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The Project Gutenberg EBook of The History of England from the Accession
of James II. , by Thomas Babington Macaulay

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
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Title: The History of England from the Accession of James II.
Volume 5 (of 5)

Author: Thomas Babington Macaulay

Posting Date: June 23, 2008 [EBook #2614]
Release Date: May, 2001

Language: English


*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HISTORY OF ENGLAND ***




Produced by Martin Adamson





THE HISTORY OF ENGLAND FROM THE ACCESSION OF JAMES THE SECOND

Volume V

(Chapters XXIII-XXV)

by Thomas Babington Macaulay




CONTENTS:


CHAPTER XXIII


Standing Armies
Sunderland
Lord Spencer
Controversy touching Standing Armies
Meeting of Parliament
The King's Speech well received; Debate on a Peace Establishment
Sunderland attacked
The Nation averse to a Standing Army
Mutiny Act; the Navy Acts concerning High Treason
Earl of Clancarty
Ways and Means; Rights of the Sovereign in reference to Crown Lands
Proceedings in Parliament on Grants of Crown Lands
Montague accused of Peculation
Bill of Pains and Penalties against Duncombe
Dissension between the houses
Commercial Questions
Irish Manufactures
East India Companies
Fire at Whitehall
Visit of the Czar
Portland's Embassy to France
The Spanish Succession
The Count of Tallard's Embassy
Newmarket Meeting: the insecure State of the Roads
Further Negotiations relating to the Spanish Succession
The King goes to Holland
Portland returns from his Embassy
William is reconciled to Marlborough





CHAPTER XXIV


Altered Position of the Ministry
The Elections
First Partition Treaty
Domestic Discontent
Littleton chosen Speaker
King's Speech; Proceedings relating to the Amount of the Land Force
Unpopularity of Montague
Bill for Disbanding the Army
The King's Speech
Death of the Electoral Prince of Bavaria.
Renewed Discussion of the Army Question
Naval Administration
Commission on Irish Forfeitures.
Prorogation of Parliament
Changes in the Ministry and Household
Spanish Succession
Darien




CHAPTER XXV.


Trial of Spencer Cowper
Duels
Discontent of the Nation
Captain Kidd
Meeting of Parliament
Attacks on Burnet
Renewed Attack on Somers
Question of the Irish Forfeitures: Dispute between the Houses
Somers again attacked
Prorogation of Parliament
Death of James the Second
The Pretender recognised as King
Return of the King
General Election
Death of William




PREFACE TO THE FIFTH VOLUME.

I HAVE thought it right to publish that portion of the continuation of
the "History of England" which was fairly transcribed and revised by
Lord Macaulay. It is given to the world precisely as it was left: no
connecting link has been added; no reference verified; no authority
sought for or examined. It would indeed have been possible, with the
help I might have obtained from his friends, to have supplied much that
is wanting; but I preferred, and I believe the public will prefer, that
the last thoughts of the great mind passed away from among us should
be preserved sacred from any touch but his own. Besides the revised
manuscript, a few pages containing the first rough sketch of the last
two months of William's reign are all that is left. From this I have
with some difficulty deciphered the account of the death of William. No
attempt has been made to join it on to the preceding part, or to supply
the corrections which would have been given by the improving hand of the
author. But, imperfect as it must be, I believe it will be received with
pleasure and interest as a fit conclusion to the life of his great hero.

I will only add my grateful thanks for the kind advice and assistance
given me by his most dear and valued friends, Dean Milman and Mr. Ellis.




CHAPTER XXIII

Standing Armies--Sunderland--Lord Spencer--Controversy touching Standing
Armies--Meeting of Parliament--The King's Speech well received; Debate
on a Peace Establishment--Sunderland attacked--The Nation averse to a
Standing Army--Mutiny Act; the Navy Acts concerning High Treason--Earl
of Clancarty--Ways and Means; Rights of the Sovereign in reference
to Crown Lands--Proceedings in Parliament on Grants of Crown
Lands--Montague accused of Peculation--Bill of Pains and Penalties
against Duncombe--Dissension between the houses--Commercial
Questions--Irish Manufactures--East India Companies--Fire at
Whitehall--Visit of the Czar--Portland's Embassy to France--The Spanish
Succession--The Count of Tallard's Embassy--Newmarket Meeting: the
insecure State of the Roads--Further Negotiations relating to the
Spanish Succession--The King goes to Holland--Portland returns from his
Embassy--William is reconciled to Marlborough

THE rejoicings, by which London, on the second of December 1697,
celebrated the return of peace and prosperity, continued till long after
midnight. On the following morning the Parliament met; and one of the
most laborious sessions of that age commenced.

Among the questions which it was necessary that the Houses should
speedily decide, one stood forth preeminent in interest and importance.
Even in the first transports of joy with which the bearer of the treaty
of Ryswick had been welcomed to England, men had eagerly and anxiously
asked one another what was to be done with that army which had
been formed in Ireland and Belgium, which had learned, in many
hard campaigns, to obey and to conquer, and which now consisted of
eighty-seven thousand excellent soldiers. Was any part of this great
force to be retained in the service of the State? And, if any part, what
part? The last two kings had, without the consent of the legislature,
maintained military establishments in time of peace. But that they
had done this in violation of the fundamental laws of England was
acknowledged by all jurists, and had been expressly affirmed in the Bill
of Rights. It was therefore impossible for William, now that the country
was threatened by no foreign and no domestic enemy, to keep up even a
single battalion without the sanction of the Estates of the Realm; and
it might well be doubted whether such a sanction would be given.

It is not easy for us to see this question in the light in which it
appeared to our ancestors.

No man of sense has, in our days, or in the days of our fathers,
seriously maintained that our island could be safe without an army.
And, even if our island were perfectly secure from attack, an army would
still be indispensably necessary to us. The growth of the empire has
left us no choice. The regions which we have colonized or conquered
since the accession of the House of Hanover contain a population
exceeding twenty-fold that which the House of Stuart governed. There are
now more English soldiers on the other side of the tropic of Cancer in
time of peace than Cromwell had under his command in time of war. All
the troops of Charles II. would not have been sufficient to garrison the
posts which we now occupy in the Mediterranean Sea alone. The regiments
which defend the remote dependencies of the Crown cannot be duly
recruited and relieved, unless a force far larger than that which James
collected in the camp at Hounslow for the purpose of overawing his
capital be constantly kept up within the kingdom. The old national
antipathy to permanent military establishments, an antipathy which was
once reasonable and salutary, but which lasted some time after it
had become unreasonable and noxious, has gradually yielded to the
irresistible force of circumstances. We have made the discovery, that
an army may be so constituted as to be in the highest degree efficient
against an enemy, and yet obsequious to the civil magistrate. We have
long ceased to apprehend danger to law and to freedom from the license
of troops, and from the ambition of victorious generals. An alarmist who
should now talk such language, as was common five generations ago, who
should call for the entire disbanding of the land force; of the realm,
and who should gravely predict that the warriors of Inkerman and Delhi
would depose the Queen, dissolve the Parliament, and plunder the Bank,
would be regarded as fit only for a cell in Saint Luke's. But before the
Revolution our ancestors had known a standing army only as an instrument
of lawless power. Judging by their own experience, they thought it
impossible that such an army should exist without danger to the rights
both of the Crown and of the people. One class of politicians was never
weary of repeating that an Apostolic Church, a loyal gentry, an ancient
nobility, a sainted King, had been foully outraged by the Joyces and the
Prides; another class recounted the atrocities committed by the Lambs of
Kirke, and by the Beelzebubs and Lucifers of Dundee; and both classes,
agreeing in scarcely any thing else, were disposed to agree in aversion
to the red coats.

While such was the feeling of the nation, the King was, both as a
statesman and as a general, most unwilling to see that superb body
of troops which he had formed with infinite difficulty broken up and
dispersed. But, as to this matter, he could not absolutely rely on the
support of his ministers; nor could his ministers absolutely rely on the
support of that parliamentary majority whose attachment had enabled them
to confront enemies abroad and to crush traitors at home, to restore
a debased currency, and to fix public credit on deep and solid
foundations.

The difficulties of the King's situation are to be, in part at least,
attributed to an error which he had committed in the preceding spring.
The Gazette which announced that Sunderland been appointed Chamberlain
of the Royal Household, sworn of the Privy Council, and named one of the
Lords Justices who were to administer the government during the summer
had caused great uneasiness among plain men who remembered all the
windings and doublings of his long career. In truth, his countrymen
were unjust to him. For they thought him, not only an unprincipled and
faithless politician, which he was, but a deadly enemy of the liberties
of the nation, which he was not. What he wanted was simply to be safe,
rich and great. To these objects he had been constant through all the
vicissitudes of his life. For these objects he had passed from Church
to Church and from faction to faction, had joined the most turbulent
of oppositions without any zeal for freedom, and had served the most
arbitrary of monarchs without any zeal for monarchy; had voted for
the Exclusion Bill without being a Protestant, and had adored the Host
without being a Papist; had sold his country at once to both the great
parties which divided the Continent; had taken money from France, and
had sent intelligence to Holland. As far, however, as he could be said
to have any opinions, his opinions were Whiggish. Since his return from
exile, his influence had been generally exerted in favour of the Whig
party. It was by his counsel that the Great Seal had been entrusted
to Somers, that Nottingham had been sacrificed to Russell, and that
Montague had been preferred to Fox. It was by his dexterous management
that the Princess Anne had been detached from the opposition, and that
Godolphin had been removed from the head of the hoard of Treasury. The
party which Sunderland had done so much to serve now held a new pledge
for his fidelity. His only son, Charles Lord Spencer, was just entering
on public life. The precocious maturity of the young man's intellectual
and moral character had excited hopes which were not destined to
be realized. His knowledge of ancient literature, and his skill in
imitating the styles of the masters of Roman eloquence, were applauded
by veteran scholars. The sedateness of his deportment and the apparent
regularity of his life delighted austere moralists. He was known indeed
to have one expensive taste; but it was a taste of the most respectable
kind. He loved books, and was bent or forming the most magnificent
private library in England. While other heirs of noble houses were
inspecting patterns of steinkirks and sword knots, dangling after
actresses, or betting on fighting cocks, he was in pursuit of the
Mentz editions of Tully's Offices, of the Parmesan Statius, and of
the inestimable Virgin of Zarottus. [1] It was natural that high
expectations should be formed of the virtue and wisdom of a youth whose
very luxury and prodigality had a grave and erudite air, and that even
discerning men should be unable to detect the vices which were hidden
under that show of premature sobriety.

Spencer was a Whig, unhappily for the Whig party, which, before the
unhonoured and unlamented close of his life, was more than once brought
to the verge of ruin by his violent temper and his crooked politics. His
Whiggism differed widely from that of his father. It was not a languid,
speculative, preference of one theory of government to another, but a
fierce and dominant passion. Unfortunately, though an ardent, it was at
the same time a corrupt and degenerate, Whiggism; a Whiggism so narrow
and oligarchical as to be little, if at all, preferable to the worst
forms of Toryism. The young lord's imagination had been fascinated by
those swelling sentiments of liberty which abound in the Latin poets
and orators; and he, like those poets and orators, meant by liberty
something very different from the only liberty which is of importance to
the happiness of mankind. Like them, he could see no danger to liberty
except from kings. A commonwealth, oppressed and pillaged by such men
as Opimius and Verres, was free, because it had no king. A member of the
Grand Council of Venice, who passed his whole life under tutelage and
in fear, who could not travel where he chose, or visit whom he chose,
or invest his property as he chose, whose path was beset with spies,
who saw at the corners of the streets the mouth of bronze gaping for
anonymous accusations against him, and whom the Inquisitors of State
could, at any moment, and for any or no reason, arrest, torture, fling
into the Grand Canal, was free, because he had no king. To curtail,
for the benefit of a small privileged class, prerogatives which the
Sovereign possesses and ought to possess for the benefit of the whole
nation, was the object on which Spencer's heart was set. During many
years he was restrained by older and wiser men; and it was not till
those whom he had early been accustomed to respect had passed away, and
till he was himself at the head of affairs, that he openly attempted to
obtain for the hereditary nobility a precarious and invidious ascendency
in the State, at the expense both of the Commons and of the Throne.

In 1695, Spencer had taken his seat in the House of Commons as member
for Tiverton, and had, during two sessions, conducted himself as a
steady and zealous Whig.

The party to which he had attached himself might perhaps have reasonably
considered him as a hostage sufficient to ensure the good faith of his
father; for the Earl was approaching that time of life at which even
the most ambitious and rapacious men generally toil rather for their
children than for themselves. But the distrust which Sunderland inspired
was such as no guarantee could quiet. Many fancied that he was,--with
what object they never took the trouble to inquire,--employing the same
arts which had ruined James for the purpose of ruining William. Each
prince had had his weak side. One was too much a Papist, and the other
too much a soldier, for such a nation as this. The same intriguing
sycophant who had encouraged the Papist in one fatal error was now
encouraging the soldier in another. It might well be apprehended that,
under the influence of this evil counsellor, the nephew might alienate
as many hearts by trying to make England a military country as the uncle
had alienated by trying to make her a Roman Catholic country.

The parliamentary conflict on the great question of a standing army
was preceded by a literary conflict. In the autumn of 1697 began a
controversy of no common interest and importance. The press was now
free. An exciting and momentous political question could be fairly
discussed. Those who held uncourtly opinions could express those
opinions without resorting to illegal expedients and employing the
agency of desperate men. The consequence was that the dispute was
carried on, though with sufficient keenness, yet, on the whole, with a
decency which would have been thought extraordinary in the days of the
censorship.

On this occasion the Tories, though they felt strongly, wrote but
little. The paper war was almost entirely carried on between two
sections of the Whig party. The combatants on both sides were generally
anonymous. But it was well known that one of the foremost champions of
the malecontent Whigs was John Trenchard, son of the late Secretary of
State. Preeminent among the ministerial Whigs was one in whom admirable
vigour and quickness of intellect were united to a not less admirable
moderation and urbanity, one who looked on the history of past ages with
the eye of a practical statesman, and on the events which were passing
before him with the eye of a philosophical historian. It was not
necessary for him to name himself. He could be none but Somers.

The pamphleteers who recommended the immediate and entire disbanding of
the army had an easy task. If they were embarrassed, it was only by the
abundance of the matter from which they had to make their selection. On
their side were claptraps and historical commonplaces without number,
the authority of a crowd of illustrious names, all the prejudices, all
the traditions, of both the parties in the state. These writers laid
it down as a fundamental principle of political science that a standing
army and a free constitution could not exist together. What, they asked,
had destroyed the noble commonwealths of Greece? What had enslaved the
mighty Roman people? What had turned the Italian republics of the middle
ages into lordships and duchies? How was it that so many of the kingdoms
of modern Europe had been transformed from limited into absolute
monarchies? The States General of France, the Cortes of Castile, the
Grand Justiciary of Arragon, what had been fatal to them all? History
was ransacked for instances of adventurers who, by the help of mercenary
troops, had subjugated free nations or deposed legitimate princes;
and such instances were easily found. Much was said about Pisistratus,
Timophanes, Dionysius, Agathocles, Marius and Sylla, Julius Caesar and
Augustus Caesar, Carthage besieged by her own mercenaries, Rome put up
to auction by her own Praetorian cohorts, Sultan Osman butchered by his
own Janissaries, Lewis Sforza sold into captivity by his own Switzers.
But the favourite instance was taken from the recent history of our own
land. Thousands still living had seen the great usurper, who, strong in
the power of the sword, had triumphed over both royalty and freedom. The
Tories were reminded that his soldiers had guarded the scaffold before
the Banqueting House. The Whigs were reminded that those same soldiers
had taken the mace from the table of the House of Commons. From such
evils, it was said, no country could be secure which was cursed with
a standing army. And what were the advantages which could be set off
against such evils? Invasion was the bugbear with which the Court tried
to frighten the nation. But we were not children to be scared by nursery
tales. We were at peace; and, even in time of war, an enemy who should
attempt to invade us would probably be intercepted by our fleet, and
would assuredly, if he reached our shores, be repelled by our militia.
Some people indeed talked as if a militia could achieve nothing great.
But that base doctrine was refuted by all ancient and all modern
history. What was the Lacedaemonian phalanx in the best days of
Lacedaemon? What was, the Roman legion in the best days of Rome? What
were the armies which conquered at Cressy, at Poitiers, at Agincourt,
at Halidon, or at Flodden? What was that mighty array which Elizabeth
reviewed at Tilbury? In the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth
centuries Englishmen who did not live by the trade of war had made war
with success and glory. Were the English of the seventeenth century so
degenerate that they could not be trusted to play the men for their own
homesteads and parish churches?

For such reasons as these the disbanding of the forces was strongly
recommended. Parliament, it was said, might perhaps, from respect and
tenderness for the person of His Majesty, permit him to have guards
enough to escort his coach and to pace the rounds before his palace. But
this was the very utmost that it would be right to concede. The defence
of the realm ought to be confided to the sailors and the militia. Even
the Tower ought to have no garrison except the trainbands of the Tower
Hamlets.

It must be evident to every intelligent and dispassionate man that
these declaimers contradicted themselves. If an army composed of regular
troops really was far more efficient than an army composed of husbandmen
taken from the plough and burghers taken from the counter, how could the
country be safe with no defenders but husbandmen and burghers, when a
great prince, who was our nearest neighbour, who had a few months before
been our enemy, and who might, in a few months, be our enemy again, kept
up not less than a hundred and fifty thousand regular troops? If, on the
other hand, the spirit of the English people was such that they would,
with little or no training, encounter and defeat the most formidable
array of veterans from the continent, was it not absurd to apprehend
that such a people could be reduced to slavery by a few regiments of
their own countrymen? But our ancestors were generally so much blinded
by prejudice that this inconsistency passed unnoticed. They were secure
where they ought to have been wary, and timorous where they might
well have been secure. They were not shocked by hearing the same man
maintain, in the same breath, that, if twenty thousand professional
soldiers were kept up, the liberty and property of millions of
Englishmen would be at the mercy of the Crown, and yet that those
millions of Englishmen, fighting for liberty and property, would
speedily annihilate an invading army composed of fifty or sixty thousand
of the conquerors of Steinkirk and Landen. Whoever denied the former
proposition was called a tool of the Court. Whoever denied the latter
was accused of insulting and slandering the nation.

Somers was too wise to oppose himself directly to the strong current
of popular feeling. With rare dexterity he took the tone, not of an
advocate, but of a judge. The danger which seemed so terrible to many
honest friends of liberty he did not venture to pronounce altogether
visionary. But he reminded his countrymen that a choice between dangers
was sometimes all that was left to the wisest of mankind. No lawgiver
had ever been able to devise a perfect and immortal form of government.
Perils lay thick on the right and on the left; and to keep far from one
evil was to draw near to another. That which, considered merely with
reference to the internal polity of England, might be, to a certain
extent, objectionable, might be absolutely essential to her rank among
European Powers, and even to her independence. All that a statesman
could do in such a case was to weigh inconveniences against each other,
and carefully to observe which way the scale leaned. The evil of having
regular soldiers, and the evil of not having them, Somers set forth and
compared in a little treatise, which was once widely renowned as the
Balancing Letter, and which was admitted, even by the malecontents,
to be an able and plausible composition. He well knew that mere names
exercise a mighty influence on the public mind; that the most perfect
tribunal which a legislator could construct would be unpopular if
it were called the Star Chamber; that the most judicious tax which
a financier could devise would excite murmurs if it were called the
Shipmoney; and that the words Standing Army then had to English ears
a sound as unpleasing as either Shipmoney or Star Chamber. He declared
therefore that he abhorred the thought of a standing army. What he
recommended was, not a standing, but a temporary army, an army of which
Parliament would annually fix the number, an army for which Parliament
would annually frame a military code, an army which would cease to
exist as soon as either the Lords or the Commons should think that its
services were not needed. From such an army surely the danger to public
liberty could not by wise men be thought serious. On the other hand,
the danger to which the kingdom would be exposed if all the troops were
disbanded was such as might well disturb the firmest mind. Suppose a
war with the greatest power in Christendom to break out suddenly, and to
find us without one battalion of regular infantry, without one squadron
of regular cavalry; what disasters might we not reasonably apprehend?
It was idle to say that a descent could not take place without ample
notice, and that we should have time to raise and discipline a great
force. An absolute prince, whose orders, given in profound secresy, were
promptly obeyed at once by his captains on the Rhine and on the Scheld,
and by his admirals in the Bay of Biscay and in the Mediterranean, might
be ready to strike a blow long before we were prepared to parry it. We
might be appalled by learning that ships from widely remote parts, and
troops from widely remote garrisons, had assembled at a single point
within sight of our coast. To trust to our fleet was to trust to the
winds and the waves. The breeze which was favourable to the invader
might prevent our men of war from standing out to sea. Only nine years
ago this had actually happened. The Protestant wind, before which the
Dutch armament had run full sail down the Channel, had driven King
James's navy back into the Thames. It must then be acknowledged to be
not improbable that the enemy might land. And, if he landed, what would
he find? An open country; a rich country; provisions everywhere; not a
river but which could be forded; no natural fastnesses such as protect
the fertile plains of Italy; no artificial fastnesses such as, at every
step, impede the progress of a conqueror in the Netherlands. Every
thing must then be staked on the steadiness of the militia; and it was
pernicious flattery to represent the militia as equal to a conflict in
the field with veterans whose whole life had been a preparation for the
day of battle. The instances which it was the fashion to cite of the
great achievements of soldiers taken from the threshing floor and the
shopboard were fit only for a schoolboy's theme. Somers, who had studied
ancient literature like a man,--a rare thing in his time,--said that
those instances refuted the doctrine which they were meant to prove. He
disposed of much idle declamation about the Lacedaemonians by
saying, most concisely, correctly and happily, that the Lacedaemonian
commonwealth really was a standing army which threatened all the rest
of Greece. In fact, the Spartan had no calling except war. Of arts,
sciences and letters he was ignorant.
The labour of the spade and of the
loom, and the petty gains of trade, he contemptuously abandoned to men
of a lower caste. His whole existence from childhood to old age was
one long military training. Meanwhile the Athenian, the Corinthian, the
Argive, the Theban, gave his chief attention to his oliveyard or his
vineyard, his warehouse or his workshop, and took up his shield and
spear only for short terms and at long intervals. The difference
therefore between a Lacedaemonian phalanx and any other phalanx was long
as great as the difference between a regiment of the French household
troops and a regiment of the London trainbands. Lacedaemon consequently
continued to be dominant in Greece till other states began to employ
regular troops. Then her supremacy was at an end. She was great while
she was a standing army among militias. She fell when she had to contend
with other standing armies. The lesson which is really to be learned
from her ascendency and from her decline is this, that the occasional
soldier is no match for the professional soldier. [2]

The same lesson Somers drew from the history of Rome; and every scholar
who really understands that history will admit that he was in the right.
The finest militia that ever existed was probably that of Italy in the
third century before Christ. It might have been thought that seven
or eight hundred thousand fighting men, who assuredly wanted neither
natural courage nor public spirit, would have been able to protect their
own hearths and altars against an invader. An invader came, bringing
with him an army small and exhausted by a march over the snows of the
Alps, but familiar with battles and sieges. At the head of this army
he traversed the peninsula to and fro, gained a succession of victories
against immense numerical odds, slaughtered the hardy youth of Latium
like sheep, by tens of thousands, encamped under the walls of Rome,
continued during sixteen years to maintain himself in a hostile country,
and was never dislodged till he had by a cruel discipline gradually
taught his adversaries how to resist him.

It was idle to repeat the names of great battles won, in the middle
ages, by men who did not make war their chief calling; those battles
proved only that one militia might beat another, and not that a militia
could beat a regular army. As idle was it to declaim about the camp
at Tilbury. We had indeed reason to be proud of the spirit which all
classes of Englishmen, gentlemen and yeomen, peasants and burgesses,
had so signally displayed in the great crisis of 1588. But we had also
reason to be thankful that, with all their spirit, they were not brought
face to face with the Spanish battalions. Somers related an anecdote,
well worthy to be remembered, which had been preserved by tradition
in the noble house of De Vere. One of the most illustrious men of that
house, a captain who had acquired much experience and much fame in the
Netherlands, had, in the crisis of peril, been summoned back to England
by Elizabeth, and rode with her through the endless ranks of shouting
pikemen. She asked him what he thought of the army. "It is," he said, "a
brave army. " There was something in his tone or manner which showed
that he meant more than his words expressed. The Queen insisted on his
speaking out. "Madam," he said, "Your Grace's army is brave indeed. I
have not in the world the name of a coward, and yet I am the greatest
coward here. All these fine fellows are praying that the enemy may land,
and that there may be a battle; and I, who know that enemy well, cannot
think of such a battle without dismay. " De Vere was doubtless in the
right. The Duke of Parma, indeed, would not have subjected our country;
but it is by no means improbable that, if he had effected a landing,
the island would have been the theatre of a war greatly resembling that
which Hannibal waged in Italy, and that the invaders would not have been
driven out till many cities had been sacked, till many counties had been
wasted, and till multitudes of our stout-hearted rustics and artisans
had perished in the carnage of days not less terrible than those of
Thrasymene and Cannae.

While the pamphlets of Trenchard and Somers were in every hand, the
Parliament met.

The words with which the King opened the session brought the great
question to a speedy issue. "The circumstances," he said, "of affairs
abroad are such, that I think myself obliged to tell you my opinion,
that, for the present, England cannot be safe without a land force;
and I hope we shall not give those that mean us ill the opportunity of
effecting that under the notion of a peace which they could not bring to
pass by war. "

The speech was well received; for that Parliament was thoroughly well
affected to the Government. The members had, like the rest of the
community, been put into high good humour by the return of peace and by
the revival of trade. They were indeed still under the influence of
the feelings of the preceding day; and they had still in their ears
the thanksgiving sermons and thanksgiving anthems; all the bonfires had
hardly burned out; and the rows of lamps and candles had hardly been
taken down. Many, therefore, who did not assent to all that the King had
said, joined in a loud hum of approbation when he concluded. [3] As
soon as the Commons had retired to their own chamber, they resolved to
present an address assuring His Majesty that they would stand by him
in peace as firmly as they had stood by him in war. Seymour, who had,
during the autumn, been going from shire to shire, for the purpose of
inflaming the country gentlemen against the ministry, ventured to make
some uncourtly remarks; but he gave so much offence that he was hissed
down, and did not venture to demand a division. [4]

The friends of the Government were greatly elated by the proceedings
of this day. During the following week hopes were entertained that the
Parliament might be induced to vote a peace establishment of thirty
thousand men. But these hopes were delusive. The hum with which
William's speech had been received, and the hiss which had drowned the
voice of Seymour, had been misunderstood. The Commons were indeed warmly
attached to the King's person and government, and quick to resent any
disrespectful mention of his name. But the members who were disposed
to let him have even half as many troops as he thought necessary were
a minority. On the tenth of December his speech was considered in a
Committee of the whole House; and Harley came forward as the chief of
the opposition. He did not, like some hot headed men, among both
the Whigs and the Tories, contend that there ought to be no regular
soldiers. But he maintained that it was unnecessary to keep up, after
the peace of Ryswick, a larger force than had been kept up after the
peace of Nimeguen. He moved, therefore, that the military establishment
should be reduced to what it had been in the year 1680. The Ministers
found that, on this occasion, neither their honest nor their dishonest
supporters could be trusted. For, in the minds of the most respectable
men, the prejudice against standing armies was of too long growth and
too deep root to be at once removed; and those means by which the Court
might, at another time, have secured the help of venal politicians
were, at that moment, of less avail than usual. The Triennial Act was
beginning to produce its effects. A general election was at hand. Every
member who had constituents was desirous to please them; and it was
certain that no member would please his constituents by voting for a
standing army; and the resolution moved by Harvey was strongly supported
by Howe, was carried, was reported to the House on the following day,
and, after a debate in which several orators made a great display of
their knowledge of ancient and modern history, was confirmed by one
hundred and eighty-five votes to one hundred and forty-eight. [5]

In this debate the fear and hatred with which many of the best friends
of the Government regarded Sunderland were unequivocally manifested. "It
is easy," such was the language of several members, "it is easy to
guess by whom that unhappy sentence was inserted in the speech from the
Throne. No person well acquainted with the disastrous and disgraceful
history of the last two reigns can doubt who the minister is, who is now
whispering evil counsel in the ear of a third master. " The Chamberlain,
thus fiercely attacked, was very feebly defended. There was indeed in
the House of Commons a small knot of his creatures; and they were men
not destitute of a certain kind of ability; but their moral character
was as bad as his. One of them was the late Secretary of the Treasury,
Guy, who had been turned out of his place for corruption. Another was
the late Speaker, Trevor, who had, from the chair, put the question
whether he was or was not a rogue, and had been forced to pronounce
that the Ayes had it. A third was Charles Duncombe, long the greatest
goldsmith of Lombard Street, and now one of the greatest landowners of
the North Riding of Yorkshire. Possessed of a private fortune equal to
that of any duke, he had not thought it beneath him to accept the place
of Cashier of the Excise, and had perfectly understood how to make
that place lucrative; but he had recently been ejected from office by
Montague, who thought, with good reason, that he was not a man to be
trusted. Such advocates as Trevor, Guy and Duncombe could do little for
Sunderland in debate. The statesmen of the junto would do nothing for
him. They had undoubtedly owed much to him. His influence, cooperating
with their own great abilities and with the force of circumstances, had
induced the King to commit the direction of the internal administration
of the realm to a Whig Cabinet. But the distrust which the old traitor
and apostate inspired was not to be overcome. The ministers could not be
sure that he was not, while smiling on them, whispering in confidential
tones to them, pouring out, as it might seem, all his heart to them,
really calumniating them in the closet or suggesting to the opposition
some ingenious mode of attacking them. They had very recently been
thwarted by him. They were bent on making Wharton a Secretary of State,
and had therefore looked forward with impatience to the retirement of
Trumball, who was indeed hardly equal to the duties of his great place.
To their surprise and mortification they learned, on the eve of the
meeting of Parliament, that Trumball had suddenly resigned, and Vernon,
the Under Secretary, had been summoned to Kensington, and had returned
thence with the seals. Vernon was a zealous Whig, and not personally
unacceptable to the chiefs of his party. But the Lord Chancellor, the
First Lord of the Treasury, and the First Lord of the Admiralty, might
not unnaturally think it strange that a post of the highest importance
should have been filled up in opposition to their known wishes, and with
a haste and a secresy which plainly showed that the King did not wish to
be annoyed by their remonstrances. The Lord Chamberlain pretended that
he had done all in his power to serve Wharton. But the Whig chiefs were
not men to be duped by the professions of so notorious a liar. Montague
bitterly described him as a fireship, dangerous at best, but on the
whole most dangerous as a consort, and least dangerous when showing
hostile colours. Smith, who was the most efficient of Montague's
lieutenants, both in the Treasury and in the Parliament, cordially
sympathised with his leader. Sunderland was therefore left undefended.
His enemies became bolder and more vehement every day. Sir Thomas Dyke,
member for Grinstead, and Lord Norris, son of the Earl of Abingdon,
talked of moving an address requesting the King to banish for ever from
the Court and the Council that evil adviser who had misled His Majesty's
royal uncles, had betrayed the liberties of the people, and had abjured
the Protestant religion.

Sunderland had been uneasy from the first moment at which his name
had been mentioned in the House of Commons. He was now in an agony
of terror. The whole enigma of his life, an enigma of which many
unsatisfactory and some absurd explanations have been propounded, is at
once solved if we consider him as a man insatiably greedy of wealth and
power, and yet nervously apprehensive of danger. He rushed with ravenous
eagerness at every bait which was offered to his cupidity. But any
ominous shadow, any threatening murmur, sufficed to stop him in his full
career, and to make him change his course or bury himself in a hiding
place. He ought to have thought himself fortunate indeed, when, after
all the crimes which he had committed, he found himself again enjoying
his picture gallery and his woods at Althorpe, sitting in the House of
Lords, admitted to the royal closet, pensioned from the Privy Purse,
consulted about the most important affairs of state. But his ambition
and avarice would not suffer him to rest till he held a high and
lucrative office, till he was a regent of the kingdom. The consequence
was, as might have been expected, a violent clamour; and that clamour he
had not the spirit to face.

His friends assured him that the threatened address would not be
carried. Perhaps a hundred and sixty members might vote for it; but
hardly more. "A hundred and sixty! " he cried: "No minister can stand
against a hundred and sixty. I am sure that I will not try. " It must be
remembered that a hundred and sixty votes in a House of five hundred and
thirteen members would correspond to more than two hundred votes in the
present House of Commons; a very formidable minority on the unfavourable
side of a question deeply affecting the personal character of a public
man. William, unwilling to part with a servant whom he knew to be
unprincipled, but whom he did not consider as more unprincipled than
many other English politicians, and in whom he had found much of a very
useful sort of knowledge, and of a very useful sort of ability, tried to
induce the ministry to come to the rescue. It was particularly
important to soothe Wharton, who had been exasperated by his recent
disappointment, and had probably exasperated the other members of the
junto. He was sent for to the palace. The King himself intreated him
to be reconciled to the Lord Chamberlain, and to prevail on the Whig
leaders in the Lower House to oppose any motion which Dyke or Norris
might make. Wharton answered in a manner which made it clear that
from him no help was to be expected. Sunderland's terrors now became
insupportable. He had requested some of his friends to come to his house
that he might consult them; they came at the appointed hour, but found
that he had gone to Kensington, and had left word that he should soon
be back. When he joined them, they observed that he had not the gold key
which is the badge of the Lord Chamberlain, and asked where it was. "At
Kensington," answered Sunderland. They found that he had tendered his
resignation, and that it had been, after a long struggle, accepted.
They blamed his haste, and told him that, since he had summoned them to
advise him on that day, he might at least have waited till the morrow.
"To morrow," he exclaimed, "would have ruined me. To night has saved
me. "

Meanwhile, both the disciples of Somers and the disciples of Trenchard
were grumbling at Harley's resolution. The disciples of Somers
maintained that, if it was right to have an army at all, it must be
right to have an efficient army. The disciples of Trenchard complained
that a great principle had been shamefully given up. On the vital
issue, Standing Army or no Standing Army, the Commons had pronounced an
erroneous, a fatal decision. Whether that army should consist of five
regiments or of fifteen was hardly worth debating. The great dyke which
kept out arbitrary power had been broken. It was idle to say that the
breach was narrow; for it would soon be widened by the flood which would
rush in. The war of pamphlets raged more fiercely than ever. At the same
time alarming symptoms began to appear among the men of the sword. They
saw themselves every day described in print as the scum of society,
as mortal enemies of the liberties of their country. Was it
reasonable,--such was the language of some scribblers,--that an honest
gentleman should pay a heavy land tax, in order to support in idleness
and luxury a set of fellows who requited him by seducing his dairy maids
and shooting his partridges? Nor was it only in Grub Street tracts that
such reflections were to be found. It was known all over the town that
uncivil things had been said of the military profession in the House of
Commons, and that Jack Howe, in particular, had, on this subject,
given the rein to his wit and to his ill nature. Some rough and daring
veterans, marked with the scars of Steinkirk and singed with the smoke
of Namur, threatened vengeance for these insults. The writers and
speakers who had taken the greatest liberties went in constant fear
of being accosted by fierce-looking captains, and required to make an
immediate choice between fighting and being caned. One gentleman, who
had made himself conspicuous by the severity of his language, went about
with pistols in his pockets. Howe, whose courage was not proportionate
to his malignity and petulance, was so much frightened, that he retired
into the country. The King, well aware that a single blow given, at
that critical conjuncture, by a soldier to a member of Parliament might
produce disastrous consequences, ordered the officers of the army to
their quarters, and, by the vigorous exertion of his authority and
influence, succeeded in preventing all outrage. [6]

All this time the feeling in favour of a regular force seemed to be
growing in the House of Commons. The resignation of Sunderland had
put many honest gentlemen in good humour. The Whig leaders exerted
themselves to rally their followers, held meetings at the "Rose," and
represented strongly the dangers to which the country would be exposed,
if defended only by a militia. The opposition asserted that neither
bribes nor promises were spared. The ministers at length flattered
themselves that Harley's resolution might be rescinded. On the eighth of
January they again tried their strength, and were again defeated, though
by a smaller majority than before. A hundred and sixty-four members
divided with them. A hundred and eighty-eight were for adhering to the
vote of the eleventh of December. It was remarked that on this occasion
the naval men, with Rooke at their head, voted against the Government.
[7]

It was necessary to yield. All that remained was to put on the words
of the resolution of the eleventh of December the most favourable sense
that they could be made to bear. They did indeed admit of very different
interpretations. The force which was actually in England in 1680 hardly
amounted to five thousand men. But the garrison of Tangier and the
regiments in the pay of the Batavian federation, which, as they were
available for the defence of England against a foreign or domestic
enemy, might be said to be in some sort part of the English army,
amounted to at least five thousand more. The construction which the
ministers put on the resolution of the eleventh of December was, that
the army was to consist of ten thousand men; and in this construction
the House acquiesced. It was not held to be necessary that the
Parliament should, as in our time, fix the amount of the land force. The
Commons thought that they sufficiently limited the number of soldiers by
limiting the sum which was to be expended in maintaining soldiers. What
that sum should be was a question which raised much debate. Harley was
unwilling to give more than three hundred thousand pounds. Montague
struggled for four hundred thousand. The general sense of the House was
that Harley offered too little, and that Montague demanded too much. At
last, on the fourteenth of January, a vote was taken for three hundred
and fifty thousand pounds. Four days later the House resolved to
grant half-pay to the disbanded officers till they should be otherwise
provided for. The half-pay was meant to be a retainer as well as a
reward. The effect of this important vote therefore was that, whenever
a new war should break out, the nation would be able to command the
services of many gentlemen of great military experience. The ministry
afterwards succeeded in obtaining, much against the will of a portion of
the opposition, a separate vote for three thousand marines.

A Mutiny Act, which had been passed in 1697, expired in the spring of
1698. As yet no such Act had been passed except in time of war; and the
temper of the Parliament and of the nation was such that the ministers
did not venture to ask, in time of peace, for a renewal of powers
unknown to the constitution. For the present, therefore, the soldier was
again, as in the times which preceded the Revolution, subject to exactly
the same law which governed the citizen.

It was only in matters relating to the army that the government found
the Commons unmanageable. Liberal provision was made for the navy. The
number of seamen was fixed at ten thousand, a great force, according to
the notions of that age, for a time of peace. The funds assigned some
years before for the support of the civil list had fallen short of the
estimate. It was resolved that a new arrangement should be made, and
that a certain income should be settled on the King. The amount was
fixed, by an unanimous vote, at seven hundred thousand pounds; and the
Commons declared that, by making this ample provision for his comfort
and dignity, they meant to express their sense of the great things which
he had done for the country. It is probable, however, that so large a
sum would not have been given without debates and divisions, had it not
been understood that he meant to take on himself the charge of the Duke
of Gloucester's establishment, and that he would in all probability have
to pay fifty thousand pounds a year to Mary of Modena. The Tories
were unwilling to disoblige the Princess of Denmark; and the Jacobites
abstained from offering any opposition to a grant in the benefit of
which they hoped that the banished family would participate.

It was not merely by pecuniary liberality that the Parliament testified
attachment to the Sovereign. A bill was rapidly passed which withheld
the benefit of the Habeas Corpus Act, during twelve months more, from
Bernardi and some other conspirators who had been concerned in the
Assassination Plot, but whose guilt, though demonstrated to the
conviction of every reasonable man, could not be proved by two
witnesses. At the same time new securities were provided against a new
danger which threatened the government. The peace had put an end to the
apprehension that the throne of William might be subverted by foreign
arms, but had, at the same time, facilitated domestic treason. It was no
longer necessary for an agent from Saint Germains to cross the sea in
a fishing boat, under the constant dread of being intercepted by a
cruiser. It was no longer necessary for him to land on a desolate beach,
to lodge in a thatched hovel, to dress himself like a carter, or to
travel up to town on foot. He came openly by the Calais packet, walked
into the best inn at Dover, and ordered posthorses for London. Meanwhile
young Englishmen of quality and fortune were hastening in crowds to
Paris. They would naturally wish to see him who had once been their
king; and this curiosity, though in itself innocent, might have evil
consequences. Artful tempters would doubtless be on the watch for every
such traveller; and many such travellers might be well pleased to be
courteously accosted, in a foreign land, by Englishmen of honourable
name, distinguished appearance, and insinuating address. It was not to
be expected that a lad fresh from the university would be able to refute
all the sophisms and calumnies which might be breathed in his ear
by dexterous and experienced seducers. Nor would it be strange if he
should, in no long time, accept an invitation to a private audience
at Saint Germains, should be charmed by the graces of Mary of Modena,
should find something engaging in the childish innocence of the Prince
of Wales, should kiss the hand of James, and should return home an
ardent Jacobite. An Act was therefore passed forbidding English subjects
to hold any intercourse orally, or by writing, or by message, with the
exiled family. A day was fixed after which no English subject, who had,
during the late war, gone into France without the royal permission or
borne arms against his country was to be permitted to reside in this
kingdom, except under a special license from the King. Whoever infringed
these rules incurred the penalties of high treason.

The dismay was at first great among the malecontents. For English and
Irish Jacobites, who had served under the standards of Lewis or hung
about the Court of Saint Germains, had, since the peace, come over in
multitudes to England. It was computed that thousands were within the
scope of the new Act. But the severity of that Act was mitigated by a
beneficent administration. Some fierce and stubborn non-jurors who would
not debase themselves by asking for any indulgence, and some conspicuous
enemies of the government who had asked for indulgence in vain, were
under the necessity of taking refuge on the Continent. But the great
majority of those offenders who promised to live peaceably under
William's rule obtained his permission to remain in their native land.

In the case of one great offender there were some circumstances which
attracted general interest, and which might furnish a good subject to
a novelist or a dramatist. Near fourteen years before this time,
Sunderland, then Secretary of State to Charles the Second, had married
his daughter Lady Elizabeth Spencer to Donough Macarthy, Earl of
Clancarty, the lord of an immense domain in Munster. Both the bridegroom
and the bride were mere children, the bridegroom only fifteen, the bride
only eleven. After the ceremony they were separated; and many years
full of strange vicissitudes elapsed before they again met. The boy soon
visited his estates in Ireland. He had been bred a member of the Church
of England; but his opinions and his practice were loose. He found
himself among kinsmen who were zealous Roman Catholics. A Roman
Catholic king was on the throne. To turn Roman Catholic was the best
recommendation to favour both at Whitehall and at Dublin Castle.
Clancarty speedily changed his religion, and from a dissolute Protestant
became a dissolute Papist. After the Revolution he followed the fortunes
of James; sate in the Celtic Parliament which met at the King's Inns;
commanded a regiment in the Celtic army; was forced to surrender himself
to Marlborough at Cork; was sent to England, and was imprisoned in the
Tower. The Clancarty estates, which were supposed to yield a rent of not
much less than ten thousand a year, were confiscated. They were charged
with an annuity to the Earl's brother, and with another annuity to his
wife; but the greater part was bestowed by the King on Lord Woodstock,
the eldest son of Portland; During some time, the prisoner's life was
not safe. For the popular voice accused him of outrages for which the
utmost license of civil war would not furnish a plea. It is said that
he was threatened with an appeal of murder by the widow of a Protestant
clergyman who had been put to death during the troubles. After passing
three years in confinement, Clancarty made his escape to the Continent,
was graciously received at St. Germains, and was entrusted with the
command of a corps of Irish refugees. When the treaty of Ryswick had
put an end to the hope that the banished dynasty would be restored by
foreign arms, he flattered himself that he might be able to make his
peace with the English Government.