island by the mercenaries of the States-General over the Coldstream Guards and the Buffs would be almost as great a calamity as a defeat. Such a victory would be the most cruel wound ever inflicted on the national pride of one of the proudest of nations. The crown so won would never be worn in peace or security. The hatred with which the High Commission and the Jesuits were regarded would give place to the more intense hatred. which would be inspired by the alien conquerors; and many, who had hitherto contemplated the power of France with dread and loathing, would say that, if a foreign yoke must be borne, there was less ignominy in submitting to France than in submitting to Holland.

These considerations might well have made William uneasy, even if all the military means of the United Provinces had been at his absolute disposal. But, in truth, it seemed very doubtful whether he would be able to obtain the assistance of a single battalion. Of all the difficulties with which he had to struggle, the greatest, though little noticed by English historians, arose from the constitution of the Batavian republic. No great society has ever existed during a long course of years under a polity so inconvenient. The States-General could not make war or peace, could not conclude any alliance or levy any tax, without the consent of the States of every province. The States of a province could not give such consent without the consent of every municipality which had a share in the representation. Every municipality was, in some sense, a sovereign state, and, as such, claimed the right of communicating directly with foreign embassadors, and of concerting with them the means of defeating schemes on which other municipalities were intent. In some town councils, the party which had, during several generations, regarded the influence of the stadtholders with jealousy, had great power. At the head of this party were the magistrates of the noble city of Amsterdam, which was then at the height of prosperity. They had, ever since the peace of Nimeguen, kept up a friendly cor

respondence with Louis through the instrumentality of his able and active envoy the Count of Avaux. Propositions brought forward by the stadtholder as indispensa ble to the security of the Commonwealth, sanctioned by all the provinces except Holland, and sanctioned by seventeen of the eighteen town councils of Holland, had repeatedly been negatived by the single voice of Amsterdam. The only constitutional remedy in such cases was that deputies from the cities which were agreed should pay a visit to the city which dissented, for the purpose of expostulation. The number of deputies was unlimited; they might continue to expostulate as long as they thought fit; and, meanwhile, all their expenses were defrayed by the obstinate community which refused to yield to their arguments. This absurd mode of coercion had once been tried with success on the little town of Gorkum, but was not likely to produce much effect on the mighty and opulent Amsterdam, renowned throughout the world for its haven bristling with innumerable masts, its canals bordered by stately mansions, its gorgeous hall of state, walled, roofed, and floored with polished marble, its warehouses filled with the most costly productions of Ceylon and Surinam, and its Exchange resounding with the endless hubbub of all the languages spoken by civilized men.*

The disputes between the majority which supported the stadtholder and the minority headed by the magistrates of Amsterdam had repeatedly run so high that bloodshed had seemed to be inevitable. On one occasion the prince had attempted to bring the refractory deputies to punishment as traitors. On another occasion the gates of Amsterdam had been barred against him, and troops had been raised to defend the privileges of the municipal council. That the rulers of this great city would ever consent to an expedition offensive in the highest degree to Louis whom they courted, and likely to aggrandize the house of Orange which they abhorred, was not likely. Yet, with

out their consent, such an expedition could not legally be undertaken. To quell their opposition by main force was a course from which, in different circumstances, the reso lute and daring stadtholder would not have shrunk. But at that moment it was most important that he should carefully avoid every act which could be represented as tyrannical. He could not venture to violate the fundamental laws of Holland at the very moment at which he was drawing the sword against his father-in-law for violating the fundamental laws of England. The violent subversion of one free constitution would have been a strange prelude to the violent restoration of another.*

There was yet another difficulty which has been too little noticed by English writers, but which was never for a moment absent from William's mind. In the expedition which he meditated he could succeed only by appealing to the Protestant feeling of England, and by stimulating that feeling till it became, for a time, the dominant and almost the exclusive sentiment of the nation. This would, indeed, have been a very simple course, had the end of all his politics been to effect a revolution in our island and to reign there. But he had in view an ulterior end which could be obtained only by the help of princes sincerely attached to the Church of Rome. He was desirous to unite the empire, the Catholic king, and the Holy See with England and Holland in a league against the French ascendency. It was therefore necessary that, while striking the greatest blow ever struck in defense of Protestantism, he should yet contrive not to lose the good will of gov ernments which regarded Protestantism as a deadly heresy.

Such were the complicated difficulties of this great undertaking. Continental statesmen saw a part of those difficulties; British statesmen another part. One capa

cious and powerful mind alone took them all in at one view, and determined to surmount them all. It was no easy thing to subvert the English government by means

* As to the relation in which the stadtholder and the city of Amsterdam stood toward each other, see Avaux, passim.

of a foreign army without galling the national pride of Englishmen. It was no easy thing to obtain from that Batavian faction which regarded France with partiality, and the house of Orange with aversion, a decision in favor of an expedition which would confound all the schemes of France, and raise the house of Orange to the height of greatness. It was no easy thing to lead enthusiastic Protestants on a crusade against popery with the good wishes of almost all popish governments and of the pope himself. Yet all these things William effected. All his objects, even those which appeared most incompatible with each other, he attained completely and at once. The whole history of ancient and of modern times records no other such triumph of statesmanship.

The task would indeed have been too arduous even for such a statesman as the Prince of Orange, had not his chief adversaries been at this time smitten with an infatuation such as by many men not prone to superstition was ascribed to the special judgment of God. Not only was the King of England, as he had ever been, stupid and perverse, but even the counsel of the politic King of France was turned into foolishness. and energy could do, William did. no wisdom or energy could have themselves studiously removed.

Whatever wisdom Those obstacles which overcome, his enemies

On the great day on which the bishops were acquitted, and on which the invitation was dispatched to the Hague, James returned from Hounslow to Westminster in a gloomy and agitated mood. He made an effort that afternoon to appear cheerful; but the bonfires, the rockets, and, above all, the waxen popes who were blazing in every quarter of London, were not likely to soothe him. Those who saw him on the morrow could easily read in his face and demeanor the violent emotions which agitated his mind. During some days he appeared so unwilling to talk about the trial that even Barillon could not venture to introduce the subject.‡

* Adda, July, 1688. Reresby's Memoirs. Barillon, July, 1688.

Soon it began to be clear that defeat and mortification had only hardened the king's heart. The first words which he uttered when he learned that the objects of his revenge had escaped him were, "So much the worse for them." Within a week, these words, which he, according to his fashion, repeated many times, were fully explained. He blamed himself, not for having prosecuted the bishops, but for having prosecuted them before a tribunal where questions of fact were decided by juries, and where established principles of law could not be utterly disregarded even by the most servile judges. This error he determined to repair. Not only the seven prelates who had signed the petition, but the whole Anglican clergy, should have reason to curse the day on which they had triumphed over their sovereign. Within a fortnight after the trial, an order was made enjoining all chancellors of dioceses and all archdeacons to make a strict inquisition throughout their re-. spective jurisdictions, and to report to the High Commission, within five weeks, the names of all such rectors, vicars, and curates as had omitted to read the declaration. The king anticipated with delight the terror with which the offenders would learn that they were to be cited before a court which would give them no quarter.† The number of culprits was little, if at all, short of ten thousand; and, after what had passed at Magdalene College, every one of them might reasonably expect to be interdicted from all his spiritual functions, ejected from his benefice, declared incapable of holding any other preferment, and charged with the costs of the proceedings which had reduced him to beggary.

Such was the persecution with which James, smarting from his great defeat in Westminster Hall, resolved to harass the clergy. Meanwhile, he tried to show the lawyers, by a prompt and large distribution of rewards and punishments, that strenuous and unblushing servility, even when least successful, was a sure title to his favor, and that whoever, after years of obsequiousness, ventured to Barillon's own phrase, July, 1688. В в

* London Gazette of July 16, 1688. II.