Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 17.djvu/57

Edward III in Norfolk, where the king visited her every year.

The overthrow of Mortimer made Edward at the age of eighteen a king in fact as well as in name. In person he was graceful, and his face was 'as the face of a god' (Cont,, p. 226). His manners were courtly and his voice winning. He was strong and active, and loved hunting, hawking, the practice of knightly exercises, and, above all, war itself. Considerable care must have been spent on his education, for he certainly spoke English as well as French (, i. 266 sq., 306, 324, 360, iv. 290, 326), and evidently understood German. He was fearless in battle, and, though over-fond of pleasure, was until his later years energetic in all his undertakings. Although according to modern notions his ambition is to be reckoned a grave defect in his character, it seemed in his day a kingly quality. Nor were his wars undertaken without cause, or indeed, according to the ideas of the time, without ample justification. His attempts to bring Scotland under his power were at first merely a continuation of an inherited policy that it would have been held shameful to repudiate, and later were forced upon him by the alliance between that country and France. And the French war was in the first instance provoked by the aggressions of Philip, though Edward's assumption of the title of king of France, a measure of political expediency, rendered peace impossible. He was liberal in his gifts, magnificent in his doings, profuse in his expenditure, and, though not boastful, inordinately ostentatious. No sense of duty beyond what was then held to become a knight influenced his conduct. While he was not wantonly cruel he was hard-hearted; his private life was immoral, and his old age was dishonoured by indulgence in a shameful passion. As a king he had no settled principles of constitutional policy. Regarding his kingship mainly as the means of raising the money he needed for his wars and his pleasures, he neither strove to preserve prerogatives as the just rights of the crown, nor yielded anything out of consideration for the rights or welfare of his subjects. Although the early glories of his reign were greeted with applause, he never won the love of his people; they groaned under the effects of his extravagance, and fled at his coming lest his officers should seize their goods. His commercial policy was enlightened, and has won him the title of the 'father of English commerce' (, Const Hist. iii. 321), but it was mainly inspired by selfish motives, and he never scrupled to sacrifice the interests of the English merchants to obtain a supply of money or secure an ally. In foreign politics he showed genius; his alliances were well devised and skilfully obtained, but he seems to have expected more from his allies than they were likely to do for him, for England still stood so far apart from continental affairs that her alliance was not of much practical importance, except commercially. As a leader in war Edward could order a battle and inspire his army with his own confidence, but he could not plan a campaign; he was rash, and left too much to chance. During the first part of his reign he paid much attention to naval administration; he successfully asserted the maritime supremacy of the country, and was entitled by parliament the 'king of the sea' (Rot. Parl. ii. 311); he neglected the navy in his later years. Little as the nation owed him in otter respects, his achievements by sea and land made the English name respected. Apart from the story of these acts the chief interest of the reign is foreign to the purpose of a biographical sketch; it consists in the transition that it witnessed from mediæval to modern systems and ideas (, Const. Hist. ii. 375, which should be consulted for an estimate of Edward's character). Parliament adopted its present division into two houses, and in various points gradually gained on the prerogative. In church matters, papal usurpations were met by direct and decisive legislation, an anti-clerical party appeared, the wealth of the church was attached, and a protest was made against clerical administration. As regards jurisdiction, the reign saw a separation between the judicial work of the council and of the chancellor, who now began to act as an independent judge of equity. Chivalry, already decaying, and feudalism, already long decayed, received a deathblow from the use of gunpowder. Other and wider social changes followed the 'great pestilence' — an increase in the importance of capital in trade and the rise of journeymen as a distinct class, the rapid overthrow of villenage, and the appearance of tenant-farmers and paid farm labourers as distinct classes. These and many more changes, which cannot be discussed in a narrative of the king's life, mark the reign as a period in which old things were passing away and the England of our own day began to be formed.

In spite of the treaty of 1327 matters remained unsettled between the kings of England and France; Philip delayed the promised restitutions and disturbed Edward's possessions in Aquitaine. Saintes was taken by the Duke of Alençon in 1329, and Edward in consequence applied to parliament for a