The Convention and its Work

Before Charles was called back to England, a Convention, composed of the moderate men of all parties, had attempted to set in order the political and religious affairs of the nation. It invited Charles II to return, thus restoring the monarchy; it disbanded the army of the commonwealth, thus getting rid of a body that had threatened to become an instrument of tyranny; and it proclaimed a general pardon, except for the judges who had condemned Charles I. But it showed its spirit of reaction and revenge by putting to death thirteen of the judges, and by ordering the bodies of Cromwell, Ireton, and Bradshaw to be torn from their graves in Westminster Abbey and hanged at Tyburn.

Exceedingly difficult to settle were the questions relating to land, the revenues, and the church. The Convention tried to restore to their former owners the estates that had been seized by the revolutionary government. It returned to the king the lands of the crown, and gave back to the church and the royalists such lands as they had not sold of their own accord. It performed its greatest act when it abolished feudal tenures, for thereafter every man held his land by what was known as “socage " tenure, that is, by an oath of fealty and the payment of a fixed rent. This new system did away with all feudal incidents, aids, and obligations, and contributed more to England's progress than did any other act of the period. At the same time it lessened the king's revenue; and to make up for this loss, the Convention granted to the king the revenues accruing from a tax on beer. It fixed his yearly income at L1,200,000, which would hardly have met the expenses of both the king and his government, even if it had all been collected. But owing to the fact that the country was exhausted by the long struggle and by Cromwell's expensive policy, and could not pay the taxes, Charles received not even half of what parliament intended he should.

The Convention found it impossible to settle the church question. An attempt was made to effect a sort of compromise between the Episcopal and Presbyterian systems, but nothing came of it; for Charles, in December, 1660, dissolved the Convention, before it had completed its work. Writs were then issued summoning a regular parliament.

The Reaction: Election of the Cavalier Parliament

The new parliament, though to the king's liking, was in fact more royalist than was the king himself. For the most part, Charles was inclined to be tolerant. In April, 1661, he authorized the Anglicans and Presbyterians to hold a meeting at the Savoy Palace, with the object of reaching a satisfactory settlement of the religious' question ; but the conference accomplished nothing. The Cavalier Parliament was less anxious than the king for a compromise. Scarcely had it met when it made a savage attack on the Puritans and their religion. In December, 1661, it began its double work of persecuting the Nonconformists and of reestablishing the Anglican church.

By the Corporation Act I (May, 1661), all persons holding office in the towns; where the Puritans were most numerous, were required to renounce the Solemn League and Covenant, to declare that opposition to the king was treason, and to take the sacrament according to the rites of the Anglican church. In May, 1662, the Uniformity Act, the last in English history, required every clergyman to use the prayer-book, under penalty of losing his position. Two years afterward the Conventicle Act, which was passed again in 1670, forbade all meeting for purposes of worship under any other form than that prescribed by the church of England. And in 1665, parliament completed its work by the passage of the Five Mile Act,' which forbade all clergymen who had not obeyed the Act of Uniformity; and there were some two thousand who had not done so, to come within five miles of any city or corporate town.

These acts, which were accompanied with others of a similar character for Scotland, were largely the work of the chief adviser of the king, Sir Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon, who made it his object to effect the restoration of the Anglican church, to complete the work of Archbishop Laud, and to suppress all that remained of Puritanism. On this account, these various measures have sometimes been called the Clarendon Code.

But the reaction was not limited to matters of religion. During the reign of Charles II there was generally prevalent a desire to reverse all that had been done during the period of the Puritan supremacy, and to break away from the soberness and gloom of the Puritan epoch. Men and women became gay and pleasure-loving. Taking their cue from the fashions of the French court, where many had lived during the exile, they changed their books, their dress, their manners, and their speech. At court and in society French customs prevailed; vice and profligacy increased; scepticism became fashionable; gambling, card-playing, and drinking became habits of everyday life. Yet, at the same time, it must be remembered that among the mass of the people in towns and country sobriety and right living prevailed.

Conflict between Parliament and the King

However eager the members of the Cavalier Parliament may have been to persecute the Puritans, they were none the less determined to retain all political advantages their predecessors had won in the great revolution, and to exercise the parliamentary privilege of criticising the king's policy and of controlling the king's actions. Certain events that occurred after 1662 had made them suspicious of the king and had led them to doubt his loyalty to England.

In the first place, parliament did not look with favor on the king's marriage, in 1662, with Catherine of Braganza, a Portuguese princess, because it seemed to bind the king to the policy of Louis XIV, who was friendly to Portugal and hostile to Spain. Parliament thought that this marriage foreshadowed an alliance with France. It was angry when Charles sold Dunkirk to the French king in the same year, and saw with distrust the extravagances of the king's court and the profligate character of his life. It believed that Charles was conniving at the bribery of his officials by France and was spending on his mistresses all the money that he received.

In the second place, parliament blamed Charles and his advisers for the mismanagement of the Dutch war of 1665, which began auspiciously, but which brought in the end much trouble and humiliation to England.

EDWARD HYDE, EARL OFCLARENDON.