The History of England, from the Accession of James II Volume II Part 28

[Footnote 214: Sept. 6. 1679.]

[Footnote 215: See Swift's account of her in the Journal to Stella.]

[Footnote 216: Henry Sidney's Journal of March 31. 1680, in Mr.

Blencowe's interesting collection.]

[Footnote 217: Speaker Onslow's note on Burnet, i. 596.; Johnson's Life of Sprat.]

[Footnote 218: No person has contradicted Burnet more frequently or with more asperity than Dartmouth. Yet Dartmouth wrote, "I do not think he designedly published anything he believed to be false." At a later period Dartmouth, provoked by some remarks on himself in the second volume of the Bishop's history, retracted this praise but to such a retraction little importance can be attached. Even Swift has the justice to say, "After all, he was a man of generosity and good nature."--Short Remarks on Bishop Burnet's History.

It is usual to censure Burnet as a singularly inaccurate historian; hut I believe the charge to be altogether unjust. He appears to be singularly inaccurate only because his narrative has been subjected to a scrutiny singularly severe and unfriendly. If any Whig thought it worth while to subject Reresby's Memoirs, North's Examen, Mulgrave's Account of the Revolution, or the Life of James the Second, edited by Clarke, to a similar scrutiny, it would soon appear that Burnet was far indeed from being the most inexact writer of his time.]

[Footnote 219: Dr. Hooper's MS. narrative, published in the Appendix to Lord Dungannon's Life of William.]

[Footnote 220: Avaux Negotiations, Aug. 10/20 Sept. 14/24 Sept 28/Oct 8 Dec. 7/17 1682.]

[Footnote 221: I cannot deny myself the pleasure of quoting Ma.s.sillon's unfriendly, yet discriminating and n.o.ble, character of William. "Un prince profond dans ses vues; habile a former des ligues et a reunir les esprits; plus heureux a exciter les guerres qu'a combatire; plus a craindre encore dans le secret du cabinet, qu'a la tete des armees; un ennemi que la haine du nom Francais avoit rendu capable d'imaginer de grandes choses et de les executer; un de ces genies qui semblent etre nes pour mouvoir a leur gre les peuples et les souverains; un grand homme, s'il n'avoit jamais voulu etre roi."--Oraison funebre de M. le Dauphin.]

[Footnote 222: For example, "Je crois M. Feversham un tres brave et honeste homme. Mais je doute s'il a a.s.sez d'experience diriger une si grande affaire qu'il a sur le bras. Dieu lui donne un succes prompt et heureux. Mais je ne suis pas hors d'inquietude." July 7/17 1685. Again, after he had received the news of the battle of Sedgemoor, "Dieu soit loue du bon succes que les troupes du Roy ont eu contre les rebelles. Je ne doute pas que cette affaire ne soit entierement a.s.soupie, et que le regne du Roy sera heureux, Ce que Dieu veuille." July 10/20]

[Footnote 223: The treaty will be found in the Recueil des Traites, iv.

No. 209.]

[Footnote 224: Burnet, i. 762.]

[Footnote 225: Temple's Memoirs.]

[Footnote 226: See the poems ent.i.tled The Converts and The Delusion.]

[Footnote 227: The lines are in the Collection of State Poems.]

[Footnote 228: Our information about Wycherly is very scanty; but two things are certain, that in his later years he called himself a Papist, and that he received money from James. I have very little doubt that he was a hired convert.]

[Footnote 229: See the article on him in the Biographia Britannica.]

[Footnote 230: See James Quin's account of Haines in Davies's Miscellanies; Tom Brown's Works; Lives of Sharpers; Dryden's Epilogue to the Secular Masque.]

[Footnote 231: This fact, which escaped the minute researches of Malone, appears from the Treasury Letter Book of 1685.]

[Footnote 232: Leeuwen, Dec 25/Jan 4 1685/6]

[Footnote 233: Barillon,--Jan 31/Feb 10 1686/7. "Je crois que, dans le fond, si on ne pouvoit laisser que la religion Anglicane et la Catholique etablies par les loix, le Roy d'Angleterre en seroit bien plus content."]

[Footnote 234: It will be round in Wodrow, Appendix, vol. ii. No. 129.]

[Footnote 235: Wodrow, Appendix, vol. ii. No. 128. 129. 132.]

[Footnote 236: Barillon Feb 20/March 10 1686/7; Citters, Feb. 16/23; Reresby's Memoirs Bonrepaux, May 25/June 4 1687.]

[Footnote 237: Barillon, March 14/24 1687; Lady Russell to Dr.

Fitzwilliam, April 1.; Burnet, i. 671. 762. The conversation is somewhat differently related in Clarke's Life of James, ii. 204. But that pa.s.sage is not part of the King's own memoirs.]

[Footnote 238: London Gazette, March 21. 1686/7.]

[Footnote 239: Ibid. April 7. 1687.]

[Footnote 240: Warrant Book of the Treasury. See particularly the instructions dated March 8, 1687/8 Burnet, i. 715. Reflections on his Majesty's Proclamation for a Toleration in Scotland; Letters containing some Reflections on his Majesty's Declaration for Liberty of Conscience; Apology for the Church of England with a relation to the spirit of Persecution for which she is accused, 1687/8. But it is impossible for me to cite all the pamphlets from which I have formed my notion of the state of parties at this time.]

[Footnote 241: Letter to a Dissenter.]

[Footnote 242: Wodrow, Appendix, vol. ii. Nos. 132. 134.]

[Footnote 243: London Gazette, April 21. 1687 Animadversions on a late paper ent.i.tuled A Letter to a Dissenter, by H C. (Henry Care), 1687.]

[Footnote 244: Lestrange's Answer to a Letter to a Dissenter; Care's Animadversions on A letter to a Dissenter; Dialogue between Harry and Roger; that is to say, Harry Care and Roger Lestrange.]

[Footnote 245: The letter was signed T. W. Care says, in his Animadversions, "This Sir Politic T. W., or W. T. for some critics think that the truer reading."]

[Footnote 246: Ellis Correspondence, March 15. July 27. 1686 Barillon, Feb 28/Mar 10; March 3/13. March 6/16. 1687 Ronquillo, March 9/19. 1687, in the Mackintosh Collection.]

[Footnote 247: Wood's Athenae Oxonienses; Observator; Herac.l.i.tus Ridens, pa.s.sim. But Care's own writings furnish the best materials for an estimate of his character.]

[Footnote 248: Calamy's Account of the Ministers ejected or silenced after the Restoration, Northamptons.h.i.+re; Wood's Athenae Oxonienses; Biographia Britannica.]

[Footnote 249: State Trials; Samuel Rosewell's Life of Thomas Rosewell, 1718; Calamy's Account.]

[Footnote 250: London Gazette, March 15 1685/6; Nichols's Defence of the Church of England; Pierce's Vindication of the Dissenters.]

[Footnote 251: The Addresses will be found in the London Gazettes.]

[Footnote 252: Calamy's Life of Baxter.]

[Footnote 253: Calamy's Life of Howe. The share which the Hampden family had in the matter I learned from a letter of Johnstone of Waristoun, dated June 13 1688.]

[Footnote 254: Bunyan's Grace Abounding.]

[Footnote 255: Young cla.s.ses Bunyan's prose with Durfey's poetry. The people of fas.h.i.+on in the Spiritual Quixote rank the Pilgrim's Progress with Jack the Giantkiller. Late in the eighteenth century Cowper did not venture to do more than allude to the great allegorist

"I name thee not, lest so despis'd a name Should move a sneer at thy deserved fame."]

[Footnote 256: The continuation of Bunyan's life appended to his Grace Abounding.]

[Footnote 257: Kiffin's Memoirs; Luson's Letter to Brooke, May 11. 1773, in the Hughes Correspondence.]

[Footnote 258: See, among other contemporary pamphlets, one ent.i.tled a Representation of the threatening Dangers impending over Protestants.]

[Footnote 259: Burnet, i. 694.]