To outward seeming the feeling of offence was removed. Charles had no wish to resume the argument, and forbade him to believe "that it was or could be in any man's power to make him suspect his affection or integrity to his service." He covered any resentment he might feel with that dissimulation of which he was so great a master; and soon after gave an earnest of his continued good-will by promoting Clarendon's kinsman, Dr. Hyde, to the Bishopric of Salisbury. "Nor was his credit with the King thought to be lessened by anybody but himself, who knew more to that purpose than other people could do." It may be doubted whether some of Charles's familiars did not guess more shrewdly than Clarendon supposed. The gossip of Pepys lets us know that the tongues of talebearers were not silent.
CHAPTER XXIII
DECAY OF CLARENDON'S INFLUENCE
We must still look backwards a little in tracing the accumulating effect of friction, of jealousy, and of slander, in sapping the power of Clarendon.
He had not long to wait to see how adroit his many enemies were in twisting to his disadvantage any irritation which Charles might feel. The state of public affairs was sufficiently overclouded to make his anxieties in any case very great. The war still dragged on its weary course (we are now dealing with a period anterior to the peace already described), with its heavy burden of expense and its ever-recurring disasters, relieved only by occasional success. The combined calamity of the Fire and the Plague increased the general depression, paralyzed trade, and made the burden of taxation more severe. Repressive measures, if they had checked rebellion, had left a troubled background of smouldering discontent, and were sowing the seeds of future opposition to the Crown and to the Church. The temper of the House of Commons, however pronounced its adhesion to the Cavalier party, was stubborn and perverse; and stubbornness and perversity are never so provoking in politics as when they are united with an exaggeration of one's own opinion. The House resented almost with the tone and in the spirit of the Long Parliament, the dictation—and Clarendon's best friends must admit that his methods were apt to be dictatorial—of a Minister who saw that its exaggerated Royalism might be itself a danger to the Crown, and who was faithful to a theory of the constitution which imposed limits at once upon King and upon Parliament. Clarendon belonged to an older generation, and was unwilling to trim his sails to suit the newer fashions. His pedantic constitutionalism—we are all apt to think that notions which will not adopt themselves to our own practice are pedantic—became unpalatable at once to King and Parliament. He was not compliant enough to suit the prejudices of the stalwart Cavaliers; he had no weapons wherewith to fight courtiers, such as Buckingham, who knew how to make friends for themselves amongst those who condemned the Court and all connected with it. It was the growing estrangement between him and the House of Commons that added force to the schemes of his enemies.
Clarendon saw two symptoms of danger—in the attempts to detach from him his most trusted friends and allies, and in the sure and gradual advancement of those who were his sworn foes. His oldest and most trusted comrade—from whom death was soon to part him—was the Treasurer, Lord Southampton. Their friendship was the growth of years. In the earliest days of the Civil war, Southampton, who had avoided, before its outbreak, all connection with the Court, had joined the King's party with some misgiving, but had brought to it the weight of unblemished character and great debating power. He had striven, even against the inclination of the King, to advance proposals for a treaty with Parliament; and his loyalty did not blind him to the hopelessness of the struggle, or to what seemed to him defects in the Royalist cause. Too proud to be a courtier, and too sensible of the responsibility of great lineage and high station to be a rebel, his aim was to steer a moderate course. In temper, as well as in political views, he and Clarendon were closely united; and their mutual confidence continued unbroken after the Restoration. Clarendon's enemies found a convenient opportunity for kindling in the mind of Southampton some petty offence, in the fact that Clarendon, at the instance of the Duke of York and his daughter, the Duchess, had done something to promote the claims to a Court appointment of a candidate other than that favoured by Southampton. [Footnote: The post was one about the Court of the Queen, and the two claimants were the son of Lord Montague, favoured by the Duke and Duchess; and Robert Spencer, a relative of the Earl of Southampton. Personally, Clarendon preferred the latter; but he had put forward the name of the other at the solicitation of the Duke and his daughter without much consideration, and without knowing that any other claimant was in the field.] The matter was a trumpery one; but the irritation was fanned by those who were eager to break the alliance of the older statesmen. Southampton was a man who asked for few favours, and was all the more incensed when he was made to understand that his old friend had stood in his way, when for once he had stooped to make an application. Clarendon soon discerned his old friend's ill-will, and took his usual course of bringing it speedily to a clear issue. His own temper was hot, and for a time "he grew out of humour too, and thought himself unworthily suspected." But he soon thought better of it, and bluntly told the Treasurer that "it should not be in his power to break friendship with him, to gratify the humour of other people, without letting him know what the matter was." The explanation was given; and mutual confidence was soon restored between the two old allies. But Clarendon saw in the incident new evidence of the sordid tricks that sought to entangle him in the petty jealousy of rival cliques. "They who had contrived this device entered into a new confederacy, how they might first remove the Treasurer, which would facilitate the pulling the Chancellor down." [Footnote: Life, ii. 454.] Clarendon found a sign of danger even more alarming in the gradual advancement of those who were pledged to his enemies, and who became their most useful tools. There was none whose influence, in this or in other respects, was more baneful to Clarendon than the Duke of York. The incidents of the Duke's first connection with his family were amongst his bitterest memories; and although he never failed to show to his son- in-law the respect due to the brother of the King, yet Clarendon found in him a perpetual obstacle to his plans, an intriguer whose selfish aims and jealous temper ever engendered fresh dissensions at Court, and a sullen bigot whose moroseness was redeemed by none of his brother's easy suavity of manner. The Duke's pride did not permit him openly to desert the interests of his father-in-law or to range himself with Clarendon's enemies. But his blundering tactlessness, his easily wounded vanity, and his insatiable appetite for power, often led him to give encouragement to those whose influence Clarendon knew to be pernicious. One of these was Sir William Coventry, against whom Clarendon, as we have already seen, cherished an invincible dislike, all the more marked because he had known and reverenced his father, the former Chancellor. He knew Coventry's restless ambition and how capable he was by boldness, by ability in debate, and by adroitness in expedient, to supply the defects of the stolid and slow intrigue of his patron, Arlington. Coventry had managed to gain the confidence of the Duke and to be his trusted agent in the affairs of the navy, where the Duke, as Lord High Admiral, was supreme; and Clarendon knew that Coventry's influence boded no good to the moderate policy which it was his own chief aim to pursue. It was by the Duke's solicitation that Coventry now obtained the position of Privy Councillor, and was admitted to the inner Cabinet, where no modesty prevented him from opposing Clarendon at once in internal affairs and in foreign policy. An opportunity soon offered itself to Coventry for proving his influence and inflicting a deadly blow upon Sandwich, whose placid temper and essential loyalty had made him one of Clarendon's chosen friends. At first Coventry endeavoured vainly to insinuate doubts of Sandwich's capacity as a naval commander; and when he failed there he soon found another means of attack. [Footnote: This incident has already been briefly alluded to in connection with the progress of the war. See above, p. 202.] Sandwich had, with much rashness and in too ready compliance with the laxity which prevailed in matters of public finance, yielded to the urgency of some of his flag officers, and permitted the sale of some East India prizes captured from the Dutch, in order to meet long-standing arrears of pay due to his officers. He had referred the matter to the King, through the Vice- Chamberlain, but, with singular carelessness, carried the transaction through before he had received the royal approval. This gave Coventry just the chance that he desired. Sandwich's action was a clear infringement of the prerogative of the Duke as Lord High Admiral, through whom alone any such favour could be conferred. Albemarle, incensed at what appeared a flagrant breach of military discipline, became a powerful adherent of Sandwich's enemies. Sandwich's own money difficulties were no secret, and he himself was to benefit by the bounty, which he shared with his flag officers, and against which the rest of the fleet was murmuring. He saw too late the error that he had committed, and made his humble apologies to the King and the Duke. But though he was able to appease their anger, the evil to his own reputation was done, and his enemies were in no mood to relieve him of it. Clarendon could not prevent his being deprived of his naval command. Already Sandwich had incurred the jealousy of the old Cavaliers, who grudged to one, once Cromwell's officer, the rewards which had not come to their earlier loyalty. All that Clarendon could do was to soften Sandwich's fall by procuring his appointment as ambassador to Spain. The ablest of Charles's naval commanders was sacrificed because of what, in the lax financial morality of the day, seemed only an error of judgment; and the direction of naval affairs was thus placed almost entirely in the hands of Coventry, who, as representing the Duke, could issue commands and thwart the policy of the King's Ministers.
The same restless faction which had sought to sow dissension between the Chancellor and the Treasurer, were not deterred, by failure, from new efforts to break the influence of these two older Ministers. They were busy gathering new recruits to their faction and insinuating them into offices of trust; and now they thought they could undermine the fort by driving Southampton into the resignation of his office. His character and rank stood too high to make him an easy victim, or to encourage them to any open attack. But they could suggest that his powers were waning; that he was no longer equal to the task of guiding the finances of the nation; that he was ruled by subordinates; and that consideration for his age would make it only reasonable to relieve him of an irksome burden. They knew that little persuasion was required to bring about his resignation of a post which duty rather than inclination made him retain; and they guessed, with good reason, that it was Clarendon's advice that chiefly kept Southampton in office.
The procedure followed the usual course. First, Charles was persuaded that his aged Treasurer was no longer equal to the duties of his office. It was easy to suggest to him that his business would move more smoothly if the pedantic methods, the vigilant care, and the cumbrous and dilatory processes of the Lord Treasurer's office were simplified and expedited. When he was duly impressed, the King had then to be brought to discharge the ungracious task of conveying to the Chancellor the fact that the King would welcome the Treasurer's relinquishment of his office. To do him justice, Charles did not relish the part he was compelled to play. Even his selfishness could not cloak its ugly ingratitude, and it suited ill with his easy temper to be the medium of such an ungracious message. Nor was it quite compatible with that royal dignity, which he did not always cast aside, to be made the spokesman, to his more serious Minister, of a conspiracy not unlike that of unruly schoolboys. The King knew by experience that, master though he was, he could still be made uncomfortable by hearing stern and plain truths, even in the ceremonious diction in which his Chancellor knew how to clothe them.
The King began the interview—somewhat hypocritically—by "enlarging in a great commendation of the Treasurer." But in spite of all his merits Southampton "did not understand the mystery of that place, nor could his nature go through with the necessary obligations of it." His ill-health caused delay and murmuring in regard to urgent business. His secretary [Footnote: Sir Philip Warwick was born in Westminster in 1609, and was employed before the Civil War, in the service of Lord Goring, and, afterwards, of Bishop Juxon. He acted as Secretary to the King during the Conference at Newport, in 1648. After the Restoration, he became Secretary to the Treasury under Lord Southampton, and had all the qualities of an excellent civil servant, virtually controlling the department under its ministerial head. His Memoirs are not of first-rate importance, but contain some good accounts of engagements in the war, and of incidents in the life of the King. He survived till 1683, and won the fervent admiration of that other worthy official, Pepys.] virtually discharged the work of the office—an estimable and honest man, no doubt, but not equal to the position of Lord Treasurer. The Treasurer's "understanding was too fine for such gross matters as the office must be conversant about, and if his want of health did not hinder him, his genius did not carry him that way." Nothing could be further from the King's thoughts than to disoblige so faithful a servant; but perhaps he would not be unwilling to go, and perhaps the Chancellor would do the King the singular service of suggesting it to him.
The first answer of Clarendon in reply to this not very palatable speech was to ask whom the King proposed to make Treasurer in Southampton's place? He would, said the King, never have another Treasurer, but would exercise the office by Commissioners. Once more the same insuperable prejudice, which Clarendon had felt against the system involved in the Appropriation Clause, was stirred in him. He saw precisely the same motives at work, involving precisely the same dangers. Commissioners might be all very well in Cromwell's days. He needed no Treasurer, and could take care, with an army at his back, that Commissioners would not prove troublesome. But the plan suited ill with monarchical principles. The King should have his Lord Treasurer, of standing and of honour sufficient to ensure sound administration and compel respect. Commissioners, as Clarendon discerned clearly, would be bad servants and dangerous masters. Clarendon might be fighting a forlorn hope against the growing forces of officialdom; but his dislike was honest, and his discernment of the future was correct.