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of privileges, and a free trade. The English consented with reluctance to admit of a participation in their plantation trade; the Scots were with difficulty persuaded to submit to the same im posts with England, upon home consumption; but they refused, without an equivalent, to incur a share of the national debt, or to relinquish their Darien company, in which the public faith and the wealth of the kingdom were so deeply involved. The English commissioners, who still considered the privileges of the Darien as inconsistent with those of their East India company, represented that the interference of two great and exclusive companies might prove injurious to the trade of the united kingdom; and to reconcile the discordant interests of the two opposite monopolies, such difficulties occurred that the treaty was adjourned+.

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BOOK

XL

1703.

ministers.

But the unexampled duration of parliament, Change of which had subsisted fourteen years, excited general discontent. Originally it was elected for a convention, and if its authority were doubtful or disputable, when converted into a parliament in the preceding reign, its continuance under the present was considered as absolutely null. The people were entitled to annual elections; and, after the secession of the country party, they began to dispute the authority of the rump, as

4 De Foe's Hist. of Union, App. 14. Tindal's Continuation of Rapin, iii. 558.

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1703.

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BOOK the parliament was termed, and to refuse payment of the taxes which the last session had imposed. At the instigation of Queensberry, who proposed to dissolve the attachment of the Jacobites to Hamilton, and to surmount the opposition of the country party, the court embraced the opportunity to dismiss the whigs. The earls of Marchmont, Melville, Selkirk, Leven, and Hyndford, who adhered to the principles of the revolution, were displaced, and those statesmen were introduced into office who had occasionally opposed the measures of the late reign. The Jacobites were elated with the change. They availed themselves of an indemnity to return from exile; or with a secret reservation, they accepted the oaths of allegiance to the queen, as regent during the minority of her brother. The episcopal clergy solicited, and were promised, an ample toleration; and though the public exercise of their religion occasioned frequent riots, they expected nothing less than an alteration in the government of the church. The presbyterians, alarmed and depressed, began to suspect the new ministers, and the queen herself, of a secret design to supplant their religion, as the first step towards the succession of her brother, when a new par liament was summoned, to provide for the deficiencies of the former supplies 5.

Lockhart, p. 21. Boyer, i. 160. 206. ii. 15. Ridpath's Account of Parl. 1703, p. 11. Cunningham's Hist. i. 320.

XI.

1

1703.

liament.

The efforts of each party were exerted, at the BOOK general election, to strengthen its interest in the approaching parliament, the last which was destined to be held in Scotland. Lord Seafield, the New parchancellor, was employed to manage the returns; and his assurances of the queen's attachment, and of her reliance on their fidelity, persuaded many of the Jacobites to transfer their interest at elections to the crown. But the court party was divided and broken by the recent change. The adherents of the revolution were jealous of their new associates, whom the late ministers were ready to oppose. The country party were almost equally numerous; and if we except a few Jacobites, they consisted either of presbyterians, or of independent members indifferent to religious. sects. The Jacobites, who assumed the name of Cavaliers, formed a distinct body, whose numbers were still inconsiderable; but they were prepared to unite with either of the contending parties, and expected to incline the balance to which soever side they chose 6. When the parliament was May 6. opened by Queensberry the commissioner, a recognition of the queen's title and authority was proposed by Hamilton, as a compliment to her, or as a decent apology for an intended motion, that the last session was an illegal convention, and that the ministers were responsible for their unconstitutional advice. An additional clause was Ridpath, 20. 31. Lockhart, 35.

6 Cunningham, i. 324, 5.

XI.

1703.

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BOOK proposed to counteract this obvious design; that it should be high treason to question, not only her majesty's title, but the exercise of her government, since the commencement of her reign. The presbyterians concurred with the court party to support the amendment, which was carried by a large majority; and the Jacobites, who still adhered to the commissioner, endeavoured, by their ostentatious services, to merit favour from the queen. The earl of Home, their leader, proposed a supply; the earl of Strathmore an act of tole ration, to exempt the episcopal ministers from the oaths to government: but their views extended to the revival of patronage, and to the introduction of their clergy into the benefices of the church. The presbyterians, and the court party, attached to the revolution, were alarmed at their unwonted zeal in support of government. The commission of assembly petitioned against an iniquitous toleration. Argyle and Marchmont awakened the commissioner's jealousy at the growing power and ambition of Hamilton, to whom the Jacobites, when their present objects were once accomplished, would continue to ad-. here. They introduced two acts, the first to confirm the presbyterian government, and the second to declare it high treason to impugn the authority of the convention parliament, or even to attempt an alteration in the claim of rights. As the abro

7 Ridpath, 5, 38.

•XI.

1709.

gation of prelacy and of ecclesiastical pre-eminence BOOK constituted an article of the claim of rights, the presbyterian religion, from the concurrence of the presbyterians with the court party, was thus indirectly sanctioned by the penalties of treason, and all hopes of episcopal government were finally repressed. The Jacobites, who had stipulated that no confirmation should be bestowed on the revolution, abandoned the commissioner, by whose connivance their religion was proscribed; and continued afterwards invariably attached to the country party.

of the par

the nation.

These preliminary disputes were subordinate to Disposition a more important question with which the nation liament and was agitated, productive of an ultimate union between the two kingdoms. Ever since the projected settlement at Darien, the genius of the nation had acquired a new direction; and as the press is the true criterion of the spirit of the times, the numerous productions on every political and commercial subject, with which it daily teemed, had supplanted the religious disputes of the former age. As the loss of Darien was invariably ascribed to the servile dependence of ministers on the English cabinet, whatever misfortunes the nation had sustained since the union of the crowns, the increase of the prerogative, and the exaltation of the hierarchy by James VI. the introduction of the liturgy

8 Ridpath, 44. Boyer, ii. 36. Lockhart, 44. Proceedings of the Parl. of Scotland, 1703.

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