drc

fled with a

Henry of L;

but the bitt

no gratitude

his party, w

showed a w

CHAP.

THE NEW MONARCHY.

287

xham,
of his
round

je, the

istates,

)werful
of the

fellows

nt Earl

mainly

loubled

rarwick

vices to
estates

n to the

F Calais,

>Vestern

e House

lorthern

eived as
and the

, George
.ncellor.

|nny, and
ilth and
ummate
^e feudal
s. Six
Isands of
further
i^as, his
Ir he was
] military
f contriv-
i he had
|al, but a
Itined to
Ihy itself.
Ip (for he
led W?r-
le State.
;ave the
^vereign.
a slain

Lancastrian, Dame Elizabeth Grey, at the very moment when Warwick
was negotiating for him a French marriage. Her family, the Wood-
villes, were raised to greatness as a counterpoise to the Nevilles ; her
father. Lord Rivers, became treasurer and constable ; her son by the first
marriage was betrothed to the heiress of the Duke of Exeter, whom
Warwick sought for his nephew. Warwick's policy lay in a close con-
nexion with France ; foiled in his first project, he now pressed for a mar-
riage of the King's sister, Margaret, with a French prince, but in 1467,
while he crossed the sea to treat with Lewis, Edward availed himself of
his absence to deprive his brother of the seals, and prepared to wed
Margaret to the sworn enemy both of France and of Warwick, Charles
the Bold, Duke of Burgundy. Warwick replied to Edward's challenge
by a plot to rally the discontented Yorkists round the King's brother, the
Duke of Clarence. Secret negotiations ended in the marriage of his
daughter to Clarence ; and a revolt which instantly broke out threw
Edward into the hands of his great subject. But the bold scheme broke
down. The Yorkist nobles demanded the King's liberation. Warwick
could look for support only to the Lancastrians, but the Lancastrians de-
manded Henry'srestoration as the price of their aid. Such a demand was
fatal to the plan for placing Clarence on the throne, and Warwick was
thrown back on a formal reconciliation with the King. A new rising broke
out in the following spring in Lincolnshire. The King, however, was now
ready for the strife. A rapid march to the north ended in the rout of the
insurgents, and Edward turned on the instigators of the revolt. But
Clarence and the Earl could gather no force to meet him. Yorkist and
Lancastrian alike held aloof, and they were driven to flight. Calais,
though held by Warwick's deputy, repulsed them from its walls, and the
Earl's fleet was forced to take refuge in France, where the Burgundian
connexion of Edward secured his enemies the support of Lewis the
Eleventh. But the unscrupulous temper of the Earl was seen in the
alliance which he at once concluded with the partizans of the House of
Lancaster. On the promise of Queen Margaret to wed her son to his
daughter Anne, Warwick engaged to restore the crown to the royal
captive whom he had flung into the Tower ; and choosing a momtnt
when Edward was busy with a revolt in the North, and when a storm
had dispersed the Burgundian fleet which defended the Channel, he
threw himself boldly on the English shore. His army grew as he pushed
northward, and the desertion of Lord Montagu, whom Edward still
trusted, drove the King in turn to seek shelter over sea. While Edward
fled with a handful of adherents to beg help from Charles the Bold,
Henry of Lancaster was again conducted from his prison to the throne,
but the bitter hate of the party Warwick had so ruthlessly crushed found
no gratitude for the " King Maker." His own conduct, as v/ell as that of
his party, when Edward again disembarked in the spring at Ravenspur,
showed a weariness of the new alliance, quickened perhaps by their

Sec. II.
TiiK Wars

OK THK

Roses
1450

1471

1469

' n

1470

.;!!'

t!<i

Fa'.lof
Wanvick

288

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.
The Waks

OF THE

Roses
14>50

14.71

April 14,
1471

I Death cj
Henry

May 4

The Nex^r
f Monarchy

dread of Margaret, whose return to England was hourly expected.
Passing through the Lancastrian districts of the North with a declara-
tion that he waived all right to the crown and sought only his own
hereditary dukedom, Edward was left unassailed by a force which
Montagu had collected, and was joined on his march by his brother
Clarence, who had throughout acted in concert with Warwick. En-
camped at Coventry, the Earl himself contemplated a smiilar treason,
but the coming of two Lancastrian leaders put an end to the negotia-
tions. When Montagu joined his brother, Edward marched on London,
follow by Warwick's army ii^ gates were opened by tbt pcrfi:!/ A tiie
Earl's brother, Ai uhis'" :. N( ville ; p id Hei.ry of Lancaster passed
anew to the I owei , i ue battle of Barnet, a medley of carnage and
treachery which 1' stf 1 thrt > hours, ended with the fall of Warwick, who
was charged with cowardly «) :ht. Margaret had landed too late to
bring aid to her great partizan, but the military triumph of Edward was
completed by the skilful strategy with which he forced her army to
battle at Tewkesbury, and by its complete overthrow. The Queen her-
self became a captive ; her boy fell on the field, stabbed — as was
affirmed — by the Yorkist lords aftc Edward had met his cry for mercy
liy a buffet from his gauntlet ; and the death of Henry in the Tower
crushed the last hopes of the House of Lancaster. ' •■ ■ ^ >' ''

Section III.— The New Monarchy. 1471— 1509.

[Anthoj'ities. — Edward V. is the subject of a work attributed to Sir Thomas
More, and which almost certainly derives much of its information from Arch-
bishop Morton. Whatever its historical worth may be, it is remarkable in its
English form as the first historical work of any literary value which we possess
written in our modern prose. The " Letters and Papers of Richard III. and
Henry VII.," some " Memorials of Henry VII.," including his life by Bernard
Andre of Toulouse, and a volume of ** Materials " for a history of his reign
have been edited for the Rolls Series. A biography of Henry is among the
w >rks of Lord Bacon. Halle's Chronicle extends from Henry IV. to
Henry VIII. Miss Halstead, in her " Life of Richard HI.," has elaborately
illustrated a reign of some constitutional importance. For Caxton, see the
biography by Mr. Biades.] - ,. ^.

There are few periods in our annals from which we turn with such
weariness and disgust as from the Wars of the Roses. Their savage
battles, their ruthless executions, their shameless treasons, seem all
the more terrible from the pure selfishness of the ends for which men
fought, the utter want of all nobleness and chivalry in the struggle
itself, of all great result in its close. But even while the contest was
raging the cool eye of a philosophic statesman could find in it matter
for other feelings than those of mere disgust. England presented to
Philippe de Commines the rare spectacle of a land where, brutal as
was the civil stiife, " there are no buildings destroyed or demolished

HAP.

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

289

scted.
clara-
5 own
which
rother
En-
eason,
egotia-
ondon,
r of the
passed
ge and
ck, who
late to
ard was
irmy to
een her-
-as was
»r mercy
e Tower

Thomas
)m Arch-
ible in its

see

by war, and where the mischief of it falls on those who make the war."
The ruin and bloodshed were limited, in fact, to the great lords and
their feudal retainers Once or twice indeed, as at Towton, the towns
threw themsplveii into the strug^jle, but for the most part the trading
and agricultural classes stood wholly apart from it. Slowly but surely
the foreign commerce of the cou try, hitherto conducted by the Italian,
the Hanse mer:hant, or the trader of Catalonia or southern Gaul, was
passuig into English hands. English merchants were settled at
Florence and '.t Venice. English merchant ships appeared in the
Baltic. The first faint upgrowth of manufactures was seen in a crowd
of protective statutes which formed a marked feature in the legislation
of Edward the Fourth. The general tranquillity of the country at large,
while the baronage was dashing itself to pieces in battle after battle,
was shown by the remarkable fact that justice remained ii. "7 imdis-
turbed. The law courts sate at Westminster. The judge -ode on
circuit as of old. The system of jury-trial took mon ^nd Uiore its
modern form by the separation of the jurors from th' ,'ti: sses. But
if the common view of England rearing these Wars ar a r er" chaos of
treason and bloodshed is a false one, still more fals is the common
view of the pettiness of their result. The Wars o< Je Roses did
far more than ruin one royal house or set up another on the throne.
If they did not utterly destroy English freedom, they arrested its
progress for more than a hundred years. They found England, in the
words of Commines, "among all the world's lordships of which I
have knowledge, that where the public weal is best ordered, and where
least violence reigns over the people." A King of England — the
shrewd observer noticed — "can undertake no enterprise of account
without assembling his Parliament, which is a thing most wise and
holy, and therefore are these Kings stronger and better served"
than the despotic sovereigns of the Continent. The English kingship,
as a judge. Sir John Fortescue, could boast when writing at this time,
was not an absolute but a limited monarchy ; the land was not a land
where the will of the prince was itself the law, but where the prince
could neither make laws nor impose taxes save by his subjects* con-
sent. At no time had Parliament played so constant and prominent
a part in the government of the realm. At no time had the principles
of constitutional liberty seemed so thoroughly understood and so dear
to the people at large. The long Parliamentary contest between the
Crown and the two Houses since the days of Edward the First had
firmly established the great securities of »iational liberty — the right of
freedom from arbitrary taxation, from arbitrary legislation, from
arbitrary imprisonment, and the responsibility of even the highest
servants of the Crown to Parliament and to the law. But with the close
of the struggle for the succession this liberty suddenly disappears.
We enter on an epoch of constitutional retrogression in which the

Skc. III.
Thk N '

MONAi
T

290

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. III.

The New
monakchv

1471

10O9

The

Causes

of the

new

Monarchy

slow work 01 the age that went before it was rapidly undone. Parlia-
mentary life was almost suspended, or was turned into a mere form by
the overpowering influence of the Crown. The legislative powers of
the two Houses were usurped by the royal Council. Arbitrary taxation
re-appeared in benevolences and forced loans. Personal liberty wa'
almost extinguished by a formidable spy-system and by the constant
practice of arbitrary imprisonment. Justice was degraded by the pro-
digal use of bills of attainder, by the wide extension of the judicial
power of the Royal Council, by the servility of judges, by the coercion
of juries. So vast and sweeping was the change that to careless ob-
servers of a later day the constitutional monarchy of the Edwards and
the Henries seemed suddenly to have transformed itself under the
Tudors into a despotism as complete as the despotism of the Turk.
Such a view is no doubt exaggerated and unjust. Bend and strain the
law as he might, there never was a time when the most wilful of Eng-
lish rulers failed to own the restraints of law; and the obedience of the
most servile among English subjects lay within bounds, at once poli-
tical and religious, which no theory of King-worship could bring them
to overpairs. But even if we make these reserves, the character of the
Monarchy from the time of Edward the Fourth to the time of Elizabeth
remains something strange and isolated in our history. It is hard to
connect the kingship of the old English, of the Norman, the Angevin,
or the Plantagenet Kings, with the kingship of the House of York or of
the House of Tudor.

If we seek a reason for so sudden and complete a revolution, we find
it in the disappearance of th^it organization of society in which our
constitutional liberty had till now found its security. Freedom had
been won by the sword of the Baronage. Its tradition had been
watched over by the jealousy of the Church. The new class of the
Commons which had grown from the union of the country squire and
the town trader was widening its sphere of political activity as it grew.
But at the close of the Wars of the Roses these older checks no longer
served as restraints upon the action of the Crown. The baronage h.id
fallen more and more into decay. The Church lingered helpless and
perplexed, till it was struck down by Thomas Cromwell. The traders
and the smaller proprietors sank into political inactivity. On the other
hand, the Crown, which only fifty years before had been the sport of
every faction, towered into solitary greatness. The old English king-
ship, limited by the forces of feudalism or of the religious sanctions
wielded by the priesthood, or by the progress of constitutional free-
dom, faded suddenly away, and in its place we see, all-absorbing and
unrestrained, the despotism of the new Monarchy. Revolutionary as the
change was, however, we have - Iready seen in their gradual growth the
causes which brought it about. The social organization from which our
political constitution had hitherto sprung and on which it still rested

VI.]

had

spirii

war.

Chur

of the

only

great

How;

theol

Neith

with t

place

still si

traditi

spiritu

deepei

intelle(

what o;

and th(

exercis

temper

barons

spiritua

weight

means (

politica

insignif

share tl:

county J

the burg

developj

and of

insignifii

virtual d

which it

disappea

indeed \

to vindic

preserval

The Chi

corporati

landownf

disorder '

entrust tl

But abov(

CHAP.

VI. 1

THE NEW MONARCHY.

291

vers of
ixation
ty wa'
mstant
he pro-
judicial
oercion
less ob-
rds and
dor the
ke Turk,
rain the

of Eng-
ce of the
nee poli-
ing them
:er of the
Elizabeth
s hard to
Angevin,

ork or of

n,we find
hich our
;dom had
lad been
ss of the
[uire and
.s it grew.
|no longer '
inage h.id
pless and
e traders
the other
sport of
[lish king-
sanctions
lonal free-
|rbing and
ary as the
•rowth the
[which our
;till rested

had been silently sapped by the progress of industry, by the growth of
spiritual and intellectual enlightenment, and by changes in the art of
war. Its ruin was precipitated by the new attitude of men towards the
Church, by the disfranchisement of the Commons, and by the decline
of the Baronage. Of the great houses some were extinct, others lingered
only in obscure branches which were mere shadows of their former
greatness. With the exception of the Poles, the Stanleys, arid the
Howards, themselves families of recent origin, hardly a fragment of
theolder baronage interfered from this time in the work of government.
Neither the Church nor the smaller proprietors of the country, who
with the merchant classes formed the Commons, were ready to take the
place of the ruined nobles. Imposing as the great ecclesiastical body
still seemed from the memories of its past, its immense wealth, its
tradition of statesmanship, it was rendered powerless by a want of
spiritual enthusiasm, by a moral inertness, by its antagonism to the
deeper religious convictions of the people, and its blind hostility to the
intellectual movement which was beginning to stir the world. Some-
what of their old independence lingeied indeed among the lower clergy
and the monastic orders, but it was through its prelates that the Church
exercised a directly political influence, and these showed a different
temper from the clergy. Driven by sheer need, by the attack of the
barons on their temporal possessions, and of the Lollards on their
spiritual authority, into dependence on the Crown, they threw their
weight on the side of the King with the simple view of averting by
means of the Monarchy the pillage of the Church. But in any wider
political sense the influence of the body to which they belonged was
insignificant. It is less obvious at first sight why the Commons should
share the political ruin of the Church and the Lords, for the smaller
county proprietors were growing fast, both in wealth and numbers, while
the burgess class, as we have seen, was deriving fresh riches from the
developement of trade. But tue result of the narrowing of the franchise
and of the tampering with elections was now felt in the political
insignificance of the Lower House. Reduced by these measures to a
virtual dependence on the baronage, it fell with the fall of the class to
which it looked for guidance and support. And while its rival forces
disappeared, the Monarchy stood ready to take their place. Not only
indeed were the churchman, the squir^^ ^ the burgess powerless
to vindicate liberty against the Crown, but the very interests of self-
preservation led them at this moment to lay freedom at its feet.
The Church still trembled at the progress of heresy. The close
corporations of the towns needed protection for their privileges. The
landowner shared with the trader a profound horror of the war and
disorder which they had witnessed, and an almost reckless desire to
entrust the Crown with any power which would prevent its return.
But above all, the landed and nronied classes (lung passionately to the

u 2

Skc. III.

The New

MoNAKCHV

1471

1509

292

HISTORY OK THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. III.

Thk Nkw

munanchv

1471

•JO

1509

Edward

the
Fourth

Mon.irchy, as the one great force left which could save them from
stKial revolt. The rising of the Commons of Kent shows that the
troubles against which the Statutes of Labourers had been directed
still remained as a formidable source of discontent. The great change
in the character of agriculture indeed, which we have before described,
the throwing together of the smaller holdings, the diminution of
tillage, the increase of pasture lands, had tended largely to swell
the numbers and turbulence of the floating labour class. The riots
against " enclosures," of which we first hear in the time of Henry the
Sixth, and which became a constant feature of the Tudor period, are
indications not only of a constant strife going on in every quarter
between the landowner and the smaller peasant class, but of a mass
of social discontent which was constantly seeking an outlet in
violence and revolution. And at this moment the break-up of the
military households of the nobles, and the return of wounded and dis-
abled soldiers from the wars, added a new element of violence and
disorder to the seething mass. It was in truth this social danger which
lay at the root of the Tudor despotism. For the proprietary classes the
repression of the poor was a question of life and death. Employer and
proprietor were ready to surrender freedom into the hands of the one
power which could preserve them from social anarchy. It was to the
selfish panic of the landowners that England owed the Statute of
Labourers and its terrible heritage of pauperism. It was to the selfish
panic of both landowner and merchant that she owed the despotism of
the Monarchy.

The founder of the new Monarchy was Edward the Fourth. As a
mere boy he showed himself among the ablest and the most pitiless
of the warriors of the civil war. In the first flush of manhood he
looked on with a cool ruthlessness while grey-haired nobles were
hurried to the block. In his later race fc power he had shown him-
self more subtle in his treachery than even Warwick himself. His
triumph was no sooner won however than the young King seemed
to abandon himself to a voluptuous indolence, to revels with the city-
wives of London and the caresses of mistresses like Jane Shore. Tall
in stature and of singular beauty, his winning manners and gay care-
lessness of bearing secured him a popularity which had been denied
to nobler kings. But his indolence and gaiety were mere veils beneath
which Edward shrouded a profound political ability. No one could
contrast more utterly in outward appearance with the subtle sovereigns
of his time, with Louis the Eleventh or Ferdinand of Aragon, but his
work was the same as theirs, and it was done as completely. While
jesting with aldermen, or dallying with his mistresses, or idling over
the new pages from the printing-press at Westminster, Edward was
silently laying the foundations of an absolute rule. The almost total
discontinuance of Parliamentary life was in itself a revolution. Up

CHAP.

from
at the
rected
hangc
:ribed,
ion of

swell
le riots
iry the
od, are
quarter
a mass
tlet in

of the
ind dis-
ice and
r which
sses the
lyer and
the one
ls to the
;atute of
e selfish
otism of

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

As a
pitiless
ood he
les were
m him-
klf. His
seemed
|the city-
\e. Tall
ky care-
denied
1 beneath
le could
fvereigns
], but his
While
[ing over
^ard was
iost total
m. Up

to this moment the two Houses had played a part which became -nore
and more prominent in the government of the realm. Under the
two first Kings of the House of Lancaster Parliament had been sum-
moned almost every year. Not only had the ri|;ht of self-taxation and
initiation of laws been yielded explicitly to the Commons, but they
had interfered with the administration of the State, had directed the
application of subsidies, and called royal ministers to account by
repeated instances of impeachment. Under Henry the Sixtl. an im-
portant step in constitutional progress had been made by abandoning
the old form of , presenting the requests of the Parliament in the form
of petitions which were subsequently moulded into statutes by the
Royal Council ; the statute itself, in its final form, was now presented
for the royal assent, and the Crown was deprived of its former
privilege of modifying it. But with the reign of Edward the Fourth
not only does this progress cease, but the very action of Parliament itself
comes almost to an end. For the first time since the days of John not
a single law which promoted freedom or remedied the abuses of power
was even proposed. The necessity for summoning the two Houses
had, in fact, been removed by the enormous tide of wealth which the
confiscations of the civil war poured into the royal treasury. In the
single bill of attainder which followed the victory of Towton, twelve
great nobles and more than a hundred knights and squires were
stripped of their estates to the King's profit. It was said that nearly
a fifth of the land had passed into the royal possession at one period
or another of the civil war. A grant of the customs was given to the
King for life. Edward added to his resources by trading on a vast
scale. The royal ships, freighted with tin, wool, and cloth, made the
name of the merchant-king famous in the ports of Italy and Greece.
The enterprises he planned against France, though frustrated by the
refusal of Charles of Burgundy to co-operate with him in them,
afforded a fresh financial resource ; and the subsidies granted for a
war which never took place swelled the royal exchequer. But the
pretext of war enabled Edward not only to increase his hoard, but to
deal a deadly blow at the liberty which the Commons had won.
Setting aside li ^ usage of contracting loans by the authority of Parlia-
ment, Edward (ailed before him the merchants of London and
requested from c;ich a gift or "benevolence," in proportion to the
royal needs. The exaction was bitterly resented even by the c' asses
with whom the King had been most popular, but for the m(;inent re-
sistance was fruitless, and the system of " benevolence " wa.'i soon to
be developed into the forced loans of Wolsey and of Charles the First.
It was to Edward that his Tudor successors owed the introduction of
an elaborate spy-system, the use of the rack, and the practice of
interference with the purity of justice. In the history of intellectual
progress alone his reign takes a brighter colour, and the founder of

293

.Skc. III.
TiiK Nkw

M(>NAK( MY

1471

1509

>474

.tl

' i

294

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.

The New
Monarchy

1471

1500

Iilicra-

ture

after

Chaucer

a new despotism presents a claim to our regard as the patron of
Caxton. ?

Literature indeed seemed at this moment to have died as utterly as
freedom itself. The genius of Chaucer, and of the one or more
poets whose works have been confounded with Chaucer's, defied for
a while the pedantry, the affectation, the barrenness of their age ;
but the sudden close of this poetic outburst left England +0 a
crowd of poetasters, compilers, scribblers of interminable moralities,
rimers of chronicles, and translators from the worn-out field of
French romance. Some faint trace of the liveliness and beauty of
older models lingers among the heavy platitudes of Gower, but
even this vanished from the didactic puerilities, the prosaic com-
monplaces, of Occleve and Lydgate. The literature of the
Middle Ages was dying out with the Middle Ages themselves ; in
letters as in life their thirst for knowledge had spent itself in the
barren mazes of the scholastic philosophy, their ideal of warlike noble-
ness faded away before the gaudy travestie of a spurious chivalry,
and the mystic enthusiasm of their devotion shrank at the touch of
persecution into a narrow orthodoxy and a flat morality. The clergy,
who had concentrated in themselves the intellectual effort of the older
time, were ceasing to be an intellectual class at all. The monasteries
were no longer seats of learning. " I found in them," said Poggio, an
Italian traveller twenty years after Chaucer's death, " men given up to
sensuality in abundance, but very few lovers of learning, v^nd those of
a bi.i yarous sort, skilled more in quibbles and Fophisms than in
literature." The erection of colleges, which was beginning, failed to
arrest the quick decline of the universities both in the numbers and
learning of their students. Those at Oxford amoimted to only a fifth
of the scholars who had attended its lectures a century before, and
"■ Oxford Latin " became proverbial for a jargon in which the very
tradition of grammar had been lost. All literary production was nearly
at an end. Historical composition lingered on indeed in compilations
of exiracts from past writers, such as make up the so-called works of
Wals'ngham, in jejune monastic annals, or worthless popular com-
pendiims. But the only real trace of mental activity is to be found in
the numerous treatises on alchemy and magic, on the elixir of life or
the philosopher's stone, a fungous growth which most unequivocally
witnesses to the progress of intellectual decay. On the other hand,
while the older literary class was dying out, a glance beneath the
surface shows us the stir of a new interest in 1^^ owledge among the
masses of the people itself. The correspondence of the Paston family,
which has been happily preserved, not only displays a fluency and
vivacity as well as a grammatical con ctness which would have been
impossible in familiar letters a few years before, but shews country
squires discussing about books and gathering libraries. The very

."^m

•i
.ill

CHAP.

on of

;rly as
more
ied for
r age ;
1 +0 a
•alities,
ield of
auty of
'er,

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

295

but

c com-
of the
ves ; in
f in the
e noble-
:hivalry,
touch of
; clergy,
he older
lasteries
)ggio, an
^en up to
those of
than in
failed to
jers and
ly a fifth
"ore, and
|the very
,s nearly
ipilations
jworks of
lar com-
found in
>f life or
livocally
er hand,
eath the
|iong the
|n family,
incy and
.ve been
country
;he very

character of the authorship of the time, its love of compendiums and
abridgements of the scientific and historical knowledge of its day, its
dramatic performances or mysteries, the commonplace morality of its
ooets, the popularity of its rimed chronicles, are additional proofs that
literature was ceasing to be the possession of a purely intellectual class
and was beginning to appeal to the people at large. The increased
use of linen paper in place of the costlier parchment helped in the
popularization of letters. In no former age had finer copies of books
been produced ; in none had so many been transcribed. This in-
creased demand for their production caused the processes of copying
and illuminating manuscripts to be transferred from the scriptoria
of the religious houses into the hands of trade-gilds, like the Gild of
St. John at Bruges, or the Brothers of the Pen at Brussels. It was,
in fact, this increase of demand for books, pamphlets, or fly-sheets,
especially of a grammatical or religious character, in the middle of
the fifteenth century that brought about the introduction of printing.
"We meet with it first in rude sheets simply struck off from wooden
blocks, " block-books " as they are now called, and later on in works
printed from separate and moveable types. Originating at Maintz
with the thr ^ famous printers, Gutenberg, Fust, and Schceffer, the
new process travelled southward to Strasburg, crossed the Alps to
Venice, where it lent itself through the Aldi to the spread of Greek
literature in Europe, and then floated down the Rhine to the towns of
Flanders. It was probably at the press of Colard Mansion, in a little
room over the porch of St. Donat's at Bruges, that Caxton learnt the
art which he was the first to introduce into England.

J. Kentish boy by birth, but apprenticed to a London mercer,
WiUiam Caxton had already spent thirty years of his manhood in
Flanders, as Governor of the English gild of Merchant Adventurers
there, when we find him engaged as cop> ist iu the service of Edv^ard' s
sister, Duchess Margaret of Burgundy, But the tedious process of copy-
ing was soon thrown aside for the new art which Colard Mansion had
introduced into Bruges. " For as much as in the writing of the same,"
Caxton tells us in the preface to his first printed work, the Tales of
Troy, " my pen is worn, my hand weary and not steadfast, mine eyes
dimmed with over much looking on the white paper, and my courage
not so prone and ready to labour as it hath been, and that age creepeth
on me daily and feebkih all the body, and also because 1 have pro-
mised to divers gentlemen and to my friends to address to tiiem as
hastily as I might the said book, therefore I have practised and learned
at my great charge and dispense to ordain this said book in print after
the manner and form as ye may see, and is not written with pen and
ink as other books be, to the end that every man may have them at
once, for all the books of this story here emprynted as ye see were
begun in one day and also finished in one day." The printing press

Sec. in.

The New
Monarchy

1471

1500

^^'■l

Caxton

1476

\ W

296

Sec. III.

The Nkw
Monarchy

1471

iao9

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

: I

•1

Caxton's
Transla-
tions

[chap.

VI.]

was the precious freight he brought back to England, after an absence
of five-and-thirty years. Through the next fifteen, at an age when
other men look for ease and retirement, we see him plunging with
characteristic energy into his new occupation. His "red pale," or
heraldic shield marked with a red bar down the middle, invited buyers
to the press established in the Almonry at Westminster, a little
enclosure containing a chapel and almshouses near the west front of
the church, where the alms ex the abbey were distributed to the poor.
"If it please any man, spiritual or temporal," runs his advertisement,
" to buy any pyes of two or three commemorations of Salisbury all
emprynted after the form of the present letter, which be well and truly
correct, let him come to Westminster into the Almonry at the red
pale, and he shall have them good chepe." He was a practical man
of business, as this advertisement shows, no rival of the Venetian
Aldi Ci of the classical printers of Rome, but resolved to get a living
from his trade, supplying priests with service books, and preachers
with sermons, furnishing the clerk with his " Golden Legend," and
knight and baron with "joyous and pleasant histories of chivalry."
But while careful to win his daily bread, he found time to do much for
what of higher literature lay fairly to hand. He printed all the
English poetry of any moment which was ther» in existence. His
reverence for " that worshipful man, Geoffry Chaucer," who " ought to
be eternally remembered," is shown not merely by his edition cf the
" Canterbury Tales," but by his reprint of them when a purer text of
the poem offered itself. The poems of Lydgate and Gower were added
to those of Chaucer. The Chronicle of Brut and Higden's " Poly-
chronicon " were 'he only available works of an historical character
then existing in the English tongue, and Caxton not only printed them
but himself continued the latter up to his own time. A translation of
Boethius, a version of the vEneid from the French, and a tract or
two of Cicero, were the stray first-fruits of the classical press in
England.

Busy as was Caxton's printing-press, he was even busier as a trans-
lator than as a printer, More than four thousand of his printed pages
are from works of his own rendering. The need of these translations
shows the popular drift of literature at the time ; but keen as the
demand seems to have been, there is nothing mechanical in the temper
with which Caxton prepared to meet it. A natural, simple-hearted
literary taste and enthusiasm, especially for the style and forms of
language, breaks out in his curious prefaces. " Having no work in
hand," he says in the preface to his Eneid, " I sitting in my study
where as lay many divers pamphlets and books, happened that to my
hand came a little book in French, which late was translated out of
Latin by some noble clerk of France — which book is named Eneydos,
and made in Latin by that noble poet and great clerk Vergyl — in

J^i-

[CHAP.

ibsence
je when
ng with
lale," or
d buyers
a little
front of
he poor.
:isement,
sbury all
and truly
; the red
;ical man
Venetian
; a living
preachers
end," and
chivalry."
» much for
;d all the
:nce. His
" ought to
ion of the
■er text of
/ere added
v's " Poly-
character
jited them
islation of
a tract or
press in

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

297

which book I had great pleasure by reason of the fair and honest
termes and wordes in French which I never saw to-fore-like, none
so pleasant nor so well-ordered, which book as me seemed should be
much requisite for noble men to see, as well for the eloquence as
the histories ; and when I had advised me to this said book I deliber-
ated and concluded to translate it into English, and forthwith took
a pen and ink and wrote a leaf or twain." But the work of transla-
tion involved a choice of English which made Caxton's work impor-
tant in the history of our language. He stood between two schools
of translation, that of French affectation and English pedantryr It
was a moment when the character of our literary tongue was being
settled, and it is curious to see in his own words the struggle over
it which was going on in Caxton's time. " Some honest and great
clerks have been with me and desired me to write the most curious
terms that I could find ; " on the other hand, " some gentleme.i of
late blamed me, saying that in my translations I had over many
curious terms which could not be understood of common people, and
desired me to use old and homely terms in my translations." " Fain
would I please every man," comments the good-humoured printer, but
his sturdy sense saved him alike from the temptations of the court and
the schools. His own taste pointed to English, but " to the common
terms that be daily used" rather than to the English of his anti-
quarian advisers. " I took an old book and read therein, and cer-
tainly the English was so rude and broad I could not well understand
it," while the Old-English charters which the Abbot of Westminster
lent as models from the archives of his house seemed " more like
to Dutch than to English." On the other hand, to adopt current
phraseology was by no means easy at a time when even the speech
of common talk was in a state of rapid flux. " Our language now
used varieth far from that which was used and sooken when I was
born." Not only so, but the tongue of each shire was still peculiar
to itself, and hardly intelligible to men of another county. " Common
English that is spoken in one shire varieth from another so much,
that in my days happened that certain merchants v/ere in a ship in
Thames, for to have sailed over the sea into Zealand, and for lack
of wind they tarried at Foreland, and went on land for to refresh
them. And one of them, named Sheffield, a mercer, came into a
house and asked for meat, and especially he asked them after eggs.
And the good wife answered that she could speak no P'rench. And
the merchant was angry, for he also could speak no French, but would
have had eggs, but she understood him not. And then at last another
said he would have eyren, then the good wife said she understood him
well. Lo ! what should a man in these days now write," adds the
puzzled printer, "eggs or eyren.'' certainly it is hard to please every
man by cause of diversity and change of language." His own mother-

Sec. III.

The New
Monarchy

1471

1509

298

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.

The New
Monarchy

1471

1509

Iiitcra-

turc
and the
Nobles

149 1

HI '
it i

11'

I '

tongue too was that of " Kent in the Weald, where I doubt not is spoken
as broad and rude English as in any place in England ; " and coupling
this with his long absence in Flanders, we can hardly wonder at the
confession he makes over his first translation, that " when all these
things came to fore i.ie, after that I had made and writtcii a five or six
quires, I fell in despair of this work, and purposed never to have
continued therein, and the quires laid apart, and in two years after
laboured no more in this work."

He was still, however, busy translating when he died. All difficul-
ties, in fact, were lightened by the general interest which his labours
aroused. When the length of the " Golden Legend " makes him " half
desperate to have accomplished it " and ready to " lay it apart," the
Earl of Arundel solicits him in nowise to leave it and promises a yearly
fee of a buck in summer and a doe in winter, once it were done. " Many
noble and divers gentle men of this realm came and demanded many
and often times wherefore I have not made and imprinted the noble
history of the * San Graal.' " We see his visitors discussing with the
sagacious printer the historic existence of Arthur. Duchess Margaret
of Somerset lei ^ him her " Blanchardine and Eglantine ; " an Arch-
deacon of Colchester brought him his translation of the work called
" Cato ; ^' a mercer of London pressed him to undertake the " Royal
Book" of Philip le Bel. The Queen's brother, Earl Rivers, chatted
with him over his own translation of the " Sayings of the Philosophers."
Even kings showed their interest in his work ; his " TuUy " was printed
under the patronage of Edward the Fourth, his " Order of Chivalry "
dedicated to Richard the Third, his " Facts of Arms " published at the
desire of Henry the Seventh. The fashion of large and gorgeous
libraries had passed from the French to the English princes of his day :
Henry the Sixth had a valuable collection of books ; that of the Louvre
was seized by Duke Humphrey of Gloucester, and formed the basis of
the fine library which he presented to t],e University of Oxford. Great
nobles took an active and personal part of the literary revival. The
warrior, Sir John Fastolf, was a well-known lover of books. Earl
Rivers was himself one of th*^ authors of the day ; he found leisure in
the intervals of pilgrimages and politics to translate the " Sayings of
the Philosophers " and a couple of religious tracts for Caxton's press.
A friend of far greater intellectual distinction, however, than these
was found in John Tiptoft, Earl of Worcester. He had wandered
d jr'n^'; the reign of Henry the Sixth in search of learning to Italy, had
st!<li.'.d at her universities, and become a teacher at Padua, where the
ek^jiuce of his Lalinity irew tears from the most learned of the Popes,
i''iis the Second, better known as ^neas Sylvius. Caxton can find no
words warjn enough to express his admiration of one " which in his
tii'f- fiowccd in virtu-, and cunning, to whom I know none like among
th,. IcrJ- Ci" th;; temporality in science and moral virtue," But the

VI.]

ruthh

its int

the si

was J

great

noble,

vertis(

disple

and c

alread

ofGlo

once <

succes

Court.

of his ]

family,

realm.

the Coi

the latt

upon h

filled V

Hasting

ministe

The Ai

prison, i

step ren

Duke c(

presentc

estates,

lawful n

besough

Edward

Tower, £

while th(

were huj

under Bi

the two 1

Yorkists

bodies in

passed a\

Margaret

had marr

mother 01

an illegal

[chap.

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

299

> spoken
:oupling
ir at the
all these
ve or six
to have
;ars after

I difficul-
s labours
iim"half
part," the
;s a yearly
;. " Many
ded many
the noble
r with the
Margaret
an Arch-
rork called
he " Royal
rs, chatted
losophers."
v&s printed
Chivalry "
hed at the
gorgeous
of his day :
he Louvre
he basis of
ord. Great
val. The
oks. Earl
1 leisure in
Sayings of
on's press.
;han these
wandered
Italy, had
where the
|the Popes,
an find no
ich in his
like among
But the

ruthlessness of the Renascence appeared in Tiptoft side by side with
its intellectual vigour, and the fall of one whose cruelty had earned him
the surname of " the Butcher " even amidst the horrors of civil war
was greeted with sorrow by none but the faithfu! printer. "What
great loss was it," he says in a preface long after his fall, " of that
noble, virtuous, and well-disposed lord ; when I remember and ad-
vertise his life, his science, and his virtue, me thinketh (God not
displeased) over great a loss of such a man, considering his estate
and cunning."

Among the nobles who encouraged the work of Caxton we have
already seen the figure of the King's youngest brother, Richard, Duke
of Gloucester. Ruthless and subtle as Edward himself, the Duke at
once came to the front with a scheme of daring ambition when the
succession of a boy of thirteen woke aga.n the fierce rivalries of the
Court. On the King's death Richard hastened to secure the person
of his nephew, Edward the Fifth, to overthrow the power of the Queen's
family, and to receive from the counci? the office of Protector of the
realm. Little more than a month had pas-sed, when suddenly entering
the Council chamber, he charged Lord Hastings, the chief adviser of
the late King and loyal adherent of his sons, wub sorcery and designs
upon his life. As he dashed his hand upon the iible the room was
filled with soldiers. " I will not dine," said the Duke . addressmg
Hastings, "till they have brought me your head;" and the powerful
minister was hurried to instant execution in the court-yard of the Tower.
The Archbishop of York and the Bishop of Ely were thrown into
prison, and every check on Richard's desigur v'i6 removed. Only one
step remained to be taken, and two months after his brother's death the
Duke consented after some show of reluctance to recei\ a petition
presented by a body of lords and others in the name " the three
estates, which, setting aside Edward's children as the fr of an un-
lawful marriage and those of Clarence as disabled by s attainder,
besought him to take the office and title of King. His young nephews,
Edward V. and his brother the Duke of York, were ing into the
Tower, and there murdered, as was alleged, by their . icle's order ;
while the Queen's brother and son, Lord Rivers and S : Richard Grey,
were hurried to execution. Morton, the Bishop of Ely, imprisoned
under Buckingham in Wales, took advantage of the disappearance of
the two boys to found a scheme which was to unite the discontented
Yorkists with what remained of the Lancastrian party, and to link both
bodies in a wide conspiracy. All the descendants of Henry IV. had
passed away, but the line of John of Gaunt still survive . The Lady
Margaret Beaufort, the last representative of the House of Somerset,
had married the Earl of Richmond, Edmund Tudor, and become the
mother of Henry Tudor. In the act which legitimated the Bcauforts
an illegal clause had been inserted by Henry IV. which barred their

Sec. III.

The New
Monarchy

1471

1509

Richard
the Third

1483

',; i

; r

Henry
Tudor

>-•

Sec. Ill

The New-
Monarchy

1471

1509

1483

1484

Boszvorth
Field

14^5

succession to the crown ; but as the last remaining scion of the line of
Lancaster Henry's claim was acknowledged by the partizans of his
House, and he had been driven to seek a refuge in Brittany from the
jealous hostility of the Yorkist sovereigns. Morton's plan was the
marriage of Henry Tudor with Elizabeth, the daughter and heiress of
Edward IV., and with Buckingham's aid a formidable revolt was
organized. The outbreak was quickly put down. But daring as was
Richard's natural temper, it was not to mere violence that he trusted
in his seizure of the throne. During his brother's reign he had watched
keenly the upgrowth of public discontent as the new policy of the
monarchy developed itself, and it was as the restorer of its older
liberties that he appealed for popular support. " We be determined,"
said the citizens of London in a petition to the King, " rather to adven-
ture and to commit us to the peril of our lives and jeopardy of death,
than to live in such thraldom and bondage as we have lived long time
heretofore, oppressed and injured by extortions and new impositions
against the laws of God and man and the liberty and laws of this
realm, wherein every EngHshman is inherited." Richard met the ap-
peal by again convoking Parliament, which, as we have seen, had been
all but discontinued under Edward, and by sweeping measures of
reform. In the one session of his brief reign the practice of extort-
ing money by "benevolences" was declared illegal, while grants of
pardons and remission of forfeitures reversed in some measure the
policy of terror by which Edward at once held the country in awe
and filled his treasury. Numerous statutes broke the slumbers of
Parliamentary legislation. A series of mercantile enactments strove to
protect the growing interests of English commerce. The King's love
of literature showed itself in the provision that no statutes should act
as a hindrance " to any artificer or merchant stranger, of what nation
or country he be, for bringing unto this realm or selling by retail or
otherwise of any manner of books, written or imprinted." His prohibi-
tion of the iniquitous seizure of goods before conviction of felony,
whic- had prevailed during Edward's reign, his liberation of the
bondmen who still remained unenfranchised on the royal domain, and
his religious foundations, show Richard's keen anxiety to purchase a
popularity in which the bloody opening of his reign might be forgotten.
But as the news of the royal children's murder slowly spread, the
most pitiless stood aghast at this crowning deed of blood. The
pretence of constitutional rule, too, was soon thrown off, and a levy
of benevolences in defiance of the statute which had just been passed
woke general indignation. The King felt himself safe ; he had even
won the Queen-niother's consent to his marriage with Elizabeth ; and
Henry, alone and in exile, seemed a small danger. But a wide con-
spiracy at once revealed itself when Henry landed at Milford Haven, and
advanced through Wales. He no sooner encountered the royal army

VI.]

[ciiAp.

le line of
IS of his
from the
was the
leiress of
volt was
\g as was
le trusted
I watched
cy of the
its older
ermined,"
to adven-
of death,
long time
npositions
vs of this
et the ap-
, had been
gasures of
of extort-
grants of
easure the
ry in awe
umbers of
s strove to
king's love
should act
at nation
ly retail or
lis prohibi-
of felony,
Ion of the
Imain, and
lurchase a
] forgotten.
Dread, the
kd. The
ind a levy
ten passed
had even
)eth ; and
Iwide con-
[aven, and
loyal arrny

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

301

at Bosworth Field in Leicestershire than treachery decided the day.
Abandoned ere the battle began by a division of his forces under
Lord Stanley, and as it opened by a second body under the Earl of
Northumberland, Richard dashed, with a cry of " Treason, Treason,"
into the thick of the fight. In the fury of his despair he had already
flung the Lancastrian standard to the ground and hewed his way into
the very presence of his rival, when he fell overpowered by numbers,
and the crown which he had worn, and which was found as the
struggle ended lying near a hawthorn bush, was placed on the head of
the conqueror.

With the accession of Henry the Seventh ended the long bloodshed
of the civil wars. The two warring lines were united by his marriage
with Elizabeth : his only dangerous rivals were removed by the succes-
sive deaths of the nephews of Edward the Fourth, John de la Pole,
Earl of Lincoln, a son of Edward's sister, who had been acknowledged
as his successor by Richard the Third ; and the Ear) of Warwick, a son
of Edward's brother the Duke of Clarence, and next male heir of the
Yorkist line. Two remarkable impostors succeeded for a time in
exciting formidable revolts, Lambert Simnel, under the name of the
Earl of Warwick, and Perkin Warbeck, who j * >m ated the Duke of
York, the second of the children murdered in the " - vver. Defeat, how-
ever, reduced the first to the post of scullion in the royal kitchen ; and
the second, after far stranger adventures, and the recognition of his
claims by the Kings of Scotland and France, as well as by the Duchess-
Dowager of Burgundy, whom he claimed as his aunt, was captured and
four years later hanged at Tyburn. Revolt only proved more clearly
the strength which had been given to the New Monarchy by the
revolution which had taken place in the art of war. The introduction
of gunpowder had ruined feudalism. The mounted and heavily-armed
knight gave way to the meaner footman. Fortresses which had been
impregnable against the attacks of the Middle Ages crumbled before
the new artillery. Although gunpowder had been in use as early as
Cr^cy, it was not till the accession of the House of Lancaster that it was
really brought into effective employment as a military resource. But
the revolution in warfare was immediate. The wars of Henry the Fifth
were wars of sieges. The " Last of the Barons," as Warwick has pic-
turesquely been styled, relied mainly on his train of artillery. It was artil-
lery that turned the day at Barnet and Tewkesbury, and that gave Henry
the Seventh his victory over the formidable dangers which assailed him.
The strength which the change gave to the crown was, in fact, almost
irresistible. Throughout the Middle Ages the call of a great baron had
been enough to raise a formidable revolt. Yeomen and retainers took
down thebowfrom theirchimneycorner,knights buckled on theirarmour,
and in a few days an army threatened the throne. Bit without artillery
such an army was now helpless, and the one train of artillery in the

Sec. III.

The New
Monarchy

1471

1509

Henry

the
Seventh

1487
1492

1501

.1 I

I .i.r

" I

303

IITSTORY Of Tttk feNCLISn ?FOPT,E.

[chap.

Sbc. III.
The New

MoNAR( IIY

1471

ro
1509

N ■

|i^

Couri of

Star
Chamber

kingdom lay ai the disposal of the King. It was the conaiiousness of
his strength which enabled the new sovereign to quietly resume the policy
of lulward the Fourth. He was forced, indeed, by the circumstances
of his descent to base his right to the throne on a Parliamentary title.
Without reference either to the claim of blood or conquest, the Houses
enacted simply " that the inheritance of the Crown should be, rest,
remain, and abide in the most Royal person of their sovereign lord,
King Henry the Seventh, and the heirs of his body lawfully ensuing."
But the policy of Edward was faithfully followed, and Parliament was
but twice convened during the last thirteen years of Henry's reign.
The chief aim, indeed, of the King was the accumulation of a treasure
which would relieve him from the neec of ever appealing for its aid.
Subsidies granted for the support of wars which Henry evaded formed
the base of a royal treasure, which wa.> swelled by the revival of
dormant claims of the crown, by the exaction of fines for the breach
of forgotten tenures, and by a host of petty extortions. A dilemma of
his favourite minister, which received the name of " Morton's fork,"
extorted gifts to the exchequer from men who lived handsomely on
the ground that their wealth was manifest, and from those who lived
plainly on the plea that economy had made them wealthy. Still
greater sums were drawn from those who were compromised in the
revolts which chequered the King's rule. So successful were these
efforts that at the end of his reign Henry bequeathed a hoard of two
millions tn his successor. The same imitation of Edward's policy
was see in Henry's civil government. Broken as was the strength
of the biiionage, there still remained lords whom the new monarch
watched with a jealous solicitude. Their power lay in the hosts of
disorderly retainers who swarmed round their houses, ready to furnish
a force in case of revolt, while in peace they became centres of outrage
and defiance to the law. Edward had ordered the dissolution of these
military households in his Statute of Liveries, and the statute was
enforced by Henry with the utmost severity. On a visit to the Earl of
Oxford, one of the most devoted adherents of the Lancastrian cause,
the King found two long lines of liveried retainers drawn up to receive
him. " I thank you for your good cheer, my Lord," said Henry as
they parted, " but I may not endure to have my laws broken in my
sight. My attorney must speak with you." The Earl was glad to
escape with a fine of ;^io,ooo. It was with a special view to the
suppression of this danger that Henry employed the criminal jurisdic-
tion of the Royal Council. He appointed a committee of his Council
as a regular court, to which the place where it usually sat gave the
name of the Court of Star Chamber. The King's aim was probably
little more than a purpose to enforce order on the land by bringing the
great nobles before his own judgment-seat ; but the establishment of
the court as a regular and no longer an exceptional tribunal, whose

vi.l

trad it i

the al

peers,

thoug]

potisn

rather

eye, th

or gen

tastes

press,

dream

with d

which

[Autl
curately
but inte
accessib
Elizabet
The hisi
Letters, '
by Jortir
describee
share, I '.
and the i

Great

if we tu;

the min
moment
and the
enlarged
of the u
Hope ar
Columbi
Old. S(
way amc
lands, ne
gence of
that told
soon " in
range of
tells us 1
human lii

[chap.

sness of
le policy
tistances
ary title.
I Houses
be, rest,
ign lord,
irisuing."
nent was
^'s reign,
treasure
r its aid.
d formed
evival of
le breach
lemma of
I's fork,"
omely on
who lived
ly. Still
;d in the
^ere these
rd of two
I's policy
! strength
monarch
! hosts of
o furnish
if outrage
of these
Ltute was
e Earl of
an cause,
o reoeive
eniy as
;n in my
|s glad to
;w to the
jurisdic-
|s Council
gave the
probably
ging the
ihment of
lal, whose

vi.l

THE NEW MONARCHY.

303

» 1

traditional powers were confirmed by Parliamentary statute, and where
the absence of a jury cancelled the prisoner's right to be tried by his
peers, furnished his son with his readiest instrument of tyranny. But
though the drift of Henry's policy was steady in the direction of des-
potism, his temper seemed to promise the reign of a poetic dreamer
rather than of a statesman. The spare form, the sallow face, the quick
eye, the shy, solitary humour broken by outbursts of pleasant converse
or genial sarcasm, told of an inner concentration and enthusiasm. His
tastes were literary and artistic ; he was a patron of the new printing
press, a lover of books and of art. But life gave Henry little leisure for
dreams or culture. Wrapt in schemes of foreign intrigue, struggling
with dangers at home, he could take small part in the one movement
which stincu England during his reign, the great intellectual revolution
which bears the nainc of the Revival of Letters.

Section IV.— The New Learnlngr. 1509— 1520.

[Authoriiies, — The general literary history of this period is fully and ac-
curately given by Mr. Hallam (*• Literature of Europe"), and in a confused
but interesting way by Warton ("History of English Poetry"). The most
accessible edition of the typical book of the Revival, More's " Utopia," is the
Elizabethan translation, published by Mr. Arber ("English Reprints," 1869).
The history of Erasmus in England must be followed in his own entertaining
Letters, abstracts of some of which will be found in the well-known biography
by Jortin. Colet's work and the theolog'cal aspect of the Revival has been
described by Mr. Seebohm (" The Oxford Reformers of 1498 ") ; for Warham's
share, I have ventured to borrow a little from a paper of mine on " Lambeth
and the Archbishops," in " Stray .Studies."]

Great as were the issues of Henry's policy, it shrinks into littleness
if we turn from it to the weighty movements which were now stirring
the minds of men. The world was passing through changes more
momentous than any it had witnessed since the victory of Christianity
and the fall of the Roman Empire. Its physical bounds were suddenly
enlarged. The discoveries of Copernicus revealed to man the secret
of the universe. Portuguese mariners doubled the Cape of Good
Hope and anchored their merchant fleets in the harbours of India.
Columbus crossed the untraversed ocean to add a New World to the
Old. Sebastian Cabot, starting from the port of Bristol, threaded his
way among the icebergs of Labrador. This sudden contact with new
lands, new faiths, new races of men quickened the slumbering intelli-
gence of Europe into a strange curiosity. The first book of voyages
that told of the Western World, the Travels of Amerigo Vespucci, were
soon " in every body's hands." The "Utopia" of More, in its wide
range of speculation on every subject of human thought and action,
tells us how roughly and utte-ly the narrowness and limitation of
human life had been broken up. The capture of Constantinople by

Skc. IV.

The New
Lharninp.

1500

isao

The Ne^w^
lieaming

51:

304

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

!1!

S«c. IV.

The Nkw
Lkarninc;

1500

i5ao

149 1

Colet at
Oxford

the Turks, and the flight of its Greek scholars to the shores of Italy,
opened anew the science and literature of the older world at the very
Hour when the intellectual energy of the Middle Ages had sunk into
exhaustion. The exiled Greek scholars were welcomed in Italy, and
Florence, so long the home of freedom and of art, became the home
of an intellectual revival. The poetry of Homer, the drama of Sopho-
cles, the philosophy of Aristotle and of Plato woke again to life beneath
the shadow of the mighty dome with which Brunelleschi had just
crowned the City by the Arno. All the restless energy which Florence
had so long thrown into the cause of liberty she flung, now ' that her
liberty was reft from her, into the cause of letters. The galleys of her
merchants brought back manuscripts from the East as the most precious
portion of their freight. In the palaces of her nobles fragments of
classic sculpture ranged themselves beneath the frescoes of Ghirlandajo.
The recovery of a treatise of Cicero's or a tract of Sailust's from the
dust of a monastic library was welcomed by the group of statesmen
and artists who gathered in the Rucellai gardens with a thrill of
enthusiasm. Foreign scholars soon flocked over the Alps to learn
Greek, the key of the new knowledge, from the Florentine teachers.
Grocyn, a fellow of New College, was perhaps the first Englishman
who studied under the Greek exile, Chalcondylas ; and the Greek
lectures which he delivered in Oxford on his return mark the opening
of a new period in our history. Physical as well as literary activity
awoke with the re-discovery of the teachers of Greece, and the con-
tinuous progress of English science may be dated from the day when
Linacre, another Oxford student, returned from the lectures of the
Florentine Politian to revive the older tradition of medicine by his
translation of Galen.

But from the first it was manifest that the revival of letters would take
a tone in England very different from the tone it had taken in Italy, a
tone less literary, less largely human, but more moral, more religious,
more practical in its bearings both upon society and politics. The
awakening of a rational Christianity, whether in England or in the
Teutonic world at large, began with the Italian studies of John Colet ;
and the vigour and earnestness of Colet were the best proof of the
strength with which the new movement was to affect English re-
ligion. He came back to Oxford utterly untouched by the Platonic
mysticism or the semi-serious infidelity which characterized the group
of scholars round Lorenzo the Magnificent. He was hardly more
influenced by their literary enthusiasm. The knowledge of Greek
seems to have had one almost exclusive end for him, and this was
a religious end. Greek was the key by which he could unlock the
Gospels and the New Testament, and in these he thought that he could
find a new religious standing-ground. It was this resolve of Colet to
fling aside the traditional dogmas of his day and to discover a rational

VI.J

and p

stamp

a vivi(

such J

Script

of faitl

strong

Catho]

the Mi

pose fe

gramm

"p by 1

the Scl

simple

Apostle

patienc

coarser

before t

indicati

metal-w

saint so

the - she

petulant

for his a

earnestn

pathy wi

burst oul

Oxford.

one insp

out of h]

severity

he prese

frank sin

outbursts

scholars

foremost

" Greec

hearing a

the glory

followed 1:

industry,

accumulat

reading he

foundness

though he

[chap.

' Italy,
e very

ik into
,ly, and
e home
Sopho-
aeneath
ad just
'lorence
;hat her
's cf her
precious
nents of
•landajo.
Tom ihe
:atesmen
thrill of
to learn
teachers,
glishman
le Greek
; opening
f activity
the con-
lay when
es of the
le by his

vi.J

THE NEW MONARCHY.

305

and practical religion in the Gospels themselves, which gave its peculiar
stamp to the theology of the Renascence. His faith stood simply on
a vivid realization of the person of Christ. In the prominence which
such a view gave to the moral life, in his free criti. ism of the earlier
Scriptures, in his tendency to simple forms of doctrine and confessions
of faith, Colet struck the key-note of a mode of religious thought as
strongly in contrast with that of the later Reformation as with that of
Catholicism itself. The allegorical .md mystical theology on which
the Middle Ages had spent their intellectual vigour to such little pur-
pose fell at one blow before his rejection of all but the historical and
grammatic.il sense of the Biblical text. The great fabric of belief built
up by the mediaeval doctors seemed to him simply " the corruptions of
the Schoolmen." In the life and sayings of its P'ounder he founr' a
simple and rational Christianity, whose fittest expression was the
Apostles' creed. "About the rest," he said with characteristic im-
patience, " let divines dispute as they will." Of his attitude towards the
coarser aspects of the current religion his behaviour at a later time
before the famous shrine of St. Thomas at Canterbury gives us ,1 rough
indication. As the blaze of its jewels, its ' ostly sculptures, its elaborate
metal-work burst on Colet's view, he suggested with bitter irony that a
saint so lavish to the poor in his lifetime woo'd certainly prefer that
the; • should possess the wealth heaped round him since his death. With
petulant disgust he rejected the rags of the martyr which were offered
for his adoration, and the shoe which was offered for his kiss. The
earnestness, the religious zeal, the very impatience and want of sym-
pathy with the pa t which we see in every word and act of the man,
burst out in the lectures on St. Paul's Epistles which he delivered at
Oxford. Even to the most critical among his hearers he seemed " like
one inspired, raised in voice, eye, his whole com Lenance and mien,
out of himself." Severe as was the outer life of the new teacher, a
severity marked by his plain black robe and the frugal table wMch
he preserved amidst his later dignities, his lively conversation, his
frank simplicity, the purity and nobleness of his life, even the keen
outbursts of his troublesome temper, endeared him to a group of
scholars among whom Erasmus and Thomas More stood in the
foremost rank.

"Greece has crossed the Alps," cried the exiled Argyropulos on
hearing a translation of Thucydides by the German Reuchlin ; but
the glory, whether of Reuchlin or of the Teutonic scholars who
followed him, was soon eclipsed by that of Erasmus. His enormous
industry, the vast store of classical learning which he gradually
accumulated, Erasmus shared with others of his day. In patristic
reading he may have stood beneath Luther ; in originality and pro-
foundness of thought he was certainly inferior to More. His theology,
though he made a far greater mark on the world by it than even by

Sec. IV.

Thr New
Learning

1509

isao

1497

Erasmus

in
England

!■

' !

IMAGE EVALUATION
TEST TARGET (MT-3)

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HioliQgraphic

Sciences

Corporation

4ifS

23 WBT MAIN STREIT

WIBSTIR.N.Y. MSN

(716) •72-4503

3o6

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

tCHAP.

Sec. IV.

Ths New
Learning

1509

i5ao

1498

ReTWal

of
Leamincr

his scholarship, he derived almost without change from Colet. But
his combination of vast learning with keen observation, of acuteness of
remark with a lively fancy, of genial wit with a perfect good sense — his
union of as sincere a piety and as prcffound a zeal for rational religion
as Colet's w'th a dispassionate fairness towards older faiths, a large
love of secular culture, and a genial freedom and play of mind — this
union was his own, and it was through this that Erasmus embodisd for
the Teutonic peoples the quickening influence of the New Learning
during the long scholar-life which began at Paris and ended amidst
darkness and sorrow at Basel. At the time of Colet's return from Italy
Erasmus was young and comparatively unknown, but the chivalrous
enthusiasm of the new movement breaks out in his letters from Paris,
whither he had wandered as a scholar. " I have given up my whole
soul to Greek learning," he writes, " and as soon as I get any money I
shall buy Greek books — and then I shall buy some clothes." It was
in despair of reaching Italy that the young scholar made his way to
Oxford, as the one place on this side the Alps where he would be en-
abled through the teaching of Grocyn to acquire a knowledge of Greek.
But he had no sooner arrived there than all feeling of regret vanished
away. " I have found in Oxford," he writes, " so much polish and
learning that now I hardly care about going to Italy at all, save for the
sake of having been there. When I listen to my friend Colet it seems
like listening to Plato himself. Who does not wonder at the wide range
of Grocyn's knowledge .'' What can be more searching, deep, and refined
than the judgement of Linacre.? When did Nature mould a temper
more gentle, endearing, and happy than the temper of Thomas More?"
But the new movement was far from being bounded by the walls
of Oxford. The silent influences of time were working, indeed,
steadily for its cause. The printing press was making letters the
common property of all. In the last thirty years of the fifteenth
century ten thousand editions of books and pamphlets are said to have
been published throughout Europe, the most important half of them of
course in Italy ; and all the Latin authors were accessible to every
student before it closed. Almost all the more valuable authors of
Greece were published in the first twenty years of the century which
followed. The profound influence of this burst of the two great classic
literatures upon the world at once made itself felt. " For the first
time," to use the picturesque phrase of M. Taine, " men opened their
eyes and saw." The human mind seemed to gather new energies at
the sight of the vast field which opened before it. It attacked every
province of knowledge, and it transformed all. Experimental science,
the science of philology, the science of politics, the critical investigation
of religious truth, all took th^ir origin from the Renascence — this * New
Birth' of the world. Art, if it lost much in purity and propriety, gained
in scope and in the fearlessness of its love of Nature. Literature, if

VI.]

crushei

models

spirit

£nglan

httle gr

The gre

Chester,

family e

across tl

of Cantc

of the st

lavished

his abilii

friends, i

But it is

drew of 1

The lette

wanderir

stant ins!

friendshi]

noble woi

good mar

offered a s

nothing fi

which th«

quiet cha

round of

thoroughl

moral eqi

were to vj

group of s

his own.

Primate's

"Hadlfo

" I too mif

with Groc]

river to W

beginning

loved himj

brother, a:

offered hin

a pension

to Paris it

When the

Cambridge

CHAP.

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

307

But

ess of

2 — his

;ligion
large

[—this

•sd for

arning

amidst

n Italy

k^alrous

I Paris,
whole

loney I
It was

way to
be en-

• Greek.

anished

ish and

J for the

it seems

ie range

i refined
temper
More?"

he walls
indeed,
ters the
fifteenth
to have
them of
o every
ithors of
•y which
it classic
the first
led their
irgies at
id every
science,
Istigation
* New
/, gained
fature, if

crushed for the moment by the overpowering attraction of the great
models of Greece and Rome, revived with a grandeur of fo'-m, a large
spirit of humanity, such as it had never known since their day. In
£ngland the influence of the new movement extended far beyond the
little group in which it had a few years before seemed concentrated.
The great churchmen became its patrons. Langton, Bishop of Win-
chester, took delight in examining the young scholars of his episcopal
family every evening, and sent all the most promising of them to study
across the Alps. Learning found a yet warmer friend in the Archbishop
of Canterbury. Immersed as Archbishop Warham was in the business
of the state, he was no mere politician. The eulogies which Erasmus
lavished on him while he lived, his praises of the Primate's learning, of
his ability in business, his pleasant humour, his modesty, his fidelity to
friends, may pass for what eulogies of living men are commonly worth.
But it is difficult to doubt the sincerity of the glowing picture which he
drew of him when death had destroyed all interest in mere adulation.
The letters indeed which passed between the great churchman and the
wandering scholar, the quiet, simple-hearted grace which amidst con-
stant instances of munificence preserved the perfect equality of literary
friendship, the enlightened piety to which Erasmus could address the
noble words of his preface to St. Jerome, confirm the judgement of every
good man of Warham's day. In the simplicity of his life the Archbishop
offered a striking contrast to the luxurious nobles of his time. He cared
nothing for the pomp, the sensual pleasures, the hunting and dicing in
which they too commonly indulged. An hour's pleasant reading, a
quiet chat with some learned new-comer, alone broke the endless
round of civil and ecclesiastical business. Few men realized so
thoroughly as Warham the new conception of an intellectual and
moral equality before which the old social distinctions of the world
were to vanish away. His favourite relaxation was to sup among a
group of scholarly visitors, enjoying their fun and retorting with fun of
his own. But the scholar-world found more than supper or fun at the
Primate's board. His purse was ever open to relieve their poverty.
" Had I found such a patron in my youth," Erasmus wrote long after,
" I too might have been counted among the fortunate ones." It was
with Grocyn that Erasmus on a second visit to England rowed up the
river to Warham's board at Lambeth, and in spite of an unpromising
beginning the acquaintance turned out wonderfully well. The Primate
loved him, Erasmus wrote home, as if he were his father or his
brother, and his generosity surpassed that of all his friends. He
offered him a sinecure, and when he declined it he bestowed on him
a pension of a hundred crowns a year. When Erasmus wandered
to Paris it was Warham's invitation which recalled him to England.
When the rest of his patrons left him to starve on the sour beer of
Cambridge it was Warham who sent him fifty angels. " I wish

X 2

Sec. IV.

'I'he New
Learning

1509

1520

A rchbiihoft
Warham

I5IO

-"I

tvf.

T^.^ti

3o8

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

Thb New
Learning

1500

1580

Henry

the
Elffhth

1509

The New
Leamini;

and
Education

1510

there were thirty legions of them," the Primate puns in his good-
humoured way.

Real however as this progress was, the group of scholars who
represented the New Learning in England still remained a little
one through the reign of Henry the Seventh. But a " New
Order," to use their own enthusiastic term, dawned on them with
the accession of his son. Henry the Eighth had hardly completed
his eighteenth year when he mounted the throne, but the beauty
of his person, his vigour and skill in arms, seemed matched by a
frank and generous temper and a nobleness of political aims. He
gave promise of a more popular system of government by checking at
once the extortion which had been practised under colour of enforcing
forgotten laws, and by bringing his father's financial ministers, Empson
and Dudley, to trial on a charge of treason. No accession ever
excited higher expectations among a people than that of Henry the
Eighth. Pole, his bitterest enemy, confessed at a later time, that the
King was of a temper at the beginning of his reign " from which all
excellent things might have been hoped." Already in stature and
strength a King among his fellows, taller than any, bigger than any, a
mighty wrestler, a mighty hunter, an archer of the best, a knight who
bore down rider after rider in the tourney, the young monarch com-
bined with his bodily lordliness a largeness and versatility of mind
which was to be the special characteristic of the age that had begun.
His sympathies were known to be heartily with the New Learning ;
for Henry was not only himself a fair scholar, but even in boyhood
had roused by his wit and attainments the wonder of Erasmus. The
great scholar hurried back to England to pour out his exultation in
the " Praise of Folly," a song of triumph over the old world of ignor-
ance and bigotry which was to vanish away before the light and know-
ledge of the new reign. Folly, in his amusing little book, mounts a
pulpit in cap and bells and pelts with her satire the absurdities of the
world around her, the superstition of the monk, the pedantry of the
grammarian, the dogmatism of the doctors of the schools, the selfishness
and tyranny of kings.

The irony of Erasmus was backed by the earnest effort of Colet.
Four years before he had been called from Oxford to the Deanery of
St. Paul's, when he became the great preacher of his day, the prede-
cessor of Latimer in his simplicity, his directness, and his force. He
seized the opportunity to commence the work of educational reform by
the foundation of his own Grammar School, beside St. Paul's. The
bent of its fvunder's mind was shown by the image of the Child Jesus
over the master's chair, with the words "Hear ye Him "graven beneath
it. " Lift up your little white hands for me," wrote the Dean to his
scholars, ir words which show the tenderness that lay beneath the stern
outer seeming of the man, — " for me which prayeth for you to God."

:hap.

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

309

food-

who

little
■ New

with
pleted
)eauty

by a
. He
ling at
brcing
mpson
n ever
iry the
liat the
lich all
re and

any, a
;bt who
h com-
>f mind

begun,
arning ;
loyhood
The

tion in

ff ignor-
know-

lounts a

IS of the
of the

Ifishness

All the educational designs of the reformers were carried out in the new
foundation. The old methods of instruction were superseded by fresh
grammars composed by Erasmus and other scholars for its use. Lilly,
an Oxford student who had studied Greek in the East, was placed at
its head. The injunctions of the founder aimed at the union of rational
religion with sound learning, at the exclusion of the scholastic logic,
and at the steady diffusion of the two classical literatures. The more
bigoted of the clergy were quick to take alarm. " No wonder," More
wrote to the Dean, "your school raises a storm, for it is like the wooden
horse in which a»*med Greeks were hidden for the ruin of barbarous
Troy." But the cry of alarm passed helplessly away. Not only did the
study of Greek creep gradually into the schools which existed, but the
example of Colet was followed by a crowd of imitators. More gram-
mar schools, it has been said, were founded in the latter years of
Henry than in the *hree centuries before. The impulse grew only
stronger as the direct influence of the New Learning passed away.
The grammar schools of Edward the Sixth and of Elizabeth, in a word
the system of middle-class education which by the close of the century
had changed the very face of England, were amongst the results of
Colet's foundation of St. Paul's. But the '* armed Greeks " of Move's
apologue found a yet wider field in the reform of the higher education
of the country. On the Universities the influence of the New Learning
was like a passing from death to life. Erasmus gives us a picture of
what happened at Cambridge, where he was himself for a time a
teacher of Greek. " Scarcely thirty years ago nothing was taught here
but the Parva Logicalia^ Alexander, antiquated exercises from
Aristotle, and the Quastiones of Scotus. As time went on better studies
were added, mathematics, a new, or at any rate a renovated, Aristotle,
and a knowledge of Greek literature. What has been the result ? The
University is now so flourishing that it can compete with the best
universities of the age." Latimer and Croke returned from Italy
and carried on the work of Erasmus at Cambridge, where Fisher,
Bishop of Rochester, himself one of the foremost scholars of the new
movement, lent it his powerful support. At Oxford the Revival met
with a fiercer opposition. The contest took the form of boyish frays,
in which the young partisans and opponents of the New Learning
took sides as Greeks and Trojans. The King himself had to summon
one of its fiercest enemies to Woodstock, and to impose silence on
the tirades which were delivered from the University pulpit. The
preacher .alleged that he was carried away by the Spirit. "Yes,"
retorted the King, " by the spirit, not of wisdom, but of folly." But
even at Oxford the contest was soon at an end. Fox, Bishop of
Winchester, established the first Greek lecture there in his new
college of Corpus Christi, and a Professorship of Greek was at a
later time established by the Crown. " The students," wrote an eye-

Sec. IV.

Thr New
i.rarnino

1509

lAao

M ■» it:' V

I516

1520

*j'' I

3IO

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

The Nrw
Learning

1509

15flO

The New

Leamlnc

lu&d the

Church

1512

Henry

and
France

witness, " rush to Greek letters, they endure watching, fasting, toil, and
hunger in the pursuit of them." The work was crowned at last by
the munificent foundation of Cardinal College, to share in whose
teaching Wolsey invited the most eminei < of the living scholars of
Europe, and for whose library he promised to obtain copies of all the
manuscripts in the Vatican.

From the reform of education the New Learning pressed on to the
reform of the Church. Warham still flung around the movement his
steady protection, and it was by his commission that Colet was en-
abled to address the Convocation of the Clergy in words which set
before them with unsparing severity the religious ideal of the New
Learning. "Would that for once," burst forth the fiery preacher,
" you would remember your name and profession and take thought for
the reformation of the Church ! Never was it more necessary, and
never did the state of the Church need more vigorous endeavours."
" We are troubled with heretics," he went on, " but no hej-esy of theirs
is so fatal to us and to the people at large as the vicious and depraved
lives of the clergy. That is the worst heresy of all." It was the
reform of the bishops that must precede that of the clergy, the reform
of the clergy that would lead to a general revival of religion in the
people at large. The accumulation of benefices, the luxury and
worldliness of the priesthood, must be abandoned. The prelat 2s ought
to be busy preachers, to forsake the Court and labour in their own
dioceses. Care should be taken for the ordmation and promotion of
worthier ministers, residence should be enforced, the low standard of
clerical morality should be raised. It is plain that the men of the
New Learning looked forward, not to a reform of doctrine, but to a
reform of life, not to a revolution which should sweep away the older
superstitions which they despised, but to a regeneration of spiritual
feeling before which they would inevitably vanish. Colet was soon
charged with heresy by the Bishop of London. Warham however
protected him, and Henry, to whom the Dean was denounced, bade
him go boldly on. " Let every man have his own doctor," said the
young King, after a long interview, " and let every man favour his own,
but this man is the doctor for me."

But for the success of the new reform, a reform which could only be
wrought out by the tranquil spread of knowledge and the gradual en-
lightenment of the human conscience, the one thing needful was
peace ; and the young King to whom the scholar-group looked
was already longing for war. Long as peace had been established
between the two countries, the desig^ns of England upon the French
crown had never been really waived, and Henry's pride dwelt on
the older claims of England to Normandy and Guienne. Edward
the Fourth and Henry the Seventh had each clung to a system
of peace, only broken by the vain efforts to save Britanny from

FrencI
and p(
tion o
he intr
Europe
balance
the un
Ferdinz
his dau
Maximi
Seventh
tary ene
his elde
This ma
by the
enabled
howeverj
powers
Eighth
marriage
amidst
whole en
which th
the old s
efforts of
Italy. T]
mastery m
once abo\
remained
of Milan ;
in the leai
oppose he
was calle<
from the
as he was
and Juliu
Eighth. «
chased be
only used 1
the view
Navarre.
English as
need. He
of the Fr<
received fro

:hap.

, and
St by
krhose
irs of
11 the

to the

nt his

as en-

ch set

; New

lacher,

jht for

y, and

vours."

f theirs

praved

^as the

reform
in the

ry and

s ought
ir own
tion of

Idard of

of the

lut to a

le older

•iritual

Ls soon

lowever

I, bade

lid the

|is own,

)nly be
lual en-
jul was
[looked
)Ushed
'rcnch
^elt on
;dward
system
from

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

French invasion. But the growth of the French monarchy m extent
and power through the policy of Lewis the Eleventh, his extinc-
tion of the great feudatories, and the administrative centralization
he introduced, raised his kingdom to a height far above that of its
European rivals. The power of France, in fact, was only counter-
balanced by that of Spain, which had become a great state through
the union of Castile and Aragon, and where the cool and wary
Ferdinand of Aragon was building up a vast power by the marriage of
his daughter and heiress to the Archduke Philip, son of the Emperor
Maximilian. Too weak to meet France single-handed, Henry the
Seventh saw in an alliance with Spain a security against his " heredi-
tary enemy," and this alliance had been cemented by the marriage of
his eldest son, Arthur, with Ferdinand's daughter, Catharine of Aragon.
This match was broken by the death of the young bridegroom ; but
by the efforts of Spain a Papal dispensation was procured which
enabled Catharine to wed the brother of her late husband. Henry,
however, anxious to preserve a balanced position between the battling
powers of France and Spain, opposed the union ; but Henry the
Eighth had no sooner succeeded his father on the throne than the
marriage was carried out. Throughout the first years of his reign,
amidst the tournaments and revelry which seemed to absorb his
whole energies, Henry was in fact keenly watching the opening
which the ambition of France began to afford for a renewal of
the old struggle. Under the successors of Lewis the Eleventh the
efforts of the French monarchy had been directed to the conquest of
Italy. The passage of the Alps by Charles the Eighth and the
mastery which he won over Italy at a single blow lifted France at
once above the states around her. Twice repulsed from Naples, she
remained under the successor of Charles, Lewis the Twelfth, mistress
of Milan and of the bulk of Northern Italy ; and the ruin of Venice
in the league of Cambray crushed the last Italian state which could
oppose her designs on the whole peninsula. A Holy League, as ii
was called from the accession to it of the Pope, to drive France
from the Milanese was formed by the efforts of Ferdinand, aided
as he was by the kinship of the Emperor, the support of Venice
and Julius the Second, and the warlike temper of Henry the
Eighth. " The barbarians," to use the phrase of Julius " were
chased beyond the Alps ; " but Ferdinand's unscrupulous adroitness
only used the English force, which had landed at Fontarabia with
the view of attacking Guienne, to cover his own conquest of
Navarre. The troop mutinied and sailed home ; men scoffed at the
English as useless for war. Henry's spirit, however, rose with the
need. He landed in person in the north of France, and a sudden rout
of the French cavalry in an engagement near Guinegate, which
received from his bloodless character the name of the Battle of the

Sec. IV.

Tub New
Learnino

1509

isao

i 1

■1

1501

1509

I5II

1514

} A '

312

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAP.

Sec. IV.

Thi New

Lkarning

1509

i5ao

The

Peace

and the

New
Learning

Spurs, gave him the fortresses of Tdrouanne and Tournay. The young
conqueror was eagerly pressing on to the recovery of his '*' heritage of
France," when he found himself suddenly left alone by the desertion of
Ferdinand ar 1 the dissolution of the league. Henry had indeed gained
much. The might of France was broken. The Papacy was restored
to freedom. Kngland had again figured as a great power in Euiope.
But the millions left by his father were exhausted, his sub] - v ' had
been drained by repeated subsidies, and, furious as he was at the
treachery of his Spanish ally, Henry was driven to concluc' j jl peace.
To the hopes of the New Learning this sudden outbreak of the spirit
of war, this change of the monarch from whom they had looked for a
" new order " into a vulgar conqueror, proved a bitter disappointment.
Colet thundered from the pulpit of St. Paul's that " an unjust peace is
better than the justest war," and protested that "when men out of
hatred and ambition fight with and destroy one another, they fight under
the banner, not of Christ, but of the Devil." Erasmus quitted Cambridge
with a bitter satire against the " madness " around him. "It is the
people," he said, in words which must have startled his age, — "it is the
people who build cities, while the madness of princes destroys them,"
The sovereigns of his time appeared to him like ravenous birds pounc-
ing with beak and claw on the hard-won wealth and knowledge of
mankind. " Kings who are scarcely men," he exclaimed in bitter
irony, " are called * divine ; ' they are * invincible ' though they fly from
every bat^'.*,-field ; ' serene ' though they turn the world upside down in
a storm of war ; ' illustrious' though they grovel in ignorance of all that
is noble ; * Catholic ' though they follow anything rather than Christ.
Of all birds the Eagle alone has seemed to wise men the type of royalty,
a bird neither beautiful nor musical nor good fc«r food, but murderous,
greedy, hateful to all, the curse of all, and with its great powers of doing
harm only surpassed by its desire to do it." It was the first time in
modern history that religion had formally dissociated itself from the
ambition of princes and the horrors of war, or that the new spirit of
criticism had ventured not only to question but to deny what had till
then seemed the primary truths of political order. We shall soon see
to what further length the new speculations -ere pushed by a greater
thinker, but for the moment the indignation of the New Learning was
diverted to more practical ends by the sudden peace. However he had
disappointed its hopes, Henry still remained its friend. Through all the
changes of his terrible career his home was a home of letters. His boy,
Edward the Sixth, was a fair scholar in both the classical languages.
His daughter Mary wrote good Latin letters. Elizabeth began every
day with an hour's reading in the Greek Testament, the tragedies of
Sophocles, or the orations of Demosthenes. The ladies of the court
caught the royal fashion, and were found poring over the pages of Plato.
Widely as Henry's ministers differed from e^ch other, they aU agreed

VJ.]

in shai
scholar
Tenth,
give to
turbulei
declarec
Court, ii
favour 1
no war
ministry
struggles
peace,
to Engh
produce
protect i 01
Jerome 1
great sch
tion to th
tection in
to the pat
words so
sympathiz
the spirit
" Synods
no means
unless trui
more dogr
heresies,
when the \
creed we h
of reason
soon to flo
Pope Pius
principles
greater clei
future Ref(
iiad been t
wholly due
English scl
tradition,
secured uni
tion was ba
the text. ]
Oxford lect
of the Churc

CHAP.

young
age of
tion of
gained
stored
uiope.
V ■ had
at the
3eace.
B spirit
i for a
itment.
eace is
out of
t under
abridge
; is the
it is the
them."
, pounc-
edge of
1 bitter
fly from
down in
all that
Christ,
royalty,
-derous,
f doing
time in
om the
pirit of
had till
Don see
greater
ing was
he had
I all the
is boy,
[guages.
every
fdies of
,e court
.f Plato,
agreed

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

313

in sharing and fostering the culture around them. The panic of the
scholar-group therefore soon passed away. The election of Leo the
Tenth, the fellow-student of Linacre, the friend of Erasmus, seemed tj
give to the New Learning control of Christendom. The age of the
turbulent, ambitious Julius was thought to be over, and the new Pope-
declared for a universal peace. " Leo," wrote an English agent at his
Court, in words to which after-history lent a strange meaning, " would
favour literature and the arts, busy himself in building, and enter into
no war save through actual compulsion." England, under the new
ministry of Wolsey, withdrew from any active interference in the
struggles of the Continent, and seemed as resolute as Leo himself for
peace. Colet toiled on with his eaucational efforts ; Erasmus forwarded
to England the works which English liberality was enabling him to
produce abroad. Warham extended to him as generous an aid as the
protection he had afforded to Colet. His edition of the works of St.
Jerome had been begun under Warhan's encouragement during the
great scholar's residence at Cambridge, and it appeared with a dedica-
tion to the Archbishop on its title-page. That Erasmus could find pro-
tection in Warham's name for a work which boldly recalled Christendom
to the path of sound Biblical criticism, that he could address him in
words so outspoken as those of his preface, shows how fully the Primate
sympathized with the highest efforts of the Nev/ Learning. Nowhere had
the spirit of inquiry so firmly set itself against the claims of authority.
" Synods and decrees, and even councils," wrote Erasmus, " are by
no means in my judgement the fittest modes of repressing error,
unless truth depend simply on authority. But on the contrary, the
more dogmas there are, the more fruitful is the ground in producing
heresies. Never was the Christian faith purer or more undefiled than
when the world was content with a single creed, and that the shortest
creed we have." It is touching even now to listen to such an appeal
of reason and of culture against the tide of dogmatism which was
soon to flood Christendom with Augsburg Confessions and Creeds of
Pope Pius and Westminster Catechisms and Thirty-nine Articles. The
principles which Erasmus urged in his "Jerome" were urged with far
greater clearness and force in a work which laid the foundation of the
future Reformation, the edition of the Greek Testament on which he
had been engaged at Cambridge, and whose production was almost
wholly due to the encouragement and assistance he received from
English scholars. In itself the book was a bold defiance of theological
tradition. It set aside the Latin version of the Vulgate, which Had
secured universal acceptance in the Church. Its method of interpreta-
tion was based, not on received dogmas, but on the literal meaning of
the text. Its real end was the end at which Colet had aimed in his
Oxford lectures. Erasmus desired to set Christ himself in the place
of the Church, to recall men from the teachings of Christian theologians

.Skc. IV.
The Nkw

l.F\RNINr.

150Q

isao

The Jerome
of hUanHin

Neiv Testa-
ment 0/
Erasmus

i^S'll

314

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAP.

Sec. IV.
The Nkw

LlTARNINC

1509

i5ao

1516

Thomas
More

to the teachings of the Founder of Christianity. The whole value of
the Gospels to him lay in the vividness with which they brought hoiuc
to their readers the personal impression of Christ himself. " Were we
to have seen him with our own eyes, we should not have so intimate
a knowledge as they give us of Christ, speaking, healing, dying, rising
again, as it were in our very presence." All the superstitions of
mediaeval worship faded away in the light of this personal worship of
Christ. " If the footprints of Christ are shown us in any place, we
kneel down and adore them. Why do we not rather venerate the
living and breathing picture of him in these books ? We deck statues
of wood and stone with gold and gems for the love of Christ, "^'"et they
only profess to represent to us the outer form of his body, while these
books present us with a living picture of his holy mind." In the same
way the actual teaching of Christ was made to supersede the mysterious
dogmas of the older ecclesiastical teaching. " As though Christ taught
such subtleties," burst out Erasmus : " subtleties that can scarcely be
understood even by a few theologians — or as though the strength of
the Christian religion consisted in man's ignorance of it ! It may be
the safer course," he goes on, with characteristic irony, " to conceal the
state-mysteries of kings, but Christ desired his mysteries to be spread
abroad as openly as was possible." In the diffusion, in the universal
knowledge of the teaching of Christ the foundation of a reformed Chris-
tianity had still, he urged, to be laid. With the tacit approval of the
Primate of a Church which from the time of Wyclif had held the trans-
lation and reading of the Bible in the common tongue to be heresy and
a crime punishable with the fire, Erasmus boldly avowed his wish for
a Bible open and intelligible to all. " I wish that even the weakest
woman might read the Gospels and ihe Epistles of St. Paul. I wish
that they were translated into all languages, so as to be read and
understood not only by Scots and Irishmen, but even by Saracens
and Turks. But the first step to their being read is to make them in-
telligible to the reader. I long for the day when the husbandman
shall sing portions of them to himself as he follows the plough, when
the weaver shall hum them to the tune of his shuttle, when the
traveller shall while away with their stories the weariness of his
journey." The New Testament of Erasmus became the topic of the
day ; the Court, the Universities, every household to which the New
Learning had penetrated, read, and discussed it. But bold as its
language may have seemed, Warham not only expressed his approba-
tio'n, but lent the work — as he wrote to its author — " to bishop after
bishop." The most influential of his suffragans. Bishop Fo.x of Win-
chester, declared that the mere version was worth ten commentaries :
one of the most learned, Fisher of Rochester, entertained Erasmus at
his house.
Daring and full of promise as were these efforts of the New Learning

[CHAP.

alue of
t home
ere we
\timate
, rising
ions of
rship of
ace, we
ate the

statues
''et they
le these
le same
sterious
t taught
rcely ue
ength of

may be
iceal the
e spread
miversal
id Chris-
al of the
le trans-
resy and

wish for

weakest

I wish

ad and

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

315

In the direction of educational and religious reform, its political and
social speculations took a far wider range in the " Utopia" of Thomas
More. Even in the household of Cardinal Morton, where he had
spent his childhood, More's precocious ability had raised the highest
hopes. " Whoever may live to see it," the grey-haired statesman used
to say, " this boy now waiting at table will turn out a marvellous man."
We have seen the spell which his wonderful learning and the sweet-
ness of his temper threw over Colet and Erasmus at Oxford, and
young as he was, More no sooner quitted the University than he was
known throughout Europe as one of the foremost figures in the new
movement. The keen, irregular face, the grey restless eye, the thin
mobile lips, the tumbled brown hair, the careless gait and dress, as
they remain stamped on the canvas of Holbein, picture the inner soul
of the man, his vivacity, his restless, all-devouring intellect, his keen
and even reckless wit, the kindly, half-sad humour that drew its strange
veil of laughter and tears over the deep, tender reverence of the soul
within. In a higher, because in a sweeter and more loveable form than
Colet, More is the representative of the religious tendency of the New
Learning in England. The young law-student who laughed at the
superstition and asceticism of the monks of his day wore a hair shirt
next his skin, and schooled himself by penances for the cell he desired
among the Carthusians. It was characteristic of the man that among
all the gay, profligate scholars of the Italian Renascence he chose as
the object of his admiration the disciple of Savonarola, Pico di
Mirandola. Free-thinker as the bigots who listened to his daring
speculations termed him, his eye would brighten and his tongue falter
as he spoke with friv ids of heaven and the after-life. When he took
office, it v/as with the open stipulation " first to look to God, and after
God to the King." But in his outer bearing there was nothing of the
monk or recluse. The brightness and freedom of the New Learning
seemed incarnate in the young scholar, with his gay talk, his win-
someness of manner, his reckless epigrams, his passionate love of
music, his omnivorous reading, his paradoxical speculations, his gibes
at monks, his schoolboy fervour of liberty. But events were soon to
prove that beneath this sunny nature lay a stern inflexibility of con-
scientious resolve. The Florentine scholars who penned declamations
against tyrants had covered with their flatteries the tyranny of the
house of Medici. More no sooner entered Parliament than his ready
argument and keen sense of justice led to the rejection of the Royal
demand for a heavy subsidy. " A beardless boy," said the courtiers, —
and More was only twenty-six, — ''has disappointed the King's pur-
pose ; " and during the rest of Henry the Seventh's reign the young
lawyer found it prudent to withdraw from public life. But the with-
drawal had little effect on his buoyant activity. He rose at once
into repute at the bar. He wrote his " Life of Edward the Fifth,"

Skc. IV.

Thk New

Lkaknino

1509

isao

i ■It'

1 504

lf;

3l6

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

fCIIAP.

Sue. IV.
Thr Nkw

I^RARNINn

1509

isao

The
Utopia

1516

the first work in which what wc may call modern English prose
appears written with purity and clearness of style and a freedom
cither from antiquated forms of expression or classical pedantry.
His ascetic dreams were replaced by the aflfections of home. It'
is when we get a glimpse of him in his house at Chelsea that we
understand the endearing epithets which Erasmus always lavishes
upon More. The delight of the young husband was to train the
girl he had chosen for his wife in his own taste for letters and
for music. The reserve which the age cxiicted from parents was
thrown to the winds in More's intercourse with his children. He
loved teaching them, and lured them to their deeper studies by the
coins and curiosities he had gathered in his cabinet. He was as fond
of their pets and their games as his children themselves, and would
take grave scholars and statesmen into the garden to see his girls'
rabbit-hutches or to watch the gambols of their favourite monkey.
" I have given you kisses enough," he wrote to his little ones in merry
verse when far away on political business, " but stripes hardly ever."
The accession of Henry the Eighth dragged him back into the politi-
cal current. It was at his house that Erasmus penned the " Praise
of Folly," and the work, in its Latin title, " Moriae Encomium,"
embodied in playful fun his love of the extravagant humour of More.
More " tried as hard to keep out of Court," says his descendant, " as
most men try to get into it." When the charm of his conversation
gave so much pleasure to the young sovereign, " that he could not
once in a month get leave to go home to his wife or children, whose
company he much desired, ... he began thereupon to dissemble
his nature, and so, little by little, from his former mirth to dissemble
himself." More shared to the full the disappointment of his friends
at the sudden outbreak of Henry's warlike temper, but the peace again
drew him to Henry's side, and he was soon in the King's confidence
both as a counsellor and as a diplomatist.

It was on one of his diplomatic missions that More describes
himself as hearing news of the Kingdom of " Nowhere." " On a cer-
tain day when I had heard mass in Our Lady' s Church, which is
the fairest, the most gorgeous and curious church of building in all the
city of Antwerp, and also most frequented of people, and service
being over 1 was ready to go home to my lodgings, I chanced to espy
my friend Peter Gilles talking with a certain stranger, a man well
stricken in age, with a black sun-burnt face, a large beard, and a cloke
cast trimly about his shoulders, whom by his favour and apparell
forthwith I judged to be a mariner." The sailor turned out to have
been a companion of Amerigo Vespucci in those voyages to the New
World " that be now in print and abroad in every man's hand," and
on More's invitation he accompanied him to his house,and "there in my
garden upon a bench covered with green turves we sate down, talking

Vf.J

togcth
by Ve
line, ai
the sto
derful
yet the
reform
More
forms o
and pol
teaching
politica
in whic
ends of
very ins
wanders
the grea
problem:
to have
prove th<
shown ir
the pure
of the d|
most imp
pated by
treatment
current of
him "not
economic
by procesi
thing furtl
even by pi
that those
least rewai
"The rich
secure to t
to their ow
labour of tl
devices in
was the wr
life so wre
cry of pity
Jnanufactui
had been
Christendoi

[CHAP.

prose
eedom
iantry.
le. It •
lat we
iivishes
lin the
rs and
kts was
n. He

by the
as fond
I would
is girls'
nonkey.
n merry
[y ever."
le politi-
" Praise
omium,"
)f More,
ant, " as
ersation
)uld not

, whose
issemble
issemble

friends

e again
fidence

lescribes
In a cer-
/hich is
all the
service
[to espy
Ian well
I a cloke
ipparell
Ito have
le New
Id," and
le in my
1 talking

VI.]

TIIK NEW MONAkClIY.

317

together "of the man's marvellous adventures, his desertion in America
by Vespucci, his wanderings over the country under the equinoctial
line, and at last of his stay in the Kingdom of " Nowhere." It was
the story of" Nowhere,'.' or Utopia, which More embodied in the won-
derful book which reveals to us the heart of the New Learning. As
yet the movement had been one of scholars and divines. Its plans of
reform had been almost exclusively intellectual and religious. But in
More the same free play of thought which had shaken off the old
forms of education and faith turned to question the old forms of society
and politics. From a world where fifteen hundred years of Christian
teaching had produced social injustice, religious intolerance, and
political tyranny, the humourist philosopher turned to a "Nowhere"
in which the mere efforts of natural human virtue realized those
ends of security, equality, brotherhood, and freedom for which the
very institution of society seemed to have been framed. It is as he
wanders through this dreamland of the new reason that More touches
the great problems which were fast opening before the modern world,
problems of labour, of crime, of conscience, of government. Merely
to have seen and to have examined questions such as these would
prove the keenness of his intellect, but its far-reaching originality is
shown in the solutions which he proposes. Amidst much that is
the pure play of an exuberant fancy, much that is mere recollection
of the dreams of bygone dreamers, we find again and again the
most important social and political discoveries of later times antici-
pated by the genius of Thomas More. In some points, such as his
treatment of the question of Labour, he still remains far in advance of
current opinion. The whole system of society around him seemed to
him "nothing but a conspiracy of the rich against the poor." Its
economic legislation was simply the carrying out of such a conspiracy
by process of law. " The rich are ever striving to pare away some-
thing further from the daily wages of the poor by private fraud and
even by public law, so that the wrong already existing (for it is a wrong
that those from whom the State derives most benefit should receive
least reward) is made yet greater by means of the law of the State."
" The rich devise every means by which they may in the first place
secure to themselves what they have amassed by wrong, and then take
to their own use and profit at the lowest possible price the work and
labour of the poor. And so soon as the rich decide on adopting these
devices in the name of the public, then they become law." The result
was the wretched existence to which the labour-class was doomed, " a
life so wretched that even a beast's life seems enviable." No such
cry of pity for the poor, of protest against the system of agrarian and
manufacturing tyranny which found its expression in the Statute-book,
had been heard since the days of Piers Ploughman. But from
Christendom More turns with a smile to ** Nowhere." In " Nowhere "

Skc. IV.

TiiK Nkw
Lkahninu

150»

isao

3i8

HISfORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

The New

Leakninu

1509

i5ao

the aim of legislation is to secure the welfare, social, industrial, intel-
lectual, religious, of the community at large, and of the labour-class
as the true basis of a well-ordered commonwealth. The end of its
labour-laws was simply the welfare of the labourer. Goods werfe
possessed indeed in common, but work was compulsory with all. The
period of toil was shortened to the nine hours demanded by modern
artizans, with a view to the intellectual improvement of the worker.
"In the institution of the weal public this end is only and chiefly
pretended and minded that what time may possibly be spared
from the necessary occupations and affairs of the commonwealth, all
that the citizens should withdraw from bodily service to the free
liberty of the mind and garnishing of the same. For herein they
conceive the felicity of this life to consist." A public system of
education enabled the Utopians to avail themselves of their leisure.
While in England half of the population could read no English,
every child was well taught in " Nowhere." The physical aspects of
society were cared for as attentively as its moral. The houses of
Utopia " in the beginning were very low and like homely cottages or
poor shepherd huts made at all adventures of every rude piece of timber
that came first to hand, with mud walls and ridged roofs thatched
over with straw." The picture was really that of the common
English town of More's day, the home of squalor and pestilence.
In Utopia however they had at last come to realize the connexion
between public morality and the health which springs from light,
air, comfort, and cleanliness. " The streets were twenty feet broad ;
the houses backed by spacious gardens, and curiously builded after
a gorgeous and gallant sort, with their stories one after another. The
outsides of the walls be made either of hard flint, or of plaster, or else
of brick ; and the inner sides be well strengthened by timber work.
The roofs be plain and flat, covered over with plaster so tempered that
no fire can hurt or perish it, and withstanding the violence of the
weather better than any lead. They keep the wind out of their
windows with glass, for it is there much used, and sometimes also
with fine linen cloth dipped in oil or amber, and that for two commo-
dities, for by this means more light cometh in and the wind is better
kept out."

The same foresight which appears in More's treatment of the ques-
tions of Labour and the Public Health is yet more apparent in his
treatment of the question of Crime. He was the first to suggest that
punishment was less effective in suppressing it than prevention. " If
you allow your people to be badly taught, their morals to be corrupted
from childhood, and then when they are men punish them for the very
crimes to which they have been trained in childhood — what is this but
to make thieves, and then to punish them?" He was the .first to
I plead for proportion between the punishment and the crime, and to

CHAP.

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

319

intel-
-class
of its
werfc
The
lodern
worker,
chiefly
spared
,1th, all
le free
n they
tern of
leisure.
:nglish,
>ects of
uses of
iges or
f timber
hatched
ommon
itilence.

P' '

;d
r.

:ommo-
better

le ques-
in his
lest that
In. "If
trrupted
•he very
Ithis but
first to
and to

point o;it the folly of the cruel penalties of his day. '' Simple theft is
not so great an offence as to be punished with death." If a thief and
a murderer are sure of the same penalty, More shows that the law is
simply tempting the thief to secure his theft by murder. " While we
go about to make thieves afraid, we are really provoking tl\em to kill
good men." The end of all punishment he declares to be reforma-
tion, " nothing else but the destruction of vice and the saving of men."
He advises " so using and ordering criminals that they cannot choose
but be good ; and what harm soever they did before, the residue of
their lives to make amends for the same." Above all, he urges tha t to be
remedial punishment must be wrought out by labour and hope, so that
" none is hopeless or in despair to recover again his former state of
freedom by giving good tokens and likelihood of himself that he will
ever after that live a true and honest man." It is not too much to say
that in the great principles More lays down he anticipated every one of
the improvements in our criminal system which have distinguished the
last hundred years. His treatment of the religious question v^as even
more in advance of his age. If the houses of Utopia were strangely
in contrast with the halls of England, where the bones from every
dinner lay rotting in the dirty straw which strewed the floor, where
the smoke curled about the rafters, and the wind whistled through
the unglazed windows ; if its penal legislation had little likeness to the
gallows which stood out so frequently against our English sky ; the
religion of " Nowhere " was in yet stronger conflict with the faith of
Christendom. It rested simply on nature and reason. It held that
God's design was the happiness of man, and that the ascetic rejection
of human delights, save for the common good, was thanklessness to
the Giver. Christianity, indeed, had already reached Utopia, but it
had few priests ; religion found its centre rather in the family than in
the congregation : and each household confessed its faults to its own
natural head. A yet stranger characteristic was seen in the peaceable
way in which it lived side by side with the older religions. More than
a century before William of Orange, More discerned and proclaimed
the great principle of religious toleration. In " Nowhere" it was lawful
to every man to be of what religion he would. Even the disbelievers
in a Divine Being or in the immortality of man, who by a single
exception to its perfect religious indifference were excluded from
public office, were excluded, not on the ground of their religious belief,
but because their opinions were deemed to be degrading to mankind,
and therefore to incapacitate those who held them from governing in
a noble temper. But even these were subject to no punishment, be-
cause the people of Utopia were "persuaded that it is not in a
man's power to believe what he list." The religion which a man held
he might propagate 1 y argument, though not by violence or insult
to the religion of others. But while each sect performed its rites

Sec. IV.

The New
Learning

1509

1520

r >

'■■ ^1^9

l-V'

i -t'! -t"

",!

320

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. V.

WOLSKV

1515

1531

tS»7

1520

The New
Xieaminir
and the
Refor-
mation

in private, all assembled for public worship in a spacious temple,
where the vast throng, clad in white, and grouped round a priest
clothed in fair raiment wrought marvellously out of birds' plumage,
joined in hymns and prayers so framed as to be acceptable to
all. The importance of this public devotion lay in the evi-
dence it afforded that liberty of conscience could be combined
with religious unity.

Section V.-Wol«ey. 1515-1531.

{Authorities. — The chronicler Halle, who wrote under Edward the Sixth, has
been copied for Henry the Eighth's reign by Grafton, and followed by Holin-
shed. But for any real knowledge of Wolsey's administration we must turn
to the invaluable prefaces which Professor Brewer has prefixed to the Calen-
dars of State Papers for this period, and to the State Papers themselves.]

" There are many things in the commonwealth of Nowhere, which
I rather wish than hope to see adopted in our own." It was with
these words of characteristic irony that More closed the first work
which embodied the dreams of the New Learning. Destined as they
were to fulfilment in the course of ages, its schemes of social, religious,
and political reform broke helplessly against the temper of the f' ne.
At the very moment when More was pleading the cause of justice
between rich and poor, social discontent was being fanned by exactions
into a fiercer flame. While he aimed sarcasm after sarcasm at king-
worship, despotism was being organized into a system. His advocacy
of the two principles of religious toleration and Christian comprehen-
sion coincides almost to a year with the opening of the strife between
the Reformation and the Papacy

" That Luther has a fine genius," laughed Leo the Tenth, when
he heard that a German Professor had nailed some Propositions
denouncing the abuse of Indulgences, or of the Papal power to remit
certain penalties attached to the commis'^ion of sins, against the
doors of a church at Wittenberg. But the " Quarrel of Friars," as the
controversy was termed contemptuously at Rome, soon took larger
proportions. If at the outset Luther flung himself "prostrate at the
feet " of the Papacy, and owned its voice as the voice of Christ, the
sentence of Leo no sooner confirmed the doctrine of Indulgences than
their opponent appealed to a future Council of the Church. Two years
later the rupture was complete. A Papal Bull formally condemned the
errors of the Reformer. The condemnation was met with defiance, and
Luther publicly consigned the Bull to the flames. A second con-
demnation expelled him from the bosom of the Church, and the ban of
the Empire was soon added to that of the Papacy. " Here stand I ;
I can none ofher," Luther replied to the young Emperor, Charles the
Fifth, as he pressed him to recant in the Diet of Worms ; end from

CHAP.

;mple,
priest
mage,
ijle to
; evi-
ibined

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

321

cth, has
Holin-
[ist turn
Calen-
ds.]

, which
IS with
it work
as they
iligious,
le t" ne.
justice
[actions
It king-
ivocacy
prehen-
)etween

the hiding-place in the Thuringian Forest where he was sheltered by
the Elector of Saxony he denounced not merely, as at first, the abuses
of the Papacy, but the Papacy itself. The heresies of Wycl if were
revived ; the infallibility, the authority of the Roman See, the truth of
its doctrines, the efficacy of its worship, were denied and scoffed at in
vigorous pamphlets which issued from his retreat, and were dispersed
throughout the world by the new printing-press. The old resentment
of Germany against the oppression of Rome, the moral revolt In its
more religious minds against the secularity and corruption of the
Church, the disgust of the New Learning at the superstition which the
Papacy now formally protected, combined to secure for Luther a wide-
spread popularity and the protection of the northern princes of the
Empire. In England however his protest found as yet no echo.
England and Rome were drawn to a close alliance by the difficulties
of their political position. The young King himself, a trained
theologian and proud of his theological knowledge, entered the lists
against Luther with an "Assertion of the Seven Sacraments," for
which he was rewarded by Leo with the title of " Defender of the
Faith." The insolent abuse of the Reformer's answer called More
and Fisher into the field. As yet the New Learning, though scared
by Luther's intemperate language, had steadily backed him in his
struggle. Erasmus pleaded for him with the Emperor; Ulrich von
Hutten attacked the friars in satires and invectives as violent as his
own. But the temper of the Renascence was even more antagonistic
to the temper of Luther than that of Rome itself. From the golden
dream of a new age, wrought peaceably and purely by the slow pro-
gress of intelligence, the growth of letters, the developement of human
virtue, the Reformer of Wittemberg turned away with horror. He had
little or no sympathy with the new culture. He despised reason as
heartily as any Papal dogmatist could despise it He hated the very
thought of toleration or comprehension. He had been driven by a
moral and intellectual compulsion to declare the Roman system a false
one, but it was only to replace it by another system of doctrine just as
elaborate, and claiming precisely the same infallibihty. To degrade
human nature was to attack the very base of the New Learning ;
but Erasmus no sooner advanced to its defence than Luther declared
man to be utterly enslaved by original sin and incapable through any
efforts of his own of discovering truth or of arriving at goodness.
Such a doctrine not only annihilated the piety and wisdom of the
classic past, from which the New Learning had drawn its larger
views of life and of the world ; it trampled in the dust reason itself,
the very instrument by which More and Erasmus hoped to regene-
rate both knowledge and religion. To More especially, with his
keener perception of its future effect, this sudden revival of a
purely theological and dogmatic spirit, severing Christendom into

Sec. V.

WOLSEY

1515

1531

1521

h 1 U

.U,

V-. I

322

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. V.

WOLSEY

1515

1531

Wolsey

1514

1516

warring camps, and annihilating all hopes of union and tolerance,
was especially hateful. The temper which hitherto had seemed so
"endearing, gentle, and happy," suddenly gave way. His reply to
Luther's attack upon the King sank to the level of the work it
answered. That of Fisher was calmer and more argumentative ;
but the divorce of the New Learning from the Reformation was
complete.

Nor were the political hopes of the " Utopia" destined to be realized
by the minister who at the close of Henry's early war with France
mounted rapidly into power. Thomas Wolsey was the son of a wealthy
townsman of Ipswich, whose ability had raised him into notice at the
close of the preceding reign, and who had been taken by Bishop Fox
into the service of the Crown. His extraordinary powers hardly per-
haps required the songs, dances, and carouses with his indulgence
in which he was taunted by his enemies, to aid him in winning the
favour of the young soverign. From the post of favourite he soon rose
to that of minister. Henry's resentment at Ferdinand's perfidy enabled
Wolsey to carry out a policy which reversed that of his predecessors.
The war had freed England from the fear of French pressure. Wolsey
was as resolute to free her from the dictation of Ferdinand, and saw in
a French alliance the best security for English independence. In 1514
a treaty was concluded with Lewis. The same friendship was continued
to his successor Francis the First, whose march across the Alps for the
reconquest of Lombardy was facilitated by Henry and Wolsey, in the
hope that while the war lasted England would be free from all fear of
attack, and that Francis himself might be brought to inevitable ruin.
These hopes were defeated by his great victory at Marignano. But
Francis in the moment of triumph saw himself confronted by a new
rival. Master of Castile and Aragon, of Naples and the Netherlands, the
new Spanish King, Charles the Fifth, rose into a check on the French
monarchy such as the policy of Henry or Wolsey had never been able
to construct before. The alliance of England was eagerly sought by
both sides, and the administration of Wolsey, amid all its ceaseless
diplomacy, for seven years kept England out of war. The Peace, as
we have seen, restored the hopes of the New Learning ; it enabled
Colet to reform education, Erasmus to undertake the regeneration of
the Church, More to set on foot a new science of politics. But peace
as Wolsey used it was fatal to English freedom. In the political hints
which lie scattered over the "Utopia" More notes with bitter irony
the advance of the new despotism. It was only in " Nowhere" that
a sovereign was "removeable on suspicion of a design to enslave
his people." In England the work of slavery was being quietly
wrought, hints the great lawyer, through the law. "There will
never be wanting some pretence for deciding in the King's favour;
as that equity is on his side, or the strict letter of the law, or some

:hap.

ance,
ed so
)ly to
)rk it
ative ;
1 was

jalized
"ranee
realthy
at the
jp Fox
ily per-
ilgence
ing the
on rose
inabled
:essors.
Wolsey
I saw in

ImSH
intinued

5 for the

, in the
|l fear of

lie ruin.

10. But
a new

|nds, the
French

;en able

|ught by
baseless
;ace, as
enabled

lation of
It peace
tal hints
;r irony
' that
I enslave
quietly
;re will
I favour ;
)r some

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

323

forced interpretation of it ; or if none of these, that the royal pre-
rogative ought with conscientious judges to outweigh all other con-
siderations." We are startled at the precision with which More
maps out the expedients by which the law courts were to lend
themselves to the advance of tyranny till their crowning judgement
in the case of ship-money. But behind these judicial expedients
lay great principl'' 3 of absolutism, which partly from the example
of foreign monarchies, partly from the sense of social and political
insecurity, and yet more from the isolated position of the Crown, were
gradually winning their way in public opinion. " These notions," he
goes boldly on, " are fostered by the maxim that the king can do no
wrong, however much he may wish to do it ; that not only the property
but the persons of his subjects are his own ; and that a man has a right
to no more than the king's goodness thinks fit not to take from him."
In the hands of Wolsey these maxims were transformed into principles
of State. The checks which had been imposed on the action of the sove-
reign by the presence of great prelates and nobles at his council were
practically removed. All authority was concentrated in the hands of a
single minister. Henry had munificently rewarded Wolsey's services
to the Crown. He had been promoted to the See of Lincoln and thence
to the Archbishoprick of York. Henry procured his elevation to the
rank of Cardinal, and raised him to the post of Chancellor. The
revenues of two sees whose tenants were foreigners fell into his
hands ; he held the bishoprick of Winchester and the abbacy of St.
Albans ; he was in receipt of pensions from France and Spain, while
his official emoluments were enormous. His pomp was almost royal.
A train of prelates and nobles followed him wherever he moved ; his
household was composed of five hundred persons of noble birth, and
its chief posts were held by knights and barons of the realm. He spent
his vast wealth with princely ortentation. Two of his houses, Hampton
Court and York House, the later Whitehall, were splendid enough to
serve at his fall as royal palaces. His school at Ipswich was eclipsed
by the glories of his foundation at Oxford, whose name of Cardinal
College has been lost in its later title of Christ-church. Nor was this
magnificence a mere show of power. The whole direction of home and
foreign affairs rested with Wolsey alone ; as Chancellor he stood at the
head of public justice ; his elevation to the office of Legate rendered
him supreme in the Church. Enormous as was the mass of work which
he undertook, it was thoroughly done : his administration of the royal
treasury was economical ; the number of his despatches is hardly less
remarkable than the care bestowed upon each ; even More, an avowed
enemy, confesses that as Chancellor he surpassed all men's expecta-
tions. The court of Chancery, indeed, became so crowded through the
character for expedition and justice which it gained under his rule that
subordinate courts had to be created for its relief. It was this concen-

Y 2

Sec. V.

WOLSKY

1315

1531

1 ':

■V

Wolsey's ad-
vtinistration

1515

'I i.

1517

it II

Vvlj

W J

>'• »

'"i

324

Sec. V.

WOLSEY

1515

1531

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAP.

WoUey
and the
Parlia-
ment

1519

1520

tration of all secular and ecclesiastical power in a single hand which
accustomed England to the personal government which began with
Henry the Eighth ; and it was, above all, Wolsey's long tenure of the
whole Papal authority within the realm, and the consequent suspension
of appeals to Rome, that led men to acquiesce at a later time in Henry's
claim of religious supremacy. For proud as was Wolsey's bearing and
high as were his natural powers he stood before England as the mere
creature of the King. Greatness, wealth, authority he held, and owned
he held, simply at the royal will. In raising his low-born favourite to
the head of Church and State Henry was gathering all religious as well
as all civil authority into his personal grasp. The nation which
trembled before Wolsey learned to tremble before the King who could
destroy Wolsey by a breath.

The rise of Charles of Austria gave a new turn to Wolsey's policy.
Possessor of the Netherlands, of Franche Comt^, of Spain, the death
of his grandfather Maximilian added to his dominions the heritage of
the House of Austria in Swabia and on the Danube, and opened the
wj y for his election as Emperor. France saw herself girt in on every
side by a power greater than her own ; and to Wolsey and his master
the time seemed come for a bolder game. Disappointed in his hopes
of obtaining the Imperial crown on the death of Maximilian, Henry
turned to the dream of " recovering his French inheritance," which he
had never really abandoned, and which was carefully fed by his nephew
Charles. Nor was Wolsey forgotten. If Henry coveted France, his
minister coveted no less a prize than the Papacy ; and the young
Emperor was lavish of promises of support in any coming election.
The result of these seductions was quickly seen. In May, 1520,
Charles landed at Dover to visit Henry, and King and Emperor
rode alone to Canterbury. It was in vain that Francis strove to
retain Henry's friendship by an interview near Guisnes, to which
the profuse expenditure of both monarchs gave the name of the
Field of Cloth of Gold. A second interview between Charles and
his uncle as he returned from the meeting with Francis ended in
a secret confederacy of the two sovereigns, and the promise of the
Emperor to marry Henry's one child, Mary Tudor. Her right to
the throne was asserted by a deed which proved how utterly the
baronage now lay at the mercy of the King. The Duke of Buckingham
stood first in blood as in power among the English nobles ; he was the
descendant of Edward the Third's youngest son, and if Mary's succes-
sion were denied he stood heir to the throne. His hopes had been
fanned by prophets and astrologers, and wild words told his purpose
to seize the Crown on Henry's death in defiance of every opponent.
But word and act had for two years been watched by the King ; and
in 1 52 1 the Duke was arrested, condemned as a traitor by his peers,
and beheaded on Tower Hill. The French alliance came to an end,

VI.]

and at

was CO]

The fir

Wolsey

the pas

forty th

of the tj

Wolsey

Though

expense

seven ye

Parliam

summon

had inve

repaid f

were ass

from Loi

Cardinal

Commiss

assessme

some cas

for the K

following

before it

cent. TJ

received

member a

been elecl

Speaker's

reply till

effort to o

than an ;

objections

minister's

discuss th

fortnight ;

party were

demand.

nioney was

once more

from the ]

the royal <

ing," War!

should give

"then it v

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

and at the outbreak of war between France and Spain a secret league
was concluded at Calais between the Pope, the Emperor, and Henry.
The first result of the new war policy at home was quickly seen,
Wolsey's economy had done nothing more than tide the Crown through
the past years of peace. But now that Henry had promised to raise
forty thousand men for the coming campaign the ordinary resources
of the treasury were utterly insufficient. With the instinct of despotism
Wolsey shrank from reviving the tradition of the Parliament.
Though Henry had thrice called together the Houses to supply the
expenses of his earlier struggle with France, Wolsey governed during
seven years of peace without once assembling them. War made a
Parliament inevitable, but for a while the Cardinal strove to delay its
summons by a wide extension of the practice which Edward the Fourth
had invented of raising money by forced loans or " Benevolences," to be
repaid from the first subsidy of a coming Parliament. Large sums
were assessed on every county. Twenty thousand pounds were exacted
from London ; and its wealthier citizens were summoned before the
Cardinal and required to give an account of the value of their estates.
Commissioners were despatched into each shire for the purposes of
assessment, and precepts were issued on their information, requiring in
some cases supplies of soldiers, in others a tenth of a man's income,
for the King's service. So poor, however, was the return that in the
following year Wolsey was forced to summon Parliament and lay
before it the unprecedented demand of a property-tax of twenty per
cent. The demand was made by the Cardinal in person, but he was
received with obstinate silence. It was in vain that Wolsey called on
member after member to answer ; and his appeal to More, who had
been elected to the chair of the House of Commons, was met by the
Speaker's falling on his knees and representing his powerlessness to
reply till he had received instructions from the House itself. The
effort to overawe the Commons failed, and Wolsey no sooner withdrew
than an angry debate began. He again returned to answer the
objections which had been raised, and again the Commons foiled the
minister's attempt to influence their deliberations by refusing to dis-
discuss the matter in his presence. The struggle continued for a
fortnight ; and though successful in procuring a subsidy, the court
party were forced to content themselves with less than half Wolsey's
demand. Convocation betrayed as independent a spirit ; and when
money was again needed two years later, the Cardinal was driven
once more to the system of Benevolences. A tenth was demanded
from the laity, and a fourth from the clergy in every county by
the royal commissioners. There was " sore grudging and murmur-
ing," Warham wrote to the court, " among the people." " If men
should give their goods by a commission," said the Kentish squires,
"then it would be worse than the taxes of France, and England

335.

Sec. V.

WOLSEV

1515

1531

1(1

ill- '!

1523

1525

A A

'^1

■I'll!

326

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. V.

WOLSEY

1515

1531

The

Acrarian

Diacon-

tent

should be bond, not free." The political instinct of the nation dis-
cerned as of old that in the question of self-taxation was involved that
of the very existence of freedom. The clergy put themselves in the
forefront of the resistance, and preached from every pulpit that the
commission was contrary to the liberties of the realm, and that the
King could take no man's goods but by process of law. So stirred
was the nation that Wolsey bent to the storm, and offered to rely on
the voluntary loans of each subject. But the statute of Richard the
Third which declared all exaction of benevolences illegal was recalled
to memory ; the demand was evaded by London, and the commissioners
were driven out of Kent. A revolt broke out in Suffolk ; the men of
Cambridge and Norwich threatened to rise. There was in fact a
general strike of the employers. Clothmakers discharged their
workers, farmers put away their servants. " They say the King asketh
so much that they be not able to do as they have done before this ,
time." Such a peasant insurrection as was raging in Germany was
only prevented by the unconditional withdrawal of the royal demand.

Wolsey's defeat saved English freedom for the moment ; but the
danger from which he shrank was not merely that of a conflict with
the sense of ' iberty. The murmurs of the Kentish squires only swelled
the ever-deepening voice of public discontent. If the condition of the
land question in the end gave strength to the Crown by making it the
security for public order, it became a terrible peril at every crisis of
conflict between the monarchy and the landowners. The steady rise
in the price of wool was giving a fresh impulse to the agrarian changes
which had now been going on for over a hundred and fifty years,
to the throwing together of the smaller holdings, and the introduction
of sheep-farming on an enormous scale. The new wealth of the
merchant classes helped on the change. They invested largely in land,
and these "farming gentlemen and clerking knights," as Latimer
bitterly styled them, were restrained by few traditions or associations
in their eviction of the smaller tenants. The land indeed had been
greatly underlet, and as its value rose the temptation to raise the
customary rents became irresistible. "That which went heretofore
for twenty or forty pounds a year," we learn from the same source,
"now is let for fifty or a hundred." But it had been only by this
low scale of rent that the small yeomanry class had been enabled
to exist. " My father," says Latimer, " was a yeoman, and had no
lands of his own ; only he had a farm of three or four pounds by
the year at the uttermost, and hereupon he tilled so much as kept
half-a-dozen men. He had walk for a hundred sheep, and my
mother milked thirty kine ; he was able and did find the King a
harness with himself and his horse while he came to the place
that he should receive the King's wages. I can remember that I
buckled his harness when he went to Blackheath Field. He kept

HAP.

I dis-

Ithat

n the

Lt the

It the

tirred

;ly on

•d the

called

ioners

nen of

fact a
their

asketh

re this .

ly was

nand.

)ut the

:t with

swelled

I of the

g it the

trisis of
dy rise

[hanges
years,
luction
of the
n land,
atimer
iations
4 been
lise the
etofore
(source,
)y this
Enabled
lad no
ids by
Is kept
id my
:ing a
place
that I
le kept

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

me to school : he married my sisters with five pounds apiece, so
that he brought them up in godliness and fear of God. He kept
hospitality for his poor neighbours, and some alms he gave to the
poor, and all this he did of the same farm, where he that now hath it
payeth sixteen pounds by year or more, and is not able to do anything
for his prince, for himself, nor for his children, or give a cup of drink
to the poor." Increase of rent ended with such tenants in the relin-
quishment of their holdings, but the bitterness of ejection was increased
by the iniquitous means which were often employed to bring it about.
The farmers, if we believe More in 1515, were "got rid of either by
fraud or force, or tired out with repeated wrongs into parting with
their property." " In his way it comes to pass that these poor
wretches, men, women, husbands, orphans, widows, parents with little
children, households greater in number than in wealth (for arable
farming requires many hands, while one shepherd and herdsman will
suffice for a pasture farm), all these emigrate from their native fields
without knowing where to go." The sale of their scanty household
stuff drove them to wander homeless abroad, to be thrown into prison
as vagabonds, to beg and to steal. Yet in the face of such a spectacle
as this we still find the old complaint of scarcity of labour, and the old
legal remedy for it in a fixed scale of wages. The social disorder, in
fact, baffled the sagacity of English statesmen, and they could find no
better remedy for it than laws against the furth er extension of sheep-
farms, and a terrible increase of public executions. Both were alike
fruitless. Enclosures and evictions went on as before. " If you do
not remedy the evils which produce thieves," More urged with bitter
truth, " the rigorous execution of justice in punishing thieves will be
vain." But even More could only suggest a remedy which, efficacious
as it was subsequently to prove, had yet to wait a century for its reali-
zation. " Let the woollen manufacture be introduced, so that honest
employment may be found for those whom want has made thieves or
will make thieves ere long." The mass of social disorder grew steadily
greater ; while the break up of the great military households of the
nobles which was still going on, and the return of wounded and dis-
abled soldiers from the wars, introduced a dangerous leaven of outrage
and crime.

This public discontent, as well as the exhaustion of the treasury,
added bitterness to the miserable result of the war. To France,
indeed, the struggle had been disastrous, for the loss of the Milanese
and the capture of Francis the First in the defeat of Pavia laid her at
the feet of the Emperor. But Charles had no purpose of carrying out
the pledges by which he had lured England into war. Wolsey had
seen two partizans of the Emperor successively raised to the Papal
chair. The schemes of winning anew " our inheritance of France "
had ended in utter failure ; England, as before, gained nothing from

327

Sec. V.

Wolsey
1515

1531

I ;>■•'(

■t i

I|V ,v,v

''■'.•'•- *'

The
Divorce

1525

•15 U*

3a8

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. V.

WOLSEV

1S15

1531

Anne Boleyn

1526

two useless c^.mpaigns, and it was plain that Charles meant it to win
nothing. He concluded an armistice with his prisoner ; he set aside
all projects of a joint invasion ; he broke his pledge to wed Mary
Tudor, and married a princess of Portugal ; he pressed for peace
with France which would give him Burgundy. It was time for
Henry and his minister to change their course. They resolved to
withdraw from all active part in the rivalry of the two powers,
and a treaty was secretly concluded with France. But Henry re-
mained on fair terms with the Emperor, and abstained from any
part in the fresh war which broke out on the refusal of the French
monarch to fulfil the terms by which he had purchased his release.
No longer spurred by the interest of great events, the King ceased to
take a busy part in foreign politics, and gave himself to hunting and
sport. Among the fairest and gayest ladies of his court stood Anne
Boleyn. Her gaiety and wit soon won Henry's favour, and grants of
honours to her father marked her influence. In 1524 a new colour
was given to this intimacy by a resolve on the King's part to
break his marriage with the Queen. The death of every child save
Mary may have woke scruples as to the lawfulness of a marriage on
which a curse seemed to rest ; the need of a male heir may have
deepened this impression. But, whatever were the grounds of his
action, Henry from this moment pressed the Roman See to grant him
a divorce. Clement's consent to his wish, however, would mean a break
with the Emperor, Catharine's nephew ; and the Pope was now at the
Emperor's mercy. While the English envoy was mooting the question
of divorce, the surprise of Rome by an Imperial force brought home
to Clement his utter helplessness ; the next year the Pope was in
fact a prisoner in the Emperor's hands after the storm and sack of
Rome. Meanwhile a secret suit which had been brought before
Wolsey as legate was suddenly dropped ; as Catharine denied the
facts on which Henry rested his case her appeal would have
carried the matter to the tribunal of the Pope, and Clement's
decision could hardly have been a favourable one. The difficulties
of the divorce were indeed manifest. One of the most learned of the
English bishops, Fisher of Rochester, declared openly against it.
The English theologians, who were consulted on the validity of
the Papal dispensation which had allowed Henry's marriage to take
place, referred the King to the Pope for a decision of the question.
The commercial classes shrank from a step which involved an irre-
trievable breach with the Emperor, who was master of their great
market in Flanders. Above all, the iniquity of the proposal jarred
against the public conscience. But neither danger nor shame availed
against the King's wilfulness and passion. A great party too had
gathered to Anne's support. Her uncle the Duke of Norfolk, her
father, now Lord Rochford, afterwards Earl of Wiltshire, pushed the

:hap.

VI.]

Tllli: NEW MONARCHY.

329

o win

aside

Mary

peace

le for

/ed to

o.vers,

ry re-

n any

"rench

elease.

ised to

ng and

i Anne

ants of
colour

lart to

Id save

iage on

ay have

s of his

ant him

a break
at the

question

it home
was in
sack of
before
ied the
d have
ement's
culties
of the
■inst it.
dity of
to take
[uestion.
n irre-
ir great
jarred
1 availed
)o had
)lk, her
led the

divorce resohitely on ; the brilliant group of young courtiers to which
hei brother belonged saw in her success their own elevation ; and the
Duke of Suffolk with the bulk of the nobles hoped through her means
to bring about the ruin of the statesman before whom they trembled.
It was needful for the Cardinal to find some expedients to carry out
the King's will ; but his schemes one by one broke down before the
difficulties of the Papal Court. Clement indeed, perplexed at once
by his wish to gratify Henry, his own conscientious doubts as to
the course proposed, and his terror of the Emperor whose power
was now predominant in Italy, even blamed Wolsey for having
hindered the King from judging the matter in his own realm, and
marrying on the sentence of his own courts. Henry was resolute
in demanding the express sanction of the Pope to his divorce, and
this Clement steadily evaded. He at last, however, consented to
a legatinc commission for the trial of the case in England. In
this commission Cardinal Campeggio was joined with Wolsey.
Months however passed in fruitless negotiations. The Cardinals
pressed on Catharine the expediency of her withdrawal to a religious
house, while Henry pressed on the Pope that of a settlement of the
matter by his formal declaration against the validity of the marriage.
At last in 1529 the two Legates opened their court in the great hall of
the Blackfriars. Henry briefly announced his resolve to live no
longer in mortal sin. The Queen offered an appeal to Clement, and
on the refusal of the Legates to admit it she flung herself at Henry's
feet. " Sire," said Catharine, " I beseech you to pity me, a woman
and a stranger, without an assured friend and without an indifferent
counsellor. I take God to witness that I have always been to you a
true and loyal wife, that I have made it my constant duty to seek
your pleasure, that I have loved all whom you loved, whether I have
reason or not, whether they are friends to me or foes. I have
been your wife for years, I have brought you many children. God
knows that when I came to your bed I was a virgin, and I put it to
your own conscience to say whether it was not so. If there be any
offence which can be alleged against mc I consent to depart with
infamy ; if not, then I pray you to do me justice." The piteous appeal
was wasted on a King who was already entertaining Anne Boleyn with
royal state in his own palace. The trial proceeded, and the court
assembled to pronounce sentence. Henry's hopes were at their
highest when they were suddenly dashed to the ground. At the
opening of the proceedings Campeggio rose to declare the court
adjourned. The adjournment was a mere evasion. The pressure of
the Imperialists had at last forced Clement to summon the cause to
his own tribunal at Rome, and the jurisdiction of the Legates was
at an end.
" Now see I," cried the Duke of Suffolk as he dashed his hand on

i5ai

i ,p;

'J'/ie Lcga-
tine court

1528

Jttly 23

!*i

330

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Stc. v.

WOLSRY

Iftlft

1691

The Fall

of
Wolsay

1529

Death of
IVolsey

1530

the tabic, " that the old saw is true, that tlicrc was never Legate or
Cardinal that did good to Itlngland ! " " Of all men living," Wolsey
boldly retorted, " you, my lord Duke, have the least reason to dispraise
Cardinals, for if I, a poor Cardinal, had not been, you would not now
have had a head on your shoulders wh'jrcwith to make such a brag in
disrepute of us." But both the Cardinal and his enemies knew that
the minister's doom was scaled. Through the twenty years of his reign
Henry had known nothing of opposition to his will. His imperious
temper had chafed at the weary negotiations, the subterfuges and
perfidies of the Pope. His wrath fell at once on Wolsey, who had
dissuaded hin\ from acting at the first independently, from conducting
the cause in his own courts and acting on the sentence of his own
judges ; who had counselled him to seek a divorce from Rome and
promised him success in his suit. From the close of the Legatine
court he would see him no more. If Wolsey still remained minister
for a while, it was because the thread of the complex foreign negotia-
tions could not be roughly broken. Here loo, however, failure awaited
him as he saw himself deceived and outwitted by the conclusion of
peace between P" ranee and the Emperor in a new treaty at Cambray.
Not only was his French policy no longer possible, but a reconciliation
with Charles was absolutely needful, and such a reconciliation could
only be brought about by Wolsey's fall. He was at once prosecuted
for receiving bulls from Rome in violation of the Statute of Praemunire.
A few days later he was deprived of the seals. Wolsey was prostrated
by the blow. He offered to give up everything that he possessed if
the King would but cease from his displeasure. " His face," wrote the
French ambassador, " is dwindled to half its natural size. In truth his
misery is such that his enemies. Englishmen as they are, cannot help
pitying him." Office and wealth were flung desperately at the King's
feet, and for the moment Henry seemed contented with his disgrace.
A thousand boats full of Londoners covered the Thames to see the
Cardinal's barge pass to the Tower, but he was permitted to retire to
Esher. Pardon was granted him on surrender of his vast possessions
to the Crown, and he was permitted to withdraw to his diocese of
York, the one dignity he hcd been suffered to retain. But hardly a
year had passed before the jealousy of his political rivals was roused
by the King's regrets, and on the eve of his installation feast he was
arrested on a charge of high treason, and conducted by the Lieutenant
of the Tower towards London. Already broken by his enormous
labours, by internal disease, and the sense of his fall, Wolsey accepted
the arrest as a sentence of death. An attack of dysentery forced him
to rest at the abbey of Leicester, and as he reached the gate he said
feebly to the brethren who met him, " I am come to lay my bones
among you." On his death-bed his thoughts still clung to the prince
whom he had served. " He is a prince," said the dying man to the

VI.]

Lieutena

any part

do assun

hours toj

prevail.

as I have

grey hair

regarding

words coi

despotisn

before hir

to its inst

statesman

will and

trampling

ingratitud

while he r

could hare

courage, a

in the yeai

[Aut/iorii

what we re;

Hook's "L

authorities a

for the Mai

life by his

religious his

Burnet's ** I

the Monastei

Camden Soc

material of v

which begin

vols. i. ii. iii.

liy hero-worsi

during this pi

The ten ^
momentous
power, and t
out with a te
still offer re
became a n
learned their
with ruthless
and merciles

:iiAP.

ite or
^olsey
praise
t now
rag in
w that
i reign
(crious
:s and
lo had
lucting
is own
ic and
2gatine
minister
egotia-
iwaited
sion of
mbray.
:i)iation
n could
isecuted
munire.
jstrated
essed if
rote the
ruth his
ot help
King's
sgracc.
see the
etire to
essions
icese of
ardly a
roused
he was
utenant
ormous
cepted
ed him
e said
bones
prince
to the

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

Lieutenant of the Tower, "of a most royal courage: sooner than miss
any part of his will he will endanger one half of his kingdom : and I
do assure you I have often kneeled before him, sometimes for three
hours together, to persuade him from his appetite, and could not
prevail. And, Master Knyghton, had I but served (lod as diligently
as I have served the king, He would not have given me over in my
grey hairs. But this is my due reward for my pains and study, not
regarding my service to (iod, but only my duty to my prince." No
words could paint with so terrible a truthfulness the spirit of the new
despotism which Wolsey had done more than any of those who went
before him to build up. All sense of loyalty to Kngland, to its freedom,
to its institutions, had utterly passed away. The one duty which the
statesman owned was a duty to his " prince," a prince whose personal
will and appetite was overriding the highest interests of the State,
trampling under foot the wisest counsels, and crushing with the blind
ingratitude of Fate the servants who opposed him. But even Wolsey,
while he recoiled from the monstrous form which had revealed itself,
could hardly have dreamed of th*^ work of destruction which the royal
courage, and yet more royal appetite, of his master was to accomplish
in the years to come.

Section VI.— Thomaa Cromwell. 1030—1540.

\Attt/torii\es. — Crornwell's earlv life as told by Foxc is a mass of fable ;
what we really know of it may be seen conveniently put together in Dean
Hook's "Life of Archbishop Cranmer.' For his ministry, the only real
authorities are the State Papers for this period, which are now being calendared
for the Master of the Rolls. For Sir Thomas More, we have n touching
life by his son-in-law, Roper. The more important documents for the
religious history of the time will be found in Mr. Pocock's new edition of
Burnet's " History of the Reformation" ; those relating to the dissolution of
the Monasteries, in the collection of letters on that subject published by the
Camden Society, and in the *' Original Letters " of Sir Henry Ellis. A mass of
material of very various value has been accumulated by Strype in his collections,
which begin at this time. Mr. Froude's narrative (*' History of England,"
vols. i. ii. iii.), though of great literary merit, is disfigured by a )ove of paradox,
by hero-worship, and by a reckless defence of tyranny and crime. It possesses,
during this period, little or no historical value. ]

The ten years which follow the fall of Wolsey are among the most
momentous in our history. The New Monarchy at last realized its
power, and the work for which Wolsey had paved the way was carried
out with a terrible thoroughness. The one great institution which could
still offer resistance to the royal will was struck down. The Church
became a mere instrument o/ the central despotism. The people
learned their helplessness in rebellions easily suppressed and avenged
with ruthless severity. A reign of terror, organized with consummate
and merciless skill, held England panic-stricken at Henry's feet. The

33 «

Sue. V.

WoLSKY

1515

1551

^ 'i^-

' i

iii

332

Sec. VI.

Thomas
Cromwell

1530

1540

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Thomas
Cromwell

noblest heads rolled on the block. Virtue and learning could not save
Thomas More : royal descent could not save Lady Salisbury. The
putting away of one queen, the execution of another, taught England
that nothing was too high for Henry's " courage " or too sacre^ for his
" appetite." Parliament assembled only to sanction acts of unscru-
pulous tyranny, or to build up by its own statutes the great fabric of
absolute rule. All the constitutional safe-guards of English freedom
were swept away. Arbitrary taxation, arbitrary legislation, arbitrary
imprisonment were powers claimed without dispute and unsparingly
exercized by the Crown.

The history of this great revolution, for it is nothing less, is the history
of a single man. In the whole line of English statesmen there is no one
of whom we would willingly know so much, no one of whom we really
know so little, as Thomas Cromwell. When he meets us in Henry's
service he had already passed middle life ; and during his earlier years it
is hardly possible to do more than disentangle a few fragmentary facts
from the mass of fable which gathered round them. His youth was one
of roving adventure. Whether he was the son of a poor blacksmith at
Putney or no, he could hardly have been more than a boy when he was
engaged in the service of the Marchioness of Dorset. He must still
have been young when he took part as a common soldier in the wars
of Italy, a " ruffian," as he owned afterwards to Cranmer, in the most
unscrupulous school the world contained. But it was a school in which
he learned lessons even more dangerous than those of the camp. He
not only mastered the Italian language but drank in the manners and
tone of the Italy around him, the Italy of the Borgias and the Medici.
It was with Italian versatility that he turned from the camp to the
counting-house ; he was certainly engaged as a commercial agent to
one of the Venetian merchants ; tradition finds him as a clerk at
Antwerp ; and in 15 12 history at last encounters him as a thriving wool
merchant at Middleburg in Zealand. Returning to England, Cromwell
continued to amass wealth by adding the trade of scrivener, something
between that of a banker and attorney, to his other occupations, as well
as by advancing money to the poorer nobles ; and on the outbreak of
the second war with France we find him a busy and influential member
of the Commons in Parliament. Five years later the aim of his ambi-
tion was declared by his entrance into Wolsey's service. The Cardinal
needed a man of business for the suppression of some smaller monas-
teries which he had undertaken, and for the transfer of their revenues
to his foundations at Oxford and Ipswich. The task was an unpopular
one, and it was carried out with a rough indifference to the feelings it
aroused which involved Cromwell in the hate which was gathering
round his master. But his wonderful self-reliance and sense of power
o'liy broke upon the world at Wolsey's fall. Of the hundreds of
dependents who waited on the Cardinal's nod, Cromwell was the only

one who

disgrace

comfortei

to go to

common

which W

by confii

revenues,

these trar

bill disqt

and it w

permitted

seems to

patron. *

esteemed

commendt

ride to L<

which Cro

the simple

note of the

the whole ;

held out b^

absolutism

concealed,

waited pati

For succ

had come

alliance an(

was expect!

Houses ma

on Parliam(

to use it as

strife with I

the New Le

Cardinal's f;

in accepting

of his brief

religious ref(

while checki

severities ag

polemic rani

other. But

from what se

for a success

liament. Th

[chap.

3t save
. The
ngland
for his
.inscru-
,bric of
reedom
rbitrary
(aringly

: history
5 no one
e really
Henry's
• years it
iry facts
was one
smith at
n he was
lust still
the wars
the most
in which
np. He
ners and
Medici,
p to the
agent to
clerk at
ing wool
romwell
mething
, as well
break of
member
is ambi-
ardinal
monas-
l-evenues
ipopular
jlings it
ithering
kf power
Ireds of
the only

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

333

one who clung to him faithfully at the last. In the lonely hours of his
disgrace at Esher Wo?sey " made his moan uiUo Master Cromwell, who
comforted him the best he could, and desired my lord to give him leave
to go to London, where he would make or mar, which was always his
common saying." He shewed his consummate craft in a scheme by
which Wolsey was persuaded to buy off the hostility of the courtiers
by confirming the grants which had been made to them from his
revenues, while Cromwell acquired importance as go-between in
these transactions. It was by Cromwell's efforts in Parliament that a
bill disqualifying Wolsey from all after employment was defeated,
and it was by him that the negotiations were conducted which
permitted the fallen minister to retire to York. A general esteem
seems to have rewarded this rare instance of fidelity to a ruined
patron. " For his honest behaviour in his master's cause he was
esteemed the most faithfuUest servant, and was of all men greatly
commended." But Henry's protection rested on other grounds. The
ride to London had ended in a private interview with the King, in
which Cromwell boldly advised him to cut the knot of the divorce by
the simple exercise of his own supremacy. The advice struck the key-
note of the later policy by which the daring counseller was to change
the whole face of Church and State ; but Henry still clung to the hopes
held out by his new ministers, and shrank perhaps as yet from the bare
absolutism to which Cromwell called him. The advice at any rate was
concealed, and though high in the King's favour, his new servant
waited patiently the progress of events.

f^or success in procuring the divorce, the Duke of Norfolk, who
had come to the front on Wolsey's fall, relied not only on the
alliance and aid of the Emperor, but on the support which the project
was expected to receive from Parliament. The reassembling of the two
Houses marked the close of the system of Wolsey. Instead of looking
on Parliament as a danger the monarchy now felt itself strong enough
to use it as a tool ; and Henry justly counted on warm support in his
strife with Rome. Not less significant was the attitude of the men of
the New Learning. To them, as to his mere political adversaries, the
Cardinal's fall opened a prospect of better things. The dream of More
in accepting the office of Chancellor, if we may judge it from the acts
of his brief ministry, seems to have been that of carrying out the
religious reformation which had been demanded by Colet and Erasmus,
while checking the spirit of revolt against the unity of the Church. His
severities against the Protestants, exaggerated as they have been by
polemic rancour, remain the one stain on a memory that knows no
other. But it was only by a rigid severance of the cause of reform
from what seemed to him the cause of revolution that More could hope
for a successful issue to the projects which the Council laid before Par-
liament. The Petition of the Commons sounded like an echo of Colet's

Sec. VI.

Thomas
Cromwell

1530

1540

t " '

'i ■>

Norfolk
and >
More

s!(«

334

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. VI.

Thomas
Ckomwell

1530

1540

1530

Cromwell
and the
Church

famous address to the Convocation. It attributed the growth of heresy
not more to "frantic and seditious books published in the EngHsh
tongue contrary to the very true Catholic and Christian faith " than to
" the extreme and uncharitable behaviour of divers ordinaries." It re-
monstrated against the legislation of the clergy in Convocation without
the King's assent or that of his subjects, the oppressive procedure of
the Church Courts, the abuses of ecclesiastical patronage, and the ex-
cessive number of holydays. Henry referred the Petition to the
bishops, but they could devise no means of redress, and the ministry
persisted in pushing through the Houses their bills for ecclesiastical
reform. The questions of Convocation and the bishops* courts
were adjourned for further consideration, but the fees of the courts
were curtailed, the clergy restricted from lay employments, pluralities
restrained, and residence enforced. In spite of a dogged opposition
from the bishops the bills received the assent of the House of
Lords, " to the great rejoicing of lay people, and the great displea-
sure of spiritual persons." The importance of the new measures lay
really in the action of Parliament. They were an explicit announcement
that church-reform was now to be undertaken, not by the clergy, but by
the people at large. On the other hand it was clear that it would be
carried out, not in a spirit of hostility, but of loyalty to the church.
The Commons forced from Bishop Fisher an apology for words which
were taken as a doubt thrown on their orthodoxy. Henry forbade the
circulation of Tyndale's translation o^ the Bible as executed in a Pro-
testant spirit, while he promised a more correct version. But the
domestic aims of the New Learning were foiled by the failure of the
ministry in its negotiations for the divorce. The severance of the
French alliance, and the accession of the party to power which clung
to alliance with the Emperor, failed to detach Charles from his aunt's
cause. The ministers accepted the suggestion of a Cambridge scholar,
Thomas Cranmer, that the universities of Europe should be called on
for their judgement ; but the appeal to the learned opinion of
Christendom ended in utter defeat. In France the profuse bribery
of the English agents would have failed with the university of Paris
but for the interference of Francis himself. As shameless an exercize
of Henry's own authority was required to wring an approval of his cause
from Oxford and Cambridge. In Germany the very Protestants, in the
fervour of their moral revival, were dead against the King. So far as
could be seen from Cranmer's test every learned man in Christendom
but for bribery and threats would have condemned Henry's cause.

It was at the moment when every expedient had been exhausted by
Norfolk and his fellow ministers that Cromwell came again to the
front. Despair of other means drove Henry nearer and nearer to the
bold plan from which he had shrunk at Wolsey's fall. Cromwell was
again ready with his suggestion that the King should disavow the

VI.]

Papal j

realm, j

with Cr

he was

ministei

in the n

their cl<

state-cri

the first

period o

His pur]

every ri\

mere sla

in his yo

on the id

hand.

Reginald

"Prince'

or in the

tyrannies

the policy

England i

check on

lay in th(

religious <

to a mere

from the s

his decisit

without a

Cromwell

pulously t

Wolsey ha

The pedar

formally ir

The legal i

this pardor

forgiveness

fine amour

ledgement

lord, the H

demand th

hard, but 1

demands fo

by the insei

allow;" an^

i i

[CHAP.

heresy
English
than to
Itre-
without
sdure of
the ex-
to the
ninistry
siastical
' courts
e courts
uralities
iposition
[ouse of
displea-
ures lay
mcement
;y,butby
would be
e church,
ds which
bade the
in a Pro-
But the
ire of the
e of the
lich clung
lis aunt's
scholar,
[called on
inion of
bribery
of Paris
exercize
ihis cause
ts, in the
So far as
istendom
ause.
usted by
,n to the
•er to the
iwell was
avow the

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

3S5

Papal jurisdiction, declare himself Head of the Church within his
realm, and obtain a divorce from his own Ecclesiastical Courts. But
with Cromwell the divorce was but the prelude to a series of changes
he was bent upon accomplishing. In all the chequered life of the new
minister what had left its deepest stamp on him was Italy. Not only
in the rapidity and ruthlessness of his designs, but in their larger scope,
their clearer purpose, and their admirable combination, the Italian
state-craft entered with Cromwell into English politics. He is in fact
the first English minister in whom we can trace through the whole
period of his rule the steady working out of a great and definite aim.
His purpose was to raise the King to absolute authority on the ruins of
every rival power within the realm. It was not that Cromwell was a
mere slave of tyranny. Whether we may trust the tale that carries him
in his youth to Florence or no, his statesmanship was closely modelled
on the ideal of the Florentine thinker whose book was constantly in his
hand. Even as a servant of Wolsey he startled the future Cardinal,
Reginald Pole, by bidding him take for his manual in politics the
" Prince " of Machiavelli. Machiavelli hoped to find in Caesar Borgia
or in the later Lorenzo de' Medici a tyrant who after crushing all rival
tyrannies might unite and regenerate Italy ; and it is possible to see in
the policy of Cromwell the aim of securing enlightenment and order for
England by the concentration of all authority in the Crown. The last
check on royal absolutism which had survived the Wars of the Roses
lay in the wealth, the independent synods and jurisdiction, and the
religious claims of the Church. To reduce the great ecclesiastical body
to a mere department of the State in which all authority should flow
from the sovereign alone, and in which his will should be the only law,
his decision the only test of truth, was a change hardly to be wrought
without a struggle ; and it was the opportunity for such a struggle that
Cromwell saw in the divorce. His first blow showed how unscru-
pulously the struggle was to be waged. A year had passed since
Wolsey had been convicted of a breach of tiie Statute of Praemunire.
The pedantry of the judges declared the whole nation to have been
formally involved in the same charge by its acceptance of his authority.
The legal absurdity was now redressed by a general pardon, but from
this pardon the clergy found themselves omitted. They were told that
forgiveness could be bought at no less a price than the payment of a
fine amounting to a million of our present money, and the acknow-
ledgement of the King as " the chief protector, the only and supreme
lord, the Head of the Church and Clergy of England." To the first
demand they at once submitted ; against the second they struggled
hard, but their appeals to Henry and to Cromwell met only with
demands for instant obedience. A compromise was at last arrived at
by the insertion of a qualifying phrase " So far as the law of Christ will
allow ; " and with this addition the words were again submitted by

Sec. VI.

Thomas
Cromwell

1530

1540

II pm

;:ifd

I i

'■^

I53I

"i^

{

., ; • i'".fl*

336

Sec. VI.

Thomas
Cromwell

1530

1540

The

Headship

of the

Church

1532

Act of
Appeals

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE. [chap.

Warham to the Convocation. There was a general silence. " Who-
ever is silent seems to consent," said the Archbishop. " Then are we
all silent," replied a voice from among the crowd.

There is no ground for thinking that the "Headship of the Church"
which Henry claimed in this submission was more than a warning
addressed to the independent spirit of the clergy, or that it bore as
yet the meaning which was afterwards attached to it. It certainly
implied no independence of Rome ; but it told the Pope plainly
that in any strife that might come the clergy were in the King's
hand. The warning was backed by the demand for the settle-
ment of the question addressed to Clement on the part of the Lords
and some of the Commons. " The cause of his Majesty," the
Peers were made to say, " is the cause of each of ourselves." If
Clement would not confirm what was described as the judgement
of the Universities in favour of the divorce " our condition will
not be wholly irremediable. Extreme remedies are ever harsh of
application ; but he that is sick will by all means be rid of his dis-
temper." The banishment of Catharine from the King's palace gave
emphasis to the demand. The failure of a second embassy to the Pope
left Croir well free to take more decisive steps in the course on which
he had entered. As his policy developed itself More withdrew from
the post of Chancellor ; but the revolution from which he shrank was
an inevitable one. F rom the reign of the Edwards men had been
occupied with the problem of reconciling the spiritual and temporal
relations of the realm. Parliament from the first became the organ
of the national jealousy whether of Papal jurisdiction without the
kingdort or of the separate jurisdiction of the clergy within it. The
movement, long arrested by religious reaction and civil war, was
reviving under the new sense of national greatness and national
unity, when it was suddenly stimulated by the question of the
divorce, and by the submission cr English interests to a foreign
Court. With such a spur it moved forward quickly. The time had
come when England was to claim for herself the fulness of power,
ecclesiastical as well as temporal, within her bounds ; and, in the
concentration of all authority within the hands of the sovereign
which was the political characteristic of the time, to claim this
power for the nation was to claim it for the king. The import
of the headship of the Church was brought fully out in one of the
propositions laid before the Convocation of 1532. "The King's
Majesty," runs this memorable clause, " hath as well the care of the
souls of his subjects as their bodies ; and may by the law of God
by his Parliament make laws touching and concerning as well the
one as the other." Under strong pressure Convocation was brought to
pray that the power of independent legislation till now exercized by
the Church should come to an end. Rome was dealt with in the same

VI.]

unsparir

appeals

vocation

raents of

Rome or

with the

back on

doned, ai

on the P:

Clement

restore C

course wi

to submit

Pope dar<

long deba

and Cram

of Canter]

the marric

primate at

^oleyn the

As yet t]

disguised

negotiatioi

final de-isi

on the seri

whole cha

Henry's tit

to have bee

policy by

the throne.

in the strife

for the gre

defined. 1

taken, acce

Church of E

Imperial Cr

honours, jui

to the said e

reform, and

enormities,

'night or ms

astical, as w

spiritual" b

courts at We

was only se

CHAP.

Who-
ire we

lurch"

arning

ore as

rtainly

plainly

King's

settle-
; Lords
y," the
:s." If
gement
on will
larsh of
his dis-
ce gave
he Pope
ti which
ew from
ank was
ad been
:emporal
le organ
lout the
It. The
^ar, was

national
of the

foreign

ime had
power,
in the

jvereign

lim this
import

le of the
King's

re of the
of God

I well the

[ought to
:ized by

Ihe same

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

unsparing fashion. The Parliament forbade by statute any further
appeals to the Papal Court ; and on a petition from the clergy in Con-
vocation the Houses granted power to the King to suspend the pay-
ments of first-fruits, or the year's revenue which each bishop paid to
Rome on his election to a see. All judicial, all financial connexion
with the Papacy was broken by these two measures. Cromwell fell
back on Wolsey's policy. The hope of aid from Charles was aban-
doned, and by a new league with France he sought to bring pressure
on the Papal court. But the pressure was as unsuccessful as before.
Clement threatened the King with excommunication if he did not
restore Catharine to her place as Queen and abstain from all inter-
course with Anne Boleyn till the case was tried. Henry still refused
to submit to the judgement of any court outside his realm ; and the
Pope dared not consent to a trial within it. Henry at last closed the
long debate by a secret union with Anne Boleyn. Warham was dead,
and Cranmer, an active partizan of the divorce, was named to the see
of Canterbury ; proceedings were at once commenced in his court ; ant',
the marriage of Catharine was formally declared invalid by the new
primate ut Dunstable. A week later Cranmer set on the brow of Anne
Boleyn the crown which she had so long coveted.

As yet the real character of Cromwell's ecclesiastical policy had been
disguised by its connexion with the divorce. But though formal
negotiations continued between England and Rome, until Clement's
final decision in Catharine's favour, they had no longer any influence
on the series of measures which in their rapid succession changed the
whole character of the English Church. The acknowledgement of
Henry's title as its Protector and Head was soon found by the clergy
to have been more than a form of words. It was the first step in a
policy by which the Church was to be laid prostrate at the foot of
the throne. Parliament had shown its accordance with the royal will
in the strife with Rome. Step by step the ground had been cleared
for the great Statute by which the new character of the Church was
defined. The Act of Supremacy ordered that the King "shall be
taken, accepted, and reputed the only supreme head on earth of the
Church of England, and shall have and enjoy annexed and united to the
Imperial Crown of this realm as well the title and state thereof as all the
honours, jurisdictions, authorities, immunities, profits and commodities
to the said dignity belonging, with full power to visit, repress, redress,
reform, and amend all such errors, heresies, abuses, contempts, and
enormities, which by any manner of spiritual authority or jurisdiction
might or may lawfully be reformed." Authority in all matters ecclesi-
astical, as well as civil, was vested solely in the Crown. The " courts
spiritual" became as thoroughly the King's courts as the temporal
courts at Westminster. But the full import of the Act of Supremacy
was only seen in the following year, when Henry formally took the

337

f:ii

I-

Sec. VI.

Thomas
Cromwell

1530

1540

^^'

! I'

T/ie Divorce
1533

Act of
Supre-
macy

!<• !;i

1534

»S35

" i]

•1! H

I jH

?.'!

■ill

{■- W-

338

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAP.

Sec. VI.

Thomas
Cromwell

1530

1540

Subjection of
the Bishops

1536

The Dis-
solution
of the
Monas-
teries

title of " on earth Supreme Head of the Church of England," and some
months later Cromwell was raised to the post of Vicar-General or
Vicegerent of the King in all matters ecclesiastical. His title, like
his office, recalled the system of Wolsey ; but the fact that these
powers were now united in the hands not of a priest but of a layman,
showed the new drift of the royal policy. And this policy Cromwell's
position enabled him to carry out with a terrible thoroughness. Or»?
great step towards its realization had already been taken in the statute
which annihilated the free legislative powers of the convocations of the
clergy. Another followed in an Act* which under the pretext of restoring
the free election of bishops turned every prelate into a nominee of the
King. Their election by the chapters of their cathedral churches had
long become formal, and their appointment had since the time of the
Edwards been practically made by the Papacy on the nomination of
the Crown. The privilege of free election was now with bitter ifony
restored to the chapters, but they were compelled on pain of praemunire
to choose the candid? le recommended by the King. This strange ex-
pedient has lasted till the present time ; but its character has wholly
changed with the developement of constitutional rule. The nomination
of bishops has ever since the accession of the Georges passed from the
King in person to the Minister who represents the will of the people.
Practically therefore an English prelate, alone among all the prelates
of the world, is now raised to his episcopal throne by the same popular
election which raised Ambrose to his episcopal chair at Milan. But at
the moment Cromwell's measure reduced the English bishops to
absolute dependence on the Crown. Their dependence would have
been complete had his policy been thoroughly carried out and the
royal power of deposition put in force as well as that of appointment.
As it was Henry could warn the Archbishop of Dublin that if he
persevered in his " proud folly, we be able to remove you again and to
put another man of more virtue and honesty in your place." E/en
Elizabeth in a burst of ill-humour threatened to " unfrock " the Bishop
of Ely. By the more ardent partizans of the Reformation this depen-
dence of the bishops on the Crown was fully recognized. On the death
of Henry the Eighth Cranmer took out a new commission from Edward
for the exercise of his office. Latimer, when the royal policy clashed
with his belief, felt bound to resign the See of Worcester. That the
power of deposition was at a later time quietly abandoned was due not
so much to any deference for the religious instincts of the nation as to
the fact that the steady servility of the bishops rendered its exercise
unnecessary.

Master of Convocation, absolute master of the bishops, Henry had
become master of the monastic orders through the right of visitation
over them which had been transferred by the Act of Supremacy from
the Papacy to the Crown. The religious houses had drawn on them-

[CHAP.

td some
leral or
tie, like
Lt these
layman,
>mwell's
s. One
e statute
ns of the
•estoring
je of the
ches had
le of the
nation of
:ter ii'ony
■aemunire
range ex-
is wholly
)mination
I from the
,e people.
B prelates
le popular
1. But at
ishops to
,uld have
and the
lointment.
:hat if he
in and to
," E»^en
le Bishop
lis depen-
the death
_ Edward
[y clashed
That the
.s due not
ition as to
exercise

Lenry had

(visitation

lacy from

on them-

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

selves at once the hatred of the New Learning and of the Monarchy.
In the early days of the revival of letters Popes and bishops had joined
with princes and scholars in welcoming the diffusion of culture and the
hopes of religious reform. But though an abbot or a prior here or
there might be found among the supporters of the movement, the
monastic orders as a whole repelled it with unswerving obstinacy.
The quarrel only became more bitter as years went on. The keen
sarcasms of Erasmus, the insolent buffoonery of Hutten, were lavished
on the "lovers of darkness" and of the cloister. In England Colet
and More echoed with greater reserve the scorn and invective of their
friends. As an outlet for religious enthusiasm, indeed, monasticism
was practically dead. The friar, now that his fervour of devotion and
his intellectual energy had passed away, had sunk into a mere beggar.
The monks had become mere landowners. Most of their houses were
anxious only to enlarge their revenues and to diminish the number of
those who shared them. In the general carelessness which prevailed
as to the spiritual objects of their trust, in the wasteful management of
their estates, in the indolence and self-indulgence which for the most
part characterized them, the monastic houses simply exhibited the
faults of all corporate bodies which have outlived the work which they
were created to perform. But they were no more unpopular than such
corporate bodies generally are. The Lollard cry for their suppression
had died away. In the north, where some of the greatest abbeys
were situated, the monks were on good terms with the country gentry,
and their houses served as schools for their children ; nor is ihere any
sign of a different feeling elsewhere. But in Cromwell's system there
was no room for either the virtues or the vices of monasticism, for
its indolence and superstition, or for its independence of the throne.
Two royal commissioners therefore were despatched on a general
visitation of the religious houses, and their reports formed a " Black
Book" which was laid before Parliament on their return. It was
acknowledged that about a third of the religious houses, including
the bulk of the larger abbeys, were fairly and decently conducted.
The rest were charged with drunkenness, with simony, and with the
foulest and most revolting crimes. The character of the visitors, the
sweeping nature of their report, and the long debate which followed on
its reception, leaves little doubt that the charges were grossly exagge-
rated. But the want of any effective discipline which had resulted from
their exemption from any but Papal supervision told fatally against
monastic morality even in abbeys 'ike St. Alban's : and the acknow-
ledgement of Warham, as well as the partial measures of suppression
begun by Wolsey, go far to prove that in the smaller houses at least
indolence had passed into crime. But in spite of the cry of " Down
with them " which broke from the Commons as the report was read,
the country was still far from desiring the utter downfall of the

Z 2

339

Sec. VI.

Thomas
Cromwei.i,

1530

1540

1536

;>!

'11

140

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VI.

Thomas
Cromwell

1530

1540

Enslaye-

ment

of the

Oleryy

A rticles of
Religion

1536

monastic system. A long and bitter debate was followed by a com-
promise which suppressed all houses whose incomes fell below £100
a year, and granted their revenues to the Crown ; but the great abbeys
were still preserved intact.

The secular clergy alone remained ; and injunction after injunction
from the Vicar-General taught rector and vicar that they must learn to
regard themselves as mere mouthpieces of the royal will. With the
instinct of genius Cromwell discerned the part which the pulpit, as the
one means which then existed of speaking to the people at large, was
to play in the religious and political struggle that was at hand ; and he
resolved to turn it to the profit of the Monarchy. The restriction of
the right of preaching to priests who received licenses from the Crown
silenced every voice of opposition. Even to those who received these
licenses theological controversy was forbidden ; and a high-handed
process of " tuning the pulpits " by directions as to the subject and
tenor of each special discourse made the preachers at every crisis
mere means of diffusing the royal will. As a first step in this process
every bishop, abbot, and parish priest, was required to preach against
the usurpation of the Papacy, and to proclaim the King as the supreme
Head of the Church on earth. The very topics of the sermon were
carefully prescribed ; the bishops were held responsible for the com-
pliance of the clergy with Ihese orders, and the sheriffs were held
responsible for the compliance of the bishops. It was only when all
possibility of resistance was at an end, when the Church was gagged
and its pulpits turned into mere echoes of Henry's vill, that Cromwell
ventured on his last and crowning change, that of claiming for the
Crown the right of dictating at its pleasure the form of faith and
doctrine to be held and taught throughout the land. A purified
Catholicism such as Erasmus and Colet had dreamed of was now to
be the religion of England. But the dream of the New Learning was
to be wrought out, not by the progress of education and piety, but by
the brute force of the Monarchy. The Articles of Religion, which
Convocation received and adopted without venturing on a protest,
were drawn up by the hand of Henry himself. The Bible and the
three Creeds were laid down as the sole grounds of faith. The Sacra-
ments were reduced from ^ven to three, only Penance being allowed
to rank on an equality with Baptism and the Lord's Supper. The
doctrines of Transubstantiation and Confession were maintained, as
they were also in the Lutheran Churches. The spirit of Erasmus was
seen in the acknowledgement of Justification by Faith, a doctrine for
which the friends of the New Learning, such as Pole and Contarini,
were struggling at Rome itself, in the condemnation of purgatory, of
pardons, and of masses for the dead, in the admission of prayers for
the dead, and in the retention of the ceremonies of the Church without
material change. Enormous as was the doctrinal revolution, not a

:hap.

com-

bbeys

iction
am to
:h the
as the
B, was
mdhe
lion of
Crown
1 these
landed
ct and
r crisis
arocess
against
Lipreme
n were
e com-
re held
hen all
gagged
omwell
for the
ith and
lurified
now to
ng was
but by
., which
[protest,
ind the
Sacra-
illowed
The
ned, as
us was
ine for
Jntarini,
jtory, of
Ters for
irithout
not a

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

murmur broke the assent of Convocation, and the Articles were sent by
the Vicar-General into every county to be obeyed at men's peril. The
policy of reform was carried steadily out by a series of royal injunctions
which followed. Pilgrimages were suppressed ; the excessive number
of holy days diminished ; the worship of images and relics discouraged
in words which seem almost copied from the protest of Erasmus. His
burning appeal for a translation of the Bible which weavers might repeat
at their shuttle and ploughmen sing at their plough received at last a
reply. At the outset of the ministry of Norfolk and More the King
had promised an English version of the scriptures, while prohibiting
the circulation of Tyndale's Lutheran translation. The work however
lagged in the hands of the bishops ; and as a preliminary measure the
Creed, the Lord's Prayer, and the Ten Commandments were now
rendered into English, and ordered to be taught by every schoolmaster
and father of a family to his children and pupils. But the bishops'
version still hung on hand ; till in despair of its appearance a friend of
Archbishop Cranmer, Miles Coverdale, was employed to correct and
revise the translation of Tyndale ; and the Bible which he edited was
published in 1 538 under the avowed patronage of Henry himself. The
story of the royal supremacy was graven on its very title-page. The
new foundation of religious truth was to be regarded throughout
England as a gift, not from the Church, but from the King. It is
Henry on his throne who gives the sacred volume to Cranmer, ere
Cranmer and Cromwell can distribute it to the throng of priests and
laymen below.

The debate on the suppression of the monasteries was the first
instance of opposition with which Cromwell had met, and for some
time longer it was to remain the only one. While the great revolution
which struck down the Church was in progress, England looked silently
on. In all the earlier ecclesiastical changes, in the contest over the
Papal jurisdiction and Papal exactions, in the reform of the Church
courts, even in the curtailment of the legislative independence of the
clergy, the nation as a whole had gone with the King. But from the
enslavement of the clergy, from the gagging of the pulpits, from the
suppression of the monasteries, the bulk of the nation stood aloof.
It is only through the stray depositions of royal spies that we catch a
glimpse of the wrath and hate which lay seething under this silencfe of
a whole people. For the silence was a silence of terror. Before Crom-
well's rise and after his fall from power the reign of Henry the Eighth
witnessed no more than the common tyranny and bloodshed of the time.
But the years of Cromwell's administration form the one period in our
history which deserves the name which men have given to the rule of
Robespierre. It was the English Terror. It was by terror that Crom-
well mastered the King. Cranmer could plead for him at a later time
with Henry as " one whose surety was only by your Majesty, who loved

341

Sbc. VI.

Thomas
Ckomwei.i.

isao

1540

The
Terror

■t

■ ■

■''

iii;

Mf.

''-':'

: H'

I I

i 4

:-tf

;5l

342

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VI.

Thomas
Crumweli.

1530

1540

your Majesty, as I ever thought, no less than God." But the attitude
of Cromwell towards the King was something more than that of abso-
lute dependence and unquestioning devotion. He was " so vigilant to
preserve your Majesty from all treasons," adds the Primate, " that few
could be so secretly conceived but he detected the same from the
beginning." Henry, like every Tudor, was fearless of open danger,
but tremulously sensitive to the slightest breath of hidden disloyalty.
It was on this inner dread that Cromwell based the fabric of his power.
He was hardly secretary before a host of spies were scattered broad-
cast over the land. Secret denunciations poured into the open ear of
I'le minister. The air was thick with tales of plots and conspiracies,
and with the detection and suppression of each Cromwell tightened his
hold on the King. And as it was by terror that he mastered the King,
so it was by terror that he mastered the people. Men felt in England,
to use the figure by which Erasmus paints the time, " as if a scorpion
lay sleeping under every stone." The confessional had no secrets for
Cromwell. Men's talk with their closest friends found its way to his
ear. "Words idly spoken," the murmurs of a petulant abbot, the
ravings of a moon-struck nun, were, as the nobles cried passionately
at his fall, " tortured into treason." The only chance of safety lay in
silence. " Friends who used to write and send me presents," Erasmus
tells us, " now send neither letter nor gifts, nor receive any from any
one, and this through fear." But even the refuge of silence was
r'jsed by a law more infamous than any that has ever blotted the
Statute-book of England. Not only was thought made treason, but
men were forced to reveal their thoughts on pain of their very silence
being punished with the penalties of treason. All trust in the older
bulwarks of liberty was destroyed by a policy as daring as it was un-
scrupulous. The noblest institutions were degraded into instruments
of terror. Though Wolsey had strained the law to the utmost he had
made no open attack on the freedom of justice. If he had shrunk
from assembling Parliaments it was from his sense that they were the
bulwarks of liberty. Under Cromwell the coercion of juries and the
management of judges rendered the courts mere rnouth-pieces of the
royal will : and where even this shadow of justice proved an obstacle
to bloodshed, Parliament was brought into play to pass bill after bill
of attainder. " He shall be judged by the bloody laws he has himself
made," was the cry of the Council at the moment of his fall, and by a
singular retribution the crowning injustice which he sought to intro-
duce even into the practice of attainder, the condemnation of a man
without hearing his defence, was only practised on himself. But ruth-
less as was the Terror of Cromwell it was of a nobler type than the
Terror of France. He never struck uselessly or capriciously, or stooped
to the meaner victims of the guillotine. His blows were effective just
because he chose his victims from among the noblest and the best. If

VI.]

he stru

themos

it was t

blood o

murder

with hi-

few stoi

kindly-I

for a cei

ship whi

of love c

velli had

to a sys

business

" remem

sent dow

King's p]

shall go

absence (

Cromwel]

in the er

woodman

The ch

which Cr<

foremost

policy of

withdraw!

more telli]

must havi

reserve.

rapidly ca

the very li

and jufitic

More inde

gious warr

the success

legal heirs

an oath tc

succession,

Catharine v

had long ki

this oath w

Chelsea whi

he had haw

of Holbein.

:hap.

titude

abso-

ant to

at few

m the

anger,

)yalty.

power.

broad-
ear of

racies,

led his

5 King,

igland,

;orpion

rets for

yr to his

)ot, the

onately

' lay in

Irasmus

om any

ice was

ted the

ion, but
silence

le older
as un-
uments
he had
shrunk
ere the
^nd the
of the
(bstacle
ifter bill
himself
[nd by a
o intro-
a man
lut ruth-
Ihan the
stooped
;ive just
•est. U

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

343

he struck at the Church, it was through the Carthusians, the holiest and
the most renowned of English churchmen. I f he struck at the baronage,
it was through the Courtenays and the I'oles, in whose veins flowed the
blood of kings. If he struck at the New Learning it was through the
murder of Sir Thomas More. But no personal vindictivcness mingled
with his crime. In temper, indeed, so far as we can judge from the
few stories which lingered among his friends, he was a generous,
kindly-hearted man, with pleasant and winning manners which atoned
for a certain awkwardness of person, and with a constancy of friend-
ship which won him a host of devoted adherents. But no touch either
of love or hate swayed him from his course. The student of Machia-
velli had not studied the " Prince" in vain. He had reduced bloodshed
to a system. Fragments of his papers still show us with what a
business-like brevity he ticked off human lives among the casual
"remembrances" of the day. "Item, the Abbot of Reading to be
sent down to be tried and executed at Reading." " Item, to know the
King's pleasure touching Master More." " Item, when Master Fisher
shall go to his execution, and the other." It is indeed this utter
absence of all passion, of all personal feeling, that makes the figure of
Cromwell the most terrible in our history. He has an absolute faith
in the end he is pursuing, and he simply hews his way to it as a
woodman hews his way through the forest, axe in hand.

The choice of his first victim showed the ruthless precision with
which Cromwell was to strike. In the general opinion of Europe the
foremost Englishman of his time was Sir Thomas More. As the
policy of the divorce ended in an open rupture with Rome he had
withdrawn silently from the ministry, but his silent disapproval was
more telling than the opposition of obscurer foes. To Cromwell there
must have been something specially galling in More's attitude of
reserve. The religious reforms of the New Learning were being
rapidly carried out, but it was plain that the man who represented
the very life of the New Learning believed that the sacrifice of liberty
and justice was too dear a price to pay even for religious reform.
More indeed looked on the divorce and re-marriag-e as without reli-
gious warrant, though his faith in the power of Parliament to regulate
the succession made him regard the children of Anne Boleyn as the
legal heirs of the Crown. The Act of Succession, however, required
an oath to be taken by all persons, which not only recognized the
succession, but contained an acknowledgement that the marriage with
Catharine was against Scripture and invalid from the beginning. Henry
had long known More's belief on this point ; and the summons to take
this oath was simply a summons to death. More was at his house at
Chelsea when the summons called him to Lambeth, to the house where
he had bandied fun with Warham and Erasmus or bent over the easel
of Holbein. For a moment there may have been some passing impulse

Sue. VI.

'I'llOMAH

('kumwki.i.
1530

1S40

- !"!

: !

I' * i'

i' 'A

I .(iff

The

Death of

y:;M

1534

)

.^1

344

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VI.

Thomas
Cromwkm.

1530

1640

Tite
Carthusiam

to yield. Hut it was soon over. " I thank the Lord," More said with
a sudden start as the boat dropped silently down the river from his
garden steps in the early morning, " I thank the Lord that the field is
won." Cranmcr and his fellow commissioners tendered to him the
new oath of allegiance ; but, as they expected, it was refused. They
bade him walk in the garden that he might reconsider his reply. The
day was hot and More seated himself in a window from which
he could look down into the crowded court. ICven in the presence
of death, the quick sympathy of his nature could enjoy the humour
and life of the throng below. " I saw," he said afterwaids, " Master
Latimer very merry in the court, for he laughed Jind took one or
twain by the neck so handsomely that if they had been women
I should have weened that he waxed wanton." The crowd below was
chiefly of priests, rectors and vicars, pressing to take the oath that
More found harder than death. He bore them no grudge for it. When
he heard the voice of one who was known to have boggled hard at
the oath a little while before calling loudly and ostentatiously for drink,
he only noted him with his peculiar humour. " He drank," More
supposed, " either from dryness or from gladness," or " to show quod
ille notus erat Pontifici." He was called in again at last, but " only
repeated his refusal It was in vain that Cranmer plied him with dis-
tinctions which perplexed even the subtle wit of the ex-chancellor ; he
remained unshaken and passed to the Tower. He was followed there
by Bishop Fisher of Rochester, charged with countenancing treason by
listening to the prophecies of a fanatic called the " Nun of Kent." For
the moment even Cromwell shrank from their blood. They remained
prisoners while a new and more terrible engine was devised to crush
out the silent but widespread opposition to the religious changes. By
a statute passed at the close of 1534 a new treason was created in the
denial of the King's titles ; and in the opening of 1535 Henry assumed,
as we have seen, the title of " on earth supreme Head of the Church of
England." In the general relaxation of the religious life the charity and
devotion of the brethren of the Charter-house had won the reverence
even of those who condemned monasticism. After a stubborn resist-
ance they had acknowledged the royal Supremacy, and taken the oath
of submission prescribed by the Act. But by an infamous construc-
tion of the statute which made the denial of the Supremacy treason,
the refusal of satisfactory answers to official questions as to a con-
scientious belief in it was held to be equivalent to open denial. The
aim of the new measure was well known, and the brethren prepared
to die. In the agony of waiting enthusiasm brought its imaginative
consolations ; " when the Host was lifted up there came as it were a
whisper of air which breathed upon our faces as we knelt ; and there
came a sweet soft sound of music." They had not long however to
wait. Their refusal to answer was the signal for their doom. Three

CHAP.

d with
m his
field is
m the
They
The
which
esence
mmour
Master
one or
women
ow was
,th that
. When
hard at
>r drink,
," More
>w quod
)ut ■ only
vith dis-
illor ; he
,ed there
eason by
For
emained
to crush
jes. By
d in the
issumed,
hurch of
irity and
iverence
n resist-
the oath
onstruc-
treason,
a con-
.1. The
►repared
iginative
[t were a
id there
ever to
Three

vi.l

THE NEW MONARCHY.

345

of the brethren went to the gallows ; the rest were flung into Newgate,
chained to posts in a noisome dungeon where, "tied and not able to
stir," they were left to perish of gaol-fcvcr and starvation. In a
fortnight five were dead and the rest at the point of death, "almost
despatched," Cromwell's envoy wrote to him, " by the hand of (iod, of
which, considering their behaviour, I am not sorry." The interval of
imprisonment had failed to break the resolution of More, and the new
statute sufficed to bring him to the block. With Fisher he was con-
victed of denying the King's title as only supreme head of the Church.
The old Bishop approached the block with a book of the New Testa-
ment in his hand. He opened it at a venture ere he knelt, and read,
" This is life eternal to know Thee, the only true God." Fisher's death
was soon fodowed by that of More. Cn the eve of the fatal blow he
moved his beard carefully from the block. " Pity that should be cut,"
he was heard to mutter with a touch of the old sad irony, " that has
never committed treason."

But it required, as Cromwell well knew, heavier blows even than
these to break the stubborn resistance of Englishmen to his projects
of change, and he seized his opportunity in the revolt of the North.
In the north the monks had been popular ; and the outrages with
which the dissolution of the monasteries was accompanied gave point
to the mutinous feeling that prevailed through the country. The nobles
too were writhing beneath the rule of one whom they looked upon as
a low-born upstart. " The world will never mend," Lord Hussey was
heard to say, " till we fight for it." Agrarian discontent and the love
of the old religion united in a revolt which broke out in Lincolnshire.
The rising was hardly suppressed when Yorkshire was in arms. From
every parish the farmers marched with the parish priest at their head
upon York, and the surrender of the city determined the waverers.
In a few days Skipton Castle, where the Earl of Cumberland held out
with a handful of men, was the only spot north of the H umber which
remained true to the King. Durham rose at the call of Lords Latimer
and Westmoreland. Though the Earl of Northumberland feigned
sickness, the Percies joined the revolt. Lord Dacre, the chief of the
Yorkshire nobles, surrendered Pomfret, and was at once acknowledged
as their chief by the insurgents. The whole nobility of the north
were now in arms, and thirty thousand *' tall men and well horsed"
moved on the Don, demanding the reversal of the royal policy, a re-
union with Rome, the restoration of Catharine's daughter, Mary, to
her rights as heiress of the Crown, redress for the wrongs done to the
Church, and above all the driving away of base-born counsellors, in
other words the fall of Cromwell. Though their advance was checked
by negotiation, the organization of the revolt went steadily on throi ^h-
out the winter, and a Parliament of the North gathered at Pomfret,
and fornially adopted the demands of the insurgents, Only six

Sec. VI.

Thomai
Cromwell

1630

l.»40

Cromwell
and the
Nobles

The
Pilgriiuagt ' '
of Grace

»S36

I jit;

i' K

■m

346

Skc. VI.

Thomas
Cromwei.i.

1530

1540

1537

153S

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

thousand men under Norfolk barred their way southward, and the
Midland counties were known to be disaffected. Cromwell, however,
remained undaunted by the peril. lie suffered Norfolk to negotiate ;
and allowed Henry under pressure from his Council to promise pardon
and a free rarliamcnt at York, a pledge which Norfolk and Dacre
alike construed into an acceptance of the demands made by the in-
surgents. Their leaders at once Hung aside the badge of the Five
Wounds which they had worn, with a cry " We will wear no badge but
that of our Lord the King," and nobles and farmers dispersed to their
homes in triumph. Jiut the towns of the North were no sooner garri-
soned and Norfolk's army in the heart of Yorkshire than the veil was
flung aside. A few isolated outbreaks gave a pretext for the with-
drawal of every concession. The arrest of the leaders of the " Pil-
grimage of Grace," as the insurrection was styled, was followed by
ruthless severities. The country was covered with gibbets. Whole
districts were given up to military execution, liut it was on the leaders
of the rising that Cromwell's hand fell heaviest. He seized his oppor-
tunity for dealing at the northern nobles a fatal blow. " Cromwell,"
one of the chief among them broke fiercely out as he stood at 'he
Council board, "it is thou that art the very special and chief cause of
all this rebellion and wickedness, and dost daily travail to bring us to
our ends and strike off our heads. I trust that ere thou die, though
thou wouldst procure .M the noblest heads within the realm to be
stricken off, yet there shall one head remain that shall strike oft thy
head." lUit the warning was unheeded. Lord Darcy, who stood first
among the nobles of Yorkshire, and Lord Hussey, who stood first
among the nobles of Lincolnshire, went alike to the block. Tha Abbot
of Barlings, who had ridden into Lincoln with his canons in full
armour, swung with his brother Abbots of Whalley, Woburn, and
.Sawley from the gallows. The Abbots of Fountains and of Jervaulx
were hanged at Tyburn side by side with the representative of the great
line of Percy. Lady Bulmer was burnt at the stake. Sir Robert
Constable was hanged in chains before the gate of Hull. The blow to
the north had not long been struck when Cromwell turned to deal with
the west. The opposition to his system gathered above all round two
houses who represented what yet lingered of Yorkist tradition, the
Courtenays and the Poles. Margaret, the Countess of Salisbury, a
daughter of the Duke of Clarence by the heiress of the Earl of War-
wick, was at once representative of the Nevilles and a niece of Edward
the Fourth. Her third son, Reginald Pole, after refusing the highest
offers from Henry as the price of his approval of the divorce, harl
taken refuge in Rome, where he had bitterly attacked the King in a
book on "The Unity of JtliQ^. Church." "There may be found ways
enough in Italy," Cromwell wrote to him in significant words, " to rid
a treacherous subject. When Justice can take no place by process of

VI.]

THE NEW MONARCHY.

347

law at home, sometimes she may be enforced to take new means
abroad." JUit he had left hostages in Henry's liands. " Pity that the
folly of one witless fool should be the ruin of so great a family. Let
him follow ambition as fast as he can, those that little have offended
(saving that he is of their kin), were it not for the great mercy and
benignity of the prince, should and might feel wi at it is to have a
traitor as their kinsman." Pole answered l)y pressing the Emperor to
execute a bull of excommunication and dei)osition which was now
launched by the Papacy. Cromwell was quick with his reply.
Courtenay, the Marquis of Exeter, was a kinsman of the Poles, aixl
like them of royal blood, a grandson through his mother of Edward
the Fourth. He was known to have bitterly denounced the " knaves
that ruled about the King; " and his threats to "give them some day
a buffet " were formidable in the mouth of one whose influence in the
western counties was supreme. He was at once arrested with Lord
Montacute, Pole's elder brother, on a charge of treason, and both were
beheaded on Tower Hill, while the Countess of Salisbury was attainted
and sent to the Tower.

Never indeed had Cromwell shown such greatness as in his last
struggle against Fate, "lieknaved" by the King whose confidence
in him waned as he discerned the full meaning of the religious changes,
met too by a growing opposition in the Council as his favour declined,
the temper of the man remained indomitable as ever. He stood
absolutely alone. Wolsey, hated as he had been by the nobles, hud
been supported by the Church ; but Churchmen hated Cromwell with
an even fiercer hite than the nobles themselves. His only friends
were the Protestants, and their friendship was more fatal than the
hatred of his foes. liut he Shewed no signs of fear or of halting in the
course he had entered on. His activity was as boundless as ever.
Like Wolsey he had concentrated in his hands the whole administra-
tion of the state ; he was at once foreign minister and home minister
and Vicar-General of the Church, the creator of a new fleet, the
organizer of armies, the president of the terrible Star Chamber. But
his Italian indifference to the mere show of power contrasted strongly
with the pomp of the Cardinal. His personal habits were simple and
unostentatious. If he clutched at money, it was to feed the vast army
of spies whom he maintained at his own expense, and whose work he
surveyed with a sleepless vigilance. More than fifty volumes still
remain of the gigantic mass of his correspondence. Thousands of
letters from "poor bedesmen," from outraged wives and wrunged
labourers and persecuted heretics, flowed in to the all-powerful minister
whose system of personal government had turned him into the universal
court of appeal. So long as Henry supported him, however reluctan^^ly,
he was more than a match for his foes. He was strong enough to
expel his chief opponent, Bishop Gardiner of Winchester, from the

Skc. VI.
Thomas

CKUMWiil.l.

1530

1540

•539

The Fall
of Crom-
well

■( ]< I

ifl

'^■i i

348

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

Sec. VI.
Thomas

CrO IWELL

1530

1540

1538

1540

[chap.

June 1540

July

royal Council. He met the hostility of the nobles with a threat
which marked his power. " If the lords would handle him so, he
would give them such a breakfast as never was made in England, and
that the proudesc of them should know." His single will forced on a
scheme of foreign policy whose aim was to bind England to the cause
of the Reformation while it bound Henry helplessly to his minister.
The daring boast which his enemies laid afterwards to his charge,
whether uttered or not, is but the expression of his system. "In brief
time he would bring things to such a pass that the King with all his
power should not be able to hinder him." His plans rested, like the
plan which proved fatal to Wolsey, on a fresh marriage of his master.
The short-lived royalty of Anne Boleyn had ended in charges of
adultery and treason, and in her death in May, 1536. Her rival and
successor in Henry's affections, Jane Seymour, died next year in child-
birth ; and Cromwell replaced her with a German consort, Anne of
Cleves, a sister-in-law of the Lutheran elector of Saxony. He dared
even to resist Henry's caprice, when the King revolted on their first
interview at the coarse features and unwieldy form of his new bride.
For the moment Cromwell had brought matters " to such a pass " that
it was impossible to recoil from the marriage. The marriage of Anne
of Cleves, however, was but the first step in a policy which, had it been
carried out as he designed it, would have anticipated the triumphs of
Richelieu. Charles and the House of Austria could alone bring about
a Catholic reaction strong enough to arrest and roll back the Re-
formation : and Cromwell was no sooner united with the princes of
North Germany than he sought to league them with France for the
overthrow of the Emperor. Had he succeeded, the whole face of
Europe would have been changed. Southern Germany would have
been secured for Protestantism, and the Thirty Years War averted.
He failed as men fail who stand ahead of their age. The German
princes shrank from a contest with the Emperor, France from a
struggle which would be fatal to Catholicism ; and Henry, left alone
to bear the resentment of the House of Austria and chained to a wife
he loathed, turned savagely on Cromwell. The nobles sprang on him
with a fierceness that told of their long-hoarded hate. Taunts and
execrations burst from the Lords at the Council table, as the Duke of
Norfolk, who had been charged with the minister's arrest, tore the
ensign of the Garter from his neck. At the charge of treason Cromwell
flung his cap on the ground with a passionate cry of despair. ." This
then," i»e exclaimed, " is my guerdon for the services I have done \
On your consciences, I ask you, am I a traitor } " Then with a sudden
sense that all was over he bade his foes "make quick work, and not
leave me to languish in prison." Quick work was made, and a yet
louder burst of popular applause than that which hailed the attainder
of Cromwell hailed his execution,

VII.]

•m

[chap.

1 thi'eat
a so, he
and, and
:ed on a
he cause
minister.
i charge,
' In brief
h all his
, like the
s master,
larges of
rival and
: in child-
, Anne of
He dared
their first
ew bride.
Dass " that
e of Anne
ad it been
lumphs of
ring about
k the Re-
princes of
ce for the
e face of
3uld have
averted.
German
:e from a
left alone
I to a wife
ig on him
aunts and
e Duke of
, tore the
Cromwell
r. "This
,ve done!
a sudden
, and not
,nd a yet
attainder

vii.]

THE REFORMATION.

^^^ I '! ' m

CHAPTER VII.
THE REFORMATION.

Section I.— The Protestants. 1540-1553.

[Author ides. — For the lose of Henry's reign and for that of Edward, we
have a mass of material in Strypc's "Memorials," and his hves of Cranmer,
Cheke, and Smith, in Mr. Pocock's edition of •'Burnet's History of the
Reformation," in Hay ward s Life of Edward, and Edward's own Journal,
in Ilolinshed's *' Chronicle," and Machyn's '* Diary" (Camden Society), For
the Protectorate see the correspondence published by Mr. Tytler in his
'"England under Edward VI. and Mary * ; much light is thrown on its close
by Mr. NichoUs in the "Chronicle of Queen Jane" (Camden Society).
Among outer observers, the Venetian Soranzo deals with the Protectorate ;
and the despatches of Giovanni Michiel, published by Mr. Friedmann, with
the events of Mary's reign. In spite of endless errors, of Puritan prejudices
and deliberate suppressions of the truth (many of which will be found corrected
by Dr. Maitland's "Essay on the Reformation,"), its mass of facts and
wonderful charm of style will always give a great importance to the " Book
of Martyrs" of Foxe. The story of the early Protestants has been admirably
wrought up by Mr. Froude (" History of Engiand/ chap, vi.).]

At Cromwell's death the success of his policy was complete The
Monarchy had reached the height of its power. The old liberties of
England lay prostrate at the feet of the King. The Lords were cowed
and spiritless ; the House of Commons was filled with the creatures of
the Court and degraded into an engine of tyranny. Royal proclamations
were taking the place of parliamentary legislation ; benevolences were
encroaching more and more on the right of parliamentary taxation.
Justice was prostituted in the ordinary courts to the royal will, while
the boundless and arbitrary powers of the royal Council were gradii-
aljy superseding the slower processes of the Common Law. The new
religious changes had thrown an almost sacred character over the
"majesty" of the King. Henry was the Head of the Church. From
the primate to the meanest deacon every minister of it derived from
him his sole right to exercise spiritual powers. The voice of its
preachers was the echo of his will. He alone could define orthodoxy
or declare heresy. The forms of its worship and belief were changed
and rechanged at the royal caprice. Half of its wealth went to swell
the royal treasury, and the other half lay at the King's mercy. It was
this unprecedented concentration of all power in the hands of a single
man that overawed the imagination of Henry's subjects. He was re-
garded as something high above the laws which govern common men.

'I :

i t.

i 1 ii

•-It VI

I >'?.

Cromwell

and the
Monarchy

•'1

ni^

ifl

. 'A \

350

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec- I.

Thh Pro-
testants

1540

1553

Cromwell

and the

Parlia-

ment

The voices of statesmen and of priests extolled his wisdom and power
as more than human. The Parliament itself rose and bowed to the
vacant throne when his name was mentioned. An absolute devotion
to his person replaced the old loyalty to the law. When the Primate
of the English Church described the chief merit of Cromwell, it was
by asserting that he loved the King " no less than he loved God."

It was indeed Cromwell, as we have seen, who more than any man
had reared this fabric of king-worship ; but he had hardly reared it
before it began to give way. The very success of his measures indeed
brought about the ruin of his policy. One of the most striking features
of his system had been his revival of Parliaments. The great assembly
which the Monarchy, from Edward the Fourth to Wolsey, had dreaded
and silenced, was called to the front again by Cromwell, and turned into
the most formidable weapon of despotism. He saw nothing to fear in
a House of Lords whose nobles cowered helpless before the might of
the Crown, and whose spiritual members his policy was degrading into
mere tools of the royal will. Nor could he find anything to dread in a
House of Commons which was crowded with members direct'y or in-
directly nominated by the royal Council. With a Parliament such as
this Cromwell might well trust to make the nation itself through its very
representatives an accomplice in the work of absolutism. It was by
parliamentary statutes that the Church was prostrated at the feet of the
Monarchy. It was by bills of attainder that great nobles were brought
to the block. It was under constitutional forms that freedom was
gagged with new treasons and oaths and questionings. But the success
of such a system depended wholly on the absolute servility of Parlia-
ment to the will of the Crown, and Cromwell's own action made the
continuance of such a servility impossible. The part which the Houses
were to play in after years shows the importance of clinging to the
forms of constitutional freedom, even when their life is all but lost. In
the inevitable reaction against tyranny they furnish centres for the
reviving energies of the people, while the returning tide of liberty is
enabled through their preservation to flow quietly and naturally along
its traditional channels. On one occasion during Cromwell's own rule
a " great debate " on the suppression of the lesser monasteries showed
that elements of resistance still survived ; and these elemenls developed
rapidly as the power of the Crown declined under the minority of
Edward and the unpopularity or Mary. To this revival of a spirit of
independence the spoliation of the Church largely contributed. Partly
from necessity, partly from a desire to build up a faction interested in
the maintenance of their ecclesiastical policy, Cromwell and the King
squandered the vast mass of wealth which flowed into the Treasury with
reckless prodigality. Something like a fifth of the actual land in the
kingdom was in this way transferred from the holding of the Church to
that of nobles and gentry. Not only were the older houses enriched,

i- n

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

but a new aristocracy was erected from among the dependants of the
Court. The Russells and the Cavendishes are famiUar instances of
famiUes which rose from obscurity through the enormous grants of
Church-land made to Henry's courtiers. The old baronage was hardly
crushed before a new aristocracy took its place. " Those families within
or without the bounds of the peerage," observes Mr. Hallam, " who are
now deemed the most considerable, will be found, with no great number
of exceptions, to have first become conspicuous under the Tudor line
of kings, and, if we could trace the title of their estates, to have acquired
no small portion of them mediately or immediately from monastic or
other ecclesiastical foundations." The leading part which the new peers
took in the events which followed Henry's death gave a fresh strength
and vigour to the whole order. But the smaller gentry shared in the
general enrichment of the landed proprietors, and the new energy of the
Lords was soon followed by a display of fresh political independence
among the Commons themselves.

But it was above all in the new energy which the religious spirit of
the people at large drew from the ecclesiastical changes which he
had brought about, that the policy of Cromwell was fatal to the
Monarchy. Lollardry, as a great social and popular movement, had
ceased to exist, and little remained of the directly religious impulse
given by Wyclif beyond a vague restlessness and discontent with the
system of the Church. But weak and fitful as was the life of Lollardry,
the prosecutions whose records lie scattered over the bishops' registers
failed wholly to kill it. We see groups meeting here and there to read
" in a great book of heresy all one night certain chapters of the Evan-
gelists in English," while transcripts of Wyclif s tracts passed from
hand to hand. The smouldering embers needed but a breath to fan
them into flame, and the breath came from William Tyndale. He
had passed from Oxford to Cambridge to feel the full impulse given by
the appearance there of the New Testament of Erasmus. From that
moment one thought was at his heart. " If God spare my life," he
said to a learned controversialist, " ere many years I will cause a boy
that driveth the plough shall know more of the scripture than thou
dost." But he was a man of forty before his dream became fact.
Drawn from his retirement in Gloucestershire by the news of Luther's
protest at Wittemberg, he found shelter for a time in London, and
then at Hamburg, before he found his way to the little town which had
suddenly become the sacred city of the Reformation. Students of all
nations were flocking there with an enthusiasm which resembled that
of the Crusades. " As they came in sight of the town," a contemporary
tells us, " they returned thanks to God with clasped hands, for from
Wittemberg, as heretofore from Jerusalem, the light of evangelical
truth had spread to the utmost parts of the earth." In 1525 his version
of the New Testament was completed. Driven from Koln, he had to

351 : \

|| ^^^H

' ' -,' ''^^H

Sec. I.

': ill .i'l ''' '^1

The'Pro-

TESTANTS «

1540 f

iL,Ui*i. . '^^1

RMH '''N'I

Ptm 11 i''^l

1553

' /' * '^BS

^W' l'"M

r , ' ' '' i '-'-' ^1

'1'

||i-i,|

HK 1',

The Pro-

I !. '-■*';• \ J

^•1

testants j

'r-i • ■

'li

jf^^^-i^

; '\

lr:!i:::i.-i

«1
^.1

; ;, ', ,;',

• '■ ' ~-'/!

'ft!

, -;S

;

' ^

.. ; :1'

r.i

\
■ \

1525

352

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. I.

The Pro-
testants

1540

1653

1528

Iifttimer

1490

fly with his sheets to Worms, from whence six thousand copies of the
New Testament were sent to English shores. But it was not as a
mere translation of the Bible that Tyndale's work reached England.
It came as a part of the Lutheran movement ; it bore the Lutheran
stamp in its version of ecclesiastical words ; it came too in company
with Luther's bitter invectives and reprints of the tracts of Wyclif.
It was denounced as heretical, and a pile of books was burned before
Wolsey in St. Paul's Churchyard. Bibles and pamphlets however
were smuggled over to England and circulated among the poorer and
trading classes through the agency of an association of " Christian
Brethren," consisting principally of London tradesmen and citizens,
but whose missionaries spread over the country at large. They found
their way at once to the Universities, where the intellectual impulse
given by the New Learning was quickening religious speculation.
Cambridge had already won a name for heresy, and the Cambridge
scholars whom Wolsey introduced into Cardinal College which he was
founding spread the contagion through Oxford. A group of " Brethren "
which was formed in Cardinal College for the secret reading and dis-
cussion of the Epistles soon included the more intelligent and learned
scholars of the University. It was in vain that Clark, the centre of
this group, strove to dissuade fresh members from joining it by warn-
ings of the impending dangers. " I fell down on my knees at his feet,"
says one of them, Anthony Dalaber, " and with tears and sighs be-
sought him that for the tender mercy of God he should not refuse me,
saying that I trusted verily that He who had begun this an me would
not forsake me, but would give me grace to continue therein to Ihe
end. When he heard me say so he came to me, took me in his arms,
and kissed me, saying, * The Lord God Almighty grant you so to do,
and from henceforth ever take me for your father, and I will take
you for my son in Christ.'" The excitement which followed
on this rapid diffusion of Tyndale's works forced Wolsey to more
vigorous action ; many of the Oxford Brethren were thrown into
prison and their books seized. But in spite of the panic of the
Protestants, some of whom fled over sea, little severity was really
exercised; and Wolsey remained steadily indifferent to all but
political matters.

Henry's chief anxiety, indeed, was lest in the outburst against heresy
the interest of the New Learning should suffer harm. This was
remarkably shown in the protection he extended to one who was
destined to eclipse even the fame of Colet as a popular preacher.
Hugh Latimer was the son of a Leicestershire yeoman, whose armour
the boy had buckled on ere he set out to m^et the Cornish insurgents
at Blackhealh field. He has himself described the soldierly training
of his youth. " My father was delighted to teach me to shoot with the
bow. He taught me how to draw, how to lay my body to the bow.

Vll.'j

THE REFORMATION.

353

not to draw with strength of arm as other nations do, but with the
strength of the body." At fourteen he was at Cambridge, flinging
himself into the New Learning which was winning its way there with
a zeal which at last told on his physical strength. The ardour of his
mental efforts left its mark on him in ailments and enfeebled health,
from which, vigorous as he was, his frame never wholly freed itself.
But he was destined to be known, not as a scholar, but as a preacher.
The sturdy good sense of the man shook off the pedantry of the
schools as well as the subtlety of the theologian in his addresses from
the pulpit. He had little turn for speculation, and in the religious
changes of the day we find him constantly lagging behind his brother
reformers. But he had the moral earnestness of a Jewish prophet,
and his denunciations of wrong had a prophetic directness and
fire. " Have pity on your soul," he cried to Henry, " and think that
the day is even at hand when you shall give an account of your
office, and of the blood that hath been shed by your sword." His
irony was yet more telling than his invective. " I would ask you a
strange question," he said once at Paul's Cross to a ring of Bishops,
" who is the most diligent prelate in all England, that passeth all the
rest in doing of his office ? I will tell you. It is the Devil ! of all
the pack of them that have cure, the Devil shall go for my money ;
for he ordereth his business. Therefore, you unpreaching prelates,
learn of the Devil to be diligent in your office. If you will not learn
of God, for shame learn of the Devil." But he was far from limiting
himself to invective. His homely humour breaks in with story and
apologue ; his earnestness is always tempered with good sense ; his
plain and simple style quickens with a shrewd mother-wit. He talks
to his hearers as a man talks to his friends, telling stories such as we
have given of his own life at home, or chatting about the changes and
chances of the day with a transparent simplicity and truth that raises
even his chat into grandeur. His theme is always the actual world
about him, and in his homely lessons of loyalty, of industry, of pity
for the poor, he touches upon almost every subject, from the plough
to the throne. No such preaching had been heard in England before
his day, and with the growth of his fame grew the danger of perse-
cution. There were moments when, bold as he was, Latimer's heart
failed him. " If I had not trust that God will help me," he wrote
once, " I think the ocean sea would have divided my lord of London
and me by this day." A\itation for heresy at last brought the danger
home. " I intend," he wrote with his peculiar medley of humour and
pathos, " to make merry with my parishioners this Christmas, for all
the sorrow, lest perchance I may never return to them again." But
he was saved throughout by the steady protection of the Court.
Wolsey upheld him against the threats of the Bishop of Ely ; Heniy
made him his own chaplain ; and the King's interposition at this

A A

Sec. I.

The Pro-
testants

1540

1553

• -^'i'li

i ?■' J

354

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

tCHAP.

Sbc. I.

The Pro*
tbstants

1540

1553

Orom-
Tvell and
the Pro-
testants

1536

1538

critical moment forced Latimer's judges to content themselves with a
few vague words of submission.

Henry's quarrel with Rome saved the Protestants from the keener
persecution which troubled them after Wolsey's fall. The divorce,
the renunciation of the Papacy, the degradation of the clergy, the
suppression of the monasteries, the religious changes, fell like a series
of heavy blows upon the priesthood. From persecutors they suddenly
sank into men trembling for their very lives. Those whom they had
threatened were placed at their head. Cranmer became Primate ;
Shaxton, a favourer of the new changes, was raised to the see of
Salisbury ; Barlow, a yet more extreme partizan,to that of St. David's ;
Hilsey to that of Rochester ; Goodrich to that of Ely ; Fox to that of
Hereford. Latimer himself became Bishop of Worcester, and in a
vehement address to the clergy in Convocation taunted them with
their greed and superstition in the past, and with their inactivity when
the King and his Parliament were labouring for the revival of religion.
The aim of Cromwell, as we have seen, was simply that of the New
Learning ; he desired religious reform rather than revolution, a simpli-
fication rather than a change of doctrine, the purification of worship
rather than the introduction of a new ritual. But it was impossible to
strike blow after blow at the Church without leaning instinctively to
the party who sympathized with the German reformation, and were
longing for a more radical change at home. Few as these ** Luther-
ans " or " Protestants " still were in numbers, their new hopes made
them a formidable force ; and in the school of persecution they had
learned a violence which delighted in outrages on the faith which had
so long trampled them under foot. At the very outset of Cromwell's
changes four Suffolk youths broke into the church at Dovercourt, tore
down a wonder-working crucifix, and burned it in the fields. The
suppression of the lesser monasteries was the signal for a new out-
burst of ribald insult to the old religion. The roughness, insolence,
and extortion of the Commissioners sent to effect it drove the whole
monastic body to despair. Their servants rode along the road with
copes for doublets and tunicles for saddle-cloths, and scattered panic
among the larger houses which were left. Some sold their jewels and
relics to provide for the evil day they saw approaching. Some begged
of their own will for dissolution. It was worse when fresh ordinances
of the Vicar-General ordered the removal of objects of superstitious
veneration. The removal, bitter enough to those whose religion
twined itself around the image or the relic which was taken away, was
yet more embittered by the insults with which it was accompanied.
The miraculous rood at Boxley, which bowed its head and stirred its
eyes, was par?ded from market to market and exhibited as a juggle
before the Court. Images of the Virgin were stripped of their costly
vestments and sent to be publicly burnt at London. Latimer for-

vir.l

THE REFORMATION.

warded to the capital the figure of Our Lady, which he had thrust out
of his cathedral church at Worcester, with rough words of scorn :
" She with her old sister of Walsingham, her younger sister of Ips-
wich, and their two other sisters of Doncaster and Penrice, vould
make a jolly muster at Smithfield." Fresh orders were given to fling
all relics from their reliquaries, and to level every shrine with the
ground. The bones of St. Thomas of Canterbury were torn from the
stately shrine which had been the glory of his metropolitan church,
and his name was erased from the service-books as that of a traitor.
The introduction of the English Bible into churches gave a new open-
ing for the zeal of the Protestants. In spite of royal injunctions that
it should be read decently and without comment, the young zealots of
the party prided themselves on shouting it out to a circle of excited
hearers during the service of mass, and accompanied their reading
with violent expositions. Protestant maidens took the new English
primer to church with them, and studied it ostentatiously during
matins. Insult passed into open violence when the Bishops' Courts
were invaded and broken up by Protestant mobs ; and law and
public opinion were outraged at once when priests who favoured the
new doctrines began openly to bring home wives to their vicarages.
A fiery outburst of popular discussion compensated for the silence of
the pulpits. The new Scriptures, in Henry's bitter words of complaint,
were " disputed, rimed, sung, and jangled in every tavern and ale-
house." The articles which dictated the belief of the English Church
roused a furious controversy. Above all, the Sacrament of the Mass,
the centre of the Catholic system of faith and worship, and which still
remained sacred to the bulk of Englishmen, was attacked with a
scurrility and profaneness which passes belief. The doctrine of
Transubstantiation, which was as yet recognized by law, was held up
to scorn in ballads and mystery plays. In one church a Protestant
lawyer raised a dog in his hands when the priest elevated the Host.
The most sacred words of the old worship, the words of consecra-
tion, " Hoc est corpus," were travestied into a nickname for jugglery
as " Hocus-pocus." It was by this attack on the Mass, even more
than by the other outrages, that the temper both of Henry and the
nation was stirred to a deep resentment ; and the first signs of re-
action were seen in the Act of the Six Articles, which was passed by
the Parliament with g|neral assent. On the doctrine of Transubstan-
tiation, which was re-asserted by the first of these, there was no differ-
ence of feeling or belief between the men of the New Learning and the
older Catholics. But the road to a further instalment of even moderate
reform seemed closed by the five other articles which sanctioned com-
munion in one kind, the celibacy of the clergy, monastic vows, private
masses, and auricular confession. A more terrible feature of the re-
action was the revival of persecution. Burning was renounced as the

A A 2

35S

:!■' I;

Skc. I.

The Pro-
testants

1540

1553

153S

!;!

'.i:*'

' 'I

'^.f.

The Six

A rticles

»539

1 '1

I 1

I? If

i ■ !:■!

ffiV

% 1

35^

HISTORY OF THE i.NGLISM PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. I.

The Pro-
testants

1540

1553

The

Deatb of

Henry

VIII.

penalty for a denial of transubstantiation ; on a second offence it be-
came the penalty for an infraction of the other five doctrines. A
refusal to confess or to attend Mass was made felony. It was in vain
that Cranmer, with the five bishops who partially sympathized with
the Protestants, struggled against the bill in the Lords : the Commons
were " all of one opinion," and Henry himself acted as spokesman on
the side of the Articles. In London alone five hundred Protestants
were indicted under the new act. Latimer and Shaxton were im-
prisoned, and the former forced into a resignation of his see.
Cranmer himself was only saved by Henry's personal favour. But
the first burst of triumph had no sooner spent itself than the strong
hand of Cromwell again made itself felt. Though his opinions re-
mained those of the New Learning and differed little from the
general sentiment represented in the Act, he leaned instinctively to the
one party which did not long for his fall. His wish was to restrain the
Protestant excesses, but he had no mind to ruin the Protestants. The
bishops were quietly released. The London indictments were quashed.
The magistrates were checked in their enforcement of the law, while a
general pardon cleared the prisons of the heretics who had been
arrested under its provisions. A few months after the enactment of
the Six Articles we find from a Protestant letter that persecution had
wholly ceased, " the Word is powerfully preached and books of every
kind may safely be exposed for sale."

At Cromwell's fall his designs seemed to be utterly abandoned. The
marriage with Anne of Cleves was annulled, and a new Queen found
in Catharine Howard, a niece of the Duke of Norfolk. Norfolk him-
self returned to power, and resumed the policy which Cromwell had
interrupted. Like the King he looked to an Imperial alliance rather
than an alliance with Francis and the Lutherans. He still clung to
the dream of the New Learning, to a purification of the Church through
a general Council, and the reconciliation of England with the purified
body of Catholicism. For such a purpose it was necessary to vindicate
English orthodoxy ; and to ally England with the Emperor, by whose
influence alone the assembly of such a Council could be brought about.
To the hotter Catholics indeed, as to the hotter Protestants, the years
after Cromwell's fall seemed years of a gradual return to Catholicism.
There was a slight sharpening of persecution for the Protestants, and
restrictions were put on the reading of the Engjjish Bible. But neither
Norfolk nor-his master desired any rigorous measure of reaction. There
was no thought of reviving the old superstitions, or undoing the work
which had been done, but simply of guarding the purified faith against
Lutheran heresy. The work of supplying men with means of devotion
in their own tongue was still carried on by the publication of an English
Litany and prayers, which furnished the germ of the national Prayer
Book of a later time. The greater abbeys which had been saved by

CHAP.

it be-

!S. A

n vain
id with
■nmons
lan on
estants
;re im-
is see.
•. But
: strong
ons re-
om tlie
y to the
rain the
s. The
[uashed.
, while a
id been
tment of
tion had
of every

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

the energetic resistance of the Parliament in 1536 had in 1539 been
involved in the same ruin with the smaller ; but in spite of this con-
fiscation the treasury was now empty, and by a bill of 1545 more than
two thousand chauntries and chapels, with a hundred and ten hos-
pitals, were suppressed to the profit of the Crown. If the friendship
of England was offered to Charles, when the struggle between France
and the House of Austria burst again for a time into flame, it was
because Henry saw in the Imperial alliance the best hope for the
reformation of the Church and the restoration of unity. But, as Crom-
well had foreseen, the time for a peaceful reform and for a general
reunion of Christendom was past. The Council, so passionately de-
sired, met at Trent in no spirit of conciliation, but to ratify the very
superstitions and errors against which the New Learning had protested,
and which England and Germany had flung away. The long hostility
of France and the House of Austria merged in the greater struggle
which was opening between Catholicism and the Reformation. The
Emperor allied himself definitely with the Pope. As their hopes of
a middle course faded, the Catholic nobles themselves drifted uncon-
sciously with the tide of reaction. Anne Ascue was tortured and burnt
with three companions for the denial of Transubstantiation. Latimer
was examined before the Council ; and Cranmer himself, who in the
general dissolution of the moderate party was drifting towards Pro-
testantism as Norfolk was drifting towards Rome, was for a moment
in danger. But at the last hours of his life Henry proved himself true
to the work he had begun. His resolve not to bow to the pretensions
of the Papacy sanctioned at Trent threw him, whether he would or no,
back on the policy of the great minister whom he had hurried to the
block. He offered to unite in a " League Christian" with the German
Princes. He consented to the change, suggested by Cranmer, of the
Mass into a Communion Service. He flung the Duke of Norfolk into
the Tower as a traitor, and sent his son, the Earl of Surrey, to the
block. The Earl of Hertford, the head of the " new men," and known
as a patron of the Protestants, came *o the front, and was appointed
one of the Council of Regency which Henry nominated at his
death.

Catharine Howard atoned like Anne Boleyn for her unchastity by a
traitor's death ; her successor on the throne, Catharine Parr, had the
luck to outlive the King. But of Henry's numerous marriages only
three children survived ; Mary and Elizabeth, the daughters of
Catharine of Aragon and of Anne Boleyn ; and Edward, the boy who
now ascended the throne as Edward the Sixth, his son by Jane
Seymour. As ^ iward was but nine years old, Henry had appointed
a carefully bal tnced Council of Regency ; but the will fell into the
keeping of Jane's brother, whom he had raised to the peerage as Lord
Hertford, and who at a later time assumed the title of Duke of Somerset.

357

Sec. I.

Thk Pro-
testants

1540

1553

1543

I i!

154.')

Death oj
Henry \
Jan. 1547 j

Somerset'

^■^

1 ' '

HI , : if

) ..I

it Jilt

ii.

i,t

^va?

»h .-^ U
%:■■■ -n'-.

358

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. I.

The Pro-
testants

1640

1553

The
Common
Prayer

1548

1549

When the list of regents was at last disclosed Gardiner, who had till
now been the leading minister, was declared to have been excluded
from it ; and Hertford seized the whole royal power with the title of
Protector. H is personal weakness forced him at once to seek for popular
supoort by measures which marked the first retreat of the Monarchy
from the position of pure absolutism which it had reached under Henry.
The Statute which had given to royal proclamations the force of law
was repealed, and several of the new felonies and treasons which Crom-
well had created and used with so terrible an effect were erased from
the Statute Book. The hope of support from the Protestants united
with Hertford's personal predilections in his patronage of the innova-
tions against which Henry had battled to the last. Cranmer had now
drifted into a purely Protestant position ; and his open break with the
older system followed quickly on Hertford's rise to power. " This
year," says a contemporary, " the Archbishop of Canterbury did eat
meat openly in Lent in the Hall of Lambeth, the like of which was never
seen since England was a Christian country." This significant act was
followed by a rapid succession of sweeping changes. The legal pro-
hibitions of LoUardry were removed ; the Six Articles were repealed ;
a royal injunction removed all pictures and images from the churches ;
priests were permitted to marry; the new Communion which had taken
the place of the Mass was ordered to be administered in both kinds,
and in the English tongue ; an English book of Common Prayer, the
Liturgy which with slight alterations is still used in the Church of
England, replaced the Missal and Breviary from which its contents are
mainly drawn. Thece sweeping religious changes were carried through
with the despotism, if not with the vigour, of Cromwell. Gardiner, who
in his acceptance of the personal supremacy of the sovereign denounced
all ecclesiastical changes made during the King's minority as illegal
and invalid, was sent to the Tower. The power of preaching was
restricted by the issue of licences only to the friends of the Primate.
While all counter arguments were rigidly suppressed, a crowd of Pro-
testant pamphleteers flooded the country with vehement invectives
against the Mass and its superstitious accompaniments. The assent of
noble and landowner was won by the suppression of chauntries and
religious gilds, and by glutting their greed with the last spoils of the
Church. German and Italian mercenaries were introduced to stamp
out the wider popular discontent which broke out in the east, in the
west, and in the midland counties. The Cornishmen refused to receive
the new service " because it is like a Christmas game." Devonshire
demanded in open revolt the restoration of the Mass and the Six
Articles. The agrarian discontent, now heightened by economic
changes, woke again in the general disorder. Twenty thousand men
gathered round the " oak of Reformation" near Norwich, and repulsing
the royal troops in a desperate ergagement renewed the old cries

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

359

for he removal of evil counsellors, a prohibition of enclosurea, and
redress for the grievances of the poor.

Revolt was stamped out in blood ; but the weakness which the
Protector had shown in presence of the danger, his tampering with
popular demands, and the anger of the nobles at his resolve to enforce
the laws against enclosures and evictions, ended in his fall. He was
forced by the Council to resign, and his power passed to the Earl of
Warwick, to whose ruthless severity the suppression of the revolt was
mainly due. But the changeof governors brought about no change of sys-
tem. The rule of the upstarl nobles who formed the Council of Regency
became simply a rule of terror. " The greater part of the people,"
one of their creatures, Cecil, avowed, " is not in favour of defending
this cause, but of aiding its adversaries ; on that side arc the greater
part of the nobles, who absent themselves from Court, all the bishops
save three or four, almost all the judges and lawyers, almost all the
justices of the peace, the priests who can move their flocks any way,
for the whole of the commonalty is in such a state of irritation that it
will easily follow any stir towards change." But, heedless of danger
from without or from within, Cranmer and his colleagues advanced
yet more boldly v. the career of innovation. Four prelates who
adhered to the older system were deprived of their sees and committed
on frivolous pretexts to the Tower. A new Catechism embodied the
doctrines of the reformers ; and a Book of Homilies, which enforced
the chief Protestant tenets, was appointed to be read in churches. A
crowning defiance was given to the doctrine of the Mass by an order
to demolish the stone altars and replace them by wooden tables, which
were stationed for the most part in the middle of the church. A
revised Prayer-book was issued, and every change made in it leaned
directly towards the extreme Protestantism which was at this time
finding a home at Geneva. Forty-two Articles of Religion were intro-
duced ; and though since reduced by omissions to thirty-nine, these
have remained to this day the formal standard of doctrine in the
English Church. The sufferings of the Protestants had failed to
teach them the worth of religious liberty ; and a new code of eccle-
siastical laws, which was ordered to be drawn up by a board of
Commissioners as a substitute for the Canon Law of the Catholic
Church, although it shrank from the penalty of death, attached that of
perpetual imprisonment or exile to the crimes of heresy, blasphemy,
and adultery, and declared excommunication to involve a severance
of the o..ender from the mercy of God, and his deliverance into the
tyranny of the devil. Delays in the completion of this Code prevented
its legal establishment during Edward's reign ; but the use of the new
Liturgy and attendance at the new service was enforced by imprison-
ment, and subscription to the Articles of Faith was demanded by
royal authority from all clergymen, churchwardens, and schoolmasters.

Sic. I.

Thk Pro.
tkstanis

1540

1553

The Pro-
testant
MIs-ruU

ll^'anvic/f't
rrottctorati-

Articles of
Reliction

i».«i

,^:h

J : ,

36o

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Shc. I.

The Pro-
testants

1540

1553

The distaste for changes so hurried and so rigorously enforced was
increased by the daring speculations of the more extreme Protestants.
The real value of the religious revolution of the sixteenth century to
mankind lay, not in its substitution of one creed for another, but in
the new spirit of inquiry, the new freedom of thought and of discussion,
which was awakened during the process of change. But however
familiar such a truth may be to us, it was absolutely hidden from the
England of the time. Men heard with horror that the foundations of
faith and morality were questioned, polygamy advocated, oaths
denounced as unlawful, community of goods raised into a sacred
obligation, the very Godhead of the Founder of Christianity denied.
The repeal of the Statute of Heresy left the powers of the Comr.ion
Law intact, and Cranmer availed himself of these to send heretics of
the last class without mercy to the stake ; but within the Church itself
the Primate's desire for uniformity was roughly resisted by the more
ardent members of his own party. Hoop*^ r, who had been named
Bishop of Gloucester, refused to wear he episcopal habits, and
denounced them as the livery of the " harlot of Babylon," a name for
the Papacy which was supposed to have been discovered in the
Apocalypse. Ecclesiastical order was almost at an end. Priests
flung aside the surplice as superstitious. Patrons of livings presented
their huntsmen or gamekeepers to the benefices in their gift, and kept
the stipend. All teaching of divinity ceased at the Universities : the
students indeed had fallen off in numbers, the libraries were in part
scattered or burnt, the intellectual impulse of the New Learning died
away. One noble measure indeed, the foundation of eighteen
Grammar Schools, was destined to throw a lustre over the name of
Edward, but it had no tiiae to bear fruit in his reign. All that men
saw was religious and political chaos, in which ecclesiastical order
had perished and in which politics were dying down into the squabbles
of a knot of nobles over the spoils of the Church and the Crown. The
plunder of the chauntries and the gilds failed to glut the appetite of
the crew of spoilers. Half the lands of every see were flung to them
in vain : the wealthy see of Durham had been suppressed to satisfy
their greed ; and the whole endowments of the Church were threatened
with confiscation. But while the courtiers gorged themselves with
manors, the Treasury grew poorer. The coinage was again debased.
Crown lands to the value of five millions of our modern money had
been granted away to the friends of Somerset and Warwick. The
royal expenditure had mounted in seventeen years to more than four
times its previous total. It is clear that England must soon have risen
against the misrule of the Protectorate, if the Protectorate had not
fallen by the intestine divisions of the plunderers themselves.

-t)l

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

361

Section IX.— The Martyrs. ^553— 1558.

[Authorities — As before.]

The waning health of Edward warned Warwick, who had now
become Duke of Northumberland, of an unlooked-for drjiger. Mary,
the daughter of Catharine of Aragon, who had been placed next to
Edward by the Act of Succession, remained firm amidst all the changes
of the time to the older faith ; and her accession threatened to be the
signal for its return. But the bigotry of the young King was easily
brought to consent to a daring scheme by which her rights might be
set aside. Edward's " plan," as Northumberland dictated it, annulled
both the Statute of Succession and the will of his father, to whom the
right of disposing of the Crown after the death of his own children had
been entrusted by Parliament. It set aside both Mary and Elizabeth,
who stood next in the Act. With this exclusion of the direct line
of Henry the Eighth the succession would vest, if the rules of here-
ditary descent were observed, in the descendants of his elder sister
Margaret, who had become by her first husband, James the Fourth of
Scotland, the grandmother of the young Scottish Queen, Mary Stuart ;
and, by a second marriage with the Earl of Angus, was the grandmother
of Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley. Henry's will, however, had passed by
the children of Margaret, and had placed next to Elizabeth in the suc-
cession the children of his younger sister Mary, the wife of Charles
Brr^ndon, the Duke of Suffolk. Frances, Mary's child by this marriage,
was still living, and was the mother of three daughters by her marriage
with Grey, Lord Dorset, a hot partizan of the religious changes, who had
been raised under the Protectorate to the Dukedom of Suffolk. Frances
however was passed over, and Edward's " plan " named her eldest child
Jane as his successor. The marriage of Jane Grey w-th Guildford
Dudley, the fourth son of Northumberland, was all that was needed to
complete the unscrupulous plot. The consent of the judges and council
to her succession was extorted by the authority of the dying King, and
the new sovereign was proclaimed on Edward's death. But the temper
of the whole people rebelled against so lawless a usurpation. The
eastern counties rose as one man to support Mary ; and when Northum-
berland marched from London with ten thousand at his back to crush
the rising, the Londoners, Protestant as they were, showed their ill-will
by a stubborn silence. " The people crowd to look upon us," the Duke
noted gloomily, "but not one calls * God speed ye.'" The Council no
sooner saw the popular reaction than they proclaimed Mary Queen ;
the fleet and the levies of the shires declared in her favour. Northumber-
land's courage suddenly gave way, and his retreat to Cambridge was the
signal for a general defection. The Duke himself threw his cap into the
air and shouted with his men forOueen Mary. Buthissubmissionfailed

'^. ■' ■ \

Sec. IL

The
Martyrs

1553

1558

Mar^

uiiife

vHif^"

''Plan" of
succession

1553

Si-

fS!

} ii

362

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.

The
Martvrs

1553

155S

The

Spanis7a

Marriag^e

1554

to avert his doom ; and the death of Northumberland drew with it the
imprisonment in the Tov/er of the hapless girl whom he had made the
tool of his ambition. The whole system which had been pursued during
Edward's reign fell with a sudden crash. London indeed retained much
of its Protestant sympathy, but over the rest of thv« country the tide of
reaction swept without a check. The married priests were driven from
their churches, the images were replaced. In many parishes the new
Prayer-book was set aside and the Mass restored. The Parliament
which met in October annulled the laws made respecting religion during
the past reign. Gardiner was drawn from the Tower. Bonner and the
deposed bishops were restored to their sees. Ridley with the others
who had displaced them were again expelled, and Latimer and Cranmer
were sent to the Tower. But with the restoration of the system of
Henry the Eighth the popular impulse was satisfied. The people had
no more sympathy with Mary's leanings towards Rome than with the
violence of the Protestants. The Parliament was with difficulty brought
CO set aside the new Prayer-book, and clung obstinately to the Church-
lands and to the Royal Supremacy.

Nor was England more favourable to the marriage on which, from
motives both of policy and religious zeal, Mary had set her heart. The
Emperor had ceased to be the object of hope or confidence as a
mediator who would at once purify the Church from abuses and restore
the unity of Christendom : he had ranged himself definitely on the
side of the Papacy and of the Council of Trent ; and the cruelties of
the Inquisition which he introduced into Flanders gave a terrible in-
dication of the bigotry which he was to bequeath to his House. The
marriage with his son Philip, whose hand he offered to his cousin
Mary, meant an absolute submission to the Papacy, and the undoing
not only of the Protestant reformation, but of the more moderate
refornifi of the New Learning. On the other hand, it would have the
political advantage of securing Mary's throne against the pretensions
of the young Queen of Scots, Mary Stuart, who had become formidable
by her marriage with the heir of the French Crown ; and whose
adherents already alleged the illegitimate birth of both Mary and
Elizabeth, through the annulling of their mothers' marriages, as a
ground for denying their right of succession. To the issue of the
marriage he proposed, Charles promised the heritage of the Low
Countries, while he accepted the demand made by Mary's minister,
Bishop Gardiner of Winchester, and by the Council, of complete inde-
pendence both of policy and action on the part of England, in case
of such a union. The temptation was great, and Mary's resolution
overleapt all obstacles. But in spite of the toleration which she had
promised, and had as yet observedj the announcement of her design
drove the Protestants into a panic of despair. Risings which broke
out in the west and centre of the country were quickly put down.

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

36:

and the Duke of Suffolk, who appeared in arms at Leicester, was sent
to the Tower. The danger was far more formidable when the dread
that Spaniards were coming " to conquer the realm " roused Kent into
revolt under Sir Thomas Wyatt. The ships in the Thames submitted
to be seized by the insurgents. A party of the trainbands of London,
who marched under the Duke of Norfolk against them, deserted to
the rebels in a mass with shouts of " A Wyatt ! a Wyatt ! we are all
Englishmen ! " Had the insurgents moved quickly on the capital, its
gates would at once have been flung open and success would have
been assured. But in the critical moment Mary was saved by her
queenly courage. Riding boldly to the Guildhall she appealed with
" a man's voice " to the loyalty of the citizens, and when Wyatt ap-
peared on the Southwark bank the bridge was secured. The issue
hung on the question which side London would take ; and the insur-
gent leader pushed desperately up the Thames, seized a bridge at
Kingston, threw his force across the river, and marched rapidly
back on the capital. The night march along miry roads wearied and
disorganized his men, the bulk of whom were cut off from their leader
by a royal force which had gathered in the fields at what is now
Hyde Park Corner, but Wyatt himself, with a handful of followers,
pushed desperately on to Temple Bar. " I have kept touch," he
cried as he sank exhausted at the gate ; but it was closed, his adherents
within were powerless to effect their promised diversion in his favour,
and the daring leader was seized and sent to the Tower.

The courage of the Queen, who had refused to fly even while the
rebels were marching beneath her palace walls, was only equalled
by her terrible revenge. The hour was come when the Protestants
were at her feet, and she struck without mercy. Lady Jane, her
father, her husband, and her uncle atoned for the ambition of the
House of Suffolk by the death of traitors. Wyatt and his chief ad-
herents followed them to execution, while the bodies of the poorer
insurgents were dangling on gibbets round London. Elizabeth, who had
with some reason been suspected of complicity in the insurrection, was
sent to the Tower ; and only saved from death by the interposition of
the Council. But the failure of the revolt not only crushed the Pro-
testant party, it secured the marriage on which Mary was resolved.
She used it to wring a reluctant consent from the Parliament, and
meeting Philip at Winchester in the ensuing summer became his wife.
The temporizing measures to which the Queen had been forced by the
earlier difficulties of her reign could now be laid safely aside. Mary
was resolved to bring about a submission to Rome ; and her minister
Gardiner fell back on the old ecclesiastical order, as the moderate party
which had supported the policy of Henry the Eighth saw its hopes dis-
appear, and ranged himself definitely on the side of a unity which could
now only be brought about by a reconciliation with the Papacy. The

Sec. II.

The

Martyrs

1553

1558

Is I ;w

;«■

r^i

The Sub-
mission
to Rome

' I

1554

! !l

3^4

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap,

Sec. II.

The
Martyhs

1553

1558

Roi^land
Taylor

Spanish match was hardly concluded, when the negotiations with Rome
were brought to a final issue. The attainder of Reginald Pole, who
had been appointed by the Pope to receive the submission of the realm,
was reversed ; and the Legate, who entered London by the river with
his cross gleaming from the prow of his barge, was solemnly welcomed
by a compliant Parliament. The two Houses decided by a formal vote
to return to the obedience of the Papal See, and received on their knees
the absolution which freed the realm from the guilt incurred by its
schism and heresy. But, even in the hour of her triumph, the temper
both of Parliament and the nation warned the Queen of the failure of
her hope to bind England to a purely Catholic policy. The growing
independence of the two Houses was seen in their rejection of measure
after measure proposed by the Crown. A proposal to oust Elizabeth
from the line of succession could not even be submitted to the Houses,
nor could their assent be won to the postponing of her succession to
that of Philip. Though the statutes abolishing Papal jurisdiction in
England were repealed, they rejected all proposals for the restoration
of Church-lands to the clergy. A proposal to renew the laws against
heresy was thrown out by the Lords, even after the failure of Wyatt's
insurrection, and only Philip's influence secured the re-enactment of
the statute of Henry the Fifth in a later Parliament. Nor was the
temper of the nation at large less decided. The sullen discontent of
London compelled its Bishop, Bonner, to withdraw the inquisitorial
articles by which he hoped to purge his diocese ol heresy. Even the
Council was divided on thi question of persecution, and in the very
interests of Catholicism the Emperor himself counselled prudence and
delay. Philip gave the same counsel. But whether from without or from
within, warning was wasted on the fierce bigotry of the Queen.

It was a moment when the prospects of the party of reform seemed
utterly hopeless. Spain had taken openly the lead in the great
Catholic movement, and England was being dragged, however reluc-
tantly, by the Spanish marriage into the current of reaction. Its
opponents were broken by the failure of their revolt, and unpopular
through the memory of their violence and greed. Now that the laws
against heresy were enacted, Mary pressed for their execution ; and in
1555 the opposition of her councillors was at last mastered, and the
work of death began. But the cause which prosperity had ruined
revived in the dark hour of persecution. If the Protestants had not
known how to govern, they knew how to die. The story of Rowland
Taylor, the Vicar of Hadleigh, tells us more of the work which was
now begun, and of the effect it was likely to produce, than pages of
historic dissertation. Taylor, who as a man of mark had been one of
the first victims chosen for execution, was arrested in London, and
condemned to suffer in his own parish. His wife, " suspecting that her
husband should that night be carried away," had waited through the

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

darkness with her children in the porch of St. Botolph's beside Aldgate.
"Now when the sheriff his company came against St. Botolph's
Church, Elizabeth cried, saying, ' O my dear father ! Mother ! mother !
here is my father led away ! ' Then cried his wife, ' Rowland, Rowland,
where art thou ?' — for it was a very dark morning, that the one could
not see the other. Dr. Taylor answered, ' I am here, dear wife,' and
stayed. The sheriff's men would have led him forth, but the sheriff
said, ' Stay a little, masters, I pray you, and let him spp?> to his wife.'
Then came she to him, and he took his daughter Mary in his arms, and
he and his wife and Elizabeth knelt down and said the Lord's prayer.
At which sight the sheriff wept apace, and so did divers others of the
company. After they had prayed he rose up and kissed his wife and
shook her by the hand, and said, * Farewell, my dear wife, be of good
comfort, for I am quiet in my conscience ! God shall still be a father
to my children.' . . . Then said his wife, ' God be with thee, dear
Rowland ! I will, with God's grace, meet thee at Hadleigh.' ... All
the way Dr. Taylor was merry and cheerful as one that accounted
hhnself going to a most pleasant banquet or bridal. . . . Coming
within two miles of Hadleigh he desired to light off his horse, which
done he '.eaped and set a frisk or twain as men commonly do for
dancing. ' Why, master Doctor,' quoch the Sheriff, ' how do you
now.'*' He answered, 'Well, God be praised, Master Sheriff, never
better ; for now I know I am almost at home. I lack not past two
stiles to go over, and I am even at my Father's house ! ' . . . The
streets of Hadleigh were beset on both sides with men and women of
the town and country who waited to see him ; whom when they beheld
so led to death, with weeping eyes and lamentable voices, they cried,
'Ah, good Lord ! there goeth our good shepherd from us ! '" The journey
was at last over. " ' What place is this,' he asked, ' and what meaneth it
that so much people are gathered together.?' It was answered, ' It is
Oldham Common, the place where you must suffer, and the people are
come to look upon you.' Then said he, ' Thanked be God, I am even
at home !'.... But when the people saw his reverend and ancient
face, with a long white beard, they burst out with weeping tears and
cried, saying, ' God save thee, good Dr. Taylor ; God strengthen thee
and help thee ; the Holy Ghost comfort thee ! ' He wished, but was
not suffered, to speak. When he had prayed, he went to the stake and
kissed it, and set himself into a pitch-barrel whirh they had set for
him to stand on, and so stood with his back uprigh" against the stake,
with his hands folded together and his eyes towards heaven, and so
let himself be burned." One of the executioners " cruelly cast a fagot
at him, which hit upon his head and brake his face that the blood ran
down his visage. Then said Dr. Taylor, ' O friend, I have harm enough
—what needed that.-" " One more act of brutality brought his sufferings
to an end. — " So stood he still without either crying or moving, with his

"\4

365

i-;l:-:1

" «

'Rl

Sec. II.

The
Martyks

1553

1558

( ,■;

nil

1 I

1 1

,1 «

366

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.

The

Martyrs

1553

1558

The
Martyrs

Death of
Latimer

Oct. 1555

hands folded together, till Soyce with a halberd struck nim on the head
that the brains fell out, and the dead corpse fell down into the fire."

The terror of death was powerless against men like these. Bonner,
the Bishop of London, to whom, as Bishop of the diocese in which the
Council sate, its victims were generally delivered for execution, but
who, in spite of the nickname and hatred which his official prominence
in the work of death earned him, seems to have been naturally a good-
humoured and merciful man, asked a youth who was brought before
him whether he thought he could bear the fire. The boy at once held
his hand without flinching in the flame of a candle which stood by.
Rogers, a lellow-worker with Tyndale in the translation of the Bible,
and one of the foremost among the Protestant preachers, died bathing
his hands in the flame " as if it had been in cold water." Even the
commonest lives gleamed for a moment into poetry at the stake.
" Pray for me," a boy, William Hunter, who had been brought home
to Brentwood to suffer, asked of the bystanders. " I will pray no more
for thee," one of them replied, " than I will pray for a dog." " * Then,'
said William, ' Son of God, shine upon me ; ' and immediately the sun
in the elements shone out of a dark cloud so full in his face that he
was constrained io look another way ; whereat the people mused, be-
cause it was so dark a little time before." The persecution fell heavily
on London, and on Kent, Sussex, and the Eastern Counties, the homes
of the mining and manufacturing industries ; a host of Protestants
were driven over sea to find refuge at Strasburg or Geneva. But the
work of terror failed in the very ends for which it was wrought. The
old spirit of insolent defiance, of outrageous violence, was roused again
at the challenge of persecution. A Protestant hung a string of pud-
dings round a priest's neck in derision of his beads. The restored
images were grossly insulted. The old scurrilous ballads were heard
again in the streets. One miserable wretch, driven to frenzy, stabbed
the priest of St. Margaret's as he stood with the chalice in his hand
It was a more formidable sign of the times that acts of violence sucii
as these no longer stirred the people at large to their former resent-
ment. The horror of the persecution left no room for other feelings.
Every death at the stake won hundreds to the cause of its victims,
" You have lost the hearts of twenty thousands that were rank
Papists," a Protestant wrote to Bonner, " within these twelve months."
Bonner indeed, never a very zealous persecutor, was sick of his work ;
and the energy of the bishops soon relaxed. But Mary had no thought
of hesitation in the course she had begun. '' Rattling letters " from
the council roused the lagging prelates to fresh activity and the mar-
tyrdoms went steadily on. Two prelates had already perished;
Hooper, the Bishop of Gloucester, had been burned in his own cathe-
dral city ; Ferrar, the Bishop of St. David's, had suffered at Caer-
marthen. Latimer and Bishop Ridley of London were now drawn

VII. 1

THE REFORMATION.

367

from their prison at Oxford. *'Play the man, Master Ridley," cried
the old preacher of the Reformation as the flames shot up around him ;
" we shall this day light such a candle by God's grace in England as I
trust shall never oe put out." One victim remained, far beneath many
who had precedec him in character, but high above them in his posi-
tion in the Churc'i of England. The other prelates who had suffered
had been created after the separation from Rome, and were hardly re-
garded as bishop . by their opponents. But, whatever had been his
part in the schism, Cranmer had received his Pallium from the Pope.
He was, in the eyes of all. Archbishop of Canterbury, the successor
of St. Augustine and of St. Thomas in the second see of Western
Christendom. To burn the Primate of the English Church for heresy
was to shut out meaner victims from all hope of escape. But revenge
and religious zeal alike urged Mary to bring Cranmer to the stake.
First among the many decisions in which the Archbishop had prosti-
tuted justice to Henry's will stood that by which he had annulled the
King's marriage with Catharine and declared Mary a bastard. The
last of his political acts had been to join, whether reluctantly or no, in
the shameless plot to exclude Mary from the throne. His great posi-
tion too made him more than any man the representative of the reli-
gious revolution which had passed over the land. His figure stood
with those of Henry and of Cromwell on the frontispiece of the
English Bible. The decisive change which had been given to the
character of the Reformation under Edward was due wholly to
Cranmer. It was his voice that men heard and still hear in the
accents of the English Liturgy. As an Archbishop, Cranmer's judg-
ment rested with no meaner tribunal than that of Rome, and his
execution had been necessarily delayed till its sentence could be
given. But the courage which he had shown since the accession of
Mary gave way the moment his final doom was announced. The
mora! cowardice which had displayed itself in his miserable com-
pliance with the lust and despotism of Henry displayed itself again
in six successive recantations by which he hoped to purchase pardon.
But pardon was impossible ; and Cranmer' s strangely mingled nature
found a power in its very weakness when he was brought into the
church of St. Mary at Oxford to repeat his recantation on the way to
the stake. " Now," ended his address to the hushed congregation
before him, " now I come to the great thing that troubleth my con-
science more than any other thing that ever I said or did in my life,
and that is the setting abroad of writings contrary to the truth ; which
here I now renounce and refuse as things written by my hand contrary
to the truth which I thought in my heart, and written for fear of
death to save my life, if it might be. And, forasmuch as my hand
offended in writing contrary to my heart, my hand therefore shall
be the first punished ; for if I come to the fire, it shall be the

Sec. II.

The

Martyrs

1553

1558

Death of
Cranmer

1556

'it

•is

1
I

1 * ■

■ !

i.,

368

Sec. II.

The
Maktyrs

1553

1558

The

Death of

Mary

IIISTORV OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

1555

IS57

first burned." " This was the hand that wrote it," he again ex-
claimed at the stake, " therefore it shall suffer first punishment ; "
and holding it steadily in the flame " he never stirred nor cried " till
life was gone.

It was with the unerring instinct of a popular movement that, among
a crowd of far more heroic sufferers, the Protestants fixed, in spite of
his recantations, on the martyrdom of Cranmer as the death-blow to
Catholicism in England. For one man who felt within him the joy of
Rowland Taylor at the prospect of the stake, there were thousands
who felt the shuddering dread of Cranmer. The triumphant cry of
Latimer could reach only hearts as bold as his own ; but the sad
pathos of the Primate's humiliation and repentance struck chords of
sympathy and pity iu the hearts of all. It is from that moment that
we may trace the bitter remembrance of the blood shed in the cause
of Rcrne ; which, however partial and unjust it must seem to an his-
toric observer, still lies graven deep in the temper of the English people.
The overthrow of his projects *"rr the permanent acquisition of England
to the House of Austria had disenchanted Philip of his stay in the
realm ; and on the disappearance of all hope of a child, he had left
the country in spite of Mary's passiOiiate entreaties. But the Queen
struggled desperately on. She did what was possible to satisfy the
unyielding Pope. In the face of the Parliament's significant reluctance
even to restore the first-fruits to the Church, she refounded all she could
of the abbeys which had been suppressed ; the greatest of these, thai of
Westminster, was re-established in 1556. Above all, she pressed on the
work of persecution. It had spread now from bishops and priests to the
people itself. The sufferers were sent in batches to the flames. In a
single day thirteen victims, two of them women, were burnt at Stratford-
le-Bow. Seventy-three Protestants of Colchester were dragged through
the stree^^j of London, tied to a single rope. A new commission for the
■^Mppression of heresy was exempted by royal authority from all restric-
tions of law which fettered its activity. The Universities were visited ;
and the corpses of foreign teachers who had found a resting place there
under Edward were torn from their g\aves and reduc»-d to ashes. The
penalties of martial lav; were threaten'^d against the possessors of
heretical bcoks issued from Geneva ; the treasonable contents of which
indeed, and their constant exhortations to rebellion and civil war,
justly called for stern repression. But the wo*-!: '~>." terror broke down
before the silent revolt of the whole nation. Open sympathy began to
be shown to the sufferers for conscience' sake. In the three and a
half years of the persecution nearly three hundred victims had perished
at the stake. The people sickened at the work of death. The crowd
round the fire at Smithfield shouted " Amen " to the prayer of seven
martyrs whom Bonner had condemned, and prayed with them that
God would strengthen them. A general discontent was roused when, in

[chap.

ex-

gam
timent ;
ried" till

Lt, among
n spite of
ti-blow to
the joy of
housands
int cry of
It the sad
chords of
ment that
the cause
to an his-
ish people.
)f England
,tay in the
le had left
the Queen
satisfy the
reluctance
11 she could
lese, thai of
;ssed on the
riests to the
,mes. In a
t Stratford-
red through
isionforthe
L all restric-
ere visited ;
place there
ashes. The
)Ssessors of
Its of which
i civil war,
broke down
hy began to
three and a
ad perished
The crowd
er of seven
them that
icd when, in

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

369

I. V

i. I • lit

spite of the pledges given at her marriage, Mary dragged England
i ito a war to support Philip — who on the Emperor's resignation had
succeeded to his dominions of Spain, Flanders, and the New World
— in a struggle against France. The war ended in disaster. With
characteristic secrecy and energy, the Duke of Guise flung himself
upon Calais, and compelled it to surrender before succour could arrive.
" The chief jewel of the realm," as Mary herself called it, was suddenly
reft away ; and the surrender of Guisnes, which soon followed, left
England without a foot of land on the Continent. Bitterly as the blow
was felt, the Council, though passionately pressed by the Queen, could
find neither money nor men for any attempt to recover the town. The
forced loan to which she resorted came in slowly. The levies mutinied
and dispersed. The death of Mary alone averted a general revolt, and
a burst of enthusiastic joy hailed the accession of Elizabeth.

Section III.— Elizabeth. 1558—1560.

{Authorities. — Camden's "Life of Elizabeth." For ecclesiastical matters,
Strype's •' Annals," his lives of Parker, Grindal, and Whitgift, and the
"Zurich Letters" (Parker Society), are important. The State Papers are
being calendared for the Master of the Rolls, and fresh light may be looked
for from the Cecil Papers and the documents at Simancas, some of which are
embodied in Mr. Froude's " History" (vols. vii. to xii.). We have also the
Burleigh Papers, the Sidney Papers, the Sadler State Papers, the Hardwicke
State Papers, letters published by Mr. Wright in his " Elizabeth and her
Times," the collections of Murdin, the Egerton Papers, the "Letters of
Elizabeth and James VL," published by Mr. Bruce. The " Papiers d'Etat "
of Cardinal Granvelle and the French despatches published by M. Teulet are
valuable.]

Never had the fortunes of England sunk to a lower ebb than at the
moment when Elizabeth mounted the throne. The country was
humiliated by defeat and brought to the verge of rebellion by the
bloodshed and misgovernment of Mary's reign. The old social dis-
content, trampled down for a time by the horsemen of Somerset,
remained a menace to public order. The religious strife had passed
beyond hope of reconciliation, now that the reformers were parted
from their opponents by the fires of Smithfield and the party of the
New Learning all but dissolved. The more earnest Catholics were
bound helplessly to Rome. The temper of the Protestants, burned at
home or driven into exile abroad, had become a fiercer thing, and the
Calvinistic refugees were pouring back from Geneva with dreams of
revolutionary change in Church and State. England, dragged at the
heels of Philip into a useless and ruinous war, was left without an ally
save Spain ; while France, mistress of Calais, became mistress of the
Channel. Not only was Scotland a standing danger in the north,
through the French marriage of its Queen Mary Stuart and its conse-
quent bondage to French policy ; but Mary Stuart and her husband

Sec. Ill

Elizahetii
1558

1560

1558

Elizabeth

1 'i !!

1558

I'l!

! M,

370

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAP.

Sec. III.

Klizabkth
1558

1660

now assumed the style and arms of English sovereigns, and threatened
to rouse every Catholic throughout the realm against Elizabeth's title.
In presence of this host of dangers the country lay helpless, without
army or fleet, or the means of manning one, for the treasury, already
drained by the waste of Edward' s reign, had been utterly exhausted
by Mary' s restoration of the Church-lands in possession of the Crown,
and by the cost of her war with France.

England's one hope lay m the character of her Queen. Elizabeth
was now in her twenty-fifth year. Personally she had more than her
mother's beauty ; her figure was commanding, her face long but
queenly and intelligent, her eyes quick and fine. She had grown up
amidst the liberal culture of Henry's court a bold horsewoman, a
good shot, a graceful dancer, a skilled musician, and an accomplished
scholar. She studied every morning the Greek Testament, and fol-
lowed this by the tragedies of Sophocles or orations of Demosthenes,
and could " rub up her rusty Greek " at need to bandy pedantry with
a Vice-Chancellor. But she was far from being a mere pedant. The
new hterature which was springing up around her found constant
welcome in her court. She spoke Italian and French as fluently as her
mother-tongue. She was familiar with Ariosto and Tasso. Even
amidst the affectation and love of anagrams and puerilities which
sullied her later years, she listened with delight to the " Faery Queen,"
and found a smile for " Master Spenser" when h*^ appeared in her
presence. Her moral temper recalled in its strange contrasts the mixed
blood within her veins. She was at once the daughter of Henry and
of Anne Boleyn. From her father she inherited her frank and hearty
address, her love of popularity and of free intercourse with the people,
her dauntless courage and her amazing self-confidence. Her harsh,
... inlike voice, her impetuous will, her pride, her furious outbursts of
anger came to her with her Tudor blood. She rated great nobles as if
they were schoolboys ; she met the insolence of Essex with a box on
the ear ; she would break now and then into the gr^west deliberations
to swear at her ministers like a fishwife. But strangely in contrast
with the violent outlines of her Tudor temper stood the sensuous, self-
indulgent nature she derived from Anne Boleyn. Splendour and
pleasure were -.vith Elizabeth the very air she breathed. Her delight
was to move in perpetual progresses from castle to castle through a
series of gorgeous pageants, fanciful and extravagant as a caliph's
dream. She loved gaiety and laughter and wit. A happy retoxt or a
finished compliment never failed to win her favour. She hoarded
jewels. Her dresses were innumerable. Her vanity remained, even
to old age, the vanity of a coquette in her teens. No adulation was
too fulsome for her, no flattery of her beauty too gross. " To see her
was heaven," Hatton told her, " the lack of her was hell." She would
play with her rings that her courtiers might note the delicacy of her

[CHAP.

reatened
th's title.
, without
', already
:xhausted
le Crown,

Elizabeth
than her
long but
grown up
woman, a
omplished
t, and fol-
nosthenes,
antry with
lant. The
d constant
intly as her
so. Even
[ties which
iry Queen,"
ired in her
} the mixed
Henry and
and hearty
the people,
Her harsh,
lutbursts of
nobles as if
;h a box on
;liberations
|in contrast
suous, self-
sndour and
er delight
through a
a caliph's
retoit or a
le hoarded
ained, even
lulation was
To see her
She would
cacy of her

VM.l

THE REFORMATION.

3/1

hands ; or dance a coranto that the French ambassador, hidden dex-
terously behind a curtain, might report her sprightlincss to his master.
Her levity, her frivolous laughter, her unwomanly jests gave colour to
a thousand scandals. Her character in fact, like her portraits, was
utterly without shade. Of womanly reserve or self-restraint she knew
nothing. No instinct of delicacy veiled the voluptuous temper which
had broken out in the romps of her girlhood and showed itself almost
ostentatiously throughout her later life. Personal beauty in a man was
a sure passport to her liking. She patted handsome young squires on
the neck when they knelt to kiss her hand, and fondled her " sweet
Robin," Lord Leicester, in the face of the court.

It was no wonder that the statesmen whom she outwitted held
Elizabeth almost to the last to be little more than a frivolous woman,
or that Philip of Spain wondered how " a wanton " could hold in
check the policy of the Escurial. But the Elizabeth whom they saw
was far from being all of Elizabeth. The wilfulness of Henry, the
triviality of Anne Boleyn played over the surface of a nature hard
as steel, a temper purely intellectual, the very type of reason un-
touched by imagination or passion. Luxurious and pleasure-loving
as she seemed, Elizabeth lived simply and frugally, and she worked
hard. Her vanity and caprice had no weight whatever with her in
state affairs. The coquette of the presence-chamber became the
coolest and hardest of politicians at the council-board. Fresh from
the flattery of her courtiers, she would tolerate no flattery in the closet ;
she was herself plain and downright of speech with her counsellors,
and she looked for a corresponding plainness of speech in return. If
any trace of her sex lingered in her actual statesmanship, it was seen in
the simplicity and tenacity of purpose that often underlies a woman's
fluctuations of feeling. It was this in part which gave her her marked
superiority over the statesmen of her time. No nobler group of
ministers ever gathered round a council-board than those who
gathered round the council-board of Elizabeth. But she was the in-
strument of none. She listened, she weighed, she used or put by the
counsels of each in turn, but her policy as a whole was her own. It
was a poUcy, not of genius, but of good sense. Her aims were simple
and obvioub : to preserve her throne, to keep England out of war, to
restore civil and rehgious order. Something of womanly caution and
timidity perhaps backed the passionless indifference with which she set
aside the larger schemes of ambition which were ever opening before
her eyes. She was resolute in her refusal of the Low Countries. She
rejected with a laugh the offers of the Protestants to make her "head
of the religion" and "miscress of the seas." But her amazing success
in the end sprang mainly from this wise limitation of her aims. She
had a finer sense than any of her counsellors of her real resources ;
she knew instinctively how far she could go, and what she could do.

B B 2

Sec. III.

El.I2AUKTH

1558

1560

"fl

•!s

i.i

m\ f

372

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

fciCAP.

Sec. III.

Elizahrtii
1558

1560

Her cold, critical intellect was never swayed by enthusiasm or by
panic cither to exaggerate or to under-estimatc her risks or her power.
Of pol' ical wisdom indeed in its larger and more generous sense
Elizabeth had little or none ; but her political tact was unerring. She
seldom saw her course at a glance, but she played with a hundred
courses, fitfully and discursively, as a musician runs his fingers over
the key-board, till she hit suddenly upon the right one. Her nature
was essentially practical and of the present. She distrusted a plan
in fact just in proportion to its speculative range or its out-look into
the future. Her notion of statesmanship lay in watching how things
turned out around her, and in seizing the moment for makmg the best
of them. A policy of this limited, practical, tentative order was not
only best suited to the England of her day, to its small resources and
the transitional character of its religious and political belief, but it was
one eminently suited to Elizabeth's peculiar powers. It was a policy
of detail, and in details her wonderful readiness and ingenuity found
scope for their exercise. " No War, my Lords," the Queen used to
cry imperiously at the council-board, " No War ! " but her hatred of
war sprang less from her aversion to blood or to expense, real as was
her aversion to both, than from the fact that peace left the field open
to the diplomatic manoeuvres and intrigues in which she excelled.
Her delight in the consciousness of her ingenuity broke out in a
thousand puckish freaks, freaks in which one can hardly see any
purpose beyond the purpose of sheer mystification. She revelled in
"bye-ways" and "crooked ways." She played with grave cabinets as
a cat plays with a mouse, and with much of the same feline delight in
the mere embarrassment of her victims. When she was weary of mys-
tifying foreign statesmen she turned to find fresh sport in mystifying
her own ministers. Had Elizabeth written the story of her reign she
would have prided herself, not on the triumph of England or the ruin
of Spain, but on the skill with which she had hoodwinked and out-
witted every statesman in Europe during fifty years. Nor was her
trickery without political value. Ignoble, inexpressibly wearisome as
the Queen's diplomacy seems to us now, tracing it as we do through
a thousand despatches, it succeeded in its main end. It gained time,
and every year that was gained doubled Elizabeth's strength. Nothing
is more revolting in the Queen, but nothing is more characteristic, than
her shameless mendacity. It was an age of political lying, but in the
profusion and recklessness of her lies Elizabeth stood without a peer
in Christendom. A falsehood was to her simply an intellectual means
of meeting a difficulty ; and the case with which she asserted or denied
whatever suited her purpose was only equalled by the cynical indif-
ference with which she r :; the exposure of her lies as soon as their
purpose was answered. The same purely intellectual view of things
showed itself in the dexterous use she made of her very faults. Her

VII.]

TIIL REFORMATION.

levity carried her gaily over moments of detection and embarrassment
where better women would have died of shame. She screened her
tentative and hesitating statesmanship under the natural timidity and
vacillation of her sex. She turned her very luxury and sports to
good account. There were moments of grave danger in her reign
when the country remained indifferent to its perils, as it saw the
Queen give her days to hawking and hunting, and her nights to
dancing and plays. Her vanity and affectation, her womanly fickle-
ness and caprice, all had their part in the diplomatic comedies she
played with the successive candidates for her hand. If political neces-
sities made her life a lonely one, she had at any rate the satisfaction
of averting war and conspiracies by love sonnets and romantic inter-
views, or of gaining a year of tranquillity by the dexterous spinning
out of a flirtation.

As we track Elizabeth through her tortuous mazes of lying and in-
trigue, the sense of her greatness is almost lost in a sense of contempt.
But wrapped as they were in a cloud of mysterv, the aims of her policy
were throughout temperate and simple, and they were pursued with a
singular tenacity. The sudden acts of energy which from time to time
broke her habitual hesitation proved that it was no hesitation of weak-
ness. Elizabeth could wait and finesse ; but when the hour was come
she could strike, and strike hard. Her natural temper indeed tended
to a rash self-confidence rather than to self-distrust. She had, as
strong natures always have, an unbounded confidence in her luck.
" Her Majesty counts much on Fortune," Walsingham wrote bitterly ;
" I wish she would trust more in Almighty God." The diplomatists
who censured at one moment her irresolution, her delay, her changes
of front, censure at the next her " obstinacy," her iron will, her defiance
of what seemed to them inevitable ruin. " This woman," Philip's envoy
wrote after a wasted remonstrance, " this woman is possessed by a
hundred thousand devils." To her own subjects, indeed, who knew
nothing of her manoeuvres and retreats, of her " bye-ways " and
" crooked ways," she seemed the embodiment of dauntless resolution.
Brave as they were, the men who swept the Spanish Main or glided
between the icebergs of Baffin's Bay never doubted that the palm of
bravery lay with their Queen. Her steadiness and courage in the pur-
suit of her aims was equalled by the wisdom with which she chose the
men to accomplish them. She had a quick eye for merit of any sort,
and a wonderful power of enlisting its whole energy in her service.
The sagacity which chose Cecil and Walsingham was just as unerring
ir. its choice of the meanest of her agents. Her success indeed in
securing from the beginning of her reign to its end, with the single ex-
ception of Leicester, precisely the right men for the work she set them
to do sprang in great measure from the noblest characteristic of her
intellect. If in loftiness of aim her temper fell below many of the

373

skc. III.

Ki.UAiii-:rii
1558

i5eo

' ?

!1'

'< I

374

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.

Elizabeth
1558

1560

tempers of her time, in the breadth of its range, in the universaHty of
its sympathy it stood far above them all. Ehzabeth could talk poetry
with Spenser and philosophy with Bruno ; she could discuss Euphuism
with Lyiy, and enjoy the chivalry of Essex ; she could turn from talk
of the last fashions to pore with Cecil over despatches and treasury
books ; she could pass from tracking traitors with Walsingham to
settle points of doctrine with Parker, or to calculate with Frobisherthe
chances of a north-west passage to the Indies. The versatility and
many-sidedness of her mind enabled her to understand every phase of
the intellectual movement of her day, and to fix by a sort of instinct on
its higher representatives. But the greatness of the Queen rests above
all on her power over her people. We have had grander and nobler
rulers, but none so popular as Elizabeth. The passion of love, of
loyalty, of admiration which finds its most perfect expression in the
" Faery Queen," throbbed as intensely through the veins of her
mer.nest subjects. To England, during her reign of half a century,
she was a virgin and a Protestant Queen ; and her immorality, her
absolute want of religious enthusiasm, failed utterly to blur the bright-
ness of the national ideal. Her worst acts broke fruitlessly against
the general devotion. A Puritan, whose hand she cut off in a freak of
tyrannous resentment, waved his hat with the hand that was left, and
shouted " God save Queen Elizabeth ! " Of her faults, indeed, England
beyond the circle of her court knew little or nothing. The shiftings of
her diplomacy were never seen outside the royal closet. The nation
at large could only judge her foreign policy by its main outlines, by
its temperance and good sense, and abo/e all by its success. But
every Englishman was able to judge Elizabeth in her rule at home, in her
love of peace, her instinct of order, the firmness and moderation of her
government, the judicious spirit of conciliation and compromise among
warring factions which gave the country an unexamp-ed tranquillity at
a time when almost every other country in Europe was torn v/ith civil
war. Every sign of the growing prosperity, the sight of London as it
became the mart of the world, of stately mansions as they rose on
every manor, told, and justly told, in Elizabeth's favour. In one act
of her civil administration she showed the boldness and originality
of a great ruler ; for the opening of her reign saw her face the social
difficulty v.hich had so long impeded English progress, by the issue
of a commission of inquiry which ended in the solution of the
problem by the system Oi' poor-laws. She lent a ready patronage to
the new commerce ; she considered its extension and protection as
a part of public policy, and her statue in the centre of the London
Exchange was a tribute on the part of the merchant class to the
interest with which she watched a id shared personally in its enter-
prises. Her thrift won a general gratitude. The memories of the
Terror and of the Martyrs threw into bright relief the aversion from

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

375

bloodshed which was conspicuous in her earUer reign, and never
wholly wanting through its fiercer close. Above all there was a general
confidence in her instinctive knowledge of the national temper. Her
finger was always on the public pulse. She knew exactly when she
could resist the feeling of her people, and when she must give way
before the new sentiment of freedom which her policy unconsciously
fostered. But when she retreated, her defeat had all the grace of
victory ; and the frankness and unreserve of her surrender won
back at once the love that her resistance had lost. Her attitude at
home in fact was that of a woman whose pride in the well-being of her
subjects, end whose longing for their favour, was the one warm touch
in the coldness of her natural temper. If Elizabeth could be said
to love anything, she loved England. " Nothing," she said to her
first Parliament in words of unwonted fire, " nothing, no worldly thing
under the sun, is so dear to me as the love and good-will of my
subjects." And the love and good- will which were so dear to her she
fully won.

She clung perhaps to her popularity the more passionately that it
hid in some measure from her the terrible loneliness of her life. She
was the last of the Tudors, the last of Henry's children ; and her
nearest relatives were Mary Stuart and the House of Suffolk, one the
avowed, the other the secret claimant of her throne. Among her
mother's kindred she found but a single cousin. Whatever womanly
tenderness she had, wrapt itself around Leicester ; but a marriage with
Leicester was impossible, and every other union, could she even have
bent to one, was denied to her by the political difficulties of her
position. The one cry of bitterness which burst from Elizabeth
revealed her terrible sense of the solitude of her life. " The Queen
of Scots," she cried at the birth of James, " has a fair son, and I am
but a barren stock." But the loneliness of her position only reflected
the loneliness of her nature. She stood utterly apa^t from the world
around her, sometimes above it, sometimes below it, but never of it.
It was only on its intellectual side that Elizabeth touched the
England of her day. All its moral aspects were simply dead to her.
It was a time when men were being lifted into nobleness by the new
moral energy which seemed suddenly to pulse through the whole
people, when honour and enthusiasm took colours of poetic beauty, and
religion became a chivalry. But the finer sentiments of the men around
her touched Elizabeth simply as the fair tints of a picture would have
touched her. She made her market with equal indifference out of the
heroism of William of Orange or the bigotry of Philip. The noblest
aims and lives were only counters on her board. She was the one
soul in her realm whom the news of St. Bartholomew stirred to no
thirst for vengeance ; and while England was thrilling with its triumph
over the Armada, its Queen was coolly grumbling over the cost, and

Sec. III.

Elizabeth
1558

1560

€^

WFf''

' \

■}

•

'It J

\\\

t ii

\\\

376

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.

Elizabetk
1558

1560

Elizabeth
and the
Church

making hei profit out of the spoiled provisions she had ordered for the
fleet that saved her. To the voice of gratitude, indeed, she was for the
most part deaf. She accepted services such as were never rendered to
any other English sovereign without a thought of return. Walsingham
spent his fortune in saving her life and her throne, v.vd she left him to
die a beggar. But, as if by a strange irony, it was to this very want of
sympathy that she owed some of the grander features of her character.
If she was without love she was without hate. She cherished no petty
resentments ; she never stooped to envy or suspicion of the men who
served her. She was indifferent to abuse. Her good-humour was never
ruffled by the charges of wantonness and cruelty with which the Jesuits
filled every Court in Europe. She was insensible to fear. Her life became
at last the mark for assassin after assassin, but the thought of peril was
the one hardest to bring home to her. Even when the CathoUc plots
broke out in her very household she would listen to no proposals for the
removal of Catholics from her court.

It was this moral isolation which told so strangely both for good and
for evil on her policy towards the Church. The young Queen was not
without a sense of religion. But she was almost wholly destitute of
spiritual emotion, or of any consciousness of the vast questions with
which theology strove to deal. While the world around her was being
swayed more and more by theological beliefs and controversies, Eliza-
beth was absolutely untouched by them. She was a child of the Italian
Renascence rather than of the New Learning of Colet or Erasmus, and
her attitude towards the enthusiasm of her time was that of Lorenzo de'
Medici towards Savonarola. Her mind was unruffled by the spiritual
problems which were vexing the minds around her; to Elizabeth indeed
they were not only unintelligible, they were a little ridiculous. She had
the same intellectual contempt for the superstition of the Romanist as
for the bigotry of the Protestant. While she ordered Catholic images
to be flung into the fire, she quizzed the Puritans as "brethren in Christ."
But she had no sort of religious aversion from either Puritan or Papist.
The Protestants grumbled at the Catholic nobles whom she admitted
to the presence. The Catholics grumbled at the Protestant statesmen
whom she called to her council-board. But to Elizabeth the arrange-
ment was the most natural thing in the world. She looked at theo-
logical differences iu a purely political light. She agreed with Henry
the Fourth that a kingdom was well worth a mass. It seemed an
obvious thing to her to hold out hopes of conversion as a means of
deceiving Philip, or to gain a point in negotiation by restoring the
crucifix to her chapel. The first interest in her own mind was the
interest of public order, and she never could understand how it could
fail to be first in every one's mind. Her ingenuity set itself to con-
struct a system in which ecclesiastical unity should not jar against
, the rights of conscience ; a compromise which nerely required outer

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

"conformity" to the established worship while, as she was never weary
of repeating, it " left opinion free." She fell back from the very first on
the system of Henry the Eighth. " I will do," she told the Spanish
ambassador, " as my father did." She opened negotiations with the
Papal See, till the Pope's summons to submit her claim of succession
to the judgment of Rome made compromise impossible. The first
work of her Parliament was to declare her legitimacy and title to the
crown, to restore the royal supremacy, and to abjure all foreign authority
and jurisdiction. At her entry into London Elizabeth kissed the
English Bible which the citizens presented to her and promised
" diligently to read therein." Further she had no personal wish to go.
A third of the Council and at least two-thirds of the people were as
opposed to any radical changes in religion as the Queen. Among the
gentry the older and wealthier were on the conservative side, and
only the younger and meaner on the other. But it was soon necessary
to go further. If the Protestants were the less numerous, they were
the abler and the more vigorous party ; and the exiles who returned
from Geneva brought with them a fiercer hatred of Catholicism. To
every Protestant the Mass was identified with the fires of Smithfield,
while Edward's Prayer-book was hallowed by the memories of the
Martyrs. But if Elizabeth won the Protestants by an Act of Uni-
formity which restored the English Prayer-book and enforced its use
on the clergy on pain of deprivation, the alterations she made
in its language showed her wish to conciliate the Catholics as far as
possible. She had no mind merely to restore the system of the Pro-
tectorate. She dropped the words " Head of the Church " from the
royal title. The forty-two Articles which Cranmer had drawn up were
left in abeyance. If Elizabeth had had her will, she would have
retained the celibacy of the clergy and restored the use of crucifixes in
the churches. In part indeed of her effort she was foiled by the
increabed bitterness of the reformers. The London mob tore down the
crosses in the streets. Her attempt to retain the crucifix or enforce the
celibacy of the priesthood fell dead before the opposition of the Pro-
testant clergy. On the other hand, the Marian bishops, with a single
exception, discerned the Protestant drift of the changes she was making,
and bore imprisonment and deprivation rather than accept the oath
required by the Act of Supremacy. But to the mass of the nation the
compromise of Elizabeth seems to have been fairly acceptable. The
bulk of the clergy, if they did not take the oath, practically submitted
to the Act of Supremacy and adopted the Prayer-book. Of the few who
openly refused only two hundred were deprived, and many went
unharmed. No marked repugnance to the new worship was shown by
the people at large ; and Elizabeth was able to turn from questions of
belief to the question of order.
She found in Matthew Parker, whom Pole's death enabled her to

377

Sec. III.

Elizabeth
1558

1560

•i

Act of
Uniformity

1559

1 :i|-

1 \ •

Parker

378

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.

Elizabeth
1558

1560

raise to the see of Canterbury, an agent in the reorganization of the
Church whose patience and moderation were akin to her own. Theo-
logically the Primate was a moderate man, but he was resolute to
restore order in the discipline and worship of the Church. The whole
machinery of English religion had been thrown out of gear by the
rapid and radical changes of the past two reigns. The majority of the
parish priests were still Catholic in heart ; sometimes mass was cele-
brated at the parsonage for the more rigid Catholics, and the new
communion in church for the more rigid Protestants. Sometimes
both parties knelt together at the same altar-rails, the one to receive
hosts consecrated by the priest at home after the old usage, the other
wafers consecrated in Church after the new. In many parishes of the
north no change of service was made at all. On the other hand, the
new Protestant clergy were often unpopular, and roused the disgust of
the people by their violence and greed. Chapters plundered their own
estates by leases and fines and by felling timber. The marriages of
the clergy became a scandal, which was increased when the gorgeous
vestments of the old worship were cut up into gowns and bodices for
the priests' wives. The new services sometimes turned into scenes of
utter disorder where the clergy wore what dress they pleased and the
communicant stood or sate as he liked ; while the old altars were
broken down and the communion-table was often a bare board upon
trestles. The people, naturally enough, were found to be "utterly
devoid of religion," and came to church " as to a May game." To
the difficulties which Parker found in the temper of the reformers and
their opponents new difficulties were added by the freaks of the
Queen. If she had no convictions, she had tastes ; and her taste
revolted from the bareness of Protestant ritual and above all from
the marriage of priests. " Leave that alone," she shouted to Dean
Nowell from the royal closet as he denounced the use of images —
"stick to your text. Master Dean, leave that alone ! " When Parker
was firm in resisting the introduction of the crucifix or of celibacy,
Elizabeth showed her resentment at his firmness by an insult to his
wife. Married ladies were addressed at this time as " Madam,"
unmarried ladies as " Mistress ; " and when Mrs. Parker advanced at
the close of a sumptuous entertainment at Lambeth tr» take leave of
the Queen, Elizabeth feigned a momentary hesitation. " Madam,"
she said at last, " I may not call you, and Mistress I am loth to call
you ; however, I thank you for your good cheer." To the end of her
reign indeed Elizabeth remained as bold a plunderer of the wealth of
the bishops as either of her predecessors, and carved out rewards for
her ministers from the Church-lands with a queenly disregard of the
rights of property. Lord Burleigh built up the estate of the house of
Cecil out of the demesnes of the see of Peterborough. The neigh-
bourhood of Hattor Garden to Ely Place recalls the spoliation of

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

another bishopric in favour of the Queen's sprightly chancellor. Her
reply to the bishop's protest against this robbery showed what Eliza-
beth meant by her Ecclesiastical Supremacy. " Proud prelate," she
wrote, " you know what you were before I made you what you are !
If you do not immediately comply with my request, by God I will
unfrock you." But freaks of this sort had little real influence beside
the steady support which the Queen gave to the Primate in his work
of order. She suffered no plunder save her own, and she was earnest
for the restoration of order and decency in the outer arrangements
of the Church. The vacant sees were filled for the most part with
learned and able men ; and England seemed to settle quietly down
in a religious peace. »,

The settlement of religion however was not the only pressing care
which met Elizabeth as she n.ounted the throne. The country was
drained by war ; yet she could only free herself from war, and from
the dependence on Spain which it involved, by acquiescing in the loss
of Calais. But though peace was won by the sacrifice, France re-
mained openly hostile ; the Dauphin and his wife, Mary Stuart, had
assumed the arms and style of King and Queen of England ; and their
pretensions became a source of immediate danger through the pre-
sence of a French army in Scotland. To understand, however, what
had taken place there we must cursorily review the past history of
the Northern Kingdom. From the moment when England finally
abandoned the fruitless effort to subdue it the story of Scotland had
been a miserable one. Whatever peace might be concluded, a sleep-
less dread of the old danger from the south tied the country to an
alliance with France, which dragged it into the vortex of the Hundred
Years' War. But after the final defeat and capture of David in
the field of Neville's Cross the struggle died down on both sides
into marauding forays and battles, like those of Otterburn and
Homildon Hill, in which alternate victories were won by the feudal
lords of the Scotch or English border. The ballad of " Chevy Chase"
brings home to us the spirit of the contest, the daring and defiance
which stirred Sidney's heart " more than with a trumpet." But its effect
on the internal developement of Scotland was utterly ruinous. The
houses of Douglas and of March which it raised into supremacy only
interrupted their strife with England to battle fiercely with one another
or to coerce their King. The power of the Crown sank in fact
into insignificance under the earlier sovereigns of the line of Stuart
which had succeeded to the throne on the extinction of the male
line of Bruce. Invasions and civil feuds not only arres>f.ed but even
rolled back the national industry and prosperity. The country was
a chaos of disorder and misrule, in which the peasant and the
trader were the victims of feudal outrage. The Border became
a lawless land, where robbery and violence reigned utterly without

1:':

1 :r:-"

379

I' ^

1 ;.

11 ■

Sec. 111.

f ■

Elizabeth

1558

1560

■

1 'i

1559

Scotla&d

:•''■ :

1346

I37I

> tl

38o

Sec. III.

Elizabeth
1558

1560

I 'I

r i

1411

1424

1437

1502

1513

1542

1547

1558

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

check. So pitiable seemed the state of the kingdom that the
clans of the Highlands drew together at last to swoop upon it as a
certain prey ; but the common peril united the factions of the nobles,
and the victory of Harlaw saved the Lowlands from the rule of the
Celt. A gre?it name at last broke the line of the Scottish kings.
Schooled by a long captivity in England, James the First returned to
his reahn to be the ablest of her rulers as he was the first of her poets.
In the thirteen years of a short but wonderful reign justice and order
were restored for a while, the Scotch Parliament organized, the clans
of the Highlands assailed in their own fastnesses and reduced to
swear fealty to the " Saxon " King. James turned to deal with the
great houses, but feudal violence was still too strong for the hand of
the law, and a band of ruffians who burst into the royal chamber left
the King lifeless with sixteen stabs in his body. His death was the
signal for a struggle between the House of Douglas and the Crown,
which lasted through half a century. Order, however, crept gradually
in ; the exile of the Douglases left the Scottish monarchs supreme in
the Lowlands ; while their dominion over the Highlands was secured
by the ruin of the Lords of the Isles. But in its outer policy the
country still followed in the wake of France ; every quarrel between
French King and English King brought danger with it on the Scottish
border ; till Henry the Seventh bound England and Scotland together
for a time by bestowing in 1502 the hand of his daughter Margaret
on the Scottish king. The union was dissolved however by the strife
with France which followed the accession of Henry the Eighth ; war
broke out anew, and the terrible defeat and death of James the Fourth
at Flodden Field involved his realm in the turbulence and misrule of
a minority. His successor James the Fifth, though nephew of the
English King, from the outset of his reign took up an attitude hostile
to England ; and Church and people were ready to aid in plunging
the two countries into a fresh struggle. His defeat at Solway Moss
brought the young King broken-hearted to his grave. " It came with
a lass, and it will go with a lass," he cried, as they brought him on his
death-bed the news of Mary Stuart's birth. The hand of his infant
successor at once became the subject of rivalry between England and
France. Had Mary, as Henry the Eighth desired, been wedded tc
Edward the Sixth, the whole destinies of Europe might have been
changed by the union of the two realms ; but the recent bloodshed had
embittered Scotland, and the high-handed way in which Somerset
pushed the marriage project completed the breach. Somerset's in-
vasion and victory at Pinkie Cleugh only enabled Mary of Guise, the
French wife of James the Fifth, who had become Regent of the realm at
his death, to induce the Scotch estates to consent to the union of her
child with the heir of the French crown, the Dauphin Francis. From
that moment, as we have seen, the claims of the Scottish Queen on

vn.]

THE REFORMATION.

381

the English throne became so formidable a danger as to drive Mary
Tudor to her marriage with Philip of Spain. But the danger became
a still greater one on the accession of Elizabeth, whose legitimacy no
Catholic acknowledged, and whose religious attitude tended to throw
the Catholic party into her rival's hands,

In spite of the peace with France, therefore, Francis and Mary
persisted in their pretensions ; and a French force landed at
Leith, with the connivance of Mary of Guise. The appearance
of this force on the Border was intended to bring about a Catholic
rising. But the hostility between France and Spain bound Philip,
for the moment, to the support of Ehzabeth ; and his influence over
the Catholics secured quiet for a time. The Queen, too, played with
their hopes of a religious reaction by talk of her own reconciliation
with the Papacy and admission of a Papal legate to the realm, and by
plans for her marriage with an Austrian and Catholic prince. Mean-
while she parried the blow in Scotland itself, where the Reformation
had begun rapidly to gain ground, by secretly encoumging the " Lords
of the Congregation," as the nobles who headed the Protestant party
were styled, to rise against the Regent. Since her accession Eliza-
beth's diplomacy had gained her a year, and her matchless activity
had used the year to good purpose. Order was restored throughout
England, the Church was reorganized, the debts of the Crown were in
part paid off, the treasury was recruited, a navy created, and a force
ready for action in the north, when the defeat of her Scotch adherents
forced her at last to throw aside the mask. As yet she stood almost
alone in her self reliance. Spain believed her ruin to be certain ;
France despised her chances ; her very Council was in despair. The
one minister in whom she dared to confide was Cecil, the youngest
and boldest of her advisers, and even Cecil trembled for her success.
But lies and hesitt,tion were no sooner put aside than the Queen's
vigour and tenacity came fairly into play. At a moment when D Oysel,
the French ccmmander, was on the point of crushing the Lords of the
Congregation, an English fleet appeared suddenly in the Forth and
forced the Regent's army to fall back upon Leith. The Queen made
a formal treaty with the Lords, and promised to assist them in the
expulsion of the strangers. France was torn by internal strife, i.nd
could send neither money nor men. In March, Lord Grey moved
over the border with 8,000 men to join the Lords of the Congregation
in the siege of Leith. The Scots indeed gave little aid ; and an assault
on the town signally failed. Philip too in a sudden jealousy of Eliza-
beth's growing strc^ngth demanded the abandonment of the enterprise.
But Elizabeth was immovable. Famine did its work better than the
sword ; and in two treaties with the Scotch and Engli'ih, the envoys
of Francis and Mary at last promised to withdraw the French, and
leave the government to a Council of the Lords ; and acknowledged

Sec. 111.

Elizabeth
1,'558

1S60

Elisabeth

and
Scotland

1559

1560

iii

■ i

;
til

rii 1

» i

1 r

^'^i m

382

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH TEOPLE.

[chap.

Spr. IV.

England

AND Mary

Stuakt

1560

1572

Mary
Stuart

1560

1561

Elizabeth's title to her throne. A Scotch Tariiament at once declared
Calvinism the national religion. Both Act and Treaty indeed were set
aside by P'rancis and Mary, but Elizabeth's poUcy had in fact broken
the dependence of Scotland on France, and bound to her side * ' ^
strongest and most vigorous party among its nobles.

Section IV.— England and Mary Stuart. 1560-157fl.

format
Mel

I 'oiiey's
lands."!

ivi»0

>f the Dutch Republic," and " History of the United Nether-

The issue of the : tch war revealed suddenly to Europe the vigour
of Elizabeth, and the real strength of her throne. She had freed
herself from the concrol of Philip, she had defied France, she had
averted the danger from the North by the creation of an English
party among the nobles of Scotland. The same use of religious divi-
sions gave her a simi'ar check on the hostility of France. The
Huguenots, as the French Protestants were called, had become a
formidable party under the guidance of the Admiral Coligni, and
the defeat of their rising against the family of the Guises, who stood
at the head of the French Catholics and were supreme at the Court
of Francis and Mary, threw them on the support and alliance of
Elizabeth. But if the decisive outbreak of the great religious struggle,
so long looked for between the Old Faith and the New, gave Ehzabeth
strength abroad, it weakened her at home. Her Catholic subjects lost
all hope of her conversion as they saw the Queen allying herself with
Scotch Calvinists and French Huguenots ; her hopes of a religious
compromise in matters of worship were broken by the issue of a Papal
brief which forbade attendance at the EngUsh service ; and Philip of
Spain, freed like herself from the fear of France by its religious divi-
sions, had less reason to hold the English Catholics in check. He
was preparing, in fact, to take a new political stand as the patron
of Catholicism throughout the world ; and his troops were directed
to support the Guises in the civil war which broke out after the death
of Francis the Second, and to attack the heretics wherever they
might find them. " Religion," he told Elizabeth, " was being made
a cloak for anarchy and revolution." It was at the moment when
the last hopes of the English Catholics were dispelled by the Queen's
refusal to take part in the Council of Trent that Mary Stuart, whom
the death of her husband had left a stranger in France, landed
at Leith. Girl as she was, and she was only nineteen, she was
hardly inferior in intellectual power to Elizabeth herself, while in fire
and grace and brilliancy of temper she stood high above her. She

[chap.

declared

were set

t brok:*!!

side *' -

of the. Re-
iiid Leslie,
utch revolt
ed Nether-

the vigour
had freed
, she had
n English
gious divi-
nce. The
become a
)ligni, and
who stood
. the Court
illiance of
IS struggle,
Ehzabeth
Djects lost
erself with
religious
of a Papal
d Philip of
gious divi-
leck. He
the patron
directed
the death
rever they
eing made
iient when
he Queen's
art, whom
ce, landed
she was
I'hile in fire
her. She

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

383

brought with her the voluptuous refinement of the French Renascence :
she would lounge for days in bed, and rise only at night for dancef
and music. But her frame was of iron, and incapable of fatigue ;
she galloped ■•ineLy mil^s after her last defeat without a pause save to
change horses. She loved risk and adventure and the ring of arms
as she rode in a fora_> to the north, the grim swordsmen beside
her heard her wish she was a man, "to know what life it was to
lie all night in ihe fields, or to walk on the cawsey with a Glasgow
buckle and a broadsword." But in the closet she was as cool and
astute a politician as Elizabeth herself; with plans as subtle, but of a
fa'" wider and grander range than the Queen's. " Whatever policy is
in all the chief and best practised heads of France," wrote an English
envoy, " whatever craft, falsehood, and deceit is in all the subtle brains
of Scotland, is either fresh in this woman's niP .0. ' or she can fetch
it out ^yith a wet finger." Her beauty, her exot'i.jiti ^race of manner,
her generosity of temper and warmth of aff. HoLj .,er frankness of
speech, her sensibility, her gaiety, her wo'v nly tears, her manlike
courage, the play and freedom of her natrre, ag flashes of poetry
that broke from her at every intense mome; t of her life, flung a spell
over friend or foe which has only deepenec! ' ai the lapse of years.
Even to Knollys, the sternest Puritan of his day, she seemed in
her captivity to be " a notable woman." " She seemeth to regard no
ceremonious honour besides the acknowledgement of her estate royal.
She showeth a disposition to speak much, to be bold, to be pleasant,
to be very familiar. She showeth a great desire to be avenged on her
enemies. She showeth a readiness to expose herself to all perils in
hope of victory. She desireth much to hear of hardiness and valiancy,
commending by name all approved ha-dy men of her country though
they be her enemies, and she concaleth no cowardice even in her
friends." As yet men knew nothing of the stern bigotry, the intensity
of passion, which lay beneath the winning surface of Mary's ^man-
hood. But they at once recognized her political ability. She had
seized eagerly on the new strength which was given her by her hus-
band's death. Her cause was no longer hampered, either in Scotland
or in England, by a national jealousy of French interference. It was
with a resolve to break the league between Elizabeth and the Scotch
Protestants, to unite her own realm around her, and thus to give a firm
base for her intrigues among the English Catholic;, that Mary landed
at Leith. The effect of her prepence was marvellous. Her personal
fascination revived the national loyalty, and swept all Scotland to her
feet. Knox, the greatest and sternest of the Calvinistic preachers,
alone withstood her spell. The rough Scotch nobles owned that there
was in Mary " some enchantment whereby men are bewitched." A
promise of religious toleration united her subjects in support of the
claim which she advanced to be named Elizabeth's successor. But

Sec. IV.

England
AND Mary

Stuart

1560

1572

! *

ili'

.!' iP

384

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAP,

Sfc. IV.

Fnglano

ANn Maky

Stuart

1560

T(J

157a

The
Test Act

1562

til

1563

the question of the succession, like the question of her marriage, was
with Elizabeth a question of life and death. Her wedding with a
Catholic or a Protestant suitor would have been eq »lly the end of her
system of balance and national union, a signal for the revolt of the
party which she disappointed and for the triumphant dicto ion of the
party which she satisfied. " If a Catholic prince come here," a Spanish
ambassador wrote while pressing an Austrian marriage, " the first
Mass he attends will be the signal for a revolt." It was so with the
question of the succession. To name a Protestant successor from the
House of Suffolk would have driven every Catholic to insurrection.
To name Mary was to stir Protestantism to a rising of despair, and to
leave Elizabeth at the mercy of every fanatical assassin who wished to
clear the way for a Catholic ruler. " I am not so foolish," was the Queen's
reply to Mary, " as to hang a winding-sheet before my eyes."

But the pressure on her was great, and Mary looked to the triumph
of Catholicism in France to increase the pressure. It was this which
drove Elizabeth to listen to the cry of the Huguenots at the moment
when they were yielding to the strength of the Guises. Hate war as
she might, the instinct of self-preservation dragged her into the great
struggle ; and in spite of the menaces of Philip, money and six thou-
sand men were promised to the aid of the Protestants under Condd.
But a fatal overthrow of the Huguenot army at Dreux left the Guises
masters of France, and brought the danger to the very doors of Eng-
land. The hopes of the English Catholics rose higher. Though the
Pope delayed to issue his Bull of Deposition, a Papal brief pronounced
joining in the CoT.inon Prayer schismatic, and forbade the attendance
of Catholics at church. With the issue of this brief the conformity of
worship which Elizabeth had sought to estabhsh came to an end. The
hotter Catholics withdrew from church. Heavy fines were laid on them
as recusants ; fines which, as their numbers increased, became a valu-
able source of supply for the exchequer. But no fines could compensate
for the moral blow which their wi.'ndrawal dealt. It was the beginning
of a struggle which Elizabeth had averted through three memorable
years. Protestant fanaticism met Catholic fanaticism. The tidings of
Dreux spread panic through the realm. Parliament showed its terror
by measures of a new severity. " There has been enough of words,"
said the Queen's minister, Sir Francis Knollys ; " it were time to draw
sword." The sword was drawn in a Test Act, the first in a series of
penal statutes which weighed upon English Catholics for two hundred
years. By this statute an oath of allegiance to the Queen and abjura-
tion of the temporal authority of the Pope was exacted from all holders
of office, lay or spiritual, with the exception of peers. Its effect was to
place the whole power of the realm in the hands either of Protestants,
or of Catholics who accepted Elizabeth's legitimacy and her ecclesias-
tical jurisdiction in the teeth of the Papacy. Caution indeed was used

[CHAP.

[age, was
g with a
nd of her
>lt of the
on of the
1 Spanish
'the first
with the
• from the
urrection.
lir, and to
wished to
le Queen's

le triumph
this which
e moment
ate war as
) the great
d six thou-
der Condd.
the Guises
|rs of Eng-
hough the
»ronounccd
[attendance
iformity of
end. The
|id on them
ime a valu-
ompensate
beginning
emorable
tidings of
|d its terror
of words,"
,e to draw
a series of
o hundred
md abjura-
all holders
feet was to
rotestants,
ecclesias-
was used

VII.

THE REFORMATION.

385

in applying ti.is test to the laity, but pressure was more roughly put on
the clergy. Many of the parish priests, though they had submitted to
the use of the Prayer-book, had not taken the oath prescribed by the
Act of Uniformity. As yet Elizabeth had cautiously refused to allow
any strict inquiry into their opinions. But a commission was now
opened by her order at Lambeth, with the Primate at its head, to
enforce the Act ; while thirty-nine of the Articles drawn up under
Edward were adopted as a standard of faith, and acceptance of them
demanded of the clergy.

It is possible that Elizabeth might have clung to her older policy of
conciliation had she foreseen how suddenly the danger that appalled
her was to pass away. At this crisis she was able, as usual, to "count
on Fortune." The assassination of the Dukeof Guise broke up his party;
a policy of moderation and balance prevailed at the French Court ;
Catharine of Medicis was now supreme, and her aim was still an aim of
peace. The Queen's good luck was chequered by a merited humiliation.
She had sold her aid to the Huguenots in their hour of distress at the
price of the surrender of Hpvre, and Havre was again wrested from
her by the reunion of the P^ench parties. Peace with P'rance in the
following spring secured her a year's respite in her anxieties ; and Mary
was utterly foiled in her plan for bringing the pressure of a united Scot-
land, backed by France, to bear upon her rival. But the defeat only
threw her on a yet more formidable scheme. She was weary of the
mask of religious indifference which her policy had forced her to wear
with the view of securing the general support of her subjects. She re-
solved now to appeal to the English Catholics on the ground of Catho-
licism. Next to the Scottish Queen in the line of blood stood Henry
Stuart, Lord Darnley, a son of the Countess of Lennox, and grandson
of Margaret Tudor by her second marriage with the Earl oi Angus, as
Mary was her grandchild by Margaret's first marriage with James the
Fourth. Though the house of Lennox conformed to the new system
of English worship, its sympathies were known to be Catholic, and the
hopes of the Catholics wrapped themselves round its heir. It was ' >>
a match with Henry Stuart that Mary now determined to unite the
forces of Catholicism. The match was regarded on all sides as a
challenge to Protestantism. Philip had till now looked upon Mary's
system of toleration and on her hopp'' ^'rom France with equal suspicion.
But he now drew slowly to hei ^. .v-. " She is the one gate," he
owned, " through which Religion can be restored in England. All the
rest are closed." It was in vain that Elizabeth strove to prevent the
marriage by a threat of war, or by secret plots for the seizure of Mary
and the driving of Darnley back over the border. The Lords of the
Congregation woke with a start from their confidence in the Queen, and
her half-brother. Lord James Stuart, better known as Earl of Murray,
mustered his Protestant confederates. But their revolt was hardly

c c

Skc. IV.
Knc!i,and

AND MaWV

Sru ,<T
1560

1572

The

Daml«y

Marrlae*

1565

3^6

HISTORY OF TIIK KN(iI,Isn I'KOrLK.

[CIIAI'

Skc. IV.
Enoi.ani)

AND MaKV

Stuakt
1560

157a

1566

declared when Mary marched on thcni with pistols in her belt, and
drove their leaders helplessly over the border. A rumour spread that
she was in league with Spain and with France, where the influences of
the Guises was again strong. Elizabeth took refuge in the meanest
dissimulation, while the announcement of Mary's pregnancy soon gave
her a strength which swept aside Philip's counsels of caution and delay.
"With the help of God and of your Holiness," Mary wrote to the
Pope, " I will leap over the wall." Rizzio, an Italian who had counselled
the marriage, still remained her adviser, and the daring advice he
gave fell in with her natural temper. She demanded a recognit'on of
her succession. She resolved in the coming Parliament to restore
Catholicism in Scotland ; arid to secure the banishment of Murray and
his companions. The English Catholics of the North were ready to revolt
as soon as she was ready to aid them. No such danger had ever
threatened Elizabeth as this, but again she could "trust to Fortune."
Mary had staked all on her union with Darnley, and yet only a few
months had passed since her wedding day when men saw that she
" hated the King." The boy turned out a dissolute, insolent husband ;
and Mary's scornful refusal of his claim of the " crown matrimonial," a
refusal which Darnley attributed to Rizzio's counsels, drove his jealousy
to madness. At the very moment when the Queen revealed the extent
of her schemes by her dismissal of the English ambassador, the younf
King, followed by his kindred the Douglases, burst into her chamber,
dragged Rizzio from her presence, and stabbed him brutally in an outer
chamber. The darker features of Mary's character were now to develope
themselves. Darnley, keen as was her thirst for venrreance on him, was
needful to the triumph of her political aims. She masked her hatred
beneath a show of affection, which succeeded in severing the wretched
boy from his fellow-conspirators, and in gaining his help in an escape
to Dunbar. Once free, she i. arched in triumph on Edinburgh at the
head of eight thousand men undsr the Earl of Bothwell, while Morton,
Ruthven, and Lindesay fled in terror over the border. With wise dis-
simulation, however, she fell back on her system of religious toleration,
But her intrigues with the English Catholics were never interrupted,
and her Court was full of refugees from the northern counties. " Your
actions," Elizabeth wrote in a sudden break of fierce candour, " are as
full of venom as your words are of honey." The birth of her child, the
future James the Sixth of Scotland and First of England, doubled
Mary's strength. "Your friends are so increased," her ambassador
wrote to her from England, "that many whole shires are ready to rebel,
and their captains named by election of the nobility." The anxiety of
the English Parliament which met at this crisis proved that the danger
was felt to be real. The Houses saw but one way of providing against
it ; and they renewed their appeal for the Queen's marriage and for a
settlement of the succession. As we have seen, both of these measures 1

involv(
alone i
to drav
promisi
^vas no
quarrel
debate
time, hi
Commo
thought
bring to
that eit
is all rr
it never
ditch."
for her c
with a 1
without.
One t
clouds,
confeder
murder s
from her
"shehac
ened by 1
iinscrupu
shrank fr
free him
conspirac
still looki
recalled ;
secret of t
mystery m
mood see;
at once .
with vice ,
suaded hi
ruinous ar
her order,
to a weddi
explosion :
to find the
beside the
His servar
King's bed

VII. 1

'rriK KKKOKMA'IION.

387

belt, and
pread that
tluences of
e meanest
soon gave
and delay,
otc to the
counselled
advice he
ognit'on of
; to restore
Murray and
idy to revolt
;r had ever
o Fortune."
only a few
iw that she
at husband ;
;rimonial," a
his jealousy
:d the extent
•r, the youni'
ler chamber,
y in an outer
V to develope
on him, was
|l her hatred
he wretched
n an escape
lurgh at the
[hile Morton,
ith wise dis-
s toleration,
interrupted,
:ies. " Your
|our, " are as
acr child, the
nd, doubled
ambassador
ady to rebel,
e anxiety of
,t the danger
[ding against
;e and for a
;se measures

involved even greater dangers than they averted ; but Klizrbcth stood
alone in her resistance to them. To settle the succession was at once
to draw the sword. The Queen therefore on this point stood firm. The
promise to marry, which she gave after n furious burst of anger, she
was no doubt resolved to evade as she had evaded it before. But the
quarrel with the Commons which followed on her prohibition of any
debate on the succession, a ((uarrcl to which wc shall recur at a later
time, hit Elizabeth hard. It was "secret foes at home," she told the
Commons as their quarrel passed away in a warm reconciliation, " who
thought to work me that mischief which never foreign enemies could
bring to pass, which is the hatred of my Commons. Do you think
that either I am so unmindful of your surety by succession, wherein
is all my care, or that I went about to break your liberties.^ No!
it never was my meaning ; but to stay you before you fell into the
ditch." It was impossible for her however to explain the real reasons
for her course, and the dissolution of the Parliament left her face to face
with a national discontent added to the ever-deepening peril from
without.

One terrible event suddenly struck light through the gathering
clouds. Mary had used Darnley as a tool to effect the ruin of his
confederates and to further her policy, but since his share in Rizzio's
murder she had loathed and avoided him. Ominous words dropped
from her lips. " Unless she were freed of him some way," she said,
" she had no pleasure to live." Her purpose of vengeance was quick-
ened by her passion for the Earl of Bothwell, the boldest and most
unscrupulous of the border nobles. The Earl's desperate temper
shrank from no obstacles to a union with the Queen. Divorce would
free him from his own wife. Darnley might be struck down by a
conspiracy of the lords whom he had deserted and betrayed, and who
still looked on him as their bitterest foe. The exiled nobles were
recalled ; there were dark whispers among the lords. The terrible
secret of the deed which followed is still wrapt in a cloud of doubt and
mystery which will probably never be wholly dispelled. The Queen's
mood seemed suddenly to change. Her hatred to Darnley passed all
at once i to demonstrations of the old affection. He had fallen sick
with vice .md misery, and she visited him on his sick bed, and per-
suaded him to follow her to Edinburgh. She visited him again in a
ruinous and lonely house near the palace, in which he v.'a- I-^'Uged by
her order, kissed him as she bade him farewell, and rc»de gaily back
to a wedding-dance at Holyrood. Two hours after midnight an awf'i!
explosion shook the city ; and the burghers rushed o it from the pitt.>
to find the house of Kirk o' Field destroyed, and Daii^ ley's body dead
beside the ruins. The murder was undoubtedly the deed of Bothwell.
His servant, it was soon known, had stored the powder beneath the

and the Earl had watched without the walls till
c c 2

Sue. IV.

England
AND Mahv

Stuart

1560

1578

iS^i?

The
Damloj
Murder

1 ;■
; 1

' 1

lily ' ■.

itni^ '.

1567

King's bed-chamber

, > •

Kfi<Bn

388

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAl'J VII.]

Sec. IV.

England
AND Mary
Stuakt.

1560

1572

IVIary In
Snglana

1567

the deed was d(/ne. But, in spite of gathering suspicion and of al
charge of murder made formally against him by Lord Lennox, nol
serious steps were taken to investigate the crime ; and a rumour ihrdl
Mary proposed to marry the murderer drove her friends to desprJr,
Her agent in England wrote to her that " if she married that man shel
would lose the favour of God, her own reputation, and the hearts of all|
England, Ireland, and Scotland." But every stronghold in the king-
dom was soon placed in Bothwell's hands, and this step was thel
prelude to a trial and acquittal which the overwhelming force of hisi
followers in Edinburgh turned into a bitter mockery. A shameless!
suit for his divorce removed the last obstacle to his ambition ; and a
seizure of the Queen as she rode to Linlithgow was followed by a
In a month more all was over. The horror at such a I

marriage

co-open

VVithoul
and the
with En
her thro
her Prot
in check
was the 1
Flanders
merchan
Elizabetl
Defeated
the risin:

marriage with a man fresh from her husband's blood drove the whole ■ hope of

nation to revolt. Its nobles, Catholic as well as Protestant, gathered
in arms at Stirling; and their entrance into Edinburgh roused the[
capital into insurrection. Mary and the Earl advanced with ? fair
force to Seton to encounter the Lords ; but their men refused to right,]
and Bothwell galloped off into lifelong exile, while the Queen was[
brought back to Edinburgh in a frenzy of despair, tossing back wild
words of defiance to the curses of the crowd. From Edinburgh

genius, s
before ev
in Flandt
To retair
herself '.,
have enoi
aid in her

she was carried a prisoner to the fortress of Lochleven ; as the price I compliant

weapon a<

in Scotlai
was impo
nothing oi
would cle;
pressing p
to any tria
urged upo:
Mary the i
the price c
sacrificed

of her life she was forced to resign her crown in favour of her child,
and to name her brother, the Earl of Murray, who was now returning
from France, as regent. In July the babe was solemnly crowned <t^
James the Sixth.

For the moment England was saved, but the ruin of Mary's hopes
had not come one instant too soon. The great conflict between the
two religions, which had begun in France, was slowly widening into a
general struggle over the whole face of Europe. For four years the
balanced policy of Catharine of Medicis had wrested a truce from botli
Catholics and Huguenots, but Cond^ and the Guises again rose in arms,
each side eager to find its profit in the new troubles which now broke
out in Flanders. For the long persecution of the Protestants there, and ■ charging t
the unscrupulous invasion of ihe constitutional liberties of the Pro- ■ either to :
vinces by Philip of Spain, had at last stirred the Netherland , to revolt; ■triumph in
and the insurrection was seized by Philip as a pretext for dealing a ■ Scots had
blow he had long meditated at the f -owing heresy of this portion of Bher resolut
his dominions. At the moment wLcn Mary entered Lochleven, the Hand winniri
Duke of Alva was starting with an army of ten thousand men on his ■''had the
march to the Low Countries ; and wi :h his easy triumph over their Hpiesence r
insurgent forces began tht terrible series of outrages and massacres ■temper of t
which have made his name infamous in history. No event could be I In the C
more embarrassing to Elizabeth than the arrival of Alva in Flanders. Resistance s
His extirpation of heresy there would prove the prelude for his ■Cecil at th

THE REFORMATION,

389

low returning

co-operation with the Guises in t-ie extirpation of heresy in France.

Without counting, too, this future aanger, the triumph of Catholicism

and the presence of a CathoHc army in a country so closely connected

with England at once revived the dreams of a Catholic rising against

her throne ; while the news of Alva's massacres stirred in every one of

her Protestant subjects a thirst for revenge which it was hard to hold

in check. Yet to strike a blow at Alva was impossible, for Antwerp

was the great mart of English trade, and a stoppage of the trade with

Flanders, such as war would bring about, would have broken half the

merchants in London. Every day was deepening the perplexities of

Elizabeth, when Mary succeeded in making her escape from Lochleven.

Defeated at Langside, where the energy of Murray promptly crushed

the rising of the Catholic nobles in her support, she abandoned all

hope of Scotland ; and changing her designs with the rapidity of

genius, she pushed in a light boat across the Solway, and was safe

before evening fell in the castle of Carlisle. The presence of Alva

in Flanders was a far less peril than the presence of Mary in Carlisle.

To retain her in England was to furnish a cen re for revolt ; Mary

herself \ ..deed threatened that " if they kept her prisoner they should

have enough to do with her." Her ostensible demand was for English

aid in her restoration to the throne, or for a free passage to France : but

compliance with the last request would have given the Guises a terrible

weapon against Elizabeth and have ensured a new French intervention

I in Scotland, while to restore her by arms to the crown she had lost

was impossible. Till Mary was cleared of guilt, Murray would hear

nothing of her return, and Mary refused to submit to such a trial as

would clear her. So eager, however, was Elizabeth to get rid of the

pressing peril of her presence in England, that Mary's refusal to submit

to any trial only drove her to fresh devices for her restoration. She

urged upon Murray the suppression of the graver charges, and upon

Mary the leaving Murray in actual possession of the royal power as

the price of her return. Neither however would listen to terms which

sacrificed both to Elizabeth's self-interest ; the Regent persisted in

charging the Queen with murder and adultery, while Mary refused

either to answer or to abdicate in favour of her infant son. The

triumph indeed of her boM policy was best advanced, as the Queen of

Scots had no doubt foreseen, by simple inaction. Tier misfortunes,

her resolute denials, were gradually wiping away the stain of her guilt,

land wirming back the Catholics of England to her cause. Elizabeth

''had the wolf by the ears," while the fierce contest which Alva's

ipresence roused in the Netherlands and in France was firing the

[temper of the two great parties in England.

Ill the Court, as in the country, the forces of progress and of

resistance stood at last in sharp and declared opposition to each other.

|Cecil at the head of the Protestants demanded a general alliance

Sec. IV.

England

AND Mary

Stuart

1560

1572

156S

;i« :'.

i»5

The
Catholic
Revolts

: (:■

390

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

England

AND Makv

Stuart

1560

1572

Bull cfDe-
position

1569

A 570

with the Protestant churches throughout Europe, a war in the Low
Countries against Alva, and the unconditional surrender of Mary to
her Scotch subjects for the punishment she deserved. The Catholics
on the other hand, backed by the mass of the Conservative party with
the Duke of Norfolk at its head, and supported by the wealthier mer-
chants who dreaded the ruin of the Flemish trade, were as earnest in
demanding the disjTiissal of Cecil and the Protestants from the council-
board, a steady peace with Spain, and, though less openly, a recognition
of Mary's succession. Elizabeth was driven to temporize as before.
She refused Cecil's counsels ; but she sent money and arms to Conde,
and hampered Alva by seizing treasure on its way to him, and by
pusJiing the quarrel even to a temporary embargo on shipping either
side the sea. She refused the counsels of Norfolk ; but she would hear
nothing of a declaration of war, or give any judgement on the charges
against the Scottish Queen, or recognize the accession of James in her
stead. The effect of Mary's presence in England was seen in conspiracies
of Norfolk with the Northern Earls and with Spain. Elizabeth, roused to
her danger, struck quick and hard. Mary Stuart was given in charge
to Lord Huntingdon. Arundel, Pembroke, and Lumley were secured,
and Norfolk sent to the Tower. But the disasters of the Huguenots in
France, and the news brought by a papal envoy that a Bull of Deposition
against Elizabeth was ready at Rome, goaded the great Catholic
lords to action, and brought about the rising of the houses of Neville
and of Percy. The entry of the Earls of Northumberland and West-
moreland into Durham proved the signal for revolt. The Bible and
Prayer-book were torn to pieces, and Mass said once more at the altar
of Durham Cathedral, before the Earls pushed on to Doncaster with an
army which soon swelled to thousands of men. Their cry was " to re-
duce all causes of religion to the old custom and usage ; " and the Earl
of Sussex, her general in the north, wrote frankly to Elizabeth that
" there were not ten gentlemen in Yorkshire that did allow [approve]
her proceedings in the cause of religion.^' But he was as loyal as he
was frank, and held York stoutly while the Queen ordered Mary's hasty
removal to a new prison at Coventry. The storm however broke as
rapidly as it had gathered. The mass of the Catholics throughout the
country made no sign ; and the Earls no sooner halted irresolute in
presence of this unexpected inaction than their army caught the panic
and dispersed. Northumberland and Westmoreland lied, and were
followed in their flight by Leonard Dacres of Naworth, while their |
miserable adherents paid for their disloyalty in bloodshed and ruin
The ruthless measures of repression which closed this revolt were the!
first breach in the clemency of Elizabeth's rule. But they were signs
of terror which were not lost on her opponents. It was the general
inaction of the Catholics which had foiled the hopes of the northern
Earls ; and Rome now did its best to stir them to activity by publishing

lii I

[chap.

in the Low
• of Mary to
'he Cathohcs
ve party with
ealthier mer-
as earnest in
n the council-
, a recognition
ize as before,
•ms to Cond^,
him, and by
hipping either
he would hear
)n the charges
f James in her
m conspiracies
.beth, roused to
iven in charge
- were secured,
J Huguenots in
lof Deposition
D-reat Catholic
pes of Neville
and and Wcst-
rhe Bible and
are at the altar
icaster with an
;ry was " to re-
" and the Earl
hzabeth that
low [approve]
as loyal as he
d Mary's hasty
ever broke as
throughout the
d irresolute in
,ught the panic
fled, and were
th, while their
,hed and ruin.
•evolt were the I
iiey were signs |
|as the general
ifthc northern I
ly by puHishing

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

39*

the Bull of Excommunication and Deposition against the Queen, which
had been secretly issued in the preceding year, and was found nailed
in a spirit of ironical defiance on the Bishop of London's door. The
Catholics of the north withdrew stubbornly from the national worship.
Everywhere the number of recusants increased. Intrigues were busier
than ever. The regent Murray was assassinated, and Scotland plunged
into war between the adherents of Mary and those of her son. From
the defeated Catholics Mary turned again to the Duke of Norfolk, who
stood at the head of the Conservative peers. Norfolk had acquiesced
in the religious compromise of the Queen, and professed himself a Pro-
testant while he intrigued with the Catholic party. He trusted to carry
the English nobles with him in pressing for his marriage with Mary, a
marriage which should seem to take her out of the hands of French and
Catholic intriguers, to makeheranEnglish\voman,andtoset,t]e thevexed
c|uestion of the succession to Uie throne. His dreams of SL"h a union
with Mary in the preceding year had been detected by Cecil, and
checked by a short sojourn in the Tower ; but his correspondence with
the Queen was renewed on his releas^i, and ended in an appeal to Philip
for the intervention of a Spanish army. At the head of this appeal
stood the name of Mary ; while Norfolk's name was followed by those
of many lords of " the old blood," as the prouder peers styled them-
selves ; and the significance of the request was heightened by gather-
ings of Catholic refugees at Antwerp round the fugitive leaders of the
Northern Revolt, Enough of these conspiracies was discovered to rouse
a fresh ardour in the menaced i^rotestants. The Parliament met to pass
an act of attainder against the Northern I^arls, and to declare the intro-
duction of Papal Bulls into the country an act of high treason. The
rising indignation against Mary, as "the daughter of Debate, who dis-
cord fell doth sow," was shown in a statute, which declared any person
who laid claim to the Crown during the Queen's life-time incapable of
ever succeeding to it. The disaffection of the Catholics was met by
imposing on all magistrates and public officers the obligation of sub-
scribing to the Articles of Faith, a measure which in fact transferred
the administration of justice and public order to their Protestant
opponents. Meanwhile Norfolk's treason ripened into an elaborate
plot. Philip had promised aid should the revolt actually break out ;
but the clue to these negotiations had long been in Cecil's hands, and
before a single step could be taken towards the practical realization of
his schemes of ambition, they were foiled by Norfolk's arrest. With
his death and that of Northumberland, who followed him to the scaf-
fold, the dread of revolt within the realm which had so long hung
over England passed quietly away. The failure of the two attempts
not only showed the weakness and disunion of the party of dis-
content and reaction, but it revealed the weakness of all party

of a national temper which was springing

Sec. IV.

England
AND Mary

Stuart

1560

1572

Treason of
Norfolk

feeling before the rise

I ^'-z i

'57'

392

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. V.

The

England

Elizabeth

and the

Poor

Laivs

naturally out of the peace of Elizabeth's reign, and which a growing
sense of clanger to the order and prosperity around it was fast turning
into a passionate loyalty to the Queen. It was no, merely against
Cecil's watchfulness or Elizabeth's cunning that IVtary and Philip
and the Percies dashed themselves in vain ; it was against a new
England.

Section V.— The England of Elizabeth.

[Authorifies. — For our constitutional history we have D'Ewes' Journals and
Townshend's "Journal of Parliamentary Proceedings from 1580 to 1601," the
first detailed account we possess of the proceedings of our House of Commons.
The general survey given by Hall am ("Constitutional History") is as judicious
as it is able. Macpherson in his " Annals of Commerce " gives details of the
expansion of English trade ; and Hakluyt's "Collection of Voyages" tells of
its activity. Some valuable details are added by Mr. J'roude. The general
literary history is given by Craik (" History of English Literature "), who has
devoted a sej'jarate work to Spenser and his times ; and the sober but narrow
estimate of Mr. Hallam (" Literary History") may be contrasted with the more
brilliant though less balanced comments of M. Taine on the writers of the
Renac. uce. A crowd of biographers mark the new importance of individual
life and action.]

" I have desired," Elizabeth said proudly to her Parliament, " to
have the obedience of my subjects by love, and not by compulsion."
It was a love fairly won by justice and good government. Buriy.d as
she seemed in foreign negotiations and intrigues, Elizabeth was above
all an English sovereign. She devoted herself ably and energetically
to the task of civil administration. At the first r/.oment of relief from
the pressure of outer troubles, she faced the two main causes of internal
disorder. The debasement of the coinage was brought to an end in
1560. In 1561 a commission was is.ued to inquire into the best means
of facing the problem of social discontent. Time, and the natural
dpvelopement of new branches of industry, were working quietly for
the relief of the glutted labour-market ; but a vast mass of disorder still
existed in England, which found a constant ground of resentment in
the enclosures anu evictions which accompanied the progress of
agricultural change. It was on this host of " broken men" that every
rebellion could count for support ; their mere existence indeed was an
encouragement to civil war ; while in peace their presence was felt in
the msecurity of life and property, in g~ngs of marauders which held
'.hole counties in terror, and in "sturdy beggars" who stripped travel-
lers on the road. Under Elizabeth as under her predecessors the
terrible measures of repression, whose uselessness More had in vain
pointed out, .vent pitilessly on : we find the magistrates of Somerset
j 'hire capturing a gang of a hundred at a stroke, hanging fifty at on( c
I v.n t'fe gallo.vs, and complaining bitted) to the Council of the neccs-
j 3ity ior waiting till the Ass'zes before thev could cnioy the spectacle of

[chap.

a growiiig
.St turning
;ly against
ind Philip
inst a new

Journals and
■o i6oi," the
)f Commons,
j as judicious
details of the
iges " tells of
The general
e "), who has
-r but narrow
with the more
writers of the
: of individual

[lament, "to
:ompulsion."
. Buriv.d as
h was above
;nergetically
relief from
s of internal
to an end in
best means
the natural
.g quietly for
disorder still
sentment in
progress of
" that every
deed was an
;e was felt in
s which held
pped travel-
ccessors the
had in vain
if Somerset
fifty at OIK e
if the neceb-
spectacle oi

vii.]

THE REFORMATION.

the fifty others hanging beside them. But the Government were
dealing with the difficulty in a wiser and more effectual way. The
old powers to enforce labour on the idle and settlement on the vagrant
class were continued ; and each town and parish was held responsible
for the relief of its indigent and disabled poor, as well as for the em-
ployment of able-bodied mendicants. But a more efficient machinery
was gradually devised for carrying out the relief and employment of
the poor. Funds for this purpose had been provided by the collection
of ahiis in church ; but the mayor of each town and the churchwardens
of each country parish were now directed to draw up lists of all
inhabitants able to contribute to such a fund, and on a persistent
refusal the justices in sessions were empowered to assess the offender
at a fitting sum and to enforce its payment by imprisonment. The
principles embodied in these measures, that of local responsibility for
local distress, and that of a distinction between the pauper and the vaga-
bond, were more clearly defin^.d in a statute of 1572. By this Act the
justices in the country disvricts and mayors and other officers in towns
were directed to register the imj-otent poor, to settle them in fitting
habitations and to assess all inhabitivnts for their support. Overseers
were appointed to enforce and superiK^^end their labour, for which
wool, hemp, flax, or other stuff was to be provided at the expense of
the inhabitants ; and houses of correction were established in every
county for obstinate vagabonds or for paupers refusing to work at the
overseer's bidding. A subsequent Act transferr-^d to these overseers
the collection of the poor rate, and powers weic given to bind poor
children as apprentices, to erect buildings for the improvident poor,
and to force the parents and children of such paupers to maintain
them. The well-known Act which matured ar finally established
this system, the 43rd of Elizabeth, remained the se of our system of
pauper-administration until a time within the
men. Whatever flaws a later experience has fo
their wise and humane character formed a s'
legislation which had degraded our statute-bo(
Statute of Labourers ; and their efficacy at tH- time was proved by
the cessation of the social danger against w ich they were intended
to provide.

Its cessation however was owing, not merely to law, but to the natural
growth of wealth and industry tbroughout the country. The change in
the mode of cultivation, whatever social embarrassment it might bring
about, undoubtedly favoured production. Not only was a larger capital
brought to bear xipon the land, but the mere cha , ^ in the system iniro-
duced a taste for new and better modes of agriculture ; the breed of horses
and of cattle was improved, and a far greater use made of manure and
dressings. One acre under the new system produced, it was said, as
much as two under the old. As a more careful and constant cultivation

collection of living

1 in these measures,

king contrast to the

irom the date of the

393

Sec. V.

The

England

Elizabeth

1562

1601

Progress

of the

Country

III

! ■ ll

394

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

III

Enelisb

Com"

xnerce

156b

J'.'
I't

fCHAP.

Sec. V.

The

England

Elizabeth

was introduced, a greater number of hands were required on every farm ;
and much of the surplus labour which had been flung off the land in the
commencement of the new system was thus recalled to it. But a far
more efficient agency in absorbing the unemployed was found in the de-
velopement of manufactures. The linen trade was as yet of small value,
and that of silk-weaving was only just introduced. But the woollen
manufacture was fast becoming an important element in the national
wealth. England no longer sent her fleeces to be woven in Flanders and
to be dyed at Florence. The spinning of yarn, the weaving, fulling, and
dyeing of cloth, was spreading rapidly from the towns over the country-
side. The worsted trade, of which Norwich was the centre, extended over
the whole of the Eastern counties. Farmers' wives began everywhere to
spin their wool from their own sheep's backs into a coarse "home-spun."
The South and the West, however, still remained the great seats of in-
dustry and of wealth, for they were the homes of mining and manufactur-
ing activity. The iron manufactures were limited to Kent and Sussex,
though their prosperity in this quarter was already threatened by the
growing scarcity of the wood which fed their furnaces, and by the exhaus-
tion of the forests of the Weald. Cornwall was then, as now, the sole
exporter of tin ; and the exportation of its copper was just beginning. The
broadcloths of the West claimed the palm among the woollen stuffs of
England. The Cinque Ports held almost a monopoly of the commerce
of the Channel. Every little harbour from the Foreland to the Land's
End sent out its fleet of fishing-boi.,ts, manned with the bold seamen who
were to furnish crews for Drake and the Buccaneers. But in the reign
of Elizabeth the poverty and inaction to which the North had been
doomed for so many centuries began at last to be broken. We see the
first signs of the revolution which has transferred English manufactures
and EngUsh wealth to the north of the Mersey and the Humber in the
mention which now meets us of the friezes of Manchester, the coverlets
01 York, the cutlery of Sheffield, and the cloth trade of Halifax.

The growth however of English commerce far outstripped that of its
manufactures. We must not judge of it, indeed, by any modern stan-
dard ; for the whole population of the country can hardly have exceeded
five or six millions, and the burthen of all the vessels engaged in ordi-
nary commerce was estimated at little more than fifty thousand tons.
The size of the vessels employed in it would nowadays seem insignifi-
cant ; a modern collier brig is probably as large as the biggest mer-
chant vessel which then sailed from the port of London. But it was
under Elizabeth that English commerce began the rapid career of
developement which has made us the carriers of the world. The
foundation of the Royal Exchange by Sir Thomas Gresham was a
mark of the commercial progress of the time. By far the most im-
portant branch of our trade was with Flanders ; Antwerp and Bruges
were in fact the general marts of the world in the early part of the

fCHAP.

;ry farm ;
[id in the
5ut a far
n the de-
lall value,
; woollen
; national
nders and
illing, and
; country-
nded over
•ywhere to
me-spun."
eats of in-
anufactur-
nd Sussex,
ed by the
he exhaus-
w, the sole
ming. The
m stuffs of
commerce
ithe Land's
samen who
\ the reign
had been
We see the
.nufactures
iber in the
c coverlets
"ax.

that of its
idem stan-
|e exceeded
led in ordi-
.sand tons.
11 insignifi-
jgest mei-
|But it was
career of
Irld. The
■am was a
most im-
.nd Bruges
lart of the

VII. 1

THE REFORMATION.

395

sixteenth century, and the annual export of English wool and drapery
to their markets was estimated at a sum of more than two millions
in value. It was with the ruin of Antwerp at the time of its siege and
capture by the Duke of Parma that the commercial supremacy of our
own capital was first established. A third of the merchants and manu-
facturers of the ruined city are said to have found a refuge on the banks
of the Thames. The export trade to Flanders died away as London
developed into the general mart of F.urope, where the gold and sugar of
the New World were found side by side with the cotton of India, the silks
of the East, and the woollen stuffs of England itself. Not only was
much of the old trade of the world transferred by this change to
English shores, but the sudden burst of national vigour found new out-
lets for its activity. The Venetian carrying fleet still touched at South-
ampton ; but as far back as the reign of Henry the Seventh a com-
mercial treaty had been concluded with Florence, and the trade with
the Mediterranean which had begun under Pochard the Third constantly
took a wider developeinent. The trade between England and the Baltic
ports had hitherto been concluded by the Hanseatic merchants ; but the
extinction at this time of their London depot, the Steel Yard, was a sign
that this trade too had now passed into 'micm'sIi hands. The growth of
Boston and Hull marked an increase oi" ■ • -mmercial intercourse with
Scandinavia. The prosperity of Bristol, which depended in great
measure on the trade with Ireland, was stimulated by the conquest and
colonization of that island at the close of the Queen's reign and the
beginning of her successor's. The dream of a northern passage to
India opened up a trade with aland as yet unknown. Of three ships
which sailed under Hugh Willoughby to realize this dream, two were
found afterwards frozen with their crews and their hapless commander
on the coast of Lapland ; but the third, under Richard Chancellor,
made its way safely to the White Sea and by its discovery of Archangel
created the trade with Russia. A more lucrative traffic had already
begun with the coast of Guinea, to whose gold-dust and ivory the
miprchants of Southampton owed their wealth. The guilt of the Slave
Trade which sprang out of it rests with John Hawkins, whose arms (a
demi-moor, proper, bound with a cord) commemorated his priority in
the transport of negroes from Africa to the labour-fields of the New
World. The fisheries of the Channel and the German Ocean gave oc-
cupation to the numerous ports which lined the coast from Yarmouth
to Plymouth Haven ; Bristol and Chester were rivals in the fisheries of
Ulster; and the voyage of Sebastian Cabot from the former port to the
mainland of North America had called English vessels to the stormy
ocean of the North. From the time of Henry the Eighth the rumber
of English boats engaged on the cod-banks of 1 ewfoundland stradily
increased, and at the close of Elizabeth's reign tie seamen ot Biscay
found English rivals in the whale-fishery of the Polar seas.

Sec. V.

The
England

Elizabeth

|;#.'|

'553

1^62

396

i :

1 m

; ii

1 1

1 ■'

1 i

HISTOUy OF THE ENC4-TSU TFOl'LE.

fCHAf.

Sec. V.

The

Englanu

IClizaiieth

Wealth

and

Social

Progress

V/h3«^ Elizabeth contributed to this upgniwlh of national prosperity
was the peace and social order from which it sprang, and the thrift
which spared the p\irses of her subjects by enabling her in ordinary
times to content herself u ith the ordinary resources of the Crown.
She lent, too, a ready patronage to the new commerce, she shared in
its speculations, she considered its extension and protection as a part
of public policy, and she sanctioned the formation of the great Merchant
Companies which could then alone seoure the trader against wrong or
injustice in distant countries. The Merchant-Adventurers of London,
a body which had existed long before, and had received a charter of
incorporation under Henry the Seventh, furnished a model for the
Russian Company and ihe Company which absorbed the new commerce
to the Indies. But h was not wholly with satisfaction that either
Elizabeth or her ministers watched the social change which wealth was
producing around them. They feared the increased expenditure and
comfort which necessarily followed it, as likely to impoverish the land
and to eat out the hardihood of the people. " England spendeth more
on wines in one year," complained Cecil, " than it did in ancient times
in four years." The disuse of salt-fi^h and the greater consumption
of meat marked the improvement which was taking place among the
countT)'- folk. Their rough and wattled farmhouses were being
superseded by dwellings of brick and stone. Pewter was replacing
the wooden trenchers of the earlier yeomanry ; there were yeomen
who could boast of a fair show of silver plate. It is from this period
inaeed that we can first date the rise of a conception which seems to
i)s now a peculiarly English one, the conception of domestic comfort.
Ti-ti chimney-corner, so closely associated with family life, came into
existence with the general introduction of chimneys, a feature rare in
ordinary houses at the beginning of this reign. Pillows, which had
before been despised by the farmer and the trader as fit only " for
women in child-bed," were now in general use. Carpets superseded
the filthy flooring of rushes. The lofty houses of the wealthier mer-
chants, their parapeted fronts and costly wainscoting, their cumbrous
but elaborate beds, their carved staircases, their quaintly figured gables,
not only contrasted with the squalor which had till then characterized
English towns, but marked the rise of a new middle class which was
to play its part in later history. A transformation of an even more
striking kind proclaimed the extinction of the feudal character of the
noblesse. Gloomy walls and serried battlements disappeared from
the dwellings of the gentry. The strength of the mediaeval fortress
gave way to the pomp and grace of the Elizabethan Hall. Knole,
Longleat, Burleigh and Hatfield, Hardwick and Audley End, arc
familiar instances of the social as well as architectural change which
covered England with buildings where the thought of defence was
abandoned for that of domestic comfort and refinement. We still

VII. 1

THE REFORMATION.

397

.I*

gaze with pleasure on their picturesque line of gables, their fretted [ Rf.c. V
fronts, their cjildcd turrets and fanciful vanes, their castellated gate-

ways, the jutting oriels from which the great noble looked down on
his new Italian garden, on its stately terraces and broad flights of
steps, its vases and fountains, its quaint mazes, its formal walks, its
lines of yews cut into grotesque shapes in hopeless rivalry of the
cypress avenues of the vSouth. The Italian refinement of life which
told on pleasaunce and garden told on the remodelling of the house
within, raised the principal apartments to an upper floor — a change to
which we owe the grand stairc.ises of the time — surrounded the quiet
courts by long " galleries of the presence," crowned the rude hearth
with huge chimney-pieces adorned with fauns and cupids, with ciuaintly
interlaced monograms and fantastic arabesques, hung tapestries on
the walls, and crowded each chamber with quaintly-carved chairs and
costly cabinets. The life of the Middle Ages concentrated itself in
the vast castle hall, where the baron looked from his upper dais on
the retainers who gathered at his board. But the great households
were fast breaking up ; and the whole feudal economy disappeared
when the lord of the household withdrew with his family into his
"parlour" or " withdrawing-room," and left the hall to his dependents.
The p 'odigal use of glass became a marked feature in the domestic
architecture of the time, and one whose influence on the general
health of the people can hardly be overrated. Long lines of windows
stretched over the fronts of the new manor halls. Every merchant's
house had its oriel. " You shall have sometimes," Lord Bacon
grumbled, " your houses so full of glass, that we cannot tell where to
come to be out of the sun or the cold." But the prodigal enjoyment
of light and sunshine was a mark of the temper of the age. The
lavishness of a new wealth united with a lavishness of life, a love of
beauty, of colour, of display, to revolutionize English dress. The
Oueen's three thousand robes were rivalled in their bravery by the
slashed velvets, the ruffs, the jewelled purpoints of the courtiers around
her. Men " wore a manor on ti^eir backs." The old sober notions of
thrift melted before the strange revolutions of fortune wrought by the
New World. Gallants g< mbled away a fortune at a sitting, ard
sailed tff to make a fresh one in the Indies. Visions of galleons
loaded to the brim with pearls and diamonds and ingots of silver,
dreams ~>f El Dorados where all was of gold, threw a haze of prodi-
gality ar 1 profusion over the imagination of the meanest seaman.
The woi.ders, too, of the New World kindled a burst of extravagant
fancy ii; the Old. The strange medley of past and present which
distinguishes its masques and feastings only reflected the medley of
men's thoughts. Pedantry^ novelty, the allegory of Italy, the chivalry
of the Middle Ages, the mythology of Rome, the English bear-fight,
pastorals, superstition, farre, all took tlieir turn in the entertainment

Tin?

F.Nr,I.ANU
OK

Elizabeth

iiii(

I ■X'.

Mi.

39«

Sec. V.

Thk

England

OK
i: KHZABKTH

The

Revival

Enirliali

Iiltera-

ture

HISTORY OF TriE KN(iT.ISn FEOPI-K.

[CIIAI-.

which Lord Leicester provided for the Queen at Kenihvorth. A " wild
man'' from the Indies chanted her praises, and Echo answered him.
Elizabeth turned from the greetings of sibyls and giants to deliver thr
enchanted lady from her tyrant " Sans Pitie." Shepherdesses wclcomcil
her with carols of the spring, while Ceres and Bacchus poured their
corn and grapes at her feet.

It was to this turmoil of men's minds, this wayward luxuriance and
prodigality of fancy, that we owe the revival of English lotters under
Elizabeth. Here, as elsewhere, the Renascence found vernacular
literature all but dead, poetry reduced to the doggrel of Skelton, his-
tory to the annals of Fabyan or Halle. It had however done little for
English letters. The overpowering influence of the new models both
of thought and style which it gave to the world in the writers of Greece
and Rome was at first felt only as a fresh check to the dreams of any
revival of English poetry or prose. Though England shared more than
any European country in the political and ecclesiastical results of the
New Learning, its literary results were far less than in the rest of
Europe, in Italy, or Germany, or Trance. More alone ranks among
the great classical scholars of the sixteenth century. Classical learn-
ing indeed all but perished at the Universities in the storm of the
Reformation, nor did it revive there till the close of Elizabeth's reign.
Insensibly however the influences of the Renascence fertilized the in-
tellectual soil of England for the rich harvest that was to come. The
court poetry which clustered round Wyatt and Surrey, exotic and imi-
tative as it was, promised a new life for English verse. Th*" growth
of grammar schools realized the dream of Sir Thomas More, and
brought the middle-classes, from the squire to the petty tradesman,
into contact with the masters of Greece and Rome. The love of travel,
which became so remarkable a characteristic of Elizabeth's day,
quickened the intelligence of the wealthier nobles. " Home-keeping
youths," says Shakspere in words that mark the time, "have ever
homely wits ;" and a tour over the Continent was just becoming part
of the education of a gentleman. Fairfax's version of Tasso, Harring-
ton' s version of Ariosto, were signs of the influence which the litera-
ture of Italy, the land to which travel led most frequently, exerted on
English minds. The writers of Greece and Rome began at last to tell
upon England when they were popularized by a crowd of translations.
Chapman's noble version of Homer stands high above its fellows, but
all the greater poets and historians of the classical world were turned
into .English before the close of the sixteenth century. It is charac-
teristic of England that historical literature was the first to rise from
its long death, though the form in which it rose marked the difference
between the world in which it had perished and that in which it re-
appeared. During the Middle Ages the world had been without a
past, save the shadowy and unknown past of early Rome ; and annalist

[ciiAr.

, A "wild
ered him.
iehvev Uk'
welcomed
urcd their

fiance and
ters under
vernacular
kelton, his-
no little for
lodels both
s of Greece
ims of any
1 more than
suits of the
the rest of
mks among
isical learn-
torm of the
)eth's reign,
lized the in-
:ome. The
tic and imi-
h*" growth
More, and
tradesman,
>ve of travel,
ibeth's day,
>me-keeping
"have ever
:oming part
5o, Harring-
h the litera-
exerted on
It last to tell
ranslations.
fellows, but
were turned
t is charac-
to rise from
le difference
which it re-
;n without a
,nd annalist

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

and chronicler told the story of the years which went before as a pre-
face to his tale of the present without a sense of any difference between
them. But the religious, social, and political change which had passed
over England under the New Monrirchy broke the continuity of its '
life ; and the depth of the rift between the f vo ages is seen by the way !
in which History passes, on its revival under l-^lizabeth, from the
niedixval form of pure narrative to its mo lern form of an investigation
and reconstruction of the past. The new interest which attached to
the bygone u orld led to the collection of its annals, their reprinting
and embodiment in an English shape. It was his desire to give the
Elizabethan Church a basis in the past, as much as any pure zeal for
lelLcrs, which induced Archbishop Parker to lead the way in the first
of these labours. The collection of historical manuscripts which, fol-
lowing in the track of Leland, he rescued from the wreck of the
monastic libraries created a school of antiquarian imitators, whose re-
search and industry have preserved for us almost every work of per-
manent historical value which existed before the Dissolution of the
Monasteries. To his publication of some of our earlier chronicles we
owe the series of similar publications which bear the names of Camden,
Twysden, and Gale. But as a branch of literature, English History in
ihe new shape which we have noted began in the work of the poet
Daniel. The chronicles of Stowe and Speed, who preceded him, are
simple records of the past, oiien copied almost literally from the annals
they used, and utterly without style or arrangement ; v/hil Daniel, in-
accurate and superficial as he is, gave his story a literary form and
embodied it in a pure and graceful prose. Two larger works at the
close of Elizabeth's reign, the " History of the Turks" by Knolles, and
Ralegh's vast but unfinished plan of the " History of the World,"
showed the widening of historic interest beyond the merely national
bounds to which it had hitherto been conf led.

A far higher developement of our literature sprang from the growing
influence which Italy, as we have seen, was exerting, prrtly through
travel and partly through its poetry and romances, on the manners and
taste of the time. Men made more account of a story of Boccaccio's,
it was said, than of a story from the Bible. The dress, the speech, the
manners of Italy became objects of almost passionate imitation, and
of an imitation not always of the wisest or noblest kind. To Ascham
it seemed like " the enchantment of Circe brought out of Italy to
mar men's manners in England." " An Italianate Englishman," ran
the harder proverb of Italy itself, " is an incarn.i'e devil." The literary
form which this imitation took seemed at any rate absurd. John Lyly,
distinguished both as a dramatist and a poet, laid aside the tradition
of English style for a style modelled on the decadence of Italian prose.
Euphuism, as the new fashion has been styled from the prose romance
of Euphues in which Lyly originated it, is best known to modern

Skc. V.

The
England

Em/abf.tii

il^ 1 ;i

"•y and
trre

1579

IMAGE EVALUATION
TEST TARGET (MT-3)

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1.0

1.1

■tt|21 125

li! ^"

2.2

2.0

Hiotographic

Sciences

CoipoMon

23 WBT IfMH STRHT

WnSTM,N.Y. MStO

(716) •72-4S03

^^^^

400

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. V.

The
England

Elizaheth

Sidney.

1590

readers by the pitiless caricature in which Shakspere quizzed its
pedantry, its affectation, the meaningless monotony of its far-fetched
phrases, the absurdity of its extravagant conceits. Its representative,
Armado in " Love's Labour's Lost," is " a man of fire-new words,
fashion's own knight," " that hath a mint of phrases in his brain ; one
whom the music of his own vain tongue doth ravish like enchanting
harmony." But its very extravagance sprang from the general burst
of delight in the new resources of thought and language which litera-
ture felt to be at its disposal ; and the new sense of literary beauty
which it disclosed in its affectation, in its love cf a "mint of phrases"
and the " music of its own vain tongue," the new sense of pleasure in
delicacy or grandeur of phrase, in the structure and arrangement of
sentences, in what has been termed the atmosphere of words, was a
sense out of which style was itself to spring. For a time Euphuism
had it all its own way. Elizabeth was the most affected and detestable
of Euphuists ; ind " that beauty in Court which could not parley
Euphuism," a courtier of Charles the First's time tells us, "was as little
regarded as she that now there speaks not French." The fashion
however passed away, but the "Arcadia" of Sir Philip Sidney shows
the wonderful advance which prose had made under its influence.
Sidney, the nephew of Lord Leicester, was the idol of his time, and
perhaps no figure reflects the age more fully and more beautifully.
Fair as he was brave, quick of wit as of affection, noble and generous
in temper, dear to Elizabeth as to Spenser, the darling of the court and
of the camp, his learning and his genius made him the centre of the
literary world which was springing into birth on English soil. He had
travelled in France and Italy, he was master alike of the older learning
and of the new discoveries of astronomy. Bruno dedicated to him as
to a friend his metaphysical speculations ; he was familiar with the
drama of Spain, the poems of Ronsard, the sonnets of Italy. He
combined the wisdom of a grave councillor with the romantic chivalry
of a knight-errant. " I never heard the old story of Percy and
Douglas," he says, " that I found not my heart moved more than with
a trumpet." He flung away his life to save the English army in
Flanders, and as he lay dying they brought a cup of water to his
fevered lips. He bade them give it to a soldier who was stretched on
the ground beside him. " Thy necessity," he said, " is greater than
mine." The whole of Sidney's nature, his chivalry and his learning,
his thirst for adventures, his tendency to extravagance, his freshness
of tone, his tenderness and childlike simplicity of heart, his affectation
and false sentiment, his keen sense of pleasure and delight, pours
itself out in the pastoral medley, forced, tedious, and yet strangely
beautiful, of his " Arcadia." In his " Defence of Poetry " the youthful
exuberance of the romancer has passed into the earnest vigour and
grandiose stateliness of the rhetorician. But whether in the one work

vii.J

or the othe
Sidney's styl
prose, howe
who appeal
fiction is to
and Nash
the Italian
to the appe
was seen in
which passe
which they
the eight ye
" In a night
in seven yej
him dear f<
of the wit t
peers ; but
and his riv£
the pedantr;
facility, his ^
of popular li
and the ver
The abunda
of the Queer
widened far
which it beg
We shall
which this ii
religious ch
progress of 1
impulses of
revive a spir
it was impc
which her w
conflict aros
live percepti
modification
the system c
she abandon
She tamper
freedom ; th
juries in poli
ment was sti
cloth and
taxation.

VII.J

THE REFORMATION.

40 1

one

was a

or the other, the flexiWlity, the music, the luminous clearness of
Sidney's style remains the same. The quickness and vivacity of Erglish
prose, however, was first developed in the school of Italian imitators
who appeared in Elizabeth's later years. The origin of English
fiction is to be found in the tales and romances with which Greene
and Nash crowded the market, models for which they found in
the Italian novels. The brief form of these novelettes soon led
to the appearance of the " pamphlet ; " and a new world of readers
was seen in the rapidity with which the stories or scurrilous libels
which passed under this name were issued, and the greediness with
which they were devoured. It was the boast of Greene that in
the eight years before his death he had produced forty pamphlets.
" In a night or a day would he have yarked up a pamphlet, as well as
in seven years, and glad was that printer that might be blest to pay
him dear for the very dregs of his wit." Modem eyes see less
of the wit than of the dregs in the works of Greene and his com-
peers ; but the attacks which Nash directed against the Puritans
and his rivals were the first English works which shook utterly off
the pedantry and extravagance of Euphuism. In his lightness, his
facility, his vivacity, his directness of speech, we have the beginning
of popular literature. It had descended from the closet to the street,
and the very change implied that the street was ready to receive it.
The abundance indeed of printers and of printed books at the close
of the Queen's reign shows that the world of readers and writers had
widened far beyond the small circle of scholars and courtiers with
which it began.

We shall have to review at a later time the great poetic burst for
which this intellectual advance was paving the way, and the moral and
religious change which was passing over the country through the
progress of Puritanism. But both the intellectual and the religious
impulses of the age united with the influence of its growing wealth to
revive a spirit of independence in the nation at large, a spirit which
it was impossible for Elizabeth to understand, but the strength of
which her wonderful tact enabled her to feel Long before any open
conflict arose between the people and the Crown, we see her instinc-
tive perception of the changes which were going on round her in the
modifications, conscious or unconscious, which she introduced into
the system of the monarchy. Of its usurpations on English liberty
she abandoned none. But she curtailed and softened down almost all.
She tampered, as her predecessors had tampered, with personal
freedom ; there was the same straining of statutes and coercion of
juries in political trials as before, and an arbitrary power of imprison-
ment was still exercised by the Council. The duties she imposed on
cloth and sweet wines were an assertion of her right of arbitrary
taxation. Proclamations in Council constantly assumed the force of

Sec. V.

The
England

Elizabeth

EUsfc.

betbaa

Enclaad

and the

Crown

i'l >'!'

402

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

rCHAP.

Sec. V.

The

England

Elizabeth

Changes in

the
Commons.

law. In one part of her policy indeed Elizabeth seemed to fall back
from the constitutional attitude assumed by the Tudor sovereigns.
Ever since Cromwell's time the Parliament had been convened almost
year by year as a great engine of justice and legislation, but Elizabeth
recurred to the older jealousy of the two Houses which had been en-
tertained by Edward the Fourth, Henry the Seventh, and Wolsey.
Her Parliaments were summoned at intervals of never less than three,
and sometimes of five years, and never save on urgent necessity.
Practically however the royal power was wielded with a caution and
moderation that showed the sense of a gathering difficulty in the full
exercise of it. The ordinary course of justice was left undisturbed.
The jurisdiction of the Council was asserted almost exclusively over
the Catholics ; and defended in their case as a precaution against
pressing dangers. The proclamations issued were temporary in
character and of small importance. The two duties imposed were so
slight as to pass almost unnoticed in the general satisfaction at
EHzabeth's abstinence from internal taxation. She abandoned the
benevolences and forced loans which had brought home the sense of
tyranny to the subjects of her predecessors. She treated the Privy
Seals, which on emergencies she issued for advances to her Exchequer,
simply as anticipations of her revenue (like our own Exchequer Bills),
and punctually repaid them. The monopolies with which she fettered
trade proved a more serious grievance ; but during her earlier reign
they were looked on as a part of the system of Merchant Associations,
which were at that time regarded as necessary for the regulation and
protection of the growing commerce. Her thrift enabled her in
ordinary times of peace to defray the current expenses of the Crown
from its ordinary revenues. But the thrift was dictated not so much
by economy as by the desire to avoid summoning fresh Parliaments.
The Queen saw that the " management " of the two Houses, so easy to
Cromwell, was becoming harder every day. The rise of a new nobility,
enriched by the spoils of the Church and trained to political life by the
stress of events around them, was giving fresh vigour to the Lords.
The increased wealth of the country gentry, as well as their growing
desire to obtain a seat in the Commons, brought about the cessation at
this time of the old practice of payment of members by their con-
stituencies. A change too in the borough representation, which had
long been in progress but was now for the first time legally recognized,
tended greatly to increase the vigour and independence of the Lower
House. The members for boroughs had been required by the terms
of the older writs to be chosen from the body of the burgesses ; and |
an Act of Henry the Fifth gave this custom the force of law. But the |
passing of the Act shows that the custom was already widely infringed ; I
and by the time of Elizabeth most borough seats were filled by
strangers, often nominees of the great landowners round, but for the

VII.J

THE REFORMATION.

403

11 back
ereigns.
I almost
lizabeth
leen en-
Wolsey.
in three,
ecessity.
tion and
[1 the full
isturbed.
vely over
1 against
)orary in
i were so
action at
oned the
» sense of
the Privy
:xchequer,
uer Bills),
tie fettered
rlier reign
sociations,
lation and
;d her in
;he Crown
so much
.rliaments.
so easy to
w nobility,
life by the
fhe Lords.
J growing
lessationat
Itheir con-
rhich had
ecognized,
Ithe Lower
the terms
isses ; and
But the I
|infringed;
filled by
lUtfor the

most part men of wealth and blood, whose aim in entering Parliament
was a purely political one, and whose attitude towards the Crown was
far bolder and more independent than that of the quiet tradesmen who
preceded them. So changed, indeed, was the tone of the Commons,
even as early as the close of Henry's reign, that Edward and Mary
both fell back on the prerogative of the Crown to create boroughs,
and summoned members from fresh constituencies, which were often
mere villages, and wholly in the hands of the Crown. But this " pack-
ing of the House" had still to be continued by their successor. The
large number of such members whom Elizabeth called into the
Commons, sixty-two in all, was a proof of the increasing difficulty
which the Government found in securing a working majority.

Had Elizabeth lived in quiet times her thrift would have saved her
from the need of summoning Parliament at all. But the perils of her
reign drove her to rene'ved demands of subsidies, and at each demand
the tone of the Houses rose higher and higher. Constitutionally the
policy of Cromwell had had this special advantage, that at the very
crisis of our liberties it had acknowledged and confirmed by repeated
instances, for its own purposes of arbitrary rule, the traditional right
of Parliament to grant subsidies, to enact laws, and to consider and
petition for the redress of grievances. These rights remained, while
the power which had turned them into a mere engine of despotism
was growing weaker year by year. Not only did the Parliament of
Elizabeth exercise its powers as fully as the Parliament of Cromwell,
but the forces, political and religious, which she sought stubbornly to
hold in check pressed on irresistibly, and soon led to the claiming
of new privileges. In spite of the rarity of its assembling, in spite of
high words and imprisonment and dexterous management, the Parlia-
ment quietly gained a power which, at her accession, the Queen could
never have dreamed of its possessing. Step by step the Lower House
won the freedom of its members from arrest save by its own permission,
the right of punishing and expelling members for crimes committed
within the House, and of determining all matters relating to elections.
The more important claim of freedom of speech brought on a series of
petty conflicts which showed Elizabeth's instincts of despotism, as well
as her sense of the new power which despotism had to face. In the
great crisis of the Darnley marriage Mr. Dalton defied a royal prohibi-
tion to mention the subject of the succession by denouncing the claim
of the Scottish Queen. Elizabeth at once ordered him into arrest, but
the Commons prayed for leave " to confer upon their liberties," and
the Queen ordered his release. In the same spirit she commanded
Mr. Strickland, the mover of a bill for the reform of the Common
Prayer, to appear no more in Parliament ; but as soon as she perceived
the House was bent upon his restoration the command was withdi'awn.
On the other hand, the Commons still shrank from any consistent

D D 2

Sec. V.

The
England

Elizabeth

»ii,i

'! Jl

Elisabeth

and the

Parlia-

ment

: 5 i

W \ '

1566

iS7i

*• r-r

404

Sec. V.

Thk
England

Elizabeth

»57S

1588

Claims 0/

the

COHtHtOttS.

1559

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

repudiation of Elizabetn's assumption of control over freedom of
speech. The bold protest of Peter Wentworth against it was met by
the House itself with his committal to the Tower: and the yet bolder
question which he addressed to a later x^arliament, " Whether this
Council is not a place for every member of the same freely and without
control, by bill or speech, to utter any of the griefs of the Common-
wealth," brought on him a fresh imprisonment at the hands of the
Council, which lasted till the dissolution of the Parliament and with
which the Commons declined to interfere. But vhile vacillating in its
assertion of the rights of individual speakers, the House steadily
asserted its claim to the wider powers which Cromwell's policy had
given to Parliamentary action. In theory the Tudor statesmen re-
garded three cardinal subjects, matters of trade, matters of religion,
and matters of State, as lying exclusively within the competence of
the Crown. But in actual fact such subjects had been treated by
Parliament after Parliament. The whole religious fabric of the realm,
the very title of Elizabeth, rested on Parliamentary statutes. When the
Houses petitioned at the outset of her reign for the declaration of a
successor and for the Queen's marriage, it was impossible to deny
their right to intermeddle with these " matters of State," though she
rebuked the demand and evaded an answer. But the question of
the succes^jion became too vital to English freedom and English
religion to remain confined within Elizabeth's council chamber. The
Parliament which met in 1566 repeated the demand in a more im-
perative way. Her consciousness of the real dangers of such a request
united with her arbitrary temper to move Elizabeth to a burst of
passionate anger. The marriage indeed she promised, but she
peremptorily forbade the subject of the succession to be approached.
Wentworth at once rose in the Commons to know whether such a
prohibition was not "against the liberties of Parliament.?" and the
question was followed by a hot debate. A fresh message from the
Queen commanded "that there should be no further argument,"
but the message was met by a request for freedom of deliberation.
Elizabeth's prudence taught her that retreat was necessary ; she
protested that " she did not mean to prejudice any part of the liberties
heretofore granted them ; " she softened the order of silence into a
request ; and the Commons, won by the graceful concession to a loyal
assent, received her message "most joyfully and with most hearty
prayers and thanks for the same." But the victory was none the
less a real one. No such struggle had taken place between the
Commons and the Crown since the beginning of the New Monarchy;
and the struggle had ended in the virtual defeat of the Crown. It
was the prelude to another claim equally galling to the Queen.
Though the constitution of the Church rested in actual fact on Parlia-
mentary enactments, Elizabeth, like the rest of the Tudor sovereigns,

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

405

theoretically held her ecclesiastical supremacy to be a purely personal
power, with her administration of which neither Parliament nor even
her Council had any right to interfere. But the exclusion of the
Catholic gentry through the Test Acts, and the growth of Puritanism
among the landowners as a class, gave more and more a Protestant
tone to the Commons and to the Council ; and it was easy to re-
member that the Supremacy which was thus jealously guarded from
Parliamentary interference had been conferred on the Crown by a
Parliamentary statute. Here, however, the Queen, as the religious
representative of the two parties who made up her subjects, stood on
firmer ground than the Commons, who represented but one of them.
And she used her advantage boldly. The bills proposed by the more
advanced Protestants for the reform of the Common Prayer were at
her command delivered up into her hands and suppressed. Wentworth,
the most outspoken of his party, was, as we have seen, imprisoned in
the Tower : and in a later Parliament the Speaker was expressly for-
bidden to receive bills "foi reforming the Church, and transforming
the Commonwealth." In spite of these obstacles, however, the effort
for reform continued, and though crushed by the Crown or set aside
by the Lords, ecclesiastical bills were presented in every Parliament
A better fortune awaited the Commons in their attack on the royal
prerogative in matters of trade. Complaints made of the licences and
monopolies by which internal and external commerce were fettered
were at first repressed by a royal reprimand as matters neither per-
taining to the Commons nor within the compass of their understanding.
When the subject was again stirred nearly twenty years afterwards.
Sir Edward Hoby was sharply rebuked by "a great personage" for
his complaint of the illegal exactions made by the Exchequer. But
the bill which he promoted was sent up to the Lords in spite of this,
and at the close of Elizabeth's reign the storm of popular indignation
which had been roused by the growing grievance nerved the Commons
to a decisive struggle. It was in vain that the ministers opposed the
bill for the Abolition of Monopolies, and after four days of vehement
debate the tact of Elizabeth taught her to give way. She acted with
her usual ability, declared her previous ignorance of the existence of
the evil, thanked the House for its interference, and quashed at a
single blow every monopoly that she had granted.

Section VI. Mie Armada. 1572-1588.

[AutJiontie.". — The general history of the Catholics is given in the work of
Dodd ; see also "The Troubles of our Catholic Forefathers," published by
Father Morris; and for the Jesuits, "More's Historia Provinciae Anglicanae
Societatis Jesu ; " to these may be added Mr. Simpson's life of Cami>ian.]

The wonderful growth in wealth and social energy which we have
described was accompanied by a remarkable change in the religious

Src. V.

Thk
England

OF
F.I.IZABKTII

»57i

'S93

1601

The New
Protes-
tantiam

I't

¥■

1; >

y ^'■.

, ' i

■'i= ,

4o6

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. VI.

Thk
Ahmaua

157a

1588

temper of the nation. Silently, almost unconsciously, Eng'and became
Protestant, as the traditionary Catholicism which formed the religion
of three-fourths of the people at the Queen's accession died quietly
away. At the close of her reign the only parts of England where the
old faith retained anything of its former vigour were the north and the
extreme west, at that time the poorest and least populated p? ' of the
kingdom. One main cause of the ch.inge lay undoubted ^ .a the
gradual dying out of the Catholic priesthood and the growth of a new
Protestant clergy who supplied their place. The older parish priests,
though they had almost to a man acquiesced in the changes of ritual
and doctrine which the various phases of the Reformation imposed
upon them, remained in heart utterly hostile to its spirit. As Mary
had undone the changes of Edward, they hoped for a Catholic suc-
cessor to undo the changes of Elizabeth ; and in the meantime they
were content to wear the surplice instead of the chasuble, and to use
the Communion-ofifice instead of the Mass-book. Cut if they were
forced to read the Homilies from the pulpit, the spirit of their teaching
remained unchanged ; and it was easy for them to cast contempt on
the new services, till they seemed to old-fashioned worshippers a mere
" Christmas game." But the lapse of twenty years did its work in
emptying parsonage after parsonage. In 1579 the Queen felt strong
enough to enforce for the first time a general compliance with the Act
of Uniforrr.ity ; and the jealous supervision of Parker and the bishops
ensuicu an inner as well as an outer conformity to the established faith
in the clergy who took the place of the dying priesthood. The new
parsons were for the most part not merely Protestant in belief and
teaching, but ultra-Protestant. The old restrictions on the use of the
pulpit were silently removed as the need for them passed away, and the
zeal of the young ministers showed itself in an assiduous preaching
which moulded in their own fashion the religious ideas of the new
generation. But their character had even a greater influence than
their preaching. Under Henry the priests had for the most part been
ignorant and sensual men ; and the character of the clergy appointed
by the greedy Protestants under Edward or > the first years of Eliza-
beth's reig^ was even worse than that of their Catholic rivals. But the
energy of the successive Primates, seconded as it was by the general
increase of zeal and morality at the time, did its work ; and by the close
of Elizabeth's reign the moral temper as well as the social character of
the clergy had greatly changed. Scholars like Hooker could now be
found in the ranks of the priesthood, and the grosser scandals which
disgraced the clergy as a body for the most part disappeared. It was
impossible for a Puritan libeller to bring against the ministers of Eliza-
beth's reign the charges of drunkenness and immorality which Protest-
ant libellers had been able to bring against the priesthood of Henry's.
But the influence of the new clergy was backed by a general revolution

[CHAP.

t)ecame

religion
quietly
ere the
and the
' of the
.A the
f a new
priests,
of ritual
imposed
\s Mary
olic suc-
ime they
id to use
ley were
teaching
tempt on
rs a mere
work in
;lt strong
h the Act
e bishops
ihed faith
'he new
Delief and
ise of the
, and the
)reaching
the new
snce than
part been
.ppointed
of Eliza-
But the
e general
the close
iracter of
d now be
lis which
It was
of Eliza-
Protest-
Henry's,
evolution

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

in English thought. We have already watched the first upgrowth of
the new literature which was to find its highest types in Shakspcre and
Bacon. The grammar schools were diffusing a new knowledge and
mental energy through the middle classes and among the country
gentry. The tone of the Universities, no unfair test of the tone of the
nation at large, changed wholly as t\i<i Queen's reign went on. At its
opening Oxford was " a nest of Papists," and sent its best scholars to
feed the Catholic seminaries. At its close the University was a hot-
bed of Puritanism, where the fiercest tenets of Calvin reigned supreme.
The movement was no doubt hastened by the political circumstances
of the time. Under the rule of Elizabeth loyalty became more and
more a passion among Englishmen ; and the Bull of Deposition placed
Rome in the forefront of Elizabeth's foes. The conspiracies which
festered around Mary were laid to the Pope's charge ; he was known
to be pressing on France and on Spain the invasion and conquest of
the heretic kingdom ; he was soon to bles '. the Armada. Every day
made it harder for a Catholic to reconcile Catholicism with loyalty to
his Queen or devotion to his country ; and the mass of men, who arc
moved by sentiment rather than by reason, swung slowly round to the
side which, whatever its religious significance might be, was the side
of patriotism, of liberty against tyranny, of England against Spain.
A new impulse was given to this silent drift of religious opinion by the
atrocities which marked the Catholic triumph on the other side of the
Channel. The horror of Alva's butcheries, or of the massacre in Paris
on St. Bartholomew's day, revived the memories of the bloodshed
under Mary. The tale of Protestant sufferings was told with a won-
derful pathos and picturesqueness by John Foxe, an exile during the
persecution ; and his " Book of Martyrs," which was set up by royal
order in the churches for public reading, passed from the churches
to the shelves of every English household. The trading classes of
the towns had been the first to embrace the doctrines of the Refor-
mation, but their Protestantism became a passion as the refugees of
the Continent brought to shop and market their tale of outrage and
blood. Thousands of Flemish exiles found a refuge in the Cinque
Ports, a third of the Antwerp merchants were seen pacing the new
London Exchange, and a Church of French Huguenots found a home
which it still retains in the crypt of Canterbury Cathedral.

In her ecclesiastical policy Elizabeth trusted mainly to time ; and
time, as we have seen, justified her trust. Her system of compromise
both in faith and worship, of quietly replacing the old priesthood
as it died out by Protestant ministers, of wearying recusants into at
least outer conformity with the state-religion and attendance on the
state- services by fines — a policy aided, no doubt, by the moral
influences we have described— was gradually bringing England round
to a new religious front But the decay of Catholicism appealed

407

Skc. VI.

The
Armaua

157a

1»08

1572

'• . .

Si ilt

The

Seminary

Priests

m ' ■
I'"'

M V

I -1

»■ 1"

1 1

'J,

»'•■• ^'i

1*1

'!i»

.l;i:J

,... ,..

If.

4o8

S«c. VI.

Thk
Armada

157fl

1588

1576

The

Jesuit

Leading

HISTORY OK THK KN(;L!SII PEOPLE.

[CHAIV

Strongly to the new spirit of Catholic zeal which, in its despair of a'
from Catholic princes, was now girding itself for its own bitter struggle
with heresy. Dr. Allen, a scholar who had been driven from Oxford
by the test prescribed by the Act of Uniformity, had foreseen the results
of the dying out of the Marian priests, and had set up a seminary al
Douay to supply their place. The new college, liberally supported
by the Catholic peers, and supplied with pupils by a stream of refugees
from Oxford and the English grammar schools, soon landed its
" seminary priests " on English shores ; and few as they were at first,
their presence was at o* ce felt in the check which it gave to the gradual
reconciliation of the Catholic gentry to the English Churrh. No
check could have been more galling to Elizabeth, and her resentment
was quickened by the sense of danger. She had accepted the Bull of
Deposition as a declaration of war on the part of the Papacy, and she
viewed the Douay priests with some justice as its political emissaries.
The comparative security of the Catholics from active persecution
during the early part of her reign had arisen partly from the sympathy
and connivance of the gentry who acted as justices of the peace, but
still more from her own religious indifference. But the Test Act
placed the mag::itracy in Protestant hands ; and as Elizabeth passed
from indifiference to suspicion and from suspicion to terror she put less
restraint on the bigotry around her. In quitting Euston Hall, which
she had visited in one of her pilgrimages, the Queen gave its master,
young Rookwood, thanks for his entertainment and her hand to
kiss. "But my Lord Chamberlain nobly and gravely understand-
ing that Rookwood was excommunicate " for non-attendance at
church, "called him before him, demanded of him how he durst
presume to attempt her royal prf-sence, he unfit to accompany any
Christian person, forthwith said th it he was fitter for a pair of stocks,
commanded him out of Court, and yet to attend the Council's plea-
sure." The Council's pleasure was seen in his committal to the
town prison at Norwich, while "seven more gentlemen of worship"
were fortunate enough to escape with a simple sentence of arrest at
their own homes. The Queen's terror became a panic in the nation
at large. The few priests who landed from Douay were multiplied
into an army of Papal emissaries despatched to sow treason and
revolt throughout the land. Parliament, which the working of the
Test Act had made a wholly Protestant body, save for the presence
of a few Catholics among the peers, was summoned to meet the new
danger, and declared the landing of these priests and the harbouring
of them to be treason.

The Act pioved no idle menace ; and the execution of Cuthbert
Mayne, a young priest who was arrested in Cornwall with the Papal Bull
of Deposition hidden about him, gave a terrible indication of the cha-
racter of the struggle upon which Elizabeth was about to enter. She

VII.]

THE KKKORMATION.

was far, indeed, from any purpose of religious persecution ; she boasted
of her abstinence from any interference with men's consciences ; and
Cecil, in hi§ official defence of her policy, while declaring freedom of
worship to be incompatible with religious order, boldly asserted the right
of every English subject to perfect freedom of religious opinion. To
modern eyes there is something even more revolting than open per-
secution in the policy which branded every Catholic priest as a traitor,
and all Catholic worship as disloyalty ; but the first step towards
toleration was won when the Queen rested her system of repression on
purely political grounds. If Elizabeth was a persecutor, she was the
first English ruler who felt the charge of religious persecution to
be a stigma on her rule. Nor can it be denied that there was a real
political danger in the new missionaries. Allen was a restless con-
spirator, and the work of his seminary priests was meant to aid a
new plan of the Papacy for the conquest of England. And to the
efforts of the seminary priests were now added those of Jesuit
missionaries. A select few of the Oxford refugees at Douay joined
the order of the Jesuits, whose members were already famous for their
blind devotion to the will and judgements of Rome ; and the two
ablest and most eloquent of these exiles, Campian, once a fellow of St.
John's, and Parsons, rnce a fellow of Balliol, were chosen as the
heads of a Jesuit mission in England. For the moment their success
was amazing. The eagerness shown to hear Campian was so great
that in spite of the denunciations of the Government he was able to
preach with hardly a show of concealment to a large audience at
Smithfield. From London the missionaries wandered in the disguise
of captains or serving men, sometimes even in the cassock of the
English clergy, througii many of the counties ; and wherever they
went the zeal of the Catholic gentry revived. The list of nobles re-
conciled to the old faith by these wandering apostles was headed by
the name of Lord Oxford, Cecil's own son-in-law and the proudest
among English peers.

The success of the Jesuits in undoing Elizabeth's work of com-
promise was shown in a more public way by the growing withdrawal
of the Catholics from attendance at the worship of the English
Church. The panic of the Protestants and of the Parliament
outran even the real greatness of the danger. The little group of
missionaries was magnified by popular fancy into a host of disguised
Jesuits ; and the invasion of this imaginary host was met by the
seizure and torture of as many priests as the Government could lay
hands on, the imprisonment of recusants, and the securing of the
prominent Catholics throughout the country ; and by statutes which
prohibited the saying of Mass even in private houses, increased the
(ine on recusants to twenty pounds a month, and enacted that " all
persons pretending to any power of absolving subjects from their

409

Sec. VI.

Thk
Armada

157a

15«8

1580

The Pro-
testant
Terror.

1581

if I

!■

r^r" 1

*:'.!

\-m

410

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[rifAP.

Skc. VI.

Thk

Akmaua

is7a

1588

allegiance, or practising to withdraw them to the Romish religion,
with all prrsons after the present session willingly so absolved or
reconciled to the See of Rome, shall be guilty of High Treason."
The way in whicb the vast powers conferred on the Crown by
this statute were used by Elizabeth was not only characteristic
in itself, but important as at once defining the policy to which, ii
theory at least, her successors adhered for more than a hundred years.
Few laymen were brought to the bar and none to the block under
its provisions. The oppression of the Catholic gentry was limited
to an exaction, more or less rigorous at different times, of the
fines for recusancy or non-attendance at public worship. The work
of bloodshed was reserved wholly for priests, and under Elizabeth
this work was done with a ruthless energy which for the moment
crushed the Catholic reaction. The Jesuits were tracked by pursui-
vants and spies, dragged from their hiding-places, and sent in batches
to the Tower. So hot was the pursuit that Parsons was forced
to fly across the Channel ; while Campian was brought a prisoner
through the streets of London amidst the howling of the mob, and
placed at the bar on the charge of treason. " Our religion only is
our crime," was a plea which galled his judges ; but the political danger
of the Jesuit preaching was disclosed in his evasion of any direct
reply when questioned as to his belief in the validity of the excommu-
nication and deposition of the Queen by the Papal See. The death of
Campian was the prelude to a steady, pitiless effort at the extermina-
tion of his class. If we adopt the Catholic estimate of the time, the
twenty years which followed saw the execution of two hundred priests,
while a yet greater number perished in the filthy and fever- stricken
gaols into which they were plunged. The work of reconciliation to
Rome was arrested by this ruthless energy ; but, on the other hand,
the work which the priests had effected could not be undone. The
system of quiet compulsion and conciliation to which Elizabeth had
trusted for the religious reunion of her subjects was foiled ; and the
English Catholics, fined, imprisoned at every crisis of national danger,
and deprived of their teachers by the prison and the gibbet, were
severed more hopelessly than ever from the national Church. A fresh
impulse was thus given to the growing current of opinion which was
to bring England at last to recognize the right of every man to freedom
both of conscience and of worship. What Protestantism had first done
under Mary, Catholicism was doing under Elizabeth. It was deepening
the sense of personal religion. It was revealing in men who had
cowered before the might of kingship a power greater than the might of
kings. It was breaking the spell which the monarchy had laid on the im-
agination of the peopb. The Crown ceased to seem irresistible before
a passion for religious and political liberty which gained vigour from
the dungeon of the Catholic priest as from that of the Protestant zealot.

vii.l

THE REFORMATION.

But if a fierce religious struggle was at hand, men felt that behind
this lay a yet fiercer political struggle. Philip's hosts were looming
over sea, and the horrors of foreign invasion seemed about to be added
to the horrors of civil war. Spain was at ihis moment the mightiest of
Kuropean powers. The discoveries of Columbus had given it the
New World of the West ; the conquests of Cortes and IMzarro poured
into its treasury the plunder of Mexico and Peru ; its galleons brought
the rich produce of the Indies, their gold, their jewels, their ingots of
silver, to the harbour of Cadiz. To the New World its King added
the fairest and wealthiest portions of the Old ; he was master of
Naples and Milan, the richest and the most fertile districts of Italy ;
of the busy provinces of the Low Countries, of Flanders, the gfreat
manufacturing district of the time, and of Antwerp, which had become
the central mart for the commerce of the world. His native kingdom,
poor as it was, supplied him with the steadiest and the most daring
soldiers that the world had seen since the fall of the Roman Empire.
The renown of the Spanish infantry had been growing from the day
when it flung off the onset of the French chivalry on the field of
Ravenna ; and the Spanish generals stood without rivals in their
military skill, as they stood without rivals in their ruthless cruelty.
The whole, too, of this enormous power was massed in the hands
of a single man. Served as he was by able statesmen and subtle
diplomatists, Philip of Spain was his own sole minister ; labour-
ing day after day, like a clerk, through the long years of his reign,
amidst the papers which crowded his closet ; but resolute to let
nothing pass without his supervision, and to suffer nothing to be
done save by his express command. It was his boast that every-
where in the vast compass of his dominions he was " an absolute
King." It was to realize this idea of unshackled power that he crushed
the liberties of Aragon, as his father had crushed the liberties of
Castille, and sent Alva to tread under foot the constitutional freedom
of the Low Countries. His bigotry went hand in hand with his thirst
for rule. Italy and Spain lay hushed beneath the terror of the Inquisi-
tion, while Flanders was being purged of heresy by the stake and the
sword. The shadow of this gigantic power fell like a deadly blight
over Europe. The new Protestantism, like the new spirit of political
liberty, saw its real foe in Philip. It was Spain, rather than the
Guises, against which Coligni and the Huguenots struggled in vain,;
it was Spain with which William of Orange was wrestling for religious
and civil freedom ; it was Spain which was soon to plunge Germany
into the chaos of the Thirty Years' War, and to which the Catholic
world had for twenty years been looking, and looking in vain, for
a victory over heresy in England. Vast in fact as Philip's resources
were, they were drained by the yet vaster schemes of ambition into
which his religion and his gfreed of power, as well as the wide

411

Sr.r. VI.

TlIK

Anmaoa

157a

1(1

1588

BllBabcth

and

Philip

1 ■

i. ■

I ^■'

-., '1^;-

i'M

412

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VI.

The
Armada

i57a

1588

1^ 1

1572

distribution of his dominions, perpetually drew him. To coerce the
weaker States, of Italy, to command the Mediterranean,'to preserve his
influence in Germany, to support Catholicism in France, to crush heresy
in Flanders, to despatch one Armada against the Turk and another
against Elizabeth, were aims mighty enough to exhaust even the
power of the Spanish Monarchy. But it was rather on the character of
Philip than on the exhaustion of his treasury that Elizabeth counted
for success in the struggle which had so long been going on between
them. The Kingfs temper was slow, cautious even to timidity, losing
itself continually in delays, in hesitations, in anticipating remote perils,
in waiting for distant chances ; and on the slowness and hesitation
of his temper his rival had been playing ever since she mounted the
throne. The diplomatic contest between the two was like the fight
which England was soon to see between the ponderous Spanish gal-
leon and the light pinnace of the buccaneers. The agility, the sudden
changes of Elizabeth, her lies, her mystifications, though they failed to
deceive Philip, puzzled and impeded his mind. But amidst all this
cloud of intrigue the actual course of their relations had been clear and
simple. In htr earlier days France rivalled Spain in its greatness, and
Elizabeth simply played the two rivals off against one another. She
hindered France from giving efifective aid to Mary Stuart by threats of
an alliance with Spain ; while she induced Philip to wink at her heresy,
and to discourage the risings of the English Catholics, by playing on
his dread of her alliance with France. But as the tide of religious
passion which had so long been held in check broke at last over its
banks, the political face of Europe changed. The Low Countries, driven
to despair by the greed and persecution of Alva, rose in a revolt which
after strange alternations of fortune gave to Europe the Republic of
the United Provinces. The opening which their rising afforded was
seized by the Huguenot leaders of France as a political engine to break
the power which Catharine of Medicis exercized over Charles the Ninth,
and to set aside her policy of religious balance by placing France at
the head of Protestantism in the West. Charles listened to the counsels
of Coligni, who pressed for war upon Philip and promised the support
of the Huguenots in an invasion of the Low Countries. Never had a
fairer prospect opened to French ambition. Catharine however saw
ruin for the monarchy in a France at once Protestant and free. She
threw herself on the side of the Guises, and ensured their triumph by
lending herself to their massacre of the Protestants on St. Bartholo-
mew's day. But though the long gathering clouds of religious hatred
had broken, Elizabeth trusted to her dexterity to keep out of the storm.
France plunged madly back into a chaos of civil war, and the Lou-
Countries were left to cope single-handed with Spain. Whatever
enthusiasm the heroic struggle' of the Prince of Orange excited among
her subjects, it failed to move Elizabeth even for an instant from the

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

path of cold self-interest. To her the revolt of the Netherlands was
simply " a bridle of Spain, which kept war out of our own gate." At
the darkest moment of the contest, when Alva had won back all but
Holland and Zealand, and even William of Orange despaired, the
Queen bent her energies to prevent him from finding succour in France.
That the Provinces could in the end withstand Philip, neither she
nor any English statesmen believed. They held that the struggle must
close either in utter subjection of the Netherlands, or in their selling
themselves for aid to France ; and the accession of power which
either result must give to one of her two Catholic foes the Queen
was eager to avert. Her plan for averting it was by forcing the
Provinces to accept the terms offered by Spain — a restoration, that is,
of their constitutional privileges on condition of their submission to
the Church. Peace on such a footing would not only restore English
commerce, which suffered from the war ; it would leave the Netherlands
still formidable as a weapon against Philip. The freedom of the
Provinces would be saved ; and the religious question involved in a
fresh submission to the yoke of Catholicism was one which Elizabeth
was incapable of appreciating. To her the steady refusal of William
the Silent to sacrifice his faith was as unintelligible as the steady bigotry
of Philip in demanding such a sacrifice. It was of more immediate
consequence that Philip's anxiety to avoid provoking an intervention
on the part of England which would destroy all hope of his success
in Flanders, left her tranquil at home. Had revolt in England pros-
pered he was ready to reap the fruits of .. ther men's labours ; and he
made no objection to plots for the seizure or assassination of the
Queen. But his stake was too vast to risk an attack while she sate
firmly on her throne ; and the cry of the English Catholics, or the
pressure of the Pope, had as yet failed to drive the Spanish King into
strife with Elizabeth.

The control of events was however passing from the hands of states
men and diplomatists ; and the long period of suspense which their
policy had won was ending in the clash of national and political
passions. The rising fanaticism of the Catholic world was breaking
down the caution and hesitation of Philip ; while England set aside
the balanced neutrality of her Queen and pushed boldly forward to a
contest which it felt to be inevitable. The public opinion, to which
the Queen was so sensitive, took every day a bolder and more decided
tone. Her cold indifference to the heroic struggle in Flanders was
more than compensated by the enthusiasm it excited among the nation
at large. The earlier Flemish refugees found a refuge in the Cinque
Ports. The exiled merchants of Antwerp were welcomed by the
merchants of London While Elizabeth dribbled out her secret aid
to the Prince of Orange, the London traders sent him half-a-million
from their own purses, a sum equal to a year's revenue of the Crown.

413

Sec. VI.

The
Armada

157)2

1588

I] .'

': I

The Sea
Does

a '

■'. ■+

5* ' ■

414

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VI.

The

Armada

1572

1588

1581

Volunteers stole across the Channel in increasing numbers to the aid
of the Dutch, till the five hundred Englishmen who fought in the
beginning of the struggle rose to a brigade of five thousand, whose
bravery tuined one of the most critical battles of the war. Dutch
privateers found shelter in English ports, and English vessels hoisted
the flag of the States for a dash at the Spanish traders. Protestant
fervour rose steadily as "the best captains ?nd soldiers" returned
from the campaigns in the Low Countries to tell of Alva's atrocities,
or as privateers brought back tales of English seamen who had been
seized in Spain and the New World, to linger amidst the tortures of
the Inquisition, or to die in its fires. In the presence of this steady
drift of popular passion the diplomacy of Elizabeth became of little
moment. When she sought to put a check on Philip by one of her
last matrimonial intrigues, which threatened England with a Catholic
sovereign in the Duke of Anjou, a younger son of the hated Catharine
of Medicis, the popular indignation rose suddenly into a cry against
"a Popish King" which the Queen dared not defy. If Elizabeth was
resolute for peace, England was resolute for war. A new courage had
arisen since the beginning of her reign, when Cecil and the Queen
stood alone in their belief in England's strength, and when the diplo-
matists of Europe regarded her obstinate defiance of Philip's counsels
as " madness." The whole people had caught the self-confidence and
daring of their Queen. The seamen of the southern coast had long
been carrying on a half-piratical war on their own account, t our
years after Elizabeth's accession the Channel swarmed with "sea-
dogs," as they were called, vho sailed under letters of marque from
the Prince of Cond^ and the Huguenot leaders, and took heed neither
of the complaints of the French Court nor of Elizabeth's own attempts
at repression. Her efforts failed before the connivance of every man
along the coast, of the very port-officers of the Crown who made profit
out of the spoil, and of the gentry of the west, who were hand and
glove with the adventurers. They broke above all against the national
craving for open fight with Spain, and the Protestant craving for
open fight with Catholicism. Young Englishmen crossed the sea
to serve under Cond^ or Henry of Navarre. The war in the Nether-
lands drew hundreds of Protestants to the field. The suspension
of the French contest only drove the sea-dogs to the West Indies;
for the Papal decree which gave the New World to Spain, and the
threats of Philip against any Protestant who should visit its seas, fell
idly on the ears of English seamen. It was in vain that their trading
vessels were seized, and the sailors flung into the dungeons of the
Inquisition, " laden with irons, without sight of sun or moon." The
profits of the trade were large enough to counteract its perils ; and the
bigotry of Puilip was met by a bigotry as merciless as his own. The
Puritanism of the sea-dogs went hand in hand with their love of

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

415

adventure. To break through the Catholic monopoly of the New
World, to kill Spaniards, to sell negroes, to sack gold-ships, were in
these men's minds a seemly work for the " elect of God." The name
of Francis Drake became the terror of the Spanish Indies. In Drake
a Protestant fanaticism was united with a splendid daring. He
conceived the design of penetrating into the Pacific, whose waters
had never seen an English flag ; and backed by a little company of
adventurers, he set sail for the southern seas in a vessel hardly as big
as a Channel schooner, with a few yet smaller companions who fell
away before the storms and perils of the voyage. But Drake with his
one ship and eighty men held boldly on ; and passing the Straits of
Magellan, untraversed as yet by any Englishman, swept the unguarded
coast of Chili and Peru, loaded his bark with the gold-dust and silver-
ingots of Potosi, and with the pearls, emeralds, and diamonds which
formed the cargo of the great galleon that sailed once a year from
Lima to Cadiz. With spoils of above half-a-million in value the
daring adventurer steered undauntedly for the Moluccas, rounded the
Cape of Good Hope, and after completing the circuit of the globe
dropped anchor again in Plymouth harbour.

The romantic daring of Drake's voyage, as well as the vastness of
his spoil, roused a general enthusiasm throughout England. But the
welcome he received from Elizabeth on his return was accepted by
Philip as an outrage which could only be expiated by war. Sluggish
as it was, the blood of the Spanish King was fired at last by the de-
fiance with which Elizabeth received all demands for redress. She met
a request for Drake's surrender by knighting the freebooter, and by
wearing in her crown the jewels he had offered her as a present.
When the Spanish ambassador threatened that " matters would come
to the cannon," she replied " quietly, in her most natural voice, as if
she were telling a common story," wrote Mendoza, " that if I used
threats of that kind she would fling me into a dungeon." Outraged as
Philip was, she believed that with the Netherlands still in revolt and
France longing for her alliance to enable it to seize them, the King
could not aflbrd to quarrel with her. But the sense of personal wrong,
and the outcry of the Catholic world against his selfish reluctance to
avenge the blood of its martyrs, at last told on the Spanish King, and
the first vessels of an armada which was destined for the conquest of
England began to gather in the Tag^s. Resentment and fanaticism
indeed were backed by a cool policy. His conquest of Portugal had
almost doubled his power. It gave him the one navy that as yet rivalled
his own. With the Portuguese colonies his flag claimed mastery in the
Indian and the Pacific seas, as it claimed mastery in the Atlantic and
Mediterranean ; and he had now to shut Englishman and heretic not
only out of the New World of the West but out of the lucrative traffic
with the East. In the Netherlands too and in France all seemed

Sec. VI.

The
Armada

1572

1588

■(

Francis
Drake

1577

The

Deatb of

Mary

Stuart

1584

1580

iiii

■ f !

i I

I I
I f

i i,
I

) :

4l6

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAP.

Sec. VI.

The
Armada

157fl

1688

1584

1 58s

1586

to go well for Philip's schemes. His forces under Parma had steadily
won their way in the Low Countries, and a more fatal blow had been
dealt at his rebellious subjects in the assassination of William of
Orange ; while all danger of French intervention passed away with
the death of the Duke of Anjou, which left Henry of Navarre, the
leader of the Huguenot party, heir of the crown of France. To
prevent the triumph of heresy in the succession of a Protestant king,
the Guises and the French Catholics rose at once in arms ; but the
Holy League which they formed rested mainly on the support of
Philip, and so long as he supplied them with men and money,
he was secure on the side of France. It was at this moment that
Parma won his crowning triumph in the capture of Antwerp ; its
fall after a gallant resistance convinced even Elizabeth of the need
for action if the one "bridle to Spain which kept war out of our
own gate" was to be saved. Lord Leicester was hurried to the
Flemish coast with 8,000 men. In a yet bolder spirit of defiance
Francis Drake was suffered to set sail with a fleet of twenty-five vessels
for the Spanish Main. Drake's voyage was a series of triumphs. The
wrongs inflicted on English seamen by the Inquisition were requited
by the burning of the cities of St Domingo and Carthagena. The
coasts of Cuba and Florida were plundered, and though the gold fleet
escaped him, Drake returned with a heavy booty. But only one
disastrous skirmish at Zutphen, the fight in which Sidney fell, broke
the inaction of Leicester's forces, while Elizabeth strove vainly to use
the presence of his army to negotiate a peace between Philip and the
States. Meanwhile dangers thickened round her in England itself.
Maddened by persecution, by the hopelessness of rebellion within or
of deliverance from without, the fiercer Catholics listened to schemes
of assassination to which the murder of William of Orange lent a
terrible significance. The detection of Somerville, a fanatic who had
received the Host before setting out for London " to shoot the Queen
with his dagg," was followed by measures of natural severity, by the
flight and arrest of Catholic gentry and peers, by a vigorous purifica-
tion of the Inns of Court where a few Catholics lingered, and by the
despatch of fresh batches of priests to the block. The trial and death
of Parry, a member of the House of Commons who had served in the
Queen's household, on a similar charge, fed the general panic. Parlia-
ment met in a transport of horror and loyalty. All Jesuits and
seminary priests were banished from the realm on pain of death.
A bill for the security of the Queen disqualified any claimant of the
succession who instigated subjects to rebellion or hurt to the Queen's
person from ever succeeding to the Crown. The threat was aimed at
Mary Stuart. Weary of her long restraint, of her failure to rouse
Philip or Scotland to aid her, of the baffled revolt of the English
Catholics and the baffled intrigues of the Jesuits, she had bent for a

VIl.]

moment t(

me retire i

soul to die

I or mine

a new and

knew and

young Catl

to kill the

singham's

her guilt.

judges at

hilated un(

Crown.

out from st<

spite of the

the Council

opinion, ho\

demand of

Queen. Sh

took on thei

scaffold whi(

lessly as sh

"I have gi\|

Melville, " tl

The blow

the ministers

Lord Burleig

the warrant 1

act which si

Stuart in faci

by putting ai

as to the nea

bequeathed 1:

were from th;

longer needd

taught him tl

of his domini

in Flaiiders c

lay through I

Low Countri(

Vessels and

gathering in t

coast. Only

fortunes of t]

news of the c

vn.]

THE REFORMATION.

moment to submission. " Let me go" she wrote to Elizabeth ; " let
me retire from this island to some solitude where I may prepare my
soul to die. Grant this, and I will sign away every right which either
I or mine can claim." But the cry was useless, and her despair found
a new and more terrible hope in the plots against Elizabeth's life. She
knew and approved the vow of Anthony Babington and a band of
young Catholics, for i .le most part connected with the royal household,
to kill the Queen ; but plot and approval alike passed through Wal-
singham's hands, and the seizure of Mary's correspondence revealed
her guilt. In spite of her protest a Commission of Peers sate as her
judges at Fotheringay Castle ; and their verdict of " guilty " anni-
hilated under the provisions of the recent statute her claim to the
Crown. The streets of London blazed with bonfires, and peals rang
out from steeple to steeple at the news of her condemnation ; but, in
spite of the prayer of Parliament for her execution, and the pressure of
the Council, Elizabeth shrank from her death. The force of pul)1ic
opinion, however, was now carrying all before it, and the unanimous
demand of her people wrested at last a sullen consent from the
Queen. She flung the warrant signed upon the floor, and the Council
took on themselves the responsibility of executing it. Mary died on a
scaffold which was erected in the castle-hall at Fotheringay as daunt-
lessly as she had lived. " Do not weep," she said to her ladies,
" I have given my word for you." " Tell my friends," she charged
Melville, " that I die a good Catholic."

The blow was hardly struck before Elizabeth turned with fury on

the ministers who had forced her hand. Cecil, who had now become

Lord Burleigh, was for a while disgraced ; and Davison, who carried

the warrant to the Council, was flung into the Tower to atone for an

act which shattered the policy of the Queen. The death of Mary

Stuart in fact seemed to remove the last obstacle out of Philip's way,

by putting an end to the divisions of the English Catholics. To him,

as to the nearest heir in blood who was of the Catholic Faith, Mary

bequeathed her rights to the Crown, and the hopes of her adherents

were from that moment bound up in the success of Spain. Philip no

longer needed pressure to induce him to act. Drake's triumph had

taught him that the conquest of England was needful for the security

of his dominion in the New World. The presence of an English army

in Flanders convinced him that the road to the conquest of the States

lay through England itself. The operations of Parma therefore in the

Low Countries were suspended with a view to the greater enterprise.

Vessels and supplies for the fleet which had for three years been

gathering in the Tagus were collected from every port of the Spanish

coast. Only the dread of a counter-attack from France, where the

fortunes of the League were wavering, held Philip back. But the

news of the coming Armada called Drake again to action. He set

E E

417

Sec. VI.

The
Akmaua

1572

1588

1586

ill'.

I 'if

The
Armada

1587

4i8

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

fCHAP.

Skc. VI.

Thk
Armada

157a

1588

15SS

sail with thirty small baiks, burned the storeships and galleys in the
harbour of Cadiz, stormed the ports of the Faro, and was only foiled
in his aim of attacking the Armada itself by orders from home. A
descent upon Corunna however completed what Drake called his
" singeing of the Spanish King's beard." Elizabeth used the daring
blow to back her negotiations for peace ; but the Spanish pride had
been touched to the quick. Amidst the exchange of protocols Parma
gathered seventeen thousand men for the coming invasion, collected a
fleet of flat-bottomed transports at Dunkirk, and waited impatiently
for the Armada to protect his crossing. But the attack of Drake, the
death of its first admiral, and the winter storms delayed the fleet from
sailing. The fear of France held it back yet more effectually ; but in
the spring Philip's patience was rewarded. The League was trium-
phant, and the King a prisoner in its hands. The Armada at once
set sail from Lisbon, but it had hardly started when a gale in the Bay
of Biscay drove its scattered vessels into Ferrol. It was only on the
nineteenth of July that the sails of the Armada were seen from the
Lizard, and the English beacons flared out their alarm along the coast.
The news found England ready. An army was mustering under
Leicester at Tilbury, the militia of the midland counties were gathering
to London, while those of the south and east were held in readiness to
meet a descent on either shore. Had Parma landed on the earliest
day he purposed, he would have found his way to London barred by a
force stronger than his own, a force too of men in whose ranks were
many who had already crossed pikes on equal terms with his best
infantry in Flanders. "When I shall have landed," he warned
his master, "I must fight battle after battle, I shall lose men by
wounds and disease, I must leave detachments behind me to keep
open my communications ; and in a short time the body of my
army will become so weak that not only I may be unable to advance
in the face of the enemy, and time may be given to the heretics
and your Majesty's other enemies to interfere, but there may fall
out some notable inconveniences, with the loss of everything, and
I be unable to remedy it." Even had Parma landed, in fact, the only
real chance of Spanish success lay in a Catholic rising ; and at this
crisis patriotism proved stronger than religious fanaticism in the hearis
of the English Catholics. Catholic lords brought their vessels up
alongside of Drake and Lord Howard, and Catholic gentry led their
tenantry to the muster at Tilbury. But to secure a landing at all, the
Spaniards had to be masters of the Channel ; and in the Channel lay
an English fleet resolved to struggle hard for the mastery. As the
Armada sailed on in a broad crescent past Plymouth, moving towards
its point of junction with Parma at Calais, the vessels which had
gathered under Lord Howard of Effingham slipped out of the bay and
hung with the wind upon thtir rear. In numbers the two forces were

:s were
lis best
warned
nen by
keep
of my
.dvance
leretics
.ay fall
g, and
le only
at this
hearis
sols up
id their
all, the
nel lay
As the
;owards
Ich had
lay and
les were

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

strangely unequal ; the English fleet counted only 80 vessels against
the 149 which composed the Armada. In size of ships the dispropor-
tion was even greater. Fifty of the English vessels, including the
squadron of the Lord Admiral and the craft of the volunteers, were
little bigger than yachts of the present day. Even of the thirty
Queen's ships which formed its main body, there were only four which
equalled in tonnage the smallest of the Spanish galleons. Sixty-five
of these galleons formed the most formidable half of the Spanish fleet ;
and four galleys, four galleasses, armed with fifty guns apiece, fifty-six
armed merchantmen, and twenty pinnaces, made up the rest. The
Armada was provided with 2,500 cannons, and a vast store of pro-
visions ; it had on board 8,000 seamen, and more than 20,000 soldiers ;
and if a court-favourite, the Duke of Medina Sidonia, had been
placed at its head, he was supported by the ablest staff of naval officers
which Spain possessed. Small however as the English ships were,
they were in perfect trim ; they sailed two feet for the Spaniards' one,
they were manned with ^^^,000 hardy seamen, and their Admiral was
backed by a crowd of captains who had won fame in the Spanish seas.
With him was Hawkins, who had been the first to break into the
charmed circle of the Indies ; Frobisher, the hero of the North-West
passage ; and above all Drake, who held command of the privateers.
They had won too the advantage of the wind, and, closing in or draw-
ing off as they would, the lightly-handled English vessels, which fired
four shots to the Spaniards' one, hung boldly on the rear of the great
fleet as it moved along the Channel. " The feathers of the Spaniard,"
in the phrase of the English seamen, were " plucked one by one."
Galleon after galleon was sunk, boarded, driven on shore ; and yet
Medina Sidonia failed in bringing his pursuers to a close engagement.
Now halting, now moving slowly on, the running fight between the two
fleets lasted throughout the week, till the Armada dropped anchor in
Calais roads. The time had now come for sharper work if the junction
of the Armada with Parma was to be prevented ; for, demoralized as
the Spaniards had been by the merciless chase, their loss in ships
had not been great, while, though the numbers of English ships had
grown, their supplies of food and ammunition were fast running out.
Howard resolved to force an engagement, and, lighting eight fire-ships
at midnight, sent them down with the tide upon the Spanish line. The
galleons at once cut their cables, and stood out in panic to sea,
drifting with the wind in a long line off Gravelines. Drake resolved
at all costs to prevent their return. At dawn the English ships
closed fairly in, and almost their last cartridge was spent ere the
sun went down. Three great galleons had sunk, three had drifted
helplessly on to the Flemish coast ; but the bulk of the Spanish vessels
remained, and even to Drake the fleet seemed " wonderful great and
strong." Within the Armada itself, however, all hope was gone.
Huddled together by the wind and the deadly English fire, their sails

E E 2

419

Sec. VI.

The
Armada

157a

1588

/«/y 28

j« '•■»

t I!

( '!

, > ,'fi

J ■

i.. r

■i I

420

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sac. VI.

The
Akmada

1588

The
BUsa-
bethan

torn, their masts shot away, the crowded galleons h.id become mere
slaughter-houses. Four thousand men had fallen, and bravely as the
seamen fought they were cowed by the terrible butchery. Medina
himself was in despair. " Wc are lost, Scnor Oquenda," he cried to
his bravest captain ; " what arc wc to do ? " " Let others talk of being
lost," replied Oquenda, " your Excellency has only \o order 'up fresh
cartridge." But Oquenda stood alone, and a council of war resolved
on retreat to Spain by the one course open, that of a circuit round the
Orkneys. " Never anything pleased me better," wrote Drake, " than
seeing the enemy fly with a southerly wind to the northwards. Have
a good eye to the Prince of Parma, for, with the grace of God, if we
like, I doubt not ere it be long so to handle the matter with the Duke
of Sidonia, as he shall wish himself at St. Mary Port among his orange
trees." But the work of destruction was reserved for a mightier foe
than Drake. Supplies fell short and the English vessels were forced
to give up the chase ; but the Spanish ships which remained had no
sooner reached the Orkneys than the storms of the northern seas
broke on them with a fury before which all concert and union dis-
appeared. Fifty reached Corunna, bearing ten thousand men stricken
with pestilen' ,e and death. Of the rest some were sunk, some dashed
to pieces against the Irish cliffs. The wreckers of the Orkney* and
the Faroes, the clansmen of the Scottish Isles, the kernes of Donegal
and Gal way, all had their part in the work of murder and robbery.
Eight thousand Spaniards perished between the Giant's Causeway
and the Blaskets. On a strand near Sligo an English captain num-
bered eleven hundred corpses which had been cast up by the sea.
The flower of the Spanish nobility, who had been sent on the new
crusade under Alonzo da Leyva, after twice suffering shipwreck, put
a third time to sea to founder on a reef near Dunluce.

Section VII.— The Elizabethan Poets.

[Authoriius. — For a general account of this period, see Mr. Morley's ad-
mirable "First Sketch of English Literature," Hallam's " Literary History,"
M. Taine's " History of English Literature," &c. Mr. Craik has elaborately
illustrated the works of Spenser, and full details of the history of our early
drama may be found in Mr. Collier's *' History of English Dramatic Literature
to the time of Shakspere. " Malone's enquiry remains the completest inves-
tigation into the history of Shakspere's dramas ; and the works of Mr.
Armytage Brown and Mr. Gerald Massey contain the latest theories as to
the Sonnets. For Ben Jonson and his fellows, see their works with the notes
of Giflbrd, &c. The fullest account of Lord Bacon will be found in his "Life
and Letters," now published with his "Works," by Mr. Spedding, whose
apologetic tones may be contrasted with the verdict of Lord Macaulay ('* Essay
on Lord Bacon ") and with the more judicious judgement of Mr. Gardiner
(" History of England "). See also Mr. Lewes's "History of Philosophy."]

We have already watched the revival of English letters during the
earlier half of Elizabeth's reign. The general awakening of national

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

life, the increase of wealth, of refinement and leisure, which marked
that period, had been accompanied, as we have seen, by a quickening
of English intelligence, which found vent in an upgrowth of grammar
schools, in the new impulse given to classical learning at the Univer-
sities, in a passion for translations which familiarized all England with
the masterpieces of Italy and Greece, and above all in the crude but
vigorous efforts of Sackville and Lyly after a nobler poetry and prose.
But to the national and local influences which were telling on English
literature was added that of the restlessness and curiosity which
characterized the age. The sphere of human interest was widened
as it has never been "''dened before or since by the revelation of a
new heaven and a new earth. It was only in the later years of the
sixteenth century that the discoveries of Copernicus were brought
home to the general intelligence of the world by Kepler and Galileo,
or that the daring of the Buccaneers broke through the veil which
the greed of Spain had drawn across the New World of Columbus.
Hardly inferior to these revelations as a source of intellectual impulse
was the sudden and picturesque way in which the various races of
the world were brought face to face with one another through the
universal passion for foreign travel. While the red tribes of the
West were described by Amerigo Vespucci, and the strange civilization
of Mexico and Peru disclosed by Cortes and Pizarro, the voyages of
the Portuguese threw open the older splendours of the East, and the
story of India and China was told for the first time to Christendom
by Maffei and Mendoza. England took her full part in this work
of discovery. Jenkinson, an English traveller, made his way to
Bokhara. Willbughby brought back Muscovy to the knowledge of
Western Europe. English mariners penetrated among the Esquimaux,
or settled in Virginia. Drake circumnavigated the globe. The
" Collection of Voyages," which was published by Hakluyt, not only
disclosed the vastness of the world itself, but the infinite number of
the races of mankind, the variety of their laws, their customs, their
religions, their very instincts. We see the itifluence of this new and
wider knowledge of the world, not only in the life and richness which
it gave to the imagination of the time, but in the immense interest
which from this moment attached itself to Man. Shakspere's conception
of Caliban, like the questionings of Montaigne, marks the beginning
of a new and a truer, because a more inductive, philosophy of human
nature and human history. The fascination exercised by the study of
human character showed itself in the essays of Bacon, and yet more in
the wonderful popularity of the drama. And to these larger and world-
wide sources of poetic powers was added in England the impulse which
sprang from national triumph, from the victory over the Armada, the
deliverance from Spain, the rolling away of the Catholic terror which had
hung like a cloud over the hopes of the people- With its new sense of

421

Sec. VII.
Thk Eliza-

URTHAN
PoET»

,:'(

l,;i:

'!,«

■.I ' I
a;/ 1

M-M

432

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sbc. VII.
Thr Emza-

BRTHAN

Ports

8p«naer

1552

1579

1580

security, of naiiional energy and national power, the whole aspect of
England suddenly changed. As yet the interest of Elizabeth's reign
had been political and material ; the stage had been crowded with
statesmen and warriors, with Cecils and Walsinghfims and Drakes.
Literature had hardly found a place in the glories of the time. But
from the moment when the Armada drifted back broken to Ferrol, the
figures of warriors and statesmen were dwarfed by the grander figures
of poets and philosophers. Amidst the throng in Elizabeth's ante-
chamber the noblest form is that of the singer who lays the " Faerie
Queen " at her feet, or of the young lawyer who muses amid the splen-
dours of the presence over the problems of the " Novum Organum."
The triumph at Cadiz, the conquest of Ireland, pass unheeded as
we watch Hooker building up his "Ecclesiastical Polity" among the
sheepfolds, or the genius of .Shakspere rising year by year into supremer
grandeur in a rude theatre beside the Thames.

The full glory of the new literature broke on England with Edmund
Spenser. We know little of his life ; he was born in East London
of poor parents, but connected with the Spencers of Althorpe, even
then — as he proudly says — " a house of ancient fame." He studied
as a sizar at Cambridge, and quitted the University while still a boy
to live as a tutor in the north ; but after some years of obscure poverty
the scorn of a fair "Rosalind" drove 'lim again southwards. A
college friendship with Gabriel Harvey served to introduce him to
Lord Leicester, who sent him as his envoy into France, and in whose
service he first became acquainted with Leicester's nephew. Sir Philip
Sidney. From Sidney's house at Penshurst came his earliest work,
the " Shepherd's Calendar ;" in form, like Sidney's own "Arcadia," a
pastoral, where love and loyalty and Puritanism jostled oddly with the
fancied shepherd life. The peculiar melody and profuse imagination
which the pastoral disclosed at once placed its author in the forefront
of living poets, but a far greater work was already in hand ; and from
some words of Gabriel Harvey's we see Spenser bent on rivalling
Ariosto, and even hoping " to overgo " the " Orlando Furioso," in his
"Elvish Queen." The ill-will or indifference of Burleigh, however,
blasted the expectations he had drawn from the patronage of Sidney or
the Earl of Leicester, and the favour with which he had been welcomed
by the Queen. Sidney, himself in disgrace with Elizabeth, withdrew
to Wilton to write the ''Arcadia," by his sister's side ; and "discontent
of my long fruitless stay in princes' courts," the poet tells us, " and
expectation vain of idle hopes," drove Spenser at last into exile. He
followed Lord Grey as his secretary into Ireland, and remained there
on the Deputy's recall in the enjoyment of an office and a grant of
land from the forfeited estates of the Earl of Desmond. Spenser
had thus enrolled himself among the colonists to whom England was
looking at the time for the regeneration of Munster, and the practical

VII. 1

THE REFORMATION.

interest he took in the " barren soil whcie cold and want and poverty
do g.ow " was shown by the later publication of a prose tractate on
the condition and government of the island. It was at Dublin or in
his castle of Kilcolman, two miles from Doneraile, " under the foote
of Mole, that mountain hoar," that he spent the ten years in which
Sidney died and Mary fell on the scaffold and the Armada came and
went ; and it was in the latter home that Walter Ralegh found him
sitting " alwaies idle," as it seemed to his restless friend, " among the
cooly shades of the green alders by the Mulla's shore," in a visit made
memorable by the poem of " Colin Clout's come home again." But in
the " idlesse " and solitude of the poet's exile the great work begun in
the two pleasant years of his stay at Penshurst had at last taken form,
and it was to publish the first three books of the " Faerie Queen " that
Spenser returned in Ralegh's company to London.

The appearance of the " Faerie Queen" is the one critical event in the

annals of English poetry ; it settled, in fact, the question whether there

was to be such a thing as English poetry or no. The older national

verse which had blossomed and died in Caedmon sprang suddenly

into a grander life in Chaucer, but it closed again in a yet more

complete death. Across the Border, indeed, the Scotch poets of the

fifteenth century preserved something of their master's vivacity and

colour, and in England itself the Italian poetry of the Renascence

had of late found echoes in Surrey and Sidney. The new English

drama too was beginning to display its wonderful powers, and the

work of Marlowe had already prepared the way for the work of

Shakspere. But bright as was the promise of coming song, no

great imaginative poem had broken the silence of English literature

for nearly two nundred years when Spenser landed at Bristol with

the "Faerie Queen." From that moment the stream of English

poetry has flowed on without a break. There have been times, as in

the years which immediately followed, when England has "become

a nest of singing birds ; " there have been times when song was scant

and poor ; but there never has been a time when England was wholly

without a singer. The new Ehglish verse has been true to the source

from which it sprang, and Spenser has always been " the poet's poet."

But in his own day he was the poet of England at large. The " Faerie

Queen" was received with a burst of general welcome. It became

"the delight of every accomplished gentleman, the model of every

poet, the solace of every soldier." The poem expressed, indeed, the

very life of the time. It was with a true poetic instinct that Spenser

fell back for the framework of his story on the faery world of Celtic

romance, whose wonder and mystery had in fact become the truest

picture of the wonder and mystery of the world around him. In the

age of Cortes and of Ralegh dreamland had ceased to be dreamland,

and no marvel or adventure that befell lady or knight was stranger

423

Sec. VII.

The Eliza-

iiktiian
Ports

ill

^ w

The
Faerie
Queen

1590

'i:i

I ,]'

'"' '.f'

'".. 1

' l'\

I i

• -• "ff"^"::;

\l '^' fj

-,rfe
I'd

1 ..'M

424

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VII.
The Emza-

BBTIIAN

Poet*

than the tales which weather- beaten mariners from the Southern Seas
were telling every day to grave merchants upon 'Change. The very in-
congruities of the story of Arthur and his knighthood, strangely as it
had been built up out of the rival efforts of bard and jongleur and priest,
made it the fittest vehicle for the expression of the world of incongruous
feeling which we call the Renascence. To modern eyes perhaps there
is something grotesque in the strange medley of figures which crowd
the canvas of the " Faerie Queen," in its fauns dancing on the sward
where knights have hurtled together, in its alternation of the salvage-
men from the New World with the satyrs of classic mythology, in
the giants, dwarfs, and monsters of popular fancy, who jostle with
the nymphs of Greek legend and the damosels of mediaeval romance.
But, strange as the medley is, it reflects truly enough the stranger
medley of warring ideals and irreconcileable impulses which made up
the life of Spenser's contemporaries. It was not in the " Faerie Queen"
only, but in the world which it pourtrayed, that the religious mysticism
of the Middle Ages stood face to face with the intellectual freedom of
the Revival of Letters, that asceticism and self-denial cast their spell
on imaginations glowing with the sense of varied and inexhaustible
existence, that the dreamy and poetic refinement of feeling which ex-
pressed itself in the fanciful unrealities of chivalry co-existed with the
rough practical energy that sprang from an awakening sense of human
power, or the lawless extravagance of an idealized friendship and love
lived side by side with the moral sternness and elevation which England
was drawing from the Reformation and the Bible. But strangely con-
trasted as are the elements of the poem, they are harmonized by the
calmness and serenity which is the note of the " Faerie Queen." The
world of the Renascence is around us, but it is ordered, refined, and
calmed by the poet's touch. The warmest scenes which he borrows
from the Italian verse of his day are idealized into purity ; the very
struggle of the men around him is lifted out of its pettier accidents,
and raised into a spiritual oneness with the struggle in.the soul itself.
There are allusions in plenty to contemporary events, but the contest
between Elizabeth and Mary takes ideal form in that of Una and the
false Duessa,and the clash of arms between Spain and the Huguenots
comes to us faint and hushed through the serener air. The verse, like
the story, rolls on as by its own natural power, without haste or effort
or delay. The gorgeous colouring, the profuse and often complex
imagery which Spenser's imagination lavishes, leave no sense of
confusion in the reader's mind. Every figure, strange as it may be, is
seen clearly and distinctly as it passes by. It is in this calmness, this
serenity, this spiritual elevation of the " Faerie Queen," that we feel the
new life of the coming age moulding into ordered and harmonious
form the life of the Renascence. Both in its conception, and in the way
in which this conception is realized in the portion of his work which

vii.l

THE REFORMATION.

Spenser completed, his poem strikes the note of the coming Puritanism.
In his earlier pastoral, the " Shepherd's Calendar," the poet had boldly
taken his part with the more advanced retormers against the Church
policy of the Court. He had chosen Archbishop Cirindal, who was
then in disgrace for his Puritan sympathies, as his model of a Chris-
tian pastor ; and attacked with sharp invective the pomp of the higher
clergy. His " Faerie Queen," in its religious theory, is Puritan to
the core. The worst foe of its " Red-cross Knight" is the false and
scarlet-clad Duessa of Rome, who parts him for a while from Truth
and leads him to the house of Pride. Spenser presses strongly
and pitilessly for the execution of Mary Stuart. No bitter word ever
breaks the calm of his verse save when it touches on the perils with
which Catholicism was environing England, perils before which his
knight must fall " were not that Heavenly Grace doth him uphold
and steadfast Truth acquite him out of all." IJut it is yet more in
the temper and aim of his work that we catch the nobler and
deeper tones of English Puritanism. In his earlier niusings at Pens-
hurst the poet had purposed to ^urpass Ariosto, but the gaiety of
Ariosto's song is utterly absent from his own. Not a ripple of laughter
breaks the calm surface of Spenser's verse. He is habitually serious,
and the seriousness of his poetic tone reflects the seriousness of his
poetic purpose. His aim, he tells us, was to represent the moral
virtues, to assign to each its knightly patron, so that its excellence
might be expressed and its contrary vice trodden under foot by deeds
of arms and chivalry. In knight after knight of the twelve he pur-
posed to paint, he wished to embody some single virtue of the virtuous
man in its struggle with the faults and errors which specially beset it ;
till in Arthur, the sum of the whole company, man might have been
seen perfected, in his longing and progress towards the " Faerie
Queen," the Divine Glory which is the true end of human effort. The
largeness of his culture indeed, his exquisite sense of beauty, and
above all the very intensity of his moral enthusiasm, saved Spenser
from the narrowness and exaggeration which often distorted goodness
into unloveliness in the Puritan. Christian as he is to the core, his
Christianity is enriched and fertilized by the larger temper of the
Renascence, as well as by a poet's love of the natural world in which
the older mythologies struck their roots. Diana and the gods of
heathendom take a sacred tinge from the purer sanctities of the new
faith ; and in one of the greatest songs of the " Faerie Queen," the
conception of love widens, as it widened in the mind of a Greek, into
the mighty thought of the pv )ducLive energy of Nature. Spenser
borrows in fact the delicate and refined forms of the Platonist philosophy
to express his own moral enthusiasm. Not only does he love, as
others have loved, all that is noble and pure and of good report, but he
is fired as none before or after him have been fired with a passionate

Sbc. VII.
TiiK Eliza-

HKTIIAN
I'OKTS

l»

,1.' •'

:'^.:

'3!

426

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap,

Sec. VII.
The Eliza-

nETHAN

Poets

Tbe
Eliza-
bethan
Drama

sense of moral beauty. Justice, Temperance, Truth, are no mere
names to him, but real existences to which his whole nature clings
with a rapturous affection. Outer beauty he believed to spring, and
loved because it sprang, from the beauty of the soul within. There
was much in such a moral protest as this to rouse dislike in any age,
but it is the glory of the age of Elizabeth that, "mad world" as in
many ways it was, all that was noble welcomed the " Faerie Queen."
Elizabeth herself, says Spenser, " to mine oaten pipe inclined her ear,"
and bestowed a pension on the poet. In 1595 he brought three more
books of his poem to England. He returned to Ireland, to com-
memorate his marriage in Sonnets and the most beautiful of bridal
songs, and to complete the " Eaerie Queen " amongst love and poverty
and troubles from his Irish neighbours. But these troubles soon took
a graver form. In 1599 Ireland broke into revolt, and the poet
escaped from his burning house to fly to England, and to die broken-
hearted in an inn at Westminster.

If the " Faerie Queen " expressed the higher elements of the Eliza-
bethan age, the whole of that age, its lower elements and its higher
alike, was expressed in the English drama. We have already pointed
out the circumstances which throughout Europe were giving a poetic
impulse to the newly-aroused intelligence of men, and this impulse
everywhere took a dramatic shape. The artificial P>ench tragedy
which began about this time with Gamier was not, indeed, destined
to exert any influence over English poetry till a later age ; but the
influence of the Italian comedy, which had begun half a century earlier
with Machiavelli and Ariosto, was felt directly through the Novelle,
or stories, which served as plots for the dramatists. It left its stamp
indeed on some of the worst characteristics of the English stage. The
features of our drama that startled the moral temper of the time and
won the deadly hatred of the Puritan, its grossness and profanity, its
tendency to scenes of horror and crime, its profuse employment of
cruelty and lust as grounds of dramatic action, its daring use of the
horrible and the unnatural whenever they enable it to display the more
terrible and revolting sides of human passion, were derived from the
Italian stage. It is doubtful how much the English playwrights may
have owed to the Spanish drama, that under Lope and Cervantes
sprang suddenly into a grandeur which almost rivalled their own. In
the intermixture of tragedy and comedy, in the abandonment of the
solemn uniformity of poetic diction for the colloquial language of real
life, the use of unexpected incidents, the complications of their plots
and intrigues, the dramas of England and Spain are remarkably alike;
but the likeness seems rather to have sprung from a similarity in the
Ciicumstances to which both owed their rise, than from any direct
connection of the one with the other. The real origin of the English
drama, in fact, lay not in any influence from without, but in the influ-

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

427

ence of England itself. The temper of the nation was dramatic. Ever
since the Reformation, the Palace, the Inns of Court, and the University
had been vyeing with one another in the production of plays ; and
so early was their popularity, that even under Henry the Eighth it was
found necessary to create a " Master of the Revels" to supervise them.
Every progress of Elizabeth from shire to shire was a succession
of shows and interludes. Dian with her nymphs met the Queen
as she returned from hunting ; Love presented her with his golden
arrow as she passed through the gates of Norwich. From the :
earlier years of her reign, the new spirit of the Renascence had '
been pouring itself into the rough mould of the Mystery Plays,
whose allegorical virtues and vices, or scriptural heroes and heroines,
had handed on the spirit of the drama through the Middle Ages.
Adaptations from classical pieces soon began to alternate with the
purely religious " Moralities ; " and an attempt at a livelier style of
expression and invention appeared in the popular comedy of " Gammer
Gurton's Needle ; " while Sackville, Lord Dorset, in his tragedy of
" Gorboduc " made a bold effort at sublimity of diction, and intro-
duced the use of blank verse as the vehicle of dramatic dialogue.
But it was not to these tentative efforts of scholars and nobles that the
EngHsh stage was really indebted for the amazing outburst of genius,
which dates from the moment when " the Earl of Leicester's servants"
erected the first public theatre in Blackfriars. It was the people itself
that created its Stage. The theatre, indeed, was commonly only the
courtyard of an inn, or a mere booth such as is still seen at a country
fair ; the bulk of the audience sate beneath the open sky in the " pit "
or yard, a few covered seats ir the galleries which ran round it formed
the boxes of the wealthier spectators, while patrons and nobles found
seats upon the actual boards. All the appliances were of the roughest
sort : a few flowers served to indicate a garden, crowds and armies
were represented by a dozen scene-shifters with swords and bucklers,
heroes rode in and out on hobby-horses, and a scroll on a post told
whether the scene was at Athens or London. There were no female
actors, and the grossness which startles us in words which fell from
women's lips took a different colour when every woman's part was
acted by a boy. But difficulties such as these were more than com-
pensated by the popular character of the drama itself. Rude as the
theatre might be, all the worlc, was there. The stage was crowded
with nobles and courtiers. Apprentices and citizens thronged the
benches in the yard below. The rough mob of the pit inspired, as
it felt, the vigorous life, the rapid transitions, the passionate energy^
the reality, the lifelike medley and confusion, the racy dialogue, the
chat, the wit, the pathos, the sublimity, the rant and buffoonery, the
coarse horrors and vulgar bloodshedding, the immense range over all
classes of society, the intimacy with the foulest as well as the fail est

Sec. VII.

The Eliza-
bethan
Poets

' I

> !i

.:!^i

1576

428

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAP. I vn.]

Sec. VII.

The Eliza-
bethan
Poets

The
Earlier
Drama-
tists

1587

Greene

developements of human temper, which characterized the English stage.
The new drama represented " the very age and body of the time, his
form and pressure." The people itself brought its nobleness and its
vileness to the boards. No stage was ever so human, no poetic life so
intense. Wild, reckless, defiant of all past tradition, of all conventional
laws, the English dramatists owned no teacher, no source of poetic
inspiration, but the people itself.

Few events in our literary history are so startling as this sudden
rise of the Elizabethan drama. The first public theatre, as we have
seen, was erected only in the middle of the Queen's reign. Before the
close of it eighteen theatres existed in London alone. Fifty dramatic
poets, many of the first order, appeared in the fifty years which pre-
cede the closing of the theatres by the Puritans ; and great as is the
number of their works which have perished, we still possess a hundred
dramas, all written within this period, and of which at least a half are
excellent. A glance at their authors shows us that the intellectual
quickening of the age had now reached the mass of the people.
Almost all of the new playwrights were fairly educated, and many were
University men. But, instead of courfly singers of the Sidney and
Spenser sort, we see the advent of the " poor scholar." The earlier
dramatists, such as Nash, Peele, Kyd, Greene, or Marlowe, were for
the most part poor, and reckless in their poverty ; wild livers, defiant
of law or common fame, in revolt against the usages and religion of
their day, "atheists" in general reputo, "holding Moses for a juggler,"
haunting the brothel and the alehouse, and dying starved or in tavern
brawls. But with their appearance began the Elizabethan drama.
The few plays which have reached us of an earlier date are either
cold imitations of the classical and Italian comedy, or rude farces
like " Ralph Roister Doister," or tragedies such as " Gorboduc,"
where, poetic as occasional passages may be, there is little promise of
dramatic developement. But in the year which preceded the coming
of the Armada the whole aspect of the stage suddenly changes, and
the new dramatists range themselves around two men of very different
genius, Robert Greene and Christopher Marlowe. Of Greene, as the
creator of our lighter English prose, we have already spoken. But his
work as a poet was of yet greater importance, for his keen perception
of character and the relations of social life, the playfulness of his
fancy, and the liveliness of his style exerted an influence on his con-
temporaries, which was equalled by that of none but Marlowe and
Peele. No figure better paints the group of young playwrights. He
left Cambridge to travel through Italy and Spain, and to bring back
the debauchery of the one and the scepticism of the other. In the
words of remorse he wrote before his death he paints himself as a
drunkard and a roysterer, winning money only by ceaseless pamphlets
and plays to waste it on wine and women, and drinking the cup of I

THE REFORMATION.

life to the dregs. Hell and the after- world were the butts of his
ceaseless mockery. If he had not feared the judges of the Queen's
Courts more than he feared God, he said, in bitter jest, he should
often have turned cutpurse. He married, and loved his wife, but she
was soon deserted ; and the wretched profligate found himself again
plunged into excesses which he loathed, though he could not live with-
out them. But wild as was the life of Greene, his pen was pure. He
is steadily on virtue's side in the love pamphlets and novelettes he
poured out in endless succession, and whose plots were dramatized
by the school which gathered round him. The life of Marlowe was
as riotous, his scepticism even more daring, than the life and sceptic-
ism of Greene. His early death alone saved him, in all probability,
from a prosecution for atheism. He was charged with calling Moses
a juggler, and with boasting that, if he undertook to write a new
religion, it should be a better religion than the Christianity he saw
around him. But he stood far ahead of his fellows as a creator of
English tragedy. Bom at the opening of Elizabeth's reign, the son of
a Canterbury shoemaker, but educated at Cambridge, Marlowe burst
on the world in the year which preceded the triumph over the Armada,
with a play which at once wrought a revolution in the English stage.
Bombastic and extravagant as it was, and extravagance reached its
height in the scene where captive kings, the "pampered jades of Asia,"
drew their conqueror's car across the stage, " Tamburlaine" not only
indicated the revolt of the new drama against the timid inanities of
Euphuism, but gave an earnest of that imaginative daring, the secret
of which Marlowe was to bequeath to the playwrights who followed
him. He perished at twenty-nine in a shameful brawl, but in his brief
career he had struck the grander notes of the coming drama. His
Jew of Malta was the herald of Shylock. He opened in " Edward the
Second " the series of historical plays which gave us " Caesar " and
" Richard the Third." Riotous, grotesque, and full of a mad thirst for
pleasure as it is, his " Faustus" was the first dramatic attempt to touch
the great problem of the relations of man to the unseen world, to paint
the power of doubt in a temper leavened with superstition, the daring
of human defiance in a heart abandoned to despair. Extravagant,
unequal, stooping even to the ridiculous in his cumbrous and vulgar
buffoonery, there is a force in Marlowe, a conscious grandeur of tone,
a range of passion, which sets him above all his contemporaries
save one. In the higher qualities of imagination, as in the majesty
and sweetness of his " mighty line," he is inferior to Shakspere alone.

A few daring jests, a brawl and a fatal stab, make up the life of
Marlowe ; but even details such as these are wanting to the life of
William Shakspere. Of hardly any great poet, indeed, do we know
so little. For the story of his youth we have only one or two trifling
legends, and these almost certainly false. Not a single letter or

429

'II

Sec. VII.
The Eliza-

nETHAN

Poets

Marlowe

1593

Shak-
spere

!: n

ii ; n: \

•■■'!l

430

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap. I VII.]

Sec. VII.

The Eliza-
bethan
Poets

1564

1587

characteristic saying, not one of the jests " spoken at the Mermaid,"
hardly a single anecdote, remain to illustrate his busy life in London.
His look and figure in later age have been preserved by the bust over
his tomb at Stratford, and a hundred years after his death he was
still remembered in his native town ; but the minute diligence of the
enquirers of the Georgian time was able to glean hardly a single
detail, even of the most trivial order, which could throw light upon
the years of retirement before his death. It is owing perhaps to the
harmony and unity of his temper that no salient peculiarity seems to
have left its trace on the memory of his contemporaries ; it is the
very grandeur of his genius which precludes us from discovering any
personal trait in his works. His supposed self-revelation in the
Sonnets is so obscure that only a few outlines can be traced even by
the boldest conjecture. In his dramas he is all his characters, and his
characters range over all mankind. There is not one, or the act or
word of one, that we can identify personally with the poet himself.

He was born in the sixth year of Elizabeth's reign, twelve years
after the birth of Spenser, three years later than the birth of Bacon.
Marlowe was of the same age with Shakspere • Greene probably a few
years older. His father, a glover and small farmer of Stratford-on-
Avon, was forced by poverty to lay down his office of alderman, as his
son reached boyhood ; and stress of poverty may have been the cause
which drove William Shakspere, who was already married at eighteen
to a wife older than himself, to London and the stage. His life in the |
capital can hardly have begun later than in his twenty-third year, the
memorable year which followed Sidney's death, which preceded the
coming of the Armada, and which witnessed the production of Marlowe's
" Tamburlaine." If we take the language of the Sonnets as a record
of his personal feeling, his new profession as an actor stirred in him
only the bitterness of self-contempt. He chides with Fortune, " that
did not better for my life provide than public means that public man-
ners breed ; " he writhes at the thought that he has " made himself a
motley to the view " of the gaping apprentices in the pit of Blackfriars.
" Thence comes it" he adds, " that my name receives a brand, and
almost thence my nature is subdued to that it works in." But the
application of the words is a more than doubtful one. In spite of
petty squabbles with some of his dramatic rivals at the outset of his
career, the genial nature of the new comer seems to have won him a
general love among his fellow actors. In 1592, while still a mere
fitter of old plays for the stage, a fellow playwright, Chettle, answered
Greene's attack on him in words of honest affection ; " Myself have
seen his demeanour no less civil, than he excellent in the quality he
professes : besides, divers of worship have reported his uprightness of
dealing, which argues his honesty ; and his facetious grace in writing,
that approves his art." His partner Burbage spoke of him after

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

death as a " worthy friend and fellow ; " and Jonson handed down
the general tradition of his time when he described him as ** indeed
honest, and of an open and free nature." His profession as an actor
was of essential service to him in his poetic career. Not only did it
give him the sense of theatrical necessities which makes his plays
so effective on the boards, but it enibled him to bring his pieces as he
wrote them to the test of the stagj. If there is any truth in Jonson's
statement that Shakspere never blotted a line, there is no justice in
the censure which it implies on his carelessness or incorrectness.
The conditions of poetic publication were in fact wholly different from
those of our own day. A drama remained for years in manuscript
as an acting piece, subject to continual revision and amendment ; and
every rehearsal and representation afforded hints for change which we
know the young poet was far from neglecting. The chance which has
preserved an earlier edition of his "Hamlet" shows in what an unspar-
ing way Shakspere could recast even the finest products of his genius.
Five years after the supposed date of his arrival in London, he was
already famous as a dramatist. Greene speaks bitterly of him, under
the name of " Shakescene," as an " upstart crow beautified with our
feathers," a sneer which points either to his celebrity as an actor, or
to his preparation for loftier flights by fitting pieces of his predecessors
for the stage. He was soon partner in the theatre, actor, and play-
wright ; and another nickname, that of "Johannes Factotum,'' or
Jack-of-aU-Trades, shows his readiness to take all honest work which
came to hand.

With the poem of " Venus and Adonis," " the first heir of my inven-
tion," as Shakspere calls it, the period of independent creation fairly
began. The date of its publication was a very memorable one. The
" Faerie Queen " had appeared only three years before, and had placed
Spenser without a rival at the head of English poetry. On the
other hand, the two leading dramatists of the time passed at this
moment suddenly away. Greene died in poverty and self-reproach
in the house of a poor shoemaker. " Doll," he wrote to the wife he
had abandoned, " I charge thee, by the love of our youth and by my
soul's rest, that thou wilt see this man paid ; for if he and his wife had
not succoured me, I had died in the streets." " Oh, that a year were
granted me to live," cried the young poet from his bed of death — " but I
must die, of every man abhorred ! Time, loosely spent, will not again
be won ! My time is loosely spent — and I undone ! " A year later, the
death of Marlowe in a street brawl removed the only rival whose
powers might have equalled Shakspere's own. He was now about
thirty ; and the twenty-three years which elapsed between the appear-
ance of the " Adonis " and his death were filled with a series of master-
pieces. Nothing is more characteristic of his genius than its incessant
activity. Through the five years which followed the publication of his

43t

Ml!

Sec. VII.
The Eli7a

UETHAN

Poets

H.'i

1593-1598

' I i

!c* t

til A

432

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VII.

The Eliza-
bethan-

PO»iTS

early poem he seems to have produced on an average two dramas a
year. When we attempt, however, to trace the growth and progress
of the poet's mind in the order of his plays, we are met, at least in the
case of many of them, by an absence of certain information as to the
dates of their appearance. The facts on which enquiry has to build are
extremely few. " Venus and Adonis," with the " Lucrece," must have
been written before their publication in 1 593-4 ; the Sonnets, though not
published till 1609, were known in some form among his private friends
as early as 1598. His earlier plays are defined by a list given in the
" Wit's Treasury" of Francis Meres in 1598, though the omission of a
play from a casual catalogue of this kind would hardly warrant us in as-
suming its necessary non-existence at the time. The works ascribed to
him at his death are fixed, in the same approximate fashion, through
the edition published by his fellow-actors. Beyond these meagre facts,
and our knowledge of the publication of a few of his dramas in his
lifetime, all is uncertain ; and the conclusions which have been drawn
from these, and from the dramas themselves, as well as from assumed
resemblances with, or references to, other plays of the period, can only
be accepted as approximations to the truth. The bulk of his lighter
comedies and historical dramas can be assigned with fair probability
to the period from about 1 593, when he was known as nothing more than
an adapter, to 1 598, when they are mentioned in the list of Meres. They
bear on them indeed the stamp of youth. In " Love's Labour's Lost "
the young playwright, fresh from his own Stratford, flings himself into
the midst of the brilliant England which gathered round Elizabeth,
busying himself as yet for the most part with the surface of it, with the
humours and quixotisms, the wit and the whim, the unreality, the fan-
tastic extravagance, which veiled its inner nobleness. Country lad as
he is, he can exchange quip and repartee with the best ; he quizzes the
verbal wit and high-flown extravagance of thought and phrase which
Euphues had made fashionable in the court world of the time. Ke
shares the delight in existence which was so marked a feature of the age ;
he enjoys the mistakes, the contrasts, the adventures, of the men about
him ; his fun breaks almost riotously out in the practical jokes of the
" Taming of the Shrew " and the endless blunderings of the " Comedy
of Errors." His work is as yet marked by little poetic elevation, or by
passion ; but the easy grace of the dialogue, the dexterous management
of a complicated story, the genial gaiety of his tone, and the music of
his verse, promised a master of social comedy as soon as Shakspere
turned from the superficial aspects of the world about him to find a new
delight in the character and actions of men. In the " Two Gentlemen
of Verona," his painting of manners was suffused by a tenderness and
ideal beauty, which formed an effective protest against the hard though
vigorous character-painting which the first success of Ben Jonson in
" Every Man in his Humour" brought at the time into fashion. But

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

quick on these lighter comedies followed two, in which his genius started
fully into life. His poetic power, held in reserve till now, showed itself
with a splendid profusion in the brilliant fancies of the " Midsummer
Night's Dream ; " and passion swept like a tide of resistless delight
through " Romeo and Juliet." Side by side however with these
passionate dreams, these delicate imaginings and piquant sketches of
manners, had been appearing during this short interval of intense
activity his historical dramas. No plays seem to have been more
popular, from the earlieat hours of the new stage, than dramatic repre-
sentations of our history. Marlowe had shown in his '* Edward the
Second " what tragic grandeur could be reached in this favourite field ;
and, as we have seen, Shakspere had been led naturally towards it by
his earlier occupation as an adapter of stock pieces like " Henry the
Sixth " for the new requirements of the stage. He still to some extent
followed in plan the older plays on the subjects he selected, but in his
treatment of their themes he shook boldly off the yoke of the past. A
larger and deeper conception of human character than any of the old
dramatists had reached displayed itself in Richard the Third, in
Falstaff, or in Hotspur ; while in Constance and Richard the Second
the pathos of human suffering was painted as even Marlowe had never
dared to paint it. No dramas have done so much for Shakspere's
enduring popularity with his countrymen as these historical plays.
Nowhere is the spirit of our history so nobly rendered. If the poet's
work echoes sometimes our national prejudice and unfairness of temper,
it is instinct throughout with English humour, with our English love of
hard fighting, our English faith in goodness and in the doom that waits
upon triumphant evil, our English pity for the fallen.

Whether as a tragedian or as a writer of social comedy, Shakspere
had now passed far beyond his fellows. " The Muses," said Meres,
" would speak with Shakspere's fine filed phrase, if they would speak
English." His personal popularity was at its height. His pleasant
temper, and the vivacity of his wit, had drawn him early into contact
with the young Earl of Southampton, to whom his "Adonis" and
" Lucrece " are dedicated ; and the different tone of the two dedications
shows how rapidly acquaintance ripened into an ardent friendship.
Shakspere's wealth and influence too were growing fast. He had
property both in Stratford and London, and his fellow-townsmen niade
him their suitor to Lord Burleigh for favours to be bestowed on Strat-
ford. He was rich enough to aid his father, and to buy the house at
Stratford which afterwards became his home. The tradition that
Elizabeth was so pleased with Falstaff in " Henry the Fourth" that
she ordered the poet to show her Falstaff in love — an order which
produced the "Merry Wives of Windsor" — whether true or false,
proves his repute as a playwright. As the group of earlier poets
passed away, they found successors in Marston, Dekker, Middleton,

F F

433

Sec. VII.
The Emea-

DKTKAN

Poets

-'); I

,i> I

1 598-1608

f. t i:-<

434

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VII.
Thk Emza-

HETHAN

Poets

1598

Heywood, and Chapman, and above all in Ben Jonson. But none of
these could dispute the supremacy of Shakspere. The verdict of
Meres, that " Shakspere among the English is the most excellent in
both kinds for the stage," represented the general feeling of his con-
temporaries. He was at last fully master of the resources of his art.
The " Merchant of Venice " marks the perfection of his developement
as a dramatist in the completeness of its stage effect, the ingenuity of
its incidents, the ease of its movement, the poetic beauty of its higher
passages, the reserve and self-control with which its poetry is used, the
conception and unfolding of character, and above all the mastery with
which character and event are grouped round the figure of Shylock.
But the poet's temper is still young ; the " Merry Wives of Windsor"
is a burst of gay laughter ; and laughter more tempered, yet full of a
sweeter fascination, rings round us in " As You Like It." But in the
melancholy and meditative Jacques of the last drama we feel the touch
of a new and graver mood. Youth, so full and buoyant in the poet till
now, seems to have passed almost suddenly away. Though Shakspere
had hardly reached forty, in one of his Sonnets which cannot have
been written at a much later time than this, there are indications that
he already felt the advance of premature age. The outer world sud-
denly darkened around him. The brilliant circle of young nobles whose
friendship he had shared was broken up by the political storm which
burst in a mad struggle of the Earl of Essex for power. Essex himself
fell on the scaffold ; his friend and Shakspere's idol, Southampton,
passed a prisoner into the Tower ; Herbert, Lord lembroke, a younger
patron of the poet, was banished from Court. While friends were
thus falling and hopes fading without, Shakspere's own mind
seems to have been going through a phase of bitter suffering and j
unrest. In spite of the ingenuity of commentators, it is difficult and I
even impossible to derive any knowledge of his inner history from
the Sonnets ; " the strange imagery of passion which passes over
the magic mirror," it has been finely said, " has no tangible evidence
before or behind it." But its mere passing is itself an evidence
of the restlessness and agony within. The change in the character
of his dramas gives a surer indication of his change of mood.
The joyousness which b jathes through his early work disappears in
comedies such as **Troilus"and " Measure for Measure." Failure seems
everywhere. In "Julius Caesar" the virtue of Brutus is foiled by its
ignorance of and isolation from mankind ; in Hamlet even penetrating
intellect proves helpless for want of the capacity of action ; the poison
of lago taints the love of Desdemona and the grandeur of Othello;
Lear's mighty passion battles helplessly against the wind and the rain;
a woman's weakness of frame dashes the cup of her triumph from
the hand of Lady Macbeth ; lust and self-indulgence blast the heroism
of Antony ; pride ruins the nobleness of Coriolanus. But the very

vii.l

THE REFORMATION.

struggle and self-introspection that these dramas betray were to give
a depth and grandeur to Shakspere's work such as it had never known
before. The age was one in whicL man's temper and powers took a
new range and energy. The daring of the adventurer, the philosophy
of the scholar, the passion of the lover, the fanaticism of the saint,
towered into almost superhuman grandeur. Man became conscious
of the immense resources that lay within him, conscious of boundless
powers that seemed to mock the narrow world in which they moved.
It is this grandeur of humanity that spresids before us as the poet
pictures the wide speculation of Hamlet, the awful convulsion of a
great nature in Othello, the terrible storm in the soul of Lear which
blends with the very storm of the heavens themselves, the fearful ambi-
tion that nerved a woman's hand to dabble itself with the blood of a
murdered king, the reckless lust that " flung away a world for love."
Amid the terror and awe of these great dramas we learn something of
the vast forces of the age from which they sprang. The passion of
Mary Stuart, the ruthlessness of Alva, the daring of Drake, the
chivalry of Sidney, the range of thought and action in Ralegh or
Elizabeth, come better home to us as we follow the mighty series of
tragedies which began in " Hamlet " and ended in " Coriolanus."

Shakspere's last dramas, the three exquisite works in which he
shows a soul at rest with itself and with the world, " Cymbeline,"
" The Tempest," " Winter's Tale," were written in the midst of ease
and competence, in a house at Stratford, to which he withdrew a few
years after the death of Elizabeth. In them we lose all relation with
the world or the time and pass into a region of pure poetry. It is in this
peaceful and gracious close that the life of Shakspere contrasts with
that of his greatest contemporaries. Himself Elizabethan to the core,
he stood at the meeting-point of two great epochs of our history. The
age of the Renascence was passing into the age of Puritanism. A sterner
Protestantism was invigorating and ennobling life by its morality, its
seriousness, its intense conviction of God. But it was at the same time
hardening and narrowing it. The Bible was superseding Plutarch. The
" obstinate questionings " which haunted the finer souls of the Renas-
cence were being stereotyped into the theological formulas of the
Puritan. The sense of a divine omnipotence was annihilating man.
The daring which turned England into a people of " adventurers,"
the sense of inexhaustible resources, the buoyant freshness of youth,
the intoxicating sense of beauty and joy, which created Sidney and
Marlowe and Drake, were passing away before the consciousness of
evil and the craving to order man's life aright before God. A new
political world, healthier, more really national, but less picturesque,
less wrapt in the mystery and splendour which poets love, was rising
with the new moral world. Rifts which were still little were widening
hour by hour, and threatening ruin to the great fabric of Church and

F F 3

435

Skc. VII.
The Kliza

HKTIIAN
I'OETS

I608-I616

I ' m

I, t

■1

!<
'1

'■4

■ \
■■■

•I -'-l

■■\i

436

HISTORY DF THE ENGLTSII PEOPLE.

[chap. I vii.]

Sec. vii.
The Eliza-

HF.THAN

Poets

The later
Drama-
tists

State, which the Tudors had built up, and to which the men of the
Renascence clung passionately. From this new world of thought and
feeling Shakspere stood utterly aloof. Of the popular tendencies of
Puritanism — and great as were its faults, Puritanism may fairly claim to
be the first political system which recognized the grandeur of the people
as a whole — Shakspere knew nothing. His roll of dramas is the epic
of civil war. The Wars of the Roses fill his mind, as they filled the
mind of his contemporaries. It is not till we follow him through the
series of plays from "Richard the Second" to "Henry the Eighth"
that we realize how profoundly the memory of the struggle between
York and Lancaster had moulded the temper of the people, how deep
a dread of civil war, of baronial turbulence, of disputes over the suc-
cession it had left behind it. From such a risk the Crown seemed the
one security. With Shakspere as with his contemporaries the Crown
is still the centre and safeguard of the national life. His ideal England
is an England grouped round a king such as his own Henry V., a
born ruler of men, with a loyal people about him, and his enemies at
his feet. Socially too the poet reflects the aristocratic view of life
which was shared by all the nobler spirits of the Elizabethan time,
Coriolanus is the embodiment of a great noble ; and the taunts which
Shakspere hurls in play after play at the rabble only echo the general
temper of the Renascence. But he shows no sympathy with the
struggle of feudalism against the Crown. He had grown up under the
veign of Elizabeth ; he had known no ruler save one who had cast a
spell over the hearts of Englishmen. The fear of misrule was dim
and distant ; his thoughts were absorbed, as those of the country were
absorbed, in the struggle for national existence, and the heat of such
a struggle left no time for the thoughts of civil liberty. Nor were
the spiritual sympathies of the poet those of the coming time.
Turn as others might to the speculations of theology, man and man's
nature remained with him an inexhaustible subject of interest. Caliban
was among his latest creations. It iS impossible to discover whether
his faith, if faith there were, was Catholic or Protestant. It is hard,
indeed, to say whether he had any religious belief or no. The religious
phrases which are thinly scattered over his works are little more than
expressions of a distant and imaginative reverence. But on the deeper
grounds of religious faith his silence is significant. He is silent, and
the doubt of Hamlet deepens his silence, about the after- world. "To
die," it may be, was to him as to Claudio, " to go we know not
whither." Often as his " questionings " turn to the riddle of life and
death, he leaves it a riddle to the last, without heeding the common
theological solutions around him. " We are such stuff as dreams are
made of, and our little life is rounded with a sleep."

The contrast between the spirit of the Elizabethan drama and the
new temper of the nation became yet stronger when the death of|

TIIK REFORMATION.

437

Shakspere left the sovereignty of the English stage to Ben Jonson.
Jonson retained it almost to the moment when the drama itself
perished in the storm of the Civil War. Webster and Ford, indeed,
surpassed him in tragic grandeur, Massinger in facility and grace,
Hcaumont and Fletcher in poetry and inventiveness ; but in the breadth
of his dramatic quality, his range over every kind of poetic excellence,
Jonson was excelled by Shakspere alone. His life retained to the
last the riotous, defiant colour of the earlier dramatic world, in which
he had made his way to fame. The stepson of a bricklayer, he en-
listed as a volunteer in the wars of the Low Countries, killed his man
in single combat in sight of both armies, and returned at nineteen to
London to throw himself on the stage for bread. At forty-five he was
still so vigorous that he made his way to Scotland on foot. Even in
old age his " mountain belly," his scarred face, and massive frame
became famous among the men of a younger time, as they gathered
at the " Mermaid " to listen to his wit, his poetry, his outbursts of
spleen and generosity, of delicate fancy, of pedantry, of riotous excess.
His entry on the stage was marked by a proud resolve to reform it.
Already a fine scholar in early manhood, and disdainful of writers
who, like Shakspere, " had small Latin and less Greek," Jonson aimed
at a return to classic severity, to a severer criticism and taste. He
blamed the extravagance which marked the poetry around him, he
studied his plots, he gave symmetry and regularity to his sentences
and conciseness to his phrase. But creativeness disappears : in his
social comedies we are amongst qualities and types rather than men,
amongst abstractions and not characters. His comedy is no genial
reflection of life as it is, but a moral, satirical effort to reform manners.
It is only his wonderful grace and real poetic feeling that lightens all
this pedantry. He shares the vigour and buoyancy of life which dis-
tinguished the school from which he sprang. His stage is thronged
with figures. In spite of his talk about correctness, his own ex-
travagance is only sa/ed from becoming ridiculous by his amazing
force. If he could not create characters, his wealth of striking details
gave life to the types which he substituted for them. His poetry, too,
is of the highest order ; his lyrics of the purest, lightest fancy : his
masques rich with gorgeous pictures ; his pastoral, the " Sad Shepherd,"
fragment as it is, breathes a delicate tenderness. But, in spite of the
beauty and strength which lingered on, the life of our drama was fast
ebbing away. The interest of the people was in reality being drawn
to newer and graver themes, as the struggle of the Great Rebellion
threw its shadow before it, and the efforts of the playwrights to arrest
this tendency of the time by fresh excitement only brought about the
ruin of the stage. The grossness of the later comedy is incredible.
Almost as incredible is the taste of the later tragedians for horrors of
incest and blood. The hatred of the Puritans to the stage was not a

Sec. VII.
Thk Eliza*

IlKTHAN
I'OBTS

Jonson

1593

i .1'

,1:1 M

I - ?

a,
m

43^

lltSTORY OF THE KNOUSH PEOPLE.

tcilAP.

Sbc. VII.
Thk Ei.iza-

BKTHAN

I'uicrs
Bacon

iS^'i

1597

mere longing to avenge the insults which it had levelled at Puritan-
ism ; it was in the main the honest hatred of God-fearin;; men against
the foulest depravity presented in a poetic and attractive form.

If the imaj^inative resources of the new England were see.i in the
creators of Hamlet and the Faerie Queen, its purely intellectual
capacity, its vast command over the stores of human knowledge, the
amazing sense of its own powers with which it dealt with them, were
seen in the work of Francis Bacon. Bacon was born at the opening
of Elizabeth's reign, three years before the birth of Sh?kspere. He
was the younger son of a Lord Keeper, as well as the nephew of Lord
Burleigh, and even in boyhood his quickness and sagacity won the
favour of the Queen. Elizabeth " delighted much to confer with him,
and to prove him with questions : unto which he delivered himself with
that gravity and maturity above his years that her Majesty would often
term him * the young Lord Keeper.* " Even as a boy at college he had
expressed his dislike of the Aristotelian philosophy, as **a philosophy
only strong for disputations and contentions, but barren of the pro-
duction of works for the benefit of the life of man." As a law-student
of twenty-one he sketched in a tract on the " Greatest Birth of Time "
the system of inductive enquiry he was already prepared to substitute
for it. The speculations of the young thinker were interrupted by
hopes of Court success ; but these were soon dashed to the ground.
He was left poor by his father's death ; the ill-will of the Cecils barred
his advancement with the Queen : and a few years before Shakspere's
arrival in London he entered as a barrister at Gray's Inn. He soon
became one of the most successful lawyers of the time. At twenty-
three he was a member of the House of Commons, and his judgement
and eloquence at once brought li.u* to the front. " The fear of every
man that heard him was lest he should make an end," Ben Jonson tells
us. The steady growth of his reputation was quickened by the appear-
ance of his " Essays," a work remarkable not merely for the condensation
of its thought and its felicity and exactness of expression, but for the
power with which it applied to human life that experimental analysis
which Bacon was at a later time to make the key of Science. His fame
at once became great at home and abroad, but with this nobler fame
Bacon could not content himself. He was conscious of great powers,
as well as great aims for the public good ; and it was a time when such
aims could hardly be realized save through the means of the Crown.
But political employment seemed further off than ever. At the outset
of his career in Parliament he had irritated Elizabeth by a firm oppo-
sition to her demand of a subsidy ; and though the offence was atoned
for by profuse apologies, and by the cessation of all further resistance
to the policy of the court, the law offices of the Crown were more than
once refused to him, and it was only after the publication of his
I " Essays " that he could obtain some slight promotion as a Queen's

vir.]

THE RftFORMATIOK.

Counsel. The moral weakness which more and more disclosed
itself is the best justification of the Queen in her rcluctancc~a
reluctance so strangely in contrast with her ordinary course- to brinp
the wisest head in her realm to her Council-board. The men whom
I'ljizabeth employed were for the most part men whose intellect was
directed by a strong sense of public duty. Their reverence for the
Ouecn, strangely exaggerated as it may seem to us, was guided and
controlled by an ardent patriotism and an earnest sense of religion ;
and with all their regard for the royal prerogative, they never lost their
regard for the law. The grandeur and originality of Bacon's intellect
parted him from men like these quite as much as the bluntness of his
moral perceptions. In politics, as in science, he had little reverence
for the past. Law, constitutional privileges, or religion, were to him
simply means of bringing about certain ends of good government;
and if these ends could be brought about in shorter fashion he saw
• only pedantry in insisting on more cumbrous means. He had great
social and political ideas to realize, the reform and codification of
the law, the civilization of Ireland, the purification of the Church, the
union — at a later time — c5 Scotland and England, educational projects,
projects of material improvement, and the like ; and the direct and
shortest way of realizing these ends was in Bacon's eyes the use of the
power of the Crown. But whatever charm such a conception of the
royal power might have for her successor, it had little charm for
Elizabeth ; and to the end of her reign Bacon was foiled in his efforts
to rise in her service.

" For my name and memory," he said at the close of his life, " I leave
it to men's charitable speeches, and to foreign nations, and the next
age." Amid political activity and court intrigue he still found room for
the philosophical speculation which had begun with his earliest years.
At forty-four, after the final disappointment of his political hopes, from
Elizabeth, the publication of the " Advancement of Learning " marked
the first decisive appearance of the new philosophy which he had been
silently framing. The close of this work was, in his own words, " a
general and faithful perambulation of learning, with an enquiry what
parts thereof lie fresh and waste, and not improved and converted by
the industry of man ; to the end that such a plot, made and recorded
to memory, may both minister light to any public designation .u d r ' .n
serve to excite voluntary endeavours." It was only by sik h .i Mirv ),
he held, that men could be turned from useless studies, oi inclicc'u '1
means of pursuing more useful ones, and directed to the true end o.
knowledge as " a rich storehouse for the glory of the Creator and the
relief of man's estate." The work was in fact the preface to a series rf
treatises which were intended to be built up into an " Instaux^tio
Magna," which its author was never destined to complete, and of which
the parts that we possess were published in the following reign. The

43^

Sec. VII.

'I'mk Ri.ua-
iirtiian

PnRTS

The

Novum

Organum

K. t ]

440

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VII.

The Eliza-
bethan
Poets

" Cogitata et Visa " was a first sketch of the " Novum Organum," which
in its complete form was presented to James in 162 1. A year later
Bacon produced his " Natural and Experimental History." This, with
the " Novum Organum " and the " Advancement of Learning," was all
of his projected " Instauratio Magna " which he actually finished ; and
even of this portion we have only part of the last two divisions. The
" Ladder of the Understanding," which was to have followed these and
lead up from experience to science, the " Anticipations," or provisional
hypotheses for the enquiries of the new philosophy, and the closing
account of " Science in Practice," were left for posterity to bring to
completion. " We may, as we trust," said Bacon, " make no des-
picable beginnings. The destinies of the human race must complete
it, in such a manner perhaps as men looking only at the present
world would not readily conceive. For upon this will depend, not
only a speculative good, but all the fortunes of mankind, and all
their power." When we turn from words like these to the actual work •
which Bacon did, it is hard not to feel a certain disappointment.
He did not thoroughly understand the older philosophy which he
attacked. His revolt from the waste of human intelligence, which
he conceived to be owing to the adoption of a false method of investi-
gation, blinded him to the real value of deduction as an instrument of
discovery ; and he was encouraged in his contempt for it as much by
his own ignorance of mathematics as by the non-existeiice in his day
of the great deductive sciences of physics and astronomy. Nor had
he a more accurate prevision of the method of modern science. The
inductive process to which he exclusively directed men's attention bore
no fruit in Bacon's hands. The " art of investigating nature " on which
he prided himself has proved useless for scientific purposes, and would
be rejected by modern investigators. Where he was on a more correct
track he can hardly be regarded as original. " It may be doubted," says
Dugald Stewart, " whether any one important rule with regard to the
true method of investigation be contained in his works of which no
hint can be traced in those of his predecessors." Not only indeed did
Bacon fail to anticipate the methods of modern science, but he even re-
jected the great scientific discoveries of his own day. He set aside with
the same scorn the astronomical theory of Copernicus and the magnetic
investigations of Gilbert. The contempt seems to have been fully re-
turned by the scientific workers of his day. " The Lord Chancellor wrote
on science." said Harvey, the discoverer of the circulation of the blood,
"like a Lord Chancellor."

In spite however of his inadequate appreciation either of the old
philosophy or the new, the almost unanimous voice of later ages has
attributed, and justly attributed, to the " Novum Organum " a decisive
influence on the developement of modern science. If he failed in
revealing the method of experimental research, Bacon was the first to

proclair
unity of
dignity
petty de
way for
for it it;
which it
of mank
significa
was abs
servant,
others.
Casaubo
to trans!
demonst]
tician he
Reform, 1
his exhau
excluded
inapplica
certain, a
results by
accepted
tested; w
proof, an(
reason,
a subordir
step out o
Church,
nobly sho
indeed of
grandest f
of every er
the " vain
advance ir
Theatre, tl
pervades a
the Strang!
traditions (
reconciled
science,
genius or
smallest pa
though this
for all the

((

VLI.]

THE REFORMATION.

proclaim the existence of a Philosophy of Science, to insist on the
unity of knowledge and enquiry throughout the physical world, to give
dignity by the large and noble temper in which he treated them to the
petty details of experiment in which science had to begin, to clear a
way for it by setting scornfully aside the traditions c*" the past, to claim
for it its true rank and value, and to point to the enormous results
which its culture would bring in increasing the power and happiness
of mankind. In one respect his attitude was in the highest degree
significant. The age in which he lived was one in which theology
was absorbing the intellectual energy of the world. He was the
servant, too, of a king with whom theological studies superseded all
others. But if he bowed in all else to James, Bacon would not, like
Casaubon, bow in this. He would not even, like Descartes, attempt
to transform theology by turning reason into a mode of theological
demonstration. He stood absolutely aloof from it. Though as a poli-
tician he did not shrink from dealing with such subjects as Church
Reform, he dealt with them simply as matters of civil polity. But from
his exhaustive enumeration of the branches of human knowledge he
excluded theology, and theology alone. His method was of itself
inapplicable to a subject, where the premisses were assumed to be
certain, and the results known. His aim was to seek for unknown
results by simple experiment. It was against received authority and
accepted tradition in matters of enquiry that his whole system pro-
tested ; what he urged was the need of making belief rest strictly on
proof, and proof rest on the conclusions drawn from evidence by
reason. But in th ology — all theologians asserted— reason played but
a subordinate part. " If I proceed to treat of it," said Bacon, " I shall
step out of the bark of human reason, and enter into the ship of the
Church. Neither will the stars of philosophy, which have hitherto so
nobly shone on us, any longer give us their light." The certainty
indeed of conclusions on such subjects was out of harmony with the
grandest feature of Bacon's work, his noble confession of the liability
of every enquirer to error. It was his especial task to warn men against
the " vain shows " of knowledge which had so long hindered any real
advance in it, the " idols" of the Tribe, the Den, the Forum, and the
Theatre, the errors which spring from the systematizing spirit which
pervades all masses of men, or from individual idiosyncrasies, or from
the strange power of words and phrases over the mind, or from the
traditions of the past. Nor were the claims of theology easily to be
reconciled with the position which he was resolute to assign to natural
science. "Through all those ages," Bacon says, "wherein men of
genius or learning principally or even nioderately flourished, the
smallest part of human industry has been spent on natural philosophy,
though this ought to be esteemed as the great mother of the sciences ;
for all the rest, if torn from this root, may perhaps be polished and

::! T^

t*t:'

44t

Sec. VII.
The Elua-

UETHAN

Poets

/ '1

Ml 1

ill

'.1

^ m

;l!l

iml

444

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VII.
The Eliza-

BKTHAN

Poets

I The "Wax

with

Spain

formed for use, but can receive little increase." It was by the adoption

of the method of inductive enquiry which physical science was to make

its own, and by basing enquiry on grounds which physical science

could supply, that the moral sciences, ethics and politics could alone

make any real advance. " Let none expect any great promotion of the

sciences, especially in their effective part, unless natural philosophy

be drawn out to particular sciences ; and, again, unless these particular

sciences be brought back again to natural philosophy. From this

defect it is that astronomy, optics, music, many mechanical arts, and

(what seems stranger) even moral and civil philosophy and logic rise

but little above the foundations, and only skim over the varieties and

surfaces of things." It was this lofty conception of the position and

destiny of natural science which Bacon was the first to impress upon

mankind at large. The age was one in which knowledge was passing

to fields of enquiry which had till then been unknown, in which Kepler

and Galileo were creating modern astronomy, in which Descartes was

revealing the laws of motion, and Harvey the circulation of the blood.

But to the mass of men this great change was all but imperceptible ;

and it was the energy, the profound conviction, the eloquence of Bacon

which first called the attention of mankind as a whole to the power

and importance of physical research. It was he who by his lofty faith

in the results and victories of the new philosophy nerved its followers

to a zeal and confidence equal to his own. It was he who above all

gave dignity to the slow and patient processes of investigation, of

experiment^ of comparison, to the, sacrificing of hypothesis to fact, to

the single aim after truth, which was to be the law of modern science.

Section VIII.— The Conquest of Ireland, 1588— 1610.

[Authorities. — The materials for the early history of Ireland are described by
Professor O'Curry in his '* Lectures on the Materials of Ancient Irish History,"
They may be studied by the general reader in the compilation known as ** The
Annals of the Four Masters," edited by Dr. O'Donovan. Its ecclesiastical history
is dryly but accurately told by Dr. Lanigan ( * ' Ecclesiastical History of Ireland ").
The chief authorities for the earlier conquest under Henry the Second are the
"Expugnatio et Topographia Hibernica" of Gerald de Barri, edited for the
Rolls series by Mr. Dimock, and the Anglo-Norman Poem edited by
M. Francisque Michel (London, Pickering, 1857). Mr. Froude has devoted
especial attention to the relations of Ireland with the Tudors ; but both in
accuracy and soundness of judgement his work is far inferior to Mr. Brewer's
examination of them m his prefaces to the State Papers of Henry VIII., or
to Mr. Gardiner's careful and temperate account of the final conquest and
settlement under Mountjoy and Chichester ('* History of England ''). The two
series of "Lectures on the History of Ireland" by Mr. A. G. Richey are
remarkable for their information and fairness. ]

While England became " a nest of singing birds " at home, the last
years of Elizabeth's reign were years of splendour and triumph abroad.

Vil.]

The def<

broke th

The nex

Drake ai

to Engk

repulsed

treasury

commiss:

nation w

privateer:

ish Main

month af

back fron

Armada I

the Third

the throni

the Cathc

leaders, tl

heretic, pi

and recog

of Spanisl

an effort v

to aid Hei

the overwl

civil strife,

dependenc

England.

death of tl

Philip's da

it gave strc

at the feet

of his subje

is well wori

his abando

secure Pari

it dissolved

people to f(

the Treaty

been made

1596 his tl

of an Engli;

to the grou

the stores a

of this crusj

and set sail i

Vii.)

THE REFORMATION.

443

■ 1 1

A : *ii;i'.' .iii

The defeat of the Armada was the first of a series of defeats which
broke the power of Spain, and changed the political aspect of the world.
The next year fifty vessels and fifteen thousand men were sent under
Drake and Norris against Lisbon. The expedition returned baffled
to England, but it had besieged Corunna, pillaged the coast, and
repulsed a Spanish army on Spanish ground. The exhaustion of the
treasury indeed soon forced Elizabeth to content herself with issuing
commissions to volunteers ; but the war was a national one, and the
nation waged it for itself. Merchants, gentlemen, nobles, fitted out
privateers. The sea-dogs in evci growing numbers scoured the Span-
ish Main ; Spanish galloons, Spanish merchant-ships, were brought
month after month to English harbours. Philip meanwhile was held
back from, attack on England by the need of action in France. The
Armada had hardly been dispersed when the assassination of Henry
the Third, the last of the line of Valois, raised Henry of Navarre to
the throne ; and the accession of a Protestant sovereign at once ranged
the CathoHcs of France to a man on the side of the League and its
leaders, the Guises. The League rejected Henry's claims as those of a
heretic, proclaimed the Cardinal of Bourbon King as Charles the Tenth,
and recognized Philip as Protector of France. It received the support
of Spanish soldiery and Spanish treasure : and this new effort of Spain,
an effort whose triumph must have ended in her ruin, forced Elizabeth
to aid Henry with men and money in his five years' struggle against
the overwhelming odds which seemed arrayed against him. Torn by
civil strife, it seemed as? though France might be turned into a Spanish
dependency ; and it was from its coast that Philip hoped to reach
England. But the day at last went against the Leaguers. On the
death of their puppet king, their scheme of conferring the crown on
Philip's daughter awoke jealousies in the house of Guise itself, while
it gave strength to the national party who shrank from laying France
at the feet of Spain. Henry's submission to the faith held by the bulk
of his subjects at last destroyed all chance of Philip's success. " Paris
is well worth a mass " was the famous phrase in which Henry explained
his abandonment of the Protestant cause, but the step did more than
secure Paris. It dashed to the ground all hopes of further resistance,
it dissolved the League, and enabled the King at the head of a reunited
people to force Philip to acknowledge his title and consent to peace in
the Treaty of Vervins. The overthrow of Philip's hopes in France had
been made more bitter by the final overthrow of his hopes at sea. In
1596 his threat of a fresh Armada was met by the daring descent
of an English force upon Cadiz. The town was plundered and burned
to the ground ; thirteen vessels of war were fired in its harbour, and
the stores accumulated for the expedition utterly destroyed. In spite
of this crushing blow a Spanish fleet gathered in the following year
and set sail for the English coast ; but as in the case of its pred<icessor

Sec VIII.

The

Conquest

OF-

Ireland
1588

1610

1589

I. ;.

S-. ^

in: i

1591

1593

1595

l^ I ^

1' ' y

1 , ■■ ■]

: \ ' i '•

m V mm

444

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VIII.

The
Conquest

Ireland
1588

1610

Storms proved more fatal than the English guns, and the ships were
wrecked and almost destroyed in the Bay of Biscay.

With the ruin of Philip's projects in France and the assertion of
English supremacy at sea, all danger from Spain passed quietly away,
and Elizabeth was able to direct her undivided energies to the last
work which illustrates her reign.

To understand however the final conquest of Ireland, we must retrace
our steps to the reign of Henry the Second. The civilization of the
island had at that time fallen far below the height which it had reached
when its missionaries brought religion and learning to the shores of
Northumbria. Learning had almost disappeared. The Christianity
which had been a vital force in the eighth century had died into
asceticism and superstition by the twelfth, and had ceased to influence
the morality of the people at large. The Church, destitute of any
effective organization, was powerless to do the work which it had done
elsewhere in Western Europe, or to introduce order into the anarchy of
warring tribes. On the contrary, it shared the anarchy around it.
Its head, the Coarb or Archbishop of Armagh, sank into the here-
ditary chieftain of a clan ; its bishops were without dioceses, and often
mere dependants of the greater monasteries. Hardly a trace of
any central authority remained to knit the tribes into a single nation,
though the King of Ulster claimed supremacy over his fellow-kings of
Munster, Leinster, and Connaught ; and even within these minor
kingships the regal authority was little more than a name. The one
living thing in the social and political chaos was the sept, or tribe, or
clan, whose institutions remained those of the earliest stsge of human
civilization. Its chieftainship was hereditary, but, instead of passing
from father to son, it was held by whoever was the eldest member of
the ruling family at the time. The land belonging to the tribe was
shared among its members, but re-divided among them at certain in-
tervals of years. The practice of " fosterage," or adoption, bound the
adopted child more closely to its foster-parents than to its family
by blood. Every element of improvement or progress which had
been introduced into the island disappeared in the long and despe-
rate struggle with the Danes. The coast-towns, such as Dublin or
Waterford, which the invaders founded, remained Danish in blood
and manners, and at feud with the Celtic tribes around them, though
sometimes forced by the fortunes of war to pay tribute, and to accept,
in name at least, the overlordship of the Irish Kings. It was through
these towns however that the intercourse with England, which had
ceased since the eighth century, was to some extent renewed in tiie
eleventh. Cut off from the Church of the island by national anti-
pathy, the Danish coast-cities applied to the See of Canterbury for
the ordination of their bishops, and acknowledged a right of spiritual
supervision in Lanfranc and Anselm. The relations thus formed were

VII,]

drawn

Wulfst

appear

full of

spite o

Church

war, ha

and wil

was de

island

took the

body of

dalous

action.

the juri

Roman

Ireland.

strain tt

to plant

He ei

customs

the payr

the Rom

promptei

his will

honour, j

in a gre;

Empress

Henry a

were div<

Twelve

Leinster,

for the dc

civil wars

promises

by Robei

small bai

three or i

the adver

kernes ; i

their towi

and Derr

men piled

his teeth

heralded

■i1

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

445

drawn closer by the slave-trade, which the Conqueror and Bishop
Wulfstan succeeded for a time in suppressing at Bristol, but which
appears to have quickly revived. In the twelfth century Ireland was
full of Englishmen, who had been kidnapped and sold into slavery, in
spite of royal prohibitions and the spiritual menaces of the English
Church. The state of the country afforded a legitimate pretext for
war, had a pretext been needed by the ambition of Henry the Second ;
and within a few months of that King's coronation John of Salisbury
was despatched to obtain the Papal sanction for an invasion of the
island. The enterprise, as it was laid before Pope Hadrian the Fourth,
took the colour of a crusade. The isolation of Ireland from the general
body of Christendom, the absence of learning and civilization, the scan-
dalous vices of its people, were alleged as the grounds of Henry's
action. It was the general belief of the time that all islands fell under
the jurisdiction of the Papal See, and it was as a possession of the
Roman Church that Henry sought Hadrian's permission to enter
Ireland. His aim was " to enlarge the bounds of the Church, to re-
strain the progress of vices, to correct the manners of its people and
to plant virtue among them, and to increase the Christian religion."
He engaged to " subject the people to laws, to extirpate vicious
customs, to respect the rights of the native Churches, and to enforce
the payment of Peter' s pence " as a recognition of the overlordship of
the Roman See. Hadrian by his bull approved the enterprise as one
prompted by " the ardour of faith and love of religion," and declared
his will that the people of Ireland should receive Henry with all
honour, and revere him as their lord. The Papal bull was produced
in a great council of the English baronage, but the opposition of the
Empress Matilda and the difficulties of the enterprise forced on
Henry a temporary abandonment of his designs, and his energies
were diverted for the moment to plans of continental aggrandizement.
Twelve years had passed when an Irish chieftain. Dermod, King of
Leinster, presented himself at Henry's Court, and did homage to him
for the dominions from which he had been driven in one of the endless
civil wars which distracted the island. Dermod returned to Ireland with
promises of aid from the English knighthood ; and was soon followed
by Robert FitzStephen, a son of the Constable of Cardigan, with a
small band of a hundred and forty knights, sixty men-at-arms, and
three or four hundred Welsh archers. Small as was the number of
the adventurers, their horses and arms proved irresistible to the Irish
kernes ; a sally of the men of Wexford was avenged by the storm of
their town ; the Ossory clans were defeated with a terrible slaughter,
and Dermod, seizing a head from the heap of trophies which his
men piled at his feet, tore off in savage triumph its nose and lips with
his teeth. The arrival of fresh forces under Maurice Fitzgerald
heralded the coming of Richard of Clare, Earl of Pembroke and

''iij

Skc. VIIl.

The

Conquest

Ireland
1588

1610

H55

Strong,
bow

I''

■ t -

' \

ii68

>'4

■: ' \

II69

446

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VIII.

The

Conquest

Ireland
1588

1610

II71

1 176

1 185

Tbe

Barons

of the

Pale

Striguil, a ruined baron later known by the nickname of Strongbow,
who in defiance of Henry's prohibition landed near Waterford
with a force of fifteen hundred men, as Dermod's mercenary. The
city was at once stormed, and the united forces of the Earl
and King marched to the siege of Dublin. In spite of a relief
attempted by the King of Connaught, who was recognized as overking
of the island by the rest of the tribes, Dublin was taken by surprise ;
and the marriage of Richard with Eva, Dermod's daughter, left
him on the death of his father-in-law, which followed quickly on
these successes, master of his kingdom of Leinster. The new lord had
soon, however, to hurry back to England, and appease the jealousy of
Henry by the surrender of Dublin to the Crown, by doing homage for
Leinster as an English lordship, and by accompanying the King in his
voyage to the new dominion which the adventurers had won. Had
Henry been allowed by fortune to carry out his purpose, the conquest
of Ireland would now have been accomplished. The King of Connaught
indeed and the chiefs of noi them Ulster refused him homage, but the
rest of the Irish tribes owned his suzerainty ; the bishops in synod at
Cashel recognized him as their lord ; and he was preparing to penetrate
to the north and west, and to secure his conquest by a systematic
erection of castles throughout the country, when the troubles which
followed on the murder of Archbishop Thomas recalled him hurriedly
to Normandy. The lost opportunity never returned. Connaught, in-
deed, bowed to a nominal acknowledgment of Henry's overlordship ;
John De Courcy penetrated into Ulster and established himself at
Downpatrick ; and the King planned for a while the establishment of
his youngest son, John, as Lord of Ireland. But the levity of the
young prince, who mocked the rude dresses of the native chieftains,
and plucked them in insult by the beard, compelled his recall ; and
nothing but the feuds and weakness of the Irish tribes enabled the
adventurers to hold the districts of Drogheda, Dublin, Wexford, Water-
ford, and Cork, which formed what was thenceforth known as the
" English Pale."

Had the Irish driven their invaders into the sea, or the English
succeeded in the complete conquest of Ireland, the misery of its after
history might have been avoided. A struggle such as that in which
Scotland drove out its conquerors might have produced a spirit of
patriotism and national union, which would have formed a people out
of the mass of warring clans. A conquest such as that of England
by the Normans would have spread at any rate the law, the order, the
peace and civilization of the conquering country over the length and
breadth of the conquered. Unhappily L eland, while powerless to
effect its deliverance, was strong enough to hold its assailants parti-
ally at bay. The country was broken into two halves, whose conflict
has never ceased. The barbarism of the native tribes was only intcn-

VII.]

sified b;

themsel

the leve

the nar

adventu

vengcai

the leac

English

the obse

the sign.

foot. I

robber,

ence of

forays w

havoc to

were hai

feuds of

effective

force afte

rising of

barons o

Athenree

of their f

O'Connor

barons sa

who beca

was erecti

the native

were fruit

the adopt

name or d

made thai

an act of 1

with perse

Irish foste

fruitless tc

pendence

obedience

Richard tl

tion of the

the genera

Pale held

than the I

Leinster.

slain in ba

H J^^

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

sified by their hatred of the more civilized intruders. The intruders
themselves, penned up in the narrow limits of the Pale, fell rapidly to
the level of the barbarism about them. All the lawlessness, the ferocity,
the narrowness, of feudalism broke out unchecked in the horde of
adventurers who held the land by their sword. It needed the stern
vengeance of John, whose army stormed their strongholds, and drove
the leading barons into exile, to preserve even their fealty to the
English Crown. John divided the Pale into counties, and ordered
the observance of the English law ; but the departure of his army was
the signal for a return of the anarchy which he had trampled under
foot. Every Irishman without the Pale was deemed an enemy and a
robber, nor was his murder cognizable by the law. Half the subsist-
ence of the barons was drawn from forays across the border, and these
forays were avenged by incursions of native marauders, which carried
havoc to the walls of DubHn. The English settlers in the Pale itself
were harried and oppressed by enemy and protector alike ; while the
feuds of the English lords wasted their strength, and prevented any
effective combination for conquest or defence. The landing of a Scotch
force after Bannockburn with Edward Bruce at its head, and a general
rising of the Irish which welcomed this deliverer, drove indeed the
barons of the Pale to a momentary union ; and in the bloody field of
Athenree their valour was proved by the slaughter of eleven thousand
of their foes, and the almost complete extinction of the sept of the
O'Connors. But with victory returned anarchy and degradation. The
barons sank more and more into Irish chieftains ; the FitzMaurices,
who became Earls of Desmond, and whose great territory in the south
was erected into a County Palatine, adopted the dress and manners of
the natives around them ; and the provisions of the Statute of Kilkenny
were fruitless to check the growth of this evil. The Statute forbade
the adoption by any man of English blood of the Irish language or
name or dress ; it enforced within the Pale the use of English law, and
made that of the native or Brehon law, which was gaining ground,
an act of treason ; it made treasonable any marriage of the Englishry
with persons of Irish blood, or any adoption of English children by
Irish foster-fathers. But stern as they were, these provisions proved
fruitless to check the fusion of the two races, while the growing inde-
pendence of the Lords of the Pale threw off all but the semblance of
obedience to the English government. It was this which stirred
Richard the Second to a serious effort for the conquest and organiza-
tion of the island. He landed with an army at Waterford, and received
the general submission of the native chieftains. But the Lords of the
Pale held sullenly aloof ; and Richard had no sooner quitted the island
than the Irish in turn refused to carry out their promise of quitting
Leinster. In 1398 his lieutenant in Ireland, the Earl of March, was
slain in battle, and Richard resolved to complete his work by a fresh

447

Sec. VIII.

The
Conquest

Ireland
1588

leio

1210

1316

1366

1394

I i'

'■ I

■an

• !l

448

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VIII.

The

Conquest

OP
IrELAN'I)

1588

1610

1494

Poynings'
Act

invasion ; but the troubles in England soon interrupted his efforts, and
all traces of his work vanished with the embarkation of his soldiers.

With the renewal of the French wars, and the outburst of the Wars
of the Roses, Ireland was again left to itself, and English sovereignty
over the island dwindled to a shadow. But at last Henry the Seventh
took the country in hand. Sir Edward Poynings was despatched as
deputy ; the Lords of the Pale were scared by the seizure of their leader,
the Earl of Kildare ; the Parliament of the Pale was forbidden by the
famous Poynings' Act to treat of any matters save those first approved
of by the English King and his Council. For a while however the
Lords of the Pale must still serve as the English garrison against the
unconquered Irish, and Henry made his prisoner the Earl of Kildare
Lord Deputy. "All Ireland cannot rule this man," grumbled his
ministers. " Then shall he rule all Ireland," replied the King. But
though Henry the Seventh had begun the work of bridling Ireland he
had no strength for exacting a real submission ; and the great Norman
Lords of the Pale, the Butlers and Geraldines, the De la Poers and the
Fitzpatricks, though subjects in name, were in fact defiant of royal
authority. In manners and outer seeming they had sunk into mere
natives ; their feuds were as incessant as those of the Irish septs ;
and their despotism over the miserable inhabitants of the Pale
combined the horrors of feudal oppression with those of Celtic
anarchy. Crushed by taxation, by oppression, by misgovernment,
plundered alike by Celtic marauders and by the troops levied to
disperse them, the wretched descendants of the first English settlers
preferred even Irish misrule to English "order," and the border of the
Pale retreated steadily towards Dublin. The towns of the seaboard,
sheltered by their walls and their municipal self-government, formed
the only exceptions to the general chaos ; elsewhere throughout its
dominions the English Government, though still strong enough to
break down any open revolt, was a mere phantom of rule. From the
Celtic tribes without the Pale even the remnant of civilization and of
native union which had lingered on to the time of Strongbow had
vanished away. The feuds of the Irish septs were as bitter as their
hatred of the stranger ; and the Government at Dublin found it easy to
maintain a strife, which saved it the necessity of self-defence, among a
people whose " nature is such that for money one shall have the son
to war against his father, and the father against his child." During
the first thirty years of the sixteenth century, the annals of the country
which remained under native rule record more than a hundred raids
and battles between clans of the north alone. But the time was at
last come for a vigorous attempt on the part of England to introduce
order into thi . chaos of turbulence and misrule. To Henry the
Eighth the policy which had been pursued by his father, of ruling
Ireland through the great Irish lords, was utterly hateful, His purpose

[chap.

ts, and
liers.
e Wars
ireignty
Seventh
ched as
r leader,
1 by the
pproved
ever the
linst the
Kildare
bled his
\g. But
iland he
N orman
> and the
of royal
nto mere
sh septs ;
the Pale
of Celtic
ernment,
levied to
1 settlers
er of the
leaboard,
|t, formed
;hout its
LOUgh to
rom the
in and of
[bow had
as their
t easy to
among a
the son
During
country
[red raids
le was at
introduce
enry the
lof ruling
s purpose

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

was to rule in Ireland as thoroughly and effectively as he ruled in
England, and during the latter half of his reign he bent his whole
energies to accomplish this aim. From the first hours of his acccssio i,
indeed, the Irish lords felt the heavier hand of a master. The Gera ■
dines, who had been suffered under the preceding reign to govern
Ireland in the name of the Crown, were quick to discover that the
Crown would no longer stoop to be their tool. Their head, the Earl of
Kildare, was called to England and thrown into the Tower. The great
house resolved to frighten England again into a conviction of its help-
lessness ; and a rising of Lord Thomas Fitzgerald followed the usual
fashion of Irish revolts. A murder of the Archbishop of Dublin,
a capture of the city, a repulse before its castle, a harrying of the Pale,
ended in a sudden disappearance of the rebels among the bogs and
forests of the border on the advance of the English forces. It had been
usual to meet such an onset as this by a raid of the same character,
by a corresponding failure before the castle of the rebellious noble,
and a retreat like his own, which served as a preliminary to negotia-
tions and a compromise. Unluckily for the Geraldines, Henry had
resolved to take Ireland seriously in hand, and he had Cromwell to
execute his will. Skeffington, a new Lord Deputy, brought with him
a train of artillery, which worked a startling change in the political
aspect of the island. The castles which had hitherto sheltered rebellion
were battered into ruins. Maynooth, a stronghold from which the
Geraldines threatened Dublin and ruled the Pale at their will, was
beaten down in a fortnight. So crushing and unforeseen was the blow
that resistance was at once at an end. Not only was the power of the
great Norman hotlse which had towered over Ireland utterly broken,
but only a single boy was left to preserve its name.

With the fall of the Fitzgeralds Ireland felt itself in a master's
grasp. " Irishmen," wrote one of the Lord Justices to Cromwell, " were
never in such fear as now. The King's sessions are being kept in
five shires more than formerly." Not only were the Englishmen of
the Pale at Henry's feet, but the kernes of Wicklow and Wexford sent
in their submission ; and for the first time in men's memory an English
army appeared in Munster and reduced the south to obedience. A
castle of the O'Briens, which guarded the passage of the Shannon, was
carried by assault, and its fall carried with it the submission of Clare.
The capture of Athlone brought about the reduction of Connaught,
and assured the loyalty of the great Norman house of the De Burghs
or Bourkes, who had assumed an almost royal authority in the west.
The resistance of the tribes of the north was broken in the victory of
Bellahoe. In seven years, partly through the vigour of Skefifington's
successor. Lord Leonard Grey, and still more through the resolute
will of Henry and Cromwell, the power of the Crown, wh! h had been
limited to the walls of Dublin, was acknowledged over the length and

G G

449

~yFr'

TtIi

'^, ':

1
1

Src. VIII.

TlIK

Ikki.ani)
1588

leio

i .1

1534

1535

Henry

the
Eighth

1535-154

It '

t H

1 ,' •

-,■(:

.} -■■ i

i 1

i]^

■'!'• I

<\- :-ll

450

HISTORY OF THK ENGLTSH PEOPLE. [chaj'.

Sue. VIII.

The

Conquest

Ireland
1588

1610

breadth of Ireland. But submission was far from being all that Henry
desired. His aim was to civilize the people whom he had conquered
— to rule not by force but by law. But the only conception of law
which the King or his ministers could frame was that of P'.nglish law.
The customary law which prevailed without the Pale, th', native
system of clan government and common tenure of land by the tribe,
as well as the poetry and literature which threw their lustre over the
Irish tongue, were either unknown to the English statesmen, or
despised by them as barbarous. The one mode of civilizing Ireland
and redressing its chaotic misrule which presented itself to their minds,
was that of destroying the whole Celtic tradition of the Irish people-
that of " making Ireland English" in manners, in law, and in tongue.
The Deputy, Parliament, Judges, Sheriffs, which already existed
within the Pale, furnished a faint copy of English institutions ; and
these, it was hoped, might be gradually extended over the whole island.
The English language and mode of life would follow, it was believed,
the English law. The one effectual way of bringing about such a
change as this lay in a complete conquest of the island, and in its
colonization by English settlers ; but from this course, pressed on him
as it was by his own lieutenants and by the settlers of the Pale, even
the iron will of Cromwell shrank. It was at once too bloody and too
expensive. To win over the chiefs, to turn them by policy and a
patient generosity into English nobles, to use the traditional devotion
of their tribal dependents as a means of diffusing the new civilization
of their chiefs, to trust to time and steady government for the gradual
reformation of the countiy, was a policy safer, cheaper, more humane,
and more statesmanlike. It was this system whidi, even before the
fall of the Geraldines, Henry had resolved to adopt ; and it was this
which he pressed on Ireland when the conquest laid it at his feet.
The chiefs were to be persuaded of the advantage of justice and legal
rule. Their fear of any purpose to " expel them from their lands and
dominions lawfully possessed " was to be dispelled by a promise " to
conserve them as their own." Even their remonstrances against the
introduction of English law were to be regarded, and the course of
justice to be enforced or mitigated according to the circumstances of
the country. In the resumption of lands or rights which clearly
belonged to the Crown "sober ways, politic shifts, and amiable
persuasions " were to be preferred to rigorous dealing. It was this
system of conciliation which was in the main carried out by the
English Government under Henry and his two successors. Chieftain
after chieftain was won over to the acceptance of the indenture which
guaranteed him in the possession of his lands, and left his authority-
over his tribesmen untouched, on condition of a pledge of loyalty, of
abstinence from illegal wars and exactions on his fellow-subjects,
and of rendering a fixed tribute and service in war-time to the Crown.

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

45 «

The sole test of loyalty demanded was the acceptance of an English
title, and the education of a son at the English court ; though in
some cases, like that of the O'Neills, a promise was exacted to
use the English language and dress, and to encourage tillage and
husbandry. Compliance with conditions such as these was procured,
not merely by the terror of the royal name, but by heavy bribes. The
chieftains in fact profited greatly by the change. Not only were the
lands of the suppressed abbeys granted to them on their assumption of
their new titles, but the English law-courts, ignoring the Irish custom
by which the land belonged to the tribe at large, regarded the chiefs
as sole proprietors of the soil.

The merits of the system were unquestionable ; its faults were such
as a statesman of that day could hardly be expected to perceive. The
Tudor politicians held that the one hope for the regeneration of
Ireland lay in its absorbing the civilization of England. The prohibi-
tion of the national dress, customs, laws, and language must have
seemed to them merely the suppression of a barbarism which stood
in the way of all improvement. At this moment however a fatal
blunder plunged Ireland into religious strife. The religious aspect of
Ireland was hardly less chaotic than its political aspect had been.
Ever since Strongbow's landing there had been no one Irish Church,
simply because there had been no one Irish nation. There was not
the slightest difference in doctrine or discipline between the Church
without the Pale and the Church within it. But within the Pale the
clergy were exclusively of English blood and speech, and without it
they were exclusively of Irish. Irishmen were shut out by law from
abbeys and churches within the English boundary ; and the ill-will of
the natives shut out Englishmen from churches and abbeys outside it.
As to the religious state of the country, it was much on a level with its
political condition. Feuds and misrule had told fatally on ecclesiastical
discipline. The bishops were political officers, or hard fighters like the
chiefs around them ; their sees were neglected, their cathedrals aban-
doned to decay. Through whole dioceses 'he churches lay in ruins and
without priests. The only preiiching done in the country was done
by the begging friars, and the results of the friars' preaching were
small. " If the King do not provide a remedy," it was said in 1525,
"there will be no more Christentie than in the middle of Turkey."
Unfortunately the remedy which Henry provided was worse than the
disease. Politically Ireland was one with England, and the great
revolution which was severing the one country from the Papacy
extended itself naturally to the other. The results of it indeed at first
seemed small enour .. The Supremacy, a question which had convulsed
England, passed over into Ireland to meet its only obstacle in a general
indifference. Everybody was ready to accept it without a thought
of its consequences. The bishops and clergy within the Pale bent to

Q G 2

Src. VII!.

Thr

conqukst

Ireland
1588

leio

The
Refor-
mation

' u

I it

; i: im

452

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sic. VIII.

Thk

conqukst

Irf.lani)
1588

leio

Protes-
tantiam

in
Ireland

1535

the King's will as easily as their fellows in England, and their example
was followed by at least four prelates of dioceses without the Pale. The
native chieftains made no more scruple than the Lords of the Council
in renouncing obedience to the Bishop of Rome, and in acknowledging
IlcTy as the " Supreme Head of the Church of England and Ireland
under Christ." There was none of the resistance to the dissolution of
the abbeys which had been witnessed on the other side of the Channel,
and the greedy chieftains showed themselves perfectly willing to share
the plunder of the Church. IJut the results of the measure were fatal
to the little culture and religion which even the past centuries of disorder
had spared. Such as they were, the religious houses were the only
schools which Ireland contained. The system of vicars, so general in
England, was rare in Ireland ; churches in the patronage of the
abbeys were for the most part served by the religious themselves,
and the dissolution of their houses suspended public worship over
large districts of the country. The friars, hitherto the only preachers,
and who continued to labour and teach in spite of the efforts of the
Government, were thrown necessarily into a position of antagonism to
the English rule.

Had the ecclesiastical changes which were forced on the country
ended here, however, little harm would in the end have been done.
But in England the breach with Rome, the destruction of the monastic
orders, and tiie establishment of the Supremacy, had roused in a portion
of the people itself a desire for theological change which Henry shared,
and was cautiously satisfying. In Ireland the spirit of the Reforma-
tion never existed among the people at all. They accepted the
legislative measures passed in the English Parliament without any
dream of theological consequences, or of any change in the doctrine or
ceremonies of the Church. Not a single voice demanded the abolition
of pilgrimages, or the destruction of images, or the reform of public
worship. The mission of Archbishop Browne " for the plucking down
of idols and extinguishing of idolatry" was a first step in the long
effort of the English Government to force a new faith on a people who
to a man clung passionately to their old religion. Browne's attempts at
" tuning the pulpits " were met by a sullen and significant opposition.
** Neither by gentle exhortation," the Primate wrote to Cromwell, " nor
by evangelical instruction, neither by oath of them solemnly taken,
nor yet by threats of sharp correction may I persuade or induce any,
whether religious or secular, since my coming over, once to preach the
Word of God nor the just title of our illustrious Prince." Even the
acceptance of the Supremacy, which had been so quietly effected, was
brought into question when its results became clear. The bishops
abstained from compliance with the order to erase the Pope's name
out of their mass-books. The pulpits remained steadily silent. When
Browne ordered the destruction of the images and relics in his own

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

cathedral, he had to report that the prior and canons " find them so
sweet jr their gain that they heed not my words." Cromwell, however,
was resolute for a religious uniformity between the two islands, and the
Primate borrowed some of his patron's vigour. Recalcitrant priests
were thrown into prison, images were plucked down from the roodloft,
and the most venerable of Irish relics, the Staff of St. Patrick, was burnt
in the market-place. But he found no support in his vigour, save from
across the Channel. The Irish Council was cold. The Lord Deputy
knelt to say prayers before an image at Trim. A sullen, dogged
opposition baffled Cromwell's efforts, and his fall was followed by a
long respite in the religious changes which he was forcing on the con-
quered dependency. With the accession of Edward the Sixth, how-
ever, the system of change was renewed with all the energy of Protestant
zeal. The bishops were summoned before the Deputy, Sir Anthony
St. Leger, to receive the new English Liturgy, which, though written
in a tongue as strange to the native Irish as Latin itself, was now to
supersede the Latin service-book in every diocese. The order was the
signal for an open strife. " Now shall every illiterate fellow read Mass,"
burst forth Dowdall, the Archbishop of Armagh, as he flung out of the
chamber with all but one of his suffragans at his heels. Archbishop
Browne, of Dublin, on the other hand, was followed in his profession
of obedience by the Bishops of Meath, Limerick, and Kildare. The
Government, however, was far from quailing before the division of the
episcopate. Dowdall was driven from the country, and the vacant sees
were filled with Protestants, like Bale, of the most advanced type. But
no change could be wrought by measures such as these on the opinions
of the people themselves. The new episcopal reformers spoke no Irish,
and of their English sermons not a word was understood by the rude
kernes around the pulpit. The native priests remained silent. " As
for preaching we have none," reports a zealous Protestant, " without
which the ignorant can have no knowledge." The prelates who used
the new Prayer-book were simply regarded as heretics. The Bishop of
Meath was assured by one of his flock that, " if the country wist how,
they would eat you." Protestantism had failed to wrest a single Irish-
man from his older convictions, but it succeeded in uniting all Ireland
against the Crown. The old political distinctions which had been pro-
duced by the conquest of Strongbow faded before the new struggle for
a common faith. The population within the Pale and without it became
one, "not as the Irish nation," it has been acutely said, " but as Catho-
lics." A new sense of national identity was found in the identity of
religion. " Both English and Irish begin to oppose your Lordship's
orders," Browne had written years before to Cromwell, "and to lay aside
their national old quarrels."

With the accession of Mary the shadowy form of this earlier Irish
Protestantism melted quietly away. There were no Protestants in

453

Sfc. VIII.
Thk

CONQl'KST
OK

Irri.and
1588

1610

1
1

I55I

( '■[

[•'

:t>^

Ireland

and

Mary

454

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

tcHAl*.

Sec. VIII.

The

Conquest

Ireland
1588

1610

Ireland save the new bishops ; and when Bale had fled over sea,
and his fellow-prelates had been deprived, the Church resumed its old
appearance. No attempt, indeed, was made to restore the monasteries ;
and Mary exercised her supremacy, deposed and appomted bishops,
and repudiated Papal interference with her ecclesiastical acts, as
vigorously as her father. But the Mass was restored, the old modes of
religious worship were again held in honour, and religious dissension
between the Government and its Irish subjects was for the time at an
end. With the close, however, of one danger came the rise of another.
England was growing tired of the policy of conciliation which had
been steadily pursued by Henry the Eighth and his successor. As
yet it had been rewarded with precisely the sort of success which
Wolsey and Cromwell anticipated : the chiefs had come quietly in to
the plan, and their septs had followed them in submission to the new
order. " The winning of the Earl of Desmond was the winning of
the rest of Munster with small charges. Th .; making O'Brien an Earl
made all that country obedient." The .vlacwilliam became Lord
Clanrickard, and the Fitzpatricks Barons of Upper Ossory. A visit of
the great northern chief who had accepted the title of Earl of Tyrone
to the English Court was regarded as a marked step in the process of
civilization. In the south, where the system cf English law was slowly
spreading, the chieftains sate on the bench side by side with the
English justices of the peace ; and something had been done to check
the feuds and disorder of the wild tribes between Limerick and Tippe-
rary. " Men may pass quietly throughout these countries without
danger of robbery or other displeasure." In the Clanrickard county,
once wasted with war, " ploughing increaseth daily." In Tyrone and
the north, indeed, the old disorder reigned without a check ; and
everywhere the process of improvement tried the temper of the English
Deputies by the slowness of its advance. The only hope of any real
progress lay in patience ; and there were signs that the Government at
Dublin found it hard to wait. The "rough handling " of the chiefs by
Sir Edward Bellingham, a Lord Deputy under the Protector Somerset,
roused a spirit of revolt that only subsided when the poverty of the
Exchequer forced him to withdraw the garrisons he had planted in the
heart of the country. His successor in Mary's reign. Lord Sussex,
made raid after raid to no purpose on the obstinate tribes of the north,
burning in one the Cathedral of Armagh and three other churches. A
far more serious breach in the system of conciliation was made when
the project of English colonization which Henry had steadily rejected
was adopted by the same Lord Deputy, and when the country of the
O'Connors was assigned to English settlers, and made shire-land under
the names of King's and Queen's Counties, in honour of Philip and
Mary. A savage warfare began at once between the planters and the
dispossessed septs, which only ended in the following reign in the

I !!

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

455

extermination of the Irishmen. Commissioners were appointed to
survey waste lands, with the aim of carrying the work of colonization
into other districts, but the pressure of the French war put an end to
these wider projects. Elizabeth at her accession recognized the risk
of the policy of confiscation and colonization, and the prudence of Cecil
fell back on the safer though more tedious methods of Henry.

The alarm however at English aggression had already spread among
the natives : and its result was seen in a revolt of the north, and in
the rise of a leader far more vigorous and able than any with whom
the Government had had ar yet to contend. An acceptance of the
Earldom of Tyrone by tie chiei of the O'Neills brought about the inevi-
table conflict between the system of succession recognized by EngHsh
and that recognized by Irish law. On the death of the Earl, England
acknowledged his eldest son as the heir of his Earldom ; while the sept
maintained their older right of choosing a chief from among the members
of the family, and preferred Shane O'Neill, a younger son of less doubt-
ful legitimacy. Sussex marched northward to settle the question by force
of arms ; but ere he could reach Ulster the activity of Shane had quelled
the disaffection of his rivals, the O'Donnells of Donegal, and won over
the Scots of Antrim. "Never before," wrote Sussex, "durst Scot or
Irishman look Englishman in the face in plain or wood since I came
here ; " but Shane had fired his men with a new courage, and charging
the Deputy's army with a force hardly half its number, drove it
back in rout on Armagh. A promise of pardon induced him to visit
London, and make an illusory subi: mission, but he was no sooner safe
home again than its terms were set aside ; and after a wearisome
struggle, in which Shane foiled the efforts of the Lord Deputy to entrap
or to poison him, he remained virtually master of the north. His
success stirred larger dreams of ambition ; he invaded- Connaught,
and pressed Clanrickard hard : while he replied to the ren''onstrances
of the Council at Dublin with a bold defiance. " By the swcrd I ha/e
won these lands," he answered, " and by the sword will I keep them.''
But defiance broke idly against the skill and vigour of Sir Henry
Sidney, who succeeded Sussex as Lord Deputy. The rival septs
of the north were drawn into a rising against O'Neill, while the English
army advanced from the Pale; and Shane, defeated by the O'Donnells,
took refuge in Antrim, and was hewn to pieces in a drunken squabble
by his Scottish entertainers. The victory of Sidney won ten years of
peace for the wretched country ; but Ireland had already been fixed on
by the Papacy as ground on which it could with advantage fight out
its quarrel with Elizabeth. Practically indeed the religious question
hardly existed there. The ecclesiastical policy of the Protestants had
indeed been revived in name on the Queen's accession ; Rome was
again renounced, the new Act of Uniformity forced the English Prayer-
book on the island, and compelled attendance at the services in which

Sec. vm.

The

Conquest

Ireland
1588

1610

Ireland

and
Elisabeth

>i (

.;'.' 4

1567

; 1.

< >l

■'Km:.

456

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VIII.

The

Conquest

Ikeland
1588

■ 1610

1561

1571
IS79

Conquest
and
Settle-
ment

it was used. There was as before a general air of compliance with
the law ; even in the dlGiricts without the Pale the bishops generally
conformed, and the only exceptions of which we have any informa-
tion were to be found in the extreme south and in the north, where
resistance was distant enough to be safe. But the real cause of this
apparent submission to the Act of Uniformity lay in the fact that it
remained, and necessarily remained, a dead letter. It was impossible
to find any considerable number of English ministers, or of Irish priests
acquainted with English. Meath was one of the most civilized dioceses,
and out of a hundred curates in it hardly ten knew any tongue save
their own. The promise that the service-book should be translated
into Irish was never fulfilled, and the final clause of the Act itself
authorized the use of a Latin rendering of it till further order could be
taken. But this, like its other provisions, was ignored, and throughout
Elizabeth's reign the gentry of the Pale went unquestioned to Mass.
There was in fpct no religious per:-ecution, and in the many complaints
of Shane O'Neill we find no mention of a religious grievance. But
this was far from being the view of Rome or of Spain, of the Catholic
missionaries, or of the Irish exiles abroad. They represented, and
perhaps believed, the Iribh people to be writhing under a religious
oppression which they were burning to shake off. They saw in the
Irish loyalty to Catholicism a lever for overthrowing the heretic Queen
when in 1 579 the Papacy planned the greatest and most comprehensive
of its attacks upon Elizabeth. While missionaries egged on the English
Catholics to revolt, the Pope hastened to bring about a Catholic revolu-
tion in Scotland and in Ireland. Stukely, an Irish refugee, had long
pressed on the Pope and Spain the policy of a descent on Ireland ; and
his plans were carried out at last by the landing of a small force on the
shores of Kerry. In spite of the arrival in the following year of two
thousand Papal soldiers accompanied by a Legate, the attempt ended
in a miserable failure. The fort of Smerwick, in which the invaders
entrenched themselves, was forced by the new Deputy, Lord Grey, to
surrender, and its garrison put ruthlessly to the sword. The Earl of
Desmond, who after long indecision rose to support them, was defeated
and hunted over his own country, which the panic-born cruelty of his
pursuers harried into a wilderness. Pitiless as it was, the work done in
Munster spread a terror over the land which served England in good
stead when the struggle with Catholicism culminated in the fight with
the Armada ; and not a chieftain stirred during that memorable year
save to massacre the miaerable men who were shipv/recked along the
coast of Bantry or Sligo.

The power of the Government was from this moment recognized
everywhere throughout the land. But it was a power founded solely
on terror ; and the outrages and exactions of the soldiery, who had
been flushed with rapine and bloodshed in the south, sowed during che

VII.]

THE REFORMATION.

457

years which followed the reduction of Munster the seeds of a revolt
more formidable than any which Elizabeth had yet encountered. The
tribes of Ukter, divided by the policy of Sidney, were again united
by the comuion hatred of their oppressors ; and in Hugh O'Neill
they found a leader of even greater ability than Shane himself. Hugh
had been brought up at the English court, and was in manners and
bearing an Englishman ; he had been rewarded for his steady loyalty
in previous contests by a grant of the Earldom of Tyrone ; and in
his strife with a rival chieftain of his clan he had secured aid from the
Government by an offer to introduce the English laws and shire-system
into his new country. But he was no sooner undisputed master of the
north than his tone gradually changed. Whether from a long-formed
plan, or from suspicion of English designs upon himself, he at last
took a position of open defiance. It was at the moment when the
Treaty of Vervins, and the wreck of the second Armada, freed Eliza-
beth's hands from the struggle with Spain, that the revolt under Hugh
O'Neill broke the quiet which had prevailed since the victories of Lord
Grey. The Irish question again became the chief trouble of the Queen.
The tide of her recent triumphs seemed at first to have turned. A
defeat of the English forces in Tyrone caused a general rising of the
northern tribes ; and a great effort made in 1 599 for the suppression of
the growing revolt failed through the vanity and disobedience, if not
the treacherous complicity, of the Queen's Lieutenant, the young Earl
of Essex. His successor. Lord Mountjoy, found himself master on his
arrival of only a few miles round Dublin. But in three years the revolt
was at an end. A Spanish force which landed to support it at Kinsale
was driven to surrender ; a line of forts secured the country as the
English mastered it ; all open opposition was crushed out by the
energy and the ruthlessness of the new Lieutenant ; and a famine
which followed on his ravages completed the devastating work of the
sword. Hugh O'Neill was brought in triumph to Dublin ; the Earl of
Desmond, who had again roused Munster into revolt, fled for refuge to
Spain ; and the work of conquest was at last brought to a close. Under
the administration of Mountjoy's successor. Sir Arthur Chichester, an
able and determined effort was made for the settlement of the conquered
province by the general introduction of a purely English system of
government, justice, and property. Every vestige of the old Celtic
constitution of the country was rejected as " barbarous." The tribal
authority of the chiefs was taken from them by law. They were reduced
to the position of great nobles and landowners, while their tribesmen
rose from subjects into tenants, owing only fixed and customary dues
and services to their lords. The tribal system of property in common
was set aside, and the communal holdings of the tribesmen turned
into the copyhoUs of English law. In the same way the chieftains
were stripped of their hereditary jurisdiction, and the English system

Sec. VIII.

The

Conquest

Ireland
1588

1610

1598

I60I-I603

I 605- 1608

S.,' ^" m^

■ jr.
I

: ■

458

Sec. VIII.

Thk
Conquest

Ireland
1088

1610

i6io

The
I, Death of
I Slizabeth

i6oi

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

of judges and trial by jury substituted for their proceedings under
Brehon or customary law. To all this the Celts opposed the tenacious
obstinacy of their race. Irish juries, then as now, refused to convict.
Glad as the tribesmen were to be freed from the arbitrary exactions
of their chiefs, they held them for chieftains still. The attempt made
by Chichester, under pressure from England, to introduce the English
uniformity of religion ended in utter failure ; for the Englishry of the
Pale remained as Catholic as the native Irishry ; and the sole result
of the measure was to build up a new Irish people out of both on the
common basis of religion. Much, however, had been done by the
firm yet moderate government of the Deputy, and signs were already
appearing of a disposition on the part of the people to conform
gradually to the new usages, when the English Council under Eliza-
beth's successor suddenly resolved upon and carried through the great
revolutionary measure which is known as the Colonization of Ulster.
The pacific and conservative policy of Chichester was abandoned for
a vast policy of spoliation ; two-thirds of the north of Ireland was
declared to have been confiscated to the Crown by the part its
possessors had taken in a recent effort at revolt ; and the lands which
were thus gained were allotted to new settlers of Scotch and English
extraction. In its material results the Plantation of Ulster was
undoubtedly a biilliant success. Farms and homesteads, churches
and mills, rose fast amidst the desolate wilds of Tyrone. The Corpora-
tion of London undertook the colonization of Derrj-, and gave to the
Uttle town the name which its heroic defence has made so famous.
The foundations of the ecoromic prosperity which has raised Ulster
high above the rest of Ireland in wealth and intelligence were un-
doubtedly laid in the confiscation of i6io. Nor did the measure meet
with any opposition at the time save that of secret discontent. The
evicted natives withdrew sullenly to the lands which had been left
them by the spoiler ; but all faith in English justice had been torn
from the minds of the Irishry, and the seed had been sown of that
fatal harvest of distrust and disaffection, which was to be reaped through
tyranny and massacre in the age to come.

The colonization of Ulster has earned us beyond the limit^i of our
present story. The triumph of Mountjoy flung its lustre over the
last days of Elizabeth, but no outer triumph could break the gloom
which gathered round the dying Queen. Lonely as she had always
been, her loneliness deepened as she drew towards the grave. The
statesmen and warriors of her earlier days had dropped one by one
from her Council-board ; and their successors were watching her last
moments, and intriguing for favour in the coming reign. Her favourite,
Lord Essex, was led into an insane outbreak of revolt which brought him
to the block. The old splendour of her court waned and disappeared.
Only officials remained about her, " the other of the Council and nobility

[chap.

VII.]

tH£ kEFOkMATlON.

459

gs under
:enacious

convict,
exactions
ipt made
2 English
iry of the
ole result
h on the
le by the
e already

conform
der Eliza-
. the great
of Ulster,
doned for
jland was
; part its
ids which
d English
Ulster was

churches
2 Corpora-
ive to the
o famous,
sed Ulster

were un-
isure meet
tent. The

been left

been torn
ivn of that
sd through

ciifj of our
e over the
the gloom
ad always
•ave. The
one by one
ng her last
r favourite,
rought him
sappeared.
nd nobility

estrange themselves by all occasions." As she passed along in her
progresses, the people whose applause she courted remained cold and
silent. The temper of the age, in fact, was changing, and isolating her
as it changed. Her own England, the England which had grown up
around her, serious, moral, prosaic, shrank coldly from this brilliant,
fanciful, unscrupulous child of earth and the Renascence. She
had enjoyed life as the men of her day enjoyed it, and now that
they were gone she clung to it with a fierce tenacity. She hunted, she
danced, she jested with her young favourites, she coquetted and
scolded and frolicked at sixty-seven as she had done at thirty. '* The
Queen," wrote a courtier a few months before her death, " was never
so gallant these many years, nor so set upon jollity." She persisted, in
spite of opposition, in her gorgeous progresses from country-house to
country-house. She clung to business as of old, and rated in her usual
fashion " one who minded not to giving up some matter of account."
But death crept on. Her face became haggard, and her frame shrank
almost to a skeleton. At last her taste for finery disappeared, and she
refused to change her dresses for a week together. A strange melancholy
settled down on her : " she held in her hand," says one who saw her
in her last days, "a golden cup, which she often put to her lips : but in
truth her heart seemed too full to need more filling." Gradually her
mind gave way. She lost her memory, the violence of her temper
became unbearable, her very courage seemed to forsake her. She
called for a sword to lie constantly beside her, and thrust it from time
to time through the arras, as if she heard murderers stirring there.
Food and rest became alike distasteful. She sate day and night propped
up with pillows on a stool, her finger on her lip, her eyes fixed on the
floor, without a word. If she once broke the silence, it was with a
flash of her old queenliness. When Robert Cecil asserted that she
" must " go to bed, the word roused her like a trumpet. " Must ! " she
exclaimed ; " is must a. word to be addressed to princes ? Little man,
little man ! thy father, if he had been alive, durst not have used that
word." Then, as her anger spent itself, she sank into her old de-
jection. " Thou art so presumptuous," she said, " because thou knowest
I shall die." She rallied once more when the ministers beside her
bed named Lord Beauchamp, the heir to the Suffolk claim, as a
possible successor. " I will have no rogue's son," she cried hoarsely,
" in my seat." But she gav° no sign, save a motion of the head, at the
mention of the King of Scots. She was in fact fast b jcoming insensible ;
and early the next morning the life of Elizabeth, a life so great, so
strange and lonely in its greatness, passed quietly away.

Shc. VIII.

The

Conquest

Ireland
15BS

1610

iL/iiir '

! '

■r !

1603

460

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

The
Bible

CHAPTER VIIL
PURITAN ENGLAND.

Section I.— The Puritans, 1583— 1603.

[Authorities. — For the primary facts of the ecclesiastical history of this time,
Strype's "Annals," and his lives of Grindal and Whitgift. Neal's " History
of the Puritans," besides its inaccuracies, contains little for this period which is
not taken from the more colourless Strype. For the origin of the Presbyterian
movement, see the "Discourse of the Troubles at Frankfort, 1576," often
republished ; for its later contest with Elizabeth, Mr. Maskell's *' Martin
Marprelate," which gives copious extracts from the rare pamphlets printed
under that name. Mr. Hallam's account of the whole struggle (* * Constitutional
History," caps. iv. and vii.) is admirable for its fulness, lucidity, and imparti-
ality. Wallington's "Diary" gives us the common life of Puritanism; its
higher side is shown in Mrs. Hutchinson's Memoirs of her husband, and in the
early life of Milton, as told in Mr. Masson's biography.]

No GREATER moral change ever passed over a nation than passed
over England during the years which parted the middle of the reign
of Elizabeth from the meeting of the Long Parliament. England
became the people of a book, and that book was the Bible. It was as
yet the one English book which was familiar to every Englishman ; it
was read at churches and read at home, and everywhere its words, as
they fell on ears which custom had not deadened, kindled a startling
enthusiasm. When Bishop Bonner set up the first six Bibles in St.
Paul's " many well-disposed people used much to resort to the hearing
thereof, especially when they could get any that had an audible voice
to read to them." ..." One John Porter used sometimes to be occu-
pied in that goodly exercise, to the edifying of himself as well as others.
This Porter was a fresh young man and of a big stature ; and great
multitudes would resort thither to hear him, because he could read well
and had an audible voice." But the "goodly exercise" of readers
such as Porter was soon superseded by the continued recitation of
both Old Testament and New in the public services of the Church ;
while the small Geneva Bibles carried the Scripture into every home.
The popularity of the Bible was owing to other causes besides that of
religion. The whole prose literature of England, save the forgotten
tracts of Wyclif, has grown up since the translation of the Scriptures
by Tyndale and Coverdale. So far as the nation at large was concerned,
no history, no romance, hardly any poetry, save the little-known verse

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

461

il:!

of Chaucer, existed in the English tongue when the Bible was ordered
to be set up in churches. Sunday after Sunday, day after dct/, the
crowds that gathered round Bonner's Bibles in the nave of St. Paul's,
or the family group that hung on the words of the Geneva Bible in the
devotional exercises £t home, were leavened with a new literature.
Legend and annal, wr.r-song and psalm. State-roll and biography, the
mighty voices of prcohets, the parables of Evangelists, stories of
mission journeys, of rcirils by the sea and among the heathen, philo-
sophic arguments, apocalyptic visions, all were flung broadcast over
minds unoccupied f(»r the most part by any rival learning. The dis-
closure of the stores oi" Greek literature had wrought the revolution of
the Renascence. The disclosure of the older mass of Hebrew litera-
ture wrought the revolution of the Reformation. But the one revolution
was far deeper and wider in its effects than the other. No version
could transfer to another tongue the peculiar charm of language which
gave their value to the authors of Greece and Rome. Classical letters,
therefore, remained in the possession of the learned, that is, of the
few ; and among these, with the exception of Colet and More, or of
the pedants who revived a Pagan worship in the gardens of the Floren-
tine Academy, their direct influence was purely intellectual. But the
tongue of the Hebrew, the idiom of the Hellenistic Greek, lent them-
selves with a curious felicity to the purposes of translation. As a mere
literary monument, the English version of the Bible remains the
noblest example of the English tongue, while its perpetual use made
it from the instant of its appearance the standard of our language.
For the moment however its literary effect was less than its social.
The power of the book over the mass of Englishmen showed itself in
a thousand superficial ways, and in none more conspicuously than in
the influence it exerted on ordinary speech. It formed, we must
repeat, the whole literature which was practically accessible to ordi-
nary Englishmen ; and when we recall the number of common phrases
which we owe to great authors, the bits of Shakspere, or Milton, or
Dickens, or Thackeray, which unconsciously interweave themselves in
our ordinary talk, we shall better understand the strange mosaic of
Biblical words and phrases which coloured English talk two hundred
years ago. The mass of picturesque allusion and illustration which
we borrow from a thousand books, our fathers were forced to borrow
from one ; and the borrowing was the easier and the more natural
that the range of the Hebrew literature fitted it for the expression
of every phase of feeling. When Spenser poured forth his warmest
love-notes in the " Epithalamion," he adopted the very words of the
Psalmist, as he bade the gates open for the entrance of his bride.
When Cromwell saw the mists break over the hills of Dunbar, he
hailed the sun-burst with the cry of David : " Let God arise, and let
his enemies be scattered. Like as the smoke vanisheth, so shalt thou

Sec. I.

The
pukitans

1583

1603

■^'i!

■i' ■ V;

402

Sec. I.

Thb

Puritans

1583

1603

The
Puritans

t'uritanisiu
and cuitute

TIISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

drive them away ! " Even to common minds this familiarity with
grand poetic imagery in prophet and apocalypse gave a loftiness and
ardour of expression, that with all its tendency to exaggeration and
bombast we may prefer to the slipshod vulgarisms of to-day.

But far greater than its effect on literature or social phrase was the
effect of the Bible on the character of the people at large. Elizabeth
might silence or tune the pulpits ; but it was impossible for her to
silence or tune the great preachers of justice, and mercy, and truth,
who spoke from the book which she had again opened for her people.
The whole moral effect which is produced now-a-days by the religious
newspaper, the tract, the essay, the lecture, the missionary report, the
sermon, was then produced by the Bible alone ; and its effect in this
way, however di'-pass-onately we examine it, was simply amazing. One
dominant influence told on human action : and all the activities that
hc.d been called into life by the age that was passing away were
seized, concentrated, and steadied to a detinite aim by the spirit
of religion. The whole temper of the nation felt the change. A
new conception of life and ot man superseded the old. A new moral
and religious impulse spread through every class. Literature reflected
the general cendency of the time ; and. the dumpy little quartos of
controversy and piety, which still cro»vd our older libraries, drove
before them the classical translations and Italian novelettes of the age
of the Renascence. " Theology rules there," said Grotius of England
only two years after Elizabeth's death ; and when Casaubon, the last
of the great scholars of the sixteenth century, was invited to England
by King James, he found both King and people indifferent to pure
letters. " There is a great abundance of theologians in England," he
says, '' all point their studies in that direction." Even a country
gentleman like Colonel Hutchinson felt the theological impulse.
" As soon as he had improved his natural understanding with the
acquisition of learning, the first studies he exercised himself in were
the principles of religion." The whole nation became, in fact, a
Church. The groat problems of life and death, whose questionings
found no answer in the higher minds 'i Shakspere's *_ay, pressed for
an answer not only from noble and scholar but from farmer and shop-
keeper in the age that followed him. We must not, indeed, picture
the early Puritan as a gloomy fanatic. The religious movement had
not as yet come into conflict wiih general culture. W th the close of the
Elizabethan age, indeed, the intellectual freedor\ which had marked
it faded insensibly away : the bold philosophical speculations which
Sidney had caught from Br irio, and which had brought on Marlowe
and Ralegh the charge of atheism, died, like her own religious indiffer-
ence, with the Queen. But the lighter and more elegant sides of the
Elizabethan culture harmonized well enough with the temper of the
Puritan gentleman. The figure of Colonel Hutchinson, one of the

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

Reg.'cides, stands out from his wife's canvas with the grace and tender-
ness of a portrait by Vandyck. She dwells on the personal beauty which
distinguished his youth, on " his teeth even and white as the purest ivory,"
" his hair of brown, very thickset in his youth, softer than the finest silk,
curling with loose great rings at the ends." Serious as was his temper
in graver matters, the young squire of Owthorpe was fond of hawking,
and piqued himself on his skill in dancing and fence. His artistic taste
showed itself in a critical love of " paintings, sculpture, and all liberal
arts,'' as well as in the pleasure he took in his gardens, " in the im-
provement of his grounds, in planting groves and walks and forest
trees." If he was "diligent in his examination of the Scriptures,"
" he had a great love for music, and often diverted himself with a viol,
on which he played masterly." We miss, indeed, the passion of the
Elizabethan time, its caprice, its largeness of feeling and sympathy, its
quick pulse of delight ; but, on the other hand, life gained in moral
grandeur, in a sense of the dignity of manhood, in orderliness an-"
equable force. The temper of the Puritan gentleman was just, noble,
and self- controlled. The larger geniality of the age that had passed
away was replaced by an intense tenderness within the narrower circle
of the home. ** He was as kind a father," says Mrs. Hutchinson of her
husband, " as dear a brother, as good a master, as faithful a friend as
the world had." The wilful and lawless passion of the Renascence
made way for a manly purity. " Neither in youth nor riper years could
the most fair or enticing woman ever draw him into unnecessary
familiarity or dalliance. Wise and virtuous women he loved, and
delighted in all pure and holy and unblameable conversation with
them, but so as never to excite scandal or temptation. Scurrilous
discourse even among men he abhorred ; and though he sometimes
took pleasure in wit and mirth, yet that which was mixed with impurity
he never could endure." To the Puritan the wilfulness of life, in which
the men of the Renascence had revelled, seemed unworthy of life's
character and end. His aim was to attain self-command, to be master
jf himself, of his thought and speech and acts. A certain gravity and
reflectiveness gave its tone to the lightest details of his converse with
the world about him. His temper, quick as it might naturally be, was
kept under strict control. In his discourse he was ever on his guard
against talkativeness or frivolity, striving to be deliberate in speech
and "ranking the words beforehand." His life was orderly and
methodical, sparing of diet and of self-indulgence ; he rose early, " he
never was Ctt any time idle, and hated to see any one else so." The
new sobriety and self-restraint marked itself even in his change of
dress. The gorgeous colours and jewels of the Renascence dis-
appeared. Colonel Hutchinson "left off very early the wearing of
anything that was costly, yet in his plainest negligent habit appeared
very much a gentleman." The loss of colour and variety in costume

463

., . •♦ >

Sec. I.
Thk

PirKITANS

1583

1603

Puritanism

and human

conduct

I w

!l« \:

464

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. I
The

Pl'KITANS

1583

ieo3

Puritanism

and society

John
Milton

1608

reflected no doubt a certain loss of colour and variety in life itself ;
but it was a loss compensated by solid gains. Greatest among these,
perhaps, was the new conception of social equality. Their common
calling, their common brotherhood in Christ, annihilated in the mind
of the Puritans that overpowering sense of social distinctions which
characterized the age of Elizabeth. The meanest peasant felt himself
ennobled as a child of God. The proudest noble recognized a spiritual
equality in the poorest " saint." The great social revolution of the
Civil Wars and the Protectorate was already felt in the demeanour of
gentlemen like Hutchinson. " He had a loving and sweet courtesy
to the poorest, and would often employ many spare hours with the
commonest soldiers and poorest labourers." " He never disdained the
meanest nor flattered the greatest." But it was felt even more in the
new dignity and self-respect with which the consciousness of their
" calling " invested the classes beneath the rank of the gentry. Take
such a portrait as that which Nehemiah Wallington, a turner in East-
cheap, has left us of a London housewife, his mother. " She was very
loving," he says, " and obedient to her parents, loving and kind to her
husband, very tender-hearted to her children, loving all that were
godly, much misliking the wicked and profane. She was a pattern
of sobriety unto many, very seldom was seen abroad except at church ;
when others recreated themselves at holidays and other times, she
would take her needle-work and say, 'here \r, my recreation.' . . .
God had given her a pregnant wit and an excellent memory. She
was very ripe and perfect in all stories of the Bible, likewise in all the
stories of the Martyrs, and could readily turn to them ; she was also
perfect and well seen in the English Chronicles, and in the descents
of the Kings of England. She lived in holy wedlock with her husband
twenty years, wanting but four days."

Ine strength of the religious movement lay rather among the
middle and professional classes than among the gentry ; and it is in a
Puritan of this class that we find the fullest and noblest expression of
the new influence which was leavening the temper of the time. John
Milton is not only the highest, but the completest type of Puritanism.
His life is absolutely contemporaneous with his cause. He was born
when it began to exercise a direct power over English politics and
English religion ; he died when its efifort to mould them into its own
shape was over, and when it had again sunk into one of many
influences to which we owe our English character. His earlier verse,
the pamphlets of his riper years, the epics of his age, mark with a
singular precision the three great stages in its history. His youth
shows us how much of the gaiety, the poetic ease, the intellectual
culture of the Renascence lingered in a Puritan home. Scrivener and
" precisian " as his father was, he was a skilled musician ; and the boy
inherited his father's skill on lute and organ. One of the finest

VIII.]

outbursts
time is a
an agent
all rigidly
early trail
boy to the
that from
lessons to
he learnt
French,
earliest tu
wright an(
his love
Shakspere
gather froj
hints for J
of the cor
leverie, ai
antique pi
a dim rel
full-voiced
ment of th
sternness i
In spite of '
from "fesl
very slight
joUity" of
wiles ; " he
village fair
a maid, di
" unreprov(
vigorous fr;
brown hair
quoted she
from coarsi
disgust : " .
self-esteem
drank in a
disdained 1
honour. "
oath, ought
passed froi
Cambridge
University
from all rej

VIII.]

PURITAN KNGLAND.

4^5

outbursts in the scheme of education which he put forth at a later
time is a passage in which he vindicates the province of music as
an agent in moral training. His home, his tutor, his school were
all rigidly Puritan ; but there was nothing narrow or illiberal in his
early training. " My father," he says, " destined me while yet a little
boy to the study of humane letters ; which I seized with such eagerness
that from the twelfth year of my age I scarcely ever went from my
lessons to bed before midnight." But to the Greek, Latin, and Hebrew
he learnt at school, the scrivener advised him to add Italian and
French. Nor were English letters neglected. Spenser gave the
earliest turn to his poetic genius. In spite of the war between play-
wright and precisian, a Puritan youth could still in Milton's days avow
his love of the stage, "if Jonson's learned sock be on, or sweetest
Shakspere, Fancy's child, warble his native woodnotes wild," and
gather from the " masques and antique pageantry " of the court-revel
hints for his own " Comus " and " Arcades." Nor does any shadow
of the coming struggle with the Church disturb the young scholar's
j-everie, as he wanders beneath " the hicrh embowed roof, with
antique pillars massy proof, and storied windows richly dight, casting
a dim rel'gious liglit," or as he hears " the pealing organ blow to the
full- voiced choir below, in service high and anthem clear." His enjoy-
ment of the gaiety of life stands in bright contrast with the gloom and
sternness which strife and persecution fostered in the later Puritanism.
In spite of " a certain reservedness of natural disposition," which shrank
from " festivities and jests, in which I acknowledge my faculty to be
very slight," the young singer could still enjoy the "jest and youthful
jollity " of the world around him, its " quips and cranks and wanton
wiles ; " he could join the crew of Mirth, and look pleasantly on at the
village fair, " where the jolly rebecks sound to many a youth and many
a maid, dancing in the chequered shade." But his pleasures were
" unreproved." There was nothing ascetic in his look, in his slender,
vigorous frame, his face full of a delicate yet serious beauty, the rich
brown hair which clustered over his brow ; and the words we have
quoted show his sensitive enjoyment of all that was beautiful. But
from coarse or sensual self-indulgence the young Puritan turned with
disgust : " A certain reservedness of nature, an honest haughtiness and
self-esteem, kept me still above those low descents of mind." He
drank in an ideal chivalry from Spenser, but his religion and purity
disdained the outer pledge on which chivalry built up its fabric of
honour. " Every free and gentle spirit," said Milton, " without that
oath, ought to be born a knight." It was with this temper that he
passed from his London school, St. Paul's, to Christ's College at
Cambridge, and it was this temper that he preserved throughout his
University career. He left Cambridge, as he sair afterwards, " free
from all reproach, and approved by all honest men/' with a purpose of

H H

Sbc. I.
Thk

I'URITANIt

1583

1603

[%.

466

HISTORY 01" TIIK ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

bit. I.

TlIK

PUKITANS

1583

10O3

Cromwell

and

Banyan

Oliver
Crovnvell
b. 1599

sclf-clcdication "to that same lot, however mean or high, towards
which time leads me, and the will of Heaven."

Even in the still calm beauty of a life such as this, we catch the
sterner tone of the Puiitan temper. The very height of its aim, the
intensity of its moral concentration, brought with them a loss of the
genial delight in all that was human which distinguished the men of
the Renascence. " If ever God instilled an intense love of moral
beauty into the mind of any man," said Milton, "he has instilled it
into mine." " Love Virtue," closed his " Comus," " she alone is free !"
But this passionate love of virtue and of moral beauty, if it gave strength
to human conduct, narrowed human sympathy and human intelli-
gence. Already in Milton we note a certain " reservedness of temper,"
a contempt for "the false estimates of the vulgar," a proud retirement
from the meaner and coarser life around him. Great as was his love
for Shakspere, we can hardly fancy him delighting in Falstaff. in
minds of a less cultured order, this moral tension ended, no doubt,
in a hard unsocial sternness of life. The ordinary Puritan " loved all
that were godly, much misliking the wicked and profane." His bond
to other mf;n was not the sense of a common manhood, but the re-
cognition of a brotherhood among the elect. Without the pale of the
saints lay a world which was hateful to them, because it was the enemy
of their God. It was this utter isolation from the "ungodly" that
explains the contrast which startles us between the inner tenderness of
the Puritans and the ruthlessness of so many of their actions. Crom-
well, whose son's death (in his own words) went to his heart " like a
dagger, indeed it did I " and who rode away sad and wearied from the
triumph of Marston Moor, burst into horse-play as he signed the death-
warrant of the King. A temper which had thus lost sympathy with
the life of half the world around it could hardly sympathize with the
whole of its own life. Humour, the faculty which above all corrects
exaggeration and extravagance, died away before the new stress and
strain of existence. The absolute devotion of the Puritan to a Supreme
Will tended more and more to rob him of all sense of measure and
proportion in common matters. Little things became great things in
the glare of religious zeal ; and the godly man learnt to shrink from a
surplice, or a mince-pie at Christmas, as he shrank from impurity or a
lie. Life became hard, rigid, colourless, as it became intense. The
play, the geniality, the delight of the Elizabethan age were exchanged
for a measured sobriety, seriousness, and self-restraint. But the self-
restraint and sobriety which marked the Calvinist limited itself wholly
to his outer life. In his inner soul sense, reason, judgement, were too
often overborne by the terrible reality of invisible things. Our first
glimpse of Oliver Cromwell is as a young country squire and farmer in
the marsh levels around Hui ngdon and St. Ives, buried from time to
time in a deep melancholy, and haunted by fancies of coming death.

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

467

" I live in Mcshac," he writes to a friend, "whicli tlicy s.iy signifies
Prolonging ; in Kedar, which signifies Darkness ; yet tiic Lord forsakclh
me not." The vivid sense of a Divine Purity close to such men miidc
the life of common men seem sin. " You know what my manner of life
has been," Cromwell adds. " Oh, I lived in and loved darkness, and
hated light. I hated godliness." Yet his worst sin was probably
nothing more than an enjoyment of the natural buoyancy of youth,
and a want of the deeper earnestness which comes with riper years.
In imaginative tempers, like that of Bunyan, the struggle took a more
picturesque form. John Bunyan was the son of a poor tinker at
Elstow in Bedfordshire, and even in childhood his fancy revelled in
terrible visions of Heaven and Hell. " When I was but a child of
nine or ten years old," he tells us, " these things did so distress my
soul, that then in the midst of my merry sports and childish vanities,
amidst my vain companions, I was often much cast down and afflicted
in my mind therewith ; yet could I not let go my sins." The sins he
could not let go were a love of hockey and of dancing on the village
green ; for the only real fault which his bitter self-accusation dis-
closes, that of a habit of swearing, was put an end to at once and for
ever by a rebuke from an old woman. His passion for bell-ringing
clung to him even after he had broken from it as a " vain practice ; "
and he would go to the steeple-house and look on, till the thought that
a bell might fall and crush him in his sins drove him panic-stricken
from the door. A sermon against dancing and games drew him for a
time from these indulgences ; but the temptation again overmastered
his resolve. " I shook the sermon out of my mind, and to my old
custom of sports and gaming I returned with great delight. But
the same day, as I was in the midst of a game of cat, and having
struck it one blow from the hole, just as I was about to strike it the
second time, a voice did suddenly dart from heaven into my soul,
which said, * Wilt thou leave thy sins and go to Heaven, or have thy
sins and go to Hell ? ' At this I was put in an exceeding maze ;
wherefore, leaving my cat upon the ground, I looked up to heaven ;
and was as if I had with the eyes of my understanding seen the Lord
Jesus looking down upon me, as being very hotly displeased with me,
and as if He did severely threaten me with some grievous punishment
for those and other ungodly practices."

Such was Puritanism, and it is of the highest importance to realize
it thus in itself, in its greatness and its littleness, apart from the
ecclesiastical system of Presbyterianism with which it is so often
CO " *:(unded. As we shall see in the course of our story, not one of
the leading Puritans of the Long Parliament was a Presbyterian.
Pym and Hampden had no sort of objection to Episcopacy, and the
adoption of the Presbyterian system was only forced on the Puritan
patriots in their later struggle by political considerations. But the

H H 2

Skc. I.
Tmk

I'i'KI TANS

1583

laoa

John
IhinynH
I). 1628

The
Presby-
terians

i'-\\ M

■ m ,

468

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH. PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. 1.

The

Pl'kitans

1583

1603

Cartivright

IS7I

growth of the movement, which thus influenced our history for a time,
forms one of the most curious episodes in Elizabeth's reign. Her
Church poHcy rested on the Acts of Supremacy and of Uniformity ;
the first of which placed all ecclesiastica' jurisdiction and legislative
power in the hands of the State, while the second prescribed a course
of doctrine and discipline, from which no variation was legally per-
missible. For the nation at large Elizabeth's system was no doubt a
wise and healthy one. Single-handed, unsupported by any of the
statesmen or divines about her, the Queen forced on the warring
r-eligions a sort of armed truce. The main principles of the Refor-
mation were accepted, but the zeal of the ultra-reformers was held at
bay. The Bible was left open, private discussion was unrestrained,
but the warfare of pulpit against pulpit was silenced by the licensing
of preachers. Outer conformity, attendance at the common prayer,
was exacted from all ; but the changes in ritual, by which the zealots
of Geneva gave prominence to the radical features of the religious
change which was passing over the country, were steadily resisted.
While England was struggling for existence, this balanced attitude
of the Crown reflected faithfully enough the balanced attitude of the
nation ; but with the declaratio n of war by the Papacy in the Bull of
Deposition the movement in favour of a more pronounced Protes-
tantism gathered a new strength. Unhappily the Queen clung
obstinately to her system of compromise, weakened and broken as it
was. With the religious enthusiasvn which was growing up around
her she had no sympathy whatever. Her passion was for moderation,
her aim was simply civil order ; and boti? order and moderation
were threatened by the knot of clerical bigots who gathered under
the banner of Presbyterianism. Of these Thomas Cartwright was
the chief. He had studied at Geneva ; he returned with a fanatical
faith in Calvinism, and in the system of Church government
which Calvin had devised ; and as Margaret Professor of Divinity
at Cambridge he 'ised to the full the opportunities which his chair
gave him of propagating his opinions. No leader of a religious
party ever deserved less of after sympathy than Cartwright. He was
unquestionably learned and devout, but his bigotry was that of a
mediaeval inquisitor. The relics of the old ritual, the cross in baptism,
the surplice, the giving of a ring in marriag»j, were to him not merely
distasteful, as the}'^ were to the Puritans at large, they were idolatrous
and the mark of the beast. His declamation against ceremonies and
superstition however had little weight with Elizabeth or her Primates ;
what scared them was his reckless advocacy of a scheme of eccle-
siastical government which placed the State beneath the feet of the
Church. The absolute rule of bishoos, indeed, he denounced as
begotten of the devil ; but the absolute rule of Presbyters he held to
be established by the word of God. For the Church modelled after

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

the fashion of Geneva he claimed an authority which surpassed the
wildest dreams of the masters of the Vatican. All spiritual authority
and jurisdiction, the decreeing of doctrine, the ordering of ceremonies,
lay wholly in the hands of the ministers of the Church. To them
belonged the supervision of public morals. In an ordered arrange-
ment of classes and synods these Presbyters were, to govern their
flocks, to regulate their own order, to decide in matters of faith, to
administer " discipline." Their weapon was excommunication, and
they were responsible for its use to none but Christ. The province of
the civil ruler was simply to carry out the decisions of the Presbyters,
" to see their decrees executed and to punish the contemners of tiiem."
The spirit of Calvinistic Presbyterianism excluded all toleration of
practice or belief. Not only was the rule of ministers to be established
as the one legal form of Church government, but all other forms,
Episcopalian and Separatist, were to be ruthlessly put down, for
heresy there was the punishment of death. Never had the doctrine of
persecution been urged with such a blind and reckless ferocity. " I
deny," wrote Cartwright, " that upon repentance there ought to follow
any pardon of death. . . . Heretics ought to be put to death now.
If this be bloody and extreme, I am content to be so counted with the
Holy Ghost."

Opinions such as these might wisely have been left to the
good sense of the people itself. Before many years they found in
fact a crushing answer in the " Ecclesiastical Polity " of Richard
Hooker, a clergyman who had been Master of the Temple, but
whose distaste for the controversies of its pulpit drove him from
London to a Wiltshire vicarage at Boscombe, which he exchanged
at a later time for the parsonage of Bishopsbourne among the
quiet meadows of Kent. The largeness of temper which charac-
terized all the nobler minds of his day, the philosophic breadth
which is seen as clearly in Shakspere as in Bacon, was united in
Hooker with a grandeur and stateliness of style, whic'i raised him to
the highest rank among English prose writers. Divine as he was,
his spirit and method were philosophical rather than theological.
Against the ecclesiastical dogmatism of Presbyterian or Catholic he
set the authority of reason. He abandoned the narrow ground of
Scriptural argument to base his conclusions on the general principles
of nioral and political science, on the eternal obligations of natural
law. The Puritan system rested on the assumption that an immutable
rule for human action in all matters relating to religion, to worship,
and to the discipline and constitution of the Church, was laid down,
and only laid down, in Scripture. Hooker urged that a Divine order
exists, not in written revelation only, but in the moral relations, the
historical developement, and the social and political institutions of men.
He claimed for human reason the province of determining the laws of

469

Sec. I.
The

PlfRITANS

1583

1603

Hooker

1594

• ■ I

I" !

470

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. I.

The
Puritans

1583

1603

The
Admonition

1592

The
Ecclesi-
astical
Com-
mission

this order ; of distinguishing between what is changeable and unchange-
able in them, between what is eternal and what is temporary in the Bible
itself. It was easy for him to push on to the field of theological con-
troversy where men like Cartwright were fighting the battle r»f Presby-
terianism, to show that no form of Church government had ever been
of indispensable obligation, and that ritual observances Ijad in all ages
been left to the discretion of churches, and determined by the differ-
ences of times. But the truth on which Hooker based his argument
was of far higher value than his argument itself; and the acknow
ledgement of a divine order in human history, of a divine law ia
human reason, which found expression in his work; harmonized with
the noblest instincts of the Elizabethan age. Against Presby<:erianism,
indeed, the appeal was hardly needed. Popular as the Presbyterian
system became in Scotland, it never took any general hold on
England ; it remained to the last a clerical rather than a national
creed, and even in the moment of its seeming triumph under the
Commonwealth it was rejected by every part of England save
London and Lancashire, and part of Derbyshire. But the bold
challenge to the Government which was delivered by Cartwright's
party in a daring "Admonition to the Parliament," which de-
manded the establishment of government by Presbyters, raised a
panic among English statesmen and prelates which cut ofif all hopes
of a quiet appeal to reason. It is probable that, but for the
storm which Cartwright raised, the steady growth of general dis-
content with the ceremonial usages he denounced would have brought
about their abolition. The Pariiament of 1571 had not only refused
to bind the clergy to subscription to three articles on the Supremacy,
the form of Church government, and the power of the Church to
ordain rites and ceremonies, but favoured the project of reforming the
Liturgy by the omission of the superstitious practices. But with the
appearance of the "Admonition" this natural progress of opinion
abruptly ceased. The moderate statesmen who had pressed for a
change in ritual withdrew from union with a party which revived the
worst pretensions of the Papacy. As dangers from without and from
within thickened round the Queen the growing Puritanism of the
clergy stirred her wrath above measure, and she met the growth of
"nonconforming" ministers by a measure which forms the worst blot
on her reign. .

The new powers which were conferred in 1 583 on the Ecclesiastical
Commission converted the religious truce into a spiritual despotism.
From being a temporary board which represented the Royal Supremacy
in matters ecclesiastical, the Commission was now turned into a per-
manent body wielding the almost unlimited powers of the Crown. All
opinions or acts contrary to the Statutes of Supremacy and Uniformity
fell within its cognizance. A right of deprivation placed the clergy at

I -

fit i ■

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

471

its mercy. It had power to alter or amend the statutes of colleges or
schools. Not only heresy, and schism, and nonconformity, but incest
or aggravated adultery were held to fall within its scope : its means of
enquiry were left without limit, and it might fine or imprison at its will.
By the mere establishment of such a Court half the work of the
Reformation was undone. The large number of civilians on the board
indeed seemed to furnish some security against the excess of ecclesi-
astical tyranny. Of its forty-four commissioners, however, few actually
took any part in its proceedings ; and the powers of the Commission
were practically left in the hands of the successive Primates. No
Archbishop of Canterbury since the days of Augustine had wielded an
authority so vast, so utterly despotic, as that of Whitgift and Bancroft
and Abbot and Laud. The most terrible feature of their spiritual
tyranny was its wholly personal character. The old symbols of
doctrine were gone, and the lawyers had not yet stepped in to protect
the clergy by defining the exact limits of the new. The result was that
at the Commission-board at Lambeth the Primates created their own
tests of doctrine with an utter indifference to those created by law. In
one instance Parker deprived a vicar of his benefice for a denial of the
verbal inspiration of the Bible. Nor did the successive Archbishops
care greatly if the test was a varying or a conflicting one. Whitgift
strove to force on the Church the Calvinistic supralapsarianism of his
Lambeth Articles. Bancroft, who followed him, was as earnest in
enforcing his anti-Calvinistic dogma of the Divine right of the
episcopate. Abbot had no mercy for Arminianism. Laud had none for
its opponents. It is no wonder that the Ecclesiastical Commission,
which these men represented, soon stank in the nostrils of the English
clergy. Its establishment however marked the adoption of a more
resolute policy on the part of the Crown, and its efforts were backed
by stern measures of repression. All preaching or reading in privp.te
houses was forbidden ; and in spite of the refusal of Parliament to
enforce the requirement of them by law, subscription to the Three
Articles was exacted from every member of the clergy.

For the moment these measures were crowned with success. The
movement under Cart wright was checked; Cartwright himself was driven
from his Professorship ; and an outer uniformity of worship was more
and more brought about by the steady pressure of the Commission. The
old hberty which had been allowed in London and the other Protestant
parts of the kingdom was no longer permitted to exist. The leading
Puritan clergy, whose nonconformity had hitherto been winked at, were
called upon to submit to the surplice, and to make the sign of the cross
in baptism. The remonstrances of the country gentry availed as little
as the protest of Lord Burleigh himself to protect two hundred of the
best ministers from being driven from their parsonages on a refusal to
subscribe to the Three Articles. But the persecution only gave fresh

Sec. I.

TlIK

Puritans
1583

1603

Gro^rth
of Puri-
tanism

. (M

472

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

nil.]

Sec. I.

The
Puritans

1583

16C3

The
Separatists

1593

life and popularity to the doctrines which it aimed at crushing, by
drawing together two currents of opinion which were in themselves
perfectly distinct. The Presbyterian platform of Church discipline
had as yet been embraced by the clergy only, and by few among the
clergy. On the other hand, the wish of the Puritans for a reform in
the Liturgy, the dislike of " superstitious usages," of the use of the
surplice, the sign of the cross in baptism, the gift of the ring in
marriage, the posture of kneeling at the Lord's Supper, was shared by
a large number of the clergy and laity alike. At the opening of
Elizabeth's reign almost all the higher Churchmen save Parker were
opposed to them, and a motion in Convocation for their abolition was
lost but by a single vote. The temper of the country gentlemen on
this subject was indicated by that of Parliament ; and it was well
known that the wisest of the Queen's Councillors, Burleigh, Walsing-
ham, and Knollys, were at one in this matter with the gentry. If their
common persecution did not wholly succeed in fusing these two sections
of religious opinion into one, it at any rate gained for the Presbyterians
a general sympathy on the part of the Puritans, which raised them
from a clerical clique into a popular party. Nor were the consequences
of the persecution limited to the strengthening of the Presbyterians.
The " Separatists " who were beginning to withdraw from attendance
at public worship on the ground that the very existence of a national
Church was contrary to the Word of God, grew quickly from a few
scattered zealots to twenty thousand souls. Presbyterian and Puritan
felt as bitter an abhorrence as Elizabeth herself of the "Brownists," as
they were nicknamed after their founder Robert Brown. Parliament,
Puritan as it was, passed a statute against them. Brown himself was
forced to fly to the Netherlands, and of his followers many were
driven into exile. So great a future awaited one of these congre-
gations that we may pause to get a glimpse of "a poor people" in
Lincolnshire and the neighbourhood, who "being enlightened by
the Word of God," and their members " urged with the yoke of
subscription," had been led " to see further." They rejected cere-
monies as relics of idolatry, the rule of bishops as unscriptural,
and joined themselves, " as the Lord's free people," into " a church
estate on the fellowship of the Gospel." Feeling their way forward
to the great principle of liberty of conscience, they asserted their
Christian right "to walk in all the ways which God had made
known or should make known to them." Their meetings or " con-
venticles " soon drew down the heavy hand of the law, and the
little company resolved to seek a refuge in other lands ; but their first
attempt at flight was prevented, and when they made another, their
wives and children were seized at the very moment of entering the
ship. At last, however, the magistrates gave a contemptuous assent
to their project ; they were in fact " glad to be rid of them at any

price ;
some of tl
1609 at L
on these t
and quie
those wh
Fathers o
It was
of the co|
rise of a
appear an c
of public
bears the
Puritans
Crown to
opinion bj
Chamber
struggle o
printing,
finally org
versities, t
to print we
Every pub
of the Prii
system of
Armada, o
name of "
found refuj
gentry. T
these scur
named Ud
the virulei
effect, for i
the bishop
liberty wa
political ar
of public d
far from d;
had been i
at Warwic
cipline am
His examf
whole min
each dioce
of Synods

[chap.

hing, by

jm selves

iscipline

long the

;form in

e of the

ring in

lared by

cning of

ker were

tion was

;men on

vas well

A^'aising-

If their

sections

)yterians

ed them

5quences

yterians.

endance

national

m a few

Puritan

ists," as

liament,

self was

ly were

congre-

>ple" in

ined by

yoke of

id cere-

•iptural,

church

"orward

i their

made

" con-

nd the

eir first

r, their

ng the

assent

at any

\-l M

VIII.]

PURITAN ENCxLAND.

price ; " and the fugitives found shelter at Amsterdam, from whence
some of them, choosing John Robinson as their minister, took refuge in
1609 at Leydcn. " They knew they were pilgrims and looked not much
on these things, but lifted up their eyes to Heaven, their dearest country,
and quieted their spirits." Among this little band of exiles were
those who were to iDecome famous at a later time as the Pilgrim
Fathers of the Mayflower.

It was easy to be " rid " of the Brownists ; but the political danger
of the course on which the Crown had entered was seen in the
rise of a spirit of vigorous opposition, such as had not made its
appearance since the accession of the Tudors. The growing p>ower
of public opinion received a striking recognition in the struggle which
bears the name of the " Martin Marprelate controversy." The
Puritans had from the first appealed by their pamphlets from the
Crown to the people, and Whitgiit bore witness to their influence on
opinion by his efforts to gag the Presc. The regulations of the Star-
Chamber for this purpose are memorable as the first step in the long
struggle of government after government to check the liberty of
printing. The irregular censorship which had long existed was now
finally organized. Printing was restricted to London and the two Uni-
versities, the number of printers reduced, and all candidates for licence
to print were placed under the supervision of the Company of Stationers.
Every publication too, great or small, had to receive the approbation
of the Primate or the Bishop of London. The first result of this
system of repression was the appearance, in the very year of the
Armada, of a series of anonymous pamphlets bearing the significant
name of " Martin Marprelate," and issued from a secret press which
found refuge from the royal pursuivants in the country-houses of the
gentry. The press was at last seized ; and the suspected authors of
these scurrilous libels, Penry, a young Welshman, and a minister
named Udall, died, the one in prison, the other on the scaffold. But
the virulence and boldness of their language produced a powerful
effect, for it was impossible under the system of Elizabeth to " mar "
the bishops without attacking the Crown ; and a new age of political
liberty was felt to be at hand when Martin Marprelate forced the
political and ecclesiastical measures of the Government into the arena
of public discussion. The suppression, indeed, of these pamphlets was
far from damping the courage of the Presbyterians. Cartwright, who
had been appointed by Lord Leicester to the mastership of an hospital
at Warwick, was bold enough to organize his system of Church dis-
cipline among the clergy of that county and of Northaixiptonshire.
His example was widely followed ; and the general gatherings of the
whole ministerial body of the clergy, and the smaller assemblies for
each diocese or shire, which in the Presbyterian scheme bore the name
of Synods and Classes, began to be held in many parts of England for

473

Sec. I.

TlIK

Puritans
1583

1603

Martin
Marpre-
late

1585

15S8

474

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.
The First

OF THE

Stuarts

1604

leas

The

Catholic

Reaction

the purposes of debate and consultation. The new organization was
quickly suppressed indeed, but Cartwright was saved from the banish-
ment which Whitgift demanded by a promise of submission ; his influ-
ence steadily increased ; and the struggle, transferred to the higher
sphere of the Parliament, widened into the great contest for liberty
under James, and the Givil War under his successor.

Section II.— The First of the Stuarts. 1604—1623.

[Authorities. — Mr. Gardiner's "History of England from the Accession of
James I." is invaluable for its fairness and good sense, and for the fresh infor-
mation collected in it. We have Camden's "Annals of James I.," Goodman's
"Court of James I.," Weldon's "Secret History of the Court of James I.,"
Roger Coke's "Detection," the correspondence in the "Cabala," the letters
in the "Court and Times of James I.," the documents in Winwood's "Me-
morials of State," and the reported proceedings ofthe last two Parliaments.
The Camden Society has published the correspondence of James with Cecil,
and Walter Yonge's "Diary." The letters and works of Bacon (fully edited
by Mr. Spedding) are necessary for a knowledge ofthe period. Hacket s "Life
of Williams," and Harrington's " Nugse Antiquse " throw valuable side-light on
the politics of the time. But the Stuart system can only be fairly studied in
the State-papers, calendars of which are being published by the Master of the
Rolls.] [The State Papers are now carried on to 1644. — Ed.]

To judge fairly the attitude and policy of the English Puritans, that
is of three-fourths of the Protestants of England, at this moment, we
must cursorily review the fortunes of Protestantism during the reign
of Elizabeth. At its opening the success of the Reformation seemed
almost everywhere secure. Already triumphant in the north of Ger-
many at the peace of Augsburg, it was fast advancing to the conquest
ofthe south. The nobles of Austria as well as the nobles and the towns
of Bavaria were forsaking the older religion. A Venetian ambassador
estimated the German Catholics at little more than one-tenth of the
whole population of Germany. The new faith was firmly established
in Scandinavia. Eastward the nobles of Hungary and Poland became
Protestants in a mass. In the west France was yielding more and
more to heresy. Scotland flung off Catholicism under Mary, and
England veered round again to Protestantism undei Elizabeth. Only
where the dead hand of Spain lay heavy, in Castille, in Aragon, or in
Italy, was the Reformation thoroughly crushed out ; and even the dead
hand of Spain failed to crush heresy in the Low Countries. But at the
very instant of its seeming triumph, the advance of the new religion
was suddenly arrested. The first twenty years of Elizabeth's reign
were a period of suspense. The progress of Protestantism gradually
ceased. It wasted its strength in theological controversies and per-
secutions, and in the bitter and venomous discussions between the
Churches which followed Luther and the Churches which followed

[chap.

tion was
; banish-
liis influ-
e higher
r liberty

cession of
esh infor-
oodman's
imes I.,"
;he letters
d's "Me-
rliaments.
'ith Cecil,
lily edited
et^s*'Lifc
le-light on
studied in
iter of the

•ans, that
nent, we
he reign
seemed
I of Ger ■
:onquest
he towns
bassador
h of the
:ablished
I became
lore and
ary, and
1. Only
)n, or in
the dead
ut at the
religion
l's reign
i-adually

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

475

Zwingli or Calvin. It was degraded and weakened by the prostitution
of the Reformation to political ends, by the greed and worthlessness
of the German princes who espoused its cause, by the factious law-
lessness of the nobles in Poland, and of the Huguenots in France.
Meanwhile the Papacy succeeded in rallying the Catholic world round
the Council of Trent. The Roman Church, enfeebled and corrupted
by the triumph of ages, felt at last the uses of adversity. Her faith
was settled and defined. The Papacy was owned afresh as the centre
of Catholic union. The enthusiasm of the Protestants roused a counter
enthusiasm among their opponents ; new religious orders rose to
meet the wants of the day ; the Capuchins became the preachers of
Catholicism, the Jesuits became not only its preachers, but its directors,
its schoolmasters, its missionaries, its diplomatists. Their organization,
their blind obedience, their real ability, their fanatical zeal galvanized
the pulpit, the school, the confessional into a new life. If the Protest-
ants had enjoyed the profitable monopoly of martyrdom at the opening
of the century, the Catholics won a fair share of it as soon as the
disciples of Loyola came to the front. The tracts which pictured the
tortures of Campian and Southwell roused much the same fire at
Toledo or Vienna as the pages of Foxe had roused in England. Even
learning came to the aid of the older faith. Bellarmine, the greatest
of controversialists at this time, Baronius, the most erudite of Church
historians, were both Catholics. With a growing inequality of strength
such as this, we can hardly wonder that the tide was seen at last to turn.
A few years before the fight with the Armada Catholicism began defi-
nitely to win ground. Southern Germany, where Bavaria was restored to
Rome, and where the Austrian House so long lukewarm in the faith at
last became zealots in its defence, was re-Catholicized. The success of
Socinianism in Poland severed that kingdom from any real communion
with the general body of the Protestant Churches ; and these again
were more and more divided into two warring camps by the contro-
versies about the Sacrament and Free Will. Everywhere the Jesuits
won converts, and their peaceful victories were soon backed by the
arms of Spain. In the fierce struggle which followed, Philip was un-
doubtedly worsted. England was saved by its defeat of the Armada ;
the United Provinces of the Netherlands rose into a great Protestant
power through their own dogged heroism and the genius of William
the Silent. France was rescued from the grasp of the Catholic League,
at a moment when all hope seemed gone, by the unconquerable energy
of Henry of Navarre. But even in its defeat Catholicism gained
ground. In the Low Countries, the Reformation was driven from the
Walloon provinces, from Brabant, and from Flanders. In France
Hf^nry the Fourth found himself obliged to purchase Paris by a mass ;
and the conversion of the King was followed by a quiet breaking v.p
of the Huguenot party. Nobles and scholars alike forsook Protest-

">- ^

'■"'"^^a

Sec. II.
The First

OK THK
SrUAKTS

1604

1603

|;\

1' t

' 'Mr

.r»

i !

476

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH VKOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. II.

TllK l''lKST
Of TllK

.Sri'ARI S

ieo4

leaa

Puritan-
Ism
and the
Ghurch

The
Arminians

antism ; .tntl though the Reformation remained dominant south of the
Loire, it lost all hope of winning Kraiice as a whole to its sklo.

At the death of ICIizabeth, therefore, the temper of every earnest Pro-
testant, whether in Mngland or abroad, was tliat of a man who, aft< ;
cherishing the hope of a crowning victory, is forced to look on a*
crushing and irremediable defeat. The dream of a Reformation of th
universal Church was utterly at an end. The borders of Piotcstantisn
were narrowing every day, nor was there a sign that the triumph of i;. >
I'apacy was arrested. As hope after hope died into defeat ;^nd disasi •.,
the mood of the Pnrian grew sterner and more intolemp:. Vhat inten-
sified the read •. ••' a cnse of Jefection and uncertainty within the pale
ot I bd CliU!\ Ii «>t i .ngiuad itself. As a new Christendom fairly emerged
from the tro.'-W.>l voters, the Renascence again made itsintluencc felt.
Its voice was heard .Vhove all in the work of Hooker, and the appeal
to reason and to kuniariity which there found expression coloured
through its results the afterhistory of tlu, English Church. On the one
hand the historical feeling showed itself in a longing to ally the religion
of the present with the religion of the past, to claim part in the great
heritage of Catholic tradition. Men like George Herbert started back
from the bare, intense spiriiualism of the Puritan to find nourishment for
devotion in the outer associations which the piety of ages had grou* ed
around it, in holy places and holy things, in the stillness of church and
altar, in the aweful mystery of sacraments. Men like Laud, unable to
find standing ground in the purely personal relation between man and
Ciod which formed the basis of Calvinism, fell back on the conscious-
ness of a living Christendom, which, torn and rent as it seemed, was
soon to resume its ancient unity. On the other hand, the appeal which
Hooker addressed to reason produced a school of philosophical
thinkers whose timid upgrowth was almost lost in the clash of warring
creeds about them, but who were destined— as the Latitudinarians of
later days — to make a deep impression on religious thought. As yet
however this rationalizing movement limited itself to the work of
moderating and reconciling, to recognizing with Calixtus the pettiness
of the points of difference which parted Christendom, and the great-
ness of its points of agreement, or to revolting with Arminius from the
more extreme tenets of Calvin and Calvin's followers. No men could
be more opposed in their tendencies to one another than the later
High Churchmen, such as Laud, and the later Latitudinarians, such as
Hales. But to the ordinary English Protestant both Latitudinarian
and High Churchman were equally hateful. To him the struggle with
the Papacy was not one for compromise or comprehension. It was a
struggle between light and darkness, between life and death. No
innovation in faith or worship was of small account, if it tended in the
direction of Rome. Ceremonies, which in an hour of triumph might
have been allowed as solaces to weak brethren, he looked on as acts

VMI.]

of treason i
tolerance o
(he only sc
truth and f;
any ch mg:
State, but f
corresi ond
I'otestanti
(as it was
nrcessi^ n
whole numl
ment oi or^
removal of
disuse of
rigorous ob
preaching n
the religion;
and nationa
" should the
laws made c
dies as fast
siastical sta
alteration th
fact, prevaih
thing would
from the pui
resolute aga
No sovere
ruler which
than James i
clothes, his
all that mer
montade, hi
ness of spee(
ridiculous e>
scholar, with
ready repart(
controversiei
epigrams an
reading, espi
a voluminou
tobacco. Bi
of Henry th(
temper of a ]
pedant's inal

I i''>}

[CHA1». I Vltl.l

rUklTAN ENCILAND.

477

of treason in this hour of defeat. The peril was too great to admit of
tolerance or moderation. Now that falsehood was gaining ground,
the only security for truth was to draw a hard and fast line between
truth and falsehocKl. There was as yet indeed no general demand for
any ch mgc in the lorm of Church government, or of its relation to the
State, but f .r some change in the outer ritual of worship which should
corres^ ond t3 the advance wluch had been made to a more pronounced
! -otestantisni. We see the Puritan temper in the Millenary Petition
(as it was called), wiiich was presented to James the First on his
nrcessin Ly some eight hundred clergymen, about a tenth of the
whole number in his realm. It asked for no change in the govern-
ment oi organization of the Church, but for a reform of its courts, the
removal of superstitious usages from the Pook of Common Prayer, the
disuse of lessons from the apocryphal books of Scripture, a more
rigorous observance of Sundays, and the provision .»■ ' training of
preaching ministers. Even statesmen who had lit*le sy pathy with
the religious spirit about them pleaded for the pui ^asc ^f religious
and national union by ecclesiastical reforms. "^ y, ' asked Bacon,
"should the civil state be purged and restored by'^oo : and wholesome
laws made every three years in Parliament assenMed, devising reme-
dies as f^ist as time brcedeth mischief, and co :; riwise the eccle-
siastical state still continue upon the dregs of time, and receive no
alteration these forty-five years or more ?" A general expectation, in
fact, prevailed ihat, now the Queen's opposition was removed, some-
thing would be done. Put, different as his theological temper was
from the purely secular temper of Elizabeth, her successor was equally
resolute against all changes in Church matters.

No sovereign could have jarred against the conception of an English
ruler which had grown up under Plantagenet or Tudor more utterly
than James the First. His big head, his slobbering tongue, his quilted
clothes, his rickety legs, stood out in as grotesque a contrast with
all that men recalled of Henry or Elizabeth as his gabble and rhr
montade, his want of personal dignity, his buffoonery, his coarse-
ness of speech, his pedantry, his contemptible cowardice. Under this
ridiculous exterior however lay a man of much natural ability, a ripe
scholar, with a considerable fund of shrewdness, of mother-wit, and
ready repartee. His canny humour lights up the political and theological
controversies of the time with quaint incisive phrases, with puns and
epigrams and touches of irony, which still retain their savour. His
reading, especially in theological matters, was extensive ; and he was
a voluminous author on subjects which ranged from predestination to
tobacco. But his shrewdness and learning only left him, in the phrase
of Henry the Fourth, " the wisest fool in Christendom." He had the
temper of a pedant, a pedant's conceit, a pedant's love of theories, and a
pedant's inability to bring his theories into any relation with actual facts.

SKr. 11.
'I'hk First

OK TMK

STi'»Krs

AHl/enary
relit ion

1603

The

Divine

RiKht of

Kings

478

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.
The First

OF THE

Stuarts
1604

leaa

1606

1608

1610

Al' m'^iit have gone well had he confined himself to speculations about
witchcraft, about predestination, about the noxiousness of smoking.
Unhappily for England and for his successor, he clung yet more
passionately to theories of government which contained within them
the seeds of a death-struggle between his people and the Crown. Even
before his accession to the English throne, he had formuv vted his
theory of rule in a work on " The True Law of Free Monarchy ; " and
announced that, "although a good King will frame his actions to be
according to law, yet he is not bound thereto, b'lt of his own will and
for example-giving to his subjects." With the Tudor statesmen who
used the phrase, " an absolute King," or "an absolute monarchy,"
meant a sovereign or rule complete in themselves, and independent of
all foreign or Papal interference. James chose to regard the words as
implying the monarch's freedom from all control by law, or from
responsibility to anything but his own royal will. The King's theory
however was made a system of government ; it was soon, as the
Divine Right of Kings, to become a doctrine which bishops preached
from the pulpit, and for which brave men laid their heads on the block.
The Church was quick to adopt its sovereign's discovery. Convocation
in its book of Canons denounced as a fatal error the assertion that
"all civil power, jurisdiction, and authority were first derived from the
people and disordered multitude, or either is originally still in them,
or else is deduced by their consent naturally from them ; and is not
God's ordinance originally descending from Him and depending upon
Him." In strict accordance with James's theory, these doctors declared
sovereignty in its origin to be the prerogative of birthright, and
inculcated passive obedience to the monarch as a religious obligation.
Cowell, a civilian, followed up the discoveries of Convocation by an
announcement that " the King is above the law by his absolute power,"
and that "notwithstanding his oath he may alter and suspend any
particular law that seemeth hurtful to the public estate." The book
was suppressed on the remonstrance of the House of Commons, but
the party of passive obedience grew *" tSt. A few years before the death
of James, the University of Oxford decreed solemnly that "it was in
no case lawful for subjects to make use of force against their princes,
or to appear offensively or defensively in the field against them."
The King's " arrogant speeches," if they roused resentment in the
Parliaments to which they were addressed, created by sheer force of
repetition a certain belief in the arbitrary power they challenged for
the Crown. We may give one instance of their tone from a speech
delivered in the Star-Chamber. " As it is atheism and blasphemy to
dispute what God can do," said James, "so it is presumption and a
high contempt in a subject to dispute what a King can do, or to say
that a King cannot do tiiis or that." " If the practice should follow the
positions," once commented a thoughtful observer on words such as

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

479

these, " we are not likely to leave to our successors that freedom we
received from our lorefathers."

It is necessary to weigh throughout the course of James's reign this
aggressive attitude of the Crown, if we would rightly judge what seems
at first sight to be an aggressive tone in some of the proceedings of the
Parliaments. With new claims of power such as these before them,
to have stood still would have been ruin. The claim, too, was one
which jarred against all that was noblest in the temper of the time.
Men were everywhere reaching forward to the conception of law.
Bacon sought for law in material nature ; Hooker asserted the rule of
law over the spiritual world. The temper of the Puritan was eminently
a temper of law. The diligence with which he searched the Scriptures
sprang from his earnestness to discover a Divine Will which in all
things, great or small, he might implicitly obey. But this implicit
obedience was reserved for the Divine Will alone ; for human ordin
ances derived their strength only from their correspondence with the
revealed law of God. The Puritan was bound by his very religion to
examine every claim made on his civil and spiritual obedience by the
powers that be ; and to own or reject the claim, as it accorded with
the higher duty which he owed to God. "In matters of faith," Mrs.
Hutchinson tells us of her husband, " his reason always submitted to
the Word of God ; but in all other things the greatest names in the
world would not lead him without reason." It was plain that an im-
passable gulf parted such a temper as this from the temper of unques-
tioning devotion to the Crown which James demanded. It was a
temper not only legal, but even pedantic in its legality, intolerant from
its very sense of a moral order and law of the lawlessness and disorder
of a personal tyranny ; a temper of criticism, of judgement, and, if
need be, of stubborn and unconquerable resistance ; of a resistance
which sprang, not from the disdain of authority, but from the Puritan's
devotion to an authority higher than that of kings. But if the theory
of a Divine Right of Kings was certain to rouse against it all the nobler
energies of Puritanism, there was something which roused its nobler
and its pettier instincts of resistance alike in the place accordcc
by James to Bishops. Elizabeth's conception of her ecclesiastical
Supremacy had been a sore stumbling-block to her subjects, but Eliza-
beth at least regarded the Supremacy simply as a branch of her
ordinary prerogative. The theory o'* ' mes, however, was as different
from that of Elizabeth, as his view oi kingship was different from
hers. It was the outcome of the bitter years of humiliation which he
had endured in Scotland in his struggle with Presbyterianism. The
Scotch presbyters had insulted and frightened him in the early days of
his reign, and he chose to confound Puritanism with Presbyterianism.
No prejudice, however, was really required to suggest his course. In
itself it was logical, and consistent with the premisses from which it

Sic. II.
The First

or THE

Stuakts

ieo4

leaa

The

Orovm

and the

Bishops

I 'i

*^f

I . 1

■'■h

ill 'I

48o

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. 11.
TiiK First

Of TIIK

Stwakts

ieo4

T«»

16fl3

lliiiitfiton

Court Con-

Jcretu e

1604

The
Cro^iTii
and the
Parlia-
ment

started. If thcolojjically his opinions were Calvinistic, in the ecclesias-
tical fabric of Calvinism, in its or^Mnization of the Church, in its annual
assemblies, in its public discussion and criticism of acts of government
ihrouj^h the pulpit, he saw an organized democracy which threatened
his crown. The new force which had overthrown episcopacy in Scot-
land, was a force which might overthrow the monarchy itself. It was
the people which in its religious or its political guise was the assailant of
both. And as their foe was the same, so James argued with the shrewd
short-sightedness of his race, their cause was the same. " No bishop,"
ran his famous adage, "no King!" Mopes of ecclesiastical changfj
found no echo in a King who, among all the charms that Engla'id
presented him, saw none so attractive as its ordered and obedient
Church, its synods that met at the royal will, its courts that carried
out the royal ordinances, its bishops that held themselves to be royal
ofticers. If he accepted the Millenary Petition, and summoned a con-
ference of prelates and I'uritan divines at Hampton Court, he showed
no purpose of discussing the grievances alleged. He revelled in the
opportunity for a display of his theological reading ; but he viewed
the Puritan demands in a purely political light. The bishops declared
that the insults he showered on their opponents were dictated by the
Holy Ghost. The Puritans still ventured to dispute his infallibility.
James broke up the conference with a threat which revealed the policy
of the Crown. "I will make them conform," he said of the remon-
strants, " or I will harry them out of the land."

It if only by thoroughly realizing the temper of the nation on re-
ligious and civil subjects, and the temper of the King, that we can
understand the long Parliamentary conflict which occupied the whole
of James's reign. Hut to make its details intelligible we must briefly
review the relations between the two Houses and the Crown. The
wary prescience of Wolsey had seen in Parliament, even in its
degradation under the Tudors, tre memorial of an older freedom,
and a centre of national resistance to the new despotism which Henry
was establishing, should the nation ever rouse itself to resist. Never
perhaps was English liberty in such deadly peril as when Wolsey
resolved on the practical suppression of the two Houses. But the
bolder genius of Cromwell set aside the traditions of the New
Monarchy. His confidence in the power of the Crown revived the
Parliament as an easy and manageable instrument of tyranny. The
old forms of constitutional freedom were turned to the profit of the
royal despotism, and a revolution which for the moment left England
absolutely at Henry's feet was wrought out by a series of parliamentary
statutes. Throughout Henry's reign Cromwell's confidence was justi-
fied by the spirit of slavish submission which pervaded the Houses.
But the effect of the religious change for which his measures made
room began to be felt during the minority of Edward the Sixth ; and

recourse to

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

481

on re-

we can

whole

jriefly

The

in its

eedom,

Henry

Never

Volsey

Jut the

New

ed the

The

of the

ngland

entary

5 justi-

[ouses.

made

: and

the debates and divisions on the reliy^ious reaction which Mary pressed
on the Parliament were many and violent. A jjreat step forw: rd was
marked by the effort of the Crown to neutralize by " management " an
opposition which it could no longer overawe. The Parliaments were
packed with nominees of the Crown. Twenty-two new boroughs were
created under Edward, fourteen under Mary ; some, indeed, places
entitled to representation by their wealth and population, but the bulk
of them small towns or hamlets which lay wholly at the disposal of
the royal Council. Elizabeth adopted the system of her two pre-
decessors, both in the creation of boroughs and the recommendation
of candidates ; but her keen political instinct soon perceived the use-
Icssness of both expedients. She fell back as far as she could on
Wolsey's policy of practical aboUtion, and summoned Parliaments at
longer and longer intervals. By rigid economy, by a policy of balance
;md peace, she strove, and for a long time successfully strove, to avoid
the necessity of assembling them at all. Hut Mary of Scotland and
Philip of Spain proved friends to English liberty in its sorest need.
The struggle with Catholicism forced Elizabeth to have more frequent
recourse to her Parliament, and as she was driven to appeal for
increasing supplies the tone of the Houses rose higher and higher.
On the question of taxation or monopolies her fierce spirit was forced
to give way to their demands. On the question of religion she refused
all concession, and England was driven to await a change of system
from her successor. But it is clear, from the earlier acts of his reign,
that James was preparing for a struggle with the Houses rather than
for a policy of concession. During the Queen's reign, the power of
Parliament had sprung mainly from the continuance of the war, and
from the necessity under which the Crown lay of appealing to it for
supplies. It is fair to the war party in Elizabeth's Council to remember
that they were fighting, not merely for Protestantism abroad, but for con-
stitutionalliberty at home. When Essex overrode Burleigh's counsels
of peace, the old minister pointed to the words of the Bible, " a blood-
thirsty man shall not live out half his days." But Essex and his friends
had nobler motives for their policy of war than a thirst for blood ; as
James had other motives for his policy of peace than a hatred of
bloodsheddi ig. The peace which he hastened to conclude with Spain
was necessary to establish the security of his throne by depriving the
Catholics, who alone questioned his title, of foreign aid. With the
same object of averting a Catholic rising, he relaxed the p^rM laws
against Catholics, and released recusants from payment of hnes. But
however justifiable such steps might be, the sterner Protestants heard
angrily of negotiations with Spain and with the Papacy which seemci
to show a withdrawal from the struggle with Catholicism at home and
abroad.
The Parliament of 1604 met in another mood from that ol" any

Sue. II.

r»iK First

Ol' THK
STI'ARTH

1604

T(»

16B3

T/te fiolicy
of James

' i'

I'.i 1
J

'! I

482

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.
The First

OF THE

Stuarts

1604

to
1623

The Par-
liament
of 1604

Apology

0/ the

Commons

The Gun-
powder
Plot

Par' 'anient which had met for a hundred years. Short as had been
the time since his accession, the temper of the King had already dis-
closed itself; and men were dwelling ominously on the claims of
absolutism in Church and State which were constantly on his lips,
ibove all, the hopes of religious concessions to which the Puritans
nad clung had been dashed to the ground in the Hampton Court Con-
ference ; and of the squires and merchants who thronged the benches
at Westminster three-fourths were in sympathy Puritan. They listened
with coldness and suspicion to the proposals of the King for the union
of England and Scotland under the name of Great Britain. What the
House was really set on was religious reform. The first step of the
Commons was to name a committee to frame bills for the redress of
the more crymg ecclesiastical grievances ; and the rejection of the
measures they proposed was at once followed by an outspoken address
to the King. The Parliament, it said, had come together in a spirit
of peace : " Our desires were of peace only, and our device of unity."
Their aim had been to put an end to the long-standing dissension
among the ministers, and to preserve uniformity by the abandonment
of " a few ceremonies of small importance," by the redress of some
ecclesiastical abuses, and by the establishment of an efficient training
for a preaching clergy. If they had waived their right to deal with
these matters during the old age of Elizabeth, they asserted it now.
" Let your Majesty be pleased to receive public information from your
Commons in Parliament, as well of the abuses in the Church, as in
the civil state and government." The claim of absolutism was met
in words which sound like a prelude to the Petition of Right. " Your
Majesty would be misinformed," said the address, " if any man should
deliver that the Kings of England have any absolute power in them-
selves either to alter religion, or to make any laws concerning the
same, otherwise than as in temporal causes, by consent of Parlia-
ment." The address was met by a petulant scolding from James, and
the Houses were adjourned. The support of the Crown emboldened
the bishops to a fresh defiance of the Puritan pressure. The act of
Elizabeth which sanctioned the Thirty-nine Articles compelled minis-
ters £0 subscribe only to those which concerned the faith aiid the
sacraments ; but the Convocation of 1604 by its canons require d sub-
scription to the articles touching rites and ceremonies. The new
archbishop, Bancroft, added a requirement of rigid conformity with
the rubrics on the part of all beneficed clergymen. In the following
spring three hundred of the Puritan clergy were driven from their
livings for a refusal to comply with these demands.

The breach with the Purit, ns was followed by a breach with the
Catholics. The increase in their numbers since the remission of fines
had spread a general panic ; and Parliament had re-enacted the penal
laws. A rumour of his own conversion so angered the King that these

r'-^

[chap.

; had been
ilready dis-
I claims of
m his lips.
16 Puritans
Court Con-
he benches
tiey listened
»r the union
, What the
step of the
e redress of
:tion of the
ken address
• in a spirit
:e of unity."
I dissension
)andonmen'
ess of some
lent training
to deal with
rted it now.
n from your
hurch, as in
,m was met
ht. " Your
man should
ver in them-
Lcerning the
It of Parlia-
James, and
emboldened

The act of
elled minis-
ith a lid the
squirf d sub-
The new
brmity with
he following

from their

ch with the

sion of fines

d the penal

-g that these

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

were now put in force with even more severity than of old. The
despair of the CathoUcs gave fresh life to a conspiracy which had long
been ripening. Hopeless of aid from abroad, or of success in an open
rising at home, a small knot of desperate men, with Robert Catesby,
who had taken part in the rising of Essex, at their head, resolved to
destroy at a blow both King and Parliament. Barrels of powder were
placed in a rellar beneath the Parliament House ; and while waiting for
the fifth of November, when the Parliament was summoned to meet,
the plans of the little group widened into a formidable conspiracy.
Catholics of greater fortune, such as Sir Everard Digby and Francis
Tresham, were admitted to their confidence, and supplied money for the
larger projects they designed. Arms were bought in Flanders, horses
were held in readiness, a meeting of Catholic gentlemen was brought
about under show of a hunting party to serve as the beginning of a
rising. The destruction of the King was to be followed by the seizure
of his children and an open revolt, in which aid might be called for
from the Spaniards in Flanders. Wonderful as was the secrecy with
which the plot was concealed, the family affection of Tresham at the last
moment g^-^e a clue to it by a letter to Lord Montoagle, his relative,
which warned him to absent himself from the Parliament on the fatal
day ; and further information brought about the discovery of the cellar
and of Guido Fawkes, a soldier of fortune, who was charged with the
custody of it. The hunting party broke up in despair, the conspirators
were chased from county to county, and either killed or sent to the block,
and Garnet, the Provincial of the English Jesuits, was brought to trial
and executed. He had shrunk from all part in the plot, but its existence
had been made known to him by another Jesuit, Greenway, and horror-
stricken as he represented himself to have been he had kept the
S(„cret and left the Parliament to its doom.

Parhament was drawn closer to the King by deliverance from a com-
mon peril, and when the Houses met in 1606 the Commons were willing
to vote a sum large enough to pay the debt left by Elizabeth after the
war. But the prodigality of James was fast raising his peace expen-
diture to the level of the war expenditure of Elizabeth ; and he was
driven by the needs of his treasury, and the desire to free himself
from Parliamentary control, to seek new sources of revenue. His
first great innovation was the imposition of customs duties. It had
long been declared illegal for the Crown to levy any duties ungranted
by Parliament save those on wool, leather, and tin. A duty on imports
indeed had been imposed in one or two instances by Mary, and this
impost had been extended by Elizabeth to currants and wine ; but these
instances were too trivial and exceptional to break in upon the general
usage. A more dangerotis precedent lay in the duties which the P'reit
trading companies, such as those to the Levant and to the Indies, ex-
actedfrom merchants, in exchange — as was held — for the protection they

112

483

' 'l^

Sec. II.
The First

OK THE

Stuarts
1604

1623

James
and the
Parlia-
ment

The
Iinpoiitions

i ;

484

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.
The First

OF THE

Stuarts
1604

ica3

Bates's case
1606

T/ie Great

Contract

I61O

T/ie Petition

afforded them in far-off seas. The Levant Company was now dissolved,
and James seized on the duties it had levied as lapsing to the Crown.
Parliament protested in vain. James cared quite as much to assert his
absolute authority as to fill his treasury. A case therefore was brought
before the Exchequer Chamber, and the judgement of the Court asserted
the King's right to levy what customs duties he would at his pleasure.
" All customs," said the Judges, "are the effects of foreign commerce,
but all affairs of comrrierce and treaties with foreign nations belong to
the King's absolute power. He therefore, who has power over the
cause, has power over the effect." The importance of a decision which
would go far to free the Crown from the necessity of resorting to Par-
liament was seen keenly enough by James. English commerce was
growing fast, and English merchants were fighting their way to the
Spice Islands, and establishing settlements in the dominions of the
Mogul. The judgement gave James a revenue which was sure to grow
rapidly, and the needs of his treasury forced him to action. After two
years' hesitation a royal proclamation imposed a system of customs
duties on many articles of export and import. But if the new impositions
came in fast, the royal debt grew faster. Every year the expenditure
of James reached a higher level, and necessity forced on the King a fresh
assembling of Parliament. The "great contract" drawn up by Cecil,
now Earl of Salisbury, proposed that James should waive certain op-
pressive feudal rights, such as those of wardship and marriage, and the
right of purveyance, on condition that the Commons raised the royal
revenue by a sum of two hundred thousand a year. The bargain
failed however before the distrust of the Commons : and the King's de-
mand for a grant to pay off the royal debt was met by a petition of
grievances. They had jealously watched the new character given by
James to royal proclamations, by which he created new offences, imposed
new penalties, and called offenders before courts which had no legal
jurisdiction over them. The province of the spiritual courts had been
as busily enlarged. It was in vain that the judges, spurred no doubt by
the old jealousy between civil and ecclesiastical lawyers, entertained
appeals against the High Commission, and strove by a series of
decisions to set bounds to its limitless clain.s of jurisdiction, or to restrici
its powers of imprisonment to cases of schism and heresy. The judges
were powerless against the Crown ; and James was vehement in his
support of courts which were closely bound up with his own prerogative
Were the treasury once full no means remained of redressing these evils,
Nor were the Commons willing to pass over silently the illegalities of
the past years. James forbade them to enter on the subject of the new
duties, but their remonstrance was none the less vigorous. "Finding
that your Majesty without advice or counsel of Parliament hath lately
in time of peace set both greater impositions and more in number than
any of youT noble ancestors did ever in time of war," they prayed

VIII.]

"that all

abolishe(

all impos

only by c

Church g

that the c

jurisdicti

in other >

out of th

within tt

might off

ecclesiast

years pas

to face th

fairly rou

as that of

candidate

party, or ;

But three

these we

struggle '

St. Germ;

seen in t

marked t

Parliamei

refused tc

it fixed or

be redres

of Comm

Lords ; a

the vehen

pretext fo

Four of

to the To'

the King's

in goverr

carried 01

unfettered

All the ab

not only c

spiritual c

Crown la^

issued in j

Hut the tr

James to ;

I,.

[chap.

)w dissolved,
D the Crown.
1 to assert his

was brought
ourt asserted
his pleasure,
n commerce,
)ns belong to
\^er over the
jcision which
)rting to Par-
)mmerce was
r way to the
inions of the
) sure to grow
n. After two
n of customs
w impositions
e expenditure
e King a fresh
1 up by Cecil,
^e certain op-
riage, and the
sed the royal

The bargain
the King's de-

a petition of
cter given by
nces, imposed

had no legal
iirts had been

1 no doubt by
entertained
a series of

, or to restrici
The judges

lement in his

n prerogative.

ng these evils.
illegalities of

ct of the new

s. " Finding

nt hath lately
number than
they prayed

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

485

" that all impositions set without the assent of Parliament may be quite

abolished and taken away," and that " a law be made to declare that

all impositions set upon your people, their goods or merchandise, save

only by common consent in Parliament^ :ire and shall be void." As to

Church grievances their demands were in the same spirit. They prayed

that the deposed ministers might be suffered to preach, and that the

jurisdiction of the High Commission should be regulated by statute ;

in other words, that ecclesiastical like financial matters should be taken

out of the sphere of the prerogative and be owned as lying henceforth

within the cognizance of Parliament. Whatever concessions James

might offer on other subjects, he would allow no interference with his

ecclesiastical prerogative ; the Parliament was dissolved, and three

years passed before the financial straits of the Government forced James

to face the two Houses again. But the spirit of resistance was now

fairly roused. Never had an election stirred so much popular passion

as that of 1614. In every case v,nere rejection was possible, th' court

candidates were rejected. All the leading members of the popular

party, or as we should now call it, the Opposition, were again returned.

But three hundred of the members were wholly new men ; and among

these we note for the first time the names of two leaders in the later

struggle with the Crown. Yorkshire returned Thomas Wentworth ;

St. Germans, John Eliot. Signs of an unprecedented excitement were

seen in the vehement cheering and hissing which for the first time

marked the proceedings of the Commons. But the policy of the

Parliament was precisely the same as that of its predecessors. It

refused to grant suppHes till it had considered public grievances, and

it fixed on the impositions and the abuses of the Church as the first to

be redressed. Unluckily the inexperience of the bulk of the House

of Commons led it into quarrelling on a point of privilege with the

Lords ; and the King, who had been frightened beyond his wont at

the vehemence of their tone and language, seized on the quarrel as a

pretext for their dissolution.

Four of the leading members in the dissolved Parliament were sent
to the Tower ; and the terror and resentment which it had roused in
the King's mind were seen in the obstinacy with which he long persisted
in governing without any Parliament at all. For seven years he
carried out with a blind recklessness his theory of an absolute rule,
unfettered by any scruples as to the past, or any dread of the future.
All the abuses which Parliament after Parliament had denounced were
not only continued, but carried to a greater extent than before. The
spiritual courts were encouraged in fresh encroachments. Though the
Crown lawyers admitted the illegality of proclamations they were
issued in greater numbers than ever. Impositions were strictly levied.
But the treasury was still empty ; and a fatal necessity at last drove
James to a formrd breach of law. He fell back on a resource which

Sec. II.
The First

OF THE

Stuarts
1604

1623

1611

lC'4

The
Royal
Despot-
ism

1614-1621

!:■!

486

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. n.
The First

OF THE

Stuarts

1604

to
1623

Benevolences

The Crown

and the

Law

DistHisurl
I616

even Wolsey in the height of the Tudor power had been forced to
abandon. But the letters from the Council demanding benevolences
or gifts from the richer landowners remained genert»lly unanswered.
In the three years which followed the dissolution of 161 A the strenuous
efforts of tht sheriffs only raised sixty thousand poun^is, a sum less
than two-thirds of the value of a single subsidy ; and although the
remonstrances of the western counties were roughly silenced by the
threats of the Council, two counties, those of Hereford and Stafford,
sent not a penny to the last. In his distress for money James was
driven to expedients which widened the breach between the gentry
and the Crown. He had refused to part with the feudal rights which
came down to him from the Middle Ages, such as his right to
the wardship of young heirs and the marriage of heiresses, and these
were steadily used as a means of extortion. He degraded the nobility
by a shameless sale of peerages. Of the forty-five lay peers whom he
added to the Upper House during his reign, many were created by
sheer bargaining. A proclamation which forbade the increase of
houses in London brought heavy fines into the treasury. By shifts
such a-^ these James put off from day to day the necessity for again
encountering the one body which could permanently arrest his effort
after despotic rule. But there still remained a body whose tradition
was strong enough, not indeed to arrest, but to check it. The lawyers
had been subservient beyond all other classes to the Crown. In the
narrow pedantry with which they bent before isolated precedents,
without realizing the conditions under which these precedents had
been framed, and to which they owed their very varying value, the
judges had supported James in his claims. But beyond precedents jj
even the judges refused to go. They had done their best, in a case
that came before them, to restrict thp jurisdiction of the ecclesiastical
courts within legal and definite bounds : and when James asserted an
inherent right in the King to be heard before judgement was delivered,
whenever any case affecting the prerogative came before his courts,
they timidly, but firmly, repudiated such a right as unknown to the law.
James sent for them to the Royal closet, and rated them like school-
boys, till they fell on their knees, and, with a single exception, pledged
themselves to obey his will. The Chief-Justice, Sir Edward Coke, a
narrow-minded and bitter-tempered man, but of the highest eminence
as a lawyer, and with a reverence for the law that overrode every other
instinct, alone remained firm. When ai. / case came before him, he
answced, he would act as it became a judge to act. Coke was at once
dismissed from the Council, and a provision which made the judicial
ol'~'ce tenable a. the King's pleasure, but which had long fallen into
disuse, was revived to humble the common law in the person of its chief
oliicer ; on \hz continuance of his resistance he was deprived of his
pe.t of Chief-Justice. No act of James seems to have stirred a deeper

viii.l

resentn:

tamper

sense c

outrage

to furni!

Lands ;

faces ca

as that (

of grac(

the cou

drunkar

intoxica

officers (

James h

Lady E

was cele

half-idol

throughc

contemp

Mrs. Hu

as those

the immi

folly of

Council,

higher n

a despot

the sovei

Cecil, th(

services

Salisbur)

the Coui

chose to

Viscount

divorce

foreign, 1:

a horrilDh

which he

Another

Villiers, s

every ran

and entri:

ment of I

the one

inevitably

powerful <

[CHAP. I VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

487

I forced to

:nevolences

nanswered.

e strenuous

a sum less

though the

iced by the

id Stafford,

James was

the gentry

■ights which

lis right to

s, and these

the nobihty

;rs whom he

e created by

increase of

y. By shifts

ity for again

jst his effort

ose tradition

The lawyers

wn. In the

precedcxits,

cedents had

g value, the

i precedents n

st, in a case

ecclesiastical

asserted an

/as delivered,

e his courts,

\^n to the law.

like school-

tion, pledged

vard Coke, a

est eminence

e every other

fore him, he

;e was at once

the judicial

^; fallen into

on of its chief]

prived of his

red a deeper

resentment among Englishmen than this announcement of his will to
tamper with the course of justice. It was an outrage on the growing
sense of law, as the profusion and profligacy of the court were an
outrage on the growing sense of morality. The treasury was drained
to furnish masques and revels on a scale of unexampled splendour.
Lands and jewels were lavished on young adventurers, whose fair
faces caught the royal fancy. If the court of Elizabeth was as immoral
as that of her successor, its irnmorahty had been shrouded by a veil
of grace and chivalry. But no veil hid the degrading grossness of
the court of James. The King was held, though unjustly, to be a
drunkard. Actors in a masque performed at court were seen rolling
intoxicated at his feet. A scandalous trial showed great nobles and
officers of state in league with cheats and astrologers and poisoners.
James himself had not shrunk from meddling busily in the divorce of
Lady Essex ; and her subsequent bridal with one of his favourites
was celebrated in bis presence. Before scenes such as these, the
half-idolatrous reverence with whirh the sovereign had been regarded
throughout the period of the Tudo.s died away into abhorrence and
contempt. The players openly moc'/ed at the King on the stage.
Mrs. Hutchinson denounced the orgies of Whitehall in words as fiery
as those with which Elijah denounced the b?nsuality of Jezebel. But
the immorality of James's court was hardly more despicable than the
folly of his government. In the silence of Parliament, the royal
Council, composed as it was not merely of the ministers, but of the
higher nobles and hereditary officers of state, had served even under
a despot like Henry the Eighth as a check upon the arbitrary will of
the sovereign. But after the death of T ord Burk igh's son, Robert
Cecil, the minister whom Elizabeth had bequeathed o him, and whose
services in procuring his accession were rewarded b the Earldom of
Salisbury, all real control over aff"airs was withdraw by James from
the Council, and entrusted to worthless favourite^ hom the King
chose to raise to honour. A Scotcli page named arr was created
Viscount Rochester and Earl of Somerset, and married after her
divorce to Lady Essex. Supreme in State aft' rs, domestic and
foreign, he was at last hurled from favour and power on the charge of
a horrible crime, the murder of Sir Thomas C erbury by poison, of
which he and his Countess were convicted of being the instigators.
Another favourite was already prepared to take his place. George
Villiers, a handsome young adventurer, was raised rapidly through
every rank of the peerage, made Marquis and Duke of Buckingham,
and entrusted with the appointment to high offices of state. The pay-
ment of bribes to him, or marriage with his greef' relatives, became
the one road to political preferment. Resistan.e to his will was
inevitably followed by dismissal from office. Even the highest and most
powerful of the nobles were made to tremble at the nod of this young

Sbc. II.
The First

OF THE

Stuarts

1604

to
1623

The Court

The
Favourites

!;:; II

! \\

488

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.
The First

OK THE

Stuarts
1604

1623

The

Spanish

Policy

1612

1617

m I
ii .11

Ralegh!z
death

upstart. " Never any man in any age, nor, I believe, in any country,"
says the astonished Clarendon, " rose in so short a time to so much
greatness of honour, power, or fortune, upon no other advantage or
recommendation than of the beauiy or gracefulness of his person."
Buckingham indeed had no inconsiderable abilities, but his self-confi-
dence and recklessness were equal to his beauty ; and the haughty
young favourite on whose neck James loved to loll, and whose cheek
he slobbered with kisses, was destined to drag down in his fatal career
the throne of the Stuarts.

The new system was even more disastrous in its results abroad than
at home. The withdrawal of power from the Council left James in
effect his own chief minister, and master of the control of affairs as
no English sovereign had been before him. At his accession he
found the direction of foreign affairs in the hands of Salisbury, and so
long as Salisbury lived ihe Elizabethan policy was in the main adhered
to. Peace, indeed, was made with Spain ; but a close alliance with the
United Provinces, and a more guarded alliance with France, held the
ambition of Spain in check almost as effectually as war. When danger
grew threatening in Germany from the Catholic zeal of the House of
Austria, the marriage of the King's daughter, Elizabeth, with the heir
of the Elector-Palatine promised English support to its Protestant
powers. But the death of Salisbury, and the dissolution of the Parlia-
ment of 1614, were quickly followed by a disastrous change. James at
once proceeded to undo all that the struggle of Elizabeth and the
triumph of the Armada had done. His quick, snallow intelligence held
that in a joint action with Spain it had found a way by which the Crown
might at once exert weight abroad, and be rendered independent of
the nation at home. A series of negotiations was begun for the
marriage of his son with a Princess of Spain. Each of his successive
favourites supported the Spanish alliance ; and after years of secret
intrigue the King's '"tentions were proclaimed to the world, at the
moment when the policy of the House of Austria threatened the
Protestants of Southern Germany with utter ruin or civil war. P rom
whatever quarter the first aggression should come, it was plain that a
second great struggle in arms between Protestantism and Catholicism
was to be fought out on German soil. It was their prescience of the
coming conflict which, on the very eve of the crisis, spurred a party
among his ministers who still clung to the traditions of Salisbury to
support an enterprise which promised to detach the King from his new
policy by entangling him in a war with Spain. Sir Walter Ralegh, the
one great warrior of the Elizabethan time who still lingered on, had
been imprisoned ever since the beginning of the new reign in the Tower
on a charge of treason. He now disclosed to James his knowledge of
a gold-mine on the Orinoco, and prayed that he might sail thither and
work its treasures for the King. The King was tempted by the bait of

VIII.]

gold ; b

of Spar

again, h

be brou

to him.

orders t

aSpanij

The dai

Spanish

ofnatioi

him, ani

his old :

turer on

Ralegh

truce wl

i6i8by

of Aust:

cousin Jb"

its noble

Elector

by the f

but it wj

Bohemi;

son-in-k

Spain in

" statecr

Spanish

testant I

Bohemia

was earr

and peo]

his son-:

on the j

Frederic

Her fam

the Emp

into a E

the arm\

down the
to battle
gailopinc
cncampe
James
of popul
He had

i l;:

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

489

gold ; but he forbade any attack on Spanish territory, or the shedding
of Spanish blood. Ralegh however had risked his head again and
again, he believed in the tale he told, and he knew that if war could
be brought about between England and Spain a new career was open
to him. He found the coast occupied by Spanish troops ; evading direct
orders to attack he sent his men up the country, where they plundered
a Spanish town,found no gold-mine, and came broken and defeated back.
The daring of the man saw a fresh resource ; he proposed to seize the
Spanish treasure ships as he returned, and, like Drake, to turn the heads
of nation and King by the immense spoil. But his men would not follow
him, and he was brought home to face his doom. James at once put
his old sentence in force ; and the death of the broken-hearted adven-
turer on the scaffold atoned for the affront to Spain. The failure of
Ralegh came at a critical moment in German history. The religious
truce which had so long preserved the peace of Germany was broken in
1618 by the revolt of Bohemia against the rule of the Catholic House
of Austria ; and when the death of the Emperor Matthias raised his
cousin Ferdinand in i6i9to the Empire and to the throne of Bohemia,
its nobles declared the realm vacant and chose Frederick, the young
Elector Palatine, as their King. The German Protestants v/ere divided
by the fatal jealousy between their Luthe^ an i nd Calvinist princes ;
but it was believed that Frederick's election cr, Jd unite them, and the
Bohemians counted on England's support when they chose James's
son-in-law for their king. A firm policy would at any rate have held
Spain inactive, and limited the contest to Germany itself. But the
" statecraft " on which James prided himself led him to count, not on
Spanish fear, but on Spanish friendship. He refused aid to the Pro-
testant Union of the German Princes when they espoused the cause of
Bohemia, and threatened war against Holland, the one power which
was earnest in the Palatine's cause. It was in vain that both court
and people were unanimous in their cry for war. James still pressed
his son-in-law to withdraw from Bohemia, and relied in such a case
on the joint efforts of England and Spain to restore peace. But
Frederick refused consent, and Spain quickly threw aside the mask.
Her famous battalions were soon moving up the Rhine to the aid of
the Emperor ; and their march turned the local struggle in Bohemia
into a European war. While the Spaniards occupied the Palatinate,
the army of the Catholic League under Maximilian of Bavaria marched
down the Danube, reduced Austria to submission, and forced Frederick
to battle before the walls of Prague. Before the day was over he was
galloping off, a fugitive, to North Germany, to find the Spaniards
encamped as its masters in the heart of the Palatinate.

James had been duped, and for the moment he bent before the burst
of popular fury which the danger to German Prot btantism called up.
He had already been brought to suffer Sir Horace V^re to take s-otiie

Sec. II.

The First

OK THE

Stuakts

1604

1623

■'

I6I8

'/7ii' Thirty
J cars' War

Nov. 1620

The Par-
liament
of 1621

49°

HISTORY OF THE KN(;i.lSH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.
The First

OK THE

Sti'akts
1604

1623

Fall of
Bacon

i6i8

1621

English volunteers to the Palatinate. But the succour had come too
late. The cry for a Parliament, the necessar)' prelude to a war, over-
powered the King's secret resistance ; and the Houses were again
called together. But the Commons were bitterly chagrined as they
found only demands for supplies, and a persistence in the old efforts to
patch up a peace. James even sought the good will of the Spaniards
by granting license for the export ot arms to Spain. The resentment
of the Commons found expression in their dealings with home affairs.
The most crying constitutional grievance arose from the revival of
monopolies, in spite of the pledge of Elizabeth to suppress them. A
parliamentary right which had slept ever since the reign of Henry VI.,
the right of the Lower House to impeach great offenders at the bar of
the Lords, was revived against the monopolists ; and James was driven
by the general indignation to leave them to their fate. But the prac-
tice of monopolies was only one sign of the corruption of the court.
Sales of peerages and offices of state had raised a general disgust ;
and this disgust showed itself in the impeachment of the highest
P'liong the officers of State, the Chancellor, Francis Bacon, the most
uistinguished man of his time for learning and ability. At the acces-
sion of James the rays of royal favour l:ad broken slowly upon Bacon.
He became successively Solicitor and Attorney-General ; the year of
Shakap^re's death saw him called to the Privy Council : he verified
Elizabeth's prediction by becoming Lord Keeper. At last the goal of
his ambition was reached. He had attached himself to the rising
fortunes of Buckingham, and the favour of Buckingham made him
Lt . i Chancellor. He was raised to the peerage as Baron Verulam,
ana created, at a later time, Viscount St. Albans. But the nobler
dreams for which these meaner honours had been sought escaped
his grasp. His projects still remained projects, while to retain his
hold on office he was stooping to a miserable compliance with the
worst excesses of Buckingham and his royal master. The years
during which he held the Chancellorship were the most disgraceful
years of a disgraceful reign. They saw the execution of Ralegh, the
sacrifice of the Palatinate, the exaction of benevolences, the multiplica-
tion of monopolies, the "^.upremacy of Buckingham. Against none of the
acts of folly and wickedness which distinguished James's government
did Bacon do more than protest ; in some of the worst, and above
all in the attempt to coerce the judges into prostrating law at the
King's feet, he took a personal part. But even his remonstrances were
too much for the young favourite, who regarded him as the mere
creature of his will. It was in vain that Bacon flung himself on the
Duke's mercy, and begged him to pardon a single instance of opposition
to his caprice. A Parliament was impending, and Buckingham resolved
to avert from himself the storm which was gathering by sacrificing to
it his meaner dependants. To ordinary eyes the Chancellor was at

VIIl.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

491

the t^ummit oi human success. Jonson had just sung of him as one
" whose even thread the Fates spin round and full out of their choicest
and their whitest wool," when the storm burst. The Commons charged
Bacon with corruption in the exercise of his office. It had been cus-
tomary among Chancellors to receive gifts from successful suitors after
their suit was ended. Bacon, it is certain, had taken such gifts from
men whose suits were still unsettled ; and though his judgement may
have been unaffected by them, the fact of their reception left him with
no valid defence. He at once pleaded guilty to the charge. " I do
plainly and ingenuously confess that I am guilty of corruption, and do
renounce all defence." " I beseech your Lordships," he added, " to be
merciful to a broken reed." The heavy fine imposed on him was
remitted by the Crown ; but the Great Seal was taken from him, and
he was declared incapable of holding office in the State or of sitting in
Parliament. Bacon's fall restored him to that position of real greatness
from which his ambition had so long torn him away. " My conceit of
his person," said Ben Jonson, " was never increased towards him by
his place or honours. But I have and do reverence him for his great-
ness that was only proper to himself, in that he seemed to me ever by
his work one of the greatest men, and most worthy of admiration, that
had been in many ages. In his adversity I ever prayed that God would
give him strength : for greatness he could not want." His intellectual
activity was never more conspicuous than in the last four years of
his life. He had presented " Novum Organum " to James in the year
before his fall ; in the year after it he produced his " Natural and
Experimental History." He began a digest of the laws, and a " History
of England under the Tudors," revised and expanded his " Essays,"
dictated a jest book, and busied himself with experiments in physics.
It was while studying the effect of cold in preventing animal putrefac-
tion that he stopped his coach to stuff a fowl with snow and caught the
fever which ended in his death.

James was too shrewd to mistake the importance of Bacon's im-
peachment ; but the hostility of Buckingham to the Chancellor, and
Bacon's own confession of his guilt, made it difficult to resist his
condemnation. Energetic too as its measures were against corrup-
tion and monopolists, the Parliament respected scrupulously the
King's prejudices m other matters ; and even when checked by an
adjournment, resolved unanimously to support him in any earnest
effort for the Protestant cause. A warlike speech from a member
before the adjournment roused an enthusiasm which recalled the days
of Elizabeth. The Commons answered the appeal by a unanimous
vote, " lifting their hats as high as they could hold them," that for
the recovery of the Palatinate they would adventure their fortunes,
their estates, and their lives. " Rather this declaration," cried a leader
of the country party when it was read by the Speaker, " than ten thou-

Sec. II.
The First

OK THE

Stuarts

ieo4

1623

Bacon.
1626

Dissolu-
tion of

the Par-
liament

Jurie^ 1 62 1

492

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.
Thk First

Ol- TIIK

Stuakt .
1604

T623

> Nov. 1621

Protestation-

of the

Commons

sand men already on the march." For the moment the resolve seemed
to give vigour to the royal policy. James had aimed throughout at
the restitution of Bohemia to Ferdinand, and at inducing the Empoior,
through the mediation of Spain, to abstain from any retaliation on the
Palatinate. He now freed himself for a moment from the trammels
of diplomacy, and enforced a cessation of the attack on his son-in-law's
dominions by a threat of war. The suspension of arms lasted through
the summer ; but mere threats could do no more, and on the conquest
of the Upper Palatinate by the forces of the Catholic League, James
fell back on his old policy of mediation through the aid of Spain.
The negotiations for the marriage with the Infanta were pressed more
busily. Gondomar, the Spanish Ambassador, who had become all-
powerful at the English court, was assured that no effectual aid should
be sent to the Palatinate. The English fleet, which was cruising by
way of menace off the Spanish coast, was called home. The King
dismissed those of his ministers who still opposed a Spanish poHcy ;
and threatened on trivial pretexts a war with the Dutch, the one great
Protestant power that remained in alliance with England, and was
ready to back the Elector. But he had still to reckon with his
Parliament ; and the first act of the Parliament on its re-assembling
was to demand a declaration of war with Spain. The instinct
of the nation was wiser than the statecraft of the King. Ruined
and enfeebled as she really was, Spain to the world at large still
seemed the champion of Catholicism. It was the entry of her
troops into the Palatinate which had first widened the local wnr in
Bohemia into a great struggle for the suppression of Protestantism
along the Rhine ; above all Jt was Spanish influence, and the hopes
held out of a marriage of his son with a Spanish Infanta, which were
luring the King into his fatal dependence on the great enemy of the
Protestant cause. In their petition the Houses coupled with their
demands for war the demand of a Protestant marriage for their future
King. Experience proved in later years how perilous it was for
English freedom that the heir to the Crown should be brought up under
a Catholic mother ; but James was beside himself at their presump-
tion in dealing with mysteries of state, " Bring stools for the Ambas-
sadors," he cried in bitter irony as their committee appeared before
him. He refused the petition, forbade any further discussion of state
policy, and threatened the speakers with the Tower. " Let us resort
to our prayers," a member said calmly as the King's letter was read,
" and then consider of this great business." The temper of the House
was seen in the Protestation which mei the royal command to abstain
from discussion. It resolved " That the liberties, franchises, privileges,
and jurisdictions of Parliament are the ancient and undoubted birth-
right and inheritance of the subjects of England ; and that the arduous
and urgent affairs concerning the King, state, and defence of the

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

493

realm, and of the Church of England, and the making and mainten-
ance of laws, and redress of grievances, which daily happen within this
realm, are proper subjects and matter of council and debate in Parlia-
ment. And that in the handling and proceeding of those businesses
every member of the House hath, and of rjoht ought to have, freedom
of speech to propound, treat, reason, and bring I ) conclusion the same."
The King answered the Protestation by a characteristic outrage.
He sent for the Journals of the House, anci with his own hand tore
out the pages which contained it. " I will govern," he said, " ac-
cording to the common weal, but nut according to the common
will." A few days after he dissolved the Parliament, " It is the best
thing that has happened in the interests of Spain and of the Catholic
religion since Luther began preaching," wrote the Count of Gondomar
to his master, in his joy that all danger of war had passed away. " 1
am ready to depart," Sir Henry Savile, on the ofher hand, murmured
on his death-bed, " the rather that having lived in good times f foresee
worse." Abroad indeed all was lost ; and Germany plunged wildly
and blindly forward into the chaos of the Thirty Years' War. But for
England the victory of freedom was practically won. James had
himself ruined the main bulwarks of the monarchy. In his desire for
personal government he had desf oyed the authority of the Council.
He had accustomed men to think lightly of the ministers of the
Crown, to see them lirowbeaten by fa\curites, and driven from office
for corruption. He had disenchanted his people of their blind faith
in the monarchy by a policy at home and abroad which ran counter
to every national instinct. He had quarrelled with, and insulted the
Houses, as no English sovereign had ever done before ; and all the
while the authority he boasted of was passing, without his being able
to hinder it, to the Parliament which he outraged. There was
shrewdness as well as anger in his taunt at its "ambassadors." A
power had at last risen up in the Common with which the Monarchy
was henceforth to reckon. In spite of the King's petulant outbreaks.
Parliament had asserted its exclusive right to the control of taxation.
It had attacked monopolies. It had reformed abuses in the courts of
law. It had revived the right of impeaching and removing from office
the highest ministers of the Crown. It had asserted its privilege of free
discussion on all questions connected with the welfare of the realm.
It had claimed to deal with the question of religion. It had even
declared its will on the sacred "mystery" of foreign poHcy. James
might tear the Protestation from its Journals, but there were pages in
the record of the Parliament of 1621 which he n( ver could tear out.

Section III.— The King and the Parliament. 1623—1629.

{Attihorities.— For the first part of this period we have still Mr. Gardiner's
"History of England from the accession of James I.," which throws a full

Sei 1 1.
'I'liK First

OF THE

Stuart
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494

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.
The King

AND THE

Parlia>

MBNT

1683

16&9

The

Spanish

Marrlare

1623

and fr«h light on one of the most obscure times in our history. His work is
as valuable for the early reign of Charles, a period well illustrated by Mr.
Forster's •* Life of Sir John Eliot." Among the general accounts of the
reign of Charles, Mr. Disraeli's *' Commentaries on the Reign of Charles I."
is the most prominent on the one side ; Brodie's '* History of the British
Empire," and Godwin's " History of the Commonwealth," on the other. M.
(iuizot's work is accurate and impartial, and Lingard of especial value for the
history of the English Catholics, and for his detail «>f foreign affairs. F'^r the
ecclesiastical side see Laud's *' Diary." The Commons Journal gives the
proceedings of the Parliaments. Throughout this period the Calendars of State
Papers, now issuing under the direction of the Master of the Rolls, are of the
greatest historic value. Ranke's '* History of England in the Seventeenth
Century " is important for the whole Stuart period.]

In the obstinacy with which he clung to his Spanish policy James
stood absolutely alone ; for not only the old nobility and the statesmen
who preserved the tradition of the age of Elizabeth, but even his own
ministers, with the exception of Buckingham and the Treasurer,
Cranfield, were ''t one with the Commons. The King's aim, as we
have said, was to enforce peace on the combatants, and to bring
about the restitution of the Palatinate to the Elector, through the
influence of Spain. It was to secure this influence that he pressed
for a closer union with the great Catholic power ; and of this union,
and the success of the policy which it embodied, the marriage of his
son Charles with the Infanta, which had been held out as a lure to his
vanity, was to be the sign. But the more James pressed for this consum-
mition of his projects, the more Spain held back. At last Buckingham
proposed to force the Spaniard's hand by the arrival of Charles himself
at the Spanish Court. The Prince quitted England in disguise, and
appeared with Buckingham at Madrid to claim his bride. It was in
vain that Spain rose in its demands ; for every new demand was met by
fresh concessions on the part of England. The abrogation of the
penal laws against the Catholics, a Catholic education for the Prince's
children, a Catholic household for the Infanta, all were no sooner
asked than they were granted. But the marriage was still delayed,
while the influence of the new policy on the war in Germany was hard
to see. The Catholic League and its army, under the command of
Count Tilly, won triumph after triumph over their divided foes. The
reduction of Heidelberg and Mannheim completed the conquest of the
Palatinate, whose Elector fled helplessly to Holland, while his Electoral
dignity was transferred by the Emperor to the Duke of Bavaria. But
there was still no sign of the hoped-for intervention on the part of
Spain. At last the pressure of Charles himself brought about the
disclosure of the secret of its policy. " It is a maxim of state with us,"
Olivares confessed, as the Prince demanded an energetic interference
in Germany, " that the King of Spain must never fight against the
Emperor. We cannot employ our forces against the Emperor." " If
you hold to thit," replied the Prince, " there is an end of all."

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

495

His return was the signal for a burst of national joy. All London
was alight with bonfires, in her joy at the failure of the Spanish match,
and of the collapse, humiliating as it was, of the policy which had so
long trailed English honour at the chariot-wheels of Spain. Charles
returned to take along with Buckingham the direction of affairs out of
his father's hands. The journey to Madrid had revealed to those around
him the strange mixture of obstinacy and weakness in the Prince's
character, the duplicity which lavished promises because it never pur-
posed to be bound by any, the petty pride that subordinated every
poHtical consideration to personal vanity or personal pique. He had
granted demand after demand, till the very Spaniards lost faith in his
concessions. With rage in his heart at the failure of his efforts, he
had reneweu his betrothal on the very eve of his departure, only that he
might insult the Infanta by its withdrawal when he was safe at home.
But to England at large the baser features of his character were still
unknown. The stately reserve, the personal dignity and decency of
manners which distinguished the Prince, contrasted favourably with the
gabble and indecorum of his father. The courtiers indeed who saw him
in his youth, would often pray God that " he might be in the right way
when he was set ; for if he was in the wrong he would prove the most
wilful of any king that ever rei .;ned." But the nation was willing to
ta^e his obstinacy for firmness ; as it took the pique which inspired his
course on his return for pa.riotiFm and for the promise of a nobler rule.
Under the pressure of Charles and Buckingham the King was forced to
call a Parliament, and to concede the point on which he had broken
with the last, by laying before it the whole question of the Sp:.nish
negotiations. Buckingham and the Prince gave their personal support
to Parliament in its demand for a rupture of the treaties with Spain and
a declaration of war. A subsidy was eagerly voted ; the persecution of
the Catholics, which had long been suspended out of deference to Spanish
intervention, began with new vigour. The head of the Spanish party,
Cranfield, Earl of Middlesex, the Lord Treasurer, was impeached on a
charge of corruption, and dismissed from office. James was swept along
helplessly by the tide ; but his shrewdness saw clearly the turn that
affairs were taking ; and it was only by hard pressure that the favourite
succeeded in wresting his consent to the disgrace of Middlesex. " You
are making a rod for your own back," said the King. But Buckingham
and Charles persisted in their plans of war. A treaty of alliance was
concluded with Holland ; negotiations were begun with the Lutheran
Princes of North Germany, who had looked coolly on at the ruin of the
Elector Palatine ; an alliance with France was proposed, and the
marriage of Charles with Henrietta, a daughter of Henry the Fourth
of France, and sister of its King. To restore the triple league was to
restore the system of Elizabeth ; but the first whispers of a Catholic
Queen woke opposition in the Commons. At this juncture the death

Sec. II L
The King

AND THE

Parlia-
ment

leaa

leae

Charlea

the

First

tach with
Sfiain

1624

1625

Death of
James

'i> XA

■ J y

! ■■
■i

i-M-

ii'«..yii

496

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.
The Kino

AND THE

Parlia-
ment

1623

ias9

The

Policy of

Charles

/iug. 1625

of the King placed Charles upon the throne ; and his first Parliament
met in May, 1625. " We can hope everything from the King who now
governs us," cried Sir Benjamin Rudyerd in the Commons. But there
were cooler heads in the Commons than Sir Benjamin Rudyerd's ;
and enough had taken place in the few months since its last session to
temper its loyalty with caution.

The war with Spain, it must be remembered, meant to the mass of
Englishmen a war with Catholicism ; and the fervour against Catho-
licism without roused a corresponding fervour against Catholicism
within the realm. Every English Catholic seemed to Protestant eyes
an enemy at home. A Protestant who leant towards Catholic usage
or dogma was a secret traitor in the ranks. But it was suspected, and
suspicion was soon to be changed into certainty, that in spite of his
pledge to make no religious concessions to France, Charles had on
his marriage promised to relax the penal laws against Catholics, and
that a foreign power had again been given the right of intermeddling
in the civil affairs of the realm. And it was to men with Catholic
leanings that Charles seemed disposed to show favour. Bishop Laud
was recognized as the centre of that varied opposition to Puritanism,
whose members were loosely grouped under the name of Arminians ;
and Laud now became the King's adviser in ecclesiastical matters.
With Laud at its head the new party grew in boldness as well as
numbers. It naturally sought for shelter for its religious opinions by
exalting the power of the Crown. A court favourite, Montague, ventured
to slight the Reformed Churches of the Continent in favour of the Church
of Rome, and to advocate as the faith of the Church the very doctrines
rejected by the Calvinists. The temper of the Commons on religious
matters was clear to every observer. " Whatever mention does break
forth of the fears or dangers in religion, and the increase of Popery,"
wrote a member who was noting the proceedings of the House, " their
affections are much stirred." Their first act was to summon Montague
to the bar and to commit him to prison. But there were other grounds
for their distrust besides the King's ecclesiastical tendency. The con-
ditions on which the last subsidy had been granted for war with Spain
had been contemptuously set aside ; in his request for a fresh grant
Charles neither named a sum nor gave any indication of what war it
was to support. His reserve was met by a corresponding caution.
While voting a small and inadequate subsidy, the Commons restricted
their grant of certain customs duties called tonnage and poundage,
which had commonly been granted to the new sovereign for life, to
a single year, so as to give time for consideration of the additional
impositions laid by James on these duties. The restriction was taken
as an insult ; Charles refused to accept the grant on such a condition,
and adjourned the Houses. When they met again at Oxford it was
in a sterner tamper, for Charles had shown his defiance of Parliament

VIII.J

PURITAN ENGLAND.

by drawing Montague from prison, by promoting him to a royal chap-
laincy, and by levying the disputed customs without authority of law.
" England," cried Sir Robert Phelips, " is the last monarchy that yet
retains her liberties. Let them not perish now ! " But the Commons
had no sooner announced their resolve to consider public grievances
before entering on other business than they were met by a dissolution.
Buckingham, to whom the firmness of tte Commons seemed simply the
natural discontent which follows on ill success, resolved to lure them
from their constitutional struggle by a great military triumph. His hands
were no sooner free than he sailed for the Hague to conclude a general
alliance against the House of Austria, while a fleet of ninety vessels and
ten thousand soldiers left Plymouth in October for the coast of Spain.
But these vast projects broke down before Buckingham's administrative
incapacity. The plan of alliance proved fruitless. After an idle descent
on Cadiz the Spanish expedition returned broken with mutiny and
disease ; and the enormous debt which had been incurred in its
equipment forced the favourite to advise a new summons of the
Houses. But he was keenly alive to the peril in which his failure had
plunged him, and to a coalition which had been formed between his
rivals at Court and the leaders of the last Parliament. His reckless
daring led him to anticipate the danger, and by a series of blows to
strike terror into his opponents. The Councillors were humbled by
the committal of Lord Arundel to the Tower. Sir Robert Phelips,
Coke, and four other leading patriots were made sheriffs of their
counties, and thus prevented from sitting in the coming Parliament.
But their exclusion only left the field free for a more terrible foe.

If Hampden and Pym are the great figures which embody the later
national resistance, the earlier struggle for Parliamentary liberty
centres in the figure of Sir John Eliot. Of an old family which had
settled under Elizabeth near the fishing hamlet of St. Germans,
and raised their stately mansion of Port Eliot, he had risen to the
post of Vice-Admiral of Devonshire under tho patronage of Buck-
ingham, and had seen his activity in the suppression of piracy in the
Channel rewarded by an unjust imprisonment. He was now in the
first vigour of manhood, with a mind exquisitely cultivated and famiUar
with the poetry and learning of his day, a nature singularly lofty and
devout, a fearless and vehement temper. There was a hot impulsive
element in his nature which showed itself in youth in his drawing
sword on a neighbour wht) denounced him to his father, and which in
later years gave its characteristic fire to his eloquence. But his intellect
was as clear and cool as his temper was ardent. In the general enthu-
siasm which followed on the failure of the Spanish marriage, he had
stood almost alone in pressing for a recognition of the rights of Parlia-
ment, as a preliminary to any real reconciliation with the Crown. He
fixed, from the very outset of his career, on the responsibility of the royal

K K

497

Sec. III.
Thb King

AND THE

Parlia-

MENT

16fl3

1689

Buckings
hunt's
desifffis

Eliot

'.:,•'

k :r

. ? u

« fj

,fe. ''«i

1624

III

498

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

tcHAr.

Sec. III.
The King

AND THE

Parlia-
ment

leaa

iefl9

Impeach-
ment of
Bucking-
ham

1626

ministers to Parliament, as the one critical point for English liberty. It
was to enforce the demand of this that he availed himself of Buckings
ham's sacrifice of the Treasurer, Middlesex, to the resentment of the
Commons. " The greater the delinquent,* he urged, " the greater the
djlict. They are a happy thing, great men and officers, if they be good,
and one of the greatest blessings of the land : but power converted into
evil is the greatest curse that can befall it." But the new Parliament had
hardly met, when he came to the front to threaten a greater criminal
than Middlesex. So menacing were his words, as he called for an inquiry
into the failure before Cadiz, that Charles himself stooped to answer
threat with threat. " I see," he wrote to the House, "you especially
aim at the Duke of Buckingham. I must let you know that I will not
allow any of my servants to be questioned among you, much less such
as are of eminent place and near to me." A more direct attack on
a right already acknowledged in the impeachment of Bacon and Mid-
dlesex could hardly be imagined, but Eliot refused to uiove from his
constitutional ground. The King was by law irresponsible, he " could
do no wrong." If the country therefore was to be saved from a pure
despotism, it must be by enforcing the responsibility of the ministers
who counselled and executed his acts. Eliot persisted in denouncing
Buckingham's incompetence and corruption, and the Commons ordered
the subsidy v/hich the Crown had demanded to be brought m " when
we shall have presented our grievances, and received his Majesty's
answer thereto." Charles summoned them to Whitehall, and com-
manded them to cancel the condition. He would grant them " liberty
of counsel, but not of control ; " and he closed the interview with a
significant threat. " Remember," he said, " that Parliaments are
altogether in my power for their calling, sitting, and dissolution ; and,
therefore, as I find the fruits of them to be good or evil, they are to
continue or not to be." But the will of the Commons was as resolute
as the will of the King. Buckingham's impeachment was voted and
carried to the Lords. The favourite took his seat as a peer to listen
to the charge with so insolent an air of contempt that one of the
managers appointed by the Commons to conduct it turned sharply on
him. " Do you jeer, my Lord ! " said Sir Dudley Digges. " I can
show you when a greater man than your Lordship — as high as you in
place and power, and as deep in the King's favour — has been hanged
for as small a crime as these articles contain." The "proud carriage"
of the Duke provoked an invective from Eliot which marks a new era
in Parliamentary speech. From the first the vehemence and passion
of his words had contrasted with the grave, colourless reasoning of
older speakers. His opponents complained that Eliot aimed to " stir
up affections." The quick emphatic sentences he substituted for the
cumbrous periods of the day, his rapid argument, his vivacious and
caustic allusions, his passionate appeals, his fearless invective, struck

VIII.]

a new no
Buckingha
to the fierc
land, the st
it. It is to
magnificent
visible evid
the immens
same terrib
tion, his in
neglect of e
he had accu
tions, his pi
must be mai
withstand hi
ever to striki
parallel betw
have been hi
judgment. '
burgesses of
all our evils
remedies ! I
opprimat ! "
The reply
He hurried t(
which Buckii
their seats, ai
however, refu
were restored
his rolease wj
one moment,'
and a final re
miss Bucking
dissolution,
deprived of \
nation to pay
refused to gn
public resistai
by way of Par
subsidy-men <
they answerec
ment ! else no
very justices n
Cornwall only
sell one of tl

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

499

a new note in English eloquence. The frivolous ostentation of
Buckingham, his very figure blazing with jewels and gold, gave point
to the fierce attack. " He has broken those nerves and sinews of our
land, the stores and treasures of the King. There needs no search for
it. It is too visible. His profuse expenses, his superfluous feasts, his
magnificent buildings, his riots, his excesses, what are they but the
visible evidences of an express exhausting of the State, a chronicle of
the immensity of his waste of the revenues of the Crown ? " With the
same terrible directness Eliot reviewed the Duke's greed and corrup-
tion, his insatiate ambition, his seizure of all public authority, his
neglect of every public duty, his abuse for selfish ends of the powers
he had accumulated. " The pleasure of his Majesty, his known direc-
tions, his public acts, his acts of council, the decrees of courts— all
must be made inferior to this man's will. No right, no interest may
withstand him. Through the power of state and justice he has dared
ever to strike at his own ends." " My Lords," he ended, after a vivid
parallel between Buckingham and Sejanus, " you see the man ! What
have been his actions, what he is like, you knovv ! I leave him to your
judgment. This only is conceived by us, the knights, citizens, and
burgesses of the Commons House of Parliament, that by him came
all our evils, in him we find the causes, and on him must be the
remedies ! Pereat qui perdere cuncta festinat. Opprimatur ne omnes
opprimat ! "

The reply of Charles was as fierce and sudden as the attack of Eliot.
He hurried to the House of Peers to avow as his own the deeds with
which Buckingham was charged. Eliot and Digges were called from
their seats, and committed prisoners to the Tower. The Commons,
however, refused to proceed with public business till their members
were restored ; and after a ten-days' struggle Eliot was released. But
his rdease was only a prelude to the close of the Parliament. " Not
one moment," the King replied to the prayer of his Council for delay ;
and a final remonstrance in which the Commons begged him to dis-
miss Buckingham from his service for ever was met by their instant
dissolution. The remonstrance was burnt by royal order ; Eliot was
deprived of his Vice-Admiralty ; and an appeal was made to the
nation to pay as a free gift the subsidies which the Parliament had
refused to grant till their grievances were redressed. But the tide of
public resistance was slowly rising. Refusals to give anything, " save
by way of Parliament," came in from county after county. When the
subsidy-men of Middlesex and Westminster were urged to comply,
they answered with a tumultuous shout of " a Parliament ! a Parha-
ment ! else no subsidies ! " Kent stood out to a man. In Bucks the
very justices neglected to ask for the " free gift." The freeholders of
Cornwall only answered that, " if they had but two kine, they would
sell one of them for supply to his Majesty— in a Parliamentary

K K 2

Sec. III.
The Kinu

AND THE

1'arlia-

MENT

leaa

iea»

m ^

The Kins

and the

People

June 1 6,
1626

50O

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAr.

Skc. III.
The Kinc

AND THE

Parlia-
ment

leaa

The Forced
Loan

1627

Hatnpden's
protest.

Siege of
Rocheile

1627

way." The failure of the voluntary gift forced Charles ♦.o an open
defiance of the law. He met it by the levy of a forced loan. Com-
missioners were named to assess the amount which every landowner
was bound to lend, and to examine on oath all who refused. Evfiry
means of persuasion, as of force, was resorted to. The pulpits of the
Laudian clergy resounded with the cry of " passive obedienc " Dr.
Mainwaring preached before Charles hinself, that the Kingn : " ;dno
Parliamentary warrant for taxation, and that to resist his will was to
incur eternal damnation. Poor men who refused to lend wc.e pressed
into the army or navy. Stubborn tradesmen were flung into prison.
Buckingham himself undertook the task of overawing the nobles and
the gentry. ChaHes met the opposition of the judges by instantly dis-
missing from his office the Chief Justice, Crew. But in the country at
large resistance was universal. The northern counties In a mass set the
Crown at defiance. The Lincolnshire farmers drove the Commissioners
from the town. Shropshire, Devon, and Warwickshire "refused
utterly." j^ight peers, with Lord Essex and Lord Warwick at their
head, declined to comply with the exaction as illegal. Two hundred
country gentlemen, whose obstinacy had not been subdued by their
transfer from prison to prison, were summoned before the Council;
and John Hampden, as yet only a young Buckinghamshire squire,
appeared ;it the board to begin that career of patriotism which has
made his name dear to Englishmen. " I could be content to lend,"
he said, " but fear to draw on myself that curse in Magna Charta, which
should be read twice a year against those who infringe it." So close
an imprisonment in the Gate House rewarded his protest, " that he
never afterwards did look like the same man he was before." With
gathering discontent as well as bankruptcy before him, nothing could
save the Duke but a great military success ; and be equipped a force
of six thousand men for the maddest and most profligate of all his
enterprises. In the great struggle with Catholicism the hopes of every
Protestant rested on the union of England with France against the
House of Austria. But- the blustering and blundering of the favourite
had at last succeeded in plunging him into .-trife with his own allies,
and England now suddenly found herself at war with France and
Spain together. The French minister, Cardinal Richelieu, anxious
as he was to maintain the English alliance, was convinced that the
first step to any effective interference of France in a European war
must be the restoration of order at home by the complete reduction
of the Protestant town of Rocheile which had risen in revolt. In
1625 English aid had been given to the French forces, however reluct-
antly. But now Buckingham saw his way to win an easy popularity
at home by supporting the Huguenots in their resistance. The enthu-
siasm for their cause was intense ; and he resolved to take advantage
of this enthusiasm to secure such a triumph for the royal arms as

viii.l

should sile

sailed und<

as was his

After an u

troops wen

ships ; and

man to thei

The first

whelmed a£

Parliament

than the las

patriot lead

recent resist

spite of Eli(

gave place t(

" We must V

in words so(

the laws mat

as no licenti

of sharp anc

should take

to one great

that protecte

benevolences

otherwise tl;

imprisonmer

people or en

recited. Thi

above all sim

formally. A

" that no ma

benevolence,

of Parliamen

such oaths, o

ceming the «

in such mam

And that you

and mariners,

to come. An

may be revok

like nature mi

executed as a

subjects be d

franchises of

excellent Maj(

VIII.l

PURITAN ENGLAND.

501

should silence all opposition at home. A fleet of a hundred vessels
sailed under his command for the relief of Rochelle. But. imposing
as was his force, the expedition was as disastrous as it was impolitic.
After an unsuccessful siege of the castle of St. Martin, the English
troops were forced to fall back along a narrow causeway to their
ships ; and in the retreat two thousand fell, without the loss of a single
man to their enemies.

The first result of Buckingham's fo!ly was to force on Charles, over-
whelmed as he was with debt and shame, the summoning of a new
Parliament ; a Parliament which met in a mood even more resolute
than the last. The Court candidates were everywhere rejected. The
patriot leaders were triumphantly returned. To have suffered in the
recent resistance to arbitrary taxation was the sure road to a seat. In
spite of Eliot's counsel, even the question of Buckingham's removal
gave place to the craving for redress of wrongs done to personal liberty.
" We must vindicate our ancient liberties," said Sir Thomas Wentworth,
in words soon to be remembered against himself : " we must reinforce
the laws made by our ancestors. We must set such a stamp upon them,
as no licentious spirit shall dare hereafter to invade them." Heedless
of sharp and menacing messages from the King, of demands that they
should take his " royal word " for their liberties, the House bent itself
to one great work, the drawing up a Petition of Right. The statutes
that protected the subject against arbitrary taxation, against loans and
benevolences, against punishment, outlawry, or deprivation of goods,
otherwise than by lawful judgment of his peers, against arbiuary
imprisonment without stated charge, against billeting of soldiery on the
people or enactment of martial law in time of peace, were formally
recited. The breaches of them under the last two sovereigns, and
above all since the dissolution of the last Parliament, were recited as
formally. At the close of this significant list, the Commons prayed
" that no man hereafter be compelled to make or yield any gift, loan,
benevolence, tax, or such like charge, without common consent by Act
of Parliament. And that none be called to make answer, or to take
such oaths, or to be confined or otherwise molested or disputed con-
cerning the same, or for refusal thereof. And that no freeman may
in such manner as is before mentioned be imprisoned or detained.
And that your Majesty would be pleased to remove the said soldiers
and mariners, and that your people may not be so burthened in time
to come. And that the commissions for proceeding by martial law
may be revoked and annulled, and that hereafter no commissions of
like nature may issue forth to any person or persons whatsoever to be
executed as aforesaid, lest by colour of them any of your Majesty's
subjects be destroyed and put to death, contrary to the laws and
franchises of the land. All which they humbly pray of your most
excellent Majesty, as their rights and liberties, according to the laws

Sec. III.
The Kinc

AND THK

Parlia<

MENT

leaa

leae

The
Petition
of Rlffbt

The Parlia.

ment of

1628

" '

.1 i

5oa

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.
The Kino

AND THK

Parlia-
ment

laaa

1689

The
Death of
Bucking-
ham

and statutes of the realm. And that your Majesty would aUo
vouchsafe to declare that the awards, doings, and proceedings to the
prejudice of your people in any of the premisses shall not be drawn
hereafter into consequence or example. And that your Majesty
would be pleased graciously for the further comfort and safety of your
people to declare your royal will and pleasure, that in the things
aforesaid all your officers and ministers shall serve you according to
the laws and statutes of this realm, as they tender the honour of your
Majesty and the prosperity of the kingdom." It was in vain that the
Lords desired to conciliate Charles by a reservation of his " sovereign
power." " Our petition," Pym quietly replied, " is for th*? laws of
England, and this power seems to be another power distinct from
the power of the law." The Lords yielded, but Charles gave an
evasive reply ; and the failure of the more moderate counsels for
which his own had been set aside, called Eliot again to the front.
In a speech of unprecedented boldness he moved the presentation
to the King of a Remonstrance on the state of the realm. But
at the moment when he again touched on Buckingham's removal
as the preliminary of any real improvement the Speaker of the
House interposed. " There was a command laid on him," he said,
"to interrupt any that should go about to lay an aspersion on the
King's ministers." The breach of their privilege of free speech
produced a scene in the Commons such as St. Stephen's had never
witnessed before. Eliot sate abruptly down amidst the solemn silence
of the House. " Then appeared such a spectacle of passions," says
a letter of the time, " as the like had seldom been seen in such an
assembly ; some weeping, some 'expostulating, some prophesying of
the fatal ruin of our kingdom, soine playing the divmes in confessing
their sins and country's sins wiiich drew these judgements upon us,
some finding, as it were, fault with those that wept. There were above
an hundred weeping eyes, many who offered to speak being interrupted
and silenced by their own passions." Pym himself rose only to sit
down choked with tears. At last Sir Edward Coke found words to
blame himself for the timid counsels which had checked Eliot at the
beginning of the Session, and to protest " that the author and source
of all those miseries was the Duke of Buckingham."

Shouts of assent greeted the resolution to insert the Duke's name in
their Remonstrance. But at this moment Charles gave way. To win
supplies for a new expedition to Rochelle, Buckingham bent the King |
to consent to the Petition of Right. As Charles understood it, indeed,
the consent meant little. The point for which he really cared was the I
power of keeping men in prison without bringing them to trial or
assigning causes for their imprisonment. On this he had consulted
his judges ; and they had answered that his consent to the Petition
left his rights untouched ; like other laws, they said, the Petition would

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

503

have to be interpreted when it came before them, and the prerogative
remained unaffected. As to the rest, while waiving all claim to levy taxes
not granted by Parliament, Charles still reserved his right to levy impo-
sitions paid customarily to the Crown, and amongst these he counted
tonnage and poundage. Of these reserves however the Commons knew
nothing. The King's consent won a grant of subsidy from the Parliament,
and such a ringing of bells and lighting of bonfires from the people '* as
were ne\'€r seen but upon his majesty's return from Spain." But, like
all Charles's concessions, it came too late to effect the end at which he
aimed. The Commons persisted in presenting their Remonstrance.
Charles received it coldly and ungraciously ; while Buckingham, who
had stood defiantly at his master's side as he was denounced, fell on
his knees to speak. " No, George ! " said the King as he raised him ;
and his demeanour gave emphatic proof that the Duke's favour re-
mained undiminished. " We will perish together, George," he added
at a later time, " if thou dost." No shadow of his doom, in fact, had
fallen over the brilliant favourite, when, after the prorogation of the
Parliament, he set out to take command of a new expedition for the
relief of Rochelle. But a lieutenant in the army, John Felton, soured
by neglect and wrongs, had found in the Remonstrance some fancied
sanction for the revenge he plotted ; and, mixing with the throng
which crowded the hall at Portsmouth, he stabbed Buckingham to the
heart. Charles flung himself on his bed in a passion of tears when the
news reached him ; but outside the Court it was welcomed with a burst
of joy. Young Oxford bachelors, grave London aldermen, vied with
each other in drin'^ing healths to Felton. " God bless thee, little
David," cried an o) \ woman, as the murderer passed manacled by ;
" the Lord comfort thee," shouted the crowd, as the Tower gates closed
on him. The very crews of the Duke's armament at Portsmouth
shouted to the King, as he witnessed their departure, a prayer that he
would " spare John Felton, their sometime fellow soldier." But what-
ever national hopes the fall of Buckingham had aroused were quickly
dispelled. Weston, a creature of the Duke, became Lord Treasurer,
and his system remained unchanged. " Though our Achan is cut off,"
said Eliot, " the accursed thing remains."

It seemed as if no act of Charles could widen the breach which
his reckless lawlessness had made between himself and hib subjects.
But there was one thing dearer to England than free speech in
Parliament, than security for property, or even personal liberty ; and
that one thing was, in the phrase of the day, " the Gospel." The gloom
which at the outset of this reign we saw settling down on every Puritan
heart had deepened with each succeeding year. The great struggle
abroad had gone more and more against Protestantism, and at this
moment the end of the cause seemed to have come. In Germany
Lutheran and Calvinist alike lay at last beneath the heel of the Catholic

Src. hi.

Thr Kino

AM) THP.

Paklia*

MENT
TO

iea9

1628

The
Quarrel

of
Reliffion

H). <

. u

504

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sic. III.
Thb King

AND THE

Par LI A-

MBNT

laaa

leaa

The

Laudian

Clergy

The
Avmval

}

House of Austria. The fall of Rochelle after Buckingham's death
seemed to leave the Huguenots of France at the feet of a Roman
Cardinal. While England was thrilling with excitement at the thought
that her own hour of deadly peril might come again, as it had come
in the year of the Armada, Charles raised Laud to the Bishopric of
London, ai«d entrusted him with the direction of ecclesiastical affairs.
To the excited Protestantism of the country, Laud and the Churchmen
whom he headed seemed a danger really more formidable than the
Popery which was making such mighty strides abroad. To the Puri-
tans they were traitors to God and their country at once. Their aim
was to draw the Church of England farther away from the Protestant
Churches and nearer to the Church which Protestants regarded as
Babylon. They aped Roman ceremonies. Cautiously and tentatively
they were introducing Roman doctrine. But they had none of the
sacerdotal independence which Rome had at any rate preserved.
They were abject in their dependence on the Crown. Their gratitude
for the royal protection which enabled them to defy the religious
instincts of the realm showed itself in their erection of the most
dangerous pretensions of the monarchy into religious dogmas.
Archbishop Whitgift declared James to have been inspired by
God. They preached passive obedience to the worst tyranny. They
declared the person and goods of the subject to be at the King's
absolute disposal. They were ti'.rning religion into a systematic attack
on English liberty. Up to this lime they had been little more than a
knot of courtly ecclesiastics, for the mass of the clergy, like their flocks,
were steady Puritans ; but the energy of Laud, and the patronage of
the Court, promised a speedy increase of their numbers and their
power. Sober men looked forward to a day when every pulpit would
be ringing with exhortations to passive obedience, with denunciations
of Calvinism and apologies for Rome. Of all the members of the
House of Commons Eliot was least fanatical in his natural bent, but
the religious crisis swept away for the moment all other thoughts from
his mind. " Danger enlarges itself in so great a measure," he wrote
from the country, " that nothing but Heaven shrouds us from despair."
The House met in the same temper. The first business called up was
that of religion. " The Gospel," Eliot burst forth, " is that Truth in
which this kingdom has been happy through a long and rare prosperity.
This ground, therefore, let us lay for a foundation of our building, that
that Truth, not with words, but with actions we will maintain!"
"There is a ceremony," he went on, " used in th-* Eastern Churches,
of standing at the repetition of the Creed, to testify their purpose to
maintain it, not only with their bodies upright, but with their swords
drawn. Give me leave to call that a custom very commendable!"
The Commons answered their leader's challenge by a solemn avowal.
They avowed that they held for truth that sense of the Articles as

■i;

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

505

established by Parliament, which by the public act of the Church, and
the general and current exposition of the writers of their Church,
had been delivered unto them. But the debates over religion were
suddenly interrupted. The Commons, who had deferred all grant of
customs till the wrong done in the illegal levy of them was re-
dressed, had summoned the farmers of those dues to the bar ; but
though they appeared, they pleaded the King's command as a ground
for their refusal to answer. The House was proceeding to a pro-
test, when the Speaker signified that he had received an order to
adjourn. Dissolution was clearly at hand, and the long-suppressed
indignation broke out in a scene of strange disorder. The Speaker
was held down in the chair, while Eliot, still clinging to his great
principle of ministerial responsibility, denounced the new Treasurer
as the adviser of the measure. " None have gone about to break
Parliaments," he added in words to which after events gave a terrible
significance, " but in the end Parliaments have broken them." The
doors were locked, and in spite of the Speaker's protests, of the
repeated knocking of the usher at the door, and of the gathering
tumult within the House itself, the loud " Aye, Aye " of the bulk of
the members supported Eliot in his last vindication of English liberty.
By successive resolutions the Commons declared whomsoever should
bring in innovations in religion, or whatever minister endorsed the
levy of subsidies not granted in Parliament, " a capital enemy to the
kingdom and commonwealth," and every subject voluntarily complying
with illegal acts and demands " a betrayer of the liberty of England
and an enemy of the same."

Section IV.— New England.

•

[Authorities. — The admirable account of American colonization given by
Mr. Bancroft (** History of the United States") maybe corrected in some
points of detail by Mr. Gardiner's History. For Laud h mself, see his re-
markable "Diary" and his Correspondence. His work a^ Lambeth is
described in Prynne's scurrilous " Canterbury's Doom."] (Mr. Doyle's book
"The English in America " has appeared since this list was drawn up. — Ed.)

The dissolution of the Parliament of 1629 marked the darkest hour
of Protestantism, whether in England or in the world at large. But it
was in this hour of despair that the Puritans won their noblest
triumph. They " turned," to use Canning's words in a far truer and
grander sense than that which he gave to them, they "turned to
the New World to redress the balance of the Old." It was during the
years of tyranny which followed the close of the third Parlia nent of
Charles that a great Puritan emigration founded the States of New
England.

The Puritans were far from being the earliest among the English
colonists of North America. There w.is little in the circumstances

Sec. III.
Thb Kinc;

AND THr

Parlia-
ment

leaa

1089

Dissolution
o/tht

Parliamtnl
1629

England

and the

New

World

t ^

'<\

yWf

!,•

'••i
.1 *

%l\

'a.

5oG

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

New
England

1576

1584

1606

which attended the first discovery of the Western world which pro-
mised well for freedom ; its earliest result, indeed, was to give an
enormous impulse to the most bigoted and tyrannical among the
powers of Europe, and to pour the wealth of Mexico and Peru into the
treasury of Spain. But while the Spanish galleons traversed the
Southern seas, and Spanish settlers claimed the southern part of the
great continent for the Catholic crown, a happy instinct drew English-
men to the ruder and more barren districts along the shore of
Northern America. England had reached the mainland even earlier
than Spain, for before Columbus touched its shores Sebastian Cabot,
a seaman of Genoese blood born and bred in England, sailed with an
English crew from Bristol in 1497, and pushed along the coast of
America to the south as far as Florida, and northward as high &?
Hudson's Bay. But no Englishman followed on the track of this bold
adventurer ; and while Spain built up her empire in the New World,
the Englisn seamen reaped a humbler harvest in the fisheries of
Newfoundland. It was not till the reign of Elizabeth that the thoughts
of Englishmen turned again to the New World. The dream of finding
a passage to Asia by a voyage round the northern coast of the American
continent drew a west-country seaman, Martin Frobisher, to the coast
of Labrador, and the news which he brought back of the existence of
gold mines tuere set adventurers cruising among the icebergs of
Baffin's Bay. Luckily the quest of gold proved a vain one ; and the
nobler spirits among those who had engaged in it turned to plans of
colonization. But the country, vexed by long winters and thinly
peopled by warlike tribes of Indians, gave a rough welcome to the
earlier colonists. After a fruitless attempt to form a settlement. Sir |
Humphry Gilbert, one of the noblest spirits of his time, turned home-
wards again, to find his fate in the stormy seas. " We are as near to I
Heaven by sea as by land," were the famous words he was heard to
utter, ere the light of his little bark was lost for ever in the darkness
of the night. An expedition sent by his half-brother, Sir Walter
Ralegh, explored Pamlico Sound ; and the country they discovered,!
a country where, in their poetic fancy, " men lived after the manner
of the Golden Age," received from Elizabeth, the Virgin Queen, thef
name of Virginia. The introduction of tobacco and of the potato into I
Europe dates from Ralegh's discovery ; but the energy of his settlersi
was distracted by the delusive dream of gold, the hostility of the native!
tribes drove them from the coast, and it is through the gratitude ofl
later times for what he strove to do, rather than for what he did, thatf
Raleigh, the capital of N orth Carolina, preserves his name. The firsti
permanent settlement on the Chesapeake was effected in the beginningl
of the reign of James the First, and its success was due to the convicT
tion of the settlers that the secret of the New World's conquest layj
simply in labour. Among the hundred and five colonists who originallyl

[chap.

ch pro-
give an
ong the
into the
•sed the
rt of the
English-
shore of
n earlier
1 Cabot,
with an
coast of
high a?
this bold
V World,
heries of
thoughts
jf finding
\merican
the coast
istence of
'bergs of
t and the
I plans of
nd thinly
ae to the
ment, Sir
ed home-
s near to
heard to
darkness
ir Walter
scovered,
manner
ueen, the
otato into
s settlers
the native
atitude of
5 did, that
The first
beginning
le convic-
iquest lay
originally

HE AMERICAN COLONIES
IN ie4o

Scale of Statute Miles

O 60 lOO ISO

London; Mai-mUlan &• (!?

Stantbrclj,' Cieugntphical, SstabUshmmt.

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

landed, forty-eight were gentlemen, and only twelve were tillers of the
soil. Their leader, John Smith, however, not only explored the vast
bay of Chesapeake and discovered the Potomac and the Susquehannah,
but held the little company together in the face of famine and desertion
till the colonists had learnt the lesson of toil. In his letters to the
colonizers at home he set resolutely aside the dream of gold. " Nothing
is to be expected thence," he wrote of the new country, " but by
labour ; " and supplies of labourers, aided by a wise allotment of lands
to each colonist, secured after five years of struggle the fortunes of
Virginia. " Men fell to building houses and planting corn ; " the very
streets of Jamestown, as their capital was called from the reigning
sovereign, were sown with tobacco ; and in fifteen years the colony
numbered five thousand souls.

The laws and representative institutions of England were first intro-
duced into the New World in the settlement of Virginia : some years
later a principle as unknown to England as it was to the greater part
of Europe found its home in another colony, which received its name
of Maryland from Henrietta Maria, the Queen of Charles the First.
Calvert, Lord Baltimore, one of the best of the Stuart counsellors,
was forced by his conversion to Catholicism to seek a shelter for
himself and colonists of his new faith in the district across the Potomac,
and round the head of the Chesapeake. As a purely Catholic settle-
ment was impossible, he resolved to open the new colony to men of
every faith. "No person within this province," ran the earliest
law of Maryland, " professing to believe in Jesus Christ, shall be in
any ways troubled, molested, or discountenanced for his or her
religion, or in the free exercise thereof." Long however before Lord
Baltimore's settlement in Maryland, only a few years indeed after
the settlement of Smith in Virginia, the church of Brownist or Inde-
pendent refugees, whom we saw driven in the reign of James to
Amsterdam, had resolved to quit Holland and find a home in the
wilds of the New World. They were little disheartened by the tidings
of suffering which came from the Virginian settlement. " We are well
weaned," wrote their minister, John Robinson, "from the delicate
milk of the mother-country, and inured to the difficulties of a strange
land : the people are industrious and frugal. We are knit together
as a body in a most sacred covenant of the Lord, of the violation
whereof we make great conscience, and by virtue whereof we hold
ourselves strictly tied to all care of each other's good and of the whole.
It is not with us as with men whom small things can discourage."
Returning from Holland to Southampton, they started in two small
vessels for the new land : but one of these soon put back, and only
its companion, the Mayflower ^ a bark of a hundic;d and eighty tons,
with forty-one emigrants and their families on board, persisted in pro-
secuting its voyage. The little company of the " Pilgrim Fathers," as

507

"^M

Sec. IV.

New
Englahd

* ;,

•V i !

The
Pilgrim
Fathers

1634

h':

: \

1620

- '-'ml

.'X ') \

5o8

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sbc. IV.

New
England

The
Puritan
Emigra-
tion

l| 1629

1630

after-times loved to call them, landed on the barren coast of Massa-
chusetts at a spot to which they gave the name of Plymouth, in
memory of the last English port at which they touched. They had
soon to face the long hard winter of the north, to bear sickness
and famine : even when these years of toil and suffering had passed
there was a time when " they knew not at night where to have a bit in
the morning." Resolute and industrious as they were, their progress
was very slow ; and at the end of ten years they numbered only three
hundred souls. But small as it was, the colony was now firmly esta-
blished and the struggle for mere existence was over. " Let it not be
grievous unto you," some of their brethren had written from England
to the poor emigrants in the midst of their sufferings, " that you have
been instrumental to break the ice for others. The honour shall be
yours to the world's end."

From the moment of their establishment the eyes of the English
Puritans were fixed on the little Puritan settlement in North America.
Through the early years of Charles projects were canvassed for a new
settlement beside the little Plymouth ; and the aid which the mer-
chants of Boston in Lincolnshire gave to the realization of this project
was acknowledged in the name of its capital. At the moment when
he was dissolving his third Parliament, Charles granted the charter
which established the colony of Massachusetts ; and by the Puritans at
large the grant was at once regarded as a Providential call. Out of
the failure of their great constitutional struggle, and the pressing
danger to " godliness " in England, rose the dream of a land in the
West where religion and liberty could fina a safe and lasting home.
The Parliament was hardly dissolved, when "conclusions" for the
establishment of a great colony on the other side the Atlantic were
circulating among gentry and traders, and descriptions of the new
country of Massachusetts were talked over in every Puritan household.
The proposal was welcomed with the quiet, stern enthusiasm which
marked the temper of the time ; but the words of a well-known emi-
grant show how hard it was even for the sternest enthusiasts to tear
themselves from their native land. " I shall call that my country,"
said the younger Winthrop, in answer to feelings of this sort, " where I
may most glorify God and enjoy the presence of my dearest friends."
The answer was accepted, and the Puritan emigration began on a
scale such as England had never before seen. The two hundred who
first sailed for Salem were soon followed by John Winthrop with eight
hundred men ; and seven hundred more followed ere the first year of the
king's personal rule had run its course. Nor were the emigrants, like
the earlier colonists of the South, " broken men," adventurers, bank-
rupts, criminals ; or simply poor men and artisans, like, the Pilgrim
Fathers of the Mayflower, They were in great part men of the pro-
fessional and middle classes ; some of them men of large landed estate,

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

some zealous clergymen like Cotton, Hooker, and Roger Williams,
some shrewd London lawyers, or young scholars from Oxford. The
bulk were God-fearing farmers from Lincolnshire and the Eastern
counties. They desired in fact " only the best " as sharers in their
enterprise ; men driven forth from their fatherland not by earthly
want, or by the greed of gold, or by the lust of adventure, but by the
fear of God, and the zeal for a godly worship. But strong as was
their zeal, it was not without a wrench that they tore themselves
from their English homes. " Farewell, dear England ! " was the cry
which burst from the first little company of emigrants as its shores
faded from their sight. " Our hearts," wrote Winthrop's followers to
the brethren whom they had left behind, " shall be fountains of tears
for your everlasting welfare, when we shall be in our poor cottages in
the wilderness."

During the next two years, as the sudden terror which had found so
violent an outlet in Eliot's warnings died for the moment away,
there was a lull in the emigration. But the measures of Laud soon
revived the panic of the Puritans. The shrewdness of James had read
the very heart of the man when Buckingham pressed for his first
advancement to the see of St. David's. " He hath a restless spirit," said
the old King, " which cannot see when things are well, but loves to
toss and change, and to bring matters to a pitch of reformation floating
in his own brain. Take him with you, but by my soul you will repent
it." Cold, pedantic, superstitious as he was (he notes in his diary the
entry of a robin-redbreast into his study as a matter of grave moment),
William Laud rose out of the mass of court-prelates by his industry,
his personal unselfishness, his remarkable capacity for administration.
At a later period, when immersed in State-business, he found time
to acquire so complete a knowledge of commercial affairs that the
London merchants themselves owned him a master in matters of trade.
Of statesmanship indeed he had none. But Laud's influence was really
derived from the unity of his purpose. He directed all the power of a
clear, narrow mind and a dogged will to the realization of a single aim.
His resolve was to raise the Church of England to what he conceived
to be its real position as a branch, though a reformed branch, of the
great Catholic Church throughout the world ; protesting alike against
the innovations of Rome and the innovations of Calvin, and basing its
doctrines and usages on those of the Christian communion in the cen-
turies which preceded the Council of Nicaea. The first step in the
realization of such a theory was the severance of whatever ties had
hitherto united the English Church to the Reformed Churches of the
Continent. In Laud's view episcopal succession was of the essence of
a Church, and by their rejection of bishops, the Lutheran and Calvin-
istic Churches of Germany and Switzerland had ceased to be Churches
at all. The freedom of worship therefore which had been allowed to

509

Sec. IV.

New
England

Iiaud

and the

Puritans

i '1

P i

■?y

i;|-|i^

^i: .

■ '■' -

: !

5IO

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

New
England

Land as
Archbishop

1633

the Huguenot refugees from France, or the Walloons from Flanders,
was suddenly withdrawn ; and the requirement of conformity with the
Anglican ritual drove them in crowds from the southern ports to seek
toleration in Holland. The same conformity was required from the
English soldiers and merchants abroad, who had hitherto attended
without scruple the services of the Calvinistic churches. The English
ambassador in Paris was forbidden to visit the Huguenot conventicle
at Charenton. As Laud drew further from the Protestants of the Con-
tinent, he drew, consciously or unconsciously, nearer to Rome. His
theory owned Rome as a true branch of the Church, though severed
from that of England by errors and innovations against which Laud
vigorously protested. But with the removal of these obstacles reunion
would naturally follow, and his dream was that of bridging over the
gulf which ever since the Reformation had parted the two Churches.
The secret offer of a cardinal's hat proved Rome's sense that Laud
was doing his work for her ; while his rejection of it, and his own
reiterated protestations, prove equally that he was doing it uncon-
sciously. Union with the great body of Catholicism, indeed, he
regarded as a work which only time could bring about, but for which
he could prepare the Church of England by raising it to a higher
standard of Catholic feeling and Catholic practice. The great ob-
stacle in his way was the Puritanism of nine-tenths of the English
people, and on Puritanism he made war without mercy. No sooner
had his elevation to the see of Canterbury placed him at the head of
the English Church, than he turned the High Commission into a
standing attack on the Puritan ministers. Rectors and vicars were
scolded, suspended, deprived for "Gospel preaching." The use of
the surplice, and the ceremonies most offensive to Puritan feeling, were
enforced in every parish. The lectures founded in towns, which were
the favourite posts of Puritan preachers, were rigorously suppressed.
They found a refuge among the country gentlemen, and the Archbishop
withdrew from the country gentlemen the privilege of keeping chap-
lains, which they had till then enjoyed. As parishes became vacant
the High Church bishops had long been filling them with men who
denounced Calvinism, and declared passive obedience to the sovereign
to be part of the law of God. The Puritans soon felt the stress of this
process, and endeavoured to meet it by buying up the appropriations
of livings, and securing through feoffees a succession of Protestant
ministers in the parishes of which they were patrons : but Laud cited
the feoffees before the Court of Exchequer, and roughly put an end to
them. Nor was the persecution confined to the clergy. Under the two
last reigns the small pocket-Bibles called the Geneva Bibles had become
universally popular amongst English laymen ; but their marginal notes
were found to savour of Calvinism, and their importation was pro-
hibited. The habit of receivii:g the communion in a sitting posture

had becom

VIII.]

I'URITAN ENGLAND.

had become common, but kneeling was now enforced, and hundreds
were excommunicated for refusing to comply with the injunction. A
more gaUing means of annoyance was found in the different views of
the two religious parties on the subject of Sunday. The Puritans
identified the Lord's day with the Jewish Sabbath, and transferred to
the one the strict observances which were required for the other. The
Laudian clergy, on the other hand, regarded it simply as one among
the holidays of the Church, and encouraged their flocks in the pastimes
and recreations after service which had been common before the
Reformation. The Crown under James had taken part with the High
Churchmen, and had issued a " Book of Sports " which recommended
certain games as lawful and desirable on the Lord's day. The Parlia-
ment, as might be expected, was stoutly on the other side, and had
forbidden Sunday pastimes by statute. 1 he general religious sense of
the country was undoubtedly tending to a stricter observance of the
day, when Laud brought the contest to a sudden issue. He summoned
the Chief- Justice, Richardson, who had enforced the statute in the
western shires, to the Council-table, and rated him so violently that the
old man came out complaining he had been all but choked by a pair of
lawn sleeves. He then ordered every minister to read the declaration
in favour of Sunday pastimes from the pulpit. One Puritan minister
had the wit to obey, and to close the reading with the significant hint,
" You have heard read, good people, both the commandment of God
and the commandment of man. Obey which you please." But the
bulk refused to comply with the Archbishop's will. The result followed
at which Laud no doubt had aimed. Puritan ministers were cited
before the High Commission, and silenced or deprived. In the
diocese of Norwich alone thirty parochial ministers were expelled
from their cures.

The suppression of Puritanism in the ranks of the clergy was only a
prelimir^ary to the real work on which the Archbishop's mind was set,
the preparation for Catholic reunion by the elevation of the clergy to
a Catholic standard in doctrine and ritual. Laud publicly avowed his
preference of an unmarried to a married priesthood. Some of the
bishops, and a large part of the new clergy who occupied the posts
from which the Puritan ministers had been driven, advocated doctrines
and customs which the Reformers had denounced as sheer Papistry ;
the practice, for instance, of auricular confession, a Real Presence in
the Sacrament, or prayers for the dead. One prelate, Montague, was
earnest for reconciliation with Rome. Another, Goodman, died acknow-
ledginghimself a Papist. Meanwhile Laud was indefatigable in his efforts
to raise the civil and political status of the clergy to the point which it
had reached ere the fatal blow of the Reformation fell on the priest-
hood. Among the archives of his see lies a large and costly volume in
vellum, containing a copy of such records in the Tower as concerned

Sec. IV.

New
England

Sunday
pastimes

'633

Laud
and tbe
Clergy

! 1: V:

512

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

New

England

Laud ami
Ritual

the privileges of the clergy. Its compilation was entered in the
Archbishop's diary as one among the "twenty-one things which I
have projected to do if God bless me in them/' and as among the
fifteen to which before his fall he had been enabled to add his
emphatic " done." The power of the Bishops' Courts, which had long
fallen into decay, revived under his patronage. In 1636 he was able
to induce the King to raise a prelate, Juxon, Bishop of London, to the
highest civil post in the realm, that of Lord High Treasurer. " No
Churchman had it since Henry the Seventh's time," Laud comments
proudly. " I pray God bless him to carry it so that the Church may
have honour, and the State service and content by it. And now, if
the Church will not hold up themselves, under God I can do no more.'*
As he aimed at a more Catholic standard of doctrine in the clergy, so
he aimed at a nearer approach to the pomp of Catholicism in public
worship. His conduct in his own house at Lambeth brings out with
singular vividness the reckless courage with which he threw himself
across the religious instincts of a time when the spiritual aspect of
worship was overpowering in most men's minds its aesthetic and devo-
tional sides. Men noted as a fatal omen the accident which marked
his first enti / into Lambeth ; for the overladen ferry-boat upset in the
passage of the river, and though the horses and servants were saved,
the Archbishop's coach remained at the bottom of the Thames. But
no omen, carefully as he might note it, brought a moment's hesitation
to the bold, narrow mind of the new Primate. His first act, he boasted,
was the setting about a restoration of his chapel ; and, as Laud managed
it, his restoration was the simple undoing of all that had been done
there by his predecessors since the Reformation. The chapel of
Lambeth House was one of the most conspicuous among the eccle-
siastical buildings of the time ; it had seen the daily worship of
every Primate since Cranmer, and was a place " whither many of the
nobility, judges, clergy, and persons of all sorts, as well strangers as
natives, resorted." But all pomp of worship had gradually passed
away from it. Under Cranmer the stained glass was dashed from its
windows. In Elizabeth's time the communion table was moved into
the middle of the chapel, and the credence table destroyed. Under
James Archbishop Abbot put the finishing stroke on all attempts at a
high ceremonial. The cope was no longer used as a special vestment
in the communion. The Primate and his chaplains forbore to bow at
the name of Christ. The organ and choir were alike abolished, and
the service reduced to a simplicity which would have satisfied Calvin.
To Laud the state of the chapel seemed intolerable. With charac-
teristic energy he aided with his own hands in the replacement of the
painted glass in its windows, and racked his wits in piecing the frag-
ments together. The glazier was scandalized by the Primate's express
command to repair and set up again the " broken crucifix " in the east

His "new co

VIII. 1

PURITAN ENCT^ANT).

window. The holy table was removed from the centre, and set altar-
wise against the eastern wall, with a cloth of arras behind it, on which
was embroidered the history of the Last Supper. The elaborate
woodwork of the screen, the rich copes of the chaplain, the silver
candlesticks, the credence table, the organ and the choir, the stately
ritual, the bowings at the sacred name, the genuflexions to the altar,
made the chapel at last such a model of worship as Laud desired. It
he could not exact an equal pomp of devotion in other quarters, he
exacted as much as he could. Bowing to the altar was introduced
into all cathedral churches. A royal injunction ordered the removal
of the communion table, which for the last half-century or more had
in almost every parish c.urch stood in the middle of the nave, back to
its pre-Reformation position in the chancel, and secured it from pro-
fanation by a rail. The removal implied, and was understood to imply,
a recognition of the Real Presence, and a denial of the doctrine which
Englishmen generally held about the Lord's Supper. But, strenuous
as was the resistance Laud encountered, his pertinacity and severity
warred it down. Parsons who denounced the change from their pulpits
were fined, imprisoned, and deprived of their benefices. Church-
wardens who refused or delayed to obey the injunction were rated at
the Commission-table, and frightened into compliance.

In their last Remonstrance to the King the Commons had denounced
Laud as the chief assailant of the Protestant cha-icter of the Church of
England ; and every year of his Primacy showed him bent upon justify-
ing the accusation. His policy was iio longer the purely conservative
policy of Parker or Whitgift ; it was aggressive and revolutionary.
His "new counsels" threw whatever force there was in the feeling of
conservatism into the hands of the Puritan, for it was the Puritan who
now seemed to be defending the old character of the Church of England
against its Primate's attacks. But backed as Laud was by the power
of the Crown, the struggle became more hopeless every day. While
the Catholics owned that they had never enjoyed a like tranquillit)-,
while the fines for recusancy were reduced, and their worship suffered
to go on in private houses, the Puritan saw his ministers silenced or
deprived, his Sabbath profaned, the most sucred act of his worship
brought near, as he fancied, co the Roman mass. Roman doctrine
met him from the pulpit, Roman practices met him in the Church.
We can hardly wonder that with such a world around them " godly
people in England began to apprehend a special hand of Providence
in raising this plantation " in Massachusetts ; " and their hearts were
generally stirred to come over." It was in vain that weaker men
returned to bring news of hardships and dangers, and told how two
hundred of the new comers had perished with their first winter. A
letter from Winthrop told how the rest toiled manfully on. " We now
enjoy God and Jesus Christ," he wrote to those at home, " and is not

' L L

S13

Skc. IV,

New
England

•'1

The
Puritan
Colonies

I 'i

,ii<

"i. 1

(!■

ii4

msToKY OF TiiK i'N(;i.isn rForu:.

fCMAI'.

Sec. IV.

Nrw
Knci.ani)

that enough ? I thank God I like so well to be here >is I do not repent
my coming. I would not have altered my course though I had fore-
seen all these afflictions. I never had more content of mind." With
the strength and manliness of Puritanism, its bigotry and narrowness
had crossed the Atlantic too. Roger Williams, a young minister who
held the doctrine of freedom of conscience, was driven from the new
settlement, to become a preacher among the settlers of Rhode Island.
The bitter resentment stirred in the emigrants by persecution at home
was seen in their rejection of Episcopacy and their prohibition of the
use of the Book of Common Prayer. The intensity of its religious
sentiments turned the colony into a theocracy. " To the r^nd that the
body of the Commons may be preserved of honest and good men, it
was ordered and agreed that for the time to come no man shall be
admitted to the freedom of the body politic but such as are members
of some of the churches within the bounds of the same." As the con-
test grew hotter at home the number of Puritan emigrants rose fast.
Three thousand new colonists arrived from England in a single year.
The growing stream of emigrants marks the terrible pressure of the
time. Between the sailing of Winthrop's expedition and the assembly
of the Long Parliament, in the space, that is, often or eleven years,
two hundred emigrant ships had crossed the Atlantic, and twenty
thousand Englishmen had found a refu^^e in the West.

The Sus-
pension
of Par-
liament

Mar. 1629

rhe policy 0/
Charles

Section v.— The Personal Oovemment. 1629—1640.

[Authorities. — For the general events of the time, see previous sections.
The "Strafford Letters," and the Calendars of Domestic State Papers for this
period give its real history. " Baillie's Letters " tell the story of the Scotch
rising. Generally, Scotch affairs may be studied in Mr. Burton's *' History of
Scotland." Portraits of Weston, and most of the statesmen of this period, may
be found in the earlier part of Clarendon's " History of the Rebellion."]

At the opening of his third Parliament Charles had hinted in
ominous words that the continuance of Parliament at all depended on
its compliance with his will. " If you do not your duty," said the
King, " mine would then order me to use those other means which
God has put into my hand." The threat, however, failed to break the
resistance of the Commons, and the ominous words passed into a
settled policy. " We have showed," said a proclamation which fol-
lowed on the dissolution of the Houses, " by our frequent meeting our
people, our love to the use of Parliament ; yet, the late abuse having
for the present driven us unwillingly out of that course, we shall account
it presumption for any to prescribe any time unto us for Parliament."

No Parliament in fact met for eleven years. But it would be unfair
to charge the King at the outset of this period with any definite
scheme of establishing a tyranny, or of changing what he con-
ceived to be the older constitution of the realm. He " hated the ver)'

VIII.]

PUKITAN i:n(;lani).

nDne of Parliaments," but in spite of his hate he had as yet no settled
purpose of abolishing them. His belief was that England would in
time recover its senses, and that then Parliament might rc-assemble
without inconvenience to the Crown. In the interval, however long it
might be, he proposed to govern single-handed by the use of "those
means which God had put into his hands." Resistance, indeed, he
was resolved to put down. The leaders of the popular party in the
last Parliament were thrown into prison ; and Eliot died, the first
martyr of English liberty, in the Tower. Men were forbidden to speak
of the reassembling of a Parliament. But here the King stopped. The
opportunity which might have suggested dreams of organized despotism
to a Richelieu, suggested only means of filling his Exchequer to Charles.
He had in truth neither the grander nor the meaner instincts of a born
tyrant. He did not seek to gain an absolute power over his people,
because he believed that his absolute power was already a part of the
constitution of the country. He set up no standing army to secure it,
partly because he was poor, but yet more because his faith in his
position was such that he never dreamed of any effectual resistance.
His expedients for freeing the Crown from that dependence on
Parliaments against which his pride as a sovereign revolted were
simply peace and economy. To secure the first he sacrificed an
opportunity greater than ever his father had trodden under foot. The
fortunes of the great struggle in Germany were suddenly reversed at this
juncture by the appearance of Gustavus Adolphus, with a Swedish army,
in the heart of Germany. Tilly was defeated and slain ; the Catholic
League humbled in the dust ; Munich, the capital of its Bavarian leader,
occupied by'''e Swedish army, and the Lutheran princes of North
Germany freed from the pressure of the Imperial soldiery ; while the
Emperor himself, trembling within the walls of Vienna, was driven to call
for aid from Wallenstein, an adventurer whose ambition he dreaded, but
whose army could alone arrest the progress of the Protestant conqueror.
The ruin that James had wrought was suddenly averted ; but the
victories of Protestantism had no more power to draw Charles out of
the petty circle of his politics at home than its defeats had had power to
draw James out of the circle of his imbecile diplomacy. When Gustavus,
on the point of invading Germany, appealed for aid to England and
France, Charles, left penniless by the dissolution of Parliament,
resolved on a policy of peace, withdrew his ships from the Baltic,
and opened negotiations with Spain, which brought about a treaty
on the virtual basis of an abandonment of the Palatinate. Ill luck
clung to him in peace as in war. The treaty was hardly concluded
when Gustavus began his wonderful career of victory. Charles strove
at once to profit by his success, and a few Scotch and English regi-
ments followed Gustavus in his reconquest of the Palatinate. But the
conqueror demanded, as the price of its restoration to Frederick, that

L L 2

5«S

Skc. V.

The

Pkksonai.

<!oVKKN-
MFN r

1640

. 1

Fituf

1630

' H

4 fi

3 1

5»^>

HISTORY OF TIIK ENGLISH TKOPLK.

[chap.

Skc. V.

Thk

I'kkkunai.

(ioVKKN-
MENT

iea»

1640

The

Klnc's

Rule

The Star
Chamber

Ch.irlcs shoultl a^Min declare war upon Spain ; and this was a price
that the Kini; would not pay, determined as he was not to pUinge into
a combat which wouhl a^'ain force him to summon Parliament. His
whole attention was absorbed by the pressing question of revenue.
The debt was a lar^c one ; and the ordinary income of the Crown,
unaided by parliamentary supplies, was in.idequate to meet its ordinary
expenditure. Charles himself was fruj,'al and laborious ; and the
economy of Weston, the new Lord Treasurer, whom he made Earl of
Portland, contrasted .idvantajjeously with the waste and extravagance
of the government under Buckingham. But economy failed to close
the yawning gulf of the treasury, and the course into which Charles
was driven by the financial pressure showed with how wise a prescience
the Commons had fixed on the point of arbitrary taxation as the chief
danger to constitutional freedom.

It is curious to see to what shifts the royal pride was driven in its
effort at once to fill the Exchequer, and yet to avoid, as far as it could,
any direct breach of constitutional law in the imposition of taxes by the
sole authority of the Crown. The dormant powers of the prerogative
were strained to their utmost. The right of the Crown to force
knighthood on the landed gentry was revived, in order to squeeze
them into composition for the »efusal of it. Fines were levied on
them for the redress of defects in their title-deeds. A Commission of
the Forests exacted large sums from the neighbouring landowners for
their encroachments on Crown lands. London, the special object of
courtly dislike, on account of its stubborn Puritanism, v/as brought
within the sweep of royal extortion by the enforcement of an illegal
proclamation which James had issued, prohibiting its extension. Every
house throughout the large suburban districts in which the prohibition
had been disregarded was only saved from demolition by the payment
of three years* rental to the Crown. Though the Catholics were no
longer troubled by any active persecution, and the Lord Treasurer was
in heart a Papist, the penury of the Exchequer forced the Crown to
maintain the old system of fines for " recusancy." Vexatious measures
of extortion such as these v jre far less hurtful to the State than the
conversion of justice into a means of supplying the royal necessities
by means of the Star Chamber. The jurisdiction of the King's
Council had been revived by Wolsey as a check on the nobles ; and it
had received great developement, especially on the side of criminal
law, during the Tudor reigns. Forgery, perjury, riot, maintenance,
fraud, libel, and conspiracy, were the chief offences cognizable in this
court, but its scope extended to every misdemeanor, and especially to
charges where, from the imperfection of the common law, or the power
of offenders, justice was baffled in the lower courts. Its process
resembled that of Chancery : in State trials it acted on an informa-
tion laid before it by the King's Attorney. Both witnesses and accused

vm.l

PURITAN ENf;T,ANn.

5»7

were examined on oath by special interrojjatorics, and the Court was
at liberty to adjud^^c any punislmicnt short of death. However dis-
tinfjuishcd the Star Chamber was in ordinary cases for the learning
and fairness of its jud^jements, in political trials it was impossible to
hope for exact and impartial justice from a tribunal almost entirely
composed of privy councillors. The possession of such a weapon
would have been fat.il to liberty under a great tyrant ; under Charles It
was turned freely to the profit of the Kxchecjucr and the support of
arbitrary rule. ICnormous penalties were exacted for opposition to the
royal will, and though the fines imposed were often remitted, they served
as terrible engines of oppression. Fines such as these however affected
a smaller range of sufferers than the financial expedient to which Weston
had recourse in the renewal of monopolies. Monopolies, abandoned by
Klizabeth, and extinguished by Act of Parliament under Jatnes, were
again set on foot, and on a scale far more gigantic than had been
seen before ; the companies who undertook them paying a fixed duty
on their profits as well as a large sun> for the original concession of
the monopoly. Wine, soap, saU, and almost every article of domestic
consumption fell into the hands of mo.iopolists, and rose in price out of
all proportion to the profit gained by the Crown. "They sup in our
cup," Colepepper said afterwards in the Long Parliament," they dip in
our dish, they sit by our fire ; we find them in the dye-fat, the wash
bowls, and the powdering tub. They share with th.i cutler in his box.
They have marked and sealed us from head to foot." But in spite of
these expedients the Treasury would liave remained unfilled had not
the King persisted in those financial measures which had called forth
the protest of the Parliament. The exaction of customs duties went on
as of old at the ports. The resistance of the London merchants to their
payment was roughly put down ; and one of them. Chambers, who
complained bitterly that merchants were worse off in England than in
Turkey, was brought before the Star Chamber and ruined by a fine cf
two thousand pounds. It was by measures such as these that Charles
gained the bitter enmity of the great city whose strength and resources
were fatal to him in the coming war. The freeholders of the counties
were equally difficult to deal with. On one occasion, when those of
Cornwall were called together at Bodmin to contribute to a voluntary
loan, half the hundreds refused, and the yield of the rest came to little
more than two thousand pounds. One of the Cornishmen has left an
amusing record of the scene which took place before the Commissioners
appointed for assessment of the loan. " Some with great words and
threatenings, some with pert lasicns," he says, " were drawn to it. I
was like to have been complimented out of my money ; but knowing
with whom I had to deal, I held, when I talked with them, my hands
fast in my pockets."
By such means as these the debt was reduced, and the annual

Skc. v.
Tmk

I'i'.HSONAI,

(luVKRN-

MKNT

16fl0

i(>

1640

I'' i ties iiHif

Cuiionis

ill.

■ 1
1 llj

• I 1
L i

5iS

MtSTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAt*.

Sec. V.

The

Peksonai
Govern-
ment

1629

1640

General
Pros-
perity

Went-
Tvortli

revenue of the Crown increased. Nor wa? there much sign of active
discontent. Vexatious indeed and illegal as were the proceedings of
the Crown, there seems in these earlier years of personal rule to have
been little apprehension of any permanent danger to freedon. in the
country at large. To those who read the letters of the time there is
something inexpressibly touching in the general faith of their writers
in the ultimate victory of the Law. Charles was obstinate, but ob-
stinacy was too common a foible amongst Englishmen to rouse any
vehement resentment. The people were as stubborn as their King,
and their political sense told them that the slightest disturbance of
affairs must shake dowi the financial fabric which Charles was slowly
building up, and force him back on subsidies and a Parliament.
Meanwhile they would wait for better days, and their patience was
aided by the general prosperity of the country. The great Continental
wars threw wealth into English hands. The intercourse between Spain
and Flanders was carried on solely in English ships, and the English
flag covered the intercourse between Portuguese ports and the colonies
in Africa, India, and the Pacific. The long peace was producing its
ineviteible results in an extension of commerce and a rise of manufactures
in the towns of the West Riding of Yorkshire. Fresh land was being
brought into cultivation, and a great scheme was set on foot for reclaim-
ing the Fens. The new wealth of the country gentry, through the
increase of rent, was seen in the splendour of the houses which they
were raising. The contrast of this peace and prosperity with the ruin and
bloodshed of the Continent afforded a ready argument to the friends of
j the King's system. So tranquil was the outer appearance of the country
that in Court circles all sense of danger had disappeared. " Some of the
I greatest statesmen and privy councillors," says May, "would ordinarily
I laugh when the word, ' liberty of the subject,' was named." There were
I courtiers bold enough to express their hope that "the King would
I never need any more Parliaments." But beneath this outer calm "the
1 country," Clarendon honestly tells us while eulogizing the peace, "v/as
' full of pride and mutiny and discontent." Thousands were quitting
j England for America. The gentry held aloof from the Court. "The
common people in the generality and the country freeholders would
rationa'lly argue of their own rights and the oppressions which were
laid upon them." If Charles was content to deceive himself, there was
one man among his ministers who saw that the people were right in
their policy of patience, and that unless other measures were taken
the fabric of despotism would fall at the first breath of adverse fortune.
Sir Thomas Wentwoi th, a great Yorkshire landowner and one of the
representatives of his county, had stood during the Parliament of 1628
among the more prominent members of the popular party in the
Commons. But from the first moment of his appearance in public his
passionate desire had been to find employment in the service of the

((

VIII.]

Crown. /
with the C(
ministers,
the conscio
the jealous
flung by r
eloquence-
sustained, t
at Court ro
genius he ii
Yorkshire,
office, and
county
grace in tl
outburst of
openly, as <
revolted ag
worth's ain
longed for,
and noble
people, and
before this
this end tha
the Petition
nobler impi
under foot r
his words w
common lit
was thus h(
desire that
wonder at."
It is as SI
this. The (
that stood 1
throughout,
was admitte
determined,
ever from t
the faith in
his royal mj
with Laud
good grour
Wentworth,
of his life,
embodied.

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

Crown. At the close of the preceding reign he was already connected
with the Court, he had secured a seat in Yorkshire for one of the royal
ministers, and was believed to be on the high road to a peerage. But
the consciousness of political ability which spurred his ambition roused
the jealousy of Buckingham ; aiid the haughty pride of Wentworth was
flung by repeated slights into an attitude of opposition, which his
eloquence— grander in its sudden outbursts, though less earnest and
sustained, than that of Eliot — soon rendered formidable. His intrigues
at Court roused Buckingham to crush by a signal insult the rival whose
genius he instinctively dreaded. While sitting in his court as sheriff of
Yorkshire, Wentworth received the announcement of his dismissal from
office, and of the gift of his post to Sir John Savile, his rival in the
county. " Since they will thus weakly breathe on me a seeming dis-
grace in the public face of my country," he said with a characteristic
outburst of contemptuous pride, " I shall crave leave to wipe it away as
openly, as easily ! " His whole conception of a strong and able rule
revolted against the miserable government of the favourite. Went-
worth's aim was to force on the King, not such a freedom as Eliot
longed for, but such a system as the Tudors had clung to, where a large
and noble policy placed the sovereign naturally at the head of the
people, and where Parliaments sank into mere aids to the Crown. But
before this could be, Buckingham must be cleared away. It was with
this end that Wentworth sprang to the front of the Commons in urging
the Petition of Right. Whether in that crisis of Wentworth's life some
nobler impulse, some true passion for the freedom he was to trample
under foot mingled with his thirst for revenge, it is hard to tell. But
his words were words of fire. " If he did not faithfully insist for the
common liberty of the subject to be preserved whole and ei^tire," it
was thus he closed one of his speeches on the Petition, " it was his
desire that he might be set as a beacon on a hill for all men else to
wonder at."

It is as such a beacon that his name has stood from that time to
this. The death of Buckingham had no sooner removed the obstacle
that stood between his ambition and the end at which it had aimed
throughout, than the cloak of patriotism was flung by. Wentworth
was admitted to the royal Council, and he took his seat at the board
determined, to use his own phrase, to " vindicate the Monarchy for
ever from the conditions and restraints of subjects." So great was
the faith in his zeal and power which he knew how to breathe into
his royal master that he was at once raised to the peerage, and placed
with Laud in the first rank of the King's councillors. Charles had
good ground for this rapid confidence in his new minister. In
Wentworth, or as he is known from the title he assumed at the clos ,i
of his life, in the Earl of Strafford, the very genius of tyranny was
embodied. If he shared his master's belief that the arbitrary power

S»9

Sec. V.

The
Personal
Govern-
ment

1640

■ -■

^,1

Went-
ixrorth as
Minister

1629

f5 t

I .i!

520

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

1 1

Sec. V.

The
Personal
Govern-
ment

I6a9

1640

Went-

worth in

Ireland

which Charles was wielding formed part of the old constitution of the
country, and that the Commons had gone out of their "ancient
bounds" in limiting the royal prerogative, he was clear-sighted
enough to see that the only way of permanently establishing absolute
rule in England was not by reasoning, or by the force of custom,
but by the force of fear. His system was the expression of his
own inner temper ; and the dark gloomy countenance, the full heavy
eye, which meet us in Strafford's portrait are the best commentary
on his policy of " Thorough." It was by the sheer strength of
his genius, by the terror his violence inspired amid the meaner
men whom Buckingham had left, by the general sense of his power,
that he had forced himself upon the Court. He had none of the
small arts of a courtier. His air was that of a silent, proud,
passionate man ; when he first appeared at Whitehall his rough un-
courtly manners provoked a smile in the royal circle. But the smile
soon died into a general hate. The (2ueen, frivolous and meddlesome
as she was, detested him ; his fellow-ministers intrigued against him,
and seized on his hot speeches against the great lords, his quarrels
with the royal household, his transports of passion at the very Council-
table, to ruin him in his master's favour. The King himself, while
steadily supporting him against his rivals, was utterly unable to under-
stand his drift. Charles valued him as an administrator, disdainful
of private ends, crushing great and small with the same haughty
indifference to men's love or hate, and devoted to the one aim of
building up the power of the Crown. But in his purpose of preparing
for the great struggle with freedom which he saw before him, of building
up by force such a despotism in England as Richelieu was building up
in France, and of thus making England as great in Europe as France
had been made by Richelieu, he could look for little sympathy and less
help from the King.

Wentworth's genius turned impatiently to a sphere where it could
act alone, untrammelled by the hindrances it encountered at home.
His purpose was to prepare for the coming contest by the provision of
a fixed revenue, arsenals, fortresses, and a standing army, and it was
in Ireland that he resolved to find them. He saw in the miserable
country which had hitherto been a drain upon the resources of the
Crown the lever he needed for the overthrow of English freedom.
The balance of Catholic against Protestant in Ireland might be used
to make both parties dependent on the royal authority ; the rights of
conquest, which in Wentworth's theory vested the whole land in the
absolute possession of the Crown, gave him a large field for his ad-
ministrative ability ; and for the rest he trusted, and trusted justly, to
the force of his genius and of his will. In 1633 he was made Lord
Deputy, and five years later his aim seemed all but realized. " The
King," he wnjte to Laud, " is as absolute here as any prince in the

VIII. 1

world can
Archbishc
the island
strode ov
mutiny, w
war, and t
at public
livered the
a hundred
to feel thei
was repres
the sea wa
the linen n
first devek
Wentwortl
further enc
ing about
obliteratior
raised by
angered th
pension of
hood, whiU
Plantation
which left I
Crown. It 1
of ihe Irish
atrocities o
so terrible
hands. He
provide for
Charles hes
to read a le:
that dreade
will ; and h
House of I
villages, the
forced to ei
But precaut
the stern m
muttering, c
with a perfe
sand foot ai
result wouk
worth, " up(
subsist and

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

world can be." Wentworth's government indeed was a rule of terror.
Archbishop Usher, with almost every name which we can respect in
the island, was the object of his insult and oppression. His tyranny
strode over all legal bounds. A few insolent words, construed as
mutiny, were enough to bring Lord Mountnorris before a council of
war, and to inflict on him a sentence of death. But his tyranny aimed
at public ends, and in Ireland the heavy hand of a single despot de-
livered the mass of the people at any rate from the local despotism of
a hundred masters. The Irish landowners were for the first time made
to feel themselves amenable to the law. Justice was enforced, outrage
was repressed, the condition of the clergy was to some extent raised,
the sea was cleared of the pirates who infested it. The foundation of
the linen manufacture which was to bring wealth to Ulster, and the
first developement of Irish commerce, date from the Lieutenancy of
Wentworth. But good government was only a means with him for
further ends. The noblest work to be done in Ireland was the bring
ing about a reconciliation between Catholic and Protestant, and an
obliteration of the anger and thirst for vengeance which had been
raised by the Ulster Plantation. Wentworth, on the other hand,
angered the Protestants by a toleration of Catholic worship and a sus-
pension of the persecution which had feebly begun against the priest-
hood, while he fed the irritation of the Catholics by schemes for a
Plantation of Connaught. His purpose was to encourage a disunion
which left both parties dependent for support and protection on the
Crown. It was a policy which was to end in bringing about the horrors
of ihe Irish revolt, the vengeance of Cromwell, and the long series of
atrocities on both sides which make the story of the country he ruined
so terrible to tell. But for the hour it left Ireland helpless in his
hands. He doubled the revenue. He reorganized the army. To
provide for its support he ventured, in spite of the panic with which
Charles heard his project, to summon an Irish Parliament. His aim was
to read a lesson to England and the King, by showing how completely
that dreaded thing, a Parliament, could be made the organ of the royal
will ; and his success was complete. Two-thirds, indeed, of an Irish
House of Commons consisted of the representatives of wretched
villages, the pocket-bo'oughs of the Crown ; while absent peers were
forced to entrust their proxies to the Council to be used at its pleasure.
But precautions were hardly needed. The two Houses trembled at
the stern masler who bade their members not let the King " find them
muttering, or, to speak it more truly, mutinying in corners," and voted
with a perfect docility the means of maintaining an army of five thou-
sand foot and five hundred horse. Had the subsidy been refused, the
result would have been the same. " I would undertake," wrote Went-
worth, " upon the peril of my head, to make the King's army able to
subsist and provide for itself among them without their help."

521

Sec. V.

The
Peksonai
Govern-
ment

1029

1640

,1
1

»634

522

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. V.

The

Pkksonal
Govern-
ment

iea9

1640

Charles

and
Scotland

Scotland
and the
Stuarts

1-572

While Wentworth was thus working out his system of " Thorough "
on one side of St. George's Channel, it was being carried out on the
other by a mind inferior, indeed, to his own in genius, but almost equal
to it in courage and tenacity. On Weston's death in 1635, Laud became
virtually first minister at the English Council-board. We have already
seen with what a reckless and unscrupulous activity he was crushing
Puritanism in the English Church, and driving Puritan ministers from
English pulpits ; and in this work his new position enabled him to
back the authority of the High Commission by the terrors of the Star
Chamber. It was a work, indeed, which to Laud's mind was at once
civil and religious : he had allied the cause of ecclesiastical organization
with that of absolutism in the State ; and, while borrowing the power
of the Crown to crush ecclesiastical liberty, he brought the influence of
the Church to bear on the ruin of civil freedom. But his power stopped
at the Scotch frontier. Across the Border stood a Church with bishops
indeed, but without a ritual, modelled on the doctrine and system
of Geneva, Calvinist in teaching and to a great extent in government.
The mere existence of such a Church gave countenance to English
Puritanism, and threatened in any hour of ecclesiastical weakness to
bring a dangerous influence to bear on the Church of England. With
Scotland, indeed, Laud could only deal indirectly through Charles,
for the King was jealous of any interference of his English ministers
or Parliament with his Northern Kingdom. But Charles was him-
self earnest to deal with it. He had imbibed his father's hatred
of all that tended to Presbyterianism, and from the outset of his reign
he had been making advance after advance towards the more com-
plete establishment of Episcopacy. To understand, however, what
had been done, and the relations which had by this time grown up
between Scotland and its King, we must take up again the thread of
its history which we broke at the moment when Mary fled for refuge
over the English border.

After a few years of wise and able rule, the triumph of Protestantism
under the Earl of Murray had been interrupted by his assassination,
by the revival of the Queen's faction, and by the renewal of civil war.
The next regent, the child-king's grandfather, was slain in a fray ; but
under the strong hand of Morton the land won a short breathing-space.
Edinburgh, the last fortress held in Mary's name, surrendered to an
English force sent by Elizabeth ; and its captain, Kirkcaldy of Grange,
was hanged for treason in the market-place ; while the stern justice of
Morton forced peace upon the warring lords. The people of the
Lowlands, indeed, were now stanch for the new faith ; and the
Protestant Church rose rapidly after the death of Knox into a power
which appealed at every critical juncture to the deeper feelings of the
nation at large. In the battle with Catholicism the bishops had clung
to the old religion ; and the new faith, left without episcopal interfer-

Viii.l

tURltAN ENGLAND.

ence, and influenced by the Genevan training of Knox, borrowed from
Calvin its model of Church government, as it borrowed its theology.
The system of Presbyterianism, as it grew up at the outset without
direct recognition from the law, not only bound Scotland together as
it had never been bound before by its administrative organization, its
church synods and general assemblies, but by the power it gave the
lay elders in each congregation, and by the summons of laymen
in an overpowering majority to the earlier Assemblies, it called
the people at large to a voice, and as it proved, a decisive voice, in
the administration of affairs. If its government by ministers gave it
the outer look of an ecclesiastical despotism, no Church constitution
has proved in practice so democratic as that of Scotland. Its influence
in raising the nation at large to a consciousness of its own power is
shown by the change which passes, from the moment of its final
establishment, over the face of Scotch history. The sphere of action
to which it called the people was in fact not a mere ecclesiastical but
a national sphere ; and the power of the Church was felt more and
more over nobles and King. When after five years the union of
his rivals put an end to Morton's regency, the possession of the young
sovereign, James the Sixth, and the exercise of the royal authority in
his name, became the constant aim of the factions who where tearing
Scotland to pieces. As James grew to manhood, however, he was
strong enough to break the yoke of the lords, and to become master of
the great houses that had so long overawed the Crown. But he was
farther than ever from being absolute master of his realm. Amidst the
turmoil of the Reformation a new force had come to the front. This
was the Scotch people which had risen into being under the guise of
the Scotch Kirk. Melville, the greatest of the successors of Knox,
claimed for the ecclesiastical body an independence of the State which
James hardly dared to resent, while he struggled helplessly beneath
the sway which public opinion, expressed through the General Assembly
of the Church, exercized over the civil government. In the great crisis
of the Armada his hands were fettered by the league with England
which it forced upon him. The democratic boldness of Calvinism allied
itself with the spiritual pride of the Presbyterian ministers in their
dealings with the Crown. Melville in open council took James by
the sleeve, and called him " God's silly vassal." " There are two
Kings," he told him, " and two kingdoms in Scotland. There is
Christ Jesus the King, and His Kingdom the Kirk, whose subject
James the Sixth is, and of whose kingdom not a king, nor a lord, nor
a head, but a member." The words and tone of the great preacher
were bitterly remembered when James mounted the English throne.
"A Scottish Presbytery," he exclaimed years afterwards at the
Hampton Court Conference, " as well fitteth with Monarchy as God
and the Devil ! No Bishop, no King ! " But Scotland was resolved

■ '^ i

52.1

■' "1

i "

j ' i

Sec. V,

The

. '

Personal

1 . !

Govern-

ment

leao

1 i'

; . 1

1640

1577

. / iii/rew
Melville

\ .» '

\ l|

524

Sec. V.

The
Pkrsonai.
Govern-
ment

leao

164.0

Preshy-

terinnism

eitablislied

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

1592

1605
1606

Episcopacy
restored

1610

Laud and

the Scotch

Church

on " no bishop." Episcopacy had become identified among the more
zealous Scotchmen with the old Catholicism they had shaken off.
When he appeared at a later time before the English Council-table,
Melville took the Archbishop of Canterbury by the sleeves of his
rochet, and, shaking them in his manner, called them Romish rags,
and marks of the Beast. Four years therefore after the ruin of the
Armada, Episcopacy was formally abolished, and the Presbyterian
system established by law as the mode of government of the Church
of Scotland. The rule of the Church was placed in a General
Assembly, with subordinate Provincial Synods, Presbyteries, and
Kirk Sessions, by which its discipline was carried down to every
member of a congregation. All that James could save was the
right of being present at the General Assembly, and of fixing a
time and place for its annual meeting. But James had no sooner
succeeded to the English throne than he used his new power in
a struggle to undo the work which had been done. In spite of his
assent to an act leg'lizing its annual convention, he hmdered any
meeting of the General Assembly for five successive years by repeated
prorogations. The protests of the clergy were roughly met. When
nineteen ministers constituted themselves an Assembly they were
banished as traitors from the realm. Of the leaders who remained
the boldest were summoned with Andrew Melville to confer with the
King in England on his projects of change. On their refusal to betray
the freedom of the Church they were committed to prison ; and an
epigram which Melville wrote on the usages of the English com-
munion was seized on as a ground for bringing him before the English
Privy Council. He was sent to the Tower, and released after some
years of imprisonment only to go into exile. Deprived of their leaders,
threatened with bonds and exile, deserted by the nobles, ill supported
as yet by the mass of the people, the Scottish ministers bent before
the pressure of the Crown. Bishops were allowed to act as presidents
in their synods ; and episcopacy was at last formally recognized in
the Scottish Church. The pulpits were bridled. The General
Assembly was brought to submission. The ministers and elders
were deprived of their right of excommunicating offenders, save
with a bishop's sanction. A Court of High Commission enforced
the supremacy of the Crown. But with this assertion of his royal
authority James was content. His aim was political rather than
religious, and in seizing on the control of the Church through his
organized prelacy, he held himself to have won back that mastery
of his realm which the Reformation had reft from the Scottish
Kings. The earlier policy of Charles followed his father's line of
action. It effected little save a partial restoration of Church-lands,
which the lords were forced to surrender. But Laud's vigorous
action soon made itself felt. His first acts were directed rather to

VIII.]

points of ou
Presbyteriai
control of e(
to the Crowi
costume on
Moray prea(
Edinburgh,
The innova
directed all
costume, ho
Many years
Scotch subj(
of this natio
" with the f
my anger, b
make that st
durst not ph
of Ihat peo
come at las
character o
uniformity w
the sole autl
absolutely in
summoned 1
introduced I
rogative supi
Common Oi
and generall
the English
up by four S(
the General .
taken togetl
system whic
Crown. To
most serious
tion, and Le
Triumpha
—at his fee
There were
even a bol
merchants,
freedom anc
and nobles

VIIT.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

525

points of outer observance than to any attack on the actual fabric of
Presbyterian organization. The Estates were induced to withdraw the
control of ecclesiastical apparel from the Assembly, and to commit it
to the Crown ; a step soon followed by a resumption of their episcopal
costume on the part of the Scotch bishops. When the Bishop of
Moray preached before Charles in his rochet, on the King's visit to
Edinburgh, it was the first instance of its use since the Reformation.
The innovation was followed by the issue of a royal warrant which
directed all ministers to use the surplice in divine worship. From
costume, however, the busy minister soon passed to weightier matters.
Many years had gone by since he had vainly invited James to draw his
Scotch subjects " to a nearer conjunction with the liturgy and canons
of this nation." " I sent him back again," said the shrewd old King,
" with the frivolous draft he had drawn. For all that, he feared not
my anger, but assaulted me again with another ill-fangled platform to
make that stubborn Kirk stoop more to the English platform ; but I
durst not play fast and loose with my word. He knows not the stomach
of Ihat people." But Laud knew how to wait, and his time had
come at last. He was resolved to put an end to the Presbyterian
character of the Scotch Church altogether, and to bring it to a
uniformity with the Church of England. A book of canons issued by
the sole authority of the King placed the government of the Church
absolutely in the hands of its bishops ; no Church Assembly might be
summoned but by the King, no alteration in worship or discipline
introduced but by his permission. As daring a stretch of the pre-
rogative superseded what was known as Knox's Liturgy — the book of
Common Order drawn up on the Genevan model by that Reformer,
and generally used throughout Scotland — by a new Liturgy based on
the English Book of Common Prayer. The liturgy and canons drawn
up by four Scottish bishops were laid before Laud ; in their composition
the General Assembly had neither been consulted nor recognized ; and
taken together they formed the code of a political and ecclesiastical
system which aimed at reducing Scotland to an utter subjection to the
Crown. To enforce them on the land was to effect a revolution of the
most serious kind. The books however were backed by a royal injunc-
tion, and Laud flattered himself that the revolution had been wrought.
Triumphant in Scotland, with the Scotch Church — as he fancied
—at his feet. Laud's hand still fell heavily on the English Puritans.
There were signs of a change of temper which might have made
even a bolder man pause. Thousands of " the best," scholars,
merchants, lawyers, farmers, were flying over the Atlantic to seek
freedom and purity of religion in the wilderness. Great landowners
and nobles were preparing to follow. Ministers were quitting their
parsonages rather than abet the royal insult to the sanctity of the
Sabbath. The Puritans who remained among the clergy were giving

Skc. v.

The

Personal
Govern-
ment

iea9

1640

1633

1636

The ne^v
I.itvrgy

i_r\

Milton

at
Horton

526

HISTORY OF TIIK ENGLISH PKOl'LK.

(chap

Sec. V.

The

Pf.hsonai.

( ioVEKN-
MK.NT

16SI9

1640

1633

His early
Poems

up their homes rather than consent to the change of the sacred table
into an altar, or to silence in their protests against the new Popery.
The noblest of living Englishmen refused to become the priest of a
Church whose ministry could only be " bought with servitude and
forswearing." We have seen John Milton leave Cambridge, self-
dedicated " to that same lot, however mean or high, to which time
leads me .ind the will of Heaven." But the lot to which these called
him was not the ministerial office to which he had been destined from
his childhood. In later life he told bitterly the story, how he had been
" Church-outed by the prelates." " Coming to some maturity of years,
and perceiving what tyranny had invaded in the Church, that he who
would take orders must subscribe slave, and take an oath withal,
which unless he took with a conscience that would retch he must
either straight perjure or split his faith, I thought it better to prefer a
blameless silence before the sacred office of speaking, bought and
begun with servitude and forswearing." In spite therefore of his
father's regrets, he retired to a new home which the scrivener had
found at Horton, a village in the neighbourhood of Windsor, and
quietly busied himself with study and verse. The poetic impulse of
the Renascence had been slowly dying away under the Stuarts. The
stage was falling into mere coarseness and horror ; Shakspere had
died quietly at Stratford in Milton's childhood ; the last and worst
play of Ben Jonson appeared in the year of his settlement at Horton ;
and though Ford and Massinger still lingered on there were no suc-
cessors for them but Shirley and Davenant. T'le philosophic and
meditative taste of the age had produced indeed poetic schools of its
own : poetic satire had become fashionable in Hall, better known
afterwards as a bishop, and had been carried on vigorously by George
Wither ; the so-called " metaphysical " poetry, the vigorous and pithy
expression of a cold and prosaic good sense, began with Sir John
Davies, and buried itself in fantastic affectations in Donne ; religious
verse had become popular in the gloomy allegories of Quarles and the
tender refinement which struggles through a jungle of puns and ex-
travagances in George Herbert. But what poetic life really remained
was to be found only in the caressing fancy and lively badinage of
lyric singers like Herricl' whose grace is untouched by passion and
often disfigured by coarseness and pedantry ; or in the school of
Spenser's more direct successors, where Browne in his pastorals, and
the two Fletchers, Phineas and Giles, in their unreadable allegories,
still preserved something of their master's sweetness, if they preserved
nothing of his power. Milton was himself a Spenserian ; he owned to
Dryden in later years " that Spenser was his original," and in some of
his earliest lines at Horton he dwells lovingly on " the sage and solemn
tones " of the " Faerie Queen," its " forests and enchantments drear,
where more is meant than meets the ear." But of the weakness and

VIII. 1

PURITAN ENGLAND.

affectation which characterized Spenser's successors he had not a trace.
In the " Allegro" and " Pcnseroso," the first results of his retirement
at Horton, we catch again the fnncy and melody of the Elizabethan
verse, the wealth of its imagery, its wide sympathy with nature and
man. There is a loss, perhaps, of the older freedom and spontaneity
of the Renascence, a rhetorical rather than passionate turn in the
young poet, a striking absence of dramatic power, and a want of subtle
precision even in his picturesque touches. Milton's imagination is not
strong enough to identify him with the world which he imagines ; he
stands apart from it, and looks at it as from a distance, ordering it
and arranging it at his will. Ikit if in this respect he falls, both in his
earlier and later poems, far below Shakspcre or Spenser, the deficiency
is all but compensated by his nobleness of feeling and expression, the
severity of his taste, his sustamed dignity, and the perfectness and
completeness of his work. The moral grandeur of the Puritan breathes,
even in thes'- lighter pieces of his youth, through every line. The
" Comus," planned as a masque for the festivities which the Earl of
Bridgewater was holding at Ludlow Castle, rises into an almost im-
passioned pleading for the love of virtue.

The historic interest of Milton's " Comus " lies in its forming part of
a protest made by the more cultured Puritans at this time against the
gloomier bigotry which persecution was fostering in the party at large.
The patience of Englishmen, in fact, was slowly wearing out. There
was a sudden upgrowth of virulent pamphlets of the old Martin Mar-
prelate type. Men, whose names no one asked, hawked libels, whose
authorship no one knew, from the door of the tradesman to the door of
the squire. As the hopes of a Parliament grew fainter, and men de-
spaired of any legal remedy, violent and weak-headed fanatics came, as
at such times they always come, to the front. Leighton, the father of
the saintly Archbishop of that name, had given a specimen of their tone
at the outset of this period, by denouncing the prelates as men of blood,
Episcopacy as Antichrist, and the Popish queen as a daughter of Heth.
The" Histrio-mastix " of Prynne, a lawyer distinguished for his consti-
tutional knowledge, but the most obstinate and narrow-minded of men,
marked the deepening of Puritan bigotry under the fostering warmth of
Laud's persecution. The book was an attack on players as the minis-
ters of Satan, on theatres as the devil's chapels, on hunting, maypoles,
the decking of houses at Christmas with evergreens, on cards, music,
and false hair. The attack on the stage was as offensive to the more
cultured minds among the Puritan party as to the Court itself ; Selden
and Whitelock took a prominent part in preparing a grand masque by
which the Inns of Court resolved to answer its challenge, and in the fol-
lowing year Milton wrote his masque of " Comus" for Ludlow Castle.
To leave Prynne, however, simply to the censure of wiser men than him-
self was too sensible a course for the angry Primate. No man was ever

527

r>Kc. V.

Thr
Pkrsosal

(ioVF.KN
MKNT

1609

1640

1634

Hampden

and Shlp-

nioney

1633

f ;■;■
' , t ■

:-' ,

' t

528

TTTSTORY OF THE ENGLTSTT rFOPLF..

fcirAP

Sec. V.

The
Personal
Govern-
ment

1609

1640

Ship-vtoney
1634

The new
Shijf-money

1635

sent to prison before or since for such a sheer mass of nonsense ; but
a passage in the book was taken as a reflection on the Queen, and his
sentence showed the hard cruelty of the Primate. Prynne was dis-
missed from the bar, deprived of his university degree, and set in the
pillory. His ears were clipped from his head, and he was taken back
to prison. But the storm of popular passion which was gathering was
not so pressing a difficulty to the royal ministers at this time as the
old difficulty of the exchequer. The ingenious devices of the Court
lawyers, the revived prerogatives, the illegal customs, the fines and
confiscations which were alienating one class after another and sowing
in home after home the seeds of a bitter hatred to the Crown, were
msufficient to meet the needs of the Treasury ; and new exactions
were necessary, at a time when the rising discontent made every new
exaction a challenge to revolt. A fresh danger had suddenly appeared
in an alliance of France and Holland which threatened English domi-
nion over the Channel ; and there were rumours of a proposed partition
of the Spanish Netherlands between the two powers. It was neces-
sary to put a strong fleet on the seas ; and the money which had to
be found at home was procured by a stretch df the prerogative which
led afterwards to the great contest over ship-money. The legal research
of Noy, one of the law officers of the Crown, found precedents among
the records in the Tower for the provision of ships for the King's use
by the port-towns of the kingdom, and for the furnishing of their
equipment by the maritime counties. The precedents dated from
times when no permanent fleet existed, and when sea warfare was
waged by vessels lent for the moment by the various ports. But they
were seized as a means of equipping a permanent navy without cost
to the exchequer ; the first demand for ships was soon commuted into
a demand of money for the payment of ships. ; and the writs which
were issued to London and the chief English ports were enforced by
fine and imprisonment. When Laud took the direction of affairs a
more vigorous and unscrupulous impulse made itself felt. To Laud
as to Wentworth, indeed, the King seemed over-Cautious, the Star
Chamber feeble, the judges over-scrupulous. " I am for Thorough,'
the one writes to the other in alternate fits of impatience at the slow
progress they are making. Wentworth was anxious that his good
work might not " be spoiled on that side." Laud echoed the wish,
while he envied the free course of the Lord Lieutenant. " You have a
good deal of honour here," he writes, " for your proceeding. Go on
a' God's name. I have done with expecting of Thorougli on this
side." The financial pressure was seized by both to force the King
on to a bolder course. " The debt of the Crown being taken off,"
Wentworth urged, "you may govern at your will." All pretence of
precedents was thrown aside, and Laud resolved to find a permajient
revenue in the conversion of the " ship-money," till now levied on

fCHAI».

VIII. ]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

ports and the maritime counties, into a general tax imposed by
the royal will upon the whole country. " I know no reason," Went-
worth had written significantly, " but you may as well rule the
common lawyers in England as I, poor beagle, do here;" and the
judges no sooner declared the new impost to be legal than he drew
the logical deduction from their decision. " Since it is lawful for the
King to impose a tax for the equipment of the navy, it must be e»[ually
so for the levy of an army : and the same reason which authorizes him
to levy an army to resist, will authorize him to carry that army abroad
that he may prevent invasion. Moreover what is law in England is law
also in Scotland and Ireland. The decision of the judges will there-
fore make the King absolute at home and formidable abroad. Let him
only abstain from war for a few years that he may habituate his
subjects to the payment of that tax, and in the end he will find
himself more powerful and respected than any of his predecessors."
Ikit there were men who saw the danger to freedom in this levy of
ship-money as clearly as Wentworth himself. The bulk of the country
party abandoned all hope of English freedom. There was a sudden
revival of the emigration to New England ; and men of blood and
fortune now prepared to seek a new home in the West. Lord Warwick
secured the proprietorship of the Connecticut valley. Lord Saye and
Sele and Lord Brooke began negotiations for transporting themselves
to the New World. Oliver Cromwell is said, by a doubtful tradition,
to have only been prevented from crossing the seas by a royal
embargo. It is more certain that Hampden purchased a tract of
land on the Narragansett. John Hampden, a friend of Eliot's, a man
of consummate ability, of unequalled power of persuasion, of a keen
intelligence, ripe learning, and a charactersingularly pure and loveablc,
had already shown the firmness of his temper in his refusal to contri-
bute to the forced loan of 1627. He now repeated his refusal, declared
ship-money an illegal impost, and resolved to rouse the spirit of the
country by an appeal for protection to the law.

The news of Hampden's resistance thrilled through England at a
moment when men were roused by the news of resistance in the north.
The patience of Scotland had found an end at last. While England
was waiting for the opening of the great cause of ship-money, peremp-
tory orders from the King forced the clergy of Edinburgh to introduce
the new s':;rvice into their churches. But the Prayer Book was no
sooner opened at the church of St, Giles's than a murmur ran through
the congregation, and the murmur soon grew into a formidable riot.
The church was cleared, and the service read ; but the rising discon-
tent frightened the judges into a decision that the royal writ enjoined
the purchase, and not the use, of the Prayer Book. Its use was at
once discontinued, and the angry orders which came from England
for its restoration were met by a shower of protests from every part of

529

Skc. V.

Thk

Pkksonai

(loVKKN-
MENT

iea9

ie4o

Jan. 1636

The
Resist-
ance

ii '

July 23

i»

53^'

Sbc. V.

Thk
pkrsonai.

OOVKRN-

MKNT

ieB»

1«40

msToRY OK TIfK KNCMSH I'KOPI-K.

fiMIAI'

Hampden s
trial

Nov, 1637

June 1638

Scotland. The Duke of Lennox alone took sixty-cijfht petitions with
him to the court ; while ministers, nobles, and Rent:/ poured into
Kdinburgh to or^Mnize the national resistance. The effect of these
events in Scotland was at once seen in the open demonstration of dis-
content south of the border. The prison with which Laud had
rewarded Prynne's bulky quarto had tamed his spirit so little that a
new tract written within its walls attacked the bishops as devouring
wolves and lords of Lucifer. A fellow-prisoner, John Bastwick,
declared in his " Litany" that " Hell was broke loose, and the Devils
in surplices, hoods, copes, and rochetc, were come among us." Burton,
a London clergyman silenced by the High Commission, called oii all
Christians to resist the bishops as " robbers of souls, limbs of the
Beast, and factors of Antichrist." Raving of this sort might have been
passed by had not the general sympathy shown how fast the storm of
popular passion was rising. Prynne and his fellow pamphleteers,
when Laud dragged them before the Star Chamber as " trumpets of
sedition," listened with defiance to their sentence of exposure in the
pillory and imprisonment for life ; and the crowd who filled Palace
Yard to witness their punishment groaned at the cutting off of their
cars, and "gave a great shout" when Prynne urged that the sentence
on him was contrary to the law. A hundred thousand Londoners
lined the road as they passed on the way to prison ; and the journey
of these " Martyrs," as the spectators called them, was like a triumphal
progress. Startled as he was at the sudden burst of popular feeling,
Laud remained dauntless as ever. Prynne's entertainers as he
passed through the country were summoned before the Star Chamber,
while the censorship struck fiercer blows at the Puritan press. But
the real danger lay not in the libv '.- of silly zealots but in the attitude
of Scotland, and in the effect which was being produced in England
at large by the trial of Hampden. For twelve days the cause of ship-
money was solemnly argued before the full bench of judges. It was
proved that the tax in past times had been levied only in cases of
sudden emergency, and confined to the coast and port towns alone,
and that even the show of legality had been taken from it by formal
statute : it was declared a breach of the " fundamental laws " of Eng-
land. The case was adjourned, but the discussion told not merely on
England but on the temper of the Scots. Charles had replied to their
petitions by a simple order to all strangers to leave the capital. But
the Council at Edinburgh was unable to enforce his order ; and the
nobles and gentry before dispersing to their homes named a body of
delegates, under the odd title of " the Tables," v/ho carried on through
the winter a series of negotiations with the Crown. The negotiations
were interrupted in the following spring by a renewed order for their
dispersion, and for the acceptance of a Prayer Book ; while the judges
in England delivered at last their long-delayed decision on Hampden's

VIII.]

rUktTAN KNGI^ANI).

Ill

case. Two judges only pronounced in his f.ivour ; though three fol-
lowed them on technical grounds. The majority, seven in number,
gave judgement against him. The broad principle was laid down thai
no statute prohibiting arbitrary taxation could be pleaded against the
King's will. " I never read or heard," said Judge Berkley, " that lc\
was rex, but it is common and most true that rex is lex." Finch, the
Chief-Justice, summed up the opinions of his fellow Judges. " Acts of
Parliament to t.ake away the King's royal power in the defence of his
kingdom are void," he said :...." they are void Acts of Parliament
to bind the King not to command the subjects, their persons, and
goods, and I say their money too, for no Acts of Parliament make
any differeiice."

" I wish Mr. Hampden and others to his likeness," the Lord Deputy
wrote bitterly from Ireland, " were well whipt into their right senses."
Amidst the exultation of the Court over the decision of the judges,
Wentworth saw clearly that Hampden's work had been done. His
resistance had roused England to a sense of the danger to her freedom,
and forced into light the real character of the royal claims. How
stern and bitter the temper even of the noblest Puritans had become
at last we see in the poem which Milton produced at this time, his
elegy of " Lycidas." Its grave and tender lament is broken by a
sudden flash of indignation at the dangers around the Church, at the
"blind mouths that scarce themselves know how to hold a sheep-
hook," and to whom " the hungry sheep look up, and are not fed,"
while " the grim wolf" of Rome " with privy paw daily devours apace,
and nothing said ! " The stern resolve of the people to demand justice
on their tyrants spoke in his threat of the axe. Wentworth and
Laud, and Charles himself, had yet to reckon with " that two-handed
engine at the door" which stood "ready to smite once, and smite no
more." But stern as was the general resolve, there was no need for
immediate action, for the difficulties which were gathering in the north
were certain to bring a strain on the Government which would force
it to seek support from the people. The King's demand for immediate
submission, which reached Edinburgh while England was waiting for
the Hampden judgment, at once gathered the whole body of remon-
strants together round "the Tables" at Edinburgh; and a protestation,
read at Edinburgh and Stirling, was followed, on Johnston of Warris-
ton's suggestion, by a renewal of the Covenant with God which had
been drawn up and sworn to in a previous hour of peril, when Mary
was still plotting against Protestantism, aiid Spain was preparing its
Armada. " We promise and swear," ran the solemn engagement at
its close, " by the great name of the Lord our God, to continue in the
profession and obedience of the said religion, and that we sha" aefend
the same, and resist all their contrary errors and corruptions, accord-
ing to our vocation and the utmost of that power which God has put

M M 2

Skc. V.

'I'll!',

I'KHsoNAI.

( in\ lUN-

MKN I'

leao

lit

1640

The
Oovenant

1638

I i

532

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[cHAr.

Skc. V.

The
Pkksonal

(jOVKKN-
MENT

1629

1640

The Scotch
revolution

The Scotch
■way

1 639

into our hands all the days of our life." The Covenant was signed in
the churchyard of the Grey Friars at Edinburgh, in a tumult of
enthusiasm, "with such content and joy as those who, having long
before been outlaws and rebels, are admitted again into covenant with
God." Gentlemen and nobles rode with the documents in their
pockets over the country, gathering subscriptions to it, while the
ministers pressed for a general consent to it from the pulpit. But
pressure was needless. " Such was the zeal of subscribers that for a
while many subscribed with tears on their cheeks ; " some were indeed
reputed to have " drawn their own blood and used it in place of ink
to underwrite their names." The force given to Scottish freedom by
this revival of religious fervour was seen in the new tone adopted by
the Covenanters. The Marquis of Hamilton, who came as Royal
Commissioner to put an end to the quarrel, was at once met by
demands for an abolition of the Court of High Commission, the with-
drawal of the Books of Canons and Common Prayer, a free Pailiament,
and a free General Assembly. It was in vain that he threatened war;
even the Scotch Council pressed Charles to give fuller satisfaction to
the people. ''I will rather die," the King wrote to Hamilton, "than
yield to these impertinent and damnable demands ; " but it was needful
to gain time. " The discontents at home," wrote Lord Northumber-
land to Wentworth, " do rather increase than lessen : " and Charles
was without money or men. It was in vain that he begged for a loan
from Spain on promise of declaring war against Holland, or that he
tried to procure two thousand troops from Flanders with which to
occupy Edinburgh. The loan and troops were both refused, and some
contributions offered by the English Catholics did little to recruit the
Exchequer. Charles had directed the Marquis to delay any decisive
breach till the royal fleet appeared in the Forth ; but it was hard to
equip a fleet at all. Scotland indeed was sooner ready for war than
the King. The Scotch volunteers who had been serving in the Thirty
Years' War streamed home at the call of their brethren. General
Leslie, a veteran trained under Gustavus, came from Sweden to take
the command of the new forces. A voluntary war tax was levied in
every shire. The danger at last forced the King to yield to the Scotch
demands ; but he had no sooner yielded than the concession v/as
withdrawn, and the Assembly hardly met before it was called upon to
disperse. By an almost unanimojs vote, however, it resolved to con-
tinue its session. The innovations in worship and discipline were
abolished, episcopacy was abjured, the bishops deposed, and the
system of Presbyterianism re-established in its fullest extent. The
news that Charles was gathering an army at Ycr!-. and reckoning for
support on the scattered loyalists in Scotland itself, was answered by the
seizure of Edinburgh, Dumbarton, and Stirhng ; while 10,000 well-
equipped troops under Leslie and the Earl of Montrose entered Aber-

VIII.]

deen, ar
Instead
in the F
Border,
linle crc
offered

Charle
to the ga
his eyes
summon
were in
aid fron
Scotch I
appeal tc
answer i
Strafiforc
back to 1
should b(
of the bi
heavy su
is known
forces,
servile P
for the m
in its ef
was fight
to any at
were qui
redress o
could be
for the 1
failed to
sitting it
was the (
the cour
kingdom,
the memc
that, by 1
Charles
supply hi
command
But the S
the Tyne
tastle, an
prayed tl

'% >.?^-*^'~ ■ '^ "^-ji^ ~.^

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

deen, and brought the Catholic Earl of Huntly a prisoner to the south.
Instead of overawing the country, the appearance of the royal fleet
in the Forth was the signal for Leslie's march with 20,000 men to the
Border. Charles had hardly pushed across the Tweed, when the " old
little crooked soldier, " encamping on the hill of Dunse Law, fairly
oftered him battle.

Charles however, without money to carry on war, was forced to consent
to the gathering of a free Assembly and of a Scotch Parliament. But in
his eyes the pacification at Berwick was a mere suspension of arms ; his
summons of Wentworth from Ireland was a proof that violent measures
were in preparation, and the Scots met the challenge by seeking for
aid from France. The discovery of a correspondence between the
Scotch leaders and the French court raised hopes in the King that an
appeal to the country for aid against Scotch treason would still find an
answer in English loyalty. Wentworth, who was now made Earl of
Strafford, had never ceased to urge that the Scots should be whipped
back to their border ; he now agreed with Charles that a Parliament
should be called, the correspondence laid before it, and advantage taken
of the burst of indignation on which the King counted to procure a
heavy subsidy. While Charles summoned what from its brief duration
is known as the Short Parliament, Strafford hurried to Ireland to lew
forces. In fourteen days he had obtained money and men from his
servile Parliament, and he came back flushed with his success, in time
for the meeting of the Houses at Westminster. But the lesson failed
in its effect. Every member of the Commons knew that Scotland
was fighting the oattle of English liberty. All hope of bringing them
to any attack upon the Scots proved fruitless. The intercepted letters
were quietly set aside, and the Commons declared as of old that
redress of grievances must precede the grant of supplies. No subsidy
could be granted till security was had for religion, for property, and
for the liberties of Parliament. An offer to relinquish ship-money
failed to draw Parliament from its resolve, and after three weeks'
sitting it was dissolved. " Things must go worse before they go better "
was the cool comment of St. John, one of the patriot leaders. But
the country was strangely moved. " So great a defection in the
kingdom," wrote Lord Northumberland, " hath not been known in
the memory of man." Strafford alone stood undaunted. He urged
that, by the refusal of the Parliament to supply the King's wants,
Charles was " freed from all rule of government," and entitled to
supply himself at his will. The Earl was bent upon war, and took
command of the royal army, which again advanced to the north.
But the Scots were ready to cross the border ; forcing the passage of
the Tyne in the face of an English detachment, they occupied New-
castle, and despatched from that town their proposals of peace. They
prayed the King to consider their grievances, and, " with the advice

Sf.c. V

The
Pkrsonai.

GOVRRN
ME NT

1629

1640

The

Bishops

War

.1!

T/ie Short
Parliament

April 1640

'Tlf

, • . ■ ill

ill

534

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. V.

Thf

Personai-

GOVERN-
MENT

1629

1640

and consent of the Estates of England convened in Parliament, to
settle a firm and desirable peace." The prayer was backed by pre-
parations for a inarch upon York, where Charles had abandoned
himself to despair. Strafford's troops were a mere mob ; neither by
threats nor prayers could he recal '. them to their duty, and he was
forced to own that two months were required before they could be fit
for action. It was in vain that Charles won a truce. Behind him in
fact England was all but in revolt. The London apprentices mobbed
Laud at Lambeth, and broke up the sittings of the High Commission
at St. Paul's. The war was denounced everywhere as " the Bishops'
War," and the new levies murdered officers whom they suspected of
Papistry, broke down altar-rails in every church they passed, and
deserted to their homes. Two peers. Lord Wharton and Lord Howard,
ventured to lay before the King himself a petition for peace with the
Scots ; and though Strafford arrested and proposed to shoot them as
mutineers, the English Council shrank from desperate courses. The
King still strove to escape from the humiliation of calling a Parlia-
ment. He summoned a Great Council of the Peers at York. But his
project broke down before its general repudiation by the nobles ; and
with wraih and shame at his heart Charles was driven to summon
again the Houses to Westminster.

Section VI.— The Lov\g: Parliament. 1640— 164-4.

{Ant/ioriiies. — Clarendon's *• History of the Rebellion," as Haliam justly
says, 'belongs rather to the class of memoirs" than of histories, and the
rigorous analysis of it by Ranke shows the very different value of its various
parts. Though the work will always retain a literaiy interest from its noble-
ness of style and the grand series of character-portraits which it embodies, the
worth of its account of all that preceded the war is almost destroyed by the
contrast between its author's conduct at the time and his later description of
the Parliament's proceedings, as well as by the deliberate and malignant false-
hood with which he has perverted the whole action of his parliamentary oppo-
nents. May's "History of the Long Parliament" is fairly accurate and
impartial ; but the basis of any real account of it must be found in its own
proceedings as they have been preserved in the notes of Sir Ralph Verney and
Sir Simonds D'Ewes. The last remain unpublished ; but Mr. Forster has
drawn much from them in his two works, " The Grand Remonstrance" and
"The Arrest of the Five Members." The collections of slate-papers by Rush-
ivorlh and Nalson are indispensable for this period. It is illustrated by a series
of memoirs, of very different degrees of value, such as those of "Whitelock,
Ludlow, and Sir Philip Warwick, as well as by works like Mrs. Hutchinson's
memoir of her husband, or Baxter's *' Autobiography." For Irish affairs we
have a vast store of materials in the Ormond papers and letters collected by
Carte ; for Scotland, "Baillie's Letters" and Mr. Bniton's History. Lingard
is useful for information as to intrigues with the Catholics in England and
Ireland ; and Guizot directs special attention to the relations with foreign
powers. Pym has been fairly sketched with other statesmen of the lime by
Mr. Forster in his ** Statesmen of the Commonwealth," and in an Essay on

VIII.l

PURITAN ENGLAND.

him by Mr. Goldwin Smith. A good deal of vahiable research for the period
in general is to be found in Mr. Sandford's " Illustrations of the (ireat
Rebellion."] (Mr. Gardiner has now carried on his History to 1644. — Ed.)

If Strafford embodied the spirit of tyranny, John Pym, the leader of
the Commons from the first meeting of the new houses at West-
minster, stands out for all after time as the embodiment of law. A
Somersetshire gentleman of good birth and competent fortune, he
entered on public life in the Parliament of 1614, and was imprisoned
for his patriotism at its close. He had been a leading member in
that of 1620, and one of the "twelve ambassadors " for whom James
ordered chairs to be set at Whitehall. Of the band of patriots with
whom he had stood side by side in the constitutional struggle against
the earlier despotism of Charles he was almost the sole survivor. Coke
had died of old age ; Cotton's heart was broken by oppression ; Eliot
had perished in the Tower ; Wentworth had apostatized. Pym alone
remained, resolute, patient as of old ; and as the sense of his greatness
grew silently during the eleven years of deepening misrule, the hope
and faith of better things clung almost passionately to the man who
never doubted of the final triumph of freedom and the law. At
their close, Clarendon tells us, in words all the more notable for their
bitter tone of hate, " he was the most popular man, and the most able
to do hurt, that has lived at any time." He had shown he knew
how to wait, and when waiting was over lie showed he knew how
to act. On the eve of the Long Parliament he rode through England
to quicken the electors to a sense of the crisis which had come at
last ; and on the assembling of the Commons he took his place, not
merely as member for Tavistock, but as their acknowledged head.
Few of the country gentlemen, indeed, who formed the bulk of the
members, had sat in any previous House ; and of the few, none
represented in so eminent a way the Parliamentary tradition on which
the coming struggle was to turn. Pym's eloquence, inferior in bold-
ness and originality to that of Eliot or Wentworth, was better suited
by its massive and logical force to convince and guide a great party ;
and it was backed by a calmness of temper, a dexterity and order in
the management of public business, and a practical power of shaping
the course of debate, which gave a form and method to Parliamentary
proceedings such as they had never had before. Valuable, however,
as these qualities were, it was a yet higher quality which raised Pym
into the greatest, as he was the first, of Parliamentary leaders. Of the
five hundred members who sate round him at St. Stephen's, he was
the one man who had clearly foreseen, and as clearly resolved how to
meet, the difiiculties which lay before them. It was certain that Par-
liament would be drawn into a struggle with the Crown. It was
probable that in such a struggle the House of Commons would be
hampered, as it had been hampered before, by the House of Lords,

535

Sec. VI.

The
Long Par-
liament

164.0

1644
Pym

-n

m '

■ i
1

'IS

i/ts political
theory

536

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VI.

The
LoNt; Pak-

I.IAMENT

1640

1644

His political
genius

The legal antiquaries of the older constitutional school stood helpless
before such a conflict of co-ordinate powers, a conflict for which no
provision had been made by the law, and on which precedents threw
only a doubtful and conflicting light. But with a knowledge of
precedent as great as their own, Pym rose high above them in his
grasp of constitutional principles. He was the first English statesman
who discovered, and applied to the political circumstances around
him, what may be called the doctrine of constitutional proportion.
He saw that as an element of constitutional life Parliament was of
higher value than the Crovvn ; he saw, too, that in Parliament itself
the one essentia?! part was the House of Commons. On these two
facts he based his whole policy in the contest which followed. When
Charles refused to act with the Parliament, Pym treated the refusal as
a temporary abdication on the part of the sovereign, which vested the
executive power in the two Houses until new arrangements were made.
When the Lords obstructed public business, he warned them that
obstruction would only force the Commons "to save the kingdom
alone." Revolutionary as these principles seemed at the time, they
have both been recognized as bases of our constitution since the days
of Pym. The first principle was established by the Convention and
Parliament which followed on the departure of James the Second ; the
second by the acknowledgement on all sides since the Reform Bill of
1832 that the government of the country is really in the hands of the
House of Commons, and can only be carried on by ministers who
represent the majority of that House. Pym's temper, indeed, was the
very opposite of the temper of a revolutionist. Few natures have ever
been wider in their range of sympathy or action. Serious as his
purpose was, his manners were genial, and even courtly : he turned
easily from an invective against Strafford to a chat with Lady Carlisle ;
and the grace and gaiety of his social tone, even when the care and
weight of public affairs were bringing him to his grave, gave rise
to a hundred silly scandals among the prurient royalists. It was this
striking combination of genial versatility with a massive force in his
nature which marked him out from the first moment of power as a
born ruler of men. He proved himself at once the subtlest of diplo-
matists and the grandest of demagogues. He was equally at home in
tracking the subtle intricacies of royalist intrigues, or in kindling
popular passion with words of fire. Though past middle life when
his work really began, for he was born in 1584, four years before the
coming of the Armada, he displayed from the first meeting of the
Long Parliament the qualities of a great administrator, an immeiise
faculty for labour, a genius for organization, patience, tact, a power of
inspiring confidence in all whom he touched, calmness and moderation
under good fortune or ill, an immovable courage, an iron will. No
English ruler has ever shown greater nobleness of natural temper or a

>--

VIll.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

537

wider capacity for government than the Somersetshire squire whom
his enemies, made clear-sighted by their hate, greeted truly enough
as " King Pym."

His ride over England with Hampden on the eve of the elections
had been hardly needed, for the summons of a Parliament at once
woke the kingdom to a fresh life. The Puritan emigration to New
England was suddenly and utterly suspended ; " the change," said
Winthrop, " made all men to stay in England in expectation of a new
world." The public discontent spoke from every Puritan pulpit, and
expressed itself in a sudden burst of pamphlets, the first-fruits of the
thirty thousand which were issued in the next twenty years, and which
turned England at large into a school of political discussion. The
resolute looks of the members as they gathered at Westminster con-
trasted with the hesitating words of the King, and each brought from
borough or county a petition of grievances. Fresh petitions were
brought every day by bands of citizens or farmers. Forty committees
were appointed to examine and report on them, and their reports
formed the grounds on which the Commons acted. Prynne and his
fellow ''martyrs," recalled from their prisons, entered London in triumph
amidst the shouts of a great multitude who strewed laurel in their path.
The Commons dealt roughly with the agents of the royal system. In
every county a list of "delinquents," or officers who had carried out
the plans of the government, was ordered to be prepared and laid before
the House. But their first blow was struck at the leading ministers of
the King. Even Laud was not the centre of so great and universal a
hatred as the Earl of Strafford. Strafford's guilt was more than the
guilt of a servile instrument of tyranny, it was the guilt of " that grand
apostate to the Commonwealth who," in the terrible words which
closed Lord Digby's invective, " must not expect to be pardoned in
this world till he be despatched to the other." He was conscious of
his danger, but Charles forced him to attend the Court ; and with
characteristic boldness he resolved to anticipate attack by accusing
the Parliamentary leaders of a treasonable correspondence with the
Scots. He was just laying his scheme before Charles when the news
reached him that Pym was at the bar of the Lords with his impeach-
ment for high treason. " With speed," writes an eye-witness, " he
comes to the House : he calls rudely at the door," and, " with a proud
glooming look, makes towards his place at the board-head. But at
once many bid him void the House, so he is forced in confusion to go
to the door till he was called. ' He was only recalled to hear his com-
mittal to the Tower. He was still resolute to retort the charge of
treason on his foes, and " offered to speak, but was commanded to be
gone without a word." The keeper of the Black Rod demanded his
sword as he took him in charge. " This done, he makes through a
number of people towards his coach, no man capping to him, before

Sfx. VI.

The
LoNf; Par-
liament

1640

1644

The
TVork of
the Par-
liament

- 1 ■ ■

I ' ■. ■"

f ' ■''

: ' ', i

' 1 ■•

( ■ i

1640

Impeach-
ment of
Strafford

Nov. II

']\ ;; '•-

I-

1 \

'\:

'i*

.•:!

■■\A

538

Sec. VI.

The
Long Par

LIAMENT

164.0

1644

Fall of the
Ministers

Dec. 1640

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap,

1641

Tbe
Death of
Strafford

Mar. 22
V Trial

whom that morning the greatest of all England would have Ltood
uncovered." The blow was quickly followed up. Windebank, the
Secretary of State, was charged with corrupt favouring of recusants,
and escaped to France ; Finch, the Lord Keeper, was impeached, and
tied in terror over-sea. Laud himself was thrown into prison. The
shadow of wh.at was to come falls across the pages of his diary, and
softens the hard temper of the man into a strange tenderness. " I
stayed at Lambeth till the evening," writes the Archbishop, " to avoid
the gaze of the people. I went to evening prayer in my chapel. The
Psalms of the day and chapter fifty of Isaiah gave me great comfort.
God make me worthy of it, and fit to receive it. As I went to my
barge, hundreds of my poor neighbours stood there and prayed for my
safety and return to my house. For which I bless God and them."
Charles was forced to look helplessly on at the wreck of the royal
system, for the Scotch army was still encamped in the north ; and the
Parliament, which saw in the presence of the Scots a security against
its own dissolution, was in no hurry to vote the money necessary for
their withdrawal. "We cannot do without them," Strode honestly
confessed, " the Philistines are still too strong for us." One by one the
lawless acts of Charles's government were undone. Ship-money was
declared illegal, the judgement in Hampden's case annulled, and one of
the judges committed to prison. A statute declaring " the ancient right
of the subjects of this kingdom that no subsidy, custom, impost, or
any charge whatsoever, ought or may be laid or imposed upon any
merchandize exported or imported by subjects, denizens, or aliens,
without common consent in Parliament," put an end for ever to all
pretensions to a right of arbitrary taxation on the part of the Crown.
A Triennial Bill enforced the assembly of the Houses every three years,
and bound the returning officers to proceed to election if the Royal
writ failed to summon them. A Committee of Religion had been
appointed to consider the question of Church Reform, and on its
report the Commons passed a bill for the removal of bishops from the
House of Lords.

The King made no sign of opposition. He was known to be
resolute against the abolition of Episcopacy ; but he announced
no purpose of resisting the expulsion of the bishops from the
Peers. Strafford's life he was determined to save ; but he threw
no obstacle in the way of his impeachment. The trial of the Earl
began in Westminster Hall, and the whole of the House of Commons
appeared to support it. The passion which the cause excited was seen
in the loud cries of sympathy or hatred wb'ch burst from the crowded
benches on either side. For fifteen days Strafford struggled with a
remarkable courage and ingenuity against the list of charges, and
melted his audience to tears by the pathos of his defence. But the
trial was suddenly interrupted. Though tyranny and misgovernment

vni.l

PURITAN ENGLAND.

had been conclusively proved ajrainst him, the technical proof of
treason was weak. " The law of England," to use Hallam's words,
" is silent as to conspiracies against itself," and treason by the Statute
of Edward the Third was restricted to a levying of war against the
King or a compassing of )iis death. The Commons endeavoured to
strengthen their case by bringing forward the notes of a meeting of
a Committee of the Commons in which Strafford had urged the use of
his Irish troops "to reduce this kingdom ; " but the Lords would only
admit the evidence on condition of wholly reopening the case. Pym
and Hampden remained convinced of the sufficiency of the impeach-
ment ; but the Commons broke loose from their control, and, guided
by St. John and Henry Marten, resolved to abandon these judicial
proceedings, and fall back on the resource of a Bill of Attainder.
Their course has been bitterly censured by some whose opinion in
such a matter is entitled to respect, liut the crime of Strafford was
none the lees a crime that it did not fall within the scope of the
Statute of Treasons. It is impossible indeed to provide for some
of the greatest dangers which can happen to national freedom by any
formal statute. Even now a minister might avail himself of the
temper of a Parliament elected in some moment of popular panic,
and, though ihe nation returned to its senses, might simply by refusing
to appeal to the country govern in defiance of its will. Such a course
would be technically legal, but such a minister would be none the less
a criminal. Strafford's course, whether it fell within the Statute of
Treasons or no, was from beginning to end an attack on the freedom
of the whole nation. In the last resort a nation retains the right
of self-defence, and the Bill of Attainder is the assertion of such a
right for the punishment of a public enemy who falls within the scope
of no written law. To save Strafford and Episcopacy Charles seemed
to assent to a proposal for entrusting the offices of State to the leaders
of the Parliament, with the Earl of Bedford as Lord Treasurer ; the
only conditions he made were that Episcopacy should not be abolished
nor Strafford executed. But the negotiations were interrupted by
Bedford's death, and by the discovery that Charles had been listening
all the while to counsellors who proposed to bring about his end by
stirring the army to march on London, seize the Tower, free Strafford,
and deliver the King from his thraldom to Parliament. The discovery
of the Army Plot sealed Strafford's fate. The Londoners were roused
to frenzy, and as the Peers gathered at Westminster crowds sur-
rounded the House with cries of "Justice." On May 8 the Lords
passed the Bill of Attainder. The Earl's one hope was in the King,
but two days later the royal assent was given, and he passed to his
doom. Strafford died as he had lived. His friends warned him
of the vast multitude gathered before the Tower to witness his fall.
•'I know how to look death in the face, and the people too," he

539

Sec. VI.

The
Long Par-

1.1 AMEN T

1640

1644

urn of

Attainder

The Army
Plot

May 12

540

HISTORY OK THE ENGLISH FEOi'LE.

[chap. I vm.]

Skc. VI.

Thf

LoNf; Pak-

I.IAMEN r

1640

1644

The

Grand

Remon-

vtrance

The Pauic

Abolition of
the Star
Chaiubcr

Charles in
Sc'Otland

answered proudly. " I thank God I am no more afraid of death, but
as cheerfully put off my doublet at this time as ever I did when I went
to bed." As the axe fell, the silence of the great multitude was broken
by a universal shout of joy. The streets blazed with bonfires. The
bells clashed out from every steeple. " Many," says an observer, " that
came to town to see the execution rode in triumph back, waving their
hats, and vith all expressions of joy through every town they went,
crying, * His head is off! His head is off! * "

The failure of the attempt to establish a Parliamentary ministry, the
discovery of the Army Plot, the execution of Strafford, were the turning
points in the history of the Long Parliament. Till May there was
still hope for an accommodation between the Commons- and the Crown
by which the freedom that had been won might have been taken as
the base of a new system of government. But from that hour little
hope of such an agreement remained. On the one hand, the air, since
the army conspiracy, was full of rumours and panic ; the creak of a
few boards revived the memory of the Gunpowder Plot, and the
members rushed out of the House of Commons in the full belief that
it was undermined. On the other hand, Charles regarded his consent
to the new measures as having been extorted by force, and to be
retracted at the first opportunity. Both Houses, in their terror, swore
to defend the Protestant religion and the public liberties, an oath
which was subsequently exacted from every one engaged in civil
employment, and voluntarily taken by the great mass of the people.
The same terror of a counter-revolution induced Hyde and the
" moderate men " in the Commons to agree to a bill providing that
the present Parliament should not be dissolved but by its own consent.
Of all the demands of the Parliament this was the first that could be
called distinctly revolutionary. To consent to it was to establish a
power permanently co-ordinate with the Crown. Charles signed the
bill without protest, but he was already planning the means of breaking
the Parliament. Hitherto, the Scotch army had held him down, but
its payment and withdrawal could no longer be delayed, and a pacifi-
cation was arranged between the two countries. The Houses hastened
to complete their task of reform. The irregular jurisdictions of the
Council of the North and the Court of the Marches of Wales had been
swept away ; and the civil and criminal jurisdiction of the Star Chamber
and the Court of High Commission, the last of the extraordinary courts
which had been the support of the Tudor monarchy, were now sum-
marily abolished. The work was pushed hastily on, for haste was
needed. The two armies had been disbanded ; and the Scots were no
sooner on i. eir way homeward than the King resolved to bring them
back. In spite of prayers from the Parliament he left London for
Edinburgh, yielded to every demand of the Assembly and the Scotch
Estates, attended the Presbyterian worship, lavished titles and favours

[chap.

;ath, but
1 I went
i broken
s. The
M-, " that
ng their
;y went,

stry, the
; turnintj
lere was
e Crown
aken as
mr little
lir, since
sak of a
and the
:lief that
consent
id to be
>r, swore
an oath
in civil

people,
ind the
ing that
consent.
:ould be
ablish a
ned the
)reaking
3wn, but
a pacifi-
lastened
IS of the
lad been
rhamber
ry courts
ow sum-
iste was
were no
ng them
idon for
; Scotch

favours

vm.l

PURITAN ENGLANn.

on the Earl of Argyle and the patriot leaders, and gained for a few
months a popularity which spread dismay in the English Parliament.
Their dread of his designs was increased when he was found to hiive
been intriguing all the while with the Earl of Montrose — who had
seceded from the patriot party before his coming, and been rewarded
for his secession with imprisonment in the castle of Edinburgh — and
when Hamilton and Argyle withdrew suddenly from the capital, and
charged the King with a treacherous plot to seize and carry them out
of the realm. The fright was fanned to frenzy by news which came
suddenly from Ireland, where the fall of Strafford had put an end to
all semblance of rule. The disbanded soldiers of the army he had
raised spread over the country, and stirred the smouldering disaffec-
tion into a flame. A conspiracy, organised with wonderful power and
secresy, burst forth in Ulster, where the confiscation of the Settlement
had never been forgiven, and spread like wildfire over the centre and
west of the island. Dublin was saved by a mere chance ; but in the
open country the work of murder went on unchecked. Thousands of
English people perished in a few days, and rumour doubled and
trebled the number. Tales of horror and outrage, such as maddened
our own England when they reached us from Cawnpore, came day
after day over the Irish Channel. Sworn depositions told how husbands
were cut to pieces in presence of their wives, their children's brains
dashed out before their faces, their daughters brutally violated and
driven out naked to perish frozen in the woods. " Some," says May,
" were burned on set purpose, others drowned for sport or pastime,
and if they swam kept from landing with poles, or shot, or murdered
in the water ; many were buried quick, and some set into the earth
breast-high and there left to famish." Much of all this was the wild
exaggeration of panic. But the revolt was unlike any earlier rising in
its religious character. It was no longer a struggle, as of old, of Celt
against Saxon, but of Catholic against Protestant. The Papists
within the Pale joined hands in it with the wild kernes outside the
Pale. The rebels called themselves " Confederate Catholics," resolved
to defend " the public and free exercise of the true and Catholic Roman
religion." The panic waxed greater when it was found that they
claimed to be acting by the King's commission, and in aid of his
authority. They professed to stand by Charles and his heirs against
all that should " directly and indirectly endeavour to suppress their
royal prerogatives." They showed a Commission, purporting to have
been issued by royal command at Edinburgh, and styled themselves
" the King's army." The Commission was a forgery, but belief in it
was quickened by the want of all sympathy with the national honour
which Charles displayed. To him the revolt seemed a useful check
on his opponents. " I hope," he wrote coolly, when the news reached
him, " this ill news of Ireland may hinder some of these follies in

541

Sec. VI.

Thk
Lt»N(i Pak-

I.IAMKNT

1640

1644

7'At' /n'sh

JCisintr
Oct. 1641

Pfi^P.jjj

542

Sec. VI.

Thk
Long I'ak-

UAMKNT

1640

1644

'I'ltc new
Royaliits

HISTORY OK TMK KNGLISII PEOPLE.

[CHAI'.

The Grand
Rett I ou-
st rantc

Nov. 1 64 1

England." Above all, it would necessitate the raising of an army, and
with an army at his command he would again be the master of the
Parliament. The Parliament, on the other hand, saw in the Irish
revolt the disclosure of a vast scheme for a counter-revolution, 01
which the withdrawal of the Scotch army, the reconciliation of Scot-
land, the intrigues at Edinburgh, were all parts. Its terror was
quickened into panic by the exultation of the royalists at the King's
return, and by the appearance of a royalist party in the Parliament
itself. The new party had been silently organized by Hyde, the future
Lord Clarendon. With him stood Lord Falkland, a man learned and
accomplished, the centre of a circle which embraced the most liberal
thinkers of his day, a keen reasoner and able speaker, whose intense
desire for liberty of religious thought, which he now saw threatened
by the dogmatism of the time, estranged him from Parliament, while
his dread of a conflict with the Crown, his passionate longing for
peace, his sympathy for the fallen, led him to struggle for a King
whom he distrusted, and to die in a cause that was not his own.
Behind Falkland and Hyde soon gathered a strong force of sup-
porters ; chivalrous soldiers like Sir Edmund Verney (" I have eaten
the King's bread and served him now thirty years, and I will not do
so base a thing as to desert him "), as well as men frightened by the
rapid march of change or by the dangers which threatened Episcopacy
and the Church, the partizans of the Court, and the time-servers who
looked forward to a new triumph of the Crown. With a broken
Parliament, and perils gathering without, Pym resolved to appeal for
aid to the nation itself. The Grand Remonstrance which he laid
before the House was a detailed narrative of the work which the
Parliament had done, the difficulties it had surmounted, and the new
dangers which lay in its path. The Parliament had been charged
with a design to abolish Episcopacy, it declared its purpose to be
simply that of reducing the power of bishops. Politically it repudiated
the taunt of revolutionary aims. It demanded only the observance of
the existing laws against recusancy, securities for the due administra-
tion of justice, and the employment of ministers who possessed the
confidence of Parliament. The new King's party fought fiercely,
debate followed debate, the sittings were prolonged till lights had to
be brought in ; and it was only at midnight, and by a majority of
eleven, that the Remonstrance was finally adopted. On an attempt of
the minority to olTer a formal protest against a subsequent vote for its
publication the slumbering passion broke out into a flame. " Some
waved their hats over their heads, and others took their swords in
their scabbards out of their belts, and held them by the pommels in
their hands, setting the lower part on the ground." Only Hampden's
coolness and tact averted a conflict. The Remonstrance was felt on
both sides to be a crisis in the struggle. " Had it been rejected," said

[CHAl'.

VIII.]

I'UklTAN KNGLANl).

rmy, and
er of the
the Irish
ution, o!
of Scot-
rror was
le King's
irliament
he future
rned and
St liberal
e intense
ireatened
;nt, while
iging for
• a King
his own.
; of sup-
Lve eaten
11 not do
d by the
)iscopacy
vers who

broken
ppeal for

he laid
hich the
the new
charged
se to be
pudiated
vance of
ninistra-
ssed the

fiercely,
;s had to
jority of
tempt of
te for its

" Some
words in
imels in
impden's
LS felt on
ed," said

Cromwell, as he left the House, " I would have sold ♦o-morrow all I
possess, and left England for ever." Listened to sullenly by the King,
it kindled afresh the spirit of the country. London swore to live and
die with the Parliament ; associations were formed in every county for
ihe defence of the Houses ; and when the guard which the Commons
had asked for in the panic of the Army IMot was withdrawn by the
King, the populace crowded down to Westminster to take its place.

The question which had above all broken the unity of the Parlia-
ment had been the question of the Church. All were agreed on the
necessity of reform, and one of the first acts of the Parliament had been
to appoint a Committee of Religion to consider the question. The bulk
of the Commons as of the Lords were at first against any radical
changes in the constitution or doctrines of the Church. But within as
without the House the general opinion was in favour of a reduction of
the power and wealth of the prelates, as well as of the jurisdiction
of the Church Courts. Even among the bishops themselves, the more
prominent saw the need for consenting to the abolition of Chapters
and Bishops' Courts, as well as to the election of a council of ministers
in each diocese, which had been suggested by Archbishop Usher as a
check on episcopal autocracy. A scheme to this effect was drawn up
by Bishop Williams of Lincoln ; but it was far from meeting the
wishes of the general body of the Commons. Pym and Lord Falk-
land demanded, in addition to these changes, a severance of the clergy
from all secular or state offices, and an expulsion of the bishops from
the House of Lords. Such a measure seemed needed to restore the
independence of the Peers ; for the number and servility of the bishops
were commonly strong enough to prevent any opposition to the Crown.
There v/as, however, a gro\ving party which pressed for the abolition
of Episcopacy altogether. The doctrines of Cartwright had risen
into popularity under the persecution of Laud, and Presbyterianism
was now a formidable force among the middle classes. Its chief
strength lay in the eastern counties and in London, where a few
ministers such as Calamy and Marshall had formed a committee
for its diffusion ; while in Parliament it was represented by Lord
Mandeville and some others. In the Commons Sir Harry Vane
represented a more extreme party of reformers, the Independents of
the future, whose sentiments were little less hostile to Presbyterianism
than to Episcopacy, but who acted with the Presbyterians for the
present, and formed a part of what became known as the " root and
branch party," from its demand for the extirpation of prelacy. The
attitude of Scotland in the great struggle against tyranny, and the
political advan .ges of a religious union between the two kingdoms,
as well as the desire to knit the English Church more closely to the
general body of Protestantism, gave force to the Presbyterian party.
Milton, who after the composition of his " Lycidas " had spent a year

S4-J

Skc. VI.

'I'lIK

i.oM. Par.

I.IAMKNT

ie4o

1644

Arrest

of the

Five

Members

Chunk
reform

The liishops
and Parlia-
ment

•i

t 'I

544

Sue. VI.

Thk

LoN(; Pak-

LIAMKNT

1640

Tf)

7.044.

Cai'itiietJi

and

Roundheads

Jan. 4
1642

HISTORY OK THK ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAI*.

in foreign travel, returned to throw himself on this ground into the
theological strife. He held it "an unjust thing that the Knglish should
differ from all Churches as many as be reformed." In spite of this
pressure, however, and of a Presbyterian petition from London with
fifteen thousand signatures to the same purport, the Committee of
R( ligion reported in favour of the moderate reforms proposed by
FaPkland and Pym ; and a bill for the removal of bishops from the
House of Peers passed the Commons almost unanimously. Rejected
by the Lords on the eve of the King's journey to Scotland, it was
again introduced on his return. Pym and his colleagues, anxious to
close the disunion in their ranks, sought to end the pressure of the
Presbyterian zealots, and the dread of the Church party, by taking their
stand on the compromise suggested by the Committee of Religion in
the spring. But in spite of violent remonstrances from the Commons
the bill still hung fire among the Peers. The delay roused the excited
crowd of Londoners who gathered round Whitehall ; the bishops'
carriages were stopped, and the prelates themselves rabbled on their
way to the House. The angry pride of Williams induced ten of his
fellow bishops to declare themselves prevented from attendance in
Parliament, and to protest against all acts done in their absence as
null and void. The protest was met at once on the part of the Peers
by the committal of the prelates v/ho had signed it to the Tower. IJut
the contest gave a powerful aid to the projects of the King. The
courtiers declared openly that the rabbling of the bishops proved that
there was " no free Parliament," and strove to bring about fresh out-
rages by gathering troops of officers and soldiers of fortune, who were
seeking for employment in the Irish war, and pitting them against the
crowds at Whitehall. The brawls of the two parties, who gave each
other the nicknames of " Roundheads " and " Cavaliers," created fresh
alarm in the Parliament ; but Charles persisted in refusing it a guard.
" On the honour of a King," he engaged to defend them from violence
as completely as his own children, but the answer had hardly been given
when his Attorney appeared at the bar of the Lords, and accused
Hampden, Pym, HoUis, Strode, and Haselrig of high treason in their
correspondence with the Scots. A herald-at-arms appeared at the bar
of the Commons, and demanded the surrender of the five members.
If Charles believed himself to be within legal forms, the Commons
saw a mere act of arbitrary violence in a charge which proceeded
personally from the King, which set aside the most cherished privi-
leges of Parliament, and summoned the accused before a tribunal
which had no pretence to a jurisdiction over them. The Commons
simply promised to take the demand into consideration, and again
requested a guard. " I will reply to-morrow," said the King. On the
morrow he summoned the gentlemen who clustered round Whitehall
to follow him, and, embracing the Queen, promised her that in an hour

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

545

lic would return master of his kinji^dnm. A mob of Cavaliers joined
iiirn as he left the palace, and remained in Westminster Hall as Charles,
accompanied by his nephew, the IClcctor- Palatine, entered the 1 louse of
Commons. *' Mr. Speaker," he said, " I must for a time borrow your
chair ! " He paused with a sudden confusion as his eye fell on the vacant
spot where Pym commonly sale: for at the news of his approach the
House h.'ul ordered the five members to withdraw. "Gentlemen," he
hcKan In slow broken sentences, " I am sorry for this occasion of coming
unto you. Yesterday I sent p Sergeant-at-arms upon a very important
occasion, to apprehend some that by my command were accused of
high treason, whereunto I did expect obedience, and .lot a message."
Treason, he went on, had no privilej,'e, " and therefore I am come to
know if any of these persons that were accused are here." There was
a dead silence, only broken by his reiterated " I must have them where-
soever 1 find them." He again paused, but the stillness was unbroken.
Then he called out, " Is Mr. Vym here .-'" There was no answer ; and
Charles, turning to the Speaker, asked him whether the five members
were there. Lenthall fell on his knees ; " I have neither eyes to see,"
he replied, " nor ton ;ue to speak in this place, but as this House is
pleased to direct me." " Well, well," Charles angrily retorted, " 'tis no
matter. I think my eyes are as good as another's ! " There was
another long pause, while he looked carefully over the ranks of
members. *' I see," he said at last, " all the birds arc flown. I do
expect you will send them to me as soon as they return hither." If
they did not, he added, he would seek them himself; and with a
closing protest that he never intended any force, " he went out of the
House," says an eye-witness, " in a more discontented and angry
passion than he came in."

Nothing but the absence of the five members, and the calm dignity
of the Commons, had prevented the King's outrage from ending in
bloodshed. " It was believed," says Whitelock, who was present at
the scene, " that if the King had found them there, and called in his
guards to have seized them, the members of the House would have
endeavoured the defence of them, which might have proved a very
unhappy and sad business." Five hundred gentlemen of the best
blood in England would hardly have stood tamely by while the bravoes
of Whitehall laid hands on their leaders in the midst of the Parlia-
ment. But Charles was blind to the danger of his course. The five
members had taken refuge in the city, and it was there that on the
next day the King himself demanded their surrender from the aldermen
at Guildhall. Cries of " Privilege " rang round him as he returned
through the streets : the writs issued for the arrest of the five were
disregarded by the Sheriffs, and a proclamation issued four days
later, declaring them traitors, passed without notice. Terror drove the
Cavaliers from Whitehall, and Charles stood absolutely alono ; for the j

N N

Skc. VI.

Tmf.

l.<)No Par-

I.IAMRNT

1040

Tr>

1644

The Eve
of the
War

546

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

S«c. VI.

The.
Long Par-
liament

1640

1644

Prepara-
tions for
War

Otiil^rcak
of War

outrage had severed him for the moment from his new friends in the
Parliament, and from the ministers, Falkland and Colepepper, whom
he had chosen among them. But lonely as he wr^s, Charles had
'esolved on war. The Earl of Newcastle was despatched to muster
a royal force in the north ; and on the tenth of January news that the
five members were about to return in triumph to Westminster drove
Charles from Whitehall. He retired to Hampton Court and to
Windsor, while the Trained Bands of London and Southwark on
foot, and the London watermen on the river, all sworn " to guard the
Parliament, the Kingdom, and the King," escorted Pym and his
fellow-members along the Thames to the House of Commons. Both
sides prepared for the coming struggle. The Queen sailed from Dover
with the Crown jewels to buy munitions of war. The Cavaliers again
gathered round the King, and the royalist press flooded the country
with State papers drawn up by Hyde. On the other hand, the Com-
mons resolved by vote to secure the gre? . arsenals of the kingdom,
Hull, Portsmouth and the Tower ; while mounted processions of free-
holders from Buckinghamshire and Kent traversed London on their
way to St. Stephen's, vowing to live and die with the Parliament. The
Lords were scared out of their policy of obstruction by ^*ym's bold
announcement of the new position taken by the House of Commons.
"The Commons," said their leader, "will be glad to have your con-
currence and help in saving the kingdom ; but if they fail of it, it
should not discourage them in doing their duty. And whether the
kingdom be lost or saved, they shall be sorry that the story of this
present Parliament should tell posterity that in so great a danger and
extremity the House of Commons should be enforced to save the
kingdom alone." The effect of Pym' s words was seen in the passing
of the bill for excluding bishops from the House of Lords. The great
point, however, was to secure armed support from the nation at large,
anH here both sides were in a difficulty. Previous to the innovations
introduced by the Tudors, and which had been already questioned by
the Commons in a debate on pressing soldiers, the King in himself
had no power of calling on his subjects generally to bear arms,
save for purposes of restoring order or meeting foreign invasion.
On the other hand, no one contended that such a power had ever
been exercised by the two Houses without the King ; and Charles
steadily refused to consent to a MiUtia bill, in which the command
of the national force was given in every county to men devotee^
to the Parliamentary cause. Both parties therefore broke through
constitutional precedent, the Parliament in appointing the Lord
Lieutenants who commanded the Militia by ordinance of the two
Houses, Charles in levying forces by royal commissions of array. The
King's great difficulty lay in procuring arms, and on the twenty-third
of April hfr suddenly appeared before Hull, the magazine of the north,

[CHAP.

s in the
r, whom
rles had
3 muster
that the
;er drove
: and to
iwark on
fuard the
L and his
IS. Both
ml Dover
iers again
e country
the Com-
kingdom,
US of free-
1 on their
lent. The
'ym's bold
Commons,
your con-
lil of it, it
hether the
oiy of this
ganger and
save the
;he passing
The great
m at large,
nnovations
Rationed by
in himself
bear arms,
n invasion.
:r had ever
,nd Charles
3 command
en devote(^
)ke through
T the Lord
of the two
array. The
;wenty-third
lof the north,

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

and demanded admission. The new governor, Sir John Hotham, fell
on his knees, but refused to open the gates : and the avowal of his act
by the Parliament was followed by the withdrawal of the royalist party
among its members from their scats at Westminster. Falkland,
Colepepper and Hyde, with thirty-two peers and sixty members of the
House of Commons, joined Charles at York ; and Lyttelton, the Lord
Keeper, followed with the Great Seal. They aimed at putting a check
on the King's projects of war, and their efforts were backed by the
general opposition of the country. A great meeting of the Yorkshire
freeholders which he convene ' on Heyworth Moor ended in a petition
praying him to be reconciled to the Parliament, and in spite of gifts
of plate from the Universities and nobles of his party, arms and
money were still wanting for his new levies. The two Houses, on
the othei" hand, gained in unity and vigour by the withdrawal of the
royalists. The militia was rapidly enrolled, Lord Warwick named
to the command of the fleet, and a loan opened in the city to which
the women brought even their wedding rings. The tone of the two
Houses had risen with the tiireat of force : and their last proposals
demanded the powers of appointing and dismissing the royal ministers,
naming guardians for the royal children, and of virtually controlling
military, civil, and religious affairs. " If I granted your demands,"
replied Charles, " I should be no more thaii the nicre phantom of a
king."

Section VII.-The Civil War. July 1642-Aug. 1646.

[Aut/iofitics. — To those before given we may add Warburton's biography
of Prince Rupert, Mr, Clements Markham's life of Fairfax, the Fairfax Cor-
respondence, and Ludlow's " Memoirs." Sprigg's " Anglin Rediviva " gives
an account of the New Model and its doings. For Cromwell, the primary
authority is Mr. Carlyle's " Life and Letters," an invaluabl° stor.e of docu-
ments, edited with the care of an antiquary and the genius of a poet.
Clarendon, who now becomes of greater value, gives a good ticcount of the
Cornish rising.]

The breaking off of negotiations was followed on both sides by pre-
parations for immediate war. Hampden, Pym, and Hollis became the
guiding spirits of a Committee of Public Safety which was created by
I'arliament as its administrative organ ; English and Scotch officers
were drawn from the Low Countries, and Lord Essex named com-
mander of an army, which soon rose to twenty thousand foot and four
thousand horse. The confidence on the Parliamentary side was great ;
" we all thought one battle would decide," Baxter confessed after the
fust encounter ; for the King was almost destitute of money and arms,
and in spite of his strenuous efforts to raise recruits he was embarrassed
by the reluctance of his own adherents to begin the struggle. Re-
solved, however, to force on a contest, he raised the Royal Standard

N N 2

547

Sec. VI.

The
LoNc Pak-

LIAMENT

164.0

1644

May 1642

Edeehill

. i 1 ■ ;.

1^,

Ait^^. 22

•I !

548

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. VII.

Thf Civil
Wak

164-2

1646

Oil. 23,
1642

Charles at
Oxford

rek 1643

at Nottingham " on tlie eveninr^ of a very stormy and tempestuous
day," but the country made no answer to his appeal ; while Essex, who
had quitted London amVdst the shouts of a great multitude, with orders
from the Parliament to follow the King, " and by battle or other way
rescue him from his perfidious counsellors and restore him ]to Parlia-
ment," mustered his army at Northampton. Charles had but a
handful of men, and the dash of a few regiments of horse would have
ended the war ; but Essex shrank from a decisive stroke, and trusted
to reduce the King to submission by a show of force. As Charles
fell back on Shrewsbury, Essex too moved westward and occupied
Worcester. But the whole face of afijiirs suddenly changed. Catholics
and royalists rallied fast to the King's standard, and a bold march
on London drew Essex from Worcester to protect the capital. The
two armies fell in with one another on the field of Edgehill, near
Banbury. The encounter was a surprise, and the battle which
followed was little more than a confused combat of horse. At its
outset the desertion of Sir Faithful Fortescue with a whole regiment
threw the Parliamentary forces into disorder, while the royalist
horse on either wing drove the cavalry of the enemy from the
field ; but the foot soldiera of Lord Essex broke the infantry which
formed the centre of the King's line, and though his nephew,
Prince Rupert, brought back his squadrons in time to save Charles
from capture or flight, the night fell on a drawn battle. The moral
advantage, however, rested with the King. Essex had learned that
his troopers were no match for the Cavaliers, and his withdrawal to
Warwick left open the road to the capital. Rupert pressed for an
instant march on London, but the proposal found stubborn opponents
among the moderate loyalists, who dreaded the complete triumph of
Charles as much as his defeat. The King therefore paused for the
time at Oxford, where he was received with uproarious welcome ; and
when the cowardice of its garrison delivered Reading to Rupert's
horse, and his daring capture of Brentford drew the royal army in his
support almost to the walls of the capital, the panic of the Londoners
was already over, and the junction of their trainbands with the army
of Essex forced Charles to fall back again on his old quarters. But
though the Parliament rallied quickly from the blow of Edgehill, the
war, as its area widened through the winter, went steadily for the
King. The fortificat'on of Oxford gave him a firm hold on the mid-
land qpunties ; while the balance of the two parties in the north was
overthrown by the march of the Earl of Newcastle, with the force he
had raised in Northumberland, upon York. Lord Fairfax, the Parlia-
mentary leader in that county, was thrown back on the manufactrring
towns of the W^est Riding, where Puritanism found its stronghold ; and
the arrival of the Queen with arms from Holland encouraged the royal
army to push its scouts across the Trent, and threaten the eastern

VIII.J

rURITAN ENGLAND.

counties, which held firmly for the Parliament. The stress of the war
was shown by the vigorous exertions of the two Houses. Some
negotiations which had gone on into the spring were broken off by ihc
old demand that the King should return to his Parliament ; London
was fortified ; and a tax of two millions a year was laid on the districts
whicli adhered to the Parliamentary cause. Essex, whose army had
been freshly equipped, was ordered to advance upon Oxford ; but
though the King held himself ready to fall back on the west, the Karl
shrank from again risking his raw army in an encounter. He confined
himself to the recapture of Reading, and to a month of idle encampment
round Brill.

But while disease thinned his ranks and the royalists beat up his
quarters the war went more and more for the King. The inaction of
Essex enabled Charles to send a part of his small force at Oxford to
strengthen a royalist rising in the west. Nowhere was the royal cause
to take so brave or noble a form as among the Cornishmen. Cornwall
stood apart from the general life of England : cut oft' from it not only
by differences of blood and speech, but by the feudal tendencies of its
people, who clung with a Celtic loyalty to their local chieftains, and
suffered their fidelity to the Crown to determine their own. They had
as yet done little more than keep the war out of their own county ; but
the march of a small Parliamentary force under Lord Stamford upon
Launceston forced them into action. A little band of Cornishmen
gathered round the chivalrous Sir Bevil Greenvil, " so destitute of pro-
visions that the best officers had but a biscuit a day," and with only a
handful of powder for the whole force ; but starving and outnumbered
as they were, they scaled the steep rise of Stratton Hill, sword in
hand, and drove Stamford back on Exeter, with a loss of two thousand
men, his ordnance and baggage train. Sir Ralph Hopton, the best of
the royalist generals, took the command of their army as it advanced
into Somerset, and drew the stress of the war into the West. ELssex
despatched a picked force under Sir William Waller to check their
advance ; but Somerset was already lost ere he reached Bath, and the
Cornishmen stormed his strong position on Lansdowne Hill in the teeth
of his guns. But the stubborn fight robbed the victors of their leaders ;
Hopton was wounded, and Greenvil slain ; while soon after, at the siege
of Bristol, fell two other heroes of the little army, Sir Nicholas Slanning
and Sir John Trevanion, " both young, neither of them above eight and
twenty, of entire friendship to one another, and to Sir Bevil Greenvil."
Waller, beaten as he was, hung on their weakened force as it moved
for aid upon Oxford, and succeeded in cooping up the foot in Devizes.
Hut the horse broke through, and joining a force which Charles had
sent to theii relief, turned back, and dashed Waller's army to pieces in
afresh victory on Roundway Down. The Cornish rising seemed to
decide the fortune of the war ; and the succours which his Oueen was

549

Six. Vll.

TiiK Civil
Wau

1642

1646

The

Cornish

Rising

M/j' 1643

Jn/j' 1643

I 1

» ■

550

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VII.

The Ciml
War

1642

1646

Death of
Hampdtn

The
Covenant

Sept. 6

League with
Scotland

bringing hini from the army of the North determined Charles to
make a fresh advance upon London. He was preparing for this
advance, when Rupert in a daring raid from Oxford on the Parlia-
mentary army, met a party of horse with Hampden at its head, on
Chalgrovc field. The skirmish ended in the success of the royalists,
and Hampden was seen riding off the field before the action was done,
"which he never used to do," with his head bending down, and resting
his hands upon the neck of his horse. He was mortally wounded, and
his death seemed an omen of the ruin of the cause he loved. Disaster
followed disaster. Essex, more and more anxious for a peace, fell back
on Uxbridge ; while a cowardly surrender of Bristol to Prince Rupert
gave Charles the second city of the kingdom, and the mastery of the
West. The news fell on the Parliament " like a sentence of death."
The Lords debated nothing but proposals of peace. London itself
was divided :

great

multitude of the wives of substantial
citizens" clamoured at the door of the Commons for peace; and
a flight of six of the few peers who remained at Westminster to
the camp at Oxford proved the general despair of the Parliament's
success.

From this moment, however, the firmness of the Parliamentary
leaders began slowly to reverse the fortunes of the war. If Hampden
was gone, Pym remained. The spirit of the Commons was worthy of
their great leader : and Wilier was received on his return from Round-
way Hill " as if he had brDught the King prisoner with him." A new
army was placed under the command of Lord Manchester to check
the progress of Newcastle in the North. But in the West the danger
was greatest. Prince Maurice continued his brother Rupert's career
of success, and his conquest of Barnstaple and Exeter secured Devon
for the King. Gloucester alone interrupted the communications
between his forces in Bristol and in the north ; and Charles moved
against the city, with hope of a speedy surrender. But the gallant
resistance of the town called Essex to its relief. It was reduced to a
single barrel of powder when the Eprl's approach forced Charles to raise
the siege ; and the Puritan army fell steadily back again on London,
after an indecisive engagement near Newbury, in which Lord Falkland
fell, "ingeminating 'Peace, peace!'" and the London trainbands flung
Rupert's horsemen roughly off their front of pikes. In this posture of
his affairs nothing but a great victory could have saved the King, for
the day which witnessed the triumphant return of Essex witnessed
the solemn taking of the Covenant. Pym had resolved at last to
fling the Scotch sword into the wavering balance ; and in the darkest
hour of the Parliament's cause Sir Harry Vane had been despatched
to Edinburgh to arrange the terms on which the aid of Scotland
would be given. First amongst them stood the demand of a " unity
in Religion ; " an adoption, in other words, of the Presbyterian system

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

by the Church of England. Events had moved so rapidly since the
earlier debates on Church government in the Commons that some
arrangement of this kind had become a necessity. The bishops to a
man, and the bulk of the clergy whose bent was purely episcopal, had
joined the royal cause, and were being expelled from their livings as
" delinquents." Some new system of Church government was impera-
tively called for by the religious necessities of the country ; and,
though Pym and the leading statesmen were still in opinion moderate
Episcopalians, the growing force of Presbyterianism, and still more the
needs of the war, forced them to seek such a system in the adoption
of the Scotch discipline. Scotland, for its part, saw that the triumph
of the Parliament was necessary for its own security ; and whatever
difficulties stood in the way of Vane's wary and rapid negotiations
were removed by the policy of the King. While the Parliament looked
for aid to the north, Charles had been seeking assistance from the Irish
rebels. The massacre had left them the objects of a vengeful hate such
as PIngland had hardly known before, but with Charles they were
simply counters in his game of king-craft. The conclusion of a truce
with the Confederate Catholics left the army under Lord Ormond,
which had hitherto held their revol* in check, at the King's disposal
for service in England. With the promise of Catholic support Charles
might even think himself strong enough to strike a blow at the
Government in Edinburgh ; and negotiations were soon opened with
the Irish Catholics to support by their landing in Argyleshire a rising
of the Highlanders under Montrose. None of the King's schemes
proved so fatal to his cause as these. As the rumour of his inten-
tions spread, officer after officer in his own army flung down their
commissions, the peers who had fled to Oxford fled back again to
London, and the royalist reaction in the Parliament itself came utterly
to an end. Scotland, anxious for its own safety, hastened to sign the
Covenant; and the Commons, "with uplifted hands," swore in St.
Margaret's church to observe it. They pledged themselves to " bring
the Churches of God in the three Kingdoms to the nearest conjunction
and uniformity in religion, confession of faith, form of Church govern-
ment, direction for worship and catechizing ; that we, and our posterity
after us, may as brethren live in faith and love, and the Lord may
delight to live in the midst of us" : to extirpate Popery, prelacy, super-
stition, schism, and profaneness ; to "preserve he rights and privileges
of the Parliament, and the liberties of the Kingoom ;" to punish malig-
iiants and opponents of reformation in Church and State ; to " unite
the two Kingdoms in a firm peace and union to all posterity." The
Covenant ended with a solemn acknowledgement of national sin, and a
vow of reformation. " Our true, unfeigned pi:rpose, desire, and endea-
vour for ourselves and all others under our power and charge, both in
public and private, in all duties we owe to Ciod and man, is to amend i

551

,. 1

' J'

Sec. VII,

The Civil
War

1642

1646

!■ » ;

• ! :

j
i
[ .

i '

■ '. IF

^^i

6V/A IS

F.ns^land

sivt'iirs to the

Covenant

Sept. 25

; -i ■

552

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

VIII,]

Sec. VII.

The Civil
War

164.2

1646

Marston
Moor

July 2,
1644

our lives, and each one to go before another in the example of a real
reformation."

The conclusion of the Covenant had been the last work of Pym.
A " Committee of the 'I'wo Kingdoms" which was entrusted after his
death in December with the conduct of the war and of foreign affairs
did their best to carry out the plans he had formed for the coming
year. The vast scope of these plans bears witness to his amazing
ability. Three strong armies, comprising a force of fifty thousand
men, had been raised for the coming campaign. Essex, with the army
of the centre, was charged with the duty of watching the king at Oxford.
Waller, with another army, was to hold Prince Maurice in check in the
west. The force of fourteen thousand men which had been raised by
the zeal of the eastern counties, and in which Cromwell's name was
becoming famous as a leader, was raised into a third army under Lord
Manchester, ready to co-operate in Yorkshire with Sir Thomas Fairfax.
With Alexander Leslie, Lord Leven, at its head, the Scotch army crossed
the border in January " in a great frost and snow," and Newcastle was
forced to hurry northward to arrest its march. His departure freed
the hands of Fairfax, who threw himself on the English troops from
Ireland that had landed at Chester, and after cutting them to pieces
marched as rapidly back to storm Selby. The danger in his rear
called back Newcastle, who returned from confronting the Scots at
Durham to throw himself into York, where he was besieged by
Fairfax and by the Scotch army. The plans of Pym were now rapidly
developed. While Manchester marched with the army of the Associated
Counties to join the forces of Fairfax and Lord Leven under the walls
of York, Waller and Essex gathered their troops round Oxford. Charles
was thrown on the defensive. The troops from Ireland on which he
counted had been cut to pieces by Fairfax or by Waller, and in
North and South he seemed utterly overmatched. But he was far
from despairing. He had already answered Newcastle's cry for aid by
despatching Prince Rupert from Oxford to gather forces on the Welsh
border ; and the brilliant partizan, after breaking the sieges of Newark
and Lathom House, burst over the Lancashire hills into Yorkshire,
slipped by the Parliamentary army, and made his way untouched into
York. But the success of this feat of arms tempted him to a fresh act
of daring ; he resolved on a decisive battle, and a discharge of musketry
from the two armies as they faced each other on Marston Moor
brought on, as evening gathered, a disorderly engagement. On the
one flank a charge of the King's horse broke that of the enemy ; on
the other, Cromwell's brigade won as complete a success over Rupert's
troopers. " God made them as stubble to our swords," wrote the
general at the close of the day ; but in the heat of victory he called
back his men from the chase to back Manchester in his attack on the
royaUst foot, and to rout their other wing of horse as it returned

breathles
so fierce,
as he ber
what it w
God had
enemies.'
north hai
rendered,
southwan
on Charl
changed
cesses, i
followed
attack P
Waller at
two days
up his su
to crush b
error, Ess
and where
tightly roi
surrender
besiegers,
surrender
promised
fulfilled th
in Argyle
himself in
new force
victory wh
spread ten
the west, tc
detained a
his path al
who had si
the field. \
squadrons
defeat by i
them back
moment o
single brig
officers, re
victory ovf
Oxford, an
The qua

[chap,

f a real

3f Pym.
ifter his
1 affairs
coming
amazing
housand
he army
; Oxford.
:k in the
aised by
ame was
ier Lord
; Fairfax.
y crossed
astle was
.ire freed
ops from
to pieces
his rear
Scots at
ieged by
vv rapidly
ssociated
the walls

Charles
which he

and in
e was far
"or aid by
he Welsh
f Newark
(Yorkshire,
ched into

fresh act
musketry
ton Moor
On the
lemy ; on
r Rupert's
wrote the
' he called
ick on the
: returned

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

553

breathless from pursuing the Scots. Nowhere had the ngliti^g been
so fierce. A young Puritan who lay dying on the field told Cromwell
as he bent over him that one thing lay on his spirit. " I asked him
what it was," Cromwell wrote afterwards. " He told me it was that
God had not sufered him to be any more the executioner of His
enemies." At ni^-ht-fall all was over ; and the royalist cause in the
north had perished at a blow. Newcastle fled over sea: York sur
rendered, and R ipert, with about six thousand horse at his back, rode
southward to Oxford. The blow was the more terrible that it fell
on Charles at a moment when his danger in the south was being
changed into triumph by a series of brilliant and unexpected suc-
cesses. After a month's siege the King had escaped from Oxford
followed by Essex and Waller ; had waited till Essex marched to
attack Prince Maurice at Lyme ; and then, turning fiercely on
Waller at Cropredy Bridge, had driven him back broken to London,
two days before the battle of Marston Moor. Charles followed
up his success by hurrying in the track of Essex, whom he hoped
to crush between his own force and that under Maurice. By a fatal
error, Essex plunged into Cornwall, where the country was hostile,
and where the King hemmed him in among the hills, drew his lines
tightly round his army, and forced the whole body of the foot to
surrender at his mercy, while the horse cut their way through the
besiegers, and Essex himself fled by sea to London. The day of the
surrender was signalized by a royalist triumph in Scotland which
promised to undo what Marston Moor had done. The Irish Catholics
fulfilled their covenant with Charles by the landing of Irish soldiers
in Argyle ; and as had long since been arranged, Montrose, throwing
himself into the Highlands, called the clans to arms. Flinging his
new force on that of the Covenanters at Tippermuir, he gained a
victory which enabled him to occupy Perth, to sack Aberdeen, and to
spread terror to Edinburgh. The news fired Charles, as he came up from
the west, to venture on a march upon London ; but though the Scots were
detained at Newcastle the rest of the victors at Marston Moor lay in
his path at Newbury ; and their force was strengthened by the so^liers
who had surrendered in Cornwall, but who had been again brought into
the field. The charges of the royalists failed to break the Parliamentary
squadrons, and the soldiers of Essex wiped away the shame of their
defeat by flinging themselves on the cannon they had lost, and bringing
them back in triumph to their lines. Cromwell would have seized the
moment of victory, but the darkness hindered his charging with his
single brigade. Manchester, meanwhile, in spite of the prayers of his
officers, refused to attack. Like Essex, he shrank from a crowning-
victory over the King. Charles was allowed to withdraw his army to
Oxford, and even to reappear unchecked in the field of his defeat.
The quarrel of Cromwell with Lord Manchester at Newbury was

Sec. VII.

Thk Civil.
War

1642

1646

I i-

Newbury
Oct. 27

Croinivell

■\ -'Si

?■ ,i

554

IITSTORY OF THE ENGUFH PEOPLE.

[chap.

VIII 1

Sec. VII.

The Civil.

War

1642

1646

1599

brigade

\ !

I \

destined to give a new colour and direction to the war. Pym., in fact,
had hardly been borne to his grave in Westminster Abbey before
England instinctively recognized a successor of yet greater genius in
the victor of Marston Moor. Born in the closing years of Elizabeth's
reign, the child of a cadet of the great house of the Cromwells of
Hinchinbrook, and of kin through their mothers with Hampden and
St. John, Oliver had been recalled by his father's death from a short
stay at Cambridge to the little family estate at Huntingdon, which he
quitted for a farm at St. Ives. We have already seen his mood during
the years of personal rule, as hf* dwelt in "prolonging" and "blackness"
amidst fanc'.s or coming death, the melancholy which formed the
ground of his nature feeding itself on the inaction of the time. But his
energy made itself felt the moment the tyranny was over. His
father had sat, with three of his uncles, in the later Parliaments of
Elizabeth. Oliver had himself been returned to that of 1628, and the
town of Cambridge ijent him as its representative to the Short Parlia-
ment as to the Eong It is in the latter that a courtier. Sir Philip War-
wick, gives us our first glimpse of hi,' actual appearance. " I came into
the House one morning, well clad, and perceived a gentleman speaking
whom I knew not, very ordinarily apparelled, for it v/as a plain cloth
suit, which seemed to have been made by an ill country tailor. His
linen was plain, and not very clean ; and I remember a speck or two of
blood upon his little band, which was not much larger than his collar.
His hat was without a hat -band. His stature was of a good size ; his
sword stuck close to his side ; his countenance swoln and reddish ;
his voice sharp and untuneable, and his eloquence full of fervour." He
was already " much hearkened unto," but his power was to assert itself
in deeds rather than in words. Men of his own time marked him out
from all others by the epithet of Ironside. He appeared at the head of
a troop of his own raising at Edgehill ; but with the eye of a born soldier
he at once saw the blot in the army of Essex. " A set of poor tapsters
and town apprentices," he warned ^lampden, "woud never fight against
men of honour;" and he pointed to religious enthusiasm as the one
weapon which could meet the chivalry of the Cavalier. Even to Hamp-
den the plan seemed impracticable ; but the regiment of a thousand men
which Cromwell raised for the Association of th"^ Eastern Counties was
formed strictly of " men of religion." He ^pent his fortune freely on
the task he set himself. " The business .... hath had of me in money
between eleven and twelve hundred pounds, therefore my private
estate can do little to hoip the public, ... I have little money of iny
own (left) to help my soldiers." But they were " a lovely company," he
tells his friends with soldierly pride. Noblasphemy, drinking, disorder,
or impiety were suffered in their ranks. "Not a man swears but he
pays his twelve pence." Nor was his cl\oice of " men of religion" the
only innovation Cromwell introduced into his new regiment. The

social ti
rcgardci
commitl
men mr
and birt
appear ?
men tha
conscien
approve
enough ;
though ]
servativc
which th
patiently
fights for
and is n
ends witl
The sami
Bitter as
worked t
like most
with the :
content m
at his pie
"is a ver
and stoii
Church tl
shall see,
claim of t
blems of
fashion,
were the
among h
answered
"Anabap
they are
He was j
—to a far
with his
his horsei
such soldi
beaten at
they charj
and freed
tizans. A

[CHAP.

■>., in fact,
jy before
genius in
lizabeth's
n wells of
oclen and
n a short
which he
od during
lackness"
irmed the
But his
ver. His
iments of
8, and the
3rt Parlia-
hilip War-
came into
\ speaking
slain cloth
ulor. His
c or two of
his collar.
:l size ; his
i reddish ;
vour." He
Lssert itself
ed him out
he head of
lorn soldier
)or tapsters
ght against
as the one
1 to Hamp-
)usand men
:)unties was
le freely on
e in money
my private
oney of n^y
mpany," he
g, disorder,
ars but he
;ligion" the
nent. The

VIII 1

PURITAN ENGLAND.

$$$

social traditions which restricted command to men of birth were dis-
regarded. " It may be," he wrote, in answer to complaints from the
committee of the Association, " it provokes your spirit to see such plain
men made captains of horse. It had been well that men of honour
and birth had entered into their employments ; but why do they not
appear? But seeing it is necessary the work must go on, better plain
men than none : but best to have men patient of wants, faithful and
conscientious in their employment, and such, I hope, these will
approve themselves." The words paint Cromwell's temper accurately
enough : he is far more of the practical soldier than of the reformer ;
though his genius already breaks in upon his aristocratic and con-
servative sympathies, and catches glimpses of the social revolution to
which the war was drifting. " I had rather," he once burst out im-
patiently, "have a plain russet-coated captain, that knows what he
fights for and loves what he knows, than what you call a gentlei.ian,
and is nothing else. I honour a gentleman that is so indeed ! " he
ends with a characteristic return to his more common mood of feeling.
The same practical temper broke out in a more startling innovation.
Bitter as had been his hatred of the bishops, and strenuously as he had
worked to bring about a change in Church government, Cromwell,
like most of the Parliamentary leaders, seems to have been content
with the new Presbyterianism, and the Pr'^sbyterians were more than
content with him. Lord Manchester " suffered him to guide the army
at his pleasure." " The man, Cromwell," writes the Scotchman Baillie,
"is a very wise and active head, universally well beloved as religious
and stout." But against dissidents from the legal worship of th..
Church the Presbyterians were as bitter as Laud himself; and, as we
shall see, Nonconformity was rising into proportions which made its
claim of toleration, of the freedom of religious worship, one of the pro-
blems of the time. Cromwell met the problem in his unspeculative
fashion. He wanted good soldiers and good men ; and, if they
were these, the Independent, the Baptist, the Leveller, found entry
among his troops. " You would respect them, did you see them," he
answered the panic-strickf^n Presbyterians who charged them with
"Anabaptistry" and revolutionary aims: "they are no Anabaptists :
they are honest, sober Christi?ns ; they expect to be used as men."
He was soon to be driven — as in the social change we noticed before
—to a far larger and grander point of view. But as yet he was busier
with his new regiment than with theories of Church and State ; and
his horsemen were no sooner in action than they proved themselves
such soldiers as the war had never seen yet. " Truly they were never
beaten at all," their leader said proudly at its close. At Winceby fio^ht
they charged "singing psalms," cleared Lincolnshire of the Cavaliers,
and freed the eastern counties from all danger from Newcastle's par-
tizans. At Marston Moor they faced and routed Rupert's chivalry. At

Sec. VII.

Thr Civil
War

1G42

1646

Cromtvell

and the
dissidents

556

iriSTORV OK THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VII.

Thk Civil.
VVak

1642

1646

The New
Model

The Self

denying

Ordinani.

Newbury it was only Manchester's reluctance that hindered them from
completing the ruin of Charles.

Cromwell had shown his capacity for organization in the creation of
his regiment ; his military genius had displayed itself at Marston Moor.
Newbury first raised him into a political leader. " Without a more
speedy, vigorous, and effective prosecution of the war," he said to the
Commons after his quarrel with Manchester, " casting off all lingerinj,'
proceedings, like those of soldiers of fortune beyond sea to spin out a
war, we shall make the kingdom weary of us, and hate the name of a
Parliament." But under the leaders who at present conducted it
a vigorous conduct of the war was hopeless. They were, in Cromwell's
plain words, "afraid to conquer." They desired not to crush Charles,
but to force him back, with as much of his old strength remaining as
might be, to the position of a constitutional King. The old loyalty,
too, clogged their enterprise ; they shrank from the taint of treason.
" If the King be beaten," Manchester urged at Newbury, " he will still
be king ; if he beat us he will hang us all for traitors." To a mood like
this Cromwell's attitude seemed horrible : " If I met the King in battle,"
he answered, according to a later story, " I would fire my pistol at the
King as at another." The army, too, as he long ago urged at Edge-
hill, was not an army to conquer with Now, as then, he urged that
till the whole force was new modelled, and placed under a stricter
discipline, *' they must not expect any notable success in anything
they went about." But the first step in such a re-organization must
be a change of officers. The army was led and officered by members
of the two Houses, and the Self-denying Ordinance, as it was intro-
duced by Cromwell and Vane, declared the tenure of military or civil
offices incompatible with a seat in either. The long and bitter resist-
ance which this measure met before it was finally passed in a modified
form was justified at a later time by the political results which followed
the rupture of the tie which had hitherto bound the army to the Parlia-
ment. But the drift of public opinion was too strong to be withstood.
The passage of the Ordinance brought about the retirement of Esse.N,
Manchester, and Waller ; and the new organization of the army went
rapidly on under a new commander-in-chief, Sir Thomas Fairfax, the I
hero of the long contest in Yorkshire, and who had been raised into[
fame by his victory at Nantwich, and his bravery at Marston Moor.
But behind Fairfax stood Cromwell ; and the principles on which
Cromwell had formed his brigade were carried out on a larger scale I
in the " New Model." The one aim was to get together twenty
thousand " honest " men. " Be careful," Cromwell had written, " what
captains of horse you choose, what men be mounted. A few honest
men are better than numbers. If you choose godly honest men to be
captains of horse, honest men will follow them." The result was a
curious medley of men of different ranks among the officers of the New

VIM.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

557

Model. The bulk of those in high command remained men of noble
or gentle blood, Montagues, Pickerings, Fortescucs, Sheffields, Sidneys,
and the like. But side by side with these, though in far smaller pro-
portion, were seen ofiicers like 1*2 wer, who had been a serving-man,
like Okey, who had been a drayman, or Rainsbt)rough, who had been
a " skipper at sea." A result hardly leas notable was the youth of the
officers. Among those in high command there were few who, like
Cromwell, had passed middle age. Fairfax was but thirty-three, and
most of his colonels were even younger. I-^qually strange was the
mixture of religions in its ranks ; though a large proportion of the in-
fantry was composed of pressed recruits, the cavalry was for the most
part strongly Puritan, and in that part of the army Especially dissidence
of every type had gained a firm foothold.

Of the political and religious aspect of the New Model we shall have to
speak at a later time ; as yet its energy was directed solely to " the speedy
and vigorous prosecution of the war." Fairfax was no sooner ready for
action than the policy of Cromwell was alued by the policy of the King.
From tb»=' l-»niir when Newbury marked the breach between the peace
and war parties in the Parliament, the Scotch Commissioners and the
bulk of the Commons had seen that their one chance of hindering
what they looked on as revolution in Church and State lay in pressing
for fresh negotiations with Charles. Commissioners met at Uxbridge
to draw up a treaty ; but the hopes of concession which Charles held out
were suddenly withdrawn in the spring. He saw, as he thought, the
Parliamentary army dissolved and ruined by its new modelling, at an
instant when news came from Scotland of fresh successes on the part
of Montrose, and of his overthrow of the Marquis of Argyle's troops in
the victory of Inverlochy. " Before the end of the summer," wrote the
conqueror, " I shall be in a position to come to your Majesty's aid
with a brave army." The party of war gained the ascendant ; and in
May the King opened his campaign by a march to the north. Leicester
was stormed, the blockade of Chester raised, and the eastern counties
threatened, until Fairfax, who had been unwillingly engaged in a
siege of Oxford, hurried at last on his track. Cromwell, who had
been suffered by the House to retain his command for a few days
in spite of the Ordinance, joined Fairfax as he drew near the King, and
his arrival was greeted by loud shouts of welcome from the troops.
The two armies met near Naseby, to the north-west of Northampton.
The King was eager to fight. " Never have my affairs been in as
good a state," he cried ; and Prince Rupert was as impatient as his
uncle. On the other side, even Cromwell doubted as a soldier the
success of the newly-drilled troops, though religious enthusiasm swept
away doubt in the assurance of victory. " I can say this of Naseby,"
he wrote soon after, " that when I saw the enemy draw up and
march in gallant order towards us, and we a company of poor

Skc. VII.

Tmi-: Civil
Wak

164a

1(1

1646

Naseby

June 14
1645

Hi!

' i i !

! ,

558

HISTORY OF THE KNGUSII PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. VII.

TlIK t.lVII.

Wak
1648

1646

Cloic of the
War

Sept. 1645

ignorant men, to seek to order our battle, the general having com-
mand i me to order all the horse, I could not, riding alone about
my business, but smile out to God in praises, in assurance of victory,
because God would by things that arc not bring to nought things
that are. Of which I had great assurance, and (iod did it." The
battle began with a furious charge of Rupert uphill, which routed
the wing opposed to him under Ireton ; while the royalist foot,
after a single discharge, clubbed their muskets and fell on the centre
under Fairfax so hotly that it slowly and stubbornly gave way.
But Cromwell's brigade were conquerors on the left. A single charge
broke the northern horse under Langdale, who had already tied before
them at Marston M(J()r ; and holding his troops firmly in hand, Crom-
well fell with them on the flank of the royalist foot in the very crisis
of its success. A panic of the King's reserve, and its flight from the
field, aided his efforts : it was in vain that Rupert returned with forces
exhausted by pursuit, that Charles, in a passion of despair, called on
his troopers for " one charge more." The battle was over : artillery,
baggage, even the royal papers, fell into the conquerors' hands ; five
thousand men surrendered ; only two thousand followed the King in
his headlong flight from the field. The war was ended at a blow.
While Charles wandered helplessly along the Welsh border in search
of fresh forces, Fairfax marched rapidly into Somersetshire, and routed
the royal forces at Langport. A victory at Kilsyth, which gave Scotland
for the moment to Montrose, threw a transient gleam over the darken-
ing fortunes of his master's cause ; but the surrender of Bristol to the
Parliamentary army, and the dispersion of the last force Charles could
collect in an attempt to relieve Chester, was followed by news of the
crushing and irretrievable defeat of the " Great Marquis " at Philip-
haugh. In the wreck of the royal cause we may pause for a moment
over an incident which brings out in relief the best temper of both sides.
Cromwell " spent much time with God in prayer before the storm " of
Basing House, where the Marquis of Winchester had held stoutly out
through the war for the King. The storm ended its resistance, and
the brave old royalist was brought in a prisoner with his house flaming
around him. He " broke out," reports a Puritan bystander, " and
said, ' that if the King had no more ground in England but Basing
House he would adventure it as he did, and so maintain it to the
uttermost,' comforting himself in this matter ' that Basing House was
called Loyalty.'" Of loyalty such as this Charles was utterly unworthy.
The seizure of his papers at Naseby had hardly disclosed his earlier
intrigues with the Irish Catholics when the Parliament was able to
reveal to England a f' \\ treaty with them, which purchased no longer
their neutrality, but their aid, by the simple concession of every demand
they had made. The shame was without profit, for whatever aid
Ireland might have given came too late to be of service. The spring

[chap.

aving com-
alone about
i of victory,
ught things
d it." The
hich routed
oyalist foot,
m the centre
• gave way.
ingle charge
y tied before
hand, Crom-
c very crisis
ight from the
d with forces
air, called on
er : artillery,
,' hands ; five
I the King in
d at a blow,
•der in search
re, and routed
jave Scotland
r the darken-
Bristol to the
Charles could
y news of the
is" at Philip-
"or a moment
• of both sides,
the storm " of
;ld stoutly out
esistance, and
lOUse flaming
tander, "and
id but Basing
tain it to the
ig House was
erly unworthy,
ised his earlier
,t was able to
ased no longer
every demand
whatever aid
. The spring

VIM,]

I'UKITAN KNCJLAM).

559

of 1646 saw the few troops who still clung to Charles surrounded aud
routed ai Stow. " Vou have done your work now,'' their leader, Sir
Jacob Astley, said bitterly to his comiucrors, " ami may go to play,
unless you fall out among yourselves."

Section VIII.- The Army and the Parliament. 1646-1649.

{Aiilhoritics. — Mainly as before, though Clarendon, invalualile dining the
war, is tedious and unimportant here, and Cromwell's letters become, unfortu-
nately, few at the moment when we most need their aid. On the other hand
Ludlow and Whitelock, as well as the passionate and unscrupulous " Memoirs "
of Holies and Major Hutchinson, l)ecome of much importance. For Charles
liiniself, we have Sir Thomas Herbert's "Memoirs" of the last two years of
this reign. Burnet's "Lives of the Ilamiltons" throw a good deal of light
on Scotch affairs at this lime, and Sir James Turner's " Memoir of the Scotch
Invasion." The early history 01 the Independents, and of the jmnciple of
religious freedom, is told by Mr. Masson ("Life of Milton," vol. iii.).]

With the close of the Civil War we enter on a time of confused
struggles, a time tedious and uninteresting in its outer details, but of
higher interest than even the war itself in its bearing on our :ifter his-
tory. Modern England, the England among whose thoughts and
sentiments we actually live, began however dimly with the triumph
of Naseby. Old things passed silently away. When Astley gave up
his sword the "work" of the generations which had struggled for
Protestantism against Catholicism, for public liberty against absolute
rule, in his own emphatic phrase, was " done." So far as these con-
tests were concerned, however the later Stuarts might strive to revi\e
them, England could safely " go to play." But with the end of this
older work a new work began. The constitutional and ecclesiastical
problems which still in one shape or another beset us started to the
front as subjects of national debate in the years between the close of
the Civil War and the death of the King. The great parties which
have ever since divided the social, the political, and the religious life
of England, whether as Independents and Presbyterians, as Whigs
and Tories, as Conservatives and Liberals, sprang into organized
existence in the contest between the Army and the Parliament. Then
for the first time began a struggle which is far from having ended yet,
a struggle between political tradition and political progress, between
the principle of religious conformity and the principle of religious
freedom.

It was the religious struggle which drew the political in its train.
We have already witnessed the rise under Elizabeth of sects who did
not aim, like the Presbyterians, at a change in ChurcJi government,
but rejected the notion of a national Church at all, and insisted on the
right of each congregation to perfect independence of faith and worship.
At the close of the Queen's reign, however, these " Brownists " had

Sk(. Vlll.
I'hk Akmv

AM) IKK
I'AKIIA-

MKNT

1646

1649

The
Indepen-
dents

-1^

» !J

56o

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VIII .
The Akmy

AND THE

Parlia-

MENT

1646

1649

1640

Presby-

tertan

England

iVv

almost entirely disappeared. Some of the dissidents, as in the notable
instance of the congregation that produced the Pilgrim Fathers, had
found a refuge in Holland ; but the bulk had been driven by perse-
cution lO a fresh conformity with the Established Church. " As for
those which we call Brownists," says Bacon, " being when they were
at the best a very small number of very silly and base people, here and
there in corners dispersed, they are now, thanks to God, by the good
remedies that have been used, suppressed and worn out so that there
is scarce any news of them." As soon, however, as Abbot's primacy
promised a milder rule^ The Separatist refugees began to venture
timidly back again to England. During their exile in Holland the
main body had contented themselves with the free developement of
their system of independent congregations, each forming in itself a
complete Church, and to them the name of Independents attached
itself at a later time. A small part, however, had drifted into a more
marked severance in doctrine from the Established Church, especially
in their belief of the necessity of adult baptism, a belief from which
their obscure congregation at Leyden became known as that of the
Baptists. Both of theso sects gathered a church in London in the
middle of James's reign, but the persecuting zeal of Laud prevented
any spread of their opinions under that of his successor ; and it was
not till their numbers were suddenly increased by the return of a host
of emigrants from New England, with Hugh Peters at their head, en
the opening of the Long Parliament, that the Congregational or Inde-
pendent body began to attract attention. Lilburne and Burton soon
declared themselves adherents of what was called " the New England
way ; " and a year later saw in London alone the rise of " four score
congregations of several sectaries," as Bishop Hall scornfully tells us,
" instructed by guides fit for them, cobblers, tailors, felt-makers,
and s ich-like trash." But little religious weight however could be
attributed as yet to the Congregational movement. Baxter at this
time had not heard of the existence of any Independents. Milton in
his earlier pamphlets shows no sign of their influence. Of the
hundred and five ministers present in the Westminster Assembly
only five were Congregational in sympathy, and these were all returned
refugee? from Holland. Among the one hundred and twenty London
ministers in 1643, only three wen suspected of leanings towards the
Sectaries.

The struggle with Charles in fact at its outset only threw new
difficulties in the way of religious freedom. It was with strictly con-
servative aims in ecclesiastical as in political matters that Pym and
his colleagues began the strife. Their avowed purpose was simply to
restore the Church of England to its state under Elizabeth, and to free
it from " innovations," from the changes introduced by Laud and his
fellow prelates. The great majority of the Parliament were averse to

[chap.

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

561

notable
ers, had
y perse-
•' As for
ey were
tiere and
he good
lat there
primacy
venture
land the
lement of
1 itself a
attached
;o a more
especially
)m which
lat of the
on in the
prevented
.nd it was
. of a host
r head, on
.1 or Inde-
irton soon
J England
bur score
lly tells us,
jlt-makers,
could be
;er at this
Milton in
Of the
Assembly
I returned
y London
ards the

any alterations in the constitution or doctrine of the Church itself ; and
it was only the refusal of the bishops to accept any diminution of their
power and revenues, the growth of a party hostile to Episcopalian
government, the necessity for purchasing the aid of the Scots by a
union in religion as in politics, and above rJl the urgent need of con-
structing some new ecclesiastical organization in the place of the older
organization which had become impossible from the political attitude
of the bishops, that forced on the two Houses the adoption of the
Covenant. But the change to a Presbyterian system of Church govern-
ment seemed at that time of little import to the bulk of Englishmen.
The dogma of the necessity of bishops was held by few, and the
change was generally regarded with approval as one which brought
the Church of England nearer to that of Scotland and to the reformed
Churches of the Continent. Bus. whatever might be the change in its
administration, no one imagined that it had ceased to be the Church
of England, or that it had parted with its right to exact conformity to
its worship from the nation at large. The Tudor theory of its relation
to the State, of its right to embrace all Englishmen within its pale, and
to dictate what should be their faith and form of worship, remained
utterly unquestioned by any man of note. The sentiments on which
such a theory rested indeed for its main support, the power of his-
torical tradition, the association of " dissidence " with danger to the
State, the strong English instinct of order, the as strong English
dislike of " innovations," with the abhorrence of " indifferency," as a
sign of lukewarmness in matters of religion, had only been intensified
by the earher incidents of the struggle with the King. The Parliament
therefore had steadily pressed on the new system of ecclesiastical
government in the midst of the troubles of the war. An Assembly of
Divines which was called together at Westminster in 1643, and which
sat in the Jerusalem Chamber during the five year.'' which followed, was
directed to revise the Articles, to draw up a Confession of Faith, and
a Directory of Public Worship ; and these with a scheme of Church
government, a scheme only distinguished from that of Scotland by the
significant addition of a lay court of superior appeal set by Parliament
over the whole system of Church courts and assemblies, were accepted
by the Houses and embodied in a series of Ordinances.

Had the change been made at the moment when " with uplifted
hands" the Commons swore to the Covenant in St. Margaret's it
would probably have been accepted by the country at large. But it
met with a very different welcome when it came at the end of the
war. In spite of repeated votes of Parliament for its establishment,
the pure Presbyterian system took root only in London and Lanca-
shire. While the Divines, indeed, were drawing up their platform of
uniform belief and worship in the Jerusalem Chamber, dissidence had
grown into a religious power. In the terrible agony of the struggle

Skc. VIII.
The Army

AND THE

Parlia-
ment

1646

1649

■ii'

Westminster
Assembly

I 643 -I 648

Freedom
of Con- m
science

< .11

I I

562

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec VIII.
The Army

AND THE

Parlia-
ment

1646

1649

■■

Cromwell
and tolera-
tion

against Charles, individual conviction becam.e a stronger force than
religious tradition. Theological speculation took ?.n unprecedented
boldness from the temper of the times. Four years after the war had
begun a horror-stricken pamphleteer numbered sixteen religious sects
as existing in defiance of the law ; and, widely as these bodies differed
among themselves, all were at one in repudiating any right of control in
faith or worship by the Church or its clergy. Milton himself had left
his Presbyterian stand-point, and saw that " new Presbyter is but old
Priest writ large." The question of sectarianism soon grew into a
practical one from its bearing on the war : for the class specially
infected with the new spirit of religious freedom was just the class to
whose zeal and vigour the Parliament was forced to look for success
in its struggle. We have seen the prevalence of this spirit among the
farmers from whom Cromwell drew his horsemen, and his enlistment
of these " sectaries " was the first direct breach in the old system of
conformity. The sentiments of the farmers indeed were not his own.
Cromwell had signed the Covenant, and there is no reason for crediting
him with any aversion to Presbyterianism as a system of doctrine or
of Church organization. His first step was a purely practical one, a
step dictated by mihtary necessities, and excused in his mind by a
sympathy with " honest " men, as well as by the growing but still vague
notion of a communion among Christians wider than that of outer
conformity in worship or belief. But the alarm and remonstrances of
the Presbyterians forced his mind rapidly forward on the path of tole-
ration. " The State in choosing men to serve it," Cromwell wrote
before Marston Moor, " takes no notice of these opinions. If they be
willing faithfully to serve it, that satisfies." Marston Moor spurred
him to press on the Parliament the need of at least " tolerating " dissi-
dents ; and he succeeded in procuring the appointment of a Committee
of the Commons to find some means of effecting this. But the con-
servative temper of the bulk of the Puritans was at last roused by his j
efforts. "We detest and abhor," wrote the London clergy in 1645,
" the much endeavoured Toleration ; " and the Corporation of London
petitioned Parliament to suppress all sects "without toleration." The
Parliament i^elf too remained steady on the conservative side. But
the fortunes of the war told for religious freedom. Essex and his
Presbyterians only marched from defeat to defeat. In remodelling
the army the Commons had rejected a demand made by the Lords
that officers and men, besides taking the Covenant, should submit "to
the form of Church government that was already voted by both I
Houses." The victory of Naseby raised a wider question than that of]
mere toleration. " Honest men served you faithfully in this action/i
Cromwell wrote to the Speaker of the House of Commons from the!
field. " Sir, they are trusty : I beseech y( i in the name of God not tol
discourage them. He that ventures his life for the liberty of his|

countr
storm
more (
same s
agree t
wise ai
most g]
head.
Christia
permit,
compuh
The i
growing
day moi
bitterly (
which h
law. Sc
executior
uniformit
the Parlij
hundred j
royalist s(
Algernon
was only
Cromwell
towards j
trigued hi
Vane and
with the I
by the ma
the King
camp of tl
to Newc,
religious fi
Lords, by
their enem
the prospe
the majori
of peace- b(
seemed to
Parliament
exclusion ^
war, from
the establi
, of conscie

[CHAP.

ce than

edented

war had

)us sects

, differed

ontrol in

■ had left

s but old

;W into a

specially

e class to

)r success

imong the

jnlistment

system of

>t his own.

r crediting

loctrine or

ical one, a

mind by a

t still vague

at of outer

istrances of

lath of tole-

iwell wrote
If they be

)or spurred
ing"dissi-
Committee

ut the con-
.used by his i
gy in 1645,
of London
tion." The
side. But
sex and his
remodelling
y the Lords
submit "to
ed by both I
than that of
this actions
ins from the!
God not tol
Iberty of his|

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

country, I wish he trust God for the liberty of his conscience." The
storm of Bristol encouraged him to proclaim the new principles yet
more distinctly. "Presbyterians, Independents, all here have the
same spirit of faith and prayer, the same presence and answer. They
agree here, have no names of difference ; pity it is it should be other-
wise anywhere. All that believe have the real unity, which is the
most glorious, being the inward and spiritual, in the body and in the
head. For being united in forms (commonly called uniformity), every
Christian will for peace' sake study and do as far as conscience will
permit. And from brethren in things of the mind we look for no
compulsion but that of light and reason."

The increasing firmness of Cromwell's language was due to the
growing irritation of his opponents. The two parties became every
day more clearly defined. The Presbyterian ministers complained
bitterly of the increase of the sectaries, and denounced the toleration
which had come into practical existence without sanction from the
law. Scotland, whose army was still before Newark, pressed for the
execution of the Covenant and the universal enforcement of a religious
uniformity. Sir Harry Vane, on the other hand, was striving to bring
the Parliament round to less rigid courses by the introduction of two
hundred and thirty new members, who filled the seats left vacant by
royalist secessions, and the more eminent of whom, such as Ireton and
Algernon Sidney, were incHned to support the Independents. But it
was only the pressure of the New Model, and the remonstrances of
Cromwell as its mouthpiece, which hindered any effective movement
towards persecution. Amidst the wreck of his fortunes Charles in-
trigued busily with both parties, and promised liberty of worship to
Vane and the Independents, at the moment when he was negotiating
with the Parliament and the Scots. His negotiations were quickened
by the march of Fairfax upon Oxford. Driven from his last refuge,
the King after some aimless wanderings made his appearance in the
camp of the Scots. Lord Leven at once fell back with his royal prize
to Newcastle. The new aspect of affairs threatened the party of
religious freedom with ruin. Hated as they were by the Scots, by the
Lords, by the city of London, the apparent junction of Charles with
their enemies destroyed their growing hopes in the Commons, where
the prospects of a speedy peace on Presbyterian terms at once swelled
the majority of their opponents. The two Houses laid their conditions
of peace before the King vithout a dream of resistance from one who
seemed to have placed himself at their mercy. They required for the
Parliament the command of the army and fleet for twenty years ; the
exclusion of all " Malignants," or royalists who had taken part in the
war, from civil and military office ; the abolition of Episcopacy ; and
the establishment of a Presbyterian Church. Of toleration or liberty
of conscience they said not a word. The Scots pressed these terms

002

563

Sec. VIII.
The Armv

AND THE

Parlia-
ment

1646

1649

•, .-^'^-II^ 1

Charles
and the
Presby.
terians

; i

Charles in

the Scotch

Camp

-ii

May 1646

•

564

HISTORY OF THE ENGLTSH PEOPLE.

[chap.

|(.

Sec. VIII.
Tim Akmv

AND TIIK

Paki.ia-

MKNT

1646

1649

|!:»

Surrrntffr
of the A' //if,

Jan. 1647

The
Army
and the
Parlia-
ment

on the King " with tears ; " his friends, and even the Queen, urged
their acceptance. Ihit the aim of Charles was simply delay. Time
and the dissensions of his enemies, as he believed, were fighting for
him. " I am not without hope," he wrote coolly, " that I shall be able
to draw cither the Presbyterians or the Independents to side with me
for extirpating one another, so that I shall be really King again."
His refusal of the terms offered by the Houses was a crushing defeat
for the Presbyterians. " What will become of us," asked one of them,
" now that the King has rejected our proposals 1 " " What would have
becone of us," retorted an Independent, "had he accepted them?"
The vigour of Holies and the Conservative leaders in the Parliament
rallied however to a bolder effort. The King's game lay in balancing
the army against the Parliament ; and while the Scotch army lay at
Newcastle the Houses could not insist on dismissing their own. It
was only a withdrawal of the Scots from England and their transfer of
the King's person into the hands of the Houses that would enable
them to free themselves from the pressure of their own soldiers by
disbanding the New Model. Hopeless of success with the King, and
unable to bring him into Scotland in face of the refusal of the General
Assembly to receive a sovereign who would not swear to the Cove-
nant, the Scottish aniiy accepted £40o,'Doo in discharge of its claims,
handed Charles over to a committee of the Houses, and marched
back over the Border. Masters of the King, the Presbyterian leaders
at once moved boldly to their attack on the New Model and the
Sectaries. Th'^y voted that the army should be disbanded, and that
a new army should be raised for the suppression of the Irish rebellion
with Presbyterian officers at its head. It was in vain that the men
protested against being severed from " officers that we love," and that
the Council of Officers strove to gain time by pressing on the Parlia-
ment the danger of mutiny. Holies and his fellow-leaders were
resolute, and their ecclesiastical legislation showed the end at which
their resolution aimed. Direct enforcement of conformity was im-
possible till the New Model was disbanded ; but the Parliament pressed
on in the work of providing the machinery for enforcing it as soon as
the army was gone. Vote after vote ordered the setting up of Presby-
teries throughout the country, and the first-fruits of these efforts were
seen in the Presbyterian organization of London, and in the first
meeting of its Synod at St. Paul's. Even the officers on Fairfax's staff |
were ordered to take the Covenant.

All hung however on the disbanding of the New Model, and the!
New Model showed no will to disband itself. Its attitude can onlyf
fairly be judged by remembering what many of the conquerors o(j
Naseby really were. They were soldiers of a different class and of a|
different temper from the soldiers of any other army that the world has!
seen. They were for the most part young farmers and tradesmen oil

VHI.]

the low

HAP.

.irged

Time

ig for

c able

th me

.gain."

defeat

■ them,

d have

hem?"

iament

lancing

yr lay at

wn. It

.nsfer oi

L enable

iiers by

ing, and

General

lie Cove-

s claims,

inarched
leaders

|l and the
and that
rebellion
the men

I' and that
le Parlia-
ters were
at which
was inv
it pressed
,s soon as
,f Presby-
forts were
the fiist
irfax's staff I

VIII. 1

PURITAN ENGLAND

56s

the lower sort, maintaining themselves, for the pay was twelve months
ill arrear, mainly at their own cost. The horsemen in many regiments
luul been specially picked as " honest," or religious men ; and what-
ever enthusiasm or fanaticism they may have shown, their very ene-
mies acknowledged the order and piety of their camp. They looked
on themselves not as swordsmen, to be caught up and flung away
at the will of a paymaster, but as men who had left farm and mer-
chandise at a direct call from God. A great work had been given
them to do, and the call bound them till it was done. Kingcraft,
as Charles was hoping, might yet restore tyranny to the throne. A
more immediate danger threatened that liberty of conscience which
was to them '* the ground of the quarrel, and for which so many of
their friends' lives had been lost, and so much of their own blood had
been spilt." They would wait before disbanding till these liberties were
secured, and if need came they would again act to secure them. But
their resolve sprang from no pride in the brute force of the sword they
wielded. Gn the contrary, as they pleaded passionately at the bar of
the Commons, "on becoming soldiers we have not ceased to be
citizens." Their aims and proposals throughout were purely those of
citizens, and of citizens who were ready the moment their aim was
won to return peacefully to their homes. Thought and discussion had
turned the army into a vast Parliament, a Parliament which regarded
itself as representative of " godly " men in as high a degree as the
Parliament at Westminster, and which must have become every day
more conscious of its superiority in political capacity to its rival.
Ireton, the moving spirit of the New Model, had no equal as a states-
man in St. Stephen's ; nor is it possible to compare the large and far-
sighted proposals of the army with the blind and narrow policy of the
two Houses. Whatever we may think of the means by which the New
Model sought its aims, we must in justice remember that, so far as
those aims went, the New Model was in the right. For the last two
hundred years England has been doing little more than carrying out
in a slow and tentative way the scheme of political and religious
reform which the army propounded at the close of the Civil War.
It was not till the rejection of the officers' proposals had left little hope
of conciliation that the army acted, but its action was quick and
decisive. It set aside for all political purposes the Council of Officers,
and elected a new Council of Agitators or Agents, two members being
named by each regiment, which summoned a general meeting of the
army at Triploe Heath, where the proposals of pa/ and disbanding
made by the Parliament were rejected with cries of " Justice." While
the army was gathering, in fact, the Agitators had taken a step which
put submission out of the question. A rumour that the King was to
be removed to London, a new army raised, a new civil war begun,
roused the soldiers to madness. Five hundred troopers suddenly

Six. VIII.
TiiK Akmy

ANI> TIIK

Pari.ia-

MKNT

1646

10
1649

'ilte seizure
0/ the King

June 1647

! .t

I «

566

Sec. VIII.
The Armv

AND THE

Parlia-
ment

1646

1649

The

Army

and the

Kin?

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

appeared before Holmby House, where the King was residing in
charge of Parliamentary Commissioners, and displaced its guards.
"Where is your commission for this act?" Charles asked the cornet
who commanded them. " It is behind me," said Joyce, pointing to
his soldiers. " It is written in very fine and legible characters," laughed
the King. The seizure had in fact been previously concerted between
Charles and the Agitators. " I will part willingly," he told Joyce, " if
the soldiers confirm all that you have promised me. You will exact
from me nothing that offends my conscience or my honour." " It is
not our maxim," replied the cornet, " to constrain the conscience of
any one, still less that of our King.'' After a fresh burst of terror at
the news, the Parliament fell furiously on Cromwell, who had relin-
quished his command and quitted the army before the close of the
war, and had ever since been employed as a mediator between the two
parties. The charge of having incited the mutiny fell before his
vehement protest, but he was driven to seek refuge with the army, and
on the 25th of June it was in full march upon London. Its demand?
were expressed with perfect clearness in an " Humble Representation"
which it addressed to the Houses. " We desire a settlement of the
Peace of the kingdom and of the liberties of the subject according
to the votes and declarations of Parliament. We desire no alteration
in the civil government : as little do we desire to interrupt or in the
least to intermeddle with the settling of the Prepbyterial government."
They demanded toleration ; but " not to open a way to licentious Hving
under pretence of obtaining ease for tender consciences, we profess, as
ever, in these things when the state has made a settlement we have
nothing to say, but to submit or suffer." It was with a view to such
a settlement that they demanded the expulsion of eleven members
from the Commons, with Holies at their head, whom the soldiers
charged with stirring up strife between the army and the Parliament,
and with a design of renewing the civil war. After fruitless negotia-
tions the terror of the Londoners forced the eleven to withdraw;
and the Houses named Commissioners to treat on the questions
at issue.

Though Fairfax and Cromwell had been forced from their pcsition
as mediators into a hearty co-operation with the army, its political
direction rested at this moment with Cromwell's son-in-law, Henry
Ireton, and Ireton looked for a real settlement, not to the Parliament,
but to the King. " There must be some difference," he urged bluntly,
" between conquerors and conquered ; " but the terms which he laid
before Charles were terms of studied moderation. The vindictive
spirit which the Parliament had shown against the royalists and th<i
Church disappeared in the terms exacted by the New Model ; and the
army contented itself with the banishment of seven leading " delin-
quents," a general Act of Oblivion for the rest, the withdrawal of all

[CMAP.

ing in
;uards.
cornet
ting to
aughed
etween
ce, "if
11 exact

" It is
ence of
;rror at
d relin-
5 of the
the two
"ore his
my, and
iemand?
[itation "
X of the
:cording
Iteration
ir in the
rnment."
us Uving
ofess, as
we have
' to such
[nembers

soldiers
rliament,

negotia-

ithdraw ;

juestions

viii.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

567

coercive power from the clergy, the control of Parliament over the
military and naval forces for ten years, and its nomination of the great
officers of State. Behind these demands however came a masterly and
comprehensive plan of political reform which had already been
sketched by the army in the '* Humble Representation," with which it
had begun its march on London, Belief and worship were to be free
to all. Acts enforcing the use of the Prayer-book, or attendance at
Church, or the enforcement of the Covenant were to be repealed.
Even Catholics, whatever other restraints might be imposed, were to
be freed from the bondage of compulsory worship. Parliaments were
to be triennial, and the House of Commons to be reformed by a fairer
distribution of seats and of electoral rights ; taxation was to be re-
adjusted ; legal procedure simplified ; a crowd of political, commercial,
and judicial privileges abolished. Ireton believed that Charles could
be "so managed" (says Mrs. Hutchinson) "as to comply with the
public good of his people after he could no longer uphold his violent
will." But Charles was equally dead to the moderation and to the
wisdom of this great Act of Settlement. He saw in the crisis nothing
but an opportunity of balancing one party against another ; and be-
lieved that the army had more need of his aid than he of the army's.
" You cannot do without me — you are lost if I do not support you," he
said to Ireton as he pressed his proposals. " You have an intention to
be the arbitrator between us and the Parliament," Ireton quietly
replied, " and we mean to be so between the Parliament and your
Majesty." But the King's tone was soon explained. A mob of
Londoners broke into the House of Commons, and forced its members
to recall the eleven. While some fourteen peers and a hundred com-
moners fled to the army, those who remained at Westminster prepared
for an open struggle with it, and invited Charles to return to London.
But the news no sooner reached the camp than the army was again
on the march. "In two days," Cromwell said coolly, "the city will
be in our han^ds." The soldiers entered London in triumph, and restored
the fugitive members ; the eleven were again expelled, and the army
leaders resumed negotiations with the King. The indignation of the
soldiers at his delays and intrigues made the task hourly more difficult ;
but Cromwell, who now threw his whole weight on Ireton's side, clung
to the hope of accommodation with a 'passionate tenacity. His mind,
conservative by tradition, and above all practical in temper, saw the
political difficulties which would follow on the abolition of Monarchy,
and in spite of the King's evasions he persisted in negotiating with
him. But Cromwell stood almost alone ; the Parliament refused to
accept Ireton's proposals as a basis of peace, Charles still evaded, and
the army grew restless and suspicious. There were cries for a wide
reform, for the abolition of the House of Peers, for a new House of
Commons ; and the Agitators called on the Council of Officers to

Sec. viii.
The Armv

AND THB

Parlia-
ment

1046

1649

Aug, 6

568

Sfc, VHI.
The Army

AND THE

Paklia-

MENT

164.6

1649

Flight of
the King

Nov. 1647

The

Second

Civil War

I: '<u

1648

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

discuss the question of abolishing royalty itself. Cromwell was never
braver than when he faced the gathering storm, forbade the disc ^ssion,
adjourned the Council, and sent the officers to their regiments. ' ' it the
strain was too great to last long, and Charles was still resolute t< • play
his game." He was in fact so far frombe-ng in earnest in h"i negotia-
tion with Cromwell and Ireton, that at the moment they wer' iskin"
their lives for him he was conducting another and equally C >.lusive
negotiation wi'h the Parliament, fomenting the dl'^x nterjt in London,
prer-'rinpr ^' r j, fresh royalist rising^ and for an intervention of the
Scoi . in iiis lavour. " The two nations," he wrote joyously, "will soon
be u ^";;*.' Ml that was needed for the success of his schemes was
his owii Ibert) and in the midst of their hopes of an accommodation
the army leadeib i.iund with astonishment that they had been duped
throughout, and that the King ha-* fled.

The flight fanned the excitement of the New Model into frenzy, and
only the courage of Cromwell averted an open mutiny in its gathering
at Ware. But even Cromwell was powerless to break the spirit which
now pervaded the aoidiers, and the King's perfidy left him without
resource. " The King is a man of great parts and great understand-
ing," he said, " but so great a dissembler and so false a man that he is
not to be trusted." The danger from his escape indeed soon passed
away. By a strange error Charles had ridden from Hampton Court
to the Isle of Wight, perhaps with some hope from the sympathy of
Colonel Hammond, the Governor of Carisbrook Castle, and again
found himself a prisoner. Foiled in his effort to put himself at the
head of the new civil war, he set himself to organize it from his prison ;
and while again opening delusive negotiations with the Parlii ment, he
signed a secret treaty with the Scots for the invasion of the realm.
The practical suspension of the Covenant and the triumph of the
party of religious liberty in England had produced a violent reaction
across the Tweed. The moderate party had gathered round the Duke
of Hamilton, and carried the elections against Argyle and the more
zealous religionists ; and on the King's consenting to a stipulation for
the re-establishment of Presbytery in England, they ordered an army
to be levied for his support. In England the whole of the conservative
party, with many of the most conspicuous members of the Long
Parliament at its head, was drifting, in its horror of the religious and
political changes which seemed impending, towards the King ; and
the news from Scotland gave the signal for fitful insurrections in
almost every quarter. London was only held down by main force,
old officers of the Parliament unfurled the royal flag in South Wales,
and surprised Pembroke. The seizure of Berwick and Carlisle opened
a way for the Scotch invasion. Kent, Essex, and Hertford broke out
in revolt. The fleet in the Downs sent their captains on shore,
hoisted the King's pennon, and blockaded the Thames. "The hour

tCHAP.

s never

: jssion,

I 'it the

vin.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

569

play
icgotia-
; iskipf^
C. elusive
London,
1 of tht
vill soon
mes was
lodation
n duped

nzy, and
athering
rit which
without
lerstand-
hat he is
n passed
on Court
ipathy of
nd again
If at the
s prison ;
ment, he
le realm,
h of the
reaction
he Duke
the more
lation for
an army
iservative
he Long
ious and
ing ; and
ctions in
lin force,
h Wales,
e opened
roke out
tn shore.
The hour

is come for the Parliament to save the kingdom and to govern alone,"
cried Cromwell ; but the Parliament only showed itself eager to ta' r
a':lvantage of the cri^.is to profess its adherence to monarchy, to i
open the negotiations it had broken off with the King, and to deal U
fiercest blow at relig jus freedom which it had ever received. 1^.;
Presbyterians flocked back to their seats ; and an " Ordinance for the
suppression of Blasphemies and Heresies," which Vane and Cromwell
had 'ong held at bay, was passed by triumphant majorities. Any man
-ran this terrible statute — denying the doctrine of the Trinity or of
the Divinity of Christ, or that the books of Scripture are " the Word
of God," or the resurrection of the body, or a future day of judgement,
and refusing on trial to abjure his heresy, " shall suffer the pain of
death." Any man declaring (amidst a long 1" of other errors) " that
man by nature hath free will to turn to God," i.i\£ii eie is a Purgatory,
that images are lawful, that infant baptit i i;. nlawful ; any one
denying the obligation of observing the Lof Is day, or asserting " that
the Church governmeit by Presbytery is d.nr '.hristian or unlawful,"
shall on a refusal to renounce his errors ** be commanded to prison."
It was plain that the Presbyterians couj 1 n the King's success to
resume their policy of conformity, and had Charles been free, or the
New Model disbanded, their hopes would probably have been realized.
But Charles was still safe at Carisbrook ; and the New Model was
facing fiercely the danger which surrounded it. The wanton renewal
of the war at a moment when all tended to peace swept from the mind
of Fairfax and Cromwell, as fiorn that of the army at large, every
thought of reconciliation with the King. Soldiers and generals were
at last bound together again in a stern resolve. On the eve of their
march against the revolt all gathered in a solemn prayer-meeting, and
came " to a very clear and joint lesolution, ' That it was our duty, if
ever the Lord brought us back again in peace, to call Char ' Stuart,
that man of blood, to account for the blood he has shed anu mischief
he has done to his utmost against the Lord's cause and people in this
poor nation.' " In a few days Fairfax had trampled down the Kentish
insurgents, and had prisoned those of the eastern countries within the
walls of Colchester, while Cromwell drove the Welsh insurgents within
those of Pembroke. Both towns however held stubbornly out ; and
though a rising under Lord Holland in the neighbourhood of London
was easily put down, there was no force left to stem the inroad of the
Scots, who poured over the border some twenty thousand strong.
Luckily the surrender of Pembroke at this critical moment set Crom-
well free. Pushing rapidly northward with fivo thousand men, he
called in the force under Lambert which had been gallantly hanging
on the Scottish flank, and pushed over the Yorkshire hills into the
valley of the Ribble, where the Duke of Hamilton, reinforced by three
thousand royalists of the north, had advanced as far as Preston. With

Sec. VIII.
The Army

AND THE

Parlia-
ment

1640

1649

'J7te Houses
and the
A rmy

' H.

^i^

•I -

'J'/te Scotch
Invasion

^\m>s}A

570

Skc. VIII.
Thk Akmv

ANO TDK

Paki.ia-

MKNT

1046

1649

.-it/^-. 17,
1648

Ruin of
the Par-
liament

Dcntamh of
the Army

Nov. 30

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

an army which now numbered ten thousand men, Cromwell poured
down on the flank of the Duke's straggling line of march, attacked the
Scots as they retired behind the Ribble, passed the river with them,
cut their rearguard to pieces at Wigan, forced the defile . Warrington,
where the flying enemy made a last and desperate stand, and drove
their foot to surrender, while Lambert hunted down Hamilton and the
horse. Fresh from its victory, the New Model pushed over the Border,
while the peasants of Ayrshire and the west rose in the " Whiggamore
raid '* (notable as the first event in which we find the name " Whig,"
which is possibly the same as our " Whey," and conveys -^ taunt
against the " sour-milk " faces of the fanatical Ayrshiremen), and,
marching upon Edinburgh, dispersed the royalist party and again
installed Argyle in power.

Argyle welcomed Cromwell as a deliverer, but the victorious general
had hardly entered Edinburgh when he was recalled by pressing news
from the south. The temper with which the Parliament had met the
royalist revolt was, as we have seen, widely different from that of the
army. It had recalled the eleven members, and had passed the Ordi-
nance against heresy. At the moment of the victory at Preston the
Lords were discussing charges of treason against Cromwell, while
commissioners were again sent to the Isle of Wight, in spite of the
resistance of the Independents, to conclude peace with the King.
Royalists and Presbyterians alike pressed Charles to grasp the easy
terms which were now offered him. But his hopes from Scotland had
only broken dov»ji to give place to hopes of a new war with the aid of
an army from Ireland ; and the negotiators saw forty days wasted in
useless chicanery. " Nothing," Charles wrote to his friends, " is
changed in my designs." But the surrender of Colchester to Fairfax
in August, and Cromwell's convention with Argyle, had now set free
the army, and petitions from its regiments at once demanded "justice
on the King." A fresh " Rr*^ionstrance" from the Council of Officers
called for the election of a new Parliament ; for electvjral reform ; for
the recognition of the supremacy of the Houses " in all things ; " for
the change of kingship, should it be retained, into a magistracy elected
by the Parliament, and without veto on its proceedings. Above all,
they demanded "that the capital and grand author of our troubles, by
whose commissions, commands, and procurements, and in whose
behalf and for whose interest only, of will and power, all our wars and
troubles have been, with all the miseries attending them, may be
specially brought to justice for the treason, blood, and mischief he is
therein guilty of." The demand drove the Houses to despair. Their
reply was to accept the King's concessions, unimportant as they were,
as a basis of peace. The step was accepted by the soldiers as a
defiance : Charles was again seized by a troop of horse, and carried
off to Hurst Castle, while a letter from Fairfax announced the march

fCHAP.

Vltl.l

rURlTAN ENGLAND.

571

poured
ced the
, them,
ington,
\ drove
and the
Border,
gamore
Whig,"
a, taunt
i), and,
d again

s general
ng news
met the
at of the
;he Ordi-
Eston the
;11, while
te of the
he King,
the easy
tland had
he aid of
asted in
inds, "is
o Fairfax
set free
"justice
if Officers
:orm ; for
; " for
y elected
.bove all,
fubles, by
|in whose
wars and
I, may be
hief he is
r. Their
;hey were,
iers as a
d carried
he march

of his army upon London. " We shall know now," said Vane, as the
troops took their post round the Houses of Parliament, " who is on
the side of the King, and who on the side of the people." Hut the
terror of the army proved weaker among the members than the
agonized loyalty which strove to save the mon.irchy and the Church,
and a large majority in both Houses still voted for the acceptance of
the terms which Charles had offered. The next morning saw Colonel
Pride at the door of the House of Commons with a list of forty mem-
bers of the majority in his hands. The Council of Officers had
resolved to exclude them, and as each member made his appearance
he was arrested, and put in confinement. " By what right do you
act ? " a member asked. " By the right of the sword," Hugh Peters is
said to have replied. The House was still resolute, but on the follow-
ing morning forty more members were excluded, and the rest gave
way. The sword had fallen ; and the two great powers which had
waged this bitter conflict, the Parliament and the Monarchy, suddenly
disappeared. The expulsion of one hundred and forty members, in
a word of the majority of the existinr House, reduced the Commons
to a name. The remnant who remained to co-operate with the
army were no longer representative of the will of the country ; in the
coarse imagery of popular speech they were but the "rump" of a Parlia-
ment. While the House of Commons dwindled to a sham, the House of
Lords passed away altogether. The effect of " Pride's Purge" was seen
in a resolution of the Rump for the trial of Charles and the nomination
of a Court of one hundred and fifty Commissioners to conduct it, with
John Bradshaw, a lawyer of eminence, at their head. The rejection of
this Ordinance by the few peers who remained brought about a fresh
resolution from members who remained in the Lowti- House, " that
the People are, under God, the original of all just power ; that the
Commons of England in Parliament assembled — being chosen by, and
representing, the People — have the supreme^ower in this nation ; and
that whatsoever is enacted and declared for law by the Comi. Oiis in
Parliament assembled hath the force of a law, and all the people of
thisnation are concluded thereby, although the consent and concurrence
of the King or House of Peers be not had thereunto."

Charles appeared before Br^'^ -haw's Court only to deny its compe-
tence and to refuse to plead ; ^.kk. ihirty-two witnesses were examined
to satisfy the consciences of his judges, and it was not till the fifth day of
the trial that he was condemned to death as a tyrant, traitor, murderer,
and enemy of his country. The popular excitement vented itself in
cries of "Justice," or "God save your Majesty," as the trial went )n,
but all save the loud outcries of the soldiers was hushed as Charles
passed to receive his doom. The dignity which he had failed to
preserve in his loni: jangling with Bradshaw and the judges returned
at the call vf death. Whatever had been the faults and follies of his

Sec. VIII.
Tmk Akmv

/ -^D THE

I'ARI.IA-

MENT

1640

1649

Pride's
J' urge

Dcc.b

The

King's
Deatb

Jan. 30
1649

-1 ' 1

57a

Sku IX.

TlIK
<'oMMON-
WKAITM

1649

insTokv OK TiiK KNci.isir rr.ori.i:.

|(iiAr.

The
Council
of State

lilo, " he Motliin^ (Oiiunoii did nor mean, upon (It.il inoinorahloscrnc."
Two masked cxcculioiicrs awaited the Kin^ as he mounted ihescallold,
\vhi< h had been ere« led outside «)ne of the windows of the Matuiuetin^'
House at Whitehall; the streets and roofs were lhroni,'ed with spec -
tatois, and a strong l)t»dy of st)ldiers stood (hawn up beneath. His
head fell at the lirst blow, and as the exeeutiiiner lifted it to the sij^ht
of all A groan of pity and honor burst from the silent crovvil.

Section IX. -The Oommonwealth. 1649—1653.

f.//////('////V.». -KusKvvoith's collect ion ceases with llie Kind's Trial ; White
lock iiiul l.udlow continue as hefore, and must he stipplenienled l»y Ihe Pailiii-
nu'nlary History and the State 'i'lials. Special lives of Vnne uivl Maitvn will
he found \i\ Mr. Korster's " Statesnien of the C'ouinionwealth," and a vigorous
defence of the Council of .State in the " History ()f the Ooinuiotjwenlth," hy
Mr, Hisset. For Irish afVairs see the Oruiond Papers collected hy Carle, aiul
Cromwell's despatches in Carlyle's " Letters." The account };iven hy ^\^.
Carlyle of the .Scotch war is perhaps the niost valuable j)i)rli(»n of his work.
The foreign politics and wars o( this period are admiraf>Iy illustrated with a
copii>us appendix of documents by M. (lui/ot (" Kepuhlic and Cromwell,"
vol. i,), whose account of the whole periotl is the fairest and best for the j;encral
reader. Mr. HepWi)rth Hixon has published a biojjraphy o( lUakc. 1 |Mr.
Masson's *' bife of Milton," v«)ls. iv. and v., which illusliale this period, have
been published since this list was drawn up. — liD.]

The news of the King's death was received throuj;hout Muropc with
a thrill of horror. The Czar of Russia chased the l'!nglish envoy
from his court. The ambassador of France was withdrawn on the
proclamation of the Republic. The Trotcstant powers of the Continent
seemed more anxious than any to disavow all connexion with the I'to-
testant people who had " rought their King to the block. Holland
took the lead in acts of open hostility to the new power as soon as the
news of the execution reached the Hague ; the States-CJencral waited
solemnly on the Trince of Wales, who took the title of Charles the
Second, and recognized him as " Majesty," while they refused an
audience to the Fhiglish envoys. Their Stadtholder, his brother-in-
law, the Prince of Orange, was supported by popular sympathy in the
aid and encouragement he afforded to Charles ; and eleven ships of
the English tleet, which had found a refuge at the Hague ever since
their revolt from the Parliament, were suffered to sail under Rupert's
command, and to render the seas unsafe for F^nglish traders. The
danger was far greater nearer home. In Scotland Argyle and his party
proclaimed Charles the Second King, and despatched an Embassy to
the Hague to invite him to ascend the throne. In Ireland, Ormond had
at last brought to some sort of union the factions who ever since the
rebellion had turned the land into a chaos — the old Irish Catholics or
native party under Owen Roe O'Neil, the Catholics of the English

scene."
icaHold,
muolin^;
:h spcc-
t. His
he sight
1.

VIII.J

rUKI'lAN I'.NCI.ANI).

57.1

1; While
he Parh:!
iirlyn will
a vi^oituis
cnllh," hy
Jailc, ami
n hy Mr-
Ills work.
U'd with a
>oiuwcll,"
ihc j;onoral
kc.| I Mr.
Ljiiod, have

trope witli
ish envoy
kvn on the
Continent
1 the Tro-
ll olhmd
oon as the
;ral waited
larles the
cfused an
3rothcr-in-
ithy in the
n ships of
ever since
Rupert's
ders. The
d his party
mbassy to
rmond had
;r since the
:atholics or
;he EngUsh

' ll

Pale, the Kpiscopahan Koyahsts, the I'rcsbytcrian Rtiyahsts of the
north ; and Orniond called on Charles to land at once in a country
where he would find threc-f(nuths of its people devoted t«» his cause.
Nor was the danger from without inet liy resoliuion and energy on
the part of the diminislied farliament which remained the sole
depositary of legal powers, 'i'he Conunons entered on their n(!W task
with hesitation and <lelay. Six weeks passed after the King's execu-
tion before the monarchy was formally abolished, and the government
of the nation provided for by the creation of a Council of State
consisting of forty-one mendiers selected from the Commons, wlio
were entrusted with full executive power at home or abroad. Two
months more elapsed before the passing of the memorable Act which
declared " that the l*eopIe of J'lngland and of all the dominions and
territories thereunto belonging are, and shall be, and arc hereby con-
stituted, made, established, and confirmed to be a Comnutnwealth and
Free State, and shall henceforward be governed as a Commonwealth
and I'ree State by the supreme authority of this nation, the repre-
sentatives of the People in Parliament, and by such as they shall
appoint and constitute officers and ministers for the good of the people,
and that without any King or House of Lords."

Of the dangers which threatened the new Commonwealth some
were more apparent than real. The rivalry of France and Spain, both
anxious for its friendship, secured it from the hostility of the greater
jjowers of the Continent ; and the ill-will of Holland could be delayed,
if not averted, by negotiations. The acceptance of the Covenant was
insisted on by Scotland before it would formally receive Charles as its
ruler, and nothing but necessity would induce him to comply with such
a demand. On the side of Ireland the danger was more pressing,
and an army of twelve thousand men was set apart for a vigorous
prosecution of the Irish war. Ikit the real difficulties were the difli-
culties at home. The de.ath of Charles gave fresh vigour to the royalist
cause, and the new loyalty was stirred to enthusiasm by the publication
of the " Eikon Basilike," a work really due to the ingenuity of Dr.
(i.. iden, a Presbyterian minister, but which was believed to have been
composed by the King himself in his later hours of captivity, and
whicii reflected with admirable skill the hopes, the suffering, and the
piety of the royal " martyr." The dreams of a risi'ig were roughly
checked by the execution of the Duke of Hamilton a'jd Lords Holland
and Capell, who had till now been confined ?n the Tower, iiut the
popular disaffection told even on the Council cf State. A n :, iority of
its members declined the oath offered to them .U their caHicst meeting,
pledging them to an approval of the King's death and the establish-
ment of the Commonwealth. Half the judges retired from the bench.
Thousands of refusals met the demand of an engagement to be faith-
ful to the Republic which was made to all beneficed clergymen and

Sn. IX.

TlIK

ClIMMON-

vvi'.Ai.ni
1649

1653

At'olilioH of
A/i>nn ri hy

May 19

The

Rump

and the

Army

1 ■

■"^'*^''*»"

tSSHA

,>i,i( , , iiiifiifl-aiaB

574

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

(

Sec. IX.

The
Common

WEALTK

1649

1653

Aug. 1649

The
Coaquest

of
Ireland

public functionaries. It was not till May, and even then in spite of
the ill-will of the citizens, that the Council ventured to prociaim the
Commonwealth in 1 ondon. The army indeed had no thought of sett-
ing up a mere miHtary rule. Still less did it contemplate leaving the
conduct of affairs to the small body of members, which still called itself
the House of Commons, a body which numbered hardly a hundred, and
whose average attendance was little more than fifty. In reducing it by
" Pride's Purge " to the mere shadow of a House the army had never
dreamed of its continuance as a permanent assembly : it had, in fact,
insisted as a condition of even its temporary continuance that it should
prepare a bill for the summoning of a fresh Parliament. The plan put
forward by the Council of Officers is still interesting as the basis of
many later efforts towards parliamentary reform. It advised a dis-
solution in the spring, liie assembling every two years of a new
Parliament consisting of four hundred members elected by all house-
holders rateable to the poor, and a redistribution of seats which
would have given the privilege of representation to every piace of
importance. Paid military officers and civil officials were excluded
from election. The plan was apparently accepted by the Commons,
and a bill based on it was again and again discussed, but there was a
suspicion that no serious purpose of its own dissolution was enter-
tained by the House. The popular discortent found a mouthpiece in
John Lilburne, a brave, hot-headed sold'f.r, and the excitement of the
army appeared suddenly in a formidable mutiny in May. " You must
cut these people in pieces," Cromwell broke out in the Council of
State, " or they will cut you in pieces ; " and a forced march of fifty
miles to Burford enabled him to burst on the mutinous regiments at
midnight, and to stamp out the revolt. But resolute as he was against
disorder, Cromwell went honestly with the army in its demand of a
new Parliament ; he believed, and in his harangue to the mutineers he
pledged himself to the assertion, that the House proposed to dissolve
itself. Within the House, however, a vigorous knot of politicians
was resolved to prolong its existence ; in a witty paraphrase of the
story of Moses, Henry Martyn was soon to picture the Common-
wealth as a new-born and delicate babe, and hint that '' no one is so
proper to bring it up as the mother who has brougnt it into the
world." As yet, however, their in* iitions were kept secz'et, and in spite
of the delays thrown in the wa) of the bill for a new Representative
body C romwell entertained no serious suspicion of the Parliament's
design, when he was summoned to Ireland by a series of royalist
successes which left only Dublin in the hands of the Parliamentary
forces.

With Scotland threatening war, and a naval struggle impending with
Holland, it was necessary that the work of the army in Ireland should
be done quickly. The temper, too, of Cromwell and his soldiers was

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

575

one of vengeance, for the horror of the Irish massacre remained living
in every Enghsh breast, and the revolt was looked upon as a continu-
ance of the massacre. " We are come," he said on his landing, ** to
ask an account of the innocent blood that hath been shed, and to
endeavour to bring to an account all who by appearing in arms shall
justify the same." A sortie from Dublin had already broken up
Ormond's siege of the capital ; and feeling himself powerless to keep
the field before the new army, the Marquis had thrown his best troops,
three thousand Englishmen under Sir Arthur Aston, as a garrison into
Drogheda. The storm of Drogheda by Cromwell was the first of a
series of awful massacres. The garrison fought bravely, and repulsed
the first attack ; but a second drove Aston and his force back to the
Mill-Mount. " Our men getting up to them," ran Cromwell's terrible
despatch, " were ordered by me to put them all to the sword. And
indeed, being in the heat of action, 1 forbade them to spare any that
were in arms in the town, and I think that night they put to death
about two thousand men." A few fled to St. Peter's church, " where-
1"" m I ordered the steeple to be fired, whcxe one of them was heard
to say in the midst of the flames : ' God damn me, I burn, I burn.' "
" In the church itself nearly one thousand were put to the sword.
I believe all their friars were knocked on the head promiscuously but
two," but these were the sole exceptions to the rule of killing the
soldiers only. At a later time Cromwell challenged his enemies to
give "an instance of one man since my coming into Ireland, not in
arms, massacred, destroyed, or banished." But for soldiers who
refused to surrender on summons there was no mercy. Of the rem-
nant who were driven to yield at last through hunger, " when they
submitted, their officers were knocked on the head, every tenth man
of the soldiers killed, and the rest shipped for the Barbadoes." " I
am persuaded," the despatch ends, " that this is a righteous judge-
ment of God upon these barbarous wretches who have imbrued their
hands in so much innocent blood, and that it will tend to prevent the
effusion of blood for the future." A detachment sufficed to relieve
Derry, and to quiet Ulster ; and Cromwell turned to the south, where
as stout a defence was followed by as terrible a massacre at Wexford.
A fresh success at Ross brought him to Waterford ; but the city neld
stubbornly out, disease thinned his army, where there was scarce an
officer who had not been sick, and the general himself was arrested by
illness. At last the tempestuous weather drove him into winter
quarters at Cork with his work half done. The winter was one of
terrible anxiety. The Parliament was showing less and less inclination
to dissolve itself, and was meeting the growing discon<^ent by a stricter
censorship of the press, and a fruitless prosecution of J ohn Lilburne.
English commerce was being ruined by the piracies of Rupert's fleet,
which now anchored at Kinsale to support the royalist cause in Ireland.

Sec. IX.

The

Common-
wealth

1649

1653

Sept. 1649

g<>t'wya(fl»y-."fy»'-.»-T»>-y

576

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IX.

The

Common-
wealth

1649

1653

Charles and
the Scots

1650

Dunbar
aad Wor-
cester

July 1650

Dunbar
Sept. 3

The energy of Vane indeed had already re-created a navy, squadrons
of which were being despatched into the British seas, the Mediterranean,
and the Levant, and Colonel Blake, who had distinguished himself by
his heroic defence of Taunton during the war, was placed at the head
of a fleet which drove Rupert from the Irish coast, and finally blockaded
him in the Tagns. But even the energy of Vane quailed before the
danger from the Scots. " One must go and die there," the young
King cried at the news of Ormond's defeat before Dublin, "for it is
shameful for me to live elsewhere." But his ardour for an Irish cam-
paign cooled as Cromwell marched from victory to victory ; and from
the isle of Jersey, which alone remained faithful to him of all his
southern dominions, Charles renewed the negotiations with Scotland
which his hopes from Ireland had broken. They were again delayed by
a proposal on the part of Montrose to attack the very Government with
whom his master was negotiating ; but the failure and death of the
Marquis in the spring forced Charles to accept the Presbyterian
conditions. The news of the negotiations filled the English leaders
with dismay, for Scotland was raising an army, and Fairfax, while
willing to defend England against a Scotch invasion, scrupled to take
the lead in an invasion of Scotland. The Council recalled Cromwell
from Ireland, but his cooler head saw that there was yet time to finish
his work in the west. During the winter he had been busily preparing
for a new campaign, and it was only after the storm of Clonmell,
and the overthrow of the Irish under Hugh O'Neil, that he embarked
again for England.

Cromwell entered London amidst the shouts of a great multitude ;
and a month after Charles had landed on the shores of Scotland the
English army started for the north. It crossed the Tweed, fifteen
thousand men strong ; but the terror of his massacres in Ireland hung
round its leader, the country was deserted as he advanced, and he was
forced to cling for provisions to a fleet which sailed along the coast.
David Leslie, with a larger force, lefused battle and lay obstinately
in his lines between Edinburgh ?nd Leith. A march of the English
army round his position to the slopes of the Pentlands only brought
about a change of the Scottish front ; and as Cromwell fell back baffled
upon Dunbar, Leslie encamped upon the heights above the town, and
cut off the English retreat along the coast by the seizure of Cockburns-
path. His post was almost unassailable, while the soldiers of Cromwell
were sick and starving : and their general had resolved on an embarca-
tion of his forces, when he saw in the dusk of evening signs of move-
ment in the Scottish camp. Leslie's caution had at last been overpowered
by the zeal of the preachers, and his army moved down to the lower
ground between the hillside on which it was encamped and a little
brook which covered the English front. His horse was far in advance
of the main body, und it had hardly reached the level ground when

[chap.

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

577

squadrons
iterranean,
himself by
at the head
f blockaded
before the
the young
1, •' for it is
I Irish cam-
■ ; and from
n of all his
ith Scotland
1 delayed by
jrnment with
death of the
Presbyterian
elish leaders
'airfax, while
upled to take
led Cromwell
time to finish
sily preparing
of Clonmell,
he embarked

Cromwell in the dim dawn flung his whole force upon it. " They run ;
I profess they run ! " he cried as the Scotch horse broke after a des-
perate resistance, and threw mto confusion the foot who were hurrying
to its aid. Then, as the sun rose over the mist of the morning, he
added in nobler words : '' Let God arise, and let His enemies be
scattered ! Like as the mist vanisheth, so shal<- Thou drive them
away ! " In less than an hour the victory was complete. The defeat
at once became a rout ; ten thousand prisoners were taken, with all the
baggage and guns ; three thousand were slain, with scarce any loss on
the part of the conquerors. Leslie reached Edinburgh, a general
without an army. The effect of Dunbar was at once seen in the atti-
tude of the Continental powers. Spain hastened to recognize the
Republic, and Holland offered its alliance. But Cromwell was
watching with anxiety the growing discontent at home. The general
amnesty claimed by Ireton, and the bill for the Parliament's dissolu-
tion, still hung on hand; the reform of the courts of justice, which
had been pressed by the army, failed before the obstacles thrown in
its way by the lawyers in the Commons. " Relieve the oppressed,"
Cromwell wrote from Dunbar, " hear the groans of poor prisoners. Be
pleased to reform the abuses of all professions. If there be any one
that makes many poor to make a few rich, that suits not a Common-
wealth." But the House was seeking to turn the current of public
opinion in favour of its own continuanceby a great diplomatic triumph.
It resolved secretly on the wild project of bringing about a union
between England and Holland, and it took advantage of Cromwell's
victory to despatch Oliver St. John with a stately embassy to the
Hague. His rejection of an alliance and Treaty of Commerce
which the Dutch offered was followed by the disclosure of the
English proposal of union, but the proposal was at once refused.
The envoys, who returned angrily to the Parliament, attributed their
failure to the posture of affairs in Scotland, where Charles was pre-
paring for a new campaign. Humiliation after humiliation had been
heaped on Charles since he landed in his northern realm. He had
subscribed to the Covenant ; he had listened to sermons and scold-
ings from the ministers ; he had been called on to sign a declaration
that acknowledged the tyranny of his father and the idolatry of his
mother. Hardened and shameless as he was, the young King for a
moment recoiled. " I could never look my mother in the face again,"
he cried, '"after signing such a paper ;" but he signed. He was still,
hdwever, a King only in name, shut out from the Council and the army,
with his friends excluded from all part in government or the war. But
he was at once freed by the victory of Dunbar. " I liclieve the King
will set up on his own score now," Cromwell wrote after his victory.
With the overthrow of Leslie fell the power of Argyle and the narrow
Presbyterians wb.om he led. Hamilton, the brother and successor of

P P

Sec. IX.

THK

Cdmmon-

WEALTH

1649

1653

Bn'ak wlik
Holland

578

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

h t

Sec. IX.

The

Common-
wealth

1649

1653

1650-1651

Worcester

Sept. 3,

1651

The

Dntch

War

the Duke who had been captured at Preston, brought back the
royalists to the camp, and Charles insisted on taking part in the
Council and on being crowned at Scone. M ister of Edinburgh, but
foiled in an attack on Stirling, Cromwell waited through the winter
and the long spring, while intestine feuds broke up the nation opposed
to him, and while the stricter Covenanters retired sulkily from the
royal army on the return of the " Malignants," the royalists of the
earlier war, to its ranks. With summer the campaign recommenced,
but Leslie again fell back on his system of positions, and Cromwell,
finding the Scotch camp at Stirling unassailable, crossed into Fife and
left the road open to the south. The bait was taken. In spite of
Leslie's counsels Charles resolved to invade England, and was soon in
full march through Lancashire upon the Severn, with the English horse
under Lambert hanging on his rear, and the English foot hastening by
York and Coventry to close the road to London. " We have done to
the best of our judgement/' Cromwell replied to the angry alarm of the
Parliament, " knowing that if some issue were not put to this business
it would occasion another winter's war," At Coventry he learnt
Charles's position, and swept round by Evesham upon Worcester,
where the Scotch King was encamped. Throwing half his force across
the river, Cromwell attacked the town on both sides on the anniversary
of his victory at Dunbar. He led the van in person, and was " the first
to set foot on the enemy's ground." When Charles descended from
the cathedral tower to fling himself on the eastern division, Cromwell
hurried back across the Severn, and was soon " riding in the midst of
the fire." For four or five hours, he tcid the Parliament, " it was as
stiff a contest as ever I ha e seen ; " the Scots, outnumbered and
beaten into the city, gave no answer but shot to offers of quarter,
and it was not till nightfall that all was over. The loss of the victors
was as usual inconsiderable. The conquered lost six thousand men,
and all their baggage and artillery. Leslie was among the prisoners :
Hamilton among the dead. Charles himself fled from the field ; and
after months of wanderings made his escape to France.

" Now that the King is dead and his son defeated," Cromwell said
gravely to the Parliament, " I think it necessary to come to a settle-
ment." But the settlement which had been promised after Naseby was
still as distant as ever after W rcester. The bill for dissolving the
present Parliament, though Cromwell pressed it in person, was only
passed, after bitter opposition, by a majority of two ; and even this
succe^i had been purchased by a compromise which permitted the
House to sit for three years more. Internal affairs were almost at a
deai' lock. The Parliament appointed committees to prepare plans for j
legal reforms, or for ecclesiastical reforms, but it did nothing to carry I
them into effect. It was overpowered by the crowd of affairs which |
the confusion of the war had thrown into its hands, by confiscations,

viii.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

579

sequestrations, appointments to civil and military offices, in fact, the
whole administration of the state ; and there were times when it was
driven to a resolve not to take any pri'-ate aftairs for weeks together in
order that it might make some progress with public business. To add
to this confusion and muddle there were the inevitable scandals which
arose from it ; charges of malversation and corruption were hurled at
the members of the house ; and some, like Haselrig, were accused with
justice of using their power to further their own interests. The one
remedy for all this was, as the army saw, the assembly of a new and
complete Parliament in place of the mere " rump " of the old ; but this
was the one measure which the House was resolute to avert. Vane
spurred it to a new activity. The Amnesty Bill was forced through
after fifteen divisions. A Grand Committee, with Sir Matthew Hale
at its head, was appointed to ':onsider the rtt\)rm of the law. A union
with Scotland was pushed resolutely forward ; eight English Com-
missioners convoked a Convention of delegates from its counties and
boroughs at Edinburgh, and in spite of dogged opposition procured a
vote in favour of the proposal. A bill was introduced which gave legal
form to the union, and admitted representatives from Scotland into the
next Parliament. A similar plan v^as proposed for a union with
Ireland. But it was necessary/ for Vine's purposes not only to show
the energy of the Parliament, but to free it from the control of the
army. His aim was to raise in the navy a force devoted to the House,
and to eclipse the glories of Dunbar and Worcester by yet greater
triumphs at sea. With this view die qua rel with Holland had been
carefully nursed ; a " Navigation Act" pr(>hibiting the importation in
foreign vessels of any but the products of tli countries to which they
belonged struck a fatal blow at the carrying ide from which the Dutch
drew their wealth ; and fresh debates aro .^
salutes from all vessels in the Channel.
Dover, and a summons from Blake to lo\v< i the Dutch flag was met by
the Dutch admiral. Van Tromp, with a bn dside. The States-General
attributed the collision to accident, and ' :-3red to recall Van Tromp ;
but the English demands rose at each ep in the negotiations till war
became inevitable. The army hardly needed the warning conveyed by
the introduction of a bill for its disbanding to understand the new
policy of the Parliament. It was signitic nt that while accepting the
bill for its own dissolution the House had as yet prepared no plan for
the assembly which was to follow it , and the Dutch war had hardly
been declared when, abandoning the atti*^ -de of inaction which it had
observed since the beginning of theComm< i> wealth, the army petitioned,
not only for reform in Church and State, but for an explicit declaration
that the House would bring its proceedings to a close. The Petition
forced the House to discuss a bill for " a New ^Representative," but the
discussion soon brought out the resolve of the sitting members to

p p 2

om the English claim to
he two fleets met before

Sec. IX.
The

CoMMON-
WEAI.TH

1649

leJia

ActtvUy of

fhe
Pari ia men t

1652

IVarwith
//oil and

SSo

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

•

Sec. IX.

The
Common-
wealth

1649

1653

The

Ejection

of the

Rump

B/ai-£

Feb. 1653

continue as a part of the coming Parliament without re-election. The
officers, irritated by such a claim, demanded in conference after con-
ference an immediate dissolution, and the House as resolutely refused.
In ominous words Cromwell supported the demand of the army. " As
for the members of this Parliament, the army begins to take them in
disgust. I would it did so with less reason." There was just ground,
he urged, for discontent in their selfish greed of houses and lands, the
scandalous lives of many, their partiality as judges, their interference
with the ordinary course of law in matters of private interest, their
delay of law reform, above all in their manifest design of perpetuating
their own power. "There is little to hope for from such men," he
ended with a return to his predominant thought, " for a settlement
of the nation."

For the moment the crisis was averted by the events of the war. A
terrible storm had separated the two fleets when on the point of en-
gaging in the Orkneys, but Ruyter and Blake met again in the Channel,
and after a fierce struggle the Dutch were forced to retire under cover
of night. Since the downfall of Spain Holland had been the first naval
power in the world, and the spirit of the nation rose gallantly with its
earliest defeat. Immense efforts were made to strengthen the fleet, and
the veteran. Van Tromp, who was replaced at its head, appeared in the
Channel with seventy-three ships of war. Blake had but half the
number, but he at once accepted the challenge, and the unequal
fight went on doggedly till nightfuU, when the English fleet withdrew
shattered into the Thames. Tromp swept the Channel in triumph, with
a broom at his masthead ; and the tone of the Commons lowered with
the defeat of their favourite force. A compromise seems to have been
arranged between the two parties, for the bill providing a new Repre-
sentative was again pushed on, and the Parliament agreed to retire in
the coming Nc ember, while Cromwell offered no opposition to a reduc-
tion of the army. But the courage of the House rose afresh with a
turn of fortune. The strenuous efforts of Blake enabled him again to
put to sea in a few months after his defeat, and a running fight through
four days ended at last in an English victory, though Tromp's line
seamanship enabled him to save the convoy he was guarding. The
House at once insisted on the retention of its power. Not only were
the existing members to continue as members of the new Parliament,
depriving the places they represented of their right of choosing re-
presentatives, but they were to constitute a Committee of Revision,
to determine the validity of each election, and the fitness of the
members returned. A conference took place between the leaders of
the Commons and the Officers of the Army, who resolutely demanded
not only the omission of these clauses, but that the Parliament
should at once dissolve itself, and commit the new elections to the
Council of State. ■' Our charge," retorted Haselrig, " cannot be

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

581

transferred to any one." The conference was adjourned till the next
morning, on an understanding that no decisive step should be taken :
but it had no sooner re-assembled than the absence of the leading
members confirmed the news that Vane was fast pressing the bill for
a new Representative through the Mouse. " It is contrary to common
honesty," Cromwell angrily broke out ; and, quitting Whitehall, he
summoned a company of musketeers to follow him as far as the door
of the Commons. He sate down quietly in his place, "clad in plain
grey clothes and grey worsted stockings," and listened to Vane's
passionate arguments. " I am come to do what grieves me to the
heart," he said to his neighbour, St. John ; but he still remained
quiet, till Vane pressed the House to waive its usual forms and pass
the bill at once. "The time has come," he said to Harrison. "Think
well," replied Harrison, " it is a dangerous work ! " and Cromwell
listened for another cjuarter of an hour. At the question " that this
Bill do pass," he at length rose, and his tone grew higher as he
repeated his former charges of injustice, self-interest, and delay.
" Your hour is come," he ended, " the Lord hath done with you ! " A
crowd of members started to their feet in angry protest. " Come,
come," replied Cromwell, " we hav^ n;ic enough of this ; " and striding
into the midst of the chamber, he apt his hat on his head, and
exclaimed, "I will put an end to your prating!" In the din that
followed his voice was heard in broken sentences — " It is not fit that
you should sit here any longer ! You should give place to better men !
You are no Parliament." Thirty musketeers entered at a sign from
their General, and the fifty members present crowded to the door.
" Drunkard ! " Cromwell broke out as Wentworth passed him ; and
Martin was taunted with a yet coarser name. Vane, fearless to the
last, told him his act was " against all right and all honour." " Ah,
Sir Harry Vane, Sir Harry Vane," Cromwell retorted in bitter indig-
nation at the trick he had been played, " you might have prevented
all this, but you are a Juggler, and have no common honesty ! The
Lord deliver me from Sir Harry Vane ! " The Speaker refused to quit
his seat, till Harrison offered to "lend him a hand to comedown,"
Cromwell lifted the mace from the table. " What shall we do with
this bauble.'*" he said. "Take it away!" The door of the House
was locked at last, and the dispersion of the Parliament was followed
a few hours after by that of its executive committee, the Council of
State. Cromwell himself summoned them to withdraw. " We have
heard," replied the President, John Bradshaw, "what you have done
this morning at the House, and in some hours all luigland will hear
it. I5ut you mistake, sir, if you think the Parliament dissolved.
No power on earth can dissolve the Parli nnent but itself, be sure
of that ! " ''

Sia. IX.
The

COMMON-
WKAl.TII

1649

1653

Aj»il 20
165J

■i

The
J\i7liaiiient
dtiicn out

1 '

582

HISTORY OF THE KNCJLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Se(. X.

TlIF

Kali, ok

I'l'KITANISM

1653
1660

The
Puritan
Conveii-

tiou

Section X. -The Fall of Puritanism. 1653--1660.

[.'i«///c';7ViVj. Many of the works mentioned before are still valuable, but
the real key to (lie history of this jjcriod lies in Cromwell's remarkal)le series of
Spijcches (Carlyle, ** Letters ami Speeches," vol, iii.). Thurlow's State Papers
furnish an im;ncnse massof ducuuients. For the Second Parliament of the Pro-
tector we have llurton's " Diary." I'or the Restoration, M. (iuizot's " Richard
Cromwell and the Restoration," Ludlow's "Memoirs," Ba.vter's "Autobio-
grai)hy,'' and the minute and ai'curate account given by Clarendon himself]

The dispersion of the Parliament and of the Council of State left
Knj.,dand without a government, for the authority of every official
ended with that of the bcdy from which his power was derived. Crom-
well, in fcict, as Captain- (ieneral of the forces, was forced to recognize
his responsibility for the I'laintenance of ])ul)lic order. IJut no thought
of military despotism can l)c fairly traced in the acts of the general
or the amiy. They were in fact far from regarding their position as a
revolutionary one. Though incapable of justification on any formal
ground, their proceedings since theestablishment of the Commonwealth
had as yet been substantially .'n vindication of the rights of the country
to representation and self-government ; and public opinion had gone
fairly with the army in its demand for a full and efficient body of repre-
sentatives, as well as in its resistance to the project by which the Rump
would have deprived half England of its right of election. It was
only when no other means existed of preventing such a wrong that the
soldiers had driven out the wrongdoers. "It is you that have forced
me to this," Cromwell exclaimed, as he drove the members from the
House ; " I have sought the Lord night and day that He would rather
slay me than put me upon the doing of this work." The act was one
of violence to the members of the House, but the act which it aimed
at preventing was one of violence on their part to the constitutional
rights of the whole nation. The people had in fact been "dissatisfied
in every corner of the realm " at the state of public affairs : and tne
expulsion of the members was ratified by a general assent. " We
did not hear a dog bark at their going," the Protector said years after-
wards. Whatever anxiety may have been felt at the use which was like
to be made of " the power of the sword," was in great part dispelled by
a proclamation of the officers. Their one anxiety was " not to grasp
the power ourselves nor to keep it in military hands, no not for a day,"
and their promise to " call to the government men of approved fidelity
and honesty" was to some extent redeemed by the nomination of a
provisional Council of State, consisting of eight officers of high rank
and fourcivilians, with Cromwell as their head, and a seat in which was
ottered, though fruitlessly, to Vane. The first business of such a body
was clearly to summon a new Parliament and to resign its trust into its
hands : but the bill for Parliamentary reform had dropped with the ex-
pulsion : and reluctant as the Council was to summon a new Parliament

VIM.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

5«3

on the old basis of election, it shrank from the responsibility of effecting
so fundan.'^ntal a change as the creation of a new basis by its own
authority. It was this difficulty which led to the expedient of a Con-
stituent Convention. Cromwell told the story of this unlucky assembly
some years after with an amusing frankness. " I will come and tell
you a story of my own weakness and folly. And yet it was done in my
simplicity — 1 dare avow it was. ... It was thought then that men of
our own judgment, who had fought in the wars, and were all of a piece
on that account — why, surely, these men will hit it, and these men
will do it to the purpose, whatever can be desired ! And surely we
did think, and I did think so — the more blame to me ! " Of the
hundred and fifty-six men, "faithful, fearing God, and hating covetous-
ness," whose names were selected for this purpose by the Council of
State, from lists furnished by the congregational churches, the bulk
were men, like Ashley Cooper, of good blood and " free estates ; " and
the proportion of burgesses, such as the leather-merchant, Praise-God
Barebones, whose name was eagerly seized on as a nickname for the
body to which he belonged, seems to have been much the same as in
earlier Parliaments. lUit the crrcumstanccs of their choice told fatally
on the temper of its members. Cromwell himself, in the burst of
rugged eloquence with which he welcomed their assembling, was
carried away by a strange enthusiasm. " Convince the nation," he
said, " that as men fearing God have fought them out of their bondage
under the regal power, so men fearmg God do now rule them in the
fear of God. . . . Own your call, for it is of God : indeed, it is
marvellous, and it hath been unprojected. . . . Never was a supreme
power under such a way of owning God, and being owned by Him."
A spirit yet more enthusiastic appeared in the proceedings of the
Convention itself. The resignation of their pov/ers by Cromwell and
the Council into its hands left it the one siipreme authority ; but by
the instrument which convoked it provision had been made that this
authority shouJid be transferred in fifteen months to another assembly
elected accorchng to its directions. Its work was, in fact, to be that
of a constituent assemblv, paving the way for a Parliament on a really
nati*>nal basis. But the Convention put the largest construction on its
commission, and boldly undertook the whole task of constitutional
ref(Hm. Committees were appointed to consider the needs of the
Church and the nation. The spirit of economy and honesty which
pervaded the assembly appeared in its redress of the extravagance
which prevailed in the civil service, and of the inequality of taxation.
With a remarkable energy it undertook a host of reforms, for whose
execution England has had to wait to our own day. The Long
Parliament had shrunk from any reform of the Court of Chancery,
where twenty-three thousand cases were waiting unheard. The
Convention proposed its abolition. The work of compiling a single

Skc. X.

The

Fall ok
i'ukitanism

1653

1660

The

Hare bones

Parliatnent

July 1653

The -work

of the
Convention

i t

584

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

Sel. X.

Tiir,
Fai.i. ok

Pl'RlTANISM

1653

'JO

1660

The VIexv

Consti-

tution

C/ose of the
Conventioi:

Dec. 1653

tcliAP.

VIII.

code of laws, begun under the Long Parliament by a committee with
Sir Matthew Hale at its head, was again pushed fuiward. The
frenzied ahum which these bold measures aroused among the lawyer
class was soon backed by that of the clergy, who saw their wealth
menaced by the establishment of civil marriage, and by proposals to
substitute the free contributions of congregations for the payment of
tithes. The landed proprietors too rose against the schemfe for the
abolition of lay-patronage, which was favoured by the Convention, and
predicted an age of confiscation. The " Harebones Parliament," as
the assembly was styled in derision, was charged with .1 design to ruin
property, the Church, and the law, with enmity to knowledge, and a
blind and ignorant fanaticism. Cromwell himself shared the general
uneasiness at its proceedings. His mind was that of an adminis-
trator, rather than that of a statesman, unspeculative, deficient in
foresight, conservative, and eminently practical. He saw the need of
administrative reform in Church and State ; but he had no sympathy
whatever with the revolutionary theories which were filling the air
around him. His desire was for "a settlement" which should be
accompanied with as little disturbance of the old stale of things as
possible. If Monarchy had vanished in ihe turmoil of war, his
experience of the Long Parliament only confirmed him in his belief of
the need of establishing an executive power of a similar kind, unart
from the power of the legislature, as a condition of civil liberty. His
sword had won "liberty of conscience ; " but passionately as he clung
to it, he was still for an established Church, for a parochial system, and
a ministry maintained by tithes. His social tendencies were simply
those of the class to which he belonged. " 1 was by birth a gentle-
man," he cold a later Parliament, and in the old social arrangement of
"a nobleman, a gentleman, a yeoman," he saw "a good interest of
the nation and a great one." He hated "that levelling principle''
which tended to the reducing of all to one ec(urlity. " What was the
purport of it," he asks with an amusing simplicity, " but to make the
tenant as liberal a fortune as the landlord ,'' Which, I think, if obtained,
would not have lasted long. The men of that principle, after they had
served their own turns, would then have cried up property and interest
fast enough."

To a practical temper such as this the speculative reforms of the
Convention were as distasteful as to the lawyers and clergy whom
they attacked. " Nothing," said Cromwell, "was in the hearts of these
men but * overturn, overturn.' " But he was delivered from his em-
barrassment by the internal dissensions of the Assembly itself. The
day after the decision against tithes the more conservative members
snatched a vote by surprise " that the sitting of this Parliament any
longer, as now constituted, will not be for the good of the Common-
wealth, and that it is requisite to deliver up unto the Lord-( icneral the

VIII.]

rURITAN ENGLAND.

powciii wc received from him." 'I'lic .Speaker placed their abcUcation
in Cromvveirs hands, and the ai:l was confirmed by the subscciucnt
adhesion of a majority of the members. The dissolution of the Con-
vention replaced matters in the slate in which its assembly had found
IJicm ; but there was st!Il the same genc.d anxiety to substitute some
sort of Icg.d rule for the j)ou-er of the sword. The Convention had
named during its session a fresh Council of State, and this body at
once dr( w up, under the name of the Instrument of (lovernment, a
remarkable Constitution, which was adopted by the Council of Officers.
They were driven by necessity to the step from whic h they had shrunk
before, that of convening a Parliament on the reformed basis of repre-
sentation, though such a basis had no legal sanction. The 1 louse was
to consist of four hundred membeia from ICngl.md, thirty from Scot-
land, and thirty from Ireland, The scats hitherto assigned to small
and rotten lioroughs were transferred to larger constituencies, and for
the n"\ost part to countie^>. All special rights of Noting in the election
of members were abolished, and replaced by a general right of sulViage,
based on the possession of real or personal projjcrly to the value of
two hundred pounds. Catholics and " Malignants," as those who had
fought for the King were called, were excluded for the while from the
franchise. Constitutionally, all further organization of the form of
j,'overnment should have been left to this Assembly ; but the dread of
disorder during the interval of its election, as well ;is a longing for
"settlement," drove the Council to complete their work by pressing
the office of " Protector'' upon Cromwell. *' They told me that exce[)l
1 would undertake the government they thought things would liardly
come to a composure or settlement, but blood and confusion would
break in as before." If we follow however his own statement, it
was when they urged that the acceotance of such a Protectorate
actually limited his power as Lord-General, and " bound his hands
to act nothing without the consent of a Council until the Parliament
that the post was accepted. The powers of the new I'rotector indeed
were strictly limited. Though th members of the Council were
originally named by him, each member was irremovable save by
consent of the rest : their advice was necessary in all foreign affairs,
tlicir consent in matters of peace and war, their approval in nomina-
tions to the great offices of state, or the disposal of the military
or civil power. With this body too lay the choice of all future
Protectors. To the administrative check of the Council was added
the political check of the Parliament. Three years at the most were to
elapse between the assembling of one Parliament and another. Laws
could not be made, nor taxes imposed but by its authority, and after
the lapse of twenty days the statutes it passed became laws even if
the Protector's assent was refused to them. The new Constitution was
undoubtedly popular ; a id the promise of a real Parliament in a few

585

' ii

Ski. X.

•1hi.:

Kai.i, ok

I'i'K'l TANrSM

1653

leeo

'/"//(■ histrif

nil' lit of
Ci(rvi'yiiiiicHt

li»l

IMAGE EVALUATION
TEST TARGET (MT-3)

1.0

I.I

11.25

■ttlM 125

1*0 ^^~ BMB

■U 122 122

£ 1^ 12.0

''^

Photographic

Sciences
Corporation

33 WIST MAIN STREET

WEBSTER, N.Y. 14SS0

(7U) S72-4503

586

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. X.

The

Fall ok

Puritanism

1653

1660

Parlia-
ment
of 1654

months covered the want of any legal character in the new rule. The
Government was generally accepted as a provisional one, which could
only acquire legal authority from the ratification of its acts in the
coming session ; and the desire to settle it on such a Parliamentary
basis was universal among the members of the new Assembly which
met in the autumn at Westminster.

Few Parliaments have ever been more memorable, or more truly
representative of the English people, than the Parliament of 1654.
It was the first Parliament in our history where members from Scot-
land and Ireland sate side by side with those from England, as they
sit in the Parliament of to-day. The members for rotten boroughs
and pocket-boroughs had disappeared. In spite of the exclusion of
royalists and Catholics from the polling-booths, and the arbitrary
erasure of the names of a few ultra-republican members by the
Council, the Ho-se had a better title to the name of a "free Parlia-
ment " than any which had sat before. The freedom with which the
electors had exercized their right of voting was seen indeed in the
large number of Presbyterian members who were returned, and in the
reappearance of Haselrig and Bradshaw, with many members of the
Long Parliament, side by side with Lord Herbert and the older Sir
Harry Vane. The first business of the House was clearly to consider
the question of government ; and Haselrig, with the fiercer republicans,
at once denied the legal existence of either Council or Protector, on
the ground that the Long Parliament had never been dissolved. Such
an argument, however, told as much against the Parliament in which
they sate as against the administration itself, and the bulk of the
Assembly contented themselves with declining to recognize the Con-
stitution or Protectorate as of more than provisional validity. They
proceeded at once to settle the government on a Parliamentary basis.
The " Instrument" was taken as the groundwork of the new Consti-
tution, and carried clause by clause. That Cromwell should retain
his rule as Protector was unanimously agreed ; that he should possess
the right of veto or a co-ordinate legislative power with the Parliament
was hotly debated, though the violent language of Haselrig did little to
disturb the general tone of moderation. Suddenly, however, Cromwell
interposed. If he had undertaken the duties of Protector with reluct-
ance, he looked on all legal defects in his title as more than supplied
by the consent of the nation. " I called not myself to this place," he
urged, " God and the people of these kingdoms have borne testimony to
it." His rule had been accepted by London, by the army, by tbe solemn
decision of the judges by addresses from every shire, by the very
appearance of the member-^, cf the Parliament in answer to his writ.
" Why may I not balance this Providence," he asked, "with any heredi-
tary interest ? " In this national approval he saw a call from God, a Di-
vine Right of a higher order than that of the kings who had gone before.

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

587

But there was another ground for the anxiety with which he wat^rhed
the proceedings of the Commons. His passion for administration
had far overstepped the bounds of a merely provisional rule in the
interval before the assembling of the Parliament. His desire for
" settlement " had been strengthened not only by the drift of public
opinion, but by the urgent need of every day ; and the power reserved
by the "Instrument" to issue temporary ordinances "until further
order in such matters, to be taken by the Parliament," gave a scope
to his marvellous activity of which he at once took advantage. Sixty-
four Ordinances had been issued in the nine months before the
meeting of the Parliament. Peace had been concluded with Holland.
The Church had oeen set in order. The law itself had been minutely
regulated. The union with Scotland had been brought to completion.
So far was Cromwell from dreaming that these measures, or the
authority which enacted them, would be questioned, that he looked
to Parliament simply to complete his work. " The great end of your
meeting," he said at the first assembly of its members, " is healing
and settling." Though he had himself done much, he added, " there
was still much to be done." Peace had to be made with Portugal, aAd
alliance with Spain. Bills were laid before the House for the codifica-
tion of the law. The plantation and settlement of Ireland had still to
be completed. He resented the setting these projects aside for con-
stitutional questions which, as he held, a Divine call had decided, but
he resented yet more the renewed claim advanced by Parliament to
the sole power of legislation. As we have seen, his experience of the
evils which had arisen from the concentration of legislative and
executive power in the Long Parliament had convinced Cromwell of
the danger to public liberty which lay in such a union. He saw in
the joint government of " a single person and a Parliament " the only
assurance " that Parliaments should not make themselves perpetual,"
or that their power should not be perverted to public wrong. But
whatever strength there may have been in the Protector's arguments,
the act by which he proceeded to enforce them was fatal to liberty,
and in the end to Puritanism. "If my calling be from God," he
ended, "and my testimony from the People, God and the People
shall take it from me, else I will not part from it." And he announced
that no member would be suffered to enter the House without signing
an engagement " not to alter the Government as it is settled in a
single person and a Parliament." No act of the Stuarts had been
a bolder defiance of constitutional law ; and the act was as needless
as it was illegal. One hundred members alone refused to take the
engagement, and the signatures of three-fourths of the House proved
that the security Cromwell desired might have been easily procured
by a vote of Parliament. But those who remained resumed their
constitutional task with unbroken firmness. They quietly asserted

Sec. X.

The

Fall ok

Puritanism

1653

1660

Crom-
well's
Adminis-
tration

i'-A

Dissolution

0/ the
Parliament

't'.f

■% III

I.
ti;;.

S88

Sec. X.

Thk

Fall ok

Puritanism

1093

1660

Jan. 1655

The New
Tyranny

The Major-
Generals

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

their sole title to government by referring the Protector's Ordinances
to Committees for revision, and for conversion into laws. The
"Instrument of Government" was turned into a bill, debated, and
after some modifications read a third time. Money votes, as in
previous Parliaments, were deferred till "grievances" had been settled,
liut Cromwell once more intervened. The royalists were astir again ;
and he attributed their renewed hopes to the hostile attitude which
he ascribed to the Parliament. The army, which remained unpaid
while the supplies were delayed, was seething with discontent. " It
looks," said the Protector, " as if the laying grounds for a quarrel
had rather been designed than to give the people settlement. Judge
yourselves whether the contesting of things that were provided for by
this government hath been profitable expense of time for the good of
this nation." In words of angry reproach he declared the Parliament
dissolved.

With the dissolution of the Parliament of 1654 ended all show of
constitutional rule. The Protectorate, deprived by its own act of all
chance of legal sanction, became a simple tyranny. Cromwell pro-
fessed, indeed, to be restrained by the " Instrument " : but the one
great restraint on his power which the Instrument provided, the inability
to levy taxes save by consent of Parliament, was set aside on the plea
of necessity. " The People," said the Protector in words which Strafford
might have uttered, " will prefer their real security to forms." That a
danger of royalist revolt existed was undeniable, but the danger was
at once doubled by the general discontent. From this moment, White-
lock tells us, " many sober and noble patriots," in despair of public
liberty, " did begin to incline to the King's restoration." In the mass
of the population the reaction was far more rapid. " Charles Stuart,"
writes a Cheshire correspondent to the Secretary of State, " hath five
hundred friends in these adjacent counties for every one friend to you
among them." But before the overpowering strength of the army even
this general discontent was powerless. Yorkshire, where the royalist
insurrect; on was expected to be most formidable, never ventured to
rise at all. There were risings in Devon, Dorset, and the Welsh
Marches, but they were quickly put down, and their leaders brought to
the scaffold. Easily however as the revolt was suppressed, the terror |
of the Government was seen in the energetic measures to which
Cromwell resorted in the hope of securing order. The country was
divided into ten military governments, each with a major-general at
its head, whc was empowered to disarm all Papists and royalists, and |
to arrest suspected persons. Funds for the supports of this militan-
despotism were provided by an Ordinance of the Council of State,
which enacted that all who had at any time borne arms for the King I
should pay every year a tenth part of their income, in spite of the Act
of Oblivion, as a fine for their royalist tendencies. The despotism

viii.l

PURITAN ENGLAND.

of the major-generals was seconded by the older expedients of tyranny.
The ejected clergy had been zealous in promoting the insurrection,
and they were forbidden in revenge to act as chaplains or as tutors.
The press was placed under a strict censorship. The payment of taxes
levied by the sole authority of the Protector was enforced by distraint ;
and when a collector was sued in the courts for redress, the counsel
for the prosecution were sent to the Tower.

If pardon, indeed, could ever be won for a tyranny, the wisdom
and grandeur with which he used the power he had usurped would
win pardon for the Protector. The greatest among the many great
enterprises undertaken by the Lord Parliament had been the Union
of the three Kingdoms : and that of Scotland with England had
been brought about, at the very end of its career, by the tact and
vigour of Sir Harry Vane. But its practical realization was left to
Cromwell. In four months of hard fighting General Monk brought
the Highlands to a new tranquillity ; and the presence of an army
of eight thousand men, backed by a line of forts, kept the most
restless of the clans in good order. The settlement of the country
was brought about by the temperance and sagacity of Monk's successor,
General Deane. No further interference with the Presbyterian system
was attempted beyond the suppression of the General Assembly. Rut
religious liberty was resolutely protected, and Dcane ventured even
to interfere on behalf of the miserable victims whom Scotch bigotry
was torturing and burning on the charge of witchcraft. Even steady
royalists acknowledged the justice of the Government and the wonder-
ful discipline of its troops. " We always reckon those eight years
of the usurpation," said Burnet afterwards, " a time of great peace
and prosperity." Sterner work had to be done before Ireland could
be brought into real union with its sister kingdoms. The work of
conquest had been continued by Ireton, and completed after his
death by General Ludlow, as mercilessly as it had begun. Thousands
perished by famine or the sword. Shipload after shipload of those
who surrendered were sent over sea for sale into forced labour
in Jamaica and the West Indies. More than forty thousand of the
beaten Catholics were permitted to enlist for foreign service, and
found a refuge in exile under the banners of France and Spain.
The work of settlement, which was undertaken by Henry Cromwell,
the younger and abler of the Protector's sons, turned out to be
even more terrible than the work of the sword. It took as its
model the Colonization of Ulster, the fatal measure which had
destroyed all hope of a united Ireland and had brought inevitably
in its train the revolt and the war. The people were divided into
classes in the order of their assumed guilt. All who after fair trial
were proved to have personally taken part in the massacre were
sentenced to banishment or death. The general amnesty which freed

589

Sfc. X.

The

Fall of

Puritanism

1653

leeo

Scotland

and
Ireland

Settlement
of Ireland

M- »

bi' "J ■

l:'i'
i.i.«

tt^

590

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. X.

The

Fall ok

Puritanism

1653

1660

Encland
and the
Protec-
torate

"those of the meaner sort" from all question on other scores was
far from extending to the landowners. Catholic proprietors who had
shown no goodwill to the Parliament, even hough they had taken no
part in the war, were punished by the forfeiture of a third of their
estates. All who had borne arms were held to have forfeited the whole,
and driven into Connai'.ght, where fresh estates were carved out for
them from the lands of the native clans. No such doom had ever
fallen on a nation in modern times as fell upon Ireland in its new
settlement. Among the bitter memories which part Ireland from
England the memory of the bloodshed and confiscation which the
Puritans wrought remains the bitterest ; and the worst curse an Irish
peasant can hurl at his enemy is " the curse of Cromwell." But
pitiless as the Protector's policy was, it was successful in the ends at
which it aimed. The whole native population lay helpless and crushed.
Peace and order were restored, and a large incoming of Protestant
settlers from England and Scotland brought a new prosperity to the
wasted country. Above ail, the legislative union which had been
brought about with Scotland was now carried out with Ireland, and
thirty seats were allotted to its representatives in the general Parliament.
In England Cromwell dealt with the royalists as irreconcilable
enemies ; but in every other respect he carried fairly out his i ledge of
" healing and settling." The series of administrative reforms planned
by the Convention had been partially carried into eftect before the meet-
ing of Parliament in 1654 ; but the work was pushed on after the dissolu-
tion of the House with yet greater energy. Nearly a hundred ordinances
showed the industry of the Government. Police, public amusements,
roads, finances, the condition of prisons, the imprisonment of debtors,
were a few among the subjects which claimed Cromwell's attention.
An ordinance of more than fifty clauses reformed the Court of
Chancery. The anarchy which had reigned in the Church since
the break-down of Episcopacy and the failure of the Presbyterian
system to supply its place, was put an end to by a series of wise and
temperate measures for its reorganization. Rights of patronage were
left untouched ; but a Board of Triers, a fourth of whom were laymen,
was appointed to examine the fitness of ministers presented to livings ;
and a Church board of gentry and clergy was set up in every county
to exercise a supervision over ecclesiastical affairs, and to detect and
remove scandalous and ineffectual ministers. Even by the confession
of Cromwell's opponents, the plan worked well. It furnished the
country with " able, serious preachers," Baxter tells us, " who lived a
godly life, of what tolerable opinion soever they were," and, as both
Presbyterian and Independent ministers were presented to livings at
the will of their patrons, it solved so far as practical working was con-
cerned the problem of a religious union among the Puritans on the base
of a wide variety of Christian opinion. From the Church which was

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

591

thus reorganized all power of interference with faiths diftering from its
own was resolutely withheld. Save in his dealings with the Episco-
palians, whom he looked on as a political danger, Cromwell remained
true throughout to the cause of religious liberty. Even the Quaker,
rejected by all other Christian bodies as an anarchist and blasphemer,
found sympathy and protection in the Protector. The Jews had been
excluded from England since the reign of Edward the First ; and a
prayer which they now presented for leave to return was refused by
the commission of merchants and divines to whom the Protector
referred it for consideration. But the refusal was quietly passed over,
and the connivance of Cromwell in the settlement of a few Hebrews in
London and Oxford was so clearly understood that no one ventured
to interfere with them.

No part of his policy is more characteristic of Cromwell's mind,
whether in its strength or in its weakness, than his management of
foreign affairs. While England had been absorbed in her long and ob-
stinate struggle for freedom the whole face of the world around her had
changed. The Thirty Years' War was over. The victories of Gustavus,
and of the Swedish generals who followed him, had been seconded by
the policy of Rich'jlieu and the intervention of France. Protestantism
in Germany was no longer in peril from the bigotry or ambition of the
House of Austria : and the Treaty of Westphalia had drawn a
permanent line between the territories belonging to the adherents of
the old religion and the new. There was little danger, indeed, now
to Europe from the great Catholic House which had threatened its
freedom ever since Charles the Fifth. Its Austrian branch was called
away from dreams of aggression in the west to a desperate struggle
with the Turk for the possession of Hungary and the security of Austria
itself. Spain was falling into a state of strange decrepitude. So far
from aiming to be mistress of Europe, she was rapidly sinking into
the almost helpless prey of France. It was France which had now
become the dominant power in Christendom, though her position was
far from being as commanding as it was to become under Lewis the
Fourteenth. The peace and order which prevailed after the cessation
of the religious troubles throughout her compact and fertile territory
gave scope at last to the quick and industrious temper of the French
people ; while her wealth and energy were placed by the centralizing
administration of Henry the Fourth, of Richelieu, and of Mazarin,
almost absolutely in the hands of the Crown. Under the three great
rulers who have just been named her ambition was steadily directed to
the same purpose of territorial aggrandizement, and though limited as
yet to the annexation of the Spanish and Imperial territories which
still parted her frontier from the Pyrenees, the Alps, and the Rhine, a
statesman of wise political genius would have discerned the beginning
of that great struggle for supremacy over Europe at large which was

Skc. X.

The
Fai.i. of

PlIKlTANISM

1653

leeo

Crom-

Tirell nnd

Europe

Cromwell's
foreign
policy

♦ ?!

}x-'

' 1 ■

i -

', ■ I-'

592

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

I _

Sec. X.

The

Fam. ok

Puritanism

ia53

1660

War with
Spain

1654

only foiled by the genius of Marlborough and the victories of the
Grand Alliance. But in ni.^ view of European politics Cromwell
was misled by ihe conservaiive and unspeculativc temper of his mind
as well as by the strength of his religious enthusiasm. Of the chan^^e
in the world around him he seems to have discerned nothip" He
brought to the Europe of Mazarin the hopes and ideas wit hich
all England was thrilling in his youth at the outbreak of the Thirty
Years' War. Spain was still to him " the heaci of the Papa, nterest,"
whether at home or abroad. " The Papists in England," he said to
the Parliament of 1656, " have been accounted, ever since I was born,
Spaniolized ; they never regarded France, or any other Papist state,
but vSpain only." The old English hatred of Spain, the old English
resentment at the shameful part which the nation had been forced to
play in the great German struggle by the policy of James and of Charles,
lived on in Cromwell, and was only strengthened by the religious
enthusiasm A^hich the success of Puritanism had kindled within him.
" The Lord Himself," he wrote to his admirals as they sailed to the
West Indies, "hath a controversy with your enemies ; even with that
Romish Babylon of which the Spaniard is the great underpropper.
In that respect we fight the Lord's battles." What Sweden had been
under Gustavus, England, Cromwell dreamt, might be now — the head
of a great Protestant League in the struggle against Catholic aggres-
sion. *' Vou have on your shoulders," he said to the Parliament of
1654, " the interest of all the Christian people of the world. I wish it
may be written on our hearts to be zealous for that interest."

The first step in such a struggle was necessarily to league the Pro-
testant powers together, and Cromwell's earliest efforts were directed to
bring the ruinous and indecisive quarrel with Holland to an end. The
fierceness of the strife had grown with each engagement ; but the hopes
of Holland fell with her admiral, Tromp, who received a mortal wound
at the moment when he had succeeded in forcing the P^nglish line;
and the skill and energy of his successor, De Ruyter, struggled in vain
to restore her waning fortunes. She was saved by the expulsion of
the Long Parliament, which had persisted in its demand of a political
union of the two countries ; and the new policy of Cromwell was seen
in the conclusion of peace. The United Provinces recognized the
supremacy of the English flag in the British seas, and submitted to the
Navigation Act, while Holland pledged itself to shut out the House of
Orange from power, and thus relieved England from the risk of seeing
a Stuart rest oration supported by Dutch forces. The peace with the
Dutch was followed by the conclusion of like treaties with Sweden and
with Denmark ; and on the arrival of a Swedish envoy with offers of a
league of friendship, Cromwell endeavoured to bring the Dutch, the
Brandenburgers, and the Danes into a confederation of the Protestant
powers. His efforts in this direction however, though they never

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

wholly ceased, remained fruitless ; but the Protector was resolute to
carry out his plans single-handed. The defeat of the Dutch had left
England the chief sea-power of the woild ; and before the dissolution
of the Parliament, two fleets put to sea with secret instructions. The
first, under Blake, appeared in the Mediterranean, exacted reparation
from Tuscany for wrongs done to T^nglish commerce, bombarded
Algiers, and destroyed the fleet with which its pirates had ventured
through the reign of Charles to insult the English coast. The thunder
of Blake's guns, every Puritan believed, would be heard in the castle
of St. Angelo, and Rome itself would have to bow to the greatness
of Cromwell. But though no declaration of war had been issued
against Spain, the true aim of both expeditions was an attack on that
power ; and the attack proved singularly unsuccessful. Though Blake
sailed to the Spanish coast, he failed to intercept the treasure fleet
from America ; and the second expedition, which made its way to the
West Indies, was foiled in a descent on St. I >omingo. Its conquest of
Jamaica, important as it really was in breaking through the monopoly
of the New World in the South which Spain had till now enjoyed,
seemed at the time but a poor result for a vast expenditure of blood
and money. Its leaders were sent to the Tower on their return ; but
Cromwell found himself at war with Spain, and thrown whether he
would or no into the hands of the French minister Mazarin.

He was forced to sign a treaty of alliance with France ; while the
cost of his abortive expeditions drove him again to face a Parliament.
But Cromwell no longer trusted, as in his earlier Parliament, to freedom
of elections. The sixty members sent from Ireland and Scotland
under the Ordinances of union were simply nominees of the Govern-
ment. Its whole influence was exerted to secure the return of the
more conspicuous members of the Council of State. It was calculated
that of the members returned one-half were bound to the Government
by ties of profit or place. But Cromwell was still unsatisfied. A
certificate of the Council was required from each member before ad-
mission to the House ; and a fourth of the whole number returned —
one hundred in all, with Haselrig at their head — were by this means
excluded on grounds of disaffection or want of religion. To these
arbitrary acts of violence the House replied only by a course of
singular moderation and wisdom. From the first it disclaimed any
[purpose of opposing the Government. One of its earliest acts pro-
vided securities for Cromwell's person, which was threatened by
constant plots of assassination. It supported him in his war policy,
and voted supplies of unprecedented extent for the maintenance of the
struggle. It was this attitude of loyalty which gave force to its steady
refusal to sanction the system of tyranny which had practically placed
[England under martial law. In his opening address Cromwell boldly
[took his stand in support of the military despotism wielded by the

Q Q

593

Skc. X.

Thb

1'ali. or

Puritanism

166a

I6SS

Sept. 1655

Parlia-
ment
of 1655

I^R

^^^B' '

H^^^^^Bt

\ 'i

^^^^^^H '

■M'

^^^^^^^Bl

' lK

^^■i

nil

i^^H''^1ll'

a^^H'-t,

\ ' -n

lit.
•ill

594

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOl'LE.

[CMAIV

Sec. X.

Tub

Kali, ok

Puritanism

maa

laeo

Offer

of the

Grown

to Orom-

weU

Man 1657

major-generals. " It hath been more effectual towards the discoun
tenancing of vice and settling religion than anything done these fifty
years. I will abide by it," he said, with singular vehemence, "not
withstanding the envy and slander of foolish men. I could as soon
venture my life with it as with anything I ever undertook. If it were
to be done again, I would do it." But no sooner had a bill been
introduced into Parliament to confirm the proceedings of the major-
generals than a long debate showed the temper of the Commons.
They had resolved to icquiesce in the Protectorate, but they were
equally resolved to bring it again to a legal mode of gove.nment.
This indeed was the aim of even Cromwell's wiser adherents. " What
makes me fear the passing of this Act," one of them wrote to his son
Henry, " is that thereby His Highness' government will be more founded
in force, and more removed from that natural foundation which the
people in Parliament are desirous to give him, supposing that he ww!
become more theirs than now he is." The bill was rejected, and
Cromwell bowed to the feeling of the nation by withdrawing the powers
of the major-generals.

But the defeat of the tyranny of the sword was only a step towards
a far bolder effort for the restoration of the power of the law. It was
no mere pedantry, still less was it vulgar flattery, which influenced the
Parliament in their offer to Cromwell of the title of King. The
experience of the last few years had taught the nation the value of the
traditional forms under which its liberties had grown up. A king was
limited by constitutional precedents. "The king's prerogative," it
was well urged, " is under the court? of justice, and is bounded as well
as any acre of land, or anything r. man hath." A Protector, on the
other hand, was new in our history, and there were no traditional
means of limiting his power. " The one office being lawful in its
nature," said Glynne, " known to the nation, certain in itself, and
confined and regulated by the law, and the other not so — that was the
great ground why the Parliament did so much insist on this office and
title." Under the name of Monarchy, indeed, the question really at
issue between the party headed by the officers and the party led by the j
lawyers in the Commons was that of the restoration of constitutional I
and legal rule. The proposal was carried by an overwhelming majority,
but a month passed in endless consultations between the Parliament
and the Protector. His good sense, his knowledge of the general
feeling of the nation, his real desire to obtain a settlement which should
secure the ends for which Puritanism fought, political and religious
liberty, broke in conference after conference through a mist of words. [
But his real concern throughout was with the temper of the army. Crom-
well knew well that his government was a sheer government of the sword,
and that the discontent of his soldiery would shake the fabric of his|
power. He vibrated to and fro between his sense of the political advan-

VUI.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

595

tages of such a settlement, and his sense of its inipossibiUty in face of
the mood of the army. His soldiers, he said, were no common swords-
men. They were " godly men, men that will not be beaten down by
a worldly and carnal spirit while they keep their integrity ; " men in
whose general voice he recognized the voice of God. " They arc
honest and faithful men," he urged, " true to the great things of the
Government. And though it really is no part of their goodness to
be unwilling to submit to what a Parliament shall settle over them,
yet it is my duty and conscience to beg of you that there may be
no hard things put upon them which they cannot swallow. I cannot
think God would bless an undertaking of anything which would justly
and with cause grieve them." The temper of the army was soon
shown. Its leaders, with Lambert, Fleetwood, and Desborough at
their head, placed their commands in Cromwell's hands. A petition
from the officers to Parliament demanded the withdrawal of the pro-
posal to restore the Monarchy, " in the name of the old cause for
which they had bled." Cromwell at once anticipated the coming
debate on this -petition, a debate which might have led to an open
breach between the army and the Commons, by a refusal of the crown.
" I cannot undertake this Government," he said, " with that title of
King ; and that is my answer to this great and weighty business."

Disappointed as it was, the Parliament with singular self-restraint
turned to other modes of bringing about its purpose. The offer of the
crown had been coupled with the condition of accepting a consti-
tution which was a modification of the Instrument of Government
adopted by the Parlian mt of 1654, and this constitution Cromwell
emphatically approved. '* The things provided by this Act of Govern-
ment," he owned, " do secure the liberties of the people of God as they
never before have had them." With a change of the title of King into
that of Protector, the Act of Government now became law ; and the
solemn inauguration of the Protector by the Parliament was a prac-
tical acknowledgment on the part of Cromwell of the illegality of his
former rule. In the name of the Commons the Speaker invested him
with a mantle of State, placed the sceptre in his hand, and girt the
sword of justice by his side. By the new Act of Government Crom-
well was allowed to name his own successor, but in all after cases the
office was to be an elective one. In every other respect the forms of
the older Constitution were carefully restored. Parliament was again
to consist of two Houses, the seventy members of " the other House "
j being named by the Protector. The Commons regained their old
right of exclusively deciding on the qualification of their members.
Parliamentary restrictions were imposed on the choice of members of
the Council, and officers of State or of the army. A fixed revenue
was voted to the Protector, and it was provided that no moneys should
jbe raised but by assent of Parliament. Liberty of worship was secured

Q Q 2

Skc. X.

Thk
Fa 1.1. OK

I'liKITANISM

1653

leeo

.Uaj' 8,
1657

Inaugur-
ation of
the Pro-
tector

yttf/t' 26,
1657

\) 4

• n

596

Src. X.

Tub

Fall ok

pukitanism

1659

16«0

Orom-

wall's

triumphs

1658

Death of
CromiMrell

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE. [chap.

for all but Papists, Prelatists, Socinians, or those who denied the
inspiration of the Scriptures ; and liberty of conscience wa? secured
for all.

The adjournment of the House after his inauguration left Cromwell
at the height of his power. He seemed at last to have placed his
government on a legal and national basis. The ill-success of his
earlier operations abroad was forgotten in a blaze of glory. On the
eve of the Parliament's assembly one of Blake's captains had managed
to intercept a part of the Spanish treasure fleet. At the close of 1656
the Protector seemed to have found the means of realizing his schemes
for rekindling the religious war throughout Europe in a quarrel
between the Duke of Savoy and his Protestant subjects in the valleys
of Piedmont. A ruthless massacre of these Vaudois by the Duke's
troops roused deep resentment throughout England, a resentment
which still breathes in the noblest of Milton's sonnets. While the
poet called on God to avenge his " slaughtered saints, whose bones lie
scattered on the Alpine mountains cold," Cromwell was already busy
with the work of earthly vengeance. An English envoy appeared at
the Duke's court with haughty demands of redress. Their refusal
would have been followed by instant war, for the Protestant Cantons
of Switzerland were bribed into promising a force of ten thousand men
for an attack on Savoy. The plan was foiled by the cool diplomacy of
Mazarin, who forced the Duke to grant Cromwell's demands ; but the
apparent success of the Protector raised his reputation at home and
abroad. The spring of 1657 saw the greatest as it was the last of the
triumphs of Blake. He found the Spanish Plate fleet guarded by
galleons in the strongly-armed harbour of Santa Cruz ; he forced an
entrance into the harbour and burnt or sank every ship within it.
Triumphs at sea were followed by a triumph on land. Cromwell's
demand of Dunkirk, which had long stood in the way of any acceptance
of his offers of aid, was at last conceded ; and a detachment of the
Puritan army joined the French troops who were attacking Flanders
under the command of Turenne. Their valour and discipline were
shown by the part they took in the capture of Mardyke ; and still more
by the victory of the Dunes, a victory which forced the Flemish
towns to open their gates to the French, and gave Dunkirk to
Cromwell.

Never had the fame of an English ruler stood higher ; but in the
midst of his glory the hand of death was falling on the Protector.
He had long been weary of his task. . " God knows," he had burst out
to the Parliament a year before, " I would have been glad to have lived I
under my wocdside, and to have kept a flock of sheep, rather than to
have undertaken this government." And now to the weariness of power
was added the weakness and feverish impatience of disease. Vigorous
and energetic as his life had seemed, his health was by no means as

strong as I
the midst (
the past y
some infirr
re-opening
and his fev
supplies hi
arrear, whil
of the new
Under the I
preceding y
the nation \
Commons,
hasty act oft
as the new
" Lords," kii
fanned by h
contended t
simply judic
at Cromweir
and the reap
observer at
What gave v
and its preps
body of Span
of it. His hop
and their mi
this that drc
sudden inipu
and setting a
Houses to hi
speech of anj
Fatal as was
reconciled by
were weeded
officers vowe
royalist rising
Great news t(
cession of Dt
crept steadily
Fox, who met
to him," he sj
felt a waft of
I he looked liki
heart was in f

viii.l

PURITAN ENGLAND.

597

strong as his will ; he had been struck down by intermittent fever in
the midst of his triumphs both in Scotland and in Ireland, and during
the past year he had suffered from repeated attacks of it. " ! have
some infirmities upon mc," he owned twice over in his speech at the
re-opening of the Parliament after an adjournment of six months ;
and his feverish irritability was quickened by the public danger. No
supplies had been voted, and the pay of the army was heavily in
arrear, while its temper grew more and more sullen at the appearance
of the new Constitution and the re-awakening of the royalist intrigues.
Under the terms of the new Constitution the members excluded in the
preceding year took their places again in the House. The mood of
the nation was reflected in the captious and quarrelsome tone of the
Commons. They still delayed the grant of supplies. Meanwhile a
hasty act of the Protector in giving to his nominees in"the other House,"
as the new second chamber he had devised was called, the title of
" Lords," kindled a strife between the two Houses which was busily
fanned by Haselrig and other opponents of the Government. It was
contended that the "other House" had under the new Constitution
simply judicial and not legislative powers. Such a contention struck
at Cromwell's work of restoring the old political forms of English life ;
and the reappearance of Parliamentary strife threw him at last, says an
observer at his court, " into a rage and passion like unto madness."
What gave weight to it was the growing strength of the royalist party,
and its preparations for a coming rising. Charles himself with a large
body of Spanish troops drew to the coast of Flanders to take advantage
of it. His hopes were above all encouraged by the strife in the Commons,
and their manifest dislike of the system of the Protectorate. It was
this that drove Cromwell to action. Summoning his coach, by a
sudden impulse, the Protector drove with a few guards to Westminster ;
and setting aside the remonstrances of Fleetwood, summoned the two
Houses to his presence. " I do dissolve this Parliament," he ended a
speech of angry rebuke, " and let God be judge between you and me.'
Fatal as was the error, for the moment all went well. The army was
reconciled by the blow levelled at its opponents, and the few murmurers
were weeded from its ranks by a careful remodelling. The triumphant
officers vowed to stand or fall with his Highness. The danger of a
royalist rising vanished before a host of addresses from the counties.
Great news too came from abroad, where victory in Flanders, and the
cession of Dunkirk, set the seal on Cromwell's glory. But the fever
crept steadily on, and his looks told the tale of death to the Quaker,
Fox, who met him riding in Hampton Court Park. " Before I came
to him," he says, " as he rode at the head of his Life Guards, I saw and
felt a waft of death go forth against him, and when I came to him
he looked like a dead man." In the midst of his triumph Cromwell's
heart was in fact heavy with the sense of failure. He had no desire to

.Sue. X.

Thb

Fall or

FURITANISM

1053

leeo

Jan. 1658

Dissolution

of the
Parliament

4
'I

1 r I I

t' .

^■"i

598

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. X.

The

Fall of
Puritanism

1653

1660

! ytu^^. 1658

The Fall
of Purl-
tanlsm

Richard
Cromwell

Jan. 1659

play ilie tyrant ; nor had he any belief in the permanence of a mere
tyranny. He clung desperately to the hope of bringing the country to
his side. He had hardly dissolved the Parliament before he was
planning the summons of another, and angry at the opposition which
his Council offered to the project. " I will lake my own resolutions,"
he said gloomily to his household ; " I can no longer satisfy myself to
sit still, and make myself guilty of the loss of all the honest party and
of the nation itself." But before his plans could be realized the over-
taxed strength of the Protector suddenly gave way. He saw too
clearly the chaos into which his death would plunge England to be
willing to die. " Do not think I shall die," he burst out with feverish
energy to the physicians who gathered round him ; " say not I
have lost my reason ! I tell you the truth. I know it from better
authority than any you can have from Galen or Hippocrates. It is the
answer of God Himself to our prayers ! " Prayer indeed rose from
every side for his recovery, but death drew steadily nearer, till even
Cromwell felt that his hour was come. " I would be willing to live,"
the dying man murmured, " to be further serviceable to God and His
people, but my work is done ! Yet God will be with His people ! "
A storm which tore roofs from houses, and levelled huge trees in every
forest, seemed a fitting prelude to the passing away of his mighty
spirit. Three days later, on the third of September, the day which
had witnessed his victories of Worcester and Dunbar, Cromwell
quietly breathed his last.

So absolute even in death was his sway over the minds of men,
that, to the wonder of the excited royalists, even a doubtful nomina-
tion on his death-bed was enough to secure the peaceful succession
of his son, Richard Cromwell. Many, in fact, who had rejected the
authority of his father submitted peaceably to the new Protector.
Their motives were explained by Baxter, the most eminent among the
Presbyterian ministers, in the address to Richard which announced his
adhesion. *' I observe," he says, "that the nation generally rejoice
in your peaceable entrance upon the Government. Many are per-
suaded that you have been strangely kept from participating in any of
our late bloody contentions, that God might make you the healer of
our breaches, and employ you in that Temple work which David him-
self might not be honoured with, though it was in his mind, because
he shed blood abundantly and made great wars." The new Protector
was a weak aid worthless man, but the bulk of the nation were con-
tent to be ruled by one who was at any rate no soldier, no Puritan, and
no innovator. Richard was known to be lax and worldly in his con-
duct, and he was believed to be conservative and even royalist in
heart. The tide of reaction was felt even in his Council. Their first
act was to throw aside one of the greatest of Cromwell's reforms,
and to fall back in the summons which they issued for the new Par-

a mere
ntry to
\e was
. which
jtions,"
jrself to
rty and
le over-
jaw too
id to be
feverish
r not I
ti better
It is the
)se from
till even
to live,"
and His
jeople!"
in every
s mighty
ay which
[Cromwell

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

599

liament on the old system of election. It was felt far more keenly
in the tone of the new House of C-^mmons. The republicans under
Vane, backed adroitly by the secret royalists, fell hotly on Cromwell's
system. The fiercest attack of all came from Sir Ashley Cooper, a
Dorsetshire gentleman who had changed sides in the civil war, had
fought for the King and then for the Parliament, had been a mem-
ber of Cromwell's Council, and had of late ceased to be a member of
it. His virulent invective on "his Highness of deplorable memory,
who with fraud and force deprived you of your liberty when living, and
entailed slavery on you at his death," was followed by an equally
virulent invective against the army. " They have not only subdued
their enemies," said Cooper, " but the masters who raised and main-
tained them ! They have not only conquered Scotland and Ireland,
but rebellious England too ; and there suppressed a Malignant party
of magistrates and laws." The army was quick with its reply. It
had already demanded the appointment of a soldier as its General in
the place of the new Protector, who had assumed the command. The
tone of the Council of Officers low became so menacing that the
Commons ordered the dismissal of all officers who refused to engage
"not to disturb or interrupt the free meetings of Parliament."
Richard ordered the Council of Officers to dissolve. Their reply
was a demand for the dissolution of the Parliament, a demand with
which Richard was forced to comply. The purpose of the army
however was still to secure a settled government ; and setting aside
the new Protector, whose weakness was now evident, they resolved to
come to a reconciliation with the republican party, and to recall the
fragment of the Commons whom they had expelled from St. Stephen's
in 1653. Of the one hundred and sixty members who had continued
to sit after the King's death, about ninety returned to their seats, and
resumed the administration of affairs. But the continued exclusion of
the members who had been "purged" from the House in 1648, proved
that no real intention existed of restoring a legal rule. The House
was soon at strife with the soldiers. In spite of Vane's counsels, it
proposed a reform of the officers, and though a royalist rising in
Cheshire during August threw the disputants for a moment together,
the struggle revived as the danger passed away. A new hope indeed
filled men's minds. Not only was the nation sick of military rule,
but the army, unconquerable so long as it held together, at last showed
signs of division. In Ireland and Scotland the troops protested
against the attitude of their English comrades ; and Monk, the com-
mander of the Scottish army, threatened to march on London and free
the Parliament from their pressure. Their divisions encouraged
Haselrig and his coadjutors to demand the dismissal of Fleetwood
and Lambert from their commands. They answered by driving the
Parliament again from Westminster, and by inarching under Lambert

Sec. X.

The

Fall of

Puritanilm

1653

leeo

Return of
the Rump

•\\ 4

' ■ 1 i

Divisions in
the army

■X

6oo

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. X.

The

Fall of

Puritanism

1653

leeo

Jan. 1660

The
Convention

April 25

Return 0/
Charles

May 25

Milton

to the north to meet Monk's army. Negotiation gave Monk time to
gather a Convention at Edinburgh, and strengthen himself with money
and recruits. His attitude roused England to action. So rapidly did
the tide of feeling rise throughout the country that the army was
driven to undo its work by recalling the Rump. Monk however ad-
vanced rapidly to Coldstream, and crossed th'j border. The cry of
"A free Parliament" ran like fire through the country. Not only
Fairfax, who appeared in arms in Yorkshire, but the ships on the
Thames and the mob which thronged the streets of London caught up
the cry ; and Monk, who lavished protestations of loyalty to the Rump,
while he accepted petitions for a " Free Parliament," entered London
unopposed. From the moment of his entry the restoration of the
Stuarts became inevitable. The army, resolute as it still remained for
the maintenance of " the cause," was deceived by Monk's declarations of
loyalty to it, and rendered powerless by his adroit dispersion of the troops
over the country. At the instigation of Ashley Cooper, those who re-
mained of the members who had been excluded from the House of Com-
mons by Pride's Purge in 1648 again forced their way into Parliament,
and at once resolved on a dissolution and the election of a new House
of Commons. The new House, which bears the name of the Conven-
tion, had hardly taken the solemn League and Covenant which showed
its Presbyterian temper, and its leaders had only begun to draw up
terms on which the King's restoration might be assented to, when they
found that Monk was in negotiation with the exiled Court. All exac-
tion of terms was now impossible ; a Declaration from Breda, in which
Charles promised a general pardon, religious toleration, and satisfac-
tion to the army was received with a burst of national enthusiasm ;
and the old Constitution was restored by a solemn vote of the Conven-
tion, " that according to the ancient and fundamental laws of this
Kingdom, the government is, and ought to be, by King, Lords, and
Commons." The King was at once invitea to hasten to his realm ; he
landed at Dover, and made his way amidst the shouts of a great multi-
tude to Whitehall. " It is my own fault," laughed the new King, with
characteristic irony " that I had not come back sooner ; for I find
nobody who does not tell me he has always longed for my return."

Puritanism, so men believed, had fallen never to rise again. As a
political experiment it ad ended in utter failure and disgust. As a
religious system of national life it brought about the wildest outbreaic
of moral revolt that England has ever witnessed. And yet Puritanism
was far from being dead ; it drew indeed a nobler life from suffering and
defeat. Nothing aids us better to trace the real course of Puritan influ-
ence since the fall of Puritanism than the thought of the two great works
which have handed down from one generation to another its highest
and noblest spirit. From that time to this the most popular of all reli-
gious books has been the Puritan allegory of the " Pilgrim's Progress."

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

6oi

,n.

The most popular of all English poems has been the Puritan epic of
the " Paradise Lost." Milton had been engaged during the civil war
in strife with Presbyterians and with Royalists, pleading for civil and
religious freedom, for freedom of social life, and freedom of the press.
At a later time he became Latin Secretary to the Protector, in spite of
a blindness which had been brought on by the intensity of his study.
The Restoration found him of all living men the most hateful to the
Royalists ; for it was his " Defence of the English People " which had
justified throughout Europe the execution of the King. Parliament
ordered his book to be burnt by the common hangman ; he was for
a time imprisoned, and even when released he had to live amidst
threats of assassination from fanatical Cavaliers. To the ruin of his
cause were added personal misfortunes in the bankruptcy of the
scrivener who held the bullc of his property, and in the Fire of London,
which deprived him of much of what was left. As age drew on, he found
himself reduced to comparative poverty, and driven to sell his library
for subsistence. Even among the sectaries who shared his political
opinions Milton stood in religious opinion alone, for he had gradually
severed himself from every accepted form of faith, had embraced
Arianism, and had ceased to attend at any place of worship. Nor
was his home a happy one. The grace and geniality of his youth dis-
appeared in the drudgery of a schoolmaster's life and amongst the
invectives of controversy. In age his temper became stern and exact-
ing. His daughters, who were forced to read to their blind father in
languages which they cculd not understand, revolted utterly against
their bondage. But solitude and misfortune only brought out into
bolder relief Milton's inner greatness. There was a grand simplicity
in the life of his later years. He listened every morning to a chapter
of the Hebrew Bible, and after musing in silence for a while pursued
his studies till midday. Then he took exercise for an hour, played
for another hour on the organ or viol, and renewed his studies.
The evening was spent in converse with visitors and friends. For,
lonely and unpopular as Milton was, there was one thing about
him which made his house in Bunhill Fields a place of pilgrimage
to the wits of the Restoration. He was the last of the Elizabethans.
He had possibly seen Shakspere, as on his visits to London after
his retirement to Stratford the playwright passed along Bread Street
to his wit combats at the Mermaid. He had been the contemporary
of Webber and Massinger, of Herrick and Crashaw. His " Comus"
and " Arcades " had rivalled the masques of Ben Jonson. It was
with a reverence drawn from thoughts like these that men looked
on the blind poet as he sate, clad in black, in his chamber hung with
rusty green tapestry, his fair brown hair falling as of old over a calm,
serene face that still retained much of its youthful beauty, his cheeks
delicately coloured, his clear grey eyes showing no trace of their

Sec. X.

The
Fall of

Puritanism

1653

leeo

•!• i

6o2

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

tcHAP.

Sec. X.

Thb

Fall of

Puritanism

1653

leeo

The

Paradise

Lost

1667

blindness. But famous, whether for good or ill, as his prose writings
had made him, during fifteen years only a few sonnets had broken
his silence as a singer. It was now, in his blindness and old age,
with the cause he loved trodden under foot by men as vile as the rabble
in " Comus," that the genius of Milton took refuge in the great poem on
which through years of silence his imagination had still been brooding.
On his return from his travels in Italy, Milton had spoken of himself
as musing on " a work not to be raised from the heat of youth or the
vapours of wine, like that which flows at waste from the pen of some
vulgar amourist or the trencher fury of a rhyming parasite, nor to be
obtained by the invocation of Dame Memory and her Siren daughters ;
but by devout prayer to that Eternal Spirit who can enrich with all
utterance and knowledge, and sends out His Seraphim, with the
hallowed fire of His altar, to touch and purify the lips of whom He
pleases." His lips were touched at last. In his quiet retreat he mused
during these years of persecution and loneliness on his great work.
Seven years after the Restoration appeared the " Paradise Lost," and
four years later the " Paradise Regained " and " Samson Agonistes,"
in the severe grandeur of whose verse we see the poet himself " fallen,"
like Samson, " on evil days and evil tongues, with darkness and with
danger compassed round." But great as the two last works were, their
greatness was eclipsed by that of their predecessor. The whole genius
of Milton expressed itself in the " Paradise Lost." The romance, the
gorgeous fancy, the daring imagination which he shared with the Eliza-
bethan poets, the large but ordered beauty of form which he had
drunk in from the literature of Greece and Rome, the sublimity of
conception, the loftiness of phrase, which he owed to the Bible, blended
in this story " of man's first disobedience, and the fruit of that for-
bidden tree, whose mortal taste brought death into the world and all
our woe." It is only when we review the strangely mingled elements
which make up the poem, that we realize the genius which fused
them into such a perfect whole. The meagre outline of the Hebrew
legend is lost in the splendour and music of Milton's verse. The
stern idealism of Geneva is clothed in the gorgeous robes of the
Renascence. If we miss something of the free play of Spenser's
fancy, and yet more of the imaginative delight in their own creations
which gives so exquisite a life to the poetry of the early dramatists,
we find in place of these the noblest example which our literature
affords of the ordered majesty of classic form. But it is not with the
literary value of the " Paradise Lost " that we are here concerned.
Its historic importance lies in this, that it is the Epic of Puritanism.
Its scheme is the problem with which the Puritan wrestled in hours
of gloom and darkness, the problem of sin and redemption, of the
world-wide struggle of evil against good. The intense moral concen-
tration of the Puritan had given an almost bodily shape to spiritual

abstractic
Death. :
sin" the
passionnti
which we
the Purita
and a hi^
developed
stage ; the
life for tw
which the
" Paradise
temper sp
purity of
equable re
Milton is <
Whether h
Satan to th
and unfalte
Puritan ten
it we feel al
of a large
Dealing as
that poet ev
of invisible
look in vai
" Man's dis(
down as ch
course. Or
Pope's snee
had ordered
orders and £
or Archange
is just as litt
so loveable i
individuality
stamp of hin
in every lin
virtue whicl:
paints and n
mortal man
the stoical se
utters no ci
suffers in a
that we mus

VIII.]

PURITAN ENGLAND.

603

■i'il

abstractions before Milton gave life and being to the forms of Sin and
Death. It was the Puritan tendency to mass into one vast " body of
sin" the various forms of human evil, and by the very force of a
passionate hatred to exaggerate their magnitude and their power, to
which we owe the conception of Milton's Satan. The greatness of
the Puritan aim in the '.>ng and wavering struggle for justice and law
and a higher good ; the grandeur of character which the contest
developed ; the colossal forms of good and evil which moved over its
stage ; the debates and conspiracies and battles which had been men's
life for twenty years ; the mighty eloquence and mightier ambition
which the war had roused into being — all left their mark on the
"Paradise Lost." Whatever was highest and best in the Puritan
temper spoke in the nobleness and elevation of the poem, in its
purity of tone, in its grandeur of conception, in its ordered and
equable realization of a great purpose. Even in his boldest flights,
Milton is calm and master of himself. His touch is always sure.
Whether he passes from Heaven to Hell, or from the council hall of
Satan to the sweet conference of Adam and Eve, his tread is steady
and unfaltering. But if the poem expresses the higher qualities of the
Puritan temper, it expresses no less exactly its defects. Throughout
it we feel almost painfully a want of the finer and subtler sympathies,
of a large and genial humanity, of a sense of spiritual mystery.
Dealing as Milton does with subjects the most awful and mysterious
that poet ever chose, he is never troubled by the obstinate questionings
of invisible things which haunted the imagination of Shakspere. We
look in vain for any iEschylean background of the vast unknown.
" Man's disobedience " and the scheme for man's redemption are laid
down as clearly and with just as little mystery as in a Puritan dis-
course. On topics such as these, even God the Father (to borrow
Pope's sneer) "turns a school divine." As in his earlier poems he
had ordered and arranged nature, so in the "Paradise Lost" Milton
orders and arranges Heaven and Hell. His mightiest figures, Angel
or Archangel, Satan or Belial, stand out colossal but distinct. There
is just as little of the wide sympathy with all that is human which is
so loveable in Chaucer and Shakspere. On the contrary the Puritan
individuality is nowhere so overpowering as in Milton. He leaves the
stamp of himself deeply graven on all he creates. We hear his voice
in every line of his poem. The cold, severe conception of moral
virtue which reigns throughout it, the intellectual way in which he
paints and regards beauty (for the beauty of Eve is a beauty which no
mortal man may love) are Milton's own. We feel his inmost temper in
the stoical self-repression which gives its dignity to his figures. Adam
utters no cry of agony when he is driven from Paradise. Satan
suffers in a defiant silence. It is to this intense self-concentration
that we must attribute the strange deficiency of humour which Milton

Sec. X.

The

Fall of

Puritanism

1653

1660

i .m

604

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sfc. X.

The

Fall of

Puritanism

1653

1«60

Dlaband-

Inv of
the Army

shared with the Puritans generally, and which here and there breaks
the sublimity of his poem with strange slips into the grotesque. But
it is above all to this Puritan deficiency in human sympathy that we
must attribute his wonderful want of dramatic genius. Of the power
which creates a thousand different characters, which endows each with
its appropriate act and word, which loses itself in its own creations,
no great poet ever had less.

The poem of Milton was the epic of a fallen cause. The broken
hope, which had seen the Kingdom of the Saints pass like a dream
away, spoke in its very name. Paradise was lost once more, when
the New Model, which embodied the courage and the hope of Puri-
tanism, laid down its arms. In his progress to the capital Charles
passed in review the soldiers assembled on Blackheath. Betrayed by
their general, abandoned by their leaders, surrounded as they were by a
nation in arms, the gloomy silence of their ranks awed even the careless
King with a sense of danger. But none of the victories of the New
Model were so glorious as the victory which it won over itself. Quietly,
and without a struggle, as men who bowed to the inscrutable will of
God, the farmers and traders who had dashed Rupert's chivalry to
pieces onNaseby field, who had scattered at Worcester the "anny of the
aliens," and driven into helpless flight the sovereign that now came "to
enjoy his own again," who had renewed beyond sea the glories of Crdcy
and Agincourt, had mastered the Parliament, had brought a King to
justice and the block, had given laws to England, and held even
Cromwell in awe, became farmers and traders again, and were known
among their fellow-men by no other sign than their greater soberness
and industry. And, with them, Puritanism laid down the sword. It
ceased from the long attempt to build up a kingdom of God by force
and violence, and fell back on its truer work of building up a kingdom
of righteousness in the hearts and consciences of men. It was from
the moment of its seeming fall that its real victory began. As soon as
the wild orgy of the Restoration was over, men began to see that nothing
that was really worthy in the work of Puritanism had been undone.
The revels of Whitehall, the scepticism and debauchery of courtiers,
the corruption of statesmen, left the mass of Englishmen what
Puritanism had made them, serious, earnest, sober in life and conduct,
firm in their love of Protestantism and of freedom. In the Revolution
of 1688 Puritanism did the work of civil liberty which it had failed to
do in that of 1642. It wrought out through Wesley and the revival
of the eighteenth century the work of religious reform which its
earlier efforts had only thrown back for a hundred years. Slowly but
steadily it introduced its own seriousness and purity into English
society, English Hterature, English politics. The whole history of
English progress since the Restoration, on its moral and spiritual
sides, has been the history of Puritanism,

[Aui/iorill
the dramatic
on the Drai
Science see
the Royal S<
of Newton.

^ The entr;
lasting chaii
England bcj
our history,
archical infl
Middle Age
denly lost p
Restoration
of thought i
from that tii
England, ar
the love of
steadily forv
tends more 1
intellectual, ;
thought, on !
ofmenbefor
thinker in th
point of Stat
He would fir
or national
government,
and his own.
followed the
there may h
there has be
political, our
have found n

ix.l

THE REVOLUTION.

CHAPTER IX.
THE REVOLUTION,

Section I.— England and the Revolution.

[Aut/writies. — For the social change see Memoirs of Pepys and Evelyn,
Ihe dramatic works of Wycherly and Etherege, and Lord Macaulay's '• Essay
on the Dramatists of the Restoration." For the earlier history of English
Science see Hallam's sketch {•' Literary History," vol. iv.) ; the histories of
the Royal Society by Thompson or Wade ; and Sir D. Brewster's biography
of Newton. Sir W. Molesworth has edited the works of Hobbes.]

The entry of Charles the Second into Whitehall n.arked a deep and
lasting change in the temper of the English people. With it modern
England began. The influences which had up to this time moulded
our history, the theological influence of the Reformation, the mon-
archical influence of the new kingship, the feudal influence of the
Middle Ages, the yet earlier influence of tradition and custom, sud-
denly lost power over the minds of men. From the moment of the
Restoration we find ourselves all at once among the great currents
of thought and activity which have gone on widening and deepening
from that time to this. The England around us becomes our own
England, an England whose chief forces are industry and science,
the love of popular freedom and of law, an England which presses
steadily forward to a larger social justice and equality, and which
tends more and more to bring every custom and tradition, religious,
intellectual, and political, to the test of pure reason. Between modern
thought, on some at least of its more important sides, and the thought
of men before the Restoration there is a great gulf fixed. A political
thinker in the present day would find it equally hard to discuss any
point of statesmanship with Lord Burleigh or with Oliver Cromwell.
He would find no point of contact between their ideas of national life
or national welfare, their conception of government or the ends of
government, their mode of regarding economical and social questions,
and his own. But no gulf of this sort parts us from the men who
followed the Restoration. From that time to this, whatever differences
there may have been as to practical coi"?rlu3ions drawn from them,
there has been a substantial agreement as to the grounds of our
political, our social, our intellectual and religious life. Paley would
have found no difficulty in understanding Tillotson : Newton and Sir

605

' I'

Modem
England

i •

1 "'■

■■m

^'.i

6o6

HISTORY OF TIIK ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAr.

Skc. I.
Englanii

AND TMR

Revolution

The

Puritan

Ideal

Humphry Davy could have talked without a sense of severance. There
would have been nothing to hinder a perfectly clear discussion on
government or law between John Locke and Jeremy Bentham.

The change from the old England to the new is so startling that we
are apt to look on it as a more sudden change than it really was, and
the outer aspect of the Restoration does much to strengthen this
impression of suddenness. The aim of the Puritan had been to set
up a visible Kingdom of God upon earth. He had wrought out his
aim by reversing the policy of the Stuarts and the Tudors. From the
time of Henry the Eighth to the time of Charles the First, the Church
had been looked upon primarily as an instrument for securing, by
moral and religious influences, the social and political ends of the
State. Under the Commonwealth, the State, in its turn, was regarded
primarily as an instrument for securing through its political and social
influences the moral and religious ends of the Church. In the Puritan
theory, Englishmen were " the Lord's people ; " a people dedicated to
Him by n solemn Covenant, and whose end as a nation was to carry
out His will For such an end it was needful that rulers, as well as
people, shoi !d be "godly men." Godliness became necessarily the
chief qualification for public employment. The new modelling of the
army filled its ranks with " saints." Parliament resolved to employ no
man "but such as the House shall be satisfied of his real godliness."
The Covenant which bound the nation to God bound it to enforce
God's laws even more earnestly than its own. The Bible lay on the
table of the House of Commons ; and its prohibition of swearing,
of drunkenness, of fornication became part of the law of the land.
Adultery was made felony without the benefit of clergy. Pictures
whose subjects jarred with the new decorum were ordered to be burnt,
and statues were chipped ruthlessly into decency. It was in the same
temper that Puritanism turned from public life to private. The
Covenant bound not the whole nation only, but every individual
member of the nation, to "a jealous God," a God jealous of any
superstition that robbed him of the worship which was exclusively
his due, jealous of the distraction and frivolity which robbed him of
the entire devotion of man to his service. The want of poetry, of
fancy, in the common Puritan temper condemned half the popular
observances of England as superstitions. It was superstitious to keep
Christmas, or to deck the house with holly and ivy. It was super-
stitious to dance round the village May-pole. It was flat Popery to eat
a mince-pie. The rough sport, the mirth and fun of " merry England,"
were out of place in an England called with so great a calling. Bull-
baiting, bear-baiting, horse-racing, cock-fighting, the village revel, the
dance under the May-pole, were put down with the same indiscrim-
inating severity. The long struggle between the Puritans and the
play-wrights ended in the closing of every theatre.

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

The Restoration brought Charles to Whitehall : and in an instant the
whole face of England was changed. All that was noblest and best
in Puritanism was whirled away with its pettiness and its tyranny in
the current of the nation's hate. Religion had been turned into a
system of political and social oppression, and it fell with their fall.
Godliness became a by-word of scorn ; sobriety in dress, in speech, in
manners was Houted as a mark of the detested Puritanism. Butler in
his " Hudibras" poured insult on the past with a pedantic buffoonery
for which the general hatred, far more than its humour, secured a
hearing. Archbishop Sheldon listened to the mock sermon of a
Cavalier who held up the i*uritan phrase and the Puritan twang to
ridicule in his hall at Lambeth. Duelling and raking became the
marks of a fine gentleman ; and grave divines winked at the follies of
" honest fellows," who fought, gambled, swore, drank, and ended a day
of debauchery by a night in the gutter. Life among men of fashion
vibrated between frivolity and excess. One of the comedies of the
time tells the courtier that "he must diess well, dance well, fence well,
have a talent for love-letters, an agreeable voice, be amorous and dis-
creet—but not too constant." To graces such as these the rakes of the
Restoration added a shamelessness and a brutality which passes belief.
Lord Rochester was a fashionable poet, and the titles of some of his
poems are such as no pen of our day could copy. Sir Charles Sedley
was a fashionable wit, and the foulness of his words made even the
porters of Covent Garden pelt him from the balcony when he ventured
to address them. The Duke of Buckingham is a fair type of the time,
and the most characteristic event in the Duke's life was a duel in which
he consummated his seduction of Lady Shrewsbury by killing her hus-
band, while the Countess in disguise as a page held his horse for him
and looked on at the murder. Vicious as the stage was, it only re-
flected the general vice of the time. The Comedy of the Restoration
borrowed everything from the Comedy of France save the poetry, the
delicacy, and good taste which veiled its grossness. Seduction, in-
trigue, brutality, cynicism, debauchery, found fitting expression in
dialogue of a studied and deliberate foulness, which even its wit fails
to redeem from disgust. Wyclierly, the popular play-wright of the
time, remains the most brutal among all writers of the stage ; and
nothing gives so damning an impression of his day as the fact that
he found actors to repeat his words and audiences to applaud them.
Men such as Wycherly gave Milton models for the Belial of his great
poem, " than whom a spirit more lewd fell not from Heaven, or more
gross to love vice for itself." The dramatist piques himself on the
frankness and " plain dealing " which painted the world as he saw it,
a world of brawls and assignations, of orgies at Vauxhall, and fights
with the watch, of lies and double-entendres, of knaves and dupes, of
men who sold their daughters, and women who cheated their husbands.

607

j^^^B

Skc. I.

■Lp'

England

^^^B

AND THK

^^^^^^^^B^'

^^^^^^^^B*''

Revolution

■^^^^^^■i.

The
ReTOlt
of the
Restora-
tion

•■WA

1663- 1678

6o8

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sbc. I.
England

AND THE

Revolution

Tht
Barll«r

But the cynicism of Wycherly was no greater than that of the men
about him ; and in mere love of what was vile, in contempt of virtue
and disbelief in purity or honesty, the King himself stood ahead of any
of his subjects.

It is however easy to exaggerate the extent of this reaction. So far
as we can judge from the memoirs of the time, its more violent forms
were practically confined to the capital and the court. The mass of
Englishmen were satisfied with getting back their M.iy-poles and mince-
pies ; and a large part of the people remained Puritan in life and
belief, though they threw aside many of the outer characteristics of
Puritanism. Nor was the revolution in feeling as sudden as it seemed.
Even if the political strength of Puritanism had remained unbroken,
its social influence must soon have ceased. The young Englishmen
who grew up in the midi t of the civil war knew nothing of the bitter
tyranny which gave its zeal and fire to the religion of their fathers.
From the social and religious anarchy around them, from the endless
controversies and discussions of the time, they drank in the spirit
of scepticism, of doubt, of free inquiry. If religious enthusiasm had
broken the spell of ecclesiastical tradition, its own extravagance
broke the spell of religious enthusiasm ; and the new generation
turned in disgust to try forms of polit'cal government and spiritual
belief by the cooler and less fallible test of reason. The children
even of the leading Puritans stood aloof from Puritanism. The eldest
of Cromwell's sons made small pretensions to religion. Cromwell
himself in his later years felt bitterly that Puritanism had missed
its aim. He saw the country gentleman, alienated from it by the
despotism it had brought in its train, alienated perhaps even more
by the appearance of a religious freedom for which he was un-
prepared, drifting into a love of the older Church that he had once
opposed. He saw the growth of a dogged resistance in the people at
large. The attempt to secure spiritual results by material force had
failed, as it always fails. It broke down before the indifference and
resentment of the great mass of the people, of men who were neither
lawless nor enthusiasts, but who clung to the older traditions of social
order, and whose humour and good sense revolted alike from the
artificial conception of human life which Puritanism had formed and
from its effort to force such a conception on a people by law. It broke
down, too, before the corruption of the Puritans themselves. It was
impossible to distinguish between the saint and the hypocrite as soon as
godliness became profitable. Even amongst the really earnest Puritans
prosperity disclosed a pride, a worldliness, a selfish hardness which had
been hidden in the hour of persecution. The tone of Cromwell's later
speeches shows his consciousness that the ground was slipping from
under his feet. He no longer dwells on the dream of a Puritan England,
of a nation rising as a whole into a people of God. He falls back on the

So far
It forms
mass of
I mince-
life and
istics of
seemed,
ibroken,
rlishmen
he bitter
• fathers.
z endless
he spirit
asm had
avagance
eneration
spiritual
children
'he eldest
romwell
d missed
it by the
/en more
was un-
had once
people at
force had
•ence and
re neither
of social
from the
irmed and
It broke
It was
as soon as
jt Puritans
which had
■ell's later
iping from
England,
ack on the

ix.J

THE REVOLUTION.

phrasf*' of his youth, and the saints become again a " peculiar people,"
a remnant, a fragment among the nation at large. Hut the influences
which were really foiling Cromwell's aim, and forming beneath his eyes
the new England from which he ttirncd in despair, were influences
whose power he can hardly have recognized. P>en before the out-
burst of the Civil War a small group of theological Latitudinarians
had gathered round Lord Falkland at Great Tew. In the very year
when the King's standard was set up at Nottingham, Hobbcs published
the first of his works on Government. The last royalist had only just
laid down his arms when the little company who were at a Liter time
to be known as the Royal Society gathered round Wilkins at Oxford.
It is in this group of scientific observers that we catch the secret of
the coming generation. From the vexed problems, political and re-
ligious, with which it had so long wrestled in vain, England turned at
last to the physical world around it, to the observation of its phenomena,
to the discovery of the laws which govern them. The pursuit of physical
science became a passion ; and its method of research, by observation,
comparison, and experiment, transformed the older methods of inquiry
in matters without its pale. In religion, in politics, in the study of man
and of nature, not faith but reason, not tradition but inquiry, were to be
the watchwords of the coming time. The dead-weight of the past was
suddenly rolled away, and the new England heard at last and understood
the call of Francis Bacon.

Bacon had already called men with a trumpet-voice to such studies ;
but in England at least Bacon stood before his age. The beginnings
of physical science were more slow and timid there than in any country
of Europe. Onl two discoveries of any real value came from English
research before the Restoration ; the first, Gilbert's discovery of
terrestrial magnetism in the close of Elizabeth's reign ; the next, the
great discovery of the circulation of the blood, which was taught by
Harvey in the reign of James. Apart from these illustrious names
England took little share in the scientific movement of the continent ;
and her whole energies seemed to be whirled into the vortex of theology
and politics by the Civil War. But the war had not reached its end
when a little group of students were to be seen in London, men
" inquisitive," says one of them, " into natural philosophy and other
parts of human learning, and particularly of what hath been called
the New Philosophy, . . . which from the times of Galileo at Florence,
and Sir Francis Bacon (Lord Verubm) in England, hath been much
j cultivated in Italy, France, Germany, and other parts abroad, as well
as with us in England." The strife of the time indeed aided in
directing the minds of men to natural inquiries. " To have been
always tossing about some theological question," says the first historian
of the Royal Society, Bishop Sprat, "would have been to have made
[that their private diversion, the excess of which they disliked in the

R R

609

Src. I.
Engi.ani>

AND THE

Rbvolution

hiteilectuiil
niovewtnt

Becln-

nlngs of

Enslisb

Science

[ill

164S

6io

HISTORY OF TIIK ENGMSII PEonLK.

tcilAP.

Skc. I.
Knui.anu

ANI» TIIK

KKVoLiirmN

1648

The

Royal

Society

; !

1662

public. To have been eternally musing on civil business and the
distresses of the country was too melancholy a reflection. It was
nature alone which could pleasantly entertain them in that estate."
Foremost in the group stood Doctors Wallis and Wilkins, whose re-
moval to Oxford, which had just been reorganized by the Puritan
Visitors, divided the little company into two societies. The Oxford
society, which was the more important of the two, held its meetings at
the lodgings of Dr. Wilkins, who had become Warden of Wadham
College, and added to the names of its members that of the eminent
mathematician Dr. Ward, and that of the first of English economists,
Sir William Petty. " Our business," Wallis tells us, " was (precluding
matters of theology and Stjjte affairs) to discourse and consider of philo-
sophical inquiries and such as related thereunto, as Physick, Anatomy,
Geometry, Astronomy, Navigation, Statics, Magnetics, Chymicks,
Mechanicks, and Natural Experiments : with the state of these studies,
as then cultivated at home and abroad. We then discoursed of the
circulation of the blood, the valves in the vena lactca^ the lymphatic-
vessels, the Copernican hypothesis, the nature of comets and new
stars, the satellites of Jupiter, the oval shape of Saturn, the spots in
the sun and its turning on its own axis, the inequalities and seleno-
graphy of the moon, the several phases of Venus and Mercury, the
improvement of telescopes, the- grinding of glasses for that purpose,
the weight of air, the possibility or impossibility of vacuities, and
Nature's abhorrence thereof, the Torricellian experiment in quicksilver,
the descent of heavy bodies and the degree of acceleration therein,
and divers other things of like nature."

The other little company of inquirers, who remained in London, was
at last broken up by the troubles of the Second Protectorate ; but
it was revived at the Restoration by the return to London of the more
eminent members of the Oxford group. Science suddenly became the
fashion of the day. Charles was himself a fair chymist, and took a
keen interest in the problems of navigation. The Duke of Buckingham
varied his freaks of riming, drinking, and fiddling by fitb of devotion
to his laboratory. Poets like Dryden and Cowley, courtiers like Sir
Robert Murray and Sir Kenelm Digby, joined the scientific company to
which in token of his sympathy with it the King gave the title of " The
Royal Society." The curious glass toys called Prince Rupert's drops
recall the scientific inquiries which, with the study of etching, amused |
the old age of the great cavalry-leader of the Civil War. Wits and fops 1
crowded to the meetings of the new Society. Statesmen like Lord Somers
felt honoured at being chosen its presidents. Its definite establishment
marks the opening of a great age of scientific discovery in England.
Almost every year of the half-century which followed saw some step
made to a wider and truer knowledge. Our first national observatory
rose at Greenwich, and modern astronomy began with the long series

ofastron
His suc(
comets, .1
and gave
air-pump
came the
to the s(
Sydenhai
changed I
Willis fir
was the
" Ornitho
first to rai
classificati
Modern b
of an Oxf
Malpighi
But great ;
the lustre
Lincolnshi
outbreak o
Cambridge
for matheii
the older n
life becami
he facilitate
Fluxions,
ments with
which he
embodied ii
on becomin
had been n
was then gc
disclosing
Revolution
of the Univ
It is impc
have given,
distinguishe
experimenta
at the same
attempt to
elusions of
theologians
theeveof th(

IX.J

THE RKVOLUTION.

ofnstronomicalobservationswhich iniinurtalizcd the naincof h Inmstccd.
His successor, Hallcy, undertook the invcstijjation of the tides, of
comets, and of terrestrial magnetism. Hooke improved the microscope,
and gave a fresh impulse to microscopical research. Hoylc m.ide the
air-pump a means of advancing the science of pneumatics, and be-
came the founder of experimental chymistry. Wilkins pointed forward
to the science of philology in his scheme of a universal language.
Sydenham introduced a careful observation of nature and facts which
changed the whole face of medicine. The physiological researches of
Willis first threw light upon the structure of the brain. Woodwarii
was the founder of mineralogy. In his edition of Willoughby's
" Ornithology," and in his own " History of Fishes," John Ray was the
first to raise zoology to the rank of a science ; and the first scientific
dassificationof animals was attempted in his ".Synopsis of Quadrupeds."
Modern botany began with his " History of Plants," and the researches
of an Oxford professor, Robert Morrison ; while Grew divided with
Malpighi the credit of founding the study of vegetable physiology.
But great as some of these names undoubtedly are, they 'are lost in
the lustre of Isaac Newton. Newton was born at Woolsthorpe in
Lincolnshire, on Christmas-day, in the memorable year which saw the
outbreak of the Civil War. In the year of the Restoration he entered
Cambridge, where the teaching of Isaac Barrow quickened his genius
for mathematics, and where the method of Descartes had superseded
the older modes of study. From the close of his Cambridge career his
life became a series of great physical discoveries. At twenty-three
he facilitated the calculation of planetary movements by his theory of
Fluxions. The optical discoveries to which he was led by his experi-
ments with the prism, and which he partly disclosed in the lectures
which he delivered as Mathematical Professor at Cambridge, were
embodied in the theory of light which he laid before the Royal Society
on becoming a Fellow of it. His discovery of the law of gravitation
had been made as early as 1666 ; but the erroneous estimate which
was then generally received of the earth's diameter prevented him from
disclosing it for sixteen years ; and it was not till the eve of the
Revolution that the " Principia " revealed to the world his new theory
of the Universe.

It is impossible to do more than indicate, in such a summary as we
have given, the wonderful activity of directly scientific thought which
distinguished the age of the Restoration. But the sceptical and
experimental temper of mind which this activity disclosed was telling
at the same time on every phai^e of the world around it. We see the
attempt to bring religious speculation into harmony with the con-
clusions of reason and experience in the school of Latitudinarian
theologians which sprang from the group of thinkers that gathered on
the eve of the Civil War round Lord Falkland at Great Tew. Whatever

R R 2

611

Ski-. I,
Knoi.ano

AND TIIK

Kkvui.ution

!l4

1 litii

Xcwtott
1642

1665

J a

1687

The

Latitudi.

narlaas

I I

6l2

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. I.
England

AND THE

Revolution

Hales

Chilling'
worth

Taylor

verdict history may pronounce on Falkland's political career, his name
must ever remain memorable in the history of religious thought. A
new era in English theology began with the speculations of the men
he gathered round him. Their work was above all to deny the
authority of tradition in matters of faith, as Bacon had denied it in
matters of physical research ; and to assert in the one field as in the
other the supremacy of reason as a test of truth. Of the authority of
the Church, its Fathers, and its Councils, John Hales, a canon of
Windsor, and a friend of Laud, said briefly " it is none." He dis-
missed with contempt the accepted test of universality. " Universality
is such a proof of truth as truth itself is ashamed of. The most
singular and strongest part of human authority is properly in the
wisest and the most virtuous, and these, I trow, are not the most
universal" William Chillingworth, a man of larger if not keener
mind, had been taught by an early conversion to Catholicism, and by a
speedy return, the insecurity of any basis for belief but that of piivate
judgment. In his " Religion of Protestants " he set aside ecclesias-
tical tradition or Church authority as grounds of faith in favour of the
Bible, but only of the Bible as interpreted by the common reason of
men. Jeremy Taylor, the most brilliant of English preachers, a
sufferer like Chillingworth on the royalist side during the troubles,
and who was rewarded at the Restoration with the bishopric of Down,
limited even the authority of the Scriptures themselves. Reason was
the one means which Taylor approved of in interpreting the Bible ;
but the certainty of the conclusions which reason drew from the Bible
varied, as he held, with the conditions of reason itself. In all but the
simplest truths of natural religion " we are not sure not to be deceived."
The deduction of points of belief from the words of the Scriptures was
attended with all the uncertainty and liability to error which sprang
from the infinite variety of human understandings, the difficulties which
hinder the discovery of truth, and the influences which divert the mind
from accepting or rightly estimating it. It was plain to a mind like
Chillingworth's that this denial of authority, this perception of the
imperfection of reason in the discovery of absolute truth, struck as
directly at the root of Protestant dogmatism as at the root of Catholic
infallibility. " If Protestants are faulty in this matter [of claiming
authority] it is for doing it too much and not' too little. This pre-
sumptuous imposing of the senses of man upon the words of God, of
the special senses of man upon the general words of God, and laying
them upon men's consciences together under the equal penalty of
death and damnation, this vain conceit that we can speak of the
things of God better than in the words of God, this deifying our own
interpretations and tyrannous enforcing them upon others, this re-
straining of the word of God from that latitude and generality, and the
understandings of men from that liberty wherein Christ and His

apostles 1
schisms o
" Liberty
tion with ;
the Indepi
freedom o
communio
weakness (
pleads eve
place to t
principles
such — whi(
quit the C
dissented :
cution in
cursing, da
words of G
no man m
have no ti
disclaim it
they do offe
ciation of ii
of comprel
" Utopia" (
on the fact
Christendoi
prehension
from a ratic
of the publi
live accordi
in any part
union on tl
in all the
"Such bodi
hurt." " H
inconvenien
not do oth(
Creed in its
union which
tion the La
distinguishei
tion to dogn
Bible or the
by their ai
opinion, by

IX.]

THK RFVOLUTTON.

apostles left them, is and hath been the only foundation of all the
schisms of the Church, and that which makes them immortal." In his
" Liberty of Prophesying " Jeremy Taylor pleaded the cause of tolera-
tion with a weight of argument which hardly required the triumph of
the Independents and the shock of Naseby to drive it home. But the
freedom of conscience which the Independent founded on the personal
communion of each soul with God, the Latitudinarian founded on the
weakness of authority and the imperfection of human reason. Taylor
pleads even for the Anabaptist and ihe Romanist. He only gives
place to the action of the civil magistrate in " those religions whose
principles destroy government," and " those leligions — if there be any
such — which teach ill life." Hales openly professed that he would
quit the Church to-morrow if it required him to believe that all that
dissented from it must be damned. Chillingvvorth denounced perse-
cution in words of fire. " Take away this persecution, burning,
cursing, damning of men for no^ subscribing the words of men as the
words of God : require of Christians only to believe Christ and to call
no man master but Him ; let them leave claiming infallibility that
have no title to it, and let them that in their own words disclaim it,

disclaim it also in their actions Protestants are inexcusable if

they do offer violence to other men's consciences." From the denun-
ciation of intolerance the Latitudinarians passed easily to the dream
of comprehension which had haunted every nobler soul since the
" Utopia" of More. Hales based his loyalty to the Church of England
on the fact that it was the largest and the most tolerant Church in
Christendom. Chillingworth )ointed out how many obstacles to com-
prehension were removed by such a simplification of belief as flowed
from a rational theology. Like More, he asked for " such an ordering
of the public service of God as that all who believe the Scripture and
live according to it might without scruple or hypocrisy or protestation
in any part join in it." Taylor, like Chillingworth, rested his hope of
union on the simplification of belief. He saw a probability of error
in all the creeds and confessions adopted by Christian Churches.
" Such bodies of confessions and articles," he said, " must do much
hurt." " He is rather the schismatic who makes unnecessary and
inconvenient impositions, than he who disobeys them because he can-
not do otherwise without violating his conscience." The Apostles'
Creed in its literal meaning seemed to him the one term of Christian
union which the Church had any right to impose. With the Restora-
tion the Latitudinarians came at once to the front. They were soon
distinguished from both Puritans and High Churchmen by their opposi-
tion to dogma, by their preference of reason to tradition whether of the
Bible or the Church, by their basing religion on a natural theology,
by their aiming at rightness of life rather than at correctness of
opinion, by their advocacy of toleration and comprehension as the

613

Sec. I.
England

AND THE

Revolution

1647

T/te Laiittf
dinar! an
Theology

j 1

The later
Latitudi-
narians

6i4

Sec. I.
England

AND THE

Revolution

Hobbes

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap

158S 1679

164^

1651

His political
speculations

grounds of Christian unity. Chillingworth and Taylor found sue-
cessors in the restless good sense of Burnet, the enlightened piety of
Tillotson, and the calm philosophy of Bishop Butler. Meanwhile
the impulse which such men were giving to religious speculation was
being given to political and social inquiry by a mind of far greater
keenness and power.

Bacon's favourite secretary was Thomas Hobbes. " He was
beloved by his Lordship," Aubrey tells us, "who was wont to have
him walk in his delicate groves, where he did meditate ; and when
a notion darted into his mind, Mr. Hobbes was presently to write it
down. And his Lordship was wont to say that he did it better than
any one else about him ; for that many times when he read their notes
he scarce understood what they writ, because they understood it not
clearly themselves." The long life of Hobbes covers a memorable
space in our history. He was born in the year of the victory over the
Armada ; he died, at the age of ninety-two, only nine years before the
Revolution. His ability soon made itself felt, and in his earlier days he
was the secretary of Bacon, and the friend of Ben Jonson and Lord
Herbert of Cherbury. But it was not till the age of fifty-four, when he
withdrew to France on the eve of the Great Rebellion, that his specu-
lations were made known to the world in his treatise " De Cive."
He joined the exiled Court at Paris, and became mathematical tutor
to Charles the Second, whose love and regard for him seem to have
been real to the end. But his post was soon forfeited by the appear-
ance of his "Leviathan"; he was forbidden to approach the Court,
and returned to England, where he seems to have acquiesced in the
rule of Cromwell. The Restoration brought him a pension ; but both
his woiks were condemned by Parliament, and " Hobbism " became,
ere he died, the popular synonym fof irreligion and immorality. Pre-
judice of this kind sounded oddly in the case of a writer who had laid
down, as the two things necessary to salvation, faith in Christ and
obedience to the law. But the prejudice sprang from a true sense of
the efilect which the Hobbist philosophy must necessarily have on the
current religion and the current notions of political and social morality.
Hobbes was the first great English writer who dealt with the science
of government from the ground, not of tradition, but of reason. It
was in his treatment of man in the stage of human developement
which he supposed to precede that of society that he came most roughly
into conflict with the accepted beliefs. Men, in his theory, were by
nature equal, and their only natural relation was a state of war. It
was no mnate virtue of man himself which created human society out
of this chaos of warring strengths. Hobbes in fact denied the existence
of the more spiritual sides of man's nature. His hard and narrow logic
dissected every human custom and desire, and reduced even the most
sacred to demonstrations of a prudent selfishness. Friendship was

[chap.

d suc'
iety of
nwhile
)n was
;reatei

e was

have

1 when
ivrite it
er than
ir notes
d it not
norable
)ver the
fore the
days he
id Lord
vhen he
s specu-
; Give."
:al tutor

to have
appear-
e Court,
i in the
ut both
became,
|y. P re-
ad laid
.rist and
sense of
e on the
oraUty.
science
son. It
pement
roughly
[were by
Iwar. It
iety out
ixistence
ow logic
Ithe most
ihip was

ix.J

THE REVOLUTION.

simply a sense of social utility to one another. The so-called laws of
nature, such as gratitude or the love of our neighbour, were in fact
contrary to the natural passions of man, and powerless to restrain
them. Nor had religion rescued man by the interposition of a Divine
will. Nothing better illustrates the daring with which the new scepti-
cism was to break through the theological traditions of the older
world than the pitiless logic with which Hobbcs assailed the very
theory of revelation. " To say God hath spoken to man in a dream,
is no more than to say man dreamed that God hath spoken to him."
"To say one hath seen a vision, or heard a voice, is to say he hath
dreamed between sleeping and waking." Religion, in fact, was nothing
more than " the fear of invisible powers ; " and here, as in all other
branches of human science, knowledge dealt with words and not
with things. It was man himself who for his own profit created
society, by laying down certain of his natural rights and retaining
only those of self-preservation. A Covenant between man and man
originally created " that great Leviathan called the Commonwealth or
State, which is but an artificial man, though of greater stature and
strength than the natural, for whose protection and defence it was
intended." The fiction of such an " original contract " has long been
dismissed from political speculation, but its efifect at the time of its
first appearance was immense. Its almost universal acceptance put
an end to the religious and pati"iarchal theories of society, on which
Kingship had till now founded its claim of a Divine right to authority
which no subject might question. But if Hobbes destroyed the old
ground of royal despotism, he laid a new and a firmer one. To
create a society at all, he held that the whole body of the governed
must have resigned all rights save that of self-preservation into the
hands of a single ruler, who was the representative of all. Such a
ruler was absolute, for to make terms with him implied a man making
terms with himself. The transfer of rights was inalienable, and after
generations were as much bound by it as the generation which made
the transfer. As the head of the whole body, the ruler judged every
question, settled the laws of civil justice or injustice, or decided between
religion and superstition. His was a Divine Right, and the only Divine
Right, because in him were absorbed all the rights of each of his sub-
jects. It was not in any constitutional check that Hobbes looked for
the prevention of tyranny, but in the common education and enlighten-
ment as to their real end and the best mode of reaching it on the part
of both subjects and Prince. And the real end of both was the weal
of the Commonwealth at large. It was in laying boldly down this end
of government, as well as in the basis of contract on which he made
government repose, that Hobbes really influenced all later politics.
Locke, the foremost political thinker of the Restoration, derived
political authority, like Hobbes, from the consent of the governed,

615

Sec. I.
England

AND THE

Revolution

T/ie Social
Contract

• : t m

• '\ ■■ •l

' it

1 '

j i

. !■ . i|

John Locke

6i6

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE

[chap.

Sec. I.
England

AND THB

Revolutiok

The
Restora-
tion

and adopted the common weal as the end of Government. But the
practical temper of the time moulded the new theory into a form
which contrasted strangely with that given to it by its first inventor.
The political philosophy of Locke indeed was little more than a formal
statement of the conclusions which the bulk of Englishmen had drawn
from the great struggle of the Civil War. In his theory the people
remain passively in possession of the power which they have delegated
to the Prince, and have the right to withdraw it if it be used for pur-
poses inconsistent with the end which society was formed to promote.
To the origin of all power in the people, and the end of all power for
the people's good — the two great doctrines of Hobbes — Locke added
the right of resistance, the responsibility of princes to their subjects
for a due execution of their trust, and the supremacy of legislative
assemblies as the voice of the people itself. It was in this modified
and enlarged form that the new political philosophy found general
acceptance after the Revolution of i68S.

Section II.— The Restoration. 1660— 1667.

[Authorities. — Clarendon's detailed account of his own ministry in his "Life,"
Bishop Rennet's " Register," and Burnet's lively " History of my own Times,"
are our principal sources of information. We may add fragments of the auto-
biography of James the Second preserved in Macpherson's "Original Papers"
(of very various degrees of value. ) For the relations of the Church and the
Dissenters, see Neal's " Histoiy of the Puritans," Calamy's *' Memoirs of the
Ejected Ministers," Mr. Dixon's "Life of William Penn," Baxter's " Aulo-
biography," and Bunyan's account of his sufferings in his various works. The
social history of the time is admirably given by Pepys in his "Memoirs."
Throughout the whole reign of Charles the Second, the "Constitutional
History" of Mr. Hallam is singularly judicious and full in its information.]

When Charles the Second entered Whitehall, the work of the Long
Parliament seemed undone. Not only was the Monarchy restored,
but it was restored, in spite of the efforts of Sir Matthew Hale,
without written restriction or condition on the part of the people,
though with implied conditions on the part of Charles himself;
and of the two great influences which had hitherto served as
checks on its power, the first, that of Puritanism, had become
hateful to the nation at large, while the second, the tradition
of constitutional liberty, was discredited by the issue of the Civil
War. But amidst all the tumult of demonstrative loyalty the great
" revolution of the seventeenth century," as it has justly been styled,
went steadily on. The supreme power was gradually transferred from
the Crown to the House of Commons. Step by step. Parliament drew
nearer to a solution of the political problem which had so long foiled
its efforts, the problem how to make its will the law of administrative
action without itself undertakinp the task of administration. It is only

IX. J

THE REVOLUTION.

617

Jut the
a, form
ventor.

formal
, drawn

people
legated

by carefully fixing our eyes on this transfer of power, and by noting the
successive steps towards its realization, that we can understand the
complex history of the Restoration and the Revolution.

The first acts of the new Government showed a sense that, loyal as
was the temper of the nation, its loyalty was by no means the blind
devotion of the Cavalier. The chief part in the Restoration had in
fact been played by the Presbyterians ; and the Presbyterians were
still powerful from their almost exclusive possession of the magistracy
and all local authority. The first ministry which Charles ventured to
form bore on it the marks of a compromise between this powerful
party and their old opponents. Its most influential member indeed
was Sir Edward Hyde, the adviser of the King during his exile, who
soon became Earl of Clarendon and Lord Chancellor. Lord South-
ampton, a steady royalist, accepted the post of Lord Treasurer ; and
the devotion of Ormond was rewarded with a dukedom and the dignity
of Lord Steward. But the purely Parliamentary interest was repre-
sented by Monk, who remained Lord-General of the army with the title
of Duke ex*" Albemarle ; and though the King's brother, James, Duke
of York, was made Lord Admiral, the administration of the fleet was
virtually in the hands of one of Cromwell' s followers, Montagu, the
new Earl of Sandwich. An old Puritan, Lord Say and Sele, was made
Lord Privy Seal. Sir Ashley Cooper, a leading member of the same
party, was rewarded for his activity in bringing about the Restoration
first by a Privy Councillorship, and soon after by a barony and the
office of Chancellor of the Exchequer. Of the two Secretaries of
State, the one, Nicholas, was a devoted royalist ; the other, Morice,
was a steady Presbyterian. Of the thirty members of the Privy Council,
twelve had borne arms against the King.

It was clear that such a ministry was hardly likely to lend itself to a
mere policy of reaction, and the temper of the new Government there-
fore fell fairly in with the temper of the Convention when that body,
after declaring itself a Parliament, proceeded to consider the measures
which were requisite for a settlement of the nation. The Convention
had been chosen under the ordinances which excluded royalist
" Malignants " from the right of voting ; and the bulk of its members
were men of Presbyterian sympathies, loyalist to the core, but as
averse to despotism as the Long Parliament itself. In its earlier days
a member who asserted that those who had fought against the King
were as guilty as those who cut off his head was sternly rebuked from
the Chair. The first measure which was undertaken by the House,
the Bill of Indemnity and Oblivion for all offences committed during
the recent troubles, showed at once the moderate character of the
Commons. In the punishment of the Regicides indeed, a Presby-
terian might well be as zealous as a Cavalier. In spite of a Proclama-
tion he had issued in the first days of his return, in which mercy was

Src. II.

The

Restora-
tion

leeo

1667

The new
viinistry

,'.-

,t .

The

Conven>

tlon

n/u of

indemnity

6i8

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap,

Sec. II.

The
Restora-
tion

1660

1667

Settlement
of the
Nation

virtually promised to all the judges of the late King who surrendered
themselves to justice, Charles pressed for revenge on those whom he
regarded as his father's murderers, and the Lords went hotly with the
King. It is to the credit of the Commons that they steadily resisted
the cry for blood. By the original provisions of the Bill of Oblivion
and Indemnity only seven of the living regicides were excluded from
pardon ; and though the rise of royalist fervour during the three
months in which the bill was under discussion forced the House in
the end to leave almost all to the course of justice, the requirement of
a special Act of Parliament for the execution of those who had surren-
dered under the Proclamation protected the lives of most of them.
Twenty eight of the King's judges were in the end arraigned at the
bar of a court specially convened for their trial, but only thirteen were
executed, and only one of these, General Harrison, had played any
conspicuous part in the rebellion. Twenty others, who had been pro-
minent in what were now called " the troubles " of the past twenty
years, were declared incapable of holding office under the State : and
by an unjustifiable clause which was introduced into the Act before its
final adoption. Sir Harry Vane and General Lambert, though they had
taken no part in the King's death, were specially exempted from the
general pardon. In dealing with the questions of property which arose
from the confiscations and transfers of estates during the Civil Wars
the Convention met with greater difficulties. No opposition was made
to the resumption of all Crown-lands by the State, but the Convention
desired to protect the rights of those who had purchased Church pro-
perty, and of those who were in actual possession of private estates
which had been confiscated by the Long Parliament, or by the Govern-
ment which succeeded it. The bills however which they prepared for
this purpose were delayed by the artifices of Hyde ; and at the close of
the session the bishops and the evicted royalists quietly re-entered into
the occupation of their old possessions. The royalists indeed were
far from being satisfied with this summary confiscation. Fines and
sequestrations had impoverished all the steady adherents of the royal
cause, and had driven many of them to forced sales of their estates ;
and a demand was made for compensation for their losses and the
cancelling of these sales. Without such provisions, said the frenzied
Cavaliers, the bill would be " a Bill of Indemnity for the King's
enemies, and of Oblivion for his friends." But here the Convention
stood firm. All transfers of property by sale were recognized as valid,
and all claims of compensation for losses by sequestration ".ere barred
by the Act. From the settlement of the nation the Convention passed
to the settlement of the relations between the nation and the Crown.
So far was the constitutional work of the Long ParUament from being
undone, that its more important measures were silently accepted as
the base of future government. Not a voice demanded the restoration

mission ; n

; ,t

ix.l

THE REVOLUTION.

of the Star Chamber, or of monopolies, or of the Court of High Com-
mission ; no one disputed the justice of the condemnation of Ship-
money, or the assertion of the sole right of Parliament to grant
supplies to the Crown. The Militia, indeed, was placed in the King's
hands ; but the army was disbanded, though Charles was permitted
to keep a few regiments for his guard. The revenue was fixed at
;^i,200jOOO ; and this su!»i was granted to the King for life, a grant
which might have been perilous fcr freedom had not the taxes provided
to supply the sum fallen constantly below this estimate, while the
current expenses of the Crown, even in time of peace, greatly exceeded
it. But even for this grant a heavy price was exacted. Though the
rights of the Crown over lands held, as the bulk of English estates
were held, in military tenure, had ceased to be of any great pecuniary
value, they were indirectly a source of considerable power. The right
of wardship and of marriage, above all, enabled the sovereign to ex-
ercise a galling pressure on every landed proprietor in his social and
domestic concerns. Under Elizabeth, the right of wardship had been
used to secure the education of all Catholic minors in the Protestant
faith ; and under James and his successor the charge of minors had
been granted to court favourites or sold in open market to the highest
bidder. But the real value of these rights to the Crown lay in the
political pressure which it was able to exert through them on the
country gentry. A squire was naturally eager to buy the good will of
a sovereign who might soon be the guardian of his daughter and the
administrator of his estate. But the same motives which made the
Crown cling to this prerogative made the Parliament anxious to do
away with it. Its efforts to bring this about under James the First had
been foiled by the King's stubborn resistance ; but the long interrup-
tion of these rights during the wars made their revival almost impos-
sible at the Restoration. One of the first acts therefore of the
Convention was to free the country gentry by abolishing the claims of
the Crown to reliefs and wardship, purveyance, and pre-emption, and
by the conversion of lands held till then in chivalry into lands held in
common socage. In lieu of his rights, Charles accepted a grant of
;^ioo,ooo a year ; a sum which it was originally purposed to raise by a
tax on the lands thus exempted from feudal exactions ; but which was
provided for in the end, with less justice, by a general excise.

Successful as the Convention had been in effecting the settlement of
political matters, it failed in bringing about a settlement of the Church.
In his proclamation from Breda Charles had promised to respect
liberty of conscience, and to assent to any Acts of Parliament which
should be presented to him for its security. The Convention was in
the main Presbyterian ; but it soon became plain that the continuance
of a purely Presbyterian system was impossible. " The generality of
the people," wrote Sharpe, a shrewd Scotch observer, from London,

619

Sec. II.

The
Restora-
tion

leeo

1667

'NM

\ f

The

CaTalier

Parlia.

ment

: 1

T/tg Chjirch
question

■■ -ill

Mi-. '

ri^Ll

620

inSTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

fCHAP.

Skc. II.

The

Restora-
tion

leeo

i6e7

The

Con7>ention

Disiolved

1660

Parliament
of 1661

"are doting after Prelacy and the Service-book." The Convention,
however, still hoped for some modified form of Episcopalian govern,
ment which would enable the bulk of the Puritan party to remain
within the Church. A large part of the existing clergy, indeed, were
Independents, and for these no compromise with Episcopacy was
possible : but the greater number were moderate Presbyterians, who
were ready " for fear of worse " to submit to such a plan of Church
government as Archbishop Usher had proposed, a plan in which the
bishop was only the president of a diocesan board of presbyters, and
to accept the Liturgy with a few amendments and the omission of the
" superstitious practices." It was to a compromise of this kind that the
King himself leant at the beginning ; and a royal declaration which
announced his approval of the Puritan demands was read at a con-
ference of the two parties, and with it a petition from the Independents
praying for religious liberty. The King proposed to grant the prayer
of the petition, not for the Independents only but for all Christians ;
but on the point of tolerating the Catholics, Churchmen and Puritans
were at one, and a bill which was introduced into the House of Com-
mons by Sir Matthew Hale to turn the declaration into a law was
thrown out. A fresh conference was promised, but in the absence of
any Parliamentary action the Episcopal party boldly availed them-
selves of their legal rights. The ejected clergy who still remained
alive entered again into their parsonages, the bishops returned to their
sees, and the dissolution of the Convention- Parliament destroyed the
last hope of an ecclesiastical compromise. The tide of loyalty had in
fact been rising fast during its session, and its influence was already
seen in a shameful outrage wrought under the very orders of the Con-
vention itself. The bodies of Cromwell, Bradshaw, and Ireton were
torn from their graves and hung on gibbets at Tyburn, while those of
Pym and Blake were cast out of Westminster Abbey into St. Margaret's
churchyard. But in the elections for the new Parliament the zeal for
Church and King swept all hope of moderation and compromise before
it. " Malignity " had now ceased to be a crime, and voters long de-
prived of the suffrage, vicars, country gentlemen, farmers, with the j
whole body of the Cathc cs, rushed again to the poll. The Presbyterians |
sank in the Cavalier Parliament to a handful of fifty members. The ,
new House of Commons was made up for the most part of young men,
of men, that is, who had but a faint memory of the Stuart tyranny of |
their childhood, but who had a keen memory of living from manhood
beneath the tyranny of the Commonwealth. Their very bearing was
that of wild revolt against the Puritan past. To a staid observer,
Roger Pepys, they seemed a following of '' the most profane, swearing
fellows that ever I heard in my life." The zeal of the Parhament at
its outset, indeed, far outran that of Charles or his ministers. Though |
it confirnaed the other acts of the Convention, it could with diffi-

culty be h
pressed foi
the spirit c
even if cor
the block,
against a V
and his spi
is too dang
coolness, "
members \
suffering ha
and for the
ardent not i
their sessio
communion
the commo
bishops fron
the Savoy b
anger, and t
a view to dij
The temp*
of revenge.
the civil war
the most act
land in 1642
Parliament a
system of Er
was to be ex
carrying out
on which the
lay in the Pn
corporations
members,
municipal pi
ception of t
Church, a rei
that it was w\
before admis;
at the Puritai
was the use
in all public
nianded from
in it ; while,
those conferr
declaration e

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

culty be brought to confirm the Act of Indemnity. The Commons
pressed tor the prosecution of Vane. Vane was protected alike by
the spirit of the law and by the King s pledge to the Convention that,
even if convicted of treason, he would not suffer him to be brought to
the block. But he was now brought to trial on the charge of treason
against a King " kept out of his royal authority by traitors and rebels,"
and his spirited defence served as an excuse for his execution. " He
is too dangerous a man to let live," Charles wrote with characteristic
coolness, " if we can safely put him out of the way." But the new
members were yet better churchmen than loyalists. A common
suffering had thrown the squires and the Episcopalian clergy together,
and for the first time since the Reformation the English gentry were
ardent not for King only, but for Church and King. At the opening of
their session the Commons ordered every member to receive the
communion, and the League and Covenant to be solemnly burnt by
the common hangman in Westminster Hall. The bill excluding
bishops from the House of Lords was repealed. The conference at
the Savoy between the Episcopalians and Presbyterians broke up in
anger, and the few alterations made in the Liturgy were made with
a view to disgust rather than to conciliate the Puritan party.

The temper of the new Parliament, however, was not a mere temper
of revenge. Its wish was to restore the constitutional system which
the civil war had violently interrupted, and the royalists were led by
the most active of the constitutional loyalists who had followed Falk-
land in 1642, Hyde, now Earl of Clarendon and Lord Chancellor. The
ParHament and the Church were in his conception essential parts of the
system of English governn.ent, through which the power of the Crown
was to be exercized ; and under his guidance Parliament turned to the
carrying out of the principle of uniformity in Church as well as in State
on which the minister was resolved. The chief obstacle to such a policy
lay in the Presbyterians, and the strongholds of this party were in the
corporations of the boroughs, which practically returned the borough
members. An attempt was made to drive the Presbyterians from
municipal posts by a severe Corporation Act, which required a re-
ception of the Communion according to the rites of the Anglican
Church, a renunciation of the League and Covenant, and a declaration
that it was unlawful on any grounds to take up arms against the King,
before admission to municipal offices. A more deadly blow was dealt
at the Puritans in the renewal of the Act of Uniformity. Not only
was the use of the Prayer-book, and the Prayer-book only, enforced
in all public worship, but an unfeigned consent and assent was de-
manded from every minister of the Church to all which was contained
in it ; while, for the first time smce the Reformation, all orders save
those conferred by the hands of bishops were legally disallowed. The
declaration exacted from corporations was exacted from the clergy,

621

Skc. II.

TlIK

Kksioka

TION

leeo

i6e7

Clarendon

Corporation
Act

lil

Act 0/
Uniformity

623

IIISTOUY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sue. II.

Tick
Rksto'<a-

TION

laeo

i6e7

St.
Bartho-
lomew's

Day

1662

tts religious
results

and a pledge was required that they would seek to make no change in
Church or State. It was in vain that Ashley opposed the bill fiercely
in the Lords, that the peers pleaded for pensions to the ejected ministers
and for the exemption of schoolmasters from the necessity of subscri p.
tion, and that even Clarendon, who felt that the King's word was at
stake, pressed for the insertion of clauses enabling the Crown to grant
dispensations from its provisions. Every suggestion of compromise was
rejected by the Commons ; and Charles at last assented to the bill, while
he promised to suspend its execution by the exercize of his prerogative.
The Anglican Parliament however was resolute to enforce the law ;
and on St. Bartholomew's day, the last day allowed for compliance with
its requirements, nearly two thousand rectors and vicars, or about a
fifth of the English clergy, were driven from their parishes as Noncon-
formists. No such sweeping alteration in the religious aspect of the
Church had ever been seen before. The changes of the Reformation
had been brought about with little change in the clergy itself. Even
the severities of the High Commission under Elizabeth ended in the
expulsion of a few hundreds. If Laud had gone zealously to work in
emptying Puritan pulpits, his zeal had been to a great extent foiled
by the restrictions of the law and by the growth of Puritan sentiment
in the clergy as a whole. A far wider change had been brought about
by the Civil War ; but the change had been gradual, and had osten-
sibly been wrought for the most part on political or moral rather than
on religious grounds. The parsons expelled were expelled as " malig-
nants " or as imfitted for their ofifice by idleness or vice or inability to
preach. But the change wrought by St. Bartholomew's day was a
distinctly religious change, and it was a change which in its sudden-
ness and completeness stood utterly alone. The rectors and vicars who
were driven out were the most learned and the most active of their
order. The bulk of the great livings throughout the country were in
their hands. They stood at the head of the London clergy, as the
London clergy stood in general repute at the head of their class
throughout England. They occupied the higher posts at the two
Universities. No English divine, save Jeremy Taylor, rivalled Howe
as a preacher. No parson was so renowned a controversialist, or so
indefatigable a parish priest, as Baxter. And behind these men stood
a fifth of the whole body of the clergy, men whose zeal and labour had
diffused throughout the country a greater appearance of piety and
religion than it had ever displayed before. But the expulsion of these
men was far more to the Church of England than the loss of their
individual services. It was the definite expulsion of a great party
which from the time of the Reformation had played the most active
and popular part in the life of the Church. It was the close of an
effort which had been going on ever since Elizabeth's accession to j
bring the English Communion into closer relations with the Reformed

Communio

religious ii

stood from

the Christi

from those

rejection oi

as irretriev

whether Li

healthy rel

immobility

change, all

stopped I

unable to i

modificatioi

all the relig

two hundre(

But if the :

spiritual \\U

degree adva

tion religioi

Independent

the right of i

own consciei

at its head, '

worship, if r

parties withi

almost irresi

mew's day d

clung, and fc

hated till the

suffering soc

broke down

the new sect;

found itself c

its pale. TI

from Englisl

worship in th

by degrees st

which it enjo

of its official

quences howe

here that witi

clergy a new

of Dissent, tl:

into play.

IX.]

THE RKVOLUTION.

Communions of the Continent, and into greater harmony with the
rehgious instincts of the nation at large. The Church of England
stood from that moment isolated and alone among all the Churches of
the Christian world. The Reformation had severed it irretrievably
from those which still clung to the obedience of the Papacy. By its
rejection of all but episcopal orders, the Act of Uniformity severed it
as irretrievably from the general body of the Protestant Churches,
whether Lutheran or Reformed. And while thus cut off from all
healthy religious communion with the world without, it sank into
immobility within. With the expulsion of the Puritan clergy, all
change, all efforts after reform, all national developement, suddenly
stopped. From that time to this the Episcopal Church has been
unable to meet the varying spiritual needs of its adherents by any
modification of its government or its worship. It stands alone among
all the religious bodies of Western Christendom in its failure through
two hundred years to devise a single new service of prayer or of praise.
But if the issues of St. Bartholomew's day have been harmful to the
spiritual life of the English Church, they have been in the highest
degree advantageous to the cause of religious liberty. At the Restora-
tion religious freedom seemed again to have been lost. Only the
Independents and a few despised sects, such as the Quakers, upheld
the right of every man to worship God according to the bidding of his
own conscience. The bulk of the Puritan party, with the Presbyterians
at its head, was at one with its opponents in desiring a uniformity of
worship, if not of belief, throughout the land ; and, had the two great
parties within the Church held together, their weight would have been
almost irresistible. Fortunately the great severance of St. Bartholo-
mew's day drove out the Presbyterians from the Church to which they
clung, and forced them into a general union with sects which they had
hated till then almost as bitterly as the bishops themselves. A common
suffering soon blended the Nonconformists into one. Persecution
broke down before the numbers, the wealth, and the political weight of
the new sectarians ; and the Church, for the first time in its history,
found itself confronted with an organized body of Dissenters without
its pale. The impossibility of crushing such a body as this wrested
from English statesmen the first legal recognition of freedom of
worship in the Toleration Act ; their rapid growth in later times has
by degrees stripped the Church of almost all the exclusive privileges
which it enjoyed as a religious body, and now threatens what remains
of its ofificial connexion with the State. With these remoter conse-
quences however we are not as yet concerned. It is enough to note
here that with the Act of Uniformity and the expulsion of the Puritan
clergy a new element in our religious and political history, the element
of Dissent, the influence of the Nonconformist churches, comes first
into play.

623

Skc. II.

Thic
Rkstora-

TION

leeo

iee7

' 'f n'i

Its fiolitkal
results

624

Src. II.

TlIK

Restora-
tion

leeo

T<»

1667

The

l>«raecu •

tlon

First
DcclttrixtijPt

"/
InduifrcHcc

1662

Conx'iHthk

Ait

1664

1665

HISTORY OK TlIK KNOr^rsiI PKOPI.E.

[chap.

The sudden outbreak and violence of the |)ersecution turned tlic
disappointment of the Presbyterians into despair. Many were for
retiring to Holland, others proposed flight to New Kngland rnd tho
American colonics. Charles however was anxious to use the strife
between the two great bodies of Protestants so as to secure toleration
for the Catholics, and revive at the same time his prerogative of dis-
pensing with the execution of laws ; and fresh hopes of protection were
raised by a royal proclamation, whirh expressed the King's resolve to
exempt from the penalties of the Act," those who, living peaceably, do
not conform themselves thereunto, through scruple and tenderness of
misguided conscience, but modestly and without scandal perform their
devotions in their own way." A bill introduced in 1663, in redemption of
a pledge in the declaration itself, gave Charles the power to dispense, not
only with the provisions of the Act of Uniformity, but with the penalties
provided by all laws which enforced religious conformity, or which im-
posed religious tests. But if the I'resbyterian leaders in the council had
stooped to accept the aid of the declaration, the bulk of the Dissidents
had no mind to have their grievances used as a means of procuring by
a side wind toleration for Roman Catholics, or of building up again that
dispensing power which the civil wars had thrown down. The Church-
men, too, whose hatred for the Dissidents had been embittered by
suspicions of a secret league between the Dissidents and the Catholics
in which the King was taking part, were resolute in opposition. The
Houses therefore struck simultaneously at both their opponents. They
forced Charles by an address to withdraw nis pledge of toleration.
They then extorted from him a proclamation for the banishment of all
Catholic priests, and followed this up by a Conventicle Act, which
punished with fine, imprisonment, and transportation on a third ofifence
all persons who met in greater number than five for any religious
worship save that of the Common Prayer ; while return, or escape
fiom banishment was punished by death. The Five Mile Act, a year
later, completed the code of persecution. By its provisions, every
clergyman who had been driven out by the Act of Uniformity was
called on to swear that he held it unlawful under any pretext to take up
arms against the King, and that he would at no time " endeavour any
alteration of government in Church and State." In case of refusal, he
was forbidden to go within five miles of any borough, or of any place
where he had been wont to minister. As the main body of the Non-
conformists belonged to the city and trading classes, the etifect of this
measure was to rob them of any religious teaching at all. A motion to
impose the oath of the Five Mile Act on every person in the nation was
rejected in the same session by a majority of only six. The sufferings of
the Nonconformists indeed could hardly fail to tell on the sympathies
of the people* The thirst for revenge, which had been roused by the
violence of the Presbyterians in their hour of triumph, was satisfied by

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

625

their humiliation in the hour of dcfc;it. The sight of pious and learned
clergymen driven from their homes and their Hocks, of reli^'ious meet-
ings broken up by the constables, of preachers set side by side with
thieves and outcasts in the dock, of ^aols crammed with honest
enthusiasts whose piety was their only crime, pleaded more eloquently
for toleration than all the reasoning in the world. We have a clue to
the extent of the persecution from what we know to have been its effect
on a single sect. The Quakers had excited alarm by their extravagances
of manner, their refusal to bear arms or to take oaths ; and a special
Act was passed for their repression. They were one of the smallest of
the Nonconformist bodies, but more than four thousand were soon in
prison, and of these five hundred were imprisoned in London alone.
The King's Declaration of Indulgence, twelve years later, set free
twelve hundred Quakers who had found their way to the gaols. Of
the sufferings of the expelled clergy one of their own number, Richard
Baxter, has given us an account. ** Many hundreds of them, with their
wives and children, had neither house nor bread. . . . Their congrega-
tions had enough to do, besides a small maintenance, to help them out
of prisons, or to maintain them there. Though they were as frugal as
possible they could hardly live ; some lived on little more than brown
bread and water, many had but eight or ten pounds a year to maintain
a family, so that a piece of flesh has not come to one of their tables in
six weeks' time ; their allowance could scarce afford them bread and
cheese. One went to plow six days and preached on the Lord's Day.
Another was forced to cut tobacco for a livelihood." But poverty was
the least of their sufferings. They were jeered at by the players. They
were hooted through the streets by the mob. " Many of th^ ministers,
being afraid to lay down their ministry after they had been ordained to
it, preached to such as would hear them in fields and private houses,
till they were apprehended and cast into gaols, where many of them
perished." They were excommunicated in the Bishops' Court, or
fined for non-attendance at church ; and a crowd of informers grew
up who made a trade of detecting the meetings they held at midnight.
Alleyn, the author of the well-known "Alarm to the Unconverted,"
died at thirty-six from the sufferings he endured in Taunton Gaol.
Vavasour Powell, the apostle of Wales, spent the eleven years which
followed the Restoration in prisons at Shrewsbury, Southsea, and
Cardiff, till he perished in the Fleet. John Bunyan was for twelve
years a prisoner at Bedford.

We have already seen the atmosphere of excited feeling in which
the youth of Bunyan had been spent. From his childhood he heard
heavenly voices, and saw visions of heaven ; from his childhood, to*" ,
j he had been wrestling with an overpowering sense of sin, which sick-
ness and repeated escapes from death did much as he grew up to
I deepen. But in spite of his self-reproaches his life was a religious one ;

s s

Sic. II.
'I'mk

Rl sKiKA.
THIN

leeo

1607

The
Pilgrim's
Progress

626

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sbc. II.

The
Restora-
tion

laeo

1667

164s

i6s:

Bunyan in
prison

and the purity and sobriety of his youth was shown by his admission
at seventeen into the ranks of the " New Model." Two years later
the war was over, and Bunyan though hardly twenty found himself
married to a " godly " wife, as young and penniless as himself. So
poor were the young couple that they could scarce muster a spoon
and a plate between them ; and the poverty of their home deepeneo,
perhaps, the gloom of the young tinker's restlessness and religious
depression. His wife did what she could to comfort him, teaching
him again to read and write, for he had forgotten his school-learning,
and reading with him in two little "godly" books which formed his
library. But the darkness only gathered the thicker round his ima-
ginative soul. " I walked," he tells us of this time, " to a neighbouring
town ; and sate down upon a settle in the street, and fell into a very
deep pause about the most fearful state my sin had brought me to ;
and after long musing I lifted up my head ; but methought I saw as
if the sun that shineth in the heavens did grudge to give me light ;
and as if the very stones in the street and tiles upon the houses did
band themselves against me. Methought that they all combined
together to banish me out of the world. I was abhorred of them, and
wept to dwell among them, because I had sinned against the Saviour.
Oh, how happy now was every creature over I ! for they stood fast and
kept their station. But I was gone and lost." At las<-, after more than
two years of this struggle, the darkness broke. Bunyan felt himself
" converted," and freed from the burthen of his sin. He joined a
Baptist church at Bedford, and a few years later he became famous as
a preacher. As he held no formal post of minister in the congregation,
his preaching even under the Protectorate was illegal and "gave great
offence," he tells us, " to the doctors and priests of that county," but
he persisted with little real molestation until the Restoration. Six
months however after the King's return he was committed to Bedford
Gaol on a charge of preaching in unlicensed conventicles ; and his
refusal to promise to abstain from preaching kept him there twelve I
years. The gaol was crowded with prisoners like himself, and amongst
them he continued his ministry, supporting himself by making tagged
thread laces, and finding some comfort in the Bible, the "Book of
Martyrs," and the writing materials which he was suffered to have
with him in his prison. But he was in the prime of life, his age was
thirty-two when he was imprisoned ; and the inactivity and severance
from his wife and little children was hard to bear. " The parting with
my wife and poor children," he says in words of simple pathos, "hathj
often been to me in this place as the pulling of the flesh from the
bones, and that not only because I am somewhat too fond of those!
great mercies, but also because I should have often brought to my mind!
the many hardships, miseries, and wants that my poor family was like
to meet with should I be taken from them, especiplly my poor blindl

child, wh(
of the ha:
break my
thou like 1
must beg,
though I <
suffering c
for the nai
pen. Tra^
Aboundini
succession
part of hi
result of I:
popularity
sympathies
Banyan's c
already bee
a century h
him its fai
steadily fro:
and the mo:
more clearh
common life
is the simpl
by any grea
images of t
evangelist j
Song of So
Apocalypse,
that one feel
He has live
has lived a
possible unn
naturalness
Despond an(
day, that we
had met ther
tion that Bu
this is far fro
ness, in its si
dialogue to d
ness, in the s
words, in its
and balanced
Shadow of E

ix.l

THE REVOLUTION.

child, who lay nearer to my heart than all besides. Oh, the thoughts
of the hardships I thought my poor blind one might go under would
break my heart to pieces. ' Poor child,' thought I, ' what sorrow art
thou like to have for thy portion in this world ! Thou must be beaten,
must beg, sufter hunger, cold, nakedness, and a tho, sand calamities,
though I cannot now endure the wind should blow upon thee.' " But
suffering could not break his purpose, and Bunyan found compensation
for the narrow bounds of his prison in the wonderful activity of his
pen. Tracts, controversial treatises, poems, meditations, his " Grace
Abounding," and his "Holy City," followed each other in quick
succession. It was in his gaol that he wrote the first and greatest
part of his "Pilgrim's Progress." Its publication was the earliest
result of his deliverance at the Declaration of Indulgence, and the
popularity which it enjoyed from the first proves that the religious
sympathies of the English people were still mainly Puritan. Tiefore
Bunyan's death in 1688 ten editions of the "Pilgrim's Progress" hr.d
already been sold ; and though even Cowper hardly dared to quote it
a century later for fear of moving a smile in the polite world about
him its favour among the middle classes and the poor has grown
steadily from its author's day to our own. It is now the most popular
and the most widely known of all English books. In none do we see
more clearly the new imaginative force which had been given to the
cominon life of Englishmen by their study of the Bible. Its English
is the simplest and the homeliest English which has ever been used
by any great Engli 'i writer ; but it is the English of the Bible. The
images of the " Pilgrim's Progress " are the images of prophet and
evangelist ; it borrows for its tenderer outbursts the very verse of the
Song of Songs, and pictures the Heavenly City in the words of the
Apocalypse. But so completely has the Bible become Bunyan's life
that one feels its phrases as the natural expression of his thoughts.
He has lived in the Bible till its words have become his own. He
has lived among its visions and voices of heaven till all sense of
possible unreality has died away. He tells his tale with such a perfect
naturalness that allegories become living things, that the Slou;^h of
Despond and Doubting Castle are as real to us as places we see every
day, that we know Mr. Legality and Mr. Worldly Wiseman as if we
had met them in the street. It is in this amazing; reality of impersona-
tion that Bunyan's imaginative genius specially displays itself. But
this is far from being his only excellence. In its range, in its direct-
ness, in its simple grace, in the ease with which it changes from lively
dialogue to dramatic action, from simple pathos to passionate earnest-
ness, in the subtle and delicate fancy which often suffuses its childlike
words, in its playful humour, its bold character-painting, in the even
and balanced power which passes without effort from the Valley of the
Shadow of Death to the land " where the Shining Ones commonly

S s 2

627

Sec. II.

The

Restoka-

TION

1660

i6e7

1672

1 ;

/ !

628

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap,

Sec. II.

The

Restora-
tion

1660

1667

The War

with
Holland

i66S

1666

J^tre of
London,

walked, because it was on the borders of heaven," in its sunny kindli-
ness unbroken by one bitter word, the " Pilgrim's Progress " is among
the noblest of English poems. For if Puritanism had first discovered
the poetry which contact with the spiritual world awakes in the
meanest soul, liunyan was the first of the Puritans who revealed this
poetry to the outer world. The joarney of Christian from the City of
Destruction to the Heavenly City is simply a record of the life of such
a Puritan as Bunyan himself, seen through an imaginative haze of
spiritual idealism in which its commonest incidents are heightened and
glorified. He is himself the pilgrim who flies from the City of Destruc-
tion, who climbs the hill Difficulty, who faces Apollyon, who sees his
loved ones cross the river of Death towards the Heavenly City, and
how, because " the hill on which the City was framed was higher than
the clouds, they therefore went up through the region of the air,
sweetly talking as they went." , ^

The success, however, of the system of religious repression rested
mainly on the maintenance of peace ; and while Bunyan was lying in
Bedford Gaol, and the Church was carrying on its bitter persecution
of the Nonconformists, England was plunging into a series of bitter
humiliations and losses abroad. The old commercial jealousy between
the Dutch and English, which had been lulled by a formal treaty in
1662, but which still lived on in petty squabbles at sea, was embittered
by the cession of Bombay — a port which gave England an entry into
the profitable trade with India — and by the establishment of a West
Indian Company in London which opened a traffic with the Gold
Coast of Africa. The quarrel was fanned into a war. Parliament voted a
large supply unanimously ; and the King was won by hopes of the ruin
of the Dutch presbyterian and republican government, and by his resent
ment at the insults he had suffered from Holland in his exile. The war at
sea which followed was a war of giants. An obstinate battle off Lowestoft
ended in a victory for the English fleet ; but ir. an encounter the next
year with De Ruyter off the North Foreland Monk and his fleet after
two day's fighting were only saved from destruction by the arrival of
Prince Rupert. The dogged admiral renewed the fight, but the combat
again ended in De Ruyter's favour and the English took refuge in the
Thames. Their fleet was indeed ruined, but the losses of the enemy
had been hardly less. " English sailors may be killed," said De Witt,
"but they cannot be conquered ;" and the saying was as true of one
side as the other. A third battle, as hard-fought as its piedecessors,
ended in the triumph of the English, and their fleet sailed along the|
coast of Holland, burning ships and towns. But Holland was as un-
conquerable as England herself, and the Dutch fleet was soon again I
refitted and was joined in the Channel by the French. Meanwhile,
calamity at home was added to the sufferings of the war. In the pre-
ceding year a hundred thousand Londoners had died in six months ofl

the Plagu
the Plagu
oi Londo
Temple,
destroyed.
The trea
when the
the Than
Medway, 1
and withd
Channel.

{AtUhorit
of Sir Willii
man, Reresl
of the Coun
picture of tl
materials he
Catholic sid
throws great
tcrnal and cc
in his '• Mei
real secret 01
been supers^
Succession d

The thur

woke Engh

loyalty was

upon Olivei

all the neig

watching th

turning it tc

tion of Eng

playing, a g

deceived no

leads histori

pleasant, br

caricatures (

park. To i

idlers. " p

kind ol plea

discovered t

the very sigl

Killigrew fni

one man wh

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION,

the Plague which broke out in the crowded streets of the capital ; and
the Plague was followed now by a fire, which, beginning in the heart
of London, reduced the whole city to ashes from the Tower to the
Temple. Thirteen thousand houses and ninety churches were
destroyed. The loss of merchandise and property was beyond count.
The Treasury was empty, and neither ships nor forts were manned
when the Dutch fleet appeared at the Nore, advanced unopposed up
the Thames to Gravesend, forced the boom which protected the
Medway, burned three men-of-war which lay anchored in the river,
and withdrew only to sail proudly along the coast, the masters of the
Channel.

Section III.— Charles the Second. 1667—1673.

[Authorities. — To the aiUhorilics already mentioned, we may add the Memoirs
of Sir William Temple, with Lord Macaulay's well-known Essay on that states-
man, Reresby's Memoirs, and the works of Andrew Marvel!. The " Memoirs
of the Count de Grammont," by Anthony ILamillon, fjive a witty and amusing
picture of the life of the court. Lingard becomes important from the original
materials he has used, and from his clear and dispassionate statement of the
Catholic side of the question. Ranke's "History of the XVII. Century"
throws great light on the diplomatic history of the later Stuart reigns ; on in-
ternal and constitutional points he is dispassionate but of less value. Dalrymplc,
in his ** Memoirs of Great Britain and Ireland," was the first to discover the
real secret of the negotiations with France ; but all previous rescNirches have
been superseded by those of M. Mignet, whose " Negociations relatives a la
Succession d'Espagne" is indispensable for a knowledge of the time.]

The thunder of the Dutch guns in the Medway and the Thames
woke England to a bitter sense of its degradation. The dream of
loyalty was over. " Everybody novv-a-days," Pepys tells us, " reflect
upon Oliver and commend him, what brave things he did, and made
all the neighbour princes fear him." But Oliver's successor was coolly
watching this shame and discontent of his people with the one aim of
turning it to his own advantage. To Charles the Second the degrada-
tion of England was only a move in the political game which he was
playing, a game played with so consummate a secrecy and skill that it
deceived not only the closest observers of his own day but still mis-
leads historians of ours. What his subjects saw in their King was a
pleasant, brown-faced gentleman playing with his spaniels, or drawing
caricatures of his ministers, or flinging cakes to the water-fowl in the
park. To all outer seeming Charles was the most consummate of
idlers. " He delighted," says one of his courtiers, " in a bewitching
kind of pleasure called sauntering." The business-like Pepys soon
discovered that " the King do mind nothing but pleasures, and hates
the very sight or thoughts of business." He only laughed when Tom
Killigrew frankly told him that badly as things were going there was
one man whose industry could soon set them right, " and this is one

, I

6a9

Sec. III.
Chari.f.8

THK

Second
1667

1673

1667

Charles

the
Second

i'E

i ;i

) t

■%

630

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.
Charles

THE

Second
1667

1673

Charles Stuart, who now spends his time in using his lips about the
Court, and hath no other employment." That Charles had great
natural parts no one doubted. In his earlier days of defeat and
danger he showed a cool courage and presence of mind which never
failed him in the many perilous moments of his reign. His temper
was pleasant and social, his manners perfect, and there was a care-
less freedom and courtesy in his address which won over everybody
who came into his presence. His education indeed had been so grossly
neglected that he could hardly read a plain Latin book ; but his
natural quickness and intelligence showed itself in his pursuit of
chymistry and anatomy, and in the interest he showed in the scientific
inquiriei: of the Royal Society. Like Peter the Great his favourite
study was that of naval architecture, and he piqued himself on being a
clever ship-builder. He had some little love too for art and poetry, and
a taste for music. But his shrewdness and vivacity showed itself most
in his endless talk. He was fond of telling stories, and he told them
with a good deal of grace and humour. His humour indeed never
forsook him : even on his death-bed he turned to the weeping
courtiers around and whispered an apology for having been so un-
conscionable a time in dying. He held his own fairly with the wits of
his Court, and bandied repartees on equal terms with Sedley or
Buckingham. Even Rochester in his merciless epigram was forced
to own that Charles " never said a foolish thing." He had inherited
in fact his grandfather's gift of pithy sayings, and his habitual irony
often gave an amusing turn to them. When his brother, the most un-
popular man in England, solemnly warned him of plots against his
life, Charles laughingly bade him set all fear aside. " They will
never kill me, James," he said, " to make you king." But courage and
wit and ability seemed to have been bestowed on him in vain. Charles
hated business. He gave to outer observers no sign of ambition. The
one thing he seemed in earnest about was sensual pleasure, and he
took his pleasure with a cynical shamelessness which roused the dis-
gust even of his shameless courtiers. Mistress followed mistress,
and the guilt of a troop of profligate women was blazoned to the
world by the gift of titles and estates. The royal bastards were set
amongst English nobles. The ducal house of Grafton springs from
the King's adultery with Barbara Palmer, whom he created Duchess
of Cleveland. The Dukes of St. Albans owe their origin to his in-
trigue with Nell Gwynn, a player and a courtezan. Louise de
Qu^rouaille, a mistress sent by France to win him to its interests,
became Duchess of Portsmouth and ancestress of the house of Rich-
mond. An earlier mistress, Lucy Walters, was mother of a boy whom
he raised to the Dukedom of Monmouth, and to whom the Dukes of
Buccleuch trace their line ; but there is good reason for doubting
whether the King was actually his father. But Charles was far from

IX,]

THE REVOLUTION.

631

l1 irony
lost un-
nst his
ey will
ige and
Charles
n. The
and he
the dis-
listress,
to the
^ere set
rs from
)uchess
his in-
uise de
terests,
if Rich-
whom
ukes of
lubting
,r from

being content with these recognized mistresses, or with a single form
of self-indulgence. Gambling and drinking helped to fill up the vacant
moments when he could no longer toy with his favourites or bet at
Newmarket. No thought of remorse or of shame seems ever to have
crossed his mind. " He could not think God would make a man
miserable," he said once, " only for taking a little pleasure out of the
way." From shame indeed he was shielded by his cynical disbelief in
human virtue. Virtue he regarded simply as a trick by which clever
hypocrites imposed upon fools. Honour among men seemed to him
as mere a pretence as chastity among women. Gratitude he had none,
for he looked upon self-interest as the only motive of men's actions,
and though soldiers had died and women had risked their lives for
him, he " loved others as little as he thought they loved him." But
if he felt no gratitude for benefits he felt no resentment for wrongs.
He was incapable either of love or of hate. The only feeling he
retained for his fellow-men was that of an amused contempt.

It was difficult for Englishmen to believe that any real danger to
liberty could come from an idler and a voluptuary such as Charles the
Second. But in the very difficulty of believing this lay half the King's
strength. He had in fact no taste whatever for the despotism of the
Stuarts who had gone before him. His shrewdness laughed his
grandfather's theory of Divine Right down the wind, while his indo-
lence made such a personal administration as that which his father
delighted in burthensome to him. He was too humorous a man to
care for the pomp and show of power, and too good-natured a man to
play the tyrant. But he believed as firmly as his father or his grand-
father had believed in the older prerogatives of the Crown ; and, like
them, he looked on Parliaments with suspicion and jealousy. " He told
Lord Essex," Burnet says, " that he did not wish to be like a Grand
Signior, with some mutes about him, and bags of bowstrings to strangle
nen ; but he did not think he was a king so long as a company of fellows
were looking into his actions, and examining his ministers as well as his
accounts." " A king," he thought, " who might be checked, and have his
ministers called to an account, was but a king in name." In other words,
he had no settled plan of tyranny, but he meant to rule as independently
as he could, and from the beginning to the end of his reign there never
was a moment when he was not doing something to carry out his aim.
But he carried it out in a tentative, irregular fashion which it was as
hard to detect as to meet. Whenever there was any strong opposition
he gave way. If popular feeling demanded the dismissal of his minis-
ters, he dismissed them. If it protested against his declaration of
indulgence, he recalled it. If it cried for victims in the frenzy of the
Popish Plot, he gave it victims till the frenzy was at an end. It was
easy for Charles to yield and to wait, and just as easy for him to take
up the thread of his purpose again the moment the pressure was over.

Sec. III.
Charlbs

THE

Second
1667

1673

The
Kind's
Policy

•it

I iU

5 11

632

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. hi.

Chaki.ks

riiK
Second

1667

1673

Dissolution

the Union

1660

The one fixed resolve which overrode every other thought in the K'ng's
mind was a resolve "not to set out on his travels again." His father
had fallen through a quarrel with the two Houses, and Charles was
determined to remain on good terms with the Parliament till he was
strong enough to pick a quarrel to his profit. He treated the Lords
with an easy familiarity which robbed opposition of its seriousness.
" Their debates amused him," he said in his indolent way ; and he stood
chatting before the fire while peer after peer poured invectives on his
ministers, and laughed louder than the rest when Shaftesbury directed
his coarsest taunts at the barrenness of the Queen. Courtiers were
entrusted with the secret "management" of the Commons: obstinate
country gentlemen were brought to the royal closet to kiss the King's
hand and listen to the King's pleasant stories of his escape after
Worcester ; and still more obstinate country gentlemen were bribed.
Where bribes, flattery, and management failed, Charles was content
to yield and to wait till h!s time came again. Meanwhile he went on
patiently gathering up what fragments of the old royal power still
survived, and availing himself of whatever new resources offered
themselves. If he could not undo what Puritanism had done in
England, he could undo its work in Scotland and in Ireland. Before
the Civil War these kingdoms had served as useful checks on English
liberty, and by simply regarding the Union which the Long Parliament
and the Protector had brought about as a nullity in law it was possible
they might become checks again. In his refusal to recognize the
Union Charles was supported by public opinion among his English
subjects, partly from sheer abhorrence of changes wrought during " the
troubles," and partly from a dread that the Scotch and Irish members
would form a party in the English Parliament which would always be
at the service of the Crown. In both the lesser kingdoms too a
measure which seemed to restore somewhat of their independence
was for the moment popular. But the results of this step were quick
in developing themselves. In Scotland the Covenant was at once
abolished. The new Scotch Parliament at Edinburgh, the Drunken
Parliament, as it was called, outdid the wildest loyalty of the English
Cavaliers by annulling in a single Act all the proceedings of its pre-
decessors during the last eight-and-twenty years. By this measure
the whole existing Church system of Scotland was deprived of legal
sanction. The General Assembly had already been prohibited from
meeting by Cromwell ; the kirk-sessions and ministers' synods were
now suspended. The Scotch bishops were again restored to their
spiritual pre-eminence, and to their seat? in Parliament. An iniquitous
trial sent the Marquis of Argyle, the only noble strong enough to
oppose the royal will, to the block, and the government was entrusted
to a knot of profligate statesmen till it fell into the hands of Lauder-
dale, one of the ablest and most unscrupulous of the King's ministers.

Their poli

Presbyteri;

freedom, ai

struggle wi

be ready ir

port. In Ir

to their see

balance of

was baffled

plans for rei

struggle be(

the Protest

surrender o

hardly a six

holding. T

leave the g

moderate a

absolute ruJ

next reign.

in itself a ga

building up

hateful a thi

whom the N

to propose

brother Jami

disciplined f

national resi

availed hims

Monarchy m

five thousanc

A body of " j

mounted, an(

person; and

sisted, steadi

Twenty year

and one thoi

a reserve of

Provinces.

But Charle
James believ<
by the royal ]
less possible
down, Englis
nunciation of
ceased to be j

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

Their policy was steadily directed to the two purposes of humbling
Presbyterianism — as the force which could alone restore Scotland to
freedom, and enable her to lend aid as before to English liberty in any
struggle with the Crown — and that of raising a royal army which might
be ready in case of need to march over the border to the King's sup-
port. In Ireland the dissolution of the Union brought back the bishops
to their sees ; but whatever wish Charles may have had to restore the
balance of Catholic and Protestant as a source of power to the Crown
was baffled by the obstinate resistance of the Protestant settlers to any
plans for redressing the confiscations of Cromwell. Five years of bitter
struggle between the dispossessed loyalists and the new occupants left
the Protestant ascendency unimpaired ; and in spite of a nominal
surrender of one-third of the confiscated estates to their old possessors,
hardly a sixth of the profitable land in the island remained in Catholic
holding. The claims of the Duke of Ormond too made it necessary to
leave the government in his hands, and Ormond's loyalty was too
moderate and constitutional to lend itself to any of the schemes of
absolute rule which under Tyrconnell played so great a part in the
next reign. But the severance of the two kingdoms from England was
in itself a gain to the royal authority ; and Charles turned quietly to the
building up of a royal army at home. A standing army had become so
hateful a thing to the body of the nation, and above all to the royalists
whom the New Model had trodden under foot, that it was impossible
to propose its establishment. But in the mind of Charles and his
brother James, their father's downfall had been owing to the want of a
disciplined force which would have trampled out the first efforts of
national resistance ; and while disbanding the New Model, Charles
availed himself of the alarm created by a mad rising of some Fifth-
Monarchy men in London under an old soldier called Venner to retain
five thousand horse and foot in his service under the name of his guards.
A body of " gentlemen of quality and veteran soldiers, excellently clad,
mounted, and ordered," was thus kept ready for service near the royal
person ; and in spite of the scandal which it aroused the King per-
sisted, steadily but cautiously, in gradually increasing its numbers.
Twenty years later it had grown to a force of seven thousand foot
and one thousand seven hundred horse and dragoons at home, with
a reserve of six tine regiments abroad in the service of the United
Provinces. •

But Charles was too quick-witted a man to believe, as his brother
James believed, that it was possible to break down English freedom
by the royal power or by a few thousand men in arms. It was still
less possible by such means to break down, as he wished to break
down, English Protestantism. In heart, whether the story of his re-
nunciation of Protestantism during his exile be true or no, he had long
ceased to be a Protestant. Whatever religious feeling he had was on

633

Skc.III.
Chaki.es

THE

Second

1673

The Royal
A rmy

■vh

Charles

and
France

634

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.
Charles

THB

Second
1667

1673

Charles and
Catholicism

Marriage of
Charles

the side of Catholicism ; he encouraged conversions among his cour-
tiers, and the last act of his life was to seek formal admission into the
Roman Church. But his feelings were rather political than religious.
The English Roman Catholics formed a far larger part of the popula-
tion then than now ; their wealth and local influence gave them a
political importance which they have long since lost, and every motive
of gratitude as well as self-interest led him to redeem his pledge to
procure toleration for their worship. But he was already looking,
however vaguely, to something more than Catholic toleration. He
saw that despotism in the State could hardly co-exist with free inquiry
and free action in matters of the conscience, and that government, in
his own words, " was a safer and easier thing where the authority was
believed infallible and the faith and submission of the people were
implicit." The difficulties in the way of such a religious change
probably seemed the less to him from his long residence in Roman
Catholic countries, and from his own religious scepticism. Two years
indeed after his restoration he had already despatched an agent to
Rome to arrange the terms of a reconciliation between the Anglican
Church and the Papacy. But though he counted much for the success
of his project of toleration on taking advantage of the dissensions
between Protestant Churchmen and Protestant Dissenters he soon
discovered that for any real success in his political or religious aims he
must seek resources elsewhere than at home. At this moment France
was the dominant power in Europe. Its young King, Lewis the
Fourteenth, was the champion of Catholicism and despotism against
civil and religious liberty throughout the world. France was the
wealthiest of European powers, and her subsidies could free Charles
from dependence on his Parliament. Her army was the finest in the
world, and French soldiers could put down, it was thought, any resist-
ance from English patriots. The aid of Lewis could alone realize the
aims of Charles, and Charles was willing to pay the price which Lewis
demanded for his aid, the price of concurrence in his designs on Spain.
Spain at this moment had not only ceased to threaten Europe but
herself trembled at the threats of France ; and the aim of Lewis was
to complete her ruin, to win the Spanish provinces in the Netherlands,
and ultimately to secure the succession to the Spanish throne for a
French prince. But the presence of the French in Flanders was equally
distasteful to England and to Holland, and in such a contest Spain
might hope for the aid of these states and of the Empire. For some
years Lewis contented himself with perfecting his army and preparing
by skilful negotiations to make such a league of the great powers against
him impossi' 'e. His first success in England was in the marriage
of the King. Portugal, which had only just shaken ofif the rule of
Spain, was really dependent upon France ; and in accepting the
hand of Catharine of Braganza in spite of the protests of Spain, Charles

IX. 1

THE REVOLUTION.

63s

announced his adhesion to the alliance of Lewis. Already English
opinion saw the danger of such a course, and veered round to the
Spanish side. As early as 1661 the London mob backed the Spanisl'
ambassador in a street squabble for precedence with the ambas-
sador of France. "We do all naturally love the Spanish," says
Pepys, "and hate the French." The marriage of Catharine, the
sale of Dunkirk, the one result of Cromwell's victories, to !• ranee,
aroused the national jealousy and suspicion of French influence ;
and the war with Holland seemed at one time likely to end in a war
with Lewis. The Dutch war was in itself a serious stumblingblock in
the way of French projects. To aid either side was to throw the
other on the aid of the House of Austria, and to build up a league
which would check France in its aim. Only peace could keep the
European states disunited, and enable Lewis by their disunion to
carry out his design of seizing Flanders. His attempt at mediation
was fruitless ; the defeat of Lowestoft forced him to give aid to
Holland, and the news of his purpose at once roused England to a
hope of war. When Charles announced it to the Houses, " there was
a great noise," says Louvois, " in the Parliament to show the joy of
the two Houses at the prospect of a fight with us." Lewis, however,
cautiously limited his efiforts to narrowing the contest to a struggle at
sea, while England, vexed with disasters at home and abroad, could
scarcely maintain the war. The appearance of the Dutch fleet in the
[Thames was followed by the sudden conclusion of peace which
again left the ground clear for the diplomatic intrigues of Lewis.

In England the irritation was great and universal, but the public
resentment fell on Clarendon alone. Charles had been bitterly angered
when in 1663 his bill to vest a dispensing power in the Crown had been
met by Clarendon's open opposition. The Presbyterian party, repre-
sented by Ashley, and the Catholics, led by the Earl of liristol, alike
sought his overthrow ; in the Court he was opposed by Bennet, after-
wards Earl of Arlington, a creature of the King's. But Clarendon was
still strong in his intimate connexion with the King's affairs, in the
marriage of his daughter, Anne Hyde, to the Duke of York, in his
capacity for business, above all in the support of the Church, and the
confidence of the royalist and orthodox House of Commons. Foiled
in their efiforts to displace him, his rivals had availed themselves of
the jealousy of the merchant-class to drive him against his will into
[the war with Holland ; and though the Chancellor succeeded in
forcing the Five Mile Act through the Houses in the teeth of Ashley's
jprotests, the calculations of his enemies were soon verified The union
Ibetween Clarendon and the Parliament was broken by the war. The
jParliament was enraged by his counsel for its dissolution, and by his
Iproposal to raise troops without a Parliamentary grant, and his oppo-
Isition to the inspection of accounts, in which they saw an attempt

Sec. III.
Charles

THB

Second
1667

1673

li!li

1665

Peace of
Breda

1667

The
Fall of
Clarendon

i ,

r ■

fla

Is Ij

636

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

Sec. III.
Charles

THK

Sbcunu
1067

1073

The Cabal

i668

The policy
of France

1667

[chap.

to re-establish the one thing they hated most, a standing army. Charles
could at last free himself from the minister who had held him in check
so long ; the Chancellor was dismissed from office, and driven to take
refuge in France. By the exile of Clarendon, the death of South-
ampton, and the retirement of Ormond and Nicholas, the party
of constitutional loyalists in the Council ceased to e.xist ; and the
section which had originally represented the Presbyterians, and which
under the guidance of Ashley had bent to purchase toleration even
at the cost of increasing the prerogatives of the Crown, came to the
front of affairs. The religious policy of Charles had as yet been
defeated by the sturdy Churchmanship of the Parliament, the influence
of Clarendon, and the reluctance of the Presbyterians as a body to
accept the Royal " indulgence" at the price of a toleration of Catholicism
and a recognition of the King's power to dispense with Parliamentary
statutes. The first steps of the new ministry in releasing Noncon-
formists from prison, in suffering conventicles to reopen, and suspending
the operation of the Act of Uniformity, were in open defiance of the
known will of the two Houses. But when Charles again proposed to
his counsellors a general toleration he no longer found himself supported
by them as in 1663. Even Ashley's mood was changed. Instead of
toleration they pressed for a union of Protestants which would have
utterly foiled the King's projects ; and a scheme of Protestant compre-
hension which had been approved by the moderate divines on both
sides, by Tillotson and Stillingfleet on the part of the Church as well
as by Manton and Baxter on the part of the Nonconformists, was laid
before the House of Commons. Even its rejection failed to bring
Ashley and his party back to their old position. They were still for
toleration, but only for a toleration the benefit of which did not extend j
to Catholics, " in respect the laws have determined the principles of the
Romish religion to be inconsistent with the safety of your Majesty's
person and government." The policy of the Council in fact was]
determined by the look of public affairs abroad. Lewis had quickly
shown the real cause of the eagerness with which he had pressed on j
the Peace of Breda between England and the Dutch. He had secured
the neutrality of the Emperor by a secret treaty which shared the!
Spanish dominions between the two monarchs in case the King of j
Spain died without an heir. England, as he believed, was held inj
check by Charles, and like Holland was too exhausted by the late war!
to meddle with a new one. On the very day therefore on which the!
treaty was signed he sent in his formal claims on the Low Countries,!
and his army at once took the field. The greater part of Flandersj
was occupied and six great fortresses secured in two months.!
Franche Comtd was overrun in seventeen days. Holland protested!
and appealed to England for aid ; but her appeals remained at first!
unanswered. England sought in fact to tempt Holland, Spain, and!

France in

manded, as

share in tl

assignment

World. Bi

became clej

gradually se

ment. The

of France, r

licism. Me

and with it

himself had

in heart he

and of the ir

keep the Fre

Lewis, warn<

offers of pea

turning over

to carry ther

were, in fact,

Arlington de

signature of j

bound Lewis

him the Peac

Few measu

"It is the on]

since the Kin

as a Tory, co

Triple Bond

Lewis to adh

advantageous

about too thai

felt instinctive

ton's aim to n

and he tried

Swiss Cantons

foiled; but thi

Alliance whicl

back the repui

It was a sign (

and of the forr

to the welfare

of England w

Holland. Thj

phrase to Holl

[chap.

IX]

THE REVOLUTION.

637

Charles
n check
I to take
F South-
le party
and the
id which
ion even
ne to the
y'Ct been
influence
body to
thoUcism
amentary
Noncon-
ispending
ice of the
jposed to
supported
instead of
ould have
it compre-
s on both
ch as well
was laid
to bring
e still for
ot extend
lies of the
Majesty's
fact was
,d quickly
Iressed on
.d secured
Ihared the
^e King of
,s held in
|e late war
Iv^rhich the
ountries,
Flanders
months,
protested
;d at first
pain, and!

France in turn by secret oflTers of alliance. From France she de-
manded, as the price of her aid against Holland and perhaps Spain, a
share in the eventual partition of the Spanish dominions, and an
assignment to her in such a case of the Spanish Empire in the New
World. But all her offers were alike refused. The need of action
became clearer every hour to the English ministers, and wider views
gradually set aside the narrow dreams of merely national aggrandize-
ment. The victories of Lewis, the sudden revelation of the strength
of France, roused even in the most tolerant minds a dread of Catho-
licism. Men felt instinctively that the very existence of Protestantism
and with it of civil freedom was again to be at stake. Arlington
himself had a Dutch wife and had resided in Spain ; and Catholic as
in heart he was, thought more of the political interests of England,
and of the invariable resolve of its statesmen since Elizabeth's day to
keep the French out of Flanders, than of the interests of Catholicism.
Lewis, warned of his danger, strove to lull the general excitement by
offers of peace to Spain, while he was writing to Turenne, " I am
turning over in my head things that are far from impossible, and go
to carry them into execution whatever they may cost.'' Three armies
were, in fact, ready to march on Spain, Germany, and Flanders, when
Arlington despatched Sir William Temple to the Hague, and the
signature of a Triple Alliance between England, Holland, and Sweden
bound Lewis to the terms he had offered as a blind, and forced on
him the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle.

Few measures have won a greater popularity than the Triple Alliance.
" It is the only good public thing," says Pepys, " that hath been done
since the King came to England." Even Dryden, writing at the time
as a Tory, counted among the worst of Shaftesbury's crimes that " the
Triple Bond he broke." In form indeed the Alliance simply bound
Lewis to adher6 to terms of peace proposed by himself, and those
advantageous terms. But in fact it utterly ruined his plans. It brought
about too that union of the powers of Europe against which, as Lewis
felt instinctively, his ambition w tuld dash itself in vain. It was Arling-
ton's aim to make the Alliance the nucleus of a greater confederation ;
and he tried not only to perpetuate it, but to include within it the
Swiss Cantons, the Empire, and the House of Austria. His efforts were
foiled ; but the " Triple Bond" bore within it the germs of the Grand
Alliance which at last saved Europe. To England it at once brought
back the reputation which she had lost since the death of Cromwell.
It was a sign of her re-entry on the general stage of European politics,
and of the formal a ' >ption of the balance of power as a policy essential
to the welfare of Europe at large. But it was not so much the action
of England which had galled the pride of Lewis, as the action of
Holland. That "a nation of shopkeepers" (for Lewis applied the
phrase to Holland long before Napoleon applied it to England) should

Sec III.
Chahi.e.h

Tlllf

Second
1667

1673

The Triple
A lliance

1668

The

Treaty

of Dover

\ .

638

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap. I IX.]

Sbc. III.
Chari.rs

THE

Sf.cono
1667

1673

Charles
turns to
France

1669

May 1670

have foiled his plans at the very moment of their realization, " stung
him," he owned, "to the quick." If he refrained from an instant
attack it was to nurse a surer revenge. His steady aim during the
four years which followed the Peace of Aix-la-Chapellc was to isolate
the United Provinces, to bring about the neutrality of the Funpirc
in any attack on them, to break the Triple Alliance by detaching
Sweden from it and securing Charles, and to leave the Dutch without
help, save from the idle goodwill of IJrandcnburg and Spain. lijs
diplomacy was everywhere successful, but it was nowhere so successful
as with England. Charles had been stirred to a momentary pride by
the success of the Triple Alliance, but he had never seriously aban-
doned his policy, and he was resolute at last to play an active part in
realizing it. It was clear that little v,'as to be hoped for from his old
plans of winning toleration for the Catholics from his new ministers,
and that in fact they were resolute to bring about such a union of Pro-
testants as would have been fatal to his designs. From this moment
he resolved to seek for his advantage from France. The Triple Alliance
was hardly concluded when he declared to Lewis his purpose of enter-
ing into an alliance with him, offensive and defensive. He owned to
being the only man in his kingdom who desired such a league, but he
was determined to realize his desire, whatever might be the sentiments
of his ministers. His ministers, indeed, he meant either to bring over
to his scheri?es or to outwit. Two of them, Arlington and Sir Thomas
Clifford, were Catholics in heart like the King ; and they were sum-
moned, with the Duke of York, who had already secretly embraced
Catholicism, and two Catholic nobles, to a conference in which Charles,
after pledging them to secrecy, "declared himself a Catholic, and asked
their counsel as to the means of establishing the Catholic religion in
his realm. It was resolved to apply to Lewis for aid in this purpose;
and Charles proceeded to seek from the King a " protection," to use
the words of the French ambassador, " of which he always hoped to
feel the powerful effects in the execution of his design of changing the j
present state of religion in England for a better, and of establishing
his authority so as to be able to retain his subjects in the obedience
they owe him." The fall of Holland was as needful for the success of
the plans of Charles as of Lewis ; and with the ink of the Triple
Alliance hardly dry, Charles promised help in Lewis's schemes for the
ruin of Holland and the annexation of Flanders. He offered therefore
to declare his rehgion and to join France in an attack on Holland, if
Lewis would grant him a subsidy equal to a million a year. In the
event of the King of Spain's death without a son Charles pledged
himself to support France in her claims upon Flanders, while Lewis
promised to assent to the designs of England on the Spanish dominions
in America. On this basis, after a year's negotiations, a secret treaty
was concluded at Dover in an interview between Charles and his I

THE REVOLUTION.

639

sister Henrietta, the Uuchcss of Orleans. It provided that Charles
should announce his conversion, and that in case of any disturbance
arising from such a step he should be supported by a French army and
a French subsidy. War was to be declared by both powers against
Holland, England furnishing a small land force, but bearing the chief
burthen of the contest at sea, on condition of an annual subsidy of
three hundred thousand pounds.

Nothing marks better the political profligacy of the age than that
Arlington, the author of the Triple Alliance, should have been chosen
as the confidant of Charles in his treaty of Dover. Hut to all save
Arlington and Clifford the King's change of religion or his political
aims remained utterly unknown. It would have been impossible to
obtain the consent of the party in the royal council which represented
the old Presbyterians, of Ashley or Lauderdale or the Duke of Buck-
ingham, to the Treaty of Dover. But it was possible to trick them into
approval of a war with Holland by playing on their desire for a
toleration of the Nonconformists. The announcement of the King's
Catholicism was therefore deferred ; and a series of mock negotiations,
carried on through Buckingham, ended in the conclusion of a sham
treaty which was communicated to Lauderdale and to Ashley, a treaty
which suppressed all mention of the religious changes or of the
promise of French aid in bringing them about, and simply stipulated
for a joint war against the Dutch. In such a war there was no formal
breach of the Triple Alliance, for the Triple Alliance only guarded
against an attack on the dominions of Spain, and Ashley and his
colleagues were lured into assent to it in I671 by the promise of a
toleration on their own terms. Charles in fact yielded the point to
which he had hitherto clung, and, as Ashley demanded, promised that
no Catholic should be benefited by the Indulgence. The bargain once
struck, and his ministers outwitted, it only remained for Charles to
outwit his Parliament. A large subsidy had been demanded in 1670 for
the fleet, under the pretext of upholding the Triple Alliance ; and the
subsidy was granted. In the spring the two Houses were adjourned.
So great was the national opposition to his schemes that Charles was
driven to plunge hastily into hostilities. An attack on a Dutch
convoy was at once followed by a declaration of war, and fresh supplies
were obtained for the coming struggle by closing the Exchequer, and
suspending under Clifford's advice the payment of either principal or
interest on loans advanced to the public Treasury. The suspension
spread bankruptcy among half the goldsmiths of London ; but with
the opening of the war Ashley and his colleagues gained the toleration
they had bought so dear. By virtue of his ecclesiastical powers the
King ordered " that all manner of penal laws on matters ecclesiastical
against whatever sort of Nonconformists or recusants should be from
that day suspended," and gave liberty of public worship to all

Src. III.
Charles

TMK

Second
1607

1673

Th«

DeclMTA-

tion of

Indul-

The Cabal
and the war

1671

167a

640

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAT.

Sec. III.
Charles

THE

Second
1667

1673

The

War with

Holland

1673

Rise of the

Country

Party

dissidents save Catholics, who were allowed to say mass only in
private houses. The effect of the Declaration went far to justify
Ashley and his colleagues (if anything could justify their course) in
the bargain by which they purchased toleration. Ministers returned,
after years of banishment, to their homes and their flocks. Chapels
were reopened. The gaols were emptied. Bunyan left his prison at
Bedford ; and hundreds of Quakers, who had been the special objects
of persecution, were set free to worship God after their own fashion.

The Declaration of Indulgence however failed to win any expression
of gratitude from the bulk of the Nonconformists. Dear as toleration
was to them, the general interests of religion were dearer, anc! not
only these but national freedom was now at stake. The success or the
Allies seemed at first complete. The French army passed the Rhine,
ovenan three of the States without opposition, and pushed its outposts
to within sight of Amsterdam. It was r nly by skill and desperate
courage that the Dutch ships under De I.uyter held the English fleet
under the Duke of York at bay in an obstinate battle off the coast of
Suffolk. The triumph of the English cabinet was shown in the eleva-
tion of the leaders of both its parties. Ashley was made Chancellor
and Earl of Shaftesbury, and Clifford became Lord Treasurer. But
the Dutch were saved by the stubborn courage which awoke before
the arrogant demands of the conqueror. The plot of the two Courts
hung for success on the chances of a rapid surprise ; and with the
approach of winter which suspended military operations, all chance of
a surprise was over. The death of De Witt, the leader of the great
merchant class, called William the Prince of Orange to the head of
the Republic. Young a5. he was, he at once displayed the cool/courage
and tenacity of his race. "Do you not see your country is lost?"
asked the Duke of Buckingham, who had been sent to negotiate at
the Hague. " There is a sure way never to see it lost," replied WiUiam,
" ai'd that is, to die in the last ditch." With the spring the tide
began to turn. Holland was saved and province after province won
back from France by William's dauntless resolve. In England the
delay of winter had exhausted the supplies which had been so un-
scrupulously procured, while the closing of the Treasury had shaken
credit and rendered it in.possible to raise a loan. It was necessary in
1673 to appeal to the Commons, but the Commons met in a mood of |
angry distrust. The war, unpopular as it was, they left alone. What
overpowered all other feelings was a vague sense, which we know now
to have been justified by the facts, that liberty and religion were being
unscrupulously betrayed. There was a suspicion that the whole armed
force of the nation was in Catholic hands. The Duke of York was
suspected of being m heart a Papist, and he was in command of the
fleet. Catholics had been placed as officers in the force which was
being raised for the war in Holland. Lady Castiemaine, the King's

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

641

only in
o justify
ourse) in
returned,
Chapels
prison at
al objects
"ashion.
;xpression
toleration
r, ant', not
;ess 01 the
;he Rhine,
:s outposts
desperate
iiglish fleet
lie coast of
L the eleva-
Chancellor
iurer. But
^^oke before
two Courts
id with the
II chance of
)f the great
the head of
ool'courage
ry is lost?"
egotiate at
d WilUam,
g the tide
[ovince won
.ngland the
een so un-
ihad shaken
ecessary in
a mood of
ine. What
know now
were being
■hole armed
if York was
and of the
which was
the King's

mistress, paraded her conversion ; and doubts were fast gathering
over the Protestantism of the King. There was a general suspicion
that a plot was on foot for the establishment of Catholicism and des-
potism, and that the war and the Indulgence were parts of the plot.
The change of temper m the Commons was marked by the appearance
of what was from that time called the Country party, with Loid
Russell, Lord Cavendish, and Sir William Coventry at its head, a
party which sympathized with the desire of the Nonconformists for
religious toleration, but looked en it as its first duty to guard against
the designs of the Court. As to the Declaration of Indulgence, how-
ever, all parties in the House were at one. The Commons resolved
"that penal statutes in matters ecclesiastical cannot be suspended but
by consent of Parliament," and refused supplies till the Declaration
was recalled. The King yielded ; but the Declaration was no sooner
recalled than a Test Act was passed through both Houses without
opposition, which required from every one in the civil and military
employment of the State the oaths of allegiance and supremacy, a
declaration against transubstantiation, and a reception of the sacra-
ment according to the rites of the Church of England. It was known
that the Protestant dissidents were prepared to waive all objection to
oath or sacrament, while the Bill would wholly exclude Catholics from
share in the government. Clifford at once counselled resistance, and
Buckingham talked flightily about bringing the army to London. But
the grant of a subsidy was still held in suspense ; and Arlington, who
saw that all hope of carrying the " great plan " through was at an end,
pressed Charles to yield. A dissolution was the King's only resource,
but in the temper of the nation a new Parliament would have been
yet more violent than the present one ; and Charles sullenly gave way.
Few measures have ever brought about more startling results. The
Duke of York owned himself a Catholic, and resigned his ofifice as
Lord High Admiral. Throngs of excited people gathered round the
Lord Treasurer's house at the news that Clifford, too, h'td owned to
being a Catholic and had laid down his staff of office. Their resigna-
tion was followed by that of hundreds of others in the army and Ihe
jcivil service of the Crown. On public opinion the effect was wonderful.
'"I dare not write all the strange talk of the town," says Evelyn. The
resignations were held to have proved the existence of the dangers
Iwhich the Test Act had been framed to meet. From this moment all
ust in Charles was at an end. " The King,'' Shaftesbury said bitterly,
"who if he had been so happy as to have been born a private gentle-
an had certainly passed for a man of good parts, excellent breeding,
ind well natured, hath now, being a Prince, brought his affairs to that
)ass that there is not a person in the world, man or woman, that dares
ily upon him or put any confidence in his word or friendship."

T T

Sec. III.
Charles

THE

Second
1667

1673

r/ie Test
Act

^- n

642

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAr.

Sec. IV.

Dandy
1673

1678

Sliaftea-
bury

iiection IV.— Dauby. 1673-1678.

[Authorities. — As before. Mr. Christie's ** Life of Shaftesbury," a defence,
and in some respects a ^iccessful defence, of that statesman's career, throws a
fresh light on the policy of the Whig party during this period.]

The one man in England en whom the discovery of the King's
perfidy fell with the most crushing effect was the Chancellor, Lord
Shaftesbury. Ashley Cooper had piqued himself on a penetration
which read the characters of men around him, and on a political
instinct which discerned every coming change. His self-reliance was
wonderful. In mere boyhood he saved his estate from the greed of his
guardians by boldly appealing in person to Noy, who was then Attorney-
General. As an undergraduate at Oxford he organized a rebellion of
the frcshnier. against the oppressive customs which were enforced by
the sen'or men of his college, and succeeded in abolishing them. At
eighteen he was a member of the Short Parliament. On the outbreak
of the Civil War he took part with the King ; but in the midst of the
royal successes he foresaw the ruin of the royal cause, passed to the
Parliament, attached him? r^lf to the fortunes of Cromwell, and became
member of the Council of State. Before all things a strict Parlia-
mentarian, however, he was alienated by Cromwell's setting up of
absolute rule without Parliament ; and a temporary disgrace during
the last years of the Protectorate only quickened him to an active
opposition which did much to bring about its fall. His bitter invec-
tives against the dead Protector, his intrigues with Monk, and the
active part which he took, as member of the Council of State, in the
King's recall, were rcvarded at the Restoration with a peerage, and
with promotion to a foremost share in the royal councils. Ashley
v;as then a man of forty, and under the Commonwealth he had
been, in the contemptuous phrase of Dryden when writing as a
Tory, " the loudest bagpipe of the squeaking train ; " but he was
no sooner a minister of Charles than he flung himself into the de-
bauchery of the Court with an ardour which surprised even his
master. " You are the wickedest dog in England ! " laughed Charles
at some unscrupulous jest of his counsellor's. " Of a subject. Sir, I
believe I am!" was the unabashed reply. But the debauchery of I
Ashley was simply a mask. He was in fact temperate by nature and
hcbit, and his ill-health rendered any great excess impossible. Men
soon found that the courtier who lounged in Lady Castlemaine's
boudoir, or drank and jested with Sedley and Buckingham, was a
diligent and able man of business. " He is a man," says the puzzled!
Pepys, three years after the Restoration, " of great business, and yet
of pleasure and dissipation too." His rivals were as envious of the
ease and mastery with which he dealt with questions of finance, as ofl

the "nin
years his
owned tl
access," 2
the needf
that his ]
behind it
which sei
tlie nervoi
was " fretl
weakness
attacked r
Burnet, wj
in speakin
them was
preaching
in the Hou
laughing u
As a stal
from his w(
in his scorr
every fault
political le
religion he
death our s
representat
royal counc
tion, but hii
that perseci
and that th(
thus exposei
England of
Churchmen
temper of E:
toleration s;
despatch of
influence ovc
which Ashle;
as we have s
protecting A
the Test and
cution of the
ability with m
the Dutch wa
Parliament t<

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

643

King's
ir, Lord
etration
political
nee was
;d of his
Lttorney-
>ellion of
orced by
lem. At
outbreak
1st of the
gd to the
d became
;t Parha-
ng up of
ze during
an active
ter invec-
and the
,te, in the
;rage, and
Ashley
Ih he had
jting as a
it he was
o the de-
even his
;d Charles
ect, Sir, I
juchery of
lature and
lie. Men
itlemaine's
.m, was a I
te puzzled
is, and yet]
JUS of the I
.nee, as of

the "nimble wit" which won the favour of the King. Even in later
years his industry earned the grudging praise of his enemies. Dryden
owned that as Chancellor he was " swift to despatch and easy of
access," and wondered at the restless activity which " refused his age
the needful hours of rest." His activity indeed was the more wonderful
that his health was utterly broken. An accident in early days left
behind it an abiding weakness, whose traces were seen in the furrows
which seared his long pale face, in the feebleness of his health, and
the nervous tremor which shook his puny frame. The " pigmy body ''
was " fretted to decay " by the ''fiery soul" within it. But pain and
weakness brought with them no sourness of spirit. Ashley was
attacked more unscrupulously than any statesman save Walpole ; but
Burnet, who did not love him, owns that he was never bitter or angry
in speaking of his assailants. Even the wit with which he crushed
them was commonly good-humoured. "When will you have done
preaching ? " a bishop murmured testily, as Shaftesbury was speaking
in the House of Peers. " When I am a bishop, my Lord ! " was the
laughing reply.

As a statesman Ashley not only stood high among his contemporaries
from his wonderful readiness and industry, but he stood far above them
in his scorn of personal profit. Even Dryden, while raking together
every fault in his character, owns that his hands w<5re clean. As a
political leader his position was to modern eyes odd enough. In
religion he was at best a Deist, with some fanciful notions " that after
death our souls lived in stars." But Deist as he was, he remained the
representative of the Presbyterian and Nonconformist party in the
royal council. He was the steady and vehement advocate of tolera-
tion, but his advocacy v/as based on purely political grounds. He saw
that persecution would fail to bring back the Dissenters to the Church,
and that the effort to recall them only left the country disunited, and
thus exposed English liberty to invasion from the Crown, and robbed
England of all influence in Europe. The one means of uniting
Churchmen and Dissidents was by a policy of toleration, but in the
temper of England after the Restoration he saw no hope of obtaining
toleration save from the King. Wit, debauchery, rapidity in the
despatch of business, were all therefore used as a means to gain
influence over the King, and to secure him as a friend in the struggle
which Ashley carried on against the intolerance of Clarendon. Charles,
as we have seen, had his own game to play and his own reasons for
protecting Ashley during his vehement but fruitless struggle against
the Test and Corporation Act, the Act of Uniformity, and the perse-
cution of the Dissidents. Fortune at last smiled on the unscrupulous
ability with whicb he entangled Clarendon in the embarrassments of
the Dutch war of 1664, and took advantage of the alienation of the
Parliament to ensure his fall. By a yet more unscrupulous bargain

T T 2

Sec. IV.

Danby
1673

1678

Shaftes-
bury's
Policy

I '41

; K iy!|

644

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CIIAI-

Sec. IV.

Daniiy
1673

1678

Shaftes-
bury's

change of
poiicy

Ashley had bought, as he believed, the Declaration of Indulgence, the
release of the imprisoned Nonconformists, and freedom of worship for
all dissidents, at the price of a consent to the second attack on
Holland ; and he was looked on by the public at large as the minister
most responsible both for the measures he advised and the measures
he had nothing to do with. But while facing the gathering storm of
unpopularity Ashley learnt in a moment of drunken confidence the
secret of the King's religion. He owned to a friend " his trouble at the
black cloud which was gathering over England ; " but, troubled as he
was, he still believed himself strong enough to use Charles for his own
purposes. His acceptance of the Chancellorship and of the Earldom
of Shaftesbury, as well as his violent defence of the war on opening the
Parliament, identified him yet more with the royal policy. It was
after ihe opening of the Parliament, if we credit the statement of the
French Ambassador, that he learnt from Arlington the secret of the
Treaty of Dover. Whether this were so, or whether suspicion, as in
the people at large, deepened into certainty, Shaftesbury saw he had
been duped. To the bitterness of such a discovery was added the
bitterness of having aided in schemes which he abhorred. His change
of policy was rapid and complete. He pressed in the royal council for
the withdrawal of the Declaration of Indulgence. In Parliament he
supported the Test Act with extraordinary vehemence. The displace-
ment of James and Clifford by <-he Test left him, as ht thought, dominant
in the royal council, and gav<i him hopes of revenging the deceit which
had been practised on him by forcing his poHcy on the King. He was
resolved to end the war. He had dreams of meeting the danger of a
Catholic successor by a dissolution of the King's marriage and by a
fresh match with a Protestant princess. For the moment indeed
Charles was helpless. He found himself, as he had told Lewis long
before, alone in his realm. The Test Act had been passed unani-
mously by both Houses. Even the Nonconformists deserted him, and
preferred persecution to the support of his plans. The dismissal of the
Catholic officers made the employment of force, if he ever contemplated
it, impossible, while the ill success of the Dutch war robbed him of all
hope of aid from France. The firmness of the Prince of Orange had
roused the stubborn energy of his countrymen. The French conquests
on land were slowly won back, and at sea the fleet of the allies was
still held in check by the fine seamanship of De Ruyter. Nor was
William less successful in diplomacy than in war. The House of
Austria was at last roused to action by the danger which threatened
Europe, and its union with the United Provinces laid the foundation
of the Grand Alliance. If Charles was firm to continue the war,
Shaftesbury, like the Parliament itself, was resolved on peace ; and for
this purpose he threw himself into hearty alliance with the Country
party in the Commons, and welcomed the Duke of Ormond and Prince

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

Rupert, who were looked upon as " great Parliament men," back to
the royal council. It was to Shaftesbury's influence that Charles
attributed the dislike which the Commons displayed to the war, and
their refusal of a grant of supplies until fresh religious securities were
devised. It was at his instigation that an address was presented by
both Houses against the plan of marrying James to a Catholic
princess, Mary of Modena. But the projects of Shaftesbury were
suddenly interrupted by an unexpected act of vigour on the part of
the King. The Houses were no sooner prorogued in November than
the Chancellor was ordered to deliver up the Seals.

" It is only laying down my gown and buckling on my sword,"
Shaftesbury is said to have replied to the royal bidding ; and, though
the words were innocent enough, for the sword was part of the usual
dress of a gentleman which he must necessarily resume when he laici
aside the gown of the Chancellor, they were taken as conveying a covert
threat. He was still determined to force on the King a peace with the
States. But he looked forward to the dangers of the future with even
greater anxiety than to those of the present. The Duke of York, the
successor to the throne, had owned himself a Catholic, and almost
every one agreed that securities for the national religion would be
necessary in the case of his accession. But Shaftesbury saw, and it is
his especial merit that he did see, that with a king like James, convinced
of his Divine Right and bigoted in his religious fervour, securities
were valueless. From the first he determined to force on Charles his
brother's exclusion from the throne, and his resolve was justified by
the Revolution which finally did the work he proposed to do. Un-
happily he was equally determined to fight Charles with weapons as
vile as his own. The result of Clifford's resignation, of James's
acknowledgement of his conversion, had been to destroy all belief in
the honesty of public men. A panic of distrust had begun. The fatal
truth was whispered that Charles himself was a Catholic. In spite of
the Test Act, it was suspected that men Catholics in heart still held
high office in the State, and we know that in Arlington's case the
suspicion was just. Shaftesbury seized on this public alarm, stirred
above all by a sense of inability to meet the secret dangers which day
after day was disclosing, as the means of carrying out his plans. He
began fanning the panic by tales of a Papist rising in London, and
of a coming Irish revolt with a French army to ba:k it. He retired to
his house in the City to find security against a conspiracy which had
been formed, he said, to cut his throat. Meanwhile he rapidly organized
the Country party in the Parhament, and placed himself openly at its
head. An address for the removal of ministers " popishly affected or
otherwise obnoxio'ic or dangerous " was presented on the reassembling
of the Houses. The Commons called on the King to dismiss Lauder-
dale, Buckingham, and Arlington, and to disband the troops raised

64s

Sec. IV.

Dan BY
1673

1678

Shaftes-
bury's
Dismissal

1673

Charles

and
Shaftes-
bury

'."n

: . '

, ■ 1 i

"i i-

1 1
■I

, 1

V. ■ \ ■

... ll

The public
panic

1674

646

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV,

Danby
1673

1678

Peace with
Holland

1674

Danby

since 1664. A bill was brought in to prevent all Catholics from
approaching the Court, in other words for removing James from the
King's councils. A far more important bill was that of the Protestant
Securities, which was pressed by Shaftesbury, Halifax, and Carlisle,
the leaders of the new Opposition in the House of Lords, a bill which
enacted that any prince of the blood should forfeit his right to the
Crown on his marriage with a Catholic. The bill, which was the first
sketch of the later Exclusion Bill, failed to pass, but its failure left the
Houses excited and alarmed. Shaftesbury intrigued busily in the City,
corresponded with William of Orange, and pressed for a war with
France which Charles could only avert by an appeal to Lewis, a subsidy
from whom enabled him to prorogue the Parliament. But Charles saw
that the time had come to give way. " Things have turned out ill," he
said to Temple with a burst of unusual petulance, " but had I been well
served I mighi have made a good business of it." His concessions
however were as usual complete. He dismissed Buckingham and
Arlington. He made peace with the Dutch. But Charles was never
more formidable than in the moment of defeat, and he had already
resolved on a new policy by which the efforts of Shaftesbury might be
held at bay. Ever since the opening of his reign he had clung to a
system of balance, had pitted Churchman against Nonconformist, and
Ashky against Clarendon, partly to preserve his own independence, and
partly with a view of winning some advantage to the Catholics from the
political strife. The temper of the Commons had enabled Clarendon to
baffle the King's efforts ; and on his fall Charles felt strong enough to
abandon the attempt to preserve a political balance, and had sought
to carry out his designs with the single support of the Nonconformists.
But the new policy had broken down like the old. The Noncon-
formists refused to betray the cause of Protestantism, and Shaftesbury,
their leader, was pressing on measures which would rob Catholicism
of the hopes it had gained from the conversion of James. In straits
like these Charles resolved to win back the Commons by boldly
adopting the policy on which the House was set. The majority of
its members were Cavalier Churchmen, who regarded Sir Thomas
Osborne, a dependant of Arlington's, as their representative in the
royal councils. The King had already created Osborne Earl of Danby,
and made him Lord Treasurer in Clifford's room. In 1674 he frankly
adopted the policy of Danby and his party in the Parliament.

The policy of Danby was in the main that of Clarendon. He had
all Clarendon's love of the Church, his equal hatred of Popery and
Dissent, his high notions of the prerogative tempered by a faith in
Parliament and the law. His first measures were directed to allay the
popular panic, and strengthen the position of James. Mary, the
Duke's eldest child and after him the presumptive heir to the Crown,
was confirmed by the royal order as a Protestant. Secret negotiations

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

were opened for her marriage with William of Orange, the bo.* '^f the
King's sister Mary, who if James and his house were excluded stood
next in succession to the crown. Such a marriage secured James
against the one formidable rival to his claims, while it opened to
William a far safer cliance of mounting the throne at his father-in-law's
death. The union between the Church and the Crown was ratified in
conferences between Danby and the bishops ; and its first fruits were
seen in the rigorous enforcement of the law against conventicles, and
the exclusion of all Catholics from court ; while the Parliament which
was assembled in i'^?? was assured that the Test Act should be
rigorously enforced. The change in the royal policy came not a
moment too soon. As it was, the aid of the Cavalier party which
rallied round Danby hardly saved the King from the humiliation of
being forced to recall the troops he still maintained in the French
service. To gain a majority on this point Danby was forced to avail
himself of a resource which f*-om this time played for nearly a hundred
years an important part in English politics. He bribed lavishly. He
was more successful in winning back the majority of the Commons
from their alliance with the Country party by reviving the old spirit of
religious persecution. He proposed that the test which had been
imposed by Clarendon on municipal officers should be extended to all
functionaries of the State ; that every member of either House, every
magistrate and public officer, should swear never to take arms against
the King or to " endeavour any alteration of the Protestant religion
now established by law in the Church of England, or any alteration in
the Government in Church and State as it is by law established." Tho
Bill was forced through the Lords by the bishops and the Cavalier party,
and its passage through the Commons was only averted by a quarrel
on privilege between the two Houses which Shaftesbury dexterously
fanned into flame. On the other hand the Country party remained
strong enough to hamper their grant of supplies with conditions
unacceptable to the King. Eager as they were for the war with France
which Danby promised, the Commons could not trust the King ; and
Danby was soon to discover how wise their distrust had been. For
the Houses were no sooner prorogued than Charles revealed to him
the negotiations he had been all the while carrying on with Lewis, and
required him to sign a treaty by which, on consideration of a yearly
pension guaranteed on the part of France, the two sovereigns bound
themselves to enter into no engagements with other powers, and to
lend each other aid in case of rebellion in their dominions. Such a
treaty not only bound England to dependence on France, but freed the
King from all Pariiamentary control. But his minister pleaded in vain
for delay and for the advice of the Council. Charles answeried his
entreaties by signing the treaty with his own hand. Danby found
himself duped by the King as Shaftesbury had found himself duped ;

647

•i!

■^ i!;l

Sec. IV.

Da Nil Y
1673

1678

•' '! il

Nh'

Danby and
the Com-
mons

t'X

i'i; i

1675

Danhy's
measures

m ■

648

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOFLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.
Dakbv

ie73

1678

Feb. 1677

Treaty

.Of NIme.

Knen

but his bold temper was only spurred to fresh plans for rescuing
Charles from his bondage to Lewis. To do this the first step was
to reconcile the King and the Parliament, which met after a pro-
rogation of fifteen months. The Country party stood in the way of
such a reconciliation, but Danby resolved to break its strength by
measures of unscrupulous vigour, for which a blunder of Shaftesbury's
gave an opportunity. Shaftesbury despaired of bringing the House of
Commons, elected as it had been fifteen years before in a moment of
religious and political reaction, to any steady opposition to the Crown.
He had already moved an address for a dissolution ; and he now urged
that as a statute of Edward the Third ordained that Parliaments
should be held " once a year or oftener if need be," the Parliament by
the recent prorogation of a year and a half had ceased legally to exist.
The Triennial Act deprived such an argument of any force. But
Danby represented it as a contempt of the House, and the Lords at
his bidding committed its supporters, Shaftesbury, Buckingham, Salis-
bury, and Wharton, to the Tower. While the Opposition cowered
under the blow, Danby pushed on a measure which was designed to
win back alarmed Churchmen to confidence in the Crown. By the
Bill for the security of the Church it was provided that on the succes-
sion of a king not a member of the Established Church the appointment
of bishops should be vested in the existing prelates, and that the King's
children should be placed in the guardianship of the Archbishop of
Canterbury.

The bill however failed in the Commons ; and a grant of supply >yas
only obtained by Danby's profuse bribery. The progress of the war
abroad, indeed, was rousing panic in England faster than Danby could
allay it. New successes of the French arms in Flanders, and a defeat
of the Prince of Orange at Cassel, stirred the whole country to a cry
for war. The two Houses echoed the cry in an address to the Crown ;
but Charles parried the blow by demanding a supply before the war
was declared, and on the refusal of the still suspicious House pro-
rogued the Parliamert. Fresh and larger subs' dies from France
enabled him to continue this prorogation for seven mouihs. But the
silence of the Parliament did little to silence the country ; and Danby
took advantage of the popular cry for war to press an energetic course
of action on che King. I'l its will to check French aggression the
Cavalier party was as earnej>t as the Puri.an, and Danby aimed at
redeeming his failure at home by uniting the Parliament through a
vigorous policy abroad. As usual, Charles appeared to give way. He
was himself for the momer t uneasy at the appearance of the French on
the Flemish coast, and he owned that " he could never live at ease
with his subjects " if Flanders were abandoned. He allowed Danby,
therefore, to press on both parties the necessity for mutual concessions,
and to define the new attitude of England by a step which was to

produce ]

England,

The mar;

Holland, i

With the

ensuring

angered ;

set his arr

and the m

lowed by j

throne wa

were vote<

still failed

busy turni

rogations f

from Lewi«

good office

Charles ad(

three thous

were alreae

Charles soc

bargain wa

he had hin

sibly retiree

allies, but ;

gave way to

cause of th(

arbiter of E

Disgacef

a force of tv

and with ne

•lad roused

secret plot v

I religion. T

of the Treat

j faster than t

I disappointed

four years in

of Clarendoi

English Jest

I secretary of

sufficient kn^

! to warrant h

I saving Cathc

I P:irliament.

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

649

rescuing
itep was
r a pro-
e way of
;ngth by
tesbury's
House of
oment of
e Crown,
low urged
rliaments
ament by
yr to exist,
rce. But
; Lords at
am, Salis-
a cowered
"signed to
I. By the
tie succes-
ipointment
the King's
ibishop of

proiuce momentous results. The Prince of Orange was invited to
England, and wedded to Mary, the presumptive heiress of the Crown.
The marriage promised a close political union in the future with
Holland, and a corresponding opposition to the ambition of France.
With the country it was popular as a Protestant match, and as
ensuring a Protestant successor to James. But Lewis was bitterly
angered ; he rejected the English propositions of peace, and again
set his army in the field. Danby was ready to accept the challenge,
and the withdrawal of the English ambassador from Paris was fol-
lowed by an assembly of the Parliament. A warlike speech from the
throne was answered by a warlike address from the House, supplies
were voted, and an army raised. But the actual declaration of war
still failed to appear. While Danby threatened France, Charles was
busy turning the threat to his own profit, and gaining time by pro-
rogations for a series of base negotiations. At one stage he demandc '
from Lewis a fresh pension for the next three years as the price of his
good offices with the allies. Danby stooped to write the demand, and
Charles added, " This letter is written by my order, C.R." A force of
three thousand Enghsh soldiers were landed at Ostend ; but the allies
were already broken by their suspicions of the King's real policy, and
Charles soon agreed for a fresh pension to recall the brigade. The
bargain was hardly struck when Lewis withdrew the terms of peace
he had himself offered, and on the faith of which England had osten-
sibly retired from the scene. Once more Danby offered aid to the
allies, but all faith in England was lost. One power after another
gave way to the new French demands, and though Holland, the original
cause of the war, was saved, the Peace of Nimeguen made Lewis the
arbiter of Europe.

Disg aceful as the peace was to England, it left Charles the master of
a force of twenty thousand men levied for the war he refused to declare,
and with nearly a million of French money in his pocket. His course
had roused into fresh life the old suspicions of his perfidy, and of a
secret plot with Lewis for the ruin of English freedom and of English
religion. That there was such a plot we know ; and from, the moment
of the Treaty of Dover the hopes of the Catholic party mounted even
faster than the panic of the Protestants. But they had been bitterly
disappointed by the King's withdrawal from his schemes after his
four years ineffectuil struggle, and by his seeming return to the policy
of Clarendon. Their anger and despair were revealed in letters from
English Jesuits, and the correspondence of Coleman. Coleman, the
secretary of the Duchess of York, and a busy intriguer, had gained
sufficient knowledge of the real plans of the King and of his brother
1 to warrant him in begging for money from Lewis for the work of
I saving Catholic interests from Danby's hostility by intrigues in the
Parliament. A passage from one of his letters gives us a glimpse of the

Skc. IV.

Danbv
1673

1678

.\farriage of

William

and Mary

1678

July 1678

The

Popish

Plot

6so

HISTORY OF THE KNGLISH PEOPLE.

Sec. IV.

Danhy
1073

1078

Titus Oates

Aug. 1678

wild dreams which were stirring amon^ the hotter Catholics of die
time. " They had a mighty work on their hands," he wrote, " no less
than the conversion of three kingdoms, and by that perhaps the utter
subduing of a pestilent heresy which had so long domineered over a
great part of the northern world. Success would give the greatest blow
to the I'rotestant religion that it had received since its birth." The
suspicions which had been stirred in the public mind mounted into
alarm when the Peace of Nimeguen suddenly left Charles master— as
it seemed — of the position ; and it was of this general panic that one
of the vile impostors who are always thrown to the surface at times of
great public agitation was ready to take advantage by the invention of
a Popish plot. Titus Gates, a Baptist minicter before the Restoration,
a curate and navy chaplain after it, but left penniless by his infamous
character, had sought bread in a conversion to Catholicism, and had
been received into Jesuit houses at Valladolid and St. Omer. While he
remained there, he learnt the fact of a secret meeting of the Jesuits in
London, which was probably nothing but the usual congregation of the
order. On his expulsion for misconduct this single fact widened in his
fertile brain into a plot for the subversion of Protestantism and the death
of the King. His story was laid before Charles, and received with cool
incredulity ; but Gates made affidavit of its truth before a London
magistrate. Sir Edmondsbury Godfrey, awd at last managed to appear
before the Council. He declared that he hati been trusted with letters
which disclosed the Jesuit plans. They were stirring rebellion in
Ireland ; in Scotland they disguised themselves as Cameronians; in
England their aim was to assassinate the King, and to leave the throne
open to the Papist Duke of York. The extracts from Jesuit letters
however which he produced, though they showed the disappointment
and anger of the writers, threw no light on the monstrous charges ofa|
plot for assassination. Gates would have been dismissed indeed with I
contempt but for the seizure of Coleman's correspondence. His letters
gave a new colour to the plot. Danby himself, conscious of the truth
that ihere were designs which Charles dared not avow, was shaken in
his rejection of the disclosures, and inclined to use them as weapons
to check the King in his Catholic policy. But a more dexterous hand
had already seized on the growing panic. Shaftesbury, released after a
long imprisonment and hopeless of foiling the King's policy in any!
other way, threw himself into the plot. " Let the Treasurer cry as loudj
as he pleases against Popery," he laughed, " I will cry a note louder."
But no cry was needed to heighten the popular frenzy from thel
moment when Sir Edmondsbury Godfrey, the magistrate beforel
whom Gates had laid his information, was found in a field nearl
London with his sword run through his heart. His death was assumed!
to be murder, and the murder to be an attempt of the Jesuits toj
" stifle the plot." A solemn funeral added to public agitation ; and!

THE REVOLUTION.

651

[ over a
est blow
." The
ted into
iSter— as
that one
times of
ention of
iteration,
infamous
and had
While he
Jesuits in
ion of the
ned in his
the death
with cool
a London
to appear
/ith letters
bellion in
nians ; in
he throne
\mt letters
Ipointment
arges of a
deed with
is letters
If the trutli
shaken in
,s weapons
;rous hand
Ised after a
|icy in any
:ry as loud
Ite louder."
from the
.te before
field near
,s assumed
Jesuits to|
ition; and]

[the two Houses named committees to investigate the charges made
I by Gates.

In this investigation Shaftesbury took the lead. Whatever his
[personal ambition may have been, his public aims in all that followed
I were wise and far-sighted. He aimed at forcing Charles to dissolve
'arliament and appeal to the nation. He aimed at driving Danhy out
of ofifice and at forcing on Charles a ministry which should break his
1 dependence on France and give a constitutional turn to his policy. He
saw that no security would really avail to meet the danger of a Catholic
sovereign, and he aimed at excluding James from the throne. Hut in
pursuing these aims he rested wholly on the plot. He fanned the
j popular panic by accepting without question some fresh depositions in
which Gates charged five Catholic peers with part in the Jesuit con-
spiracy. The peers were sent to the Tower, and two thousand suspected
persons were hurried to prison. A proclamation ordered every Catholic
Ito leave London. The trainbands were called to arms, and patrols
paraded through the streets, to guard against 'Sue Catholic rising which
Oates declared to be at hand. Meanwhile Shaftesbury turned the panic
to political account by forcing through Parliament a bill which excluded
Catholics from a seat in either House. The exclusion remained in force
[for a century and a half ; but it had really been aimed against the Duke
of York, and Shaftesbury was defeated by a proviso which exempted
names from the operation of the bill. The plot, which had been sup-
ported for four months by the sole evidence of Oates, began to hang fire ;
but a promise of reward brought forward a villain, named Bedloe, with
tales beside which those of Gates seemed tame. The two informers were
now pressed forward by an infamous rivalry to stranger and stranger
revelations. Bedloe swore to the existence of a plot for the landing of
a Catholic army and a general massacre of the Protestants. Oates capped
the revelations of Bedloe by charging the Queen herself, at the bar of
the Lords, with knowledge of the plot to murder her husband. Mon-
strous as such charges were, they revived the waning frenzy of the
people and of the two Houses. The peers under arrest were ordered
Ito be impeached. A new proclamation enjoined the arrest of every
ICatholic in the realm. A series of judicial murders began with the
trial and execution of Coleman, which even now can only be remem-
;red with horror. But the alarm must soon have worn out had it only
)een supported by perjury. What gave force to the false plot was the
ixistence of a true one. Coleman's letters had won credit for the
irjuries of Oates, and a fresh discovery now won credit for the perju-
ies of Bedloe. From the moment when the pressure of the Commons
mcl of Danby had forced Charles into a position of seeming antagonism
[0 France, Lewis had resolved to bring about the dissolution of the Par-
iarnent, the fall of the Minister, and the disbanding of the army which
)anby still looked on as a weapon against him. For this purpose the

Skc. IV.
Dandv

ie73

i67e

The
Fall of
Danby

1678

1679

I ■1

Lewis and
the Plot

652

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

Skc. IV.

Danuv
1673

1678

Dissolution

of the
Par lilt ment

Sir

William

Temple

The new
ministry

French ambassador had entered into negotiations with the leaders of |
the Country party. The KngUsh ambassador at Paris, Ralph Monla^ju,
now re' irned home on a quarrel with Danby, obtained a scat ia the
House of Commons, and in spite of the seizure of his papers, laid on
the table of the House the despatch which had been forwarded to Lewis, I
demanding payment for the King's services to France during the late j
negotiations. The House was thunderstruck ; for strong as had been
the general suspicion, the fact of the dependence of England on ai
foreign power had never before been proved. Danby's name was
signed to the despatch, and he was al once impeached on a charge of
high treason. But Shaftesbury was more eager to secure the election of I
a new Parliament than to punish his rival, and Charles was resolved tof
prevent at any price a trial which could not fail to reveal the disgrace-
ful secret of his foreign policy. Charles was in fact at Shaftesbury's I
mercy, and the end for which Shaftesbury had been playing was at
last secured. In January, 1679, the Parliament of 1661, after the
longest unbroken life in our Parliamentary annals, was at Iast|
dissolved.

Section v.— Shaftesbury. 1670— 168fl.

[Atitkorieies. — As before. We may add for this period Earl Russell's Lifc|
of his ancestor, William, Lord Russell.]

The new Parliament was elected in a tumult of national excitement.!
The n-kembers were for the most part Churchmen and country gentle-,
men, but they shared the alarm of the country, and even before thcir|
assembly in March their temper had told on the King's poHcy. James
was sent to Brussels. Charles began to disband the army and
promised that Danby should soon withdraw from office. In hia
speech from the throne he asked for supplies to maintain the Pro-j
testant attitude of his Government in foreign affairs. But it waj
impossible to avert Danby's fall. The Commons insisted on carrying
his impeachment to the bar of the Lords. It was necessary to dismis^
him from his post of Treasurer and to construct a new ministryj
Shaftesbury became President of the Council. The chiefs of th(
Country party, Lord Russell and Lord Cavendish, took their seats a|
the board with Lords Holies and Roberts, the older representatives oj
the Presbyterian party which had merged in the general Oppositionj
Savile, Lord Halifax, as yet known only as a keen and ingeniouj
speaker, entered the ministry in the train of Shaftesbury, with whon
he was connected ; Lord Sunderland was admitted to the Council!
while Lord Essex and I ord Capel, two of the most popular among thj
Country leaders, went the Treasury. The recall of Sir Willian
Temple, the negotiator of the Triple Alliance, from his embassy at th^
Hague to fill the post of Secretary of State, promised a foreign polic

THE REVOLUTION.

653

lussell's Lifcl

which would again place Kngland high among the Kuropean powers.
Temple returned with a plan of administration which, fruitless as it
directly proved, is of great importance as marking the silent change
which was passing over the Constitution. Like many men of his time,
I he was equally alarmed at the power both of the Crown and of the
Parliament. In moments of national excitement the power of the
Houses seemed irresistible. They had overthrown Clarendon. They had
overthrown Clifford and the Cabal. They had just overthrown I )anby.
Hut though they were strong enough in the end to punish ill govern-
ment, they showed no power of securing good government or of
permanently inrtuencing the policy of the Crown. For nineteen years,
jwith a Parliament always sitting, Charles as far as foreign policy went
had it pretty much his own way. He had made war against the will
of the nation and he had refused to make war when the nation de-
manded it. While every Englishman hated France, he had made
England a mere dependency of the French King. The remedy for
this state of things, as it was afterwards found, was a very simple
Unc. By a change which we shall have to trace, the Ministry has
now become a Committee of State-officers, named by the majority
of the House of Commons from amongst the more prominent of its
representatives in either House, whose object in accepting office is
to do the will of that majority. So long as the majority of the House
of Commons itself represents the more powerful current of public
[opinion it ia clear that such an arrangement makes government an
laccurate reflection of the national will. But obvious as such a plan
may seem to us, it had as yet occurred to no English statesman.
Even to Temple the one remedy seemed to lie in the restoration
of the Royal Council to its older powers. This body, composed as
lit was of the great officers of the Court, the royal Treasurer and
ISccretaries, and a few nobles specially summoned to it by the sove-
reign, formed up to the close of Elizabeth's reign a sort of delibe-
rative assembly to which the graver matters of public administration
were commonly submitted by the Crown. A practice, however, of
Ipreviously submitting such measures to a smaller body of the more
limportant councillors must always have existed ; and under James this
Isecret committee, which was then known as the Cabala or Cabal,
Ibegan almost wholly to supersede the Council itself. In the large and
Ibalanced Council which was formed after the Restoration all real
Ipower rested with the " Cabala" of Clarendon, Southampton, Ormond,
JMonk. and the two Secretaries ; and on Clarendon's fall these were
Isucceeded by Clififord, Arlington, Buckingham, Ashley, and Lauder-
Idale. By a mere coincidence the initials of the latter names formed
Ithe word " Cabal," which has ever since retained the sinister meaning
Itheir unpopularity gave to it. The effect of these smaller committees
pd undoubtedly been to remove the check which the larger numbers

Skc. V.

Shaktik-
nuKv

1679

168a

ill

! .1

Temph
and his
Council

654

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

Sec. V.

Shaftks*
nuRV

1670

lesfl

The

Exclusion

Bill

The Bill of
Securities

and the more popular composition of the Royal Council laid upon the
Crown. The imscrupulous projects which made the Cabal of Clifford
and his fellows a by-word among Ei^glishmen could never have been
laid before a Council of great peers and hereditary officers of State.
To Temple therefore the organization of the Council seemed to
furnish a check on mere personal government which Parliament was
unable to supply. For this purpose the Cabala, or Cabinet, as it was
now becoming the fashion to term the confidential committee of the
Council, was abolished. The Council itself was restricted to thirty
members, and their joint income was not to fall below ;^ 300,000, a sum
little less than what was estimated as the income of the whole House
of Commons. A body of great nobles and proprietors, not too
numerous for secrc': deliberation, and wealthy enough to counterbalance
either the Commons or the Crown, would form. Temple hoped, a
barrier against the violence and aggression of the one power, and a
check on the mere despotism of the other.

The new Council and the new ministry gave fair hope of p wise
and patriotic government. But the difficulties were still great. The
nation was frenzied with saspicion and panic. The elections to the
Parliament had taken place amidst a whirl of excitement which left
no place for candidates of the Court. The appointment of the new
ministry, indeed, was welcomed with a general burst of joy. But
the question of the Succession threw all others Into the shade. At
the bottom of the national panic lay the dread of a Catholic King,
a dread which the after history of Jamos fully justified. Shaftesbury
was earnest for the exclusion of James, but as yet the majority of
the Council shrank from the step, and supported a plan which
Charles brought forward for preserving the rights of the Duke of
York while restraining his powers as sovereign. By this project the
presentation to Church livings was to be taken out of his hands on
his yccessioii. The last Parliament of the preceding reign was to
continue to sit ; and the appointment of all Councillors, Judges, Lord-
Lieutenants, and officers in the fleet, was vested in the two Houses so
long as a Catholic sovereign was on the throne. The extent of these!
provisions showed the pressure which Charles felt, but Shaftesbury
was undt ubtedly right in setting the plan aside as at once insufficient!
and impracticable. He continued to advocate the Exclusion in the
royal Council ; and a bill for depriving James of his right to the
Crown, and for devolving it on the next Protestant in the line of
succession was introduced into the Commons by his adherents, andj
passed the House by a large majority. It was known that Charles
would use his influence with the ^eers for its rejection, and the Earl
therefore fell back on the tactics of Pym. A bold Remonstrance was!
prepared in the Commons. The City of London was ready with an
address to the two Houses in favour of the bill. All Charles could doj

was to ga

dissolutior

But dela

at one. 1

was so hot

union amoi

England tl

of the Cou

which that

daughter \

order of sui

the failure (

England di

and to pave

templating

Orange as i

weakening <

His motive

in the maxii

Whatever w

claims of Ja

to place the

puted to be

profligate in

reputation ft

between the

put the Dul

the Covenai

the King tc

have put th

mouth's han

Sunderlan

opposed to £

ruin in the e'

solution of tl

in threats the

their heads.

of the King ;

possible cont

to recall the

the King's n

Captain-Gen(

the realm. 1

Shaftesbury t
The prosecut

THE REVOLUTION.

65s

was to gain time by the prorogation of the Parhament, and by its
dissohition in May.

But delay would have been useless had the Country party remained
at one. The temper of the nation and of the House of Commons
was so hotly pronounced in favour of the exclusion of the Duke, that
union among the ministers must in the end have secured it and spared
England the necessity for the Revolution of 1688. The wiser leaders
of the Country party, indeed, were already leaning to the very change
which that Revolution brought about. If James were passed over, his
daughter Mary, the wife of the Prince of Orange, stood next in the
order of succession : and the plan of Temple, Essex, and Halifax after
the failure of their bill of Securities, was to bring the Prince over to
England during the prorogation, to introduce him into the Council,
and to pave his way to the throne. Unhappily Shaftesbury was con-
templating a very different course. He distrusted the Prince of
Orange as a mere adherent of the royal house, and as opposed to any
weakening of the royal power or invasion of the royal prerogative.
His motive for setting aside William's claims is probably to be found
in the maxim ascribed to him, that " a bad title makes a good king."
Whatever were his motives, however, he had resolved to set aside the
claims of James and his children, as well as William's own claim, and
to place the Duke of Monmouth on the throne. Monmouth was re-
puted to be the eldest of the King's bastards, a weak and worthless
profligate in temper, but popular through his personal beauty and his
reputation for bravery. The tale was set about of a secret marriage
between the King and his mother ; Shaftesbury induced Charles to
put the Duke at the head of the troops sent to repress a rising of
the Covenanters in the west of Scotland, and on his return pressed
the King to give him the command of the Guards, which would
have put the only military force possessed by the Crown in Mon-
mouth's hands.

Sunderland, Halifax, and Essex, however, were not only steadily
opposed to Shaftesbury's project, but saw themselves marked out for
ruin in the event of Shaftesbury's success. They had advised the dis-
solution of the last Parliament ; and the Earl's anger had vented itself
in threats that the advisers of the dissolution should pay for it with
their heads. The danger came home to them when a sudden illness
of the King and the absence of James made Monmouth's accession a
possible contingency, The three ministers at once induced Charles
to recall the Duke of York ; and though he withdrew to Scotland on
the King's recovery, Charles deprived Monmouth 'of his charge as
Captain-General of the P'orces and ordered him like James to leave
the realm. Left alone in his cause by the opposition of his colleagues,
Shaftesbury threw himself more and more on the support of the Plot.
The prosecution of its victims was pushed recklessly on. Three

Sec. V.
Sjiaktks-

HURY

1679

168a

Mon-
moutb

Shaftes-
bury's
Second

Dismissal

6s6

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. V.

Shaftes-
bury

1679

1082

Oct. 1679

Shaftes-

burya

struggle

Catholics were hanged in London. Eight priests were put to death
in the country. Pursuivants and informers spread terror through every
Catholic household. He counted on the reassembling of the Parlia-
ment to bring all this terror to bear upon the King. But Charles had
already marked the breach which the Earl's policy had made in the
ranks of the Country party. He saw that Shaftesbury was unsup-
ported by any of his colleagues save Russell. To Temple, Essex, or
Halifax it seemed possible to bring about the succession of Mary
without any violent revolution ; but to set aside not only the right of
James but the right of his Protestant children, and even of the Prince
of Orange, was to ensure a civil war. It was with their full support
therefore that Charles deprived Shaftesbury of his post of Lord Pre-
sident of the Council. The dismissal was the signal for a struggle to
whose danger Charles was far from blinding himself. What had saved
him till now was his cynical courage. In the midst of the terror and
panic of the Plot men " wondered to see him quite cheerful amidst
such an intricacy of troubles," says the courtly Reresby, " but it was
not in his nature to think or perplex himself much about anything."
Even in the heat of the tumult which followed on Shaftesbury's dis-
missal, Charles was seen fishing and sauntering as usual in Windsor
Park. But closer observers than Reresby saw beneath this veil of
indolent unconcern a consciousness of new danger. " From this
time," says Burnet, "his temper was observed to change very visibly."
He became in fact " sullen and thoughtful ; he saw that he had to do
with a strange sort of people, that could neither be managed nor
frightened." But he faced the danger with his old unscrupulous cool-
ness. He reopened secret negotiations with France. Lewis was as
alarmed as Charles himself at the warlike temper of the nation, and
as anxious to prevent the assembly of a Parliament ; but the terms on
which he offered a subsidy were too humiliating even for the King's
acceptance. The failure forced him to summon a new Parliament ;
and the panic, which Shaftesbury was busily feeding with new tales of
massacre and invasion, returned members even more violent than the
members of the House he had just dismissed. A host of petitions
called on the King to suffer Parliament to meet at the opening of
1680. Even the Council shrank from the King's proposal to prorogue
its assembly to November, 1680, but Charles persisted. Alone as he
stood, he was firm in his resolve to gain time, for time, as he saw, was
working in his favour. The tide of public sympathy was beginning
to turn. The perjury of Oates proved too much at last for the credulity
of juries ; and the acquittal of four of his victims was a sign that the
panic was beginning to ebb. A far stronger proof of this was seen in
the immense efforts which Shaftesbury made to maintain it. Fresh
informers were brought forward to swear to a plot for the assassination
of the Earl himself, and to the share of the Duke of York in the con-

spiracies ol

produced a

cessions pa

burnt amid

Acts of yi

was ready j

and, greyhe

seemed to v

on the nati

committee f

petitions wl:

sent to ever]

of signature:

Shaftesbury'

as the natio

tyranny." S

every fortresi

was really lej

Acquittal foil

cruelty which

to the pitile;

Anxious as tl:

revolted agaii

and every ^q\

Mary aside t

The memory

rumour of an

King. The J

counties was ,

who declared

country was

|"abhorrers,"

"Tories" whi(

jtory from the

advantage of tl

Court. He rei

as of the Earl

projects " with

Followed hy a

Jury of Middle:
and the King's
nuisance, while
gained favour
IShaftesbury rel
[been in the vei

'ir^

;> - IS;

ZHAP.

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

death

every

J^arlia-

Bs had

in the

unsup-

sex, or

: Mary

•ight of

Prince

support

rd Pre-

jggle to

d saved

ror and

. amidst

It it was

ything."

iry's dis-

Windsor

s veil of

rom this

; visibly."

ad to do

aged nor

ous cool-
is was as
tion, and
arms on
16 King's
liament ;
r tales of
than the
petitions
ening of
prorogue
ine as he
I saw, was
)eginning j

spiracies of his fellow-religionists. A paper found in a meal-tub was
produced as evidence of the new danger. Gigantic torch-light pro-
cessions paraded the streets of London, and the effigy of the Pope was
burnt amidst the wild outcry of a vast multitude.

Acts of yet greater daring showed the lengths to which Shaftesbury
was ready to go. He had grown up amidst the tumults of civil war,
and, greyheaded as he was, the fire and vehemence of his early days
seemed to wake again in the singular recklessness with which he drove
on the nation to a struggle in arms. Early in 1680 he formed a
committee for promoting agitation throughout the country ; and the
petitions which it drew up for the assembly of the Parliament were
sent to every town and grand jury, and sent back again with thousands
of signatures. Monmouth, in spite of the King's orders, returned at
Shaftesbury's rail to London ; and a daring pamphlet pointed him out
as the nation's leader in the coming struggle "against Popery and
tyranny." So great was the alarm of the Council that the garrison in
every fortress was held in readiness for instant war. But the danger
was really less than it seemed. The tide of opinion had fairly turned.
Acquittal followed acquittal. A reaction of horror and remorse at the
cruelty which had hurried victim after victim to the gallows succeeded
to the pitiless frenzy which Shaftesbury had fanned into a flame.
Anxious as the nation was for a Protestant sovereign, its sense of justice
revolted against the wrong threatened to James's Protestant children ;
and every gentleman in the realm felt insulted at the project of setting
Mary aside to put the crown of England on the head of a bastard.
The memory too of the Civil War was still fresh and keen, and the
rumour of an outbreak of revolt rallied men more and more round the
King. The host of petitions which Shaftesbury procured from the
counties was answered by a counter host of addresses from thousands
who declared their " abhorrence " of the plans against the Crown. The
country was divided into two great factions of " petitioners " and
"abhorrers," the germs of the two great parties of "Whigs" and
" Tories " which have played so prominent a part in our political his-
tory from the time of the Exclusion Bill. Charles at once took
advantage of this turn of affairs. He recalled the Duke of York to the
Court. He received the resignations of Russell and Cavendish, as well
as of the Earl of Essex, who had at last gone over to Shaftesbury's
projects " with all his heart." Shaftesbury met defiance with defiance.
Followed by a crowd of his adherents he attended before the Grand
credulity BJ'^^'y o^ Middlesex, to indict the Duke of York as a- Catholic recusant,
that the B^i^d the King's mistress, the Duchess of Portsmouth, as a national
seen in Bnuisance, while Monmouth made a progress through the country, and
Fresh ■S'^^i^ed favour everywhere by his winning demeanour. Above all,
ssinationB^haftesbury relied on the temper of the Commons, elected as they had
the con-W^^^ i^ the very heat of the panic and irritated by the long delay in

U U

657

Skc. V.
Shaftes-

HURY

1679

1682

Peti.
tioners
and Ab-
horrers

The
reaction

■ n

h ,

''■:

I-

658

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. v.
Shaftes-

BURV

1679

leaa

Wilttam
and the
Exclusion

1680

The
Oxford
Parlia-
ment

Trial of

Lord
Stafford

calling them together. The first act of the House on meeting in
October was to vote that their care should be "to suppress Popery and
prevent a Popish successor." Rumours of a Catholic plot in Ireland
were hardly needed to push the Exclusion Bill through the Commons
without a division. So resolute was the temper of the Lower House
that even Temple and Essex now gave their adhesion to it as a neces-
sity, and Sunderland himself wavered towards accepting it. Halifax,
whose ability and eloquence had now brought him fairly to the front,
opposed it resolutely and successfully in the Lords; but Halifax was
only th'3 mouthpiece of William. " My Lord Halifax is entirely in the
interest of the Prince of Orange," the French ambassador, Barillon,
wrote to Ills master, " and what he seems to be doing for the Duke of
York is really in order to make an opening for a compromise by which
the Prince of Orange may benefit." The Exclusion Bill once rejected,
Halifax followed up the blow by bringing forward a plan of Protestant
securities, which would have taken from James on his accession the
right of veto on any bill passed by the two Houses, the right of
negotiating with foreign states, or of appointing either civil or military
officers save with the consent of Parliament. This plan also was no
doubt prompted by the Prince of Orange ; and the States of Holland
supported it by pressing Charles to come to an accommodation with
his subjects which would enable them to check the perpetual aggres-
sions which France was making on her neighbours.

But if the Lords would have no Exclusion Bill the Commons with
as good reason would have no Securities Bill. They felt — as one of the
members for London fairly put it — that such securities would break]
down at the very moment they were needed. A Catholic king, should I
he ever come to the throne, would have other forces besides those in
England to back him. "The Duke rules over Scotland; the Irish
and the English Papists will follow him ; he will be obeyed by the]
officials of high and low rank whom the King has appointed ; he
be just such a king as he thinks good." Shaftesbury however was farj
from resting in a merely negative position. He made a despairinc
effort to do the work of exclusion by a Bill of Divorce, which wouk
have enabled Charles to put away his Queen on the ground of barren-
ness, and by a fresh marriage to give a Protestant heir to the throne]
The Earl was perhaps already sensible of a change in public feelingj
and this he resolved to check and turn by a great public impeachmenj
which would revive and establish the general belief in the Plot. Low
Stafford, who from his age and rank was looked on as the leader of thj
Catholic party, had lain a prisoner in the Tower since the first outbursj
of popular frenzy. He was now solemnly impeached ; and his trial ii
December 1680 mustered the whole force of informers to prove tW
truth of a Catholic conspiracy against the King and the realm, m
evidence was worthless ; but the trial revived, as Shaftesbury hail

hoped, mu
by a majoi
The blow
pressed the
and even 1
cowed intc
Charles wa
ph'es with c
royal garris
was again
subtlety, he
new one to 1
was to frigl:
and his sui
country aga
reviving the
ordered his
disorder ; a
Court, aidec
arms on the ]
through the
hand, and C
France. H(
words to wi
William was
with the natt
if he remair
violence of t
King's hand
same as tho
just dissolve
dissolutions,
by Halifax, v
vested the ac
of Orange, a
party. The
peaching an
defiance of th
to a trial by
throw public
in fact, went
Charles at hi:
the King his ,
freed the K
simply to exl

!■ '^: 111

ix.l

THE REVOLUTION.

hoped, much of the old panic, and the condemnation of the prisoner
by a majority of his peers was followed by his death on the scaffold.
The blow produced its effect on aU but Charles. Sunderland again
pressed the King to give way. But deserted as he was by his ministers,
and even by his mistress, for the Duchess of Portsmouth had been
cowed into supporting the exclusion by the threats of Shaftesbury,
Charles was determined to resist. On the coupling of a grant of sup-
plies with demands for a voice in the appointment of officers of the
royal garrisons he prorogued the Parliament. The truth was that he
was again planning an alliance with France. With characteristic
subtlety, however, he dissolved the existing Parliament, and called a
new one to meet in March. The act was a mere blind. The King's aim
was to frighten the country intc reaction by the dread of civil strife ;
and his summons of the Parliament to Oxford was an appeal to the
country against the disloyalty of the capital, and an adroit means of
reviving the memories of the Civil War. With the same end he
ordered his guards to accompany him, on the pretext of anticipated
disorder ; and Shaftesbury, himself terrified at the projects of the
Court, aided the King's designs by appearing with his followers in
arms on the plea of self-protection. Monmouth renewed his progresses
through the country. Riots broke out in London. Revolt seemed at
hand, and Charles hastened to conclude his secret negotiations with
France. He verbally pledged himself to a policy of peace, in other
words to withdrawal from any share in the Grand Alliance which
William was building up, while Lewis promised a small subsidy which
with the natural growth of the royal revenue sufficed to render Charles,
if he remained at peace, independent of Parliamentary aids. The
violence of the new Parliament played yet more effectually into the
King's hands. The members of the House of Commons were the
same as those who had been returned to the Parliaments he had
just dissolved, and their temper was naturally embittered by the two
dissolutions. Their rejection of a new Limitation Bill brought forward
by Halifax, which while granting James the title of King would have
vested the actual functions of government in the Prince and Princess
of Orange, alienated the more moderate and sensible of the Country
party. The attempt of the Lower House to icvive the panic by im-
peaching an informer named Fitzharris before the House of Lords, in
defiance of the constitutional rule which entitled him as a commoner
to a trial by his peers in the course of common law, did still more to
throw public opinion on the side of the Crown. Shaftesbury's course,
in fact, went wholly on a belief that the penury of the Treasury left
Charles at his mercy, and that a refusal of supplies must 'spring from
the King his assent to the Exclusion. But the gold of France had
freed the King from his thraldom. He had used the Parliament
simply to exhibit himself as a sovereign whose patience and con-

u u 2

659

Sec. V.

Shaftes-
nt'RY

1679

168a

I6SI

l:i

Cliarlet
turns to
Frame

( i,

66o

Sec. V.

Shaftes-
bury

1679

1682

Shaftes.
bury'B
Death

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Jan 1683

ciliatory temper was rewarded with insult and violence ; and now
that his end was accomplished, he no sooner saw the Exclusion lijll
re-introduced, than he suddenly dissolved the Houses after a month's
sitting, and appealed in a royal declaration to the justice of the
nation at large.

The appeal was met by an almost universal burst of loyalty. The
Church rallied to the King ; his declaration was read from every
pulpit ; and the Universities solemnly decided that " no religion, no
law, no fault, no forfeiture," could avail to bar the sacred right of
hereditary succession. The arrest of Shaftesbury on a charge of
suborning false witnesses to the Plot marked the new strength of the
Crown. London indeed was still true to him ; the Middlesex Grand
Jury ignored the bill of his indictment ; and his discharge from the
Tower was welcomed in every street with bonfires and ringing of bells.
But a fresh impulse was given to the loyal enthusiasm of the country
at large by the publication of a plan said to have been found among
his papers, the plan of a secret association for the furtherance of the
Exclusion, whose members bound themselves to obey the orders of
Parliament even after its prorogation or dissolution by the Crown. So
general was the reaction that Halifax advised the calling of a new
Parliament in the belief that it would be a loyal one. William of
Orange too visited England 10 take advantage of the turn of affairs
to pin Charles to the policy of the Alliance ; but the King met both
counsels with evasion. He pushed boldly on in his new course. He
confirmed the loyalty of the Church by a renewed persecution of the
Nonconformists, which drove Penn from England and thus brought
about the settlement of Pennsylvania as a refuge for his fellow Quakers.
He was soon strong enough to call back James to Court. Monmouth,
who had resumed his progresses through the country as a means of
checking the tide of reaction, was arrested. The friendship of a Tory
mayor secured the nomination of Tory sheriffs in London, and the
juries they packed left the life of every Exclusionist at the mercy of
the Crown. Shaftesbury, alive to the new danger, plunged madly into
conspiracies with a handful of adventurers as desperate as himrelf,
hid himself in the City, where he boasted that ten thousand " b. isk
boys" were ready to appear at his call, and urged his friends to
rise in arms. But their delays drove him to flight ; and two months
after his arrival in Holland, the soul of the great leader, great from
his immense energy md the wonderful versatility of his genius, but
whose genius and energy had ended in wrecking foi the time thej
fortunes of English freedom, and in associating the noblest of causes
with the vilest of crimes, found its first quiet in death.

Sect

[Aui/iorii
Luttrell's '•

The flig]
marvellous
further resi
to answer t
mouth, wit
Hampden,
founding a
the assemb
clustered re
of assassins
as they paj
market. B*
distinct fror
blended the
death by sui
of sharing i
Fields. Th(
terror over 1
tions for sec
stitutional oj
crushed at hi
wild tyranny
On the very i
ping their ha
University of
obedience, e\
Charles saw
tyranny. Tl:
against the E
government,
of a renewal
before the opf
the few years
open violation
no tax by roy
how great a w
'^eign of Charl
|"^vas restored
No attempt wj
pad swept awa

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

661

'. The
I every
jion, no
right of
large of I
h of the
K Grand
From the
of bells,
country
d among
ce of the
arders of
own. So
of a new
William of
of affairs
met both
irse. He
,on of the
s brought
Quakers,
onmouth,
means of
of a Tory
, and the
mercy of
,adly into
,s himrelf,
id "bisk
1 friends to
o months
;reat from
lenius, but
time the
of causes

Section VI.— The Second Stuart Tyranny, 1682—1688.

[Aut/iorilifr..- -To those given before we may add Welwood's *' Memoirs,"
Luttrcll's '-Diary," and above all Lord Macaulay's "History of England."]

The flight of Shaftesbury proclaimed the triumph of the King. His
marvellous sagacity had told him when the struggle was over and
further resistance useless. But the country leaders, who had delayed
to answer the Earl's call, still believed opposition possible ; and Mon-
mouth, with Lord Essex, Lord Howard of Ettrick, Lord Russell,
Hampden, and Algernon Sidney held meetings with the view of
founding an association whose agitation should force on the King
the assembly of a Parliament. The more desperate spirits who had
clustered round him as he lay hidden in the City took refuge in plots
of assassination, and in a plan for murdering Charles and his brother
as they passed the Rye-Iiouse on their road from London to New-
market. Both projects were betrayed, and though they were wholly
distinct from one another the cruel ingenuity of the Crown lawyers
blended them into one. Lord Essex saved himself from a traitor's
death by suicide in the Tower. Lord Pussell, convicted on a charge
of sharing in the Rye-house plot, was beheaded in Lincoln's Inn
Fields. The same fate awaited Algernon Sidney. Monmouth fled in
terror over sea, and his flight was followed by a series of prosecu-
tions for sedition directed against his followers. In 1683 the Con-
stitutional opposition which had held Charles so long in check lay
crushed at his feet. A weaker man might easily have been led into a
wild tyranny by tLe mad outburst of loyalty which greeted his triumph.
On the very day when the crowd around Russell's scaffold were dip-
ping their handkerchiefs in his blood, as in the blood of a martyr, the
University of Oxford solemnly declared that the doctrine of passive
obedience, even to the worst of rulers, was a part of religion. But
Charles saw that immense obstacles still lay in the road of a mere
tyranny. The great Tory party which had rallied to his succour
against the Exclusionists were still steady for parliamentary and legnl
government. The Church was as powerful as ever, and the mention
of a renewal of the Indulgence to Nonconformists had to be withdrawn
before the opposition of the bishops. He was careful therefore during
the few years which remained to him to avoid the appearance of any
open violation of public law. He suspended no statute. He imposed
[no tax by royal authority. Nothing indeed shows more completely
jhow great a work the Long Parliament had done than a survey of the
ireign of Charles the Second. " The King," Kaiiam bays very truly,
"was restored to nothing but what the law had preserved to him."
No attempt was made to restore the abuses which the patriots of 1641
had swept away. Parliament was continually summoned. In spite of

Sec. VI.

The

Seccnd

.SrtJART

Tyranny

1688

10
1688

The

Royal

Triumph

Rye-house
Plot

662

HISTORY OF THE KNGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAI'.

Sec. VI.

The

Second
Stuart

TVRANNV

leaa

1688

Freedom
of the
Press

Habeas
Corpus Act

Death of
Charles

its frequent refusal of supplies, no atfempc was ever made to raise
money by unconstitutional means. The few illegal proclamations
issued under Clarendon ceased with his fall. No effort was made to
revive the Star Chamber and the Court of High Commission ; r d jf
judges were servile and juries sometimes packed, there was n(» pen
interference with the course of justice. In two remarkable prmtj
freedom had niade an advance even on 1641. From the moment hen
printing began to tell on public opinion, it had been gagged by a s tern
of licences. The regulations framed under Henry tne Eighili sub-
jecte ' the pr?. .s o the control of the S^^ar Chainber, and the Martin
Maio .'It ; ;;btli, brought about a yet more stringent control under
Elizfbrih I -^ nn the Long Parliament laid a heavy hand on the press,
and ihe ;, '.at rr-rmnstrance of Milton in his " Areopagitica " fell dead
on the ears of his i nritan associates. But the statute for the regula-
tion of printing which was passed immediately after the Restoration
expired finally in 1679, and the temper of the Parliament at once put
an end to any attempt at re-establishing the censorship. To the new
freedom of the press the Habeas Corpus Act added a new security for
the personal freedom y)i every Englishman. Against arbitrary im-
prisonment provision had been made in the earliest ages by a famous
clause in the Great Charter. No free man could be held ia prison
save on charge or conviction of crime or for debt, and every prisoner
on a criminal charge could demand as a right from the Court of King's
Bench the issue of a writ of " habeas corpus," which bound his gaoler
to produce both the prisoner and the warrant on which he was im-
prisoned, that the court might judge whether he was imprisoned
according to law. In crises however of imprisonment on a warrant of
the royal Council it had been sometimes held by judges that the writ
could not be issued, and under Clarendon's administration instances
had in this way occurred of imprisonment without legal remedy. But
his fall was quickly followed by the introduction of a bill to secure this
right of the subject, and after a long struggle the Act which is known
as the Habeas Corpus Act passed finally in 1679, By this great statute
the old practice of the law was freed from all difficulties and exceptions.
Every prisoner committed for any crime save treason or felony was
declared entitled to his writ even in the vacations of the courts, and
heavy penalties were enforced on judges or gaolers who refused him
this right. Every person committed for felony or treason was entitled
to be released on bail, unless indicted at the next session of gaol
delivery after his commitment, and to be discharged if not indicted
at the sessions which followed. It was forbidden under the heaviest
penalties to send a prisoner into any places or fortresses beyond the \
seas.

Galling to the Crown as the freedom of the press and the Habeas
Corpus Act were soon found to be, Charles made no attempt to curtail

IX.]

TIIK REVOLUTION.

663

the one or to infringe the other. But while cautious to avoid rousing
popular resistance, he moved coolly and resolutely forward on the path
of despotism. It was in vain that Halifax pressed for energetic resist-
ance to the af f^ressions of France, for the recall of Monmouth, or for
the calling of a fresh Parliament. Like every other English statesmai
he fountl he had been dured, and that now his work was done he was:
sui.'ered to remain in office but left without any influence in the govern-
ment. Hyde, who w.'',s created Earl of Rochester, still remained at the
head of the Treasury ; but Charles soon gave more of his confidence
[r, lue aupple and acute Sunderland. Parliament, in defiance of the
Triennial Act, which after having been repealed had been re-enacted
but without the safeguards of the original act, remained unassembled
during the remainder of the King's reign. His secret alliance with
France furnished Charles with the funds he irrmediately required,
and the rapid growth of the customs through th in ^jase of English
commerce promised to give him a revenue ^vhic' If peace were
preserved, would save him from the need of n '"resh appeal to the
Commons. All opposition was at an end Tl.o strength of the
Country party had been broken by its ov'n isscnsions over the
Exclusion Bill, and by the flight or death of «*^s more prominent
leaders. Whatever strength it retained lay ^aiofly in the towns, and
these were now attacked by writs of " quo warranto," which called
on them to show cause why their charters should not be declared
forfeited on the ground of abuse of their privileges. A few verdicts
on the side of the Crown brought about a general surrender of muni-
cipal liberties ; and the grant of fresh charters, in which all but ultra-
loyalists were carefully excluded from their corporations, placed the
representation of the boroughs in the hands of the Crown. Against
active discontent Charles had long Leen quietly providing by the
gradual increase of his Guards. Thf. withdrawal of its garrison from
Tangier enabled him to raise their force to nine thousaifc^ well-
equipped soldiers, and to supplement this force, the nucleus . our
present standing army, by a reserve of six regiments, which were main-
tained till they should be needed at home in the service of the United
Provinces. But great as the danger really was, it lay not so much in
isolated acts of tyranny as in the character and purpose of Charles
himself. His death at the very moment of his triumph saved English
freedom. He had regained his old popularity, and at the news of his
sickness crowds thronged the churches, praying that God would raise
him up again to be a father to 'lis people. But the one anxiety of
the King was to die reconciled to the Catholic Church. His chamber
was cleared and a priest named Huddleston, who had saved his
life after the battle of Worcester, received his confession and ad-
ministered the last sacraments. Not a word of this ceremony was
whispered when the nobles and bishops were recalled into the

Skc. VI.

Thk

Seconij
Stuart

"VRANNY

leaa

1688

Charters

i I

' ^1

1685

)^?l

664

HISTORY OF TIIK ENGIJSII PEOPLK. [chap

Sec. VI.

The

Seconu

SrUAKT

Tykannv
1682

1688

Jamie 8

the
Second

Argyll's
rining

loyal presence. All the children of his mistresses s.ivc Monmouth
were gathered round the bed. Charles " blessed all his children
one by one, pulling them on to his bed ; and then the bishops
moved him, as he was the Lord's anointed and the father of his
country, to bless them also and all that were there pre'-^jnt, and in
them the general body of his subjects. Whereupon, the room beinj,'
full, all fell down upon their knees, and he raised himself in his bed
and very solemnly blessed them all." The strange comedy was at
last over. Charles died as he had lived : i^ave, witty, cynical, even
in the presence of death. Tortured as he was with pain, he begged
the bystanders to forgive him for being so unconscionable a time in
dying. One mistress, the Duchess ff Portsmouth, hung weeping ovei
his bed. His last thought was of another mistress, Nell Gwynn. "Do
not," he whispered to his successor ere he sank into a fatal stupor, " do
not let poor Nelly starve ! "

The first words of James on his accession in February 1685, his pro-
mise " to preserve the Government both in Church and State as it is
now by law established," were welcomed by the whole country with
enthusiasm. All the suspicions of a Catholic sovereign seemed to
have disappeared. " We have the word of a King ! " ran the general
cry, " and of a King who was never worse than his word." The con-
viction of his brother's faithlessness stood James in good stead. He
was looked upon as narrow, impetuous, stubborn, and despotic in
heart, but even his enemies did not accuse him of being false. Above
all he was believed to be keenly alive to the honour of his country, and
resolute to free it f»"om foreign dependence. It was necessary to sum-
mon a Parliament, for the royal revenue ceased with the death of
Charles ; but the elections, swayed at once by the tide of loyalty and
by the command of the boroughs which the surrender of their charters
had given to the Crown, sent up a House of Commons in which James
found few members who were not to his mind. The question of reli-
gious security was waived at a hint of the royal displeasure. A revenue
of nearly two millions was granted to the King for life. All that was
wanted to rouse the loyalty of the country into fanaticism was supplied
by a rebellion in the North, and by another under Monmouth in the
West. The hopes of Scotch freedoni had clung ever since the Restora-
tion to the house of Argyll. The great Marquis, indeed, had been
brought to the block at the King's return. His son, the Earl of Argyll,
had been unable to save himself even by a life of singular caution and
obedience from the ill-will of the vile politicians who governed Scot-
land. He was at last convicted of treason in 1682 on grounds at which
every English statesman stood aghast. " We should not hang a dog ,.
here," Halifax pro; jsted, " on the grounds on which my lord Argyll
has been sentenced to death." The Earl escaped however to Holland, j
and lived peacefully there during the last years of the reign of Charles.

Monmoi
in the K
from Wi
blow to t
to a reso
two ]ead(
and the
Argyll's I
his landi
King, an(
his effort
fight; am
traitor's d
popularitj
when he
governnie
•^he farme
standard,
and on tht
showed its
train of yo
His forces
of success i
king. Th(
against the
William, h(
of the revo]
in an atter
water, and
King's fore
'ailed; and
checked in
were brokei
fled from th
captured an
Never ha
changed int
lowed on th
servile tool (
in which the
test howeve
the Court to
vengeance ;
powers but c
judicial mun

[CHAJ'.

nmouth
:hiklrcn
bishops
of his
, and in
m bein^'
. his bed
r was at
:al, even
- begged
. time in
aing ovei
in. "1)0
ipor, " do

5,hispro-
;e as it is
,ntry with
seemed to
he general
The con-
ead. He
lespotic in
ke. Above
)untry, and
Li-y to sum-
e death of
oyalty and
;ir charters
lich James
;ion of reli-
A revenue
il that was
s suppUed
luth in the
e Restora-
had been
of Argyll,
laution and
brned Scot-
Is at which
lang a dog
(lord Argyll
Ito Holland,
[of Charles.

ix.J

IIIE KliVOLUTION.

665

Monmouth hr. 1 found the same refuge at the ll.iguc, where a belief
in the King's purpose to recall him secured him a kindly reception
from William of Orange. But the accession of James was a death-
blow to the hopes of the Duke, while it stirred the fanaticism of Argyll
to a resolve of wresting Scotland from the rule of a Catholic king. The
two leaders determined to appear in arms in England and the North,
and the two expeditions sailed within a few days of each other.
Argyll's attempt was soon over. His clan of the Campbells rose on
his landing in Cantyre, but the country had been occupied for the
King, and quarrels among the exiles who accompanied him robbed
his effort of every chance of success. His force scattered without a
fight ; and Argyll, arrested in an attempt to escape, was hurried to a
traitor's death. Monmouth for a time found brighter fortune. His
popularity in the West was great, and though the gentry held aloof
when he landed at Lyme, and demanded effective parliamentary
government and freedom of worship for Protestant Nonconformists,
*he farmers and traders of Devonshire and Dorset flocked to his
standard. The clothier-towns of Somerset were true to the Whig cause,
and on the entrance of the Duke into Taunton the popular enthusiasm
showed itself in flowers which wreathed every door, as well as in a
train of young girls who presented Monmouth with a Bible and a flag.
His forces now amounted to six thousand men, but whatever chance
of success he might have had was lost by his assumption of the title of
king. The Houses supported James, and passed a bill of attainder
against the Duke. The gentry, still true to the cause of Mary and of
William, held stubbornly aloof ; while the Guards hurried to the scene
of the revolt, and the militia gathered to the royal standard. Foiled
in an attempt on Bristol and Bath, Monmouth fell back on Bridge-
water, and flung himself in the night of the sixth of July, 1C85, on the
King's forces, which lay encamped on Sedgemoor. The surprise
failed ; and the brave peasants and miners who followed the Duke,
checked in their advance by a deep drain which crossed the moor,
were broken after a short resistance by the royal horse. Their le:i> 0,
fled from the field, and after a vain effort to escape from the realm, was
captured and sent pitilessly to the block.

Never had England shown a firmer loyalty ; but its loyalty was
changed into horror by the terrible measures of repression which fol-
lowed on the victory of Sedgemov.. Tven North, the Lord Keeper, a
servile tool of the Crown, protested against the license and bloodshed
in which the troops were suffered to indulge after the battle. His pro-
test however was disregarded, and he withdrew broken-hearted from
the Court to die. James was, in fact, resolved on a far more terrible
vengeance ; and the Chief-Justice Jeffreys, a man of great natural
powers but of violent temper, was sent to earn the Seals by a series of
judicial murders which have left his name a byword for cruelty. Three

Skc. VI.

The
SecoNu
Sri)/' NT

TVKrtNNV

loaa

1688

flloftniouth's
rising

The
Bloody
Circuit

■!

666

HISTORY OF TIIK KNCiLISlI PKOl'LK.

[chap.

Sifc. VI.
Thb

SBCONI)
St I' ART

Tyranny

lesfl

1688

;

The
Tyranny

hundred and fifty rebels were hanged in the " liloody Circuit," as
Jeffreys made his way through Dorset and Somerset. More than
eight hundred were sold into slavery beyond sea. A yet larger
number were whipped and imprisoned. The Queen, the maids of
honour, the courtiers, even the Judge himself, made shameless profit
from the sale of pardons. What roused pity above all were the
cruelties wreaked upon women. Some were scourged from market-
town to market-town. Mrs. Lisle, the wife of one of the Regicides,
was sent to the block at Winchester for harbouring a rebel. Eliza')eih
daunt, for the same act of womanly charity, was burned at Tyburn,
i'ity turned into horror when it was found that cruelty such a? tliis was
avowed and sanctioned by the King. Even the cold heart of General
Churchill, to whose energy the victory at Sedgemoor had mainly been
owing, revolted at the ruthlessness with which James turned away
from all appeals for mercy. "This marble," he cried as he struck the
chimney-piece on which he leant, " is not harder than the King's
heart." But it was soon plain that the terror which the butchery was
meant to strike into the people was part of a larger purpose. The
revolt was made a pretext for a vast increase of the standing army.
Charles, as we have seen, had silently and cautiously raised it to
nearly ten thousand men ; James raised it at one swoop to twenty
thousand. The employment of this force was to be at home, not
abroad, for the hope of an English policy in foreign affairs had already
(Lilcd away. In the designs which James had at heart he could look
for no consent from Parliament ; and however his pride revolted against
a dependence on France, it was only by French gold and French
soldiers that he could hope to hold the Parliament permanently at
bay. A week therefore after his accession he assured Lewis that
his gratitude and devotion to him equalled that of Charles himself.
"Tell your master," he said o the French ambassador, "that without
his protection I can do nothing. He has a right to be consulted,
and it is my wish to consult him, about everything." The pledge of
subserviency was rewarded with the promise of a subsidy, and the
promise was received with the strongest expressions of delight and
servility.

Never had the secret league with France seemed so full of danger
to English religion. Europe had long been trembling at the ambition
of Lewis ; it was trembling now at his bigotry. He had proclaimed
warfare against civil liberty in his attack upon Holland ; he declared
war at this mgrnent upon religious freedom by revoking the Edict of
Nantes, the measure by which Henry the Fourth after his abandon-
ment of Protestantism secured toleration and the free exercise of
their worship for his Protestant subjects. It had been respected
by Richelieu even in his victory over the Huguenots, and only
lightly tampered with by Mazarin. But from the beginning of his

reign Lewi
tion of it i
of persecut
than even
Protestant
streets, chil
in Catholic
royal edict
atrocities, i
Holland, S
Thousands
fields east c
men were h
from them i
regiments v,
Council on
Act. He m
legal or no
tioned, and
was the tern
of a standinj
by the majo
grievances m
of the illega
protest of th
backed by tl
prorogued,
could not ol
dismissing fo
and their su
Catholic ofifi
pleaded in 1;
judges assert
according to
a recklt s in
were admitte
Catholic pre]
laws which fc
the open exer
chapel was oj
'<ing. Carm
ligious garb ii
school in the
The quick ^
^viser man int

ix.l

TIIK kKVol.UtlON.

667

t," as
tlian

ids of
profit
re the
\arkcl-
[icidcs,
iza'iclh
'yburn.
liis was
General
ly been
d away
uck the
King's
ery was
e. The
^ army,
ed it to

L already
luld look
1 against
French
lently at
wis that
himself,
without
nsulted,
(ledge of
and the
ight and

reign Lewis had resolved to set aside its provisions, and his revoca-
tion of it in 1685 was only the natural close of a progressive system
of persecution. The Revocation was followed by outrages more cruel
than even the bloodshed of Alva. l)r;»i;oons were (juartercd on
Protestant families, women were Hung lioin their sick-beds into the
streets, children were torn from their mothers' arms to be brought up
in Catholicism, ministers were sent to the galleys. In spite of the
royal edicts, which forbade even flight to the victims of these horrible
atrocities, a hundred thousand Protestants fled over the borders, and
Holland, Switzerland, the Palatinate, were filled with French exiles.
Thousands found refuge in England, and their industry founded in the
fields east of London the silk trade of Spitalfields. But while English-
men were looking with horror on these events in France, James drew
from them new hopes. In defiance of the law he was filling his fresh
regiments with Catholic ofificcrs. He dismissed Halifax from the Privy
Council on his refusal to consent to a plan for repealing the Test
Act. He met the Parliament with a haughty declaration that whether
legal or no his grant of commissions to Catholics must not be ques-
tioned, and with a demand of supplies for his new troops. Loyal as
was the temper of the Houses, their alarm for the Church, their dread
of a standing army, was yet stronger than their loyalty. The Commons
by the majority of a single vote deferred the grant of supplies till
grievances were redressed, and demanded in their address the recall
of the illegal commissions. The Lords took a bolder tone ; and the
protest of the bishops against any infringement of the Test Act was
backed by the eloquence of Halifax. But both Houses were at once
prorogued. The King resolved to obtain from the judges what he
could not obtain from Parliament. He remodelled the bench by
dismissing four judges who refused to lend themselves to his plans ;
and their successors decided in the case of Sir Edward Hales, a
Catholic officer in the army, that a royal dispensation could be
pleaded in bar of the Test Act. The principle laid down by the
judges asserted the right of the King to dispense with penal laws
according to his own judgement, and it was applied by Jamea with
a recklt s impatience of all decency and self-restraint. Catholics
were admitted into civil and military ofifices without stint, and four
Catholic peers were sworn as members of the Privy Council. The
laws which forbade the presence of Catholic priests in the roalm, or
the open exercise of Catholic worship, were set at nought. A gorgeous
chapel was opened in the palace of St. James for the worship of the
King. Carmelites, Benedictines, Franciscans, apptired in their 1 -
ligious garb in the streets of London, and the Jesuits set up a crowded
school in the Savoy.

The quick growth of discontent at these acts would have startled a
wiser man into prudence, but James prided himself on an obstinacy

Skc. VI

TlIK

Skconii

.STl'AKr
TVHANNV

1682

1688

lif'

1686

The

Test Act
set aiide

if
'I

1 11

• ■ \

James
and the
Church

668

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

fCHAP.

Sec. VI.

The

Second
Sti.'art

TVKANNY

1682

1688

CoV'inissioK

i6S6

v/hich never gave way ; and a riot which took place on the opening of
a fresh Catholic chapel in the City was followed by the establishment
of a camp of thirteen thousand men at Hounslow to overawe the
capital. The course which James intended to follow in England was
shown by the course he was following in the sister kingdoms. In
Scotland he acted as a pure despot. He placed its government in the
hands of two lords, Melfort and Perth, who had embraced his own
religion, and put a Catholic in command of the Castle of Edinburgh.
The Scotch Parliament had as yet been the mere creature of the
Crown, but servile as were its members there was a point at which
their servility stopped. When James boldly required them to legalize
the toleration of Catholics, they refused to pass such an Act. It was
in vain that the King tempted them to consent by the offer of a
free trade with England. " Shall we sell our God "i " was the
indignant reply. James at once ordered the Scotch judges to treat
all laws against Catholics as null and void, and his orders were
obeyed. In Ireland his policy threw off even the disguise of law.
Catholics were admitted by the King's command to the Council ;d
to civil offices. A Catholic, Lord Tyrconnell, was put at the head o*
the army, and set instantly about its re-organization by cashiering
Protestant officers and by admitting two thousand Catholic natives
into its ranks. Meanwhile James had begun in England a bold and
systematic attack upon the Church. He regarded his ecclesiastical
supremacy as a weapon providentially 'eft co him for undoing the
work which it had enabled his predecessors to do Under Henry and
Elizabeth it had been used to turn the Church of England from
Catholic to Protestant. Under James it should be used to turn it
back again from Protestant to Catnolic. The High Commission
indeed b^d been declared illegal by an Act of the Long Parliament,
and this Act had been conflrmed by the Parliament of the Restora-
tion. But it was thought possible to evade this Act by omitting from
the instructions on which the Commission acted the extraordinary
powers and jurisdictions by which its predecessor had given ofience,
V/ith this reserve, seven commissioners were appointed for the govern-
ment of the Church, with Jeffreys at their head ; and the first blow of
the Commission was at the Bishop of London. James had forbidden
the clergy to preach against "the King's religion,'' and ordered
Bishop Compton to suspend a London vicar who ?et this order at
defiance. The Bishop's refusal wa:> oimished by his own suspension.
But the pressure of the Commission only drove the clergy to a bolder
defiance of the royal will. Sermons against superstition were preached
from every pulpit ; and he two most famous divines of the day,
Tillotson and Stillingflcct, put themselves at the head of a host of
controversialists who scattered pamphlets and tracts from every
printing press.

I!'-

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

669

It was in vain that the bulk of the Catholic gentry stood aloof and
predicted the inevitable reaction his course must bring about, or that
Rome itself counselled greater moderation. James was infatuated
with what seemed to be the success of his enterprises. He looked on
the opposition he experienced as due to the influence of the High
Church Tories who had remained in power since the reaction of 168 1,
and these he determined "to chastise." The Duke of Quecnsberry,
the leader of this party in Scotland, was driven from office. Tyrconnell,
as we have seen, was placed as a check on Ormond in Ireland. In
England James resolved to show the world that even the closest ties
of blood were as nothing to him if they conflicted with the demands of
his faith. His earlier marriage with Anne Hyde, the daughter of
Clarendon, bound both the Chancellor's sons to his fortunes ; and on
his accession he had sent his elder brother-in-law, Henry, Earl of
Clarendon, as Lord Lieutenant to Ireland, and raised the younger,
Laurence, Earl of Rochester, to the post of Lord Treasurer. But
Rochester was now told that the King could not safely entrust so
great a charge to any one who did not share his sentiments on religion,
and on his refusal to abandon his faith he was deprived of the White
Staff. His brother. Clarendon, shared his fail. A Catholic, Lord
Bellasys, became First Lord of the Treasury, which was put into com-
mission after Rochester's removal ; and another Catholic, Lord Arundel,
became Lord Privy Seal, while Father Petre, a Jesuit, was called to
the Privy Council. One official after another who refused to aid in
the repeal of the Test Act was dismissed. In defiance of the law the
Nuncio of the Pope was received in state at Windsor. But even James
could hardly fail to perceive the growth of public discontent. If the
great Tory nobles were staunch for the Crown, they were as resolute
Englishmen in their hatred of mere tyranny as tho Whigs themselves.
James gave the Duke of Norfolk the sword of State to carry before
him as he went to Mass. The Duke stopped at the Chapel door.
" Your father would have gone further," said the King. " Your
Majesty's father was the better man," replied the Duke, "and he would
not have gone so far." The young Duke of Somerset was ordered to
introduce the Nuncio into the Presence Chamber. " I am advised,"
he answered, " that I cannot obey your Majesty without breaking the
law." " Do yoi: not know that I am above the law ? " Jamss asked
angrily. "Your Majesty may be, but I am not," retorted the Duke.
He was dismissed from his post ; but the spirit of resistance spread
fast. In spite of the King's letters the governors of the Charter
House, who numbered among them some of the greatest English
nobles, refused to admit a Catholic to the benefits of the foundation.
The most devoted loyalists began to murmur when James d^m.-inded
apostasy as a proof of their loyalty. He had soon in fact to abandon
all hope of bringing the Church or the Tories over to his will. He

Skc. VI.

The
Second

SlUART

Tyranny
1682

1688

Declara-
tion of
Indul-
gence

1687

The Tory
nobles

The Non-
conforntistsi

670

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

TCHAP.

Sec. VI.

The

Seco:4i>

Stuart

Tyrannv

1682

1688

James
and the
Univer-
sities

turned, as Charles had turned, to the Nonconformists, and published
in 1687 a Declaration of Indulgence which suspended the operation of
the penal laws against Nonconformists and Catholics alike, and of every
Act which imposed a test as a qualification for office in Church or
State. The temptation to accept the Indulgence was great, for since
the fall of Shaftesbury persecution had fallen heavily on the Pro-
testant dissidents, and we can hardly wonder that the Nonconformists
wavered for a time, or that numerous addresses of thanks were pre-
sented to James. But the great body of them, and all the more
venerable names among them, remained true to the cause of freedom.
Baxter, Howe, and Bunyan all refused an Indulgence which could
only be purchased by the violent overthrow of the law. It was plain
that the attempt to divide the forces of Protestantism had utterly
failed, and that the only mode of securing his end was to procure a
repeal of the Test Act from Parliament itself.

The temper of the existing Houses however remained absolutely
opposed to the King's project. He therefore dissolved the Parliament,
and summoned a new one. But no free Parliament could be brought,
as he knew, to consent to the repeal. The Lords indeed could be
swamped by lavish creations of new peers. " Your troop of horse,"
his minister, Lord Sunderland, told Churchill, " shall be called up into
the House of Lords." But it was a harder matter to secure a com-
pliant House of Commons. The Lord-Lieutenants were directed to
bring about such a " regulation " of the governing body in boroughs
as would ensure the return of candidates pledged to the repeal of the
Test, and to question every magistrate in their county as to his vote.
Half of them at once refused, and a long list of great nobles— the
Earls of Oxford, Shrewsbury, Dorset, Derby, Pembroke, Rutland,
Abergavenny, Thanet, Northampton, and Abingdon — were dismissed
from their Lord-Lieutenancies. The justices when questioned simply
replied that they would vote according to their consciences, and send
members to Parliament who would protect the Protestant religion.
After repeated " regulations " it was found impossible to form a cor-
porate body which would return repreb'^ntatives willing to comply with
the royal will. All thought of a Parliament had to be abandoned ; and
even the most bigoted courtiers counselled moderation at this proof
of the stubborn opposition which James must prepare to encounter
from the peers, the gentry, and the trading classes. The clergy alone
still hesitated in any open act of resistance. Even the tyranny of the
Commission failed to rouse into open disaffection men who had been
preaching Sunday after Sunday the doctrine of passive obedience to the I
worst of kings. But James cared little for passive obedience. He looiced |
on the refusal of the clergy to support his plans as freeing him from
his pledge to maintain the Church as established by law ; and he re-
solved to attack it in the great institutions which had till now been its

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

671

published
eration of
d of every
:hurch or
, for since

the Pro-
i^nforniists
were pre-

the more
»f freedom,
hich could
t was plain
had utterly
procure a

Parliament,
be brought,
zd could be
p of horse,"
illed up into
;cure a corn-
directed to
in boroughs
•epeal of the
to his vote,
nobles— the
|ce, Rutland,
•re dismissed
[ioned simply
;es, and send
;ant religion.
form a cor-
comply with
[ndoned ; and
at this proof
to encounter
clergy alone
'ranny of the
rho had been
idiencetothe
e. He looked
jing him from
; and he re-
new been its

strongholds. To secure the Universities for Catholicism was to seize
the only training schools which the clergy possessed. Cambridge
indeed escaped easily. A Benedictine monk who presented himself
with royal letters recommending him for the degree of a Master of
Arts was rejected on his refusal to sign the Articles : and the Vice-
Chancellor paid for the rejection by dismissal from his office. But a
violent and obstinate attack was directed against Oxford. The Master
of University College, v/ho declared himself a convert, was authorized
to retain his post in defiance of the law. Massey, a Roman Catholic,
was presented by the Crown to the Deanery of Christ Church.
Magdalen was the wealthiest Oxford College, and James in 1687
recommended one Farmer, a Catholic of infamous life and nr»t even
qualified by statute for the office, to its vacant headship. The Fellows
remonstrated, and on the rejection of their remonstrance chose Hough,
one of their own number, as their President. The Ecclesiastical Com-
mission declared the election void ; and James, shamed out of his first
candidate, recommended a second, Parker, Bishop of Oxford, a
Catholic in heart and the meanest of his courtiers. But the Fellows
held stubbornly to their legal heaa. It was in vain that the King
visited Oxford, summoned them to his presence, and rated them as
they knelt before him like schoolboys. " I am King," he said, " I will
be obeyed ! Go to your chapel this instant, and elect the Bishop !
Let those who refuse look to it, for they shall feel the whole weight of
my hand ! " It was seen that to give Magdalen as well as Christ
Church into Catholic hands was to turn Oxford into a Catholic semi-
nary, and the King's threats were disregarded. But they were soon
carried out. A special Commission visited the University, pronounced
Hough an intruder, set aside his appeal to the law, burst open the door
of his President's house to install Parker in his place, and on their I
refusal to submit deprived the Fellows of their fellowships. The ex-
pulsion of the Fellows was followed on a like refusal by that of the
Demies. Parker, vrho died immediately after his installation, was
succeeded by a Roman Catholic bishop m partibus^ Bonaventure
Giffard, and twelve Catholics were admitted to fellowships in a single
day.

Meanwhile James clung to the hope of finding a compliant Parlia-
ment, from which he might win a repeal of the Test Act. In face of
the dogged opposition of the country the elections had been ad-
journed ; and a renewed Declaration of Indulgence was intended as
an appeal to the nation at large. At its close he promised to summon
a Parliament in November, and he called on the electors to choose such
members as would bring to a successful end the policy he had begun.
His resolve, he said, was to establish universal liberty of conscience
for all future time. It was in this character of a royal appeal that he
ordered every clergyman to read the declaration during divine service

Sec. VI.

The

Second

Stuart

Tyranny

1682

1688

The

Seven

Bishops

April 1688

672

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

ICHAP.

Sec. VI.

The

Second

Stuaut

Tykanny

1682

1688

Trial 0/ the

Bisho/>s

I6SC

William
cird Europe

on two successive Sundays. Little time was given for deliberation, but
little time was needed. The clergy refused almost to a man to be the
instruments of their own humiliation. The Declaration was read in
only four of the London churches, and in these the congregation
flocked out of church at the first words of it. Nearly all of the
country clergy refused to obey the royal orders. The Bishops went
with the rest of the clergy. A few days before the appointed. Sunday
Archbishcp Sancroft called his suffragans together, and the six who
were able to appear at Lambeth signed a temperate protest to the
King, in which they declined to publish an illegal Declaration. " It is
a standard of rebellion," James exclaimed as the Primate presented
the paper ; and the resistance of the clergy was no sooner announced
to him than he determined to wreak his vengeance on the prelates
who had signed the protest. He ordered the Ecclesiastical Commis-
sioners to deprive them of their sees, but in this matter even the
Commissioners fhrank from obeying him. The Chancellor, Lord
Jeffrey,s, advised a prosecution for libel as an easier mode of punish-
meiit ■ and the bishops, who refused to give bail, were committed on
this charge to the Tower. They passed to their prison amidst the
shouts of a great multitude, the sentinels knelt for their blessing as
they entered its gates, and the soldiers of the garrison drank their
healths. So threatening was the temper of the nation that his minis-
ters pressed James to give way. But his obstinacy grev/ witn the
danger. "Indulgence," he said, "ruined my father;" and on the
29th of June the bishops appeared as criminals at the bar of the King's
Bench. The jury had been packed, the judges \;^ere mere tools of the
Crown, but judges and jury were alike overawed by the indignation of
the people at large. No sooner hr d the foreman of the jury uttered
the words " Not guilty " than a roar of applause burst from the crowd,
and horsemen spurred along every road to carry over the country the
news of the acquittal.

faction VII.— William of Orange.

\A71thorities. — As before.]

Amidst the tumult of the Plot and the Exclusion Bill the wiser
among English statesmen had fixed their hopes steadily on the
, ucccssion of Mary, the elder daughter and heiress of James. The
tyranny of her father's reign made this succession the hope of the
T-eople at larrj. But to Europe the importance of the change, when-
ever it should come about, lay not so much in the succession of Mary,
I as in the n<;w powe;" which such an event would give to her husband,
I Wi^'^am Prince of C)range. We have come in fact to a moment when
i the struggle of Engl.ind against the aggression of its King blends with

IX. 1

THE REVOLUTION

^73

ition,but
to be the
s read in
gregation
ill of the
lops went
d Sunday
e six who
est to the
.n. "It is
presented
mnounced
le prelates
1 Commis-
r even the
2llor, Lord
of punish-
nmitted on
amidst the
blessing as
drank their
t his minis-
w witn the
md on the
f the King's
tools of the
iignation of
ury uttered
the crowd,
Icountry the

the larger struggle of Europe against the aggression of Lev/is the
Fourteenth, and it is only by a rapid glance at the political state of
the Continent that we can understand the real nature and results of
the Rcv'olution which drove James from the throne.

At this moment France was the dominant power in Christendom.
The religious wars which began with the Reformation had broken the
strength of the nations around her. Spain was no longer able to fight
the battle of Catholicism. The Peace of Westphalia, by the inde-
pendence it gave to the German princes and the jealousy it kept alive
between the Protestant and Catholic powers of Germany, destroyed
the strength of the Empire. The German branch of the House of
Austria, spent with the long struggle of the Thirty Years' War, had
enough to do in battling hard agaiiist the advance of the Turks from
Hungary on Vienna. The victories of Gustavus and of the generals
whom he formed had been dearly purchased by the exhaustion of
Sweden. The United Provinces were as yet hardly regarded as a
great power, and were trammelltd by their contest with England for
the empire of the seas. France aicne profited by the general wreck.
The wise policy of Henry the Fourth in securing religious peace by a
grant of toleration to the Protestants haa jndone the ill effects of its
religious wars. The Huguenots were still numerous south of the
Loire, but the loss of their fortresses had tu/ned *heir energies into
the peaceful channels of industry and trade. Feudal disorder was
roughly put down by Richelieu, and the policy whirh gathered all local
[ power into the hands of the crown, though fatal iii the end to the real
welfare of France, gave it for the moinenL an air cf good government,
and a command over its internal resources which no other country
could boast. Its compact and fertile territory, the itural activity and
enterprise of its people, and the rapid growth ol ts commerce and
manufactures, were sources of natural wealth w
taxation failed to check. In the latter half of the
France was looked upon as the wealthiest pow
yearly income of the French crown was double
even Lewis the Fourteenth trusted as much •
treasury as to the glory of his arms. " After .1

fortunes of war began to turn against him, "it is

-h even its heavy
•venteenth century
in Europe. The
t of England, and
the credit of his
he said, when the
the last louis d'or

which must win I" It was in fact this superiority in wealth which
enabled France to set on foot forces such as hid never been seen in
Europe since the downfall of Rome. At the opening of the reign of
i Lewis the Fourteenth its army mustered a hundred thousand men.
With the war against Holland it rose to nearly V t hundred thousand.
In the last struggle against the Grand Alliance tiicie was a time when
it counted nearly half a million of men in arms. Nor was France
I content with these enormous land forces. Since the ruin of Spain the
[fleets of Holland and of England had alone disputed the empire of

X X

Sec. VII
William

Orange

The
Great*
ness of
France

674

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap

Sec. VII

WlLlIAM
OK

Orange

IiewlB
the Four-
teenth

France and
Spain

the seas. Under Richelieu and Mazarin France could hardly be
looked upon as a naval power. But the early years of Lewis saw the
creation of a navy of loo men-of-war, and the fleets of France soon
held their own against England or the Dutch.

Such a power would have been formidable at any time ; but it was
doubly formidable when directed by statesmen who in knowledge and
ability were without rivals in Europe. No diplomatist could compare
with Lionne, no war minister with Louvois, no financier with Colbert.
Their young master, Lewis the Fourteenth, bigoted, narrow-minded,
commonplace as he was, without personal honour or personal courage,
without gratitude and without pity, insane in his pride, insatiable in
his vanity, brutal in his selfishness, had still many of the qualities of
a great ruler : industry, patience, quickness of resolve, firmness of
purpose, a capacity for discerning greatness and using it, an immense
self-belief and self-confidence, and a temper utterly destitute indeed
of real greatness, but with a dramatic turn for seeming to be great.
As a politician Lewis had simply to reap the harvest which the two
great Cardinals who went before him had sown. Both had used to
the profit of France the exhaustion and dissension which the wars of
religion had brought upon Europe. Richelieu turned the scale against
the House of Austria by his alliance with Sweden, with the United
Provinces, and with the Protestant princes of Germany ; and the two
great treaties by which Mazarin ended the Thirty Years' War, the
Treaty of Westphalia and the Treaty of the Pyrenees, left the Empire
disorganized and Spain powerless. From that moment indeed Spain
sank into a strange decrepitude. Robbed of the chief source of her
wealth by the independence of Holland, weakened at home by the
revolt of Portugal, her infantry annihilated by Coridd in his victory of
Rocroi, her fleet ruined by the Dutch, her best blood drained away to
the Indies, the energies of her people destroyed by the suppression of
all liberty, civil or religious, her intellectual life crushed by the Inqui-
sition, her industry crippled by the expulsion of the Moors, by financial
oppression, and by the folly of her colonial system, the kmgdom which
under Philip the Second had aimed at the empire of the world lay helpless
and exhausted under Philip the Fourth. The aim of Lewis from 1661,
the year when he really became master of France, was to carry on the
policy of his predecessors, and above all to complete the ruin of Spain.
The conquest of the Spanish provinces in the Netherlands would carry
his border to the Scheldt. A more distant hope lay in the probable
extinction of the Austrian line which now sat on the throne of Spain.
By securing the succession to that throne for a French prince, noti
only Castille and Aragon with the Spanish dependencies in Italy and
the Netherlands, but the Spanish empire in the New World would be
added to the dominions of France. Nothing could save Spain but aj
union of the European powers, and to prevent this union by his nego-

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

lardly be
s saw Ihc
ance soon

but it was
/ledge and
d compare
th Colbert.
>w-minded,
al courage,
Lsatiable in
qualities of
firmness of
m immense
tute indeed
to be great,
lich the two
had used to
the wars of
scale against
, the United
and the two
rs' War, the
. the Empire
indeed Spain
(ource of her
lome by the
AS victory of
ned away to
ppression of
jy the Inqui-
,, by financial
ngdom which
[d lay helpless
is from 1661,
carry on the
|ruin of Spain,
s would carry
the probable
me of Spain.
jh prince, not i
|s in Italy and
»rld would be
Spain but a I
by his nego-

tiations was a work at which Lewis toiled for years. The intervention
of the Empire was guarded against by a renewal of the old alliances
between France and the lesser German princes. A league with the
Turks gave Austria enough to do on her eastern border. The old
league with Sweden, the old friendship with Holland were skilfully
maintained. The policy of Charles the Second bound England to the
side of Lewis. At last it seemed that the moment for which he had
waited had come, and the signing of the Treaty of Breda gave an
opportunity for war of which Lewis availed himself in 1667. But the
suddenness and completeness of the French success awoke a general
terror before which the skilful diplomacy of Charles gave way.
Holland was roused to a sense of danger at home by the appearance
of French arms on the Rhine. England woke from her lethargy
on the French seizure of the coast-towns of Flanders. Sweden joined
the two Protestant powers in the Triple Alliance ; and the dread of a
wider league forced Lewis to content himself with the southern half of
Flanders and the possession of a string of fortresses which practically
left him master of the Netherlands.

Lewis was maddened by the check. He had always disliked the
Dutch as Protestants and Republicans r h^i hated them now as an
obstacle which must be taken out of the \v-\.\' ere he could resume his
projects upon Spain. Four years were spent in preparations for a
decisive blow. The French army was gradually raised to a hundred
and eighty thousand men. Colbert created a fleet which rivalled that
of Holland in number and equipment. Sweden was again won over.
England was again secured by the Treaty of Dover. Meanwhile
Holland lay wrapped in a false security. The French alliance had
been its traditional policy since the days of Henry the Fourth, and it
was especially dear to the party of the great merchant class which had
mounted to power on the fall of the House of Orange. John de Witt,
the leader of this party, though he had been forced to conclude the
Triple Alliance by the advance of Lewis to the Rhine, still clung
blindly to the friendship of France. His trust only broke down when
the French army crossed the Dutch border in 1672, and the glare
of its watch-fires was seen from the walls of Amsterdam. For tl^
moment Holland lay crushed at the feet of Lewis, but the arrogance
of the conqi eror roused again the stubborn courage which had wrung
victory from Alva and worn out the pride of Philip the Second. De
Witt was murdered in a popular tumult, and his fall called William,
the Prince of Orange, to the head of the Repubhc. Though the new
Stadholder had hardly reached manhood, his great qualities at once
made themselves felt. His earlier life had schooled him in a wonder-
ful self-control. He had been left fatherless and ail but friendless in
childhood, he had been bred among men who Icoked on his very
existence as a danger to the State, his words haa been watched, his

X X 2

Sec. VII.
William

Okangk

1668

William

of
Orange

1672

676

HTSTiJRY OF THii: ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VN.
William

Orange

William

and
Charles

II.

ill

looks noted, his friends jealously withdrawn. In such an atmosphere
the boy grew up silent, wary, self-contained, grave in temper, cold in
demeanour, blunt and even repulsive in address. He was weak and
sickly from his cradle, and manh(jod brought with it an asthma and
consumption which shook his frame with a constant cough ; his fact-
was sullen and bloodless and scored with deep lines which told of
ceaseless pain. But beneath this cold and sickly presence lay a fiery
and commanding temper, an immoveable courage, and a political
ability of the highest order. William was a born statesman. Neglected
as his education had been in other ways, fo* he knew nothing of letters
or of art, he had been carefu)ly trained in politics by John De Witt :
and the wide knowledge with which in his first address to the States-
General the young Stadholdei reviewed the general state of Europe,'
the cool courage with which he calculated the chances of the struggle,
at once won him the trust of his countrymen. Their trust was soon
rewarded. Holland was saved, and province after province won back
from the arms of France, by William's dauntless resolve. Like his
great ancestor, William the Silen% he was a luckless commander, and
no general had to bear more freauent defeats. But he profited by
defeat as other men profit by victory. His bravery indeed was of
that nobler cast which rises to its height in moments of ruin and
dismay. The coolness with which, boy-general as he was, he rallied
his broken squadrons amidst the rout of SenefF, and wrested from
Cond^ at the last the fruits of his victory, moved his veteran opponent
to a generous admiration. It was in such moments indeed that tlje
real temper of the man broke through the veil of his usual reserve. A
strange light flashed from his eyes as soon as he was under fire, and
in the terror and confusion of defeat his manners took an ease and
gaiety that charmed every soldier around him.

The pohtical ability of William was seen in the skill with which he
drew Spain and the House of Austria into a coalition against France,
a union which laid the foundation of the Grand Alliance. But France
was still matchless in arms, and the effect of her victories was seconded
by the selfishness of the allies, and above all by the treacherous diplo-
macy of Charles the Second. William was forced to consent in 1678
to the Treaty of Nimeguen, which left France dominant over Europe
as she had never been before. Holland indeed was saved from the
revenge of Lewis, but fresh spoils had been wrested from Spain, and
Franche-Comt^, which had been restored at the close of the former
war, was retained at the end of this. Above all France overawed
Europe by the daring and success with which she had faced single-
handed the wide coalition against her. Her King's arrogance became
unbounded. Lorraine was turned into a subject-state. Genoa was
bombarded, and its Doge forced to seek pardon in the antechambers
of Versailles. The Pope was humiliated by the march of an army

ix.l

THE RKVOLUTION.

677

tinosphcre
er, cold in
, weak and
sthma aiul
I ; his face
ich told of
: lay a (icry
a political

Neglected
ng of letters
i De Witt :
I the States-
j of Europe,'
;he struggle,
ist was soon
ce won back
e. Like his
mander, and
; profited by
deed was of
of ruin and
as, he rallied
ivrested from
ran opponent
leed that tl^e
1 reserve. A
ider fire, and

an ease and

vith which he
ainst France,
But France
was seconded
:herous diplo-
nsent in 1678
over Europe
ived from the
m Spain, and I
of the former
nee overawed j
faced single-
gance became
Genoa was
antechambers
:h of an army

upon Rome to avenge a slight offered to the French ambassador.
The Empire ""\s outraged by a shameless seizure of Imperial fiefs in
Flsass and elsewhere. The whole Protestant world was defied by
the persecution of the Huguenots which was to culminate in the revo-
cation of the Edict of Nantes, In the mind of Lewis peace meant a
series of outrages on the powers around him ; but every outrage helped
the cool and silent adversary who was looking on from the Hague to
build up that Great Alliance of all Europe from which alone he looked
for any effectual check to the ambition of France. The experience of
the last war had taught William that of such an alliance England must
form a part, and the efforts of the Prince ever since the peace had
been directed to secure her co-operation. A reconciliation of the
King with his Parliament was an indispensable step towards freeing
Charles from his dependence on France, and it was such a recon-
ciliation that William at first strove to bring about ; but he was for
a long time foiled by the steadiness with which Charles clung to the
power whose aid was needful to cany out the schemes which he was
contemplating. The change of policy however which followed on
the fall of the Cabal and the entry of Danby into power raised new
hopes in William's mind ; and his marriage with Mary dealt Lewis
what proved to be a fatal blow. James was without a son, and the
marriage with Mary would at any rate ensure William the aid of
England in his great enterprise on his father-in-law's death. But it
was impossible to wait for that event, and though the Prince used
his new position to bring Charles round to a decided policy his efforts
remained fruitless. The storm of the Popish Plot complicated hir,
position. In the earlier stages of the Exclusion Bill, when the
Parliament seemed resolved simply to pass over James and to seat
Mary at once on the throne after her uncle's death, William stood
apart from the struggle, doubtful of its issue, though prepared to
accept the good luck if it came to him. But the fatal error of
Shaftesbury in advancing the claims of Monmouth forced him into
action. To preserve his wife's right of succession, with all the great
issues which were to come of it, no other course v/as left than to
adopt the cause of the Duke of York. In the crisis of the struggle,
therefore. William threw his whole weight on the side of James, The
eloquence of Halifax secured the rejection of the Exchijion Bill, and
Halifax was but the mouthpiece of William.

But while England was seething with the madness of the Popish
Plot and of the royalist reaction, the great European struggle was
drawing nearer and nearer. The patience of Cjcrmany was worn out
by the ceaseless aggressions of Lewis, and in 1686 its princes had
bound themselves at Augsburg to resist all further encroachments on
the part of France. From that moment war became inevitable, and
William watched the course of his father-in-law with redoubled

Sec. Vn.
William

Ol'

Orangb

i'jl

1677"

AVilliam

and
James II.

67S

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CIIAP.

Src. VII.

WM.r.IAM

OK
OKANr.F.

The Invi-
tation

i68S

anxiety. His efforts to ensure English aid had utterly failed. James
luul renewed his brother's secret treaty with France, and plunged into
a quarrel with his people which of itself would have prevented him
from giving any aid in a struggle abroad. The Prince could only
silently look on, with a desperate hope that James might yet be brouylil
to a nobler policy. He refused all encouragement to the leading mal-
contents who were already calling on him to interfere in arms. On
the other hand he declined to support the King in his schemes for the
abolition of the Test. If he still cherished hopes of bringing about
a peace between the King and people which might enable him to
enlist England in the Grand Alliance, they vanished in 1687 before
the Declaration of Indulgence. It was at this moment that James
called on him to declare himself in favour of the abolition of the penal
laws and of the Test. But simultaneously with the Kind's a|)po:il
came letters of warning and promises of support from the leadinij
English nobles. Some, like the Hydes, simply assured him of tlicir
friendship. The Bishop of London added promises of support. Others,
like Devonshire, Nottingham, and Shrewsbury, cautiously or openly
warned the Prince against compliance with the King's demand. Lord
Churchill announced the resolve of Mary's sister Anne to stand by the
cause of Protestantism. Danby, the leading representative of the
great Tory party, sent urgent earnings. The letters dictated William's
answer. No one, he truly protested, loathed religious persecution
more than he himself did, but in relaxing political disabilities James
called on him to countenance an attack on his own religion. "I
cannot," he ended, " concur in what your Majesty desires of me."
But William still shrank from the plan of an intervention in arras.
General as the disaffection undoubtedly was, the position of James
seemed fairly secure. He counted on the aid of France. He had an
army of twenty thousand men. Scotland, disheartened by the failure
of Argyll's rising, could give no such aid as it gave to the Long Parlia-
ment. Ireland was ready to throw a Catholic army on the western
coast. It was doubtful if in England itself disaffection would turn
into actual rebellion. The " Bloody Circuit" had left its terror on the
Whigs. The Tories and the Churchmen, angered as they were, were
hampered by their doctrine of non-resistance. William's aim therefore
was to discourage all violent counsels, and to confine himself to
organizing such a general opposition as would force James by legal
means to reconcile himself to the country, to abandon his policy at
home and abroad, and to join the alliance against France.

But at this moment the whole course of William's policy was changed
by an unforeseen event. His own patience and that of the nation
rested on the certainty of Mary's succession. But in the midst of
the King's struggle with the Church it was announced that the Queen
was again with child. The news was received with general unbelief

ix.l

THE REVOLUTION.

670

f(ir five years had passed since the last pregnancy of Mary of Modcna
lUit it at once forced on a crisis. If, as the Catholics joyously fore
told, the child turned out a boy, and, as was certain, was brought up
a Catholic, the liighest Tory had to resolve at last whether the tyranny
under which I-'.ngland lay should go on for c. or. The hesitation of
the country was at an end. Danby, loyal above all to the Church
and firm in his hatred of subservience to France, answered for the
Tories ; Compton for the High Churchmen, goaded at last into re-
bellion by the Declaration of Indulgence. The Earl of Devonshire,
the Lord Cavendish of the Exclusion struggle, answered for the Non-
conformists, who were satisfied with William's promise to procure
them toleration, ab well as for the general body of the Whigs. The
announcement of the birth of a Prince of Wales was followed ten
days after by a formal invitation to William to intervene in arms for
the restoration of English liberty and the protection of the Protestant
religion ; it was signed by the representatives of the great parties now
united against a common danger, and by some others, and was carried
to the Hague by Herbert, the most popular of English seamen, who
had been deprived of his command for a refusal to vote against the
Tc ,t. The Invitation called on Vv illiam to land with an army strong
enough to justify those who signed it in rising in arms. It was sent
from London on the day after the acquittal of the Bishops. The
general excitement, the shouts of the boats which covered the river,
the bonfires in every street, showed indeed that the country was on
the eve of revolt. The army itself, on which James had implicitly
relied, suddenly showed its sympathy with the people. James was at
Hounslow when the news of the verdict reached him, and as he rode
from the camp he heard a great shout behind him. '' What is that ?"
he asked. " It is nothing," was the reply, " only the soldiers are glad
that the Bishops are acquitted!" "Do you call that nothing?'*
grumbled the King. The shout told him that he stood utterly alone in
his realm. The peerage, the gentry, the Bishops, the clergy, tae Univer-
sities, every lawyer, every trader, every f. rmer, stood aloof from him.
And now his very soldiers forsook him. The most devoted Catholics
pressed him to give way. But to give way was to change the whole
nature of his government. All show of legal rule had disappeared.
Sheriffs, mayors, magistrates, appointed by the Crown in defiance
of a parliamentary statute, were no real officers in the eye of the law.
Even if the Houses were summoned, members returned by officers
such as these could form no legal Parliament. Hardly a Minister of
the Crown or a Privy Councillor exercised any lawful authority. James
had brought things to such a pass that the restoration of legal govern-
ment meant the absolute reversal of every act he had done. But he
was in no mood to reverse his acts. His temper was only spurred to
a more dogged obstinacy by danger and remonstrance. He broke up

Sic. VFI,
William

Oranok

i. ^

June 20

June 30

The

national

discontent

I n

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TEST TARGET (MT-3)

1.0

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Sciences

Corporation

F^r-^iii

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33 WeST MAIN STRiiT

WEBSTER, N.Y. 14SM

(716)«72-4S03

6So

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VII.
William

Orangb

William's
Ifandlng

1688

James

the camp at Hounslow and dispersed its troops in distant cantonments.
He dismissed the two judges who had favoured the acquittal of the
Bishops. He ordered the chancellor of each diocese to report the
names of the clergy who had not read the Declaration of Indulgence.
But his will broke fruitlessly against the sullen resistance which met
him on every side. Not a chancellor made a return to the Commis-
sioners, and the Commissioners were cowed into inaction by the
temper of the nation. When the judges who had displayed their
servility to the Crown went on circuit the gentry refused to meet them.
A yet fiercer irritation was kindled by ihe King's resolve to supply
the place of the English troops, whose temper proved unserviceable
for his purposes, by draughts from the Catholic army which Tyrcon-
nell had raised in Ireland. Even the Roman Catholic peers at the
Council table protested against this measure ; and six officers in a
single regiment laid d'^wn their commissions rather than enroll the
Irish recruits among their men. The ballad of " Lillibullero," a
scurrilous attack on the Irish recruits, was sung from one end of
England to the other.

An outbreak of revolt was in fact inevitable. William was straining
all his resources to gather a fleet and sufficient forces, while noble after
noble made their way to the Hague. The Earl of Shrewsbury brought
;^2,ooo towards the expenses of the expedition. Edward Russell, the
representative of the Whig Earl of Bedford, was followed by the
repr jsentatives of great Tory houses, by the sons of the Marquis of
Winchester, of Lord Danby, of Lord Peterborough, and by the High
Church Lord Macclesfield. At home the Earls of Danby and Devon-
shire prepared silently with Lord Lumley for a rising in the North. In
spite of the profound secrecy with which all was conducted, the keen
instinct of Sunderland, who had stooped to purchase continuance in
office at the price of a secret apostasy to Catholicism, detected the
preparations of William ; and the sense that his master's ruin was at
hand encouraged him to tell every secret of James on the promise of a
pardon for the crimes to which he had lent himself. James alone
remamed stubborn and insensate as of old. He had no fear of a
revolt unaided by the Pnnce of Orange, and he believed that the threat
of a French attack on Holland would render William's departure
impossible. But in September the long-delayed war began, and by
the greatest political error of his reign Lewis threw his forces not
on Holland, but on Germany. The Dutch at once felt themselves
secure ; the States-General gave their sanction to William's project,
and the armament he had prepared gathered rapidly in the Scheldt.
The news no sooner reached England than the King passed from
obstinacy to panic. By draughts from Scotland and Ireland he had
mustered forty thousand men, but the temper of the troops robbed him
of all trust in them. Help from France was now cut of the question.

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

68 1

He could only fall back on the older policy of a union with the Tory
party and the party of the Church. He personally appealed for support
to the Bishops. He dissolved the Ecclesiastical Commission. He
replaced the magistrates he had driven from office. He restored their
franchises to the towns. The Chancellor carried back the Charter of
London in state into the City. The Bishop of Winchester was sent
to replace the expelled Fellows of Magdalen. Catholic chapels and
Jesuit schools were ordered to be closed. Sunderland pressed for the
instant calling of a Parliament, but to James the counsel seemed
treachery, and he dismissed Sunderland from office. In answer to a
declaration from the Prince of Orange, which left the question of the
legitimacy of the Prince of Wales to Parliament, he produced before
the peers who were in London proofs of the birth of his child. But
concessions and proofs came too late. Detained by ill winds, beaten
back on its first venture by a violent storm, William's fleet of six
hundred transports, escorted by fifty men-of-war, anchored on the
fifth of November in Torbay ; and his army, thirteen thousand men
strong, entered Exeter amidst the shouts of its citizens. His coming
had not been looked for in the West, and for a week no great
landowner joined him. But nobles and squires soon flocked to his
camp, and the adhesion of Plymouth secured his rear. Insurrection
broke out in Scotland. Danby, dashing at the head of a hundred
horsemen into York, gave the signal for a rising. The mjlitia met
his appeal with shouts of "A free Parliament and the Protestant
religion ! " Peers and gentry flocked to his standard ; and a march
on Nottingham united his forces to those under Devonshire, who
had mustered at Derby the great lords of the midland and eastern
counties. Everywhere the revolt was triumphant. The garrison of
Hull declared for a free Parliament. The Duke of Norfolk appeared
at the head of three hundred gentlemen in the market-place at Nor-
wich. At Oxford townsmen and gownsmen greeted Lord Lovelace
with uproarious welcome. Bristol threw open its gates to the Prince
of Orange, who advanced steadily on Salisbury, where James had
mustered his forces. But the King's army, broken by dissensions
and mutual suspicions among its leaders, fell back in disorder ;
and the desertion of Lord Churchill was followed by that of so many
other officers that James abandoned the struggle in despair. He
fled to London to hear that his daughter Anne had left St. James's
to join Danby at Nottingham. " God help me," cried the wretched
King, "for my own children have forsaken me!" His spirit was
utterly broken ; and though he promised to call the Houses together,
and despatched commissioners to Hungerford to treat with William on
the terms of a free Parliament, in his heart he had resolved on flight.
Parliament, he said to the few who still clung to him, would force on
him concessions he could not endure ; and he only waited for news of

Sec. VII.
William

OuANor

' I

Tfie%
Natiofial
Rising

\ !!

;■!'!

Flight of
Jantci

682

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VII.
William

Okanub

The Re-
volution

The
Convention

1689

the escape of his wife and child to make his way to the Isle of Sheppcy,
where a hoy lay ready to carry him to France. Some rough fishermen
who took him for a Jesuit, prevented his escape, and a troop of Life
Guards brought him back in safety to London : but it was the policy
of William and his advisers to further a flight which removed their
chief difficulty out of the way. It would have been hard to depose
James had he remained, and perilous to keep him prisoner : but the
entry of the Dutch troops into London, the silence of the Prince, and
an order to leave St. James's, filled the King with fresh terrors, and
taking advantage of the means of escape which were almost openly
placed at his disposal, James a second time quitted London and
embarked on the 23rd of December unhindered for France.

Before flying James had burnt most of the writs convoking the new
Parliament, had disbanded his army, and destroyed so far as he could
all means of government. For a few days there was a wild burst ol
panic and outrage in London, but the orderly instinct of the people
soon reasserted itself. The Lords who were at the moment in London
provided on their own authority as Privy Councillors for the more
pressing needs of administration, and resigned their authority into
William's hands on his arrival. The difficulty which arose from the
absence of any person legally authorized to call Parliament together
was got over by convoking the House of Peers, and forming a second
body of all members who had sat in the Commons in the reign of
Charles the Second, with the Aldermen and Common Cpuncillors of
London. Both bodies requested William to take on himself the pro-
visional government of the kingdom, and to issue circular letters in-
viting the electors of every town and county to send up representatives
to a Convention which met in January, 1689. In the new Convention
both Houses were found equally resolved against any recall of or
negotiation with the fallen King. They were united in entrusting a
provisional authority to the Prince of Orange. But with this step
their unanimity ended. The Whigs, who formed a majority in the
Commons, voted a resolution which, illogical and inconsistent as it
seemed, was well adapted to unite in its favour every element of the
opposition to James : the Churchman who was simply scared by his
bigoiiy, the Tory who doubted the right of a nation to depose its
King, the Whig who held the theory of a contract between King and
People. They voted that King James, "having endeavoured to sub-
vert the constitution of this kingdom by breaking the original contract
between King anr* People, and by the advice of Jesuits and other
wicked persons having violated the fundamental laws, and having
withdrawn himself out of the kingdom, has abdicated the Government,
and that the throne is thereby vacant." But in the Lords, where the
Tories were still in the ascendant, the resolution was fiercely debated.
Archbishop Sancroft with the high Tories held that no crime could

bring about
King, but tl
from him th<
to a Regencj
that James h
vacant, and
sovereignty '
eloquence of
resolution of
lost by a sir
majority. Bi
William. H(
Danby, to be
refused to ac
The two dech
William and
that the actu
Parliamentary
Somers, a you
the Bishops ai
drew up a Dc
13th to Williai
at Whitehall,
and the resolvi
and liberties c
lishment of ar
without Parliai
suspend or dis
Parliament. I
choice of repn
administration
liberty of deba
religion by all
the Protestant
faith that thes
William and M
Orange King a
Halifax, in the
receive the cro\
his wife's, and (
the laws and to

IX. 1

THE REVOLUTION.

683

bring about a forfeitirc of the crown, and that James still remained
King, but that his tyranny had given the nation a right to withdraw
from him the actual exercise of government and to entrust his functions
to a Regency. The moderate Tories under Danby's guidance admitted
that James had ceased to be King, but denied that the throne could be
vacant, and contended that from the moment of his abdication the
sovereignty vested in his daughter Mary. It was in vain that the
eloquence of Halifax backed the Whig peers in struggling for the
resolution of the Commons as it stood. The plan of a Regency was
lost by a single vote, and Danby's scheme was adopted by a large
majority. But both the Tory courses found a sudden obstacle in
William. He declined to be Regent. He had no mind, he said to
Danby, to be his wife's gentleman-usher. Mary, on the other hand,
refused to accept the crown save in conjunction with her husband.
The two declarations put an end to the question. It was agreed that
William and Mary should be acknowledged as joint sovereigns, but
that the actual administration should rest with William alone. A
Parliamentary Committee in which the most active member was John
Somers, a young lawyer who had distinguished himself in the trial of
the Bishops and who was destined to play a great part in later history,
drew up a Declaration of Rights which was presented on February
13th to William and Mary by the tv/o Houses in the banqueting-room
at Whitehall. It recited the misgovernment of James, his abdication,
and the resolve of the Lords and Commons to assert the ancient rights
and liberties of English subjects. It condemned as illegal his estab-
lishment of an ecclesiastical commission, and his raising an army
without Parliamentary sanction. It denied the right of any king to
suspend or dispense with laws, or to exact money, save by consent of
Parliament. It asserted for the subject a right to petition, to a free
choice of representatives in Parliament, and to a pure and merciful
administration of justice. It declared the right of both Houses to
liberty of debate. It demanded securities for the free exercise of their
religion by all Protestants, and bound the new sovereign to maintain
the Protestant religion and the law and liberties of the realm. In full
faith that these principles would be accepted and maintained by
William and Mary, it ended with declaring the Prince and Princess of
Orange King and Queen of England. At the close of the Declaration,
Halifax, in the name of the Estates of the Realm, prayed them to
receive the crown. William accepted the offer in his own name and
his wife's, and declared in a few words the resolve of both to maintain
the laws and to govern by advice of Parliament.

Sec. VII.
William

Orange

•

Declaration
ofliiihts

'>■; I

684

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. VIII.

The Grand
Alliance

1689

169/

The

Orand

Alliance

Section VIII.— The Grand Alliance. 1689— 1697.

/ [Authorities. — As before.]

The blp.nder of Lewis in choosing Germany instead of Holland for
his point of attack was all but atoned for by the brilliant successes
with which he opened the war. The whole country west of the Rhine
was soon in his hands ; his armies were masters of the Palatinate, and
penetrated even to V/urtemberg. His hopes had never been higher
than at the moment when the arrival of James at St. Germain dashed
all hope to the ground. Lewis was at once thrown back on a war of
defence, and the brutal ravages which marked the retreat of his armies
from the Rhine revealed the bitterness with which his pride stooped to
the necessity. The Palatinate was turned into a desert. The same
ruin fell on the stately palace of the Elector at Heidelberg, on the
venerable tombs of the Emperors at Speyer, on the town of the trader,
on the hut of the vine-dresser. In accepting the English throne William
had been moved not so much by personal ambition as by the prospect
of firmly knitting together England and Holland, the two great Pro-
testant powers whose fleets held the mastery of the sea, as his diplo-
macy had knit all Germany together a year before in the Treaty of
Augsburg. But thc^ advance from such a union to the formation oi
the European alliance against P>ance was still delayed by the reluct-
ance of the two branches of the House of Austria in Germany and
Spain to league with Protestant States against a Catholic King, while
England cared little to join in an attack on France with the view of
saving the liberties of Europe. All hesitation, however, passed away
when the reception of James as still King of England at St. Germain
gave England just ground for a declaration of war, a step in which it
was soon followed by Holland, and the two countries at once agreed
to stand by one another in their struggle against France. The adhe-
sion of Spain and the Court of Vienna in 1689 to this agreement
completed the Grand Alliance which William had designed; and
when Savoy joined the allies France found herself girt in on every
side save that of Switzerland with a ring of foes. The Scandinavian
kingdoms alone stood aloof from the confederacy of Europe, and their
neutrality was unfriendly to France. Lewis was left without a single
ally save the Turk : but the energy and quickness of movement which
sprang from the concentration of the power of France in a single hand
still left the contest an equal one. The Empire was slow to move;
the Court of Vienna was distracted by a war with the Turks ; Spain
was all but powerless ; Holland and England were alone earnest in
the struggle, and England could as yet give little aid in the war. One
English brigade, indeed, formed from the regiments raised by James,
joined the Dutch army on the Sambre, and distinguished itself under

Churchill, v
of Marlbon
William ha<
In Englai
his tyranny
Lowlands w
sooner had 1
than Edinbi
up in arms, a
of the Stuarl
and driven
these disord(
of legal aut
Lords presei
similar to ths
responsibility
the Scotch P
forfeited the
Mary. The
the model of 1
in England, b
Both crown s
regiments whi
the new Gove
Graham of C
Western Cove
Scotch army,
troopers from
In the Highla
I government;
restoration of
the restoratior
[attainder; and
I as ready to joi
ment which u
I in the same ci
William's Scot
of Killiecranki<
clansmen and s
death in the n
Highlanders to
terror through
summer Mackj
in the very hea
and pardon br

;t I 'i ^1

; i

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

Churchill, who had been rewarded for his treason by the title Oi Earl
of Marlborough, in a brisk skirmish with the enemy at Walcourt. But
Willianx had as yet grave work to do at home.

In England not a sword had been drawn for James. In Scotland
his tyranny had been yet greater than in England, and so far as the
Lowlands went the fall of his tyranny was as rapid and complete. No
sooner had he called his troops southward to meet William's invasion
than Edinburgh rose in revolt. The western peasants were at once
up in arms, and the Episcopalian clergy who had been the instruments
of the Stuart misgovemment ever since the Restoration were rabbled
and driven from their parsonages in every parish. The news of
these disorders forced William to act, though he was without a show
of legal authority over Scotland. On the advice of the Scotch
Lords present in London, he ventured to summon a Convention
similar to that which had been summoned in England, and on his own
responsibility to set aside the laws which excluded Presbyterians from
the Scotch Parliament. This Convention resolved that James had
forfeited the crown by misgovemment, and offered it to William and
Mary. The offer was accompanied by a Claim of Right framed on
the model of the Declaration of Rights to which they had consented
in England, but closing with a demand for the abolition of Prelacy.
Both crown and claim were accepted, and the arrival of the Scotch
regiments which William had brought from Holland gave strength to
the new Government. Its strength was to be roughly tested. John
Graham of Claverhouse, whose cruelties in the persecution of the
Western Covenanters had been rewarded by high command in the
Scotch army, and the title of Viscount Dundee, withdrew with a few
troopers from Edinburgh to the Highlands, and appealed to the clans.
In the Highlands nothing was known of English government or mis-
govemment : all that the Revolution meant to a Highlander was the
restoration of the House of Argyll. To many of the clans it meant
the restoration of lands which had been granted them on the Earl's
attainder; and the Macdonalds, the Macleans, the Camerons, were
as ready to join Dundee in fighting the Campbells and the Govern-
ment which upheld them as they had been ready to join Montrose
in the same cause forty years before. They were soon in arms. As
William's Scotch regiments under General Mackay climbed the pass
of Killiecrankie, Dundee charged them at the head of three thousand
clansmen and swept them in headloug rout down the glen. But his
death in the moment of victory broke the only bond which held the
Highlanders together, and in a few weeks the host which had spread
terror through the Lowlands melted helplessly away. In the next
summer Mackay was able to build the strong post of Fort William
in the very heart of the disaffected country, and his offers of money
and pardon brought about the submission of the clans. Sir John

68s

Sec. VIII.

Thb Grand
Alliancb

1689

1697

V^illlam

and
Scotland

I !

Killie.
crankic

fuly 1689

. < - ..

. i! ■

!'l

686

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec.VIII.

Thb Gmani)
Alliance

1689

1697

Massacre of
Glencoe

Feb. 13,
1692

The
Irish

R«TOlt

Dalrymple, the Master of Stair, in whose hands the government of
Scotland at this tfme mainly rested, had hoped that a refusal of the
oath of allegiance would give groun Is for a war of extermination, and
free Scotland for ever from its terror of the Highlanders. He had
provided for the expected refusal by orders of a ruthless severity.
" Your troops," he wrote to the officer in command, " will destroy
entirely the country of Lochaber, Lochiel's lands, Keppoch's, Glen
garry's, and Glencoe's. Your powers shall be large enough. I hope
the soldiers will not trouble the Government with prisoners." But s
hopes were disappointed by the readiness with which the clans ac-
cepted the offers of the Government. All submitted in good time save
Macdonald of Glencoe, whose pride delayed his taking of the oath till
six days after the latest date fixed by the proclamation. Foiled in his
larger hopes of destruction, Dalrymple seized eagerly on the pretext
given by Macdonald, and an order " for the extirpation of that sect of
robbers " was laid before William and received the royal signature.
"The work," wrc.e the Master of Stair to Colonel Hamilton who
undertook it, " must be secret and sudden." The troops were chosen
from among the Campbells, the deadly foes 'of the clansmen of
Glencoe, and quartered peacefully among the Macdonalds for twelve
days, till all suspicion of their errand disappeared. At daybreak they
fell on their hosts, and in a few moments thirty of the clansfolk
lay dead on the «now. The rest, sheltered by a storm, escaped to
the mountai."**" tO perish for the most part of cold and hunger. " The
only thing I regret," said the Master of Stair when the news reached
him, "is that any got away." Whatever horror the Massacre of
Glencoe has roused in later days, few save Dalrymple knew of it at the
time. The peace of the Highlands enabled the work of reorganization
to go on quietly at Edinburgh. In accepting the Claim of Right with
its repudiationof Prelacy, William had in effect restored the Presbyterian
Church, and its restoration was accompanied by the revival of the
Westminster Confession as a standard of faith, and by the passing of
an Act which abolished lay patronage. Against the Toleration Act
which the King proposed, the Scotch Parliament stood firm. But the
King was as firm in his purpose as the Parliameut. So long as he
reigner^, William declared in memorable words, there should be no
persecution for conscience' sake. " We never could be of that mind
that violence was suited to the advancing of true religion, nor do we
intend that our authority shall ever be a tool to the irregular passions
of any party."

It was not in S cotland, however, but in Ireland that James and
Lewis hoped to arrest William's progress. In the middle of his reign,
when his chief aim was to provide against the renewed depression of j
his fellow religionists at his death by any Protestant successor, James |
had resolved (if we may trust the statement of the French ambassador)

to place Irel;
as a refuge 1
from the Loi
by the CatF
raised to a d
turned out
Mayor and i
an Irishman,
men and pur
officers. In
and the life a
the natives o:
King's flight
spread panic
believed to t
chiefly from t
the north on t
derry, and pn
delayed, and fc
ment. But hi
James to retui
ammunition, a
Tyrconnell thr
with the wordj
called every (
selves on the \
havoc was doi
years to repai
His aim was t
sand men that
hopes were ru
Tyrconnell an
tasteful. The
first step was
Ulster. Half
Londonderry,
a weak wall, m
But the seven
up for its we£
repulse of his a
the siege into
streets, and of
town was still
and five days,
when on the 28

■ I I

.X.]

THE REVOLUTION.

to place Ireland in such a position of independence that she might serve
as a refuge for his Catholic subjects. Lord Clarendon was dismissed
from the Lord-Lieutenancy and succeeded in the charge of the island
by the Catholic Earl of Tyrconnell. The new governor, who was
raised to a dukedom, went roughly to work. Every Englishman was
turned out of office. Every Judge, every Privy Councillor, every
Mayor and Alderman of a borough was requited to be a Catholic and
an Irishman. The Irish army, raised to the number of fifty thousand
men and purged of its Protestant soldiers, was entrusted to Catholic
officers. In a few months the English ascendency was overthrown,
and the life and fortune of the English settlers were at the mercy of
the natives on whom they had trampled since Cromwell's day. The
King's flight and the agitation among the native Irish at the news
spread panic therefore through the island. Another massacre was
believed to be at hand ; and fifteen hundred Protestant families,
chiefly from the south, fled in terror over sea. The Protestants of
the north on the other hand drew together at Ennii '<illen and London-
derry, and prepared for self-defence. The outbreak however was still
delayed, and for two months Tyrconnell intrigued with William's Govern-
ment. But his aim was simply to gain time. He was in fact inviting
James to return to Ireland, and at the news of his coming with officers,
ammunition, and a supply of money provided by the French King,
Tyrconnell threw off the mask. A flag was hoisted over Dublin Castle,
with the words embroidered on its folds " Now or Never." The signal
called every Catholic to arms. The maddened natives flung them-
selves on the plunder which their masters had left, and in a few weeks
havoc was done, the French envoy told Lewis, which it would take
years to repair. Meanwhile James sailed from France to Kinsale.
His aim was to carry out an invasion of England with the fifty thou-
sand men that Tyrconnell was said to have at his disposal. But his
hopes were ruined by the war of races which had broken out. To
Tyrconnell and the Irish leaders the King's plans were utterly dis-
tasteful. Their policy was that of Ireland for the Irish, and the
first step was to drive out the Englishmen who still stood at bay in
Ulster. Half of Tyrconnell's army therefore had been sent against
Londonderry, where the bulk of the fugitives found shelter behind
a weak wall, manned by a few old guns, and destitute even of a ditch.
But the seven thousand desperate Englishmen behind the wall made
up for its weakness. So fierce were their sallies, so crushing the
repulse of his attack, that the King's general, Hamilton, at last turned
the siege into a blockade. The Protestants died of hunger in the
streets, and of the fever which comes of hunger, but the ciy of the
town was still " No Surrender." The siege had lasted a hundred
and five days, and only two days' food remained in Londonderry,
when on the 28th of July an English ship broke the boom across the

687

Skc. Vlll.

Tmr Grand
Ali.iancr

1689

ie»7

*i!

^ili

1689

Sicf^ecfLon-
donatrry

!■

688

HISTORY OF THE ENGIJSH PEOPLE.

fcrfAr.

Svc.VIII.

Thr Grand
Alliancb

1689

1694

EnKland
and the
Revolu-
tion

Bill of
Rights

river, and the besiegers sullenly withdrew. Their defeat was turned
into a rout by the men of Enniskillen, who struggled through a bn^
to charge an Irish force of double their number at Newtown Butler,
and drove horse and foot before them in a panic which soon spread
through Hamilton's whole army. The routed soldiers fell back on
Dublin, where James lay helpless in the hands of the frenzied Parlia-
ment which he had summoned. Every member returned was an
Irishman and a Catholic, and their one aim was to undc the succes-
sive confiscations which had given the soil to English settlers and to
get back Ireland for the Irish. The Act of Settlement on which all
title to property rested was at once repealed in spite of the King's
reluctance. Three thousand Protestants of name and fortune were
massed together in the hugest Bill of Attainder which the world has
seen. In spite of James's promise of religious freedom, the Protestant
clergy were driven from their parsonages, Fellows and scholars were
turned out of Trinity College, and the French envoy, the Count of
Avaux, dared even to propose that if any Protestant rising took place
on the English descent, as was expected, it should be met by a general
massacre of the Protestants who still lingered in the districts which
had submitted to James. To his credit the King shrank horror-struck
from the proposal " I cannot be so cruel," he said, "as to cut their
throats while they live peaceably under my government." " Mercy to
Protestants," was the cold reply, " is cruelty to Catholics."

Through the long agony of Londonderry, through the proscription
and bloodshed of the new Irish rule, William was forced to look
helplessly on. The best troops in the army which had been mustered
at Hounslow had been sent with Marlborough to the Sambre ; and the
political embarrassments which grew up around the Government made
it impossible to spare a man of those who remained. The great ends
of the Revolution were indeed secured, even amidst the confusion and
intrigue which we shall have to describe, by the common consent of all.
On the great questions of civil liberty Whig and Tory were now at one.
The Declaration of Rights was turned into the Bill of Rights by the
Convention which had now become a Parliament, and the passing of
this measure in 1689 restored to the monarchy the character which it
had lost under the Tudors and the Stuarts. The right of the people
through its representatives to depose the King, to change the order of
succession, and to set on the throne whom they would, was now
established. All claim of Divine Right, or hereditary right indepen-
dent of the law, was formally put an end to by the election of William
and Mary. Since their day no English sovereign has been able t:
advance any claim to the crown save a claim which rested on a
particular clause in a particular Act of Parliament. William, Mary, j
and Anne were sovereigns simply by virtue of the Bill of Rights.
Geoige the First and his successors have been sovereigns solely by;

virf tie of the
the creature
realm. Noi
The older c{
England th«
over taxatior
been the sec
new legislatu
of four years
gentlemen of
enemy of thei
whom their r
only change
anger was a r
one, a resolve
next Tory Par
almost as grea
the army. Tl
Cromwell had
war the existei
a force which
ordinary subje
military offenci
assumed power
away by the I
was met by the
the army were >
was made for
powers were g
the grant of sup
and as it is imp
I army to exist
Parliament has
I constitutional c
brought about ii
which experienc
met with far les
ment, which hac
without fresh el
limited the dura
opposition, but
counteract the i
Commons with
excluded all per
parliament, was

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

virttie of the Act of Settlement. An English monarch is now as much
llic creature of an Act of Tarliament as the pettiest tax-}^atherer in hili
rcahn. Nor was the older character of the kingship alone restored.
The older constitution returned with it. Hitter experience had taught
England the need of restoring to the Parliament its absolute power
over taxation. The grant of revenue for life to the last two kings had
been the secret of their anti-national policy, and the first act of the
new legislature was to restrict the grant of the royal revenue to a term
of four years. William was bitterly galled by the provision. " The
gentlemen of England trusted King James," he said, " who was an
enemy of their religion and their laws, and they will not trust me, by
whom their religion and their laws have been preserved." But the
only change brought about in the Parliament by this burst of royal
anger was a resolve henceforth to make the vote of supplies an annual
one, a resolve which, in spite of the slight changes introduced by the
next Tory Parliament, soon became an invariable rule. A change of
almost as great importance established the control of Parliament over
the army. The hatred to a standing army which had begun under
Cromwell had only deepened under James ; but with the continental
war the existence of an army was a necessity. As yet, however, it was
a force which had no legal existence. The soldier was simply an
ordinary subject; there were no legal means of punishing strictly
military offences or of providmg for military discipline : and the
assumed power of billeting soldiers in private houses h xd been taken
[away by the law. The difficulty both Oi Parliament and the army
was met by the Mutiny Act. The powers requisite for discipline in
I the army were conferred by Par ament on its officers, and provision
I was made for the pay of the .orce, but both pay and disciplinary
powers were granted only for a single year. The Mutiny Act, like
the grant of supplies, has remained annual ever since the Revolution ;
and as it is impossible for the State to exist without supplies, or for the
army to exist without discipline and pay, the annual assembly of
Parliament has become a matter of absolute necessity. The greatest
constitutional change which our history has witnessed was thus
brought about in an indirect but perfectly efficient way. The dangers
which experience had lately shown lay in the Parliament itself were
met with far less skill. Under Charles, England had seen a Parlia-
ment, which had been returned in a moment of reaction, maintained
without fresh election for eighteen years. A Triennial Bill, which
lliraited the duration of a Parliament to three, was passed with little
opposition, but fell before the dislike and veto of William. To
[counteract the influence which a king might obtain by crowding the
ICommons with officials proved a yet harder task. A Place Bill, which
lexcluded all persons in the employment of the State from a seat in
|Parliament, was defeated, and wisely defeated, in the Lords. The

Y Y

689

.skc. vm.

Tmr CiKANO
Al.l.lANCIi

i6a»

1607

'1 iixation

i':t

':il'

The A rmy

The Pat-
Uainent

60O

HISTORY OF TIIF. FNCUSfl PF.OI'LF..

f<HAi>.

Sm. VIII

I'llR CiKANI)

Ali.iancic

ie»7

Tolera-
tion
and the
Oburcb

Toleration

The
Nonjurors

modern course of providing against a pressure from the Court or the
administration by excluding all minor oflficials, but of preserving the
hold of Parliament over the great officers of State by admitting thcp.i
into its body, seems as yet lo have occurred to nobody. It is equally
strange that while vindicating its right of Parliamentary control over
the public revenue and the army, the Bill of Rights should have left
by its silence the control of trade to the Crown. It was only a few-
years later, in the discussions on the charter granted to the Kast India
Company, that the Houses silently claimed and obtained the right of
regulating English commerce.

The religious results of the Revolution were hardly less weighty than
the political. In the common struggle against Catholicism Churchman
and Nonconformist had found themselves, as we have seen, strangely
at one ; and schemes of Comprehension became suddenly popular.
But with the fiiU of James the union of the two bodies abruptly
ceased : and the establishment of a Presbyterian Church in Scotland,
together with the " rabbling " of the Episcopalian clergy in its western
shires, revived the old bitterness of the clergy towards the dissidents.
The Convocation rejected the scheme of the Latitudinarians for such
modifications of the Prayer-book as would render possible a return of
the Nonconformists, and a Comprehension Bill which was introduced
into Parliament failed to pass in spite of the King's strenuous support.
William's attempt to partially admit Dissenters to civil equality by a
repeal of the Corporation Act proved equally fruitless ; but the passing
of a Toleration Act in 1689 practically established freedom of worship.
Whatever the religious effect of the failure of the Latitudinarian schemes
may have been, its political effect has been of the highest value. At
no time had the Church been so strong or so popular as at the Revolu-
tion, and the reconciliation of the Nonconformists would have doubled
its strength. It is doubtful whether the disinclination to all political
change which has characterized it during the last two hundred years
would have been affected by such a change ; but it is certain that the
power of opposition which it has wielded would have been enormously
increased. As it was, the Toleration Act established a group of I
religious bodies whose religious opposition to the Church forced them
to support the measures of progress which the Church opposed. With I
religious forces on the one side and on the other England has es-
caped the great stumbling-block in the way of nations where the cause!
of religion has become identified with that of political reaction. Aj
secession from within its own ranks weakened the Church still more.
The doctrine of Divine Right had a strong hold on the body of the!
clergy, though they had been driven from their other favourite doctrinej
of passive obedience, and the requirement of the oath of allegiance toj
the new sovereigns from all persons in public functions was resented as
an intolerable wrong by almost every parson. Sancroft, the Arch-^

bishop of C;
higher clerg;
schismatics,
themselves a
only membei
bowed to ne
was fanned
.assertion of
deposition of
such as Tilloi
of Salisbury,
^V'higs and L
find friends s
were driven t
was a several
clergy which h
(ieorge the TI;
fiut the resen
already added
Yet greater c
the Commons
aim was to rec
during the last 1
The judgement!
In spite of the <
had been again
received a part
merely the redr
Whig and Torj
both parties hac
prolong their un
He named the
Earl of Shrews
i-ord Halifax, a
save in a momei
""possible. Th
liad joined in ..
'0 pass the Bill c
William on the
scription should
Arone. His tern
neither of the
stnfe would be 1
Ae cares of his .

federacy of which

ix.l

TIIF RKVOLUTION.

601

bishop of Canterbury, with a few prelates and a large number of tho
higher clergy, absohitely refused the oath, treated all who took it as
schismatics, and on their deprivation by Act of I'arliamcnt regarded
themselves and their adherents, who were known as Nonjurors, as the
only members of the true Church of Kngland. The bulk of the clergy
bowed to necessity, but their bitterness against the new (iovernmcnt
was fanned into a flame by the religious policy announced in this
assertion of the supremacy of Parliament over the Church, and the
deposition of bishops by an act of the legislature. The new prelates,
such as Tillotson, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and Hurnct, Bishop
of Salisbury, were men of learning and piety ; but it was only among
Whigs and Latitudinarians that William and his successors could
find friends among the clergy, and it was mainly to these that they
were driven to entrust the higher offices of the Church. The result
was a severance between the higher dignitaries and the mass of the
clergy which broke the strength of the Church ; and till the time of
George the Third its fiercest strife was waged within its own ranks.
But the resentment at the measure which brought this strife about
already added to the difficulties which William had to encounter.

Yet greater difficulties arose from the temper of his Parliament. In

the Commons the bulk of the members were Whigs, and their first

aim was to redress the wrongs which the Whig party had suffered

during the last two reigns. The attainder of Lord Russell was reversed.

The judgements against Sidney, Cornish, and Alice Lisle were annulled.

In spite of the opinion of the judges that the sentence on Titus Gates

had been against law, the Lords refused to reverse it, but even Gates

received a pardon and a pension. The Whigs however wanted not

merely the redress of wrongs but the punishment of the wrong-doers.

Whig and Tory had been united, indeed, by the tyranny of James ;

both parties had shared in the Revolution, and William had striven to

prolong their union by joining the leaders of both in his first Ministry.

He named the Tory Earl of Danby Lord President, made the Whig

Earl of Shrewsbury Secretary of State, and gave the Privy Seal to

Lord Halifax, a trimmer between the one party and the other. But

save in a moment of common oppression or common danger union was

impossible. The Whigs clamoured for the punishment of Tories who

I had joined in the illegal acts of Charles and of James, and refused

1 to pass the Bill of General Indemnity which William laid before them.

William on the other hand was resolved that no bloodshed or pro-

I scription should follow the revolution which had placed him on the

throne. His temper was averse from persecution ; he had no great love

for either of the battling parties ; and above all he saw that internal

strife would be fatal to the effective prosecution of the war. While

Ithe cares of his new throne were chaining him to England, the con-

Arch-Jfederacy of which he was the guiding spirit was proving too slow and

Y Y 2

Ski. vim.

TmR (iRANh
Al.l.lANl-R

iea»

ieo7

^ m

The Act
of Orace

PoUtkal
(ii/jicHHies

692

HISTORY OF TFIE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[ciiAr.

Sec. VIII.
The Gkani)

Al.I.IANCK

1689

1697

The
Jacobiies

1690

Battle of

the

Boyne

too loosely compacted to cope with the swift and resolute movements
of France. 1 he armies of Lewis had fallen back within their own
borders, but only to turn fiercely at bay. Even the junction of the
English and Dutch fleets failed to assure them the mastery of the
seas. The English navy was paralyzed by the corruption which f)re-
vailed in the public service, as well as by the sloth and incapacity of
its commander. The services of Admiral Herbert at the Revolution
had been rewarded by the Earldom of Torrington and the command
of the fleet ; but his indolence suffered the seas to be swept by French
privateers, and his want of seamanship was shown in an indecisive
engagement with a French squadron in Bantry Bay. Meanwhile
Lewis was straining every nerve to win the command of the Channel ;
the French dockyards were turning out ship after ship, and the
galleys of the Mediterranean fleet were brought round to reinforce the
fleet at Brest. A French victory off the English coast would have
brought serious political danger, for the reaction of popular feeling
which had begun in favour of James had been increased by the pres-
sure of the war, by the taxation, by the expulsion of the Non-jurors
and the discontent of the clergy, by the panic of the Tories at the
spirit of vengeance which broke out among the triumphant Whigs, and
above all by the presence of James in Ireland. A new party, that of
the Jacobites or adherents of King James, was just forming ; and it
was feared that a Jacobite rising would follow the appearance of a
French fleet on the coast. In such a state of affairs William judged
rightly that to yield to the Whig thirst for vengeance would have
been to ruin his cause. He dissolved the Parliament, which had
refused to pass a Bill of Indemnity for all political offences, and called
a new one to meet in March. The result of the election proved that
he had only expressed the general temper of the nation. The
boroughs had been alienated from the Whigs by their refusal to
pass the Indemnity, and their attempts to secure the Corporations
for their own party ; while in the counties parson after parson led his
flock to the poll against the Whigs. In the new Parliament the bulk j
of the members proved Tories. William accepted the resignation of j
the more violent Whigs among his councillors, and placed Danby at \
the head of affairs. In May the Houses gave their assent to the Act
of Grace. The King's aim in this sudden change of front was not only
to meet the change in the national spirit, but to secure a momentary
lull in English faction which would suffer him to strike at the rebellion j
in Ireland. While James was King in Dublin it was hopeless to crushi
treason at home ; and so urgent was the danger, so precious every!
moment in the present juncture of affairs, that William could trust noj
one to bring the work as sharply to an end as was needful save himself.

In the autumn of t>^e year 1689 the Duke of Schomberg, an exiled!
Huguenot who had followed William to England, had been sent with!

a small for
fresh enthu
and James
that of his i
whom it wj
trenched hii
off half his 1
six months J
it by a coina
plunder. ^\
the Channe
strengthened
sprinpr came
the importan
Frenchmen,
the army or
/anded at Cai
soon caught s
"I am glad
delight; "am
next morning
Irish foot bro
stand that Sc:
English centn
ever, at the ]
throughout be
than frankly t
back in retrea
But though
abandon the c
the Stuart sov(
kings with us,'
him v/ith the p
fight you agai;
French, indeec
at bay beneath
sneered Lauzui
them down wit
with Sarsfield,
England and a
nition train, his
the approach
course of the
work to one wl
war. Churchill

! i.t

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

693

a small force to Ulster, but his landing had only roused Ireland to a
fresh enthusiasm. The ranks of the Irish army were filled up at once,
and James was able to face the Duke at Droghedawith a force double
that of his opponent. Schomberg, whose men were all raw recruits
whom it was hardly possible to trust at such odds in the field, en-
trenched himself at Dundalk, in a camp where pCGtilencc soon swept
off half his men, till winter parted the two armies. During the next
six months James, whose treasury was utterly exhausted, strove to fill
it by a coinage of brass money, while his soldiers subsisted by sheer
plunder. William meanwhile was toiling hard on the other side of
the Channel to bring the Irish war to an end. Schomberg was
strengthened during the winter with men and stores, and when the
spring came his force reached thirty thousand men. Lewis too felt
the importance of the coming struggle ; and seven thousand picked
Frenchmen, under the Count of Lauzun, were despatched to reinforce
the army of James. They had hardly arrived when William himself
landed at Carrickfergus,and pushed rapidly to the south. His columns
soon caught sight of the Irish forces, posted strongly behind the Boyne.
" I am glad to see you, gentlemen," William cried with a burst of
delight ; " and if you escape me now the fault will be mine." Early
next morning the whole English army plunged into the river. The
Irish foot broke in a sudden panic, but the horse made so gallant a
stand that Schomberg fell in repulsing its charge, and for a time the
English centre was held in check. With the arrival of William, how-
ever, at the head of the left wing all was over James, who had
throughout been striving to secure the withdrawal of his troops rather
than frankly to meet William's onset, forsook his troops as they fell
back in retreat upon Dublin, and took ship at Kinsale for France.
But though the beaten army was forced by William's pursuit to
abandon the capital, it was still resolute to fight. The incapacity of
the Stuart sovereign moved the scorn even of his followers. " Change
kings with us," an Irish officer replied to an Englishman who taunted
him v/ith the panic of the Boyne, " change kings with us and we will
fight you again." They did better in fighting without a king. The
French, indeed, withdrew scornfully from the routed army as it ^tood
at bay beneath the walls of Limerick. " Do you call these ramparts ?"
sneered Lauzun : " the English will need no cannon ; they may batter
them down with roasted apples." But twenty thousand men remained
with Sarsfield, a brave and skilful officer who had seen service in
England and abroad ; and his daring surprise of the English ammu-
nition train, his repulse of a desperate attempt to storm the town, and
the approach of the winter, forced William to raise the siege. The
course of the war abroad recalled him to England, and he left his
work to one who was quietly \ roving himself a master in the art of
war. Churchill, now Earl of Marlborough, had been recalled from

Sec. VIII.

TiiK Grand
Alliance

1689

1697

■m

July I,
1690

i I

\\l

The Irish
War.

' 0?

694

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VIII.

The Grand
Alliance

1089

ieo7

Ireland
conquered

Oct. 1 69 1

The

Jacobite

Plots

June 30,
1690

Flanders to command a division which landed in the south of Ireland.
Only a few days remained before the operations were interrupted by
the coming of winter, but the few days were turned to good account.
Cork, with five thousand men behind its walls, was taken in forty-eight
hours. Kinsale a few days later shared the fate of Cork. Winter
indeed left Connaught and the greater part of Munster in Irish hands ;
the French force remained untouched, and the coming o^ a new French
general, St. Ruth, with arms and supplies encouraged the insurgents.
But the summer of 1691 had hardly opened when Ginkell, the new
English general, by his seizure of Athlone forced on a battle with the
combined French and Irish forces at Aughrim, in which St. Ruth fell
on the field and his army was utterly broken. The defeat left Limerick
alone in its revolt, and even Sarsfield bowed to the necessity of a
surrender. Two treaties were drawn up between the Irish and English
generals. By the first it was stipulated that the Catholics of Ireland
should enjoy such privileges in the exercise of their religion as were
consistent with law, or as they had enjoyed in the reign of Charles the
Second. The Crown pledged itself also to summon a Parliament as
soon as possible, and to endeavour to procure to the good Roman
Catholics security " from any disturbance upon the account of the said
religion." By the military treaty those of Sarsfield's soldiers who would
were suffered to follow him to France ; and ten thousand men, the
whole of his force, chose exile rather than life in a land where all hope
of national freedom was lost. When the wild cry of the women who
stood watching their departure was hushed, the silence of death settled
down upon Ireland. For a hundred years the country remained at
peace, but the peace was a peace of despair. The most terrible legal
tyranny under which a nation has ever groaned avenged the rising
under Tyrconnell. The conquered people, in Swift's bitter words of
contempt, became " hewers of wood and drawers of water " to their
conquerors. Though local risings of these serfs perpetually spread
terror among the English settlers, all dream of a national revolt passed
away ; and till the eve of the French Revolution Ireland ceased to be
a source of political danger to England.

Short as the struggle of Ireland had been, it had served Lev/is well,
for while William v/as busy at the Boyne a series of brilliant successes
was restoring the fortunes of France. In Flanders the Duke of Luxem-
bourg won the victory of Fleurus. In Italy Marshal Catinat defeated
the Duke of Savoy. A success of even greater moment, the last victory
which France was fated to win at sea, placed for an instant the very
throne of William in peril. William never showed a cooler courage
than in quitting England to fight James in Ireland at a moment
when the Jacobite<= were only looking for the appearance of a French
fleet on the coast to rise in revolt. He was hardly on his way in
fact when Tourvillc, the French admiral, put to sea with strict oraers

to fight. H
and the D
numbered, i
whether froi
crushed, anc
danger was
master of th
the Jacobite
Non-jurors £
landing of t
sailors called
put an end t(
reaction aga
strength for
hung around
presence abn
undone, and
first time sim
had appearet
But the slown
forced to loc
Frenchmen cl
Netherlands, ;
Lewis. The i
William's fort
heavily than e
bytheindigna
Tories, such a
munications m
Earl of Shrew
William's ingr
borough's min(
His design wa
from the throi
' his daughter
place the real
danger lay in
Torrington in
removed the or
to make for th
brought to sup
thousand troo
descent on the
I passage, and T(
I Brest. Thougl

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

695

to fight. He was met by the English and Dutch fleet at Beachy Head,
and the Dutch division at once engaged. Though utterly out-
numbered, it fought stubbornly in hope of Herbert's aid ; but Herbert,
whether from cowardice or treason, looked idly on while his allies were
crushed, and withdrew at nightfall to seek shelter in the Thames. The
danger was as great as the shame, for Tourvillc's victory left him
master of the Channel, and his presence off the coast of Devon invited
the Jacobites to revolt. But whatever the discontent of Tories and
Non-jurors against William might be, all signs of it vanished with the
landing of the French. The burning of Teignraouth by Tourville's
sailors called the whole coast to arms ; and the ne\\ s of the Boyne
put an end to all dreams of a rising in favour of James. The natural
reaction against a cause which looked for foreign aid gave a new
strength for the moment to William in England ; but ill luck still
hung around the Grand Alliance. So urgent was the need for his
presence abroad that William left, as we have seen, his work in Ireland
undone, and crossed in the spring of 1691 to Flanders. It was the
first time since the days of Henry the Eighth that an English king
had appeared on the Continent at the head of an English army.
But the slowness of the allies again baffled William's hopes. He was
forced to look on with a small army while a hundred thousand
Frenchmen closed suddenly around Mons, the strongest fortress of the
Netherlands, and made themselves masters of it in the presence of
Lewis. The humiliation was great, and for the moment all trust in
William's fortune faded away. In England the blow was felt more
heavily than elsewhere. The Jacobite hopes which had been crushed
by the indignation at Tourville's descent woke up to a fresh life. Leading
Tories, such as Lord Clarendon and Lord Dartmouth, opened com-
munications with James ; and some of the leading Whigs, with the
Earl of Shrewsbury at their head, angered at what they regarded as
William's ingratitude, followed them in their course. In Lord Marl-
borough's mind the state of affairs raised hopes of a double treason.
His design was to bring about a revolt which would drive William
from the throne without replacing James, and give the crown to
his daughter Anne, whose affection for Marlborough's wife would
place the real government of England in his hands. A yet greater
danger lay in the treason of Admiral Russell, who had succeeded
Torrington in command of the fleet. Russell's defection would have
removed the one obstacle to a new attempt which James was resolved
to make for the recovery of his throne, and which Lewis had been
brought to support. In the beginning of 1692 an army of thirty
thousand troops was quartered in Normandy in readiness for a
descent on the English coast. Transports were provided tor their
passage, and Tourville was ordered to cover it with the French fleet at
Brest. Though Russell had twice as many ships as his opponent, the

Sec. VIII.

The Grand
Alliance

1689

1697

h'reuch
descent on
Jingi'anil

fntrigucx in
EiiiiLind

ill

I i'i

■ i

696

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. VIII

The Grand
Alliance

1689

1697

Battle of
La Jlogue

2 'Ac turn of
the war

1692

The First
English
MinlBtry

belief in his purpose of betraying William's cause was so strong that
Lewis ordered Tourville to engage the allied fleets at any disadvan-
tage. But whatever Russell's intrigues may have meant, he was no
Herbert. " Do not think I will let the French triumph over us in our
own seas,'* he warned his Jacobite correspondents. " If I meet them
I will fight them, even though King James were on board." When the
allied fleets met the French off" the heights of Barfleur his fierce attack
proved Russell true to his word. Tourville's fifty vessels were no
match for the ninety ships of the allies, and after five hours of a brave
struggle the French were forced to fly along the rocky coast of the
Cotentin. Twenty-two of their vessels reached St. Male ; thirteen
anchored with Tourville in the bays of Cherbourg and La Hogue ; but
their pursuers were soon upon them, and in a bold attack the English
boats burnt ship after ship under the eyes of the French army. All
dread of the invasion was at once at an end ; and the throne of William
was secured by the detection and suppression of the Jacobite conspiracy
at home which the invasion was intended to support. But the over-
throw of the Jacobite hopes was the least result of the victory of
La Hogue. France ceased from that moment to exist as a great naval
power ; for though her fleet was soon recruited to its former strength,
the confidence of her sailors was lost, and not even Tourville ventured
again to tempt in battle the fortune of the seas. A new hope, too,
dawned on the Grand Alliance. The spell of French triumph was
broken. Namur indeed surrendered to Lewis, and the Duke of
Luxembourg maintained the glory of the French arms by a victory
over William at Steinkirk. But the battle was a useless butchery in
which the conquerors lost as many men as the conquered. France
felt herself disheartened and exhausted by the vastness of her efforts.
The public misery was extreme. " The country," Fdnelon wrote frankly
to Lewis, " is a vast hospital." In 1693 the campaign of Lewis in
the Netherlands proved a fruitless one, and Luxembourg was hardly
able to beat off" the fierce attack of William at Neerwinden. For the
first time in his long career of prosperity Lewis bent his pride to seek
peace at the sacrifice of his conquests, and though the effort was
vain it told that the daring hopes of French ambition were at an
end, and that the work of the Grand Alliance was practically done.

In outer seeming, the Revolution of 1688 had only transferred the
sovereignty over England from James to William and Mary. In
actual fact it had given a powerful and decisive impulse to the
great constitutional progress which was transferring the sovereignty
from the King to the House of Commons. From the moment when
its sole right to tax the nation was established by the Bill of Rights,
and when its own resolve settled the practice of granting none
but annual supplies to the Crown, the House of Commons became j
the supreme power in the State. It was impossible permanently to

1^.1

THE REVOLUTION.

697

suspend its sittings, or in the long run to oppose its will, when cither
course must end in leaving the Government penniless, in breaking up
the army and navy, and in suspending the public service. But though
the constitutional change was complete, the machinery of government
was far from having adapted itself to the new conditions of political
life which such a change brought about. However powerful the will
of the House of Commons might be, it had no means of bringing
its will directly to bear upon the conduct of public affairs. The
Ministers who had charge of them were not its servants, but the
servants of the Crown ; it was from the King that they looked for
direction, and to the King that they held themselves responsible. By
impeachment or more indirect means the Commons could force a
King to remove a Minister who contradicted their will ; but they had no
constitutional power to replace the fallen statesman by a Minister who
would carry out their will. The result was the growth of a temper in
the Lower House which drove William and his Ministers to despair.
It became as corrupt, as jealous of power, as fickle in its resolves and
factious in spirit, as bodies always become whose consciousness of the
possession of power is untempered by a corresponding consciousness
of the practical difficulties or the moral responsibilities of the power
which they possess. It grumbled at the ill-success of the war, at the
suffering of the merchants, at the discontent of the Churchmen ; and
it blamed the Crown and its Ministers for all at which it grumbled.
But it was hard to find out what policy or measures it would have
preferred. Its mood changed, as William bitterly complained, with
every hour. It was, in fact, without the guidance of recognized leaders,
without adequate information, and destitute of that organization out
of which alone a definite policy can come. Nothing better proves the
inborn political capacity of the English mind than that it should at
once have found a simple and effective solution of such a difficulty as
this. The credit of the solution belongs to a man whose political
character was of the lowest type. Robert, Earl of Sunderland, had
been a Minister in the later days of Charles the Second ; and he had
remained Minister through almost all the reign of James. He had
held office at last only by compliance with the worst tyranny of hi?
roaster, and by a feigned conversion to the Roman Catholic faith ;
but the ruin of James was no sooner certain than he had secured
pardon and protection from William by the betrayal of the master to
whom he had sacrificed his conscience and his honour. Since the Revo-
lution Sunderland had striven only to escape public observation in
a country retirement, but at this crisis he came secretly forward to
bring his unequalled sagacity to the aid of the King. His counsel was
to recognize practically the new power of the Commons by choosing
the Ministers of the Crown exclusively from among the members of
the party which was strongest in the Lower House. As yet no

Sec. Vlll.

Tub Grand
Alliance

1689

1697

The

sovereignty

0/ th'e
Commons

I ^Jl

Lord
Sunderland

til

; i

'J 'he tietv

ministerial

system

■ ^\

69S

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CIIAP.

Skc. VIII.

The Granii
Ali iancb

1689

1607

The
Junto

Ministry in the modern sense of the term had existed. Each great
officer of state Treasurer or Secretary or Lord Privy Seal, had in
theory been independent of his fellow-officers ; each was the " King's
servant" and responsible for the discharge of his special duties to the
King alone. From time to time one Minister, like Clarendon, might
tower above the rest and give a general direction to the whole course
of government, but the predominance was merely personal and never
permanent ; and even in such a case there were colleagues who were
ready to oppose or even impeach the statesman who overshadowed
them. It was common for a King to choose or dismiss a single
Minister without any communication with the rest ; and so far was even
William from aiming at ministerial unity, that he had striven to repro-
duce in the Cabinet itself the balance of parties which prevailed outside
it. Sunderland's plan aimed at replacing these independent Ministers
by a homogeneous Ministry, chosen from the same party, represent-
ing the same sentiments, and bound together for common action
by a sense of responsibility and loyalty to the party to which it
belonged. Not only would such a plan secuie a unity of adminis-
tration which had been unknown till then, but it gave an organiza-
tion to the House of Commons which it had never had before. The
Ministers who were representatives of the majority of its members
became the natural leaders of the House. Small factions were drawn
together into the two great parties which supported or opposed the
Ministry of the Crown. Above all it brought about in the simplest
possible way the solution of the problem which had so long vexed both
King and Commons. The new Ministers ceased in all but name to
be the King's servants. They became simply an executive Committee
representing the will of the majority of the House of Commons, and
capable of being easily set aside by it and replaced by a similar
Committee whenever the balance of power shifted from one side of the
House to the other. 1 ir;-

Such was the origin of that system of representative government
which has gone on from Sunderland's day to our own. But though
William showed his own political genius in understanding and adopting
Sunderland's plan, it was only slowly and tentatively that he ventured
to carry it out in practice. In spite of the temporary reaction Sunder-
land believed that the balance of political power was really on the
side of the Whigs. Not only were they the natural representatives
of the principles of the Revolution, and the supporters of the war, but
they stood far above their opponents in parliamentary and adminis-
trative talent. At their head stood a group of statesmen, whose close
union in thought and action gained them the name of the Junto.
Russell, as yet the most prominent of these, was the victor of Lai
Hogue ; John Somers was an advocate who had sprung into fame byj
his defence of the Seven Bishops ; Lord Wharton was known as the 1

most dexter
was fast ma
spite of sue
would have
but for the
hausted as 1
to win a sinj
by the Frem
of taxation.
Alliance, no'
hand, remaii
whose mind
driven slowly
met the straii
previously si
creation of a
the supply of
called, was ii
people at lar^
advanced on
thrown open 1
formed into a
all after loans
The discovery
vealed a fresh
Debt, as the m
a new securif
would have b"
I "fundholders."
William abroa
change which
out. One by 01
success, were r
Admiralty; So
of State; Mon
change was cor
took a new tone
ciplined, movec
the Whig Minij
to face the sh(
Queen Mary,
hopes had been
however, whom
the Triennial Bi
rewarded by trii

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

most dexterous and unscrupulous of party managers ; and Montague
was fast making a reputation as the ablest of English financiers. In
spite of such considerations, however, it is doubtful whether William
would have thrown himself into the hands of a purely Whig Ministry
but for the attitude which the Tories took towards the war. Ex-
hausted as France was the war still languished, and the allies failed
to win a single victory. Meanwhile English trade was all but ruined
by the French privateers, and the nation stood aghast at the growth
of taxation. The Tories, always cold in their support of the Grand
Alliance, now became eager for peace. The Whigs, on the other
hand, remained resolute in their support of the war. William, in
whose mind the contest with France was the first object, was thus
driven slowly to follow Sunderland's advice. Montague had already
met the strain of the war by bringing forward a plan which had been
previously suggested by a Scotchman, William Paterson, for the
creation of a National Bank. While serving as an ordinary bank for
the supply of capital, the Bank of England, as the new institution was
called, was in reality an instrument for procuring loans from the
people at large by the formal pledge of the State to repay the money
advanced on the demand of the lender. A loan of ;^ 1,200,000 was
thrown open to public subscription ; and the subscribers to it were
formed into a chartered company in whose hands the negotiations of
all after loans was placed. In ten days the list of subscribers was full.
The discovery of the resources afforded by the national wealth re-
vealed a fresh source of power ; and the rapid growth of the National
Debt, as the mass of these loans to the State came to be called, gave
a new security against the return of the Stuarts, whose first work
would have been the repudiation of the claims of the lenders or
"fundholders." The evidence of the public credit gave strength to
William abroad, while at home a new unity of action followed the
change which Sunderland counselled and which was quietly carried
out. One by one the Tory Ministers, already weakened by Montague's
success, were replaced by members of the Junto. Russell went to the
Admiralty ; Somers was named Lord Keeper ; Shrewsbury, Secretary
of State ; Montague, Chancellor of the Exchequer. Even before this
change was completed its effect was felt. The House of Commons
took a new tone. The Whig majority of its members, united and dis-
j ciplined, moved quietly under the direction of their natural leaders,
the Whig Ministers of the Crown. It was this which enabled William
1 to face the shock which was given to his position by the death of
i Queen Mary. The renewed attacks of the Tories showed what fresh
hopes had been raised by William's lonely position. The Parliament,
however, whom the King had just conciliated by assenting at last to
the Triennial Bill, v/ent steadily with the Ministry; and its fidelity was
rewarded by triumph abroad. In 1695 the Alliance succeeded for the

699

Skc. VIII,

The Grand
Alliance

1689

1697

1694

The

National

Debt

1694

i:.

' ^

. 11

Death oj
Mary

1694

; V.

■ i:

! . f

r : ■

1 ' K

700

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CIIAP,

Sec. VI II.

The Grand
Alliance

1689

1697

1696

Peace of
Ryswick

1697

first time in winning a great triumph over France in the capture of
Namur. The King skilfully took advantage of his victory to call a
new Parliament, and its members at once showed their temper by a
vigorous support of the war. The Houses, indeed, were no mere tools
in William's hands. They forced him to resume prodigal grants of
lands made to his Dutch favourites, and to remove his ministers in
Scotland who had aided in a wild project for a Scotch colony on the
Isthmus of Darien. They claimed a right to name members of the
new Board of Trade, established for the regulation of commercial
matters. They rejected a proposal, never henceforth to be revived,
for a censorship of the Press. But there was no factious opposition.
So strong was the ministry that Montague was enabled to face the
general distress that was caused for the moment by a reform of the
currency, which had been reduced by clipping to far less than its
nominal value ; and in spite of the financial embarrassments created
by the reform, William was able to hold the French at bay.

But the war was fast drawing to a close. Lewis was simply fighting
to secure more favourable terms, and William, though he held that
"the only way o" treating with France is with our swords in our
hands," was almost as eager as Lewis for a peace. The defection of
Savoy made it impossible to carry out the original aim of the Alliance,
that of forcing France back to its position at the Treaty of West-
phalia, and the question of the Spanish succession was drawing closer
every day. The obstacles which were thrown in the way of an ac-
commodation by Spain and the Empire were set aside in a private
negotiation between William and Lewis, and the year 1697 saw the
conclusion of the Peace of Ryswick. In spite of failure and defeat in
the field William's policy had won. The victories of France remained
barren in the face of a United Europe ; and her exhaustion forced
her, for the first time since Richelieu's day, to consent to a disadvan-
tageous peace. On the side of the Empire France withdrew from
every annexation save that of Strassburg which she had made since
the Treaty of Nimeguen, and Strassburg would have been restored
but for the unhappy delays of the German negotiators. To Spain
Lewis restored Luxemburg and all the conquests he had made during
the war in the Netherlands. The Duke of Lorraine was replaced
in his dominions. A far more important provision of the peace pledged
Lewis to an abandonment of the Stuart cause and a recognition of
William as King of England. For Europe in general the Peace of
Ryswick was little more than a truce. But for England it was the
close of a long and obstinate struggle and the opening of a new
aera of political history. It was the final and decisive defeat of the
conspiracy which had gone on between Lewis and the Stuarts ever
since the Treaty of Dover, the conspiracy to turn England into a
Roman Catholic country and into a dependency of France. But it

was even m(
as the ccntri
the balance

[Authorities
Peace of Ryi

England unde
the main autli
his *« Despatcl
carefully giver
accurate and j
his political ti
the Tory oppoi

What had
the Peace of
the need of p;
King of Spaii
with him enc
hundred yean
had f.^!len froi
antly shown, \
resources whi(
believed its ol
master of sor
New, of Spai]
Netherlands, <
Main To ad<
or of the Emp
independence
prevent either
Peace of Rys
succession we
King's elder si
younger sistei
In strict law-
matter- the cl
claim of the I
right to the
Fourteenth, a
the Pyrenees ;
Bavarian cand
blood, but it wl
was as resolutf
Emperor as tc

ix.l

THE REVOLUTION.

was even more than this. It was the definite establishment of England
as the centre of European resistance against all attempts to overthrow
the balance of power.

Section IX.— Marlborouch. 1698—1712.

[Authorities. — Lord Macau! ay's great work, which practically ends at the
Peace of Ryswick, has been continued by Lord Stanhope (** History of
England under Queen Anne ") during this period. For Marlborough himself
the main authority must be the Duke s biography by Archdeacon Coxe, with
his "Despatches. The French side of the war and negotiations has been
carefully given by M. Martin ("H'stoire de Prance") in what is the most
accurate and judicious portion of \..i, work. Swift's Journal to Stella, and
his political tracts and Bolingbroke's correspondence shew the character of
the Tory opposition.]

What had bowed the pride of Lewis to the humiliating terms of
the Peace of Ryswick was not so much the exhaustion of France as
the need of preparing for a new and greater struggle. The death of the
King of Spain, Charles the Second, was known to be at hand ; and
with him ended the male line of the Austrian princes, who for two
hundred years had occupied the Spanish throne. How strangely Spain
had fallen from its high estate in Europe the wars of Lewis had abund-
antly shown, but so vast was the extent of its empire, so enormous the
resources which still remained to it, that under a vigoious ruler men
believed its old power would at once return. Its sovereign was still
master of some of the noblest provinces of the Old World and the
New, of Spain itself, of the Milanese, of Naples and Sicily, of the
Netherlands, of Southern America, of the noble islands of the Spanish
Main To add such a dominion as this to the dominion either of Lewis
or of the Emperor would be to undo at a blow the work of European
independence which William had wrought ; and it was with a view to
prevent either of these results that William freed his hands by the
Peace of Ryswick. At this moment the claimants of the Spanish
succession were three: the French Dauphin, a son of the Spanish
King's elder sister j the Electoral Prince of Bavaria, a grandson of his
younger sister ; and the Emperor, who was a son of Charles's aunt.
In strict law — if there had been any law really applicable to the
matter— the claim of the last was the strongest of the three ; foi the
claim of the Dauphin was barred by an express renunciation of all
right to the succession at his mother's marriage with Lewis the
Fourteenth, a renunciation which had been ratified at the Treaty of
the Pyrenees ; and a similar renunciation barred the claim of the
Bavarian candidate. The claim of the Emperor was more remote in
blood, but it was barred by no renunciation at all. William, however,
was as resolute in the interests of Europe to repulse the claim of the
Emperor as to repulse that of Lewis ; and it was the consciousness

701

^ \ i

Skc. IX.

MakL"

1
f

IIOKUUiiH

1698

. i

, 1

1718

, ii

The
Spanish
Buccea-

■ion

f Ii

7oa

HISTORY OF TIIK liNClMSlI PICOPLi:.

ffirAi'.

Skc. IX.
Maki.-

HOKUUCH

1698

i7ia

First

Partition

Triaty

1698

Fall of the
Junto

Second

Partition

Treaty

1700

that the Austrian succession was inevitable if the war continued and
Spain remained a member of the (jrand Alliance, in arms against
France and leaj,'ued with the Emperor, which made him suddenly
conclude the Peace of Ryswick. Had England and Holland shared
William's temper he would have insisted on the succession of the
Electoral Prince to the whole Spanish dominions. Hut both were
weary of war. In England the peace was at once followed by the
reduction of the army at the demand of the House of Commons to
fourteen thousand men ; and a clamour had already begun for the
disbanding even of these. It was necessary to bribe the two rival
claimants to a waiver of their claims ; and by the First Parti;ion
Treaty, concluded in 1698, between England, Holland, and France,
the succession of the Electoral Prince was recognized on condition of
the cession by Spain of its Italian possessions to his two rivals. The
Milanese was to pass to the Emperor ; the Two Sicilies, with the
border province of Guipuzcoa, to France. But the arrangement was
hardly concluded when the death of the Bavarian prince made the
Treaty waste paper. Austria and France were left face to face, and
a terrible struggle, in which the success of either would be equally
fatal to the independence of Europe, seemed unavoidable. The peril
was greater that the temper of England left Wiliiam without the
means of backing his policy by arms. The suffering which the war
had caused to the merchant class, and the pressure of the debt and
taxation it entailed, were waking every day a more bitter resentment
in the people, and the general discontent avenged itself on William
and the party who had backed his policy. The King's natural partiality
to his Dutch favourites, the confidence he gave to Sunderland, his
cold and sullen demeanour, his endeavours to maintain the standing
army, robbed him of popularity. In the elections held at the close of
1698 a Tory majority pledged to peace was returned to the House of
Commons. The Junto lost all hold on the new Parliament. The
resignation of Montague and Russell was followed by the dismissal of
the Whig ministry, and Somers and his friends were replaced by an
administration composed of moderate Tories, with Lords Rochester
and Godolphin as its leading members. The tourteen thousand men
who still remained in the army were cut down to seven. William's
earnest entreaty could not turn the Parliament from its resolve to send
his Dutch guards out of the country. The navy, which had numbered
forty thousand sailors during the war, was cut down to eight. How
much William's hands were weakened by this peace-temper of
England was shown by the Second Partition Treaty which was con-
cluded between the two maritime powers and France. The demand
of Lewis that the Netherlands should be given to the Elector of
Bavaria, whose political position left him a puppet in the French
King's hands, was resisted. Spain, the Netherlands, and the Indies

^ I'll

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

703

were assigned to the second son of the Kmperor, the Archduke Charles
of Austria. i>ut the whole of the Spanish territories in Italy were now
j^ranted to France ; and it was provided that Milan should be exchanged
for Lorraine, whose Duke w'\s to be summarily transferred to the new
Duchy. If the Emperor persisted in his refusal to come into the
Treaty, the share of his son was to pass to another unnamed prince,
who was probably the Duke of Savoy.

The Emperor still protested, but his protest was of Utile moment so
long as Lewis and the two maritime powers held firmly together. Nor
was the bitter resentment of Spain of more avail. The Spaniards
cared little whether a French or an Austrian prince sat on the throne
of Charles the Second, but their pride revolted against the dismember-
ment of the monarchy by the loss of its Italian dependencies. Even
the dying King shared the anger of his subjects, and a will wrested
from him by the factions which wrangled over his death-bed bequeathed
the whole monarchy of Spain to a grandson of Lewis, the Duke of
Anjou, the second son of the Dauphin. The Treaty of Partition was
so recent, and the risk of accepting this bequest so great, that Lewis
would hardly have resolved on it but for his belief that the temper of
England must necessarily render William's opposition a fruitless one.
Never in fact had England been so averse from war. So strong was
the antipathy to William's foreign policy that men openly approved
the French King's course. Hardly any one in England dreaded the
succession of a boy who, French as he was, would as they believed
soon be turned into a Spaniard by the natural course of events. The
succession of the Duke of Anjou was generally looked upon as far
better than the increa^^e of power which France would have derived
from the cessions of the last Treaty of Partition, cessions which would
have turned the Mediterranean, it was said, into a French lake, im-
perilled the English trade with the Levant and America, and raised
France into a formidable power at sea. " It grieves me to the heart,"
William wrote bitterly, "that almost every one rejoices that France has
preferred the Will to the Treaty." Astonished and angered as he was
at his rival's breach of faith, he had no means of punishing it. The
Duke of Anjou entered Madrid, and Lewis proudly boasted that
henceforth there were no Pyrenees. The life-work of William seemed
undone. He knew himself to be dying. His cough was incessant, his
eyes sunk and dead, his frame so weak that he could hardly get into
his coach. But never had he shown himself so great. His courage
rose with every difficulty. His temper, v.nich had been heated by the
personal affronts lavished on him through English faction, was hushed
by a supreme effort of his will. His large and clear-sighted intellect
looked through the temporary embarrassments of French diplomacy
and English party strife to the great interests which he knew must in
the end determine the course of European politics. Abroad and at

Skc. IX

Mahi-
noMoi'cii

ie»e

i7ia

The

Second

Orand

Alliance

f'li!.

tSflii

It
Hi

Duke of

Anjou in

Spain

1 701

704

HISTORY OF TIIK ENGLISH PIIOI'LE.

ICIIAI'.

Skc. IX
Maki.-

1698

1718

England
and the iva*

Deatli of
James

Sept. 1 70 1

home iill seemed to jjo against him. For the moment he had no ally
save Holland, for Spain was now united with Lewis, while the attitude
of Havaria divided Germany and held the House of Austria in check,
The liavarian Elector indeed, who had charge of the Spanish Nether-
lands and on whom William had counted, openly joined the French
side from the first and proclaimed the Duke of Anjou as King in
Brussels. In England the new Parliament was crowded with Tories
who were resolute against war. The Tory Ministry pressed him to
acknowledge the new King of Spain ; and as even Holland did this,
William was forced to submit. He could only count on the greed of
Lewis to help him, and he did not count in vain. The approval of the
French King's action had sprung from the belief that he intended to
leave Spain to the Spaniards under their new King. Bitter too as the
strife of Whig and Tory might be in England, there were two things
on which Whig and Tory were agreed. Neither would suffer France
to occupy the Netherlands. Neither would endure a French attack
on the Protestant succession which the Revolution of 1688 had es-
tablished. But the arrogance of Lewis blinded him to the need of
moderation in his hour of good-luck. In the name of his grandson he
introduced French troops into the seven fortresses known as the Dutch
barrier, and into Ostend and the coast towns of Flanders. Even the
Peace-Parliament at once acquiesced in William's demand for their
withdrawal, and authorized him to conclude a defensive aUiance with
Holland. The King's policy indeed was bitterly blamed, while the
late ministers, Somers, Russell, and Montajue (now become peers),
were impeached for their share in the treaties. But outside the Hous»i
of Commons the tide of national feeling rose as the designs of Lewis
grew clearer. He refused to allow the Dutch barrier to be re-established ;
and a great French fleet gathered in the Channel to support, it was
believed, a fresh Jacobite descent, which was proposed by the ministers
of James in a letter intercepted and laid before Parliament. Even the
House of Commons took fire it this, and the fleet was raised to thirty
thousand men, the army to ten thousand. Kent sent up a remonstrance
against the factious measures ^y which the Tories still struggled
against the King's policy, with a prayer that addresses might be
turned into Bills of Supply ; and William was encouraged by these
signs of a change of temper to despatch an English force to Holland,
and to conclude a secret treaty with the United Provinces for the
recovery of the Netherlands from Lewis, and for their transfer with
the Milanese to the house of Austria as a means of counter-balancing
the new power added to France. But England was still clinging
desperately to a hope of peace, when Lewis by a sudden act forced it
into war. He had acknowledged William as King in the Peace of
Ryswick, and pledged himself to oppose all attacks on his throne. He
now entered the bed-chamber at St. Germain where James was breath-

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

ing his last, and promised to acknowledge his son at his death as King
of England, Scotland, and Ireland. The promise was in fact a
declaration of war, and in a moment all Kngland was at one in ac-
cepting the challenj^e. The issue Lewis had raised was no longer a
matter of European politics, but the question whether the work of the
Revolution should be undone, and whether Catholicism and despotism
should be replaced on the throne of England by the arms of France.
On such a question as this there was no difference between Tory and
Whig. When the death, in 1700, of the last child of the Princess Anne
had been followed by a new Act of Succession, not a voice had been
raised for James or his son ; and the descendants of the daughter
of Charles the First, Henrietta of Orleans, whose only child had
married the Catholic Duke of Savoy, were passed over in the same
silence. The Parliament fell back on the line of James the First. His
daughter Elizabeth had married the Elector Palatine, and her only
surviving child, Sophia, was the wife of the late and the mother of the
present Elector of Hanover. It was in Sophia and her bclrs, being
Protestants, that the Act of Settlemen. vested the Crown. It was
enacted that every English sovereign must be in communion with the
Church of England as by law established. All future kings were for-
bidden to leave England without consent of Parliament, and foreigners
were excluded from all public posts. The independence of justice was
established by a clause which provided that no judge should be re-
moved from office save on an address from Parliament to the Crown.
The two principles that the King acts only th ough his ministers, and
that these ministers are responsible to Parliament, were asserted by a
requirement that all public business should be formally done in the
Privy Council, and all its decisions signed by its members — provisions
which' went far to complete the parliamentary Constitution which
had been drawn up by the Bill of Rights. The national union which
had already been shown in this action of the Tory Parliament, now
showed itself in the King's welcome on his return from the Hague,
where the conclusion of a new Grand Alliance between the Empire,
Holland, and the United Provinces, had rewarded William's patience
and skill. The Alliance was soon joined by Denmark, Sweden, the
Palatinate, and the bulk of the German States. The Parliament
of 1702, though still Tory in the main, replied to William's stirring
appeal by voting forty thousand soldiers and as many sailors for the
coming struggle. A Bill of Attainder was passed against the new
Pretender ; and all members of either House and all public officials
were sworn to uphold the succession of thi House of Hanover.

But the King's weakness was already too great to allow of his taking
the field ; and he was forced to entrust the war in the Netherlands to
the one Englishman who had shown himself capable of a great com-
mand. John Churchill, Earl of Marlborough, was born in 1650, the

z z

70s

Sec. IX.

Marl-
borough

1698

i7ia

t|'l

Act of

StttUmtnt

1701

Marl,
borough

i}!

7o6

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IX.

Marl-
borough

1698

1712

Churchill

and

James

Churchill

and
William

son of a Devonshire Cavalier, whose daughter became at the Restora-
tion mistress of the Duke of York. The shame of Arabella did more
perhaps than her father's loyalty to win for her brother a commission
in the royal Guards ; and, after five years' service abroad under
Turenne, the young captain became colonel of an English rejjiment
which was retained in the service of France. He had already shown
some of the qualities of a great soldier, an unruffled courage, a bold
and venturous temper held in check by a cool and serene judgment,
a vigilance and capacity for enduring fatigue which never forsook him.
In later years he was known * o spend a whole day in reconnoitring,
and at Blenheim he remained on horseback for fifteen hours. But
courage and skill in arms did less for Churchill on his return to the
English court than his personal beauty. In the French camp he had
been known as " the handsome Englishman ; " and his manners were
as winning as his person. Even in age his address was almost
irresistible : " he engrossed the graces," says Chesterfield ; and his
air never lost the careless sweetness which won the favour of Lady
Castlemaine. A present of ;^5,ooo from the King's mistress laid the
foundation of a fortune which grew rapidly to greatness, as the prudent
forethought of the handsome young soldier hardened into the avarice
of age. But it was to the Duke of York that Churchill looked mainly
far advancement, and he earned it by the fidelity with which as a
member of his household he clung to the Duke's fortunes during the
dark days of the Popish Plot. He followed James to the Hague and to
Edinburgh, and on his master's return he was rewarded with a peerage
and the colonelcy of the Life Guards. The service he rendered James
after his accession by saving the royal army from a surprise at Sedge-
moor would have been yet more splendidly acknowledged but for the
King's bigotry. In spite of his master's personal solicitations Churchill
remained true to Protestantism ; but he knew James too well to count
on further favour. Luckily he had now found a new groundwork for
his fortunes in the growing influence of his wife over the King's second
daughter, Anne ; and at the crisis of the Revolution the adhesion of
Anne to the cause of Protestantism was uf the highest value. No
sentiment of gratitude to his older patron hindered Marlborough from
corresponding with the Prince of Orange, from promising Anne's
sympathy to William.'s effort, or from deserting the ranks of the King's
army when it faced William in the field. His desertion proved fatal
to the royal cause ; but great as this service was it was eclipsed by a
second. It was by his wife's persuasion that Anne was induced to
forsake her father and take refuge in Danby's camp. Unscrupulous
as hir conduct had been, the services which he rendered to Willia.i.
were too great to miss their reward. He became Earl of Marl-
borough ; he was put at the head of a force during the Irish war
where his rapid successes won William's regard ; and he was given

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

high command in the army of Flanders. But the sense of his
power over Anne soon turned Marlborough from plotting treason
against James to plot treason against William. Great as was his
greed of gold, he had married Sarah Jennings, a penniless beauty
of Charles's court, in whom a violent and malignant temper was
strangely combined with a power of winning and retaining love.
Churchill's affection for her ran like a thread of gold through the dark
web of his career. In the midst of his marches and from the very
battle-field he writes to his wife with the same passionate tenderness.
The composure which no danger or hatred could ruffle broke down
into almost womanish depression at the thought of her coldness or at
any burst of her violent humour. He never left her without a pang.
" I did for a great while with a perspective glass look upon the cliffs,"
he once wrote to her after setting out on a campaign, " in hopes that
I might have had one sight of you." It was no wonder that the
woman who inspired Marlborough with a love like this bound to her
the weak and feeble nature of the Princess Anne. The two friends
threw off the restraints of state, and addressed each other as " Mrs.
Freeman " and " Mrs. Morley." It was on his wife's influence over
her friend that the Earl's ambition counted in its designs against
William. His plan was to drive the King from the throne by backing
the Tories in their opposition to the war as well as by stirring to frenzy
the English hatred of foreigners, and to seat Anne in his place. The
discovery of his designs roused the King to a burst of unusual resent-
ment. " Were I and my Lord Marlborough private persons," William
exclaimed, " the sword would have to settle between us." As it was,
he could only strip the Earl of his c ices and command, and drive his
wife from St. James's. Anne followed her favourite, and the court of
the Princess became the centre of the Tory opposition ; while Marl-
borough opened a correspondence with James. So notorious was his
treason that on the eve of the French invasion of 1692 he was one of
the first of the suspected persons sent to the Tower.

The death of Mary forced William, to recall Anne, who became by
this event his successor ; and with Anne the Marlboroughs returned
to court. The King could not bend himself to trust the Earl again ;
but as death drew near he saw in him the one man whose splendid
talents fitted him, in spite of the baseness and treason of his life, to
rule England and direct the Grand / lliance in his stead. He employed
Marlborough therefore to negotiate the treaty of alliance with the
Emperor, and put him at the head of the army in Flanders. But the
Earl had only just taken the command when a fall from his horse
proved fatal to the broken frame of the King. " There was a time
when I should have been glad to have been delivered out of my
troubles," the dying man whispered to Portland, " but I own I see
another scene, and could wish to live a little longer." He knew,

z z 2

707

Sec. IX.

Marl-
borough

1698

i7ia

1 : • 11

Marl,
borouifh
and the

Grand
Alliance

■ t

Death of
Willian.

Mar. 1702

7o8

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IX.

Marl-
borough

1698

1712

however, that the wish was vain, and commended Marlborough to
Anne as the fittest person to lead her armies and guide her counsels.
Anne's zeal needed no quickening. Three days after her accession
the Earl was named Captain-General of the English forces at home
and abroad, and entrusted with the entire direction of the war. His
supremacy over home affairs was secured by the construction of a
purely Tory administration with Lord Godolphin, a close friend of
Marlborough's, as Lord Treasurer at its head. The Queen's affection
for his wife ensured him the suppo t of the Crown at a moment
when Anne's personal popularity gave the Crown a new weight with
the nation. In England, indeed, party feeling for the moment died
away. All save the extreme Tories were won over to the war now
that it was waged on behalf of a Tory queen by a Tory general, while
the most extreme of the Whigs were ready to back even a Tory
general in waging a Whig war. Abroad, however, William's death
shook the Alliance to its base ; and even Holland wavered in dread of
being deserted by England in the coming struggle. But the decision
of Marlborough soon did away with this distrust. Anne was made
to declare from the throne her resolve to p irsue with energy the
policy of her predecessor. The Parliament was brought to sanction
vigorous measures for the prosecution of the war. I'he new general
hastened to the Hague, received the command of the Dutch as well as
of the English forces, and drew the German powers into the Confederacy
with a skill and adroitness which even William might have envied.
Never was greatness more quickly recognized than in the case of
Marlborough. In a few months he was regarded by all as the guiding
spirit of the Alliance, and princes whose jealousy had worn out the
patience of the King yielded without a struggle to the counsels of his
successor. His temper fitted him in an especial way to be the head
of a great confederacy. Like William, he owed little of his power to
any early training. The trace of his neglected education was seen to
the last in his reluctance to write. " Of all things," he said to his wife,
" I do not love writing." To pen a despatch indeed was a far greater
trouble to him than to plan a campaign. But nature had given him
qualities which in other men spring specially from culture. His
capacity for business was immense. During the next ten years he
assumed the general direction of the war in Flanders and in Spain.
He managed every negotiation with the courts of the allies. He
watched over the shifting phases of En-,lish politics. He cross«=d the
Channel to win over Anne to a change in the Cabinet, or hurried to
Berlin to secure the due contingent of Electoral troops from Branden-
burg. At one and the same moment men saw him reconciUng the
Emperor with the Protestants of Hungary, stirring the Calvinists of
the Cdvennes into revolt, arranging the affairs of Portugal, and
providing for the protection of the Duke of Savoy. But his air showed

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

no trace of fatigue or haste or vexation. He retained to the last the
indolent grace of his youth. His natural dignity was never ruffled by
an outbreak of temper. Amidst the storm of batde his soldiers saw
their leader " without fear of danger or in the least hurry, giving his
orders with all the calmness imaginable." In the cabinet he was as
cool as on the battle-field. He met with the same equable serenity
the pettiness of the German princes, the phlegm of the Dutch, the
ignorant opposition of his officers, the libels of his political opponents.
There was a touch of irony in the simple expedients by which he
sometimes solved problems which had baffled Cabinets. The touchy
pride of the King of Prussia made him one of the most vexatious
among the allies, but all difficulty with him ceased when Marlborough
rose at a state banquet and handed him a napkin. Churchill's com-
posure rested partly indeed on a pride which could not stoop to bare
the real self within to the eyes of meaner men. In the bitter moments
before his fall he bade Godolphin burn some querulous letters which
the persecution of his opponents hr.d wrung from him. " My desire is
that the world may continue in their error of thinking me a happy
man, for I think it better to be envied than pitied." But in great
measure it sprang from the purely intellectual temper of his mind.
His passion for his wife was the one sentiment which tinged the
colourless light in which his understanding moved. In all else he was
without love or hate, he knew neither doubt nor regret. In private
life he was a humane and compassionate man ; but if his position
required it he could betray Englishmen to death, or lead his army to
a butchery such as that of Malplaquet. Of honour or the finer senti-
ments of mankind he knew nothing ; and he turned without a shock
from guiding Europe and winning great victories to heap up a matchless
fortune by peculation and greed. He is perhaps the only instance of
a man of real greatness who loved money for money's sake. The
passions which stirred the men around him, whether noble or ignoble,
were to him simply elements in an intellectual problem which had to
be solved by patience. " Patience will overcome all things," he writes
again and again. " As I think most things are governed by destiny,
having done all things we should submit with patience."

As a statesman the high q-^alities of Marlborough were owned by his
bitterest foes. " Over the Confederacy," says Bolingbroke, " he, a new,
a private man, acquired by merit and management a more decided
influence than high birth, confirmed authority, and even the crown of
Great Britain, had given to King William." But great as he was in
the council, he was even greater in the field. He stands alone amongst
the masters of the art of war as a captain whose victories began at an
age when the work of most men is done. Though he served as a
young officer under Turenne and for a few months in Ireland and the
Netherlands, he had held no great command till he took the field in

709

Sec. IX.

Marl-
borough

1698

1712

■ In;

! ' -I

Marl-

borough

and the

"War

4'-

710

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IX.
Marl-

UOKOUGH

1698

1712

opening of
the war

Flanders at the age of fifty-two. He stands alone, too, in his unbroken
good fortune. Voltaire notes that he never besieged a fortress which
he did not take, or fought a battle which he did not win. His
difficulties came not so much from the enemy, as from the
ignorance and timidity of his own allies. He was never defeated in
the field, but victory after victory was snatched from him by the
incapacity of his officers or the stubbornness of the Dutch. What
startled the cautious strategists of his day was the vigour and audacity
of his plans. Old as he was, Marlborough's designs had from the first
all the dash and boldness of youth. On taking the field in 1702 he at
once resolved to force a battle in the heart of Brabant. The plan was
foiled by the timidity of the Dutch deputies. But his resolute advance
across the Meuse drew the French forces from that river, and enabled
him to reduce fortress after fortress in a series of sieges, till the
surrender of Lidge closed a campaign which cut off the French from
the Lower Rhine, and freed Holland from all danger of an invasion.
The successes of Marlborough had been brought into bolder relief by
the fortunes of the war in other quarters. Though the Imperialist
general. Prince Eugene of Savoy, showed his powers by a surprise of
the French army at Cremona, no real successes had been won in
Italy. An English descent on the Spanish coast ended in failure. In
Germany the Bavarians joined the French, and the united armies
defeated the forces of the Empire. It was in this quarter that Lewis
resolved to push his fortunes. In the spring of 1703 a fresh army
under Marshal Villars again relieved the Bavarian Elector from the
pressure of the Imperial forces, and only a strife which arose between
the two commanders hindered the joint armies from marching on
Vienna. Meanwhile the timidity of the Dutch deputies served Lewis
well in the Low Countries. The hopes of Marlborough, who had been
raised to a Dukedom for his services in the previous year, were again
foiled by the deputies of the States-General. Serene as his temper
was, it broke down before their refusal to co-operate in an attack on
Antwerp and French Fbnders ; and the prayers of Godolphin and of
the pensionary Heinsius alone induced him to withdraw his offer of
resignation. But in spite of his victories on the Danube, of the
blunders of his adversaries on the Rhine, and the sudden aid of an
insurrection which broke out in Hungary, the difficulties of Lewis
were hourly increasing. The accession of Savoy to the Grand
Alliance threatened his armies in Italy with destruction. That of
Portugal gave the allies a base of operations against Spain. The
French King's energy however rose with the pressure ; and while the
Duke of Berwick, a natural son of James the Second, was despatched
against Portugal, and three small armies closed round Savoy, the
flower of the French troops joined the army of Bavaria on the
Danube ; for the bold plan of Lewis was to decide the fortunes of the

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

711

war by a victory which would wrest peace from the Empire under the
walls of Vienna.

The master-stroke of Lewis roused Marlborough at the opening of
1704 to a master-stroke in return ; but the secresy and boldness of the
Duke's plans deceived both his enemies and his allies. The French
army in Flanders saw in his march upon Maintz only a design to
transfer the war into Elsass. The Dutch were lured into suffering
their troops to be drawn as far from Flanders as Coblentz by proposals
for an imaginary campaign on the Moselle. It was only when Marl-
borough crossed tlie Neckar and struck through the centre of Germany
for the Danube that the true aim of his operations was revealed.
After struggling through the hill country of Wurtemberg, he joined the
Imperial army under the Prince of Baden, stormed the heights of
Donauwerth, crossed the Danube and the Lech, and penetrated into
the heart of Bavaria. The crisis drew the two armies which were
facing one another on the Upper Rhine to the scene. The arrival of
Marshal Tallard with thirty thousand French troops saved the Elector
of Bavaria for the moment from the need of submission ; but the
junction of his opponent, Prince Eugene, with Marlborough raised the
contending forces again to an equality. After a few marches the armies
met on the north bank of the Danube, near the little town of Hochstadt
and the village of Blindheim or Blenheim, which have given their
names to one of the most memorable battles in the history of the
world. In one respect the struggle which followed stands almost
unrivalled, for the v/hole of the Teutonic race was represented in
the strange medley of Englishmen, Dutchmen, Hanoverians, Danes,
VVurtembergers and Austrians who followed Marlborough and Eugene.
The French and Bavarians, who numbered like their opponents some
fifty thousand men, lay behind a little stream which ran through
swampy ground to the Danube. Their position was a strong one, for
its front was covered by the swamp, its right by the Danube, its left by
the hill-country in which the stream rose ; and Tallard had not only
entrenched himself, but was far superior to his rival in artillery. But for
once Marlborough's hands were free. " I have great reason," he wrote
calmly home, " to hope that everything will go well, for I have the
pleasure to find all the officers willing to obey without knowing any
other reason than that it is my desire, which is very different from
what it was in Flanders, where I was obliged to have the consent of a
council of war for everything I undertook." So formidable were the
obstacles, however, that though the allies were in motion at sunrise,
it was not till midday that Eugene, who commanded on the right,
succeeded in crossing the stream. The English foot at once forded it
on the left and attacked the village of Blindheim in which the bulk of
the French infantry were entrenched ; but after a furious struggle the
attack was repulsed, while as gallant a resistance at the other end of

Sec. IX.
Marl-

UOKOUGH

1608

i7ia

Blenheim

Ati^. 13,
1704

ill

^ i1

712

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IX.

Marl-
borough

1698

1712

Ramillies

Occasional
conformity

the line held Eugene in check. The centre, however, which the French
believed to be unassailable, had been chosen by Marlborough for the
chief point of attack ; and by making an artificial road across the
morass he was at last enabled to throw his eight thousand horsemen
on the French cavalry which occupied this position. Two desperate
charges which the Duke headed in person decided the day. The
French centre was flung back on the Danube and forced to surrender.
Their left fell back in confusion on Hochstadt : while their right,
cooped up in Blindheim and cut off from retreat, became prisoners of
war. Of the defeated army only twenty thousand escaped. Twelve
thousand were slain, fourteen thousand were captured. Germany was
finally freed from the French ; and Marlborough, who followed the
wreck of the French host in its flight to Elsass, soon made himself
master of the Lower Moselle. But the loss of France could not be
measured by men or fortresses. A hundred victories since Rocroi had
taught the world to regard the French army as invincible, when
Blenheim and the surrender of the flower of the French soldiery broke
the spell. From that moment the terror of victory passed to the side
of the allies, and " Malbrook " became a name of fear to every child
in France.

In England itself the victory of Blenheim aided to bring about a
great change in the political aspect of affairs. The Tories were
resolved to create a permanent Tory majority in the Commons by
excluding Nonconformists from the municipal corporations, which
returned the bulk of the borough members. The Protestant Dissenters,
while adhering to their separate congregations, in which they were
now protected by the Toleration Act, "qualified for office" by the
" occasional conformity " of receiving the sacrament at Church once
in the year. It was against this "occasional conformity" that the
Tories introduced a test to exclude the Nonconformists ; and this test
at first received Marlborough's support. But it was steadily rejected
by the Lords as often as it was sent up to them, and it was soon
guessed that their resistance was secretly backed by both Marl-
borough and Godolphin. Tory as he was, in fact, Marlborough had
no mind for an unchecked Tory rule, or for a revival of religious
strife which would be fatal to the war. But he strove in vain to
propitiate his party by inducing the Queen to set aside the tenths
and first-fruits hitherto paid by the clergy to the Crown as a fund
for the augmentation of small benefices, a fund which still bears
the name of Queen Anne's Bounty. The Commons showed their
resentment by refusing to add a grant of money to the grant of a
Dukedom after his first campaign ; and the higher Tories, with Lord
Nottingham at their head, began to throw every obstacle they could
in the way of the continuance of the war. At last they quitted
office in 1704, and Marlborough replaced them by Tories of a more

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

713

moderate stamp who were still in favour of the war : by Robert
Harley, who became Secretary of State, and Henry St. John, a man
of splendid talents, who was named Secretary at War. The Duke's
march into Germany, which pledged England to a struggle in the
heart of the Continent, embittered the political strife. The high
Tories and Jacobites threatened, if Marlborough failed, to bring his
head to the block, and only the victory of Blenheim saved him from
political ruin. Slowly and against his will the Duke drifted from his
own party to the party which really backed his policy. He availed
himself of the national triumph over Blenheim to dissolve Parliament ;
and when the election of 1705, as he hoped, returned a majority in
favour of the war, his efforts brought about a coalition between the
moderate Tories who still clung to him and the Whig Junto, whose
support was purchased by making a Whig, William Cowper, Lord
Keeper, and by sending Lord Sunderland as envoy to Vienna. The
bitter attacks of the peace party were entirely foiled by this union, and
Marlborough at last felt secure at home. But he had to bear disap-
pointment abroad. His plan of attack along the line of the Moselle
was defeated by the refusal of the Imperial army to join him. When
he entered the French lines across the Dyle, the Dutch generals with-
drew their troops ; and his proposal to attack the Duke of Villeroy in
the field of Waterloo was rejected in full council of war by the deputies
of the States with cries of " murder " and " massacre." Even Marl-
borough's composure broke into bitterness at the blow. " Had I had
the same power I had last year," he wrote home, " I could have won a
greater victory than that of Blenheim." On his complaint the States
recalled their commissaries, but the year was lost ; nor had greater
lesults been brought about in Italy or on the Rhine. The spirits of the
allies were only sustained by the romantic exploits of Lord Peterborough
in Spain. Profligate, unprincipled, flighty as he was, Peterborough had a
genius for war, and his seizure of Barcelona with a handful of men, his
recognition of the old liberties of Aragon, roused that province to
support the cause of the second son of the Emperor, who had been
acknowledged as King of Spain by the allies under the title of Charles
the Third. Catalonia and Valencia soon joined Aragon in declaring
for Charles: while Marlborough spent the winter of 1705 in negotia-
tions at Vienna, Berlin, Hanover, and the Hague, and in preparations
for the coming campaign. Eager for freedom of action, and sick of
the Imperial generals as of the Dutch, he planned a march over the
Alps and a campaign in Italy ; and though his designs were defeated
by the opposition of the allies, he found himself unfettered when he
again appeared in Flanders in 1 706. The French marshal Villeroy
was as eager as Marlborough for an engagement ; and the two armies
met on the 23rd of May at the village of Ramillies on the undulating
plain which forms the highest ground in Brabant. The French were

Sec. IX.

Marl-
borough

1698

i7ia

.11

The
Coalition
Ministry

.•,|l

in
.11

li'i

7»4

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IX.
Makl-

BOKOUGH

1698

i7ia

The

Union

with

Scotland

1706

drawn up in a wide curve with morasses covering their front. After a
feint on their left, Marlborough flung himself on their right wing at
Ramillies, crushed it in a brilliant charge that he led in person, and
swept along their whole line till it broke in a rout which only ended
beneath the walls of Louvain. In an hour and a half the French had lost
fifteen thousand men, their baggage, and their guns ; and the line of the
Scheldt, Brussels, Antwerp and Bruges became the prize of the victors.
It only needed four successful sieges which followed the battle of
Ramillies to ccuiplete the deliverance of Flanders.

The year which witnessed the victory of RamiUies remains yet more
memorable as the year which witnessed the final Union of England
with Scotland. As the undoing of the earlier union had been the first
work of the Government of the Restoration, its revival was one of the
first aims of the Government which followed the Revolution. But the
project was long held in check by religious and commercial jealousies.
Scotland refused to bear any part of the English debt. England
would not yield any share in her monopoly of trade with the colonies.
The English Churchmen longed for a restoration of Episcopacy north
of the border, while the Scotch Presbyterians would not hear even of
the legal toleration of Episcopalians. In 1703, however, an Act of
Settlement which passed through the Scotch Parliament at last
brought home to English statesmen the dangers of further delay. In
dealing with this measure the Scotch Whigs, who cared only for
the independence of their country, joined hand in hand with the
Scotch Jacobites, who looked only to the interests of me Pretender.
The Jacobites excluded from the Act the name of the Princess
Sophia ; the Whigs introduced a provision that no sovereign of
England should be recognized as sovereign of Scotland save upon
security given to the religion, freedom, and trade of the Scottish
people. Great as the danger arising from such a measure undoubtedly
was, for it pointed to a recognition of the Pretender in Scotland on the
Queen's death, and such a recognition meant war between Scotland
and England, it was only after three years' delay that the wisdom and
resolution of Lord Somers brought the question to 'an issue. The
Scotch proposals of a federati e rather than a legislative union were
set aside by his firmness ; the commercial jealousies of the English
trader were put by ; and the Act of Union provided that the two
kingdoms should be united into one under the name of Great Britain,
and that the succession to the crown of this United Kingdom should be
ruled by the provisions of the English Act of Settlement. The Scotcii
Church and the Scotch Law were left untouched : but all rights of trade
were thrown open, and a uniform system of coinage adopted. A single
Parliament was henceforth to represent the United Kingdom, and for
this purpose forty-five Scotch members were added to the five hundred
and thirteen English members of the House of Commons, and sixteen

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

representative peers to the one hundred and eight who formed the
English House of Lords. In Scotland the opposition was bitter and
almost universal. The terror of the Presb> ^erians indeed was met by
an Act of Security which became part of the Treaty of Union, and
which required an oath to support the Presbyterian Church from every
sovereign on his accession. But no securities could satisfy the enthu-
siastic patriots or the fanatical Cameronians. The Jacobites sought
troops from France, and plotted a Stuart restoration. The nationalists
talked of seceding from the Houses which voted for the Union, and
of establishing a rival Parliament. In the end, however, good sense
and the loyalty of the trading classes to the cause of the Protestant
succession won their way. The measure was adopted by the Scotch
Parliament, and the Treaty of Union became in 1707 a legislative Act
to which Anne gave her assent in noble words. " I desire," said the
(2ueen, " and expect from my subjects of both nations that from hence-
forth they act with all possible respect and kindness to one another,
that so it may appear to all the world they have hearts disposed to
become one people." Time has more than answered these hopes.
The two nations whom the Union brought together have ever since
remained one. England gained in the removal of a constant danger
of treason and war. To Scotland the Union opened up new avenues
of wealth which the energy of its people turned to wonderful account.
The farms of Lothian have become models of agricultural skill. A
fishing town on the Clyde has grown into the rich and populous
Glasgow. Peace and culture have changed the wild clansmen of the
Highlands into herdsmen and farmers. Nor was the change followed
by any loss of national spirit. The world has hardly seen a mightier
and more rapid development of national energy than that of Scotland
after the Union. All that passed away was the jealousy which had
parted since the days of Edward the First two peoples whom a
common blood and common speech proclaimed to be one. The
Union between Scotland and England has been real and stable simply
because it was the legislative acknowledgment and enforcement of a
national fact.

With the defeat of Ramillies the fortunes of France reached their
lowest ebb. The loss of Flanders was followed by the loss of Italy
after a victory by which Eugene relieved Turin ; and not only did
Peterborough hold his ground in Spain, but Charles the Third with an
army of English and Portuguese entered Madrid. Marlborough was
at the height of his renown. Ramillies gave him strength enough to
force Anne, in spite of her hatred of the Whigs, to fulfil his compact
with them by admitting Lord Sunderland, the bitterest leader of their
party, to office. But the system of political balance which he had
maintained till now began at once to break down. Constitutionally,
Marlborough's was the last attempt to govern England on other terms

715

Sec. IX.
Makl-

UUKOUCJll

1698

i7ia

Itn n'su/ts

* '' 'I ra

Marl.

borough

and the

VThigs

1706

.j'^

7i6

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IX.
Marl-

DOKUUGH

1608

i7ia

1706

Triumph
o/the
Whi^s
1708

1707

than those of party government, and the union of parties to which he
had clung ever since his severance from the extreme Tories soon
became impossible. The growing opposition of the Tories to the war
threw the Duke more and more on the support of the Whigs, and the
Whigs sold their support dearly. Sunderland, who had inherited his
father's conceptions of party government, was resolved to restore
a strict party administration on a purely Whig basis, and to drive
the moderate Tories from ofificc in spite of Marlborough's desire to
retain them. The Duke wrote hotly home at the news of the
pressu^•; which the Whigs were putting on him. "England," he
said, " will not be ruined because a few men are not pleased." Nor
was Marlborough alone in his resentment. Harley foresaw the danger
of his expulsion from office, and began to intrigue at court, through
Mrs. Masham, a bedchamber woman of the Queen, who was supplant-
ing the Duchess in Anne's favour, against the Whigs and against
Marlborough. St. John, who owed his early promotion to office to the
Duke's favour, was driven by the same fear to share Harley's schemes.
Marlborough strove to win both of them back, but he was helpless in
the hands of the only party that steadily supported the war. A
factious union of the Whigs with their opponents, though it roused the
Duke to a burst of unusual passion in Parliament, effected its end by
convincing him of the impossibility of further resistance. The oppo-
sitiou .of the Queen indeed was stubborn and bitter. Anne was at
heart a Tory, and her old trust in Marlborough died with his sub-
mission to the Whig demands. It was only by the threat of resignation
that he had forced her to admit Sunderland to office ; and the violent
outbreak of temper with which the Duchess enforced her husband's
will changed "the Queen's friendship for her into a bitter resentment.
Marlborough was driven to increase this resentment by fresh com-
pliances with the conditions which the Whigs imposed on him, by
removing Peterborough from his command as a Tory general, and by
wresting from Anne her consent to the dismissal from office of Harley
and St. John with the moderate Tories whom they headed. Their
removal was followed by the complete triumph of the Whigs. Somers
became President of the Council, Wharton Lord-Lieutenant of Irelend,
while lower posts were occupied by men destined to play a great part
in our later history, such as the young Duke of Newcastle and Robert
Walpole. Meanwhile, the great struggle abroad went on, with striking
alternations of success. France rose with singular rapidity from the
crushing blow of Ramillies. Spain vv^as recovered for Philip by a victory
of Marshal Berwick at Almanza. Vi liars won fresh triumphs on tiic
Rhine, while Eugene, who had penetrated into Provence, was driven
back into Italy. In Flanders, Marlborough's designs for taking ad-
vantage of his great victory were foiled by the strategy of the Duke
of Vendome and by the reluctance of the Dutch, who were now

1X.1

THE REVOLUTION.

wavering towards peace. In the campaign of 1708, however, Ven-
(lAmo, in spite of his superiority in force, was attacked and defeated at
Oudcnardc ; and though Marlborough was hindered from striking at
the lieart of France by the timidity of tlic I'jiglish and Dutch statesmen,
he rc(hired IJlJc, the strongest of its frontier fortresses, in the face of
an army of rchcf which numbered a hundred thousand men. The
pride of Lewis was at last broken by defeat and by the terrible
suffering of France. He offered terms of peace which yielded all that
the allies had fought for. He consented to withdraw his aid from
Philip of Spain, to give up ten Flemish fortresses to the Dutch, and to
surrender to the Empire all that France had gained since the Treaty of
Westphalia. He offered to acknowledge Anne, to banish the Pretender
from his domin.'ons, and to demolish the fortifications of Dunkirk, a
port hateful to England as the home of the French privateers.

To Marlborough peace now seemed secure ; but in spite of his
counsels, the allies and the Whig Ministers in England demanded
that Lewis should with his own troops compel his grandson to give up
the crown of Spain. " If I must wage war," replied the King, " I had
rather wage it against my enemies than against my children." In a
bitter despair he appealed to France ; and exhausted as it was, the
campaign of 1709 proved how nobly France answered his appeal.
The terrible slaughter which bears the name of the battle of Mal-
plaquet showed a new temper in the French soldiers. Starving as
they were, they flung away their rations in their eagerness for the
fight, and fell back at its close in serried masses that no efforts of
Marlborough could break. They had lost twelve thousand men, but
the forcing their lines of entrenchment had cost the allies a loss of
double that number. Horror at such a " deluge of blood " increased
the growing weariness of the war ; and the rejection of the French offers
was unjustly attributed to a desire on the part of Marlborough of
lengthening out a contest which brought him profit and power. A
storm of popular passion burst suddenly on the Whigs. Its occasion
was a dull and silly sermon in which a High Church divine, Dr.
Sacheverell, maintained the doctrine of non-resistance at St. Paul's.
His boldness challenged prosecution ; but in spite of the warning of
Marlborough and of Somers the Whig Ministers resolved on his im-
peachment before the Lords, and the trial at once widened into a great
party struggle. An outburst of popular enthusiasm in Sacheverell's
favour showed what a storm of hatred had gathered against the Whigs
and the war. The most eminent of the Tory Churchmen stood by his
side at the bar, crowds escorted him to the court and back again, while
the streets rang with cries of " The Church and Dr. Sacheverell." A
small majority of the peers found the preacher guilty, but the light
sentence they inflicted was in effect an acquittal, and bonfires and
illuminations over the whole country welcomed it as a Tory triumph.

717

Skc. IX.
Mahi.-

IIOHrXHill

1698

i7ia

''t(H

Envland

and the

War

Malplaijuet

Sacheverell

7i8

Sbc. IX.

Mari.-
iiorouc.ii

1698

i7ia

Fall of

Marl.

boroufh

HISTORY OF THE B:N(JL1SII PEOPLE.

[chap.

Dismissal
of the
IVhigs

I7IO

17II

The party whom the Whigs had striven to crush were roused to new
life. The expulsion of Harley and St. John from the Ministry hau ^Mven
the Tories leaders of a more subtle and vigorous stamp than the Ilii^ri,
Churchmen who had quitted office in the first years of the war, and
St. John brought into play a new engine of political attack whose
powers soon made themselves felt. In the Examiner and in a crowd
of pamphlets and periodicals which followed in its train, the humour of
Prior, the bitter irony of Swift, and St. John's own brilliant sophistry
spent themselves on the abuse of the war and of its general. *' Six
millions of supplies and almost fifty millions of debt 1 " Swift wrote
bitterly ; "the High Allies have been the ruin of us !" Marlborough
was ridiculed and reviled, he was accused of insolence, cruelty and
ambition, of corruption and greed. Even his courage was called in
question. The turn of popular feeling freed Anne at once from the
pressure beneath which she had bent : and the subtle intrigue of Harley
was busy in undermining the Ministry. The Whigs, who knew the
Duke's alliance with them had simply been forced on him by the war,
were easily persuaded that the Queen had no aim but to humble him,
and looked coolly on at the dismissal of his son-in-law, Sunderland, and
his friend, Godolphin. Marlborough on his part was lured by hopes
of reconciliation with his old party, and looked on as coolly while
Anne dismissed the Whig Ministers and appointed a Tory Ministry
in their place, with Harley and St. John at its head. lUit the intrigues
of Harley paled before the subtle treason of St. John. Resolute to
drive Marlborough from his command, he fed the Duke's hopes of
reconciliation with the Tories, till he led him to acquiesce in his
wife's dismissal, and to pledge himself to a co-operation with the
Tory policy. It was the Duke's beliet mat a reconciliation with the
Tories was effected that led him to sanction the despatch of troops
which should have strengthened his army in Flanders on a fruitless
expedition against Canada, though this left him too weak to carry out
a masterly plan which he had formed for a march into the heart of
France in the opening of 17 11. He was unable even to risk a battle
or to do more than to pick up a few seaboard towns, and St. John at
once turned the small results of the campaign into an argument for the
conclusion of peace. In defiance of an article of the Grand Alliance
which pledged its members not to carry on separate negotiations widi
France, St. John, who now became Lord Bolingbroke, pushed forward
a secret accommodation between England and France. It was for
this negotiation that he had crippled Marlborough's campaign ; and it
was the discovery of his perfidy which revealed to the Duke how utterly
he had been betrayed, and forced him at last to break with the Tory
Ministry. He returned to England ; and his efforts induced the House
of Lords to denounce the contemplated peace ; but the support of the
Commons and the Queen, and the general hatred of the wat among the

IX.]

Till-: KKVOLUTION.

people, enabled Harley to ride down all resistance. At the opening of
17 12 the Whig majority in the House of Lords was swamped by the
creation of twelve Tory peers. Marlborough was dismissed from his
command, charged with peculation, and condemned as guilty by a
vote of the House of Commons. The Duke at once withdrew from
Kngland, and with his withdrawal all opposition to the peace was at
an end.

Marlborough's flight was followed by the conclusion of a Treaty at
Utiecht between France, England, and the Dutch ; and the desertion
of his allies forced the Emperor at last to make pe.ice at Rastadt. Hy
these treaties the original aim of the war, that of preventing the
possession of France and Spain by the House of Bourbon, was
abandoned. No precaution was taken against the dangers it involved
to the "balance of power," save by a provision that the two crowns
should never be united on a single head, and by Philip's renunciation
of all right of succession to the throne of France. The principle on
which the Treaties were based was in fact that of the earlier Treaties
of Partition. Philip retained Spain and the Indies : but he ceded his
possessions in Italy and the Netherlands with the island of Sardinia
to Charles of Austria, who had now become Emperor, in satisfaction
of his claims ; while he handed over Sicily to the Duke of Savoy.
To England he gave up not only Minorca but Gibraltar, two positions
which secured her the command of the Mediterranean. France had
to consent to the re-establishment of the Dutch barrier on a greater
scale than before ; to pacify the English resentment against the
French privateers by the dismantling of Dunkirk ; and not only to
recognize the right of Anne to the crown, and the Protestant succes-
sion in the House of Hanover, but to consent to the expulsion of the
Pretender from her soil. The failure of the Queen's health made
the succession the real question of the day, and it was a question which
turned all politics into faction and intrigue. The Whigs, who were
still formidable in the Commons, and who showed the strength of their
party in the Lords by defeating a Treaty of Commerce, in which Boling-
broke anticipated the greatest financial triumph of William Pitt and
secured freedom of trade between England and France, were zealous
for the succession of the Elector ; nor did the Tories really contemplate
any other plan. But on the means of providing for his succession Harley
and Bolingbroke differed widely. Harley inclined to an alliance between
the moderate Tories and the Whigs. The policy of Bolingbroke, on the
other hand, was so to strengthen the Tories by the iirter overthrow of
their opponents, that whatever might be the Elector's sympathies they
could force their policy on him as King. To ruin his rival's influence
he introduced a Schism Bill, which hindered any Nonconformist
from acting as a schoolmaster or a tutor ; and which broke Harley's
plans by creating a more bitter division than ever between Tory and

719

Skc. IX.
Maki.-

IIDHOdUII

1608

i7ia

Treaty of
Utrecht

1713

:h.

■ lb
■ ■ t

Harley and
Bolingbroke

720

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IX.

Marl-
borough

1698

1712

Death of
Anne

Aug. 10
1714

Whig. But its success went beyond his intentions. The Whigs re-
garded the Bill as the first step in a Jacobite restoration. The Electress
Sophia was herself alarmed, and the Hanoverian ambassador de-
manded for the son of the Elector, the future George the Second, who
had been created Duke of Cambridge, a summons as peer to the coming
Parliament, with the aim of securing the presence in England of a
Hanoverian Prince in case of the Queen's death. The Queen's anger,
fanned by Bolingbroke, broke out in a letter to the Electress which
warned her that " such conduct may imperil the succession itself ; "
and in July Anne was brought to dismiss Harley, now Earl of Oxford,
and to construct a strong and united Tory Ministry which would back
her in her resistance to the Elector's demand. As the crisis grew
nearer, both parties prepared for civil war. In the beginning of 17 14
the Whigs had made ready for a rising on the Queen's death, and
invited Marlborough from Flanders to head them, in the hope that his
name would rally the army to their cause. Bolingbroke, on the other
hand, intent on building up a strong Tory party, made the Duke of
Ormond, whose sympathies were known to be in favour of the Pre-
tender's succession. Warden of the Cinque Ports, the district in which
either claimant of the crown must land, while he gave Scotland in
charge to the Jacobite Earl of Mar. But events moved faster than his
plans. Anne was suddenly struck with apoplexy. The Privy Council
at once assembled, and at the news the Whig Dukes of Argyll and
Somerset entered the Council Chamber without summons and took
their places at the board. The step had been taken in secret concert
with the Duke of Shrewsbury, who was President of the Council in the
Tory Ministry, but a rival of Bolingbroke and an adherent of the
Hanoverian succession. The act was a decisive one. The right of the
House of Hanover was at once acknowledged, Shrewsbury was nomi-
nated as Lord Treasurer by the Council, and the nomination was
accepted by the dying Queen. Bolingbroke, though he remained
Secretary of State, suddenly found himself powerless and neglected,
while the Council took steps to provide for the em.ergency. Four
regiments were summoned to the capital in the expectation of a civil
war. But the Jacobites were hopeless and unprepared ; and on the
death of Anne the Elector George of Hanover, who had become heir to
the throne by his mother's death, was proclaimed King of England
without a show of opposition.

Section X.— VTalpole, 1712—1742.

{Authorities. — Coxe's Life of Sir Robert Walpole, Horace Walpole's
" Memoirs of the Reign of George II.," and Lord Hervey's amusing Memoirs
from the accession of George II. to the death of Quaen Caroline, give the
main materials on one side ; Bolingbroke's Letter to Sir William Wyndhnm,

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

721

s grew
of 1714
th, and
that his
e other
3uke of
he Pre-
n which
;land in
than his
Council
gyll and
nd took
concert
ilinthe
of the
t of the
ls nomi-
ion was
emained
glected,
Four
»f a civil
d on the
le heii to
England

Walpole's
Memoirs
give the

^yndhnm,

his " Patriot King," and his correspondence afford some insight into the other.
Horace Walpole's Letters to Sir Horace Mann give a minute account of his
father's fall. A sober and judicious account of the whole period may be found
in Lord Stanhope's " History of England fi-om the Peace of Utrecht."]

The accession of George the First marked a change in ti e position
of England in the European Commonwealth. From the age of the
Plantagenets the country had stood apart from more than passing
contact with the fortunes of the Continent. But the Revolution had
forced her to join the Great Alliance of the European peoples ; and
shameful as were some of its incidents, the Peace of Utrecht left her
'the main barrier against the ambition of the House of Bourbon. And
not only did the Revolution set England irrevocably among the powers
of Europe, but it assigned her a special place among them. The result
of the alliance and the war had been to establish what was then called
a " balance of power " between the great European states ; a balance
which rested indeed not so much on any natural equilibrium of forces
as on a compromise wrung from warring nations b}' the exhaustion of
a great struggle ; but which, once recognized and established, could
be adapted and readjusted, it was hoped, to the varying political con-
ditions of the time. Of this balance of power, as recognized and
defined in the Treaty of Utrecht and its successors, England became
the special guardian. The stubborn policy of the Georgian statesmen
has left its mark on our policy ever since. In struggling for peace and
for the sanctity of treaties, even though the struggle was one of selfish
interest, England took a ; \y which she has never wholly lost. Warlike
and imperious as is her national temper, she has never been able to
free herself from a sense that her business in the world is to seek peace
alike for herself and for the nations about her, and that the best
security for peace lies in her recognition, amidst whatever difficulties
and seductions, of the force of international engagements and the
sanctity of treaties.

At home the new King's accession was followed by striking political
results. Under Anne the throne had regained much of the older
influence which it lost through William's unpopularity ; but under
the two sovereigns who followed Anne the power of the Crown lay
absolutely dormant. They were strangers, to whom loyalty in its
personal sense was impossible ; and their character as nearly
approached insignificance as it is possible for human character to
approach it. Both were honest and straightforward men, who frankly
accepted the irksome position of constitutional kings. But neither had
any qualities which could make their honesty attractive to the people
at large. The temper of George the First was that of a gentleman
usher; and his one care was to get money for his favourites and
himself. The temper of George the Second was that of a drill-

3 A

III

Sec. X.

VValhole
1712

i74>a

Fin gland
and Europt

England

aod the

House of

Hanover

•h

Decline of
the royal
mjluencc

723

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

rcHAP.

Sec. X.

Walpole
1712

1742

Withdratual
of the Tories

Rule of the
IVhigs

sergeant, who believed himself master of his realm while he repeated
the lessons he had learnt from his wife, and which his wife had learnt
from the Minister. Their Court is familiar enough in the witty
memoirs of the time ; but as political figures the two Georges are
almost absent from our history. William of Orange had not only used
the power of rejecting bills passed by the; two Houses, but had kept in
his own hands the control of foreign affairs. Anne had never yielded
even to Marlborough her exclusive right of dealing with Church pre-
ferment, and had presided to the last at the Cabinet Councils of her
ministers. But with the accvjssion of the Georges these reserves passed
away. No sovereign since Anne's death has appeared at a Cabinet
Council, or has ventured to refuse his assent to an Act of Parliament.
As Elector of Hanover indeed the King still dealt with Continental
affairs : but his personal interference roused an increasing jealousy,
while it affected in a very slight, degree the foreign policy of his
English counsellors. England, in short, was governed not by the King,
but by the Whig ministers of the Crown. Nor had the Whigs to fear
any effective pressure from their political opponents. " The Tory party,"
Bolingbroke wrote after Anne's death, " is gone." In the first House
of Commons indeed which was called by the new King, the Tories
hardly numbered fifty members ; while a fatal division broke their
strength in the country at large. In their despair the more vehement
among them turned to the Pretender. Lord Oxford was impeached
and sent to the Tower ; Bolingbroke and the Duke of Ormond fled
from England to take office under the son of King James. At home
Sir William Wyndham seconded their efforts by building up a Jacobite
faction out of the wreck of the Tory party. The Jacobite secession
gave little help to the Pretender, while it dealt a fatal blow to the
Tory cause. England was still averse from a return of the Stuarts ;
and the suspicion of Jacobite designs not only alienated the trading
classes, who shrank from the blow to public credit which a Jacobite
repudiation of the debt would bring about, but deadened the zeal
even of the parsons and squires ; while it was known to have sown
a deep distrust of the whole Tory party in the heart of the new
sovereign. The Crown indeed now turned to the Whigs ; while the
Church, which up to this time had been the main stumbling-block
of their party, was sinking into political insignificance, and was
no longer a formidable enemy. For more than thirty years the
Whigs ruled England. But the length of their rule was not wholly
due to the support of the Crown or the secession of the Tories. It
was in some measure due to the excellent organization of their party.
While their adversaries were divided by differences of principle and
without leaders of real eminence, the Whigs stood as one man on the
principles of the Revolution, and produced great leaders who carried
them into effect. They submitted with admirable discipline to the

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

guidance of a knot of great nobles, to the houses of Bentinck, Manners,
Campbell, and Cavendish, to the Fitzroys and Lennoxes, the Russells
and Grenvilles, families whose resistance to the Stuarts, whose share
in the Revolution, whose energy in setting the line of Hanover on the
throne, gave them a claim to power. It was due yet more largely to
the activity with v/hich the Whigs devoted themselves to the gaining
and preserving an ascendency in the House of Commons. The
support of the commercial classes and of the great !owns was secured
not only by a resolute maintenance of public credit, but by the special
attention which each mmistry paid to questions of trade and finance.
Peace and the reduction of the land-tax conciliated the farmers and
the landov;ners, while the Jacobite sympathies of the bulk of the
squireSj and their conseqCient withdrawal from all share in politics,
threv/ even the representation of the shires for a time into Whig
hands. Of the county members, who formed the less numerous but
the weightier part of the lower House, nine-tenths were for some years
relatives and dependents of the great Whig families. Nor were coarser
means of controlling Parliament neglected. The wealth of the Whig
houses was lavishly spent in securing a monopoly of the small and
corrupt constituencies which made up a large part of the borough
representation. It was spent yet more unscrupulously in parliamentary
bribery. Corruption was older than Walpole or the Whig Ministry,
for it sprang out of the very transfer of power to the House of Commons
which had begun with the Restoration. The transfer was complete,
and the House was supreme in the State ; but while freeing itself from
the control of the Crown, it was as yet imperfectly responsible to the
people. It was only at election time that a member felt the pressure
of public opinion. The secrecy of parliamentary proceedings, which
had been needful as a safeguard against royal interference with debate,
served as a safeguard against interference on the part of constituencies.
This strange union of immense power with absolute freedom from
responsibility brought about its natural results in the bulk of members.
A vote was too valuable to be given without recompense ; and parlia-
mentary support had to be bought by places, pensions, and bribes in
hard cash. But dexterous as was their management, and compact as
was their organization, it was to nobler qualities than these that the
Whigs owed their long rule over England. They were true throughout
to the principles on which they had risen into power, and their unbroken
administration converted those principles into national habits. Before
their long rule was over. Englishmen had forgotten that it was possible
to persecute for difference of opinion, or to put down the liberty of the
press, or to tamper with the administration of justice, or to rule without
a Parliament.

That this policy was so firmly grasped and so steadily carried out was
due above all to the genius of Robert Walpole. Born in 1676, he entered

3 A 2

723

Sec. X.

Walpole
1712

1742

The Whigs

and Partia'

ment

l.ii

. Mi

I .4fl

Walpole

724

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. X.
Walpole

i7ia

1742

The

Jacobite

Revolt

The

Townshetuf
Ministty

Parliament two years before William's death as a young Norfolk land-
owner of fair fortune, with the tastes and air of the class from which he
sprang. His big square figure, his vulgar good-humoured face were
those of a common country squire. And in Walpole the squire underlay
the statesman to the last. He was ignorant of books, he " loved neither
writing nor reading," and if he had a taste for art, his real love was for
the table, the bottle, and the chase. He rode as hard as he drank.
Even in moments of political peril, the first despatch he would open
was the letter from his gamekeeper. There was the temper of the
Norfolk fox-hunter in the " doggedness " which Marlborough noted as
his characteristic, in thf» burly self-confidence which declared " If I
had not been Trime Minister I should have been Archbishop of
Canterbury," in the stubborn courage which conquered the awkward-
ness of his earlier efforts to speak, or met single-handed at the last the
bitter attacks of a host of enemies. There was the same temper in the
genial good-humour which became with him a new force in politics.
No man was ever more fiercely attacked by speakers and writers, but
he brought in no " gagging Act " for the press ; and though the lives of
most of his assailants were in his hands through their intrigues with the
Pretender, he made little use of his power over them. Where his
country breeding showed itself most, however, was in the shrewd,
narrow, honest character of his mind. Though he saw very clearly,
he could not see far, and he would not believe what he could not see.
He was thoroughly straightforward and true to his own convictions, so
far as they went. " Robin and I are two honest men," the Jacobite
Shippen owned in later years, when contrasting him with his factious
opponents : "he is for King George and I am for King James, but those
men with long cravats only desire place either under King George or
King James." He saw the value of the political results which the
Revolution had won, and he carried out his " Revolution principles "
with a rare fidelity through years of unquestioned power. But his
prosaic good sense turned sceptically away from the poetic and
passionate sides of human feeling. Appeals to the loftier or purer
motives of action he laughed at as " school-boy flights." For young
members who talked of public virtue or patriotism he had one good-
natured answer : " You will soon come off that and grow wiser."

How great a part Walpole was to play no one could as yet foresee.
Though his vigour in the cause of his party had earned him the bitter
hostihty of the Tories in the later years of Anne, and a trumped-up
charge of peculation had served in 17 12 as a pretext for expelling him
from the House and committing him to the Tower, at the accession
of George the First Walpole was far from holding the commanding
position he was soon to assume. The first Hanoverian. Ministry was
drawn wholly from the Whig party, but its leaders and Marlborough
found themselves alike set aside. The direction of affairs was en-

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

725

h the

pies"

ut his

and

purer

young

good-

jresee.
bitter

3ed-up

ig him
ession
nding

ry was

rough

as en-

trusted to the new Secretary of State, Lord Townshend ; his fellow
Secretary was General Stanhope, who was raised to the peerage. It
was as Townshend's brother-in-law, rather than from a sense of his
actual ability, that Walpole successively occupied the posts of Pay-
master of the Forces, Chancellor of the Exchequer, and P'irst Lord
of the Treasury, in the new administration. The first work of the
Ministry was to meet a desperate attempt of the Pretender to gain
the throne. There was no real prospect of success, for the active
Jacobites in England were few, and the Tories were broken ajid
dispirited by the fall of their leaders. The death of Lewis ruined
all hope of aid from France ; the hope of Swedish aid proved as
fruitless ; but in spite of Bolingbroke's counsels James Stuart resolved
to act alone. Without informing his new minister, he ordered the Earl
of Mar to give the signal for revolt in the North. In Scotland the
triumph of the Whigs meant the continuance of the House of Argyll
in power, and the rival Highland clans were as ready to fight the
Campbells under Mar as they had been ready to fight them under
Dundee or Montrose. But Mar was a leader of different stamp from
these. Six thousand Highlanders joined him at Perth, but his cowar-
dice or want of conduct kept his army idle, till Argyll had gathered
forces to meet it in an indecisive engagement at Sheriffmuir. The
Pretender, who arrived too late for the action, proved a yet more
sluggish and incapable leader than Mar : and at the close of 1715 the
advance of fresh forces drove James over-sea again and dispersed the
clans to their hills. In England the danger passed away like a dream.
The accession of the new King had been followed by some outbreaks
of riotous discontent ; but at the talk of Highland risings and French
invasions Tories and Whigs alike rallied round the throne ; while the
army went hotly for King George. The suspension of the Habeas
Corpus Act, and the arrest of their leader, Sir William Wyndham,
cowed the Jacobites ; and not a man stirred in the west when Ormond
appeared off the coast of Devon, and called on his party to rise.
Oxford alone, where the University was a hotbed of Jacobitism, showed
itself restless ; and a few of the Catholic gentry rose in Northumber-
land, under Lord Der went water and Mr. Forster. The arrival of two
thousand High !" nders who had been sent to join them by Mar spurred
them to a march into Lancashire, where the Catholic party was
strongest ; but they were soon cooped up in Preston, and driven to a
surrender. The Ministry availed itself of its triumph to gratify the
Nonconformists by a repeal of the Schism and Occasional Conformity
Acts, and to venture on a great constitutional change. Under the
Triennial Bill in William's reign the duration of a Parliament was
limited to three years. Now that the House of Commons however
was become the ruling power in the State, a change was absolutely
required to secure steadiness and fixity of political action ; and in

Sec. X.

Walpolk
1712

TO
174a

I >1

I ■. r- ' ' '

The Rising
"/ I715

The
Septennial

Pill

1 !l

726

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. X.

Walpoi-e
1712

1742

The
Whies

and
Burope

Alliance

against

Spain

1 716 this necessity coincided with the desire of the Whigs to main-
tain in power a thoroughly Whig Parliament. The duration of
Parliament was therefore extended to seven years by the Septennial
Bill. But the Jacobite rising brought about a yet more momentous
change in English policy abroad. At the moment when the landing
of James in Scotland had quickened the anxiety of King George that
France should be wholly detached from his cause, the actual state of
European politics aided to bring about a new triple alliance between
France, England, and Holland.

Since the death of Lewis the Fourteenth in 171 5 France had been
ruled by the Duke of Orleans as Regent for the young King, Lewis the
Fifteenth. The Duke stood next in the succession to the crown, if
Philip of Spain observed the renunciation of his rights which he had
made in the Treaty of Utrecht. It was well known, however, that
Philip had no notion of observing this renunciation, and the constant
dream of every Spaniard was to "ecover all that Spain had given up.
To attempt this was to defy Europe ; for Savoy had gained Sicily ;
the Emperor held the Netherlands, Naples, and the Milanese ; Holland
looked on the Barrier fortresses as vital to its own security ; while
England clung tenaciously to the American trade. But the boldness
of Cardinal Alberoni, who was now the Spanish Minister, accepted
the risk ; and while his master was intriguing against the Regent in
France, Alberoni promised aid to the Jacobite cause as a means of
preventing the interference of England with his designs. His first
attempt was to recover the Italian provinces which Philip had lost,
and armaments greater than Spain had seen for a century reduced
Sardinia in 17 17. England and France at once drew together and
entered into a compact by which France guaranteed the succes-
sion of the House of Hanover in England, and England the succession
of the House of Orleans, should Lewis the Fifteenth die without heirs ;
and the two powers were joined, though unwillingly, by Holland. When
in the summer of 17 18 a strong Spanish force landed in Sicily, and
made itself master of the island, the appearance of an English
squadron in the Straits of Messina was followed by an engagement
in which the Spanish fleet was all but destroyed. Alberoni strove
to avenge the blow by fitting out an armament which the Duke of
Ormond was to command for a revival of the Jacobite rising in
Scotland. But the ships were wrecked in the Bay of Biscay ; and
the accession of Austria with Savoy to the Triple Alliance left Spain
alone in the face of Europe. The progress of the French armies
in the north of Spain forced Phihp at last to give way. Alberoni
was dismissed ; and the Spanish forces were withdrawn from Sardinia
and Sicily. The last of these islands now passed to the Emperor,
Savoy being compensated for its loss by the acquisition of Sardinia,
from which its Duke took the title of King ; while the work of the

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

Treaty of Utrecht was completed by the Emperor's renunciation of
his claims on the crown of Spain, and Phihp's renunciation of his
claims on the Milanese and the two Sicilies.

The struggle however had shown the difficulties -which the double
position of its sovereign was to bring on England. In his own mind
George cared more for the interests of his Electorate of Hanover than
of his kingdom ; and these were now threatened by Charles XII. of
Sweden, whose anger had been roused at the cession to Hanover of
the Swedish possessions of Bremen and Verden by the King of Den-
mark, who had seized them while Charles was absent in Turkey.
The despatch of a British fleet into the Baltic to overawe Sweden
identified England with the policy of Hanover, and Charles retorted by
joining with Alberoni, and by concluding an alliance with the Czar,
Peter the Great, for a restoration of the Stuarts. Luckily for the new
dynasty his plans were brought to an end by his death at the siege of
Frederickshall ; but the policy which provoked them had already
brought about the dissolution of the Ministry. In assenting to a
treaty of alliance with Hanover against Sweden, they had yielded to
the fact that Bremen and Verden were not only of the highest import-
ance to Hanover, which was thus brought into contact with the sea,
but of hardly less value to England, as they secured the mouths of
the Elbe and the Weser, the chief inlets for British commerce into
Germany, in the hands of a friendly state. But they refused to go
further in carrying out a Hanoverian policy ; the anger of the
King was seconded by intrigues among the ministers ; and in 17 17
Townshend and Walpole had been forced to resign their posts. In
the reconstituted cabinet Lords Sunderland and Stanhope remained
supreme ; and their first aim was to secure the maintenance of
the Whig power by a constitutional change. Harley's creation of
tv/elve peers to ensure the sanction of the Lords to the Treaty of
Utrecht showed that the Crown possessed a power of swamping the
majority in the House of Peers. In 1720 therefore the Ministry intro-
duced a bill, suggested as was believed by Sunderland, which professed
to secure the liberty of the Upper House by limiting the power of the
Crow n in the creation of fresh Peers. The number of Peers was per-
manently fixed at the number then sitting in the House ; and creations
could only be made when vacancies occurred. Twenty-five hereditary
Scotch Peers were substituted for the sixteen elected Peers for Scotland.
The bill however was strenuously opposed by Walpole. It would in
fact have rendered representative government impossible. For repre-
sentative government was now coming day by day more completely to
mean government by the will of the House of Commons, carried out
by a Ministry which served as the mouthpiece of that will. But it was
only through the prerogative of the Crown, as exercized under the
advice of such a Ministry, that the Peers could be forced to bow to the

727

Sec. X.
Walfolk

i7ia

TO
174a

The
Stanbope
Ministry

. I.

1718

England

and
Hanover

1:1

The Peerage
Bill

728

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. X.

Wali'ole
1712

1742

South Sea
Bubble

WalJ>ole-s
Ministry

Walpole'B
Peace
Policy

will of the Lower House in matters where their opinion was adverse to
it ; and the proposal of Sunderland would have brought legislation and
government to a dead lock. The Peerage Bill owed its defeat to
Walpole's opposition ; and his rivals were forced to admit him, with
Townshend, into the Ministry, though they held subordinate places.
But this soon gave way to a more natural arrangement. The sudden
increase of English commerce begot at this moment the mania of
speculation. Ever since the age of Elizabeth the unknown wealth
of Spanish America had acted like a spell upon the imagination
of Englishmen ; and Harley gave countenance to a South Sea Com-
pany, which promised a reduction of the public debt as the price
of a monopoly of the Spanish trade. Spain however clung jealously
to her old prohibitions of all foreign commerce ; and the Treaty
of Utrecht only won for England the right of engaging in the negro
slave-trade, and of despatching a single ship to the coast of Spanish
America. But in spite of all this, the Company again came forward,
offering in exchange for new privileges to pay off national burdens
which amounted to nearly a million a year. It was in vain that
Walpole warned the Ministry and the country against this " dream."
Both went mad ; and in 1720 bubble Company followed bubble Com-
pany, till the inevitable reaction brought a general ruin in its train.
The crash brought Stanhope to the grave. Of his colleagues, many
were found to have received bribes from the South Sea Company
to back its frauds. Craggs, the Secretary of State, died of terror at
the investigation ; Aislabie, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, was sent
to the Tower ; and in the general wreck of his rivals Walpole mounted
again into power. In 1721 he became First Lord of the Treasury,
while Townshend returned to his post of Secretary of State. But
their relative position was now reversed. Townshend had been the
head in their earlier administration : in this Walpole was resolved, to
use his own characteristic phrase, that " the firm should be Walpole
and Townshend and not Townshend and Walpole."

If no Minister has fared worse at the hands of poets and historians,
there are few whose greatness has been more impartially recognized by
practical statesmen. The years of his power indeed are years without
parallel in our history for political stagnation. His long administration
of more than twenty years is almost without a history. All legislative and
political activity seemed to cease with his entiy into office. Year after
year passed by without a change. In the third year of his Ministry there
was but one division in the House of Commons. The Tory members
were so few that for a time they hardly cared to attend its sittings ;
and in 1722 the \ ss of Bishop Atterbury of Rochester, who was con
victed of correspondence with the Pretender, deprived of his bishopric,
and banished by Act of Parliament, deprived the Jacobites of their
only remaining leader. Walpole's one care was to maintain the quiet

which wj
But this
popular 1
I'he ener
commerc
justly an(
content tc
was to be
industries
rather tha
as Englan
quiet and
the tempe
place amc
most succe
stances," 1:
we must b(
ends." It
in his han
the skill of
But in spite
the Court ;
lutely kept j
Emperor C
he providec
his daughte
to guarante
possessions
seized the c
the Four P(
support the
to aid in wn
to a Spanis
A grant of
to a comm
Ostend, in c
of England
fears of the
an alliance
the last Pom
the Spanian
of Holland,
war. Whil^
coast, and
forcing the

CHAP.

IX.]

THE REVOLUTION.

729

irse to
•n and
"eat to
{, with
places.
Hidden
inia of
wealth
ination

1 Com-

2 price
alously
Treaty
e negro
jpanish
orward,
burdens
lin that
dream."
le Com-
ts train.
IS, many
:ompany
terror at
was sent
nounted
reasury,

But
Deen the
olved, to
Walpole

which was reconciling the country to the system of the Revolution.
But this inaction fell in with the temper of the nation at large. It was
popular with the class which commonly presses for political activity.
The energy of the trading class was absorbed in the rapid extension of
commerce and accumulation of wealth. So long as the country was
justly and temperately governed the merchant and shopkeeper were
content to leave government in the hands that held it. All they asked
was to be let alone to enjoy their new freedom, and develope their new
industries. And Walpole let them alone. Progress became material
rather than political, but the material progress of the country was such
as England had never seen before. The work of keeping England
quiet and of giving quiet to Europe, was in itself a noble one ; and it is
the temper with which he carried on this work which gives Walpole his
place among English statesmen. He was the first and he was the
most successful of our Peace Ministers. " The most pernicious circum-
stances," he said, " in which this country can be are those of war ; as
we must be losers while it lasts, and cannot be great gainers when it
ends." It was not that the honour or influence of England suffered
in his hands, for he won victories by the firmness of his policy and
the skill of his negotiations as effectual as any which are won by arms.
But in spite of the complications of foreign affairs, and the pressure from
the Court and the Opposition, it is the glory of Walpole that he reso-
lutely kept England at peace. Peace indeed was hard to maintain. The
Emperor Charles the Sixth had issued a Pragmatic Sanction, by which
he provided that his hereditary dominions should descend unbroken to
his daughter, Maria Theresa ; but no European State had yet consented
to guarantee her succession. Spain, still resolute to regain her lost
possessions, and her old monopoly of trade with her American colonies,
seized the opportunity of detaching the Emperor from the alliance of
the Four Powers, which left her isolated in Europe. She promised to
support the Pragmatic Sanction in return for a pledge from Charles
to aid in wresting Gibraltar and Minorca from England, and in securing
to a Spanish prince the succession to Parma, Piacenza, and Tuscany.
A grant of the highest trading privileges in her American dominions
to a commercial company which the Emperor had established at
Ostend, in defiance of the Treaty of Westphalia and the remonstrances
of England and Holland, revealed this secret alliance ; and there were
fears of the adhesion of Russia. The danger was met for a while by
an alliance of England, France, and Prussia ; but the withdrawal of
the last Power again gave courage to the confederates, and in 1727
the Spaniards besieged Gibraltar, while Charles threatened an invasion
of Holland. The moderation of Walpole alone averted a European
war. While sending British squadrons to the Baltic, the Spanish
coast, and America, he succeeded by diplomatic pressure in again
forcing the Emperor to inaction ; Spain was at last brought to sign

.Sec. X.

Walhoi.k
1712

1742

Fresh efforts
of Spain

I : '11

1725

1729

730

IITSTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. X.

WaI.I'OI.K

171fl

174fl

Walpole'M
Finance

Walpole
and the
Parlia-
ment

George the
Second

the Treaty of Seville, and to content herself with a promise of the
succession of a Spanish prince to the Uuchies of Parma and Tuscany;
and the discontent of Charles at this concession was allayed in 1731
by ^nving the guarantee of Enjjland to the Pragmatic Sanction.

As Walpole was the first of our Peace Ministers, so he was the first
of our Financiers. He was far indeed from discerning the powers
which later statesmen have shown to exist in a sound finance, but he
had the sense to see, what no minister had till then seen, that the
wisest course a statesman can take in presence of a great increase
in national industry and national wealth is to look quietly on and
let it alone. At the outset of his rule he declared in a speech
from the Throne that nothing would more conduce to the exten-
sion of commerce " than to make the exportation of our own
manufactures, and the importation of the commodities used in
the manufacturing of them, as practicable and easy as may be."
The first act of his financial administration was to take off the
duties from more than a hundred British exports, and nearly forty
articles of importation. In 1730 he broke in the same enlightened
spirit through the prejudice which restricted the commerce of the
colonies to the mother-country alone, by allowing Georgia and the
Carolinas to export their rice directly to any part of Europe. The result
was that the rice of America soon drove that of Italy and Egypt from
the market. His Excise Bill, defective as it was, was the first measure
in which an English Minister showed any real grasp of the principles
of taxation. The wisdom of Walpole was rewarded by a quick up-
growth of prosperity. Our exports, which were six millions in value at
the beginning of the century, had doubled by the middle of it. The
rapid developement of the Colonial trade gave England a new wealth.
In Manchester and Birmingham, whose manufactures were now becom-
ing of importance, population doubled in thirty years. Bristol, the chief
seat of the West Indian trade, rose into new prosperity. Liverpool, which
owes its creation to the new trade with the West, sprang up from a
little country town into the third port in the kingdom. With peace and
security, and the wealth that they brought with them, the value of land,
and with it the rental of every country gentleman, rose fast. But this
up-growth of wealth around him never made Walpole swerve from
a rigid economy, from the steady reduction of the debt, or the
diminution of fiscal duties. Even before the death of George the
First the public burdens were reduced by twenty millions.

The accession of George the Second in 1727 seemed to give a fatal
shock to Walpole's power ; for the new King was known to have hated
his father's Minister hardly less than he had hated his father. But
hate Walpole as he might, the King was absolutely guided by the
adroitness of his wife, Caroline of Anspach ; and Caroline had resolved
that there should be no change in the Ministry. The years which

followed )
height. I
he had gai
remained
prejudices
the land-ta
to stir. A
the House:
thought wr
proceeding
language,
at a great r
of its intro
was due t(
beer, cyder
income of
with Franc
spirits, win
increase in
amounted i.
and a half
even philosc
should be d
other hand,
over the cc
freeing the
diminished
amounted tc
this evil by
tion of the <
not of Custc
port, and do
increased th
Walpole to ]
the change i
an additiona
life and the
remain absc
principles w
free trade; 1
agitation brc
Queen's wisl
bill. **Iwil
" to enforce f
prejudice in

IX.j

THE REVOLUTION.

followed were in fact those in which Walpole's power reached its
height. He gained as great an influence over George the Second as
he had gained over his father. His hold over the House of Commons
remained unshaken. The country was tranquil and prosperous. The
prejudices of the landed gentry were met by a steady effort to reduce
the land-tax. The Church was quiet. The Jacobites were too hopeless
to stir. A few trade measures and social reforms crept quietly through
the Houses. An inquiry into the state of the gaols showed that social
thought was not utterly dead. A bill of great value enacted that all
proceedings in courts of justice should henceforth be in the English
language. Only once did Walpole break this tranquillity by an attempt
at a great measure of statesmanship. No tax had from the first moment
of its introduction been more unpopular than the Excise. Its origin
was due to Pym and the Long Parliament, who imposed duties on
beer, cyder, and perry, which at the Restoration produced an annual
income of more than six hundred thousand pounds. The war
with France brought with it the malt-tax, and additional duties on
spirits, wine, tobacco, and other articles. So great had been the
increase in the public wealth that the return from the Excise
amounted at the death of George the First to nearly two millions
and a half a year. But its unpopularity remained unabated, and
even philosophers like Locke contended that the whole public revenue
should be drawn from direct taxes upon the land. Walpole, on the
other hand, saw in the growth of indirect taxation a means of winning
over the country gentry to the new dynasty of the Revolution by
freeing the land from all burdens whatever. Smuggling and fraud
diminished the revenue by immense sums. The loss on tobacco alone
amounted to a third of the whole duty. The Excise Bill of 1733 "^et
this evil by the establishment of bonded warehouses, and by the collec-
tion of the duties from the inland dealers in the form of Excise and
not of Customs. The first measure would have made London a free
port, and doubled English trade. The second would have so largely
increased the revenue, without any loss to the consumer, as to enable
Walpole to repeal the land-tax. 1: the case of tea and coffee alone,
the change in the mode of levying the duty was estimated to bring in
an additional hundred thousand pounds a year. The necessaries of
life and the raw materials of manufacture were in Walpole's plan to
remain absolutely untaxed. The scheme was an anticipation of the
principles which have guided English finance since the triumph of
free trade ; but in 1733 Walpole stood ahead of his time. A violent
agitation broke out ; riots almost grew into revolt ; and in spite of the
Queen's wish to put d^ /n resistance by force, Walpole withdrew the
bill. "I will not be the Minister," he said with noble self-command,
" to enforce taxes at the expense of blood." What had fanned popular
prejudice into a flame during the uproar was the /iolence of the

731

Skc. X.
Walpolk

i7ia

174a

Excise Bill

The

Patriots

1 '

■ 4

:.|

73«

HISTORY OF TIIK ENGLISH PKOPLK.

[ciiAr.

Sir. X.

V.ALPoi.ri
171fi

1742

The

Spanish

War

The Faviily
Compact

so-called " Patriots." In the absence of a strong opposition and
of great impulses to enthusiasm a party breaks readily into factions ;
and the weakness of the Tories joined with the stagnation of public
afTiiirs to breed faction among the Whigs. Walpolc too was jealous
of power ; and as his jealousy drove colleague after colleague out of
office, they became leaders of a party whose sole aim was to thrust
him from his post. Greed of power indeed was the one passion which
mastered his robust common-sense. Townshend was turned out of
office in 1730, Lord Chesterfield in 1733 ; and though he started with
the ablest administration the country had known, Walpole was left
after twenty years of supremacy with but one man of ability in his
cabinet, the Chancellor, Lord Hardwicke. With the single exception
of Townshend, the colleagues whom his jealousy dismissed plunged
into an opposition more factious and unprincipled than has ever (lis-
graced English politics. The " Patriots," as they called themselves,
owned Pulteney as th^ir head ; they were reinforced by a band of
younger Whigs — the " Hoys," as Walpole named them — whose temper
revolted alike against the inaction and cynicism of his policy, and
whose spokesman was a young cornet of horse, William Pitt ; and
they rallied to these the fragment of the Tory party which still took
part in politics, and which was guided for a while by the virulent
ability of Bolingbrokc, whom Walpole had suffered to return from
exile, but to whom he had refused the restoration of his seat in the
House of Lords. But Walpole's defeat on the Excise Bill had done
little to shake his power, and Bolingbroke withdrew to France in
despair at the failure of his efforts.

Abroad the first signs of a new danger showed themselves in 1733,
when the peace of Europe was broken afresh by disputes which rose
out of a contested election to the throne of Poland. Austria and France
were alike drawn into the strife ; and in England the awakening
jealousy of French designs roused a new pressure for war. The new
King too was eager to fight, and her German sympathies inclined even
Caroline to join in the fray. But Walpole stood firm for the observance
of neutrality. " There are fifty thousand men slain this year in Europe,"
he boasted as the strife went on, " and not one Englishman." The
intervention of England and Holland succeeded in 1736 in restoring
peace ; but the country noted bitterly that peace was bought by the
triumph of both branches of the House of Bourbon. A new Bourbon
monarchy was established at the cost of the House of Austria by
the cession of the Two Sicilies to a Spanish Prince, in exchange for
his right of succession to Parma and Tuscany. On the other hand, Lor-
raine passed finally into the hands of France. The birth of children
to Lewis the Fifteenth had settled all questions of succession in
France, and no obstacle remained to hinder their family sympathies
from uniting the Bourbon Courts in a common action. As early as 1733

ix.l

THE REVOLUTTON.

733

a Family 'ompact had been secretly concluded between France and
Spain, the main object of which was the ruin of the maritime supre-
macy of Hritain. Spain bound herself to deprive England j^'radually of
its commercial privilcj^es in her American dominions, and to transfer
them to France. France in return engaged to support Spain at sea,
and to aid her in the recovery of Gibraltar. The caution with which
Walpolc held aloof from the Polish war rendered this compact in-
operative for the time ; but neither of the Uourbon courts ceased to
look forward to its future execution. No sooner was the war ended
than France strained every nerve to increase her fleet ; while Spain
steadily tightened the restrictions on British commerce with her
American colonies. The trade with Spanish America, which, illegal
as it was, had grown largely through the connivance of Spanish port-
officers during the long alliance of England and Spain in the wars
against France, had at last received a legal recognition in the Peace
of Utrecht. It was indeed left under narrow restrictions ; but these
were evaded by a vast system of smuggling which rendered what
remained of the Spanish monopoly all but valueless. The efforts of
Philip however to bring down English intercourse with his colonies
to the importation of no,, roes and the despatch of a single ship, as
stipulated by the Treaty of Utrecht, brought about collisions which
made it hard to keep the peace. The ill-humour of the trading classes
rose to madness in 1738 when a merchant captain named Jenkins told
at the bar of the House of Commons the tale of his torture by the
Spaniards, and produced an ear which, he said, they had cut off with
taunts at the English king. It was in vain that Walpole strove to do
justice to both parties, and that he battled stubbornly against the cry
for an unjust and impolitic war. The Emperor's death was now close
at hand ; and at such a juncture it was of the highest importance that
England should be free to avail herself of every means to guard the
European settlement. But his efforts were in vain. His negotiations
were foiled by the frenzy of the one country and the pride of the
other. At home his enemies assailed him with a storm of abuse.
Ballad-singers trolled out their rimes to the crowd on " the cur-dog of
Britain and spaniel of Spain." His position had been weakened by
the death of the Queen ; and it was now weakened yet more by the
open hostility of the Prince of Wales. His mastery of the House of
Commons too was no longer unquestioned. The Tories were slowly
returning to Parliament. The numbers and the violence of the
" Patriots " had grown with the open patronage of Prince Frederick.
The country was slowly turning against him. With the cry for a
commercial war the support of the trading class failed him. But it
was not till he stood utterly alone that Walpole gave way and that he
consented in 1739 to a war against Spain.
" They may ring their bells now," the great minister said bitterly, as

Skc. X.
Wai.i'oi.k

i7ia

1748

and a pain

•H

;(■

Fai. of
Walpole

734

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. X.

'W.A'-POLE

1712

i74.a

The
Austrian
Succession

1740

Resignation
of Waipolc

peals and bonfires welcomed his surrender ; " but they will soon be
wringing their hands." His foresight was at once justified. No sooner
had Admiral Vernon appeared off the coast of South America with an
English fleet, and captured Porto Bello, than France formally declared
that she would not consent to any English settlement on the main-
land of South America, and despatched two squadrons to the West
Indies. At this crisis the death of Charles the Sixth forced on the
European struggle which Walpole had dreaded. France saw her op-
portunity for finishing the work which Henry the Second had begun
of breaking up the Empire into a group of powers too weak to resist
French aggression. While the new King of Prussia, Frederick the
Second, claimed Silesia, Bavaria claimed the Austrian Duchies, which
passed with the other hereditary dominions, according to the Prag-
matic Sanction, to the Queen of Hungary, Maria Theresa. In union
therefore with Spain, which aimed at the annexation of the Milanese,
France promised her aid to Prussia and Bavar' x ; while Sweden and
Sardinia alHed themselves to France. In thj summer of 1741 two
French armies entered Germany, and the Elector of Bavaria appeared
unopposed before Vienna. Never had the House of Austria stood in
such peril. Its opponents counted on a division of its dominions.
France claimed the Netherlands, Spain the M lanese, Bavaria the
kingdom of Bohemia, Frederick the Second Silesia. Hungary and
the Duchy of Austria alone were left to Maria Theresa. Vvalpole,
though still true to her cause, advised her to purchase Frederick's aid
against France and her allies by the cession of part of Silesia ; but
the " Patriots " spurred her to refusal by promising her the aid of
England. Walpole's last hope of rescuing Austria was broken, and
Frederick was driven to ccnclude an alliance with France. But
the Queen refused to despair. She won the support of Hungary by
restoring its constitutional rights ; and British subsidies enabled her
to march at the head of a Hungarian army to the rescue of Vienna,
to overrun Bavaria, and repulse an attack of Frederick on Moravia
in the spring of 1742. On England's part, however, the war was
waged feebly and ineffectively. Admiral Vernon was beaten before
Carthagena ; and Walpole was charged with thwarting and starving
the war. He still repelled the attacks of the " Patriots " with wonderful
spirit ; but in a new Parliament his majority dropped to sixteen, and
in his own cabinet he became almost powerless. The buoyant temper
which had carried him through so many storms broke down at last. " He
who was asleep as soon as his head touched the pillow," writes his son,
" now never sleeps above an hour without waking : and he who at dinner
always forgot his own anxieties, and was more gay and thoughtless than
all the company, now sits without speaking, and with his eyes fixed for
an hour together." The end was in fact near ; and in the opening of
1742 the dwindling of his majority to three forced Walpole to resign.

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

CHAPTER X.

MODERN ENGLAND.

Section I. -William Pitt, 1742-1762.

\Authorities. — Lord Stanhope and Horace Walpole, as before. Southey's
biography, or the more elaborate life by Mr. Tyerman, gives an account of
Wesley. For Pilt himself, the Chatham correspondence, his life by Thackeray,
and Lord Macaulay's two essays on him. The Annual Register begins with
1758 ; its earlier portion has been attributed to Burke. Carlyle's " Frederick
the Great " gives a picturesque account of the Seven Years' War. For Clive,
see the biography by Sir John Malcolm, and Lord Macaulay's essay.]

The fall of Walpole revealed a change in the temper of England
which was to influence from that time to this its social and political
history. New forces, new cravings, new aims, vv^hich had been silently
gathering beneath the crust of inaction, began at last to tell on the
national life. The stir showed itself markedly in a religious revival
which dates from the later years of Walpole's mmistry. Never had
religion seemed at a lower ebb. The progress of free inquiry,
the aversion from theological strife which had been left by the Civil
Wars, the new political and material channels opened to human
energy, had produced a general indifference to all questions of religious
speculation or religious life. The Church, predominant as its influence
seemed at the close of the Revolution, had sunk into political insigni-
ficance. The bishops, who were now chosen exclusively from among
the small number of Whig ecclesiastics, were left politically po verless
by the estrangement and hatred of their clergy ; while the clergy
themselves, drawn by their secret tendencies to Jacobitism, stood
sulkily apart from any active interference with public aiiairs. The
prudence of the Whig statesmen aided to maintain this ecclesiastical
immobility. They were careful to avoid all that could rouse into life
the slumbering forces of bigotry and fanaticism. When the Dissenters
pressed for a repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, Walpole openly
avowed his dread of awaking the passions of religious hate by such a
neasure, and satisfied them by an annual act of indemnity for any
breach of these penal statutes ; while a suspension of the meetings of
Convocation deprived the clergy of their natural centre of agitation
and opposition. Nor was this political inaction compensated by any
religious activity. A large number of prelates were mere Whig parti-
zans with no higher aim than that . of promotion. The levees of the

735

; ;'!

The

Church

and the

Georges

736

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. I.

William
Pitt

174.2

1762

Indijferencc

The

Relii^ious

Revival

Ministers were crowded with lawn sleeves. A Wek!i bishop avowed
that he had seen his diocesp but once, and habitually resided at the
lakes of Westmoreland. The system ot pluralities turned the wealthier
and more learned of the priesthood into absentees, while the bulk of
them were indolent, poor, and without social consideration. A shrewd,
if prejudiced, observer brands the English clergy of the day as the
most lifeless in Europe, "the most remiss of their labours in private,
and the least severe in their lives." There was a revolt against
religion and against churches in both the extremes of English
society. In the higher circles of society "every one laughs," said
Montesquieu on his visit to England, " if one talks of religion." Of
the prominent statesmen of the time the greater part were unbelievers
in any form of Christianity, and distinguished for the grossness and
immorality of their lives. Drunkenness and foul talk were thought no
discredit to Walpole. A later prime minister, the Duke of Grafton,
was in the habii; of appearing with his mistress at the play. Purity
and fidelity to the marriage vow were sneered out of fashion ; and
Lord Chesterfield, in his letters to his son, instructs him in the art of
seduction as part of a polite education. At the other end of the social
scale lay the masses of the poor. They were ignorant and brutal to a
degree which it is hard to conceive, for the increase of population
which followed on the growth of towns and the developement of com-
merce had been met by no effort for their religious or educational
improvement. Not a new parish had been created. Schools there
were none, save the grammar schools of Edward and Elizabeth, and
some newly established " circulating schools " in Wales, for religious
education. The rural peasantry, who were fast being reduced to
pauperism by the abuse of the poor-laws, were left without much
moral or religious training of any sort. " We saw but one Bible in the
parish of Cheddar," said Hannah More at a far later time, " and that
was used to prop a flower-pot." Within the towns things were worse.
There was no effective police ; and in great outbreaks the mob of
London or Birmingham burnt houses, flung open prisons, and sacked
and pillaged at their will. The criminal class gathered boldness and
numbers in the face of ruthless laws which only testified to the terror
of society, laws which made it a capital crime to cut down a cherry
tree, and which strung up twenty young thieves of a morning in front
of Newgate ; while the introduction of gin gave a new impetus to
drunkenness. In the street?? of London at one time gin-shops invited
every passer-by to get drunk for a penny, or dead drunk for twopence.
In spite however of scenes such as this, England remained at heart
religious. In the middle class the old Puritan spirit lived on unchanged,
and it was from this cl-ass that a religious revival burst forth at the close
of Walpole's administra tion, which changed after a time the whole tone
of English society. The Church was restored to life and activity.

Religion
while it ]
reformed
laws, abc
educatioi
whose re
in ascetic
regularity
Three fig
transfer t(
and even
in the tas!
first, that;
lation whi
collieries (
broke Col
governing
when a d]
pulpits of 1
fields. TI
corners of
the dens ol
labour the
field's pres
theatrical,
by its inte
sympathy ^
enthusiast
admiration
down from
colliers, gri:
tears " mak
rough and i
and his fell
preaching s
were often i
stoned, the)
aroused was
strong men
terrupted by
phenomena
time strange
sense of a co
took forms a
Church stud(

:hai'.

owed
at the
ilthier
ulk of
irevvd,
as the
rivate,
Lgainst
English
" said
1." Of
ilievers
;ss and
ight no
}rafton,
Purity
in ; and
e art of
e social
ital to a
pulation
of com-
icational
)ls there
;th, and
eligious
luced to
[t much
•le in the
land that
e worse,
mob of
sacked
less and
e terror
a cherry
in front
ipetus to
IS invited
■opencc.
at heart
:hanged,
the close
tole tone
activity.

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

737

Religion carried to the hearts of the people a fresh spirit of moral zeal,
while it purified our literature and our manners. A new philanthropy
reformed our prisons, infused clemency and wisdom into our penal
laws, abolished the slave trade, and gave the first impulse to popular
education. The revival began in a small knot of Oxford students,
whose revolt against the religious deadness of their times showed itself
in ascetic observances, an enthusiastic devotion, and a methodical
regularity of life which gained them the nickname of " Methodists."
Three figures detached themselves from the group as soon as, on its
transfer to London in 1738, it attracted public attention by the fervour
and even extravagance of its piety ; and each found his special work
in the task to which the instinct of the new movement led it from the
first, that of carrying religion and morality to the vast masses of popu-
lation which lay concentrated in the towns, or around the mines and
collieries of Cornwall and the north. Whitefield, a servitor of Pem-
broke College, was above all the preacher of the revival. Speech was
governing English politics ; and the religious power of speech was shown
when a dread of " enthusiasm " closed against the new apostles the
pulpits of the Established Church, and forced them to preach in the
fields. Their voice was soon heard in the wildest and most barbarous
corners of the land, among the bleak moors of Northumberland, or in
the dens of London, or in the long galleries where in the pauses of his
labour the Cornish miner listens to the sobbing of the sea. White-
field's preaching was such as England had never heard before,
theatrical, extravagant, often commonplace, but hushing all criticism
by its intense reality, its earnestness of belief, its deep tremulous
sympathy with the sin and sorrow of mankind. It was no common
enthusiast who could wring gold from the close-fisted Franklin and
admiration from the fastidious Horace Walpole, or who could look
down from the top of a green knoll at Kingswood on twenty thousand
colliers, grimy from the Bristol coal-pits, and see as he preached the
tears " making white channels down their blackened cheeks." On the
rough and ignorant masses to whom they spoke the effect of Whitefield
and his fellow Methodists was mighty both for good and ill. Their
preaching stirred a passionate hatred in their opponents. Their lives
were often in danger, they were mobbed, they were ducked, they were
stoned, they were smothered with filth. But the enthusiasm they
aroused was equally passionate. Women fell down in convulsions ;
strong men were smitten suddenly to the earth ; the preacher was in-
terrupted by bursts of hysteric laughter or of hysteric sobbing. All the
phenomena of strong spiritual excitement, so familiar now, but at that
time strange and unknown, followed on their sermons ; and the terrible
sense of a conviction of sin, a new dread of hell, a new hope of heaven,
took forms at once grotesque and sublime. Charles Wesley, a Christ
Church student, came to add sweetness to this sudden and startling

3 B

Sec. I.

Willi AM
Pitt

1742

1762

The
Methodists

i-i

■M

i J

i ,

( , ■■

Whitefield

( liarles

738

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE

[chap

Sec. I.

William
Pitt

174a

i7efl

John
Wesley

1703-1791

light. He was the "sweet singer" of the movement. His hymns
expressed the fiery conviction of its converts in lines ao chaste and
beautiful that its more extravagant features disappeared. The wild
throes of hysteric enthusiasm passed into a passion for hymn-singing,
and a new musical impulse was aroused in the people which gradually
changed the face of public devotion throughout England.

But it was his elder brother, John Wesley, who embodied in himself
not this or that side of the new movement, but the movement itself.
Even at Oxford, where he resided as a fellow of Lincoln, he had been
looked upon as head of the group of Methodists, and after his return
from a quixotic mission to the Indians of Georgia he again took the
lead of the little society, which had removed in the interval to London.
In power as a preacher he stood next to Whitefield ; as a hymn-writer
he stood second to his brother Charles. But while combining in some
degree the excellences of either, he possessed qualities in which both
were utterly deficient ; an indefatigable industry, a cool judgement, a
command over others, a faculty of organization, a singular union of
patience and moderation with an imperious ambition, which marked
him as a ruler of men. He had besides a learning and skill in writing
which no other of the Methodists possessed ; he was older than any of
his colleagues at the start of the movement, and he outlived them all.
His life indeed almost covers the century, and the Methodist body had
passed through every phase of its history before he sank into the grave
at the age of eighty-eight. It would have been impossible for Wesley
to have wielded the power he c id had he not shared the follies and
extravagance as well as the enthusiasm of his disciples. Throughout
his Hfe his asceticism was that of a monk. At times hehved on bread
only, and he often slept on the bare boards. He lived in a world of
wonders and divine interpositions. It was a miracle if the rain stopped
and allowed him to set forward on a journey. It was a judgement of
Heaven if a hailstorm burst over a town which had been deaf to his
preaching. One day, he tells us, when he was tired and his horse fell
lame, " I thought — cannot God heal either man or beast by any means
or without any? — immediately my headache ceased and my horse's
lameness in the same instant." With a still more childish fanaticism
he guided his conduct, whether in ordinary events or in the great crises
of his Hfe, by drawing lots or watching the particular texts at which his
Bible opened. But with all this extravagance and superstition, Wesley's
mind was essentially practical, orderly, and conservative. No man
ever stood at the head of a great revolution ,whose temper was so anti-
revolutionary. In his earlier days the bishops Had been forced to rebuke
him for the narrowness and intolerance of his churchmanship. When
Whitefield began his sermons in the fields, Wesley "could not at first
reconcile himself to that strange way." He condemned and fought
against the admission of laymen as preachers till he found himself left

x.l

with t
the CI
a lay j
who h
dangei
broke
vagant
him to
was ne
adoptei
and his
journey
in his n
system,
joymeni
links th(
of his s
iiense di
marked
Jng up
enthusia
into clas:
worthy n
and wan
the abso]
as he liv
Wesley ;
simplicitj
without a
in it."

The gr(
sand men
and Amei
least resu
the lethar
found ref
Establish!
at last im
and most
ministers
popular
enthusiasn
healthy in
ance of th<
foulness w

r 1

[chap.

hymns
ite and
he wild
singing,
radually

t himself
int itself.
lad been
is return
took the
London,
nn-writer
g in some
[lich both
gement, a
union of
h marked
in writing
lan any of
L them all.
It body had
p the grave
■or Wesley
follies and
hroughout
d on bread
a world of
lin stopped
gement of
eaf to his
horse fell
any means
my horse's
fanaticism
great crises
t which his
n, Wesley's
No man
vas so anti-
id to rebuke
lip. When
not at first
and fought
[himself left

x.l

MODERN ENGLAND.

with none but laymen to preach. To the last he clung passionately to
the Church of England, and looked on the body he had formed as but
a lay society in full communion with it. He broke with the Moravians,
who had been the earliest friends of the new movement, when they en-
dangered its safe conduct by their contempt of religious forms. He
broke with Whitefield when the great preacher plunged into an extra-
vagant Calvinism. But the same practical temper of mind which led
him to reject what was unmeasured, and to be the last to ciu^pt what
was new, enabled him at once to grasp and organize the novelties he
adopted. He became himself the most unwearied of field preachers,
and his journal for half a century is little more than a record of fresh
journeys and fresh sermons. When once driven to employ lay helpers
in his ministry be made their work a new and attractive feature in his
system. His earlier asceticism only lingered in a dread of social en-
joyments and an aversion from the gayer and sunnier side of life which
links the Methodist movement with that of the Puritans. As the fervour
of his superstition died down into the calm of age, his cool common
iiense discouraged in his followers the enthusiastic outbursts which
marked the opening of the revival. His powers were bent to the build-
ing up of a great religious society which might give to the new
enthusiasm a lasting and practical form. The Methodists were grouped
into classes, gathered in love-feasts, purified by the expulsion of un-
worthy members, and furnished with an alternation of settled ministers
and wandering preachers ; while the whole body was placed under
the absolute government of a Conference of ministers. But so long
as he lived, the direction of the new religious society remained with
Wesley alone. " If by arbitrary power," he replied with charming
simplicity to objectors, " you mean a power which I exercise simply
without any colleagues therein, this is certainly true, but I see no hurt
in it."

The great body which he thus founded numbered a hundred thou-
sand members at his death, and now counts its members in England
and America by millions. But the Methodists themselves were the
least result of the Methodist revival. Its action upon the Church broke
the lethargy of the clergy ; and the "Evangelical" movement, which
found representatives like Newton and Cecil within the pale of the
Establishment, made the fox-hunting parson and the absentee rector
at last impossible. In Walpole's day the English clerg) were the idlest
and most lifeless in the world. In our own time no body of religious
ministers surpasses them in piety, in philanthropic energy, or in
popular regard. In the nation at large appeared a new moral
enthusiasm which, rigid and pedantic as it often seemed, was still
healthy in its social tone, and whose power was seen in the disappear-
ance of the profligacy which had disgraced the upper classes, and the
foulness which had infesced literature, ever since the Restoration. A

3 B 2

739

Sec. I.

William
Pitt

174a

i7ea

The Ne^
Philan-
thropy

'ill

;r ?/t

740

Sec. I.

William
Pitt

1748

1762

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

John
Howard

yet nobler result of the religious revival was the steady attempt, which
has never ceased from that day to this, to remedy the guilt, the ignor-
ance, the physical suffering, the social degradation of the profligate and
the poor. It was not till theWesleyan impulse had done its work that
this philanthropic impulse be^an. The Sunday Schools established
by Mr. Raikes of Gloucester at the close of the century were the
beginnings of popular education. By writings and by her own personal
example Hannah More drew the sympathy of England to the poverty
and crime of the agricultural labourer. A passionate impulse of human
sympathy with the wronged and afflicted raised hospitals, endowed
charities, built cnurches, sent missionaries to the heathen, supported
Burke in his plea for the Hindoo, and Clarkson and Wilberforce in
their crusade against the iniquity of the slave-trade. It is only the
moral chivalry of his labours that amongst a crowd of philanthropists
draws us most, perhaps, to the work and character of John Howard.
The sympathy which all were feeling for the sufferings of mankind he
felt for the sufferings of the worst and most hapless of men. With
wonderful ardour and perseverance he devoted himself to the cause of
the debtor, the felon, and the murderer. An appointment to the office
of High Sheriff of Bedfordshire in 1774 drew his attention to the state
of the prisons which were placed under his care ; and from that time
the quiet country gentleman, whose only occupation had been reading
his Bible and studying his thermometer, became the most energetic
and zealous of reformers. Before a year was over he had personally
visited almost every English gaol, and he found in nearly all of them
frightful abuses which had been noticed half a century before, but left
unredressed by Parliament. Gaolers who bought their places were
paid by fees, and suffered to extort what they could. Even when
acquitted, men were dragged back to their cells for want of funds to
discharge the sums they owed to their keepers. Debtors and felons
were huddled together in the prisons which Howard found crowded by
the cruel legislation of the day. No separation was preserved between
different sexes, no criminal discipline enforced. Every gaol was a
chaos of cruelty and the foulest immorality, from which the prisoner
could only escape by sheer starvation, or through the gaol-fever that
festered without ceasing in these haunts of wretchedness. Howard
saw everything with his own eyes, he tested every suffering by his own
experience. In one gaol he found a cell so narrow and noisome that
the poor wretch who inhabited it begged as a mercy for hanging.
Howard shut himself up in the cell and bore its darkness and foulness
till nature could bear no more. It was by work of this sort, and by the
faithful pictures of such scenes which it enabled him to give, that he
brought about their reform. The book in which he recorded his
terrible experience, and the plans which he submitted for the reforma-
tion of criTiinals made him the father, so far as England is concerned,

X.]

of pris
Englar
Germa
progres
and the
was sei
"laidq
Whil
Engiani
made n
his mini
their po
oppositi
a man ^
mainly f
Austria
hold Fr£
puppet, (
aided by
consent
terms of
to drive
fleet bloc
forced D
treaty of
French a
determin<
French ei
back fron
the impe.r
carry out
Bavaria ii
supported
men, the
from the ]
finally tun
a superior
31,000 me
the battle
army save
and the d(
but their (
the victor
Germany.
Rhine; ar

[chap.

, which
; ignor-
ateand
ark that
iblished
^ere the
)ersonal
poverty
F human
jndowed
ipported
force in
only the
thropists
Howard,
nkind he
a. With
; cause of
the office
the state
that time
n reading
energetic
jersonally

of them

|e, but left

,ces were

en when

funds to
nd felons
|owded by
between

.ol was a
le prisoner

fever that

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

741

of prison discipline. But his labours were far from being co'-^^'ned to
England. In journey after journey he visited the gaols of Holland and
Germany, till his longing to discover some means of checking the fatal
progress of the plaguo led him to examine the lazarettos of Europe
and the East. He was still engaged in this work of charity when he
was seized by a malignant fever at Cherson in Southern Russia, and
" laid quietly in the eanh," as he desired.

While the revival ci the Wesleys was stirring the very heart of
Englj»nd, its political stagnation was unbroken. The fall of Walpole
made no change in English policy, at home or abroad. The bulk of
his ministry, who had opposed him in his later years of office, resumed
their posts, simply admitting some of the more prominent members of
opposition, and giving the control of foreign affairs to Lord Carteret,
a man of great power, and skilled in continental affairs. Carteret
mainly followed the system of his predecessor. It was in the union of
Austria and Prussia that he looked for the means of destroying the
hold France had now established in Germany by the election of her
puppet, Charles of Bavaria, as Emperor ; and the pressure of England,
aided by a victory of Frederick at Chotusitz, forced Maria Theresa to
consent to Wal pole's plan of a peace with Prussia at Breslau on the
terms of the cession of Silesia. The peace enabled the Austrian army
to drive the French from Bohemia at the close of 1742 ; an English
fleet blockaded Cadiz, and another anchored in the bay 01 Naples and
forced Don Carlos by a threat of bombarding his capital to conclude a
treaty of neutrality, while English subsidies detached Sardinia from the
French alliance. Unfortunately Carteret and the Court of Vienna now
determined not only to set up the Pragmatic Sanction, but to undo the
French encroachments of 1736. Naples and Sicily were to be taken
back from their Spanish King, Elsass and Lorraine from France ; and
the imperial dignity was to be restored to the Austrian House. To
carry out these schemes an Austrian army drove the Emperor from
Bavaria in the spring of 1743 ; while George the Second, who warmly
supported Carteret's policy, put himself at the head of a force of 40,000
men, the bulk of whom were English and Hanoverians, and marched
from the Netherlands to the Main. His advance was checked and
finally turned into a retreat by the Due de Noailles, who appeared with
a superior army on the south bank of the river, and finally throwing
31,000 men across it, threatened to compel the King to surrender. In
the battle of Dettingen which followed, however, not only was the allied
army saved from destruction by the impetuosity of the French horse
and the dogged obstinacy with which the English held their ground,
but their opponents were forced to recross the Main. Small as was
the victory, it produced amazing results. The French evacuated
Germany. The English and Austrian armies appeared on the
Rhine ; and a league between England, Prussia, and the Queen of

Sec. I.

William
Pitt

174a

1762

Carteret

Englami
ami A tistria

' I ' iff

i-y

Dettingen
June 27,
1743

742

HISTORY OF THE KNGLISM PEOPLE.

tcHAP.

Sec. I.

WlI.I.lAM

Pitt
1742

1762

Fontenoy

T/te P'.iliam
Afinistiy

1745

Hungary, seemed all that was needed to secure the results already
gained.

But the prospect of peace was overthrown by the ambition of the
House of Austria. In the spring of 1744 an Austrian army marched
upon Naples, with the purpose of transferring it after its conquest fo
the Bavarian Emperor, whose hereditary dominions in Bavaria were
to pass in return to Maria Theresa. If however Frederick had with-
drawn from the war on the cession of Silesia, he was resolute to
take up arms again rather than suffer so great an aggrandisement of
the House of Austria in Germany. His sudden alliance with France
failed at first to change the course of the war ; for though he was suc-
cessful in seizing Prague and drawing the Austrian army from the
Rhine, Frederick .^as c.riven from Bohemia, while the death of thu
Emperor forced Bavaria to lay down its arms and to ally itself with
Maria Tncrciia. So high were the Queen's hopes at this moment that
she formed a secret alliance with Russia for the division of the Prus-
sian monarchy. But in 1745 the t'de turned, and the fatal results of
Carteret's weakness in assenting to the change from a war of defence
into one of attack became manifest. The French King, Lewis the Fif-
teenth, led an army into the Netherlands ; and the refusal of Holland
to act against him left their defence wholly in the hands of England.
The general an!?er at this widening of the war proved fatal to Carteret,
or, as he now became, Earl Granville. His imperious temper had
rendered him odious to his colleagues, and he was driven from office
by the Duke of Newcastle and his brother Henry Pelham. Of the
reconstituted ministry which followed Henry Pelham became the head.
His temper, as well as a consciousness of his own mediocrity, dis-
posed him to a policy of conciliation \vhich reunited the Whigs.
Chesterfield and the Whigs in opposition, with Pitt and " the Boys,"
all found ro'^m in the new administration ; and even a few Tories
found admittance. The bulk of the Whigs were true to Walpole's
policy ; and it was to pave the way to an accommodation with
Frederick and a close of ihe war that the Pelhams forced Carteret
to resign. But their attendo'i had firs, to be given to thp war in
Flanders, where Marsh."1 Saxe had established the superiority of the
French army by his defeat of the Duke of Cumberland. Advancing
to the relief of Tournay with a force of English, Hanoverians, and
Dutch— for Holland had at last l>ccn dragged into th*-- war — the Duke
on the 31st of May 1745 found the French covered Vjy a line of fortified
villages and redoubts with but a single narrow gap near the hamlet of
Fontenoy. Into this gap, however, the English troops, formed in a
dense column, doggedly thrust ihemselves in spite of a terrible fire ;
but at the moment when the day seemed won the French guns, rapidly
concentr£,ted in their fror.t, tore the column in pieces and drove it back
in a slow and orderly retreat. The blow was quickly followed up in

June by
Austr ar
Scotlanc
The y,
and as
Second,
formidal:
defeated
French t
howeverj
in a sma
three wc
the clan;
himself a
army as 1
in triump
and two 1
John Cop
a single
doubled
head of 1
people of
the utmoj
south. I
and after
through
Derby,
had risen
Jacobitisn
march as
shire, but
on as the
ar illumin
he had 1
Walpole
The long
the Govei
Tories inti
the mere J
Charles E(
thousand
own stren^
under the
that the H
the Lowlai

•■ =i .rnv

-v]

MODERN ENGLAND.

743

June by a victory of Frederick at Hohenfriedburg which drove the
Austr ans from Silesia, and by a landing of a Stuart on the coast of
Scotland at the close of July.

The war with France had at once revived the hopes of the Jacobites ;
and as early as 1744 Charles Edward, the grandson of James the
Second, was placed by the French Government at the head of a
formidable armament. But his plan of a descent on Scotland was
defeated by a storm which wrecked his fleet, and by the march of the
French troops which had sailed in it to the war in Flanders. In 1745,
however, the young adventurer again embarked with but seven friends
in a small vessel and landed on a little island of the Hebrides. For
three weeks he stood almost alone ; but on the 29th of August
the clans rallied to his standard in Glenfinnan, and Charles found
himself at the head of fifteen hundred men. His force swelled to an
army as he marched through Blair Athol on Perth, entered Edinburgh
in triumph, and proclaimed " James the Eighth " at the Town Cross :
and two thousand English troops who marched against him under Sir
John Cope were broken and cut to pieces on the 21st of September by
a single charge of the clansmen at Preston Pans. Victory at once
doubled the forces of the conqueror. The Prince was now at the
head of six thousand men ; but all were still Highlanders, for the
people of the Lowlands held aloof from his standard, and it was with
the utmost difficulty that he could induce them to follow him to the
south. His tact and energy however at last conquered every obstacle,
and after skilfully evading an army gathered at Newcastle he marched
through Lancashire, and pushed on the 4th of December as far as
Derby. But here all hope of success came to an end. Hardly a man
had risen in his support as he passed through the districts where
Jacobitism boasted of its strength. The people flocked to see his
march as if to see a show. Catholics and Tories abounded in Lanca-
shire, but only a single squire took up arms. Manchester was looked
on as the most Jacobite of English towns, but all the aid it gave was
ar illumination and two thousand pounds. From Carlisle to Derby
he had been joined by hardly two hundred men. The policy of
Walpole had in fact secured England for the House of Hanover.
The long peace, the prosperity of the country, and the clemency of
the Government, had done their work. The recent admission of
Tories into the administration had severed the Tory party finally from
the mere Jacobites. Jacobitism as a fighting force was dead, and even
Charles Edward saw that it was hopeless to conquer England with five
thousand Highlanders. He soon learned too that forces of double his
own strength were closing on either side of him, while a third army
under the King and Lord Stair covered London. Scotland itself, now
that the Highlanders were away, quietly renewed in all the districts of
the Lowlands its allegiance to the House of Hanover. jEven in the

Src. I.

WnxiAM
Pitt

174fl

1768

Charles

EdTvard

Stuart

Preston
Pans

1745

1 ■

■■i

1 ■

i
i

744

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

X.J

Sec. I.

WlI.MAM

Pitt
174a

i7ea

OiUoiien
Moor

Conquest

of the
Ht'shlauds

Peace of

Aix-la-

Chapelle

1745

1748

Highlands the Macleods rose in arms for King George, while the
Gordons refused to stir, though reused by a small French force which
landed at Montrose. To advance further south was impossible, and
Charles fell rapidly back on Glasgow ; but the reinforcements which
he found there raised his army to nine thousand men, and on the
23rd January, 1746, he boldly attacked an English army under General
Hawley which had followed his retreat and had encamped near Falkirk.
Again the wild charge of his Highlanders won victory for the Prince,
but victory was as fatal as defeat. The bulk of his forces dispersed
with their booty to the mountains, and Charles fell sullenly back to
the north before the Duke of Cumberland. On the i6th of April the
armies faced one another on Culloden Moor, a few miles eastward of
Inverness. The Highlanders still numbered six thousand men, but
they were starving and dispirited, while Cumberland's force was nearly
double that of the Prince. Torn by the Duke's guns, the clansmen
Hung themselves in their old fashion on the English front ; but they
were received with a terrible fire of musketry, and the few that broke
through the first line found themselves fronted by a second. In a few
moments all was over, and the Stuart force was a mass of hunted
fugitives. Charles himself after strange adventures escaped to France.
In England fifty of his followers were hanged ; three Scotch lords,
Lovat, Balmerino, and Kilmarnock, brought to the block ; and forty
persons of rank attainted by Act of Parliar.ifint. More extensive
measures of repression were needful in the Highlands. The feudal
tenures xvere abolished. The hercdita"y jurisdictions of the chiefs
were bought up and transferred to the Crown. The tartan, or garb of
the Highlanders, was forbidden by law. These measures, followed by a
general Act of Indemnity, proved effective for their purpose. The dread
of the clansmen passed away, and the Sheriff's writ soon ran through
the Highlands with as little resistance as in the streets of Edinburgh.

Defeat abroad and danger at home only quickened the resolve of
the Pelhams to bring the war with Prussia to an end. When England
was threatened by a Catholic Pretender, it was no time tor weakening
the chief Protestant power in Germany. On the refusal of Maria
Theresa to join in a general peace, England concluded the Convention
of Hanover with Prussia, and withdrew so far as Germany was con-
cerned from the wai\ Elsewhere however the contest lingered on.
The victories of Maria Theresa in Italy were balanced by those of
France in the Netherlands, where Marshal Saxe inflicted new defeats
on the English and Dutch at Roucoux and Lauffeld. The danger of
Holland and the financial exhaustion of France at last brought about
the conclusion of a peace at Aix-la-Chapelle, by which England sur-
rendered its gains at sea, and France its conquests on land. But the
peace was a mere pause in the struggle, during which both parties
I hoped to gain strength for a mightier contest which they saw impend-

ing. Th

or of Eui

the desti)

the Ohio

the fortu

or Englis

merchant

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the great

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coast, tha

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v/as cede(

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attempt th

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French in ]

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Mauritius,

clerks and

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CHAP.

e the
which

;, and
which
)n the
eneral
alkirk.
^rince,
persed
ack to
»ril the
^ard of
en, but
, nearly
insmen
ut they
t broke
n a few
hunted
France,
h lords,
id forty
xtensive
; feudal
; chiefs
garb of
ved by a
le dread
through

X.J

MODERN ENGLAND.

745

ing. The war was in fact widening far beyond the bounds of (Jermany
or of Europe. It was becoming a world-wide duel u hich was to settle
the destinies of mankind. Already France was claiming the valleys of
the Ohio and the Mississippi, and mooting the great question whether
the fortunes of the New World were to be moulded by Frenchmen
or Englishmen. Already too French adventurers were driving English
merchants from Madras, and building up, as they trusted, a power
which was to add India to the dominions of France.

The early intercourse of England with India gave little promise of
the great fortunes v/hich awaited it. It was not till the close of Eliza-
beth's reign, a century after Vasco da Gama had crept round the Cape
of Good Hope and founded the Portuguese settlement on the Goa
coast, that an East India Company was established in London, The
trade, profitable as it was, remained small in extent ; and the three
early factories of the Company were only gradually acquired during
the century which followed. I'he first, that of Madras, consisted of
but six fishermen's houses beneath Fort St. George ; that of Bombay
v/as ceded by the Portuguese as part of the dowry of Catharine of
Braganza ; while Fort William, with the mean village which has since
grown inlo Calcutta, owes its origin to the reign of William the Third.
Each of these forts was built simply for the protection of the Com-
pany's warehouses, and guarded by a few " sepahis," sepoys, or paid
native soldiers ; while the clerks and traders of each establishment
were under the direction of a President and a Council. One of tlicse
clerks in the middle of the eighteenth century was Robert Clive, the
son of a small proprietor near Market Drayton in Shropshire, an idle
dare-devil of a boy whom his friends had been glad to get rid of by
packing him off in the Company's service as a writer to Madras. His
early days there were days of wretchedness and despair. He was
poor and cut off from his fellows by the haughty shyness of his
temper, weary of desk-work, and haunted by home-sickness. Twice
he attempted suicide ; and it was only on the failure of his second
attempt that he flung down the pistol which baffled him with a con-
viction that he was reserved for higher things.

A change came at last in the shape of war and captivity. As soon
as the war of the Austrian Succession broke out, the superiority of the
French in power and influence tempted them to expel the English from
India. Labourdonnais, the governor of the P'rench colony of the
Mauritius, besieged Madras, razed it to the ground, and carried its
clerks and merchants prisoners to Pondicherry. Clive was among
these captives, but he escaped in disguise, and returning to the settle-
ment, threw aside his clerkship for an ensign's commission in the force
which the Company was busily raising. For the capture of Madras
had not only established the repute of the French arms, but had roused
Dupleix, the governor of Pondicherry, to conceive plans for the

Sec. I.

Wll.I.IAM

Pitt
174fl

176a

OlWe

til

Dupleix

1746

74«

HISTORY OK Till': KNGLISII IMCOl'LE.

[CHAl'.

Skc. I.

William
Pitt

1742

i7«a

Anol

.i ' ■■' I .

The
American
Colonies

creation of a French empire in India. When the English merchants
of Elizabeth's day brought their goods to Surat, all India, save the
south, had just been brought for the first time under the rule of a
single great \x ver by the Mogul Emperors of the line of Akbar. lUit
with the death of Aurungzebc, in the reign of Anne, the Mogul Empire
fell fast into decay. A line of feudal princes raised themselves to
independence in Rajpootana. The lieutenants of the Emperor founded
separate sovereignties at Lucknow and Hyderabad, in the Carnatic,
and in liengal. The plain of the Upper Indus was occupied by a race
of religious fanatics called the Sikhs. Persian and Affghan invaders
crossed the Indus, and succeeded even in sacking Delhi, the capital of
the Moguls. Clans of systematic plunderers, who were known under
the name of Mahrattas, and who were in fact the natives whom con-
quest had long held in subjection, poured down from the highlands
along the western coast, ravaged as far as Calcutta and Tanjore, and
finally set up independent states at Poonah and (iwalior. Dupleix
skilfully availed himself of the disorder around him. He offered his
aid to the En-rperor against the rebels and invaders who had reduced
his power to a shadow ; and it was in the Emperor's name that he
meddled with the quarrels of the states of Central and Southern India,
made himself virtually master of the Court of Hyderabad, and seated
a creature of his own on the throne of the Carnatic. Trichinopoly, the
one town which held out against this Nabob of the Carnatic, was all
but brought to surrender when Clive, in 175 1, came forward with a
daring scheme for its relief. With a few hundred English and sepoys
he pushed through a thunderstorm to the surprise of Arcot, the Nabob's
capital, entrenched himself in its enormous fort, and held it for fifty
days against thousands of assailants. Moved by his gallantry, the
Mahrattas, who had never believed that Englishmen would fight
before, advanced and broke up the siege ; but Clive was no sooner
freed than he showed equal vigour in the field. At the head of raw
recruits who ran away at the first sound oi a gun, and sepoys who hid
themselves as soon as the cannon opened fire, he twice attacked and
defeated the French and their Indian allies, foiled every effort of
Dupleix, and razed to the ground a pompous pillar which the French
governor had set up in honour of his earlier victories.

Clive was recalled by broken health to England, and the fortunes
of the struggle in India were left for decision to a later day. But
while France was struggling for the Empire of the East she was
striving with even more apparent success for the command of the new
world of the West. Populous as they had become, the English settle-
ments in America still lay mainly along the sea-board of the Atlantic ;
for only a few exploring parties had penetrated into the Alleghanies
before the Seven Years' Wa- and Indian tribes wandered unques-
tioned along the lakes. It was not till the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle

X.]

that the
Englisli
firmly i
country
ordered
of Ohio
1*1 ven til
The orij,
and an
Corn pan
that rive
sylvania
tribes ac
challeng<
Ontario,
despatch
colony o
Duquesn
this force
under Gi
forced to
was left ii
Canada a
cause, an(
Braddock
attack up
dock slair
French fo
tration.
plans of a
Niagara
were link
English c(
had alreac
America v
on a leagu
Frederick
only serve
Silesia. T
the Family
Chang, of
entertainec
brought
Queen of
of Saxony

CHAl'.

X.]

MODKRN KNGIANI).

747

:hants
vc the
e of A
. liul
empire
Ives to
aundecl
irn;itic,
f a rate
ivaders
Lpital of
n under
3m con-
ghlands
ore, and
Dupleix
ered his
reduced
that he
rn India,
d seated
>poly, the
, was all
Id with a
sepoys
Nabob's
for fifty
try, the
uld fight
lo sooner
ad of raw
who hid
eked and
effort of
He French

fortunes
lay. But

that the pretensions of !• "rancc drew the eyes of the colonists and of
Knglish statesmen to the interior of the Western Continent. Planted
firmly in Louisiana and Canada, France openly claimed the whole
country west of the AUe^dianies as its own, and its governors now
ordered all F.nglish settlers or merchants to be driven from the valleys
of Ohio or Mississippi which were still in the hands of Indian tribes.
Even the inactive I'elham revolted from pretensions such as these.
The original French settlers were driven from Acadia or Nova Scotia,
and an English colony founded the settlement of Halifax. An Ohio
Company was formed, and its agents made their way to the valleys of
that river and the Kentucky ; while envoys from Virginia and Penn-
sylvania drew closer the alliance between their colonics and the Indian
tribes across the mountains. Nor were the French slow to accept the
challenge. Fighting began in Acadia. A vessel of war appeared in
Ontario, and Niagara was turned into a fort. A force of 1,200 men
despatched to Eric drove the few English settlers from their little
colony on the fork of the Ohio, and founded there a fort called
Duquesne, on the site of the later Pittsburg. Tlic fort at once gave
this force command of the river valley. After a fruitless attack on it
under George Washington, a young Virginian, the col-^nists were
forced to withdraw over the moimtains, and the whole of the west
was left in the hands of France. The bulk of the Indian tribes from
Canada as far as the Mississippi attached themselves to the French
cause, and the value of their aid was shown in 175S, when General
Braddock led a force of English soldiers and American militia to an
attack upon Fort Duquesne. The force was utterly routed and Brad-
dock slain. The Marquis of Montcalm, who in 1756 commanded the
French forces in Canada, was gifted with singular powers of adminis-
tration. He carried out with even more zeal than his predecessor the
plans of annexation ; and the three forts of Duquesne on the Ohio, of
Niagara on the St. Lawrence, and of Ticonderoga on Lake Champlain,
were linked together by a chain of lesser forts, which cut off the
English colonists from all access to the west. The defeat of Braddock
had already roused England to its danger, for it was certain that war in
America would be followed by war in Europe. The ministers looked
on a league with Prussia, as the only means of checking France ; but
Frederick held cautiously aloof, while the advances of England to Prussia
only served to alienate Maria Theresa, whose one desire was to regain
Silesia. The two powers of the House of Bourbon were still bound by
the Family Compact ; and as early as 1752 Maria Theresa by a startling
change of policy drew to their alliance. The jealousy which Russia
entertained of the growth of a strong power in North Germapy
brought the Czarina Elizabeth to promise aid to the schemes of the
Queen of Hungary; and in 1755 the league of the four powers and
of Saxony was practically completed. So secret were these nego-

Skc. I.

Wll.l.lAM
TlTT

174fl

i7oa

174S

743

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. I.

William
Pitt

1742

1762

The

Seven

Yeax-s'

War

1755

1756

'William
Pitt

tiations that they remained unknown to Henry Pelham and to his
brother the Duke of Newcastle, who succeeded him on his death in
1754 as the head of the Ministry. But they were detected from the
first by the keen eye of Frederick of Prussia, who saw himself fronted
by a line of foes that stretched from Paris to St. Petersburg.

The danger to England was hardly less ; for France appeared again
on the stage with a vigour and audacity which recalled the days of
Lewis the Fourteenth. The weakness and corruption of the French
government were screened for a time by the daring and scope of its
plans, as by the ability of the agents it found to carry them out. In
England, on the contrary, all v/as vagueness and indecision. It was
not till the close of the year that a treaty was at last concluded with
the Prussian King. With this treaty between England and Frederick
began the Seven Years' War. No war has had greater results on
the history of the world or brought greater triumphs to England ;
but few have had more disastrous beginnings. Newcastle was too
weak and ignoran; to rule without aid, and yet too greedy of power
to purchase aid by sharing it with more capable men. His pre-
parations for the gigantic struggle before him may be guessed from
the fact that there were but three regiments fit for service in England
at the opening of 1756. France, on the other hand, was quick in
her attack. Port Mahon in Minorca, the key of the Mediterranean,
"/as besieged by the Duke of Richelieu and forced to capitulate.
To complete the shame of England, a fleet sent to its relief
under Admiral Byng retreated before the French. In Germany
Frederick seized Dresden at the outset of ths war and forced the
Saxon army to surrender ; and in 1757 a victory at Prague made
him master for a while of Bohemia ; but his success was transient,
and a defeat at Kolin drove him to retreat again into Saxony
In the same year the Duke of Cumberland, who had taken post
on the Weser with an army of fifty thousand men for the defence
of Hanovei, fell back before a French army to the mouth of the
Elbe, and engaged by the Convention of Closter-Seven to disband
his forces. In America things went even worse than in Germany.
The inactivity of the English generals was contrasted with the genius
and activity of Montcalm. Already masters of the Ohio by the
defeat of Braddock, the French drove the English garrison from the
forts which commanded Lake Ontario and Lake Champlain, and
theii empire stretched without a break over the vast territory from
Louisiana to the St. Lawrence. A despondency without parallel
in our history took possession of our coolest statesmen, and even the
impassive Chesterfield cried in despair, " We are no longer a nation."

13ut the nation of which Chesterfield c'espaired was really on the eve
of its greatest triumphs, and the miserable incapacity of the Duke of
Newcastle only called to the front the genius of William Pitt. Pitt

X.]

was the
Parliam
and had
The disi
his enerf
the " brc
after the
him into
When th
in Nover
the enmi
In July I
Newcastl
with his
two state
coveted, f
policy, th
nor inclin
ment was
living mc
borough,
distributic
turned di<
Walpole,
this partit
two stranj
last, of th
beginning
little more
family of
the young
had sneer
Revolutioi
aim. " I
enervate s
her." His
spirit into
his own g
soldier of
himself br;
as were hi:
temper in
" England
Prussia as
brought fo

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

749

was the grandson of a wealthy governor of Madras, who had entered
Parliament in 1735 as member for one of his father's pocket boroughs,
and had headed the younger " patriots " in their attack on Walpole.
The dismissal from the army by v/hich Walpole met his attacks turned
his energy wholly to poUtics. His fiery spirit was hushed in office during
the " broad-bottom administration" which followed Walpole's fall, but
after the death of Henvy Pelham, Newcastle's jealousy of power threw
him into an attitude of opposition and he was deprived of his place.
When the disasters of the war however drove Newcastle from oif^ce
in November 1756, Pitt became Secretary of State ; but in four months
the enmity of the King and of Newcastle's party drove him to resign.
In July 1757, however, it was necessary to recall him. The failure of
Newcastle to construct an administration forced the Duke to a junction
with his rival ; and fortunately for their country, the character of the
two statesmen made the compromise an easy one. For all that Pitt
coveted, for the general direction of public affairs, the control of foreign
policy, the administration of the war, Newcastle had neither capacity
nor inclination. On the other hand, his skill in parliamentary manage-
ment was unrivalled. If he knew little else, he knew better than any
living man the price of every member and the intrigues of every
borough. What he cared for was not the control of affairs, but the
distribution of patronage and the work of corruption, and from this Pitt
turned disdainfully away. " Mr. Pitt does everything," wrote Horace
Walpole, " and the Duke gives everything. So long as they agree in
this partition they may do what they please." Out of the union of these
two strangely-contrasted leaders, in fact, rose the greatest, as it was the
last, of the purely Whig administrations. But its real power lay from
beginning to end in Pitt himself. Poor as he was, for his income was
little more than two hundred a year, and springing as he did from a
family of no political importance, it was by sheer dint of genius that
the young cornet of horse, at whose youth and inexperience Walpole
had sneered, seized a power which the Whig houses had ever since the
Revolution kept jealously in their grasp. His ambition had no petty
aim. " I want to call England," he said as he took office, " out of that
enervate state in which twenty thousand men from France can shake
her." His call was soon answered. He at once breathed his own lofty
spirit into the country he served, as he communicated something of
his own grandeur to the men who served him. " No man," said a
soldier of the time, " ever entered Mr. Pitt's closet who did not feel
himself braver when he came out than when he went in." Ill-combined
as were his earlier expeditions, many as were his failures, he roused a
temper in the nation at large which made ultimate defeat impossible.
" England has been a long time in labour," exclaimed Frederick of
Prussia as he recognized a greatness like his own, " but she has at last
brought forth a man."

Sec. I.

William
Pitt

174a

1762

Newcastle
and Pitt

'ill

750

Til STORY OF THE ENGLTSH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. I.

Willi AM
Pitt

1742

1762

Pitt and
the Age

His public
spirit

It is this personal and solitary grandeur which strikes us most as
we look back to William Pitt. The tone of his speech and action
stands out in utter contrast with the tone of his time. In the iiidst of
a society critical, polite, indifferent, simple even to the affectation of
simplicity, witty and amusing but absolutely prosaic, cool of heart and
of head, sceptical of virtue and enthusiasm, sceptical above all of
itself, Pitt stood absolutely alone. The depth of his conviction, his
passionate love for all that he deemed lofty and true, his fiery energy,
his poetic imaginativeness, his theatrical airs and rhetoric, his haughty
self-assumption, his pompousness and extravagance, were not more
puzzling to his contemporaries than the confidence with which he
appealed to the higher sentiments of mankind, the scorn with which
he turned from a corruption which had till then been the great engine
of politics, the undoubting faith which he felt in himself, in the grandeur
of his aims, and in his power to carry them out. " I know that I can
save the country," he said to the Duke of Devonshire on his entry into
the Ministry, " and I know no other man can." The groundwork of
Pitt's character was an intense and passionate pride ; but it was a pride
which kept him from stooping to the level of the men who had so long
held England in their hands. He was the first statesman since the
Restoration who set the example of a purely public spirit. Keen as
was his love of power, no man ever refused office so often, or accepted
it with so strict a regard to the principles he professed. " I will not go
to Court," he replied to an offer which was made him, " if I may not
bring the Constitution with me." For the corruption about him he had
nothing but disdain. He left to Newcastle the buying of seats and the
purchase of members. At the outset of his career Pelham appointed
him to the most lucrative office in his administration, that of Paymaster
of the Forces ; but its profits were of an illicit kind, and poor as he was
Pitt refused to accept one farthing beyond his salary. His pride never
appeared in loftier and nobler form than in his attitude towards the
people at large. No leader had ever a wider popularity than "the
great commoner," as Pitt was styled, but his air was always that of a
man who commands popularity, not that of one who seeks it. He
never bent to flatter popular prejudice. When mobs were roaring
themselves hoarse for " Wilkes and liberty," he denounced Wilkes as
a worthless profligate ; and when all England went mad in its hatred
of the Scots, Pitt haughtily declared his esteem for a people whose
courage he had been the first to enlist on the side of loyalty. His
noble figure, the hawk-like eye which flashed from the small thin face,
his majestic voice, the fire and grandeur of his eloquence, gave him a
sway over the House of Commons far greater than any other minister
has possessed. He could silence an opponent with a look of scorn, or
hush the whole House with a single word. But he never stooped
to the arts by which men form a political party, i id at the height

of his p

member

His re

large, t

revolutio

with a hi

He was 1

mind ha(

produced

tives in t

when Pit

ment, " t(

the Hous

forced hii

towns ba<

fidence. '

London «

wealthiest

figure as 1

admirably

round hin

its honest

drawn by

aims were

full of ten(

ground foi

country hi

and perso]

virtue, till

his trium{

above all t

the faction

public !

real spell

chequered

Whig Stat

pressed its

was essen

in his ver

dress. H

are stilted

day to jest

ance whid

and his en

bringin

giU

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

of his power his personal following hardly numbered half a dozen
members.

His real strength indeed lay not in Parliament but in the people at
large. His significant title of " the great commoner " marks a political
revolution. " It is the people who have sent me here," Pitt boasted
with a haughty pride when the nobles of the Cabinet opposed his will.
He was the first to see that the long political inactivity of the public
mind had ceased, and that the progress of commerce and industry had
produced a great middle class, which no longer found its representa-
tives in the legislature. " You have taught me," said George the Second
when Pitt sought to save Byng by appealing to the sentiment of Parlia-
ment, " to look for the voice of my people in other places than within
the House of Commons." It was this unrepresented class which had
forced him into power. During his struggle with Newcastle the greater
towns backed him with the gift of their freedom and addresses of con-
fidence. " For weeks," laughs Horace Walpole, " it rained gold boxes."
London stood by him through good report and evil report, and the
wealthiest of English merchants. Alderman Beckford, was proud to
figure as his political lieutenant. The temper of Pitt indeed harmonized
admirably wi+h the temper of the commercial England which rallied
round him, with its energy, its self-confidence, its pride, its patriotism,
its honesty, its moral earnestness. The merchant and the trader were
drawn by a natural attraction to the one statesman of their time whose
aims were unselfish, whose hands were clean, whose life was pure and
full of tender affection for wife and child. But there was a far deeper
ground for their enthusiastic reverence and for the reverence which his
country has borne Pitt ever since. He loved England with an intense
and personal love. He believed in her power, her glory, her public
virtue, till England learned to believe in herself. Her triumphs were
his triumphs, her defeats his defeats. Her da,ngers lifted him high
abov(i all thought of self or party-spirit. " Be one people," he cried to
the factions who rose to bring about his fall : " forget everything but the
public ! I set you the example ! " His glowing patriotism was the
real spell by which he held England. But even the faults which
chequered his character told for him with the middle classes. The
Whig statesmen who preceded him had been men whose pride ex-
pressed itself in a marked simplicity and absence of pretence. Pitt
was essentially an actor, dramatic in the cabinet, in the House,
in his very office. He transacted business with his clerks in full
dress. His letters to his family, genuine as his love for them was,
are stilted and unnatural in tone. It was easy for the wits of his
day to jest at his affectation, his pompous gait, the dramatic appear-
ance which he made on great debates with his limbs swathed in flannel
and his crutch by his side. Early in life Walpole sneered at him for
bringing into the House of Commons " the gestures and emotions of

751

Sec:. I.

William
Pitt

174a

176a

The
Great
Com-
moner

His
fopnlarity

''I

752

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. I.

William
Pitt

174a

i7ea

Pitt's
Elo-
quence

His states-
manship

the Stage." But the classes to whom Pitt appealed were classes not
easily offended by faults of taste, and saw nothing to laugh at in the
statesman who was borne into the lobby amidst the tortures of the
gout, or carried into the House of Lords to breathe his last in a protest
against national dishonour.

Above all Pitt wielded the strength of a resistless eloquence. The
power of political speech had been revealed in the stormy debates of
the Long Parliament, but it was cramped in its utterance by the legal
and theological pedantry of the time. Pedantry was flung off by the
age of the Revolution, but in the eloquence of Somers and his rivals
we see ability ::ather than genius, knowledge, clearness of expression,
precision of thought, the lucidity of the pleader or the man of business,
rather than the passion of the orator. Of this clearness of statement
Pitt had little or none. He was no ready debater like Walpole, no
speaker of set speeches like Chesterfield. His set speeches were always
his worst, for in these his want of taste, his love of effect, his trite
quotations and extravagant metaphors came at once to the front.
That with defects like these he stood far above every orator of his time
was due above all to his profound conviction, to the earnestness and
sincerity with which he spoke. " I must sit still," he whispered once
to a friend, " for when once I am up everything that is in my mind
comes out." But the reality of his eloquence was transfigured by a
large and poetic imagination, and by a glow of passion which not only
raised him high above the men of his own day but set him in the front
rank among the orators of the world. The cool reasoning, the wit, the
common sense of his age made way for a splendid audacity, a sympathy
with popular emotion, a sustained grandeur, a lofty tehem^nce, a
command over the whole range of human feeling. He passed without
an effort from the most solemn appeal to the gayest raillery, from the
keenest sarcasm to the tenderest pathos. Every word was driven
home by the grand self-consciousness of the speaker. He spoke always
as one having authority. He was in fact the first English orator whose
words were a power, a power not over Parliament only but over the
nation at large. Parliamentary reporting was as yet unknown, and it
was only in detached phrases and half-remembered outbursts that the
voice of Pitt reached beyond the walls of St. Stephen's. But it was
especially in these sudden outbursts of inspiration, in these brief
passionate appeals, that the power of his eloquence lay. The few
broken words we have of him stir the same thrill in men of our day
which they stirred in the men of his own. But passionate as was
Pitt's eloquence, it was the eloquence of a statesman, not of a
rhetorician. Time has approved almost all his greater struggles, his
defence of the liberty of the subject against arbitrary imprisonment
under "general warrants," of the liberty of the press against Lord
Mansfield, of the rights of constituencies against the House of Com-

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

753

mons, of the constitutional rights of America against England itself.
His foreign policy was directed to the preservation of Prussia, and
Prussia has vindicated his foresight by the creation of Germany.
We have adopted his plans for the direct government of India by
the Crown, which when he proposed them were regarded as insane.
Pitt was the first to recognize the liberal character of the Church of
England. He was the first to sound the note of Parliamentary reform.
One of his earliest measures shows the generosity and originality of
his mind. He quieted Scotland by employing its Jacobites in the
service of their country, and by raising Highland regiments among
its clans. The selection of Wolfe and Amherst as generals showed
his contempt for precedent and his inborn knowledge of men.

But it was fortune rather than his genius which showered on Pitt

the triumphs which signalized thv; opening of his ministry. In the

East the daring of a merchant's clerk made a company of English

traders the sovereigns of Bengal, and opened that wondrous career of

conquest which has added the Indian peninsula, from Ceylon to

the Himalayas, to the dominion of the British crown. Recalled by

broken health to England, Clive returned at the outbreak of the

Seven Years' War to win for England a greater prize than that

which his victories had won for it in the supremacy of the Carnatic.

He had been only a few months at Madras when a crime whose

horror still lingers in English memories called him to Bengal. Bengal,

the delta of the Ganges, was the richest and most fertile of all the

provinces of India. Its rice, its sugar, its silk, and the produce of

its looms, were famous in European markets. Its viceroys, like their

fellow lieutenants, had become practically independent of the Emperor,

and had added to Bengal the provinces of Orissa and Behar, Surajah

Dowlah, the master of this vast domain, had long been jealous of

the enterprise and wealth of the English traders ; and, roused at this

moment by the instigation of the French, he appeared before Fort

WiUiam, seized its settlers, and thrust a hundred and fifty of them into

a small prison called the Black Hole of Calcutta. The heat of an

Indian summer did its work of death. The wretched prisoners trampled

each other under foot in the madness of thirst, and in the morning

only twenty-three remained alive. Clive sailed at the news with a

thousand Englishmen and two thousand sepoys io wreak vengeance

for the crime. He was no longer the boy-soldier of Arcot ; and the

tact and skill with which he met Surajah Dowlah in the negotiations

by which the Viceroy strove to avert a conllict were sulliv°d by the

Oriental falsehood and treachery to which he stooped. But hii> courage

remained unbroken. When the two armies faced each other on the

plain of Plassey the odds were so great that on the very eve of the

battle a council of war counselled retreat. Clive withdrew to a grove

hard by, and after an hour's lonely musing gave the word to fight.

3 c

Sec. 1.

WlI.MAM

Pitt
1742

i7«a

Plaasey

Black Hole
of Calcutta

754

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

•?t

X.]

Sec. I.

WiLMAM

Pitt

i7oa

Pitt and
Frederick

Rossbnch

Nov. lysy

Courage, in fact, was all that was needed. The fifty thousand foot
and fourteen thousand horse who were seen covering the plain at day-
break on the 23rd of June, 1757, were soon thrown into confusion by
the English guns, and broke in headlong rout before the English
charge. The death of Surajah Dowlah enabled the Company to place
a creature of its own on the throne of Bengal ; but his rule soon
became a nominal one. With the victory of Plassey began in fact
the Empire of England in the East.

The year of Plassey was the year of a victory hardly less important
in the West. There was little indeed in the military expeditions which
marked the opening of Pitt's ministry to justify the trust of his country ;
for money and blood were lavished on buccaneering descents upon the
French coasts which did small damage to the enemy. But incidents
such as these had little weight in the minister's general policy. His
greatness lies in the fact that he recognized the genius of Frederick
the Great, and resolved to give him an energetic support. On his
entry into office he refused io ratify the Convention of Closter-Seven,
which had reduced Frederick to despair by throwing open his realm
to a French advance ; protected his flank by gathering an English
and Hanoverian force on the Elbe, and en the counsel of the Prussian
King placed the best of his generals, the Prince of Brunswick, at its
head ; while subsidy after subsidy were poured into Frederick's ex-
hausted treasury. Pitt's trust was met by the most brilliant display of
military genius which the modern world had as yet witnessed. Two
months after his repulse at Kolin, Frederick flung himself on a French
army which had advanced into the heart of Germany, and annihilated
it in the victory of Rossbach. Before another month had passed he
hurried from the Saale to the Oder, and by a yet more signal victory
at Leuthen cleared Silesia of the Austrians. The victory of Rossbach
was destined to change the fortunes of the world by bringing about
the unity of Germany ; its immediate effect was to force the French
army on the Elbe to fall back on the Rhine. Here Ferdinand of
Brunswick, reinforced with twenty thousand English soldiers, held
them at bay during the summer, while Frederick, foiled in an attack
on Moravia, drove the Russians back on Poland in the battle of Zorn-
dorf. His defeat however by the Austrian General Daun at Hoch-
kirch proved the first of a series of terrible misfortunes ; and the year
1759 marks the lowest point of his fortunes. A fresh advance of the
Russian army forced the King to attack it at Kunersdorf in August, and
Frederick's repulse ended m the utter rout of his army. For the moment
all seemed lost, for even Berlin lay open to the conqueror. A few
days later the surrender of Dresden gave Saxony to the Austrians;!
and at the close of the year an attempt upon them at Plauen was
foiled with terrible loss. But every disaster was retrieved by thej
indomitable courage and tenacity of the King, and winter found him

as before
Daun's c
Fredericl
of Minde
descent u
a naval ai
and Brog
thousand
along the
and a bro
strong, m;
nand's arn
order, mar
on their {[
musketry,
seen," said
line of infa
of battle, ai
John Sackv
he headed
again fell 1
of an invas
sand men
Admiral H;
The sea wi
was so dan
remonstrate
"You have
replied; "n
ships were
the disgrace
It was nc
Quiberon br
wisely limite
Atlantic the
office than tl
sistance to F
prehensive p
by an order
royal officers
men, and tax
tions were sii
Ohio valley,
third under
mouth of th

CHAP.

i foot
t day-
on by
nglish
) place
e soon
in fact

portant
3 which
ountry ;
pon the
icidents
y. His
rederick
On bis
r-Seven,
is reahn
English
Prussian
ck, at its
ick's ex-
isplay of
d. Two
a French
nihilated
tassed he
il victory

ossbach
|ng about
|e French

.inand of
lers, held

in attack
of Zorn-

|at Hoch-
the year

ice of the

igust, and
moment

A few

uistrians;

auen was

:d by the!

lound him

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

as before master of Silesia and of all Saxony save the ground which
Daun's camp covered. The year which marked the lowest point of
Frederick's fortunes was the year of Pitt's greatest triumphs, the year
of Minden and Quiberon and Quebec. France aimed both at a
descent upon England and at the conquest of Hanover, and gathered
a naval armament at Brest, while fifty thousand men under Contades
and Broglie united on the Weser. Ferdinand with less than forty
thousand met them on the field of Minden. The French marched
along the Weser to the attack, with their flanks protected by that river
and a brook which ran into it, and with their cavalry, ten thousand
strong, massed in the centre. The six English regiments in Ferdi-
nand's army fronted the French horse, and, mistaking their general's
order, marched at once upon them in line, regardless of the batteries
on their flank, and rolled back charge after charge with volleys of
musketry. In an hour the French centre was utterly broken. " I have
seen," said Contades, " what I never thought to be possible — a single
line of infantry break through three lines of cavalry, ranked in order
of battle, and tumble them to ruin ! " Nothing but the refusal of Lord
John Sackville to complete the victory by a charge of the horse which
he headed saved the French from utter rout. As it was, their army
again fell back broken on Frankfort and the Rhine. The project
of an invasion of England met with like success. Eighteen thou-
sand men lay ready to embark on board the French fleet, when
Admiral Hawke came in sight of it at the mouth of Quiberon Bay.
The sea was rolling high, and the coast where the French ships lay
was so dangerous from its shoals and granite reefs that the pilot
remonstrated with the English admiral against his project of attack.
"You have done your duty in this remonstrance," Hawke coolly
replied ; " now lay me alongside the French admiral." Two English
ships were lost on the shoals, but the French fleet was ruined and
the disgrace of Byng's retreat wiped away.

It was not in the Old World only that the year of Minden and
Quiberon brought glory to the arms of England. In Europe, Pitt had
wisely limited his efforts to the support of Prussia, but across the
Atlantic the field was wholly his own, and he had no sooner entered
office than the desultory raids, which had hitherto been the only re-
sistance to French aggression, were superseded by a large and com-
prehensive plan of attack. The sympathies of the colonies were won
by an order which gave their provincial officers equal rank with the
royal officers in the field. They raised at Pitt's call twenty thousand
men, and taxed themselves heavily for their support. Three expedi-
tions were simultaneously directed against the French line — one to the
Ohio valley, one against Ticonderoga on Lake Champlain, while a
third under General Amherst and Admiral Boscawen sailed to the
mouth of the St. Lawrence. The last was brilliantly successful.

3 C 2

755

Sf.c. I.

William
Pitt

i74.a

1762

Minden
Ju^ir. I,

1759

: , m

Quiberon
Nov. 20

!■ . ;1

The

Conquest

Canada

175S

7S6

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Siic. 1.

William
Pitt

1748

1762

1759

Wolfi

Qut-lnc

Louisbur^, though defended l^y a garrison \Si rive thousand mon, was
taken with the Heet in its harbour, and the whole province of Cape
Breton reduced. The American militia supported the British troops
in a vigorous campaign against the forts ; and though Montcalm, with
a far inferior force, was able to repulse General Abercromby from
Ticonderoga, a force from Philadelphia and Virginia, guided and i,i-
spired by the courage of George Washington, made itself master of
Duquesne. The name of Pittsburg which was given to their new con-
quest still c'Miimcm n-a':es the enthusiasm of the colonists fnr the ^rcai.
Minist"?'- w ii fir* ,ren. d to thr.m the West. The next year saw the
evacuation ' ' I i«.^ jndtroga before the advance of Amherst, and the cap-
ture of Fc t : ^5 f;u Ti after the defeat of an Indian force which marched
to its relief, 'liio capi ; '^ of the three forts was the close of the French
effort to bar the advance of the colonists to the valley of the Mississippi,
and to place in other than English hiinds the destinies of North
America. But Pitt had resolved, not merely to foil the ambition of
Montcalm, but to destroy the French rule in America altogether ; and
while Amherst was breaking through the line of forts, an expedition
under General Wolfe entered the St. Lawrence and anchored below
Quebec. Wolfe had already fought at Dettingen, Fontenoy, and
Laffeidt, and had played the first part in the capture of Louisburg.
Pitt had discerned the genius and heroism which lay hidden beneath
the awkward manner and the occasional gasconade of the young soldier
of thirty-three whom he chose for the crowning exploit of the war, but
for a while his sagacity seemed to have failed. No efforts could draw
Montcalm from the long line of inaccessible cliffs which at this point
borders the river, and for six weeks Wolfe saw his men wasting away in
inactivity while he himself lay prostrate with sickness and despair, /t
last his resolution was fixed, and in a long line of boats the army
dropped down the St. Lawrence to a point at the base of the Heights
of Abraham, where a narrow path had been discovered to the summit.
Not a voice broke the silence of the night save the voice of Wolfe
himself, as he quietly repeated the stanzas of Gray's " Elegy in a
Country Churchyard," remarking as he closed, " I had rather be the
author of that poem than take Quebec." But his nature was as brave
as it was tender ; he was the first to leap on shore and to scale the
narrow path where no two men could go abreast. His men followed,
pulling themselves to the top by the help of bushes and the crags, and
at daybreak on the I2th of September the whole army stood in orderly
formation before Quebec. Montcalm hastened to attack, though his
force, composed chiefly of raw militia, was far inferior in discipline to
the English ; his onset however was met by a steady fire, and at the
first English advance his men gave way. Wolfe headed a charge
which broke the French line, but a ball pierced his breast in the
moment of victory. " They run," cried an officer who held the dying

man ir
they V '
mured,
defeat c
capture
a Frenc

\AHthc
same pur]
Lord Stai
IJ.incroft I
tailed and
two narra
Accession
(ieorge th
Bedford C
North ; tf
of C. J. I
his ««Tho
for any rea
all but CO
Ilallam's (
Century "

Never
as in the
world.
Lagos,
brought w
ask every
"for fear
in the imp
remains s
of its man
kind. W:
revival of
under the
PJassey th
Alexander
phrase, " s
Asia new n
of Wolfe o
States. B
the mother
had barred

[CHAP.

ipn, was
of Cape
,h troops
ilm, with
iby from
and i>i-
nastcr of
new con-
the :;rc.il
: saw the
d the cap-
1 marched
le French
ississippi,
of North
nbition of
ther ; and
expedition
jred below
enoy, and
Louisburg.
en beneath
lung soldier
le war, but
could draw
t this point
ng away in
espair. /t
the army
he Heights
[le summit.
;e of Wolfe
|Elegy in a
;her be the
las as brave
scale the
;n followed,
crags, and
in orderly
though his
iscipline to
L and at the
Id a charge
•east in the
Id the dying

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

man in his arms — " I protest they run." Wolfe rallied to ask who
they V nre that ran, and was told "The French." "Then," he mur-
mured, " I die happy !" The fall of Montcalm in the moment of his
defeat completed t])e victory ; and the submission of Canada, on the
capture of Montreal by Amherst in 1760, put an end to the dream of
a French en pirc in America.

fRc.tiuu II.— The Independence of America. 1761—1782.

[Authorities. — The two sides of the American quarrel have been told with the
same purpose of fairness and truthfulness, thouj^h with a very difforcnt 1)ias, liy
Lord Stanhope (" History of England from the Peace of Utrecht"), and Nfr.
Bancroft (" History of the United States"). The latter is h-' far the more de-
tailed and picturesque, the former perhaps the cooler and m . i. ariird of the
two narratives. For England see Mr. Massey's " History o Ei; • uid from the
Accession of George the Third ;" Walpole's " Memoirs o ihe ; dy Keit:;n of
George the Third;" the Rockingham Memoirs; the ^-eii ille lapers ; the
Bedford Correspondence: the correspondence of Geor^ . t'C /hird with I.ord
North ; the Letters of Junius ; and Lord Russell's ** Lix' a) I Correspondence
of C. J. Fox." Burke's speeches and pamphlets durin • lhlr> period, above all
his "Thoughts on the Causes of the Present Discont^ ," are indispensable
for any real knowledge of it. The Constitutional History of Sir Erskine May
all but compensates us, in its fulness and impartiality, for the loss of Mr.
Hallam's comments.] [Mr. Lecky's "History of England in the Eighteenth
Century" has been published since this book was written. — Eii.'\

Never had England played so great a part in the history of mankind
as in the year 1759. It was a year of triumphs in every quarter of the
world. In September came the news of Mindcn, and of a victory off
Lagos. In October came tidings of the capture of Quebec. November
brought word of the French defeat at Ouiberon. " We are forced to
ask every morning what victory there is, 'laughed Horace Wal;.ole,
"for fear of missing one." But it was not so much in the number
in the importance of its triumphs that the Seven Years' War stood aua
remains still without a rival. It is no exaggeration to say that three
of its many victories determined for ages to come the destinies of man-
kind. With that of Rossbach began the re-creation of Germany, the
revival of its political and intellectual life, the long process of its union
under the leadership of Prussia and Prussia's kings. With that of
Plassey the influence of Europe told for the first time since the days of
Alexander on the nations of the East. The world, in Burke's gorgeous
phrase, "saw one of the races of the .orth-west cast into the heart of
Asia new manners, new doctrines, new institutions." With the triumph
of Wolfe on the heights of Abraham began the history of the United
States. By removing an enemy whose dread had knit the colonists to
the mother country, and by breaking through the line with which France
had barred them from the basin of the Mississippi, Pitt laid the founda-

757

Six. II.

Tiu: Inde-
ri'-.r' :nce

OK / 'RILA

■ill

The

Seven

Years'

W^ar

758

HISTORY OF TIIK F.N(;iJSII PF.OPLK.

fciiAi'.

Src. II.

Tim Indr-

»'Kni)i:n(K
OK Amkkica

1761

1788

Pritai'n
and its
eiiipite

1764

The

American

Colonies

1664

tion of the grciit republic of tlri west. Nor were tliesc triumphs less
momentous to Uritain. The Seven Years' War is a turninjj-point in
our national history, as it is a turninj^-point in the history of the world.
Till now the relative weight of the Kuropcan states had been drawn
from their possessions within Europe itself. But from the clo'- - of the
war it mattered little whether England counted for less or more with
the nations around her. She was no longer a mere European power,
no longer a mere rival of Germany or Russia or France. Mistress of
Northern America, the future mistress of India, claiming as her own
the empire of the seas, Britain suddenly towered high above the nations
whose position in a single continent doomed them to comparative in-
significance in the after history of the world. The war indeed was hardly
ended when a consciousness of the destinies that lay before the English
people showed itself in the restlessness with which our seamen pene-
trated into far-oflf seas. The Atlantic was dwindling into a mere strait
within the British Empire ; but beyond it to the westward lay a reach
of waters where the British flag was almost unknown. In the year
which followed the Peace of Paris two English ships were sent on
a j.Tuise of discovery to the Straits of Magellan ; three years later
Captain Wallis reached the coral reefs of Tahiti ; and in 1768 Captain
Cook traversed the Pacific from end to end, and wherever he touched,
in New Zealand, in Australia, he claimed the soil for the English
Crown, and opened a new world for the expansion of the English
race. Statesmen and people alike felt the change in their country's
attitude. In the words of Burke, the Parliament of Britain claimed
" an imperial character in which as from the throne of heaven she
superintends all the several inferior legislatures, and guides and con-
trols them all, without annihilating any." Its people, steeped in the
commercial ideas of the time, saw in the growth of their vast posses-
sions, the monopoly of whose trade was reserved to the mother country,
a source of boundless wealth. The trade with America alone was in
1772 nearly equal to what England r.arried on with the whole world at
the beginning of the century. To guard and preserve so /ast and
lucrative a dominion became from this moment not only the aim of
British statesmen but the resolve of the British people.

From the time when the Puritan emigration added the four New
England States, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Connecticut, and
Rhode Island to those of Maryland and Virginia the progress of the
English colonies in North America had been slow, but it had never
ceased. Settlers still came, though in smaller numbers, and two new-
colonies south of Virginia received from Charles the Second their name
of the Carolinas. The war with Holland transferred to British rule a
district claimed by the V .itch from the Hudson to the inner Lakes ; and
this country, which was granted by Charles to his brother, received
from him the name of New York. Portions were soon broken off from

X.]

MODKRN KNGLANI).

759

its vast territory t > form the colonics of New Jersey and 1 )cla\v;irc. I n
1682 a train of Quakers followed William I'cnn across the Delaware
into the heart of the ])rima^val forest, and became a colony vvhi( h
recalled its founder and the woodlands amonjj which he planted it in
its name of Pennsylvania. A long interval elapsed before a new settle-
ment, which received its title of (ieorgia from the reigning sovereign,
George the Second, was established by (iencral Oglethorpe on the
Savannah as a refuge for English debtors and for the persecuted Pro-
testants of Germany. Slow as this progress seemed, the colonies were
really growing fast in numbers and in wealth. Their whole population
amounted in the middle of the eighteenth century to about i,2ck),ooo
\vhites and a quarter of a million of negroes ; nearly a fourth of that of
the mother country. The wealth of the colonists was growing even
faster than their numbers. As yet the southern colonies were the more
productive. Virginia boasted of its tobacco plantations, Georgia and
the Carolinas of their maize and rice and indigo crops, while New York
and Pennsylvania, with the colonies of New England, were restricted
to their whale and cod fisheries, their corn harvests and their timber
trade. The distinction indeed between the Northern and Southern
colonies was more than an industrial one. In the Southern States the
prevalence of slavery produced an aristocratic spirit and favoured the
creation of large estates ; even the system of entails had been intro-
duced among the wealthy planters of Virginia, where many of the
older English families found representatives in houses such as those
of Fairfax and Washington. Throughout New England, on the other
hand, the characteristics of the Puritans, their piety, their intolerance,
their simplicity of life, their love of equality and tendency to democratic
institutions, remained unchanged. In education and political activity
New England stood far ahead of its fellow colonies, for the settlement
of the Puritans had been followed at once by the establishment of a
system of local schools which is still the glory of America. " Every
township," it was enacted, " after the Lord hath increased them to the
number of fifty householders, shall appoint one to teach all children to
write and read ; and when any town shall increase to the number of
a hundred families, they shall set up a grammar school."

Great however as these differences were, and great as was to be
their influence on American history, they were little felt as yet. In
the main features of their outer org ^on the whole of the colonies

stood fairly at one. In religious and in civil matters alike all of them
contrasted sharply with the England at home. Religious tolerance had
been brought about by a medley of religious faiths such as the world
had never seen before. New England was still a Puritan stronghold.
In all the Southern colonies the Episcopal Church was established by
law, and the bulk of the settlers clung to it ; but Roman Catholics formed
a large part of the population of Maryland. Pennsylvania was a State

Sk. II.

'I'lIK InUK-
IKNDKNCK

oi' Amkkica
1761

178a

Their
progress

ZSngrland

and the

Colonies

76o

HISTORY OF THK FNflMSII PFOrLK.

[CIIAP,

Skc. If.
Thk Indk-

I'KNUKNll',

OK Amkhica
1761

17 SB

English
tontrol

of Quakers. Presbyterians and Haptists had fled from tests and per-
secutions to colonize New Jersey. Lutherans and Moravians from
Germany abounded amon^ the settlers of Carolina and (Ieorj[,Ma. In
such a chaos of creeds religious persecution became impossible. There
was the same outer diversity and the same real unity in the political
tendency and organization of the States. Whether the spirit of the
colony was democratic, moderate, n oligarchical, its form of govern-
ment was pretty much the same. The original rights of the proprietor,
the projector and grantee of the earliest settlement, had in all cases,
save in those of Pennsylvania and Maryland, either ceased to exist or
fallen into desuetude. The government of each colony lay in a Houso
of Assembly elected by the people at large, with a Council sometimes
elected, sometimes nominated by the Governor, and a Governor either
elected, or appointed by the Crown. With the appointment of these
Governors all administrative interference on the part of the Govern-
ment at home practically ended. The colonies were left by a happy
neglect to themselves. It was wittily said at a later day that " Mr.
Grenville lost America because he read the American despatches, which
none of his predecessors ever did." There was little room indeed for
any interference within the limits of the colonies. Their privileges
were secured by royal charters. Their Assemblies alone exercised the
right of internal taxation, and they exercised it sparingly. Walpole,
like Pitt afterwards, set roughly aside the project for an American
excise. ** I have Old England set against me," he said, " by this
measure, and do you think I will have New England too?" Even in
matters of trade the supremacy of the mother country was far from
being a galling one. There were some small import duties, but they
were evaded by a well-understood system of smuggling. The re-
striction of trade with the colonies to Great Britain was more than
compensated by the commercial privileges which the Americans en-
joyed as British subjects. As yet, therefore, there was nothing to
break the good will which the colonists felt towards the mother
country, while the danger of French aggression drew them closely to
it. But strong as the attachment of the Americans to Britain seemed
at the close of the war, keen lookers-on saw in the very com-
pleteness of Pitt's triumph a danger to their future union. The
presence of the French in Canada, their designs in the west, had
thrown America for protection on the mother-country. But with the
conquest of Canada all need of this protection was removed. The
attitude of England towards its distant dependency became one of
mere possession : and differences of temper, which had till now been
thrown into the background by the higher need for union, started
into a new prominence. If questions of trade and taxation awoke
murmurings and disputes, behind these grievances lay an uneasy
dread at the democratic form which the government and society

of the c
prevailc(
To chc
strengthi
the youn
father in
House ol
in Englij
in playin
governmi
into disal
revolt an
tlie brink
very gren
George w
any Eng
wretchedl
Nor had
which soi
the contra
and hate,
might put
"this trur
monumen
sonally."
purpose ai
rule. " C
repeated 1
always " a
work whic
on the sub
as no real
that autho]
this usurps
govern, no
from the d
Minister o
with the P
its final foi
solved to c
the circum:
the defeat c
finally awa
and the sqi
in the acce

CHAP.

.1 per-
froin

1. In

There

)litic:il

of the

ovcrn-

nietor,
cases,

ixist or

House

ictimcs

r cither

if these

iovcrn-
happy

t " Mr.

;, which

Iced for

ivileges

ised the

^alpole,

merican

Iby this

pven in
ar from

3ut they
he re-

ire than

:ans en-
ling to
mother
osely to
seemed
y com-
The
est, had
with the
The
one of
ow been
started
awoke
uneasy
society

x.l

MODKKN FNCI.ANI).

761

of the colonics had taken, and at the " levelling principles " which
prevailed.

To check this republican spirit, to crush all dreams of severance,and to
strengthen the unity of the British Kmpirc was one of the chief aims of
the young sovereign who mounted the throne on the death of his grand-
father in 1760. For the first and last time since the accession of the
House of Hanover Kngland saw a King who was resolved to play a part
in English politics ; and the part which (ieorge the Third succeeded
in playing was undoubtedly a memorable one. In ten years he reduced
government to a shadow, and turned the loyalty of his subjects at home
into disaffection. In twenty he had forced the American colonies into
revolt and independence, and brought Kngland to what then seemed
the brink of ruin. Work such as this has sometimes been done by
very great men, and often by very wicked and profligate men ; but
George was neither profligate nor great. He had a smaller mind than
any English king befoie him save James the Second. He was
wretchedly educated, and his natural powers were of the meanest sort.
Nor had he the capacity for using greater minds than his own by
which some sovereigns have concealed their natural littleness. On
the contrary, his only feeling towards great men was one of jealousy
and hate. He longed for the time when ** decrepitude or death"
might put an end to Pitt ; and even when death had freed him from
''this trumpet of sedition," he denounced the proposal for a public
monument to the great statesman as " an offensive measure to me per-
sonally." But dull and petty as his temper was, he was clear as to his
purpose and obstinate in the pursuit of it. And his purpose was to
rule. " George," his mother, the Princess of Wales, had continually
repeated to him in youth, " George, be king." He called himself
always " a Whig of the Revolution," and he had no wish to undo the
work which he believed the Revolution to have done. But he looked
on the subjection of his two predecessors to the will of their ministers
as no real part of the work of the Revolution, but as a usurpation oi
that authority which the Revolution had left to the crown. And to
this usurpation he was determined not to submit. His resolve was to
govern, not to govern against law, but simply to govern, to be freed
from the dictation of parties and ministers, and to be in effect the first
Minister of the State. How utterly incompatible such a dream was
with the Parliamentary constitution of the country as it had received
its final form from Sunderland it is easy to see ; but Geor^^^e was re-
solved to carry out his dream. And in carrying it out ht wiis aided by
the circumstances of the time. The spell of Jacobitism '>.as broken by
the defeat of Charles Edward, and the later degradation )f hib life wore
finally away the thin coating of disloyalt;'^ which clung to the clergy
and the squires. They were ready again to take part in politics, and
in the accession of a king who, unlike his two predecessors, was no

Sue. II.

I'HNDKNt K
(»K AmKKU'A

1761

1780

Oeorce

the
Third

Return oj
the Torres

-^\^-a

762

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.

The Indk-

penuence

OK America

1761

178&

Uf.

The King's
Friends

Pitt

revigms

stranger >ut an Englishman, who had been born in England and spoke
English, they found the opportunity they desired. From the opening
of the ^eign Tories gradually appeared again at court. It was only
slowly indeed that the party as a whole swung round to a steady
support of the Government , but their action tcld at once on the
complexion of English politics. Their withdrawal from public affairs
had left them untouched by the progress of political ideas since the
Revolution of i6S8, and when they returned to political life it was
to invest the new sovereign with all the reverence which they had
bestowed on the Stuarts. A "King's party" was thus ready made
to his hand ; but George was able to strengthen it by a vigorous
exertion of the power and influence which was still left to the Crown.
All promotion in the Church, all advancement in the army, a great
number of places in the civil administration and about the court,
were stili at the King's disposal. If this vast mass of patronage
had been practically usurped by the ministers of his predecessors,
it was resumed and firmly held by George the Third ; and the cha-
racter of the House of Commons made patronage, as we have seen,
a powerful engine in its management. George had one of Walpole's
weapons in his hands, and he used it with unscrupulous energy to
break up the party which Walpole had held so long together. He
saw that the Whigs were divided among themselves by the factious
spirit which springs from a long hold of office, and that they were
'Vf" kened by the riiing contempt with which the country at large re-
garded the selfishness and corruption of its represeiitatives. More than
thirty years before, Gay had set the leading statesmen of the day on
the public st^ge under the guise of highwaymen and pickpockets. " It
is difficult to determine," said the witty playwright, "whether the fine
gentlemen imiiate the gentlemen of the road, or the gentlemen of the
road the fine gentlemen." And now that the " fine gentlemen " were
represented by hoary jobbers such as Newcastle, the public contempt
was llercei than ever, and men turned sickened from the intrigues
and corruption of party to a young sovereign who aired himself in a
character which Bolingbroke had invented, as a Patriot King.

Had Pitt and Newcastle held together, supported as the one was by
the commercial classes, the other by the Whig families and the whole
machinery of Parliamentary management, George must have strugp^led
in vain. But the ministry was already disunited. The Whigs, atta jhed
to peace by the traditions of Walpole, disn.yed at the enormous ex-
penditure, and haughty with the pride of a ruling oligarchy, were in
silent revolt against the war and the supremacy of the Great Com-
moner. It was against their will "ihat he rejected proposals of peace
from France which wo aid have secured to England all her conquests
on the terms of a desertion of Prussia, and that his steady support
enabled Frederick still to hold out against the terrible exhaustion of

r i

N.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

763

an unequal struggle. The campaign of 1760 indeed was one of the
grandest efforts of Frederick's genius. Foiled in an attempt on
Dresden, he again saved Silesia by a victory at Liegnitz, and hurled
back an advance of Daun by a victory at Torgau ; while Ferdinand
of Brunswick held his ground as of old along the Weser. But even
victories drained Frederick's strength. Men and money alike failed
him. It was impossible for him to strike another great blow, and
the ring of enemies again closed slowly round him. His one remaining
hope lay in the firm support of Pitt, and triumphant as his policy
had been, Pitt was tottering to his fall. The envy and resentment
of his colleagues at his undisguised supremacy found a supporter
in the young King. The Earl of Bute, a mere Court favourite,
with the temper and abilities of a gentleman usher, was forced into
the Cabinet. As he was known to be his master's mouthpiece, a
peace-party was at once formed ; but Pitt showed no signs of giving
way. In 1761 he proposed a vast extension of the war. He had
learnt the signature of a treaty which brought into force the Family
Compact between the Courts of Paris and Madrid, and of a special
convention wh'ch bound the last to declare war on England at the
close of the year. Pitt proposed to anticipate the blow by an instant
seizure of the treasure fleet which was on its way from the Indies to
Cadiz, by occupying the Isthmus of Panama, and by an attack on
the Spanish dominions in the New World, But his colleagues shrank
from plans so vast and daring ; and Newcastle was backed in his
resistance by the bulk of the Whigs. The King openly supported
them. It was in vain that Pitt enforced his threat of resignation by
declaring himself responsible to " the people " ; and the resignation
of his post in October changed the face of European affairs.

" Pitt disgraced ! " wrote a French philosopher, " it is worth two
victories to us ! " Frederick on the other hand was almost driven to
despair. But George saw in the removal of his powerful minister an
opening for the realization of his long-cherished plans. Pitt's appeal
had been heard by the people at large. When he went to Guildhall the
Londoners hung on his c;irriage wheels, hugged his footmen, and even
kissed his horses. Their break with Pitt was in fact the death-blow
of the Whigs. Newcastle found he had freed himself from the great
statesman only to be driven from office by a series of studied mortifica-
tions from his young master ; and the more powerful of his Whig
colleagues followed him into retirement. George saw hiniself trium-
phant over the two great forces which had hampered the free action
of the Crown, " the power which arose," in Burke's words, " from
popularity, and the power which arose from political connexion ; "
and the rise of Lord Buce to the post of First Minister marked the
triumph of the Kmg. He took office simply as an agent of the King's
will ; and the King's will was to end the war. In the spring of 1762

Sec. II.

The Indj:-

i'endence
OK America

1761

178a

of the

Seven

Years'

War

■;rf
ii'

Bute's
Ministry

, i

764

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sf.c. II.

The Inue-

hendence

OF America

1761

1782

Bl ^ Pence of
Paris

\\ Feb. 1763

The
House of
Commons

Frederick, who still held his ground stubbornly against fate, was
brought to the brink of ruin by a withdrawal of the English subsidies ;
it was in fact only his dogged resolution and a sudden change in the
policy of Russia, which followed on the death of his enemy the Czarina
I'^lizabeth, that enabled him at last to retire from the struggle in the
Treaty of Hubertsberg without the loss of an inch of territory. George
and Lord Bute had already purchased peace at a very different price.
With a shameless indifference to the national honour they not only
deserted Frederick, but they offered to negotiate a peace for him on
the basis of a cession of Silesia to Maria Theresa and East Prussia to
the Czarina. The issue of the strife with Spain saved England from
humiliation such as this. Pitt's policy of instant attack had been
justified by a Spanish declaration of war three weeks after his fall ;
and the year 1762 saw triumphs which vindicated his confidence in
the issue of the new struggle. Martinico, the strongest and wealthiest
of the French West Indian possessions, was conquered at the opening
of the year, and its conquest was followed by those of Grenada, St,
Lucia, and St. Vincent. In the summer the reduction of Havana
brought with it the gain of the rich Spanish colony of Cuba. The
Philippines, the wealthiest of the Spanish colonies in the Pacific,
yielded to a British fleet. It was these losses that brought about the
Peace of Paris. So eager was Bute to end the war that he contented
himself in Europe with the recovery of Minorca, while he restored
Martinico to France, and Cuba and the Philippines to Spain. The
real gains of Britain were in India and America. In the first the
French abandoned all right to any military settlement. From the
s'^cond they wholly withdrew. To England they gave up Canada,
Nova Scotia, and Louisiana as far as the Mississippi, while they
resigned the rest of that province to Spain, in compensation for its
surrender of Florida to the British Crown.

The anxiety which the young King showed for peace abroad sprang
mainly from his belief that peace was needful for success in the struggle
for power at home. So long as the war lasted Pitt's return to office
and the union of the Whigs under his guidance was an hourly danger.
But with peace the King's hands were free. He could count on the
dissensions of the Whigs, on the new-born loyalty of the Tories, on the
influence of the Crown patronage which he had taken into his own
hands. But what he counted on most of all vvas the character of the
House of Commons. At a time when it had become all-powerful in the
State, the House of Commons had ceased in any real and effective sense
to be a representative body at all. That changes in the distribution of
seats were called for by the natural shiftings of population and wealth
since the days of Edward the First had been recognized as early as the
Civil Wars ; but the reforms of the Long Parliament were cancelled at
the Restoration. From the time of Charles the Second to that of George

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

765

the Third not a single effort had been made to meet the growing abuses
of our parliamentary system. Great towns like Manchester or Birming-
ham remained without a member, while members still sat for boroughs
which, like Old Sarum, had actually vanished from the face of the
earth. The effort of the Tudor soveieigns to establish a Court party
in the House by a profuse creation of boroughs, most of which were
mere villages then in the hands of the Crown, had ended in the
appropriation of these seats by the neighbouring landowners, who
bought and sold them as they bought and sold their own estates. Even
in towns which had a real claim to representation, the narrowing of
municipal privileges ever since the fourteenth century to a small part
of the inhabitants, and in many cases the restriction of electoral rij^^hts
to the members of the governing corporation, rendered their represent-
ation a mere name. The choice of such places hung simply on the
purse or influence of poHticians. Some were " the King's boroughs,"
others obediently returned nominees of the Ministry of the day, others
were "close boroughs" in the hands of jobbers like the Duke of New-
castle, who at one time returned a third of all the borough members
in the House. The counties and the jreat commercial towns could
alone be said to exercise any real right of suffrage, though the enormous
expense of contesting such constituencies practically left their represen-
tation in the hands of the great local families. But even in the counties
the suffrage was ridiculously limited and unequal. Out of a population
of eight millions, only a hundred and sixty thousand were electors at all.
How far such a House was from really representing English opinion
we see from the fact that in the height of his popularity Pitt could
hardly find a seat in it. Purchase was becoming more and more the
means of entering Parliament. Seats were bought and sold in the
open market at a price which rose to four thousand pounds, and
we can hardly wonder that a reformer could allege without a chance
of denial, " This House is not a representative of the people of
Great Britain. It is the representative of nominal boroughs, of ruined
and exterminated towns, of noble families, of wealthy individuals,
of foreign potentates." The meanest motives naturally told on a
body returned by such constituencies, cut off from the influence
of public opinion by the secrecy of Parliamentary proceedings, and
yet invested with almost boundless authority. Walpole and New-
castle had made bribery and borough-jobbing the base of their power.
George the Third seized it in his turn as if'base of the power he
proposed to give to the Crown, The royal revenue was employed
to buy seats and to buy votes. Day by d;iy George himself scruti-
nized the voting-list of the two Houses, and distributed rewards and
punishments as members voted according to his will or no. Promo-
tion in the civil service, preferment in the Church, rank in the army,
was reserved fo; "the King's friends." Pensions and court places were

Sec. II.

The Inde-
pendence
OK America

1761

1782

dcorffe and
the Parlia-
ment

766

HISTORV OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.

The Inde-
pendence
OK America

1761

1782

Fall of
Bute

Lreorge
Grenville

used to influence debates. Bribery was employed on a scale never
known before. Under Bute's ministry an office was opened at the
Treasury for the purchase of members, and twenty-five thousand pounds
are said to have b ^en spent in a single day.

The result of these m.easures was soon seen in the tone of the Par-
liament. Till now it had bowed beneath the greatness of Pitt ; but in
the teeth of his denunciation the provisions of the Peace of Paris were
approved by a majority of five to one. " Now indeed," ciied the
Princess Dowager, "my son is king." But the victory was hardly won
when King and minister found themselves battling with a storm of
popular ill-will such as never since the overthrow of the Stuarts assailed
.He throne. Violent and reckless as it was, the storm only marked a
fresh advance in the re-awakening of public opinion. The Parliament
indeed had become supreme, and in theory the Parliament was a re-
presentative of the whole Engli«ih people. But in actual fact the bulk
of the English people 'ound itself powerless to control the course of
English government. For the first and last time in our history Parlia-
ment was vpopular and its opponents sure of popularity. The House
of Commons was more corrupt than ever, and it was the slave of
the King. The King still called himself a Whig, yet he was reviving
a system of absolutism which Whiggism had long made impossible.
His minister was a mere favourite, and in Englishmen's eyes a foreigner.
The masses saw this, but they saw no way of mending it. They had
no means of influencing the Government they hated save by sheer
violence. They came therefore to the front with their old national
and religious bigotry, their long-nursed dislike of the Hanoverian
Court, their long-nursed habits of violence and faction, their long-
nursed hatred of Parliament, but with r .) means of exfiressing them
save riot and uproar. Bute found himself the object of a sudden and
universal hatred ; and in 1763 he withdrew from office as a means of
allayiiig the storm of popular indignation. But the King was made
of more stubborn F.tuff than his minister. If he suffered his favourite
to resign he still regarded him as the real head of administration ;
for the ministry which Bute left behind him consisted simply of the
more courtly of his colleagues. George Grenville was its nominal
chief, but its measures were still secretly dictated by the favourite.
Charles Townshend and the Duke of Bedford, the two ablest of the
Whigs who had remained with Bute after lewcastle's dismissal, re-
fuses to join it ; and its one man of ability was Lord Shelburne, a
young Irishman. Tt was in fact only the disunion of its opponents
whicV" allowed it '.o hold its ground. Townshend and Bedford re-
mained apart from the main body of the Whigs, and both sections
held aloof fron Pitt. C-eorge had counted on the divisions of the
opioiHii.T; in forming such a ministry ; and he counted on the weak-
u'Ji'i of the ministry to mxke it the creature of his will. But Grenville

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

767

had no mind to be a puppet either of the King or of Bute ; and
the conflicts between the King and his minister soon became so bitter
that George appealed in despair to Pitt to form a ministry. Never had
Pitt shown a nobler patriotism or a grander self command than in the
reception he gave to this appeal. He set aside all resentment at his
own expulsion from office by Newcastle and the Whigs, and made the
return to office of the whole party, with the exception of Bedford, a
condition of his own. George however refused to comply with terms
which would have defeated his designs. The result left Grenville as
powerful as he had been weak. Bvite ceased to exercise any political
influence. On the other hand, Bedford joined Grenville with his
whole party, and the ministry thus became strong and compact.

Grenville's one aim was to enforce the supremacy of Parliament over
subject as over King. He therefore struck fiercely at the new force of
opinion which had just shown its pcwer in the fail of Bute. The
opinion of the country no sooner 5ound itself unrepresented in Parlia-
ment than it sought an outlet in the Press. In spite of the removal of
the censorship after the Revolution tw^- Press had been slow to attain
any political influence. Under the first two Georges its progress had
been hindered by the absence of great topic: for discussion, the worth-
lessness of the writers, and above all the letha/gy of the time. It was
in fact not till ^he accession of George the Third that ^he impulse which
Pitt had giten to the national spirit, and the rise of a keener interest in
politics, raised the Preis into a political power. The nation found in
it A court of appeal from the Houses oi" Parliament. The journals
became organs for that outburst of popi'lar hatred which drove Lord
Bute from office ; and in the North Briton John Wilkes led the way
by denouncing the Cabinet and the Peace with p uhar bitterness,
and venturing to attack the hated minister by nam Wilkes was a
worthless profligate, but he had a remarkable f: .Ity of enlisting
popular sympathy on his side, and by a singular my of fortune he
became the chief instrument in bringing about three of the greatest
advances which our Constitution has ever made. e woke the nation
to a conviction of the need for Parliamentary r - ;m by his defence
of the rights of constituencies against the desj. -m of the House of
Commons. He took the lead in the struggle winch put an end to the
secrecy of Parliamentary proceedings. He was the first to establish
the right of the Press to discuss public affairs. ' \ his attack on the
ministry of Lord Bute, however, he was simply an organ of the general
discontent. It was indeed his attack which more than all else deter-
mined Bute to withdraw from office. But Grer, ;'le was of stouter
stuff than the court favourite, and his administrai,on was hardly re-
formed when he struck at the growing opposition to Parliament by a
blow at its leader. In " Number 45 " of the North Briton Wilkes had
censured the speech from the throne at the opening of Parliament, and

Sec. II.

The Inue-

j'endence

OK America

1761

1782

Aug. 1763

Quarrel

with the

Press

John Wilkei

768

Sec. II.

The Inde-
pendence
OK Amekica

1761

1782

IViUrs
expelled

The

Stamp

Act

Bute and
America.

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE

[chap.

a " general warrant " by the Secretary of State was issued against the
" authors, printers, and pubUshers of this seditious libel." Under this
warrant forty-nine persons were seized for a time ; and in spite of his
privilege as a member of Parliament Wilkes himself was sent to the
Tower. The arrest however was so utterly illegal that he was at once
released by the Court of Common Pleas ; lout he was immediately pro-
secuted for libel. While the paper which formed the subject for
prosecution was still before the courts of justice it was condemned by
the House of Commons as a " false, scandalous, and seditious libel."
The House of Lords at the same time voted a pamphlet found among
Wilkes's papers to be blasphemous, and advised a prosecution. Wilkes
fled to France, and was in 1 764 expelled from the House of Commons.
But the assumption of an arbitrary judicial power by both Houses, and
the system of terror which Grenville put in force against the Press by
issuing two hundred injunctions against different journals, roused a
storm of indignation throughout the country. Every street resounded
with cries of " Wilkes and Liberty." It was soon clear that opinion
had been embittered rather than silenced by the blow at Wilkes ; and
six years later, the failure of the prosecution directed against an
anonymous journalist named " Junius " for his Letter to the King estab-
lished the right of the Press to criticize the conduct not of ministers or
Parliament only, but of the sovereign himself.

The same narrowness of view, the same honesty of purpose, the same
obstinacy of temper, were shown by Grenville in a yet more important
struggle, a struggle with the American Colonies. Pitt had waged \^ar
with characteristic profusion, and he had defrayed the cost of the war
by enormous loans. At the time of the Peace of Paris the public debt
stood at a hundred and forty millions. The first need therefore which
met Bute after the conclusion of the Peace was that of making provision
for the new burthens which the nation had incurred, and as these had
been partly incurred in the defence of the American Colonies it was the
general opinion of Englishmen that the Colonies should bear a share
of them. In this opinion Bute and the King concurred. But their
plans went further than mere taxation. The new minister declared
himself resolved on a rigorous execution of the Navigation laws, laws
by which a monopoK of American trade was secured to the mother-
country, on the raising of a revenue within the Colonies for the discharge
of the debt, and above all on impressing upon the colonists a sense of
their dependence upon Britain. The direct trade between America and
the French or Spanish West Indian islands had hitherto been fettered
by prohibitory duties, but these had been easily evaded by a general
system of smuggling. The duties were now reduced, but the reduced
duties were rigorously exacted, and a ccriFiderable naval force was
despatched to the American coast with a v'ew of suppressing the
clandestine trade with the foreigner. The revenue which was expected

X.]

[chap.

gainst the
Jnder this
pitc of his
cnt to the
as at once
Liatcly pro-
iubjcct for
letnnecl by
ious hbel."
Lind among
)n. Wilkes

Commons,
louses, and
he Press by
s, roused a
t resounded
;hat opinion
Vilkes; and

against an
jKingestab-
ministers or

t)se, the same
re important
waged \^ar
St of the war
e pubUc debt
refore which
ing provision
as these had
ies it was the
bear a share
But their
3ter declared
on laws, laws
the mother-
the discharge
sts a sense of
America and
been fettered
by a general
the reduced
al force was
ipressing the
was expected

X.]

MODERN ENGI.AND.

769

from this measure was ^a be supplemented by an internal Stamp Tax,
a tax on all legal documents issued within the Colonies. The plans of
Bute had fallen to the ground on his retirement from office. Ikit Grenvillc
had fully concurred in the financial part at least of Bute's designs ; and,
now that he found himself at the head of a strong administration, he
proceeded to carry out the plans which had been devised for the purpose
of raising both an external and an internal revenue from America.
One of his first steps was to suppress, by a rigid enforcement of the
Navigation laws, the contraband trade which had grown up between
American ports and the adjacent Spanish islands. Harsh and unwise
as these measures seemed, the colonists owned their legality ; and their
resentment only showed itself in a pledge to use no British manufactures
till the restrictions were relaxed. But the next scheme of the Minister
— his proposal to introduce internal taxation within the bounds of the
Colonies themselves by reviving the project of an excise or stamp duty,
which Walpole's good sense had rejected — was of anoth'^r order from
his schemes for suppressing the contraband traffic. Unlin.e the system
of the Navigation Acts, it was a gigantic change in the whole actual
relations of England and its Colonies. They met it therefore in another
spirit. Taxation and representation, they a? >en i.d, went hand in hand.
America had no representatives in the Britis.^ : . jliament. The repre-
sentatives of the colonists met in their own colonial assemblies, and all
save the Pennsylvanians protested strongly against the interference of
ParHament with their right of self-taxation. Massachusetts marked
accurately the position she took. " Prohibitions of trade are neither
equitable nor just ; but the power of taxing is the grand barrier of
British liberty. If that is once broken down, all is lost." The distinc-
tion was accepted by the assembly of every colony ; and it was with
their protest that they despatched Benjamin Franklin, who had risen
from his position of a working printer in Philadelphia to high repute
among scientific discoverers as their agent to England. In England
however Franklin found few who recognized the distinction which the
colonists had drawn. Grenville had no mind to change his plans
without an assurance, which Franklin could not give, of a union of the
Colonies to tax themselves ; and the Stamp Act was passed through
both Houses with lebS opposition than a turnpike bill.

The Stamp Act was hardly passed when an insult offered to the
Princess Dowager, by the exclusion of her name from a Regency Act,
brought to a head the quarrel which had long been growing between
the ministry and the Kinj;;^. George again offered power to William
Pitt. But Pitt stood absolutely alone. The one friend who remained
to him, his brother-in-law. Lord Temple, refused to aid in an attempt
to construct a Cabinet ; and he felt himself too weak, when thus
deserted, to hold his ground in any ministerial combination with the
Whigs. The King turned for help to the main body of the Whigs,

3 D

Sec. II.

Thb Inde-
pendence
i)K America

1761

1782

Crenville s
policy

I. m

Franklin
mission

1765

The
Rock-
ingham
Ministrji

770

HISTORY OF Tlir, KNCILTSH rKOl'l.l!:.

[ciiAf,

Sec. II.

The i'ndk

i'endence

OK America

1761

178a

Repeal

of the

Stamp

Act

Edmund
Bnrkc

now headed by the Mar{[uis of Rockingham. The weakness of the
ministry which Rockingham formed in July, 1765, was seen in its slow-
ness to deal with American affairs. Franklin had seen no other course
for the Colonies, when the obnoxious Acts were passed, but that of sub-
mission. But submission was the last thing the colonists dreamed of.
Everywhere through New England riots broke out on the news of the
arrival of the stamped paper ; and the frightened collectors resigned
their posts. Northern and Southern States were drawn together by
the new danger. The assembly of Virginia was the first to formally
deny the right of the British Parliament to meddle with internal
taxation, and to demand the repeal of the acts. Massachusetts not
only adopted the denial and the <lemand as its own, but proposed a
Congress of delegates from all the colonial assemblies to provide for
common and united action ; and in October 1763 this Congress met to
repeat the protest and petition of Virginia. The news of its assembly
reached England at the end of the year, and at once called Pitt to the
front when the Houses met in the spring of 1766. As a minister he
had long since rejected a similar scheme for taxing the colonies. He
had been ill and absent from Parliament when the Stamp Act was
passed, but he adopted to the full the constitutional claim of America.
He gloried in a resistance which was denounced in Parliament as
rebellion. " In my opinion," he said, " this kingdom has no right to
lay a tax on the colonies. . . America is obstinate I America is almost
in open rebellion ! Sir, I rejoice that America has resisted. Three
n;i!lions of people so dead to all the feelings of liberty as voluntarily to
suLvntiit to be slaves would have been fit instruments to make slaves of
the rest."

There was a general desire that Pitt should return to office ; but the
negotiations for his union with the Whigs broke down. The radical
difference between their policy and that of Pitt was now in fact de-
fined for them by the keenest political thinker of the day. Edmund
Burke had come to London in 1750 as a poor and unknown Irish
adventurer. The learning which at once won him the friendship of
Johnson, and the imaginative power which enabled him to give his
learning a living shape, promised him a philosophical and literary
career : but instinct drew Burke to politics ; he became secretary to
Lord Rockingham, and in 1765 entered Parliament under his patron-
age. His speeches on the Stamp Acts at once lifted him into fame.
The heavy Ouaker-like figure, the scratch wig, the round spectacles,
the cumbrous roll of paper which loaded Burke's pocket, gave little
promise of a great orator and less of the characteristics of his oratory
— its passionate ardour, its poetic fancy, its amazing prodigality of
resources; the dazzling succession in which irony, pathos, invective,
tenderness, the most brilliant word-pictures, the coolest argument
followed each other. It was an eloquence indeed of a wholly new

fciIAI'.

iss of the
1 its slow-
ler course
lat of sub-
"eamecl of.
2WS of the
s resigned
)gether by
formally
h internal
lusetts not
aroposed a
provide for
ress met to
:s assembly
, Pitt to the
minister he
Ionics. He
np Act was
of America,
irliament as
no right to
cais almost
ted. Three
oluntarily to
ike slaves of

Ice ; but the
The radical
in fact de-
Edmund
known Irish
riendship of
to give his
u\d literary
secretary to
• his patron-
n into fame,
d spectacles,
t, gave little
his oratory
)rodigality of
)S, invective,
|st argument
wholly new

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

order in English experience. Walpolc's clearness of statement, Pitt's
appeals to emotion, were exchanged for the impassioned expression of
a distinct philosophy of politics. " I have learned more from him than
from all the books I ever read," Fox cried at a later time, with a burst
of generous admiration. The philosophical cast of Burke's reasoning
was unaccompanied by any philosophical coldness of tone or phrase.
The groundwork indeed of his nature was poetic. His ideas, if con-
ceived by the reason, took shape and colour from the splendour and
fire of his imagination, A nation was to him a great living society, so
complex in its relations, and whose institutions were so interwoven
with glorious events in the past, that to touch it rudely was a sacrilege.
Its constitution was no artificial scheme of government, but an
exquisite balance of social forces which was in itself a natural outcome
of its history and developement. His temper was in this way conser-
vative, but his conservatism sprang not from a love of inaction but
from a sense of the value of social order, and from an imaginative
reverence for all that existed. Every institution was hallowed to him
by the clear insight with which he discerned its relations to the past,
and its subtle connexion with the social fabric around it. To touch
even an anomaly seemed to Burke to be risking the ruin of a complex
structure of national order which it had cost centuries to build up.
"The equilibrium of the Constitution," he said, "has something so
delicate about it, that the least displacement may destroy it." " It is
a difficult and dangerous matter even to touch so complicated a
machine." Perhaps the readiest refutation of such a theory was to be
found in its influence on Burke's practical dealing with politics. In
the great question indeed which fronted him as he entered Parliament,
it served him well. No man has ever seen with deeper insight tlie
working of those natural forces which build up communities, or which
group communities into emp'res; and in the actual state of the Ameri-
can Colonies he saw a result of such forces which only madmen and
pedants would disturb. But Burke's theory was less fitted to the state
of politics at home. He looked on the Revolution of 1688 as the final
establishment of English institutions. His aim was to keep England
as the Revolution had left it, an i under the rule of the great nobles
who were faithful to the Revolution. He gave his passionate adhesion
to the inaction of the Whigs. He made an idol of Lord Rockingham,
an honest man, but the weakest of party leaders. He strove to check
the corruption of Parliament by a bill for civil retrenchment, but he
took the lead in defeatinj: all plans for its reform. Though he was one
of the few men in England who understood with Pitt the value of free
industry, he struggled bitterly against the young Minister's proposals
to give freedom to Irish trade, and against his Commercial Treaty
with France. His work seemed to be that of investing with a gorgeous
poetry the policy of timid content which the Whigs believed they

3 l^ 2

771

Sec. II.

'I'lIK InDE-
IM'.NDHNC K

oi- Amekica
1761

1782

Burke and

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PKOI'M-:.

[CKAr

Skc. II.
'I'liK In;>b-

I'KNDKNri':

OK Amkkila
1761

1782

Fc>K 1766

The
Chatham
Ministry

^766

1767

inherited from Sir Robert Walpole ; and the very intensity of his trust
in the natural deveh)pement of a people rendered him incapabk of
understanding tlic good that might come from particular laws or from
special reforms. At this crisis then the temper of Burke squared witli
the temper of the Whig party. Rockingham and his fellow-ministers
were driven, whether they would or no, to a practical acknowledgement
of the policy which Pitt demanded ; but they resolved that the repeal
of the Stamp Acts should be accompanied by a formal repudiation of
the principles of colonial freedom which Pitt had laid down. A declara-
tory act was brought in, which asserted the supreme power of Parlia-
ment over the Colonies " in all cases whatsoever." The passing of
this act was followed by the introduction of a bill for the rei'oal of the
Stamp Acts ; and in spite of the resistance of the King's friends, a
resistance instigated by George himself, the bill was carried by a
large majority.

From this moment the Ministry was unable to stand against the
general sense that the first man in the country should be its ruler,
and bitter as was the King's hatred of him, he was forced to call Pitt
into office. Pitt's aim was still to unite the Whig party, and though
forsaken by Lord Temple, he succeeded to a great extent in the adminis-
tration which he formed in the summer of 1766. Though Rockingham
stood coldly aside, some of his fello'v ministers accepted office, and they
were reinforced by the few friends who clung to Pitt ; while Pitt stooped
to strengthen his Parliamentary support by admitting some even of
the " King's friends" to a share in the administration. But its life lay
really in Pitt himself, in his immense popularity, and in the command
which his eloquence gave him over the House of Commons. His
acceptance of the Earldom of Chatham removed him to the House
of Lords, and for a while ruined the confidence which his reputation
for unselfishness had aided him to win. But it was from no vulgar
ambition that Pitt laid down his title of the Great Commoner. It
was the consciousness of failing strength which made him dread the
storms of debate, and in a few months the dread became a certainty.
A painful and overwhelming illness, the result of nervous disorganiza-
tion, withdrew him from public atfairs ; and his withdrawal robbed his
colleagues of all vigour or union. The plans which Chatham had set
on foot for the better go\'ernment of Ireland, the transfer of India
from the Company to the Crown, and the formation of an alliance
with Prussia and Russia to balance the Family Compact of the House
of Bourbon, were suffered to drop. The one aim of the ministry which
bore his name, and which during hi?, retirement looked to the Duke of
Grafton as its actual head, was simply to exist. But even existence
was difficult ; and Grafton saw himself forced to a union with the
fiiction which was gathered under the Duke of Bedford, and to the
appointment of a Tory noble as Secretary of State.

X.]

MODERN KNGLAND.

773

The force of public opinion on which Pitt h;ul relied turned at once
against the ministry which had so drifted from its former position.
The elections for the new Parliament were more corrupt than any that
had been yet witnessed, ilow bitter the in(lii,mation of the country
had grown was seen in its fresh backing of W'illcs. He seized on the
opening afforded by the elcrtions to return from France, and was elected
niem))er for Middlesex, a county 'he 'arge number of whose voters
made its choice a real expression of public opinion. The choice of
Wilkes was in effect a public condemnation of the House of Commons
and the ministerial system. The ministry howcxer and the House
alike shrank from a fresh struggle with the agitator ; but the King was
eager fur the contest. After ten years of struggle and disappointment
(icorge had all but reached his aim. The two forces which had as
yet worsted him were both of them i)aralyzed. The Whigs were fatally
divided, and discredited in the ryes of the country by their antagonism
to Pitt. Pitt, on the other hand, was suddenly removed from the stage.
The ministry was without support in the country ; and for Parliament-
ary support it was forced to lean more and more on the men who
looked for direction to the King himself. One form of opposition
alone remained in the public discontent ; and at this he struck more
fiercely than ever. " I think it highly expedient to apprise you," he
wrote to Lord North, "that the expulsion of Mr. Wilkes appears to
be very essential, and must be effected." The Ministers and the House
of Commons bowed to his will. By his non-appearance in coi t when
charged with libel, Wilkes had become an outlaw, and he was now
thrown into prison on his outlawry. Dangerous riots broke out in
London and over the whole country. The Ministry were torn with
dissensions. The announcement of Lord Shelburne's purpose to resign
office was followed by the resignation of Chatham hmiself; and his
withdrawal from the Cabinet which traded on his name left the
Ministry wholly dependent on the King. In 1769 Wilkes was brought
before the bar of the House of Commons on a charge of libel, a
crime which was cognizable in the ordinary courts of law ; and
was expelled from Parliament. He was .it once re-elected by the
shire of Middlesex. Violent and oppressive as the course of the
House of Commons had been, it had as yet acted within its strict
right, for no one questioned its possession of a right of expulsion.
But the defiance of Middlesex led it now to go further. It resolved,
" That Mr. Wilkes having been in this session of Parliament expelled
the House, was and is incapable of being elected a member to
serve in the present Parliament ; " and it issued a writ for a fresh
election. Middlesex answered this insolent claim to limit the free
choice of a constituency by again returning Wilkes ; and the House
was driven by its anger to a fresh and more outrageous usurpation.
It again expelled the member for Middlesex ; and on his return for

Sec. 11.
Thk Inok-

I'lvNDICNi K

Oh .Xmf.hii a

1761

■i(i

178fl

Wilkes
and the
Parlia-
ment

1 :6ii

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J\csii;v(ttion

0/ ( Ita'hiDH

I76S

U'Ukes
expelled

IMAGE EVALUATION
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125

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l!f |£0 12.0

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Hiotographic

Sciences

Corporation

23 WIST MAIN STREET

WEBSTER, N.Y. 14580

(716) •72-4503

774

TTTSTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap

Src. II.
TiiR Inde-

l-KNDKNCR

UK America

i7ei

1782

Parlia-

ment

and

Reform

the third time by an imnieuse majority, it voted that the candidate
whom he had defeated, Colonel Luttrell, ought to have been returned,
and was the legal representative of Middlesex. The Commons had
not only limited at their own arbitrary discretion the free election of
the constituency, but they had transferred its rights to themselves
by seating Lut'.rell as member in defiance of the deliberate choice of
Wilkes by the freeholders of Middlesex. The country at once rose
indignantly against this violation of constitutional law. Wilkes was
elected an Alderman of London ; and the Mayor, Aldermen, and
Livery petitioned the King to dissolve the Parliament. A remon-
strance from London and Westminster said boldly that " there is a
time when it is clearly demonstrable that men cease to be representa-
tives. That time is now arrived. The House of Commons do not
represent the people." Meanwhile a writer who styled himself Junius
attacked the Government in letters, which, rancorous and unscrupulous
as was their tone, gave a new power *o the literature of the Press by
their clearness and terseness of statement, the finish of their style, and
the terrible vigour of their invective.

The storm however beat idly on the obstinacy of the King. The
printer of the letters was prosecuted, and the petitions and remon-
strances of London were haughtily rejected. At the beginning of
1770 a cessation of the disease which had long held him prostrate
enabled Chatham to reappear in the House of Lords. He at once
denounced the usurpations of the Commons, and brought in a bill to
declare them illegd. But his genius made him the first to see that
remedies of this sort were inadequate to meet evils which really sprang
from the fact that the House of Commons no longer represented the
people of England ; and he mooted a plan for its reform by an increase
of the county members, who then formed the most independent portion
of the House. Further he could not go, for even in the proposals he
made he stood almost alone. The Tories and the King's friends
were not likely to welcome schemes which would lessen the King's
influence. The Whigs under Lord Rockingham had no sympathy
with Parliamentary reform ; and they shrank with haughty disdain
from the popular agitation in which public opinion was forced to
express itself, and which Chatham, while censuring its extravagance,
deliberately encouraged. It is from the quarrel between Wilkes and
the House of Commons that we may date the influence of public
meetings on English politics. The gatherings of the Middlesex
electors in his support were preludes to the great meetings of Yorkshire
freeholders in which the question of Parliamentary reform rose into
importance ; and it was in the movement for reform, and the establish-
ment of corresponding committees throughout the country for the
purpose of promoting it, that the power of political agitation first made
itself felt. Political societies and clubs took their part in this quicken-

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

ing and organization of public opinion : and the spread of discussion,
as well as the influence which now began to be exercised by the
appearance of vast numbers of men in support of any political
movement, proved that Parliament would soon have to reckon with
the sentiments of the people at large.

But an agent far more effective than popular agitation was preparing
to bring the force of public opinion to bear on Parliament itself. We
have seen how much of the corruption of the House of Commons sprang
from the secrecy of Parliamentary proceedings, but this secrecy was
the harder to preserve as the nation woke to a greater interest in its
own affairs. From the accession of the Georges imperfect reports of
the more important discussions began to be published under the title
of " The Senate of Lilliput," and witii feigned names or simple initials
to denote the speakers. Obtained by stealth and often merely recalled
by memory, such reports were naturally inaccurate ; and their inaccu-
racy was eagerly seized on as a pretext for enforcing the rules which
guarded the secrecy of proceedings in Parliament. In 177 1 the
Commons issued a proclamation forbidding the publication of debates ;
and six printers, who set it at defiance, were summoned to the bar of
the House. One who refused to appear was arrested by its messenger ;
but the arrest at once brought the House into conflict with the
magistrates of London. They set aside the proclamation as without
legal force, released the printers, and sent the messenger to prison for
an unlawful arrest. The House sent the Lord Mayor to the Tower, but
the cheers of the crowds which followed him on his way told that public
opinion was again with the Press, and the attempt to hinder its publica-
tion of Parliamentary proceedings dropped silently on his release at
the next prorogation. Few changes of equal importance have been so
quietly brought about. Not only was the responsibility of members
to their constituents made constant and effective by the publication of
their proceedings, but the nation itself was called in to assist in the
deliberations of its representatives. A new and wider interest in its
own affairs was roused in the people at large, and a new political
education was given to it through the discussion of every subject of
national importance in the Houses and the Press. Public opinion, as
gathered up and represented on- all its sides by the journals of the
day, became a force in practical statesmanship, influenced the course
of debates, and controlled in a closer and more constant way than even
Parliament itself had been able to do the actions of the Government.
The importance of its new position gave a weight to the Press which
it had never had before. The first great English journals date from
this time. With the Morning Chronicle^ the Morning Posty the
Morning Herald, and the Times, all of which appeared in the interval
between the opening years of the American War and the beginning of
the war with the French Revolution, journalism tool? a new tone of

775

Shc. II.

TiiK Inok-

l-KNUKNCR

ov America

i7ei

i7aa

Power
of the
Preas

776

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. II.

The Indb-

pbndencr

OK Amekica

1761

i7aa

Oeorce
III. and
America

The
Klnc's
Ministry

responsibility and intelligence. The hacks of Grub Street were super-
seded by publicists of a high moral temper and literary excellence ;
and philosophers like Coleridge or statesmen like Canning turned to
influence public opinion through the columns of the Press.

But as yet these influences were feebly felt, and George the Third
was able to set Chatham's policy disdainfully aside, and to plunge into
a contest far more disastrous than his contest with the Press. In all
the proceedings of the last few years, what had galled him most had
been the act which averted a war between England and her colonies.
To the King the Americans were already " rebels," and the great
statesman whose eloquence had made their claims irresistible was a
"trumpet of sedition." George deplored in his correspondence with
his ministers the repeal of the Stamp Acts. " All men feel," he wrote,
"that the fatal compliance in 1766 has increased the pretensions
of the Americans to absolute independence." In America itself the
news of the repeal had been received with universal joy, and taken as
a close of the strife. But on both sides there remained a pride and
irritability which only wise handling could have allayed ; and in the
present state of English politics wise handling was impossible. Only
a few liionths indeed passed before the quarrel was re-opened ; for no
sooner had the illness of Lord Chatham removed him in 1767 from any
real share in public affairs, than the wretched administration which
bore his name suspended the Assembly of New York on its refusal to
provide quarters for English troops, and resolved to assert British
sovereignty by levying import duties of trivial amount at American
ports. The Assembly of Massachusetts was dissolved on a trifling
quarrel with its Governor, and Boston was occupied for a time by
British soldiers. The remonstrances of the Legislatures of Massachu-
setts and Virginia, however, coupled with a fall in the funds, warned
the Ministers of the dangerous course on which they had entered ; and
in 1 769 the troops were withdrawn, and all duties, save one, abandoned.
But the King insisted on retaining the duty on tea ; and its retention
was enough to prevent any thorough restoration of good feeling. A
series of petty quarrels went on in almost every colony between the
popular Assemblies and the Governors appointed by the Crown, and
the colonists persisted in their agreement to import nothing from the
mother country. As yet however there was no prospect of serious
strife. In America the influence of George Washington allayed the
irritation of Virginia. Massachusetts contented itself with quarrelling
with its Governor, and refusing to buy tea so long as the duty was
levied. In England, even Grenv'lle, though approving the retention
of the duty in question, abandonea all dream of further taxation.

But the King was now supreme. The attack of Chatham in 1770
had completed the ruin of the Ministry. Those of his adherents who
still clung to it resigned their poats ; and were followed by the Duke of

Grafton,
ents of th
of the Ex
cloak for
did he dir
matters ol
managenii
be made o
for himsel
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officers, ai
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and disper
governmer
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maintenam
the King h;
a majority,
ministry tl
the ministei
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English his
His fi.\ec
the "fatal c
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with tea kir
agreement
boarded the
was deplore
leading stat
to support t
the thought
he set roug
and his fellc
vexatious "
missal of tw
of free insti
as a pretex
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against all c
by withdrav
Fathers Ian
its Council
nomination

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luper-
ence ;
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Third

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In all

st had

lonies.
great

was a

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self the

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British

iierican
trifling

Lime by

issachu-
warned

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mts who
Duke of

X.)

MODERN ENGLAND.

777

Grafton. All that remained were the Bedford faction and the depend-
ents of the King ; these were gathered under the former Chancellor
of the Exchequer, Lord North, into a ministry which was in fact a mere
cloak for the direction of public aflairs by George himself. " Not only
did he direct the minister," a careful observer tells us," in all important
matters of foreign and domestic policy, but he instructed him as to the
management of debates in Parliament, suggested what motions should
be made or opposed, and how measures should be carried. He reserved
for himself all the patronage, he arranged the whole cast of administra-
tion, settled the relative place and pretensions of ministers of StJite, law
officers, and members of the household, nominated and promoted the
English und Scotch judges, appointed and translated bishops and deans^
and dispensed other preferments in the Church. He disposed of military
governments, regiments, and commissions, and himself ordered the
marching of troops. He gave and refused titles, honours, and pensions."
All this immense patronage was steadily uG-^d for the creation and
maintenance in both Houses of Parliament of a majority directed by
the King himself; and its weight was seen in the steady action of such
a majority. It was seen yet more in the subjection to which the
ministry that bore North's name was reduced. George was in fact
the minister through the twelve years of its existence, from 1770 till the
close of the American war ; and the shame of the darkest hour of
English history lies wholly at his door.

His fi.xed purpose was to seize on the first opportunity of undoing
the "fatal compliance of 1766." A trivial riot gave him the handle he
wanted. In December 1773 the arrival of some English ships laden
with tea kindled fresh irritation in Boston, where the non importation
agreement was strictly enforced. A mob in the disguise of Indians
boarded the vessels and flung their contents into the sea. The outrage
was deplored alike by the friends of America in England and by its own
leading statesmen ; and both Washington and Chatham were prepared
to support the Government in its looked-for demand of redress. But
the thought of the King was not of redress but of repression, and
he set roughly aside the more conciliatory proposals of Lord North
and his fellow- ministers. They had already rejected as " frivolous and
vexatious " a petition of the Assembly of Massachusetts for the dis-
missal of two public officers whose letters home advised the withdrawal
of free institutions from the Colonies. They now seized on the rio;
as a pretext for rigorous measures. A bill introduced into Parlia-
ment in the beginning of 1774 punished Boston by closing its port
against all commerce. Another punished the State of Massachusetts
by withdrawing the liberties it had enjoyed ever since the Pilgrim
Fathers landed on its soil. Its charter was altered. The choice of
its Council was transferred from the people to the Crown, and the
nomination of its judges was transferred to the Governor. In the

Sec. II.
Thk Indb-

l-hNUENCR

OK America
1761

178a

^^i;ti

The
Boston
Tea-
Riots

i It

778

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH FEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. II.
The Inoe-

l>ENI)ENCi{

OK America

i7ei

178fi

Resistance
of A me tic a

The In-
depend-
ence of
America

Governor, too, by a provision more outrageous than even these, was
vested the right of sending all 'persons charged with a share in the
late disturbances to England for trial. To enforce these measures of
repression troops were sent to America, and General Gage, the com-
mander-in-chief there, was appointed Governor of Massachusetts. The
King's e.cultation at the prospect before him was unbounded. "The
die," he wrote triumphantly to his minister, " is cast. The Colonies
must either triumph or submit." Four regiments would be enough to
bring the Americans to their senses. They would only be " lions
while we are lambs." "If we take the resolute part," he decided
sobmnly, "they will undoubtedly be very meek." Unluckily, the
blow at Massachusetts was received with anything but meekness.
The jealousies between State and State were hushed by the sense that
the liberties of all were in danger. If the British Parliament could
cancel the charter of Massachusetts and ruin the trade of Boston, it
could cancel the charter of every colony and ruin the trade of every
port from the St. Lawrence to the coast of Georgia. All therefore
adopted the cause of Massachusetts ; and all their Legislatures, save
that of Georgia, sent delegates to a Congress which assembled on the
4th of September at Philadelphia. Massachusetts took a yet bolder
course. Not a citizen would act under the new laws. Its Assembly
met in defiance of the Governor, called out the militia of the State, and
provided arms and ammunition for it. But there was still room for
reconciliation. The resolutions of the Congress had been moderate ;
for Virginia was the wealthiest and most influential among the States
who sent delegates ; and though resolute to resist the new measures
of the Government, Virginia still clung to the mother country. At
home, the merchants of London and Bristol pleaded loudly for
reconciliation ; and in January 1775 Chatham again came forward to
avert a strife he had once before succeeded in preventing. With
characteristic largeness of feeling he set aside all half-measures or
proposals of compromise. " It is not cancelling a piece of parchment,"
he insisted, " that can win back America : you must respect her fears
and her resentments." The bill which he introduced in concert with
F' anklin provided for the repeal of the late acts and for the security
ot the colonial charters, abandoned the claim to taxation, and ordered
the recall of the troops. A colonial assembly was directed to meet
and provide means by which America might contribute towards the
payment of the public debt.

Chatham's measure was contemptuously rejected by the Lords, as
was a similar measure of Burke's by the Commons, and a petition of
the City of London in favour of the Colonies by the King himself.
With the rejection of these efforts at reconciliation began the great
struggle which ended eight years later in the severance of the American
Colonies from the British Crown. The Congress of delegates from

x.l

MODERN ENGLAND.

779

the Colonial Legislatures at once voted measures for general defence,
ordered the levy of an army, and set George Washington at its head.
No nobler figure e'. er stood in the forefront of a nation's life. Wash-
ington was grave and courteous in address ; his manners were simple
and unpretending ; his silence and the serene calmness of his temper
spoke of a perfect self-mastery ; but there was little in his outer
bearing to reveal the grandeur of soul which lifts his figure, with all the
simple majesty of an ancient statue, out of the smaller passions, the
meaner impulses of the world around him. What recommended him
for command was simply his weight among his fellow landowners of
Virginia, and the experience of war which he had gained by service
in border contests with the French and the Indians, as well as in
Braddock's luckless expedition against Fort Duquesne. It was only
as the weary fight went on that the colonists learned little by little the
greatness of their leader, his clear judgment, his heroic endurance, his
silence under difficulties, his calmness in the hour of danger or defeat,
the patience with which he waited, the quickness and hardness with
which he struck, the lofty and serene sense of duty that never swerved
from its task through resentment or jealousy, that never through war
or peace felt the touch of a meaner ambition, that knew no aim save
that of guarding the freedom of his fellow countrymen, and no personal
longinf save that of returning to his own fireside when their freedom
was secured. It was almost unconsciously that men learned to cling
to Washington with a trust and faith such as few other men have won,
and to regard him with a reverence which still hushes us in presence
of his memory. Even America hardly recognized his real greatness
till death set its seal on " the man first in war, first in peace, and first
in the hearts of his fellow countrymen." Washington more than
any of his fellow colonists represented the clinging of the Virginian
landowners to the mother country, and his acceptance of the command
proved that even the most moderate among them had no hope now
save in anns. The struggle opened with a skirmish between a party
of English troops and a detachment of militia at Lexington, and in
a few days twenty thousand colonists appeared before Boston. The
Congress re-assembled, declared the States they represented "The
United Colonies of America," and undertook the work of government.
Meanwhile ten thousand fresh troops landed at Boston ; but the pro-
vincial militia seized the neck of ground which joins it to the mainland,
and though they were driven from the heights of Bunker's Hill which
commanded the town, it was only after a desperate struggle in which
their bravery put an end for ever to the taunts of cowardice which
had been levelled against the colonists. " Are the Yankees cowards ? "
shouted the men of Massachusetts, as the first English attack rolled
back baffled down the hill-side. But a far truer courage was shown
in the stubborn endurance with which Washington's raw militiamen,

f c. II.
TiiR Indr-

TENURNCK
OK AmRKIL A

i7ei

1788

Georgt

v^MI

Opening of
the war

Jttne 1 7

780

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

ff-HAl'.

Sec. II.

The Inof.-

penoenck
OK Amekica

i7ei

178a

Declnration
of luiie
i>ende»ce

Death of
Chatham

who gradually dwindled from sixteen thousand to ten, ill fed, ill armed,
and with but forty-five rounds of ammunition to each man, cooped up
through the winter a force of ten thousand veterans in the lines of
Hoston. The spring of 1776 saw them force tlies>^ troops to withdraw
from the City to New York, where the whole British army, largely rein-
forced by mercenaries from Germany, was concentrated under General
Howe. Meanwhile a raid of the American (ieneral, Arnold, nearly
drove the British troops from Canada ; and though his attemj-t broke
down before Quebec, it showed that all hope of reconciliation was over.
The Colonies of the south, the last to join in the struggle, had in fact
expelled their Governors at the close of 1775 ; at the opening of the
next year Massachusetts instructed its delegates to support a complete
repudiation of the King's government by the Colonies ; while the
American ports were thrown open to the world in defiance of the Navi-
gation Acts. These decisive steps were followed by the great act with
which American history begins, the adoption on the 4th of July, 1776,
by the delegates in Congress of a Declaration of Independence. " We,"
ran its solemn words, " the representatives of the United States of
America in Congress assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of
the world for the rectitude of our intentions, solemnly publish and
declare that these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, Free
and Independent States."

The earlier successes of the Colonists were soon followed by suffering
and defeat. Howe, an artive genci al with a fine army at his back, cleared
Long Island in August b^ a victory at Brooklyn ; and Washington,
whose army was weakened by withdrawals and defeat, and disheartened
by the loyal tone of the State in which it was encamped, was forced to
evacuate New York and New Jersey, and to fall back first on the
Hudson and then on the Delaware. The Congress prepared to lly
from Philadelphia, and a general despair showed itself in cries of peace.
But a well-managed surprise and a daring march on the rear of Howe's
army restored the spirits of Washington's men, and forced the English
general in his turn to fall back on New York. The campaign of 1777
opened with a combined effort for the suppression of the revolt. An
army assembled in Canada under General Burgoyne marched by ^"ay
of the La<ces to seize the line of the Hudson, and with help from the
army at New York tc cut off New England from her sister provinces.
Howe meanwhile sailed up the Chesapeake, and advanced on Phil-
adelphia, the temporary capital of the United States and the seat of the
Congress. The rout of his little army of seven thousand men at
Brandywine forced Washington to abandon Philadelphia, and, after a
bold but unsuccessful attack on hi j victors, to retire into winter quarters
on the banks of the Schuylkill ; where the unconquerable resolve with
which he nerved his handful of beaten and half-starved troops to face
Howe's army in their camp at Valley Forge is the noblest of his

f<-HAl',

x.l

MOnKRN ENGLAND.

7«l

irmed,
3ed up
ines of
:hdra\v
y rein-
leneral
nearly
t broke
IS over,
in fact
of the
implele
ile the
e Navi-
ict with

y^, 1776,

"We,"
tates of
udge of
ish and
)e, Free

lUffering

cleared

lington,

artened

)rced to

on the

I to ily

' peace.

Howe's

nglish

of 1777
)lt. An
by way
rom the
ovinces.
)n Phil-
at of the
men at
after a
quarters
Ive with
i to face
of his

triumphs. liut in the north the war had taken another colour. When
Burgoyne appeared on the Upper Hudson he found the road to Albany
barred by an American force under General Gates. The spirit of New
England, which had grown dull as the war rolled .iway from its borders,
quickened again at the news of invasion and of the outrages committed
by the Indians whom Hurgoyne employed among his troops. Its
militia ricd from town and homestead to the camp ; ind after a
fruitless attack on the American lines, Burgoyne saw hi:nself sur-
rounvijd on the heights of Saratoga. On the 17th of October he was
compelled to surrender. The news of this calamity gave force to the
words with which Chatham at the very time of the surrender was
pressing for peace. " You cannot conquer America," he cried when
men were glorying in Howe's successes. " If I were an American as
I am an Englishman, while a foreign troop was landed in my country,
I rever would lay down my arms— never, never, never ! " Then in a
burst of indignant eloquence he thundered ag.iinst the use of the Indian
and his scalping-knife as allies of England against her children. The
proposals which Chatham brought forward might perhaps, in his hands,
even yet have drawn America and the mother country together. His
plan was one of absolute conciliation, and of a federal union between
the settlements and Great Britain which would have left the Colonies
absolutely their own masters in all matters of internal government,
and linked only by ties of affection and loyalty to the general body of
the Empire. But it met with the same fate as his previous proposals.
Its rejection was at once followed by the news of Saratoga, and by the
yet more fatal news that this disaster had roused the Bourbon Courts to
avenge the humiliation of the Seven Years' War. In February 1778
France concluded an alliance with the States. Lord North strove to
meet the blow by fresh offers of conciliation, and by a pledge to re-
nounce for ever the right of direct taxation over the Colonies ; but he
felt that the time for conciliation was past, while all hope of reducing
America by force of arms had disappeared. George indeed was as
obstinate for war as ever ; and the country, stung to the quick by the
attack of France, backed passionately the obstinacy of the King. But
unlike George the Third, it instinctively felt that if a hope still remained
of retaining the friendship of the Colonies, and of baffling the efforts
of the Bourbons, it lay in Lord Chatham ; and in spite of the King's
resistance the voice of the whole country called him back to power.
But on the eve of his return to office this last chance was shattered by
the hand of death. Broken with age and disease, the Earl was borne
to the House of Lords to utter in a few broken words his protest against
the proposal to surrender America. " I rejoice," he murmured, " that
I am still alive to lift up my voice against the dismemberment of this
ancient and noble monarchy. His Majesty succeeded to an Empire
as great in extent as its reputation was unsullied. Seventeen years

St.. II.

Thf Indk-

hkndenj k
UK America

1761

178a

Sittaloga

Cfiaihaiii'i
/<ro/>osals

April 7

783

HISTORY

THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAl'.

Sic. II
Thb lNnB>

PKNDENCK

OP America
1761

uan

Fr«vre«s

of the
War

Bnffland

and

India

ago tuis people was the terror of the world." He listened impatiently
to the reply of the Duke of Richmond, and again rose to his feet. Hut
he hiid hardly risen when he pressed his hand upon his heart, and
fallin;^ back in a swoon was borne home to die.

From the hour of Chatham's death England entered on a conflict
with enemies whose circle gradually widened till she stood single-
handed against the world. At the close of 1778 Spain joined the
league of France and America against her ; and in the next year the
joint fleets of the two powers rode the masters of the Channel. They
even threatened a descent on the English coar t. But dead as Chatham
was, his cry woke a new life in England. " Shall we fall prostrate,"
he exclaimed with his last breath, "before the House of Bourbon?"
and the divisions which had broken the nation in its struggle with
American liberty were hushed in the presence of this danger to its own
existence. The weakness of the Ministry was compensated by the
energy of England itself. For three years, from 1779 to 1782, General
Elliott held against famine and bombardment the rock fortress of
Gibraltar. Although a quarrel over the right of search banded
Holland and the Courts of the North in an armed neutrality against
her, and added the Dutch fleet to the number of her assailants, England
held her own at sea. Even in America the fortune of the war seemed
to turn. After Burgoyne's surrender the English generals had with-
drawn from Pennsylvania, and bent all their efforts on the South
where a strong Royalist party still existed. The capture of Charles-
town and the successes of Lord Cornwallis in 1780 were rendered
fruitless by the obstinate resistance of General Greene ; but the States
were weakened by bankruptcy, and unnerved by hopes of aid from
France. Meanwhile England was winning new triumphs in the East.

Since the day of Plassey, India had been fast passing irto the hands
of the merchant company whose traders but a few years before held
only three petty factories along its coast. The victory which laid
Bengal at the feet of Clive had been followed in 1760 by a victory at
Wandewash, in which Colonel Coote's defeat of Lally, the French
Governor of Pondicherry, established British supremacy over Southern
India. The work of organization had soon to follow on that of
conquest ; for the tyranny and corruption of the merchant- clerks who
suddenly found themselves lifted into rulers was fast ruining the
province of Bengal ; and although Clive had profited more than any
other by the spoils of his victory, he saw that the time had come when
greed must give way to the responsibilities of power. In 1765 he
returned to India, and the two years of his rule were in fact the most
glorious years in his life. In the teeth of opposition from every clerk
and of mutiny throughout the army, he put down the private trading
of the Company's servants and forbade their acceptance of gifts from
the natives. Clive set an example of disinterestedness by handing

x.l

MODERN KNGLAND.

7S3

over to public r cs a legacy which had been left him by the prince he
had raised to tlie throne of Bengal ; and returned poorer than he went
to face the storm his acts had roused among those who were interested
in Indian .ibuses at home. His unsparing denunciations of the mis-
government of Bengal at last stirred even Lord North to interfere ;
and when the financial distress of the Company drove it for aid to
Government, tiie grant of aid was coupled with measures of adminis-
trative reform. The Regulating Act of 1773 established a (iovernor-
General and a Supreme Court of Judicature for all British possessions
in India, prohibited judges and members of Council from trading,
forbade any receipt of presents from natives, and ordered that p' ,.^
act of the Directors should be signified to the Government to be
approved or disallowed. The new interest which had been aroused in
the subject of India was seen in an investigation of the whole question
of its administration by a Committee of the House of Commons.
Clive's own early acts were examined with unsparing severity. His
bitter complaint in the Lords that, Baron of Plassey as he was, he had
been arraigned like a sheep-stealer, failed to prevent the passing of
resolutions which censured the corruption and treachery of the early
days of British rule in India. Here, however, the justice of the House
stopped. When his accusers passed from the censure of Indian mis-
government to the censure of Clive himself, the memory of his great
deeds won from the House of Commons a unanimous vote, " That
Robert Lord Clive did at the same time render great and meritoriojs
services to his country."

By the Act of 1773 Warren Hastings was named Governor-General
of Bengal, with powers of superintenden e and control over the
other presidencies. Hastings was sprung of a noble family which
had long fallen into decay, and poverty had driven him in boy-
hood to accept a writership in the Company's service. Clive, whose
quick eye discerned his merits, drew him after Plassey into political
life ; and the administrative ability he showed, during the disturbed
period which followed, raised him step by step to the post of Governor
of Bengal. No man could have been better fitted to discharge the
duties of the new office which the Government at home had created
without a thought of its real greatness. Hastings was gifted with
rare powers of organization and control. His first measure was to
establish the direct rule of the Company over Bengal by abolishing
the government of its native princes, which, though it had become
nominal, hindered all plans for effective administration. The Nabob sank
into a pensionary, and the Company's new province was roughly but
efficiently organized. Out of the clerks and traders about him Hastings
formed that body of public servants which still remains the noblest
product of our rule in India. The system of law and finance which
he devised, hasty and imperfect as it necessarily was, was far superior

Skc. II.
TiiK Indk*

I'KNUENCK

OK Amkrica
1761

178a

I' M

Warren
Hastlnfa

f IFI

784

HISTORY OF TrrK KNf'.I-rsH PKOI'M:.

fcifAP.

Sec. II.
Thk lNr>K-

HRNDKNCK

OP America
1761

178a

India

in the

American

War

HyderAli

to any that India had ever seen. Corruption he put down with as
firm a hand as Clive's, but he won the love of the new " civihans " as
he won the love of the Hindoos. Althouf,Mi he raised the revenue of
Bengal and was able to send home every yc ir a surphis of half a million
to the Company, he did this without layinj,' a fresh burden on the
natives or losing their good will. His government was guided by an
intimate knowledge of and sympathy with the people. At a time when
their tongue was looked on simply as a medium of trade and business,
Hastings was skilled In the languages of India ; he was versed in native
customs, and familiar with native feeling. We can hardly wonder
that his popularity with the Bengalees was such as no later ruler has
ever attained, or that after a century of great events Indian mothers
still hush their infants with the name of Warren Hastings.

As yet, though English Influence was great in the south, Bengal
alone was directly In English hands. Warren Hastings recognized a
formidable danger to the power of Britain In that of the Mahratfas,
freebooters of Hindoo blood whose tribes had for a century past
carried their raids over India from the hills of the western coast,
and founded sovereignties In Guzerat, Malwa, and Tanjore, and who
were bound by a slight tie of subjection to the Mahratta chief who
reigned at Poonah. The policy of Hastings was to prevent the
Mahrattas from over- running the whole of India, and taking the
place which the Mogul Emperors had occupied. He bound native
princes, as In Oudh or Berar, by treaties and subsidies, crushed without
scruple the Rohillas to strengthen his ally the Nabob Vizier of Oudh,
and watched with incessant jealousy the growth of powers even as
distant as the Sikhs. The jealousy of France sought In the Mahrattas
a counterpoise to the power of Britain, and through their chieftain the
French envoys were able to set the whole confederacy in motion against
the English presidencies. The danger was met by Hastings with charac-
teristic swiftness of resolve. His difficulties were great. For two years
he had been rendered powerless through the opposition of his Council ;
and when freed from this obstacle the Company pressed him inces-
santly for money, and the Crown more than once strove to recall him.
His own general, Sir Eyre Ccote, was miserly, capricious, and had to
be humoured like a child. Censures and complaints reached him with
every mail. But his calm self-command never failed. No trace of his
embarrassments showed itself in his work. The war with the Mahrattas
was pressed with a tenacity of purpose which the blunders of subor-
dinates and the inefficiency of the soldiers he was forced to use never
shook for a moment. Failure followed failure, and success had hardly
been wrung from fortune when a new and overwhelming danger
threatened from the south. A military adventurer, Hyder All, had
built up a compact and vigorous empire out of the wreck of older
principalities on the table-land of Mysore. Tyrant as he was, no

UIO of

lillioii
m the
by an
when
iincss,
native
/onder
ler has
lothcrs

was, no

x.l

MODERN KNdLAND.

785

native rule w.isso just as Hycler's, no statc<;nianship so vigorous. He
was quickwitted enough to discern the real power of Britain, and only
the wretched bhindcring of the Council of Madras forced him at last
to the conclusion that war with the Knglish was less dangerous than
friendship with them. Old as he was, his generalship retained all its
energy ; and a disciplined army, covered by a cloud of horse and backed
by a train of artillery, poured down in 1780 on the plain of the Carnatic.
The small British force which met him was driven into Madras, and
Madras itself was in danger. The news reached Hastings when he
was at last on the verge of triumph over the Mahrattas ; but his triumph
was instantly abandoned, a peace was patched up, and every soldier
hurried to Madras. The appearance of Eyre Coote checked the pro-
gress of Hyder, and after a campaign of some months he was hurled
back into the fastnesses of Mysore. India was the one quarter of the
world where Britain lost nothing during the American war ; and in the
annexation of Benares, the extension of British rule along the Ganges,
the reduction of Oudh to virtual dependence, the appearance of
English armies in Central India, and the defeat of Hyder, the genius
of Hastings laid the foundation of an Indian Empire

But while England triumphed in the East, the face of the war in
America was changed by a terrible disaster. Foiled in an attempt on
North Carolina by the refusal of his fellow general. Sir Henry Clinton,
to assist him, Lord Cornwallis fell back in 1781 on Virginia, and en-
trenched himself in the lines of York Town. A sudden march of
Washington brought him to the front of the English troops at a
moment when the French fleet held the sea, and the army of Corn-
wallis was driven by famine to a surrender as humiliating as that of
Saratoga. The news fell like a thunderbolt on the wretched Minister
who had till now suppressed at his master's order his own conviction
of the uselessness of further bloodshed. Opening his arms and pacing
wildly up and down his room, Lord North exclaimed " It is all over,"
and resigned. England in fact seemed on the brink of ruin. In
the crisis of the American struggle Ireland itself turned on her. A
force of forty thousand volunteers had been raised in 1779 for the
defence of the island against a French invasion. Threats of an armed
revolt backed the eloquence of two Parliamentary leaders, Grattan and
Flood, in their demand for the repeal of Poynings' Act, which took all
power of initiative legislatibn from the Irish Parliament, and for the
recognition of the Irish House of Lords as an ultimate Court of Appeal.
The demands were in effect a claim for national independence ; but
there were no means of resisting them, for England was without a
soldier to oppose the volunteers. The fall of Lord North recalled the
Whigs under Lord Rockingham to office ; and on B ockingham fell
the double task of satisfying Ireland and of putting an end, at any
cost, to the war with the United States. The task involved in both
quarters a humiliating surrender ; and it needed the bitter stress uf '

3 E

Skc. II.
TiiK Indr-

I'KNUKNCK

OK Amkkk a
1761

178a

1781

End of
the War

Mar. 1782

' eg

786

IIISTO

OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

fCHAP.

Sec. II.

Thr InuR'
PRNDENCR

nr America
17«1

1798

fan. 1 6,
1780

Treaties of
/tiue

and th«
World

necessity to induce the Houses to follow his counsels. The English
Parliament abandoned by .t formal statute the judicial and legisla<
tive supremacy it had till then asserted over the Parliament of
Ireland ; and negotiations were begun with America and its allies.
In the difficulties of England the hopes of her enemies rose high.
Spain refused to suspend hostilities at any other price than the
surrender of Gibraltar. France proposed that England should give
up all her Indian conquests save Bengal. But the true basis of her
world-power lay on the sea ; and at this moment the command of the
seas again became her own. Admiral Rodney, the greatest of English
seamen save Nelson and Blake, had in January, 1780, encountered the
Spanish fleet off Cape St. Vincent, and only four of its vessels escaped
to Cadiii. Two years later the triumphs of the French Admiral Dc
Grasse called him to the West Indies, and in April 1782, a manoeuvre
which he was the first to introduce broke his opponent's line, and drove
the French fieet shattered from the Atlantic. In September a last
attack of the joint force gathered against Gibraltar was repulsed by
the heroism of Elliott. Nor would America wait any longer for the
satisfaction of her allies. In November her commissioners signed the
preliminaries of a peace, in which Britain reserved to hersel*" on the
American continent only Canada and the island of Newfoundland, and
acknowledged without reserve the independence of the United States.
The treaty of peace with the United States was a prelude to treaties
of peace with the Bourbon powers. France indeed won nothing in
the treaties with which the war ended ; Spain gained only Florida and
Minorca. England, on the other hand, had won ground in India;
she had retained Canada ; her West Indian islands were intact ; she
had asserted her command of the seas. But at the close of the war
there '-3 less thought of what she had retained than of what she
had lost. The American Colonies were irrecoverably gone. It is
no wonder that in the first shock of such a loss England looked on
herself as on the verge of ruin, or that the Bourbon Courts believed
her position as a world-power to be practically at an end. How utterly
groundless such a conception was the coming years were to show.

Section III.— The Second Pitt. 1783—1793.

[Authorities.— "iJir. Massey's account of this period may be supplemented by
Lord Stanhope's "Life of Pitt," Lord Russelrs "Memoirs of Fox," and the
Correspondence of Lord Malmesbury, Lord Auckland, and Mr. Rose. For
the Slave Trade, see the Memoirs of Wilberforce by his sons. Burke may be
studied in his Life by Macknight, in Mr. Morley's valuable essay on him, and
above all in his own works. The state of foreign affairs in 1789 is best seen
in Von Sybel's " History of the French Revolution."]

That in the creation of the United States the world had reached
\ one of the turning points in its history seems at the time to have

English
Icgisla-
lent of
3 allies.
;e high,
lan the
Id give
i of her
d of the
EngUsh
Ered the
escaped
liral Dc
inoeuvre
nd drove
!r a last
ulsed by
;r for the
gned the
1*" on the
land, and
id States.
treaties
jthing in
)rida and
n India;
;act ; she

the war
what she
le. It is
ooked on

believed

)w utterly

low.

x.l

MODERN ENGLAND.

mented by
," and the
lose. For
•ke may be
n him, and
is best seen

d reached
le to have

entered into the thought of not a single European statesman. What
startled men most at the moment was the discovery that England
herself was far from being ruined by the greatness of her defeat. She
rose from it indeed stronger and more vigorous than ever. Never
had she shown a mightier energy than in the struggle against France
which followed only ten years after her loss of America, nor did she
ever stand higher among the nations than on the day of Waterloo.
Her real greatness, however, lay not in the old world but in the new.
She was from that hour a mother of nations. In America she had
begotten a great people, and her emigrant ships were still to carry
on the movement of the Teutonic race from which she herself had
sprung. Her work was to be colonization. Her settlers were to
dispute Africa with the Kaffir and the Hottentot ; they were to build
up in the waters of the Pacific colonies as great as those which she
had lost in America. And to the nations that she founded she was
to give not only her blood and her speech, but the freedom which
she had won. It is the thought of this which flings its ^landcur round
the pettiest details of cur story in the past. The history of France has
little result beyond France itself. German or Italian history has no
direct issue outside the bounds of Germany or Italy. But England
is only a small part of the outcome of English history. Its greater
issues lie not within the narrow limits of the mother island, but in the
destinies of nations yet to be. The struggles of her patriots, the
wisdom of her statesmen, the steady love of liberty and law in her
people at large, were shaping in the past of our httle island thf future
of mankind.

Meanwhile the rapid developement of industrial energy and industrial
wealth in England itself was telling on the conditions of English
statesmanship. Though the Tories and " King's friends " had now
grown to a compact body of a hundred and fifty members, the Whigs,
who held office under Lord Rockingham, were superior to their rivals
in numbers and political character, now that the return of the Bedford
section to the general body of the party during its steady opposition
to the American war had restored much of its old cohesion. But this
reunion only strengthened their aristocratic and exclusive tendencies,
and widened the breach which was steadily opening on questions such
as Parliamentary Reform, between the bulk of the Whig party and the
small fragment which remained true to the more popular sympathies of
Chatham. Lord Shelburne stood at the head of the Chatham party, and
it was reinforced at this moment by the entry into Parliament of the
second son of Chatham himself. William Pitt had hardly reached his
twenty-second year ; but he left college with the learning of a ripe
scholar, and his ready and sonorous eloquence had been matured by his
father's teaching. " He will be one of the first men in Parliament,"
said a member to the Whig leader, Charles Fox, after Pitt's first

3 E 2 .

787

skc. in.

Thk

Si'XONII

Pitt
1783

1793

The

Rock-

ingham

Ministry

Ml i

788

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.

The

Second
Pitt

1783

1793

Economical
Reform

1732

The
CM>alitioii

speech in the House of Commons. " He is so already," replied Fox.
The haughty self-esteem of the new statesman breathed in every
movement of his tall, spare figure, in the hard lines of a countenance
which none but his closer friends saw lighted by a smile, in his cold
and repulsive address, his invariable gravity of demeanour, and his
hi. Uual air of command. How great the qualities were which lay
beneath this haughty exterior no one knew ; nor had any one guessed
how soon this " boy," as his rivals mockingly styled him, was to crush
every opponent and to hold England at his will. He refused any
minor post in the Rockingham Administration, claiming, if he took
office at all, to be at once admitted to the Cabinet. But Pitt had
no desire to take office under Rockingham. To him as to Chatham
the main lesson of the war was the need of putting an end to those
abuses in the composition of Parliament by which George the Third
had been enabled to plunge the country into it. A thorough reform
of the House of Commons was the only effectual means of doing
this, and Pitt brought forward a bill founded on hi& father's plans
for that purpose. But the great bulk of the Whigs could not re-
solve on the sacrifice of property and influence which such a reform
would involve. Pitt's bill was thrown out ; and in its stead the
Ministry endeavoured to weaken the means of corrupt influence which
the King had unscrupulously used, by disqualifying persons holding
government contracts from sitting in Parliament, by depriving revenue
officers of the elective franchise (a measure which diminished the
influence of the Crown in seventy boroughs), and above all by a
bill for the reduction of the civil establishment, of the pension list,
and of the secret service fund, which was brought in by Burke,
These measures were to a great extent effectual in diminishing the
influence of the Crown over Parliament, and they are memorable as
marking the date when the direct bribery of members absolutely
ceased. But they were absolutely inoperative in rendering the House
of Commons really representative of or responsible to the people of
England. The jealousy which the mass of the Whigs entertained of the
Chatham section and its plans was more plainly shown on the death of
Lord Rockingham in July. Shelburne was no sooner called to the
head of the Ministry than Fox, who acted on personal grounds, and
the bulk of Rockingham's followers resigned. Pitt on the other hand
accepted office as Chancellor of the Exchequer.

The Shelburne Ministry only lasted long enough to conclude the
final peace with the United States ; for in the opening of 1783 it was
overthrown by the most unscrupulous coalition known in our history,
that of the Whig followers of Fox with the Tories who still clung 10
Lord North. Never had the need of representative reform been more
clearly shown than by a coalition which proved how powerless was the
force of public opinion to check even the most shameless faction in

Parlian:
measun
the peo]
Pitt's re
majoritj
heedless
Commoi
yet taxec
dominioi
niere coi
transfer
to a boa
was vest
the Crow
moveable
was at or
an injudi
destitute
Company
actual Mi
exercising
this India
The mere
merchant-
of a chart(
ferring the
the faults (
it. To g
ing House
a body wh
was the s
to exert hi
on its defe
ber 1783 P
position w<
its nomina
large majo
shower of
Oxford as
opinion wt
general ser
the teeth o
solution of
ripening o
When ♦he

iAP.

Fox.

very

ance

cold

ihis

1 lay

essed

crush

I any

J took

:thad

itham

those

Third

reform j

doing
plans

lot re-
reform

ad the

I which

lolding

evenue

ed the

.1 by a

[on list,
Burke,

ing the

[able as

lolutely

House

loplo of

Id of the

leath of

to the

ids, and

ir hand

x.l

MODERN ENGLAND.

Parliament, how completely the lessening of the royal influence by the
measures of Burke and Rockingham had tended to the profit, not of
the people, but of the borough-mongers who usurped its representation.
Pitt's renewed proposal of Parliamentary Reform was rejected by a
majority of two to one. Secure in their Parliamentary majority, and
heedless of the power of public opinion without the walls of the House of
Commons, the new Ministers entered boldly on a greater task than had as
yet taxed the constructive genius of English statesmen. To leave such a
dominion as Warren Hastings had built up in India to the control of a
mere company of traders was clearly impossible ; and Fox proposed to
transfer the political government from the Directors of the Company
to a board of seven Commissioners. The appointment of the seven
was vested in the first instance in Parliament, and afterwards in
the Crown ; their office was to be held for five years, but they were re-
moveable on address from either House of Parliament. The proposal
was at once met with a storm of opposition. The scheme indeed was
an injudicious one ; for the new Commissioners would have been
destitute of that practical knowledge of India which belonged to the
Company, while the want of any immediate link between them and the
actual Ministry of the Crown would have prevented Parliament from
exercising an efifective control over their acts. But the real faults of
this India Bill were hardly noticed in the popular outcry against it.
The merchant-class was galled by the blow levelled at the greatest
merchant-body in the realm : corporations trembled at the cancelling
of a charter ; the King viewed the measure as a mere means of trans-
ferring the patronage of India to the Whigs. With the nation at large
the faults of the bill lay in the character of the Ministry which proposed
it. To give the rule and patronage of India over to the exist-
ing House of Commons was to give a new and immense power to
a body which misused in the grossest way the power it possessed. It
was the sense of this popular feeling which encouraged the King
to exert his personal influence to defeat the measure in the Lords, and
on its defeat to order his Ministers to deliver up the seals. In Decem-
ber 1783 Pitt accepted the post of First Lord of the Treasury ; but his
position would at once have been untenable had the country gone with
its nominal representatives. He was defeated again and again by
large majorities in the Commons ; but the majorities dwindled as a
shower of addresses from every quarter, from the Tory University of
Oxford as from the Whig Corporation of London, proved that public
opinion went with the Minister and not with the House. It was the
general sense of this which justified Pitt in the firmness with which, in
the teeth of addresses for his removal from office, he delayed the dis-
solution of Parliament for five months, and gained time for that
ripening of national sentiment on which he counted for success.
When *he elections of 1784 came the struggle was at once at an end.

789

Skc. III.

The

Second
Pitt

1783

1793

The India
Bill

Fall of the
Coalition

I- I

790

HISTORY OF THE KNGLTSH PEOPLE.

[rHAK

Sec. III.

The

Second
Pitt

1783

1703

William
Pitt

The public feeling had become strong enough to break through the
corrupt influences which commonly governed its representation. Every
great constituency returned supporters to Pitt ; of the majority which
had defeated him in the Commons a hundred and sixty members were
unseated ; and only a fragment of the Whig party was saved by its
command of nomination boroughs.

When • Parliament came together after the overthrow of the
Coalition, the Minister of twenty-five was master of England as
no Minister had been before. Even the King yielded to his sway,
partly through gratitude for the triumph he had won for him over
the Whigs, partly from a sense of the madness which was soon to
strike him down, but still more from a gradual discovery that the
triumph which he had won over his political rivals had been won, not
to the profit of the crown, but of the nation at large. The Whigs,
it was true, were broken, unpopular, and without a policy, while the
Tories clung to the Minister who had " saved the King." But it
was the support of a new political power that really gave his strength
to the young Minister. The sudden rise of English industry was
pushing the manufacturer to the front ; and all that the trading classes
loved in Chatham, his nobleness of temper, his consciousness of power,
his patriotism, his sympathy with a wider world than the world within
the Parliament-house, they saw in his son. He had little indeed of
die poetic and imaginative side of Chatham's genius, of his quick
perception of what was just and what was possible, his far-reaching
conceptions of national policy, his outlook into the future of the
world. Pitt's flowing and sonorous commonplaces rang hollow beside
the broken phrases which still make his father's eloquence a living
thing to Englishmen. On the other hand he possessed some qualities
in which Chatham was utterly wanting. His temper, though naturally
ardent and sensitive, had been schooled in a proud self-command.
His simplicity and good taste freed him from his father's ostentation
and extravagance. Diffuse and commonplace as his speeches seem,
they were adapted as much by their very qualities of dififuseness
and commonplace as by their lucidity and good sense to the intelli-
gence of the middle classes whom Pitt felt to be his real audience.
In his love of peace, his immense industry, his despatch of busi-
ness, his skill in debate, his knowledge of finance, he recalled Sir
Robert Walpole ; but he had virtues which Walpole never possessed,
and he was free from Walpole's worst defects. He was careless of
personal gain. He was too proud to rule by corruption. His lofty
self-esteem left no room for any jealousy of subordinates. He was
generous in his appreciation of youthful merits ; and the " boys " be
gathered round him, such as Canning and Lord Wellesley, rewarded
his generosity by a devotion which death left untouched. With
Walpole's cynical inaction Pitt had no sympathy whatever. His

policy froi

one of th

Walpole ]

of his fell

humanity.

fathei-'s lo^

prejudice '

he had noi

jealousy of

Pitt answe

the enemy

and the h

the eightet

race, was e

such as Ti

love of mai

can only t

which he 1

secured by

But he ros<

the practics

Pitt's stn

the growth

to a great

Population

advance of

war had adi

was hardly

with that c

was to ma

already stoc

George the

The wool-tr

Riding of "!

manufactun

Bolton, an(

eighteenth (

of fifty thous

in the linen

The process

of productio

wheel that t

as yet spun

sitting with

processes of

MODERN ENGLAND.

791

policy from the first was one of active reform, and he faced every
one of the problems, financial, constitutional, religious, from which
Walpole had shrunk. Above all he had none of Wal pole's scorn
of his fellow-men. The noblest feature in his mind was its wide
humanity. His love for England was as deep and personal as his
fathei-'s love, but of the sympathy with English passion and English
prejudice which had been at once his fat^ ^s weakness and strength
he had not a trace. When Fox taunted him with forgetting Chatham's
jealousy of France and his faith that she was the natural foe of England,
Pitt answered nobly that " to suppose any nation can be unalterably
the enemy of another is weak and childish." The temper of the time
and the larger sympathy of man with man, which especially marks
the eighteenth century as a turning-point in the history of the human
race, was everywhere bringing to the front a new order of statesmen,
such as Turgot and Joseph the Second, whose characteristics were a
love of mankind, and a belief that as the happiness of the individual
can only be secured by the general happiness of the community to
which he belongs, so the welfare of individual nations can only be
secured by the general welfare of the world. Of these Pitt was one.
But he rose high above the rest in the consummate knowledge, and
the practical force which he brought to the realization of his aims.

Pitt's strength lay in finance ; and he came forward at a time when
the growth of English wealth made a knowledge of finance essential
to a great minister. The progress of the nation was wonderful.
Population more than doubled during the eighteenth century, and the
advance of wealth was even greater than that of population. The
war had added a hundred millions to the national debt, but the burden
was hardly felt. The loss of America only increased the commerce
with that country ; and industry had begun that great career which
was to make Britain the workshop of the world. Though England
already stood in the first rank of commercial states at the accession of
George the Third, her industrial life at home was mainly agricultural.
The wool-trade had gradually established itself in Norfolk, the West
Riding of Yorkshire, and the counties of the south-west ; while the
manufacture of cotton was still almost limited to Manchester and
Bolton, and remained so unimportant that in the middle of the
eighteenth century the export of cotton goods hardly reached the value
of fifty thousand a year. There was the same slow and steady progress
in the linen trade of Belfast and Dundee, and the silks of Spitalfields.
The processes of manufacture were too rude to allow any large increase
of production. It was only where a stream gave force to turn a mill-
wheel that the wool-worker could establish his factory ; and cotton was
as yet spun by hand in the cottages, the " spinsters " of the family
sitting with their distaffs round the weaver's handloom. But had the
processes of manufacture been more efficient, they would have been, ren-

Sec. III.

The

Second

Pitt

1788

1783

Enffliah
Industry

Manufac-
tures

Roads and
canals

iV '!,

792

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.

Thk

Second

Pitt

1783

1793

Coal and
Iron

The Steam-
Engine

Adam
Smith

dered useless by the want of a cheap and easy means of transport.
The older main roads, which had lasted fairly through the middle
ages, had broken down in later times before the growth of traffic
and the increase of wagons and carriages. The new lines of trade
lay often along mere country lanes which had never been more than
horse-tracks. Much of the woollen trade therefore had to be carried
on by means of long trains of pack-horses ; and in the case of yet
heavier goods, such as coal, distribution was almost impracticable,
save along the greater rivers or in districts accessible from the sea.
A new aera began when the engineering genius of Brindley joined
Manchester with its port of Liverpool in 1767 by a canal which
crossed the Irwell on a lofty aqueduct ; the success of the experiment
soon led to the universal introduction of water-carriage, and Great
Britain was traversed in every direction by three thousand miles
of navigable canals. At the same time a new importance was
given to the coal which lay beneath the soil of England. The
stores of iron which had lain side by side with it in the northern
counties had lain there unworked through the scarcity of wood,
which was looked upon as the only fuel by which it could be smelted.
In the middle of the eighteenth century a process for smelting iron
with coal turned out to be effective ; and the whole aspect of the
iron-trade was at once revolutionized. Iron was to become the
working material of the modern world ; and it is its production of
iron which more than all else has placed England at the head of
industrial Europe. The value of coal as a means of producing
mechanical force was revealed in the discovery by which Watt in
1765 transformed the Steam-Engine from a mere toy into the most
wonderful instrument which human industry has ever had at its
command. The invention came at a moment when the existing
supply of manual labour could no longer cope with the demands of
the manufacturers. Three successive inventions in twelve years, that
of the spinning-jenny in 1764 by the weaver Hargreaves, of the
spinning-machine in 1768 by the barber Arkwright, of the " mule" by
the weaver Crompton in 1776, were followed by the discovery of the
power-loom. But these would have been comparatively useless had it
not been for the revelation of a new and inexhaustible labour-force in
the steam-engine. It was the combination of such a force with such
means of applying it that enabled Britain during the terrible years of
her struggle with France and Napoleon to all but monopolize the
woollen and cotton trades, and raised her into the greatest manufac-
turing country that the world had seen.

To deal wisely with such a growth required a knowledge of the
laws of wealth which would have been impossible at an earlier time.
But it had become possible in the days of Pitt. If books are to be
measured by the effect which they have produced on the fortunes of

X.J

MODERN ENGLAND.

mankind, the " Wealth of N ations " must rank among the greatest
of books. Its author was Adam Smith, nn Oxford scholar and a
professor at Glasgow. Labour, he contended, was the one source of
wealth, and it was by freedom of labour, by suffering the worker to
pursue his own interest in his own way, that the public wealth would
best be promoted. Any attempt to force labour into artificial channels,
to shape by laws the course of commerce, to promote special branches
of industry in particular countries, or to fix the character of the in-
tercourse between one country and another, is not only a wrong to the
worker or the merchant, but actually hurtful to the wealth of a state.
The book was published in 1776, at the opening of the American
war, and studied by Pitt during his career as an undergraduate .it
Cambridge. From that time he owned Adam Smith for his master.
He had hardly become Minister before he took the principles of
the " Wealth of Nations" as the groundwork of his policy. The ten
earlier years of his rule marked a new point of departure in English
statesmanship. Pitt was the first English Minister who really grasped
the part which industry was to play in promoting the welfare of the
world. He was not only a peace Minister and a financier, as Walpole
had been, but a statesman who saw that the best security for peace lay
in the freedom and widening of commercial intercourse between
nations ; that public economy not only lessened the general burdens
but left additional capital in the hands of industry ; and that finance
might be turned from a mere means of raising revenue into a powerful
engine of political and social improvement. '

That little was done by Pitt himself to carry these principles into
effect was partly owing to the mass of ignorance and prejudice with
which he had to contend, and still more to the sudden break of
his plans through the French Revolution. His power rested above all
on the trading classes, and these were still persuaded that wealth
meant gold and silver, and that commerce was best furthered by
jealous monopolies. It was only by patience and dexterity that the
mob of merchants and country squires who backed him in the House
of Commons could be brought to acquiesce in the changes he proposed.
How small his power was when it struggled with the prejudices around
him was seen in the failure of the first great measure he brought for-
ward. The question of parliamentary reform which had been mooted
during the American war had been steadily coming to the front.
Chatham had advocated an increase of county members, who were
then the most independent part of the Lower House. The Duke of
Richmond talked of universal suffrage, equal electoral districts, and
annual Parliaments. Wilkes anticipated the Reform Bill of a later
time by proposing to disfranchise the rotten boroughs, and to give
members in their stead to the counties and to the more populous and
wealthy towns. William Pitt had made the question his own by

793

Sfx. III.

Tub

Second

Pitt

1783

1793

Pitt and
Reform

"•f

i i

P !

794

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.

Thb

Second
Pitt

1783

1793

Pitt's
Finance

bringing foiward a motion for reform on his first entry into the House,
and one of his first measures as Minister was to bring in a bill in 1785
which, while providing for the gradual extinction of all decayed
boroughs, disfranchised thirty-six at once, and transferred their mem-
bers to counties. He brought the King to abstain from opposition, and
strove to buy off the borough-mongers, as the holders of rotten
boroughs were called, by offering to compensate them for the seats
they lost at their market value. But the bulk of his own party joined
the bulk of the Whigs in a steady resistance to the bill. The more
glaring abuses, indeed, within Parliament itself, the abuses which stirred
Chatham and Wilkes to action, had in great part disappeared. The
bribery of members had ceased. Burke's Bill of Economical Reform
had just dealt a fatal blow at the influence which the King exercised
by suppressing a host of useless offices, household appointments,
judicial and diplomatic charges, which were maintained for the
purposes of corruption. Above all, the recent triumph of public
opinion to which Pitt owed his power had done much to diminish
the sense of any real danger from the opposition which Parliament
had shown till now to the voice of the nation. " Terribly disappointed
and beat" as Wilberforce tells us Pitt was by the rejection of his
measure, the temper of the House and of the people was too plain
to be mistaken, and though his opinion remained unaltered, he never
brought it forward again.

The failure of his constitutional reform was more than compensated
by the triumphs of his finance. When he entered office public credit
was at its lowest ebb. The debt had been doubled by the American
war, yet large sums still remained unfunded, while the revenue was
reduced by a vast system of smuggling which turned every coast-
town into a nest of robbers. The deficiency was met for the moment
by new taxes, but the time which was thus gained served to change
the whole face of public affairs. The first of Pitt's financial measures
— his plan for gradually paying off the debt by a sinking fund — was
undoubtedly an error ; but it had a happy effect in restoring public
confidence. He met the smuggler by a reduction of Custom-duties
which made his trade unprofitable. He revived Walpole's plan of an
Excise. Meanwhile the public expenses were reduced, and commission
after commission was appointed to introduce economy into every
department of the public service. The rapid developement of the
national industry which we have already noted no doubt aided the
success of these measures. Credit was restored. The smuggling
trade was greatly reduced. In two years there was a surplus of a
million, and though duty after duty was removed the revenue rose
steadily with every remission of taxation. Meanwhile Pitt was showing
the political value of the new finance in a wider field. Ireland, then
as now, was England's difficulty. The tyrannous misgovernment under

which she
ducing its
faction, reli
had the att
the Americ
relinquish i
much at lea
poverty. 1
stationary a
the direct n
protect Jhe
England wa
and weaver;
this wrong ^
introduced i
between En|
would " drav
repair in par
Ireland; an(
from the Wli
the English
ensured its
spurred him
upon as En
Treaty of Cc
countries to i
away with al
import duty.
India owe:
unchanged t(
preserved in
Directors, wh
of the Privy
Practically, }
sorbed by a s
whom all the 1
by the bill, m
cised by its P
of State for tl
I of each Mini;
Parliament, t
general syster
supplied the <
be deficient.
English peopr

CHAP.

•1

MODEKN KNGLAND.

19$

ilouse,
n 1785
ecayed
• mem-
3n,and

rotten
e seats

joined
le more
I stirred
The
Reform
cercised
itments,
for the
F pubhc
liminish
rliament
apointed
n of his
00 plain
he never

pensated
lie credit
American
;nue was
•y coast-
moment
change
measures
md— was
ng public
jm-duties
Ian of an
mmission
ito every
nt of the
aided the
smuggling
rplus of a
enue rose
,s showing
land, then
lent under

which she had groaned ever since the battle of the Boyne was pro-
ducing its natural fruit ; the miserable land was torn with political
faction, religious feuds and peasant conspiracies ; and so threatening
had the attitude of the Protestant party which ruled it become during
the American war that they had forced the English Parliament to
relinquish its control over their Parliament in Dublin. Pitt saw that
much at least of the misery and disloyalty of Ireland sprang from its
poverty. The population had grown rapidly while culture remained
stationary and commerce perished. And of this poverty much was
the direct result of unjust law. Ireland was a grazing country, but to
protect \he interest of English graziers the import of its cattle into
England was forbidden. To protect the intere ..j of English clothiers
and weavers, its manufactures were loaded with duties. To redress
this wrong was the first financial effort of Pitt, and the bill which he
introduced in 1785 did away with every obstacle to freedom of trade
between England and Ireland. It was a measure which, as he held,
would " draw what remained of the shattered empire together," and
repair in part the loss of America by creating a loyal and prosperous
Ireland ; and struggling almost alone in face of a fierce opposition
from the Whigs and the Manchester merchants, he dragged it through
the English Parliament, only to see amendments forced into it which
ensured its rejection by the Irish Parliament. But the defeat only
spurred him to a greater effort elsewhere. France had been looked
upon as England's natural enemy ; but in 1787 he concluded a
Treaty of Commerce with France which enabled the subjects of both
countries to reside and travel in either without license or passport, did
away with all prohibition of trade on either side, and reduced every
import duty.

India owes to Pitt's triumph a form of government which remained
unchanged to our own day. The India Bill which he carried in 1784
preserved in appearance the political and commercial powers of the
Directors, while establishing a Board of Control, formed from members
of the Privy Council, for the approval or annulling of their acts.
Practically, however, the powers of the Board of Directors were ab-
sorbed by a secret committee of three elected members of that body, to
whom all the more important administrative functions had been reserved
by the bill, while those of the Board of Control were virtually exer-
cised by its President. As the President was in effect a new Secretary
of State for the Indian Department, and became an important member
of each Ministry, responsible like his fellow-members for his action to
Parliament, the administration of India was thus made a part of the
general system of the English Government ; while the secret committee
supplied the experience of Indian affairs in which the Minister might
be deficient. Meanwhile the new temper that was growing up in the
English people told on the attitude of England towards its great depend-

Sec. III.

THE

Second
Pitt

1783

17»3

The

THal of

Hastinya

ink

796

Skc. III.

The

Sfcond
Pitt

1783

1786

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CIIAP. I xj

The
Slave
Trade

ency. Discussions over rival plans of Indian administration diffused a

sense of national responsibility for its good government, and there was a

general resolve that the security against injustice and misrule which

was enjoyed by the poorest Englishman should be enjoyed by the

poorest Hindoo. This resolve expressed itself in the trial of Warren

Hastings. Hastings returned from India at the close of the war with

the hope of rewards as great as those of Clive. He had saved all

that Clive had won. He had laid the foundation of a vast empire

in the East. He had shown rare powers of administration, and the

foresight, courage, and temperance which mark the born ruler of men.

But the wisdom and glory of his rule could not hide its terrible ruth-

lessness. He v/as charged with having sold for a vast sum the services

of British troops to crush the free tribes of the Rohillas, with having

wrung half a million by extortion from the Rajah of Benares, with

having extorted by torture and starvation more than a million from

the Princesses of Oudh. He was accused of having kept his hold upon I Revolutfon

power by measures as unscrupulous, and with having murdered a I govern itself

native who opposed him by an abuse of the forms of English law. On

almost all these charges the cooler judgement of later enquirers has

acquitted Warren Hastings of guilt. Personally there can be little

doubt that he had done much to secure to the new subjects of Britain

into the Va

Wilberforcc

party gave

to bring in

fell before 1

general indi

which breatl

culties at h

nation agaii

more fatal 1

his measures

growing into

So far as

seventeenth (

tendency of

callyestablisl
from the hig
same law. '
influence on |

a just and peaceable government. What was hardest and most pitilessi prevented fro
in his rule had been simply a carrying out of the system of administraJ social traditioi
tion which was native to India and which he found existing there I commoners.
But such a system was alien from the new humanity of Englishmen ;■ classes, and tl
and few dared to vindicate Hastings when Burke in words of passion-lfrom the lowe
ate earnestness moved for his impeachment. The great trial lingeredlsense of edu<
on for years, and in the long run Hastings secured an acquittal. Butlstruggle as th(
the end at which the impeachment aimed had really been won. ThJother great st;
attention, the sympathy of Englishmen had been drawn across distanJof freedom,
seas to a race utterly strange to them ; and the peasant of Cornwallsupreme in re
or Cumberland had learned how to thrill at the suffering of a peasant rigid division
of Bengal. at large any e

Even while the trial was going on a yet wider extension of Englisl seen how aliei
sympathy made itself felt. In the year which followed the adop which the wid
tion of free trade with France the new philanthropy allied itself will ivas spreading
the religious movement created by the Wesleys in an attack 01 enlightened rt
the Slave Trade. One of the profits which England bought by th( to satisfy the s
triumphs of Marlborough was a right to a monopoly of the slave tradi af sovereigns 1
between Africa and the Spanish dominions ; and it was England tha n Austria am
had planted slavery in her American colonies and her West Indiai luch as Turgc
islands. But the horrors and iniquity of the trade, the ruin and degra )etween the a]
dation of Africa which it brought about, the oppression of the negr v^s felt most!
himself, were now felt widely and deeply. " After a conversation i nore completl
the open air at the root of an old tree, just above the steep desceii )ublic affairs

[chap. I X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

797

ffused a
re was a
e which

by the
"Warren
kvar with
saved all
t empire

and the
r of men.
ible ruth-
; services
;h having
ires, with
lion from
[lold upon
irdered a
law. On
uirers has
1 be little

into the Vale of Keston," with the younger Pitt, his friend, William
Wilberforce, whose position ^s a representative of the evanjjelical
party gave weight to his advocacy of such a cause, resolved in 1788
to bring in a bill for the abolition of the slave trade. lUit the bill
fell before the opposition of the Liverpool slave merchants and the
general indifference of the House of Commons. The spirit of humanity
which breathed through Pitt's policy had indeed to wrestle with difiti-
culties at home and abroad ; and his efforts to sap the enmity of
nation against nation by a freer intercourse encountered a foe even
more fatal than English prejudice, in the very movement of which
his measures formed a part. Across the Channel this movement was
growing into a revolution which was to change the face of the world.

So far as England was concerned the Puritan resistance of the
seventeenth century had in the end succeeded in checking the general
tendency of the time to religious and political despotism. Since the
Revolution of 1688 freedom of conscience and the people's right to
govern itself through its representatives in Parliament had been practi-
cally established. Social equality had begun long before. Every man
from the highest to the lowest was subject to, and protected by, the
same law. The English aristocracy, though exercising a powerful
of Britainl influence on government, were possessed of few social privileges, and
ost pitilessi prevented from forming a separate class in the nation by the legal and
dministra-l social tradition which counted all save the eldest son of a noble house as
ing there I commoners. No impassable line parted the gentry from the commercial
glishmen ;| classes, and these again possessed no privileges which could part them
jf passion-lfrom the lower classes of the community. Public opinion, the general
al lingeredl sense of educated Englishmen, had established itself after a short
ittal. Butlstruggle as the dominant element in En^^ Ush government. But in all the
«ron. ThJother great states of Europe the wars of religion had left only the name
oss distanJof freedom. Government tended to a pure despotism. Privilege was
Cornwallsupreme in religion, in politics, in society. Society itself rested on a
a peasanirigid division of classes from one another, which refused to the people
jat large any equal rights of justice or of industry. We have already
of Englisllseen how alien such a conception of national life was from the ideas
the adoplwhich the wide diffusion of intelligence during the eighteenth century
itself witlwas spreading throughout Europe ; and in almost every country some
attack oJenlightened rulers endeavoured by administrative reforms in some sort
jght by thito satisfy the sense of wrong which was felt around them. The attempts
slave tradi)f sovereigns like Frederick the Great in Prussia, and Joseph the Second
gland tbain Austria and the Netherlands, were rivalled by the efforts of statesmen
/^est India&uch as Turgot in France. It was in France indeed that the contrast
and degra )etween the actual state of society and the new ideas of public right
f the negri vas felt most keenly. Nowhere had the victory of the Crown been
/ersation i nore complete. The aristocracy had been robbed of all share in
eep descei mblic affairs ; it enjoyed social privileges and exemption from any

Skc. III.

The

Skcono

FiTT

17S3

1793

BnclMid

and
Bnrop*

I ',:

7qS

msToKv (M' Tiir-: knclfsii pkoplf.

r*'»rAp.

x.l

Src. III.

Tub

Srconu

Pitt

178S

1793

State of

France

contribution to the public burdens, without thiit -ense of public duty
which a governing class to some degree always possesses. Guilds and
monopolies fettered the industry of the trader and the merchant, and
cut them off from the working classes, as the value attached to nohio
blood cut off both from the aristocracy.

If its political position indeed were compared with that of most
of the countries round it, France stood high. Its government was less
oppressive, its general wealth was larger and more evenly diffused,
there was a better administration of justice, and greater security for
public order. Poor as its peasantry seemed to English eyes, they were
far above the peasants of Germany or Spain. It^ middle class was the
quickest and most intelligent in Europe. Under Lewis the Fifteenth
opinion was practically free ; and a literary class had sprung up which
devoted itself with wonderful brilliancy and activity to popularizing the
ideas of social and political justice which it learned from English
writers, and in the case of Montesquieu and Voltaire from personal
contact with English life. The moral conceptions of the time, its love
of mankind, its sense of human brotherhood, its hatred of oppression,
its pity for the guilty and the poor, its longing after a higher and nobler
standard of life and action, were expressed by a crowd of writers, and
above all by Rousseau, with a fire and eloquence which carried them
to the heart of the people. But this new force of intelligence only
jostled roughly with the social forms with which it found itself in
contact. The philosopher denounced the tyranny of the priesthood.
The peasant gp-umbled at the lord's right to judge him in his courts and
to exact feudal services from him. The merchant was galled by the
trading restrictions and the heavy taxation. The country gentry rebelled
against their exclusion from public life and from the government of the
country. Its powerlessness to bring about any change at home turned
all this new energy into sympathy with a struggle against tyranny
abroad. Public opinion forced France to ally itself with America in
its contest for liberty, and French volunteers under the Marquis de
Lafayette joined Washington's army. But while the American war
spread more widely throughout the nation the craving for freedom,
it brought on the Government financial embarrassment from which it
could only free itself by an appeal to the country at large. Lewis
the Sixteenth resolved to summon the States-General, which had not
met since the time of Richelieu, and to appeal to the nobles to waive
their immunity from taxation. His resolve at once stirred into
vigorous life every impulse and desire which had been seething in
the minds of the people ; and the States-General no sooner met at
Versailles in May 1789 than the fabric of depotism and privilege
began to crumble. A rising in Paris destroyed the Bastille, and the
capture of this fortress was taken for the sign of a new aera of constitu
tional freedom in France and through Europe. Even in England men

thrilled w
this the g
with a bui
Pitt reg
had long I
distrust,
attack of r
a right to
Wales. T
travelling i
the Prince
Pitt succes
case the rij
would, lay
on the Prir
Houses wh
Foreign dii
into greatn
solved fron
Turks from
stantinople.
Frederick tl
of the whol
seated a no
with the E
to a share
Russian frc
the Dniepei
Frederick h
tion of her
was at an ei
for the anm
her most w
hands for
watchful, an
with Ameri(
two countri
but destroy
been restore
cessor in
weight was
in 1789 for
struggle see
of France
danger pas

fruAp.

lie duty
Ids iiiul
int, and
1 nobln

?>( most
was less
diffused,
urity for
tiey were
; was the
Mfteenth
Lip which
izing the
English
personal
», its love
jpression,
nd nobler
iters, and
ried them
ence only
I itself in
riesthood.
:ourts and
led by the
■y rebelled
lent of the
me turned
st tyranny
merica in
larquis de
;rican war
r freedom,
m which it I
Te. Lewis
:h had not
;s to waive
iirred into
eething in
ner met at
d privilege
le, and the|
of constitu-
igland menl

x.l

MODERN KNCI.ANn.

799

thrilled with a strange joy at the tidings of its fall. " How much is
this the greatest event that ever happened in the world,'" Fox cried
with a burst of enthusiasm, " and how much the best ! "

Pitt regarded the approach of France to sentiments of liberty which
had long been familiar to England with greater coolness, but with no
distrust. For the moment indeed his attention was distracted by an
attack of madness which visited the King in 1788, and by the claim of
a right to the Regency which was at once advanced by the Prince of
Wales. The Prince belonged to the Whig party ; and Fox, who was
travelling in Italy, hurried home to support his claim, in full belief that
the Prince's Regency would be followed by his own return to power.
Pitt successfully resisted it on the constitutional ground that in such a
case the right to choose a temporary legent, under what limitations it
would, lay with Parliament ; and a bill which conferred the Regency
on the Prince, in accordance with this view, was already passing the
Houses when the recovery of the King put an end to the long dispute.
Foreign difficulties, too, absorbed Pitt's attention. Russia had risen
into greatness under Catharine the Second ; and Catharine had re-
solved from the first on the annexation of Poland, the expulsion of the
Turks from Europe, and the setting up of a Russian throne at Con-
stantinople. In her first aim she was baffled for the moment by
Frederick the Great. She had already made herself virtually mistress
of the whole of Poland, her armies occupied the kingdom, and she had
seated a nominee of her own on its throne, when Frederick in union
with the Emperor Joseph the Second forced her to admit Germany
to a share of the spoil. If the Polish partition of 1773 brought the
Russian frontier westward to the upper waters of the Dvvina and
the Dnieper, it gave G^licia to Maria Theresa, and West Prussia to
Frederick himself. Foiled in her first aim, she waited for the realiza-
tion of her second till the alliance between the two German powers
was at an end through the resistance of Prussia to Joseph's schemes
for the annexation of Bavaria, and till the death of Frederick removed
her most watchful foe. Then in 1788 Joseph and the Empress joined
hands for a partition of the Turkish Empire. But Prussia was still
watchful, and England was no longer fettered as in 1773 by troubles
with America. The friendship established by Chatham between the
two countries, which had been suspended by Bute's treachery and all
but destroyed during the Northern League of Neutral Powers, had
been restored by Pitt through his co-operation with Frederick's suc-
cessor in the restoration of the Dutch Statholderate. Its political
weight was now seen in an alliance of England, Prussia, and Holland
in 1789 for the preservation of the Turkish Empire. A great European
struggle seemed at hand ; and in such a struggle the sympathy and aid
of France was of the highest importance. But with the treaty the
danger passed away. In the spring of 1790 Joseph died broken-

S|.L. Ill

Tmr

Skcond

Hut

1783

1793

Pitt and
RuaaU

Lea/fue
against
Kuisia

8oo

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc III.

THE

Skconi)
Pitt

1783

1703

Pitt and
France

England

and the

Revolution

Nootka
Sound

hearted at the failure of his plans and the revolt of the Netherlands
against his innovations ; and Austria practically withdrew from the
war with the Turks.

Meanwhile in France things moved fast. By breaking down the
division between its separate orders the States-General became a
National Assembly, which abolished the privileges of the provincial
parliaments, of the nobles, and the Church. In October the mob of
Paris marched on Versailles and forced the King to return with them
to the capital ; and a Constitution hastily put together was accepted
by Lewis thv» Sixteenth in the stead of his old despotic power. To
Pitt the tumult and disorder with which these great changes were
wrought seemed transient matters. In January 1790 he still believed
that " the present convulsions in France must sooner or later culmin-
ate in general harmony and regular order," and that when her own
freedom was established, " France would stand forth as one of the
most brilliant powers of Europe." But the coolness and good-will
with which Pitt looked on the Revolution was far from being universal
in the nation at large. The cautious good sense of the bulk of
Englishmen, their love of order and law, their distaste for violent
changes and for abstract theories, as well as their reverence for the
past, were fast rousing throughout the country a dislike of the
revolutionary changes which were hurrying on across the Channel ;
and both the political sense and the political prejudice of the nation
were being fired by the warnings of Edmund Burke. The fall of the
Bastille, though it kindled enthusiasm in Fox, roused in Burke only dis-
trust. " Whenever a separation is made between liberty and justice,"
he wrote a few weeks later, " neither is safe." The night cf the fourth
of August, when the privileges of every class were abolished, filled him
with horror. He saw, and rightly saw, in it the critical moment which
revealed the character of the Revolution, and his part was takea at
once. " The French," he cried in January, while Pitt was foretelling
a glorious future for the new Constitution, " the French have shown
themselves the ablest architects of ruin who have hitherto existed in
the world. In a short space of time they have pulled to the ground
their army, their navy, their commerce, their arts and their manufac-
tures." But in Parliament Burke stood alone. The* Whigs, though
distrustfully, followed Fox in his applause of the Revolution. The
Tories, yet more distrustfully, followed Pitt ; and Pitt warmly expressed
his sympathy with the constitutional government which was ruling
France. At this moment indeed the revolutionary party gave a signal
proof of its friendship for England. Irritated by an English settlement
at Nootka Sound in California, Spain appealed to France for aid in
accordance with the Fimily Compact : and the French Ministry, with
a party at its back which believed things had gone far enough, resolved
on a war as the best means of checking the progress of the Revolution

and restc
naturally
declaring
the Kir" ;
Governme
bounded i
revolution;
France. H
England w
interventio
of Dantzig
hard, a Ru
in Parliami
union of Ai
about a clo
the indeper
But whil(
Burke was r
indeed, to \
which had
Stamp Act
length of hi
argument, i
his passionc
and perplex
at last as "
thin at his
peachment (
of England
his repute h
now past six
he stood ui
loneliness wi
the embodin
of the past, j
the past ha
crumbling b
I molished an(
a night. A,
political reli
was at once
House was c
The « Reflec
October i79(
which sulliec

CHAP.

rlands
m the

vn the
Lme a
vincial
nob of

I them
:cepted
r. To
;s were
elieved
:ulmin-
ler own
! of the
3od-will
niversal
bulk of

violent
for the
of the

:hannel ;

B nation

II of the
inly dis-

Ijustice,"
le fourth
iUed him
Int which
Itakeii at
(retelling
le shown
isted in
ground
Inanufac-
1, though
.n. The
[xpressed
.s ruling
a signal
;ttlement
ir aid in
ilry, with
resolved
ivolution

X.]

MODERIJ ENGLAND.

and restoring the power of the Crown. The revolutionary party
naturally opposed this design ; after a bitter struggle the righl uf
declaring war, save with the sanction of the Assembly, was taken from
the Kir" ; and all danger of hostilities passed away. " The French
Government," Pitt asserted, "was bent on cultivating the most un-
bounded friendship for Great Hritain," and he saw no reason in its
revolutionary changes why Britain should not return the friendship of
France. He was convinced that nothing but the joint action of France and
England would in the end arrest the troubles of Eastern Europe. His
intervention foiled for the moment a fresh effort of Prussia to rob Poland
of Dantzig and Thorn. But though Russia was still pressing Turkey
hard, a Russian war was so unpopular in England that a hostile vote
in Parliament forced Pitt to discontinue his armaments ; and a fresh
union of Austria and Prussia, which promised at this juncture to bring
about a close of the Turkish struggle, promised also a fresh attack on
the independence of Poland.

But while Pitt was pleading for friendship between the two countries,
Burke was resolved to make friendship impossible. He had long ceased,
indeed, to have any hold over the House of Commons. The eloquence
which had vied with that of Chatham during the discussions on the
Stamp Act had become distasteful to the bulk of its members. The
length of his speeches, the profound and philosophical character of his
argument, the splendour and often the extravagance of his illustrations,
his passionate earnestness, his want of temper and discretion, wearied
and perplexed the squires and merchants about him. He was known
at last as " the dinner-bell of the House," so rapidly did its benches
thin at his rising. For a time his energies foun \ scope in the im-
peachment of Hastings ; and the grandeur of his appeals to the justice
of England hushed detraction. But with the close of the impeachment
his repute had again fallen ; and the approach of old age, for he was
now past sixty, seemed to counsel retirement from an assembly where
he stood unpopular and alone. But age and disappointment and
loneliness were all forgotten as Burke saw rising across the Channel
the embodiment of all that he hated — a Revolution founded on scorn
of the past, and threatening with ruin the whole social fabric which
the past had reared ; the ordered structure of classes and ranks
crumbling before a doctrine of social equality ; a State rudely de-
molished and reconstituted ; a Church and a Nobility swept away in
a night. Against the enthusiasm of what he rightiy saw to be a new
political religion he resolved to rouse the enthusiasm of the old. He
was at once a great orator and a great writer; and now that the
House was deaf to his voice, he appealed to the country by his pen.
The " Reflections on the French Revolution " which he published in
October 1790 not only denounced the acts of rashness and violence
which sullied the great change that France had wrought, but the very

3 i

Sot

Sec. III.

The

Second
Pitt

1783

1793

Burke

and the

Revnlu-

tion

8o2

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.

The

Second
Pitt

1783

1703

Pitt and

the Re-

▼olntion

Constitution
given to
Canada

179I

principles from which the change had sprung. Burke's deep sense of
the need of social order, of the value of that continuity in human
affairs "without which men would become like flies in a summer,"
blinded him to all but the faith in mere rebellion, and the yet sillier
faith in mere novelty, which disguised a real nobleness of aim and
temper even in the most ardent of the revolutionists. He would see
no abuses in the past, now that it had fallen, or anything but the ruin
of society in the future. He preached a crusade against men whom
he regarded as the foes of religion and civilization, and called on the
armies of Europe to put down a Revolution whose pi inciples threatened
every state with destruction.

The great obstacle to such a crusade was Pitt : and one of the
grandest outbursts of the " Reflections " closed with a bitter taunt at
the Minister's policy. " The age of chivalry," Burke cried, " is gone ;
that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded, and the
glory of Europe is extinguished for ever." But neither taunt nor in-
vective moved Pitt from his course. At the moment when the " Reflec-
tions " appeared he gave a fresh assurance to France of his resolve to
have nothing to do with any crusa.de against the Revolution. " This
country," he wrote, "means to persevere in the neutrality hitherto
scrupulously observed with respect to the internal dissensions of France ;
and from which it will never depart unless the conduct held there
makes it indispensable as an act of self-defence." So far indeed
was he from sharing the reactionary panic which was spreading around
him that he chose this time for supporting Fox in his Libel Act, a
measure which, by transferring the decision on what was libellous in
any publication from the judge to the jury, completed the freedom of
the press ; and himself passed a Bill which, though little noticed
among the storms of the time, was one of the noblest of his achieve-
ments. He boldly put aside the dread which had been roused by the
American war, that the gift of self-government to our colonies would
serve only as a step towards their secession from the mother-country,
and established a House of Assembly and a Council in the two|
Canadas. " I am convinced," said Fox (who, however, differed from I
Pitt as to the nature of the Constitution to be given to Canada), " that |
the only method of retaining distant colonies with advantage is to en-
able them to govern themselves ; " and the policy of the one statesman I
and the foresight of the other have been justified by the later history of |
our dependencies. Nor had Burke better success with his own party,
Fox remained an ardent lover of the Revolution, and answered a freshj
attack of Burke upon it with more than usual warmth. A close affec-
tion had bound till now the two men together ; but the fanaticism ofl
Burke declared it at an end. " There is no loss of friendship," Foxl
exclaimed, with a sudden burst of tears. " There is ! " Burke repeated.|
" I know the price of my conduct. Our friendship is at an end.''

Within
"Appej
detach
praise t
made m
princes
at Cobli
people \
copies si
Englishi
favourab
Channel
working
turn of 1]
order, th
human fe
it was a
economic
lack of in
that everj
harmonio
wanting a
first amon
changes, J
was soon
stitutional
reaction,
who had :
country, E
of neutral
So anxi(
for the res
its emigra
and declar
neutral sh
But the Ei
self. Tho
to plunge t
which woi
Leopold n
flight of L(
for a mom(
back; and
in France t
stitution, bi

[chap.

mse of
liuman
nmer,"
t sillier
im and
uld see
he ruin
L whom
on the
eatened

» of the
taunt at
is gone ;
, and the
it nor in-
« Reflec-
esolve to
. " This
hitherto
if France;
leld there
ir indeed
ng around
Del Act, a
DcUous in
reedom of
e noticed
s achieve-
,ed by the
lies would
;r-country,
the two I
ered from|
.da), "that I
e is to en-
statesman I
r history of]
own party,
fred a fresh]
close affec-
naticism ofl
iship," Fox
:e repeatedj
it an end."

X.1

MODERN ENGLAND.

803

Within the walls of Parliament, Burke stood utterly alone. His
"Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs," in June 1 791, failed to
detach a follower from Fox. Pitt coldly counselled him rather to
praise the English Constitution than to rail at the French. " I have
made many enemies and few friends," Burke wrote sadly to the French
princes who had fled from their country and were gathering in arms
at Coblentz, "by the part I have taken." But the opinion of the
people was slowly drifting to his side. A sale of thirty thousand
copies showed that the " Reflections " echoed the general sentiment of
Englishmen. The mood of England indeed at this moment was un-
favourable to any fair appreciation of the Revolution across the
Channel. Her temper was above all industrial. Men who were
working hard and fast growing rich, who had the narrow and practical
turn of men of business, looked angrily at this sudden disturbance of
order, this restless and vague activity, these rhetorical appeals to
human feeling, these abstract and often empty theories. In England
it was a time of political content and social well-being, of steady
economic progress, and of a powerful religious revival ; and an insular
lack of imaginative interest in other races hindered men from seeing
that every element of this content, of this order, of this peaceful and
harmonious progress, of this reconciliation of society and religion, was
wanting abroad. The sympathy which the Revolution had roused at
first among Englishmen died away before the violence of its legislative
changes, and the growing anarchy of the country. Sympathy in fact
was soon limited to a few groups of reformers who gathered in " Con-
stitutional Clubs," and whose reckless language quickened the national
reaction. But in spite of Burke's appeals and the cries of the nobles
who had fled from France and longed only to march against their
country, Europe held back from war, and Pitt preserved his attitude
of neutrality, though with a greater appearance of reserve.

So anxious, in fact; did the aspect of affairs in the East make Pitt
for the restoration of tranquillity in France, that he foiled a plan which
its emigrant nobles had formed for a descent on the French coast,
and declared formally at Vienna that England would remain absolutely
neutral should hostilities arise between France and the Emperor,
But the Emperor was as anxious to avoid a French war as Pitt him-
self. Though Catharine, now her strife wlch Turkey was over, wished
to plunge the two German Powers into a struggle with the Revolution
which would leave her free to annex Poland single-handed, neither
Leopold nor Prussia would tie their hands by such a contest. The
flight of Lewis the Sixteenth from Paris in June 1791 brought Europe
for a moment to the verge of war ; but he was intercepted and brought
back ; and for a while the danger seemed to incline the revolutionists
in France to greater moderation. Lewis too not only accepted the Con-
stitution, but pleaded earnestly with the Emperor against any armed

3 F 2

Sec. III.

Thb

Second
Pitt

1783

1793

Bitrke'i

success with

the country

I i|

'■m.

\ %■

Confer-
ence of
PiUnits

8o4

Sec. III.

The

Second
Pitt

1783

1793

Coaliiion
a/gainst
France

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Pitt's
Strassle
for Peace

1792

intervention as certain to bring ruin to his throne. In their conference
at Pillnitz therefore, in August, Leopold and the King of Prussia con-
tented themselves with a vague declaration inviting the European
powers to co-operate in restoring a sound form of government in
France, availed themselves of England's neutrality to refuse all mili-
tary aid to the French princes, and dealt simply with the affairs of
Poland. But the peace they desired soon became impossible. The
Constitutional Royalists in France availed themselves of the irritation
caused by the Declaration of Pillnitz to rouse again the cry for a war
which, as they hoped, would give strength to the throne. The more
violent revolutionists, or Jacobins, on the other hand, under the in-
lluence of the " Girondists," or deputies from the south of France,
whose aim was a republic, and who saw in a great national struggle a
means of overthrowing the monarchy, decided in spite of the opposition
of their leader, Robespierre, on a contest with the Emperor. Both
parties united to demand the breaking up of an army which the
emigrant princes had formed on the Rhine ; and though Leopold
assented to this demand, France declared war against his successor,
Francis, in April 1792.

Misled by their belief in a revolutionary enthusiasm in England,
the French had hoped for her alliance in this war ; and they were
astonished and indignant at Pitt's resolve to stand apart from the
struggle. It was in vain that Pitt strove to allay this irritation by de-
manding only that Holland should remain untouched, and promising
neutrality even though Belgium should be occupied by a French army,
or that he strengthened these pledges by a reduction of military forces,
and by bringing forward a peace-budget which rested on a large
remission of taxation. The revolutionists still clung to the hope of
England's aid in the emancipation of Europe, but they came now to
believe that England must itself be emancipated before such an aid could
be given. Their first work therefore they held to be the bringing about
a revolution in England which might free the people from the aristo-
cracy which held it down, and which oppressed, as they believed, great
peoples beyond the bounds of England itself. To rouse India, to rouse
Ireland to a struggle which should shake off the English yoke, became
necessary steps to the establishment of freedom in England. From this
moment therefore French agents were busy " sowing the revolution " in
each quarter. In Ireland they entered into communication with the
United Irishmen. In India they appeared at the courts of the native
princes. In England itself they strove through the Constitutional Clubs
to rouse the same spirit which they had roused in France ; and the
French envoy, Chauvelin, protested warmly against a proclamation
which denounced this correspondence as seditious. The effect of these
revolutionary efforts on the friends of the Revolution was seen in a
declaration which they wrested from Fox, that at such a moment even

the discu
Burke wj
forgotten
Europe,
take arm;
he wrote
sowed ha
threat of ^
together,
gathered
advanced
forced on
Belgium t
panic spre
horrible fo
Paris brok
Lewis, wh
his o.ffice
General D
progress c
murderers
Paris, with
which met t
sian army,
on Paris b(
at Jemappc
of the Fre:
vention de(
nations wh
enemies," s
of treaties s
England vvl
resolved to
arms the op
To do tl
pressing ha:
of Septembe
more to estr
of Burke, j
imprisonme
His hope wj
and to"lea^
own interna
as the hour
the growing

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

the discussion of parliamentary reform was inexpedient. Meanwhile
Burke was working hard, in writings whose extravagance of style was
forgotten in their intensity of feeling, to spread alarm throughout
Europe. He had from the first encouraged the emigrant princes to
take arms, and sent his son to join them at Coblentz. " Be alarmists,"
he wrote to them ; " diffuse terror ! " But the royalist terror which he
sowed had roused a revolutionary terror in France itself. At the
threat of war against the Emperor the two German Courts had drawn
together, and reluctantly abandoning all hope of peace with France,
gathered eighty thousand men under the Duke of Brunswick, and
advanced slowly in August on the Meuse. France, though she had
forced on the struggle, was really almost defenceless ; her forces in
Belgium broke at the first shock of arms into shameful rout ; and the
panic spreading from the army to the nation at large, took violent and
horrible forms. At the first news of Brunswick's advance the mob of
Paris broke into the Tuileries on the loth of August ; and at its demand
Lewis, who had taken refuge in the Assembly, was suspended from
his office and imprisoned in the Temple. In September, while
General Dumouriez by boldness and adroit negotiations arrested the
progress of the allies in the defiles of the Argonne, bodies of paid
murderers butchered the royalist prisoners who crowded the gaols of
Paris, with a view of influencing the elections to a new Convention
which met to proclaim the abolition of royalty. The retreat of the Prus-
sian army, whose numbers had been reduced by disease till an advance
on Paris became impossible, and a brilliant victory won by Dumouriez
at Jemappes which laid the Netherlands at his feet, turned the panic
of the Frencl^ into a wild self-confidence. In November the Con-
vention decreed that France offered the aid of her soldiers to all
nations who would strive for freedom. "All Governments are our
enemies," said its President ; " all peoples are our allies." In the teeth
of treaties signed only two years before, and of the stipulation made by
England when it pledged itself to neutrality, the French Government
resolved to attack Holland, and ordered its generals to enforce by
arms the opening of the Scheldt.

To do this was to force England into war. Public opinion was
pressing harder day by day upon Pitt. The horror of the massacres
of September, the hideous despotism of the Parisian mob, had done
more to estrange England from the Revolution than all the eloquence
of Burke. But even while withdrawing our Minister from Paris on the
imprisonment of the King, Pitt clung stubbornly to the hope of peace.
His hope was to bring the war to an end through English mediation,
and to "leave France, which I believe is the best way, to arrange its
own internal affairs as it can." No hour of Pitt's life is so great
as the hour when he stood alone in England, and refused to bow to
the growing cry of the nation for war. Even the news of the Septem-

805

Sec. III.

The

Second
Pitt

1788

1783

The

Coalition

attacks

France

1792

"'I I

France
declares
War on
England

8o6

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. III.

Thf

Seconii
Pitt

1783

1793

Pitt and
the War

Tlu English
panic

ber massacres could only force from him a hope that France might
abstain from any war of conquest, and escape from its social anarchy.
In October the French agent in England reported that Pitt was about
to recognize the Republic. At the opening of November he still
pressed on Holland a steady neutrality. It was France, and not
England, which at last wrenched from his grasp the peace to which
he clung so desperately. The decree of the Convention and the attack
on the Dutch left him no choice but war, for it was impossible for
England to endure a French fleet at Antwerp, or to desert allies like
the United Provinces. But even in December the news of the ap-
proaching partition of Poland nerved him to a last struggle for peace ;
he offered to aid Austria in acquiring Bavaria if she would make
terms with France, and pledged himself to France to abstain from war
if that power would cease from violating the independence of her
neighbour states. But across the Ghannel his moderation was only
taken for fear, while in England the general mourning which followed
on the news of the French King's execution showed the growing
ardour for the contest. The rejection of his last offers indeed made a
contest inevitable. Both sides ceased from diplomatic communica-
tions, and in February, 1793, France issued her Declaration of War.

Section IV.— The War with France. 1793—1815.

\Authorities. — To those mentioned before we may add Moore's Life of Sheri-
dan ; the Lives of Lord Castlereagh, Lord Eldon, and Lord Sidmouth ; Romilly's
Memoirs ; Lord Cornwallis's Correspondence ; Mr. Yonge's Life of Lord
Liverpool ; the Diaries and Correspondence of Lord M^jlmesbury, Lord
Colchester, and Lord Auckland. For the general history of England at
this time, see Alison's "History of Europe;" for its military history, Sir
William Napier's " History of the Peninsular War."]

From the moment when France declared war against England Pitt's
power was at an end. His pride, his immoveable firmness, and the
general confidence of the nation still kept him at the head of affairs ;
but he could do little save drift along with a tide of popular feeling
which he never fully understood. The very excellences of his character
unfitted him for the conduct of a war. He was in fact a Peace Minister,
forced into war by a panic and enthusiasm which he shared in a very
small degree, and unaided by his father's gift of at once entering into
the sympathies and passions around him, and of rousing passions and
sympathies in return. Around him the country broke out in a fit of
frenzy and alarm which rivalled the passion and panic over-sea. The
confidence of France in its illusions as to opinion in England deluded
for the moment even Englishmen themselves. The partizans of Re-
publicanism were in reality but a few handfuls of men who played at
gathering Conventions, and at calling themselves citizens and patriots^

in childij
the mass
into she(
when he
" Old Wl
Earls Sp(
followed
himself, tl
shaken b
of " thous
to plunde
he said to
of Man,"
Revolutioi
have thous
It was this
war. Bitt
England w
as he trus
England it
lative mea
Act was s
liberty of j
of Treason
Press ; the
seditious ;
roughly brc
in Scotlanc
of Parliame
a brutal juc
seditious c£
passed awa
of the Corr
France, we
acquittal pr
riots, to w
social distu
war. But t
the panic
quarter of
which thre£
the change
nobly chara
the dread
At first

CHAP.

might
archy.
aboit
le still
,d not
which
attack
ble for
es like
he ap-
peace ;
I make
om war
of her
as only
ollowed
Trowing
made a
munica-
fWar.

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

807

of Sheri-
Romilly's
of Lord
ry, Lord
igland at
tory,

Sir

,nd Pitt's
and the
' affairs ;
,r feeling
:haracter
Minister,
in a very
;ring into
iions and
n a fit of
ea. The
i deluded
ns of Re-
played at
I patriots,

in childish imitation of what was going on across the Channel. But in
the mass of Englishmen the dread of revolution passed for the hour
into sheer panic. Even the bulk of the Whig party forsook Fox
when he still proclaimed his faith in France and the Revolution. The
" Old Whigs," as they called themselves, with the Duke of Portland,
Earls Spencer and Fitzwilliam, and Mr. Windham at their head,
followed Burke in giving their adhesion to the Government. Pitt
himself, though little touched by the political reaction around him, was
shaken by the dream of social danger, and believed in the existence
of " thousands of bandits," who were ready to rise against the throne,
to plunder every landlord, and to sack London. " Paine is no fool,"
he said to his niece, who quoted to him a passage from the " Rights
of Man," in which that author had vindicated the principles of the
Revolution ; " he is perhaps right ; but if I did what he wants, I should
have thousands of bandits on my hands to-morrow, and London burnt."
It was this sense of social danger which alone reconciled him to the
war. Bitter as the need of the struggle which was forced upon
England was to him, he accepted it with the less reluctance that war,
as he trusted, would check the progress of " French principles " in
England itself. The worst issue of this panic was the series of legis-
lative measures in which it found expression. The Habeas Corpus
Act was suspended, a bill against seditious assemblies restricted the
liberty of public meeting, and a wider scope was' given to the Statute
of Treasons. Prosecution after prosecution was directed against the
Press ; the sermons of some dissenting ministers were indicted as
seditious ; and the conventions of sympathizers with France were
roughly broken up. The worst excesses of the panic were witnessed
in Scotland, where young Whigs, whose only offence was an advocacy
of Parliamentary reform, were sentenced to transportation, and where
a brutal judge openly expressed his regret that the practice of torture in
seditious cases should have fallen into disuse. The panic indeed soon
passed away for sheer want of material to feed on. In 1794 the leaders
of the Corresponding Society, a body which professed sympathy with
France, were brought to trial on a charge of high treason, but their
acquittal proved that all active terror was over. Save for occasional
riots, to which the poor were goaded by sheer want of bread, no
social disturbance troubled England through the twenty years of the
war. But the blind reaction against all reform which had sprung from
the panic lasted on when the panic was forgotten. For nearly a
quarter of a century it was hard to get a hearing for any measure
which threatened change to an existing institution, beneficial though
the change might be. Even the philanthropic movement which so
nobly characterized the time found itself checked and hampered by
the dread of revolution.
At first indeed all seemed to go ill for France. She was girt in

Sec. IV.

The

War with

Francs

1703

1815

Resttlts <j/
the panic

I 1 ' i-

;l;:|,:i! it-

ai
■|r|

8o8

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

The

War with

Franck

1793

1815

France

and the

Coalition

Revival of
France

Break up

of the
Coalition

by a ring of enemies ; the Empire, Austria, Prussia, Sardinia, Spain,
and England were leagued in arms against her ; and their efforts
were seconded by civil war. The peasants of Poitou and Britannv
rose in revolt against the government at Paris, while Marseilles and
Lyons were driven into insurrection by the violent leaders who now
seized on power in the capital. The French armies were driven back
from the Netherlands when ten thousand English soldiers, under the
Duke of York, joined the Austrians in Flanders in 1793. But the
chance of crushing the Revolution was lost by the greed of the two
German powers. Russia, as Pitt had foreseen, was now free to carry
out her schemes in the East ; and Austria and Prussia saw themselves
forced, in the interest of a balance of power, to share in her annexations
at the cost of Poland, But this new division of Poland would have
become impossible had France been enabled by a restoration of its
monarchy to take up again its natural position in Europe, and to accept
the alliance which Pitt would in such a case have offered her. The
policy of the German courts therefore was to prolong an anarchy which
left them free for the moment to crush Poland : and the allied armies
which might have marched upon Paris were purposely frittered away
in sieges in the Netherlands and the Rhine. Such a policy gave
France time to recover from the shock of her disasters. Whatever
were the crimes and tyranny of her leaders, France felt in spite of
them the value of the Revolution, and rallied enthusiastically to its
support. The revolts in the West and South were crushed. The
Spanish invaders were held at bay at the foot of the Pyrenees, and the
Piedmontese were driven from Nice and Savoy. The great port of
Toulon, which called for foreign aid against the government of Paris, and
admitted an English garrison within its walls, was driven to surrender
by measures counselled by a young artillery officer from Corsica, Napo-
leon Buonaparte. At the opening of 1794 a victoryat Fleurus which again
made the French masters of the Netherlands showed that the tide had
turned. France was united within by the cessation of the Terror and
of the tyranny of the Jacobins, while on every border victory followed
the gigantic efforts with which she met the coalition against her.
Spain sued for peace ; Prussia withdrew her armies from the Rhine ;
the Sardinians were driven back from the V iritime Alps ; the Rhine
provinces were wrested from the Austrians ; and before the year ended
Holland was lost. Pichegru crossed the Waal in mid-winter with an
overwhelming force, and the wretched remnant of ten thousand men
who had followed the Duke of York to the Netherlands, thinned by
disease and by the hardships of retreat, re-embarked for England.

The victories of France broke up the confederacy which had threat-
ened it with destruction. The Batavian republic which Pichegru had
set up after his conquest of Holland was now an ally of France.
Prussia bought peace by the cession of her possessions west of the

Rhine,
the Prol
France i
against t
Director
and Pitt
ment as
strife. E
triumphs
on land ;
defeated
the day c
too had 1
had been
Dutch, th
of the Ma
But Pitt \
army was
were utter
" but some
the condu(
without sc
her wealth
coalition, i
the immei
expenditur
reached its
to a heigh
bounds. ]
But thoi
European
close the s
longings fc
its ardour
the last out
the world i
At the moi
had rouse(
was foiled
Buonaparte
Piedmont
the Duchie
an armistic
from Austr
France the

[chap.

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

809

Spain,
efforts
'itanny
les and
lO now
n back
icr the
3ut the
he two
o carry
iiselves
ixations
Id have
n of its
3 accept
:r. The
ly which
i armies
•ed away
icy gave
Whatever
, spite of
ly to its
2d. The
3, and the
it port of
*aris, and
surrender
:a, Napo-
jch again
tide had
error and
followed
.inst her.
e Rhine;
he Rhine
jar ended
:r with an
sand men
linned by
gland,
ad threat-
legru had
»f France,
est of the

Rhine. Peace with Spain followed in the summer, while Sweden and
the Protestant cantons of Switzerland recognized the Republic. In
France itself discord came well-nigh to an end. The fresh severities
against the ultra-republicans which followed on the establishment of a
Directory indicated the moderate character of the new government,
and Pitt seized on this change in the temper of the French govern-
ment as giving an opening for peace. Pitt himself was sick of the
strife. England had maintained indeed her naval supremacy. The
triumphs of her seamen were in strange contrast with her weakness
on land ; and at the outset of the contest, in 1794, the French fleet was
defeated off Brest by Lord Howe in a victory which bore the name of
the day on which it was won, the First of June. Her colonial gains
too had been considerable. Most of the West Indian islands which
had been held by France, and the far more valuable settlements of the
Dutch, the Cape of Good Hope, Ceylon, and the famous Spice Islands
of the Malaccas and Java had been transferred to the British Crown.
But Pitt was without means of efficiently carrying on the war. The
army was small and without military experience, while its leaders
were utterly incapable. " We have no General," wrote Lord Grenville,
" but some old woman in a red riband." Wretched too as had been
the conduct of the war, its cost was already terrible. If England was
without soldiers, she had wealth, and Pitt had been forced to turn
her wealth into an engine of war. He became the paymaster of the
coalition, and his subsidies kept the allied armies in the field. But
the immense loans which these called for, and the quick growth of
expenditure, undid all his financial reforms. Taxation, which had
reached its lowest point under Pitt's peace administration, mounted
to a height undreamt of before. The public debt rose by leaps and
bounds. In three years nearly eighty millions had been added to it.

But though the ruin of his financial hopes, and his keen sense of the
European dangers which the contest involved, made Pitt earnest to
close the struggle with the Revolution, he stood almost alone in his
longings for peace. The nation at large was still ardent for war, and
its ardour was fired by Burke in his "Letters on a Regicide Peace,"
the last outcry of that fanaticism which had done so much to plunge
the world in blood. Nor was France less ardent for war than England.
At the moment when Pitt sought to open negotiations, her victories
had roused hopes of wider conquests, and though General Moreau
was foiled in a march on Vienna, the wonderful successes of Napoleon
Buonaparte, who now took the command of the army of the Alps, laid
Piedmont at her feet. Lombardy was soon in the hands of the French,
the Duchies south of the Po pillaged, and the Pope driven to purchase
an armistice. Fresh victories enabled Buonaparte to wring a peace
from Austria in the treaty of Campo Formio, which not only gave
France the Ionian Islands, a part of the old territory of Venice, as

Sf.( . IV.

The

Wak with

France

1793

1815

1795

Progress
of the
War

1796

Oct. 1797

' ii'h

8io

Sec. IV.

The

War with

Francr

1793

1815

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[CHAP.

Cape St.
Vincent

Feb. 14

Camper-
down

Oct. II

Battle of
the Nth-

Aus;. I,

1798

well as the Netherlands and the whole left bank of the Rhine, but
united Lombardy with the Duchies south of the Po, and the Papal
States as far as the Rubicon, into a " Cisalpine Republic," which was
absolutely beneath her control. The withdrawal of Austria left France
without an enemy on the Continent, and England without an ally.
The stress of the war was pressing more heavily on her every day.
The alarm of a French invasion of Ireland brought about a suspension
of specie payments on the part of the Bank. A mutiny in the fleet
was suppressed with difficulty. It was in this darkest hour of the
struggle that Burke passed away, protesting to the last against the
peace which, in spitv^ of his previous failure, Pitt tried in 1797 to
negotiate at Lille. Peace seemed more needful to him than ever ; for
the naval supremacy of Britain was threatened by a coalition such as
had all but crushed her in the American War. Again the Dutch
and Spanish fleets were allied with the fleets of France, and if they
gained command of the Channel, it would enable France to send over-
whelming forces in aid of the rising which was planned in Ireland.
But the danger had hardly threatened when it was dispelled by two
great victories. When in 1797 the Spanish fleet put out to sea, it was
attacked by Admiral Jervis off Cape St. Vincent and driven back to
Cadiz with the loss of four of its finest vessels ; while the Dutch fleet
from the Texel, which was to protect a French force in its descent
upon Ireland, was met by a far larger fleet under Admiral Duncan,
and almost annihilated in a battle off Camperdown, after an obstinate
struggle which showed the Hollanders still worthy of their old renown.
The ruin of its hopes in the battle of Camperdown drove Ireland to a
rising of despair ; but the revolt was crushed by the defeat of the insur-
gents at Vinegar Hill in May, 1798, and the surrender of General Hum-
bert, who landed in August with a French force. Of the threefold attack
on which the Directory relied, two parts had now broken down. Eng-
land still held the seas, and the insurrection in Ireland had failed.
The next year saw the crowning victory of the Nile. The genius of
Buonaparte had seized on the schemes for a rising in India, where
Tippoo Sahib, the successor of Hyder Ali in Mysore, had vowed to
drive the English from the south ; and he laid before the Directory a
plan for the conquest of Egypt as a preliminary to a campaign in
Southern India. In 1798 he landed in Egypt ; and its conquest was
rapid and complete. But the thirteen men-of-war which had escorted
his expedition were found by Admiral Nelson in Aboukir Bay, moored
close to the coast in a line guarded at either end by gun-boats and
batteries. Nelson resolved to thrust his own ships between the
French and the shore ; his flagship led the way ; and after a terrible
fight of twelve hours, nine of the French vessels were captured and
destroyed, two were burnt, and five thousand French seamen were
killed or made prisoners. All communication between France and

Buonapai
starting-p
Freed i
India, an<
and in su(
the Europ
formed a
that Pitt I,
and Austr
the Rhine
soldiers t(
united fore
masters wj
more succ
parte conci
of an arm
march upc
key of Syi
tering train
Smith, wh(
besiegers vv
despairing (
in Paris wal
consuls tool
parte becai
changed the
he made to
to shake th(
a new force
with the ar
First Consi
Marengo fo
arrested the
pushing on
the Austriai
army on th^
the Contine
Luneville.

It was but
about the I
during the
is one whie
surrender o
Irish Catho
and a foreig

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

8ii

Buonaparte's army was cut off; and his hopes of making Kgypt a
starting-point for the conquest of India fell at a bU)w.

Freed from the dangers that threatened her rule in Ireland and in
India, and mistress of the seas, I^ngland was free to attack France ;
and in such an attack she was aided at this moment by the temper of
the European powers, and the ceaseless aggressions of France. Russia
formed a close alliance with Austria ; and it was with renewed hope
that Pitt lavished subsidies on the two allies. A union of the Russian
and Austrian armies drove the French back again across the Alps and
the Rhine ; but the stubborn energy of General Massena enabled his
soldiers to hold their ground in Switzerland ; and the attempt of a
united force of Russians and PInglish to wrest Holland from its French
masters was successfully repulsed. In the East, however, England was
more successful. Foiled in his dreams of Indian conquests, Buona-
parte conceived the design of the conquest of Syria, and of the creation
of an army among its warlike mountaineers, with which he might
march upon Constantinople or India at his will. But Acre, the
key of Syria, was stubbornly held by the Turks, the French bat-
tering train was captured at sea by an English captain, Sir Sidney
Smith, whose seamen aided in the defence of the place, and the
besiegers were forced to fall back upon Egypt. The French general
despairing of success left his army and returned to France. His arrival
in Paris was soon followed by the overthrow of the Directors. Three
consuls took their place ; but under the name of First Consul Buona-
parte became in effect sole ruler of the country. His energy at once
changed the whole face of European affairs. The offers of peace which
he made to England and Austria were intended to do little more than
to shake the coalition, and gain breathing time for the organization of
a new force which was gathering in secrecy at Dijon, while Moreau
with the army of the Rhine pushed again along the Danube. The
First Consul crossed the Saint Bernard in 1800, and a victory at
Marengo forced the Austrians to surrender Lombardy ; while a truce
arrested the march of Moreau, who had captured Munich and was
pushing on to Vienna. On the resumption of the war in the autumn
the Austrians were driven back on Vienna ; and Moreau crushed their
army on the Iser in the victory of Hohenlinden. In February, 1801,
the Continental War was brought suddenly to an end by the Peace of
Luneville.

It was but a few months before the close of the war that Pitt brought
about the Union of Ireland with England. The history of Ireland,
during the fifty years that followed its conquest by William the Third,
is one which no Englishman can recall without shame. After the
surrender of Limerick every Catholic Irishman, and there were five
Irish Catholics to every Irish Protestant, was treated as a stranger
and a foreigner in his own country. The House of Lords, the House

Skc. IV.

Thk

War with
Fkancr

1793

1815

The
Peace of
liuneTllle

Nov. 10,
1799

June 14,
1800

Dec. 2

Ireland

under the

Georgres

';:.t '

8l9

Sec. IV.

Thr

Wak with
Franc I".

1793

1815

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

X.J

Government
in Iretnmi

of Commons, the m.iRistracy, all corporate offices in towns, all ranks
in the army, the bench, the bar, the whole administration of govern-
ment or justice, were closed apainst Catholics. The very ri^du df
voting' for their representatives in Parliament was denied them. Few
Catholic landowners had been left by the swccpinjj confiscations whirh
had followed the successive revolts of the island, and oppressive laws
forced even these few with scant exceptions to profess Protestant-
ism. Necessity, indeed, had brought about a practical toleration of
their relij,Mon and their worship ; but in all social and political
matters the native Catholics, in other words the immense majority of
the people of Ireland, were simply hewers of wood and drawers of
water to their Protestant masters, who looked on themselves as mere
settlers, who boasted of their Scotch or English extraction, and
who regarded the name of " Irishman " as an insult. But small as
was this Protestant body, one half of it fared little better, as far as
power was concerned, than the Catholics ; for the Presbyterians, who
formed the bulk of the Ulster settlers, were shut out by law from all
civil, military, and municipal offices. The administration and justice
of the country were thus kept rigidly in the hands of members of the
Established Church, a body which comprised about a twelfth of the
population of the island ; while its government was practically
monopolized by a few great Protestant landowners. The rotten
boroughs, which had orifjinally been created to make the Irish Parlia-
ment dependent on the Crown, had fallen under the influence of the
adjacent landlords, who were thus masters of the House of Commons,
while they formed in person the House of Peers. During the first
half of the eighteenth century two thirds of the House of Commons,
in fact, was returned by a small group of nobles, whc "'ere recognized
as " parliamentary undertakers," and who undertook to " manage "
Parliament on their own terms. Irish politics were for these men a
means of public plunder ; they were glutted with pensions, preferments,
and bribes in hard cash in return for their services ; they were the
advisers of every Lord-Lieutenant, and the practical governors of the
country. The only check to the tyranny of this narrow and corrupt
oligarchy was in the connexion of Ireland with England and the
subordination of its Parliament to the English Privy Council. The
Irish Parliament had no power of originating legislative or financial
measures, and could only say " yes " or " no " to Acts submitted to it
by the Privy Council in England. The English Parliament too claimed
the right of binding Ireland as well as England by its enactments,
and one of its statutes transferred the appellate jurisdiction of the
Irish Peerage to the English House of Lords. But as if to com-
pensate for the benefits of its protection, England did her best to
annihilate Irish commerce and to ruin Irish agriculture. Statutes
passed by the jealousy of English landowners forbade the export of

Irish cat
bidden, 1
Poverty
deepenc(
turned \\
The b
check all
sprang fr
purely sc
ruling cla
from the
the Third
control of
imposed <
that this <
was force(
Volunteei
Ministry,
that the s
other. D
but its in(
a iG^f nobl
of the Eni
of monop(
Union mt
alone, thoi
the domin
boroughs
Volunteers
lies and 1
for the Pi
political li
Irish Pari
the Protes
aid by the
penal laws
party, plea
rights to
borough
liament.
with other
Viceroys C(
administra
said Lord I
commonalt

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

813

,11 ranks
govern-
rijihl (if
11. Few
ns which
iivc laws
ntestant-
ration of
political
\jority of
•avvers of
i as mere
:ion, and
t small as
as far as
ians, who
/ from all
nd justice
ers of the
ifth of the
practically
:he rotten
lish Parlia-
nce of the
Commons,
the fust
Commons,
recognized
manage "
lese men a
eferments,
y were the
lors of the
.nd corrupt
and the
mcil. The
)r financial
mitted to it
00 claimed
snactments,
lion of the
if to com-
er best to
Statutes
e export of

Irish cattle or sheep to Knglish ports. The export of wool was for-
bidden, lest it might interfere with the profits of Knglish wool-growers.
Poverty was thus added to the curse of misgovernmcnt ; and poverty
deepened with the rapid growth of the native j)opulation, till faminr
turned the country into a hell.

The bitter lesson of the last conquest, however, long sufficed to
check all dreams of revolt among the natives, and the outbreaks which
sprang from time to time out of the general misery and discontent were
purely social in their character, and were roughly repressed by the
ruling class. When political revolt threatened at last, the threat came
from the ruling class itself. At the very outset of the reign of George
the Third, the Irish Parliament insisted on its claim to the exclusive
control of money bills, and a cry was raised for the removal of the checks
imposed on its independence. But it was not till the American war
that this cry became a political danger, a danger so real that ICngland
was forced to give way. From the close of the war, when the Irish
Volunteers wrung legislative independence from the Rockingham
Ministry, England and Ireland were simply held together by the fact
that the sovereign of the one island was also the sovereign of the
other. During the next eighteen years Ireland was "independent;"
but its independence was a mere name for the uncontrolled rule of
a few noble families and of the Irish Executive backed by the support
of the English Government. To such a length had the whole system
of monopoly and patronage been carried, that at the time of the
Union more than sixty seats were in the hands of three families
alone, those of the Hills, the Ponsonbys, and the Beresfords ; while
the dominant influence in the Parliament now lay with the Treasury
boroughs at the disposal of the Government. The victory of the
Volunteers immediately produced measures in favour of the Catho-
lics and Presbyterians. The Volunteers had already in 1780 won
for the Presbyterians, who formed a good half of their force, full
political liberty by the abolition of the Sacramental Test ; and the
Irish Parliament of 1782 removed at once the last grievances of
the Protestant Dissenters. The Catholics were rewarded for their
aid by the repeal of the more grossly oppressive enactments of the
penal laws. But when Grattan, supported by the bulk of the Irish
party, pleaded for Parliamentary reform, and for the grant of equal
rights to the Catholics, he was utterly foiled by the small group of
borough owners, who chiefly controlled the Government and the Par-
liament. The ruling class found government too profitable to share it
with other possessors. It was only by hard bribery that the English
Viceroys could secure their co-operation in the simplest measures of
administration. " If ever there was a country unfit to govern itself,"
said Lord Hutchinson, " it is Ireland. A corrupt aristocracy, a ferocious
commonalty, a distracted Government, a divided people I " In Pitt's

Sue. IV.

Tiir.

War Willi

Fkan( K

1793

1815

Pitt and
Ireland

ImUptniienci
of Iceland

1782

8i4

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

The

War with

France

1703

1815

1785

The
Union

eyes the danger of Ireland lay above all in the misery of its people.
Although the Irish Catholics were held down by the brute force of
their Protestant rulers, he saw that their discontent was growing fast
into rebellion, and that one secret of their discontent at any rate lay
in Irish poverty, a poverty increased if not originally brought about by
the jealous exclusion of Irish products from their natural markets in
England itself. In 1779 Ireland had won from Lord North large
measures of free-trade abroad ; but the heavy duties laid by the Eng-
lish Parliament on all Irish manufactures save linen and woollen yarn
still shut them out of England. One of Pitt's first commercial measures
aimed at putting an end to this exclusion by a bill which established
freedom of trade between the two islands. His first proposals were
accepted in the Irish Parliament ; but the fears and jealousies of the
English farmers and manufacturers forced into the Bill amendments
which gave to the British Parliament powers over Irish navigation
and commerce, thus over-riding their newly-won independence, and
the measure in its new form was rejected in Ireland. The outbreak of
the revolutionary struggle, and the efforts which the French revolu-
tionists at once made to excite rebellion amongst the Irish, roused
Pitt to fresh measures of conciliation and good government. In 1793
he forced the Irish Administration to abandon a resistance which had
wrecked his projects the previous year; and the Irish Parliament
passed without opposition measures for the admission of Catholics to
the electoral franchise, and to civil and military office within the island,
which promised to open a new era of religious liberty. But the promise
came too late. The hope of conciliation was lost in the fast rising tide
of religious and social passion. The Society of " United Irishmen,"
which was founded in 1791 at Belfast by Wolfe Tone with a view of form-
ing a union between Protestants and Catholics to win Parliamentary
reform, drifted into a correspondence with France and projects of insur-
rection. The peasantry, brooding over their misery and their wrongs,
were equally stirred by the news from France ; and their discontent
broke out in outrages of secret societies which spread panic among the
ruling classes. The misery was increased by faction fights between
the Protestants and Catholics, which had already broken out before
the French Revolution. The Catholics banded themselves together
as " Defenders " against the outrages of the " Peep-o'-day Boys," who
were mainly drawn from the more violent Presbyterians; and these
factions became later merged in the larger associations of the" United
Irishmen " and the " Orange-men."

At last the smouldering discontent and disaffection burst into flame. [
The panic roused in 1796 by an af'.empted French invasion under
Hoche woke passions of cruelty aud tyranny which turned Ireland
into a hell. Soldiers and yeomanry marched over the country tor-
turing and scourging the "croppies," as the Irish peasantry were

called i
murderi
formed
for the 1
men pa
of the ]
above al
by atroc
lashed ai
without
thousand
than the
utterly su
greater d
hundred
broke a f
surrender
with thirt
Protestan
troops ani
forced to
farce of "
The politi
home to e
during the
claims of
of Irelanc
peoples w
conceivab
this dange
the two I
was natun
question
and with
shameless
the only
passed. A
Irish mem
and twent
Parliamen
Commerce
and every
taxation w
The lav
for the U

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

815

people.

orce of

ing fast

rate lay

bout by

rkets in

th large

tie Eng-

len yarn

neasures

ablished

ials were

es of the

indments

avigation

mce, and

tbreak of

h revolu-

;h, roused
In 1793

/hich had

arliament

itholics to

the island,

le promise

rising tide
rishmen,"
w of form-
iamentary
;s of insur-
er wrongs,
discontent
among the
ts between
out before
;s together
3oys," who
and these
le" United

into flame,
sion under!
led Ireland!
;ountry tor-
iantry were]

called in derision from their short-cut hair, robbing, ravishing, and
murderiiig. Their outrages were sanctioned by the landowners who
formed the Irish Parliament in a Bill of Indemnity, and protected
for the future by an Insurrection Act. Meanwhile the United Irish-
men prepared for an insurrection, which was delayed by the failure
of the French expeditions, on which they counted for support, and
above all by the victory of Camperdown. Atrocities were answered
by atrocities when the revolt at last broke out in 1798. Loyalists were
lashed and tortured in their turn, and every soldier taken was butchered
without mercy. The rebels however no sooner mustered fourteen
thousand men strong in a camp on Vinegar Hill, near Enniscorthy,
than the camp was stormed by the English troops, and the revolt
utterly suppressed. The suppression came only just in time to prevent
greater disasters. A few weeks after the close of the rebellion nine
hundred French soldiers under General Humbert landed in Mayo,
broke a force of thrice their number in a battle at Castlebar, and only
surrendered when the Lord-Lieutenant, Lord Cornwallis, faced them
with thirty thousand men. Pitt's disgust at " the bigoted fury of Irish
Protestants " backed Lord Cornwallis in checking the reprisals oi" his
troops and of the Orangemen ; but the hideous cruelty which he was
forced to witness brought about a firm resolve to put an end to the
farce of " Independence," which left Ireland helpless in such hands.
The political necessity for a union of the two islands had been brought
home to every English statesman by the course of the Irish Parliament
during the disputes over the Regency ; for while England repelled the
claims of the Prince of Wales to the Regency as of right, the legislature
of Ireland admitted them. As the oiily union left between the two
peoples was their obedience to a common ruler, such an act might
conceivably have ended in their entire severance ; and the sense of
this danger secured a welcome in England for Pitt's proposal to unite
the two Parliaments. The opposition of the Irish boroughmongers
was naturally stubborn and determined. But with them it was a sheer
question of gold ; and their assent was bought with a million in money,
and with a liberal distribution of pensions and peerages. Base and
shameless as were such means, Pitt may fairly plead that they were
the only means by which the bill for the Union could have been
passed. As the matter was finally arranged in June 1800, one hundred
Irish members became part of the House of Commons at Westminster,
and twenty-eight temporal with four spiritual peers, chosen for each
Parliament by their fellows, took their seats in the House of Lords.
Commerce between the two countries was freed from all restrictions,
and every trading privilege of the one thrown open to the other ; while
taxation was proportionately distributed between the two peoples.

The lavish creation of peers which formed a part of the price paid
for the Union of Ireland brought about a practical change in our

Sec. IV.

The

War with

France

1793

1815

May 21,
1798

1799

Pitt
and the
Peerace

8i6

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

The

War with
France

1793

1815

Increase of
the peers

Catholic
cipation

constitution. Few bodies have varied more in the number of their
members than the House of Lords. At the close of the Wars of the
Roses the lay lords who remained numbered fifty-two ; in Elizabeth's
reign they numbered only sixty ; the prodigal creations of the Stuarts
raised them to one hundred and seventy-six. At this point, however,
they practically remained stationary during the reigns of the first two
Georges ; and, as we have seen, only the dogged opposition of Wal-
pole prevented Lord Stanhope from hmiting the peerage to the number
it had at that time reached. Mischievous as such a measure would
have been, it would at any rate have prevented the lavish creation of
peerages on which George the Third relied in the early days of his
reign as one of his means of breaking up the party government which
restrained him. But what was with the King a mere means of cor-
ruption became with Pitt a settled purpose of bringing the peerage into
closer relations with the landowning and opulent classes, and render-
ing the Crown independent of factious combinations among the
existing peers. While himself disdainful of hereditary honours,
he lavished them as no Minister had lavished them before. In his
first five years of rule he created forty-eight new peers. In two later
years alone, 1796-7, he created thirty-five. By i8oi the peerages
which were the price of the Union with Ireland had helped to raise
his creations to upwards of one hundred and forty. So busily was his
example followed by his successors that at the end of George the
Third's reign the number of hereditary peers had become double
what it was at his accession. The whole charactei* of the House of
Lords was changed. Up to this time it had been a small assembly of
great noblei, bound together by family or party ties into a distinct
power in the State. From this time it became the stronghold of pro-
perty, the representative of the great estates and great fortunes which
the vast increase of English wealth was building up. For the first
time, too, in our history it became the distinctly conservative element
in our constitution. The full import of Pitt's changes has still to be
revealed, but in some ways their results have been clearly marked.
The larger number of the peerage, though due to the will of the
Crown, has practically freed the House from any influence which the
Crown can exert by the distribution of honours. This change, since
the power of the Crown has been practically wielded by the House of
Commons, has rende''ed it far harder to reconcile the free action of
the Lords with the regular working of constitutional government. On
the other hand, the increased number of its members has rendered the
House more responsive to public opinion, when public opinion is
strongly pronounced ; and the political tact which is inherent in great
aristocratic assemblies has hitherto prevented any collision with the
Lower House from being pushed to an irreconcilable quarrel.
But the legislative union of the two countries was only part of the

plan whi<
the cone
countries
play; an(
growth a
gone stea
Ireland d
a gradua
their adn:
made of
of concili
posing to
he pointe
England
Catholic I
and had \
provision 1
His words
the remov
which wen
as a meanj
part of the
would hav
itself. Aft
Cabinet a
perfect equ
tests which
admission
or posts in
and of fidel
test; while
secured by
over the Ej
means of
ministers,
of quarrel
people. T
immediate
won the pla
cellor, Lore
my personj
proposes ai
mitting his
under whicl
from the coi

:HAr.

their
>f the

3eth's
tuarts

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

817

vever,

3t two
Wal-

umber

would

tion of ,

of his !

v/hich

of Gor-
ge into

-ender-

ng the

onours,
In his

vo later

eerages

to raise

was his

rge the
double

louse of

imbly of
distinct
of pro-
s which

Ithe first
element
ill to be
marked.
1 of the

Ihich the
re, since
louse of
iction of
bnt. On
llered the
)inion is
in great
I with the

Irt of the

plan which Pitt had conceived for the conciliation of Ireland. With
the conclusion of the Union his projects of free trade between the
countries, which had been defeated a few years back, came into
play ; and in spite of insufficient capital and social disturbance the
growth of the trade, shipping, and manufactures of Ireland has
gone steadily on from that time to this. The change which brought
Ireland directly under the common Parliament was followed too by
a gradual revision of its oppressive laws, and an amendment in
their administration ; taxation was lightened, and a faint beginning
made of public instruction. But in Pitt's mind the g:reat means
of conciliation was the concession of religious equality. In pro-
posing to the English Parliament the unioii of the two countries
he pointed out that when thus joined to a Protestant country like
England all danger of a Catholic supremacy in Ireland, should
Catholic disabilities be removed, would be practically at an end ;
and had suggested that in such a case " an effectual and adequate
provision for the Catholic clergy " would be a security for their loyalty.
His words gave strength to the hopes of " Catholic Emancipation," or
the removal of what remained of the civil disabilities of Catholics,
which were held out by the viceroy. Lord Castlereagh, in Ireland itself,
as a means of hindering any opposition to the project of Union on the
part of the Catholics. It was agreed on all sides that their opposition
would have secured its defeat ; but no Catholic opposition showed
itself. After the passing of the bill, Pitt prepared to lay before the
Cabinet a measure which would have raised the Irish Catholic to
perfect equality of civil rights. He proposed to remove all religious
tests which limited the exercise of the franchise, or were required for
admission to Parliament, the magistracy, the bar, municipal offices,
or posts in the army, or the service of the State. An oath of allegiance
and of fidelity to the Constitution was substituted for the Sacramental
test ; while the loyalty of the Catholic and Dissenting clergy was
secured by a grant of some provision to both by the State. To win
over the Episcopal Church, measures were added for strengthening its
means of discipline, and for increasing the stipends of its poorer
ministers. A commutation of tithes was to remove a constant source
of quarrel in Ireland between the Protestant clergy and the Irish
people. The scheme was too large and statesmanlike to secure the
immediate assent of the Cabinet ; and before that assent could be
won the plan was communicated through the treachery of the Chan-
cellor, Lord Loughborough, to George the Third. " I count any man
my personal enemy," the King broke out angrily to Dundas, " who
proposes any such measure." Pitt answered this outburst by sub-
mitting his whole plan to the King. " The political circumstances
under which the exclusive laws originated," he wrote, " arising either
from the conflicting powers of hostile and nearly balanced sects, from

3 G

Sec. IV.

The

War with

Francr

1793

1815

Pitt's policy

I J

'■•! "iM

H-4'

Its defeat

\ ' I

fi n

8i8

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

The

War with

France

1793

1815

Pitt resigns

The
Adding.

ton
Ministry

The

Continental

System

the apprehension of a Popish Queen as successor, a disputed suc-
cession and a foreign pretender, a division in Europe between Catholic
and Protestant Powers, are no longer applicable to the present state
of things." But argument was wasted upon George the Third. In
spite of the decision of the lawyers whom he consulted, the King held
himself bound by his Coronation Oath to maintain the tests. On this
point his bigotry was at one with the bigotry of the bulk of his subjects,
as well as with their political distrust of Catholics and Irishmen ; and
his obstinacy was strengthened by a knowledge that his refusal must
drive Pitt from office. In February 1801, the month of the Peace of
Luneville, Pitt resigned, and was succeeded by the Speaker of the
House of Commons, Mr. Addington, a weak and narrow-minded man,
and as bigoted as the King himself. Of Lord Hawkesbury, who suc-
ceeded Lord Grenville in the conduct of foreign affairs, nothing was
known outside the House of Commons.

It was with anxiety that England found itself guided by men like
these at a time when every hour brought darker news. The scarcity
of bread was mounting to a famine. Taxes were raised anew, and
yet the loan for the year amounted to five and twenty millions. The
country stood utterly alone ; while the peace of Luneville secured
France from all hostility on the Continent. And it was soon plain
that this peace was only the first step in a new policy on the part
of the First Consul. What he had done was to free his hands for
a decisive conflict with Britain itself, both as a world-power and as
a centre of wealth. England was at once the carrier of European
commerce, and the workshop of European manufactures. While her
mines, her looms, her steam-engines, were giving her almost a
monopoly of industrial production, the carrying trade of France
and Holland alike had been transferred to the British flag, and the
conquest during the war of their richer settlements had thrown into
British hands the whole colonial trade of the world. In his gigantic
project of a" Continental System "the aim of Buonaparte was to strike
at the trade of England by closing the ports of Europe against her ships.
By a league of the Northern powers he sought to wrest from her the com-
mand of the seas. Denmark and Sweden, who resented the severity
with which Britain enforced that right of search which had brought
about their armed neutrality at the close of the American war, were
enlisted in a league of neutrals which was in effect a declaration of
war against England, and which Prussia was prepared to join. The
Czar Paul of Russia on his side saw in the power of Britain the
chief obstacle to his designs upon Turkey. A squabble over Malta,
which had been taken from the Knights of St. John by Buona-
parte on his way to Egypt, and had ever since been blockaded by
English ships, but whose possession the Czar claimed as his own
on the ground of an alleged election as Grand Master of the Order,

served 1
preparec
the Balti
practical
the coml
fleet apf
silenced
Denmarl
enter the
death of 1
settled th
war, and
MeanwhiJ
as effectiv
surrender
the Medit
A force of
Bay. Til
concentrat
English a
mortally w
close of J
closed the
Both pa]
to suspend
France anc
other chant
at the close)
ment. Thj
March i8c
interfere wj
retire from I
it had set
England r<
conquered
Ionian Is] J
Knights of]
sense of re/
ambassador
of London.!
temper of .
French rev(
of the natiJ
freeing the]
rulers. Bi

x.l

MODERN ENGLAND.

819

I sue-
itholic
t state
i. In
g held
)n this
bjects,
I ; and
il must
eace of
of the
id man,
ho suc-
ing was

nen Uke
scarcity
ew, and
IS. The
secured
on plain
the part
lands for
r and as
European
^hile her
ilmost a
France
and the
own into
gigantic
J to Strike
her ships.
: the corn-
severity
1 brought
war, were
aration of
oin. The
ritain the
^er Malta,
y Buona-
:kaded hy
i his own I
:he Order,!

served him as a pretext for a quarrel with England, and Paul openly
prepared for hostilities. It was plain that as soon as spring opened
the Baltic, the fleets of Russia, Sweden, and Denmark would act in
practical union with those of France and Spain. But dexterous as
the combination was it was shattered at a blow. In April a British
fleet appeared before Copenhagen, and after a desperate struggle
silenced the Danish batteries, captured six Danish ships, and forced
Denmark to conclude an armistice which enabled English ships to
enter the Baltic. The Northern Coalition too was broken up by the
death of the Czar. In June a Convention between England and Russia
settled the vexed questions of the right of search and contraband of
war, and this Convention was accepted by Sweden and Denmark.
Meanwhile, at the very moment of the attack on Copenhagen, a stroke
as efifective had wrecked the projects of Buonaparte in the East. The
surrender of Malta to the English fleet left England the mistress of
the Mediterranean ; and from Malta she now turned to Egypt itself.
A force of 1 5,000 men under General Abercromby anchored in Aboukir
Bay. The French troops that Buonaparte had left in Egypt rapidly
concentrated, and on the 21st of March their general attacked the
English army. After a stubborn battle, in which Abercromby fell
mortally wounded, the French drew ofif with heavy loss ; and at the
close of June the capitulation of the 13,000 soldiers who remained
closed the French rule over Egypt.

Both parties in this gigantic struggle however were at last anxious
to suspend the war. It was to give time for such an organization of
France and its resources as might enable him to reopen the struggle with
other chances of success that Buonaparte opened negotiations for peace
at the close of 1 801. His offers were at once met by the English Govern-
ment. The terms of the Peace of Amiens which was concluded in
March 1802 were necessarily simple, for England had no claim to
interfere with the settlement of the Continent. France promised to
retire from Southern Italy, and to leave to themselves the republics
it had set up along its border in Holland, Switzerland and Piedmont.
England recognized the French Government, gave up her newly
conquered colonies save Ceylon and Trinidad, acknowledged the
Ionian Islands as a free Republic, and engaged to replace the
Knights of St. John in the isle of Malta. There was a general
sense of relief at the close of the long struggle ; and the new French
ambassador was drawn in triumph on his arrival through the streets
of London. But shrewd observers saw the dangers that lay in the
temper of the First Consul. Whatever had been the errors of the
French revolutionists, even their worst attacks on the independence
of the nations around them had been veiled by a vague notion of
freeing the peoples whom they invaded from the yoke of their
rulers. But the aim of Buonaparte was simply that of a vulgar

3 G 2

Ski-. IV.

Thk

Wak Willi
Franck.

1793

1815

The
Coalition
broken up

1 801

i I

The
Peace oi
Amiens

• >.-,

Designs of
Napaleon

820

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Skc. IV.

The

War with

France

1793

1815

Declaration
of war

Trafalgar

The Camp
at Boulogne

conqueror. He was resolute to be master of the Western world, and
no notions of popular freedom or sense of national right interfered with
his resolve. The means at his command were immense. The
political life of the Revolution had been cut short by his military
despotism, but the new social vigour which it had given to France
through the abolition of privileges and the creation of a new middle
class on the ruins of the clergy and the nobles still lived on. While
the dissensions which tore France asunder were hushed by the policy
of the First Consul, by his restoration of the Church as a religious
power, his recall of the exiles, and the economy and wise administra-
tion which distinguished his rule, the centralized system of government
bequeathed by the Monarchy to the Revolution, and by the Revolution
to Buonaparte, enabled him easily to seize this national vigour for the
profit of his own despotism. The exhaustion of the brilliant hopes
raised by the Revolution, the craving for public order, the military
enthusiasm and the impulse of a new glory given by the wonderful
victories France had won, made a Tyranny possible ; and in the hands
of Buonaparte this tyranny was supported by a secret police, by the
suppression of the press and of all freedom of opinion, and above all
by the iron will and immense ability of the First Consul himself. Once
chosen Consul for life, he felt himself secure at home, and turned
restlessly to the work of outer aggression. The pledges given at
Amiens were set aside. The republics established on the borders of
France were brought into mere dependence on his will. Piedmont and
Parma were annexed to France ; and a French army occupied
Switzerland. The temperate protests of the English Government
were answered by demands for the expulsion of the French exiles
who had been living in England ever since the Revolution, and
for its surrender of Malta, which was retained till some security
could be devised against a fresh seizure of the island by the French
fleet. It was plain that a struggle was inevitable ; huge armaments
were preparing in the French ports, and a new activity was seen in
those of Spain. In May 1803 the British Government anticipated
Buonaparte's attack by a declaration of war.

The breach only quickened Buonaparte's resolve to attack the I
enemy at home. The difficulties in his way he set contemptuously]
aside. " Fifteen millions of people," he said, in allusion to the dis-
proportion between the population of England and France, "must I
give way to forty millions " ; and an invasion of England itself was
plannec on a gigantic scale. A camp of one hundred thousand
men was formed at Boulogne, and a host of flat-bottomed boats
gathered for their conveyance across the Channel. Tb, peril of I
the nation forced Addington from office and recalled Pitt to power.
His health was broken, and as the days went by his alppearance}
became so haggard and depressed that it was plain death was drawj

Jng near.

all its ol

and he \

ministry,

of Lord C

as the los

' ieft him j

danger wi

nent whe

Napoleon

the Chanr

masters oi

fleet wouI{

centrated

destined t(

fleet at N

that of Fra

of the Chi

Spanish ai

vast arman

dred thousi

attack woul

Army, had I

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

821

d, and
d with

The
lUitary
France
middle
While
! policy
jligious
inistra-
rnment
solution
• for the
t hopes
military
onderful
le hands
2, by the
ibove all
f. Once
d turned
given at
orders of
mont and
occupied
vernment
ch exiles
ion, and

security

French
rmaments

seen in
nticipated

Lttack the
tnptuously
the dis-
ce, "must
itself was
thousand
ned boats
peril of
to power,
.ppearancej
was draw-

ing near. But dying as he really was, the nation clung to him with
all its old faith. He was still the representative of national union ;
and he proposed to include Fox and the leading Whigs in his new
ministry, but he was foiled by the bigotry of the King ; and the refusal
of Lord Grenville and of Windham to take office without Fox, as well
as the loss of his post at a later time by his ablest supporter, Dundas,
left him almost alone. But lonely as he was, he faced difficulty and
danger with the same courage as of old. The invasion seemed immi-
nent when Buonaparte, who now assumed the title of the Emperor
Napoleon, appeared in the camp at Boulogne. " Let us be masters of
the Channel for six hours," he is reported to have said, " and we are
masters of the world." A skilfully combined plan by which the British
fleet would have been divided, while the whole French navy was con-
centrated in the Channel, was delayed by the death of the admiral
destined to execute it. But the alliance with Spain placed the Spanish
fleet at Napoleon's disposal, and in 1805 he planned its union with
that of France, the crushing of the squadron which blocked the ports
of the Channel before the English ships which were watching the
Spanish armament could come to its support, and a crossing of the
vast armament thus protected to the English shore. The three hun-
dred thousand volunteers mustered in England to meet the coming
attack would have offered small hindrance to the veterans of the Grand
Army, had they once crossed the Channel. But Pitt had already found
work for France elsewhere. The alarm of the Continental Powers
had been brought to a head by Napoleon's annexation of Genoa ;
Pitt's subsidies had removed the last obstacle in the way of a league ;
and Russia, Austria, and Sweden joined in an aUiance to wrest Italy
and the Low Countries from the grasp of the French Emperor.
Napoleon meanwhile swept the sea in vain for a glimpse of the
great armament whose assembly in the Channel he had so skilfully
planned. Admiral Villeneuve, uniting the Spanish ships with his
own squadron from Toulon, drew Nelson in pursuit to the West
Indies, and then, suddenly returning to Cadiz, hastened to form a
junction with the French squadron at Brest and crush the English
fleet in the Channel. But a headlong pursuit brought Nelson up with
him ere the manoeuvre was complete, and the two fleets met on the
2 1 St of October, 1805, off Cape Trafalgar. " England," ran Nelson's
famous signal, " expects every man to do his duty ; " and though he
fdl himself in the hour of victory, twenty French sail had struck their
flag ere the day was done. " England has saved herself by her courage,"
Pitt said in what were destined to be his last public words : " she will
save Europe by her example ! " But even before the victory of Trafalgar
Napoleon had abandoned the dream of invading England to m-zct the
coalition Jh his rear ; and swinging round his forces on the Danube he
forced an Austrian army to capitulation in Uim three days before his

Sec. IV.

The

War with

France

1703

1815

•^m

League
against
France

I'' i'1

Nov, 1805

822

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

The

War with

France

1703

1815

Death of
Pitt

The
Orenville
Ministry

Jena

The Berlin
Decree

Nov, 1806

naval defeat. From Ulm he marched on Vienna, and crushed the
combined armies of Austria and Russia in the battle of Austerlitz.
"Austerlitz/'Wilberforce wrote in his diary, "killed Pitt." Though he
was still but forty-seven, the hollow voice and wasted frame of the great
Minister had long told that death was near ; and the blow to his hopes
proved fatal. " Roll up that map," he said, pointing to a map of Europe
which hung upon the wall : " it will not be wanted these ten years ! "
Once only he rallied from stupor ; and those who bent over him caught
a faint murmur of" My country ! How I 'eave my country ! " On the
23rd of January, 1806, he breathed his last ; and was laid in West-
minster Abbey in the grave of Chatham. " What grave," exclaimed
Lord Wellesley, "contains such a father and such a son ! What
sepulchre embosoms thd remains of so much human excellence and
glory ! "

So great was felt to be the loss that nothing but the union of parties,
which Pitt had in vain desired during his lifetime, could fill up the gap
left by his death. In the new Ministry Fox, with the small body of
popular Whigs who were bent on peace and internal reform, united
with the aristocratic Whigs under Lord Grenville and with the Tories
under Lord Sidmouth. All home questions in fact were subordinated
to the need of saving Europe from the ambition of France, and in the
resolve to save Europe, Fox was as resolute as Pitt himself. His hopes
of peace, indeed, were stronger ; but they were foiled by the evasive
answer which Napoleon gave to his overtures, and by a new war
which he undertook against Prussia, the one power which seemed able
to resist his arms. On the 14th of October, 1806, a decisive victory
at Jena laid North Germany at Napoleon's feet. Death only a month
before saved Fox from witnessing the overthrow of his hopes ; and his
loss weakened the Grenville Cabinet at the opening of a new and
more desperate struggle with France. Napoleon's earlier attempt at
the enforcement of a Continental System had broken down with the
failure of the Northern League; but in his mastery of Europe he
now saw a more effective means of realizing his dream ; and he was
able to find a pretext for his new attack in England's own action. By
a violent stretch of her rights as a combatant she had declared the
whole coast occupied by France and its allies, from Dantzig to Trieste,
to be in a state of blockade. It was impossible to enforce such a
" paper blockade," even with the immense force at her disposal ; and
Napoleon seized on the opportunity to retaliate by the entire exclu-
sion of British commerce from the Continent, an exclusion which he
trusted would end the war by the ruin it would bring on the English
manufacturers. A decree was issued from Berlin which— without a
single ship to carry it out — placed the British Islands in a state of
blockade. All commerce or communication with them was prohibited ;
all English goods or manufactures found in the territory of France or

its allies
closed, I
who hai
system ^
trade, b
connivar
the prcs:
to do wit
of licenc
marched
with shoe
industry,
to move
cation, ar
American
it, and it
January, :
the coast
vessels tr
from satis
to Lord (
been too
Its greate^
done in tl
merchants
to open th
to serve ir
of a pledg
pledge the
Its fall
by the pe;
the war Ei
head of tl
the Duke (
George C;
brilliant r
while the
colour to tl
so hopeles
of Poland,
in the hare
the Czar
Peace of '
Eastern E
the conque

X.]

MODERN KNGLAND.

823

its allies were declared liable to confiscation ; and their harbours were
closed, not only against vessels coming from Britain, but against all
who had touched at her ports. The attempt to enforce such a
system was foiled indeed by the rise of a widespread contraband
trade, by the reluctance of Holland to aid in its own ruin, by the
connivance of officials along the Prussian and Russian shores, and by
the pressure of facts. It was impossible even for Napoleon himself
to do without the goods he pretended to exclude ; an immense system
of licences soon neutralized his decree ; and the French army which
marched to Eylau was clad in great-coats made at Leeds, and shod
with shoes made at Northampton. But if it failed to destroy British
industry, it told far more fatally on British commerce. Trade began
to move from English vessels, which were subject to instant confis-
cation, and to pass into the hands of neutrals, and especially of the
Americans. The merchant class called on the Government to protect
it, and it was to this appeal that the Grenville Ministry replied in
January, 1807, by an Order in Council which declared all the ports of
the coast of France and her allies under blockade, and any neutral
vessels trading between them to be good prize. Such a step was far
from satisfying the British merchants. But their appeal was no longer
to Lord Grenville. The forces of ignorance and bigotry which had
been too strong for Pitt were too strong for the Grenville Ministry.
Its greatest work, the abolition of the slave trade, in February, was
done in the teeth of a vigorous opposition from the Tories and the
merchants of Liverpool ; and in March the first indication of its desire
to open the question of religious equality by allowing Catholic officers
to serve in the army was met on the part of the King by the demand
of a pledge not to meddle with the question. On the refusal of this
pledge the Ministry was dismissed.

Its fall was the final close of the union of parties brought about
by the peril of French invasion ; and from this time to the end of
the war England was wholly governed by the Tories. The nominal
head of the Ministry which succeeded that of Lord Grenville was
the Duke of Portland ; its guiding spirit was the Foreign Secretary,
George Canning, a young and devoted adherent of Pitt, whose
brilliant rhetoric gave him power ^ over the House of Commons,
while the vigour and breadth of his mind gave a new energy and
colour to the war. At no time had opposition to Napoleon seemed
so hopeless. From Berlin the Emperor marched into the heart
of Poland, and though checked in the winter by the Russian forces
in the hard-fought battle of Eylau, his victory of Friedland brought
the Czar Alexander in the summer of 1807 to consent to the
Peace of Tilsit. From foes the two Emperors of Western and
Eastern Europe became friends, and the hope of French aid in
the conquest of Turkey drew Alexander to a close alliance with

Skc. IV.

The

Wak with

France

1793

1815

I
I

Orders in
Council

5! !■

Canning

Peace of
Tilsit

824

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

The

War with

Franck

1793

1815

The Milnn
Decree

The Pen-

Insnlar

War

Napoleon. Russia not only enforced the Berlin decrees against
British commerce, but forced Sweden, the one ally that England still
retained on the Continent, to renounce her alliance. The Russian
and Swedish fleets were thus placed at the service of France ; and the
two Emperors counted on securing the fleet of Denmark, and again
threatening by this union the maritime supremacy which formed
England's real defence. The hope was foiled by the appearance off
Elsinore in July 1807 of an expedition, promptly and secretly equipped
by Canning, with a demand for the surrender of the Danish fleet into
the hands of England, on pledge of its return at the close of the war.
On the refusal of the Danes the demand was enforced by a bombard-
ment of Copenhagen ; and the whole Danish fleet, with a vast mass of
naval stores, was carried into British ports. It was in the same spirit
of almost reckless decision that Canning turned to meet Napoleon's
Continental System. In November he issued fresh Orders in Council.
By these France, and every Continental state from which the British
flag was excluded, was put in a state of blockade, and all vessels bound
for their harbours were held subject to seizure unless they had touched
at a British port. The orders were at once met by another decree of
Napoleon issued at Milan in December, which declared every vessel,
of whatever nation, coming from or bound to Britain or any British
colony, to have forfeited its character as a neutral, and to be liable to
seizure.

Meanwhile the effect of the Continental System upon Napoleon was
to drive him to aggression after aggression in order to maintain the
material union of Europe against Britain. He was absolutely master
of Western Europe, and its whole face changed as at an enchanter's
touch. \ Prussia was occupied by French troops. Holland was changed
into a monarchy by a simple decree of the French Emperor, and its
crown bestowed on his brother Louis. Another brother, Jerome,
became King of Westphalia, a new realm built up out of the Electo-
rates of Hesse Cassel and Hanover. A third brother, Joseph, was
made King of Naples ; while the rest of Italy, and even Rome itself,
was annexed to the French Empire. It was the hope of effectually
crushing the world power of Britain which drove him to his worst aggres-
sion, the aggression upon Spain.. He acted with his usual subtlety.
In October 1807 France and Spain agreed to divide Portugal between
them ; and on the advance of their forces the reigning House of
Braganza fled helplessly from Lisbon to a refuge in Brazil. But the
seizure of Portugal was only a prelude to the seizure of Spain. Charles
the Fourth, whom a riot in his capital drove at this moment to abdica-
tion, and his son, Ferdinand the Seventh, were drawn to Bayonne in
May, 1808, and forced to resign their claims to the Spanish crown ; while
a French army entered Madrid and proclaimed Joseph Buonaparle King
of Spain. But this high-handed act of aggression was hardly completed

when S|
the effoi
througlu
Sheridai
with prir
out patri
are anim
that " ne
bold stro
to chan^
islands f(
the Spar
placed ui
for servic
a French
the powe:
severe. L
Wellesle>
and force
August. ;
appeared
Moore, w!
Spanish a
fall hastil)
before Cc
all seemei
the Frenc
repulsed t
The lai
Spanish c
to the dee
of the evj
Spanish J
already pi
sand fres
Wellesley
against ai
critical mc
were draw
had rouse
When M2
Wellesley
disastrous
pushed wi
joined on

X.]

MOLERN ENGLAND.

when Spain rose; as one man against the stranger ; and desperate as
the effort of its people seemed, the news of the rising was welcomed
throughout England with a burst of enthusiastic joy. *' Hitherto," cried
Sheridan, a leader of the Whig opposition, "Huonaparte has contended
with princes without dignity, numbers without ardour, or peoples with-
out patriotism. He has yet to learn what it is to combat a people who
are animated by one spirit against him." Tory and Whig alike held
that " never had so happy an opportunity existed in Britain to strike a
bold stroke for the rescue of the world;" and Canning at once resolved
to change the system of desultory descents on colonics and sugar
islands for a vigorous warfare in the Peninsula. Supplies were sent to
the Spanish insurgents witli reckless profusion, and two small armies
placed under the command of Sir John Moore and Sir Arthur Wellesley
for service in the Peninsula. In July 1808 the surrender at Baylen of
a French force which had invaded Andalusia gave the first shock to
the power of Napoleon, and the blow was followed by one almost as
severe. Landing at the Mondego with fifteen thousand men, Sir Arthur
Wellesley drove the French army of Portugal from the field of Vimiera,
and forced it to surrender in the Convention of Cintra on the 30th of
August. But the tide of success was soon roughly turned. Napoleon
appeared in Spain with an army of two hundred thousand men ; and
Moore, who had advanced from Lisbon to Salamanca to support the
Spanish armies, found them crushed on the Ebro, and was driven to
fall hastily back on the coast. His force saved its honour in a battle
before Corunna, which enabled it to embark in safety ; but elsewhere
all seemed lost. The whole of northern and central Spain was held by
the French armies ; and even Zaragoza, which had once heroically
repulsed them, submitted after a second equally desperate resistance.

The landing of the wreck of Moore's army and the news of the
Spanish defeats turned the temper of England from the wildest hope
to the deepest despair ; but Canning remained unmoved. On the day
of the evacuation of Corunna he signed a treaty of alliance with the
Spanish Junta at Cadiz ; and the English force at Lisbon, which had
already prepared to leave Portugal, was reinforced with thirteen thou-
sand fresh troops and placed under the command of Sir Arthur
Wellesley. " Portugal," Wellesley wrote coolly, " may be defended
against any force which the French can bring against it." At this
critical moment the best of the French troops with the Emperor himself
were drawn from the Peninsula to the Danube ; for the Spanish rising
had roused Austria as well as England to a renewal of the struggle.
When Marshal Soult therefore threatened Lisbon from the north,
Wellesley marched boldly against h' nn, drove him from Oporto in a
disastrous retreat, and suddenly -hanging his line of operations,
pushed with twenty thousand men by Abrantes en Madrid. He was
joined on the march by a Spanish force of thirty thousand men ; ard

8as

Skc. IV.

Thk

War with

Fkanck

1703

1815

The riitHg
of Spain

!■•'

Jan. 16,
1809

Welleslejf

! . II

826

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH I'KOPLK.

[chap.

Sue. IV.

Thk

Wak with

Kranck

1703

1815

Torres
Vtdras

The
Perceval
Ministry

a bloody action Vvith a IVench army of equal force at Talavera in
July, 1809, restored the renown of English arms. The losses on both
sides were enormous, and the French fell back at the close of the
struggle ; but the fruits of the victory were lost by a sudden appear-
ance of Soult on the l''.nt,lish line of advance, and Wcllcslcy was forced
to retreat hastily on liadajoz. His failure was embittered by heavier
disasters elsewhere. Austria was driven to sue for peace by Napoleon's
victory at Wagram ; and a force of forty thousand l-'nglish soldiers
which had been despatched against Antwerp returned home baffled
after losing half its numbers in the marshes of Walchercn.

The failure at Walcheren brought about the fall of the Portland
Ministry. Canning attributed the disaster to the incompetence of
Lord Castlereagh, an Irish peer who after taking the chief part in
bringing about the union between England and Ireland had been
raised by the Duke of Portland to the post of Secretary at War ; and
the quarrel between the two Ministers ended in a duel, and in their
resignation of their offices. The Duke of I^ortland retired with
Canning ; and a new ministry was formed out of the more Tory
members of the late administration under the guidance of Spencer
Perceval, an industrious mediocrity of the narrowest type ; the Marquis
of Wellesley, a brother of the English general in Spain, Ijecoming Foreign
Secretary. But if Perceval and his colleagues possessed few of the
higher qualities of statesmanship, they had one characteristic which
in the actual portion of English aiTairs was beyond all price. They
were resolute to continue the war. Ln the nation at large the fit of
enthusiasm had been followed by a fit of despair ; and the City of
London even petitioned for a withdrawal of the English forces from
the Peninsula. Napoleon seemed irresistible, and now that Austria
was crushed and England stood alone in opposition to him, the
Emperor resolved to put an end to the strife by a vigorous prosecution
of the war in Spain. Andalusia, the one province which remained
independent, was invaded in the opening of 18 10, and with the excep-
tion of Cadiz reduced to submission ; while Marshal Massena with a fine
army of eighty thousand men marched upon Lisbon. Even Perceval
abandoned all hope of preserving a hold on the Peninsula in face of
these new efiforts, and threw on Wellesley, who had been raised to the
peerage as Lord Wellington after Talavera, the responsibility of re-
solving to remain there. But the cool judgement and firm temper
which distinguished Wellington enabled him to face a responsibility
from which weaker men would have shrunk. " I conceive," he an-
swered, " that the honour and interest of our country require that we
should hold our ground here as long as possible ; and, please God, I
will maintain it as long as I can." By the addition of Portuguese
troops who had been trained under British officers, his army was now
raised to fifty thousand men ; and though his inferiority in force com-

pelled hi
of Ciuda
the hcigl
lines of <
along a (
with can
as Mass
efforts tc
privation
country 1
Ciudad I-
Massena
had besic
1811, fail(
d'Onore, ;
his effort
Great a
the Engli
resistance
save the <
all Spain
coast was
England tl
she was j
aggressior
had atteiT
English
ports undc
serious en
France ar
combatant
Governme
seizing En
i^'fj mean J
the sailor
in the Bri
such as th(
disinclinat
maintenan
the Milan
them by
however, Ir
at the ope
Non-Inten
equally in

x.l

MODERN ENGLAND

827

pclled him to look on wlvlc Masscna reduced lljc frontier fi)rtrcsses
of Ciudad Rodrij,'o and Auncida, he inflicted on him a heavy check at
the heights of Husaco, and finally fell back in October, iSio, on three
lines of defence which he had secretly constructed at Torres Vcdras,
along a chain of mountain heights crowned with redoubts and bristling
with cannon. The position was impregnable ; and able and stubborn
as Massena was he found himself forced after a month's fruitless
efforts to fall back in a masterly retreat ; but so terrible were the
privations of the French army in passing again through the wasted
country that it was only with forty thousand men that he reached
Ciudad Rodrigo in the spring of 1811. Reinforced by fresh troops,
Massena turned fiercely to the relief of Almeida, which Wellington
had besieged ; but two days' bloody and obstinate fighting in May,
181 1, failed to drive the English army from its position at Fuentes
d'Onore, and the Marshal fell back on Salamanca and relinquished
his effort to drive Wellington from Portugal.

Great as was the effect of Torres Vedras in restoring the spirit of
the English people and in reviving throughout ICurope the iiope of
resistance to the tyranny of Napoleon, its immediate result was little
save the deliverance of Portugal. The French remained masters of
all Spain save Cadiz and the eastern provinces, and even the east
coast was reduced in 181 1 by the vigour of Cleneral Suchet. While
England thus failed to rescue Spain from the aggression of Napoleon,
she was suddenly brought face to face with the result of her own
aggression in America. The Orders in Council with which Canning
had attempted to prevent the transfer of the carrying trade from
English to neutral ships, by compelling all vessels on their way to
ports under blockade to touch at British harbours, had at once created
serious embarrassments with America. In the long strife between
France and England, America had already borne much from both
combatants, but above all from Britain. Not only had the English
Government exercized its right of search, but it asserted a right of
seizing English seamen found in American vessels ; and as there were
few means of discriminating between English seamen <ind American,
the sailor of Maine or Massachusetts was often impressed to serve
in the British fleet. Galled however as was America by outrages
such as these, she was hindered from resenting them by her strong
disinclination to war, as well as by the profit which she drew from the
maintenance of her neutral position. But the Orders in Council and
the Milan Decree forced her into action, and she at once answered
them by an embargo of trade with Europe. After a year's trial,
however, America found it impossible to maintain the embargo ; and
at the opening of 1809 she exchanged the embargo for an Act of
N on- Intercourse with France and England alone. But the Act was
equally ineffective. The American Government was utterly with-

Skc. IV.
TlIK

War with
Franik

1793

1815

England

and
America

1807

1809

ill

828

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

Ihb

War wit."

France

1793

TO
181 fy

May i8io

State of
Engpland

out meims of enforcing it on its land frontier ; and it had small
means of eiiforcing it at sea. Vessels sailed daily for British ports ;
and at last the Non-Intercourse Act was repealed altogether.
All that America persisted in maintaining was an offer that if
either Power would repeal its edicts, it would prohibit American
commerce with the other. Napoleon seized on this offer, and after
promising to revoke his Berlin and Milan Decrees he called on
America to redeem her pledge. In February iSii, therefore, the
United States announced that a!) intercourse with Great Britain and
her dependencies was at an end. The effect of this step was seen in
a reduction of English exports during this year by a third of their
whole amount. It was in vain that Britain pleaded that the
Emperor's promises remained unfulfilled, and that the enforcement of
non-intercourse with England was thus an unjust act, and an act of
hostility. The pressure of the American policy, as well as news of the
warlike temper which had at last grown up in the United States, made
submission inevitable ; for the industrial state of England was n jw so
critical that to expose it to fresh shocks was to court the very ruin
which Napoleon had planned.

During the earlier years of the war indeed the increase of wealth
had been enormous. England was sole mistress of the seas. The
v/p.r gave her possession of the colonies of Spain, of Holland, and
of France ; and if her trade was checked for a time by the Berlin
Decree, the efforts of Napoleon were soon rendered fruitless by the
vast smuggling system which sprang up along the southern coasts
and the coast of North Germany. English exports had nearly
doubled since the opening of the century. Manufactures profited
by the discoveries of Watt and Arkwright ; -rnd the consumption of
raw cotton in the mills of Lancashire rose during the same period
from fifty to a hundred millions of pounds. The vast accumula-
tion of capital, as well as the vast increase of the population at this
time, told upon the land, and forced agriculture into a feverish and
unhealthy prosperity. Wheat rose to famine prices, and the value of
land rose in proportion with the price of wheat. Inclosures went on
with prodigious rapidity ; the income of every landowner was doubled,
while the farmers were able to introduce improvements into the pro-
cesses of agriculture which changed the who e face of the country.
But if the increase of wealth was enormous, its distribution was partial.
During the fifteen years which preceded Waterloo, the number of the
population rose from ten to thirteen millions, and this rapid increase
kept down the rate of wages, which would naturally have advanced in
a corresponding degree with the increase in the national wealth. Even
manufactures, though destined in the long run to benefit the labouring
classes, seemed at first rather to depress them ; for one of the earliest
results of the introduction of machinery was the ruin of a number of

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

829

small trades which were carried on at home, and the pauperization of
families who relied on them for support. In the winter of 181 1 the ter-
rible pressure of this transition from handicraft to machinery was seen
in the Luddite, or machine-breaking, riots which broke out over the
northern and midland counties ; and which were only suppressed by
military force. While labour was thus thrown out of its older grooves,
and the rate of wages kept down at an artificially low figure "v/ the
rapid increase of population, the rise in the price of wheat, which brought
wealth to the landowner and the farmer, brought famine and death to
the poor, for England was cut off by the war from the vast corn-fields
of the Continent or of America, which now-a-day redress from their
abundance the results of a bad harvest. Scarcity was followed by a
terrible pauperization of the labouring classes. The amount of the
poor-rate rose fifty per cent. ; and with the increase of poverty followed
its inevitable result, the increcise of crime.

The natural relation of trade and commerce to the general wealth of
the people at large was thus disturbed by the peculiar circumstances
of the time. The war enriched the landowner, the farmer, the mer-
chant, the manufacturer ; but it impoverished the poor. It is indeed
from these fatal years which lie between the Peace of Luneville and
Waterloo that we must date that war of classes, that social severance
between employers and employed, which still forms the main difficulty
of English politics. But it is from these years too that we must date the
renewal of that progressive movement in politics which had been sus-
pended since the opening of the war. The publication of the Edinburgh
Review in 1802 by a knot of young lawyers at Edin.>urgh marked a
revival of the poHcy of constitutional and administrative progress which
had been reluctantly abandoned by William Pitt. Jeremy Benthamgave
a new vigour to political speculation by his advocacy of the doctrine
of Utility, and his definition of " the greatest happiness of the greatest
number" as the aim of poUtical action. In 1809 Sir Francis Burdett
revived the question of Parliamentary Reform. Only fifteen members
supported his motion ; and a reference to the House of Commons, in a
pamphlet which he subsequently published, as " a part of our fellow-sub-
jects collected together by means which it is not necessary to describe "
was met by his committal to the Tower, where he remained till the
prorogation of the Parliament. A far greater effect was produced by
the perseverance with which Canning pressed year by year the question
of Catholic Emancipation. So long as Perceval lived both efforts at
Reform were equally vain ; but on the accession of Lord Liverpool to
power the advancing strength of a more liberal sentiment iii the nation
was felt by the policy of " moderate concession " which was adopted by
the new ministry. Catholic Emancipation became an open question in
the Cabinet itself, and was adopted in 181 2 by a triumphant majority
in the House of Commons, though still rejected by the Lords.

Sec. IV.

The

War with

P'ranck

1793

1815

ReviTal

of
Reform

ii|?

830

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

The

Wak with

France

1793

1815

IVarwith
America

The

Liverpool
Ministry

Sala-
manca

and
MoscoTir

With social and political troubles thus awaking about them, even
Tory statesmen were not willing to face the terrible consequences of a
ruin of English industry, such as might i"olIow from the junction of
America with Napoleon. They were, in fact, preparing to withdrav.'
the Orders in Council when their plans were arrested by the dissolution
of the Perceval Ministry. Its position had fiom the first been a weak
one. A return of the King's madness had made it necessary in the
beginning of 181 1 to confer the Regency by Act of Parliament on the
Prince of Wales ; and the V/hig sympathies of the Prince threatened
the Perceval Cabinet with dismissal. The insecurity of their position
told on the conduct of the war ; for the apparent inactivity of Welling-
ton during 181 1 was really due to the hesitation and timidity of the
ministers at home. In May, 1812, the assassination of Perceval by a
maniac named Bellingham brought about the fall of his ministry ;
and fresh efforts were made by the Regent to install the Whigs in
office. Mutual distrust howevei foiled his attempts ; and the old
ministry was restored under the headship of Lord Liverpool, a
man of no great abilities, but temperate, well informed, and endowed
with a remarkable skill in holding discordant colleagues together.
The most important of these colleagues was Lord Castlereagh, who
became Secretary for Foreign Affairs. His first w">rk was to meet the
danger in which Canning had involved the country by his Orders in
Council. At ihe opening of 181 2 America, in despair of redress, had
resolved on war ; Congress voted an increase of both army and navy,
and laid an embargo on all vessels in American harbours. Actual
hostilities might still have been averted by the repeal of the Orders,
on which the English Cabinet was resolved, but in the confusion which
followed the murder of Perceval the opportunity was lost. On the 23rd
of June, only twelve days after the Ministry had been formed, the
Orders were repealed ; but when the news of the repeal reached
America, it came six weeks too late. On the i8th of June an Act of
Congress had declared America at war with Great Britain.

The moment when America entered into the great struggle was a
critical moment in the history of mankind. Six days after President
Madison issued his declaration of wtar. Napoleon crossed the Niemen
on his march to Moscow. Successful as his poHcy had been in stirring
up war between England and America, it had been no less successful
in breaking the alliance which he had made with the Emperor
Alexander at Tilsit and in forcing on a contest with Russia. On the
one hand. Napoleon was 'rritated by the refusal of Russia to enforce
strictly the suspension of all trade with England, though such a sus-
pension would have ruined the Russian landowners. On the other,
the Czar saw with growing anxiety the advance of the French Empire
which sprang from Napoleon's resolve to enforce his system by a
seizure of the northern coasts. In 181 1 Holland, the Hanseatic towns.

part of
annexec
peremp
intercot
tions w<
the Frei
and W<
thousan
withdra'
tude of
during t
Niemen
a march
both sidi
English
he was r
remaine(
lost ! " V\
the whol
equal, bi
forced Jc
concentr
was still
made his
The tow]
the two
Spain,
Portugue
Spain
a militar
was forge
English
Army frc
had ente
patiently
kindled 1
army wa
Of the f
Army at
Decembe
In spit
loss of th
broken b
Russians
which he

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

«3I

part of Westphalia, and the Duchy of Oldenburg were successively
annexed, and the Duchy of Mecklenburg threatened with seizure. A
peremptory demand on the par*: of France for the entire cessation of
intercourse with England brouglt the quarrel to a head ; and prepara-
tions were made on both sides for a gigantic struggle. The best of
the French soldiers were drawn from Spain to the frontier of Poland ;
and Wellington, whose army had been raised to a force of forty
thousand Englishmen and twenty thousand Portuguese, profited by the
withdrawal to throw off his system of defence and to assume an atti-
tude of attack. Ciudad Rodrigo and Badajoz were taken by storm
during the spring of 1812 ; and three days before Napoleon crossed the
Niemen in his march on Moscow, Wellington crossed the Agueda in
a march on Salamanca. After a series of masterly movements on
both sides, Marmont with the French army of the North attacked the
English on the hills in the neighbourhood of that town. While
he was marching round the right of the English position, his left wing
remained isolated ; and with a sudden exclamation of " Marmont is
lost ! " Wellington flung on it the bulk of his force, crushed it, and drove
the whole army from the field. The loss on either side was nearly
equal, but failure had demoralized the French army ; and its retreat
forced Joseph to leave Madrid, and Soult to evacuate Andalusia and to
concentrate the southern army on the eastern coast. While Napoleon
was still pushing slowly over the vast plains of Poland, Wellington
made his entry into Madrid in AugusL, and began the siege of Burgos.
The town however held out gallantly for a month, till the advance of
the two French armies, now concentrated in the north and south of
Spain, forced Wellington in October to a hasty retreat on the
Portuguese frontier. If he had shaken the rule of the French in
Spain in this campaign, his ultimate failure showed how firm
a military hold they still possessed there. But the disappointment
was forgotten in the news which followed it. At the moment when the
English troops fell back from Burgos began the retreat of the Grand
Army from Moscow. Victorious in a battle at Borodino, Napoleon
had entered the older capital of Russia in triumph, and waited im-
patiently to receive proposals of peace from the Czar, when a fire
kindled by its own inhabitants reduced the city to ashes. The French
army was forced to fall back amidst the horrors of a Russian winter.
Of the four hundred thousand combatants who formed the Grand
Army at its first outset, only a few thousand recrossed the Niemen in
December.

In spite of the gigantic efforts which Napoleon made to repair the
loss of the Grand Army, the spell which he had cast over Europe was
broken by the retreat from Moscow. Prussia rose against him as the
Russians crossed the Niemen in the spring of 181 3 ; and the forces
which held it were at once thrown back on the Elbe. In this

Skc. IV.

The

War with

France

1793

1815

]Vellington
in Spain

July 22 \

H;'

The Retreat

from

Moscmv

Fall of
Napoleon

832

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[JHAP.

Sec. IV.

The

War with
France

1793

1815

June 21,
1813

The

American

War

emergency the military genius of the French Emperor vose to its
height. With a fresh army of two hundred thousand men whom he
had gathered at Main? he marched on the allied armies of Russia and
Prussia in May, cleared Saxony by a victory over them at Lutzen, and
threw them back on the Oder by a fresh victory at Bautzen. Dis-
heartened by defeat, and by the neutral attitude which Austria still
preserved, the two powers consented in June to an armistice, and
negotiated for peace. But Austria, though unwilling to utterly ruin
France to the profit of her great rival in the East, was as resolute as
either of the allies to wrest from Napoleon his supremacy over Europe ;
and at the moment when it became clear that Napoleon was only bent
on playing with her proposals, she was stirred to action by news that
his army was at last driven from Spain. Wellington had left Portugal
in May with an army which had now risen to ninety thousand men ;
and overtaking the French forces in retreat at Vitoria he inflicted on
them a defeat which drove them in utter rout across the Pyrenees.
Madrid was at once evacuated ; and Clauzel fell back from Zaragoza
into France. The victory not only freed Spain from its invaders ; it
restored the spirit of the Allies. The close of the armistice was
followed by a union of Austria with the forces of Prussia and the Czar ;
and in October a final overthrow of Napoleon at Leipzig forced the
French army to fall back in rout across the Rhine. The war now
hurried to its close. Though held at bay for a while by the sieges of
San Sebastian and Pampeluna, as well as by an obstinate defence of
the Pyrenees, Wellington succeeded in the very rtionth of the triumph
at Leipzig in winning a victoiy on the Bidassof., which enabled him
to enter France. He was soon followed by the Allies. On the last
day of 181 3 their forces crossed the Rhine; and a third of France
passed, without opposition, into their hands. For two months more
Napoleon maintained a wonderful struggle with a handful of raw
conscripts against their overwhelming numbers ; while in the south,
Soult, forced from his entrenched camp near Bayonne and defeated at
Orthes, fell back before Wellington on Toulouse. Here their two
armies met in April in a stubborn and indecisive engagement. But
though neither leader knew it, the war was even then at an end. The
struggle of Napoleon himself had ended at the close of March with the
surrender of Paris ; and the submission of the capital was at once
followed by the abdication of the Emperor and the return of the
Bourbons.

England's triumph over its enemy was dashed by the more doubtful
fortunes of the struggle across the Atlantic. The declaration of war
by America seemed an act of sheer madness ; for its navy consisted of
a few frigates and sloops ; its army was a mass of half-drilled and half-
armed recruits ; while the States themselves were divided on the
question of the war, and Connecticut with Massachusetts refused to

send e

during
these ;
sea. ]
frigate:
victori(
were tj
macy
by moi
capture
made t
Canada
of the ]
recover!
the part
to the \
terrible
America
Massac!
with deh
their grii
was rene
invaded,
the Briti
a few we
on its o^
Governs
which it
thousanc
before e\
Few mor
inore sh
Governm
tended si
stress jf
to penetr
proved u
which m
Champlai
which ac
appeared
New Orle
half its ni
close of tl:
niade the

i '

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

833

to its

3m he

ia and

n, and
Dis-

•ia still

:e, and

ly ruin

•lute as

:urope ;

ily bent

ws that

Portugal

d men ;

cted on

yrenees.

^aragoza

.ders; it

tice was

he Czar ;

irced the

war now
sieges of

efence of

! triumph

bled him
I the last
)f France
ths more
il of raw
he south,
jfeated at
their two
ent. But
nd. The
with the
is at once
■n of the

send either money or men. Three attempts to penetrate into Canada
during the summer and autumn were repulsed with heavy loss. But
these failures were more than redeemed by unexpected successes at
sea. In two successive engagements between English and American
frigates, the former were forced to strike their flag. The effect of these
victories was out of all proportion to their real importance ; for they
were the first heavy blows which had been dealt at England's supre-
macy over the seas. In 181 3 America followed up its naval triumphs
by more vigorous efforts on land. Its forces cleared Lake Ontario,
captured Toronto, destroyed the British flotilla on Lake Erie, and
made themselves masters of Upper Canada. An attack on Lower
Canada, however, was successfully beaten back ; and a fresh advance
of the British and Canadian forces in the heart of the winter again
recovered the Upper Province. The reverse gave fresh strength to
the party in the United States which had throughout been opposed
to the war, and whose opposition to it had been embittered by the
terrible distress brought about by the blockade and the ruin of
American commerce. Cries of secession began to be heard, and
Massachusetts took the bold step of appointing delegates to confer
with delegates from the othe: New England States " on the subject of
their grievances and common concerns." In 1814, howe»fer, the war
was renewed with more vigour than ever ; and Upper Canada was again
invaded. But the American army, after inflicting a severe defeat on
the British forces in the battle of Chippewa in July, was itself defeated
a few weeks after in an equally stubborn engagement, and thrown back
on its own frontier ; while the fall of Napoleon enabled the English
Government to devote its whole strength to the struggle with an enemy
which it had ceased to despise. General Ross, with a force of four
thousand men, appeared in the Potomac, captured Washington, and
before evacuating the city burnt its public buildings to the ground.
Few more shameful acts are recorded in our history ; and it was the
more shameful in that it was done under strict orders from the
Government at home. The raid upon Washington, however, was in-
tended simply tc strike terror into the American people ; and the real
stress of the war was thrown on two expeditions whose business was
to penetrate into the States from the north and from the south. Both
proved utter failures. A force of nine thousand Peninsular veterans
which marched in September to the attack of Plattsburg on Lake
Champlain was forced to fall back by the defeat of the English flotilla
which accompanied it. A second force under General Packenham
appeared in December at the mouth of the Mississippi and attacked
New Orleans, but was repulsed by General Jackson with the loss of
half its numbers. Peace, however, had already been concluded. The
close of the French war, if it left untouched the grounds of the struggle,
made the United States sensible of the danger of pushing it further ;

3 H

Sec. IV.

The

War with

France

1703

1615

'il

'}<{

I . „ll.

834

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

The

War with

France

1703

1815

Return

Napoleon

March i,
1815

Waterloo

1815

Bi itain herself was anxious for peace ; and the warring claims, both of
England and America, were set aside in silence in the treaty of 18 14.

The close of the war with America freed England's hands at a
moment when the reappearance of Napoleon at Paris called her to a
new and final struggle with France. By treaty with the Allied Powers
Napoleon had been suffered to retain a fragment of his former empire
— the island of Elba off the coast of Tuscany ; and from Elba he had
looked on at the q jarrels which sprang up between his conquerors as
soon as they gathered at Vienna to complete the settlement of Europe.
The most formidable of these quarrels arose from the claim of Prussia
to annex Saxony, and that of Rursia to annex Poland ; but their union
for this purpose was met by a counter-league of England and Austria
with their old enemy France, whose ambassador, Talleyrand, laboured
vigorously to bring the question to an issue by force of arms. At the
moment, however, when a war between the two leagues seemed close
at hand. Napoleon quitted Elba, landed on the coast near Cannes,
and, followed only by a thousand of his guards, marched over the
mountains of Dauphind upon Grenoble and Lyons. He counted, and
counted justly, on the indifference of the country to its new Bourbon
rulers, on the longitig of the army for a fresh struggle which should
restore its glory, and above all on the spell of his name over soldiers
whom he had so often led to victory. In twenty days from his land-
ing he reached the Tuikries unopposed, while Lewis the Eighteenth
fled helplessly to Ghent. But whatever hopes he had drawn from the
divisions of the Allied Powers were at once dispelled by their resolute
artion on the news of his descent upon France. Their strife was
hushed and their old union restored by the consciousness of a common
danger. An engagement to supply a million of men for the purposes of
the war, and a recall of their armies to the Rhine, answered Napoleon's
efforts to open negotiations with the Powers. England furnished
subsidies to the amount of eleven millions, and hastened to place an
army on the frontier of the Netherlands. The best troops of the force
which had been employed in the Peninsula, however, were still across
the Atlantic ; and of the eighty thousand men who gathered round
Wellington only about a half were Englishmen, the rest principally
raw levies from Belgium and Hanover. The Duke's plan was to unite
with the one hundred and fifty thousand Prussians under Marshal
Blucher who were advancing on the Lower Rhine, and to enter France
by Mons and Namur, while the forces of Austria and Russia closed in
upon Paris by way of Belfort and Elsass.

But Napoleon had thrown aside all thought of a merely defensive
war. By amazing efforts he had raised an army of two hundred and
fifty thousand men in the few months since his arrival in Paris ; and
in the opening of June one hundred and twenty thousand Frenchmen
were concentrated on the Sambre at Charleroi, while Wellington's

troop
Nivel
Both
juncti
was h
test d:
with 1
reserv
Englis
assem
horse ;
forW«
Ney s£
field,
engage
Englis
breakii
left the
Prussia
thousar
order u
the Em
thirty tj
while w
to battl
one anc
on the 1
a contir
line dra
road fr(
stragglii
for his
between
in guns
vof Celgi
fierce at
not till
near La
struggle,
been sh
Waterloi
hurled \
victoriou
siers, an
flung its<

CHAP.

>oth of

1814.

5 at a

;r to a

Powers

empire

he had

rors as

Europe.

Prussia

ir union

Austria

aboured
At the

ed close

Cannes,

over the

ted, and

Bourbon

h should

■ soldiers

his land-

ighteenth

from the
resolute

itrife was
common
irposes of
apoleon's
furnished
place an
the force

Itill across
■ed round
irincipally
,s to unite
Marshal
er France
closed in

defensive
idred and
'aris; and
'renchmen
[ellington's

X.]

MODERN ENGLAND.

83$

troops still lay in cantonments on the line of the Scheldt from Ath to
Nivelle, and Blucher's on that of the Meuse from N ivelle to Lidge.
Both the allied armies hastened to unite at Quatre Bras ; but their
junction was already impossible. Blucher with eighty thousand men
was himself attacked by Napoleon at -igny, and after a desperate con-
test driven back with terrible loss upon Wavre. On the same day Ney
with twenty thousand men, and an equal force under D'Erlon in
reserve, appeared before Quatre Bras. Adhere as yet only ten thousand
English and the same force of Bf,lgian troops had been able to
assemble. The Belgians broke bfjfore the charges of the French
horse ; but the dogged resistance of ^he English infantry gave time
for Wellington to bring up corps after corps, till at the close of the day
Ney saw himself heavily outnumbered, and withdrew baffled from the
field. About five thousand men had fallen on either side in this fierce
engagement : but heavy as was Wellington's loss, the firmness of the
English army had already done much to foil Napoleon's effort at
breaking through the line of the Allies. Blucher's retreat however
left the English flank uncovered ; and on the following day, while the
Prussians were falling back on Wavre, Wellington with nearly seventy
thousand men — for his army was now well in hand — withdrew in good
order upon Waterloo, followed by the mass of the French forces under
the Emperor himself. Napoleon had detached Marshal Grouchy with
thirty thousand men to hang upon the rear of the beaten Prussians,
while with a force of eighty thousand he resolved to bring V^ellington
to battle. On the morning of the i8th of June the two armies faced
one another on the field of Waterloo in front of the Forest of Soignies,
on the high road to Brussels. Napoleon's one fear had been that of
a continued retreat. " I have them ! " he cried, as he saw the English
line drawn up on a low rise of ground which stretched across the high
road from the chateau of Hougomont on its right to the farm and
straggling village of La Haye Sainte on its left. He had some grounds
for his confidence of success. On either side the forces numbered
between seventy and eighty thousand men : but the French were superior
in guns and cavalry, and a large part of Wellington's force consisted
of Belgian levies who broke and fled at the outset of the fight. A
fierce attack upon Hougomont opened the battle at eleven ; but it was
not till midday that the corps of D'Erlon advanced upon the centre
near La Haye Sainte, which from that time bore the main brunt of the
struggle. Never has greater courage, whether of attack or endurance,
been shown on any field than was shown by both combatants at
Waterloo. The columns of D'Erlon, repulsed by the English foot, were
hurled back in disorder by a charge of the Scots Greys ; but the
victorious horsemen were crushed in their turn by the French cuiras-
siers, and the mass of the French cavalry, twelve thousand strong,
flung itself in charge after charge on the English front, carrying the

3 H 2

Sec. IV.

The

War with
France

1703

1815

June 1 6

ii>

836

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

[chap.

Sec. IV.

The

War with

France

1793

1815

English guns and sweeping with desperate bravery round the unbroken
squares whose fire thinned their ranks. With almost equal bravery
the French columns of the centre again advanced, wrested at last the
farm of La Haye Sainte from their opponents, and pushed on vigorously
though in vain under Ney against the troops in its rear. But mean-
while every hour was telling against Napoleon. To win the battle he
must crush the English army before Blucher joined it ; and the English
army was still uncrushed. Terrible as was his loss, and many of his
regiments were reduced to a mere handful of men, Wellington stub-
bornly held his ground while the Prussians, advancing from Wavre
through deep and miry forest roads, were slowly gathering to his
bupport, disregarding the attack on their rear by which Grouchy strove
to hold them back from the field. At halt-past four their advanced
guard deployed at last from the woods ; but the main body was far
behind, and Napoleon was still able to hold his ground against them
till their increasing masses forced him to sta':e all on a desperate
effort against the English front. The Imperial Guard — his only
reserve, and which had as yet taken no part in the battle — was drawn
up at seven in two huge columns of attack. Tho first, with Ney him-
self at its head, swept all before it as it mounted the ris'* beside La
Hayo Sainte, on which the thin English line still held its ground, and
all but touched the English fro^H when its mass, torn by the terrible
fire of musketry with which it was received, gave way before a charge.
The second, three thousand strong, advanced with the same courage
over the slope near Hougomont, only to be repulsed and shattered in
its turn. At the moment when these masses fell slowly and doggedly
back down the fatal rise, the Prussians pushed forward on Napoleon's
right, their guns swept the road to Charleroi, and Wellington seized
the moment for a' general advance. From that hour all was lost.
Only the Guard stood firm in the wreck of the French army ; and
though darkness anO. exhaustion checked the English in their pursuit
of the broken troops ab they hurried from the field, the Prussian horse
continued *che chase through the night. Only forty thousand French-
men with some thirty guns recrossed the Sambre, while Napoleon
himself fled hurriedly to Paris. His st^ond abdication war followed
by the triumphant entry of the English and Prussian armies into
the French capital ; and the long war ended with his exile to St.
Helena, and the return of Lewis the Eighteenth to the throne of tb"
Bo'irbons. "

Wn
some
greatei
near tc
In a wi
ourselv
events
The
feverisi
Malta,
to exist
the Fre
the oth
which I
general
industry
home ar
manufa(
series ol
landowr
agriculti
produce
introduc
Society,
sequent
by the d
The mo
i8i2 rev
brought
too of th
now sup:
irritation
reform "
drove mc
In 1819
assemble
increasec
desperate
tion of

Conspira

HAP.

oken
ivery
it the
ously
tiean-
le he
iglish
of his

stub-
Vavre
to his
strove
^anced
■as far
t them
iperate
s only

drawn
;y him-
side La
id. and
terrible
1 charge,
courage

ered in
oggedly

loleon's
seized

as lost.

Ly ; and
pursuit

in horse

iFrench-

apoleon

followed

EPILOGUE.

837

EPILOGUE.

With the victory of Waterloo we reach a time within the memory of
some now living, and the opening of a period of our history, tlie
greatest indeed of all in real importance and interest, but perhaps too
near to us as yet to admit of a cool and purely historical treatment.
In a work such as the present at any rate it will be advisable to limit
ourselves from this point to a brief summary of the more noteworthy
events which have occurred in our political history since 181 5.

The peace which closed the great war with Napoleon left Britain
feverish and exhausted. Of her conquests at sea she retained only
Malta, (whose former possessors, the Knights of St. John, had ceased
to exist,) the Dutch colonies of Ceylon, and the C.ipe of Good Hope,
the French Colony of Mauritius, and a few West India islands. On
the other hand the pressure of the heavy taxation and of the debt,
which now reached eight hundred millions, was embittered by the
general distress of the country. The rapid developement of English
industry for a time ran ahead of the world's demands ; the markets at
home and abroad were glutted with unsaleable goods, and mills and
manufactories were brought to a standstill. The scarcity caused by a
series of bad harvests was intensified by the selfish legislation of the
landowners in Parliament. Conscious that the prosperity of English
agriculture was merely factitious, and rested on the high price of corn
produced by the war, they prohibited by an Act passed in 1S15 the
introduction of foreign corn till wheat had reached famine prices.
Society, too, was disturbed by the great changes of employment con-
sequent on a sudden return to peace after twenty years of war, and
by the disbanding of the immense forces employed at sea and on land.
The movement against machinery which had been put down in
1 81 2 revived in formidable riots, and the distress of the rural poor
brought about a rapid increase of crime. The steady opposition
too of the Administration, in which Lord Castlereagh's influence was
now supreme, to any project of political progress created a dangerous
irritation which brought to the front men whose demand of a " radical
reform " in English institutions won them the name of Radicals, and
drove more violent agitators into treasonable disaffection and silly plots.
In 1 819 the breaking up by military force of a meeting at Manchester,
assembled for the purpose of advocating a reform in Parliament,
increased the unpopularity of the Government ; and a plot of some
desperate men with Arthur Thistlewood at their head for the assassina-
tion of the whole Ministry, which is known as the Cato- Street
Conspiracy, threw light on the violent temper which was springing up

Epilogub
1815
1873 <

'M I

The
Peace

IIP

1820

8^8

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

Eriloguk
1815

• 1873

Oannlngr

1820

among its more extreme opponents. The death of George the Third
in 1820, and the accession of his son the Prince Regent as George the
Fourth, only added to the general disturbance of men's minds. The
new King had long since forsaken his wife and privately charged her
with infidelity ; his first act on mounting the throne was to renew his
accusations against her, and to lay before Parliament a bill for the
dissolution of her marriage with him. The public agitation which
followed on this step at last forced the Ministry to abandon the bill,
but the shame of the royal family and the unpopularity of the King
increased the general discontent of the country.

The real danger to public order, however, lay only in the blind oppo-
sition to all political change which confused wise and moderate projects
of reform with projects of revolution ; and in 1822 the suicide of
Lord Castlereagh, who had now become Marquis of Londonderry,
and to whom this opposition was mainly due, put an end to the
policy of mere resistance. Canning became Foreign Secretary in
Castlereagh's place, and with Canning returned the earlier and progres-
sive policy of William Pitt. Abroad, his first act was to break with
the " Holy Alliance," as it called itself, which the continental courts
had formed after the overthrow of Napoleon for the repression of
revolutionary or liberal movements in their kingdoms, and whose
despotic policy had driven Naples, Spain, and Portugal into revolt.
Canning asserted the principle of non-interference in the imernal
affairs of foreign states, a principle he enforced by sending troops in
1826 to defend Portugal from Spanish intervention, while he recognized
the revolted colonies of Spain in South America and Mexico as indepen-
dent states. At home his influence was seen in the new strength gained
by the question of Catholic Emancipation, and in the passing of a bill
for giving relief to F.'^rnan Catholics through the House of Commons
in 1825. With the entry of his friend Mr. Huskisson into office in 1823
began a commercial policy which was founded on a conviction of
the benefits derived from freedom of trade, and which brought about
at a later time the repeal of the Corn Laws. The new drift of public
policy produced a division among the Ministers which showed itself
openly at Lord Liverpool's death in 1827. Canning became First Lord
of the Treasury, but the Duke of Wellington, with the Chancellor, Lord
Eldon, and the Home Secretary, Mr. Peel, refused to serve under him ;
and four months after the formation of Canning's Ministry it was broken
up by his death. A temporary Ministry formed under Lord Goderich
on Canning's principles was at once weakened by the position of foreign
affairs. A revolt of the Greeks against Turkey had now lasted some
years in spite of Canning's efforts to bring about peace, and the de-
spatch of an Egyptian expedition with orders to devastate the Morea
and carry off its inhabitants as slaves forced England, France, and
Russia to interfere. In 1827 their united fleet under Admiral Codrington

attacke(

blow at

already

Thef

with Mi

looked (

the state

O' Conni

when th

war. T

designee

but a fev

Crown.

Tory pai

was sudc

Revolutii

and calle

a Consti

crown on

was favo

concessic

time afte

under the

which to

or rotten

or large

establishe

and extei

was laid

appealed

passed th

rejection

Peers wh

The Refoi

and inexf

the condi

country.

reconstitu

this admir

had now v

by a Mini;

a Whig Pz

as it was

country, n

changes it

EPILOGUE.

839

hird
; the
The
iher
w his
r the
vhich
z bill,
King

oppo-

ojects

ide of

derry,

to the

iry in

ogres-

k with

courts

iion of

whose

revolt.

iiernal

ops in

)gnized

depen-

gained

>fabill
imons

|in 1823

jtion of

|t about
public
Id itself
It Lord
>r, Lord
ir him ;
broken
iderich
foreign
some
the de-
Morea
ice, and
irington

attacked and destroyed that of Egypt in the bay of Navarino ; but the
blow at Turkey was disapproved by English opinion, and the Minisny,
already wanting in Parliamentary strength, was driven to resign.

The formation of a purely Tory Ministry by the Duke of Wellington,
with Mr. Peel for its principal support in the Commons, was generally
looked on as a promise of utter resistance to all further progress. But
the state of Ireland, where a " Catholic Association '' formed by Daniel
O'Connell maintained a growing agitation, had now reached a point
when the English Ministry had to choose between concessions and civil
war. The Duke gave way, and brought in a bill which, like that
designed by Pitt, admitted Roman Catholics to Parliament, and to all
but a few of the highest posts, civil or military, in the service of the
Crown. The passing of this bill by the aid of the Whigs threw the
Tory party into confusion ; while the cry for Parliamentary Reform
was suddenly revived with a strength it had never known before by a
Revolution in France, which drove Charles the Tenth from the throne
and called his cousin, Louis Philippe, the Duke of Orleans, to reign as
a Constitutional King. William the Fourth, who succeeded to the
crown on the death of his brother, George the Fourth, at this moment
was favourable to the demand of Reform, but Wellington refused all
concession. The refusal drove him from office ;• and for the first
time after twenty years the Whigs saw themselves again in power
under the leadership of Earl Grey. A bill for Parliamentary Reform,
which took away the right of representation from fifty-six decayed
or rotten boroughs, gave the 143 members it gained to counties
or large towns which as yet sent no members to Parliament,
established a ;^io householder qualification for voters in boroughs,
and extended the county franchise to leaseholders and copyholders,
was laid before Parliament in 1831. On its defeat the Ministry
appealed to the country. The new House of Commons at once
passed the bill, and so terrible was the agitation produced by its
rejection by the Lords, that on its subsequent reintroduction the
Peers who opposed it withdrew and suffered it to become law.
The Reformed Parliament which met in 1833 did much by the violence
and inexperience of many of its new members, and especially by
the conduct of O'Connell, to produce a feeling of reaction in the
country. On the resignation of Lord Grey in 1834 the Ministry was
reconstituted under the leadership of Viscount Melbourne ; and though
this administration was soon dismissed by the King, whose sympathies
had now veered round to the Tories, and succeeded for a short time
by a Ministry under Sir Robert Peel, a general election again returned
a Whig Parliament, and replaced Lord Melbourne in office. Weakened
as it was by the growing change of political feeling throughout the
country, no Ministry has ever wrought greater and more beneficial
changes than the Whig Ministry under Lord Grey and Lord Melbourne

Lhilogub
1816

1873

Reform

1829

1830

fitne I,
1832

JVov. 1834
April 1835

840

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

Ei'lLOGCK

1815

1873

18JI-1841

Peel

during its ten years of rule. In 1833 the system of slavery which still
existed in the IJritish colonies, though the Slave Trade was suppressed,
was abolished at a cost of twenty millions ; the commercial monopoly
of the Kast India Company wp^ abolished, ;tnd the trade to the Kast
thrown open to all merchants. In 1^34 the growing evil of pauperism
was checked by the enactment of a New Poor Law. In 1835 the
Municipal Corporations Act restored to the inhabitants of towns those
rights of self-government of which they had been deprived since the
fourteenth century. 1836 saw the passing of the General Registration
Act, while the constant quarrels over tithe were remedied by the Act
for Tithe Commutation, and one of the grievances of Dissenters re-
dressed by a measure which allowed civil marriage. A system of
national education, begun in 1834 by a small annual grant towards the
erection of schools, was developed in 1839 by the creation of a Committee
of the Privy Council for educational purposes and by the steady increase
of educational grants.

Great however as these measures were, the difficulties of the Whig
Ministry grew steadily year by year. Ireland, where O'Connell
maintained an incessant agitar.on for the Repeal of the Union, could
only be held down by Coercion Acts. In spite of the impulse given
to trade by the system of steam communication which began with the
opening of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway in 1830, the country
still suffered from distress : and the discontent of the poorer classes
gave rise in 1839 to riotous demands for "the People's Charter," including
universal suffrage, vote by ballot, annual Parliaments, equal electoral
districts, the abolition of all property qualification for members, and
payment for their services. In Canada a quarrel between the two
districts of Upper and Lower Canada was suffered through misman-
agement to grow into a formidable revolt. The vigorous but meddle-
some way in which Lord Palmerston, a disciple of Canning, carried
out that statesman's foreign policy, supporting Donna Maria as
sovereign in Portugal and Isabella as Queen in Spain against claimants
of more absolutist tendencies by a Quadruple Alliance with France
and the two countries of the Peninsula, and forcing Mehemet Ali, the
Pacha of Egypt, to withdraw from an attack on Turkey by the
bombardment of Acre in 1840, created general uneasiness ; while
the public conscience was wounded by a war with China in 1839 on its
refusal to allow the smuggling of opium into its dominions. A more
terrible blow was given to the Ministry by events in India ; where the
occupation of Cabul in 1839 ended two years later in a general revolt
of the Affghans and in the loss of a British army in the Khyber Pass.
The strength of the Government was restored for a time by the death
of William the Fourth in 1837 and the accession of Victoria, the
daughter of his brother Edward, Duke of Ken With the accession
of Queen Victoria ended the union of England and Hanover und^ the

EPILOGUE.

841

ch still
ressccl,
nopoly
e East i
pcrism
{35 the
s those
ICC the
stration
the Act
ters re-
stem of
irds the
nmittee
increase

le Whig
'Connell
n, could
56 given
with the
country
f classes
deluding
electoral
>ers, and
the two
misman-
meddle-
carried
I aria as
laimants
France
Ali, the
by the
; while
39 on its
A more
here the
al revolt
jer Pass,
he death
oria, the
iccession
md^ the

same sovereigns, the latter state passing to the next male heir, Krncst,
Duke of Cumberland. Hut the Whig hold on the House of Commons
passed steadily away, and a general election in 1.S41 giive their
opponents, who now took the name of Conservatives, a majority of
nearly a hundred members. The general confidence in Sir Robert
Peel, who was placed at the head of the Mmistry which followed that
of Lord Melbourne, enabled him to deal vigorously with two of the
difficulties which had most hampered his predecessors. The disorder
of the public finances was repaired by the repeal of a host of oppressive
and useless duties and by the imposition of an Income Tax. In Ire-
land O'Connell was charged with sedition and convicted, and though
subsequently released from prison on appeal to the House of Lords, his
influence received a shock from which it never recovered. Peace was
made with China by a treaty which threw open some of its ports to
traders of all nations ; in India the disaster of Cabul was avenged
by an expedition under General Pollock which penetrated victoriously
to the capital of that country in 1842, and the province of Scinde was
annexed to the British dominions. The shock, however, to the English
power brought about fresh struggles for supremacy with the natives,
and especially with the Sikhs, who were crushed for the time in three
great battles at Moodkee, Ferozeshah, and Sobraon.

Successful as it proved itself abroad, the Conservative Government
encountered unexpected difficulties at home. From the enactment of
the Corn Laws in 181 5 a dispute had constantly gone on between those
who advocated these and similar measures as a protection to native
industry and those who, viewing them as simply laying a tax on the
consumer for the benefit of the producer, claimed entire freedom
of trade with the world. In 1839 an Anti-Corn-Law League had
been formed to enforce the views of the advocates of free trade ;
and it was in great measure the alarm of the farmers and landowners
at its action which had induced them to give so vigorous a support to
Sir Robert Peel. But though Peel entered office pledged to protective
measures, his own mind was slowly veering round to a conviction of
their inexpediency ; and in 1846 the failure of the potato crop in Ireland
and of the harvest in England forced him to introduce a bill for the
repeal of the Corn Laws. The bill passed, but the resentment of his
own party soon drove him from office ; and he was succeeded by a
Whig Ministry under Lord John Russell which remained in power till
1852. The first work of this Miijistry was to carry out the policy of
free trade into every department of British commerce ; and from that
time to this the max" '\ of the League, to " buy in the cheapest market
and sell in the dearest," has been accepted as the law of our commer-
cial policy. Other events were few. The general overthrow of the
continental monarchs in the Revolution of 1848 found faint echoes
in a feeble rising in Ireland under Smith O'Brien which was easily

Kl-ILOGUB

ISIS
187«

1845-1846

Pree-
Trade

842

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

Epilogue
1815

1873

RuHBian

and

Sepoy

VTars

suppressed by a few poliremen, and in a demonstration of the Chartists
in London which passed off without further disturbance. Afresh war
with the Sikhs in 1848 was closed by ihe victory of Goojerat and the
annexation of the Punjaub in the following year.

The long peace which had been maintained betv/een the European
powers since the treaties of 181 5 was now drawing to a close. In 1852
the Ministry of Lord John Russell was displaced by a short return of
the Conservatives to power under Lord Derby ; but a union of the
Whigs with the Free Trade followers of Sir Robert Peel restored them
to ofifice at the close of the year. Lord Aberdeen, the head of the new
administration, was at once compelled to resist the attempts of Russia
to force on '^urkey ?, humiliating treaty ; and in 1854 England allied
herself with Louis Napoleon, who had declared himself Emperor of
the French, to resist the invasion of the Danubian Principalities by a
Russian army. Th^ army was withdrawn ; but in September the allied
force landed on the shores of the Crimea, and after a victory at the
river Alma undertook the siege of Sebastopol. The garrison however
soon proved as strong as the besiegers, and as fresh Russian forces
icached the Crimea the Allies found themselves besieged in their turn.
An attack on the English position at Inkermann en November the 5th
was repulsed with the aid of a French division ; but winter proved
more terrible than the Russian sword, and the English force wasted
away with cold or disease. The public indignation at its sufferings
forced the Aberdeen Ministry from office in the opening of 1855 ; and
Lord Palmerston became Premier with a Ministry which included
those members of the last administration who were held to be most in
earnest In the prosecution of the war. After a siege of nearly a year
the Allies at last became masters of Sebastopol in September, and
Russia, spent v/ith the strife, consented in 1856 to the Peace of Paris.
The military reputation of England had fallen low during the struggle,
and to this cause the mutiny of the native troops in Bengal, which
quickly followed in 1857, mjy parciy be attributed. Russian intrigues,
Moslem fanaticism, resentment at the annexation of the kingdom of
Oudh by Lord Dalhousie, and a fanatical belief on the part of the
Hindoos that the English Government had resolved to make them
Christians by forcing them to lose their caste, have all been assigned
as causes of an outbreak which still remains mysterious. A mutiny
at Meerut in May was followed by the seizure of Delhi where the
native king was enthroned as Emperor of Hindostan, by a fresh
mutiny and massacre of the Europeans at Cawnpore, by the rising of
Oudh and the siege of the Residency at Lucknow. The number of
English troops in India was small, and for the moment all Eastern and
Central Hindostan seemed lost ; but Madras, Bombay, ari the Punjaub
remained untouched, and the English in Bengal and Oudh not only held
their ground but marched upon Delhi, and in September took the town

by sto
Colin
the he
and cl(
follow(
in 185J
claime

Russia
alterati
of an i
to havf
French
Volunti
men ; ;
thoughi
France
became
1859 hi
death ii
whole e
five gre
a war b|
of the 1
secessic
in their
France
1864.
cotton, ]
cruisers
gave A I
a far lat
policy o
by his s
but dec
ferred t(
With
inaction
to bring
bill for
was foil
again b
of Com
Reform
failed iil

EPILOGUE.

843

tiartists
;sh war
ind the

iropean
1111852
eturn of

1 of the
id them
the new
f Russia
id allied
iperor of
ties by a
he allied
y at the
however
m forces
heir turn,
ir the 5th
r proved
e wasted
sufferings
855 ; and

included

2 u^ost in
ly a year
iber, and

of Paris,
struggle,
jal, which
intrigues,
ngdom of
art of the
lake them

assigned
A mutiny
where the

a fresh

rising of
lumber of
astern and
e Punjaub

only held
k the town

by storm. Two months later the arrival of reinforcements under Sir
Colin Campbell relieved Lucknow, which had been saved till now by
the heroic advance of Sir Henry Havelock with a handful of troops,
and cleared Oudh of the mutineers. The suppression of the revolt was
followed by a change in the government of India, which was transferred
in 1858 from the Company to the Crown ; the Queen being formally pro-
claimed its sovereign, and the Governor-General becoming her Viceroy.
The credit which Lord Palmerston won during the struggle with
Russia and the Sepoys was shaken by his conduct in proposing an
alteration in the law respecting consph°acies in 1858, in consequence
of an attempt to assassinate Napoleon the Third which was believed
to have originated on English ground. The violent language of the
French army brought about a movement for the enlistment of a
Volunteer force, which soon reached a hundred and fifty thousand
men ; and so great was the irritation it caused that the bill, which was
thought to have been introduced in deference to the demands of
France, was rejected by the House of Commons. Lord Derby again
became Prime Minister for a few months : but a fresh election in
1859 brought back Lord Palmerston, whose Ministry lasted till his
death in 1865. At home his policy was one of pure inaction ; and his
whole energy was directed to the preservation of English neutrality in
five great strifes which distracted not only Europe but the New World,
a war between France and Austria in 1859 which ended in the creation
of the kingdom of Italy, a civil war in America which began with the
secession of the Southern States in 1861 and ended four years later
in their subjugation, an insurrection of Poland in 1863, an attack of
France upon Mexico, and of Austria and Prussia upon Denmark in
1864. The American war, by its interference with the supply of
cotton, reduced Lancashire to distress ; while the fitting out of piratical
cruisers in English harbours in the name of the Southern Confederation
gave America just grounds for an irritation which was only allayed at
a far later time. Peace however, was successfully preserved ; and the
policy of non-intervention was pursued after Lord Palmerston' s death
by his successor. Lord Russell, who remained neutral during the brief
but decisive conflict between Prussia and Austria in 1866 which trans-
ferred to the former the headship of Germany.

With Lord Palmerston, however, passed away the policy of political
inaction which distinguished his rule Lord Russell had long striven
to bring about a further reform of Parliament ; and in 1866 he laid a
bill for that purpose before the House of Commons, whose rejection
was followed by the resignation of the Ministry. Lord Derby, who
again became Prime Minister, with Mr. Disraeli as leader of the House
of Commons, found himself however driven to introduce in 1867 a
Reform Bill of a far more sweeping character than that which had
failed in Lord Russell's hands. By this measure, which passed in

Epilogue
1815

1873

Lord Pal-
merston

The
Ife-w Re-
formers

844

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

Epilogue
1915

1873

1867

August, the borough franchise was extended to all ratepayers, as well
as to lodgers occupying rooms of the annual value of ;^io ; the county
franchise was fixed at ;^I2, thirty-three members were withdrawn from
English boroughs, twenty-five of whom were transferred to English
counties, and the rest assigned to Scotland and Ireland. Large
numbers of the working classes were thus added to the constituencies;
and the indirect effect of this great measure was at once seen in the
vigorous policy of the Parliament which assembled after the new
elections in 1868. Mr. Disraeli, who had become Prime Minister on
the withdrawal of Lord Derby, retired quietly on finding that a Liberal
majority of over one hundred members had been returned to the
House of Commons ; and his place was taken by Mr. Gladstone,
at the head oi a Ministry which for the first time included every
section of the Liberal party. A succession of great measures proved
the strength and energy of the new administration. Its first work was
with Ireland, whose chronic discontent it endeavoured to remove by
the disestablishment and disendowment of the Protestant Church in
1869, and by a Land Bill which established a sort of tenant-right in
every part of the country in 1870. The claims of the Nonconformists
were met in 1868 by the abolition of compulsory church-rates, and in
1 87 1 by the abolition of all religious tests for admission to offices or
degrees in the Universities. Important reforms were undertaken in
the management of the navy ; and a plan for the entire reorganization
of the army was carried into effect after the system of promotion to
its command by purchase had been put an end to. In 1870 the ques-
tion of national education was furthered by a bill which provided for
the establishment of School Boards in every district, and for their
support by means of local rates. In 1872 a fresh step in Parliamentary
reform was made by the passing of a measure which enabled the votes
of electors to be given in secret by means of the ballot. The great-
ness and rapidity of these changes, however, produced so rapid a
reaction in the minds of the constituencies that on the failure of his
attempt to pass a bill for organizing the higher education of Ireland,
Mr. Gladstone felt himself forced in 1874 to consult public opinion
by a dissolution of Parliament ; and the return of a Conservative
majority of nearly seventy members was necessarily followed by his
retirement from office, Mr. Disraeli again becoming First Minister
of the Crown.

as well
county
m from
English
Large
lencies;
1 in the
he new
ister on
Liberal
. to the
idstone,
d every
5 proved
rork was
nove by
hurch in
-right in
iformists
s, and in
offices or
•taken in
anization
notion to
he ques-
vided for
or their
imentary
the votes
he great-
rapid a
ire of his
Ireland,
opinion
servative
d by his
Minister

INDEX.

Abbo of Fleury, 58

Abbot, Archbishop of Canterbury, 471, 512

Abercorn, see of, 34, ?6, 185

Aberdeen, harl of, 842

Abercromby, General, 756, 819

Aberffraw. princes of, 164, 167

" Abhorrers," 657

Aboukir, battle of, 819

Aclea, battle < f , 46

Acre, siege < f , 811

bombardment of, 840
Add.ngton's Ministry, 818, 820
Adelard of Bath, 132, 137
^Ifheah, Archbish p of Canterbury, 62, 65
Mlired, King of Wessex, 47
his rule, 48 — 50
character, 50, 51
literary work, 51, 52
struggle with Daues, 48, 50, 53
death, 53
" Sayings of," 121

Alfred, the ^theling, 67

^ile, KingofDeira, 18

JElh, King of the South Saxons, 11

iEthelbald, King of Mercia, 38, 41

iEthelberht, King of Kent, 17 — xg

iCthelflaed, Lady of the Mercians, 49, 54

yEthelfriih, King of Northumbria, 19, 20

vEthelgifu, mother-in-law of Eadwig, 57

i^thelred, King of Mercia, 35—37

iEthelred the First, Kin^ of Wess»x, 46, 47

iEthelred the Unready, King of Wessex, 61
marriage, 62

flight to Normandy, id. , 78
death, 65

i¥^thelred, Ealdorman of Mercia, 49, 53, 54

i^thelric, King of Bernicia, 13, 17

iEthelstan, King of Wessex, 54, 55

iEthelthryth (Etheldreda), S., 33

iEthelwold, Bishop of Winchester, 58

^thelwulf, King of Wessex, 46

Affghanistan, war in, 840

Agincourt, battle of, 268

Agitators, Council of, 563

Agriculture, changes in, 245—247, 292, 393

Aldan, S., 24, 25

Aislabie, Chancellor of the Excheq uei", 728

Aix-la-Chapelle, Peace of, 637, 74 +

Albemarle, Stephen of, 89

Alberoni, Cardinal, 726

Alcluyd, 4t

Alcuin, 43 _

Aldgate, Priory of Holy Trinity at, 95

Aldfrith the Learned, King of Northumbria, 38

Alexander the First, C2ar of Russia, 823
Alexander the Third, King of Scots, x88
Allen, Dr., 408, 409
Alliance, (Irand, 684, 705

Hcly, 838

Trip'le, 637, 726

Quadruple, 840
Alma, battle of, 842
Almania, battle of, 716
Almeida, siege of, 827
Alva, Duke of, 388, 389

America, Knglish settlements in, 506, 746,
. 758, 759

rivalry with the French, 747, 748, 755 — 757

religion aiid government, 759, 760

relations with England, 760, 768

struggle for self-taxati n, 769, 776, 777

Congress, 770, 778 — 780

Declarati n of Independence, 780

alliance wi h France, 781

war with England, 779—782, 785, 7S6

embargo and non-.ntercourse, 827, 828

war with England, 830, 832, 834

civil war, 843

Spanish settlements, 506

their trade with English, 733
Amherst, General, 755 — 757
Amiens, Mise of, 156

Peace of, 819
Anderida, 11
Andredsweald, 11
Angeln, i

Anglesey conquered by Eadwine, 21
Anglia, East, settlement of the Engle in, 11

submits to Penda, 22

seized by Offa, 43

conquered by Danes, 46, 47

earldom of, 65
Anjou, Duke of, suitor of Eliiabeth, 414, 416
Anjou, Counts of, oS — 100
Anne, daughter of James the Second, deserts
him, 63 I

her relations with the Marlboroughs, 695,
707, 716

Queen, 708

her Bounty, 712

death, 720
Anne of Bonemia, wife of Richard the Second,

C63
Anselm, S., 73, 74

Archbishop of Canterbury, 90

exiled, iS.

recalled, 91

supports Henry the First, 96

846

INDEX.

Anti-Com Law League, 841

Appeal, Henry the Second's court of, 11 1

Aquitains, loss of, 233, 234

Arcv.t, Clive's capture < f, 7^6

Argyll, Earl and Marquis of, Presbyterian

leader, 541, 570, 572, 577
beheaded, 632, 664
Argyll, Earl ofT his c ndemnation, rebellion

and death, 664, 665
Aristotle, study of, in Middle Ages, 135, 137,

Arkv ight invents spinning-machine, 792
Arlington, Bennet, Earl of 635

forms Triple Alliance, 637

share in Treaty of Dover, 638, 639

dismissed, 646
Arlotta, mother of William the Conqueror, 75
Armada, Spanish, 418 — 420

second, 443—444
Arminians or Latitudinarians, 476
Arms, Assize of, no
Army, standing, its origin, 633

mcreased by James the Second, 666

subject to control of Parliament, 689

purchase in, abolished, 844
Army Plot, 539

Arthur, romances and legends of, 119, 120, 166
Arthur of Britanny, 115
Arthur, son of Henry the Seventh, 311
Articles of Religion, 340

the Six, 355

repealed, 358

Forty-two, 359

Thirty-nine, 385

Three, 471
Artillery, results of its introduction, 301
Arundel, ArchHshop of Canterbury, 262, 263
Arundel, Ea'I of, patron of Caxton, 298
Arundel, Farl of, Lord Privy Seal, 669
Ascue, Anne, 357
Ashdown, battle of, 47
Ashley, Lord, see Coojier

opposes Act of Uniformity, 622

heads the Presbyterians, 635

his scheme of Pr. testant comprehension, 636

terms of toleration, 639

Chancellor, 640, see Shaftesbury
Assandun, battle of, 65
Asser, 51
Assize of Arms, no

of Clarendon, tb., in

of Northampton, in
Astley, Sir Jacob, 559
Athelney, 48, 52
Athenree, battle of, 447
Atterbury, Bishop of Rochester, 728
Aughriin, Lc»nle of, 694
Augsburg, league of, 677
Augustine, his mission to England, i8, ly
Austerlitz, battle of, 822
Austria joins the Grand Alliance, 684

war of succession in, 734

policy during French war, 799, 801, 8n,
821, 832
Aylesford, battle of, 9

Uabincton's Plot, 417
Bacon, Francis, 4^8—442

his plea for Church reform, 477

Bacon, Ytdinus— continued.

fall, 490, 491

death, 491
Bacon, Roger, 137 — 141
Badby, John, 265
Badajoz stor.ned, 831
Badon, Mount, battle of, 12
Bseda, 39—41

.Alfred's translation of, 52
'* Balance of power," 721
Ballj John, 240, 250 — 252
Balliol, Edward, 214, 216
Balliol, John, 188—190
Balmerino, Earl of, 744
Baltimore, Calvert, Lord, 507
Bamborough, 13, 25

Bancroft, Archbi.-^hop of Canterbury, 471, 482
Bangor, monks cf, slain, 19, 20
Bank of England founded, 6j9
Bannjckburn, battle of, 213, 214
Bantry Bay, battle in, 692
Baptists, 560

Barbury Hill, battle of, 12
Bards, the Welsh, 166
Barebonesj Praise-God, 583
Barlow, Bishop of St. David's, 354
Barnet, battle of, 288

Barons, their relations with the Conqueror
84, 8s, 88

with Henry the First, 96

with Henry the Second, 109

with John, 124, 126, 127

council of, appointed to enforce the
Charter, 130

offer the crown 10 Lewis, ib,

quarrel with Henry the Third, 154, 155

war with him, 156, 157

greater and lesser, 174

their rule, 203

struggle with Edward the First, 203, 204

effects of Hundred Years' War on, 273, 274

their decline, 290, 291

Henry the Seventh's dealings with, 302

Northern, rise against Elizabeth, 390
Barrier, the Dutch, 704
Bartholomew's Day, S., massacre of, 412

the English, 622, 623
Basing House, siege of, 558 ' •'

Bastille destroyed, 798 .'

Bates's case, 484 j

Bath, Henry de, 145
Bautzen, battle of, 832 ' • .

Baxter, Richard, 622, 625, 636, 670
Baylen, French surrender at, 825
Beachy Head, battle of, 695
Beaufort, Henry, Bishop of Winchester, 273

Cardinal, 280
Beaufort, Margaret, see Richmond
Beaufort, house of, its claims to the Crown,

282, 283
P>eaumont, palace of, 133 \-*'-

Bec, abbey of, 72
Beckford, Alderman, 751
Bedford, John, Duke of, Regent of France,

275, 279, a8o
Bedford, Duke of, minister of George the Third,

766, 767. 772
Bedloe, 651
Beket, Gilbert, 92 ' ;

site of his house, 103 . . '

INDEX.

847

Beket, Thomas, 103, 104
Chancellor, 100
Archbishop of Canterbury, ib.

Suarrel with Heniy the Second, 107, 108
eath, 108, 109

canonized, 109

desecration of his shrine, 355
Belesme, Robert of, 96, 164
Bellahoe, battle of, 449
Bellasys, Lord, 669
Benedict Biscap, 29, 30, 39
"Benedict of Peterborough," ii8
*' Benevolences" under Edward the Fourth, 293

under Wolsey, 325

under James the First, 486
Benslngton, battle of, 41
Bentham, Jeremy, 829
Beorhtric, King of Wessex, 42, 43
Beornwulf, King of Mercia, 44
Bernicia. kingdom of, 13

joined with Deira. ib., 17
Bertha, wife of iEthelberht of Kent, 17
Berwick stormed by £dward the First, 190

taken by Bruce, 309

its peculiar position, 216

pacification at, 533
Berwick, Duke of, 710, 716
Beverley, Alfred of, 119
Bible, Wyclifs translation of, 244

its effects, 259

in Bohemia, 263

translation promised by Henry the Eighth,

334

Tyndale's, 351, 352

forbidden, 334

Coverdale's, '141^

the Geneva, (()rbidden, 510

effects of, on England, 460 — 462
Bigod, Hugh. Earl of Norfolk, 154, 155
Bigod, Earl of Norfolk, defies Edward the

First, ao6
Birinus, 24
Bishops, mode of appointing, 338

James the First's theory of, 479, 4B0

expelled from House of Lords, 538

restored, 621

position under the Georges, 735, 736

the Seven, 672
Black Death, the, 248
Blake defends Taunton, 576

blockades Rupert in the Tagus, ib.

struggle with Tromp, 579, 580

with Spain, 593, 596

his corpse outraged, 620
Blenheim, battle of, 711, 712
Bloreheath, battle of, 283
Blucher, Marshal, 834 —836
Bohemia, effects of Wyclifs writings in, 263

struggle against Austria, 489
Boleyn, Anne, 328, 329, 337, 348
Bolingbroke, Viscount {see St. John), 718

rivalry with Harley, 719

joins the Pretender, 722

returns, 732
Bombay ceded to England, 628, 745
Boniface, S. (Winfrith), 43
Boniface VIIL, Pope, 192, 206
Bonner, Bishop of London, 362, 364, 366, 460
Bom, Bertrand de, 113
Borodino, battle of, 831

Boroughbridge, battle of, 209
Boroughs, early ii^nglish, 194

their representation in Parliament, 158,

177

restriction of franchise in, 272

changes in representation, 402

new, created under the Tudors, 481

the Five, 49, 54
Boscawen, Admiral, 755
Boston (Linculnshire) its foundation, 33
Boston (Massachusetts) occupied by British
troops, 776

tea-nots, 777

port closed, ib.

siege of, 779, 780
Hosworth, battle of, 301
Bothwell, Earl of, 386—388
Botulf founds Boston, 33
Boulogne, Napoleon's camp at, 8i:o
Boulogne, Eustace, Count of, 69, 82
Bouvines, battle of, 126 ,

Boyle, chei i.t, 6n
Boyne, battle of, 693
" Boys," the, 732
Braddock, General, 747
Bradford, battle of, 34
Bradshaw, John, 571, 581, 620
Brandywine, battle of, 780
Breautd, Fuukes de, 142
Breda, Peace of, 63s
Bremen, dispute about, 727
Breslau, Peace of, 741
Br^tigny, treaty of, 231
Bngham, treaty of, i83
Brindley, engineer, 792
Bristol, slave-trade at, 51/, 88

siege of, 549

surrender, 550

West Indian trade, 730
Bristol, Earl of, 633
Britain under the Romans, 5, 6

attacked by Picts and Scots, 6

English conquest of, 7 — 13
Britain, Great, 714
Britons, extermination of, 9, 10

defeat at Daegsastan, 19

end of their dominion, 43
Brooklyn, battle of, 780
Browne, Archbishop of Dublin, 452, 453
Browne's Pastorals, 526
Brownists, ^72, 473, 507, 559, 560
Bruce, David, 215, 216, 228
Bruce, Edward, 447
Bruce, Robert, the elder, 188, 192
Bruce, Robert, the younger, murders Comyn,
211, 212

crowned, 212

his successes, 213, 214

truce With England, 214

acknowledged king, 215 ,

dies, ib.
Brunanburh, battle of, S3
Brunswick, Ferdinand, Prince of, 754, 755, 763
Brunswick, Duke of, 805
Buckingham, Duke of, beheaded, 324
Buckingham, George Villiers,Duke of, 487, 4158

his policy, 494, 495, 497

impeached, 498

expedition to Rochelle, 500, 501

slain, 503 , ,,

■';■

:il

848

INDEX.

Buckingham, second Duke of, 607, 610, 639

negotiates with Holland, 640

dismissed, 646

imprisoned, 648
Bulmer, Lady, burnt, 346
Hunker's Hill, battle of, 779
Uunyan, John, 467, 625 — 627

his '* Pilgrim's Progress," 627, 628

released, 640

refuses Indulgence^ 670
Buonaparte, Joseph, King of Naples and Spain,

824, 831
Buonaparte, Napoleon, 808

successes in Italy, 809, 810

in Egypt, 810

designs on Syritr, Bin

First Consul, ib.

victory at Marengo, ib.

Continental System, 818

schemes of contjiiest, 819, 820

France under him, 820

war declared against, ib.

threatens invasion of England, 831 ; see
NapJeon
Burdett, Sir Francis, 829
Burford, battle of, 38
Burgh, Hubert de, 131, 141, 143, 144
Burgos, siege of, 831
Burgoyne, General, 780, 781
Burgundy, Charles the Bold, Duke of, S87
Burgundy, John, Duke of, 270
Burgundy, Philip, Duke of, 270, 275, 278, 280
Burke, Edmund, 770—772

supports American demands, 778

his Bill of Economical Reform, 788

moves impeachment of Hastings, 796

hostility t > the Revolution, 800 — 803, 805

quarrel with Fox, 802

" Letters on Regicide Peace," 809 ,

death, 810
Burleigh, Lord, 417 ; sec Cecil
Burnet, Bishop of Salisbury, 614, 691
Busaco, battle of, 827
Bute, Earl of, 763, 766, 767

his policy in America, 768, 769
Butler, Bishop, 614
Butler's " Hudibras," 607
Byng, Admiral, 748

"Cabal," the, 653, 654
Cabinet, its origin, 654
Cabot, Sebastian, 303, 506
Cabul occupied, 840, 841
Cade, John, 281, 282
Cadiz, Englis'i descent on, 443

blockaded, 741
Cadwalbn, king of the Welsh, 32, 23
Caedmon, 27 — 29
Calais, siege of, by Edward the Third, 228, 229

ceded to him, 231

lost, 369
Calcutta, its origin, 745

Black Hole of, 753
Calne, council of, 61
Cambray, league of, 311

treaty of, 330
Cambridge, the New Learning at, 309

Erasmus at, t^., 313

Protestants at, 352

Cambridge, George, Duke of, 720 ; see George

the Second
Camden, 399
Campbell, Sir Colin, 843
Campeggio, Cardinal, 329
Camperdown, battle of, 810
Lanipian, Jesuit, 409, 410
Campo Formio, Treaty of, 809
Canada, conquest of, 755—757

ceded by France, 764

Constitution granted to, 802

American invasions of, 833

revolt in, 840
Canals, 792
Canning, George, Foreign Secretary, 823

his policy, 824, 825

retires, 826

supports Catholic emancipation, 829

returns to office, 838

death, ib.
Canons of 1604, 482

of 1636, 525
Canterbury, royal city of Kent, 17

Augustine at, 18

Theodore's school at, 39 *

sacked by Danes, 62

historians of, 118
Cape of Good Hope won by England, 869
Cardigan, conquest of, 165
Carli:ile conquered by Ecgfrith, 34

Cuthbertat, 35
Carolinas, their settlement, 758
Caroline of Anspach, wife of George the

Second, 730, 733
Carteret, Lord, 741, 742
Carthusians, victims of T. Cromwell, 344, 345
Cartwright, Thomas, 468—471, 473, 474
Carucage, 129

Cassel, battle of, 648 *■

Castlebar, battle of, 815 '■ •

Castlemaine, Lady, 640
Castlereagh, Lord, 817, 826, 830, 838
Catesby, Robert, 483
Catharine of Aragon, wife of Henry the Eighth,

511, 328, 329, 337
Cathanne of Braganza, wife of Charles the

Second, 634
Catharine of France, wife of Henry the Fifth,

270
Catharine the Second, Empress of Russia, 799,

803
Catholics, Roman, their position under Eliza-
beth, 384, 385, 391

revolt, 390

revival, ^08, 410, 475

laws against them relaxed, 481

priests banished, 624

prospects under Charles the Second, 634

excluded from Indulgence, 639, 640

from Court, 646, 647

their hopes, 649, 650

excluded .' om Parliament, 651

admitted to office, &c., by James the
Second, 667

Confederate, 541, 551

condition in Ireland, 811, 8ie

struggles for emancipation, 813, 817, 818,
823, 838, 839
Cato Street conspiracy, 837
"Cavaliers," 544

INDEX.

849

17, 818,

Cavendish, Lord, 641, 652, 657; see Devon-
shire
Cawnpore, massacre of, 843
Caxton, William, 305—398
Ceadda, Bishop of Mercia, 35, 26
Ceadwalla. King of Wessex, 37
Ceawlin, King of Wessex, 12
Cecil, Robert, see Salisbuiy
Cecil, William, 381, 390, 391 ; see Burleigh
Centwine, King of Wessex, 37
Cenwealh, King of Wessex, 34
Cenwulf, King of Mercia, 43, 44
Ceolfrid, founder of Jarrow, 39
Ceolred, King of Mercia, 37, 38
Ceorls, 4

Cerdic, first King of West Saxons, 11, 12
Ceylon won by England, 809
Chad, see Ceadda
Chalgrove Field, battle of, 550
Ch&lus, siege of, 1x5
Chambers, Atderman, 517
Chancellor, Richard, 395
Chancellor, the, his office, 96, 171
Chancery. Court of, 171
Chantries suppressed, 357
Charford, battle of, 11^

Charles (the First), Prince, negotiations for his
marriage, 468, 493

goes to Madrid, 494

his character, 495

marriage, ib.

King, 496

policy, ib.

{>rotects Buckingham, 498, 499, 503
evies forced loan, 500
consents to Petition of Right, 502
his personal government, 514—517
dealings with Scotland, 524, 530—534,

540, 541 ^
• tries to arrest nve members, 544, 545

attempt on Hull, 546, 547

raises standard at Nottingham; 547;, 548

campaign of 1642, 548, 549

negotiates with Confederate Catholics, 551

movements in 1644, 553

negotiates at Uxbridge, 557
< defeated at Naseby, 557, 558

treaty with the Irish, 558

goes to Scotch camp, 563

sold to Parliament, 564

seized by army, 566

flies, 568

prisoner, ib.

seized a jain, 570

trial, 571

death, 5)2
Charles the Second proclaimed King in Scot-
land, 572

negotiates with the Scots, 576

crowned at Scone, 578

defeated at Worcester, ib.

restored, 600

character, 639—631

policy, 631, 632

army, 633

l^lans of Cathol'c toleration, 633, 634

conversion, 638

negotiates with Lewis, 638, 639

relations with Parliament, 641, 645, 646, 648

relations with Lewis, 6<{7, 649, 653

Charles the Second — continued.

plan for James's succession, 654

change in his temper, 656

treaty with France, 659

triumph over Country party, 660, 661

rule, 661—663

death, 663, 664
Charles the dreat, 43
Charles the Simple grants Normandy to Hrolf,

71
Charles the Fifth, King of Spain, &c., 332

Emperor, 324

alliance with Henry the Eighth, ib.

breaks his pledges, 327, 328

treatv with France, 330
Charles the Sixth, Emperor, 729, 734
Charles the Seventh. Emperor, 741, 742
Charles the Fifth, King of France, 233
Charles the Sixth of France, 261, 267, 270, 275
Charles the Seventh of France, 275, 376, 278,

280, 281
Charles the Eighth, King of France, his Italian

campaign, 311
Charles the Tenth, King of France, 839
Charles the Second, King of Spain, 701, 703
Ch'^.rles the Third, King of Spain, 713, 715
Charles the Fourth, King of Spain, 824
Charles the Twelfth, King of Sweden, 727
Charlestown, capture of, 782
Charmouth, battle of, 46
Charter of Henry the First, 91 '

produced by Langton, 127

the Great, 128, 1:^0

re-issued, 131

confirmed by Henry the Third, 142, 146

confirmed by Edward the First, 207

the People's, 840

of towns, cancelled by Charles the Second,
663 _
ChSteau-Gaillard, 114, 116
Chatham, Earl of («<? Pitt), 772—774, 778, 781,

782
Chaucer, 219 — 222

Caxton's edition of, 296
Cherbourg surrendered to Charles the Seventh,

381
Chester conquered by iEthelfrith, 19, 20

Danes at, 53

conquered by William, 83
Chesterfield, Earl of, 732, 742
Chichester, Sir Arthur, 457
Chillingworth, William, theologian, 612, 613
China, War with, 840

^ treaty, 841
Chippewa, battle of, 833
Chivalty, 182, 183
Chotusitz, battle of, 741
Christ Church, Oxford, 323
" Christian Brethren," th ;, 352
Chronicle, English, 52

its end, 121
Church, English, its foundation, 18, 19

in Northumbria, 23 — 27, 29, 30

organized by Theodore, 30 — 32

condition under William the First, 86

under Rufus, 89, 90

under Henry the First, 95. of>

action during the anarchy, 103

Henry the Second and, 106, 107

John and, 133, 124

■I, ;i il

11-1

1. I:.|

'il

3 I

8so

INDEX.

Church, English — coni\iued.

condition und>;r John and Henry the Third,

148
under Edward the First, 172
in fourteenth century, 236, 237
plans of reform in, 238 — 240
political decline in fifteenth century, 373
condition after Wars of the Roses, 291
its reform undertaken by Parliament, 334
Henry the Eighth Head of, 335 — 338
its independent jurisdiction abolished, 336
T. Cromwell's clealings with, 338—340
spoliation of. 350, 351
changes under Edward the Sixth, 358 — 360
submissior to Rome, 363, 364
£lizabet>' id, 37'> — ^70
proposals for reform in Parliau 'nt, 405
condition under Elizabeth, 406
parties in, 4^6
demand for its reform, 477
the Long Parliament and, 543
Cromwell's dealings with, 590
condition under Charles the Second, 621,

622
bill for its security, 648
James the Second s dealings with, 668
temper after the Revolution, 690
condition under the Georges, 735, 736
influence of Methodists on, 739
Irish, its mission work, 23, 24
condition under Henry the Eighth, 451 —

453
Protestant, disestablished, 844

Scottish Presbyterian, 522 — 525, 686
Church-rates abolished, 844
Churchill, John, 666, 705, 706. See Marlborough
Cintra, Convention of, 825
Circuit, the Bloody, 666
Cistercians, 95

Ciu dad Rodrigo stormed, 831
Clair-sur-Epte, treaty of, 71
Clare, Earl of, settles in Pembroke, 164, 165
Clarence, George, Duke of, 287, 288
Clarendon, Assize of, no, 1 11

Constitutions of, 107
Clarendon, Edvi-^rd Hyde, Earl of (see Hyde),
Lord Chancv'lor, 617

his policy, 621

fall, 635, 636
Clarendon, Henry Hyde, Earl of, 669, 695
Claverhouse, 685

Clement the Seventh, Pope, 328, 329, 337
Clergy, representation of, in Parliament, 179,
180 _

condition in fourteenth century, 237, 238

submission to Henry the Eighth, 335, 336

their enslavement, 340

position und'^r Elizabeth, 378, 406, 470, 471

Puritan, expelled, 482

Laud's dealings with, 510, 511

condition under the Georges, 735 — 736

e'fect of Methodist revival on, 739
Cleveland, Barbara Palmer, Duchess of, 630
Cleves, Anne of, 348 , 356
Clifford, Lord, 284
Clifford, Sir Thomas, 638 — 641
Clive, Robert, 745, 746, 753, 782, 783
Closter-Seven, Convention of, 748
Cloth of Gold, Field of, 324
Cnichtenafild, in London, 95, 197

Cnut, King of Denmaik and England, 64— C7
Cnut the Fourth, King of Denmark, tiS
Cual, discovery of its uses, 793
Coalition Ministry, 713, 788, 789
Cobham, Eleanor, 27
vm,
267

. 274
ir Ji

Cobhiim, Lord (Sir John Oldcastle), 359, 266,

Codrington, Admiral, 838

Coke, Sir Edward, 486, 503

Colche-tei, siege of, 569, 570

Coleman, secretary of Mary of Modena, 649,

651
Colet, John, 304, 305

f'.sai. of St. Paul's, 308
V.jno St. Paul's School, ib.
1. s ifi 'ress to C'<nvocatio , 31P
chai^eil with heresy, ib.
i! ^ounces war, :}i2

Bishop of Lmdisfarne, 30

<.'oluml 1 ., 2j

ir;:... :\(M

Commeii

ingbroke's proposed treaty of,

719

Pitt's Treaty with France, 79^

Commission, Ecclesiastical, und«v Elizabeth,
470, 471
abolished, 540
restored, 668

Commons summoned to Parliament, 158
House of, r32

its struggle with Wolsey, 325
Petition to Henry the Eighth, 333, 334
advance under Elizabeth, 403—405
under James the First, 492, 45)3
struggle with Charles the First, 498, 499,

501, 502, 505, 537—540. 542-^545
place in the constitution, 536
proceedings in 16741 645, 646
temper after the Revolution, 691
becomes supreme in the State, 696, 697
its relation to the Cro'.vn and the Ministry,

697
Whig ascendency in, 723

character under George the Third, 764,

765
struggle with Wilkes, 773, 774

with the Press, 775

adopts Catholic emancipation, 829, 838 ; see
Parliament
Commons of Kent, their Complaint, 2b.^
Commonwealth established, 573

proclaimed, 574
" Communes," 156
Compact, the Family, 733
Compiegne, its defence by Jeanne d'Arc, 278
Comprehension Bill, 690
Compton, Bishop of London, 668, 678, 679
Compurgation abolished, in
Comyn, regent of Scotland, 192
Comyn, the Red, slain, 211, 212
Congregation, Lords of the, 381
Congregationalists, their rise, 560 • '

Connecticut, origin of the settlement, 529
Conservatives, 841
Conservators of the Peace, 173
Constable, Sir Robert, 346
Constance of Britanny, 119
Constantine, King of Scots, 55
Constitutional Clubs, 803, 804
Continental system. Napoleon's, 818, 822
Contract, the Great, 484

INDEX.

851

764.

Convintionof 1660, 600

declares itself a Parliament, 617

of 1688, 68a

Constituent, 583, 584

S .>ttish, 68s
Conv lion, Colet's addrc5S to, ?to

ai nits to Henry tie Eiihth, 336

upi.jld . Divine Right o; iwings, 478

its ;anonsofi6o4 482
jended, 735
Japtaii 758

Cook
Coov

Sir Ashley, 599
hancellor of the Exchen"er, 617

See Ashley. Shafts \u:j
Coote, Eyre, yJa, 764, 785
Cope, Sir John, 743
Copenhagen, battle of, G19

bombardment of, 824
Copy-holders, 246
Corn Laws, 837, 841
Cornwall conquered by Ecgberht, 43

revolis, 46

royalist rising in, 549
Cornwall, Richard, Earl of, 152, 157
Cornwallis, Lord, 782, 785
Corresponding Society, 807
Corunna, battle of, 825
Council, the Continual, 155, 203

Great, in, 129, 173, 174

of Officers, 574

Royal, its criminal jurisdiction, 302

reorganized by Temple, 653, 654

Privy, 111

of State, 573
County Court, the, 176
Country party, 641, 645, 647
Courcy, John de, 446
Courtenay, Bishop of London, 239

Archbishop of Canterbury, 242, 259, 260

Sourtenay, see Exeter
ovenant. the Scottish, 531, 532

signed in London, 551

burnt there, 621

abolished in Scotland, 632
Coventry, Sir William, 641
Coverdale, Miles, 341
Cowell, his theory of absolutism, 478
Cowper, William, Lord Keeper, 713
Craft-gilds, 198, 799, 201
Craggs, Secretary of State, 728
Cranfield, Treasurer, 494 ; see Middlesex
Cranmer, Thomas, his advice on Henry the
Eighth's divorce, 314

Archbishop of Canterbury, 337

divorces Henry and Catharine, ib.

crowns Anne Boleyn, ib,

his Protestantism, 358

imprisoned, 362

his life and death, 367, 368
Crecy, battle of, 226, 227
Crew, Chief Justice, 500
Crimean war, 842

Croinpton invents the "mule," 792
Cromwell, Henry, 589
Cromwell, Oliver, his youth, 466, 467, 554

at Marston Moor, 552, 553

quarrel with Manchester, 553

his regiment, 554, 555

scheme of New Model, 556, 557

victory at Naseby, 557, 558

Cromwell, OWwtr— continued.

advocates toleration, 562

defeats Sccjts, 570

conquest of Ireland, 574—57'"

victory at Dunbar, 570, 577

at Worcester, 578

drives out the Rump, 581

his policy, 584

named Protector, 585

his rule, 586-591

foreign policy, 592, 593, 596

settlement of Ireland, 58^

refuses title of king, 594, 595

inaugurated as Protector, 595

death, 598

his corpse outraged, 620
Cromwell, Richard, 598
Cromwell, Thomas, 332

fidelity to Wolsey, 333

counsel on the divorce, //'., 334 '

policy, 335

Vicar- General, 338

dealings with the Church, n^i— 3« , ^54,
356

his rule, 341—343

dealings with the nobles, , ' 3.: -

administrative activity, j^y '

fall, 348

success of his policy, 3.10 350

his revival of Parliameri'. 50
Crowland Abbey, 33
Cuba, English conquest of, 764
Culloden Moor, battle of, 744
Cumberland granted to Conslantine of Scot-
land, 55
Cumberland, Ernest, Duke of. King of Han-
over, 841
Cumberland, William, Duke of, 742, 744, 748
Cumbria, kingdom of, 19, 184, 185

southern, conquered by Ecgfrlth, 34
Cuthbert, S., 26, 27, 34, 35
Cuthwulf, King of the West Saxons, 12
Cynric, 11, 12

Dacre, Lord, 345, 346
Dacres, Leonard, 390
Daegsastan, battle of, 19
Danby, Thomas Osborne, Earl of, Lord Trea-
surer, 646

his policy, ib., 647, 648

fall. 652

correspondence vvith William, 678, 679

prepares for a rising, 680, 681

Lord President, 691
Danegeld, 97
Danelaw, the, 48

conquest of, 54

revolts, 55, 57 _

submits to Swein, 62
Danes attacV Britain, 45, 46

conquer East Angha and attack Wessex,

struggle with ^Ifred, 48, 53

treaties wi h him, 48, 50

routed by Eadward and iEthelred, 53

defeated at Brunanburh, 55

massacre of, 62

conquer England, 62 — 64

their settlements in Ireland, 444

■i !i

3 I 2

852

INDEX.

Daniel, poet and historian, 399

Darcy, Lord, 346

Daraley, Henry Stuart, Lord, 361, 385, 386,

.?lJi

David, King of Scots, 187

David Bruce ; see Bruce

David, Prince of Wales, i68

Davies, Sir John, 526

Deane, General, <&g

"Defenders," Irish, 814

Deira, kingdom of, i3» 17

Deorham, battle c f, la

Derby, Ferrers, Earl of, 109

Derby, Henry of Lancaster, Earl of, 361, 263,

363 ; see Henry th« Fourth,
Derby, Edward Stanley, Earl of, 842, 843
Derinod, King of Lemster, 445, 446
Desmond, Earl of, 456
Desi^ensers, the, 209, 210
Dettingen, bpttle of; 741
Devonshire, Earl of (see Cavendish), 679, 680,

681
Digby, Lord, 537
Digges, Sir Dudley, 498, 499
Directory, the French, 809
Dissidence, its growth, 561, 56a
Disraeli, Benjamin, 843, 844
Domesday Book, 85
Dominic, S., 148
Dominicans, see Friars
Donne, 536

Dorchester, first West-Saxon see, 24
Dorset, Sackville, Earl of, 437
Douglas, James, 313
Dover besieged by Lewis of France, 131

treaty of, 63°, 639
Dowdall Archbishop of Armagh, 453
Drake, Francis, 415—419, 431, 443
Drama, see Literature
Dreux, battle of, 383 .

Drogheda, storm of, 575
Dryden, 610, 637, 642
Dublin besieged by Ormond, 575
Dudley, minister of Henry the Seventh, 308
Dudley, Guildford, 361, 363
Dumbarton taken by Eadberht, 41
Dunbar, battle of, 576, 577
Duncan, Admiral, 810
Dundas, Henry, 821

Dundee, John Graham of Claverhouse, Vis-
count, 685
Dunedin, 185
Dunes, battle of the, 596
Dunkirk ceded to England, 596

sold to France, 635
Duns Scotus, 151
Dunstan, S., 55. 5^

his administration, 56 — 58

death, 61
Dupleix, his designs in India, 745, 746
Duquesne, Fort, 747, 756
Durham, liistorians of, 417
Dyvnaint, 42

Eadberht, King of Northnmbria, 41
Eadgar, King of England, 57, 58, 61

his Law, 58, 65
Eadgar, the ^theling, 80, 83, 90
Eadgar, King of Scots, 90

Eadmer, 118

Eadmund, S., of East Anglia, 46

Eadmund, Kmg of Wessex, 55, 56

grants Strathclyde to Malcolm, 186
Eadmund Ironside, 65
Kadrcd, King of Wessex, 56, 57
Eadric of Merr ia, 65

EaJward the Elder, King of Wessex, 53 54
Eadward the Confessor, 68 — 70

his promise to William, 78
Eadward the Martyr, 6i
Eadwig, King of Wessex, 57
Iiladwig, brother of Eadmund Ironside, 65
Eadwine, King of Northumbria, 30 — 33
Eadwine, Earl of Mercia, 73. 80 — 83
Kaldhelm, Bishop of Sherborne, 37
Ealdormen, 15

Ealdred, Archbishop of York, 81
Ealhstan, Bishop of Sherborne, 46
Earldoms created by Cnut, 65
Ebbsfleet, 7, 8, 18
Ecgberht of Wessex, 43 — 44

death, 46
Ecgberht, Archbishop of York, 41
Ecgfrith, King of Northumbria, 33 — 35, i8>,
Ecgwine, Bishop of Worcester, 33
Edgehill, battle of,. 548
Edinburgh, its origin, 21, 185

capital of Scot Kings, 187

French troops at, 260
Edinburgh Review, 829 '

Edington, battle of, 48
Edith, see Matilda

Edmund, son of Henry the Third, 154 '
Edmund Rich, i« '

reads ArLstotle at Oxford, 138

Archbishop of Canterbury, 145

exile, 146
Education, national, its beginnings, 840

Committee of, ib.

School Boards, 844; see Literature,
Schools
Edward the First, his motto, 153

defeated by Llewelyn, 154

faithful to the Provisions of Oxford, 15s

captured at Lewes, 157

escapes, 159

takes Gloucester, ib. *

victory at Evesham, 159, 160

character, 167, 181 — 184

crusade, 168

conquers Wales, 168, 169 1

his policy, 169

judicial reforms, 170, 171

legislation, 172

social changes under, 173, 175, 177, 202

first conquest of Scotland, 188 — 190

second, 191 — 193

struggle with barons, 203, 204, 206, 207

expels Jews, 205

dealings with clergy, 206

war with France, ih.

confirms Charters, 207

death, 212
Edward the Second, King, 207

struggle 'vith Lords Ordainers, 208, 209

defeated at Bannockburn, 213, 214

truce with Scotland, 214

deposed, 210 .

murdered, 211

INDEX.

853

Edward the Third proclaimed King, k o

arrests Mortimer, J 15

strujgie w ith Sc >tland, »i6

quarrel with France. 323, 334

alliance w h Flanders, 334

war with F-ance, 225 -231

lo>es Aquitaine, 233, 234

dea h, 3^1
Edward the Fourth, see March

King, 285

victor at Tow ton, i6.

marr.age, a£6. 287

struggle with Warwick, flight and return,
287

final success, 388

rharacter, 292
' poi.?y. 'o^

patron < f Caxton, 293, 294, 298

death, 29)
Edward the Fifth, 299

More's Life of, 315
Edward ihe S xth. King, 357

proposal for his marriage, 380

his Grammar SchooU, 360

his ■•plan" for the succession, 361

dea h. ti>.
Edward the Black Prince at Cr6cy, 226, 227

plunders Gas? ny, 2^0

victor^' at Poitiers, i6.

sacks L.m ges, 233

death, 235
Egypt conquered by Buonaparte, 810

French withdraw from, 819
"Eikon Basiiike," 573
Eld n, Lord Chancellor, 838
Eleanor of Poitou, wife of Henry the Second,

104, 106, 1 1 Si 116
Eleanor of Provence, w»fe of Henry the Third,

144, 156, 158, 159
Eleanor, sister of Henry the Third, marries

Simon de Montfort, 152
Eliot, Sir John, 485, 497, 498

attacks Buckingham, 499

arrested, t'i>.

moves Remonstrance, 502

speeches in Parliament, 504, 505

death, 513
Elizabeth, daughter of Henry the Eighth,

, 357

her Greek scholarship, 312

accession, 369

character, 370 — 376

Church policy, 376 — 379, 468

dealings with Scotland, 381

with Huguenots, 384

with Roman Catholics, 384," 385, 408 — 410,
416

troubles with Mary Stuart and the Parlia-
ment, 386, 387

with Mary and Alva, 389

Catholic revolt and Bull of Deposition
against her, 390, 391

relations with Parliament, 402 — 405, 481

plans for her marriage, 414

policy in Ireland, 455 — 457

death, 459
Elizabeth, daughter of Edward the Fourth,
300

marries Henry the Seventh, 301
Elizabeth, daughter of James the First, 488

Elizabeth, Empress of Ruvsia, 747, 764
P'.llandun, battle of, 44
Kll.ott. General, 782, 786
Ely, foundation <.f, 33

burnt by I)ane'«, ^6

surrendered 10 William, 83
Emma, wife of /tt'ielred the becond. 6?
Emp on. min ster of Henry the Seventh, 308
Kncloa; res, riots ngainst. 292
England, the making of, 7 — 44

into course wit 1 the I' ranks, 43

Danish c n [uest of, 6a -64

condition under Cnut 64—^7

relations wit'i N rmandy, 77, 78

con ;uered by Will. am, to — 83

immis^ration from the C n i,ient into, 93

conditi n under Stt phen, 103

under Inter tict, 134

agrarian di-ic nent in, 24"^, 326, 327

Com nin"*' ace u..t of, 383, 289

N w Leamin'T in, 3 4 — 314

effi cts of VVi-lsey's adiu.nistration in, 322—

324
change in altitude towards Rome. 336
indus rial progress under Edward the

Fir t, 2"a _
social condition in the s^xth century, 14 —

'6
in te ith and eleventh centuries, 59, 60
un er tie Edwards, 173, 175, aoa, 217 —

219. 232, 223, 238
in fourteen; h century, 245 — 350, 257—259
in fifteen h century, 272 — 374
during Wars f the Roses, 289
after, 390—292
under Elizabeth, 392 — 397
in Puritan time, 4O2 — 464, 466
modern, its beg.nning, 605
joins Triple Alliance, 637
position in Grand Alliance, 684
new posi ion under Hous** of Hanover, 721
growth of trade and wealth, 730
society in, under the Georges, 736
philanthropic re ival in. 740
alliance w th Prussia, 748
its place in the world, 758, 787
relations wi h Anenca, 760, 777 — 781, 785,

786, 827, 828, 832— B3.I
industrial progress in eighteenth century,

791. 792
condition compared with the Continent,

797

attitude towards French revolution, 803

efforts of revolutionists in, 804

panicin, 806, 807

colonial gains, 809

successes at sea, 809, 810

norths" Tue against, 818, 819

declare. ith Buonaparte, 820

condition during French war, 828, 829

after, 837

severed from Hanover. 840
England, New. 505-509, 513, 514

return of Independents from, 560

its four States, 758

its schools, 759
England, Old, 1
Engle, their Sleswick home, I, 2

settle in East Anglia, 11

conquer Mid-Britain and the North, 12, 13

854

INDEX.

LaKlish people, their life in the older England,

their religion, 4, 5

comiuer IJr.tain, 7 — 13

their si'ttlement, 14, 15

•ignificance of tlicir history, 787 ; see Eng-
land
English. Middle, 13
Eorls, 4
Episcopacy abolished in Scotland, 524

restored, id.

deiiiatid for its abulition in England, 543
Erasmus, 305, 306

his edition of S, Jerome, 307, 313

" Praise of Fully," 308. 316

denounces the war, 312

his (Ireek lestainent, 313

his tiu'ology, 313, 314
Essex, Countess of, 487
Essex, Earl of, Elizabeth's favourite, 434, 457,

458
Essex, Earl of, commander of Parliamentary
army, 5^7, 549

relieves Gloucester, 550

defeated in Cornwall, 553

resigns his command, 556
Essex, Earl of, minister of Charles the Second,
65^, 655, 657

suicide, 661
Essex, Henry of, 165
Euphuism, 309, 400
Eustace the Monk, 131
Evesham, its origin, 33

battle of, i6o
Exchange, the Royal, 394
Exchequer, Court of, 97. 112

R.chard Fitz-Neal's treatise on, lil)
closed, 639
Excise Hill, Walpole's, 731
Exclusion Bill, 654, 658
Exeter, Danes in, 48

revols against the Conqueror, 82
Exeter, Courtenay, Marquis of, 347
Eylau, battle of, 823

Faddii.ey, battle of, 17

Fairfax, L rd, 548

Fairfax, Sir Thomas, 552, 55^— 5S8, 569. 57°

Falkirk, battles of, 192, 744

Falkland, Viscount, 542

his deman Is of Church reform, 543

leaves Parliament and joins Charles, 547

death, 550

his philosophy, 609, 611, 612
Farmers, their rise. 246
Fastoife, Sir John, 276, 298
Fawkes, Guido, 483
Felton. John, 503
Ferdinand the Catholic, King of Aragon, 311,

Ferdinand the Seventh, King of Spain, 824
Ferozeshah, battle of, 841
Ferrar, Bishop of St. David's, 366
Feudalism, its growth under the Conqueror,

. 83,84

its ruin, 227
Fifth-Monarchy men, 633
Finch, Chief Justice, 531, 538
First of June, battle of, 809

Fisher. Bi«hop of Rochester, aupporti tb« N«w
Learning, 30;

E.^tron of Erasmus, 314
is reply to Luther, ^aa
opposes (icnry the Eighth's divorce, 328
imprisoned, 344
death, 345

Fitzgerald, Maurice, 445

Fitzgerald, Ix)rd Thomas, 449

I'itz-llaiiio, Robert, 164

Fitzharris, his impeachment, 659

Fitz-Neal, Ricliard, his dialogue on the Exche-
quer, 118

Fiti-Osbcrn, William, 81, 83

Fitz- Peter, Geoffrey, Justiciar, 197

Fiti-Stephen, Robert, 445

Fitz-Tho.nas, Thomas, mayor of London, 30x

Fitz-Urse. Reginald, 108, 109

Fitz-VValter, P bert, 127, 131

Fitz-Warcniif, Fulk, 146

Five Boroughs, 4 ), 54

Fiamsteed, astronomer, 611

Flanders, its relations with England. 234, 225,

391
English Gild of Merchant Adventurers in,

2^5 _

occupied by the French, 636

delivered by Marlborough, 714
Flemings in Pembroke, 164, 165

under Edward the Third, 224
Fletcher, Phineas and Giles, 526
Fleurus, battles of, 694, 808
F'lodden, battle of, 380
Fl jod, Irish leader, 785
Florida ceded to England, 764

restored to Spain, 786
Fontenoy, battle <<f, 742
Fortescue, S.r John, his definition of English

kingship, 289
Fort William (Calcutta), its origin, 745
Fourmigny, battle of, 281
Fox, Bishop of Winchester, 309, 314, 322
Fox, Charles, 787, 788

his India ^,11, 789

supports Regency of Prince of Wales, 799

attitud"; towards Rev.dution, t'i., 800

his Libel Act, 802

Burke's quarrel with, z6.

forsaken by the Whigs, 807

returns to office, 822

death, i6.
Foxe, John, his " Bc^k nf Martyrs," 407
France, William the First and, 89

Cdward the Third and, 223—231

alliance with the Scots, 260

truce with Richard the Second, 261

Henry the Fifth and, 267 — 270

Bedford's campaigns in, 275—280

English expelled from, 281

relations with Italy, 311

with Henry the Eighth, Spain, and the
Empire, /<J., 312, 322, 325, 327, 330

civil wars in, 384, 388, 412, 443

relations with England and Holland, 634,

Family Compact with Spain, 733
alliance with Pruss. a, 742
designs in America, 747 f
withdraws thence, 764
alliance with United States, 781, 798

Fra

Frai
Frat

Fran

Fredi

Fred

Fred<

Friar

Fride

Fried

Frith

Fuen

Fulk

Gage
Gaim;
Galen
Gardi

St
St

INDEX.

855

France — coHtinutd.

Pitt's treaty of commerce with, 795

condition in eighteenth century, 797, 7(>8

revolution in, 798. 8oci, 803— 8trf>

declares war on the Emperor, 804

on Holland, 805

on England, 806

insurrections in, 808

struKKle nf^ainst Kurope, il>.

comiuers iiollund, ib.

Directory in, 809

conquests in Italy, 809, 810

Consulate, 811

Buonaparte's rule in, 830

re/olution of 1830, 839
Frarjhise, Parliamentary, restricted under
Henry the Sixth, 271, 373

the furty shilling, 273

extension in 1833, 839

in 1867, 844
Francis, S., of Assisi, 194
Francis the First, King of France, comiuers
Lombardy, J22

meeting witn Henry the Eighth, 334

prisoner, 327

released, 328
Francis the Second, King of France, 380, 383
Franciscans, see Friars
Franklin, Henjamin, 769
Frank-pledfjc, 197

Franks, their intercourse with Kn^^land, 43
Frederick the Second, King of Prussia, 734

victory at Chotusitz, 741

alliance with France, 743

seizes Prague, ib.

drives Ausirians from Silesia, 743

treaty with England, 748

seizes Dresden, ib.

victory at Prague and defeat at Kolin, ib.

victories at Rossbach, Leuthen, and Zorn-
dorf, 754

defeats in 1759, ib.

successes in i;r6o, 763 *

share in partition of Poland, 799

death, ib.
Frederick, Prince of Wales, 733
Frederick, Elector Palatine, 481, 489, 494
Friars, the, 148 -151

Frideswide, S., Pnory of, at Oxford, 133
Friedland, battle of, 823
Frith-Gilds, 196, 107
Fuentes d'Onore, battle of, 837
Fulk the Black, C-'unt of Arinu, 99, 100
Fulk the Good, Count of An, vi, 99
Fulk of Jerusalem, Count of a njou, 100
Fulk the Red, Count of Anjou, 99

Gage, General, 778

Gaimar, 119

Galen, Linacre's translation of, 304

Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester, 348, 358, 362,

Garnet, Jesuit, 483
Gauden, Dr., 573
Gaunt, Elizabeth, 666

Gaunt, John of, Duke of Lancaster, invades
France; 233

struggle with Parliament, 234 — 235

supports Wyclif, 239, 240

Gaunt, John o^—contiHueit.

turns against hir>i 241,343

driven from pn :t, 2(>i

exuedition to b.jain, r/.
Ciavel-kind, 247
(lavcston. Piers, 207-303
(Jeoffry lirey->;i.wn, Ci<ii:it of Anjou, 99
(Jeoffry Martei, Count of Anjoii, 76, 9;, 100
(leofTry Plantaifeiict, Count of Anjou, loi, 104
( Jeoffry, son of Henry the Second, 109, 113, 119
George the I'irst, King, 7-'o, 721, 727
George the Second, King (^Vi.- Cambridge), 731.

7JO. 74«. 761
Georj^e the Third, King, 761

his '• friends," 7O2

supports Whigs against Pitt, 76J, 763

his home policy, 764

dealings with the Commons, 765, 766

with the Whigs, 766

with Pitt, 767

his personal administration, 777

dealings with America, 776-— 778

madness, 799, 830

refuses Catholic emancipation, 3i8

death, 838
George the Fourth, Prince of Wales, Regent,
79<;, 830

King, 839

deatn, 839
Georgia colonized, 759
(Jitrald de Barri, 118, 119, 134
Cicraldines, the, 449
Gcwissas, 11

Gibraltar, sieges of, 729, 782, 7S6
Gilbert, Sir Humphry, 506
Gilbert discovers terrestrial magnetism, 609
Gildas, 14
Gilds, 93, 196 — 199
Ginkelf, General, 694
Giraldus Camlirensis, see Gerald
Gladstone, Mr., 844

Glamorgan, conquest gf, 164 '

Glanvill, Ralph, no

his treatise on law, 118
Glastonbury, 37

Arthur s tomb at, 119
Glencoe, massacre of, 686
Glendower, see Glyndwr
Gloucester, siege of, 550
Gloucester, Eleanor Cobham. Duchess of, 274
Gloucester, Duke of, son of Edward the Third,

261, 262
Gloucester, Humphry, Duke of, 275, 280

his library, 298
Gloucester, Richard, Duke of, see Richard the

Third
Gloucester, Gilbert, Earl of, 157, 159
Gl ucester, Richard, Earl of, 155, 156
Gloucester, Robert, Earl of, loi, 102
Glyndwr, Owen, 266
Goderich, Lord, 838
Godfrey, Sir Edmondsbury, 650
Godolphin, Earl of, 702, 708
Godwine, Earl of Wessex, 67, 68

exiled, 69 '

returns and dies, 70
"Goliath, Bishop," 120
Gondomar, Count of, 492, 493
Goodrich, Bishop of Ely, 354
Goojerat, battle of, 842

f ! '

856

INDEX.

Government, Act of, 595

Instrument of, 585, 586, 588
Gower, pctt, 294

Caxion's edition of, 296
Grafion, Jjuke of. 772, 776, 777
Granville, Karl, 742 ; see Carteret
Grattan, 7B5, B13
Greek, reived study of, 304
Gretne, Robert, 401, 428, 429, 431
Gr«2nvil. Sir Bevil, 549
Greenway, Jesuit. 483
Greenwich Ob ervai>-ry founded, 610
Gregory the Great, Pope, 18

iElfreJ's translation of his Pastoral, 52
Grenville, George, his ministry, 766—769
GrenviLe, Lord, 821 — 823
Gresham, Sir Tiiomas, 394
Grey, Earl, 839

Grey, Elizabeth, wife of Edward the Fourth, 287
Grey, Lady Jane, 361, 363
Grey, John de, Bishop of Norwich, 123
Grey, Lord, Deputy in Ireland, 422, 456
Grey, ..ord Le. nard, 449
Grey, Sir Richard, 299
Grew, vegetable physiologist, 611
Grindecobbe, William, 352, 254
Gr,.cyn, 304, 306, 307
Grosseteste, Robert, Bishop of Lincoln, 139,

145, 148. 151, 153
Gruffydd, prince > f Wales, 164
Guienne, struggle of Edward the First and
Philip the Sixth for, 223

lost to England, 281
Guiscard, Robert, 74

Guise. Mary cf, Regent of Scotland, 380, 381
Guises, the, 382, 384, 385, 412
Guisnes lost to England, 369
Gunhild, sister of Swein, 62
Gunpowder, effect of us introduction, 301
Gunpowder PI t, 483
Gustavus Adulphus, 515
Guthlac, S., 33
Guthrum, King of East Anglia, 47

treaties with iElfred, 48, 50
Gwynn, Nell, 630
Gyrth. son of Godwine, 80
Gyrwas, 13

Hadrian the Fourth, Pope, 443

Hainault, Jacqueline, Countess of, 275

Hale, Sir Matthew, 579, 584, 616, 620

Hales, Sir Kdwarrt. 667

Hales, John, theologian. 612

Hales, John, leader of Peasant Revolt, 252

Halidon HJl, battle of, 216

Halifax, Savile, Viscount, 652, 655, 658, 659

share in the Revolution, 683

Privy Seal. 691
Halifax (Nova Sc tia) founded, 747
Hall, Bishop and satirist, 526
Halky, astronomer, 6ji

Hamilton, Marquis and Duke of, 532, 569, 573
Hamilton, second Duke of, 577, 578
Hanipden, J hn, resists a forced loan, 500

refuses ship-rnoney, 529

trial, 530, 5:^1

judgement annulled, 538

charged with treason, 544

death, 550

Hampton Court Conference, 480
Hanover, Convention of. 744

House I f, 705. 721. 722
severed from England, 840
Harald, K.ng of England, 67
Harald Hardrada. K ng of Norway, 78, 79
Hardvvicke, ] ord Chai-cellor, 732
Harfleur taken by Henry the B.fth, 268
Hargreaves, invent r of spinning -jenny, 792
Harlaw, ba.tle of, 380
Harley, Robert, 713

intrigues aga.nst Marlborough, 716, 718

rivalry with Bolingbroke, 719

countenances South Sea Company, 728 ;
see xf rd
Harold, son of Godwine, 69

his administra.ion, 70
Welsh campaign, 164

King, 70

his oath to Wi'.liam, 78

struggle with Harald Hardrada and
William, 78, 79

death, 80
Harthacnut, King of England, 67
Harvey discovers circulation of the blood, 609
Haselrig, cne of the five members, 544, 580,

. 586. 597i 599
Hastin.', 53

Hastings, battle of, 79, 80
Hastings, John, claims Scottish throne, 188
Hastings, Lord, minister of Edward the Fourth,

299
Hastings, Warren, 783, 785, 796
HatfielJ, battle of, 22
Havelock, bir Henry, 843
Hawke. Admiral, 755
Hawkins, John , 395
Hawley, General, 744
Heaven's Field, battle of, 23
Hengest, 7, 8
Henj;est.dun, battle of, 46
Henrietta Mar.a, wife cf Charles the First, 495
Henry the First, his accession, charter, and
marriage, 91

suppresses revolt, 96

Conquers Normandy, ib.

his admini tration, 96, 97

struggle with Anjou, 100

death, 101

palace I f Beaumont, 133

dealings with Wales, 164
Henry the Second, his marriage and accession,
104

person and character, 104, 105

policy, 105, 106

relations with France, 106

Church policy, io5, 107

quarrel with Beket, 108, 109

war of Toulouse, 106, 109

crowning of his eldest son, i .

revolt against, 109, no

penance, no

legal reforms, 109, no, 111

death, 112

vis.t to Glaston' try, 119

dealings with Wales, 165

with Scotland, 187, 188

with Ireland, 445, 446
Henry the Third, crowned, 131

confirms charter, 142, 145

INDEX.

857

id accession,

Henry the Third — continued.

quarrel with Hubert de Burgh, 143

character and policy, 144

•"arriage, ib.

misruio, 145, 146

expedition to Poltou, 146

quarrel with Simon de Montfort, 152, 153

with the bar ns. 154, 155

his English proclamation, 155

treaties with France and Wales, ib.

war with the barons, 156 — 160

death, 168
Henry the Fourth, see Derby

king, 264

relati ms with Parliament, 265

suppresses Lollardry, ib.

rev >Ks against him, 266

death, ib.
Henrj' the Fifth, King, 266

war with France, 267 — 269

coniuers Normandy, 269, 270

marriage, 270

treaty with France, ib.

death, ib.

Regency nominated by him, 275
Henry the Sixth, his minority, 271 — 274

crow • i at Paris, 279

marriage, 280

loses Normandy and Guienne, 281

birth of his son, 282

idiocy, ib., 283

prisoner, 283

deposed, 285

flies t ) Scotland, ib.

prisoner, 286

restored, 287

dies, 288

his library, 298
Henry the Seventh, see Richmond

king, 301

marriage, ib,

revjlts against him, /(^.

his p.jlicy, 302

title to the throne, ib.

character, 303

patnii of Caxton, 298

dealings with Ireland, 448
Henry the Eighth, his accession, 308

person, ib.

marries Catharine of A'-agon, 311

war with France, 311, 312

education of his children, 312

his '* Assertion of the Seven Sacraments,"

treaty with France, 322

seeks Imperial crown, 324

mefts Francis, ib.

alliance with Charles the Fifth, ib., 325

withdraws from the war, 328

proceedings for divorce, ib,, 329, 334,

337.
promises a translation of the Bible, 334
" Head of the Church," 335, 336, 338
marries Anne Boleyn, 337
Jane Seymour, 348
Anne of Cleves, ib.
Catharine Howard, 356
death, 357
his will, ib,, 361
dealings with Ireland, 449—451

F2nglai>d and
637. 638—640,

Henry, son of Henry the Second, 108, 109,

112
Henry of Blois, Bishop of Winchester, 103
Henry, King of Navarre (Henry the Fourth

of France), 416, 443, 475
Herbert, Admiral, 679. See Torrington
Herbert, George, 526
Hereward, 83

Herford, Nich->la.s, 240, 242, 244
Herl iiin of lirionne, 72
Herrick, 526

Herrings, buttle of the, 276, 277
Hertford, Earl of, 357, 358. See Somerset
Hexha.n, battle of, 286

historians cf, 118
Highlands subdued by Monk, 589

c nquest of. 744
Hild, abbess of Whitby, 27
Hil-ey, Bishop of Rochester, 354
History, English, its beginning, 40

under iElfred, 52

its significance. 7?7
Hobbes, Th )ina-, 609, 614, 615
H jchkirch, battle of, 754
Hohentriedburg battle f, 743
Ho'ienlinden, battle i f, 811
HoUanl, its relations with
France, 573, 628, 629,
646, 675, 808
Holland, Jacqueline, Countess of, 275
H ;lle , one of the five members, 544, 564, 566
Homilies, B ok of, 359
Hooke, microscopist, 611
Honker, Rl hard, 469, 470
Hooper, Bishop r,f Gloucester, 360, 366
Hopton, Sir Ralph, 549
Horsa, 7, 9
Horsted, 9

Hotham, Sir John, 547
Hotspur, 266
Hough, President of Magdalen College, Oxford,

671
H mnslow, camp at, 668
Howard, Ca.harine, 356, 357
Howard, John, 740, 741
Howard of Effingham, Lord, 418
How'den, Tvoger if, 118
Howel iMa, Laws of, 164
Howe, General, 780
Howe, Lord, 809
Hrolf the Ganger, 71
Hubert Walter, Archbishop of Canterbury,

11^, 123
Hubert de Burgh, sec Burgh
Hubertsberg, Treaty of, 764
Huddleston, Calh lie pnest, 663
Huguenots, 382, 384, 412

in England, 667
Humbert, Gentral, 810, 815
Hundred Years'War, its origin, 223, 224

change in if; character, 267

its effect on England, 273, 274

its end, 281
Huntingdon, Henry of, 118
Huskisson, Mr. , 838
Hus'^ey, Lord, 315, 346
Hutchinson, Colonel, 462 — 464
Hyde, Anne, 635, 669

Hyde, Edward, 542, 546, 547. Sec Clarendon
Hyder Ali, 784, 785

858

INDEX.

Ida founds kingdom of Bemicia, 13

Impositions of James the First, 483, 484

Income-tax, 841

Indemnity, Bill of, 691, 692

Independence, Declaration of, 780

Independents, 559 — 563

India, English and P irtaguese in, 745

French in, ib., 746

Clive's victories in, 746, 753, 754

French withdraw from, 764

Clive's rule in, 782, 783

Regulating Act, 783

condition under Hastings, 783—785

Fox's India Bill, 789

Pitt's, 79s

Mutiny in, 842, 843

transferred to the Crown, 843
India C >mpan; East, 396, 745, 783, 843
Indies, West, r :quired by England, 809
Indulgence, 'Jeclarations of, 624, 639—641,

670 — 672
Ine, king of Wessex, 37, 38
Ingelger, 98

Inkermann, battle of, 842
Innocent III., Pope, 123, 124, 130
Instrument of Government, 585, 586, 588,

595
Interdict in England, 124
Inverlochy, battle of, 557
lona, 23

Ipswich, Wolsey's school at, 323
Ireland attacked by Ecgfrith, 35

condition in twelfth century, 444, 445

its conquest, 445, 446

John in, 447

Richard the Second in, 261, 447

Henry the Seventh's policy in, 448

Henry the Eighth's, 450, 451

English colonization under Mary, 454

revolts against Elizabeth, 455 — 457

coloniiati n of Ulster, 158

Wentwonh in, 520, 521

revolt, 541

Cromwell's conquest of, 574, 576

settlement, 589, 590

James the Second's dealings with, 668,
686, 687

rising in, 687, 688

William's campaign in, 693

Marlborough's, ib., 694

first union with England, 579, 590

dissolved, 632

demands of the volunteers, 783

made independent, 786, 813

condition under the Georges, 795, 811,
812

Pitt's dealings with, 795, 8i<j

eff-rts of French rev /lutionists in, 804

revolt of 1798, 810, 815

union with England, 815

agitation for repeal, 840

rising of S.mth O'Brien, 841

Mr. Gladstone's dealings with, 844
Ireton, General, 565, 566, 567, 589, 620
Irishmen, United, 804, 814
Iron-trade, 792
Isabella of Angouleme, wife of King John,

145
Isabella of France, wife of Edward the Second,
210, 225

Isabella of France, wife of Richard the Second,

261
Italy, its influence on English literature, 399 —

401

Jacobites, 692, 695

revolt, 725, 743, 744

decline, 761
Jamaica, Errjlish conquest of, 593
James thf. First, King of Scotland, 380
James tLe Fourth. King of Scotland, 380
James the Fifth, King of Scotland, 38 >
James the Sixth of Scotland (First of England),
his birth, 3S6

crowned, 388

struggles with Presbyterianism, 533,524

person and character, 477

theory of monarchy, 478

of ecclesiastical supremacy, 479

at Hampton Court Conference, 480

relaxes penal laws, 481

proposes union with Scotland, 482

his impositions, 483, 484

despotism, 485, 486

Court and favourites, 4S7

foreign policy, 481, 488, 489

tears out Protestaaon of Parliament, 493

death, 495, 496
James the Second, see Y(jrk

King, 664

revolts against, ib., 665

his vengeance, 665, 666

increases the army, 666

alliance with France, ib.

dispenses with Test Act, 667

dealings with Scotland, 668

struggle with English Churchmen, 669

tries to win Nonconformists, 670

attacks Universities, 671

struggle with clergy and Bishops, 671,
672

birth of his son, 679

deserted, 679 — 681

flight, 682

goes to St. Germain, 684

dealings with Ireland, 668, 686—688, 693

death, 704
Jarrow, 39

Java won by England, 8og
Jeanne d'Arc, 274—279
Jeffieys, Chief-Justice, 665, 666

Chancellor, 672
Jeinappes, battle of, 805
Jena, battle of, 822
Jenkins' ear, 733
Jersey, New, 759
Jervis, Admiral, 810
Jesu.ts in England, 409, 410
Jews settle in England, 86, 87

expelled, 205

return, 591
Joan of Arc, see Jeanne
Johanna, daughter of King John, 165
John, son of Henry the Second, 112, 113

King, IIS

loses Normandy, &c., 115, 116

his characer, 122

quarrel with the Church, 123, 124

with the barons, 124, 125

INDEX.

ament, 493

Bishops, 671,

36-688, 693

John — continued.

Welsh wars, 124, 125, 165

homage to the Pope, 125

war with France, 125, 126

with the barons, 127

signs Charter, 128

subdues Rochester and the North, 130

dealings with Ireland, 446, 447

death, 131
John, King of Bohemia, 227
John, King of France, 230
John the Old-Saxon, 51
John the Litster, 254
Jonson, Ben, 437
Joseph the Second, Emperor, 799
Junius, 768, 774
Junto, the, 698, 699, 702
Jurors in the shire-court, 176
Jury, the grand, iii

pettj , ib.

trial by, 1 10
Justiciar, the, q6
Justices of the Peace, 173
Jutes, their country, i

land at Ebbsfleet, 7, 8

found kingdom of Kent, 15
Juxon, Bishop of London and Treasurer, 512

Kbnneth MacAlpin, King of Picts and

Scots, 185
Kent, English conquest of, 8 — 10

kingdom of, 15

greatness under ^thelberht, 17 ,

conversion, x8

fall, 19

subject to Mercia, 36, 41

John Ball in, 250

revolts in, 252, 281

Complaint of Commons of, 282
Kent, Edward, Duke of. 840
Kent, Earl of, beheaded, 215
Ketel of S. Edmundsbury, 94
Kildare, Earl of, Lord Deputy of Ireland, 448,

449
Kilkenny, Statute of, 447
Killiecrankie battle of, 685
Kilmarnock, Earl of, 744
Kilsyth, battle of, 558
King, growth of his dignity, 59

the King in council, 171

Divine r,ght of, 478

his feudal rights abolished, 619
King's Bench, Court of, 112
King's Court, the, 97, iii, 171
Kingdoms, the Three, icj
Kingship, English, its origin, 15

theory of, in thirteenth century, 183, 184

Sir John Fortescue's definition of, 289 ; see
Monarchy
Kit's Coty House, 9
Knights of the shire, 15?, 176, 177
KnoTles* " History of the Turks, '^ 399
Knox's Liturgy, 525
Kolin, battle of, 748
Kunersdorf, battle of, 754

Labourers, their rise, 246, 247

condition after Black Death, 248, 249

Labourers — continued.

as painted by Longland, 257, 258

their enfranchisement refused, 255

Statute of, 249

its failure, "j/

demand tor its repeal, 282

influence of labour question on the
monarchy, 292
La Hogue, battle of, 696
Lambert, General, 569, 595, 599, 6i3
Lambeth, treaty of, 131
Lancaster, John, Duke of, see Gaunt
Lancaster, Thomas, Earl of, 208, 200
Lancaster, House of, its claims to the Crown,

264, 283

its fall, 288
Land-tenure, changes in, 84, 85, 173, 326, 327
Lanfranc at Bee, 72, 77

Archbishop of Canterbury, 85

secures the Crown for Rufus, 89

death, ib.
Langport, battle of, 558
Langside, battle of, 389
Langton, Simon, 130

Langton, Stephen, Archbishop of Canterbury,
123

heads opposition to John, 126

produces Charter of Henry the First, 127

suspended, 130

his care for the Charter, 142

death, 143
Langton, Bishop of Winchester. 307
Language, English, under the Normans, 120,
121

Henry the Third's proclamation in, 155

growing use of, 217, 218

changes in Caxton's time, 297

used in law courts, 731
Lansdowne Hill, battle of, 549
Latimer, Hugh, 352, 353

Bishop of Wurcester, 354

imprisoned, 356, 362

burned, 367
Latitudinnrians, 476, 609, 611— 613
Laud, B'S 'v, 496, 504

character and policy, 509, 510

Archbis*iop < f Canterburv, 510

plans of Church restoration, 511 — 514

first minister, 522

dealings with Scotch Church, 524, 525

sent to the Tower, 538
Lauderdale, Earl of, 632
Lauffeld, battle of. 744
Lau2un, Count of, 693
Law, national, its development under Alfred,

Roman, in England, 132, 133

of Eadgar, 58. 65

of Eadward, 68

of Howel Dda, 164
Law Courts, Common, 170, 171

English language adopted in, 731
Layamon, 121
Ivcague, the Holy, 311. 312
Leammg, the New, 303, 304

its educational ref mis, 308, 309

plans of Church reform, 310

throl gy, 313, 314

antagonism to Luther, 321, 322
Leases, their introduction, 246

■;i

86o

INDEX.

Leicester, town of, 194, 195

Leicester, Earl of, revolts against Henry the

Sec nd, 109
Leicester, Earl of, Elizabeth's favourite, 416,418
Leicester, Earl of, see Montfort
Lejpzig, battle of, 832
Leith, siege of, 381
Leland 399
Lenthall, Speaker, 545
Le) the Tenth, Pope, 313, 320, 321
Leofric, Earl of Mercia, 68
leslie, David. 532, 538, 576—578
Leuthen, battle of, 754
Levant Company, 484
Leven, Alexandjr Leslie, Earl of, 552, 563
Lewes, battle of, 157

Mise of, 758
Lewis the seventh. King of France, 106, 109
Lewis(the >i^ighth)of Fra iCjin England,i3o,i3i
Lewis the Ninth, King of France. 156
Lewis the Eleventh King of France, 311
Lewis the Twelfth, King of France, 311, 322
Lewis the Fourteenth, 634

relafions with England and Holland, 635

claims Low Coun'ries, 636

makes peace at Aix-la-Chapelle, 637

trea' ies « ith Charles the Second, 638, 639,
647, 659

revokes Edict of Nantes, 666, 667

his power, 673

character and policy, 674, 67s

attacks Flanders, 675

Holland, ib.

Italy, 676

Germany, 677, 680, 684

Netherlands, 6^6

designs on Spam, 701, 702

acknowledges the Pretender, 705

campaign of 1703, 710

offers terms, 717

death. 725, 726
Lewis the Fifteenth, 726. 742
Lewis the Sixteenth, 798, 800, 803, 805, 806
Lewis the Eighteenth, 834, 836
I,Byington, battle o'.', 7/9
Lichfield, seat of Mercian bishopric, 25, 26

archbishopric of, 42

suppressed, 43
Liegnitz, battle of, 763
Lieny. battle of, 835
Lilburne. Jo'..n. 574, 575
Lille taken by Marlborough, 717
"Lillibullero," 680
I-illy, head of St. Paul's School, 309
Limerick, siege of, 693, 694
Limitation Bill, 659
Limoges, sack of, 233
Linacre, 304
Lincoln, bat i';. c <", T02

Fair of, 131
Lincoln, John de la ".-ok. Earl-ji^ 301
Lindisfarne, See of, 2^

Irish monks ;f. nxthdrf-W to lona, 30

Cuthbe'.; ,T., 3',. 35
Lindiswara, i-\

submit to h':>.''i'.Ls, 22

to Oswald, zi

ceded to ^^^:^ii'^l j4

seized by. Ethckt' dp;,
Lisle, Alice, 666

Litany, the English, 356
Literature, in \orthumbria, 38 — 41

under Alfred, 51, 52

under Diinstan, 58

under Nor. nan-; and Angevins, 117 — 121

in fourteenth century, 218—222

literature of Peasant Kevoit, 251, 252, 255
— 257_

decline in fifteenth century, 274, 294

Caxton's translations, 296, 297

New I earning, 303 — 309

under Elizabeth, 398 — 401, 421 — 425

Elizabeihan drama, 426—437
■ drama ol the Rest-irat on, 607

beginnings of journalism, 775

literature of Wales, i6i — 163
Lithsnten ■ f London, 198
Liturgy, ihe Scottish, 525, 529
Liverpo 1, its rise, 730
Liverpool, Earl of, 829, 830, 838
Livery Companies < f London, 201
Llewelyn ap ("ruflfydd, 154, 167. 168
Llewelyn ap Jorwerth, 142, 165 — 167
Loan, forced. -00
Locke, John, 615, 616
Lollardry, its origin, 242

suppressed at (~)xf )rd, 243

character after Wyclif's death, 259

progress, 260

suppressed, 265. 267

under Henry the Sixth, 273
London, its posiion, 12

submits to Wulfhere, 32

to Ine, 37

to Offa, 41

plundered by northmen, 45

subject to iElfred, 50

submits to William, 81

Normans in, 92

Henry the First's charter to, 93

religious revival in, 95

S. Paul's cathedral, fh.

election of Stephen, loi

defies Innocent the Third, 130

Friars in, 149

.supports Earl Simon, 156, 157

its cnihtengild, 95, 197

lithsmen, 198

rising of craftsmen in, 200, 201

attacked by Peasants, 252

supports Lollardry, 259

Lollard ri-ing in, 267

supports Richard of York. 283

declares for Edward the Fourth, 285

its trade, 58, 395

Merchant Adventurers of, 396

its extension forbidden, 516

supports Shaftesbury, 654, 660

Plague of, 629

Fire of, ib.

sympathy with America, 778
T/ondonderry, Marquis of (j^fCastlereagh), 838
Londonderry, siege of, 687, 688
Longchamp, William of, 112, 113
Ix)nglfind, William, 255 — 257
Lords, House of, Harleys dealings with, 719

scheme for limiting its numbers, 727

Pit;'a dealings with, 816

rejects Catholic emancipation, 829 ,

dealings with Reform Bill, 839

INDEX.

86 1

251, 252, 255

Istlereagh), 838

Lothian granted to the Scots, 186

Loughb rough, Lord Chancellor, 817

Louis Philippe, King of the French, 839

Louisburg, capture of, 756

Lovat, Lord, 744

Lowestoft, battle of, C28

Ix>w lands, the, 184

Lucknow, relief of, 843

Luddite ri:>ts, 820

Ludlow, General, 589

Luneville, Peace of, 811

Luther, 320, 321

Mnre's and Fisher's replies to, 322
Luttrell, C lonel, 774
Lutzen, battle of, 832
Lydgate, 294

Caxton's edition of, 29G
Lyly, John, 399
Lyttelton, Lord Keeper, 547

" Mabinogion,'* 162

Mackay, General, 685

Madras, its origin, 745

Magellan, Straits of, English explorers in, 758

Mahrattas, 746, 784

Maine, county of, 77, 115, 280

Major-Generals, Cromwell's, 588

Mala< cas won by England, 809

Malcrlm the First, King of Scots, 55, 186

Malcolm the Third, King of Scots, 83, 90, 187

Maldon, battle of, 6t

Malmesbury, William of, 118

Malplaquet, battle of, 717

Malta, c'*spute for possession of, 818

retained by England, 837
Man, Isle of, conquered by Eadwine, 21
Manchester, massacre, 837
Manchester, Earl ot; 550, 552, 553, 556
Manor, the English. 245, 246
Manufactures, English, 224, 394, 791, 792, 828
Map, Walter de, 120
Mar, Earl of, 720. 725
March, Edward, Earl of, 284 ; see Edward the

Fourth.
Mare, Peter de la, 235
Marengo, batile of, 811

Margaret, sister of Eadgar the ^Etheling, 83,187
Margaret, daughter of Henry the Seventh, 361,

380, 385
Margaret of Anjou, wife of Henry the Sixth,

280, 283, 285, 287, 288
Margaret, the Maid of Norway, 188
Margaret of York, Duchess of Burgundy, 287,

301
iviaria Theresa of Austria, 729, 734, 741, 747
Marignano, battle of, 322
Marlborough, Earl of, see Churchill.

campaign in Ireland, 693, 694

intrigues against William, 695, 707

power over Anne, 707

character and statesmanship, 708, 709

campaign in Netherlands, 710

victory at Blenheim, 711, 712

Duke, 712

relations with the Tories, 712, 713

with the Whigs, 713, 715, 716

victory at Ramillies, 713, 714

successes in FlanderSj 717

fall, 718, 719

Marlborough, Sarah Jennings, Duchess of, 707,

716
Marlowe, Christopher, 429
Marriages, civil, legalised, 840
Mar:;h or de Marisco, Adam, 151, 152, 154
Marshal, Richard, Earl, 145
Marshal, William, Earl of Pembroke, 123,

131. 141
Marston Moor, battle of, 552, 553
Marten, Henry, 539, 574
Martinico, English conquest of, 764
'' Martin Marpielate," 473
Mary, daughter of Henry the Eighth, betrothed
to Charles the Fifth, 324

Queen, 361

her policy, 362

marriage, i7>., 363

revolt against her, 363

her persecutions, 364, 366, 368

war wi^h France, 369

death, i'i>.

Ireland under her, 453, 454
Mai-y, daughter of James, Duke of York,
646

marriage, 647, 649

Queen, 6^3

deiith, 699
Mary Stiiart, Qu -en of Scots, 361, 362

claims to En^I'sh throne, 362, 369, 370,
379. 380, 383

propoied as wife foi Edward the Sixths
380

marries the Dauphin, t'^.

returns to Scotland, 382

character and policy, 382, ^83

marries Darnley, 385

her plans, 386, 387

veng»!ance on Du»";"iley, 387

marries Bothwell, 38?^

imprisonment cr"* abdication, t'>.

escapes to England, 389

plots against Elizabeth, 391

death, 417
Mary, daughter of Henry the Seven
Mary of Modena, wife of James t

645
Maryland colonized, 507
Maserfeld, battle of, 24
Masham, Mrs., 716
Massachusetts, its settlement and '

509
Puritan emigration to, 513, 514
charter altered, 777
Massena, General, 8ir, 826, 8.
Massey, dean of Christ Churcl ' Kford, 671
Matilda (Edith), wife of Henry the First 91
Matilda, the Empress, daughter of Henry the

First, 97, 98, loi, 102
Matilda <jf Flanders, wife uC ^'.'illiaia the

Conqueror, 77
Maunay, Sir Waiter, 248
Maurice, Prince, 550
MayJJotver, the, 507
Mayne, Cuthbert, 408
Meaux, siege of, by Henry the Filth, 270
Medeshamstead, 33
Medicis, Catharin'? of, 385, 388, 412
Medina SiHonia, Duke of, 419, 420
Melbourne, Viscount, 839 — 84T
Mellitus, Bishop of London, 2:2

36 r
Second,

'ter, 508,

\ A

•1,
r

862

INDEX.

Melrose, 26

Melville, Andrew, 523, 524
Meon-wara, 32
Merchadtf, 114
Merchant-gilds, 197
Mercia, its origin, 13

under Penda, 22

its conversion, 25

three provinces, ib.

under Wulfhere, 32, 33

struggle with Wessex, 38, 41 — 44

pays tribute to Danes, 47

extent after Peace of Wedmore, 49

annexed to Wessex, 54

earldom of, 65
Merlin, prophecies of, 166, 168
Meth'idists, 737—739
Middlesex, electors of, their struggle with the

Commons, 773, 774
Middlesex, Cranfield, Earl of, 495
Millenary Petition, 477
Milton, John, 464 — 466

early poems, 526, 527

" Lycidas," 531

ecclesiastical views, 543, 544

later years, 601

"Paradise Lost," 602 — 604
Minden, battle of, 755
Ministry, Sunderland's organization of, 697,

698
Minorca ceded to England, 764

restored to Spain, 786
Mirebeau, siege of, 115
Mise of Amiens, 156

of Lewes, 158
Model, New, of the army, 556, 557

its struggle with Parliament, 564 — 571, 599

disbanded, 604
Monarchy, the new, its character and causes,
290-1-292

its military power, 301

growth under Wolsey, 322, 323

height of its power, 349, 350

under Elizabeth, 401

abolished, 573

effect of the Revolution on, 688

decline of its influence, 721, 722
Monasteries, dissolution of, 339, 340, 356, 357
Monasticism, its reform under Eadgar, 58
Monk, General, 589, 599, 600, 617
Monmouth, Duke of, 630

scheme for his succession, 655, 657

flight, 661

rebellion and death, 664, 665
Monmouth, Geoff"ry of, 119
Monopolies, 405. 517
Mons, siege of, 695
Montfioute, Lord, 347
Montagu, Lord, brother of Warwick, 286, 287,

288
Montagu, Ralph, 652
Montague, Dr., 496, 497
Montague, his finance, 699, 700

impeached, 704
Montcalm, Marquis of, 747, 748, 756, 757
Montfort, Eleanor de, 168
Mon f ft, Simon de, Earl of Leicester, 152

Governor of Gascony, 153

character, 153, 154

heads the barons, 155

Montfort, Simon de — continued.

negotiates with France, 155

struggle with Henry the Third, 156, 157

his rule, 157, 158

summons Commons to Parliament, 158

last struggle and death, 159, 160
Montfort, Simon de, the younger, 159
Montreal, capture of 757
Montrose, Earl and Marquis of, 532

joins the King's party, 541

victory at Tippermuir, 553

Inverlochy. 557

Kilsyth, 558

defeat at Philiphaugh, id.

death, 576
Moodkee, battle of, 841
M.ore, Sir John, 825
More, Hannah, 740
More, Sir Thomas, 315, 316

his "Utopia," 316—320

reply to Luther, 321, 322

Speaker, 325

Chancellor, 333

resigns, 336

summoned to Lambeth, 343

imprisoned, 344 '

death, 345
Moreau, General, 809, 811
Morkere, Earl of Northumbria, 70, 80, 83
Morrison, Robert, botanist, 611
Mortemer, battle of, 76
Mortimer, Edmund, 264
Mortimer, House of, its claims to the Crown,

_ 264, 283
Mortimer, Roger, 215
Mortimer's Cross, battle of, 284
Morton, Bishop of Ely, 299, 300

his "fork," 302
Morton, Earl of. Regent of Scotland, 532
Moscow, Napoleon's retreat from, 831
Mountjoy, Lord, 457
Mowbray, Roger, 109
Murray, James Stuart, Earl of, 385

Regent of Scotland, 388, 389

murdered, 391, 522

Namur taken by Lewis the Fourteenth, 696

by the Allies, 700
Nantes, Edict of, 666

revoked, 667
Napoleon the First, Emperor of the French
{see Buonaparte). Sp.i

his victories over Austria and Germany,
821, 822

C nunental system, 822, 823

alliance with Russia, 823

rnas'ery of Europe, 824

dealings with Spain, ii>.

with America, 828

with Northern Europe, 830, 831

Russian campaign, 831

fall, 832

return, 834

last struggle, 835, 836
Napoleon the '1 hird. Emperor, 842
Naseby, battle of, 557, 558
Nash, pamphleteer, /•oi
Navarino, batt'e of 839
Nectansmere, battle of, 35, 185

Nori

INDEX.

863

the Crown,

Neerwinden, battle of, 696
Nelson, Admiral, Sio, 821
Netherlands revolt against Philip the Second,
388, 412—413

English volunteers in, 414

claimed by Lewis the Fourteenth, 636

invaded, 675. 696

Marlborough's campaigns in, 710, 717

invaded again, 743, 808
Neville, Anne, 287
Neville, George, Archbishop of York and

Chancellor, 286, 287, 288
Neville's Cross, battle of, 228
Newburgh, William of, 118
Newbury, battles of, 550, 553
Newcastle-on-Tyne founded, 89
Newcastle, Duke of, 74a, 748, 763
Newcastle, Earl of, Cavalier general, 546, 548,-

552. 553
Newton, Isaac, 611

Newtown Butler, battle of, 688 V
Niagara, Fort, 747, 756
Nicholas, Secretary of State, 617,636
Nile, battle of, 810
Nimeguen, Peace of, 64^
Nonconformists, expulsion of ministers, 622,
623

persecution of, 624, efw
Non-jurors, 691
Nootka Sound, 800
Norfolk, Duke of, his quarrel with Henry of

Lancaster, 263
Norfolk, Duke of, uncle of Anne Boleyn, 328

his policy, 333. 356

dealings with insurgents, 346

imprisoned, 357
Norfolk, Duke of, under Elizabeth, 390, 391
Norfolk, Duke of, under James the Second,

669, 63 1
Norfolk, Ralph of Guader, Earl of, 88
Norfolk, Earl of, see Bigod
Norham, Parliament at, 188
Normandy, 71, 72

its relations with England, 61, 62, 77, 78

with the Angevins, 113, 114

conquered by Philip, 115, 116

reconquered by Henry the Fifth, 269, 270

Bedford's rule in, 280

lost again, 281
Normandy, Richard the Fearless, Duke cf, 72
Normandy, Robert, Duke of, 75
Normandy, Robert Curthose, Duke of, 89, 90,

Normandy, William Longsword, Duke of, 72
Normandy, William the Conqueror, Duke of,

see William
Normans, their settlement in Gaul, 71, 72

conquests, 74
North, Lord Keeper, 665
North, Lord, minister of George the Third, 777,

781, 78s, 814
Northampton, Assize of, in

battle of, 283

Council of, 108

treaty of, 215
Northampton, John of, mayor of London,

259
North Bnton, the, 767
North-folk, 11
Northmen, 45, 46 ; see Danes, Ostmen

Northumberland, Duke of (ftr^ Warwick), 361,

362
Northumberland, Robert Mowbray, Earl of, 89
Northumberland, Percy, Earl of, under Henry

the Fourth. 266
Northumberland, Earl of, under Elizabeth, 390,

391
Northumbria, kingdom of, 13, 17

its extent, 19

greatness, 20, 21

conversion, 21

Irish missionaries in, 24

Cuthbert in, 26, 27

ecclesiastical strife in, 29, 30

extent under Ecgfrith, 34

its fnll, 35, 36

liter .ry greatness, 38 — 41

submits to Ecgberht, 44

to the Danes, 46

to Eadward, 54

to iEthelstan, 55 .

earldom of, 57, 65

its northern part granted to the Scots, 186
Norwich, rising of John the Litster at, 254
Nottingham, peace of, 46
Nova Scotia conquered, 747

ceded by France, 764
Noy invents ship-money, 528

Oates> Titus, 650, 651. '■-vT

O'Brien, Smith, 841

Occleve, 294

Ockham, 151, 236

O'Connell, Daniel, 839, 840, 841

Odo, Archbishop of Canterbury, 55, 57

Odo, Bishop of Bayeux, 81, 88, 89

Offa, King of Mercia, 41 — 43

Oglethorpe, General, 759

Ohio Company, 747

Oldcastle, Sir John, 259. See Cobham.

O'Neil, Hugh, 576

O'Neil, Owen Roe, 572

O'Neill. Hugh, 457

O'Neill, Shane, 455

Orange, William the First, Prince of, 412, 413,

416
Orange, William the Second, Prince of, 572
Orange, William the Third, Prince of, see

William
Orangemen, 814
Ordainers, the Lords, 208
Ordeal, in

Orders in Council, Canning's, 824, 827, 830
Ordinance, Self-denying. 556

for Suppression of Blasphemies, 569
Orleans, siege of, 275 — 278
Orleans, Henrietta, Duchess of, 639
Orleans, Duke of. Regent of France, 726
( )rmond. Earl of, general in Ireland, 551

invites Charles the Second thither, 573

besieges Dublin, ^75

Duke and Lord Steward, 617

Governor m Ireland, 633

retires, 636

returns to the C'luncil, 644, 645
Ormond, second Dtike of, 720, 722, 725, 726
Orthes, battle of, 832
Osbern's lives of English saints, 118
Osney Abbey, 133

!!' I

i:i''

864

INDEX.

Ostmen, ss

Oswald, King of Northumbrla, 22 — 24

Oswald, Bishop of Wi-rcester, 58

Oswiii, King of Northumbria, 25, 30, 33

Otford, battle of, 41

Othere's voyage, 50

Otto of Saxony, Emreror, ir 1, 125, 17ft

Oiidenarde, battle of, 717

Oudh. annexaiion <f, 84a

Overbiiry, Sir Thomas, 487

Oxford besieged by Stepnen, 102

town, 13:1

Vacarius at, //'.

friars in, 149, 150

Provisions of, 155, 156

Charles the First at, 548, 54^

siege of, 552

Parliament at, 659

University, 133, 134, 136

drives out a Papal Legate, 146

Lollards at, 242, 243

decline in fifteenth century, 294

Duke Humphry gives his library to, 298

the New Learning at, 304, 306, 309, 310

Cardinal College at, 310, 323

Protestants at, 352

religious changes in, 407

decrees passive obedience, 478
'niggle with James the Second, 671
j.ijobites in, 725
Oxford, Earl of, under Henry the Seventh,

302
Oxford, Earl 01, son-in-lr.w of Cecil, 409
Oxford, Harley, Earl of (^^^ Hariey), 720, 722

Packenham, General, 833

Palatinate ravaged by Lewis 'ht Fourteenth,
684

Pale, the English, in Ireland, 4,1. 447

Palmerston, Viscount, 840, S42, b,;j

Pampehma, siege of, 832

Pandulf, Cardinal, 125, 141

fapacy, its claims on the English Church, 143,
236. 237
its jurisdiction rejected, 336, 337
Mary's submission to, 363
rejected again, 377

Paris, English students at, 134 — 136
Henry the Sixth crowned at, 279
declares for Charles the Seventh, 280
surrenders to the allies, 832, 836
Peace of, 764, 842 <

Paris, Matthew, 146, 147

Parker, Marthew, Archbishop of Canterbury,

377. M9
Parliament, Commons summoned to, 158
growth in thirteenth century, T73 — i8r
changes in its composition, 231
two Houses, 232

superseded by permanent committee, 262
deposes Richard the Second and elects

Henry the Fourih, 264
position under H' use of Lancaster, 265
importance during Wars of the Roses, 289,

293
decline under Edward the Fourth, 293
revival under Richard the Third, 300
Henry the Seventh's dealings with, 302
struggle with Wolsey, 325

Parliament — co-'iUnited.

revival after his fall, 333
undertakes Church reform, 334
revival under Cromwell, 350
opposes Mary's Church policy, 364
position under Eliiabeth, 40a — 405
relations with the Crown, 180, ^81
suspension under Charles tne First, 514
struggle with Charles the Second, 641,

645, 646
Danby's dealings with, 648
Roman Catholics excluded from, 651
James the Second's attempt to " regulate,"

670
position after the Revolution, 689
composition after union with Scotland, 714,

715
after onion with I'dand, 815
relations with the ^*ress, 775
Admonition to, 47c
Acts of, see Sta'.:iite.-
reform of, 774, 788, 793, 794, 829, 839,

84:;, 844
Barebones' Parliament, 583, 584
the Cavalier, 620 — 624
Club, 274 '

Convention, 617—620
Good, 234

Long, Its proceedings in .640, 337, 538
in 1641, 540

GrandRemonstrance, 543
schemes of Church Reform, 543, 544
five members, 544, 545
prepares for war, 546, 547
dealings with religion, 561, 56a, 564
with the army, 564 — 567
Oxford, 659, 660
Rump, 571. 573. 574. 577" S8i
Short, 533

of 1604, 481, 482 ; of 1606, 483 ; of 1610,
484 ; of 1614, 485 ; of 1621, 490—493 ;
of 1624, 495 ; of 1625, 496 ; of i6a8,
501—505; of 1655, 593—595; of 1658,
597 ; of 1659, 599 ; of 1679, 652, 655 ;
of 1680, 656, 658 ; of i6£5, 667 ; of 1690,
692 ; of 1696, 700; of 1698, 702 ; of 1701,
704; of 1784, 789, 790; of 1832, 1833,
and 183s, 839 ; of 1859, 843 ; of 1868
and 1874, 844
Irish, under Wentworth, 521, 522
under James the Second, 688
under the Georges, 812
its independence restored. 785, 795, 813
rejects free trade, 795, 814 >

action as to Regency, 815
Scottish, the " Drunken," 632
Parma, Duke of, 416, 418
Parr, Catharine, 357
Parsons, Jesuit, 409. 410
Partition, Treaties of, 702
Paston Letters, 294
Paterson, William, financier, 699
" Patriots," 732, 733
Paul, Czar of Russia, 818, 819
Paulinus, 21, 23
Pavia, battle of, 327
Peasant revolt, 250 — 255
Peel, Sir Robert, 838, 839, 841
" Peep-o' -Day Boys," 814
Peerage Bill, 727, 728

INDEX.

86s

Pelham. Tlenry, 742, 748

Pembroke, s ti'ieinent of, 164, 165

Pembroke, Earls of,sir Marshal, Strigiiil

Penda, King ( f Mercia. ^^, 24, 25

Pengwyrn becu.-iies Shrewsbury, 42

Peninsular war, 825-827

Penn, William, 660, 759

Pennsylvania foun leil, t6o, 759

Penry, author of Marprelate tracts, 473

Perceval, Spencer, 826, 830

Percy, see Hntspur, Northumberland

Perrers, Alice. J35

Perth, Conv'jcation of, 193

Peterborough founded, 33

burnt by I).'.nes, 46

Benedict of, ii3 .

petertorough, Karl of, 713, 716
Tiietition of GrlKvances, 484, 485

Millenary, 477

of Right, 501, 502
"Petitioners" and " Abhorrers," 657
Petitions changed into Statutes, 233
Petre, Father, 669
Petty, Sir William, 610
Pevensey. 11

William lands at, 79
Phelips, Sir Robert, 497
Ph.ladelphia, Congress at, 778~7£o
Philip Augustus, King of France, :i2

war with R. chard the First, 113, 114

conquers Normandy, &c., 115, 116

charged to depose Juhii, 124

victory at Bouvines, 126
Philip of Valois, King of France, h!a war with

I'.dward the Third, 21-5—227
Philip (the Second of Sr'ain) son of Charles
the Fifth, marries Mary Tudor, 362, 363

supports Elizabeth, 381

turns to Mary Stuart, 335

position and character, 4ti, 412

conquers Portugal, 415

defeat of his Armada, 418 — 420

designs on France. 443
Philip, Duke of Anjou, King of Spain, 703,

726
Philiphaugh. battle of, 558
Philippines, English conquest of, 764
Pict-land, 185
Picts attack Britain. 6

defeated, 8

subdued by Ecgfritti, 34, 185

rise against him, 35, 185
Piers the Ploughman, 255 — 257
Pilgr.m Fathers, 507, 508
Pilgrimage of Grace, 345, 346
Pillnit^r, Conference of, 80+
Pinkie Cleugh, battle of, 380
Pitt, William, 732

enters office, 742

character, 749—753

supports Frederick the Second, 754

policy towards America, 755, 756

opposed by the Wh.gs, 762

fall, 763

recalled, 767, 769

denounces Stamp Act, 770

returns to office, 772 ; see Chatham
Pitt, William, the younger, 787, 788

his plan of reform. 788
Chancellor of the Exche'^uer, id.

Pitt, William, the younger — continued.

first minister. 789

his character, 790, 791

policy, 793

bill for Parliamentary reform, 794

his tinanre, ii>-

treaty of commerce with France. 795

dealings with Ireland, //'., 815, 817

with foreign politics, 8ixj, 801, 804 — 806

supports Libel A't, 802

gives Constitution to Canada, ii'.

financial difficulties, 809, 810

dealings with the peerage, 816

resigns, 818

returns ti office, 820

death, 822
Pittsburg, 7^,6
Place Bin, 689
Plassey, battle of, 753, 75 ^
Plattsburg, English alta^ k on, 833
Pl.auen, battle of, 754
Pleas, Court of Conunon, 112
p. itiers, battle of, 230
Poland, disputed election in, 732

partition of, 799
Pole, Reginald. 346, 347, 364
Pollock, General, 841
Poll-tax, 251
" Popish Plot," 650, 651
Portland, Duke of, 807, 823, 826
Port Mahon taken by the French, 748
Porto Bello captured by Vernon, 734
Portreeves of London, 92, 93
Portsmouth, Louise de Qucn uaille. Duchess of,

630, 659, 6^4
Portugal conquered by Spain, 415

Wellington's campaigns in, 825 — 827
Poynings, Sir Edward, 448
Pragmatic Sanction, 729, 730
Prague, battles of, 489, 748
Prayer, Book of Conunon, 358

Sottish. 525. 529
Presbyterianism in England, 468, 470, 472, 543

in Ireland, 812, 813

in Scotland. 523, 686
Press, regulated by Star-Chamber, 473

censor; hip of, abolished, 662

proposal '.o revive, 700

growth of its influence, 767

Grenville's struggle with, i6., 7OB

influence on Parliament, 775

beg'nnings of journalism, ii>.
Preston, battle of, 569. 570
Preston Pans, battle of, 743
Pride's Purge, 571
Printing, invention f f, 295
Protectorate, the, 585
■ Protestants, their triumph under T. Cromwellj

354, 355
under Hertford, 358
persecuted under Mary, 364 — 366, 368
growth under Elizabeth, 406, 4 7
fjrtunes on the C' niinent, 474, 475
attitude at Elizabeth's death, 476, 477
French, see Huguenots

Prussia rises against Napoleon, 871

Pulteney, head of the " Patriots," 732

Punjaub, annexation of, 842

Puritanism, its rise, 402
temper, 463, 464, 479

3 K

866

INDEX.

Puritanism — continue J.
growth, 471 — 47a
Laud's struggle with, 510
its attitude towards the stage, 527
fall, 604
work, ib,
ideal, G06

revolt against, 607, 608
Puritan clergy expelled, 483
emigration to America, 513, 514

Pym, John, 50a, 535—537

his Grand Remonstrance, 54a
plans for Church reform, 543, 544
charged with treason, 544
proposes terms with Scotland, 550
death, 55a
his corpse outraged, 620

QiTAKERS, persecution of, 635

•elci'^ed, 640
Quarles, 526

Quatre Bras, battle of, 835
C uebec, capture of, 756, 757
Quiberon, battle of, 755
" Quo Warranto," 203, 304

Radicals, 837

Raedwald, King of East Anglia, 19, ao, 22

Rahere founds S. Bartht^lomew's, Smithfield,

95
Railways, 840

Raikes, founder of Sunday Schools, 740
Ralegh, his " History of the World,'* 399

disco t^ers Virginia, 506

last expedition and death, 48S, 489
Ramillies, battle of, 713, 714
Ray, John, zoologist, 61:
Reform, Economical, 788

Pai liamentary, see Parliament
Reformation, the, its beginning, 320

antagonism to the Renascence, 321
Regicides, their fate, 617, 618
Reginald, sub-prior of Canterbury, elected

Archbishop, 123
Remonstrance, the Grand, 542
Renascence, see Learning, New
Restoration, its social effects, 607, 6o3
Revolution, the English, 682, 683

results, 688 — 690

the French, 798, 800, 803 — 806

of 1830, 839

of 1848, 841
Rhys ap Tewdor, prince of South Wales, 164
Rich, Edmund, see Edmund
Richard th.i First, son of Henry the Second,
his rebellions, 109, iia

Crusade, ii:>

wars with France and alliance with Ger-
many, 113

builds Chateau-Gaillard, 114

releases Scotland from homage, 188

death, 115
Richard the Second, son of the Black Prince,
acknowledged heir to the Crown, 235

King, 251

dealings with Peasant Revolt, 252, 254

takes government in his own hands, 261

truce with France, ib.

Richard the Second— continued.

marriage, v6i

character, iA.

rule, 36a

banishes Henry of Lancaster, 263

expeditions to Ireland, 361, 363, 447

prisoner, 363

deposed, 364
Richard the Third, patron of Caxton, 398

King, 39^—301
Richmond, Edmund Tudor, Earl of, 399
Richmond, Henry Tudor, Earl of, 399

claim to the Crown, 300

plan for his marriage, ib,

victory at Bosworth, 301 ; see Henry tht
Seventh
Richmond, Margaret Beaufort, Countess of,

399
Ridley, Bishop of London, 363, 367
Right, Claim of, 685 .

Petition of, 501, 503
Rights, Bill of, 688

Declaration of, 683
Rivers, Earl, father of Elizabeth Woodville,

287
Rivers, Earl^ brother of Elizabeth Woodville
his •' Sayings of the Philosophers," 29 j

executed, 299
Rixzlo, 386

Robinson, John, Brownist minister, 473, 507
Rochelle, Buckingham's expedition to, 500, 501

its fall, 504
Roches, Peter des, 142, 14s
Rochester, s;ege of, by William the Second

89
Rochester, Carr, Viscount, 487
Rochester, Laurence Hyde, Earl of, 663, 669

702
Rochester, vVilmot, Earl of, 607
Rochford, Led, 328

Rockingham, Marquis of, 770, 772, 785, 788
Rodney. Admiral, 786

Roger, Bishop of Salisbury and Justiciar, lo;
Roger, son < f William Fiti-Osbern, 88
Rohese, wifeof G.lbert Beket, 103
Rome, Cnut at, 66

Church of, its revival in sixteenth century,

475
Roses, Wars of the, their beginning, 283

results, 289, 290
Ross, General, 833
Rossbach, battle of, 754
Roucoux, battle of, 744
Rouen, siege of. by Henry the Fifth, 269, 270

Henry the Sixth at, 280

submits to Charles the Seventh, 281
" Roundheads," 544
Roundway Down, battle of, 549
Royal Society, the, 609, 6iq
Runnymede, 128

Rupert, Prince, at Edgehill, Reading, and
Brentford, 548

at Chalgrove, 550

enters York, 552

defeated at Marston Moor, 552, 553

at Naseby, 558

commands a fleet for Charles the Second,
572, 575. 576. 628

returns to the Council, 645

his "drops," 610

r, 263
2631 447

.xton, 298

rl of, 299
of, 299

see Henry the

, Countess of,
367

eth Woodville.

)eth Woodville
jsophers," 293

ster, 473. 507
itionto, 500, 501

n the Second

irl of, 663, 669

772, 78s, 788

id Justiciar, 101

)ern, 88

103

;teenth century,

ning, 2B3

Fifth, 269, 270
enth, 281

Reading, and

. 552, 553

les the Second,

INDEX.

867

Russell, Lord John, 841, 843

F.arl, 843
Russell, William, Lord, leader of Country
party. 641

enters the Council, 652

resigns. 657

behfadcil, 661 1

Russell, Admiral, 695, 696

enters the Ministry, 699

resigns, 702

impeached, 704
Rutland, Earl or, 284

Rusiia, its policy in eighteenth centur;-, 747,
799, 801, 811, 818, 819, 831, 833

quarrel with Napoleon, 830, 831
Ruyter, Admiral, 580, 593, 638, 640
Rye-house Plot, 661
Ryswick, Peace of, 700

Sachkverell, Dr., 717

St. Albans, its historical school, 146

revolt of its burghers, 253, 254

battles at, 384, 285
St. Edmandsbury, its origin, 47

history, 93—95

confirmation of its privileges, 254
St. John, Henry, 713, 716, 718 ; see Bolingbroke
St. Ruth, General, 694
St. Paul's School, 308, 300
St. Vincent, Cape, Dattlts of, 786, 810
Salamanca, battle of, 831
Salisbury, Margaret, Countoss of, 346, 347
Salisbury, Earl if, adherent of Richard the

Second, 263, 206
Salisbury, Earl of, partisan of York, 283

beheaded, 284
Sahsbury, Robert Cecil, Earl of, 484, 487, 4.88
Sancroft, Archbishop of Canterbury, 672, 682,

690, 691
Sandwich, Montagu, Earl of, 617
San Sebastian, siege of, 8j2
Saratoga, Burgoyne's surrender at, 781
SarsfieTd, General, 693, 694
Sautre, William, 265
Savoy, the, 144

sacked, 252

conference at, 621
Savoy, Boniface of. Archbishop of Canterbury',

Savoy, Prince Eugene of, 7x0, 711, 715, 716
Savoy, Peter of, 144
Saxe, Marshal, 742, 744
Saxons, their home-land, 2

East, their settlements, 11, 12

West, c n juer Southern Britain, ib.

defeated at Faddiley, 17

conquer S imerset, 34, 37

conquer Dyvnaint, 42

South, kingdom of, n
"Saxony," 184, 185
Say, Lord, 282
Scholasticism, 151
Schomberg. Duke of, 692, 613
Schools founded under' Henry the Eighth, 308,

309
under Edward the Sixth, 360
'* Circulating," 736
National, 840
Sunday, 740 '

3 K

Science, English, its beginnings, 609—6x1

Scinde, annexation of, 841

.Scotland, condition in thirteenth century, 184

kingdom of, its origin, 185, 186

relations with England, 186 — 18"

first conquest of, 188 — 190

second, 191 — 113

revolt tinder Bruce, 211— 314

its independence recogniicd, 215

alliance v!th F''ance, 360 \

history after Bruce, 37^, 380

Elizabeth's deahngs with, jHi

union w ilh England proposed, 482

relations wuh the Stuarts, 52.-, 523

revolts against Charles the First, 53J

reaction in, 5^8

condition under Cromwell, 5F9

under Charles the Second, 632

acknowledges William and Mary, 68s

first union with England, 579, 58 ^

dissolved, 632

second union, 714, 715

Jacobite risings in, 725, 743, 744
Scots attack Bntain, 6

their origin, 185

submit to E.idw.ird the Elder, 54, 186

league with the Percies, 266

in ser. ice of France, 275
Scrope, Archbishop of York, 26 j
Scutage, 109, i:" )
Sea-Dogs, the, 414
Sebastopol, siege of, 842
Securities Bill, 646, b-jS
Sedgemoor, battle of, 065
Sedley, Sir CharU>, 607
Seminary Priests, 408
SenefT, battle of, 676
Separatists, 47^
Seven Years' War, its beginning, 748

its effects, 757

end, 76 > ■ "

Seville, treaty of, 730
Seymour, Jane, 348
Shaftesbury, Earl o{{see Ashley, Cooper), 640

character and career, 642, 643

policy, 643, 644

dismissed, 645

new policy, //'., 646

demands a dissolution, 648

imprisoned, ib.

dealings With Popi '1 Plot, 650,651,656,

657—659

President of Council, 652

plans for Monmouth's succession, 655

dismissed, 656

recalls Monmouth, 657

fall and death, 660
Shakspere, 429 — 436
Shaxton, Bishop of .Salisbury, 354
Shelburne, Lord, 7''6, 773, 787
Sherborne, see of, 37

Sheriff, his function in the shire-Cc irt, 176
Sheriffmtiir, br'.ttle of, 725
Ship-money, 528, 529

declared illegal, 538
Shire, Knights of the, 158, 176, 177
Shire-court, 175, 176
Shrewsbury (Scrobsbyryg), 42

battle of, 266
Shrewsbury, Duke of, 720

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INDEX.

Shrewsbury, Talbot, Earl of, 280, 281

Shrewsbury. Earl of, Secretary of State, 691, 699

Si<linouth, Lord, 823

Sidney, Algernon, 661

Sjdney, Sir Henry, 455

Sidney, Sir Philip, 400, 4x6, 43a

Sigeberht. k>ng of East AngLa, aa

Sikhs, 746, 8ai, 84a

Simnel, LamDert, 301

Siward, Earl of Northumbria, 68

Skeffington. Deputy in Ireland, 449

Slanning, Sir Nicholas, 549

Slavery in early England, 15, 16

its decline, 58, 59

disappearance, 345

colonial, abolished, 840
Slave-trade in early England, 59, 88

African, 395

movement for its abolition, 796, 797

abolished, 833
Sleswick, its people in the fifth century, i
Sluys, battle of, 225
Smerwick, massacre at, 456
Smith, Adam, 793
Smith, John, settles in Virginia, 507
Smith, Sir Sidney, 811
Smithfield, 8

St. Bartholomew's Priory at, 95
Snowdon, Lords of, 165
Sobraon, battle of, 841
Solway Moss, battle of, 380
Somers, John, 683

Lord Keeper, 699

dismissed, 702

impeached, 704

President of Council, 716
Somerset conquered by West-Saxons, 34, 37
S )merset, Beaufort, Duke of, 283, 283
Somerset, Margaret, Duchess of, patron of

Caxton, 398
Somerset, Protector, see Hertford

invades Scotland, 380
Somerset, Duke of, and James the Second, f 69
Somerset, Carr, Viscount Rochester and Earl

of, 487
Somerton taken by iEthelbald of Mercia, 38
Somerville's plot, 416
S 3phia, Electress of Hanover, 705
Soult, Marshal, 835, 831, 832
Sjuthampt. n. Earl uf, friend of Shakspere,

433f 434
Southampton, Earl of. Lord Treasurer, 617, 636
bouth-f Jk, II
South Sea Bubble, 728
Southumbrians, i^
Spain, growth of its power, 311

alliance with Henry the Seventh, ib.

under Philip the Second, 411

relations with James the First, 488, 489,

, 4Q2, 494. 495

Its decline, 674

disputed succession in, 701 — 703

war in, 71^

alliance with Charles the Sixth, 729

Family Compact with Frantve, 733

war with England, 734, 763, 764

league with France and America, 783

mastered by Napoleon, 834

rises, 825

Wellington's campaign in, 831, 833

Speed, chronicler, 399
Spencer, Earl, 807
Spenser, Edmund, 423 — 436

influence on Milton, 536
Sports, Book of, 511
Spurs, battle of the, 311, 3x2
Stafford, Lord, 658, 659
Stair, Dairy mple. Master of, 686
Stamford Bridge, Battle of, 79
Standard, battle of the, loa
Stanh jpe, Ljrd, Secretary' of State, 735

his Mmistry, 727

death, 728
Star Chamber, Court of, esublished, 303

regulates the Press, 473

empl jvment by Charles the First, 516, 517

aboliihed, 540
Stalioners, Company of, 473
Statutes, change in mode of passing them, 393

of Apparel, 28a

Appeals, 337

Ballot Act, 844

Civil Marriage, 8^0

Church Disestablishment (Ireland), 844

Conventicle, 634

Corn Laws, 837

repealed. 841

Corporation Act, 631

Five Mile, 624, 635

of Grace, 692

< f Government, 595

Habeas Corpus, 662

suspended, 725

Statute of Heresy, 265

repealed, 358, 3eo

re-enact .'d, 364

India, 795

of Indemnity and Oblivion, 617, 618

of Kilkenny. 447

of Labourers, 249

Land Act (Ireland), 844

Libel, 803

o' Liveries, 302

of Merchants, 172

of Mortmain, ib.

Municipal Corporations, 840

Mutiny, 689

Navigation, 579, 768, 769

Occasional Conf .r.nity, 712

repealed, 725

Poor Laws, 392, 393, 840

Poynines", 448

repealed, 786

of^Praemunire, 237

used by Henry the Eighth against Wolsey,

330
against the clergy, 335
of Provisors, 237
" Quia Emyitores," 173
Reform, 839, 844
Registration, 840
Regulating, 783
of Rights, 688 "
Schism, 719
repealed, 725
of^Security, 715
Septennial, 726
of Settlement, 705
Six Articles, 353
repealed, 358

INDEX.

869

30a

tf 516. 517

them, 293

id). 844

.618

1st Wolsey,

Statutes — contiHueii.

Stamp Act, 769 ^

resisted in America, 770

repealed, 773

of Success! n, 343

of Supremacy, 337

Test, 384, 641

set aside, 6^7

Tithe Commutation, 840

Triennial, 538, 689, 699

Toleration, 690

of Uniformitv, 377, 621

of Union with Ireland, 815

with Scotland, 714, 715

of Wales, 169

of Winchester, 172
Steam-engine, 793
Steinkirk, battle of, 696
Stephen, King, loi, 102, 104, 133
Stigand, Archbishop of Canterbury, 70, 85
Stillingfleet, 636, 668
Stirling, battle of, 191
Stowe, chronicler, 399
S.rafford, Earl oi{see WentworthX 533, 534

impeached, 537

trial, 538

death, 539, 540
Strathclyde, 19

submits to Oswald, 34

to Eadberht, 41

to Eadwzrd, 54

granted to Malcolm, 186
Stratton Hill, battle of; 549
Streoneshealh, see Whitby
Striguil, Richard of Clare, Earl of Pembroke

and, 445, 4j6
Strode, one of the Five Members, 544
Strongbow, 446

Stuart, Charles Edward, 743, 744
Stuart, James Francis, son of James the Second,

„ , <79i 7 as

Stukely, 456

Sudbury. Archbishop, S52, 353

Suffolk, Michael de la Pole, Earl of, 261

Su£fjlk, Earl of, minister of Henry the Sixth,

sPo, 281
Suffolk, Grey. Duke of (Lord Dorset), 361, 363
Sunderland, Robert, Earl of, 653, 655, 659

his ministerial system. 697
Sunderland, Charles, Eari of, 713, 715, 716,

.727
Supplies, grant of, made annual, 689
Surajah D .wlah, 753, 754
Surrey, John de Wartenne, Earl of, 191
Surrey, Henry Howard, Earl of, 357
Sussex submits to Wulfhere, 33

to Ceadwalla, 37

to Offa, 41
Sussex, Earl of, Deputy in Ireland, 454, 455
Swein Forkbeard, Ki'?g of Denmark, 62, 65
Swein Estrith-ion, King of Denmark, 82
Swein, son of Godwine, 69
Swithun, bishop of Winchester, 46
Sydenhajn, medical writer, 611

••Tables," the, 530
TaillebourE, battle of, 145
Talavera, battle of, 836
Taunton founded, 37

T.nxation regulated by Great Charter, latj

how levied, 175, 177

tinder Elizabeth, 403

arbitrary, set Benevolence, Imposition^
L lan

regulated by Long Parliament, 53b

Parliament regains control over, 689

reduced by Walpole, 730

during French war, 809

Income-tax. 841

of America, 760, 770, 776

Papal, on the English clergy, 146, 337
Taylor, Jeremy, 612, 61?
Taylor, Rowland, 364 — 366
Temple, Ear!, 769, 773
Temple, Sir ViTiUiam, 637

Secretary of State. 653

his CouikII, 653, 654

a.';rces to the Exclusion, 658
Tenchi-ibray, battle of, 96
Tesiaiaent, New, Erasmus's edition of, 3x3
Tewkesbury, bnttle of, s88
Thanet. Engli>h land m. 7, 8

A'jgu-itine lands in, 18
Theatre,, first erected in London, 437
Thegn, the, 60
Theobald. Archbishop of Canterbury, 103

his court, 133
Tliodore, Archbishop of Canterbury. 30—33

his school at Canterbury, 39
Thirty Years' War, 489
Thistlewood, Arthur, 837
" ThDrough," Wentworth's, 528
Thurstan, Archbishop of York, 102
Ticonderoga, Fort, 747. 756
Tillotson, theologian. 614. 636, 668

Archbishop of Canterbury, 691
Tilsit, Peace of, 823
Tippermtiir, battle of, 553
Tippoo Sahib, 810
Tithes, 31

commutation of, 840
Tone, Wolfe. 814
Torgau, battle of, 763
'• Tories," their origm, 657

attitude towards Grand Alliance, 699

relations with Marlborough, 712, 713

withdraw from p3litic8, 722

return, 733, 762

govern during French war, 833 ; see Coo*
servatives
Torres Vedras, Wellington's defence of, 827
Torrington, Herbert, Earl of, 692, 695
Tortulf the Forester, 98
Tobtig, son of Godwine, 70, 78
Toulon, revolt of, 808
Toulouse, siege of, 106

battle of. 8p
Tourville, Admiral. 694, 693
Tower of London founde J, 81
Towns, early English, 93—95

their privileges confiruicJly Gicat Charter,
129

share in the Barons' War, 156

taxation of, 177

stru.egle f)r freedom, 194 — iq^

social life, 196 — 199

strife of classes in, 199 — 201

charters cancelled by Charles the Second,
663

870

INDEX.

Tomta—coHtinutd.

•clf'govemment restored, 840. S««
Boroughs
Townshend, Charles, 766
Townshend, Viscount, 7«s, 737, 798, 732
Township, the old English, 3, 4
Towton, battle of, 285
Trade, English, under Eadgar, 58

under Cnut, 66 67

under Edward the First, 202

Edward the Third, 224, 235

Elisabeth, 39^—396

with the colonies, 730, 758, 768 — 769

with Spanish America, 733

in coal and iron, 793

Buonaparte's efforU to check, 818, 833, 823

Huskisson's and Canning's policy towards,
838

freedom of, 841

Board of, 700

Irish, 795, 812, 814, 8x5. Set Slave-trade
Trafalgar, battle of, 83s
Trent. Council of, 337
Tresham, Francis, 483
Trevanion, Sir John, 549
Trichinopoly relieved by Clive, 746
Tromp, Admiral, 579, 580, 592
Troyes, Treaty of, aro
Trumwine, Bisnop of Abercorn, 34f 36
Tudor, House of, its claim t%> the Crown, 299,

300. See Richmond
Turgot, annalist of Durham ,117
Twysden, 399
Tyler, Wat, 252, aS3
Tyndale, William, 351
Tyrconnell, Earl of, 668, 687

Udall, author of Marprelate tracts, 473
Ulm, capiiulation of, 821
Ulster, Plantation of, 457
Universities, their rise, 132

relation to feudalism, 135, 136

to the Church. 136, 137

influence of New Learning on, 309, 310

consulted on Henry the Eighth s divorce,

334
struggle with James the Second, 671
_ religious tests abolished in, 844
Uricomum, 12
Usher, Archbishop, 543
Utrecht, Treaty of 719
Uxbridge, Treaty of, 557

Vacabius, 133
Val-fes-Dunes, battle of, 75
Valley Forfje, battle of. 780
Vane, Sir Harry, the elder, 586
yane, Sir Harry, the younger, supports Inde«
pendents, 545, 563

negotiates at Edinburgh, 550

organizes navy, 57^

his policy, 579

quarrel with Cromwell, 581

offered seat in Council, 582

share in union with Scotland, 589

excluded from pardon, 618

executed, 621
Varangians, 82
Varaville, battle of, 76

Vaudois, massacre of, 596

Verden, dispute about, 727

Vere, Sir Horace, 489

Vemeuil, battle of, 275

Vemey, Sir Edmund, 543

Vernon, Admiral, 734

Vervins, Treaty of, 4^3

Vespucci. Amerigo, his traveU, 303, 316

Victoria, Queen, 840

Villeins, 345

become copy>holders, 346

revolt, 349, 350

excluded from school and college, 358

extinction, 257
Vimiera, battle of, 825
Vinejgar Hill, battle of, 810, 815
Virginia discovered, 506

settled, 507
Vitoria, battle of. 83a
Volunteers, English, B43

Insh, 785, 813

Wacb, X19

Wagram, battle of, 836 /

Wakefield, battle of, 384

Walcheren expedition, 836

Walcourt, battle of, 685

Wales, William the First's dealings with, 89

its literature. 161 — 163

relations with England, 163, 164

revival in twelfth century, x6$ — 167 •

conquest of, 168

statute of, 169

revolt in, 366
Wallace, William, 191 — 193
Waller, Sir William, 549, 556
Wallingford, Treaty of, 10 j
Walhngton, Nehemiah, 464
Wallis, CapUin, 758
Wallis, Dr., 610
Walpole, Sir Robert, 723, 724 _ ^

his offices in Townshend ministry, 725

resigns, 727

opposes Peerage Bill, ib.

returns to office, 738

his peace policy, 729

finance, 730. 731

greed of power, 73a , ,

attitude in Polish war, ib.

towards Spain, 733

fall, 73^
Walter, Hubert, see Hubert
Walters, Lucy. 630
Walworth, William, 253
Wanborough, battle c^ 37 ,1

Wandewash, battle of, 782
Warbecit, Perkin, 301
Ward, Dr., mathematician, 6ro
Warham, Archbishop of Canterbury, friend of
the New Learning, 307

protects Chur.':h reformers, 3x0

supports Erasmus, ^13

his share in submission of the clergy, 336

death, 337
Warwick, Neville, Earl of (the King-makerX
283, 285

his character and position, 286

policy, 287

death, 388

Wai

Was
Was
Wai
Wai
Wai
Wei
We<
Wei
Wei
We!

Wei

Wei
Wei

Wes
Wes

We!

ffti

4Ve!
Wh
Wh

Wh
Wh
Wh

Wii
Wii

Wii

INDEX.

871

>89

End of

. 336
lakerX

Warwick, Earl of, son of Clarence, 30t
Warwick, Earl of, Protector, 359. See North-
umberland
Warwick, Earl of, buys Connecticut valley,5a9

commander of the flett, 547
Washington, George, 747, 756, 779, 780, 785
Washington, English capture of, 833
Waterloo, battle of, 835, 836
Watline Street, 49
Watt, James, 792
Wearmouth, monastery at, 29
Wedmore, peace of, 48, 49
Wellesley, Sir Arthur, 823, S26. See Wellington
Wellesley, Marquis, 8a6
Wellington, Lord {see Wellesley), campaign in
Portugal, 826, 827

in Spain, 831, 832

in France, 832

in Belgium, 834—836

(Duke of) his ministry, 839 ^,,

Welsh, their alliance with Penda, 22

submit to Ofla, 42

to Eceberht, 4s. 46

to ^tnelstan, 55
Wentworth, Peter. 404
Wentworth, Thomas, 485, 50Z

his policy, 519, 520, 528

Deputy in Ireland, 520, 521 ; see Strafford
Wesley, Charles, 737, 738
Wesley, John, 738. 739
Wessex, kingdom of, 11, 12

its extent, 10

submits to Oswald's overlordship, 24

becomes Christian, ib.

ravaged by Wulfhere, y.

revival under Centwine, CeadA'alla, and
Ine, 37

struggle with Mercia, 37, 38, 42—44

attacked by northmen, 45, 46

by Danes, 47

revival under ^Elfred, 49 — 52

fall, 61, 62

earldom of, 65
fl^estminster Abbey, 144, 180

Assembly and Confession, 561

Parliament settled at, 180

Provisions of, 155
Weston, Lord Treasurer. 503, 516, 522
Wharton, Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, 716
Whiggamore raid, 570
" Whigs," their origin, 570, 657

support war against France, 699

relations with Marlborough, 713, 715, 716

their long rule, 722, 723

factions under Walpole, 732

reunited under Pelham, 742

oppose Pitt, 762, 763

divisions under Rockingham, 787

the "Old," 807

return to power, 839, 841, 842
Whitefield, 737, 738
White Ship, wreck of the, 97
Whitby, abbey of, 27

synod of, 29, 30
Whitgift. ArchbiShop. 471, 473, 474
Wiglaf, King rf Mercia, 44
Wilberforr.e, William, 797
Wilfrid of York, 29, 30
Wilkes, John, 767, 768, 773. 774
Wilkins, Dr., 610, 611

William the Conqueror, Duke of Normandy.
74. 76

war with France, 76

subdues Main; and Britanny, 77

his rule in Normandy, ib,

marriage, ib.

relations with Lanfranc, ib.

visits England, 78

his claims, ib.

lands at Pevensey, 79

victory at Hastings, 79, 80

crowned, 81

his conquest of England, 81—83

dealings with feudalism, 83 — 85

administration, 85

Church policy, 8^—86

revolts against him, 82, 88

his rule, 88

bridles Scotland and Wa:lcs, 88, 89

death, 89
William Rums, King, 89

revolts against him, ib.

struggle with the Church, 89, 90

Continental wars, 00

dealings with Scotland, ib.

with Wales, ib, , 164

death. 90, gi
William the Third, Prince cf Orange, 640, 644

67s. 676

proposed marriage, 6.<7

defeat at Cassel, 648

marriage, 649

policy in England, 6$^. 660, 677, 678

on the Continent, 676, 677

invited to England, 679

lands, 681

King, 683

forms Grand Alliance, 684

dealings with Scotland, 685, 686

with the Church, 690, 691

campaign in Ireland, 693

in Flanders, 695

motives f )r petice of Ryswick, 701, 702

last struegle with Lewis, 703, 704

death, 707
William the Fourth, King, 839, 840
William the iEtlieling. 97
William the Lion, King of Scots, invades

England, 109

Erisoner, xio
omage to Henry the Second. 187, 188
released from it by Richard, 188
William, son of Robert of Normandy, 96, 97,

lOI

William of the Long Beard, 200, 201 %*

Williams, Bishop of Lincoln, 543, 544

Williams, Roger, 514

Will s, physiologist, 611

Wiltshire, Earl of. 328

Wincheliey, Archbishop of Canterbury, 207

Winchester surrendered to the Conqueror, 80

Statute of. 172
Winchester, Marquis of, 558
Windebank, Secretary of State, 538
Windham, leader of "'Old Whigs." 807
Winfrith, see Boniface
Winthrop, John, 508
Winwsd, battle of, 25
Wippedsfleet, battle of, 10
Witenagemot, the, 60. 61

873

INDEX.

Wither, George, 526
Witt, John de, 675
Wolfe, General, 756, 757
Wolsey, Thomas, 323

his foreign pohcy, ib.

his offices, 323

educational foundations, 310, 323

administra ion, 323, 324

financial measures, 335, 336

struggle with Parliament, ib,

conduct in the king's divorce case, 328, 329

faP, 330

results of his career, 3 11
Woodville, Elizabeth, see Grey
Woodward, mineral igist, 611
Worcester, battle of, 578
Worcester, Tiptoft, Earl of, 274, 298, 299
Wulf here, King of Mercia, 32 — 34
Wulfstan, Archbishop of York, 55, 57
Wulfstan, Bishop of Worcester, 89
Wulfstan's voyage, 50
Wyatt, Sir Th- mas, 363
Wycherly, 607
Wyclif, John, 23s, 236

his plans of reform, 239

charged with heresy, ib., 340

his "poor preachers," 240, 242

denies Transubstantiatiun, 241

his writings, ib.

condemned, 342

death, 244

translation of the Bible, ib.

its effects, 25)

influence in Bohemia, 363

Wykeham, William of. Bishop ( f Winchester-
Wyndham, lif William, 733, 735

York conquered by the Deiri, 13

by Cadwall in, 33

revolts against William the First, 8a

massacre of Jews at, 205

Parliament at, 210

siefie of, 553
Y irk. New, its origin, 758
York Town, surrender of Cornwallis at, 7S5
York, Duke of, joins Henry the Fourth, 363
York, Frederick, Duke of, 808
York, James Duke of, ^^ord Admiral, 617

marries Anne Hyde, 635, 669

convenitn, 638

fight with De Ruyter, 640

resigns office, 641

second marriage, 645

plans f r hrs sucressi< n, 654, 658, 659

see Tames the Sec nd
York, Richard, Duke of. Regent in France iat
Henry the Sixth, 280

rivalry with Henry, 283, 284

death, 284
York, Richard, Duke of, son of Edward the
Fourth, 3;P9

Zaragoza, sieges of, 825
Zorndorf, battle f f 754
Zutphen, battle of, 416

THE END,

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