ealm, to alter the succession, should
suffer death as a traitor: But the situation of James was widely
different from that of Elizabeth. Far inferior to her in abilities and
in popularity, regarded by the English as an alien, and excluded from
the throne by the testament of Henry the Eighth, the King of Scots was
yet the undoubted heir of William the Conqueror and of Egbert. He had,
therefore, an obvious interest in inculcating the superstitions notion
that birth confers rights anterior to law, and unalterable by law. It
was a notion, moreover, well suited to his intellect and temper. It soon
found many advocates among those who aspired to his favour, and made
rapid progress among the clergy of the Established Church.

Thus, at the very moment at which a republican spirit began to manifest
itself strongly in the Parliament and in the country, the claims of the
monarch took a monstrous form which would have disgusted the proudest
and most arbitrary of those who had preceded him on the throne.

James was always boasting of his skill in what he called kingcraft; and
yet it is hardly possible even to imagine a course more directly opposed
to all the rules of kingcraft, than that which he followed. The policy
of wise rulers has always been to disguise strong acts under popular
forms. It was thus that Augustus and Napoleon established absolute
monarchies, while the public regarded them merely as eminent citizens
invested with temporary magistracies. The policy of James was the direct
reverse of theirs. He enraged and alarmed his Parliament by constantly
telling them that they held their privileges merely during his pleasure
and that they had no more business to inquire what he might lawfully
do than what the Deity might lawfully do. Yet he quailed before them,
abandoned minister after minister to their vengeance, and suffered them
to tease him into acts directly opposed to his strongest inclinations.
Thus the indignation excited by his claims and the scorn excited by
his concessions went on growing together. By his fondness for worthless
minions, and by the sanction which he gave to their tyranny and
rapacity, he kept discontent constantly alive. His cowardice, his
childishness, his pedantry, his ungainly person, his provincial accent,
made him an object of derision. Even in his virtues and accomplishments
there was something eminently unkingly. Throughout the whole course of
his reign, all the venerable associations by which