IX. crimes, the greatest and the most irremediable are those CHAP. which sever the bonds that unite the sovereign and the people. 1712. 72. crisis. But the people themselves were far from being immaculate at this crisis. On the contrary, they largely shared Errors of the people at once in the ingratitude of the Court and the blindness at this of the Government. They entered not only readily, but cordially and enthusiastically, into the prosecution of the illustrious general who had raised their country to such an unparalleled pitch of glory; they evinced the too frequent, and to human nature degrading, jealousy of little against great minds. Such was the strength of this feeling that it led them to overlook, not only every consideration of prudence and wisdom, but every attention to their own and their children's interests; to forget alike their principles, their policy, and security; and generally support, at the close of a war in the prosecution of which they had made the greatest sacrifices and displayed the noblest spirit, a peace which was characterised by the abandonment of all the objects for which those sacrifices had been made, and all the securities which that spirit had enabled them to attain. 73. the Queen Tories at Still greater, because blacker and more unpardonable, was the ingratitude of the Queen on this occasion. Her Faults of fault was of a far deeper dye than that either of the and the Whigs or Tories, for it was mixed up with personal this crisis. feeling, it was stained by odious ingratitude. Marlborough had in every sense been the architect of her fortune. By displacing her father, he had been mainly instrumental in placing her on the throne; he had secured her there by the wisdom of his measures, and illustrated her reign by the glory of his actions. Whatever he had been to others, to her at least he had been VOL. II. Q CHAP. IX. 1712, 74. Moral les son from events. a true and faithful servant-a wise and trusty counsellor -a successful and glorious general. Yet she repaid all these inestimable services by the blackest ingratitude, and not only acquiesced, but took the lead, in a series of persecutions of her first and greatest subject, her first and greatest benefactor, which were a disgrace to the age in which she lived, and to the end of the world will be a hissing and a reproach against human nature itself. Her Tory ministers were blamable, not because they strove to supplant Marlborough and the Whigs in power, but because, in the prosecution of that object they abandoned all the main objects of our foreign policy, relinquished all the fruits of the war, and carried their political hostility beyond all bounds into private malignity and persecution. But in Queen Anne's case, these offences, grave as they are, were mingled with others of a deeper dye; for she was not only unwise and inconsistent as a sovereign, but ungrateful and revengeful as a woman. It is recorded by Lord Bacon, that when the English garrison of Calais, in the reign of Queen Mary, was subsequent evacuating that fortress after its capitulation to the Duke of Guise, a French officer said to an English, "When will your standard be again seen here?" "When your national sins shall exceed ours," was the Englishman's reply. We have seen the accomplishment of this memorable prophecy. The march of Marlborough and Eugene to Paris in 1711 was interrupted, and a disgraceful peace concluded, in consequence of divisions and heartburnings-the sad bequest of two successful revolutions in Great Britain; and repeatedly, during the eighteenth century, England was brought to the verge of ruin in consequence. But time rolled on, and brought its wonted changes on its wings. England, under the Hanoverian dynasty, which Marlborough seated on the throne, enjoyed during a century the inestimable blessings of civil and religious freedom, combined with devotion and loyalty to the throne. The national feeling was composed of all the generous aspirations which actuated the Whigs of the preceding century, and all the noble devotion which sustained the Tories. Meanwhile, France, during the same period, was distracted by the passions, and at last torn by the convulsions, which had desolated England a century before; and what was the result? Such, and such only, as under the administration of a righteous Providence might be expected. The march of Eugene and Marlborough, suspended for a century, was renewed; victory was in the end faithful to the standards of freedom and loyalty, of patriotism and perseverance; the national sins of France had exceeded those of England, and the anticipated result took place: the gates of Calais were entered by the English horse, which had traversed France from Bayonne; and the standards of Wellington and Blucher were seen on the towers of Paris. IX. 1712. CHAPTER X. MARLBOROUGH'S BRILLIANT RECEPTION ON THE CONTINENT.-LOSES CHAP. X. 1713. 1. Marlbo rough's im share in se curing the Hanoverian LIKE all other great contests which have desolated the world, the War of the Succession, although ostensibly waged on account of the Spanish succession, was really the result of opposite and contending principles which portant divided mankind. Civil and religious liberty was the cause for which Marlborough contended, and its success succession. Was wound up with the Hanoverian succession. Civil despotism was the principle which animated the armies of Louis; the establishment of the Romish faith would have followed their triumph, and the restoration of the Stuart line was its symbol. The Elector of Hanover was found with the one host, the Pretender was conspicuous in the ranks of the other. The malice of his enemies, and the factious spirit which had come to animate the British counsels, had deprived Marlborough of the means of securing the independence of his country by the conditions of the treaty of peace, and at the same time demonstrated in the clearest manner the force of his genius, by the disasters which had befallen the Alliance since he had been removed from its direction. But Providence, even during the few remaining years allotted to his earthly career, had reserved for him another triumph, which involved within itself the dearest objects for which he had contended in the field. As the life of efforts of the Queen Anne drew towards a close, the CHAP. X. 1713. 2. rough is with the honours on nent, Nov. If Marlborough had experienced in his own country the usual envy of little at great minds, and the well- Marlboknown and oft-experienced ingratitude of sovereigns and received their subjects for inappreciable services, he was in some highest degree indemnified by his reception on the Continent. the ContiOn landing at Brille, on the 24th November, he was 24, 1713. received with such demonstrations of gratitude and respect as showed how deeply his public services had sunk into the hearts of men, and how warmly they appreciated his efforts to avert from England and the coalition the evils likely to flow from the Treaty of Utrecht. He departed on the following morning under a triple discharge of artillery, and was received at Antwerp, outside the walls, by the governor, the Marquis of Terracina, who paid him every respect in his power. |