Read The History of England - Vols. 1 to 6 Online
Authors: David Hume
The History of England - Vols. 1 to 6 (182 page)
[[K]]Knyghton, p. 2715, &c. The same author, p. 2680, tells us, that the king, in return to the message, said, that he would not for their desire remove the meanest scullion from his kitchen. This author also tells us, that the king said to the commissioners, when they harangued him, that he saw his subjects were rebellious, PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)
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and his best way would be to call in the king of France to his aid. But it is plain, that all these speeches were either intended by Knyghton merely as an ornament to his history, or are false. For (1) when the five lords accuse the king’s ministers in the next parliament, and impute to them every rash action of the king, they speak nothing of those replies which are so obnoxious, were so recent, and are pretended to have been so public. (2) The king, so far from having any connexions at that time with France, was threatend with a dangerous invasion from that kingdom. This story seems to have been taken from the reproaches afterwards thrown out against him, and to have been transferred by the historian to this time, to which they cannot be applied.
[[L]]We must except the 12th article, which accuses Brembre of having cut off the
heads of twenty-two prisoners, confined for felony or debt, without warrant or process of law: But as it is not conceivable what interest Brembre could have to treat these felons and debtors in such a manner, we may presume that the fact is either false or misrepresented. It was in these men’s power to say any thing against the persons accused: No defence or apology was admitted: All was lawless will and pleasure.They are also accused of designs to murder the lords: but these accusations either are general, or destroy one another. Sometimes, as in article 15th, they intend to murder them by means of the mayor and city of London: Sometimes, as in article 28th, by trial and false inquests: Sometimes, as in article 28th, by means of the king of France, who was to receive Calais for his pains.
[[M]]In general, the parliament in those days never paid a proper regard to Edward’s
statute of treasons, though one of the most advantageous laws for the subject that has ever been enacted. In the 17th of the king, the dukes of Lancaster and Glocester complain to Richard, that Sir Thomas Talbot, with others of his adherents, conspired the death of the said dukes in divers parts of Cheshire, as the same was confessed and well known; and praying that the parliament may judge of the fault. Whereupon the king and the lords in the parliament judged the same fact to be open and high treason: And hereupon they award two writs, the one to the sheriff of York, and the other to the sheriffs of Derby, to take the body of the said Sir Thomas returnable in the King’s bench in the month of Easter then ensuing. And open proclamation was made in Westminster-hall, that upon the sheriffs return, and at the next coming in of the said Sir Thomas, the said Thomas should be convicted of treason, and incur the loss and pain of the same: And all such as should receive him after the proclamation should incur the same loss and pain. Cotton, p. 354. It is to be observed, that this extraordinary judgment was passed in a time of tranquillity. Though the statute itself of Edward III. reserves a power to the parliament to declare any new species of treason, it is not to be supposed that this power was reserved to the house of lords alone, or that men were to be judged by a law ex post facto. At least, if such be the meaning of the clause; it may be affirmed, that men were at that time very ignorant of the first principles of law and justice.
[[N]]In the preceding parliament, the commons had shewn a disposition very
complaisant to the king; yet there happend an incident in their proceedings, which is curious, and shews us the state of the house during that period. The members were either country gentlemen, or merchants, who were assembled for a few days, and were entirely unacquainted with business; so that it was easy to lead them astray, and draw PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)
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them into votes and resolutions very different from their intention. Some petitions, concerning the state of the nation, were voted; in which, among other things, the house recommended frugality to the king, and for that purpose, desired, that the court should not be so much frequented as formerly by bishops and ladies. The king was displeased with this freedom: The commons very humbly craved pardon: He was not satisfied unless they would name the mover of the petitions. It happened to be one Haxey, whom the parliament, in order to make atonement, condemned for this offence to die the death of a traitor. But the king, at the desire of the archbishop of Canterbury, and the prelates, pardoned him. When a parliament in those times, not agitated by any faction, and being at entire freedom, could be guilty of such monstrous extravagance, it is easy to judge what might be expected from them in more trying situations. See Cotton’s Abridg. p. 361, 362.
[[O]]To show how little credit is to be given to this charge against Richard, we may observe, that a law in the 13 Edw. III. had been enacted against the continuance of sheriffs for more than one year: But the inconvenience of changes having afterwards appeared from experience, the commons in the twentieth of this king, applied by petition that the sheriffs might be continued; though that petition had not been enacted into a statute, by reason of other disagreeable circumstances, which attended it. See Cotton, p. 361. It was certainly a very moderate exercise of the dispensing power in the king to continue the sheriffs, after he found that that practice would be acceptable to his subjects, and had been applied for by one house of parliament: Yet is this made an article of charge against him by the present parliament. See art. 18. Walsingham, speaking of a period early in Richard’s minority, says, But what do acts of parliament signify, when, after they are made, they take no effect; since the king, by the advice of the privy council, takes upon him to alter or wholly set aside, all those things, which by general consent had been ordained in parliament? If Richard, therefore, exercised the dispensing power, he was warranted by the examples of his uncles and grandfather, and indeed of all his predecessors from the time of Henry III, inclusive.
[[P]]The following passage in Cotton’s Abridgment, p. 196, shows a strange prejudice against the church and churchmen. The commons afterwards coming into the parliament, and making their protestation, shewed, that for want of good redress about the king’s person in his household, in all his courts, touching maintainers in every county, and purveyors, the commons were daily pilled, and nothing defended against the enemy, and that it should shortly deprive the king and undo the state. Wherefore in the same government, they entirely require redress. Whereupon the king appointed sundry bishops, lords and nobles, to sit in privy-council about these matters: Who since that they must begin at the head, and go at the request of the commons, they in the presence of the king charged his confessor not to come into the court but upon the four principal festivals. We should little expect that a popish privy-council, in order to preserve the king’s morals, should order his confessor to be kept at a distance from him. This incident happened in the minority of Richard. As the popes had for a long time resided at Avignon, and the majority of the sacred college were Frenchmen, this circumstance naturally encreased the aversion of the nation to the papal power: But the prejudice against the English clergy cannot be accounted for from that cause.
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[[Q]]That we may judge how arbitrary a court, that of the constable of England was, we may peruse the patent granted to the earl of Rivers in this reign, as it is to be found in Spellman’s Glossary in verb. Constabularius; as also, more fully in Rymer, vol. xi.
p. 581. Here is a clause of it: Et ulterius de uberiori gratia nostra eidem comiti de Rivers plenam potestatem damus ad cognoscendum, & procedendum, in omnibus, & singulis, causis et negotiis, de et super crimine lesae majestatis, seu super occasione caeterisque causis, quibuscunque per praefatum comitem de Rivers, ut constabularium Angliae—quae in curia constabularii Angliae ab antiquo, viz. tempore dicti domini Gulielmi conquestoris seu aliquo tempore citra tractari, audiri, examinari, aut decidi consueverant, aut jure debuerant, aut debent, causasque et negotia praedicta cum omnibus et singulis emergentibus, incidentibus & connexis, audiendum, examinandum, et fine debito terminandum, etiam summarie et de plano, sine strepitu et figura justitiae, sola facti veritate inspecta, ac etiam manu regia, si opportunum visum fuerit eidem comiti de Rivers, vices nostras, appellatione remota. The office of constable was perpetual in the monarchy; its jurisdiction was not limited to times of war, as appears from this patent, and as we learn from Spellman: Yet its authority was in direct contradiction to Magna Charta; and it is evident, that no regular liberty could subsist with it. It involved a full dictatorial power, continually subsisting in the state.
The only check on the crown, besides the want of force to support all its prerogatives, was, that the office of constable was commonly either hereditary or during life; and the person invested with it, was, for that reason, not so proper an instrument of arbitrary power in the king. Accordingly the office was suppressed by Henry VIII. the most arbitrary of all the English princes. The practice, however, of exercising martial law, still subsisted; and was not abolished till the petition of Right under Charles I.
This was the epoch of true liberty, confirmed by the Restoration, and enlarged and secured by the Revolution.
[[R]]We shall give an instance: Almost all the historians, even Comines, and the continuator of the annals of Croyland, assert that Edward was about this time taken prisoner by Clarence and Warwic, and was committed to the custody of the archbishop of York, brother to the earl; but being allowed to take the diversion of hunting by this prelate, he made his escape, and afterwards chaced the rebels out of the kingdom. But that all the story is false appears from Rymer, where we find, that the king, throughout all this period, continually exercised his authority, and never was interrupted in his government. On the 7th of March 1470, he gives a commission of array to Clarence, whom he then imagined a good subject; and on the 23d of the same month, we find him issuing an order for apprehending him. Besides, in the king’s manifesto against the duke and earl, (Claus. 10 Edward IV. m. 7, 8.) where he enumerates all their treasons, he mentions no such fact: He does not so much as accuse them of exciting young Welles’s rebellion: He only says, that they exhorted him to continue in his rebellion. We may judge how smaller facts will be misrepresented by historians, who can in the most material transactions mistake so grossly. There may even some doubt arise with regard to the proposal of marriage made to Bona of Savoy; though almost all the historians concur in it, and the fact be very likely in itself: For there are no traces in Rymer of any such embassy of Warwic’s to France. The chief certainty in this and the preceding reign arises either from public records, or from the notice taken of certain passages by the French historians. On the contrary, for some centuries after the conquest, the French history is PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)
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not complete without the assistance of English authors. We may conjecture, that the reason of the scarcity of historians during this period, was the destruction of the convents, which ensued so soon after: Copies of the more recent historians not being yet sufficiently dispersed, these histories have perished.
[[S]]Sir Thomas More, who has been followed, or rather transcribed, by all the historians of this short reign, says, that Jane Shore had fallen into connexions with lord Hastings; and this account agrees best with the course of the events: But in a proclamation of Richard’s, to be found in Rymer, vol. xii. p. 204, the marquis of Dorset is reproached with these connexions. This reproach, however, might have been invented by Richard, or founded only on popular rumour; and is not sufficient to overbalance the authority of Sir Thomas More. The proclamation is remarkable for the hypocritical purity of manners affected by Richard: This bloody and treacherous tyrant upbraids the marquis and others, with their gallantries and intrigues as the most terrible enormities.
[[T]]Every one that has perused the ancient monkish writers, knows, that, however barbarous their own style, they are full of allusions to the Latin classics, especially the poets. There seems also in those middle ages to have remained many ancient books, that are now lost. Malmesbury, who flourished in the reign of Henry I. and king Stephen, quotes Livy’s description of Caesar’s passage over the Rubicon. Fitz-Stephen, who lived in the reign of Henry II. alludes to a passage in the larger history of Sallust. In the collection of letters, which passes under the name of Thomas a Becket, we see how familiar all the ancient history and ancient books were to the more ingenious and more dignified churchmen of that time, and consequently how much that order of men must have surpassed all the other members of the society.
That prelate and his friends call each other Philosophers in all the course of their correspondence, and consider the rest of the world as sunk in total ignorance and barbarism.
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