The temper of the king was not controlled by this dismal condition of a Christian land; but, with a crimefraught conscience, the tyrant was affrighted by superstitious terrors, and the fatal predictions of a popular soothsayer. The pope invoked the alliance of France to quell by invasion and the force of arms that resistance against which the mandates and penalties of Rome had proved unavailing. Under the dread of this danger, the mean and abject spirit of John sank to its lowest and worst estate. The crown of England, that which had decked the brow of Alfred and of the Confessor and of the Conqueror, was laid at the feet of Pandulph, the papal legate, and John surrendered his kingdom to receive it back and hold it as the vassal and tributary of the pope. The infamy of John was completed and national degradation brought upon England. "The transaction," says the Roman Catholic historian, "was certainly a disgraceful act;"* and an English poet, in a higher strain of patriotic indignation, has said—

"Lo! John self-stripped of his insignia ;-crown,
Sceptre and mantle, sword and ring, laid down
At a proud Legate's feet! The spears that line
Baronial halls, the opprobrious insult feel,

And angry Ocean roars a vain appeal."†

After this came the third and last great struggle of the reign, in which the confederate barons wrested from the reluctant king the Great Charter of English rights— that sealed acknowledgment of ancient rights which is an epoch in the history of constitutional freedom. In that

*Lingard, vol. iii. p. 32.

Wordsworth's Sonnet on Papal Abuses, p. 354.

achievement, no one rendered more important services than Stephen Langton,-he whom Innocent the Third had, in fact, made the Primate of England. In the political struggle connected with the Charter, the pope was arrayed on the side of his vassal king and against the cause of English liberties; while Langton, true to his nativity as an Englishman, and to his station as the chief bishop of England, was the fearless defender of that Charter of which it has been said that-"If every subsequent law were swept away, there would still remain the bold features which distinguish a free from a despotic monarchy."

After a reign of conflict and confusion and disgrace, John dies a miserable and a suffering death; and the last words that fall upon his dying ear are the evil tidings of continued disaster. The spirit of Arthur is avenged.*

At the close of the tragedy, Shakspeare, with some disregard of chronological accuracy, brings back the nobles to their allegiance; and then, with the voice of Falconbridge the very embodiment of patriotism and loyalty— he raises the mind from the weakness and degradation of the reign to a sense of England's power and independIt is in a high strain of that national self-confi

ence.

* "In the chroniclers, we have manifold changes of fortune in the life of John, after Arthur of Brittany has fallen. In Shakspeare, Arthur is at once avenged. The heart-broken mother and her boy are not the only sufferers from double courses. The spirit of Constance is appeased by the fall of John. The Niobe of a Gothic age, who vainly thought to shield her child from so stern a destiny as that with which Apollo and Artemis pursued the daughter of Tantalus, may rest in peace." Historical Illustrations to C. Knight's Shakspeare, vol. i. p. 78. W. B. R.

dence which, though it may degenerate into national vanity or swell into intolerable national pride, is part of the power which makes a people unconquerable, it is in such a spirit that Falconbridge tells the young prince and the nobles

"This England never did,(nor never shall,)
Lie at the proud foot of a conqueror,
But when it first did help to wound itself.
Now these her princes are come home again,

Come the three corners of the world in arms,

And we shall shock them: nought shall make us rue,
If England to itself do rest but true."

Let me add that these lines were composed by Shakspeare not long after that year in which the formidable invasion by the Spanish Armada was driven back in ruin from the shores of England. The poet's heart beat high as he beheld the banners of the ships of Spain hung out as trophies from the battlements of the Cathedral of St. Paul's, when Queen Elizabeth, in the midst of a rejoicing people, went up to that metropolitan temple to give thanks to God for the safety of her realm.

LECTURE V.*

The Reign of Richard the Second.

Henry the Third and the Edwards passed over by Shakspeare-De Montfort's Rebellion-Growth of the Constitution-The CommonsExtent of parliamentary government-Our republican institutionsThe highway of nations-The Plantagenet kings-Edward the Third and the Black Prince-Chaucer-War with France-Arnold's view-Southey-From Richard the Second the "Chronicle-Plays" continuous-The fifteenth century-King John and Henry the Eighth, prologue and epilogue-Richard the Second strictly historical-Character of the king-His previous career-Popular element in France and Flanders and England-Wat Tyler's Rebellion-Its effects-Revolt of the nobles-Opening of the tragedy-Norfolk and Bolingbroke-Exile-Character of Bolingbroke-Death of John of Gaunt Moral degradation of the king-His misfortunes elevate him-Bolingbroke's return-Divine right of kings-Richard's deposition, imprisonment, and death.

AFTER King John, the next period of English history which has been illustrated by Shakspeare's historical plays is the reign of Richard the Second. The reign of King John belongs, it will be remembered, to the first years of the thirteenth century; that of Richard the Second closed the fourteenth; so that the intervening time was not a great deal less than two hundred years, an interval of great importance for the

* January 25th, 1847.

events that distinguished it and for the progress of the Constitution, but less familiar, for the single reason, I believe, that the light of Shakspeare's mind has not illuminated it for us. The reigns during that interval were few in number, for two of them were protracted to an uncommon length,-half a century in one case, and more than that in another. The reigns which Shakspeare has passed over are those of Henry the Third and the first three of the Edwards.

When, on the death of King John, his son Henry, in the tenth year of his age, was crowned King of England, the Earl of Pembroke, addressing his baronial peers, said,— "We have persecuted the father for evil demeanour, and worthily yet this young child, whom ye see before you, as he is in years tender, so he is innocent of his father's doings." The appeal was not in vain. The young Plantagenet was set on the throne, enjoying the restored allegiance of his barons; but the regal power, thus fortified by returning loyalty, was also in the bonds of the Great Charter. The child-king grew to manhood, but not to the strength of manhood. Old abuses were revived, and the high spirit of the barons awoke again to resist them-by remonstrance, by opposition, and, at length, by open war. There was De Montfort, Earl of Leicester, at the head of the insurgent nobles,-he who, with his Oxford Parliament-the "Mad Parliament," as the old historians called it-took the kingdom away from the sovereign, and gave it into the hands of Commissioners. There were the vicissitudes of civil war,-the king, at one time, a prisoner, and afterwards triumphant, and Leicester dead on the field of battle. "All the months of the year," says the witty church-historian, Thomas Fuller, "may in