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IX.

1689.

at the restoration; aggravated by all the vexatious insolence of delegated power. To England the revolution was a glorious event, useful rather than absolutely necessary; for if the late king had remained, its religion and liberties, under a regency, might have been secured by proper limitations on the throne. The loyalty of the English was gratified, while the adherents of James were insensibly mollified, by the accession of his daughters; and the nation was gradually reconciled and prepared to adopt a more complete change in the line of succession. To this circumstance must be ascribed the apparent defects in its declaration of rights, which neither asserts the choice that was actually made of a new race, nor secures the frequency and independence of parliament against the influence of the crown. But the revolution was absolutely necessary to restore tranquillity to Scotland, and to revive the confidence of the people in government; without which the king unavoidably degenerates into a tyrant, and his subjects vibrate alternately between rebels and slaves. So various and so enormous was the tyranny which I have attempted, imperfectly, to delineate, that the people never could have dismissed their suspicion and resentment, nor the government the terrors which it felt, and sought to inspire; the uniform principle of despotism, for which we may truly affirm that there was no cure but the expulsion of the Stuarts.

THE

HISTORY

OF

SCOTLAND.

BOOK X.

Convention turned into a parliament.—Insurrection.—
Dundee's Victory and Death.-Montgomery's Plots.
Redress of grievances, and Presbytery restored.-
Massacre of Glencoe.-Settlement of Darien.-Na-
tional distress and despair.-Death of James.
Death and character of William.

X.

1689.

nistration.

T was difficult, in the choice of an administra- BOOK tion, to gratify the unreasonable expectations of claimants, and to provide for the security of the New adminew reign. The episcopal party had few pretensions: from their refusal of the oaths to government, they soon acquired the appellation of nonjurors; and of Jacobites, from their stedfast attachment to James. The presbyterians who began the revolution, assumed superior merit with the king; but the exiles who returned from Holland, enjoyed a larger share of his confidence and esteem. Lord Melville, with inferior talents, was appointed

X.

1689.

BOOK Sole secretary, in preference to Montgomery, whose mind was estranged from the new government by disgust and neglect. The duke of Ha milton was appointed high commissioner, the earl of Crawford president of parliament; but as the chief offices of state, the treasury and the seals, were reserved to be put in commission, the former was disappointed of the distribution of places among his children and friends. By a choice less fortunate, as it was productive of general discontent, Dalrymple created viscount Stair, was restored to the presidency of the court of session, on the assassination of Lockhart, by one who conceived himself injured by an unjust award. Sir John Dalrymple, his son, was appointed king's advocate; and though they were both presbyterians, they were unacceptable and odious to that party from their compliance with the times. Their abilities were confessedly great and transcendant; but the father had abetted the iniquitous administration of Lauderdale; the son, as king's advocate in the late reign, had revived the persecutions for the insurrection at Bothwell; and from a general dislike of the confidence unguardedly reposed in men whose characters were by no means pure, their advice was suspected of creating a separation of interests between the people and the king. But the confidence of William was soon transferred to Carstairs, his chaplain, who studied, like the earl of Nottingham in England, to pre

X.

possess his master against the surrender of a single BOOK branch of his prerogative, as the more dangerous, and necessary to be resisted, where he was raised by popular consent to the throne1.

1689.

turned into

ment.

In the transactions of civil society, the example Convention of Cortes, when he resigned his commission from a parliaVelasquez to a council of his own appointment, from whom he received another in the name of his sovereign, has been frequently transcribed. By June 5. the royal assent to an act of convention, the estates who declared William king, were inversely converted into a parliament by the same powers which they had previously conferred. Necessity was supposed, in each kingdom, to supersede the vain consideration of forms. While the nation was threatened with an invasion by James, who had landed in Ireland, and with a civil war by Dundee, who retired to the highlands, neither the convention could be safely dissolved, nor another parliament freely elected. But it is observable, that representatives are ever more desirous to perpetuate their authority than to return to their constituents; and when the convention was once converted into a parliament, its authority was prolonged during the whole reign.

When the redress of grievances was taken into Opposition. consideration, a sudden opposition was created between the parliament and the king. The latter,

Balcarras, 64. Burnet, iv. 34. Fount. Dec. Carstairs'

State Papers, p. 42.

BOOK

X.

1689.

though not adverse to the regulation of the lords of articles, proposed that they should be freely elected and monthly renewed by their respective estates; agreed that whatever motions they rejected might be revived in parliament; but required that the officers of state should be conjoined to facilitate business, or to preserve some share of a negative before debate. But the parliament, jealous of their influence or encroachments, was inflexible in demanding their removal from the articles. Their introduction into that committee was originally an usurpation, no less than the official seats which they had acquired in parliament; and the loudest resentment was excited at the king's refusal, or reluctance, to redress entirely the first grievance of which the nation complained 2.

William, indifferent to forms of worship if toleration were established, would have concurred in preserving prelacy, if the episcopal party had contributed to his support 3. But as presbytery was the condition on which he was admitted to the throne, an act was passed to abolish prelacy and pre-eminence in ecclesiastical office. His commissioner was instructed to repeal the extensive

2 State Tracts, Temp. Gul. iii. 466. Burnet, iv. 35. Hist. of the Rev. 150. Minutes of Parlt. MS.

3 Keith's Catalogue of Scottish Bishops, 43. Burnet,

iv. 33.

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