strike public attention ; and it was very suggestive,
for men could well remember how the coming
domination of the Whigs over Godolphin and the
unwilling Queen was signalised by the appoint-
^ Harley Papers^ ii. 524.
7
98 ROBERT HARLEY
ment in 1 708 of Sunderland as Secretary of State.
Thus there was a peculiar irony in his fall which
was a personal satisfaction to Harley and the
Queen. Yet the first step was conducted with the
tact which one would expect from Harley. Sunder-
land was known to be extremely obnoxious to the
Queen, while his hot temper and arrogant manner
made him little liked even by political friends. He
could be dismissed without alarming the country
and the monied men, especially the merchants of
London, and without much regret being felt by his
own party. He was succeeded by Lord Dartmouth,
a judicious and amiable nobleman, whose appoint-
ment was intended to show the Queen's moderation,
and to allay the fears of the large body of persons
who hovered in opinion between the two sharply
divided parties.
But all things tended in the same direction : the
over-reaching claims of Marlborough, the impolitic
trial of Sacheverell, the hostility of public opinion,
especially of the High Churchmen, the unpopu-
larity of the war, the personal position of Godolphin
forcing him to be importunate with the Queen.
These different political streams finally uniting,
overwhelmed the Lord Treasurer. On the 8th of
August 1 7 10 he received by letter his dismissal from
his Queen ; on the same day Harley was appointed
Chancellor of the Exchequer, and then became
Prime Minister. That political term was then
FALL OF GODOLPHIN 99
almost unknown, but it alone expresses the abso-
lutely dominating political position of Harley when
he came into office. In the country he had been
preparing the public for a change of Government,
but, as before, he had been careful to demonstrate
his unique position as a moderating politician.
*' Since I had the honour of seeing you," wrote
the ubiquitous De Foe to him on the 28th of
July 1 7 10, ** I can assure you by experience I
find the acquainting some people they are not all
to be devoured and eaten up, will have all the
effect upon them could be wished for, assuring
them that moderate counsels are at the bottom of
all these things ; that the old mad party are not
coming in ; that his Grace the Duke of Shrewsbury
and yourself are at the head of the management,
and that neither have been moved, however ill-
treated, to forsake the principles you always served ;
that toleration, succession, or union are not struck
at, and that they may be easy as to the nation s
liberties."^
These were the principles of the Revolution, in
other words, the principles of the Whig statesmen,
whom Harley had just defeated, but they were the
principles upon which Harley had acted in the past,
and by which he was determined to be guided
in the future. Yet he was taking office as the
leader of the Tories, never more hot with animosity
^ Harley Papers^ ii. 552.
100 ROBERT HARLEY
against the Nonconformists than at the moment
when they had for their new leader one who was
the son and grandson of rigid Puritans, and
himself more in sympathy with a Baptist than a
High Churchman. Harley's accession to power
was an actual check not only to the present policy
of the Whigs, but also to the unbounded ambitions
and arrogance, the constantly increasing claims of
the Whig chief, who by conmon action had obtained
the control of an obedient and united Parliamentary
party. His object had been secured by the com-
bined action of the personal will of the sovereign
and of popular feeling, aided by the most influential
Tories, by whom he was regarded as the only
leader who could bring them back to power.
" No one," wrote Bolingbroke to him soon after
the triumph of the Whigs in 1708, **is able to
do so much as you towards removing our present
evils." ^ We cannot, however, too clearly re-
member that in each of the two capital events of
Harley's political career — his defeat by the Whigs
in 1708 and his triumph in 17 10 — more powerful
than intrigue or personal ambitions was the force
of popular opinion.
1 Longleat MSS., Hist. MSS. Com., p. 193. Seealsop. 191 : "You
broke the party ; unite it again."
CHAPTER VI
PRIME MINISTER
1710-1714
Harley's Negotiations with the Whig Junto— The Posi-
tion OF Halifax — Harley forms a Tory Cabinet — Contrast
BETWEEN Harley and Bolingbroke— Introduction of Swift
TO Harley— Erasmus Lewis— Swift and Harley— The Rela-
tions OF Marlborough and Harley— The Conclusion of
Peace the Object of Harley's Policy— Guiscard's Attempt
on Harley's Life — Harley created Earl of Oxford and
APPOINTED Lord Treasurer— Negotiations with France—
Marlborough opposes Harley's Policy— The Government
defeated in the Lords on the Address— Temporary Alli-
ance of High Church Tories and Whigs— Bill against
Occasional Conformity carried— De Foe's Suggestion to
defeat it— The Political Crisis— Harley's Confidence—
The Creation of Peers— 1711 and 1832— Dismissal of Marl-
borough— Triumph OF Harley— The Restraining Orders-
Conclusion OF Peace.
HARLEY had no sooner attained to supreme
power in 1710, than, acting on those prin-
ciples of moderation which he was always endeav-
ouring to follow, he sought to induce Somers,
Cowper, Halifax, and other Whigs to take office
in his Administration. The negotiations between
Halifax and Somers on the one hand and Harley on
the other continued to the end of the year 1711,^
^ Harley Papers^ iii. 108, 115, 120.
101
102 ROBERT HARLEY
Halifax being apparently the chief mover in them.
Though tliey hadTio-rj^sult, the relations of the two
statesmen were throughout the continuance of the
new Admihistfatioh isi'ngularly cordial and confi-
dential. The position of Halifax differed from that
of the other Whig chiefs. During part of the reign
of William iii., from 1692 to 1699, he had held a
remarkable place in the State and in the House of
Commons, and as Chancellor of the Exchequer he
had achieved unexampled success. Fallen from
office, and disappointed, he had during Godolphin's
Ministry failed to obtain any high employment.
This exclusion from power undoubtedly was a
constant grievance to him, and from 17 10 to the fall
of Harley's Ministry Halifax was unquestionably
hopeful of forming some kind of coalition with
Harley, the friend of his youth and of his manhood.
Each was keenly interested in the national finances,
and both, though each differed on two cardinal
points of policy from his party, found in them a
common political bond. For both agreed in the
desire for religious toleration, and both were sin-
cerely anxious for peace between France and Eng-
land, though at one time they disagreed on its terms.
Yet each was so bound to the party to which he
belonged, that it was impossible for them openly to
coalesce ; and warm and confidential as was their
private union, Halifax ultimately became a member
of the Administration which impeached his lifelong
CHARLES MONTAGUE, EARL OF HALIFAX, K.G.
Frotn a portrait by Sir Godfrey KnelUr hi the National Portrait Gallery
NEGOTIATIONS WITH WHIGS 103
friend. The negotiations, however, with the Whig
chiefs at least showed Harley's moderation to many
who, especially in London and the larger towns, were
watching the change of Government with apprehen-
sion and anxiety, and they indicated that the new
Minister did not intend abruptly to end the policy
of the late Ministry. They thus served a useful
purpose, perhaps as much as Harley hoped or
intended, though they did not result in a political
union. The Prime Minister would willingly have
leavened a Tory Ministry if he could, and some of
the minor Whig officials retained their offices ; but
the chief places in the Government had to be filled
with Tories, and therefore between the dissolution
of one Parliament on 21st September and the
meeting of another on 25th November, the new
Administration had become wholly Tory. Henry
St. John, who had retired with Harley in 1708,
returned to office as the one of the two Secretaries
of State more particularly concerned with the
conduct of foreign affairs ; Harcourt,^ who repre-
^ Simon Harcourt, i66i(?)-i727, was the only son of Sir Philip
Harcourt of Stanton Harcourt, Oxfordshire. He was at school at
Shelton with Robert Harley, and went subsequently to Oxford, and
in 1683 was called to the Bar. In 1688, Harcourt succeeded to the
family estates, and in 1690 became member for Abingdon. He
subsequently took a leading part in the House of Commons, and
in 1707 became Attorney General, but resigned office with Harley
in 1708. He defended Sacheverell in 17 10 — at that time being
without a seat in the House of Commons. After a further short
period of office as Attorney General, he was appointed Lord Keeper
of the Great Seal in Harley's Ministry, and on 3rd September 1711
104 ROBERT HARLEY
sented not only Tory lawyers but Tory squires,
became, after an interval of office as Lord Keeper,
Lord Chancellor, and Dartmouth retained the other
Secretaryship of State. Harley himself was at
first only Chancellor of the Exchequer, but in
May of the following year he was appointed to the
supreme office of Lord Treasurer, having a week
before been created Earl of Oxford and Earl
Mortimer.
From the very beginning of his administration
its policy was wholly directed by himself and St.
John — they were as yet friends, Harley still the
"dear Master to his Harry."
It has not been altogether fortunate for Harley's
fame that he should have had a colleague so
brilliant as Bolingbroke, one so entirely his opposite
and with so striking a personality.
**The Earl of Oxford is an indefatigable man
of business, of a lively and aspiring spirit, and
manages the caballing parties with that dexterity
that he keeps in with both. It was his good
fortune to understand how to improve the in-
discreet blunders of the late Ministry to his own
purpose, by using the Queen with all duty and
respect imaginable, while they used her with
he was created a peer by the title of Baron Harcourt. In September
17 14 he was dismissed from office by George I. He died in London
on 29th July 1727. Harcourt was neither a learned lawyer nor an
eminent statesman, but he had a great reputation as a speaker.
CONTRAST WITH BOLINGBROKE 105
contempt; and while he was concerned with the
public affairs asked nothing contrary to her pleasure
and good liking, whereby he engrossed to himself
all her favour and esteem, and by his smooth tongue
and winning mien got so great an ascendant over
her that he has her approbation of all that he does,
so that he now steers the helm of state with as
great sway as ever Richelieu or Mazarin did in
France ; and to fix himself faster therein he has
introduced persons (in a manner) subservient to
him, some of low birth and small fortune, but
good parts, and others of good birth and great
fortune, but without experience and of indifferent
parts." ^
Such was the description of Harley which
Prince Eugene gave to the Court of Vienna after
his mission to England in 171 2. It may well be
compared with the better-known sketch of Boling-
broke which Swift has left us —
** I think Mr. St. John the greatest young man
I ever knew, with capacity, beauty, quickness of
apprehension, good learning, and an excellent taste ;
the best orator in the House of Commons, admir-
able conversation, good nature and good manners ;
generous, and a despiser of money, the only fault
is talking with friends in way of complaint of too
^ Harley Papers^ iii. 157.
106 ROBERT HARLEY
great a level of business which looks a little like
affectation ; and he endeavours too much to mix
the fine gentleman and man of pleasure with the
man of business."^
In his gifts as an orator and a writer, in his
versatility and his social gaiety, Bolingbroke was
the antithesis of his chief — a halting speaker, a
parliamentary archaeologist, a collector not a maker
of books, and whose letters are as involved as
Bolingbroke's are clear. In his domestic life
Harley was as irreproachable as Bolingbroke was
irregular.
As a politician, Bolingbroke, who was every inch
a cultivated aristocrat, was without principles or
scruples, full of vanity and ambition. Harley, on
the contrary, a type of the common-sense English-
man of the upper middle class, held and acted on
fixed ideas of political conduct, but was unfitted
for a party leader in a national crisis. Strangely
enough, while Bolingbroke, a pronounced free
thinker, ultimately became the head of the High
Church section, Harley, who was now chief of the
Tory party, was a friend of the Dissenters, and
was more in sympathy with the opinions of his
opponents than with those of whom he was the
leader. He was the most unassuming of men, and
for many years led a laborious public life rather
^ Journal^ 3rd November 171 1.
SWIFT AND HARLEY 107
from a love of practical work than from the
desire of personal distinction. From temperament
and from an accurate perception of the varying
feeling of the country, trained by the observation
of a constant volume of information collected by
trustworthy subordinates, he sought to steer a
course which would give him the support of the
moderate men of both parties, and of that large
mass of the people who desire peace and prosperity
without regard to party fortunes. A Whig in
principle, he was always endeavouring to moderate
the actions of the Tory High-flyers and never to
press harshly on the Nonconformists. How difficult
and indeed impossible such an ideal of political
conduct was when reduced to practice in such an
age as that in which Harley lived, his fortunes
sufficiently show. How it involved him in double
dealing is equally clear. And yet it was an object
for which there was much to be said, and which
in other times might not have been impossible of
success.
It has been told how Harley and De Foe
became acquainted ; in 1710 the friendship between
Harley and Swift began, which was ended only by
death. In that year Swift returned from Ireland
to the centre of political affairs in London. Dis-
appointed with the Whigs, he arrived in England
as the change of Government was in process of
completion, anxious to settle once for all the long
108 ROBERT HARLEY
outstanding question of the Irish first-fruits.^
Never a thorough believer in the policy of the
Whigs, it is not surprising that he turned to those
who were now in the ascendant. He was promised
an interview with Harley, and on 4th October he
was introduced to him by Erasmus Lewis. This
useful person never rendered Harley, a better service
than when he made Swift personally known to him.
It is the natural fate of many who have had an
important but unseen influence on public affairs,
and on the actions of eminent public men, to pass
into oblivion. Lewis was one of those persons
who move silently behind the scenes, influencing
events but unknown to the world. Though his
counsel had great weight with the Tory leaders, he
has been almost forgotten. His career, however,
is noteworthy and interesting. Born in 1670 in the
Vale of Towy, he obtained a scholarship at West-
minster and thence proceeded to Trinity College,
Cambridge. After living for some years in
Germany, he became — about 1700 — Secretary to
^ Swift had come over to England in 1708 empowered by the
Archbishop of Dublin on behalf of the Irish clergy, to obtain for them
a remission of the first-fruits and tenths — the first whole year's profit
of a preferment and one-tenth of the subsequent annual profits —
which were paid to the Crown. In England these payments had
been granted to the clergy by charter, confirmed by statute in 1703
(2 & 3 Anne, c. 11), and formed the fund then and since known as
Queen Anne's Bounty. Swift had several interviews with Godolphin,
the Earl of Pembroke, and other Ministers on the subject, and was at
length assured that the Queen had made the grant. But he had to
return to Ireland in 1709 much vexed at the business being still
uncompleted.
JONATHAN SWIFT
From a portrait by Charles yervas in the Xaiional Portrait Gallery
ERASMUS LEWIS 109
Lord Macclesfield, then Ambassador in Paris,
after whose recall in 1701 Lewis appears to have
fallen to the prosaic position of a schoolmaster at
Carmarthen. By some means he became known
to Harley, who, with his usual insight into character,
appointed him in May 1704 one of his secretaries.
His fortune was now assured. Hard-working,
judicious, and agreeable, he became an invaluable
assistant to Harley. After the fall of his chief, he
was given, in 1709, the place of Under-Secretary
of State, a post he continued to hold throughout
Harley s Administration. When the Whigs came
into power in 1714, Lewis' official career ended,
but Harley, with his customary kindness, appointed
him his steward, chiefly, one may think, for the
purpose of paying him a salary. For Lewis trans-
acted very little business, and lived thenceforward
an easy, agreeable life, now visiting in this house
and now in that, playing ombre with the ladies and
gossiping with the men. He had reached the
mature age of fifty-four before he married, when,
with his usual prudence, he selected a well-to-do
widow lady no younger than himself. A typical
permanent official, he was the business man of that
coterie of men of letters and statesmen with whom
Harley foregathered ; the judicious friend of Swift
and Prior, of Parnell and Pope, of Arbuthnot and
Gay, he outlived them all, not dying till the age of
eighty-three, in 1754.
110 ROBERT HARLEY
This, then, was the man who initiated the famous
friendship between Harley and Swift.
" To-day," says Swift in the Journal to Stella,
" I was brought privately to Mr. Harley, who
received me with the greatest respect and kindness
imaginable." The gift of accurate perception of
efficient subordinates was always a marked feature
in Harley 's character. *' He was seldom mistaken
in his judgment of men," says Swift himself, ''and
therefore not apt to change a good or ill opinion
by the representation of others." This quality
was never more clearly shown than by the rapid
unreserve of his immediate and close intercourse
with Swift ; his treatment of him was masterly,
indicative of his keen insight into men's characters,
for he received him with a frankness and a friend-
ship, unlike his usual reserve, thus at once winning
the permanent confidence and goodwill of a man
who was not only at the moment irritated by want
of success in his negotiations with the Whigs, but
was to the last degree sensitive and proud. Harley
possessed the rare power of attaching some men
to him by a tie of personal affection. Swift, Prior,
and Erasmus Lewis remained for years friends as
much as fellow-workers ; to retain their confidence
is sufficient evidence that there were traits in
Harley's nature more admirable than were
apparent to many of his contemporaries.
The time which followed this introduction was
SWIFT AND HARLEY 111
certainly the happiest part of Swift's Hfe ; it had its
anxieties and its cares, but he was hopeful for the
future, and his ambition was for the moment
gratified in a way to which he could a short time
before never in his most sanguine hours have
looked forward. For his influence, as he well
knew, and as every one took care to inform him,
was felt both by the public and by the Government.
No one but a Cabinet Minister was ever so near
the centre of affairs, and no one enjoyed more
keenly the excitement of political warfare, or
appreciated more the consideration which his
unique position caused him to receive. Every one,
from an ambassador to a literary hack, sought his
assistance. To a man of Swifts temperament,
the retrospect in after years of that singular time,
and of his share in memorable events, was enough
to cause a career more agreeable than that of an
Irish Dean engaged in letters and in political
controversy, to appear flat, unprofitable, and
wholly disappointing.
From the first the relations of Harley and
Swift were very cordial, marked by an agreeable
and social kindness on the part of the statesman,
by a varied enjoyment in which personal dignity
was never lost on the part of the man of letters.
Harley was always ready to listen, and to appre-
ciate Swift's views on the affairs of the nation.
**His mind," wrote Lewis in 1713, **has been
112 ROBERT HARLEY
communicated more fully to you than any one
else," while Swift on' his side stated his opinions
to the Minister with a frankness which never for
a moment interrupted the personal friendship of
the two men — *'in your public capacity," he wrote
in 1 714, **you have often angered me to the heart,
but as a private man never once."
Swift soon got to work for his new friends,
and from November 17 10 until the following
June he wrote a weekly essay in the Examiner ^
which had lately been established by Bolingbroke.
He avowed himself to be a Tory, but yet a reason-
able, honest man who hated *' mad, ridiculous
extremes." His essays were admirable advocacy;
they appealed to the common sense of his reader,
placing him on good terms with himself. He
glided over weak places with so much art, and his
strong points emerged so naturally, while every
line was illuminated by a delightful vitality, that
whether he was defending the change of Ministry,
the treatment of Marlborough, or the negotiations
with France, the person who perused his writings
insensibly found himself a stronger Tory than the
author. The famous pamphlets which followed —
The Conduct of the Allies and Remarks on the
Banner Treaty — for the same reasons were
equally effective.
Harley's accession to power necessarily brought
him again into close connection with Marlborough,
MARLBOROUGH AND HARLEY 113
but their relations were different from those of four
years before, when Marlborough was chiefly instru-
mental in bringing him into high office. Funda-
mentally they were, and had always been, in
agreement in regard to English parties. To
Marlborough, Whig and Tory were ** detested
names," to Harley they were significant of ''party
tyranny." If Marlborough and Harley could have
dispensed with party support, the one for the con-
duct of the war, the other for the retention of
office, they might have remained on terms of
political and personal friendship.
-It was long before Marlborough could be per-
suaded to take up a position hostile to Harley,
and it was only when he thought that the Lord
Treasurer and the Tories were likely to hinder his
opportunities as a soldier, that he was willing to take
actively the side of the Whigs. But by the time
that Harley was placed in office by the Queen in
1 7 lo, Marlborough's friendship had turned to dislike.
** He will continue by the army," he writes to the
Duchess in October 1710, when the new Parliament
was being elected. And he continues, *' I detest
Mr. Harley, but think I have lived long enough
in the world to be able to distinguish between
reason and faction." Years before he had written
to his wife, '' I meddle with no business but what
belongs to the army." It was vexation at the
hindrance which Harley, whom he now rightly
8
114 ROBERT HARLEY
associated with the Tory party, would be to him
as a general, that had caused his change of
opinion ; it was disappointment and weariness
at the party battles which to him seemed so
unreasonable, so unnecessary, and so childish ; it
was regret at the loss of Godolphin, who had so
strenuously aided him at home.
In many respects Harley was in exactly the
same frame of mind, but from an opposite point
of view. John Drummond, who had long been
his confidential agent in Holland, wrote to him
on the iith of November 1710 —
** All the weak arguments which I can produce
can be but of little influence if matters be other-
wise fixed and a scheme laid by which that great
man is to lose his command, and I only should
reason in the dark if I pretended to give the best
reasons I am capable of on that subject, and there-
fore as to a reconciliation I should think it nowise
impracticable if there were a real inclination to it
on both sides, and that it be the Queen's intention.
The true way to begin it is by a mutual complais-
ance, and I could wish there were no dispute who
was to begin and make the first advances. I
think a faithful, honest man who had no by-end,
and in whom both had some confidence, might by