In consequence of these exalted ideas of kingly authority, the prerogative, besides the articles of jurisdiction founded on precedent, was by many supposed to possess an inexhaustible fund of latent powers, which might be exerted on any emergence. In every government, necessity, when real, supersedes all laws, and levels all limitations; but in the English government, convenience alone was conceived to authorize any extraordinary act of regal power, and to render it obligatory on the people. Hence the strict obedience required to proclamations during all periods of the English history; and if James has incurred blame on account of his edicts, it is only because he too frequently issued them at a time when they began to be less regarded, not because he first assumed or extended to an unusual degree that exercise of authority. Of his maxims in a parallel case, the following is a pretty remark able instance.

Queen Elizabeth had appointed commissioners for the inspection of prisons, and had bestowed on them full discretionary powers to adjust all differences between prisoners and their creditors, to compound debts, and to give liberty to such debtors as they found honest and insolvent. From the uncertain and undefined nature of the English constitution, doubts sprang up in many, that this commission was contrary to law; and it was represented in that light to James. He forbore, therefore, renewing the commission, till the fifteenth of his reign; when complaints rose so high with regard to the abuses practised in prisons, that he thought himself obliged to overcome his scruples, and to appoint new commissioners, invested with the same discretionary powers which Elizabeth had formerly conferred.[*]

Upon the whole, we must conceive that monarchy, on the accession of the house of Stuart, was possessed of a very extensive authority: an authority, in the judgment of all, not exactly limited; in the judgment of some, not limitable. But, at the same time, this authority was founded merely on the opinion of the people, influenced by ancient precedent and example. It was not supported either by money or by force of arms. And, for this reason, we need not wonder that the princes of that line were so extremely jealous of their prerogative; being sensible, that when these claims were ravished from them, they possessed no influence by which they could maintain their dignity, or support the laws. By the changes which have since been introduced, the liberty and independence of individuals has been rendered much more full, entire and secure; that of the public more uncertain and precarious. And it seems a necessary, though perhaps a melancholy truth, that in every government, the magistrate must either possess a large revenue and a military force, or enjoy some discretionary powers, in order to execute the laws and support his own authority.

We have had occasion to remark, in so many instances, the bigotry which prevailed in that age, that we can look for no toleration among the different sects. Two Arians, under the title of heretics, were punished by fire during this period; and no other reign, since the reformation, had been free from the like barbarities. Stowe says, that these Arians were offered their pardon at the stake, if they would merit it by a recantation. A madman, who called himself the Holy Ghost, was without any indulgence for his frenzy, condemned to the same punishment. Twenty pounds a month could, by law, be levied on every one who frequented not the established worship. This rigorous law, however, had one indulgent clause, that the lines exacted should not exceed two thirds of the yearly income of the person. It had been usual for Elizabeth to allow those penalties to run on for several years; and to levy them all at once, to the utter ruin of such Catholics as had incurred her displeasure. James was more humane in this, as in every other respect. The Puritans formed a sect which secretly lurked in the church, but pretended not to any separate worship or discipline. An attempt of that kind would have been universally regarded as the most unpardonable enormity. And had the king been disposed to grant the Puritans a full toleration for a separate exercise of their religion, it is certain, from the spirit of the times, that this sect itself would have despised and hated him for it, and would have reproached him with luke-warmness and indifference in the cause of religion. They maintained, that they themselves were the only pure church; that their principles and practices ought to be established by law; and that no others ought to be tolerated. It may be questioned, therefore, whether the administration at this time could with propriety deserve the appellation of persecutors with regard to the Puritans. Such of the clergy, indeed, as refused to comply with the legal ceremonies, were deprived of their livings, and sometimes, in Elizabeth’s reign, were otherwise punished: and ought any man to accept of an office or benefice in an establishment, while he declines compliance with the fixed and known rules of that establishment? But Puritans were never punished for frequenting separate congregations; because there were none such in the kingdom; and no Protestant ever assumed or pretended to the right of erecting them. The greatest well-wishers of the Puritanical sect would have condemned a practice, which in that age was universally, by statesmen and ecclesiastics-philosophers and zealots, regarded as subversive of civil society. Even so great a reasoner as Lord Bacon thought that uniformity in religion was absolutely necessary to the support of government, and that no toleration could with safety be given to sectaries.[*]

Nothing but the imputation of idolatry, which was thrown on the Catholic religion, could justify, in the eyes of the Puritans themselves, the schism made by the Hugonots and other Protestants who lived in Popish countries.

In all former ages, not wholly excepting even those of Greece and Rome, religious sects, and heresies, and schisms had been esteemed dangerous, if not pernicious, to civil government, and were regarded as the source of faction, and private combination, and opposition to the laws.[*] The magistrate, therefore, applied himself directly to the cure of this evil, as of every other; and very naturally attempted, by penal statutes, to suppress those separate communities, and punish the obstinate innovators. But it was found by fatal experience, and after spilling an ocean of blood in those theological quarrels, that the evil was of a peculiar nature, and was both inflamed by violent remedies, and diffused itself more rapidly throughout the whole society. Hence, though late, arose the paradoxical principle and salutary practice of toleration.

The liberty of the press was incompatible with such maxims and such principles of government as then prevailed, and was therefore quite unknown in that age. Besides employing the two terrible courts of star chamber and high commission, whose powers were unlimited, Queen Elizabeth exerted her authority by restraints upon the press. She passed a decree in her court of star chamber, that is, by her own will and pleasure, forbidding any book to be printed in any place but in London, Oxford, and Cambridge:[**] and another, in which she prohibited, under severe penalties, the publishing of any book or pamphlet “against the form or meaning of any restraint or ordinance, contained, or to be contained, in any statute or laws of this realm, or in any injunction made or set forth by her majesty or her privy council, or against the true sense or meaning of any letters patent, commissions or prohibitions under the great seal of England.”[***] James extended the same penalties to the importing of such books from abroad.[****]

And to render these edicts more effectual, he afterwards inhibited the printing of any book without a license from the archbishop of Canterbury, the archbishop of York, the bishop of London, or the vice-chancellor of one of the universities, or of some person appointed by them.[*]

In tracing the coherence among the systems of modern theology, we may observe, that the doctrine of absolute decrees has ever been intimately connected with the enthusiastic spirit, as that doctrine affords the highest subject of joy, triumph, and security to the supposed elect, and exalts them by infinite degrees above the rest of mankind. All the first reformers adopted these principles; and the Jansenists too, a fanatical sect in France, not to mention the Mahometans in Asia, have ever embraced them. As the Lutheran establishments were subjected to Episcopal jurisdiction, their enthusiastic genius gradually decayed; and men had leisure to perceive the absurdity of supposing God to punish by infinite torments what he himself from all eternity had unchangeably decreed. The king, though at this time his Calvinistic education had rivetted him in the doctrine of absolute decrees, yet, being a zealous partisan of Episcopacy, was insensibly engaged, towards the end of his reign, to favor the milder theology of Arminius. Even in so great a doctor, the genius of the religion prevailed over its speculative tenets; and with him, the whole clergy gradually dropped the more rigid principles of absolute reprobation and unconditional decrees. Some noise was at first made about these innovations; but being drowned in the fury of factions and civil wars which ensued, the scholastic arguments made an insignificant figure amidst those violent disputes about civil and ecclesiastical power with which the nation was agitated. And at the restoration, the church, though she still retained her old subscriptions and articles of faith, was found to have totally changed her speculative doctrines, and to have embraced tenets more suitable to the genius of her discipline and worship, without its being possible to assign the precise period in which the alteration was produced.

It may be worth observing, that James, from his great desire to promote controversial divinity, erected a college at Chelsea for the entertainment of twenty persons, who should be entirely employed in refuting the Papists and Puritans.[**]

All the efforts of the great Bacon could not procure an establishment for the cultivation of natural philosophy: even to this day, no society has been instituted for the polishing and fixing of our language. The only encouragement which the sovereign in England has ever given to any thing that has the appearance of science, was this short-lived establishment of James; an institution quite superfluous, considering the unhappy propension which at that time so universally possessed the nation for polemical theology.

The manners of the nation were agreeable to the monarchical government which prevailed, and contained not that strange mixture which at present distinguishes England from all other countries. Such violent extremes were then unknown, of industry and debauchery, frugality and profusion, civility and rusticity, fanaticism and scepticism. Candor, sincerity, modesty, are the only qualities which the English of that age possessed in common with the present.

High pride of family then prevailed; and it was by a dignity and stateliness of behavior, that the gentry and nobility distinguished themselves from the common people. Great riches acquired by commerce were more rare, and had not as yet been able to confound all ranks of men, and render money the chief foundation of distinction. Much ceremony took place in the common intercourse of life, and little familiarity was indulged by the great. The advantages which result from opulence are so solid and real, that those who are possessed of them need not dread the near approaches of their inferiors. The distinctions of birth and title, being more empty and imaginary, soon vanish upon familiar access and acquaintance.

The expenses of the great consisted in pomp, and show, and a numerous retinue, rather than in convenience and true pleasure. The earl of Nottingham, in his embassy to Spain, was attended by five hundred persons: the earl of Hertford, in that to Brussels, carried three hundred gentlemen along with him. Lord Bacon has remarked, that the English nobility, in his time, maintained a larger retinue of servants than the nobility of any other nation, except, perhaps, the Polanders.[*]

Civil honors, which now hold the first place, were at that time subordinate to the military. The young gentry and nobility were fond of distinguishing themselves by arms. The fury of duels, too, prevailed more than at anytime before or since.[**] This was the turn that the romantic chivalry, for which the nation was formerly so renowned, had lately taken.

Liberty of commerce between the sexes was indulged, but without any licentiousness of manners. The court was very little an exception to this observation. James had rather entertained an aversion and contempt for the females; nor were those young courtiers, of whom he was so fond, able to break through the established manners of the nation.

The first sedan chair seen in England was in this reign, and was used by the duke of Buckingham; to the great indignation of the people, who exclaimed, that he was employing his fellow-creatures to do the service of beasts.

The country life prevails at present in England beyond any cultivated nation of Europe; but it was then much more generally embraced by all the gentry. The increase of arts, pleasures, and social commerce, was just beginning to produce an inclination for the softer and more civilized life of the city. James discouraged, as much as possible, this alteration of manners. “He was wont to be very earnest,” as Lord Bacon tells us, “with the country gentlemen to go from London to their country seats. And sometimes he would say thus to them: ‘Gentlemen, at London you are like ships in a sea, which show like nothing; but in your country villages you are like ships in a river, which look like great things.’”[*]

He was not content with reproof and exhortation. As Queen Elizabeth had perceived with regret the increase of London, and had restrained all new buildings by proclamation, James, who found that these edicts were not exactly obeyed, frequently renewed them; though a strict execution seems still to have been wanting. He also issued reiterated proclamations, in imitation of his predecessor; containing severe menaces against the gentry who lived in town.[**]

This policy is contrary to that which has ever been practised by all princes who studied the increase of their authority. To allure the nobility to court; to engage them in expensive pleasures or employments which dissipate their fortune; to increase their subjection to ministers by attendance; to weaken their authority in the provinces by absence: these have been the common arts of arbitrary government. But James, besides that he had certainly laid no plan for extending his power, had no money to support a splendid court, or bestow on a numerous retinue of gentry and nobility. He thought too, that by their living together, they became more sensible of their own strength, and were apt to indulge too curious researches into matters of government. To remedy the present evil, he was desirous of dispersing them into their country seats; where, he hoped, they would bear a more submissive reverence to his authority, and receive less support from each other. But the contrary effect soon followed. The riches amassed during their residence at home rendered them independent. The influence acquired by hospitality made them formidable. They would not be led by the court: they could not be driven: and thus the system of the English government received a total and a sudden alteration in the course of less than forty years.

The first rise of commerce and the arts had contributed, in preceding reigns, to scatter those immense fortunes of the barons which rendered them so formidable both to king and people. The further progress of these advantages began, during this reign, to ruin the small proprietors of land;[*] and, by both events, the gentry, or that rank which composed the house of commons, enlarged their power and authority. The early improvements in luxury were seized by the greater nobles, whose fortunes, placing them above frugality, or even calculation, were soon dissipated in expensive pleasures. These improvements reached at last all men of property; and those of slender fortunes, who at that time were often men of family, imitating those of a rank immediately above them, reduced themselves to poverty. Their lands, coming to sale, swelled the estates of those who possessed itches sufficient for the fashionable expenses, but who were not exempted from some care and attention to their domestic economy.

The gentry also of that age were engaged in no expense, except that of country hospitality. No taxes were levied, no wars waged, no attendance at court expected, no bribery or profusion required at elections.[**] Could human nature ever reach happiness, the condition of the English gentry, under so mild and benign a prince, might merit that appellation.

The amount of the king’s revenue, as it stood in 1617, is thus stated.[***]

Of crown lands, eighty thousand pounds a year; by customs and new impositions, near one hundred and ninety thousand; by wards and other various branches of revenue, besides purveyance, one hundred and eighty thousand: the whole amounting to four hundred and fifty thousand. The king’s ordinary disbursements, by the same account, are said to exceed this sum thirty-six thousand pounds.[*] All the extraordinary sums which James had raised by subsidies, loans, sale of lands, sale of the title of baronet, money paid by the states and by the king of France, benevolences, etc., were, in the whole, about two millions two hundred thousand pounds; of which the sale of lands afforded seven hundred and seventy-five thousand pounds. The extraordinary disbursements of the king amounted to two millions; besides above four hundred thousand pounds given in presents. Upon the whole, a sufficient reason appears, partly from necessary expenses, partly for want of a rigid economy, why the king, even early in his reign, was deeply involved in debt, and found great difficulty to support the government.

Farmers, not commissioners, levied the customs. It seems, indeed, requisite, that the former method should always be tried before the latter, though a preferable one. When men’s own interest is concerned, they fall upon a hundred expedients to prevent frauds in the merchants; and these the public may afterwards imitate, in establishing proper rules for its officers.

The customs were supposed to amount to five per cent. of the value, and were levied upon exports, as well as imports. Nay, the imposition upon exports, by James’s additions, is said to amount, in some few instances, to twenty-five per cent This practice, so hurtful to industry, prevails still in France, Spain, and most countries of Europe. The customs in 1604 yielded one hundred and twenty-seven thousand pounds a year: [**] they rose to one hundred and ninety thousand towards the end of the reign.

Interest, during this reign, was at ten per cent. till 1624, when it was reduced to eight. This high interest is an indication of the great profits and small progress of commerce.

The extraordinary supplies granted by parliament, during this whole reign, amounted not to more than six hundred and thirty thousand pounds; which, divided among twenty-one years, makes thirty thousand pounds a year. I do not include those supplies, amounting to three hundred thousand pounds, which were given to the king by his last parliament. These were paid in to their own commissioners; and the expenses of the Spanish war were much more than sufficient to exhaust them. The distressed family of the palatine was a great burden on James, during part of his reign. The king, it is pretended, possessed not frugality proportioned to the extreme narrowness of his revenue. Splendid equipages, however, he did not affect, nor costly furniture, nor a luxurious table, nor prodigal mistresses. His buildings too were not sumptuous; though the Banqueting House must not be forgotten, as a monument which does honor to his reign. Hunting was his chief amusement, the cheapest pleasure in which a king can indulge himself. His expenses were the effects of liberality, rather than of luxury.

One day, it is said, while he was standing amidst some of his courtiers, a porter passed by, loaded with money, which he was carrying to the treasury. The king observed that Rich, afterwards earl of Holland, one of his handsome, agreeable favorites, whispered something to one standing near him. Upon inquiry, he found that Rich had said, “How happy would that money make me!” Without hesitation, James bestowed it all upon him, though it amounted to three thousand pounds. He added, “You think yourself very happy in obtaining so large a sum; but I am more happy in having an opportunity of obliging a worthy man, whom I love.” The generosity of James was more the result of a benign humor or light fancy, than of reason or judgment. The objects of it were such as could render themselves agreeable to him in his loose hours; not such as were endowed with great merit, or who possessed talents or popularity which could strengthen his interest with the public.

The same advantage, we may remark, over the people, which the crown formerly reaped from that interval between the fall of the peers and rise of the commons, was now possessed by the people against the crown, during the continuance of a like interval. The sovereign had already lost that independent revenue by which he could subsist without regular supplies from parliament; and he had not yet acquired the means of influencing those assemblies. The effects of this situation, which commenced with the accession of the house of Stuart, soon rose to a great height, and were more of less propagated throughout all the reigns of that unhappy family.

Subsidies and fifteenths are frequently mentioned by historians; but neither the amount of these taxes, nor the method of levying them, have been well explained. It appears, that the fifteenths formerly corresponded to the name, and were that proportionable part of the movables.[*] But a valuation having been made in the reign of Edward III., that valuation was always adhered to, and each town paid unalterably a particular sum, which the inhabitants themselves assessed upon their fellow-citizens. The same tax in corporate towns was called a tenth; because there it was, at first, a tenth of the movables. The whole amount of a tenth and a fifteenth throughout the kingdom, or a fifteenth, as it is often more concisely called, was about twenty-nine thousand pounds.[**] The amount of a subsidy was not invariable, like that of a fifteenth. In the eighth of Elizabeth, a subsidy amounted to one hundred and twenty thousand pounds: in the fortieth, it was not above seventy-eight thousand.[***] It afterwards fell to seventy thousand, and was continually decreasing.[****] The reason is easily collected from the method of levying it. We may learn from the subsidy bills,[v] that one subsidy was given for four shillings in the pound on land, and two shillings and eightpence on movables throughout the counties; a considerable tax, had it been strictly levied. But this was only the ancient state of a subsidy. During the reign of James, there was not paid the twentieth part of that sum. The tax was so far personal, that a man paid only in the county where he lived, though he should possess estates in other counties; and the assessors formed a loose estimation of his property, and rated him accordingly.

To preserve, however, some rule in the estimation, it seems to have been the practice to keep an eye to former assessments, and to rate every man according as his ancestors, or men of such an estimated property, were accustomed to pay. This was a sufficient reason why subsidies could not increase, notwithstanding the great increase of money and rise of rents. But there was an evident reason why they continually decreased. The favor, as is natural to suppose, ran always against the crown; especially during the latter end of Elizabeth, when subsidies became numerous and frequent, and the sums levied were considerable, compared to former supplies. The assessors, though accustomed to have an eye to ancient estimations, were not bound to observe any such rule, but might rate anew any person, according to his present income. When rents fell, or parts of an estate were sold off, the proprietor was sure to represent these losses, and obtain a diminution of his subsidy; but where rents rose, or new lands were purchased, he kept his own secret, and paid no more than formerly. The advantage, therefore, of every change was taken against the crown; and the crown could obtain the advantage of none. And, to make the matter worse, the alterations which happened in property during this age, were in general unfavorable to the crown. The small proprietors, or twenty-pound men, went continually to decay; and when their estates were swallowed up by a greater, the new purchaser increased not his subsidy. So loose, indeed, is the whole method of rating subsidies, that the wonder was, not how the tax should continually diminish, but how it yielded any revenue at all. It became at last so unequal and uncertain, that the parliament was obliged to change it into a land tax.

The price of corn during this reign, and that of the other necessaries of life, was no lower, or was rather higher, than at present. By a proclamation of James, establishing public magazines, whenever wheat fell below thirty-two shillings a quarter, rye below eighteen, barley below sixteen, the commissioners were empowered to purchase corn for the magazines.[*] These prices then are to be regarded as low; though they would rather pass for high by our present estimation. The usual bread of the poor was at this time made of barley.[**] The best wool, during the greater part of James’s reign, was at thirty-three shillings a tod.[***] At present, it is not above two-thirds of that value; though it is lo be presumed that our exports in woollen goods are somewhat increased. The finer manufactures, too, by the progress of arts and industry, have rather diminished in price, notwithstanding the great increase of money.

In Shakspeare, the hostess tells Falstaff, that the shirts she bought him were Holland at eight shillings a yard; a high price at this day, even supposing, what is not probable, that the best Holland at that time was equal in goodness to the best that can now be purchased. In like manner, a yard of velvet, about the middle of Elizabeth’s reign, was valued at two and twenty shillings. It appears from Dr. Birch’s life of Prince Henry,[*] that that prince, by contract with his butcher, paid near a groat a pound throughout the year for all the beef and mutton used in his family. Besides, we must consider, that the general turn of that age, which no laws could prevent, was the converting of arable land into pasture; a certain proof that the latter was found more profitable, and consequently that all butcher’s meat, as well as bread, was rather higher than at present. We have a regulation of the market with regard to poultry, and some other articles, very early in Charles I.‘s reign; [**] and the prices are high. A turkey cock four shillings and sixpence, a turkey hen three shillings, a pheasant cock six, a pheasant hen five, a partridge one shilling, a goose two, a capon two and sixpence, a pullet one and sixpence, a rabbit eightpence, a dozen of pigeons six shillings.[***] We must consider that London at present is more than three times more populous than it was at that time; a circumstance which much increases the price of poultry, and of every thing that cannot conveniently be brought from a distance: not to mention, that these regulations by authority are always calculated to diminish, never to increase the market prices. The contractors for victualling the navy were allowed by government eightpence a day for the diet of each man when in harbor, sevenpence halfpenny when at sea; [****] which would suffice at present. The chief difference in expense between that age and the present consists in the imaginary wants of men, which have since extremely multiplied.[v] These are the principal reasons why James’s revenue would go further than the same money in our time; though the difference is not near so great as is usually imagined.

The public was entirely free from the danger and expense of a standing army. While James was vaunting his divine vicegerency, and boasting of his high prerogative, he possessed not so much as a single regiment of guards to maintain his extensive claims; a sufficient proof that he sincerely believed his pretensions to be well grounded, and a strong presumption that they were at least built on what were then deemed plausible arguments. The militia of England, amounting to one hundred and sixty thousand men,[*] was the sole defence of the kingdom. It is pretended that they were kept in good order during his reign.[**] The city of London procured officers who had served abroad, and who taught the trained bands their exercises in Artillery Garden; a practice which had been discontinued since 1588. All the counties of England, in emulation of the capital, were fond of showing a well-ordered and well-appointed militia. It appeared, that the natural propensity of men towards military shows and exercises will go far, with a little attention in the sovereign, towards exciting and supporting this spirit in any nation. The very boys, at this time, in mimicry of their elders, enlisted themselves voluntarily into companies, elected officers, and practised the discipline, of which the models were every day exposed to their view.[***] Sir Edward Harwood, In a memorial composed at the beginning of the subsequent reign, says, that England was so unprovided with horses fit for war, that two thousand men could not possibly be mounted throughout the whole kingdom.[****] At present, the breed of horses is so much improved, that almost all those which are employed, either in the plough, wagon, or coach, would be fit for that purpose.

The disorders of Ireland obliged James to keep up some forces there, and put him to great expense. The common pay of a private man in the infantry was eightpence a day, a lieutenant two shillings, an ensign eighteen pence.[v]

The armies in Europe were not near so numerous during that age; and the private men, we may observe, were drawn from a better rank than at present, and approaching nearer to that of the officers.

In the year 1583, there was a general review made of all the men in England capable of bearing arms; and these were found to amount to one million one hundred and seventy-two thousand men, according to Raleigh.[*] It is impossible to warrant the exactness of this computation; or rather, we may fairly presume it to be somewhat inaccurate. But if it approached near the truth, England has probably, since that time, increased in populousness. The growth of London, in riches and beauty, as well as in numbers of inhabitants, has been prodigious. From 1600, it doubled every forty years;[*] and consequently, in 1680, it contained four times as many inhabitants as at the beginning of the century. It has ever been the centre of all the trade in the kingdom; and almost the only town that affords society and amusement. The affection which the English bear to a country life, makes the provincial towns be little frequented by the gentry. Nothing but the allurements of the capital, which is favored by the residence of the king, and by being the seat of government and of all the courts of justice, can prevail over their passion for their rural villas.

London at this time was almost entirely built of wood, and in every respect was certainly a very ugly city. The earl of Arundel first introduced the general practice of brick buildings.[**]

The navy of England was esteemed formidable in Elizabeth’s time, yet it consisted only of thirty-three ships, besides pinnaces;[***] and the largest of these would not equal our fourth-rates at present. Raleigh advises never to build a ship of war above six hundred tons. James was not negligent of the navy. In five years preceding 1623, he built ten new ships, and expended fifty thousand pounds a year on the fleet.

Of the Invention of Shipping. This number is much superior to that contained in Murden, and that delivered by Sir Edward Coke to the house of commons; and is more likely.

By Raleigh’s account, in his discourse of the first invention of shipping, the fleet, in the twenty-fourth of the queen, consisted only of thirteen ships, and was augmented afterwards eleven. He probably reckoned some to be pinnaces, which Coke called ships, besides the value of thirty-six thousand pounds in timber, which he annually gave from the royal forests.[*] The largest ship that ever had come from the English docks was built during this reign. She was only one thousand four hundred tons, and carried sixty-four guns.[**] The merchant ships, in cases of necessity, were instantly converted into ships of war. The king affirmed to the parliament, that the navy had never before been in so good a condition.[***]

Every session of parliament, during this reign, we meet with grievous lamentations concerning the decay of trade, and the growth of Popery: such violent propensity have men to complain of the present times, and to entertain discontent against their fortune and condition. The king himself was deceived by these popular complaints, and was at a loss to account for the total want of money, which he heard so much exaggerated.[****] It may, however, be affirmed, that during no preceding period of English history, was there a more sensible increase, than during the reign of this monarch, of all the advantages which distinguish a flourishing people. Not only the peace which he maintained was favorable to industry and commerce: his turn of mind inclined him to promote the peaceful arts: and trade being as yet in its infancy, all additions to it must have been the more evident to every eye which was not blinded by melancholy prejudices.[v] 63

By an account[v*] which seems judicious and accurate, it appears, that all the seamen employed in the merchant service amounted to ten thousand men, which probably exceeds not the fifth part of their present number. Sir Thomas Overbury says, that the Dutch possessed three times more shipping than the English, but that their ships were of inferior burden to those of the latter.[v**] Sir William Monson computed the English naval power to be little or nothing inferior to the Dutch,[v***] which is surely an exaggeration. The Dutch at this time traded to England with six hundred ships; England to Holland with sixty only.[v****]

A catalogue of the manufactures for which the English were then eminent, would appear very contemptible, in comparison of those which flourish among them at present. Almost all the more elaborate and curious arts were only cultivated abroad, particularly in Italy, Holland, and the Netherlands. Ship-building and the founding of iron cannon were the sole in which the English excelled. They seem, indeed, to have possessed alone the secret of the latter; and great complaints were made every parliament against the exportation of English ordnance.

Nine tenths of the commerce of the kingdom consisted in woollen goods.[*] Wool, however, was allowed to be exported, till the nineteenth of the king. Its exportation was then forbidden by proclamation; though that edict was never strictly executed. Most of the cloth was exported raw, and was dyed and dressed by the Dutch; who gained, it is pretended, seven hundred thousand pounds a year by this manufacture.[**] A proclamation issued by the king against exporting cloth in that condition, had succeeded so ill during one year, by the refusal of the Dutch to buy the dressed cloth, that great murmurs arose against it; and this measure was retracted by the king, and complained of by the nation, as if it had been the most impolitic in the world. It seems indeed to have been premature.

In so little credit was the fine English cloth even at home, that the king was obliged to seek expedients by which he might engage the people of fashion to wear it.[***] The manufacture of fine linen was totally unknown in the kingdom.[****]

The company of merchant adventurers, by their patent, possessed the sole commerce of woollen goods, though the staple commodity of the kingdom. An attempt made during the reign of Elizabeth to lay open this important trade, had been attended with bad consequences for a time, by a conspiracy of the merchant adventurers not to make any purchases of cloth; and the queen immediately restored them their patent.

It was the groundless fear of a like accident, that enslaved the nation to those exclusive companies which confined so much every branch of commerce and industry. The parliament, however, annulled, in the third of the king, the patent of the Spanish company; and the trade to Spain, which was at first very insignificant, soon became the most considerable in the kingdom. It is strange that they were not thence encouraged to abolish all the other companies, and that they went no further than obliging them to enlarge their bottom, and to facilitate the admission of new adventurers.

A board of trade was erected by the king in 1622.[*] One of the reasons assigned in the commission is, to remedy the low price of wool, which begat complaints of the decay of the woollen manufactory. It is more probable, however, that this fall of prices proceeded from the increase of wool. The king likewise recommends it to the commissioners to inquire and examine, whether a greater freedom of trade, and an exemption from the restraint of exclusive companies, would not be beneficial. Men were then fettered by their own prejudices; and the king was justly afraid of embracing a bold measure, whose consequences might be uncertain. The digesting of a navigation act, of a like nature with the famous one executed afterwards by the republican parliament, is likewise recommended to the commissioners. The arbitrary powers then commonly assumed by the privy council, appear evidently through the whole tenor of the commission.

The silk manufacture had no footing in England: but, by James’s direction, mulberry-trees were planted, and silk-worms introduced.[**] The climate seems unfavorable to the success of this project. The planting of hops increased much in England during this reign.

Greenland is thought to have been discovered about this period; and the whale fishery was carried on with success: but the industry of the Dutch, in spite of all opposition, soon deprived the English of this source of riches. A company was erected for the discovery of the north-west passage; and many fruitless attempts were made for that purpose. In such noble projects, despair ought never to be admitted, till the absolute impossibility of success be fully ascertained.

The passage to the East Indies had been opened to the English during the reign of Elizabeth; but the trade to those parts was not entirely established till this reign, when the East India company received a new patent, enlarged their stock to one million five hundred thousand pounds,[*] and fitted out several ships on these adventures. In 1609, they built a vessel of twelve hundred tons, the largest merchant ship that England had ever known. She was unfortunate, and perished by shipwreck. In 1611, a large ship of the company, assisted by a pinnace, maintained five several engagements with a squadron of Portuguese, and gained a complete victory over forces much superior. During the following years, the Dutch company was guilty of great injuries towards the English, in expelling many of their factors, and destroying their settlements: but these violences were resented with a proper spirit by the court of England. A naval force was equipped under the earl of Oxford,[**] and lay in wait for the return of the Dutch East India fleet. By reason of cross winds, Oxford tailed of his purpose, and the Dutch escaped. Some time after, one rich ship was taken by Vice-admiral Merwin; and it was stipulated by the Dutch to pay seventy thousand pounds to the English company, in consideration of the losses which that company had sustained.[***]

But neither this stipulation, nor the fear of reprisals, nor the sense of that friendship which subsisted between England and the states, could restrain the avidity of the Dutch company, or render them equitable in their proceedings towards their allies. Impatient to have the sole possession of the spice trade, which the English then shared with them, they assumed a jurisdiction over a factory of the latter in the Island of Amboyna; and on very improbable, and even absurd pretences, seized all the factors with their families, and put them to death with the most inhuman tortures. This dismal news arrived in England at the time when James, by the prejudices of his subjects and the intrigues of his favorite, was constrained to make a breach with Spain: and he was obliged, after some remonstrances, to acquiesce in this indignity from a state whose alliance was now become necessary to him. It is remarkable, that the nation, almost without a murmur, submitted to this injury from their Protestant confederates; an injury which, besides the horrid enormity of the action, was of much deeper importance to national interest, than all those which they were so impatient to resent from the house of Austria.

The exports of England from Christmas, 1612, to Christmas 1613, are computed at two millions four hundred and eighty-seven thousand four hundred and thirty-five pounds; the imports at two millions one hundred and forty-one thousand one hundred and fifty-one: so that the balance in favor of England was three Hundred and forty-six thousand two hundred and eighty-four.[*] But in 1622, the exports were two millions three hundred and twenty thousand four hundred and thirty-six pounds; the imports two millions six hundred and nineteen thousand three hundred and fifteen; which makes a balance of two hundred and ninety-eight thousand eight hundred and seventy-nine pounds against England.[**] The coinage of England from 1599 to 1619 amounted to four millions seven hundred and seventy-nine thousand three hundred and fourteen pounds thirteen shillings and fourpence:[***] a proof that the balance, in the main, was considerably in favor of the kingdom. As the annual imports and exports together rose to near five millions, and the customs never yielded so much as two Hundred thousand pounds a year, of which tonnage made a part, it appears that the new rates affixed by James did not, on the whole, amount to one shilling in the pound, and consequently were still inferior to the intention of the original grant of parliament. The East India company usually carried out a third of their cargo in commodities.[****] The trade to Turkey was one of the most gainful to the nation. It appears that copper halfpence and farthings began to be coined in this reign.[v] Tradesmen had commonly carried on their retail business chiefly by means of leaden tokens. The small silver penny was soon lost, and at this time was nowhere to be found.