The History of England from the Accession of James II, Vol. 2

T >> Thomas Babington Macaulay >> The History of England from the Accession of James II, Vol. 2

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22

The Lower House was all in a flame. There was now no difference
of opinion there. Even those members who thought that the
Resumption Bill and the Land Tax Bill ought not to have been
tacked together, yet felt that, since those bills had been tacked
together, it was impossible to agree to the amendments made by
the Lords without surrendering one of the most precious
privileges of the Commons. The amendments were rejected without
one dissentient voice. It was resolved that a conference should
be demanded; and the gentlemen who were to manage the conference
were instructed to say merely that the Upper House had no right
to alter a money bill; that the point had long been settled and
was too clear for argument; that they should leave the bill with
the Lords, and that they should leave with the Lords also the
responsibility of stopping the supplies which were necessary for
the public service. Several votes of menacing sound were passed
at the same sitting. It was Monday the eighth of April. Tuesday
the ninth was allowed to the other House for reflection and
repentance. It was resolved that on the Wednesday morning the
question of the Irish forfeitures should again be taken into
consideration, and that every member who was in town should be
then in his place on peril of the highest displeasure of the
House. It was moved and carried that every Privy Councillor who
had been concerned in procuring or passing any exorbitant grant
for his own benefit had been guilty of a high crime and
misdemeanour. Lest the courtiers should flatter themselves that
this was meant to be a mere abstract proposition, it was ordered
that a list of the members of the Privy Council should be laid on
the table. As it was thought not improbable that the crisis might
end in an appeal to the constituent bodies, nothing was omitted
which could excite out of doors a feeling in favour of the bill.
The Speaker was directed to print and publish the report signed
by the four Commissioners, not accompanied, as in common justice
it ought to have been, by the protest of the three dissentients,
but accompanied by several extracts from the journals which were
thought likely to produce an impression favourable to the House
and unfavourable to the Court. All these resolutions passed
without any division, and without, as far as appears, any debate.
There was, indeed, much speaking, but all on one side. Seymour,
Harley, Howe, Harcourt, Shower, Musgrave, declaimed, one after
another, about the obstinacy of the other House, the alarming
state of the country, the dangers which threatened the public
peace and the public credit. If, it was said, none but Englishmen
sate in the Parliament and in the Council, we might hope that
they would relent at the thought of the calamities which impend
over England. But we have to deal with men who are not
Englishmen, with men who consider this country as their own only
for evil, as their property, not as their home; who, when they
have gorged themselves with our wealth, will, without one uneasy
feeling, leave us sunk in bankruptcy, distracted by faction,
exposed without defence to invasion. "A new war," said one of
these orators, "a new war, as long, as bloody, and as costly as
the last, would do less mischief than has been done by the
introduction of that batch of Dutchmen among the barons of the
realm." Another was so absurd as to call on the House to declare
that whoever should advise a dissolution would be guilty of high
treason. A third gave utterance to a sentiment which it is
difficult to understand how any assembly of civilised and
Christian men, even in a moment of strong excitement, should have
heard without horror. "They object to tacking; do they? Let them
take care that they do not provoke us to tack in earnest. How
would they like to have bills of supply with bills of attainder
tacked to them?" This atrocious threat, worthy of the tribune of
the French Convention in the worst days of the Jacobin tyranny,
seems to have passed unreprehended. It was meant--such at least
was the impression at the Dutch embassy--to intimidate Somers. He
was confined by illness. He had been unable to take any public
part in the proceedings of the Lords; and he had privately blamed
them for engaging in a conflict in which he justly thought that
they could not be victorious. Nevertheless, the Tory leaders
hoped that they might be able to direct against him the whole
force of the storm which they had raised. Seymour, in particular,
encouraged by the wild and almost savage temper of his hearers,
harangued with rancorous violence against the wisdom and the
virtue which presented the strongest contrast to his own
turbulence, insolence, faithlessness, and rapacity. No doubt, he
said, the Lord Chancellor was a man of parts. Anybody might be
glad to have for counsel so acute and eloquent an advocate. But
a very good advocate might be a very bad minister; and, of all
the ministers who had brought the kingdom into difficulties, this
plausible, fair-spoken person was the most dangerous. Nor was the
old reprobate ashamed to add that he was afraid that his Lordship
was no better than a Hobbist in religion.

After a long sitting the members separated; but they reassembled
early on the morning of the following day, Tuesday the ninth of
April. A conference was held; and Seymour, as chief manager for
the Commons, returned the bill and the amendments to the Peers in
the manner which had been prescribed to him. From the Painted
Chamber he went back to the Lower House, and reported what had
passed. "If," he said, "I may venture to judge by the looks and
manner of their Lordships, all will go right." But within half an
hour evil tidings came through the Court of Requests and the
lobbies. The Lords had divided on the question whether they would
adhere to their amendments. Forty-seven had voted for adhering,
and thirty-four for giving way. The House of Commons broke up
with gloomy looks, and in great agitation. All London looked
forward to the next day with painful forebodings. The general
feeling was in favour of the bill. It was rumoured that the
majority which had determined to stand by the amendments had been
swollen by several prelates, by several of the illegitimate sons
of Charles the Second, and by several needy and greedy courtiers.
The cry in all the public places of resort was that the nation
would be ruined by the three B's, Bishops, Bastards, and Beggars.
On Wednesday the tenth, at length, the contest came to a decisive
issue. Both Houses were early crowded. The Lords demanded a
conference. It was held; and Pembroke delivered back to Seymour
the bill and the amendments, together with a paper containing a
concise, but luminous and forcible, exposition of the grounds on
which the Lords conceived themselves to be acting in a
constitutional and strictly defensive manner. This paper was read
at the bar; but, whatever effect it may now produce on a
dispassionate student of history, it produced none on the thick
ranks of country gentlemen. It was instantly resolved that the
bill should again be sent back to the Lords with a peremptory
announcement that the Commons' determination was unalterable.

The Lords again took the amendments into consideration. During
the last forty-eight hours, great exertions had been made in
various quarters to avert a complete rupture between the Houses.
The statesmen of the junto were far too wise not to see that it
would be madness to continue the struggle longer. It was indeed
necessary, unless the King and the Lords were to be of as little
weight in the State as in 1648, unless the House of Commons was
not merely to exercise a general control over the government, but
to be, as in the days of the Rump, itself the whole government,
the sole legislative chamber, the fountain from which were to
flow all those favours which had hitherto been in the gift of the
Crown, that a determined stand should be made. But, in order that
such a stand might be successful, the ground must be carefully
selected; for a defeat might be fatal. The Lords must wait for
some occasion on which their privileges would be bound up with
the privileges of all Englishmen, for some occasion on which the
constituent bodies would, if an appeal were made to them, disavow
the acts of the representative body; and this was not such an
occasion. The enlightened and large minded few considered tacking
as a practice so pernicious that it would be justified only by an
emergency which would justify a resort to physical force. But, in
the many, tacking, when employed for a popular end, excited
little or no disapprobation. The public, which seldom troubles
itself with nice distinctions, could not be made to understand
that the question at issue was any other than this, whether a sum
which was vulgarly estimated at millions, and which undoubtedly
amounted to some hundreds of thousands, should be employed in
paying the debts of the state and alleviating the load of
taxation, or in making Dutchmen, who were already too rich, still
richer. It was evident that on that question the Lords could not
hope to have the country with them, and that, if a general
election took place while that question was unsettled, the new
House of Commons would be even more mutinous and impracticable
than the present House. Somers, in his sick chamber, had given
this opinion. Orford had voted for the bill in every stage.
Montague, though no longer a minister, had obtained admission to
the royal closet, and had strongly represented to the King the
dangers which threatened the state. The King had at length
consented to let it be understood that he considered the passing
of the bill as on the whole the less of two great evils. It was
soon clear that the temper of the Peers had undergone a
considerable alteration since the preceding day. Scarcely any,
indeed, changed sides. But not a few abstained from voting.
Wharton, who had at first spoken powerfully for the amendments,
left town for Newmarket. On the other hand, some Lords who had
not yet taken their part came down to give a healing vote. Among
them were the two persons to whom the education of the young heir
apparent had been entrusted, Marlborough and Burnet. Marlborough
showed his usual prudence. He had remained neutral while by
taking a part he must have offended either the House of Commons
or the King. He took a part as soon as he saw that it was
possible to please both. Burnet, alarmed for the public peace,
was in a state of great excitement, and, as was usual with him
when in such a state, forgot dignity and decorum, called out
"stuff" in a very audible voice while a noble Lord was haranguing
in favour of the amendments, and was in great danger of being
reprimanded at the bar or delivered over to Black Rod. The motion
on which the division took place was that the House do adhere to
the amendments. There were forty contents and thirty-seven not
contents. Proxies were called; and the numbers were found to be
exactly even. In the House of Lords there is no casting vote.
When the numbers are even, the non contents have it. The motion
to adhere had therefore been negatived. But this was not enough.
It was necessary that an affirmative resolution should be moved
to the effect that the House agreed to the bill without
amendments; and, if the numbers should again be equal, this
motion would also be lost. It was an anxious moment. Fortunately
the Primate's heart failed him. He had obstinately fought the
battle down to the last stage. But he probably felt that it was
no light thing to take on himself, and to bring on his order, the
responsibility of throwing the whole kingdom into confusion. He
started up and hurried out of the House, beckoning to some of his
brethren. His brethren followed him with a prompt obedience,
which, serious as the crisis was, caused no small merriment. In
consequence of this defection, the motion to agree was carried by
a majority of five. Meanwhile the members of the other House had
been impatiently waiting for news, and had been alternately
elated and depressed by the reports which followed one another in
rapid succession. At first it was confidently expected that the
Peers would yield; and there was general good humour. Then came
intelligence that the majority of the Lords present had voted for
adhering to the amendments. "I believe," so Vernon wrote the next
day, "I believe there was not one man in the House that did not
think the nation ruined." The lobbies were cleared; the back
doors were locked; the keys were laid on the table; the Serjeant
at Arms was directed to take his post at the front door, and to
suffer no member to withdraw. An awful interval followed, during
which the angry passions of the assembly seemed to be subdued by
terror. Some of the leaders of the opposition, men of grave
character and of large property, stood aghast at finding that
they were engaged,--they scarcely knew how,--in a conflict such as
they had not at all expected, in a conflict in which they could
be victorious only at the expense of the peace and order of
society. Even Seymour was sobered by the greatness and nearness
of the danger. Even Howe thought it advisable to hold
conciliatory language. It was no time, he said, for wrangling.
Court party and country party were Englishmen alike. Their duty
was to forget all past grievances, and to cooperate heartily for
the purpose of saving the country.

In a moment all was changed. A message from the Lords was
announced. It was a message which lightened many heavy hearts.
The bill had been passed without amendments.

The leading malecontents, who, a few minutes before, scared by
finding that their violence had brought on a crisis for which
they were not prepared, had talked about the duty of mutual
forgiveness and close union, instantly became again as rancorous
as ever. One danger, they said, was over. So far well. But it was
the duty of the representatives of the people to take such steps
as might make it impossible that there should ever again be such
danger. Every adviser of the Crown, who had been concerned in the
procuring or passing of any exorbitant grant, ought to be
excluded from all access to the royal ear. A list of the privy
councillors, furnished in conformity with the order made two days
before, was on the table. That list the clerk was ordered to
read. Prince George of Denmark and the Archbishop of Canterbury
passed without remark. But, as soon as the Chancellor's name had
been pronounced, the rage of his enemies broke forth. Twice
already, in the course of that stormy session, they had attempted
to ruin his fame and his fortunes; and twice his innocence and
his calm fortitude had confounded all their politics. Perhaps, in
the state of excitement to which the House had been wrought up, a
third attack on him might be successful. Orator after orator
declaimed against him. He was the great offender. He was
responsible for all the grievances of which the nation
complained. He had obtained exorbitant grants for himself. He had
defended the exorbitant grants obtained by others. He had not,
indeed, been able, in the late debates, to raise his own voice
against the just demands of the nation. But it might well be
suspected that he had in secret prompted the ungracious answer of
the King and encouraged the pertinacious resistance of the Lords.
Sir John Levison Gower, a noisy and acrimonious Tory, called for
impeachment. But Musgrave, an abler and more experienced
politician, saw that, if the imputations which the opposition had
been in the habit of throwing on the Chancellor were exhibited
with the precision of a legal charge, their futility would excite
universal derision, and thought it more expedient to move that
the House should, without assigning any reason, request the King
to remove Lord Somers from His Majesty's counsels and presence
for ever. Cowper defended his persecuted friend with great
eloquence and effect; and he was warmly supported by many members
who had been zealous for the resumption of the Irish grants. Only
a hundred and six members went into the lobby with Musgrave; a
hundred and sixty-seven voted against him. Such a division, in
such a House of Commons, and on such a day, is sufficient
evidence of the respect which the great qualities of Somers had
extorted even from his political enemies.

The clerk then went on with the list. The Lord President and the
Lord Privy Seal, who were well known to have stood up strongly
for the privileges of the Lords, were reviled by some angry
members; but no motion was made against either. And soon the
Tories became uneasy in their turn; for the name of the Duke of
Leeds was read. He was one of themselves. They were very
unwilling to put a stigma on him. Yet how could they, just after
declaiming against the Chancellor for accepting a very moderate
and well earned provision, undertake the defence of a statesman
who had, out of grants, pardons and bribes, accumulated a
princely fortune? There was actually on the table evidence that
His Grace was receiving from the bounty of the Crown more than
thrice as much as had been bestowed on Somers; and nobody could
doubt that His Grace's secret gains had very far exceeded those
of which there was evidence on the table. It was accordingly
moved that the House, which had indeed been sitting massy hours,
should adjourn. The motion was lost; but neither party was
disposed to move that the consideration of the list should be
resumed. It was however resolved, without a division, that an
address should be presented to the King, requesting that no
person not a native of his dominions, Prince George excepted,
might be admitted to the Privy Council either of England or of
Ireland. The evening was now far spent. The candles had been some
time lighted; and the House rose. So ended one of the most
anxious, turbulent, and variously eventful days in the long
Parliamentary History of England.

What the morrow would have produced if time had been allowed for
a renewal of hostilities can only be guessed. The supplies had
been voted. The King was determined not to receive the address
which requested him to disgrace his dearest and most trusty
friends. Indeed he would have prevented the passing of that
address by proroguing Parliament on the preceding day, had not
the Lords risen the moment after they had agreed to the
Resumption Bill. He had actually come from Kensington to the
Treasury for that purpose; and his robes and crown were in
readiness. He now took care to be at Westminster in good time.
The Commons had scarcely met when the knock of Black Rod was
heard. They repaired to the other House. The bills were passed;
and Bridgewater, by the royal command, prorogued the Parliament.
For the first time since the Revolution the session closed
without a speech from the throne. William was too angry to thank
the Commons, and too prudent to reprimand them.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The health of James had been during some years declining and he
had at length, on Good Friday, 1701, suffered a shock from which
he had never recovered. While he was listening in his chapel to
the solemn service of the day, he fell down in a fit, and
remained long insensible. Some people imagined that the words of
the anthem which his choristers were chanting had produced in him
emotions too violent to be borne by an enfeebled body and mind.
For that anthem was taken from the plaintive elegy in which a
servant of the true God, chastened by many sorrows and
humiliations, banished, homesick, and living on the bounty of
strangers, bewailed the fallen throne and the desolate Temple of
Sion: "Remember, O Lord, what is come upon us; consider and
behold our reproach. Our inheritance is turned to strangers, our
houses to aliens; the crown is fallen from our head. Wherefore
dose thou forget us for ever?"

The King's malady proved to be paralytic. Fagon, the first
physician of the French Court, and, on medical questions, the
oracle of all Europe, prescribed the waters of Bourbon. Lewis,
with all his usual generosity, sent to Saint Germains ten
thousand crowns in gold for the charges of the journey, and gave
orders that every town along the road should receive his good
brother with all the honours due to royalty.21

James, after passing some time at Bourbon, returned to the
neighbourhood of Paris with health so far reestablished that he
was able to take exercise on horseback, but with judgment and
memory evidently impaired. On the thirteenth of September, he had
a second fit in his chapel; and it soon became clear that this
was a final stroke. He rallied the last energies of his failing
body and mind to testify his firm belief in the religion for
which he had sacrificed so much. He received the last sacraments
with every mark of devotion, exhorted his son to hold fast to the
true faith in spite of all temptations, and entreated Middleton,
who, almost alone among the courtiers assembled in the
bedchamber, professed himself a Protestant, to take refuge from
doubt and error in the bosom of the one infallible Church. After
the extreme unction had been administered, James declared that he
pardoned all his enemies, and named particularly the Prince of
Orange, the Princess of Denmark, and the Emperor. The Emperor's
name he repeated with peculiar emphasis: "Take notice, father,"
he said to the confessor, "that I forgive the Emperor with all my
heart." It may perhaps seem strange that he should have found
this the hardest of all exercises of Christian charity. But it
must be remembered that the Emperor was the only Roman Catholic
Prince still living who had been accessory to the Revolution, and
that James might not unnaturally consider Roman Catholics who had
been accessory to the Revolution as more inexcusably guilty than
heretics who might have deluded themselves into the belief that,
in violating their duty to him, they were discharging their duty
to God.

While James was still able to understand what was said to him,
and make intelligible answers, Lewis visited him twice. The
English exiles observed that the Most Christian King was to the
last considerate and kind in the very slightest matters which
concerned his unfortunate guest. He would not allow his coach to
enter the court of Saint Germains, lest the noise of the wheels
should be heard in the sick room. In both interviews he was
gracious, friendly, and even tender. But he carefully abstained
from saying anything about the future position of the family
which was about to lose its head. Indeed he could say nothing,
for he had not yet made up his own mind. Soon, however, it became
necessary for him to form some resolution. On the sixteenth
James sank into a stupor which indicated the near approach of
death. While he lay in this helpless state, Madame de Maintenon
visited his consort. To this visit many persons who were likely
to be well informed attributed a long series of great events. We
cannot wonder that a woman should have been moved to pity by the
misery of a woman; that a devout Roman Catholic should have taken
a deep interest in the fate of a family persecuted, as she
conceived, solely for being Roman Catholics; or that the pride of
the widow of Scarron should have been intensely gratified by the
supplications of a daughter of Este and a Queen of England. From
mixed motives, probably, the wife of Lewis promised her powerful
protection to the wife of James.

Madame de Maintenon was just leaving Saint Germains when, on the
brow of the hill which overlooks the valley of the Seine, she met
her husband, who had come to ask after his guest. It was probable
at this moment that he was persuaded to form a resolution, of
which neither he nor she by whom he was governed foresaw the
consequences. Before he announced that resolution, however, he
observed all the decent forms of deliberation. A council was held
that evening at Marli, and was attended by the princes of the
blood and by the ministers of state. The question was propounded,
whether, when God should take James the Second of England to
himself, France should recognise the Pretender as King James the
Third?

The ministers were, one and all, against the recognition. Indeed,
it seems difficult to understand how any person who had any
pretensions to the name of statesman should have been of a
different opinion. Torcy took his stand on the ground that to
recognise the Prince of Wales would be to violate the Treaty of
Ryswick. This was indeed an impregnable position. By that treaty
His Most Christian Majesty had bound himself to do nothing which
could, directly or indirectly, disturb the existing order of
things in England. And in what way, except by an actual invasion,
could he do more to disturb the existing order of things in
England than by solemnly declaring, in the face of the whole
world, that he did not consider that order of things as
legitimate, that he regarded the Bill of Rights and the Act of
Settlement as nullities, and the King in possession as an
usurper? The recognition would then be a breach of faith; and,
even if all considerations of morality were set aside, it was
plain that it would, at that moment, be wise in the French
government to avoid every thing which could with plausibility be
represented as a breach of faith. The crisis was a very peculiar
one. The great diplomatic victory won by France in the preceding
year had excited the fear and hatred of her neighbours.
Nevertheless there was, as yet, no great coalition against her.
The House of Austria, indeed, had appealed to arms. But with the
House of Austria alone the House of Bourbon could easily deal.
Other powers were still looking in doubt to England for the
signal; and England, though her aspect was sullen and menacing,
still preserved neutrality. That neutrality would not have lasted
so long, if William could have relied on the support of his
Parliament and of his people. In his Parliament there were agents
of France, who, though few, had obtained so much influence by
clamouring against standing armies, profuse grants, and Dutch
favourites, that they were often blindly followed by the
majority; and his people, distracted by domestic factions,
unaccustomed to busy themselves about continental politics, and
remembering with bitterness the disasters and burdens of the last
war, the carnage of Landen, the loss of the Smyrna fleet, the
land tax at four shillings in the pound, hesitated about engaging
in another contest, and would probably continue to hesitate while
he continued to live. He could not live long. It had, indeed,
often been prophesied that his death was at hand; and the
prophets had hitherto been mistaken. But there was now no
possibility of mistake. His cough was more violent than ever; his
legs were swollen; his eyes, once bright and clear as those of a
falcon, had grown dim; he who, on the day of the Boyne, had been
sixteen hours on the backs of different horses, could now with
great difficulty creep into his state coach.22 The vigorous
intellect, and the intrepid spirit, remained; but on the body
fifty years had done the work of ninety. In a few months the
vaults of Westminster would receive the emaciated and shattered
frame which was animated by the most far-sighted, the most
daring, the most commanding of souls. In a few months the British
throne would be filled by a woman whose understanding was well
known to be feeble, and who was believed to lean towards the
party which was averse from war. To get over those few months
without an open and violent rupture should have been the first
object of the French government. Every engagement should have
been punctually fulfilled; every occasion of quarrel should have
been studiously avoided. Nothing should have been spared which
could quiet the alarms and soothe the wounded pride of
neighbouring nations.

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22