st between ambition that scorns danger on the one
side, and caution that supports itself by the forms of law on the
other, such as even in England has hardly ever been so sharply drawn.
The King could not possibly get any good by his conduct. The position
of England in the world depended upon the resistance that she offered
to the preponderance of Spain in both the Indies and in Europe. The
King detached himself from one of the chief interests of the nation
when he allowed a felon's death to be inflicted on the man of lofty
genius, who had undertaken, by an ill-advised attempt it is true, to
give effect in America to this feeling of world-wide opposition. James
thought that his welfare lay in maintaining the peace with Spain. But
we know that at an earlier date he had entered on a course adverse to
Spain, and that even now he had not entirely renounced it. What
confusion must eventually follow from this divided policy!

NOTES:

[381] Ant. Foscarini, Relatione 1618: 'Il re ritiene questa sorte di
vita nella quale fu habituato, e spende tutto il tempo che puo nella
caccia e ne studj.'

[382] 'Crums fallen from King James' Table, or his Table Talk.' MS. in
the British Museum.

[383] Wilson, James I, 289: 'He had pure notions in conception, but
could bring few of them into action, though they tended to his own
preservation.' Wilson, Weldon, and the notices in Balfour, are
certainly all of them deeply tinged with party feeling. The elder
Disraeli is quite right in rejecting them: but his own conception is
very unsatisfactory. Gardiner (1863) avoids unauthenticated
statements; but the views of James' character which have grown up and
established themselves owing to the commonplace repetition of such
statements, control his representation of it.

[384] Foscarini: 'A due sorti di persone dona particolarmente, a
grandi et a quelli che gli assistono che sono quasi tutti Scocesi, e
non vaca cosa alcuna della quale possino cavar utile, che non la
demandino e nello stesso momento obtengono.'

[385] Harrington: Nugae Antiquae i.

[386] Niccolo Molino, Relatione 1607: 'A abandonato e messo dietro le
spalle tutti gli affari li quali lascia al suo consiglio ed a suoi
ministri, onde si puo dire con verita ch'egli sia principe di nome e
Piu tosto d'apparenza che d'effetto.'

[387] A. Foscarini 1618: 'In campagna gli viene di giorno in giorno
dal consiglio che risiede per ordinario in Londra dato conto di quanto
passa et inviati