46

ASCENDANCY OF THE COMMONS.

Ch. 14. theory, as they had proved by fatal experience, . incompatible with any regular system of liberty,

of the Crown.

were wholly taken away. The new monarchy was Prerogatives the creature of parliament. The rights and privileges of the monarch were defined; and all the vague, undefinable, absolute power which had been exercised by former princes was vested in the three estates of the realm, the most important power of all, without which none of the other powers could work—the right of taxation-being claimed exclusively by the third, estate. It was obvious, therefore, that if the Crown was to possess any substantial share of power under the new dispensation, it was to be acquired only by influence in the House of Commons. Nor was this a desperate chance. Circumscribed in authority, and impaired in prerogative, the King still retained one privilege intact, and this was the most valuable of all. He was still the fountain of honour, and still had the distribution of offices and rewards. All the considerable preferments, and a large proportion of the lower stations in the Church; all the lucrative and dignified offices of the magistracy; every political employment from the Lord High Treasurer to a tide-waiter were absolutely at his disposal.

Parliamentary

corruption introduced by Walpole.

This potent engine of patronage, increasing yearly in strength, was brought to bear upon the House of Commons, and soon promised to recover back to the Crown all and more than all that it had lost. The process, though a simple one, was not for

PARLIAMENTARY CORRUPTION.

some time reduced to the regular system which it
afterwards became. Sir Robert Walpole was the
first minister who carried on the King's Govern-
ment by means of parliamentary corruption. He
troubled himself little about any niceties or intri-
cacies of management, but went straight to the
point. He bought the member with a place; or,
if he only wanted a vote, he bought it with money
taken from the Secret-service Fund. The Duke of
Newcastle extended and organised the system so
successfully, that by its operation alone, in the
absence of every other qualification for power, he
became, for some years, the dictator of the admi-
nistration. His plan was to buy up the small
constituencies; and, at one time he was said to
have farmed, in this manner, one-third of the
House of Commons. Government, by means of
parliamentary corruption, took its rise soon after
the Revolution, and began to decline after the
American war. It saved the Protestant succes-
sion, and it enabled George the Third, during the
first fifteen years of his reign, to rule with more
absolute power
monarch since Elizabeth;
but it brought the country to the verge of ruin.

than any

Ch. 14.

47

irreligion.

Without religion, without any sense of public Evil results of duty, the people of this age were almost equally destitute of common morality. Among the higher classes, indeed, the public outrages on decency

* Sir Robert Walpole said that he was obliged to pay members for voting according to their consciences.

48

Ch. 14.

Immorality of the people.

RESULTS OF IRRELIGION.

which had been habitually perpetrated by the Buckinghams, the Rochesters, and the Sedleys, were no longer tolerated. The callous impudence of vice, which we find displayed in the comedy of the Restoration, hardly survived the Stuarts; and the glorious gallery of Whitehall exhibited for the last time harlots toying, French boys warbling love-songs, and gamesters crowding round the faro table, on that memorable Sabbath evening1 when the merry monarch quitted for ever the vanities of a world, which he left more wicked than he found it.

It is not to be inferred, however, because vice was less openly avowed, that manners had undergone any substantial amendment. The depravity was too widely spread, and had penetrated too deep, for a speedy cure. It could only be said, that it was a favourable symptom when some regard to outward decency began to be manifested. It was something gained, when the grossest of Wycherly's and Centlivre's comedies were withdrawn from the stage, and when Mrs. Behn's and Mrs. Heywood's novels were no longer generally read. Royal mistresses still occupied a high position at court; but lord high chancellors and generalissimos no longer thought such a position a desirable preferment for their sisters and daughters. The courtiers of George the First were not expected to accompany him to the levees m of the Duchess of

LICENTIOUSNESS OF THE COURT.

49

Kendal, nor were the manners of the Countess of Ch. 14. Suffolk, like the manners of the Countess of Castlemaine, those of the most degraded of her unhappy class. It was true, that a maid of honour would sometimes make a slip; and with so little scandal, that the offspring was openly christened by the name of the heir apparent." But I doubt whether even Frederick Prince of Wales, or his household, would have thought it a morning's amusement to dissect the still-born offspring of a lady of the court. To this extent, the bad example set by the highest person in the social scale was mitigated, during the reigns of George the First and Second.

men of fash

The man of fashion of this period was a com- Effeminacy of pound of effeminacy and affectation. He painted ion. and perfumed like a woman. His toilet occupied a great proportion of his time; his dress was of the most costly materials, and the most fantastic patterns. Silks and brocades, embroidery, gold-lace and jewellery, adorned his person, both in morning and evening costume. He seldom stirred abroad on foot, except to take a turn in the Mall; and if he had to cross the street only from his lodging to a tavern, he was conveyed in a

"Miss Vane, a maid of honour, was confined in the palace, and the infant was christened Fitz-Frederick Vane; but the paternity so implied, was disputed by Lord Harrington and by Lord Hervey himself.- HERVEY's Memoirs.

• This was a freak of Charles the Second.-PEPYS's Memoirs.

50

Ch. 14.

Two classes of men of fashion.

MEN OF FASHION.

chair. Gaming was his chief employment; gallantry occupied the hours which could be spared from dress and play. He had made the grand tour, and consequently knew the world. Of books he knew little or nothing. Men of education he called 'prigs' and 'pedants.' The only literature which he cultivated was plays, novels, lampoons, or tracts in ridicule of religion.

Such were the beaux and fribbles of the time of Anne and of the Hanover succession. The reader who would know more of the manners and conversation of this class, will find their affectation and ignorance, their profligacy, insolence, and inanity, sketched, without exaggeration, in the 'Foppington' of Cibber, the Fellamar' of Fielding, and the 'Whiffle' of Smollet. But there was then, as there always is, another variety of men of fashion, superior to the light, frivolous creatures that float on the surface of society. These were the men of wit, some of whom pursued ambition as well as pleasure; and some who turned their abilities to account in supplying the deficiencies of fortune. At the head of this class may be placed the great minister, Sir Robert Walpole himself. Since the establishment of representative government in this country, no minister has ever been assailed by such a formidable combination as that which, for a series of years, vainly endeavoured to drag down the great defender of the Revolution. Discarded Whigs;