enormous abuses of power with which both sovereigns are accused, owed their origin to the same source; the errors arifing from a bad education, aggravated and extended by the impious flattery of designing priests; we shall also be obliged to confefs, that the parliament itself, by an unprecedented fervility, helped to confirm James in the exalted idea he had entertained of the royal office, and that the doctrines of an absolute and unconditional fubmiffion on the part of fubjects, which, in the reign of his father, was, in a great meafure, confined to the precepts of a Laud, a Sibthorpe, and Maynwaring, were now taught as the avowed doctrines of the Church of England, were acknowledged by the two Universities, and implicitly avowed by a large majority of the nation; so great, indeed, was the change in the temper, manners, and opinions of the people, from the commencement of the reign of Charles the First to the commencement of the reign of his fon James, that at this shameful period the people gloried in having laid all their privileges at the foot of the throne, and execrated every generous principle of freedom, as arifing from a spirit totally incompatible with the peace of society, and altogether repugnant to the doctrines of Chriftianity.

This was the fituation of affairs at the acceffion of the unfortunate James; and had he been equally unprincipled as his brother, the deceased king; had he prefessed himself a Proteftant, whilst he was in his heart a Papift; had he not regarded it as his duty to use his omnipotent power for the restoring to some parts of its ancient dignity a Church which he regarded as the only true Church of Christ; or had he, instead of attacking the prerogative of the prelacy, fuffered them to share the regal despotifm which they had fixed on the bafis of confcience, the most flagrant abuses of civil power would never have been called in judgment against him, and parliament themselves would have lent their constitutional authority to have riveted the chains of the empire in such a manner as should have put it out of the power of the moft determined votaries of freedom to have re-established the government on its ancient foundation. From this immediate evil England owes its deliverance to the bigoted fincerity of James; a circumstance which ought, in fome measure, to conciliate our affections to the memory of the sufferer, and induce us to treat those errors with

lenity, which have led to the enjoyment of privileges which can never be entirely loft, but by a general corruption of principle and depravity of manners.

It was faid by the witty duke of Buckingham, "that Charles the Second might " do well if he would, and that James "would do well if he could;" an obfervation which says little for the understanding of James, but a great deal for his heart; and, with all the blemishes with which his public character is stained, he was not deficient in feveral qualities necessary to compose a good fovereign. His industry and business were exemplary, he was frugal of the public money, he cherished and extended the maritime power of the empire, and his encouragement of trade was attended with such success, that, according to the observation of the impartial hiftorian Ralph, as the frugality of his administration helpadmin ed to increase the number of malcontents, so his extreme attention to trade was not less alarming to the whole body of the Dutch, than his resolution not to rush into a war with France was mortifying to their stadtholder.

In domestic life, the character of James, though not irreproachable, was comparatively good. It is true, he was in a great measure tainted with that licentiousness of manners, which at this time pervaded the whole society, and which reigned triumphant within the circle of the court; but he was never carried into any excesses which trenched deeply on the duties of social life; and if the qualities of his heart were only to be judged by his different conduct in the different characters of husband, father, mafter, and friend, he might be pronounced a man of very amiable difpofition. But those who know not how to forgive injuries, and can never pardon the errors, the infirmities, the vices, or even the virtues of their fellow-creatures, when in any refpect they affect personal interest or inclination, will aim against them the sensibility of every humane mind, and can never expect from others that justice and commiseration which themselves have never exercised: but whilft we execrate that rancorous cruelty with which James, in the short hour of triumph, perfecuted all those who endeavoured to thwart his ambitious hopes, it is but justice to observe, that the rank vices of pride, malice, and revenge, which blacken his conduct, whilft he figured in the station of prefumptive heir to the crown, and afterwards in the character of sovereign, on the Uu 3 fuccessful

fuccefsful quelling of the Monmouth rebellion, were thoroughly corrected by the chaftifing hand of affliction: that the whole period of his life, from his return to Ireland to the day of his death, was spent in the exercise of the first Chriftian virtues, patience, fortitude, humility, and refignation. Bretonneau, his biographer, records, that he always spoke with an extreme moderation of the individuals who had acted the moft fuccessfully in his disfavour; that he reproved those who mentioned their conduct with severity; that he read, even with a ftoical apathy, the bittereft writings which were published against him; that he regarded the lofs of empire as a necessary correction of the misdemeanors of his life, and even rebuked those who expreffed any concern for the issue of events, which he refpected as ordinations of the divine will.

According to the fame biographer, James was exact in his devotion, moderate even to abftinence in his life; full of fentiments of the highest contrition for past offences; and, according to the difcipline of the Romish church, was very fevere in the austerities which he inflicted on his perfon. As this prince juftly regarded himself as a martyr to the Catholic faith, as his warmeft friends were all of this perfuafion, as his conversation in his retirement at St. Germains was entirely, in a great measure, confined to priests and devotees, it is natural that this fuperftition should increase with the increase of religious sentiment; and as he had made use of his power and authority, whilft in England, to enlarge the number of profelytes in popery, fo, in a private flation, he laboured incessantly, by prayer, exhortation, and example, to confirm the piety of his Popish adherents, and to effect a reformation in those who still continued firm to the doctrines of the church of England. He visited the monks of La Trappe once a year, the feverest order of religionists in France; and his conformity to the discipline of the convent was so strict and exact, that he impressed those devotees with fentiments of admiration at his piety, humility, and conftancy.

Thus having spent twelve years with a higher degree of peace and tranquillity than he had ever experienced in the most triumphant part of his life, he was seized with a palty in September 1701, and after having languished fifteen days, died in the fixty-eighth year of his age, having filled up the interval between his first seizure and hual exit with the whole train of religious

exercises enjoined on fimilar occafions by the church of Rome, with folemn and repeated profeffions of his faith, and earnest exhortation to his two children, the youngest of whom was born in the second year of his exile, to keep ftedfaft to the religion in which they had been educated. These precepts and commands have acted with a force fupcrior to all the temptations of a crown, and have been adhered to with a firmness which obliges an historian to acknowledge the fuperiority which James's defcendants, in the nice points of honour and confcience, have gained over the character of Henry the Fourth, who, at the period when he was looked up to as the great hero of the Proteftant caufe, made no fcruple to accept a crown on the difgraceful terms of abjuring the principles of the Reformation, and embracing the principles of a religion, which, from his early infancy, he had been taught to regard as idolatrous and profane.

The dominion of error over the minds of the generality of mankind is irrefiftible. James, to the laft hour of his life, continued as great a bigot to his political as his religious errors: he could not help confidering the strength and power of the crown as a circumstance neceffary to the prefervation and happiness of the people; and in a letter of advice which he wrote to his fon, whilft he conjures him to pay a religious obfervance to all the duties of a good fovereign, he cautions him against fuffering any entrenchment on the royal prerogative. Among feveral heads, containing excellent instructions on the art of reigning happily and juftly, he warns the young prince never to disquiet his fubjects in their property or their religion; and, what is remarkable, to his last breath he perfifted in asserting, that he never attempted to fubvert the laws, or procure more than a toleration and equality of privilege to his Catholic fubjects. As there is great reason to believe this afsertion to be true, it shews, that the delusion was incurable under which the king laboured, by the truft he had put in the knavish doctrines of lawyers and priests; and that neither himself, nor his Proteftant abettors, could fathom the consequences of that enlarged toleration which he endeavoured to establish. Macaulay.

§106. Character of WILLIAM III. William III. was in his person of the middle stature, a thin body, and delicate conftitution, fubject to an asthma and con

prince poffefssed of few talents to make him popular. He was trusted, perhaps, less than he deferved, by the most obfequious of his parliaments; but it seems, upon the whole, apparent, that the nation adhered to his government more from a fear of the return of his predeceffor, than from any attachment to his own person, or respect for his right to the throne. Macpherson.

§108. Character of MARY, Queen Confort of WILLIAM III.

Mary was in her person tall and well proportioned, with an oval visage, lively eyes, agreeable features, a mild aspect, and an air of dignity. Her apprehenfion was clear, her memory tenacious, and her judgment solid. She was a zealous Proteftant, fcrupulously exact in all the duties of devotion, of an even temper, of a calm and mild conversation; she was ruffled by no paffion, and feems to have been a flranger to the emotions of natural affection, for she afcended the throne from which her father had been depofed, and treated her fister as an alien to her blood. In a word, Mary seems to have imbibed the cold difpofition and apathy of her hufband, and to have centered all her ambition in deserving the epithet of an humble and obedient wife.

Smollett.

Died 28th December, 1694, aged 33.

§10.9. Character of ANNE.

The queen continued to dose in a lethargic infenfibility, with very short inter vals, till the first day of Auguft in the morning, when the expired, in the fiftieth year of her age, and in the thirteenth of her reign. Anne Stuart, queen of Great Britain, was in her perfon of the middle fize, well proportioned; her hair was of dark brown colour, her complexion ruddy, her features were regular, her countenance was rather round than oval, and her aspect more comely than majestic: her voice was clear and melodious, and her prefence engaging; her capacity was naturally good, but not much cultivated by learning; nor did the exhibit any marks of extraordinary genius, or personal ambition: she was certainly deficient in that vigour of mind by which a prince ought to preferve her independence, and avoid the fnares and fetters of fycophants and favourites; but, whatever her weakness in this particular might have been, the virtues of her heart were never called in question; fe was a pattern of conjugal affection and fidelity, a tender mo

ther, a warm friend, an indulgent mistress, a munificent patron, a mild and merciful princess; during whose reign no blood was shed for treason.. She was zealously attached to the Church of England, from conviction rather than from prepossession; unaffectedly pious, just, charitable, and compaffionate. She felt a mother's fondness for her people, by whom she was universally beloved with a warmth of affection which even the prejudice of party could not abate. In a word, if she was not the greatest, the was certainly one of the best and most unblemished sovereigns that ever fat upon the throne of England, and well deserved the expressive, though simple epithet of, the "good queen Anne." Smollett.

She died in 1714.

§110. Another Character of ANNE.

Thus died Anne Stuart, queen of Great Britain, and one of the best and greatest monarchs that ever filled that throne. What was most remarkable, was a clear harmonious voice, always admired in her graceful delivery of her speeches to parliament, infomuch that it used to be a common faying in the mouth of every one, "that her very speech was mufic." Good-nature, the true characteristic of the Stuarts, predominated in her temper, which was a compound of benevolence, generofity, indolence, and timidity, but not without a due sensibility of any flight which the thought was offered to her perfon or her dignity; to these all her actions, both as a monarch and as a woman, may be ascribed; these were the fources both of her virtues and her failings; her greatest blessing upon earth was that entire union of affections and inclinations between her and her royal confort; which made them a perfect pattern of conjugal love. She was a fond and tender mother, an easy and indulgent mistress, and a most gracious fovereign; but she had more than once reason to repent her giving up her heart, and trufting her fecrets without referve to her favourites. She retained to the last the principle of that true religion which the had imbibed early; being devout without affectation, and charitable without oftentation, She had a great reverence for clergymen eminent for learning and good lives, and was particularly beneficent to the poorer fort of them, of which she left an evidence which bears her name, and will perpetuate both that and her bounty to all facceeding generations.

Chamberlaine.

§1. Another Character of ANNE.

Thus died Anne Stuart, queen of Great Britain and Ireland, in the fiftieth year of her age, and thirteenth of her reign. In her person she was of a middle stature, and, before the bore children, well made. Her hair was dark, her complexion sanguine, her features strong, but not irregular, her whole countenance more dignified than agreeable. In the accomplishments of the mind, as a woman, she was not deficient; she understood music she loved painting; she had even some taste for works of genius; the was always generous, sometimes liberal, but never profufe. Like the rest of the family, she was good-natured to a degree of weakness; indolent in her difpofition, timid by nature, devoted to the company of her favourites, easily led. She poffefsed all the virtues of her father, except political courage; she was subject to all his weaknesses, except enthusiasm in religion; she was jealous of her authority, and fullenly irreconcilable towards those who treated either herself or prerogative with disrespect; but, like him also, she was much better qualified to discharge the duties of a private life than to act the part of a fovereign. As a friend, a mother, a wife, the deserved every praise. Her condust as a daughter could scarcely be exceeded by a virtue much fuperior to all these. Upon the whole, though her reign was crowded with great events, the cannot, with any justice, be called a great princess. Subject to terror, beyond the conftitutional timidity of her fex, she was altogether incapable of decisive counfels, and nothing but her irrefiftible popularity could have fupported her authority amidst the ferment of those distracted times.

Macpherson.

§112. The Charater of MARY Queen of SCOTS.

To all the charms of beauty, and the utmost elegance of external form, Mary added those accomplishments which render their impression irrefistible. Polite, affable, infinuating, sprightly, and capable of speaking and of writing with equal ease and dignity. Sudden, however, and violent in all her attachments; because her heart was warm and unfufpicious. Impatient of contradiction, because she had been accustomed from her infancy to be treated as a queen. No stranger, on fome occafions, to diffimulation, which, in that per

fidious court where she received her education, was reckoned among the necessary arts of government. Not infenfible to flattery, or unconscious of that pleasure, with which almost every woman beholds the influence of her own beauty. Formed with the qualities that we love, not with the talents that we admire; she was an agreeable woman rather than an illustrious queen. The vivacity of her spirit, not sufficiently tempered with found judgment, and the warmth of her heart, which was not at all times under the refstraint of difcretion, betrayed her both into errors and into crimes. To say that she was always unfortunate, will not account for that long and almost uninterrupted succession of calamities which befel her; we must likewife add, that she was often imprudent. Her passion for Darnly was rash, youthful, and exceffive. And though the sudden tranfition to the opposite extreme was the natural effect of her ill-requited love, and of his ingratitude, insolence, and brutality; yet neither these, nor Bothwell's artful address and important services, can justify her attachments to that nobleman. Even the manners of the age, licentious as they were, are no apology for this unhappy paffion; nor can they induce us to look on that tragical and infamous scene, which followed upon it, with less abhorrence. Humanity will draw a veil over this part of her character, which it cannot approve, and may, perhaps, prompt some to impute her actions to her fituation, more than to her difpofition; and to lament the unhappiness of the former, rather than accuse the perverseness of the latter. Mary's fufferings exceed, both in degree and in duration, those tragical distresses which fancy has feigned to excite for. row and commiferation; and while we furvey them, we are apt altogether to forget her frailties, we think of her faults with less indignation, and approve of our tears, as if they were shed for a person who had attained much nearer to pure virtue.

With regard to the queen's person, a circumstance not to be omitted in writing the history of a female reign, all contemporary authors agree in afcribing to Mary the utmost beauty of countenance and elegance of shape of which the human form is capable. Her hair was black, though, according to the fashion of that age, she frequently wore borrowed locks, and of different colours. Her eyes were a dark grey, her complexion was exquifitely fine, and