The great civil war of the times of Charles I. and Cromwell

Front matter

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Introduction

If tlie Petition of Rights, -vFliich in the thii-d Parliament of Charles I.j confirmed those liberties that were already the bu'thi-ight of Englishmen, had been ingenuously assented to by the king, and taken by the brave and strong-minded men who were its authors for a final measm-e, it is possible the kingdom might have been spared the calamities of the following twenty years. But when, in the confidence of victory, the popular leaders proceeded to make that just and necessary enactment a vantage-ground for direct attacks on the prerogative of the crown ; and when, on the other hand, the distrustful sovereign withdrew, in effect, that assent to it wliich had difl'used among the people universal joyj a breach was made, which the living generation, though they successively flung into it ev^ything dear to man, were never to see closed.

The triumphs of that assembly were achieved by men whom, or whose like, even the great period we propose to sketch saw not again met together. The fiery EHot, foremost, if not gi'eatest, jDcrished long ere another paiiiament was called — unhappily in prison. Sir Thomas Wentworth, satisfied with that noble victory, so lai'ge a share of which was his own, mindful to wliich of the great parties in the state was now due the devotion of his vast political genius, went over to the king.

His example was followed by Digges, Littleton, Noy, and others of inferior note. Yet, that the spirit of the party survived, and would survive, while one man in particular Hved, was apparent from a now familiar anecdote of the time. That man was Pym; whose sterhng eloquence, learning, appUcation, and matchless tenacity of purpose, admirably fitted him for his office, as leader of an opposition so weighty in talent and vast in its designs. "Wentworth, before can-ying into effect liis final resolve, sought an interview in private with his inflexible associate, in which he imparted his present views, suggesting the advantages that would accrue from conciliation.

INTRODUCTION.

"You need not," interrupted Pym, indignantlyj at once perceiving Wentrrortli's drift, •wMle visions of impeaclunent rose upon Ms sight, " to tell me that you have a mind to leave us. But remember what I say — you are going to be undone. And remember, also, that though you leave us now, I will never leave you while your head is on your shoulders."

Refusing to pass a bill for suppKes, which the wants of the executive rendered ui-gent, the third parliament was dissolved in the midst of an ominous storm of contumacy on the part of the commons, and of disappointment and displeasure on that of the king. The representatives of the people retired to their homes, to brood over their personal wrongs and the despotism which now more than threatened the country, and to inflame, by their various statements of grievance, the popular discontent. The course pursued by the king had in it so much of inconsiderateness and obvious impolicy, beside what wilfulness may be imputed to it, as no hypothesis can explain, but one that includes a thorough conviction in the royal mind of its justice, in existing circumstances. He now commenced in earnest the fatal plan of governing by the bai'e force of prerogative, until a parHament could be convened with the prospect of a more complying temper. It is fau- to acquit Charles of a wish to encroach upon the known rights of his people; but a crisis had arrived, when the people would no longer distinguish between such a wish and a resolution to maintain those adverse claims of the crown, which he had inherited from his predecessors, and thought himself bound to defend in his own person, and transmit, unimpaired, to his children. King Charles reaUy desired to be the father of his people ; but in his code of pai-ental duty he included denial and correction with indulgence. We have no disposition to vindicate those infractions of the constitution, as now defined, which followed rapidly on each other. We cannot but observe, however, that numerous and gross as they were, and dii-ected equally against the freedom and the property of the subject, there were never wanting powerful minds ready to expose and exaggerate, if they were unable to prevent them; while few mentioned, perhaps few believed, the advancing prosperity of the people, which their combined operations did not check. ^

The brightest track along the course of the years which followed, is, with all its errors, the path of Wentworth. Raised to the dignities of baron and viscount, and to the offices of a privy-counsellor and president of the Council of the North, this great statesman, on the dissolution of the parliament, instantly applied himself with characteristic ardour to the high and perilous duties of his presidency.

The Council of the North was a court erected at York, in the reign of Henry VIII., with jm'isdiction over the five northern counties, in those times the theatre of frequent insurrection. The great and irregular powers exercised by this court, were, on Wentworth's appointment, enlarged to an almost unlimited extent. In administeiing them with strict but haughty and severe impartiaUty, he succeeded in the twofold object of bearing down with a high hand every show of disaffection towards the government, and of raising to an unprecedented amount the income derived from that part of the kingdom to the royal exchequer. Charles had soon to acknowledge, rather than discover, such extraordinary zeal and ability iu his new minister, as manifestly qualified him to serve

INTRODUCTION.

the state in a wider sphere. "Wentworth was nominated lord-deputy of teland, without being requned to resign the chair of the northern presidency.

That ever-unhappy country was now for the fii'st time governed by a hand ^dgorous and steady enough for the task. Wentworth made his appearance in Dublin with the pomp and ceremonial of royalty : it was his acknowledged principle of government to rule, not mei-ely as a vice-king, but as the deputed sovereign of a conquered province. Benefits and severities he dispensed with a sternly equal hand ; but even the severities of a master-mind, when first placed at the head of an arbitrary government, being for the most part merely the extinction of minor oppressions in the sovereign sway, ai'e, for the people, blessings in disguise. One of the many historians who have poui-ed their ^dals of angry censure on the proud head of Wentworth, beai's this reluctant testimony : — " the Richeheu of Ireland, he made that island wealthier in the midst of exactions, and, one might almost say, happier in the midst of oppressions."

The benefits conferred on Ireland by "Wentworth were diffused through all her institutions. We trace them in a more than quadi-upled revenue ; in the church strengthened - and made more efficient; in the courts of justice reformed; in the army disciplined; in commerce and manufactiu-es cherished and extended ; in a population wealthier, more peaceful, and more humane. Its concomitant excesses ai-e illustrated (among other lessremembered instances) by the trial and sentencing to death of the Lord Mountnorris, ostensibly for an impatient or disrespectful word ; an outbreak of tyrannous pride, made available to the strengthening of the government, which Wentworth's enemies did not forget. The sentence was meant only to humble the victim ; but a stretch of power so ^•iolent in itself, and yet so capable of aggravation by unii-iendly tongues, swelled prodigiously the gathering indignation against the viceroy, and was grimly noted down in the great impeachment-book, by those who watched with patience till the shadow upon the darkening pohtical sun-dial should point the hom- of his undoing.

Beyond the esteem of the sovereign, to whom he was ardently attached, Wentworth — ^with one exception — cared little to supply the vacancies in his former friendships from the party which he had now joined. Sincere, laborious, proud, he had no sympathy with the heartlessness and indolence of the courtiers. The exception refers to Laud ; whose translation to the see of London, and paramount authority in the administration, nearly coincided with the period of Wentworth's elevation, as both did with the fall of Buckingham. With a mind of less majestic dimensions, though more learnedly cultivated; with directness and integrity equal to Wentworth's steady and unquenchable ardour ; below him in pride, 'as- became a churchman, but as keenly capable of rigour, for conscience' sake ; as great in courage, as inflexible iu constancy ; above all, animated by like devotedness to the master whom both served " not wisely," but, iu their view of dutv, " well ;" — Laud, whatever may be thought by those who strangely discover the bond of these men's union in that most dissociative of principles, a common despotic will, was not unworthy of that intimacy with the larger-minded Wentworth which remained firm tiU violently and most aifectingly terminated by death. Such as they were, these eminent persons continued to be the main agents of King Charles's government in Chm'ch and

INTKODUCTION.

State, through many oimcultj and, finally, disastrous years. They did not originate all his plans, but. they were ever ready, in the fearlessness of duty, to carry forwai-d even the worst of them. If they erred iu an honest view of their duty, mistook the times, wounded the immature constitution, overrated even theb' abiUties, or indulged private passion at the cost of the pubUc weal ; they received in their persons, and will ever be paying in their fame, the penalty of those whom Providence places, as doomed yet not useless barriers to the violent current of changeful times; augmenting, while they brave, the fury of the waters, but prepaiing fertility for other generations, by forcing them to sweep away injiuious impediments, and then to waste their rage in difl'usion.

The means by which the government of Charles I., endeavoured to provide for its exigencies, without parliamentary aid, are known to every one. Taxes on merchandise (the "tonnage and poundage" of the period); compositions for declining to receive knighthood; fines from those whose estates were discovered to have encroached on the ancient boundaries of the royal forests; patents of monopoly on an infinite number of articles of ordinary consumption ; with other sources of revenue, some of them unprecedented and illegal, the gi'eater part arbitraiily and oppressively levied; all proved insufficient. Lai'ge sums were extorted, of which no more than a trifling proportion found its way into the treasmy; for an unsettled despotism is always plundered, and always improvident. "It is now almost fifteen years," said Pym, in the iirst session of the Long Paa-hament, "since his majesty had any assistance from his people; and these Ulegal ways of supplying the king were never pressed vrith more violence and art than they have been in this time : and yet I may, upon very good grounds, affirm, that in the last fifteen years of Queen Ehzabeth she received more by the bounty and affection of her subjects than hath come to his majesty^s coffers by all the inordinate and rigorous courses which have been taken." Refusal to comply with these demands was fi'equentj and was followed in numerous instances by fine and imprisonment in the Star Chamber, or other oppressive courts.

A more memorable tax is celebrated under the name of Ship-money. A feeble and distracted government at home had diminished the respect in which England had formerly been held by foreign nations. Her ancient dominion of her own seas was sHghted by her neighbours ; corsairs from Barbary made descents upon her coasts. To repel these disgraceful aggressions, the sea-ports were required to equip vessels for the king's service; and the demand was presently extended to the whole kingdom, the inland counties compounding for their assessments in money. The funds thus raised were honestly and successfully applied to the purposes for which they were requii-ed. But the demand was startHng and novel — revived, at least, fi'om the dust of forgotten records, Numbers opposed it, and were thi'own into prison. Among the most memorable and important processes in judicial history, is that by which the legality of this impost was tried in the case of Hampden. The patriot's assessment, upon an extensive landed property, was twenty shiUings. On so small a point turned the issue of a great consti-. tutional question ! Judgment was given for the crown ; but as the judges were beheved to be corrupted, and as the elaborate ai'guments of Hampden's counsel had convinced

INTKOBUCTION.

the nation that substantial right, if not the technical consti-uction of statutes, favoured Iiis cause, " the judgment," says Clarendon, " proved of more advantage to the gentleman condemned than to the king's sendee." Hampden, indeed, reaped a cheap immortaUty; but he ivas a man who had studied the ai-t of winning golden opinions; a man whose constancy of piu-pose was shaded by caution, or smoothed by the blandest of demeanours ; and ship-money was ia all men's ears a hated word.

But, as will always be the case in tins serious nation iu unsettled times, the deepest <ind widest grounds of discontent were occupied by questions of reUgion. The people were kept in pei-petual terror of popery by the slumber aUowed to the existing statutes against papists, and by the insolence or indiscretion of that party, in consequence of Charles's marriage mth a daughter of Roman CathoUc Fi'ance, and of liis known deferenca to the personal predilections of his queen. Tins, however, was only an aggravation of an older and more deeply-seated grievance. It could not but befall, in the great conflict of the Eeformation, that the antagonists of popery, driven at once by indignation, feai-, and hatred, would take up on the other side some extreme, and such as in cooler times would appear, to soimd judgments, untenable or worthless positions. These, when the piu'ified National Chvu'ch had been fixed on her ovm seciu-e basis, all sane persons woxdd have been ready to abandon, had no fresh cause of excitement arisen.

But events kept alarm wakeful ; and timid natui-es, remembering as a terrible di'cam whose images oppress the waking fancy, the sanguinary and flaming horrors of the past, thought themselves less secure in the efficiency of their arms and ramparts than in remoteness from the hated foe. The most primitive vestment, if the Romish, though only in common with other chm'ches, had adopted its use, retained the infection of Antichiist : observances the most venerable, in passing thi'ough that " chamber of abominable imagery," had become symbols of the mystic Babylon. That aversion to apostoUcal govern ment, and that impatience of imiformity in rites and ceremonies, which abhorrence of popish con-nption had aheady generated at home, were heightened by the sojom'n of the Mai'ian exiles among those reformed commimities abroad, whom not choice, but the pressm'e of cu'cumstances, had deprived of episcopacj^ and the decorous adjuncts of a national church. The strictness of Ehzabeth's ecclesiastical government, acting on the stubboi'n nature of conscientious Pmitanism, increased both the number and the vehemence of the Church's enemies. A further element of mischief was brought in after James had sent over his committee of divines to grace the synod of Dort. Davenant and his compeers, on their retm-n, innOculated the factions ^ith a more ^indent type of rehgious dissidence — the disputes of Prelatist and Pmitan were henceforth to be shai-pened by the reproacliful appellations of Cahiuist and Anninian ; and, by a strange contradiction, a sla\ish theology, in which the Father of mankind takes the character of a despot, became the watchword of political and religions fi-eedom.

With the authority. Laud had succeeded to the p' nciples of Cranraer, Whitgift, and Parker ; but in worse times, and, as both prime minis' ^r and metropolitan, in cii'cumstances at once more Hkely to beti-ay him into violence, and expose him to obloquy. The Pmitans who in Elizabeth's reign, though tm-bident, were comparatively inconsiderable, and hardly.

INTRODUCTION.

till towards the close of that brilliant period^ lifted their hands as a political party, grew formidable under .TameSj and, after the accession of Charles, insolent ; concessions — ^which they regarded as less than their due, and slight punishments — ^which raised them into credit with the multitude, turning equally to their advantage. Laud was folly awake to the greatness of the danger ; his error as a statesman lay in beUeving that the danger could be averted by an appliance, on the part of the rulers, of bare unyielding principle. He knew he had the kiag's perfect confidence ; he felt he had a strong heai-t and miquenchable zeal ; he trusted in the help of God, for he esteemed it his cause. Thus supported, he judged himself able to work out the justification of that poHcy which he felt convinced was just — to keep no terms with an implacable foe. "Eesolve — there is no end of yielding," was his motto. This is the sole secret of that frequent reference to " thorough," which has been so much commented on in his correspondence with Strafford. To this principle we confidently refer aU those public acts, which, often irreconcilable both ivith charity and prudence, and rendered doubly irritating by a sharp ungracious demeanour, overwhelmed him at length in. a tide of popular hatred without example. His preference of Papists to Pui-itans, as less dangerous and inveterate enemies to the Church (in which he agreed with Queen Elizabeth) ; his excessive zeal for the splendid externals of public worship ; liis measures for checking the perversion of pulpit influence to the furtherance of poUtical designs ; his revival of the obsolete jurisdiction of the ecclesiastical courts, in punishing gross profligacy of manners ; even the enormity of his share in the mulcts and mutilations inflicted by the Star Chamber, in such cases as those of Leighton, Prynne, BastTsdek, and Burton ; — had aU that origin. The offence for which these individuals were indicted, viz. the publication of libels on the hierarchy, was one so prevalent and popular, that the existence of the Church seemed to depend on steps being taken for its discouragement. Their " censure " has nevertheless been, with justice, reprobated by historians, as equally cruel and impoUtic. It proceeded from a tribunal already the object of popular odium ; it was known to have been instigated by the prelates, whose actions needed no character of harshness to secure them an unfriendly coloming ; the ignominy of the punishment outraged all the three great professions — for Prynne was a lawyer, Bastwick a physician. Burton a clergyman, and Leighton a Presbyterian divine ; finally, the manner of its execution was calculated, as penalties for licentiousness of language and opinions commonly are, to invest aspu-ing malevolence with the honours of martyrdom.

While these and other concurrent events prepared England for a great political and religious explosion, it was in the king's northern dominions that the torch of revolution was first appUed.

In the march of rapacity and violence which hurried forward the Reformation in Scotland, episcopacy was almost swept away. Only an obscure name and powerless existence remained, during many years, to intimate that law had not sealed its actual extinction. To restore the primitive worship and government of the church, in his native land, was among the fondest desires of Charles's heart, as it had been of his father's. Some distant preparatory steps toward this object had been taken by King James; but the attendance of Laud at the coronation of his royal successor, in the northern capital.

INTRODUCTION.

was indignantly perceived to have reference to an immediate plan for bringing that desire to effect. All orders of men looked on the progress of this design vpith unqualified disgust ; for in Scotland hatred of episcopacy (where, indeed, from the ignorant or designed confounding of the ideas of pope and prelate, it had, as an abstract principle, its bii-th,) was continually kept alive by two of the most powerful motives of human action — by self-interest among the nobles, and by religious enthusiasm among the people. In the mean time fatahty, or infatuation, waited on every proceeding of the government. The Scotch bishops — persons in no esteem with the people, and whom the primate's fatal poUcy had made hatefid to the nobUity, by conferring on them the highest secular preferments— were directed to prepare a Liturgy and Canons. The result of their laboui-s was submitted for revisal to the heads of the Anghcan chiu'ch; but, whether from distrust or contempt, the sanction of the native clergy was wholly overlooked. This was extreme imprudence towards a body who carried their notions of independence so high, and whose influence over their congregations was imbounded. INIoreover, by a preposterous inadvertency, the canons made their appearance before the litm-gy, to which they prescribed submission. Both were, in reaUty, inoffensive ; the canons being chiefly a compilation from the acts of the General Assembly of Scotland, and the litiu-gy or service-book only just so much varied from the EngUsh Book of Common Prayer as was required by the national vanity of the northern prelates. Nevertheless the people were taught to regard both as instruments of antichristian tjTanny j and, as such, a determined stand was to be made against their introduction.

Till the day appointed for the pubHcation of the sendee-book not a mm'mur was heard. The suppressed ire of the populace then first escaped in a riot of the lowest classes, chiefly women, which interrupted the public reading of the prayers, and endangered the lives of the officiating clergy. More perilous and decisive tumults succeeded ; in which, by degrees, fii'st the wealthy citizens, and finally the nobles, took part. For several months the government, contemptuously looking on, left the impotent local authorities to deal with its seditious subjects. At length a proclamation was sent down to assure the people of his majesty's regard for the Protestant religion, and to enforce the peace. By the treachery of some members of the pri^'y council, the contents of this document became known in Scotland before its arrival. A counter proclamation was instantly prepared by the popular leaders, which, as if of equal authority with the king's, they read and posted up at Stu-ling, Lithgow, and Edinburgh ; their armed partizans forcibly detaining the royal heralds to witness the completion of this daring act. The pretext of the tumultuous assemblies wliich convulsed the nation being to present petitions against the bishops and the Hturgy, the magistrates consented to a plan devised and insidiously proposed by the leaders, for the estabHshment of central " tables," or committees, to represent the petitioning parties. So ably were these boards conducted, that in a few weeks they had possessed themselves of unlimited authority throughout Scotland. An easy way was thus laid open to introduce the confederacy, so well remembered under the name of the " Solemn League and Covenant." The subscribers to this great national vow, after abjiu-ing the superstitions of popery, in the language of a former

8 INTRODUCTION.

covenant adopted in the reign of King James, and citing the several acts of parHament for the maintenance of the kii-k, boimd themselves, " according to the laudable example of their worthy and free progenitors, by the great name of the Lord their God," to defend their religion against all novations, and to stand by each other in resistance to the contraiy errors and corruptions, to the uttermost, against aU persons Tiithout exception. A solemn fast was observed, preparatory to subscribing. On the day appointed, multitudes of every rank, age, and sex, thronged the gi'cat church of St. GUes's and its precincts. The force, the freedom, and the extravagance of the repubUcan model of devotion, rose, on this occasion, to the highest pitch. Lifting their out-stretched hands towards heaven, the vast assembly swore to the national bond, amid shouts, and tears, and mutual embracements. The enthusiasm flew thi-ough the countiy; and all Scotland, ■\vith the exception of the immediate servants of the government, a few Roman Cathohcs, and the solitary to^vn of Aberdeen, was bound together in this vast confederacy, by the strongest tie of hiunan associations, a burning religious zeal.

Three months longer the government continued wavering and ii'resolute. It then sent down the Marquess of Hamilton, Charles's principal minister for Scotch affairs, with a commission " to conclude and determine aU things respecting the peace of the kingdom." To impress the commissioner with a high notion of their union and strength, the Covenanters, to the nirmber of twenty thousand, on foot and on horseback, met and conducted him iato the city; and seven hundi'ed robed miaisters are said to have placed themselves on an eminence by the roadside, and with one voice iatonated a psalm as he passed by.

Hamilton had undertaken a difficult task. The demands of the confederates gi'ew bolder as the negotiations advanced. Twice he journeyed to London, and twice retm-ned to his increasingly-excited countLymen with modified powers ; biinging, on his second reappearance, a surrender of everything demanded — the aboUtion of the Litiu-gy, Canons, and High Commission Com-t ; on the single condition, that for the new Covenant should be substituted that of King James. At the same time, a national assembly and a parliament were fixed, to discuss fi-eely all questions in dispute.

With these concessions the clergy and the people were disposed to be content. Not so the secular leaders. The king, they said, could not mean to grant all he had promised; his object was to gain time to reduce them by force. In a large body, headed by several noblemen, they mounted a scaffold at the INIarket Cross of Edinbui'gh ; where, sword in hand, they dehvered a formal protest, asserting their determination to persist in adherence to the Covenant.

The assembly met at Glasgow ; but the members ha^dng been almost all retiuned by the overpowering influence of "the tables," the commissioner found himself whoUy powerless before a majority resolved to caiTy forward the plans of the confederates. At the end of seven days, therefore, he dissolved the unmanageable convention, quitting it in the midst of a burst of real or affected giief, and departed for England. But the assembly refused to sepai-ate. Under the auspices of the Mai-quess of Ai'gyle, who from this time became the acknowledged head of the Covenanters, the dissolution was annulled.

INTRODUCTION.

and Episcopacy abolished, mth every other existing institution wliich could interfere with the joyful deUverance of Scotland fi.-om the absorbing ten'or of "popish and prelatic tyranny."

Naturally concluding that the king would seek by force to suppress the rebellion, the Covenanters now began to make wai'Uke prepai-ations. Troops were levied, arms purchased, the Scottish soldiers of fortune sei-ving on the Continent invited home. Encouragement was not wanting from the discontented party in England ; fr-om Fi-ance came the not less important aid of money. Lesley, a veteran from the wars of Germany, was appointed to the chief command ; and forthwith began hostihties by seizing the castles of Edinbiu-gh and Dumbarton. The king, on his part, proceeded with as much alacrity as liis want of resoui'ces permitted. At York, in which point the royal forces were concentrated, he was met by a briLLiant feudal gathering of the nobility and cliief gentry of the realm ; from thence he advanced to the vicinity of Bemick. Thither Lesley drew his Covenanters — twenty thousand men, indifferently equipped, but inspired with zeal which was kept constantly at a boiling temperature by the imwearied vehemence of pulpit oratory. Charles's troops were equal in number, and far better provided ; but without heart for the quarrel. Conscious of the unpopidarity of his cause, and reluctant to shed his subjects' blood, he readily admitted commissioners fi'om the Scottish camp; with whom was presently concluded, on the basis of the conditions before proposed at Edinbui'gh by Hamilton, the miserable armistice known in the history of the time as the Pacification of Berwick.

It was a fatal hour for England, when — whoever might be its true author — the attempt was made to force religions imiformity on the associated kingdom. The temper in which that measure was long pursued was plainly contempt — contempt for the independence of the Idrk, and for the spirit of Scotchmen. But it is a dangerous thing to despise a nation — even for a great nation to despise a mean one. Scotland became powerful, less in her own deep sense of ■«Tong endured, than in England's consciousness of wrong inflicted; unnerved by a sjnnpathy half magnanimous, half traitorous, England became the dupe and the victim of her wUy sister, in requital for having treated her in a delicate point as her vassal.

Chapter II. Strafford

While that hapless airangementj the Pacification of Berwick, was looked upon as dislionottrable in England, hj the Scots its stipulations were disregarded. Instead of disbanding their army, wliich they had engaged to do, the Covenanters dismissed a part only of the troops, and kept in pay all the officers ; nor were the lawless proceedings of the unamied revolters abated.

Already, in Scotland, Wentworth's was a name of hatred and of terror. A report that he intended to cross the Channel at the head of a body of troops, was among the earhest pretests of the Covenanters for flying to arms. This report had no foundation in fact ; yet the energy of his government awed into stillness and inaction their numerous countiymen settled in Ireland, who had begun to take the Covenant, and had shown an eager disposition to join the insurgents. Wentworth, however, was not bhnded, either by the boldness of Ms temper or by the readiness of his resources, to the dehcacy of the king's position ; he well knew the financial difficulties of the government, and its want of support in pubhc opinion j and justly apprehended the odium that would attach to the side which should be the foremost to shed blood in chnl strife. Though not directly consulted, it is probable that to the lord-deputj^s earnest advice, in his correspondence with the king, to remain on the defensive, was chiefly owing the facihty with which Charles jdelded to an accommodation.