State of Parties—Character of Lord Nottingham—of Bentinck—Influence of the Villiers family—Of Lady Orkney—Quarrel of the Queen and Princess—Marriage of Frances Jennings to the Duke of Tyrconnel—Suspicions of the Earl and Countess of Marlborough entertained at court—Disgrace of Lord Marlborough. 1689.
In order to understand the vicissitudes of favour which Lord and Lady Marlborough experienced, some insight into the state of parties, and some acquaintance with the characters of public men, are essential; although a lengthened discussion upon the subject, in a work of this nature, would be wearisome and inconvenient.
Scarcely had William the Third ascended the throne, than he found that “his crown was encircled with thorns.”[[197]] In the hurry and stir of events, carried away by the strong current of sympathy, the Tories had promoted his elevation; but when dangers were past, they remembered, too late to retrieve, what they considered to be their error—that in so doing they had departed from all their established maxims; they recollected, not only that they had dethroned James, but that they had preferred his daughters and the Prince of Orange in the succession, to the infant Prince of Wales; and, to excuse their inconsistency, they were forced to pretend a mere submission to events which they had actively promoted. This faction, reluctantly styled by Burnet, in the portion of his history[[198]] relating to this period, “Tories,” were therefore avowedly hostile to the court, and yet not to be considered as its sole, nor indeed as its most dangerous enemies.
The clergy, the majority of whom had inveighed from the pulpit against the right of infringing upon the order of succession, were, from motives of the same description, inimical also to the Calvinistic King, whose known attachment to Dissenters inspired a jealousy of him, and towards his numerous adherents of the same tenets with himself, which was quickly manifested by the Bishops. Among the seven prelates who had been persecuted by the late King, only one, the Bishop of St. Asaph, did homage to the new monarch, and took the oaths. And when Mary sent to ask Sancroft’s blessing, the cutting reply of the Archbishop was, “that she must seek her father’s first, otherwise his would not be heard in heaven.”[[199]]
Thus repelled, William looked in vain for a servile compliance from the Whigs; they had the plea of consistency to shackle the support which they might be expected to give the royal minion of their power; and, having always opposed the crown, they were unwilling to relinquish that jealousy of its prerogative for which their party had hitherto been distinguished.
After the happy termination of the war in Ireland, factious spirits, like gnats after rain coming forth in the sunbeam, began to show themselves, and to congregate for action. Whilst some complained of the great standing army kept up after the contest with James and his adherents was finally and triumphantly concluded—whilst some murmured at one grievance, some at another—Englishmen of all parties were disgusted with the preference given to the Dutch, on whom alone the confidence of the sovereign was bestowed. Nor did William take any means to ingratiate himself in the affections of his adopted country. He shut himself up all day, attended chiefly by Bentinck, whom he had created Earl of Portland, and who shared his favour with Henry Sidney, the only Englishman whom the King really liked. By degrees, a new feature in the character of the chosen successor of James, alienated from him that party who had placed him on the throne, and who began to think that there was something contagious around that unenviable position. Naturally cautious, and ignorant of our constitution, William took offence at the warmth of those who professed liberal opinions, mingled with notions of republicanism, from which he recoiled with as much dread as his prerogative-loving predecessors. The name of liberty became intolerable to him; and it was soon found that his love of monarchy, and his sense of its high privileges, were far greater than could possibly have been expected, in a prince whose pretensions rested upon the suffrage of the great body of the nation.[[200]]
These opinions were supposed to be cherished in William by the Earl of Nottingham, who was chosen Secretary of State with the Earl of Shrewsbury. Lord Nottingham had opposed the settlement of the crown with vehemence, and in copious orations; declaring, however, when the party opposed to him had prevailed, that “though he could not make a king, yet, upon his principles, he could obey one better than those who were so much set on making one.”[[201]] It was this minister’s successful endeavour to infuse distrust and dislike of the Whigs into the mind of his sovereign—to gain every species of information which could assist his efforts, from the lowest sources and by the lowest means—every angry speech in political meetings being reported to his Majesty’s ears, and making a deep impression on the mind of William.[[202]] Yet Nottingham has been said, even whilst holding his office of secretary, to have always kept “a reserve of allegiance to his exiled master;”[[203]] whilst the necessities of a numerous family induced him to take an employment in the existing government.
The great ambition of this nobleman was to be at the head of the church party. Regular in his religious duties, strict in morals, and of a formal, unbending character of virtue, the zeal of Nottingham, affected or real, aided by a solemn deportment, and by a countenance the inflexible gravity of which accorded with his disposition,—it was not until years afterwards that his actual insincerity was discovered, and that it was found that the principles which he professed had been all along at variance with those which he actually entertained.[[204]]
Amongst sundry Tories and Jacobites who, by the influence of Nottingham, were preferred, Lawrence Hyde, Earl of Rochester, contrary to all expectation, was made a privy counsellor. His near relationship to the Queen, his niece, had not hitherto secured royal favour. He was accounted a man of abilities, although immeasurably inferior in that respect to his celebrated father; he wrote well, but was an ungraceful speaker. Devoted to the exiled monarch, Rochester, whilst he perceived the errors of his royal brother-in-law, opposed the act of settlement, and voted for a regency—a step which Queen Mary found it difficult to forgive; nor was it until after Bishop Burnet had wrought upon her mind, that she consented to receive her uncle, or to forget his opposition to her reign. By degrees, however, he rose in her regard, and attained a degree of influence which was exerted against Lady Marlborough in particular, and of which she felt the effects. Lord Rochester, with many excellent and respectable qualities, united a spirit somewhat too zealous to be productive of benefit in the state affairs at that time; he was considered as the leader of the high church party; and, refusing the oaths of allegiance to William and Mary, remained a non-juror until his death.[[205]]
The more placid, but more steady opposition of Bentinck, Earl of Portland, to all that Lady Marlborough proposed and desired, was supposed by her to be even more effective than the turbulent temper of Lord Rochester. Brave, faithful, disinterested, charitable, a favourite without presumption, a consummate statesman without forgetting the higher duties, Bentinck would have been a valuable and a devoted friend, had Lady Marlborough been so fortunate as to possess his esteem; nor is there any reason to suppose that he was at any time her implacable enemy, although his interests, and even his affections, were centered in the monarch whom Lady Marlborough has treated, in her “Conduct,” with so little respect.