ed be hazardous and would require the utmost adroitness; yet it
might perhaps be in the power of the Ambassador, without committing
himself or his government, to animate the zeal of the opposition for the
laws and liberties of England, and to let it be understood that those
laws and liberties were not regarded by his master with an unfriendly
eye. [19]

Lewis, when he dictated these instructions, did not foresee how speedily
and how completely his uneasiness would be removed by the obstinacy and
stupidity of James. On the twelfth of November the House of Commons,
resolved itself into a committee on the royal speech. The Solicitor
General Heneage Finch, was in the chair. The debate was conducted by
the chiefs of the new country party with rare tact and address. No
expression indicating disrespect to the Sovereign or sympathy for rebels
was suffered to escape. The western insurrection was always mentioned
with abhorrence. Nothing was said of the barbarities of Kirke and
Jeffreys. It was admitted that the heavy expenditure which had been
occasioned by the late troubles justified the King in asking some
further supply: but strong objections were made to the augmentation of
the army and to the infraction of the Test Act.

The subject of the Test Act the courtiers appear to have carefully
avoided. They harangued, however, with some force on the great
superiority of a regular army to a militia. One of them tauntingly
asked whether the defence of the kingdom was to be entrusted to
the beefeaters. Another said that he should be glad to know how the
Devonshire trainbands, who had fled in confusion before Monmouth's
scythemen, would have faced the household troops of Lewis. But these
arguments had little effect on Cavaliers who still remembered with
bitterness the stern rule of the Protector. The general feeling was
forcibly expressed by the first of the Tory country gentlemen of
England, Edward Seymour. He admitted that the militia was not in a
satisfactory state, but maintained that it might be remodelled. The
remodelling might require money; but, for his own part, he would rather
give a million to keep up a force from which he had nothing to fear,
than half a million to keep up a force of which he must ever be afraid.
Let the trainbands be disciplined; let the navy be strengthened; and the
country would be secure. A standing army was at best a mere drain on the
public resources. The soldier was withdrawn from all useful labour