abstained from formally expressing his sentiments. At length it was represented to him that his continued silence had excited much uneasiness and distrust among his well-wishers, and that it was time to speak out. He therefore determined to explain himself. A Scotch Whig, named Stewart, had fled, some years before, to Holland, in order to avoid the boot and the gallows, and had become intimate with the Grand Pensionary Fagel, who enjoyed a large share of the Stadtholder's confidence and favor. By Stewart had been drawn up the violent and acrimonious manifesto of Argyle. When the Indulgence appeared, Stewart conceived that he had an opportunity of obtaining, not only pardon, but reward. He offered his services to the government of which he had been the enemy; they were accepted; and he addressed to Fagel a letter, purporting to have been written by the direction of James. In that letter the Pensionary was exhorted to use all his influence with the prince and princess, for the purpose of inducing them to support their father's policy. After some delay, Fagel transmitted a reply, deeply meditated, and drawn up with exquisite art. No person who studies that remarkable document can fail to perceive that though it is framed in a manner well calculated to reassure and delight English Protestants, it contains not a word which could give offence, even at the Vatican. It was announced that William and Mary would, with pleasure, assist in abolishing every law which made any Englishman liable to punishment for his religious opinions. But between punishments and disabilities a distinction was taken. To admit Roman Catholics to office would, in the judgment of their highnesses, be neither for the general interest of England nor even for the interest of the Roman Catholics themselves. This manifesto was translated into several languages, and circulated widely on the Continent. Of the English version, carefully prepared by Burnet, near fifty thousand copies were introduced into the eastern shires, and rapidly distributed over the whole kingdom. No state paper was ever more completely successful. The Protestants of our island applauded the manly firmness with which William declared that he could not consent to intrust Papists with any share in the government. The Roman Catholic princes, on the other hand, were pleased by the mild and temperate style in which his resolution was expressed, and by the hope which he held out that, under his administration, no member of their Church would be molested on account of religion. VOL. II. 18 It is probable that the Pope himself was among those who read this celebrated letter with pleasure. He had some months before dismissed Castlemaine in a manner which showed little regard for the feelings of Castlemaine's master. Innocent thoroughly disliked the whole domestic and foreign policy of the English government. He saw that the unjust and impolitic measures of the Jesuitical cabal were far more likely to make the penal laws perpetual than to bring about an abolition of the test. His quarrel with the court of Versailles was every day becoming more and more serious; nor could he, either in his character of temporal prince or in his character of sovereign pontiff, feel cordial friendship for a vassal of that court. Castlemaine was ill qualified to remove these disgusts. He was indeed well acquainted with Rome, and was, for a layman, deeply read in theological controversy.* But he had none of the address which his post required; and, even had he been a diplomatist of the greatest ability, there was a circumstance which would have disqualified him for the particular mission on which he had been sent. He was known all over Europe as the husband of the most shameless of women; and he was known in no other way. It was impossible to speak to him or of him without remembering in what manner the very title by which he was called had been acquired. This circumstance would have mattered little if he had been accredited to some dissolute court, such as that in which the Duchess of Montespan had lately been dominant. But there was an obvious impropriety in sending him on an embassy rather of a spiritual than of a secular nature to a pontiff of primitive austerity. The Protestants all over Europe sneered; and Innocent, already unfavorably disposed to the English government, considered the compliment which had been paid him, at so much risk and at so heavy a cost, as little better than an affront. The salary of the ambassador was fixed at a hundred pounds a week. Castlemaine complained that this was too little. Thrice the sum, he said, would hardly suffice. For at Rome the ministers of all the great continental powers exerted themselves to surpass one another in splendor, under the eyes of a people whom the habit of seeing magnificent buildings, decorations, and ceremonies had made fastidious. He always declared that he had been a loser by his mission. He was accompanied by several young gentlemen of the best Roman. Catholic families in England, Ratcliffes, Arundells and Tich * Adda, Nov. 19, 1685. bournes. At Rome he was lodged in the palace of the nouse of Pamfili, on the south of the stately place of Navona. He was early admitted to a private interview with the sovereign pontiff; but the public audience was long delayed. Indeed, Castlemaine's preparations for that great occasion were so sumptuous that, though commenced at Easter, 1686, they were not complete till the following November; and in November the Pope had, or pretended to have, an attack of gout, which caused another postponement. In January, 1687, at length, the solemn introduction and homage were performed with unusual pomp. The state coaches, which had been built at Rome for the pageant, were so superb, that they were thought worthy to be transmitted to posterity in fine engravings, and to be celebrated by poets in several languages.* The front of the ambassador's palace was decorated on this great day with absurd allegorical paintings of gigantic size. There was Saint George with his foot on the neck of Titus Oates, and Hercules with his club crushing College, the Protestant joiner, who in vain attempted to defend himself with his flail. After this public appearance, Castlemaine invited all the persons of note then assembled at Rome to a banquet in that gay and splendid gallery which is adorned with paintings of subjects from the Æneid by Peter of Cortona. The whole city crowded to the show; and it was with difficulty that a company of Swiss guards could keep order among the spectators. The nobles of the pontifical state, in return, gave costly entertainments to the ambassador; and poets and wits were employed to lavish on him and on his master insipid and hyperbolical adulation, such as flourishes most when genius and taste are in the deepest decay. Foremost among the flatterers was a * The Professor of Greek in the College De Propaganda Fide expressed his admiration in some detestable hexameters and pentameters, of which the following specimen may suffice: Ρωγερίου δὴ σκεψόμενος λαμπροῖο θρίαμβον, ὦκα μάλ' ήισσεν καὶ θέεν ὄχλος ἅπας· θαυμάζουσα δὲ τὴν πομπὴν, παγχρύσεα τ' αὐτοῦ The Latin verses are a little better. Nahum Tate responded English: "His glorious train and passing pomp to view, crowned head. Thirty years had elapsed since Christina, the daughter of the great Gustavus, had voluntarily descended from the Swedish throne. After long wanderings, in the course of which she had committed many follies and crimes, she had finally taken up her abode at Rome, where she busied herself with astrological calculations and with the intrigues of the conclave, and amused herself with pictures, gems, manuscripts, and medals. She now composed some Italian stanzas in honor of the English prince who, sprung, like herself, from a race of kings heretofore regarded as the champions of the Reformation, had, like herself, been reconciled to the ancient Church. A splendid assembly met in her palace. Her verses, set to music, were sung with universal applause; and one of her literary dependants pronounced an oration on the same subject in a style so florid that it seems to have offended the taste of the English hearers. The Jesuits, hostile to the Pope, devoted to the interests of France, and disposed to pay every honor to James, received the English embassy with the utmost pomp in that princely house where the remains of Ignatius Loyola lie enshrined in lazulite and gold. Sculpture, painting, poetry, and eloquence were employed to compliment the strangers; but all these arts had sunk into deep degeneracy. There was a great display of turgid and impure Latinity unworthy of so erudite an order; and some of the inscriptions which adorned the walls had a fault more serious than even a bad style. It was said in one place that James had sent his brother as his messenger to heaven, and in another that James had furnished the wings with which his brother had soared to a higher region. There was a still more unfortunate distich, which at the time attracted little notice, but which, a few months later, was remembered and malignantly interpreted "O king," said the poet, cease to sigh for a son. Though nature may refuse your wish, the stars will find a way to grant it." 66 In the midst of these festivities, Castlemaine had to suffer cruel mortifications and humiliations. The Pope treated him with extreme coldness and reserve. As often as the ambassador pressed for an answer to the request which he had been instructed to make in favor of Petre, Innocent was taken with a violent fit of coughing, which put an end to the conversation. The fame of these singular audiences spread over Rome. Pasquin was not silent. All the curious and tattling population of the idlest of cities, the Jesuits and the prelates of the French faction only excepted, laughed at Castlemaine's discomfiture. His temper, naturally unamiable, was soon exasperated to violence; and he circulated a memorial reflecting on the Pope He had now put himself in the wrong. The sagacious Italian had got the advantage, and took care to keep it. He positively declared that the rule which excluded Jesuits from ecclesiastical preferment should not be relaxed in favor of Father Petre. Castlemaine, much provoked, threatened to leave Rome. Innocent replied, with a meek impertinence, which was the more provoking because it could scarcely be distinguished from simplicity, that his excellency might go if he liked. "But if we must lose him," added the venerable pontiff, "I hope that he will take care of his health on the road. English people do not know how dangerous it is in this country to travel in the heat of the day. The best way is to start before dawn, and to take some rest at noon." With this salutary advice and with a string of beads, the unfortunate ambassador was dismissed. In a few months appeared, both in the Italian and in the English tongue, a pompous history of the mission, magnificently printed in folio, and illustrated with plates. The frontispiece, to the great scandal of all Protestants, represented Castlemaine in the robes of a peer, with his coronet in his hand, kissing the toe of Innocent.* *Correspondence of James and Innocent, in the British Museum ; Burnet, i. 703-705; Welwood's Memoirs; Commons' Journals, Oct. 28, 1689; An Account of his Excellence Roger Earl of Castelmaine's Embassy, by Michael Wright, chief steward of his Excellency's house at Rome, 1688. 18* |