Read The History of England - Vols. 1 to 6 Online
Authors: David Hume
Some memorable causes, tried about this time, though they have State of the nation.
no relation to the Rye-house conspiracy, show the temper of the bench and of the juries. Oates was convicted of having called the duke a popish traitor; was condemned in damages to the amount of one hundred thousand pounds; and was adjudged to remain in prison till he should make payment. A like sentence was passed upon Dutton-Colt for a like offence. Sir Samuel Barnardiston was fined ten thousand pounds; because in some private letters which had been intercepted, he had reflected on the government. This gentleman was obnoxious, because he had been foreman of that jury, which rejected the bill against Shaftesbury. A pretence was therefore fallen upon for punishing him; though such a precedent may justly be deemed a very unusual act of severity, and sufficient to destroy all confidence in private friendship and correspondence.
There is another remarkable trial, which shows the disposition of the courts of judicature, and which, though it passed in the ensuing year, it may not be improper to relate in this place. One Rosewel, a presbyterian preacher, was accused by three women of having spoken treasonable words in a sermon. They swore to two or three periods, and agreed so exactly together, that there was not the smallest variation in their depositions. Rosewel on the other hand made a very good defence. He proved, that the witnesses were lewd and infamous persons. He proved, that, even during Cromwel’s usurpations, he had always been a royalist; that he prayed constantly for PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)
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the king in his family: and that in his sermons he often inculcated the obligations of loyalty. And as to the sermon, of which he was accused, several witnesses, who heard it, and some who wrote it in short hand, deposed that he had used no such expressions as those which were imputed to him. He offered his own notes as a farther proof. The women could not show by any circumstance or witness, that they were at his meeting.
And the expressions, to which they deposed, were so gross, that no man in his senses could be supposed to employ them before a mixt audience. It was also urged, that it appeared next to impossible for three women to remember so long a period upon one single hearing, and to remember it so exactly, as to agree to a tittle in their depositions with regard to it. The prisoner offered to put the whole upon this issue: He would pronounce, with his usual tone of voice, a period as long as that to which they had sworn; and then let them try to repeat it, if they could. What was more unaccountable, they had forgotten even the text of his sermon; nor did they remember any single passage, but the words, to which they gave evidence. After so strong a defence, the solicitor general thought not proper to make any reply: Even Jefferies went no farther than some general declamations against conventicles and presbyterians: Yet so violent were party-prejudices, that the jury gave a verdict against the prisoner; which however appeared so palpably unjust, that it was not carried into execution.
The duke of Monmouth had absconded on the first discovery of the conspiracy; and the court could get no intelligence of him. At length, Halifax, who began to apprehend the too great prevalence of the royal party, and who thought, that Monmouth’s interest would prove the best counterpoize to the duke’s, discovered his retreat, and prevailed on him to write two letters to the king, full of the tenderest and most submissive expressions. The king’s fondness was revived; and he permitted Monmouth to come to court. He even endeavoured to mediate a reconciliation between his son and his brother; and having promised Monmouth, that his testimony should never be employed against any of his friends, he engaged him to give a full account of the plot.
But, in order to put the country party to silence, he called next day an extraordinary council; and informed them, that Monmouth had showed great penitence for the share which he had had in the late conspiracy, and had expressed his resolutions never more to engage in such criminal enterprizes. He went so far as to give orders, that a paragraph to the like purpose should be inserted in the Gazette. Monmouth kept silence till he had obtained his pardon in form: But finding, that, by taking this step, he was entirely disgraced with his party, and that, even though he should not be produced in court as an evidence, his testimony, being so publicly known, might have weight with juries on any future trial, he resolved at all hazards to retrieve his honour.
His emissaries, therefore, received orders to deny, that he had ever made any such confession as that which was imputed to him; and the party exclaimed, that the whole was an imposture of the court. The king provoked at this conduct, banished Monmouth his presence, and afterwards ordered him to depart the kingdom.
The court was aware, that the malcontents in England had held a correspondence with those of Scotland; and that Baillie of Jerviswood, a man of merit and learning, with two gentlemen of the name of Campbel, had come to London, under pretence of negociating the settlement of the Scottish presbyterians in Carolina, but really with a view of concerting measures with the English conspirators. Baillie was sent prisoner to Edinburgh; but as no evidence appeared against him, the council required him to PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)
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swear, that he would answer all questions, which should be propounded to him. He refused to submit to so iniquitous a condition; and a fine of six thousand pounds was imposed upon him. At length, two persons, Spence and Carstares, being put to the torture, gave evidence which involved the earl of Tarras and some others, who, in order to save themselves, were reduced to accuse Baillie. He was brought to trial; and being in so languishing a condition from the treatment which he had met with in prison, that it was feared he would not survive that night, he was ordered to be executed the very afternoon on which he received sentence.
The severities, exercised during this part of the present reign, were much contrary to the usual tenor of the king’s conduct; and though those who studied his character more narrowly, have pronounced, that towards great offences he was rigid and inexorable, the nation were more inclined to ascribe every unjust or hard measure to the prevalence of the duke, into whose hands the king had, from indolence, not from any opinion of his brother’s superior capacity, resigned the reins of government. The crown indeed gained great advantage from the detection of the conspiracy, and lost none by the rigorous execution of the conspirators: The horror entertained against the assassination-plot, which was generally confounded with the project for an insurrection, rendered the whole party unpopular, and reconciled the nation to the measures of the court. The most loyal addresses came from all parts; and the doctrine of submission to the civil magistrate, and even of an unlimited passive obedience, became the reigning principle of the times. The university of Oxford passed a solemn decree, condemning some doctrines, which they termed republican, but which indeed are, most of them, the only tenets, on which liberty and a limited constitution can be founded. The faction of the exclusionists, lately so numerous, powerful, and zealous, were at the king’s feet; and were as much fallen in their spirit as in their credit with the nation. Nothing that had the least appearance of opposition to the court, could be
The king endeavoured to encrease his present popularity by 1684.
every art; and knowing, that the suspicion of popery was of all others the most dangerous, he judged it proper to marry his niece, the lady Anne, to prince George, brother to the king of Denmark. All the credit, however, and persuasion of Halifax could not engage him to call a parliament, or trust the nation with the election of a new representative. Though his revenues were extremely burthened, he rather chose to struggle with the present difficulties, than try an experiment, which, by raising afresh so many malignant humours, might prove dangerous to his repose. The duke likewise zealously opposed this proposal, and even engaged the king in measures, which could have no tendency, but to render any accommodation with a parliament altogether impracticable. Williams, who had been speaker during the two last parliaments, was prosecuted for warrants, issued by him, in obedience to orders of the house: A breach of privilege, which, it seemed not likely, any future house of commons would leave unquestioned. Danby and the popish lords, who had so long been confined in the Tower, and who saw no prospect of a trial in parliament, applied by petition, and were admitted to bail: A measure just in itself, but deemed a great encroachment on the privileges of that assembly. The duke, contrary to law, was restored to the office of high admiral, without taking the test.
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Had the least grain of jealousy or emulation been mixed in the king’s character; had he been actuated by that concern for his people’s or even for his own honour, which his high station demanded, he would have hazarded many domestic inconveniencies rather than allow France to domineer in so haughty a manner as that which at present she assumed in every negociation.
The peace of Nimeguen, imposed by the Dutch on their
State of foreign
unwilling allies, had disjointed the whole confederacy; and all affairs.
the powers, engaged in it, had disbanded their supernumerary troops, which they found it difficult to subsist. Lewis alone still maintained a powerful army, and by his preparations rendered himself every day more formidable.
He now acted as if he were the sole sovereign in Europe, and as if all other princes were soon to become his vassals. Courts or chambers were erected in Metz and Brisac, for re-uniting such territories as had ever been members of any part of his new conquests. They made inquiry into titles buried in the most remote antiquity. They cited the neighbouring princes to appear before them, and issued decrees, expelling them the contested territories. The important town of Strasbourg, an ancient and a free state, was seized by Lewis: Alost was demanded of the Spaniards, on a frivolous, and even ridiculous pretence; and upon their refusal to yield it, Luxembourg was blockaded, and soon after taken.
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Genoa had been bombarded, because the Genoese had stipulated to build some gallies for the Spaniards; and, in order to avoid more severe treatment, that republic was obliged to yield to the most mortifying conditions.
The empire was insulted in its head and principal members; and used no other expedient for redress, than impotent complaints and remonstrances.
Spain was so enraged at the insolent treatment which she met with, that, without considering her present weak condition, she declared war against her haughty enemy: She hoped that the other powers of Europe, sensible of the common danger, would fly to her assistance. The prince of Orange, whose ruling passions were love of war and animosity against France, seconded every where the applications of the Spaniards. In the year 1681, he made a journey to England, in order to engage the king into closer measures with the confederates. He also proposed to the States to make an augmentation of their forces; but several of the provinces, and even the town of Amsterdam, had been gained by the French, and the proposal was rejected. The prince’s enemies derived the most plausible reasons of their opposition from the situation of England, and the known and avowed attachments of the English monarch.
No sooner had Charles dismissed his parliament, and embraced the resolution of governing by prerogative alone, than he dropped his new alliance with Spain and returned to his former dangerous connections with Lewis. This prince had even offered to make him arbiter of his differences with Spain; and the latter power, sensible of Charles’s partiality, had refused to submit to such a disadvantageous proposal. Whether any money was now remitted to England, we do not certainly know: But we may fairly presume, that the king’s necessities were in some degree
relieved by France.n
And though Charles had reason to apprehend the utmost danger from the great, and still encreasing, naval power of that kingdom, joined to the weak condition of the English fleet, no consideration was able to rouze him from his present lethargy.
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It is here we are to fix the point of the highest exaltation, which the power of Lewis or that of any European prince, since the age of Charlemagne, had ever attained. The monarch, most capable of opposing his progress was entirely engaged in his interests; and the Turks, invited by the malcontents of Hungary, were preparing to invade the emperor, and to disable that prince from making head against the progress of the French power. Lewis may even be accused of oversight, in not making sufficient advantage of such favourable opportunities, which he was never afterwards able to recall. But that monarch, though more governed by motives of ambition than by those of justice or moderation, was still more actuated by the suggestions of vanity. He contented himself with insulting and domineering over all the princes and free states of Europe; and he thereby provoked their resentment, without subduing their power.
While every one, who approached his person, and behaved with submission to his authority, was treated with the highest politeness; all the neighbouring potentates had successively felt the effects of his haughty imperious disposition. And by indulging his poets, orators, and courtiers in their flatteries, and in their prognostications of universal empire, he conveyed faster, than by the prospect of his power alone, the apprehension of general conquest and subjection.
The French greatness never, during his whole reign, inspired 1685.