The French centre pierced. CHAP. II. and pressing hotly upon the weakened centre, carried the intrenchments; pouring his men through the opening into the plain beyond, where the French cavalry was drawn up. Eugene had now rallied his men after the first onslaught of the enemy's right, and was leading them to another charge, when he was struck by a musket ball. At the same time Villars also was severely wounded in the knee, and was borne away senseless to Le Quesnoy. The French attribute their subsequent Their position becomes untenable. defeat to this accident, but their position had now become untenable. Their lines were pierced through in the centre, their right was overthrown; and although Boufflers made the most strenuous exertions to retrieve these misfortunes, the works on his side were presently carried, and nothing remained for him but to retreat, which he did in good order about three o'clock in the afternoon. The allies encamped on the field of battle with 30,000 men dead or wounded lying around them, of whom two thirds were their own comrades. The French regarded their defeat, purchased at such a cost to their adversaries, as almost equivalent to a victory; and Villars himself in his report to Louis said that such another battle would annihilate his Majesty's enemies. Terrible slaughter. The French retreated upon Maubeuge, Valenciennes, and Condé, and being protected by the Forest of Ardennes, they were enabled to carry off most of their artillery and standards. The conquerors proceeded to Mons, the surrender of which place (20th of October) closed the campaign.* Surrender of Mons. 34. The Impeachment of Dr. Sacheverell.-When Marlborough returned to England after the fall of Mons (8th November, 1709) he found the whole nation in a ferment on account of a factious sermon delivered by Dr. Sacheverell, before the Lord Mayor and Aldermen on the 5th of November. This notorious divine, although the grandson of a Presbyterian minister, and the son of a clergyman of Low Church principles, attached Sacheverell's himself to the school of Archbishop Laud on entering Holy Orders, opinions. and after some years of obscurity, was appointed to the preachership of St. Saviour's Church, Southwark, by popular election. There he discoursed to large congregations, his favourite doctrines on nonresistance and passive obedience. In the popular discussions which these occasioned, Sacheverell was generally pitted against Mr. Benjamin Hoadley, Rector of St. Peter-le-Poer in the City, who carried the opposite doctrine to the extreme, and justified the principles which had been established by the Revolution. Stanhope's Queen Anne, II., 116-123; Coxe's Marlborough, II., Chap. 72 ANNE. 1710 During the summer, Dr. Sacheverell had preached before the Judges of Assize in Derby; and in this discourse, as well as in the one delivered before the Civic dignitaries, he gave the rein to his hostility against the His sermon Lord Mayor Revolution. He denied that resistance was lawful against any form of tyranny, attacked the Dissenters and the toleration of before the "Genevan discipline" with exceeding bitterness, and declared that the Church of England was thereby in great peril and adversity. Nor did he refrain from personal allusions. He loaded the Ministers with reproach, and particularly pointed out Lord Godolphin for public contempt by his well known nickname of Volpone or the Old Fox. The Lord Mayor was an ardent High Tory; he therefore warmly admired the sermon, and encouraged the doctor to print it, although the Court of Aldermen deemed the effusion so reprehensible that they withheld the customary vote of thanks to the preacher. The sermon possessed not the slightest literary merit, but its The Tories lauded it to the audacity produced intense excitement. skies, and disseminated copies of it by thousands; while the Whigs, justly incensed at its sentiments, were equally extravagant in their denunciations. Unfortunately for themselves, the Whigs regarded too deeply what they should have treated with the contempt objects to any sermon. it deserved. The Ministers, contrary to the sage advice of Somers Somers, resolved to bring the matter before the House of notice being Commons, and institute an impeachment against Sacheve- taken of the rell. The advocates of this proposal, of whom Godolphin and Sunderland were the most prominent, were eager for an inquiry, because they anticipated a public triumph of Whig principles, and an emphatic condemnation of those of the Tories. Articles of impeachment were accordingly exhibited against the doctor, in the Lower House, and after some opposition from Harley and his partisans, submitted to the Peers. Ten weeks were occupied in the preliminary proceedings, before the trial took place. During this interval, the metropolis and the country were country. greatly agitated by the controversies which arose, and if the Whigs had been sufficiently cool to consider the popular feeling, they would already have perceived the risks to which they were exposing their tenure of power. Great agita tion in the The trial. On the 27th of February, 1710, the trial opened in Westminster Hall, Lord Chancellor Cowper presiding. Sacheverell was attended every day by Dr. Attenbury, the most powerful of the Tory writers; and Sir Simon Harcourt, the ablest of the Tory lawyers, was one of his five counsel. The articles of impeachment were four in number, but only the first possessed any permanent interest. It set forth that Sacheverell had asserted That the necessary means to bring about the Revolution were unjustifiable CHAP. II. and that to impute its foundation to the principle of resistance, was to cast black and odious colours upon William III., who had disclaimed such an imputation in his Declaration. Hallam's opinion on the question Respecting this, Hallam observes that the charge "was not for impugning what was done at the Revolution, which Sacheverell affected to vindicate; but for maintaining that it was not a case of resistance to the supreme power, and conseof Resistance. quently no exception to his tenet of an unlimited passive obedience. The managers of the Commons had, therefore, not only to prove that there was resistance in the Revolution, which could not of course be sincerely disputed, but to assert the lawfulness, in great emergencies, or what is called in politics, necessity, of taking arms against the law-a delicate matter to treat of at any time, and not least so by Ministers of State and law officers of the Crown, in the very presence, as they knew, of their Sovereign." These managers, among whom Walpole, Stanhope and Jekyll stood prominent, were very explicit in their assertion of the lawfulness of resistance in extreme cases, and the opposing counsel did not withhold their acknowledgment of this constitutional doctrine. But while they were too wary to maintain, like their client, the doctrine The Tory argument. of unconditional submission, they took their stand on the admitted truth, that obedience ought to be the rule, and resistance only the exception; and they argued. that it was not fit to name such an exception in a sermon, in which the duties of morality ought to be laid down absolutely without supposing exceptions.t After very animated debates in the House of Lords, 69 Peers voted Sacheverell guilty, and 52 not guilty; but this was the full extent of the Ministerial triumph. When the question arose as to The sentence. the sentence to be passed, the majority dwindled away, even Argyle and some other leading Whigs leaving their friends and joining the opposite side. The first vote, that the Doctor should be prohibited from preaching for three years, was carried only by six; and the second motion, that he should be incapable during that time of taking any preferment in the Church, was lost by one, There was also added a resolution that his sermons should be burnt by the hands of the common hangman, together with the famous decree issued by the University of Oxford in 1683 on the occasion of the Rye House Plot, which maintained the doctrines of passive obedience and the absolute authority of princes nd which Sacheverell had brought forward in his defence. Hallam's Constitutional History, II., 367. + Burnet's "Own Time," V.; 427. 1710 triumph. 35. Consequences of this Impeachment.-This slight punishment was with good reason deemed a sort of triumph by the Tories, and as such was celebrated throughout the Sacheverell's country. Sacheverell became the public idol. Even during the trial, he had been escorted every day from his lodgings in the Temple, to Westminster, by great crowds, who cheered him vociferously, shouting "Sacheverell and the Church for ever." Those who would not join in the cry were often insulted or knocked down, and some of the mob were animated to such a pitch of fury, that they attacked the meeting houses and demolished the pews. Some of these rioters were apprehended and subsequently brought to trial. The Queen went several times "incognito" as it was termed, to hear the trial, and on every occasion the people pressed round her sedan chair, exclaiming, "God bless your Majesty and the Church. We hope your Majesty is for Dr. Sacheverell." Such, however, was not the Queen's inclination when the impeachment began; but when she found the clergy as a body, and her own chaplains, espousing the doctor's cause, there is reason to believe that her secret wishes changed.* Sacheverell. When the impeachment was resolved upon by the Commons, they had also carried a resolution requesting the Queen to bestow some dignity in the Church upon Mr. Hoadley. Headley an But she never complied with this desire; and while the sermons of Sacheverell were being burnt at the Royal Exchange, according to the sentence, the treatises of the Low Church rector were receiving the same treatment, at the hands of the mob at Exeter and Oxford. Bonfires and illuminations were general; Sacheverell's health was drunk on bended knees; at any church where he read the service, crowds, especially of ladies, flocked to hear him; and it became the fashion to have children baptised by him and christened after his name. As the Sacheverell's spring advanced, the oak leaf,-the badge of hereditary progress right-was worn, and when the doctor set out in June to through the take possession of a considerable living bestowed on him in Wales, his journey became a festal progress-mayors and aldermen meeting him in their robes of office, and sumptuous entertainments being prepared for his reception. All this however was done out of a spirit of faction; Sacheverell was but a political puppet in the hands of Harley and the Tories, who, feeling the approach of their return to power, resorted to this expedient in order to keep up * Stanhope's Queen Anne, II., 140-141 triumphant country. CHAP. II. the popular enthusiasm, and ascertain how far they could depend upon a general election for the support of their administration.* removal from office causes a panic in the City. 36. Godolphin's Ministry is gradually broken up.-A fortnight after the sentence upon Sacheverell, Parliament was prorogued, and the Queen and the Tory party no longer hesitated to attempt a change in the Ministry. Without consulting the Lord Treasurer, Anne dismissed the Marquis of Kent from his office of Lord Chamberlain, and conferred it upon the Duke of Shrewsbury, who, although a Whig, had opposed the Ministers in the recent trial. A month after this, Marlborough was offended by the promotion of Colonel Hill, brother to Mrs. Masham, without his approbation. This was followed by a more decisive blow. On the 13th Sunderland's of June, 1710, the seals were taken from the Earl of Sunderland, and the office of Secretary of State was conferred upon Lord Dartmouth, a keen Tory and High Churchman. This last change produced great excitement; the moneyed men, who were for the most part Whigs, were considerably alarmed; the funds fell; and public credit was so much affected, that a deputation from the Bank of England waited upon the Queen, to represent the mischiefs which would arise, if any further changes were made. But the Queen continued firm under the influence of her new advisers, and on the 8th of Angust Godolphin himself was ordered dismissed. to break his staff of office. The Treasury was then put in commission, with Earl Powlett, a peer of no significance in politics, at the head. Harley became Chancellor of the Exchequer, and was practically the Prime Minister; and by the middle of September the transformation of the Ministry in all important offices was completed. Lord Rochester then superseded Somers as PresiThe new dent of the Council; St. John became Secretary of State Tory Ministry. instead of Mr. Boyle; Harcourt was made Lord Chancellor instead of Lord Cowper; and the Duke of Ormond succeeded the witty and profligate Wharton, in the lieutenancy of Ireland. These changes being made, or otherwise resolved upon, Harley determined to appeal to the constituencies; and on the 21st of September Parliament was dissolved, and a new one summoned to meet on the 25th of November. Godolphin 37. Successes of Stanhope and Staremberg in Spain.-During these political changes, the negotiations for peace which had Knight's Pop. Hist., V., Chapter 23; Stanhope's Queen Anne, II., Chapter 12; oxe's Marlborough, III.,137. |