Selected quad for the lemma: kingdom_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A63120
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A short history of standing armies in England
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Trenchard, John, 1662-1723.
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1698
(1698)
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Wing T2115; ESTC R39727
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36,748
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56
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reproach to our Country that our Reputation at Sea should be sunk to so low an eb as to be baffled by that Nation who but a few years before had sent a blank Paper to the Parliament to prescribe to them what Laws they pleased During this War the City of London was fired not without violent suspicions that the Firebals were prepared at Whitehall Soon after this he entred into the Triple Alliance to oppose the growing greatness of France and received a great Sum from the Parliament to maintain it which he made use of to break the same League sent Mr. Coventry to Sweden to dissolve it and entred into a strict Alliance with France which was sealed with his Sister's blood In conjunction with them he made a new War upon Holland to extirpat Liberty and the Protestant Religion but knowing the Parliament were averse to the War and would not support him in it he attemted before any War declared to seize their Smirna Fleet shut up the Exchequer and became so mean as to be a Pensioner to France from whence his Predecessors with Swords in their hands had so often exacted Tribute He not only suffered but assisted them to arrive at that pitch of Greatness which all Europe since hath sufficiently felt and lamented He sent over ten thousand Men to assist in subduing Flanders and Germany by whose help they did several considerable Actions He sent them Timber Seamen Ship-Carpenters and Models contrary to the Policy of all Nations which rais'd their Naval Force to a degree almost equal to our own and for their exercise he suffered them to take multitudes of English Ships by their Privateers without so much as demanding satisfaction During this War he issued out a Declaration suspending the Penal Laws which appears to be designed in favor of the Papists by his directing a Bill afterwards to be stolen away out of the House of Lords for indulging Protestant Dissenters whom he persecuted violently most of his Reign while he both countenanced and preferred Papists broke the Act of Settlement in Ireland restored them to their Estates issued forth a Proclamation giving the Papists liberty to inhabit in Corporations and married the Duke of York not only to a Papist but one in the French Interest notwithstanding the repeated Addresses of the Parliament to the contrary It was in this Reign that that cursed and detestable Policy was much improved of bribing Parliaments by distributing all the great Imployments in England among them and supplying the want of places with Grants of Lands and Mony No Man could be preferred to any Imployment in Church or State till he had declared himself an open Enemy to our Constitution by asserting Despotic Power under that nonsensical Phrase of Passive Obedience which was more preach'd up than all the Laws of God and Man The Hellish Popish Plot was stifled proved since too true by fatal experience and in the room of it Protestant ones were forged and Men trapan'd into others as the Meal-Tub Fitz Harris's the Rye-House Newmarket and Black-Heath Plots and by these Pretences and the help of packt Judges and Juries they butchered som of the best Men in England set immoderat Fines upon others gave probable suspicion of cutting the Lord Essex's Throat and to finish our destruction they took away the Charters as fast as they were able of all the Corporations in England that would not choose the Members prescribed them But he durst not have dreamt of all these Violations if he had not had an Army to justify them He had thoughts at first of keeping up the Parliament-Army which was several times in debate But Chancellor Hyde prevailed upon him by this Argument that they were a body of Men that had cut off his Father's Head that they had set up and pulled down ten several sorts of Government and that it might be his own turn next So that his fears prevailing over his ambition he consented to disband them but soon found how vain and abortive a thing Arbitrary Power would prove without an Army He therfore try'd all ways to get one and first he attemted it in Scotland and by means of the Duke of Lauderdale got an Act passed there wherby the Kingdom of Scotland was obliged to raise 20000 Foot and 2000 Horse at his Majesty's Call to march into any part of his Dominions and this Law is in being at this day Much about the same time he rais'd Guards in England a thing unheard of before in our English Constitution and by degrees increas'd them till they became a formidable Army for first they were but very few but by adding insensibly more Men to a Troop or Company and then more Troops or Companies to a Regiment before the second Dutch War he had multiplied them to near 5000 Men. He then began that War in conjunction with France and the Parliament gave him two Millions and a half to maintain it with part of which Mony he rais'd about 12000 Men which were called the Black-Heath Army appointing Marshal Shomberg to be their General and Fitz Gerald an Irish Papist their Lieutenant-General and pretended he rais'd them to attack Holland but instead of using them to that purpose he kept them encamped upon Black-Heath hovering over the City of London which put both the Parliament and City in such confusion that the King was forced at last to disband them But there were several accidents contributed to it First the ill success he had in the War with the Dutch such Gallantries being not to be attemted but in the highest Raptures of Fortune Next the never to be forgotten Generosity of that great Man General Shomberg whose mighty Genius scorn'd so ignoble an Action as to put Chains upon a free People and last of all the Army themselves mutini'd for want of Pay which added to the ill Humors that were then in the Nation made the King willing to disband them But at the same time contrary to the Articles of Peace with the Dutch he continu'd ten thousand Men in the French Service for the most part under Popish Officers to be season'd there in slavish Principles that they might be ready to execute any Commands when they were sent for over The Parliament never met but they address'd the King to recal these Forces out of France and disband them and several times prepar'd Bills to that purpose which the King always prevented by a Prorogation but at last was prevail'd upon to issue forth a Proclamation to recal them yet at the same time supply'd them with Recruits incourag'd som to go voluntarily into that Service and press'd imprison'd and carri'd over others by main Force besides he only disbanded the new rais'd Regiments and not all them neither for he kept up in England five thousand eight hundred and ninety privat Men besides Officers which was his Establishment in 1673. The King having two great designs to carry on together viz. Popery and Arbitrary Power thought this Force not
the King's Concessions a ground for a future Settlement they resolved to put him to Death and in order therto purged the House as they called it that is placed Guards upon them and excluded all Members that were for agreeing with the King and then they cut off his Head After this they let the Parliament govern for five years who made their Name famous thro the whole Earth conquered their Enemies in England Scotland and Ireland reduced the Kingdom of Portugal to their own Terms recovered our Reputation at Sea overcame the Dutch in several famous Battels secured our Trade and managed the public Expences with so much frugality that no Estates were gained by privat Men upon the public Miseries and at last were passing an Act for their own Dissolution and settling the Nation in a free and impartial Common-wealth of which the Army being afraid thought it necessary to dissolve them and accordingly Cromwel next day called two Files of Musqueteers into the House and pulled the Speaker out of the Chair behaving himself like a Madman vilifying the Members and calling one a Whoremaster another a Drunkard bidding the Soldiers take away that fools bauble the Mace and so good night to the Parliament When they had don this Act of violence the Council of Officers set up a new form of Government and chose a certain number of Persons out of every County and City of England Scotland and Ireland and these they invested with the Supreme Power but soon after expelled them and then Cromwel set up himself and framed a new Instrument of Government by a Protector and a House of Commons in pursuance of which he called a Parliament But they not answering his Expectations he excluded all that would not subscribe his Instrument and those that remained not proving for his purpose neither he dissolved them with a great deal of opprobrious Language He then divided England into several Districts or Divisions and placed Major Generals or Intendents over them who governed like so many Bashaws decimating the Cavaliers and raising Taxes at their pleasure Then forsooth he had a mind to make himself King and called another Parliament to that purpose after his usual manner secluding such Members as he did not like To this Assembly he offered another Instrument of Government which was by a Representative of the People a 2d House composed of 70 Members in the nature of a House of Lords and a single Person and left a Blank for what name he should be called which this worthy Assembly filled up with that of King addressed to Cromwel that he would be pleased to accept it and gave him power to nominat the Members of the Other House This the great Officers of the Army resented for it destroyed all their hopes of being Tyrants in their turn and therefore addressed the Parliament against the Power and Government of a King which made Cromwel decline that Title and content himself with a greater Power under the name of Protector Afterwards he nam'd the Other House as it was called for the most part out of the Officers of the Army but even this Parliament not pleasing him he dissolved them in a fury and govern'd the Nation without any Parliament at all till he died After his death the Army set up his Son Richard who called a new Parliament but their procedings being not agreable to the humor of the Soldiery they forced the Protector to dissolve them then they deposed him and took the power into their own hands but being unable to weild it they restored the Commonwealth and soon after expelled them again because they would not settle the Military Sword independent of the Civil then they governed the Nation by a Council of War at Willingford-House and those a Committee of Safety for the executive part of the Government but that Whim lasted but a little time before they chose Conservators of Liberty and that not doing neither they agreed that every Regiment should choose two Representatives and this worthy Council should settle the Nation when they met somtimes they were for calling a new Parliament somtimes for restoring the old which was at last don By this means all things fell into Confusion which gave Monk an opportunity of marching into England where he acted his part so dexterously that he restor'd the King with part of that Army which had cut off his Father's Head This is a true and lively Example of a Government with an Army an Army that was raised in the cause and for the sake of Liberty composed for the most part of Men of Religion and Sobriety If this Army could commit such violences upon a Parliament always successful that had acquired so much Reputation both at home and abroad at a time when the whole People were trained in Arms and the Pulse of the Nation beat high for Liberty what are we to expect if in a future Age an ambitious Prince should arise with a dissolute and debauched Army a flattering Clergy a prostitute Ministry a Bankrupt House of L ds a Pensioner House of C ns and a slavish and corrupted Nation By this means came in Charles the Second a luxurious effeminat Prince a deep Dissembler and if not a Papist himself yet a great favorer of them but the People had suffered so much from the Army that he was received with the utmost Joy and Transport The Parliament in the Honymoon passed what Laws he pleased gave a vast Revenue for life being three times as much as any of his Predecessors ever enjoyed and several Millions besides to be spent in his Pleasures This made him conceive vaster hopes of Arbitrary Power than any that went before him and in order to it he debauched and enervated the whole Kingdom His Court was a scene of Adulteries Drunkenness and Irreligion appearing more like Stews or the Feasts of Bacchus than the Family of a Chief Magistrate and in a little time the Contagion spread thro the whole Nation that it was out of the fashion not to be leud and scandalous not to be a public Enemy which has bin the occasion of all the Miseries that have since happened and I am afraid will not be extinguished but by our ruin He was no sooner warm in his Seat but he rejected an advantageous Treaty of Commerce which Oliver made with France as don by a Usurper suffer'd the French to lay Impositions upon all our Goods which amounted to a Prohibition insomuch that they got a Million a year from us in the overbalance of Trade He sold that important Fortress of Dunkirk let the French seize St. Christophers and other places in North America He began a foolish and unjust War with the Dutch and tho the Parliament gave him vast Sums to maintain it yet he spent so much upon his Vices that they got great advantages of us and burnt our Fleet at Chatham At last he made as dishonorable a Peace with them as he had don a War a perpetual