in _English Economic History_, Vol. II, Chap. 4.)

Bourne, H. R. F.: _English Merchants_.

Froude, J. A.: _History of England_. Many scattered passages of great
interest refer to the economic and social changes of this period, but
they are frequently exaggerated, and in some cases incorrect. Almost
the same remark applies to Professor Rogers' _Six Centuries of Work
and Wages_ and _Industrial and Commercial History of England_.

Busch, Wilhelm: _A History of England under the Tudors_. For the
economic policy of Henry VII.

CHAPTER VII

THE EXPANSION OF ENGLAND

Economic Changes Of The Seventeenth And Early Eighteenth Centuries

*49. National Affairs from 1603 to 1760.*--The last three rulers of the
Tudor family had died childless. James, king of Scotland, their
cousin, therefore inherited the throne and became the first English
king of the Stuart family. James reigned from 1603 to 1625. Many of
the political and religious problems which had been created by the
policy of the Tudor sovereigns had now to come up for solution.
Parliament had long been restive under the almost autocratic
government of Queen Elizabeth, but the danger of foreign invasion and
internal rebellion, long-established habit, Elizabeth's personal
popularity, her age, her sex, and her occasional yielding, all
combined to prevent any very outspoken opposition. Under King James
all these things were changed. Yet he had even higher ideas of his
personal rights, powers, and duties as king than any of his
predecessors. Therefore during the whole of the reign dispute and ill
feeling existed between the king, his ministers, and many of the
judges and other officials, on the one hand, and the majority of the
House of Commons and among the middle and upper classes of the
country, on the other. James would willingly have avoided calling
Parliament altogether and would have carried on the government
according to his own judgment and that of the ministers he selected,
but it was absolutely necessary to assemble it for the passing of
certain laws, and above all for the authorization of taxes to obtain
the means to carry on the government. The fall in the value of gold
and silver and the consequent rise of prices, and other economic
changes, had reduced the income of the government just at a time when
its necessary expenses were increasing, and when a spendthrift king
was making profuse additional outlays. Finances were therefore a
constant difficult