The History of England - Vols. 1 to 6 (477 page)

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long as the demands of the crown were small and casual, no great inconveniencies arose from this practice. But as all the measures of government were now changed, it must be confessed, that, if the king made a just application of public money, this inaccurate method of proceeding, by exposing him to suspicion, was prejudicial to him. If he were inclined to act otherwise, it was equally hurtful to the people. For these reasons, a contrary practice, during all the late reigns, has constantly been followed by the commons.

When the parliament met after the prorogation, they entered 1670. 14th February.

anew upon the business of supply, and granted the king an additional duty, during eight years, of twelve pounds on each tun of Spanish wine imported, eight on each tun of French. A law also passed empowering him to sell the fee farm rents; the last remains of the demesnes, by which the ancient kings of England had been supported. By this expedient he obtained some supply for his present necessities, but left the crown, if possible, still more dependent than before.

How much money might be raised by these sales is uncertain; but it could not be near

one million eight hundred thousand pounds, the sum assigned by some writers.c

The act against conventicles passed, and received the royal assent. It bears the appearance of mitigating the former persecuting laws; but if we may judge by the spirit, which had broken out almost every session during this parliament, it was not intended as any favour to the nonconformists. Experience probably had taught, that laws over rigid and severe could not be executed. By this act the hearer in a conventicle (that is, in a dissenting assembly, where more than five were present, besides the family) was fined five shillings for the first offence, ten for the second; the preacher twenty pounds for the first offence, forty for the second. The person, in whose house the conventicle met, was amerced a like sum with the preacher. One clause is remarkable; that, if any dispute should arise with regard to the interpretation of any part of the act, the judges should always explain the doubt in the sense least favourable to conventicles, it being the intention of parliament entirely to suppress them. Such was the zeal of the commons, that they violated the plainest and most established maxims of civil policy, which require, that, in all criminal prosecutions, favour should always be given to the prisoner.

The affair of Skinner still remained a ground of quarrel between the two houses; but the king prevailed with the peers to accept of the expedient proposed by the commons, that a general razure should be made of all the transactions with regard to that disputed question.

Some attempts were made by the king to effect a union between England and Scotland: Though they were too feeble to remove all the difficulties, which obstructed that useful and important undertaking. Commissioners were appointed to meet, in order to regulate the conditions: But the design, chiefly by the intrigues of Lauderdale, soon after came to nothing.

The king, about this time, began frequently to attend the debates of the house of peers.

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in the cause of lord Roos, who had obtained a divorce from his wife on the accusation of adultery, and applied to parliament for leave to marry again; people imagined, that Charles intended to make a precedent of the case, and that some other pretence would be found for getting rid of the queen. Many proposals to this purpose, it is said, were made him by Buckingham: But the king, how little scrupulous soever in some respects, was incapable of any action harsh or barbarous; and he always rejected every scheme of this nature. A suspicion however of such intentions, it was observed, had, at this time, begotten a coldness between the two royal brothers.

We now come to a period, when the king’s counsels, which had hitherto, in the main, been good, though negligent and fluctuating, became, during some time, remarkably bad, or even criminal; and breeding incurable jealousies in all men, were followed by such consequences as had almost terminated in the ruin both of prince and people.

Happily, the same negligence still attended him; and, as it had lessened the influence of the good, it also diminished the effect of the bad measures, which he embraced.

It was remarked, that the committee of council, established for foreign affairs, was entirely changed; and that prince Rupert, the duke of Ormond, secretary Trevor, and lord keeper Bridgeman, men in whose honour the nation had great confidence, were never called to any deliberations. The whole secret was entrusted to five persons, Clifford, Ashley, Buckingham, Arlington, and Lauderdale.

These men were known by the appellation of the Cabal, a word The Cabal.

which the initial letters of their names happened to compose.

Never was there a more dangerous ministry in England, nor one more noted for pernicious counsels.

Lord Ashley, soon after known by the name of earl of

Their characters.

Shaftesbury, was one of the most remarkable characters of the age, and the chief spring of all the succeeding movements. During his early youth, he had engaged in the late king’s party; but being disgusted with some measures of prince Maurice, he soon deserted to the parliament. He insinuated himself into the confidence of Cromwel; and as he had great influence with the presbyterians, he was serviceable in supporting, with his party, the authority of that usurper. He employed the same credit in promoting the restoration; and on that account both deserved and acquired favour with the king. In all his changes, he still maintained the character of never betraying those friends whom he deserted; and which-ever party he joined, his great capacity and singular talents soon gained him their confidence, and enabled him to take the lead among them. No station could satisfy his ambition, no fatigues were insuperable to his industry. Well acquainted with the blind attachment of faction, he surmounted all sense of shame: And relying on the subtilty of his contrivances, he was not startled with enterprizes, the most hazardous and most criminal. His talents, both of public speaking and private insinuation, shone out in an eminent degree; and amidst all his furious passions, he possessed a sound judgment of business, and still more of men. Though fitted by nature for beginning and pushing the greatest undertakings, he was never able to conduct any to a happy period; and his eminent abilities, by reason of his insatiable desires, were equally dangerous to himself, to the prince, and to the people.

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The duke of Buckingham possessed all the advantages, which a graceful person, a high rank, a splendid fortune, and a lively wit could bestow; but by his wild conduct, unrestrained either by prudence or principle, he found means to render himself in the end odious and even insignificant. The least interest could make him abandon his honour; the smallest pleasure could seduce him from his interest; the most frivolous caprice was sufficient to counterbalance his pleasure. By his want of secrecy and constancy, he destroyed his character in public life; by his contempt of order and economy, he dissipated his private fortune; by riot and debauchery, he ruined his health; and he remained at last as incapable of doing hurt, as he had ever been little desirous of doing good, to mankind.

The earl, soon after created duke of Lauderdale, was not defective in natural, and still less in acquired, talents; but neither was his address graceful, nor his understanding just. His principles, or, more properly speaking, his prejudices, were obstinate, but unable to restrain his ambition: His ambition was still less dangerous than the tyranny and violence of his temper. An implacable enemy, but a lukewarm friend; insolent to his inferiors, but abject to his superiors; though in his whole character and deportment, he was almost diametrically opposite to the king, he had the fortune, beyond any other minister, to maintain, during the greater part of his reign, an ascendant over him.

The talents of parliamentary eloquence and intrigue had raised Sir Thomas Clifford; and his daring impetuous spirit gave him weight in the king’s councils. Of the whole cabal, Arlington was the least dangerous either by his vices or his talents. His judgment was sound, though his capacity was but moderate; and his intentions were good, though he wanted courage and integrity to persevere in them. Together with Temple and Bridgeman, he had been a great promoter of the triple league; but he threw himself with equal alacrity into opposite measures, when he found them agreeable to his master. Clifford and he were secretly catholics: Shaftesbury, though addicted to astrology, was reckoned a deist: Buckingham had too little reflection to embrace any steady principles: Lauderdale had long been a bigotted and furious presbyterian; and the opinions of that sect still kept possession of his mind, how little soever they appeared in his conduct.

The dark counsels of the cabal, though from the first they gave Their counsels.

anxiety to all men of reflection, were not thoroughly known but by the event. Such seem to have been the views, which they, in concurrence with some catholic courtiers, who had the ear of their sovereign, suggested to the king and the duke, and which these princes too greedily embraced. They said, that the parliament, though the spirit of party, for the present, attached them to the crown, were still more attached to those powers and privileges, which their predecessors had usurped from the sovereign: That after the first flow of kindness was spent, they had discovered evident symptoms of discontent; and would be sure to turn against the king all the authority which they yet retained, and still more those pretensions which it was easy for them in a moment to revive: That they not only kept the king in dependence by means of his precarious revenue, but had never discovered a suitable generosity, even in those temporary supplies, which they granted him: That it was high time for the prince to rouze himself from his lethargy, and to recover that PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)

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authority, which his predecessors, during so many ages, had peaceably enjoyed: That the great error or misfortune of his father was the not having formed any close connexion with foreign princes, who, on the breaking out of the rebellion, might have found their interest in supporting him: That the present alliances, being entered into with so many weaker potentates, who themselves stood in need of the king’s protection, could never serve to maintain, much less augment, the royal authority: That the French monarch alone, so generous a prince, and by blood so nearly allied to the king, would be found both able and willing, if gratified in his ambition, to defend the common cause of kings against usurping subjects: That a war, undertaken against Holland by the united force of two such mighty potentates, would prove an easy enterprize, and would serve all the purposes which were aimed at: That under pretence of that war, it would not be difficult to levy a military force, without which, during the prevalence of republican principles among his subjects, the king would vainly expect to defend his prerogative: That his naval power might be maintained, partly by the supplies, which, on other pretences, would previously be obtained from parliament; partly by subsidies from France; partly by captures, which might easily be made on that opulent republic: That in such a situation, attempts to recover the lost authority of the crown would be attended with success; nor would any malcontents dare to resist a prince, fortified by so powerful an alliance; or if they did, they would only draw more certain ruin on themselves and on their cause: And that by subduing the States, a great step would be made towards a reformation of the government; since it was apparent, that that republic, by its fame and grandeur, fortified, in his factious subjects, their attachment to what they vainly termed their civil and religious liberties.

These suggestions happened fatally to concur with all the inclinations and prejudices of the king; his desire of more extensive authority, his propensity to the catholic religion, his avidity for money. He seems likewise, from the very beginning of his reign, to have entertained great jealousy of his own subjects, and, on that account, a desire of fortifying himself by an intimate alliance with France. So early as 1664, he had offered the French monarch to allow him without opposition to conquer Flanders, provided that prince would engage to furnish him with ten thousand infantry, and a suitable number of cavalry, in case of any rebellion in England.
d
As no dangerous symptom at that time appeared, we are left to conjecture, from this incident, what opinion Charles had conceived of the factious disposition of his people.

Even during the time, when the triple alliance was the most zealously cultivated, the king never seems to have been entirely cordial in those salutary measures, but still to have cast a longing eye towards the French alliance. Clifford, who had much of his confidence, said imprudently, “Notwithstanding all this joy, we must have a second war with Holland.” The accession of the Emperor to that alliance had been refused by England on frivolous pretences. And many unfriendly cavils were raised against the States with regard to Surinam and the conduct of the East India company.
NOTE [H]

But about April 1669, the strongest symptoms appeared of those fatal measures, which were afterwards more openly pursued.

De Wit, at that time, came to Temple; and told him, that he payed him a visit as a friend, not as a minister. The occasion was to acquaint him with a conversation which he had lately had with Puffendorf, the Swedish agent, who had passed by the Hague PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)