The History of England - Vols. 1 to 6 (373 page)

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only because it gave offence in England, but because, in foreign countries, it lost the crown the advantage of being considered as the head and support of the reformation.
t

On pretence of pacifying disputes, orders were issued from the council, forbidding on both sides, all preaching and printing with regard to the controverted points of predestination and free-will. But it was complained of, and probably with reason, that the impartiality was altogether confined to the orders, and that the execution of them was only meant against the calvinists.

In return for Charles’s indulgence towards the church, Laud and his followers took care to magnify, on every occasion, the regal authority, and to treat, with the utmost disdain or detestation, all puritanical pretensions to a free and independent constitution. But while these prelates were so liberal in raising the crown at the expence of public liberty, they made no scruple of encroaching themselves, on the royal rights the most incontestible; in order to exalt the hierarchy, and procure to their own order dominion and independence. All the doctrines which the Romish church had borrowed from some of the fathers, and which freed the spiritual from subordination to the civil power, were now adopted by the church of England, and interwoven with her political and religious tenets. A divine and apostolical charter was insisted on, preferably to a legal and parliamentary one.
u
The sacerdotal character was magnified as sacred and indefeizable: All right to spiritual authority, or even to private judgment in spiritual subjects, was refused to profane laymen: Ecclesiastical courts were held by the bishops in their own name, without any notice taken of the king’s authority: And Charles, though extremely jealous of every claim in popular assemblies, seemed rather to encourage than repress those encroachments of his clergy. Having felt many sensible inconveniences from the independent spirit of parliaments, he attached himself entirely to those who professed a devoted obedience to his crown and person; nor did he foresee, that the ecclesiastical power, which he exalted, not admitting of any precise boundary, might in time become more dangerous to public peace, and no less fatal to royal prerogative than the other.

So early as the coronation, Laud was the person, according to general opinion, that introduced a novelty, which, though overlooked by Charles, made a deep impression on many of the byestanders. After the usual ceremonies, these words were recited to the king. “Stand and hold fast, from henceforth, the place to which you have been heir by the succession of your forefathers, being now delivered to you by the authority of Almighty God, and by the hands of us and all the bishops and servants of God. And, as you see the clergy to come nearer the altar than others, so remember, that, in all places convenient, you give them greater honour; that the Mediator of God and man may establish you on the kingly throne, to be a mediator betwixt the clergy and the laity; and that you may reign for ever with Jesus Christ, the King of kings, and Lord of lords.”
w

The principles, which exalted prerogative, were not entertained by the king merely as soft and agreeable to his royal ears: They were also put in practice during the time that he ruled without parliaments. Though frugal and regular in his expence, he wanted money for the support of government; and he levied it, either by the revival of obsolete laws, or by violations, some more open, some more disguised, of the PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)

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privileges of the nation. Though humane and gentle in his temper, he gave way to a few severities in the star-chamber and high-commission, which seemed necessary, in order to support the present mode of administration, and repress the rising spirit of liberty throughout the kingdom. Under these two heads may be reduced all the remarkable transactions of this reign, during some years: For, in peaceable and prosperous times, where a neutrality in foreign affairs is observed, scarcely any thing is remarkable, but what is, in some degree, blamed, or blameable. And, lest the hope of relief or protection from parliament might encourage opposition, Charles issued a proclamation in which he declared, “That, whereas, for several ill ends, the calling again of a parliament is divulged; though his majesty has shown, by frequent meetings with his people, his love to the use of parliaments: Yet the late abuse having, for the present, driven him unwillingly out of that course; he will account it presumption for any one to prescribe to him any time for the calling of that assembly.”
x
This was generally construed as a declaration, that, during this reign, no more parliaments were intended to be summoned. And every measure of the king’s confirmed a suspicion, so disagreeable to the generality of the people.

Tonnage and poundage continued to be levied by the royal

Irregular levies of

authority alone. The former additional impositions were still money.

exacted. Even new impositions were laid on several kinds of

merchandize.z

The custom-house officers received orders from the council to enter in to any house, warehouse, or cellar; to search any trunk or chest; and to break any bulk whatever; in default of the payment of customs.
a

In order to exercise the militia, and to keep them in good order, each county, by an edict of the council, was assessed in a certain sum, for maintaining a muster-master, appointed for that service.
b

y
Compositions were openly made with recusants, and the popish religion became a regular part of the revenue. This was all the persecution which it underwent during the

reign of Charles.c

A commission was granted for compounding with such as were possessed of crownlands upon defective titles; and, on this pretence, some money was exacted from the

people.d

There was a law of Edward II.,
e
That whoever was possessed of twenty pounds a year in land, should be obliged, when summoned, to appear and to receive the order of knighthood. Twenty pounds, at that time, partly by the change of denomination, partly by that in the value of money, were equivalent to 200 in the seventeenth century; and it seemed just, that the king should not strictly insist on the letter of the law, and oblige people of so small revenue to accept of that expensive honour. Edward VI.,
f

and queen Elizabeth,g
who had both of them made use of this expedient for raising money, had summoned only those who were possessed of forty pounds a year and upwards to receive knighthood, or compound for their neglect; and Charles imitated their example, in granting the same indulgence. Commissioners were appointed for PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)

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fixing the rates of composition; and instructions were given to these commissioners, not to accept of a less sum than would have been due by the party, upon a tax of three subsidies and a half.
h
Nothing proves more plainly, how ill-disposed the people were to the measures of the crown, than to observe, that they loudly complained of an expedient, founded on positive statute, and warranted by such recent precedents. The law was pretended to be obsolete; though only one reign had intervened since the last execution of it.

Barnard, lecturer of St. Sepulchre’s, London, used this

Severities of the star-

expression in his prayer before sermon;
Lord, open the eyes of
chamber and high

the queen’s majesty, that she may see Jesus Christ, whom she
commission.

has pierced with her infidelity, superstition, and idolatry.
He was questioned in the high-commission court for this insult on the queen; but, upon his submission, dismissed.
i
Leighton who had written libels against the king, the queen, the bishops, and the whole administration, was condemned by a very severe, if not a cruel, sentence; but the execution of it was suspended for some time, in expectation of his submission.
k
All the severities, indeed, of this reign were exercised against those who triumphed in their sufferings, who courted persecution, and braved authority: And, on that account, their punishment may be deemed the more just, but the less prudent. To have neglected them entirely, had it been consistent with order and public safety, had been the wisest measure, that could have been embraced; as perhaps it had been the most severe punishment, that could have been inflicted on these zealots.

In order to gratify the clergy with a magnificent fabric,

1631.

subscriptions were set on foot, for repairing and rebuilding St.

Paul’s; and the king, by his countenance and example, encouraged this laudable

undertaking.l
By order of the privy-council, St. Gregory’s church was removed, as an impediment to the project of extending and beautifying the cathedral. Some houses and shops likewise were pulled down; and compensation was made to the owners.
m

As there was no immediate prospect of assembling a parliament, such acts of power in the king became necessary; and in no former age would the people have entertained any scruple with regard to them. It must be remarked, that the Puritans were extremely averse to the raising of this ornament to the capital. It savoured, as they pretended, of popish superstition.

A stamp duty was imposed on cards: A new tax, which, of itself, was liable to no objection; but appeared of dangerous consequence, when considered as arbitrary and

illegal.n

Monopolies were revived; an oppressive method of levying money, being unlimited as well as destructive of industry. The last parliament of James, which abolished monopolies, had left an equitable exception in favour of new inventions; and on pretence of these, and of erecting new companies and corporations, was this grievance now renewed. The manufacture of soap was given to a company who paid a sum for their patent.
o
Leather, salt, and many other commodities, even down to linen rags, were likewise put under restrictions.

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It is affirmed by Clarendon, that so little benefit was reaped from these projects, that of 200,000 pounds thereby levied on the people, scarcely 1500 came into the king’s coffers. Though we ought not to suspect the noble historian of exaggerations to the disadvantage of Charles’s measures; this fact, it must be owned, appears somewhat incredible. The same author adds, that the king’s intention was to teach his subjects how unthrifty a thing it was to refuse reasonable supplies to the crown. An imprudent project! to offend a whole nation, under the view of punishment; and to hope, by acts of violence, to break their refractory spirits, without being possessed of any force to prevent resistance.

The council of York had been first erected, after a rebellion, by a 1632.

patent from Henry VIII. without any authority of parliament; and this exercise of power, like many others, was indulged to that arbitrary monarch. This council had long acted chiefly as a criminal court; but, besides some innovations, introduced by James, Charles thought proper, some time after Wentworth was made president, to extend its powers, and to give it a large civil jurisdiction, and that, in some respects, discretionary.
p
It is not improbable, that the king’s intention was only to prevent inconveniencies, which arose from the bringing of every cause, from the most distant parts of the kingdom, into Westminster-hall: But the consequence, in the mean time, of this measure, was the putting of all the northern counties out of the protection of ordinary law, and subjecting them to an authority somewhat arbitrary.

Some irregular acts of that council were, this year, complained of.
q

The court of star-chamber extended its authority; and it was 1633.

matter of complaint, that it encroached upon the jurisdiction of the other courts; imposing heavy fines and inflicting severe punishment, beyond the usual course of justice. Sir David Foulis was fined 5000 pounds, chiefly because he

had dissuaded a friend from compounding with the commissioners of knighthood.r

Prynne, a barrister of Lincoln’s-Inn, had written an enormous quarto of a thousand pages, which he called
Histrio-Mastyx.
Its professed purpose was to decry stage-plays, comedies, interludes, music, dancing; but the author likewise took occasion to declaim against hunting, public festivals, Christmas-keeping, bonfires, and Maypoles.

His zeal against all these levities, he says, was first moved, by observing, that plays sold better than the choicest sermons, and that they were frequently printed on finer paper than the Bible itself. Besides, that the players were often papists, and desperately wicked; the play-houses, he affirms, are Satan’s chapels, and play-haunters little better than incarnate devils; and so many steps in a dance, so many paces to hell. The chief crime of Nero he represents to have been, his frequenting and acting of plays; and those, who nobly conspired his death, were principally moved to it, as he affirms, by their indignation at that enormity. The rest of his thousand pages is of a like strain. He had obtained a licence from archbishop Abbot’s chaplain; yet was he indicted in the star-chamber as a libeller. It was thought somewhat hard, that general invectives against plays should be interpreted into satires against the king and queen, merely because they frequented these amusements, and because the queen sometimes acted a part in pastorals and interludes, which were represented at court.

The author, it must be owned, had, in plainer terms, blamed the hierarchy, the ceremonies, the innovations in religious worship, and the new superstitions, PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)