248 THE KENTISH PETITION. 11701 effectually provided for, that your Loyal Addresses may be turned into Bills of Supply, and that his most sacred majesty (whose propitious and unblemished reign over us we pray God long to continue) may be enabled powerfully to assist his allies before it is too late." Upon hearing this read, the House resolved, "That the said petition was scandalous, insolent, and seditious, tending to destroy the constitution of parliaments, and to subvert the established government of these realms." They then ordered that those gentlemen who had brought the petition should be taken into custody, as guilty of promoting it. They were committed to the Gate-house. The "great ferment out of the House," which Vernon describes, then ran through the country. "This disposition to blame the slowness in which the House of Commons proceeded, with relation to foreign affairs, and the heat with which private quarrels were pursued, began to spread itself through the whole nation."* The imprisonment of the Kentish men led to many discussions of the right of the Commons to imprison any persons but their own members, or such as had violated the privileges of the House. On the 14th of May, the day after Mr. Colepeper and his friends were committed, a paper, signed "Legion," was conveyed to Harley, the Speaker;-some accounts say, was presented to him as he entered the House. It purported to be a Memorial, in which the grievances of the nation were set forth, and the rights of the people asserted, in the boldest terms. The concluding paragraph may be taken as a sample of its general spirit: "Thus, Gentlemen, you have your duty laid before you, which 'tis hoped you will think of: but, if you continue to neglect it, you may expect to be treated according to the resentment of an injured nation; for Englishmen are no more to be slaves to parliaments than to kings." In that "History of England from the Revolution," which still holds its place in companionship with that of Hume, it is written, "The Commons were equally provoked and intimidated by this libel, which was the production of one Daniel Defoe, a scurrilous partywriter, in very little estimation." The author of "Humphrey Clinker" might have been expected to speak somewhat more respectfully of the author of "Robinson Crusoe." There is little doubt that Defoe did write the Legion Memorial. When the Kentish gentlemen were released at the end of the Session of Parliament, a public dinner was given to them at Mercers' Hall by the chief citizens of London; where, says a Tory writer, "Nothing was wanting to show their respect to them, and the cause of sedition they had been carrying on,-no, not so much as some of the nobility themselves, to give a stamp of authority to what had been done, contrary to all law, good manners, or prudence." § Another Tory pamphleteer says, speaking of this dinner, "Next the Worthies [the Kentish men] was placed their Secretary of State, the author of the Legion letter, and one might have read the downfal of Parliaments in his very countenance." was no doubt excited by his devotion to the king. in this most sturdy and sagacious representative of enlarged patriotism, and a sympathy with his own almost ceased to look for amongst those who were "swaddled, and rocked, Burnet, vol. iv. p. 497. The bitterness of Defoe William probably found the great middle class, an high views, which he had + Ibid. Smollett, chap. vi. § 54. 1701.] THE LEGION MEMORIAL. 249 and dandled" into statesmen. William respected the man who had the courage to attack that vulgar prejudice which, regarding every foreigner as an enemy to England, compelled him to dismiss the Dutch guards and the French refugees, who had served him so long and so faithfully. "The True Born Englishman" of Defoe, made this prejudice contemptible. The Kentish Petition, and the Legion Memorial, struck at the power which had set the representatives of the people above public opinion,-the power of commanding a majority of the House of Commons by frothy declamation and passionate invective. The Tories possessed the superiority in this power, and they abused it, in this season of real national peril, to an extent which has sometimes been equalled by both of the great parties in Parliament, but never excelled. The impeachment of William's Whig ministers had "dragged its slow length along," for weeks, amidst conflicts between Lords and Commons. The terms of the Partition Treaties were again and again debated, the Commons thus subjecting themselves to the just reproof of " Legion,”"Voting the Treaty of Partition fatal to Europe, because it gave so much of the Spanish dominions to the French, and not concerning yourselves to prevent their taking possession of it all." The States-General had made the most urgent appeal for the assistance of England. They were preparing for the same sort of resistance to France which had signalised them under the guidance of the young prince of Orange. The heart of the prematurely-aged king of England must have leaped in his bosom, when his countrymen sent to him to say, "We have been obliged to put ourselves in a state of defence, more than if we were actually attacked, by overflowing our country, and even cutting our dykes, to secure our frontiers." Though the Commons had passed two formal votes of support to the king in carrying out the old treaty with the Republic, they were too much occupied with their partyquarrels to look steadily at the great question upon which William had asked their advice and assistance. They were told by Legion "that they were deserting the Dutch when the French are at their doors, till it be almost too late to help them." Gradually the House of Commons came more clearly to understand the public feeling. The people wanted more deeds and less talk. They turned" from petty tyrants to the throne." The House of Lords had a quicker comprehension of the national temper than the Commons had. They addressed the king in terms which encouraged him in the work to which the remainder of his life was devoted: "We humbly desire your majesty will be pleased, not only to make good all the articles of any former treaties to the States-General, but that you will enter into a strict league, offensive and defensive, with them, for their common preservation: and that you will invite unto it all princes and states who are concerned in the present visible danger, arising from the union of France and Spain." The Commons stopped short of directly sanctioning the extensive alliance which William desired, and which the Lords contemplated-an alliance which could have no other end than war. But they voted sufficient supplies to enable the king to send assistance to the States-telling him, however, "they are more than ever were given in a time of peace." On the 24th of June the Parliament was prorogued. On the 1st of July the king embarked for Holland. Burke has vividly described the great crisis of the summer of 1701. The House of Commons had been more reserved than the Lords. "But now they 250 THE GREAT ALLIANCE FORMED BY WILLIAM. [1701. were fairly embarked, they were obliged to go with the course of the vessel; and the whole nation, split before into an hundred adverse factions, with a king at its head evidently declining to his tomb, the whole nation, Lords, Commons, and People, proceeded as one body informed by one soul." There probably is no higher example of decision of character than the energy of William in the last six months of his life. If we imagine that he had only to lay before "princes and states" his notions of their common danger, and then to secure their cordial co-operation in its resistance, we should take a every imperfect view of the policies of the various European governments. The emperor, no doubt, could be easily induced to take part in a great confederacy to secure for his family their coveted share in the Spanish dominions. But the smaller German states were moved by various conflicting influences-of ambition, of jealousy, of fear. The notion of some was to combine in a neutrality, in which they might gain something and risk little. Several of the German electors had as much dread of Austria as of France, and probably more hatred of the power with which they were more immediately in contact. The northern maritime states, though quarrelling with each other, had no affection for the Dutch, who interfered with their commerce. William, during his sojourn in Holland, concluded Treaties with the States-General, with the king of Sweden, with the king of Denmark, with the emperor. He laid the foundation of future alliances with the king of Portugal, with the king of Prussia, with the duke of Savoy. He had an able assistant in Marlborough, whose treachery he had long ceased to fear, and in whose great ability he had a just confidence. But the experience of William in all the complications of European politics; the confidence which those with whom he had to deal had in his judgment and honesty; and, more than all, his own undoubted reliance upon the conviction of his earliest and of his latest years that the power of France must be limited, if England and Holland were to be secure and free, these were the means by which that league which history now calls the Grand Alliance was formed. One of the most remarkable features of this Alliance in its earlier stages of the union of England, the States, and the emperor, was its extreme prudence. It made no declaration as to the inheritance of the crown of Spain. It only stipulated that the contracting powers should be united to prevent the union of the crowns of France and Spain; that France should be compelled to evacuate the Netherlands; and that she should not acquire any of the Spanish Colonies in the West Indies. England was not committed by William to a war. The treaty of Alliance between England, the States-General, and the emperor, with powers for all kings and states to join the league, was signed at the Hague on the 7th of September. In Italy war had previously begun on the part of the emperor. Prince Eugene commanded the imperial army, and drove the joint forces of the French king and the duke of Savoy from their position along the Adige. Marshal Villeroy subsequently attacked Prince Eugene, but was repulsed. The warlike events of the year had no decisive results. But one event now took place which involved England in a war against France, upon far more popular grounds than the question of the succession in Spain. On the 16th of September, king James II. expired at St. Germains, in the sixty-seventh year of his age. The biographer of the exiled sovereign describes the visit of the king of France to the death-bed, 1701.] LOUIS DECLARES THE SON OF JAMES KING OF ENGLAND. 251 when Louis, having desired that nobody should withdraw, said, “I am come, Sir, to acquaint you, that whenever it shall please God to call. your majesty out of this world, I will take your family under my protection, and will treat your son, the prince of Wales, in the same manner I have treated you, and acknowledge him, as he then will be, king of England." * The biographer describes how the French and English courtiers threw themselves at his Most Christian Majesty's feet, weeping and lauding so generous an action. In the court, says Saint Simon, "nothing was heard but applause and praise." Yet reflection came to some. It was seen, that to recognize the prince of Wales was in direct opposition to the recognition, . as king of England, of the prince of Orange at the peace of Ryswick; and thus to wound that prince in the tenderest point, and to invite England and Holland to become allies of the emperor against France. Saint Simon, who takes this common-sense view, holds that the resolve of Louis XIV. was more worthy of Louis XII., or of Francis I., than of his own wisdom." The recognition of the son of James II. as king of England was no private. act of Louis. Lord Manchester, the English ambassador, wrote home: "The prince of Wales was immediately proclaimed king of England, by the title of James III. I do not hear there was any other ceremony, than that, after he had taken the title of king, those of St. Germains kissed his hand, and treated him with majesty.' William desired that his ambassador should immediately quit the French court. It was alleged by France that the bare owning of the prince's title was not a breach of the treaty of Ryswick, as they gave him no assistance to make good his claim. Neither the king of England nor his people were deceived by this sophistry. William saw that the greatest opportunity of his life had now arrived; that the factions which had so long harassed him would shrink away before the might of public opinion; that he could now-when France believed he was broken down, worn out, dying-lead a great people to go with him, heart and hand, in the work of their own national salvation, as he had led his own countrymen in the full vigour of his early manhood. Before the news arrived from St. Germains, he had been in communication with Sunderland on the state of affairs in England. In the remarkable correspondence, carried on in the third person, between the king and this Ulysses of the distracted camps of the two factions, William expresses his doubts of calling a new Parliament; "the Tories giving him great hopes, and making him great promises." Sunderland replies with a freedom which sounds like the greatest integrity: "It is a melancholy thing, that the king, who has more understanding than anybody who comes near him, is imposed on by mountebanks, or by such as, he himself knows, hate both his person and his government."+ William, on the 10th of October, sent Mr. Galway to Somers, to confer with him confidentially on the state of English politics. Somers drew up a body of arguments to induce the king to call a new Parliament, of which the first argument was, "the present ferment and disposition of the nation;" and he says, with a politician's confidence in the principle of expediency; "the art of governing in England is watching and using such opportunities." "Life of James II." vol. ii. p. 598. 252 WILLIAM OPENS HIS LAST PARLIAMENT. [1701. The king came from Holland on the 4th of November. On the 11th he dissolved the Parliament. On the 30th of December, the two Houses met, and Harley was chosen Speaker of the Commons, by a majority of fourteen over Littleton, the Whig Speaker of a former Parliament. On the last day of the year 1701, king William delivered his last parliamentary speeech,-"the best speech," says Burnet, "that he or any other prince ever made to his people." He alluded to the loyal and seasonable Addresses which he had received, in resentment of the late proceedings of the king of France. He described the setting up of the pretended prince of Wales, as king of England, as the highest indignity that could be offered to himself and to the nation. It so nearly concerned every man who had a regard for the Protestant religion, or the present and future quiet and happiness of his country, that he earnestly exhorted them to lay it seriously to heart. He then proceeded to take a general view of the position of England with reference to the Spanish succession: "By the French king's placing his grandson on the throne of Spain, he is in a condition to oppress the rest of Europe, unless speedy and effectual measures be taken. Under this pretence, he is become the real master of the whole Spanish monarchy; he has made it to be entirely depending on France, and disposes of it as of his own dominions, and by that means he has surrounded his neighbours in such a manner, that, though the name of peace may be said to continue, yet they are put to the expense and inconvenience of war. This must affect England in the nearest and most sensible manner, in respect to our trade, which will soon become precarious in all the variable branches of it; in respect to our peace and safety at home, which we cannot hope should long continue; and in respect to that part, which England ought to take in the preservation of the liberty of Europe." The king then announced that he had concluded several alliances, in order to avert the general calamity with which the rest of Christendom is threatened by the exorbitant power of France. "It is fit I should tell you, the eyes of all Europe are upon this parliament; all matters are at a stand till your resolutions are known; and therefore no time ought to be lost. You have yet an opportunity, by God's blessing, to secure to you, and your posterity, the quiet enjoyment of your religion and liberties, if you are not wanting to yourselves, but will exert the ancient vigour of the English nation; but I tell you plainly, my opinion is, if you do not lay hold on this occasion, you have no reason to hope for another." He called upon them to provide a great strength at sea, and a land force that should be proportionate to the forces of the allies. He exhorted them to take care of the public credit, "which cannot be preserved but by keeping sacred that maxim, that they shall never be losers who trust to a parliamentary security." The king concluded with this bold and stirring exhortation : "My lords and gentlemen; I hope you are come together determined to avoid all manner of disputes and differences; and resolved to act with a general and hearty concurrence for promoting the common cause, which alone can make this a happy session. I should think it as great a blessing as could befal England, if I could observe you as much inclined to lay aside those unhappy fatal animosities, which divide and weaken you, as I am disposed to make all my subjects safe and easy as to any, even the highest offences, com |