excepting in one brief moment of excitement, and thus to obtain at least some consideration for their just demands. On the other hand he had no real sympathy with the ruling classes. Fitful and uncertain in action, he strove, with long intervals of inertness, to maintain or acquire authority over them without regard for the conditions on which alone authority can be wielded.

The revolution of 1399, which hurled Richard from the throne, was, in its external circumstances, the counterpart of the revolution of 1688. Both diminished the powers of the crown; in both the leadership fell into the hands of the aristocracy. But whilst the revolution of 1688 was one step forward in the direction in which the nation was ultimately to move, the revolution of 1399 was a step backward in arrest of motion. Its main advantage was that by postponing the consideration of the relation between the labouring and the propertied classes to a time when the question could be faced without fear of violence and bloodshed, and by improving the working of constitutional government, it provided for the consideration of such matters in the way of reasoning and argument, and thus indirectly benefited even those who were, for the present, entirely excluded from the deliberations of parliament.

СНАР.
V.

§ 16. The

Revolution

of 1399.

17. Gracipation of

dual Eman

The fifteenth century witnessed, if not the entire extinction of serfage, at least its limitation within very narrow bounds. Economical laws proved too strong for the Seris. the governing classes, and they found their account rather in dealing with the labourer as a free man to be bargained with, than in treating him as a serf to be compelled to work against his will for nothing. A hundred years after the revolution of 1399 there were still serfs in England. But their existence was the exception and not the rule. Lollardism, too, ran much the same course. As soon as it ceased to be fostered by the indignation of the

H

СНАР.

V.

$18. The Decay of the Baron

age.

labouring class against its oppressors, it dwindled away. Some traces of it, indeed, are long to be found. Much dissatisfaction with the lives and teaching of the clergy lingered on till the dawn of the Reformation. The sharp statute which authorised the burning of heretics in the reign of Henry IV. found its martyrs for a time, and then fell asleep for lack of material, till a new attack upon the clergy appeared to awaken it afresh.

Whilst a new class was thus rising up to share in the the privileges of freemen, the victors of 1399 were reaping the natural consequences of their success. The revolution of selfish conservatism was followed by a scramble for power. Only with the greatest difficulty did Henry IV. succeed in holding his own against the great feudal houses. His son, Henry V., turned their energies and their love of plunder upon foreign soil. More unprincipled war there never was. It had not even the excuse which the war of Edward III. had, of the necessity of giving protection to the English trade with Flanders. When, after Henry's death, the English conquerors were driven step by step out of the territory which they had held for a time, they found themselves in much the same position as that in which their ancestors had been a century before. Cooped up within the limits of their island, they sighed for fresh fields to plunder, and those of their own countrymen were alone accessible. To restrain men in such a temper would have been difficult even for a strong king. Unhappily, the king on the throne was always weak in mind, and was often absolutely insane. The name of Henry VI. became a weapon in the armoury of men whose only object was to enrich themselves under legal forms. Men who were great and powerful already saw their opportunity of becoming more great and powerful still. Great landowners, who had crowds of armed retainers in their service, bribed and bullied juries till

the administration of the law became a farce, and on the rare occasions when this course failed, they knew how to vindicate their claims by maiming or assassinating their opponents, or by laying siege to houses, the possession. of which they coveted. A desire for a strong government to put an end to the anarchy arose, not merely in the breast of the peasant and the labourer, but amongst stout country-gentlemen who wished to keep the lands which had descended to them from their ancestors, and amongst tradesmen who wished to enjoy in peace the profits of their industry. When, therefore, the baronage, torn by its intestine divisions, broke out into civil war, the wishes of all those who had no interest in the perpetuation of confusion gradually turned to the Yorkist party as affording a hope of better things. Edward IV. had his faults, but at least he was not an idiot or a madHe was anxious to take advantage of the general desire for order and government to strengthen his own. position, and the diminution of the great houses by death upon the field and on the scaffold rendered his task easier than it would have been for anyone a few years before. Only after the overthrow of Richard III. and the assumption of the crown by Henry VII. did the greatness of the change which had taken place fully appear. The nation needed peace, but that it might have it permanently it needed a firm government. It is delusive to trace the exceeding strength of the Tudor monarchy merely to the disappearance of the great houses. Undoubtedly the Tudor monarchy would never have established itself if the great houses had remained standing. But they fell, not by the accident of civil warfare, but because they deserved to fall; because they had been turbulent, aggressive, and tyrannical; because they had misused the strength of their position to oppress their inferiors in social rank with forms of law and without forms of law. The monarchy in

CHAP.

V.

$19.

the Rise of the Tudor Monarchy.

Causes of

CHAP.
V.

the hands of Henry VII. stepped into their place because
it was able to realise the promise of the older monarchy,
to dispense justice without fear or favour, to check the
ascendancy of the rich over the poor, of the strong over
the weak. History knows no violent breaches of con-
tinuity, no new monarchy established on the ruins of the
old. The kingship of Henry VII. was but the kingship
of Henry II. and Edward I. adapted to the needs of a
different generation. But the very fact that it was so
adapted modified its character profoundly. The dread
of a return of the anarchy which had prevailed under
the forms of constitutional order made men think lightly
of the worth of constitutional order itself. The king as
the active and executive factor of the constitution was
magnified beyond measure. Parliament which had made
itself to a great extent the
was for a time discredited.
wards, kings found that they could venture upon actions
which their predecessors had not dared to commit.
Illegal levies of money, illegal imprisonments, were
winked at from fear lest the rule of the great houses should
return. Nor was this change confined to England alone.
In all the great states of the continent the path to
equality before the law lay through absolutism. England
reaped the benefit of her earlier progress in the restric-
tions upon absolutism which, in form at least, she retained
at the time when her monarchy approached the nearest
to absolutism. But even she could not escape from the
operation of the political law which prevailed elsewhere.

instrument of the nobility From Edward IV. down

CHAPTER VI.

THE TUDOR MONARCHY.

THE reign of Henry VII. gave to the English middle classes what they most needed, the protection of a firm government. By strict execution of the statute of liveries of Edward IV., the great noblemen were prohibited from giving to their followers the outward symbol of a military force, and Henry was strong enough in the general support to take care that armies were not levied at all excepting in his own name. As far as legislation was concerned, parliaments became mere instruments in his hands. The House of Lords had been thinned away by the recent massacres and executions, and the House of Commons was filled with men who had neither the power nor the will to be other than his humble servants. Men might grumble at his exorbitant taxation, but the bare idea of seeing feudal anarchy again raising its head was too terrible to be thought of, and much could be endured by those who knew what a dire calamity a successful insurrection would bring forth. Those who were ready to endure much themselves, would not be very careful of the sufferings of others, and the lesson was soon learnt by the king that, in spite of all restraints of the law, the lives and properties of the higher classes were at his mercy. Juries would be ready to convict those whom he saw fit to bring to trial. Parliaments would be prepared to condone arbitrary aggressions upon