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168

The parliament dissolved.

Who does not wish that the unfortunate Charles had imbibed better notions of morality, and that he had learned one important truth, that the laws of virtue which bind a private man are no less obligatory upon kings and princes. Had he acted upon that one persuasion towards his English subjects, from what scenes of misery and bloodshed would he have rescued them, and from what a wretched and humiliating death would he have saved himself! Insincerity was the rock on which he split a rock which no man tempts without the danger of shipwreck. This vice in his character, however, was not yet fully displayed, and the Irish, willing to believe him what they wished him to be, confided unsuspectingly in his integrity. They voted him six entire subsidies, amounting to 240,000l. a sum far exceeding Strafford's expectations, and certainly a very large sum for that age. In return, however, the commons drew up a remonstrance concerning his majesty's promised graces, and particularly in relation to the enquiry into defective titles. This remonstrance they presented by a deputation to the lord lieutenant, but they were soon contemptuously informed by him, that it had never been sent over to the king, and that they were to rest satisfied without making any more stir about defective titles, which was a thing not to be departed from.

In 1635 the parliament was dissolved, and Strafford commenced his favourite project of en

Iniquitous proceedings of the viceroy. 169 quiring into the king's title to the whole province of Connaught, a proceeding which had been rejected almost with horror in the preceding reign. This iniquitous business was pursued with unrelenting severity. Hired spies and informers, accompanied by adventurers of all descriptions, and court lawyers, were despatched through the province, and by their united knavery every title was found defective which the deputy wished should be so. The most nefarious means were taken to compel the verdicts of juries. If they did not find for the king they were imprisoned and mulcted in enormous sums, care being taken to select such jurors only whose wealth was sufficient to pay the penalties imposed. The lord deputy himself followed these infamous precursors at the head of the commissioners of plantation, escorted by an armed force. The county of Leitrim had been previously intimidated into a voluntary recognition of the king's title, and they submitted to a plantation; Roscommon was the next, where the king's title was found without scruple or hesitation; Mayo and Sligo followed the same example, and found for the king. But the Galway jury was less pliant; they did not find for the king; and what was the consequence? The flagitious tyranny of Strafford caused the sheriff to be fined 1000l. for returning what he called a pact and insufficient jury; and each of the jury was fined 4000l. their estates seized, and they imprisoned till the fine should be paid. Such

170

The unpopular measures of Strafford. was the administration of justice in this devoted country under the second of the Stuarts! Such was the method taken by the Irish government to make them a "rich and civil people," accord ing to the phrase used by Strafford to the juries when he told them that the king's intentions in establishing his undoubted title was not to deprive them of their just possessions, but to invest them with a considerable part of his own. Nor must the whole odium of these arbitrary proceedings be thrown upon Strafford; at least they were done with the knowledge and sanction of the king; for the deputy has informed us himself, that upon making his report to the king and council upon these proceedings, his majesty said "it was no severity; wished him to go on in that way; for that if he served him otherwise, he should not serve him as he expected. So I kneeled down,” adds he, "kissed his majesty's hand, and the council rose." It may naturally be supposed the Irish would complain heavily and grievously of these transactions, but their complaints had no effect upon Charles; for in 1640 he recalled the lord deputy, made him Earl of Strafford, (his former title being Lord Wentworth,) and sent him back to Ireland, with increased authority, as lord-lieutenant, where he continued to excite the hatred and disaffection of the people. So conscious, indeed, was he of his own unpopularity, and so painful was the sense of it to him, that he condescended to employ the paltry expedient of manufacturing

The king promises to conciliate his Irish subjects. 171

his own praises, and forcing them upon the records of the country. "The preamble of the last act of subsidies," says Plowden, "contains the most fulsome panegyric of his sincere and upright administration, with thanks to his majesty for having placed over them so wise, just, and vigilant a governor. These very commoners, in the next session of parliament, entered into a solemn protestation (in which they were joined by the lords) that the aforesaid preamble to the act of subsidies was contrived, penned, and inserted fraudulently (without the privity of the house). either by the Earl of Strafford himself, or by some other person or persons, advisers, procurers, or actors of or in the manifold and general grievances and oppressions of his majesty's kingdom of Ireland, by the direction and privity of the said earl, on purpose to prevent and anticipate the just and universal complaints of his majesty's faithful, dutiful, and loyal subjects against him.""

The perfidy of Charles, and his minister in Ireland, had become so notorious, and was likely to produce such effects, that it was no longer thought prudent to persevere in the system without some shew of honesty and candour. The king, therefore, wrote to the lords justices a public letter of assurance that his loving subjects should thenceforth enjoy the graces promised to them in the fourth year of his reign. Soon after this assurance the parliament was adjourned, and the people generously confided in the veracity of the

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Rebellion of 1641.

royal proclamation; they forgot former breaches, and were willing to hope that the monarch was at length sincere. During the recess, however, of parliament, the grand rebellion broke out, to which there were many subsidiary causes that require to be adverted to, especially the influence of the puritans in Ireland, where the power of that party was, if possible, greater than in England. It was greater, because, as it professed to be hostile to the catholics as a religious body, they received in Ireland the cordial co-operation of the protestestants, who were equally hostile to that religion, and though the aim of the coalesced parties was obviously different, yet they united in the common cause of opposition to the catholics. The puritans thus acquired an accession of power in Ireland, as the consequence of that artful delusion with which they acted in both countries; and while the protestants believed they were assisting them only to repress the evils of popery, they were in fact made the tools by which the crown itself was menaced and finally overthrown. It may be recorded, however, to the honour of the Irish catholic, that they were the first to take up arms, and the last to lay them down, in defence of their king, perfidious and unfaithful as he had been to

them.

Every means were taken by the puritans to produce a popish rebellion. The lords justices, Borlase and Parsons, prevented the bills of grace from passing, in direct contravention of the king's

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