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TRUE HISTORICAL NARRATION

OF THE

REBELLION AND CIVIL
CIVIL WARS IN ENGLAND,

BEGUN IN THE YEAR 1641,

WITH

THE PRECEDENT PASSAGES AND ACTIONS THAT CONTRIBUTED THEREUNTO.

32

BOOK I.

THAT HAT posterity may not be deceived, by the prosperous wickedness of these times, into an opinion, that less than a general combination, and universal apostasy in the whole nation from their religion and allegiance, could, in so short a time, have produced such a total and prodigious alteration and confusion over the whole kingdom; and so the memory of those few, who, out of duty and conscience, have opposed and resisted that torrent, which hath overwhelmed them, may lose the recompense due to their virtue; and, having undergone the injuries and reproaches of this, may not find a vindication in a better age; it will not be unuseful, at least to the curiosity if not the conscience of men, to present to the world a full and clear narration of the grounds, circumstances, and artifices of this rebellion: not only from the time since the flame hath been visible in a civil war, but, looking farther back, from those former passages, accidents, and actions, by which the seedplots were made and framed, from whence these mischiefs have successively grown to the height they are now at.

And then, though the hand and judgment of God will be very visible, in the infatuating a people (as ripe and prepared for destruction) into all the perverse actions of folly and madness, making the weak to contribute to the designs of the wicked, and suffering even those, by degrees, out of the conscience of their guilt, to grow more wicked than they intended to be; letting the wise to be imposed upon by men of no understanding, and possessing the innocent with laziness and sleep in the most visible article of danger; uniting the ill, though of the most different opinions, divided interests, and distant affections, in a firm and constant league of mischief; and dividing those, whose opinions and interests are the same, into faction and emulation, more pernicious to the public than the treason of the others: whilst the poor people, under pretence of zeal to religion, law, liberty, and parliaments, (words of precious esteem in their just signification,) are furiously hurried into actions introducing atheism, and dissolving all the elements of Christian religion; cancelling all obligations, and destroying all foundations of law and liberty; and B

rendering, not only the privileges, but very being, of parliaments desperate and impossible: I say, though the immediate finger and wrath of God must be acknowledged in these perplexities and distractions; yet he who shall diligently observe the distempers and conjunctures of time, the ambition, pride, and folly of persons, and the sudden growth of wickedness, from want of care and circumspection in the first impressions, will find all this bulk of misery to have proceeded, and to have been brought upon us, from the same natural causes and means, which have usually attended kingdoms, swoln with long plenty, pride, and excess, towards some signal mortifications, and castigation of Heaven. And it may be, upon the view of the impossibility of foreseeing many things that have happened, and of the necessity of overseeing many other things, we may not yet find the cure so desperate, but that, by God's mercy, the wounds may be again bound up; though no question many must first bleed to death; and then this prospect may not make the future peace less pleasant and durable.

And I have the more willingly induced myself to this unequal task, out of the hope of contributing somewhat to that end: and though a piece of this nature (wherein the infirmities of some, and the malice of others, both things and persons, must be boldly looked upon and mentioned) is not likely to be published at least in the age in which it is writ, yet it may serve to inform myself, and some others, what we are to do, as well as to comfort us in what we have done, and then possibly it may not be very difficult to collect somewhat out of that store, more proper, and not unuseful for the public view. And as I may not be thought altogether an incompetent person for this communication, having been present as a member of parliament in those councils before and till the breaking out of the rebellion, and having since had the honour to be near two great kings in some trust, so I shall form the same with all faithfulness and ingenuity; with an equal observation of the faults and infirmities of both sides, with their defects and oversights in pursuing their own ends; and shall no otherwise mention small and light occurrences,

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than as they have been introductions to matters | crown-lands, creating peers for money, and many of the greatest moment; nor speak of persons other particulars, which no access of power or otherwise, than as the mention of their virtues plenty since could repair. or vices is essential to the work in hand: in which as I shall have the fate to be suspected rather for malice to many, than of flattery to any, so I shall, in truth, preserve myself from the least sharpness, that may proceed from private provocation, or a more public indignation, in the whole observing the rules that a man should, who deserves to be believed.

I shall not then lead any man farther back in this journey, for the discovery of the entrance into these dark ways, than the beginning of this king's reign. For I am not so sharp-sighted as those, who have discerned this rebellion contriving from (if not before) the death of queen Elizabeth, and fomented by several princes and great ministers of state in Christendom, to the time that it brake out. Neither do I look so far back as believing the design to be so long since formed; (they who have observed the several accidents, not capable of being contrived, which have contributed to the several successes, and do know the persons who have been the grand instruments towards this change, of whom there have not been any four of familiarity and trust with each other, will easily absolve them from so much industry and foresight in their mischief;) but that, by viewing the temper, disposition, and habit, of that time, of the court and of the country, we may discern the minds of men prepared, of some to do, and of others to suffer, all that hath since happened; the pride of this man, and the popularity of that; the levity of one, and the morosity of another; the excess of the court in the greatest want, and the parsimony and retention of the country in the greatest plenty; the spirit of craft and subtlety in some, and the rude and unpolished integrity of others, too much despising craft or art; like so many atoms contributing jointly to this mass of confusion now before us.

KING JAMES in the end of March 1625 died, leaving his majesty that now is, engaged in a war with Spain, but unprovided with money to manage it; though it was undertaken by the consent and advice of parliament: the people being naturally enough inclined to the war (having surfeited with the uninterrupted pleasures and plenty of twenty-two years peace) and sufficiently inflamed against the Spaniard; but quickly weary of the charge of it: and therefore, after an unprosperous and chargeable attempt in a voyage by sea upon Cadiz, and as unsuccessful and more unfortunate a one upon France, at the Isle of Rhé, (for some difference had likewise at the same time begotten a war with that prince,) a general peace was shortly concluded with both kingdoms; the exchequer being so exhausted with the debts of king James, the bounty of his majesty that now is, (who, upon his first access to the crown, gave many costly instances of his favour to persons near him,) and the charge of the war upon Spain, and France, that both the known and casual revenue being anticipated, the necessary subsistence of the household was unprovided for; and the king on the sudden driven to those straits for his own support, that many ways were resorted to, and inconveniences submitted to, for supply; as selling the

Parliaments were summoned, and again dissolved: and that in the fourth year (after the dissolution of the two former) was determined with a profession and declaration that there should be no more assemblies of that nature expected, and all men inhibited upon the penalty of censure, so much as to speak of a parliament. And here I cannot but let myself loose to say, that no man can shew me a source, from whence these waters of bitterness we now taste have more probably flowed, than from these unseasonable, unskilful, and precipitate dissolutions of parliaments; in which, by an unjust survey of the passion, insolence, and ambition of particular persons, the court measured the temper and affection of the country; and by the same standard the people considered the honour, justice, and piety of the court; and so usually parted, at those sad seasons, with_no other respect and charity one toward the other, than accompanies persons who never meant to meet but in their own defence. In which the king had always the disadvantage to harbour persons about him, who, with their utmost industry, information, and malice, improved the faults and infirmities of the court to the people; and again, as much as in them lay, rendered the people suspected, if not odious to the king.

I am not altogether a stranger to the passages of those parliaments, (though I was not a member of them,) having carefully perused the journals of both houses, and familiarly conversed with many who had principal parts in them. And I cannot but wonder at those counsels, which persuaded the courses then taken; the habit and temper of men's minds being, no question, very applicable to the public ends; and those ends being only discredited by the jealousies the people entertained from the manner of the prosecution, that they were other, and worse than in truth they were. It is not to be denied, that there were, in all those parliaments, especially in that of the fourth year, several passages, and distempered speeches of particular persons, not fit for the dignity and honour of those places, and unsuitable to the reverence due to his majesty and his councils. But I do not know any formed act of either house (for neither the remonstrance or votes of the last day were such) that was not agreeable to the wisdom and justice of great courts, upon those extraordinary occasions. And whoever considers the acts of power and injustice in the intervals of parliament, will not be much scandalized at the warmth and vivacity of those meetings.

In the second parliament there was a mention, and intention declared, of granting five subsidies, a proportion (how contemptible soever in respect of the pressures now every day imposed) never before heard of in parliament. And that meeting being, upon very unpopular and unplausible reasons, immediately dissolved, those five subsidies were exacted, throughout the whole kingdom, with the same rigour, as if, in truth, an act had passed to that purpose. Very many gentlemen of prime quality, in all the several counties of England, were, for refusing to pay the same, committed to prison, with great rigour and extraordinary circumstances. And could it be imagined, that these men would meet again in a free convention of par

liament, without a sharp and severe expostulation, | could be preserved without parliaments, or that and inquisition into their own right, and the power that had imposed upon that right? And yet all these provocations, and many other, almost of as large an extent, produced no other resentment, than the petition of right, (of no prejudice to the crown,) which was likewise purchased at the price of five subsidies more, and, in a very short time after that supply granted, that parliament was likewise, with strange circumstances of passion on all sides, dissolved.

the passion and distemper gotten and received into parliaments could be removed and reformed by the more passionate breaking and dissolving them; or that that course would not inevitably prove the most pernicious to himself, is as much my wonder, as any thing that hath since happened. There is a protection very gracious and just, which princes owe to their servants, when, in obedience to their just commands, upon extraordinary and necessary occasions, in the execution of their trusts, they swerve from the strict rule of the law, which, without that mercy, would be penal to them. In any case, it is as legal (the law presuming it will always be done upon great reason) for the king to pardon, as for the party to accuse, and the judge to condemn. But for the supreme power to interpose, and shelter an accused servant from answering, does not only seem an obstruction of justice, and lay an imputation upon the prince, of being privy to the offence; but leaves so great a scandal upon the party himself, that he is generally concluded guilty of whatsoever he is charged; which is commonly more than the worst man ever deserved. And it is worthy the observation, that, as no innocent man who made his defence ever suffered in those times by judgment of parliament; so many guilty persons, and against whom the spirit of the time went as high, by the wise managing their defence, have

The abrupt and ungracious breaking off the two first parliaments was wholly imputed to the duke of Buckingham; and of the third, principally to the lord Weston, then lord high treasurer of England; both in respect of the great power and interest they then had in the affections of his majesty, and for that the time of the dissolutions happened to be, when some charges and accusations were preparing, and ready to be preferred against those two great persons. And therefore the envy and hatred, that attended them thereupon, was insupportable, and was visibly the cause of the murder of the first, (stabbed to the heart by the hand of an obscure villain, upon the mere impious pretence of his being odious to the parliament,) and made, no doubt, so great an impression upon the understanding and nature of the other, that, by degrees, he lost that temper and serenity of mind he had been before master of, and which was most fit to have accompanied him in his weighty employ-been freed from their accusers, not only without ments: insomuch as, out of indignation to find himself worse used than he deserved, he cared less to deserve well, than he had done; and insensibly grew into that public hatred, that rendered him less useful to the service that he only intended.

censure, but without reproach; as the bishop of Lincoln, then lord keeper, sir H. Marten, and sir H. Spiller; men, in their several degrees, as little beholden to the charity of that time, as any men since. Whereas scarce a man, who, with industry and skill, laboured to keep himself from being I wonder less at the errors of this nature in the accused, or by power to stop or divert the course duke of Buckingham; who, having had a most of proceeding, scaped without some signal mark generous education in courts, was utterly ignorant of infamy or prejudice. And the reason is clear; of the ebbs and floods of popular councils, and of for besides that, after the first storm, there is some the winds that move those waters; and could not, compassion naturally attends men like to be in without the spirit of indignation, find himself, in misery; and besides the latitude of judging in the space of a few weeks, without any visible cause those places, whereby there is room for kindness intervening, from the greatest height of popular and affection, and collateral considerations to inestimation that any person hath ascended to, (in- terpose; the truth is, those accusations (to which somuch as sir Edward Coke blasphemously called this man contributes his malice, that his wit, all him our Saviour,) by the same breath thrown men what they please, and most upon hearsay, down to the depth of calumny and reproach. I with a kind of uncharitable delight of making say, it is no marvel, (besides that he was natu- the charge as heavy as may be) are commonly Irally to follow such counsel as was given him,) stuffed with many odious generals, that the proofs that he could think of no better way to be freed seldom make good: and then a man is no sooner of the inconveniences and troubles the passions found less guilty than he is expected, but he is of those meetings gave him, than to dissolve concluded more innocent than he is; and it is them, and prevent their coming together: and thought but a just reparation for the reproach that, when they seemed to neglect the public that he deserved not, to free him from the censure peace, out of animosity to him, that he intended he deserved. So that, very probably, those two his own ease and security in the first place, and noble persons had been happy, if they had stoutly easily believed the public might be otherwise pro- submitted to the proceedings [which] were designed vided for, by more intent and dispassionate coun- against them; and, without question, it had been of cils. But that the other, the lord Weston, who sovereign use to the king, if, in those peaceable had been very much and very popularly conversant times, parliaments had been taught to know their in those conventions, who exactly knew the frame own bounds, by being suffered to proceed as far as and constitution of the kingdom, the temper of they could go; by which the extent of their power the people, the extent of the courts of law, and the would quickly have been manifested: from whence jurisdiction of parliaments, which at that time had no inconvenience of moment could have proceednever committed any excess of jurisdiction, (mo-ed; the house of commons never then pretending desty and moderation in words never was, nor ever will be, observed in popular councils, whose foundation is liberty of speech,) should believe, that the union, peace, and plenty of the kingdom

to the least part of judicature, or exceeding the known verge of their own privileges; the house of peers observing the rules of law and equity in their judgments, and proceeding deliberately upon

clear testimony and evidence of matter of fact; | Beaumonts, he had this gentleman, and two and the king retaining the sole power of par- other sons and a daughter, who all came afterdoning, and receiving the whole profit of all pen- wards to be raised to great titles and dignities. alties and judgments; and indeed having so great George, the eldest son of this second bed, was, an influence upon the body of the peerage, that it after the death of his father, by the singular affecwas never known that any person of honour was tion and care of his mother, who enjoyed a good severely censured in that house, (before this pre-jointure in the account of that age, well brought sent parliament,) who was not either immediately up; and, for the improvement of his education, prosecuted by the court, or in evident disfavour and giving an ornament to his hopeful person, there; in which, it may be, (as it usually falls he was by her sent into France; where he spent out,) some doors were opened, at which incon- two or three years in attaining the language, and veniences to the crown have got in, that were not in learning the exercises of riding and dancing; then enough weighed and considered. in the last of which he excelled most men, and returned into England by the time he was twentyone years old.

But the course of exempting men from prosecution, by dissolving of parliaments, made the power of parliaments much more formidable, as conceived to be without limit; since the sovereign power seemed to be compelled (as unable other wise to set bounds to their proceedings) to that rough cure, and to determine their being, because it could not determine their jurisdiction. Whereas, if they had been frequently summoned, and seasonably dissolved, after their wisdom in applying medicines and cures, as well as their industry in discovering diseases, had been discerned, they would easily have been applied to the uses for which they were first instituted; and been of no less esteem with the crown, than of veneration with the people. And so I shall conclude this digression, which I conceived not unseasonable for this place, nor upon this occasion, and return to the time when that brisk resolution was taken of totally declining those conventions; all men being inhibited (as I said before) by proclamation at the dissolution of the parliament in the fourth year, so much as to mention or speak as if a parliament should be called.

And here it will give much light to that which follows, if we take a view of the state of the court and of the council at that time, by which, as in a mirror, we may best see the face of that time, and the affections and temper of the people in general.

And for the better taking this prospect, we will take a survey of the person of that great man, the duke of Buckingham, (who was so barbarously murdered at this time,) whose influence had been unfortunate in the public affairs, and whose death produced a change in all the counsels. The duke was indeed a very extraordinary person; and never any man, in any age, nor, I believe, in any country or nation, rose, in so short a time, to so much greatness of honour, fame, and fortune, upon no other advantage or recommendation, than of the beauty and gracefulness and becomingness of his person. And I have not the least purpose of undervaluing his good parts and qualities, (of which there will be occasion shortly to give some testimony,) when I say, that his first introduction into favour was purely from the handsomeness of his person.

He was the younger son of sir George Villiers, of Brookesby, in the county of Leicester; a family of an ancient extraction, even from the time of the conquest, and transported then with the conqueror out of Normandy, where the family hath still remained, and still continues with lustre. After sir George's first marriage, in which he had two or three sons, and some daughters, who shared an ample inheritance from him; by a second marriage, with a young lady of the family of the

King James reigned at that time; and though he was a prince of more learning and knowledge than any other of that age, and really delighted more in books, and in the conversation of learned men; yet, of all wise men living, he was the most delighted and taken with handsome persons, and with fine clothes. He began to be weary of his favourite, the earl of Somerset, who was the only favourite that kept that post so long, without any public reproach from the people: and, by the instigation and wickedness of his wife, he became, at least, privy to a horrible murder, that exposed him to the utmost severity of the law, (the poisoning of sir Thomas Overbury,) upon which both he and his wife were condemned to die, after a trial by their peers; and many persons of quality were executed for the same.

Whilst this was in agitation, and before the utmost discovery was made, Mr. Villiers appeared in court, and drew the king's eyes upon him. There were enough in the court enough angry and incensed against Somerset, for being what themselves desired to be, and especially for being a Scotsman, and ascending, in so short a time, from being a page, to the height he was then at, to contribute all they could to promote the one, that they might throw out the other: which being easily brought to pass, by the proceeding of the law upon his crime aforesaid, the other found very little difficulty in rendering himself gracious to the king, whose nature and disposition was very flowing in affection towards persons so adorned. Insomuch that, in few days after his first appearance in court, he was made cupbearer to the king; by which he was naturally to be much in his presence, and so admitted to that conversation and discourse, with which that prince always abounded at his meals.

And his inclination to his new cupbearer disposed him to administer frequent occasions of discoursing of the court of France, and the transactions there, with which he had been so lately acquainted, that he could pertinently enlarge upon that subject, to the king's great delight, and to the reconciling the esteem and value of all the standers by likewise to him: which was a thing the king was well pleased with. He acted very few weeks upon this stage, when he mounted higher; and, being knighted, without any other qualification, he was at the same time made gentleman of the bedchamber, and knight of the order of the garter; and in a short time (very short for such a prodigious ascent) he was made a baron, a viscount, an earl, a marquis, and became lord high admiral of England, lord warden of the cinque ports, master of the horse, and entirely

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