unreasonable and unchristian thing to despise any one for his poverty, and it was one of the greatest sensualities in the world to give." He gave it as a rule to his friends of estate and quality, "to treat their poor neighbors with such a cheerfulness, that they might be glad to have met with them." The alms of lending had an eminent place in his practice. He was accustomed strongly to recommend to others, to be always furnished with something to do," as the best expedient both for innocence and pleasure.Devoted as he was to his studies, he would never suffer any body to wait, that came to speak to him and to the poor he came with peculiar alacrity. British Biography, vol. v. p. 219-225. ED.]

The earl of Clarendon, ford chancellor, was prime minister and at the head of the king's councils. The year [1661] began with new scenes of pleasure and diversion, occasioned by the king's marriage with the infanta of Portugal, which was consummated April 30. The match was promoted by general Monk and lord Clarendon, if, according to the Oxford historian, the latter was not the first mover of it. And it was reckoned very strange, that a protestant chancellor should advise the king to a popish princess, when a catholic king proposed at the same time a protestant consort. But his lordship had further views, for it was generally talked among the merchants, that the infanta could have no children, in which case the chancellor's daughter, who had been privately married to the

† Dr. Grey observes, that Mr. Neal antedates this marriage somewhat above a year; the king met the infanta at Portsmouth the 21st of May, 1662, and was then privately married to her by Dr. Sheldon, bishop of London. The doctor, on the authority of Eachard, endeavors to invalidate the imputation which lies on lord Clarendon of being the promoter, if not the first mover of this marriage. Mr. Neal is supported in his representation of the affair by the testimony of sir John Reresby, who says, "it is well known, that the lord chancellor had the blame of this unfruitful match." He adds, "that the queen was said to have had a constant fluor upon her, which rendered her incapable of conception. Though, on this occasion," says sir John, "every thing was gay, and splendid, and profusely joyful, it was easy to discern that the king was not excessively charmed with his new bride, who was a very little woman, with a pretty tolerable face. She neither in person or manners had any one article to stand in competition with the charms of the countess of Castlemain, afterwards duchess of Cleveland, the finest woman of her age." Memoirs, p. 9, 10. Ed.

king's brother, must succeed, and her issue by the duke of York become heirs to the throne; which happened accordingly in the persons of Queen Mary II. and Queen Anne. Such were the aspiring views of this great man, which together with his haughty behavior,in the end proved his ruin. The convention parliament being dissolved, a new one was elected, and summoned to meet May 8. The house of commons, by the interest of the court party, had a considerable majority of such as were zealous enemies of the presbyterians, and abettors of the principles of archbishop Laud; many of whom, having impaired their fortunes in the late wars, became tools of the ministry in all their arbitrary and violent measures. The court kept above one hundred of them in constant pay, who went by the name of the club of voters, and received large sums of money out of the Exchequer, till they had almost subverted the constitution; and then, because they would not put the finishing hand to what they had unadvisedly begun, they were disbanded.

The king acquainted the houses at the opening of the sessions, that "He valued himself much upon keeping his word, and upon making good whatsoever he had promised to his subjects." But the chancellor, who commented upon the king's speech, spoke a different language, and told the house, That there were a sort of patients in the king

There were only fifty-six members of the presbyterian party returned, notwithstanding their great interest in almost all the corporations. Bat in the interval, between the two parliaments, the court party had been active; and the hints given at the dissolution of the late parliament by the chancellor, had great weight. He recommended that "such persons should be returned as were not likely to oppose the king, but had already served him, and were likely to serve him with their whole heart, and to gratify him in all his desires."* Had the people been alive to a just sense of the design of representation and the nature of the constitution, they would have received these hints with indignant contempt. Ed.

The king went to the house of lords, to open the sessions, with almost as much pomp and splendor as had been displayed on the coronation-day; and, says my author, for the same reasons, to dazzle the mob and to impress on the minds of the people very exalted notions of the dignity of regal government. Secret History of the Court and Reign of Charles II. vol. i. p. 407, note.

Ed.

Kennet's Chron. p. 434.

*Secret Hist. of the Court and Reign of Charles II. vol. i. p. 171,and 406›

dom that deserved their utmost severity, and none of their lenity; these were the seditious preachers, who could not be contented to be dispensed with for their full obedience to some laws established, without reproaching and inveighing against those laws how established soever, who tell their auditories that when the apostle bid them stand to their liberties he bid them stand to their arms, and who, by repeating the very expressions, and teaching the very doctrines they set on foot in the year 1640, sufficiently declare that they have no mind that twenty years should put an end to the miseries we have undergone. What good christians can think, without horror, of these ministers of the gospel, who by their function should be messengers of peace, but are in their practice only the trumpets of war, and incendiaries towards rebillion?-And if the persons and place can aggravate their offence, so no doubt it does before God and man. Methinks the preaching rebellion and treason out of the pulpit, should be as much worse than advancing it in the market, as poisoning a man at a communion would be worse than killing him at a tavern-" His lordship concludes thus: "If you do not provide for the thorough quenching these firebrands; king, lords, and commons, shall be the meaner subjects, and the whole kingdom will be kindled into a general flame." This was a home-thrust at the presbyterians; the chancellor did not explain himself upon the authors of these seditious sermons, his design being not to accuse partiular persons, but to obtain a general order which might suppress all preachers who were not of the church of England; and the parliament was prepared to run blindfold into all the court measures; for in this sessions the militia was given absolutely to the king -the solemn league and covenant was declared void and illegal-the act for disabling persons in holy orders to exercise temporal jurisdiction was repealed-the bishops were restored to their seats in parliament-the old ecclesiastical jurisdiction was revived by the repeal of the 17th of Charles I. except the oath ex officio--and it was made a præmunire to call the king a papist.

Kennet's Chron. p. 510-11.

|| To Mr. Neal's detail of the acts of this sessions, it should be added, That the commons voted, that all their members should receive

The storm was all this while gathering very black over the presbyterians; for when the parliament met a second time, Nov. 20, the king complimented the bishops, who appeared now again in their places among the peers, and observed in his speech, that it was a felicity he had much desired to see, as the only thing wanting to restore the old constitution. He then spoke the language of the chancellor, and told the commons," that there were many wicked instruments who labored night and day to disturb the public peace. That it was worthy of their care to provide proper remedies for the diseases of that kind; that if they found new diseases they must find new remedies. That the difficulties which concerned religion were too hard for him, and therefore he recommended them to their care and deliberation who could best provide for them." The tendency of this speech was to make way for breaking through the Breda declaration, and to furnish the parliament with a pretence for treating the non-conformists with rigor, to which they were themselves too well inclined.

Lord Clarendon, in a conference between the two houses, affirmed positively, that there was a real conspiracy against the peace of the kingdom; and though it was dis concerted in the city, it was carried on in divers counties; a committee was therefore appointed to enquire into the truth of the report; but after all their examinations not one single person was convicted, or so much as prosecuted for it. Great pains were taken to fasten some treasonable designs on the presbyterians; letters were sent from the sacrament according to the prescribed liturgy, before a certain day, under penalty of expulsion. This was intended as a test of their religious sincerity. Besides repealing the solemn league and covenant, they ordered it to be taken out of all the courts and places where it was recorded, and to be burnt by the common hangman. To the same sentence were doomed all acts, ordinances, or engagements, which had been dictated by a republican spirit during the late times. And they enervated the right of petitioning by various restrictions; limiting the number of signatures to twenty, unless with the sanction of three justices, or the major part of the grand jury; and of those who should present a petition to the king or either house of parliament to ten persons, under the penalty of a fine of one hundred pounds and three months imprisonment. Secret History of the Court and Reign of Charles II. vol. i. p. 412, 13, 14. Ed.

Kennet's Chron, p, 602.

unknown hands to the chiefs of the party in several parts of the kingdom, intimating the project of a general insurrection, in which their friends were concerned, and desiring them to communicate it to certain persons in their neighborhood, whom they name in their letters, that they may be ready at time and place. A letter of this kind was directed to the reverend Mr. Sparry, in Worcestershire, desiring him and captain Yarrington to be ready with money; and to acquaint Mr. Oatland and Mr. Baxter with the design. This, with a packet of the same kind, was said to be left under a hedge by a Scots pedlar; and as soon as they were found, they were carried to sir J. Packington, who immediately committed Sparry, Oatland, and Farrington, to prison. The militia of the county was raised, and the city of Worcester put into a posture of defence; but the sham was so notorious, that the carl of Bristol, though a papist, was ashamed of it; and after some time the prisoners, for want of evidence, were released. The members for Oxfordshire, Herefordshire, and Staffordshire, informed the commons, that they had rumors of the like conspiracies in their counties. Bishop Burnet says, "That many were taken up, but none tried; that this was done to fasten an odium on the presbyterians, and to help carry the penal laws through the house; and there were appearances of foul dealing (says he) among the fiercer sort." Mr. Locke adds, that the reports of a general insurrection were spread over the whole nation, by the very persons who invented them; and though lord Clarendon could not but be acquainted with the farce, he kept it on foot to facilitate passing the severe laws that were now coming upon the carpet.* The government could not with decency attack the non-conformists purely on account of their religion; the declaration from Breda was too express on that article; they were therefore to be charged with raising disturbances in the state. But supposing the fact to be true, that some few malecontents had been seditiously disposed, which yet was never made out, what reason can be assigned why it should be charged upon the principles of a whole body of men, who were unquestionably willing to be quiet?

Rapin, vol. ii. p. 627.