History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Death of Elizabeth

the general

the people.

for the first three quarters of the century; and CH. I. until that time the working classes of this country remained in a condition more than prosperous. They enjoyed an abundance far beyond what in general falls to the lot of that order in longsettled countries; incomparably beyond what the same class were enjoying at that very time in Germany or France. The laws secured them; and that the laws were put in force we have the direct evidence of successive acts of the legislature justifying the general policy by its success: and we have also the indirect evidence of the contented loyalty of the great body of the people Evidence of at a time when, if they had been discontented, content of they held in their own hands the means of asserting what the law acknowledged to be their right. The government had no power to compel submission to injustice, as was proved by the fate of an attempt to levy a 'benevolence' by force, in 1525. The people resisted with a determination against which the crown commissioners were unable to contend, and the scheme ended with an acknowledgment of fault by Henry, who retired with a good grace from an impossible position. If the peasantry had been suffering under any real grievances we should not have failed to have heard of them when the religious rebellions furnished so fair an opportunity to press those grieyances forward. Complaint was loud enough when complaint was just, under the Somerset protectorate.*

* When the enclosing system | tivity and provoked insurrection. was carried on with greatest ac- In expressing a sympathy with

CH. I.

Incomes

and duties they vary now.

of the higher

classes.

The incomes of the great nobles cannot be determined, for they varied probably as much as Under Henry IV. the average income of an earl was estimated at 2000l. a year.* Under Henry VIII. the great Duke of Buckingham, the wealthiest English peer, had 6oool.t And the income of the Archbishop of Canterbury was rated at the same amount. But the establishments of such men were enormous; their ordinary retinues in time of peace consisting of many hundred persons; and in war, when the duties of a nobleman called him to the field, although in theory his followers were paid by the crown, yet the grants of parliament were on so small a scale that the theory was seldom converted into fact, and a large share of the expenses was paid often out of private purses. The Duke of Norfolk, in the Scotch war of 1523, declared (not complaining of it, but merely as a reason why he

the social policy of the Tudor | which habit had petrified into
government, I have exposed my- form, when manufactures could
self to a charge of opposing the not provide work for one addi-
received and ascertained conclu- tional hand, when the first colony
sions of political economy. I was yet unthought of, and where
disclaim entirely an intention so those who were thrown out of
foolish; but I believe that the the occupation to which they had
science of political economy came been bred could find no other.
into being with the state of things The tenants evicted, the labourers
to which alone it is applicable. thrown out of employ, when the
It ought to be evident that prin- tillage lands were converted into
ciples which answer admirably pastures, had scarcely an alterna-
when a manufacturing system tive offered them except to beg,
capable of indefinite expansion to rob, or to starve.
multiplies employment at home-
when the soil of England is but
a fraction of its empire, and the
sea is a highway to emigration- the Court of Henry VIII.

would have produced far different

effects, in a condition of things

*Lansdowne MS. No. I. fol. 26.

+ GIUSTINIANI's Letters from

+ Ibid.

Spirit of

fice.

the royal

should receive support) that he had spent all his CH. 1. private means upon the army; and in the sequel of this history we shall find repeated instances of self-sacriknights and gentlemen voluntarily ruining themselves in the service of their country. The people, not universally, but generally, were animated by a true spirit of sacrifice; by a true conviction that they were bound to think first of England, and only next of themselves; and unless we can bring ourselves to understand this, we shall never understand what England was under the reigns of the Plantagenets and Tudors. The expenses Expenses of of the court under Henry VII. were a little over household. 14,000l. a year, out of which were defrayed the whole cost of the king's establishment, the expenses of entertaining foreign ambassadors, the wages and maintenance of the yeomen of the guard, the retinues of servants, and all necessary outlay not incurred for public business. Under Henry VIII., of whose extravagance we have heard so much, and whose court was the most magnificent in the world, these expenses were 19,8947. 168. 8d.,* a small sum when compared with the present cost of the royal establishment, even if we adopt the relative estimate of twelve to one, and suppose it equal to 240,000l. a year of our money. But indeed it was not equal to 240,000l.; for, although the proportion held in articles of common consumption, articles of luxury were very dear indeed.†

22 Hen. VIII. cap. 18. + Under Hen. VI. the household expenses were 23,000l. a year. Cf. Proceedings and Or

dinances of the Privy Council,
vol. vi. p. 35. The particulars
of the expenses of the household
of Hen. VIII. are in an MS. in

CH. I.

Incomes

of the coun

men.

Passing down from the king and his nobles, to the body of the people, we find that the income and duties qualifying a country gentleman to be justice of try gentle the peace was 20l. a year, and if he did his duty, his office was no sinecure. We remember Justice Shallow and his clerk Davy, with his novel theory of magisterial law; and Shallow's broad features have so English a cast about them, that we may believe there were many such, and that the duty was not always very excellently done. But the Justice Shallows were not allowed to repose upon their dignity. The justice of the peace was required not only to take cognizance of open offences, but to keep surveillance over all persons within his district, and over himself in his own turn there was a surveillance no less sharp, and penalties for neglect prompt and peremptory.† Four times a year he was to make proclamation of his duty, and exhort all persons to complain against him who had occasion.

Twenty pounds a year, and heavy duties to do for it, represented the condition of the squire of the parish. By the 2nd of the 2nd of Henry V.,

the Rolls House. They cover
the entire outlay except the per-
sonal expenditure of the king,
and the sum total amounts to
14,365l. 108. 7d. This would
leave above 5000l. a year for the
privy purse, not, perhaps, suffi-
cient to cover Henry's gambling
extravagances in his early life.
Curious particulars of his excesses
in this matter will be found in a
publication wrongly called The
Privy Purse Expenses of Henry
the Eighth. It is a diary of

general payments, as much for purposes of state as for the king himself. The high play was confined for the most part to Christmas or other times of festivity, when the statutes against unlawful games were dispensed with for all classes.

* 18 Hen. VI. cap. 11. + Hen. VII. cap. 12. During the quarter sessions time they were allowed 4s. a day. Ric. II. xii. 10.

Salaries of

clergy.

'the wages' of a parish priest were limited to CH. I. 51. 68. 8d., except in cases where there was special licence from the bishop, when they might be the parish raised as high as 61. Priests were probably something better off under Henry VIII., but the statute remained in force, and marks an approach at least to their ordinary salary.* The priest had enough, being unmarried, to supply him in

The rudeness of the furniture in English country houses has been dwelt upon with much emphasis by Hume and others. An authentic inventory of the goods and chattels in a parsonage in Kent proves that there has been much exaggeration in this matter. It is from an MS. in the Rolls House.

The Inventory of the Goods and Catales of Rich. Master, Clerk,
Parson of Aldington, being in his Parsonage on the 20th Day
of April, in the 25th Year of the Reign of our Sovereign Lord
King Henry VIII.