THE HISTORY
OF
MY OWN TIME
VOL. I.
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London
HENRY FROWDE, M.A.
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS WAREHOUSE
AMEN CORNER, E.C.
New York
THE MACMILLAN CO., 66 FIFTH AVENUE
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BURNET'S
HISTORY OF MY OWN TIME
A NEW EDITION BASED ON THAT OF M. J. ROUTH, D.D.
PART I
THE REIGN OF
CHARLES THE SECOND
EDITED BY
OSMUND AIRY, M.A.
IN TWO VOLUMES: VOL. I
OXFORD
AT THE CLARENDON PRESS
M.DCCC.XCVII
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Oxford
PRINTED AT THE CLARENDON PRESS
BY HORACE HART, M.A.
PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY
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v
In the preparation of a new Edition of Burnet's History several points have especially demanded attention. Errors, positive or probable, required correction or suggested emendation, and omissions supplement; many statements invited illustration; it was desirable to indicate as far as possible the probable sources of Burnet's information upon matters which did not come under his personal observation; the notes of the earlier editions obviously needed revision. Finally it was necessary to provide a trustworthy text.
Probably no historian of Burnet's rank and importance has ever been so vigorously or continuously challenged on the ground of prejudice and inaccuracy. The task of meeting this challenge in any satisfactory manner is one which cannot be undertaken in a Preface, unless it is to extend to a wearisome length. But I do not hesitate to say briefly that, when it is remembered that Burnet was the first to exhibit on a large scale the picture of his time though Clarendon's Life and Continuation were composed earlier and that his narrative was drawn up almost without the aid of documentary evidence; and when it is further borne in mind that he himself played an active part in that time, that his temper was impulsive, and that the passions aroused in the varied drama which was vi acted under his eyes were strong, it will be recognized by any careful and competent investigator that his comparative freedom from grave error certainly from wilful misrepresentation is remarkable. This observation is not extended to the later portion of his work, respecting which I do not feel qualified to speak; but I am satisfied that as regards the age of Charles II, with which alone I am concerned, he is, with but few exceptions, both as to events and persons, conspicuously and honourably fair in tone, even though frequently inaccurate in detail; especially—and here I speak with still more confidence—is this the case when Scotland and Scotsmen are his theme. It is true that he was an eager and credulous listener; that he often, as indeed must be the case with any one who writes of his own time, speaks from hearsay, sometimes, as he tells us, from hearsay twice or thrice, so to speak, removed; that his information obviously takes its colour at times from his own feeling; that his character-sketches are frequently overdrawn on the bad side, and that they bear evidence of the repeated alteration mentioned by Dartmouth in his last note to Burnet's Preface—generally however by gentler strokes—according to the tone of his mind at the moment of revision or according to some fresh piece of gossip or information. There is little in all this to detract from the value of Burnet's great work, or to cause surprise. That a man should actively concern himself with public affairs in that feverish and immoral time, and should be able to hold the scales evenly, however much he might desire to do so, was absolutely impossible. But that he did desire to do so, and that through sheer honesty of purpose he has succeeded in a remarkable degree, is the opinion which prolonged attention to the subject has fixed upon my mind. Stories belonging to one set of persons or events are indeed now and then vii transferred to others; provisions of one Act of Parliament are occasionally credited to another. There are ample opportunities for corrective or illustrative criticism, but—I again limit my remark to the reign of Charles II—for destructive criticism very few; while the tone of the whole is vindicated by the results of all late research.
It is noticeable that the impression of consistency and unity in Burnet's narrative is created in spite of the fact that, except perhaps in the case of Scotland, that narrative is neither continuous nor always correct as regards chronological sequence. There is moreover no conscious artistic arrangement, or sense of proportion, or grace; the language is often inelegant and even obscure; the literary gait is often clumsy. The lacunae are numerous, and the order of events is sometimes confused. The work is a commentary upon history, a series of notes, some very detailed, some very jejune, rather than a history itself. The addition of marginal dates where necessary will, it is hoped, remove the chronological difficulties. But it has been found impossible, even where desirable, to bridge over in any satisfactory manner the wide gaps in the narrative.
As regards the insertion of notes which are merely illustrative rather than corrective or supplementary, the chief source of embarrassment, almost of despair, has been—not unnaturally, when the date of the last edition, 1833, is remembered—the overwhelming wealth of material now available. I trust that this part of the work has been kept within due limits; but even where I myself am sensible of a barrenness of illustration I fear that the opposite impression may occasionally be left on the minds of others.
The treatment of the notes to Dr. Routh's edition was the subject of much consideration. In the end it was determined to retain, as nearly as possible in the shape in which they appear there, all which seemed to possess real viii value; such are the majority of the Onslow and Dartmouth notes, dealing mainly with matters of which their authors were personally cognizant, and a considerable number of those of Dr. Routh himself. Some of the more pertinent of the contemptuous snarls of Swift have also been preserved, though I have thought it unadvisable to encumber the pages with simple terms of abuse which tend neither to edification nor to knowledge, such as 'Dunce,' 'Puppy,' 'Scotch dog,' and the like. All these earlier notes are indicated by the initial of the annotator; my own with which a few of the others are incorporated have no initial. It has occasionally been found necessary to insert a few explanatory words in the body of one of the original notes; these are indicated by square brackets.
It has been thought well to append two sets of paginal references, one to the MS. in the Bodleian Library (e.g. MS. 29), the other, in simple figures, to the folio edition. The latter are necessary, since in all works previously written on the subject, and in all quotations, the folio edition has been the common standard of reference.
One innovation, in addition to the substitution of the modern form in the spelling of all proper names, has been made in dealing with the text, which will, I hope, add to the convenience of the reader; I refer to the division into Chapters. Wherever possible this has taken place at obvious pauses in the narrative; but the absence of any intentional arrangement of the sort in Burnet's plan has made the matter one of some difficulty.
As regards the Text itself the reader is referred to the note by Mr. Macray upon his collation with the Bodleian MS., which follows this Preface.
It remains for me to express my thanks to all those who have aided me with information upon special points. The task, undertaken—perhaps presumptuously—in ix the intervals of official work, has been heavy and prolonged, and could scarcely have been performed thus far without their active and generous help. That any one who attempts to deal seriously with the history of this portion of the seventeenth century should be under deep obligations to Dr. S. R. Gardiner and Mr. C. H. Firth will be taken as a matter of course. To myself their assistance and encouragement have been lavish to a degree which makes the only fitting words of gratitude too personal for expression in this place.
To the Delegates of the Clarendon Press I desire to offer my acknowledgements of their courtesy and of their forbearance with delay.
OSMUND AIRY. Jan. 1, 1897.
The collation of the original MS. (undoubtedly the MS. promised by the original editors to be deposited in some public library, a promise never fulfilled by them) which has been made for the present edition has shown that but few noticeable variations from the text of Dr. Routh's last edition were required. But it has also shown the care with which Burnet, according to his own avowed intention in his Preface, 'over and over again retouched' his work, often softening some harsh expressions, or altering the form of sentences, or changing single words, with a view to improvement of style. All changes involving real alteration are now pointed out, but the mere substitution of one conjunction or particle for another, and the omission or insertion of small unimportant words, have been passed over.
The autograph of The History is contained in two folio volumes, now shelf-marked as 'Bodl. Add. D. 18, 19.' The text is written on one side of the leaf, and the marginal notes on the opposite blank page, where also Burnet places the numeration of the leaves : thus, 'page 1' is written on the blank page opposite the first page of the MS. and so on consecutively. This is worth pointing out, in order to obviate any possible difficulty in verification of a passage. The volumes when purchased by the Library in 1835 for £210, were entrusted to Dr. Routh for his use; and a letter from him on returning them to the Library, dated March 13, 1840, is inserted in the first volume. Unfortunately the particulars of the purchase do not appear to be now recoverable, and all that is known is that, as stated by Dr. Routh (Hist. of James II, 1852, p. 474), they had belonged 'to a family descended from the bishop.'
W. D. M.
The History of his Own Time by Bishop Burnet lays claim to our regard as an original work containing a relation of public transactions, in which either the author or his connexions were engaged. It will therefore never lose its importance; but still continue to furnish materials for other historians, and to be read by those, who wish to derive their knowledge of facts from the first sources of information.
The accuracy indeed of the author's narrative has been attacked with vehemence, and often, it must be confessed, with success; but not so often, as to overthrow the general credit of his work. On the contrary, it has in many instances been satisfactorily defended, and time has already evinced the truth of certain accounts, which rested on this single authority. It has also had the rare fortune of being illustrated by the notes of three persons of high rank, possessing in consequence of their situations means of information open to few others. That their observations on this history are now at length submitted to the public eye, is owing to the following fortunate incident.
1. A resolution having been taken by the Delegates of the Clarendon Press to reprint the work, the present Lord xi Bishop of Oxford[2] expressed his readiness to communicate to them a copy of it, in which his lordship had transcribed the marginal notes written by his ancestor the first Earl of Dartmouth. The offer was gratefully accepted, and the notes ordered to be printed with the text.
Afterwards, on an application to the Earl of Onslow, made through the late James Boswell, Esq., of the Inner Temple, his lordship was pleased to confide to the Delegates Speaker Onslow's copy of Burnet's History; in which are contained the Speaker's observations on this work, written in his own hand. Besides these remarks, there appear in the Onslow copy, in consequence of the permission of the second Earl of Hardwicke, not only the notes written by this nobleman on the second folio volume, but also the numerous passages, which were omitted in the first volume by the original editors. The notes likewise of Dean Swift are there transcribed, taken from his own copy of the history, which had come into the possession of the first Marquis of Lansdowne[3]. We shall now lay before the reader, for his greater satisfaction, a note prefixed to the Onslow copy by George, late Earl of Onslow, the son of the Speaker.
The notes in these two volumes marked H. were the notes in the present Earl of Hardwicke's copy of this work written by himself, and which he permitted me to copy into this. The earl is the son and heir of that great man the chancellor[4]. The others in the same handwriting I had also from him, and they are what are left out in the xii printed history, but are in the manuscript. All the rest of the notes are my father's own. Geo. Onslow, 1775. There are many errors of the copyist. The notes in red ink are by Dean Swift, and are copied (from an edition of this work in the Marquiss of Lansdown's library, in the margin of which they are written in the dean's own hand) by his lordship's order for myself. O. 1788.'
With respect to the notes written by the Earl of Dartmouth, it appears from Sir John Dalrymple's Memoirs of Great Britain and Ireland, and from Mr. Rose's Observations on Fox's History of the early part of the reign of James II, that both these writers had been favoured with the sight as well of these notes, as of a collection of letters which were sent by King James, when Duke of York, and residing in Scotland, to the first Lord of Dartmouth, the earl's father, and from which the earl has frequently inserted extracts[5]. Seven or eight only of the notes have been communicated to the public by the above-mentioned authors, and are pointed out as they occur in the following pages. All of them are now printed, with the exception of three, which contained reflections on the private character of as many individuals irrelevant to their public conduct. They have been omitted, with the approbation of the descendants of the noble writer[6].
As the Earl of Dartmouth has often treated his author with great severity, it should be remarked, that he was of a party in the state opposed to that which Bishop Burnet uniformly espoused. He appears also to have entertained a great personal dislike to the bishop. At the same time this nobleman, who was secretary of state, and afterwards xiii Lord Privy Seal in the latter end of Queen Anne's reign, never embraced, as may be collected from his notes, the absurd doctrine of non-resistance to government in all supposable cases; but was, what some have called, a moderate Tory; and like most of the leading Tories in the reign of the queen, was attached to the Hanover succession. The wiser members of this party held, that the right of the people to govern depends on the different laws and constitutions of different countries; but that their right to be well governed is indefeasible. To which should be added, that the tyranny of the many may as justly be resisted as the misgovernment of the few, or of the individual. The following character of his lordship has been transmitted to us by Swift, whilst eulogizing the chiefs of Queen Anne's last ministry, in the twenty-sixth number of the Examiner, 'My Lord Dartmouth,' he says, 'is a man of letters, full of good sense, good nature, and honour, of strict virtue and regularity in his life; but labours under one great defect, that he treats his clerks with more civility and good manners, than others in his station have done the queen.' See also Macky's Characters p. 89. His lordship's notes on this work of Burnet abound in curious and well told anecdotes.
The observations of Speaker Onslow and the Earl of Hardwicke have likewise been hitherto unpublished, except twenty of the former, printed in the twenty-seventh volume of the European Magazine. But more than half of Swift's short and cursory remarks have been already given to the public in that and the two following volumes of the same work by the person who communicated the others, yet often altered in the expression[7]. They are shrewd, caustic, xiv and apposite, but not written with the requisite decorum; of six notes omitted by us, three are worded in so light a way, that even modesty forbad their admission. The Speaker's notes, addressed more particularly to his son, contain many incidental discussions on political subjects, and are sensible and instructive. Those of the Earl of Hardwicke are so candid and judicious, that one cannot but wish them to have been more numerous. Earl Spencer, we are eager to acknowledge, condescendingly and most obligingly endeavoured to procure the copy of Burnet's History for our use, in the margin of which the notes were originally written by Lord Hardwicke, it being desirable that some doubtful passages of the transcript in the Onslow copy should have been compared with it; but unfortunately the book could nowhere be found.
The Earl of Dartmouth and Dean Swift, who although younger than Bishop Burnet, may be considered as his contemporaries, were, as we have already observed in the case of the Lord Dartmouth, opposed to him in politics : but Arthur Onslow, Speaker in five successive parliaments in the reign of George II, enjoyed the confidence of the Whigs, and with it a high reputation for integrity and moderation. The remaining annotator, Lord Hardwicke, son of the Lord Chancellor Hardwicke, and one of the authors of those elegant compositions, the Athenian Letters, always adhered to the same party. Lord Dartmouth uses strong, and Swift much ill language, on Burnet's supposed want of veracity; and the excellent Latin verses of Dean Moss on the same subject are now, we understand, in print. Yet the bishop's friends need not be apprehensive of a verdict of wilful falsehood against him in consequence of the corrections of his narrative in the subsequent annotations. Lord Dartmouth indeed, a man of honour, asserts that this author has published many things which he knew xv to be untrue. See his note at the beginning of vol. iv. His lordship, it must be allowed, had better opportunities than we have for determining what Burnet knew; but, as he has adduced little or nothing in support of this charge, we may be permitted to think, that strong prejudice, not wilful falsehood, occasioned the bishop's erroneous statements. It ought to be recollected in his favour, that he never professed a belief, either in the discoveries of Oates, or in the alleged murder of the Earl of Essex, although articles of his party's creed. And notwithstanding the idle stories told by him, on the authority of others, concerning the birth of the Prince of Wales, he nowhere, in the present work at least, explicitly avows an opinion of his illegitimacy. Nor, although an active and zealous opposer of King James's measures, does he appear to have been concerned in the other infamous falsehood imposed at the same time on the credulity of the nation; the intended massacre of the Protestants in this country by the Irish soldiery. There is a story indeed, which used to be told on the authority of the Dowager Countess of Nottingham, that Burnet, in a conversation with her lord, accused him of having professed different sentiments in the House of Peers on some subject from what he then did; and on Lord Nottingham's denying that he had so expressed himself, the bishop, as it was stated, rejoined, if his lordship had not, he ought to have done so: and that, notwithstanding this in Burnet's History of his Own Time, Lord Nottingham is represented to have said that which he denied he had said. All this may be true, and yet the bishop might not believe himself to have been mistaken. It must however be confessed, that where either party-zeal or personal resentment was concerned, this author too frequently appears to have been no patient investigator of the truth, but to have written under the influence of those xvi feelings, even whilst he was delineating the characters of some of the most virtuous persons of the age in which he lived. Amongst these are the Archbishops Sheldon and Sancroft, of whom he frequently speaks with unpardonable severity. He has also directed much indiscriminate censure against public bodies of men. In fact it appears by the preface to his work, that he himself suspected he had treated the clergy in particular with excessive harshness, irritated, he says, 'perhaps too much against them, in consequence of the peevishness, ill-nature, and ambition of many of them.' Nay, from some particulars, which will hereafter be mentioned, it may be collected, that the author actually omitted many passages of his history still more highly reflecting on his brethren.
That he was by no means acceptable to those prelates, who governed the Church of England in the reign of Charles II, seems extremely probable, when we consider that, according to his own account, he was an active opponent and open censurer of the bishops in Scotland, and a great meddler in English politics. Besides this, he professed to regard episcopacy itself as not necessary, although a preferable form of church government; and, however averse from republicanism, appears to have approved of the settlement made by the Scottish Covenanters in 1641 as the best system of civil polity for Scotland. See vol. i. pp. 396, 397, folio edit. The author also, during the reigns of William and Anne, was on very ill terms with the majority of the English clergy, whom he often accuses of inactivity, faction, and ambition. It may be urged on the other hand, in favour of his impartiality, that he does by no means spare the characters of those on his own side in politics; so little indeed, that for the credit of human nature we would hope, that he knew less of men and of business than he himself supposed.
xvii But whether his censures were just or unjust, Burnet himself, as it must be acknowledged even by his enemies, was an active and meritorious bishop, and, to the extent of his opportunities, a rewarder of merit in others. He was orthodox in points of faith, possessed superior talents, as well as very considerable learning; was an instructive and entertaining writer, in a style negligent indeed and inelegant, but almost always perspicuous; generous, open-hearted, and, in his actions, a good-natured man; and although busy and intrusive, at least as honest as the generality of partisans. It is true, that his conduct to the Duke of Lauderdale after the breach between them was, even in his own apprehension of it, objectionable; and he forfeited by it the favour of the royal brothers, Charles and James; who had before this time paid particular attention to him. His spleen and resentment against both these princes are apparent in every part of this history; except that his final portrait of the latter is less darkly shaded, than the harsh and hideous one which he has drawn of the former. It may be here observed, in contradiction to the report of Burnet and of several other writers, respecting the early reconciliation of Charles to the Church of Rome, that this event, as it appears from authentic accounts of the king's last moments, did not take place till a short time before his death.
2. Thus much concerning the notes on this work; and the accusation of wilful and deliberate falsehood brought against its author by the Lord Dartmouth and others. We proceed to give an account of the numerous passages omitted in the first folio volume by the original editors, and now restored to their proper places.
It is known to the readers of English history, that the
editors of this posthumous work, on the publication of
the first volume in 1724, promised to deposit the copy from
xviii
which it was printed in some public library; and they are
apprised, that in the beginning of the second volume,
printed in 1734, there appears the following declaration
with the signature of the bishop's youngest son, who was
afterwards Sir Thomas Burnet, and a judge. The original
manuscript of both volumes of this history will be deposited
in the Cotton library by T. Burnett.
The advertisement
in the former volume, which was the only one prefixed by
the editors to the work, is conceived in these terms. The
editors of the following history intend, for the satisfaction
of the public, to deposite the copy from which it is printed
(corrected and interlined in many places with the author's
own hand) in some public library, as soon as the second
volume shall be published.
Suspicions had very early arisen, nay, positive testimony had been adduced, that many passages of the original work were omitted by the editors in both the volumes (see note in vol. iv. p. 566); when at length, in the year 1795, the same person, who, according to our preceding statement, inserted the greater part of Swift's and a few of Speaker Onslow's notes, in the twenty-seventh volume of the European Magazine communicated together with them twelve passages of the text of Burnet, which, amongst numerous others, had been omitted by the editors of the first volume. They were, in all probability, published by him from either the Onslow or the Hardwicke copy of Burnet. He mentions the Hardwicke notes, although he has extracted none of them. It has been already stated, that the Hardwicke copy is missing, without hope it should seem of its recovery, and into this copy the Onslow notes had been transcribed, as those by the Earl of Hardwicke had been into the Onslow copy. Now apart from actual testimony, that the omissions were not confined to the first volume, it appeared extremely probable to us, that in xix proportion as the history drew nearer to their own times, the caution which dictated these omissions to the editors would acquire additional motives, and that as many, if not more, instances of suppression would be found to occur in the second volume.
We had therefore recourse to that noble repository of
literature and science, the British Museum, of which the
Cotton Library, as is generally known, forms a constituent
part. Henry Ellis, Esq., one of the librarians of that
institution, very obligingly complied with our request to
make the requisite search for this MS. and he subsequently
reported, that, after the most accurate examination, it did
not appear that it had ever been deposited in the library.
He added, that several collections of folio papers, written
in various hands, and at different times, contained an
imperfect copy of Bishop Burnet's History of his Own Times,
with many variations from the printed editions. That
some memorandums on a single sheet at the beginning of
this book, dated July 1699, are probably in the bishop's
hand, as are also many corrections in the history. Finally,
that Dr. Gififord has written several useful remarks in the
volume; among which is one, that
This
is the account with which we were favoured by Mr. Ellis.
It should be further observed, that the well-known fire, by
which the Cotton Library suffered considerable injury,
happened in 1731, three years before the promise was
publicly given of depositing the original MS. in that
library.
from many particulars
it appears, that the printed editions are not taken from
these loose papers: yet that though there is great variety
of expression, the substance is generally the same.
These circumstances considered, it is probable, that the same reasons which induced the editor or editors to omit certain passages in both volumes of the work, finally xx determined them, although pointedly expostulated with on the subject, to relinquish their purpose of placing the original MS. in an accessible library. It deserves notice, that in page 8 of the second letter addressed by Mr. Beach to Thomas Burnet, Esq., the writer asserts, that he had in his own possession an authentic and complete collection of the castrations. See Nichols's Literary Anecdotes, vol. i. p. 285. It is added by Beach, as we have been informed by a gentleman who inspected this second letter to the younger Burnet, as well as Sinclair's Remarks on the first letter, that these passages were also in the hands of several persons of distinction[8]. After all, we are induced by our recollection of the restored passages to think, that although they were unjustifiably omitted, because against the author's express injunctions in his last will, yet that it was not done by the editors through party considerations, but from a desire of abating the displeasure certain to be conceived against their father, by the friends or relations of those who suffered by the severity of his censure. The editors appear to have consulted their own feelings, in the omission of several traits in the character given by him of his uncle Warriston.
But it must not be omitted, that previously to the first publication of this work in 1724, some extracts from the former part of it, confessed to have been surreptitiously obtained during the author's life, were actually printed; none of which appear either in the edited work, or amongst the suppressed, and now restored passages of the first xxi volume[9]. In a tract found in the British Museum by a gentleman, who has done much for the literary history of this country, Dr. Philip Bliss, Fellow of St. John's College, Oxford, four passages are brought forward by the author of it, purporting to be extracts from Burnet's history. The title of the pamphlet is, A specimen of the Bishop of Sarum'ss Posthumous History of the Affairs of the Church and State of Great Britain during his life. By Robert Elliot, M.A., 3rd ed. London. 8vo, without date[10]. The publisher in his Preface says that he received the contents, consisting of extracts from Burnet's history, and copious remarks upon them, from Mr. Elliot, a deprived episcopal clergyman of Scotland. The extracts are asserted to have been privately made by Elliot, whilst employed together with others in transcribing a manuscript of the work lent by the author to Lord W.P. (perhaps Lord William Paulett). In support of the credibility of the account, it may be observed, that Lord Dartmouth, in a note at page 6, vol. i, mentions an offer made to himself by the author, of inspecting his history; a favour, his lordship adds, which the bishop had conferred on several others. Of these four extracts, the first is a relation of the murder of Archbishop Sharp, and although it agrees in substance with that in the edited copy, yet is much altered in point of expression. The three others contain very severe and acrimonious reflections on the English clergy.
It is observable, that in the Preface by Dr. Hickes to Three Treatises republished by him in 1709—some years before the death of Bishop Burnet—a part of the fourth xxii and last of these extracts is given in the very words produced by Elliot; and that Hickes says, he had seen a short specimen of the bishop's anecdot, perhaps communicated to him by this clergyman[11].
Dr. Bliss is of opinion, in case these extracts are authentic, that they were taken from a copy of Burnet's work in its first state, and before he altered, revised, and softened it. That they are genuine, many internal marks of authenticity lead us to suppose; over and above the circumstance, that, when Elliot, after finishing his extracts, proceeds to set down what he recollects of the substance of nine or ten other passages of the work, all that he produces has a perfect agreement with what was afterwards published as the bishop's. It is proper to remark in this place, that no additional charge of suppression or alteration can fairly be brought against the editors of Burnet's history in consequence of these extracts produced by Elliot, as they were made during the author's life, whilst he had the power of altering and revising his own work. On the other hand, against any suggestion, that the passages restored by us to the text had been in a similar way expunged or altered by the author himself, may be adduced the express testimony above referred to, that many things in the copy from which his work was printed, were omitted by the editors in both the volumes[12].
Before this account of the suppressed passages is entirely
concluded, we shall take notice, that amongst those which
are restored, there is one, in vol. i. p. 544, containing a
xxiii
severe attack on the character of King Charles I, chiefly
founded on that Prince's letters to the first Duke of
Hamilton, and on Bishop Burnet's acquaintance with the
Hamilton papers, the basis of his Memoirs of the two
dukes of that family. In favour of the king it ought first
to be stated, that the series of letters addressed to him by
the marquis, afterwards duke, of Hamilton, appears to
have formed no part of that collection of papers, Burnet
having in his Memoirs inserted few or none of them.
Again, that this nobleman so conducted himself in those
unhappy times, that he was always suspected by the
Royalists of treachery and treason against his benefactor
and sovereign; and was even charged upon oath with
having agents to raise vile reports to the dishonour of the
king and queen, and their whole court, as if it was a sink
of iniquity.
See, besides the histories of the times, two
tracts, one entitled Digitus Dei, p. 6, and the other the
Practices of the Hamiltons, p. 15, together with a note at
page 60 [ed. 1896] of this first volume of Burnet From
this source apparently originated a report unfavourable to
the character of the queen, whether true or untrue, which is
mentioned in a note by the Earl of Dartmouth, vol. i. p. 66.
Neither is any additional credit reflected on the Hamilton
papers themselves, in case they contained, according to the
assertion of some persons, the following incredible story.
That in the year 1640 the king sent a warrant to Sir William
Balfour, Lieutenant of the Tower of London, to execute
immediately the Earl of Loudon for the crime of high
treason, although, as it is well known it had formerly been
pardoned in consequence of a general act of grace; which
illegal warrant was to take effect without any previous
trial; and that Charles was diverted from insisting on
Balfour's obedience to the order, solely by the interference
of the Marquis of Hamilton. See the Conclusion of Birch's
xxiv
Inquiry into King Charles the First's Transactions with the
Earl of Glamorgan, Second Edition, where this tale is
brought forward against the king[13]. Let the Duke of
Hamilton however be heard in his own defence, and at the
same time in behalf of his royal master. In his speech
before his execution, this nobleman has the following expressions.
I take God to witness, that I have constantly
been a faithful subject and servant to his late majesty, in
spite of all malice and calumny. I have had the honour
since my childhood to attend and be near him, till now of
late, and during all that time I observed in him as eminent
virtues and as little vice, as in any man I ever knew.
Burnet's Memoirs of the Dukes of Hamilton, p. 398.
3. Thus much concerning the restored passages. To the notes of the Earls of Dartmouth and Hardwicke, Speaker Onslow, and Dean Swift, several others have been added, for the purpose of correction, and of fuller illustration. They are drawn principally from the professed answerers of Burnet, from the historians of particular xxv periods of our history, writers of memoirs and of scarce tracts, and occasionally from manuscript authorities. They were selected and appended to the text, whilst the press was going on, in the course of the last year; and will, it is hoped, as well as the strictures on some doctrines and opinions in the other annotations, appear to owe their situation in the following pages to a zeal for truth, sincere, at least, however mistaken. All these notes are interspersed with the others, and included within a parenthesis[14].
It is proper to apprise the reader, that Ralph's History of the three first reigns contained in Bishop Burnet's work, namely, those of Charles II, James II, and King William, was not procured for consultation before some part of the reign of James II was already printed. But this circumstance appeared afterwards to be of less consequence than the perusal of the latter part of the same history caused us to apprehend. This historian has obtained from Mr. Fox the praise of impartiality; which he well deserves[15].
It should also be here acknowledged, that a statement in Bishop Burnet's work at pp. 31, 32 of the first volume, ought to have been corrected from the Earl of Cromarty's Account of the Conspiracies of the Earls of Gowry, published before Burnet's death in the year 1713. The bishop affirms, that the last Earl of Gowry was descended through a daughter of Lord Methuen, from Margaret, daughter of xxvi King Henry the Seventh, although this king's daughter had in reality no issue, but what died in infancy, by her third husband, Henry, Lord Methuen, whom our author erroneously calls Francis Steward, father of a Lord Methuen. Gowry's grandmother was daughter of Henry, Lord Methuen, by his second wife, a daughter of the Earl of Athol, married to him after Margaret the Queen Dowager of Scotland's death. See the Earl of Cromarty's Account, pp. 8-12. As in this case the Earl of Gowry had no well-founded claim to the succession of the crown of England, if King James of Scotland were removed out of the way, he could scarcely be influenced by any such claim to attempt the assassination of that prince, according to the bishop's surmize, not sanctioned, as he himself owns, by any other historian.
On the other hand a confirmation of our author's testimony
has lately occurred, and the question, so ably discussed
by sergeant Heywood in his Vindication of Fox's Historical
Work, as to the conduct of General Monck during the
pending trial of the Marquis of Argyle, has been finally set
at rest. It now appears, on the authority of Sir George
Mackenzie, one of the assigned defenders of the marquis,
that Monck, when advertised of the scantiness of the
probation,
did actually transmit to Scotland several official
letters formerly received by him from the marquis for the
purpose of procuring that nobleman's condemnation. See
vol. i. p. 225, and Sir George Mackenzie's Memoirs of the
Affairs of Scotland, just published [1821], p. 4.
In printing the text of Burnet, the first edition has been followed, and the alterations of his style in those subsequent have been neglected. It is true, that in the title-page of the octavo edition printed in 1755, the whole work is said to have been revised and corrected by the editor, the bishop's son; but allowing this, the original MS. was still xxvii further departed from, than even in the folio edition. The few alterations which occur in the editor's Life of his father have been adopted.
The Index to the text of Burnet has been improved by Dr. Bliss, whose name we have already had occasion to mention; the other Index to the principal contents of the notes was entirely prepared by that gentleman[16].
The author finished his history of the reigns of Charles II and James II about the beginning of the eighteenth century: that of the reign of William, and of the former part of Queen Anne's reign in 1710. The continuation of the work to the conclusion of peace in 1713 was completed by him in that year; less than two years before his death. The present year 1823 is nearly the hundredth since the publication of the first volume in folio, comprising the two first reigns above mentioned, together with a summary of public affairs before the restoration. It appears to have excited more interest than the second volume, which followed in 1734, after an interval of ten years. But this is by no means to be wondered at, if besides taking into account the author's frequent relations in the subsequent volume of military and foreign affairs, amusive indeed, but brief and perfunctory, we consider the diminished influence of the good or ill qualities of individuals on the public events and transactions of this latter period.
The great influence which personal character had formerly on events, together with other causes, occasions the reign of Charles the First, in which the contest for political power commenced, to form the most interesting period of English history, whether we are disposed to triumph with the conquering party, or to espouse and commiserate the cause of high honour and suffering loyalty. The frequent xxviii and remarkable changes of government during the interregnum, as well as the singular and energetic character of the protector Cromwell, secure the attention of every reader. The disputes, which afterwards arose between an unprincipled, but good-humoured monarch, regardless alike of his own honour and the national interest, and a restless, violent, and merciless faction, are subjects of deep concern, on account of their melancholy results. At the same time, the mind feels consolation in the virtues of Ormond, Clarendon, and Southampton. And, notwithstanding the enormities of courtiers and anticourtiers, we reflect with pleasure on the freedom then first securely enjoyed, from every species of arbitrary taxation, and from extrajudicial imprisonment; on the provision made for the meeting of parliament once in three years at the least; in a word, on the possession of a constitution, which King William admired so much, that he professed himself afraid to improve it. The gloom of the next reign, ruined as its prospects were by folly and oppression, and finally closed by means of intrigue, falsehood, and intimidation, is in part enlivened by a view of the courageous and disinterested conduct of Sancroft, Hough, Dundee, Craven, and several others. Some of these persons, desirous of a parliamentary redress of grievances, thought, that instead of the force put upon the person of the king, an accommodation might and ought to have been effected with him; as he had a little before, when threatened with the just and open hostility of his subjects for his perversion of the law, and maintenance of a standing army, made very important concessions. Yet it may reasonably be doubted, whether a composition with a prince of his disposition and feeble judgement, whatever good qualities he was otherwise possessed of, would eventually have been lasting, or even reducible to practice. It was remarked, that the appeal made by him to his subjects xxix immediately after his retreat to another country, was signed by a secretary of state employed contrary to the intent at least of law.
Times had now passed, which were chequered with great virtues and great vices: but the reigns of William and Anne exhibit to the reader one uniform scene of venality and corruption; and the mind, instead of being interested, is disgusted with the contests of two parties for the government of the country, assuming, as it best suited their selfish purposes, each other's principles. The long contemplated change in the executive government was at length effected; its power being virtually transferred to combinations of persons possessed of great influence in parliamentary elections, and in parliament itself. Hence what has been called the practice of the constitution differed widely from its theory; and to this depression of the crown and of its direct power, occasioned by the almost constant sitting of parliament, were added maxims annihilating the will of the single person, and, in conjunction with other causes, finally subversive of all dutiful and affectionate attachment to authority. These maxims, not recognized as constitutional by Clarendon, Hale, or Locke, were advanced in order to colour and justify the alteration. A wider and more extensive field was now opened for the exertion of talents, contributing to the advancement of the individual, but often more hurtful than useful to the public. In these reigns also, contrary to every principle of justice, were laid the deep and broad foundations of a debt, which no other than the political system then adopted could have entailed on a nation. It ought still however to be remembered, that at, or soon after the revolution, a solemn recognition was made of the liberties of Englishmen; the power of dispensing with the laws was abrogated in all cases; the judges ceased to be dismissed at the sole xxx pleasure of the crown; a provision was made against the long continuance of parliaments; freedom of religious worship was secured to the great body of protestant dissenters; the important and necessary measure of a union with Scotland was effected; the liberty of the press established; trials for treason better regulated; and a more exact and impartial administration of justice generally introduced in the kingdom. These blessings, and all our constitutional rights, may God's providence, and a virtuous and independent spirit, preserve. Let us venerate the source of our freedom and happiness, the legal monarchy .of England, supporting it, when outraged by venal and prodigal factions, or threatened with subversion by reckless and usurping demagogues.
M.J.R.
I am now beginning to review and write over again the History of my own time, which I first undertook twenty years ago[1], and have been continuing it from year to year ever since: and I see some reason to review it all. I had while I was very young a greater knowledge of affairs than is usual at that age; for my father, who had been engaged in great friendships with men of both sides, living then retired from all business, as he took my education wholly into his own hands, so he took a sort of pleasure to relate to me the series of all public affairs. And as he was a man so eminent for probity and true piety that I had all reason to believe him, so I saw such an impartial sense of things in him, that I had as little reason to doubt his judgment as his sincerity. For though he adhered so firmly to the king and his side that he was the singular instance in Scotland of a man of some note, who, from the beginning to the end of the war, never once owned or submitted to the new forms of government set up all that xxxii while, yet he did very freely complain of the errors of the king's government, and of the bishops of Scotland. So that upon this foundation I set out first to look into the secret conduct of affairs among us.
I fell into great acquaintance and friendships with several persons who either were or had been ministers of state, from whom, when the secret of affairs was over, I studied to know as many particulars as I could draw from them[2]. I saw a great deal more among the papers of the dukes of Hamilton than was properly a part of their Memoirs, or fit to be told at that time: for when a licence was to be obtained, and a work was to be published fit for that family to own, things foreign to their ministry, or hurtful to any other families, were not to be intermixed with the account I then gave of the late wars. And now for above thirty years I have lived in such intimacy with all who have had the chief conduct of affairs, and have been so much trusted and on so many important occasions employed by them, that I have been able to penetrate far into the true secrets of and designs.
This made me twenty years ago write down a relation of all that I had known to that time: where I was in the dark, I past over all, and only opened those transactions that I had particular occasions to know. My chief design in writing was to give a true view of men and of counsels, leaving public transactions to gazettes and the public historians of the times. I writ with a design to make both my self and my readers wiser and better, and to lay open the good and the bad of all sides and parties, as clearly and impartially as I my self understood it, concealing nothing that I thought fit to be known, and representing things in their natural colours without art or disguise, without any regard to kindred or friends, to parties or interests. xxxiii
For I do solemnly say this to the world, and make my humble appeal upon it to the great God of truth, that I tell the truth on all occasions, as fully and freely as I upon my best inquiry have been able to find it out; where things appear doubtful, I deliver them with the same incertainty to the world.
Some may perhaps think, that, instead of favouring my own profession, I have been more severe upon them than was needful. But my zeal for the true interests of religion and of the clergy made me more careful to undeceive good and well meaning men of my own order and profession for the future, and to deliver them from common prejudices and mistaken notions, than to hide or excuse the faults of those who will be perhaps gone off the stage before this work appears on it. I have given the characters of men very impartially and copiously; for nothing guides one's judgment more truly in a relation of matters of fact than the knowing the tempers and principles of the chief actors[3].
If I have dwelt too long on the affairs of Scotland, some allowance is to be made to the affection all men bear to their native country[4]. I alter nothing of what I wrote in xxxiv the first draught of this work, only I have left out a great deal that was personal to my self, and to those I am descended from: so that this is upon the matter the same work, with very little change made in it.
I a look on the perfecting of this work, and the carrying it on through the remaining part of my life, as the greatest service I can do both to God and to the world; and therefore I set about it 2 with great care and caution. For I reckon a lie in history to be as much a greater sin than a lie in common discourse, as the one is like to be more lasting and more generally known than the other. I find that the long experience I have had of the baseness, the malice, and the falsehood of mankind, has inclined me to be apt to think generally the worst both of men and of parties: and indeed the peevishness, the ill nature, and the ambition of many hot clergymen, has sharpened my spirit perhaps too much against them: so I warn my reader to take all that I say on these heads with some grains of allowance, though I have watched over my self and my pen so carefully that I hope there is no great occasion for this apology.
I have shewed this history to several of my friends[5], who were either very partial to me, or they esteemed that this work (chiefly when it should be over and over again retouched and polished[6] by me,[7] which very probably I shall be doing as long as I live[8]) might prove of some use to the world. I have on design avoided all laboured periods or artificial strains, and have writ in as clear and plain a style as was possible, choosing rather a copious enlargement than a dark conciseness.
And now, O my God, the God of my life and of all my mercies, I offer up this work to Thee, to whose honour it is chiefly intended; that thereby I may awaken the world to just reflections on their own errors and follies, and call on them to acknowledge thy providence, to adore it, and ever to depend on it.
1The mischiefs of civil wars are so great and lasting, and the effects of ours branching themselves out by many accidents that were not thought on at first, much less intended, into such mischievous consequences, [that] I have thought it an enquiry that might be of great use both to prince and people, to look carefully into the first beginnings and occasions of them, to observe their progress, and the errors of both hands, the provocations that were given, and the jealousies that were raised by these, together with the excesses into which both sides have run by turns. And though the wars be over long ago, yet since they have left among us so many seeds of lasting feuds and animosities, which upon every turn are apt to ferment and to break out anew, it will be an useful as well as a pleasant enquiry 4 to look back to the first original of them, and to observe by what degrees and accidents they gathered strength, and at last broke forth into such a flame.
The Reformation of Scotland was popular and parliamentary: the crown was during that time either on the head of a queen that was absent, or of a king that was an infant. During his minority matters were carried on by the several regents, so as was most agreeable to the prevailing humour of the nation. But when king James grew to be of age, he found two parties in the kingdom: the one was of those who wished well to the interests of the queen his mother, then a prisoner in England; these were either professed papists, or men believed to be indifferent as to all religions: the rest were her inveterate enemies, zealous for the Reformation, and fixed in a dependence on the crown of England and a jealousy of France. When that king saw that those who were most in his interests were likewise jealous of his authority, and apt to encroach upon it , he hearkened first to the insinuations of his mother's party, who were always infusing in him a jealousy of these his friends, and saying, that by ruining his mother and setting him in her room while a year old, they had ruined monarchy, and made the crown subject and precarious, and had put him in a very unnatural posture of being seised of his mother's crown while she was in exile and a prisoner; adding, that he was but a king in name, the power being in the hands of those who were under the management of the queen of England.
Their insinuations would have been of less force if the House of Guise[2] who were his cosin-germans, had not been then engaged in great designs, of transferring the crown of France from the House of Bourbon to themselves; in order to which it was necessary to embroil England, and to draw the king of Scotland into their interests. So under the pretence of keeping up the old alliances between 5 France and Scotland, they sent creatures of their own to be ambassadors there; and they also sent a graceful young man[3], who, as he was the king's nearest kinsman by his father, was of so agreeable a temper that he became his favourite, and was made by him duke of Lennox. He was known to be a papist, though he pretended he changed his religion, and became in profession a protestant.
3 The court of England discovered all these artifices of the Guisians, who were then the most implacable enemies of the Reformation, and were managing all that train of plots against queen Elizabeth that in conclusion proved fatal to the queen of Scots. And when the English ministers saw the inclinations of the young king lay so strongly that way that all their applications to gain him were ineffectual, they infused such a jealousy of him into all their party in Scotland, that both nobility and clergy were much alarmed at it. 6
But king James learnt early that piece of kingcraft[4], of disguising, or at least denying, every thing that was observed in his behaviour that gave offence.
The main instance in which the French management appeared was, that he could not be prevailed on to enter into any treaty of marriage. It was not safe to talk of marrying a papist; and as long as the duke of Guise lived, the king, though then three and twenty, and the only person of his family, would hearken to no proposition for marrying a protestant.
But when the duke of Guise was killed at Blois, and that Henry the third was murdered soon after, so that Henry the fourth came in his room, king James was no more in a French management: so presently after he married a daughter of Denmark, and ever after that he was wholly managed by queen Elizabeth and her ministers[5]. I have seen many letters among Walsingham's papers that discover the commerce between the House of Guise and him [king James]; but the most valuable of these is a long paper of instructions to one sir Richard Wigmore[6], a great man for hunting and for all such sports, to which king James was out of measure addicted 3[7]. The queen affronted him publicly, upon which he pretended he could live no 7 longer in England, and therefore withdrew to Scotland. But all this was a contrivance of Walsingham's, who thought him a fit person to get into that king's favour: so that affront was designed to give him the more credit. He was very particularly instructed in all the proper methods to gain upon the king's confidence, and to observe and give an account of all he saw in him: which he did very faithfully. By these instructions it appears that Walsingham thought that king was either inclined to turn papist or to be of no religion. And when the court of England saw that they could not depend on him, they raised all possible opposition to him in Scotland, infusing strong jealousies into those who were enough inclined to receive them.
This is the great defect that runs through archbishop Spotswood's history[8], where much of the rude opposition that king met with, particularly from the assemblies of the Kirk, is set forth; but the true ground of all the jealousies they were possessed with is suppressed by him. After his marriage the king studied to remove these suspicions all that was possible; and he granted the Kirk all the laws they desired, and got his temporal authority to be better established than it was before: yet as the jealousies of his fickleness in religion were never quite removed, so the party gave him many new disgusts: this wrought in him a most inveterate hatred of presbytery and of the power of the Kirk; and he, fearing an opposition in his succeeding to the crown of England from the popish party, which, though it had little strength in the House of Commons, yet was very great in the House of Lords, and was very considerable in all the northern parts, and among the body of the people, employed several persons who were known to 8 be papists, though they complied outwardly. The chief of these were Elphinstone, secretary of state, whom he made lord Balmerino, and Seaton, afterwards chancellor and earl of Dunfermline; by their means he studied to assure the papists that he would connive at them. A letter was also writ to the pope by him, giving him assurance of this, which when it came to be published by Bellarmine, upon the prosecution of the recusants after the discovery of the gunpowder plot, Balmerino did affirm that he out of zeal to the king's service got his hand to it, having put it in a the bundle a of papers that were signed in course, without the king's knowing any thing of it[9]. Yet when that discovery drew no other severity on the secretary, but the turning him out of office, and the passing a sentence condemning him to die for it (which was presently pardoned, and he was after a short confinement restored to his liberty), all men believed that the king knew of the letter, and that the pretended confession of the secretary was only collusion to lay the jealousies of the king's favouring popery, which still hung upon him, notwithstanding his writing on the Revelation, and his affecting to enter on all occasions into controversy, asserting in particular that the pope was antichrist.
As he took these methods to manage the popish party, he was much more careful to secure to himself the body of the English nation. Cecil, afterwards earl of Salisbury, secretary to queen Elizabeth, entered into a particular confidence with him: and this was managed by his ambassador Bruce[10], a younger brother of a noble family in Scotland, 9 who carried 4 the matter with such address and secrecy, that all the great men of England, without knowing of one another's doing it, and without the queen's suspecting any thing concerning it, signed in writing an engagement to assert and stand by the king of Scots right of succession. This great service was rewarded by making him Master of the Rolls, and a peer of Scotland: and as the king did raise Cecil and his friends to the greatest posts and dignities, so he raised Bruce's family here in England[11].
When that king came to the crown of England he discovered his inveterate hatred to the Scottish Kirk on many occasions, in which he gratified his resentment without consulting his interests[12]. He ought to have put his utmost strength to the finishing what he did but faintly begin for the union of both kingdoms, which was lost by his unreasonable partiality in pretending that Scotland ought to be considered in this union as the third part of the isle of Great Britain, if not more[13]: so high a demand ruined the design. 10 But when that failed him, he should then have studied to keep the affections of that nation firm to him: and certainly his being secured of that kingdom might have been so managed as to have prevented that disjointing which happened afterwards both in his own reign, and more tragically in his son's. He thought to effect this by his profuse bounty to many of the nobility of that kingdom, and to his domestic servants: but as most of these settling in England were of no further use to him in that design, so his setting up episcopacy in Scotland, and his constant aversion to the Kirk, how right soever it might be in itself, was a great error in policy; for the poorer that kingdom was, it was both the more easy to gain them, and the more dangerous to offend them. So the terror which the affections of the Scotch nation might have justly given the English was soon lost, by his engaging his whole government to support that which was then very contrary to the bent and genius of the nation.
But though he set up bishops, he had no revenues to give them but what he was to purchase for them. During his minority, all the tithes and the church lands were vested in the crown: but this was only in order to the granting them away to the men that bore the chief sway[14]. It is true, when he came of age, he, according to the law of Scotland, past a general revocation of all that had been done in his infancy: and by this he could have resumed all those grants. He, and after him his son, succeeded in one part of his design: for by Act of Parliament[15] a court was erected that was to examine the state of the tithes in every parish, and to make a competent provision out of a third part to those who served the cure; which had been reserved in the great alienation for the service of the church. 11 This was carried at first to a proportion of about thirty pound a year, and was afterwards in his son's time raised to about fifty pound a year; which, considering the plenty, and way of living in that country, is a very liberal provision, and is equal in value to thrice that sum in the southern parts of England. In this he had both the clergy and the body of the people on his side; but he could not so easily provide for the bishops. They were at first forced to hold their former cures, with some small addition.
But as they assumed at their first setting out little more authority than that of a constant president of the presbyters, so they met with much rough opposition. The king intended to carry on a conformity in matters of religion with England, and he began to buy in from the grantees many of the estates that belonged to the bishoprics. It was also enacted that a form of prayer should be drawn for Scotland: and the king was authorized to appoint the habits in which the divine offices were to be performed. Some of the chief holydays were ordered to be observed; the sacrament was to be received kneeling, and to be given to the sick. Confirmation was enacted; as also the use of the cross in baptism. These things[15a] were first past in General Assemblies, which were composed of bishops and the deputies chosen by the clergy, who sat all in one house: and in it they reckoned the bishops only as single votes. Great opposition was made to all these steps: and the whole force of the government was strained to carry elections to those meetings, or to take off those who were chosen; in which it was thought that no sort of practice was omitted. It was pretended that some were frighted, and others were corrupted.
The bishops themselves did their part very ill[16]. They generally grew haughty: they neglected their functions, and 12 were often at court, and lost all esteem with the people. Some few that were stricter and more learned did lean so grossly to popery, that the heat and violence of the Reformation became the main subject of their sermons and discourses. King James grew weary of this opposition, or was so 5 apprehensive of the ill effects that it might have, that, what through sloth or fear, and what by reason of the great disorder into which his ill conduct brought his affairs in England in his latter years, he went no further in his designs on Scotland.
He had three children. His eldest, prince Henry, was a prince of great hopes; but so very little like his father, that he was rather feared than loved by him. He was so zealous a protestant, that, when his father was entertaining propositions of marrying him to popish princesses[17], once to the archduchess, and at another time to a daughter of Savoy, he in a letter that he wrote to the king on the twenty-second of that October in which he died (the original of which sir William Cook shewed me), desired that if his father married him that way, it might be with the youngest person of the two, of whose conversion he might have hope, and that any liberty she might be allowed for her religion might be in the privatest manner possible. Whether this aversion to popery hastened his death or not, I cannot tell. Colonel Titus[18] assured me that he had it from 13 king Charles the first's own mouth, that he was well assured of it that he was poisoned by the earl of Somerset's means. It is certain that from the time of the gunpowder plot king James was so struck with the terror of that danger he was then so near, that ever after he had no mind to provoke the Jesuits; for he saw what they were capable of.
And since I name that conspiracy which the papists in our days have had the impudence to deny[19], and to pretend it was an artifice of Cecil's to engage some desperate men into a plot, which he managed so that he could discover it when he pleased, I will mention what I my self saw, and had for some time in my possession. Sir Everard Digby suffered for that conspiracy: he was the father of the famous sir Kenelm Digby. The family being ruined upon the death of sir Kenelm's son, when the executors were looking out for writings to make out the title of the estates they were to sell[20], and were directed by an old servant to a cupboard that was very artificially hid, in which some papers lay, that she had observed sir Kenelm was oft reading, they, looking into it, found a velvet bag, within which there were two other silk bags: (so carefully were those relics kept:) and there was within these a collection of all the letters that sir Everard writ during his imprisonment. In these he expresses great trouble, because he heard some of their friends blamed their undertaking: he highly magnifies it; and says, if he had many lives, he would willingly have sacrificed them all in carrying it on. In one paper he says, they had taken that care that there 14 were not above two or three worth saving to whom they had not given notice to keep out of the way: and in none of those papers does he express any sort of remorse for that which he had been engaged in, and for which he suffered.
Upon the discovery of that plot, there was a general prosecution of all papists set on foot: but king James was very uneasy at it: which was much increased by what sir Dudley Carleton told him upon his return from Spain, where he had been ambassador[21]; which I had from the lord Holles, who said to me that Carleton told it to himself, and was much troubled when he saw it had an effect contrary to what he had intended. When he came home, he found the king at Theobald's hunting in a very careless and unguarded manner: and upon that, in order to the putting him on a more careful looking to himself, he told the king he must either give over that way of hunting, or stop another hunting that he was engaged in, which was priest hunting: for he had intelligence in Spain that the priests were comforting themselves with this, that if he went on 15 against them they would soon get rid of him. Queen Elizabeth was a woman of form, and was always so well attended. that all their plots against her failed, and were never brought to any effect: but a prince who was always in woods or forests would be easily overtaken. The king sent for him in private to inquire more particularly into this: and he saw it had made a great impression on him, but wrought otherwise than as he intended. For the king, resolving to gratify his humour in hunting, and in a careless and irregular way of life, did immediately order all that prosecution to be let fall. I have the minutes of the council books of the year 1606, which are full of orders to discharge and transport priests, sometimes ten in a day. From thence to his dying day he continued always writing and talking against popery, but acting for it. He married his only daughter to a protestant prince, one of the most zealous and sincerest, but one of the weakest, of them all, the elector palatine; upon which a great revolution happened in the affairs of Germany. The eldest branch of the house of Austria retained some of the impressions that their father Maximilian the second studied to infuse into them, who, as he was certainly one of the best and wisest princes of these latter ages, so he was unalterably fixed in 6 his opinion against persecution for matters of conscience: his own sentiments were so very favourable to the protestant doctrine that he was thought inwardly theirs. His brother Charles of Gratz was on the other hand wholly managed by the Jesuits, was a zealous patron of theirs, and as zealously supported by them. Rodolph and Matthias[22] reigned one after another, but without issue; their brother Albert was then dying in Flanders: so Spain with the whole popish interest joined to advance Ferdinand, the son of Charles of Gratz: and he forced Matthias to resign the crown of Bohemia to him, and got himself to be elected king. But his government became quickly severe: he resolved to extirpate the protestants, and began to 16 break through the privileges that were secured to them by the laws of that kingdom.
This occasioned a general insurrection, which was followed by an assembly of the states, who, together with those of Silesia, Moravia, and Lusatia, joined in deposing Ferdinand: and they offered their crown first to the duke of Saxony, who refused it, and then to the elector palatine, who accepted of it, being encouraged to it by his two uncles, Maurice prince of Orange, and the duke of Bouillon. But he did not ask the advice of king James: he only gave him notice of it when he had accepted the offer. Here was the probablest occasion that has been offered since the Reformation for its full establishment.
The English nation was much inclined to support it: and it was expected that so near a conjunction might have prevailed on the king: but he had an invincible aversion to war; and was so possessed of the opinion of a divine right in all kings that he could not bear that even an elective and limited king should be called in question by his subjects: so he would never acknowledge his son-in-law king, nor give him any assistance for the support of his new dignity[23]. And though it was also reckoned on, that France would enter into any design that should bring down the house of Austria, and Spain by consequence, yet even that was diverted by the means of De Luines[24]; a worthless but absolute favourite, whom the archduchess Isabella, princess of the Spanish Netherlands, gained to oblige the king [of France] into a neutrality by giving him the richest heiress then in Flanders, the daughter of Pecquigny, left to her disposal, whom he married to his brother. 17 Thus poor Frederick was left without any assistance. The jealousy that the Lutherans had of the ascendant that the Calvinists might gain by this accession had an unhappy share in the coldness which all the princes of that confession shewed towards him. Saxony only declared for Ferdinand, who likewise engaged the duke of Bavaria[25] at the head of a catholic league to maintain his interests. Maurice prince of Orange had embroiled Holland by the espousing the controversy about the decrees of God in opposition to the Arminian party, and by erecting a new and illegal court by the authority of the States General to judge of the affairs of the province of Holland; which was plainly contrary to their constitution, by which every province is an entire sovereignty within itself, not at all subordinate to the States General, who act only as the plenipotentiaries of the several provinces to maintain their union and their common concerns by that assembly. Barneveldt was condemned and executed: Grotius and others were condemned to perpetual imprisonment: and an assembly of the ministers of the several provinces met at Dort by the same authority, and condemned and deprived the Arminians[26]. Maurice his enemies gave out that he managed all this on design to make himself master of the provinces, and to put those who were like to oppose him out of the way. But though this seems a wild and groundless imagination, and not possible to be compassed, yet it is certain that he looked on Barneveldt and his party as men who were so jealous of him and of a military power, that as they had forced the truce with Spain, so they would be very unwilling to begin a new war; though the dispute about 18 Juliers and Cleves had almost engaged them, and the truce was now near expiring; at the end of which he hoped, if delivered from the opposition that he might look [for] from that party, to begin the war anew. By these means there was a great fermentation over all the provinces, so that Maurice was not then in condition to give the elected king any considerable assistance; though indeed he needed it much, for his conduct was very weak. He affected the grandeur of a regal court and the magnificence of a crowned head too early: and his queen set up some of the gay diversions that she had been accustomed to in her father's court, such as balls and masks, which very much disgusted the good Bohemians, who thought that a revolution made on the account of religion ought to have put on a greater appearance of seriousness and simplicity. 7. These particulars I had from the children of some who belonged to that court. The elected king was quickly overthrown, and driven not only out of those his new dominions but likewise out of his hereditary countries. He fled to Holland, where he ended his days. I will go no further in a matter so well known as king James's ill conduct in the whole series of that war, and that unheard-of practice of sending his only son through France into Spain, of which the relations we have are so full that I can add nothing to them.
I will only here tell some particulars with relation to Germany that Fabricius, the wisest divine I knew among them, told me he had from Charles Lewis[27] the elector palatine's own mouth. He said, Frederic the 2d. who first reformed the palatinate, whose life is so curiously writ by Thomas Hubert of Liège[28], was resolved to shake off popery, and to set up Lutheranism in his country: but 19 a counsellor of his laid before him, that the Lutherans would always depend chiefly on the house of Saxony: so it would not become him who was the first elector to be only the second in the party. It was more for his dignity to become Calvinist: he would be the head of that party: it would give him a great interest in Switzerland, and make the Huguenots of France and in the Netherlands depend on him. He was by that determined to declare for the Helvetian confession. But upon the ruin of their family the duke of Neuburg had an interview with the elector of Brandenburg about their concerns in Juliers and Cleves: and he persuaded that elector to turn Calvinist; for since their family was fallen, nothing would more contribute to raise the other than the espousing that side, which would naturally come under his protection: but he added, that for himself he had turned papist, since his little principality lay so near both Austria and Bavaria[29]. This that elector told with a sort of pleasure, when he made it appear that other princes had no more sense of religion than he himself had.
Other circumstances concurred to make king James's reign so inglorious. The States having borrowed great sums of money of queen Elizabeth, they gave her the Brill and Flushing, with some other places of less note, as pawns, till the money should be repaid. Soon after his coming to the crown of England he entered into secret treaties with Spain[30], in order to the forcing the States to a peace: one article was, that if they were obstinate he would deliver up 20 these places to the Spaniards. When the truce was made, Barneveldt, though he had promoted it, yet knowing this secret article, he saw they were very unsafe while the keys of Holland and Zealand were in the hands of a prince who might perhaps sell them or make an ill use of them: so he persuaded the States to redeem the mortgage by repaying the money that England had lent, for which these places were put in their hands: and he came over himself to treat about it. King James, who was profuse upon his favourites and servants, was delighted with the prospect of so much money; and immediately, without calling a parliament to advise with them about it, he did yield to the proposition. So the money was paid, and the places were evacuated; an action more to be commended for its honesty than wisdom. But his profuseness drew two other things upon him, which broke the whole authority of the crown, and the dependence of the nation upon it. The crown had a great estate over all England, which was all let out upon leases for years, and a small rent was reserved. So most of the great families of the nation were the tenants of the crown, and a great many boroughs were depending on the estates so held. The renewal of these leases brought in fines both to the crown and to the great officers: besides that the fear of being denied a renewal kept all in dependence on the court. King James obtained of his parliament a power of granting, that is selling, those estates for ever, with the reserve of the old quit-rent[31]: and all the money raised by this was profusely squandered away. Another main part of the regal authority was the wards, which anciently the crown took into their own management. Our kings were, according to the first institution, the 21 guardians of these wards[32]: they bred them up in their court, and disposed of them in marriage as they thought fit. Afterwards they compounded or forgave them, or gave them to some branches of the family, or to provide the younger children. But they proceeded in this very gently: and the chief care after the reformation was to breed the wards protestants. Still all were under a great dependence by this means; much money was not raised this way, but families were often at mercy, and were used according to their behaviour. 8 King James granted these generally to his servants and favourites, and they made the most of them. So that what was before a dependence on the crown, and was moderately compounded for, became then a most exacting oppression, by which several families were ruined. This went on in king Charles's time in the same method. Our kings thought they gave little when they disposed of a ward, because they made little of these. All this raised such an outcry, that Mr. Pierpoint at the Restoration gathered so many instances of these and represented them so effectually to that house of commons that called home king Charles the second, that he persuaded them to redeem themselves by an offer of excise, which produces indeed a much greater revenue, but took away the dependence in which all families were held by the dread of leaving their heirs exposed to so great a danger. Pierpoint valued himself to me upon this service he did his country, at a time when the thing was so little considered on either hand, that the court did not seem to apprehend the value of that they parted with, nor the country the value of that they purchased[33]. 22
Besides these public actings, king James suffered much in the opinion of all people by his strange way of using one of the greatest men of that age, sir Walter Raleigh; 1618. against whom the proceeding at first was much censured, but the last part of them was thought both barbarous and illegal. The whole business of Somerset's rise and fall, the matter of the countess of Essex and Overbury, the putting the inferior persons to death for that infamous poisoning and the sparing the principals, both Somerset and his lady, were so odious and inhuman, that it quite sunk the reputation of a reign that on many other accounts was already much exposed to contempt and censure, which was the more sensible because it succeeded such a glorious and happy one[34]. In the end of James's reign he was become 23 weary of the duke of Buckingham, who treated him with such an air of insolent contempt that he seemed at last resolved to throw it off, but could not think of taking the load of government on himself, and so resolved to bring in the earl of Somerset again into favour, as that lord himself reported it to some from whom I had it. He met him in the night in the gardens at Theobald's: two bed-chamber men were only in the secret. The king embraced him tenderly, and with many tears[35] complained how ill he was used. The earl of Somerset believed the secret was not well kept; for soon after the king was taken with some fits of an ague, and died of it.. My father was then in London, and did very much suspect an ill practice in the matter: but perhaps doctor Craig, my mother's uncle, d who was one of the king's physicians, possessed him with these apprehensions; for he was disgraced for saying he believed the king was poisoned. It is certain no king could die less lamented or less esteemed than he was. This sunk the credit of the bishops of Scotland, who, as they were his creatures, so they were obliged to a great dependence on him, and were thought guilty of gross and abject flattery towards him. His reign in England was a continued course of mean practices. The first condemnation of sir W. Raleigh, one of the greatest men of the age, was very black: but the executing him after so many years, and after an employment that had been given him, was counted a barbarous sacrificing him to the Spaniards. The rise and fall of the earl of Somerset, and the swift progress 24 of the duke of Buckingham's greatness, were things that exposed him to the censures of all the world. I have seen the originals of about twenty letters that he wrote to the prince and that duke while they were in Spain, which shew a meanness as well as a fondness that render him very contemptible. The great figure the crown of England had made in queen Elizabeth's time, who had rendered herself the arbiter of Christendom and the wonder of the age, was so much eclipsed, if not quite darkened, during this reign, that king James was become the scorn of the age; and while hungry writers flattered him out of measure at home, he was despised by all abroad as a pedant without true judgment, courage, or steadiness, subject to his favourites, and delivered up to the counsels, or rather the corruption, of Spain[36].
The puritans gained credit as the king and the bishops lost it[37]. They put on external appearance of great strictness and gravity: they took more pains in their parishes than those who adhered to the bishops, and were often preaching against the vices of the court; for which they were sometimes punished, though very gently, which raised their reputation, and drew presents to them that made up their sufferings abundantly. They began some particular methods of getting their people to meet privately with them: and in these meetings they gave great vent to extemporary prayer, which was looked on as a sort of inspiration: and by these means they grew very popular. They were very factious and insolent; and both in their sermons and prayers were always mixing severe reflections on their enemies. Some of them boldly gave out very many predictions; particularly two of them who were held 25 prophets, Davison and Bruce[38]. Some of the things that they foretold came to pass: but my father, who knew them both, told me of many of their predictions that he himself heard them throw out, which had no effect: but all these were forgot, and if some more probable guessings which they delivered as prophecies were accomplished, these were much magnified. They were very spiteful against all those who differed from them; and were wanting in no methods that could procure them either good usage or good presents. Of this my father had great occasion to see many instances: for my great grandmother, 9 who was a very rich woman, and much engaged to them, was most obsequiously courted by them. Bruce lived concealed in her house for some years: and they all found such advantages in their submissions to her, that she was counted for many years the chief support of the party: her name was Rachel Arnot. She was daughter to sir John Arnot, a man in great favour, and lord treasurer depute. Her husband Johnston was the greatest merchant at that time; and left her an estate of 2000l. a year, to be disposed of among his children as she pleased: and my father marrying her eldest grandchild saw a great way into all the methods of the puritans.
Cowrie's conspiracy was by them charged on the king, as a contrivance of his to get rid of that earl, who was then held in great esteem: but my father, who had taken great pains to inquire into all the particulars of that matter, did always believe it was a real conspiracy[39]. One thing, 26 which none of the historians have taken any notice of, might have induced the earl of Gowrie to put king James out of the way, but in such a disguised manner that he should seem rather to have escaped out of a snare than to have laid one for the king. Upon the king's death he stood next to the succession to the crown of England[40]; for king Henry the seventh's daughter that was married to king James the fourth did after his death marry Douglas earl of Angus: but they could not agree: so a precontract was proved against him, upon which, by a sentence from Rome, the marriage was voided, with a clause in favour of the issue, since born under a marriage de facto and bona fide. Lady Margaret Douglas was the child so provided for. I did peruse the original bull confirming the divorce. After that, the queen dowager married one Francis Stewart, and had by him a son made lord Methven by king James the fifth. In the patent he is called frater noster uterinus. He had only a daughter, who was mother or grandmother to this earl of Gowrie: so that by this he might be glad to put the king out of the way, that so he might stand next to the succession of the crown of England. He had a brother then a child, who when he grew up and found he could not carry the name of Ruthven, which by an act of parliament made after this conspiracy none might carry, he went and lived beyond sea; and it was given out that he had the philosopher's stone. He had two sons, who died without issue; and one daughter, married to 27 sir Anthony Vandyke the famous picture drawer[41], who according to this pedigree stood very near the succession of the crown. It was not easy to persuade the nation of the truth of that conspiracy: for eight years before that time king James, on a secret jealousy of the earl of Murray, then esteemed the handsomest man of Scotland, set on the marquis of Huntly, who was his mortal enemy, to murder him; and by a writing[42], all in his own hand, he promised to save him harmless for it. He set the house in which he was on fire: and the earl flying away was followed and murdered, and Huntly sent Gordon of Buckey with the news to the king. All who were concerned in that vile fact were pardoned, which laid the king open to much censure. And this made the matter of Gowrie to be the less believed.
When king Charles succeeded to the crown, he was at first thought favourable to the puritans; for his tutor and all his court were of that way[1]: and Dr. Preston, then 28 the head of the party, came up in the coach from Theobald's to London with the king and the duke of Buckingham; which being against the rules of the court gave great offence: but it was said, the king was so overcharged with grief that he wanted the comfort of so wise and so great a man. It was also given out that the duke of Buckingham offered Preston the great seal: but he was wiser than to accept of it[2]. I will go no further into the beginning of that reign with relation to English affairs, which are fully opened by others; only I will tell one particular which I had from the earl of Lothian[3], who was bred up in this court, and whose father, the earl of Ancram, was gentleman of the bedchamber, though he himself was ever much hated by the king. He told me, that king Charles was much offended with king James's light and familiar way, which was the effect of hunting and drinking, on which occasions he was very apt to forget his dignity, and to break out into great indecencies: on the other hand the solemn gravity of the court of Spain was more suited to his own temper, which was sullen even to a moroseness 29 This led him to a grave reserved deportment, in which he forgot the civilities and the affability that the nation naturally loved, and to which they had been long accustomed: nor did he in his outward deportment take 10 any pains to oblige any persons whatsoever: so far from that, he had such an ungracious way of shewing favour that the manner of bestowing it was almost as mortifying as the favour was obliging. I turn now to the affairs of Scotland, which are but little known[4].
The king resolved to carry on the two designs that his father had set on foot, but had let the prosecution of them fall in the last years of his reign. The first of these was about the recovery of the tithes and church lands. He resolved to prosecute his father's revocation, and to void all the grants made in his minority[5]; and to create titular abbots as lords of parliament, but lords as bishops only for life . And that the two great families of Hamilton and Lennox might be good examples to the rest of the nation, he, by a secret purchase and with English money, bought the abbey of Aberbroth of the former, and the lordship of Glasgow of the latter, and gave these to the two archbishoprics. These lords made a shew of zeal after a good bargain, and surrendered them to the king[6]. He also 30 purchased several estates of less value to the several sees; and all men who pretended to favour at court offered their church lands to sale at low rates.
In the third year of his reign the earl of Nithisdale[7], then believed a papist, which he afterwards professed, having married a niece of the duke of Buckingham's, was sent down with a power to take the surrenders of all church lands, and to assure all who did readily surrender that the king would take it kindly, and use them all very well, but that he would proceed with all rigour against those who would not submit their rights to his disposal. Upon his coming down, those who were most concerned in those grants met at Edinburgh, and agreed that when they were called together, if no other argument did prevail to make the earl of Nithisdale desist, they would fall upon him and all his party in the old Scotch manner, and knock them on the head. Primrose[8] told me one of these lords, Belhaven, of the name of Douglas, who was blind, bid them set him by one of the party, and he should make sure of one[9]. So 31 he was set next the earl of Dumfries: he was all the while holding him fast: and when the other asked him what he meant by that, he said, ever since the blindness was come on him he was in such fear of falling, that he could not help the holding fast to those who were next him: he had all the while a poinard in his other hand, with which he had certainly stabbed Dumfries, if any disorder had happened. The appearance at that time was so great, and so much heat was raised upon it, that the earl of Nithisdale would not open all his instructions, but came back to court, looking on the service as desperate. So a stop was put to it for some time. In the year 1633 the king came down in person to be crowned. In some conventions of the states that had been held before that, all the money that the king had asked was given; and some petitions were offered setting forth grievances, which those whom the king employed had assured them should be redressed: but nothing was done, and all was put off till the king should come down in person. His entry and coronation were managed with such magnificence, that the country suffered much by it: all was entertainment and shew[10]. When the parliament sat, the lords of the articles[11] prepared an act declaring the royal prerogative as it had been asserted by law in the year 1606; to which an addition was made of another act passed in the year 1609, by which king James was impowered to prescribe apparel to churchmen with their own consent. This was a personal thing to king James, in consideration of his great learning and experience, of which he had made no use during the rest of his reign. And in the year 1617, when he held a parliament there in person, an act was 32 prepared by the lords of the articles, authorizing all things that should thereafter be determined in ecclesiastical affairs by his majesty, with consent of a competent number of the clergy, to have the strength and power of a law. But the king either apprehended that great opposition would be made to the passing the act, or that great trouble would follow on the execution of it: so when the rubric of the act was read, he ordered it to be suppressed, though passed in the articles. In this act of 1633 these acts of 1606 and 1609 were drawn into one. To this great opposition was made by the earl of Rothes, who desired the acts might be divided: but the king said it was now one act, and he must either vote for it or against it. He said he was for the prerogative as much as any man, but that addition was contrary to the liberties of the church, and he thought no determination ought to be made in such matters without the consent of the clergy, at least without their being heard. The king bid him argue no more, but give his vote: so he voted not content. Some few lords offered to argue: but the king stopped them[12], and commanded them to vote. Almost the whole commons voted in the negative: so that the act was indeed rejected by the majority: which the 11 king knew, for he had called for a list of the numbers, and with his own pen had marked every man's vote: yet the clerk of register, who gathers and declares the votes, said it was carried in the affirmative. Rothes affirmed it went for the negative: so the king said, the clerk of register's declaration must be held good, unless Rothes would go to the bar, and accuse him of falsifying the record of parliament, which was capital: and in that case, if he should fail in the proof, he was liable to the same punishment. But the earl of Rothes would not venture on that. Thus the act was published, though in truth it was rejected. 33 The king expressed a high displeasure at all who had concurred in that opposition. Upon that the lords had many meetings: they reckoned that now all their liberties were gone, and a parliament was but a piece of pageantry, if the clerk of register might declare as he pleased how the vote went, and that no scrutiny were allowed. Upon that, Haig[13], the king's solicitor, a zealous man of that party, drew a petition to be signed by the lords, and to be offered by them to the king, setting forth all their grievances, and praying redress: he shewed this to some of them, and among others to the lord Balmerino[14], who liked the main of it, but was for altering it in some particulars: he spoke of it to Rothes in the presence of the earl of Cassillis and some others: none of them approved of it. Rothes carried it to the king; and told him, that there was a design to offer a petition in order to the explaining and justifying their proceedings, and that he had a copy to shew him : but the king would not look upon it, and ordered him to put a stop to it, for he would receive no such petition. Rothes told this to Balmerino: so the thing was laid aside: only he kept a copy of it, and interlined it in some places with his own hand. While the king was in Scotland he erected a new bishopric at Edinburgh, and made one Forbes bishop, who was a very learned and pious man: he had a strange faculty of preaching five or six hours at a time: his way of life and devotion was thought monastic, and his learning lay in antiquity: he studied to be a reconciler between papist and protestant, leaning rather to the first, as appears by his Considerationes modestæ: he was a very simple man, and knew little of the world: so he fell into several errors in conduct, but died soon after suspected 34 of popery[15], which suspicion was increased by his son's turning papist. The king left Scotland much discontented, but resolved to prosecute the design of recovering the church lands: and sir Thomas Hope, a subtle lawyer, who was believed to understand that matter beyond all the men of his profession, though in all respects he was a zealous puritan, was made king's advocate, upon his undertaking to bring all the church lands back to the crown[16]: yet he proceeded in that matter so slowly that it was believed he acted in concert with the party that opposed it. Enough was already a done to alarm all that were possessed of the church lands: and they, to engage the whole country in their quarrel, took care to infuse it into all people, but chiefly into the preachers, that all was done to make way for popery. The winter after the king was in Scotland, Balmerino was thinking how to make the petition more acceptable: and in order to that he shewed it to one Dunmoor, a lawyer in whom he trusted and desired his opinion of it, and suffered him to carry it home with him, but charged him to shew it to no person, and to take no copy of it: yet he took a copy of it, and shewed it under a promise of secrecy to one Hay of Naughton, and told him from whom he had it. Hay looking on the paper, and 35 seeing it a matter of some consequence, carried it to Spottiswoode, archbishop of St. Andrews; who, apprehending it was going about for hands, was alarmed at it, and went immediately to London, beginning his journey, as he often a did, on a Sunday, which was a very odious thing in that country. There are laws in Scotland very loosely worded, that make it capital to spread lies of the king or his government, or to alienate his subjects from him[17]. It was also made capital to know of any that do it, and not discover them: but this last was never once put in execution. The petition was thought within this act: so an order was sent down for committing Balmerino, the reason of it being for some time kept secret; so it was thought done because of his vote in parliament. But after some consultation, a special commission was sent down for his trial. In Scotland there is a court for the trial of peers distinct from the jury, who are to be fifteen, and the majority determine the verdict, the fact being only 12 referred to the jury or assize, as they call it, and the law is judged by the court: and if the majority of the jury are peers, the rest may be gentlemen. At this time a private gentleman of the name of Stewart was become so considerable that he was raised by several degrees to be made earl of Traquair and lord treasurer, and was in high favour[18]; but suffered afterwards such a reverse of fortune that I saw him so low that he wanted bread, and was forced to beg, and it was believed he died of hunger. He was a man of great parts, but of too much craft: he was thought the capablest man for business, and the best speaker in that kingdom. So he was 36 charged with the care of the lord a Balmerino's trial: but when the ground of the prosecution was known, Haig, who drew the petition, writ a letter to the lord Balmerino, in which he owned that he drew the petition without any direction or assistance from him: and upon that he went over to Holland. The court was created by a special commission: in the naming of judges there appeared too visibly a design to have that lord's life, for they were either very weak or very poor[19]. Much pains was taken to have a jury; in which so great partiality appeared that when the lord Balmerino was upon his challenges, and excepted to the earl of Dumfries for his having said, that if he were of his jury though he were as innocent as St. Paul he would find him guilty, some of the judges said that was only a rash word: yet the king's advocate allowed the challenge if proved, which could not be done. The next called on was the earl of Lauderdale, father to the duke of that title: with him the lord Balmerino had been long in enmity: yet instead of challenging him, he said he was omni exceptione major. It was long considered upon what the prisoner should be tried: for his hand interlining the paper, which did plainly soften it, was not thought evidence that he drew it, or that he was accessory to it: and they had no other proof against him: nor could they from that infer that he was the divulger, since it appeared it was only shewed by him to a lawyer for counsel. So it was settled on to insist only on this, that the paper tended to alienate the subjects from their duty to the king, and that he, knowing who was the author of it, did not discover him; which by law was capital. The court judged the paper to be seditious, and to be a lie of the king and of his government: the other point was clear, that he knowing the author did not discover him. He 37 pleaded for himself, that the statute for discovery had never been put in execution; that it could never be meant but of matters that were notoriously seditious; that till the court judged so of this, he did not take this paper to be of that nature, but considered it as a paper full of duty, designed to set himself and some others right in the king's opinion; that upon the first sight of it, though he approved of the main yet he disliked some expressions in it; that he communicated the matter to the earl of Rothes, who told the king of the design; and that upon the king's saying he would receive no such petition it was quite laid aside. This was attested by the earl of Rothes. A long debate had been much insisted on, whether the earl of Traquair or the king's ministers might be of the jury or not: but the court gave it in their favour. When the jury was shut up, Gordon of Buckey, who was one of them, being then very ancient, who forty-three years before had assisted in the murder of the earl of Murray, and was thought upon this occasion a sure man, spoke first of all, excusing his presumption in being the first that broke the silence. He desired they would all consider what they were about: it was a matter of blood, and they would feel the weight of that as long as they lived: he had in his youth been drawn in to shed blood, for which he had the king's pardon, but it cost him more to obtain God's pardon: it had given him many sorrowful hours both day and night: and as he spoke this, the tears run over his face[20]. This struck a damp on them all. But the earl of Traquair took up the argument; and said they had it not before them whether the law was a hard law or not, nor had they the nature of the paper before them, which was judged by the court to be leasing-making; they were only to consider whether the prisoner had discovered the contriver of the paper or not. 38 Upon this the earl of a Lauderdale took up the argument against him, and urged that severe laws never executed were looked on as made only to terrify people; that though now, the court having judged the paper to be seditious, after that it would be capital to conceal the author, yet before such judgment the thing could not be thought so evident that he was bound to reveal it. Upon these heads those lords argued the matter many hours: but when it went to the vote, seven acquitted, but eight cast him: so sentence was given. Upon this many meetings were held: and it was resolved either to force the prison and to set him at liberty, or, if that failed, to revenge his death both on the court and on the eight jurors; some undertaking to kill them, and others to burn their houses. When 13 the earl of Traquair understood this, he went to court, and told the king that the lord Balmerino's life was now in his hands, but the execution was in no sort advisable: so he procured his pardon, with which he was often reproached for his ingratitude: but he thought he had been so much wronged in the prosecution, and so little regarded in the pardon, that he never looked on himself as under any obligation on that account[21]. My father knew the whole steps of this matter, having been the earl of Lauderdale's most particular friend: he often told me that the ruin of the king's affairs in Scotland was in a great measure owing to that prosecution; and he carefully preserved the petition itself, and the papers relating to the trial, of which I never saw any copy besides that which I have. And that raised in me a desire of seeing the whole record, which was copied out for me, and is now in my hands. It is a little volume, and contains, according to the Scotch method, the whole abstract 39 of all the pleadings and all the evidence that was given; and is indeed a very noble piece, full of curious matter.
While the design of recovering the tithes went on, though but slowly, another design made a greater progress. The bishops of Scotland fell on the framing a liturgy and a body of canons for the worship and government of that church[22]. These were never examined in any public assembly of the clergy: all was managed by three or four aspiring bishops, Maxwell, Sydserfe, Whitford, and Banantyne, the bishops of Ross, Galloway, Dumblane, and Aberdeen[23]. Maxwell did also accuse the earl of Traquair, as cold in the king's service, and as managing the treasury deceitfully; and he was aspiring to that office. Spottiswoode, archbishop of St. Andrews, being then lord chancellor, was a prudent and mild man, but of no great decency in his course of life; for he was a frequent player at cards, and used to eat often in taverns[24]: besides that, all his livings were scandalously exposed to sale by his servants. The earl of 40 Traquair, seeing himself so pushed at, was more earnest than the bishops themselves in promoting the new models of worship and discipline; and by that he recovered the ground he had lost with the king, and with archbishop Laud. He also assisted the bishops in obtaining commissions, subaltern to the high commission court, in their several dioceses, which were thought little different from the courts of inquisition. Sydserfe set this up in Galloway: and a complaint being made in council of his proceedings, he gave the earl of Argyll the lie in full council. He was after all a very learned and good man. but strangely heated in those matters. And they all were so lifted up with the king's zeal, and so encouraged by archbishop Laud, that they lost all temper[25]; of which I knew Sydserfe make great acknowledgments in his old age.
The most unaccountable part of the king's proceedings was, that all this while, when he was endeavouring to recover so great a part of the property of Scotland as the church lands and tithes were from men that were not like to part with them willingly, and was going to change the whole constitution of that church and kingdom, he raised no force to maintain what he was about to do, but trusted the whole management to the civil execution. By this means all people saw the weakness of the government, at the same time that they complained of its rigour. All that came down from court complained of the king's inexorable stiffness, and of the progress popery was making, of the queen's power with the king, of the favour shewed the pope's nuntios, and of the many proselytes who were daily falling off to the church of Rome. Traquair infused this more effectually, though more covertly, than any other man could do: and when the country formed the first opposition they made to the king's proclamations, and 41 protested against them, he drew the first protestation, as Primrose assured me[26]; though he designed no more than to put a stop to the credit the bishops had, and to the fury of their proceedings: but the matter went much further than he seemed to intend: and he himself was fatally caught in the snare he laid for others. A troop of horse and a regiment of foot had prevented all that followed, or, rather, had by all appearance established an arbitrary government in that kingdom[27]: but, to speak in the language of a great man, those who conducted matters at that time had as little of the prudence of the serpent as of the innocence of the dove: and, as my father often told me, he and many others, who adhered in the sequel firmly to the king's interest, were then much troubled at the whole conduct of affairs, as being neither wise, legal, nor just. I will go no further in opening the beginnings of the troubles of Scotland: of these a full account will be found in the memoirs of the dukes of Hamilton[28]: of which I will take the boldness to set down the character which sir Robert Moray[29], who had a great share in the affairs of that time, and knew the whole secret of them, gave, after he read it in manuscript, that he did not think there was a truer history writ since the apostles' days[30]. The violence with which that kingdom did almost unanimously engage against the administration, may easily convince one that the provocation must 14 have been very great, to draw in such an entire and vehement concurrence against it[31]. 42 After the first pacification, upon the new disputes that arose, when the earls of a Loudoun and Dunfermline[32] were sent up with the petition from the Covenanters, the lord Savile came to them, and informed them of many particulars, by which they saw the king was highly irritated against them: he took great pains to persuade them to come with their army into England. They very unwillingly hearkened to that proposition, and looked on it as a design from the court to ensnare them by making the Scots invade England, by which this nation might have been provoked to assist the king to conquer Scotland. It is true, he hated the earl of Strafford so much, that they saw no cause to suspect him[33]: so they entered into a treaty with him about it. The lord Savile assured them, he spake to them in the name of the most considerable men in England: and he shewed them an engagement under their hands to join with them, if they would come into England, and refuse any treaty but what should be confirmed by a parliament of England. They desired leave to send this paper to Scotland; to which, after much seeming difficulty, he consented: so a cane was hollowed, and this was put within it; and one Frost, afterwards secretary to the committee of both kingdoms, was sent down with it as a poor traveller. It was to be communicated only to three persons, the earls of Rothes and Argyll and to Warriston, the three chief confidents of the covenanters. The earl of Rothes was 43 a man of pleasure, but of a most obliging temper: his affairs were low. Spottiswoode had once made the bargain between the king and him before the troubles, but the earl of Traquair broke it, seeing he was to be raised above himself. The earl of Rothes had all the arts of making himself popular; only there was too much levity in his temper, and too much liberty in his course of life. The earl of Argyll was a more solemn sort of a man, grave and sober, free of all scandalous vices[34], of an invincible calmness of temper, and a pretender to high degrees of piety: but he was a deep dissembler, and great oppressor in all his private dealings, and he was noted for a defect in his courage on all occasions where danger met him. This had one of its usual effects on him, for he was cruel in cold blood: he was much set on raising his own family to be a sort of king in the Highlands.
Warriston was my own uncle[35]: but I will not be more tender in giving his character, for all that nearness in blood. He was a man of great application, could seldom sleep above three hours in the twenty-four. He had studied the law carefully, and had a great quickness of thought, with an extraordinary memory. He went into very high notions of lengthened devotions, in which he continued many hours a day. He would often pray in his family two hours at a time, and had an unexhausted copiousness that way. He was a deep enthusiast, for what thought soever struck his fancy during those effusions, he looked on it as an answer of prayer, and was wholly determined by it. He looked on the Covenant as the setting of Christ on his throne, and so was out of measure zealous in it; and he had an unrelenting severity of temper against all that opposed it. He had no regard to the raising himself 44 or his family, though he had thirteen children: but presbytery was to him more than all the world. He had a readiness and vehemence of speaking, that made him very considerable in public assemblies; but he had no clear nor settled judgment, yet that was supplied by. And he had a fruitful invention, so that he was at all times furnished with expedients. And though he was a very honest man in his private dealings, yet he could make great stretches, when the cause seemed to require it. To these three only this paper was to be shewed upon an oath of secrecy[36]: and it was to be deposited in Warriston's hands. They were only allowed to publish to the nation that they were sure of a very great and unexpected assistance, which, though it was then to be kept secret, would appear in due time. This they published: and it was looked on as an artifice to draw in the nation: but it was afterwards found to be a cheat indeed, but a cheat of Savile's, who had forged all these subscriptions. 45
The Scots marched with a very sorry equipage[37]: every soldier carried a week's provision of oatmeal; and they had a drove of cattle with them for their food. They had also an invention of guns of white iron, tinned and done about with leather, and corded: so that they could serve for two or three discharges. These were light, and were carried on horses: and when they came to Newburn, the English army that defended the ford was surprised with a discharge of artillery: some thought it magic, and all 15 were put in such disorder, that the whole army did run with so great precipitation, that sir Thomas Fairfax, who had a command in it, did not stick to own that till he passed the Tees his legs trembled under him[38]. This struck many of the enthusiasts of the king's side as much as it exalted the Scots; who were next day possessed of Newcastle, and so were masters, not only of Northumberland and the bishopric of Durham, but of the coaleries; by which, if they had not been in a good understanding with the city of London, they could have distressed them extremely: but all the use the city made of this was, to raise a great outcry, and to complain of the war, since it was now in the power of the Scots to starve them. Upon that, petitions were sent from the city and from some counties, to the king, praying a treaty with the Scots. The lord Wharton and the lord Howard of Escrick undertook to deliver some of these; which they did, and were clapt up upon it[39]. A council 46 of war was held; and it was resolved on, as the lord Wharton told me, to shoot them at the head of the army, as movers of sedition. This was chiefly pressed by the earl of Strafford. Duke Hamilton spoke nothing till the council rose; and then he asked Strafford, if he was sure of the army, who seemed surprised at the question: but he upon inquiry understood that very probably a general mutiny, if not a total revolt, would have followed, if any such execution had been attempted. This success of the Scots ruined the king's affairs. And by it the necessity of the union of the two kingdoms may appear very evident: for nothing but a superior army able to beat the Scots can hinder their doing this at any time: and the seizing the coaleries must immediately bring the city of London into great distress. Two armies were now in the north as a load on the king, besides all the other grievances. The lord Savile's forgery came to be discovered. The king knew it; and yet he was brought afterwards to trust him, and to advance him to be earl of Sussex. The king pressed my uncle to deliver him the letter, who excused himself upon his oath; and not knowing what use might be made of it, he cut out every subscription, and sent it to the person for whom it was forged. The imitation was so exact, that every man, as soon as he saw his hand simply by itself, acknowledged that he could not have denied it. so The king was now in great straits: he had laid up seven hundred thousand pounds before the troubles in Scotland began; and yet had raised no guards nor force in England, but trusted a very illegal administration to a legal execution. His treasure was now exhausted; his subjects were highly irritated; the ministry were all frighted, being exposed to the anger and justice of the parliament: so 47 that he had brought himself into great distress, but had not the dexterity to extricate himself out of it. He loved high and rough methods, but had neither the skill to conduct them, nor the height of genius necessary to manage them. He hated all that offered prudent and moderate counsels: he thought it flowed from a meanness of spirit, and a care to preserve themselves by sacrificing his authority, or from republican principles: and even when he saw it was necessary to follow such advices, yet he hated those that gave them. His heart was wholly turned to the gaining the two armies. In order to that, he gained Rothes entirely[40], who hoped by the king's mediation to have married the countess of Devonshire, a rich and magnificent lady, that lived long in the greatest state of any in that age. He also gained the earl of Montrose, who was a young man well learned, who had travelled, but had taken upon him the port of a hero too much, and lived as in a romance; for his whole manner was stately to affectation. When he was beyond seas, he travelled with the earl of Denbigh, and they consulted all the astrologers they could hear of[41]. I plainly saw the earl of Denbigh relied on what had then been told him, to his dying day; and the rather because the earl of Montrose was promised a glorious fortune for some time, but all was to be overthrown in conclusion. When the earl of Montrose returned from his travels, he was not considered by the king as he thought he deserved: so he studied to render himself popular in Scotland; and being vain and forward, he was the first and fiercest man in the opposition they made during the first war. He both advised and drew the letter to the king of France, for which the lord Loudoun, who signed it, was imprisoned in the tower of London[42]. But the earl of 48 Lauderdale, as he himself told me, when it came to his turn to sign that letter, found false French in it; for instead of rayon de soleil, he had writ raye de soleil, which in French signifies a sort of fish; and so the matter went no further at that time; and the treaty came on so soon after that it was never again taken up. The earl of Montrose was gained by the king at Berwick, and undertook to do great services: he made the king fancy, that he could turn the whole kingdom: yet indeed he could do nothing. He was again trying to make a new party: and he kept a correspondence with the king when he lay at Newcastle; 16 and was pretending he had a great interest among the covenanters, whereas he had none at all at that time. All these little plottings came to be either known or at least suspected. The queen was a woman of great vivacity in conversation, and loved all her life long to be in intrigues of all sorts, but was not so secret in them as such times and such affairs required. She was a woman of no manner of judgment: she was bad at contrivance, but much worse in the execution: but by the liveliness of her discourse she made always a great impression on the king: and to her little practices, as well as to the king's own temper, the sequel of all his misfortunes was owing. I know it was a maxim infused into 49 his sons, which I have often heard from king James, that he was undone by his concessions. This is true in some respect: for his passing the act that the parliament should sit during pleasure, was indeed his ruin, which he was drawn to by the queen[43]. But if he had not made great concessions, he had sunk without being able to make a struggle for it[44]; and could not have divided the nation, or engaged so many to have stood by him: since by the concessions that he made, especially that of the triennial parliament, the honest and quiet part of the nation was satisfied, and thought their religion and liberties were secured: so they broke off from those violenter propositions that occasioned the war.
The truth was, the king did not come into those concessions seasonably, nor with a good grace: all appeared to be extorted from him. There were also grounds, whether true or plausible, to make it to be believed that he intended not to stand to them longer than as he lay under that force that visibly drew them from him contrary to his own inclinations. The proofs that appeared of some particulars, that made this seem true, made other things that were only whispered to be more readily believed: for in all critical times there are deceitful people of both sides, that pretend to merit by making discoveries, on condition that no use shall be made of them as witnesses; which is one of the most pestiferous ways of calumny possible. Almost the whole court had been concerned in one illegal grant or another: so these courtiers, to get their faults passed over, were as so many 50 spies upon the king and queen: they told all they heard, and perhaps not without large additions, to the leading men in the house of commons. This inflamed the jealousy, and put them on to the making still new demands. One eminent passage was told me by the lord Holles:
The earl of Strafford had married his sister[45]: so, though in that parliament he was one of the hottest men of the party, yet when that matter was before them he always withdrew. When the bill of attainder was passed, the king sent for him to know what he could do to save the earl of Strafford. Holles answered, that if the king pleased, since the execution of the law was in him, he might legally grant him a reprieve, which must be good in law; but he would not advise it. That which he proposed was. that Strafford should send him a petition for a short respite, to settle his affairs, and to prepare for death; upon which he[46] advised the king to come next day with the petition d in his hand, and lay it before the two houses, with a speech which he drew for the king; and Holles said to him, he would try his interest among his friends to get them to consent to it. He prepared a great many by assuring them, that if they would save lord Strafford, he would become wholly theirs, in consequence of his first principles: and that he might do them much more service by being preserved, than he could do, if made an example of upon such new and doubtful points. In this he had wrought on so many, that he believed if the king's party had struck into it, he might have saved him. It was carried to the queen, as if Holles had engaged that the earl of Strafford would accuse her, and discover all he 51 knew: so the queen not only diverted the king from going to the parliament, changing the speech into a message all writ with the king's own hand, and sent to the house of lords by the prince of Wales: which Holles said, would have perhaps done as well, the king being apt to spoil things by an unacceptable manner: but to the wonder of the whole world, the queen prevailed with him to add that mean postscript, If he must die, it were charity to reprieve him to Saturday: which was a very unhandsome giving up of the whole message[47]. When it was communicated to both houses, the whole court party were plainly against it: and so he fell, truly by the queen's means[48]. 52
The mentioning this makes me add one particular concerning archbishop Laud: when his impeachment was brought to the lords' bar, he, apprehending how it would end, sent over Warner, bishop of Rochester, with the keys of his closet and cabinets, that he might destroy, or put out of the way. all papers that might either hurt himself or any body else. He was at that work for three hours, till, upon 17 Laud's being committed to the black rod, a messenger went over to seal up his closet, who came after all was withdrawn. Among the writings which he took away, it is believed the original Magna Carta[49], passed by king John in the mead near Staines, was one. This was found among his papers by his executor, Dr. Lee: and that descended to his son and executor, colonel Lee, who gave it to me. So it is now in my hands; and it came very fairly to me[50]. For this conveyance of it we have nothing but conjecture.
53I do not intend to prosecute the history of the wars. I have told a great deal relating to them in the Memoirs of the dukes of Hamilton. Rushworth's collections contain many excellent materials: and now the first volume of the earl of Clarendon's history gives a faithful representation of the beginnings of the troubles, though writ in favour of the court, and full of the best excuses that such ill things were capable of. I shall therefore only set out what I had particular reason to know, and that is not to be met with in books.
The kirk was now settled in Scotland with a new mixture of ruling elders, which, though they were taken from the Geneva pattern, to assist, or rather to be a check on, the minister in the managing the parochial discipline, yet these never came to their assemblies till the year 1638, that they thought it necessary to make them first go and carry all the elections of the ministers at the several presbyteries, and next come themselves and sit in the assembly. The nobility and chief gentry offered themselves upon that occasion: and the ministers, since they saw they were like to act in opposition to the king's orders, were glad to have so great a support. But the elders that now came to assist them, beginning to take, as the ministers thought, too much on them, they grew weary 54 of such imperious masters: so they studied to work up the inferior people to much zeal: and as they wrought any up to some measure of heat and knowledge, they brought them into their eldership; and so got a majority of hot zealots who depended on them. One out of these was deputed to attend on the judicatories. They had synods of all the clergy, in one or more counties, who met twice a year: and a general assembly that met once a year: and at parting that body named some, called the Commission of the Kirk, who were to sit in the intervals, to prepare matters for the next assembly, and to look to all the concerns of the church, to give warning of dangers, and to inspect all the proceedings of the state, as far as they related to the matters of religion: by these means they became terrible to all their enemies. In their sermons, and chiefly in their prayers, all that passed in the state was canvassed: men were as good as named, and either recommended or complained of to God as they were acceptable or odious to them. This grew up in time to an insufferable degree of boldness. The way that was given to it, when the king and the bishops were their common themes, made that afterwards the humour could not be restrained when it grew so petulant that the pulpit was a scene of noise and passion. For some years this was managed with great appearances of fervour by men of age and some authority: but when the younger and hotter zealots took it up, it became odious to almost all sorts of people, except some sour enthusiasts, who thought all their impertinence was zeal, and an effect of inspiration; which flowed naturally from the conceit of extemporary prayers being praying by the Spirit[1]. 55
Henderson, a minister of Edinburgh, was by much the wisest and gravest of them all: but as all his performances that I have seen are flat and heavy, so he found it was an easier thing to raise a flame than to quench it. He studied to keep his party to him, yet he found he could not moderate the heat of some fiery spirits: so when he saw he could follow them no more, but that they had got the people out of his hands, he sunk both in body and mind, and died soon after the papers had passed between the king and him at Newcastle[2]. The person next him was Douglas, believed to be descended from the royal family, though the wrong way: for he was, as was said, the bastard of a bastard of queen Mary of Scotland, by a child that she secretly bare to Douglas, who was half brother to the earl of Murray, the regent, and had the keeping of her in the castle of Lochleven trusted to him; from whence he helped to make her escape on that consideration. There was an air of greatness in Douglas, that made all that saw him inclined enough to believe he was of no ordinary descent. He was a reserved man: he had the Scriptures by heart, to the exactness of a Jew; for he was as a concordance: he was too calm and grave for the furious men, 56 but yet he was much depended on for his prudence. I knew him in his old age: and saw plainly he was a slave to his popularity, and durst not own the free thoughts he had of some things for fear of offending the people[3].
I will not run out in giving the characters of the other leading preachers among them, such 18 as Dickson, Blair, Rutherford, Baillie, Cant, and the two Gillespies[4]. They were men all of a sort: affected great sublimities in devotion: they poured themselves out in their prayers with loud voice, and often with many tears. They had but an ordinary proportion of learning among them; something of Hebrew, very little Greek: books of controversy with the Papists, but above all with the Arminians, was the height of their study. A dull way of preaching by doctrine, reason, and use, was that they set up on: and some of them affected a strain of stating cases of conscience, not with relation to moral actions, but to some reflexions on their condition and temper, that was occasioned chiefly by their conceit of praying by the Spirit, which every one could not attain to, or keep up to the same heat in it at all 57 times. The learning they recommended to their young divines was some German systems, some commentators on the Scripture, books of controversy, and practical books. They were so careful to oblige them to make their round in these, that if they had no men of great learning among them, yet none were very ignorant: as if they had thought an equality in learning was necessary to keep up the parity of their government. None could be suffered to preach as expectants, as they called them, but after a trial or two in private before the ministers alone: then two or three sermons were to be preached in public, some more learnedly, some more practically: then a head in divinity was to be commonplaced in Latin., and the person was to maintain theses upon it: he was to be also tried in Greek and Hebrew, and in Scripture chronology. The questionary trial came last; every minister asking such questions as he pleased. When any had passed through all these with approbation, which was done in a course of three or four months, he was allowed to preach when invited, and if he was presented or called to a church, he was to pass through a new set of the same trials[5]. This made that there was a small circle of knowledge in which they were generally well instructed. True morality was little studied or esteemed by them. They were generally proud and passionate, insolent and covetous; yet they took much pains among their people to maintain their authority. They affected all the ways of familiarity that were like to gain on them: even in sacred matters they got into a set of very indecent phrases. 58
They forced all people to sign the covenant[6]: and the greatest part of the episcopal clergy, among whom there were two a bishops, came to them, and renounced their former principles, and desired to be received into their body. At first they received all that offered themselves: but afterwards they repented of this, and the violent men among them were ever pressing the purging the Kirk, as they called it, that is, the ejecting all the episcopal clergy. Then they took up the wicked term of malignants, by which all who differed from them were distinguished: but the strictness of piety and good life, which had gained them so much reputation before the war, began to wear off; and instead of that, a fierceness of temper, and a copiousness of many long sermons, and much longer prayers, came to be the distinction of the party. This they carried even to the saying grace before and after meat sometimes to the length of a whole hour. But as every new war broke out, there was a visible abatement of even the outward shews of piety. Thus the war corrupted both sides. When the war broke out in England, the Scots had a great mind to go into it. The decayed nobility, the military men, and the ministers, were violently set on it. They saw what good quarters they had in the north of England; and they hoped the umpirage of the war would fall into their hands. The division appearing so near an equality in England, they reckoned they should turn the scales, and so be courted of both sides: and they did not doubt to draw great advantages from it, both for the nation in general and 59 themselves in particular. Duke Hamilton was trusted by the king with the management of his affairs in that kingdom[7], and had powers to offer, (but so secretly that if discovered it could not be proved, for fear of disgusting the English), that if they would engage in the king's side he would consent to the uniting Northumberland, Cumberland, and Westmorland, to Scotland[8], and that Newcastle should be the seat of the government; that the prince of Wales should hold his court always among them; that every third year the king should go among them; and every office in the king's household should in the third turn be given to a Scotchman. This I found not among duke Hamilton's papers, but the earl of Lauderdale assured me of it, and that at the Isle of Wight they had all the engagements from the king to make it good upon their success that he could then give[9]. Duke Hamilton quickly saw it was a vain imagination to hope that kingdom could be brought to espouse the king's quarrel; the inclination ran strong the other way: all 19 he hoped to succeed in was to keep them neuter for some time: and this he saw could not hold long: so after he had kept off their engaging 60 with England all the year 1643, he and his friends saw it was in vain to struggle any longer. The course they all resolved on was, that the nobility should fall in heartily with the inclinations of the nation to join with England, that they might procure to themselves and their friends the chief commands in the army: and then when they were in England, and that their army was as a distinct body separated from the rest of the kingdom, it might be much easier to gain them to the king's service than it was at that time to work on the whole nation[10].
This was not a very sincere way of proceeding, but it
was intended for the king's service, and would very probably
have had the effect designed by it if some accidents had
not happened that changed the face of affairs, which are
not rightly understood: and therefore I will open them
61
clearly. The earl of Montrose and a party of high royalists
were for entering into an open breach with the country in
the beginning of the year 1643, but offered no probable
methods of managing it; nor could they reckon themselves
assured of any considerable party[11]. They were full of big
words and bold undertakings: but when they were pressed
to shew what concurrence might be depended on, nothing
was offered but from the Highlanders: and on this wise
men could not rely: so duke Hamilton would not expose
the king's affairs by such a desperate way of proceeding.
Upon this they went to Oxford, and filled all people there
with complaints of the treachery of the Hamiltons; and
they pretended they could have secured Scotland if their
propositions had been entertained. This was but too
suitable to the king's own inclinations, and to the humour
that was then prevailing at Oxford. So when the two
Hamiltons came up, they were not admitted to speak with
the king: and it was believed if the younger brother had
not made his escape that both would have suffered; for
when the queen heard of his escape, she with great commotion
said, Abercorn has missed a dukedom
; for that
earl was a papist, and next to the two brothers[12]. They
could have demonstrated, if heard, that they were sure of
above two parts in three of the officers of the army; and
62
in. did not doubt to have engaged the army into the king's
cause. But the failing in this was not all. The earl, then
made marquis of Montrose, had powers given him such as
he desired, and was sent down with them: but he could do
nothing till the end of the year. A great body of the
Macdonalds, commanded by one Collkitoch [i.e. Colquhitto][13]
came over from Ireland to recover Cantyre, the best country
of all the Highlands, out of which they had been driven by
Argyll's family, who had possessed their country about fifty
years. The head of these was the earl of Antrim[14], who
had married the duke of Buckingham's widow: and being
a papist, and having a great command in Ulster, was much
relied on by the queen. He was the main person in the
first rebellion, and was the most engaged in the bloodshed
of any in the north: yet he continued to correspond with
the queen to the great prejudice of the king's affairs[15].
When the marquis of Montrose heard they were in Argyllshire,
he went to them, and told them, if they would let
him lead them he would carry them into the heart of the
kingdom, and procure them better quarters and good pay:
so he led them down into Perthshire. The Scots had at
that time an army in England, and another in Ireland: yet
they did not think it necessary to call home any part of
either; but, despising the Irish and the Highlanders, they
raised a tumultuary army, and put it under the command
of some lords noted for want of courage[16], and of others who
63
wished well to the other side. The marquis of Montrose's
men were desperate, and met with a feeble resistance: so
that small body of the covenanters' army was routed[17].
And
here Montrose got horses and ammunition, having but three
horses before, and powder only for one charge. Then he
became considerable: and he marched through the northern
parts by Aberdeen. The marquis of Huntly was in the
king's interests; but he would not join with him, though
his sons did[18]. Astrology ruined him: he believed the stars,
and they deceived him[19]: he said often, that neither
the king, nor the Hamiltons, nor Montrose would prosper:
he believed he should outlive them all, and escape at last;
as it happened in conclusion as to his outliving the others.
He was naturally a gallant man: but the stars had so
subdued him, that he made a poor figure during the whole
course of the wars[20].
64
The marquis of Montrose's success was very mischievous, and proved the ruin of the king's affairs: on which I should not have depended entirely if I had had this only from the earl of Lauderdale[21], who was indeed my first author, but it was fully confirmed by the lord Holles[22], who had gone in with great heat into the beginnings of the war: but he soon saw the ill consequences it already had, and the worse that were like to grow with the progress of the war. He had in the beginning of the year 43, when he was sent to Oxford with the propositions, taken great pains on all about the king to convince them of the necessity of their yielding in time, since the longer they stood out the conditions would be harder: and when he was sent by the parliament, in the end of the year 44, with other propositions, he and Whitelocke entered into secret conferences with the king, of which some account is given by Whitelocke in his Memoirs[23]. They, with other commissioners that were sent to Oxford, possessed the king, and all that were in great credit with him, with this, that it was absolutely necessary the king should put an end to the war by a treaty: a new party of hot men was springing up, that were plainly for changing the government: they were growing much in the army, but were yet far from carrying any thing in the House: 20. they had gained much strength this summer, and they might make a great progress by the accidents that another year might produce: the Scottish army was entirely in the interests of those who wished for a peace. They confessed there were many things hard to be digested, that must be done in order to a peace: they asked things that were 65 unreasonable: but they were forced to consent to those demands, otherwise they would have lost their credit with the city and the people; the absence of the courts and the progress of the war had inflamed the people, who could not be satisfied without a very entire security and a full satisfaction: but the extremity to which matters might be carried otherwise made it necessary to come to a peace on any terms whatsoever, since no terms could be so bad as the continuance of the war: the king must trust them, though they were not at that time disposed to trust him so much as were to be wished. They said farther, that if a peace should follow, it would be a much easier thing to get any hard laws now moved for to be repealed, than it was now to hinder their being insisted on. With these things Holles told me that the king and many of his counsellors, who saw how his affairs declined, and with what difficulty they could hope to continue the war another year, were satisfied. The king more particularly began to feel the insolence of the military men, and of those who were daily reproaching him with their services; so that they were become as uneasy to him as those of Westminster had been formerly. Holles told me he left Oxford not doubting but a peace would have followed. But some came up in the interval from Montrose with such an account of what he had done, of the strength he had, and of his hopes next summer, that the king was by that prevailed on to believe his affairs would mend, and that he might afterwards treat on better terms. This unhappily wrought so far, that the limitations he put on those whom he sent to treat at Uxbridge made the whole design miscarry. That raised the spirits of those that were already but too much exasperated. The marquis of Montrose made a great progress the next year: but he laid no lasting foundation, for he did not make himself master of the strong places or passes of the kingdom. After his last and greatest victory at Kilsyth, he 66 was lifted up out of measure. The Macdonalds were every where fierce masters and ravenous plunderers: and the other Highlanders, who did not such military execution, yet were good at robbing: and when they had got as much as they could carry home on their backs, they deserted. The Macdonalds also left him to go and execute their revenge on Argyll's country. Montrose thought he was now master, but had no scheme how to fix his conquests: he wasted the estates of his enemies, chiefly the Hamiltons[24]; and went towards the borders of England, though he had but a small force left about him: but he thought his name carried terror with it. So he writ to the king, that he had gone over the land from Dan to Beersheba: he prayed the king to come down in these words, Come thou, and take the city, lest I take it, and it be called by my name. This letter was writ, but never sent; for he was routed, and his papers taken, before he had despatched the courier[25]. [In his defeat, he took too much care of himself; for he was never willing to expose himself much.] When his papers were taken, many letters of the king, and of others at Oxford, to him were found, as the earl of Crawford, one appointed to read them, told me; which increased the disgust: but these were not published. Upon this occasion the marquis of Argyll and the preachers shewed a very bloody temper; many prisoners that had quarters given them were murdered in cold blood[26]: and as they sent them to some towns that 67 had been ill used by Montrose's army, the people in revenge fell on them, and knocked them in the head. Several persons of quality were condemned for being with him: and these were proceeded against both with severity and with many indignities. The preachers thundered in their pulpits against all that did the work of the Lord deceitfully, and cried out against all that were for moderate proceedings, as guilty of the blood that had been shed. Thine eye shall not pity, and thou shalt not spare, were often inculcated; and after every execution they triumphed with so little decency, that it gave all people very ill impressions of them. But this was not the worst effect of Montrose's expedition. It lost the opportunity at Uxbridge: it alienated the Scots much from the king: it exalted all that were enemies to peace. For now they seemed to have some colour for all those aspersions they had cast on the king, as if he had been in a correspondence with the Irish rebels, when the worst tribe of them was thus employed by him[27]. His affairs declined totally in England that summer, and Holles said to me. all was owing to Montrose's unhappy successes.
Upon this occasion I will relate somewhat concerning Antrim[28]. I had in my hand several of his letters to the king in the year 1646, writ in a very confident style: for he was a very arrogant, as well as a very weak, man. One was somewhat particular: he in a postscript desired the king to send the inclosed to the good woman, without making any excuse for the presumption; by which, as follows in the postscript, he meant his wife, the duchess of Buckingham. This made me more easy to believe a story 68 that the earl of Essex told me he had from the earl of Northumberland: 21 upon the restoration, in the year 1660, Antrim was thought guilty of so much bloodshed, that it was taken for granted he could not be included in the indemnity that was to pass in Ireland. Upon this he seeing the duke of Ormond set against him, came over to London, and was lodged at Somerset House: and it was believed that, having no children, he settled his estate on Jermyn, then earl of St. Albans: but before he came over, he had made a prior settlement in favour of his brother[29]. He petitioned the king to order a committee of council to examine the warrants that he had acted upon. The earl of Clarendon was for rejecting the petition, as containing a high indignity to the memory of king Charles the first: and said plainly at council table, that if any person had pretended to affirm such a thing while they were at Oxford, he would either have been very severely punished for it, or the king would soon have had a very thin court. But it seemed just to see what he had to say for himself: so a committee was named, of which the earl of Northumberland was the chief. He produced to them some of the king's letters: but they did not come to a full proof. In one of them the king wrote that he had not then leisure, but referred himself to the queen's letter; and said, that was all one as if he writ himself. Upon this foundation he produced a series of letters writ by himself to the queen, in which he gave her an account of every one of the particulars that were laid to his charge, and shewed the grounds he went on, and desired her directions; and to every one of these he had answers ordering him to do as he did. This 69 the queen-mother espoused with great zeal, and said she was bound in honour to save him. I saw a great deal of that management, for I was then at court[30]. But it was generally believed, that this train of letters was made up at that time in a collusion between the queen and him. So a report was prepared to be signed by the committee, setting forth that he had so fully justified himself in every thing that had been objected to him, that he ought not to be excepted out of the indemnity. This was brought first to the earl of Northumberland to be signed by him: but he refused it, and said he was sorry he had produced such warrants, but he did not think they could serve his turn; for he did not believe any warrant from the king or queen could justify so much bloodshed in so many black instances as were laid against him. Upon his refusal, the rest of the committee did not think fit to sign the report: so it was let fall: and the king was prevailed on to write to the duke of Ormond, telling him that he had so vindicated himself, that he must endeavour to get him included in the indemnity. That was done; and was no small reproach to the king, that did thus sacrifice his father's honour to his mother's importunity. Upon this the earl of Essex told me, he had taken all the pains he could to inquire into the original of the Irish massacre, but could never see any reason to believe the king had any accession to it[31]. He did indeed believe that the queen hearkened to propositions made by the Irish, who undertook to take the government of Ireland into their hands, which they thought they could easily perform: and then, they said, they would assist the king to 70 subdue the hot spirits at Westminster. With this the plot of the insurrection began: and all the Irish believed the queen encouraged it. But in the first design there was no thought of a massacre: that came in head as they were laying the methods of executing it, which, as they were managed by the priests, so they were the chief men that set on the Irish to all the blood and cruelty that followed.
I know nothing particular of the sequel of the war, nor of all the confusions that happened till the murder of king Charles the first: only one passage I had from lieutenant general Drummond, afterwards lord Strathallan[32]. He served on the king's side, but had many friends among those who were for the covenant: so, the king's affairs being now ruined, he was recommended to Cromwell, being then in a treaty with the Spanish ambassador, who was negociating for some regiments to be levied and sent over from Scotland to Flanders. He happened to be with Cromwell when the commissioners, sent from Scotland to protest against the putting the king to death, came to argue the matter with him. Cromwell bade Drummond stay and hear their conference, which he did. They began in a heavy languid way to lay indeed great load on the king: but they still insisted on that clause in the covenant, by which they swore they would be faithful in the preservation of his Majesty's person: and with this they shewed upon what terms Scotland, as well as the two Houses, had engaged in the war, and what solemn declarations of their zeal and duty to the king they all along published; which would now appear, to the scandal and reproach of the Christian name, to have been false pretences, if when the king was in their power they should proceed to extremities. Upon this, Cromwell entered into a long 71 discourse of the nature of the regal power, according to the principles of Mariana and Buchanan[33]: he thought a breach of trust in a king ought to be punished more than any other crime whatsoever. He said, as to their covenant, they 22 swore to the preservation of the king's person in the defence of the true religion: if then it appeared that the settlement of the true religion was obstructed only by the king, so that they could not come at it but by putting him out of the way, then their oath could not bind them to the preserving him any longer. He said also, their covenant did bind them to bring all malignants, incendiaries, and enemies to the cause, to condign punishment: and was not this to be executed impartially? What were all those on whom public justice had been done, especially those who suffered for joining with Montrose, but small offenders acting by commission from the king, who was therefore the principal, and so the most guilty? Drummond said Cromwell had plainly the better of them at their own weapon, and upon their own principles[34]. At this time presbytery was in its height in Scotland. 72
In summer 1648, when the parliament declared they would engage to rescue the king from his imprisonment, and the parliament of England from the force it was put under by the army, the nobility went into the design, all except six or eight. b The king had signed an engagement to make good his offers to the nation of the northern counties, with the other conditions formerly mentioned: and particular favours were promised to every one that concurred in it[35]. The marquis of Argyll gave it out that the Hamiltons, let them pretend what they would, had no sincere intentions to their cause, but had engaged to serve the king on his own terms: he filled the preachers with such jealousies of this, that though all the demands that they made for the security of their cause, and in declaring the grounds of the war, were complied with, yet they could not be satisfied, but still said the Hamiltons were in a confederacy with the malignants in England, and did not intend to stand to what was then promised. The general assembly declared against it, as an unlawful confederacy with the .enemies of God; and called it the unlawful Engagement, which came to be the name commonly given to it in all their pulpits. They every where preached against it, and opposed the levies all they could, by solemn denunciations of the wrath and curse of God on all concerned in them. This was a strange piece of opposition to the state, little inferior to what was pretended or put in practice by the church of Rome.
The south-west counties of Scotland have seldom corn enough to serve them round the year: and the northern parts producing more than they need, these of the west usually came in the summer to buy at Leith the stores that come from the north: and from a word whiggam, used in driving their horses, all that drove was called the whiggamors, and 73 shorter the whiggs[36]. Now in that year, after the news came down of duke Hamilton's defeat, the ministers animated their people to rise, and march to Edinburgh: and they came up marching on the head of the parishes, with an unheard-of fury, praying and preaching all the way as they came. The marquis of Argyll and his party came and headed them, they being about 6000. And this was called the whiggamors' inroad: and ever after that all that opposed the court came in contempt to be called whiggs: and from Scotland the word was brought into England, where it is now one of our unhappy terms of distinction[37].
The Committee of Estates, with the force that they had in their hands, could easily have dissipated this undisciplined herd; but they, knowing their own weakness, had sent to Cromwell, desiring his assistance. Upon that, the committee saw they could not stand before him: so they came to a treaty, and delivered up the government to this new body; and upon their assuming it, they declared all who had served or assisted towards the Engagement incapable of any employment, till they had first satisfied the kirk of the truth of their repentance, and made public profession of it. All churches were upon that full of mock penitents, some making their acknowledgments all in tears, to gain more credit with the new party. The earl of Loudoun, that was chancellor[38], had entered into solemn promises both to the king and the Hamiltons: but when 74 he came to Scotland, his wife[39], a fierce covenanter, and an heiress by whom he had both honour and estate, threatened him, if he went on that way, with a process of adultery, in which it was believed she could have had very copious proofs: he durst not stand against this, and so compounded the matter by deserting his friends, and turning over to the other side: of which he made public profession in the church of Edinburgh with many tears, confessing his weakness in yielding to the temptation of what had a shew of honour and loyalty, for which he expressed a hearty sorrow. Those that came in early, with great shews of compunction, got easier off: but those who stood out long found it a harder matter to make their peace. Cromwell came down to Scotland, and saw the new model fully settled.
During his absence from the scene, the treaty of the isle of Wight was set on foot by the parliament, that, seeing the army at such a distance, took this occasion of 1648. treating with the king. Sir Harry Vane, and others who were for a change of government, had no mind to treat any more; but both city and country were so desirous of a personal treaty, that it could not be resisted[40]. Vane, Pierpoint, and some others, went to the treaty on purpose to delay matters till the army could be brought up to London. All that wished well to the treaty prayed the king, at their first coming, 23 to dispatch the business with all possible haste, and to grant the first day all that he could bring himself to grant on the last[41]. Holles and Grimston told me, they both on their knees begged this 75 of the king. They said, they knew Vane would study to draw out the treaty to a great length: and he, who declared for an unbounded liberty of conscience, would try to gain on the king s party by the offer of a toleration for the common prayer and the episcopal clergy[42]. His design in that was to gain time, till Cromwell should settle Scotland and the north. But they said, if the king would frankly come in, without the formality of papers backward and forward, and send them back next day with the concessions that were absolutely necessary, they did not doubt but he should in a very few days be brought up with honour, freedom, and safety to the parliament, and that matters should be brought to a present settlement[43]. Titus, who was then much trusted by the king, 76 and employed in a negociation with the presbyterian party, told me that he had spoke often and earnestly to him in the same strain[44]: but the a king could not come to a resolution: and he still fancied that in the struggle between the house of commons and the army, both saw they needed him so much to give them the superior strength, therefore he imagined that by balancing them he would bring both sides into a greater dependence on himself, and force them to better terms. In this Vane flattered the episcopal party, to the king's ruin as well as their own. But they still hated the presbyterians as the first authors of the war; and seemed unwilling to think well of them, or to be beholding to them. Thus the 77 treaty went on with a fatal slowness: and by the time it was come to some maturity, Cromwell came up with his army, and overturned all.
Upon this I will set down what sir Harbottle Grimston told me a few weeks before his death: but whether it was done at this time, or the year before, I cannot tell: I rather believe the latter. When the house of commons and the army were a quarrelling, at a meeting of the officers it was proposed to purge the army better, that they might know whom to depend on[45]. Cromwell upon that said, he was sure of the army; but there was another body that had more need of purging, naming the house of commons, and he thought the army only could do that. Two officers that were present brought an account of this to Grimston, who carried them with him to the lobby of the house of commons, they being resolved to justify it to the house. There was another debate then on foot: but Grimston diverted it, and said he had a matter of privilege of the highest sort to lay before them: it was about the being and freedom of the house itself. So he charged Cromwell with the design of putting a force on the house: he had his witnesses at the door, and desired they might be examined. They were brought to the bar, and justified all that they had said, and gave a full relation of all that had passed at their meetings. When they withdrew, Cromwell fell down on his knees, and made a solemn prayer to God, attesting his innocence, and his zeal for the service of the house: he submitted himself to the providence of God, who it seems thought fit to exercise him with calumny and slander, but he committed his cause to him. This he did with great vehemence, and with many tears. After this strange and bold preamble, he made so long a speech, justifying both himself and the rest of the officers, except a few that seemed inclined to return back to Egypt, that he wearied out the house, and wrought so much on his party, that what the 78 witnesses had said was so little believed, that, had it been moved, Grimston thought that both he and they would have been sent to the Tower[46]. But whether their guilt made them modest, or that they had no mind to have the matter much talked of, they let it fall: and there was no strength in the other side to carry it farther. To complete this scene, as soon as ever Cromwell got out of the house, he resolved to trust himself no more among them; but went to the army, and in a few days he brought them up, and forced a great many from the house[47].
I had much discourse with one who knew Cromwell well, and all that set of men, on this head, and asked him how they could excuse all the prevarications, and other ill things, of which they were visibly guilty in the conduct of their affairs. He told me, they believed there were great occasions in which some men were called to great services, in the doing of which they were excused from the common rules of morality: such were the practices of Ehud and Jael, Samson and David: and by this they fancied they had a privilege from observing the standing rules. It is very obvious how far this principle may be carried, and how all justice and mercy may be laid aside on this pretence by every bold enthusiast. Ludlow, in his Memoirs, justifies this force put on the parliament, as much as he condemns the force that Cromwell and the army afterwards put on the house: and he seems to lay this down for a maxim, that the military power ought always to be subject to the civil: 24 and yet, without any sort of resentment for what he had done, he owns the share he had in the force put on the parliament at this time[48]. The plain reconciling of this is, that he thought 79 when the army judged the parliament was in the wrong, they might use violence, but not otherwise: which gives the army a superior authority, and inspection into the proceedings of the parliament. This shews how impossible it is to set up a commonwealth in England: for that cannot be brought about but by a military force: and they will ever keep the parliament in subjection to them, and so keep up their own authority[49].
I leave all that relates to the king's trial and death to common historians, knowing nothing that is particular of that great transaction, which was certainly one of the most amazing scenes in history. Ireton was the person that drove it on: for Cromwell was all the while in some suspense about it. Ireton had the principles and the temper of a Cassius in him: he stuck at nothing that might have turned England to a commonwealth: and he found out Cook[50] and Bradshaw, two bold lawyers, as proper instruments for managing it. Fairfax was much distracted in his mind, and changed purpose often every day. The presbyterians and the body of the city were much against it, and were everywhere fasting and praying for the king's preservation. There were not above 8000 of the army about the town: but these were selected out of the whole army, as the most engaged in enthusiasm: and they were kept at prayer in their way almost day and night, except when they were upon duty: so that they 80 were wrought up to a pitch of fury, that struck a terror into all people. On the other hand, the king's party were without spirit: and, as many of themselves have said to me, they could never believe his death was really intended till it was too late. They thought all was a pageantry to strike a terror, and to force the king to such concessions as they had a mind to extort from him.
The king himself shewed a calm and a composed firmness which amazed all people: and that so much the more, because that was not natural to him[51]. It was imputed to a very extraordinary measure of supernatural assistance. Bishop Juxon did the duty of his function honestly, but with a dry coldness that could not much raise the king's thoughts: so it was owing wholly to somewhat within himself that he went through so many indignities with so much true greatness, without disorder or any sort of affectation. Thus he died greater than he had lived; and shewed that which has been often observed of the whole race of the Stewarts, that they bore misfortunes much better than prosperity. His reign, both in peace and war, was a continued series of errors: so that it does not appear that he had a true judgment of things. He was out of measure set on following his humour, but unreasonably feeble to those whom he trusted, chiefly to the queen. He had too high a notion of the regal power, and thought that every opposition to it was rebellion. He minded little things too much, and was more concerned in the drawing 81 of a paper than in fighting a battle. He had a firm aversion to popery, but was much inclined to a middle way between protestants and papists, by which he lost the one without gaining the other[52]. His engaging the duke of Rohan in the war of the Rochelle, and then assisting him so poorly, and forsaking him at last, gave an ill character of him to all the protestants abroad. The earl of Lauderdale told me, the duke of Rohan was at Geneva, where he himself was, when he received a very long letter, or rather a little book, from my father, which gave him a copious account of the beginning of the troubles in Scotland: he translated it to the duke of Rohan, who expressed a vehement indignation at the court of England for their usage of him: of which this was the account he then gave[53].
The duke of Buckingham had a secret conversation with the queen of France, of which the queen-mother was very 82 jealous, and possessed the king with such a sense of it, that he was ordered immediately to leave the court. Upon his return to England under this affront, he possessed the king with such a hatred of that court, that the queen was ill used on her coming over, and all her servants were sent back[54]. He also told him the protestants were so ill used, and yet so strong, that if he would protect them, they would involve that kingdom into new wars; which he represented as so glorious a beginning of his reign, that the king, without weighing the consequence of it, sent one to treat with the duke of Rohan about it[55]. Great assistance was promised by sea: so a war was resolved on, in which the share that our court had is well enough known. But the infamous part was, that Richelieu got the king of France to make his queen write an obliging letter to the duke of Buckingham, assuring him that, if he would let the Rochelle fall without, assisting it, he should have leave to come over, and should settle the whole matter of the religion according to their 25. edicts. This was a strange proceeding: but cardinal Richelieu could turn that weak king as he pleased. Upon this the duke made that shameful campaign of the isle of Rhé. But finding next winter that he was not to be suffered to go over into France, and that he was abused into a false hope, he resolved to have followed that matter with more vigour, when he was stabbed by Felton[56].
There is another story told of the king's conduct during 83 the peaceable part of his reign, which I had from Halewyn of Dort[57], who was one of the judges in the court of Holland, and was the wisest and greatest man I knew among them. He told me he had it from his father, who, being then the chief man of Dort, was of the states, and had the secret communicated to him. When Isabella Clara Eugenia[58] grew old, and began to decline, a great many of her council, apprehending what miseries they would fall under when they should be again in the hands of the Spaniards, formed a design of making themselves a free commonwealth, that, in imitation of the union among the cantons of Switzerland that were of both religions, should be in a perpetual confederacy with the states of the seven provinces. This they communicated to Henry Frederick prince of Orange, and to some of the states, who approved of it, but thought it necessary to engage the king of England into it. The prince of Orange told the English ambassador, that there was a matter of great consequence that was fit to be laid before the king; but it was of such a nature, and such persons were concerned in it, that it could not be communicated, unless the king would be pleased to promise absolute secrecy for the present. This the king did: and then the prince of Orange sent him the whole scheme. The secret was ill kept: either the king trusted it to some who discovered it, or the paper was stolen from him; for it was sent over to the court at Brussells: one of the ministry lost his head for it: and some took the alarm so quick that they got to Holland and out of danger. After this the prince of Orange had no more commerce with our court, and often lamented that so great a design was so unhappily lost[59]. He had as ill an opinion of the king's 84 conduct of the war; for when the queen came over, and brought some of the generals with her, the prince said, after he had talked with them, (as the late king told me,) he did not wonder to see the affairs of England decline as they did, since he had talked with the king's generals.
I will not enter farther into the military part: for I remember an advice of the Marshal Schomberg; never to meddle in the relation of military matters[60]. He said, some affected to relate those affairs in all the terms of war, in which they committed errors that exposed them to the scorn of all commanders, who must despise relations that pretend to an exactness when there were great errors in every part of them.
In the king's death the very ill effect of extreme violent counsels discovered itself. Ireton hoped that by this all men concerned in it would become irreconcileable to monarchy, and would act as desperate men, and destroy all that might revenge that blood. But this had a very different effect. Something of the same nature had happened in lower instances before: but they were not the 85 wiser for it. The earl of Strafford's death made all his former errors be forgot: it raised his character, and cast a lasting odium on that way of proceeding; whereas he had sunk in his credit by any censure lower than death, and had been little pitied, if not thought justly punished. The like effect followed upon archbishop Laud's death. He was a learned, a sincere, and zealous man, regular in his own life, and humble in his private deportment; but was a hot, indiscreet man, eagerly pursuing some matters that were either very inconsiderable or mischievous; such as setting the communion table by the east wall of churches, bowing to it; and calling it the altar; the suppressing the Walloons' privileges, the breaking of lectures, the encouraging sports on the Lord's day, with some other things that were of no value: and yet all the heat and zeal of that time was laid out on these[61]. His severity in the Star-chamber and in the high commission court, but above all his violence, and indeed inexcusable injustice, in the prosecution of bishop Williams, were such visible blemishes, that nothing but the putting him to death in so unjust a manner could have raised his character; which indeed it did to a degree of setting him up as a pattern, and the establishing all his notions as standards by which judgments are to be made of men, whether they are true to the church or not. His diary, though it was a base thing to publish it[62], represents him as an abject fawner on the duke of Buckingham, and 86 as a superstitious regarder of dreams: his defence of himself, writ with so much care when he was in the Tower, is a very mean performance. He intended in that to make an appeal to the world. In most particulars he excuses himself by this, that he was but one of many, who either in 26. council, star-chamber, or high commission, voted illegal things. Now though this was true, yet a chief minister, and one in high favour, determines the rest so much, that they are generally little better than machines acted by him. On other occasions he says, the thing was proved but by one witness. Now, how strong soever this defence may be in law, it is of no force in an appeal to the world; for if a thing is true, it is no matter how full or how defective the proof is. The thing that gave me the strongest prejudice against him in that book is, that after he had seen the ill effects of his violent counsels, and had been so long shut up, and so long at leisure to reflect on what had passed in the hurry of passion, or the exaltation of his prosperity, he does not, in any one part of that great work, acknowledge his own errors, nor mix in it any wise or pious reflections, on the ill usage he met with, or on the unhappy steps he had made: so that while his enemies did really magnify him by their inhuman prosecution, his friends Heylin and Wharton have as much lessened him, the one by writing his life, and the other by publishing his vindication of himself[63].
But the recoiling of cruel counsels on the authors of them never appeared more eminently than in the death of king Charles the first, whose serious and Christian deportment in it made all his former errors be entirely forgot, and raised a compassionate regard to him, that drew a lasting hatred on the actors, and was the true occasion of the great turn 87 of the nation in the year 1660. This was much heightened by the publishing of his Εικων Βασιλικυ, which was universally believed to be his: and that coming out soon after his death had the greatest run in many impressions that any book has had in our age. There was in it a nobleness and a justness of thought, with a greatness of style, that made it to be looked on as the best writ book in the English language: and the piety of the prayers made all people cry out against the murder of a prince, who thought so seriously of all his affairs in his secret meditations before God. I was bred up with a high veneration of this book: and I remember that, when I heard how some denied it to be his, I asked the earl of Lothian about it, who both knew that king very well, and loved him little: he seemed confident it was his own work; for he said, he had heard him say a great many of those very periods that he found in that book. Being thus confirmed in that persuasion, I was not a little surprised, when in the year 1673, in which I had a great share of favour and free conversation with the then duke of York, afterwards king James the second, he suffered me to talk very freely to him about matters of religion; and when I was urging him with somewhat out of his father's book, he told me that book was not of his writing, and that the letter to the prince of Wales was never brought to him[64]. He said Dr. Gauden writ it: and after the restoration he brought the duke of Somerset and the earl of Southampton both to the king and to himself, who affirmed that they knew it was his writing; and that it was carried down by Southampton, and shewed the king during the treaty of Newport, who read it, and approved of it, as containing his sense of things. Upon this he told me, that though Sheldon and the other bishops opposed Gauden's promotion, because he had taken the covenant, yet the merit of that service carried it for him, notwithstanding the opposition made to it. There has been a great deal of disputing 88 about this book: some are so zealous for maintaining it to be the king's, that they think a man false to the church that doubts it to be his: yet the evidence since that time brought to the contrary has been so strong that I must leave it under the same uncertainty under which I found it: only this is certain, that Gauden never writ any thing with that force, his other writings being such that no man, from a likeness of style, would think him capable of writing so extraordinary a book as that is[65].
Upon the king's death the Scots proclaimed his son king, and sent over sir George Winram, that married my great aunt, to treat with him while he was in the isle of Jersey[1]. 89 The king entered into a negociation with him, and sent him back with general assurances of consenting to every reasonable proposition that they should send him. He named the Hague for the place of treaty, he being to go thither in a few days. So the Scots sent over commissioners, the chief of whom were the earls of Cassillis[2] and Lothian, the former of these was my first wife's father, a man of great virtue and of a considerable degree of good understanding, had he not spoiled it with many affectations, and an obstinate stiffness in almost every thing that he did. He was so sincere that he would suffer no man to take his words in any other sense than as he meant them. He adhered firmly to his instructions, but with so much candour, 27. that king Charles retained very kind impressions of it to his life's end. The man then in the greatest favour with the king was the duke of Buckingham: he was wholly 90 turned to mirth and pleasure: he had the art of treating persons or things in a ridiculous manner beyond any man of the age: he possessed the young king with very ill principles, both as to religion and morality, and with a very mean opinion of his father, whose stiffness was a frequent subject of his raillery. He prevailed with the king to enter into a treaty with the Scots, though that was vehemently opposed by almost all the rest that were about him, who pressed him to adhere steadily to his father's maxims and example[3].
When the king came to the Hague, William duke of Hamilton, and the earl of Lauderdale, who had left Scotland, entered into a great measure of favour and confidence with him[4]. The marquis of Montrose came likewise to him, 91 and undertook, if he would follow his counsels, to restore him to his kingdoms by main force: but when the king desired the prince of Orange to examine the methods which he proposed, he entertained him with a recital of his own performances, and of the credit he was in among the people, and said, the whole nation would rise, if he went over though accompanied only with a page. The queen-mother hated him mortally[5]; for when he came over from Scotland to Paris, upon the king's requiring him to lay down arms, she received him with such extraordinary favour as his services did deserve, and gave him a large supply in money and in jewels, considering the straits to which she was then reduced. But she heard that he had talked very indecently of her favours to him; which she herself told to lady Susanna Hamilton, a daughter of duke Hamilton's[6], from whom I had it. So she sent him word to leave Paris, and would see him no more. He had wandered about the courts of Germany, but was not so much esteemed as he thought he deserved. He desired of the king nothing but power to act in his name, with a supply in money, and a letter recommending him to the king of Denmark for a ship to carry him over, and for such arms as he could spare him. With that the king gave him the garter. He got first to Orkney, and from thence into the Highlands of Scotland; but could perform nothing of what he had 92 undertaken. At last he was betrayed by one of those to whom he trusted himself, Macleod of Assynt, and was brought over a prisoner to Edinburgh[7]. He was carried through the streets with all the infamy that brutal malice could contrive, and in a few days he was hanged on a very high gibbet, and his head and quarters were set up in divers places of the kingdom. His behaviour under all that barbarous usage was as great and firm to the last, looking on all that was done to him with a noble scorn, as the fury of his enemies was black and universally detested. This raised a horror in all sober people against those who could insult over such a man in misfortune. The triumph that the preachers made on this occasion rendered them odious, and made lord Montrose to be both much pitied and lamented. This happened while the Scots commissioners were treating with the king at the Hague. The violent party in Scotland were for breaking off the treaty upon it, though by the date of Montrose's commission it appeared to have been granted before the treaty was begun[8]: but it was carried not to recall their commissioners. Nor could the king on the other hand be prevailed on by his own court to send them away upon this cruelty to a man who had acted by his commission, and yet was so used. The 93 treaty was quickly concluded. The king was in no condition to struggle with them, but yielded to all their demands, of taking the covenant, and suffering none to be about him but such as took it[9]. He sailed home to Scotland in some Dutch men of war with which the prince of Orange furnished him, with all the stock of money and arms that his credit could raise. That indeed would not have been very great if the prince of Orange had not joined his own to it. The duke of Hamilton and the earl of Lauderdale were suffered to go home with him: but soon after his landing an order came to put them from him. The king complained of this: but duke Hamilton at parting told him, he must prepare himself for things of a harder digestion: he said, at present he could do him no service: the marquis of Argyll was then in absolute credit: therefore he desired that he would study to gain him entirely, and give him no cause of jealousy on his account. This king Charles told myself, as a part of duke Hamilton's character. The duke of Buckingham took all the ways possible to gain Argyll and the ministers[10]: only his dissolute course of life was excessive scandalous; which to their great reproach they connived at, because he advised the king to put himself wholly in their hands. The king wrought himself into as grave a deportment as he could: he heard many prayers and sermons, some of a great length. I remember on one fast day there were six sermons preached without intermission. I was there my self, and not a little weary of so tedious a service[11]. The king was not allowed so much as to walk abroad on 28 Sundays: and if at any 94 time there had been any gaiety at court, such as dancing or playing at cards, he was severely reproved for it. This was managed with so much rigour and so little discretion, that it contributed not a little to beget in him an aversion to all sort of strictness in religion. All that had acted on his father's side were ordered to keep at a great distance from him: and because the common people shewed such affection to the king, the crowds that pressed to see him were also kept off from coming about him. Cromwell was not idle: but seeing the Scots were calling home their king, and knowing that from thence he might expect an invasion into England, he resolved to prevent them, and so marched into Scotland with his army. The Scots brought together a very good army. The king was suffered to come once and see it, but not to stay in it; for they were afraid he might gain too much upon the soldiers: so he was sent away[12].
The army was indeed one of the best that ever Scotland had brought together, but it was ill commanded: for all that had made defection from their cause, or that were thought indifferent as to either side, which they called detestable neutrality, were put out of commission. The preachers thought it an army of saints, and seemed well assured of success[13]. They drew near Cromwell, who being pressed by them retired towards Dunbar, where his ships and provisions lay. The Scots followed him, and were posted on a hill about a mile from thence, where there was no attacking them. Cromwell was then in great distress, and looked on himself as undone. There was no marching towards Berwick, the ground was too narrow: nor could he come back into the country without being separated from his ships, and starving his army. The least evil seemed to be to kill his horses, and put his army on board, 95 and sail back to Newcastle; which, in the disposition that England was in at that time, would have been all their destruction, for it would have occasioned an universal insurrection for the king. They had not above three days' forage for their horses. So Cromwell called his officers to a day of seeking the Lord, in their style. He loved to talk much of that matter all his life long afterwards: he said, he felt such an enlargement of heart in prayer, and such quiet upon it, that he bade all about him take heart, for God had certainly heard them, and would appear for them. After prayer they walked in the earl of Roxburgh's gardens, that lie under the hill: and by prospective glasses they discerned a great motion in the Scotish camp: upon which Cromwell said, God is delivering them into our hands, they are coming down to us[14]. Leslie was in the chief command: but he had a committee of the states with him to give him his orders, among whom Warriston was one[15]. 96 These were weary of lying in the fields, and thought that Leslie made not haste enough a to destroy those sectaries; for so they loved to call them. He told them, by lying there all was sure, but that by engaging into action with gallant and desperate men all might be lost: yet they still called on him to fall on. Many have thought that all this was treachery, done on design to deliver up our army to Cromwell; some laying it upon Leslie, and others upon my uncle. I am persuaded there was no treachery in it: only Warriston was too hot, and Leslie was too cold, and yielded too easily to their humours, which he ought not to have done. They were all the night employed in coming down the hill: and in the morning, before they were put in order, Cromwell fell upon them. Two regiments stood their ground, and were almost all killed in their ranks: the rest did run in a most shameful manner: so that both their artillery and baggage, and with these a great many prisoners, were taken, some thousands in all. Cromwell upon this advanced to Edinburgh, where he was received without any opposition; and the castle, that might have made a long resistance, did capitulate. So all the southern part of Scotland came under contribution to Cromwell. Stirling was the advanced garrison on the king's side; he himself retired to St. Johnston[16]. A parliament was called that sat for some time at Stirling, and for some time at St. Johnston, in which a full indemnity was passed, not in the language of a pardon, but of an act of approbation: all that joined with Cromwell were declared traitors. But now the ways of raising a new army were to be thought on. 97
A question had been proposed both to the committee of states and to the commissioners of the kirk, whether in this extremity those who had made defection, or had been hitherto backward in the work, might not upon the profession of their repentance be received into public trusts, and admitted to serve in the defence of their country[17]. To this, answers were distinctly given by two resolutions: the one was, that they ought to be admitted to make profession of their repentance: and the other was, that after such profession made they might be received to defend and serve their country.
Upon this, a great division followed in the kirk: those who adhered to these resolutions were called the Public Resolutioners: but against these some of those bodies protested, and they, together with those who adhered to them, were called the Protesters. On the one hand it was said, that every government might call out all that were under its protection to its defence: this seemed founded on the law of nature and of nations: and if men had been misled, it was a strange cruelty to deny room for repentance: this was contrary to the nature of God and the gospel, and was a likely mean to drive them to despair: therefore, after two years' time, it seemed reasonable to 29 allow them to serve according to their birthright in parliament, or in other hereditary offices, or in the army; from all which they had been excluded by an act made in the year 1649, that ranged them in different classes, and was from thence called the Act of Classes. But the Protesters objected against all this, that to take in men of known enmity to the cause was a sort of betraying it, because it was the 98 putting it in their power to betray it; that to admit them to a profession of repentance was a profanation, and a mocking of God[18]: it was visible they were willing to comply with these terms, though against their conscience, only to get into the army: nor could they expect a blessing from God on an army so constituted. And as to this particular they had great advantage; for this mock penitence was indeed matter of great scandal. When these resolutions were passed with this protestation, a great many of the five western counties, Clydesdale, Renfrew, Ayr, Galloway, and Nithisdale, met, and formed an association apart, both against the army of sectaries, and against this new defection in the kirk party[19]. They drew a remonstrance against all the proceedings in the treaty with the king, when, as they said, it was visible by the commission that he granted to Montrose that his heart was not sincere: and they were also against the tendering him the covenant, when they had reason to believe he took it not with a resolution to maintain it, since his whole deportment and private conversation shewed a secret enmity to the work of God: and, after an invidious enumeration of many 99 particulars, they imputed the shameful defeat at Dunbar to their prevaricating in these things; and concluded with a desire, that the king might be excluded from any share in the administration of the government, and that his cause might be put out of the state of the quarrel with the army of the sectaries. This was brought to the committee of estates at St. Johnston, and was severely inveighed against by sir Thomas Nicolson, the king's advocate or attorney general there, who had been till then a zealous man of their party: but he had lately married my sister, and my father had great influence on him. He prevailed, and the remonstrance was condemned as divisive, factious, and scandalous[20]: but that the people might not be too much moved with these things, a declaration was prepared to be set out by the king for the satisfying of them. In it there were many hard things[21]. The king owned the sin of his father's marrying into an idolatrous family: he acknowledged the bloodshed in the late wars lay at his father's door: he expressed a deep sense of his own ill education, and the prejudices he had drunk in against the cause, of which he was now very sensible: he confessed all the former part of 100 his life to have been a course of enmity to the work of God: he repented of his commission to Montrose, and of every thing he had done that gave offence: and with solemn protestations he affirmed, that he was now sincere in his declaration, and that he would adhere to it to the end of his life both in Scotland, England, and Ireland.
The king was very uneasy when this was brought to him He said, he could never look his mother in the face if he passed it. But when he was told it was necessary for his affairs, he resolved to swallow the pill without farther chewing it. So it was published, but had no good effect: for neither side believed him sincere in it[22]. It was thought a strange imposition to make him load his father's memory in such a manner. But, while the king was thus beset with the high and more moderate kirk parties, the old cavaliers sent to him, offering that if he would cast himself into their hands they would meet him near Dundee with a great body. Upon this the king, growing weary of the sad life he led, made his escape in the night, and came to the place appointed: but it was a vain undertaking, for he was met by a very inconsiderable body at Clova, the place of rendezvous. Those at St. Johnston being troubled at this, sent colonel Montgomery after him, who came up, and pressed him to return very rudely: so the king came back[23]. But this had a very good effect. The government saw now the danger of using him ill, which might provoke him to desperate courses: after that, he was used as well 101 as that kingdom, in so ill a state, was capable of. He saw the necessity of courting the marquis of Argyll, and therefore he made him great offers: at last he talked of marrying his daughter[24]. Argyll was cold and backward: he saw the king's heart lay not to him: so he looked on all offers but as so many snares. His son, the lord Lorn, was captain of the guards: and he made his court more dexterously; for he brought all persons that the king had a mind to speak with at all hours to him, and was in all 102 respects not only faithful but zealous. Yet this was suspected as a collusion between the father and the son[25]. The king was crowned on the first of January[26]: and there he again renewed the covenant: and now all people were admitted to come to him, and to serve in the army. The two armies lay peaceably in their winter quarters; but when the summer came on, a body of the English passed the Frith, and landed in Fife. So the king, having got up all the force he had expected, resolved on a march into England. Scotland could not maintain another year's war. This was a desperate resolution: but there was nothing else to be done[27].
I will not pursue the 30 relation of the march to Worcester, nor the total defeat given the king's army on the same day in which Dunbar fight had been fought the year before, on the 3rd of September. These things are so well known, as is also the king's escape, that I can add nothing to the common relations that have been over and over again made of them. At the same time that Cromwell followed the king into England, he left Monk in Scotland, with an army sufficient to reduce the rest of the kingdom. The town of Dundee made a rash and ill considered resistance: it was after a few days' siege taken by storm: much blood was shed, and the town was severely plundered. No other place made any resistance[28]. I remember well of 103 the coming of three regiments to Aberdeen. There was an order and discipline, and a face of gravity and piety among them, that amazed all people. Most of them were independents and anabaptists: they were all gifted men, and preached as they were moved; but they never disturbed the public assemblies in the churches but once. They came and reproached the preachers for laying things to their charge that were false. I was then present: the debate grew very fierce: at last they drew their swords, but there was no hurt done: yet Cromwell displaced the governor for not punishing this.
When the low countries in Scotland were thus reduced, some of the more zealous of the nobility went to the Highlands in the year 1653. The earl of Glencairn, a grave and sober man, but vain and haughty, got the tribe of the Macdonalds to declare for the king[29]. To these the lord Lorn came with about a thousand men: but the jealousy of the father made the son be suspected. The marquis of Argyll had retired into his country when the king marched into England, and did not submit to Monk till the year '52[30]. Then he received a garrison: but lord Lorn surprised a ship that was sent about with provisions to it, which helped to support their little ill-formed army. Many gentlemen came to them: and almost all the good horses of the kingdom were stolen, and carried up to them. They made a body of about 3,000: of these they had about 500 horse. They endured great hardships; for those parts were not fit to entertain men that had been accustomed to live softly. The earl of Glencairn's pride had almost spoiled all: for he took much upon him, and upon some 104 suspicion he a ordered lord Lorn to be clapt up, who had notice of it, and prevented it by an escape: otherwise they had fallen to cut one another's throats, instead of marching against the enemy[31]. The earl of Balcarres, a virtuous and knowing man but somewhat morose in his humour, went also among them[32]. They differed in their counsels: Glencairn was for falling into the low country, and he began to fancy he should be another Montrose. Balcarres, on the other hand, was for their keeping in their fastnesses, that made a shew of a body for the king, which they were to keep up in some reputation as long as they could, till they could see what assistance the king might be able to procure them from beyond sea, of men, money, and arms: whereas if they went out of those fast grounds, they could not hope to stand long before such a veteran and well disciplined army as Monk had; and if they met with the least check, their tumultuary body would soon melt away.
Among others, one sir Robert Moray, that had married the earl of Balcarres's sister[33], came among them. He had served in France, where he had got into such a degree of favour with cardinal Richelieu, that few strangers were ever so much considered by him as he was[34]. He was raised to 105 be a colonel there, and came over for recruits when the king was with the Scots' army at Newcastle. There he grew into high favour with the king, and had laid a design for his escape, of which I have given an account in duke Hamilton's memoirs: he was the most universally beloved and esteemed by men of all sides and sorts, of any man I have ever known in my whole life. He was a pious man, and in the midst of armies and courts he spent many hours a day in a devotion which was of a most elevating strain. He had gone through the easy parts of mathematics, and knew the history of nature beyond any man I ever yet knew. He had a genius much like Peiresk's, as he is described by Gassendi[35]. He was afterwards the first former of the Royal Society, and its first president; and while he lived, he was the life and soul of that body[36]. He had an equality of temper in him that nothing could alter, and was in practice the only stoic I ever knew. He had a great tincture of one of their principles, for he was much for absolute decrees. He had a most diffused love to all 106 mankind, and he delighted in every occasion of doing good, which he managed with great discretion and zeal. He had a superiority of genius and comprehension to most men: and had the plainest, but withal the softest, way of reproving, chiefly young people, for their faults, that I ever met with. And upon this account, as well as upon all the care and affection he expressed to me, I have ever reckoned that, next to my father, I owed more to him, than to any other man. Therefore I have enlarged upon his character; and yet I am sure I have rather said too little than too much.
31 Sir Robert Moray was in such credit in that little army, that lord Glencairn took a strange course to break it, and to ruin him. A letter was pretended to be found at Antwerp, as writ by him to William Murray of the bedchamber, that had been whipping-boy to king Charles the first, and upon that had grown up to a degree of favour and confidence that was very particular, and, as many thought, was as ill used, as it was little deserved[37]. He had a lewd creature there,, whom he turned off: and she, to be revenged on him, framed this plot against him. This ill-forged letter gave an account of a bargain sir Robert had made with Monk for killing the king, which was to be executed by a Mr. Murray: so he prayed him in his letter to make haste and dispatch it. This was brought to the earl of Glencairn: so sir Robert was severely questioned upon it, and put in arrest: and it was spread about through a rude army that he intended to kill the king, hoping, it seems, that upon that some of these wild people, believing it, would have fallen upon him without using any forms. But upon this occasion sir Robert practised in a very eminent manner his true Christian philosophy, without shewing so much as a cloud in his whole behaviour. 107
The earl of Balcarres left the Highlands, and went to the king, and shewed him the necessity of sending a military man to command that body, to whom they would submit more willingly than to any of the nobility. Middleton was sent over, who was a gallant man, and a good officer. He had first served on the parliament side: but he turned over to the king, and was taken at Worcester fight, but he made his escape out of the Tower[38]. He, upon his coming over, did for some time lay the heats that were among the Highlanders, and made as much of that face of an army for another year as was possible.
Drummond[39] was sent by him to Paris with an invitation to the king to come among them: for they had assurances sent them that the whole nation was in a disposition to rise with them: and England was beginning to grow weary of their new government, the army and the parliament being 108 on ill terms. The English were also engaged in a war with the States, who upon that account might be inclined to assist the king to give a diversion to their enemies' forces. Drummond told me, that upon his coming to Paris he was called to the little council that was then about the king: and when he had delivered his message, chancellor Hyde[40] asked him how the king would be accommodated if he came among them? He answered, not so well as was fitting, but they would all take care of him to furnish him with every thing that was necessary[41]. He wondered that the king did not check the chancellor in this demand: for he said, it looked strange to him, that when they were all hazarding their lives to help him to a crown, he should be concerned for accommodation. He was sent back with good words and a few kind letters. In the end of the year 1654 Morgan marched into the Highlands, and had a small engagement with Middleton[42], which broke that whole matter, of which all people were grown weary; for they had no prospect of success, and the low countries were so overrun with robberies on the pretence of going to assist the Highlanders, that there was an universal joy at the dispersing of that little unruly army. After this the country was kept in great order: some castles in the Highlands had garrisons put in them, that were so careful in their discipline, and so exact as to their rules, that in no time the Highlands were kept in better order than during the usurpation. There was a considerable force of about seven or eight thousand men kept in Scotland: these were paid exactly, and strictly disciplined. The pay of the army brought so much money 109 into the kingdom, that it continued all that while in a very flourishing state. Cromwell built three citadels, at Leith, Ayr, and Inverness, besides many lesser forts. There was good justice done, and vice was suppressed and punished[43]; so that we always reckon those eight years of usurpation a time of great peace and prosperity[44]. There was also a sort of union of the three kingdoms in one parliament, 110 where Scotland had its representatives. The marquis of Argyll went up one of our commissioners[45].
The next scene I must open relates to the church, and the heats raised in it by the Public Resolutions and the Protestation made against them. New occasions of dispute arose. A general assembly was in course to 32 meet, and sit at St. Andrews: so the Commission of the Kirk writ a circular letter to all the presbyteries, setting forth all the grounds of their Resolutions, and complaining of those who had protested against them; upon which they desired that they would choose none of those who adhered to that Protestation to represent them in the next Assembly. This was only an advice, and had been frequently practised in the former years: but now it was highly complained of, as a limitation on the freedom of elections, which inferred a nullity on all their proceedings: so the Protesters renewed their protestation against this meeting upon a higher point, disowning that authority which hitherto they had magnified as the highest tribunal in the church, in which they thought Christ was on his throne. Upon this a great debate followed, and many books were written in the course of several years. The public men said, this was the destroying of presbytery, if the lesser number did not submit to the greater: it was a sort of prelacy, if it was pretended that votes ought rather to be weighed than counted: parity was the essence of their constitution: and in this all people saw they had clearly the better of the argument. The Protesters urged for themselves, that, since all protestants rejected the pretence of infallibility, the major part of the church might fall into error, in which case the lesser number could not be bound to submit to them: they complained of the many corrupt clergymen who were yet among them, who were leavened with the old leaven, and did on all occasions shew what was still at heart, notwithstanding all 111 their outward compliance: for the episcopal clergy, that had gone into the covenant and presbytery to hold their livings, struck in with great heat to inflame the controversy: and it appeared very visibly, that presbytery, if not held in order by the civil power, could not be long kept in quiet. If in the supreme court of judicature the majority did not conclude the matter, it was not possible to keep up their beloved parity. It was confessed that in doctrinal points the lesser number was not bound to submit to the greater: but in the matters of mere government it was impossible to maintain the presbyterian form on any other bottom.
As this debate grew hot, and they were ready to break out into censures on both sides, some were sent down from the commonwealth of England to settle Scotland: of these sir Henry Vane was one[46]. The Resolutioners were known to have been more in the king's interests: so they were not so kindly looked on as the Protesters. Some of the English junto moved, that pains should be taken to unite the two parties, but Vane opposed this with much zeal: he said, would they heal the wound that they had given themselves, which weakened them so much? The setting them at quiet could have no other effect but to heal and unite them in their opposition to their authority. He therefore moved that they might be left at liberty to fight out their own quarrels, and thereby be kept in a greater dependence on the temporal authority, when both sides were forced to make their appeal to it. So it was resolved to suffer them to meet still in their presbyteries and synods, but not in general assemblies, which had a greater face of union and authority[47].
This advice was followed: so the division went on. Both sides studied, when any church became vacant, to get a man of their own party to be chosen to succeed in the election: and upon these occasions many tumults happened. In some of them stones were thrown, and many were 112 wounded, to the great scandal of religion. In all these disputes the Protesters were the fiercer side: for being less in number, they studied to make that up with their fury. In one point they had the others at a great advantage, with relation to their new masters, who required them to give over praying for the king. The Protesters were weary of doing it, and submitted very readily: but the others stood out longer, and said, it was a duty lying on them by the covenant, so they could not let it fall. Upon that the English council set out an order, that such as should continue to pray for the king should be denied the help of law to recover their tithes, or, as they are called there, their stipends. This touched them in a sensible point; but, that they might seem to act upon their own authority, they did enact it in their presbyteries, that since all duties did not oblige at all times, therefore considering the present juncture, in which the king could not protect them, they resolved to discontinue that 33 piece of duty. This exposed them to much censure, since such a carnal consideration as the force of law for their benefices, (which all regard at too much, though few will own it.) seemed to be that which determined them.
This great breach among them being rather encouraged than suppressed by those who were in power, all the methods imaginable were used by the Protesters to raise their credit among the people. They preached often and very long, and seemed to carry their devotions to a greater sublimity than others did[48]. Their constant topic was the sad defection and corruption of the judicatories of the church, and they often proposed several expedients for purging it[49]. 113 The truth was, they were more active, and their performances were livelier, than the Public men. They were in nothing more singular than in their communions. In many places the sacrament was discontinued for several years, where they thought the magistracy, or the more eminent of the parish, were engaged in what they called the defection, which was much more looked at than the scandals given by bad lives. But where the greater part of the parish was more sound, they gave the sacrament with a new and unusual solemnity. On the Wednesday before they held a fast day, with prayers and sermons for about eight or ten hours together: on the Saturday they had two or three preparation sermons: and on the Lord's day they had so very many, that the action continued above twelve hours in some places: and all ended with three or four sermons on Monday for thanksgivings. A great many ministers were brought together from several parts, and high pretenders would have gone forty or fifty miles to a noted communion. The crowds were far beyond the capacity of their churches, or the reach of their voices, so at the same time they had sermons in two or three different places: and all was performed with great shews of zeal. They had stories of many signal conversions that were wrought upon these occasions; whereas others were better believed, who told as many stories of much lewdness among the multitudes that did then run together.
It is scarce credible what an effect this had among the people, to how great a measure of knowledge they were brought, and how readily they could pray extempore, and talk of divine matters. All this tended to raise the credit of the Protesters. The Resolutioners tried to imitate them in these practices: but they were not thought so spiritual, nor so ready at them: so the other had the chief following. 114 Where the judicatories of the church were near an equality of the men of both sides, there were perpetual janglings among them: at last they proceeded to deprive men of both sides, as they were the majority in the judicatories: but because the possession of the church and the benefice was to depend on the orders of the temporal courts, both sides made their application to the privy council that Cromwell had set up in Scotland[50]: and they were by them referred to Cromwell himself. So they sent deputies up to London. The Protesters went in greater numbers: they came nearer both to the principles and to that temper that prevailed in the army: so they were looked on as the better men, on whom, by reason of the first rise of the difference, the government might more certainly depend: whereas the others were considered as more in the king's interests.
The Resolutioners sent up one Sharp[51], who had been long in England, and was an active and eager man: he had a very small proportion of learning, and was but an indifferent preacher: but having some acquaintance with the presbyterian ministers of London, whom Cromwell was then courting much by reason of their credit in the city, he was, by an error that proved fatal to the whole party, sent up in their name to London; where he continued for some years soliciting their concerns, and making himself known to all sorts of people. He seemed more than ordinary zealous for presbytery. And, as Cromwell was then designing to make himself king[52], Dr. Wilkins[53] told me he often said to him, no temporal government could have a sure support without a national church that adhered to it, and he thought England was capable of no other national constitution but of episcopacy; to which, he told me, he did not doubt but Cromwell would have turned, 115 as soon as the design of his kingship was settled. Upon this, he spoke to Sharp, that it was plain by their breach that presbytery could not be managed so as to maintain order among them, and that an episcopacy must be brought in to settle them: but Sharp could not bear the discourse, and rejected it with horror. I have dwelt the longer on this matter, and opened it the more fully than was necessary if I had not thought that this may have a good effect on the reader, and shew him how impossible it is in a parity to maintain peace and order, if the magistrate does not interpose: and then that will be cried out upon by the zealots of both sides as abominable Erastianism.
34 From these matters I go next to set down some particulars that I knew concerning Cromwell, that I have not yet seen in books. Some of these I had from the earls of Carlisle[1] and Orrery[2]: the one had been the captain of his guards, and the other had been the president of his council in Scotland. But he from whom I learned the most was Stoupe, a Grison by birth, then minister of the French church in the Savoy[3], and afterwards a brigadier general 116 in the French armies: a man of intrigue, but of no virtue: he adhered to the protestant religion as to outward appearance, but he was more a Socinian or deist than either protestant or Christian. He was much trusted by Cromwell in foreign affairs; in which Cromwell was oft to seek, and having no foreign language, but the little Latin that stuck to him from his education, which he spoke very viciously and scantily, had not the necessary means of informing himself.
When Cromwell first assumed the government, he had the three great parties of the nation all against him, the episcopal, the presbyterian, and the republican party[4]. The last was the most set on his ruin, looking on him as the person that had perfidiously broke the house of commons, and was setting up for himself[5]. He had none to rely on but the army: yet that enthusiastic temper that he had taken so much pains to raise among them made them very intractable[6]: many of the chief officers were broken and imprisoned by him: and he flattered the rest the best he could. He went on in his old way of long and dark discourses, sermons, and prayers. As to the cavalier party, 117 he was afraid both of assassination and other plottings from them[7]. As to the former of these, he took a method that proved very effectual: he said often and openly, that in a war it was necessary to return upon any side all the violent things that any of the side did the other: this was done for preventing greater mischiefs, and for bringing men to fair war: therefore, he said, assassinations were such detestable things, that he would never begin them: but if any of the king's party should endeavour to assassinate him, and fail in it, he would make an assassinating war of it, and destroy the whole family: and he pretended he had instruments ready to execute it whensoever he should give orders for it. The terror of this was a more effectual security to him than his guards.
The other, as to their plottings, was the more dangerous. But he understood that one sir Richard Willis was chancellor Hyde's chief confident, to whom he wrote often, and to whom all the party submitted, looking on him as an able and wise man. in whom they confided absolutely[8]. So he found a way to talk with him: he said, he did not intend to hurt any of the party: his design was rather to 118 save them from ruin: they were apt, after their cups, to run into foolish and ill concerted plots, which signified nothing but to ruin those who engaged in them: he knew they consulted him in every thing: all he desired of him was to know all their plots, that he might so deconcert them, that none might ever suffer for them: if he clapt any of them up in prison, it should only be for a little time, and they should be interrogated only about some trifling discourse, but never about the business they had been engaged in. He offered Willis whatever he would accept of, and to give it when or as he pleased. He durst not ask or take much, for if it had appeared that he had much money that would have given jealousy, so he did not take above two hundred pound a year. None was trusted with this but his secretary Thurloe, who was a very dexterous man at getting intelligence.
Thus Cromwell had all the king's party in a net, and he let them dance in it at pleasure, and upon occasions clapt them up for a short while: but nothing was ever discovered that hurt any of them. In conclusion, after Cromwell's death, Willis continued to give notice of every thing to Thurloe. At last, when the plot was laid among the cavaliers for a general insurrection, the king was desired to come over to that which was to be raised in Sussex: he was to have landed near Chichester, all by Willis's management: and a snare was laid for him, in which he would probably have been caught if Morland, Thurloe' s under secretary, who was a prying man, had not discovered the correspondence between his master and Willis, and warned the king of his danger[9]. Yet it was not easy to 119 persuade those who had trusted Willis so much, and thought him faithful in all respects, to believe that he could be guilty of so black a treachery: so Morland's advertisement was looked on as an artifice to create jealousy. But he, to give a full conviction, had observed where the secretary laid some letters of advice, on which he saw he relied most, and getting the key of that cabinet in his hand to seal a letter with a seal that hung to it, he took the impression of it in wax, and got a key to be made from it, by which he opened the cabinet, and sent over some of the most important of those letters. The hand was known, and this artful but black treachery was discovered: so the design of the rising was laid aside for that time. Sir George Booth having engaged at the same time to raise a body in Cheshire, two several messengers 35 were sent to him, to let him know the design could not be executed at the time appointed: both these persons were suspected by some garrisons through which they must pass, as giving no good account of themselves in a time of jealousy, and were so long stopt that they could not give him notice in time: so 120 he very gallantly performed his part: but not being seconded, he was soon crushed by Lambert. Thus Willis lost the merit of great and long services. This was one of Cromwell's masterpieces.
As for the presbyterians, they were so apprehensive of the fury of the commonwealth party, that they thought it a deliverance to be rescued out of their hands. Many of the republicans began to profess deism, and almost all of them were for destroying all clergymen and for breaking every thing that looked like the union of a national church. They were for pulling down the churches, for discharging the tithes, and for leaving religion free, as they called it, without either encouragement or restraint. Cromwell assured the presbyterians he would maintain a public ministry with all due encouragement[10]; and he joined them in a commission with some independents to be the triers of all those who were to be admitted to benefices. These disposed also of all the churches that were in the gift of the crown, of the bishops, and of the cathedral churches: so this softened them.
He studied to divide the commonwealth party among themselves, and to set the fifth-monarchy[11] men and the enthusiasts against those who pretended to little or no religion, and acted only upon the principles of civil liberty, such as Algernon Sidney, Henry Nevill, Marten, Wildman, and Harrington. The fifth-monarchy men seemed to be really in expectation every day when Christ should appear: John Goodwin headed these, who first brought in Arminianism 121 among the sectaries, for he was for liberty of all sorts. Cromwell hated that doctrine: for his beloved notion was, that once a child of God always a child of God: now he had led a very strict life for above eight years together before the wars[12]: so he comforted himself much with his reflections on that time, and on the certainty of perseverance. But none of the preachers were so thoroughpaced for him as to temporal matters as Goodwin was; for he not only justified the putting the king to death, but magnified it as the gloriousest action men were capable of[13]. He filled all people with such expectation of a glorious thousand years, speedily to begin, that it looked like a madness possessing them.
It was no easy thing for Cromwell to satisfy these when he took the power into his own hands, since that looked like a step to kingship, which Goodwin had long represented as the great Antichrist that hindered Christ's being set on his throne[14]. To these he said, and as some have told me, with many tears, that he would rather have taken a shepherd's staff than the protectorship, since nothing was more contrary to his genius than a shew of greatness[15]: but he saw it was necessary at that time to keep the nation from falling into extreme disorder, and from becoming a prey to the common enemy: and therefore he only stept in between the living and the dead, as he phrased it, in that interval till God should direct them on what bottom they ought to 122 settle: and he assured them that then he would surrender the heavy load lying upon him with a joy equal to the sorrow with which he was afflicted while under that shew of dignity. To men of this stamp he would enter into the terms of the old equality, shutting the door, and making them sit down covered by him; to let them see how little he valued those distances that, for form's sake, he was bound to keep up with others. These discourses commonly ended in a long prayer. Thus he with much ado managed the republican enthusiasts[16]. The other republicans he called the heathen, and he professed he could not so easily work upon them. He had some chaplains of all sorts: and he began in his latter years to be gentler towards those of the church of England. They had their meetings in several places about London without any disturbance from him. In conclusion, even the papists courted him: and he, with great dissimulation, carried things with all sorts of people much further than was thought possible, considering the difficulties he met with in all his parliaments[17]: but it was generally believed that his life and all his arts were exhausted at once, and that if he had lived much longer, he could not have held things together.
The debates came on very high for setting up a king. All the lawyers, chiefly Glyn, Maynard, Fountain, and St. John, were vehemently for this[18]. They said, no new government could be settled legally but by a king, who 123 should pass bills for such a form as should be agreed on. Till then, all they did was like building upon sand: still men were in danger of a revolution: and in that case, all that had been done would be void of itself, as contrary to a law as yet in being, and not repealed. Till that was done, every man that had been concerned in the war, and in the blood that was shed, chiefly the king's, was still obnoxious: and no warrants could be pleaded but what were founded on, or approved of by, a law passed by king, lords, and commons. They might agree to trust this 36 king as much as they pleased, and make his power determine as soon as they pleased, so that he should be a felo de se, and consent to an act, if need were, of extinguishing both name and thing for ever. And as no man's person was safe till this was done, so they said all the grants and sales that had been made were null and void: all men that had gathered or disposed of the public money were for ever accountable. In short, the point was made out beyond the possibility of answering it, except upon enthusiastic principles. But by that sort of men all this was called a mistrusting of God, and a trusting to the arm of flesh. They had gone out, as they said, in the simplicity of their hearts to fight the Lord's battles, to whom they made the appeals: he had heard them, and appeared for them, and now they would trust him no longer. They had pulled down monarchy with the monarch, and would they now build that up which they had destroyed: they had solemnly vowed to God to be true to the commonwealth, without a king or kingship: and under that vow, as under a banner, they had fought and prevailed: but now they must be secure, and in order to that go back to Egypt. They thought it was rather a happiness that they were still under a legal danger: this might be a mean to make them more cautious and diligent. If kings were the invaders of God's right, and the usurpers upon men's liberties, why must they have recourse to such a wicked engine? Upon these grounds 124 they stood out[19]: and they looked on all that was offered about the limiting this king in his power, as the gilding the pill: the assertors of those laws that made it necessary to have a king, would no sooner have one than they would bring forth out of the same storehouse all that related to the power and prerogative of this king: therefore they would not hearken to any thing that was offered on that head, but rejected it with scorn. Many of them began openly to say, if we must have a king, in consequence of so much law as was alleged, why should we not rather have that king to whom the law certainly pointed than any other[20]? The earl of Orrery told me, that, coming one day to Cromwell during those heats, and telling him he had been in the city all that day, Cromwell asked him what news he had heard there: the other answered, that he was told he was in treaty with the king, who was to be restored, and was to marry his daughter. Cromwell expressing no indignation at this, lord Orrery said, in the state to which things were brought, he saw not a better expedient: they might bring him in on what terms they pleased, and Cromwell might retain the same authority he then had, with less trouble. He answered, the king can never forgive his father's blood. Orrery said, he was one of many that were concerned in that, but he would be alone in the merit of restoring him. Cromwell replied, he is so damnably debauched, he would undo us all; and so turned 125 to another discourse without any emotion, which made Orrery conclude he had often thought of that expedient[21].
On the day in which he refused the offer of kingship that was made to him by the parliament, he had kept himself on such a reserve that no man knew what answer he would give. It was thought more likely he would accept of it[22]: but that which determined him to the contrary was, that, when he went down in the morning to walk in S. James's park, Fleetwood and Desborough were waiting for him: the one had married his daughter, and the other his sister. With these he entered into much discourse on the subject, and argued for it: he said, it was a tempting of God to expose so many worthy men to death and poverty, when there was a certain way to secure them. The others insisted still on the oaths they had made. He said, these oaths were against the power and tyranny of kings, but not against the four letters that made the word king. In conclusion, they, believing from his discourse that he intended to accept of it, told him they saw great confusions would follow on it: and as they could not serve him to set up the idol they had put down, and had sworn to keep down, so they would not engage in any thing against him, but would retire and look on. So they offered him their commissions, since they were resolved not to serve a king. He desired they would stay till they heard his answer. But it was believed, that he, seeing two persons so near him ready to abandon him, concluded that many others would follow their example, and therefore thought it was too bold 126 a venture[23]. So he refused it, but accepted of the continuance of his protectorship. Yet, if he had lived out the next winter, as the debates were to have been brought on again, so it was generally thought he would have accepted of the offer. And it is yet a question what the effect of that would have been. Some have thought it would have brought on a general settlement, since now the law and the ancient government were again to take place: others have fancied just the contrary, that it would have enraged the army, so that they would either have deserted the service, or have revolted from him, and perhaps have killed him in the first fray of the tumult. 37 I will not determine which of these would have most probably happened. In these debates some of the cavalier party, or rather their children, came to bear some share. They were then all zealous commonwealth's men, according to the directions sent them from those about the king. Their business was to oppose Cromwell in all his demands, and so to weaken him at home, and expose him abroad. When some of the other party took notice of this great change, from being the abettors of prerogative to become the patrons of liberty, they pretended their education in the court and their obligation to it had engaged them that way; but now since that was out of doors, they had the common principles of human nature and the love of liberty in them as well as others. By this means, as all the old republicans assisted and protected them, so they secured themselves at the same time that they strengthened the faction against Cromwell. But these very men at the restoration shook off this disguise, and reverted to their old principles for a high prerogative and absolute power. They said they were for liberty, when it was a mean to distress one who they thought had no right to govern, but when the government returned to its old channel, it appeared they were still as firm to all prerogative notions, and as great enemies to liberty, as ever[24]. 127
I go next to give an account of Cromwell's transactions with relation to foreign affairs. He laid it down for a maxim, to spare no cost or charge in order to procure him intelligence[25]. When he understood what dealers the Jews were every where in that trade that depends on news, that is, the advancing money upon high or low interest with a proportion to the risk they run, or gain to be made as the times might turn, and in the buying and selling of the actions of money so advanced, he, more upon that account than in compliance with the principle of toleration, brought a company of them over into England, and gave them leave to build a synagogue. All the while that he was negotiating this, they were sure and good spies for him, especially with relation to Spain and Portugal[26]. The earl 128 of Orrery told me, he was once walking with him in one of the galleries of Whitehall, and a man almost in rags came in view: so he presently dismissed Orrery, and carried that man into his closet, who brought him an account of a great sum of money that the Spaniards were 129 sending over to pay their army in Flanders, but in a Dutch man of war: and he told him the places of the ship in which the money was lodged. Cromwell sent an express immediately to Smith, afterwards sir Jeremy Smith, who lay in the Downs, telling him that within a day or two such a Dutch ship would pass the channel, whom he must visit for the Spanish money, which was counterband goods, he being then in war with Spain. So when the ship passed by Dover, Smith sent, and demanded leave to search him. The Dutch captain answered, none but his masters might search him. Smith sent him word, he had set up an hour glass, and if before that was run out he did not submit to the search, he would force it. The captain saw it was in vain to struggle, and so all the money was found. Next time that Cromwell saw Orrery, he told him he had his intelligence from that contemptible man he saw him go to some days before. And thus he had on all occasions very good intelligence: he knew every thing that passed in the king's little court: and yet none of his spies were discovered but one only[27].
The greatest difficulty in him in his foreign affairs was, what side to choose? France or Spain? The prince of Condé was then in the Netherlands with a great many protestants of quality about him. He set the Spaniards on making great steps towards the gaining Cromwell into their interests. Spain ordered their ambassador to compliment him. He was esteemed one of their ablest men[28]: his name was Don Alonso de Cardenas: he offered, that if Cromwell would join with them, they would engage themselves to make no peace till he should recover Calais again 130 to England. This was very agreeable to Cromwell, who thought it would recommend him much to the nation if he could restore that town again to the English empire, after it had been a hundred years in the hands of the French. Mazarin hearing of this, sent one over to negotiate with him, but at first without a character: and, to outbid the Spaniard, he offered to assist Cromwell to take Dunkirk, which was a place of much more importance. The prince of Condé sent over one likewise to offer Cromwell to turn protestant, and, if he would give him a fleet with good troops, he would make a descent on Guienne, where he did not doubt but that he should be assisted by the protestants; and that he should so distress France, as to obtain such conditions for them and for England as Cromwell himself should dictate. Upon this offer Cromwell sent Stoupe round all France[29], 38 to talk with their most eminent men, to see into their strength, into their present disposition, the oppressions they lay under, and their inclinations to trust the prince of Condé. He went from Paris down the Loire, then to Bourdeaux, from thence to Montauban, and across the south of France to Lyons: he was instructed to talk to them only as a traveller, and to assure them of Cromwell's zeal and care of them, which he magnified every where. The protestants were then very much at their ease: for Mazarin, who thought of nothing but how to enrich his family, took care to maintain the edicts better than they 131 had been in any time formerly. So he returned, and gave Cromwell an account of the ease they were then in, and of their resolution to be quiet. They had a very bad opinion of the prince of Condé as an impious and immoral man, who sought nothing but his own greatness, to which they believed that he was ready to sacrifice all his friends, and every cause that he espoused. This settled Cromwell as to that particular. He also found that the cardinal had such spies on that prince, that he knew every message that had passed between them: therefore he would have no farther correspondence with him: he said upon that to Stoupe, Stultus est, et garrulus, et venditur a suis cardinali. That which determined him afterwards in the choice was this: he found the parties grew so strong against him at home, that he saw if the king or his brother were assisted by France with an army of Huguenots to make a descent in England, which was threatened if he should join with Spain, this might prove very dangerous to him, who had so many enemies at home and so few friends[30]. This particular consideration, with relation to himself, made great impression on him; for he knew the Spaniards could give those princes no strength, nor had they any protestant 132 subjects to assist them in any such design. Upon this occasion K. James told me, that among other prejudices he had at the protestant religion this was one, that both his brother and himself, being in many companies in Paris incognito, where they met many protestants, he found they were all alienated from them, and were great admirers of Cromwell: so he believed they were all rebels in their heart. I answered, that foreigners were no other way concerned in the quarrels of their neighbours, than to see who could or would assist them: the coldness they had seen formerly in the court of England with relation to them, and the zeal which was then expressed, must naturally make them depend on one that seemed resolved to protect them. As the negotiation went on between France and England, Cromwell would have the king and his brothers dismissed the kingdom[31]. Mazarin consented to this; for he thought it more honourable that the French king should send them away of his own accord, than that it should be done pursuant to an article with Cromwell. Great excuses were made for doing it: they had some money given them, and were sent away loaded with promises of constant supplies that were never meant to be performed: and they retired to Cologne; for the Spaniards were not yet out of hope of gaining Cromwell. But when that vanished, they invited them to Brussells, and they settled great appointments on them in their way, which was always to promise much, how little soever they could perform. They also settled a pay for such of the subjects of the three kingdoms as would come and serve under our princes: but few came, except from Ireland: of these some regiments were formed. But though this gave them a great and lasting interest in our court, especially in K. James, yet they did not much to deserve it. 133
Before king Charles left Paris he changed his religion, but by whose persuasion is not yet known: only cardinal de Retz was of the secret, and lord Aubigny had a great hand in it. It was kept a great secret. Chancellor Hyde had some suspicion of it, but would never suffer himself to believe it quite[32]. Soon after the restoration, that cardinal 134 came over in disguise, and had an audience of the king: what passed is not known[33]. The first ground I had to believe it was this: the marquis de Roucy, who was the man of the greatest family in France that continued protestant to the last, was much pressed by that cardinal to change his religion: he was his kinsman, and his particular friend. Among other reasons one that he urged was, that the religion must certainly be ruined, and that they could expect no protection from England, for to his certain knowledge both the princes were already changed. Roucy told this in great confidence to his minister, who after his death sent an advertisement of it to my self. Sir Allan Brodrick, a great confident of the chancellor's, who from being very atheistical became in the last years of his life an eminent penitent, as he was a man of great parts, with whom I had lived long in great confidence, on his deathbed sent me likewise an account of this matter, which he believed was done in Fountainebleau, before king Charles was sent to Cologne. As for king James, it seems he was not reconciled at that time: for he told me, that being in a monastery in Flanders, 39 a nun desired him to pray every day, that if he was not in the right way, God would bring him into it: and he said, the impression these words made on him never left him till he changed.
To return to Cromwell: while he was balancing in his mind what was fit for him to do, Gage, who had been a priest, came over from the West Indies, and gave him such an account of the feebleness, as well as of the wealth, of the Spaniards in those parts, as made him conclude that 135 it would be both a great and an easy conquest to seize on their dominions[34]; by this he reckoned he would be supplied with such a treasure, that his government would be established before he should need to have any recourse to a parliament for money. Spain would never admit of a peace with England between the tropics: so he was in a state of war with them as to those parts, even before he declared war in Europe. He upon that equipped a fleet with a force sufficient, as he hoped, to have seized Hispaniola and Cuba; and Gage had assured him, that success in that expedition would make all the rest fall into his hands. Stoupe, being on another occasion called to his closet, saw him one day very intent in looking on a map, and in measuring distances. Stoupe saw it was a map of the bay of Mexico, and observed who printed it. So, there being no discourse upon that subject, Stoupe went next day to the printer to buy the map. The printer denied he had printed it. Stoupe affirmed he had seen it. Then he said, it must be only in Cromwell's hand; for he only had some of the prints, and had given him a strict charge to sell none till he had leave given him. So Stoupe perceived there was a design that way. And when the time of setting out the fleet came on, all were in a gaze whither it was to go: some fancied it was to rob the church of Loretto, which occasioned a fortification to be drawn round it: others talked of Rome itself; for Cromwell's preachers had this often in their mouths, that if it were not for the divisions at home, he would go and sack Babylon: others talked of Cadiz, though he had not yet broke with the Spaniards. The French could not penetrate into the secret. Cromwell had not finished his alliance 136 with them: so he was not bound to give them an account of the expedition: all he said upon it was, that he sent out this fleet to guard the seas, and to restore England to its dominion on that element. Stoupe happened to say in a company, he believed the design was on the West Indies. The Spanish ambassador, hearing that, sent for him very privately, to ask him upon what ground he said it: and he offered to lay down £10,000 if he could make any discovery of that. Stoupe owned to me he had a great mind to the money, and fancied he betrayed nothing if he did discover the grounds of these conjectures, since nothing had been trusted to him: but he expected greater matters from Cromwell, and so kept the secret, and said only, that, in a diversity of conjectures, that seemed to him more probable than any other. But the ambassador made no account of that, nor did he think it worth the writing to Don John, then at Brussells, about it[35].
Stoupe writ it over as his own conjecture to one about the prince of Condé, who at first hearing it was persuaded that that must be the design, and went next day to suggest it to Don John: but he relied so much on the ambassador that this made no impression; and indeed all the ministers whom he employed knew that they were not to disturb him with troublesome news: of which K. Charles told a pleasant story. One whom Don John was sending to some court in Germany, came to the king to ask his commands: he desired him only to write him news: the Spaniard asked him, whether he would have true or false news? and when the king seemed amazed at the question, he added that if he writ him true news the king must be secret, for he knew he must write news to Don John that would be acceptable, true or false. When the ministers of that court shewed that they would be served in such a manner, it is no wonder to see how their affairs have declined. This matter of the fleet continued a great secret; 137 and some months after that, Stoupe being accidentally with Cromwell, one came from the fleet through Ireland with a letter. The bearer looked like one that brought no welcome news; and as soon as Cromwell had read the letter, he dismissed Stoupe, who went immediately to the earl of Leicester, then lord Lisle, and told him what he had seen. He being then of Cromwell's council went to Whitehall, and came back, and told Stoupe of the descent made on Hispaniola, and of the misfortune that had happened. It was then late, and was the post night for Flanders; so Stoupe writ it as news to his correspondent, some days before the Spanish ambassador knew any thing of it. Don John was amazed at the news, and had never any regard to the ambassador after that; but had a great opinion of Stoupe, and ordered the ambassador to make him theirs at any rate. The ambassador sent for him, and asked him, now that it appeared he had guessed right, what were 40 his grounds: and when he told what they were, the ambassador owned he had reason to conclude as he did upon what he saw. And after that he made great use of Stoupe: but he himself was never esteemed so much as he had been. This deserved to be set down so particularly, since by it it appears that the greatest designs may be discovered by an undue carelessness. The court of France was amazed at the undertaking, and was glad that it had miscarried; for the cardinal said, if he had suspected it, he would have made peace with Spain on any terms, rather than to have given way to that which would have been such an addition to England, as must have brought all the wealth of the world into their hands. The fleet took Jamaica: but that was small gain, though much magnified to cover the failing of the main design[36] The war after that broke out, in which Dunkirk was indeed taken, and put in Cromwell's hands; but the trade of 138 England suffered more in that than in any former war: so he lost the heart of the city by that means.
Cromwell had two signal occasions given him to shew his zeal in protecting the protestants abroad. The duke of Savoy raised a new persecution of the Vaudois: so Cromwell sent to Mazarin, desiring him to put a stop to that; adding, that he knew well they had that duke in their power, and could restrain him as they pleased: and if they did it not, he must presently break with them. Mazarin objected to this as unreasonable: he promised to do good offices, but he could not be obliged to answer for the effects they might have. This did not satisfy Cromwell: so they obliged the duke of Savoy to put a stop to that unjust fury: and Cromwell raised a great sum for the Vaudois, and sent over Morland to settle all their concerns and supply all their losses. There was also a tumult in Nimes[37], in which some disorder had been committed by the Huguenots: and they, apprehending severe proceedings upon it, sent one over with great expedition to Cromwell, who sent him back to Paris in an hour's time with a very effectual letter to his ambassador, requiring him either to prevail that the matter might be passed over, or to come away immediately. Mazarin complained of this way of proceeding as too imperious, but the necessity of their affairs made him yield. These things raised Cromwell's character abroad, and made him be much depended on.
His ambassador at this time was Lockhart, a Scotchman, who had married his niece, and was in high favour with him, as he well deserved to be[38]. He was both a wise and 139 a gallant man, calm and virtuous, and one that carried the generosities of friendship very far. He was made governor of Dunkirk and ambassador at the same time; but he told me, that when he was sent afterwards ambassador by K. Charles, he found he had nothing of that regard that was paid him in Cromwell's time. Stoupe told me of a great design Cromwell had intended to begin his kingship with, if he had assumed it. He resolved to set up a council for the protestant religion, in opposition to the congregation de propaganda fide at Rome. He intended it should consist of seven councillors, and four secretaries for different provinces. These were the first, France, Switzerland, and the Valleys: the Palatinate and the other Calvinists were the second: Germany, the North, and Turkey were the third: and the East and West Indies were the fourth. These were to have 500 salary apiece, and to keep a correspondence every where, to know the state of religion all over the world, that so all good designs might be by their means protected and assisted. Stoupe was to have the second province, and they were to have a fonds of 10,000 a year at their disposal for ordinary emergents, but to be further supplied as occasions should require it. Chelsey college was to be made up for them, which was then an old decayed building, that had been at first raised for a design not unlike this, to be a college for writers of controversy. I thought it was not fit to let such a project as this was be quite lost: it was certainly a noble 140 one, but how far he would have pursued it must be left to conjecture[39].
Stoupe told me another remarkable passage in his employment under Cromwell. He had desired all that were about the prince of Condé to let him know some news, in return of that he writ to them. So he had a letter from one of them, giving an account of an Irishman newly gone over, who had said he would kill Cromwell, and that he was to lodge in King street, Westminster. With this he went down to Whitehall. Cromwell being then at council, he sent him a note, letting him know that he had a business of great consequence to lay before him. Cromwell was then upon a matter that did so entirely possess him. that he, fancying it was only some piece of foreign intelligence, sent Thurloe to know what it might be. Stoupe was troubled at this, but could not refuse to shew him his letter. Thurloe made no great matter of it: he said, they had many such advertisements sent them, which signified nothing, but to make the world think the Protector was in danger of his life: and the looking too much after these things had an appearance of fear, which did ill become so great a man. Stoupe told him. King street might be soon searched. Thurloe answered, what if we find no such person ? how shall we be laughed at. Yet he ordered him to write again to Brussells, and promise any reward if a more particular discovery could be made. Stoupe was much cast down, 41 when he saw that a piece of intelligence which he hoped might have made his fortune was so little considered. He wrote to Brussells: but he had no more from thence but a confirmation of what had been writ formerly to him. And Thurloe did not think fit to make any search or any further inquiry into it: nor did he so much as acquaint Cromwell with it Stoupe being uneasy at this, told lord Lisle of it: and it happened that a few 141 weeks after Syndercomb's design of assassinating Cromwell near Brentford, as he was going to Hampton court, was discovered. When he was examined, it appeared that he was the person set out in the letters from Brussells. So Lisle said to Cromwell, this is the very man of whom Stoupe had the notice given him[40]. Cromwell seemed amazed at this, and sent for Stoupe, and in great wrath reproached him for his ingratitude in concealing a matter of such consequence to him. Stoupe upon this shewed him the letters he had received; and put him in mind of the note he had sent in to him, which was immediately after he had the first letter, and that he had sent out Thurloe to him. At that Cromwell seemed yet more amazed, and sent for Thurloe, to whose face Stoupe affirmed the matter: nor did he deny any part of it; but only said that he had many such advertisements sent him, in which till this time he had never found any truth. Cromwell replied sternly, that he ought to have acquainted him with it, and left him to judge of the importance of it. Thurloe desired to speak in private with Cromwell: so Stoupe was dismissed, and went away, not doubting but Thurloe would be disgraced. But, as he understood from Lisle afterward, Thurloe shewed Cromwell such instances of his care and fidelity on all such occasions, and humbly acknowledged his error in this matter, but imputed it wholly to his care, both for his honour and quiet, that he pacified him entirely: and indeed he was so much in all Cromwell's secrets, that it was not safe to disgrace him without destroying him; and that, it seems, Cromwell could not resolve on. Thurloe having mastered this point, that he might further justify his not being so attentive as 142 he ought to have been, did so search into Stoupe's whole deportment, that he possessed Cromwell with such an ill opinion of him, that after that he never treated him with any confidence. So he found how dangerous it was even to preserve a prince, (so he called him,) when a minister was wounded in the doing of it; and that the minister would be too hard for the prince, even though his own safety was concerned in it[41].
These are all the memorable things that I have learnt concerning Cromwell; of whom so few have spoken with any temper, some commending and others condemning him, and both out of measure, that I thought a just account of him, which I had from sure hands, might be no unacceptable thing. He never could shake off the roughness[42] of his education and temper: he spoke always long, and very ungracefully. The enthusiast and the dissembler mixed so equally in a great part of his deportment, that it was not easy to tell which was the prevailing character. He was indeed both; as I understood from Wilkins and Tillotson, the one having married his sister and the other his niece. He was a true enthusiast, but with the principle 143 formerly mentioned, from which he might be easily led into all the practices both of falsehood and cruelty: which was, that he thought moral laws were only binding on ordinary occasions, but that upon extraordinary ones these might be superseded. When his own designs did not lead him out of the way, he was a lover of justice and virtue, and even of learning, though much decried at that time.
He studied to seek out able and honest men, and to employ them: and so having heard that my father had a very great reputation in Scotland for piety and integrity, though he knew him to be a royalist[43], he sent to him, desiring him to accept of a judge's place, and to do justice to his country, hoping only that he would not act against his government; but he would not press him to subscribe or swear to it. My father refused it in a pleasant way, so being a facetious man, and abounding in little stories. So when he who brought the message was running out into Cromwell's commendation, my father told a story of a pilgrim in popery, who came to a church where one saint Kilmaclotius was in great reverence: so the pilgrim was bid pray to him: but he answered, he knew nothing of him, for he was not in his breviary: but when he was told how great a saint he was, he prayed this collect; O sancte Kilmacloti, tu nobis hactenus es incognitus; hoc sohim a te rogo, ut si bona tua nobis non prosunt, saltern mala ne noccant. My father applied it, that he desired no other favour of him, but leave to live privately, without the imposition of oaths and subscriptions: and ever after that he lived in great quiet; though Overton, one of Cromwell's major-generals, who was a high republican, being for some time at Aberdeen, where we then lived, my father and he 144 were often together: in particular they were alone for about two 42 hours the night after the order came from Cromwell to take away his commissions, and to put him in arrest[44]. Upon that, Howard, afterwards earl of Carlisle, being sent down to inquire into all the plots that those men had been in, heard of this long privacy: but when with that he heard what my father's character was, he made no further inquiry into it, but said Cromwell was very uneasy when any good man was questioned for any thing. This gentleness had in a great measure quieted people's minds with relation to him, and his maintaining the honour of the nation in all foreign countries gratified the vanity which is very natural to Englishmen[45]; of which he was so careful, that though he was not a crowned head, yet his ambassadors had all the respects paid them which our king's ambassadors ever had. He said, the dignity of the crown was upon the account of the nation, of which the king was only the representative head; so the nation being still the same, he would have the same regard paid to his ministers.
Another instance of this pleased him much. Blake with the fleet happened to be at Malaga before he made war upon Spain: and some of his seamen went ashore, and met the hostie carried about and not only paid no respect to it, but laughed at those who did: so one of the priests put the people on to the resenting this indignity; they fell upon them, and beat them severely. When they returned to their ship, they complained of this usage: and upon that Blake sent a trumpet to the viceroy, to demand the priest who was the chief instrument in that ill usage. The viceroy answered, he had no authority over the priests, 145 and so could not dispose of him. Blake upon that sent him word, that he would not inquire who had the power to send the priest to him, but if he were not sent within three hours he would burn their town: and they, being in no condition to resist him, sent the priest to him, who justified himself upon the petulant behaviour of the seamen. Blake answered, that if he had sent a complaint to him of it, he would have punished them severely, since he would not suffer his men to affront the established religion of any place at which he touched: but he took it ill, that he set on the Spaniards to do it, for he would have all the world to know that an Englishman was only to be punished by an Englishman: and so he treated the priest civilly, and sent him back, being satisfied that he had him at his mercy. Cromwell was much delighted with this, and read the letters in council with great satisfaction; and said he hoped he should make the name of an Englishman as great as ever that of a Roman had been. The States of Holland were in such dread of him, that they took care to give him no sort of umbrage: and when at any time the king or his brothers came to see their sister, the princess royal, within a day or two after they used to send a deputation to let them know that Cromwell had required of the States that they should give them no harbour. K. Charles, when he was seeking for colours for the war with the Dutch in the year 1672, urged this for one. that they suffered some of his rebels to live in their provinces. Boreel, then their ambassador, answered, that was a maxim of long standing among them, not to inquire upon what account strangers came to live in their country, but to receive them all, unless they had been concerned in conspiracies against the persons of princes. The king told him upon that how they had used both himself and his brother. Boreel, in great simplicity, answered: Ha! sire, cela estoit une antre chose: Cromwell c'estoit im grand Jiomnie, et il se faisoit craindre et par terre et par mer. This was very rough. The king's answer was: Je me 146 feray craindre aussi a mon tour: but he was scarce as good as his word[46].
Cromwell's favourite alliance was with Sweden. Carolus Gustavus and he lived in a great conjunction of counsels[47]. Even Algernon Sidney, who was not inclined to think or speak well of kings, commended him to me, and said he had just notions of public liberty; and added, that queen Christina seemed to have them likewise. But she was much changed from that, when I waited on her at Rome; for she complained of us as a factious nation, that did not readily comply with the commands of our princes. All Italy trembled at the name of Cromwell, and seemed under a panic fear as long as he lived. His fleet scoured the Mediterranean: and the Turks durst not offend him, but delivered up Hyde[48], that kept up the character of an ambassador from the king there, who was brought over and executed for it. And the putting the brother of the king of Portugal's ambassador to death for murder, was the carrying justice very far; since, though in the strictness of the law of 147 nations it is only the ambassador's own person that is exempted from any authority but his master's that sends him, 43 yet the practice had gone in favour of all that the ambassador owned to belong to him[49]. Cromwell shewed his good understanding in nothing more than in seeking out capable and worthy men for all employments, but most particularly for the courts of law, which gave a general satisfaction.
Thus he lived, and at last died, on his auspicious third of September[50], of so slight a sickness, that his death was not looked for. He had two sons, and four daughters. His sons were weak[51], but honest men. Richard, the eldest, though declared protector in pursuance of a nomination pretended to be made by him, the truth of which was much questioned[52], was not at all bred to business, nor indeed capable of it. He was innocent of all the ill his father had done: so there was no prejudice lay against him: and both the royalists and presbyterians fancied he favoured them, though he pretended to be an independent. But all the commonwealth party cried out upon his assuming the protectorship, as a high usurpation; since whatever his father had from his parliaments was only personal, and so fell with him[53]: yet in opposition to this, the city. of London, and all the counties and cities almost in England, sent up addresses congratulatory, as well as condoling. So little do these pompous appearances of respect signify. Tillotson told me, that a week after Cromwell's death he being by accident at Whitehall, and hearing there was to be a fast that day in the household, he out of curiosity went into the presence chamber where it was held. On 148 the one side of a table Richard with the rest of Cromwell's family were placed, and six of the preachers were on the other side: Thomas Goodwin, Owen, Caril, and Sterry, were of the number. There he heard a great deal of strange stuff, enough to disgust a man for ever of that enthusiastic boldness. God was, as it were, reproached with Cromwell's services, and challenged for taking him away so soon. Goodwin, who had pretended to assure them in a prayer that he was not to die, which was but a very few minutes before he expired, had now the impudence to say to God, Thou hast deceived us, and we were deceived. Sterry, praying for Richard, used those indecent words, next to blasphemy, Make him the brightness of the father's glory, and the express image of his person[54]. Richard was put on giving his father a pompous funeral, by which his debts increased so upon him, that he was soon run out of all credit. When the parliament met, his party tried to get a recognition of his protectorship: but it soon appeared they had no strength to carry it. Fleetwood, that married Ireton's widow, set up a council of officers: and these resolved to lay aside Richard, who had neither genius nor friends, neither treasure nor army to support him[55]. He desired only security for the debts he had contracted; which was promised, though not performed. And so without any struggle he withdrew, and became a private man[56]. And as he had done hurt to nobody, so nobody did ever study to hurt him; by a rare instance both of the instability of human greatness and of 149 the security of innocence. His brother had been made by the father lieutenant of Ireland, and had the most spirit of the two; but he could not stand his ground when his brother let go his hold[57]. One of Cromwell's daughters was married to Claypole, and died a little before himself: another was married to the earl of Fauconberg, a wise and worthy woman, more likely to have maintained the post than either of her brothers; according to a saying that went of her. that those who wore breeches deserved petticoats better, but if those in petticoats had been in breeches they would have held them faster[58]. The other daughter was married, first to the earl of Warwick's heir, and afterwards to one Russell. I knew both the lady Fauconberg and her sister. They were both very worthy persons[59]. 150
Upon Richard's leaving the stage, the commonwealth was again set up: and the parliament which Cromwell had broke was brought together[1]: but the army and they fell into new disputes: so they were again broke by them: and upon that the nation was like to fall into great convulsions[2]. The enthusiasts became very fierce, and talked of nothing but the destroying all the records and the law, which, they said, had been all made by a succession of tyrants and papists: so they resolved to model all of new by a levelling and a spiritual government of the saints. There was so little sense in this, that Nevill and Harrington[3], with some others, set up in Westminster a meeting 151 to consider of a form of government that should secure liberty, and yet preserve the nation. They ran chiefly on having a parliament elected by ballot, in which the nation should be represented according to the proportion of what was paid in taxes towards the public expense: and by this parliament a council of twenty-four was to be chosen by ballot: and every year eight of these were to be changed, and might not again be brought into it but after an interval of three years: by these the nation was to be governed, and they were to give an account of the administration to the parliament every year. This meeting was a matter both of diversion and scorn, to see a few persons take upon them to form a scheme of government: and it made many conclude it was necessary to call home the king, that so matters 44 might again fall into their old channel. Lambert became the man on whom their army depended most[4]. Upon his forcing the parliament, great applications were made to Monk to declare for the parliament: but under this the declaring for the king was generally understood; yet he kept himself on such a reserve, that he declared all the while in the most solemn manner for commonwealth, and against a single person, in particular against the king: so that none had any ground from him to believe he had any design that way[5]. Some have thought that he 152 intended to try, if it was possible, to set up for himself: others believed rather, that he had no settled design any way, and resolved to do as occasions should be offered to him. The Scottish nation did certainly hope he would bring home the king[6]. He drew the greatest part of the army towards the borders, where Lambert advanced near him, who had 7000 horse. Monk was stronger in foot[7]: and being apprehensive of engaging on such disadvantage, he sent Clarges to the lord Fairfax for his advice and assistance, who returned answer by Dr. Fairfax, now secretary to the archbishop of Canterbury, and assured him he would raise Yorkshire on the first of January; and he desired him to press upon Lambert, in case that he sent a detachment to Yorkshire. On the first of January, Fairfax 153 appeared with about 100 gentlemen and their servants. But so much did he still maintain his great credit with the army, that the night after, the Irish brigade, that consisted of 1200 horse, and was the rear of Lambert's army, came over to him. Upon that Lambert retreated, finding his army was so little sure to him, and resolved to march back to London. He was followed by Monk, who when he came to Yorkshire met with Fairfax, and offered to resign the chief command to him. The lord Fairfax refused it, but pressed Monk to declare for a free parliament: yet in that he was so reserved to him, that Fairfax knew not how to depend on him[8]. But as Lambert was making haste up, his army mouldered away, and he himself was brought up a prisoner, and was put in the Tower of London. Yet not long after he made his escape[9], and gathered a few troops about him in Northamptonshire; but these were soon scattered: for Ingoldsby[10], though one of the king's judges, raised Buckinghamshire against him. And so little force seemed now in that party, that with very little opposition Ingoldsby took him prisoner, and brought him into 154 Northampton: where Lambert, as Ingoldsby told me, entertained him with a pleasant reflection for all his misfortunes. The people were in great crowds applauding and rejoicing for the success: so Lambert put Ingoldsby in mind of what Cromwell had said to them both, near that very place, in the year 1650, when they, with a body of the officers, were going down after their army that was marching to Scotland, the people all the while shouting and wishing them success: Lambert upon that said to Cromwell, he was glad to see they had the nation of their side: Cromwell answered, do not trust to that; for these very persons would shout as much if you and I were going to be hanged. So Lambert said he looked of himself now as in a fair way to that, and began to think Cromwell prophesied.
Upon the dispersing Lambert's army, Monk marched southward, and was now the object of all men's hope[11]. At London all sorts of people began to cabal together, royalists, presbyterians, and republicans. Holles told me, the presbyterians pressed the royalists to be quiet, and to leave the game in their hands; for their appearing would give jealousy, and hurt that which they meant to promote[12]. He and Ashley Cooper, Grimston and Annesley, met often with Manchester, Robarts, and the rest of the presbyterian party: and the ministers of London were very active in the city: so that when Monk came up, he was pressed to declare himself[13]. At first he would only declare for the 155 parliament that Lambert had forced. But there was then a great fermentation all over the nation. Monk and the parliament grew jealous of one another, even while they tried who could give the best words, and express their confidence in the highest terms of one another. I will pursue the relation of this transaction no further: for this matter is well known.
The king had gone in autumn 1659 to the meeting at the Pyrenees, where cardinal Mazarin and Don Louis de Haro were negotiating a peace[14]. He applied himself to both sides, to try what assistance he might expect upon their concluding the peace. It was then known that he went to mass sometimes, that so he might recommend himself the more effectually to both courts; yet this was carried secretly, and was confidently denied. Mazarin still talked to Lockhart upon the foot of the old confidence: for he went thither to watch over the treaty; though England was now in such convulsions, that no minister from thence could be much considered, unless it was upon his own account. But matters were ripening so fast towards a revolution in England, that the king came back to Flanders in all haste, and went from thence to Breda. Lockhart had it in his power to have made a great fortune, if he had begun first, and had brought the king to Dunkirk. As soon as the peace of the Pyrenees was made, he came over, and found Monk at London, and took all the pains he could to penetrate into his designs. But Monk continued still to protest to him in the solemnest manner possible that he would be true to the commonwealth, and against 156 the royal family[15]. Lockhart went away, persuaded that matters would continue still in that state: so that when his old friend Middleton writ to him desiring him to make his own terms, if he would invite the king to Dunkirk, he said, he was trusted by the commonwealth, and could not betray them.
The house of commons put Monk on breaking the gates of the city of London, not doubting but that would render him so odious to them, that it would force him to depend wholly on themselves. He did it: and soon after he saw how odious he was become by it. So conceiving a high indignation at those who had put him on such an ungracious piece of service, he sent about all that night to the ministers and other active citizens, assuring them that he would quickly repair that error, if they would forgive it. So the turn was sudden: for the city sent and invited him to dine the next day at Guildhall: and there he declared for the members whom the army had forced away in 47 and 48, who were known by the name of the secluded members. 45 And some happening to call the body that then sat at Westminster, the Rump of a Parliament[16], a sudden humour run like a madness through the whole city of roasting the rump of all sorts of animals; and thus the city expressed themselves sufficiently. Those at Westminster had now no support: so they fell unpitied and unregarded. The secluded members came, and sat down among them; but all they would do was to give orders for the summoning a new parliament to meet the first of May: and so they declared themselves dissolved[17]. 157
There was still a murmuring in the army; so great care was taken to scatter them in wide quarters, and not to suffer too many of those who were still for the old cause to lie near one another. The well and the ill affected were so mixed, that in case of any insurrection some might be ready at hand to resist them. They changed the officers that were ill affected, who were not thought fit to be trusted with the commanding those of their own stamp: and so created a mistrust between the officers and the soldiery. And above all they took care to have no more troops than was necessary about the city: and these were the best affected. This was managed with great diligence and skill: and by this conduct was that great turn brought about without the least tumult or any bloodshed; which was beyond what any person could have imagined. Of all this Monk had both the praise and the reward; though I have been told a very small share of it belonged to him[18]. Admiral Montagu[19] was then in the chief command at sea, 158 newly returned from the Sound, where he and De Ruyter, upon the orders they received from their masters, had brought the two northern kings to a peace; the king of Sweden dying as it was a making up. He was soon gained to be for the king; and he dealt so effectually with the whole fleet, that the turn there was as silently brought about, without any revolt or opposition, as it had been in the army. The republicans went about as madmen, to rouse up their party; but their time was past. All were either as men amazed or asleep: they had neither the skill nor the courage to make any opposition. The elections of parliament men run all the other way. So they saw their business was quite lost, and they felt themselves struck as with a spirit of giddiness; and then every man thought only how to save or secure himself. And now they saw how deceitful the argument was from success, which they had used so oft, and triumphed so much upon. For whereas success in the field, which was the foundation of their argument, depended much upon the conduct and courage of armies, in which the will of man had a large share, here was a thing of another nature. Their union was broke, and their courage sank, without any visible reason for either; and a nation that had run on long in such a fierce opposition to the royal family was now turned as one man to call home the king.
The nation had one great happiness during the long course of the civil wars, that no foreigners had got footing among them[20]. Spain was sinking to nothing: France was under a base spirited minister: and both were in war all the while. Now a peace was made between them, and very probably, according to what is in Mazarin's letters, they would have joined forces to have restored the king. The nation was by this means entirely in its own hands: and 159 now, returning to its wits, was in a condition to put every thing in joint again: whereas, if foreigners had been possessed of any important place, they might have had a large share of the management, and would have been sure to have taken care of themselves. Enthusiasm was now languid: for that, owing its mechanical force to the liveliness of the blood and spirits, men in disorder and depressed could not raise in themselves those heats with which they were formerly wont to transport both themselves and others. Chancellor Hyde was all this while very busy: he sent over Dr. Morley, who talked with the presbyterians much of great moderation in general, but would enter into no particulars: only he took care to let them know he was a Calvinist: and they had the best opinion of such of the church of England as were of that persuasion[21]. Hyde wrote in the king's name to all the leading men, and got the king himself to write a great many letters in a very obliging manner. Some that had been faulty sent over considerable presents, with assurances that they would redeem all that was past with their zeal for the future. These were all accepted of: their money was also very welcome; for the king needed money when his matters were on that crisis, and he had many tools at work, the management of which was so entirely the chancellor's single performance that there was scarce any other that had so much as a share in it with him. He kept a register of all the king's promises, and of his own; and did all that lay in 160 his power afterwards to get them all to be performed. He was also all that while giving the king many wise and good advices; but he did it too much with the air of a governor, or of a lawyer. Yet then the king was wholly in his hands[22].
I need not open the scene of the new parliament, or convention, as it came afterwards to be called, because it was not summoned by the king's writ. Such an unanimity appeared in their proceedings, that there was not the least dispute among them, but upon one single point: yet that was a very important one. Hale[23], afterwards the famous chief justice, moved that a committee might be appointed to look into the propositions that had been made, and the concessions that 46 had been offered by the late king during the war, particularly at the treaty of Newport, that from thence they might digest such propositions as they should think fit to be sent over to the king. This was well seconded, but I do not remember by whom. It was foreseen that such a motion might be set on foot: so Monk 161 was instructed how to answer it, whensoever it should be proposed. He told the house, that there was yet, beyond all men's hopes, an universal quiet all over the nation; but there were many incendiaries still at work, trying where they could first raise the flame. He said, he had such copious informations sent him of these things, that it was not fit they should be generally known: he could not answer for the peace, either of the nation or of the army, if any delay was put to the sending for the king: what need was there of sending propositions to him? Might they not as well prepare them, and offer them to him, when he should come over? He was to bring neither army nor treasure with him, either to fright them or to corrupt them. So he moved, that they would immediately send commissioners to bring over the king: and said, that he must lay the blame of all the blood or mischief that might follow on the heads of those that should still insist on any motion that might delay the present settlement of the nation. This was echoed with such a shout over the house, that the motion was no more insisted on[24].
This was indeed the great service that Monk did. It was chiefly owing to the post he was in, and to the credit he had gained: for as to the restoration itself, the tide made so strong that he only went into it so dexterously as to get much fame and great rewards for that which will have still a great appearance in history. If he had died soon after, he might have been more justly admired, because less known, and seen only in one advantageous light: but he lived long enough to have his stupidity and his other ill 162 qualities be well known: so false a judgment are men apt to make upon outward appearances[25]. To the king's coming in without conditions may be well imputed all the errors of his reign: and therefore when the earl of Southampton came to see and feel what he was a like to prove, he said once in great wrath to chancellor Hyde, it was to him they owed all they either felt or feared; for if he had not possessed them in all his letters with such an opinion of the king, they would have taken care to have put it out of his power either to do himself or them that mischief that was like to be the effect of their trusting him so entirely. Hyde answered, that he thought he had so true a judgment, and so much good nature, that when the age of pleasure should be over, and the idleness of his exile, which made him seek new pleasures for want of other employment, was turned to an obligation to mind affairs, then he would have shaken off those unhappy entanglements[26]. I must often put my 163 reader in mind, that I leave all common transactions to ordinary books. If at any time I say things that occur in other books, it is partly to keep the thread of the narration in an unintangled method, and partly because I either have not read these things in books, or, at least, I do not remember to have read them so clearly and particularly as I have related them. I now leave a mad and confused scene, to open a more august and splendid one. 164
47I divide king Charles his reign into two books, not so much because, it consisting of twenty-four years, it fell, if divided at all, naturally to put twelve years in a book: but I have a much better reason for it, since as to the first twelve years, though I knew the affairs of Scotland very authentically, yet I had only such a general knowledge of the affairs of England as I could pick up at a distance: whereas I lived so near the scene, and had indeed such a share in several parts of it, during the last twelve years, that I can write of these with much more certainty, as well as more fully, than of the first twelve. I will therefore enlarge more particularly, within the compass that I have fixed for this book, on the affairs of Scotland; both out of the inbred love that all men have to their native country, but more particularly, that I may give some useful instructions to those of my own order and profession, concerning the conduct of the bishops of Scotland: for having observed, with more than ordinary niceness, all the errors that were committed both at the first setting up of episcopacy and in the whole progress of its continuance in Scotland, till it was again overturned there, it may be of some use to see all that matter in a full view and in a clear and true light.
As soon as it was fixed that the king was to be restored, a great many went over to make their court: among these 165 Sharp, who was employed by the resolutioners of Scotland, was one[1]. He carried with him a letter from the earl of Glencairn to Hyde, made soon after earl of Clarendon[2], recommending him as the only person capable to manage the design of setting up episcopacy in Scotland: upon which he was received into great confidence. Yet, as he had observed very carefully the success of Monk's solemn protestations against the king and for a commonwealth, it seemed he was so pleased with the original, that he resolved to copy after it, without letting himself be diverted from it by anxious scruples, or any tenderness of conscience: for he stuck neither at solemn protestations, both by word of mouth and by letters, of which I have seen many proofs, nor at appeals to God of his sincerity in acting for the presbytery, both in prayers and on other occasions, joining with these many dreadful imprecations on himself if he did prevaricate. He was all the while maintained by the presbyterians as their agent, and he continued to give them a constant account of the progress of his negotiation in their service, while he was indeed undermining it. This piece of craft was so visible, he having repeated his protestations to so many persons as they grew jealous of him, that when he threw off the mask, about a year after this, it laid a foundation of such a character of him, that nothing could ever bring people to any tolerable thoughts of a man whose dissimulation and treachery was so well known, and of which so many proofs were to be seen under his own hand. With the restoration of the king a spirit of extravagant joy being spread over the nation, that brought on with it the throwing off the very professions of virtue and piety: all ended in entertainments and drunkenness, which overran 166 the three kingdoms to such a degree, that it very much corrupted all their morals[3]. Under the colour of drinking the king's health, there were great disorders and much riot every where: and the pretences to religion, both in those of the hypocritical sort, and of the more honest but no less pernicious enthusiasts, gave great advantages, as well as they furnished much matter, to the profane mockers at all true piety. Those who had been concerned in the former transactions thought they could not redeem themselves from the censures and jealousies that these brought on them by any method that was more sure and more easy, than by going in to the stream, and laughing at all religion, telling or making stories to expose both themselves and their party as impious and ridiculous.
The king[4] was then thirty years of age, and, as might have been supposed, past the levities of youth and the extravagance of pleasure. He had a very good understanding: he knew well the state of affairs both at home and abroad. He had a softness of temper, that charmed all who came near him, till they found how little they could depend on good looks, kind words, and fair promises, in which he was liberal to excess, because he intended nothing by them but to get rid of importunity, and to silence all further pressing upon him. He seemed to have no sense of religion: both at prayers and sacrament he, as it were, took care to satisfy people that he was in no sort concerned in that about which he was employed: so that he was very far from being an hypocrite, unless his assisting at those performances was a sort of hypocrisy, as no doubt it was; but he was sure not to increase that by any the least appearance of devotion. He said once to my self, he was no atheist, but he could not think God would make a man 167 miserable only for taking a little pleasure out of the way. He disguised his popery to the last: but when he talked freely, he could not help letting himself 48 out against the liberty that under the Reformation all men took of inquiring into matters: for from their inquiring into matters of religion, they carried the humour further, to inquire into matters of state. He said often, he thought government was a much safer and easier thing where the authority was believed infallible, and the faith and submission of the people was implicit: about which I had once much discourse with him. He was affable and easy, and loved to be made so by all about him. The great art of keeping him long was, the being easy, and the making every thing easy to him[5]. He had made such observations on the French government, that he thought a king who might be checked, or have his ministers called to an account by a parliament, was but a king in name. He had a great compass of knowledge, though he was never capable of great application or study. He understood the mechanics and physic: and was a good chemist, and much set on several preparations of mercury, chiefly the fixing it. He understood navigation well: but above all he knew the architecture of ships so perfectly, that in that respect he was exact rather more than became a prince[6]. His apprehension was quick, and his memory good; and he was an everlasting talker[7]. He told his stories with a good grace: but they came in his way too often. He had a very ill opinion both of men and women; and did not think there was either sincerity or chastity in 168 the world out of principle, but that some had either the one or the other out of humour or vanity. He thought that nobody served him out of love: and so he was quits with all the world, and loved others as little as he thought they loved him. He hated business, and could not be easily brought to mind any: but when it was necessary, and he was set to it, he would stay as long as his ministers had work for him. The ruin of his reign, and of all his affairs, was occasioned chiefly by his delivering himself up at his first coming over to a mad range of pleasure[8]. One of the race of the Villiers, then married to Palmer, a papist, soon after made earl of Castlemaine[9], who afterwards, being separated from him, was advanced to be duchess of Cleveland, was his first and longest mistress, by whom he had five children[10]. She was a woman of great beauty, but most enormously vicious and ravenous, foolish but imperious, 169 ever uneasy to the king, and always carrying on intrigues with other men, while yet she pretended she was jealous of him. His passion for her, and her strange behaviour towards him, did so disorder him, that often he was not master of himself, nor capable of minding business, which, in so critical a time, required great application: but he did then so entirely trust the earl of Clarendon that he left all to his care, and submitted to his advices as to so many oracles.
The earl of Clarendon was bred to the law, and was like to grow eminent in his profession. When the wars began he distinguished himself so in the house of commons, that he became considerable, and was much trusted all the while the king was at Oxford. He stayed beyond sea following the king's fortunes, till the restoration; and was now an absolute favourite, and the chief or the only minister, but with too magisterial a way. He was always pressing the king to mind his affairs, but in vain. He was a good chancellor, only a little too rough, but very impartial in the administration of justice[11]. He never seemed to understand foreign affairs well: and yet he meddled too much in them. He had too much levity in his wit, and did not always observe the decorum of his post. He was haughty[12], and was apt to reject those who addressed themselves to him, with too much contempt. He had such regard to the king, that when places were disposed of, even otherwise than as he advised, yet he would justify what the king did, and disparage the pretensions of others, not without much scorn; which created him many enemies. He was indefatigable in business, 170 though the gout did often disable him from waiting on the king: yet, during his credit, the king came constantly to him when he was laid up by the gout.
The man next to him in favour with the king was the duke of Ormond: a man every way fitted for a court, of a graceful appearance, a lively wit, and a cheerful temper: a man of great expense, decent even in his vices[13], for he always kept up the forms of religion. He had gone through many transactions in Ireland with more fidelity than success. He had made a treaty with the Irish, which was broken by the great body of them, though some few of them adhered still to him[14]. But the whole Irish nation did still pretend, that, though they broke the agreement first, yet he. or rather the king in whose name he had treated with them, was bound to perform all the articles of the treaty. He had miscarried so in the siege of Dublin that it very much lessened the opinion of his military conduct: yet his constant attendance on his master, his easiness to him, and his great sufferings for him, raised him to be lord steward of the household, and lord lieutenant of Ireland. He was firm to the protestant religion, and so far firm to the laws that he always gave good advices: but even when bad ones were followed, he was not for complaining too much of them.
49 The earl of Southampton was next to these. He was a man of great virtues, and of very good parts: he had a lively apprehension, and a good judgment. He had merited much by his constant adhering to the king's interests during the war, and by the large supplies he had sent him every year during his exile; for he had a great estate, and only three daughters to inherit it. He was made lord treasurer: but he grew soon weary of business; for as he was subject to the stone, which returned often and violently upon him, so he retained the principles of liberty, and did not go in to the violent measures of the court. When he saw the king's temper, and his way of managing, or rather of spoiling, 171 business, he grew very uneasy, and kept himself more out of the way than was consistent with that high post. The king stood in some awe of him, and saw how popular he would grow if put out of his service: and therefore he chose rather to bear with his ill humour and contradiction, than to dismiss him[15]. He left the business of the treasury wholly in the hands of his secretary, sir Philip Warwick, who was an honest but a weak man; he understood the common road of the treasury; but, though he pretended to wit and politics, he was not cut out for that, and least of all for writing of history. But he was an incorrupt man, and during seven years management of the treasury he made but an ordinary fortune out of it[16]. Before the restoration the lord treasurer had only a small salary, with an allowance for a table, but he gave, or rather sold, all the subaltern places, and made great profits out of the estate of the crown: but now, that being gone, and the earl of Southampton disdaining to sell places, the matter was settled so, that the lord treasurer was to have £8000 a year, and the king was to name all the subaltern officers. And it continued to be so all his time: but since that time the lord treasurer has both the £8000 and a main hand in the disposing of those places. 172
The man that was in the greatest credit with the earl of Southampton was sir Anthony Ashley Cooper, who had married his niece[17], and became afterwards so considerable, that he was raised to be earl of Shaftesbury. Since he came to have so great a name, and that I knew him for many years, and in a very particular manner, I will dwell a little longer on his character; for it was of a very extraordinary composition. He began to make a considerable figure very early. Before he was twenty, he came into the house of commons, and was on the king's side, and undertook to get Wiltshire and Dorsetshire to declare for him, but he was not able to effect it. Yet prince Maurice breaking articles to a town that he had got to receive him, furnished him with an excuse to forsake that side, and to turn to the parliament[18]. He had a wonderful faculty in speaking to a popular assembly, and could mix both the facetious and the serious way of arguing very agreeably. He had a particular talent of making others trust to his judgment, and depend on it: and he brought over so many to a submission to his opinion, that I never knew any man equal to him in the art of governing parties, and of making himself the head of them. He was, as to religion, a deist at best[19]. He had the dotage of astrology[20] in him to a high 173 degree: he told me, that a Dutch doctor had from the stars foretold him the whole series of his life. But that which was before him, when he told me this, proved false, if he told true: for he said he was yet to be a greater man than he had been. He fancied that after death our souls lived in stars. He had a general knowledge of the slighter parts of learning, but understood little to bottom: so he triumphed in a rambling way of talking, but argued slightly when he was held close to any point. He had a wonderful faculty at opposing, and running things down; but had not the like force in building up. He had such an extravagant vanity in setting himself out, that it was very disagreeable. He pretended that Cromwell offered to make him king. He was indeed of great use to him, in withstanding the enthusiasts of that time. He was one of those who pressed him most to accept of the kingship, because, as he said afterwards, he was sure it would ruin him. His strength lay in the knowledge of England, and of all the considerable men in it. He understood well the size of their understanding and their tempers: and he knew how to apply himself to them so dexterously, that, though by his changing sides so often it was very visible how little he was to be depended on, yet he was to the last much trusted by all the discontented party[21]. He had a no sort of virtue, for he was both a lewd and corrupt man and had a no regard either to truth or justice. 50 He was not ashamed to reckon up the many turns he had made: and he valued himself on the doing it at the properest season, and in the best manner: and was not out of countenance in owning his 174 unsteadiness and deceitfulness. This he did with so much vanity, and so little discretion, that he lost many by it, and his reputation was at last run so low that he could not have held much longer, had not he died in good time, either for his family or for his party. The former would have been ruined if he had not saved it by betraying his party[22].
Another man very near of the same sort, who passed through many great employments, was Annesley, advanced to be earl of Anglesea; who had much more knowledge, and was very learned, chiefly in the law. He had a faculty of speaking indefatigably upon every subject: but he spoke ungracefully, and did not know that he was ill at raillery, for he was always attempting it. He understood our government well, and had examined far into the original of our constitution. He was capable of great application, and was a man of a grave deportment, but stuck at nothing, and was ashamed of nothing. He was neither loved nor trusted by any man or any side: and he seemed to have no regard to the common decencies of justice and truth, but sold every thing that was in his power: and sold himself so often, that at last the price fell so low that he grew useless, because he was so well known that he was universally despised[23]. 175
Holles was a man of great courage, and of as great pride. He was counted for many years the head of the presbyterian party. He was faithful and firm to his side, and never changed through the whole course of his life. He engaged in a particular opposition to Cromwell in the time of the war. They hated one another equally. Holles seemed to carry this too far: for he would not allow Cromwell to have been either wise or brave; but often applied Solomon's observation to him, that the battle was not to the strong, nor favour to the men of understanding, but that time and chance happened to all men. He was well versed in the records of parliament, and argued well, but too vehemently; for he could not bear contradiction. He had the soul of an old stubborn Roman in him. He was a faithful but a rough friend, and a severe but fair enemy. He had a true sense of religion, and was a man of an unblameable course of life, and of a sound judgment when it was not biassed by passion. He was made a lord for his merit in bringing about the restoration[24].
The earl of Manchester was made lord chamberlain[25]: a man of a soft and obliging temper, of no great depth, but universally beloved, being both a virtuous and a generous man. The lord Robarts[26] was made lord privy seal, 176 afterwards lord lieutenant of Ireland, and at last lord president of the council. He was a man of a morose and cynical temper, just in his administration, but vicious under the appearances of virtue: learned beyond any man of his quality, but intractable, stiff and obstinate, proud and jealous.
These five, whom I have named last, had the chief hand in engaging the nation in the design of the restoration. They had great credit, chiefly with the presbyterian party, and were men of much dexterity. So the thanks of that great turn was owing them: and they were put in great posts by the earl of Clarendon's means[27], by which he lost most of the cavaliers, who could not bear the seeing such men so highly advanced and so much trusted[28]. 177
At the king's first coming over, Monk and Montagu were the most considered They both had the garter[29] 178 The one was made duke of Albemarle, and the other earl of Sandwich, and they had noble estates given them. Monk was ravenous, as well as his wife, who was a mean and contemptible creature. They both asked and sold all that was within their reach, nothing being denied them for some time; till he became so useless, that little personal regard could be paid him. But the king maintained still the appearances of it: for the appearance of the service he did him was such, that the king thought it fit to treat him with great distinction, even after he saw into him, and despised him[30]. He took care to raise his kinsman Grenville, who was made earl of Bath, and groom of the stole, a mean minded man, who thought of nothing but of getting and spending money[31]; only in spending he had 179 a peculiar talent of doing it with so ill a grace and so bad a conduct, that it was long before those who saw how much he got. and how little he spent visibly, would believe he was so poor as he was found to be at his death: which was a thought to be a the occasion of his son's shooting himself in the head a few days after his death, finding the disorder of his affairs; for both father and son were buried together. The duke of Albemarle raised two other persons. One was Clarges, his wife's brother, who was an honest but haughty man[32]. He became afterwards a very considerable parliament man, and valued himself on his opposing the court, and on his frugality in managing the public money; for he had Cromwell's economy ever 51 in his mouth, and was always for reducing the expense of war to the modesty and parsimony of those times. Many thought he carried this too far: but it made him very popular. After he was become very rich by the public money, he seemed to take care that nobody else should grow so rich as he was in that way. Another person raised by the duke of Albemarle was Morrice[33], who was the person that had chiefly prevailed with Monk to declare for the king; upon that he was made secretary of state. He was very learned, but full of pedantry and affectation. He had no 180 true judgment about foreign affairs; and Albemarle's judgment of them may be measured by what he said when he found the king grew weary of Morrice, but that in regard to him had no mind to turn him out: upon which the duke of Albemarle replied, he did not know what was necessary for a good secretary of state in which he was defective, for he could speak French and write short hand[34]. Nicholas was the other secretary, who had been employed by king Charles the first during the war, and had served him faithfully, but had no understanding in foreign affairs. He was a man of virtue, but could not fall in to the king's temper, or become acceptable to him[35]. So, not long after the restoration, Bennet, advanced afterwards to be earl of Arlington, was by the interest of the popish party made secretary of state, and was admitted into so particular a confidence that he began to raise a party in opposition to the earl of Clarendon. He was a proud and insolent man. His parts were solid, but not quick. He had the art of observing the king's temper, and managing it beyond all the men of that time. He was believed a papist; he had once professed it, and when he died he again reconciled himself to that church. Yet in the whole course of his ministry he seemed to have made it a maxim, that the king ought to shew no favour to popery, but that all his affairs would be spoiled if ever he turned that way; which made the papists become his mortal enemies, and accuse him as an apostate and the betrayer of their interests. He was a man of great vanity, and lived at 181 a vast expense, without taking any care of paying the debts which he contracted to support that[36]. His chief friend was Charles Berkeley, made earl of Falmouth, who. without any visible merit[37], unless it was the managing the king's amours, was the most absolute of all the king's favourites: and, which was peculiar to himself, he was as much in the duke of York's favour as in the king's[38]. He was generous in his expense: and it was thought if he had outlived the lewdness of that time, and come to a more 182 sedate course of life, he would have put the king on great and noble designs. This I should have thought more likely, if I had not had it from the duke, who had so wrong a taste, that there was reason to suspect his judgment both of men and things. Bennet and he had the management of the mistress, and all the earl of Clarendon's enemies came about them: the chief of whom were the duke of Buckingham and the earl of Bristol.
The first of these was a man of a noble presence. He had a great liveliness of wit, and a peculiar faculty of turning all things into ridicule, with bold figures and natural descriptions. He had no sort of literature: only he was drawn into chemistry, and for some years he thought he was very near the finding the philosopher's stone; which had the fate that attends on all such men as he was, when they are drawn in, to lay out for it. He had no principles either of religion, virtue, or friendship. Pleasure, frolic, and extravagant diversions, was all that he laid to heart. He was true to nothing: for he was not true to himself[39]. He had no steadiness nor conduct: he could keep no secret, nor execute any design without spoiling it. He could never fix his thoughts, nor govern his estate, though then the greatest in England. He was bred about the king, and for many years he had a great ascendant over him: but he spake of him to all persons with that contempt that at last he drew a lasting disgrace upon himself; and he also ruined both body and mind, fortune and reputation equally. The madness of vice appeared in his person in very eminent instances; since at last he became contemptible and poor, sickly, and sunk in his parts, as well as in all other respects, so that his conversation was as much avoided as ever it had been courted. He found the king, when he came from his travels in the year 45, newly come to Paris, sent over by 183 his father when his affairs declined: and finding him enough inclined to receive ill impressions, he, who was then got into all the impieties and vices of the age, set himself to corrupt the king, in which he was too successful, being seconded in that wicked design by the lord Percy. And to complete the matter, Hobbes was brought to him[40], under the pretence of instructing him in mathematics: and he laid before him his schemes, both with relation to religion and politics, which made deep and lasting impressions on the king's mind. So that the main blame of the king's ill principles and bad morals was owing to the duke of Buckingham[41].
The earl of Bristol was a man of courage and learning, of a bold temper and a lively wit, but of no judgment nor steadiness. He was 52 in the queen's interests during the war at Oxford, and he studied to drive things past the possibility of a treaty or any reconciliation; fancying that nothing would make the military men so sure to the king as his being sure to them, and giving them hopes of sharing the confiscated estates among them; whereas, he thought, all discourses of treaty made them feeble and fearful. When he went beyond sea he turned papist; but it was after a way of his own: for he loved to magnify the difference between the church and the court of Rome[42]. He was esteemed a very good speaker: but he was too copious and too florid. He was set at the head of the popish party, and was a violent enemy of the earl of Clarendon. 184
Having now said as much as seems necessary to describe the state of the court and ministry at the restoration, I will next give an account of the chief of the Scots, and of the parties that were formed among them[43]. The earl of Lauderdale, afterwards made duke, had been for many years a zealous covenanter: but in the year '47 he turned to the king's interests, and had continued a prisoner from Worcester fight, where he was taken. He was kept for some years in the Tower of London, in Portland castle, and in other prisons, till he was set at liberty by those who called home the king[44]. So he went over to Holland. And since he continued so long, and, contrary to all men's opinion, in so high a degree of favour and confidence, it may be expected that I should be a little copious in setting out his character; for I knew him very particularly. He made a very ill appearance: he was very big: his hair was red, hanging oddly about him: his tongue was too big for his mouth, which made him bedew all that he talked to: and his whole manner was rough and boisterous, and very unfit for a court. He was very learned, not only in Latin, in which he was a master, but in Greek and Hebrew. He had read a great deal in divinity, and almost all the historians ancient and modern: so that he had great materials. He had with these an extraordinary memory, and a copious but unpolished expression. He was a man, as the duke of Buckingham called him to me, of a blundering understanding, not always clear, but often clouded, as his looks were always. He was haughty beyond expression; abject to those he saw he must stoop to, but imperious and insolent and brutal to all others. He had a violence of passion that carried him often to fits like madness, in which he had no temper. If he took a thing 185 wrong, it was a vain thing to study to convince him: that would rather provoke him to swear he would never be of another mind: he was to be let alone, and then perhaps he would have forgot what he had said, and come about of his own accord. He was the coldest friend and the violentest enemy I ever knew: I felt it too much not to know it. He at first seemed to despise wealth: but he delivered himself up afterwards to luxury and sensuality: and by that means he ran into a vast expense, and stuck at nothing that was necessary to support that. In his long imprisonment he had great impressions of religion on his mind: but he wore these out so entirely that scarce any trace of them was left. His great experience in affairs, his ready compliance with every thing that he thought would please the king, and his bold offering at the most desperate counsels, gained him such an interest in the king, that no attempt against him, nor complaint of him, could ever shake it, till a decay of strength and understanding forced him to let go his hold. He was in his principles much against popery and arbitrary government: and yet, by a fatal train of passions and interests, he made way for the former, and had almost established the latter. And, whereas some by a smooth deportment make the first beginnings of tyranny less unacceptable and discernable, he, by the fury of his behaviour, heightened the severity of his ministry, which was liker the cruelty of an inquisition than the legality of justice, not to say mercy. With all this he was at first a presbyterian, and retained his aversion to king Charles I. and his party to his death[45]. 186
The earl of Crawford had been his fellow prisoner for ten years, and that was a good title for maintaining him in the post he had before, of being lord treasurer[46]. He was a sincere but weak man, passionate and indiscreet, and continued still a zealous presbyterian. The earl, afterwards duke, of Rothes[47], had married his daughter, and had the merit of a long imprisonment likewise to recommend him: he had a ready dexterity in the management of affairs, with a soft and insinuating address: he had a quick apprehension with a clear judgment: he had no advantage of education, no sort of literature, nor had he travelled abroad: all in him was mere nature, but it [was] nature very much depraved; for he seemed to have freed himself from all the impressions of virtue or religion, of honour or good nature. He delivered himself, without either restraint or decency, to all the pleasures of wine and women. He had but one maxim, to which he adhered firmly, that he was to do every thing, and deny himself in nothing, that might maintain his greatness, or gratify his appetites. He was unhappily made for drunkenness; for as he drank all his friends dead, and was able to subdue two or three sets 187 of drunkards one after another, so it scarce ever appeared that he was disordered; and after the greatest excesses, an hour or two of sleep carried them off so entirely that no sign of them remained: he would go about business without any uneasiness, or discovering any heat either in body or mind. This had a terrible conclusion; 53 for after he had killed all his friends, he fell at last under such a weakness of stomach, that he had perpetual cholics, when he was not hot within and full of strong liquor, of which he was presently seized; so that he was always either sick or drunk.
The earl of Tweeddale was another of Lauderdale's friends[48]. He was early engaged in business, and continued in it to a great age: he understood all the interests and concerns of Scotland well: he had a great stock of knowledge, with a mild and obliging temper. He was of a blameless, or rather an exemplary, life in all respects. He had loose thoughts both of civil and ecclesiastical government; and seemed to think that what form soever was uppermost was to be complied with. He had been in Cromwell's parliaments, and had abjured the royal family, which lay heavy on him. But the disputes about the guardianship of the duchess of Monmouth and her elder sister, to which he pretended in the right of his wife, who was their father's sister, against their mother, who was Rothes's sister, drew him into that compliance, that brought a great cloud upon him: though he was in all other respects the ablest and worthiest man of the nobility: only he was too cautious and fearful.
A son of the marquis of Douglas, made earl of Selkirk, had married the heiress of the family of Hamilton, who by her father's patent was duchess of Hamilton[49]: and when 188 the heiress to a title in Scotland marries one not equal to her in rank, it is ordinary, at her desire, to give her husband the title for life: so he was made duke Hamilton. He then passed for a soft man, who minded nothing but the recovery of that family from the great debts under which it was sinking, till it was raised up again by his great managing. After he had compassed that, he became a more considerable man. He wanted all sorts of polishing: he was rough and sullen, but candid and sincere. His temper was boisterous, neither fit to submit nor to govern. He was mutinous when out of power, and imperious in it. He wrote well, but spoke ill: for his judgment when calm was better than his imagination. He made himself a great master in the knowledge of the laws, of the history, and of the families of Scotland, and seemed always to have a great regard to justice and the good of his country: but a narrow and selfish temper brought such an habitual meanness on him, that he was not capable of designing or undertaking great things.
Another man of that side that made a good figure at that time was Bruce, afterwards earl of Kincardine[50], who 189 had married a daughter of Mr. Sommelsdyck in Holland, and by that means he had got acquaintance with our princes beyond sea, and had supplied them liberally in their necessities. He was both the wisest and the worthiest man that belonged to his country, and fit for governing any affairs but his own; which he by a wrong turn, by his love of the public, neglected to his ruin; for they consisting much in works, coals, salt, and mines, required much care; and he was very capable of it, having gone far in mathematics, and being a great master at all mechanics. His thoughts went slow, and his words came much slower: but a deep judgment appeared in every thing he said or did. He had a noble zeal for justice, in which even friendship could never bias him. He had solid principles of religion and virtue, which shewed themselves with great lustre on all occasions. He was a faithful friend, and a merciful enemy. I may be perhaps inclined to carry his character too far; for he was the first man that entered into friendship with me. We continued for seventeen years in so entire a friendship, that there was never either reserve or mistake between us all the while till his death; and it was from him that I understood the whole secret of affairs; for he was trusted with every thing. He had a wonderful love to the king; and would never believe me when I warned him what he might look for, if he did not go along with an abject compliance in every thing. He found it true in conclusion; and the love he bore the king 190 made his disgrace sink deeper in him than became such a a philosopher or so good a Christian as he was.
I now turn to another set of men, of whom the earls of Middleton and Glencairn were the chief[51]; and they were followed by the rest of the cavalier party, who were now very fierce and full of courage over their cups, though they had been very discreet managers of it in the field, and in time of action; but now every one of them vaunted that he had killed his thousands, and all were full of merit, and as full of high pretensions, far beyond what all the wealth and revenue of Scotland could answer. The subtilest of all lord Middleton's friends was sir Archibald Primrose[52], a man of long and great practice in affairs; for he and his father had served the crown successively an hundred 54 years all but one, when he was turned out of employment. He was a dexterous man in business: he had always expedients ready at every difficulty. He had an art of speaking to every man according to their sense of things, and so drew out their secrets, while he concealed his own: for words went for nothing with him. He said every thing that was necessary to persuade those he spoke to, that he was of their mind, and did it in so genuine a way that he seemed to speak his heart. He was always for soft counsels and slow methods: and thought that the chief thing that a great man ought to do was to raise his family and his kindred, who would naturally stick to him; for he had seen so much of the world, that he did not depend much on friends, and so took no care of making any. He always advised the earl of Middleton to go on slowly in the king's business, but to do his own effectually, before 191 the king should see that he had no farther occasion for him. That earl had another friend who had more credit with him, though Primrose was more necessary for managing a parliament: he was sir John Fletcher, made the king's advocate or attorney-general: for Nicolson[53] was dead. Fletcher was a man of a generous temper, who despised wealth, except as it was necessary to support a vast expense; he was a bold and fierce man, who hated all mild proceedings, and could scarce speak with decency or patience to those of the other side, so that he was looked on by all that had been faulty in the late times, as an inquisitor-general[54]. On the other hand, Primrose took money liberally, and was the intercessor for all who made such effectual applications to him.
The first thing that was to be thought on with relation to Scottish affairs, was the manner in which offenders in the late times were to be treated: for all were at mercy. In the letter the king writ from Breda to the parliament of England, he had promised a full indemnity for all that was past, excepting only those who had been concerned in his father's death: to which the earl of Clarendon persuaded 192 the king to adhere in a most sacred manner, since the breaking of faith in such a point was that which must for ever destroy confidence, and the observing all such promises seemed to be a fundamental maxim in government, which was to be maintained in such a manner, that not so much as a stretch was to be made in it. But there was no promise made for Scotland: so all the cavaliers, as they were full of revenge, hoped to have the estates of those who had been chiefly concerned in the late wars divided among them. The earl of Lauderdale told the king, on the other hand, that the Scottish nation had turned eminently, though unfortunately, to serve his father in the year 48, that they had brought himself among them, and had lost two armies in his service, and had been under nine years' oppression on that account; that they had encouraged and assisted Monk in all he did: they might be therefore highly disgusted, if they should not have the same measure of grace and pardon that he was to give England[1]. Besides, the king, while he was in Scotland, had, in the parliament at Stirling[2], passed a very full act of indemnity, though in the terms and with the title of an act of approbation. It is true, the records of that parliament were not extant, but lost in the confusion that followed upon the reduction of that kingdom: yet the thing was so recent in every man's memory, that it might have a very ill effect if the king should proceed without a regard to it. There was indeed another very severe act made at that parliament against all that should treat with or submit to Cromwell, or comply in any sort with him: but in that, he said, a difference ought to be made between those who during the struggle had deserted the service, and gone over to the enemy, of which number it might be fit to make some examples, and the rest of the kingdom, who upon the general reduction 193 had been forced to capitulate: it would seem hard to punish any for submitting to a superior force, when they were in no condition to resist it. This seemed reasonable: and the earl of Clarendon acquiesced in it; but the earl of Middleton and his party complained of it, and desired that the marquis of Argyll, whom they charged with an accession to the king's murder, and some few of those who had joined in the remonstrance while the king was in Scotland, might be proceeded against. The marquis of Argyll's craft made them afraid of him, and his estate made them desire to divide it among them. His son, the lord Lorn, was come up to court, and was well received by the king: for he had adhered so firmly to the king's interests, that he would never enter into any engagements with the usurpers[3]: and upon every new occasion of jealousy he was 55 clapt up. In one of his imprisonments he had a terrible accident from a cannon bullet[4], which the soldiers were throwing to exercise their strength; it by a recoil struck him in the head, and made such a fracture in his skull, that the operation of the trepan, and the cure, was counted one of the greatest performances of surgery in that time. The difference between his father and him went on to a total breach[5]; so that his father was set upon the disinheriting him of all that was still left in his power. Upon the restoration the marquis of Argyll went up to the Highlands for some time, till he advised with his friends what to do; who were divided in opinion. He writ by his son to the king, asking leave to come and wait on him. The king gave an answer that seemed to encourage it, but did not bind him to any thing. I have forgot the words: there was an equivocating in them that did not become a prince: but his son told me, he wrote them very particularly to his father, without any advice of his own. 194 Upon that the marquis of Argyll came up so secretly, that he was within Whitehall, before his enemies knew any thing of his journey[6]. He sent his son to the king, to beg admittance. But instead of that, he was sent to the Tower, and orders were sent down for clapping up three of the chief remonstrators. Of these Warriston was one: but he had notice sent him before the messenger came: so he made his escape, and went beyond sea, first to Hamburg[7]. He had been long courted by Cromwell, and had stood at a distance from him for seven years: but in the last year of his government he had gone into his counsels, and was summoned as one of his peers to the other house, as it was called. He was after that put into the council of state after Richard was put out: and then in another court set up by Lambert and the army, called the committee of safety. So there was a great deal against him. Swinton[8], one of Cromwell's lords, was also sent down a prisoner to Scotland. And thus it was resolved to make a few examples in the parliament that was to be called as soon as the king could be got to prepare matters for it. It was resolved on to restore the king's authority to the same state it was in before the wars, and to raise such a force as might be necessary to secure the quiet of that kingdom for the future.
It was a harder point, what to do with the citadels that were built by Cromwell, and with the English garrisons that were kept in them. Many said, it was necessary to keep that kingdom in that subdued state at least till all things were settled, and that there were no more danger from thence. The earl of Clarendon was of this mind. But the earl of Lauderdale laid before the king, that the conquest Cromwell had made of Scotland was for their 195 adhering to him: he might then judge what they would think, who had suffered so much and so long on his account, if the same thraldom should be now kept up by his means. It would create an universal disgust[9]. He told the king, that the time might come in which he would wish rather to have Scotch garrisons in England. It would become a national quarrel, and lose the affections of the country to such a degree, that perhaps they might join with the garrisons, if any disjointing happened in England against him: whereas, without any such badge of slavery, Scotland might be so managed that they might be made entirely his. The earl of Middleton and his party durst not appear for so unpopular a thing. So it was agreed on, that the citadels should be evacuated and slighted, as soon as the money could be raised in England for paying and disbanding the army. Of all this the earl of Lauderdale was believed the chief adviser. So he became very popular in Scotland.
The next thing that fell under consideration was the church, and whether bishops were to be restored or not. The earl of Lauderdale at his first coming to the king stuck firm to presbytery. He told me, the king spoke to him to let that go, for it was not a religion for gentlemen. He being really one, but at the same time resolving to get into the king's confidence, studied to convince the king by a very subtle method to keep up presbytery still in Scotland. He told him, that both king James and his father had ruined their affairs by engaging in the design of setting up episcopacy in that kingdom: and by that means Scotland became discontented, and was of no use to them: whereas the king ought to govern them according to the 196 grain of their own inclinations, and so make them sure to him: he ought, instead of endeavouring an uniformity in both kingdoms, to keep up the opposition between them, and rather to increase than to allay that hatred that was between them: and then the Scots would be ready, and might be easily brought, to serve him upon any occasion 56 of the disputes he might afterwards have with the parliament of England: all things were then smooth, but that was the honey-moon, and it could not last long: nothing would keep England more in awe, than if they saw Scotland firm in their duty and affection to him: whereas nothing gave them so much heart, as when they knew Scotland was disjointed. It was a vain attempt to think of doing any thing in England by means of the Irish, who were a despicable people, and had a sea to pass: but Scotland could be brought to engage for the king in a silenter manner, and could serve him more effectually. He therefore laid it down as a maxim from which the king ought never to depart, that Scotland was to be kept quiet and in good humour, that the opposition of the two kingdoms was to be kept up and heightened: and then the king might reckon on every man capable of bearing arms in Scotland as a listed soldier, who would willingly change a bad country for a better. This was the plan he laid before the king. I cannot tell whether this was only to cover his zeal for presbytery, or on design to encourage the king to set up arbitrary government in England[10].
To fortify these advices, he wrote a long letter in white ink to a daughter of the earl of Cassillis, lady Margaret Kennedy[11], 197 who was in great credit with the party, and was looked on as a very wise and good woman, and was out of measure zealous for them. I married her afterwards, and after her death found this letter among her papers: in which he expressed great zeal for the cause: he saw the king was very indifferent in the matter, but he was easy to those who pressed for a change: which, he said, nothing could so effectually hinder as the sending up many men of good sense, but without any noise, who might inform the king of the aversion the nation had to that government, and assure him that, if in that point he would be easy to them, he might depend upon them as to every thing else, and more particularly, if he stood in need of their service in his other dominions: but he charged her to trust very few, if any, of the ministers with this, and to take care that Sharp might know nothing of it: for he was then jealous of him. This had all the effect that the earl of Lauderdale intended by it. The king was no more jealous of his favouring presbytery; but looked on him as a fit instrument to manage Scotland to serve him in the most desperate designs: and on this was all his credit with the king founded. In the mean time Sharp, seeing the king cold in the matter of episcopacy, thought it was necessary to lay the presbyterians asleep[12], and to make them apprehend no danger to their government, and to engage the public resolutioners to proceed against all the protesters; that so those who were like to be the most inflexible in the point of episcopacy might be censured by their own party, and by that means the others might become so odious to the more violent presbyterians, that thereby they might be the more easily disposed to submit to episcopacy, or at least might have less credit to act against it. So he, being pressed by those who employed him, to procure somewhat from the king that might look like a confirmation of their government, and put to silence all discourses of an intended change, obtained by the earl of Lauderdale's means, that a letter should be writ by the 198 king to the presbytery of Edinburgh, to be communicated by them to all the other presbyteries in Scotland, in which he confirmed the general assemblies that sat at St. Andrews and Dundee while he was in Scotland, and that had confirmed the public resolutions; and he ordered them to proceed to censure all those who had protested against them, but a would not now submit to them. The king did also confirm their presbyterian government, as it was by law established. This was signed and sent down without communicating it to the earl of Middleton or his party. But as soon as he heard of it, he thought Sharp had betrayed the design; and sent for him. and charged him with it. He said, in his own excuse, that somewhat must be done for quieting the presbyterians, who were beginning to take the alarm: that might have produced such applications as would perhaps make some impression on the king: whereas now all that was secured, and yet the king was engaged to nothing; for his confirming their government, as it was established by law, could bind him no longer than while that legal establishment was in force: so the reversing of that would release the king. 57 This allayed the earl of Middleton's displeasure a little. Yet Primrose told me, he spake often of it with great indignation, since it seemed below the dignity of a king thus to equivocate with his people, and to deceive them. It seemed that Sharp thought it was not enough to cheat the party himself, but would have the king share with him in the fraud. This was no honourable step to be made by a king, and to be contrived by a clergyman. The letter was received with transports of joy: the presbyterians reckoned they were safe, and they began to proceed severely against the protesters, which was set on by some aspiring men, who hoped to merit by the heat expressed on this occasion[13]. And if Sharp's impatience to get into the archbishopric of 199 St. Andrews had not wrought too strong in him, it would have given a great advantage to the restitution of epis copacy if a general assembly had been called, and the two parties had been let loose on one another. That would have shewn the impossibility of maintaining the government of the church in a parity, and the necessity of setting a superior order over them for keeping them in unity and peace.
The king settled the ministry in Scotland[14]. The earl of Middleton was declared the king's commissioner for holding the parliament; and general of the forces that were to be raised: the earl of Glencairn was made chancellor: the earl of Lauderdale was secretary of state: the earl of Rothes president of the council: the earl of Crawford was continued in the treasury: Primrose was clerk register, which is very like the place of the master of the rolls in England. The rest depended on these; but the earls of Middleton and Lauderdale were the two heads of the parties. The earl of Middleton had a private instruction, which, as Lauderdale told me, was not communicated to him, to try the inclinations of the nation for episcopacy, 200 and to consider of the best methods in setting it up[15]. This was drawn from the king by the earl of Clarendon: for he himself was observed to be very cold in it. While these things were doing, Primrose got an order from the king to put up all the public registers of Scotland, which Cromwell had brought up and lodged in the Tower of London, as a pawn upon that kingdom, and in imitation of what king Edward I was said to have done when he subdued that nation. They were put up in fifty hogsheads, and a ship was ready to carry them down. But it was suggested to Clarendon that the original covenant signed by the king, and some other declarations under his hand, were among them[16]; and he apprehending that at some 201 time or other an ill use might have been made of these, he would not suffer them to be shipped till they were visited: nor would he take Primrose's promise of searching for these carefully, and sending them up to him. So he ordered a search to be made. None of the papers he looked for were found. But so much time was lost that the summer was spent: so they were sent down in winter: and by some easterly gusts the ship was cast away 202 near Berwick. So we lost all our records[17]; and we have nothing now but some fragments in private hands to rely on, having made at that time so great a shipwreck of all our authentic writings. This heightened the displeasure the nation had at the designs then on foot.
The main thing, upon which all other matters depended, was the method in which the affairs of Scotland were to be conducted. The earl of Clarendon moved, that there might be a council settled to sit regularly at Whitehall on Scotch affairs[18], to which every one of the Scotch privy council that happened to be on the place should be admitted: but with this addition, that, as two Scotch lords were called to the English council, so six of the English were to be of the Scotch council. The effect of this would have been, that whereas the Scotch counsellors had no great force in English affairs, the English, as they were men of great credit with the king, and were always on the place, would have the government of the affairs of Scotland wholly in their hands. This probably would have saved that nation from much injustice and violence, when there was a certain method of laying their grievances before the king: complaints would have been heard, and matters well examined: Englishmen would not, and durst not, have given way to crying oppression and illegal proceedings: for though these matters did not fall under the cognizance of an English parliament, yet it would have very much blasted a man's credit, that should have concurred in such methods of government as were put in practice afterwards in that kingdom. Therefore all people quickly saw how wise a project this was, and how happy it would have proved if affairs had still gone in that channel. But the earl of Lauderdale opposed this with all his strength. He told the king, it would quite destroy the scheme he had 203 laid before him, which must be managed secretly, and by men that were not in fear of the parliament of England, 58 nor obnoxious to it. He said to all Scottishmen, this would make Scotland a province to England, and subject it to English counsellors, who knew neither the laws nor the interests of Scotland, and yet would determine every thing relating to it: and all the wealth of Scotland would be employed to bribe them, who, having no concern of their own in the affairs of that kingdom, must be supposed capable of being turned by private considerations. To the presbyterians he said, this would infallibly bring in not only episcopacy, but every thing else from the English pattern. Men who had neither kinred nor estates in Scotland would be biassed chiefly by that which was most in vogue in England, without any regard to the inclination of the Scots. These things made great impressions on the Scottish nation. The king himself did not much like it; but the earl of Clarendon told him, Scotland, by a secret and ill management, had begun the embroilment of his father's affairs, which could never have happened if the affairs of that kingdom had been under a more equal inspection: if Scotland should again fall into new disorders, he must have the help of England to quiet them: and that could not be expected if the English had no share in the conduct of matters there. The king yielded to it: and this method was followed for two or three years; but was afterwards broke by the earl of Lauderdale, when he got into the chief management. He began early to observe some uneasiness in the king at the earl of Clarendon's positive way; he saw the mistress hated him: and he believed she would in time be too hard for him: therefore he made great applications to her. But his conversation was too coarse: and he had not money enough to support himself by presents to her: so he could not be admitted into that cabal which was held in her lodgings. He saw that in a council, where men of weight who had much at stake in England bore the chief sway, he durst not have 204 proposed those things by which he intended to establish his own interest with the king, and to govern that kingdom which way his pride or passion might guide him. Among others, he took great pains to persuade me of the great service he had done his country by breaking that method of governing it; though we had all occasion afterwards to see how fatal that proved, and how wicked his design in it was.
I have thus opened with some copiousness the first beginnings of this reign; since, as they are little known, and I had them from the chief of both sides, so they may guide the reader to observe the progress of things better in the sequel than he could otherwise do. In August the earl of Glencairn was sent down to Scotland, and had orders to call together the committee of estates[19]. This was a practice begun in the late times: when the parliament made a recess, they appointed some of every state to sit and act as a council of state in their name till the next session; for which they were to prepare matters, and to which they gave an account of their proceedings. Now when the parliament of Stirling was adjourned, the king being present, a committee had been named: so, such of these as were yet alive were summoned to meet, and to see to the quiet of the nation, till the parliament should be brought together; which did not meet before January [1661]. On the day in which the committee met, ten or twelve of the protesting ministers met likewise at Edinburgh, and had before them a warm paper[20] prepared by one [James] Guthrie,one of the violentest of the whole party. In it, after some cold compliments to 205 the king upon his restoration, they put him in mind of the covenant he had so solemnly sworn while among them: they lamented that, instead of pursuing the ends of it in England, as he had sworn to do, he had set up the common prayer in his chapel, and the order of bishops: upon which they made terrible denunciations of heavy judgments from God on him, if he did not stand to the covenant, which they called the oath of God. The earl of Glencairn had notice of this meeting: and he sent and seized on them all, together with this remonstrance. The paper was voted scandalous and seditious: and the ministers were all clapt in prison, and were threatened with great severities. Guthrie was kept still in prison, who had brought the others together, but the rest were after a while's imprisonment let go. Guthrie, being minister of Stirling while the king was there, had let fly at him in his sermons in a most indecent manner; which at last became so intolerable that he was cited to appear before the king to answer for some passages in his sermons: he would not appear, but declined the king and his council, 59 who, he said, were not proper judges of matters of doctrine, for which he was only accountable to the judicatories of the kirk. He also protested for remedy of law against the king, for thus disturbing him in the exercise of his ministry. This personal affront had irritated the king more against him than against any other of the party[21]; and it was resolved to strike a terror into them all by making an example of him. He was a man of courage, and went through all his trouble with great firmness. But this way of proceeding struck the whole party with such a consternation, that it had all the effect which was designed by it: for whereas the pulpits had, to the great scandal of religion, been places where the preachers had for many years vented their spleen and arraigned all 206 proceedings, they became now more decent, and there was a general silence every where with relation to the affairs of state: only they could not hold from many sly and secret insinuations, as if the ark of God was shaking and the glory departing. A great many offenders were summoned, at the king's suit, before the committee, and required to give bail that they should appear at the opening of the parliament, and answer to what should be then objected to them. Many saw the design of this was to fright them to a composition, and also into a concurrence with the measures that were to be taken. The greater part complied, and redeemed themselves from further vexation by such presents as they were able to make. And in these transactions Primrose and Fletcher were the great dealers.
In the end of the year Middleton came down with great magnificence: his way of living was the greatest the nation had ever seen: but it was likewise the most scandalous; for vices of all sorts were the open practices of those about him. Drinking was the most notorious of all, which was often continued through the whole night to the next morning: and many disorders happening after those irregular heats, the people, who had never before that time seen any thing like it, came to look with an ill eye on every thing that was done by such a set of lewd and vicious men[22]. This laid in all men's minds a new prejudice against episcopacy: for they, who could not examine into the nature of things, were apt to take up a very ill opinion of every change in religion that was brought about by such bad instruments. There had been a face of gravity and piety in the former administration, which made the libertinage of the present time more odious. 207
The earl of Middleton opened the parliament on the first of January with a speech setting forth the blessing of the restoration: he magnified the king's person, and enlarged on the affection that he bore to that his ancient kingdom: he hoped they would make suitable returns of zeal for the king's service, that they would condemn all the invasions which had been made on the regal authority, and assert the just prerogative of the crown, and give supplies for keeping up such a force as was necessary to secure the public peace, and to preserve them from the return of such calamities as they had so long felt. The parliament writ in answer to the king's letter a letter full of duty and thanks. The first thing proposed was to name lords of the articles. In order to the apprehending the importance of this, I will give some account of the constitution of that kingdom.
The parliament was anciently the king's court, where all who held lands of him were bound to appear. All sat in one house, but they were considered as three estates. The first was the church, represented by the bishops, and mitred abbots, and priors. The second was the baronage, the nobility and gentry who held their baronies of the king. And the third was the boroughs, who held of the king by barony, though in a community. So that the parliament was truly the baronage of the kingdom. The lesser barons grew weary of this attendance: so in king James the first's time (during the reign of Henry IV. of England) they were excused from it, and were impowered to send proxies, to an indefinite number, to represent them in parliament. Yet they neglected to do this. And it continued so till king James the sixth's time, in which the mitred abbots being taken away, and few of the titular bishops that were then continued appearing at them, the church lands being generally in lay hands, the nobility carried matters in parliament as they pleased: and as they oppressed the boroughs, so they had the king much under them. Upon this the lower barons got themselves to be 208 restored to the right which they had neglected near two hundred years. They were allowed by act of parliament to send two from a county: only some smaller counties send only one. This brought that constitution to a truer balance; and the lower barons have a right to choose, at their county courts after Michaelmas, their commissioners, to serve in any parliament that may be called within that year. 60 And they who choose them sign a commission to him who represents them. So the sheriff has no share of the return; and in the case of controverted elections the parliament examines the commissions, and see[s] who has the greatest number, and judge[s] whether every one that signs it had a right so to do. The boroughs choose their members out of their own body when the summons goes out: and all are chosen by the men of the corporation, or, as they call them, the town council. And these sit in one house, and vote together. Anciently the parliament sat only two days, the first and the last. On the first they chose those who were to sit on the articles, eight for every state, to whom the king joined eight officers of state. These received all the heads of grievances or articles that were brought to them, and formed them into bills as they pleased: and on the last day of the parliament, these were all read, and were approved or rejected by the whole body. So they were a committee that had a very extraordinary authority, since nothing could be brought before the parliament but as they pleased. This was pretended to be done only for the shortening and dispatching of sessions. The crown was not contented with this limitation, but got it to be carried further. The nobility came to choose the eight bishops, and the bishops to choose eight noblemen: and these sixteen chose the eight barons, (so the representatives for the shires are called,) and the eight burgesses. By this means our kings did upon the matter choose all the lords of the articles; so entirely had they got the liberty of that parliament into their hands. 209
During the late troubles they had still kept up a distinction of three estates, the lesser barons making one: and then every estate might meet apart, and name their own committees: but still all things were brought in and debated in full parliament. So now the first thing proposed was, the returning to the old custom of naming lords for the articles. The earl of Tweeddale opposed it, but was seconded only by one person. So it passed with that small opposition; only, to make it go easier, it was promised that there should be frequent sessions of parliament, and that all the acts should not be brought in in a hurry, and carried with the haste that had been practised in former times.[23] 210
The parliament granted the king an additional revenue for life of £40,000 a year, to be raised by an excise on 211 beer and ale, for maintaining a small force: upon which two troops and a regiment of foot guards were to be raised[24]. They ordered Montrose's quarters to be brought together, and they were buried with great state. They fell next upon the acts of the former times that had limited the prerogative: they repealed these, and asserted it with a full extent in a most extraordinary manner. Primrose had the drawing of these acts. He often confessed to me, that he thought he was as one bewitched while he drew them: for, not considering the ill use might be made of them afterwards, he drew them with preambles full of extravagant rhetoric, reflecting severely on the proceedings of the late times, and swelled them up with the highest phrases and fullest clauses that he could invent. In the act which asserted the king's power of the militia, the power of arming and levying the subjects was carried so far that it would have ruined the kingdom, if Gilmour, 212 an eminent lawyer, and a man of great integrity, who had now the more credit, for he had always favoured the king's side, had not observed that, as the act was worded, the king might require all the subjects to serve at their own charge, and so might oblige them, in order to the redeeming themselves from serving, to pay whatever might be set on them. So he made such an opposition to this that it could not pass, till a proviso was added to it, that the kingdom should not be obliged to maintain any force levied by the king, otherwise than as it should be agreed to in parliament, or in a convention of estates. This was the only thing that was then looked to: for all the other acts passed in the articles as Primrose had penned them, and from thence they were brought into parliament, and upon one hasty reading of them they were put to the vote, and were always carried.
One act troubled the presbyterians extremely. In the act asserting the king's power in treaties of peace and war, all treaties with any other nation not made by the king's authority were declared treasonable: and in consequence of this, the league and covenant made with England in the year [16]43 was condemned, and declared to be of no force for the future[25]. This was the idol of all the presbyterians: so they were much alarmed at it. But Sharp restrained all those with whom he had credit: he told them, the only way to preserve their government was, to let all that related to the king's authority be separated from it, and be condemned, that so they might be no more 61 accused as enemies to monarchy, or as leavened with the principles of rebellion. He told them, they must be contented to let that pass, that the jealousy which the king had of them as enemies to his prerogative might be extinguished in the most effectual manner. This restrained many, but some hotter zealots could not be governed. One Macquaird, a hot man, and considerably learned, did 213 in his church at Glasgow openly protest against this act, as contrary to the oath of God, and so void of itself. To protest against an act of parliament was treason by their law. And Middleton was resolved to make an example of him for terrifying others. But Macquaird was as stiff as he was severe, and would come to no submission: yet he was condemned only to perpetual banishment. Upon which he, and some others who were afterwards banished, went and settled themselves at Rotterdam, where they formed themselves into a presbytery, and writ many seditious books[26], and kept a correspondence over all Scotland, that being the chief seat of the Scottish trade: and by that means they did much more mischief to the government than they could have done had they continued still in Scotland.
The lords of the articles grew weary in preparing so many acts as the practices of the former times gave occasion for; but did not know how to meddle with those acts that the late king had passed in the year [16]41, or the present king had passed while he was in Scotland. They saw, that, if they should proceed to repeal those by which presbyterian government was ratified, that would raise much 214 opposition, and bring petitions from all that were for that government over the whole kingdom; which Middleton and Sharp endeavoured to prevent, that so the king might be confirmed in what they had affirmed, that the general bent of the nation was now turned against presbytery and for bishops. So Primrose proposed, but half in jest, as he assured me, that the better and shorter way would be to pass a general act rescissory, (as it was called,) annulling all the parliaments that had been held since the year 1638, during the whole time of the war, as faulty and defective in their constitution[27]. But it was not so easy to know upon what point that defect was to be fixed. The only colourable pretence in law was, that, since the ecclesiastical state was not represented in those parliaments, they were not a full representative of the kingdom, and so not true parliaments. But this could not be alleged by the present parliament, which had not bishops in it: so if that inferred a nullity, this was no parliament. Therefore they could only fix the nullity upon the pretence of force and violence. Yet it was a great strain to insist on that, since it was visible that neither the .late king nor the present were under any force when they passed them: they came of their own accord, and passed those acts[28]. If it was insisted on, that the ill state of their affairs was of the nature of a force, the ill consequences of this were visible; since no prince by this means could be bound to any treaty, or be concluded by any law, that limited his power, since these are always drawn from them by the necessity of their affairs, which can never be called a force as long as their persons are free. So, upon some debate about it on those grounds, at a private junto, the proposition, though well liked, was let fall, as not capable to have good colours 215 put upon it: nor had the earl of Middleton any instruction to warrant his passing any such act. Yet within a day or two, when they had drunk higher, they resolved to venture on it. Primrose was then ill; so one was sent to him to desire him to prepare a bill to that effect. He set about it: but perceived it was so ill grounded, and so wild in all the frame of it, that he thought, when it came to be better considered, it must certainly be laid aside. But it fell out otherwise: his draught was copied out next morning, without altering a word in it, and carried to the articles, and from thence to the parliament, where it met indeed with great opposition. The earl of Crawford and the duke of Hamilton argued much against it. The parliament in the year 1641 was legally summoned: the late king came thither in person with his ordinary attendance, and without any force: if any acts then passed needed to be reviewed, that might be well done: but to annul a parliament was a terrible precedent, which destroyed the whole security of government: another parliament might annul the present parliament, as well as that which was now proposed to be done: so no stop could be made, nor any security laid down for fixing things for the future. The parliament in the year 1648 proceeded upon instructions under the king's own hand, which was all that could be had, considering his imprisonment: 62 they had declared for the king, and raised an army for his preservation. To this the earl of Middleton, who, contrary to custom, managed the debate himself, answered, that though there was no visible force on the late king in the year [16]41, yet they all knew he was under a real force, by reason of the rebellion that had been in that kingdom, and the apparent danger of one ready to break out in England; which forced him to settle Scotland on such terms as he could bring them to: that distress of his affairs was really equivalent to a force on his person: yet he confessed, it was just, that such an appearance of a parliament should be a full authority to all who acted under it, and care was taken to secure 216 these by a proviso that was put in the act to indemnify them. He acknowledged the design of the parliament in the year [16]48 was good: yet they had declared for the king in such terms, and had acted so hypocritically in order to the gaining the kirk party, that it was just to condemn the proceedings, though the intentions of many were honourable and loyal: for we went into it, he said, as knaves, and therefore no wonder if we miscarried in it as fools. This was very ill taken by all who had been concerned in it. The bill was put to the vote, and carried by a great majority in the affirmative: and the earl of Middleton immediately passed it without staying for an instruction from the king. The excuse he made for it was, that, since the king had by his letter to the presbyterians confirmed their government as it was established by law, there was no way left to get out of that but the annulling all those laws. This was a most extravagant act, and only fit to be concluded after a drunken bout; it shook all possible security for the future, and laid down a most pernicious precedent. The earl of Lauderdale aggravated this heavily to the king. It shewed, the earl of Middleton understood not the first principles of government, since he had, without any warrant for it, given the king's assent to a law that must for ever take away all the security that law can give: no government was so well established, as not to be liable to a revolution: this would cut off all hopes of peace and submission, if any disorders should happen at any time thereafter. And since the earl of Clarendon had set it up for a maxim never to be violated, that acts of indemnity were sacred things, he studied to possess him against the earl of Middleton, who had now annulled the very parliaments in which two kings had passed acts of indemnity[29]. This raised a great clamour; and upon that the earl of 217 Middleton complained in parliament that their best services were represented to the king as blemishes on his honour, and as a prejudice to his affairs: so he desired they would send up some of the most eminent of their body to give the king a true account of their proceedings. The earls of Glencairn and Rothes were sent up: for the earl of Rothes gave secret engagements to both sides, resolving to strike into that to which he saw the king most inclined. The earl of Middleton's design was to accuse the earl of Lauderdale of misrepresenting the proceedings of parliament, and of lying of the king's good subjects, called in the Scottish law leasing making; which either to the king of the people, or to the people of the king, is capital.
Sharp went up with these lords to press the speedy setting up of episcopacy, now that the greatest enemies of that government were under a general consternation, and were upon other accounts so obnoxious that they durst not make any opposition to it, since no act of indemnity was yet passed[30]. He had expressed a great concern to his old brethren when the act rescissory passed, and acted that part very solemnly for some days: yet he seemed to take heart again, and persuaded the ministers of that party that it would be a service to them, since now the case of ratifying their government was separated from the rebellion of the late times: so that hereafter it was to subsist by a law passed in a parliament that sat and acted in full freedom. So he undertook to go again, and to move for an instruction to settle presbytery on a new and undisputed bottom. The poor men were so struck with the ill state of their affairs, that they either trusted him, or at least seemed to do it; for indeed they had neither sense nor courage left them. During the session of parliament, the most aspiring men of the clergy were picked out to preach before the parliament. They did not speak out: but they all insinuated the necessity of a greater authority 218 than was then in the church, for keeping them in order. One or two spoke plainer: upon which the presbytery of Edinburgh went to the earl of Middleton, and complained of that, as an affront to the law and to the king's letter. He dismissed them with good words, but took no notice of their complaint. The synods in several places resolved to prepare addresses both to king and parliament, 63 for an act establishing their government; and Sharp dissembled so artificially, that he met with those who were preparing an April, address to be presented to the synod of Fife, that was to sit within a week after. The heads were agreed on; and Honeyman, afterwards bishop of Orkney, drew it up with so much vehemence, that Wood, their divinity professor, told me, he and some others sat up almost the whole night before the synod met, to draw it over again in a smoother strain. But Sharp gave the earl of Middleton notice of this; so the earl of Rothes was sent over to see to their behaviour, and as soon as the ministers entered upon this subject, he in the king's name dissolved the synod, and commanded the ministers under pain of treason to retire to their several habitations. Such care was taken that no public application should be made in favour of presbytery. Any attempt that was made on the other hand met with great encouragement. The synod of Aberdeen was the only body that made an address looking towards episcopacy. In a long preamble they reflected on the confusions and violence of the late times, of which they enumerated many particulars; and they concluded with a prayer, that since the legal authority upon which their courts proceeded was now annulled, that therefore the king and parliament would settle their government conform to the Scriptures and the rules of the primitive church. The presbyterians of that body saw what was driven at, and how their words would be understood: but I heard one of them say, for I was present at that meeting, that no man could decently oppose those words, since by that he would insinuate that he thought presbytery was not conform to these.
219 In this session of parliament another act passed, which was a new affliction to all the party. The 29 of May was appointed to be kept as a holy day; since on that day an end had been put to three and twenty years' course of rebellion, of which the whole progress was reckoned up in the highest strains of Primrose's eloquence. The ministers saw, that by observing this act, passed with such a preamble that condemned all their former proceedings as rebellious and hypocritical, they would lose all their credit, and contradict all they had been building up in a course of so many years. Yet such was the heat of that time that they durst not except to it on that account: so they laid hold on the subtilty of a holy day[31], and covered themselves under that controversy, denying it was in the power of any human authority to make a day holy. But withal they fell upon one of their poor shifts: they enacted in their several presbyteries that they should observe that day as a thanksgiving for the king's restoration: so they took no notice of the act of parliament, but observed it in obedience to their own act. But this, though it covered them from prosecution, since the law was obeyed, yet it laid them open to much contempt. When the earls of Glencairn and Rothes came to court, the king was soon satisfied with the account they gave of the proceedings of parliament: and the earl of Lauderdale would not own that he had ever misrepresented them. They were ordered to proceed in their charging of him as the earl of Clarendon should direct them. He told them the assaulting of a minister, as long as he had an interest in the king, was a practice that could never be approved: it was one of the uneasy things that a house of commons of England sometimes ventured on, which was always ungrateful to the court: such an attempt, instead of shaking the earl of Lauderdale, would give him a faster 220 root with the king. They must therefore content themselves with letting the king see how well his service went on in their hands, and how injustly they had been misrepresented to him: and thus by degrees they would gain their point, and the earl of Lauderdale would become useless to the king. So this design was let fall. But the earl of Rothes assured Lauderdale he had diverted the storm: though Primrose told me, this was the true ground on which they proceeded. They became all friends, as to outward appearance.
Thus I have gone through the actings of the first session of this parliament with relation to public affairs. It was a mad roaring time, full of extravagance; and no wonder it was so, when the men of affairs were almost perpetually drunk. I shall in the next place give an account of the attainders passed in it.
The first and chief of these was of the marquis of Argyll. He was indicted at the king's suit for a great many facts, that were reduced to three heads. The first was of his public actings during the war, of which many instances were given; such as his 64 being concerned in the delivering up of the king to the English at Newcastle, his opposing the engagement in the year [16]48, and his heading the rising in the west in opposition to the committee of estates: in this, and many other steps made during the war, he was esteemed the principal actor, and so ought to be made the greatest example for terrifying others. The second head consisted of many murders and other barbarities committed by his officers, during the war, on many of the king's party; chiefly those who had served under the marquis of Montrose, many of them being murdered in cold blood. The third head consisted of some articles of his concurrence with Cromwell and the usurpers, in opposition to those who appeared for the king in the Highlands; his being one of his parliament, and assisting in proclaiming him protector, with a great many particulars into which his compliance 221 was branched out. He had counsel assigned him, who performed their part very well.
The substance of his defence was, that during the late wars he was but one among a great many more: he had always acted by authority of parliament, and according to the instructions that were given him, as oft as he was sent on any expedition or negotiation. As to all things done before the year [16]41, the late king had buried them in an act of oblivion then passed, as the present king had also done in the year [16]51: so he did not think he was bound to answer to any particulars before that time[32]. For the second head, he was at London when most of the barbarities set out in it were committed: nor did it appear that he gave any orders about them. It was well known that great outrages had been committed by the Macdonalds, and he believed his people, when they had the better of them, had taken cruel revenges. This was to be imputed to the heat of the time, and to the tempers of the people, who had been much provoked by the burning his whole country, and by much blood that was shed. And as to many stories laid to the charge of his men, he knew some of them were mere forgeries, and others were aggravated much beyond the truth: but, what truth soever might be in them, he could not be answerable but for what was done by himself or by his orders. As to the third head, of his compliance with the usurpation, he had stood out till the nation was quite conquered: and in that case it was the received opinion both of divines and lawyers, that men might lawfully submit to an usurpation, when forced to it by an inevitable necessity. It was the epidemical sin of the nation. His circumstances were such, that more than a bare compliance was required of him. What he did that way was only to preserve himself and his family, and was not done on design to oppose the king's interest: nor 222 did his service suffer by any thing he did. This was the substance of his defence: he was often brought to the bar, and began every article of his defence with a long speech, which he did with so good a grace, and so skilfully, that his character was as much raised as his family suffered by the prosecution. In one speech excusing his compliances with Cromwell, he said, what could he think of that matter after a man so eminent in the law as his majesty's advocate had taken the engagement? This inflamed the other so much, that he called him an impudent villain, and was not so much as chid for that barbarous treatment. Argyll gravely said, he had learned in his affliction to bear reproaches: but so the parliament saw no cause to condemn him, he was less concerned at the advocate's railing. The king's advocate[33] put in an additional article, of charging him with accession to the king's death: for which all the proof he offered lay in a presumption. Cromwell had come down to Scotland with his army in September [16]48, and at that time he had many long conferences with Argyll; and since immediately upon his return to London the treaty with the king was broke off, and the king was brought to his trial, he from thence inferred that it was to be presumed that Cromwell and he had concerted that matter between them. While this process was carried on, which was the solemnest that ever was in Scotland, the lord Lorn continued at court soliciting for his father; and obtained a letter to be writ by the king to the earl of Middleton, requiring him to order his advocate not to insist on any public proceedings before the indemnity he himself had passed in the year 1651. He also required him, when the trial was ended, to send up the whole process, and lay it before the king, before the parliament 223 should give sentence[34]. The earl of Middleton submitted to the first part of this: so all further inquiry into those matters was superseded. But as to the second part of the letter, it looked so like a distrust of the justice of the parliament, that he said he durst not let it be known, till he had a second and more positive order, which he earnestly desired might not be sent, for it would very much discourage this loyal and affectionate parliament: and he begged earnestly to have that order recalled; which was done. For some time there was a stop in the proceedings, in which Argyll was 65 contriving an escape out of the castle. He kept his bed for some days: and his lady being of the same stature with himself, and coming to him in a chair, he had put on her clothes, and was going into the chair: but he apprehended he should be discovered, and his execution hastened; and so his heart failed him. The earl of Middleton resolved, if possible, to have the king's death fastened on him. By this means, as he would die with the more infamy, so he reckoned this would put an end to the family, since nobody durst move in favour of the son of one judged guilty of that crime. And he, as was believed, hoped to obtain a grant of his estate. Search was made into all the precedents, of men who had been at any time condemned upon presumption; and the earl of Middleton resolved to argue the matter himself, hoping that the weight of his authority would bear down all opposition. He managed it indeed with more force than decency: he was too vehement, and maintained the argument with a strength that did more honour to his parts than to his justice or his character. But Gilmour, though newly made lord president of the session, which is the supreme court of justice in that kingdom, abhorred the precedent of attainting a man upon so remote a presumption; and he 224 looked upon it as less justifiable than the much decried attainder of the earl of Strafford. So he undertook the argument against Middleton: they replied upon one another thirteen or fourteen times in a debate that lasted many hours. Gilmour had so clearly the better of the argument, that though the parliament was so set against Argyll that every thing was like to pass that might blacken him, yet, when it was put to the vote, he was acquitted as to that by a great majority: at which he expressed so much joy, that he seemed little concerned at any thing that could happen to him after that. All that remained was to make his compliance with the usurpers appear to be treason. The debate was like to have lasted long. The earl of Loudoun, who had been lord chancellor[35], and was counted the eloquentest man of the time, for he had a copiousness in speaking that was never exhausted, and was of his family and his particular friend, had prepared a long and learned argument on that head. He had gathered the opinions both of divines and lawyers, and had laid together a great deal out of history, more particularly out of the Scottish history, to shew that it had never been censured as a crime, but that, on the contrary, in all their confusions, the men who had merited the most of the crown in all its shakings, were persons who had got credit by compliances with the side that prevailed, and by that means had brought things about again. But, while it was very doubtful how it would have gone, Monk, by an inexcusable baseness, had searched among his letters, and found some that were writ by Argyll to himself, that were so hearty and zealous on their side, that after they were read it could not be pretended that his compliance was feigned, or extorted from him. Every 225 body blamed Monk for sending these down, since it was a betraying the confidence that they then lived in. They were sent down by an express, and came to the earl of Middleton after the parliament was engaged in the debate. So he ordered the letters to be read. This was much blamed, as contrary to the forms of justice, since probation was closed on both sides; but the reading of them silenced all further debate[36]. All his friends rose and went out: and he was condemned as guilty of treason. The marquis of Montrose only refused to vote; he owned he had too much resentment to judge in that matter. It was designed he should be hanged, as Montrose had been: but it was carried that he should be beheaded, and that his head should be set up where Montrose's had been set. He received his sentence decently, and composed himself to suffer with a courage that was not expected from him.
The day before his death he wrote to the king, justifying his intentions in all he had acted in the matter of the covenant: he protested his innocence as to the death of 226 the late king: he submitted patiently to his sentence, and wished the king a long and happy reign: he cast his family and children upon his mercy; and prayed that they might not suffer for their father's fault. On the 27 May, the day appointed for his execution, he came to the scaffold in a very solemn but undaunted manner, accompanied with many of the nobility and some ministers. He spoke for half an hour with a great appearance of serenity. Cunningham, his physician, told me he touched his pulse, and that it did then beat at the usual rate, calm and strong. He did in a most solemn manner vindicate himself from all knowledge or accession to the king's death: he pardoned all his enemies; and submitted to the sentence, as to the will of God: he spoke highly in justification of the covenant, calling it the cause and work of God; and he expressed his apprehension of sad times like to follow, and exhorted all people to adhere to the covenant, 66 and to resolve to suffer rather than sin against their consciences. He parted with all his friends very decently: and after some time spent in his private devotion he was beheaded; and did end his days much better than those who knew the former parts of his life expected. Concerning which the earl of Crawford told me this passage. He had lived always in ill terms with him, and went out of town on the day of his execution. The earl of Middleton, when he saw him first, after it was over, asked him, if he did not believe his soul was in hell? He answered, not at all. And when the other seemed surprised at that, he said his reason was, he knew Argyll was naturally a very great coward, and was always afraid of dying: so, since he heard he had died with great resolution, he was persuaded that was from some supernatural assistance; he was sure it was not his natural temper. A few days after him, Guthrie suffered. He was accused of his accession to the remonstrance when the king was in Scotland, and for a book he had printed with the title of The causes of God's wrath upon the nation[38], in which the 227 treating with the king, the tendering him the covenant, and the admitting him to the exercise of the government, were highly aggravated as great acts of apostasy. His declining the king's authority to judge of his sermons, and his protesting for remedy of law against him, and the late seditious paper that he was drawing others to concur in, were the matters objected to him. He was a resolute and stiff man: so when his lawyers offered him legal defences, he would not be advised by them, but resolved to take his own way. He confessed and justified all that he had done, as agreeing to the principles and practices of the kirk, who had asserted all along that the doctrine delivered by them in their sermons did not fall under the cognizance of the temporal courts, till it was first judged by the church; for which he brought much dull and tedious proof[39]. He said, his protesting for remedy of law against the king was not meant at the king's person, but was only with relation to costs and damages. The earl of Middleton had a personal animosity to him; for in the late times he had excommunicated him[40]: so his eagerness in the prosecution did not look well. The defence he made signified nothing to justify himself, but laid a great load on presbytery; since he made it out beyond all dispute that he had acted upon their principles, which made them the more odious, as having among them some of the worst maxims of the church of Rome; that in particular, which was to make the pulpit a privileged place, in which a man might safely vent treason, and be secure in doing it, if the church judicatory should agree to acquit him. So upon this occasion great advantage was taken, to shew how near the spirit that had reigned in presbytery came to popery. It was resolved to make a public example of a preacher: so he was singled out. He gave no advantage to those who wished to have saved him, by the least step towards any 228 submission, but much to the contrary. Yet, though all people were disgusted at the earl of Middleton's eagerness in the prosecution, the earl of Tweeddale was the only man that moved against the putting him to death[41]. He said, banishment had been hitherto the severest censure that had been laid on the preachers for their opinions: he knew Guthrie was a man apt to give personal provocation, and he wished that might not have too great a share in carrying the matter so far. Yet he was condemned to die. I saw him suffer. He was so far from shewing any fear, that he rather expressed a contempt of death: he spoke an hour upon the ladder, with the composedness of a man that was delivering a sermon rather than his last words. He justified all he had done, and exhorted all people to adhere to the covenant, which he magnified highly. With him one Govan was also hanged; he had deserted the army while the king was in Scotland, and had gone over to Cromwell. The man was inconsiderable, till they made him more considered by putting him to death on such an account at so great a distance of time[42].
The gross iniquity of the court appeared in nothing more eminently than in the favour shewed Macleod of Assynt, who had betrayed the marquis of Montrose, and was brought over upon it[43]. He in prison struck up to a high pitch of vice and impiety, and gave great entertainments: and that, notwithstanding the baseness of the man and of his crime, begot him so many friends, that he was let go without any censure. The proceedings against Warriston were soon despatched, he being absent. It was proved 229 that he had presented the remonstrance; that he had acted under Cromwell's authority, and had sat as a peer in his parliament; that he had confirmed him in his protectorship, and had likewise sat one of the committee of safety: so he was attainted. Swinton had been attainted[44] in the parliament at Stirling for going over to Cromwell: so he was brought before the parliament to hear what he could say why the sentence should not be executed. He was then become a quaker; and did, with a sort of eloquence that moved the whole house, lay out all his own errors, and the ill spirit he was in when he committed them, with so tender a sense, that he seemed as one indifferent what they should do with him: and, without so much as moving for mercy, or even for a delay, he 67 did so effectually prevail on them, that they recommended him to the king as a fit object of his mercy. This was the more easily consented to by the earl of Middleton in hatred to the earl of Landerdale, who had got the gift of his estate. He had two good pleas in law: the one was, that the record of his attainder at Stirling, with all that had passed in that parliament, was lost: the other was, that by the act rescissory that parliament being annulled, all that [was] done by it was void: but he urged neither, since there was matter enough to attaint him of new if the defects of that supposed attainder had been observed. So till the act of indemnity was passed he was still in danger, having been the man of all Scotland that had been the most trusted and employed by Cromwell: but upon passing the act of indemnity he was safe[45].
The session of parliament was now brought to a conclusion, without any motion for an indemnity. The secret of this was, that since episcopacy was to be set up, and 230 that those who were the most like to oppose it were on other accounts obnoxious, it was thought best to keep them under that fear till the change should be made. The earl of Middleton went up to court full of merit, and as full of pride. He had a mind to be lord treasurer; and told the king, that, if he intended to set up episcopacy, the earl of Crawford, that was a noted presbyterian, must be put out of that post: it was the opinion of the king's zeal for that form of government that must bear down all the opposition that might otherwise be made to it: and it would not be possible to persuade the nation of that as long as they saw the white staff in such hands. Therefore, on the first day that a Scottish council was called after he came up, he gave a long account of the proceedings of parliament, and magnified the zeal and loyalty that many had expressed, while others that had been not only pardoned, but were highly trusted by the king, had been often cold and backward, and sometimes plainly against his service. The earl of Lauderdale was ill that day: so the earl of Crawford undertook to answer this reflection, which he thought was meant of himself, for opposing the act rescissory. He said, he had observed such an entire unanimity in carrying on the king's service that he did not know of any that had acted otherwise: and therefore he moved, that the earl of Middleton might speak plain, and name persons. The earl of Middleton desired to be excused: he did not intend to accuse any, but yet he thought he was bound to let the king know how he had been served. The earl of Crawford still pressed him to speak out after so general an accusation: no doubt he would inform the king in private who these persons were: and since he had already gone so far in public, he thought he ought to go further. The earl of Middleton was in some confusion, for he did not expect to be thus attacked: so to get off, he named the opposition that the earl of Tweeddale had made to the sentence passed on Guthrie, not without indecent reflections, as if his prosecution had flowed from the king's resentments 231 of his behaviour to himself: and so he turned the matter, that the earl of Tweeddale's reflection, which was thought indeed pointed against himself, should seem as meant against the king. The earl of Crawford upon this said, that the earl of Middleton ought to have excepted to the words when they were first spoken, and no doubt the parliament would have done the king justice: but it was never thought consistent with the liberty of speech in parliament, to bring men into question afterwards for words spoken in any debate when they were not challenged as soon as they were spoken. The earl of Middleton excused himself: he said, the thing was passed before he made due reflections on it; and so asked pardon for that omission. The earl of Crawford was glad he himself had escaped, and was silent as to the earl of Tweeddale's concern: so, nobody offering to excuse him, an order was presently sent down for committing him to prison, and for examining him upon the words he had spoken, and on his meaning in them[46]. That was not a time in which men durst pretend to privilege, or the freedom of debate: so he did not insist on it, but sent up such an account of his words, and such an explanation of them, as fully satisfied the king. So after the imprisonment of some weeks, he was set at liberty. But this raised a great outcry against the earl of Middleton, as a thing that was contrary to the freedom of debate, and destructive of the liberty of parliament. It lay the more open to censure, because the earl of Middleton had accepted of a great entertainment from the earl of Tweeddale after Guthrie's business was over: and it seemed contrary to the rules of hospitality, to have such a design in his heart against a man in whose house he had been so treated: all the excuse he made for it was, that he never intended it, but that the earl of Crawford had pressed him so hard upon the complaint he had made in general, that he had no way of getting out of it without naming some particular, and he had no other so ready then at hand. 232
68 Another difference of greater moment fell in between him and the earl of Crawford. The earl of Middleton was now raising the guards that were to be paid out of the excise granted by the parliament. So he moved, that the excise might be raised by collectors named by himself as general, that so he might not depend on the treasury for the pay of the forces. The earl of Crawford opposed this with great advantage, since all revenues given the king did by the course of law come into the treasury. Scotland was not in a condition to maintain two treasurers: and, as to what was said of the necessity of having the pay of the army well ascertained, and ever ready, otherwise it would become a grievance to the kingdom, he said the king was master, and what orders soever he thought fit to send to the treasury they would be most punctually obeyed. But the earl of Middleton knew there would be a great overplus of the excise, beyond the pay of the troops: and he reckoned that if the collection was put in his hands, he would easily get a grant of the overplus at the year's end. The earl of Crawford said, no such thing was ever pretended to by any general, unless by such as set up to be independent, and who hoped by that means to make themselves the masters of the army. So he carried the point, which was thought a victory. And the earl of Middleton was much blamed for putting his interest at court on such an issue, where the pretension was so unusual and so unreasonable.
The next point was concerning Argyll's estate. The king was inclined to restore the lord Lorn; though much pains was taken to persuade him that all the zeal he had expressed in his service was only an artifice between his father and him to preserve the family in all adventures: it was said, that had been an ordinary practice in Scotland for father and son to put themselves in different sides[47]. The marquis of Argyll had taken very extraordinary methods to raise his own family to such a superiority in the Highlands that he was a sort of a king among them. 233 The marquis of Huntly had married his sister, and during their friendship he was bound with him for some of his debts. After that, the marquis of Huntly, as he neglected his affairs, so he engaged in the king's side, by which Argyll saw he must be undone[48]. So he pretended that he only intended to secure himself, when he bought in prior mortgages and debts, which, as was believed, were compounded at very low rates. The friends of that family pressed the king hard to give his heir the confiscation of that part of Argyll's estate in which the marquis of Huntly's debts and all the pretensions on his estate were comprehended. And it was given to the marquis of Huntly, now duke of Gordon, then a young child: but no care was taken to breed him a protestant[49]. The marquis of Montrose, and all others whose estates had been ruined under Argyll's conduct, expected likewise reparation out of his estate; which was a very great one, but in no way able to satisfy all those demands. And it was believed that the earl of Middleton himself hoped to have carried away the main bulk of it: so that both the lord Lorn and he concurred, though with different views, to put a stop to all the pretensions made upon it.
The point of the greatest importance then under consideration was whether episcopacy should be restored in Scotland or not. The earl of Middleton assured the king, 234 it was desired by the greater and honester part of the nation. One synod had as good as petitioned for it: and many others wished for it, though the share they had in the late wars made them think it was not fit or decent for them to move for it. Sharp assured the king, that none but the protesters, of whom he had a very bad opinion, were against it; and that of the public resolutioners there would not be found twenty that would oppose it. All who were for making the change agreed that it ought to be done now in the first heat of joy after the restoration, and before the act of indemnity passed. The earl of Lauderdale and all his friends, on the other hand, assured the king, that the national prejudice against it was still very strong; that those who seemed zealous for it run into that only as a method to procure favour, but that those who were against it would be found stiff and eager in their opposition to it; that by setting it up the king would lose the affections of the nation, and that the supporting it would grow a heavy load on his government. The earl of Lauderdale turned all this, that looked like a zeal for presbytery, to a dexterous insinuating himself into the king's confidence, as one that seemed to design nothing but his greatness, and the having Scotland sure to him, in order to the executing of any design he might afterwards be engaged in. He said, he remembered well the aversion that he himself had observed in that nation to any thing that looked a superiority in the church. But to that the earl of Middleton and Sharp answered by assuring him that the insolencies committed by the presbyterians while they governed, and the ten years' usurpation that had followed, had made such a change in people's tempers that they were much altered since he had been among them. The king naturally hated 69 presbytery: and, having called a new parliament in England that did with great zeal espouse the interests of the church of England, and was beginning to complain of the evacuating the garrisons held by their army in that kingdom, he did easily give way, 235 though with a visible reluctancy, to the change of the church government in Scotland. The aversion he seemed to express was imputed to his own indifference as to all those matters, and to his unwillingness to involve his government in new troubles. But the view of things that the earl of Lauderdale had given him was the true root of all that coldness. The earl of Clarendon set it on with great zeal; and so did the duke of Ormond, who said it would be very hard to maintain the government of the church in Ireland if presbytery continued in Scotland; since the northern counties, which were the best stocked of any they had, as they were originally from Scotland, so they would still follow the way of that nation[1] Upon all this diversity of opinion, the thing was proposed in a Scotch council at Whitehall. The earl of Crawford declared himself against it: but the earl of Lauderdale, the duke of Hamilton, and sir Robert Moray, were only for delaying the making any such change till the king should be better satisfied concerning the inclinations of the nation[2]. The result of the debate, all the rest who were present being earnest for the change, was, that a letter was writ to the privy council of Scotland, intimating the king's intentions for setting up episcopacy, and demanding their advice upon it. The earl of Glencairn ordered the letter to be read, having taken care that such persons should be present who he knew would speak warmly for it, that so others who might intend to oppose it might be frightened from doing it. None spoke against it but the earl of Kincardin. He proposed that some certain methods might be taken, by which they might be well informed, and so be able to inform the king, of the temper of the nation, before they offered an advice, that might have such effects very much 236 to perplex, if not to disorder, all their affairs. Some smart repartees passed between the earl of Glencairn and him. This was all the opposition that was made at that board. So a letter was writ to the king from thence, encouraging him to go on, and assuring him that the change he intended to make would give a general satisfaction to the main body of the nation.
Upon that the thing was resolved on. It remained after this only to consider the proper methods of doing it, and the men who ought to be employed in it. Sheldon and the English bishops had an aversion to all that had been engaged in the covenant: so they were for seeking out all the episcopal clergy who had been driven out of Scotland in the beginning of the troubles, and preferring them. There was but one of the old bishops left alive, Sydserfe, that had been bishop of Galloway. He had come up to London, not doubting but that he should be advanced to the primacy of Scotland. It is true, he had of late done some very irregular things. When the act of uniformity required all men who held any benefices in England to be episcopally ordained, he, who by observing the ill effects of their former violence was become very moderate, with others of the Scotch clergy that gathered about him, did set up a very indefensible practice of ordaining all those of the English clergy who came to him, and that without demanding either oaths or subscriptions of them. Some believed that this was done by him only to subsist on the fees that arose from the letters of orders so granted; for he was very poor. This did so disgust the English bishops at him and his company, that they took no care of him. Yet they were much against a set of presbyterian bishops; they believed they could have no credit, and that they would have no zeal. This touched Sharp in the quick: so he laid the matter before the earl of Clarendon. He said, these old episcopal men, by their long absence out of 237 Scotland, knew nothing of the present generation: and by the ill usage they had met with, they were so irritated that they would run matters quickly to great extremities: and, if there was a faction among the bishops, some valuing themselves upon their constant steadiness, and looking with an ill eye on those who had been carried away with the stream, this would divide and distract their councils, whereas a set of men of moderate principles would be more uniform in their proceedings. This prevailed with the earl of Clarendon, who saw the king so remiss in that matter that he resolved to keep things in as great temper as was possible. And he, not doubting that Sharp would pursue that in which he seemed to be so zealous, and that he would carry things with great moderation, persuaded the bishops of England to leave the management of that matter wholly to him. And upon that, Sharp, being assured of that at which he had long aimed, laid aside his mask, and owned that he was to be archbishop of St. Andrews. He said to some, from whom I had it, that when he saw that the king was resolved on the change, and that some hot men were like to be advanced, whose violence would ruin the country, he had submitted to that post on design to moderate matters, and to cover some good men from a storm that might otherwise break upon them. So deeply did he still dissemble: for now he talked of nothing so much as of love and moderation.
70 Sydserfe was removed to be bishop of Orkney, one of the best revenues of any of the bishoprics in Scotland: but it had been almost in all times a sinecure. He lived little more than a year after his translation. He had died in more esteem if he had died a year before it [3]. But Sharp was ordered to find out proper men for filling the other sees. That care was left entirely to him. The choice was generally very bad.
238 Two men were brought up to be consecrated in England, Fairfoul, designed for the see of Glasgow, and Hamilton, brother to the lord Belhaven[4], for Galloway. The former of these was a pleasant and facetious man, insinuating and crafty: but he was a better physician than a divine. His life was scarce free of scandal, and he was eminent in nothing that belonged to his own function. He had not only sworn the covenant, but had persuaded others to do it; and when one objected to him, that it went against his conscience, he answered, there were some very good medicines that could not be chewed, but these were to be swallowed down in a pill or a bolus; and since it was plain that a man could not live in Scotland unless he sware it, therefore it must be swallowed down without any further examination[5]. Whatever the matter was, soon after his consecration his parts sunk so fast that in a few months he, who had passed his whole life long for one of the cunningest men in Scotland, became almost a changeling; upon which it may be easily collected what commentaries the presbyterians would make. Sharp lamented this to me, as one of their great misfortunes; he said it began to appear in less than a month after he came to London. Hamilton was a good natured man, but weak: he was always believed episcopal, yet he had so far complied in the time of the covenant, that he affected a peculiar expression of his counterfeit zeal for their cause, to secure himself from suspicion: at every time when he gave the sacrament, he excommunicated all that were not true to the covenant, using a form in the Old Testament of shaking out the lap of his gown, saying, so did he cast out of the church and communion all that dealt falsely in the covenant.
239 With these there was a fourth man found out, who was then at London in his return from the Bath, where he had been for his health: and on him I will enlarge more copiously. He was the son of doctor Leighton, that had in archbishop Laud's time writ Zion's Plea against the Prelates; for which he was condemned in the Star-chamber to have his ears cut and his nose slit. He was a man of a violent and ungoverned heat[6]. He sent his eldest son Robert to be bred in Scotland, who was accounted a saint from his youth up[7]. He had great quickness of parts, a lively apprehension, with a charming vivacity of thought and expression. He had the greatest command of the purest Latin that ever I knew in any man. He was a master both in Greek and Hebrew, and in the whole compass of theological learning, chiefly in the study of the Scriptures. But that which excelled all the rest, he came to be possessed with the highest and noblest sense of divine things that I ever saw in any man. He had no regard to his person, unless it was to mortify it by a constant low diet, that was like a perpetual fast. He had a contempt both of wealth or reputation. He seemed to have the lowest thoughts of himself possible, and to desire that all other persons should think as meanly of him as he himself did. He bore all sort of ill usage and reproach like a man that 240 took pleasure in it. He had so subdued the natural heat of his temper, that in a great variety of accidents, and in a course of 22 years' intimate conversation with him, I never observed the least sign of passion, but upon one single occasion. He brought himself into so composed a gravity, that I never saw him laugh and but seldom smile. And he kept himself in such a constant recollection, that I do not remember that ever I heard him say one idle word. There was a visible tendency in all he said to raise his own mind, and those he conversed with, to serious reflections. He seemed to be in perpetual meditation. And, though the whole course of his life was strict and ascetical, yet he had nothing of the sourness of temper that generally possesses men of that sort. He was the freest of superstition, of censuring others, or of imposing his own methods on them, possible; so that he did not so much as recommend them to others. He said there was a diversity of tempers, and every man was to watch over his own, and to turn it in the best manner he could. When he spoke of divine matters, which he did almost perpetually, it was in such an elevating manner, that I have often reflected on these words, and felt somewhat like them within myself while I was with him, Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked with us by the way? His thoughts were lively, oft out of the way and surprising, yet just and genuine. And he had laid together in his memory the greatest 71 treasure of the best and wisest of all the ancient sayings of the heathens as well as Christians, that I have ever known any man master of, and he used them in the aptest manner possible. He had been bred up with the greatest aversion imaginable to the whole frame of the church of England. From Scotland his father sent him to travel. He spent some years in France, and spoke that language like one born there. He came afterwards and settled in Scotland, and had presbyterian ordination; but he quickly broke through the prejudices of his education. 241 His preaching had a sublimity both of thought and expression in it; and, above all, the grace and gravity of his pronunciation was such that few heard him without a very sensible emotion: I am sure I never did. It was so different from all others, and indeed from every thing that one could hope to rise up to, that it gave a man an indignation at himself and all others. It was a very sensible humiliation to me, and for some time after I heard him, I could not bear the thought of my own performances, and was out of countenance when I was forced to think of preaching. His style was rather too fine[8]: but there was a majesty and beauty in it that left so deep an impression, that I cannot yet forget the sermons I heard him preach thirty year[s] ago. And yet with all this he seemed to look on himself as so ordinary a preacher, that while he had a cure he was ready to employ all others: and when he was a bishop he chose to preach to small auditories, and would never give notice beforehand. He had indeed a very low voice, and so could not be heard by a great crowd. He soon came to see into the follies of the presbyterians, and to hate their covenant, particularly the imposing it, and their fury against all who differed from them. He found they were not capable of large thoughts: theirs were narrow, as their tempers were sour. So he grew weary of mixing with them: he scarce ever went to their meetings, and lived in great retirement, minding only the care of his own parish at Newbotle near Edinburgh. Yet all the opposition that he made to them was, that he preached up a more universal charity, and a silenter but sublimer way of devotion, and a more exact rule of life than seemed to them consistent with human nature: but his own practice did even outshine his doctrine.
In the year [16]48 he declared himself for the engagement for the king. But the earl of Lothian, who lived in his parish, had so high an esteem for him that he persuaded the violent men not to meddle with him: though he gave occasion to great exception; for when some of his parish, 242 who had been in the engagement, were ordered to make public profession of their repentance for it, he told them, they had been in an expedition in which, he believed, they had neglected their duty to God, and had been guilty of injustice and violence, of drunkenness and other immoralities, and he charged them to repent of these very seriously, without meddling with the quarrel, or the grounds of that war. He entered into great correspondence with many of the episcopal party, and with my own father in particular, and did wholly separate himself from the presbyterians. At last he left them, and withdrew from his cure: for he could not do the things imposed on him any longer. And yet he hated all contention so much, that he chose rather to leave them in a silent manner than to engage in any disputes with them. But he had generally the reputation of a saint, and of something above human nature in him: so the mastership of the college of Edinburgh falling vacant some time after, and it being in the gift of the city, he was prevailed with to accept of it, because in it he was wholly separated from all church matters. He continued ten years in that post, and was a great blessing in it; for he talked so to all the youth of any capacity or distinction that it had a great effect on many of them. He preached often to them: and if crowds broke in, which they were apt to do, he would have gone on in his sermon in Latin, with a purity and life that charmed all who understood it. Thus he had lived above twenty years in Scotland, in the highest reputation that any man in my time ever had in that kingdom.
But he had a brother, well known at court, sir Elisha, who was very like him in face and in the vivacity of his parts, but the most unlike him in all other things that can be imagined: for, though he loved to talk of great sublimities in religion, yet he was a very immoral man, both lewd, false, and ambitious. He was a papist of a form of his own: but he had changed his religion to raise himself at 243 court; for he was at that time secretary to the duke of York[9], and was very intimate with the lord Aubigny, a brother of the duke of Richmond's, who had changed his religion, and was a priest, and had probably been a cardinal if he had lived a little longer[10]. He maintained an outward decency, and had more learning and better notions than men of quality, who enter into orders generally have. Yet he was a very vicious man: and this perhaps made him the more considered by the king, who loved and trusted him to a high degree. No man had more credit with the king; for he was of the secret as to his religion, and was more trusted with the whole design that was then managed in order to it, than any man whatsoever. Sir Elisha brought his brother and him acquainted: for Leighton loved to know men in all the varieties of religion.
72 In the vacation time he made excursions, and came oft 244 to London, where he observed all the eminent men in Cromwell's court, and in the several parties then about the city of London. But he told me he never could see any thing among them that pleased him: they were men of unquiet and meddling tempers: and their discourses and sermons were dry and unsavoury, full of airy cant, or of bombast swellings. Sometimes he went over to Flanders, to see what he could find in the several orders of the church of Rome. There he found some of Jansenius's followers, who seemed to be men of extraordinary tempers, and who studied to bring things, if possible, to the purity and simplicity of the primitive ages; on which all his thoughts were much set. He thought controversies had been too much insisted on, and had been carried too far. His brother, who thought of nothing but the raising himself at court, fancied that his being made a bishop might render himself more considerable. So he possessed the lord Aubigny with such an opinion of him, that he made the king apprehend that a man of his piety and his notions (and his not being married was not forgot) might contribute to carry on their design. He fancied such a monastic man, who had a great stretch of thought, and so many other eminent qualities, would be a mean, at least, to prepare the nation for popery, if not directly to come over to them; for his brother did not stick to say he was sure that lay at root with him. So the king named him of his own proper motion, which gave all those who began to suspect the king himself great jealousies of him. Leighton was averse to this promotion, as much as was possible. His brother had great power over him; for he took care to hide his vices from him, and to make before him a great shew of piety. He seemed to be a papist rather in name and shew than in reality, of which I will set down one instance that was then much talked of. Some of the church of England loved to magnify the sacrament in an extraordinary manner, affirming the real presence, only blaming the church of 245 Rome for defining the manner; they saying Christ was present in a most unconceivable manner. This was so much the mode, that the king and all the court went into it. So the king, upon some raillery about transubstantiation, asked sir Elisha if he believed it. He answered, he could not well tell; but he was sure the church of England believed it. And when the king seemed amazed at that, he replied, do not you believe that Christ is present in a most unconceivable manner? Which the king granted: then said he, that is just transubstantiation, the most unconceivable thing that was ever yet invented. When Leighton was prevailed on to accept a bishopric, he chose Dunblane, a small diocese, as well as a little revenue[11]. But the deanery of the chapel royal was annexed to that see. So he was willing to engage in that, that he might set up the common prayer in the king's chapel; for the rebuilding of which orders were given. The English clergy were well pleased with him, finding him both more learned, and more thoroughly theirs in the other points of uniformity, than the rest of the Scotch clergy, whom they could not much value. And though Sheldon did not very much like his great strictness, in which he had no mind to imitate him, yet he thought such a man as he was might give credit to episcopacy in its first introduction to a nation much prejudiced against it. Sharp did not know what to make of all this: he neither liked his strictness of life nor his notions: he believed they would not take the same methods, and he fancied he might be much obscured by him; for he feared he would be well supported. He saw the earl of Lauderdale began to magnify him; and so he did all he could to discourage him, but without any effect; for he had no regard to him. I bear still the greatest veneration for the memory of that man that I do to any person, and reckon my early knowledge of him, which happened the year after this, and my long and intimate conversation with him, that 246 continued to his death for 23 years, in all which time he made it very visible that I was the person he made most use of, and relied most upon, I say I reckon this among the greatest blessings of my life, and for which I know I must give an account to God in the great day in a most particular manner. And yet, though I know this account of his promotion may seem a blemish upon him, I would not conceal it, being resolved to write of all persons and things with all possible candor. I had the relation of it from himself, and more particularly from his brother. But what hopes soever the papists had of him at this time, when he knew nothing of the design of bringing in popery, and had therefore talked of some points of popery with the freedom of an abstracted and speculative man, yet he expressed another sense of the matter, when he came to see it was really intended to be brought in among us. He then spoke of popery in the complex at much another rate: and he seemed to have more zeal against it than I thought was in his nature with relation to any points in controversy; for his abstraction made him seem cold in all those matters. But he gave all who conversed with him a very different view of popery, when he saw we were really in danger of coming under the power of a religion that had, as he used to say, much of the wisdom that was earthly, sensual, and devilish, 73 but had nothing in it of the wisdom that was from above, and was pure and peaceable. He did indeed think the corruptions and cruelties of Popery were such gross and odious things, that nothing could have maintained that church under those just and visible prejudices but the several orders among them, that had such an appearance of mortification and contempt of the world; that with all the trash that was among them this maintained a face of piety and devotion. He also thought the great and fatal error of the Reformation was, that more of those houses and of that course of life, free from the entanglements of vows and other mixtures, was not preserved: so that the Protestant churches had neither places of education, nor 247 retreat for men of mortified tempers. I have dwelt long upon this man's character: but it was so singular, that it seemed to deserve it. And I was so singularly blessed by knowing him as I did, that I am sure he deserved it of me that I should give so full a view of him; which I hope may be of some use to the world.
When the time fixed for the consecration of the bishops of Scotland came on, the English bishops finding that Sharp and Leighton had not episcopal ordination to be priests and deacons, the other two having been ordained by bishops before the wars, they stood upon it that they must be ordained first deacons and then priests. Sharp was very uneasy at this, and remembered them of what had happened when king James had set up episcopacy. Bishop Andrews moved at that time the ordaining them, as was now proposed: but that was overruled by king James, who thought it went too far towards the unchurching of all those who had not bishops among them[12]. But the late wars, and the disputes during that time, had raised these controversies higher, and brought men to stricter notions, and to maintain them with more fierceness. The English bishops did also say, that by the late Act of Uniformity that matter was more positively settled than it had been before; so that they could not legally consecrate any but those who were, according to that constitution, made first priests and deacons. They also made this difference between the present time and king James's: for then the Scots were only in an imperfect state, having never had bishops among them since the Reformation; so in such a state of things, in which they had been under a real necessity, it was reasonable to allow of their orders, how defective soever: but that of late they had been in a state of schism, they had revolted from their bishops, and had thrown off that order: so that orders given in such a wilful opposition to the whole constitution of the primitive church 248 was a thing of another nature. They were positive in the point, and would not dispense with it. Sharp stuck more at it than could have been expected from a man that had swallowed down greater matters[13]. Leighton did not stand much upon it. He did not think orders given without bishops were null and void. He thought the forms of government were not settled by such positive laws as were unalterable, but only by apostolical practice, which, as he thought, authorized episcopacy as the best form. Yet he did not think it necessary to the being of a church. But yet he thought[14] that every church might make such rules in ordination as they pleased, and that they might reordain all that came to them from any other church; so that the reordaining a priest ordained in another church imported no more but that they received him into orders according to their rules, and did not infer the annulling the orders he had formerly received. These two were upon this privately ordained deacons and priests; and then all the four were consecrated publicly in the abbey of Westminster. Leighton told me he was much struck with the feasting and jollity of that day: it had not such an appearance of seriousness or piety as became the new modelling of a church[15]. When that was over, he made some attempts to work up Sharp to the two designs which possessed him most. The one was, to try what could be done towards the uniting the presbyterians and them: he offered Usher's Reduction as 249 the plan upon which they ought to form their schemes. The other was, to try how they could raise men to a truer and higher sense of piety, and bring the worship of that church out of their extempory methods into more order, and so to prepare them for a more regular way of worship, which he thought was of much more importance than a form of government. But he was amazed, when he observed that Sharp had neither formed any scheme, nor seemed so much as willing to talk of any. He reckoned they would be established in the next session of parliament, and so would be legally possessed of their bishoprics: and then every bishop was to do the best he could once to get all to submit to their authority, and when that point was carried, they might proceed to other things as should be found expedient: but he did not care to lay down any scheme. Fairfoul, when he talked to 74 him, had always a merry tale ready at hand to divert him: so that he avoided all serious discourse, and indeed did not seem capable of any. By these means Leighton quickly lost all heart and hope; and he said often to me upon it, that in the whole progress of that affair there appeared such cross characters of an angry Providence, that, how fully soever he was satisfied in his own mind as to episcopacy itself, yet it seemed that God was against them, and that they were not like to be the men that should build up his church; so that the struggling about it seemed to him like a fighting against God. He who had the greatest hand in it proceeded with so much dissimulation, and the rest of the order were so mean and so selfish, and the earl of Middleton, with the other secular men that conducted it, were so openly impious and vicious, that it did cast a reproach on every thing relating to religion, to see it managed by such instruments.
All the steps that were made afterwards were of a piece with this melancholy beginning. Upon the consecration 250 of the bishops, the presbyteries of Scotland that were still sitting began now to declare openly against episcopacy, and to prepare protestations, or other acts and instruments, against them. Some were talking of entering into new engagements against submitting to them. So Sharp moved, that, since the king had set up episcopacy, a proclamation might be issued out, forbidding clergymen to meet together in any presbytery or other judicatory, till the bishops should settle a method of proceeding in them. Upon the setting out this proclamation, a general obedience was given to it: only the ministers, to keep up a shew of acting on an ecclesiastical authority, met once, and entered in their books a protestation against this proclamation, as an invasion on the liberties of the church, to which they declared they gave obedience only for a time, and for peace sake. Sharp did this without any advice: and it proved very fatal. For when king James brought in the bishops before, they had still suffered the inferior judicatories to continue sitting, till the bishops came and sat down among them: some of them protested indeed against that: yet they sat on after that: and so the whole church had a face of unity, while all sat together in the same judicatories, though upon different principles. The old presbyterians said, they sat still as in a court settled by the laws of the church and state: and though they looked on the bishops sitting among them, and assuming a negative vote, as an usurpation, yet they said it did not infer a nullity on the court: whereas now, by this silencing these courts, the case was much altered: for if they had continued sitting, and the bishops had come among them, they would have said it was like the bearing with an usurpation when there was no remedy: and what protestations soever they might have made, or what opposition soever they might have given the bishops, that would have been kept within their own walls, but would not have broke out into such a distraction, as the nation was cast into upon that. All the opposition that might have been made would have died with those few 251 that were disposed to make it: and, upon due care to fill the vacant places with worthy and well-affected men, the nation might have been brought off from their prejudices. But these courts being now once broken, and brought together afterwards by a sort of connivance, without any legal authority, only as the bishop's assistants and officials, to give him advice, and to act in his name, they pretended they could not sit in them any more, unless they should change their principles, and become thoroughly episcopal, which was too great a turn to be soon brought about. So fatally did Sharp precipitate matters: he affected to have the reins of the church put wholly in his hands. The earl of Lauderdale was not sorry to see him commit errors; since the worse things were managed, his advices would be thereby the more justified. And the earl of Middleton and his party took no care of any business, being almost perpetually drunk: by which they came in a great measure to lose the king, for though, upon a frolic, he, with a few . in whose company he took pleasure, would sometimes run into excess, yet he did it seldom, and had a very bad opinion of all that got into the habit and love of drunkenness[16].
The bishops came down to Scotland soon after their consecration, all in one coach. Leighton told me, he believed they were weary of him, for he was very weary of them: but he, finding they intended to be received at Edinburgh with some pomp, left them at Morpeth, and came to Edinburgh a few days before them: he hated all the appearances of vanity. He would not have the title of lord given him by his friends, and was not easy when others forced it on him. In this he was thought too stiff: it provoked the other bishops, and looked like singularity and affectation, and furnished those who were prejudiced against him with a specious appearance, to represent him 252 as a man of odd notions and practices. The lord chancellor, with all the nobility and privy-counsellors then at Edinburgh, went out, together with the magistracy of the city, and brought the bishops in, as in triumph[17]. I looked on; and though I was thoroughly episcopal, yet I thought there was somewhat in the slight pomp of that entry, that did not look like the humility that became their function. Soon after their arrival, six other bishops were consecrated, but not ordained 75 priests and deacons[18]. The see of Edinburgh was for some time kept void. Sharp hoped that Douglas might be prevailed on to accept it: but he would enter into no treaty about it. So the earl of Middleton forced upon Sharp one Wishart, that had been the marquis of Montrose's chaplain, and had been taken prisoner, and used with so much cruelty in the gaol of Edinburgh, that he had been almost eat up with vermin; so the earl of Middleton thought it was but justice to advance a man in that place, where he had[19] been so near an advancement of another sort.
The session of parliament came on in April 1662: where the first thing that was proposed by the earl of Middleton was, that since by the act rescissory, that had annulled all the parliaments after that held in the year [16]33, the former laws in favour of episcopacy were now again in force, 253 the king had restored that function that had been so long glorious in the church, and for which his blessed father had suffered so much: and though the bishops had a right to come and take their place in parliament, yet it was a just piece of respect to send some of every state to invite them to come and sit among them. This was agreed to: so upon the message that was sent the bishops came and took their places[20]. Leighton came not with them, as indeed he never came to parliament but when there was something before them that related to religion or to the church.
The first act that passed in this session was for restoring of episcopacy, and settling the government of the church in their hands. Sharp had the framing of this act, as Primrose told me; and it appeared to be his; for, according to the fable of the harpies, he had an art of spoiling every thing that he touched. The whole government and jurisdiction of the church in the several dioceses was declared to be lodged in the bishops, which they were to exercise with the advice and assistance of such of their clergy as were of known loyalty and prudence: all men that held any benefice in the church were required to own and submit to the government of the church as now by law established. This was plainly the setting episcopacy on another bottom than it had been ever on in Scotland before this time: for the whole body of the presbyters did formerly maintain such a share in the administration, that the bishops had never pretended to any more than to be their settled presidents, with a negative voice upon them[21]. 254 But now it was said, that the whole power was lodged singly in the bishop, who was only bound to carry along with him in the administration so many presbyters as he thought fit to single out, as his advisers and assistants; which was the taking all power out of the body of the clergy. Church judicatories were now made only the bishop's assistants: and the few of the clergy that must assist being to be picked out by him, that was only a matter of shew: nor had they any authority lodged with them, all that being vested only in the bishop. Nor did it escape censure, that among the qualifications of those presbyters that were to be the bishop's advisers and assistants, loyalty and prudence were only named, and that piety and learning were forgot, which must always be reckoned in the first rank of the qualifications of the clergy. In the next place, exception was taken to the obligation laid on the clergy to own and submit to the government thus established by law. They said, it was hard even to submit to so high an authority as was now lodged with the bishops; but to require them to own it, seemed to import an antecedent approving, or at least a subsequent justifying, of such an authority, which carried the matter far beyond a bare obedience even to an imposing upon conscience. These were not only the exceptions made by presbyterians, but by the episcopal men themselves, who had never carried the argument farther in Scotland than for a presidency, with some authority in ordination, and a negative in matters of jurisdiction. They thought the body of the clergy ought to be a check upon the bishops, so that without a consent of the majority they ought not to be legally empowered to act in so imperious a manner, as was warranted by this act. Many of them would never subscribe to this form of owning and submitting: and the prudenter bishops did not impose it on their clergy. The whole frame of the act was liable to great censure. It was thought an unexcusable piece of madness, that, when a government was brought in upon a nation so averse to it, the first step 255 should carry their power so high. All the bishops, except Sharp, disowned their having any share in the penning the act; which indeed was passed in haste, without due consideration: nor did any of the bishops, no not Sharp himself, ever carry their authority so high as by the act they were warranted to do. But all the enemies to episcopacy had this act ever in their mouth, to excuse their not submitting to it; that it asserted a greater stretch of authority in bishops than they themselves thought fit to assume.
Soon after that act passed, some of the presbyterian preachers were summoned to answer before the parliament for some reflections made in their sermons against episcopacy. But nothing could be made of it: for their words were general, and capable of different senses. So it was resolved, for a proof of their loyalty, to tender them the, oath of allegiance and supremacy, that had been enacted in the former parliament, and was refused by none but 76 the earl of Cassillis. He desired that an explanation might be made of the supremacy. The words of the oath were large: and when the oath was enacted in England, a clear explanation was given in one of the articles of the church of England, and more copiously afterwards in a discourse of archbishop Usher's, published by king James's order. But the parliament would not satisfy him so far: and they were well pleased to see scruples raised about the oath, that so a colour might be put on their severities against such as should refuse it, as being men that refused to swear allegiance to the king. Upon that the earl of Cassillis left the parliament, and quitted all his employments: for he was a man of most inflexible firmness[22]. Many said there was no need of an explanation, since how ambiguous soever the words might be in themselves, yet that oath, being brought to Scotland from England, ought to be understood 256 in the same sense in which it was imposed in that kingdom. On the other hand, there was just reason for men's being tender in so sacred a matter as an oath. The earl of Cassillis had offered to take the oath, provided he might join his explanation to it. The earl of Middleton was contented to let him say what he pleased, but he would not suffer him to put it in writing. The ministers to whom it was now tendered offered to take it upon the same terms; and in a petition to the lords of the articles they offered their explanation. Upon that a debate arose, whether an act explanatory of the oath should be offered to the parliament or not. This was the first time that Leighton appeared in parliament. He pressed it might be done, with much zeal. He said the land mourned by reason of the many oaths that had been taken: the words of this were certainly capable of a bad sense: in compassion to papists a limited sense had been put on them in England: and he thought there should be a like tenderness shewed to protestants, especially when the scruple was just, and there was an oath in the case, in which the matter ought certainly to be made clear: to act otherwise looked like the laying snares for people, and the making men offenders for a word. Sharp took this ill from him, and replied upon him with great bitterness: he said it was below the dignity of government to make acts to satisfy the weak scruples of peevish men: it ill became them, who had imposed their covenant on all people without any explanation, and had forced all to take it, now to expect such extraordinary favour. Leighton insisted that it might be done for that very reason, that all people might see a difference between the mild proceedings of the government now, and their severity: and said it ill became the very same persons that had complained of that rigour now to practise it themselves; for thus it may be said, the world will go mad by turns. This was ill taken by the earl of Middleton and all his party: for they designed to keep the matter so, that the presbyterians should 257 be possessed with many scruples on this head, and that when any of the party should be brought before them that they believed in fault, but had not full proof against him, the oath should be tendered as the trial of his allegiance, and that for refusing it they should censure him as they thought fit. So the ministers' petition was rejected, and they were required to take the oath as it stood in the law, without putting any sense upon it. They refused to do it, and were upon that condemned to perpetual banishment, as men that denied allegiance to the king. And by this an engine was found out to banish as many as they pleased: for the resolution was taken up by the whole party to refuse it, unless with an explanation. So soon did men forget all their former complaints of the severity of imposing oaths, and began to set on foot the same practices, now that they had it in their power to do it. But how unbecoming soever this rigour might be in laymen, it was certainly much more indecent when managed by clergymen. And the supremacy which now was turned against the presbyterians, was not long after this laid much heavier on the bishops themselves: and then they desired an explanation, as much as the presbyterians did now, but could not obtain it.
The parliament was not satisfied with this oath: for they apprehended that many would infer, that, since it came from England, it ought to be understood in the public and established sense of the words that was passed there, both in an article of doctrine and in an act of parliament. Therefore another oath was likewise taken from the English pattern, of abjuring the covenant, both the league and the national covenant. It is true this was only imposed on men in the magistracy, or in public employments. By it all the presbyterians were turned out[23]: for this oath was 258 decried by the ministers as little less than open apostasy from God, and a throwing off their baptismal covenant.
The main business of this session of parliament, now that episcopacy was settled, and these oaths were enacted, was the passing the act of indemnity[1]. The earl of Middleton had obtained of the king an instruction to consent to the fining of the chief offenders, or to other punishments not extending to life[2]. This was intended to enrich him and his party, since all the rich and great offenders would be struck with the terror of this, and choose rather to make a good present than be fined on record, as guilty persons. This matter was debated at the council in Whitehall. The earls of Lauderdale and Crawford argued against it. They said the king had granted a full indemnity in England, out of which none were excepted but the regicides: it seemed therefore an unkind and unequal way of proceeding towards Scotland, that had merited eminently at the king's hands ever since the year [16]48, and had suffered much for it, that the one kingdom should not have the same measure of grace and pardon that was granted in the other. The earl of Middleton answered, that all he desired was in 77 favour of the loyal party in Scotland, who were undone by their adhering to the king: the revenue of the crown was too small, and too much charged, to repair their losses: so the 259 king had no other way to be just to them, but by making their enemies pay for their rebellion. Limitations were offered to the fines into which any should be condemned that were plausible; as, that it should be only for offences committed since the year [16]50, and that no man should be fined in above a year's rent of his estate; and these were agreed to. So he had an instruction to pass an act of indemnity, with a power of fining restrained to these rules. There was one sir George Mackenzie, since made lord Tarbot[3], a young man of great vivacity of parts, but full of ambition, and very crafty, who has had the art to recommend himself to all sides and parties by turns, and is yet alive, having made a great figure in that country now above fifty years. He has great notions of virtue and religion: but they are only notions, at least they have not had great effect on himself at all times. He became now the earl of Middleton's chief favourite. Primrose was grown rich and cautious: and his maxim having always been, that when he apprehended a change he ought to lay in for it by courting the side that was depressed, that so in the next turn he might secure friends to himself, he began to think that the earl of Middleton went too fast to hold out long. He had often advised him to manage the business of restoring episcopacy: he had formed a scheme by which it should have been the work of seven years, in a slow progress; but the earl of Middleton's heat and Sharp's vehemence spoiled all his project. The earl of Middleton, after his disgrace, said often to him, that his advices had been always wise and faithful: but he thought princes were 260 more sensible of services, and more apt to reflect on them, and to reward them, than he found they were.
When the settlement of episcopacy was over, the next care was to prepare the act of indemnity. Some proposed, that, besides the power of fining, they should move the king that he would consent to an instruction, empowering them likewise to put some under an incapacity to hold any public trust. This had never been proposed in public; but the earl of Middleton pretended that many of the best affected of the parliament had proposed it in private to himself. So he sent the lord Tarbot up to the king with two draughts of an act of indemnity; the one containing an exception of some persons to be fined, and the other containing likewise a clause for the incapacitating of some, not exceeding twelve, from all public trusts[4]. He was ordered to lay both before the king: the one was penned according to the earl of Middleton's instructions: the other was drawn at the desire of the parliament, for which he prayed an instruction, if the king thought fit to approve of it. The earl of Lauderdale had no apprehension of any design against himself in the motion: so he made no objection to it. And an instruction was drawn, empowering the earl of Middleton to pass an act with that clause. Tarbot was then much considered at court, as one of the most extraordinary men that Scotland had produced, and was the better liked, because he was looked on as the person that the earl of Middleton intended to set up in the earl of Lauderdale's room, who was then so much hated that nothing could have preserved him but the course that was taken to ruin him. So lord Tarbot went back to Scotland; and the duke of Richmond and the earl of Newburgh went down with him, by whose mild and ungoverned extravagancies the earl of Middleton's whole conduct fell under such an universal odium, and so much contempt, that it was well his own ill management forced the king to put an end to his ministry; for he could not 261 have served there much longer with any reputation. One instance of unusual severity was, that a letter of the lord Lorn's to the lord Duffus was intercepted, in which he did a little too plainly, but very truly, complain of the practices of his enemies in endeavouring to possess the king against him by many lies: but he said he had now discovered them, and had defeated them, and had gained the person upon whom the chief among them depended. This was the earl of Clarendon, upon whom the earl of Berkshire had wrought so much, that he resolved to oppose his restoration no more: and for this the earl of Berkshire was to have a thousand pound. This letter was carried into the parliament, and complained of as leasing-making; since lord Lorn pretended he had discovered the lies of his enemies to the king, which was a sowing dissension between the king and his subjects, and the creating in the king an ill opinion of them. So the parliament desired the king would send him down to be tried upon it. The king thought the letter very indiscreetly writ, but could not see any thing in it that was criminal; yet, in compliance with the desire of so zealous a parliament, Lorn was sent down upon his parole: but the king writ positively to the earl of Middleton not to proceed to the execution of any sentence that might pass upon him. Lorn, upon his appearance, was made a prisoner: and an indictment was brought against him for leasing-making. He made no defence: but in a long speech he set out the great provocation he had been under, the many libels [that] had been printed against him: some of these had been put in the king's own hands, to represent him as unworthy of his grace and favour: so, after all that hard usage, it was no wonder if he had writ with some sharpness: but he protested he meant no harm to any person; his design being only to preserve and save himself from the malice and lies of others, and not to make lies of any. In conclusion, he submitted to the justice of the parliament, and cast himself on the king's mercy. He was upon this condemned to die, 262 as guilty of leasing-making: and the day of his execution was left to the earl of Middleton by the parliament. I never knew any thing more generally cried out on than this was, 78 unless it was the second sentence passed on him about twenty years after this, which had more fatal effects and a more tragical conclusion. He was certainly born to be the signalest instance in this age of the rigour, or rather of the mockery, of justice. All that was said at this time to excuse the proceeding was, that it was certain his life was in no danger. But since that depended on the king, it did not excuse those who passed so base a sentence, and left to posterity the precedent of a parliamentary judgment, by which any man may be condemned for a letter of common news. This was not all the fury with which this matter was driven: for an act was passed against all persons, who should move the king for restoring the children of those who were attainted by parliament; which was an unheard-of restraint on applications to the king for his grace and mercy. This the earl of Middleton also passed, though he had no instruction for it. There was no penalty put in the act, from a maxim of the pleaders for prerogative, who thought the fixing a punishment was a limitation on the crown: whereas an act forbidding any thing made the offenders criminals: and in that case they did reckon, that the punishment was arbitrary; only that it could not extend to life. A committee was next appointed for setting the fines. They proceeded without any regard to the rules the king had set them. The most obnoxious compounded secretly. No consideration was had either of men's crimes or of their estates: no proofs were brought; inquiries were not so much as made: but as men were delated, they were marked down for such a fine: and all was transacted in a secret committee. When the list of the men and of their fines was read in parliament, exceptions were made to divers particulars: some had been under age all the time of transgression, and others had been abroad. But to every thing of this kind an answer 263 was made, that there would come a proper time in which every man was to be heard in his own defence: for the meaning of setting the fine was only this, that such persons should have no benefit by the act of indemnity unless they paid the fine: therefore every man that could stand upon his innocence, and renounce the benefit of the indemnity, was thereby freed from the fine, that was only his composition for the grace and pardon of the act. So all passed in a great hurry.
The other point, concerning the incapacity, was carried further than was perhaps intended at first; though the lord Tarbot assured me, he had from the beginning designed it. It was infused into all people that the king was weary of the earl of Lauderdale, but that he could not decently throw him off, and that therefore the parliament must help him with a fair pretence for doing it. Yet others were very apprehensive that the king could not approve of a parliament's falling upon a minister. So lord Tarbot proposed two expedients. The one was, that no person should be named, but that every member was to do it by ballot, and was to bring twelve names in a paper; and that a secret committee, two of every estate, should make the scrutiny; and that they, without making any report to the parliament, should put those twelve names on whom the greater number fell in the act of incapacity; which was to be an act apart, and not made a clause of the act of indemnity[5]. This was taken from the ostracism in Athens, and seemed the best method in an act of oblivion, in which all that was passed was to be forgiven: so no seeds of feuds would remain, when it was not so much as known against whom any one had voted. The other expedient was, that a clause should be put in the act, that it should have no force, and that the names in it should never be 264 published, unless the king should approve of it. By this means it was hoped, that, if the king should dislike the whole thing, yet it would be easy to soften that, by letting him see how entirely the act was in his power. Emissaries were sent to every parliament man, directing him how to make his list, that so the earls of Lauderdale, Crawford, and sir Robert Moray, might be three of the number. This was managed so carefully, that by a great majority they were three of the incapacitated persons[6]. The earl of Middleton passed the act, though he had no instruction about it in this form. The matter was so secretly carried, that it was not let out till the day before it was done: for they reckoned their success in it was to depend on the secrecy of it, and on their carrying it to the king before he should be possessed against it by the earl of Lauderdale or his party. So they took great care to visit the packet, and to stop any that should go post: and all people were under such a terror that no courage was left. Only lord Lorn sent one on his own horses, who was to go on in cross roads, till he got into Yorkshire; for they had secured every stage to Durham[7]. By this means the earl of Lauderdale had the news three days before the duke of Richmond and lord Tarbot got to court. He carried it presently to the king, who could scarce believe it. But when he saw by the letters that it was certainly true, he assured the earl of Lauderdale that he would preserve him, and never suffer such a destructive precedent to pass. He said he looked for no better upon the duke of Richmond's 265 going to Scotland, and his being perpetually drunk there. This mortified the earl of Lauderdale; for it looked like the laying in an excuse for the earl of Middleton. From him, by his orders, he went to the earl of Clarendon, and told all to him. He was amazed at it; and said, that certainly he had some secret friend that had got into their confidence, and had persuaded them to do as they had done on design to ruin them; but growing more serious, he added, he was sure the king on his own account would take care not to suffer such a thing to pass: otherwise no man could serve him: if way was given to such a method of proceeding, he himself would go out of his dominions as fast as his gout would suffer him. Two days after this, the duke of Richmond and lord Tarbot came to court. They brought the act of incapacity sealed up, together with a letter from the parliament magnifying the earl of Middleton's services, and another letter signed by ten of the bishops, setting forth his zeal for the church, and his care of them all: 79 and in particular they set out the design he was then on, of going round some of the worst affected counties to see the church established in them, as a work that was highly meritorious. At the same time he sent over the earl of Newburgh to Ireland, to engage the duke of Ormond to represent to the king the good effects that they began to feel in that kingdom from the earl of Middleton's administration in Scotland, hoping the king would not discourage, much less change, so faithful a minister. The king received the duke of Richmond and lord Tarbot very coldly. When they delivered the act of incapacity to him, he assured them it should never be opened by him; and said their last actings were like madmen, or like men that were perpetually drunk. Tarbot said, all was yet entire, and in his hands, the act being to live or to die as he pleased: he magnified the earl of Middleton's zeal in his service, and set out the loyal affections of his parliament, who had on this occasion consulted both the king's safety and his honour: the incapacity act was only intended 266 to put it out of the power of men, who had been formerly bad instruments, to be so any more: and even that was submitted by them to the king's judgment. The king heard him patiently, and, without any farther discourse on the subject, dismissed them: so they hoped they had mollified him. But the earl of Lauderdale turned the matter upon the earl of Middleton and lord Tarbot, who had made the king believe that the parliament desired leave to incapacitate some; whereas no such motion had ever been made in parliament: and then; after that the king upon that misrepresentation had given way to it, the parliament was made believe that the king desired that some might be put under that censure: so that the abuse had been equally put on both. Honours went by ballot at Venice, but punishments had never gone so, since the ostracism at Athens, which was the factious practice of a jealous commonwealth, never to be set up as a precedent under a monarchy: even the Athenians were ashamed of it when Aristides, the justest man among them, fell under the censure: and they laid it aside not long after[8].
The earl of Clarendon gave up the thing as unexcusable: but he studied to preserve the earl of Middleton. The change newly made in the church of Scotland had been managed by him with zeal and success: but though it was well begun, yet if these laws were not maintained by a vigorous execution, the presbyterians, who were quite dispirited by the steadiness of his conduct, would take heart again; especially if they saw the earl of Lauderdale grow upon him, whom they looked on as theirs in his heart: so he prayed him to forgive one single fault, that came after so much merit. He also sent advices to the earl of Middleton to go on in his care of establishing the church, and to get the bishops to send up copious accounts of all he had done. The king ordered him to come up, and to 267 give him an account of the affairs in Scotland. But he represented the absolute necessity of seeing some of the laws lately made put in execution: for it was hoped the king's displeasure would be allayed, and go off, if some time could be but gained.
One act passed in the last parliament that restored the rights of patronage[9], the taking away of which even presbytery could not carry till the year [16]49, in which they had the parliament entirely in their hands; for then the election of ministers was put in the church session and the lay elders, so that, from that time, all that had been admitted to churches came in without presentations. One clause in the act declared all these incumbents to be unlawful possessors: only it indemnified them for what was past, and required them between [ ] and Michaelmas to take presentations from the patron, who was obliged to give it, being demanded, and to get themselves to be instituted by the bishops; otherwise their churches were declared vacant on Michaelmas day. This took in all the young and hot men: so the presbyterians had many meetings about it, in which they all resolved not to obey the act. They reckoned the taking institution from a bishop was such an owning of his authority that it was a renouncing of all their former principles: whereas some few, that had a mind to hold their benefices, thought that was only a secular law for a legal right to their tithes and benefices, and had no relation to their spiritual concerns; and therefore they thought they might submit to it, especially where bishops were so moderate as to impose no subscription upon them, as the greater part were. But the resolution taken by the main body of the presbyterians was to pay no obedience to any of the acts made in this session, and to look on, and see what the state would do. The earl of Middleton was naturally fierce, and that was 268 heightened by the ill state of his affairs at court: so he resolved on a punctual execution of the law. He and all about him were at this time so constantly disordered by high entertainments and other excesses, that, even in the short intervals between their drunken bouts, they were not cool nor calm enough to consider what they were doing. He had also so mean an opinion of the party, that he believed they would comply with any thing rather than lose their benefices; and therefore he declared he would execute the law in its utmost rigour. On the other hand, the heads of the presbyterians reckoned, that if great numbers were turned out all at once, it would not be possible to fill their places all of the sudden; and that the government would be forced to take them in 80 again, if there were such a vacancy made, that a great part of the nation were cast destitute, and had no divine service in it. For that which all the wiser of the party apprehended most was, that the bishops would go on slowly, and single out some that were more factious, upon particular provocations, and turn them out by degrees, as they had men ready to put in their room; which would have been more insensible, [defensible ?] and more excusable, if indiscreet zealots had, as it were, forced censures from them. The advice sent over all the country from their leaders, that had settled measures at Edinburgh, was, that they should do and say nothing that might give a particular distaste, but should look on, and do their duty as long as they were connived at; and that if any proclamation should be issued out, commanding them to be silent, that they should all obey at once. In these measures both sides were deceived in their expectations. The bishops went to their several dioceses: and according as the people stood affected, they were well received: and they held their synods every where in October. In the northern parts very few stood out: but in the western parts scarce any came to them. The earl of Middleton went to Glasgow before Michaelmas. So when the time fixed by the act was past, and that scarce any one in all 269 those counties had paid any regard to it, he called a meeting of the privy council, that they might consider what was fit to be done. Duke Hamilton told me, they were all so drunk that day, that they were not capable of considering any thing that was laid before them, and would hear of nothing but the executing the law, without any relenting or delay. So a proclamation was issued out, requiring all who had their livings without presentations, and that had not obeyed the late act, to give over all further preaching, or serving the cure, and to withdraw from their parishes immediately: and the military men that lay in the country were ordered to pull them out of their pulpits, if they should presume to go on in their functions. This was opposed only by duke Hamilton, and sir James Lockhart, father to sir William Lockhart. They represented, that the much greater part of the preachers in these counties had come into their churches since the year [16]49; that they were very popular men, both esteemed and beloved of their people: it would be a great scandal if they should be turned out, and none be ready to be put in their places: and it would not be possible to find a competent number of well qualified men to fill the many vacancies that this proclamation would make. The earl of Middleton would hear of nothing but the immediate execution of the law. So the proclamation was issued out: and upon it above two hundred churches were shut up in one day: and about one hundred and fifty more were to be turned out for not obeying, and submitting to, the bishops' summons to their synods[10]. All this was done without considering the consequence of it, or communicating it to the other bishops. Sharp said to my self, that he knew nothing of it, nor did he imagine that so rash a thing could have been done till he saw it in print. He was glad that this was done without his having any share in it: for by it he was furnished with somewhat in which he was no way concerned, upon which he cast the blame of all the ill things that followed. Yet this was suitable 270 enough to a maxim that he and all that sort of people set up, that the execution of laws was that by which all governments maintained their strength as well as their honour[11]. The earl of Middleton was surprised at this extraordinary submission of the presbyterians; he had fancied that the greatest part would have complied, and that some of the more intractable would have done some extraordinary thing, to have justified the severities he would have exercised in that case; and was disappointed both ways. Yet this obedience of a party, so little accustomed to it, was much magnified at court. It was said that all plied before him: they knew he was steady: so they saw how necessary it was not to change the management, if it was really intended to preserve the church. Tarbot told me, that the king had expressed to himself the esteem he had for Sheldon, upon the account of the courage that he shewed [in] the debate concerning the execution of the act of uniformity at the day prefixed, which was St. Bartholomew's, when some suggested the danger that might arise, if the act were vigorously executed. From thence, it seems, the earl of Middleton concluded, the zeal he shewed now would be so acceptable, that all former errors would be forgiven, if he went through with it; as indeed he stuck at nothing. Yet the clamour of putting several counties as it were under an interdict, was very great. So all endeavours were used to get as many as could be had to fill those vacancies; and among others, I was much pressed both by the earl of Glencairn and the lord Tarbot, to go into any of the vacant churches that I liked best. I was then but nineteen: but there is no law in Scotland limiting the age of a priest. And it was upon this account that I was let in so far into the secret of all affairs: for they had such an imagination of some service I might do them, that they treated me with a very particular freedom and confidence. But I had drunk in the principle of moderation so early, that, though I was entirely episcopal, yet I would not engage with a body 271 of men that seemed to have the principles and tempers of inquisitors in them, and to have no regard to religion in any of their proceedings. So I stood upon my youth, and could not be wrought on 81 to go to the west; though the earl of Glencairn offered to carry me with him under his protection[12]. There was a sort of an invitation sent over the kingdom, like a hue and cry, to all persons to accept of benefices in the west. The livings were generally well endowed, and the parsonage houses were well built, and in good repair: and this drew many very worthless persons thither, who had little learning, less piety, and no sort of discretion. They came thither with great prejudices upon them, and had many difficulties to wrestle with. The former incumbents, who were for the most part Protesters, were a grave, solemn sort of people; their spirits were eager, and their tempers sour: but this had an appearance that created respect. They were r