KINGDOM OFFERED TO LOUIS.

491

the mansions and property of the nobles. In the morning he would set fire, with his own hands, to the house in which he had slept for the night; and, with such an example before them, his followers reduced towns and villages to ashes; robbing the unarmed countryman; and torturing the citizen, till he confessed to these robbers where he had hoped to conceal his money.

When the barons saw the king proceed in this manner, as though he had resolved to reduce England into a frightful desert, and to leave them no alternative but rebellion, or ruin and death, they made up their minds to offer the crown of England to some person capable of rescuing the country from the lawless marauders, who were thus desolating it in every direction. And as most of these foreigners were subjects of the king of France, they fixed upon his son Louis; hoping, that at his summons, half the mercenaries would immediately quit John; and that the misery of a long civil war might thus be avoided.

The pope, however, ordered the king of France to abstain from meddling with the affairs of a kingdom, subject, he said, to the Roman See. But Philip answered, that England neither did, nor ever should, belong to the pope. And he was seconded in this declaration by his nobles; who asserted, with one voice, that no king could of his own will give away his kingdom, or make it tributary to any foreign power, transferring the barons of the land like so many slaves.

In May, 1216, Louis set sail from Calais with a fleet of 680 vessels. John was on the opposite heights of Dover, with a numerous army under his command; but, never courageous except in face of the weak, he broke up his camp before the French could land; and fled across the country, spreading desolation as he went, till he had reached Bristol, and so put the whole breadth of England between

himself and his enemies. The road was thus left open to Louis, who was received with great joy in London, which the barons had hitherto kept possession of, and thereby preserved from pillage. In London, the nobility did homage to the French prince; who, in return, swore upon the Gospel to restore the authority of their good laws, and to reinstate them in all their rights and possessions.

And now England appeared about to purchase its escape from present tyranny, at no less a price than that of becoming henceforward a province of France. But from this it was saved by the timely death of king John; who was still ravaging the distant counties with a flying army, when he was made to find that though his cowardice might keep him out of reach of the sword of human vengeance, there is no way of escaping the power of GOD in that day of destruction for which the wicked is reserved, until he hath done his appointed work as the scourge, if he be such, of a sinful people.

The king was on his way from Norfolk into Lincolnshire, and had himself crossed the Wash in safety; when the train of carts which carried his plate, jewels, and treasure, coming upon a quicksand, and being thus overtaken by the tide where it meets the stream of the Welland, were all lost, with the horses and drivers.

The irritation of John, on finding himself deprived in such a manner of his valuables, had wrought him into a fever, before he reached the monastery of Swinshead; and there he indulged in large draughts of new cyder, and in eating a quantity of peaches. The next morning he was exceedingly ill; but was conveyed in a litter to Sleaford, and thence to Newark; where after a few days he expired, in the forty-ninth year of his age, and eighteenth of his reign.

Oct. 19.

*Job xxi. 30.

He had desired to be buried in Worcester cathedral; that St. Wulstan* might take charge of his body and soul. There his mouldered corpse was, a few years ago, exposed to view; and the cowl of a monk was found upon his head. For they who had passed their lives in the unrestrained indulgence of every passion and every lust, were then permitted by their blind guides to hope, that if their bodies were found in the supposed livery of mortification and self-denial, it might lead their all-seeing Judge to overlook what had really been their habits. Even Matthew Paris, the honest monk of St. Alban's abbey, whose faithful pen would not disguise any man's vices to flatter greatness, after relating the wickedness of John as a son, a brother, a husband, a subject, a king, and a creature born to glorify his Creator, habitually and flagrantly violating every duty towards man and towards GOD, finishes his history with saying, that some good works which the king did in this life, will speak for him before the tribunal of Christ; inasmuch as he built a monastery at Beaulieu; and, when dying, bequeathed an estate of ten pounds a year to Croxton Abbey.' So pitifully defective have the wisest men's notions of the heinousness of sin ever been, in ages or countries where the Scriptures are but little read.

But though the Almighty was thus, as it were, forgotten, He was even then visibly preparing blessings for generations which should again be taught to honour His holy word.

Perhaps in no period of English history were the events which occurred, and the characters of those who took the lead in them, more undeniably beneficial in the end, to the great interests of our nation, than in this reign. And yet human wisdom would certainly never have devised such means for benefitting any country, as subjecting it to a foolish and

* See p. 277...

wieked monarch like John; and exposing it at the same time, to such politic and powerful enemies of its prosperity and independence, as Philip and pope Innocent.

The crimes and the cowardice of king John, combined with the abilities and unscrupulous ambition of Philip, were first useful to England, by separat< ing from it the greater part of those French provinces which had been subject to king Henry II. Had they remained in the possession of the kings of England, the revenues raised on one side of the channel would have been employed to enslave the other, by monarchs greedy of power; and a prudent use of the domains which he inherited in France, would probably have enabled John, or his successors, to conquer that kingdom. In which case England would have been deserted by its sovereigns for the richer country; and a monarch uniting the resources of both kingdoms, might have erected a despotic government over the whole of Europe; making it easy for the pope, by an alliance with him, to keep all souls enslaved.

Instead of such a disastrous extension of their dominions, the kings of England began, from this period, to be Englishmen again; sharing, in many respects, the same feelings and same interests as their subjects. And the pecuniary wants of its sovereigns, after they ceased to have any sources of income from abroad, enabled the English to purchase some of the most valuable parts of our constitution, in a peaceable manner, by making them the conditions on which supplies of money were granted.

It has been already observed how useful was Innocent's encroaching spirit; first, in leading him to force upon the king an able and patriotic statesman, as head of the English Church; and then, in tempting him to abuse his influence, till he had taught all classes to be jealous of the papal power.

Lastly, all these things worked together, with the

weakness and wickedness of John, to bring about the demand, and the concession of a charter of liberties, so drawn up that the nobles and people should, henceforward, have a common interest in upholding its authority.

The arrival at a period from which the kings of England were to cease being foreigners; the first symptoms of a general abhorrence of papal tyranny, since its establishment; and the signature of Magna Charta, form an important æra in the growth of our national constitution. They are like the first glimpses of the dawn; but there was still a long hour of darkness to be passed. At this time, indeed, the natives of Spain, and still more those of Italy, had far brighter prospects than our forefathers; but the night returned upon them; and their loss should force us to acknowledge, with overflowing hearts, that to the free bounty of GOD alone we owe it, that our more favoured country reposes in light and liberty. The same mercy which has been seen, so conspicuously, sowing the seeds of all our present blessings, was equally needed to provide instruments, who should water the plants; and it was as graciously afforded to give the increase; or we should never have tasted the fruits.

END OF VOL. I.