Page:Cassell's Illustrated History of England vol 3.djvu/108

94 pulpits, caused James to issue an order through the bishop of London, that the clergy should not in their prayers "prejudicate the prince's journey, but only pray to God to return him home in safety again to us, and no more."

Wbereupon a preacher, with an air of great simplicity, prayed that the prince might return in safety again, and no more—that is, as it was understood, without a catholic wife. Yet to pacify his subjects, the king informed them that he had sent after them two protestant chaplains, together with all the stuff and ornaments fit for the service of God. And he added, "I have fully instructed them, so as all their behaviour and service shall, I hope, prove decent and agreeable to the purity of the primitive church, and yet so near the Roman form as can lawfully be done. For," says this stern persecutor of Catholicism, "it hath ever been my way to go with the church of Rome usque ad aras."

In so very complying a mood was James at this moment, that when these chaplains asked him what they were to do if they met the host in the streets, he replied they must avoid meeting it whenever they could; when they could not, they must do as the people did there. And poor James soon found that he had need of all his moral pliability. The Spanish court, as might have been foreseen, once having the prince in their power, resolved to benefit by it. They soon let the prince and Buckingham know that the pope made great difficulty about the dispensation, and the papal nuncio was sternly set against it, and it was inquired how far the prince could go in concession. Buckingham wrote, therefore, to the king, in these ominous words:—"We would gladly have your directions how far we may engage you in the acknowledgment of the pope's special power, for we almost find, if you will be contented to acknowledge the pope chief head under Christ, that the match will be made without him."

This was asking everything, and James was brought to a stand. He wrote in reply, that he did not know what they meant by acknowledging the pope's spiritual supremacy. He was sure they would not have him renounce his religion for all the world. "Perhaps," he wrote, "you allude to a passage in my book against cardinal Bellannine, where I say that if the pope would quit his godhead and usurping over kings, I would acknowledge him for chief bishop, to whom all appeals of churchmen ought to lie en dernier ressort. That is the farthest my conscience would permit me to go; for I am not a monsieur who can shift his religion as easily as he can shift his shirt when he cometh from tennis."

That Buckingham would have advised Charles to abandon his religion for the achievement of his object, had he dared, there is little question, for his mother was an avowed papist, and was his constant prompter in his course. Before leaving London, the two adventurers had obtained the king's solemn promise in writing, that whatever they agreed to with the Spanish monarch, he would ratify; so that well might James be alarmed at their suggestion. Charles, in fact, did not hesitate, in reply to a letter from the pope, to pledge himself to abstain from every act hostile to the catholic religion, and to seek every opportunity of accomplishing the reunion of the church of England with that of Rome. The letter—which lord Clarendon truly says, "is, by your favour, more than a compliment"—may be seen in the Hardwicke papers. Charles afterwards said that it was only a promise that he never meant to keep; we may therefore see that already his father's notions of king-craft had taken full possession of him, and, with a naturally serious and conscientious disposition, produced that fatal mixture of determination and unscrupulous insincerity which ruined him. Instead of a firm resistance to the palpable schemes of the pope and the Spaniard, and a truthful candour which would have convinced them that they had no chance of moving him, he led them, by his apparent acquiescence, to believe that they could win him over; and when they had carried him beyond the bounds of prudence, and much beyond those of honesty, he had no alternative but to steal away and repudiate his own solemn words and acts. Is it at all to be wondered at that neither foreign nations nor his own could ever after put faith in him? The Jesuitry of absolutism of the father had already destroyed the son, by perverting his moral constitution. It is very probable that Charles also acquired a strong taste for ecclesiastical pomp and circumstance during this visit, and its religious shows and ceremonies, which falling in afterwards with the ambitious taste of Laud, also tended to direct him towards the same "facilis decensus Averni."

James had despatched after the prince a great number of people, to form a becoming attendance on the heir of England. Others flocked thither of themselves, and especially catholic refugees, who swarmed in the prince's court, and particularly about Buckingham. The Jesuits did their best to convert them, and certainly were encouraged by every appearance of success. Though James had sent what he called the "stuff and ornaments" for public protestant worship, we are informed that these were never used; for though he had the earl of Carlisle, and the lords Mountjoy, Holland, Rochfort, Andover, Denbigh, Vaughan, and Kensington, besides a great number of other courtiers, and their dependents around him, they had no public worship, as if they were ashamed of their heretical faith, or feared to offend their catholic friends. The prince contented himself with bed-chamber prayers. The consequence was, as Howell, who was there, wrote, that the Spaniards, hardly believing the English Christians, and seeing no evidence of worship, set them down for little better than infidels. This occasioned great discontent amongst the more conscientious of the retinue, and they did not hesitate to avow their religious belief, and their contempt of the popish mummery which they saw around them, which led to much scandal and anger. Archy, or Archibald Armstrong, the famous court fool, whom oddly enough James had sent as well as the church plate and vestments, seemed to think himself privileged by his office to say what he pleased, and he did not hesitate to laugh at the religious ceremonies, and argue on religious points with all the zeal of a Scotch presbyterian, as he was. Others even proceeded to blows. Sir Edward Varney, finding a priest at the bedside of a sick Englishman, struck him under the ear, and they fell to fighting till they were thrust asunder.

This state of things would not have been tolerated so near the inquisition except for the great end in view—the belief that Charles would become a catholic. Gregory XV. had written to the inquisitor-general to this effect:—"We