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 mentioned in the Breda document, advance matters far (see, Life, ii. 18–97; cf. Memoirs of Orrery).

The first period of the reign of Charles II is that of the ascendency of Clarendon, from the Restoration to the autumn of 1667. Applications for offices had pursued the king all the way from the Hague to London; in at Canterbury there had been a slight fencing-match between him, Clarendon, and Monck's confidential friend Morrice, concerning a list of high officials drawn up by Monck (, Monck, 273, 278–80). Finally the privy council was formed of thirty members, of whom twelve had not been royalists, and within it, according to a practice already in use under Charles I, was selected a committee, commonly called a ‘cabinet’ or ‘cabal,’ but technically known as the committee for foreign affairs, which in the first instance consisted of Lord-chancellor Clarendon, together with Albemarle (Monck), Southampton, Ormonde, Colepepper, and the two secretaries of state, Nicholas and Morrice. The Duke of York and the Bishop of London (Sheldon) were afterwards included (, i. 231–8; cf., Life, i. 315–16). Unfortunately, however, the king's initial difficulties were not confined to the need of establishing a kind of balance between the leaders of the parties which had supported his restoration. Long-standing dissensions among the king's friends required his attention. Clarendon was openly opposed by Bristol, who as a Roman catholic was excluded from the privy council; Buckingham, who was sworn of it in 1662, always had the king's ear; and with him Bennet (Arlington), who became secretary of state in the place of Nicholas in the same year, and Berkeley (Falmouth) operated against the chancellor. But the real focus of these intrigues was the apartment of the king's mistress, Mrs. Palmer, whose husband in 1662 was created Earl of Castlemaine, and to whom Clarendon and Southampton alone refused to pay homage. On the discovery, however, in October 1662, of the secret marriage of Clarendon's daughter to the Duke of York, the king behaved with great kindness to the chancellor (Life, i. 371–406). Possibly he was not unwilling to prove his independence of the influence of his mother, who had come over purposely from France to prevent the match (, iv. 166, 168).

On 27 July Charles urged upon the lords in the Convention the speedy passing of the long-delayed Act of Indemnity with the excepted names, and 29 Aug. it was passed (see Somers Tracts, vii. 462–4). It would be wholly unjust to impute to Charles the want of generosity shown by parliament in this matter; in the case of Vane, however, whom the king had promised the houses to spare in the event of his being judicially condemned, his conduct hardly admits of condonation (cf., ii. 827, and , ii. 291 n.) The proclamations issued by the king before the passing of the act had partly been intended to prepare the public mind for it; another was directed against vicious and debauched persons who sought to make the Restoration the starting-point of a reign of license (Somers Tracts, vii. 423). Together with the Indemnity Bill the king gave his assent to several others. including one for a perpetual anniversary thanksgiving on 29 May, and the extremely important bill for disbanding and paying off the military and naval forces of the realm. Charles, however, contrived to retain three regiments in his service, under the name of guards, and thus to form the nucleus of a standing army at the very moment when the nation thought itself freed at last from the hated military incubus, ii. 315; see his conversations with the Spanish general Marsin ap. , iv. 159–60). More difficult than either the amnesty or this army question was that turning on the passage in the declaration of Breda which many interpreted as a promise of liberty of conscience, but which in truth ‘was but a profession of the king’s readiness to consent to any act which the parliament should offer him to that end’ (Reliquæ Baxterianæ, 217). Charles was prepared for concessions in the way of a reorganisation of the church; and the declaration issued by him 25 Oct. before the closing of the Convention parliament (, i. 401–14, and note) excited strong hopes in this direction. In the negotiations which ensued the king was brought into personal contact with Baxter and his other presbyterian ‘chaplains in ordinary,’ and at first seemed to smile upon the plan of bringing about an agreement on the basis of Ussher's model. But even the more sanguine of the divines must have been shaken by his wish to add to his declaration a clause implying toleration of papists and sectaries, and though he consented to the offer of high church preferments to a few presbyterian ministers, his supposed good-will to the scheme of union proved a broken reed (Reliquiæ Baxterianæ, esp, 231–2, 257). The friends of the court voted in the majority which rejected a bill to give effect to the royal declaration. After the Savoy conference the presbyterian ministers were admitted to a final audience, at which he had nothing to offer them but the query, with reference to certain disputed points, ‘Who shall be judge?’ (ib. 365). Yet though he did nothing to bring about a