always going backward and forward; but it should be remembered to his honour, that it was always from the stronger to the weaker

pressing the people, Falkland was a resolute champion of liberty. He attacked Strafford. He even concurred in strong measures against Episcopacy. But the violence of his party annoyed him, and drove him to the other party, to be equally annoyed there. Dreading the success of the cause which he had espoused, sickened by the courtiers of Oxford, as he had been sickened by the patriots of Westminster, yet bound by honour not to abandon them, he pined away, neglected his person, went about moaning for peace, and at last rushed desperately on death as the best refuge in such miserable times. If he had lived through the scenes that followed, we have little doubt that he would have condemned himself to share the exile and beggary of the royal family; that he would then have returned to oppose all their measures; that he would have been sent to the Tower by the Commons as a disbeliever in the Popish Plot, and by the king as an accomplice in the Rye-House Plot; and that, if he had escaped being hanged, first by Scroggs, and then by Jeffries, he would, after manfully opposing James the Second through his whole reign, have been seized with a fit of compassion at the very moment of the Revolution, have voted for a regency, and died a nonjuror.

the resistance of assemblies, which were no longer supported by a national force, gradually becoming more and more feeble, and at length altogether ceasing. The friends and the ene-side that he deserted. While Charles was opmies of liberty perceived with equal clearness the causes of this general decay. It is the favourite theme of Strafford. He advises the king to procure from the judges a recognition of his right to raise an army at his pleasure. "This piece, well fortified," says he, "forever vindicates the monarchy at home from under the conditions and restraints of subjects." We firmly believe that he was in the right. Nay; we believe that, even if no deliberate scheme of arbitrary government had been formed by the sovereign and his ministers, there was great reason to apprehend a natural extinction of the constitution. If, for example, Charles had played the part of Gustavus Adolphus; if he had carried on a popular war for the defence of the Protestant cause in Germany; if he had gratified the national pride by a series of victories; if he had formed an army of forty or fifty thousand devoted soldiers, we do not see what chance the nation would have had of escaping from despotism. The judges would have given as strong a decision in favour of camp-money as they gave in favour of ship-money. If they had scrupled, it would have made little difference. An individual who resisted would have been treated as Charles treated Eliot, and as Strafford wished to treat Hampden. The Parliament might have We do not dispute that the royal party conbeen summoned once in twenty years, to contained many excellent men and excellent citigratulate a king on his accession, or to give zens. But this we say-that they did not dissolemnity to some great measure of state. cern those times. The peculiar glory of the Such had been the fate of legislative assem- Houses of Parliament is, that, in the great blies as powerful, as much respected, as high-plague and mortality of constitutions, they spirited, as the English Lords and Commons. took their stand between the living and the The two Houses, surrounded by the ruins of dead. At the very crisis of our destiny, at the 30 many free constitutions, overthrown or very moment when the fate which had passed sapped by the new military system, were re-on every other nation was about to pass on quired to intrust the command of an army, and England, they arrested the danger. the conduct of the Irish war, to a king who had proposed to himself the destruction of liberty as the great end of his policy. We are decidedly of opinion that it would have been fatal to comply. Many of those who took the side of the king on this question would have cursed their own loyalty if they had seen him return from war at the head of twenty thousand troops, accustomed to carnage and free quarters in Ireland.

Those who conceive that the parliamentary leaders were desirous merely to maintain the old constitution, and those who represent them as conspiring to subvert it, are equally in error. The old constitution, as we have attempted to show, could not be maintained. The progress of time, the increase of wealth, the diffusion of knowledge, the great change in the European system of war, rendered it impossible that any of the monarchies of the middle ages We think with Mr. Hallam, that many of the should continue to exist on the old footing. royalist nobility and gentry were true friends The prerogative of the crown was constantly to the constitution; and that, but for the solemn advancing. If the privileges of the people protestations by which the king bound himself were to remain absolutely stationary, they to govern according to the law for the future, would relatively retrograde. The monarchical they never would have joined his standard. and democratical parts of the government were But surely they underrated the public danger. placed in a situation not unlike that of the two Falkland is commonly selected as the most re- brothers in the Fairy Queen, one of whom saw spectable specimen of this class. He was the soil of his inheritance daily washed away indeed a man of great talents, and of great by the tide, and joined to that of his rival. virtues; but, we apprehend, infinitely too fas-The portions had at first been fairly meted out: tidious for public life. He did not perceive by a natural and constant transfer, the one had that in such times as those on which his lot been extended; the other had dwindled to no. had fallen, the duty of a statesman is to choose thing. A new partition or a compensation the better cause, and to stand by it, in spite of those excesses by which every cause, however good in itself, will be disgraced. The present evil always seemed to him the worst. He was VOL. L-11

was necessary to restore the original equality.

It was now absolutely necessary to violate the formal part of the constitution, in order to preserve its spirit. This might have seen

clamour on this subject, we think that such an event ought to be, if possible, averted; and this could only be done, if Charles was to be left on the throne, by placing his domestic arrangements under the control of Parliament. A veto on the appointment of ministers was demanded. But this veto Parliament had virtually possessed ever since the Revolution. It is no doubt very far better that this power of the legislature should be exercised, as it is now exercised, when any great occasion calls for interference, than that at every change it should have to signify its approbation or disapproba tion in form. But, unless a new family had been placed on the throne, we do not see how this power could have been exercised as it is now exercised. We again repeat, that no restraints which could be imposed on the princes who

done, as it was done at the Revolution, by ex- | Little as we are disposed to join in the vulgar pelling the reigning family, and calling to the throne princes, who, relying solely on an elective title, would find it necessary to respect the privileges and follow the advice of the assemblies to which they owed every thing, to pass every bill which the legislature strongly pressed upon them, and to fill the offices of state with men in whom it confided. But as the two Houses did not choose to change the dynasty, it was necessary that they should do directly what at the Revolution was done indirectly. Nothing is more usual than to hear it said, that if the Long Parliament had contented itself with making such a reform in the government under Charles as was afterwards made under William, it would have had the highest claim to national gratitude; and that in its violence it overshot the mark. But how was it possible to make such a settlement un-reigned after the Revolution could have added der Charles? Charles was not, like William and the princes of the Hanoverian line, bound by community of interests and dangers to the two Houses. It was therefore necessary that they should bind him by treaty and statute.

Mr. Hallam reprobates, in language which has a little surprised us, the nineteen propositions into which the Parliament has digested its scheme. We will ask him whether he does not think that, if James the Second had remained in the island, and had been suffered, as he probably would in that case have been suffered, to keep his crown, conditions to the full as hard would have been imposed on him? On the other hand, if the Long Parliament had pronounced the departure of Charles from London an abdication, and had called Essex or Northumberland to the throne, the new prince might have safely been suffered to reign without such restrictions; his situation would have been a sufficient guarantee. In the nineteen propositions, we see very little to blame except the articles against the Catholics. These, however, were in the spirit of that age; and to some sturdy churchmen in our own, that may seem to palliate even the good which the Long Parliament effected. The regulation with respect to new creations of Peers is the only other article about which we entertain any doubt.

to the security which their title afforded. They were compelled to court their parliaments. But from Charles nothing was to be expected which was not set down in the bond.

It was not stipulated that the king should give up his negative on acts of Parliament. But the Commons had certainly shown a strong disposition to exact this security also. "Such a doctrine," says Mr. Hallam, "was in this country as repugnant to the whole history of our laws as it was incompatible with the subsistence of the monarchy in any thing more than a nominal pre-eminence." Now this article has been as completely carried into effect by the Revolution, as if it had been formally inserted in the Bill of Rights and the Act of Settlement. We are surprised, we confess, that Mr. Hallam should attach so much importance to a prerogative which has not been exercised for a hundred and thirty years, which probably will never be exercised again, and which can scarcely, in any conceivable case, be exercised for a salutary purpose.

But the great security, that without which every other would have been insufficient, was the power of the sword. This both parties thoroughly understood. The Parliament insisted on having the command of the militia, and the direction of the Irish war. "By God, not for an hour!" exclaimed the king. Keep One of the propositions is, that the judges the militia," said the queen after the defeat shall hold their offices during good behaviour. of the royal party, "keep the militia; that To this surely no exception will be taken. will bring back every thing." That, by The right of directing the education and mar- the old constitution, no military authority was riage of the princes was most properly claimed lodged in the Parliament, Mr. Hallam has by the Parliament on the same ground on clearly shown. That it is a species of power which, after the Revolution, it was enacted, which ought not to be permanently lodged in that no king, on pain of forfeiting his throne, large and divided assemblies, must, we think, should espouse a papist. Unless we condemn in fairness be conceded. Opposition, publicity, the statesmen of the Revolution, who conceived long discussion, frequent compromise, these that England could not safely be governed by are the characteristics of the proceedings in a sovereign married to a Catholic queen, we such bodies. Unity, secrecy, decision, are the can scarcely condemn the Long Parliament, qualities which military arrangements require. because, having a sovereign so situated, they This undoubtedly was an evil. But, on the thought it necessary to place him under strict other hand, at such a crisis to trust such a king restraints. The influence of Henrietta Maria with the very weapon which, in hands less had already been deeply felt in political affairs. dangerous, had destroyed so many free consti In the regulation of her family, in the educa- tutions, would have been the extreme of rash tion and marriage of her children, it was stillness. The jealousy with which the oligarchy more likely to be felt. There might be another of Venice and the States of Holland regarded Catholic queen; possibly, a Catholic king. their generals and armies induced them per

after a disaster, are perfectly ready to cut the throats and rifle the baggage of their companions.

petually to interfere in matters of which they | collects round it a vast retinue, composed of were incompetent to judge. This policy se- people who thrive by its custom, or are amused cured them against military usurpation, but by its display, who may be sometimes reckonplaced them under great disadvantages in war. ed, in an ostentatious enumeration, as forming The uncontrolled power which the king of a part of it, but who give no aid to its operaFrance exercised over his troops enabled him tions, and take but a languid interest in its to conquer his enemies, but enabled him also success: who relax its discipline and dishoto oppress his people. Was there any interme-nour its flag, by their irregularities; and who, diate course? None, we confess, altogether free from objection. But, on the whole, we conceive that the best measure would have been that which the Parliament over and over proposed; that for a limited time the power of the sword should be left to the two Houses, and that it should revert to the crown when the constitution should be firmly established; when the new securities of freedom should be so far strengthened by prescription, that it would be difficult to employ even a standing army for the purpose of subverting them.

Thus it is in every great division: and thus it was in our civil war. On both sides there was, undoubtedly, enough of crime and enough of error, to disgust any man who did not reflect that the whole history of the species is nothing but a comparison of crimes and errors. Misanthropy is not the temper which qualifies a man to act in great affairs, or to judge of

them.

"Of the Parliament," says Mr. Hallam, "it may be said, I think, with not greater severity than truth, that scarce two or three public acts of justice, humanity, or generosity, and very few of political wisdom or courage, are recorded of them, from their quarrel with the king to their expulsion by Cromwell." Those who may agree with us in the opinion which we have expressed as to the original demands of the Parliament, will scarcely concur in this strong censure. The propositions which the Houses made at Oxford, at Uxbridge, and at Newcastle, were in strict accordance with these demands. In the darkest period of the war, they showed no disposition to concede any vital principle. In the fulness of their success, they showed no disposition to encroach beyond these limits. In this respect we cannot but think that they showed justice and generosity, as well as political wisdom and

Mr. Hallam thinks that the dispute might easily have been compromised, by enacting that the king should have no power to keep a standing army on foot without the consent of Parliament. He reasons as if the question had been merely theoretical-as if at that time no army had been wanted. "The kingdom," he says, "might have well dispensed, in that age, with any military organization." Now, we think that Mr. Hallam overlooks the most important circumstance in the whole case. Ireland was at that moment in rebellion; and a great expedition would obviously be necessary to reduce that kingdom to obedience. The Houses had, therefore, to consider, not an abstract question of law, but an urgent practical question, directly involving the safety of the state. They had to consider the expediency of immediately giving a great army to a king, who was at least as desirous to put down the Parliament of England as to conquer the insur-courage. gents of Ireland.

Of course, we do not mean to defend all their measures. Far from it. There never was a perfect man; it would, therefore, be the height of absurdity to expect a perfect party or a perfect assembly. For large bodies are far more likely to err than individuals. The passions are inflamed by sympathy; the fear of punishment and the sense of shame are diminished by partition. Every day we see men do for their faction what they would die rather than do for themselves.

The Parliament was certainly far from faultless. We fully agree with Mr. Hallam in reprobating their treatment of Laud. For the individual, indeed, we entertain a more unmitigated contempt than for any other character in our history. The fondness with which a portion of the church regards his memory, can be compared only to that perversity of affection which sometimes leads a mother to select the monster or the idiot of the family as the object of her especial favour. Mr. Hallam has incidentally observed, that in the correspondence No private quarrel ever happens, in which of Laud with Strafford, there are no indicathe right and wrong are so exquisitely divid- tions of a sense of duty towards God or man. ed, that all the right lies on one side, and all The admirers of the archbishop have, in conthe wrong on the other. But here was a schism sequence, inflicted upon the public a crowd of which separated a great nation into two parties. extracts, designed to prove the contrary. Now, Of these parties, each was composed of many in all those passages, we see nothing which a smaller parties. Each contained many mem- prelate as wicked as Pope Alexander or Carbers, who differed far less from their moderate dinal Dubois might not have written. They opponents than from their violent allies. Each indicate no sense of duty to God or man; but reckoned among its supporters many who simply a strong interest in the prosperity and were determined in their choice, by some acci- dignity of the order to which the writer be dent of birth, of connection, or of local situa- longed; an interest which, when kept within tion. Each of them attracted to itself in multi- certain limits, does not deserve censure, but tudes those fierce and turbid spirits, to whom which can never be considered as a virtue. the clouds and whirlwinds of the political hur- Laud is anxious to accommodate satisfactorily ricane are the atmosphere of life. A party, the disputes in the University of Dublin. Ho like a camp, has its sutlers and camp-follow-regrets to hear that a church is used as a stable, ers, as well as its soldiers. In its progress it and that the benefices of Ireland are very poor;

He is desirous that, however small a congre- | themselves in the lower ranks of the party. gation may be, service should be regularly performed. He expresses a wish that the judges of the court before which questions of tithe are generally brought, should be selected with a view to the interest of the clergy. All this may be very proper; and it may be very proper that an alderman should stand up for the tolls of his borough, and an East Indian director for the charter of his company. But it is ridiculous to say that these things indicate piety and benevolence. No primate, though he were the most abandoned of mankind, would wish to see the body, with the consequence of which his own consequence was identical, degraded in the public estimation by internal dissensions, by the ruinous state of its edifices, and the slovenly performance of its rites. We willingly acknowledge that the particular letters in question have very little harm in them; a compliment which cannot often be paid either to the writings or to the actions of Laud.

honest Englishmen for the defence of the pub-reach them. Here his own case differed widely lic good, of durable tranquillity, of temperate from theirs. Not only was his condemnation freedom, were buried in the grave of Hamp-in itself a measure which only the strongest

den.

necessity could vindicate, but it could not be The self-denying ordinance was passed, and procured without taking several previous the army was remodelled. These measures steps, every one of which would have rewere undoubtedly full of danger. But all that quired the strongest necessity to vindicate it. was left to the Parliament was to take the less It could not be procured without dissolving of two dangers. And we think that, even if the government by military force, without esthey could have accurately foreseen all that tablishing precedents of the most dangerous followed, their decision ought to have been the description, without creating difficulties which same. Under any circumstances, we should the next ten years were spent in removing, have preferred Cromwell to Charles. But without pulling down institutions which it there could be no comparison between Crom- soon became necessary to reconstruct, and well and Charles victorious-Charles restored, setting up others which almost every man was Charles enabled to feed fat all the hungry soon impatient to destroy. It was necessary grudges of his smiling rancour, and his cringing to strike the House of Lords out of the constipride. The next visit of his majesty to his tution, to exclude members of the House of faithful Commons would have been more se- Commons by force, to make a new crime, a rious than that with which he last honoured new tribunal, a new mode of procedure. The them; more serious than that which their own whole legislative and judicial systems were general paid them some years after. The trampled down for the purpose of taking a sinking would scarce have been content with col-gle head. Not only those parts of the constilaring Marten, and praying that the Lord would tution which the republicans were desirous to deliver him from Vane. If, by fatal misman-destroy, but those which they wished to retain agement, nothing was left to England but a choice of tyrants, the last tyrant whom she should have chosen was Charles.

ers.

and exalt, were deeply injured by these transactions. High courts of justice began to usurp the functions of juries. The remaining deleFrom the apprehension of this worst evil the gates of the people were soon driven from Houses were soon delivered by their new lead-their seats, by the same military violence The armies of Charles were everywhere which had enabled them to exclude their colrouted; his fastnesses stormed; his party hum-leagues. bled and subjugated. The king himself fell If Charles had been the last of his line, there into the hands of the Parliament; and both the would have been an intelligible reason for putking and the Parliament soon fell into the ting him to death. But the blow which termihands of the army. The fate of both the cap-nated his life, at once transferred the allegiance tives was the same. Both were treated alternately with respect and with insult. At length the natural life of the one, and the political life of the other, were terminated by violence; and the power for which both had struggled was united in a single hand. Men naturally sympathize with the calamities of individuals; but they are inclined to look on a fallen party with contempt rather than with pity. Thus misfortune turned the greatest of Parliaments into the despised Rump, and the worst of kings into the Blessed Martyr.

of every royalist to an heir, and an heir who was at liberty. To kill the individual, was truly, under such circumstances, not to destroy, but to release the king.

We detest the character of Charles; but a man ought not to be removed by a law ex post facto, even constitutionally procured, merely because he is detestable. He must also be very dangerous. We can scarcely conceive that any danger which a state can apprehend from any individual, could justify the violent measures which were necessary to procure a

Mr. Hallam decidedly condemns the execu-sentence against Charles. But in fact the tion of Charles; and in all that he says on | danger amounted to nothing. There was inthat subject, we heartily agree. We fully con- deed danger from the attachment of a large cur with him in thinking that a great social party to his office. But this danger, his execuschism, such as the civil war, is not to be con- tion only increased. His personal influence founded with an ordinary treason; and that was little indeed. He had lost the confidence the vanquished ought to be treated according of every party. Churchmen, Catholics, Presbyto the rules, not of municipal, but of interna- terians, Independents, his enemies, his friends, tional law. In this case the distinction is of his tools, English, Scotch, Irish, all divisions the less importance, because both international and subdivisions of his people had been deand municipal law were in favour of Charles.ceived by him. His most attached councillors He was a prisoner of war by the former, a turned away with shame and anguish from his king by the latter. By neither was he a trai- false and hollow policy; plot intertwined with tor. If he had been successful, and had put plot, mine sprung beneath mine, agents dishis leading opponents to death, he would have owned, promises evaded, one pledge given in deserved severe censure; and this without re- private, another in public.-"Oh, Mr. Secretaerence to the justice or injustice of his cause. ry," says Clarendon, in a letter to Nicholas, Yet the opponents of Charles, it must be ad-"those stratagems have given me more sad mitted were technically guilty of treason. He might have sent them to the scaffold without violating any established principle of jurisprudence. He would not have been compelled to overturn the whole constitution in order to

hours than all the misfortunes in war which have befallen the king; and look like the effects of God's anger towards us.”

The abilities of Charles were not formida ble. His taste in the fine arts was indeed ex H