not feel his disgrace. Clarendon, attached as he was to
monarchy, and to the house of Stuart, could not join him in his base
intrigues; and therefore lost, as was to be expected, the royal favor.
He had been the companion and counsellor of Charles in the days of his
exile; he had attempted to enkindle in his mind the desire of great
deeds and virtues; he had faithfully served him as chancellor and
prime minister; he was impartial and incorruptible; he was as much
attached to Episcopacy, as he was to monarchy; he had even advised
Charles to rule without a parliament; and yet he was disgraced because
he would not comply with all the wishes of his unscrupulous master.
But Clarendon was, nevertheless, unpopular with the nation. He had
advised Charles to sell Dunkirk, the proudest trophy of the
Revolution, and had built for himself a splendid palace, on the site
of the present Clarendon Hotel, in Albemarle Street, which the people
called _Dunkirk House_. He was proud, ostentatious, and dictatorial,
and was bitterly hostile to all democratic influences. He was too good
for one party, and not good enough for the other, and therefore fell
to the ground; but he retired, if not with dignity, at least with
safety. He retreated to the Continent, and there wrote his celebrated
history of the Great Rebellion, a partial and bitter history, yet a
valuable record of the great events of the age of revolution which he
had witnessed and detested.

Charles received the bribe of two hundred thousand pounds from the
French king, with the hope of being made independent of his
parliament, and with the condition of assisting Louis XIV. in his
aggressive wars on the liberties of Europe, especially those of
Holland. He was, at heart an absolutist, and rejoiced in the victories
of the "Grand Monarch." But this supply was scarcely sufficient even
for his pleasures, much less to support the ordinary pomp of a
monarchy, and the civil and military powers of the state. So he had to
resort to other means.

[Sidenote: Venality and Sycophancy of Parliament.]

It happened, fortunately for his encroachments, but unfortunately for
the nation, that the English parliament, at that period, was more
corrupt, venal, base, and sycophantic than at any period under the
Tudor kings, or at any subsequent period under the Hanoverian princes.
The House of Commons made no indignant resistance; it sent up but few
spirited remonstrances; but tamely acquiesced in the mea