Identifier: histofengfromthe01macauoft (find matches)
Title: The history of England, from the accession of James the Second
Year: 1914 (1910s)
Authors: Macaulay, Thomas Babington Macaulay, Baron, 1800-1859 Firth, C. H. (Charles Harding), 1857-1936
Subjects: Great Britain -- History James II, 1685-1688 Great Britain -- History William and Mary, 1689-1702
Publisher: London : Macmillan
Contributing Library: Robarts - University of Toronto
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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ll, andwere immovably fixed in the belief that the money which ought to havesupported their households had, by some inexplicable process, gone tothe favourites of the King. The minds of men were now in such a temper that every public actexcited discontent. Charles had taken to wife Catharine Princess ofPortugal. The marriage was generally disliked ; and the murmursbecame loud when it appeared that the King was not likely to have anylegitimate posterity. Dunkirk, won by Oliver from Spain, was sold toLewis the Fourteenth, King of France. This bargain excited generalindignation. Englishmen were already beginning to observe withuneasiness the progress of the French power, and to regard the House II UNDER CHARLES THE SECOND 171 of Bourbon with the same feeling with which their grandfathers hadregarded the House of Austria. Was it wise, men asked, at such atime, to make any addition to the strength of a monarchy already tooformidable ? Dunkirk was, moreover, prized by the people, not merely
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GEORGE VILLIERS, SECOND DUKE OF BUCKINGHAMFrom a mezzotint by I. Beckett, after the painting by Verelst as a place of arms, and as a key to the Low Countries, but also as atrophy of English valour. It was to the subjects of Charles whatCalais had been to an earlier generation, and what the rock of Gibraltar,so manfully defended, through disastrous and perilous years, against the 172 HISTORY OF ENGLAND chap. fleets and armies of a mighty coalition, is to ourselves. The plea ofeconomy might have had some weight, if it had been urged by aneconomical government. But it was notorious that the charges ofDunkirk fell far short of the sums which were wasted at court in viceand folly. It seemed insupportable that a sovereign, profuse beyondexample in all that regarded his own pleasures, should be niggardly inall that regarded the safety and honour of the state. The public discontent was heightened, when it was found that, whileDunkirk was abandoned on the plea of economy, the fortress of Tangi

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