FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131  
132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   >>   >|  
nally hold these offices, from the moment of Cecil's death the actual direction of affairs was in the hands of the king. [Sidenote: The Council set aside.] Another constitutional check remained in the royal Council. As the influence of Parliament died down during the Wars of the Roses, that of the Council took to some extent its place. Composed as it was not only of ministers of the Crown but of the higher nobles and hereditary officers of state, it served under Tudor as under Plantagenet as an efficient check on the arbitrary will of the sovereign. Even the despotic temper of Henry VIII. had had to reckon with his Council; it had checked act after act of Mary; it played a great part in the reign of Elizabeth. In the administrative tradition indeed of the last hundred years the Council had become all-important to the Crown. It brought it in contact with public opinion, less efficiently, no doubt, but more constantly than the Parliament itself; it gave to its acts an imposing sanction and assured to them a powerful support; above all it provided a body which stood at every crisis between the nation and the monarchy, which broke the shock of any conflict, and which could stand forth as mediator, should conflict arise, without any loss of dignity on the part of the sovereign. But to the practical advantages or to the traditional weight of such a body James was utterly blind. His cleverness made him impatient of its discussions; his conceit made him impatient of its control; while the foreign traditions which he had brought with him from a foreign land saw in the great nobles who composed it nothing but a possible force which might overawe the Crown. One of his chief aims therefore had been to lessen the influence of the Council. So long as Cecil lived this was impossible, for the practical as well as the conservative temper of Cecil would have shrunk from so violent a change. But he was no sooner dead than James hastened to carry out his plans. The lords of the Council found themselves of less and less account. They were practically excluded from all part in the government; and the whole management of affairs passed into the hands of the king or of the dependent ministers who from this time became mere agents of the king's will. [Sidenote: The Favourites.] Such a personal rule as this, concentrating as it does the whole business of government in a single man, requires for its actual conduct the entire devotion of
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131  
132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
Council
 

ministers

 

brought

 
sovereign
 

nobles

 

government

 

foreign

 

affairs

 

Sidenote

 

conflict


actual

 
practical
 

temper

 
impatient
 
Parliament
 

influence

 

overawe

 

conceit

 

utterly

 

weight


traditional

 

dignity

 

advantages

 

cleverness

 

discussions

 
composed
 

traditions

 

lessen

 

control

 

sooner


agents

 

Favourites

 
dependent
 

excluded

 

management

 

passed

 

personal

 

requires

 

conduct

 

entire


devotion
 
single
 

concentrating

 

business

 

practically

 
shrunk
 

violent

 
conservative
 
impossible
 

change