Afterwards they proceeded, but in a very temperate manner, to the examination of grievances. They found, that patents had been granted to Sir Giles Mompesson and Sir Francis Michel, for licensing inns and alehouses; that great sums of money had been exacted, under pretext of these licenses; and that such innkeepers as presumed to continue their business without satisfying the rapacity of the patentees, had been severely punished by fine, imprisonment, and vexatious prosecutions.
The same persons had also procured a patent, which they shared with Sir Edward Villiers, brother to Buckingham, for the sole making of gold and silver thread and lace, and had obtained very extraordinary powers for preventing any rivalship in these manufactures: they were armed with authority to search for all goods which might interfere with their patent; and even to punish, at their own will and discretion, the makers, importers, and venders of such commodities. Many had grievously suffered by this exorbitant jurisdiction; and the lace which had been manufactured by the patentees was universally found to be adulterated, and to be composed more of copper than of the precious metals.
These grievances the commons represented to the king and they met with a very gracious and very cordial reception. He seemed even thankful for the information given him; and declared himself ashamed that such abuses, unknowingly to him, had crept into his administration. “I assure you,” said he, “had I before heard these things complained of, I would have done the office of a just king, and out of parliament have punished them, as severely, and peradventure more, than you now intend to do.”[*] A sentence was passed for the punishment of Michel and Mompesson.[**] It was executed on the former. The latter broke prison and escaped. Villiers was at that time sent purposely on a foreign employment; and his guilt, being less enormous, or less apparent, than that of the others, he was the more easily protected by the credit of his brother Buckingham.[***]
Encouraged by this success, the commons carried their scrutiny, and still with a respectful hand, into other abuses of importance. The great seal was at that time in the hands of the celebrated Bacon, created Viscount St. Albans; a man universally admired for the greatness of his genius, and beloved for the courteousness and humanity of his behavior. He was the great ornament of his age and nation; and nought was wanting to render him the ornament of human nature itself, but that strength of mind which might check his intemperate desire of preferment, that could add nothing to his dignity, and might restrain his profuse inclination to expense, that could be requisite neither for his honor nor entertainment. His want of economy, and his indulgence to servants, had involved him in necessities; and, in order to supply his prodigality, he had been tempted to take bribes, by the title of presents, and that in a very open manner, from suitors in chancery. It appears that it had been usual for former chancellors to take presents; and it is pretended that Bacon, who followed the same dangerous practice, had still, in the seat of justice, preserved the integrity of a judge, and had given just decrees against those very persons from whom he had received the wages of iniquity. Complaints rose the louder on that account, and at last reached the house of commons, who sent up an impeachment against him to the peers. The chancellor, conscious of guilt, deprecated the vengeance of his judges, and endeavored, by a general avowal, to escape the confusion of a stricter inquiry. The lords insisted on a particular confession of all his corruptions. He acknowledged twenty-eight articles; and was sentenced to pay a fine of forty thousand pounds, to be imprisoned in the Tower during the king’s pleasure, to be forever incapable of any office, place, or employment, and never again to sit in parliament, or come within the verge of the court.
This dreadful sentence, dreadful to a man of nice sensibility to honor, he survived five years; and being released in a little time from the Tower, his genius, yet unbroken, supported itself amidst involved circumstances and a depressed spirit, and shone out in literary productions which have made his guilt or weaknesses be forgotten or overlooked by posterity. In consideration of his great merit, the king remitted his fine, as well as all the other parts of his sentence, conferred on him a large pension of one thousand eight hundred pounds a year, and employed every expedient to alleviate the weight of his age and misfortunes. And that great philosopher at last acknowledged with regret, that he had too long neglected the true ambition of a fine genius; and by plunging into business and affairs, which require much less capacity, but greater firmness of mind, than the pursuits of learning, had exposed himself to such grievous calamities.[*]
The commons had entertained the idea, that they were the great patrons of the people, and that the redress of all grievances must proceed from them; and to this principle they were chiefly beholden for the regard and consideration of the public. In the execution of this office, they now kept their ears open to complaints of every kind; and they carried their researches into many grievances which, though of no great importance, could not be touched on without sensibly affecting the king and his ministers. The prerogative seemed every moment to be invaded; the king’s authority, in every article, was disputed; and James, who was willing to correct the abuses of his power, would not submit to have his power itself questioned and denied. After the house, therefore, had sitten near six months, and had as yet brought no considerable business to a full conclusion, the king resolved, under pretence of the advanced season, to interrupt their proceedings; and he sent them word, that he was determined, in a little time, to adjourn them till next winter. The commons made application to the lords, and desired them to join in a petition for delaying the adjournment; which was refused by the upper house. The king regarded this project of a joint petition as an attempt to force him from his measures: he thanked the peers for their refusal to concur in it; and told them, that, if it were their desire, he would delay the adjournment, but would not so far comply with the request of the lower house.[**] And thus, in these great national affairs, the same peevishness, which, in private altercations, often raises a quarrel from the smallest beginnings, produced a mutual coldness and disgust between the king and the commons.
During the recess of parliament, the king used every measure to render himself popular with the nation, and to appease the rising ill humor of their representatives. He had voluntarily offered the parliament to circumscribe his own prerogative, and to abrogate, for the future, his power of granting monopolies. He now recalled all the patents of that kind and redressed every article of grievance, to the number of thirty-seven, which had ever been complained of in the house of commons.[*] But he gained not the end which he proposed. The disgust which had appeared at parting, could not so suddenly be dispelled. He had likewise been so imprudent as to commit to prison Sir Edwin Sandys,[**] without any known cause, besides his activity and vigor in discharging his duty as member of parliament. And, above all, the transactions in Germany were sufficient, when joined to the king’s cautions, negotiations, and delays, to inflame that jealousy of honor and religion which prevailed throughout the nation.[***] This summer, the ban of the empire had been published against the elector palatine; and the execution of it was committed to the duke of Bavaria.[****] The Upper Palatinate was, in a little time, conquered by that prince; and measures were taking in the empire for bestowing on him the electoral dignity, of which the palatine was then despoiled. Frederic now lived with his numerous family, in poverty and distress, either in Holland, or at Sedan with his uncle the duke of Bouillon. And throughout all the new conquests, in both the Palatinates, as well as in Bohemia, Austria, and Lusatia, the progress of the Austrian arms was attended with rigors and severities, exercised against the professors of the reformed religion.
The zeal of the commons immediately moved them, upon their assembling, to take all these transactions into consideration. They framed a remonstrance, which they intended to carry to the king. They represented, that the enormous growth of the Austrian power threatened the liberties of Europe; that the progress of the Catholic religion in England bred the most melancholy apprehensions, lest it should again acquire an ascendant in the kingdom; that the indulgence of his majesty towards the professors of that religion had encouraged their insolence and temerity; that the uncontrolled conquests made by the Austrian family in Germany, raised mighty expectations in the English Papists; but above all, that the prospect of the Spanish match elevated them so far as to hope for an entire toleration, if not the final reëstablishment of their religion. The commons, therefore, entreated his majesty, that he would immediately undertake the defence of the Palatinate, and maintain it by force of arms; that he would turn his sword against Spain, whose armies and treasures were the chief support of the Catholic interest in Europe that he would enter into no negotiation for the marriage of his son but with a Protestant princess; that the children of Popish recusants should be taken from their parents, and be committed to the care of Protestant teachers and schoolmasters; and that the fines and confiscations to which the Catholics were by law liable, should be levied with the utmost severity.[*]
By this bold step, unprecedented in England for many years, and scarcely ever heard of in peaceable times, the commons attacked at once all the king’s favorite maxims of government; his cautious and pacific measures, his lenity towards the Romish religion, and his attachment to the Spanish alliance, from which he promised himself such mighty advantages. But what most disgusted him was, their seeming invasion of his prerogative, and their pretending, under color of advice, to direct his conduct in such points as had ever been acknowledged to belong solely to the management and direction of the sovereign. He was at that time absent at Newmarket; but as soon as he heard of the intended remonstrance of the commons, he wrote a letter to the speaker, in which he sharply rebuked the house for openly debating matters far above their reach and capacity; and he strictly forbade them to meddle with any thing that regarded his government, or deep matters of state, and especially not to touch on his son’s marriage with the daughter of Spain, nor to attack the honor of that king, or any other of his friends and confederates. In order the more to intimidate them, he mentioned the imprisonment of Sir Edwin Sandys; and though he denied that the confinement of that member had been owing to any offence committed in the house, he plainly told them, that he thought himself fully entitled to punish every misdemeanor in parliament, as well during its sitting as after its dissolution; and that he intended thenceforward to chastise any man whose insolent behavior there should minister occasion of offence.[*]
This violent letter, in which the king, though he here imitated former precedents, may be thought not to have acted altogether on the defensive, had the effect which might naturally have been expected from it: the commons were inflamed, not terrified. Secure of their own popularity, and of the bent of the nation towards a war with the Catholics abroad, and the persecution of Popery at home, they little dreaded the menaces of a prince who was unsupported by military force, and whose gentle temper would, of itself, so soon disarm his severity. In a new remonstrance, therefore, they still insisted on their former remonstrance and advice; and they maintained, though in respectful terms, that they were entitled to interpose with their counsel in all matters of government; that to possess entire freedom of speech in their debates on public business, was their ancient and undoubted right, and an inheritance transmitted to them from their ancestors; and that if any member abused this liberty, it belonged to the house alone, who were witnesses of his offence, to inflict a proper censure upon him.[**]
So vigorous an answer was nowise calculated to appease the king. It is said, when the approach of the committee who were to present it was notified to him, he ordered twelve chairs to be brought; for that there were so many kings a coming.[***]
His answer was prompt and sharp. He told the house, that their remonstrance was more like a denunciation of war than an address of dutiful subjects; that their pretension to inquire into all state affairs, without exception, was such a plenipotence as none of their ancestors, even during the reign of the weakest princes, had ever pretended to; that public transactions depended on a complication of views and intelligence, with which they were entirely unacquainted; that they could not better show their wisdom, as well as duty, than by keeping within their proper sphere;[*] and that in any business which depended on his prerogative, they had no title to interpose with their advice, except when he was pleased to desire it. And he concluded with these memorable words: “And though we cannot allow of your style, in mentioning your ancient and undoubted right and inheritance, but would rather have wished that ye had said, that your privileges were derived from the grace and permission of our ancestors and us, (for the most of them grew from precedents, which shows rather a toleration than inheritance,) yet we are pleased to give you our royal assurance, that as long as you contain yourselves within the limits of your duty, we will be as careful to maintain and preserve your lawful liberties and privileges as ever any of our predecessors were, nay, as to preserve our own royal prerogative.”[**]
This open pretension of the king’s naturally gave great alarm to the house of commons. They saw their title to every privilege, if not plainly denied, yet considered at least as precarious. It might be fortified by abuse; and they had already abused it. They thought proper, therefore, immediately to oppose pretension to pretension. They framed a protestation, in which they repeated all their former claims for freedom of speech, and an unbounded authority to interpose with their advice and counsel. And they asserted, “That the liberties, franchises, privileges, and jurisdictions of parliament, are the ancient and undoubted birthright and inheritance of the subjects of England.”[***]
The king, informed of these increasing heats and jealousies in the house, hurried to town. He sent immediately for the journals of the commons; and, with his own hand, before the council, he tore out this protestation;[****] 56 and ordered his reasons to be inserted in the council-book. He was doubly displeased, he said, with the protestation of the lower house, on account of the manner of framing it, as well as of the matter which it contained.
It was tumultuously voted, at a late hour, and in a thin house; and it was expressed in such general and ambiguous terms,[*] as might serve for a foundation to the most enormous claims, and to the most unwarrantable usurpations upon his prerogative.[**]
The meeting of the house might have proved dangerous after so violent a breach. It was no longer possible, while men were in such a temper, to finish any business. The king, therefore, prorogued the parliament, and soon after dissolved it by proclamation; in which he also made an apology to the public for his whole conduct.
The leading members of the house, Sir Edward Coke and Sir Robert Philips, were committed to the Tower; Selden Pym, and Mallory, to other prisons. As a lighter punishment, Sir Dudley Digges, Sir Thomas Crew, Sir Nathaniel Rich, Sir James Perrot, joined in commission with others, were sent to Ireland, in order to execute some business.[***] The king at that time enjoyed, at least exercised, the prerogative of employing any man, even without his consent, in any branch of public service.
Sir John Savile, a powerful man in the house of commons, and a zealous opponent of the court, was made comptroller of the household, a privy counsellor, and soon after a baron.[****] This event is memorable, as being the first instance, perhaps, in the whole history of England, of any king’s advancing a man on account of parliamentary interest, and of opposition to his measures. However irregular this practice, it will be regarded by political reasoners as one of the most early and most infallible symptoms of a regular, established liberty.
The king having thus, with so rash and indiscreet a hand, torn off that sacred veil which had hitherto covered the English constitution, and which threw an obscurity upon it so advantageous to royal prerogative, every man began to indulge himself in political reasonings and inquiries; and the same factions which commenced in parliament, were propagated throughout the nation. In vain did James, by reiterated proclamations, forbid the discoursing of state affairs.[v] Such proclamations, if they had any effect, served rather to inflame the curiosity of the public. And in every company or society, the late transactions became the subject of argument and debate.
All history, said the partisans of the court, as well as the history of England, justify the king’s position with regard to the origin of popular privileges; and every reasonable man must allow, that as monarchy is the most simple form of government, it must first have occurred to rude and uninstructed mankind. The other complicated and artificial additions were the successive invention of sovereigns and legislators; or, if they were obtruded on the prince by seditious subjects, their origin must appear, on that very account, still more precarious and unfavorable. In England, the authority of the king, in all the exterior forms of government, and in the common style of law, appears totally absolute and sovereign; nor does the real spirit of the constitution, as it has ever discovered itself in practice, fall much short of these appearances. The parliament is created by his will; by his will it is dissolved. It is his will alone, though at the desire of both houses, which gives authority to laws. To all foreign nations, the majesty of the monarch seems to merit sole attention and regard. And no subject who has exposed himself to royal indignation, can hope to live with safety in the kingdom; nor can he even leave it, according to law, without the consent of his master. If a magistrate, environed with such power and splendor, should consider his authority as sacred, and regard himself as the anointed of Heaven, his pretensions may bear a very favorable construction. Or, allowing them to be merely pious frauds, we need not be surprised, that the same stratagem which was practised by Minos, Numa, and the most celebrated legislators of antiquity, should now, in these restless and inquisitive times, be employed by the king of England. Subjects are not raised above that quality, though assembled in parliament. The same humble respect and deference is still due to their prince. Though he indulges them in the privilege of laying before him their domestic grievances, with which they are supposed to be best acquainted, this warrants not their bold intrusion into every province of government. And, to all judicious examiners, it must appear, “That the lines of duty are as much transgressed by a more independent and less respectful exercise of acknowledged powers, as by the usurpation of such as are new and unusual.”[*]
The lovers of liberty throughout the nation reasoned after a different manner. It is in vain, said they, that the king traces up the English government to its first origin, in order to represent the privileges of parliament as dependent and precarious: prescription, and the practice of so many ages, must, long ere this time, have given a sanction to these assemblies, even though they had been derived from an origin no more dignified than that which he assigns them. If the written records of the English nation, as asserted, represent parliaments to have arisen from the consent of monarchs, the principles of human nature, when we trace government a step higher, must show us, that monarchs themselves owe all their authority to the voluntary submission of the people. But, in fact, no age can be shown, when the English government was altogether an unmixed monarchy; and, if the privileges of the nation have, at any period, been overpowered by violent irruptions of foreign force or domestic usurpation, the generous spirit of the people has ever seized the first opportunity of reëstablishing the ancient government and constitution. Though in the style of the laws, and in the usual forms of administration, royal authority may be represented as sacred and supreme, whatever is essential to the exercise of sovereign and legislative power must still be regarded as equally divine and inviolable. Or, if any distinction be made in this respect, the preference is surely due to those national councils, by whose interposition the exorbitancies of tyrannical power are restrained, and that sacred liberty is preserved, which heroic spirits, in all ages, have deemed more precious than life itself. Nor is it sufficient to say, that the mild and equitable administration of James affords little occasion, or no occasion, of complaint. How moderate soever the exercise of his prerogative, how exact soever his observance of the laws and constitution, “If he founds his authority on arbitrary and dangerous principles, it is requisite to watch him with the same care, and to oppose him with the same vigor, as if he had indulged himself in all the excesses of cruelty and tyranny.”
Amidst these disputes, the wise and moderate in the nation endeavored to preserve, as much as possible, an equitable neutrality between the opposite parties; and the more they reflected on the course of public affairs, the greater difficulty they found in fixing just sentiments with regard to them. On the one hand, they regarded the very rise of parties as a happy prognostic of the establishment of liberty; nor could they ever expect to enjoy, in a mixed government, so invaluable a blessing, without suffering that inconvenience which, in such governments, has ever attended it. But when they considered, on the other hand, the necessary aims and pursuits of both parties, they were struck with apprehension of the consequences, and could discover no feasible plan of accommodation between them. From long practice, the crown was now possessed of so exorbitant a prerogative, that it was not sufficient for liberty to remain on the defensive, or endeavor to secure the little ground which was left her: it was become necessary to carry on an offensive war, and to circumscribe, within more narrow, as well as more exact bounds; the authority of the sovereign. Upon such provocation, it could not but happen, that the prince, however just and moderate, would endeavor to repress his opponents; and, as he stood upon the very brink of arbitrary power, it was to be feared that he would, hastily and unknowingly, pass those limits which were not precisely marked by the constitution. The turbulent government of England, ever fluctuating between privilege and prerogative, would afford a variety of precedents, which might be pleaded on both sides. In such delicate questions, the people must be divided: the arms of the state were still in their hands: a civil war must ensue; a civil war where no party, or both parties, would justly bear the blame and where the good and virtuous would scarcely know what vows to form; were it not that liberty, so necessary to the perfection of human society, would be sufficient to bias their affections towards the side of its defenders.
1622.
To wrest the Palatinate from the hands of the emperor and the duke of Bavaria, must always have been regarded as a difficult task for the power of England, conducted by so unwarlike a prince as James: it was plainly impossible, while the breach subsisted between him and the commons. The king’s negotiations, therefore, had they been managed with ever so great dexterity, must now carry less weight with them; and it was easy to elude all his applications. When Lord Digby, his ambassador to the emperor, had desired a cessation of hostilities, he was referred to the duke of Bavaria, who commanded the Austrian armies. The duke of Bavaria told him, that it was entirely superfluous to form any treaty for that purpose. “Hostilities are already ceased,” said he, “and I doubt not but I shall be able to prevent their revival, by keeping firm possession of the Palatinate, till a final agreement shall be concluded between the contending parties.”[*]
Notwithstanding this insult, James endeavored to resume with the emperor a treaty of accommodation; and he opened the negotiations at Brussels, under the mediation of Archduke Albert; and, after his death, which happened about this time, under that of the infanta: when the conferences were entered upon, it was found, that the powers of these princes to determine in the controversy were not sufficient or satisfactory. Schwartzenbourg, the imperial minister, was expected at London; and it was hoped that he would bring more ample authority: his commission referred entirely to the negotiation at Brussels. It was not difficult for the king to perceive that his applications were neglected by the emperor; but as he had no choice of any other expedient, and it seemed the interest of his son-in-law to keep alive his pretensions he was still content to follow Ferdinand through all his shifts and evasions. Nor was he entirely discouraged, even when the imperial diet at Ratisbon, by the influence, or rather authority of the emperor, though contrary to the protestation of Saxony, and of all the Protestant princes and cities, had transferred the electoral dignity from the palatine to the duke of Bavaria.
Meanwhile the efforts made by Frederic for the recovery of his dominions, were vigorous. Three armies were levied in Germany by his authority, under three commanders, Duke, Christian of Brunswick, the prince of Baden-Dourlach, and Count Mansfeldt. The two former generals were defeated by Count Tilly and the imperialists: the third, though much inferior in force to his enemies, still maintained the war; but with no equal supplies of money either from the palatine or the king of England. It was chiefly by pillage and free quarters in the Palatinate, that he subsisted his army. As the Austrians were regularly paid, they were kept in more exact discipline; and James justly became apprehensive, lest so unequal a contest, besides ravaging the palatine’s hereditary dominions, would end in the total alienation of the people’s affections from their ancient sovereign, by whom they were plundered, and in an attachment to their new masters, by whom they were protected.[*] He persuaded, therefore, his son-in-law to disarm, under color of duty and submission to the emperor; and, accordingly, Mansfeldt was dismissed from the palatine’s service; and that famous general withdrew his army into the Low Countries, and there received a commission from the states of the United Provinces.
To show how little account was made of James’s negotiations abroad, there is a pleasantry mentioned by all historians, which, for that reason, shall have place here. In a farce, acted at Brussels, a courier was introduced carrying the doleful news, that the Palatinate would soon be wrested from the house of Austria; so powerful were the succors which, from all quarters, were hastening to the relief of the despoiled elector: the king of Denmark had agreed to contribute to his assistance a hundred thousand pickled herrings, the Dutch a hundred thousand butter-boxes, and the king of England a hundred thousand ambassadors. On other occasions, he was painted with a scabbard, but without a sword, or with a sword which nobody could draw, though several were pulling at it.[**]
It was not from his negotiations with the emperor or the duke of Bavaria, that James expected any success in his project of restoring the palatine: his eyes were entirely turned towards Spain; and if he could effect his son’s marriage with the infanta, he doubted not but that, after so intimate a conjunction, this other point could easily be obtained. The negotiations of that court being commonly dilatory, it was not easy for a prince of so little penetration in business, to distinguish whether the difficulties which occurred were real or affected; and he was surprised, after negotiating five years on so simple a demand, that he was not more advanced than at the beginning. A dispensation from Rome was requisite for the marriage of the infanta with a Protestant prince; and the king of Spain, having undertaken to procure that dispensation, had thereby acquired the means of retarding at pleasure, or of forwarding the marriage, and at the same time of concealing entirely his artifices from the court of England.
In order to remove all obstacles, James despatched Digby, soon after created earl of Bristol, as his ambassador to Philip IV., who had lately succeeded his father in the crown of Spain. He secretly employed Gage as his agent at Rome, and finding that the difference of religion was the principal, if not the sole difficulty, which retarded the marriage, he resolved to soften that objection as much as possible. He issued public orders for discharging all Popish recusants who were imprisoned; and it was daily apprehended that he would forbid, for the future, the execution of the penal laws enacted against them. For this step, so opposite to the rigid spirit of his subjects, he took care to apologize; and he even endeavored to ascribe it to his great zeal for the reformed religion. He had been making applications, he said, to all foreign princes, for some indulgence to the distressed Protestants; and he was still answered by objections derived from the severity of the English laws against Catholics.[*] It might indeed occur to him, that if the extremity of religious zeal were ever to abate among Christian sects, one of them must begin; and nothing would be more honorable for England, than to have led the way in sentiments so wise and moderate.
Not only the religious Puritans murmured at this tolerating measure of the king; the lovers of civil liberty were alarmed at so important an exertion of prerogative. But, among other dangerous articles of authority, the kings of England were at that time possessed of the dispensing power; at least, were at the constant practice of exercising it. Besides, though the royal prerogative in civil matters was then extensive, the princes, during some late reigns, had been accustomed to assume a still greater in ecclesiastical. And the king failed not to represent the toleration of Catholics as a measure entirely of that nature.
By James’s concession in favor of the Catholics, he attained his end. The same religious motives which had hitherto rendered the court of Madrid insincere in all the steps taken with regard to the marriage, were now the chief cause of promoting it. By its means, it was there hoped the English Catholics would for the future enjoy ease and indulgence; and the infanta would be the happy instrument of procuring to the church some tranquillity, after the many severe persecutions which it had hitherto undergone. The earl of Bristol, a minister of vigilance and penetration, and who had formerly opposed all alliance with Catholics,[*] was now fully convinced of the sincerity of Spain; and he was ready to congratulate the king on the entire completion of his views and projects.[**] A daughter of Spain, whom he represents as extremely accomplished, would soon, he said, arrive in England, and bring with her an immense fortune of two millions of pieces of eight, or six hundred thousand pounds sterling; a sum four times greater than Spain had ever before given with any princess, and almost equal to all the money which the parliament, during the whole course of this reign, had hitherto granted to the king. But what was of more importance to James’s honor and happiness, Bristol considered this match as an infallible prognostic of the palatine’s restoration; nor would Philip, he thought, ever have bestowed his sister and so large a fortune, under the prospect of entering next day into a war with England. So exact was his intelligence, that the most secret counsels of the Spaniards, he boasts, had never escaped him;[***] and he found that they had all along considered the marriage of the infanta and the restitution of the Palatinate as measures closely connected, or altogether inseparable.[****]
However little calculated James’s character to extort so vast a concession; however improper the measures which he had pursued for attaining that end; the ambassador could not withstand the plain evidence of facts, by which Philip now demonstrated his sincerity. Perhaps, too, like a wise man, he considered, that reasons of state, which are supposed solely to influence the councils of monarchs, are not always the motives which there predominate; that the milder views of gratitude, honor, friendship, generosity, are frequently able, among princes as well as private persons, to counterbalance these selfish considerations; that the justice and moderation of James had been so conspicuous in all these transactions, his reliance on Spain, his confidence in her friendship, that he had at last obtained the cordial alliance of that nation, so celebrated for honor and fidelity. Or, if politics must still be supposed the ruling motive of all public measures, the maritime power of England was so considerable, and the Spanish dominions so divided, as might well induce the council of Philip to think, that a sincere friendship with the masters of the sea could not be purchased by too great concessions.[*] And as James, during so many years, had been allured and seduced by hopes and protestations, his people enraged by delays and disappointments, it would probably occur, that there was now no medium left between the most inveterate hatred and the most intimate alliance between the nations. Not to mention that, as a new spirit began about this time to animate the councils of France, the friendship of England became every day more necessary to the greatness and security of the Spanish monarch.
All measures being, therefore, agreed on between the parties, nought was wanting but the dispensation from Rome, which might be considered as a mere formality.[**] The king, justified by success, now exulted in his pacific counsels, and boasted of his superior sagacity and penetration; when all these flattering prospects were blasted by the temerity of a man whom he had fondly exalted from a private condition, to be the bane of himself, of his family, and of his people.
Ever since the fall of Somerset, Buckingham had governed, with an uncontrolled sway, both the court and nation; and could James’s eyes have been opened, he had now full opportunity of observing how unfit his favorite was for the high station to which he was raised. Some accomplishments of a courtier he possessed: of every talent of a minister he was utterly destitute. Headlong in his passions, and incapable equally of prudence and of dissimulation; sincere from violence rather than candor; expensive from profusion more than generosity; a warm friend, a furious enemy, but without any choice or discernment in either; with these qualities he had early and quickly mounted to the highest rank; and partook at once of the insolence which attends a fortune newly acquired, and the impetuosity which belongs to persons born in high stations and unacquainted with opposition.
1623.
Among those who had experienced the arrogance of this overgrown favorite, the prince of Wales himself had not been entirely spared; and a great coldness, if not an enmity, had, for that reason, taken place between them. Buckingham, desirous of an opportunity which might connect him with the prince, and overcome his aversion, and, at the same time envious of the great credit acquired by Bristol in the Spanish negotiation, bethought himself of an expedient by which he might at once gratify both these inclinations. He represented to Charles, that persons of his exalted station were peculiarly unfortunate in their marriage, the chief circumstance of life; and commonly received into their arms a bride unknown to them, to whom they were unknown; not endeared by sympathy, not obliged by service; wooed by treaties alone, by negotiations, by political interests: that however accomplished the infanta, she must still consider herself as a melancholy victim of state, and could not but think with aversion of that day when she was to enter the bed of a stranger; and, passing into a foreign country and a new family, bid adieu forever to her father’s house and to her native land: that it was in the prince’s power to soften all these rigors and lay such an obligation on her, as would attach the most indifferent temper, as would warm the coldest affections: that his journey to Madrid would be an unexpected gallantry, which would equal all the fictions of Spanish romance, and, suiting the amorous and enterprising character of that nation, must immediately introduce him to the princess under the agreeable character of a devoted lover and daring adventurer: that the negotiations with regard to the Palatinate, which had hitherto languished in the hands of ministers, would quickly he terminated by so illustrious an agent, seconded by the mediation and entreaties of the grateful infanta: that Spanish generosity, moved by that unexampled trust and confidence, would make concessions beyond what could be expected from political views and considerations: and that he would quickly return to the king with the glory of having reëstablished the unhappy palatine, by the same enterprise which procured him the affections and the person of the Spanish princess.[*]
The mind of the young prince, replete with candor, was inflamed by these generous and romantic ideas suggested by Buckingham. He agreed to make application to the king for his approbation. They chose the moment of his kindest and most jovial humor; and, more by the earnestness which they expressed, than by the force of their reasons, they obtained a hasty and unguarded consent to their undertaking. And having engaged his promise to keep their purpose secret, they left him, in order to make preparations for the journey.
No sooner was the king alone, than his temper, more cautious than sanguine, suggested very different views of the matter, and represented every difficulty and danger which could occur. He reflected that however the world might pardon this sally of youth in the prince, they would never forgive himself, who, at his years, and after his experience, could intrust his only son, the heir of his crown, the prop of his age, to the discretion of foreigners, without so much as providing the frail security of a safe-conduct in his favor: that if the Spanish monarch were sincere in his professions, a few months must finish the treaty of marriage, and bring the infanta into England; if he were not sincere, the folly was still more egregious of committing the prince into his hands: that Philip, when possessed of so invaluable a pledge, might well rise in his demands, and impose harder conditions of treaty: and that the temerity of the enterprise was so apparent, that the event, how prosperous soever, could not justify it; and if disastrous, it would render himself infamous to his people, and ridiculous to all posterity.[**]
Tormented with these reflections, as soon as the prince and Buckingham returned for their despatches, he informed them of all the reasons which had determined him to change his resolution; and he begged them to desist from so foolish an adventure. The prince received the disappointment with sorrowful submission and silent tears: Buckingham presumed to speak in an imperious tone, which he had ever experienced to be prevalent over his too easy master. He told the king, that nobody for the future would believe any thing he said, When he retracted so soon the promise so solemnly given; that he plainly discerned this change of resolution to proceed from another breach of his word, in communicating the matter to some rascal, who had furnished him with those pitiful reasons which he had alleged, and he doubted not but he should hereafter know who his counsellor had been; and that if he receded from what he had promised, it would be such a dis-obligation to the prince, who had now set his heart upon the journey, after his majesty’s approbation, that he could never forget it, nor forgive any man who had been the cause of it[*]
The king, with great earnestness, fortified by many oaths, made his apology, by denying that he had communicated the matter to any; and finding himself assailed, as well by the boisterous importunities of Buckingham, as by the warm entreaties of his son, whose applications had hitherto, on other occasions, been always dutiful, never earnest, he had again the weakness to assent to their purposed journey. It was agreed that Sir Francis Cottington alone, the prince’s secretary, and Endymion Porter, gentleman of his bed-chamber, should accompany them; and the former being at that time in the antechamber, he was immediately called in by the king’s orders.
James told Cottington, that he had always been an honest man, and therefore he was now to trust him in an affair of the highest importance, which he was not, upon his life, to disclose to any man whatever. “Cottington,” added he, “here is baby Charles and Stenny,” (these ridiculous appellations he usually gave to the prince and Buckingham,) “who have a great mind to go post into Spain, and fetch home the infanta: they will have but two more in their company, and have chosen you for one. What think you of the journey?” Sir Francis, who was a prudent man, and had resided some years in Spain as the king’s agent, was struck with all the obvious objections to such an enterprise, and scrupled not to declare them. The king threw himself upon his bed, and cried, “I told you this before;” and fell into a new passion and new lamentations, complaining that he was undone, and should lose baby Charles.
The prince showed by his countenance, that he was extremely dissatisfied with Cottington’s discourse; but Buckingham broke into an open passion against him. The king, he told him, asked him only of the journey, and of the manner of travelling; particulars of which he might be a competent judge, having gone the road so often by post; but that he, without being called to it, had the presumption to give his advice upon matters of state, and against his master, which he should repent as long as he lived. A thousand other reproaches he added, which put the poor king into a new agony in behalf of a servant, who, he foresaw, would suffer for answering him honestly. Upon which he said, with some emotion, “Nay, by God, Stenny, you are much to blame for using him so: he answered me directly to the question which I asked him, and very honestly and wisely; and yet, you know, he said no more than I told you before he was called in.” However, after all this passion on both sides, James renewed his consent; and proper directions were given for the journey. Nor was he now at any loss to discover, that the whole intrigue was originally contrived by Buckingham, as well as pursued violently by his spirit and impetuosity.
These circumstances, which so well characterize the persons, seem to have been related by Cottington to Lord Clarendon, from whom they are here transcribed; and though minute, are not undeserving of a place in history.
The prince and Buckingham, with their two attendants, and Sir Richard Graham, master of horse to Buckingham, passed disguised and undiscovered through France; and they even ventured into a court ball at Paris, where Charles saw the princess Henrietta, whom he afterwards espoused, and who was at that time in the bloom of youth and beauty. In eleven days after their departure from London, they arrived at Madrid; and surprised every body by a step so unusual among great princes. The Spanish monarch immediately paid Charles a visit, expressed the utmost gratitude for the confidence reposed in him, and made warm protestations of a correspondent confidence and friendship. By the most studied civilities, he showed the respect which he bore to his royal guest. He gave him a golden key, which opened all his apartments, that the prince might; without any introduction, have access to him at all hours: he took the left hand of him on every occasion, except in the apartments assigned to Charles; for there, he said, the prince was at home: Charles was introduced into the palace with the same pomp and ceremony that attends the kings of Spain on their coronation: the council received public orders to obey him as the king himself.
Olivarez too, though a grandee of Spain, who has the right of being covered before his own king, would not put on his hat in the prince’s presence:[*] all the prisons of Spain were thrown open, and all the prisoners received their freedom, as if the event the most honorable and most fortunate had happened to the monarchy:[**] and every sumptuary law with regard to apparel was suspended during Charles’s residence in Spain. The infanta, however, was only shown to her lover in public; the Spanish ideas of decency being so strict, as not to allow of any further intercourse, till the arrival of the dispensation.[***]
The point of honor was carried so far by that generous people, that no attempt was made, on account of the advantage which they had acquired, of imposing any harder conditions of treaty: their pious zeal only prompted them, on one occasion, to desire more concessions in the religious articles; but, upon the opposition of Bristol, accompanied with some reproaches, they immediately desisted. The pope, however, hearing of the prince’s arrival in Madrid, tacked some new clauses to the dispensation;[****] and it became necessary to transmit the articles to London, that the king might ratify them. This treaty, which was made public, consisted of several articles, chiefly regarding the exercise of the Catholic religion by the infanta and her household. Nothing could reasonably be found fault with, except one article, in which the king promised, that the children should be educated by the princess, till ten years of age. This condition could not be insisted on, but with a view of seasoning their minds with Catholic principles; and though so tender an age seemed a sufficient security against theological prejudices, yet the same reason which made the pope insert that article, should have induced the king to reject it.
Besides the public treaty, there were separate articles, privately sworn to by the king; in which he promised to suspend the penal laws enacted against Catholics, to procure a repeal of them in parliament, and to grant a toleration for the exercise of the Catholic religion in private houses.[v]