The History of England, from the Accession of James the Second - Volume 1, Thomas Babington Macaulay [ebook pc reader txt] 📗

could not therefore be legally exacted by the

new sovereign. Some weeks must elapse before a House of Commons

could be chosen. If, in the meantime, the duties were suspended,

the revenue would suffer; the regular course of trade would be

interrupted; the consumer would derive no benefit, and the only

gainers would be those fortunate speculators whose cargoes might

happen to arrive during the interval between the demise of the

crown and the meeting of the Parliament. The Treasury was

besieged by merchants whose warehouses were filled with goods on

which duty had been paid, and who were in grievous apprehension

of being undersold and ruined. Impartial men must admit that this

was one of those cases in which a government may be justified in

deviating from the strictly constitutional course. But when it is

necessary to deviate from the strictly constitutional course, the

deviation clearly ought to be no greater than the necessity

requires. Guildford felt this, and gave advice which did him

honour. He proposed that the duties should be levied, but should

be kept in the Exchequer apart from other sums till the

Parliament should meet. In this way the King, while violating the

letter of the laws, would show that he wished to conform to their

spirit, Jeffreys gave very different counsel. He advised James to

put forth an edict declaring it to be His Majesty's will and

pleasure that the customs should continue to be paid. This advice

was well suited to the King's temper. The judicious proposition

of the Lord Keeper was rejected as worthy only of a Whig, or of

what was still worse, a Trimmer. A proclamation, such as the

Chief Justice had suggested, appeared. Some people had expected

that a violent outbreak of public indignation would be the

consequence; but they were deceived. The spirit of opposition had

not yet revived; and the court might safely venture to take steps

which, five years before, would have produced a rebellion. In the

City of London, lately so turbulent, scarcely a murmur was

heard.234


The proclamation, which announced that the customs would still be

levied, announced also that a Parliament would shortly meet. It

was not without many misgivings that James had determined to call

the Estates of his realm together. The moment was, indeed. most

auspicious for a general election. Never since the accession of

the House of Stuart had the constituent bodies been so favourably

disposed towards the Court. But the new sovereign's mind was

haunted by an apprehension not to be mentioned even at this

distance of time, without shame and indignation. He was afraid

that by summoning his Parliament he might incur the displeasure

of the King of France.


To the King of France it mattered little which of the two English

factions triumphed at the elections: for all the Parliaments

which had met since the Restoration, whatever might have been

their temper as to domestic politics, had been jealous of the

growing power of the House of Bourbon. On this subject there was

little difference between the Whigs and the sturdy country

gentlemen who formed the main strength of the Tory party. Lewis

had therefore spared neither bribes nor menaces to prevent

Charles from convoking the Houses; and James, who had from the

first been in the secret of his brother's foreign politics, had,

in becoming King of England, become also a hireling and vassal of

France.


Rochester, Godolphin, and Sunderland, who now formed the interior

cabinet, were perfectly aware that their late master had been in

the habit of receiving money from the court of Versailles. They

were consulted by James as to the expediency of convoking the

legislature. They acknowledged the importance of keeping Lewis in

good humour: but it seemed to them that the calling of a

Parliament was not a matter of choice. Patient as the nation

appeared to be, there were limits to its patience. The principle,

that the money of the subject could not be lawfully taken by the

King without the assent of the Commons, was firmly rooted in the

public mind; and though, on all extraordinary emergency even

Whigs might be willing to pay, during a few weeks, duties not

imposed by statute, it was certain that even Tories would become

refractory if such irregular taxation should continue longer than

the special circumstances which alone justified it. The Houses

then must meet; and since it was so, the sooner they were

summoned the better. Even the short delay which would be

occasioned by a reference to Versailles might produce irreparable

mischief. Discontent and suspicion would spread fast through

society. Halifax would complain that the fundamental principles

of the constitution were violated. The Lord Keeper, like a

cowardly pedantic special pleader as he was, would take the same

side. What might have been done with a good grace would at last

be done with a bad grace. Those very ministers whom His Majesty

most wished to lower in the public estimation would gain

popularity at his expense. The ill temper of the nation might

seriously affect the result of the elections. These arguments

were unanswerable. The King therefore notified to the country his

intention of holding a Parliament. But he was painfully anxious

to exculpate himself from the guilt of having acted undutifully

and disrespectfully towards France. He led Barillon into a

private room, and there apologised for having dared to take so

important a step without the previous sanction of Lewis. "Assure

your master," said James, "of my gratitude and attachment. I know

that without his protection I can do nothing. I know what

troubles my brother brought on himself by not adhering steadily

to France. I will take good care not to let the Houses meddle

with foreign affairs. If I see in them any disposition to make

mischief, I will send them about their business. Explain this to

my good brother. I hope that he will not take it amiss that I

have acted without consulting him. He has a right to be

consulted; and it is my wish to consult him about everything. But

in this case the delay even of a week might have produced serious

consequences."


These ignominious excuses were, on the following morning,

repeated by Rochester. Barillon received them civilly. Rochester,

grown bolder, proceeded to ask for money. "It will be well laid

out," he said: "your master cannot employ his revenues better.

Represent to him strongly how important it is that the King of

England should be dependent, not on his own people, but on the

friendship of France alone."235


Barillon hastened to communicate to Lewis the wishes of the

English government; but Lewis had already anticipated them. His

first act, after he was apprised of the death of Charles, was to

collect bills of exchange on England to the amount of five

hundred thousand livres, a sum equivalent to about thirty-seven

thousand five hundred pounds sterling Such bills were not then to

be easily procured in Paris at day's notice. In a few hours,

however, the purchase was effected, and a courier started for

London.236 As soon as Barillon received the remittance, he flew

to Whitehall, and communicated the welcome news. James was not

ashamed to shed, or pretend to shed, tears of delight and

gratitude. "Nobody but your King," he said, "does such kind, such

noble things. I never can be grateful enough. Assure him that my

attachment will last to the end of my days." Rochester,

Sunderland, and Godolphin came, one after another, to embrace the

ambassador, and to whisper to him that he had given new life to

their royal master.237


But though James and his three advisers were pleased with the

promptitude which Lewis had shown, they were by no means

satisfied with the amount of the donation. As they were afraid,

however, that they might give offence by importunate mendicancy,

they merely hinted their wishes. They declared that they had no

intention of haggling with so generous a benefactor as the French

King, and that they were willing to trust entirely to his

munificence. They, at the same time, attempted to propitiate him

by a large sacrifice of national honour. It was well known that

one chief end of his politics was to add the Belgian provinces to

his dominions. England was bound by a treaty which had been

concluded with Spain when Danby was Lord Treasurer, to resist any

attempt which France might make on those provinces. The three

ministers informed Barillon that their master considered that

treaty as no longer obligatory. It had been made, they said, by

Charles: it might, perhaps, have been binding on him; but his

brother did not think himself bound by it. The most Christian

King might, therefore, without any fear of opposition from

England, proceed to annex Brabant and Hainault to his empire.238


It was at the same time resolved that an extraordinary embassy

should be sent to assure Lewis of the gratitude and affection of

James. For this mission was selected a man who did not as yet

occupy a very eminent position, but whose renown, strangely made

up of infamy and glory, filled at a later period the whole

civilized world.


Soon after the Restoration, in the gay and dissolute times which

have been celebrated by the lively pen of Hamilton, James, young

and ardent in the pursuit of pleasure, had been attracted to

Arabella Churchill, one of the maids of honour who waited on his

first wife. The young lady was plain: but the taste of James was

not nice: and she became his avowed mistress. She was the

daughter of a poor Cavalier knight who haunted Whitehall, and

made himself ridiculous by publishing a dull and affected folio,

long forgotten, in praise of monarchy and monarchs. The

necessities of the Churchills were pressing: their loyalty was

ardent: and their only feeling about Arabella's seduction seems

to have been joyful surprise that so homely a girl should have

attained such high preferment.


Her interest was indeed of great use to her relations: but none

of them was so fortunate as her eldest brother John, a fine

youth, who carried a pair of colours in the foot guards. He rose

fast in the court and in the army, and was early distinguished as

a man of fashion and of pleasure. His stature was commanding, his

face handsome, his address singularly winning, yet of such

dignity that the most impertinent fops never ventured to take any

liberty with him; his temper, even in the most vexatious and

irritating circumstances, always under perfect command. His

education had been so much neglected that he could not spell the

most common words of his own language: but his acute and vigorous

understanding amply supplied the place of book learning. He was

not talkative: but when he was forced to speak in public, his

natural eloquence moved