The History of England - Vols. 1 to 6 (363 page)

The king, finding that the parliament was resolved to grant him no supply, and would

furnish him with nothing but empty protestations of duty,f
or disagreeable complaints

of grievances; took advantage of the plague,g
which began to appear at Oxford, and on that pretence, immediately dissolved them. By finishing the session with a dissolution, instead of a prorogation, he sufficiently expressed his displeasure at their conduct.

To supply the want of parliamentary aids, Charles issued privy August 12.

seals for borrowing money from his subjects.h
The advantage reaped by this expedient was a small compensation for the disgust which it occasioned. By means, however, of that supply, and by other expedients, he was, though with difficulty, enabled to equip his fleet.

It consisted of eighty vessels, great and small; and carried on October 1.

board an army of 10,000 men. Sir Edward Cecil, lately created Viscount Wimbleton,

was entrusted with the command. He sailed immediately for

Naval expedition

Cadiz, and found the bay full of Spanish ships of great value. He against Spain.

either neglected to attack these ships, or attempted it

preposterously. The army was landed, and a fort taken: But the undisciplined soldiers, finding store of wine, could not be restrained from the utmost excesses. Farther stay appearing fruitless, they were reimbarked; and the fleet put to sea with an intention of intercepting the Spanish galleons. But the plague having seized the seamen and soldiers,

they were obliged to abandon all hopes of this prize, and return November.

to England. Loud complaints were made against the court for

entrusting so important a command to a man like Cecil, whom, though he possessed great experience, the people, judging by the event, esteemed of slender capacity.
i

Charles, having failed of so rich a prize, was obliged again to 1626.

have recourse to a parliament. Though the ill success of his enterprizes diminished his authority, and showed every day more plainly the imprudence of the Spanish war; though the encrease of his necessities rendered him more dependent, and more exposed to the encroachments of the commons; he was PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)

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resolved to try once more that regular and constitutional expedient for supply. Perhaps too, a little political art,

which at that time he practised, was much trusted to. He had Second parliament.

named four popular leaders, sheriffs of counties; Sir Edward Coke, Sir Robert Philips, Sir Thomas Wentworth, and Sir Francis Seymour; and, though the question had been formerly much contested,
k
he thought that he had by that means incapacitated them from being elected members. But his intention being so evident, rather put the commons more upon their guard. Enow of patriots still remained to keep up the ill humour of the house; and men needed but little instruction or rhetoric to recommend to them practices, which encreased their own importance and consideration. The weakness of the court also could not more evidently appear, than by its being reduced to use so ineffectual an expedient, in order to obtain an influence over the commons.

The views, therefore, of the last parliament were immediately February 6.

adopted; as if the same men had been every where elected, and no time had intervened since their meeting. When the king laid before the house his necessities, and asked for supply, they immediately voted him three subsidies and three fifteenths; and though they afterwards added one subsidy more, the sum was little proportioned to the greatness of the occasion, and ill fitted to promote those views of success and glory, for which the young prince, in his first enterprize, so ardently longed. But this circumstance was not the most disagreeable one. The supply was only voted by the commons. The passing of that vote into a law was reserved till

the end of the session.l
A condition was thereby made, in a very undisguised manner, with their sovereign. Under colour of redressing grievances, which, during this short reign, could not be very numerous; they were to proceed in regulating and controuling every part of government, which displeased them: And if the king either cut them short in this undertaking, or refused compliance with their demands, he must not expect any supply from the commons. Great dissatisfaction was expressed by Charles

at a treatment, which he deemed so harsh and undutiful.m
But his urgent necessities obliged him to submit; and he waited with patience, observing to what side they would turn themselves.

The duke of Buckingham, formerly obnoxious to the public,

Impeachment of

became every day more unpopular, by the symptoms which

Buckingham.

appeared both of his want of temper and prudence, and of the uncontrouled ascendant, which he had acquired over his master.
n
Two violent attacks he was obliged this session to sustain; one from the earl of Bristol, another from the house of commons.

As long as James lived, Bristol, secure of the concealed favour of that monarch, had expressed all duty and obedience; in expectation that an opportunity would offer of re-instating himself in his former credit and authority. Even after Charles’s accession, he despaired not. He submitted to the king’s commands of remaining at his country-seat, and of absenting himself from parliament. Many trials he made to regain the good opinion of his master; but finding them all fruitless, and observing Charles to be entirely governed by Buckingham, his implacable enemy, he resolved no longer to keep any measures with the court. A new spirit, he saw, and a new power arising in PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)

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the nation; and to these he was determined for the future to trust for his security and protection.

When the parliament was summoned, Charles, by a stretch of prerogative, had given orders that no writ, as is customary, should be sent to Bristol.
o
That nobleman applied to the house of lords by petition; and craved their good offices with the king for obtaining what was his due as a peer of the realm. His writ was sent him; but accompanied with a letter from the lord keeper, Coventry, commanding him, in the king’s name, to absent himself from parliament. This letter Bristol conveyed to the lords, and asked advice how to proceed in so delicate a situation.
p
The king’s prohibition was withdrawn, and Bristol took his seat. Provoked at these repeated instances of rigour, which the court denominated contumacy, Charles ordered his attorney-general to enter an accusation of high treason against him. By way of recrimination, Bristol accused Buckingham of high treason. Both the earl’s defence of himself and accusation of the duke remain;
q
and together with some original letters still extant, contain the fullest and most authentic account of all the negociations with the house of Austria. From the whole, the great inprudence of the duke evidently appears, and the sway of his ungovernable passions; but it would be difficult to collect thence any action, which in the eye of the law could be deemed a crime; much less could subject him to the penalty of treason.

The impeachment of the commons was still less dangerous to the duke, were it estimated by the standard of law and equity. The house, after having voted, upon some queries of Dr. Turner’s,
that common fame was a sufficient ground of
accusation by the commons,
r
proceeded to frame regular articles against Buckingham.

They accused him, of having united many offices in his person; of having bought two of them; of neglecting to guard the seas, insomuch that many merchant-ships had fallen into the hands of the enemy; of delivering ships to the French king, in order to serve against the Hugonots; of being employed in the sale of honours and offices; of accepting extensive grants from the crown; of procuring many titles of honour for his kindred; and of administering physic to the late king without acquainting his physicians. All these articles appear, from comparing the accusation and reply, to be either frivolous, or false, or both.
s
The only charge, which could be regarded as important, was, that he had extorted a sum of ten thousand pounds from the East-India company, and that he had confiscated some goods belonging to French merchants, on pretence of their being the property of Spanish. The impeachment never came to a full determination; so that it is difficult for us to give a decisive opinion with regard to these articles: But it must be confessed, that the duke’s answer in these particulars, as in all the rest, is so clear and satisfactory, that it is impossible to refuse our assent to it.
t
His faults and blemishes were in many respects very great; but rapacity and avarice were vices, with which he was entirely unacquainted.

It is remarkable, that the commons, though so much at a loss to find articles of charge against Buckingham, never adopted Bristol’s accusation, or impeached the duke for his conduct in the Spanish treaty, the most blameable circumstance in his whole life.

He had reason to believe the Spaniards sincere in their professions; yet, in order to gratify his private passions, he had hurried his master and his country into a war pernicious to the interests of both. But so rivetted throughout the nation were the PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)

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prejudices with regard to Spanish deceit and falsehood, that very few of the commons seem as yet to have been convinced that they had been seduced by Buckingham’s narrative: A certain proof that a discovery of this nature was not, as is imagined by several historians, the cause of so sudden and surprising a variation in the measures of the parliament.
NOTE [S]

While the commons were thus warmly engaged against Buckingham, the king seemed desirous of embracing every opportunity, by which he could express a contempt and disregard for them. No one was at that time sufficiently sensible of the great weight, which the commons bore in the balance of the constitution. The history of England had never hitherto afforded one instance, where any great movement or revolution had proceeded from the lower house. And as their rank, both considered in a body and as individuals, was but the second in the kingdom; nothing less than fatal experience could engage the English princes to pay a due regard to the inclinations of that formidable assembly.

The earl of Suffolk, chancellor of the university of Cambridge, dying about this time, Buckingham, though lying under impeachment, was yet, by means of court-interest, chosen in his place. The commons resented and loudly complained of this affront; and the more to enrage them, the king himself wrote a letter to the university, extolling the

duke, and giving them thanks for his election.w

The lord keeper, in the king’s name, expressly commanded the house not to meddle with his minister and servant, Buckingham; and ordered them to finish, in a few days, the bill, which they had begun for the subsidies, and to make some addition to them;

otherwise they must not expect to sit any longer.x
And though these harsh commands were endeavoured to be explained and mollified, a few days after, by a speech of

Buckingham’s,y
they failed not to leave a disagreeable impression behind them.

Besides a more stately stile, which Charles in general affected to this parliament than to the last, he went so far, in a message, as to threaten the commons, that, if they did not furnish him with supplies, he should be obliged to try
new counsels.
This language was sufficiently clear: Yet, lest any ambiguity should remain, Sir Dudley Carleton, vice-chamberlain, took care to explain it. “I pray you consider,” said he, “what these new counsels are or may be. I fear to declare those that I conceive. In all Christian kingdoms, you know that parliaments were in use anciently, by which those kingdoms were governed in a most flourishing manner; until the monarchs began to know their own strength, and, seeing the turbulent spirit of their parliaments, at length they, by little and little, began to stand on their prerogatives, and at last overthrew the parliaments, throughout Christendom, except here only with us.—Let us be careful then to preserve the king’s good opinion of parliaments, which bringeth such happiness to this nation, and makes us envied of all others, while there is this sweetness between his majesty and the commons; lest we lose the repute of a free people by our turbulency in parliament.”
z
These imprudent suggestions rather gave warning than struck terror. A precarious liberty, the commons thought, which was to be preserved by unlimited complaisance, was no liberty at all. And it was necessary, while yet in their power, to secure the constitution by such invincible barriers, that no PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)

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king or minister should ever, for the future, dare to speak such a language to any parliament, or even entertain such a project against them.

Two members of the house, Sir Dudley Digges and Sir John Elliott, who had been employed as managers of the impeachment against the duke, were thrown into prison.
a
The commons immediately declared, that they would proceed no farther upon business, till they had satisfaction in their privileges. Charles alledged, as the reason of this measure, certain seditious expressions, which, he said, had, in their accusation of the duke, dropped from these members. Upon enquiry, it appeared, that no such expression had been used.
b
The members were released, and the king reaped no other benefit from this attempt than to exasperate the house still farther, and to show some degree of precipitancy and indiscretion.