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Home Domestic Affairs, 1689-1714 England; Part 3 |
England; Part 3Though the Crown still continued to select the ministers, and, in William's reign at all events, to control the Home and Foreign politics of the country, the Revolution had secured, therefore, for the individual Englishman his political liberty and for the Parliament which represented him complete control of taxation and, subject to the king's veto, of legislation. In two other respects the Revolution had important effects. Hitherto all publications had, under an annual Licensing Act, been subject to a rigorous censorship (In Charles II's reign printing was confined to London, York, and the two Universities, and the number of "master-printers" was only twenty. All new works had to be examined and licensed before they were published). In 1695 the House of Commons decided not to renew the Act, and thus was secured the Liberty of the Press for which half a century previously Milton had ardently pleaded-though that liberty was still somewhat. curtailed by the severity of the laws of Libel (These libel laws were mitigated by an Act passed in 1792) and by heavy stamp duties upon newspapers. Secondly, something was done to make religious restrictions less severe. By the Toleration Act (1689), liberty of worship was allowed to those who could subscribe to thirty-six of the thirty-nine Articles in the Book of Common Prayer, i.e. practically all except Roman Catholics and Unitarians. But the Nonconformists were still excluded from office under the Test and Corporation Acts passed in the reign of Charles II. The Toleration Act marked, nevertheless, a great advance, and from that time the feeling of tolerance steadily increased. After the accession of the House of Hanover in the eighteenth century an Act was annually passed excusing the Nonconformists from the penalties which they had incurred for holding any office. Complete toleration to all sects, including Roman Catholics, was not however to come till the nineteenth century (Though the Nonconformists obtained toleration, severe laws continued to be passed against the Roman Catholics. Thus in i6cvy a law was passed rendering any priest liable to perpetual imprisonment for celebrating Masc; and a friar named Atkinson, who was convicted through the evidence of his serving-maid-she was rewarded with a gift of £1oo-was imprisoned for thirty years at Hurst Castle, finally dying there in 1729 at the age of seventy-three. But these vindictive laws were not as a rule enforced by the Government, and the Roman Catholics, as a whole, were allowed to have their worship undisturbed).We must now say something about the details of the domestic history. William and Mary established their position with greater ease than might have been expected. The death of Dundee at the Battle of Killiecrankie (p. 433) and the flight of James to France after the Battle of the Boyne (p. 434) led to the submission of Scotland and Ireland. In England itself there was surprisingly little opposition. One of the Archbishops, four bishops and four hundred other clergymen, known as the Non-jurors, refused to take the oath of allegiance to William and Mary, and consequently were deprived of their benefices-and that was all. Yet, though there was little opposition, there was also little loyalty to the new sovereigns. Statesmen and warriors were alike faithless. Danby, who was the chief minister for five years, Marlborough, the general, and Russell, the victor of the Battle of La Hogue, all intrigued with James whilst holding high office under William and Anne. Parliaments were often unfriendly, and there was one plot against William's life (The idea was to kill the king in a narrow lane near Turnham Green, as he was returning from his usual Saturday hunt; but the plot was discovered). |
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