[314] Clarendon and Hume inveigh against the parliament for this publication; in which they are of course followed by the whole rabble of Charles's admirers. But it could not reasonably be expected that such material papers should be kept back; nor were the parliament under any obligation to do so. The former writer insinuates that they were garbled; but Charles himself never pretended this (see Supplement to Evelyn's _Diary_, p. 101); nor does there seem any foundation for the surmise. His own friends garbled them, however, after the restoration; some passages are omitted in the edition of King Charles's Works; so that they can only be read accurately in the original publication, called _The King's Cabinet Opened_, a small tract in quarto; or in the modern compilations, such as the _Parliamentary History_, which have copied it. Ludlow says he has been informed that some of the letters taken at Naseby were suppressed by those intrusted with them, who since the king's restoration have been rewarded for it. _Memoirs_, i. 156. But I should not be inclined to believe this.
There is, however, an anecdote which may be mentioned in this place: A Dr. Hickman, afterwards Bishop of Derry, wrote in 1690, the following letter to Sprat, Bishop of Rochester, a copy of which, in Dr. Birch's handwriting, may be found in the British Museum. It was printed by him in the Appendix to the _Inquiry into the Share K. Charles I. had in Glamorgan's Transactions_, and from thence by Harris, in his _Life of Charles I._, p. 144.
"MY LORD,--Last week Mr. Bennet [a bookseller] left with me a manuscript of letters from King Charles I. to his queen; and said it was your lordship's desire and Dr. Pelling's, that my Lord Rochester should read them over, and see what was fit to be left out in the intended edition of them. Accordingly, my lord has read them over, and upon the whole matter says he is very much amazed at the design of printing them, and thinks that the king's enemies could not have done him a greater discourtesy. He showed me many passages which detract very much from the reputation of the king's prudence, and something from his integrity; and in short he can find nothing throughout the whole collection, but what will lessen the character of the king and offend all those who wish well to his memory. He thinks it very unfit to expose any man's conversation and familiarity with his wife, but especially that king's; for it was apparently his blind side, and his enemies gained great advantage by showing it. But my lord hopes his friends will spare him; and therefore he has ordered me not to deliver the book to the bookseller, but put it into your lordship's hands; and when you have read it, he knows you will be of his opinion. If your lordship has not time to read it all, my lord has turned down some leaves where he makes his chief objections. If your lordship sends any servant to town, I beg you would order him to call here for the book, and that you would take care about it."
Though the description of these letters answers perfectly to those in the _King's Cabinet Opened_, which certainly "detract much from the reputation of Charles's prudence, and something from his integrity,"
it is impossible that Rochester and the others could be ignorant of so well-known a publication; and we must consequently infer that some letters injurious to the king's character have been suppressed by the caution of his friends.
[315] The king had long entertained a notion, in which he was encouraged by the attorney-general Herbert, that the act against the dissolution of the parliament without its own consent was void in itself. _Life of Clarendon_, p. 86. This high monarchical theory of the nullity of statutes in restraint of the prerogative was never thoroughly eradicated till the Revolution, and in all contentions between the Crown and parliament destroyed the confidence, without which no accommodation could be durable.
[316] "There is little or no appearance but that this summer will be the hottest for war of any that hath been yet; and be confident that, in making peace, I shall ever show my constancy in adhering to bishops and all our friends, not forgetting to put a short period to this perpetual parliament." _King's Cabinet Opened_, p. 7. "It being presumption, and no piety, so to trust to a good cause as not to use all lawful means to maintain it, I have thought of one means more to furnish thee with for my assistance, than hitherto thou hast had: it is, that I give thee power to promise in my name, to whom thou thinkest most fit, that I will take away all the penal laws against the Roman catholics in England as soon as God shall enable me to do it; so as by their means, or in their favours, I may have so powerful assistance as may deserve so great a favour, and enable me to do it.
But if thou ask what I call that assistance, I answer that when thou knowest what may be done for it, it will be easily seen, if it deserve to be so esteemed. I need not tell thee what secrecy this business requires; yet this I will say, that this is the greatest point of confidence I can express to thee; for it is no thanks to me to trust thee in anything else but in this, which is the only point of difference in opinion betwixt us: and yet I know thou wilt make as good a bargain for me, even in this, as if thou wert a protestant."
_Id. ibid._ "As to my calling those at London a parliament, I shall refer thee to Digby for particular satisfaction; this in general--if there had been but two, besides myself, of my opinion, I had not done it; and the argument that prevailed with me was, that the calling did no ways acknowledge them to be a parliament, upon which condition and construction I did it, and no otherwise, and accordingly it is registered in the council books, with the council's unanimous approbation." _Id._ p. 4. The one counsellor who concurred with the king was Secretary Nicholas, Supplement to Evelyn's _Memoirs_, p. 90.
[317] The queen evidently suspected that he might be brought to abandon the catholics. _King's Cabinet Opened_, pp. 30, 31. And, if fear of her did not prevent him, I make no question that he would have done so, could he but have carried his other points.
[318] _Parl. Hist._ 428; _Somers Tracts_, v. 542. It appears by several letters of the king, published among those taken at Naseby, that Ormond had power to promise the Irish a repeal of the penal laws and the use of private chapels as well as a suspension of Poyning's law. _King's Cabinet Opened_, pp. 16, 19; Rushw. Abr. v. 589.
Glamorgan's treaty granted them all the churches with the revenues thereof, of which they had at any time since October 1641 been in possession; that is, the re-establishment of their religion: they, on the other hand, were to furnish a very large army to the king in England.
[319] Rushw. Abr. v. 582, 594. This, as well as some letters taken on Lord Digby's rout at Sherborn about the same time, made a prodigious impression. "Many good men were sorry that the king's actions agreed no better with his words; that he openly protested before God with horrid imprecations that he endeavoured nothing so much as the preservation of the protestant religion and rooting out of popery; yet in the meantime, underhand, he promised to the Irish rebels an abrogation of the laws against them, which was contrary to his late expressed promises in these words, 'I will never abrogate the laws against the papists.' And again he said, 'I abhor to think of bringing foreign soldiers into the kingdom,' and yet he solicited the Duke of Lorrain, the French, the Danes, and the very Irish, for assistance."
May's "Breviate of Hist. of Parliament" in Maseres's _Tracts_, i. 61.
Charles had certainly never scrupled (I do not say that he ought to have done so) to make application in every quarter for assistance; and began in 1642 with sending a Col. Cochran on a secret mission to Denmark, in the hope of obtaining a subsidiary force from that kingdom. There was at least no danger to the national independence from such allies. "We fear this shall undo the king for ever, that no repentance shall ever obtain a pardon of this act, if it be true, from his parliaments." Baillie, ii. 185. Jan. 20, 1646. The king's disavowal had some effect; it seems as if even those who were prejudiced against him could hardly believe him guilty of such an apostasy, as it appeared in their eyes. P. 175. And, in fact, though the catholics had demanded nothing unreasonable either in its own nature or according to the circumstances wherein they stood, it threw a great suspicion on the king's attachment to his own faith, when he was seen to abandon altogether, as it seemed, the protestant cause in Ireland, while he was struggling so tenaciously for a particular form of it in Britain. Nor was his negotiation less impolitic than dishonourable. Without depreciating a very brave and injured people, it may be said with certainty that an Irish army could not have had the remotest chance of success against Fairfax and Cromwell; the courage being equal on our side, the skill and discipline incomparably superior. And it was evident that Charles could never reign in England but on a protestant interest.
[320] Birch's _Inquiry into the Share which King Charles I. had in the Transactions of the Earl of Glamorgan_, 1747. Four letters of Charles to Glamorgan, now in the British Museum (Sloane MSS. 4161), in Birch's handwriting, but of which he was not aware at the time of that publication, decisively show the king's duplicity. In the first, which was meant to be seen by Digby, dated Feb. 3, 1646, he blames him for having been drawn to consent to conditions much beyond his instructions. "If you had advised with my lord lieutenant, as you promised me, all this had been helped;" and tells him he had commanded as much favour to be shown him as might possibly stand with his service and safety. On Feb. 28 he writes by a private hand, Sir John Winter, that he is every day more and more confirmed in the trust that he had of him. In a third letter, dated April 5, he says, in a cipher, to which the key is given, "you cannot be but confident of my making good all instructions and promises to you and nuncio." The fourth letter is dated April 6, and is in these words: "Herbert, as I doubt not but you have too much courage to be dismayed or discouraged at the usage like you have had, so I assure you that my estimation of you is nothing diminished by it, but rather begets in me a desire of revenge and reparation to us both (for in this I hold myself equally interested with you), whereupon not doubting of your accustomed care and industry in my service, I assure you of the continuance of my favour and protection to you, and that in deeds more than in words I shall show myself to be your most assured constant friend. C. R."
These letters have lately been republished by Dr. Lingard, _Hist. of Eng._ x. note B, from Warner's _Hist. of the Civil War in Ireland_.
The cipher may be found in the _Biographia Britannica_, under the article Bales. Dr. L. endeavours to prove that Glamorgan acted all along with Ormond's privity; and it must be owned that the expression in the king's last letter about revenge and reparation, which Dr. L.
does not advert to, has a very odd appearance.
The controversy is, I suppose, completely at an end; so that it is hardly necessary to mention a letter from Glamorgan, then Marquis of Worcester, to Clarendon after the restoration, which has every internal mark of credibility, and displays the king's unfairness.
_Clar. State Pap._ ii. 201, and Lingard, _ubi supra_. It is remarkable that the transaction is never mentioned in the _History of the Rebellion_. The noble author was, however, convinced of the genuineness of Glamorgan's commission, as appears by a letter to Secretary Nicholas. "I must tell you, I care not how little I say in that business of Ireland, since those strange powers and instructions given to your favourite Glamorgan, which appear to be so inexcusable to justice, piety, and prudence. And I fear there is very much in that transaction of Ireland, both before and since that you and I were never thought wise enough to be advised with in. Oh! Mr. Secretary, those stratagems have given me more sad hours than all the misfortunes in war which have befallen the king, and look like the effect of God's anger towards us." _Id._ p. 237. See also a note of Mr. Laing, _Hist.
of Scotland_, iii. 557, for another letter of the king to Glamorgan, from Newcastle, in July 1646, not less explicit than the foregoing.
[321] Burnet's _Mem. of Dukes of Hamilton_, 284. Baillie's letters, throughout 1646, indicate his apprehension of the prevalent spirit, which he dreaded as implacable, not only to monarchy, but to presbytery and the Scots nation. "The leaders of the people seem inclined to have no shadow of a king, to have liberty for all religions, a lame Erastian presbytery, to be so injurious to us as to chase us hence with the sword."--148. March 31, 1646. "The common word is, that they will have the king prisoner. Possibly they may grant to the prince to be a duke of Venice. The militia must be absolutely, for all time to come, in the power of the parliament, alone," etc.--200.
On the king's refusal of the propositions sent to Newcastle, the Scots took great pains to prevent a vote against him. 226. There was still, however, danger of this. 236, Oct. 13, and p. 243. His intrigues with both parties, the presbyterians and independents, were now known; and all sides seem to have been ripe for deposing them. 245. These letters are a curious contrast to the idle fancies of a speedy and triumphant restoration, which Clarendon himself as well as others of less judgment seem to have entertained.
[322] "Though he should swear it," says Baillie, "no man will believe that he sticks upon episcopacy for any conscience."--ii. 205. And again: "It is pity that base hypocrisy, when it is pellucid, shall still be entertained. No oaths did ever persuade me, that episcopacy was ever adhered to on any conscience."--224. This looks at first like mere bigotry. But, when we remember that Charles had abolished episcopacy in Scotland, and was ready to abolish protestantism in Ireland, Baillie's prejudices will appear less unreasonable. The king's private letters in the _Clarendon Papers_ have convinced me of his mistaken conscientiousness about church government; but of this his contemporaries could not be aware.
[323] Hollis maintains that the violent party were very desirous that the Scots should carry the king with them, and that nothing could have been more injurious to his interests. If we may believe Berkley, who is much confirmed by Baillie, the presbyterians had secretly engaged to the Scots that the army should be disbanded, and the king brought up to London with honour and safety. "Memoirs of Sir J. Berkley," in Maseres's _Tracts_, i. 358; Baillie, ii. 257. This affords no bad justification of the Scots for delivering him up.
"It is very like," says Baillie, "if he had done any duty, though he had never taken the covenant, but permitted it to have been put in an act of parliament in both kingdoms, and given so satisfactory an answer to the rest of the propositions, as easily he might, and sometimes I know he was willing, certainly Scotland had been for him as one man: and the body of England, upon many grounds, was upon a disposition to have so cordially embraced him, that no man, for his life, durst have muttered against his present restitution. But remaining what he was in all his maxims, a full Canterburian, both in matters of religion and state, he still inclined to a new war; and for that end resolved to go to Scotland. Some great men there pressed the equity of Scotland's protecting of him on any terms. This untimeous excess of friendship has ruined that unhappy prince; for the better party finding the conclusion of the king's coming to Scotland, and thereby their own present ruin, and the ruin of the whole cause, the making the malignants masters of church and state, the drawing the whole force of England upon Scotland for their perjurious violation of their covenant, they resolved by all means to cross that design."--P.
253.
[324] The votes for payment of the sum of 400,000 to the Scots are on Aug. 21, 27, and Sept. 1; though it was not fully agreed between the two nations till Dec. 8. Whitelock, 220, 229. But Whitelock dates the commencement of the understanding as to the delivery of the king about Dec. 24. P. 231. See Commons' Journals. Baillie, ii. 246, 253; Burnet's _Memoirs of Hamiltons_, 293, etc.; Laing, iii. 362; and Mr.
Godwin's _History of the Commonwealth_, ii. 258; a work in which great attention has been paid to the order of time.
[325] Journals, Aug. and Sept.; Godwin, _ubi supra_; Baillie, ii.
_passim_.
[326] Baillie, who, in Jan. 1644, speaks of the independents as rather troublesome than formidable, and even says: "No man, I know, in either of the houses of any note is for them" (437); and that "Lord Say's power and reputation is none at all;" admits, in a few months, the alarming increase of independency and sectarianism in the Earl of Manchester's army; more than two parts in three of the officers and soldiers being with them, and those the most resolute and confident; though they had no considerable force either in Essex's or Waller's army, nor in the assembly of divines or the parliament, ii. 5, 19, 20.
This was owing in a great degree to the influence, at that period, of Cromwell over Manchester. "The man," he says, "is a very wise and active head, universally well beloved, as religious and stout; being a known independent, and most of the soldiers who love new ways put themselves under his command."--60.
[327] The independent party, or at least some of its most eminent members, as Lord Say and Mr. St. John, were in a secret correspondence with Oxford, through the medium of Lord Saville, in the spring of 1645, if we believe Hollis, who asserts that he had seen their letters, asking offices for themselves. _Mem. of Hollis_, sect. 43.
Baillie refers this to an earlier period, the beginning of 1644 (i.
427); and I conceive that Hollis has been incorrect as to the date.
The king, however, was certainly playing a game with them in the beginning of 1646, as well as with the presbyterians, so as to give both parties an opinion of his insincerity. _Clarendon State Papers_, 214; and see two remarkable letters written by his order to Sir Henry Vane, 226, urging an union, in order to overthrow the presbyterian government.
[328] The principles of the independents are set forth candidly, and even favourably, by Collier, 829; as well as by Neal, ii. 98. For those who are not much acquainted with ecclesiastical distinction, it may be useful to mention the two essential characteristics of this sect, by which they differed from the presbyterians. The first was, that all churches or separate congregations were absolutely independent of each other as to jurisdiction or discipline; whence they rejected all synods and representative assemblies as possessing authority; though they generally admitted, to a very limited degree, the alliance of churches for mutual counsel and support. Their second characteristic was the denial of spiritual powers communicated in ordination by apostolical succession; deeming the call of a congregation a sufficient warrant for the exercise of the ministry.
See Orme's _Life of Owen_, for a clear view and able defence of the principles maintained by this party. I must add, that Neal seems to have proved that the independents, as a body, were not systematically adverse to monarchy.
[329] Edwards's _Gangraena_, a noted book in that age, enumerates one hundred and seventy-six heresies, which, however, are reduced by him to sixteen heads; and these seem capable of further consideration.
Neal, 249. The house ordered a general fast, Feb. 1647, to beseech God to stop the growth of heresy and blasphemy. Whitelock, 236; a presbyterian artifice to alarm the nation.
[330] _Parl. Hist._ ii. 1479. They did not meet till July 1, 1643.
Rushw. Abr. v. 123; Neal, 42; Collier, 823. Though this assembly showed abundance of bigotry and narrowness, they were by no means so contemptible as Clarendon represents them (ii. 423); and perhaps equal in learning, good sense, and other merits, to any lower house of convocation that ever made a figure in England.
[331] Whitelock, 71; Neal, 103. Selden, who owed no gratitude to the episcopal church, was from the beginning of its dangers a steady and active friend, displaying, whatever may have been said of his timidity, full as much courage as could reasonably be expected from a studious man advanced in years. Baillie, in 1641, calls him "the avowed proctor of the bishops" (i. 245); and when provoked by his Erastian opposition in 1646, presumes to talk of his "insolent absurdity" (ii. 96). Selden sat in the assembly of divines; and by his great knowledge of the ancient languages and of ecclesiastical antiquities, as well as by his sound logic and calm clear judgment, obtained an undeniable superiority, which he took no pains to conceal.
[332] Scobell; Rushw. Abr. v. 576; _Parl. Hist._ iii. 444; Neal, 199.
The latter says, this did not pass the Lords till June 6. But this is not so. Whitelock very rightly opposed the prohibition of the use of the common prayer, and of the silencing episcopal ministers, as contrary to the principle of liberty of conscience avowed by the parliament, and like what had been complained of in the bishops. 226, 239, 281. But, in Sept. 1647, it was voted that the indulgence in favour of tender consciences should not extend to tolerate the common prayer. _Id._ 274.
[333] The Erastians were named from Erastus, a German physician in the sixteenth century. The denomination is often used in the present age ignorantly, and therefore indefinitely; but I apprehend that the fundamental principle of his followers was this: That in a commonwealth where the magistrate professes Christianity, it is not convenient that offences against religion and morality should be punished by the censures of the church, especially by excommunication.
Probably he may have gone farther, as Selden seems to have done (Neal, 194), and denied the right of exclusion from church communion, even without reference to the temporal power; but the limited proposition was of course sufficient to raise the practical controversy. The Helvetic divines, Gualter and Bullinger, strongly concurred in this with Erastus; "Contendimus disciplinam esse debere in ecclesia, sed satis esse, si ea administretur a magistratu." Erastus, _de Excommunicatione_, p. 350; and a still stronger passage in p. 379. And it is said, that Archbishop Whitgift caused Erastus's book to be printed at his own expense. See one of Warburton's notes on Neal.
Calvin, and the whole of his school, held, as is well known, a very opposite tenet. See _Erasti Theses de Excommunicatione_, 4to, 1579.
The ecclesiastical constitution of England is nearly Erastian in theory, and almost wholly so in practice. Every sentence of the spiritual judge is liable to be reversed by a civil tribunal, the court of delegates, by virtue of the king's supremacy over all causes.
And, practically, what is called church discipline, or the censures of ecclesiastical governors for offences, has gone so much into disuse, and what remains is so contemptible, that I believe no one, except those who derive a little profit from it, would regret its abolition.
"The most part of the House of Commons," says Baillie, ii. 149, "especially the lawyers, whereof there are many, and divers of them very able men, are either half or whole Erastians, believing no church government to be of divine right, but all to be a human constitution depending on the will of the magistrate." "The pope and king," he says in another place (196), "were never more earnest for the headship of the church than the plurality of this parliament." See also p. 183; and Whitelock, 169.
[334] _Parl. Hist._ 459 _et alibi_; Rushw. Abr. v. 578 _et alibi_; Whitelock, 165, 169, 173, 176 _et post_; Baillie's _Letters_, _passim_; Neal, 23, etc., 191 _et post_; Collier, 841. The assembly attempted to sustain their own cause by counter votes; and, the minority of independents and Erastians having withdrawn, it was carried with a single dissent of Lightfoot, that Christ had established a government in his church independent of the civil magistrate. Neal, 223.
[335] Neal, 228. Warburton says, in his note on this passage, that "the presbyterian was _to all intents and purposes_ the established religion during the time of the commonwealth." But, as coercive discipline and synodical government are no small intents and purposes of that religion, this assertion requires to be modified, as it has been in my text. Besides which, there were many ministers of the independent sect in benefices, some of whom probably had never received ordination. "Both baptists and independents," says a very well informed writer of the latter denomination, "were in the practice of accepting the livings, that is, the temporalities of the church.
They did not, however, view themselves as parish ministers, and bound to administer all the ordinances of religion to the parish population.
They occupied the parochial edifices, and received a portion of the tithes for their maintenance; but in all other respects acted according to their own principles." Orme's _Life of Owen_, 136. This he thinks would have produced very serious evils, if not happily checked by the Restoration. "During the commonwealth," he observes afterwards (245), "no system of church government can be considered as having been properly or fully established. The presbyterians, if any, enjoyed this distinction."
[336] The city began to petition for the establishment of presbytery, and against toleration of sectaries, early in 1646; and not long after came to assume what seemed to the Commons too dictatorial a tone. This gave much offence, and contributed to drive some members into the opposite faction. Neal, 193, 221, 241; Whitelock, 207, 240.
[337] Vol. ii. 268. See also 207, and other places. This is a remark that requires attention; many are apt to misunderstand the question.
"For this point (toleration) both they and we contend," says Baillie, "tanquam pro aris et focis."--ii. 175. "Not only they praise your magistrate" (writing to a Mr. Spang in Holland), "who for policy gives some secret tolerance to divers religions, wherein, as I conceive, your divines preach against them as great sinners, but avow that by God's command the magistrate is discharged to put the least discourtesy on any man, Jew, Turk, Papist, Socinian, or whatever, for his religion."--18. See also 61, and many other passages. "The army"
(says Hugh Peters in a tract, entitled "A Word for the Army, and Two Words to the People," 1647) "never hindered the state from a state religion, having only wished to enjoy now what the puritans begged under the prelates; when we desire more, blame us, and shame us." In another, entitled "Vox Militaris," the author says: "We did never engage against this platform, nor for that platform, nor ever will, except better informed; and therefore, if the state establisheth presbytery, we shall never oppose it."
The question of toleration, in its most important shape, was brought at this time before parliament, on occasion of one Paul Best who had written against the doctrine of the trinity. According to the common law, heretics, on being adjudged by the spiritual court, were delivered over to be burned under the writ de haeretico comburendo.
This punishment had been inflicted five times under Elizabeth; on Wielmacker and Ter Wort, two Dutch anabaptists, who, like many of that sect, entertained Arian tenets, and were burned in Smithfield in 1575; on Matthew Hammond in 1579, Thomas Lewis in 1583, and Francis Ket in 1588; all burned by Scambler, Bishop of Norwich. It was also inflicted on Bartholomew Legat and Edward Wightman, under James, in 1614; the first burned by King, Bishop of London, the second by Neile of Litchfield. A third, by birth a Spaniard, incurred the same penalty; but the compassion of the people showed itself so strongly at Legat's execution that James thought it expedient not to carry the sentence into effect. Such is the venomous and demoralising spirit of bigotry, that Fuller, a writer remarkable for good nature and gentleness, expresses his indignation at the pity which was manifested by the spectators of Legat's sufferings. _Church Hist._ part ii. p. 62. In the present case of Paul Best, the old sentence of fire was not suggested by any one; but an ordinance was brought in, Jan. 1646, to punish him with death. Whitelock, 190. Best made, at length, such an explanation as was accepted (Neal, 214); but an ordinance to suppress blasphemies and heresies as capital offences was brought in. Commons'
Journals, April 1646. The independents gaining strength, this was long delayed; but the ordinance passed both houses, May 2, 1648. _Id._ 303.
Neal (338) justly observes, that it shows the governing presbyterians would have made a terrible use of their power, had they been supported by the sword of the civil magistrate. The denial of the trinity, incarnation, atonement, or inspiration of any book of the Old or New Testament, was made felony. Lesser offences, such as anabaptism, or denying the lawfulness of presbyterian government, were punishable by imprisonment till the party should recant. It was much opposed, especially by Whitelock. The writ de haeretico comburendo, as is well known, was taken away by act of parliament in 1677.
[338] "In all New England, no liberty of living for a presbyterian.
Whoever there, were they angels for life and doctrine, will essay to set up a different way from them [the independents], shall be sure of present banishment." Baillie, ii. 4, also 17. I am surprised to find a late writer of that country (Dwight's _Travels in New England_) attempt to extenuate at least the intolerance of the independents towards the quakers, who came to settle there; and which, we see, extended also to the presbyterians. But Mr. Orme, with more judgment, observes that the New England congregations did not sufficiently adhere to the principle of independency, and acted too much as a body; to which he ascribes their persecution of the quakers and others.