A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon / For the Use of Schools and Colleges

by John Lord

Nothing else of note occurred in this reign, except the prosecution of the Spanish match, which was so odious to the nation that Buckingham, to preserve his popularity, broke off the negotiations, and by a system of treachery and duplicity as hateful as were his original efforts to promote the match. War with Spain was the result of the insult offered to the infanta and the court. An alliance was now made with France, and Prince Charles married Henrietta Maria, daughter of Henry IV. The Commons then granted abundant supplies for war, to recover the Palatinate; and liberty of conscience was granted by the monarch, on the demands of Richelieu, to the Catholics—so long and, perseveringly oppressed.

Shortly after, (March 27, 1625,) King James Death of James I. died at Theobalds, his favorite palace, from a disease produced by anxiety, gluttony, and sweet wines, after a reign in England of twenty-two years; and his son, Charles I., before the breath was out of his body, was proclaimed king in his stead.

The course pursued by James I. was adopted by his son; and, as their reigns were memorable for the same struggle, we shall consider them together until revolution gave the victory to the advocates of freedom.

Charles I. was twenty-five years of age when he began his reign. In a moral and social point of view he was a more respectable man than his father, but had the same absurd notions of the royal prerogative, the same contempt of the people, the same dislike of constitutional liberty, and the same resolution of maintaining the absolute power of the crown, at any cost. He was moreover, perplexed by the same embarrassments, was involved in debt, had great necessities, and was dependent on the House of Commons for aid to prosecute his wars and support the dignity of the crown. But he did not consider the changing circumstances and spirit of the age, and the hostile and turbulent nature of his people. He increased, rather than diminished, the odious monopolies which irritated the nation during the reign of his father; he clung to all the old feudal privileges; he retained the detestable and frivolous Buckingham as his chief minister; and, when Buckingham was assassinated, he chose others even more tyrannical and unscrupulous; he insisted on taxing the people without their consent, threw contempt on parliament, and drove the nation to rebellion. In all his political acts he was infatuated, after making every allowance for the imperfections of human nature. A wiser man would have seen the rising storm, and might possibly have averted it. But Charles never dreamed of it, until it burst in all its fury on his devoted head, and consigned him to the martyr's grave. We pity his fate, but lament still more his blindness. And so great was this blindness, that it almost seems as if Providence had marked him out to be a victim on the altar of human progress.

With the reign of Charles commences unquestionably the most exciting period of English history, and a period to which historians have given more attention than to any other great historical era, the French Revolution alone excepted. The attempt to describe the leading events in this exciting age and reign would be, in this connection, absurd; and yet some notice of them cannot be avoided.

For more than ten centuries, The Struggle of Classes. great struggles have been going on in society between the dominant orders and sects. The victories gained by the oppressed millions, over their different masters, constitute what is called the Progress of Society. Defenders of the people have occasionally arisen from orders to which they did not belong. When, then, any great order defended the cause of the people against the tyranny and selfishness of another order, then the people have advanced a step in civil and social freedom.

When Feudalism weighed fearfully upon the people, "the clergy sought, on their behalf, a little reason, justice, and humanity, and the poor man had no other asylum than the churches, no other protectors than the priests; and, as the priests offered food to the moral nature of man, they acquired a great ascendency, and the preponderance passed from the nobles to the clergy." By the aid of the church, royalty also rose above feudalism, and aided the popular cause.

The church, having gained the ascendency, sought then to enslave the kings of the earth. But royalty, borrowing help from humiliated nobles and from the people, became the dominant power in Europe.

In these struggles between nobles and the clergy, and between the clergy and kings, Rise of Popular Power. the people had acquired political importance. They had obtained a knowledge of their rights and of their strength; and they were determined to maintain them. They liked not the tyranny of either nobles, priests, or kings; but they bent all their energies to suppress the power of the latter, since the two former had been already humiliated.

The struggle of the people against royalty is preëminently the genius of the English Revolution. It is to be doubted whether any king could have resisted the storm of popular fury which hurled Charles from his throne. But no king could have managed worse than he, no king could be more unfortunately and unpropitiously placed; and his own imprudence and folly hastened the catastrophe.