Read The History of England - Vols. 1 to 6 Online
Authors: David Hume
The History of England - Vols. 1 to 6 (437 page)
[NOTE [II]]
These are the words: “Laneric; I wonder to hear (if that be true) that some of my friends say, that my going to Jersey would have much more furthered my PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)
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personal treaty, than my coming hither, for which, as I see no colour of reason, so I had not been here, if I had thought that fancy true, or had not been secured of a personal treaty; of which I neither do, nor I hope will repent: For I am daily more and more satisfied with the governor, and find these islanders very good, peaceable and quiet people. This encouragement I have thought not unfit for you to receive, hoping at least it may do good upon others, though needless to you.” Burnet’s Memoirs of Hamilton, p. 326. See also Rushworth, part 4, vol. ii. p. 941. All the writers of that age, except Clarendon, represent the king’s going to the isle of Wight as voluntary and intended. Perhaps the king thought it little for his credit, to be trepanned into this measure, and was more willing to take it on himself as entirely voluntary. Perhaps, he thought it would encourage his friends, if they thought him in a situation, which was not disagreeable to him.
[k]Rush. vol. viii. p. 845, 859.
[l]Idem, ibid. p. 875. Clarendon, vol. v. p. 87.
[n]The following was a favourite text among enthusiasts of that age. “Let the high
praises of God be in the mouths of his saints, and a two-fold sword in their hands, to execute vengeance upon the heathen and punishment upon the people; to bind their kings with chains and their nobles with fetters of iron; to execute upon them the judgments written: This honour have all his saints.” Psalm cxlix. ver. 6, 7, 8, 9. Hugh Peters, the mad chaplain of Cromwel, preached frequently upon this text.
[s]Rush. vol. viii. p. 965, 967.
[t]Rush. vol. viii. p. 998. Clarendon, vol. v. p. 93.
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[c]Clarendon, vol. v. p. 180. Sir Edward Walker’s perfect Copies, p. 6.
[f]Burnet’s Memoirs of Hamilton.
[i]Clarendon, Sir Edward Walker, p. 319.
[u]Ibid. p. 75, 82. Rush. vol. viii. p. 1323.
[NOTE [JJ]]
The king composed a letter to the prince, in which he related the whole course of this transaction, and accompanied his narrative with several wise, as well as pathetical reflections and advices. The words with which he concluded the letter, are remarkable. “By what hath been said, you see how long I have laboured in the search of peace: Do not you be disheartened to tread in the same steps. Use all worthy means to restore yourself to your rights, but prefer the way of peace: Show the greatness of your mind, rather to conquer your enemies by pardoning, than by punishing. If you saw how unmanly and unchristian the implacable disposition is in our ill-wishers, you would avoid that spirit. Censure me not for having parted with so much of our right: PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)
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The price was great; but the commodity was, security to us, peace to my people. And I am confident, that another parliament would remember, how useful a king’s power is to a people’s liberty; of how much power I divested myself, that I and they might meet once again in a parliamentary way, in order to agree the bounds of prince and people. Give belief to my experience, never to affect more greatness or prerogative, than what is really and intrinsically for the good of the subjects, not the satisfaction of favourites. If you thus use it, you will never want means to be a father to all, and a bountiful prince to any, whom you incline to be extraordinarily gracious to. You may perceive, that all men entrust their treasure, where it returns them interest; and if a prince, like the sea, receive and repay all the fresh streams, which the rivers entrust with him, they will not grudge, but pride themselves, to make up an ocean. These considerations may make you as great a prince as your father is a low one; and your state may be so much the more established, as mine hath been shaken. For our subjects have learned, I dare say, that victories over their princes, are but triumphs over themselves, and so, will more unwillingly hearken to changes hereafter. The English nation are a sober people, however, at present, infatuated. I know not but this may be the last time, I may speak to you or the world publicly. I am sensible into what hands I am fallen; and yet, I bless God, I have those inward refreshments, which the malice of my enemies cannot perturb. I have learned to be busy myself, by retiring into myself; and therefore can the better digest whatever befals me, not doubting, but God’s providence will restrain our enemies power, and turn their fierceness into his praise. To conclude, if God give you success, use it humbly, and be ever far from revenge. If he restore you to your right on hard conditions, whatever you promise, keep. These men, who have violated laws, which they were bound to preserve, will find their triumphs full of trouble. But do not you think any thing in the world worth attaining, by foul and unjust means.”
[d]Col. Cooke’s Memoirs, p. 174. Rush. vol. viii. p. 1347.
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[k]Perinchef, p. 85. Lloyde, p. 319.
[l]Burnet’s History of his own Times.
[m]Clement Walker’s history of independency.
[NOTE [KK]]
The imputation of insincerity on Charles I. like most party clamours, is difficult to be removed; though it may not here be improper to say something with regard to it. I shall first remark, that this imputation seems to be of a later growth than his own age; and that even his enemies, though they loaded him with many calumnies, did not insist on this accusation. Ludlow, I think, is almost the only parliamentarian, who imputes that vice to him; and how passionate a writer he is, must be obvious to every one. Neither Clarendon nor any other of the royalists ever justify him from insincerity; as not supposing that he had ever been accused of it. In the second place, his deportment and character in common life was free from that vice: He was reserved, distant, stately; cold in his address, plain in his discourse, inflexible in his principles; wide of the caressing, insinuating manners of his son; or the professing, talkative humour of his father. The imputation of insincerity must be grounded on some of his public actions, which we are therefore in the third place to examine. The following are the only instances, which I find cited to confirm that accusation. (1.) His vouching Buckingham’s narrative of the transactions in Spain. But it is evident that Charles himself was deceived: Why otherwise did he quarrel with Spain? The following is a passage of a letter from lord Kensington, ambassador in France, to the duke of Buckingham, Cabbala, p. 318. “But his highness (the prince) had observed as great a weakness and folly as that, in that after they (the Spaniards) had used him so ill, they would suffer him to depart, which was one of the first speeches he uttered after he came into the ship: But did he say so? said the queen (of France). Yes, madam, I will assure you, quoth I, from the witness of mine own ears. She smiled and replied, Indeed I heard he was used ill. So he was, answered I, but not in his entertainment; for that was as splendid as that country could afford it; but in their frivolous delays, and in the unreasonable conditions which they propounded and pressed, upon the advantage they had of his princely person.” (2.) Bishop Burnet, in his history of the house of Hamilton, p. 154, has preserved a letter of the king’s to the Scottish bishops, in which he desires them not to be present at the parliament, where they would be forced to ratify the abolition of their own order: “For,” adds the king,
“we do hereby assure you, that it shall be still one of our chiefest studies how to rectify and establish the government of that church aright, and to repair your losses, which we desire you to be most confident of.” And in another place, “You may rest secure, that though perhaps we may give way for the present to that which will be prejudicial both to the church and our own government: yet we shall not leave thinking in time how to remedy both.” But does the king say, that he will arbitrarily revoke his concessions? Does not candor require us rather to suppose, that he hoped his authority would so far recover as to enable him to obtain the national consent to re-establish episcopacy, which he believed so material a part of religion as well as of government? It is not easy indeed to think how he could hope to effect this purpose in any other way than his father had taken, that is, by consent of parliament. (3.) There is PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)
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a passage in lord Clarendon, where it is said, that the king assented the more easily to the bill, which excluded the bishops from the house of peers; because he thought, that that law, being enacted by force, could not be valid. But the king certainly reasoned right in that conclusion. Three-fourths of the temporal peers were at that time banished by the violence of the populace: Twelve bishops were unjustly thrown into the Tower by the commons: Great numbers of the commons themselves were kept away by fear or violence: The king himself was chased from London. If all this be not force, there is no such thing. But this scruple of the king’s affects only the bishop’s bill, and that against pressing. The other constitutional laws had passed without the least appearance of violence, as did indeed all the bills passed during the first year, except Strafford’s attainder, which could not be recalled. The parliament, therefore, even if they had known the king’s sentiments in this particular, could not, on that account, have had any just foundation of jealousy. (4.) The king’s letter intercepted at Naseby, has been the source of much clamour. We have spoken of it already in chap.
lviii. Nothing is more usual in all public transactions than such distinctions. After the death of Charles II. of Spain, king William’s ambassadors gave the duke of Anjou the title of king of Spain: Yet at that very time king William was secretly forming alliances to dethrone him: And soon after he refused him that title, and insisted (as he had reason) that he had not acknowledged his right. Yet king William justly passes for a very sincere prince; and this transaction is not regarded as any objection to his character in that particular. In all the negociations at the peace of Ryswic, the French ambassadors always addressed king William as king of England; yet it was made an express article of the treaty, that the French king should acknowledge him as such.
Such a palpable difference is there between giving a title to a prince, and positively recognizing his right to it. I may add, that Charles when he inserted that protestation in the council-books before his council, surely thought he had reason to justify his conduct. There were too many men of honour in that company to avow a palpable cheat. To which we may subjoin, that, if men were as much disposed to judge of this prince’s actions with candor as severity, this precaution of entering a protest in his council-books might rather pass for a proof of scrupulous honour; lest he should afterwards be reproached with breach of his word, when he should think proper again to declare the assembly at Westminster no parliament. (5.) The denying of his commission to Glamorgan is another instance which has been cited. This matter has been already treated in a note to chap. lviii. That transaction was entirely innocent.
Even if the king had given a commission to Glamorgan to conclude that treaty, and had ratified it, will any reasonable man, in our age, think it strange, that, in order to save his own life, his crown, his family, his friends, and his party, he should make a treaty with papists, and grant them very large concessions for their religion. (6.) There is another of the king’s intercepted letters to the queen commonly mentioned; where, it is pretended, he talked of raising and then destroying Cromwel: But that story stands on no manner of foundation, as we have observed in a preceding note to this chapter. In a word, the parliament, after the commencement of their violences, and still more, after beginning the civil war, had reason for their scruples and jealousies, founded on the very nature of their situation, and on the general propensity of the human mind; not on any fault of the king’s character; who was candid, sincere, upright; as much as any man, whom we meet with in history. Perhaps, it would be difficult to find another character so unexceptionable in this particular.