The History of England - Vols. 1 to 6 (529 page)
Read The History of England - Vols. 1 to 6 Online
Authors: David Hume
[o]Journals, vol. viii. p. 24.
[p]King James’s Memoirs. This prince says, that Venner’s insurrection furnished a
reason or pretence for keeping up the guards, which were intended at first to have been disbanded with the rest of the army.
[r]Parl. Hist. vol. xxiii. p. 173.
[s]Carte’s Answer to the Bystander, p. 79.
[t]D’Estrades, 25th of July, 1661. Mr. Ralph’s History, vol. i. p. 176.
[u]Carte’s Ormond, vol. ii. p. 254. This account seems better supported, than that in
Ablancourt’s Memoirs, that the chancellor chiefly pushed the Portuguese alliance.
The secret transactions of the court of England could not be supposed to be much known to a French resident at Lisbon: And whatever opposition the chancellor might make, he would certainly endeavour to conceal it from the queen and all her family; and even in the parliament and council would support the resolution already taken.
Clarendon himself says in his Memoirs, that he never either opposed or promoted the
Portuguese match.
[w]Lord Landsdown’s Defence of general Monk. Temple, vol. ii. p. 154.
[x]D’Estrades, 17th of August, 1662. There was above half of 500,000 pounds really
paid as the queen’s portion.
[y]D’Estrades, 21st of August, 12th of September, 1662.
[z]It appears, however, from many of D’Estrades’s letters, particularly that of the 21st
of August, 1661, that the king might have transferred Dunkirk to the parliament, who would not have refused to bear the charges of it, but were unwilling to give money to the king for that purpose. The king on the other hand was jealous, lest the parliament should acquire any separate dominion or authority in a branch of administration, which seemed so little to belong to them: A proof that the government was not yet settled into that composure, and mutual confidence, which is absolutely requisite for conducting it.
[a]Id. 3d of October, 1662. The chief importance indeed of Dunkirk to the English
was, that it was able to distress their trade, when in the hands of the French: But it was Lewis the XIVth who first made it a good sea-port. If ever England have occasion to transport armies to the continent, it must be in support of some ally whose towns serve to the same purpose as Dunkirk would, if in the hands of the English.
PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)
375
http://oll.libertyfund.org/title/793
Online Library of Liberty: The History of England, vol. 6
[c]The author confesses, that the king’s zeal for popery was apt, at intervals, to go
farther than is here supposed, as appears from many passages in James the Second’s Memoirs.
[e]King James in his Memoirs gives an account of this affair different from what we
meet with in any historian. He says, that, while he was asleep, Brounker brought orders to Sir John Harman, captain of the ship, to slacken sail. Sir John remonstrated, but obeyed. After some time, finding that his falling back was likely to produce confusion in the fleet, he hoisted the sail as before: So that the prince coming soon after on the quarter deck, and finding all things as he left them, knew nothing of what had passed during his repose. No body gave him the least intimation of it. It was long after, that he heard of it, by a kind of accident; and he intended to have punished Brounker by martial law; but just about that time, the house of commons took up the question and impeached him, which made it impossible for the duke to punish him otherwise than by dismissing him his service. Brounker, before the house, never pretended, that he had received any orders from the duke.
[f]D’Estrades, 19th of December, 1664.
[g]D’Estrades, 14th August, 1665.
[h]Tromp’s life. D’Estrades, 5th of February 1665.
[i]D’Estrades, 21st of May 1666.
[k]The Dutch had spent on the war near 40 millions of livres a year, above three
millions sterling: A much greater sum than had been granted by the English parliament. D’Estrades, 24th of December, 1665; 1st of January, 1666. Temple, vol. i.
p. 71. It was probably the want of money which engaged the king to pay the seamen with tickets; a contrivance which proved so much to their loss.
[m]Some nonconformists however, both in Scotland and England, had kept a
correspondence with the States, and had entertained projects for insurrections, but they were too weak even to attempt the execution of them. D’Estrades, 13th October, 1665.
[NOTE [F]]
The articles were, that he had advised the king to govern by military power without parliaments, that he had affirmed the king to be a papist or popishly affected, that he had received great sums of money for procuring the Canary patent and other illegal patents, that he had advised and procured divers of his majesty’s subjects to be imprisoned against law, in remote islands and garrisons, thereby to prevent their having the benefit of the law, that he had procured the customs to be farmed at under rates, that he had received great sums from the Vintners’ company, PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)
376
http://oll.libertyfund.org/title/793
Online Library of Liberty: The History of England, vol. 6
for allowing them to inhance the price of wines, that he had in a short time gained a greater estate than could have been supposed to arise from the profits of his offices, that he had introduced an arbitrary government into his majesty’s plantations, that he had rejected a proposal for the preservation of Nevis and St. Christopher’s, which was the occasion of great losses in those parts, that when he was in his majesty’s service beyond sea he held a correspondence with Cromwel and his accomplices, that he advised the sale of Dunkirk, that he had unduly altered letters patent under the king’s seal, that he had unduly decided causes in council, which should have been brought before chancery, that he had issued quo warrantos against corporations with an intention of squeezing money from them, that he had taken money for passing the bill of settlement in Ireland, that he betrayed the nation in all foreign treaties, and that he was the principal adviser of dividing the fleet in June 1666.
[z]Wodrow’s History, vol. i. p. 255.
[NOTE [G]]
The abstract of the report of the Brook-house committee (so that committee was called) was first published by Mr. Ralph, vol. i. p. 177. from lord Hallifax’s collections, to which I refer. If we peruse their apology, which we find in the subsequent page of the same author, we shall find, that they acted with some malignity towards the king. They would take notice of no services performed before the 1st of September 1664. But all the king’s preparations preceded that date, and as chancellor Clarendon told the parliament, amounted to eight hundred thousand pounds; and the computation is very probable. This sum, therefore, must be added.
The committee likewise charged seven hundred thousand pounds to the king on account of the winter and summer guards, saved during two years and ten months that the war lasted. But this seems iniquitous. For though that was an usual burthen on the revenue, which was then saved; would not the diminution of the customs during the PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)
377
http://oll.libertyfund.org/title/793
Online Library of Liberty: The History of England, vol. 6
war be an equivalent to it? Besides, near three hundred and forty thousand pounds are charged for prize-money, which perhaps the king thought he ought not to account for.
These sums exceed the million and a half.
[c]Mr. Carte, in his vindication of the Answer to the Bystander, p. 99, says, that the
sale of the fee farm rents would not yield above one hundred thousand pounds; and his reasons appear well founded.
[d]D’Estrades, 21st July, 1667.
[NOTE [H]]
Gourville has said in his memoirs, vol. ii. p. 14, 67. that Charles was never sincere in the triple alliance; and that, having entertained a violent animosity against de Wit, he endeavoured, by this artifice, to detach him from the French alliance with a view of afterwards finding an opportunity to satiate his vengeance upon him. This account, though very little honourable to the king’s memory, seems probable from the events, as well as from the authority of the author.
[g]This year, on the 3d of January, died George Monk, duke of Albemarle, at Newhall
in Essex, after a languishing illness, and in the sixty-third year of his age. He left a great estate of 5,000 l. a year in land, and 60,000 l. in money, acquired by the bounty of the king, and encreased by his own frugality in his later years. Bishop Burnet, who, agreeably to his own factious spirit, treats this illustrious personage with great malignity, reproaches him with avarice: But as he appears not to have been in the least tainted with rapacity, his frugal conduct may more candidly be imputed to the habits, acquired in early life, while he was possessed of a very narrow fortune. It is indeed a singular proof of the strange power of faction, that any malignity should pursue the memory of a nobleman, the tenor of whose life was so unexceptionable, and who, by restoring the antient and legal and free government to three kingdoms, plunged in the most destructive anarchy, may safely be said to be the subject, in these islands, who, since the beginning of time, rendered the most durable and most essential services to his native country. The means also, by which he atchieved his great undertakings, were almost entirely unexceptionable. His temporary dissimulation, being absolutely necessary, could scarcely be blameable. He had received no trust from that mungrel, pretended, usurping parliament whom he dethroned; therefore could betray none: He even refused to carry his dissimulation so far as to take the oath of abjuration against the king. I confess, however, that the Rev. Dr. Douglas has shown me, from the Clarendon papers, an original letter of his to Sir Arthur Hazzlerig, containing very earnest, and certainly false protestations of his zeal for a commonwealth. It is to be lamented, that so worthy a man, and of such plain manners, should ever have found it necessary to carry his dissimulation to such a height. His family ended with his son.
[h]Carte’s Ormond, vol. ii. p. 225.
[i]England’s Appeal, p. 22. This year, on the 12th of November, died, in his retreat,
and in the 60th year of his age, Thomas lord Fairfax, who performed many great actions, without being a memorable personage, and allowed himself to be carried into PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)
378
http://oll.libertyfund.org/title/793
Online Library of Liberty: The History of England, vol. 6
many criminal enterprizes, with the best and most upright intentions. His daughter and heir was married to George Villiers, duke of Buckingham.
[l]Which may be thus translated.
The man, whose mind on virtue bent,
Pursues some greatly good intent,
With undiverted aim,
Serene beholds the angry crowd;
Nor can their clamours, fierce and loud,
His stubborn honour tame.
Not the proud tyrant’s fiercest threat,
Nor storms, that from their dark retreat
The lawless surges wake,
Not Jove’s dread bolt that shakes the pole,
The firmer purpose of his soul
With all its power can shake.
Shou’d Nature’s frame in ruins fall,
And chaos o’er the sinking ball
Resume primeval sway,
His courage chance and fate defies,
Nor feels the wreck of earth and skies
Obstruct its destin’d way.
Blacklocke.
[m]Since the publication of this History, the Author has had occasion to see the most
direct and positive evidence of this conspiracy. From the humanity and candour of the principal of the Scotch College at Paris, he was admitted to peruse James the Second’s Memoirs, kept there. They amount to several volumes of small folio, all writ with that prince’s own hand, and comprehending the remarkable incidents of his life from his early youth till near the time of his death. His account of the French alliance is as follows: The intention of the king and duke was chiefly to change the religion of England, which they deemed an easy undertaking, because of the great propensity, as they imagined, of the cavaliers and church party to popery: The treaty with Lewis was concluded at Versailles in the end of 1669, or beginning of 1670, by Lord Arundel of Wardour, whom no historian mentions as having had any hand in these transactions.
The purport of it was, that Lewis was to give Charles 200,000 pounds a year in quarterly payments, in order to enable him to settle the catholic religion in England; and he was also to supply him with an army of 6000 men in case of any insurrection.
When that work was finished, England was to join with France in making war upon Holland. In case of success, Lewis was to have the inland provinces, the prince of Orange Holland in sovereignty, and Charles, Sluice, the Brille, Walkeren, with the rest of the sea ports as far as Mazeland Sluice. The king’s project was first to effect the change of religion in England; but the dutchess of Orleans, in the interview at Dover, persuaded him to begin with the Dutch war, contrary to the remonstrances of the duke of York, who insisted that Lewis, after serving his own purposes, would no PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)
379
