Constitutional History of England

Chapter 42

This overture produced for many months no sensible effect. The Scots, with all their national wariness, suspected that, in spite of these general declarations in favour of their church polity, it was not much at heart with most of the parliament, and might be given up in a treaty, if the king would concede some other matters in dispute.

Accordingly, when the progress of his arms, especially in the north, during the ensuing summer, compelled the parliament to call in a more pressing manner, and by a special emba.s.sy, for their aid, they resolved to bind them down by such a compact as no wavering policy should ever rescind. They insisted therefore on the adoption of the solemn league and covenant, founded on a similar a.s.sociation of their own, five years before, through which they had successfully resisted the king, and overthrown the prelatic government. The covenant consisted in an oath to be subscribed by all sorts of persons in both kingdoms, whereby they bound themselves to preserve the reformed religion in the church of Scotland, in doctrine, worship, discipline, and government, according to the word of G.o.d and practice of the best reformed churches; and to endeavour to bring the churches of G.o.d in the three kingdoms to the nearest conjunction and uniformity in religion, confession of faith, form of church-government, directory for worship, and catechising: to endeavour, without respect of persons, the extirpation of popery, prelacy (that is, church government by archbishops, bishops, their chancellors and commissaries, deans and chapters, archdeacons, and all other ecclesiastical officers depending on that hierarchy), and whatsoever should be found contrary to sound doctrine and the power of G.o.dliness to preserve the rights and privileges of the parliaments, and the liberties of the kingdoms, and the king"s person and authority, in the preservation and defence of the true religion and liberties of the kingdoms: to endeavour the discovery of incendiaries and malignants, who hinder the reformation of religion, and divide the king from his people, that they may be brought to punishment: finally, to a.s.sist and defend all such as should enter into this covenant, and not suffer themselves to be withdrawn from it, whether to revolt to the opposite party, or to give in to a detestable indifference or neutrality. In conformity to the strict alliance thus established between the two kingdoms, the Scots commissioners at Westminster were intrusted, jointly with a committee of both houses, with very extensive powers to administer the public affairs.[261]

_The parliament subscribes to the covenant._--Every member of the Commons who remained at Westminster, to the number of 228, or perhaps more, and from 20 to 30 Peers that formed their upper house,[262]

subscribed this deliberate pledge to overturn the established church; many of them with extreme reluctance, both from a dislike of the innovation, and from a consciousness that it raised a most formidable obstacle to the restoration of peace; but with a secret reserve, for which some want of precision in the language of this covenant (purposely introduced by Vane, as is said, to shelter his own schemes) afforded them a sort of apology.[263] It was next imposed on all civil and military officers, and upon all the beneficed clergy.[264] A severe persecution fell on the faithful children of the Anglican church. Many had already been sequestered from their livings, or even subjected to imprisonment, by the parliamentary committee for scandalous ministers, or by subordinate committees of the same kind set up in each county within their quarters; sometimes on the score of immoralities or false doctrine, more frequently for what they termed malignity, or attachment to the king and his party.[265] Yet wary men who meddled not with politics, might hope to elude this inquisition.

But the covenant, imposed as a general test, drove out all who were too conscientious to pledge themselves by a solemn appeal to the Deity to resist the polity which they generally believed to be of his inst.i.tution. What number of the clergy were ejected (most of them but for refusing the covenant, and for no moral offence or imputed superst.i.tion) it is impossible to ascertain. Walker, in his _Sufferings of the Clergy_, a folio volume published in the latter end of Anne"s reign, with all the virulence and partiality of the high-church faction in that age, endeavoured to support those who had reckoned it at 8000; a palpable over-statement upon his own showing, for he cannot produce near 2000 names, after a most diligent investigation. Neal, however, admits 1600, probably more than one-fifth of the beneficed ministers in the kingdom.[266] The biographical collections furnish a pretty copious martyrology of men the most distinguished by their learning and virtues in that age. The remorseless and indiscriminate bigotry of presbyterianism might boast that it had heaped disgrace on Walton, and driven Lydiat to beggary; that it trampled on the old age of Hales, and embittered with insult the dying moments of Chillingworth.

_Impeachment and execution of Laud._--But the most unjustifiable act of these zealots, and one of the greatest reproaches of the long parliament, was the death of Archbishop Laud. In the first days of the session, while the fall of Strafford struck every one with astonishment, the Commons had carried up an impeachment against him for high treason, in fourteen articles of charge; and he had lain ever since in the Tower, his revenues, and even private estate sequestered, and in great indigence. After nearly three years" neglect, specific articles were exhibited against him in October 1643, but not proceeded on with vigour till December 1644; when, for whatever reason, a determination was taken to pursue this unfortunate prelate to death.

The charges against him, which Wild, Maynard, and other managers of the impeachment, were to aggravate into treason, related partly to those papistical innovations which had nothing of a political character about them, partly of the violent proceedings in the star-chamber and high-commission courts, wherein Laud was very prominent as a counsellor, but certainly without any greater legal responsibility than fell on many others. He defended himself, not always prudently or satisfactorily, but with courage and ability; never receding from his magnificent notions of spiritual power, but endeavouring to shift the blame of the sentences p.r.o.nounced by the council on those who concurred with him. The imputation of popery he repelled by a list of the converts he had made; but the word was equivocal, and he could not deny the difference between his protestantism and that of our reformation. Nothing could be more monstrous than the allegation of treason in this case. The judges, on a reference by the Lords, gave it to be understood, in their timid way, that the charges contained no legal treason.[267] But, the Commons having changed their impeachment into an ordinance for his execution, the Peers were pusillanimous enough to comply. It is said by Clarendon that only seven Lords were in the house on this occasion: but the Journals unfortunately bear witness to the presence of twenty.[268] Laud had amply merited punishment for his tyrannical abuse of power; but his execution at the age of seventy, without the slightest pretence of political necessity, was a far more unjustifiable instance of it than any that was alleged against him.

_Decline of the king"s affairs in 1644._--Pursuant to the before-mentioned treaty, the Scots army of 21,000 men marched into England in January 1644. This was a very serious accession to Charles"s difficulties, already sufficient to dissipate all hopes of final triumph, except in the most sanguine minds. His successes, in fact, had been rather such as to surprise well-judging men than to make them expect any more favourable termination of the war than by a fair treaty. From the beginning it may be said that the yeomanry and trading cla.s.ses of towns were generally hostile to the king"s side, even in those counties which were in his military occupation; except in a few, such as Cornwall, Worcester, Salop, and most of Wales, where the prevailing sentiment was chiefly royalist;[269] and this disaffection was prodigiously increased through the licence of his ill-paid and ill-disciplined army. On the other hand, the gentry were, in a great majority, attached to his cause, even in the parts of England which lay subject to the parliament. But he was never able to make any durable impression on what were called the a.s.sociated counties, extending from Norfolk to Suss.e.x inclusively, within which no rising could be attempted with any effect:[270] while, on the other hand, the parliament possessed several garrisons, and kept up considerable forces in that larger portion of the kingdom where he might be reckoned superior. Their resources were far greater; and the taxes imposed by them, though exceedingly heavy, more regularly paid, and less ruinous to the people, than the sudden exactions, half plunder, half contribution, of the ravenous cavaliers. The king lost ground during the winter. He had built hopes on bringing over troops from Ireland; for the sake of which he made a truce, then called the cessation, with the rebel catholics. But this reinforcement having been beaten and dispersed by Fairfax at Namptwich, he had the mortification of finding that this scheme had much increased his own unpopularity, and the distrust entertained of him even by his adherents, without the smallest advantage. The next campaign was marked by the great defeat of Rupert and Newcastle at Marston Moor, and the loss of the north of England; a blow so terrible as must have brought on his speedy ruin, if it had not been in some degree mitigated by his strange and unexpected success over Ess.e.x in the west, and by the tardiness of the Scots in making use of their victory. Upon the result of the campaign of 1644, the king"s affairs were in such bad condition that nothing less than a series of victories could have reinstated them; yet not so totally ruined as to hold out much prospect of an approaching termination to the people"s calamities.

_Factions at Oxford._--There had been, from the very commencement of the war, all that distraction in the king"s councils at Oxford, and all those bickerings and heart-burnings among his adherents, which naturally belong to men embarked in a dangerous cause with different motives and different views. The military men, some of whom had served with the Swedes in Germany, acknowledged no laws but those of war; and could not understand that, either in annoying the enemy or providing for themselves, they were to acknowledge any restraints of the civil power. The lawyers, on the other hand, and the whole const.i.tutional party laboured to keep up, in the midst of arms, the appearances at least of legal justice, and that favourite maxim of Englishmen, the supremacy of civil over military authority, rather more strictly perhaps than the nature of their actual circ.u.mstances would admit. At the head of the former party stood the king"s two nephews, Rupert and Maurice, the younger sons of the late unfortunate elector palatine, soldiers of fortune (as we may truly call them), of rude and imperious characters, avowedly despising the council and the common law, and supported by Charles, with all his injudiciousness and incapacity for affairs, against the greatest men of the kingdom. Another very powerful and obnoxious faction was that of the catholics, proud of their services and sacrifices, confident in the queen"s protection, and looking at least to a full toleration as their just reward. They were the natural enemies of peace, and little less hated at Oxford than at Westminster.[271]

_Royalist lords and commoners summoned to Oxford._--At the beginning of the winter of 1643 the king took the remarkable step of summoning the peers and commoners of his party to meet in parliament at Oxford.

This was evidently suggested by the const.i.tutionalists with the intention of obtaining a supply by more regular methods than forced contribution, and of opposing a barrier to the military and popish interests.[272] Whether it were equally calculated to further the king"s cause may admit of some doubt. The royalist convention indeed, which name it ought rather to have taken than that of parliament, met in considerable strength at Oxford. Forty-three peers, and one hundred and eighteen commoners, subscribed a letter to the Earl of Ess.e.x, expressing their anxiety for a treaty of peace; twenty-nine of the former, and fifty-seven of the latter, it is said, being then absent on the king"s service, or other occasions.[273] Such a display of numbers, nearly double in one house, and nearly half in the other, of those who remained at Westminster, might have an effect on the nation"s prejudices, and at least redeem the king from the charge of standing singly against his parliament. But they came in no spirit of fervid loyalty, rather distrustful of the king, especially on the score of religion, averse to some whom he had injudiciously raised to power, such as Digby and Cottington, and so eager for pacification as not perhaps to have been unwilling to purchase it by greater concessions than he could prudently make.[274] Peace however was by no means brought nearer by their meeting; the parliament, jealous and alarmed at it, would never recognise their existence; and were so provoked at their voting the Lords and Commons at Westminster guilty of treason, that, if we believe a writer of high authority, the two houses unanimously pa.s.sed a vote on Ess.e.x"s motion, summoning the king to appear by a certain day.[275] But the Scots commissioners had force enough to turn aside such violent suggestions, and ultimately obtained the concurrence of both houses in propositions for a treaty.[276] They had begun to find themselves less likely to sway the councils of Westminster than they had expected, and dreaded the rising ascendancy of Cromwell. The treaty was opened at Uxbridge in January 1645. But neither the king nor his adversaries entered on it with minds sincerely bent on peace: they, on the one hand, resolute not to swerve from the utmost rigour of a conqueror"s terms, without having conquered; and he, though more secretly, cherishing illusive hopes of a more triumphant restoration to power than any treaty could be expected to effect.[277]

The three leading topics of discussion among the negotiators at Uxbridge were, the church, the militia, and the state of Ireland.

Bound by their unhappy covenant, and watched by their Scots colleagues, the English commissioners on the parliament side demanded the complete establishment of a presbyterian polity, and the subst.i.tution of what was called the directory for the Anglican liturgy. Upon this head there was little prospect of a union. The king had deeply imbibed the tenets of Andrews and Laud, believing an episcopal government indispensably necessary to the valid administration of the sacraments, and the very existence of a christian church. The Scots, and a portion of the English clergy, were equally confident that their presbyterian form was established by the apostles as a divine model, from which it was unlawful to depart.[278]

Though most of the laity in this kingdom entertained less narrow opinions, the parliamentary commissioners thought the king ought rather to concede such a point than themselves, especially as his former consent to the abolition of episcopacy in Scotland weakened a good deal the force of his plea of conscience; while the royalists, even could they have persuaded their master, thought episcopacy, though not absolutely of divine right (a notion which they left to the churchmen), yet so highly beneficial to religion, and so important to the monarchy, that nothing less than extreme necessity, or at least the prospect of a signal advantage, could justify its abandonment.

They offered however what in an earlier stage of their dissensions would have satisfied almost every man, that limited scheme of episcopal hierarchy, above-mentioned as approved by Usher, rendering the bishop among his presbyters much like the king in parliament, not free to exercise his jurisdiction, nor to confer orders without their consent, and offered to leave all ceremonies to the minister"s discretion. Such a compromise would probably have pleased the English nation, averse to nothing in their established church except its abuses; but the parliamentary negotiators would not so much as enter into discussion upon it.[279]

They were hardly less unyielding on the subject of the militia. They began with a demand of naming all the commanders by sea and land, including the lord lieutenant of Ireland and all governors of garrisons, for an unlimited time. The king, though not very willingly, proposed that the command should be vested in twenty persons, half to be named by himself, half by the parliament, for the term of three years, which he afterwards extended to seven; at the expiration of which time it should revert to the Crown. But the utmost concession that could be obtained from the other side was to limit their exclusive possession of this power to seven years, leaving the matter open for an ulterior arrangement by act of parliament at their termination.[280] Even if this treaty had been conducted between two belligerent states, whom rivalry or ambition often excite to press every demand which superior power can extort from weakness, there yet was nothing in the condition of the king"s affairs which should compel him thus to pa.s.s under the yoke, and enter his capital as a prisoner.

But we may also remark that, according to the great principle, that the English const.i.tution, in all its component parts, was to be maintained by both sides in this contest, the question for parliament was not what their military advantages or resources for war ent.i.tled them to ask, but what was required for the due balance of power under a limited monarchy. They could rightly demand no further concession from the king than was indispensable for their own and the people"s security; and I leave any one who is tolerably acquainted with the state of England at the beginning of 1645, to decide whether their privileges and the public liberties incurred a greater risk, by such an equal part.i.tion of power over the sword, as the king proposed, than his prerogative and personal freedom would have encountered by abandoning it altogether to their discretion. I am far from thinking that the acceptance of the king"s propositions at Uxbridge would have restored tranquillity to England. He would still have repined at the limitations of monarchy, and others would have conspired against its existence. But of the various consequences which we may picture to ourselves as capable of resulting from a pacification, that which appears to me the least likely is, that Charles should have re-established that arbitrary power which he had exercised in the earlier period of his reign. Whence, in fact, was he to look for a.s.sistance? Was it with such creatures of a court as Jermyn or Ashburnham, or with a worn-out veteran of office, like Cottington, or a rash adventurer, like Digby, that he could outwit Vane, or overawe Cromwell, or silence the press and the pulpit, or strike with panic the stern puritan and the confident fanatic? Some there were, beyond question, both soldiers and courtiers, who hated the very name of a limited monarchy, and murmured at the const.i.tutional language which the king, from the time he made use of the pens of Hyde and Falkland, had systematically employed in his public declarations.[281] But it is as certain that the great majority of his Oxford parliament, and of those upon whom he must have depended, either in the field or in council, were apprehensive of any victory that might render him absolute, as that Ess.e.x and Manchester were unwilling to conquer at the expense of the const.i.tution.[282] The catholics indeed, generally speaking, would have gone great lengths in a.s.serting his authority.

Nor is this any reproach to that body, by no means naturally less attached to their country and its liberties than other Englishmen, but driven by an unjust persecution to see their only hope of emanc.i.p.ation in the nation"s servitude. They could not be expected to sympathise in that patriotism of the seventeenth century, which, if it poured warmth and radiance on the protestant, was to them as a devouring fire. But the king could have made no use of the catholics as a distinct body for any political purpose, without uniting all other parties against him. He had already given so much offence, at the commencement of the war, by accepting the services which the catholic gentry were forward to offer, that instead of a more manly justification, which the temper of the times, he thought, did not permit, he had recourse to the useless subterfuges of denying or extenuating the facts, and even to a strangely improbable recrimination; a.s.serting, on several occasions, that the number of papists in the parliament"s army was much greater than in his own.[283]

It may still indeed be questioned whether, admitting the propositions tendered to the king to have been unreasonable and insecure, it might not yet have been expedient, in the perilous condition of his affairs, rather to have tried the chances of peace than those of war. If he could have determined frankly and without reserve to have relinquished the church, and called the leaders of the presbyterian party in both houses to his councils, it is impossible to prove that he might not both have regained his power over the militia in no long course of time, and prevailed on the parliament to consent to its own dissolution. The dread that party felt of the republican spirit rising amongst the independents, would have induced them to place in the hands of any sovereign they could trust, full as much authority as our const.i.tution permits. But no one who has paid attention to the history of that period, will conclude that they could have secured the king against their common enemy, had he even gone wholly into their own measures.[284] And this were to suppose such an entire change in his character, and ways of thinking, as no external circ.u.mstances could produce. Yet his prospects from a continuance of hostilities were so unpromising that most of the royalists would probably have hailed his almost unconditional submission at Uxbridge. Even the steady Richmond and Southampton, it is said, implored him to yield, and deprecated his misjudging confidence in promises of foreign aid, or in the successes of Montrose.[285] The more lukewarm or discontented of his adherents took this opportunity of abandoning an almost hopeless cause; between the breach of the treaty of Uxbridge and the battle of Naseby, several of the Oxford peers came over to the parliament, and took an engagement never to bear arms against it. A few instances of such defection had occurred before.[286]

_Miseries of the war._--It remained only, after the rupture of the treaty at Uxbridge, to try once more the fortune of war. The people, both in the king"s and parliament"s quarters, but especially the former, heard with dismay that peace could not be attained. Many of the perpetual skirmishes and captures of towns which made every man"s life and fortune precarious, have found no place in general history; but may be traced in the journal of Whitelock, or in the Mercuries and other fugitive sheets, great numbers of which are still extant. And it will appear, I believe, from these that scarcely one county in England was exempt, at one time or other of the war, from becoming the scene of this unnatural contest. Compared indeed with the civil wars in France in the preceding century, there had been fewer acts of enormous cruelty, and less atrocious breaches of public faith. But much blood had been wantonly shed, and articles of capitulation had been very indifferently kept. "Either side," says Clarendon, "having somewhat to object to the other, the requisite honesty and justice of observing conditions was mutually, as it were by agreement, for a long time violated."[287] The royalist army, especially the cavalry, commanded by men either wholly unprincipled, or at least regardless of the people, and deeming them ill affected, the princes Rupert and Maurice, Goring and Wilmot, lived without restraint of law or military discipline, and committed every excess even in friendly quarters.[288]

An ostentatious dissoluteness became characteristic of the cavalier, as a formal austerity was of the puritan; one spoiling his neighbour in the name of G.o.d, the other of the king. The parliament"s troops were not quite free from these military vices, but displayed them in a much less scandalous degree, owing to their more religious habits and the influence of their presbyterian chaplains, to the better example of their commanders, and to the comparative, though not absolute, punctuality of their pay.[289] But this pay was raised through unheard-of a.s.sessments, especially an excise on liquors, a new name in England, and through the sequestration of the estates of all the king"s adherents; resources of which he also had availed himself, partly by the rights of war, partly by the grant of his Oxford parliament.[290]

A war so calamitous seemed likely to endure till it had exhausted the nation. With all the parliament"s superiority, they had yet to subdue nearly half the kingdom. The Scots had not advanced southward, content with reducing Newcastle and the rest of the northern counties. These they treated almost as hostile, without distinction of parties, not only exacting contributions, but committing, unless they are much belied, great excesses of indiscipline; their presbyterian gravity not having yet overcome the ancient national propensities.[291] In the midland and western parts the king had just the worse, without having sustained material loss; and another summer might pa.s.s away in marches and counter-marches, in skirmishes of cavalry, in tedious sieges of paltry fortifications, some of them mere country houses, which nothing but an amazing deficiency in that branch of military science could have rendered tenable.

_Ess.e.x and Manchester suspected of lukewarmness._--This protraction of the war had long given rise to no unnatural discontent with its management, and to suspicions, first of Ess.e.x, then of Manchester and others in command, as if they were secretly reluctant to complete the triumph of their employers. It is indeed not impossible that both these peers, especially the former, out of their desire to see peace restored on terms compatible with some degree of authority in the Crown, and with the dignity of their own order, did not always press their advantages against the king, as if he had been a public enemy.[292] They might have thought that, having drawn the sword avowedly for the preservation of his person and dignity as much as for the rights and liberties of the people, they were no farther bound by their trust than to render him and his adherents sensible of the impracticability of refusing their terms of accommodation.

_Self-denying ordinance._--There could however be no doubt that Fairfax and Cromwell were far superior, both by their own talents for war and the discipline they had introduced into their army, to the earlier parliamentary commanders, and that, as a military arrangement, the self-denying ordinance was judiciously conceived. This, which took from all members of both houses their commands in the army, or civil employments, was, as is well known, the first great victory of the independent party which had grown up lately in parliament under Vane and Cromwell.[293] They carried another measure of no less importance, collateral to the former; the new-modelling, as it was called, of the army; reducing it to twenty-one or twenty-two thousand men; discharging such officers and soldiers as were reckoned unfit, and completing their regiments by more select levies. The ordinance, after being once rejected by the Lords, pa.s.sed their house with some modifications in April.[294] But many joined them on this occasion for those military reasons which I have mentioned, deeming almost any termination of the war better than its continuance. The king"s rejection of their terms at Uxbridge had disgusted some of the more moderate men, such as the Earl of Northumberland and Pierrepont; who, deeming reconciliation impracticable, took from this time a different line of politics from that they had previously followed, and were either not alive to the danger of new-modelling the army, or willing to hope that it might be disbanded before that danger could become imminent. From Fairfax too, the new general, they saw little to fear and much to expect; while Cromwell, as a member of the House of Commons, was positively excluded by the ordinance itself. But, through a successful intrigue of his friends, this great man, already not less formidable to the presbyterian faction than to the royalists, was permitted to continue lieutenant-general.[295] The most popular justification for the self-denying ordinance, and yet perhaps its real condemnation, was soon found at Naseby; for there Fairfax and Cromwell triumphed not only over the king and the monarchy, but over the parliament and the nation.

It does not appear to me that a brave and prudent man, in the condition of Charles the First, had, up to that unfortunate day, any other alternative than a vigorous prosecution of the war, in hope of such decisive success as, though hardly within probable calculation, is not unprecedented in the changeful tide of fortune. I cannot therefore blame him either for refusing unreasonable terms of accommodation, or for not relinquishing altogether the contest. But, after his defeat at Naseby, his affairs were, in a military sense, so irretrievable that in prolonging the war with as much obstinacy as the broken state of his party would allow, he displayed a good deal of that indifference to the sufferings of the kingdom and of his own adherents, which has been sometimes imputed to him. There was, from the hour of that battle, one only safe and honourable course remaining. He justly abhorred to reign, if so it could be named, the slave of parliament, with the sacrifice of his conscience and his friends. But it was by no means necessary to reign at all. The sea was for many months open to him; in France, or still better in Holland, he would have found his misfortunes respected, and an asylum in that decent privacy which becomes an exiled sovereign. Those very hopes which he too fondly cherished, and which lured him to destruction, hopes of regaining power through the disunion of his enemies, might have been entertained with better reason, as with greater safety, in a foreign land. It is not perhaps very probable that he would have been restored; but his restoration in such circ.u.mstances seems less desperate than through any treaty that he could conclude in captivity at home.

Whether any such thoughts of abandoning a hopeless contest were ever entertained by the king during this particular period, it is impossible to p.r.o.nounce; we should infer the contrary from all his actions. It must be said that many of his counsellors seem to have been as pertinacious as himself, having strongly imbibed the same sanguine spirit, and looking for deliverance, according to their several fancies, from the ambition of Cromwell or the discontent of the Scots. But, whatever might have been the king"s disposition, he would not have dared to retire from England. That sinister domestic rule, to which he had so long been subject, controlled every action.

Careless of her husband"s happiness, and already attached probably to one whom she afterwards married, Henrietta longed only for his recovery of a power which would become her own.[296] Hence, while she constantly laid her injunctions on Charles never to concede anything as to the militia or the Irish catholics, she became desirous, when no other means presented itself, that he should sacrifice what was still nearer to his heart, the episcopal church-government. The queen-regent of France, whose sincerity in desiring the king"s restoration there can be no ground to deny,[297] was equally persuaded that he could hope for it on no less painful conditions. They reasoned of course very plausibly from the great precedent of flexible consciences, the reconciliation of Henrietta"s ill.u.s.trious father to the catholic church. As he could neither have regained his royal power, nor restored peace to France without this compliance with his subjects"

prejudices, so Charles could still less expect, in circ.u.mstances by no means so favourable, that he should avoid a concession, in the eyes of almost all men but himself, of incomparably less importance.

_The king throws himself into the hands of the Scots._--It was in expectation of this sacrifice, that the French envoy, Montreuil, entered on his ill-starred negotiation for the king"s taking shelter with the Scots army. And it must be confessed that several of his best friends were hardly less anxious that he should desert a church he could not protect.[298] They doubted not, reasoning from their own characters, that he would ultimately give way. But that Charles, unchangeably resolved on this head,[299] should have put himself in the power of men fully as bigoted as himself (if he really conceived that the Scots presbyterians would shed their blood to re-establish the prelacy they abhorred), was an additional proof of that delusion which made him fancy that no government could be established without his concurrence; unless indeed we should rather consider it as one of those desperate courses, into which he who can foresee nothing but evil from every calculable line of action will sometimes plunge at a venture, borrowing some ray of hope from the uncertainty of its consequences.[300]

It was an inevitable effect of this step, that the king surrendered his personal liberty, which he never afterwards recovered. Considering his situation, we may at first think the parliament tolerably moderate, in offering nearly the same terms of peace at Newcastle which he had rejected at Uxbridge; the chief difference being, that the power of the militia which had been demanded for commissioners nominated and removable by the two houses during an indefinite period, was now proposed to reside in the two houses for the s.p.a.ce of twenty years; which rather more unequivocally indicated their design of making the parliament perpetual.[301] But in fact they had so abridged the royal prerogative by their former propositions, that, preserving the decent semblance of monarchy, scarce anything further could be exacted. The king"s circ.u.mstances were however so altered that, by persisting in his refusal of those propositions, he excited a natural indignation at his obstinacy in men who felt their own right (the conqueror"s right), to dictate terms at pleasure. Yet this might have had a n.o.bler character of firmness, if during all the tedious parleys of the last three years of his life, he had not, by tardy and partial concessions, given up so much of that for which he contended, as rather to appear like a pedlar haggling for the best bargain, than a sovereign unalterably determined by conscience and public spirit. We must, however, forgive much to one placed in such unparalleled difficulties. Charles had to contend, during his unhappy residence at Newcastle, not merely with revolted subjects in the pride of conquest, and with bigoted priests, as blindly confident in one set of doubtful propositions as he was in the opposite, but with those he had trusted the most, and loved the dearest. We have in the _Clarendon State Papers_ a series of letters from Paris, written, some by the queen, others jointly by Colepepper, Jermyn, and Ashburnham, or the two former, urging him to sacrifice episcopacy, as the necessary means of his restoration. We have the king"s answers, that display, in an interesting manner, the struggles of his mind under this severe trial.[302] No candid reader, I think, can doubt that a serious sense of obligation was predominant in Charles"s persevering fidelity to the English church. For, though he often alleges the incompatibility of presbyterianism with monarchy, and says very justly, "I am most confident that religion will much sooner regain the militia than the militia will religion,"[303] yet these arguments seem rather intended to weigh with those who slighted his scruples, than the paramount motives of his heart. He could hardly avoid perceiving that, as Colepepper told him in his rough style, the question was, whether he would choose to be a king of presbytery or no king. But the utmost length which he could prevail on himself to go was to offer the continuance of the presbyterian discipline, as established by the parliament, for three years, during which a conference of divines might be had, in order to bring about a settlement. Even this he would not propose without consulting two bishops, Juxon and Duppa, whether he could lawfully do so. They returned a very cautious answer, a.s.senting to the proposition as a temporary measure, but plainly endeavouring to keep the king fixed in his adherence to the episcopal church.[304]

Pressed thus on a topic, so important above all others in his eyes, the king gave a proof of his sincerity by greater concessions of power than he had ever intended. He had some time before openly offered to let the parliament name all the commissioners of the militia for seven years, and all the officers of state and judges to hold their places for life.[305] He now empowered a secret agent in London, Mr. William Murray, privately to sound the parliamentary leaders, if they would consent to the establishment of a moderated episcopacy after three or five years, on condition of his departing from the right of the militia during his whole life.[306] This dereliction of the main ground of contest brought down the queen"s indignation on his head.

She wrote several letters, in an imperious and unfeeling tone, declaring that she would never set her foot in England as long as the parliament should exist.[307] Jermyn and Colepepper a.s.sumed a style hardly less dictatorial in their letters,[308] till Charles withdrew the proposal, which Murray seems never to have communicated.[309] It was indeed the evident effect of despair and a natural weariness of his th.o.r.n.y crown. He now began to express serious thoughts of making his escape,[310] and seems even to hint more than once at a resignation of his government to the Prince of Wales. But Henrietta forbade him to think of an escape, and alludes to the other with contempt and indignation.[311] With this selfish and tyrannical woman, that life of exile and privacy which religion and letters would have rendered tolerable to the king, must have been spent in hardly less bitterness than on a dishonoured throne. She had displayed in France as little virtue as at home; the small resources which should have been frugally dispensed to those who had lost all for the royal cause were squandered upon her favourite and her French servants.[312] So totally had she abandoned all regard to English interest, that Hyde and Capel, when retired to Jersey, the governor of which, Sir Edward Carteret, still held out for the king, discovered a plan formed by the queen and Jermyn to put that island into the hands of France.[313]

They were exceedingly perplexed at this discovery, conscious of the impossibility of defending Jersey, and yet determined not to let it be torn away from the sovereignty of the British Crown. No better expedient occurred than, as soon as the project should be ripe for execution, to despatch a message "to the Earl of Northumberland or some other person of honour," asking for aid to preserve the island.

This was of course, in other words, to surrender it into the power of the parliament, which they would not name even to themselves. But it was evidently more consistent with their loyalty to the king and his family, than to trust the good faith of Mazarin. The scheme, however, was abandoned; for we hear no more of it.

It must, however, be admitted at the present day, that there was no better expedient for saving the king"s life, and some portion of royal authority for his descendants (a fresh renunciation of episcopacy perhaps only excepted), than such an abdication; the time for which had come before he put himself into the hands of the Scots.

His own party had been weakened, and the number of his well-wishers diminished, by something more than the events of war. The last unfortunate year had, in two memorable instances, revealed fresh proofs of that culpable imprudence, speaking mildly, which made wise and honest men hopeless of any permanent accommodation. At the battle of Naseby, copies of some letters to the queen, chiefly written about the time of the treaty of Uxbridge, and strangely preserved, fell into the hands of the enemy, and were instantly published.[314] No other losses of that fatal day were more injurious to his cause. Besides many proofs of a contemptible subserviency to one justly deemed irreconcilable to the civil and religious interests of the kingdom, and many expressions indicating schemes and hopes inconsistent with any practicable peace, and especially a design to put an end to the parliament,[315] he gave her power to treat with the English catholics, promising to take away all penal laws against them as soon as G.o.d should enable him to do so, in consideration of such powerful a.s.sistance, as might deserve so great a favour, and enable him to effect it.[316] Yet it was certain that no parliament, except in absolute duress, would consent to repeal these laws. To what sort of victory therefore did he look? It was remembered that, on taking the sacrament at Oxford some time before, he had solemnly protested that he would maintain the protestant religion of the church of England, without any connivance at popery. What trust could be reposed in a prince capable of forfeiting so solemn a pledge? Were it even supposed that he intended to break his word with the catholics, after obtaining such aid as they could render him, would his insincerity be less flagrant?[317]

_Discovery of Glamorgan"s treaty._--These suspicions were much aggravated by a second discovery that took place soon afterwards, of a secret treaty between the Earl of Glamorgan and the confederate Irish catholics, not merely promising the repeal of the penal laws, but the establishment of their religion in far the greater part of Ireland.[318] The Marquis of Ormond, as well as Lord Digby who happened to be at Dublin, loudly exclaimed against Glamorgan"s presumption in concluding such a treaty, and committed him to prison on a charge of treason. He produced two commissions from the king, secretly granted without any seal or the knowledge of any minister, containing the fullest powers to treat with the Irish, and promising to fulfil any conditions into which he should enter. The king, informed of this, disavowed Glamorgan; and a.s.serted in a letter to the parliament that he had merely a commission to raise men for his service, but no power to treat of anything else, without the privity of the lord lieutenant, much less to capitulate anything concerning religion or any property belonging either to church or laity.[319]

Glamorgan however was soon released, and lost no portion of the king"s or his family"s favour.

This transaction has been the subject of much historical controversy.

The enemies of Charles, both in his own and later ages, have considered it as a proof of his indifference at least to the protestant religion, and of his readiness to accept the a.s.sistance of Irish rebels on any conditions. His advocates for a long time denied the authenticity of Glamorgan"s commissions. But Dr. Birch demonstrated that they were genuine; and, if his dissertation could have left any doubt, later evidence might be adduced in confirmation.[320] Hume, in a very artful and very unfair statement, admitting the authenticity of these instruments, endeavours to show that they were never intended to give Glamorgan any power to treat without Ormond"s approbation. But they are worded in the most unconditional manner, without any reference to Ormond. No common reader can think them consistent with the king"s story. I do not, however, impute to him any intention of ratifying the terms of Glamorgan"s treaty. His want of faith was not to the protestant, but to the catholic. Upon weighing the whole of the evidence, it appears to me that he purposely gave Glamorgan, a sanguine and injudicious man, whom he could easily disown, so ample a commission as might remove the distrust that the Irish were likely to entertain of a negotiation wherein Ormond should be concerned; while by a certain lat.i.tude in the style of the instrument, and by his own letters to the lord lieutenant about Glamorgan"s errand, he left it open to a.s.sert, in case of necessity, that it was never intended to exclude the former"s privity and sanction. Charles had unhappily long been in the habit of perverting his natural acuteness to the mean subterfuges of equivocal language.

By these discoveries of the king"s insincerity, and by what seemed his infatuated obstinacy in refusing terms of accommodation, both nations became more and more alienated from him; the one hardly restrained from casting him off, the other ready to leave him to his fate.[321]

_The king delivered up by the Scots._--This ill opinion of the king forms one apology for that action which has exposed the Scots nation to so much reproach--their delivery of his person to the English parliament. Perhaps if we place ourselves in their situation, it will not appear deserving of quite such indignant censure. It would have shown more generosity to have offered the king an alternative of retiring to Holland; and from what we now know, he probably would not have neglected the opportunity. But the consequence might have been his solemn deposition from the English throne; and, however we may think such banishment more honourable than the acceptance of degrading conditions, the Scots, we should remember, saw nothing in the king"s taking the covenant, and sweeping away prelatic superst.i.tions, but the bounden duty of a christian sovereign, which only the most perverse self-will induced him to set at nought.[322] They had a right also to consider the interests of his family, which the threatened establishment of a republic in England would defeat. To carry him back with their army into Scotland, besides being equally ruinous to the English monarchy, would have exposed their nation to the most serious dangers. To undertake his defence by arms against England, as the ardent royalists desired, and doubtless the determined republicans no less, would have been, as was proved afterwards, a mad and culpable renewal of the miseries of both kingdoms.[323] He had voluntarily come to their camp; no faith was pledged to him; their very right to retain his person, though they had argued for it with the English parliament, seemed open to much doubt. The circ.u.mstance, unquestionably, which has always given a character of apparent baseness to this transaction, is the payment of 400,000 made to them so nearly at the same time that it has pa.s.sed for the price of the king"s person. This sum was part of a larger demand on the score of arrears of pay, and had been agreed upon long before we have any proof or reasonable suspicion of a stipulation to deliver up the king.[324] That the parliament would never have actually paid it on any other consideration, there can be, I presume, no kind of doubt; and of this the Scots must have been fully aware. But whether there were any such secret bargain as has been supposed, or whether they would have delivered him up, if there had been no pecuniary expectation in the case, is what I cannot perceive sufficient grounds to p.r.o.nounce with confidence; though I am much inclined to believe the affirmative of the latter question. And it is deserving of particular observation, that the party in the House of Commons which sought most earnestly to obtain possession of the king"s person, and carried all the votes for payment of money to the Scots, was that which had no further aim than an accommodation with him, and a settlement of the government on the basis of its fundamental laws, though doubtless on terms very derogatory to his prerogative; while those who opposed each part of the negotiation were the zealous enemies of the king, and, in some instances, at least, of the monarchy. The Journals bear witness to this.[325]

_Growth of the independents and republicans._--Whatever might have been the consequence of the king"s accepting the propositions of Newcastle, his chance of restoration upon any terms was now in all appearance very slender. He had to encounter enemies more dangerous and implacable than the presbyterians. That faction, which from small and insensible beginnings had acquired continued strength, through ambition in a few, through fanaticism in many, through a despair in some of reconciling the pretensions of royalty with those of the people, was now rapidly ascending to superiority. Though still weak in the House of Commons, it had spread prodigiously in the army, especially since its new-modelling at the time of the self-denying ordinance.[326] The presbyterians saw with dismay the growth of their own and the const.i.tution"s enemies. But the royalists, who had less to fear from confusion than from any settlement that the Commons would be brought to make, rejoiced in the increasing disunion; and fondly believed, like their master, that one or other party must seek a.s.sistance at their hands.[327]

_Opposition to the presbyterian government._--The independent party comprehended, besides the members of that religious denomination,[328]

a countless brood of fanatical sectaries, nursed in the lap of presbyterianism, and fed with the stimulating aliment she furnished, till their intoxicated fancies could neither be restrained within the limits of her creed nor those of her discipline.[329] The presbyterian zealots were systematically intolerant. A common cause made toleration the doctrine of the sectaries. About the beginning of the war, it had been deemed expedient to call together an a.s.sembly of divines, nominated by the parliament, and consisting not only of clergymen, but, according to the presbyterian usage, of lay members, peers as well as commoners, by whose advice a general reformation of the church was to be planned.[330] These were chiefly presbyterian; though a small minority of independents, and a few moderate episcopalians, headed by Selden,[331] gave them much trouble. The general imposition of the covenant, and the subst.i.tution of the directory for the common prayer (which was forbidden to be used even in any private family, by an ordinance of August 1645), seemed to a.s.sure the triumph of presbyterianism; which became complete, in point of law, by an ordinance of February 1646, establishing for three years the Scots model of cla.s.ses, synods, and general a.s.semblies throughout England.[332] But in this very ordinance there was a reservation which wounded the spiritual arrogance of that party. Their favourite tenet had always been the independency of the church. They had rejected, with as much abhorrence as the catholics themselves, the royal supremacy, so far as it controlled the exercise of spiritual discipline. But the House of Commons were inclined to part with no portion of that prerogative which they had wrested from the Crown.

Besides the independents, who were still weak, a party called Erastians,[333] and chiefly composed of the common lawyers, under the guidance of Selden, the sworn foe of every ecclesiastical usurpation, withstood the a.s.sembly"s pretensions with success. They negatived a declaration of the divine right of presbyterian government. They voted a pet.i.tion from the a.s.sembly, complaining of a recent ordinance as an encroachment on spiritual jurisdiction, to be a breach of privilege.

The presbyterian tribunals were made subject to the appellant control of parliament; as those of the Anglican church had been to that of the Crown. The cases wherein spiritual censures could be p.r.o.nounced, or the sacrament denied, instead of being left to the clergy, were defined by law.[334] Whether from dissatisfaction on this account, or some other reason, the presbyterian discipline was never carried into effect, except to a certain extent in London and in Lancashire. But the beneficed clergy throughout England, till the return of Charles II., were chiefly, though not entirely, of that denomination.[335]

This party was still so far predominant, having the strong support of the city of London and its corporation,[336] with almost all the peers who remained in their house, that the independents and other sectaries neither opposed this ordinance for its temporary establishment, nor sought anything farther than a toleration for their own worship. The question, as Neal well observes, was not between presbytery and independency, but between presbytery with a toleration, and without one.[337] Not merely from their own exclusive bigotry, but from a political alarm by no means ungrounded, the presbyterians stood firmly against all liberty of conscience. But in this again they could not influence the House of Commons to suppress the sectaries, though no open declaration in favour of indulgence was as yet made. It is still the boast of the independents that they first brought forward the great principles of religious toleration (I mean as distinguished from maxims of political expediency) which had been confined to a few philosophical minds; to Sir Thomas More, in those days of his better judgment when he planned his republic of Utopia, to Thua.n.u.s, or L"Hospital. Such principles are indeed naturally congenial to the persecuted; and it is by the alternate oppression of so many different sects, that they have now obtained their universal reception. But the independents also a.s.sert that they first maintained them while in power; a far higher praise, which however can only be allowed them by comparison. Without invidiously glancing at their early conduct in New England,[338] it must be admitted that the continuance of the penal laws against catholics, the prohibition of the episcopalian worship, and the punishment of one or two anti-trinitarians under Cromwell, are proofs that the tolerant principle had not yet acquired perfect vigour. If the independent sectaries were its earliest advocates, it was the Anglican writers, the lat.i.tudinarian school of Chillingworth, Hales, Taylor, Locke, and Hoadley, that rendered it victorious.[339]

The king, as I have said, and his party cherished too sanguine hopes from the disunion of their opponents.[340] Though warned of it by the parliamentary commissioners at Uxbridge, though in fact it was quite notorious and undisguised, they seem never to have comprehended that many active spirits looked to the entire subversion of the monarchy.

The king in particular was haunted by a prejudice, natural to his obstinate and undiscerning mind, that he was necessary to the settlement of the nation; so that, if he remained firm, the whole parliament and army must be at his feet. Yet during the negotiations at Newcastle there was daily an imminent danger that the majority of parliament, irritated by his delays, would come to some vote excluding him from the throne. The Scots presbyterians, whatever we may think of their behaviour, were sincerely attached, if not by loyal affection, yet by national pride, to the blood of their ancient kings. They thought and spoke of Charles as of a headstrong child, to be restrained and chastised, but never cast off.[341] But in England he had absolutely no friends among the prevailing party; many there were who thought monarchy best for the nation, but none who cared for the king.

This schism nevertheless between the parliament and the army was at least in appearance very desirable for Charles, and seemed to afford him an opportunity which a discreet prince might improve to great advantage, though it unfortunately deluded him with chimerical expectations.[342] At the conclusion of the war, which the useless obstinacy of the royalists had protracted till the beginning of 1647,[343] the Commons began to take measures for breaking the force of their remaining enemy. They resolved to disband a part of the army, and to send the rest into Ireland.[344] They formed schemes for getting rid of Cromwell, and even made some demur about continuing Fairfax in command.[345] But in all measures that exact prompt.i.tude and energy, treachery and timidity are apt to enfeeble the resolutions of a popular a.s.sembly. Their demonstrations of enmity were however so alarming to the army, who knew themselves disliked by the people, and dependent for their pay on the parliament, that as early as April, 1647, an overture was secretly made to the king, that they would replace him in his power and dignity. He cautiously answered, that he would not involve the kingdom in a fresh war, but should ever feel the strongest sense of this offer from the army.[346] Whether they were discontented at the coldness of this reply, or, as is more probable, the offer had only proceeded from a minority of the officers, no further overture was made, till not long afterwards the bold manoeuvre of Joyce had placed the king"s person in their power.

_The parliament yield to the army._--The first effect of this military violence was to display the parliament"s deficiency in political courage. It contained, we well know, a store of energetic spirits, not apt to swerve from their attachments. But, where two parties are almost equally balanced, the defection, which external circ.u.mstances must produce among those timid and feeble men from whom no a.s.sembly can be free, even though they should form but a small minority, will of course give a character of cowardice and vacillation to counsels, which is imputed to the whole. They immediately expunged, by a majority of 96 to 79, a vote of reprehension pa.s.sed some weeks before, upon a remonstrance from the army which the presbyterians had highly resented, and gave other proofs of retracing their steps. But the army was not inclined to accept their submission in full discharge of the provocation. It had schemes of its own for the reformation and settlement of the kingdom, more extensive than those of the presbyterian faction. It had its own wrongs also to revenge. Advancing towards London, the general and council of war sent up charges of treason against eleven princ.i.p.al members of that party, who obtained leave to retire beyond sea. Here may be said to have fallen the legislative power and civil government of England; which from this hour till that of the restoration had never more than a momentary and precarious gleam of existence, perpetually interrupted by the sword.

Those who have once bowed their knee to force, must expect that force will be for ever their master. In a few weeks after this submission of the Commons to the army, they were insulted by an unruly, tumultuous mob of apprentices, engaged in the presbyterian politics of the city, who compelled them by actual violence to rescind several of their late votes.[347] Trampled upon by either side, the two speakers, several peers, and a great number of the lower house, deemed it somewhat less ignominious, and certainly more politic, to throw themselves on the protection of the army. They were accordingly soon restored to their places, at the price of a more complete and irretrievable subjection to the military power than they had already undergone. Though the presbyterians maintained a pertinacious resistance within the walls of the house, it was evident that the real power of command was gone from them, and that Cromwell with the army must either become arbiters between the king and parliament, or crush the remaining authority of both.[348]

_Mysterious conduct of Cromwell._--There are few circ.u.mstances in our history which have caused more perplexity to inquirers than the conduct of Cromwell and his friends towards the king in the year 1647.

Those who look only at the ambitious and dissembling character of that leader, or at the fierce republicanism imputed to Ireton, will hardly believe that either of them could harbour anything like sincere designs of restoring him even to that remnant of sovereignty which the parliament would have spared. Yet, when we consider attentively the public doc.u.ments and private memoirs of that period, it does appear probable that their first intentions towards the king were not unfavourable, and so far sincere that it was their project to make use of his name rather than totally to set him aside. But whether by gratifying Cromwell and his a.s.sociates with honours, and throwing the whole administration into their hands, Charles would have long contrived to keep a tarnished crown on his head, must be very problematical.

_Imprudent hopes of the king._--The new gaolers of this unfortunate prince began by treating him with unusual indulgence, especially in permitting his episcopal chaplains to attend him. This was deemed a pledge of what he thought an invaluable advantage in dealing with the army, that they would not insist upon the covenant, which in fact was nearly as odious to them as to the royalists, though for very different reasons. Charles, naturally sanguine, and utterly incapable in every part of his life of taking a just view of affairs, was extravagantly elated by these equivocal testimonies of good-will. He blindly listened to private insinuations from rash or treacherous friends, that the soldiers were with him, just after his seizure by Joyce. "I would have you to know, sir," he said to Fairfax, "that I have as good an interest in the army as yourself;" an opinion as injudiciously uttered as it was absurdly conceived.[349] These strange expectations account for the ill reception which in the hasty irritation of disappointment he gave to the proposals of the army, when they were actually tendered to him at Hampton Court, and which seems to have eventually cost him his life. These proposals appear to have been drawn up by Ireton, a lawyer by education, and a man of much courage and capacity. He had been supposed, like a large proportion of the officers, to aim at a settlement of the nation under a democratical polity. But the army, even if their wishes in general went so far, which is hardly evident, were not yet so decidedly masters as to dictate a form of government uncongenial to the ancient laws and fixed prejudices of the people. Something of this tendency is discoverable in the propositions made to the king, which had never appeared in those of the parliament. It was proposed that parliaments should be biennial; that they should never sit less than a hundred and twenty days, nor more than two hundred and forty; that the representation of the Commons should be reformed, by abolishing small boroughs and increasing the number of members for counties, so as to render the House of Commons, as near as might be, an equal representation of the whole. In respect of the militia and some other points, they either followed the parliamentary propositions of Newcastle, or modified them favourably for the king. They excepted a very small number of the king"s adherents from the privilege of paying a composition for their estates, and set that of the rest considerably lower than had been fixed by the parliament. They stipulated that the royalists should not sit in the next parliament. As to religion, they provided for liberty of conscience, declared against the imposition of the covenant, and by insisting on the retrenchment of the coercive jurisdiction of bishops and the abrogation of penalties for not reading the common prayer, left it to be implied that both might continue established.[350] The whole tenor of these propositions was in a style far more respectful to the king, and lenient towards his adherents, than had ever been adopted since the beginning of the war.

The sincerity indeed of these overtures might be very questionable, if Cromwell had been concerned in them; but they proceeded from those elective tribunes called Agitators, who had been established in every regiment to superintend the interests of the army.[351] And the terms were surely as good as Charles had any reason to hope. The severities against his party
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