Inevitabile crimen, fays Tacitus concerning those words, nam, quia vera erant, etiam dicta credebantur.

The alliance was undeniable; there were children born of it; and the King was not bleffed with any from his marriage. An inevitable crime laid on our Author. For, because it was true, that there were children from one marriage, and not from the other, it was fuggefted, that both marriages had been fo contrived by the Chancellor : though the King knew very well, that his own marriage had not been first projected or propofed by this Author; and that he had often told his Majefty, what fufpicions there were in the world, that that great and virtuous Princess might prove unfruitful.

Another inevitable misfortune, which was then laid as a crime too on our Author, was a report very falfely but very induftriously spread abroad, that first begat a coldness, and, by degrees, very much difinclined a great many of the royal party to him; a report, that he should have inftilled into the King's mind a principle, that he must prefer his enemies, and advance them, to gain them to be his friends; and for his old friends, it was no matter how he used them, for they would be fo ftill. To which very scandalous mifreprefentation we must give this true answer:

It fell out indeed, that every man's expectation, that had laboured all the heat of the day in

the

the vineyard, who had received wounds in their perfons in the day of battle, or suffered in their fortunes or liberties, for the preservation of a good confcience during the ufurpation of tyranny and anarchy, was not, and, alas! could not be recompenfed immediately according to their merit, or the hopes they had entertained and because it was true that they were disappointed, it was believed by fome of them, that our Author, being minifter at that time, had inftilled this damnable doctrine and pofition, that it was no matter how the King used his old friends: and because it was true that they were not confidered as they deserved, it must be believed, as they would have it, that he was the author of that advice.

It was true that the King, who was so wonderfully restored with all that glory and peace, more perhaps upon the confidence of his declarations and promifes from Breda, than any other human means, and who had thought it neceffary to recommend, in his moft gracious fpeech to both Houses, upon the paffing the Act of Indemnity, that all marks of distinction and divifion amongst his fubjects fhould be for ever buried and forgotten, did not think it for his honour, and true intereft, to reign over a party only of his subjects; and therefore, immediately after his restoration, in order to the fettlement of his court and family, the then Earl of Manchefter, whofe part every body remembered to

have been very eminent, in the time of the Rebellion, against King Charles the First, but who had industriously applied himself several years to the King, to make reparation for his former errors, and had been confiderably ferviceable to him in feveral occafions, was honoured with the office of Lord Chamberlain of the Household; to let the kingdom fee, how the King himself began with practifing what he exhorted his fubjects to, that admirable art of forgetfulness, when he put fuch a person into fo eminent a station in the government, near his own person. And it was certainly of advantage to the King, in the beginning of his fettlement here, as well as a mark of justice in his nature, to let his fubjects know and feel, that every one of them might capacitate himself, by his future behaviour, for any dignity and preferment.

But it could never be in the heart of a man, who had been all along on the suffering fide, to do his own party fo bafe an office with the King, as this falfe report did infinuate. He might be of opinion that the fatted calf was to be killed, for the entertainment of the Prodigal Son, whenever he returned; that there might be no diftinction of parties kept up amongst us: but he could never forget the birthright of the eldest fon, who had ferved the King fo many years, and had not at any time tranfgreffed his commandment, and fo well deferved that praise, and that reward, Son, thou art ever with me, and all

that

that I have is thine. And yet this calumny, falfe as it was, was another inevitable crime, or at leaft misfortune. For without that opinion, which fome of the royal party had fucked in, that the Chancellor had abandoned their intereft, it had been impoffible to have engaged a majority in that Parliament, to have confented to that act of banishment.

God forgive the inventors and contrivers of that foul calumny! But, by his almighty Providence, who from heaven reveals fecrets, it was not long before that party was difabused. For, though the Chancellor for fome time bore the blame, that they had not been more confidered, it was quickly found, that it was not from him, but from the mistaken politics of the new statesmen, that they were defigned to be neglected. Nor did they at all find themselves more taken notice of, after his removal; nor have the several other parties in the kingdom, that have been cherished and countenanced in oppofition to this, much declined, as we conceive, to this day.

But after all, we are humbly of opinion, that it was neither of these above-mentioned unavoidable misfortunes, nor both together, that gave the fatal and laft decifive blow to the fortune of this good man. The King had too good a judgment, and was too well natured, to have been impofed upon barely by fuch attacks as thefe; which he knew very well himself, as to

our

our Author's guilt in them, were frivolous and unjust.

But there are always in courts fecret engines, that actually confummate the mischiefs, that others, in a more public way, have been long in bringing to pass: and in this cafe there were two principal ones :

The one, the interest of some of the zealots of the Popish party, who knew this minister had too much credit in the nation, though he should lose it with the King, to suffer the projects, they perpetually had of propagating their religion, to take effect, whilft he should be in the kingdom:

The other, the faction of the ladies, too prevalent at that time with the King, who were afraid of fuch a man's being near him, as durft talk to him, as he had feveral times taken the liberty to do, of the scandal of their lives, and reprove both the mafter and the mistreffes, for their public unlawful conversations.

Thus these two interefts, joining their forces, were so powerful, that there was no refifting them, by a man, who could not make court to either. And fo he fell a facrifice to the ambition and malice of all forts of enemies, who were defirous of getting new places to themselves in the Court, and of trying new inventions in the State.

And yet it is to be observed, that that King, who was, almost all his reign, ever labouring, with

much