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The World's Greatest Books — Volume 12 — Modern History

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Title: The World's Greatest Books — Volume 12 — Modern History

Editor: Arthur Mee
        J. A. Hammerton


        
Release date: July 7, 2004 [eBook #12845]
                Most recently updated: October 28, 2024

Language: English

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORLD'S GREATEST BOOKS — VOLUME 12 — MODERN HISTORY ***

THE WORLD'S GREATEST BOOKS

JOINT EDITORS

ARTHUR MEE Editor and Founder of the Book of Knowledge

J.A. HAMMERTON Editor of Harmsworth a Universal Encyclopaedia

VOL. XII MODERN HISTORY

       *       *       *       *       *


_Table of Contents_


MODERN HISTORY

AMERICA
  ELIOT, SAMUEL
    History of the United Stales

  PRESCOTT, W.H.
    History of the Conquest of Mexico
    History of the Conquest of Peru

ENGLAND
  EDWARD HYDE, E. OF CLARENDON
    History of the Rebellion

  MACAULAY, LORD
    History of England

  BUCKLE, HENRY
    History of Civilization in England

  BAGEHOT, WALTER
    English Constitution

FRANCE
  VOLTAIRE
    Age of Louis XIV

  TOCQUEVILLE, DE
    Old Régime

  MIGNET, FRANCOIS
    History of the French Revolution

  CARLYLE, THOMAS
    History of the French Revolution

  LAMARTINE, A.M.L. DE
    History of the Girondists

  TAINE, H.A.
    Modern Régime

GERMANY
  CARLYLE, THOMAS
    Frederick the Great

GREECE
  FINLAY, GEORGE
    History of Greece

HOLLAND
  MOTLEY, J.L.
    Rise of the Dutch Republic
    History of the United Netherlands

INDIA
  ELPHINSTONE, MOUNTSTUART
    History of India

RUSSIA
  VOLTAIRE
    Russia under Peter the Great

SPAIN
  PRESCOTT, W.H.
    Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella

SWEDEN
  VOLTAIRE
    History of Charles XII

PAPACY
  MILMAN, HENRY
    History of Latin Christianity

  VON RANKE, LEOPOLD
    History of the Popes

A Complete Index of THE WORLD'S GREATEST BOOKS will be found at the end
of Volume XX.

       *       *       *       *       *

_Acknowledgment_

     Acknowledgment and thanks for permitting the use of the
     selection by H.A. Taine on "Modern Régime," appearing in this
     volume, are hereby tendered to Madame Taine-Paul-Dubois, of
     Menthon St. Bernard, France, and Henry Holt & Co., of New
     York.

       *       *       *       *       *




SAMUEL ELIOT


History of the United States


     Samuel Eliot, a historian and educator, was born in Boston in
     1821, graduated at Harvard in 1839, was engaged in business
     for two years, and then travelled and studied abroad for four
     years more. On his return, he took up tutoring and gave
     gratuitous instruction to classes of young workingmen. He
     became professor of history and political science in Trinity
     College, Hartford, Conn., in 1856, and retained that chair
     until 1864. During the last four years of that time, he was
     president of the institution. From 1864 to 1874 he lectured on
     constitutional law and political science. He lectured at
     Harvard from 1870 to 1873. He was President of the Social
     Science Association when it organised the movement for Civil
     Service reform in 1869. His history of the United States
     appeared in 1856 under the title of "Manual of United States
     History between the Years 1792 and 1850." It was revised and
     brought down to date in 1873, under the title of "History of
     the United States." A third edition appeared in 1881. This
     work gained distinction as the first adequate textbook of
     United States history and still holds the place it deserves in
     popular favor. The epitome is supplemented by a chronicle
     compiled from several sources.


The first man to discover the shores of the United States, according to
Icelandic records, was an Icelander, Leif Erickson, who sailed in the
year 1000, and spent the winter somewhere on the New England coast.
Christopher Columbus, a Genoese in the Spanish service, discovered San
Salvador, one of the Bahama Islands, on October 12, 1492. He thought
that he had found the western route to the Indies, and, therefore,
called his discovery the West Indies. In 1507, the new continent
received its name from that of Amerigo Vespucci, a Florentine who had
crossed the ocean under the Spanish and Portuguese flags. The middle
ages were Closing; the great nations of Europe were putting forth their
energies, material and immaterial; and the discovery of America came
just in season to help and be helped by the men of these stirring years.

Ponce de Leon, a companion of Columbus, was the first to reach the
territory of the present United States. On Easter Sunday, 1512, he
discovered the land to which he gave the name of Florida or Flower Land.
Numberless discoverers succeeded him. De Soto led a great expedition
northward and westward, in 1539-43, with no greater reward than the
discovery of the Mississippi. Among the French explorers to claim Canada
under the name of New France, were Verrazzano, 1524, and Cartier,
1534-42. Champlain began Quebec in 1608. The oldest town in the United
States, St. Augustine, Florida, was founded September 8, 1565, by
Menendez de Aviles, who brought a train of soldiers, priests and negro
slaves. The second oldest town, Santa Fe, was founded by the Spaniards
in 1581.

John Cabot, a Venetian residing in Bristol, was the first person sailing
under the English flag, to come to these shores. He sailed in 1497, with
his three sons, but no settlement was effected. Sir Humphrey Gilbert was
lost at sea in 1583, and Walter Raleigh, his cousin, took up claims that
had been made to him by Queen Elizabeth, and crossed to the shores of
the present North Carolina. Sir Richard Grenville left one hundred and
eighty persons at Roanoke Island, in 1585. They were glad to escape at
the earliest opportunity. Fifteen persons left there later were murdered
by the Indians. Still a third settlement, consisting of one hundred and
eighteen persons, disappeared, leaving no trace. Raleigh was discouraged
and made over his patent to others, who were still less successful.

The Plymouth Colony and London Colony were formed under King James I. as
business enterprises. The parties to the patents were capitalists, who
had the right to settle colonists and servants, impose duties and coin
money, and who were to pay a share of the profits in the enterprise to
the Crown.

The London company, under the name of Jamestown, established the
beginning of the first English town in America, May 13, 1607, with one
hundred colonists. Captain John Smith was the genius of the colony, and
it enjoyed a certain prosperity while he remained with it. A curious
incident of its history was the importation of a large number of young
women of good character, who were sold for one hundred and twenty, or
even one hundred and fifteen, pounds of tobacco (at thirteen shillings a
pound) to the lonely settlers. The Company failed, with all its
expenditures, some half-million dollars, in 1624, and at that time,
numbered only two thousand souls--the relics of nine thousand, who had
been sent out from England.

Though the Plymouth Company had obtained exclusive grants and
privileges, they never achieved any actual colony. A band of
independents, numbering one hundred and two, whose extreme principles
led to their exile, first from England and then from Holland, landed at
a place called New Plymouth, in 1620. Half died within a year.
Nevertheless, the Pilgrims, as they were called, extended their
settlement. The distinction of the Pilgrims at Plymouth is that they
relied upon themselves, and developed their own resources. Salem was
begun in 1625, and for three years was called Naumkeag. In 1628, John
Endicott came from England with one hundred settlers, as Governor for
the Massachusetts Colony, extending from the Charles to the Merrimac
river. A royal charter was procured for the Governor and Company of
Massachusetts Bay in New England, and one thousand colonists, led by
John Winthrop, settled Boston, 1630. These colonists were Puritans, who
wished to escape political and religious persecution. They brought over
their own charter and developed a form of popular government. The
freemen of the town elected the governor and board of assistants, but
suffrage was restricted to members of the church. Representative
government was granted in other colonies, but in the royal colonies of
Virginia and New York, the executive officers and members of the upper
branch of the legislature were appointed by the Crown. In Maryland,
appointments were made in the same way by the Proprietor. Maryland was
founded 1632, by royal grant to Cecilius Calvert, Lord Baltimore.

The English colonies were divided in the middle by the Dutch at New
Amsterdam and the Swedes on the Delaware. The claim of the prior
discovery of Manhattan was raised by the English, who took New
Amsterdam, in 1664. Charles II. presented a charter to his brother,
James, Duke of York. East and west Jersey were formed out of part of the
grant.

The patent for the great territory included in the present state of
Pennsylvania was granted to William Penn in 1681. Penn laid the
foundations for a liberal constitution. Patents for the territory of
Carolina were given in 1663. Carolina reached the Spanish possessions in
the South.

The New England settlers spread westward and northward. Connecticut
adopted a written constitution in 1639. The charter of Rhode Island,
1663, confirmed the aim of its founder, Roger Williams, in the
separation of civil and religious affairs.

The English predominated in the colonies, though other nationalities
were represented on the Atlantic seaboard. The laws were based on
English custom, and loyalty to England prevailed. The colonists united
for mutual support during the early Indian wars. The United Colonies of
New England, comprised Massachusetts Bay, Plymouth, Connecticut and New
Haven. This union was formed in 1643, and lasted nearly forty years. The
"Lord of Trade" caused the colonies to unite later, at the time of the
French and Indian War, 1754.

The colonies, nevertheless, were too far apart to feel a common
interest. Communication between them was slow, and commerce was almost
entirely carried on with the English. The boundaries were frequently a
cause of conflict between them. The plan of a constitution was devised
by Franklin, but even the menace of war could not make the colonies
adopt it.

While the English were establishing themselves firmly on the coast, the
French were all the time quietly working in the interior. Their
explorers and merchants established posts to the Great Lakes, the
northwest and the valley of the Mississippi. The clash with the English
came in 1690. King William's War, Queen Anne's War and the French and
Indian War, were all waged before the difficulties were settled in the
rout of the French from the continent. The so-called French and Indian
War (1701-13) was the American counterpart of the Seven Years' War of
Europe. The chief events of this war were: the surrender of Washington
at Fort Necessity, 1754; removal of the Arcadian settlers, 1755;
Braddock's defeat, July 9, 1755; capture of Oswego by Montcalm, 1756;
the capture of Louisburg and Fort Duquesne, 1758; the capture of
Ticonderoga and Niagara in 1759; battle of Quebec, September 13, 1759;
surrender of Montreal, 1760.

At the Peace of Paris, 1763, the French claims to American territory
were formally relinquished. Spain, however, got control of the territory
west of the Mississippi, in 1762. This was known as Louisiana, and
extended from the Mississippi to the Rocky Mountains.

At this period the relations of the colonies with the home government
became seriously strained. The demands that goods should be transported
in English ships, that trade should be carried on only with England,
that the colonies should not manufacture anything in competition with
home products, were the chief causes of friction. The navigation laws
were evaded without public resistance, and smuggling became a common
practice.

The Stamp Act, in 1765, required stamps to be affixed to all public
documents, newspapers, almanacs and other printed matter. All of the
colonies were taxed at the same time by this scheme, which was contrary
to their belief that they should be taxed only by their legislatures;
although the proceeds of the taxes were to have been devoted to the
defence of the colonies. Delegates, protesting against the Act, were
sent to England by nine colonies. The Stamp Act Congress, October 7,
1765, passed measures of protest. The people never used the stamps, and
the Act was repealed the next year. As a substitute, the English
government established, in 1767, duties on paper, paint, glass and tea.
The colonies replied by renewing the agreement which they made in 1765,
not to import any English goods. The sending of troops to Boston
aggravated the trouble. All the duties but that on tea were then
withdrawn. Cargoes of tea were destroyed at Boston and Charleston, and a
bond of common sympathy was slowly forged between the colonies.

In 1774, the harbour of Boston was closed, and the Massachusetts charter
was revoked. Arbitrary power was placed in the hands of the governor.
The colonies mourned in sympathy. The assembly of Virginia was dismissed
by its governor, but merely reunited, and proceeded to call a
continental congress.

The first continental congress was held at Capitol Hall, Philadelphia,
September 5, 1774. All the colonies but Georgia were represented. The
congress appealed to George III. for redress. They drafted the
Declaration of Rights, and pledged the colonies not to use British
importations and to export no American goods to Great Britain or to its
colonies.

The battles of Lexington and Concord were precipitated by the attempt of
the British to seize the colonists' munitions of war. The immediate
result was the assembling of a second continental congress at
Philadelphia, May 10, 1775. The second congress was in a short time
organising armies and assuming all the powers of government.

On November 1, 1775, it was learned that King George would not receive
the petition asking for redress, and the idea of the Declaration of
Independence was conceived. On May 15, 1776, the congress voted that all
British authority ought to be suppressed. Thomas Jefferson, in December,
drafted the Constitution, and it was adopted on July 4, 1776.

The leading events of the Revolution were the battles of Lexington and
Concord, April 19, 1775; capture of Ticonderoga, May 10; Bunker Hill,
June 17; unsuccessful attack on Canada, 1775-1776; surrender of Boston,
March 17, 1776; battle of Long Island, August 27; White Plains, October
28; retreat through New Jersey, at the end of 1776; battle of Trenton,
December 26; battle of Princeton, January 3, 1777; Bennington, August
16; Brandywine, September 11; Germantown, October 4; Saratoga, October
7; Burgoyne's surrender, October 17; battle of Monmouth, June 28, 1778;
storming of Stony Point, July 15, 1779; battle of Camden, August 16,
1780; battle of Cowpens, January 17, 1781; surrender of Cornwallis,
October 19, 1781.

The surrender of Cornwallis terminated the struggle. The peace treaty
was signed in 1783. The financial situation was very deplorable. One of
the greatest difficulties that confronted the colonists, was the limited
power of Congress. The states could regulate commerce and exercise
nearly all authority. But disputes regarding their boundaries prevented
their development as a united nation.

Congress issued an ordinance in 1784 under which territories might
organise governments, send delegates to Congress, and obtain admission
as states. This was made use of in 1787 by the Northwest Territory, the
region lying between the Ohio and the Mississippi and the Great Lakes.
The states made a compact in which it was agreed that there should be no
slavery in this territory.

The critical period lasted until 1789. In the absence of strong
authority, economic and political troubles arose. Finally, a commission
appointed by Maryland and Virginia to settle questions relating to
navigation on the Potomac resulted in a convention to adjust the
navigation and commerce of the whole of the United States, called the
Annapolis Convention from the place where it met, May 1, 1787. Rhode
Island was the only state that failed to send delegates. Instead of
taking up the interstate commerce questions the convention formulated
the present Constitution. A President, with power to carry out the will
of the people, was provided, and also, a Supreme Court.

Washington was elected first President, his term beginning March 4,
1789. A census was taken in 1790. The largest city was Philadelphia,
with a population of 42,000--the others were New York, 33,000, and
Boston, 18,000. The total population of the United States was 4,000,000.
The slaves numbered 700,000; free negroes, 60,000, and the Indians,
80,000.

The Federalists, who believed in centralised government, were the most
influential men in Congress. Washington appointed Thomas Jefferson
Secretary of State, Knox Secretary of War, Hamilton Secretary of the
Treasury, Osgood Postmaster General, and Jay Chief Justice of the
Supreme Court.

The first tariff act was passed with a view of providing revenue and
protection, in 1789. The national debt amounted to $52,000,000.00--a
quarter of which was due abroad. The states had incurred an expense of
$25,000,000.00 more, in supporting the Revolution. The country suffered
from inflated currency. The genius of Hamilton saved the situation. He
persuaded Congress to assume the whole obligation of the national
government and of the states. Washington selected the site of the
capitol on the banks of the Potomac. But the government convened at
Philadelphia for ten years. Vermont and Kentucky were admitted as states
by the first Congress.

In Washington's administration, a number of American ships were captured
by British war vessels. England was at war with France and claimed the
right of stopping American vessels to look for possible deserters. War
was avoided by the Jay Treaty, November 19, 1794.

Washington retired, in 1796, at the end of two terms. John Adams, who
had been Ambassador to France, Holland and England, became second
President. The Democratic-Republican party, originated at this time,
stood for a strict construction of the constitution and favoured France
rather than England. Its leader was Thomas Jefferson. Adams proved but a
poor party leader, and the power of the Federalists failed after eight
years. He had gained some popularity in the early part of his first term
when France began to retaliate for the Jay Treaty by seizing American
ships, and would not receive the American minister. He appointed Charles
Coatesworth Pinckney, with John Marshall and Elbridge Gerry, as a
commission to treat with the French. The French commissioners who met
them demanded $24,000,000.00 as a bribe to draw up a treaty. The names
of the French commissioners were referred to in American newspapers as
X, Y and Z. Taking advantage of the popular favour gained in the conduct
of this affair, the Federalists succeeded in passing the Alien and
Sedition Laws.

Napoleon seized the power in France and made peace with the United
States. In the face of impending war between France and England,
Napoleon gave up his plans of an empire in America and sold Louisiana to
the United States for $15,000,000.00. The territory included 1,500,000
square miles. The Lewis and Clarke Expedition, sent out by Jefferson,
started from St. Louis May 14, 1804, crossed the Rocky Mountains and
discovered the Oregon country.

Aaron Burr was defeated for Governor of New York, and in his
Presidential ambitions, and in revenge killed Hamilton in a duel. He
fled the Ohio River country and made active preparations to carry out
some kind of a scheme. He probably intended to proceed against the
Spanish possessions in the Southwest and Mexico, and set himself up as a
ruler. He was betrayed by his confidante, Wilkinson, and was tried for
treason and acquitted in Richmond, Va., in 1807.

The momentous question of slavery in the territories came up in
Jefferson's administration. The institution was permitted in
Mississippi, but the ordinance of 1787 was maintained in Indiana. The
importation of slaves was prohibited after January 1, 1808.

James Madison, a Republican, became President, in 1809. The Indians,
under Tecumseh, attacked the Western settlers, but were defeated at
Tippecanoe by William Henry Harrison in 1811. In the same year, Congress
determined to break with England. Clay and Calhoun led the agitation.
Madison acceded, and war was declared June 18, 1812. The Treaty of Ghent
was signed on December 24, 1814. British commerce had been devastated. A
voyage even from England to Ireland was made unsafe.

The leading events of the War of 1812 were the unsuccessful invasion of
Canada and surrender at Detroit, August 12, 1812; sea fight in which the
"Constitution" took the "Guerriere," August 19th; sea fight in which the
"United States" took the "Macedonian," October 25, 1813; defeat at
Frenchtown, January 22nd; victory on Lake Erie, September 10th; loss of
the "Chesapeake" to the "Shannon," June 1st; victory at Chippewa, July
5, 1814; victory at Lundy's Lane, July 15th; Lake Champlain, September
11th; British burned public buildings in Washington, August 25th;
American defeated British at Baltimore, September 13th; American under
Jackson defeated the British at New Orleans, December 23rd and 28th.

Kentucky, Tennessee and Ohio, were admitted as states, in 1792, 1796,
and 1803, respectively. In 1806, the federal government began a wagon
road, from the Potomac River to the West through the Cumberland Gap. New
York State finished the Erie Canal, in 1825. The population increased so
rapidly, that six new states, west and south of the Allegheny Mountains,
were admitted between 1812 and 1821. A serious conflict arose in 1820
over the admission of Missouri. The Missouri Compromise resulted in the
prohibition of slavery in the Louisiana Purchase, north of 36° and 30'
north latitude. Missouri was admitted in 1831, and Maine, as a free
state, in 1820.

With the passing of protective tariff measures in 1816 a readjustment of
party lines took place. Protection brought over New England from
Federalism to Republicanism. Henry Clay of Kentucky was the leading
advocate of protection. Everybody was agreed upon this point in
believing that tariff was to benefit all classes. This time was known as
"The Era of Good Feeling."

Spain ceded Florida to the United States for $5,000,000.00, throwing in
claims in the Northwest, and the United States gave up her claim to
Texas. The treaty was signed in 1819.

The Monroe Doctrine was contained in the message that President Monroe
sent to Congress December 2, 1823. The colonies of South America had
revolted from Spain and had set up republics. The United States
recognised them in 1821. Spain called on Europe for assistance. In his
message to Congress, Monroe declared, "We could not view any
interposition for the purpose of oppressing them, or controlling in any
other manner their destiny by any European power, in any other light
than as a manifestation of an unfriendly feeling toward the United
States....The American Continents are henceforth not to be considered as
subjects for future colonisation by any European power." Great Britain
had previously suggested to Monroe that she would not support the
designs of Spain.

Protective measures were passed in 1824 and 1828. Around Adams and Clay
were formed the National-Republican Party, which was joined by the
Anti-Masons and other elements to form the Whig Party. Andrew Jackson
was the centre of the other faction, which came to be known as the
Democratic Party and has had a continuous existence ever since. South
Carolina checked the rising tariff for a while by declaring the tariff
acts of 1828 and 1832 null and void.

The region which now forms the state of Texas had been gradually filling
up with settlers. Many had brought slaves with them, although Mexico
abolished slavery in 1829. The United States tried to purchase the
country. Mexican forces under Santa Anna tried to enforce their
jurisdiction in 1836. Texas declared her independence and drew up a
constitution, establishing slavery. Opposition in the United States to
the increase of slave territory defeated a plan for the annexation of
this territory.

The New England Anti-Slavery Society was formed 1832, and the American
Anti-Slavery Society was founded in Philadelphia in 1833. William Lloyd
Garrison was the leader of abolition as a great moral agitation.

John C. Calhoun, Tyler's Secretary of State, proposed the annexation of
Texas in 1844, but the scheme was rejected by the Senate. The election
of Polk changed the complexion of affairs and Congress admitted Texas,
which became a state in December, 1845.

The boundaries had never been settled and war with Mexico followed.
Taylor defeated the Mexican forces at Palo Alto, May 8, 1846, at Resaca
de la Palma, May 9th, and later at Monterey and Buena Vista. Scott was
sent to Vera Cruz with an expedition, which fought its way to the City
of Mexico by September 14, 1846. The United States troops also seized
New Mexico. California revolted and joined the United States. The
Gadsden Purchase of 1853 secured a further small strip of territory from
Mexico.

The Boundary Treaty with Great Britain, in June, 1846, established the
northern limits of Oregon at 49th parallel north latitude.

The plans for converting California into a slave state were frustrated
by the discovery of gold. Fifty thousand emigrants poured in. The men
worked with their own hands, and would not permit slaves to be brought
in by their owners. Five bills, known as the Compromise of 1850,
provided that New Mexico should be organised as a territory out of
Texas; admitted California as a free state; established Utah as a
territory; provided a more rigid fugitive slave law; and abolished
slavery in the District of Columbia.

Cuba was regarded as a promising field for the extension of the slave
territory when the Democratic Party returned to power in 1853 with the
administration of Franklin Pierce. The ministers to Spain, France and
Great Britain met in Belgium, at the President's direction, and issued
the Ostend Manifesto, which declared that the United States would be
justified in annexing Cuba, if Spain refused to sell the island. This
Manifesto followed the popular agitation over the Virginius affair. The
Spaniards had seized a ship of that name, which was smuggling arms to
the Cubans, and put to death some Americans. War was averted, and Cuba
remained in the control of the Spaniards.

The Supreme Court in 1857, in the Dred Scott decision, held that a slave
was not a citizen and had no standing in the law, that Congress had no
right to prohibit slavery in the territories, and that the constitution
guaranteed slave property.

The Presidential campaign in 1858, which was signalised by the debates
between Douglass and Lincoln, resulted in raising the Republican power
in the House of Representatives, to equal that of the Democrats.

A fanatic Abolitionist, John Brown, with a few followers, seized the
Federal arsenal at Harper's Ferry in 1859, defended it heroically
against overpowering numbers, but was finally taken, tried and condemned
for treason. This incident served as an argument in the South for the
necessity of secession to protect the institution of slavery.

In the Presidential election of 1860, the Republican convention
nominated Lincoln. Douglass and John C. Breckenridge split the
Democratic vote, and Lincoln was elected President. This was the
immediate cause of the Civil War. The first state to secede was South
Carolina. A state convention, called by the Legislature, met on December
20, 1860, and declared that the union of that state and the other states
was dissolved. Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia and Louisiana,
followed in the first month of 1861, and Texas seceded February 1st.
They formed a Confederacy with a constitution and government at a
convention at Montgomery, Alabama, February, 1861. Jefferson Davis was
chosen President, and Alexander H. Stephens, Vice-President.

Sumter fell on April 14th, and the following day Lincoln called for
75,000 volunteers. The demand was more than filled. The Confederacy,
also, issued a call for volunteers which was enthusiastically received.
Four border states went over to the Confederacy, Arkansas, North
Carolina, Virginia and Tennessee. Three went over, in May, and the last,
June 18.

The leading events of the Civil War were, the battle of Bull Run, July
21, 1861; Wilson's Creek, August 2; Trent Affair, November 8, 1862;
Battle of Mill Spring, January 19; Ft. Henry, February 6; Ft. Donelson,
February 13-16: fight between the "Monitor" and "Merrimac," March 9;
Battle of Shiloh, April 6-7; capture of New Orleans, April 25; battle of
Williamsburgh, May 5; Fair Oaks, May 31-June 1; "Seven Days'
Battle"--Mechanicsville, Gaines's Mill, Frazier's Farm, Malvern Hill,
June 25-July 1; Cedar Mountain, August 9; second battle of Bull Run,
August 30; Chantilly, September 1; South Mountain, September 14;
Antietam, September 17; Iuka, September 19; Corinth, October 4;
Fredericksburg, December 13; Murfreesboro, December 31-January 2, 1863.
Emancipation Proclamation, January 1; battle of Chancellorsville, May
1-4; Gettysburg, July 1-3; fall of Vicksburg, July 4; battle of
Chickamauga, September 19-20; Chattanooga, November 23-25; 1864--battles
of Wilderness and Spottsylvania, May 5-7; Sherman's advance through
northern Georgia, in May and June; battle of Cold Harbor, June 1-3; the
"Kearsarge" sank the "Alabama," June 19; battles of Atlanta, July 20-28;
naval battle of Mobile, August 5; battle of Winchester, September 19;
Cedar Creek, October 19; Sherman's march through Georgia to the sea,
November and December; battle of Nashville, December 15-16;
1865--surrender of Fort Fisher, January 15; battle of Five Forks, April
1; surrender of Richmond, April 3; surrender of Lee's army at
Appomattox, April 9; surrender of Johnston's army, April 26; surrender
of Kirby Smith, May 26.

Lincoln, who had been elected for a second term, was assassinated on
April 14, 1865, in Ford's Theatre, Washington.

The United States expended $800,000,000 in revenue, and incurred a debt
of three times that amount during the war.

The Reconstruction Period lasted from 1865 to 1870. The South was left
industrially prostrate, and it required a long period to adjust the
change from the ownership to the employment of the negro.

Alaska was purchased from Russia, in 1867, for $7,200,000.00.

An arbitration commission was called for by Congress to settle the
damage claims of the United States against Great Britain, on account of
Great Britain's failure to observe duties of a neutral during the war.
The conference was held at Geneva, at the end of 1871, and announced its
award six months later. This was $15,000,000.00 damages, to be paid to
the United States for depredations committed by vessels fitted out by
the Confederates in British ports. The chief of these privateers was the
"Alabama."

One of the first acts of President Hayes, in 1877, was the withdrawal of
the Federal troops of the South. The new era of prosperity dates from
the resumption of home rule.

The Bland Bill of 1878 stipulated that at least $2,000,000, and not more
than $4,000,000, should be coined in silver dollars each month, at the
fixed ratio of 16-1.

Garfield, the twentieth President of the United States, was elected
1880, and was assassinated on July 2, 1881, in Washington, by an insane
office-seeker, and died September 19th.

The Civil Service Act of 1833 provided examinations for classified
service, and prohibited removal for political reasons. It also forbade
political assessments by a government official, or in the government
buildings.

The Interstate Commerce Commission was established in 1877 with very
limited powers, based on the clause in the constitution, drawn up in
1787, giving Congress the power to regulate domestic commerce.

Harrison was elected 1888. Both Houses were Republican, and the tariff
was increased. In 1890, the McKinley Bill raised the duties to an
average of 50 per cent, but reciprocity was provided for.

The Sherman Bill superseded the Bland Bill, and provided that 4,500,000
ounces of silver bullion must be bought and stored in the Treasury each
month. This measure failed to sustain the price of silver, and there was
a great demand, in the South and West, for the free coinage of that
metal.

The tariff was made the issue of the next Presidential election, in
1892, when Cleveland defeated Harrison by a large majority of electoral
votes. Each received a popular vote of 5,000,400. The Populist Party,
which espoused the silver cause, polled 1,000,000 votes.

Congress was called in special session, and repealed the Silver Purchase
Bill, and devised means of protection for the gold reserve which was
approaching the vanishing point.

Cleveland forced Great Britain to arbitrate the boundary dispute with
Venezuela in 1895, by a defiant enunciation of the Monroe doctrine.
Congress supported him and voted unanimously for a commission to settle
the dispute.

Free coinage of silver was the chief issue of the Presidential election,
in 1896. McKinley defeated Bryan by a great majority. The Dingley Tariff
Bill maintained the protective theory.

The blowing up of the "Maine," in the Havana Harbor, in 1898, hastened
the forcible intervention of the United States, in Cuba, where Spain had
been carrying on a war for three years.

On May 1st, Dewey entered Manila Bay and destroyed a Spanish fleet. The
more powerful and stronger Spanish fleet was destroyed while trying to
escape from the Harbour of Santiago de Cuba, on July 3.

By the Treaty of Paris, December 10, Porto Rico was ceded, and the
Philippine Islands were made over on a payment of $20,000,000, and a
republic was established in Cuba, under the United States protectory.

Hawaii had been annexed, and was made a territory, in 1900.

A revolt against the United States in the Philippine Islands was put
down, in 1901, after two years.

McKinley was elected to a second term, with a still more overwhelming
majority over Bryan.

McKinley was assassinated on September 6, 1901, at the Pan-American
Exposition at Buffalo, by an Anarchist. Theodore Roosevelt, the
Vice-President, succeeded him, and was re-elected, in 1904, defeating
Alton B. Parker.

Roosevelt intervened in the Anthracite Coal Strike, in 1902, recognised
the revolutionary Republic of Panama, and in his administration, the
United States acquired the Panama Canal Zone, and began work on the
inter-oceanic canal. Great efforts were made, during his administration,
to repress the big corporations by prosecutions, under the Sherman
Anti-Trust Law. The conservation of natural resources was also taken up
as a fixed policy.

       *       *       *       *       *




WILLIAM HICKLING PRESCOTT


History of the Conquest of Mexico


     The "Conquest of Mexico" is a spirited and graphic narrative
     of a stirring episode in history. To use his own words, the
     author (see p. 271) has "endeavoured to surround the reader
     with the spirit of the times, and, in a word, to make him a
     contemporary of the 16th century."


_I. The Mexican Empire_


Of all that extensive empire which once acknowledged the authority of
Spain in the New World, no portion, for interest and importance, can be
compared with Mexico--and this equally, whether we consider the variety
of its soil and climate; the inexhaustible stores of its mineral wealth;
its scenery, grand and picturesque beyond example; the character of its
ancient inhabitants, not only far surpassing in intelligence that of the
other North American races, but reminding us, by their monuments, of the
primitive civilisation of Egypt and Hindostan; and lastly, the peculiar
circumstances of its conquest, adventurous and romantic as any legend
devised by any Norman or Italian bard of chivalry. It is the purpose of
the present narrative to exhibit the history of this conquest, and that
of the remarkable man by whom it was achieved.

The country of the ancient Mexicans, or Aztecs as they were called,
formed but a very small part of the extensive territories comprehended
in the modern Republic of Mexico. The Aztecs first entered it from the
north towards the beginning of the thirteenth century, but it was not
until the year 1325 that, led by an auspicious omen, they laid the
foundations of their future city by sinking piles into the shallows of
the principal lake in the Mexican valley. Thus grew the capital known
afterwards to Europeans as Mexico. The omen which led to the choice of
this site--an eagle perched upon a cactus--is commemorated in the arms
of the modern Mexican Republic.

In the fifteenth century there was formed a remarkable league,
unparallelled in history, according to which it was agreed between the
states of Mexico, Tezcuco, and the neighbouring little kingdom of
Tlacopan, that they should mutually support each other in their wars,
and divide the spoil on a fixed scale. During a century of warfare this
alliance was faithfully adhered to and the confederates met with great
success. At the beginning of the sixteenth century, just before the
arrival of the Spaniards, the Aztec dominion reached across the
continent, from the Atlantic to the Pacific. There was thus included in
it territory thickly peopled by various races, themselves warlike, and
little inferior to the Aztecs in social organisation. What this
organisation was may be briefly indicated.

The government of the Aztecs, or Mexicans, was an elective monarchy, the
sovereign being, however, always chosen from the same family. His power
was almost absolute, the legislative power residing wholly with him,
though justice was administered through an administrative system which
differentiated the government from the despotisms of the East. Human
life was protected, except in the sense that human sacrifices were
common, the victims being often prisoners of war. Slavery was practised,
but strictly regulated. The Aztec code was, on the whole, stamped with
the severity of a rude people, relying on physical instead of moral
means for the correction of evil. Still, it evinces a profound respect
for the great principles of morality, and as clear a perception of those
principles as is to be found in the most cultivated nations. One
instance of their advanced position is striking; hospitals were
established in the principal cities, for the cure of the sick, and the
permanent refuge of the disabled soldier; and surgeons were placed over
them, "who were so far better than those in Europe," says an old
chronicler, "that they did not protract the cure, in order to increase
the pay."

In their religion, the Aztecs recognised a Supreme Creator and Lord of
the universe, "without whom man is as nothing," "invisible, incorporeal,
one God, of perfect perfection and purity," "under whose wings we find
repose and a sure defence." But beside Him they recognised numerous
gods, who presided over the changes of the seasons, and the various
occupations of man, and in whose honour they practised bloody rites.
Such were the people dwelling in the lovely Mexican valley, and wielding
a power that stretched far beyond it, when the Spanish expedition led by
Hernando Cortes landed on the coast. The expedition was the fruit of an
age and a people eager for adventure, for gain, for glory, and for the
conversion of barbaric peoples to the Christian faith. The Spaniards
were established in the West Indian Islands, and sought further
extension of their dominions in the West, whence rumours of great
treasure had reached them. Thus it happened that Velasquez, the Spanish
Governor of Cuba, designed to send a fleet to explore the mainland, to
gain what treasure he could by peaceful barter with the natives, and by
any means he could to secure their conversion. It was commanded by
Cortes, a man of extraordinary courage and ability, and extraordinary
gifts for leadership, to whose power both of control and inspiration
must be ascribed, in a very great degree, the success of his amazing
enterprise.


_II.--The Invasion of the Empire_


It was on the eighteenth of February, 1519, that the little squadron
finally set sail from Cuba for the coast of Yucatan. Before starting,
Cortes addressed his soldiers in a manner both very characteristic of
the man, and typical of the tone which he took towards them on several
occasions of great difficulty and danger, when but for his courageous
spirit and great power of personal influence, the expedition could only
have found a disastrous end. Part of his speech was to this effect: "I
hold out to you a glorious prize, but it is to be won by incessant toil.
Great things are achieved only by great exertions, and glory was never
the reward of sloth. If I have laboured hard and staked my all on this
undertaking, it is for the love of that renown, which is the noblest
recompense of man. But, if any among you covet riches more, be but true
to me, as I will be true to you and to the occasion, and I will make you
masters of such as our countrymen have never dreamed of! You are few in
number, but strong in resolution; and, if this does not falter, doubt
not but that the Almighty, who has never deserted the Spaniard in his
contest with the infidel, will shield you, though encompassed by a cloud
of enemies; for your cause is a _just cause_, and you are to fight under
the banner of the Cross. Go forward then, with alacrity and confidence,
and carry to a glorious issue the work so auspiciously begun."

The first landing was made on the island of Cozumel, where the natives
were forcibly converted to Christianity. Then, reaching the mainland,
they were attacked by the natives of Tabasco, whom they soon reduced to
submission. These made presents to the Spanish commander, including some
female slaves. One of these, named by the Spaniards Marina, became of
great use to the conquerors in the capacity of interpreter, and by her
loyalty, her intelligence, and, not least, by her distinguished courage
became a powerful influence in the fortunes of the Spaniards.

The next event of consequence in the career of the Conquerors was the
foundation of the first colony in New Spain, the town of Villa Rica de
Vera Cruz, on the sea-shore. Following this, came the reduction of the
warlike Republic of Tlascala, and the conclusion of an alliance with its
inhabitants which proved of priceless value to the Spaniards in their
long warfare with the. Mexicans.

More than one embassy had reached the Spanish camp from Montezuma, the
Emperor of Mexico, bearing presents and conciliatory messages, but
declining to receive the strangers in his capital. The basis of his
conduct and of that of the bulk of his subjects towards the Spaniards
was an ancient tradition concerning a beneficent deity named
Quetzalcoatl who had sailed away to the East, promising to return and
reign once more over his people. He had a white skin, and long, dark
hair; and the likeness of the Spaniards to him in this respect gave rise
to the idea that they were his representatives, and won them honour
accordingly; while even to those tribes who were entirely hostile a
supernatural terror clung around their name. Montezuma, therefore,
desired to conciliate them while seeking to prevent their approach to
his capital. But this was the goal of their expedition, and Cortes, with
his little army, never exceeding a few hundred in all, reinforced by
some Tlascalan auxiliaries, marched towards the capital. Montezuma, on
hearing of their approach, was plunged into despondency. "Of what avail
is resistance," he is said to have exclaimed, "when the gods have
declared themselves against us! Yet I mourn most for the old and infirm,
the women and children, too feeble to fight or to fly. For myself and
the brave men round me, we must bare our breasts to the storm, and meet
it as we may!"

Meanwhile the Spaniards marched on, enchanted as they came by the beauty
and the wealth of the city and its neighbourhood. It was built on piles
in a great lake, and as they descended into the valley it seemed to them
to be a reality embodying in the fairest dreams of all those who had
spoken of the New World and its dazzling glories. They passed along one
of the causeways which constituted the only method of approach to the
city, and as they entered, they were met by Montezuma himself, in all
his royal state. Bowing to what seemed the inevitable, he admitted them
to the capital, gave them a royal palace for their quarters, and
entertained them well. After a week, however, the Spaniards began to be
doubtful of the security of their position, and to strengthen it Cortes
conceived and carried out the daring plan of gaining possession of
Montezuma's person. With his usual audacity he went to the palace,
accompanied by some of his cavaliers, and compelled Montezuma to consent
to transfer himself and his household to the Spanish quarters. After
this, Cortes demanded that he should recognise formally the supremacy of
the Spanish emperor. Montezuma agreed, and a large treasure, amounting
in value to about one and a half million pounds sterling, was despatched
to Spain in token of his fealty. The ship conveying it to Spain touched
at the coast of Cuba, and the news of Cortes's success inflamed afresh
the jealousy of Velasquez, its governor, who had long repented of his
choice of a commander. Therefore, in March, 1520, he sent Narvaez at the
head of a rival expedition, to overcome Cortes and appropriate the
spoils. But he had reckoned without the character of Cortes. Leaving a
garrison in Mexico, the latter advanced by forced marches to meet
Narvaez, and took him unawares, entirely defeating his much superior
force. More than this, he induced most of these troops to join him, and
thus, reinforced also from Tlascala, marched back to Mexico. There his
presence was greatly needed, for news had reached him that the Mexicans
had risen, and that the garrison was already in straits.


_III.--The Retreat from Mexico_


It was indeed in a serious position that Cortes found his troops,
threatened by famine, and surrounded by a hostile population. But he was
so confident of his ability to overawe the insurgents that he wrote to
that effect to the garrison of Vera Cruz, by the same dispatches in
which he informed them of his safe arrival in the capital. But scarcely
had his messenger been gone half an hour, when he returned breathless
with terror, and covered with wounds. "The city," he said, "was all in
arms! The drawbridges were raised, and the enemy would soon be upon
them!" He spoke truth. It was not long before a hoarse, sullen sound
became audible, like that of the roaring of distant waters. It grew
louder and louder; till, from the parapet surrounding the enclosure, the
great avenues which led to it might be seen dark with the masses of
warriors, who came rolling on in a confused tide towards the fortress.
At the same time, the terraces and flat roofs in the neighbourhood were
thronged with combatants brandishing their missiles, who seemed to have
risen up as if by magic. It was a spectacle to appall the stoutest.

But this was only the prelude to the disasters that were to befall the
Spaniards. The Mexicans made desperate assaults upon the Spanish
quarters, in which both sides suffered severely. At last Montezuma, at
the request of Cortes, tried to interpose. But his subjects, in fury at
what they considered his desertion of them, gave him a wound of which he
died. The position became untenable, and Cortes decided on retreat. This
was carried out at night, and owing to the failure of a plan for laying
a portable bridge across those gaps in the causeway left by the
drawbridges, the Spaniards were exposed to a fierce attack from the
natives which proved most disastrous. Caught on the narrow space of the
causeway, and forced to make their way as best they could across the
gaps, they were almost overwhelmed by the throngs of their enemies.
Cortes who, with some of the vanguard, had reached comparative safety,
dashed back into the thickest of the fight where some of his comrades
were making a last stand, and brought them out with him, so that at last
all the survivors, a sadly stricken company, reached the mainland.

The story of the reconstruction by Cortes of his shattered and
discouraged army is one of the most astonishing chapters in the whole
history of the Conquest. Wounded, impoverished, greatly reduced in
numbers and broken in spirit by the terrible experience through which
they had passed, they demanded that the expedition should be abandoned
and themselves conveyed back to Cuba. Before long, the practical wisdom
and personal influence of Cortes had recovered them, reanimated their
spirits, and inspired them with fresh zeal for conquest, and now for
revenge. He added to their numbers the very men sent against him by
Velasquez at this juncture, whom he persuaded to join him; and had the
same success with the members of another rival expedition from Jamaica.
Eventually he set out once more for Mexico, with a force of nearly six
hundred Spaniards, and a number of allies from Tlascala.



_IV.--The Siege and Capture of Mexico_



The siege of Mexico is one of the most memorable and most disastrous
sieges of history. Cortes disposed his troops so as to occupy the three
great causeways leading from the shore of the lake to the city, and thus
cut off the enemy from their sources of supply. He was strong in the
possession of twelve brigantines, built by his orders, which swept the
lake with their guns and frequently defeated the manoeuvres of the
enemy, to whom a sailing ship was as new and as terrible a phenomenon as
were firearms and cavalry. But the Aztecs were strong in numbers, and in
their deadly hatred of the invader, the young emperor, Guatemozin,
opposed to the Spaniards a spirit as dauntless as that of Cortes
himself. Again and again, by fierce attack, by stratagem, and by their
indefatigable labours, the Aztecs inflicted checks, and sometimes even
disaster, upon the Spaniards. Many of these, and of their Indian allies,
fell, or were carried off to suffer the worse fate of the sacrificial
victim. The priests promised the vengeance of the gods upon the
strangers, and at one point Cortes saw his allies melting away from him,
under the power of this superstitious fear. But the threats were
unfulfilled, the allies returned, and doom settled down upon the city.
Famine and pestilence raged with it, and all the worst horrors of a
siege were suffered by the inhabitants.

But still they remained implacable, fighting to their last breath, and
refusing to listen to the repeated and urgent offers of Cortes to spare
them and their property if they would capitulate. It was not until the
15th of August, 1521, that the siege, which began in the latter part of
May, was brought to an end. After a final offer of terms, which
Guatemozin still refused, Cortes made the final assault, and carried the
city in face of a resistance now sorely enfeebled but still heroic.
Guatemozin, attempting to escape with his wife and some followers to the
shore of the lake, was intercepted by one of the brigantines and carried
to Cortes. He bore himself with all the dignity that belonged to his
courage, and was met by Cortes in a manner worthy of it. He and his
train was courteously treated and well entertained.

Meanwhile, at Guatemozin's request, the population of Mexico were
allowed to leave the city for the surrounding country; and after this
the Spaniards set themselves to the much-needed work of cleansing the
city. They were greatly disappointed in their hope of treasure, which
the Aztecs had so effectively hidden that only a small part of the
expected riches was ever discovered. It is a blot upon the history of
the war that Cortes, yielding to the importunity of his soldiers,
permitted Guatemozin to be tortured, in order to gain information
regarding the treasure. But no information of value could be wrung from
him, and the treasure remained hidden.

At the very time of his distinguished successes in Mexico, the fortunes
of Cortes hung in the balance in Spain. His enemy Velasquez, governor of
Cuba, and the latter's friends at home, made such complaint of his
conduct that a commissioner was sent to Vera Cruz to apprehend Cortes
and bring him to trial. But, as usual, the hostile effort failed, and
the commissioner sailed for Cuba, having accomplished nothing. The
friends of Cortes, on the other hand, made counter-charges, in which
they showed that his enemies had done all in their power to hinder him
in what was a magnificent effort on behalf of the Spanish dominion, and
asked if the council were prepared to dishonour the man who, in the face
of such obstacles, and with scarcely other resources than what he found
in himself, had won an empire for Castile, such as was possessed by no
European potentate. This appeal was irresistible. However irregular had
been the manner of proceeding, no one could deny the grandeur of the
results. The acts of Cortes were confirmed in their full extent. He was
constituted Governor, Captain General, and Chief Justice of New Spain,
as the province was called, and his army was complimented by the
emperor, fully acknowledging its services.

The news of this was received in New Spain with general acclamation. The
mind of Cortes was set at ease as to the past, and he saw opening before
him a noble theatre for future enterprise. His career, ever one of
adventure and of arms, was still brilliant and still chequered. He fell
once more under suspicion in Spain, and at last determined to present
himself in person before his sovereign, to assert his innocence and
claim redress. Favourably received by Charles V., he subsequently
returned to Mexico, pursued difficult and dangerous voyages of
discovery, and ultimately returned to Spain, where he died in 1547.

The history of the Conquest of Mexico is the history of Cortes, who was
its very soul. He was a typical knight-errant; more than this, he was a
great commander. There is probably no instance in history where so vast
an enterprise has been achieved by means apparently so inadequate. He
may be truly said to have effected the conquest by his own resources. It
was the force of his genius that obtained command of the co-operation of
the Indian tribes. He arrested the arm that was lifted to smite him, he
did not desert himself. He brought together the most miscellaneous
collection of mercenaries who ever fought under one standard,--men with
hardly a common tie, and burning with the spirit of jealousy and
faction; wild tribes of the natives also, who had been sworn enemies
from their cradles. Yet this motley congregation was assembled in one
camp, to breathe one spirit, and to move on a common principle of
action.

As regards the whole character of his enterprise, which seems to modern
eyes a bloody and at first quite unmerited war waged against the Indian
nations, it must be remembered that Cortes and his soldiers fought in
the belief that their victories were the victories of the Cross, and
that any war resulting in the conversion of the enemy to Christianity,
even as by force, was a righteous and meritorious war. This
consideration dwelt in their minds, mingling indeed with the desire for
glory and for gain, but without doubt influencing them powerfully. This
is at any rate one of the clues to this extraordinary chapter of
history, so full of suffering and bloodshed, and at the same time of
unsurpassed courage and heroism on every side.

       *       *       *       *       *




History of the Conquest of Peru


     The "History of the Conquest of Peru," which appeared in 1847,
     followed Prescott's "History of the Conquest of Mexico." It is
     a vivid and picturesque narrative of one of the most romantic,
     if also in some ways one of the darkest, episodes in history.
     It is impossible in a small compass to convey a tithe of the
     astonishing series of hairbreadth escapes, of conquest over
     tremendous odds, and of rapid eventualities which make up this
     kaleidoscopic story.


_I.--The Realm of the Incas_


Among the rumours which circulated among the ambitious adventurers of
the New World, one of the most dazzling was that of a rich empire far to
the south, a very El Dorado, where gold was as abundant as were the
common metals in the Old World, and where precious stones were to be
had, almost for the picking up. These rumours fired the hopes of three
men in the Spanish colony at Panama, namely, Francisco Pizarro and Diego
de Almagro, both soldiers of fortune, and Hernando de Luque, a Spanish
priest. As it was primarily from the efforts of these three that that
astonishing episode, the Spanish conquest of Peru, came to pass.

The character of that empire which the Spaniards discovered and
undertook to conquer may be briefly sketched.

According to the traditions of Peru, there had come to that country,
then lying in barbarism and darkness, two "Children of the Sun." These
had taught them wise customs and the arts of civilisation, and from them
had sprung by direct descent the Incas, who thus ruled over them by a
divine right. Besides the ruling Inca, whose person and decrees received
an honour that was almost worship, there were numerous nobles, also of
the royal blood, who formed a ruling caste. These were held in great
honour, and were evidently of a race superior to the common people, a
fact to which the very shape of their skulls testifies.

The government was developed to an extraordinary pitch of control over
even the private lives of the people. The whole land and produce of the
country were divided into three parts, one for the Sun, the supreme
national deity; one for the Inca, and the third for the people. This
last was divided among them according to their needs, especially
according to the size of their families, and the distribution of land
was made afresh each year. On this principle, no one could suffer from
poverty, and no one could rise by his efforts to a higher position than
that which birth and circumstances allotted to him. The government
prescribed to every man his local habitation, his sphere of action, nay,
the very nature and quality of that action. He ceased to be a free
agent; it might almost be said, that it relieved him of personal
responsibility. Even his marriage was determined for him; from time to
time all the men and women who had attained marriageable age were
summoned to the great squares of their respective towns, and the hands
of the couples joined by the presiding magistrate. The consent of
parents was required, and the preference of the parties was supposed to
be consulted, but owing to the barriers imposed by the prescribed age of
the parties, this must have been within rather narrow limits. A dwelling
was prepared for each couple at the charge of the district, and the
prescribed portion of land assigned for their maintenance.

The country as a whole was divided into four great provinces, each ruled
by a viceroy. Below him, there was a minute subdivision of supervision
and authority, down to the division into decades, by which every tenth
man was responsible for his nine countrymen.

The tribunals of justice were simple and swift in their procedure, and
all responsible to the Crown, to whom regular reports were forwarded,
and who was thus in a position to review and rectify any abuses in the
administration of the law.

The organisation of the country was altogether on a much higher level
than that encountered by the Spaniards in any other part of the American
continent. There was, for example, a complete census of the people
periodically taken. There was a system of posts, carried by runners,
more efficient and complete than any such system in Europe. There was,
lastly, a method of embodying in the empire any conquered country which
can only be compared to the Roman method. Local customs were interfered
with as little as possible, local gods were carried to Cuzco and
honoured in the pantheon there, and the chiefs of the country were also
brought to the capital, where they were honoured and by every possible
means attached to the new _régime_. The language of the capital was
diffused everywhere, and every inducement to learn it offered, so that
the difficulty presented by the variety of dialects was overcome. Thus
the Empire of the Incas achieved a solidarity very different from the
loose and often unwilling cohesion of the various parts of the Mexican
empire, which was ready to fall to pieces as soon as opportunity
offered. The Peruvian empire arose as one great fabric, composed of
numerous and even hostile tribes, yet, under the influence of a common
religion, common language, and common government, knit together as one
nation, animated by a spirit of love for its institutions and devoted
loyalty to its sovereign. They all learned thus to bow in unquestioning
obedience to the decrees of the divine Inca. For the government of the
Incas, while it was the mildest, was the most searching of despotisms.


_II.--First Steps Towards Conquest_


It was early in the sixteenth century that tidings of the golden empire
in the south reached the Spaniards, and more than one effort was made to
discover it. But these proved abortive, and it was not until after the
brilliant conquest of Mexico by Cortes that the enterprise destined for
success was set on foot. Then, in 1524, Francisco Pizarro, Almagro, and
Father Luque united their efforts to pursue the design of discovering
and conquering this rich realm of the south. The first expedition,
sailing under Pizarro in 1524, was unable to proceed more than a certain
distance owing to their inadequate numbers and scanty outfit, and
returned to Panama to seek reinforcements. Then, in 1526, the three
coadjutors signed a contract which has become famous. The two captains
solemnly engaged to devote themselves to the undertaking until it should
be accomplished, and to share equally with Father Luque all gains, both
of land and treasure, which should accrue from the expedition. This last
provision was in recognition of the fact that the priest had supplied by
far the greater part of the funds required, or apparently did so, for
from another document it appears that he was only the representative of
the Licentiate Gaspar de Espinosa, then at Panama, who really furnished
the money.

The next expedition met with great vicissitudes, and it was only the
invincible spirit of Pizarro which carried them as far as the Gulf of
Guayaquil and the rich city of Tumbez. Hence they returned once more to
Panama, carrying this time better tidings, and again seeking
reinforcements. But the governor of the colony gave them no
encouragement, and at last it was decided that Pizarro should go to
Spain and apply for help from the Crown. He did so, and in 1529 was
executed the memorable "Capitulation" which defined the powers and
privileges of Pizarro. It granted to Pizarro the right of discovery and
conquest in the province of Peru, (or New Castile as it was then
called,) the title of Governor, and a salary, with inferior honours for
his associates; all these to be enjoyed on the conquest of the country,
and the salaries to be derived from its revenues. Pizarro was to provide
for the good government and protection of the natives, and to carry with
him a specified number of ecclesiastics to care for their spiritual
welfare.

On Pizarro's return to America, he had to contend with the discontent of
Almagro at the unequal distribution of authority and honours, but after
he had been somewhat appeased by the efforts of Pizarro the third
expedition set sail in January, 1531. It comprised three ships, carrying
180 men and 27 horses--a slender enough force for the conquest of an
empire.

After various adventures, the Spaniards landed at Tumbez, and in May,
1532, set out from there to march along the coast. After founding a town
some thirty leagues south of Tumbez, which he named San Miguel, he
marched into the interior with the bold design of meeting the Inca
himself. He came at a moment when Peru was but just emerging from a
civil conflict, in which Atahuallpa had routed the rival and more
legitimate claimant to the throne of the Incas, Huascar. On his march,
Pizarro was met by an envoy from the Inca, inviting him to visit him in
his camp, with, as Pizarro guessed, no friendly intent. This coincided,
however, with the purpose of Pizarro, and he pressed forward. When his
soldiers showed signs of discouragement in face of the great dangers
before them, Pizarro addressed them thus:

"Let every one of you take heart and go forward like a good soldier,
nothing daunted by the smallness of your numbers. For in the greatest
extremity God ever fights for His own; and doubt not He will humble the
pride of the heathen, and bring him to the knowledge of the true faith,
the great end and object of the Conquest." The enthusiasm of the troops
was at once rekindled. "Lead on!" they shouted as he finished his
address. "Lead on wherever you think best! We will follow with goodwill;
and you shall see that we can do our duty in the cause of God and the
king!"

They had need of all their daring. For when they had penetrated to
Caxamalca they found the Inca encamped there at the head of a great host
of his subjects, and knew that if his uncertain friendliness towards
them should evaporate, they would be in a desperate case. Pizarro then
determined to follow the example of Cortes, and gain possession of the
sovereign's person. He achieved this by what can only be called an act
of treachery; he invited the Inca to visit his quarters, and then,
taking them unawares, killed a large number of his followers and took
him prisoner. The effect was precisely what Pizarro had hoped for. The
"Child of the Sun" once captured, the Indians, who had no law but his
command, no confidence but in his leadership, fled in all directions,
and the Spaniards remained masters of the situation.

They treated the Inca at first with respect, and while keeping him a
prisoner, allowed him a measure of freedom, and free intercourse with
his subjects. He soon saw a door of hope in the Spaniards' eagerness for
gold, and offered an enormous ransom. The offer was accepted, and
messengers were sent throughout the empire to collect it. At last it
reached an amount, in gold, of the value of nearly three and a half
million pounds sterling, besides a quantity of silver. But even this
ransom did not suffice to free the Inca. Owing partly to the malevolence
of an Indian interpreter, who bore the Inca ill-will, and partly to
rumours of a general rising of the natives instigated by the Inca, the
army began to demand his life as necessary to their safety. Pizarro
appeared to be opposed to this demand, but to yield to his soldiers, and
after a form of trial the Inca was executed. But Pizarro cannot be
acquitted of responsibility for a deed which formed the climax of one of
the darkest chapters in Spanish colonial history, and it is probable
that the design coincided only too well with his aims.


_III.--Triumph of Pisarro; his Assassination_


There was nothing now to hinder the victorious march of the Spaniards to
Cuzco, the Peruvian capital. They now numbered nearly five hundred,
having been reinforced by the arrival of Almagro from Panama.

In Cuzco they found great quantities of treasure, with the natural
result that the prices of ordinary commodities rose enormously as the
value of gold and silver declined, so that it was only those few who
returned with their present gains to their native country who could be
called wealthy.

All power was now in the hands of the Spaniards. Pizarro indeed placed
upon the throne of the Incas the legitimate heir, Manco, but it was only
in order that he might be the puppet of his own purposes. His next step
was to found a new capital, which should be near enough to the sea-coast
to meet the need of a commercial people. He determined upon the site of
Lima on the festival of Epiphany, 1535, and named it "Ciudad de los
Reyes," or City of the Kings, in honour of the day. But this name was
before long superseded by that of Lima, which arose from the corruption
of a Peruvian name.

Meanwhile Hernando Pizarro, the brother of Francisco, had sailed to
Spain to report their success. He returned with royal letters confirming
the previous grants to Francisco and his associates, and bestowing upon
Almagro a jurisdiction over a given tract of country, beginning from the
southern limit of Pizarro's government. This grant became a fruitful
source of dissension between Almagro and the Pizarros, each claiming as
within his jurisdiction the rich city of Cuzco, a question which the
uncertain knowledge of distances in the newly-explored country made it
difficult to decide.

But the Spaniards had now for a time other occupation than the pursuit
of their own quarrels. The Inca Manco, escaping from the captivity in
which he had lain for a time, put himself at the head of a host of
Indians, said to number two hundred thousand, and laid siege to Cuzco
early in February, 1536. The siege was memorable as calling out the most
heroic displays of Indian and European valour, and bringing the two
races into deadlier conflict with each other than had yet occurred in
the conquest of Peru. The Spaniards were hard pressed, for by means of
burning arrows the Indians set the city on fire, and only their
encampment in the midst of an open space enabled the Spaniards to endure
the conflagration around. They suffered severely, too, from famine. The
relief from Lima for which they looked did not come, as Pizarro was in
no position to send help, and from this they feared the worst as to the
fate of their companions. Only the firm resolution of the Pizarro,
brothers and the other leaders within the city kept the army from
attempting to force a way out, which would have meant the abandoning of
the city. At last they were rewarded by the sight of the great host
around them melting away. Seedtime had come, and the Inca knew it would
be fatal for his people to neglect their fields, and thus prepare
starvation for themselves in the following year. Thus, though bodies of
the enemy remained to watch the city, the siege was virtually raised,
and the most pressing danger past.

While these events were passing, Almagro was engaged upon a memorable
expedition to Chili. His troops suffered great privations, and hearing
no good tidings of the country further south, he was prevailed upon to
return to Cuzco. Here, claiming the governorship, he captured Hernando
and Gonzalo Pizarro, though refusing the counsel of his lieutenant that
they should be put to death. Then, proceeding to the coast, he met
Francisco Pizarro, and a treaty was concluded between them by which
Almagro, pending instructions from Spain, was to retain Cuzco, and
Hernando Pizarro was to be set free, on condition of sailing for Spain.
But Francisco broke the treaty as soon as made, and sent Hernando with
an army against Almagro, warning the latter that unless he gave up Cuzco
the responsibility of the consequences would be on his own head. The two
armies met at Las Salinas, and Almagro was defeated and imprisoned in
Cuzco. Before long Hernando brought him to trial and to death, thus ill
requiting Almagro's treatment of him personally. Hernando, on his return
to Spain, suffered twenty years' imprisonment for this deed, which
outraged both public sentiment and sense of justice.

Francisco Pizarro, though affecting to be shocked at the death of
Almagro, cannot be acquitted of all share in it. So, indeed, the
followers of Almagro thought, and they were goaded to still further
hatred of the Pizarros by the poverty and contempt in which they now
lived, as the survivors of a discredited party. The house of Almagro's
son in Lima formed a centre of disaffection, to whose menace Pizarro
showed remarkable blindness. He paid dearly for this excessive
confidence, for on Sunday, the 26th of June, 1541, he was attacked while
sitting in his own house among his friends, and killed.


_IV.--Later Fortunes of the Conquerors_


The death of Pizarro did not prove in any sense a guarantee of peace
among the Spaniards in Peru. At the time of his death, indeed, an envoy
from the Spanish court was on his way to Peru, who from his integrity
and wisdom might indeed have given rise to a hope that a happier day was
about to dawn. He was endowed with powers to assume the governorship in
the event of Pizarro's death, as well as instructions to bring about a
more peaceful settlement of affairs. He arrived to find himself indeed
the lawful governor, but had before him the task of enforcing his
authority. This brought him into collision with the son of Almagro, at
the head of a strong party of his father's followers. A bloody battle
took place on the plains of Chupas, in which Vaca de Castro was
victorious. Almagro was arrested at Cuzco and executed.

The history of the Spanish dominion now resolves itself into the history
of warring factions, the chief hero of which was Gonzalo Pizzaro, one of
the brothers of the great Pizarro. The Spaniards in Peru felt themselves
deeply injured by the publication of regulations from Spain, by which a
sudden check was put upon their spoliation and oppression of the
natives, which had reached an extreme pitch of cruelty and
destructiveness. They called upon Gonzalo to lead them in vindication of
what they regarded as their privileges by right of conquest and of their
service to the Spanish crown. His hands were strengthened by the rash
and high-handed behaviour of, Blasco Nuñez Vela, yet another official
sent out from Spain to deal with this turbulent province. Pizarro
himself was an able and daring leader, and, at least in his earlier
years, of a chivalrous spirit which made him beloved of his soldiers. He
had great personal courage, and, as says one who had often seen him,
"when mounted on his favourite charger, made no more account of a
squadron of Indians than of a swarm of flies." He was soon acclaimed as
governor by the Spaniards, and was actually supreme in Peru. But in the
following year, 1545, the Spanish government selected an envoy who was
to bring the now ascendant star of Pizarro to eclipse. This was an
ecclesiastic named Pedro de la Gasea, a man of great resolution,
penetration, and knowledge of affairs. After varying fortunes, in which
Pizarro for some time held his own, he was routed by the troops of
Gasea, largely through the defection of a number of his own soldiers,
who marched over to the enemy. Pizarro surrendered to an officer, and
was carried before Gasea. Addressing him with severity, Gasea abruptly
inquired, "Why had he thrown the country into such confusion; raising
the banner of revolt; usurping the government; and obstinately refusing
the offer of grace that had been repeatedly made to him?" Gonzalo
defended himself as having been elected by the people. "It was my
family," he said, "who conquered the country, and as their
representative here, I felt I had a right to the government." To this
Gasea replied, in a still severer tone, "Your brother did, indeed,
conquer the land; and for this the emperor was pleased to raise both him
and you from the dust. He lived and died a true and loyal subject; and
it only makes your ingratitude to your sovereign the more heinous." A
sentence of death followed, and thus passed the last of Pizarro's name
to rule in Peru.

Under the wise reforms instituted by Gasea, Peru was somewhat relieved
of the disastrous effects of the Spanish occupation, and under the mild
yet determined policy inaugurated by him, the ancient distractions of
the country were permanently healed. With peace, prosperity returned
within the borders of Peru, and this much-tried land settled down at
last to a considerable measure of tranquillity and content.

       *       *       *       *       *




EDWARD HYDE


The History of the Rebellion


     Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon, who was born February 18,
     1608; at Dinton, Wilts, and who died at Rouen, 1674, was son
     of a private gentleman and was educated at Oxford, afterwards
     studying law under Chief Justice Nicholas Hyde, his uncle.
     Early in his career he became distinguished in political life
     in a stormy period, for, as a prominent member of the Long
     Parliament, he espoused the popular cause. The outbreak of the
     Civil War, however, threw his sympathies over to the other
     side, and in 1642 King Charles knighted him and appointed him
     Chancellor of the Exchequer. When Charles, Prince of Wales,
     afterwards King Charles II., fled to Jersey after the great
     defeat of his father at Naseby, he was accompanied by Hyde,
     who, in the island, commenced his great work, "The History of
     the Rebellion," and also issued a series of eloquently worded
     papers which appeared in the king's name as replies to the
     manifestoes of Parliament. After the Restoration he was
     appointed High Chancellor of England and ennobled with the
     title of Earl of Clarendon. But the ill success of the war
     with Holland brought the earl into popular disfavour, and his
     unpopularity was increased by the sale of Dunkirk to the
     French. Court intrigues led to the loss of his offices and he
     retreated to Calais. An apology which he sent to the Lords was
     ordered to be burnt by the common hangman. For six years, till
     his death in Rouen, he lived in exile, but he was honoured by
     burial in Westminster Abbey. His private character in a
     dissolute age was unimpeachable. Anne Hyde, daughter of the
     earl, became Queen of England, as wife of James II., and was
     mother of two queens, Anne and Mary. The "History of the
     Rebellion" is a noble and monumental work, invaluable as
     written by a contemporary.


King James, in the end of March, 1625, died, leaving his majesty that
now is, engaged in a war with Spain, but unprovided with money to manage
it, though it was undertaken by the consent and advice of Parliament;
the people being naturally enough inclined to the war (having surfeited
with the uninterrupted pleasures and plenty of 22 years of peace) and
sufficiently inflamed against the Spaniard, but quickly weary of the
charge of it. Therefore, after an unprosperous attempt by sea on Cadiz,
and a still more unsuccessful one on France, at the Isle of Rhé (for
some difference had also begotten a war with that country), a general
peace was shortly concluded with both kingdoms.

The exchequer was exhausted by the debts of King James and the war, so
that the known revenue was anticipated and the king was driven into
straits for his own support. Many ways were resorted to for supply, such
as selling the crown lands, creating peers for money, and other
particulars which no access of power or plenty could since repair.

Parliaments were summoned, and again dissolved: and that in the fourth
year after the dissolution of the two former was determined with a
declaration that no more assemblies of that nature should be expected,
and all men should be inhibited on the penalty of censure so much as to
speak of a parliament. And here I cannot but let myself loose to say,
that no man can show me a source from whence these waters of bitterness
we now taste have probably flowed, than from these unseasonable,
unskilful, and precipitate dissolutions of parliaments. And whoever
considers the acts of power and injustice in the intervals between
parliaments will not be much scandalised at the warmth and vivacity
displayed in their meetings.

In the second parliament it was proposed to grant five subsidies, a
proportion (how contemptible soever in respect of the pressures now
every day imposed) never before heard of in Parliament. And that meeting
being, upon very unpopular and implausible reasons immediately
dissolved, those five subsidies were exacted throughout the whole
kingdom with the same rigour as if in truth an act had passed to that
purpose. And very many gentlemen of prime quality, in all the counties,
were for refusing to pay the same committed to prison.

The abrupt and ungracious breaking of the first two parliaments was
wholly imputed to the Duke of Buckingham; and of the third, principally
to the Lord Weston, then high treasurer of England. And therefore the
envy and hatred that attended them thereupon was insupportable, and was
visibly the cause of the murder of the first (stabbed to the heart by
the hand of an obscure villain).

The duke was a very extraordinary person. Never any man in any age, nor,
I believe, in any nation, rose in so short a time to such greatness of
honour, fame, and fortune, upon no other advantage or recommendation,
than that of the beauty and gracefulness of his person. He was the
younger son of George Villiers, of Brookesby, Leicestershire. After the
death of his father he was sent by his mother to France, where he spent
three years in attaining the language and in learning the exercises of
riding and dancing; in the last of which he excelled most men, and
returned to England at the age of twenty-one.

King James reigned at that time. He began to be weary of his favourite,
the Earl of Somerset, who, by the instigation and wickedness of his
wife, became at least privy to the poisoning of Sir Thomas Overbury. For
this crime both he and his wife, after trial by their peers, were
condemned to die, and many persons of quality were executed for the
same.

While this was in agitation, Mr. Villiers appeared in court and drew the
king's eyes upon him. In a few days he was made cupbearer to the king
and so pleased him by his conversation that he mounted higher and was
successively and speedily knighted, made a baron, a viscount, an earl, a
marquis, lord high admiral, lord warden of the cinque ports, master of
the horse, and entirely disposed of all the graces of the king, in
conferring all the honours and all the offices of the kingdom, without a
rival. He was created Duke of Buckingham during his absence in Spain as
extraordinary ambassador.

On the death of King James, Charles, Prince of Wales, succeeded to the
crown, with the universal joy of the people. The duke continued in the
same degree of favour with the son which he had enjoyed with the father.
But a parliament was necessary to be called, as at the entrance of all
kings to the crown, for the continuance of supplies, and when it met
votes and remonstrances passed against the duke as an enemy to the
public, greatly to his indignation.

New projects were every day set on foot for money, which served only to
offend and incense the people, and brought little supply to the king's
occasions. Many persons of the best quality were committed to prison for
refusing to pay. In this fatal conjuncture the duke went on an embassy
to France and brought triumphantly home with him the queen, to the joy
of the nation, but his course was soon finished by the wicked means
mentioned before. In the fourth year of the king, and the thirty-sixth
of his own age, he was assassinated at Portsmouth by Felton, who had
been a lieutenant in the army, to whom he had refused promotion.

Shortly after Buckingham's death the king promoted Dr. Laud, Bishop of
Bath and Wells, to the archibishopric of Canterbury. Unjust modes of
raising money were instituted, which caused increasing discontent,
especially the tax denominated ship-money. A writ was directed to the
sheriff of every county to provide a ship for the king's service, but
with the writ were sent instructions that, instead of a ship, he should
levy upon his county a sum of money and send it to the treasurer of the
navy for his majesty's use.

After the continued receipt of the ship-money for four years, upon the
refusal of Mr. Hampden, a private gentleman, to pay thirty shillings as
his share, the case was solemnly argued before all the judges of England
in the exchequer-chamber and the tax was adjudged lawful; which judgment
proved of more advantage and credit to the gentleman condemned than to
the king's service.

For the better support of these extraordinary ways the council-table and
star-chamber enlarged their jurisdictions to a vast extent, inflicting
fines and imprisonment, whereby the crown and state sustained deserved
reproach and infamy, and suffered damage and mischief that cannot be
expressed.

The king now resolved to make a progress into the north, and to be
solemnly crowned in his kingdom of Scotland, which he had never seen
from the time he first left it at the age of two years. The journey was
a progress of great splendour, with an excess of feasting never known
before. But the king had deeply imbibed his father's notions that an
Episcopal church was the most consistent with royal authority, and he
committed to a select number of the bishops in Scotland the framing of a
suitable liturgy for use there. But these prelates had little influence
with the people, and had not even power to reform their own cathedrals.

In 1638 Scotland assumed an attitude of determined resistance to the
imposition of the liturgy and of Episcopal church government. All the
kingdom flocked to Edinburgh, as in a general cause that concerned their
salvation. A general assembly was called and a National Covenant was
subscribed. Men were listed towards the raising of an army, Colonel
Leslie being chosen general. The king thought it time to chastise the
seditious by force, and in the end of the year 1638 declared his
resolution to raise an army to suppress their rebellion.

This was the first alarm England received towards any trouble, after it
had enjoyed for so many years the most uninterrupted prosperity, in a
full and plentiful peace, that any nation could be blessed with. The
army was soon mustered and the king went to the borders. But
negotiations for peace took place, and civil war was averted by
concessions on the part of the king, so that a treaty of pacification
was entered upon. This event happened in the year 1639.

After for eleven years governing without a parliament, with Archbishop
Laud and the Earl of Strafford as his advisers, King Charles was
constrained, in 1640, to summon an English parliament, which, however,
instead of at once complying with his demands, commenced by drawing up a
list of grievances. Mr. Pym, a man of good reputation, but better known
afterwards, led the remonstrances, observing that by the long
intermission of parliaments many unwarrantable things had been
practiced, notwithstanding the great virtue of his majesty. Disputes
took place between the Lords and Commons, the latter claiming that the
right of supply belonged solely to them.

The king speedily dissolved Parliament, and, the Scots having again
invaded England, proceeded to raise an army to resist them. The Scots
entered Newcastle, and the Earl of Strafford, weak after a sickness, was
defeated and retreated to Durham. The king, with his army weakened and
the treasury depleted, was in great straits. He was again constrained to
call a parliament, which met on November 3, 1640. It had a sad and
melancholic aspect. The king himself did not ride with his accustomed
equipage to Westminster, but went privately in his barge to the
parliament stairs. The king being informed that Sir Thomas Gardiner, not
having been returned a member, could not be chosen to be Speaker, his
majesty appointed Mr. Lenthall, a bencher of Lincoln's Inn. In this
parliament also Mr. Pym began the recital of grievances, and other
members followed with invectives against the Earl of Strafford, accusing
him of high and imperious and tyrannical actions, and of abusing his
power and credit with the king.

After many hours of bitter inveighing it was moved that the earl might
be forthwith impeached of high treason; which was no sooner mentioned
than it found a universal approbation and consent from the whole House.
With very little debate the peers in their turn, when the impeachment
was sent up to them, resolved that he should be committed to the custody
of the gentleman usher of the black-rod, and next by an accusation of
high treason against him also the Archbishop of Canterbury was removed
from the king's council.

The trial of the earl in Westminster Hall began on March 22, 1641, and
lasted eighteen days. Both Houses passed a bill of attainder. The king
resolved never to give his consent to this measure, but a rabble of many
thousands of people besieged Whitehall, crying out, "Justice, justice;
we will have justice!" The privy council being called together pressed
the king to pass the bill of attainder, saying there was no other way to
preserve himself and his posterity than by so doing; and therefore he
ought to be more tender of the safety of the kingdom than of any one
person how innocent soever. No one counsellor interposed his opinion, to
support his master's magnanimity and innocence.

The Archbishop of York, acting his part with prodigious boldness and
impiety, told the king that there was a private and a public conscience;
that his public conscience as a king might not only dispense with, but
oblige him to do that which was against his private conscience as a man;
and that the question was not whether he should save the earl, but
whether he should perish with him. Thus in the end was extorted from the
king a commission from some lords to sign the bill. This was as valid as
if he had signed it himself, though they comforted him even with that
circumstance, "that his own hand was not in it."

The earl was beheaded on May 12, on Tower Hill. Together with that of
the attainder of this nobleman, another bill was passed by the king, of
almost as fatal consequences to him and the kingdom as that was to the
earl, "the act for perpetual parliament," as it is since called. Thus
Parliament could not be adjourned, prorogued, or dissolved, without its
consent.

Great offence was given to the Commons by the action of the king in
appointing new bishops to certain vacant sees at the very time when they
were debating an act for taking away bishops' votes. And here I cannot
but with grief and wonder remember the virulence and animosity expressed
on all occasions from many of good knowledge in the excellent and wise
profession of the common law, towards the church and churchmen. All
opportunities were taken uncharitably to improve mistakes into crimes.

Unfortunately the king sent to the House of Lords a remonstrance from
the bishops against their constrained absence from the legislature. This
led to violent scenes in the House of Commons, which might have been
beneficial to him, had he not been misadvised by Lord Digby. At this
time many of his own Council were adverse to him. Injudiciously, the
king caused Lord Kimbolton and five members of the Commons to be accused
of high treason, advised thereto by Lord Digby. The king's attorney,
Herbert, delivered to Parliament a paper, whereby, besides Lord
Kimbolton, Denzil Hollis, Sir Arthur Haslerig, Mr. Pym, Mr. Hampden, and
Mr. Strode, stood accused of conspiring against the king and Parliament.

The sergeant at arms demanded the persons of the accused members to be
delivered to him in his majesty's name, but the Commons refused to
comply, sending a message to the king that the members should be
forthcoming as soon as a legal charge should be preferred against them.
The next day the king, attended by his own guard and a few gentlemen,
went into the House to the great amazement of all; and the Speaker
leaving the chair, the king went into it. Asking the Speaker whether the
accused members were in the House, and he making no answer, the king
said he perceived that the birds had flown, but expected that they
should be sent to him as soon as they returned; and assured them in the
word of a king that no force was intended, but that he would proceed
against them in a fair and legal way; and so he returned to Whitehall.

The next day the king went to the City, where the accused had taken
refuge. He dined with the sheriffs, but many of the rude people during
his passage through the City flocked together, pressed very near his
coach, and cried out, "Privilege of Parliament; privilege of Parliament;
to your tents, O Israel!" The king returned to Whitehall and next day
published a proclamation for the apprehension of the members, forbidding
any person to harbour them.

Both Houses of Parliament speedily manifested sympathy with the accused
persons, and a committee of citizens was formed in the City for their
defence. The proceedings of the king and his advisers were declared to
be a high breach of the privileges of Parliament. Such was the temper of
the populace that the king thought it convenient to remove from London
and went with the queen and royal children to Hampton Court. The next
day the members were brought in triumph to Parliament by the trained
bands of London. The sheriffs were called into the House of Commons and
thanked for their extraordinary care and love shown to the Parliament.

Though the king had removed himself out of the noise of Westminster, yet
the effects of it followed him very close, for printed petitions were
pressed on him every day. In a few days he removed from Hampton Court to
Windsor, where he could be more secure from any sudden popular attempt,
of which he had reason to be very apprehensive.

After many disagreements with Parliament the king in 1642 published a
declaration, that had been long ready, in which he recapitulated all the
insolent and rebellious actions which Parliament had committed against
him: and declared them "to be guilty; and forbade all his subjects to
yield any obedience to them": and at the same time published his
proclamation; by which he "required all men who could bear arms to
repair to him at Nottingham by August 25, on which day he would set up
his royal standard there, which all good subjects were obliged to
attend."

According to the proclamation, on August 25 the standard was erected,
about six in the evening of a very stormy day. But there was not yet a
single regiment levied and brought there, so that the trained bands
drawn thither by the sheriff was all the strength the king had for his
person, and the guard of the standard. There appeared no conflux of men
in obedience to the proclamation. The arms and ammunition had not yet
come from York, and a general sadness covered the whole town, and the
king himself appeared more melancholy than he used to be. The standard
was blown down the same night it had been set up.

Intelligence was received the next day that the rebel army, for such the
king had declared it, was horse, foot, and cannon at Northampton,
whereas his few cannon and ammunition were still at York. It was evident
that all the strength he had to depend upon was his horse, which were
under the command of Prince Rupert at Leicester, not more than 800 in
number, whilst the enemy had, within less than twenty miles of that
place, double the number of horse excellently well armed and appointed,
and a body of 5,000 foot well trained and disciplined.

Very speedily intelligence came that Portsmouth was besieged by land and
sea by the Parliamentary forces, and soon came word that it was lost to
the king through the neglect of Colonel Goring. The king removed to
Derby and then to Shrewsbury. Prince Rupert was successful in a skirmish
at Worcester. The two universities presented their money and plate to
King Charles, but one cause of his misfortunes was the backwardness of
some of his friends in lending him money.

Banbury Castle surrendered to Charles, and, marching to Oxford, he there
experienced a favourable reception and recruited his army. At the battle
of Edghill neither side gained the advantage, though altogether about
_5,000_ men fell on the field. Negotiations were entered into between
the king and the Parliament, and these were renewed again and again, but
never with felicitous issues.

On June 13, 1645, the king heard that General Fairfax was advanced to
Northampton with a strong army, much superior to the numbers he had
formerly been advised of. The battle began at ten the next morning on a
high ground about Naseby. The first charge was given by Prince Rupert,
with his usual vigour, so that he bore down all before him, and was soon
master of six pieces of cannon. But though the king's troops prevailed
in the charge they never rallied again in order, nor could they be
brought to make a second charge. But the enemy, disciplined under such
generals as Fairfax and Cromwell, though routed at first, always formed
again. This was why the king's forces failed to win a decisive victory
at Edghill, and now at Naseby, after Prince Rupert's charge, Cromwell
brought up his troops with such effect that in the end the king was
compelled to quit the field, leaving Fairfax, who was commander-in-chief
of the Parliamentary army, master of his foot, cannon, and baggage.

It will not be seasonable in this place to mention the names of those
noble persons who were lost in this battle, when the king and the
kingdom were lost in it; though there were above one hundred and fifty
officers, and gentlemen of prime quality, whose memories ought to be
preserved, who were dead on the spot. The enemy left no manner of
barbarous cruelty unexercised that day; and in the pursuit thereof
killed above one hundred women, whereof some were officers' wives of
quality. The king and Prince Rupert with the broken troops marched by
stages to Hereford, where Prince Rupert left the king to hasten to
Bristol, that he might put that place in a state of defence.

Nothing can here be more wondered at than that the king should amuse
himself about forming a new army in counties that had been vexed and
worn out with the oppressions of his own troops, and not have
immediately repaired into the west, where he had an army already formed.
Cromwell having taken Winchester and Basing, the king sent some messages
to Parliament for peace, which were not regarded. A treaty between the
king and the Scots was set on foot by the interposition of the French,
but the parties disagreed about church government. To his son Charles,
Prince of Wales, who had retired to Scilly, the king wrote enjoining him
never to surrender on dishonourable terms.

Having now no other resource, the king placed himself under the
protection of the Scots army at Newark. But at the desire of the Scots
he ordered the surrender of Oxford and all his other garrisons. Also the
Parliament, at the Scots' request, sent propositions of peace to him,
and these proposals were promptly enforced by the Scots. The Chancellor
of Scotland told him that the Parliament, after the battles that had
been fought, had got the strongholds and forts of the kingdom into their
hands, that they had gained a victory over all, and had a strong army to
maintain it, so that they might do what they would with church and
state, that they desired neither him nor any of his race to reign any
longer over them, and that if he declined to yield to the propositions
made to him, all England would join against him to depose him.

With great magnanimity and resolution the king replied that they must
proceed their own way; and that though they had all forsaken him, God
had not. The Scots began to talk sturdily in answer to a demand that
they should deliver up the king's person to Parliament. They denied that
the Parliament had power absolutely to dispose of the king's person
without their approbation; and the Parliament as loudly replied that
they had nothing to do in England but to observe orders. But these
discourses were only kept up till they could adjust accounts between
them, and agree what price should be paid for the delivery of his
person, whom one side was resolved to have, and the other as resolved
not to keep. So they quickly agreed that, upon payment of £200,000 in
hand, and security for as much more upon days agreed upon, they would
deliver up the king into such hands as Parliament should appoint to
receive him.

And upon this infamous contract that excellent prince was in the end of
January, 1647, wickedly given up by his Scottish subjects to those of
the English who were trusted by the Parliament to receive him. He was
brought to his own house at Holmby, in Northants, a place he had taken
much delight in. Removed before long to Hampton Court, he escaped to the
Isle of Wight, where he confided himself to Colonel Hammond and was
lodged in Carisbrooke Castle. To prevent his further escape his old
servants were removed from him.

In a speech in Parliament Cromwell declared that the king was a man of
great parts and a great understanding (faculties they had hitherto
endeavoured to have thought him to be without), but that he was so great
a dissembler and so false a man, that he was not to be trusted. He
concluded therefore that no more messages should be sent to the king,
but that they might enter on those counsels which were necessary without
having further recourse to him, especially as at that very moment he was
secretly treating with the Scottish commissioners, how he might embroil
the nation in a new war, and destroy the Parliament. The king was
removed to Hurst Castle after a vain attempt by Captain Burley to rescue
him.

A committee being appointed to prepare a charge of high treason against
the king, of which Bradshaw was made President, his majesty was brought
from Hurst Castle to St. James's, and it was concluded to have him
publicly tried. From the time of the king's arrival at St. James's, when
he was delivered into the custody of Colonel Tomlinson, he was treated
with much more rudeness and barbarity than ever before. No man was
suffered to see or speak to him but the soldiers who were his guard.

When he was first brought to Westminster Hall, on January 20, 1649,
before their high court of justice, he looked upon them and sat down
without any manifestation of trouble, never stirring his hat; all the
impudent judges sitting covered and fixing their eyes on him, without
the least show of respect. To the charges read out against him the king
replied that for his actions he was accountable to none but God, though
they had always been such as he need not be ashamed of before all the
world.

Several unheard-of insolences which this excellent prince was forced to
submit to before that odious judicatory, his majestic behaviour, the
pronouncing that horrible sentence upon the most innocent person in the
world, the execution of that sentence by the most execrable murder ever
committed since that of our blessed Saviour, and the circumstances
thereof, are all so well-known that the farther mentioning it would but
afflict and grieve the reader, and make the relation itself odious; and
therefore no more shall be said here of that lamentable tragedy, so much
to the dishonour of the nation and the religion professed by it.

       *       *       *       *       *




LORD MACAULAY


History of England


     Thomas Babington Macaulay was born October 25, 1800, and died
     December 28, 1859. He was the son of Zachary Macaulay, a West
     Indian merchant and noted philanthropist. He brilliantly
     distinguished himself as a prizeman at Cambridge, and on
     leaving the University devoted himself enthusiastically to
     literary pursuits. Fame was speedily won by his contributions
     to the "Edinburgh Review," especially by his article on
     Milton. Though called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn, in 1826,
     Macaulay never practised, but through his strong Whig
     sympathies he was drawn into politics, and in 1830 entered
     Parliament for the pocket-borough of Calne. He afterwards was
     elected M.P. for Edinburgh. Appointed Secretary of the Board
     of Control for India, he resided for six years in that
     country, returning home in 1838. In 1840 he was made War
     Secretary. It was during his official career that he wrote his
     magnificent "Lays of Ancient Rome." An immense sensation was
     produced by his remarkable "Essays," issued in three volumes;
     but even greater was the popularity achieved by his "History
     of England." Macaulay was one of the most versatile men of his
     time. His easy and graceful style was the vehicle of
     extraordinary acquisitions, his learning being prodigious and
     his memory phenomenal.


_England in Earlier Times_


I purpose to write the History of England from the accession of King
James II. down to a time within the memory of men still living. I shall
recount the errors which, in a few months, alienated a loyal gentry and
priesthood from the House of Stuart. I shall trace the course of that
revolution which terminated the long struggle between our sovereigns and
their parliaments, and bound up together the rights of the people and
the title of the reigning dynasty.

Unless I greatly deceive myself, the general effect of this chequered
narrative, faithfully recording disasters mingled with triumphs, will be
to excite thankfulness in all religious minds, and hope in the breasts
of all patriots. For the history of our country during the period
concerned is eminently the history of physical, of moral, and of
intellectual improvement.

Nothing in the early existence of Britain indicated the greatness she
was destined to attain. Of the western provinces which obeyed the
Caesars, she was the last conquered, and the first flung away. Though
she had been subjugated by the Roman arms, she received only a faint
tincture of Roman arts and letters. No magnificent remains of Roman
porches and aqueducts are to be found in Britain, and the scanty and
superficial civilisation which the islanders acquired from their
southern masters was effaced by the calamities of the 5th century.

From the darkness that followed the ruin of the Western Empire Britain
emerges as England. The conversion of the Saxon colonists to
Christianity was the first of a long series of salutary revolutions. The
Church has many times been compared to the ark of which we read in the
Book of Genesis; but never was the resemblance more perfect than during
that evil time when she rode alone, amidst darkness and tempest, on the
deluge beneath which all the great works of ancient power and wisdom lay
entombed, bearing within her that feeble germ from which a second and
more glorious civilisation was to spring.

Even the spiritual supremacy of the Pope was, in the dark ages,
productive of far more good than evil. Its effect was to unite the
nations of Western Europe in one great commonwealth. Into this
federation our Saxon ancestors were now admitted. Learning followed in
the train of Christianity. The poetry and eloquence of the Augustan age
was assiduously studied in the Mercian and Northumbrian monasteries. The
names of Bede and Alcuin were justly celebrated throughout Europe. Such
was the state of our country when, in the 9th century, began the last
great migration of the northern barbarians.

Large colonies of Danish adventurers established themselves in our
island, and for many years the struggle continued between the two fierce
Teutonic breeds, each being alternately paramount. At length the North
ceased to send forth fresh streams of piratical emigrants, and from that
time the mutual aversion of Danes and Saxons began to subside.
Intermarriage became frequent. The Danes learned the religion of the
Saxons, and the two dialects of one widespread language were blended.
But the distinction between the two nations was by no means effaced,
when an event took place which prostrated both at the feet of a third
people.

The Normans were then the foremost race of Christendom. Originally
rovers from Scandinavia, conspicuous for their valour and ferocity, they
had, after long being the terror of the Channel, founded a mighty state
which gradually extended its influence from its own Norman territory
over the neighbouring districts of Brittany and Maine. They embraced
Christianity and adopted the French tongue. They renounced the brutal
intemperance of northern races and became refined, polite and
chivalrous, their nobles being distinguished by their graceful bearing
and insinuating address.

The battle of Hastings, and the events which followed it, not only
placed a Duke of Normandy on the English throne, but gave up the whole
population of England to the tyranny of the Norman race. The subjugation
of a nation has seldom, even in Asia, been more complete. During the
century and a half which followed the Conquest, there is, to speak
strictly, no English history. Had the Plantagenets, as at one time
seemed likely, succeeded in uniting all France under their government,
it is probable that England would never have had an independent
existence. England owes her escape from dependence on French thought and
customs to separation from Normandy, an event which her historians have
generally represented as disastrous. The talents and even the virtues of
her first six French kings were a curse to her. The follies and vices of
the seventh, King John, were her salvation. He was driven from Normandy,
and in England the two races were drawn together, both being alike
aggrieved by the tyranny of a bad king. From that moment the prospects
brightened, and here commences the history of the English nation.

In no country has the enmity of race been carried further than in
England. In no country has that enmity been more completely effaced.
Early in the fourteenth century the amalgamation of the races was all
but complete: and it was soon made manifest that a people inferior to
none existing in the world has been formed by the mixture of three
branches of the great Teutonic family with each other, and with the
aboriginal Britons. A period of more than a hundred years followed,
during which the chief object of the English was, by force of arms, to
establish a great empire on the Continent. The effect of the successes
of Edward III. and Henry V. was to make France for a time a province of
England. A French king was brought prisoner to London; an English king
was crowned at Paris.

The arts of peace were not neglected by our fathers during that period.
English thinkers aspired to know, or dared to doubt, where bigots had
been content to wonder and to believe. The same age which produced the
Black Prince and Derby, Chandos and Hawkwood, produced also Geoffrey
Chaucer and John Wycliffe. In so splendid and imperial a manner did the
English people, properly so called, first take place among the nations
of the world. But the spirit of the French people was at last aroused,
and after many desperate struggles and with many bitter regrets, our
ancestors gave up the contest.


_The First Civil War_


Cooped up once more within the limits of the island, the warlike people
employed in civil strife those arms which had been the terror of Europe.
Two aristocratic factions, headed by two branches of the royal family,
engaged in the long and fierce struggle known as the Wars of the White
and Red Roses. It was at length universally acknowledged that the claims
of all the contending Plantagenets were united in the House of Tudor.

It is now very long since the English people have by force subverted a
government. During the 160 years which preceded the union of the Roses,
nine kings reigned in England. Six of those kings were deposed. Five
lost their lives as well as their crowns. Yet it is certain that all
through that period the English people were far better governed than
were the Belgians under Philip the Good, or the French under that Louis
who was styled the Father of his people. The people, skilled in the use
of arms, had in reserve that check of physical force which brought the
proudest king to reason.

One wise policy was during the Middle Ages pursued by England alone.
Though to the monarch belonged the power of the sword, the nation
retained the power of the purse. The Continental nations ought to have
acted likewise; as they failed to conserve this safeguard of
representation with taxation, the consequence was that everywhere
excepting in England parliamentary institutions ceased to exist. England
owed this singular felicity to her insular situation.

The great events of the reigns of the Tudors and the Stuarts were
followed by a crisis when the crown passed from Charles II. to his
brother, James II. The new king commenced his administration with a
large measure of public good will. He was a prince who had been driven
into exile by a faction which had tried to rob him of his birthright, on
the ground that he was a deadly enemy to the religion and laws of
England. He had triumphed, he was on the throne, and his first act was
to declare that he would defend the Church and respect the rights of the
people.

But James had not been many hours king when violent disputes arose. The
first was between the two heads of the law, concerning customs and the
levying of taxes. Moreover, the time drew near for summoning Parliament,
and the king's mind was haunted by an apprehension, not to be mentioned,
even at this distance of time, without shame and indignation. He was
afraid that by summoning his Parliament he might incur the displeasure
of the King of France. Rochester, Godolphin, and Sunderland, who formed
the interior Cabinet, were perfectly aware that their late master,
Charles II., had been in the habit of receiving money from the court of
Versailles. They understood the expediency of keeping Louis in good
humour, but knew that the summoning of the legislature was not a matter
of choice.

As soon as the French king heard of the death of Charles and of the
accession of James, he hastened to send to the latter a munificent
donation of £35,000. James was not ashamed to shed tears of delight and
gratitude. Young Lord Churchill was sent as extraordinary ambassador to
Versailles to assure Louis of the gratitude and affection of the King of
England. This brilliant young soldier had in his 23rd year distinguished
himself amongst thousands of brave men by his serene intrepidity when
engaged with his regiment in operations, together with French forces
against Holland. Unhappily, the splendid qualities of John Churchill
were mingled with alloy of the most sordid kind.


_Subservience to France_


The accession of James in 1685 had excited hopes and fears in every
Continental court. One government alone, that of Spain, wished that the
trouble that had distracted England for three generations, might be
eternal. All other governments, whether republican or monarchical,
Protestant or Romanist, wished to see those troubles happily terminated.
Under the kings of the House of Stuart, she had been a blank in the map
of Europe. That species of force which, in the 14th century, had enabled
her to humble France and Spain, had ceased to exist. The Government was
no longer a limited monarchy after the fashion of the Middle Ages; it
had not yet become one after the modern fashion. The chief business of
the sovereign was to infringe the privileges of the legislature; that of
the legislature was to encroach on the prerogatives of the sovereign.

The king readily received foreign aid, which relieved him from the
misery of being dependent on a mutinous Parliament. The Parliament
refused to the king the means of supporting the national honour abroad,
from an apprehension, too well founded, that those means might be
employed in order to establish despotism at home. The effect of these
jealousies was that our country, with all her vast resources, was of as
little weight in Christendom as the duchy of Savoy or the duchy of
Lorraine, and certainly of far less weight than the small province of
Holland. France was deeply interested in prolonging this state of
things. All other powers were deeply interested in bringing it to a
close. The general wish of Europe was that James should govern in
conformity with law and with public opinion. From the Escurial itself
came letters expressing an earnest hope that the new King of England
would be on good terms with his Parliament and his people. From the
Vatican itself came cautions against immoderate zeal for the Catholic
faith.

The king early put the loyalty of his Protestant friends to the proof.
While he was a subject he had been in the habit of hearing mass with
closed doors in a small oratory which had been fitted up for his wife.
He now ordered the doors to be thrown open, in order that all who came
to pay him their duty might see the ceremony. Soon a new pulpit was
erected in the palace, and during Lent sermons were preached there by
Popish divines, to the great displeasure of zealous churchmen.

A more serious innovation followed. Passion week came, and the king
determined to hear mass with the same pomp with which his predecessors
had been surrounded. The rites of the Church of Rome were once more,
after an interval of 127 years, performed at Westminster on Easter
Sunday with regal splendour.


_Monmouth and his Fate_


The English exiles in Holland induced the Duke of Monmouth, a natural
son of Charles II., to attempt an invasion of England, and on June 11,
1685, he landed with about 80 men at Lyme, where he knelt on the shore,
thanked God for having preserved the friends of liberty and pure
religion from the perils of the sea, and implored the divine blessing on
what was yet to be done by land. The little town was soon in an uproar
with men running to and fro, and shouting "A Monmouth! a Monmouth! the
Protestant religion!" An insurrection was inaugurated and recruits came
in rapidly. But Parliament was loyal, and the Commons ordered a bill of
attainder against Monmouth for high treason. The rebel army was defeated
in a fight at Sedgmore, and Monmouth in his misery complained bitterly
of the evil counsellors who had induced him to quit his happy retreat in
Brabant. Fleeing from the field of battle the unfortunate duke was found
hidden in a ditch, was taken to London, lodged in the Tower, and
beheaded, with the declaration on his lips, "I die a Protestant of the
Church of England."

After the execution of Monmouth the counties that had risen against the
Government endured all the cruelties that a ferocious soldiery let loose
on them could inflict. The number of victims butchered cannot now be
ascertained, the vengeance being left to the dissolute Colonel Percy
Kirke. But, a still more cruel massacre was schemed. Early in September
Judge Jeffreys set out on that circuit of which the memory will last as
long as our race or language. Opening his commission at Winchester, he
ordered Alice Lisle to be burnt alive simply because she had given a
meal and a hiding place to wretched fugitives entreating her protection.
The clergy of Winchester remonstrated with the brutal judge, but the
utmost that could be obtained was that the sentence should be commuted
from burning to beheading.


_The Brutal Judge_


Then began the judicial massacre known as the Bloody Assizes. Within a
few weeks Jeffreys boasted that he had hanged more traitors than all his
predecessors together since the Conquest. Nearly a thousand prisoners
were also transported into slavery in the West Indian islands. No
English sovereign has ever given stronger proofs of a cruel nature than
James II. At his court Jeffreys, when he had done his work, leaving
carnage, mourning, and terror behind him, was cordially welcomed, for he
was a judge after his master's own heart. James had watched the circuit
with interest and delight. At a later period, when all men of all
parties spoke with horror of the Bloody Assizes, the wicked judge and
the wicked king attempted to vindicate themselves by throwing the blame
on each other.

The king soon went further. He made no secret of his intention to exert
vigorously and systematically for the destruction of the Established
Church all the powers he possessed as her head. He plainly declared that
by a wise dispensation of Providence, the Act of Supremacy would be the
means of healing the fatal breach which it had caused. Henry and
Elizabeth had usurped a dominion which rightfully belonged to the Holy
See. That dominion had, in the course of succession, descended to an
orthodox prince, and would by him be held in trust for the Holy See. He
was authorised by law to suppress spiritual abuses; and the first
spiritual abuse which he would suppress would be the liberty which the
Anglican clergy assumed of defending their own religion, and of
attacking the doctrines of Rome.

No course was too bold for James. To confer a high office in the
Established Church on an avowed enemy of that Church was indeed a bold
violation of the laws and of the royal word. The Deanery of Christchurch
became vacant. It was the head of a Cathedral. John Massey, notoriously
a member of the Church of Rome, and destitute of any other
recommendation, was appointed. Soon an altar was decked at which mass
was daily celebrated. To the Pope's Nuncio the king said that what had
thus been done at Oxford should very soon be done at Cambridge.

The temper of the nation was such as might well make James hesitate.
During some months discontent steadily and rapidly rose. The celebration
of Roman Catholic worship had long been prohibited by Act of Parliament.
During several generations no Roman Catholic clergyman had dared to
exhibit himself in any public place with the badges of his office. Every
Jesuit who set foot in this country was liable to be hanged, drawn, and
quartered.

But all disguise was now thrown off. Roman Catholic chapels arose all
over the land. A society of Benedictine monks was lodged in St. James's
Palace. Quarrels broke out between Protestant and Romanist soldiers.
Samuel Johnson, a clergyman of the Church of England, who had issued a
tract entitled "A humble and hearty Appeal to all English Protestants in
the Army," was flung into gaol. He was then flogged and degraded from
the priesthood. But the zeal of the Anglican clergy displayed. They were
Jed by a united Phalanx, in the van of which appeared a rank of steady
and skillful veterans, Tillotson, Stillingfleet, Prideaux, Patrick,
Tenison, Wake. Great numbers of controversial tracts against Popery were
issued by these divines.

Scotland also rose in anger against the designs of the king, and if he
had not been proof against all warning the excitement in that country
would have sufficed to admonish him. On March 18, 1687, he took a
momentous step. He informed the Privy Council that he had determined to
prorogue Parliament till the end of November, and to grant, by his own
authority, entire liberty of conscience to all his subjects. On April
4th appeared the memorable Declaration of Indulgence. In this document
the king avowed that it was his earnest wish to see his people members
of that Church to which he himself belonged. But since that could not
be, he announced his intention to protect them in the free exercise of
their religion. He authorised both Roman Catholics and Protestant
Dissenters to perform their worship publicly.

That the Declaration was unconstitutional is universally agreed, for a
monarch competent to issue such a document is nothing less than an
absolute ruler. This was, in point of fact, the most audacious of all
attacks of the Stuarts on public freedom. The Anglican party was in
amazement and terror, for it would now be exposed to the free attacks of
its enemies on every side. And though Dissenters appeared to be allowed
relief, what guarantee was there for the sincerity of the Court? It was
notorious that James had been completely subjugated by the Jesuits, for
only a few days before the publication of the Indulgence, that Order had
been honoured with a new mark of his confidence, by appointing as his
confessor an Englishman named Warner, a Jesuit renegade from the
Anglican Church.


_Petition of the Seven Bishops and their Trial_


A meeting of bishops and other eminent divines was held at Lambeth
Palace. The general feeling was that the king's Declaration ought not to
be read in the churches. After long deliberation, preceded by solemn
prayer, a petition embodying the general sense, was written by the
Archbishop with his own hand. The king was assured that the Church still
was, as she had ever been, faithful to the throne. But the Declaration
was illegal, for Parliament had pronounced that the sovereign was not
constitutionally competent to dispense with statutes in matters
ecclesiastical. The Archbishop and six of his suffragans signed the
petition. The six bishops crossed the river to Whitehall, but the
Archbishop, who had long been forbidden the Court, did not accompany
them. James directed that the bishops should be admitted to the royal
presence, and they found him in very good humour, for he had heard from
his tool Cartwright that they were disposed to obey the mandate, but
wished to secure some little modifications in form.

After reading the petition the king's countenance grew dark and he
exclaimed, "This is the standard of rebellion." In vain did the prelates
emphasise their protests of loyalty. The king persisted in
characterising their action as being rebellious. The bishops
respectfully retired, and that evening the petition appeared in print,
was laid out in the coffeehouses and was cried about the streets.
Everywhere people rose from their beds, and came out to stop the
hawkers, and the sale was so enormous that it was said the printer
cleared a thousand pounds in a few hours by this penny broadside.

The London clergy disobeyed the royal order, for the Declaration was
read in only four churches in the city, where there were about a
hundred. For a short time the king stood aghast at the violence of the
tempest he had raised, but Jeffreys maintained that the government would
be disgraced if such transgressors as the seven bishops were suffered to
escape with a mere reprimand. They were notified that they must appear
before the king in Council. On June 8 they were examined by the Privy
Council, the result being their committal to the Tower. From all parts
of the country came the report that other prelates had signed similar
petitions and that very few of the clergy throughout the land had obeyed
the king. The public excitement in London was intense. While the bishops
were before the Council a great multitude filled the region all round
Whitehall, and when the Seven came forth under a guard, thousands fell
on their knees and prayed aloud for the men who had confronted a tyrant
inflamed with the bigotry of Mary.

The king learned with indignation that the soldiers were drinking the
health of the prelates, and his officers told him that this could not be
prevented. Before the day of trial the agitation spread to the furthest
corners of the island. Scotland sent letters assuring the bishops of the
sympathy of the Presbyterians, hostile though they were to prelacy. The
people of Cornwall were greatly moved by the danger of Bishop Trelawney,
and the peasants chanted a ballad of which the burden is still
remembered:

    "And shall Trelawney die, and shall Trelawney die?
    Then thirty thousand Cornish boys will know the reason why."

The miners from their caverns re-echoed the song with a variation:

    "Then twenty thousand underground will know the reason why."

The bishops were charged with having published a false, malicious, and
seditious libel. But the case for the prosecution speedily broke down in
the hands of the crown lawyers. They were vehemently hissed by the
audience. The jury gave the verdict of "Not Guilty." As the news spread
all London broke out into acclamation. The bishops were greeted with
cries of "God bless you; you have saved us all to-day." The king was
greatly disturbed at the news of the acquittal, and exclaimed in French,
"So much the worse for them." He was at that moment in the camp at
Hounslow, where he had been reviewing the troops. Hearing a great shout
behind him, he asked what the uproar meant. "Nothing," was the answer;
"the soldiers are glad that the bishops are acquitted." "Do you call
that nothing?" exclaimed the king. And then he repeated, "So much the
worse for them." He might well be out of temper. His defeat had been
complete and most humiliating.


_The Prince of Orange_


In May, 1688, while it was still uncertain whether the Declaration would
or would not be read in the churches, Edward Russell had repaired to the
Hague, where he strongly represented to the Prince of Orange, husband of
Mary, eldest daughter of Charles I., the state of the public mind, and
had advised His Highness to appear in England with a strong body of
troops, and to call the people to arms. William had seen at a glance the
whole importance of the crisis. "Now or never," he exclaimed in Latin.
He quickly received numerous assurances of support from England.
Preparations were rapidly made, and on November I, 1688, he set sail
with his fleet, and landed at Torbay on November 4. Resistance was
impossible. The troops of James's army quietly deserted wholesale, many
joining the Dutch camp at Honiton. First the West of England, and then
the North, revolted against James. Evil news poured in upon him. When he
heard that Churchill and Grafton had forsaken him, he exclaimed, "Est-il
possible?" On December 8 the king fled from London secretly. His home in
exile was at Saint Germains.

William and Mary were proclaimed King and Queen of the United Kingdom,
and thus was consummated the English Revolution. It was of all
revolutions the least violent and yet the most beneficent.


_After the Great Revolution_


The Revolution had been accomplished. The rejoicings throughout the land
were enthusiastic. Still more cordial was the rejoicing among the Dutch
when they learned that the first minister of their Commonwealth had been
raised to a throne. James had, during the last year of his reign, been
even more hated in England by the Tories than by the Whigs; and not
without cause; for to the Whigs he was only an enemy; and to the Tories
he had been a faithless and thankless friend.

One misfortune of the new king, which some reactionaries imputed to him
as a crime, was his bad English. He spoke our language, but not well.
Our literature he was incapable of enjoying or understanding. He never
once appeared in the theatre. The poets who wrote Pindaric verse in his
praise complained that their flights of sublimity were beyond his
comprehension. But his wife did her best to supply what was wanting. She
was excellently qualified to be the head of the Court. She was English
by birth and also in her tastes and feelings. The stainless purity of
her private life and the attention she paid to her religious duties
discourages scandal as well as vice.

The year 1689 is not less important in the ecclesiastical than in the
civil history of England, for in that year was granted the first legal
indulgence to Dissenters. And then also the two chief sections within
the Anglican communion began to be called the High Church and Low Church
parties. The Low Churchmen stood between the nonconformists and the
rigid conformists. The famous Toleration Bill passed both Houses with
little debate. It approaches very near the ideal of a great English law,
the sound principle of which undoubtedly is that mere theological error
ought not to be punished by the civil magistrate.


_The War in Ireland_


The discontent of the Roman Catholic Irishry with the Revolution was
intense. It grew so manifestly, that James, assured that his cause was
prospering in Ireland, landed on March 12, 1689, at Kinsale. On March 24
he entered Dublin. This event created sorrow and alarm in England. An
Irish army, raised by the Catholics, entered Ulster and laid siege to
Londonderry, into which city two English regiments had been thrown by
sea. The heroic defence of Londonderry is one of the most thrilling
episodes in the history of Ireland. The siege was turned into a blockade
by the construction of a boom across the harbour by the besiegers. The
citizens endured frightful hunger, for famine was extreme within the
walls, but they never quailed. The garrison was reduced from 7,000 to
3,000. The siege, which lasted 105 days, and was the most memorable in
the annals of the British Isles, was ended by the breaking of the boom
by a squadron of three ships from England which brought reinforcements
and provisions.

The Irish army retreated and the next event, a very decisive one, was
the defeat at the Battle of the Boyne, where William and James commanded
their respective forces. The war ended with the capitulation of
Limerick, and the French soldiers, who had formed a great part of
James's army, left for France.


_The Battle of La Hogue_


The year 1692 was marked by momentous events issuing from a scheme, in
some respects well concerted, for the invasion of England by a French
force, with the object of the restoration of James. A noble fleet of
about 80 ships of the line was to convey this force to the shores of
England, and in the French dockyards immense preparations were made.
James had persuaded himself that, even if the English fleet should fall
in with him, it would not oppose him. Indeed, he was too ready to
believe anything written to him by his English correspondents.

No mightier armament had ever appeared in the English Channel than the
fleet of allied British and Dutch ships, under the command of Admiral
Russell. On May 19 it encountered the French fleet under the Count of
Tourville, and a running fight took place which lasted during five
fearful days, ending in the complete destruction of the French force off
La Hogue. The news of this great victory was received in England with
boundless joy. One of its happiest effects was the effectual calming of
the public mind.


_Creation of the Bank of England_


In this reign, in 1694, was established the Bank of England. It was the
result of a great change that had developed in a few years, for old men
in William's reign could remember the days when there was not a single
banking house in London. Goldsmiths had strong vaults in which masses of
bullion could lie secure from fire and robbers, and at their shops in
Lombard Street all payments in coin were made. William Paterson, an
ingenious speculator, submitted to the government a plan for a national
bank, which after long debate passed both Houses of Parliament.

In 1694 the king and the nation mourned the death from small-pox, a
disease always working havoc, of Queen Mary. During her illness William
remained day and night at her bedside. The Dutch Envoy wrote that the
sight of his misery was enough to melt the hardest heart. When all hope
was over, he said to Bishop Burnet, "There is no hope. I was the
happiest man on earth; and I am the most miserable. She had no faults;
none; you knew her well; but you could not know, none but myself could
know, her goodness." The funeral was remembered as the saddest and most
august that Westminister had ever seen. While the queen's remains lay in
state at Whitehall, the neighbouring streets were filled every day, from
sunrise to sunset, by crowds that made all traffic impossible. The two
Houses with their maces followed the hearse, the Lords robed in scarlet
and ermine, the Commons in long black mantles. No preceding sovereign
had ever been attended to the grave by a Parliament: for till then the
Parliament had always expired with the sovereign. The gentle queen
sleeps among her illustrious kindred in the southern aisle of the Chapel
of Henry the Seventh.

The affection of her husband was soon attested by a monument the most
superb that was ever erected to any sovereign. No scheme had been so
much her own, and none so dear to her heart, as that of converting the
palace at Greenwich into a retreat for seamen. As soon as he had lost
her, her husband began to reproach himself for neglecting her wishes. No
time was lost. A plan was furnished by Wren; and soon an edifice,
surpassing that asylum which the magnificent Louis had provided for his
soldiers, rose on the margin of the Thames. The inscription on the
frieze ascribes praise to Mary alone. Few who now gaze on the noble
double edifice, crowned by twin domes, are aware that it is a memorial
of the virtues of the good Queen Mary, of the love and sorrow of
William, and of the greater victory of La Hogue.

On the Continent the death of Mary excited various emotions. The
Huguenots, in every part of Europe to which they had wandered, bewailed
the Elect Lady, who had retrenched her own royal state in order to
furnish bread and shelter to the persecuted people of God. But the hopes
of James and his companions in exile were now higher than they had been
since the day of La Hogue. Indeed, the general opinion of politicians,
both here and on the Continent, was that William would find it
impossible to sustain himself much longer on the throne. He would not,
it was said, have sustained himself so long but for the help of his
wife, whose affability had conciliated many that were disgusted by his
Dutch accent and habits. But all the statesmen of Europe were deceived:
and, strange to say, his reign was decidedly more prosperous after the
decease of Mary than during her life.

During the month which followed her death the king was incapable of
exertion. His first letter was that of a brokenhearted man. Even his
martial ardour had been tamed by misery. "I tell you in confidence," he
wrote to Heincius, "that I feel myself to be no longer fit for military
command. Yet I will try to do my duty: and I hope that God will
strengthen me." So despondingly did he look forward to the most
brilliant and successful of his many campaigns.

All Europe was looking anxiously towards the Low Countries. A great
French army, commanded by Villeroy, was collected in Flanders. William
crossed to the Continent to take command of the Dutch and British
troops, who mustered at Ghent. The Elector of Bavaria, at the head of a
great force, lay near Brussels. William had set his heart on capturing
Namur. After a siege hard pressed, that fortress, esteemed the strongest
in Europe, splendidly fortified by Vauban, surrendered to the allies on
August 26, 1695.


_The Treaty of Ryswick_


The war was ended by the signing of the treaty of Ryswick by the
ambassadors of France, England, Spain, and the United Provinces on
September 10, 1697. King William was received in London with great
popular rejoicing. The second of December was appointed a day of
thanksgiving for peace, and the Chapter of St. Paul's resolved that on
that day their new Cathedral, which had long been slowly rising on the
ruins of a succession of pagan and Christian temples, should be opened
for public worship. There was indeed reason for joy and thankfulness.
England had passed through severe trials, and had come forth renewed in
health and vigour.

Ten years before it had seemed that both her liberty and her
independence were no more. Her liberty she had vindicated by a just and
necessary revolution. Her independence she had reconquered by a not less
just and necessary war. All dangers were over. There was peace abroad
and at home. The kingdom, after many years of ignominious vassalage, had
resumed its ancient place in the first rank of European powers. Many
signs justified the hope that the Revolution of 1688 would be our last
Revolution. Public credit had been re-established; trade had revived;
the Exchequer was overflowing; and there was a sense of relief
everywhere, from the Royal Exchange to the most secluded hamlets among
the mountains of Wales and the fens of Lincolnshire.

Early in 1702 alarming reports were rife concerning William's state of
health. Headaches and shivering fits returned on him almost daily, and
it soon became evident that the great king's days were numbered. On
February 20 William was ambling on a favourite horse, named Sorrel,
through the park of Hampton Court. The horse stumbling on a mole-hill
went down on his knees. The king fell off and broke his collar-bone. The
bone was set, and to a young and vigorous man such an accident would
have been a trifle. But the frame of William was not in a condition to
bear even the slightest shock. He felt that his time was short, and
grieved, with such a grief as only noble spirits feel, to think that he
must leave his work but half finished. On March 4 he was attacked by
fever, and he was soon sinking fast. He was under no delusion as to his
danger. "I am fast drawing to my end," said he. His end was worthy of
his life. His intellect was not for a moment clouded. His fortitude was
the more admirable because he was not willing to die. From the words
which escaped him he seemed to be frequently engaged in mental prayer.
The end came between seven and eight in the morning. When his remains
were laid out, it was found that he wore next to his skin a small piece
of black silk riband. The lords in waiting ordered it to be taken off.
It contained a gold ring and a lock of the hair of Mary.

       *       *       *       *       *




HENRY BUCKLE


History of Civilisation in England


     Henry Thomas Buckle was born at Lee, in Kent, England, Nov.
     24, 1821. Delicate health prevented him from following the
     ordinary school course. His father's death in 1840 left him
     independent, and the boy who was brought up in Toryism and
     Calvinism, became a philosophic radical and free-thinker. He
     travelled, he read, he acquired facility in nineteen languages
     and fluency in seven. Gradually he conceived the idea of a
     great work which should place history on an entirely new
     footing; it should concern itself not with the unimportant and
     the personal, but with the advance of civilisation, the
     intellectual progress of man. As the idea developed, he
     perceived that the task was greater than could be accomplished
     in the lifetime of one man. What he actually accomplished--the
     volumes which bear the title "The History of Civilisation in
     England"--was intended to be no more than an introduction to
     the subject; and even that introduction, which was meant to
     cover, on a corresponding scale, the civilisation of several
     other countries, was never finished. The first volume was
     published in 1857, the second in 1861; only the studies of
     England, France, Spain, and Scotland were completed. Buckle
     died at Damascus, on May 29, 1862.


_I.---General Principles_


The believer in the possibility of a science of history is not called
upon to hold either the doctrine of predestination or that of freedom of
the will. The only positions which at the outset need to be conceded are
that when we perform an action we perform it in consequence of some
motive or motives; that those motives are the result of some
antecedents; and that, therefore, if we were acquainted with the whole
of the precedents and with all the laws of their movements we could with
unerring certainty predict the whole of their immediate results.

History is the modification of man by nature and of nature by man. We
shall find a regularity in the variations of virtuous and vicious
actions that proves them to be the result of large and general causes
which, working upon the aggregate of society, must produce certain
consequences without regard to the decision of particular individuals.

Man is affected by purely physical agents--climate, food, soil,
geographical conditions, and active physical phenomena. In the earliest
civilisations nature is more prominent than man, and the imagination is
more stimulated than the understanding. In the European civilisations
man is the more prominent, and the understanding is more stimulated than
the imagination. Hence the advance of European civilisation is
characterised by a diminishing influence of physical laws and an
increasing influence of mental laws. Clearly, then, of the two classes
of laws which regulate the progress of mankind the mental class is more
important than the physical. The laws of the human mind will prove to be
the ultimate basis of the history of Europe. These are not to be
ascertained by the metaphysical method of studying the inquirer's own
mind alone, but by the historical method of studying many minds. And
this whether the metaphysician belongs to the school which starts by
examining the sensations, or to that which starts with the examination
of ideas.

Dismissing the metaphysical method, therefore, we must turn to the
historical, and study mental phenomena as they appear in the actions of
mankind at large. Mental progress is twofold, moral and intellectual,
the first having relation to our duties, the second to our knowledge. It
is a progress not of capacity, but in the circumstances under which
capacity comes into play; not of internal power, but of external
advantage. Now, whereas moral truths do not change, intellectual truths
are constantly changing, from which we may infer that the progress of
society is due, not to the moral knowledge, which is stationary, but to
the intellectual knowledge, which is constantly advancing.

The history of any people will become more valuable for ascertaining the
laws by which past events were governed in proportion as their movements
have been least disturbed by external agencies. During the last three
centuries these conditions have applied to England more than to any
other country; since the action of the people has there been the least
restricted by government, and has been allowed the greatest freedom of
play. Government intervention is habitually restrictive, and the best
legislation has been that which abrogated former restrictive
legislation.

Government, religion, and literature are not the causes of civilisation,
but its effects. The higher religion enters only where the mind is
intellectually prepared for its acceptance; elsewhere the forms may be
adopted, but not the essence, as mediæval Christianity was merely an
adapted paganism. Similarly, a religion imposed by authority is accepted
in its form, but not necessarily in its essence.

In the same way literature is valuable to a country in proportion as the
population is capable of criticising and discriminating; that is, as it
is intellectually prepared to select and sift the good from the bad.


_II.---Civilisation in England_


It was the revival of the critical or sceptical spirit which remedied
the three fundamental errors of the olden time. Where the spirit of
doubt was quenched civilisation continued to be stationary. Where it was
allowed comparatively free play, as in England and France, there has
arisen that constantly progressive knowledge to which these two great
nations owe their prosperity.

In England its primary and most important consequence is the growth of
religious toleration. From the time of Elizabeth it became impossible to
profess religion as the avowed warrant for persecution. Hooker, at the
end of her reign, rests the argument of his "Ecclesiastical Polit" on
reason; and this is still more decisively the case with Chillingworth's
"Religion of Protestants" not fifty years later. The double movement of
scepticism had overthrown its controlling authority.

In precisely the same way Boyle--perhaps the greatest of our men of
science between Bacon and Newton--perpetually insists on the importance
of individual experiments and the comparative unimportance of what we
have received from antiquity.

The clergy had lost ground; their temporary alliance with James II. was
ended by the Declaration of Indulgence. But they were half-hearted in
their support of the Revolution, and scepticism received a fresh
encouragement from the hostility between them and the new government;
and the brief rally under Queen Anne was overwhelmed by the rise of
Wesleyanism. Theology was finally severed from the department both of
ethics and of government.

The eighteenth century is characterised by a craving after knowledge on
the part of those classes from whom knowledge had hitherto been shut
out. With the demand for knowledge came an increased simplicity in the
literary form under which it was diffused. With the spirit of inquiry
the desire for reform constantly increased, but the movement was checked
by a series of political combinations which demand some attention.

The accession of George III. changed the conditions which had persisted
since the accession of George I. The new king was able to head reaction.
The only minister of ability he admitted to his counsels was Pitt, and
Pitt retained power only by abandoning his principles. Nevertheless, a
counter-reaction was created, to which England owes her great reforms of
the nineteenth century.


_III.--Development of France_


In France at the time of the Reformation the clergy were far more
powerful than in England, and the theological contest was much more
severe. Toleration began with Henry IV. at the moment when Montaigne
appeared as the prophet of scepticism. The death of King Henry was not
followed by the reaction which might have been expected, and the rule of
Richelieu was emphatically political in its motives and secular in its
effects. It is curious to see that the Protestants were the illiberal
party, while the cardinal remained resolutely liberal.

The difference between the development in France and England is due
primarily to the recognition in England of the fact that no country can
long remain prosperous or safe in which the people are not gradually
extending their power, enlarging their privileges, and, so to say,
incorporating themselves with the functions of the state. France, on the
other hand, suffered far more from the spirit of protection, which is so
dangerous, and yet so plausible, that it forms the most serious obstacle
with which advancing civilisation has to contend.

The great rebellion in England was a war of classes as well as of
factions; on the one side the yeomanry and traders, on the other the
nobles and the clergy. The corresponding war of the Fronde in France was
not a class war at all; it was purely political, and in no way social.
At bottom the English rebellion was democratic; the leaders of the
Fronde were aristocrats, without any democratic leanings.

Thus in France the protective spirit maintained its ascendancy
intensified. Literature and science, allied to and patronised by
government, suffered demoralisation, and the age of Louis XIV. was one
of intellectual decay. After the death of Louis XIV. the French
discovered England and English literature. Our island, regarded hitherto
as barbarous, was visited by nearly every Frenchman of note for the two
succeeding generations. Voltaire, in particular, assimilated and
disseminated English doctrines.

The consequent development of the liberal spirit brought literature into
collision with the government. Inquiry was opposed to the interests of
both nobles and clergy. Nearly every great man of letters in France was
a victim of persecution. It might be said that the government
deliberately made a personal enemy of every man of intellect in the
country. We can only wonder, not that the revolution came, but that it
was still so long delayed; but ingrained prejudices prevented the crown
from being the first object of attack. The hostility of the men of
letters was directed first against the Church and Christianity.
Religious scepticism and political emancipation did not advance hand in
hand; much that was worst in the actual revolution was due to the fact
that the latter lagged behind.

In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries some progress had been made
in the principles of writing history. Like everything else, history
suffered from the rule of Louis XIV. Again the advance was inaugurated
by Voltaire. His principle is to concentrate on important movements, not
on idle details. This was not characteristic of the individual author
only, but of the spirit of the age. It is equally present in the works
of Montesquieu and Turgot. The defects of Montesquieu are chiefly due to
the fact that his materials were intractable, because science had not
yet reduced them to order by generalising the laws of their phenomena.
In the second half of the eighteenth century the intellectual movement
began to be turned directly against the state. Economical and financial
inquiries began to absorb popular attention. Rousseau headed the
political movement, whereas the government in its financial straits
turned against the clergy, whose position was already undermined, and
against whom Voltaire continued to direct his batteries.

The suppression of the Jesuits meant a revival of Jansenism. Jansenism
is Calvinistic, and Calvinism is democratic; but the real concentration
of French minds was on material questions. The foundations of religious
beliefs had been undermined, and hence arose the painful prevalence of
atheism. The period was one of progress in the study of material laws in
every field. The national intellect had taken a new bent, and it was one
which tended to violent social revolt. The hall of science is the temple
of democracy. It was in these conditions that the eyes of Frenchmen were
turned to the glorious revolt in the cause of liberty of the American
people. The spark was set to an inflammatory mass, and ignited a flame
which never ceased its ravages until it had destroyed all that Frenchmen
once held dear.


_IV.---Reaction in Spain_


I have laid down four propositions which I have endeavoured to
establish--that progress depends on a successful investigation of the
laws of phenomena; that a spirit of scepticism is a condition of such
investigation; that the influence of intellectual truths increases
thereby relatively to that of moral truths; and that the great enemy of
his progress is the protective spirit. We shall find these propositions
verified in the history of Spain.

Physically, Spain most closely resembles those non-European countries
where the influence of nature is more prominent than that of man, and
whose civilisations are consequently influenced more by the imagination
than by the understanding. In Spain, superstition is encouraged by the
violent energies of nature. After the fall of the Roman Empire, Spain
was first engaged in a long struggle on behalf of the Arianism of the
Goths against the orthodoxy of the Franks. This was followed by centuries
of struggle between the Christian Spaniard and the Mohammedan
Moors. After the conquest of Granada, the King of Spain and Emperor,
Charles V., posed primarily as the champion of religion and the enemy of
heresy. His son Philip summarised his policy in the phrase that "it is
better not to reign at all than to reign over heretics."

Loyalty was supported by superstition; each strengthened the other.
Great foreign conquests were made, and a great military reputation was
developed. But the people counted for nothing. The crown, the
aristocracy, and the clergy were supreme--the last more so than ever in
the seventeenth century. At the beginning of the eighteenth century the
Bourbon replaced the Hapsburg dynasty. The Bourbons sought to improve
the country by weakening the Church, but failed to raise the people, who
had become intellectually paralysed. The greatest efforts at improvement
were made by Charles III.; but Charles IV., unlike his predecessors, who
had been practically foreigners, was a true Spaniard. The inevitable
reaction set in.

In the nineteenth century individuals have striven for political reform,
but they have been unable to make head against those general causes
which have predetermined the country to superstition. Great as are the
virtues for which the Spaniards have long been celebrated, those noble
qualities are useless while ignorance is so gross and so general.


_V.--The Paradox of Scottish History_


In most respects Scotland affords a complete contrast to Spain, but in
regard to superstition, there is a striking similarity. Both nations
have allowed their clergy to exercise immense sway; in both intolerance
has been, and still is, a crying evil; and a bigotry is habitually
displayed which is still more discreditable to Scotland than to Spain.
It is the paradox of Scotch history that the people are liberal in
politics and illiberal in religion.

The early history of Scotland is one of perpetual invasions down to the
end of the fourteenth century. This had the double effect of
strengthening the nobles while it weakened the citizens, and increasing
the influence of the clergy while weakening that of the intellectual
classes. The crown, completely overshadowed by the nobility, was forced
to alliance with the Church. The fifteenth century is a record of the
struggles of the crown supported by the clergy against the nobility,
whose power, however, they failed to break. At last, in the reign of
James V., the crown and Church gained the ascendancy. The antagonism of
the nobles to the Church was intensified, and consequently the nobles
identified themselves with the Reformation.

The struggle continued during the regency which followed the death of
James; but within twenty years the nobles had triumphed and the Church
was destroyed. There was an immediate rupture between the nobility and
the new clergy, who united themselves with the people and became the
advocates of democracy. The crown and the nobles were now united in
maintaining episcopacy, which became the special object of attack from
the new clergy, who, despite the extravagance of their behaviour, became
the great instruments in keeping alive and fostering the spirit of
liberty.

When James VI. became also James I. of England, he used his new power to
enforce episcopacy. Charles I. continued his policy; but the reaction
was gathering strength, and became open revolt in 1637. The democratic
movement became directly political. When the great civil war followed,
the Scots sold the king, who had surrendered to them, to the English,
who executed him. They acknowledged his son, Charles II., but not till
he had accepted the Covenant on ignominious terms.

At the restoration Charles II. was able to renew the oppressive policy
of his father and grandfather. The restored bishops supported the crown;
the people and the popular clergy were mercilessly persecuted. Matters
became even worse under James II., but the revolution of 1688 ended the
oppression. The exiled house found support in the Highlands not out of
loyalty, but from the Highland preference for anarchy; and after 1745
the Highlanders themselves were powerless. The trading spirit rose and
flourished, and the barbaric hereditary jurisdictions were abolished.
This last measure marked but did not cause the decadence of the power of
the nobility. This had been brought about primarily by the union with
England in 1707. In the legislature of Great Britain the Scotch peers
were a negligible and despised factor. The _coup de grace_ was given by
the rebellion of 1745. The law referred to expressed an already
accomplished fact.

The union also encouraged the development of the mercantile and
manufacturing classes, which, in turn, strengthened the democratic
movement. Meanwhile, a great literature was also arising, bold and
inquiring. Nevertheless, it failed to diminish the national
superstition.

This illiberality in religion was caused in the first place by the power
of the clergy. Religion was the essential feature of the Scotch war
against Charles I. Theological interests dominated the secular because
the clergy were the champions of the political movement. Hence, in the
seventeenth century, the clergy were enabled to extend and consolidate
their own authority, partly by means of that great engine of tyranny,
the kirk sessions, partly through the credulity which accepted their
claims to miraculous interpositions in their favour. To increase their
own ascendancy, the clergy advanced monstrous doctrines concerning evil
spirits and punishments in the next life; painted the Deity as cruel and
jealous; discovered sinfulness hateful to God in the most harmless acts;
punished the same with arbitrary and savage penalties; and so crushed
out of Scotland all mirth and nearly all physical enjoyment.

Scottish literature of the eighteenth century failed to destroy this
illiberality owing to the method of the Scotch philosophers. The school
which arose was in reaction against the dominant theological spirit; but
its method was deductive not inductive. Now, the inductive method, which
ascends from experience to theory is anti-theological. The deductive
reasons down from theories whose validity is assumed; it is the method
of theology itself. In Scotland the theological spirit had taken such
firm hold that the inductive method could not have obtained a hearing;
whereas in England and France the inductive method has been generally
followed.

The great secular philosophy of Scotland was initiated by Hutchinson.
His system of morals was based not on revealed principles, but on laws
ascertainable by human intelligence; his positions were in fiat
contradiction to those of the clergy. But his method assumes intuitive
faculties and intuitive knowledge.

The next and the greatest name is that of Adam Smith, whose works, "The
Theory of Moral Sentiments" and "Wealth of Nations," must be taken in
conjunction. In the first he works on the assumption that sympathy is
the mainspring of human conduct. In the "Wealth of Nations" the
mainspring is selfishness. The two are not contradictory, but
complementary. Of the second book it may be said that it is probably the
most important which has ever been written, whether we consider the
amount of original thought which it contains or its practical influence.

Beside Adam Smith stands David Hume. An accomplished reasoner and a
profound thinker, he lacked the invaluable quality of imagination. This
is the underlying defect of his history. Important and novel as are
Hume's doctrines, his method was also deductive, and, like Adam Smith,
he rests little on experience. After these two, Reid was the most
eminent among the purely speculative thinkers of Scotland, but he stands
far below them both. To Hume the spirit of inquiry and scepticism is
essential; to Reid it is a danger.

The deductive method was no less prevalent in physical philosophy. Now,
induction is more accessible to the average understanding than
deduction. The deductive character of this Scottish literature prevented
it from having popular effect, and therefore from weakening the national
superstition, from which Scotland, even to-day, has been unable to shake
herself free.

       *       *       *       *       *




WALTER BAGEHOT


The English Constitution


     Walter Bagehot was born at Langport in Somerset, England, Feb.
     3, 1826, and died on March 24, 1877. He was educated at
     Bristol and at University College, London. Subsequently he
     joined his father's banking and ship-owning business. From
     1860 till his death, he was editor of the "Economist." He was
     a keen student not only of economic and political science
     subjects, which he handled with a rare lightness of touch, but
     also of letters and of life at large. It is difficult to say
     in which field his penetration, his humour, and his charm of
     style are most conspicuously displayed. The papers collected
     in the volume called "The English Constitution" appeared
     originally in the "Fortnightly Review" during 1865 and 1866.
     The Reform Bill, which transferred the political centre of
     gravity from the middle class to the artisan class had not yet
     arrived; and the propositions laid down by Bagehot have
     necessarily been in some degree modified in the works of more
     recent authorities, such as Professor Dicey and Mr. Sidney
     Low. But as a human interpretation of that exceedingly human
     monument, the British Constitution, Bagehot's work is likely
     to remain unchallenged for all time.


_I.---The Cabinet_


No one can approach to an understanding of English institutions unless
he divides them into two classes. In such constitutions there are two
parts. First, those which excite and preserve the reverence of the
population, the dignified parts, if I may so call them; and, next, the
efficient parts, those by which it, in fact, works and rules. Every
constitution must first win the loyalty and confidence of mankind, and
then employ that homage in the work of government.

The dignified parts of government are those which bring it force, which
attracts its motive power. The efficient parts only employ that power.
If all subjects of the same government only thought of what was useful
to them, the efficient members of the constitution would suffice, and no
impressive adjuncts would be needed. But it is not true that even the
lower classes will be absorbed in the useful. The ruder sort of men will
sacrifice all they hope for, all they have, themselves, for what is
called an idea. The elements which excite the most easy reverence will
be not the most useful, but the theatrical. It is the characteristic
merit of the English constitution that its dignified parts are imposing
and venerable, while its efficient part is simple and rather modern.

The efficient secret of the English constitution is the nearly complete
fusion of the executive and legislative powers. The connecting link is
the cabinet. This is a committee of the legislative body, in choosing
which indirectly but not directly the legislature is nearly omnipotent.
The prime minister is chosen by the House of Commons, and is the head of
the efficient part of the constitution. The queen is only at the head of
its dignified part. The Prime Minister himself has to choose his
associates, but can only do so out of a charmed circle.

The cabinet is an absolutely secret committee, which can dissolve the
assembly which appointed it. It is an executive which is at once the
nominee of the legislature, and can annihilate the legislature. The
system stands in precise contrast to the presidential system, in which
the legislative and executive powers are entirely independent.

A good parliament is a capital choosing body; it is an electoral college
of the picked men of the nation. But in the American system the
president is chosen by a complicated machinery of caucuses; he is not
the choice of the nation, but of the wirepullers. The members of
congress are excluded from executive office, and the separation makes
neither the executive half nor the legislative half of political life
worth having. Hence it is only men of an inferior type who are attracted
to political life at all.

Again our system enables us to change our ruler suddenly on an
emergency. Thus we could abolish the Aberdeen Cabinet, which was in
itself eminently adapted for every sort of difficulty save the one it
had to meet, but wanted the daemonic element, and substitute a statesman
who had the precise sort of merit wanted at the moment. But under a
presidential government you can do nothing of the kind. There is no
elastic element; everything is rigid, specified, dated. You have
bespoken your government for the time, and you must keep it. Moreover,
under the English system all the leading statesmen are known quantities.
But in America a new president before his election is usually an unknown
quantity.

Cabinet government demands the mutual confidence of the electors, a calm
national mind, and what I may call rationality--a power involving
intelligence, yet distinct from it. It demands also a competent
legislature, which is a rarity. In the early stages of human society the
grand object is not to make new laws, but to prevent innovation. Custom
is the first check on tyranny, but at the present day the desire is to
adapt the law to changed conditions. In the past, however, continuous
legislatures were rare because they were not wanted. Now you have to get
a good legislature and to keep it good. To keep it good it must have a
sufficient supply of business. To get it good is a precedent difficulty.
A nation in which the mass of the people are intelligent, educated, and
comfortable can elect a good parliament. Or what I will call a
deferential nation may do so--I mean one in which the numerical majority
wishes to be ruled by the wiser minority.

Of deferential countries England is the type. But it is not to their
actual heavy, sensible middle-class rulers that the mass of the English
people yield deference, but to the theatrical show of society. The few
rule by their hold, not over the reason of the multitude, but over their
imaginations and their habits.


_II.--The Monarchy_


The use of the queen in a dignified capacity is incalculable. The best
reason why monarchy is a strong government is that it is an intelligible
government; whereas a constitution is complex. Men are governed by the
weakness of their imagination. To state the matter shortly, royalty is a
government in which the attention of the nation is concentrated on one
person doing interesting actions. A republic is a government in which
that attention is divided between many who are all doing uninteresting
actions. Secondly, if you ask the immense majority of the queen's
subjects by what right she rules, they will say she rules by God's
grace. They believe they have a mystic obligation to obey her. The crown
is a visible symbol of unity with an atmosphere of dignity.

Thirdly, the queen is the head of society. If she were not so, the prime
minister would be the first person in the country. As it is the House of
Commons attracts people who go there merely for social purposes; if the
highest social rank was to be scrambled for in the House of Commons, the
number of social adventurers there would be even more numerous. It has
been objected of late that English royalty is not splendid enough. It is
compared with the French court, which is quite the most splendid thing
in France; but the French emperor is magnified to emphasise the equality
of everyone else. Great splendour in our court would incite competition.
Fourthly, we have come to regard the crown as the head of our morality.
Lastly, constitutional royalty acts as a disguise; it enables our real
rulers to change without heedless people knowing it. Hence, perhaps, the
value of constitutional royalty in times of transition.

Popular theory regards the sovereign as a co-ordinate authority with the
House of Lords and the House of Commons. Also it holds that the queen is
the executive. Neither is true. There is no authentic explicit
information as to what the queen can do. The secrecy of the prerogative
is an anomaly, but none the less essential to the utility of English
royalty. Let us see how we should get on without a queen. We may suppose
the House of Commons appointing the premier just as shareholders choose
a director. If the predominant party were agreed as to its leader there
would not be much difference at the beginning of an administration. But
if the party were not agreed on its leader the necessity of the case
would ensure that the chief forced on the minority by the majority would
be an exceedingly capable man; where the judgment of the sovereign
intervenes there is no such security. If, however, there are three
parties, the primary condition of a cabinet polity is not satisfied.
Under such circumstances the only way is for the moderate people of
every party to combine in support of the government which, on the whole,
suits every party best. In the choice of a fit minister, if the royal
selection were always discreetly exercised, it would be an incalculable
benefit, but in most cases the wisest course for the monarch would be
inaction.

Now the sovereign has three rights, the right to be consulted, the right
to encourage, and the right to warn. In the course of a long reign a
king would acquire the same advantage which a permanent under-secretary
has over his superior, the parliamentary secretary. But whenever there
is discussion between a king and the minister, the king's opinion would
have its full weight, and the minister's would not. The whole position
is evidently attractive to an intelligent, sagacious and original
sovereign. But we cannot expect a lineal series of such kings. Neither
theory nor experience warrant any such expectations. The only fit
material for a constitutional king is a prince who begins early to
reign, who in his youth is superior to pleasure, is willing to labour,
and has by nature a genius for discretion.


_III.--The House of Lords and the House of Commons_


The use of the order of the lords in its dignified capacity is very
great. The mass of men require symbols, and nobility is the symbol of
mind. The order also prevents the rule of wealth. The Anglo-Saxon has a
natural instinctive admiration of wealth for its own sake; but from the
worst form of this our aristocracy preserves us, and the reverence for
rank is not so base as the reverence for money, or the still worse
idolatry of office. But as the picturesqueness of society diminishes,
aristocracy loses the single instrument of its peculiar power.

The House of Lords as an assembly has always been not the first, but the
second. The peers, who are of the most importance, are not the most
important in the House of Peers. In theory, the House of Lords is of
equal rank with the House of Commons; in practice it is not. The evil of
two co-equal houses is obvious. If they disagree, all business is
suspended. There ought to be an available decisive authority somewhere.
The sovereign power must be comeatable. The English have made it so by
the authority of the crown to create new peers. Before the Reform Act
the members of the peerage swayed the House of Commons, and the two
houses hardly collided except on questions of privilege. After the
Reform Bill the house ceased to be one of the latent directors and
palpable alterers.

It was the Duke of Wellington who presided over the change, and from the
duke himself we may learn that the use of the House of Lords is not to
be a bulwark against revolution. It cannot resist the people if the
people are determined. It has not the control of necessary physical
force. With a perfect lower house, the second chamber would be of
scarcely any value; but beside the actual house, a revising and leisured
legislature is extremely useful. The cabinet is so powerful in the
commons that it may inflict minor measures on the nation which the
nation does not like. The executive is less powerful in the second
chamber, which may consequently operate to impede minor instances of
parliamentary tyranny.

The House of Lords has the advantage: first, of being possible;
secondly, of being independent. It is accessible to no social bribe, and
it has leisure. On the other hand, it has defects. In appearance, which
is the important thing, it is apathetic. Next, it belongs exclusively to
one class, that of landowners. This would not so greatly matter if the
House of Lords _could_ be of more than common ability, but being an
hereditary chamber, it cannot be so. There is only one kind of business
in which our aristocracy retain a certain advantage. This is diplomacy.
And aristocracy is, in its nature, better suited to such work. It is
trained to the theatrical part of life; it is fit for that if it is fit
for anything. Otherwise an aristocracy is inferior in business. These
various defects would have been lessened if the House of Lords had not
resisted the creation of life peers.

The dignified aspect of the House of Commons is altogether secondary to
its efficient use. Its main function is to choose our president. It
elects the people whom it likes, and it dismisses whom it dislikes, too.
The premier is to the house what the house is to the nation. He must
lead, but he can only lead whither they will follow. Its second function
is _expressive_, to express the mind of the English people. Thirdly, it
ought to teach the nation. Fourthly, to give information, especially of
grievances--not, as in the old days, to the crown, but to the nation.
And, lastly, there is the function of legislation. I do not separate the
financial function from the rest of the legislative. In financial
affairs it lies under an exceptional disability; it is only the minister
who can propose to tax the people, whereas on common subjects any member
can propose anything. The reason is that the house is never economical;
but the cabinet is forced to be economical, because it has to impose the
taxation to meet, the expenditure.

Of all odd forms of government, the oddest really is this government by
public meeting. How does it come to be able to govern at all? The
principle of parliament is obedience to leaders. Change your leader if
you will, but while you have him obey him, otherwise you will not be
able to do anything at all. Leaders to-day do not keep their party
together by bribes, but they can dissolve. Party organisation is
efficient because it is not composed of warm partisans. The way to lead
is to affect a studied and illogical moderation.

Nor are the leaders themselves eager to carry party conclusions too far.
When an opposition comes into power, ministers have a difficulty in
making good their promises. They are in contact with the facts which
immediately acquire an inconvenient reality. But constituencies are
immoderate and partisan. The schemes both of extreme democrats and of
philosophers for changing the system of representation would prevent
parliamentary government from working at all. Under a system of equal
electoral districts and one-man vote, a parliament could not consist of
moderate men. Mr. Hare's scheme would make party bands and fetters
tighter than ever.

A free government is that which the people subject to it voluntarily
choose. If it goes by public opinion, the best opinion which the nation
will accept, it is a good government of its kind. Tried by this rule,
the House of Commons does its appointing business well. Of the
substantial part of its legislative task, the same may be said. Subject
to certain exceptions, the mind and policy of parliament possess the
common sort of moderation essential to parliamentary government. The
exceptions are two. First, it leans too much to the opinions of the
landed interest. Also, it gives too little weight to the growing
districts of the country, and too much to the stationary. But parliament
is not equally successful in elevating public opinion, or in giving
expression to grievances.


_IV.--Changes of Ministry_


There is an event which frequently puzzles some people; this is, a
change of ministry. All our administrators go out together. Is it wise
so to change all our rulers? The practice produces three great evils. It
brings in suddenly new and untried persons. Secondly, the man knows that
he may have to leave his work in the middle, and very likely never come
back to it. Thirdly, a sudden change of ministers may easily cause a
mischievous change of policy. A quick succession of chiefs do not learn
from each other's experience.

Now, those who wish to remove the choice of ministers from parliament
have not adequately considered what a parliament is. When you establish
a predominant parliament you give over the rule of the country to a
despot who has unlimited time and unlimited vanity. Every public
department is liable to attack. It is helpless in parliament if it has
no authorised defender. The heads of departments cannot satisfactorily
be put up for the defence; but a parliamentary head connected by close
ties with the ministry is a protecting machine. Party organisation
ensures the provision of such parliamentary heads. The alternative
provided in America involves changing not only the head but the whole
bureaucracy with each change of government.

This, it may be said, does not prove that this change is a good thing.
It may, however, be proved that some change at any rate is necessary to
a permanently perfect administration. If we look at the Prussian
bureaucracy, whatever success it may recently have achieved, it
certainly does not please the most intelligent persons at home.
Obstinate officials set at defiance the liberal initiations of the
government. In conflicts with simple citizens guilty officials are like
men armed cap-a-pie fighting with the defenceless. The bureaucrat
inevitably cares more for routine than for results. The machinery is
regarded as an achieved result instead of as a working instrument. It
tends to be the most unimproving and shallow of governments in quality,
and to over-government in point of quantity.

In fact, experience has proved in the case of joint-stock banks and of
railways that they are best conducted by an admixture of experts with
men of what may be, called business culture. So in a government office
the intrusion of an exterior head of the office is really essential to
its perfection. As Sir George Lewis said: "It is not the business of a
cabinet minister to work his department; his business is to see that it
is properly worked."

In short, a presidential government, or a hereditary government are
inferior to parliamentary government as administrative selectors. The
revolutionary despot may indeed prove better, since his existence
depends on his skill in doing so. If the English government is not
celebrated for efficiency, that is largely because it attempts to do so
much; but it is defective also from our ignorance. Another reason is
that in the English constitution the dignified parts, which have an
importance of their own, at the same time tend to diminish simple
efficiency.


_V.--Checks, Balances, and History_


In every state there must be somewhere a supreme authority on every
point. In some states, however, that ultimate power is different upon
different points. The Americans, under the mistaken impression that they
were imitating the English, made their constitution upon this principle.
The sovereignty rested with the separate states, which have delegated
certain powers to the central government. But the division of the
sovereignty does not end here. Congress rules the law, but the president
rules the administration. Even his legislative veto can be overruled
when two-thirds of both houses are unanimous. The administrative power
is divided, since on international policy the supreme authority is the
senate. Finally, the constitution itself can only be altered by
authorities which are outside the constitution. The result is that now,
after the civil war, there is no sovereign authority to settle immediate
problems.

In England, on the other hand, we have the typical constitution, in
which the ultimate power upon all questions is in the hands of the same
person. The ultimate authority in the English constitution is a
newly-elected House of Commons. Whatever the question on which it
decides, a new House of Commons can despotically and finally resolve. No
one can doubt the importance of singleness and unity. The excellence in
the British constitution is that it has achieved this unity. This is
primarily due to the provision which places the choice of the executive
in "the people's house." But it could not have been effected without
what I may call the "safety valve" and "the regulator." The "safety
valve" is the power of creating peers, the "regulator" is the cabinet's
power of dissolving. The defects of a popular legislature are: caprice
in selection, the sectarianism born of party organisation, which is the
necessary check on caprice, and the peculiar prejudices and interests of
the particular parliament. Now the caprice of parliament in the choice
of a premier is best checked by the premier himself having the power of
dissolution. But as a check on sectarianism such an extrinsic power as
that of a capable constitutional king is more efficient. For checking
the peculiar interests our colonial governors seem almost perfectly
qualified. But the intervention of a constitutional monarch is only
beneficial if he happens to be an exceptionally wise man. The peculiar
interests of a specific parliament are seldom in danger of overriding
national interests; hence, on the whole, the advantage of the premier
being the real dissolving authority.

The power of creating peers, vested in the premier, serves constantly to
modify the character of the second chamber. What we may call the
catastrophe creation of peers is different. That the power should reside
in the king would again be beneficial only in the case of the
exceptional monarch. Taken altogether, we find that hereditary royalty
is not essential to parliamentary government. Our conclusion is that
though a king with high courage and fine discretion, a king with a
genius for the place, is always useful, and at rare moments priceless,
yet a common king is of no use at a crisis, while, in the common course
of things, he will do nothing, and he need do nothing.

All the rude nations that have attained civilisation seem to begin in a
consultative and tentative absolutism. The king has a council of elders
whom he consults while he tests popular support in the assembly of
freemen. In England a very strong executive was an imperative necessity.
The assemblies summoned by the English sovereign told him, in effect,
how far he might go. Legislation as a positive power was very secondary
in those old parliaments; but their negative action was essential. The
king could not venture to alter the law until the people had expressed
their consent. The Wars of the Roses killed out the old councils. The
second period of the constitution continues to the revolution of 1688.
The rule of parliament was then established by the concurrence of the
usual supporters of royalty with the usual opponents of it. Yet the mode
of exercising that rule has since changed. Even as late as 1810 it was
supposed that when the Prince of Wales became Prince Regent he would be
able to turn out the ministry.

It is one of our peculiarities that the English people is always
antagonistic to the executive. It is their natural impulse to resist
authority as something imposed from outside. Hence our tolerance of
local authorities as instruments of resistance to tyranny of the central
authority.

Our constitution is full of anomalies. Some of them are, no doubt,
impeding and mischievous. Half the world believes that the Englishman is
born illogical. As a matter of fact, I am inclined to believe that the
English care more even than the French for simplicity; but the
constitution is not logical. The complexity we tolerate is that which
has grown up. Any new complexity, as such, is detestable to the English
mind. Let anyone try to advocate a plan of suffrage reform at all out of
the way, and see how many adherents he can collect.

This great political question of the day, the suffrage question, is made
exceedingly difficult by this history of ours. We shall find on
investigation that so far from an ultra-democratic suffrage giving us a
more homogeneous and decided House of Commons it would give us a less
homogeneous and more timid house. With us democracy would mean the rule
of money and mainly and increasingly of new money working for its own
ends.

       *       *       *       *       *




VOLTAIRE


The Age of Louis XIV


     Voltaire's "History of the Age of Louis XIV.," was published
     when its author (see p. 259), long famous, was the companion
     of Frederick the Great in Prussia--from 1750 to 1753. Voltaire
     was in his twentieth year when the Grand Monarque died. Louis
     XIV. had succeeded his father at the age of five years, in
     1643; his nominal reign covered seventy-one years, and
     throughout the fifty-three years which followed Mazarin's
     death his declaration "L'État c'est moi" had been politically
     and socially a truth. He controlled France with an absolute
     sway; under him she achieved a European ascendency without
     parallel save in the days of Napoleon. He sought to make her
     the dictator of Europe. But for William of Orange,
     Marlborough, and Eugene, he would have succeeded. Politically
     he did not achieve his aim; but under him France became the
     unchallenged leader of literary and artistic culture and
     taste, the universal criterion.


_I.--France Under Mazarin_


We do not propose to write merely a life of Louis XIV.; our aim is a far
wider one. It is to give posterity a picture, not of the actions of a
single man, but of the spirit of the men of an age the most enlightened
on record. Every period has produced its heroes and its politicians,
every people has experienced revolutions; the histories of all are of
nearly equal value to those who desire merely to store their memory with
facts. But the thinker, and that still rarer person the man of taste,
recognises only four epochs in the history of the world--those four
fortunate ages in which the arts have been perfected: the great age of
the Greeks, the age of Cæsar and of Augustus, the age which followed the
fall of Constantinople, and the age of Louis XIV.; which last approached
perfection more nearly than any of the others.

On the death of Louis XIII., his queen, Anne of Austria, owed her
acquisition of the regency to the Parlement of Paris. Anne was obliged
to continue the war with Spain, in which the brilliant victories of the
young Duc d'Enghein, known to fame as the Great Condé, brought him
sudden glory and unprecedented prestige to the arms of France.

But internally the national finances were in a terribly unsatisfactory
state. The measures for raising funds adopted by the minister Mazarin
were the more unpopular because he was himself an Italian. The Paris
Parlement set itself in opposition to the minister; the populace
supported it; the resistance was organised by Paul de Gondi, afterwards
known as the Cardinal de Retz. The court had to flee from Paris to St.
Germain. Condé was won over by the queen regent; but the nobles, hoping
to recover the power which Richelieu had wrenched from them, took the
popular side. And their wives and daughters surpassed them in energy. A
very striking contrast to the irresponsible frivolity with which the
whole affair was conducted is presented by the grim orderliness with
which England had at that very moment carried through the last act in
the tragedy of Charles I. In France the factions of the Fronde were
controlled by love intrigues.

Condé was victorious. But he was at feud with Mazarin, made himself
personally unpopular, and found himself arrested when he might have made
himself master of the government. A year later the tables were turned;
Mazarin had to fly, and the Fronde released Condé. The civil war was
renewed; a war in which no principles were at stake, in which the
popular party of yesterday was the unpopular party of to-day; in which
there were remarkable military achievements, much bloodshed, and much
suffering, and which finally wore itself out in 1653, when Mazarin
returned to undisputed power. Louis XIV. was then a boy of fifteen.

Mazarin had achieved a great diplomatic triumph by the peace of
Westphalia in 1648; but Spain had remained outside that group of
treaties; and, owing to the civil war of the Fronde, Condé's successes
against her had been to a great extent made nugatory--and now Condé was
a rebel and in command of Spanish troops. But Condé, with a Spanish
army, met his match in Turenne with a French army.

At this moment, Christina of Sweden was the only European sovereign who
had any personal prestige. But Cromwell's achievements in England now
made each of the European statesmen anxious for the English alliance;
and Cromwell chose France. The combined arms of France and England were
triumphant in Flanders, when Cromwell died; and his death changed the
position of England. France was financially exhausted, and Mazarin now
desired a satisfactory peace with Spain. The result, was the Treaty of
the Pyrenees, by which the young King Louis took a Spanish princess in
marriage, an alliance which ultimately led to the succession of a
grandson of Louis to the Spanish throne. Immediately afterwards, Louis'
cousin, Charles II., was recalled to the throne of England. This closing
achievement of Mazarin had a triumphant aspect; his position in France
remained undisputed till his death in the next year (1661). He was a
successful minister; whether he was a great statesman is another
question. His one real legacy to France was the acquisition of Alsace.


_II.---The French Supremacy in Europe_


On Mazarin's death Louis at once assumed personal rule. Since the death
of Henry the Great, France had been governed by ministers; now she was
to be governed by the king--the power exercised by ministers was
precisely circumscribed. Order and vigour were introduced on all sides;
the finances were regulated by Colbert, discipline was restored in the
army, the creation of a fleet, was begun. In all foreign courts Louis
asserted the dignity of France; it was very soon evident that there was
no foreign power of whom he need stand in fear. New connections were
established with Holland and Portugal. England under Charles II. was of
little account.

To the king on the watch for an opportunity, an opportunity soon
presents itself. Louis found his when Philip IV. of Spain was succeeded
by the feeble Charles II. He at once announced that Flanders reverted to
his own wife, the new king's elder sister. He had already made his
bargain with the Emperor Leopold, who had married the other infanta.

Louis' armies were overrunning Flanders in 1667, and Franche-Comté next
year. Holland, a republic with John de Witt at its head, took alarm; and
Sir William Temple succeeded in effecting the Triple Alliance between
Holland, England, and Sweden. Louis found it advisable to make peace,
even at the price of surrendering Franche-Comté for the present.

Determined now, however, on the conquest of Holland, Louis had no
difficulty in secretly detaching the voluptuary Charles II. from the
Dutch alliance. Holland itself was torn between the faction of the De
Witts and the partisans of the young William of Orange. Overwhelming
preparations were made for the utterly unwarrantable enterprise.

As the French armies poured into Holland, practically no resistance was
offered. The government began to sue for peace. But the populace rose
and massacred the De Witts; young William was made stadtholder. Ruyter
defeated the combined French and English fleets at Sole Bay. William
opened the dykes and laid the country under water, and negotiated
secretly with the emperor and with Spain. Half Europe was being drawn
into a league against Louis, who made the fatal mistake of following the
advice of his war minister Louvois, instead of Condé and Turenne.

In every court in Europe Louis had his pensioners intriguing on his
behalf. His newly created fleet was rapidly learning its work. On land
he was served by the great engineer Vauban, by Turenne, Condé, and
Condé's pupil, Luxembourg. He decided to direct his own next campaign
against Franche-Comté. But during the year Turenne, who was conducting a
separate campaign in Germany with extraordinary brilliancy, was killed;
and after this year Condé took no further part in the war. Moreover, the
Austrians were now in the field, under the able leader Montecuculi.

In 1676-8 town after town fell before Vauban, a master of siege work as
of fortification; Louis, in many cases, being present in person. In
other quarters, also, the French arms were successful. Especially
noticeable were the maritime successes of Duquesne, who was proving
himself a match for the Dutch commanders. Louis was practically fighting
and beating half Europe single-handed, as he was now getting no
effective help from England or his nominal ally, Sweden. Finally, in
1678, he was able practically to dictate his own terms to the allies.
The peace had already been signed when William of Orange attacked
Luxembourg before Mons; a victory, on the whole, for him, but entirely
barren of results. With this peace of Nimeguen, Louis was at the height
of his power.

By assuming the right of interpreting for himself the terms of the
treaty, he employed the years of peace in extending his possessions. No
other power could now compare with France, but in 1688 Louis stood
alone, without any supporter, save James II. of England. And he
intensified the general dread by the revocation of the Edict of Nantes
and the expulsion of the French Huguenots.

The determination of James to make himself absolute, and to restore
Romanism in England, caused leading Englishmen to enter on a
conspiracy--kept secret with extraordinary success--with William of
Orange. The luckless monarch was abandoned on every hand, and fled from
his kingdom to France, an object of universal mockery. Yet Louis
resolved to aid him. A French force accompanied him to Ireland, and
Tourville defeated the united fleets of England and Holland. At last
France was mistress of the seas; but James met with a complete overthrow
at the Boyne. The defeated James, in his flight, hanged men who had
taken part against him. The victorious William proclaimed a general
pardon. Of two such men, it is easy to see which was certain to win.

Louis had already engaged himself in a fresh European war before
William's landing in England. He still maintained his support of James.
But his newly acquired sea power was severely shaken at La Hogue. On
land, however, Louis' arms prospered. The Palatinate was laid waste in a
fashion which roused the horror of Europe. Luxembourg in Flanders, and
Catinat in Italy, won the foremost military reputations in Europe. On
the other hand, William proved himself one of those generals who can
extract more advantage from a defeat than his enemies from a victory, as
Steinkirk and Neerwinden both exemplified. France, however, succeeded in
maintaining a superiority over all her foes, but the strain before long
made a peace necessary. She could not dictate terms as at Nimeguen.
Nevertheless, the treaty of Ryswick, concluded in 1697, secured her
substantial benefits.


_III.---The Spanish Succession_


The general pacification was brief. North Europe was soon aflame with
the wars of those remarkable monarchs, Charles XII. and Peter the Great;
and the rest of Europe over the Spanish succession. The mother and wife
of Louis were each eldest daughters of a Spanish king; the mother and
wife of the Emperor Leopold were their younger sisters. Austrian and
French successions were both barred by renunciations; and the absorption
of Spain by either power would upset utterly the balance of power in
Europe. There was no one else with a plausible claim to succeed the
childless and dying Charles II. European diplomacy effected treaties for
partitioning the Spanish dominions; but ultimately Charles declared the
grandson of Louis his heir. Louis, in defiance of treaties, accepted the
legacy.

The whole weight of England was then thrown on to the side of the
Austrian candidate by Louis' recognition of James Edward Stuart as
rightful Kin

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