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* Danby’s Memoirs, p. 7.

** Danby’s Memoirs, p. 65.

*** Journ. 1st of March, 1689.

**** Journ. 20th of March, 1689.

v    D’Estrades, 20th of October. 1666.

Charles in the beginning of his reign had in pay near five thousand men, of guards and garrisons. At the end of his reign, he augmented this number to near eight thousand. James, on Monmouth’s rebellion, had on foot about fifteen thousand men; and when the prince of Orange invaded him, there were no fewer than thirty thousand regular troops in England.

The English navy, during the greater part of Charles’s reign, made a considerable figure, for number of ships, valor of the men, and conduct of the commanders. Even in 1678, the fleet consisted of eighty-three ships;[*] besides thirty which were at that time on the stocks. On the king’s restoration, he found only sixty-three vessels of all sizes.[**] During the latter part of Charles’s reign, the navy fell somewhat to decay, by reason of the narrowness of the king’s revenue: but James, soon after his accession, restored it to its former power and glory; and before he left the throne, carried it much further. The administration of the admiralty under Pepys, is still regarded as a model for order and economy. The fleet at the revolution consisted of one hundred and seventy-three vessels of all sizes, and required forty-two thousand seamen to man it.[***] That king, when duke of York, had been the first inventor of sea signals. The military genius during these two reigns had not totally decayed among the young nobility. Dorset, Mulgrave, Rochester, not to mention Ossory, served on board the fleet, and were present in the most furious engagements against the Dutch.

The commerce and riches of England did never, during any period, increase so fast as from the restoration to the revolution. The two Dutch wars, by disturbing the trade of that republic, promoted the navigation of this island; and after Charles had made a separate peace with the states, his subjects enjoyed unmolested the trade of Europe. The only disturbance which they met with, was from a few French privateers, who infested the channel; and Charles interposed not in behalf of his subjects with sufficient spirit and vigor.

* Pepys’s Memoirs, p. 4.

** Memoirs of English Affairs, chiefly naval.

*** Lives of the Admirals, vol. ii. p. 476.

The recovery or conquest of New York and the Jerseys was a considerable accession to the strength and security of the English colonies; and, together with the settlement of Pennsylvania and Carolina which was effected during that reign, extended the English empire in America. The persecutions of the dissenters, or, more properly speaking, the restraints imposed upon them contributed to augment and people these colonies. Dr. Davenant affirms,[*] that the shipping of England more than doubled during these twenty-eight years. Several new manufactures were established; in iron brass, silk, hats, glass, paper, etc. One Brewer, leaving the Low Countries when they were threatened with a French conquest, brought the art of dying woollen cloth into England, and by that improvement saved the nation great sums of money. The increase of coinage during these two reigns was ten millions two hundred and sixty-one thousand pounds. A board of trade was erected in 1670; and the earl of Sandwich was made president. Charles revived and supported the charter of the East India Company; a measure whose utility is by some thought doubtful: he granted a charter to the Hudson’s Bay Company; a measure probably hurtful.

We learn from Sir Josiah Child,[**] that in 1688 there were on the Change more men worth ten thousand pounds than there were in 1650 worth a thousand; that five hundred pounds with a daughter was, in the latter period, deemed a larger portion than two thousand in the former; that gentlewomen, in those earlier times, thought themselves well clothed in a serge gown, which a chambermaid would, in 1688, be ashamed to be seen in; and that, besides the great increase of rich clothes, plate, jewels, and household furniture, coaches were in that time augmented a hundred fold.

* Discourse on the Public Revenues, part ii. p. 29, 33, 36.

** Brief Observations, etc.

The duke of Buckingham introduced from Venice the manufacture of glass and crystal into England. Prince Rupert was also an encourager of useful arts and manufactures: he himself was the inventor of etching.

The first law for erecting turnpikes was passed in 1662: the places of the turnpikes were Wadesmill, Caxton, and Stilton: but the general and great improvement of highways took not place till the reign of George II.

In 1663 was passed the first law for allowing the exportation of foreign coin and bullion.

In 1667 was concluded the first American treaty between England and Spain: this treaty was made more general and complete in 1670. The two states then renounced all right of trading with each other’s colonies; and the title of England was acknowledged to all the territories in America of which she was then possessed.

The French king, about the beginning of Charles’s reign, laid some impositions on English commodities: and the English, partly displeased with this innovation, partly moved by their animosity against France, retaliated, by laying such restraints on the commerce with that kingdom as amounted almost to a prohibition. They formed calculations, by which they persuaded themselves that they were losers a million and a half or near two millions a year by the French trade. But no good effects were found to result from these restraints, and in King James’s reign they were taken off by parliament.

Lord Clarendon tells us, that, in 1665, when money, in consequence of a treaty, was to be remitted to the bishop of Munster, it was found, that the whole trade of England could not supply above a thousand pounds a month to Frankfort and Cologne, nor above twenty thousand pounds a month to Hamburgh: these sums appear surprisingly small.[*]

* Life of Clarendon, p. 237.

At the same time that the boroughs of England were deprived of their privileges, a like attempt was made on the colonies. King James recalled the charters, by which their liberties were secured; and he sent over governors invested with absolute power. The arbitrary principles of that monarch appear in every part of his administration.

The people, during these two reigns, were in a great measure cured of that wild fanaticism by which they had formerly been so much agitated. Whatever new vices they might acquire, it may be questioned, whether by this change they were, in the main, much losers in point of morals. By the example of Charles II. and the cavaliers, licentiousness and debauchery became prevalent in the nation. The pleasures of the table were much pursued. Love was treated more as an appetite than a passion. The one sex began to abate of the national character of chastity, without being able to inspire the other with sentiment or delicacy.

The abuses in the former age, arising from overstrained pretensions to piety, had much propagated the spirit of irreligion; and many of the ingenious men of this period lie under the imputation of Deism. Besides wits and scholars by profession, Saftesbury, Halifax, Buckingham, Mulgrave, Sunderland Essex, Rochester, Sidney, Temple, are supposed to have adopted these principles.

The same factions which formerly distracted the nation were revived, and exerted themselves in the most ungenerous and unmanly enterprises against each other. King Charles, being in his whole deportment a model of easy and gentleman-like behavior, improved the politeness of the nation; as much as faction, which of all things is most destructive to that virtue, could possibly permit. His courtiers were long distinguishable in England by their obliging and agreeable manners.