Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 24.djvu/277

 1689, and in the parliamentary histories of Chandler and Cobbett should be assigned to his father, Richard Hampden (cf. ib.) John Hampden left England for the sake of his health in October 1680, and remained in France till September 1682. He was elected in his absence member for Wendover in the parliament of 1681, and his father took his place as member for the county.

According to Burnet, Hampden 'was a young man of great parts, one of the learnedest gentlemen I ever knew; for he was a critic both in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew; he was a man of great wit and vivacity, but too unequal in his temper; he had once great principles of religion, but he was corrupted by F. Simon's conversation at Paris ' (, History of his own Time, ii. 353). Father Richard Simon, whose 'Critical History of the Old Testament' had been published in 1078, greatly influenced Hampden's subsequent life. Adopting Simon's critical views, he went farther and became a professed freethinker (, Memoirs of the House of Cromwell, ii. 83).

In Paris Hampden also met the historian Mezeray, who confirmed him in his opposition to the government of Charles II. Mezeray told him that France had once enjoyed the same free institutions as England, but lost them owing to the encroachments of its kings. 'Think nothing,' he said, 'too dear to maintain these precious advantages; venture your life, your estates, and all you have rather than submit to the miserable condition to which you see us reduced.' 'These words,' wrote Hampden, 'made an impression in me which nothing can efface' (A Collection of State Tracts published during the Reign of King William III, folio, 1706, ii. 313).

While in France, the French government suspected Hampden of intrigues with the protestants there, and at the same time Lord Preston, the English ambassador, believed that he was carrying on some secret negotiation with agents of Louis XIV on behalf of the English opposition (Hist. MSS. Comm. 7th Rep. pp. 275-8).

Hampden returned to England in September 1682, and became intimately associated with the leaders of the opposition. Sydney answered for his political views, and Russell when in prison often spoke of him to Burnet 'with great kindness and esteem' (Life of William, Lord Russell, ed. 1820, ii. 272). Like his friends, Hampden was accused of complicity in the Rye House plot, and was committed to the Tower 8 July 1683. On giving bail for 30,000l. he was released at the end of November, and on 6 Feb. 1684 was tried at the king's bench 'for a high misdemeanor' (, Diary, i. 292). The charge brought against him was that he had been one of the council of six who had met together to plot an insurrection. Their first meeting was said to have taken place at Hampden's house in Bloomsbury during January 1683, and the chief witness was Lord Howard of Escrick, one of the council in question. Howard's evidence was to some extent contradictory, for on Sydney's trial he had sworn to a long speech made by Hampden, of which he now remembered nothing (State Trials, ed. Howell, ix. 1053). Hampden was, however, found guilty, and sentenced on 12 Feb. to be fined 40,000l., and to be imprisoned till the fine was paid. The sum fixed was far beyond his means. But he states that when he 'offered several sums of money,' he was told 'they would rather have him rot in prison than have the 40,000l.' (ib. ix. 961). After Monmouth's rising he was removed from the king's bench prison to the Tower, and was again put on his trial, this time on the charge of high treason. The government had now procured a second witness against him in Lord Grey, whose confession to some extent confirmed the evidence of Lord Howard respecting the preparations for an insurrection made in the spring of 1683 (The Secret History of the Rye-House Plot and of Monmouth's Rebellion, written by Ford, lord Grey, 1754, pp. 42, 51, 59). Hampden's condemnation was absolutely certain, and therefore, by the advice of his friends, 'because it could be prejudicial to no man, there being none alive of those called the Council of Six but the Lord Howard,' he resolved to plead guilty and throw himself on the mercy of the king. Sir John Bramston, who himself thought that Hampden had taken the wisest course, observes : 'The whigs are extreme angry at him. . . and they have reason on their side, for, as they truly say, he hath made good all the evidence of the plot, and branded the Lord Russell and some of the others with falsehood, even when they died' (Autobiography of Sir John Bramston, p. 218). Hampden was sentenced to death, and it was rumoured that the warrant for his execution was actually signed (State Trials, ix. 959; Ellis Correspondence, i. 2, 6). The king, however, was content with his humiliation, and on paying 6,000l. to Lord Jefferies and Father Petre, and begging for his life, he obtained a pardon and liberty.

Henceforth the memory of his humiliation 'gave his spirits a depression and disorder he could never quite master' (, iii. 57). His influence with his party was greatly