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. SATIRES
PROFANITIES
AND
BY
•
JAMES
THOMSON (B.V.f
(Author of “The City o¥ Dreadful Night”)
With a Preface by G. W. Foote.
A New Edition.
The Story of a Famous Old Jewish Firm
Religion in the Rocky Mountains
The Devil in the Church of England
Christmas Eve in the Upper Circles
A Commission of Inquiry on Royalty
A Bible Lesson on Monarchy
The One Thing Needful
The Athanasian Creed
ONE SHILLING.
LONDON:
PROGRESSIVE PUBLISHING COMPANY,
-28 Stonecutter Street, E.C,
1890.
��63'2X>5
MC3?
NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY
SATIRES
AND
PROFANITIES
BY
JAMES
THOMSON (B.V.)
(Author of “ The City
of
Dreadful Night”)
With a Preface by G. W. Foote.
A New Edition.
LONDON
progressive PUBLISHING company,
28 Stonecutter Street, E.C.
1890.
�LONDON
PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY G. W. BOOTH
28 STONECUTTER STREET, E.C,
�CONTENTS
PASS
Preface ...
...
...
5
The Story of a Famous Old Jewish Firm
...
...
7
Religion in the Rocky Mountains
...
...
21
The Devil in the Church of England...
..
..
36
Christmas Eve in the Upper Circles...
...
...
47
A Commission of Inquiry on Royalty
...
...
58
A Bible Lesson on Monarchy
..
...
...
66
The One Thing Needful
...
...
...
...
71
The Athanasian Creed
..
...
..
..
75
...
...
...
...
�..................
�EDITOR’S PREFACE.
Under the title of Satires and Profanities I collected and
published, in 1884, twenty-three prose pieces of James
Thomson’s, contributed by him at various times to Freethought
journals, namely, the National Reformer, edited by Mr. Brad
laugh, and the Secularist, edited by myself. After the sale of
about five hundred copies, the remaining sheets were destroyed
by a fire at the publisher’s premises. It was a pity that such
a book should be out of print, but complete republication was
impossible. The enterprise would have been a heavy financial
loss. There is, however, a possibility of realising one’s invest
ment in a smaller collection of the principal pieces, and I
venture to issue it in the present form.
Thomson was a born satirist as well as a born poet. I do
not think anyone can read these pieces without feeling that
Thomson enjoyed the writing of them. They reveal a side of
his genius which only found occasional expression in his verse.
He allowed me to publish two of them as pamphlets before any
collection of his poems was given to the world. Some of his
admirers, who scarcely share his convictions, are in the habit
of depreciating these satires on the current theology. But he
would have smiled at their soreness. “ Thomson’s satire,” as
I wrote in the preface to Satires and Profanities,“ was always
bitterest, or at any rate most trenchant, when it dealt with
Religion, which he considered a disease of the mind, engendered
by folly and fostered by ignorance and vanity. He saw that
spiritual superstition not only diverts men from Truth, but
induces a slavish stupidity of mind, and prepares the way for
every form of political and social injustice. He was an Atheist
first and a Republican afterwards. He derided the idea of
making a true Republic of a population besotted with religion,
paralysed with creeds, cringing to the agents of their servitude,
and clinging to the chains that enthral them.”
No doubt the cry of “Blasphemy!” will continue to be
raised against Thomson’s religious satires, as against every
pointed, and therefore “painful,” attack on Christianity.
�▼i.
Editor's Preface.
But Thomson has justified himself in this respect. Defending
a certain 11 outburst of Rabelasian laughter,” which was de
nounced by the Saturday Review in 1867, he wrote
The
Grecian mythology is dead, is no longer aggressive in its
absurdities ; the priestcraft and the foul rites have long since
perished, the beauty and the grace and the splendor remain.
But your composite theology is still alive, is insolently
aggressive, its lust for tyrannical dominion is unbounded;
therefore we must attack it if we would not be enslaved by it.
The cross is a sublime symbol; I would no more think of
treating it with disrespect while it held itself aloft in the
serene heaven of poetry than of insulting the bow of Phoebus
Apollo or the thunderbolts of Zeus; but if coarse hands will
insist on pulling it down upon my back as a ponderous wooden
reality, what can I do but fling it off as a confounded burden
not to be borne ?” Thomson also pointed out that “ For the
Atheist, God is a figment, nothing: in blaspheming God he
therefore blasphemes nothing. A man really blasphemes
when he mocks, insults, pollutes, vilifies that which he really
believes to be holy and awful.” He admitted that there
might be a hundred Christians in England who really believed
in the Christian God, and they could be guilty of blaspheming
him; but “ speaking philosophically, an honest Atheist can no
more blaspheme God than an honest Republican can be disloyal
to a King, than an unmarried man can be guilty of conjugal
infidelity.”
There is no need to say more. Thomson’s “blasphemy”
and its justification are here together. Every purchaser of
this brochure is warned in the preface what to expect, and
if his nerves are too weak for an Atheist’s satire he can give
it to a robuster friend.
May, 1890.
G. W. FOOTE.
�Story of a Famous Old Jewish Firm
[Written in 1866.]
Many thousand years ago, when the Jews first started
in business, the chief of their merchants was a venerable
and irascible old gentleman named Jah. The Jews
have always been excellent traders, keen to scent
wealth, subtle to track it, unweary to pursue it, strong
to seize it, tenacious to hold it ; and the most keen,
subtle, untiring, strong, tenacious of them all, was this
Jah. The patriarchs of his people paid him full
measure of the homage which Jews have always eagerly
paid to wealth and power, and all their most important
transactions were carried out through him. In those
antique times people lived to a very great age, and Jah
is supposed to have lived so many thousands of years
that one may as well not try to count them. Perhaps
it was not one Jah that existed all this while, but the
house of Jah : the family, both for pride and profit,
preserving through successive generations the name of
its founder. Certain books have been treasured by
the Jews as containing exact records of the dealings of
this lordly merchant (or house) both with the Jews
themselves and with strangers. Many people in our
times, however, have ventured to doubt the accuracy of
these records, arguing that some of the transactions
therein recorded it would have been impossible to
transact, that others must have totally ruined the
richest of merchants, that the accounts often contradict
each other, and that the system of book-keeping
generally is quite unworthy of a dealer so truthful and
clear-headed as Jah is affirmed to have been. The
records are so ancient in themselves, and they treat of
matters so much more ancient still, that it is not easy
to find other records of any sort with which to check
�8
Satires and Profanities.
their accounts. Strangely enough the most recent
researches have impugned the accuracy of the most
ancient of these records ; certain leaves of a volume
called the “ Great Stone Book ” having been brought
forward to contradict the very first folio of the ledger
in which the dealings of Jah have been posted up
according to the Jews. It may be that the first few
folios, like the early pages of most annals, are somewhat
mythical ; and the present humble compiler (who is
not deep in the affairs of the primaeval world, and who,
like the late lamented Captain Cuttie with his large
volume, is utterly knocked up at any time by four or
five lines of the “ Great Stone Book ”) will prudently
not begin at the beginning, but skip it with great
comfort and pleasure, especially as many and learned
men are now earnest students of this beginning. We
will, therefore, if you please, take for granted the facts
that at some time, in some manner, Jah created his
wonderful business, and that early in his career he met
with a great misfortune, being compelled, by the
villainy of all those with whom he had dealings, to
resort to a wholesale liquidation, which left him so poor,
that for some time he had not a house in the world,
and his establishment was reduced to four male and as
many female servants.
He must have pretty well recovered from this severe
shock when he entered into the famous covenant or
contract with Abraham and his heirs, by which he
bound himself to deliver over to them at a certain,
then distant, period, the whole of the valuable landed
property called Canaan, on condition that they should
appoint him the sole agent for the management of
their affairs. In pursuance of this contract, he con
ducted that little business of the flocks and herds for
Jacob against one Laban ; and afterwards, when the
children of Abraham were grown very numerous, he
managed for them that other little affair, by which
they spoiled the Egyptians of jewels of silver and
jewels of gold ; and it is even asserted that he fed and
clothed the family for no less than forty years in a
country where the commissariat was a service of
extreme difficulty.
�Story of a Famous Old Jewish Firm.
9
At length the time came when he was to make over
to them the Land of Canaan, for this purpose evicting
the several families then in possession thereof, ihe
whole of the covenanted estate he never did make over
to them, but the Jews freely admit that this was through
their own fault. They held this land as mortgaged to
him, he pledging himself not to foreclose while, they
dealt with him faithfully and fulfilled all the conditions
of the covenant. They were to pay him ten per cent,
per annum interest, with sundry other charges, to put
all their affairs into his hands, to have no dealings what
soever with any rival merchants, etc., etc. Under this
covenant the Jews continued in possession of the fine
little property of Canaan for several hundred years,
and they assert that this same Jah lived and conducted
his business throughout the whole period. But, as I
have ventured to suggest, the long existence of the
house of Jah may have been the sum total of the lives
of a series of individual Jahs. The Jews could not
have distinguished the one from the other ; for it is a
strange fact that Jah himself, they admit, was never
seen. Perhaps he did not affect close contact with
Jews. Perhaps he calculated that his power over them
would be increased by mystery ; this is certain, that he
kept himself wholly apart from them in his private
office, so that no one was admitted even on business.
It is indeed related that one Moses (the witness to the
execution of the covenant) caught a glimpse of him
from behind, but this glimpse could scarcely have
sufficed for identification ; and it is said, also, that at
certain periods the chief of the priesthood was admitted
to consultation with him ; but although his voice was
then heard, he did not appear in person—only the
shadow of him was seen, and everyone will allow that
a shadow is not the best means of identification. And
in further support of my humble suggestion it may be
noted that in many and important respects the later
proceedings attributed to Jah differ extremely in chal’acter from the earlier ; and this difference cannot be
explained as the common difference between the youth
and maturity and senility of one and the same. man,
for we are expressly assured that Jah was without
�10
Satires and Profanities.
change—by which we are not to understand that
either through thoughtlessness or parsimony he never
had small cash in his pocket for the minor occasions of
life ; but that he was stubborn in his will, unalterable
in his ideas, persistent in his projects and plans.
The records of his dealings at home with the Jews,
and abroad with the Egyptians, the Assyrians, the
Philistines, the Babylonians, the Persians, the Edomites,
and other nations, as kept by the Jews themselves, are
among the strangest accounts of a large general busi
ness which have ever been put down in black on
white. And in nothing are they more strange than in
the unsullied candor with which the Jews always admit
and proclaim that it was their fault, and by no means
the fault of Jah, whenever the joint business went
badly, and narrate against themselves the most astonish
ing series of frauds and falsehoods, showing how they
broke the covenant, and attempted to cheat the other
party in every imaginable way, and, in order to ruin
his credit, conspired with foreign adventurers of the
worst character—such as MM. Baal, Ashtaroth, and
Moloch. Jah, who gave many proofs of a violent and
jealous temper, and who was wont to sell up other
debtors in the most heartless way, appears to have been
very patient and lenient with these flagitious Jews.
Yet with all his kindness and long-suffering he was
again and again forced to put executions into their
houses, and throw themselves into prison ; and at
length, before our year One, having, as it would seem,
given up all hope of making them deal honestly with
him, he had put certain strict Romans in possession of
the property to enforce his mortgage and other rights.
And now comes a sudden and wonderful change in
the history of this mysterious Jah. Whether it was
the original Jah, who felt himself too old to conduct
the immense business alone, or whether it was some
successor of his, who had not the same self-reliance
and imperious will, one cannot venture to decide ; but
we all know that it was publicly announced, and soon
came to be extensively believed, that Jah had taken
unto himself two partners, and that the business was
thenceforth to be carried on by a firm, under the style
�Story of a Famous Old Jswish Firm.
11
of Father, Son, and Co. It is commonly thought that
history has more of certainty as it becomes more
recent ; but unfortunately in the life of Jah, uncertainty
grows ten more times uncertain when we attain the
period of this alleged partnership, for the Jews deny it
altogether ; and of those who believe in it not one is
able to define its character, or even to state its possi
bility in intelligible language. The Jews assert roundly
that the alleged partners are a couple of vile impostors,
that Jah still conducts his world-wide business alone,
that he has good reasons (known only to himself) for
delaying the exposure of these pretenders ; and that,
however sternly he has been dealing with the Jews for
a long time past, and however little they may seem to
have improved so as to deserve better treatment, he
will yet be reconciled to them, and restore them to
possession of their old land, and exalt them above all
their rivals and enemies, and of his own free will and
absolute pleasure burn and destroy every bond of
their indebtedness now in his hands. And in support
of these modest expectations they can produce a
bundle of documents which they assert to be his
promissory notes, undoubtedly for very large amounts ;
but which, being carefully examined, turn out to be all
framed on this model: “ I, the above-mentioned A. B.”
(an obscure or utterly unknown Jew, supposed to have
lived about three thousand years ago), “ hereby promise
in the name of Jah, that the said Jah shall in some
future year unknown, pay unto the house of Israel the
following amount, that is to say, etc.” If we ask,
Where is the power of attorney authorising this dubious
A. B. to promise this amount in the name of Jah ? the
Jews retort : “If you believe in the partnership, you
must believe in such power, for you have accepted all
the obligations of the old house, and have never refused
to discount its paper : if you believe neither in Jah
nor in the partnership, you are a wretch utterly with
out faith, a commercial outlaw.” In addition, however,
to these remarkable promissory notes, the Jews rely
upon the fact that Jah, in the midst of his terrible
anger, has still preserved some kindness for them. He
threatened many pains and penalties upon them for
�12
Satires and Profanities,
breach of the covenant, and many of these threats he
has carried out ; but the most cruel and horrific of all
he has not had the heart to fulfil : they have been
oppressed and crushed, strangers have come into their
landed property, they have been scattered among all
peoples, a proverb and a by-word of scorn among the
nations, their religion has been accursed, their holy
places are defiled, but the crowning woe has been spared
them (Deut. xxviii., 44) ; never yet has it come to pass
that the stranger should lend to them, and they should
not lend to the stranger. There is yet balm in Gilead,
a rose of beauty in Sharon, and a cedar of majesty on
Lebanon ; the Jew still lends to the stranger, and does
not borrow from him, except as he “borrowed ” from
the Egyptian—and the interest on money lent is still
capable, with judicious treatment, of surpassing the
noble standard of “ shent per shent.”
And even among the Gentiles there are some who
believe that Jah is still the sole head of the house, and
that the pair who are commonly accounted junior
partners are in fact only superior servants, the one a
sort of manager, the other general superintendent and
agent, though Jah may allow them a liberal commission
on the profits, as well as a fixed salary.
But the commercial world of Europe, in general,
professes to believe that there is a bond fide partnership,
and that the three partners have exactly equal authority
and interest in the concern ; that, in fact, there is such
thorough identity in every respect that the three may,
and ought to be, for all purposes of business, considered
as one. The second partner, they say, is really the son
of Jah ; though Jah, with that eccentricity which has
ever abundantly characterised his proceedings, had this
son brought up as a poor Jewish youth, apparently the
child of a carpenter called Joseph, and his wife Mary.
Joseph has little or no influence with the firm, and we
scarcely hear of a transaction done through him, but
Mary has made the most profitable use of her old liaison
with Jah, and the majority of those who do business
with the firm seek her good offices, and pay her very
liberal commissions. Those who do not think so
highly of her influence, deal with the house chiefly
�Story of a Famous Old Jewish Firm.
13
through, the Son, and thus it has come to pass that poor
Jah is virtually ousted from his own business. He
and the third partner are little more than sleeping
partners, while his mistress and her son manage every
affair of importance.
This state of things seems somewhat unfair to Jah ;
yet one must own that there are good reasons for it.
Jah was a most haughty and humorous gentleman,
extremely difficult to deal with, liable to sudden fits of
rage, wherein he maltreated friends and foes alike,
implacable when once offended, a desperately sharp
shaver in a bargain, a terrible fellow for going to law.
The son was a much more kindly personage, very
affable and pleasant in conversation, willing and eager
to do a favor to any one, liberal in promises even
beyond his powers of performance, fond of strangers,
and good to the poor ; and his mother, with or without
reason, is credited with a similar character. Moreover,
Jah always kept himself invisible, while the son and
mother were possibly seen, during some years, by a
large number of persons ; and among those who have
never seen them their portraits are almost as popular
as photographs of the Prince and Princess of Wales.
With the real or pretended establishment of the
Firm, a great change took place in the business of Jah.
This business had been chiefly with the Jews, and even
when it extended to foreign transactions, these were all
subordinate to the Jewish trade. But the Firm lost
no time in proclaiming that it would deal with the
whole world on equal terms : no wonder the Jews
abhor the alleged partners I And the nature of the
contracts, the principal articles of trade, the mode of
keeping the accounts, the commission and interest
charged and allowed, the salaries of the agents and
clerks, the advantages offered to clients, were all
changed too. The head establishment was removed
from Jerusalem to Rome, and branch establishments
were gradually opened in nearly all the towns and
villages of Europe, besides many in Asia and Africa,
Bnd afterwards in America and Australia. It is worth
noting that in Asia and Africa (although the firm arose
in the former) the business has never been carried on
�14
Satires and Profanities.
very successfully; Messrs. Brahma, Vishnu, Seeva
and Co., the great houses of Buddha and Mumbo
Jumbo, various Parsee firms, and other opposition
houses, having among them almost monopolised the
trade.
The novel, distinctive, and most useful article -which
the Firm engaged to supply was a bread called par
excellence the Bread of Life. The Prospectus (which
was first drafted, apparently in perfect good faith, by
the Son ; but which has since been so altered and ex
panded by successive agents that we cannot learn what
the original, no longer extant, exactly stated) sets forth
that the House of Jah, Son and Co. has sole possession
of the districts yielding the corn whereof this bread is
made, the sole patents of the mills for grinding and
ovens for baking, and that it alone has the secret of the
proper process for kneading. The Firm admits that
many other houses have pretended to supply this in
valuable bread, but accuses them all of imposture or
poisonous adulteration. For itself, it commands the
genuine supply in such quantities that it can under
take to feed the whole world, and at so cheap a rate
that the poorest will be able to purchase as much as he
needs ; and, moreover, as the firm differs essentially
from all other firms in having no object in view save
the benefit of its customers, the partners being already
so rich that no profits could add to their wealth, it will
supply the bread for mere love to those who have not
money!
This fair and beautiful prospectus, you will easily
believe, brought vast multitudes eager to deal with the
firm, and especially large multitudes of the poor,
ravished with the announcement that love should be
henceforth current coin of the realm ; and the business
spread amazingly. But at the very outset a sad mis
chance occurred. The Son, by far the best of the
partners, was suddenly seized and murdered and buried
by certain agents of the old Jewish business (furious
at the prospect of losing all their rich trade), with the
connivance of the Roman installed as inspector. At
least, these wretches thought they had murdered the
poor man, and it is admitted on every side that they
�Story of a Famous Old Jewish Firm.
15
buried him ; but the dependants of the Firm have a
strange story that he was not really killed, but arose
out of his tomb after lying there for three days, and
slipped away to keep company with his father, the
invisible Jah, in his exceedingly private office ; and
they assert that he is still alive along with Jah, molli
fying the old man when he gets into one of his furious
passions, pleading for insolvent debtors, and in all
things by act and counsel doing good for all the clients
of the house. They, moreover, assert that the third
partner, who as the consoling substitute for the absent
Son is commonly called the Comforter, and who is
very energetic, though mysteriously invisible in his
operations, superintends all the details of the business
in every one of the establishments. But this third
partner is so difficult to catch, that, as stated before,
the majority of the customers deal with the venerable
mother, as the most accessible and humane personage
belonging to the house.
Despite the death or disappearance of the Son, the
firm prospered for a considerable time. After severe
competition, in which neither side showed itself very
‘scrupulous, the great firm of Jupiter and Co., the old
Greek house, which had been strengthened by the
amalgamation of the wealthiest Roman firms, was
utterly beaten from the field, sold up and extinguished.
In the sale of the effects many of the properties in
most demand were bought in by the new firm, which
also took many of the clerks and agents into its em
ployment, and it is even said adopted in several impor
tant respects the mode of carrying on business and the
system of book-keeping. But while the firm was thus
conquering its most formidable competitor, innumerable
dissensions were arising between its own branch esta
blishments ; every one accusing every other of dealing
on principles quite hostile to the regulations instituted
by the head of the house, of falsifying the accounts,
and of selling an article which was anything but the
genuine unadulterated bread. There were also inter
minable quarrels among them as to relative rank and
importance.
And whether the wheat, as delivered to the various
�16
Satires and Profanities.
establishments, was or was not the genuine article
which the firm had contracted to supply, it was soon
discovered that it issued from the licensed shops adul
terated in the most audacious manner. And, although
the prospectus had stated most positively that the
bread should be delivered to the poor customers of the
firm without money and without price (and such seems
really to have been the good Son s intention), it was
found, in fact, that the loaves, when they reached the
consumer, were at least as costly as ever loaves of any
kind of bread had been. It mattered little that the
wheat was not reckoned in the price, when agents r
commissioners’, messengers fees, bakers charges, and
a hundred items, made the price total so enormous.
When, at length, the business was flourishing all over
Europe, it was the most bewildering confusion of con
tradictions that, perhaps, was ever known in the com
mercial world. Eor in all the establishments the
agents professed and very solemnly swore that they
dealt on principles opposed and infinitely superior to
the old principles of trade ; yet their proceedings (save
that they christened old things with new names) were w
identical with those which had brought to shameful
ruin the most villainous old firms. The sub-managers,
who were specially ordered to remain poor while in the
business, and for obedience were promised the most
splendid pensions when superannuated, all became rich
as princes by their exactions from the clients of the
house ; the agents, who were especially commanded to
keep the peace, were ever stirring up quarrels and
fighting ferociously, not only with opposition agents
but with one another. The accounts, which were tn
be regulated by the most honest and simple rules, were
complicated in a lawless system, which no man could
understand, and falsified to incredible amounts, to the
loss of the customers, without being to the gain of the
firm. In brief, each establishment was like one ot
those Chinese shops where the most beautiful and noble
maxims of justice and generosity are painted in gilt
letters outside, while the most unblushing fraud and
extortion are practised inside. When poor customers
complained of these things, they were told that the
�17
Story of a Famous Old Jewish Firm.
system was perfect, that the evils were all from the
evil men who conducted the business ! but the good
people did not further explain how the perfection of
the system could ever be realised, since it must always
be worked by imperfect men. Complainants thus
mildly and vaguely answered were very fortunate ;
others, in places where the firm was very powerful,
were answered by imprisonment or false accusations, or
by being pelted and even murdered by mobs. Many
who thought the bread badly baked were themselves
thrust into the fire.
Yet so intense is the need of poor men for some
bread of life, so willing are simple men to believe fair
promises, that, in spite of the monstrous injustice and
falsehood and cruelty and licentiousness of the
managers and sub-managers and agents of the firm,
the business continued to flourish, and all the wealth
of Europe flowed into its coffers. And generations
passed ere some persons bethought them to think
seriously of the original Deed of Partnership and th©
fundamental principles of the Firm. These documents,
which had been carefully confined in certain old dead
languages which few of the customers could read, were
translated into vulgar tongues, which all could read or
understand when read, and everyone began studying
them for himself. This thinking of essentials, which,
is so rare a thought among mankind, has already pro
duced remarkable effects, and promises to produce
effects yet more remarkable in a short time.
Behold a few of the-questions which this study of the
first documents has raised.—The Father, whom no one
has seen, is there indeed such a personage ? The Son,
whom certainly no one has seen for eighteen hundred
years, did he really come to life again after being
brutally murdered ? The junior partner, whom no one
has ever seen, the Comforter, is he a comforter made of
the wool of a sheep that never was fleeced ? Th©
business, as we see it, merely uses the names, and
would be precisely the same business if these names
covered no personages. Do the managers and sub
managers really carry it on for their own profit, using
these high names to give dignity to their rascality, and
B
�18
Satires and Profanities.
to make poor people believe that they have unbounded
capital at their back ? One is punished for defamation
of character if he denies the existence of the partners,
yet not the very chief of all the managers pretends to
have seen any of the three !
And the vaunted Bread of Life, wherein does it
differ from the old corn-of-Ceres bread, from the baking
of the wheat of Mother Hertha ? Chiefly in this, that
it creates much more wind on the stomach. It is not
more wholesome, nor more nourishing, and certainly
not more cheap ; and it does us little good to be told
that it would be if the accredited agents were honest
and supplied it pure, when we are told, at the same
time, that we must get it through these agents. It is
indeed affirmed that, in an utterly unknown region
beyond the Black Sea, the genuine wheat may be seen
growing by anyone who discovers the place ; but, as
no one who ever crossed the sea on a voyage of
discovery ever returned, the assertion rests on the bare
word of people who have never seen the corn-land any
more than they have seen the partners of the firm ;
and their word is bare indeed, for it has been stripped
to shame in a thousand affairs wherein it could be
brought to the test. They tell us also that we shall all
in time cross the Black Sea, and if we have been good
customers shall dwell evermore in that delightful land,
with unlimited supplies of the bread gratis. This may
be true, but how do they know ? It may be true that
in the sea we shall all get drowned for ever.
These and similar doubts which, in many minds, have
hardened into positive disbelief, are beginning to affect
seriously the trade of the firm. But its interests are
now so inextricably bound up with the interests of
thousands and millions of well-to-do and respectable
people, and on its solvency or apparent solvency depends
that of so large a number of esteemed merchants, that
we may expect the most desperate struggles to postpone
its final bankruptcy. In the great Roman establish
ment the manager has been supported for many years
by charitable contributions from every one whom he
could persuade to give or lend, and now he wants to
borrow much more. The superintendent of the shops
�Story of a Famous Old Jewish Firm.
19
in London is in these days begging for ten hundred
thousand pounds to assist the poor firm in its difficulties.
It seems a good sum of money ; but, bless you, it is but
a drop in the sea compared with what the business has
already absorbed, and is still absorbing. Scattered
shops in the most distant countries have only been sus
tained for many years by alms from customers here.
The barbarians won’t eat the bread, but the bakers sent
out must have their salaries. A million of pounds are
being begged here ; and people (who would prosecute a
mendicant of halfpence) will give it no doubt! Yet, 0
worthy manager of the London Shops, one proved loaf
of the real Bread would be infinitely more valuable,
and would infinitely more benefit your firm ! The
villainy of the agents was monstrous, generation after
generation, the cost of that which was promised without
money and without price was ruinous for centuries ; but
not all the villainy and extortion multiplied a hundred
fold could drive away the poor hungry customers while
they had faith in the genuineness of the bread. It was
the emptiness and the wind on the stomach after much
eating, which raised the fatal doubts as to the bona fides
of the whole concern. The great English managers
had better ponder this ; for at present they grope in
the dark delusion that more and better bakers salaried
with alms, and new shops opened with eleemosynary
funds, will bring customers to buy their bran cakes as
wheaten loaves. A very dark delusion, indeed ! If
the pure promised bread cannot be supplied, no amount
of money will keep the business going very long. Con
sider what millions on millions of pounds have been
subscribed already, what royal revenues are pouring in
still; all meant for investment in wholesome and
nourishing food, but nearly all realised in hunger and
emptiness, heartburn and flatulence. The old Roman
shrewdly calculated that the House of Olympus would
prove miserably insolvent if its affairs were wound up,
if it tried honestly to pay back all the deposits of its
customers. As for this more modern firm, one suspects
that, in like case, it would prove so insolvent that it
could not pay a farthing in the pound. For Olympus
was a house that dealt largely in common worldly
�20
Satires and Profanities.
goods, and of these things really did give a considerable
quantity to its clients for their money ; but the new
firm professed to sell things infinitely more valuable,
and of these it cannot prove the delivery of a single
parcel during the eighteen hundred years it has been
receiving purchase-money unlimited.
The humble compiler of this rapid and imperfect
summary ought, perhaps, to give his own opinion of the
firm and the partners, although he suffers under the
disadvantage of caring very little for the business, and
thinks that far too much time is wasted by both the
friends and the enemies of the house in investigation
of every line and figure in its books. He believes that
Jah, the grand Jewish dealer, was a succession of
several distinct personages ; and will probably continue
to believe thus until he learns that there was but one
Pharaoh, King of Egypt, but one Bourbon, King of
France, and that the House of Rothschild has always
been one and the same man. He believes that the Son
was by no means the child of the Father, that he was
a much better character than the Father, that he was
really and truly murdered, that his prospectus and
business plans were very much more wise and honest
and good than the prospectus as we have it now, and
the system as it has actually been worked. He believes
that the Comforter has really had a share in this as in
every other business not wholly bad in the world, that
he has never identified his interests with those of any
firm, that specially he never committed himself to a
partnership of unlimited liability with the Hebrew Jah,
that he undoubtedly had extensive dealings with the
Son, and placed implicit confidence in him while a
living man, and that he will continue to deal profitably
and bountifully with men long after the firm has
become bankrupt and extinct. He believes that the
corn of the true bread of life is sown and grown,
reaped, ground, kneaded, baked and eaten on this side
of the Black Sea. He believes that no firm or company
whatever, with limited or unlimited liability, has the
monopoly for the purveyance of this bread, that no
charters can confer such monopoly, that the bread is
only to be got pure by each individual for himself, and
�Story of a Famous Old Jewish Firm.
21
that no two individuals of judgment really like it pre
pared in exactly the same fashion, but that unfor
tunately (as his experience compels him to believe)
the bulk of mankind will always in the future, no less
than in the past, persist in endeavoring to procure it
through great chartered companies.
Finally, he
believes that the worthy chief baker in London with
his million of money is extremely like the worthy
Mrs. Partington with her mop against the Atlantic.
Religion in the Rocky Mountains.
Top of Pike’s Peak, March Mh, 1873.
Honored with your special commission, I at once
hurried across to Denver, and thence still westward
until I found myself among the big vertebrae of this
longish backbone of America. I have wandered to and
fro among the new cities, the advanced camps of civili
sation, always carefully reticent as to my mission,
always carefully inquiring into the state of religion
both in doctrine and practice. You were so hopeful
that high Freethought would be found revelling trium
phant in these high free regions, that I fear you will be
acutely pained by this my true report. Churches and
chapels of all kinds abound—Episcopalian, Methodist
Episcopal (for the Methodists here have bishops), Pres
byterian, Baptist, Congregational, Roman Catholic, etc.
Zeal inflaming my courage, three and even four times
have I ventured into a Church, each time enduring the
whole service ; and if I have not ventured oftener, cer
tainly I had more than sufficient cause to abstain. For
�22
Satires and Profanities.
as I suffered in my few visits to churches in your Eng
land, so I suffered here ; and such sufferings are too
dreadful to be frequently encountered, even by the
bravest of the brave. Whether my sensations in church
are similar to those of others, or are peculiar to myself,
I cannot be sure; but I am quite sure that they are
excruciating. On first entering I may feel calm,
wakeful, sane, and not uncomfortable, except that here
I rather regret being shut in from the pure air and
splendid sky, and in England rather regret having come
out through the raw, damp murk, and in both regret
that civilisation has not yet established smoking-pews ;
but the Church is always behind the age. It is pleasant
for awhile to note the well-dressed people seated or
entering ; the men with unctuous hair and somewhat
wooden decorum ; the women floating more at ease,
suavely conscious of their fine inward and outward
adornments. It is pleasant to keep a hopeful look-out
for some one of more than common beauty or grace,
and to watch such a one if discovered. As the service
begins, and the old, old words and phrases come floating
around me, I am lulled into quaint dream-memories of
childhood ; the long unthought-of school-mates, the
surreptitious sweetstuff, the manifold tricks and
smothered laughter, by whose aid (together with total
inattention to the service, except to mark and learn the
text) one managed to survive the ordeal. The singing
also is pleasant, and lulls me into vaguer dreams.
Gradually, as the service proceeds, I become more
drowsy ; my small faculties are drugged into quiet
slumber, they feel themselves off duty, there is nothing
for which they need keep awake. But, with the com
mencement of the sermon, new and alarming symptoms
arise within me, growing ever worse and worse until
the close. Pleasure departs with tranquillity, the irrita
tion of revolt and passive helplessness is acute. I cannot
find relief in toffy, or in fun with my neighbors, as
when I was a happy child. The old stereotyped phrases,
the immemorial platitudes, the often-killed sophistries
that never die, come buzzing and droning about me
like a sluggish swarm of wasps, whose slow deliberate
stinging is more hard to bear than the quick keen
�Religion in the Rocky Mountains.
23
stinging of anger. Then the wasps, penetrating through
my ears, swarm inside me ; there is a horrid buzzing in
my brain, a portentous humming in my breast ; my
small faculties are speedily routed, and disperse in blind
anguish, the implacable wasps droning out and away
after them, and I am left void, void ; with hollow skull,
empty heart, and a mortal sinking of stomach ; my
whole being is but a thin shell charged with vacuity
and desperate craving ; I expect every instant to col
lapse or explode. It is but too certain that if anyone
should then come to lead me off to an asylum for idiots,
or a Young Men’s Christian Association, or any similar
institution, I could not utter a single rational word to
save myself. And though all my faculties have left
me, I cannot attempt to leave the church ; decorum,
rigid and frigid, freezes me to my seat ; I stare stonily
in unimaginable torture, feebly wondering whether the
sermon will outlast my sanity, or my sanity outlast the
sermon. When at length released, I am so utterly
demoralised that I can but smoke furiously, pour much
beer and cram much dinner into my hollowness, and
so with swinish dozing hope to feel better by tea-time.
Now, though in order to fulfil the great duties you
entrust to me, I have cheerfully dared the Atlantic,
and spent long days and perilous nights in railroad cars,
and would of course (were it indeed necessary) face
unappalled mere physical death and destruction, I
really could not go on risking, with the certainty of
ere long losing, my whole small stock of brains ; espe
cially as the loss of these would probably rather hinder
than further the performance of the said duties. For
suppose me reduced to permanent idiocy by church
going, become a mere brazen hollowness with a riotous
tongue like Cowper’s church-going bell ; is it not most
likely that I would then turn true believer, renouncing
and denouncing your noble commission, even as you
would renounce and denounce your imbecile commis
sioner ?
Finding that I could not pursue my inquiries in the
churches and chapels, I was much grieved and per
plexed, until one of those thoughts occurred to me
which are always welcome and persuasive, because ill
�24
Satires and Profanities.
exact agreement with our own desires or necessities.
I thought of what I had remarked when visiting your
England : how the churches and chapels and lecture
halls, each sect thundering more or less terribly against
all the others, made one guess that the people were
more disputatious than pious ; how one became con
vinced, in spite of his infidel reluctance, that the people
were indeed, as a rule, thoroughly and genuinely
religious, by mingling freely with them in their com
mon daily and nightly life. I asked myself, What really
proved to me the pervading Christianity of England ?
the sermons, the tracts, the clerical lectures, the mis
sionary meetings ? the cathedrals and other theatres
and music-halls crowded with worshippers on Sunday,
while the museums and other public-houses were empty
and shut? No, scarcely these things ; but the grand
princeliness of the princes, the true nobleness of the
nobles, the lowliness of the bishops, the sanctity of the
clergy, the honesty of the merchants, the veracity of
the shopkeepers, the sobriety and thrift of the artisans,
the independence and intelligence of the rustics ; the
general faith and hope and love which brightened the
sunless days, the general temperance and chastity which
made beautiful the sombre nights ; the almost universal
abhorrence of the world, the flesh, and the Devil ; the
almost universal devotion to heaven, the spirit, and God.
I thereupon determined to study the religion out
here, even as I had studied it in England, in the ordinary
public and private life of the people ; and you will
doubtless be sorely afflicted to learn that I have found
everywhere much the same signs of genuine, practical
Christianity as are so common and patent in the old
country. The ranchmen have sown the good seed, and
shall reap the harvest of heavenly felicity ; the stockmen will surely be corraled with the sheep, and not
among the goats, at the last day ; not to gain the whole
world would the storekeepers lose their own souls ; the
pioneers have found the narrow way which leadeth unto
life ; the fishermen are true disciples, the trappers catch
Satan in his own snares, the hunters are mighty before
the Lord; bright are the celestial prospects of the
prospectors, and the miners are all stoping-out that
�Religion in the Boclcy Mountains.
25
hidden treasure which is richer than silver and much
dine gold. As compared with the English, these
Western men are perchance inferior in two important
points of Christian sentiment; they probably do not
fear God, being little given to fear anyone ; they cer
tainly do not honor the king, perhaps because they
unfortunately have none to honor. On the other
hand, as I have been assured by many persons from
the States, and the old country, they are even superior
to the English in one important point of Christian
conduct. Christ has promised that in discharging the
damned to hell at the Day of Judgment, he will fling
.at them this among other reproaches, “ I was a stranger,
and ye took me not in ” ; and this particular rebuke
seems to have wrought a peculiarly deep impression in
these men perhaps because they have much more to
do with strangers than have people ih the old settled
countries, so much, indeed, that the wrord “ stranger
is continually in their mouths. The result is (as the
said persons from England and the States have often
solemnly assured me) that any and every stranger
arriving in these regions is most thoroughly, most
beautifully, most religiously taken in. So that should
any of these fine fellows by evil hap be among the
accursed multitude whom Christ thus addresses, they
will undoubtedly retort in their frank fashion of
•speech : “ Wall, boss, it may be right to give us hell
on other counts, but you say you was a stranger and
we' didn’t take you in. What we want to know is,
Did you ever come to our parts to trade in mines or
stock or sich ? If you didn't, how the Devil could we
take you in ? if you did, it’s a darned lie, and an insult
to our understanding to say we didn't."
But though the practical life out here is so veritably
'Christian, you still hope that at any rate the creeds and
doctrines are considerably heterodox. I am sincerely
sorry to be obliged to destroy this hope. In the ordinary
-talk of the men continually recur the same or almost
the same expressions and implications of orthodox
belief, as are so common in your England, and
throughout Christendom. Why such formulas are
.generally used by men onlj, I have often been puzzled
�26
Satires and Profanities.
to explain ; it may be that the women, who in all lands
attend divine service much more than do the men, find
ample expression of their faith in the set times and
places of public worship and private prayer ; while
the men, less methodical, and demanding liberal scope,
give it robust utterance whenever and wherever they
choose. These formulas, as you must have often
remarked, are most weighty and energetic ; they avouch
and avow the supreme personages and mysteries and
dogmas of their religion ; they are usually but brief
ejaculations, in strong contrast to those long prayers of
the Pharisees which Jesus laughed to scorn ; and they
are often so superfluous as regards the mere worldly
meaning of the sentences in which they appear, that it
is evident they have been interjected simply to satisfy
the pious ardor of the speaker, burning to proclaim in
season and out of season the cardinal principles of his
faith. I say speaker, and not writer, because writing,
being comparatively cold and deliberate, seldom flames
out in these sharp swift flashes, that leap from living
lips touched with coals of fire from the altar.
I am aware that these fervid ejaculations are apt tobe regarded by the light-minded as trivial, by the coldhearted as indecorous, by the sanctimonious as even
profane ; but to the true philosopher, whether he be
religious or not, they are pregnant with grave signi
ficance. For do not these irrepressible utterances burst
forth from the very depths of the profound heart of
the people ? Are they not just as spontaneous and
universal as is the belief in God itself ? Are they not
among the most genuine and impassioned words of man
kind ? Have they not a primordial vigor and vitality ?
Are they not supremely of that voice of the people which
has been well called the voice of God ? Thus when your
Englishman instead of “ Strange !” says “ The Devil !”
instead of “Wonderful!” cries “Good Heavens!” instead
of “ How startling !” exclaims “ 0 Christ 1” he does
more than merely express his emotions, his surprise, his
wonder, his amaze ; he hallows it to the assertion of
his belief in Satan, in the good kingdom of God, in
Jesus; and, moreover, by the emotional gradation
ranks with perfect accuracy the Devil lowest in the
�Religion in the Rocky Mountains,
27
scale, the heavens higher, Christ the loftiest. When
another shouts “ God damn you ! he not only con
demns the evil of the person addressed ; he also takes
occasion to avow his own strong faith in God and
God’s judgment of sinners. Similarly
God bless
you
implies that there is a God, and that from him
all blessings flow. How vividly does the vulgar
hyperbole “ Infernally hot,” prove the general belief
in hell-fire? And the phrase “God knows! not
merely declares that the subject is beyond human
knowledge, but also that an all-wise God exists. Here
in the West, as before stated, such brief expressions
of faith, which are so much more sincere than. long
formularies repeated by rote in church, are quite as
common as in your England. When one has sharply
rebuked or punished another, he says, “ 1 gave him
hell.” And that this belief in future punishment per
vades all classes is proved by the fact that even a
profane editor speaks of it as a matter of course. lor
the thermometer having been stolen from his sanctum,
the said worthy editor announced that the .mean cuss
who took it might as well bring or send it back (no
questions asked) for it could not be of any use to him
in the place he was going to, as it only registered up
to 212 degrees. The old notion that hell or Hades is
located in the middle of the earth (which may have a
scientific solution in the Plutonic theory that we dwell
on the crust of a baked dumpling full of fusion and
confusion) is obviously tallied by the miner s assertion
that his vein was true-fissure, reaching from the grass
roots down to hell. The frequent phrase A Go damned liar,” “A God-damned thief,” recognises God
as the punisher of the wicked. I have heard a man
complain of an ungodly headache, implying first, theexistence of God, and secondly, the fact that the God1 Is it not time that we wrote such words as this damn at lull
length, as did Emily Bronte, the Titaness, whom Charlotte just y
vindicates in this as in other respects; instead of putting oni y
initial and final letters, with a hypocritical fig-leaf dash m the
middle, drawing particular attention to what it affects to conceal ? These words are in all men’s mouths, and many ot
em
are emphatically the leading words of the Bible.
�58
Satires and Profanities.
head does not ache, or in other words is perfect.
Countless other phrases of this kind might be alleged,
a few of them astonishingly vigorous and racy, for new
countries breed lusty new forms of speech ; but the
few already given suffice for my present purpose. One
remarkable comparison, however, k cannot pass over
without a word : it is common to say of a man who has
too much self-esteem, He thinks himself a little tin
Jesus on wheels. It is clear that some profound sug
gestion, some sacrosanct mystery, must underlie this
bold locution ; but what I have been hitherto unable
to find out. The connection between Jesus and tin
may seem obvious to such as know anything of bishops
and pluralists, pious bankers and traders. But what
about the wheels ? Have they any relation to the
opening chapter of Ezekiel ? It is much to be wished
that Max Muller, and all other such great scholars, who
(as I am informed, for it’s not I that would presume to
study them myself) manage to extract whatever noble
mythological meanings they want, from unintelligible
Oriental metaphors and broken phrases many thousand
years old, would give a few years of their superfluous
time to the interpretation of this holy riddle. Do not,
gentlemen, do not by all that is mysterious, leave it to
the scholars of millenniums to come ; proceed to probe
and analyse and turn it inside out at once, while it is
still young and flourishing, while the genius who
invented it is still probably alive, if he deceased not in
his boots, as decease so many gallant pioneers.
And here, before afflicting you further, 0 muchenduring editor, let me soothe you a little by stating
that some particles of heresy, some few heretics, are to
be found even here. I have learned that into a very
good and respectable bookstore in a city of these
regions, certain copies of Taylor’s Diegesis have pene
trated, who can say how ? and that some of these have
been sold. A living judge has been heard to declare
that he couldn’t believe at all in the Holy Ghost outfit.
It has also been told me of a man who must have held
strange opinions as to the offspring of God the Father,
though certainly this man was not a representative
pioneer, being but a German miner, fresh from the
�Religion in the Rocky Mountains.
29“
States. This Dutchman (all Germans here are Dutch,
doubtless from Deutsche, the special claims of the
Hollanders being ignored) was asked solemnly by a
clergyman, “ WIio died to save sinners ?” and answered
“Gott.” “What,” said the pained and pious pastor,
“Don’t you know that it was Jesus the Son of God ?”
“ Ah,” returned placidly the Dutchman, “ it vass one
of te boys, vass it ? I always dought it vass te olt man
himselben.” This good German may have been misled
by the mention of the sons of God early in Genesis,
yet it is strange that he knew not that Jesus is the only
son of God, and our Savior. A story is moreover told
of two persons, of whom the one boasted rather too
often that he was a self-made man, and the other at
length quietly remarked that he was quite glad to hear
it, as it cleared God from the responsibility of a darned
mean bit of work. Whence some have inferred the
heresy that God is the creator of only a part of the
universe, but I frankly confess that in my own opinion
the reply was merely a playful sarcasm.
The most decided heresy which has come under my
own observation was developed in the course of a chat
between two miners in a lager-beer saloon and billiardhall ; into the which, it need scarcely be remarked, I
was myself solely driven by the fierce determination
to carry out my inquiries thoroughly. Bill was
smoking, Dick was chewing ; and they stood up
together, at rather rapidly decreasing intervals, for
drinks of such “fine old Bourbon” rye whiskey as
bears the honorable popular title of rot-gut. The fre
quency with which the drinking of alcoholic liquors
leads to impassioned and elevated discussion of great
problems in politics, history, dog-breeding, horse
racing, moral philosophy, religion and kindred
important subjects, seems to furnish a strong and
hitherto neglected argument against teetotalism. There
are countless men who can only be stimulated to a
lively and outspoken interest in intellectual questions
by a series of convivial glasses and meditative whiffs.
If such men really take any interest in such questions
at other times, it remains deplorably latent, not exer
cising its legitimate influence on the public opinion of
�.'30
Satires and Profanities.
the world. Our two boys were discussing theology ;
and having had many drinks, grappled with the doctrine
of the triune God. “ Wall,” said Bill, “ I can’t make
out that trinity consarn, that three’s one and one’s three
outfit.” Whereto Dick : “ Is that so ? Then you
warn’t rigged out for a philosopher, Bill. Look here,”
pulling forth his revolver, an action which caused a
•slight stir in the saloon, till the other boys saw that he
didn’t mean business ; “ look here, I’ll soon fix it up
for you. Here’s six chambers, but it’s only one pistol,
with one heft and one barrel; the heft for us to catch
hold of, the barrel to kill our enemy. Wall, God
a’mighty’s jest made hisself a three-shooter, while he
remains one God; but the Devil, he’s only a single-shot
derringer : so God can have three fires at the Devil for
one the Devil can have at him. Now can’t you figure
it out ?” “ Wall,” said Bill, evidently staggered by
the revolver, and feeling, if possible, increased respect
for that instrument on finding it could be brought to
bear toward settlement of even such a difficulty as the
present; “Wall, that pans out better than I thought
it could : but to come down to the bed-rock, either
God's a poor mean shot or his piece carries darned
light ; for I reckon the Devil makes better play
with his one chamber than God with his three.”
“ Maybe,” replied Dick, with calm candor, strangely
indifferent to the appalling prospects this theory held
out for our universe ; “ some of them pesky little
things jest shoot peas that rile the other fellow without
much hurting him, and then, by thunder, he lets day
light through you with one good ball. Besides, it’s
likely enough the Devil’s the best shot, for he’s been
consarned in a devilish heap of shooting more than
God has ; at any rate”—perchance vaguely remember
ing to have heard of such things as “ religious wars ”—
“ of late years, between here and ’Frisco. Wall, I
guess I don’t run the creation. Let’s liquor
mani
festly deriving much comfort from the consciousness
that he had no hand in conducting this world. Bill
acquiesced with a brief “ Ja,” and they stood up for
another drink. I am bound to attest that, in spite or
because of the drinks, they had argued throughout
�Religion in the Rocky Mountains.
31
-with the utmost deliberation and gravity, with a
dignified demeanor which Bishops and D.Ds. might
■envy, and ought to emulate.
Having thus comforted you with what little of heresy
and infidelity I have been able to gather, it is now my
painful duty to advance another class of proofs of the
general religiousness here ; a class of which you have
very few current specimens in England, unless it be
among the Roman Catholic. All comparative mythologists—indeed, all students of history—are said to
agree that the popular legends and myths of any race
at any time are of the utmost value, as showing what
the race then believed, and thus determining its moral
and intellectual condition at that period ; this value
being quite irrespective of the truth or untruth to fact
■of the said legends. Hence in modern times collections
of old traditions and fairy tales have been excellently
well received, whether from the infantile literature of
ancient peoples, as the Oriental and Norse, or from the
■senile and anile lips of secluded members of tribes
whose nationality is fast dying out, as the Gaelic and
Welsh. And truly such collections commend them
selves alike to the grave and the frivolous, for the
scientific scholar finds in them rich materials for
•serious study, and the mere novel-reader can flatter
himself that he is studying while simply enjoying
strange stories become new from extreme old age. All
primitive peoples, who read and write little, have their
most popular beliefs fluidly embodied in oral legends
and myths ; and in this respect the settlers of a new
region, though they may come from the oldest countries,
resemble the primitive peoples. They are too busy
with the tough work of subduing the earth to give
much time to writing or reading anything beyond their
local newspapers ; they love to chat together when not
working, and chat, much more than writing, runs into
stories. Thus religious legends in great numbers circu
late out here, all charged and surcharged with faith in
the mythology of the Bible. Of these it has been my
sad privilege to listen to not a few. As this letter is
already too long for your paper, though very brief for
the importance of its theme, I will subjoin but a couple
�32
Satires and Profanities.
of them, which I doubt not will be quite enough to
indicate what measureless superstition prevails in
these youngest territories of the free and enlightened
Republic.
It is told—on what authority no one asks, the legend
being universally accepted on its intrinsic merits, as.
Protestants would have us accept the Bible, and Papists
their copious hagiology—that St. Joseph, the putative
father of oui’ Lord, fell into bad habits, slipping almost
daily out of Heaven into evil society, coming home
very late at night and always more or less intoxicated.
It is suggested that he may have been driven into these
courses by unhappiness in his connubial and parental
relations, his wife and her child being ranked so much
above himself by the Christian world, and the latter
being quite openly attributed to another father. Peter,
though very irascible, put up with his misconduct for
a long time, not liking to be harsh to one of the Royal
Family ; and it is believed that God the Father sym
pathised with this poor old Joseph, and protected him,
being himself jealous of the vastly superior popularity
of Mary and Jesus. But at length, after catching a
violent cold through getting out’ of bed at a prepos
terous hour to let the staggering Joseph in, Peter told
him roundly that if he didn’t come home sober and in
good time, he must just stay out all night. Joseph,
feeling sick and having lost his pile, promised amend
ment, and for a time kept his word. Then he relapsed
the heavenly life proved too slow for him, the continual
howling of “all the menagerie of the Apocalypse”
shattered his nerves, he was disgusted at his own
insignificance, the memory of the liaison between his
betrothed and the Holy Ghost filled him with gall and
wormwood, and perhaps he suspected that it was still
kept up. So, late one night or early one morning,.
Peter was roused from sleep by an irregular knocking
and fumbling at the gate, as if some stupid dumb
animal w.ere seeking admittance. “Who’s there?”
growled Peter. “ It’s me—Joseph,” hiccoughed the
unfortunate. “You’re drunk,” said Peter, savagely.
“ You’re on the tear again ; you’re having another
bender.” “Yes,” answered Joseph, meekly. “Wall,”
�Religion in the Rocky Mountains.
33
said Peter, “you jest go back to where you come from
and spend the night there; get.” “I can’t,” said
Joseph. “They’re all shut up; they’ve turned me
out.” “ Then sleep outside in the open air ; it’s whole
some, and will bring you round,” said Peter. After
much vain coaxing and supplicating, old Joe got quite
mad, and roared out, “ If you don’t get up and let me
in at once, by God I’ll take my son out of the outfit
and bust up the whole consarn!” Peter, terrified by
this threat, which, if carried out, would ruin his pro
spects in eternal life by abolishing his office of celestial
porter, caved in, getting up and admitting Joseph, who
ever since, has had a latch-key that he may go and
come when he pleases. It is to be hoped that he will
never when tight let this latch-key be stolen by one of
the little devils who are always lurking about the
haunts of dissipation he frequents ; for in that case the
consequences might be awful as can be readily imagined.
Again it is told that a certain miner, a tough cuss,
who could whip his weight in wild cats and give points
to a grizzle, seemed uncommonly moody and lowspirited one morning, and on being questioned by his
chum, at length confessed that he was bothered by a
very queer dream. “ I dreamt that I was dead,” he
explained ; “ and a smart spry pretty little angel took
me up to heaven.” “Dreams go by contraries,” sug
gested the chum, by way of comfort. “ Let that slide,”
answered the dreamer ; “ the point isn’t there. Wall,
St.. Peter wasn’t at the gate, and the angel critter led
me on to pay my respects to the boss, and after travelling
considerable we found him as thus. God the Father,
God the Son, God the Holy Ghost and Peter, all as large
as life, were playing a high-toned game of poker, and
there was four heavy piles on the table—gold, not shin
plasters, you bet. I was kinder glad to see that they
played poker up in heaven, so as to make life there not
onbearable ; for *it would be but poor fun singing
psalms all day ; I was never much of a hand at singing,
more particularly when the songs is psalms. Wall, we
waited, not liking to disturb their game, and I watched
the play. I soon found that Jesus Christ was going
through the rest, cheating worse than the heathen
C
�34
Satires and Profanities.
Chinee at euchre ; but of course I didn’t say nothing,
not being in the game. After a while Peter showed
that he began to guess it to, if he wasn’t quite sure ; or
p’raps he was skeared at up and telling Christ to his
face. At last, however, what does Christ do, after a
bully bluff which ran Pete almost to his bottom, dollar,
but up and show five aces to Pete’s call; and ‘ What’s
that for high ?’ says he, quite cool. ‘ Now look you,
Christ,’ shouts Pete, jumping up as mad as thunder, and
not caring a cent or a continental what he said to any
body ; ‘ look you, Christ, that’s too thin ; we don’t want
any of your darned miracles here !’ and with that he
grabbed up his pile and all his stakes, and went off in a
mighty huff. Christ looked pretty mean, I tell you, and
the game was up. Now you see,” said the dreamer, sadly
and thoughtfully, “ it’s a hard rock to drill and darned poor
pay at that, if when you have a quiet hand at poker up
there, the bosses are allowed to cheat and a man can’t
use his deringer or put a head on ’em ; I don’t know
but I’d rather go to the other place on those terms.”
Not yet to be read in books, as I have intimated, but
circulating orally, and in versions that vary with the
various rhapsodists, such are the legends you may hear
when a ring is formed round the hotel-office stove at
night, in shanties and shebangs of ranchmen and
miners, in the shingled offices of judge and doctor, in
railroad cars and steamboats, or when bumming around
the stores ; whenever and wherever, in short, men are
gathered with nothing particular to do. The very
naivete of such stories surely testifies to the child-like
sincerity of the faith they express and nourish. It is
the simple unbounded faith of the Middle Ages, such
as we find in the old European legends and poems and
mysteries, such as your poetess Mrs. Browning well
marks in Chaucer—
“ the infantine
Familiar clasp of things divine.”
Many of the so-called Liberal clergy complain of the
gulf which yawns in this age of materialistic science
between religion and every-day life, this world and the
next, heaven and earth, God and man. The higher
things are treated as mere thin abstractions, they say ;
�Religion in the Rocky Mountains.
35
and only the lower things are recognised as real. These
pious pioneers, in the freshness and wonderfulness of
their new life, overleap this gulf without an effort,
realising heaven as thoroughly as earth. How could
the communion and the human nature of saints be
better exhibited than in St. Joseph falling into dissipa
tion and St. Peter playing poker ? How could the
manhood as well as the Godhead of Jesus Christ be
more familiarly brought home to us than by his taking
a hand at this game and then miraculously cheating.
When generations have passed away, if not earlier, such
legends as these will assuredly be gathered by earnest
and reverent students as quite invaluable historical
relics. They must fill the Christian soul with delight;
they must harrow the heart of him who hath said in
his heart, There is no God.
In conclusion, I must again express my deep regret
at being forced by the spirit of truth to give you so
favorable an account of the state of religion out here,
both in creed and practice. I trust that you will lose
no time and spare no exertion in attacking, and if pos
sible, routing out the Christianity now entrenched in
these great natural fortresses. Be your war-cry that
of the first pioneers, “ Pike’s Peak or bust ” ; and be
not like unto him found teamless half-way across the
plains, with the confession on his waggon-tilt, “ Busted,
by thunder.” For you can come right out here by
railroad now. As for myself, I climbed wearily and
with mortal pantings unto the top of this great moun
tain, thinking it one of the best coigns of vantage
whence to command a comprehensive view of the
sphere of my inquiries, and also a spot where one
might write without being interrupted or overlooked
by loafers. Unfortunately I have not been able to dis
cover any special religious or irreligious phaenomena ;
for, though the prospect is indeed ample where not
intercepted by clouds or mist, very few of the people
and still fewer of their characteristics can be made out
distinctly even with a good glass. How I am to get
down and post this letter puzzles me. The descent
will be difficult, dangerous, perhaps deadly. Would
that I had not come up. After all there is some truth
�36
Satires and Profanities.
in the Gospel narrative of the Temptation : for by
studying the general course of ecclesiastical promotion
and the characters of the most eminent churchmen, I
was long since led to recognise that it is indeed Satan
who sets people on pinnacles of the temple ; and I am
now, moreover, thoroughly convinced that it is the
Devil and the Devil only that takes any one to the top
of an exceeding high mountain.
The Devil in the Church of England.
[Whitten
in
1876.]
The Judical Committee of the Privy Council has
delivered judgment in the case of Jenkins v. Cook.
Many of the highest personages in the realm, including
the Archbishop of Canterbury and the great law-lords,
were present to give weight and solemnity to the
decision, which was read by the Lord Chancellor. It
was reported at full length in the Times of the follow
ing day, Feb. 17, 1876, the length being two columns
of small print.
I must try to indicate briefly the main facts of the
case, before hazarding any comments on it. Mr. Jen
kins, of Christ Church, Clifton, brought an action
against his vicar, the Rev. Flavel S. Cook, for refusing
him the Sacrament of the Holy Communion. Mr.
Cook justified the refusal on the ground that Mr. Jen
kins did not believe in the Devil, all passages relating
to the Devil and evil spirits having been excluded from
a bulky volume published by Mr. Jenkins, entitled
Selections from the Old and New Testaments. By
�The Devil in the Church of England.
37
the evidence of Mrs. Jenkins, who attempted an amic
able arrangement, it appears that Mr. Cook said to her :
“Let Mr. Jenkins write me a calm letter, and say he
believes in the Devil, and I will give him the Sacra
ment.” Whereupon Mr. Jenkins wrote on July 20,
1874: “With regard to my book, Selections from the
Old and New Testaments, the parts I have omitted,
and which has enabled me [[meaning, doubtless, and
the omission of which has enabled mej to use the book
morning and evening in my family are, in their present
generally received sense, quite incompatible with
religion or decency (in my opinion). How such ideas
have become connected with a book containing every
thing that is necessary for a man to know, I really
cannot say ; I can only sincerely regret it.” Mr. Cook
replied in effect: “ Then you cannot be received at
the Lord’s table in my church.” Mr. Jenkins, a
regular communicant, and admittedly a man of exem
plary and devout life, answered: “ Thinking as you do,
I do not see what other course you could consistently
have taken. I shall, nevertheless, come to the Lord’s
table as usual at ‘your’ church, which is also mine.”
Accordingly he presented himself, and was repelled,
whereupon he brought an action against Mr. Cook.
The case was first tried in the Court of Arches, and
the dean dismissed the suit and condemned Mr. Jen
kins in costs, saying, “ I am of opinion that the avowed
and persistent denial of the existence and personality
of the Devil did, according to the law of the Church,
as expressed in her canons and rubrics, constitute the
promoter [Mr. JenkinsJ ‘ an evil liver, and ‘ a depraver
of the Book of Common Prayer and Administration of
the Sacraments,’ in such sense as to warrant the defen
dant in refusing to administer the Holy Communion to
him until he disavowed or withdrew his avowal of the
heretical opinion, and that the same consideration
applies to the absolute denial by the promoter of the
doctrine of the eternity of punishment, and, of course,
still more to the denial of all punishment for sin in a
future state, which is the legitimate consequence of
his deliberate exclusion of the passages of scripture
referring to such punishment.”
�38
Satires and Profanities.
So far, so well; the Church of England was assured
of the Devil and the eternal punishment it has always
held so dear. But Mr. Jenkins appealed to the highest
court, and this has reversed the decision of the lower,
admonished Mr. Cook for his conduct in the past,
monished him to refrain from the like offence in
future, and condemned him in the costs of both suits.
Do you think, then, that the Church of England is
authoritatively deprived of her dear Devil and her
beloved eternal punishment? Not at all ; the really
important problem is evaded with consummate lawyer
like wariness ; the points in dispute are most shiftily
shifted like slides of a magic lantern ; we have a new
decision essentially unrelated to that which it cancels ;
we have a judgment which concerns not the Devil—
except that he would chuckle over the too clever
unwisdom which fancies it can extinguish “ burning
questions ” with legal wigs.
Their most learned lordships in the first place
observe that the learned judge of the Court of Arches
appears to have considered that the canon and the
rubric severally warrant the repulsion from the Lord’s
table of “ an evil liver,” and “ a depraver of the Book
of Common Prayer,” whereas the terms are “ an open
and notorious evil liver,” and “ common and notorious
depravers.”
This is a most pregnant distinction,
teaching us that an evil liver and a depraver of the
said book, as long as he is not notoriously such, is fully
entitled to the Holy Communion, fully entitled to the
privilege of “ eating and drinking damnation to him
self
a privilege from which the notorious evil liver
and depraver is righteously debarred.
Now, their most learned lordships find that there is
absolutely no evidence that the appellant was an evil
liver, much less an open and notorious evil liver. The
question follows, Was he a common and notorious
depraver of the Book of Common Prayer ? It was
contended that the Selections, coupled with the letter
of July 20, proved him to be this. But the letter was
not written spontaneously. He was invited by the
respondent, Mr. Cook, to write it. It was a friendly
and private, as well as a solicited, communication.
�lhe Devil in the Church of England.
39
Therefore, whatever be the construction of the letter,
and even if there be in it a depravation of the Book of
Common Prayer, still it would be impossible to hold
that the writing of such a letter in such circumstances
could make the appellant “ a common and notorious
depraver.” Whence it is clear that a man may deprave
the Book of Common Prayer as much as he pleases m
private conversation and letters, yet retain the precious
privilege of “ eating and drinking damnation to him
self ” in the Holy Communion ; he can only forfeit
this by common and notorious depravation of that
blessed book—for instance, by a depravation repeatedly
published in a newspaper, or persistently proclaimed
by the town-crier.
So far the law seems most clear, and the judgment
quite incontestible. But leaving the strait limits of
the law, and looking at the facts in evidence, there is
one part of the judgment which to the common lay
mind is simply astonishing. Their most learned lord
ships “ desire to state in the most emphatic manner that
there is not before them any evidence that the appellant^
entertains the doctrines attributed to him by the Dean of
Archeswherefore their most learned and subtle
lordships “ do not mean to decide that those doctrines
are otherwise than inconsistent with the formularies of
the Church of England.” Nor, of course, do they mean
to decide that those doctrines are inconsistent with
those formularies. No, “ This is not the subject for
their lordships’ present consideration.” Indeed, “If
they were [Nad been ] called upon to decide that
[whether] those opinions, or any of them, could be
entertained or expressed by a member of the Church,
whether layman or clergyman, consistently with the
law and with his remaining in communion with the
Church, they would have looked upon this case with
much greater anxiety than they now feel in its
decision •
Mr. Jenkins compiles and publishes a book of
Selections from the Bible, carefully . excluding all
passages relating to the Devil and evil spirits. The
book is bulky ; and, in fact, though this is not expressly
stated, seems to contain pretty well all the Bible except
�40
Satires and Profanities.
such passages. He farther exhibits in the case a book
of selections from the liturgy of the Church of England,
apparently compiled on the same principle of exclusion.
Mr. Cook sends through Mrs. J. a message : “ Let
Mr. J. write me a calm letter, and say he believes in
the Devil and I will give him the Sacrament.” Mr. J.
replies, as we have seen, that the parts he has omitted
are, in his opinion, quite incompatible with religion
or decency, in their generally received sense; such
generally received sense being evidently (to all of us
save their most learned and subtle lordships) that in
which the Church of England receives them. Mr. C.
replies, “ Then I must refuse to you the Communion.”
Mr. J. answers, “ Thinking as you do, I do not see
what other course you could consistently have taken
and resolves to test the question of legality. With
these facts staring them in the face, their most learned
and most subtle lordships can, with the utmost
solemnity, and in the most emphatic manner, declare
that there is not any evidence before them that
Mr. Jenkins does not believe in the Devil in the com
mon Church of England sense ! What the eyes of
laymen, however purblind, cannot help seeing clearly,
their far-sighted lordships, putting on legal spectacles,
dim with the dust of many ages, manage not to discern
at all.
The question cannot be left thus undecided. As
matters stand, the poor Church does not know whether,
legally, it has a Devil or not. Its Devil, its dear and
precious old Devil, is in a state of suspended animation,
neither dead nor alive ; a most inefficient and burden
some Devil. He must either be restored to full health
and vigor, or buried away decently for ever ; decently
and solemnly, the Archbishop of Canterbury, in the
presence of all their lordships of the Judicial Com
mittee of the Privy Council, reading the appropriate
Church service over his grave. That would be touch
ing and impressive !—“ Forasmuch as it hath pleased
Almighty God (with the sanction and authority of the
Judicial Committee of the Privy Council) of his great
mercy to take unto himself the soul of our dear brother
here departed, we therefore commit his body to the
�The Devil in the Church of England.
41
ground ; earth, to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust;
in sure and certain hope of the resurrection to eternal
life, through our Lord Jesus Christ.” At present it
appears that every clergyman and layman in the
Church has the legal right to sing as a solo in private,
especially if solicited, Beranger’s refrain, “ lhe Deml
is dead! The Devil is dead!" while it is doubtful
whether he is at liberty to chant it publicly and in
chorus—a state of things anomalous beyond even the
normal anomalism of all things in this our happy
England. It is urgent that some one, lay or cleric,
should compel the decision which the suit of Mr. Jen
kins has failed to obtain.
.
In considering the question whether disbelief m the
Devil would “deprave” the Prayer Book, we must
refer to this book itself. It contains three creeds—the
Apostles’, the Nicene, and that called of Athanasius.
Of these the Nicene (the creed in the Communion
Service, by the way) mentions neither the Devil nor
Hell; the Apostles’ and the so-called Athanasian men
tion Hell but not the Devil. In No. Ill of the Thirtynine Articles hell is solidly established, but again there
is no mention of the Devil. It may be argued that
hell implies the Devil, as a fox-hole implies a fox ; but
his existence is not authoritatively averred. . Strangely
enough, the only personage who, according to the
creeds and articles, has certainly been in hell, is Jesus
Christ himself : “ He descended into hell ; the third
day he rose again from the dead ; he ascended into
heaven.” What took him to hell ? The Prayer Book
does not inform us. But we learn from the Epistle
called 1 Peter, chap, iii., 19, 20, and chap, iv., 6_: f By
which also he went and preached unto the spirits in
prison, which sometime were disobedient, when once
the long-suffering of God waited in the days of Noah,
while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is
eight souls, were saved by water. ... For this cause
was the gospel preached also to them that are dead,
that they might be judged according to men in the
flesh, but live according to God in the spirit.” Whence
it appears that the spirits in prison were not the Devil
and his angels, but the spirits of those who were
�42
Satires and Profanities.
drowned in the Flood for disobedience ; and it further
more appears that these spirits were saved by the
preaching of Christ ; so that in this famous harrying
of hell, he seems to have left it as empty as the moss
troopers in their forays left farmsteads. It is true
that No. VI. of the Articles settles the canon of the
Old and New Testaments, and that anyone daring to
exclude from belief anything in this canon might be
convicted of depraving the Prayer Book. But in that
case all the best scholars and divines of the Church are
guilty of this dreadful sin ; and not only guilty, but
openly, commonly and notoriously guilty ; and there
fore all merit repulsion from the Lord’s table. Let
the truly faithful clergy, those who believe all wuthout
question or distinction, do their duty to the Articles of
religion of their Church (the Creeds, as I have pointed
out, are neutral), and they will shut out from their
Communion nearly all the intelligent piety and learn
ing which lend it whatever dignity it still retains „
Granted the canon in its integrity, and the existence of
a personal Devil, and the doctrine of eternal punish
ment cannot be fairly disputed. Without multiplying
texts, I may refer to Revelation, chap, xx., as decisive
on these points.
From these considerations it follows that if the
Church of England is bound by her own articles she
will hold fast to the Devil and hell, and deny the
privilege of her Communion to any one who depraves
the Prayer Book by common and notorious disbelief
in them. And for my own part, I do not see how the
Church could get on at all without a Devil and hell,
especially in competition with the other Christian sects,
which make unlimited use of both. The Devil is in
fact as essential to the Christian scheme as a leader
of the opposition to that great political blessing,
government by party. If he were to die, or be deposed,
it would be necessary to elect another to the vacant
dignity. You cannot put the leadership in commission
as the unfortunate Liberals were taunted with doing
in their demoralisation after their disasters of the
General Election, and Mr. Gladstone’s sudden retire
ment. Just as Mr. Disraeli lamented the withdrawal
�The Devil in the Church of England.
43
of Mr. Gladstone, complaining of the embarrassment
caused to the Government by having no responsible
leader opposed to it, so we can imagine dear God
lamenting the absence of a Devil, and declaring that
the Christian scheme could not work well without one.
His utter loss would make the government of the
world retrograde from an admirably balanced consti
tutional monarchy to a mere Oriental absolute
despotism. You must choose some one to lead, if only
in name and for the time, as the Whigs chose Lord
Hartington. But though Lord Hartington is still
tolerated by us English, a Lord Hartington of a Devil,
be it said with all respect to both his lordship and his
Devilship, would scarcely be tolerated by either the
celestial or the infernal benches.
In Beranger’s authentic record, already alluded to, of
“ The Death of the Devil ’’—which, however, relates
only to the Church of Rome—we read how, on
learning the catastrophe :—
“ The conclave shook with mortal fear;
Power and cash-box, adieu! they said;
We have lost our father dear,
The Devil is dead ! the Devil is dead ! ”
But while they were in this passion of grief and
despair, St. Ignatius offered to take the place of the
dead Devil ; and none could doubt that he with his
Jesuits for imps would prove a most efficient substitute.
Wherefore the Church threw off its sorrow and
welcomed his offer with holy rapture :—
“ Noble fellow! cried all the court,
We bless thee for thy malice and hate.
And at once his Order, Rome’s support,
Saw its robes flutter Heaven’s gate.
Prom the Angels tears of pity fell:
Poor man will have cause to rue, they said;
St. Ignatius inherits Hell.
The Devil is dead! the Devil is dead.”
Thus matters continued well for the Church of Rome,
and, in fact, became even better than before. But if
the Devil should die in the Church of England, whom
has she that could efficiently take his place ? She has
no saints except the disciples and apostles of the New
�44
Satires and Profanities.
Testament, and these have long since gone to glory.
Would Mr. Gladstone undertake the office? or Mr'
Beresford Hope, with the Saturday Review for his
infernal gazette ? or the editor of the Rock ? or he of
the Church Times ? or the man who does religion for
the Daily Telegraph? Each of these distinguished
gentlemen might well eagerly accept the candidature
for a post so lofty : but I fear that none of them
could be considered equal to its functions. Perhaps
Mr. Disraeli has the requisite genius, and probably he
would be very glad to exchange the Premiership of
little England for that of large hell: but unfortunately
he has already committed himself to the side of the
angels, meaning by angels the humdrum Tory angels
of heaven—for, as Dr. Johnson said, the Devil was the
first Whig. On the whole, the Church of England had
better keep loyal to its ancient and venerable Devil,
being too impoverished in intellect and character to
supply a worthy successor.
■ I have ventured to compare the government of the
world in the Christian scheme, by a God and a Devil,
with our own felicitous government by party. There
is, however, or rather there appears to be, a striking
difference between the two. In our government, when
the Prime Minister finds himself decidedly in a minority,
he goes out of office, and the Leader of the Opposition
goes in; in the Government of the World the
Leader of the Opposition seems to have always had
an immense majority (and his majority in these days
is probably larger than ever before, seeing that
sceptics and infidels have multiplied exceedingly),
yet the other side is supposed to retain permanent
possession of office. I say “ supposed,” because the
Bible itself suggests that this popular opinion is a
mistake, the Devil (if there be a Devil) being entitled
by it the prince of this world, which surely implies his
accession to power.
Although the Godhead or governing power of the
world, according to the Christian scheme, is usually
spoken and written of as a trinity, it is in fact, qua
ternary oi’ fourfold fcr Protestants, and quinary or
fivefold for Roman Catholics. The former have God
�The Devil in the Church of England.
45
the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Ghost, and
God the Devil; the latter supplement these with
Goddess the Virgin Mary. Both formally acknow
ledge the first three as collectively and severally
almighty, but Protestants implicitly acknowledge the
fourth, and Roman Catholics the fifth, as more almighty
still (these solecisms of dogma cannot be expressed
without solecisms of language.) With the Roman
Catholics I am not concerned here. With regard to
the Protestants, and those especially professing the
Protestantism of the Church of England, I may safely
affirm that the Devil is not less essential to their
theology than is any person of the Trinity, or, in fact,
than are the three persons together. Indeed, the
Father and the Holy Ghost have been practically dis
pensed with, leaving Christ and Satan to fight the
battle out between themselves.
As this is a gloriously scientific age, nobly enamored
of the exact sciences, I will endeavor to expound this
sublime subject of the divinity of the Church of Eng
land mathematically, even after the manner of the
divine Plato in Book VIII. of “ The Republic,” treat
ing of divine and human generation; and in the
“ Timseus,” treating of the creation of the universal
soul. His demonstrations, indeed, are so divinely
obscure as to confound all the scholiasts ; my demon
stration, however, shall be so translucent that even the
most learned and subtle lords of the Judicial Committee
of the Privy Council, with their legal spectacles on,
shall not be able to help seeing through it. And
whereas the figures, which are shapes, are more intel
ligible to most people than the figures which are
numbers, let the exposition be geometrical. We will
say, then, that the Church of old conceived the divinity
in the form of an equilateral triangle, whereof the base
was Christ as the whole system was founded on belief
in the Lord Jesus Christ, and the Father and the Holy
Ghost were the two sides, leaning each on the other ;
and the Devil was the apex, as opposed to, and farthest
from, our blessed Savior. But in course of time the
theologians (perhaps merely wanting some occupation
for their vigorous talents, perhaps deeming it undig-
�46
Satires and Profanities.
nified to have two persons of the Godhead supporting
each other obliquely like a couple of tipsy men, perhaps
simply in order to make matters square) set to work,
and pushed up the two sides, so that each might stand
firm and perpendicular by itself. This process had two
unforeseen results ; it expanded the apex, which was a
very elastic point, so that it became the crowning side
of the square, and it so unhinged the sides that after a
brief upright existence they lost their balance, and
were carried to Limbo by the first wind of strange
doctrine which blew that way ; and the Devil and
Christ, or Christ and the Devil (arrange the precedence
as you please), were left alone confronting each other.
These two are of course equal and parallel, the main
distinction between them being that Christ is below,
and the Devil above, or, in other words, that the Devil
is superior and Christ is inferior(theDevil seems entitled
to the precedence). Thus matters have continued even
to the present time, the divinity showing itself, as we
may say, without form and void ; and we are free to
speculate on the momentous questions : Will the crown
(which is the Devil) fall into the base (which is Christ)?
Will the base float up into the crown ? Will the two
coalese half way ? Will they both, unknit from their
sides, be carried away to Limbo by some blast of strange
doctrine ? One thing is certain, they cannot long remain
as they are. Rare Ben Johnson chanted the Trinity, or
Equilateral Triangle ; rare Walt Whitman has chanted
the Square Deific (with Satan for the fourth side); no
poet can care to chant the two straight lines which, in
the language of Euclid, and in the region of intelli
gence, cannot enclose a space, but are as a magnified
symbol of equal—to nothing.
PS.—It may be appropriately added that the books
of Euclid are really symbolic and prophetic expositions
of most sublime and sacrosanct mysteries, though in
these days few persons seem aware of the fact. Thus
the very first definition, “ A point is position without
magnitude,” exactly defines every point of difference
between the theologians. So a line, which is as the
prolongation of a point, or length without breadth,
represents in one sense (for each symbol has manifold
�The Devil in the Church of England.
47
meanings) the history of any theological system. An
acute angle is, say, Professor Clifford ; an obtuse
angle, Mr. Whalley ; a right angle, the present writer :
non angeli sed Angli. The first proposition, “ To erect
an equilateral triangle upon a given finite straight line,”
indicates the problem solved by Christianity, when it
erected the Trinity on the basis of the man we call
Jesus. This pregnant subject should be worked out in
detail through the whole eight books.
Christmas Eve in the Upper Circles.
[Written
in
1866.]
Poor dear God sat alone in his private chamber,
moody, melancholy, miserable, sulky, sullen, weary,
dejected, supernally hipped. It was the evening of
Sunday, the 24th of December, 1865. Waters con
tinually dripping wear away the hardest stone ; year
falling after year will.at length overcome the strongest
god : an oak-tree outlasts many generations of men ;
a mountain or a river outlasts many celestial dynasties.
A cold like a thick fog in his head, rheum in his eyes,
and rheumatism in his limbs and shoulders, his back
bent, his chin peaked, his poll bald, his teeth decayed,
his body all shivering, his brain all muddle, his heart
all black care ; no wonder the old gentleman looked
poorly as he cowered there, dolefully sipping his
Lachryma Christi. “I wish the other party would
lend me some of his fire,” he muttered, “ for it is
horribly frigid up here.” The table was crowded and
the floor littered with books and documents, all most
�48
Satires and Profanities.
unreadable reading : missionary reports, controversial
divinity, bishops’ charges, religious periodicals, papal
allocutions and encyclical letters, minutes of Exeter
Hall meetings, ponderous blue books from the angelic
bureaux—dreary as the humor of Punch, silly as the
critiques of the Times, idiotic as the poetry of AU the
Year Round. When now and then he eyed them
askance he shuddered more shockingly, and looked at
his desk with loathing despair. For he had gone
through a hard day’s work, with extra services appro
priate to the sacred season ; and for the ten-thousandth
time he had been utterly knocked up and bewildered
by the Athanasian Creed.
While he sat thus, came a formal tap at the door,
and his son entered, looking sublimely good and re
spectable, pensive with a pensiveness on which one
grows comfortably fat. “ Ah, my boy,” said the old
gentleman, '• you seem to get on well enough in these
sad times : come to ask my blessing for your birthday
fete ?” “ I fear that you are not well, my dear father ;
do not give way to dejection, there was once a man—”
“ 0, dash your parables I keep them for your disciples ;
they are not too amusing. Alack for the good old times!”
“ The wicked old times you mean, my father ; the times
when we were poor, and scorned, and oppressed ; the
times when heathenism and vain philosophy ruled
everywhere in the world. Now, all civilised realms
are subject to us. and worship us.” “ And disobey us.
You are very wise, much wiser than your old worn-out
father ; yet perchance a truth or two comes to me in
solitude, when it can’t reach you through the press of
your saints, and the noise of your everlasting preaching
and singing and glorification. You knowhow I began
life, the petty chief of a villainous tribe. But I was
passionate and ambitious, subtle and strong-willed, and,
in spite of itself, I made my tribe a nation ; and I
fought desperately against all the surrounding chiefs,
and with pith of arm and wile of brain I managed to
keep my head above water. But I lived all alone, a
stern and solitary existence. None other of the gods
■was so friendless as I ; and it is hard to live alone when
memory is a sea of blood. I hated and despised the
�Christmas Eve in the Upper Circles.
r
4J
Greek Zeus and his shameless court; yet I could not
but envy him, for a joyous life the rogue led. So I,
like an old fool, must have my amour ; and a pretty
intrigue I got into with the prim damsel Mary ! Then
a great thought arose in me : men cannot be loyal to
utter aliens ; their gods must be human on one side,
divine on the other ; my own people were always
deserting me to pay homage to bastard deities. I
would adopt you as my own son (between ourselves, I
have never been sure of the paternity), and admit you
to a share in the government. Those infernal Jews
killed you, but the son of a God could not die ; you
came up hither to dwell with me ; I the old absolute
king, you the modern tribune of the people. Here you
have been ever since ; and I don’t mind telling you
that you were a much more lovable character below
there as the man Jesus than you have proved above
here as the Lord Christ. As some one was needed on
earth to superintend the executive, we created the
Comforter, prince royal and plenipotentiary ; and
behold us a divine triumvirate ! The new blood was
I must own, beneficial. We lost Jerusalem, but we
won Rome ; Jove, Neptune, Apollo, Bacchus, and the
rest, were conquered and slain ; our leader of the
opposition ejected Plato and Pan. Only I did not
bargain that my mistress should more than succeed to
Juno, who was, at any rate, a lawful wife. You
announced that our empire was peace ; you announced
likewise that it was war; both have served us. Our
power extended, our glory rose ; the chief of a miser
able tribe has become emperor of Europe. But our
empire was to be the whole world ; yet instead of signs
of more dominion, I see signs that what we have is
falling to pieces. From my youth up I have been a
man of war; and now that I am old and weary and
wealthy, and want peace, peace flies from me. Have
we not shed enough blood ? Have we not caused
enough tears ? Have we not kindled enough fires ?
And in my empire what am I ? Yourself and my
mistress share all the power between you ; I am but a
name at the head of our proclamations. I have been a
man of war, I am getting old and worn out, evil days
•
D
�50
Satires and Profanities.
are at hand, and I have never enjoyed life ; therefore
is my soul vexed within me. And my own subjects
are as strangers. Your darling saints I cannot bear.
The whimpering, simpering, canting, chanting block
heads ! You were always happy in a pious miserable
ness, and you do not foresee the end. Do you know
that in spite of our vast possessions we are as near
bankruptcy as Spain or Austria ? Do you know that
our innumerable armies are a Chinese rabble of cowards
and traitors ? Do you know that our legitimacy (even
if yours were certain) will soon avail us as little as that
of the Bourbons has availed them ? Of these things
you are ignorant : you are so deafened with shouts and
songs in your own praise that you never catch a whisper
of doom. I would not quail if I had youth to cope
with circumstance ; none can say honestly that I ever
feared a foe ; but I am so weak that often I could not
walk without leaning on you. Why did I draw out my
life to this ignominious end ? Why did I not fall
fighting like the enemies I overcame ? Why the Devil
did you get born at all, and then murdered by those
rascally Jews, that I who was a warrior should turn
into a snivelling saint ? The heroes of Asgard have
sunk into a deeper twilight than they foresaw; but
their sunset, fervent and crimson with blood and with
wine, made splendid that dawnless gloaming. The
joyous Olympians have perished, but they all had lived
and loved. For me, I have subsisted and hated. What
of time is left to me I will spend in another fashion.
Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die.” And he
swallowed hastily a bumper of the wine, which threw
him into convulsions of coughing.
Serene and superior, the son had let the old man run
on. “ Do not, I entreat you, take to drink in your old
age, dear father. You say that our enemies lived and
loved ; but think how unworthy of divine rulers was
their mode of life, how immoral, how imprudent, how
disreputable, how savage, how lustful, how un-Christian! What a bad example for poor human souls
“ Human souls be blessed ! Are they so much improved
now ? . . . Would that at least I had conserved Jove’s
barmaid ; the prettiest, pleasantest girl they say (we
�Christmas Eve in the Upper Circles.
51
know you are a Joseph, though you always had
three or four women dangling about you) ; fair-ankled
was the wench, bright-limbed ; she might be unto me
evfen as was Abishag, the Shunammite, unto my old
friend David.” “ Let us speak seriously, my father, of
the great celebration to-morrow.” “ And suppose I am
speaking very seriously, you solemn prig ; not a drop
of my blood is there in you.”
Here came a hurried knocking at the door, and the
angelic ministers of state crawled in, with super
elaborate oriental cringings, to deliver their daily
reports. “ Messages from Brahma. Ormuzd, etc., to
congratulate on the son’s birthday.” “ The infidels!
the mockers I” muttered the son. “Good words,” said
the father ; “ they belong to older families than ours,
my lad, and were once much more powerful. You are
always trying to win over the parvenus.” “ A riot in
the holy city. The black angels organised to look after
the souls of converted negroes having a free fight with
some of the white ones.” “ My poor lambs !” sighed the
son. “ Black sheep,” growled the father; “ what is
the row ?” “ They have plumed themselves brighter
than peacocks, and scream louder than parrots ; claim
precedence over the angels of the mean whites ; insist
on having some of their own hymns and tunes in the
programme of to-morrow’s concert.” “Lock ’em all
up, white and black, especially the black, till Tuesday
morning ; they can fight it out then—it’s Boxing Day.
We’ll have quite enough noise to-morrow without ’em.
Never understood the nigger question, for my part :
was a slave-holder myself, and cursed Ham as much as
pork.” “ New saints grumbling about lack of civilised
accommodation : want underground railways, steamers
for the crystal sea, telegraph wires to every mansion,
morning and evening newspapers, etc., etc. ; have had
a public meeting with a Yankee saint in the chair, and
resolved that heaven is altogether behind the age.”
“ Confound it, my son, have I not charged you again
and again to get some saints of ability up here ? Bor
years past every batch has been full of good-for-nothing
noodles. Have we no engineers, no editors at all?”
“ One or two engineers, we believe, sire, but we can’t
�52
Natives and Profanities.
find a single editor.” “ Give one of the Record fellows
the measles, and an old I' Univers hand the cholera, and
bring them up into glory at once, and we’ll have two
daily papers. And while you are about it, see whether
you can discover three or four pious engineers—not
muffs, mind—and blow them up hither with their own
boilers, or in any other handy way. Haste, haste, post
haste !” “ Deplorable catastrophe in the temple of the
New Jerusalem : a large part of the foundation given
way, main wall fallen, several hundred workmen
bruised.” “ Stop that fellow who just left; counter
mand the measles, the cholera will be enough ; we will
only have one journal, and that must be strictly official.
If we have two, one will be opposition. Hush up the
accident. It is strange that Pandemonium was built
so much better and more quickly than our New Jeru
salem !” “ All our best architects and other artists have
deserted into Elysium, my lord ; so fond of the
company of the old Greeks.”
"When these and many other sad reports had been
heard, and the various ministers and secretaries savagely
dismissed, the father turned to the son, and said : “ Did
I not tell you of the evil state we are in ?” “ By hope
and faith and charity, and the sublime doctrine of selfrenunciation, all will yet come right, my father.”
“ Humph ! let hope fill my treasury, and faith finish the
New Jerusalem, and charity give us peace and quiet
ness, and self-renunciation lead three-quarters of your
new-fangled saints out of heaven ; and then I shall
look to have a little comfort.” “ Will you settle to-mor
row’s programme, sire ? or shall I do my best to spare
you the trouble ?” “ You do your best to spare me the
trouble of reigning altogether, I think. What pro
gramme can there be but the old rehearsal for the
eternal life (I wish you may get it) ? 0, that horrible
slippery sea of glass, that bedevilled throne vomiting
thunders and lightning, those stupid senile elders in
white nightgowns, those four hideous beasts full of
eyes, that impossible lamb with seven horns and one
eye to each horn ! 0, the terrific shoutings and harpings and stifling incense! A pretty set-out for my
time of life! And to think that you hope some time
�Christmas Eve in the Upper Circles.
53
or other to begin this sort of thing as a daily amuse
ment, and to carry it on for ever and ever! Not much
appearance of its beginning soon, thank goodness—•
that is to say, thank badness. Why can’t you have a
play of Aristophanes, or Shakespeare, or Molidre ? Why
should I meddle with the programme ? I had nothing
to do with first framing it. Besides, it is all in your
honor, not in mine. You like playing the part of the
Lamb ; I’m much more like an old wolf. You are
ravished when those beasts give glory and honor and
thanks ; as for me, I am utterly sick of them. Behold
what I will do; I must countenance the affair, but I
can do so without disturbing myself. I’ll not go
thundering and roaring in my state-carriage of the
whirlwind ; I’ll slip there in a quiet cloud. You cant
do without my glory, but it really is too heavy for my
aged shoulders ; you may lay it upon the throne ; it
will look just as well. As for my speech, here it is all
ready written out ; let Mercury, I mean Raphael or
Uriel, read it; I can’t speak plainly since I lost so
many teeth. And now I consider the matter, what
need is there for my actual presence at all ? Have me
there in effigy ; a noble and handsome dummy can
wear the glory with grace. Mind you have a hand
some one ; I wish all the artists had not deserted us.
Your pious fellows make sad work of us, my son.
But then their usual models are so ugly ; your saints
have good reason to speak of their vile bodies. How
is it that all the pretty girls slip away to the other
place, poor darlings ? By the bye, who are going on
this occasion to represent the twelve times twelve
thousand of the tribes of Israel ? Is the boy Mortara
dead yet ? He will make one real Jew.” “We are
converting them, sire.” “Not the whole gross of thou
sands yet, I trust ? Faugh ! what a greasy stench there
would be—what a blazing of Jew jewelry ! Hand me
the latest bluebook, with the reports. . . . Ah, I see ;
great success ! Power of the Lord Christ! (always you,
of course). Society flourishing. Eighty-two thousand
pounds four shillings and twopence three-farthings last
year from Christians aroused to the claims of the lost
sheep of the House of Israel. (Very good.) Five con-
�54
Satires and Profanities.
versions !! Three others have already been persuaded
to eat pork sausages. (Better and better.) One, who
drank most fervently of the communion wine suffered
himself to be treated to an oyster supper. Another,
being greatly moved, was heard to ejaculate ‘ 0 Christ!’
. . . Hum, who are the five ? Moses Isaacs : wasn’t he
a Christian ten years ago in Italy, and afterwards a
Mahommedan in Salonica, and afterwards a Jew in
Marseilles ? This Mussulman is your oyster-man, I
presume ? You will soon get the one hundred and fortyfour thousand at this rate, my son ! and cheap too 1”
He chuckled, and poured out another glass of
Lachryma Christi ; drank it, made a wry face, and then
began coughing furiously. “ Poor drink this for a god
in his old age. Odin and Jupiter fared better. Though
decent for a human tipple, for a divinity it is but
am&rosze stygiale, as my dear old favorite chaplain
would call it. I have his devotional works under lock
and key there in my desk. Apropos, where is he ?
Left us again for a scurry through the more jovial
regions ? I have not seen him for a long time.” “ My
father! really, the words he used, the life he led ; so
corrupting for the young saints ! We were forced to
invite him to travel a little for the benefit of his health.
The court must be kept pure, you know.” “ Send for
him instantly, sir. He is out of favor because he likes
the old man and laughs at your saints, because he can’t
cant and loves to humbug the humbugs. Many a fit
of the blues has he cured for me, while you only make
them bluer. Have him fetched at once. 0, I know
you never liked him ; you always thought him laughing
at your sweet pale face and woebegone airs, laughing
‘ en horrible sarcasm et sanglante derision ’ (what a
style the rogue has I what makes that of your favorite
parsons and holy ones so flaccid and flabby and hectic ?)
‘ Physician, heal thyself 1’ So, in plain words, you
have banished him ; the only jolly soul left amongst
us, my pearl and diamond and red ruby of Chaplains,
abstracter of the quintessence of pantagruelism ! The
words he used ! I musn’t speak freely myself now,
and the old books I wrote are a great deal too coarse
for you ! Michael and Gabriel told me the other day
�Christmas Eve in the Upper Circles.
55
that they hacl just been severely lectured on the
earnestness of life by one of your new proteges; they
had to kick him howling into limbo. A fine set of
solemn prigs we are getting !” “ My father, the holi
ness of sorrow, the infiniteness of suffering!” “ Yes,
yes, I know all about it. That long-winded poet of
yours (he does an ode for you to-morrow ?) began to
sermonise me thereon. By Jupiter, he wanted to
arouse me to a sense of my inner being and responsi
bilities and so forth. I very soon packed him off to
the infant school, where he teaches the alphabet and
catechism to the babies and sucklings. Have you sent
for my jovial, joyous, jolly Cure of Meudon ?” “I
have ; but I deeply regret that your Majesty thinks it
fitting to be intimate with such a free-liver, such a
glutton and wine-bibber and mocker and buffoon.”
“Bah ! you patronised the publicans and sinners your
self in your younger and better days. The strict ones
blamed you for going about eating and drinking so
much. I hear that some of your newest favorites
object to the wine in your last supper, and are going to
insist on vinegar-and-water in future.”
Whereupon entered a man of noble and courtly
presence, lively-eyed and golden bearded, ruddy complexioned, clear-browed, thoughtful, yet joyous, serene,
and unabashed. “Welcome, thrice welcome, my beloved
Alcofribas,” cried the old monarch; “ very long is it
since last I saw you.” “ I have been exiled since then,
your Majesty.” “ And I knew nothing of it!” “And
thought nothing of it or of me until you wanted me.
No one expects the King to have knowledge of what
is passing under his eyes.” “ And how did you manage
to exist in exile, my poor chaplain?” “Much better
than here at court, sire. If your Majesty wants a little
pleasure, I advise you to get banished yourself. Your
parasites and sycophants and courtiers are a most
morose, miserable, ugly, detestable, intolerable swarm
of blind beetles and wasps ; the devils are beyond
comparison better company.” “ What ! you have
been mixing with traitors ?” “ Oh, I spent a few
years in Elysium, but didn’t this time go into the
lower circles. But while I sojourned as a country
�56
Satires and Profanities.
gentleman on the heavenly borders,’ I met a few
contrabandists.
I need not tell you that large, yea,
enormous quantities of beatitude are smuggled out of
your dominions.” “ But what is smuggled in ?” “ Sire,
I am not an informer ; I never received anything out
of the secret-service money. The poor angels are glad
to run a venture at odd times, to relieve the tedium of
everlasting Te Deum. By the bye, I saw the Devil
himself.” “ The Devil in my kingdom ? What is
Uriel about ? he’ll have to be superannuated.” “ Bah !
your Majesty knows very well that Satan comes in and
returns as and when he likes. The passport system
never stops the really dangerous fellows. When he
honored me with a call he looked the demurest young
saint, and I laughed till I got the lockjaw at his earnest
and spiritual discourse. He would have taken yourself
in, much more Uriel. You really ought to get him on
the list of court chaplains. He and I were always good
friends, so if anything happens. . . . It may be well for
you if you can disguise yourself as cleverly as he.
A revolution is not quite impossible, you know.”
The Son threw up his hands in pious horror ; the
old King, in one of his spasms of rage, hurled
the blue-book at the speaker’s head, which it
missed, but knocked down and broke his favorite
crucifix. “Jewcy fiction versus crucifixion, sire;
magna est veritas et prevalebit! Thank Heaven,
all that folly is owfeide my brains ; it is not the first
book full of cant and lies and stupidity that has been
flung at me. Why did you not let me finish ? The
Devil is no fonder than your sacred self of the new
opinions ; in spite of the proverb, he loves and dotes
upon holy water. If you cease to be head of the
ministry, he ceases to be head of the opposition ; he
wouldn’t mind a change, an innings for him and an
outings for you ; but these latest radicals want to crush
both Whigs and Tories. He was on his way to confer
with some of your Privy Council, to organise joint
action for the suppression of new ideas. You had
better be frank and friendly with him. Public oppo
sition and private amity are perfectly consistent and
praiseworthy. He has done you good service before
�Christmas Eve in the Upper Circles.
57
now ; and you and your Son have always been of the
greatest assistance to him.” “ By the temptation of
Job ! I must see to it. And now no more business.
I am hipped, my Rabelais ; we must have a spree. The
cestus of Venus, the lute of Apollo, we never could
find; but there was sweeter loot in the sack of
-Olympus, and our cellars are not yet quite empty. We
will have a petit souper of ambrosia and nectar.” “ My
father! my father! did you not sign the pledge
to abstain from these heathen stimulants ?” “ My
beloved Son, with whom I am not at all well pleased,
go and swill water till you get the dropsy, and permit
me to do as I like. No wonder people think that I am
failing when my child and my mistress rule for me 1”
The Son went out, shaking his head, beating his
breast, scrubbing his eyes, wringing his hands, sobbing
and murmuring piteously. “ The poor old God ! my
dear old father 1 Ah, how he is breaking! Alack, he
will not last long 1 Verily his wits are leaving him 1
Many misfortunes and disasters would be spared us
were he to abdicate prudently at once. Or a regency
might do. But the evil speakers and slanderers would
say that I am ambitious. I must get the matter judi-ciouslv insinuated to the Privy Council. Alack I
alack !”
“ Let him go and try on his suit of lamb’s wool for
to-morrow,” said the old monarch. “ I have got out of
the rehearsal, my friend ; I shall be conspicuous by my
.absence ; there will be a dummy in my stead.” “ Rather
perilous innovation, my Lord ; the people may think
that the dummy does just as well, that there is no need
to support the original.” “ Shut up, shut up, 0, my
'Cure ; no more politics, confound our politics ! It is
Bunday, so we must have none but chaplains here.
You may fetch Friar John and sweet Dean Swift and
the amiable parson Sterne, and any other godly and
-devout and spiritual ministers you can lay hold of ;
but don’t bring more than a pleiad.” “ With Swift for
the lost one ; he is cooling his ‘ sseva indignatio ’ in
the Devil’s kitchen-furnace just now, comforting poor
Addison, who hasn’t got quit for his death-bed brandy
jet.” “ A night of devotion will we have, and of in-
�58
Satires and Profanities.
extinguishable laughter ; and with the old liquor we
will pour out the old libations. Yea, Gargantuan shall
be the feast ; and this night, and to-morrow, and all
next week, and twelve days into the new year the
hours shall reel and roar with Pantagreulism. Quick,
for the guests, and I will order the banquet1” “ With
all my heart, sire, will I do this very thing. Parsons
and pastors, pious and devout, will I lead back, choice
and most elect souls worthy of the old drink delectable.
And I will lock and double bolt the door, and first
warm the chamber by burning all these devilish books ;
and will leave word with the angel on guard that we
are not to be called for three times seven days, when
all these Christmas fooleries and mummeries are long
over. Amen. Selah. Aurevoir. Tarry till I come.”’
A Commission of Inquiry on Royalty.
[Written
in
1866.]
The subjects for our solemn consideration are the
seclusion of her Most Gracious Majesty, and the com
plaints thereanent published in several respectable
journals. In order to investigate the matter thoroughly,
we constituted ourselves (the unknown number rr) into
a special Commission of Inquiry. We are happy to
state that the said Commission has concluded its
arduous labors, and now presents its report within
a week of its appointment; surely the most prompt and
rapid of commissions. The cause of this celerity we
take to be the fact that the Commissioners were un-
�A Commission of Inquiry on Royalty.
salaried ; we being unanimously of opinion that had .we
received good pay for the inquiry throughout the period
of our session, we could have prolonged it with certain
benefit, if not to the public yet to ourselves, for a.gr.eat
number of years. If, therefore, you want a commission
to do its work rapidly vote no money for it. And do
not fear that the most headlong haste in gathering
evidence and composing the report will diminish the
value of such report; for when a Commission has lasted
for years or months it generally rises in a quite different
state of the subject matter from that in which it first
sat, and the report must be partly obsolete, partly a
jumble of anachronisms. In brief, it may be fairly
affirmed as a general rule that no Commission of
Inquiry is of any value at all; the appointment, of one
being merely a dodge by which people who don’t want
to act on what they and everybody else see quite well
with their naked eyes, set a number of elderly gentle
men to pore upon it with spectacles and magnifying
glasses until dazed and stupid with poring, in the hope
that this process will last so long that ere it is finished
the public will have forgotten the matter altogether.
And now for the result of our inquiries on this subject,
which is not only immensely important, but is even
sacred to our loyal hearts.
A West-end tradesman complains bitterly that
through the absence of the Court from Buckingham
Palace, and the diminished number and splendor of
royal pomps and entertainments, the “ Season ” is for
him a very poor season indeed. The Commissioners
find that the said tradesman (whose knowledge seems
limited to a knowledge of his business, supposing he
knows that) is remarkably well off ; and consider that
West-end tradesmen have no valid vested interest in
Royalty and the Civil List, that at the worst they do a
capital trade with the aristocracy and wealthy classes
(taking good care that the punctual and honest shall
amply overpay their losses by the unpunctual and dis
honest) ; and if they are not satisfied with the West
end, they had better try the East-end and see how
that will suit them ; and, in short, that this tradesman
is not worth listening to.
�60
Satires and Profanities.
Numerous fashionable and noble people (principally
ladies) complain that they have no Court to shine
in. The Commissioners think that they shine a great
■deal too much already, and in the most wasteful
manner, gathered together by hundreds, light glittering
■on light; and that if they really want to shine
beneficially in a court there are very many dark courts
in London where the light of their presence would be
most welcome.
It is complained on behalf of their Royal Highnesses
the Prince and Princess of Wales that they have to
perform many of the duties of royalty without getting
a share of the royal allowance. The Commissioners
think that if the necessary expenses of the heir to the
throne are really too heavy for his modest income, and
are increased by the performance of royal duties, he
had better send in yearly a bill to his Mamma for
expenses incurred on her account, and a duplicate of
the same to the Chancellor to the Exchequer ; so that
in every Budget the amount of the Civil List
shall be equitably divided between her Majesty
and her Majesty’s eldest son, doubtless to their com
mon satisfaction.
It is complained on behalf of various foreign royal or
ruling personages that while they in their homes treat
generously the visiting members of our royal family,
they are treated very shabbily when visiting here. The
Commissioners think that Buckinghan Palace, being
seldom or never wanted by the Queen, and very seldom
wanted for the reception of the English Court, should
be at all times open for such royal or ruling visitors ;
that a Lord Chamberlain, or other such noble domestic
servant should be detailed to attend on them, and see
to their hospitable treatment in all respects ; and that
to cover the expenditure on their account a fair
deduction should be made from her Majesty’s share
of the Civil List, which deduction, being equitable,
her Majesty would no doubt view with extreme
pleasure.
It is complained on the part of her Majesty’s
Ministers, that when they want the royal assent and
signature to important Acts of Parliament, they have
�A Commission of Inquiry on Royalty.
61
to lose a day or two and undergo great fatigue (which
is peculiarly hard on men who are mostly aged, and
all overworked) in travelling to and from Osborne or
Balmoral. The Commissioners think the remedy plain
and easy, as in the two preceding cases. Let a law be
passed assuming that absence, like silence, gives
consent; so that whenever her Majesty is not in town,
the Speaker of the Commons or the Lord Chancellor,
or other great officer of State, be empowered to seal
and sign in her name, and generally to perform any of
her real and royal duties, on the formal demand of the
Ministry, who always (and not the Queen) are respon
sible to Parliament and the country for all public acts.
A Taxpayer complains that for fourteen years her
Majesty has been punctually drawing all moneys
allotted to support the royal dignity, while studiously
abstaining from all, or nearly all, the hospitalities and
other expensive functions incident to the support of the
said dignity. The Commissioners consider that her
Majesty is perchance benefiting the country more (and
may be well aware of the fact) by taking her money
for doing nothing than if she did something for it ;
that if she didn’t take the said money, somebody else
would (as for instance, were she to abdicate, the Prince
of Wales, become King, would want and get at least as
much); so that while our Government remains as it is,
the complaint of the said taxpayer is foolish.
Another Taxpayer, who must be a most mean-minded
fellow, a stranger to all sacred sympathies and hallowed
emotions, says : “ If a washerwoman, being stupified by
the death of her husband, neglected her business for
more than a week or two, she would certainly lose her
custom or employment, and not all the sanctity of con
jugal grief (about which reverential journalists gush)
would make people go on paying her for doing nothing ;
and if this washerwoman had money enough of her own
to live on comfortably, people would call her shameless
and miserly if she asked for or accepted payment while
doing nothing ; and if this washerwoman had a large
family of boys and girls around her, and shut herself
up to brood upon her husband’s death for even three or
four months, people would reckon her mad with selfish
�62
Satires and Profanities.
misery.” The Commissioners (as soon as they recover
from the stupefaction of horror into which this blas
phemy has thrown them) consider and reply that there
can be no proper comparison of a Queen and a washer
woman, and that nobody would think of instituting one,
except a brute, a Republican, an Atheist, a Communist’
a fiend in human form ; that anyhow if, as this wretch
says, a washerwoman would be paid for a week or two
without working, in consideration of her conjugal
affliction, it is plain that a Queen, who (it will be uni
versally allowed) is at least a hundred thousand times
as good as a washerwoman, is therefore entitled to at
least a hundred thousand times the “ week or two ” of
salary without performance of duty—that is, to at least
1,923 or 3,846 years, whereas this heartless and ribald
reprobate himself only complains that our beloved
Sovereign has done nothing for her wage throughout
“ fourteen years.” The Commissioners therefore eject
this complainant with ineffable scorn ; and only wish
they knew his name and address, that they might
denounce him for prosecution to the Attorney-General.
A Malthusian (whatever kind of creature that may
be) complains that her Majesty has set an example of
uncontrolled fecundity to the nation and the royal
family, which, besides being generally immoral, is
likely, at the modest estimate of £6,000 per annum per
royal baby, to lead to the utter ruin of the realm in a
few generations. The Commissioners, after profound
and prolonged consideration, can only remark that
they do not understand the complaint any better than
the name (which they do not understand at all) of the
“ Malthusian ” ; that they have always been led to
believe that a large family is a great honor to a legiti
mately united man and woman ; and that, finally, they
beg to refer the Malthusian to the late Prince Consort.
A devotedly loyal Royalist (who unfortunately does
not give the name and address of his curator) complains
that her Majesty, by doing nothing except receive her
Civil List, is teaching the country that it can get on
quite as well without a monarch as with one, and might
therefore just as well, and indeed very much better,
put the amount of the Civil List into its own pocket
�A Commission of Inquiry on Royalty.
63
and call itself a Republic. The Commissioners remark
that this person seems the most rational of the whole
lot of complainants (most rational, not for his loyalty,
but most rational as to the grounds of his complaint,
from his own point of view) ; in accordance with the
dictum, “ A madman reasons rightly from wrong pre
mises ; a fool wrongly from right ones
and that his
surmise is very probably correct—namely, that her
Majesty is really a Republican in principle, but not
liking (as is perfectly natural in her position) to publicly
profess and advocate opinions so opposed to the worldly
interests of all her friends and relatives, has been con
tent to further these opinions practically for fourteen
years past by her conduct, without saying a word on
the subject. The Commissioners, however, find one
serious objection to this surmise in the fact that if her
Majesty is really a Republican at heart, she must wish
to exclude the Prince of Wales from the throne ; while
it seems to them that the intimate knowledge she must
have of his wisdom and virtues (not to speak of her
motherly affection) cannot but make her 1661 that no
greater blessing could come to the nation after her
death than his reigning over it. As this is the only
complaint which the Commissioners find at once wellfounded and not easy to remedy, they are happy to
know that it is confined to the very insignificant class
of persons who are “ devotedly loyal Royalists.”
The Commissioners thus feel themselves bound to
report that all the complaints they have heard against
our beloved and gracious sovereign (except the one
last cited, which is of no importance) are without
foundation, or frivolous, or easily remedied, and that
our beloved and gracious Sovereign (whom may
Heaven long preserve!) could not do better than she is
now doing, in doing nothing.
But in order to obviate such complaints, which do
much harm, whether ill or well founded, and which
especially pain the delicate susceptibilities of all respec
table men and women, the Commissioners have thought
it their duty to draw up the following project of a Con
stitution, not to come into force until the death of our
present beloved and gracious Sovereign (which may
�64
Satires and Profanities.
God, if it so please him, long avert!), and to be
modified in its details according to the best wisdom of
our national House of Palaver.
DRAFT.
Whereas it is treasonable to talk of dethroning a
monarch, but there can be no disloyalty in preventing
a person not yet a monarch from becoming one :
And whereas it is considered by very many, and
seems proved by the experience of the last...................
years that the country can do quite well without a
monarch, and may therefore save the extra expense of
monarchy :
And whereas it is calculated that from the accession
of George I. of blessed memory until the decease of the
most beloved of Queens, Victoria, a period of upwards
of a century and a half, the Royal Family of the House
of Guelph have received full and fair payment in every
respect for their generous and heroic conduct in
coming to occupy the throne and other high places of
this kingdom, and in saving us from the unconstitu
tional Stuarts :
And whereas the said Stuarts may now be considered
extinct, and thus no longer dangerous to this realm :
And whereas the said Royal Family of the House of
Guelph is so prolific that the nation cannot hope to
support all the members thereof for a long period tn
come in a royal manner :
And whereas the Dukes of this realm are accounted
liberal and courteous gentlemen :
And whereas the constitution of our country is so
far Venetian that it cannot but be improved in har
mony and consistency by being made more Venetian
still :
Be it enacted, etc., That the Throne now vacant
through the ever-to-be-deplored death of her late most
gracious Majesty shall remain vacant. That the mem
bers of what has been hitherto the Royal Family keep
all the property they have accumulated, the nation re
suming from them all grants of sinecures and other
salaried appointments. That no member of the said
Family be eligible for any public appointment whatever
for at least one hundred years. That the Dukes in the
�A Commission of Inquiry on Royalty.
65
order of their seniority shall act as Doges (with what
ever title be considered the best) year and year about,
under penalty of large fines in case of refusal, save
when such refusal is supported by clear proof of poverty
(being revenue under a settled minimum), imbecility,
brutality, or other serious disqualification. That no
members of a ducal family within a certain degree of
relationship to the head of the house be eligible for any
public appointment whatever ; the head of the house
being eligible for the Dogeship only. That the duties
of the Doge be simply to seal and sign Acts of Parlia
ment, proclamations, etc., when requested to do so by
the Ministry ; and to exercise hospitality to royal or
ruling and other representatives of foreign countries,
as well as to distinguished natives. That a fair and
even excessive allowance be made to the Doge for the
expenses of his year of office. That the royal palaces
be official residences of the Doge. That the Doge be
free from all political responsibility as from all political
power ; but be responsible for performing liberally and
courteously the duties of hospitality, so that Bucking
ham Palace shall not contrast painfully with the Man
sion House. Etc., etc.
God preserve the Doge !
The Commission of Inquiry having thus trium
phantly vindicated our beloved and gracious Sovereign
against the cruel aspersions of people in general, and
having moreover drafted a plan for obviating such
aspersions against any British King or Queen in future,
ends its Report, and dissolves itself, with humble
thankfulness to God Almighty whose grace alone has
empowered it to conclude its arduous labors so speedily,
and with results so incalculably beneficial.
�66
Satires and Profanities.
A Bible Lesson on Monarchy.
[Whitten in 1876.]
The old theory of “ The right divine of kings to
govern wrong,” and the much-quoted text, “Fear God
and honor the king,” seem to have impressed many
good people with the notion that the Bible is in favor
of monarchy. But “ king ” in the text plainly has the
general meaning of “ruler,” and would be equally
applicable to the President of a Republic. In
Romans xiii., 1—3, we read : “ Let every soul be
subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power
but of God : the powers that be are ordained of God.
Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the
ordinance of God : and they that resist shall receive
to themselves damnation. For rulers are not a terror
to good works, but to the evil.” Without stopping to
discuss the bold assertion in the last sentence, we may
remark that the real teaching of this passage is that
Christians ought to be indifferent to politics, quietly
accepting whatever government they find in power ; for
if the powers that be are ordained of God, or in other
words, if might is right, all forms of government are
equally entitled to obedience so long as they actually
exist. Of course Christians are not now, and for the
most part have not been for centuries, really indifferent
to politics, because for the most part they now are and
long have been Christians only in name ; but it is easy
to understand from the New Testament itself why the
first Christians , naturally were thus indifferent, and
why Christianity, has never afforded any political
inspiration. Nothing can be clearer to one who reads
the New Testament honestly and without prejudice
than the fact that Christ and his apostles believed that
the end of the world was at hand. Thus in Matt, xxiv.,
Jesus after foretelling the coming to judgment of the’
son of man in the clouds of heaven with power and
great glory,"when the angels shall gather the elect from
�A Bible Lesson on Monarchy.
67
the four winds, adds, v. 34, “Verily I say unto you,
This generation shall not pass, till all these things be
fulfilled.” This is repeated in almost the same words
in Mark xiii., and Luke xxi., and a careful reading
of the Epistles shows that their writers were profoundly
influenced by this prophecy. But with the world
coming to an end so soon, it would be as absurd to take
any interest in its politics as for a traveller stopping
two or three days in an inn to concern himself
with schemes for rebuilding it. when about to leave
for a far country where he intends settling for life. If
therefore, we want any political guidance from the
Holy Scriptures, we must go to the Old Testament, not
to the New.
Now the first lesson on Monarchy, which we re
member made us think even in childhood, is the fable
of the trees electing a king, told by Jotham, the son of
Gideon, in Judges ix. The trees in the process of this
election showed a judgment much superior to that
which' men usually show in such a business. It is
true that they did not select first the most strong and
stalwart of trees, the cedar or the oak, but they had
the good sense to choose the most sweet-natured and
bountiful, the olive, then the fig, then the vine. But
the bountiful trees thus chosen had good sense too, and
would not forsake the fatness and the sweetness and the
wine which cheereth God and man, to rule over their
fellow trees. Then the poor trees, like a jilted girl who
marries in spleen the first scamp she comes across,
asked the bramble to be their king ; and that barren
good-for-nothing of course accepted eagerly the crown
which the noble and generous had refused, and called
upon the trees to put their trust in its scraggy shadow,
“ and if not, let fire come out of the bramble, and
devour the cedars of Lebanon.” Young as we were
when this fable first caught our attention, we mused a
good deal over it, and even then began to learn that
those most eager for supremacy, the most forward
candidates in elections, are nearly always brambles, not
olives or fig-trees or vines ; and that the first thought
of a bramble, when made ruler over its betters, is
naturally to destroy with fire the cedars of Lebanon.
�68
Satires and Profanities.
But God himself in the case of the Israelites has
vouchsafed to us a very clear judgment on the question
of Monarchy. In the remarkable constitution for that
people -which he gave to Moses, he did not include a
king, and Israel remained without a king for more
years than it is worth while endeavoring to count here.
We read, 1 Samuel viii., how ‘‘All the elders of Israel
gathered themselves together, and came to Samuel
unto Ramah, and said unto him, Behold thou art old,
and thy sons walk not in thy ways: now make us a
king to judge us like all the nations. But the thing
displeased Samuel, when they said, Give us a king to
judge us. And Samuel prayed unto the Lord. And
the Lord said unto Samuel, Hearken unto the voice
of the people in all that they say unto thee : for
they have not rejected thee, but they have
rejected me, that I should not reign over them.
... Now therefore hearken unto their voice : how
beit yet protest solemnly unto them, and show
them the manner of the king that shall reign over
them.” Some students of the Bible may have thought
that God’s severe condemnation of the Israelites for
wanting a king arose chiefly from wounded pride, from
the fact that they had rejected him, and we cannot
affirm that this feeling did not inflame his anger, for
he himself has said that he is a jealous God ; but the
protest which he orders Samuel to make, and the
exposition of the common evils of kingship, prove
clearly that God did not (and therefore, of course, does
not) approve this form of government. And, indeed,
it is plain that if he had approved it, he would have
given it to his chosen people at first. For although
divines have termed the form of government under
which the Jews lived before the kings a theocracy,
God did not then rule immediately, but always through
the medium of a high-priest or judge, and could have
governed through the medium of a king had he thought
it well so to do. And he who reads the history of the
Jews under the Judges, as contained in the Book of
Judges, and especially the narratives in chapters xvii.
to xxi. which illustrate the condition of Jewish society
in those days when “there was no king in Israel:
�J Bible Lesson on Monarchy.
69
every man did that which was right in his own eyes,”
will see that God must have thought a Monarchy very
vile and odious indeed when he was angry at the
request for it, and implied that it was actually worse
than that government by Judges alternated with bond
age under neighboring tribes which the theologians call
a theocracy. Samuel warned the people of what a
king would do, and doubtless thought he was warning
them of the worst, but kings have far outstripped all
that the prophet could foresee. The king, he said, will
take your sons to be his warriors and servants ; and
will take your daughters to be confectionaries, and
cooks, and bakers. This was the truth, and nothing
but the truth, but it was not the whole truth ; for the
sons have been taken to be far worse than mere
warriors and servants, and the daughters for much viler
purposes than cooking and baking. Samuel goes on :
“ And he will take your fields, and your vineyards,
and your oliveyards, even the best of them, and give
them to his servants ”—when he does not keep them
for himself might have been added. “ And he will
take the tenth of your seed, and of your vineyards,
and give to his officers, and to his servants.” Surely
much more than a tenth, 0 Samuel! We will not
quote the remainder of this wise warning. Like most
wise warnings it was ineffectual ; the foolish people
insisted on having a king, and in the following chapters
we read how Saul the Son of Kish, going forth to seek
his father’s asses, found his own subjects.
The condemnation of Monarchy by God, as we read
it in this instance, is so thorough and general that we
feel bound to add a few words on an exceptional case
in which a king is highly extolled in the Scriptures,
without any actions being recorded of him, as in the
instances of David and Solomon, to nullify the praise.
The king in question was Melchizedek, King of Salem,
and priest of the most high God, who met Abram
returning from the defeat of the four kings and blessed
him, and to whom Abram gave tithes of all, as we read
in Genesis xiv. But this short notice of Melchizedek
in. Genesis does not by any means suggest to us the
fall wonderfulness of his character, though we natu-
�70
Satires and Profanities.
rally conclude from it that he was indeed an important
personage to whom Abram gave tithes of all. The
New Testament, however, comes to our aid, and for
once gives us a most valuable political lesson, though
the inspired writer was far from thinking of political
instruction when he wrote the passage. In Hebrews
vi., 20, and vii., 1 to 3, we read : “ Jesus, made an High
Priest for ever after the order of Melchizedec. For
this Melchisedec, King of Salem, priest of the most
high God, who met Abraham returning from the
slaughter of the kings, and blessed him ; to whom also
Abraham gave a tenth part of all ; first being by inter
pretation King of righteousness, and after that also
King of Salem, which is King of peace ; without father,
without mother, without descent, having neither be
ginning of days nor end of life ; but made like unto
the Son of God ; abideth a priest continually.” Now
he to whom Jesus is compared, and who is like the Son
of God, is clearly the noblest of characters ; and there
fore, as the history in the first book of Samuel teaches
us that Monarchy is generally to be avoided, these fine
verses from the Epistle to the Hebrews delineate for
us the exceptional king whose reign is to be desired.
The delineation is quite masterly, for a few lines give
us characteristics which cannot be overlooked or mis
taken. This model monarch must be a priest of the
most high God—a king of righteousness and king of
peace; without father, without mother, without descent,
having neither beginning of days nor end of life ; but
made like unto the Son of God. Whenever and
wherever such a gentlemen is met with, we would
advise even the most zealous Republicans to put him
forthwith upon the throne. But in the absence of
such a gentleman we can hardly do wrong if we follow
the good advice of Samuel dictated by God Almighty,
and manage without any monarch.
�The One Thing Needful.
71
The One Thing Needful.
[Whitten
in
1866.]
When I survey with pious joy the present world of
Christendom, finding everywhere that the true believers
love their neighbors as themselves and are specially
enamored of their enemies ; that no one of them takes
thought for the morrow, what he shall eat or what he
shalfdrink, or wherewithal he or she shall be clothed ;
that all the pastors and flocks endeavor to outstrip each
other in laying not up for themselves treasures upon,
earth, where moth and rust corrupt, and where thieves
break through and steal ; and all are so intensely eager
to quit this earthly tabernacle and become freeholders
of mansions in the skies ; when I find faith as universal
as the air, and charity as common as cold water ; I
sometimes wonder, how it is that any misbelievers and
unbelievers are left, and feel astonished that the New
Jerusalem has not yet descended, and hope that the
next morning’s Times (rechristened The Eternities) will
announce the inauguration of the Millennium.
What delayeth the end ? Can there indeed be any
general hindering sin or imperfection among the pure
saints, the holy, unselfish, aspiring, devout, peaceful,
loving men and women who make up the population of
every Christian land ? Can any error infect the
teachings of the innumerable divines and theologians,
who all agree together in every particular, drawing all
the same doctrines from the same texts of the one un
varied Word of God ? I would fain believe that no
such sin or error exists, not a single inky spot in the
universal dazzling whiteness ; but then why have we to
deplore the continued existence of heathens and
infidels ? why is the New Jerusalem so long a-building ?
why is the Millennium so long a-coming ? why have
we a mere Sardowa instead of Armageddon ?
After long and painful thought, after the most
serious and reverent study, I think I have found the
�72
Satires and Profanities.
rock on which the ship of the Church has been wrecked ;
and I hasten to communicate its extreme latitude and
interminable longitude, that all Christian voyagers may
evade and circumvent it from this time forward.
The error which I point out, and the correction
which I propose, have been to a certain extent, in a
vague manner, pointed out and proposed before. A
clergyman named Malthus, not in his clerical capacity,
but condescending to the menial study of mundane
science, is usually considered the first discoverer. But
mundane science is conditioned, limited, vague, its
precepts are full of hesitation ; while celestial science
is absolute, unlimited, clear as the noonday sun, and its
precepts are imperiously forthright.
It seems to me that the one fatal error which has
lurked in our otherwise consummate Christianity, and
which demands immediate correction is this, that the
propagation of children is reconcileable with the pro
pagation of the faith—an error which while it lasts
adjourns sine die the day of judgment, and begins the
Millennium with the Greek Kalends.
One need not quote the numerous texts throughout
the New Testament (let Matthew xix., 12, suffice)
proving that Jesus and the epistolary apostles ac
counted celibacy essential to the highest Christian life.
One only of the disciples, so far as we know, was
married ; and he it was who denied his master ; and
most of the more profound divines consider that Peter
was justly punished for marrying, when Christ cured
his mother-in-law of that fever which might else have
carried her off.
But many modest people may be content with a
respectable Christian life which is not of the very
highest kind. They may think that as husbands and
wives they will make very decent middle-class saints in
heaven, after a comfortable existence on earth, leaving
the nobler crowns of holiness for more daring spirits.
Humility is one of the fairest graces, and we revere it;
but there is a consideration, most momentous for the
kind Christian heart, which such good people must
have overlooked—very naturally, since it is very
obvious.
�The One. Thing Needful.
73
Jesus tells us that many are called but few are
chosen; that few enter the strait gate and travel
€^narrow way, while many take the broadwaythat
leadeth to destruction. In other words, the 1 g
majority of mankind, the large majority of even those
who have the gospel preached to them, must be damn .
When a human soul is born into the world the odds
«re at least ten to one that the Devil will get it. Can
any pious member of the Church who has thought o
this take the responsibility of becoming a Parent. 1
thoroughly believe not. I am convinced that we have
so many Christian parents only because this very con“nous aspect of the case ^s not caught their vie
■ If the parents could have any assurance that the piety
of their offspring would be in proportion to their own
they would be justified in wedding m holiness But
alas7; we all know that some of the most religious
parents have had some of the most wicked children.
Dearly beloved brethren and sisters, pause and calcu
late that for every little saint you give to heaven, you
beget and bear at least nine sinners who will eventually
g The remedy proposed is plain and simple as a gospel
precept : let no Christian have any child at ail—a
rule which, in the grandeur of its absoluteness makes
the poor timid and tentative Malthusianism very
ridiculous indeed. For this rule is drawn immediately
from the New Testament and cannot but be perfect as
its source.
, . ,
7,
Let us think of a few of the advantages which would
flow from its practice. The profane have sometimes
sneered that Jesus and his disciples manifestly thought
that the world would come to an end, the millennium
be inaugurated, within a very few years from the public
ministry of Jesus. Luckily the profane are always
ignorant or shallow, or both. For, as the New Jeru
salem is to come down while Christians, are alive, and
as Christians in the highest sense or Christians without
offspring must have come to an end with the first gene
ration, it is plain that the belief which has been sneered
at was thoroughly well founded ; and that it has been
disappointed only because the vast majority of Cnris-
.
�74
Satires and Profanities.
,n°tbeen Christians in the highest senseat
all, but in their ignorance have continued to propagate
like so many heathen proletarians.
Now, supposing the very likely case that all Chris
tians now living reflect upon the truth herein expounded, and see that it is true, and, therefore, always
act upon it, it follows that, with the end of our now
young generation, the whole of Christendom will be
translated into the kingdom of heaven. Either the
mere scum of non-Christians left upon the earth will
be wholly or m great part converted by an example so
splendid and attractive, and thus translate all Christen
dom in the second edition in a couple of generations
more; or else the world, being without any Christianitv
a matter of course, be so utterly vile and evil
that the promised fire must destroy it at once, and so
bring m the New Heavens and New Earth.
Roman Catholic Christians may indeed answer that,
although the above argument is irresistible to the
Protestants, who have no mean in the next life between
Heaven and Hell, yet that it is not so formidable tn
them, seeing that they believe in the ultimate salvation
of nearly every one born and reared in their com
munion, and only give a temporary purgatory to the
worst of their own sinners. And I admit that such
reply is very cogent. Yet, strangely enough, the
Catholics even more than the Protestants, recognise and
cultivate the supreme beatitude of celibacy ; their
legions of unwedded priests, and monks, and nuns and
saints are so many legions of concessions to the truth
of my main argument.
I am aware that one of the most illustrious dignitariesof our own National Church, the very reverend and
reverent Dr. Swift, Dean of St. Patrick’s, has advo
cated on various grounds, and with impressive force of
reasoning, the general eating of babies : and I antici
pate that some prudent Christians may, therefore, argue .
that it is better to get babies and eat them than to have *
none &t a^’ s^nce th© souls of the sweet innocents
would surely go to heaven, while their bodies would be
very nourishing on earth. Unfortunately, however
the doctrine of Original Sin, as expounded and illus-
�The One Thing Needful.
75
trated by many very thoughtfui theologians and specially theologians of the most determined Protestant
Ze makes it very doubtful whether the souls of
iX “are not damned. It will surely be better, then,
for good Protestants to have no infants at all:
The Athanasian Creed.
[Written
in 1865.]
ON Christmas Day, as on all other chief holidays of theyear, the ministers and congregations of our National
Church have had the noble privilege and pleasure o
standing up and reciting the creed commonly called of
St. Athanasius. The question of the authorship does
not concern us here, but a note of Gibbon (chapter 37)
is so brief and comprehensive that we may as well cite
it •_ “ But the three following truths, however strange
thev may seem, are now universally acknowledged.
1 St Athanasius is not the author of the creed which
is so frequently read in our churches. 2. It does not
appear to have existed within a century after his death.
3 It was originally composed in the Latin tongue,
and consequently in the western provinces. Gennadius, patriarch of Constantinople, was so much amazed
by this extraordinary composition, that he frankly pro
nounced it to be the work of a drunken man.
(Ihis
Gennadius, by the bye, is the same whom Gibbon
mentions two or three times afterwards in the account
of the siege and conquest of Constantinople by the
Whoever elaborated the Creed, and whether he did
it drunk or sober, the Church of England has made it
thoroughly her own by adoption.
�76
Satires and Profanities.
Yet it must be admitted that many good churchmen
and perhaps even a few churchwomen, have not loved
th? adopted child of their Holy Mother as warmly as
their duty commanded. The intelligently pion?
Tillotson wishes Mother Church well rid of the bant
ing ; and poor George the Third himself, with all his
immense genius for orthodoxy, could not take kindly
to it. He was willing enough to repeat all its expres
sions of theological faith—in fact, their perfect non
sense, their obstinate irrationality, must have been
exquisitely delightful to a brain such as his?but he
was not without a sort of vulgar manhood, even when
worshipping m the Chapel Royal, and so rather choked
its denunciations—“ for it do curse dreadful.” He
am d mu'
faith Whole and ^defiled by reason, yet
did not like to assert that all who had been and were
and should in future be in this particular less happy
than himself, must without doubt perish everlastingly.
^OnS6 ^her.hand °ne of our most liberal Church
men, Mr. Maurice, has argued that this creed is essen
tially merciful, and that its retention in the Book of
Common Prayer is a real benefit. Mr. Maurice, how
ever, as we all know, interprets “perish everlastingly”
into a meaning very different from that which most
members of the Church accept. And his opinions lose
considerably in weight from the fact that no man save
himself can infer any one of them from any other.
? -°U T C^eered UP a bit by bis notions
?tern.al, a?d “ Everlasting,” you are soon
depressed again by his pervading woefulness. Of all
the rulers we hear of—the ex-king of Naples, the king
of Prussia the Elector of Hesse-Cassel, Abraham
Lincoln, and the Pope included—the poor God of Mr.
Maurice is the most to be pitied : a God whose world
is m so deplorable a state that the good man who owns
him lives in a perpetual fever of anxiety and misery
m endeavoring to improve it for him.
What part of this creed shocks the pious who are
shocked at. all by it ? Simply the comprehensive
damnation it deals out to unbelievers, half-believers,
and all except whole believers. For we do not hear
that the pious are shocked by the confession of theo-
�The Athanasian Creed.
77
logical or theo-illogical faith, itself. Their reverence
bowsand kisses the rod, which we cool outsiders mibht
fairly have expected to be broken up and. flung out
doors in a fury of indignation. Their sinful human
nature is shocked on account of their fellow-men ; their
divine religious nature is not shocked on account o
their God : yet does not the creed use God as badly as
m A chemist secures some air, and analyses it into its
ultimate constituents, and states with precise numerals
the proportions of oxygen, nitrogen, and carbonic acid
therein Just so the author of this creed secures the
Divinity and analyses it into Father, Son, and Ho y
Ghost, and just as precisely he reports the relations
these A mathematician makes you a problem of a
certain number divided into three parts in certain ratios
to each other and to the sum, from which ratios you
are to deduce the sum and the parts Just so the
author of this creed makes a riddle of his God dividing
him into three persons, from whose inter-relations you
are to deduce the Deity. An anatomist gets hold of
a dead body and dissects it, exposing the structure and
functions of the brain, the lungs, the hearts, etc. Just
so the author of this creed gets possession of the corpse
of God (he died of starvation doing slop-work toi
Abstraction and Company ; and the dead body .was
nurveved by the well-known resurrectionist Priest
craft), and cuts it open and expounds the generation
and functions of its three principal organs. But the
chemist does not tell- us that oxygen, nitrogen, and
carbonic acid are three gases and yet one gas, that each
of them is and is not common air, that they have each
peculiar and yet wholly identical properties; the
mathematician does not tell us that each of the three
parts of his whole number is equal to the whole, and
equal to each of the others, and yet less than the whole
and unequal to either of the others ; the anatomist does
not tell us that brain and lungs and heart are each dis
tinct and yet all the same in substance, structure, and
function, and that each is in itself the whole body and
at the same time is not : while the author of this creed
goes tell us analogous contradictions of the tnree
�78
Satires and Profanities.
aMe and tolerant as human nature can hope to be •
while the author of this creed aims at and manages to’
reach an almost super-human unreason and intnlpran™
™ W®re a sample of air, a certain number,
a dead body This humble-minded devotee, who knows
+£ Tn? c
1S finite and that God is infinite, and
that the finite cannot conceive, much less comprehend
SS exPress ibe infinite, yet expounds this Infinite
with the most complete and complacent knowledge
turns it inside out and upside down, tells us all about
it, cuts it up into three parts, and then glues it together
again with a glue that has the tenacity of atrocious
wrongheadedness instead of the coherence of logic puts
his mark upon it, and says, “ This is the only genuine
thing in the God line. If you are taken in by any
other why, go and be damned
and having done all
this finishes by chanting “ Glory be to the Father, and
to the Son, and to the Holy Ghcst !” And the pious
are not shocked by what they should abhor as horrible
sacrilege and blasphemy ; they are shocked only by
the Go, and be damned,” which is the prologue and
epilogue of the blasphemy. Were the damnatory
clauses omitted, it appears that even the most devout
worshippers could comfortably chant the Glory be to
the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost ”
immediately after they had been thus degrading Father
Son, and Holy Ghost to the level and beneath the level
ot their low human understanding. And these very
people are horrified by the lack of veneration in
�The Athanasian Creed.
79
Atheists and infidels! What infidel ever dealt with
God more contemptuously and blasphemously than this
creed has dealt with him ? Can it be expected that
Xe and sensible men, who have out-grown the pre
judices sucked in with their mothers milk, will be
reconverted to reverence a Deity whom his votaries
■dare to treat in this fashion ?
..
Ere we conclude, it may be as well to anticipate a
probable objection. It may likely enough be urged
that the author and reciters of the creed do not pretend
to know the Deity so thoroughly as we have ass^med’
since they avouch very early in the creed that the
three persons of the Godhead are one and all incom
prehensible. If the word incomprehensible, thus used
means (what it apparently meant in the author s mind)
unlimited as to extension, just as the word eternal
means unlimited as to time, the objection is altogether
wide of the mark. But even if the word incompre
hensible be taken to mean (what it apparently means
in the minds of most people who use the creed) beyond
the comprehension or capacity of the human intellect,
still the objection is without force. lor in the same
sense a tuft of grass, a stone, anything and everything
in the world is beyond the capacity of the human
intellect : the roots of a tuft of grass stride as deeply
into the incomprehensible as the mysteries of the Deity
Relatively this creed tells us quite as much about God
as ever the profoundest botanist can tell us about the
grass ; in fact, it tells relatively more, for it implies
a knowledge of the Final Cause of the subsistence of
God, which no future botanist can tell or imply of the
grass.
���
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Victorian Blogging
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Satires and profanities : with a preface by G. W. Foote
Description
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Edition: New ed.
Place of publication: London
Collation: 79 p. ; 19 cm.
Notes: Part of the NSS pamphlet collection. Printed and published by G.W. Foote. First published 1884: see Preface. Satires previously published in the National Reformer and the Secularist.
Contents: The story of a famous old Jewish firm -- Religion in the Rocky mountains -- The Devil in the Church of England -- Christmas eve in the upper circles -- A commission of inquiry on royalty -- A Bible lesson on monarchy -- The one thing needful --The Athanasian creed.
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Thomson, James [1834-1882]
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Progressive Publishing Company
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1890
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N639
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Foote, G. W. (George William) [1850-1915]
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Rationalism
Free thought
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Satires and profanities : with a preface by G. W. Foote), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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Text
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English
Athanasian Creed
Church of England
Monarchy
NSS
Rationalism
Satire
-
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f263ae1b6478ba7e66b27e80858e84cb
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Text
. ..... ............ .
�IMPEACHMENT
OF THE
HOUSE OF BRUNSWICK.
BY
CHARLES BRADLAUGH.
[second EDITION,
REVISED
AND
LARGELY
RE-WRITTEN.]
LONDON:
Austin & Co., 17, Johnson’s Court, Fleet Street, E.C.
PRICE ONE SHILLING.
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�PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.
In re-writing and enlarging the matter of this pamphlet, I
have become so sensible of its many defects, that were it
not for the pressing demands for an immediate edition, I
should be inclined to wait. Each day’s research amongst
the correspondence of Waldegrave, Cowper, Temple, Rose,
Grenville, Walpole, North, Castlereagh, Holland, Pitt, Ward,
Malmesbury, Buckingham, Fox, Grey, Wellington, &c., &c.,
brings out new facts to assist my Impeachment. The first
edition has received from the press much abuse, and save
one article, in the Gentlemans Magazine, to which I give
a special reply,, but little criticism. It has been denounced
as treasonable, and threats, varying from indictment to
menace, even of physical violence, have been inserted in
respectable journals. My answer is this improved edition,
in which I have found no reason to soften a single word.
The matter in these pages has been delivered as lectures
in some of the finest halls in Great Britain, and before
crowded, and not only orderly, but enthusiastic audiences.
At least eighty thousand different persons have listened to
the statements here printed; discussion and opposition have
been invited, none worthy mention has been offered. It is
said that I try to throw upon the Brunswick family the whole
blame of misgovernment. Not quite; I blame also the
people that they have permitted an inefficient and mischief
working family to rule so long. It is said that I seek to
make the present members of the Royal Family responsible
for the vices and incapabilities of their predecessors. This
is not so; I seek to show that the Family exhibits no govern
mental capacity, and that even to-day the aspirants for the
�iv
Preface.
Throne have no such high merit as shall redeem or separate
them from the consequences of the judgment I seek to obtain
from my fellow countrymen. I only ask a judgment to be
pronounced in the Parliament House, and I know that be
fore this can be feared or hoped for, there is hard work to
be done in enlightening the British people in the history of
the last two hundred years.
This is not even a Republican pamphlet. The virtues or
vices of the Brunswicks have no part—for or against—in
the discussion of Republicanism. Here is only a conten
tion that our Monarchy is elective, and that the people have
the right and duty to make another selection. I am, it is true,
a Republican, but while I hope and work for the spread of
Republican views, I do not desire a fierce, a sudden, change.
I would, rather than have a Republic won by force, hope
that an English-thinking ruler, chosen by the suffrages of
the nation, with pride for those British names which have
carried our literature through the world, might do better for
us than a foreign family—foreign to us alike in their memo
ries, their language, their inter-marryings, and their hopes.
If, however, it should in this country have at last to come
to a question of Republic, or another George IV., then I
can see only one reply, and I can hear scores of thousands
of my fellow-countrymen training themselves to give it.
C. BRADLAUGH.
�IMPEACHMENT
OF THE
HOUSE OF BRUNSWICK.
CHAP. I.
INTRODUCTORY.
By statutes of the 12 and 13 Will. III., and 6 Anne c. 11, Article
2, the British Parliament, limiting the Monarchy to members of
the Church of England, excluded the Stuarts, and from and
after the death of King William and the Princess Anne without
heirs, contrived that the Crown of this kingdom should devolve
upon the Princess Sophia, Duchess Dowager of Hanover, and
the heirs of her body, being Protestants. Heirs failing to Anne,
although seventeen times pregnant, and Sophia dying about
seven weeks before Anne, her son George succeeded under
these Acts as George I. of England and Scotland.
It is said, and perhaps truly, that the German Protestant
Guelph was an improvement on the Catholic Stuart, and the
Whigs take credit for having effected this change in spite of the
Tories. This credit they deserve ; but it must not be forgotten
that it was scarce half a century before that the entire aristo
cracy, including the patriotic Whigs, coalesced to restore to the
throne the Stuarts, who had been got rid of under Cromwell.
If this very aristocracy, of which the Whigs form part, had
never assisted in calling back the Stuarts in the person of
Charles II., there would have been no need to thank them for
again turning that family out.
The object of the present essay is to submit reasons for the
repeal of the Acts of Settlement and Union, so far as the suc
cession to the throne is concerned, after the abdication or demise
of the present monarch. It is of course assumed, as a point
upon which all supporters of the present Royal Family will
agree, that the right to deal with the throne is inalienably vested
in the English people, to be exercised by them through their
representatives in Parliament. The right of the members of
the House of Brunswick to succeed to the throne is a right
accruing only from the Acts of Settlement and Union, it being
clear that, except from this statute, they have no claim to the
throne. It is therefore submitted that should Parliament in its
wisdom see fit to enact that after the death or abdication of her
present Majesty, the throne shall no longer be filled by a mem
�6
The House of Brunswick.
ber of the House of Brunswick, such an enactment would be
perfectly within the competence of Parliament. It is further
submitted that the Parliament has full and uncontrollable autho
rity to make any enactment, and to repeal any enactment here
tofore made, even if such new statute, or the repeal of any old
statute, should in truth change the constitution of the Empire,
or modify the character and powers of either Parliamentary
Chamber. The Parliament of the English Commonwealth,
which met on April 25th, 1660, gave the Crown to Charles II.,
and the Parliament of the British Monarchy has the undoubted
right to withhold the Crown from Albert Edward Prince of
Wales. The Convention which assembled at Westminster on
January 22nd, 1688, took away the Crown from James II., and
passed over his son, the then Prince of Wales, as if he had been
non-existent. This Convention was declared to have all the
authority of Parliament—ergo, Parliament has admittedly the
right to deprive a living King of his Crown, and to treat a
Prince of Wales as having no claim to the succession.
In point of fact two of the clauses of the Act of Settlement
were repealed in the reign of Queen Anne, and a third clause was
repealed early in the reign of George I., showing that this par
ticular statute has never been considered immutable or irrepealable. It is right to add that the clauses repealed were only of
consequence to the nation, and that their repeal was no injury to
the Crown. The unbounded right of the supreme Legislature
to enlarge its own powers, was contended for and admitted in
1716, when the duration of Parliament was extended four years,
a triennial Parliament declaring itself and all future Parliaments
septennial. Furthermore, it has been held to be sedition to
deny the complete authority of the Irish Parliament to put an
end to its own existence.
It has been admitted to be within the jurisdiction of Parlia
ment to give electoral privileges to citizens theretofore unenfran
chised ; Parliament claims the unquestioned right to disfran
chise persons, hitherto electors, for misconduct in the exercise
of electoral rights, and in its pleasure to remove and annul any
electoral disability. The right of Parliament to decrease or in
crease the number of representatives for any borough, has never
been disputed, and its authority to decrease the number of Peers
sitting and voting in the House of Lords was recognised in pass
ing the Irish Church Disestablishment Bill, by which several
Bishops were summarily ejected from amongst the Peers. It
is now submitted that Parliament possesses no Legislative right
but what it derives from the people, and that the people are
under no irrevocable contract or obligation to continue any
member of the House of Brunswick on the throne.. In ordei
to show that this is not a solitary opinion, the following Parlia
mentary dicta are given :—
.
•
The Honourable Temple Luttrell, in a speech made in the
House of Commons, on the7th November, 1775, showed “that of
thirty-three sovereigns since William the Conqueror, thirteen
�The House of Brunswick.
7
only have ascended the throne by divine hereditary right...... The
will of the people, superseding any hereditary claim to succession,
at the commencement of the twelfth century placed Henry I. on
the throne,” and this subject to conditions as to laws to be made
by Henry. King John was compelled “ solemnly to register an
assurance of the ancient rights of the people in a formal manner;
and this necessary work was accomplished by the Congress at
Runnymede, in the year 1115. “ Sir, in the reign of Henry 111,
(about the year 1223), the barons, clergy, and freeholders under
standing that the King, as Earl of Poictou, had landed some of
his continental troops in the western ports of England, with a
design to strengthen a most odious and arbitrary set of ministers,
they assembled in a Convention or Congress, from whence they
despatched deputies to King Henry, declaring that if he did not
immediately send back those Poictouvians, and remove from his
person and councils evil advisers, they would place upon the
throne a Prince who should better observe the laws of the land
Sir, the King not only hearkened to that Congress, but shortly
after complied with every article of their demand, and publicly
notified his reformation. Now, Sir, what are we to call that as
sembly which dethroned Edward II. when the Archbishop of
Canterbury preached a sermon on this Text, 1 The voice op the
people is the voice of God ?’ ” “ A Prince of the house of Lancas
ter was invited over from banishment, and elected by the people
to the throne ” on the fall of Richard II. “I shall next proceed
to the general Convention and Congress, which in 1461, enthroned
the Earl of March by the name of Edward IV., the Primate of
all England collecting the suffrages of the people.” “ In 1659,
a Convention or Congress restored legal Monarchy in the person
of Charles II.”
William Pitt, on the 16th December, 1788, being then Chan
cellor of the Exchequer, contended that “the right of providing
for the deficiency of Royal authority rested with the two remain
ing branches of the legislatureand again, “ on the disability of the
Sovereign, where was the right to be found ? It was to be found
in the voice, in the sense of the people, with them it rested.”
On the 22nd December, Mr. Pitt said that Mr. Fox had con
tended that “ the two Houses of Parliament cannot proceed to
legislate without a King.” His (Mr. Pitt’s) answer was : “ The
conduct of the Revolution had contradicted that assertion; they
had acted legislatively, and no King being present, they must,
consequently, have acted without a King.”
Mr. Hardinge, a barrister of great repute, and afterwards
Solicitor-General and Judge, in the same debate, said : “The
virtues of our ancestors and the genius of the Government accu
rately understood, a century ago, had prompted the. Lords and
Commons of the realm to pass a law without a King ; and a law
which, as he had always read it, had put upon living record this
principle: ‘That whenever the supreme executive hand shall
have lost its power to act, the people of the land, fully and freely
represented, can alone repair the defect.’”
�8
The House of Brunswick.
On the 26th December, in the House of Lords, discussing the
power to exclude a sitting Monarch from the throne, the Earl of
Abingdon said: “Will a King exclude himself? No ! no!
my Lords, that exclusion appertains to us and to the other
House of Parliament exclusively. It is to us it belongs, it is our
duty. It is the business of the Lords and Commons of Great
Britain, and of us alone, as the tustees and representatives of the
nation.” And following up this argument, Lord Abingdon con
tended that in the contingency he was alluding to, “the right to
new model or alter the succession, vests in the Parliament of
England without the King, in the Lords and Commons of Great
Britain solely and exclusively.”
Lord Stormont, in the same debate, pointed out that William
III. “possessed no other right to the throne than that which he
derived from the votes of the two Houses.”
The Marquis of Lansdowne said : “One of the best constitu
tional writers we had whs Mr. Justice Foster, who, in his book
on the ‘ Principles of the Constitution/ denies the right even of
hereditary succession, and says it is no right whatever, but
merely a political expedient...... The Crown, Mr. Justice Foster
said, was not merely a descendable property like a laystall, or a
pigstye, but was put in trust for millions, and for the happiness
of ages yet unborn, which Parliament has it always in its power
to mould, to shape, to alter, to fashion, just as it shall think
proper. And in speaking of Parliament,” his Lordship said,
“ Mr. Justice Foster repeatedly spoke of the two Houses of
Parliament only.”
My object being to procure the repeal of the only title under
which any member of the House of Brunswick could claim to
succeed the present sovereign on the throne, or else to procure a
special enactment which shall for the future exclude the Brunswicks, as the Stuarts were excluded in 1688 and 1701, the follow
ing grounds are submitted as justifying and requiring such repeal
or new enactment:—
1st. That during the one hundred and fifty-seven years the
Brunswick family have reigned over the British Empire, the
policy and conduct of the majority of the members of that
family, and especially of the various reigning members, always
saving and excepting her present Majesty, have been hostile to
the welfare of the mass of the people. This will be sought to
be proved at length by a sketch of the principal events in the
reign of each monarch, from August 1st, 1714, to the present
date.
2nd. That during the same period of one hundred and fifty
seven years, fifteen-sixteenths of the entire National Debt have
been created, and that this debt is in great part the result of
wars arising from the mischievous and pro-Hanoverian policy
of the Brunswick family.
3rd. That in consequence of the incompetence or want of
desire for governmental duty on the part of the various reigning
members of the House of Brunswick, the governing power of
�The House of Brunswick.
9
the country has been practically limited to a few families who
have used government in the majority of instances as a system
of machinery for securing place and pension for themselves and
their associates ; while it is submitted that Government should
be the best contrivance of national wisdom for the alleviation
of national suffering and promotion of national happiness. Earl
Grey even admits that “ Our national annals since the Revolu
tion of 1688 present a sad picture of the selfishness, baseness,
and corruption of the great majority of the actors on the political
stage.”
4th. That a huge pension list has been created, the recipients
of the largest pensions being in most cases persons who are
already members of wealthy families, and. who have done nothing
whatever to justify their being kept in idleness at the national
expense, while so many workers in the agricultural districts are
in a state of semi-starvation ; so many toilers in large works in
Wales, Scotland, and some parts of England, are in constant
debt and dependence ; and while large numbers of the Irish
peasantry—having for many generations been denied life at home
—have until lately been driven to seek those means of existence
across the sea which their own fertile land should have amply
provided for them.
5th. That the monarchs of the Brunswick family have been,
except in a few cases of vicious interference, costly puppets,
useful only to the governing aristocracy as a cloak to shield the
real wrongdoes from the just reproaches of the people.
6th. That the Brunswick family have shown themselves utterly
incapable of initiating or encouraging wise legislation. That
George I. was shut out practically from the government by his
utter ignorance of the English language, his want of sympathy
with British habits, and his frequent absences from this country.
A volume of history, published by Messrs. Longmans in 1831,
says that “ George I. continued a German princeling on the
British throne—surrounded still by his petty Hanoverian satel
lites, and so ignorant even of the language of his new subjects,
that his English minister, who understood neither French nor
German, could communicate with him only by an imperfect
jargon of barbarous Latin.” He “ discarded his wife, and had
two mistresses publicly installed in their Court rights and privi
leges.” Earl Grey declares that “ the highly beneficial practice
of holding Cabinet Councils without the presence of the sovereign
arose from George the First’s not knowing English.” Leslie
describes George I. as altogether ignorant of our language, laws,
customs, and constitution. Madame de Maintenon writes of
him as disgusted with his subjects. That George II. was utterly
indifferent to English improvement, and was mostly away in
Hanover. Lord Hervey’s “ Memoirs ” pourtray him as caring
for nothing but soldiers and women, and declare that his highest
ambition was to combine the reputation of a great general with
that of a successful libertine. That George III. was repeatedly
insane, and that in his officially lucid moments his sanity was
�10
The House of Brunswick.
more dangerous to England than his madness. Buckle says of
him that he was “ despotic as well as superstitious........Every
liberal sentiment, everything approaching to reform, nay, even
the mere mention of inquiry, was an abomination in the eyes of
that narrow and ignorant prince.” Lord Grenville, his Prime
Minister, said of him : “ He had perhaps the narrowest mind of
any man I ever knew.” That George IV. was a dissipated,
drunken debauchee, bad husband, unfaithful lover, untrustworthy
friend, unnatural father, corrupt regent, and worse king. Buckle
speaks of “ the incredible baseness of that ignoble voluptuary.”
That William IV. was obstinate, but fortunately fearful of losing
his crown, gave way to progress with a bad grace when chica
nery was no longer possible, and continued resistance became
dangerous.
7th. That under the Brunswick family, the national expendi
ture has increased to a frightful extent, while our best posses
sions in America have been lost, and our home possession,
Ireland, rendered chronic in its discontent by the terrible mis
government under the four Georges.
And 8th. That the ever-increasing burden of the national
taxation has been shifted from the land on to the shoulders of
the. middle and lower classes, the landed aristocracy having,
until very lately, enjoyed the practical monopoly of tax-levying
power.
CHAP. II.
THE REIGN OF GEORGE I.
On August ist, 1714, George Lewis, Elector of Hanover, and
great-grandson of James I. of England, succeeded to the throne;
but being apparently rather doubtful as to the reception he
would meet in this country, he delayed visiting his new domi
nions until the month of October. In April, 1714, there was so
little disposition in favour .of the newly-chosen dynasty, that the
Earl of Oxford entreated George not to bring any of his family
into this country without Queen Anne’s express consent. It
seems strange to read in the correspondence of Madame Eliza
beth Charlotte, Duchesse d’Orleans, her hesitation “ to rejoice
at the accession of our Prince George, for she had no confidence
in the Englishand her fears “ that the inconstancy of the
English will in the end produce some scheme which may be in
jurious to the French monarchy.” She adds: “If the English
were to be trusted, I should say that it is fortunate the Parlia
ments are in favour of George, but themore one reads the history
of English revolutions, the more one is compelled to remark the
eternal hatred which the people of that nation have had towards
their kings, as well as their fickleness.” To-day it is the Eng
�The House of Brunswick.
11
lish who charge the French with fickleness. Thackeray says of
George I.,that “he showed an uncommon prudence and cool
ness of behaviour when he came into his kingdom, exhibiting no
elation ; reasonably doubtful whether he should not be turned
out some day ; looking upon himself only as a lodger, and making
the most of his brief tenure of St James’s and Hampton Court,
plundering, it is true, somewhat, and dividing amongst his Ger
man followers ; but what could be expected of a sovereign who
at home could sell his subjects at so many ducats per head, and
make no scruple in so disposing of them ?” At the accession of
George I. the national debt of this country, exclusive of an
nuities, was about ^36,000,000; after five Brunswicks have left us,
it is _£8oo,ooo,ooo for Great Britain and Ireland, and much more
than £110,000,000 for India. The average annual national ex
penditure under the rule of George I. was ,£5,923,079 : to-day it is
more than £70,000,000, of which more than £20,000,000 have
been added in the last twenty years. During the reign of
George I. land paid very nearly one-fourth the whole of the
taxes, to-day it pays less than one-seventieth part; and yet, while
its proportion of the burden is so much lighter, its exaction from
labour in rent is ten times heavier.
George I. came to England without his wife, the Princess of
Zelle. Years before, he had arrested her and placed her in
close confinement in Ahlden Castle, on account of her intrigue
with Philip, Count Konigsmark, whom some say George I. sus
pected of being the actual father of the Electoral Prince George,
afterwards George II. To use the language of a writer patro
nised by George Prince of Wales, in 1808, “The coldness
between George I. and his son and successor George II. may
be said to have been almost coeval with the existence of the latter.”
Our King, George I., described by Thackeray as a “ cold, selfish
libertine,” had Konigsmark murdered in the palace of Heranhausen ; confined his wife, at twenty-eight years of age, in a dun
geon, where she remained until she was sixty; and when George
Augustus, Electoral Prince of Hanover, tried to get access to his
mother, George Lewis, then Elector of Hanover, arrested Prince
George also, and it is said would have put him to death if the
Emperor of Germany had not protected him as a Prince of the
German Empire. During the reign of George II., Frederick
Prince of Wales, whom his father denounced as “a changeling,”
published an account of how George I. had turned Frederick’s
father out of ■ the palace. These Guelphs have been a loving
family. The Edinburgh Review declares that “ the terms on
which the eldest sons of this family have always lived with their
fathers have been those of distrust, opposition, and hostility.”
Even after George Lewis had ascended the throne of England,
his hatred to George Augustus was so bitter, that there was
some proposition that James, Earl Berkeley-and Lord High
Admiral, should carry off the Prince to America and keep him
there.
Thackeray says : “When George I. made his first visit''to
�12
The House of Brunswick.
Hanover, his son was appointed regent during the Royal ab
sence. But this honour was never again conferred on the
Prince of Wales ; he and his father fell out presently. On the
occasion of the christening of his second son, a Royal row took
place, and the Prince, shaking his fist in the Duke of New
castle's face, called him a rogue, and provoked his august
father. He and his wife were turned out of St. James’s, and
their princely children taken from them, by order of the Royal
head of the family. Father and mother wept piteously at part
ing from their little ones. The young ones sent some cherries,
with their love, to papa and mamma, the parents watered the
fruit with their tears. They had no tears thirty-five years after
wards, when Prince Frederick died, their eldest son, their heir,
their enemy.”
A satirical ballad on the expulsion of Prince George from St.
James’s Palace, which was followed by the death of the newlychristened baby Prince, is droll enough to here repeat :—
The King then took his gray goose quill,
And dipt it o’er in gall ;
And, by Master Vice-Chamberlain,
He sent to him this scrawl:
“ Take hence yourself, and eke your spouse,
Your maidens and your men ;
Your trunks, and all your trumpery,
Except your chil-de-ren.”
*****
The Prince secured with nimble haste
The Artillery Commission ;
And with him trudged full many a maid,
But not one politician.
Up leapt Lepel, and frisked away,
As though she ran on wheels ;
Miss Meadows made a woful face,
Miss Howe took to her heels.
But Bellenden I needs must praise,
Who, as down stairs she jumps,
Sang “ O’er the hills and far away,”
Despising doleful dumps.
Then up the street they took their way,
And knockt up good Lord Grant-ham ;
Higgledy-piggledy they lay,
And all went rantam scantam.
Now sire and son had played their part,
What could befall beside ?
Why the poor babe took this to heart,
Kickt up its heels, and died.
�The House of Brunswick.
13
Mahon, despite all his desire to make out the best for the
Whig revolution and its consequences, occasionally makes some
pregnant admissions : “ The jealousy which George I. enter
tained for his son was no new feeling. It had existed even at
Hanover, and had since been inflamed by an insidious motion
of the Tories that out of the Civil List £100,000 should be
allotted as a separate revenue for the Prince of Wales. This
motion was over-ruled by the Ministerial party, and its rejection
offended the Prince as much as its proposal had the King......
In fact it is remarkable...... that since that family has reigned,
the heirs-apparent have always been on ill terms with the sove
reign. There have been four Princes of Wales since the death
of Anne, and all four have gone into bitter opposition.” “ That
family,” said Lord Carteret one day in full Council, “ always has
quarrelled, and always will quarrel, from generation to genera
tion.”
“ Through the whole of the reign of George I., and through
nearly half of the reign of George II.,” says Lord Macaulay, “a
Tory was regarded as the enemy of the reigning house, and was
excluded from all the favours of the Crown. Though most of
the country gentlemen were Tories, none but Whigs were ap
pointed deans and bishops. In every county, opulent and welldescended Tory squires complained that their names were left
out of the Commission of the Peace, while men of small estate
and of mean birth, who were for toleration and excise, septen
nial parliaments and standing armies, presided at Quarter Ses
sions, and became deputy-lieutenants.”
In attacking the Whigs, my object is certainly not to write in
favour of the Tories, but some such work is needful while so
many persons labour under the delusion that the Whigs have
always been friends to liberty and progress.
Although George I. brought with him no wife to England, he
was accompanied by at least two of his mistresses, and our
peerage roll was enriched by the addition of Madame Kielmansegge as Countess of Darlington, and Mademoiselle Erangard
Melosine de Schulenberg as Duchess of Kendal and Munster,
Baroness of Glastonbury and Countess of Feversham. These
peeresses were received with high favour by the Whig aristo
cracy, although the Tories refused to countenance them, and
“ they were often hooted by the mob as they passed through the
streets.” The Edinburgh Review described them as “ two big
blowsy German women.” Here I have no room to deal fairly
with Charlotte Sophia, Baroness of Brentford and Countess of
Darlington ; her title is extinct, and I can write nothing of any
good or useful act to revive her memory. Lord Chesterfield
says of George I. : “No woman came amiss to him, if she were
only very willing and very fat.” John Heneage Jesse, in his
“ Memoirs of the Court of England”—speaking of the Duchess
of Kendal, the Countess Platen (the co-partner in the murder
of Konigsmark), afterwards Countess of Darlington, and many
others less known to infamy—says that George I. “ had the
�14
The House of Brunswick.
folly and wickedness to encumber himself with a seraglio of
hideous German prostitutes.” The Duchess of Kendal was for
many years the chief mistress of George, and being tall and lean
was caricatured as the Maypole or the Giraffe. She had a
pension of ,£7,500 a year, the profits of the place of Master of
the Horse, and other plunder. The Countess of Darlington’s
figure may be judged from the name of Elephant or Camel
popularly awarded to her. Horace Walpole says of her : “I
remember as a boy being terrified at her enormous figure. The
fierce black eyes, large and rolling, between two lofty-arched
eyebrows, two acres of cheeks spread with crimson, an ocean of
neck that overflowed, and was not distinguished from the lower
part of her body, and no part restrained by stays. No wonder
that a child dreaded such an ogress.” She died 1724. Mahon
says : “ She was unwieldy in person, and rapacious in cha
racter.”
Phillimore declares that “ George I. brought with him from
Hanover mistresses as rapacious, and satellites as ignoble, as
those which drew down such deserved obloquy on Charles II.
Bothman, Bernstoff, Robethon, and two Turks—Mustapha and
Mahomet—meddled more with public affairs, and were to the
full as venal as Chiffin, Pepys, and Smith.” Mahon, who calls
Robethon “ a prying, impertinent, venomous creature,” adds that
<l coming from a poor electorate, a flight of hungry Hanoverians,
like so many famished vultures, fell with keen eyes and bended
talons on the fruitful soil of England.”
One of the earliest acts of the Whig aristocracy, in the reign of
George I., was to pass a measure through Parliament lengthen
ing the existence of that very Parliament to seven years, and
giving to the King the power to continue all subsequent Par
liaments to a like period. The Triennial Parliaments were thus
lengthened by a corrupt majority. For the committal of the
Septennial bill, there was a majority of 72 votes, and it is alleged
by the Westminster Review, “ that about 82 members of the
honourable house had either fingered Walpole’s gold, or pocketed
the bank notes which, by the purest accident, were left under
their plates........In the ten years which preceded the Septennial
Act, the sum expended in Secret Service money was ,£337,960.
In the ten years which followed the passing of the Septennial
Act, the sum expended for Secret Service was ,£1,453,400.”
The same writer says, “ The friends and framers of the Triennial
Bill were for the most part Tories, and its opponents for the most
part Whigs. The framers and friends of the Bill for long Par
liaments were all Whigs, and its enemies all Tories.” When the
measure came before the Lords, we find Baron Bernstoff, on the
King’s behalf, actually canvassing Peers’wives with promises of
places for their relatives in order to induce them to get their
husbands to vote for the Bill. Another of the early infringements
of public liberty by the Whig supporters of George I., was the
passing (1 Geo.. I., c. 5) the Riot Act, which had not existed
from the accession of James I. to the death of Queen Anne. Sir
�The House of Brunswick.
15
John Hinde Cotton, a few years afterwards, described this Act,
which is still the law of England, as “ An Act by which a little
dirty justice of the peace, the meanest and vilest tool a minister
can use, had it in his power to put twenty or thirty of the best
subjects of England to immediate death, without any trial 01form, but that of reading a proclamation’” In order to facilitate
the King’s desire to spend most of his time in Hanover, the
third section of the Act of Settlement was repealed.
Thackeray says : “Delightful as London city was, King George
I. liked to be out of it as much as ever he could, and when there,
passed all his time with his Germans. It was with them as with
Blucher one hundred years afterwards, when the bold old Reiter
looked down from St. Paul’s and sighed out, ‘ Was fur plunder !”
The German women plundered, the German secretaries plun
dered, the German cooks and intendants plundered; even
Mustapha and Mahomet, the German negroes, had a share of
the booty. Take what you can get, was the old monarch’s
maxim.”
There was considerable discontent expressed in the early years
of George’s reign. Hallam says : “ Much of this disaffection
was owing to the cold reserve of George I., ignorant of the lan
guage, alien to the prejudices of his people, and continually
absent in his electoral dominions, to which he seemed to sacri
fice the nation’s interest....... The letters in Coxe’s Memoirs of
Walpole, abundantly show the German nationality, the impolicy
and neglect of his duties, the rapacity and petty selfishness of
George I. The Whigs were much dissatisfied, but the fear of
losing their places made them his slaves.” In order to add the
duchies of Bremen and Verden to Hanover, in 1716, the King,
as Elector, made a treaty with Denmark against Sweden, which
treaty proved the source of those Continental wars, and the
attendant system of subsidies to European powers, which have,
in the main, created our enormous National Debt. Bremen and
Verden being actually purchased for George I. as the Elector of
Hanover, with English money, Great Britain in addition was
pledged by George I. to guarantee Sleswick to Denmark.
Sweden and Denmark quarrelling—and George I. as Elector of
Hanover having, without the consent of the English Parliament,
declared war against Sweden—an English fleet was sent into
the Baltic to take up a quarrel with which we had no concern.
In addition we were involved in a quarrel with Russia, because
that power had interfered to prevent Mecklenburg being added
to George’s Hanoverian estates. The chief mover in this matter
was the notorious Baron Bernstoff, who held some village pro
perty in Mecklenburg. In all these complications, Hanover
gained, England lost. If Hanover found troops, England paid
for them, while the Electorate solely reaped the benefit. Every
thoughtful writer admits that English interests were always
betrayed to satisfy Hanoverian greed.
The King’s fondness for Germany provoked some hostility,
and amongst the various squibs issued, one in 1716, from the
�16
The House of Brunswick.
pen of Samuel Wesley, brother of John Wesley, is not without
interest. It represents a conversation between George and the
Duchess of Kendall :—
As soon as the wind it came fairly about,
That kept the king in and his enemies out,
He determined no longer confinement to bear,
And thus to the Duchess his mind did declare :
“ Quoth he, my dear Kenny, I’ve been tired a long while,
With living obscure in this poor little isle,
And now Spain and Pretenderhave no more mines to spring,
I’m resolved to go home and live like a king.”
The Duchess approves of this, describes and laughs at all the
persons nominated for the Council of Regency, and concludes:—
“ On the whole, I’ll be hanged if all over the realm
There are thirteen such fools to be put to the helm ;
So for this time be easy, nor have jealous thought,
They ha’n’t sense to sell you, nor are worth being bought.”
“’Tis for that (quoth the King, in very bad French),
I chose them for my regents, and you for my wench,
And neither, I’m sure, will my trust e’er betray,
For the devil won’t take you if I turn you away.”
It was this same Duchess of Kendal who, as the King’s
mistress, was publicly accused of having received enormous
sums of money from the South Sea Company for herself and the
King, in order to shield from justice the principal persons con
nected with those terrible South Sea frauds, by which, in the
year 1720, so many families were reduced to misery.
In 1717, Mr. Shippen, a member of the House of Commons,
was committed to the Tower, for saying in his place in the
House, that it was the “ infelicity of his Majesty’s reign that he
is unacquainted with our language and constitution.” Lord
Macaulay tells us how Lord Carteret, afterwards Earl Granville,
rose into favour. The King could speak no English ; Carteret
was the only one of the Ministry who could speak German.
“ All the communication that Walpole had with his master was
in very bad Latin.” The influence Carteret wielded over the
King did not extend to every member of the Royal Family. The
Princess of Wales afterwards described the Lords Carteret and
Bolingbroke as two she had “ long known to be two as worth
less men of parts as any in the country, and who I have not
only been often told are two of the greatest liars and knaves in
any country, but whom my own observation and experience have
found so.”
Under George I. our standing army was nearly doubled by the
Whig Ministry, and this when peace would rather have justified
a reduction than an increase. The payments to Hanoverian
troops commenced under this king, a payment which William
Pitt afterwards earned the enmity of George II. by very sharply
�The House of Brunswick.
IT
denouncing, and which payment was but a step in the system of
continental subsidies which have helped to swell our national
debt to its present enormous dimensions.
In this reign the enclosure of waste lands was practically com
menced, sixteen enclosure Acts being passed, and 17,660 acres
of land enclosed. This example, once furnishe4, was followed
in the next reign with increasing rapidity, 226 enclosure Acts
being passed in the reign of George II., and 318,778 acres of
land enclosed. As Mr. Fawcett states, up to 1845, more than
7,000,000 acres of land, over which the public possessed in
valuable rights, have been gradually absorbed, and individuals
wielding legislative influence have been enriched at the expense
of the public and the poor.
Within six years from his accession, the King was about
.£600,000 in debt, and this sum was the first of a long list of
debts discharged by the nation for these Brunswicks. When
our ministers to-day talk of obligations on the part of the people
to endow each additional member of the Royal Family, the
memory of these shameful extravagances should have some
effect. George I. had a civil list of £700^000 a year; he received
£300,000 from the Royal Exchange Assurance Company, and
.£300,000 from the London Assurance Companies, and had one
million voted to him in 1726 towards payment of his debts.
When the “ South Sea Bill” was promoted in 1720, wholesale
bribery was resorted to. Transfers of stock were proved to have
been made to persons high in office. Two members of the
Whig Ministry, Lord Sunderland and Mr. Aislabie, were so im
plicated that they had to resign their offices, and the last-named,
who was Chancellor of the Exchequer, was ignominiously ex
pelled the House of Commons. Royalty itself, or at least the
King’s sultanas, and several of his German household, shared
the spoil. £30,000 were traced to the King’s mistresses, and
a select committee of the House denounced the whole business
as “ a train of the deepest villany and fraud with which hell ever
contrived to ruin a nation.” Near the close of the reign, Lord
Macclesfied, Lord Chancellor and favourite and tool of the King,,
was impeached for extortion and abuse of trust in his office, and
being convicted, was sentenced to pay a fine of £30,000. In
5716, Mademoiselle Schulenberg, then Duchess of Munster,
received £“5,000 as a bribe for procuring the title of Viscount
for Sir Henry St. John. In 1724, the same mistress, bribed by
Lord Bolingbroke, successfully used her influence to pass an act
through Parliament restoring him his forfeited estates. Mr.
Chetwynd, says my Lady Cowper, in order to secure his position
in the Board of Trade, paid to another of George’s mistresses
£500 down, agreed to allow her £200 a year as long as he held
the place, and gave her also the fine brilliant earrings she wore.
In 1724, there appeared in Dublin, the first of the famous
“ Drapier Letters,” written by Jonathan Swift against Wood’s
coinage patent. A patent had been granted to a man named
Wood for coining halfpence in Ireland. This grant was made
C
�18
The House of Brunswick.
under the influence of the Duchess of Kendal, the mistress of
the King, and on the stipulation that she should receive a large
share of the profits. These “ Drapier Letters ” were prosecuted
by the Government, but Swift followed them with others ; the
grand juries refused to find true bills, and ultimately the patent
was cancelled. Wood, or the Duchess, got as compensation a
grant of a pension of ,£3,000 a year for eight years.
George died at Osnabruck, on his journey Hanoverwards, hi
June 1727, having made a will by which he disposed of his
money in some fashion displeasing to his son George II.; and as
the Edinburgh Review tells us, the latter “ evaded the old King’s
directions, and got his money by burning his will.” In this
George II. only followed his royal father’s example. When
Sophia Dorothea died, she left a will bequeathing her property
in a fashion displeasing to George I., who, without scruple,,
destroyed the testament and appropriated the estate. _ George L
had also previously burned the will of his father-in-law, the
Duke of Zell. At this time the destruction of a will was a capital
felony in England.
In concluding this rough sketch of the reign of George I., it
must not be forgotten that his accession meant the triumph of
the Protestant caste in Ireland, and that under his rule much
was done to render permanent the utter hatred manifested by
the Irish people to their English conquerors, who had always
preferred the policy of extermination to that of conciliation.
Things were so sad in Ireland at the end of this reign, that
Dean Swift, in bitter mockery, “ wrote and published his
‘ Modest Proposal ’ for relieving the miseries of the people, by
cooking and eating the children of the poor“ a piece of the
fiercest sarcasm,” says Mitchell, “ steeped in all the concentrated
bitterness of his soul.” Poor Ireland, she had, at any rate,,
nothing to endear her to the memory of George I.
CHAP. III.
THE REIGN OF GEORGE IL
When George I. died there was so little interest or affection
exhibited by his son and successor, that Sir Robert Walpole, on
announcing to George II. that by the demise of his father he
had succeeded to regal honours,, was saluted with a volley of
oaths, and “ Dat is one big lie.” No pretence even was made
of sorrow. George Augustus had hated George Lewis . during
life and at the first council, when the will of the late King was
produced by the Archbishop of Canterbury, the new monarch
simply took it up and walked out of the room with the docu
ment, which was never seen again. Thackeray, who pictures
�The House of Brunswick.
19
George II. as a dull, little man, of low tastes,” says that he
“ made away with his father’s will under the astonished nose of
the Archbishop of Canterbury.” A duplicate of this will having
been deposited with the Duke of Brunswick, a large sum of money
was paid to that Prince nominally as a subsidy by the English
Government for the maintenance of troops, but really as a bribe
for surrendering the document. A legacy having been left by
this will to Lady Walsingham, threats were held out in 1733 by
her then husband, Lord Chesterfield, and £20,000 was paid in
compromise.
The eldest son of George II. was Frederick, born in 1706,
and who up to 1728 resided permanently in Hanover. Lord
Hervey tells us that the King hated his son Frederick, and that
the Queen Caroline, his mother, abhorred him. To Lord Her
vey the Queen says “ My dear Lord, I will give it you under
my hand, if you are in any fear of my relapsing, that my dear
first-born is the greatest ass, and the greatest liar, and the
greatest canaille, and the greatest beast in the whole world ; and
that I most heartily wish he were out of it.” This is a tolerably
strong description of the father of George III. from the lips of
his own mother. Along with this description of Frederick by
the Queen, take Thackeray’s character of George II.’s worthy
father of worthy son : “ Here was one who had neither dignity,
learning, morals, nor wit—who tainted a great society by a bad
example ; who in youth, manhood, old age, was gross, low, and
sensuaL”
In 1705, when only Electoral Prince of Hanover, George had
married Caroline, daughter of the Margrave of Anspach, a
woman of more than average ability. Thackeray describes
Caroline in high terms of praise, but Lord Chesterfield says
that “ she valued herself upon her skill in simulation and dis
simulation...... Cunning and perfidy were the means she made
use of in business.” The Prince of Anspach is alleged by the
Whisperer to have raised some difficulties as to the marriage
on account of George I. being disposed to deny the legitimacy
of his son, and it is further pretended that George I. had actually
to make distinct acknowledgment of his son to King William
III. before the arrangements for the Act of Settlement were
consented to by that King. It is quite clear from the diary of
Lady Cowper, that the old King’s feeling towards George II.
was always one of the most bitter hatred.
The influence exercised by Queen Caroline over George II.
was purely political; and Lord Hervey declares that “wherever
the interest of Germany and the honour of the Empire were con
cerned, her thoughts and reasonings were as German and Im
perial as if England had been out of the question.”
A strange story is told of Sir Robert Walpole and Caroline.
Sir Robert, when intriguing for office under George I., with
Townshend, Devonshire, and others, objected to their plans
being communicated to the Prince of Wales, saying, “ The fat
b
his wife, would betray the secret and spoil the project.”
�'20
The Hottie of Brunswick.
This courtly speech being made known by some kind friend to
the Princess Caroline, considerable hostility was naturally ex
hibited. Sir Robert Walpole, who held the doctrine that every
person was purchasable, the only question being one of price,
managed to purchase peace with Caroline when Queen. When
the ministry suspended, “ Walpole not fairly out, Compton not
fairly in,” Sir Robert assured the Queen that he would secure
her an annuity of ,£100,000 in the event of the King’s death, Sir
Spencer Compton, who was then looked to as likely to be in
power, having only offered £60,000. The Queen sent back
word, “ Tell Sir Robert the fat b—h has forgiven him,” and
thenceforth they were political allies until the Queen’s death
in 1737.
The domestic relations of George II. were marvellous. We
pass with little notice Lady Suffolk, lady-in-waiting to the
Queen and mistress to the King, who was sold by her husband
for a pension of ,£12,000 a year, paid by the British taxpayers,
and who was coarsely insulted by both their Majesties. It is
needless to dwell on the confidential communications, in which
« that strutting little sultan George II.,” as Thackeray calls him,
solicited favours from his wife for his mistress, the Countess of
Walmoden ; but, to use the words of the cultured Edinburgh
Review, the Queen’s “actual intercession to secure for the
King the favours of the Duchess of Modena precludes the idea
that these sentiments were as revolting to the royal Philaminte
as they would nowadays be to a scavenger’s daughter. Nor
was the Queen the only lady of the Royal Family who talked
openly on these matters. When Lady Suffolk was waning at
court, the Princess Royal could find nothing better to say than
this : ‘ I wish with all my heart that he (z>., the King) would
take somebody else, that Mamma might be relieved from the
ennui of seeing him for ever in her room.’ ”
Lady Cowper in her diary tells us that George IL, when Prince
of Wales, intrigued with Lady Walpole, not only with the know
ledge of the Princess Caroline, but also with connivance of the
Prime Minister himself. Lord Hervey adds that Caroline used
to sneer at Sir Robert Walpole, asking how the poor man—“ avec
ce gros corps, ces jambes enflees et ce vilcvin ventre ■ could pos
sibly believe that any woman couldlove him for himself. And that
Sir Robert retaliated, when Caroline afterwards complained to
him of the King’s cross temper, by telling her very coolly that “it
was impossible it could be otherwise, since the King had tasted
better things,” and ended by advising her to bring pretty Lady
Tankerville en rapport with the King.
In 1727 an Act was passed, directed against workmen in the
woollen trade, rendering combination for the purpose of raising
wages unlawful. Some years afterwards, this Act was extended
to other trades, and the whole tendency of the septennial Parlia
ment legislation manifests a most unfortunate desire on the part
of the Legislature to coerce and keep in subjection the artisan
classes.
„
�The House of Brunswick.
21
In February 1728, the celebrated “Beggar’s Opera,” by Gay,
was put on the stage at the Lincoln’s Inn Fields Theatre, and
being supposed to contain some satirical reflections on court
corruption, provoked much displeasure on the part of Royalty.
The Duchess of Queensborough, who patronised Gay, being
forbidden to attend court, wrote thus : “The Duchess of Queens
borough is surprised and well pleased that the King has given
her so agreeable a command as forbidding her the court..........
She hopes that, by so unprecedented an order as this, the King
will see as few as she wishes at his court, particularly such as
dare speak or think truth.”
In 1729, £115,000 was voted by Parliament for the payment
of the King’s debts. This vote seems to have been obtained
under false pretences, to benefit the King, whose “ cardinal pas
sion,” says Phillimore, “ was avarice.”
The Craftsman, during the first decade of the reign, fiercely
assailed the Whig ministry for “a wasteful expenditure of money
in foreign subsidies and bribes and in his place in the House
of Commons William Pitt, “the great Commoner,” in the
strongest language attacked the system of foreign bribery by
which home corruption was supplemented.
The rapidly-increasing expenditure needed every day increased
taxation, and a caricature published in 1732 marks the public
feeling. A monster (Excise), in the form of a many-headed
dragon, is drawing the minister (Sir Robert Walpole) in his
coach, and pouring into his lap, in the shape of gold, what it
has eaten up in the forms of mutton, hams, cups, glasses, mugs,
pipes, &c.
“ See this dragon Excise
Has ten thousand eyes,
And five thousand mouths to devour us ;
A sting and sharp claws,
With wide gaping jaws,
And a belly as big as a store-house.”
Beginning with'wines and liquors—
“ Grant these, and the glutton
Will roar out for mutton,
Your beef, bread, and bacon to boot ;
Your goose, pig, and pullet,
He’ll thrust down his gullet,
Whilst the labourer munches a root.”
In 1730, Mr. Sandys introduced a Bill to disable pensioners
from sitting in Parliament. George II. vigorously opposed this
measure, which was defeated. In the King’s private notes to
Lord Townshend, Mr. Sandys’ proposed act is termed a “vil
lainous measure,” which should be “ torn to pieces in every
particular.”
It was in 1732 that the Earl of Aylesford, a Tory peer, de
clared that standing armies in time of peace were “ against the
�22
The House of Brunswick.
very words of the Petition of Rights" and that “ all the con
fusions and disorders which have been brought upon this king
dom for many years have been all brought upon it by means of
standing armies.” In 1733, Earl Strafford affirmed that “a
standing army ” was “ always inconsistent with the liberties of
the peopleand urged that “ where the people have any regard
for their liberties, they ought never to keep up a greater number
of regular forces than are absolutely necessary for the security
of the Government.” Sir John Barnard declared that the army
ought not to be used on political questions. He said : “ In a
free country, if a tumult happens from a just cause of complaint
the people ought to be satisfied ; their grievances ought to be
redressed ; they ought not surely to be immediately knocked on
the head because they may happen to complain in an irregular
way.” Mr. Pulteney urged that a standing army is “ a body of
men distinct from the body of the people ; they are governed by
different laws ; blind obedience and an entire submission to the
orders of their commanding officer is their only principle. The
nations around us are already enslaved by those very means ;
by means of their standing armies they have every one lost
their liberties ; it is indeed impossible that the liberties of the
people can be preserved in a country where a numerous stand
ing army is kept up.”
In 1735, sixteen Scottish peers were elected to sit in the House
of Lords, and in a petition to Parliament it was alleged, that the
whole of this list of sixteen peers was elected by bribery and
corruption. The petition positively asserted “ that the list of
sixteen peers for Scotland had been formed by persons high in
trust under the crown, previous to the election itself. The peers
were solicited to vote for this list without the liberty of making
any alteration, and endeavours were used to engage peers to
vote for this list by promise of pensions and offices, civil and
military, to themselves and their relations, and by actual pro
mise and offers of sums of money. Several had received money,
and releases of debts owing to the crown were granted to those
who voted for this list. To render this transaction more in
famous, a battalion of troops occupied the Abbey Court of Edin
burgh, and continued there during the whole time of the election,
while there was a considerable body lying within a mile of the
city ready to advance on the signal.” This petition, notwith
standing the gravity of its allegations, was quietly suppressed.
Lady Sundon, Woman of the Bedchamber and Mistress of
the Robes to Queen Caroline, received from Lord Pomfret
jewellery of ,£1,400 value, for obtaining him the appointment of
Master of the Horse.
With a Civil List of ,£800,000 a year, George II. was continually in debt, but an obedient Ministry and a corrupt Parliament never hesitated to discharge his Majesty’s obligations out
of the pockets of the unrepresented people. Lord Carteret, m
1733, speaking of a Bill before the House for granting the King
half a million out of the Sinking Fund, said : “ This Fund, my
�The House of Brunswick.
23
Lords, has been clandestinely defrauded of several small sums at
different times, which indeed together amount to a pretty large
sum ; but by this Bill it is to be openly and avowedly plundered
of £500,000 at once.”
On the 27th of April, 1736, Prince Frederick was married to
the Princess Augusta, of Saxe Gotha, whom King George II.
afterwards described as “ cette diablesse Madame la PrincesseP
In August of the same year, a sharp open quarrel took place
between the Prince of Wales and his parents, which, after some
resumptions of pretended friendliness, ended, on September 10,
1737, in the former being ordered by the King to quit St. James’s
Palace, where he was residing. On the 22nd of the preceding
February, Pulteney had moved for an allowance of ,£100,000 a
year to Prince Frederick. George II. refused to consent, on the
ground that the responsibility to provide for the Prince of Wales
rested with himself, and that “ it would be highly indecorous to
interfere between father and son.” On the Prince of Wales
taking up his residence at Norfolk House, “the King issued an
order that no persons who paid their court to the Prince and
Princess should be admitted to his presence.” An official intima
tion of this was given to foreign ambassadors.
On the 20th of November, 1737, Queen Caroline died, never
having spoken to her son since the quarrel. “ She was,” says
Walpole, “implacable in hatred even to her dying moments.
She absolutely refused to pardon, or even to see, her son.” The
death-bed scene is thus spoken of by Thackeray : “ There never
was such a ghastly farce and as sketched by Lord Hervey, it
is a monstrous mixture of religion, disgusting comedy, and bru
tishness : “ We are shocked in the very chamber of death by
the intrusion of egotism, vanity, buffoonery, and inhumanity.
The King is at one moment dissolved in a mawkish tenderness,
at another sunk into brutal apathy. He is at one moment all
tears for the loss of one who united the softness and amiability
of one sex to the courage and firmness of the other ; at another
all fury because the object of his regrets cannot swallow, or
cannot change her posture, or cannot animate the glassy fixed
ness of her eyes ; at one moment he begins an elaborate pane
gyric on her virtues, then breaks off into an enumeration of his
own, by which he implies that her heart has been enthralled,
and her intelligence awed. He then breaks off into a stupid
story about a storm, for which his daughter laughs at him, and
then while he is weeping over his consort’s death-bed, she ad
vises him to marry again ; and we are—what the Queen was
not—startled by the strange reply, ‘ Non, faurai des mattresses^
with the faintly-moaned out rejoinder, ‘Gela riempeche pas?”
So does the Edinburgh Reviewer, following Lord Hervey, paint
the dying scene of the Queen of our second George.
After the death of the Queen, the influence of the King’s mis
tresses became supreme, and Sir R. Walpole, who in losing
Queen Caroline had lost his greatest hold over George, paid
court to Lady Walmoden, in order to maintain his weakened
�24
The House of Brunswick.
influence. In the private letters of the Pelham family, who
succeeded to power soon after Walpole’s fall, we find frequent
mention of the Countess of Yarmouth as a power to be gained,
a person to stand well with. “ I read,” says Thackeray, “ that
Lady Yarmouth (my most religious and gracious king’s favou
rite) sold a bishopric to a clergyman for ,£5,000. (He betted
her ^5,000 that he would not be made a bishop, and he lost, and
paid her.) Was he the only prelate of his time led up by such
hands for consecration ? As I peep into George II.’s St. James’s,
I see crowds of cassocks rustling up the back-stairs of the ladies
of the Court; stealthy clergy slipping purses into their laps ;
that godless old King yawning under his canopy in his Chapel
Royal, as the chaplain before him is discoursing.”
On the 23rd of May, 1738, George William Frederick, son of
Frederick, and afterwards George III., was born.
In 1739, Lady Walmoden, who had up to this year remained
in Hanover, was brought to England and formally installed at
the English Court. In this year we bound ourselves by treaty
to pay 250,000 dollars per annum for three years to the Danish
Government. “ The secret motive of this treaty,” says Mahon,
« as of too many others, was not English, but Hanoverian, and
regarded the possession of a petty castle and lordship called
Steinhorst. This castle had been bought from Holstein by
George II. as Elector of Hanover, but the Danes claiming the
sovereignty, a skirmish ensued.......... The well-timed treaty of
subsidy calmed their resentment, and obtained the cession of
their claim.” Many urged, as in truth it was, that Steinhorst
was bought with British money, and Bolingbroke expressed his
fear “ that we shall throw the small remainder- of our wealth
where we have thrown so much already, into the German Gulf,
which cries Give ! Give 1 and is never satisfied.”
On the 19th of May, 1739, in accordance with the wish of the
King, war was declared with Spain, nominally on the question
of the right of search, but when peace was declared at Aix-laChapelle, this subject was never mentioned. According to Dr.
Colquhoun, this war cost the country £(46,418,680.
George II. was, despite the provisions of the Act of Settle
ment, continually in Hanover. From 1729 to I73I> again in
1735 and 1736, and eight times between 174° an(i I7551745 he wished to go, but was not allowed.
On the 2nd of October, 1741 (the Pelham family having
managed to acquire power by dint, as Lord Macaulay puts it,
of more than suspected treason to . [their leader and colleague),
the Duke of Newcastle, then Prime Minister, wrote his brother,
Henry Pelham, as follows : “ I must freely own to you, that I
think the King’s unjustifiable partiality for Hanover, to which
he makes all other views and considerations subservient, has
manifested itself so much that no man can continue in the active
part of the administration with honour.” The duke goes on to
describe the King’s policy as “ both dishonourable and fatal ; ’
and Henry Pelham, on the 8th of October, writes him back that
�The House of Brunswick.
25
“ a partiality to Hanover is general, is what all men of business
have found great obstructions from, ever since this family have
been upon the throne.” Yet these are amongst the most promi
nent of the public defenders of the House of Brunswick, and a
family which reaped great place and profit from the connection.
Of the Duke of Newcastle, Lord Macaulay says : “ No man
was so unmercifully satirised. But in truth he was himself a
satire ready made. All that the art of the satirist does for other
men, nature had done for him. Whatever was absurd about
him stood out with grotesque prominence from the rest of the
character. He was a living, moving, talking, caricature. His
gait was a shuffling trot, his utterance a rapid stutter ; he was
always in a hurry; he was never in time; he abounded in fulsome
caresses and in hysterical tears. His oratory resembled that of
Justice Shallow. It was nonsense, effervescent with animal
spirits and impertinence. Of his ignorance many anecdotes
remain, some well authenticated, some probably invented at
coffee-houses, but all exquisitely characteristic. ‘ Oh! yes, yes,
to be sure ! Annapolis must be defended ; troops must be sent
to Annapolis. Pray where is Annapolis ?’ ‘ Cape Breton an
island ! Wonderful ! show it me in the map. So it is, sure
enough. My dear sir, you always bring us good news. I must
go and tell the King that Cape Breton is an island.’ And this
man was, during near thirty years, Secretary of State, and during
near ten years First Lord of the Treasury ! His large fortune,
his strong hereditary connection, his great Parliamentary interest,
will not alone explain this extraordinary fact. His success is a
signal instance of what may be effected by a man who devotes his
whole heart and soul without reserve to one object. He was eaten
up by ambition. His love of influence and authority resembled
the avarice of the old usurer in the ‘ Fortunes of Nigel.’ It was
so intense a passion that it supplied the place of talents, that it
inspired even fatuity with cunning. ‘ Have no money dealings
with my father,’ says Martha to Lord Glenvarloch, 1 for, dotard
as he is, he will make an ass of you.’ It was as dangerous to
have any political connection with Newcastle as to buy and sell
with old Trapbois. He was greedy after power with a greedi
ness all his own. He was jealous of all colleagues, and even of
his own brother. Under the disguise of levity, he was false
beyond all example of political falsehood. All the able men of
his time ridiculed him as a dunce, a driveller, a child who never
knew his own mind for an hour together ; and he over-reached
them all round.”
In 1742, under the opposition of Pulteney, the Tories called
upon Paxton, the Solicitor to the Treasury, and Scrope, the
Secretary to the Treasury, to account for the specific sum of
^1,147,211, which it was proved they had received from the
minister. No account was ever furnished. George Vaughan, a
confidant of Sir Robert Walpole, was examined before the
Commons as to a practice charged upon that minister, of oblig
ing the possessor of a place or office to pay a certain sum out
D
�26
The House of Brunswick.
of the profits of it to some person or persons recommended by
the minister. Vaughan, who does not appear to have ventured
any direct denial, managed to avoid giving a categorical reply,
and to get excused from answering on the ground that he might
criminate himself. Agitation was commenced for the revival of
Triennial Parliaments, for the renewal of the clause of the Act
of Settlement, by which pensioners and placemen were excluded
from the House of Commons, and for the abolition of standing
armies in time of peace. The Whigs, however, successfully
crushed out the whole of this agitation. Strong language was
heard in the House of Commons, where Sir James Dashwood
said that “ it was no wonder that the people were then unwilling
to support the Government, when a weak, narrow-minded prince
occupied the throne.”
A very amusing squib appeared in 1742, when Sir Robert
Walpole’s power was giving way, partly under the bold attacks
of the Tories, led by Cotton and Shippen ; partly before the
malcontent Whigs under the guidance of Carteret and Pulteney ;
partly before the rising power of the young England party led
by William Pitt ; and somewhat from the jealousy, if not
treachery, of his colleague the Duke of Newcastle. The squib
pictures the King’s embarrassment and anger at being forced to
dismiss Walpole, and to Carteret whom he has charged to form
a ministry :—
“ Quoth the King : My good lord, perhaps you’ve been told
That I used to abuse you a little of old,
But now bring whom you will, and eke turn away,
Let but me and my money at Walmoden stay.”
Lord Carteret explaining to the King whopi he shall keep of
the old ministry, includes the Duke of Newcastle :—“Though Newcastle’s false, as he’s silly I know,
By betraying old Robin to me long ago,
As well as all those who employed him before,
Yet I leave him in place but I leave him no power.
“ For granting his heart is as black as his hat,
With no more truth in this than there’s sense, beneath that,
Yet, as he’s a coward, he’ll shake when I frown ;
You call’d him a rascal, I’ll use him like one.
“ For your foreign affairs, howe’er they turn out,
At least I’ll take care you shall make a great rout;
Then cock your great hat, strut, bounce, and look bluff,
For though kick’d and cuff’d here, you shall there kick and cuff.
“ That Walpole did nothing they all used to say,
So I’ll do enough, but I’ll make the dogs pay ;
Great fleets I’ll provide, and great armies engage,
Whate’er debts we make, or whate’er wars we wage !
�The House of Brunswick.
With cordials like these the monarch’s new guest
Reviv’d his sunk spirits, and gladden’d his breast;
Till in rapture he cried, ‘ My dear Lord, you shall do
Whatever you will—give me troops to review.’ ”
In t743? King George II. actually tried to engage this country
by a private agreement, to pay .£300,000 a year to the Queen of
Hungary, ‘ as long as war should continue, or the necessity of
her affairs should require.” The King, being in Hanover, sent
over the treaty to England, with a warrant directing the Lords
Justices to “ratify and confirm it,” which, however, they refused
to do. On hearing that the Lord Chancellor refused to sanc
tion the arrangement, King George II. threatened, through Earl
Granville, to affix the Great Seal with his own hand. Ultimately
the £300,000 per annum was agreed to be paid so long as the
war lasted, but this sum was in more than one instance ex
ceeded.
Although George II. had induced the country to vote such
large sums to Maria Therese, the Empress-Queen, he nevertheless abandoned her in a most cowardly manner when he
thought his Hanoverian dominions in danger, and actually
treated with France without the knowledge or consent of his
ministry. A rhyming squib, in which the King is termed the
Balancing Captain,” from which we present the following ex
tracts, will serve to show the feeling widely manifested in Eng
land at that time
“ I’ll tell you a story as strange as ’tis new,
Which all who’re concern’d will allow to be true,
Of a Balancing Captain, well known hereabouts/
Returned home (God save him) a mere king of clouts.
“ This Captain he takes in a gold ballasted ship,
Each summer to terra damnosa a trip,
For which he begs, borrows, scrapes all he can get,
And runs his poor owners most vilely in debt.
“ The last time he set out for this blessed place,
He met them, and told them a most piteous case,
Of a sister of his, who, though bred up at court
Was ready to perish for want of support.
’
This Hung'ry sister he then did pretend,
Would be to his owners a notable friend,
If they would at that critical juncture supply her •
They did—but, alas ! all the fat’s in the fire !”
The ballad then suggests that the King, having got all the
money possible, made a peace with the enemies of the Queen of
Hungary, described in the ballad as the sister
“ He then turns his sister adrift, and declares
most mortal foes were her father’s right heirs :
‘ o71h7dS !’
such a steP was ne’er taken!’
Oh, oh ! says Moll Bluff, I have saved my own bacon.
�28
The House of Brunswick.
‘ Let France damn the Germans, and undamn the Dutch,
And Spain on Old England pish ever so much ;
Let Russia bang Sweden, or Sweden bang that,
I care not, by Robert, one kick of my hat /
‘ Or should my chous’d owners begin to look sour,
I’ll trust to mate Bob to exert his old power,
Regit animas dictis, or numis with ease,
So, spite of your growling, I’ll act as I please !’ ”
The British Nation, described as the owners, are cautioned to
look into the accounts of their Captain, who is bringing them to
insolvency :—
“ This secret, however, must out on the day
When he meets his poor owners to ask for his pay ;
Arid I fear, when they come to adjust the account,
A zero for balance will prove their amount.”
The firial result of all these subsidy votes was to increase our
national debt, up to the signing of the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle,
to ^76,000,000 ; while the seven years’ war, which Came later,
brought the debt to
133,000,000, not including in this the
capitalised value of the terminable annuities.
On November 22nd, 1743, a caricature was published, which
had a wide sale, and which represented the King as a fat
Hanoverian white horse riding to death a nearly starved British
lion.
In 1744, ^200,000 was voted, which King George and Lord
Carteret, who was called by William Pitt his “ Hanoverian troop
minister,” had agreed to give the King of Sardinia. ^40,000
was also voted for a payment made by the King to the Duke of
Arenberg. This payment was denounced by Mr. Lyttelton as a
dangerous misapplication of public money.
The votes for foreign subsidies alone, in 1744, were ,£691,426,
while the Hanoverian soldiers cost us .£393,773- The King
actually tried in addition in the month of August to get a further
subsidy for his friend the Elector of Saxony, and another for the
King of Poland, and this when Englishmen and Irishmen were
lacking bread. Nor was even a pretence made in some instances
of earning the money, f 150,000 was paid this year to keep
Prince Charles in Alsace, and the moment Austria got the
money, Prince Charles was withdrawn, and Henry Pelham,
writing to the Duke of Newcastle, says, “The same will be the
case with every sum of money we advance. The allies will take
it, and then act as suits their convenience and security.” In the
four years from 1744 to 1747 both included, we paid ,£4,342,683
for foreign troops and subsidies, not including the Dutch and
Hessians, whom we hired to put down the rebellion of 1745- In
the case of the whole of this war, in which we subsidised all our
allies except the Dutch, it is clear that the direct and sole blame
rests upon the King, who cared nothing for English interests in
�The House of Brunswick.
29
the matter. When firmly remonstrated with by Lord Chancellor
Hardwicke, his reply was what the Duke of Newcastle describes,
as “almost sullen silence.”
For the rebellion of 1745—which came so. near being success
ful, and which would have thoroughly succeeded had the Pre
tender’s son possessed any sort of ability as a leader—there is,
little room to spare here. The attempt to suppress it in its early
stages is thus described in a Jacobite ballad ;—
“ Horse, foot, and dragoons, from lost Flanders they call,
With Hessians and Danes, and the devil and all;
And hunters and rangers led by Oglethorpe ;
And the Church, at the bum of the Bishop of York.
And pray, who so fit to lead forth this parade,
As the babe of Tangier, my old grandmother Wade ?
Whose cunning’s so quick, but whose motion’s so slow,
That the rebels marched on, while he stuck in the snow.”'
The hideously disgusting cruelties and horrible excesses com
mitted by the infamous Duke of Cumberland, and the Hessians
and Hanoverians under his command, in suppressing the rebel
lion after the battle of Culloden, are, alas 1 too well known.
Duncan Forbes, Lord President of the Court of Session, and a
warm supporter of the Brunswicks, remonstrating with the Duke
as to the latter’s disregard of the laws of the country, his Royal
Highness of Cumberland replied with an oath : “ The laws of
my country, my lord ; I’ll make a brigade give laws.” Scotland
has many reasons for loving the House of Brunswick. Lord
Waldegrave, who strove hard to whitewash the Duke of Cumber
land, says that “ Frederick Prince of Wales gave too much
credit to the most malignant and groundless accusations, by
showing favour to every man who aspersed his brother’s cha
racter.”
In 1747, £456,733 was voted by Parliament for the payment
of the King’s debts.
In 1748 considerable difficulty arose in consequence of the.
King’s intrigues to obtain, at the expense of England, the
Bishopric of Osnaburg as a princely establishment for his.
favourite son the Duke of Cumberland, that pious prince, much
esteemed in Scotland as “ the butcher.” The most open hosti
lity subsisted between the Duke of Cumberland and Prince
Frederick, and pamphleteering attacks on the former, for his
brutality and excesses, were supposed to be encouraged by the
Leicester House party.
Amongst the curious scandals of 1749, it is stated that the
King—being present at a masked ball, at which Elizabeth Chudleigh, afterwards Duchess of Kingston, figured as “ La Belle
Sauvage” in a close fitting dress of flesh-coloured silk—re
quested permission to place his hand on Miss Chudleigh’s breast.
The latter replied that she would put the King’s hand on a still
softer place, and immediately raised it to his own royal forehead.
�30
The House of Brunswick.
On the 20th March, 1751, Frederick Prince of Wales died.
The King, who received the news while playing cards with his
mistress, Lady Yarmouth, and who had not spoken to his son for
years, merely said, “Freddy is dead.” On this subject Thackeray
preserves for us the following epitaph :—
“ Here lies Fred,
o>
Who was alive, and is dead.
Had it been his father,
I had much rather.
Had it been his brother,
Still better than another.
Had it been his sister,
N o one would have missed her.
Had it been the whole generation,
Still better for the nation.
■
But since ’tis only Fred,
Who was alive, and is dead,
There’s no more to be said.”
In 1755, there was the second war, estimated to have cost
;£i 11,271,996. In this George II. pursued exactly the opposite
course of policy to*that taken by him in the previous one. The
war during the years fallowing 1739, was f°r the humiliation of
the King of Prussia ; the policy in the last war was to prevent
his humiliation. Mr. Baxter estimates the debt (exclusive of
annuities) at ^133,000,000 ; Dr. Colquhoun, adding the value of
the annuities, makes it ^146,682,843 at the conclusion of this
war.
Towards the close of the reign of George II., who died on
October 25th, 1760, his Royal Highness the Duke of Cumber
land, by an exhibition of great strategy, combined with much
discretionary valour, succeeded in making peace on terms which
ensured the repose of himself and his Hanoverian forces during
the remainder of the war. At home his Royal Higness was
much attacked, some venturing to describe his personal conduct
as cowardly and his generalship as contemptible. It is a suffi
cient refutation of such a calumny to say that the Duke of Cum
berland was as brave a soldier and as able a general as our
present Commander-in-Chief, his Royal Highness the Duke of
Cambridge.
Lord Waldegrave, who wrote in favour of George II., admits
that the King “ is accused by his ministers of being hasty and
passionate when any measure is proposed which he does not
approve of.” That “ too great attention to money seems to be
his capital failing.” And that “ his political courage seems
somewhat problematical.” Phillimore says : “ In public life he
was altogether indifferent to the welfare of England, except as
it affected his Electorate’s or his own. Always purchasing con
cubines, he was always governed by his wife. In private life he
was a gross lover, an unreasonable master, a coarsely unfaithful
husband, an unnatural parent, and a selfish man.”
�The House of Brunswick.
31
N o more fitting conclusion can be found to this chapter than
the following pregnant words from the pen of Lord Macaulay :
—“At the close of the reign of George II. the feeling of aver
sion with which the House of Brunswick had long been regarded
by half the nation had died away ; but no feeling of affection
to that house had yet sprung up. There was little, indeed, in
the old King’s character to inspire esteem or tenderness. He
was not our countryman. He never set foot on our soil till he
was more than thirty years old. His speech bewrayed his
foreign origin and breeding. His love for his native land, though
the most amiable part of his character, was not likely to endear
him to his British subjects. He was never so happy as when
he could exchange St. James’s for Heranhausen. Year after
year our fleets were employed to convoy him to the Continent,
and the interests of his kingdom were as nothing to him when
compared with the interests of his Electorate. As to the rest,
he had neither the qualities which make dulness respectable, nor
the qualities which make libertinism attractive. He had been
a bad son and a worse father, an unfaithful husband and an un
graceful lover. Not one magnanimous or humane action is re
corded of him ; but many instances of meanness, and of a
harshness which, but for the strong constitutional restraints
under which he was placed, might have made the misery of his
people.”
CHAP. IV.
THE REIGN OF GEORGE III.
When George II. died, his grandson and successor, George
III., was twenty-two years of age. The Civil List of the new
King was fixed at £800,000 a year, “ a provision,” says Phillimore, in his “ History of England,” “ that soon became inade
quate to the clandestine purposes of George III., and for the
purchase of the mercenary dependents, on the support of whom
his unconstitutional proceedings obliged him to depend.” The
Civil List of George III. was not, however, - really so large as
that of her present Majesty. The Civil List disbursements in
cluded such items as Secret Service, now charged separately ;
pensions and annuities, now charged separately ; diplomatic
salaries, now forming distinct items ; fees and salaries of min
isters and judges, now forming no part of the charge against
the Civil List. So that though ,£924,041 was the Civil List of
George III. four years after he ascended the throne, in truth to
day the Royal Family alone get much more than all the great
offices and machinery of State then cost. The Royal Family at
the present time get from the country, avowedly and secretly,
about one million sterling a year.
�32
The House of Brunswick.
“At the accession of George III.,” says Thackeray, “the
Patricians were yet at the height of their good fortune. Society
recognised their superiority, which they themselves pretty
calmly took for granted. They inherited not only titles and
estates, and seats in the House of Peers, but seats in the House
of Commons. There were a multitude of Government places,
and not merely these, but. bribes of actual ^500 notes, which
members of the House took not much shame in assuming. Fox
went into Parliament at twenty, Pitt was just of age, his father
not much older. It was the good time for Patricians.”
A change of political parties was imminent; Whig rule had
lasted seventy years, and England had become tolerably dis
gusted with the consequences.
“ Now that George II. was dead,” says Macaulay, “ a courtier
might venture to ask why England was to become a party in a
dispute between two German powers. What was it to her
whether the House of Hapsburg or the House of Brandenburg
ruled in Silesia ? Why were the best English regiments fight
ing on the Maine ? Why were the Prussian battalions paid with
English gold ? The great minister seemed to think it beneath
him to calculate the price of victory. As long as the Tower
guns were fired, as the streets were illuminated, as French ban
ners were carried in triumph through London, it was to him
matter of indifference to what extent the public burdens were
augmented. Nay, he seemed to glory in the magnitude of those
sacrifices which the people, fascinated by his eloquence and
success, had too readily made, and would long and bitterly
regret. There was no check on waste or embezzlement. Our
commissaries returned from the camp of Prince Ferdinand, to
buy boroughs, to rear palaces, to rival the magnificence of the
old aristocracy of the realm. Already had we borrowed, in four
years of war, more than the most skilful and economical govern
ment would pay in forty years of peace.”
The Church allied itself with the Tories, who assumed the
reins of government, and thenceforth totally forgot the views of
liberty they had maintained when in opposition. The policy of
all their succeeding legislation was that of mischievous retro
gression ; they sought to excel the old Whigs in their efforts to
consolidate the aristocracy at the expense of the people.
“This reactionary movement,” says Buckle, “was greatly
aided by the personal character of George III.; for he, being
despotic as well as superstitious, was equally anxious to extend
the prerogative, and strengthen the Church. Every liberal sen
timent, everything approaching to reform, nay, even the mere
mention of inquiry, was an abomination in the eyes of that nar
row and ignorant Prince. Without knowledge, without taste,
without even a glimpse of one of the sciences, or a feeling for
one of the fine arts, education had done nothing to enlarge a
mind which nature had more than usually contracted. Totally
ignorant of the history and resources of foreign countries, and
barely knowing their geographical position, his information was
�The House of Brunswick.
33
scarcely more extensive respecting the people over whom he
was called to rule. In that immense mass of evidence now
extant, and which consists of every description of private cor
respondence, records of private conversation, and of public
acts, there is not to be found the slightest proof that he knew
any one of those numerous things which the governor of a
country ought to know ; or, indeed, that he was acquainted with
a single duty of his position, except the mere mechanical routine
of ordinary business, which might have been effected by the
lowest clerk in the meanest office in his kingdom.
“ He gathered round his throne that great party, who, clinging
to the tradition of the past, have always made it their boast to
check the progress of their age. During the sixty years of his
reign, he, with the sole exception of Pitt, never willingly admitted
to his councils a single man of great ability : not one whose
name is associated with any measure of value, either in domestic
or foreign policy. Even Pitt only maintained his position in the
state by forgetting the lessons of his illustrious father, and aban
doning those liberal principles in which he had been educated,
and with which he entered public life. Because George III.
hated the idea of reform, Pitt not only relinquished what he had
before declared to be absolutely necessary, but did not hesitate
to persecute to death the party with whom he had once associated
in order to obtain it. Because George III. looked upon slavery
as one of those good old customs which the wisdom of his
ancestors had consecrated, Pitt did not dare to use his power
for procuring its abolition, but left to his successors the glory of
destroying that infamous trade, on the preservation of which his
royal master had set his heart. Because George III. detested
the French, of whom he knew as much as he knew of the in
habitants of Kamschatka or Thibet, Pitt, contrary to his own
judgment, engaged in a war with France, by which England was
seriously imperilled, and the English people burdened with a
debt that their remotest posterity will be unable to pay. But,
notwithstanding all this, when Pitt, only a few years before his
death, showed a determination to concede to the Irish a small
share of their undoubted rights, the King dismissed him from
office, and the King’s friends, as they were called, expressed their
indignation at the presumption of a minister who could oppose
the wishes of so benign and gracious a master. And when, un
happily for his own fame, this great man determined to return
to power, he could only recover office by conceding that very
point for which he had relinquished it; thus setting the mischiev
ous example of the minister of a free country sacrificing his own
judgment to the personal prejudices of the reigning sovereign.
As it was hardly possible to find other ministers who to equal
abilities would add equal subservience, it is not surprising that
the highest offices were constantly filled with men of notorious
incapacity. Indeed, the King seemed to have an instinctive
antipathy to everything great and noble. During the reign of
George II. the elder Pitt had won for himself a reputation which
�34
The House of Brunswick.
covered the world, and had carried to an unprecedented height
the glories of the English name. He, however, as the avowed
friend of popular rights, strenuously opposed the despotic prin
ciples of the Court; and for this reason he was hated by George
III. with a hatred that seemed barely compatible with a sane
mind. Fox was one of the greatest statesmen of the eighteenth
century, and was better acquainted than any other with the
character and resources of those foreign nations with which our
interests were intimately connected. To this rare and impor
tant knowledge he added a sweetness and amenity of temper
which extorted the praises even of his political opponents. But
he, too, was the steady supporter of civil and religious liberty ;
and he, too, was so detested by George III., that the King, with
his own hand, struck his name out of the list of Privy Council
lors, and declared that he would rather abdicate the throne than
admit him to a share in the Government.
“While this unfavourable change was taking place in the
sovereign and ministers of the country, a change equally un
favourable was being effected in the second branch of the impe
rial legislature. Until the reign of George III. the House of
Lords was decidedly superior to the House of Commons in the
liberality and general accomplishments of its members. It is
true that in both Houses there prevailed a spirit which must be
called narrow and superstitious if tried by the larger standard
of the present age.
“ The superiority of the Upper House over the Lower was, on
the whole, steadily maintained during the reign of George II.,
the ministers not being anxious to strengthen the High Church
party in the Lords, and the King himself so rarely suggesting
fresh creations as to cause a belief that he particularly disliked
increasing their numbers. It was reserved for George III., by
an unsparing use of his prerogative, entirely to change the cha
racter of the Upper House, and thus lay the foundation for that
disrepute into which, since then, the peers have been constantly
. falling. The creations he made were numerous beyond all pre
cedent, their object evidently being to neutralise the liberal spirit
hitherto prevailing, and thus turn the House of Lords into an
engine for resisting the popular wishes, and stopping the progress
of reform. How completely this plan succeeded is well known to
the readers of our history ; indeed, it was sure to be successful
considering the character of the men who were promoted. They
consisted almost entirely of two classes : of country gentlemen,
remarkable for nothing but their wealth, and the number of
votes their wealth enabled them to control; and of mere lawyers,
who had risen to judicial appointments partly from their pro
fessional learning, but chiefly from the zeal with which they
repressed the popular liberties, and favoured the royal prero
gative.
“ That this is no exaggerated description may be ascertained
by anyone who will consult the lists of the new peers made by
George III.
�The House of Brunswick.
35
“ Here and there we find an eminent man, whose public ser
vices were so notorious that it was impossible to avoid reward
ing them ; but, putting aside those who were in a manner forced
upon the sovereign, it would be idle to deny that the remainder,
and of course the overwhelming majority, were marked by a
narrowness and illiberality of sentiment which, more than any
thing else, brought the whole order into contempt. No great
thinkers, no great writers, no great orators, no great statesmen,
none of the true nobility of the land, were to be found among
the spurious nobles created by George III.”
In the early part of his reign, George III. (whom even the
courtly Alison pictures as having “ little education and no great
acquired information”) was very much under the influence of
his mother, who had, previously to his being King, often spoken
of her son with contempt. The Princess of Wales, in turn, was
almost entirely guided by Lord Bute, represented by scandal,
says Macaulay, as “ her favoured lover.” “ Of this attachment,”
says Dr. Doran, “ the Prince of Wales himself is said to have
had full knowledge, and did not object to Lord Bute taking
solitary walks, with the Princess, while he could do the same
with Lady Middlesex.” The most infamous stories were cir
culated in the Whisperer, and other journals of the time as to
the nature of the association between the Scotch Peer and the
King’s mother, and its results. Phillimore regards the Princess
of Wales as “before and after her husband’s death the mis
tress of Lord Bute.” The Princess Dowager seems to have
been a hard woman. Walpole tells us how, when the PrincessDowager reproved one of her maids of honour for irregular
habits, the latter replied, “Madame, chacun a son But." “ See
ing,” says Thackeray, “the young Duke of Gloucester silent
and unhappy once, she sharply asked him the cause of his
silence. ‘ I am thinking,’ said the poor child. ‘ Thinking, sir !
and of what ?’ 11 am thinking if ever I have a son, I will not
make him so unhappy as you make me.’ ”
John Stuart, Earl of Bute, shared with William Pitt and John
Wilkes the bulk of popular attention during the first ten years
of the King’s reign. Bute had risen rapidly to favour, having
attracted the attention of the Princess-Dowager at some private
theatricals, and he became by her influence Groom of the Stole.
His poverty and ambition made him grasp at power, both against
the great Commoner and the Pelham faction ; and a lady ob
server described the great question of the day in 1760, as being
whether the King would burn in his chamber Scotch coal, New
castle coal, or Pitt coal. Macaulay, who seems to have followed
Lord Waldegrave’s “Memoirs,” says of Bute: “A handsome
leg was among his chief qualifications for the stage.......... His
understanding was narrow, his manners cold and haughty.” His
qualifications for the part of a statesman were best described by
Prince Frederick, who often indulged in the unprincely luxury
of sneering at his dependents. “ Bute,” said his Royal High
ness, “ you are the very man to be envoy at some small proud
�36
The House of Brunswick.
German Court, where there is nothing to do.” Phillimore
speaks of Lord Bute as “ a minion raised by Court favour to
a post where his ignorance, mean understanding, and disregard
of English honour, became national calamities.”
The King’s speech on his accession is said to have been
drawn up by Bute, who did not then belong to the Council,
but the terms being vehemently objected to by Pitt, it was ac
tually altered after delivery, and before it found its way to the
printer.
Whatever were the relations between Lord Bute and the
Princess-Dowager, it is quite certain that on more than one
occasion George III. condescended not only to prevaricate, but
to lie as to the influence exercised by Lord Bute. It is certain,
from the “ Memoirs” of Earl Waldegrave, and other trustworthy
sources, that the Scotch Earl, after being hissed out of office by
the people, was still secretly consulted by the King, who, like a
truly Royal Brunswick, did not hesitate to use falsehood on the
subject even to his own ministers. Phillimore, in remarkably
strong language, describes George III. as “an ignorant, dis
honest, obstinate, narrow-minded boy, at that very moment the
tool of an adulteress and her paramour.” The Duke of Bed
ford has put upon record, in his correspondence, not only his
conviction that the King behaved unfaithfully to his ministers,
but asserts that he told him so to his face.
In 1759, George was married to Hannah Lightfoot, a Quakeress,
in Curzon Street Chapel, May Fair, in the presence of his brother,
Edward, Duke of York. Great doubt has, however, been cast
on the legality of this marriage, as it would, if in all respects
valid, have rendered null as a bigamous contract the subsequent
marriage entered into by the King. Dr. Doran says that the
Prince of Wales, afterwards George IV., when needing money
in later years, used this Lightfoot marriage as a threat against
his royal parents—that is, that he threatened to expose his
mother’s shame and his own illegitimacy if the Queen would not
use her influence with Pitt. Glorious family, these Brunswicks!
Walpole affinns that early in his reign George III. admitted to
his uncle, the Duke of Cumberland, “ that it had not been
common in their family to live well together.”
On the 18th of September, 1761, George was married to the
Princess Charlotte Sophia, of Mecklenburgh Strelitz, Hannah
Lightfoot being still alive. Of the new Queen Phillimore says :
“ If to watch over the education of her children and to promote
their happiness be any part of a woman’s duty, she has little
claim to the praises that have been so lavishly bestowed on her
as a model of domestic virtue. Her religion was displayed in
the scrupulous observance of external forms. Repulsive in her
aspect, grovelling in her instincts, sordid in her habits ; steeped
from the cradle in the stupid pride which was the atmosphere
of her stolid and most insignificant race ; inexorably severe to
those who yielded to temptation from which she was protected,
not more by her situation and the vigilance of those around her,
�The House of Brunswick.
37
than by the extreme homeliness of her person ; bigoted, avari
cious, unamiable to brutality, she added dulness and gloom even
to the English court.”
In 1761, the Duke of Bedford was Lord Lieutenant of Ireland ;
that unfortunate country, for centuries governed by men who
tried to exterminate its natives, and which was used under the
first three reigns of the House of Brunswick as a sponge out of
which, regardless of much bloodshed and more misery, gold
could be squeezed for the dependents and relatives of aristocrats
in office. His reign of office in Ireland was brief. Walpole
says that “ the ill-humour of the country determined the Duke
of Bedford to quit the Government, after having amply gratified
his family and dependents with pensions.” It was this Duke of
Bedford who consented that the Princess of Hesse should have
a pension of .£6,000 a year out of the Irish revenues, and who
gave to his own relative, the Lady Betty Waldegrave, .£800 a
year from the same source. Shortly after this, Prince Charles of
Strelitz, the Queen’s brother, received ,£30,000 towards the pay
ment of the debts he owed in Germany. This ,£30,000 was
nominally given by the King out of the Civil List, but was really
paid by the nation when discharging the Civil List debts which
it increased. On the motion of Lord Barrington, ,£400,000
subsidy was granted this year to the Landgrave of Hesse, under
a secret treaty made by George II., without the knowledge or
consent of Parliament, and ,£300,000 was also voted to the
Chancery of Hanover for forage for Hanoverian, Prussian, and
Hessian Cavalry.
On August 12th, 1762, George Prince of Wales was born ; and
in the same year, with the direct connivance of George III., the
peace of Paris was made; a peace as disgraceful to England,
under the circumstances, as can be possibly imagined. Lord
Bute, who was roundly charged with receiving money from
France for his services, and this with the knowledge of the
mother of George III., most certainly communicated to the
French minister “ the most secret councils of the English Cabinet.”
This was done with the distinct concurrence of George III., who
was himself bribed by the immediate evacuation of his Hanove
rian dominions. In the debate in the Lords on the preliminaries
of peace, Horace Walpole tells us that “the Duke of Grafton,
with great weight and greater warmth, attacked them severely’
and looking full on Lord Bute, imputed to him corruption and
worse arts.” Count Virri, the disreputable agent employed in
this matter by the King and Lord Bute, was rewarded under the
false name of George Charles with a pension of f 1,000 a year
out of the Irish revenues. Phillimore may well declare that Lord
Bute was “ a minion, raised by court favour to a post where his
ignorance, mean understanding, and disregard of English honour,
became national calamities.” To carry the approval of this peace
of Paris through the Commons, Fox, afterwards Lord Holland,
was purchased with a most lucrative appointment, although only
shortly before he had published a print of George, with the
�38
The House of Brunswick.
following lines, referring to the Princess Dowager and Lord
Bute, written under the likeness :—
“ Son of a-------I could say more.”
To gain a majority in the House of Commons, Walpole tells
us “ that a shop was publicly opened at the pay office, whither
the members flocked and received the wages of their venality in
bank bills even to so low a sum as >£200, for their votes on the
treaty. .£25,000 was thus issued in one morning.” Lord Ches
terfield speaks of the large sums disbursed by the King “ for the
hire of Parliament men.”
As an illustration of the unblushing corruption of the age, the
following letter from Lord Saye and Sele to Mr. Grenville, then
Prime Minister of England, tells its own terrible tale :—
“ November 26th, 1763.
“ Honoured Sir,—I am very much obliged to you for that
freedom of converse you this morning indulged me in, which I
prize more than the lucrative advantage I then received. To show
the sincerity of my words (pardon, Sir, the over-niceness of my
disposition), I return enclosed the bill for ,£300 you favoured me
with, as good manners would not permit my refusal of it when
tendered by you.
“ Your most obliged and obedient servant,
“Saye and Sele.
“ As a free horse needs no spur, so I stand in need of no in
ducement or douceur to lend my small assistance to the King or
his friends in the present Administration.”
That this was part of the general practice of the Government
under George III., may be seen by the following extract from
an infamous letter- written about fifteen years later by the LordLieutenant of Ireland : “ No man can see the inconvenience of
increasing the Peers more forcibly than myself, but the recom
mendation of many of those persons submitted to his Majesty
for that honour, arose from engagements taken up at the press
of the moment to rescue questions upon which the English Go
vernment were very particularly anxious. My sentiments cannot
but be the same with reference to the Privy Council and pen
sions, and I had not contracted any absolute engagements of
recommendations either to peerage or pension, till difficulties
arose which necessarily occasioned so much anxiety in his
Majesty’s Cabinet, that I must have been culpable in neglecting
any possible means to secure a majority in the House of Com
mons.”
A good story is told of the great Commoner Pitt’s repartee
to Fox (afterwards Lord Holland), in one of the debates of this
period. “ Pitt,” says the London Chronicle, “ in the heat of his
declamation, proceeded so far as to attack the personal deformity
of Fox ; and represented his gloomy and lowering countenance,
�The House of Brunswick.
39
with the penthouse of his eye-brows, as Churchill phrases it, as
a true introduction of his dark and double mind. Mr. Fox was
nettled at this personal reflection, and the more so, perhaps, that
it was as just as it was cutting. He therefore got up, and after
inveighing bitterly against the indecency of his antagonist, in
descending to remark on his bodily defects, observed that his
'figure was such as God Almighty had made it, and he could not
look otherwise ; and then, in a tone between the plaintive and
indignant, cried out, ‘ How, gentlemen, shall I look ?’ Most of
the members apprehending that Mr. Pitt had gone rather too
far, were inclined to think that Mr. Fox had got the better of
him. But Mr. Pitt started up, and with one of those happy
turns, in which he so much excels, silenced his rival, and made
him sit down with a countenance, if possible, more abashed than
formerly. Look ! Sir, said he—look as you cannot look, if you
would—look as you dare' not look, if you could—look like an
honest man.”
In the London Chro'nicle for March, 1763, we find bitter com
plaints that since 1760, “every obsolete, useless place has been
revived, and every occasion of increasing salaries seized with
eagerness,” and that a great Whig leader “ has just condescended
to stipulate for an additional salary, without power, as the price
of his support to the Tory Government.”
In March, 1763, George III. gave four ships of war to the
King of Sardinia at the national expense, and in August appears
to have given a fifth vessel.
On the 23rd of April, 1763, No. 45 of the North Briton, a
journal which had been started in opposition to Lord Bute’s
paper, the Briton, was published, severely criticising the King’s
speech, and warmly attacking Lord Bute. This issue provoked
the ministers to a course of the utmost illegality. A general
warrant to seize all persons concerned in the publication of the
North Briton, without specifying their names, was immediately
issued by the Secretary of State, and a number of printers and
publishers were placed in custody, some of whom were not at
all concerned in the obnoxious publication. Late on the night
of the 29th of April, the messengers entered the house of John
Wilkes, M.P. for Aylesbury (the author of the article in
question), and produced their warrant, with which he refused
to comply.
On the following morning, however, he was
carried before the Secretaiy of State, and committed a close
prisoner to the Tower, his papers being previously seized
and sealed, and all access to his person strictly prohibited.
The warrant was . clearly an illegal one, and had only been
previously resorted to in one or two instances, and under very
extraordinary circumstances, of which there were none in the
present case. Wilkes’s friends immediately obtained a writ of
habeas corpus, which the ministers defeated by a mean subter
fuge ; and it was found necessary to obtain a second before
they could bring the prisoner before the Court of King’s Bench,
by which he was set at liberty, on the ground of his privilege
�40
The House of Brunswick.
as a Member of Parliament. He then opened an angry corre
spondence, followed by actions at law, against the Secretaries of
State, on the seizure of his papers, and for the wrongful arrest.
These actions abated, although in the one for the seizure of the
papers a verdict was given for £1,000 damages and costs. But
in the meantime the Attorney-General had been directed to in
stitute a prosecution against Wilkes in the King’s Bench for
libel, and the King had ordered him to be deprived of his com
mission as Colonel in the Buckinghamshire Militia. The King
further exhibited his resentment by depriving Lord Temple of
the Lord-Lieutenancy of the same county, and striking his name
out of the Council-book, for an expression of personal sym
pathy which had fallen from him. Worse than all, this King
George III. actually deprived General A’Court, M.P. for Heytesbury, of his commission as Colonel of the uth Dragoons
for having voted that the arrest of Wilkes was a breach of pri
vilege. He also caused it to be intimated to General Conway,
“ that the King cannot trust his army in the hands of a man who
votes in Parliament against him.”
The House of Commons ordered the North Briton to be
burned by the common hangman; but when the authorities
attempted to carry out the sentence, the people assembled, res
cued the number, and burned instead a large jack-boot, the
popular hieroglyphic for the unpopular minister.
Amongst the many rhymed squibs the following is worth re
petition :—
“ Because the North Briton inflamed the whole nation,
To flames they commit it to show detestation ;
But throughout old England how joy would have spread,
Had the real North Briton been burnt in its stead!”
The North Briton of the last line is, of course, the Scotch Earl
Bute.
As an illustration of the then disgraceful state of the English
law, it is enough to notice that Lord Halifax, the Secretary of
State, by availing himself of his privileges as a peer, managed
to delay John Wilkes in his action from June, 1763, to Novem
ber, 1764 ; and then, Wilkes having been outlawed, the noble
Earl appeared and pleaded the outlawry as a bar to further pro
ceedings. Ultimately, after five years’ delay, Wilkes annulled
the outlawry, and recovered £4,000 damages against Lord
Halifax. For a few months Wilkes was the popular idol, and
had he been a man of real earnestness and integrity, might
have taken a permanently leading position in the State.
In August, 1763, Frederick, Duke of York, was born. He
was created Prince Bishop of Osnaburg before he could speak.
The King and Queen were much dissatisfied because the clergy
of the diocese, who did not dispute the baby bishop’s ability to
attend to the souls of his flock, yet refused to entrust to him
the irresponsible guardianship of the episcopal funds. This
bishopric had actually been kept vacant by the King nearly
�The House of Brunswick.
41
three years, in order that he might not give it to the Duke of
York or Duke of Cumberland. The income was about ,£25,000
a year, and it was to secure this Prince Bishopric for the Duke
of Cumberland that George II. burdened the country with
several subsidies to petty European sovereigns.
The King’s sister, Augusta, was, like the rest of the Brunswick
Family, on extremely bad terms with her mother, the Princess
of Wales. The Princess Augusta was married on January 16th,
1764, to the hereditary Prince of Brunswick, who received
.£80,000, besides £8,000, a year for becoming the husband of
one of our Royal Family. In addition to this, George III. and
Queen Charlotte insulted the newly-married couple, who returned
the insult with interest. Pleasant people, these Brunswicks !
In March, 1764, the first steps were taken in the endeavour to
impose taxes on the American colonies, an endeavour which at
length resulted in their famous rebellion. The commanders of
our ships of war on the American coast were sworn in to act as
revenue officers, the consequence of which was the frequently
illegal seizures of ships and cargoes without any means of
redress for the Americans in their own colony. As though to
add to the rising disaffection, Mr. Grenville proposed a new
stamp-tax. As soon as the Stamp Act reached Boston, the
ships in the harbour hung their colours half-mast high, the bells
were rung muffled, the Act of Parliament was reprinted with a
death’s head for title, and sold in the streets as the “ Folly of
England and Ruin of America.” The Americans refused to
use stamped paper. The Government distributors of stamps
were either forced to return to England, or were obliged to re
nounce publicly and upon oath their official employment ; and
when the matter was again brought before the English House
of Commons, Pitt denied the right of Parliament to levy taxa
tion on persons who had no right to representation, and ex
claimed : “ I rejoice that America has resisted ; three millions
of people so dead to all feelings of liberty as voluntarily to
submit to be slaves, would have been fit instruments to make
slaves of all the rest.” The supporters of the Government
actually advanced the ridiculously absurd and most monstrous
pretension that America was in law represented in Parliament
as .part of the manor of East Greenwich I
The Earl of Abercom and Lord Harcourt appear to have been
consulted by the Queen as to the effect of the previous marriage
of George III. with Hannah Lightfoot, who seems to have been
got rid of by some arrangement for a second marriage between
her and a Mr. Axford, to whom a sum of money was paid. It
is alleged that this was done without the knowledge of the King,
who entreated Lord Chatham to discover where the Quakeress
had gone. No fresh communication, however, took place between
George III. and Hannah Lightfoot; and the King’s first attack
of insanity, which took place in 1764, is strongly suggested to
have followed the more than doubts as to the legality of the
second marriage and the legitimacy of the Royal Family. Hannah
E
�42
The House of Brunswick.
Lightfoot died in the winter of 1764, and in the early part of the
year 1765, the King being then scarcely sane, a second ceremony
of marriage with the Queen was privately performed by
the Rev. Dr. Wilmot at Kew Palace. Hannah Lightfoot left
children by George III., but of these nothing is known.
In the winter of 1764, and spring of 1765, George III. was, in
diplomatic language, labouring under an indisposition ; in truth,
he was mad. Her present Gracious Majesty often labours under
an indisposition, but no loyal subject would suggest any sort of
doubt as to her mental condition. A Bill was introduced in 1764
in the House of Lords, to provide for a Regency in case of the
recurrence of any similar attack. In the discussion on this Bill,
a doubt arose as to who were to be regarded as the Royal Family;
fortunately, the Law Lords limited it to the descendants of George
II. If a similar definition prevailed to-day, we should perhaps
not be obliged to pay the pensions to the Duke of Cambridge
and Princess Mary, which they at present receive as members of
the Royal Family.
On the 30th of October, 1765, William, Duke of Cumberland,
the King’s uncle, died. Dr. Doran says of him : “As he grew in
manhood, his heart became hardened ; he had no affection for
his family, nor fondness for the army, for which he affected
attachment. When his brother (Prince Frederick) died, pleasure,
not pain, made his heart throb, as he sarcastically exclaimed,
‘ It’s a great blow to the country, but I hope it will recover in
time.’ He was the author of what was called ‘the bloody mutiny
act.’ ‘ He was dissolute and a gambler.’ After the ‘disgraceful
surrender of Hanover and the infamous convention of Klosterseven,’ his father George II. said of him, ‘Behold the son who
has ruined me, and disgraced himself.”’ His own nephew,
George III., believed the Duke to be capable of murder. The
Dukes of Cumberland in this Brunswick family have had a most
unfortunate reputation.
In 1766, William Henry, Duke of Gloucester, brother of the
King, married Maria, Countess-Dowager of Waldegrave. This
marriage was at the time repudiated by the rest of the Royal
Family.
In October of the same year, Caroline Matilda, the King’s
sister, married Christian, King of Denmark, an unfeeling, disso
lute brute. Our Princess, who lived very unhappily, was after
wards accused of adultery, and rescued from ■ punishment by a
British man-of-war.
In the autumn of 1766, in consequence of the high price of
provisions and taxes, large gatherings took place in many parts
of the kingdom ; these assemblages were dispersed with con
siderable loss of life, of course by the military, which the House
of Brunswick was not slow to use in checking political mani
festations. At Derby the people were charged by the cavalry,
at Colton eight were shot dead, in Gloucestershire many lives
were lost; in fact, from Exeter to Berwick-on-Tweed, there was
one ferment of discontent and disaffection. The people were
�The House of Brunswick.
43
-heavily taxed, the aristocracy corrupt and careless. As an in
stance of the madness of the governing classes, it is sufficient to
point out that in 1767, while taxation was increasing, the landed,
gentry, who were rapidly appropriating common lands under
Private Enclosure Acts, most audaciously reduced the land tax
by one-fourth. During the first thirty-seven years of the reign
of George III., there were no less than 1,532 Enclosure Acts
passed, affecting in all 2,804,197 acres of land filched from the
nation by a few families. Wealth took and poverty lost; riches
got land without burden, and labour inherited burden in lieu of
land. It is worth notice that in the early part of the reign of
George III., land yielding about a sixth or seventh of its present
rental, paid the same nominal tax that it does to-day, the actual
amount paid at the present time being however smaller through
redemption ; and yet then the annual interest on the National
Debt was under ,£4,500,000, while to-day it is over ,£26,000,000.
Then the King’s Civil List covered all the expenses of our State
ministers and diplomatic representatives ; to-day, an enormous
additional sum is required, and a Prime Minister professing
economy, and well versed in history, has actually the audacity to
pretend that the country gains by its present Civil List arrange
ment.
0
In 1769, George III. announced to his faithful Commons that
he owed half a million. John Wilkes and a few others protested,
but the money was voted.
In 1770, King George III. succeeded in making several buttons
.at Kew, and as this is, as far as I am aware, the most useful work
of his life, I desire to give it full prominence. His son, after
wards George IV., made a shoebuckle. No other useful product
has resulted directly from the efforts of any male of the family.
In 1770, Henry, Duke of Cumberland, the King’s brother, was
sued by Lord Grosvenor for crim, con., and had to pay ,£10,000
damages. This same Henry, in the following year, went through
the form of marriage with a Mrs. Horton, which marriage,
being repudiated by the Court, troubled him but little, and in
the lifetime of the lady he contracted a second alliance, which
gave rise to the famous Olivia Serres legitimacy issue.
The Royal Marriage Act, a most infamous measure for en
suring the perpetuation of vice, and said to be the result of the
Lightfoot experience, was introduced to Parliament by a mes
sage from George III., on the 20th February, 1772, twelve days
after the death of the Princess-Dowager of Wales. George III.
wrote to Lord North on the 26th February : “ I expect every
nerve to be strained to carry the Bill. It is not a question re
lating to the Administration, but personally to myself, therefore
I have a right to expect a hearty support from every one in my
service, and I shall remember defaulters.”
In May, 1773, the East India Company, having to come before
Parliament for. borrowing powers, a select committee was ap
pointed, whose inquiries laid open cases of rapacity and treachery
involving the highest personages, and a resolution was carried.
�44
The House of Brunswick.
in the House of Commons affirming that Lord Clive had dis
honourably possessed himself of ^234,000 at the time of the
deposition of Surajah Dowlah, and the establishment of Meer
Jaffier. Besides this, it was proved that Lord Clive received
several other large sums in succeeding years. Phillimore describesthis transaction, in terrific language, as one of “ disgusting and
sordid turpitude,” declaring that “ individual members of the
English Government were to be paid for their treachery by a
hire, the amount of which is almost incredible.” A few yearsafter this exposure, Lord Clive committed suicide.
On the 18th of December, 1773, the celebrated cargoes of tea
were thrown overboard in Boston Harbour. The tea duty was
a trifling one, but was unfortunately insisted upon by the King’sGovernment as an assertion of the right of the British Parliament
to tax the unrepresented American colonies, a right the colonistsstrenuously and successfully denied.
The news of the firm attitude of the Bay State colonists
arrived in England early in March, 1774, and Lord North’s Go
vernment, urged by the King, first deprived Boston of her
privileges as a port; secondly, took away from the State ox
Massachusetts the whole of the executive powers granted by the
charter of William III., and vested the nomination of magis
trates of every kind in the King, or royally-appointed Governor ;
and thirdly, carried an enactment authorising persons accused
of political offences committed in Boston to be sent home toEngland to be tried.
These monstrous statutes provoked the most decided resist
ance ; all the other American colonists joined with Boston, and
a solemn league and covenant was entered into for suspending
all commercial intercourse with Great Britain until the obnoxious .
acts were repealed. On the 5th of Sept., 1774, a congress of fiftyone representatives from twelve old colonies assembled m Phila
delphia. The instructions given to them disclaimed every idea
of independence, recognised the constitutional authoiity of the:
mother country, and acknowledged the prerogatives of the crown ;
but unanimously declared that they would never give up the
rights and liberties derived to them from their ancestors asBritish subjects, and pronounced the late acts relative to the
colony of Massachusetts Bay to be unconstitutional, oppressive,
and dangerous. The first public act of the congress was a resolution declarative of their favourable disposition towards the
colony above mentioned; and by subsequent resolutions, they
formally approved the opposition it had given to the obnoxious
acts, and declared that if an attempt were made to carry them into
execution by force, the colony should be supported by all America.
The following extract is from the “ Address of the Twelve
United Provinces to the Inhabitants of Great Britain, when
force was actually used
“ We can retire beyond the reach of
your navy, and, without any sensible diminution of the necessaries
of life, enjoy a luxury, which from that period you will want
the luxury of being free?
�The House of Brunswick.
45
On the 16th November, 1775, Edmund Burke proposed the
renunciation on the part of Great Britain of the exercise of taxa
tion in America, the repeal of the obnoxious duty on tea, and
a general pardon for past political offenders. This was directly
■ opposed by the King, who had lists brought to him of how the
members spoke and voted, and was negatived in the House of
■Commons by 210 votes against 105. On the 20th November,
after consultation with George III., Lord North introduced a
Bill by which all trade and commerce with the thirteen United
■ colonies were interdicted. It authorised the seizure, whether in
harbour or on the high seas, of all vessels laden with American
property, and by a cruel stretch of refined tyranny it rendered
all persons taken on board American vessels, liable to be entered
as sailors on board British ships of war, and to serve (if required)
against their own countrymen. About the same time, as we
learn by a “ secret ” dispatch from Lord Dartmouth to General
Howe, the King had been unmanly enough to apply to the
Czarina of Russia for the loan of 20,000 Russian soldiers to
-enable him to crush his English subjects in the American
colonies. As yet the Americans had made no claim for inde
pendence. They were only petitioners for justice.
In order to crush out the spirit of liberty in the American
colonies, the Government of George III., in February, 1776,
hired 17,000 men from the Landgrave and Hereditary Prince of
Hesse Cassel, and from the Duke of Brunswick. Besides these,
there were levies of troops out of George III.’s Hanoverian
dominions, and that nothing might be wanting to our glory, the
King’s agents stirred up the Cherokee and Creek Indians to
.scalp, ravish, and plunder the disaffected colonists. Jesse says :
“ The newly-arrived troops comprised several thousand kid
napped German soldiers, whom the cupidity of the Duke of
Brunswick, of the Landgrave of Hesse Cassel, and other Ger
man Princes, had induced to let out for hire to the British Go
vernment.......... Frederick of Prussia not only denounced the
traffic as a most scandalous one, but wherever, it is said, the
unfortunate hirelings had occasion to march through any part
<of his dominions, used to levy a toll upon them, as if they had
been so many head of bullocks........... They had been sold,
.he said, as cattle, and therefore he was entitled to exact the
toll.”
The consequence of all this was, on the 4th July, 1776, the
famous declaration of the American Congress.
The history
of the reigning sovereign, they said, was a history of repeated
.-injuries and usurpations. So evidently was it his intention to
establish an absolute despotism, that it had become their duty,
.as well as their right, to secure themselves against further ag
gressions...... In every stage of these oppressions,” proceeds the
Declaration, “ we have petitioned for redress in the most humble
terms. Our petitions have been answered only by repeated in
juries. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act
which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free
�The House of Brunswick.
45
On the 16th November, 1775, Edmund Burke proposed the
renunciation on the part of Great Britain of the exercise of taxa
tion in America, the repeal of the obnoxious duty on tea, and
a general pardon for past political offenders. This was directly
■ opposed by the King, who had lists brought to him of how the
members spoke and voted, and was negatived in the House of
■Commons by 210 votes against 105. On the 20th November,
after consultation with George III., Lord North introduced a
Bill by which all trade and commerce with the thirteen United
■ colonies were interdicted. It authorised the seizure, whether in
harbour or on the high seas, of all vessels laden with American
property, and by a cruel stretch of refined tyranny it rendered
all persons taken on board American vessels, liable to be entered
as sailors on board British ships of war, and to serve (if required)
against their own countrymen. About the same time, as we
learn by a “ secret ” dispatch from Lord Dartmouth to General
Howe, the King had been unmanly enough to apply to the
Czarina of Russia for the loan of 20,000 Russian soldiers to
-enable him to crush his English subjects in the American
colonies. As yet the Americans had made no claim for inde
pendence. They were only petitioners for justice.
In order to crush out the spirit of liberty in the American
colonies, the Government of George III., in February, 1776,
hired 17,000 men from the Landgrave and Hereditary Prince of
Hesse Cassel, and from the Duke of Brunswick. Besides these,
there were levies of troops out of George III.’s Hanoverian
dominions, and that nothing might be wanting to our glory, the
King’s agents stirred up the Cherokee and Creek Indians to
.scalp, ravish, and plunder the disaffected colonists. Jesse says :
“ The newly-arrived troops comprised several thousand kid
napped German soldiers, whom the cupidity of the Duke of
Brunswick, of the Landgrave of Hesse Cassel, and other Ger
man Princes, had induced to let out for hire to the British Go
vernment.......... Frederick of Prussia not only denounced the
traffic as a most scandalous one, but wherever, it is said, the
unfortunate hirelings had occasion to march through any part
<of his dominions, used to levy a toll upon them, as if they had
been so many head of bullocks........... They had been sold,
.he said, as cattle, and therefore he was entitled to exact the
toll.”
The consequence of all this was, on the 4th July, 1776, the
famous declaration of the American Congress.
The history
of the reigning sovereign, they said, was a history of repeated
.-injuries and usurpations. So evidently was it his intention to
establish an absolute despotism, that it had become their duty,
.as well as their right, to secure themselves against further ag
gressions...... In every stage of these oppressions,” proceeds the
Declaration, “ we have petitioned for redress in the most humble
terms. Our petitions have been answered only by repeated in
juries. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act
which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free
�46
The House of Brunswick.
people.” And the United Colonies solemnly declared them
selves to be “ free and independent States.”
In 1777, during this American war, Earl Chatham, in one of
his grand speeches, after denouncing “the traffic and barter
driven with every little pitiful German Prince that sells his sub
jects to the shambles of a foreign country,” he adds : “ The
mercenary aid on which you rely, irritates to an incurable re
sentment the minds of your enemies, whom you overrun with,'
the sordid sons of rapine and of plunder, devoting them and
their possessions to the rapacity of hireling cruelty! If I were an,
American, as I am an Englishman, while a foreign troop was
landed in my country, I never would lay down my arms, never 1.
never ! never !” In reply to Lord Suffolk, who had said, in re
ference to employing the Indians, that “we were justified in
using all the means which God and nature had put into our
hands,” “ I am astonished,” exclaimed Lord Chatham, as he rose,.
“ shocked, to hear such principles confessed, to hear them avowed
in this House, or in this country ; principles equally unconstitu
tional, inhuman, and un-Christian. That God and Nature fut
into our hands ! I know not what idea that Lord may entertain
of God and nature, but I know that such abominable principles
are equally abhorrent to religion and humanity. What! attri
bute the sacred sanction of God and nature to the massacres of
the Indian scalping-knife, to the cannibal savage, torturing,
murdering, roasting, and eating; literally, my Lords, eating the
mangled victims of his barbarous battles 1”
And yet even after this we find George III. writing to Lord
North, on the 22nd of June, 1779 : “ I do not yet despair that,
with Clinton’s activity, and the Indians in their rear, the pro
vinces will soon now submit.”
Actually so late as the 27th of November, 1781, after the
surrender of Cornwallis, we find George III. saying that, “re
taining a firm confidence in the wisdom and protection of Divine
Providence,” he should be able “ by the valour of his fleets andarmies to conquer America.” Fox, in the House of Commons,
denounced this speech of the King’s as one “ breathing ven
geance, blood, misery, and rancour and “ as containing thesentiments of some arbitrary, despotic, hard-hearted, and un
feeling monarch, who, having involved his subjects in a ruinous
and unnatural war, to glut his feelings of revenge, was deter
mined to persevere in it in spite of calamity.” “ Divest the
speech,” said he, “ of its official forms, and what was its purport ?
‘ Our losses in America have been most calamitous ; the blood
of my subjects has flowed in copious streams ; the treasures of
. Great Britain have been wantonly lavished ; the load of taxes
imposed on an over-burthened country is become intolerable ;
my rage for conquest is unquenched ; my revenge unsated ; nor
can anything except the total subjugation of my American
subjects allay my animosity.’ ”
The following table shows what this disastrous war ultimately'
�The House of Brunswick.
47
cost this country in mere money ; no table can efficiently show
its cost in blood and misery :—
Year.
1775
1776
1777
1778
1779
1780
1781
1782
1783
1784
1785
Total
Taxation.
£10,138,061
10,265,405
10,604,013
10,732,405
11,192,141
12,255,214
12,454,936
12,593,297
11,962,718
12,905,519
14,871,520
Loans.
—
£2,000,000
5,500,000
6,000,000
7,000,000
12,000,000
12,000,000
13,500,000
12,000,000
12,879,341
10,990,651
£129,975,229
£^93,869,992
The American war terminated in 1783 ; but as the loans >6f
the two following years were raised to wind up the expenses of
that struggle, it is proper they should be included. The total
expense of the American war will stand thus :—
Taxes
Loans
Advances by the Bank of England
Advances by the East India Company
Increase in the Unfunded Debt ...
,£129,975,229
93,869,992
110,000
3,200,000
5,170,273
Total
Deduct expense of a peace establish
ment for eleven years, as it stood in
1774
232,325,494
Nett cost of the American war
...
113,142,403
£119,183,091
In addition to this must be noted ,£1,340,000 voted as com
pensation to American loyalists in 1788, and £4,000 a year pen
sion since, and even now, paid to the descendants of William
Penn, amounting, with compound interest, to an enormous addi
tional sum, even to the present date, without reckoning future
liability. And this glorious colony parted from us in blood and
shame, in consequence of a vain attempt to gratify the desire
of the House of Brunswick to make New England contribute
to their German greed as freely and as servilely as Old England
had done.
Encouraged by the willingness with which his former debts
had been discharged, George III., in 1777, sent a second
message, but this time for the larger sum of £600,000, which
was not only paid, but an additional allowance of £100,000 a
year was voted to his Majesty, and £40,000 was given to the
Landgrave of Hesse.
ml. •;
�48
The House of Brunswick.
As an illustration of the barbarity of our laws, it is enough to
say that in 1777, Sarah Parker was burnt for counterfeiting silver
coin. In June, 1786, Phoebe Harris was burnt for the same
offence. And this in a reign when persons in high position
accused of murder, forgery, perjury, and robbery, escaped almost
scot free.
In April, 1778, ,£60,000 a year was settled on the six younger
princes, and £) 30,000 a year on the five princesses. These pen
sions, however, were professedly paid out of the King’s Civil
List, not avowedly in addition to it, as they are to-day. The
Duke of Buckingham stated that in 1778, and again in 1782, the
King threatened to abdicate. This threat, which unfortunately
was never carried out, arose from the King’s obstinate per
sistence in the worse than insane policy against the American
colonies.
In December, 1779, in consequence of England needing Irish
soldiers to make war on America, Ireland was graciously per
mitted to export Irish woollen manufactures. The indulgences,
however, to Ireland—even while the Ministers of George III.
were trying to enlist Irishmen to kill the English, Scotch, and
Irish in America—were made most grudgingly. Pious Protestant
George III. would not consent that any Irish Catholic should
own one foot of freehold land ; and Edmund Burke, in a letter
to an Irish peer, says that it was pride, arrogance, and a spirit
of domination,” which kept up “ these unjust legal disabilities.”
On the 8th February, 1780, Sir G. Savile presented the famous
Yorkshire petition, sighed by 8,000 freeholders, praying the House
of Commons to inquire into the management and expenditure of
public money, to reduce all exorbitant emoluments, and to abolish
all sinecure places, and unmerited pensions. Three days later,
Edmund Burke proposed a reduction of the national taxation
(which was then only a sixth part of its amount to day), and a
diminution of the power of the Crown. Burke was defeated, but
shortly after, on the motion of Mr. Dunning, the House of
Commons declared, bya majority of 18 against the Government,
“ That the influence of the Crown has increased, is increasing, and.
ought to be diminished.”
On the 20th March, 1782, Lord North, in consequence of the
impossibility of subduing the American colonies, determined to
resign. The King opposed this to the last, declaring that no
difficulties should induce him to consent to a peace acknowledg
ing the Independence of America. “ So distressing,” says Jesse,
“was the conflict which prevailed in the mind of George III.,
that he not only contemplated abandoning the Crown of Eng
land for the Electorate of Hanover, but orders had actually been
issued to have the royal yacht in readiness for his flight.” . What
a blessing to the country if he had really persevered in his reso
lution.
Charles James Fox, who now came into power for a brief space,
had, says Jesse, “ taught himself to look upon his sovereign as a
mere dull, obstinate, half-crazed, and narrow-minded bigot; a
�The House of Brunswick.
49
Prince whose shallow understanding had never been improved
by education, whose prejudices it was impossible to remove,
and whose resentments it would be idle to endeavour to soften.”
In 1784, George Prince of Wales was over head and ears in
debt, and the King, who appears to have hated him, refusing
any aid, he resorted to threats. Dr. Doran says : “ A conversa
tion is spoken of as having passed between the Queen and the
Minister, in which he is reported as having said, ‘ I much fear,
your Majesty, that the Prince, in his wild moments, may allow
expressions to escape him that may be injurious to the Crown.’
‘ There is little fear of that,’ was the alleged reply of the Oueen,
< he is too well aware of the consequences of such a course of
conduct to himself. As regards that point, therefore, I can rely
upon him.’ ”
Jesse says of the Prince of Wales, that between eighteen and
twenty, “ to be carried home drunk, or to be taken into custody
by the watch, were apparently no unfrequent episodes in the
early part of the career of the Heir to the Throne. Under the
auspices of his weak and frivolous uncle, the Duke of Cumber
land, the Prince’s conversation is said to have been a compound
of the slang of grooms and the wanton vocabulary of a brothel.”
“ When we hunt together,” said the King to the Duke of Glou
cester, “ neither my son nor my brother speak to me; and lately,
when the chase ended at a little village where there was but a
.single post-chaise to be hired, my son and brother got into it,
and drove off, leaving me to go home in a cart, if I could find
one.” And this is the family Mr. Disraeli holds up for English
men to worship 1
In July, 1782, Lord Shelburne came into office ; but he
“ always complained that the King had tricked and deserted
him,” and had “secretly connived at his downfall.” He re
signed office on the 24th February, 1783. An attempt was made
to form a Coalition Ministry, under the Duke of Portland. The
King complained of being treated with personal incivility, and
the attempt failed. On the 23rd March, the. Prince of Wales,
at the Queen’s Drawing-room, said : “ The King had refused to
accept the coalition, but by God he should be made to agree to
it.” Under the great excitement, the King’s health gave way.
The Prince, says Jesse, was a member of Brooks’s Club,
where, as Walpole tells us, the members were not only
strangely licentious ” in their talk about their sovereign, but
in their zeal for the interests of the heartless young Prince,
“ even wagered on the duration of the King’s reign.” The King
repeated his threat of abandoning the Throne, and retiring to
his Hanoverian dominions ; and told the Lord-Advocate, Dun
das, that he had obtained the consent of the Queen to his taking
this extraordinary step. Young William Pitt refusing twice to
accept the Premiership, Fox and Lord North came again into
power. ^30,000 was voted for the Prince of Wales’s debts, and.
.a similar sum to enable him to furnish his house. The “ un
natural” Coalition Ministry did not last long. Fox introduced
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The House of Brunswick.
his famous India Bill. The King, regarding it as a blow at the
power of the Crown, caballed and canvassed the Peers against
it. “ The welfare of thirty millions of people was overlooked
in the excitement produced by selfish interests, by party zeal,
and officious loyalty.” “ Instantly,” writes Lord Macaulay, “a.
troop of Lords of the Bedchamber, of Bishops who wished to
be translated, and of Scotch peers who wished to be re-elected,
made haste to change sides.” The Bill had passed the Com
mons by large majorities. The King opposed it like a partisan,
and when it was defeated in the Lords, cried, “ Thank God ! it
is all over ; the House has thrown out the Bill, so there is an
end of Mr. Fox.” The Ministers not resigning, as the King
expected they would, his Majesty dismissed them at once, send
ing to Lord North in the middle of the night for his seals of
office.
On the 19th December, 1783, William Pitt, then twenty-four
years of age, became Prime Minister of England. The House
of Commons passed a resolution, on the motion of Lord Surrey,
remonstrating with the King for having permitted his sacred
name to be unconstitutionally used in order to influence thedeliberations of Parliament. More than once the Commons
petitioned the King to dismiss Pitt from office. Pitt, with large
majorities against him, wished to resign ; but George III. said,
“If you resign, Mr. Pitt, I must resign too,” and he again
threatened, in the event of defeat, to abandon England, and re
tire to his Hanoverian dominions. Now our monarch, if a king,,
would have no Hanoverian dominions to retire to.
In 1784, £60,000 was voted by Parliament to defray the King’s
debts. In consequence of the large debts of the Prince of Wales,,
an interview was arranged at Carlton House on the 27th April,.
1785, between the Prince and Lord Malmesbury. The King,
the Prince said, had desired him to send in an exact statement
of his debts ; there was one item, however, of £25,000, on which
the Prince of Wales would give no information. If it were a
debt, argued the King, which his son was ashamed to explain,,
it was one which he ought not to defray. The Prince threatened
to go abroad, saying, “ I am ruined if I stay in England. I shall
disgrace myself as a man ; my father hates me, and has hated
me since I was seven years old........We are too wide asunder
ever to meet. The King has deceived me ; he has made me
deceive others. I cannot trust him, and he will not believe me.”
And this is the Brunswick family to which the English nation
are required to be blindly loyal !
In 1785, George Prince of Wales was married to a Roman
Catholic lady, Mrs. Fitzherbert, a widow. It is of course known
that the Prince treated the lady badly. This was not his first
experience, the history of Mary Robinson forming but one
amongst a long list of shabby liaisons. A question havingarisen before the House of Commons, during a discussion on
the debts owing by the Prince, Charles James Fox, on the written
authority of the Prince, denied that any marriage, regular or
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51
irregular, bad ever taken place, and termed it “ an invention......
destitute of the slightest foundation.” Mr. Fox’s denial was
made on the distinct written authority of the Prince, who offered,
through Fox, to give in the House of Lords the “fullest assur
ances of the utter falsehood ” of the allegation ; although not
only does everybody know to-day that the denial was untrue,
but in point of fact the fullest proofs of the denied marriage
exist at this very moment in the custody of Messrs. Coutts, the
bankers. Out of all the Brunswicks England has been cursed
with, George I. is the only one against whom there is no charge
of wanton falsehood to his ministers or subjects, and it is fairly
probable that his character for such truthfulness was preserved
by his utter inability to lie in our language.
Not only did George Prince of Wales thus deny his marriage
with Mrs. Fitzherbert, but repeated voluntarily the denial after
he became King George IV. Despite this denial, the King’s
executors, the Duke of Wellington and Sir William Knighton,
were compelled by Mrs. Fitzherbert to admit the proofs. The
marriage took place on the 21st December, 1785, and Mrs. Fitz
herbert being a Roman Catholic, the legal effect was to bar
Prince George and prevent him ever becoming the lawful King
of England. The documents above referred to as being at
Coutts’s, include—1. The marriage certificate. 2. A letter written
by the Prince of Wales acknowledging the marriage. 3. A will,,
signed by him, also acknowledging it, and other documents.
And yet George, our King, whom Mr. Disraeli praises, autho
rised Charles James Fox to declare the rumour of his marriage
“ a low malicious falsehood and then the Prince went to Mrs.
Fitzherbert and, like a mean, lying, hypocrite as he was, said,
“ Oh, Maria, only conceive what Fox did yesterday, he went
down to the House and denied that you and I were man and
wife.”
Although when George Prince of Wales had attained his
majority, he had an allowance of £50,000 a year, £60,000 to
furnish Carlton House, and .an additional ,£40,000 for cash tostart with, yet he was soon after deep in debt. In 1787,
£ 160,000 was voted, and a portion of the Prince’s debts was
paid. £20,000 further was added as a vote for Carlton House.
Thackeray says : “ Lovers of long sums have added up the
millions and millions which in the course of his brilliant exist
ence this single Prince consumed. Besides his income of
£50,000, £y0,000, £100,000, £120,000 a year, we read of three
applications to Parliament; debts to the amount of £160,000,
of £650,000, besides mysterious foreign loans, whereof he poc
keted the proceeds. What did he do for all this money ? Why
was he to have it ? If he had been a manufacturing town, or a
populous rural district, or an army of five thousand men, he
would not have cost more. He, one solitary stout man, who did
not toil, nor spin, nor fight—what had any mortal done that he
should be pampered so ?”
The proposed impeachment of Warren Hastings, which ac-
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tually commenced on February 13th, 1788, and which did not
conclude until eight years afterwards, excited considerable feel
ing, it being roundly alleged that Court protection had been
purchased by the late Governor-General of India, by means of
a large diamond presented to the King. The following rhymed
squib tells its own story. It was sung about the streets to the
tune of '' Derry Down —
“ I’ll sing you a song of a diamond so fine,
That soon in the crown of the monarch will shine ;
Of its size and its value the whole country rings,
By Hastings bestowed on the best of all Kings.
Derry down, &c.
“ From India this jewel was lately brought o’er,
Though sunk in the sea, it was found on the shore,
And just in the nick to St. James’s it got,
Convey’d in a bag by the brave Major Scott.
Derry down, &c.
“ Lord Sydney stepp’d forth, when the tidings were known,
It’s his office to carry such news to the throne ;—
Though quite out of breath, to the closet he ran,
And stammer’d with joy ere his tale he began.
Derry down, &c.
‘ Here’s a jewel, my liege, there’s none such in the land ;
Major Scott, with three bows, put it into my hand :
And he swore, when he gave it, the wise ones were bit,
For it never was shown to Dundas or to Pitt.’
Derry down, &c.
For Dundas,’ cried our sovereign, 'unpolished and rough,
Give him a Scotch pebble, it’s more than enough.
And jewels to Pitt, Hastings justly refuses,
For he has already more gifts than he uses.’
Derry down, &c.
'“'But run, Jenky, run !’ adds the King in delight,
‘ Bring the Queen and Princesses here for a sight;
They never would pardon the negligence shown,
If we kept from their knowledge so glorious a stone.
Derry down, &c.
''' But guard the door, Jenky, no credit we’ll win,
If the Prince in a frolic should chance to step in :
The boy to such secrets of State we’ll ne’er call,
Let him wait till he gets our crown, income, and all.’
Derry down, &c.
'' In the Princesses run, and surprised cry, ' Ola I
’Tis big as the egg of a pigeon, papa 1’
‘And a pigeon of plumage worth plucking is he,’
Replies our good monarch, ‘ who sent it to me.’
Derry down, &c.
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53
il Madame Schwellenberg peep’d through the door ata chink,.
And tipp’d on the diamond a sly German wink ;
As much as to say, 4 Can we ever be cruel
To him who has sent us so glorious a jewel?’
Derry down, &c.
“ Now God save the Queen ! while the people I teach,
How the King may grow rich while the Commons impeach
Then let nabobs go plunder, and rob as they will,
And throw in their diamonds as grist to his mill.
Derry down, &c.”
It was believed that the King had received not one diamond,,
but a large quantity, and that they were to be the purchase
money of Hastings’s acquittal. Caricatures on the subject wereto be seen in the window of every print-shop. In one of these
Hastings was represented wheeling away in a barrow the King,
with his crown and sceptre, observing, “ What a man buys, he
may selland, in another, the King was exhibited on his kneesr
with his mouth wide open, and Warren Hastings pitching
diamonds into it. Many other prints, some of them bearing
evidence of the style of the best caricaturists of the day, kept up
the agitation on this subject. It happened that there was a quack
in the town, who pretended to eat stones, and bills of his exhibi
tion were placarded on the walls, headed, in large letters, “The
great stone-eater 1” The caricaturists took the hint, and drew
the King with a diamond between his teeth, and a heap of othersbefore him, with the inscription, “ The greatest stone-eater !”
We borrow a few sentences from Lord Macaulay to enableour readers to judge, in brief space, the nature of Warren Hastings’s position, standing impeached, as he did, on a long string of
charges, some of them most terrible in their implication of
violence, falsehood, fraud, and rapacity.. Macaulay thus pictures
the situation between the civilised Christian and his tributaries :—On one side was a band of English functionaries, daring, in
telligent, eager to be rich. On the other side was a great native
population, helpless, timid, and accustomed to crouch under
oppression.” When some new act of rapacity was resisted there'
came war; but “ a war of Bengalees against Englishmen waslike a war of sheep against wolves, of men against demons.” There
was a long period before any one dreamed that justice and mo
rality should be features of English rule in India. 44 During the
interval, the business of a servant of the Company was simply
to wring out of the natives a hundred or two hundred thousand
pounds as speedily as possible, that he might return home before
his constitution had suffered from the heat, to marry a peer’sdaughter, to buy rotten boroughs in Cornwall, and to give balls
in St. James’s Square.” Hastings was compelled to turn hisattention to foreign affairs. The object of his diplomacy was at
this time simply to get money. The finances of his government
were in an embarrassed state, and this embarrassment he was
determined to relieve by some means, fair or foul. The principle
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which directed all his dealings with his neighbours is fully ex
pressed. by the old motto of one of the great predatory families
of Teviotdale— Thou shalt want ere I want.” He seems to
have laid it down, as a fundamental proposition which could not
be disputed, that, when he had not as many lacs of rupees as the
public service lequired, he was to take them from anybody who
had. One thing, indeed, is to be said in excuse for him. The
pressure applied to him by his employers at home, was such as
only the highest virtue could have withstood, such as left him
no choice except to commit great wrongs, or to resign his high
post, and with that post all his hopes of fortune and distinction.
Hastings was in need of funds to carry on the government of
Bengal, and to send remittances to London ; and Sujah Dowlah
had an ample revenue. Sujah Dowlah was bent on subjugating
the Rohillas ; and Hastings had at his disposal the only force
‘by which the Rohillas could be subjugated. It was agreed that
an English army should be lent to Nabob Vizier, and that for
the loan he should pay four hundred thousand pounds sterling
besides defraying all the charge of the troops while employed
in his service. _ “ I really cannot see,” says Mr. Gleig, “ upon
what grounds, either of political or moral justice, this propostion
‘deserves to be stigmatised as infamous.” If we understand the
meaning of words, it is infamous to commit a wicked action for
hire, and it is wicked to engage in war without provocation. In
this particular war, scarcely one aggravating circumstance was
wanting. The object of the Rohilla war was this, to deprive a
large population, who had never done us the least harm of a '
.good government, and to place them, against their will, under an
execrably bad one...... The horrors of Indian war were let loose
on the fair valleys and cities of Rohilcund. The whole country
was in a blaze. More than a hundred thousand people fled from
their homes to pestilential jungles, preferring famine, and fever
and the haunts of tigers, to the tyranny of him to whom an
English and a Christian government had, for shameful lucre
sold their substance, and their blood, and the honour of their
wives and daughters...... Mr. Hastings had only to put down by
main force the brave struggles of innocent men fighting for their
liberty. Their military resistance crushed, his duties ended ;
and he had then only to fold his arms and look on, while their
villages were burned, their children butchered, and their women
violated...... We hasten to the end of this sad and disgraceful
story. The war ceased. The finest population in India was
subjected to a greedy, cowardly, cruel tyrant. Commerce and
agriculture languished. The rich province which had tempted
the cupidity of Sujah Dowlah became the most miserable part
even of his miserable dominions. Yet is the injured nation not
extinct. At long intervals gleams of its ancient spirit have
-flashed forth ; and even at this day valour, and self-respect, and
a chivalrous feeling rare among Asiatics, and a bitter remem
brance of the] great crime of England, distinguish that noble
Afghan race.”
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55
Partly in consequence of the proposed legislation by Fox on
the affairs of the East India Company, and partly from per
sonal antagonism, members of the Indian Council hostile to
Governor-General Hastings were sent out to India. Amongst
his most prominent antagonists was Francis, the reputed author
of Junius’s Letters. It was to Francis especially that the Maha
rajah Nuncomar of Bengal addressed himself. “ He put into
the hands of Francis, with great ceremony, a paper containing
several charges of the most serious description. By this docu
ment Hastings was accused of putting offices up to sale, and of
receiving bribes for suffering offenders to escape. In particular,
it was alleged that Mahommed Reza Khan had been dis
missed with impunity, in consideration of a great sum paid to
the Governor-General...... He stated that Hastings had received
a large sum for appointing Rajah Goordas treasurer of the
Nabob’s household, and for committing the care of his High
ness’s person to 'Munny Begum. He put in a letter purporting
to bear the seal of the Munny Begum, for the purpose of estab
lishing the truth of his story.”
Much evidence was taken before the Indian Council, where
there was considerable conflict between the friends and enemies
of Hastings. “ The majority, however, voted that the charge
was made out; that Hastings had corruptly received between
thirty and forty thousand pounds ; and that he ought to be com
pelled to refund.”
Now, however, comes an item darker and more disgraceful, if
possible, than what had preceded.
“ On a sudden, Calcutta was astounded by the news that
Nuncomar had been taken up on a charge of felony, committed,
and thrown into the common gaol. The crime imputed to him
was, that six years before he had forged a bond. The osten
sible prosecutor was a native. But it was then, and still is, the
opinion of everybody, idiots and biographers excepted, that
Hastings was the real mover in the business.” The ChiefJustice Impey, one of Hastings’s creatures, pushed on a mock
trial, “a verdict of Guilty was returned, and the Chief-Justice
pronounced sentence of death on the prisoner.......... Of Impey’s
conduct it is impossible to speak too severely. He acted un
justly in refusing to respite Nuncomar. No rational- man can
doubt that he took this course in order to gratify the GovernorGeneral. If we had ever had any doubts on that point, they
would have been dispelled by a letter which Mr. Gleig has
published. Hastings, three or four years later, described Impey
as the man £ to whose support he was at one time indebted for
the safety of his fortune, honour, and reputation.’ These strong
words can refer only to the case of Nuncomar ; and they must
mean that Impey hanged Nuncomar in order to support Has
tings. It is therefore our deliberate opinion that Impey, sitting
as a judge, put a man unjustly to death in order to serve a poli
tical purpose.”
Encouraged by success, a few years later, Hastings, upon the
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The House of Brunswick.
most unfair pretext, made war upon and plundered the Rajah of
Benares, and a little later subjected the eunuchs of the Begums
of Oude to physical torture, to make them confess where the
royal treasure was hidden.
It is evident from Miss Burney’s diary that the King and.
Queen warmly championed the cause of Warren Hastings, who,
after a wearisome impeachment, was acquitted.
In 1788, the King’s insanity assumed a more violent form than
usual, and on a report from the Privy Council, the subject was
brought before Parliament. In the Commons, Pitt and the Tory
party contended that the right of providing for the government of
the country in cases where the monarch was unable to perform
his duties, belonged to the nation at large, to be exercised by its
representatives in Parliament. Fox and the Whigs, on the other
hand, maintained that the Prince of Wales possessed the in
herent right to assume the government. Pitt seizing this argu
ment as it fell from Fox, said, at the moment, to the member
seated nearest to him, “ I’ll unwhig the gentleman for the rest
of his life.”
During the discussions on the Regency Bill, Lord Thurlow,
who was then Lord Chancellor, acted the political rat, and
coquetted with both parties. When the King’s recovery was
announced by the royal physicians, Thurlow, to cover his
treachery, made an extravagant speech in defence of Pitt’s
views, and one laudatory of the King. After enumerating the
rewards received from the King, he said, “ and if I forget the
monarch who has thus befriended me, may my great Creator
forget me.” John Wilkes, who was present in the House of
Lords, said, in a stage aside, audible to many of the peers, “For
get you, he will see you damned first.” Phillimore, describing
Lord Chancellor Thurlow, says that he—“ either from an in
stinctive delight in all that was brutal ” (which did not prevent
him from being a gross hypocrite), “ or from a desire to please
George III.—supported the Slave Trade, and the horrors of the
Middle Passage, with the uncompromising ferocity of a Liver
pool merchant or a Guinea captain.”
It appears that the Prince of Wales and the Duke of York
exhibited what was considered somewhat indecent eagerness to
have the King declared irrecoverably insane, and on more than
one occasion the Queen refused to allow either of these Royal
Princes access to the King’s person, on the ground that their
violent conduct retarded his recovery. The Prince of Wales and
Duke of York protested in writing against the Queen’s hostility
to them, and published the protest. Happy family, these Brunswicks ! Dr. Doran declares : “There was assuredly no decency
in the conduct of the Heir-apparent, or of his next brother. They
were gaily flying from club to club, party to party, and did not
take the trouble even to assume the sentiment which they could
not feel. ‘ If we were together,’ says Lord Granville, in a letter
inserted in his Memoirs, ‘ I would tell you some particulars of
the Prince of Wales’s behaviour to the King and Queen, within
�The House of Brunswick.
57
these few days, that would make your blood run cold.’ It was
said that if the King could only recover and learn what had been
said and done during his illness, he would hear enough to drive
him again into insanity. The conduct of his eldest sons was
marked by its savage inhumanity.” Jesse says : “ The fact is a
painful one to relate, that on the 4th December—the day on
which Parliament assembled, and when the King’s malady was
at its worst—the graceless youth (the Duke of York) not only
held a meeting of the opposition at his own house, but afterwards
proceeded to the House of Lords, in order to hear the deposi
tions of the royal physicians read, and to listen to the painful
details of his father’s lunacy. Moreover the same evening we
track both the brothers (the Prince of Wales and the Duke of
York) to Brooks’s, where in a circle of boon companions, as irre
verent as themselves, they are said to have been in the habit
of indulging in the most shocking indecencies, of which the
King’s derangement was the topic. On such occasions, we are
told, not only did they turn their parents into ridicule, and blab
the secrets of the chamber of sickness at Windsor, but the Prince
even, went to such unnatural lengths as to employ his talents for
mimicry, in which he was surpassed by few of his contempora
ries in imitating the ravings and gestures of his stricken father.
As for the Duke of York, we are assured that ‘ the brutality of the
stupid sot disgusted even the most profligate of his associates.’ ”
Even after the King’s return to reason had been vouched by the
physicians, William Grenville, writing to Lord Buckingham,
says that the two princes “ amused themselves with spreading
the report that the King was still out of his mind.” When the
great thanksgiving for the King’s recovery took place at Saint
Paul’s, the conduct of the Prince of Wales and the Duke of
York, in the Cathedral itself, is described “ as having been in the
highest degree irreverent, if not indecent.” Sir William Young
writes to Lord Buckingham, “ The day will come when English
men will bring these Princes to their senses.” Alas for England
the day has not yet come !
’
In 1789, a great outcry was raised against the Duke of York
on account of his licentiousness. In 179°, the printer of the
Times newspaper was fined ^100 for libelling the Prince of
Wales, and a second ^100 for libelling the Duke of York. It
was in this year that the Prince of Wales, and the Dukes of
York and Clarence, issued joint and several bonds to an enor
mous amount—it is said, ,£1,000,000 sterling, and bearing 6 per
cent, interest. These bonds were taken up chiefly abroad; and
some Frenchmen who subscribed, being unable to obtain either
principal or interest, applied to the Court of Chancery, in order
to charge the revenues of the Duchy of Cornwall. Others of '
the foreign holders of bonds had recourse to other proceedings
to enforce their claims. In nearly every case the claimants
were arrested by the Secretary of State’s order, and sent out of
England under the Alien Act, and when landed in their own
country were again arrested for treasonable communication with
F
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the enemy, and perished on the scaffold. MM. De Baume,
Chaudot, Mette, Aubert, Vaucher, and others, all creditors of the
Prince, were thus arrested under the Duke of Portland’s war
rant, and on their deportation re-arrested for treason, and guillo
tined. Thus were some of the debts of the Royal Family of
Brunswick settled, if not paid. Honest family, these Brunswicks 1
George Prince of Wales and the Duke of York were con
stant patrons of prize fights, races, and gambling tables, largely
betting, and not always paying their wagers when they lost. In
the autumn of 1791 a charge was made against the Prince of
Wales that he allowed his horse Escape to run badly on the
20th of October, and when heavily betted against caused the
same horse to be ridden to win. A brother of Lord Lake, who
was friendly to the Prince, and who managed some of his
racing affairs, evidently believed there was foul play, and so did
the Jockey Club, who declared that if the Prince permitted the
same jockey, Samuel Chifney, to ride again, no gentleman
would start against him. A writer employed by George Prince
of Wales to defend his character says : “ It may be asked, why
did not the Prince of Wales declare upon his honour, that no
foul play had been used with respect to Escape’s first race ?
Such a declaration would at once have solved all difficulties,
and put an end to all embarrassments. But was it proper for
the Prince of Wales to have condescended to such a submis
sion ? Are there not sometimes suspicions of so disgraceful a
nature afloat, and at the same time so improbable withal, that
if the person, who is the object of them, condescends to reply
to them, he degrades himself? Was it to be expected of the
Prince of Wales that he should purge himself, by oath, like his
domestic ? Or was it to be looked for, that the first subject in
the realm, the personage whose simple word should have com
manded deference, respect, and belief, was to submit himself to
the examination of the Jockey Club, and answer such questions
as they might have thought proper to have proposed to him ?”
This, coming from a family like the Brunswicks, and from one
of four brothers who, like their highnesses of Wales, York, Kent,
and Cumberland, had each in turn declared himself upon honour
not guilty of some misdemeanour or felony, is worthy a note of
admiration. George, Prince of Wales, declared himself not
guilty of bigamy ; the Duke of York declared himself not guilty
of selling promotion in the army. Both these Princes publicly
declared themselves not guilty of the charge of trying to hinder
their royal father’s restoration to sanity. The Duke of Kent,
the Queen’s father, declared that he was no party to the subor
nation of witnesses against his own brother. The Duke of
Cumberland pledged his oath that he had never been guilty of
sodomy and murder.
In September, 1791, the Duke of York was married to the
Princess Frederica, daughter of the King of Prussia, with whom
he lived most unhappily for a few years. The only effect of this
�The House of Brunswick.
59
marriage on the nation was that ,£ 18,000 a year was voted as an
extra allowance to his Royal Highness the Duke of York. This
was in addition to 100,000 crowns given out of the Civil List
as a marriage portion to the Princess. Dr. Doran says of the
Duchess of York : “For six years she bore with treatment from
the ‘Commander-in-Chief’ such as no trooper under him would
have inflicted on a wife equally deserving. At the end of that
time the ill-matched pair separated.” Kind husbands, these
Brunswicks!
In a print published on the 24th May, 1792, entitled “Vices
Overlooked in the New Proclamation,” Avarice is represented
by King George and Queen Charlotte, hugging their hoarded
millions with extreme satisfaction, a book of interest tables lying
at hand. This print is divided into four compartments, repre
senting : 1. Avarice ; 2. Drunkenness, exemplified in the person
of the Prince of Wales ; 3. Gambling, the favourite amusement
of the Duke of York; and 4. Debauchery,the Duke of Clarence
and Mrs. Jordan—as the four notable vices of the Royal family
of Great Britain. If the print had to be re-issued to-day, it
would require no very vivid imagination to provide materials
from the living members of the Royal Family to refill the four
compartments.
Among various other remarkable trials occurring in 1792,
those of Daniel Holt and AVilliam Winterbottom are here wor
thy of notice, as illustrating the fashion in which the rule of the
Brunswick monarchy has trenched on our political liberties.
The former, a printer of Nottingham, was convicted and sen
tenced to two years’ imprisonment for re-publishing, verbatim
a political tract, originally circulated without prosecution by the
Thatched House Tavern Association, of which Mr. Pitt and
the Duke of Richmond had been members. The other, a dis
senting minister at Plymouth, of virtuous and highly respectable
character, was convicted of sedition, and sentenced to four
years’ imprisonment in the gaol of Newgate, for two sermons
preached m commemoration of the revolution of 1688. The
indictment charged him with affirming, “That his Majesty was
placed upon the throne on condition of keeping certain laws
and rules, and if he does- not observe them, he has no more
right to the crown than the Stuarts had.”. All the Whigs in the
kingdom might, doubtless, have been comprehended in a similar
indictment. And if the doctrine affirmed by the Rev. Mr. Win
terbottom be denied, the monstrous reverse of the proposition
follows, that the King is bound by no conditions or laws • and
that though resistance to the tyranny of the Stuarts might be
justifiable, resistance under the same circumstances to the
House of Brunswick, is not. This trial, for the cruelty and
infamy attending it, has been justly compared to the celebrated
one of Rosewell m the latter years of Charles II., to the events
of which those of 1792 exhibit, in various respects, a striking
and alarming parallel.
&
Before his election to the National Convention, Thomas Paine
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The House of Brunswick.
published the second part of his l< Rights of Man,” in which he
boldly promulgated principles which, though fiercely condemned
at the date of their issue, are now being gradually accepted by
the great mass of the people. Paine’s work was spread through
the kingdom with extraordinary industry, and was greedily sought
for by people of all classes. Despite the great risk of fine and
imprisonment, some of the most effective parts were printed on
pieces of paper, which were used by Republican tradesmen as
wrappers for their commodities. Proceedings were immediately
taken against Thomas Paine as author of the obnoxious book,
which was treated as a libel against the government and consti
tution, and on trial Paine was found guilty. He was defended
with great ability by Erskine, who, when he left the court, was
cheered by a crowd of people who had collected without, some of
whom took his horses from his carriage, and dragged him home
to his house in Serjeant’s Inn. The name and opinions of
Thomas Paine were at this moment gaining influence, in spite of
the exertions made to put them down. From this time for
several years, it is almost impossible to read a weekly journal
without finding some instance of persecution for publishing Mr.
Paine’s political views.
The trial of Thomas Paine was the commencement of a series
of State prosecutions, not for political offences, but for political
designs. The name of Paine had caused much apprehension,
but many even amongst the Conservatives dreaded the extension
of the practice of making the publication of a man’s abstract
opinions criminal, when unaccompanied with any direct or open
attempt to put them into effect. In the beginning of 1793,
followed prosecutions in Edinburgh, where the ministerial in
fluence was great, against men who had associated to do little
more than call for reform in Parliament; and five persons,
whose alleged crimes consisted chiefly in having read Paine’s
“ Rights of Man,” and in having expressed either a partial ap
probation of his doctrines, or a strong declaration in favour of
Parliamentary reform, were transported severally : Joseph
Gerrald, William Skirving, and Thomas Muir for fourteen, and
Thomas Fyshe Palmer and Maurice Margarot for seven years !
These men had been active in the political societies, and it was
imagined that, by an exemplary injustice of this kind, these
societies would be intimidated. Such, however, was not the
case, for, from this moment, the clubs in Edinburgh became
more active than ever, and they certainly took a more dangerous
character ; so that, before the end of the year, there was actually
a “ British Convention ” sitting in the Scottish capital. This
was dissolved by force at the beginning of 1794, and two of its
members were added to the convicts already destined for trans
portation. Their severe sentences provoked warm discussions
in the English Parliament, but the ministers were inexorable in
their resolution to put them in execution.
The extreme severity of the sentences passed on the Scottish
political martyrs, even as judged by those admitting the legality
�The House of Brunswick.
61
and justice of their conviction, was so shameful, as to rouse
general interest. Barbarous as the law of Scotland appeared
to be, it became a matter of doubt whether the Court of Justi
ciary had not exceeded its power, in substituting the punishment
of transportation for that of banishment, imposed by the Act of
Queen Anne, for the offence charged on those men.
In 1794, the debts of the Prince of Wales, then amounting to
about ,£650,000, not including the amounts due on the foreign
bonds, a marriage was suggested in order to give an excuse for
going to Parliament for a vote. This was at a time when the
Prince was living with Mrs. Fitzherbert as his wife, and when
Lady Jersey was his most prominent mistress. The bride selected
was Caroline of Brunswick. A poor woman for a wife, if Lord
Malmesbury’s picture is a true one, certainly in no sense a bad
woman. But her husband our Prince ! When she arrived in
London, George was not sober. His first words, after greeting
her, were to Lord Malmesbury, “ Get me a glass of brandy.”
Tipsy this Brunswicker went to the altar on 8th April, 1794 ; so
tipsy that he got up from his knees too soon, and the King had
to whisper him down, the Archbishop having halted in amaze in
the ceremony. Here there is no possibility of mistake. The
two Dukes who were his best men at the wedding, had their
work to keep him from falling; and to one, the Duke of Bedford,
he admitted that he had had several glasses of brandy before
coming to the chapel.
Thackeray says, “ What could be. expected from a wedding
which had such a beginning—from such a bridegroom and such
a bride ? Malmesbury gives us the beginning of the marriage
story—how the prince reeled into chapel to be married ; how he
hiccupped out his vows of fidelity—you know how he kept them ;
how he pursued the woman whom he had married ; to what a
state he brought her ; with what blows he struck her ; with what
malignity he pursued her ; what his treatment of his daughter
was ; and what his own life. He the first gentleman of Europe 1”
The Parliament not only paid the Prince of Wales’s debts, but
gave him ^28,000 for jewels and plate, and ,£26,000 for the
furnishing of Carlton House.
On the 12th of May, Mr. Henry Dundas brought down on
behalf of the government, a second message from the King, im
porting that seditious practices had been carried on by certain
societies in London, in correspondence with other societies ; that
they had lately been pursued with increasing activity and bold
ness, and had been avowedly directed to the assembling of a
pretended National Convention, in contempt and defiance of the
authority of Parliament, on principles subversive of the existing
laws and the constitution, and tending to introduce that system
of anarchy prevailing in France ; that his Majesty had given
orders for seizing the books and papers of those societies, which
were to be laid before the House, to whom it was recommended
to pursue measures necessary to counteract their pernicious ten
dency. A large collection of books and papers was, in conse
�62
The House of Brunswick.
quence, brought down to the House ; and, after an address had
been voted, a resolution was agreed to, that those papers should
be referred to a committee of secrecy. A few days after the
King’s message was delivered, the following persons were com
mitted to the Tower on a charge of high treason :—Mr. Thomas
Hardy, a shoemaker in Piccadilly, who officiated as secretary to
the London Corresponding Society ; Mr. Daniel Adams, secre
tary to the Society for Constitutional Information ; Mr. John
Horne Tooke ; Mr. Stewart Kyd ; Mr. Jeremiah Joyce, precep
tor to Lord Mahon, eldest son of the Earl of Stanhope ; and
Mr. John Thelwall, who had for some time delivered lectures on
political subjects in London.
Under the influence of excitement resulting from the Govern
ment statement of the discovery of a plot to assassinate the
King, and which plot never existed outside the brains of the
Government spies, a Special Commission of Oyer and Terminer
was issued on the ioth of September, 1794, for the trial of the
State prisoners confined in the Tower on a charge of high trea
son. On the 2nd of October, the Commission was opened at the
Sessions House, Clerkenwell, by Lord Chief Justice Eyre, in an
elaborate charge to the grand jury. Bills were then found against
all who had been taken up in May, except Daniel Adams.
Hardy was first put on his trial at the Old Bailey. The trial
commenced on the 28th of October, and continued with short
adjournments until the 5th of November. Mr Erskine was
•counsel for Hardy, and employed his great talents and brilliant
•eloquence with the most complete success. After consulting
together for thtee hours, the jury, who, though the avowed friends
•of the then administration, were men of impartiality,intelligence,
and of highly respectable characters, returned a verdict of N ot
Guilty. There has seldom been a verdict given in a British
-court of justice which afforded more general satisfaction. It is
doubtful whether there has been a verdict more important
in its consequences to the liberties of the English people. On
the 17th of November, John Horne Tooke was put on his trial.
The Duke of Richmond, Earl Camden, Mr. Pitt, and Mr. Beaufoy, were subpoenaed by the prisoner ; and the examination of
William Pitt by Mr. Tooke and his counsel, formed the most
important feature in the trial, as the evidence of the Prime
Minister tended to prove, that from the year 1780 to 1782, he
himself had been actively engaged with Mr. Tooke and many
•others in measures of agitation to procure a Parliamentary re
form, although he now not only deemed the attempt dangerous
.and improper, but sought to condemn it as treasonable, or at
least as seditious. Mr. Erskine, who was counsel for Mr. Tooke
also, in a most eloquent and powerful manner contended that
the conduct of his client was directed only to the same object as
that previously sought by Pitt himself, and that the measures
resorted to, so far from being criminal, were perfectly constitu
tional. Mr. Pitt was extremely guarded in his replies, and pro
fessed very little recollection of what passed at the meetings
�The House of Brunswick.
63
which he attended. A letter he had written to Mr. Tooke at
that time on the subject, was handed to him, which he pretended
he could scarcely recognise, and which the judge would not
permit to be read. Mr. Sheridan, who was likewise engaged in
the agitation for political reform, and subpoenaed by Mr. Tooke,
gave unqualified evidence in favour of Mr. Tooke respecting the
proceedings at those meetings. The trial continued till the
Saturday following, when the jury were out of court only six
minutes, and returned a verdict of Not Guilty !
The opening of Parliament was looked forward to with great
anxiety, on account of the extreme distress under which the
country was labouring. As the time approached, popular meet
ings were held in the metropolis, and preparations were made
for an imposing demonstration. During the morning of the 29th
of October, the day on which the King was to open the session
in person, crowds of men continued pouring into the town from
the various open spaces outside, where simultaneous meetings
had been called by placards and advertisements ; and before
the King left Buckingham House, on his way to St. James’s, the
number of people collected on the ground over which he had to
pass is admitted in the papers of the day to have been not less,
than two hundred thousand. At first the state carriage was
allowed to move on through this dense mass in sullen silence,
no hats being taken off, nor any other mark of respect being
shown. This was followed by a general outburst of hisses and
groans, mingled with shouts of “ Give us peace and bread 1”
No war!” “No King !” “ Down with him ! down with George!”
and the like ; and this tumult continued unabated until the King
reached the House of Lords, the Guards with difficulty keeping
the mob from closing on the carriage. As it passed through
Margaret Street the populace seemed determined to attack it,
and when opposite the Ordnance Office a stone passed through
the glass of the carriage window. ' A verse published the follow
ing day says:—
“ Folks say it was lucky the stone missed the head,
When lately at Caesar ’twas thrown ;
I think very different from thousands indeed,
’Twas a lucky escape for the stone.”
The demonstration was, if anything, more fierce on the King’s
return, and he had some difficulty in reaching St. James’s Palace
without injury ; for the mob threw stones at the state carriage
and damaged it considerably. After remaining a short time at
St. James’s, he proceeded in his private coach to Buckingham
House, but the carriage was stopped in the Park by the popu
lace, who pressed round it, shouting, “ Bread, bread ! Peace,
peace !” until the King was rescued from this unpleasant situa
tion by a strong body of the Guards.
Treason and sedition Acts were hurried through Parliament
to repress the cries of the hungry for bread, whilst additional
taxes were imposed to make the poor poorer.
�64
The House of Brunswick.
That the terrible French war—of which it is impossible to
give any account in the limits of this essay, a war which cost
Great Britain at least ^1,000,000,000 in hard cash, without
reckoning the hundreds of thousands of killed, wounded, and
pauperised, and which Buckle calls 11 the most hateful, the most
unjust, and the most atrocious war England has ever waged
against any country ”—directly resulted from our government
under the Brunswick family, is a point on which it is impossible
for any one who has examined the facts, to have serious doubt.
Sir Archibald Alison tells us that early in 1791, “The King of
England took a vivid interest in the misfortunes of the Royal
Family of France, promising, as Elector of Hanover, to concur
in any measures which might be deemed necessary to extricate
them from their embarrassments ; and he sent Lord Elgin to
Leopold, who was then travelling in Italy, to concert measures
for the common object.” It was as Elector of Hanover also that
his grandfather, George II., had sacrificed English honour and
welfare to the personal interest and family connections of these
wretched Brunswicks.- It is certain too that after years of
terrible war, on one of the Occasions of negotiation for peace,
hindrances arose because our Government insisted on describing
George III., in the preliminaries, as “King of France.” The
French naturally said, first, your King George never has been
King of any part of France at any time ; and next, we, having
just declared France a Republic, cannot in a solemn treaty re
cognise the continued existence of a claim to Monarchy over us.
The following table, which we insert at this stage to save the
need for further reference, shows how the labour of the British
nation was burdened for generations to come, by the insane
affection of the House of Brunswick for the House of Bourbon :—
Years.
1793
1794
1795
1796
1797
1798
1799
1800
1801
1802
1803
1804
1805
1806
1807
1808
1809
1810
1811
...
Taxes.
^17,656,418
17,170,400
17,308,411
17,858,454
18,737,760
20,654,650
30,202,915
35,229,968
33,896,464
35,415,296
37,240,213
37,677,063
45,359,442
49,659,281
53,3O4<254
58,390,255
61,538,207
63,405,294
66,681,366
Loans.
^25,926,526
—
51,705,698
56,945,566
25,350,000
35,624,250
21,875,300
29,045,000
44,816,250
41,489,438
16,000,000
18,200,000
39,543,124
29,880,000
18,373,200
13,693,254
21,278,122
19,811,108
29,244,711
�65
The House of Brunswick.
Years.
1812
1813
1814
1815
Taxes.
£64,763,870
63,169,845
66,925,835
69,684,192
Loans.
^40,743,031
54,780,324
63,645,930
70,888,402
£768,858,934
Total
■■ £981,929,853
After making some deductions on account of the operations of
the loyalty loan, and the transfer of annuities, the total debt con
tracted from 1793 to 1815, amounts to £762,537,445. If to this
sum be added the increase in the unfunded debt during that
period, and the additional sums raised by taxes in consequence
of hostilities, we shall have the total expenditure, owing to the
French war, as follows :—
Debt contracted from 1793 to 1815 • •• £762,537,445
50,194,060
Increase in the Unfunded Debt
614,488,459
War taxes
1,427,219,964
Total
Deduct sum paid to the Commissioners
for reduction of the National Debt ...
173,309,383
Total cost of the French war .............. £1,253,910,581
Lord Fife, in the House of Lords, said that “ in this horrid
war had he first witnessed the blood and treasure of the nation
expended in the extravagant folly of secret expeditions, which
had invariably proved either abortive or unsuccessful. Grievous
and heavy taxes had been laid on the people, and wasted in ex
pensive embassies, and in subsidising proud, treacherous, and
useless foreign princes.”
In 1795 King George and his advisers tried by statute to put
a stop for ever in this country to all political or religious discus
sion. No meeting was to be held, except on five days’ duly
advertised notice, to be signed by householders ; and if for lec
tures or debates, on special licence by a magistrate. Power was
given to any magistrate to put an end in his discretion to any
meeting, and to use military force in the event of twelve persons
remaining one hour after notice. If a man lent books, news
papers, or pamphlets without license, he might be fined twenty
pounds for every offence. If he permitted lectures or debates
on any subject whatever, he might be fined one hundred pounds
a day. And yet people dare to tell us that we owe our liberties
to these Brunswicks.
On the 1st of June, 1795, Gillray, in a caricature entitled
“ John Bull Ground Down,” had represented Pitt grinding John
Bull into money, which was flowing out in an immense stream
beneath the mill. The Prince of Wales is drawing off a large
portion, to pay the debts incurred by his extravagance ; while
Dundas, Burke, and Loughborough, as the representatives of
ministerial pensioners, are scrambling for the rest. King George
s
�I
66
The House of Brunswick.
encourages Pitt to grind without mercy. Another caricature by
Gillray, published on the 4th of June, represents Pitt as Death
on the White Horse (the horse of Hanover) riding over a drove
of pigs, the representatives of what Burke had termed the “ swi
nish multitude.”
On the 7th of January, 1796, the Princess Charlotte of Wales
was born, and on the 30th of April, George Prince of Wales
wrote to the Princess Caroline, stating that he did not intend to
live with her any more. The Prince had some time previously
sent by Lord Cholmondeley a verbal message to the same effect,
which, however, the Princess had refused to accept. The
. mistress reigning over the Prince of Wales at this time was
Lady Jersey.
No impeachment of the House of Brunswick would be even
tolerably supported which did not contain some reference to the
terrible misgovernment of Ireland under the rule of this obsti
nate and vicious family, and yet these few pages afford but little
space in which to show how beneficent the authority of King
George III. has proved to our Irish brethren.
During the war, when there were no troops in Ireland, and
when, under Flood and Grattan, the volunteers were in arms,
some concessions had been made to the Irish people. A few
obnoxious laws had been repealed, and promises had been held
out of some relaxation of the fearfully oppressive laws against
the Catholics. From the correspondence of Earl Temple, it is
clear that in 1782 not only was the King against any further
concession whatever, but that his Majesty and Lord Shelburne
actually manoeuvred to render the steps already taken as fruit
less as possible. We find W. W. Grenville admitting, on the
15th December, 1782, “that the [Irish] people are really miser
able and oppressed to a degree I had not at all conceived.” The
Government acted dishonestly to Ireland. The consequence
was, continued misery and disaffection ; and I assert, without
fear of contradiction, that this state of things is directly trace
able to the King’s wilfulness on Irish affairs. As an illustration
of the character of the Government, it is worth notice that Lord
Temple, when Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, wrote to his brother
in cipher, because his letters were opened in the Post Office by
Lord Shelburne. The Parliament of Ireland was in great part
owned by absentee peers, and each change of Lord-Lieutenancy
was marked by heavy addition to the Pension List. The con
tinuance of the Catholic disabilities rendered permanent quiet
impossible. Three-fourths of the nation were legally and socially
almost outlawed. The national discontent was excited by the
arbitrary conduct of the authorities, and hopes of successful
revolution were encouraged, after 1789, by the progress of the
Revolution in France.
About 1790, the “United Irishmen ” first began to be heard
of. Their object was “a complete reform in the legislature,
founded on the principles of civil, political, and religious liberty.”'
The clubs soon became secret associations, and were naturally
�The House of Brunswick.
67
soon betrayed. Prosecutions for sedition in 1793 were soon
followed by military repression.
Lord Moira in the House of Lords in 1797, in a powerful
speech, which has remained without any refutation, described
the Government of Ireland as “ the most absurd, as well as the
most disgusting, tyranny that any nation ever groaned under.”
He said : “ If such a tyranny be persevered in, the consequence
must inevitably be the deepest and most universal discontent,
and even hatred to the English name. I have seen in that
country a marked distinction made between the English and
Irish. I have seen troops that have been sent full of this preju
dice—that every inhabitant in that kingdom is a rebel to the
British Govenment. I have seen the most wanton insults prac
tised upon men of all ranks and conditions. I have seen the most
grievous oppressions exercised, in consequence of a presumption
that the person who was the unfortunate object of such oppres
sion was in hostility to the Government ; and yet that has been
done in a part of the country as quiet and as free from disturb
ance as the city of London.” His Lordship then observed that,
“ from education and early habits, the curfew vr&s, ever con
sidered by Britons as a badge of slavery and oppression. It was
then practised in Ireland with brutal rigour. He had known an
instance where the master of a house had in vain pleaded to be
allowed the use of a candle, to enable the mother to administer
relief to her daughter struggling in convulsive fits. In former
times, it had been the custom for Englishmen to hold the in
famous proceedings of the Inquisition in detestation. One of
the greatest horrors with which it was attended was that the
person, ignorant of the crime laid to his charge, or of his accuser,
was torn from his family, immured in a prison, and kept in the
most cruel uncertainty as to the period of his confinement, or
the fate which awaited him. To this injustice, abhorred by Pro
testants in the practice of the Inquisition, were the people of
Ireland exposed. All confidence, all security, were taken away.
When a man was taken up on suspicion he was put to the tor
ture ; nay, if he were merely accused of concealing the guilt of
another. The rack, indeed, was not at hand ; but the punish
ment of picqueting was in practice, which had been for some
years abolished as too inhuman, even in the dragoon service.
He had known a man, in order to extort a confession of a sup
posed crime, or of that of some of his neighbours, picqueted till
he actually fainted—picqueted a second time till he fainted
again, and as soon as he came to himself, picqueted a third time
till he once more fainted ; and all upon mere suspicion ! Nor
was this the only species of torture. Men had been taken and
hung up till they were half dead, and then threatened with a
repetition of the cruel treatment, unless they made confession
of the imputed guilt. These were not particular acts of
cruelty, exercised by men abusing the power committed
to them, but they formed part of our system. They were
notorious, and no petson could say who would be the
�68
The House of Brunswick.
next victim of this oppression and cruelty, which he saw
others endure. This, however, was not all; their lord
ships, no doubt, would recollect the famous proclamation issued
by a military commander in Ireland, requiring the people
to give up their arms. It never was denied that this proclama
tion was illegal, though defended on some supposed necessity ;
but it was not surprising that some reluctance had been shown
to comply with it by men who conceived the Constitution gave
them a right to keep arms in their houses fortheir own defence ;
and they could not but feel indignation in being called upon to
give up their right. In the execution of the order the greatest
cruelties had been committed. If anyone was suspected to have
concealed weapons of defence, his house, his furniture, and all
his property were burnt; but this was not all. If it were sup
posed that any district had not surrendered all the arms which
it contained, a party was sent out to collect the number at which
it was rated; and in execution of this order, thirty houses were
sometimes burnt down in a single night. Officers took upon
themselves to decide discretionary the quantity of arms ; and
upon their opinions the fatal consequences followed. These
facts were well known in Ireland, but they could not be made
public through the channel of the newspapers, for fear of that
summary mode of punishment which had been practised towards
the Northern Star, when a party of troops in open day, and in
a town where the General’s headquarters were, went and de
stroyed all the offices and property belonging to that paper. It
was thus authenticated accounts were suppressed.”
Can any one wonder that the ineffectual attempt at revolution
of 1798 followed such a state of things ? And when, in the
London Chronicle and Cambridge Intelligencer, and other jour
nals by no means favourable to Ireland or its people, we read
the horrid stories of women ravished, men tortured, and farms
pillaged, all in the name of law and order, and this by King
George’s soldiers, not more than seventy years ago, can we feel
astonishment that the Wexford peasants have grown up to hate
the Saxon oppressor ? And this we owe to a family of kings
who used their pretended Protestantism as a cloak for the illtreatment of our Catholic brethren in Ireland. In impeaching
the Brunswicks, we remind the people of proclamations of
ficially issued in the King’s name, threatening to burn and de
vastate whole parishes, and we allege that the disaffection in
Ireland at the present moment, is the natural fruit of the utter
regardlessness, on the part of these Guelphs, for human liberty,
or happiness, or life. The grossest excesses were perpetrated in
Ireland by King George II I.’s foreign auxiliaries. The troops
from Hesse Cassel, from Hesse Darmstadt, and from Hanover,
earned an unenviable notoriety by their cruelty, rapacity, and
licentiousness. And these we owe entirely to the Brunswicks.
A letter from the War Office, dated April nth, 1798, shows
how foreigners were specially selected for the regiments sent
over to Ireland. Sir Ralph Abercromby publicly rebuked the
�The House of Brunswick.
69
King’s army, of which he was the Commander-in-Chief, for their
disgraceful irregularities and licentiousness. Even LieutenantGeneral Lake admits that “ the determination of the troops to
destroy every one they think a rebel is beyond description, and
needs correction.”
In 1801, it was announced that King George III. was suffering
from severe cold and sore throat, and could not therefore go out
in public. His disease, however, was more mental than bodily.
Her present Majesty has also suffered from severe cold and sore
throat, but no allegation is ventured that her mental condition
is such as to unfit her for her Royal duties.
On March 29, 1802, the sum of .£990,053 was voted for pay
ment of the King’s debts.
In 1803, the Prince of Wales being again in debt, a further
vote was passed of ,£60,000 a year for three years and a half.
Endeavours were made to increase this grant, but marvellous to
relate, the House of Commons actually acted as if it had some
slight interest in the welfare of the people, and rejected a motion
of Mr. Calcraft for a further vote of money to enable his Royal
Highness to maintain his state and dignity. The real effect of
the vote actually carried, was to provide for ,£800,649 of the
Prince’s debts, including the vote of 1794.
On July 21, 1763, ,£60,000 cash, and a pension of ,£16,000 a
year, were voted to the Prince of Orange.
In 1804, King George was very mad, but Mr. Addington ex
plained to Parliament, that there was nothing in his Majesty’s
indisposition to prevent his discharging the Royal functions.
Mr. Gladstone also recently explained to Parliament, that there
would be no delay in the prorogation of Parliament in conse
quence of her gracious Majesty’s indisposition and absence.
In 1805, the House of Commons directed the criminal prose
cution of Lord Melville, for corrupt conduct and embezzlement of
public money, as first Lord of the Admiralty. For this, how
ever, impeachment was substituted, and on his trial before the
House of Peers, he was acquitted, as out of 136 peers, only 59
said that they thought him guilty, although he had admitted the
misapplication of ,£10,000.
On the 29th of March, 1806, a warrant was signed by King
George III., directed to Lord Chancellor Erskine, to Lord
Grenville, the Prime Minister, to Lord Ellenborough, then Lord
Chief Justice of England, and to Earl Spencer, commanding
them to inquire into the conduct of Her Royal Highness the
Princess of Wales. Before these Lords, Charlotte Lady Douglas
swore that she had visited the Princess, who confessed to having
committed adultery, saying “ that she got a bedfellow whenever
she could, that nothing was more wholesome.” Lady Douglas
further swore to the Princess’s pregnancy, and evidence was
given to prove that she had been delivered of a male child. The
whole of this evidence was found to be perjury, and Lady Douglas
was recommended for prosecution. The only person to be benefitted was George Prince of Wales, who desired to be divorced
�70
The House of Brunswick.
from his wife, and it is alleged that he suborned these witnesses
to commit perjury against her. At this time the Prince of Wales
himself had just added Lady Hertford to the almost intermin
able muster-roll of his loves, and was mixed up in a still more
strange and disgraceful transaction, in which he used his per
sonal influence to canvass Peers—sitting as the highest law court
in the realm—-in order to induce them to vote the guardianship
of Miss Seymour, a niece of Lady Hertford, to Mrs. Fitzherbert.
Spencer Perceval, who acted for the Princess of Wales, being
about to publish the whole of the proceedings of the Royal Com
missioners, with the evidence and their verdict, his book was
quietly suppressed, and he received a reward—a post in the
Cabinet. It is said that Ceorge III. directed the report of the
Commissioners to be destroyed, and every trace of the whole
affair to be buried in oblivion.
For some years rumours had been current of corruption in
the administration of military promotion under the Duke of
York, just as for some time past rumours have been current of
abuse of patronage under his Royal Highness the present Duke
of Cambridge. A Major Hogan, in 1808, published a declara
tion that he had lost his promotion because he had refused to
give the sum of ^600 to the Duke of York’s “ Venus.”
On the 27th January, 1809, Colonel Wardle—who is said to
have been prompted to the course by his Royal Highness the
Duke of Kent—rose in his place in the House of Commons,
and formally charged his Royal Highness Frederick Duke of
York with corruption in the administration of army patronage.
It is difficult to determine how far credit should be given to
the statements of Mrs. Clarke, who positively alleges that she
was bribed to betray the Duke of York by his brother, the
Duke of Kent, the father of her present Majesty. It is quite
certain that Major Dodd, the private secretary of the Duke of
Kent, was most active in collecting and marshalling the evi
dence in support of the various charges made in the Commons
against the Duke of York. The Duke of Kent, however, after
the whole business was over, formally and officially denied that
he was directly or indirectly mixed up in the business. It is
clear that much bitter feeling had for some time existed between
the Dukes of York and Kent. In a pamphlet published about
that time, we find the following remarkable passages relating to
the Duke of Kent’s removal from his military command at Gib
raltar :—“ It is, however, certain that the creatures whom we
could name, and who are most in his [the Duke of York’s] con
fidence, were, to a man, instructed and industriously employed
in traducing the character and well-merited fame of the Duke
of Kent, by misrepresenting his conduct with all the baseness
of well-trained sycophants. Moreover, we need not hesitate
in saying that this efficient Commander-in-Chief, contrary to the
real sentiments of his Majesty, made use of his truly dangerous
and undue influence with the confidential servants of the Crown
to get his brother recalled from the Government of Gibraltar,
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under a disingenuous pretext, and at the risk of promoting sedi
tion in the army.”
In another pamphlet, dated 1808, apparently printed on behalf
of the Duke of Kent, we find it suggested that the Duke of
York had used Sir Hew Dalrymple as a spy on his brothei' the
Duke of Kent at Gibraltar. Whether the Duke of York slan
dered the Duke of Kent, and whether the Queen's father re
venged himself by getting up the case for Colonel Wardle, others
must decide. The following extracts from this gentleman’s
address to the House of Commons, are sufficient to put the
material points before our readers :—
“ In the year 1803, his Royal Highness the Commander-inChief took a handsome house, set up a full retinue of servants
and horses, and also a lady of the name of Clarke. Captain
Tonyn, of the 48th Regiment, was introduced by Captain Sandon, of the Royal Waggon Train, to this Mrs. Clarke, and it was
agreed that, upon his being promoted to the majority of the 31st
Regiment, he should pay her ^500. The ^500 lodged, with Mr.
Donovan by Captain Sandon, was paid by him to Mrs. Clarke.
The difference between a company and a majority is ^1100 ;
this lady received only ^500, while the half-pay fund lost the
whole sum, for the purpose of putting ^500 into the pocket of
Mrs. Clarke. This ^500 was paid by Mrs. Clarke to Mr. Per
kins, a silversmith, in part payment for a service of plate ; that
the Commander-in-Chief made good the remainder, and that the
goods were sent to his house in Gloucester Place. From this I
infer, first, that Mrs. Clarke possesses the power of military pro
motion ; secondly, that she received a pecuniary consideration
for such promotion ; and thirdly, that the Commander-in-Chief
was a partaker in the benefit arising from such transactions. In
this case, there are no less than five different persons as wit
nesses—viz., Major Tonyn, Mrs. Clarke, Mr. Donovan, Captain
Sandon, and the executor of Mr. Perkins, the silversmith.
“The next instance is of Lieutenant Colebrooke, of the 56th
Regiment. It was agreed that Mrs. Clarke should receive /200
upon Lieutenant Colebrooke’s name appearing in the Gazette for
promotion. At that moment, this lady was anxious to go on an
excursion into the country, and she stated to his Royal High
ness that she had an opportunity of getting ^200 to defray the
expenses of it, without applying to him. This was stated upon
a Thursday, and on the Saturday following this officer’s name
appeared in the Gazette, and he was accordingly promoted; upon
which Mr. Tuck waited on the lady and paid her the money. To
this transaction the witnesses are Lieutenant Colebrooke, Mr
Tuck, and Mrs. Clarke.”
After instancing further cases, Colonel Wardle stated that :—
“ At this very hour there is a public office in the city where
commissions are still offered at the reduced prices which Mrs.
Clarke chooses to exact for them. The agents there have de
clared to me that they are now employed by the present favourite,
Mrs. Carey. They have not only declared this as relative to
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military commissions, but they have carried it much farther;
for, in addition to commissions in the army, places of all desscriptions, both in Church and State, are transacted at their
office ; and these agents do not hesitate to give it under their
own hands, that they are employed by many of the first officers
in his Majesty’s service.”
On the examination of witnesses, and general inquiry, which
lasted seven weeks, the evidence was overwhelming, but the
Duke of York having written a letter, pledging his honour as a
Prince that he was innocent, was acquitted, although at least
112 Members of Parliament voted for a verdict of condemna
tion. In the course of the debate, Lord Temple said that “he
found the Duke of York deeply criminal in allowing this woman
to interfere in his official duties. The evidence brought forward
by accident furnished convincing proofs of this crime. It was
evident in French’s levy. It was evident in the case of Dr.
O’Meara, this minister of purity, this mirror of virtue, who, pro
fessing a call from God, could so far debase himself, so far abuse
his sacred vocation, as to solicit a recommendation from such a
person as Mrs. Clarke, by which, with an eye to a bishopric,
he obtained an opportunity of preaching before the King. What
could be said in justification of his Royal Highness for allowing
this hypocrite to come down to Weymouth under a patronage,
unbecoming his duty, rank, and situation ?”
Mr. Tierney—in reply to a taunt of the Chancellor of the
Exchequer, that Colonel Wardle had been tutored by “ cooler
heads ”—said : “ He would state that the Duke of York had got
his letter drawn up by weaker heads ; he would, indeed, add
something worse, if it were not unparliamentary to express it.
The Duke of York was, he was persuaded, too manly to sub
scribe that letter, if he were aware of the base, unworthy, and
mean purposes to which it was to be applied. It was easy to
conceive that his Royal Highness would have been prompt to
declare his innocence upon a vital point ; but why declare it
upon the 1 honour of a Prince,’ for the thing had no meaning ?”
Mr. Lyttleton declared that “ if it were in the power of the
House to send down to posterity the character of the Duke of
York unsullied—if their proceedings did not extend beyond
their journals, he should be almost inclined to concur in the
vote of acquittal, even in opposition to his sense of duty. But
though the House should acquit his Royal Highness, the proofs
would still remain, and the public opinion would be guided by
them, and not by the decision of the House. It was in the
power of the House to save its own character, but not that of
the Commander-in-Chief.”
It is alleged that the Queen herself by no means stood with
clean hands ; that in connection with Lady Jersey and a Doctor
Randolph, her Majesty realised an enormous sum by the sale of
cadetships for the East Indies.
On the 31st May, 1810, London was startled by the narrative
of a terrible tragedy. His Royal Highness Ernest Augustus,
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Duke of Cumberland, afterwards King of Hanover, and who,
while King of Hanover, drew ,£24,000 a year from the pockets
of English taxpayers, was wounded in his own room in the dead
of the night, by some man whom he did not see, although the
room was lighted by a lamp, although his Royal Highness saw
“a letter” which lay on a night tableland which letter was
“covered with blood.” The wounds are said to have been
sword wounds inflicted with an intent to assassinate, by Joseph
Sellis, a valet of the Duke, who is also said to have immediately
afterwards committed suicide by cutting his own throat. General
Sir B. Stephenson, who saw the body of Sellis, but who was
not examined at the inquest, swore that “ the head was nearly
severed from the body.” Sellis’s cravat had been cut through
and taken off his neck. Sir Everard Home and Sir Henry
Halford were the physicians present at St. James’s Palace the
day of this tragedy, and two surgeons were present at the in
quest, but no 'medical or surgical evidence was taken as to
whether or not the death of Sellis was the result of suicide or
murder; but a cheesemonger was called to prove that twelve
years before he had heard Sellis say, “ Damn the King and the
Royal Family and a maid servant was called to prove that
fourteen years before Sellis had said, “ Damn the Almighty.”
Despite this conclusive evidence, many horrible rumours were
current, which, at the time, were left uncontradicted ; but on
the 17th April, 1832, his Hoyal Highness the Duke of Cumber
land made an affidavit in which he swore that he had not mur
dered Sellis himself, and that “ in case the said person named
Sellis did not die by his own hands,” then that he, the Duke,
was not any way, in any manner, privy or accessory to his
death.” His Royal Highness also swore that “ he never did com
mit, nor had any intention of committing, the detestable crime,”
which it had been pretended Sellis had discovered the Duke in
the act of committing. This of course entirely clears the Queen’s
uncle from all suspicion. Daniel O’Connell, indeed, described
him as “ the mighty great liarbut with the general character for
truthfulness of the family, it would be in the highest degree im
proper to suggest even the semblance of a doubt. It was proved
upon the inquest that Seliis was a sober, quiet man, in the
habit of daily shaving the Duke, and that he had never exhibited
any suicidal or homicidal tendencies. It therefore appears that
he tried to wound or kill his Royal Highness without any motive,
and under circumstances in which he knew discovery was inevit
able, and that he then killed himself with a razor, cutting his
head almost off his body, severing it to the bone. When
Matthew Henry Graslin first saw the body, he “ told them all
that Sellis had been murdered,” and although he was cafed on
the inquest, he does not say one word as to the condition of
Sellis’s body, or as to whether or not he believes it to have been
a suicide. Of all the persons who saw the body of Sellis, and
they appear to be many, only one, a sergeant in the Coldstreams,
gave the slightest evidence as to the state in which the body was
H
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found, and no description whatever was given on the inquest, of
the nature of the fearful wound which had nearly severed Sellis’s
head from his body ; nor, although it was afterwards proved by
sworn evidence that Sellis’s cravat “was cut through the whole
of the folds, and the inside fold was tinged with blood,” was any
evidence offered as to this on the inquest, although it shows that
Sellis must have first tried to cut his throat through his cravat,
and that having partially but ineffectively cut his throat, he then
took off his cravat and gave himself with tremendous force the
gash which caused his death. It is said that the razor with which
Sellis killed himself was found two feet from the bed, and on
the left-hand side ; but although it was stated that Sellis was a
left-handed man, no evidence was offered of this, and on the
contrary, the bloody hand marks, said to have been made by
Sellis on the doors, were all on the right-hand. It is a great
nuisance when people you are mixed up with commit suicide.
Undoubtedly, Sellis must have killed himself. The journals tell
us how Lord Graves killed himself long years afterward. The
Duke of Cumberland and Lady Graves, the widow, rode out
together very shortly after the suicide.
In the Rev. Erskine Neale’s Life of the Duke of Kent it is
stated that a surgeon of note, who saw Sellis after his death,
declared that there were several wounds on the back of the
neck which it was physically impossible Sellis could have
self-inflicted. In a lecture to his pupils the surgeon repeated
this in strong language, declaring that “no man can behead
himself.”
The madness of George III. having become too violent and
too continual to permit it to be any longer hidden from the
people, the Prince of Wales was, in 1811, declared Regent, with
limited powers, and ^70,000 a year additional was voted for
the Regent’s expenses, and a further 10,000 a year also granted
to the Queen as custodian of her husband. The grant to the
Queen was the more outrageous, as her great wealth and
miserly conduct were well known. When the Regent was first
appointed, he authorised the Chancellor of the Exchequer to
declare officially to the House of Commons, that he woulcj
not add to the burdens of the nation ; and yet, in 1812, the
allowance voted was made retrospective, so as to include every
hour of his office.
In the discussion in Parliament on the proposed Regency,
it appeared that the people had been for a considerable period
utterly deceived on the subject of the King’s illness ; and that
although his Majesty had been for some time blind, deaf, and
delirious, the Ministry representing the King to be competent,
had dared to carry on the Government whilst George III.
was in every sense incapacitated. It is worthy of notice th'at
the Right Honourable Benjamin Disraeli, the leader of the
great Conservative party in this country, publicly declared on
September 26th, 1871, that her present Majesty, Queen Victoria,
was both “ physically and morally ” incapable of performing her
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regal functions. One advantage of having the telegraph wires
in the hands of Government is shown by the fact that all the
telegraphic summaries omitted the most momentous words of
Mr. Disraeli’s speech. During the debate in the session of
1811, it was shown that when the King was mad in the month
of March, 1804, he had on the 4th been represented by Lord
Eldon as if he had given his assent to a Bill granting certain
lands to the Duke of York, and on the 9th as if he had signed a
commission.
Earl Grey stated that it was notorious that on two occasions
the Great Seal had been employed as if by his Majesty’s com
mand, while he was insane. The noble earl also declared that
in 1801, the King was mad for some weeks, and yet during that
time councils were held, members sworn to it, and acts done re
quiring the King’s sanction. Sir Francis Burdett said, “ that to
have a person at the head of affairs who had long been incapable
of signing his name to a document without some one to guide
his hand ; a person long incapable of receiving petitions, of even
holding a levee, or discharging the most ordinary functions of
his office, and now afflicted with this mental malady, was a most
mischievous example to the people of this country, while it had
a tendency to expose the Government to the contempt of foreign
nations.”
One of the earliest acts of the Prince Regent was to reappoint
his brother, the Duke of York, to the office of Commander-inChief. A motion was proposed by Lord Milton, in the House
of Commons, declaring this appointment to be “highly improper
and indecorous.” The Ministry were, however, sufficiently
powerful to negative this resolution by a large majority. Though
his Royal Highness had resigned his high office when assailed
with charges of the grossest corruption, he was permitted to re
sume the command of the army without even a protest, save
from a minority of the House of Commons, and from a few of the
unrepresented masses. The chief mistress of the Prince Regent
at this time was the Marchioness of Hertford ; and the Courier,
then the ministerial journal, had the cool impudence to speak of
her as “Britain’s guardian angel,” because her influence had
been used to hinder the carrying any measure for the relief of the
Irish Catholics. Amongst the early measures under the Regency,
was the issue in Ireland of a circular letter addressed to the
Sheriffs and Lord Lieutenants of the counties, forbidding the
meetings of Catholics, and threatening all Catholic committees
with arrest and imprisonment. This, however, was so grossly
illegal, that it had shortly after to be abandoned, a Protestant
jury having refused to convict the first prisoners brought to
trial. It is curious to read the arguments against Catholic Eman
cipation pleaded in the Courier, one being that during the whole
of his reign, George III. “ is known to have felt the most con
scientious and irrevocable objections ” to any such measure of
justice to his unfortunate Irish subjects.
In 1812 we had much poverty in England ; and though this
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The House of Brunswick.
was not dealt with by Parliament, £^100,000 was granted to Lord
Wellington, and ,£200,000 voted for Russian sufferers by the
French war. We had a few months previously voted .£100,000
for the relief of the Portuguese against the French. On a
message from the Prince Regent, annuities of £3,000 each were
also granted to the four Princesses, exclusive of ,£4,000 from
the Civil List. The message from the Prince Regent for the
relief of the “Russian sufferers” was brought down on the
17th of December; and it is a curious fact that while Lord
Castlereagh and Lord Liverpool were eulogising the Russians
for their “heroic patriotism” in burning Moscow, the Rus
sians themselves were declaring in the St. Petersburgh Gazette
that the deed was actually committed by “the impious French,”
on whose heads the Gazette invoked the vengeance of God.
In 1812, the Prince Regent gave a sinecure office, that of
Paymaster of Widows’ Pensions, to his “ confidential servant,”
Colonel Macmahon. The nature of the sort of private services
which had been for some years performed by this gallant
colonel for this virtuous Prince may be better guessed than
described. Mr. Henry Brougham declared the appointment to
be an insult to Parliament. It was vigorously attacked indoors
and out of doors, and in obedience to the voice of popular
opinion the Commons voted the immediate abolition of the
office. To recompense Colonel Macmahon for the loss of his
place, he was immediately appointed Keeper of the Privy Purse
and Private Secretary to the Prince Regent. This appoint
ment was also severely criticised; and although the Govern
ment were sufficiently powerful to defeat the attack in the
Commons, they were yet compelled, by the strong protest made
by the public against such an improper appointment, to nomi
nally transfer the salary to the Regent’s privy purse. The trans
fer was not real, as, the Civil List being always in debt, the
nation had in fact ultimately to pay the money.
In 1813, foreign subsidies to the amount of ,£ 11,000,000, and
100,000 stand of arms, were voted by the English Parliament.
Out of the above, Portugal received £,2,000,000, Sicily ,£400,000,
Spain £3,000,000, Sweden £3,000,000, Russia and Prussia
£3,000,000, Austria £3,000,000, besides stores sent to Germany
to the amount of £3,000,000 more.
This year his Royal Highness the Prince Regent went to
Ascot races, where he was publicly dunned by a Mr. Vauxhall
Clarke for a betting debt incurred some years before, and left
unpaid.
Great excitement was created in and out of Parliament by
the complaint of the Princess of Wales that she was not allowed
to see her daughter, the Princess Charlotte. The Prince Re
gent formally declared, through the Speaker of the House of
Commons, that he would not meet, on any occasion, public or
private, the Princess of Wales (whom it was urged that “ he had
been forced to marry ”) ; while the Princess of Wales wrote a
formal letter to Parliament complaining that her character
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77
had been “traduced by suborned perjury.” Princess Char
lotte refused to be presented at Court except by her mother
who was not allowed to go there. In the House of Commons’
Mr. Whitbread charged the Lords Commissioners with unduly
straining the evidence, by leading questions ; and Lord Ellenborough, in his place in the House of Peers, declared that the
accusation was “ as false as hell.” Ultimately, it was admitted
that the grave charges against the Princess of Wales were
groundless, and ^35,000 a year was voted to her, she agree
ing to travel abroad. Mr. Bathurst, a sinecurist pensioner,
pleading on behalf of the Prince Regent that the House of
Commons ought not to interfere, urged that it was no unusual
thing to have dissensions in the Royal Family, and that they
had been frequent in the reigns of George I. and George II.
Mr. Stuart Wortley, in the course of a severe speech in reply
to Lord Castlereagh, declared that “we had a Royal Family
which took no warning from what was said or thought about
them, and seemed to be the only persons in the country who
were wholly regardless of their own welfare and respectability.”
The Princess Charlotte of Wales was at this time residing in
Warwick House, and some curiosity was aroused by the dis
missal, by order of the Prince Regent, of all her servants. This
was immediately followed by the flight of the Princess from the
custody of her father to the residence of her mother, the Princess
of Wales. Persuaded to return to the Prince Regent by her
mother, Lord Eldon, and others, she appears to have been
really detained as a sort of prisoner, for we find the Duke of
Sussex soon after complaining in the House of Lords that he
was unable to obtain access to the Princess, and asking by
whose authority she was kept in durance. Happy family these
Brunswicks.
In 1814, ^100,000 further was voted to the Duke of Wellington
together with an annuity of ,£10,000 a year, to be at any time
commuted for ,£300,000. The income of the Duke of Wellington
from places, pensions, and grants, amounted to an enormous
sum. At present we pay his heir ,£4000 a year for having in
herited his father’s riches.
th® year i^i4j .£118,857 was voted for payment of the
Civil List debts.
The Emperor of Russia and King of Prussia, after the resto.ratmn of Louis XVIII., visited the Prince Regent in this country,
when the following squib was published :—
“ There be princes three,
Two of them come from a far countrie,
And for valour and prudence their names shall be
Enrolled in the annals of glorie.
The third is said at a bottle to be
More than a match for his whole armie,
And fonder of fur caps and fripperie
Than any recorded in storie.
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Those from the North great warriors be,
And warriors have in their companie,
But he of the South must stare to see
Himself in such goodly companie.
For to say what his usual consorts be,
Would make but a pitiful storie.”
On the 12th of August, 1814, the Princess of Wales quitted
England, and it is alleged that on the evening prior to her de
parture, the Prince Regent, having as usual drunk much wine,
proposed a toast, “To the Princess of Wales damnation, and
may she never return to England.” Whether this story, which
Dr. Doran repeats, be true or false, it is certain that the Prince
Regent hated his wife with a thoroughly merciless hatred. When
the death of Napoleon was known in England, a gentleman,
thinking to gain favour with George IV., said, “ Your Majesty’s
bitterest enemy is dead.” The “first gentleman of Europe”
thought only of his wife, and replied, “ Is she, by God !”
The highly esteemed and virtuous Duke of Cumberland was
married at Berlin to the Princess of Salms, a widow who had
been twice married, once betrothed, and once divorced. The
lady was niece to the Oueen of England, who refused to receive
her publicly or privately. On this refusal being known, a letter
was published in the newspapers, written and signed by the
Queen herself, to her brother the Duke of Mecklenburgh-Strelitz,
the father of the bride, in which letter the Queen gave assurances
of a kind reception to the bride on her arrival in England. The
Queen’s friends replied that the Queen’s letter was only written to
be shown to the German Courts on the condition that the Duchess
should not come to England. Curious notions of truth and
honour seem current among these Brunswicks.
On the 27th of June, the Lords, on a message from the Prince
Regent, voted an additional allowance of £6,000 a year to the
Duke of Cumberland in consequence of the marriage. In the
House of Commons, after a series of very warm debates, in which
Lord Castlereagh objected to answer “ any interrogatories tend
ing to vilify the Royal Family,” the House ultimately refused to
grant the allowance by 126 votes against 125.
One historian says : “ The demeanour of the Duchess of
Cumberland in this country has been, to say the least, unobtru
sive and unimpeached; but it must be confessed that a disastrous
fatality—something inauspicious and indescribable—attaches to
the Prince, her husband.”
This year ,£200,000 further was voted to the Duke of Welling
ton, for the purchase of an estate, although it appeared from one
Member of Parliament’s speech that the vote should rather have
been to the Prince Regent. “Who,” he asked, “ had rendered
the army efficient ? The Prince Regent—by restoring the Duke
of York to the Horse Guards. Who had gained the Battle of
Waterloo ? The Prince Regent—by giving the command of the
army to the Duke of Wellington 1! ” The Prince Regent him
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79
self had even a stronger opinion on the matter. Thackeray says:
“ I believe it is certain about George IV. that he had heard so
much of the war, knighted so many people, and worn such a
prodigious quantity of marshal’s uniforms, cocked hats, cocks’
feathers, scarlet and bullion in general, that he actually fancied
he had been present at some campaigns, and under the name of
General Brock led a tremendous charge of the German legion at
Waterloo.”
In 1816, Prince Leopold of Coburg Saalfeld, a very petty Ger
man Prince, without estate or position, married the Princess
Charlotte of Wales as if he were a Protestant, although he most
certainly on other occasions acted as if he belonged to the
Catholic Church. A grant of £60,000 a year was made to the
royal couple; ,£60,000 was given for the wedding outfit, and
£50,000 secured to Prince Leopold for life, in the event of his
surviving the Princess. And although this was done, it was well
known to the Prince Regent and the members of the Govern
ment, that on the 2nd January of the previous year, a marriage
ceremony, according to the rites of the Roman Catholic Church,
had been performed, by which the Prince Leopold was united to
the Countess of Cohaky. Bigamy appears to be a fashionable
vice, and one to which these Brunswicks never raise any objec
tion.
On the 9th December, the City of London presented an
address to the Prince Regent, in which they complained of
immense subsidies to foreign powers to defend their own
territories, or to commit aggressions on those of their neigh-,
hours,” “ of an unconstitutional and unprecedented military force
in time of peace, of the unexampled and increasing magnitude
of the Civil List, of the enormous sums paid for unmerited pen
sions and sinecures, and of a long course of the most lavish and
improvident expenditure of the public money throughout every
branch of the Government.” This address appears to have
deeply wounded the Regent, and the expressions of stern rebuke
he used in replying, coupled with a rude sulkiness of manner,
were ungracious and unwarrantable. He emphasised his answer
with pauses and frowns, and turned on his heel as soon as he
had delivered it. And yet at this moment hundreds of thousands
m England were starving. Kind monarchs these Brunswicks.
Early in 1817, the general distress experienced in all parts
of England, and which had been for some time on the increase,
was of a most severe character. Meetings in London, and the
provinces grew frequent, and were most numerously attended,
and on February 3rd, in consequence of a message from the
Prince Regent, Committees of Secrecy were appointed by the
Lords and Commons, to inquire into the character of the various
movements. The Government was weak and corrupt, but the
people lacked large-minded leaders, and the wide-spread discon
tent of the masses of the population rendered sqme of their
number easy victims to the police spies who manufactured
political plots.
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The House of Brunswick.
On the 6th of November, 1817, Princess Charlotte of Wales
died. Complaints were raised that the Princess had not been
fairly treated, and some excitement was created by the fact that
Sir Richard Croft, the doctor who attended her, soon after com
mitted suicide, and that the public and the reporters were not
allowed to be present at the inquest. No notice whatever of the
Princess’s death was forwarded to her mother, the Princess of
Wales. In a letter to the Duke of Buckingham, Mr. Wynn
speaks of this as “ the most brutal omission I ever remember,
and one which would attach disgrace in private life.” At this
very time a large sum of money was being wasted in the employ
ment of persons to watch the Princess of Wales on her foreign
travels. In her correspondence we find the Princess complain
ing that her letters were opened and read, and that she was sur
rounded with spies. From the moment that George III. was
declared incurable, and his death approaching, there seems little
doubt that desperate means were resorted to to manufacture
evidence against the Princess to warrant a divorce.
On July 13th, 1818, his Royal Highness the Duke of Clarence
married Adelaide, Princess of Saxe Meiningen, and his Royal
Highness the Duke of Kent married Her Serene Highness
Victoria, Princess of Leiningen. The Duke of Clarence, of
course, had voted to him an additional allowance of ,£6,000 a
year on entering the married state, although he was already re
ceiving from the country more than ,£21,000 a year in cash, and
a house rent free. It is highly edifying to read that during the
debates in Parliament, and when some objection was raised to
the extra sums proposed to be voted to one of the Royal Dukes,
Mr. Canning pleaded as a reason for the payment, that his Royal
Highness was not marrying “ for his own private gratification,but
because he had been advised to do so for the political purposes
of providing succession to the throne.” Pleasant this for the
lady, and glorious for the country—Royal breeding machines!
The Duke of Kent, who had the same additional vote, had about
^£25,000 a year, besides a grant of ,£20,000 towards the pay
ment of his debts, and a loan of .£6,000 advanced in 1806, of
which up to the time of his marriage only ,£1,000 had been repaid.
Of Edward Augustus Duke of Kent, father of her present
Majesty, it is only necessary to say a few words. The fourth
son of George III. was somewhat better than his brothers, and
perhaps for this very reason he seems always to have been dis
liked, and kept at a distance by his father, mother, and brothers.
Nor was the Duke of Kent less disliked amongst the army,
which he afterwards commanded. Very7 few of the officers
loved him, and the bulk of the privates seem to have regarded
him with the most hostile feelings. Kept very short of money
by his miserly father and mother, he had even before his ma
jority incurred considerable debts ; and coming to England in
1790, in order to try and induce the King to make him some
sufficient allowance, he was ordered to quit England in ten days.
While allowances were made to all the other sons of George,
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the Duke of Kent had no Parliamentary vote until he was
thirty-three years of age. In 1802 he was appointed Governor
of Gibraltar, where a mutiny took place, and the Duke had a
narrow escape of his life. The Duke of Kent’s friends allege
that this mutiny was encouraged by officers of the highest rank,
secretly sustained by the Duke of York. The Duke of York’s
friends, on the contrary, maintain that the overbearing conduct
of the Duke of Kent, his severity in details, and general harsh
ness in command, alone produced the result. The Duke of Kent
was recalled from the Government of Gibraltar, and for some
months the pamphleteers were busy on behalf of the two Dukes,
each seeking to prove that the Royal brother of his Royal
client was a dishonourable man. Pleasant people, these Bruns
wicks 1 If either side wrote the truth, one of the Dukes was a
rascal. If neither side wrote the truth, both were. The follow
ing extract from a pamphlet by Mary Anne Clarke, mistress of
the Duke of York, will serve to show the nature of the publica
tions I refer to : “I believe there is scarcely a military man in
the kingdom who was at Gibraltar during the Duke of Kent’s
command of that fortress but is satisfied that the Duke of
York’s refusal of a court martial to his Royal brother af
forded an incontestible proof of his regard for the military
character and honour of the Duke of Kent ; for if a court
martial had been granted to the Governor of Gibraltar, I
always understood there was but one opinion as to what
would have been the result; and then the Duke of Kent
would have lost several thousands a year, and incurred such
public reflections that would, most probably, have been pain
ful to his honourable and acute feelings. It was, however,
this act of affection for the Duke of Kent that laid the
foundation of that hatred which has followed the Commander
in-Chief up to the present moment; and to this unnatural
feeling he is solely indebted for all the misfortunes and dis
grace to which he has been introduced. In one of the many
conversations which I had with Majors Dodd and Glennie,
upon the meditated ruin of the Duke of York, they informed
me that their royal friend had made every endeavour in his power
to poison the King's ear against the Commander-in-Chief, but
as Colonel Taylor was so much about the person of his Majesty,
all his efforts had proved ineffectual; and to have spoken his
sentiments before Colonel Taylor would have been very inju
dicious, as he would immediately have communicated them to
the Commander-in-Chief, who, though he knew this time (said
these confidential and worthy patriots) that the Duke of Kent
was supporting persons to write against him, and that some
parliamentary proceedings were upon the eve of bursting upon
the public attention, yet deported himself towards his royal
brother as if they lived but for each other’s honour and happi
ness ; and the Duke of Kent, to keep up appearances, was more
particular in his attentions to the Duke of York than he had
ever been before.”
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Despite the Duke of Kent’s recall, he continued to receive
salary and allowances as Governor. After the celebration of the
marriage, he resided abroad, and was on such unfriendly terms
with his family that when he returned from Amorbach to England,
it was against the express orders of the Prince Regent, who,
shortly after meeting his brother at the Spanish Ambassador’s,
took not the slightest notice of him.
On the 17th November, 1818, the Queen died, and the custody
of the body of the mad, deaf, and blind monarch of England was
nominally transferred to the Duke of York, who was voted an
extra ,£10,000 a year for performing the duty of visiting his royal
father twice a week. Objection was ineffectually raised that his
Royal Highness had also his income as Commander-in-Chief
and General Officer, and it might have also been added, his
pensions and his income as Prince Bishop of Osnaburg. Mr.
Curwen said : “ Considering how complete the revenue of his
Royal Highness was from public emoluments, he could not con
sent to grant him one shilling upon the present occasion.”
In 1819, the Duke of Kent tried to get up a lottery for the sale
of his Castlebar estate, in order to pay his debts, which were
then about ,£70,000, but the project being opposed by the Prince
Regent, fell to the ground.
On the 24th of May, 1819, her present Majesty was bom;
and on the 23rd January, 1820, the Duke of Kent, her father,
died.
On the 29th January, 1820, after a sixty years’ reign—in which
debt, dishonour, and disgrace accrued to the nation he reigned
over—George III. died. The National Debt at the date of his
accession to the throne was about £ 150,000,000, at his death it
was about ,£900,000,000.
Phillimore asks : “ Had it not been for the unlimited power
of borrowing, how many unjust and capricious wars would
have been avoided. How different would be our condition, and
the condition of our posterity. If half the sum lavished to prevent
any one bearing the name of Napoleon from residing in France,
for replacing the Bourbons on the thrones of France and Naples,
for giving Belgium to Holland, Norway to Sweden, Finland
to Russia, Venice and Lombardy to Austria, had been employed
by individual enterprise, what would now be the resources of
England.”
An extract, giving Lord Brougham’s summary of George III.’s
life and character, may, we think, fairly serve to close this
chapter :—“ Of a narrow understanding, which no culture had
enlarged ; of an obstinate disposition, which no education per
haps could have humanised ; of strong feelings in ordinary
things, and a resolute attachment to all his own opinions and
predilections, George III. possessed much of the firmness of
purpose which, being exhibited by men of contracted mind
without any discrimination, and as pertinaciously when they are
in the wrong as when they are in the right, lends to their cha
racters an appearance of inflexible consistency, which is often
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mistaken for greatness of mind, and not seldom received as a
substitute for honesty. In all that related to his kingly office he
was the slave of deep-rooted selfishness ; and no fueling of a
kindly nature ever was allowed access to his bosom whenever
his power was concerned.”
CHAP. V.
THE REIGN OF GEORGE IV.
The wretched reign of George IV. commenced on the 30th
January, 1820. Mr. Buckle speaks of “the incredible baseness
of that ignoble voluptuary who succeeded George III. on the
throne.” The coronation was delayed for a considerable period,
partly in consequence of the hostility between the King and his
unfortunate wife, and partly because of the cost. We find the
Right Hon. Thomas Grenville writing of the coronation : “ I
think it probable that it will be put off, because the King will
not like it unless it be expensive, and Vansittart knows not how
to pay for it if it is.” Generous monarchs, these Brunswicks !
Thousands at that moment were in a state of starvation in
England, Scotland, and Ireland. Lord Cassilis writes : “ There
seems nothing but chaos and desolation whatever way a man
may turn himself.......... the lower orders existing only from the
circumstance of the produce of the land being unmarketable.
.......... The weavers are certainly employed, but they cannot
earn more than from six to eight shillings a week. Such is our
state.” When the coronation did ultimately take place, some
strange expenses crept in. Diamonds were charged for to the
extent, it is said, of ,£80,000, which found their way to one of
the King’s favoured mistresses. The crown itself was made up
with hired jewels, which were kept for twenty-one months after
the coronation, and for the hire of which alone the country
paid ^11,000. The charge for coronation robes was ,£24,000.
It was in consequence of Sir Benjamin Bloomfield having to
account for some of the diamonds purchased that he resigned
his position in the King’s household. Rather than be suspected
of dishonesty, he preferred revealing that they had reached the
hands of Lady Conyngham. Sir George Naylor, in an infa
mously servile publication, for which book alone the country
paid,£3,000, describes “the superb habiliments which his Ma
jesty, not less regardful of the prosperity of the people than of
the splendour of his throne, was pleased to enjoin should be
worn upon the occasion of his Majesty’s sacred coronation.”
Sir William Knighton declares that on the news of the King’s
death reaching the Prince Regent, “ the fatal tidings were re
ceived with a burst of grief that was very affecting.” The King
had been mad and blind and deaf for ten years, and the Queen,
years before, had complained of the Prince’s conduct as unfilial,
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if not inhuman. With the Prince Regent’s known character,
this sudden burst of grief is really “ very affecting.”
On the 23rd of February, London was startled with the news
of what since has been described as the Cato Street Conspiracy.
The trial of Arthur Thistlewood and his misguided associates,
is valuable for one lesson. The man who found money for the
secret conspirators, and who incited them to treason and murder,
was one George Edwards. This Edwards was well described by
one of the journals of the period, “ as neither more nor less than
the confidential agent of the original conspirators, to hire for
them the treasons they have a purpose in detecting.” By origi
nal conspirators were meant Lord Castlereagh and Lord Sidmouth. In the House of Commons, Mr. Aiderman Wood moved
formally, “ That George Edwards be brought to the bar of the
House on a breach of privilege. He pledged himself, if he had
this incendiary in his hands, to convict him of the crimes im
puted ; he hoped he had not been suffered to escape beyond
seas ; otherwise there were hon. gentlemen who were in pos
session of him, so that he might be produced ”—meaning by this
that he was kept out of the way by the Government. “ He re
garded him as the sole author and contriver of the Cato Street
plot. It was strange how such a man should be going about
from public-house to public-house, nay, from one private house
to another, boldly and openly instigating to such plots ; and, in
the midst of this, should become, from abject poverty, suddenly
flush with money, providing arms, and supplying all conspirators.”
Mr. Hume seconded the motion. “ It appeared by the deposi
tions, not of one person only, but of a great many persons, that
the individual in question had gone about from house to house
with hand-grenades, and, up to twenty-four hours only preceding
the 23rd of February, had been unceasingly urging persons to
join with him in the atrocious plot to assassinate his Majesty’s
Ministers. All of a sudden he became quite rich, and was buy
ing arms in every quarter, at every price, and of every descrip
tion ; still urging a variety of persons to unite with him. Now
it was very fitting for the interest of the country, that thecountry
should know who the individuals were who supplied him with
the money.”
As a fair specimen of the disposition of the King in dealing
with his Ministry, I give the following extract from a memoran
dum of Lord Chancellor Eldon, dated April 26th, 1820 : “ Our
royal master seems to have got into temper again, so far as I
could judge from his conversation with me this morning. He
has been pretty well disposed to part with us all, because we
would not make additions to his revenue. This we thought
conscientiously we could not do in the present state of the
country, and of the distresses of the middle and lower orders of
the people—to which we might add, too, that of the higher orders.
My own individual opinion was such that I could not bring my
self to oppress the country at present by additional taxation for
that purpose.”
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On the 23rd of March, Henry Hunt, John Knight, Joseph
Johnson, Joseph Healey, and Samuel Bamford, were, after six
days’ trial at York, found guilty of unlawfully assembling. Lord
Grenville feared that if acquitted, Peterloo might form a terrible
bill of indictment against the Ministry. His Lordship writes on
March 29th, to the Marquis of Buckingham : “It would have
been a dreadful thing if it had been established by the result of
that trial that the Manchester meeting was under all its cir
cumstances a legal assembly.” His Lordship knew that the
magistrates and yeomanry cavalry might have been indicted for
murder had the meeting been declared legal. Sir C. Wolseley
and the Rev. J. Harrison were at this time being prosecuted
for seditious speaking, and were ultimately found guilty on April
10th. In May the state of the country was terrible; even
Baring, the Conservative banker, on May 7th, described the
“ state of England ” to a full House of Commons, “ in the most
lamentable terms.” On the 8th we find Mr. W. H. Fremantle
saying of the King, “ His language is only about the Coronation
and Lady Conyngham [his then favourite sultana] ; very little of
the state of the country.” Early in June, it being known that
Queen Caroline was about to return to England, and that she
intended to be present at the Coronation, the King offered her
£50,000 a year for life to remain on the Continent, and forbear
from claiming the title of Queen of England. This Caroline
indignantly refused. The Queen’s name had, by an order in
Council, and on the King’s direction, been omitted from the
Liturgy as that of a person unfit to be prayed for, and on the
6th July a bill of pains and penalties was introduced by Lord
Liverpool, alleging adultery between the Queen and one Barto
lomeo Bergami. To wade through the mass of disgusting evi
dence offered by the advisers of the King in support of the Bill,
is terrible work. It seems clear that many of the witnesses
committed perjury. It is certain that the diplomatic force of
England was used to prevent the Queen from obtaining wit
nesses on her behalf. Large sums of the taxpayers’ money were
shown to have been spent in surrounding the Princess of Wales
with spies in Italy and Switzerland. Naturally the people took
sides with the Queen. To use the language of William Cobbett :
u The joy of the people, of all ranks, except nobility, clergy, and
the army and the navy, who in fact were theirs, was boundless ;
and they expressed it in every possible way that people can
express their joy. They had heard rumours about a lewd life,
and about an adulterous intercourse. They could not but believe
that there was some foundation for something of this kind ; but
they, in their justice, went back to the time when she was in fact
turned out of her husband’s house, with a child in her arms,
without blame of any sort ever having been imputed to her.
They compared what they had heard of the wife with what they
had seen of the husband, and they came to their determination
accordingly. As far as related to the question of guilt or inno
cence they cared not a straw; they took a large view of the
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matter ; they went over her whole history ; they determined that
she had been wronged, and they resolved to uphold her.”
On the 6th of August, the Duchess of York died. Dr. Doran
thus writes her epitaph :—“ Her married life had been unhappy,
and every day of it was a disgrace to her profligate, unprincipled,
and good-tempered husband.”
In the month of September Lord Castlereagh was compelled
to admit that the expenses incurred in obtaining evidence from
abroad against the Queen, had been defrayed out of the Secret
Service money. The trial of Queen Caroline lasted from the
17th of August until the 10th of November, when in a house of
307 peers, the Queen was found guilty by a majority of 9 votes.
On this, Lord Liverpool said that “ as the public sentiment had
been expressed so decidedly against the measure,” he would
withdraw the Bill. Amongst those who voted against the Queen,
the names appear of Frederick Duke of York and William
Henry Duke of Clarence. They had been most active in
attacking the Queen, and now were shameless enough to vote as
her judges. While the trial was proceeding, the Duke of York’s
private conversation “ was violent against the Queen.” He ought
surely, for very shame’s sake, this Prince-Bishop, to have re
membered the diamonds sent by the King his father to Princess
Caroline Amelia Elizabeth of Brunswick. Being the bearer of
the jewels, his Royal Highness the Duke of York and PrinceBishop of Osnaburg, stole them, and presented them to Mrs.
Mary Anne Clarke. Mr. Denman, the Queen’s Solicitor-General,
was grandly audacious in his indictment of the King’s brothers for
their cowardly conduct. In the presence of the assembled Lords,
he, without actually referring to him by name, denounced the
Dukeof Clarence as acalumniator. Hecalled on the Duke to come
forward openly, saying, “ Come forth, thou slanderer.” And this
slanderer was afterwards our King ! The Queen, in a protest
against the Bill, declared that “those who avowed themselves her
prosecutors have presumed to sit in judgment upon the question
between the Queen and themselves. Peers have given their voices
against her, who had heard the whole evidence for the charge, and
absented themselves during her defence. Others have come to
the discussion from the Secret Committee with minds biassed by
a mass of slander, which her enemies have not dared to bring
forward in the light.” Lord Dacre in presenting the protest to
the assembled peers, added : “ Her Majesty complained that the
individuals who formed her prosecutors in this odious measure,
sat in judgment against her. My Lords, I need not express an
opinion upon this complaint; delicacy alone ought to have, in
my opinion, prevented their becoming her accusers, and also her
judges.”
George IV. was guilty of the vindictive folly of stripping
Brougham of his King’s Counsel gown, as a punishment for his
brilliant defence of the Queen.
While the trial of the Queen was going on, it might have been
thought that the King would at any rate affect a decency of con-
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duct. But these Brunswicks are shameless. Speaking of the
cottage at Windsor, on August nth, Mr. Fremantle says
“ The principal object is of course the Lady Conyngham, who
is here. The King and her always together, separated from the
rest, they ride every day or go on the water, and in the evening
sitting alone.......... The excess of his attentions and enjouement
is beyond all belief.” On December 17th, Mr. Fremantle finds
the King ill, and says : “ The impression of my mind is that
the complaint is in the head.” Most of the Brunswicks have
been affected in the head. Either George I. was insane, or
George II. was not his son. George II. himself had certainly
one or two delusions, if not more. George III.’s sanity is not
affirmed by any one. It may be a question whether or not any
allegation of hereditary affection is enough however to justify
an appeal to Parliament for a re-arrangement of the succession
to the throne.
On the 9th of January, 1821, King George IV. wrote a private
letter to Lord Chancellor Eldon, in the “ double capacity as a
friend and as a minister,” in order to influence the proceedings
then pending in the law courts “ against vendors of treason and
libellers.”
On the 8th of June, on the motion of Lord Londonderry, and
after an ineffectual opposition by Mr. Hume, ,£6,000 a year ad
ditional was voted to the Duke of Clarence. The vote was
made retrospective, and thus gave the Duke ,£18,000 extra in
cash. Besides this, we find a charge of .£9,166 for fitting up
the Duke’s apartments.
On the 5th of July, Mr. Scarlett moved the court on behalf of
Olivia Wilmot Serres, claiming to be the legitimate daughter of
the Duke of Cumberland, who was brother of George III. Mr.
Scarlett submitted that he had documents proving the accuracy
of the statement, but on a technical point the matter was not
gone into.
In August, 1821, King George IV. visited Ireland. Knowing
his habits, and the customs of some other members of the
family, it excites little surprise to read that, on the voyage to
Dublin, “ his Majesty partook most abundantly of goose pie
and whiskey,” and landed in Ireland “ in the last stage of in
toxication.” And this was a king ! This journey to Ireland
cost the country ,£58,261. In a speech publicly made by the
King in Ireland within a few hours after receiving the news of
Queen Caroline’s death, the monarch said : “ This is one of the
happiest days of my life.”
On the 7th of August Queen Caroline died. In Thelwall’s
Champion there is a full account of the disgraceful conduct of
the King’s Government with reference to the funeral. On the
morning of the 14th, after a disgusting contest between her
executors and the King’s Government for the possession of her
remains, they were removed from Brandenburgh House towards
Harwich, on their way to interment at Brunswick. The ministers,
to gratify personal feelings of unworthy rancour beyond the
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grave, gave orders that the funeral should take a circuit, to avoid
manifestations of sympathy from the Corporation and the people
along the direct route through London. At Kensington, the
procession found every road but that of London barricaded by
the people, and was constrained to take the forbidden route,
with the intention of passing through Hyde Park into the
northern road. The Park gate was closed and barricaded, but
was forced by the military. The upper gate was also barricaded.
Here a conflict took place between the military and the people,
and two persons were shot by the soldiers. The procession
moved on, the conflict was renewed, the people triumphed, and
the corpse was borne through the City. Sir Robert Wilson re
monstrated with some soldiers and an officer on duty ; but his
humane interference caused his removal from the army. In re
turn, a large sum was subscribed by the public to compensate
Sir Robert Wilson for his loss. The directing civil magistrate
present, for having consulted his humanity in preference to his
orders, and to prevent bloodshed yielded to the wishes of the
multitude, was also deprived of his commission. On the in
quest on the body of one of the men shot, the coroner’s jury,
vindicating the rights of the people, returned a verdict of “ Wilful
murder ” against the Life Guardsman who fired.
While the King was in Ireland he paraded his connection
with the Marchioness of Conyngham in the most glaring man
ner. Fremantle says : “ I never in my life heard of anything to
equal the King’s infatuation and conduct towards Lady Conyng
ham. She lived exclusively with him during the whole time he
was in Ireland, at the Phoenix Park. When he went to Slane,
she received him dressed out as for a drawing-room. He saluted
her, and they then retired alone to her apartments.”
If it be objected that I am making too great a feature of the
Marchioness of Conyngham’s connection with the King, I plead
my justification in Henry W. Wynn’s declaration of “her folly
and rapacity,” affirming that this folly and rapacity have left
their clear traces on the conduct of affairs, and in the increase
of the national burdens. Her husband, as a reward for her
virtue, was made an English peer in 1821. Lord Mount Charles,
his eldest son, was made Master of the Robes, Groom of his
Majesty’s Bedchamber, and ultimately became a member of the
Government. On this, Bulwer said : “ He may prove himself an
admirable statesman, but there is no reason to suppose it.”
In order that the student of history may fairly judge the ac
count of the rapturous reception given to the King in Ireland,
it is needful to add that political discontent was manifest on all
sides. Poverty and misery prevailed in Limerick, Mayo, Cavan,
and Tipperary, which counties were proclaimed, and occupied
by a large military force. Executions, imprisonments, and
tumults filled the pages of the daily journals.
In the autumn of 1821, King George IV. visited Hanover, and
if the Duke of Buckingham’s correspondence be reliable,
« Lord Liverpool put a final stop to the visit by declaring that
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no more drafts could be honoured, except for the direct return
home.”
On the 12th August, 1822, Castlereagh, the most noble the
Marquis of Londonderry, sent himself to heaven, from North
Cray Farm, Bexley, at the age of fifty-three. He was buried in
Westminster Abbey. Meaner clay would have been got rid of
at some cross roads.
“ The death,” says Wallace,“ of a public man in England—
especially a death so sudden and lamentable—greatly assuages
the political resentments against him in his life ; and there was
a reaction in aristocratic circles in favour of Lord Londonderry
when he ceased to live. His servile complaisance to despots
abroad, his predilection for the worst engines of government at
home, were for a moment forgotten. But the honest hatred of
the populace, deep-rooted, sincere, and savage, remained un
touched, and spoke in a fearful yell of triumphant execration
over his remains whilst his coffin was descending into the grave
in Westminster Abbey.”
No language could do fitting justice to Robert Stewart, Mar
quis of Londonderry. Words would be too weak to describe
Castlereagh’s cruelty and baseness towards his own country
men, or his infernal conduct in connection with the Government
of England. All that can be fittingly said is, that he was pre
eminently suited to be Minister of State under a Brunswick.
In 1823, the thanks of Parliament were presented to George
IV. for “ having munificently presented to the nation a library
formed by George III.” Unfortunately, the thanks were un
deserved. George IV. was discreditable enough to accept
thanks for a donation he had never made. The truth is, says
the Daily News, “ that the King being, as was his wont, in ur
gent need of money, entertained a proposal to sell his father’s
library to the Emperor of Russia for a good round sum. The
books were actually packed up, and the cases directed in due
form, when representations were made to Lord Sidmouth, then
Home Secretary, on the subject. The Minister resolved, if
possible, to hinder the iniquity from being perpetrated. Accord
ingly, he represented his view of the matter to the King.
George IV. graciously consented, after a good deal of solicita
tion, to present the library to the nation, conditionally on his re
ceiving in return the same sum as he would have received had
the sale of it to the Emperor of Russia been completed. What
the nation did was, firstly, to pay the money ; secondly, to erect
a room for the library at the cost of ,£140,000; and thirdly, to
return fulsome thanks to the sovereign for his unparalleled
munificence.”
On the 24th of April, 1825, the Duke of York spoke in the
House of Lords against Catholic Emancipation. His speech
was made, if not by the direction, most certainly with the con
sent, of the King. George IV.’s reluctance to Catholic Emanci
pation was deep-rooted and violent. The bare mention of the
subject exasperated him. He was known to say, and only in his
I
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milder mood, “I wish those Catholics were damned or eman
cipated.” The angered despotism of this alternative still afforded
the hope that his intolerance might be overcome by his selfish
love of ease. The Duke of York’s address to his brother peers
closed with the declaration that he would, to the last moment
of his life, whatever his situation, resist the emancipation of the
Catholics, “ so help him God !” All tyrants think themselves
immortal ; the Catholics and their cause outlived the Duke of
York, and triumphed. His speech, however, coming from the
presumptive heir to the Crown, had a great share in deciding
the majority of the Lords against the measure ; and acted with
great effect upon the congenial mass of brute ignorance and
bigotry which is found ready to deny civil rights to all outside
the pale of their own Church.
On the 5th January, 1827, the Duke of York died. Wallace,
in his “ Life of George IV.,” says : “ Standing in the relation of
heir-presumptive to the Throne; obstinately and obtuselyfortified
against all concession to the Catholics ; serving as a ready and
authoritative medium of Toryism and intolerance to reach, un
observed, the Royal ear—his death had a great influence upon
the state of parties, and was especially favourable to the ascend
ancy of Mr. Canning. He, some weeks only before he died, and
when his illness had already commenced, strenuously urged the
King to render the Government uniform and anti-Catholic—in
other words, to dismiss Mr. Canning ; and, had he recovered,
Mr. Canning must have ceased to be Foreign Minister, or the
Duke to be Commander-in-Chief. The Duke of York was not
without personal good qualities, which scarcely deserved the
name of private virtues, and were over-clouded by his private
vices. He was constant in his friendships—but who were his
friends and associates? Were they persons distinguished in
the State, in literature, in science, in arts, or even in his own
profession of arms ? Were they not the companions and sharers
of his dissipations and prodigalities? He did not exact from his
associates subserviency or form ; but it was notorious that, from
the meaness of his capacity, or the vulgarity of his tastes, he
descended very low before he found himself at his own social
level. His services to the army as Commander-in-Chief were
beyond all measure over-rated. Easy access, diligence, a me
chanical regularity of system, which seldom yielded to solicita
tion, and never discerned merit ; an unenvying, perhaps un
scrupulous, willingness to act upon the adviceland appropriate the
measures of others more able and informed than himself; these
were his chief merits at the Horse Guards. But, it will be said,
he had an uncompromising, conscientious fidelity to his public
principles ; this amounts to no more than that his bigotry was
honest and unenlightened. His death, perhaps, was opportune ;
his non-accession fortunate for the peace of the country and the
stability of his family on the Throne. Alike incapable of fear
and foresight, he would have risked the integrity of the United
Kingdom rather than concede the Catholic claims ; and the
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91
whole Monarchy rather than sanction Reform. It would be easy
to suggest a parallel, and not always to his advantage, between
the constitution of his mind and that of James, Duke of York,
afterwards James II., whose obstinate bigotry forced the nation
to choose between their liberties and his deposition from the
Throne.”
In 1827, the Duke of Clarence obtained, after much opposi
tion, a further vote of £8,000 a year to himself, besides £6,000
a year to the Duchess. The Duke of Clarence also had £3,000
a year further, consequent on the death of the Duke of York,
making his allowance £43,000 a year.
In April, 1829, the infamous Duke of Cumberland had stated,
that if the King gave his assent to the Catholic Emancipation
Bill, he (the Duke) would quit England never to return to it.
The Right Honourable Thomas Grenville says, in a letter dated
April 9th : “ There is some fear that a declaration to that effect
may produce a very general cheer even in the dignified assem
bly of the House of Lords.” How loved these Brunswicks have
been even by their fellow peers !
On the 10th of April, the Roman Catholic Emancipation Bill
passed the House of Lords, the Duke of Wellington confessing
that civil war was imminent, if the relief afforded by the measure
was longer delayed.
On June 26th, 1830, the Royal physicians issued a bulletin,
stating that “ it has pleased Almighty God to take from this
world the King’s most excellent majesty.” Most excellent
majesty ! ! A son who threatened his mother to make public
the invalidity of her marriage ; a lover utterly regardless of the
well-being of any one of his mistresses ; a bigamous husband,
who behaved most basely to his first wife, and acted the part of
a dishonourable scoundrel to the second; a brother at utter
enmity with the Duke of Kent; a son who sought to aggravate
the madness of his Royal father ; a cheat in gaming and racing.
He dies because lust and luxury have, through his lazy life, done
their work on his bloated carcass, and England sorrows for the
King’s “most excellent majesty 1”
George IV. was a great King. Mrs. J. R. Greer, in her work
on “ Quakerism,” says that he once went to a woman’s meeting
in Quaker dress. “ His dress was all right; a grey silk gown,
a brown cloth shawl, a little white silk handkerchief with hemmed
edge round his neck, and a very well poked friend’s bonnet,
with the neatly-crimped border of his clear muslin cap tied
under the chin, completed his disguise.” Royal George was
detected, but we are told that the Quakers, who recognised their
visitor, were careful to treat him with courtesy and deference !
In the ten years’ reign, the official expenditure for George IV.
and his Royal Family, was at the very least £ 16,000,000 sterling.
Windsor Castle cost £894,500, the Pavilion at Brighton is said
to have cost a million, and another half-million is alleged to
have been expended on the famous “ Cottage.” After the King’s
death his old clothes realised £ 15,000.
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Thackeray says of him that he “ never resisted any tempta
tion ; never had a desire but he coddled it and pampered it; if
he ever had any nerve, he frittered it away among cooks, and
tailors, and barbers, and furniture-mongers, and opera dancers
.......... all fiddling, and flowers, and feasting, and flattery, and
folly.......... a monstrous image of pride, vanity, and weakness.”
Wallace says : “ Monarchy, doubtless, has its advantages;
but it is a matter of serious reflection that under a government
called free, among a people called civilised, the claims of millions,
and the contingent horrors of a civil war, should be thus depen
dent upon the distempered humours and paramount will of a
single unit of the species.”
CHAP. VI.
THE REIGN OF WILLIAM IV.
William Henry, Duke of Clarence, Admiral of the Fleet, and
third son of George III., born August 21st, 1765, succeeded his
brother George IV. as King of England, on the 26th June, 1830.
The new King was then 65 years of age, and had been married,
July nth, 1818, to Adelaide Amelia Louisa Teresa Caroline,
Princess of Saxe-Meiningen. Mrs. Dorothy Jordan, with whom
William had lived, and who had borne him ten children, had
fled to France to avoid her creditors, and had there died,
neglected by the world, deserted by William, and in the greatest
poverty. This Mrs. Jordan was sold to William by one Richard
Ford, her former lover, who, amongst other rewards of virtue,
was created a Knight, and made Police Magistrate at Bow Street.
Mrs. Jordan’s children bore the name of “ Fitzclarence,” and
great dissatisfaction was expressed against the King, who, too
mean to maintain them out of his large income, contrived to
find them all posts at the public cost. At the date of William
IV.’s accession, the imperial taxation was about ^47,000,000 ;
to-day it has increased at least ^25,000,000.
The annual allowances to the junior branches of the Royal
Family in 1830, formerly included in the Civil List, and now
paid separately, were as follows :—■
The Duke of Cumberland ,£21,0'00. He had no increase on
his marriage ; the House of Commons rejected a motion to that
effect; but an allowance of £6,000 a year for his son. Prince
George, had been issued to him since he became a resident in
this country. This is the Duke of Cumberland, who so loved
his brother, William IV., that he intrigued with the Orange
men to force William’s abdication, and to get made King in his
stead.
The Duke of Sussex received £21,000.
The Duke of Cambridge, father of the present Duke, had
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£27,000. He obtained an increase on his marriage of £6,000
a year. This Prince was charged with the government of the
family territory, the kingdom of Hanover, and consequently re
sided but little in England.
Princess Augusta, £ 13,000.
The Princess Elizabeth of Hesse Homburg, £13,000.
Princess Sophia, £ 13,000.
The Duchess of Kent, including the allowance granted in
1831, for her daughter, the Princess Victoria, heir-presumptive
to the Throne, £22,000.
The Duke of Gloucester, including £13,000 which he received
as the husband of the Princess Mary, £27,000.
The Princess Sophia of Gloucester, his sister, £7,000.
Queen Adelaide had £'100,000 a year, and the residence at
Bushey, granted to her for life.
Mrs. Fitzherbert, as the widow of George IV., was in receipt
of £6,000 a year, and the ten Fitzclarences also enjoyed places
and pensions.
The Duke of Wellington and Sir Robert Peel were the King’s
Ministers ; and, although there was some personal hostility be
tween William and the Iron Duke, they were at first his willing
coadjutors. in opposing either reduction of expenditure, or any
kind of political or social reform. The quarrel between Wil
liam as Duke of Clarence and the Duke of Wellington had
arisen when William was Lord High Admiral. William had
given improper orders to a military officer, named Cockburn,
which the latter had refused to obey. The Duke of Wellington
refused to sacrifice Cockburn, and ultimately the Duke of Cla
rence resigned his office as Lord High Admiral, for which, says
the Rev. Mr. Molesworth, “ he was ill-qualified, and in which
he was doing great mischief.”
In November, 1830, Earl Grey, Lord Brougham, Lord Mel
bourne, and Lord Althorp came into office as leaders of the
Whig party. With slight exception, in 1806, the Whigs had
not been before in office during the present century, and very
little indeed since 1762. The Whigs encouraged the Radical
Reformers so far as to ensure their own accession to power ; but
it is evident that the Whig Cabinet only considered how little
they could grant, and yet retain office. In finance, as well as
reform, they were disloyal to the mass of the people who pushed
them into power.
The Duke of Wellington and his Ministry resigned office in
November, 1830, because the House of Commons wished to
appoint a Select Committee to examine the Civil List. King
William IV., according to the words of a letter written by him
to Earl Grey, on December 1st, 1830, felt considerable “alarm
and uneasiness ” because Joseph Hume, and other Radical
members, wished to put some check on the growing and already
extravagant Royal expenditure. He objects “most strenu
ously,” and says, referring on this especially to the Duchy of
Lancaster :—“ Earl Grey cannot be surprised that the King
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should view with jealousy any idea of Parliamentary interference
with the only remaining pittance of an independent possession,
which has been enjoyed by his ancestors, during many cen
turies, as their private and independent estate, and has now,
as such, lawfully devolved upon him in right of succession.
That he should feel that any successful attempt to deprive the
Sovereign of this independent possession, will be to lower and
degrade him into the state and condition of absolute and entire
dependence, as a pensioner of the House of Commons, to place
him in the condition of an individual violating or surrendering
a trust which had been held sacred by his ancestors, and which
he is bound to transmit to his successors. The King cannot
indeed conceive upon what plea such a national invasion of the
private rights, and such a seizure of the private estates, of the
Sovereign could be justified.”
William IV. reminds Earl Grey, that the Chancellor of the
Duchy is sworn to do all things “ for the weal and profit of the
King’s Highness. And his Majesty has fair reason to expect
that a pledge so solemnly taken will be fulfilled, and that he will
be supported in his assertion of these private rights, not only of
himself, but of his heirs and successors, as they have devolved
upon him, separate from all other his possessions jure coronce,
and consequently, as his separate personal and private, estate,
vested in his Majesty, by descent from Henry VII. in his body
natural, and not in his body politic as King.”
Earl Grey naturally promised to prevent Radical financial
reformers from becoming too annoying to Royalty. The Whigs
love to talk of economy out of office, and to avoid it when in
place.
Daniel O’Connell appears to have much troubled the King.
Directly after the Dublin meeting in December, 1830, Sir Henry
Taylor says : “ The King observed, that he would have been
better pleased if this assembly of people had not dispersed
quietly at his bidding, as the control which he has successfully
exercised upon various occasions in this way, appears to his
Majesty the most striking proof of the influence he has acquired
over a portion of the lower classes in Ireland.”
It is pretended in the Cabinet Register for 1831, and vfas
stated by Lord Althorp in Parliament, that “ his Majesty m ost
nobly and patriotically declined to add to the burdens of his
people by accepting an outfit for his royal consort, though ,£54,000
had been granted by Parliament to the Oueen of George III.,
as an outfit to purchase jewels, &c.” This is so little true, that
it appears from the correspondence between the King and Earl
Grey, that a grant for the Queen’s outfit had been agreed to by
the outgoing Tories, and would have been proposed by the new
Whig Government, had not one of the Cabinet (probably Lord
Brougham) decidedly objected, on the ground “ that proposing
a grant for this purpose would have a bad effect on the House
of Commons, and on public opinion and by a letter dated
February 4th, 1831, from the King, it is clear that he only aban
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doned the claim when he found he could not get it. There is
not a word about “ the burdens of the people,” although many at
that time were in a starving condition. On the contrary, the
secretary of the King says on the 6th of February, that “ the
disinclination shown in the House of Commons ” to grant the
outfit, had “produced a very painful impression on his Majesty.”
The King, afraid of the spread of Reform opinions, says that
he “ trusts that the Lord-Lieutenants and Deputy-Lieutenants
of counties will be cautioned to scrutinise the ballots for the
militia as far as possible, so as to endeavour to exclude from its
ranks men of dangerous and designing character, whose influ
ence might prove very pernicious upon newly-established corps,
and before they shall' have acquired habits of discipline and
subordination.” And to show his desire for .Reform, he urges
the Ministers to check the public gatherings, saying, “ I am ig
norant to what extent it may be in contemplation to increase the
military means, either by calling out the militia partially, or by
any addition to the regular force ; but I am convinced that the
latter would be not only the most efficient, but the cheapest; and
it would have the advantage of being applicable to all purposes.”
The Reformer King—for this pretence has been made—in
another letter says : “ His Majesty is satisfied that he may rely
upon Earl Grey’s strenuous support in his determination to re
sist all attempts which may be made to sap the established rights
of the Crown, and to destroy those institutions under which&this
country has so long prospered, while others have been suffering
so severely from the effects of revolutionary projects, and from
the admission of what are called Radical remedies....;....He is
induced thus pointedly to notice the proposal of introducing
Election by Ballot, in order to declare that nothing should ever
induce him to yield to it, or to sanction a practice which would
in his opinion, be a protection to concealment, would abolish
the influence of fear and shame, and would be inconsistent with
the manly spirit and the free avowal of opinion which distinguish
the people of England. His Majesty need scarcely add that his
opposition to the introduction of another, yet more objectionable
proposal, the adoption of Universal Suffrage, one of the wild
projects which have sprung from revolutionary speculation
would have been still more decided.”
’
How William IV. could ever have been suspected of being
favourable to Reform, is difficult to comprehend. As Duke of
Clarence he had spoken in favour of the Slave Trade, and had
declared that its abolition should meet with his most serious
and most unqualified opposition.” When the Reform Bill actually
became law, although William IV. did not dare to veto it he re
fused to give the royal assent in person.
’
In this chapter there is not space enough to go through the
higory of the Reform agitation of 1832. In Molesworth’s
u J^s.tory °f the Reform Bill,” and Roebuck’s account of the
Whig Ministry, the reader will find the story fully told It is not
enough to say here that the King not only hindered Reform until
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Ths House of Brunswick.
Revolution was imminent, and the flames of burning castles and
mansions were rising in different parts of England, but it may be
stated that he condescended to deceive his Ministers; that he
allowed his children to canvass peers against the Bill, and would
have resorted to force to crush the Birmingham Political Union,
if he could have thrown the responsibility of this tyranny upon
the Cabinet. In the King’s eyes the people were “ the rabble.”
We find him “ impatient ” for the return of the Tories to power,
and bitterly discontented when the orderly character of popular
demonstrations rendered the employment of the military im
possible.
The Earl of Munster, one of the King’s ten children by Mrs.
Jordan, and who was Governor of Windsor Castle, Colonel in the
Army, Aide-de-Camp to the King, Lieutenant of the Tower,
Tory and State pensioner, being charged with having “ unhand
somely intrigued against Earl Grey’s Government,” made the
curious defence“ that for six months before and for twenty-four
hours after the resignation ” of the Grey Government, “ it was
from certain circumstances out of his power to act in the matter
imputed to him.”
It is worthy of notice, as against Mr. Frederic Harrison’s
opinion, that no English monarch could now really interfere
with the course of government in Great Britain, that in April,
1832, William IV. gave written directions to Earl Grey, “that
no instructions should be sent ” to foreign ambassadors until
they had “ obtained his previous concurrence.” And it is clear,
from a letter of the King’s private secretary, that William gave
these orders because he was afraid there was a “disposition
...... to unite with France in support of the introduction of liberal
opinions and measures agreeably to the spirit of the times.”
Although the newspapers praised William, he does not seem to
have been very grateful in private. In 1832, he declared to his
confidential secretary that he had “ long ceased to consider the
press (the newspaper family) in any other light than as the
vehicle of all that is false and infamous.”
In January, 1833, in a speech, not written for him, but made
extemporaneously after dinner, William IV. said, to compliment
the American Ambassador, “ that it had always been a matter
of serious regret to him that he had not been born a free, inde
pendent American.” We regret that the whole family have not
lon°- since naturalised themselves as American citizens. But
such a sentiment from the son of George III., from one who in
his youth had used the most extravagant phraseology in denun
ciation of the American rebels ! !
The family insanity, shown in the case of George 11. by his
persistence in wearing his Dettingen old clothes ; more notorious
and less possible of concealment in that of George III.; well
known to all but the people as to George IV., who actually tried
to persuade the Duke of Wellington that he (George) had led
a regiment at Waterloo, was also marked in William IV. In
April, 1832, the King’s own secretary admits “distressing symp
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toms ” and “ nervous excitement,” but says that the attack “ is
now subsiding.” Raikes, a Tory, and also a king-worshipper,
in his “ Diary,” under date May the 27th, 1834, says, after speak
ing of the King’s “ excitement ” and “rather extraordinary”
conduct, that11 at the levee a considerable sensation was created
the other day by his insisting that an unfortunate wooden-legged
lieutenant should kneel down.” On June nth, visiting the Royal
Academy, the President showed the King, amongst others, the
portrait of Admiral Napier, and was astonished to hear his
Majesty at once cry out : “ Captain Napier may be damned, sir,
and you may be damned, sir ; and if the Queen was not here,
sir, I would kick you down stairs, sir.”- The King’s brother, his
Royal Highness the Duke of Gloucester, died November 20th,
1834. Raikes says of him : “He was not a man of talent, as
may be inferred from his nickname of Silly Billy.” This is the
Royal Family, the head of which, according to Mr. Disraeli, was
physically and mentally incapable of performing the regal
functions, and which yet, according to that brilliant statesman,
so fitly represents the intelligence and honour of Great Britain.
In 1836, Sir William Knighton died. He had been made
private secretary to the late King, and had made his fortune by
means of some papers which Colonel Macmahon, confidant of
George IV., had when dying, and which came into Knighton’s
hands as medical attendant of the dying man. Sir W. Knighton
was made a “ Grand Cross,” not for his bravery in war, or in
telligence in the State, but for his adroit manipulation of secrets
relating to Lady Jersey, Mrs. Fitzherbert, and the Marchioness
of Conyngham. Sir William Knighton and the latter lady were
supposed to have made free with ^300,000 ; but great larcenies
win honour, and Sir W. Knighton died respected.
In August, 1836, William—hearing that the Duke of Bedford
had helped O Connell with money—ordered the Duke’s bust,
then in the Gallery at Windsor, to be taken down, and thrown
into the lifne kilns.
On June 20th, 1837, William IV. died. Ernest, Duke of Cum
berland, by William s death, became King of Hanover, and was
on the same day publicly hissed in the Green Park. Naturally,
in this loving family there was considerable disagreement for
some time previous to the King’s death between his Majesty and
the Duchess of Kent.
The. Edinburgh Review, soon after the King’s death, while
admitting that his understanding may not have been of as high
an order as his good nature,” says : “ We have learned to forget
|he ’au(:s °f the Duke of Clarence in the merits of William IV.”
Where were these merits shown ? Was it in “ brooding ”—(to
use the expression of his own private secretary)— over questions
of whether he could, during the commencement of his reign,
personally appropriate sums of money outside the Civil List
votes ? Was it in desiring that Colonel Napier might be “ struck
on the half-pay list,” for having made a speech at Devizes in
lavoui of 1 arliamentary Reform ? W as it when he tried to perK
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The House of Brunsivick.
suade Earl Grey to make Parliament pay Rundell and Bridge’s
bill for plate—and this when the masses were in a starving con
dition? Was it when he declared that he was by “ no means
dissatisfied” that a proposed meeting was likely to be so
“violent, and in other respects so objectionable,” as it would
afford the excuse for suppressing by force the orderly meetings
which, says his secretary, “ the King orders me to say he cannot
too often describe as being, in his opinion, far more mischievous
and dangerous ” than those of “ a more avowed and violent
character.”
CHAP. VII.
THE PRESENT REIGN.
Her present Majesty, Alexandrina Victoria, was born May 24th,
1819, and ascended the throne June 20th, 1837, as representing
her father, the Duke of Kent, fourth son of George III. On
February 10th, j 840, it being the general etiquette for the Bruns
wick family to intermarry amongst themselves, she was married
to her cousin, Prince Albert of Saxe Coburg, who received an
allowance from the nation of £30,000, to compensate him for
becoming the husband of his wife. The Queen, more sensible
than others of the arduous position of a Prince Consort, wished
her loyal husband to have £ 100,000 a year. The Government
reduced this to £50,000; Joseph Hume and the Radicals re
duced it still further to ,£30,000, For this annual payment the
Prince undertook to submit to naturalisation, to be the first sub
ject in England, to reside rent free in the Royal Palaces re
paired at the cost of the nation. He also, on his own account,
and for his own profit, attended to various building speculations
at the West End of London, and died very rich. He is known
as Prince Albert the Good. His goodness is marked—not by
parks given to the people, as in the case of Sir Francis Crossley;
not by improved dwellings for the people, as in the case of
George Peabody ; not by a large and costly market place, freely
given, as in the case of Miss Burdett Coutts—Peeress without
her patent of Baroness;—but by statues erected in his honour
in many cities and boroughs by a loyal people. As an employer
of labour, the Prince’s reputation for generosity is marked solely
by these statues. As a Prince, he felt in his lifetime how much
and how truly he was loved by his people ; and at a dinner given
to the Guards, Prince Albert, in a speech probably not revised
beforehand, told the Household troops how he relied on them
to protect the throne against any assaults. The memory of the
Prince is dear to the people ; he has left us nine children to
keep out of the taxpayers’ pockets, his own large private accu
mulations of wealth being inapplicable to their maintenance.
When her Majesty ascended the throne, poor rates averaged
5s. 4^d. per head per annum ; to-day they exceed 7s. During
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the last fifteen years alone there has been an increase of more
than 250,000 paupers in England and Wales, and one person
out of every twenty-two is in receipt of workhouse relief. Every
body, however, agrees that the country is prosperous and happy.
In Scotland there has been an increase of 9,048 paupers in the
last ten years. Two out of every fifty-three Scotchmen are at
this moment paupers. In Ireland in the last ten years the out
door paupers have increased 19,504. As, however, we have,
during the reign of her present most gracious Majesty, driven
away the bulk of the Irish population, there are considerably
fewer paupers in Ireland than there are in Scotland. The
average Imperial taxation during the first ten years of her
Majesty’s reign was under ^50,000,000 a year. The average
taxation at the present day is over ,£70,000,000 a year. Pauper
ism and local and Imperial taxation are all on the increase, and,
despite agricultural labourers’ outcries and workmen’s strikes, it
is agreed that her Majesty’s reign has brought us many blessings.
On March 20th, 1842, the Earl of Munster, eldest son of
William IV., and who had been made Constable of Windsor
Castle by her Majesty, committed suicide. Although the eldest
son of the late King, his position as a natural child excluded
him from heaven, according to the Bible, and from all right to
the Throrfe, according to our law.
Her Majesty’s eldest daughter, the Princess Royal, Victoria
Adelaide Mary Louisa, is married to the Prince Imperial,
Frederick William of Germany, and, as it would have been
manifestly unreasonable to expect either the Queen or the Prince
Consort, out of their large private fortunes, to provide a dowry
for their daughter, the English nation pays ,£8,000 a year to the
Princess.
Her Majesty’s eldest son, Albert Edward, Prince of Wales,
Duke of Saxony, Cornwall, and Rothesay, and Earl of Dublin,
has earned already so wide a fame that notice here is almost
needless. As a writer, his letters—a few of which have been
published by the kind permission of Sir Charles Mordaunt—
illustrate the grasp of mind peculiar to the family, and mark in
strong relief the nobility of character of the Royal author. As a
military chieftain, the Autumn Manoeuvres of 1871 demonstrated
the tact and speed he could display in a strategic movement of
masterly retreat. As an investigator of social problems, he has
surpassed the Lords Townshend and Shaftesbury, and at Mabille
and in London has, by experience, entitled himself to speak with
authority. As a pigeon shooter, he can only be judged by com
parison with the respectable ex-bushranger now claiming the
Tichborne estates. Here, it is true, the latter is a man of more
weight. The Prince of Wales receives ,£40,000 a year, and we
give his wife ,£10,000 a year as a slight acknowledgment for the
position she has to occupy as Princess of Wales. With the
history of the wives of the two last Princes of Wales to guide
them, it is almost wonderful that the advisers of the Princess did
not insist on a much higher premium against the risks of the
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The House of Brunswick.
position. When his Royal Highness came of age, he found ac
cumulations of the Duchy of Cornwall of more than a million
sterling, which, invested in Consols, would bring him in at least
a further £40,000 per annum. His Royal Highness also has the
income of the Duchy of Cornwall, amounting net to about £63,000
a year. In addition to this, the Prince of Wales is entitled to
military salary as Colonel of the Rifle Brigade and 10th Hussars.
Last year—conscious that it is unfair to expect a Prince to live on
£153,000 a year—Z7>6oo were voted by Parliament for the repair
of the house in which he sometimes resides when in London.
A few years ago his Royal Highness was in Paris, and certain
scurrilous foreign prints pretended that on the Boulevard des
Italiens, in the face of France, he had forgotten that one day he
would seek to be King of England. It is written, “ In vino
■veritas” and if the proverb hold, the Prince is more than half
his time a man remarkable for his truthfulness. Some time
later, the Royal Leamington Chronicle, which, in his mercy, the
Prince of Wales never prosecuted, coupled his reputation with
infamy. Later, his Royal Highness was ill, and the nation wept.
Then came recovery and Thanksgiving at St. Paul’s.
“ So when the devil was sick,
The devil a saint would be ;
When the devil got well again,
The devil a saint was he.”
The Prince of Wales has since been to Paris, and, according to
La Liberte, has honoured Mabille with his Royal presence.
Her Majesty’s second son is Alfred Ernest, Duke of Edin
burgh. His Royal Highness, when serving on board the Galatea,
had leave to go on shore at Marseilles. Journeying to Paris, he
overstayed his leave, refused to return when summoned, and
stayed there, so Paris journals said, till his debts were thousands.
Any other officer in the navy would have been cashiered ; his
Royal Highness has since been promoted. The Duke of Edin
burgh visited our Colonies, and the nation voted about £3>5°°
for presents made by the Prince. The presents the Prince re
ceived were, of course, his own, and the vote enabled the Duke
o do justice to the generous sentiments of his family. The
Colonists pretended at the time that some of the presents were
not paid for by the Duke of Edinburgh ; nay, they went so far
as to allege that some of the Duke’s debts had to be discharged
by the Colonist Reception Committee. Representing the honour
of England, his Royal Highness earned himself a fame and a
name by the associates he chose. In visiting India, a special
sum of, we believe, £10,000 was taken from the Indian revenues
and handed to the Duke, so that an English Prince might be
liberal in his gifts to Indians at their own cost. Ihe Duke or
Edinburgh has £15,000 a year. Three years ago he borrowed
£450 from the pay-chest of the Galatea. I have no means ot
knowing whether it has since been paid back ; all I can afnim
is, that the country made up the deficient sum in the pay-chest
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101
without a word from any M.P. Had the borrower been a pay
sergeant, he would have been sent to a District Military Prison;
if a commissioned officer, other than a Royal one, he would
have been dismissed the service. The difference between the
Prince of Wales and the Duke of Edinburgh is this : in the first
case, the virtues of the Prince equal his intelligence ; in the
second case, the intelligence of the Duke is more developed than
are his virtues.
In the case of Broadwood v. the Duke of St. Albans, both the
Royal brothers were permitted to guard a pleasant incognito.
The judge who allowed this concealment was soon afterwards
created a Peer of the Realm.
Our army and navy, without reckoning the Indian Establish
ment, cost more to-day, by about £9,000,000 a year, than when
her Majesty ascended the throne. Her Majesty’s cousin, George
William Frederick, Duke of Cambridge, is Commander-in-Chief
of the Army, and for this service receives ,£4,432 per annum.
His Royal Highness also receives the sum of £12,000 in con
sequence of his being the cousin of the Queen. His Royal High
ness is also Field-Marshal, and Colonel of four distinct regi
ments, for which he gets more than ,£5,000 annually. Naturally,
in the Duke is found embodied the whole military talent of the
Royal Family. His great-uncle, the Duke of Cumberland,
carved “Klosterseven” on the Brunswick monuments. Frederick
Duke of York, the uncle of the Duke of Cambridge, recalled
from the field of battle, that he might wear in peace at home
the laurels he had won abroad, added “ Clarke ” and “ Tonyn ”
as names to vie with Cressy or Waterloo. The present Duke
of Cambridge was, when Prince George, stationed in Yorkshire,
in the famous “ plug plot ” times, and his valiancy then threat
ened most lustily what he would do against the factory “ turn
outs,” poor starved wretches clamouring for bread. In the
army, the normal schoolmasters can tell how this brave Brunswicker rendered education difficult, and drove out, one by one,
many of the best teachers. Soldiers who think too much make
bad machines. It was the father of the present Duke of Cam
bridge who publicly expressed his disbelief in 1844—5, of the
failure of the potato crop in Ireland, “ because he had always
found the potatoes at his own table very good 1”
For many years her Majesty’s most constant attendant has
been a Scotsman, John Brown. This person so seldom leaves
her Majesty thatfit is said that some years since the Queen in
sisted on his presence when diplomatic communications were
made to her Majesty ; and that, when escorting the Queen to
Camden House, on a visit to the ex-Emperor Napoleon, Mr.
Brown offered her his arm from the carriage to the door.
Afterwards, when an idiotic small boy—armed with a broken
pistol, loaded with red flannel, and without gunpowder—made a
sham attack on her Majesty, Mr. Brown courageously rushed
to the Queen’s aid, and has since received a medal to mark his
valour.
�102
. The House of Brunswick.
For many years her Majesty has taken but little part in the
show ceremonials of State. Parliament is usually opened and
closed by commission—a robe on an empty throne, and a speech
read by deputy, satisfying the Sovereign’s loyal subjects. It is,
however, the fact that in real State policy her interference has
been most mischievous, and this especially where it affected her
Prusso-German relatives. In the case of Denmark attacked by
Prussia and Austria, and in the case of the Franco-Prussian
War, English Court influences have most indecently affected
our foreign relations.
Her Majesty is now enormously rich, and—as she is like her
Royal grandmother—grows richer daily. She is also generous,
Parliament annually voting her moneys to enable her to be so
without touching her own purse.
It is charged against me that I have unfairly touched private
character. In no instance have I done so, except as I have
found the conduct of the individuals attacked affecting the
honour and welfare of the nation. My sayings and writings are
denounced in many of the journals, and in the House of Lords
as seditious, and even treasonable. My answer is, that fortu
nately, Hardy, Tooke, and Thelwall heard “ Not Guilty” given
as the shield against a criticism which dared to experiment on
persecution. In case of need, I rely on a like deliverance. I
I do not pretend here to have pleaded for Republicanism; I
have only pleaded against the White Horse of Hanover. I ad
mire the German intellect, training the world to think. I loathe
these small German breast-bestarred wanderers, whose only
merit is their loving hatred of one another. In their own land
they vegetate and wither unnoticed ; here we pay them highly
to marry and perpetuate a pauper prince-race. If they do
nothing, they are “ good.” If they de ill, loyalty gilds the vice
till it looks like virtue.
�
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The impeachment of the House of Brunswick
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Edition: 2nd. ed. rev. and largely re-written
Place of publication: London
Collation: iv, 102 p. ; 18 cm.
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Bradlaugh, Charles
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Austin & Co.
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1883
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G4938
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Republicanism
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English
House of Hanover
Monarchy
Republicanism
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Text
THE ENGLISH MONARCHY
AND
AMERICAN REPUBLICANISM.
Reply to the Speech of the Right Hon. Benjamin Disraeli by
CHARLES
WATTS,
VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE LONDON REPUBLICAN CLUB.
On April 3rd, 1872, the Right Hon. Benjamin Disraeli delivered
a political manifesto in the Free Trade Hall, Manchester. His
statements On the occasion were endorsed generally by the Tory
press throughout the country, and accepted by them as indicat
ing the programme of that “ enlightened ” party. Whatever is
publicly uttered by the hon. gentleman is deemed of more than
ordinary importance in consequence of the prominent position
he occupies as chief of English Conservatism. The principal
topic chosen by Mr. Disraeli for his speech was English Monarchy
and the American Republic ; his object being to show that the
form of Government in this country has certain advantages that
the American Republic does not possess. The reason for the se
lection of this subject maybe given in the speaker’s own words:—
“ The fundamental principles of the [English] Constitution have
been recently impugned and assailed. The flag of the Republic
has been raised, and therefore, gentlemen, I think it is not in
appropriate to the present hour and situation if I make to you
one or two brief remarks on the character of those institutions.”
It is evident that Mr. Disraeli had not only become conscious
of the rapid growth of Republican principles in England, but
that he had made up his mind to do his best to prevent their
further extension. Now there can be no objection to a person
stating why he differs from the Republican programme, supposing
he considers that programme wrong ; but no man has a right to
misrepresent facts, and utter statements before a public audience
which have no authority, and that are unsupported by statistics
or records of history. To show that Mr. Disraeli did this in his
Manchester speech is the object of the present reply.
�2
Before noticing the hon. gentleman’s fallacies, it may conduce
to the better understanding of the question under consideration
to inquire briefly into the nature of Monarchy. Generally
speaking, there are four kinds—absolute, constitutional, heredi
tary, and elective. In addition to these, we have in England an
imported Monarchy, that is, when the throne, being vacant, and
no one of native growth was found to occupy it,we sent to Holland
and Germany, andimported an occupant. True, these importations
have proved expensive, but then that is an “ advantage” shared
principally by the “ people,” and therefore it has commanded
official silence. The present Monarchy in England is supposed
to be a limited, constitutional, and hereditary one. Strictly speak
ing, however, it is not hereditary, because on several occasions that
principle has been set aside in the history of England, and some
of the best writers upon constitutional government agree that,
whenever the people pronounce in favour of an elective Monarchy,
they can have one in strict accordance with the law under which
they live. The hereditary principle is unwise, inasmuch as it pre
supposes that good and intelligent parents must necessarily have
good and intelligent children. This, however, is not so. The late
Prince Albert possessed some excellent qualities that the Prince
of Wales shows no inclination to emulate. Thus,as Dr. Vaughan
observes : “ In a hereditary Monarchy the worst men may come
into the place of the best.” To guard against such an evil is the
duty of every Republican. Moreover, the principle is unjust.
We are not justified in urging that because one generation
prefers a King or Queen, therefore succeeding generations
should do likewise. Each age should be at liberty to elect that
kind of Government which it finds most in accordance with the
genius of the time, and the aspirations of the people who have
to be ruled. There is some truth in designating the English
Monarchy limited. In one particular its limitation is very
perceptible. This, of course, is no reproach to the Queen, who,
from the best of motives, has for some years lived a life of seclu
sion. Her Majesty is a far-seeing woman, and can discern that
in the future of England a Republican form of Government will
obtain; and as a thoughtful sovereign, she absents herself, so that
her subjects may get initiated into the art of self-government,
that when they come to fulfil the duties thereof, they shall not be
taken unawares, but shall be able to perform such duties with
credit to themselves and with a benefit to the commonwealth.
Whilst opposed to all Monarchies, that form certainly may be
pronounced the best which recognises the right of election.
Kings and Queens should win their position by their ability, and
not rule because they have descended from royal parents, whose
only claim to Royalty was that of birth.
To prove the superiority of the English Monarchy over the
American Republic, Mr. Disraeli said that for two centuries
Monarchical governments had prevented a revolution in this
country, and had established order, public liberty, and political
rights. Now, accepting the term revolution in the limited sense
�3
used by Macaulay, it is true that in this country for nearly two
hundred years it has been unknown. But taking revolution, in
its comprehensive signification, as embodying the elements of
public discontent at, and rebellion against, official artifices and
governmental opposition to the people’s rights, England has
experienced many such outbreaks since 1688. What was the
American rebellion but a revolt against the wicked and unjust
obstinacy and oppression of the English Monarchy ? If it had
not been attempted to enforce taxation without representation
upon the inhabitants of America, they might still have been
bound to us by national ties, and then England would have been
saved the disgrace of an expensive and unnecessary war. The
numerous uprisings and manifestations against injustice in India,
in Jamaica, and in Ireland were so many revolutionary pro
tests against the cruel and tyrannical acts of Monarchical mis
rule. And if in England during the last two centuries revolution
has not broken out in its worst forms, it has not been in conse
quence of an enlightened and amicable policy adopted by our
Governments, but ’ rather the result of the forbearance of the
people, who desired to advance their cause by peaceable means.
The Monarchical policy has too often provoked anarchy and
public discord, by withholding reforms from the nation until it
was driven to despair, by insults and procrastination. Where is
the proof that Monarchical Governments have established order
and promoted public liberty, as stated by Mr. Disraeli? Not
in the history of the Derbyshire outbreak and Snow Hill riots of
1816 and 1817 ; not at the Peterloo massacre of 1819 ; not at the
riots of Bristol, Nottingham, and other towns in ^832; not
during the struggles for Free Trade, Catholic Emancipation, the
admission of Jews into the Legislature, and for Parliamentary
Reform. In connection with these movements, the conduct of
the Governments was such as to produce the very opposite of
order. They refused to grant what the people required until
there was “ no alternative but concession, or the horrors of civil
war.” At the close of the last, and in the early part of the present,
century, great efforts were made to obtain Parliamentary Reform
and an improvement of the land laws. And how were these
efforts met by the “ powers that be ?” Public petitions were
unheeded, supplications were disregarded, and traps were laid
by the Government to catch within the clutches of the law the
leading agitators of the time. Dr. Vaughan says the Govern
ment “ instituted a spy system, which was made to spread itself
everywhere; and miscreants, who could not detect treason to
satisfy their employers, were careful to stimulate and sometimes
to invent it. Hence came a long series of State prosecutions, in
which law was so perverted, or so openly violated, that each one
of them, in place of removing disaffection, multiplied it mani
fold........ Men of the most worthless character were accepted as
witnesses ; and juries who wanted evidence managed to pro
nounce the verdict of ‘ guilty ’ in the absence of it.” Even Sir
Samuel Romilly declared that “he believed in his conscience
�4
the whole of the Derbyshire insurrection was the work of persons
sent by Government.”
The State prosecutions that took place a little more than half
a century since will prove how reliable Mr. Disraeli’s statement
is, that Monarchical rule has favoured political rights and public
liberty. The trials of Muir and Palmer in Scotland, and Hardy,
Tooke, Thelwall, Cobbett, and Leigh Hunt in England, reveal
to us the fact that when Monarchical influence was paramount,
the solitude of a prison and heavy fines were the rewards of
those who sought to advance the social and political condition
of society. When and where has the throne of England ever
pleaded for the liberty of the people ? When has it attempted
to vindicate the rights of man ? or to extend that national freedom
which is the birth-right of every citizen ? Upon what page of
history is it recorded that modern progress has sprung from
Monarchy ? The liberties we now have were dearly bought by
the energies and self-sacrifice of those brave men whose aspira
tions and labours were sought to be crushed by royalist intrigues
and aristocratic exclusiveness. The lever that impelled forward
political and social freedom was found among the masses, apart
altogether from the occupants of the throne. For, as recorded
by Cassell, in his “ History of England,” “ whilst Royalty sat in
emblematic darkness, the people were breaking into light and
power by the efforts of genius born amongst them.”
The right hon. gentleman, in order to prove that Monarchy is
a national benefit, referred to the reign of George III. Now,
it is only reasonable to suppose that in Mr. Disraeli’s opinion
this sovereign was the best that could be cited as illustrative of
the alleged advantages of Royalty. A glance, therefore, at the
condition of society under George III. will enable us fully to
appreciate the value pf Monarchical “influence” on the progress
and well-being of the country. The following facts are taken
from pages 570, 571, and 572, vol. vi., of Cassell’s “ History of
England —-“George III. could not comprehend the right of
America to resist arbitrary taxation; he could as little comprehend
the right of his subjects to have full freedom of conscience, but
opposed doggedly the emancipation of the Catholics on account
of their creed. To all other reforms he was equally hostile, and his
Government and his son had, to the hour of his death, rigidly main
tained the same principles of rule. They had, as we have seen,
done their best to destroy the freedom of the press, the freedom
of speech, and the right to assemble and petition for the redress
of grievances. They had turned loose the soldiery on the people
exercising this right, and had armed the magistracy with full
powers to seize any person whom they pleased to suspect of free
ideas ; and having shut them up in prison had suspended the
Habeas Corpus Act, to keep them there without a hearing during
their pleasure. Never in the history of England, since the days
of the Stuarts, had there been so determined an attempt to
crush the national liberties as toward the end of this reign.......
The same reluctance had always marked the mind of George
�5
III. to reform the penal code as to reform political abuses.
During his period of sanity he continued to behold unmoved
the frightful ferocity of the criminal code, and to sign, unshudderingly, death-warrants for men and women, some of the
latter with children in their arms, for the theft of a sheep, or of
a few yards of calico.......The same darkness and apathy existed
on the subject of education. The great bulk of the people during
the Georgian period were almost wholly unable to read.” This
monarch’s “ influence,” no doubt, was great on the religion of
the time, for the same historian records that “ the Christianity
of the reign of George III. was a bloody farce, and an abomina
tion.” If this is the state of society to result from the influence of
Royalty, England will do well to get rid of it as speedily as
possible. For a full and correct account of what George III.
did for this nation, the reader is referred to Mr. C. Bradlaugh’s
“ Impeachment of the House of Brunswick,” where the deeds of
that worthy monarch are faithfully recorded.
Mr. Disraeli’s next statement in favour of Monarchy was that
this country “ is properly represented by a Royal Family.” This
sentence is the very opposite of truth. When has Royalty re
presented the intelligence, the industry, or the poverty of the
people ? What great literary or scientific production has ever
emanated from the wearer of the English Crown ? Indolence
and luxurious wealth have too often surrounded the throne, while
those who have been compelled to support it have had to “ toil
night and day ” amidst penury and squalid wretchedness. As
a nation we boast, among our characteristics, virtue, honour,
domestic purity, and benevolence. But in what Royal Family,
within the two hundred years mentioned by Mr. Disraeli, have
these characteristics found their representative ? Was virtue
represented by Charles II., who kept so many mistresses, and
had such a host of illegitimate children that no historian has
committed himself by naming the number of either? “No
man,” says Cassell, “ ever saddled the country with such a troop
of bastards ” as did Charles 11. Among the numerous progeny
resulting from his licentiousness may be mentioned the Dukes
of Monmouth, Southampton, Grafton, Northumberland, St.
Albans, and Richmond. Truly, these aristocratic families had
a noble origin ! Writing of this king, Buckle says : “ With the
exception of the needy profligates who thronged his Court, all
classes of men soon learned to despise a king who was a
drunkard, a libertine, and a hypocrite ; who had neither shame
nor sensibility ; and who in point of honour was unworthy to
enter the presence of the meanest of his subjects.” Did James
II. represent the honour of the country when he made secret
arrangements with Louis of France, whereby he sacrificed
England’s prestige and integrity for so many bribes, one alone
amounting to 500,000 crowns, which was followed by a second
remittance of two million livres ? His dishonour was only
equalled by his hypocrisy, for when he wanted sums of money
voted him by Parliament, he declared that he had “ a true
�6
English heart;” and when soliciting bribes from the French’
monarch, he proclaimed that his “ heart was French.” James 11,
represented nothing that was noble and true. “ He hoped to
turn a free Government into an absolute Monarchy,” but in this
he failed; and having disregarded the rights of the people, and
defied their wishes, he was driven from the throne. His fate
should be a warning to future would-be monarchs. Were the
wishes of the country represented by William III., in whose reign
commenced an extensive warfare, a reckless expenditure, and
the official inauguration of our National Debt ? In the twelve
years Queen Anne occupied the throne, she not only sided with
the Tories in their frequent quarrels with the Whigs, but she
raised the funded debt in that period from ^12,600,000 to
^36,000,000. Was this the Royal mode of illustrating the progress
and economy of the country ? Of domestic purity, as exhibited
within the domain of Royalty, but one instance shall be given,
and that from Mr. Disraeli’s king par excellence, George III.,
of whom Washington Wilkes, on pages 130—1 of his history of
the first half of the present century, writes :—“ It is generally
supposed that he was a model of domestic morality ; whereas he
was either a seducer or a bigamist........ It is not common for
virtuous parents to bring up a whole family of licentious profli
gates ; and yet what family ever exhibited such a troop of the
most shameless and sensual ones as that of George III. ? He
saw his sons seduce and abandon one woman after another, and
he could not reprimand them ; for he knew his own story better
than they who now act the historian seem to do.” No doubt,
by some, Queen Victoria is supposed to be a true representative
of benevolence. Well, if to give away portions of the money
that has been annually voted by Parliament for that purpose,
constitutes benevolence, then Her Majesty may be entitled to
that honour. But the record of sums given from the Queen’s
private .purse for benevolent purposes is difficult to find. View
ing, apart from class interest, the characteristics of the country,
and the conduct of Monarchy, it will require a Conservative
genius to discover how the former have been represented by the
latter.
Mr. Disraeli’s attempt to prove that the English Monarchy
was less expensive than the American Republic was a perversion
of facts, and a misrepresentation of figures. He said that her
Majesty had a considerable estate in the country which she had
given up, and the revenues from them had gone into the public
exchequer. The hon. gentleman did not inform us what estates he
alluded to. At the present moment the Queen is in possession of
large estates at Balmoral, at Osborne, and in the West of London,
the revenues of which the country does not receive. Did Mr.
Disraeli refer to the Crown lands ? If so, they never belonged to
the Queen, and, therefore, she could not have given them up.
Is it, however, correct to allege that the revenues derived from
the Crown lands are equal to the annual sum we pay to the Royal
Family ? That sum, according to the Blue Book and other
�official'documents, amounts to £692,373. This does not, it should
be observed, include the entire cost of Monarchy, but simply
represents the net cash paid in one year to and for the Royal
Family. Now, towards this £692,373, what is obtained fromthe
Crown lands? There was paid into the Exchequer in 1847,
.£68,000; in 1854, £272,000; in 1855—6, .£260,000 ; in 1870—1,
£385,000 ; and for the present financial year the amount named
is £375,000. Thus it will be seen that until the last few years,
the Crown land receipts were exceedingly low, and even now
they do not equal half the cost of the Queen and her family.
Mr. Disraeli said : “ I will deal with the cost of sovereignty in
the United States of America. Gentlemen, there is no analogy
between the position of Queen Victoria and the President of the
United States.” There is much truth in this remark; there is no
analogy between the two. The President of the United States
has to work; and the Queen as the right hon. gentleman re
marked on a former occasion, had become “physically and morally
incapacitated from performing her duties.” A man who aspires
to the Presidential chair must possess political ability, while a
knowledge of politics has not been deemed a necessary qualifica
tion in the occupant of the English throne. Besides, the Queen’s
salary is £385,000 a year, and the President’s is but £3,750.
In dealing with the relative costs of the two forms of Govern
ment, Mr. Disraeli did not put the case fairly. He was careful
to speak of the cost of the American Cabineg, but he never men
tioned the cost of our English Cabinet. The English Cabinet is
composed of sixteen members, who receive annually between
them in salaries £66,000. The American Administrative Depart
ment is composed of seven members, who receive among them
£8,400. In England some members get £5,000, others £7,500,
and one as much as £10,000 per year. In America no member
gets more than £1,200. Then we have the entire administration,
for which we pay, in salaries alone, £176,718, which, with the
£45,023 for expenses of the House of Lords, and £49,806 for the
House of Commons, together with £692,373 paid to the Royal
Family, make the cost of the English Government to be
.£963,920, while, as admitted by Mr. Disraeli himself, the
Republic in America costs only between £700,000 and
£800,000. And out of this sum the Americans pay their
representatives, an advantage we should do well to emulate ;
for if men are sent to Parliament to do our work, they ought to
be paid for it. If that were done, we should not find so many
empty benches as we do when the money of the country is being
voted away. In America, moreover, the sovereignty is the people.
There the people pay to rule themselves, while here we pay
Royalty to rule us. In America the sovereignty supports itself; in
this country it is supported by something outside of itself. Surely
then that which is self-supporting is more economical than that
which depends on something extraneous for its existence.
In
America its £700,000 or £800,000 are distributed among nearly
five hundred persons, but in England the £963,920 are given to
�8
less than one hundred individuals. So that in this country about
one hundred Government officials cost over £ 163,000 more than
five times that number in America.
There is a striking contrast also in the expenditure for diplo
macy in the two countries. As shown by Mr. Bradlaugh, in his
recent letter to Mr. Disraeli, America pays her Ambassador in
London a yearly salary of £3,215, and the total cost of the
American Embassy here is £4,336. Our Ambassador at New
York receives the sum of £5,000 per year, and an annual allow
ance of £1,000 for house rent, and the total cost of our Embassy
in America is ,£8,150, or nearly double. The Americans pay their
Ambassador at Paris £3,670, and the total cost of the Embassy
is ,£4,146. We give our Parisian Ambassador £10,000, and the
total cost of our Embassy is £13,595. Thus diplomacy in France
costs America less than one-third of our expenditure. In Eng
land the Lord Chief-Justice receives an annual salary of £8,000,
while the same functionary in America is paid £1,700 a year.
Many other instances could be given to show that Mr.
Disraeli was decidedly inaccurate in his comparisons of the ex
penses of the two countries. But, leaving particular departments,
what is the total cost of each nation ? The general cost of the
Governmentof Americafor 1871 was£s8,012,584,while the general
cost of England was £69,698,539 12s. 2d. The advantage to
America will appear the greater when we remember that last year
her population was 38,555,983 persons ; Great Britain and Ire
land 31,817,108. Territory of Great Britain and Ireland is about
119,924 square miles ; United States, 2,933,588 square miles.
Notwithstanding the much larger population, and the greater
extent of territory, the Republic has a much less expenditure
than the Monarchy.
Too much importance is not here attached to what has been
termed the “ cheap argument.” Because an article is cheap, it
does not therefore follow that it is preferable to that which is
more expensive. And the present examination of the relative
costs of the American and English forms of Government has
been to show, that in his speech the Right Hon. Benjamin Dis
raeli stated the very opposite of facts. True economy consists
in the usefulness of that which is purchased. Monarchy is dear
at any price, because it lacks the elements of good government.
The basis of all sound legislation is the public will, made known
through a fair and comprehensive system of representation; and
as this advantage is recognised and enforced by Republicanism,
its claims are established as superior to Royalty, even if it were
not less expensive.
PRICE ONE PENNY.
London : Printed and Published by Austin & Co., 17, Johnson’s
Court, Fleet Street, E.C.
�
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The English monarchy and American republicanism. Reply to the Speech of the Right Hon. B. Disraeli
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Watts, Charles
Disraeli, Benjamin [1804-1881]
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Republicanism
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Monarchy
Republicanism
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NATIONALSECULARSOCIETY
COMMON
SENSE.
BY
THOMAS PAINE.
Wiflj
arár an
fxr
LONDON:
FREETHOUG-HT PUBLISHING COMPANY,
63, FLEET
STREET, E.C.
1884.
PRICE
SIXPENCE
�LONDON:
PRINTED BY ANNIE BESANT AND CHARLES BRADLAUGH,
63, FLEET STREET, ®.C
�B "2^5
INTRODUCTION.
4
'
In the T08 'years which have passed since Thomas Paine ad
dressed this pamphlet to the Anglo-Saxons in British North
America, the extension of the territory and population has been
of the grandest description. The jurisdiction of the thirteen
colonies was then everywhere circumscribed by the Indian lines,
and the number of the population—when the United States first
declared themselves a confederation—did not exceed three mil
lions. To-day in 88 States and in 10 territories, with an area of
3,603,844 square miles, exclusive of the Indian territory, the
American Republic has a population of more than 50,000,000.
When Paine penned the words now re-printed, the doctrine of
independence was scarcely comprehended by any ; George Wash
ington was a Royalist by education and association, and even the
most advanced disciples of Otis shrank from breaking with the
Monarchy. Paine’s “ Common Sense ” appealed, however, to
the people, and their decision was swift, universal, and perma
nent. The 4th of July was the grand answer of the American
people—an answer they have never had reason to regret.
The very month it was issued Washington regarded the situa
tion as “ truly alarming,” and wrote that “ the first burst of
revolutionary zeal had passed away.” Paine’s pen revived the
zeal, and achieved a victory which at that time Washington’s
sword was insufficient to conquer. In England the fear of
Paine’s pen was widespread, as may be seen by reading the trial
of the shoemaker, John Hardy, for high treason.
|To-day Paine’s “ Common Sense ” has a merit beyond its mere
local significance, mighty as this was, and no apology is needed
for its re-publication.
Chaeles Beadlaugh.
��AUTHOR’S INTRODUCTION
-------- ♦--------
Perhaps the sentiments contained in the following pages are not
yet sufficiently fashionable to procure them general favor ; a long
habit of not thinking a thing wrong, gives it a superficial appear
ance of being right, and raises at first a formidable outcry in
defence of custom. But the tumult soon subsides. Time makes
more converts than reason.
As a long and violent abuse of power is generally the means of
calling the right of it in question (and in matters which might
never have been thought of, had not the sufferers been aggravated
into the inquiry), and as the King of England hath undertaken
in his own right to support the Parliament in what he calls theirs,
and as the good people of this country are grievously oppressed by
the combination, they have an undoubted privilege to inquire into
the pretensions of both, and equally to reject the usurpation of
either.
In the following sheets the author hath studiously avoided
everything which is personal among ourselves. Compliments
as well as censure to individuals make no part thereof. The
wise and the worthy need not the triumph of a pamphlet; and
those whose sentiments are injudicious, or unfriendly, will cease
of themselves, unless too much pains are bestowed upon their
conversion.
The cause of America is in a great measure the cause of all
mankind. Many circumstances have, and will arise, which are not
local, but universal, and through which the principles of all lovers
of mankind are affected, and in the event of which their affections
are interested. The laying a country desolate with fire and sword,
declaring war against the natural rights of all mankind, and extir
pating the defenders thereof from the face of the earth, is the con
cern of every man to whom nature hath given the power of feel
ing ; of which class, regardless of party censure, is
The Author.
Philadelphia, Feb. 14, 1776.
��COMMON SENSE.
-------- ♦--------
Of the Origin and Design of Government in general, with concise
Remarks on the English Constitution.
Some writers have so confounded Society with Government, as
to leave little or no distinction between them ; whereas they are
not only different, but have different origins. Society is produced
by our wants, and government by our wickedness; the former
promotes our happiness positively, by uniting our affections; the
latter negatively, by restraining our vices. The one encourages
intercourse, the other creates distinctions. The first is a patron,
the last a punisher.
Society, in every state, is a blessing ; but government, even in
its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an
intolerable one ; for when we suffer, or are exposed to the same
miseries by a government, which we might expect in a country
without government, our calamity is heightened by reflecting, that
we furnish the means by which we suffer. Government, like
dress, is the badge of lost innocence; the palaces of kings are
built on the ruins of the bowers of paradise. For, were the
impulses of conscience clear, uniform, and irresistibly obeyed,
man would need no other lawgiver; but that not being the case,
he finds it necessary to surrender up a part of his property to
furnish means for the protection of the rest; and this he is
induced to do by the same prudence which, in every other case,
advises him out of two evils to choose the least. Wherefore,
Security being the true design and end of Government, it un
answerably follows, that whatever form thereof appears most
likely to ensure it to us with the least expense and greatest bene
fit, is preferable to all others.
In order to gain a clear and just idea of the design and end of
government, let us suppose a small number of persons settled in
some sequestered part of the earth, unconnected with the rest;
they will then represent the first peopling of any country, or of
the world. In this state of natural liberty, society will be their
first thought. A. thousand motives will excite them thereto ; the
strength of one man is so unequal to his wants, and his mind so
unfitted for perpetual solitude, that he is soon obliged to seek
assistance and relief of another, who in his turn requires the
same. Four or five united would be able to raise a tolerable
dwelling in the midst of a wilderness; but one man might labor
Out the common period of his life without accomplishing any
thing ; when he had felled his timber he could not remove it, nor
erect it after it was removed; hunger in the meantime would
�Common Sense.
urge him from his work, and every different want call him a
different way. Disease, nay, even misfortune, would be death ;
for though neither might be mortal, yet either would disable him
from living, and reduce him to a state in which he might be
rather said to perish than to die.
Thus, necessity, like a gravitation power, would soon form our
newly arrived emigrants into society, the reciprocal blessings of
which would supersede and render the obligations of law and
government unnecessary while they remained perfectly just to
each other; but as nothing but heaven is impregnable to vice, it
will unavoidably happen, that in proportion as they surmount
the first difficulties of emigration, which bound them together in
a common cause, they will begin to relax in their duty and attach
ment to each other; and this remissness will point out the neces
sity of establishing some form of government to supply the
defect of moral virtue.
Some convenient tree will afford them a state-house, under the
branches of which the whole colony may assemble to deliberate
on public matters. It is more than probable that their first laws
will have the title only of regulations, and be enforced by no
other penalty than public disesteem. In this first parliament
every man by natural right will have a seat.
But as the colony increases, the public concerns will increase
likewise, and the distance at which the members may be sepa
rated will render it too inconvenient for all of them to meet on
every occasion as at first, when their number was small, their
habitations near, and the public concerns few and trifling. This
will point out the convenience of their consenting to leave the
legislative part to be managed by a select number chosen from
the whole body, who are supposed to have the same concerns at
stake which those have who appointed them, and who will act in
the same manner as the whole body would act, were they present.
If the colony continue increasing, it will become necessary to
augment the number of the representatives ; and that the interest
of every part of the colony may be attended to, it will be found
best to divide the whole into convenient parts, each part sending
its proper number; and that the elected may never form to them
selves an interest separate from the electors, prudence will point
out the necessity of having elections often; because, as the elected
must by that means return and mix again with the general body
of the electors in a few months, their fidelity to the public will be
secured by the prudent reflexion of not making a rod for them
selves. And as this frequent interchange will establish a com
mon interest with every part of the community, they will mutually
and naturally support each other: and on this (not the unmean
ing name of king) depends the strength of government and the
happiness of the government.
Here, then, is the origin and rise of government; namely, a
mode rendered necessary by the inability of moral virtue to
govern the world; here too is the design and end of government,
viz., freedom and security. And however our eyes may be
�Common Sense.
9
dazzled with show, or our ears deceived by sound; however
prejudice may warp our wills, or interest darken our understand
ing, the simple voice of nature and of reason will say it is right.
I draw my idea of the form of government from a principle in
nature, which no art can overturn, viz., that the more simple any
thing is the less liable it is to be disordered, and the easier re
paired when disordered : and with this maxim in view I offer a few
remarks on the so-much-boasted constitution of England. That
it was noble for the dark and slavish times in which it was erec
ted is granted. When the world was overrun with tyranny the
least remove therefrom was a glorious risk. But that it is im
perfect, subject to convulsions, and incapable of producing what
it seems to promise is easily demonstrated.
Absolute governments (though the disgrace of human nature)
have this advantage with them, that they are simple ; if the
people suffer they know the head from which their suffering
springs, know likewise the remedy, and are not bewildered by a
variety of causes and cures. But the constitution of England is
so exceedingly complex that the nation may suffer for years to
gether without being able to discover in which part the fault
lies ; some will say in one, and some in another, and every po
litical physician will advise a different medicine.
I know it is difficult to get over local or long-standing pre
judices ; yet if we suffer ourselves to examine the component
parts of the English constitution we shall find them to be the
base remains of two ancient tyrannies, compounded with some
new Republican materials.
First.—The remains of monarchical tyranny in the person of
the king.
Secondly.—The remains of aristocratical tyranny in the persons
of the peers.
Thirdly.—The new Republican materials in the persons of the
commons, on whose virtue depends the freedom of England.
The two first being hereditary are independent of the people,
wherefore, in a constitutional sense they contribute nothing to
wards the freedom of the state.
To say that the constitution of England is a union of three
powers, reciprocally checking each other is farcical; either the
words have no meaning or they are flat contradictions.
To say that the commons are a check upon the king, presup
poses two things :
First.—That the king is not to be trusted without being looked
after, or, in other words, that a thirst for absolute power is the
natural disease of monarchy.
Secondly.—That the commons, by being appointed for that
purpose, are either wiser or more worthy of confidence than the
crown.
But as the same constitution which gives the commons power
to check the king, by withholding supplies, gives afterwards the
king a power to check the commons, by empowering him to
reject their other bills, it again supposes that the king is wiser
�10
Common Sense.
than those whom it has already supposed to be wiser than him.
A mere absurdity.
There is something exceedingly ridiculous in the composition
of monarchy ; it first excludes a man from the means of informa
tion, yet it empowers him to act in cases where the highest judg
ment is required. The state of a king shuts him from the world,
yet the business of a kiDg requires him to know it thoroughly;
wherefore the different parts, by unnaturally opposing and des
troying each other, prove the whole character to be absurd and
useless.
Some writers have explained the English constitution thus:
the kiDg, they say, is one, the people another; the peers are a
house in behalf of the king, the commons in behalf of the people;
but this hath all the distinctions of an house divided against
itself; and though the expressions be pleasantly arranged, yet
when examined they appear idle and ambiguous; and it always
happens that the nicest construction that words are capable of,
when applied to the description of something which either can
not exist or is too incomprehensible to be within the compass of
description, will be words of sound only, and though they may
amuse the ear they cannot inform the mind; for this explanation
includes a previous question, viz., “ How came the king by a
power which the people are afraid to trust, and always obliged
to check ? ” Such a power could not be the gift of a wise
people, neither can any power which needs checking be from
God ; yet the provision which the constitution makes supposes
such a power to exist.
But the provision is unequal to the task; the means either
cannot or will not accomplish the end, and the whole affair is a
felo de se; for as the greater weight will always carry up the less,
and as all the wheels of a machine are put in motion by one, it
only remains to know which power in the constitution has the
most weight; for that will govern ; and though the others, or a
part of them, may clog, or, as the phrase is, check the rapidity
of its motion, yet so long as they cannot stop it their endeavors
will be ineffectual, the first moving power will at last have its
way, and what it wants in speed is supplied by time.
That the crown is this overbearing part of the English con
stitution needs not be mentioned, and that it derives its whole
consequence merely from being the giver of places and pensions
is self-evident; wherefore, though we have been wise enough to
shut and lock a door against absolute monarchy, we at the same
time have been foolish enough to put the crown in possession of
the key.
The prejudice of Englishmen in favor of their own govern
ment, by king, lords, and commons, arises as much or more from
national pride than reason. Individuals are, undoubtedly, safer
in England than in some other countries, but the will of the
king is as much the law of the land in Britain as in France, with
this difference, that instead of proceeding directly from his
mouth it is handed to the people under the formidable shape of
�Common Sense.
11
an Act of Parliament. For the fate of Charles the First hath
only made kings more subtle;—not more just.
Wherefore, laying aside all national pride and prejudice in
favour of modes and forms, the plain truth is, that it is wholly
owing to the constitution of the people, and not to the constitu
tion of the government, that the crown is not so oppressive in
England as in Turkey.
An inquiry into the constitutional errors in the English form
of government is at this time highly necessary : for as we are
never in a proper condition of doing justice to others, while we
continue under the influence of some leading partiality, so neither
are we capable of doing it to ourselves while we remain fettered
with an obstinate prejudice. And as a man who is attached to a
prostitute, is unfitted to choose or judge a wife, so any prepos
session in favour of a rotten constitution of government, will
disable us from discerning a good one.
Of Monarchy and Hereditary Succession.
Mankind being originally equal in the order of creation, the
equality only could be destroyed by some subsequent circum
stances ; the distinctions of rich and poor may in a great measure
be accounted for, and that without having recourse to the harsh
and ill-sounding names of oppression and avarice. Oppression
is often the consequence, but seldom the means, of riches ; and
though avarice will preserve a man from being necessitously
poor, it generally makes him too timorous to be wealthy.
Bftt there is another and greater distinction, for which no
truly natural or religious reason can be assigned, and that is, the
distinction of men into kings and subjects. Male and female
are the distinctions of Nature ; good and bad, the distinctions of
Heaven ; but how a race of men came into the world so exalted
above the rest, and distinguished like some new species, is worth
enquiring into, and whether they are the means of happiness or
of misery to mankind.
In the early ages of the world, according to the Scripture
Chronology, there were no kings; the consequence of which
was, there were no wars. It is the pride of kings which throws
mankind into confusion. Holland, without a king, hath enjoyed
more peace for the last century than any of the monarchical
governments in Europe. Antiquity favors the same remark;
for the quiet and rural lives of the first patriarchs have a happy
something in them, which vanishes away when we come to the
history of Jewish royalty.
Government by kings was first introduced to the world by
the heathens, from whom the children of Israel copied the cus
tom. It was the most prosperous invention the devil ever set
on foot for the promotion of idolatry. The heathen paid divine
honours to their deceased kings, and the Christian world hath
improved on the plan, by doing the same to its living ones. How
�12
Common Sense.
impious is the title of sacred majesty applied to a worm, who in
the midst of his splendor is crumbling into dust!
As the exalting one man so greatly above the rest cannot be
justified on the equal rights of nature, so neither can it be de
fended on the authority of Scripture; for the will of the
Almighty, as declared by Gideon and the prophet ,Samuel,
expressly disapproves of government by kings. All antimonarchical parts of the Scripture have been very smoothly
glossed over in monarchical governments; but they undoubtedly
merit the attention of countries which have their governments
yet to form. “ Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s,”
is the Scripture doctrine of courts, yet it is no support of
monarchical government, for the Jews at that time were without
a king, and in a state of vassalage to the Romans.
Near three thousand years passed away from the Mosaic
account of the creation, till the Jews, under a national delusion,
requested a king. Till then, their form of government (except
in extraordinary cases, where the Almighty interposed) was
a kind of Republic, administered by a judge and the elders of
the tribes. Kings they had none, and it was held sinful to
acknowledge any being under that title but the Lord of Hosts.
And when a man seriously reflects on the idolatrous homage
which is paid to the persons of kings, he need not wonder that
the Almighty, ever jealous of his honor, should disapprove of a
form of government which so impiously invades the prerogative
of Heaven.
Monarchy is ranked in Scripture as one of the sins of the
Jews, for which a curse in reserve is denounced against them.
The history of that transaction is worth attending to.
The children of Israel being oppressed by the Midianites,
Gideon marched against them with a smsll army, and victory,
through the Divine interposition, decided in his favor. The
Jews, elate with success, and attributing it to the generalship of
Gideon, proposed making him a king, saying, “ Rule thou over
us, thou and thy son, and thy son’s son.” Here was a tempta
tion in its fullest extent: not a kingdom only, but a hereditary
one. But Gideon in the piety of his soul, replied, “ I will not
reign over you, neither shall my son rule over you: the Lord
shall rule over you.” Words need not be more explicit.
Gideon doth not decline the honor, but denieth their right to
give it; neither doth he compliment them with invented decla
rations of his thanks, but in the positive style of a prophet
charges them with disaffection to their proper sovereign, the King
of Heaven.
About one hundred and thirty years after this, they fell again
into the same error. The hankering which the Jews had for the
idolatrous customs of the heathen, is something exceedingly un
accountable ; but so it was, that laying hold of the misconduct
of Samuel’s two sons, who were entrusted with some secular
concerns, they came in an abrupt and clamorous manner to
Samuel, saying, “ Behold, thou art old, and thy sons walk not in
�Common Sense.
13
thy ways: now make us a king to judge us like all the other
nations.” And here we cannot but observe that their motives
were bad, viz., that they might be like unto other nations, i.e.,
the heathen; whereas their true glory laid in being as much un
like them as possible. “Bat the thing displeased Samuel when
they said, Give us a King to judge us ; and Samuel prayed unto
the Lord, and the Lord said unto Samuel, Hearken unto the
voice of the people in all they say unto thee, for they have not
rejected thee, but they have rejected me, that I should not
reign over them. According to all the works which they have
done since the day that I brought them out of Egypt, even unto
this day; wherewith they have forsaken me and served other
gods ; so do they also unto thee. Now, therefore, hearken unto
their voice, howbeit protest solemnly unto them, and show the
manner of a king that shall reign over them (z.e., not of any
particular king, but the general manner of the kings of the earth,
whom Israel was so eagerly copying after; and notwithstanding
the great difference of time, and distance, and manners, the cha
racter is still in fashion). And Samuel told all the words of
the Lord unto the people, that asked of him a king. And he
said, This shall be the manner of the king that shall reign over
you ; he will take your sons and appoint them for himself, for
his chariots, and to be his horsemen, and some shall run before
his chariots (this description agrees with the present mode of
impressing men), and he will appoint them captains over thou
sands, and captains over fifties, and will set them to ear his
ground, and to reap his harvest, and make his instruments of
war, and instruments of his chariots; and he will take your
daughters to be confectionaries, and to be cooks, and to be
bakers (this describes the expense and luxury as well as the
oppression of kings), and he will take your fields and your olive
yards, even the best of them, and give them to his servants;
and he will take the tenth of your seed, and of your vineyards,
and give them to his officers and his servants (by which we see
that bribery, corruption and favoritism are the standing vices of
kings) ; and he will take the tenth of your men-servants, and
your maid-servants, and your goodliest young men, and your
asses, and put them to his work; and he will take the tenth of
your sheep, and you shall be his servants ; and ye shall cry out
in that day because of your king which ye shall have chosen,
and the Lord will not hear you in that day.”
This accounts for the continuation of monarchy; neither do
the characters of the few good kings who have lived since either
sanctify the title or blot out the sinfulness of the origin ; the
high encomium given of David takes no notice of him officially
as a king, but only as a man after God’s own heart. “Never
theless the people refused to obey the voice of Samuel, and
they said, Nay, but we will have a King over us, that we may be
like all the nations, and that our King may judge us, and go out
before us, and fight our battles.” Samuel continued to reason
with them, but to no purpose ; he set before them their ingrati
�14
Common Sense.
tude, but all would not avail; and seeing them fully bent on their
folly, he cried out: “I will call unto the Lord and he shall send
thunder and rain (which then was a punishment, being in the
time of wheat harvest), that ye may perceive and see that your
wickedness is great which ye have done in the sight of the Lord,
in asking you a king. So Samuel called unto the Lord, and the
Lord sent thunder and rain that day, and all the people greatly
feared the Lord and Samuel. And all the people said unto
Samuel, Pray for thy servants unto the Lord thy God that we
die not, for we have added unto our sins this evil, to ask a king.”
These portions of Scripture are direct and positive. They admit
of no equivocal construction. That the Almighty hath there
entered his protest against monarchical government is true, or
the Scripture is false. And a man hath good reason to believe
that there is as much of kingcraft as priestcraft in withholding
the Scripture from the public in Popish countries. For monarchy
in every instance is the Popery of Government.
To the evil of monarchy we have added that of hereditary
succession; and as the first is a degradation and lessening of
ourselves, so the second, claimed as a matter of right, is an insult
and imposition on posterity. For all men being originally equal,
no one by birth could have a right to set up his own family in
perpetual preference to all others for ever ; and though himself
might deserve some decent degree of honors of his contempo
raries, yet his descendants might be far too unworthy to inherit
them. One of the strongest natural proofs of the folly of heredi
tary right in kings is, that nature disproves it, otherwise she
would not so frequently turn it into ridicule by giving mankind
an ass for a lion.
Secondly, as no man at first could possess any other public
honors than were bestowed upon them, so the givers of those
honors could have no right to give away the right of posterity.
And though they might say: “ We choose you for our head,”
they could not, without manifest injustice to their children, say,
“that your children and your children’s children shall reign over
ours for ever,” because such an unwise, unjust, unnatural com
pact might, perhaps, in the next succession, put them under the
government of a rogue or a fool. Most wise men, in their
private sentiments, have ever treated hereditary right with con
tempt ; yet it is one of those evils which, when once established,
is not easily removed; many submit from fear, others from super
stition, and the most powerful part shares with the king the
plunder of the rest.
This is supposing the present race of kings in the world to
have had an honorable origin; whereas it is more than probable
that, could we take off the dark covering of antiquity and trace
them to their first rise, we should find the first of them nothing
better than the principal ruffian of some restless gang, whose
savage manners or pre-eminence in subtilty, obtained him the
title of chief among plunderers; and who, by increasing in
power, and extending his depredations, overawed the quiet and
�Common Sense.
15
defenceless to purchase their safety by frequent contributions.
Yet his electors could have no idea of giving hereditary right to
his descendants, because such a perpetual exclusion of themselves
was incompatible with the free and unrestained principles they
professed to live by. Wherefore hereditary succession in the
early ages of monarchy could not take place as a matter of claim,
but as something casual or complimental; but as few or no re
cords were extant in those days, and traditionary history is
stuffed with fables, it was very easy, after the lapse of a few
generations, to trump up some superstitious tale, conveniently
timed, Mahomet-like, to cram hereditary right down the throats
of the vulgar. Perhaps the disorders which threaten, or seemed
to threaten, on the decease of a leader, and the choice of a new
one (for elections among ruffians could not be very orderly) in
duced many at first to favor hereditary pretensions ; by which
means it happened, as it hath happened since, that what at first was
submitted to as a convenience was afterwards claimed as a right.
England, since the conquest, hath known some few good
monarchs, but groaned beneath a much larger number of bad
ones, yet no man in his senses can say that their claim under
William the Conqueror is a very honorable one. A French
bastard landing with an armed banditti, and establishing him
self King of England, against the consent of the natives, is, in
plain terms, a very paltry, rascally original. It certainly hath
no divinity in it. However, it is needless to spend much time
in exposing the folly of hereditary right; if there are any so
weak as to believe it, let them promiscuously worship the ass
and the lion, and welcome ; I shall neither copy their humility,
nor disturb their devotion.
Yet I should be glad to ask, how they suppose kings came at
first? The question admits but of three answers, viz., either
by lot, by election, or by usurpation. If the first king was
taken by lot, it establishes a precedent for the next, which ex
cludes hereditary succession. Saul was by lot, yet the succession
was not hereditary, neither does it appear from that transaction,
there was any intention it ever should. If the first king of any
country was by election, that likewise establishes a precedent
for the next; for to say that the right of all future generations
is taken away by the act of the first electors, in their choice, not
only of a king but of a family of kings for ever, hath no parallel
in or out of Scripture, but the doctrine of original sin, which
supposes the free will of all men lost in Adam; and from such
comparison (and it will admit of no other) hereditary succession
can derive no glory. For as in Adam all sinned, and as in the
first electors all men obeyed; so in the one all mankind are
subjected to Satan, and in the other to Sovereignty: as our
innocence was lost in the first, and our authority in the last; and
as both disable us from re-assuming some further state and privi
lege, it unanswerably follows that original sin and hereditary suc
cession are parallels. Dishonorable rank! Inglorious connexion !
Yet the most subtle sophist cannot produce a juster simile.
�16
Common Sense.
As to usurpation no man will be so hardy as to defend it; and
that William the Conqueror was an usurper is a fact not to be
contradicted. The plain truth is that the antiquity of English
monarchy will not bear looking into.
But it is not so much the absurdity as the evil of hereditary
succession which concerns mankind. Did it insure a race of
good and wise men, it would have the seal of divine authority;
but as it opens a door to the foolish, the wicked, and the im
proper, it hath in it the nature of oppression. Men, who look
upon themselves as born to reign, and on the others to obey,
soon grow insolent; selected from the rest of mankind, their
minds are easily poisoned by importance, and the world they act
in differs so materially from the world at large that they have
but little opportunity of knowing its true interests, and when
they succeed to the government are frequently the most ignor
ant and unfit of any throughout the dominions.
Another evil which attends hereditary succession is, that the
throne is liable to be possessed by a minor at any age; all which
time the regency, acting under the cover of a king, has every
opportunity and inducement to betray its trust. The same
national misfortune happens when a king, worn out with age
and infirmity, enters the last stage of human weakness. In both
these cases the public becomes a prey to every miscreant who
can tamper with the follies either of infancy or age.
The most plausible plea which hath ever been offered in favor
of hereditary succession is, that it preserves a nation from civil
wars; and were this true it would be weighty ; whereas, it is
the most barefaced falsity ever imposed upon mankind. The
whole history of England disowns the fact. Thirty kings and
two minors have reigned in that distracted kingdom since the
conquest, in which time there have been (including the Revo
lution) no less than eight civil wars and nineteen rebellions.
Wherefore, instead of making for peace it makes against it, and
destroys the very foundation it seems to stand on.
The contest for monarchy and succession between the houses
of York and Lancaster laid England in a scene of blood for many
years. Twelve pitched battles, besides skirmishes and sieges,
were fought between Henry and Edward. Twice was Henry
prisoner to Edward, who in his turn was prisoner to Henry. And
so uncertain is the fate of war, and temper of a nation, when
nothing but personal matters are the ground of a quarrel, that
Henry was taken in triumph from a prison to a palace, and
Edward obliged to fly from a palace to a foreign land; yet, as
sudden transitions of temper are seldom lasting, Henry in his
turn was driven from the throne, and Edward recalled to succeed
him ; the Parliament always following the strongest side.
This contest began in the reign of Henry the Sixth, and was
not entirely extinguished till Henry the Seventh, in whom the
families were united; including a period of sixty-seven years,
viz., from 1422 to 1489.
In short, monarchy and succession have laid, not this or that
�Common Sense.
17
kingdom only, but the world in blood and ashes. It is a form of
government which the word of God bears testimony against, and
blood will attend it.
If we inquire into the business of a king we shall find that in
iome countries they have none ; and after sauntering away their
lives without pleasure to themselves or advantage to the nation,
withdraw from the scene, and leave their successors to tread the
same idle ground. In the absolute monarchies the whole weight
of business, civil and military, lies on the king ; the children of
Israel, in their request for a king, urged this plea, “ that he may
judge us and go out before us, and fight our battles.” But in
countries where he is neither a judge nor a general a man would
be puzzled to know what is his business.
The nearer any government approaches to a Republic the less
business there is for a king. It is somewhat difficult to find a
proper name for the government of England. Sir William
Meredith calls it a Republic; but in its present state it is un
worthy of the name, because the corrupt influence of the crown,
by having all the places in its disposal, hath so effectually swal
lowed up the power and eaten out the virtue of the House of
Commons (the Republican part of the constitution), that the
government of England is nearly as monarchical as that of France
or Spain. Men fall out with names without understanding them,
for it is the Republican, and not the monarchical, part of the con
stitution of England which Englishmen glory in, viz., the liberty
of choosing a House of Commons from out of their own body ;
and it is easy to see that when Republican virtue fails slavery
ensues. Why is the constitution of England sickly, but because
monarchy hath poisoned the Republic, the crown hath engrossed
the Commons ?
In England the king hath little more to do than to make war
and give away places; which, in plain terms, is to impoverish
the nation and set it together by the ears. A pretty business
indeed, for a man to be allowed eight hundred thousand sterling
a-year for, and worshipped into the bargain ! Of more worth is
One honest man to society, and in the sight of God, than all the
crowned ruffians that ever lived.
Thoughts on the present State of American Affairs.
In the following pages I offer nothing more than simple facts,
plain arguments, and common sense ; and have no other prelimi
naries to settle with the reader than that he will divest himself
Of prejudice and prepossession, and suffer his feelings to deter
mine for themselves; that he will put on, or rather that he will
not put off, the true character of a man, and generously enlarge
his views beyond the present day.
Volumes have been written on the subject of the struggle
between England and America. Men of all ranks have embarked
in the controversy, from different motives, and with various
designs ; but all have been ineffectual, and the period of debate
�18
Common Sense.
is closed. Arms, as the last resource, decide the contest; and
the appeal was the choice of a king, and the continent hath
accepted the challenge.
It hath been reported of the late Mr. Pelham, who, though an
able minister, was not without his faults, that on his being
attacked in the House of Commons on the score that his measures
were only of a temporary kind, replied: “They will last my time.”
Should a thought so fatal and unmanly possess the colonies
in the present contest, the name of ancestors will be remembered
by future generations with detestation.
The sun never shone on a cause of greater worth. It is not
the affair of a city, a county a province, or of a kingdom, but of
a continent—of, at least, one-eighth part of the habitable globe.
It is not the concern of a day, a year, or an age ; posterity are
involved in the contest, and will be more or less affected, even
to the end of time, by the proceedings now. Now is the seed
time of continental union, faith and honor. The least fracture
now will be like a name engraved with the point of a pin on the
tender rind of a young oak; the wound will enlarge with the
tree, and posterity read it in full-grown characters.
By referring the matter from argument to arms, a new era for
politics is struck, a new method of thinking hath arisen. All
plans, proposals, etc., prior to the 19th of April, i.e., to the
commencement of hostilities, are like the almanacks of last year,
which, though proper then, are superseded and useless now.
Whatever was advanced by the advocates on either side of the
question then terminated in one and the same point, viz., a
union with Great Britain ; the only difference between the parties
was the method of affecting it, the one proposing force, the
other friendship ; but it hath so far happened that the first hath
failed, and the second hath withdrawn her influence.
As much hath been said of the advantages of reconciliation,
which, like an agreeable dream, hath passed away and left us as
we were, it is but right that we should view the contrary side of
the argument, and inquire into some of the many material
injuries which these colonies sustain, and always will sustain, by
being connected with, and dependent on, Great Britain. To
examine that connexion and dependence, on the principles of
nature and common sense, to see what we have to trust to, if
separated, and what we are to expect, if dependent.
I have heard it asserted by some that, as America had
flourished under her former connexion with Great Britain, the
same connexion is necessary towards her future happiness, and
will always have the same effect. Nothing can be more fallacious
than this kind of argument. We may as well assert that because
a child has thriven upon milk it is never to have meat, or that the
first twenty years of our lives are to become a precedent for the
next twenty. But even this is admitting more than is true, for I
answer roundly that America would have flourished as much, and
probably much more, had no European power anything to do
with her. The commerce by which she hath enriched herself are
�Common Sense.
19
the necessaries of life, and will always have a market while eating
is the custom of Europe.
But she has protected us, say some. That she has engrossed
us is true, and defended the continent at our expense as well as
her own is admitted ; and she would have defended Turkey from
the same motive, viz., the sake of trade and dominion.
Alas! we have been long led away by ancient prejudices, and
made large sacrifices to superstition. We have boasted of the
protection of Great Britain, without considering that her motive
was interest, not attachment; but she did not protect us from
our enemies on our account, but from her enemies on her own
account, from those who had no quarrel with us on any other
account, and who will always be our enemies on the same
account. Let Britain waive her pretensions to the continent, or
the continent throw off the dependence, and we should be at
peace with France and Spain were they at war with Britain.
The miseries of Hanover, last war, ought to warn us against
connexions.
It has lately been asserted in Parliament that the colonies have
no relation to each other but through the parent country, i.e.,
Pennsylvania and the Jerseys, and so on for the rest, are sister
colonies by the way of England ; this is certainly a very round
about way of proving relationship, but it is the nearest and only
true way of proving enemyship, if I may so call it. France and
Spain never were, nor perhaps ever will be, our enemies as
Americans, but as our being the subjects of Great Britain.
But Britain is the parent country say some. Then the more
shame upon her conduct. Even brutes do not devour their young,
nor savages make war on their families; wherefore the assertion,
if true, turns to her reproach ; but it happens not to be true, or
only partly so, and the phrase parent or mother country hath
been jesuitically adopted by the king and his parasites, with a
low papistical design of gaining an unfair bias on the credulous
weakness of our minds. Europe, and not England, is the parent
country of America. This new world hath been the asylum for
the persecuted lovers of civil and religious liberty in every part
of Europe. Hither have they fled, not from the tender embraces
of the mother, but from the cruelty of the monster; and it is so
far true of England, that the same tyranny which drove the first
emigrants from home pursues their descendants still.
In this extensive quarter of the globe, we forget the narrow
limits of three hundred and sixty miles (the extent of England),
and carry our friendship on a larger scale; we claim brotherhood
with every European Christian, and triumph in the generosity
of the sentiment.
It is pleasant to observe by what regular gradations we sur
mount the force of local prejudice, as we enlarge our acquaint
ance with the world. A man born in any town in England
divided into parishes, will naturally associate with his fellow
parishioner, because their interests in many cases will be com
mon, and distinguish him by the name of neighbor ; if he meet
B2
�20
Common Sense.
him but a few miles from home, he salutes him by the name of
townsman ; if he travel out of the county, and meet him in any
other, he forgets the minor divisions of street and town, and
calls him countryman, ie., county man ; but if in their foreign
excursions they should associate in France, or in any other part
of Europe, their local remembrance would be enlarged into that
of Englishman. And by a just parity of reasoning, all Europeans
meeting in America, or any other quarter of the globe, are
countrymen ; for England, Holland, Germany, or Sweden, when
compared with the whole, stand in the same places on the larger
scale, which the divisions of street, town and county, do on the
smaller ones; distinctions too limited for continental minds.
Not one third of the inhabitants, even of this province, are of
English descent. Wherefore I reprobate the phrase of parent
or mother country applied to England only, as being false,
selfish, narrow, and ungenerous.
But admitting that we were all of English descent, what does
it amount to? Nothing. Britain being now an open enemy,
extinguishes every other name and title ; and to say that recon
ciliation is our duty, is truly farcical. The first king of England
of the present line (William the Conqueror) was a Frenchman,
and half the peers of England are descendants from the same
country; wherefore by the same method of reasoning, England
ought to be governed by France.
Much hath been said of the united strength of Britain and the
colonies; that in conjunction they might bid defiance to the
world. But this is mere presumption; the fate of wars is un
certain ; neither do the expression mean anything; for this
continent never would suffer itself to be drained of inhabitants,
to support the British arms in either Asia, Africa, or Europe.
Besides, what have we to do with setting the world at defi
ance ? Our plan is commerce, and that, well attended to, will
secure us the peace and friendship of all Europe ; because it is
the interest of all Europe to have America a free port. Her
trade will always be a protection, and her barrenness of gold and
silver secure her from invaders.
I challenge the warmest advocate for reconciliation to show
a single advantage this continent can reap by being connected
with Great Britain ; I repeat the challenge, not a single advan
tage is derived. Our corn will fetch its price in any market in
Europe, and our imported goods must be paid for, buy them
where you will.
But the injuries and disadvantages we sustain by that con
nexion are without number ; and our duty to mankind at large,
as well as to ourselves, instructs us to renounce the alliance, be
cause, any submission to, or dependence on, Great Britain tends
to involve this continent in European wars and quarrels, and set
us at variance with nations who would otherwise seek our friend
ship, and against whom we have neither anger nor complaint.
As Europe is our market for trade, we ought to form no partial
connexion with any part of it. It is the true interest of America
�Common Sense.
21
to steer clear or European contentions, which she can never do,
while by her dependence on Britain she is made the make-weight
in the scale of British politics.
Europe is too thickly planted with kingdoms to be long at
peace, and whenever a war breaks out between England and any
foreign power the trade of America goes to ruin, because of her
connexion with Great Britain. The next war may not turn out
like the last, and should it not the advocates for reconciliation
now will be wishing for a separation then, because neutrality
in that case would be a safer convoy than a man of war. Every
thing that is right or natural pleads for a separation. The blood
of the slain, the weeping voice of nature, cries. It is time to part.
Even the distance at which the Almighty hath placed England
and America, is a strong and natural proof that the authority of
the one over the other was never the design of heaven. The
time, likewise, at which the continent was discovered, adds to the
weight of the argument, and the manner in which it was peopled
increases the force of it. The reformation was preceded by the
discovery of America, as if the Almighty graciously meant to
open a sanctuary to the persecuted in future years, when home
should afford neither friendship nor safety.
The authority of Great Britain over this continent is a form
of government which, sooner or later, must have an end; and a
serious mind can draw no true pleasure by looking forward,
under the painful and positive conviction, that what he calls
“ the present constitution ” is merely temporary. As parents we
can have no joy, knowing that this government is not sufficiently
lasting to ensure anything which we may bequeath to posterity ;
and by a plain method of argument, as we are running the next
generation into debt, we ought to do the work of it, otherwise
we use them meanly and pitifully. In order to discover the line
of our duty rightly we should take our children in our hands,
and fix our station a few years farther into life; that eminence
will present a prospect, which a few present fears and prejudices
conceal from our sight.
Though I would carefully avoid giving unnecessary offence
yet I am inclined to believe that all those who espouse the doc
trine of reconciliation may be included within the following
descriptions : Interested men, who are not to be trusted ; weak
men, who cannot see ; prejudiced men, who will not see ; and
a certain set of moderate men, who think better of the European
world than it deserves; and this last class, by an ill-judged
deliberation, will be the cause of more calamities to this conti
nent than all the other three.
It is the good fortune of many to live distant from the scene
of sorrow ; and the evil is not sufficiently brought to their doors
to make them feel the precariousness with which all American
property is possessed. But let our imaginations transport us for
a few moments to Boston ; that seat of wretchedness will teach
us wisdom, and instruct us for ever to renounce a power in whom
we can have no trust; the inhabitants of that unfortunate city,
�22
Common Sense.
who but a few months ago were in ease and affluence, have now
no other alternative than to stay and starve, or turn out to beg.
Endangered by the fire of their friends if they continue within
the city, and plundered by the soldiery if they leave it. In their
present condition they are prisoners without the hope of redemp
tion, and in a general attack for their relief they would be ex
posed to the fury of both armies.
Men of passive tempers look somewhat lightly over the
offences of Britain, and still hoping for the best, are apt to call
out: “ Come, come, we shall be friends again, for all this.” But
examine the passions and feelings of mankind, bring the doctrine
of reconciliation to the touchstone of nature, and then tell me
whether you can hereafter love, honor, and faithfully serve the
power which hath carried fire and sword into your land ? If you
cannot do all these then you are only deceiving yourselves, and
by your delay bringing ruin upon posterity. Your future connex
ion with Britain, whom you can neither love nor honor, will be
forced and unnatural, and being formed only on the plan of
present convenience will in a little time fall into a relapse more
wretched than the first. But if you say you can still pass the
violations over then I ask, hath your house been burnt ? Hath
your property been destroyed before your face ? Are your wife
and children destitute of a bed to lie on, or bread to live on ?
Have you lost a parent or child by their hands, and you yourself
the ruined and wretched survivor? If you have not, then are
you a judge of those who have ? But if you have, and still can
shake hands with the murderers, then you are unworthy the name
of husband, father, friend, or lover ; and whatever may be your
rank or title in life you have the heart of a coward, and the
spirit of a sycophant.
This is not inflaming or exaggerating matters, by trying them
by those feelings and affections which nature justifies, and
without which we should be incapable of discharging the social
duties of life, or enjoying the felicities of it. I mean not to
exhibit horror for the purpose of provoking revenge, but to
awaken us from fatal and unmanly slumbers, that we may pursue
determinately some fixed object. It is not in the power of
Britain, or of Europe, to conquer America, if she do not conquer
herself by delay and timidity. The present winter is worth an
age, if rightly employed, but if neglected the whole continent
will partake of the misfortune; and there is no punishment which
that man will not deserve, be he who, or what, or where he will,
that may be the means of sacrificing a season so precious and
useful.
It is repugnant to reason, to the universal order of things, to
all examples of former ages, to suppose that this continent can
longer remain subject to any external power. The most sanguine
in Britain does not think so. The utmost stretch of human
wisdom cannot, at this time, compass a plan short of separation,
which can promise the continent a year’s security. Reconciliation
is now a fallacious dream. Nature has deserted the connexion
�Common Sense.
and art cannot supply her place ; for as Milton wisely expresses:
“ Never can true reconcilement grow where wounds of deadly
hate have pierced so deep.”
Every quiet method for peace hath been ineffectual. Our
prayers have been rejected with disdain, and only tended to
convince us that nothing flatters vanity or confirms obstinacy in
kings more than repeated petitioning ; and nothing hath contri
buted more than that very measure to make the kings of Europe
absolute; witness Denmark and Sweden. Wherefore, since
nothing but blows will do, for God’s sake let us come to a final
separation, and not leave the next generation to be cutting of
throats under the violated, unmeaning names of parent and
-child.
To say they will never attempt it again is idle and visionary ;
we thought so at the repeal of the Stamp Act, yet a year or two
undeceived us ; as well may we suppose that nations which have
been once defeated will never renew the quarrel.
As to government matters, it is not in the power of Britain to
do this continent justice. The business of it will soon be too
weighty and intricate to be managed with any tolerable degree
of convenience by a power so distant from us and so very ignorant
of us; for if they cannot conquer us, they cannot govern us.
To be always running three or four thousand miles with a tale
or petition, waiting four or five months for an answer, which,
when obtained, requires five or six more to explain it, will in
a few years be looked upon as folly and childishness. There was
a time when it was proper, and there is a proper time for it to
cease.
Small islands, not capable of protecting themselves, are the
proper objects for kingdoms to take under their care; but there
is something very absurd in supposing a continent to be perpetu
ally governed by an island. In no instance hath nature made the
satellite larger than its primary planet; and as England and
America, with respect to each other, reverse the common order of
nature, it is evident they belong to different systems : England,
to Europe ; America, to itself.
I am not induced by motives of pride, party, or resentment to
espouse the doctrine of separation and independence. I am
clearly, positively, and conscientiously persuaded that it is the
true interest of the continent to be so ; that everything short of
that is merely patchwork, that it can afford no lasting felicity,
that it is leaving the sword to our children, and slinking back at
a time when a little more, a little farther, would have rendered
the continent the glory of the earth.
As Britain hath not manifested the least inclination towards
a compromise, we may be assured that no terms can be obtained
worthy the acceptance of the continent, or any ways equal to the
expense of blood and treasure we have been already put to.
The object contended for ought always to bear some just pro
portion to the expense. The removal of North, or the whole
detestable junto, is a matter unworthy the millions we have ex
�24
Common Sense.
pended. A temporary stoppage of trade was an inconvenience
which would have sufficiently balanced the repeal of all the Act»
complained of, had such repeals been obtained ; but if the whole
continent must take up arms, if every man must be a soldier, it is
scarcely worth our while to fight against a contemptible ministry
only. Dearly, dearly do we pay for the repeal of the Acts, if that
is all we fight for ; for, in a just estimation, it is as great a folly
to pay a Bunker Hill price for law as for land. As I have always
considered the independence of the continent as an event which,
sooner or later, must arise, so from the late rapid progress of thè
continent to maturity, the event could not be far off. Wherefore,
on the breaking out of hostilities, it was not worth while to have
disputed a matter which time would have finally redressed, unless
we meant to be in earnest ; otherwise it is like wasting an estate
on a suit of law, to regulate the trespasses of a tenant whose
lease is just expiring. No man was a warmer wisher for recon
ciliation than myself before the fatal nineteenth1 of April, 1775 ;
but the moment the event of that day was made known, I rejected
the hardened, sullen-tempered Pharaoh of England for ever, and
disdained the wretch that, with the pretended title of Father of
his People, can unfeelingly hear of their slaughter, and com
posedly sleep with their blood upon his soul.
But, admitting that matters were now made up, what would be
the event ? I answer, the ruin of the continent. And that for
several reasons.
First. The powers of governing still remaining in the hands
of the king, he will have a negative over the whole legislation of
the continent. And as he hath shown himself such an inveterate
enemy to liberty, and discovered such a thirst for arbitrary power,
is he, or is he not, a proper man to say to these colonies : “You
shall make no laws but what I please ” ? And is there any in
habitant in America so ignorant as not to know that, according,
to what is called the present constitution, this continent can.
make no laws but what the king gives leave to ? And is there
any man so unwise as not to see (considering what has happened)
he will suffer no law to be made here but such as suits his pur
pose? We may be as effectually enslaved by the want of laws
in America as by submitting to laws made in England. After
matters are made up, as it is called, can there be any doubt but.
the whole power of the crown will be exerted to keep this con
tinent as low and as humble as possible ? Instead of going
forward, we shall go backward, or be perpetually quarrelling or
ridiculously petitioning. We are already greater than the king,
wishes us to be, and will he not endeavor to make us less ? To
bring the matter to one point : Is the power who is jealous of
our prosperity a proper power to govern us ? Whoever says no
to this question is an independent ; for independency means no
more than whether we shall make our own laws, or whether the
king (the greatest enemy this continent hath or can have) shall
tell us : “ There shall be no laws but such as I like.”
1 Lexington.
�Common Sense.
25
But the king, you will say, has a negative in England; the
people there can make no laws without his consent. In point of
right and good order, there is something very ridiculous, that a
youth of twenty-one (which hath often happened), shall say toseven millions of people, older and wiser than himself—I forbid
this or that act of yours to be law. But in this place I decline
this sort of reply, though I will never cease to expose the absur
dity of it, and only answer that England, being the king’s resi
dence, and America not so, make quite another case. The king’s
negative here is ten times more dangerous and fatal than it can
be in England ; for there he will scarcely refuse his consent to a
bill for putting England into as strong a state of defence as pos
sible, and in America he would never suffer such a bill to be
passed.
America is only a secondary object in the system of British
politics. England consults the good of this country no farther
than it answers her own purpose. Wherefore her own interest
leads her to suppress the growth of ours in every case which
doth not promote her advantage, or in the least interfere with it.
A pretty state we should soon be in under such a second-hand
Government, considering what has happened! Men do not
change from enemies to friends by the alteration of a name;
and in order to show that reconciliation now is a dangerous
doctrine, I affirm, that it would be policy in the King at this
time to repeal the Acts, for the sake of reinstating himself in the
government of the provinces ; in order that he may accomplish
by craft and subtlety, in the long run, what he cannot do by force
and violence in the short one. Reconciliation and ruin are nearly
related.
Secondly. That as even the best terms which we can expect to
obtain, can amount to no more than a temporary expedient, or a
kind of government by guardianship, which can last no longer
than till the colonies come of age, so the general face and state
of things, in the interim, will be unsettled and unpromising.
Emigrants of property will not choose to come to a country
whose form of government hangs but by a thread, and that is
every day tottering on the brink of commotion and distur
bance, and numbers of the present inhabitants would lay hold of
the interval to dispose of their effects, and quit the continent.
But the most powerful of all arguments is, that nothing but
independence, i.e., a continental form of government, can keep
the peace of the continent, and preserve it inviolate from civil
wars. I dread the event of a reconciliation with Britain now, as
it is more than probable that it will be followed by a revolt
somewhere or other ; the consequences of which may be far mor©
fatal than all the malice of Britain.
Thousands are already ruined by British barbarity ! thousands
more will probably suffer the same fate! Those men have other
feelings than we, who have nothing suffered. All they now
possess is liberty; what they before enjoyed is sacrificed to its
service, and having nothing more to lose, they disdain submission.
�26
;
, j
•Common Sense.
Besides, the general temper of the colonies towards a British
government, will be like that of a youth who is nearly out of his
time ; they will care very little about her. And a government
which cannot preserve the peace is no government at all, and in that
case we pay our money for nothing ; and pray what is it Britain
can do, whose power will be wholly on paper, should a civil
tumult break out the very day after reconciliation ? I have heard
some men say, many of whom, I believe, spoke without thinking,
that they dreaded an independence, fearing it would produce
civil wars. It is but seldom that our first thoughts are truly
correct, and that is the case here ; for there are ten times more
to dread from a patched-up connexion than from independence.
I make the sufferer’s case my own, and I protest, that were I
driven from house and home, my property destroyed, and my
circumstances ruined, that, as a man sensible of injuries, I could
never relish the doctrine of reconciliation, or consider myself
bound thereby.
The colonies have manifested such a spirit of good order and
obedience to continental government as is sufficient to make
every reasonable person easy and happy on that head. No man
can assign the least pretence for his fears on any other ground
than such as are truly childish and ridiculous, viz., that one colony
will be striving for superiority over another.
Where there are no distinctions, there can be no superiority ;
perfect equality affords no temptation. The Republics of Europe
are all, and we may say always, at peace. Holland and Switzer
land are without wars, foreign and domestic: monarchical gov
ernments, it is true, are never long at rest; the crown itself is a
temptation to enterprising ruffians at home ; and that degree of
pride and insolence, ever attendant on regal authority, swells into
a rupture with foreign powers, in instances where a Republican
government, by being formed on more natural principles, would
negociate the mistake.
If there is any true cause of fear respecting independence, it is
because no plan is yet laid down : men do not see their way out.
Wherefore, as an opening to that business, I offer the following
hints ; at the same time modestly affirming, that 1 have no other
opinion of them myself, than that they may be the means of
giving rise to something better. Could the straggling thoughts
of individuals be collected, they would frequently form materials
for wise and able men to improve into useful matter.
Let the assemblies be annual, with a president only. The re
presentation more equal; their business wholly domestic, and
subject to the authority of a continental congress.
Let each colony be divided into six, eight, or ten convenient
districts, each district to send a proper number of delegates to
congress, so that each colony send at least thirty. The whole
number in congress will be at least three hundred and ninety.
Each congress to sit * * * * and to choose a president by the
following method :—When the delegates are met, let a colony be
taken from the whole thirteen colonies by lot; after which let the
�Common Sense.
27
whole congress choose, by ballot, a president from out of the
delegates of that province. In the next congress, let a colony be
taken by lot from twelve only, omitting that colony from which
the president was taken in the former congress, so proceeding on
till the whole thirteen shall have had their proper rotation. And
in order that nothing may pass into a law but what is satis
factorily just, not less than three-fifths of the congress to be
called a majority. He that will promote discord under a govern
ment so equally formed as this, would have joined Lucifer in his
revolt.
But as there is a peculiar delicacy, from whom and in what
manner this business must first arise; and as it seems most
agreeable and consistent that it should come from some inter
mediate body between the governed and the governors, that is,
between the congress and the people, let a continental conference
be held, in the following manner and for the following
purpose:—
A committee of twenty-six members of congress, viz., two for
each county. Two members from each house of assembly or
provincial convention; and five representatives of the people at
large, to be chosen in the capital city or town of each province,
for and in behalf of the whole province, by as many qualified
voters as shall think proper to attend from all parts of the pro
vince for that purpose; or, if more convenient, the representatives
may be chosen in two or three of the most populous parts there
of. In this conference thus assembled will be united the two
grand principles of business, knowledge and power. The
members of congress, assemblies, or conventions, by having had
experience in national concerns, will be able and useful coun
sellors ; and the whole, empowered by the people, will have a
truly legal authority.
The conferring members being met, let their business be to
frame a continental charter, or charter of the united colonies,
answering to what is called Magna Charta of England; fixing
the number and manner of choosing members of congress, mem
bers of assembly, with their date of sitting, and drawing the line
of business and jurisdiction between them ; always remembering
that our strength is continental, not provincial; securing freedom
and property to all men ; and, above all things, the free exercise
of religion, according to the dictates of conscience; with such
other matter as it is necessary for a charter to contain. Imme
diately after which the said conference to dissolve, and the bodies
which shall be chosen conformable to the said .charter to be the
legislators and governors of the continent for the time being,
whose peace and happiness may God preserve ! Amen.
. Should any body of men be hereafter delegated for this or some
similar purpose, I offer them the following extract from that wise
observer on governments, Dragonetti:—“ The science,” says he,
“ of the politician consists in fixing the true point of happiness
and freedom. Those men would deserve the gratitude of ages,
who should discover a mode of government that contained the
�Common Sense.
greatest sum of individual happiness, with the least national
expense.”—Dragonetti, on “ Virtue and Rewards.”
But where, some say, is the king of America ? I will tell you,
friend, he reigns above, and does not make havoc of mankind,
like the royal brute of Britain. Yet, that we may not appear to
be defective even in earthly honors, let a day be solemnly set
apart for proclaiming the charter; let it be brought forth, placed
on the divine law, the word of God; let a crown be placed
thereon, by which the world may know that so far we approve of
monarchy, that in America the law is king. For as in absolute
governments the king is law, so in free countries the law ought
to be king, and there ought to be no other. But lest any ill use
should afterwards arise, let the crown, at the conclusion of the
ceremony, be demolished and scattered among the people, whose
right it is.
A government of our own is our natural right; and when a
man seriously reflects on the precariousness of human affairs, he
will become convinced that it is infinitely wiser and safer to form
a constitution of our own in a cool, deliberate manner, while we
have it in our power, than to trust such an interesting event to
time and chance. If we omit it now, some Masaniello may
*
hereafter arise, who, laying hold of popular disquietudes, may
collect together the desperate and discontented, and by assuming
to themselves the powers of government, may sweep away the
liberties of the continent like a deluge. Should the government
of America return again to the hands of Britain, the tottering
situation of things will be a temptation for some desperate
adventurer to try his fortune; and in such a case, what relief
can Britain have ? Ere she could hear the news, the fatal busi
ness might be done, and ourselves suffering, like the wretched
Britains, under the oppression of the conqueror. Ye that oppose
independence now, ye know not what ye do ; ye are opening a
door to eternal tyranny.
There are thousands and tens of thousands who would think it
glorious to expel from the continent that barbarous and hellish
power which hath stirred up the Indians and negroes to destroy
us ; the cruelty hath a double guilt—it is dealing brutally by us
and treacherously by them.
To talk of friendship with those in whom our reason forbids us
to have faith, and our affections, wounded through a thousand
pores, instruct us to detest, is madness and folly. Every day
wears out the little remains of kindred between us and them,
and can there b§ any reason to hope that, as the relationship
expires, the affection will increase ; or that we shall agree better
when we have ten times more and greater concerns to quarrel
over than ever ?
Ye that tell us of harmony and reconciliation, can ye restore to
* Thomas Aniello, otherwise Masaniello, a fisherman of Naples, who, after
spiriting up his countrymen in the public market-place against the oppression of
the Spaniards, to whom the place was then subject, prompted them to revolt, and
in the space of a day became king.
�Common Sense.
29
us the time that is past? Can you give to prostitution its former
innocence ? Neither can ye reconcile Britain and America. The
last cord now is broken, the people of England are presenting
addresses against us. There are injuries which nature cannot
forgive; she would cease to be nature if she did. As well can a
lover forgive the ravisher of his mistress as the continent forgive
the murderers of Britain. The Almighty hath implanted in us
these unextinguishable feelings for good and wise purposes.
They are the guardians of his image in our hearts. They
distinguish us from the herd of common animals. The social
compact would dissolve and justice be extirpated from the earth,
or have only a casual existence, were we callous to the touches
of affection. The robber and the murderer would often escape
unpunished, did not the injuries which our temper sustains pro
voke us into justice.
O ye that love mankind; ye that dare oppose, not only the
tyranny, but the tyrant, stand forth ; every spot of the old world
is overrun with oppression. Freedom hath been hunted round
the globe. Asia and Africa have long expelled her, Europe
regards her like a stranger, and England hath given her warning
to depart. O receive the fugitive ; and prepare in time an asylum
for mankind.
Of the present Ability of America, with some miscellaneous
Reflexions.
I have never met with a man, either in England or America
who hath not confessed his opinion that a separation between the
two countries would take place one time or other. And there is
no instance in which we have shown less judgment than in
endeavoring to describe what we call the ripeness or fitness of
the continent for independence.
As all men allow the measure, and vary only in their opinion
of the time, let us, in order to remove mistakes, take a general
survey of things, and endeavor, if possible, to find out the very
time. But we need not go far, the inquiry ceases at once, for
the time hath found us. The general concurrence, the glorious
union of all things, prove the fact.
It is not in numbers, but in unity, that our great strength lies;
yet our present numbers are sufficient to repel the force of all
the world. The continent hath, at this time, the largest body of
armed and disciplined men of any power under heaven, and is
just arrived at that pitch of strength in which no single colony
is able to support itself, and the whole, when united, can accom
plish the matter ; and either more or less than this might be fatal
in its effects. Our land force is already sufficient, and as to naval
affairs, we cannot be insensible that Britian would r ever suffer an
American man-of-war to be built while the continent remained
in her hands, wherefore we should be no forwarder a hundred
years hence in that branch than we are now; but the truth is, we
shall be less so, because the timber of the country is every day
�30
Common Sense.
diminishing, and that which will remain at last will be far off
and difficult to procure.
Were the continent crowded with inhabitants, her sufferings
under the present circumstances would be intolerable. The more
sea-port towns we had, the more should we have both to defend
and to lose. Our present numbers are so happily proportioned
to our wants, that no man need to be idle. The diminution of
trade affords an army, and the necessities of an army create a
new trade.
Debts we have none, and whatever we may contract on this
account will serve as a glorious memento of our virtue. Can we
but leave posterity with a settled form of government, an inde
pendent constitution of its own, the purchase at any price will be
cheap. But to expend millions for the sake of getting a few vile
acts repealed, and routing the present ministry only, is unworthy
the charge, is using posterity with the utmost cruelty; because
it is leaving them the great work to do, and a debt upon their
backs from which they derive no advantage. Such a thought is
unworthy a man of honor, and is the true characteristic of a
narrow heart and a peddling politician.
The debt we may contract doth not deserve our regard, if the
work be but accomplished. No nation ought to be without a
debt; a national debt is a national bond, and when it bears no
interest, is in no case a grievance. Britain is oppressed with a
debt of upwards of one hundred and fifty millions sterling, for
which she pays upwards of four millions interest. As a compen
sation for the debt, she has a large navy ; America is without a
debt and without a navy; yet, for the twentieth part of the
English national debt, could have a navy as large again. The
navy of England is not worth more at this time than three
millions and a half sterling.
The charge of building a ship of each rate, and furnishing
her with masts, yards, sails, and rigging, together with a pro
portion of eight months’ boatswain’s and carpenter’s sea stores,
as calculated by Mr. Burchett, Secretary to the Navy, is as
follows:—
For a ship of 100 guns...................................... £35,552
90
.................................... 29 886
80
23.638
70
17,785
60
14,197
50
................................... 10,606
40
7,758
30
5,846
20
3,710
And from hence it is easy to sum up the value, or cost rather,
of the whole British navy, which, in the year 1757, when it was
at its greatest glory, consisted of the following ships and
guns:—
�Common Sense.
Ship.
Guns.
Cost of one.
31
Cost of all.
£35,553 ............. ........... £213 318
100
6
29,886 ............. ...........
358 632
12
90
23,638 ............. ...........
283 656
12
80
17,785 ............. ............
70
764.755
48
14,197 ............. ...........
60
496.895
35
10,606 ............. ...........
40
50
424,240
7,758 ............. ...........
40
344,110
45
3,710 ............. ...........
58
20
215,180
85 Sloops, bombs, and)
fireships, one with;- 2,000 ..........................
170,000
another.
J
----------Cost ......................... 8,270.786
Remains for guns
....
229,214
£3,500,0001
No country on the globe is so happily situated, or so internally
capable of raising a fleet, as America. Tar, timber, iron, and
cordage are her natural produce. We need go abroad for
nothing. Whereas the Dutch, who make large profits by hiring
out their ships of war to the Spaniards and Portuguese, are
obliged to import most of the materials they use. We ought
to view the building a fleet as an article of commerce, it being
the natural manufactory of this country. It is the best money
we can lay out. A navy, when finished, is worth more than it
cost; and is that nice point in national policy in which commerce
and protection are united. Let us build; if we want them not,
we can sell; and by that means replace our paper currency with
ready gold and silver.
In point of manning a fleet people in general run into great
errors. It is not necessary that one fourth part should be sailors.
The “Terrible,’’privateer,Captain Death, stood thehottestengagement of any ship last war, yet had not twenty sailors on board,
though her complement of men was upwards of two hundred. A
few able and sociable sailors will soon instruct a sufficient number
of active landsmen in the common work of a ship. Wherefore,
we never can be more capable to begin on maritime matters than
now, while our timber is standing, our fisheries blocked up, and
our sailors and shipwrights out of employ. Men of war of
seventy and eighty guns were built forty years ago in New
England, and why not the same now? Ship building is America’s
greatest pride, and in which she will in time excel the whole
world. The great empires of the east are mostly inland, and
consequently excluded from the possibility of rivalling her.
Africa is in a state of barbarism, and no power in Europe hath
either such an extent of coast, or such an internal supply of
materials. Where nature hath given the one she has withheld
1 Mr. Paine would be a little astonished if he could to-day examine
the estimates for an English ironclad.
�32
Common Sense.
the other. To America only hath she been liberal in both. The
vast empire of Russia is almost shut out from the sea ; where
fore her boundless forests, her tar, iron, and cordage are only
articles of commerce.
In point of safety, ought we to be without a fleet ? We are not
the little people now which we were sixty years ago. At that time
we might have trusted our property in the street, or field rather,
and slept securely without locks or bolts to our doors or
windows. The case now is altered, and our methods of defence
ought to improve with our increase of property. A common
pirate, twelve months ago, might have come up the Delaware and
laid the City of Philadelphia under instant contribution for what
sum he pleased, and the same might have happened to other places.
Nay, any daring fellow, in a brig of fourteen or sixteen guns,
might have robbed the whole continent, and carried off half a
million of money. These are circumstances which demand our
attention, and point out the necessity of naval protection.
Some, perhaps, will say that after we have made it up with
Britain, she will protect us. Can we be so unwise as to mean
that she shall keep a navy in our harbors for that purpose?
Common sense will tell us that the power which hath endeavored
to subdue us is, of all others, the most improper to defend
•us. Conquest may be effected under the pretence of friendship,
and ourselves, after a long and brave resistance, be at last
cheated into slavery. And if her ships are not to be admitted
into our harbors, I would ask, how is she to protect us ? A
navy three or four thousand miles off can be of little use, and on
sudden emergencies none at all. Wherefore, if we must here
after protect ourselves, why not do it for ourselves ? why do it
for another ?
The English list of ships of war is long and formidable, but
not a tenth part of them are at any one time fit for service,
numbers of them not in being, yet their names are pompously
continued in the list, if only a plank be left of the ship; and not
a fifth part of such as are fit for service can be spared on any one
station at one time. The East and West Indies, Mediterranean,
Africa, and other parts over which Britain extends her claim,
make large demands upon her navy. From a mixture of preju
dice and inattention, we have contracted a false notion respecting
me navy of England, and have talked as if we should have the
/vnole of it to encounter at once, and for that reason supposed
mat we must have one as large, which not being instantly prac
ticable, has been made use of by a set of disguised Tories to
discourage our beginning thereon. Nothing can be farther from
truth than this, for if America had only a twentieth part of the
naval force of Britain, she would be by far an overmatch for her,
because, as we neither have nor claim any foreign dominion, our
own force will be employed on our own coast, where we should,
in the long run, have two to one the advantage of those who had
three or four thousand miles to sail over before they could
attack us, and the same distance to return in order to refit and
�33
Common Sense.
recruit. And although Britain, by her fleet, hath a check over
our trade to Europe, we have as large a one over her trade to the
West Indies, which, by lying in the neighborhood of the continent,
is entirely at its mercy.
Some method might be fallen on to keep up a naval force in
the time of peace, if we should not judge it necessary to support
a constant navy. If premiums were to be given to merchants, to
build and employ in their service ships mounted with twenty,
thirty, forty, or fifty guns (the premiums to be in proportion to
the loss of bulk to the merchants,) fifty or sixty of those ships,
with a few guardships on constant duty, would keep up a suffi
cient navy, and that without burdening ourselves with the evil
so loudly complained of in England, of suffering their fleet, in
time of peace, to lie rotting in the docks. To unite the sinews of
commerce and defence is sound policy, for when our strength and
our riches play into each other’s hands we need fear no external
enemy.
In almost every article of defence we abound. Hemp flourishes
even to rankness, so that we need not want cordage. Our iron
is superior to that of other countries. Our small arms equal to
any in the world. Cannon we can cast at pleasure. Saltpetre
and gunpowder we are every day producing. Our knowledge is
hourly improving. Resolution is our inherent character, and
courage hath never yet forsaken us. Wherefore, what is it we
want ? Why is it that we hesitate ? From Britain we expect
nothing but ruin. If she is once admitted to the government of
America again, this continent will not be worth living in.
Jealousies will be always arising ; insurrections will be constantly
happening; and who will go forth to quell them ? Who will
venture his life to reduce his own countrymen to a foreign obedi
ence ? The difference between Pennsylvania and Connecticut,
respecting some unlocated lands, shows the insignificance of a
British government, and fully proves that nothing but continental
authority can regulate continental matters.
Another reason why the present time is preferable to all others
is, that the fewer our numbers are, the more land there is yet
unoccupied, which, instead of being lavished by the king on his
Worthless dependents, may be hereafter applied, not only to the
discharge of the present debt, but to the constant support of
government. No nation under heaven hath such an advantage
as this.
The infant state of the colonies, as it is called, so far from being
against, is an argument in favor of independence. We are suffi.
oiently numerous, and were we more so, we might be less united.
It is a matter worthy of observation that the more a country is
peopled, the smaller their armies are. In military numbers the
ancient far exceeded the moderns; and the reason is evident, for
trade being the consequence of population, men become too much
absorbed thereby to attend to anything else. Commerce dimiishes the spirit both of patriotism and military defence; and
history sufficiently informs us, that the bravest achievements
C
�34
Common Sense.
were always accomplished in the nonage of a nation. With the
increase of commerce, England hath lost its spirit. The city of
London, notwithstanding its numbers, submits to continued
insults with the patience of a coward. The more men have to
lose, the less willing they are to venture. The rich are in general
slaves to fear, and submit to courtly power with the trembling
duplicity of a spaniel.
Youth is the seed-time of good habits, as well in nations as in
individuals. It might be difficult, if not impossible, to form the
continent into one government half a century hence. The vast
variety of interests, occasioned by the increase of trade and popu
lation, would create confusion. Colony would be against colony.
Each being able, might scorn each other’s assistance ; and while
the proud and foolish gloried in their little distinctions, the wise
would lament that the union had not been formed before. Where
fore, the present time is the true time for establishing it. The
intimacy which is contracted in infancy, and the friendship which
is formed in misfortune, are of all others the most lasting and
honorable. Our present union is marked with both these cha
racters ; we are young, and we have been distressed; but our
concord hath withstood our troubles, and fixes a memorable era
for posterity to glory in.
The present time, likewise, is that peculiar time which never
happens to a nation but once, viz., the time of forming itself into
a government. Most nations have let slip the opportunity, and
by that means have been compelled to receive laws from their
conquerors, instead of making laws for themselves. First, they
had a king, and then a form of government; whereas, the articles
or charter of government should be formed first, and men dele
gated to execute them afterwards; but from the errors of other
nations, let us learn wisdom, and lay hold of the present oppor
tunity—to begin government at the right end.
When William the Conqueror subdued England, he gave them
law at the point of the sword, and until we consent that the seat
of government in America be legally and authoritatively occupied,
we shall be in danger of having it filled by some fortunate ruf
fian, who may treat us in the same manner; and then, where
will be our freedom ? where our property ?
As to religion, I hold it to be the indispensable duty of all
governments to protect all conscientious professors thereof, and I
know of no other business which government hath to do there
with. Let a man throw aside that narrowness of soul, that sel
fishness of principle, which the niggards of all professions are so
unwilling to part with, and he will be at once delivered of his
fears on that head. Suspicion is the companion of mean souls,
and the bane of all good society. For myself, I fully and con
scientiously believe that it is the will of the Almighty that there
should be a diversity of religious opinions among us; it affords a
larger field for our Christian kindness. Were we all of one way
of thinking, our religious dispositions would want matter for
probation; and on this liberal principle, I look on the various
�Common Sense.
35
denominations among us to be, like children of the same family,
differing only in what is called their Christian names.
In page twenty-seven I threw out a few thoughts on the pro
priety of a continental charter (for I only presume to offer hints,
not plans), and in this place I take the liberty of re-mentioning
the subject by observing that a charter is to be understood as a
bond of solemn obligation, which the whole enters into, to sup
port the right of every separate part, whether of religion, per
sonal freedom, or property. A firm bargain and a right reckon
*
ing make long friends.
In a former page I likewise mentioned the necessity of a large
and equal representation, and there is no political matter which
more deserves our attention. A small number of electors, or a
small number of representatives, are equally dangerous ; but if the
number of the representatives be not only small, but unequal, the
danger is increased. As an instance of this I mention the follow
ing : When the Associators’ petition was before the House of
Assembly of Pennsylvania twenty-eight members only were pre
*
sent; all the Bucks county members, being eight, voted against it,
and had seven of the Chester members done the same, this whole
province had been governed by two counties only, and this danger
it is always exposed to. The unwarrantable stretch, likewise,
which that House made in their last sitting, to gain an undue
authority over the delegates of that province, ought to warn the
people at large how they trust power out of their own hands. A
set of instructions for the delegates were put together, which in
point of sense and business would have dishonored a schoolboy ;
and after being approved by a few, a very few, without doors,
were carried into the House, and there passed in behalf of th®
whole colony; whereas, did the whole colony know with what
ill-will that House had entered on some necessary public
measures, they would not hesitate a moment to think them un
*
worthy of such a trust.
Immediate necessity makes many things convenient, which, if
continued, would grow into oppressions. Experience and right
are different things. When the calamities of America required
a consultation, there was no method so ready, or at that time so
proper, as to appoint persons from the several Houses of As
sembly for that purpose ; and the wisdom with which they have
proceeded hath preserved this continent from ruin. But as it is
more than probable that we shall ever be without a Congress,
every well-wisher to good order must own that the mode for
choosing members of that body deserves consideration. And I
put it as a question to those who make a study of mankind,
whether representation and election are not too great a power
for one and the same body of men to possess? When we are
planning for posterity, we ought to remember that virtue is not
hereditary.
It is from our enemies that we often gain excellent maxima
and are frequently surprised into reason by their mistakes. Mr.
Cornwall, one of the Lords of the Treasury, treated the petition
c 2
�36
Common Sense.
of the New York Assembly with contempt, because that House’
he said, consisted but of twenty-six members, which trifling
number, he argued, could not with decency be put for the whole.
We thank him for his involuntary honesty.
*
To conclude : however strange it may appear to some, or how
ever unwilling they may be to think so, matters not; but many
strong and striking reasons may be given, to show that nothing
can settle our affairs so expeditiously as an open and determined
declaration for independence. Some of which are:
First. It is the custom of nations, when any two are at war, for
some other powers not engaged in the quarrel, to step in as
mediators, and bring about the preliminaries of a peace; but
while America calls herself the subject of Great Britain, no power,
however well-disposed she may be, can offer her mediation.
Wherefore, in our present state, we may quarrel on for ever.
Secondly. It is unreasonable to suppose that France or Spain
will give us any kind of assistance, if we mean only to make use
of that assistance for the purpose of repairing the breach, and
strengthening the connexion between Britain and America, be
cause those powers would be sufferers by the consequences.
Thirdly. While we profess ourselves the subjects of Britain,
we must, in the eyes of foreign nations, be considered as rebels.
The precedent is somewhat dangerous to their peace, for men to
be in arms under the name of subjects ; we, on the spot, can solve
the paradox; but to unite resistance and subjection requires an
idea much too refined for common understandings.
Fourthly. Were a manifesto to be published, and dispatched
to foreign Courts, setting forth the miseries we have endured,
and the peaceable methods we have ineffectually used for redress,
declaring, at the same time, that not being able any longer to live
happily or safely under the cruel disposition of the British Court,
we had been driven to the necessity of breaking off all connexion
with her; at the same time assuring all such Courts of our
peaceable disposition towards them, and of our desire of entering
into trade with them ; such a memorial would produce more good
effects to this continent than if a ship were freighted with petitions
to Britain.
Under our present denomination of British subjects, we can
neither be received nor heard abroad; the custom of all Courts
is against us, and will be so until, by an independence, we take
rank with other nations.
These proceedings may at first appear strange and difficult;
but like other steps which we have already passed over, will in a
little time become familiar and agreeable; and until an indepen
dence is declared, the continent will find itself like a man who
continues putting off some unpleasant business from day to day,
yet knows it must be done, hates to set about it, wishes it over,
and is continually haunted with the thoughts of its necessity.
♦Those who would fully understand of what great consequenee a large
and equal representation is to a State, should read Burgh’s “ Political Disquisi
tions.’’
�Common Sense.
37
APPENDIX.
„
5
*
Since the publication of the first edition of this pamphlet, or
rather on the same day on which it came out, the king’s speech
made its appearance in this city. Had the spirit of prophecy
directed the birth of this production, it could not have brought
it forth at a more seasonable juncture, or a more necessary time.
The bloody-mindedness of the one shows the necessity of pursu
ing the doctrine of the other. Men read by way of revenge.
And the speech, instead of terrifying, prepared a way for the
manly principles of independence.
Ceremony, and even silence, from whatever motive they may
arise, have a hurtful tendency, when they give the least degree of
countenance to base and wicked performances ; wherefore, if this
maxim be admitted, it naturally follows, that the king’s speech,
as being a piece of finished villainy, deserved, and still deserves,
a general execration both by the Congress and the People. Yet
as the domestic tranquillity of a nation depends greatly on the
chastity of what may properly be called national manners, it is
often better to pass some things over in silent disdain, than to
make use of such new methods of dislike as might introduce the
least innovation on the guardian of our peace and safety. And,
perhaps, it is chiefly owing to this prudent delicacy, that the
king’s speech hath not, before now, suffered a public execration.
The speech, if it may be called one, is nothing better than a
wilful, audacious libel against the truth, the common good, and
the existence of mankind ; and is a formal and pompous method
of offering up human sacrifices to the pride of tyrants. But this
general massacre of mankind is one of the privileges, and the
certain consequence of kings: for as Nature knows them not,
they know not her; and although they are beings of our own
creating, they know not us, and are become the gods of their
creators. The speech hath one good quality, which is, that it is
not calculated to deceive; neither can we, even if we would, be
deceived by it; brutality and tyranny appear on the face of it.
It leaves us at no loss ; and every line convinces, even in the
moment of reading, that he who hunts the woods for prey, the
naked and untutored Indian, is less a savage than the king of
Britain.
Sir John Dalrymple, the putative father of a whining, Jesuitical
piece, fallaciously called “The Address of the People of England
to the Inhabitants of America,” hath, perhaps, from a vain sup
position that the people here were to be frightened at the pomp
and description of a king, given (though very unwisely on his part)
the real character of the present one. “ But,” says this writer,
“if you are inclined to pay compliments to an administration
which we do not complain of ” (meaning the Marquis of Rock* ngham’s at the repeal of the Stamp Act), “ it is very unfair in
ou to withhold them from that prince by whose nod alone they
�38
Common Sense.
were permitted to do anything.” This is Toryism with a witness!
Here is idolatry even with a mask! and he who can calmly hear
and digest such doctrine hath forfeited his claim to rationality—
an apostate from the order of manhood—and ought to be con
sidered as one who hath not only given up the proper dignity of
man, but sunk himself beneath the rank of animals, and con
temptibly crawls through the world like a worm.
It is now the interest of America to provide for herself. She
hath already a large and young family, whom it is more her duty
to take care of than to be granting away her property, to sup
port a power who is become a reproach to the names of men and
Christians. Ye, whose office it is to watch over the morals of a
nation, of whatsoever sect or denomination ye are of, as well as
ye who are more immediately the guardians of the public liberty,
if ye wish to preserve your native country uncontaminated by
European corruption, ye must in secret wish a separation. But
leaving the moral part to private reflexion, I shall chiefly coniine
my farther remarks to the following heads:—
First. That it is the interest of America to be separated from
Britain.
Secondly. Which is the easiest and most practicable plan,
Reconciliation or Independence ? with some occasional remarks.
In support of the first, I could, if I judged it proper, produce
the opinion of some of the ablest and most experienced men on
this continent; and whose sentiments on that head are not yet
publicly known. It is in reality a self-evident position ; for no
nation in a state of foreign dependence, limited in its commerce,
and cramped and fettered in its legislative powers, can ever arrive
at any material eminence. America doth not yet know what
opulence is; and although the progress which she hath made
stands unparalleled in the history of other nations, it is but child
hood, compared with what she would be capable of arriving at,
had she, as she ought to have, the legislative power in her own
hands. England is, at this time, proudly coveting what would
do her no good, were she to accomplish it; and the continent,
hesitating on the matter, which will be her final ruin, if neglected.
It is the commerce and not the conquest of America by which
England is to be benefited ; and that would in a great measure
continue, were the countries as independent of each other as
France and Spain; because in many articles, neither can go to a
better market. But it is the independence of this country of
Britain or any other, which is now the main and only object
worthy of contention ; and which, like all other truths discovered
by necessity, will appear clearer and stronger every day.
First. Because it will come to that one time or other.
Secondly. Because the longer it is delayed the harder it will
be to accomplish.
I have frequently amused myself, both in public and private
companies, with silently remarking the specious errors of those
who spoke without reflecting. And among the many which I have
heard, the following seems the most general, viz.: That had this
�Common Sense.
39
rupture happened forty or fifty years hence, instead of now, the
continent would have been more able to have shaken off the de
pendence. To which I reply, that our military ability, at this
time, arises from the experience gained in the last war, and which,
in forty or fifty years’ time, would have been totally extinct. The
continent would not, by that time, have had a general, or even
a military officer, left; and we, or those who may succeed.us,
would have been as ignorant of martial matters as the ancient
Indians. And this single position closely attended to, will unan
swerably prove, that the present time is preferable to all others.
The argument turns thus: At the conclusion of the last war we
had experience, but wanted numbers, and forty or fifty years
hence we shall have numbers without experience ; wherefore, the
proper point of time must be some particular point between the
two extremes, in which a sufficiency of the former remains, and a
proper increase of the latter is obtained; and that point of time
is the present time.
The reader will pardon this digression, as it does not properly
come under the head I first set out with, and to which I shall
again return by the following position, viz :
Should affairs be patched up with Britain, and she to remain
the governing and sovereign power of America (which, as matters
are now circumstanced, is giving up the point entirely), we shall
deprive ourselves of the very means of sinking the debt we have
or may contract. The value of the back land, which some of
the provinces are clandestinely deprived of, by the unjust exten
sion of the limits of Canada, valued at only five pounds sterling
per hundred acres, amounts to upwards of twenty-five millions
Pennsylvania currency ; and the quit rents at one penny sterling
per acre, or two millions yearly.
It is by the sale of those lands that the debt may be sunk,
without burden to any, and the quit-rent reserved thereon will
always lessen, and in time will wholly support the yearly expense
of government. It matters not how long the debt is in paying,
so that the lands, when sold, be applied to the discharge of it;
and for the execution of which, the Congress for the time being
will be continental trustees.
I proceed now to the second head, viz.: Which is the easiest
and most practical plan, Reconciliation or Independence ? with
some occasional remarks.
He who takes nature for his guide is not easily beaten out of
his argument, and on that ground I answer generally—that
independence being a Bingle simple line contained within our
selves, and reconciliation a matter exceedingly perplexed and
complicated, and in which a treacherous, capricious court is to
interfere, gives the answer without a doubt.
The present state of America is truly alarming to every man
who is capable of reflection. Without law, without government,
without other mode of power than what is founded on, and
granted by courtesy; held together by an unexampled occurrence
of sentiment, which is nevertheless subject to change, and which
�40
Common Sense.
every secret enemy is endeavoring to dissolve. Our present
condition is legislation without law, wisdom without a plan, a
constitution without a name ; and what is strangely astonishing,
perfect independence contending for dependence. The instance
is without a precedent; the case never existed before ; and who
can tell what may be the event; the property of no man is secure
in the present embarrassed system of things; the mind of the multi
tude is left at random; and seeing no fixed object before them,
they pursue such as fancy or opinion starts. Nothing is criminal ;
there is no such thing as treason; wherefore everyone thinks
himself at liberty to act as he pleases. The Tories dared not to
have assembled offensively, had they known that their lives,
by that act, were forfeited to the laws of the state. A line of
distinction should be drawn between English soldiers taken in
battle, and inhabitants of America taken in arms. The first are
prisoners, but the latter traitors. The one forfeits his liberty,
the other his head.
Notwithstanding our wisdom, there is a visible feebleness in
some of our proceedings which gives encouragement to dissensions.
The continental belt is too loosely buckled ; and if something be
not done in time, it will be too late to do anything, and we shall
fall into a state, in which neither reconciliation nor independence
will be practicable. The Court and its worthless adherents are
got at their old game of dividing the continent; and there are not
wanting among us printers, who will be busy in spreading specious
falsehoods. The artful and hypocritical letters which appeared,
a few months ago, in two of the New York papers, and likewise
in two others, are an evidence, that there are men who want
either judgment or honesty.
It is easy getting into holes or corners, and talking of recon
ciliation ; but do such men seriously consider, how difficult the task
is, and how dangerous it may prove, should the continent divide
thereon ? Do they take within their view all the various orders
of men, whose situations and circumstances, as well as their own,
are to be considered therein ? Do they put themselves in the
place of the sufferer whose all is already gone, and of the soldier
who hath quitted all for the defence of his country ? If their
ill-judged moderation be suited to their own private situations
only, regardless of others, the event will convince them “that
they are reckoning without their host.”
Put us, say some, on the footing we were on in sixty-three.
To which I answer, the request is not now in the power of
Britain to comply with ; neither will she propose it; but if it
were, and even should be granted, I ask, as a reasonable question,
by what means is such a corrupt and faithless Court to be kept
to its engagements? Another Parliament, nay, even the present,
may hereafter repeal the obligation, on the pretence of its being
violently obtained, or unwisely granted ; and in that case, where
is our redress ? No going to law with nations; cannon are the
barristers of crowns ; and the sword, not of justice, but of war,
decides the suit. To be on the footing of sixty-three, it is not
�Common Sense.
41
sufficient that the laws only be put on the same state, but that
our circumstances, likewise, be put on the same state ; our burnt
and destroyed towns repaired or built up; our private losses
made good, our public debts (contracted for defence) discharged ;
otherwise, we shall be millions worse than we were at that envi
able period. Such a request, had it been complied with a year
ago, would have won the heart and soul of the continent—but it
is now too late, “ the rubicon is passed.”
Besides, the taking up arms merely to enforce the repeal of a
pecuniary law, seems as unwarrantable by the divine law, and as
repugnant to human feelings, as the taking up arms to enforce
obedience thereto. The object on either side does not justify
the means ; for the lives of men are too valuable to be cast away
on such trifles. It is the violence which is done and threatened to
our persons ; the destruction of our property by an armed force ;
the invasion of our country by fire and sword, which conscien
tiously qualifies the use of arms; and the instant in which such
a mode of defence became necessary, all subjection to Britain
ought to have ceased ; and the independence of America should
have been considered as dating its era from, and published by the
first musket that was first fired against her. This line is a line of
consistency ; neither drawn by caprice, nor extended by ambition;
but produced by a chain of events, of which the colonies were
not the authors.
I shall conclude these remarks with the following timely and
well-intended hints. We ought to reflect, that there are three
different ways by which an independency can hereafter be effected ;
and that one of those three will one day or other be the fate of
America, viz. : By the legal voice of the people in Congress, by a
military power, or by a mob. It may not always happen that our
soldiers are citizens, and the multitude a body of reasonable men;
virtue, as I have already remarked, is not hereditary, neither is it
perpetual. Should an independency be brought about by the first
of those means, we have every opportunity and every encourage
ment before us to form the noblest, purest constitution on the
face of the earth. We have it in our power to begin the world
over again. A situation, similar to the present, hath not happened
since the days of Noah till now. The birthday of a new world
is at hand, and a race of men, perhaps as numerous as all Europe
contains, are to receive their portion of freedom from the event
of a few months. The reflexion is awful—and in this point of
view, how trifling, how ridiculous, do the little paltry cavillings of
a few weak or interested men appear, when weighed against the
business of a world.
Should we neglect the present favorable and inviting period,
and an independence be hereafter effected by any other means, we
must charge the consequence to ourselves, or to those rather
whose narrow and prejudiced souls are habitually opposing the
measure, without either inquiring or reflecting. There are reasons
to be given in support of independence, which men should rather
privately think of, than be publicly told of. We ought not now
�42
Common Sense.
to be debating whether we shall be independent or not, but
anxious to accomplish it on a firm, secure, and honorable basis,
and uneasy rather that it is not yet begun upon. Every day
convinces us of its necessity. Even the Tories (if such beings
yet remain among us) should, of all men, be the most solicitous
to promote it; for, as the appointment of committees at first
protected them from popular rage, so a wise and well-established
form of government will be the only certain means of continuing
it securely to them. Wherefore, if they have not virtue enough
to be Whigs, they ought to have prudence enough to wish for
independence.
In short, independence is the only bond that can tie and keep
us together ; we shall then see our object, and our ears will be
legally shut against the schemes of an intriguing, as well as a
cruel enemy. We shall then, too, be on a proper footing to treat
with Britain; for there is reason to conclude that the pride of
that Court will be less hurt by treating with the American States
for terms of peace, than with those whom she denominates
“rebellious subjects,” for terms of accommodation. It is our
delaying it that encourages her to hope for conquest, and our
backwardness tends only to prolong the war. As we have, with
out any good effect therefrom, withheld our trade to obtain
a redress of our grievances, let us now try the alternative by
independently redressing them ourselves, and then offering to
open the trade. The mercantile and reasonable part in England
will be still with us, because, peace with trade is preferable to
war without it; and if this offer be not accepted, other courts
may be applied to.
On these grounds I rest the matter. And as no offer hath yet
been made to refute the doctrine contained in the former editions
of this pamphlet, it is a negative proof that either the doctrine
cannot be refuted, or that the party in favor of it are too
numerous to be opposed. Wherefore, instead of gazing at each
other with suspicious or doubtful curiosity, let each of us hold
out to his neighbor the hearty hand of friendship, and unite in
drawing a line which, like an act of oblivion, shall bury in
forgetfulness every former dissension. Let the names of Whig
and Tory be extinct; and let none other be heard amoDg us than
those of a good citizen, an open and resolute friend, and a virtuous
supporter of the rights of mankind, and of the free and inde
pendent States of America.
�Common Sense.
43
To the Representatives of the Religious Society of the People called
Quakers, or to so many of them as were concerned in publishing
a late Piece, intituled: “ The Ancient Testimony and Principles
of the People called Quakers renewed, with respect to the King and
Government, and touching the Commotions now prevailing in these
and other parts of America, addressed to the People in England.'’’
The writer of this is one of those few, who never dishonor
religion, either by ridiculing or cavilling at any denomination
whatsoever. To God, and not to man, are all men accountable
on the score of religion. Wherefore this epistle is not so properly
addressed to you, as a religious, but as a political body, dabbling
in matters, which the professed quietude of your principles
instruct you not to meddle with.
As you have, without a proper authority for so doing, put
yourselves in the place of the whole body of the Quakers, so the
writer of this, in order to be on equal rank with yourselves, is
under the necessity of putting himself in the place of all those
who approve the very writings and principles, against which your
testimony is directed ; and he hath chosen this singular situation
in order that you might discover in him that presumption of
character which you cannot see in yourselves. For neither he
nor you can have any claim or title to political representation.
When men have departed from the right way, it is no wonder
that they stumble and fall. And it is evident from the manner
in which ye have managed your testimony, that politics (as a reli
gious body of men) is not your proper walk ; however well
adapted it might appear to you, it is, nevertheless, a jumble of
good and bad put unwisely together, and the conclusion drawn
therefrom, both unnatural and unjust.
The two first pages (and the whole doth not make four), we
give you credit for, and expect the same civility from you because
the love and desire of peace is not confined to Quakerism, it is
the natural as well as the religious wish of all denominations of
men. And on this ground, as men laboring to establish an
independent constitution of our own, do we exceed all others in
our hope, end, and aim. Our plan is peace for ever. We are tired
of contention with Britain, and can see no real end to it but in final
separation. We act consistently, because for the sake of intro
ducing an endless and uninterrupted peace, do we bear the evils
and burdens of the present day. We are endeavoring, and will
steadily continue to endeavor, to separate and dissolve a con
nexion, which hath already filled our land with blood; and
which, while the name of it remains, will be the fatal cause of
future mischiefs to both countries.
We fight neither for revenge nor conquest; neither from pride
nor passion; we are not insulting the world with our fleets and
armies, nor ravaging the globe for plunder. Beneath the shade of
�44
Common Sense.
our own vines are we attacked; in our own houses, and in our own
land, is the violence committed against us. We view our enemies
in the character of highwaymen and housebreakers; and having
no defence for ourselves in the civil law, are obliged to punish
them by the military one, and apply the sword in the very case
where you have before now applied the halter. Perhaps we feel
for the ruined and insulted sufferers in all and every part of the
continent, with a degree of tenderness which hath not yet made
its way into some of your bosoms. But be ye sure that ye
mistake not the cause and ground of your testimony. Call not
coldness of soul religion, nor put the bigot in the place of the
Christian.
O ye partial ministers of your own acknowledged principles!
if the bearing arms be sinful, the first going to war must be more
so, by all the difference between wilful attack and unavoidable
defence. Wherefore, if ye really preach from conscience, and
mean not to make apolitical hobby-horse of your religion, convince
the world thereof, by proclaiming your doctrine to our enemies,
for they likewise bear arms. Give us a proof of your sincerity by
publishing it at St. James’s, to the commanders-in-chief at Boston,
to the admirals and captains who are piratically ravaging our
coasts, and to all the murdering miscreants who are acting
in authority under the tyrant whom ye profess to serve. Had
ye the honest soul of Barclay, ye would preach repentance
*
to your king ; ye would tell the despot of his sins, and warn him
of eternal ruin. Ye would not spend your partial invectives
against the injured and the insulted only, but like faithful
ministers, would cry aloud and spare none. Say not that ye
are persecuted, neither endeavor to make us the authors of
that reproach, which ye are bringing upon yourselves, for we
testify unto all men that we do not complain against ye because
ye are Quakers, but because ye pretend to be, and are not
Quakers.
Alas! it seems by the particular tendency of some part of your
testimony, and other parts of your conduct, as if all sin was
reduced to, and comprehended in, the act of bearing arms, and
that by the people only. Ye appear to us to have mistaken party
for conscience ; because the general tenor of your actions wants
uniformity ; and it is exceedingly difficult to us to give credit to
many of your pretended scruples ; because we see them made by
the same men, who, in the very instant that they are exclaiming
against the mammon of this world, are, nevertheless, hunting after
* “ Thou hast tasted of prosperity and adversity! thou knowest what it is to be
banished thy native country, to be overruled as well as to rule, and set upon the
throne: and being oppressed,thou hast reason to know how hateful the oppressor
is both to God and man. If after all these warnings and advertisements, thou dost
not turn unto the Lord with all thy heart, but forget him who remembered thee in
thy distress, and give up thyself to follow lust and vanity, surely great will be thy
condemnation; against which snare, as well as the temptation of those who may or
do feed thee, and prompt thee to evil, the most excellent and prevalent remedy will
be to apply thyself to that light of Christ which shineth in thy conscience, and
which neither can, nor will flatter thee, nor suffer thee to be at ease in thy sins.”
Barclay’s Address to Charles II.
�Common Sense,
45
it with a step as steady as time, and an appetite as keen as
death.
The quotation which ye have made from Proverbs, in the third
page of your testimony, that when a man’s ways please the Lord,
he maketh “ even his enemies to be at peace with him,” is very
unwisely chosen on your part, because it amounts to a proof that
the tyrant whom ye are so desirous of supporting does not please
the Lord, otherwise his reign would be in peace.
I now proceed to the latter part of your testimony, and that for
which all the foregoing seems only an introduction, viz:—
“ It hath ever been our judgment and principle, since we are
called to profess the light of Christ Jesus manifested in our con
sciences unto this day, that the setting up and putting down kings
and governments is God’s peculiar prerogative for causes best
known to himself ; and that it is not our business to have any hand
or contrivance therein ; nor to be busy-bodies above our station,
much less to plot and contrive the ruin, or overturn of any of
them, but to pray for the king and safety of our nation and good
of all men ; that we might live a peaceable and quiet life, in all
godliness and honesty, under the government which God is
pleased to set over us.” If these are really your principles, why
do ye not abide by them ? Why do ye not leave that which ye
call God’s work to be managed by himself ? These very principles
instruct you to wait with patience and humility for the event of
all public measures, and to receive that event as the divine will
towards you. Wherefore, what occasion is there for your political
testimony, if you fully believe what it contains ? And, therefore,
publishing it proves that you either do not believe what ye
profess, or have not virtue enough to practice what ye believe.
The principles of Quakerism have a direct tendency to make a
man the quiet and inoffensive subject of any and every govern
ment which is set over him. And as the setting up and putting down
of kings and governments is God’s peculiar prerogative, he most
certainly will not be robbed thereof by us; wherefore the prin
ciple itself leads you to approve of everything which ever
happened, or may happen, to kings, as being his work. Oliver
Cromwell thanks you. Charles, then, died, not by the hands of
men; and should the present proud imitator of him come to the
same untimely end, the writers and publishers of the testimony
are bound, by the doctrine it contains, to applaud the fact.
Kings are not taken away by miracles, neither are changes in
governments brought about by any other means than such as
are common and human ; and such as we are now using. Even
the dispersion of the Jews, though foretold by our Savior, was
effected by arms. Wherefore, as ye refuse to be the means on
one side, ye ought not to be meddlers on the other, but to wait
the issue in silence; and unless ye can produce divine authority,
to prove that the Almighty, who hath created and placed this new
world at the greatest distance it could possibly stand, east and
west, from every part of the old, doth, nevertheless, disapprove of
its being independent of the corrupt and abandoned Court of
�46
• Common Sense.
Britain; unless, I say, ye can show this, how can ye, on the ground
of your principles, justify the exciting and stirring up the people
“ firmly to unite in the abhorrence of all such writings and mea
sures as evidence a desire and design to break off the happy con
nexion we have hitherto enjoyed with the kingdom of Great
Britain, and our just and necessary subordination to the king,
and those who are lawfully placed in authority under him."
What a slap of the face is here ! the men who, in the very para
graph before, have quietly and passively resigned up the order
ing, altering, and disposal of kings and governments into the
hands of God, are now recalling their principles, and putting in
for a share of the business. Is it possible that the conclusion which
is here justly quoted, can any ways follow from the doctrine laid
down ? The inconsistency is too glaring not to be seen; the
absurdity too great not to be laughed at; and such as could
only have been made by those whose understandings were
darkened by the narrow and crabbed spirit of a despairing poli
tical party; for ye are not to be considered as the whole body of
the Quakers, but only as a factional or fractional part thereof.
Here ends the examination of your testimony (which I call
upon no man to abhor, as ye have done, but only to read and
judge of fairly), to which I subjoin the following remark : “ That
the setting up and putting down of kings,” must certainly mean,
the making him a king, who is yet not so, and the making him
no king who is already one. And pray what hath this to do in
the present case? We neither mean to set up nor to put down,
neither to make nor to unmake, but to have nothing to do with
them. Wherefore, your testimony, in whatever light it is viewed,
serves only to dishonor your judgment, and for many other
reasons had better have been left alone than published.
First. Because it tends to the decrease and reproach of all
religion whatever, and is of the utmost danger to society, to
make it a party in political disputes.
Secondly. Because it exhibits a body of men, numbers of
whom disavow the publishing political testimonies, as being
concerned therein and approvers thereof.
Thirdly. Because it hath a tendency to undo that continental
harmony and friendship which yourselves, by your late liberal
and charitable donations, have lent a hand to establish ; and the
preservation of which is of the utmost consequence to us all.
And here without anger or resentment I bid you farewell.
Sincerely wishing that, as men and Christians, ye may always
fully and uninterruptedly enjoy every civil and religious right;
and be in your turn, the means of securing it to others; but that
the example which ye have unwisely set, of mingling religion
with politics, may be disavowed and reprobated by every inhabi
tant of America.
�Works by CHAS. BRADLAUGH—
The Freethinker’s Text-Book. Part I.¥ Section I.—“The Story
of the Origin of Man, as told by the Bible and by Science.” Sec
tion II.—“What is Religion?” “How^has it Grown ?” “God and
Soul.” Bound in cloth, price 2s. 6d.
Impeachment of the House of Brunswick.—Ninth edition. Is.
Political Essays. Bound in cloth, 2s. 6d.
Theological Essays. Bound in cloth, 3s.
Hints to Emigrants, containing important information on the
United States, Canada, and New Zealand. Is.
Debates—
Four — with the Rev. Dr. Baylee, in Liverpool; the Rev. Dr.
Harrison, in London; Thomas Cooper, in London; the Rev.
R. A. Armstrong, in Nottingham ; with Three Discourses by
the Bishop of Peterborough and replies by C. Bradlaugh.
Bound in one volume, cloth, 3s.
. gji-w
What does Christian Theism Teach ? A verbatim report' of two
nights’ Public Debate with the Rev. A. J. Harrison. Second
edition. 6d.
God, Man, and the Bible. A verbatim report of a three nights’
Discussion at Liverpool with the Rev. Dr. Baylee. 6d.
On the Being of a God as the Maker and Moral Governor of the
Universe. A verbatim report of a two nights’ Discussion with
Thomas Cooper. 6d.
Has Man a Soul? A verbatim report of two nights’debate at
Burnley, with the Rev. W. M. Westerby. Is.
Christianity in relation to Freethought, Scepticism and Faith.
Three Discourses by the Bishop of Peterborough with
Special Replies. 6d.
’
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Threo
nights’ debate with the Rev. Dr. McCann. Is.
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nights’ debate at Nottingham with the Rev. R. A. Armstrong
Is.
The True Story of my Parliamentary Struggle. Contain
ing a Verbatim Report of the proceedings before the Select
Committee of the House of Commons ; Mr. Bradlaugh’s
Three Speeches at the Bar of the House, etc., etc.
0 6
Fourth Speech at the Bar of the House of Commons. 30th
Thousand
0
May the House of Commons Commit Treason? ...
0
A Cardinal’s Broken Oath
0 1
Perpetual Pensions. Fortieth thousand
...
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Civil Lists and Grants to Royal Family
...
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The Land, the People, and the Coming Struggle...
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Five Dead Men whom I Knew when Living. Sketches of
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Sumner and Ledru Rollin ...
0 4
Cromwell and Washington: a Contrast...
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Anthropology. In neat wrapper
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When were our Gospels Written ?
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Plea for Atheism
0 3
Has Man a Soul ?
0 2
The Laws Relating to Blasphemy and Heresy
0 6
Jesus, Shelley, and Malthus, an Essay on the Population
Question
0 2
�Verbatim Report of the Trial of C. Bradlaugh before Lord Cole
ridge for Blasphemy, in three Special Extra Numbers of the
National Reformer. 6d.
Verbatim Report of the Trial, The Queen against Bradlaugh and
Besant. Cloth, 5s. With Portraits and Autographs of the two
Defendants. Second Edition, with Appendix, containing the
judgments of Lords Justices Bramwell, Brett, and Cotton.
Works by ANNIE BESANT—
The Freethinker’s Text-Book. Part II. “On Christianity.”
Section I.—“Christianity: its Evidences Unreliable.” Section
II—“Its Origin Pagan.” Section III.—“Its Morality Fallible.”
Section IV.—“Condemned by its History.” Bound in cloth,
3s. 6d.
History of the Great French Revolution. Cloth, 2s.
My Path to Atheism. Collected Essays. The Deity of Jesus—
Inspiration—Atonement— Eternal Punishment—Prayer — Re
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rejected; together with some Essays on the Book of Common
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Marriage: as it was, as it is, and as it should be. Second Edition.
In limp cloth, Is.
Light, Heat, and Sound. In three parts, 6d. each. Illustrated.
Bound in limp cloth, Is. 6d.; cloth, 2s.
The Jesus of the Gospels and The Influence of Christianity on
the World. Two nights’ Debate with the Rev. A. Hatchard. Is.
Social and Political Essays. 3s. 6d.
Theological Essays and Debate. 2s. 6d.
Fruits of Christianity
...
...
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The Christian Creed; or, What it is Blasphemy to Deny... 0 6
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...
...
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The Gospel of Atheism. Fifth Thousand
...
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Is the Bible Indictable ?
...
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Fourth Thousand...
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London: Freethought Publishing Company, 63, Fleet Street.
�
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Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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Common sense : with appendix and an address to Quakers
Creator
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Paine, Thomas [1737-1809]
Bradlaugh, Charles [1833-1891]
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 46, [2] p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Part of the NSS pamphlet collection. First published Philadelphia: William and Thomas Bradford, 1776. Works by Bradlaugh and Besant listed on unnumbered pages at the end. Printed by Annie Besant and Charles Bradlaugh.
Publisher
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Freethought Publishing Company
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1884
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N526
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Politics
Republicanism
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Common sense : with appendix and an address to Quakers), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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Text
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English
Monarchy
NSS
Political science-History-18th century
United States-Politics and Government-1775-1783
-
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6e1b705c10f3993e898fb2c27327c3e5
PDF Text
Text
THE WEDDING
DAME WINDSOR’S,
AND
W THAT WAS SAID ABOUT IT BY
IN
RELATIONS AND FRIENDS,
AND BY THE
ZI OYS OF St. STEPHEN’S SCHOOL.
i«*8t !
W iJfDON : A. RITCHIE, 15, WINE OFFICE COURT, FLEET STREET.
Price Sixpence.
?
�J. COEN, PRINTER,
15, WINE OFFICE COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON.
------ y
when I first saw the vessel?
cg-crnx uvu<nu ax
�Webbing nt Same Wxnbsof s.
GrH
WHAT RELATIONS SAID ABOUT IT.
3N ame
Windsor is a widow, a little over fifty, of ample
fd rtune, and possessor of several spacious houses.
r|er husband, good soul, who was universally re
31! jected,
died suddenly, to the deep regret of every-
.1 le, and left her with a family of nine children, five
idi ‘which are daughters, two of them being unmarried,
?
e 1 'er eldest daughter, who was greatly esteemed, on
in<
ccount of her comeliness and graces, was united,
91
|me years since, to a fine German, who lives in a
71
driving hotel in Berlin, the sign of which has been
b
|tely altered from the “ King William ” to the
aißi IKaiser,” and which change of style is expected, at
a early period, when the present landlord, who is an
|d man, dies, to prove highly advantageous to the
'¿w occupier.
1 Two other daughters, Alice and Helen, are also
3.”i
S:
�1
o
3
n:
4
married to Germans, whose incomes, although liberal, U.P'1
are not equal to that of the former, nor are theiri Ldh
future promotions in life anything so promising.
.] L-j ■
Mrs. Windsor’s eldest son, who has a large yearly ufi?
income in his own right in some tin mines, which
were profitably worked during the young man’s;
minority by his prudent father, inherited a consider^ y N
able fortune when he came of age. This lucky fello^j
was married, about eight years since, to a handsoma Lj®
li
Danish lady, which event gave great satisfaction at
I
the time, as the young girl came from an old stock,
ir.
o
b
t
b
e
>>
?
3
e
•(
t
and was mighty winning in her behaviour both to
rich and poor.
Teddy, for that is the young man’s
4*
name, is likewise heir to three rich domains, and will, [¿i
be more looked up to when he comes into that ancieni tn
property.
He has seen much of the world, having
gone round it with observant guides, and has picked be
up varied knowledge.
Few men, it is said, can, hn
01
better understand a genuine cigar, and his experience jgqx
of fire-engines is also great, as he rarely fails to enjoy
a run upon them, with some smart mates, when a big h ■
run.
1t
* blaze illumines the town where he lives.
Now, one evening, Mrs. Windsor, who was desirous
|l
> when I first saw the vessel.”
I"
�5
getting her single children off her hands, being
amn one with her eldest unmarried daughter, Louise, at
0
•ii Leir own house in the north, at a place called Bahl
fi 'orrell, she spake motherly unto the lass regarding
li. ■ 3r affections towards a young man of those parts,
Ij.
o ha had beguiled the damsel’s heart, and whose
d afl sits had been much encouraged by the glad dame
t mention thereof, the innocent girl coloured up,
Epd hid her blushing face on her mother’s bosom,
)|hereat the maternal dame kindly hinted that her
rt ild was quite free to marry the honest Gael, if such
rfere her real wishes, and she graciously gave her
¿nsent to the match,
The whole of the family, at
•me and abroad, were at once made acquainted with
te proposed wedding, the news of which was ill
ovtifceived by some of them, because of their very high
hfwate.
The brother-in-law at Berlin, thought, for
q I? part, that the young lass would do better by belirij
ming the wife of one of his kinsmen, especially as
fwq
3 own expectations of a rise were very great; how-
ff-J
er, he would not strongly urge against the wedding,
such were the wish of the two people, and Mrs.
»¿bl indsor approved of the same.
3.”—
.
Si
�o
6
Teddy thought the choice of a more distinguished 1..4.
fl
partner advisable, but, lighting a fresh Havannah,
3
said ma might advise about the matter as she pleased: [
so he left them, to look after his horses and to attend
I *
to his book at the club.
Alf, on being spoken to about it, didn’t see wb !
1
/I
Louie shouldn’t marry who she liked, provided hi li,„ j
I
was really a proper fellow, and likely to make : :..i>
hi
Y
ir
o
kind husband, as he was sure Archy would, and hi H .
■ r *
hoped when the couple put out to sea, the sails o b
matrimony would swell with many a pleasant gale. I
j
Leo said he preferred a match of the kind, ant , .
b
thought mother would be more liked by everybody | ..
■ t
b
le
»
?
P
for letting Master Lome come into the family, whc |.
he was sure, would make his sister happy, and wha 1 ,
I r'
else had they to care about.
Little Beatry almost jumped for joy, and said sh j
was so glad ma would let Louie have Archie ; i ;
>e
r<
a
would be so nice to have them living in England, a 1
?;
their new house.
«
Q.
a
i
she would not lose her, but be able to go often t
Cousin George, who is blind, got some one to wr|
a note for him, which he sent from abroad, bearing| |
F
d
■ti________ _________________ ,
s when I first saw the vessel.”
�-b®«d abbed-out Hanover stamp.
In it he was rather
psihij molding about the affair; but as he had lately lost a
'.av/d town, and was vexed, considering himself cruelly
iteqi nposed upon by friends who, he thought, should
juve treated him better, Mrs. Windsor and her family
et down his disfavour to Louie’s wedding to bad
iesq.d emper, so they took no heed of his cold words.
ynA
Another cousin George—he of Cambridge—hap-
Ao in lened to drop in while the affair was being talked
"''M
>ver, with his red coat rather splashed, for he had just
g...nej )een seeing his soldiers do their work in the Park,
gd u )n being spoken to about the suit, he gave it his
•(insj iearty approval, and thought it high time such silly
ifoiid lotions of shutting out certain people from the family
p-rel were done .away with. He had kicked against such a
do* foolish rule himself, and in defying people’s remarks
.. bfi had found no reason to repent of his course; and
why shouldn’t Louie be as happy with a Scotch
noiva swain as with any foreign fellow with a sounding
hibI name that meant nothing.
He knew the boy, and
jodlliked his good sense, which would always carry him
hoi well through the world, and prove creditable to
in ou Louie.
�0
Aunt Augusta was too infirm to come, but she
wrote, saying that in her young days such things
were deemed shocking.
However, as times are sol
altered now, she would not dream of hindering the
5
new idea, the more so as her niece, Mrs. Windsor,
had determined on setting the change.
/I
1
?”•
i?'
ip
se
1H
ja
a-,
_a
:
a
th.
sa
>i
»e
as when I first saw the vessel.”
�9
YHAT
THE . FAMILY
ADVISERS
SAID
ABOUT IT.
ft]
.as Irs. Windsor, who is a model of household order,
jiu< rould not seriously move about her daughter’s pro-
.o^gosed wedding without consulting certain family
dvisers, whose opinions thereon should finally decide
d a er how to act.
She therefore bade Some men of
he ood repute and knowledge to come down to her
hiA welling on an island at the edge of the sea, where
?
ight confer with her and advise on the matter
hey miL
ri
nq h lat pressed upon her heart.
- sill Then certain prudent chiefs assembled at her house,
J ad, after listening to her words, they counselled
illy thereon.
An elder, named Hatherley, deeply
h rJ i,rned in the law, spake of the practices of times
»st, and declared that no statute in the books of the
n
j a1 ws of the land hindered the marriage; but rather,
• odi
thought, were it to be contracted between the
a srsons proposed, it would bring felicity to them, and
s.”-
�10
command favour with all people. A councillor nameJ
Gladstone next gave utterance, and would have
waxed into a flow of artful words, but that the occa
sion needed only his mind to be declared in simple
speech.
The virtues of Mrs. Windsor’s daughter, he
said, claimed the best of husbands, and that maternal
solicitude and sagacity which had caused those mani
fold virtues and graces to bud and ripen, were the
surest guarantees that a match so wisely arrangea
should continue auspicious to the end.
Ko legal
prohibition against it existed, and Mrs. Windsor, by
sanctioningthe same, would complete her daughter’l
happiness, and revive her own popularity.
The !
chief, Granville, with rare gentleness of tongue and
manner, said he knew the laddie well, and had
marked his shrewdness and good parts.
He felt !
assured that if Mrs. Windsor desired him for a sori j
in-law, no loss of dignity or respect towards he) i
would follow on that account; indeed, by grafting st I
honourable a branch to her own ancient stock, everl I
one would be pleased, and regard her more affec t
tionately.
After several others had all likewise spoken, on
when I first saw the vessel.”
�11
■iirtgi]
blister Lowe, who is keeper of the treasure-chest,
boied
Littered to the same purpose.
rZ" -ua
toair will need a little money wherewith to keep house
Besides, he said, the
'“mofhonestly, and I will speak to my good master, Mister
7 JlulBull, who will not in the least begrudge to give them
eilthe few thousands that I shall name, so that they
Sh^Jmay lack nought to support their state decently and
rtj)ai?}freflect his honour.
£)
e.”—
Sh
�12
WHAT WAS SAID BY DECENT CITIZENS
AND SOME CHURLS.
i
The intended wedding, being well bruited abroad
was in all men’s moutbs, who spake of it one to the
ii
r
,r
o
other, wishing Dame Windsor’s daughter abundant
joy to the end of her days.
In the highway which is called Parliament-street,
in the City of Westminster, a citizen thereof, and a
b
t
f
e
?
p
5
se
ri
a
7;
.«<
man of much substance, meeting one of his fellows,]
also of ample means, being a tradesman of the Wests
End, bade him good day, and pointed out to him
certain M.P.’s who were driving to the House to
speechify and to say “Aye” for a proposed yearfy
gfant to Miss Windsor, the young lady about to be
married.
He then talked of the matter, assured that
the Members would with one consent agree to the
moderate dotation, for that the damsel deserved the
same, and that they would the more heartily bestow
h
a
i
if
;d
----is when I first saw the vessel.”
�13
ifi because her mother had wisely set aside a perverse
e tie on her child’s behalf.
f
“Tea, and a right thing, too,” answered the
stener, “ for the swain is reported well worthy of
fist > fair a bride ; besides, ’tis a good sign when custom,
Gfflj
lb4 unded in pride, loses its force, having only age to
mo ¡commend it.
As well preserve a dung-heap on a
Wife ithway, because it was made by Caesar’s horse.
way with nuisances, say I, whether they encumber
Ind or weigh heavily upon man.
JOJ
By-the-bye, it is
pmoured that Mrs. Windsor is coming more amongst
L ; and I’m sure that her wonted face will bring
imshine to us again, and waken shouts that had wellj 4'
igh died away.”
| When these men of quality had parted, a labourer,
ib.
b
fending to his work along the flags, overtook another,
■hose pipe gave forth a cloud wreathing behind over
is shoulder.
Then the former asked for a light, and
iiey two went on, forgetting care in their smoking,
¿id filling the wind with the smell of their tobacco.
4T 1
-11.. I
i “ It gives me joy, mate, to see thee journeying to
4j ■job.
Is it for long F”
I “ Nay, only for a week, to make gas-piping for the
V 1
»/A J
e.”—
_
Si
�3
jy
14
flare that will light the shops at night, when the grand f
!
■y
wedding comes off.”
“ Of Mrs. Windsor’s daughter ?”
“ Yes ! and rarely for better purpose did fiery stars ,
turn the dark streets into day, to amuse the crowds,
than will the glowing ciphers kindled everywhere on
that coming occasion.
Why, I’ll burn a tallow-wicJ
myself to tell the world that another ban is blotted j
i
from the earth.”
“ Eh ! they’re going to vote her a round sum to
night at the House yonder, and I only wish that all]
r
)
>
t
the money they gave went to as good a use.
It’s
quite time that husbands for Dame Windsor’s single)I
daughters were found at home, without hunting fori
them in the land of sour krout.”
“ But one Taylor is going to pitch in against the
. i
grant.”
“ He ain’t got the pluck; and if he had he’d be
laughed down, as he ought to.
Let him slip intJ
real abuses, and he’s my man; but as for goinJ
|
agin that, why he’s as mischievous as the brawlera
who pretend to be working men; but who filch
their living from simpletons by spouting.”
t____
when I first saw the vessel.”
u.
�F
15
>’ “ At any rate Dame Windsor has touched the
>[ n^ ight key in this instance, which pleases everybody.
a '¿J1 inly she should begin to come out more, to enliven
[at# ne folks a bit, and set some trade moving.”
1'idZI
^slg
fiilT
Here the men ceased to discourse, having come to
place where their feet should turn opposite ways.
Thus the whole populace talked of the marriage,
h nd rejoiced much that Dame Windsor esteemed her
[aughter’s welfare beyond the tyrannous whim of
t'A
EQxds ashion.
inff
But certain obscure Odgerites, noisy and churlish
-wol
fellows, whom few men heeded, strove to stir up the
n nultitude against the reasonable dowry that John
Bull, in the largeness of his heart, was bent upon
giving to the bride.
These disturbers lifted up their
n Voices in pot-houses, while they swilled with the hire
iXlj
juggled from the pockets of the simple; yet their
¡iiivyavings were not regarded by peaceable folks, who
■wlreverenced Dame Windsor the more for her sound
iWit and love for her daughter, in that she might
mlinarry the man of her own choice, and one of her own
a country.
So the brawlers, whose tongues were as brands,
GB
�sank into limbo, and there was mirth throughout the
land, the rich and the poor loyally beseeching a life
long blessing on the wedding of Dame Windsor’s
daughter.
J. Cocn, Printer, 15, Wine-Office-Court, Fleet-street, London.
I first saw the vessel.”
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
The wedding at Dame Windsor's and what was said about it by relations and friends, and by the boys of St. Stephen's School
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 16 p. ; 17 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Printed by J. Coen, Fleet Street, London. A satire on the wedding of Princess Louise Caroline Alberta to the Marquess of Lorne (later 9th Duke of Argyll). Text partially obscured by binding.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
A. Ritchie
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
[1871]
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
G5453
Subject
The topic of the resource
Monarchy
Marriage
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
[Unknown]
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The wedding at Dame Windsor's and what was said about it by relations and friends, and by the boys of St. Stephen's School), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
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application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Language
A language of the resource
English
Conway Tracts
Louise Caroline Alberta
Marriage
Monarchy
Princess of Great Britain
Satire
Weddings
-
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PDF Text
Text
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Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
The new Book of Kings
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Davidson, John Morrison [1843-1916]
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 123, [5] p. ; 19 cm.
Notes: List of reviews of the book in four unnumbered pages at the end. Date of publication from KVK.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
The Modern Press
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
[1885?]
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
T399
Subject
The topic of the resource
Republicanism
Monarchy
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The new Book of Kings), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Language
A language of the resource
English
History
Monarchy
Republicanism
Socialism