Charles, indignant at this outrage, dissolved the body, and appealed to the country for a loan. The same reply came from every quarter. "We will gladly lend the money, but it must be done through Parliament." The King was thoroughly aroused. If the loan will not be voluntary, it must be forced. A tax was levied, fines and penalties for its resistance meted out by subservient judges.
John Hampden was one of the earliest victims. His means were ample, the sum was small, but his manhood was great. "Not one farthing, if it cost me my life," was his reply as he sat in the prison at Gate House.
The supply did not meet the King's demand. Overwhelmed with debt and shame and rage, he was obliged again to resort to the hated means. Parliament was summoned. The Commons, with memory of recent outrages in their hearts, were more determined than before. The members drew up a "Petition of Right," which was simply a reaffirmation of the inviolability of the rights of person, of property and of speech—a sort of second "Magna Charta."
They resolutely and calmly faced their King, the "Petition" in one hand, the granted subsidies in the other. For a while he defied them; but the judges were whispering in his ear that the "Petition" would not be binding upon him, and Buckingham was urging him to yield. Perhaps it was Charles Stuart the gentleman who hesitated to receive money in return for solemn promises which he did not intend to keep! But Charles the King signed the paper, which seven judges out of twelve, in the highest court of the realm, were going to pronounce invalid because the King's power was beyond the reach of Parliament. It was inherent in him as King, and bestowed by God. Any infringement upon his prerogative by Act of Parliament was void!
With king so false, and with justice so polluted at its fountain, what hope was there for the people but in Revolution?
From the tyranny of the Church under Laud, a way was opened when, in 1629, Charles granted a Charter to the Colony of Massachusetts. With a quiet, stern enthusiasm the hearts of men turned toward that refuge in America. Not men of broken fortunes, adventurers, and criminals, but owners of large landed estates, professional men, some of the best in the land, who abandoned home and comfort to face intolerable hardships. One wrote, "We are weaned from the delicate milk of our Mother England and do not mind these trials." As the pressure increased under Laud, the stream toward the West increased in volume; so that in ten years 20,000 Englishmen had sought religious freedom across the sea, and had founded a Colony which, strange to say,—under the influence of an intense religious sentiment,—became itself a Theocracy and a new tyranny, although one sternly just and pure.
The dissolute, worthless Buckingham had been assassinated, and Charles had wept passionate tears over his dead body. But his place had been filled by one far better suited to the King's needs at a time when he had determined not again to recall Parliament, but to rule without it until resistance to his measures had ceased.
It was with no sinister purpose of establishing a despotism such as a stronger man might have harbored, that he made this resolve. What Charles wanted was simply the means of filling his exchequer; and if Parliament would not give him that except by a dicker for reforms, and humiliating pledges which he could not keep, why then he would find new ways of raising money without them. His father had done it before him, he had done it himself. With no Commons there to rate and insult him, it could be done without hindrance.
He was not grand enough, nor base enough, nor was he rich enough, to carry out any organized design upon the country. He simply wanted money, and had such blind confidence in Kingship, that any very serious resistance to his authority did not enter his dreams. It was the limitations of his intelligence which proved his ruin, his inability to comprehend a new condition in the spirit of his people. Elizabeth would have felt it, though she did not understand it, and would have loosened the screws, without regard for her personal preferences, and by doing it, so bound the people to her, that her policy would have been their policy. Charles was as wise as the engineer who would rivet down the safety-valves!
Sir Thomas Wentworth (Earl Strafford), who had taken the place of Buckingham, was an apostate from the party of liberty. Disappointed in becoming a leader in the Commons he had drawn gradually closer to the King, who now leaned upon him as the vine upon the oak.