with the Commons, he sent for the declaration, and with his own hands broke the seals. But the Parliament, though satisfied with the king's compliance, had not lost all those apprehensions to which the measures of the court had given so much foundation. A law was passed, known as the TEST ACT, which continued in force till the reign of George IV.* By this act all persons holding any public office were compelled to take the oaths of allegiance ⚫ and supremacy, to receive the sacrament in the Established Church, and to abjure all belief in the doctrine of transubstantiation. In consequence of this act, the Duke of York resigned all his commands, and was succeeded in the command of the fleet by Prince Rupert. He fought several battles with the Dutch, this summer, but the victory was generally doubtful. The French alliance, and the war against Holland, became more and more unpopular, and when the Parliament met in the autumn they discovered great symptoms of ill-humor. They expressed great indignation at the marriage of the Duke of York with a princess of the house of Modena, then in close alliance with France. They voted the standing army a grievance, and declared that they would grant no more supplies unless it appeared that the Dutch were so obstinate as to refuse all reasonable conditions of peace. To cut short these disagreeable attacks, the king prorogued the Parliament amid scenes of great confusion (Nov. 4).

The "Cabal" ministry was now at an end. Lord Shaftesbury, foreseeing the coming storm, had deserted the court, and become the chief leader of the opposition. Directly after the prorogation he was dismissed from the office of chancellor, to which he had been elevated in the preceding year. The great seal was given to Sir Heneage Finch, afterward Earl of Nottingham. The test had incapacitated Clifford, and the white staff was conferred on Sir Thomas Osborne, soon after created Earl of Danby,† a minister of abilities, who had risen by his parliamentary talents. The king's necessities soon obliged him again to assemble the Parlia· ment (1674), and by some popular acts he paved the way for the session. But all his efforts were in vain. The disgust of the Commons was fixed in foundations too deep to be easily removed. They made an attack on the remaining members of the Cabal, to whose pernicious counsels they imputed all their present grievThe king plainly saw that he could expect no supply from the Commons for carrying on a war so odious to them, and that he must defer to a more convenient time the execution of his se

ances.

For farther particulars, see Notes and Illustrations (A).

He was created by William III. Marquess of Carmarthen in 1689, and Duke of Leeds in 1694, and from him the present duke is lineally descended.

A.D. 1673-1675. PEACE BETWEEN FRANCE AND HOLLAND. 497

cret treaty with Louis. He therefore concluded a separate treaty with the Dutch (Feb. 9, 1674). The honor of the flag was yielded to the English; all possessions were restored to the same condition as before the war; and the States agreed to pay to the king nearly £300,000. Charles, though obliged to make a separate peace, still kept up connections with the French monarch. He apologized for deserting his ally by representing to him all the real, undissembled difficulties under which he labored, and Louis admitted the validity of his excuses.

§ 13. Considerable alterations were about this time made in the English ministry. Buckingham was dismissed, who had long, by his wit and entertaining humor, possessed the king's favor: he now became, like Shaftesbury, a leader of the opposition. The Earl of Danby, the lord treasurer, obtained the chief direction of public affairs. He was a man of honor, and a declared enemy to the French alliance; but he never possessed authority enough to overcome the prepossessions which the king retained toward it, and Charles continued to draw annual supplies from the French court. But, while Danby scorned the idea of making the king absolute by the assistance of a foreign court, he had the highest notions of the king's prerogative, and endeavored to augment the power of the crown. Accordingly, in 1675, he caused a bill to be introduced into the House of Lords, by which all members of either house, and all who possessed any office, were required to swear that it was not lawful, upon any pretense whatever, to take arms against the king; that they abhorred the traitorous position of taking arms by his authority against his person; and that they would not at any time endeavor to alter the Protestant religion, or the established government either in Church or state. Great opposition was made to this bill; during 17 days the debates were carried on with much zeal, and it was carried only by two voices in the House of Peers. The Parliament was prorogued before its discussion by the House of Commons.

Meantime the war continued on the Continent. The Prince of Orange, supported by the emperor and the German states, continued manfully the struggle against Louis. The Earl of Danby and the nation urged Charles to join the Dutch, and put an effectual curb upon the ambition of the French monarch; but when Charles seemed disposed to yield to the wishes of his minister and his subjects, and began to levy troops, the Commons took the alarm and opposed the levy. Such was the distrust of the king, that the Commons, though anxious for a war with France, feared to intrust their sovereign with troops, lest he should employ them against their own liberties. Nor was their distrust unfounded; for at the very time that he pledged his royal word to the Commons to carry on war against France with the supplics which he begged of

them, he had signed a secret treaty with France, and had obtained a pension on the promise of his neutrality; a fact which renders his royal word, solemnly given to his subjects, one of the most dishonorable and most scandalous acts that ever proceeded from a throne. But Charles was distrusted by Louis as well as by his own subjects. The French embassador entered into secret negotiations with the popular party; bribed even some of the popular leaders to resist the war against France, and gave them proofs of the king's treachery. Charles, however, was sincerely anxious for peace; for he was sensible that, so long as the war continued abroad, he should never enjoy peace at home. As a means to this end, he was persuaded by the Earl of Danby and Sir William Temple to entertain proposals for marrying the Princess Mary, the elder daughter of the Duke of York, to the Prince of Orange, who came over to England at the close of the campaign of 1677. The marriage was celebrated on Nov. 4, and gave general satisfaction; but it occasioned no alteration in the policy of Charles, except that he exerted himself more vigorously in arranging the terms of a peace. In the following year (1678) peace was signed at Nimeguen between France and Holland. Louis resigned the city of Maestricht to the Dutch, but retained possession of FrancheComté, together with Valenciennes, Cambray, and other towns in the Low Countries. The French king thus obtained considerable accession of territory at the expense of Spain. The King of Spain and the emperor were indignant at this treaty, but were obliged to accept of the terms prescribed to them.

NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.

the Act is, " An Act for preventing dangers which may happen from Popish Recusants." Under the provisions of the act, all persons holding any office or place of trust, civil or

of York's household, were to receive the sacrament according to the usage of the Church of England, and to make and subscribe the following declaration: "I, A. B., do declare that I believe there is not any transubstantiation in the sacrament of the Lord's Supper, or in the elements of bread and wine, at or after the consecration thereof by any person whatsoever." The Dissenters entertained such fears of the papists that they actively supported the passing of this act, though it included them not less than papists, by reason of the requisition of taking the sacrament according to the rites of the Church of England.

A. TEST AND CORPORATION ACTS. The Corporation Act was passed in 1661. In it a religious test was combined with a political test. All corporate officers were re-military, or admitted of the king's or Duke quired to have taken the sacrament of the Lord's Supper, "according to the rites of the Church of England," within one year before their elections, and, upon being elected, to take the oaths of allegiance and of supremacy, and the following oath: "I, A. B., do declare and believe that it is not lawful, upon any pretense whatsoever, to take anns against the king, and that I do abhor that traitorous position of taking arms by his authority against his person, or against those that are commissioned by him;" besides subscribing a declaration against the Solemn League and Covenant. The Corporation Oath of non-resistance was abolished, not indeed at the Revolution, though it most probably became a dead letter at that epoch, but at the accession of the house of Brunswick, by the "Act for quieting and establishing Corporations." (5 Geo. I., c. 6, s. 2.) The Test Act was passed in 1673, with the object of preventing political power being placed in the hands of papists. The title of

The Parliamentary Test was imposed in the year 1678, five years after the first test. In this interval, the alarm in the country of the designs of papists had been greatly increased by the discovery of the supposed Popish Plot. The title of the act is "An Act for the more effectual preserving the King's person and government, by disabling

CHAP. XXIV.

NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.

Papists from sitting in either Honse of Parliament." Under the provisions of the act, "No peer or member of the House of Commons shall sit or vote without taking the oaths of allegiance and supremacy, and a declaration repudiating the doctrine of transubstantiation, the adoration of the Virgin, and the sacrifice of the Mass. Peers and members offending are to be deemed and adjudged Popish Recusants convict, and are to forfeit £500," besides suffering numerous disabilities. These acts were repealed in the reign of Geo. IV. The preceding account is abridged from Amos, "The English Constitution in the reign of Charles II.," p. 135, seq.

B. THE ACT OF UNIFORMITY. This act is entitled "An Act for Uniformity of Public Prayers, and administration of Sacraments and other rites and ceremonies; and for establishing the form of making, ordaining, and consecrating Bishops, priests, and deacons in the Church of England." In treating of the act, it will be convenient to notice, I., those persecuting clauses which have been repealed; and, II., those clauses touching assent and consent to the Book of Common Prayer and episcopal ordination, which continue in force in the present day.

I. By the 34th section, all former statutes relating to the uniformity of prayer and administration of the sacraments were re-enacted. The Act of Uniformity in force previously to the statute of Charles II. was the 1st of Elizabeth, c. 2, which incorporates, by reference, penal clauses in the earlier Uniformity Act of 5th and 6th Edward VI., c. 1, which, again, incorporates by reference simiilar clauses in the Uniformity Act of the 2d and 3d Edward VI., c. 1. These obscure references will be found to include the declaring or speaking any thing in the derogation, depraving, or de-pising of the Book of Common Prayer, or of any thing therein contained, or any part thereof," the punishment of which, for the third offense, is forfeiture of goods and chattels and imprisonment for life. Among other clauses included, by reference, in the Uniformity Act of Charles II., are the compelling attendance at parish churches, and the offense of whoever shall "willingly and wittingly hear or be present at any other manner or form of Common Prayer than is mentioned and set forth in the Book of Common Prayer," provisions which have been repealed by statutes of Victoria (7&8 Vict., c. 102; 9 & 10 Vict., c. 59). By the 14th section of the act, it is enacted "that no person shall presume to administer the holy sacrament of the Lord's Supper before such time as he shall be ordained priest, according to the form and manner in and by the said book prescribed, unless he have formerly been made priest by episcopal ordination, upon pain to forfeit for the said offense the sum of £100." The £100 penalty was repealed by the Toleration Act of William and Mary.

The 9th section of the act contained the following declaration: "I, A. B., do declare that it is not lawful, on any pretense whatsoever, to take arms against the king; and

499

that I do abhor that traitorous position of taking arms by his authority against his person, or against those that are commissionated by him; and that I will conform to the Liturgy of the Church of England as it is now by law established." This declaration was required to be subscribed not only by every person in holy orders, but also by public and private schoolmasters, who were likewise required to take out a license from the bishop of the diocese, under penalty of three months' imprisonment. The Declaration, so far as it relates to non-resistance, was abrogated at the Revolution (1 W. and M., c. S). The license of private tutors continned, though latterly a dead letter, till it was abolished by a statute of Victoria (9 and 10 Vict., c. 59).

A declaration, repudiating of the Solemn League and Covenant, was, by the Act of Uniformity, to be taken until the 25th of March, 1682, a period allowed for the extinction of Covenanters by the course of nature.

II. With respect to the permanent clauses of the Act of Uniformity: these are, 1st, the Declaration of assent and consent to the Book of Common Prayer; and, 2d, a provision requiring Episcopal Ordination. Abridged from Amos, "The English Constitution in the reign of Charles II.," p. 87, seq.

C. IMMUNITY OF JURIES. Previous to the year 1670, juries were frequently fined if they gave a verdict contrary to the dictation of the judge. But in that year this pernicious practice was finally abolished by the decision of Vaughan, chief justice of the Common Pleas. The Recorder of London had set a fine of 40 marks upon each of the jury who had acquitted the Quakers Penn and Mead on an indictment for an unlawful assembly. Bushell, the foreman, refused to pay, and being committed to prison, obtained his writ of Habeas Corpus from the court of Common Pleas; and on the return made, that he had been committed for finding a verdict against full and manifest evidence, and against the direction of the court, Chief Justice Vaughan held the ground to be insufficient, and discharged the prisoner. Erskine, in his famous speech for the Dean of St. Asaph, observed that the country was almost as much indebted to Bushell as to Hampden in resisting ship-money.

In earlier times, when juries were also witnesses [see p. 154], they were liable to be punished by the terrible writ of Attaint if a second jury, consisting of 24 jurors, found them guilty of giving a false verdict. The ancient punishment was, in such a case, that the jurors should be deprived of all their property, be imprisoned, and become forever infamous; and that the plaintiff should be restored to all he had lost by reason of the unjust verdict. ceeding, though obsolete even in the time of Elizabeth, was not abolished till the 5th of George IV. See Hallam's Constitutional History, iii., p. 9; Amos, English Constitution in the reign of Charles II., p. 279, seq.; Kerr's Blackstone, iii., p. 433.

This odious pro

Attinctus, stained or blackened.

Medal relating to the Rye House Plot. Obv. PERIBVNT FVLMINIS ICTV 1683. The king as Hercules menaced by a hydra-like monster, having seven human heads, which represent those of the supposed conspirators; above, a hand in the clouds holding a thun

derbolt.

CHAPTER XXV.

CHARLES II. CONTINUED. FROM THE PEACE OF NIMEGUEN TO THE DEATHI OF THE KING. A.D. 1678-1685.

§ 1. The Popish Plot. Oates's Narrative. Godfrey's Murder. § 2. Zeal of the Parliament. Bedloe's Narrative. Bill for a new Test. § 3. Accusation of Danby. Dissolution of Parliament. § 4. Trial and Execution of Coleman and others. The Duke of Monmouth. § 5. A new Parliament. Danby's Impeachment. New Council. § 6. The Exclusion Bill. Habeas Corpus Act. § 7. Prosecutions of Papists. Affairs of Scotland. Murder of Archbishop Sharpe. § 8. Meal-tub Plot. Whig and Tory. § 9. Violence of the new Parliament. Exclusion Bill rejected in the Lords. Trial and Execution of Lord Stafford. Parliament dissolved. § 10. The new Parliament dissolved. Turn of the popular Feeling. Court Prosecutions. § 11. Trial of Shaftesbury. London and other Cities deprived of their Charters. § 12. Rye House Plot. Trial and Execution of Lord Russell and Algernon Sidney. § 13. State of the Nation. Monmouth banished. § 14. Marriage of Prince George of Denmark and the Princess Anne. The King's Indolence and Subserviency. His Death and Character.

§ 1. THE English nation, ever since the fatal league with France, had entertained violent jealousies against the court. Some mysterious design was still suspected in every enterprise and profession. Arbitrary power and popery were apprehended as the scope of all projects. Each breath or rumor made the people start with anxiety: their enemies, they thought, were in their very bosom, and had gotten possession of their sovereign's confidence. While in this timorous, jealous disposition, the cry of a plot all on a sudden struck their ears. They were wakened from their slumber, and, like men affrighted and in the dark,

.