1660. contempt, that at last he drew a lasting disgrace upon himself. And he at length ruined both body and mind, fortune and reputation equally. The madness of vice appeared in his person in very eminent instances; since at last he became contemptible and poor, sickly, and sunk in his parts, as well as in all other respects, so that his conversation was as much avoided as ever it had been courted. He found the king, when he came from his travels in the year forty-five, newly come to Paris, sent over by his father when his affairs declined: and finding the king enough inclined to receive ill impressions, he, who was then got into all the impieties and vices of the age, set himself to corrupt the king, in which he was too successful, being seconded in that wicked design by the lord Percy. And to complete the matter, Hobbs was brought to him, under the pretence of instructing him in mathematics: and he laid before him his schemes, both with relation to religion and politics, which made deep and lasting impressions on the king's mind. So that the main blame of the king's ill principles and bad morals was owing to the duke of Buckingham P. Bristol's character. The earl of Bristol was a man of courage and learning, of a bold temper and a lively wit, but of no judgment nor steadiness. He was in the Queen's 101 interest during the war at Oxford. And he studied to drive things past the possibility of a treaty, or any reconciliation; fancying that nothing would make the military men so sure to the king, as his P The famous Butler (author of Hudibras) says in his Characters, lately published, "The "duke of Bucks is one that 66 has studied the whole body "of vice." And says also of being sure to them, and giving them hopes of shar- 1660. ing the confiscated estates among them; whereas, he thought, all discourses of treaty made them feeble and fearful. When he went beyond sea, he turned papist. But it was after a way of his own: for he loved to magnify the difference between the church and the court of Rome. He was esteemed a very good speaker: but he was too copious, and too florid. He was set at the head of the popish party, and was a violent enemy of the earl of Clarendon. dale's cha Having now said as much as seems necessary to Landerdescribe the state of the court and ministry at the racter. restoration, I will next give an account of the chief of the Scots, and of the parties that were formed among them. The earl of Lauderdale, afterwards made duke, had been for many years a zealous covenanter : but in the year forty-seven he turned to the king's interests; and had continued a prisoner all the while after Worcester fight, where he was taken. He was kept for some years in the tower of London, in Portland castle, and in other prisons, till he was set at liberty by those who called home the king. So he went over to Holland. And since he continued so long, and contrary to all men's opinions in so high a degree of favour and confidence, it may be expected that I should be a little copious in setting out his character; for I knew him very particularly. He made a very ill appearance: he was very big: his hair red, hanging oddly about him: his tongue was too big for his mouth, which made him bedew all that he talked to: and his whole manner was rough and boisterous, and very unfit for a court. He was very learned, not only in Latin, in which he was a master, but in Greek and Hebrew. He had 1660. read a great deal of divinity, and almost all the historians ancient and modern: so that he had great materials. He had with these an extraordinary memory, and a copious but unpolished expression. He was a man, as the duke of Buckingham called him to me, of a blundering understanding. He was haughty beyond expression, abject to those he saw he must stoop to, but imperious to all others. He had a violence of passion that carried him often to fits like madness, in which he had no temper. If he took a thing wrong, it was a vain thing to study to convince him: that would rather provoke him to swear, he would never be of another mind: he was to be let alone: and perhaps he would have forgot what he had said, and come about of his own accord. He was the coldest friend and the violentest enemy I ever knew: I felt it too much not to know 102 it. He at first seemed to despise wealth: but he delivered himself up afterwards to luxury and sensuality and by that means he ran into a vast expense, and stuck at nothing that was necessary to support it. In his long imprisonment he had great impressions of religion on his mind: but he wore these out so entirely, that scarce any trace of them was left. His great experience in affairs, his ready compliance with every thing that he thought would please the king, and his bold offering at the most desperate counsels, gained him such an interest in the king, that no attempt against him, nor complaint of him, could ever shake it, till a decay of strength and understanding forced him to let go his hold. He was in his principles much against popery and arbitrary government: and yet, by a fatal train of passions and interests, he made way for the for mer, and had almost established the latter. And, 1660. whereas some by a smooth deportment made the first beginnings of tyranny less discernible and unacceptable, he, by the fury of his behaviour, heightened the severity of his ministry, which was liker the cruelty of an inquisition than the legality of justice. With all this he was a presbyterian, and retained his aversion to king Charles I. and his party to his death. character. character. The earl of Crawford had been his fellow prisoner Crawford's for ten years. And that was a good title for maintaining him in the post he had before, of being lord treasurer. He was a sincere but weak man, passionate and indiscreet, and continued still a zealous presbyterian. The earl, afterwards duke of Rothes, Rothes's had married his daughter, and had the merit of a long imprisonment likewise to recommend him: he had a ready dexterity in the management of affairs, with a soft and insinuating address: he had a quick apprehension with a clear judgment: he had no advantage of education, no sort of literature: nor had he travelled abroad: all in him was mere nature. [But it was nature very much depraved; for he seemed to have freed himself from all impressions of virtue or religion, of honour or good nature. He delivered himself, without either restraint or decency, to all the pleasures of wine and women. He had but one maxim, to which he adhered firmly, that he was to do every thing, and deny himself in nothing, that might maintain his greatness, or gratify his appetites. He was unhappily made for drunkenness. For as he drank all his friends dead, and was able to subdue two or three sets of drunkards one after another; so it scarce ever appeared, 1660. that he was disordered; and after the greatest excesses, an hour or two of sleep carried them all off so entirely, that no sign of them remained. He would go about business without any uneasiness, or discovering any heat either in body or mind. This had a terrible conclusion; for after he had killed all his friends, he fell at last under such a weakness of stomach, that he had perpetual cholics, when he was not hot within, and full of strong liquor, of which he was presently seized; so that he was always either sick or drunk.] Tweedale's character. The earl of Tweedale was another of lord Lauderdale's friends. He was early engaged in business, and continued in it to a great age. He understood all the interests and concerns of Scotland well: he had a great stock of knowledge, with a mild and obliging temper. He was of a blameless, or rather an exemplary life in all respects. He had loose thoughts both of civil and ecclesiastical government; and seemed to think, that what form soever was uppermost was to be complied with. He had been in Cromwell's parliament, and had abjured the royal family, which lay heavy on him. But the disputes about the guardianship of the duchess of Monmouth and her elder sister, to which he pretended in the 103 right of his wife, who was their father's sister, against her mother, who was lord Rothes's sister, drew him into that compliance which brought a great cloud upon him: though he was in all other respects the ablest and worthiest man of the nobility: only he was too cautious and fearful. D. Hamilton's character. A son of the marquis of Douglas, made earl of Selkirk, had married the heiress of the family of Hamilton, who by her father's patent was duchess |