Page:Cassell's Illustrated History of England vol 3.djvu/564

550 effectually alienated all hearts from him. From him nothing but destruction of every liberty and sentiment that Englishmen held dear was to be expected; and in the heir which was now, as was generally believed, foisted on the nation by the king and the Jesuits, there was only the pledge of the reign of popery and proscription, and of the extermination of all those high hopes and privileges which were entwined with protestant freedom. The whig leaders had sent repeatedly to William to stimulate him to the enterprise; but, independent of his habitual caution and the salutary fear that Monmouth's reception had inspired, the prince of Orange had many difficulties to contend with from the peculiar constitution of the Dutch republic, and the peculiar views and interests of his allies. Though at the head of the Dutch confederation, he had always experienced much opposition from individual states and cities, especially Amsterdam, which his great enemy, Louis of France, managed to influence. This enterprise called him to expel from his throne a catholic king, and replace his government by a protestant one, though the pope and Spain, the most catholic of countries, were his close allies, and must not be offended. He had, therefore, stipulated that he should receive such an invitation under the hands and seals of the whig leaders as should leave little doubt of his reception, and that he should be regarded as the saviour from an intolerable ruler, and not forced to attempt a conquest which must in its very success bring ruin by wounding the national pride of England.

He now received a paper, signed by the earls of Shrewsbury, Devonshire, Danby, lord Lumley, bishop Compton, Edward Russell, the admiral of England, and Henry Sidney, the brother of the late Algernon Sidney, and afterwards earl of Romney. This paper, which had been furnished at William's request, was but the result of negotiations betwixt himself and the whig leaders for some time. He now called into council with the English envoy his two great confidential friends, Bentinck and Dykvelt, and it was resolved that the time for action was come, and that the invitation should be accepted. Meantime, whilst William began in earnest, but as secretly as circumstances would allow, his preparations, James at home did everything which a foolish and obstinate ruler could do to complete the alienation of the affections of his subjects. He returned from his camp to his capital only to find it in all the transports of delight over his own defeat, and resounding on all sides with the explosions of guns and crackers, drinking of the health of the bishops in the streets, and the effigy of the pope blazing before his own gate. So far from making him pause at the contemplation of the avowed and universal spirit of his people, he was only the more exasperated, and continued muttering "So much the worse for them." He determined to take summary vengeance on the whole body of the clergy, on the lawyers who had opposed or deserted him, on the army, and on the people. He burst forth at once into an Ishmael, whose hand was against every one, only soon to find every man's hand against him. He was a modern Pharaoh, whose heart was now hardened to the pitch of defying heaven and earth, and rushing on destruction open-eyed. He at once promoted Mr. solicitor-general Williams, for his unscrupulous conduct on the trial of the bishops, to a baronetcy, and would have placed so convenient a man on the bench could he have spared him at the bar. He dismissed Powell and Holloway; he determined to visit with his vengeance all the clergy throughout the kingdom who had refused to read the declaration; and an order was issued to all the chancellors of the dioceses and the archdeacons to make a return of them. No matter that they approached ten thousand in number; if necessary, he would drive them all from their benefices. The judges on the circuits were ordered to denounce these refractory clergy, and to speak in the most derogatory terms of the bishops. He broke up his camp, the soldiers of which had been intended to overawe the capital, and stand by whilst he destroyed the national constitution and the national religion; but had now terrified and disgusted him by drinking to the healths of the liberated bishops.

But all his angry attempts only recoiled on himself, and showed more clearly than ever that the reins of power were irrecoverably slipping from his fingers. The spell of royalty, a people's respect, was utterly broken. The chancellors and archdeacons paid no attention to the order for reporting their independent brethren; the High Commission met, and, so far from finding any returns, received a letter from one of the most truckling of their own body, Sprat, bishop of Rochester, resigning his place in the High Commission. If such a man saw the handwriting on the wall, the warning, they felt, must be imminent, and they departed in confusion. The judges, on their part, found themselves deserted on their circuits; nobody but the sheriff and his javelin men came to meet them, and then went through their duties amid every sign of indifference to their dignity. They were treated, not as the high-minded judges of England, but as the base and venal tools of a most lawless and mischievous monarch. The soldiers were as bold in their separate quarters as they had been in camp. James thought he could deal with them separately, and tried the experiment by ordering a regiment of infantry which had been raised in the catholic district of Staffordshire, to sign an engagement to support him in dispersing all the rest, or to quit the army. Almost to a man they piled their arms, and the confounded king was obliged to withdraw the order. But James had a remedy even for the defection of the army. In Ireland the brutal and debauched Tyrconnel had been busily engaged in driving Irish Celts, and preparing an army so strongly catholic that he might by this means carry out the royal design of repealing the act of settlement, and driving the protestant colonists from their lands. These troops James sent for, regiment after regiment, and the people of England saw with equal indignation and alarm that their liberties, their religion, their laws were to be trodden down, and the kingdom reduced to a miserable abode of slaves by the wild tribes of the sister island, vengeful with centuries of unrequited oppressions. This put the climax to the national resentment, and still more pressing messages were sent over to William to hasten his approach, still more numerous leaders of party contemplated a speedy transit to his standard. It was at this juncture that the wild genius of Wharton gave vent to the pent-up feelings of protestant wrath, by the adaptation of the old Irish tune of "Lillibullero" to English words.

William, meantime, was making strenuous preparations for his enterprise. He formed a camp at Nimeguen, collecting troops and artillery from the different fortresses.