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Home The First Two Stuarts and their Foreign Policy |
The First Two Stuarts and their Foreign PolicyThe development of England at every stage has been largely influenced by the character of its monarchs. But it may be doubted whether at any other period more depended upon the character of the sovereign than during the first half of the Seventeenth Century, when, as we shall see, most difficult questions arose both at home and abroad. It will be as well, therefore, to say something at once about the first two kings of the house of Stuart who sat upon the English throne—about James I, who succeeded Queen Elizabeth in 1603, and reigned till 1625, and his son, Charles I, who reigned from 1625 till 1649.James I has been described as the most learned man who ever occupied a British throne. He was highly educated. In his youth he was something of a prodigy (At the age of ten "he was able, extempore" wrote a contemporary, " to read a chapter out of the Bible out of Latin into French, and out of French after into English"), and in later life he wrote tolerable verses, whilst his speeches and prose writings were vigorous and clever (His writings include A Counterblast to Tobacco, a violent attack upon the practice of smoking). He was exceptionally well informed, especially in theology, and well versed in foreign politics. Moreover, not only was he a great reader, but a great rider as well; he was fond of all forms of exercise, and was a mighty hunter. He was humorous, and not without shrewdness. "Bring stools for the ambassadors," was his remark when a deputation came from the House of Commons in 1621, James recognizing that it was becoming, in some sense, a rival power to himself. " You will live to have your bellyful of impeachments," was his prophetic reply when his son Charles pressed him to sanction the impeachment of one of his ministers. He was a thoroughly well-meaning man, with every intention of doing his duty. "He felt himself", as it has been humorously put, "as an enormous brood fowl set over his new kingdom, and would so fain gather it all under his wings." He was a man also of large ideas. In an age of war his motto was Beati patifici. In an age of persecution he was in favour of toleration, and desired an understanding with the Pope and a cessation of religious controversy. Almost alone he saw the great value of the political union between England and Scotland, a union which was not, however, to be achieved till 1707. Perhaps it is not quite true and even if true it was not his fault that James, in Macaulay's words, had an "awkward figure, a rickety walk, and a slobbering mouth"; but his personal appearance, if it was neither ludicrous nor displeasing, was at all events not prepossessing, and his personal habits were not all of them nice. Unfortunately, however, apart from that, the defects of James more than counterbalanced his virtue. He was indolent, averse to taking trouble, and he refused to think out details. He was timid and lacking in decision, as he showed in his foreign policy. He might have large ideas, but they were vague and formless. He was prodigiously conceited, and no flattery of this " Solomon of England", as he was called by his courtiers, was too fulsome for him; and, finally, he was pedantic and loquacious to a degree which would have provoked any English House of Commons at any period. James was, in truth, unsympathetic and tactless, and, as was natural in a Scot brought up in Scotland, entirely ignorant of the ordinary opinions of the ordinary Englishman. The French king once called James "the wisest fool in Christendom"—perhaps that is the best description of him. |
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