s death-bed, "the rather that having lived in good times I
foresee worse." In the obstinacy with which he clung to his Spanish
policy James stood indeed absolutely alone; for not only the old
nobility and the statesmen who preserved the tradition of the age of
Elizabeth, but even his own ministers, with the exception of Buckingham
and the Treasurer, Cranfield, were at one with the Commons in their
distrust of Spain. But James persisted in his plans. By the levy of a
fresh benevolence he was able to keep Vere's force on foot for a few
months while his diplomacy was at work in Germany and at Madrid. The
Palatinate indeed was lost in spite of his despatches; but he still
trusted to bring about its restitution to the Elector through his
influence with Spain. It was to secure this influence that he pressed
for a closer union with the great Catholic power. What really bound him
to such a foreign policy was his policy at home. If James cared for the
restoration of the Palatinate, he cared more for the system of
government he had carried out since 1610; and with that system, as he
well knew, Parliaments were incompatible. But a policy of war would at
once throw him on the support of Parliaments; and the experience of 1621
had shown him at what a price that support must be bought. From war too,
as from any policy which implied a decided course of action, the temper
of James shrank. What he clung to was a co-operation with Spain in which
the burden of enforcing peace on the German disputants should fall
exclusively on that power. Of such a co-operation the marriage of his
son Charles with the Infanta, which had so long been held out as a lure
to his vanity, was to be the sign. But the more James pressed for this
consummation of his projects, the more Spain held back. She too was
willing to co-operate with James so long as such a co-operation answered
her own purposes. Her statesmen had not favoured the war in Germany;
even now they were willing to bring it to a close by the restoration of
the Palatinate. But they would not abandon the advantages which the war
had given to Catholicism; and their plan was to restore the Palatinate
not to Frederick but to his son, and to bring up that son as a Catholic
at Vienna. Of such a simple restoration of the religious and political
balance in the Empire as James was contemplating, the statesmen of
Madrid thought no more than they thought of carrying out the scheme of a
marriage with his son. Sp