pedition to South America, with the hope of realizing the golden visions in which he was prone to indulge. It proved a total failure, but was very offensive to the Spaniards; and on his return James was persuaded to let the former sentence against Raleigh (which had never been remitted) take its course, and he was most unjustly executed.

When the Spanish match was broken off, the prince was engaged to Henrietta Maria, daughter of the King of France. Before the marriage took place, James breathed his last, after a short illness (1625), meeting his end with the appearance of firmness and devotion.

In this reign the great Lord Chancellor Bacon, whom we have mentioned already as a philosopher, and who contributed so much to the advancement of science, was compelled to acknowledge himself guilty of bribery and corruption in his high office; a memorable instance that the most exalted genius will not preserve a man from disgraceful crime, without that fear of God which is the beginning of wisdom.

Throughout the reign of James, the bishops and clergy generally seem to have had clearer views of their duty to the Church than were prevalent in the latter days of Elizabeth. But orthodoxy was sadly discouraged by Bancroft's being succeeded in the see of Canterbury by Abbott, who was as much a Puritan at heart, as his predecessor had been the reverse. (It had been expected that Andrewes, bishop of Winchester, a noble and true-hearted son of the Church, would have been selected instead.) It was no unnatural result that the Puritans, or Nonconformists, gained strength daily. But the issue of this fatal step will appear in the next reign.

Before parting with James, it is fair to mention, that as he was a man of considerable erudition himself, so his court and kingdom possessed men eminent in science and literature. The learned Buchanan had been his preceptor. Shakspere and Jonson still lived and wrote during his reign. Speed and Camden were noted as diligent antiquaries. The two Casaubons and Antonio de Dominis were specially invited to England, and patronized; and the Admirable Crichton, a Scotchman, astonished Europe with his accomplishments. A literary monarch had thus no slight influence on the literary character of his people.

CHAPTER XXX.

CHARLES I. 1625–1642 (TILL THE MEETING OF THE LONG PARLIAMENT).

Born at Holyrood Palace. Buried at Windsor. Reigned 24 From A.D. 1625 to A.D. 1649.

years.

Archbishops of Canterbury.

George Abbott, 1611-1633. 1 William Laud, 1633-1645. Vacancy, 16 years.

CHARLES was in his twenty-fifth year when he became king. His character was ill suited to the times in which he lived, and the spirits with which he had to cope. The House of Commons, which had gradually become conscious of its power, had now learnt to refuse supplies, unless the crown would grant a redress of grievances. Every Englishman must admire the courage with which the Commons asserted the unlawfulness of taxation without consent of parliament, and maintained the great principle that no one shall be imprisoned without being brought to a fair and open trial. The opposition, however, which began on these grounds, was soon tainted with the personal ends of those who conducted it, and degenerated into the most bitter enmity against both royalty and episcopacy. Released from the shackles of the Romish superstition, the minds of men had rushed to an opposite extreme, and had become intolerant of those restraints on the individual will, which are implied in a monarchical government and an episcopal Church.

Charles, on the other hand, had been trained in lofty notions of a right in kings to unlimited obedience, and regarded many of the concessions that were extorted from him as so many encroachments on his prerogative, which he therefore was at liberty to recall, when he should find himself able to do so. Exemplary in his conduct as a husband and father, and devoutly attached to the English Church, he yet suffered himself at times to dissemble with his enemies. With chivalrous courage, and a cultivated mind, he showed too often not only an unbending will, but a weak judgment, and was ever too much influenced by his queen, and other counsellors far inferior in ability

to himself. In the early part of his reign our sympathy will often be with the parliaments, which upheld the rights of the people; but in the latter period of his history, our judgment as well as feeling will for the most part be in favour of the king.

He was at first much influenced by the Duke of Buckingham, who was both disliked and suspected by the people: and though a popular war with Spain and Austria was impending, the first parliament that met would grant little more than 100,000l.; a sum very inadequate to the occasion. The feeling against Buckingham was increased by a discovery that it was intended to employ against the French Huguenots at Rochelle some ships that were collected for the Spanish war; and also by the failure of an expedition against Cadiz. On the meeting of the second parliament, Buckingham was impeached as the cause of all the evils under which the kingdom suffered. To screen his favourite, the king dissolved the parliament, and proceeded to raise money on his own authority. He had been induced by Buckingham to engage in a war with France, and an expedition was led to Rochelle, which failed through the duke's misconduct. Charles summoned a third parliament, which at once embodied the grievances of the nation in what is known as the Petition of Right; declaring illegal all taxation by the king alone, and asserting the right of all subjects to the writ of habeas corpus. This is a writ by which persons who are imprisoned can demand an open hearing, according to the law of the land. A bill was founded on this petition, and passed with the king's reluctant consent: and though this law was afterwards disregarded, it yet remained as a monument of the rights of Englishmen, to which they could ever appeal, and which they were able at last to establish.

A fleet and army were at this time assembled at Portsmouth, which Buckingham was again to command; but on leaving his chamber one morning, he was stabbed by an unknown hand, and died immediately of the wound. The assassin proved to be one Felton, a man of a fanatical spirit, who had learnt to regard the duke as the great grievance of the kingdom. He was executed as a murderer.

On the death of Buckingham, Charles took to his counsels Sir Thomas Wentworth, whom he afterwards made

Earl of Strafford, and Laud, bishop of London, who on the death of Abbott became archbishop of Canterbury. The third parliament was soon dissolved, after a scene of great violence, in which the speaker was forcibly held in his chair, when he would have left the house in compliance with the king's desire, who even threatened to force the doors and take away the mace.

For nearly twelve years from this period Charles summoned no parliament. He made peace with Spain and France, and raised by his own authority such taxes as he wanted, especially certain duties on the import of wine and other merchandise, called tonnage and poundage. With these he maintained a brilliant court, and encouraged the fine arts, for which he had a very correct taste. The kingdom at this time enjoyed much prosperity.

Under the influence of Laud, the king took measures for the more decent celebration of Divine worship according to the English ritual, and punished with severity such persons as opposed his restorations; especially Prynne, a barrister, and Bastwick, a physician, who wrote against episcopacy. Abbott had been very remiss in enforcing either the doctrine of the Church, or its discipline. Even the edifices of the Church had been suffered to go out of repair. The burden of the expense occasioned by the attempt to enforce the necessary reparations, concurred with the loose way of thinking and acting generally prevalent, to exasperate people against the archbishop, and by inference against the king. Perhaps also things were carried by the authorities with too high a hand in Church as well as in State.

In civil matters, the arbitrary manner in which the king governed excited a growing discontent; and at length the payment of a tax called ship-money, which the king revived, was resisted by John Hampden, a gentleman of Bucks. The cause was tried, and decided in Charles's favour; but the example of resistance which was thus set was not forgotten. Having lost his cause, and despairing of the liberty of England, Hampden was preparing to leave the kingdom with Oliver Cromwell and others of the same opinion, when they were stopped by a proclamation forbidding, all ship-masters to take out passengers to New England without a licence. How little did Charles foresee the part which those persons were to play, when he thus stopped their departure from his kingdom!

The king had appointed Strafford his deputy in Ireland, and that nobleman's measures were very successful in quieting and improving the condition of the country. In Scotland, however, the attempts of Charles and Archbishop Laud to strengthen the cause of episcopacy produced a violent reaction. The occasion was, their endeavour to introduce there the Liturgy of the Church of England. Such a measure had been contemplated by James, who, as we have seen already, had procured the consecration of bishops for Scotland in the year 1610. An act had been passed in Scotland, authorizing certain of the bishops of that country to prepare a Book of Common Prayer. The project was dropped for a time, but it was revived in the reign of Charles. It was, however, then determined not to introduce exactly the same Prayer Book, lest it should be supposed that the Scotch Church was intended thereby to be made dependent upon that of England. At the same time, the two Liturgies were not to be allowed to differ in any material points, lest the Romanists should exult in any fancied retrograde movement on the part of those who had thrown off their superstitious observances. Accordingly a book was framed by the Scottish bishops, and approved by Archbishop Laud, rather on the model of the first book of King Edward VI., than of that then in use. It was first introduced in Edinburgh on the 23rd of July, 1637. The result was a serious outbreak-in favour of the Presbyterian system-a confusion, it is to be feared, in the case of many, a wilful one, of the claims of Popery and Episcopacy—and a solemn league and covenant against either. Scotland had to be invaded by an English army. In order to provide funds for the war that broke forth on these grounds, a parliament was summoned, which met April 13, 1640; but was dissolved in about three weeks, in consequence of the resistance which it threatened to the measures of the king. Finding, however, that the war in Scotland became serious, he was forced to summon another parliament, which met Nov. 3, in the same year, and is known in history as the Long Parliament. From its meeting we may date the rise of a tyranny far more insupportable than the despotic rule of Charles, and a rebellion that overthrew both the altar and the throne.