1700. Tolerant disposition of William towards the Irish. treme displeasure was expressed in his speech to the commons, when they addressed him in relation to the Irish forfeitures. "Gentlemen, I was not led by inclination, but thought myself obliged in justice to reward those, who had served well and particularly in the reduction of Ireland, out of the estates forfeited to me by the rebellion there, &c." Which answer, when the speaker reported it, the commons so highly resented, that they resolved, " that whoever advised it had used his utmost endeavours to create a misunderstanding and jealousy between the King and his people." The soreness of King William on this occasion is fairly accounted for by the observation, that "Whereas the late King, who came over here a perfect stranger to our laws, and to our people, regardless of posterity, wherein he was not likely to survive, thought he could no better strengthen a new title, than by purchasing friends at the expense of every thing, which it was in his power to part with‡." The principal, if not the only obstacle, which William had experienced in establishing himself com * Vol. III. Parl. Hist. p. 122. + Swift's Hist. of the Four last Years of Ann, p. 240. The late Earl of Clare, in his speech so often referred to, (p. 2) speaking of this difference between the two parliaments, tells us," that the English colony (a term strongly marking that the Irish parliament was not then the representative of the Irish nation) however sore they might have felt under the sharp rebuke of their countrymen, were too sensible of the dangers by which they were surrounded, and their inability to encounter them, to push this political quarrel to a breach with the English parliament." pletely on the throne, was the resistance of the Irish. They were the first and last in the field in support of the house of Stuart: and although several penal and severe laws were passed during his reign against the Roman catholics of Ireland, yet it is but justice to al low, that the royal assent given to them by King William imported no personal disposition in that monarch to harass or persecute his catholic subjects on the score of religion. He is generally panegyrized for his spirit of toleration, on account of the act passed in the first year of his reign *, for easing his pro testant dissenting subjects from the penalties of several laws, which then affected them in common with the Roman catholics. This, however congenial with the feelings of King William, who was himself a Calvinist, or presbyterian, had been previously arranged by the party, that brought him over. It appears certain from Harris's admission and the constant claims of the Irish catholics, that William had made them a solemn promise"to procure them such further security from parliament in the particular of religion, as might prevent them from any future disturbance on that account.' In this, however, they were miserably disappointed: not perhaps from that monarch's want of sincerity and favourable disposition towards them, but from his inability to resist the violence of the party, to which he 1 W. and M, c. 18. An Act for exempting their Majesty's protestant subjects, dissenting from the church of England, from the penalties of certain laws. 1700. 1701. Death of William. was compelled to yield, to the sore annoyance of his own feelings. Had William been better treated by his English subjects, he would have appeared more amiable in their eyes: for in Holland, where his temper was not ruffled by disappointment and opposition, he was unexceptionably tolerant and universally beloved *. The unexpected death of the Duke of Glocester, the son of the Princess Ann, in his seventeenth year, and the death of the late King James about the same time, gave rise to the act, by which the crown was settled on the house of Hanover, which was the last act passed in this reign. This and the subsequent act of abjuration secured the protestant * Two principal causes, however, concurred against his being beloved by the generality of his Irish subjects: the first was the enactment of several penal laws against the Roman Catholics: the second was his ready co-operation with the parliament of England to ruin the woollen trade of Ireland. "I shall," said his Majesty to the English commons on the 2d of July, 1698, "do all that lies in me to discourage the woollen mannfacture in Ireland." This act passed on the 7th of June, 1701. 13 Guk c. 6. 16 is intituled, An act for the further security of his Majesty's person and the succession of the crown in the protestant line, and for extinguishing the hopes of the pretended Prince of Wales, and all other pretenders, and their open and secret abettors. This important event made little sensation in Ireland, as the whole body of Roman Catholics, from whom alone any opposition to it could have been expected, were excluded from the parliament and every interference with public affairs. succession. William's health had for some time been on the decline, but his dissolution was immediately brought on by a fall from his horse, by which his collar-bone was fractured. He died in the fifty-second year of his age, and the thirteenth of his reign, 1701: 1702. Accession of Ann. The Queen open to the of each CHAPTER II. The Reign of Ann. ANN, the daughter of James II., who had been married to the Prince of Denmark, succeeded William. She was the last of the line of Stuart, that filled the British throne. The glory of the British arms under the Duke of Marlborough has thrown a glare over the historical pages of this sovereign's reign, that has almost obliterated the melancholy effects of the spirit of party, which infected it throughout. In the meridian heat of Whiggism and Toryism, nothing was done in moderation: and few of the transactions of that day have reached us in a form unwarped by the prejudices of the narrators. Throughout every part of the British empire, except Ireland, the constitutional rights of the subject ebbed and flowed with the alternate prevalence of one of these parties. The Irish nation was doomed to suffer under every Stuart; and the conduct of this monarch to them carried the family ingratitude to its acme. The queen was alternately led down the stream ascendancy either by the Whigs or the Tories, as their respective party. parties gained the ascendancy in parliament. The whole of her reign was a state of contest and violence. Parties |