CHAP. LXXXVI. June, 1660. Shaftesbury's various promotions on the Restoration. quiet conduct for CHAPTER LXXXVI. CONTINUATION OF THE LIFE OF LORD SHAFTESBURY TILL HIS AP- SOON after the King's return, Sir Anthony Ashley Cooper, in recompense of his services, was made a Privy Councillor, Chancellor of the Exchequer, Lord Lieutenant of the county of Dorset, Governor of the Isle of Wight, Colonel of a regiment of horse, and Baron Ashley of Wimborne St. Giles. His conduct for the next seven years seems wholly inexplicable; for he remained quiet, regular, and seemingly conDifficulty tented. He had a little excitement by sitting as a judge on in account- the trial of the regicides, and joining in the sentence on some ing for his of his old associates. Not being a member of the Long Parliament, he had not joined in this particular treason, but he had often actually "levied war" against Charles I., and he had on several occasions acted under the parliament as zealously as Sir Harry Vane, for the purpose of keeping out Charles II., so that his life had been forfeited to the law by his co-operation with the prisoners. Still he thought it right and decent that he should countenance the proceedings against them. seven years. He sits on the trial of the regicides. These trials being over, he seemed to sink down into a Treasury drudge. The office of Chancellor of the Exchequer, which he held, though a peer, was not then of much importance, and chiefly imposed the duty of attending to accounts. He was not a member of the Committee of the Council to whom, under Clarendon, the conduct of foreign affairs and the management of the business in parliament were intrusted. Strange to say, it was some years before he began seriously to try to undermine Clarendon. The only solution is, that his uncle, Southampton, the Lord Treasurer, who had become very infirm, left to him almost the sole direction of the Exchequer, with all its patronage; and, being strongly attached to Clarendon, probably laboured to induce him to abstain from any turbulent measures. Shaftesbury, along with Southampton, gave some opposition to the "Corporation CHAP. LXXXVI. Act" and the "Act of Uniformity;" and when Dunkirk had been sold, he expressed some disapprobation of that transaction. He strongly supported the "bill for indulgence," which was brought in to please the King, and was rejected by the hostility of Clarendon. But during these years he did not take by any means a prominent part in parliament, and he devoted himself much to the duties of his office. He considered himself bound regularly to attend His prothe King at Whitehall, to pay court to Lady Castlemaine, fligate and to cultivate with unwearied assiduity his reputation for licentiousness,—which he did so successfully as even to rival that of his Master. manners. Clarendon. But he became tired of routine business and the life of a A. D. 1667. He begins mere roué; and seeing with satisfaction the King's growing to intrigue dislike to Clarendon, he took every opportunity of widening against the breach between them. By the death of Lord Southampton, in May, 1667, all restraint was removed, and he entered into a strict alliance with Arlington and Clifford for Clarendon's overthrow. The Treasury was put into commission against Clarendon's strong opinion, and Shaftesbury contrived to get himself named the first efficient Commissioner, still retaining his office of Chancellor of the Exchequer. His influence from henceforth grew daily; he managed to make all the odium of the Dutch war fall upon the Chancellor, who had from the beginning disapproved of it; he aggravated the discontent of Cavaliers, Dissenters, and Roman Catholics, pointing out the Chancellor as the author of all their grievances; and he incited Lady Castlemaine to seek revenge upon the man who, to be sure, had earnestly tried to prevail upon the Queen to receive her as a lady of the bedchamber, but who had given her mortal offence by forbidding his wife to visit her. After a hard struggle, they spirited up the King to take the Great Seal from Clarendon, and, as a temporary Aug. 31. arrangement, to give it to Sir Orlando Bridgeman. Shaftesbury probably had thought of it for himself ever since it was promised to him by Cromwell; but neither the Court nor the public were yet at all prepared to see such a successor of Sir Thomas More and Lord Ellesmere, and his pretensions could not at present be put forward. If either Sir Jeffry 1667. CHAP. LXXXVI. Palmer or Sir Heneage Finch, who with great reputation filled the offices of Attorney and Solicitor General, had been Appoint- appointed, there might have been some difficulty in removing them; but Bridgeman, from his age, could not hold the Seal many years; and from his want of political importance might be set aside at pleasure. ment of Lord Keeper man. Sept. 1667. bury assists in the of Clarendon. The expectant Chancellor zealously co-operated with those whose object it was,-not to bring Clarendon to the scaffold, but to compel him to fly the country, so that neither by the banishment interest of the Duke of York, or a relenting of the King, he might ever recover power. When the impeachment for high treason came up from the Commons, with a requisition that the accused should be immediately imprisoned, Shaftesbury strenuously resisted the application, on the ground that the Commons had specified no particular act of treason; but he supported the bill by which Clarendon was banished for life, and was rendered liable to instant execution if he ever again set foot on English ground.* Jan. 1668. Alliance, The first act of the new administration (constituting an The Triple exception to the whole foreign policy of this reign) was wise and virtuous "the Triple Alliance," by which the free state of Holland was saved from the rapacity of a tyrant openly aspiring to the dominion of Europe. Sir William Temple has all the merit of this deviation into rectitude; and the surprise is, that those about the King permitted him, even for a time, to desert his cherished connection with France, which brought them plenteously avowed pensions and secret bribes. But the wax which sealed the treaty of Aix-laChapelle was hardly cold before they began to plot against it. Shaftesbury's apologists have contended that he was always an enemy to the French alliance; but this is contrary to all contemporary testimony, as well as to all probability. I believe he did not take money from Louis, like his colleagues, for he was always above pecuniary corruption; but there cannot be a doubt that, with a view to gratify the King, and to consolidate his own power, he acceded to the conspiracy for crushing the liberties of Holland, and for establishing, 4 Parl. Hist. 373. with French assistance, Popery and arbitrary government in "To compass this the triple bond he broke, It has been suggested that, being now as keen a Protestant as when he denounced the Popish plot, it was on the enlightened principles of toleration that he supported "the Declaration of Indulgence," to which he induced the Lord Keeper Bridgeman to put the Great Seal. Unluckily, at this time he knew that Charles had been reconciled to Rome, and that the Declaration was a measure preparatory to the King's avowal of his conversion. He was too penetrating a genius not to discover that religious toleration was highly expedient; but, for the sake of his ambition, he would have been ready to prosecute Catholics or Protestants with indiscriminate zeal. CHAP. LXXXVI. broken by Shaftes bury. up of Although Clifford certainly was the first to propose the Shutting shutting up of the Exchequer to the Council, there is great the Exreason to think that Shaftesbury, who had the sole manage- chequer. ment of the finances as Chancellor of the Exchequer and Lord Commissioner of the Treasury, originated the nefarious scheme; and, at all events, he supported and defended it. By this conduct he rose into unbounded favour with the A. D. 1672. King, who, though he afterwards pronounced him "the weakest and wickedest man of the age," now professed the highest admiration not only of his agreeable manners, but of the boldness, energy, and originality of his genius as a states man. an Earl. In anticipation of greater advancement, as a reward He is made for his services in closing the Exchequer, he was created Earl of Shaftesbury. It is said that he was offered the Treasurer's staff, but that, on account of the national insolvency, for which he knew no real cure, he declined it. He sug gests the tions in the suits. Bankers' The CABAL was now in the zenith of its power. There were considerable jealousies among the members of the admi- injuncnistration; but the energy of Shaftesbury prevailed, and he was the mainspring of all its operations. His reputation was not at all impaired by the general distress which followed the shutting up of the Exchequer, when he came forward with LXXXVI. CHAP. his remedy of stopping, by injunctions, all the suits against the bankers, whereby commercial credit was to be restored. I have stated, in the Life of Lord Keeper Bridgeman, the refusal of that Judge to grant these injunctions, and his consequent dismissal.* Dismissal of Sir O. Bridge man, Nov. 16. 1672. Nov. 17. 1672. Shaftes The ceremony of delivering the Great Seal to Shaftesbury, with the title of Lord Chancellor, took place next morning at Whitehall, I presume, in the apartments of Lady Castlebury Chan- maine.† "And the said Earle having received the said Great Seale as Lord Chancellor, he presently attended his Majesty at his chappell in Whitehall in that capacity, bearing the said Seale before his Majesty."‡ cellor. The event was thus announced to the public in the London Gazette. "Whitehall, Nov. 17. 1672. "His Majesty, reflecting upon the age and infirmities of Sir Orlando Bridgeman, Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England, hath thought fit to admit of his resignation thereof, with all demonstration on his Majesty's part of his kindness and esteem of the said Lord Keeper's merit towards him; and his Majesty, willing to gratify the uninterrupted good services of the Earl of Shaftesbury, Chancellor of the Exchequer and one of the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury, was pleased this day to give unto him the keeping of the said Great Seal, with the title of Lord Chancellor of England." * Ante, p. 283. While she retained her ascendency, the ministers met the King in her apartments every Sunday morning, and attended him from thence to the chapel even when they were to receive the communion. Crown. Off. Min. 1672. |