no doubt could be entertained.  But this is not to be wondered at, since, in all transactions relative to the popish plot, minds of a very different cast from Charles’s became, as by some fatality, divested of all their wonted sentiments of justice and humanity.  Who can read without horror, the account of that savage murmur of applause, which broke out upon one of the villains at the bar, swearing positively to Stafford’s having proposed the murder of the king?  And how is this horror deepened, when we reflect, that in that odious cry were probably mingled the voices of men to whose memory every lover of the English constitution is bound to pay the tribute of gratitude and respect!  Even after condemnation, Lord Russell himself, whose character is wholly (this instance excepted) free from the stain of rancour or cruelty, stickled for the severer mode of executing the sentence, in a manner which his fear of the king’s establishing a precedent of pardoning in cases of impeachment (for this, no doubt, was his motive) cannot satisfactorily excuse.

In an early period of the king’s difficulties, Sir William Temple, whose life and character is a refutation of the vulgar notion that philosophy and practical good sense in business are incompatible attainments, recommended to him the plan of governing by a council, which was to consist in great part of the most popular noblemen and gentlemen in the kingdom.  Such persons being the natural, as well as the safest, mediators between princes and discontented subjects, this seems to have been the best possible expedient.  Hume says it was found too feeble a remedy; but he does not take notice that it was never in fact tried, inasmuch as not only the king’s confidence was withheld from the most considerable members of the council, but even the most important determinations were taken without consulting the council itself.  Nor can there be a doubt but the king’s views, in adopting Temple’s advice, were totally different from those of the adviser, whose only error in this transaction seems to have consisted in recommending a plan, wherein confidence and fair dealing were of necessity to be principal ingredients, to a prince whom he well knew to be incapable of either.  Accordingly, having appointed the council in April, with a promise of being governed in important matters by their advice, he in July dissolved one parliament without their concurrence, and in October forbade them even to give their opinions upon the propriety of a resolution which he had taken of proroguing another.  From that time he probably considered the council to be, as it was, virtually dissolved; and it was not long before means presented themselves to him, better adapted, in his estimation, even to his immediate objects, and certainly more suitable to his general designs.  The union between the court and the church party, which had been so closely cemented by their successful resistance to the Exclusion Bill, and its authors, had at length acquired such a degree