Chapter XXXI.
James II. And The Revolution (1685-1688).
England never loved James II.: she dreaded his religion and that unfeeling character of which he had so many times given proof. The shrewd and liberal politicians had made great efforts to exclude him from the throne; he was nevertheless proclaimed without tumult and accepted peaceably by the nation. The great revolution which was to be accomplished under his reign, and which was to make England forever a free country, had not yet begun, nor was there any presentiment of its approach.
This drama was to unfold itself slowly, and to display in its progress successively the tyranny of the king and the resistance of the nation. At the outset, James II. profited by the absolute victory obtained by Charles II. in the last years of his reign. It was an epoch of tranquillity and of good appearances, false at the foundation, notwithstanding the royal protestations and the assurances of confidence lavished on the new monarch. Already, in the month of November, 1685, many disquieting acts and fatal prognostics began to alarm the friends of liberty; and from this time we may date the commencement of that progressive tyranny which was to develop conspiracies and at the same time arouse lively opposition and legal resistance throughout the country, both within and without Parliament.
James II.
In the third period of the reign of James II. from July, 1687, to December, 1688, the nation and the king had evidently broken all ties: the one aspired without reserve to the absolute triumph of his will, the other defended proudly its attacked liberties. The contest ended only with the overthrow of James II. and his flight from England. It is necessary to follow step by step the episodes of this great conflict—a conflict unavoidable from the nature of the monarch who had just taken possession of the crown. To the far-seeing eye, the accession of James II. was the sure pledge of tyranny.
The mass of the nation was contented; the disquiet of political plots had counterbalanced the indignation caused by the Papist conspiracies, and public sentiment rallied around the throne; the great national calamities which signalized some years of the reign of Charles II.—war, pestilence, and fire—did not return to scourge the people. No hardy innovator among the literary or philosophical writers threw among the public such brands of agitation and of discord as Lilburne had scattered in spite of Cromwell or the Long Parliament. Milton died in 1674, having been solely occupied since the Restoration with his great poem, Paradise Lost, that masterpiece of religious and philosophical poetry alone worthy of saluting Dante in his sublime pilgrimage into the invisible world. The political pamphlets which had but recently served his cause and which had placed Milton in the front rank of English prose writers were eclipsed, if not forgotten, by the brilliancy of that poetical genius which had kept almost entirely silent during the ardent contests for liberty. Cowley and Butler were also dead; Otway and Waller mingled politics with their poetry. Hobbes opened the door to a dangerous school of philosophy, against which Bunyan, a poor laborer and strolling preacher, defended his country without knowing it, by writing in the depths of his prison the "Pilgrim's Progress," that strange and profound book destined to take the first rank after the Bible in the popular libraries of England. Dryden alone occupied a brilliant position: his verse and prose were elegant, powerful, rich, and energetic; but personally he was often corrupt, without principle and without respect for himself or for his fame, as his pretended conversion to Catholicism subsequently proved. Minds were contemplative without being active: the revolution and the Republic had not been propitious to literary development; while the Restoration had profited by the leisure of Milton, it did not at first realize his value; it was during a period of intellectual calm as well as of political quiet that James II. ascended the throne. The treaty of Ratisbon gave Europe hope for some relaxation of the ambition of Louis XIV. The Emperor and Spain had accepted his new conquests, "recognizing" said the Marquis de la Fare, "that the empire of the French was a necessary evil to the other nations." After so many and such cruel blows, a moment of calm seemed to rest upon the world.
James II. was destined ere long to trouble this repose. It seemed when he ascended the throne that his only desire was to render his people happy. "They have spread abroad the report that I have a desire for arbitrary power," said he, February 6th, in the council which had assembled a few hours after the death of Charles II., "but it is not the only calumny that they have invented against me. I will do my utmost to maintain the government of the State and the Church as I find it to-day. I know that the principles of the Church of England are favorable to monarchy, and that its members have proved themselves true and loyal subjects; I shall therefore defend and sustain it. I know also that the laws of England are sufficient to elevate a monarch as high as I should desire. I have often risked my life to defend this nation; I shall use the utmost of my power to preserve its rights and liberties."