mation, forbidding this great refort of people, on pre- CHA P. tence of the scarcity of provifions, and other inconve- XLVI. niencies, which, he faid, would neceffarily attend it a. He was not, however infenfible to the great overflow 1603. of affection, which appeared in his new fubjects; and being himself of an affectionate temper, he feems to have been in haste to make them some return of kindness and good offices. To this motive, probably, we are to afcribe that profufion of titles, which was observed in the beginning of his reign; when in fix weeks time, after his entrance into the kingdom, he is computed to have bestowed knighthood on no less than 237 perfons. If Elizabeth's frugality of honours, as well as of money, had been formerly repined at, it began now to be valued and efteemed: And every one was fenfible, that the king, by his lavish and premature conferring of favours, had failed of obliging the perfons, on whom he bestowed them. Titles of all kinds became fo common, that they were no longer marks of diftinction; and being diftributed, without choice or deliberation, to perfons unknown to the prince, were regarded more as the proof of facility and good-nature, than of any determined friendship or esteem. A PASQUINADE was affixed to St. Paul's, in which an art was promised to be taught, very necessary to affist frail memories, in retaining the names of the new nobility B. WE may prefume, that the English would have thrown lefs blame on the king's facility in bestowing favours, had these been confined entirely to their own nation, and had not been fhared out, in too unequal proportions, to his old fubjects. James, who, through his whole reign, was more guided by temper and inclination than by the rules of political prudence, had brought with him great numbers of his Scots courtiers; whofe impatience and importunity were apt, in many particulars, to impose on the eafy nature of their mafter, and extort favours, of which, it is natural to imagine, his English fubjects would very loudly complain. The duke of Lenox, the earl of Mar, lord Hume, lord Kinloss, Sir George Hume, fecretary Elphinstone C, were immediately A Kennet, p. 662. B 2 B Wilfon, in Kennet, p. 665. 1603. CHA P. mediately added to the English privy council. Sir George XLVI. Hume, whom he created earl of Dunbar, was his declared favourite as long as that nobleman lived; and was one of the wifeft and most virtuous, though the least powerful, of all those whom the king ever honoured with that diftin&tion. Hay, fome time after, was created vifccunt Doncafter, and then earl of Carlisle, and got an immenfe fortune from the crown; all which he fpent in a fplendid and courtly manner. Ramfay obtained the title of earl of Holdernefs; and many others, being raised, on a fudden, to the highest elevation, encreafed, by their infolence, that envy, which naturally attended them, as enemies and strangers. IT must, however, be owned, in justice to James, that he left almost all the chief offices in the hands of Elizabeth's minifters, and trusted the conduct of political concerns, both foreign and domeftic, to his English subjects. Among thefe, fecretary Cecil, created fucceffively lord Effindon, viscount Cranborne, and earl of Salifbury, was always regarded as his prime minifter and chief counsellor. Though the capacity and penetration of this minister were fufficiently known, his favour with the king created furprize on the acceffion of that monarch. Cecil was fon of the famous Burleigh, whose merits towards his fovereign and his country were great, but whose name was naturally odious to James; as the declared enemy of his mother, and the chief cause of her tragical death, by fome esteemed the great stain in the bright annals of Elizabeth. He himself, as well as his father, had ftood at the head of the court--faction, which opposed the greatness of the earl of Effex, and which, affifted by the imprudence or rather frenzy of that favourite, at last brought him to the scaffold. The people, by whom the earl was much beloved, refented the conduct of his enemies; but James ftill more, who had maintained a fecret correfpondence with Effex, and regarded him as a zealous partizan for the fucceffion in the house of Stuart. Sir Walter Raleigh, lord Grey, lord Cobham, Cecil's affociates, felt immediately the effects of these prejudices of their mafter, and were difmiffed from their employments D: But Cecil, who poffeffed all the art and cunning of a courtier, as well D Kennet, p. 663. as as many of the talents of a statesman, had found the CHA P. 1603. THE capacity of James and his ministers in negociation was immediately put to trial, on the appearance of ambassadors from almost all the princes and states of Europe, in order to congratulate the king on his acceffion, and to form with him new treaties and alliances. Befides minifters from Venice, Denmark, the Palatinate; Henry Frederic of Naffau, affifted by Barnevelt the Penfionary of Holland, reprefented the ftates of the United Provinces. Aremberg was fent by archduke Albert; and Taxis was expected in a little time from Spain. But he who most excited the attention of the public, both on account of his own merit and that of his mother, was the marquis of Rofni, afterwards duke of Sully, prime minifter and favourite of Henry IV. of 8th Junc. France. Europe. WHEN the dominions of the house of Auftria devol- State of ved on Philip II. all Europe was ftruck with terror; left the power of a family, which had been raised by fortune, should now be carried to an immeafureable height, by the wifdom and conduct of this monarch. But never were apprehenfions found in the event to be more groundless. Slow without prudence, ambitious without enterprize, falfe without deceiving any body, and refined without any true judgment; fuch was the character of Philip, and fuch the character, which, during his life-time and after his death, he impreffed on the Spanish councils. Revolted or depopulated provinces, difcontented or indolent inhabitants, were the spectacles, which thofe dominions, lying in every climate of the globe, prefented to Philip III. a weak prince, and to the duke of Lerma, a minister, weak and odious. But though military difcipline, which still remained, was what alone gave fome appearance of life and vigour to that languishing body; yet fuch was the terror, produced by former power and ambition, that the reduction of the house of Auftria was the object of mens vows, throughout all the states of Christendom. It was not perceived, that the French empire, now united in domestic peace, and governed by the most heroic and most amiable 1603 Kofni's negociations. CHAP. amiable prince, that adorns modern story, was become, XLVI. of itself, of itself, a fufficient counterpoife to the Spanish greatnefs. Perhaps, that prince himself did not perceive it, when he propofed, by his minifter, a league with James, in conjunction with Venice, the United Provinces, and the northern crowns; in order to attack the Auftrian dominions on every fide, and deprefs the exorbitant power of that ambitious family. But the genius of the English monarch was not equal to fuch vast enterprizes. The love of peace was his ruling paffion; and it was his peculiar felicity, that the conjunctures of the times rendered the fame object, which was agreeable to him, in the highest degree advantageous to his people. THE French ambaffador, therefore, was obliged to depart from these extensive aims, and to concert with James the means of providing for the fafety of the United Provinces: Nor was this object altogether without its difficulties. The king, before his acceffion to the throne of England, had entertained fcruples with regard to the revolt of the Low Countries; and being always open and fincere F, except when deliberately refolved to diffemble, he had, on many occafions, gone fo far as to give the Dutch the denomination of rebels: But having converfed more fully with English ministers and courtiers, he found their attachment to that republic so ftrong, and their opinion of common interest fo eftablished, that he was obliged to facrifice to politics his fense of justice; a quality, which, even when erroneous, is refpectable as well as rare in a monarch. He therefore agreed with Rofni to fupport fecretly the states general, in concert with the king of France; left their weakness and despair should oblige them to submit_tò their old master. The articles of the treaty were few and fimple. It was ftipulated, that the two kings should allow the Dutch to levy forces both in France and Britain; and fhould underhand remit to that republic the fum of 1,400,000 livres a year for the pay of thefe forces: That the whole fum fhould be advanced by the king E Sully's Memoirs. F Monfieur de la Boderie, the French leaguer, ambassador at that time in England, afcribes the virtue of openness and fincerity to the king. Le naturel du Roi eft affez vuvert, vol. i. p. 120. G Winwood, vol. ii. p. 55. 1603. king of France; but that the third of it should be de- C H A B. ducted from a debt due by him to queen Elizabeth, XLVI. And if the Spaniards attacked either of the princes, they agreed to affift each other; Henry with a force of ten thousand, James with that of fix thousand men. This treaty, one of the wifest and most equitable concluded by James, during the whole courfe of his reign, was more the work of the prince himself, than any of his minifters H AMIDST the great tranquillity, both foreign and do- Raleigh's mestic, with which the nation was bleft, nothing could confpiracy. be more furprising than the discovery of a confpiracy to fubvert the government, and to fix on the throne of England Arabella Stuart, a near relation to the king, and defcended equally from Henry VII. Every thing remains still mysterious in this confpiracy; and history can give us no clue to unravel it. Watfon and Clarke, two catholic priests, were accused of the plot: Lord Grey, a puritan: Lord Cobham, a thoughtless man, of no fixed principle: And Sir Walter Raleigh, fufpected to be of that philofophical fect, who were then extremely rare in England, and who have fince received the appellation of free-thinkers. Together with these, Mr. Broke, brother to lord Cobham, Sir Griffin Markham, Mr. Copeley, Sir Edward Parham. What cement could unite men of such discordant principles in fo dangerous a combination; what end they propofed, or what means proportioned to an undertaking of this nature, has never yet been explained, and cannot easily be imagined. As Raleigh, Grey, and Cobham were commonly believed, after the queen's death, to have oppofed proclaiming the king, till conditions should be made with him; they were, upon that, as well as other accounts, extremely obnoxious to the court and ministry; and people were apt, at first, to fufpect, that the plot was merely a contrivance of fecretary Cecil, to get rid of his old confederates, now become his moft inveterate enemies. But the confeffion, as well as trial of the criminals, put the matter beyond all doubt. And though no one could find any marks of a concerted enterprize, it appeared, that men of furious and ambitious fpirits, meeting H Sully's Memoirs. 1 State Trials, p. 180. 2d edit. Winwood, vol. ii. p. 8, 11. |