PART THE THIRD. LITERATURE UNDER THE FIRST TWO STUARTS AND DURING THE COMMONWEALTH. WHAT ENGLAND OWES TO THE STUARTS. WITH the name of Stuart the idea of a long tragedy is conveyed to the mind. We ask ourselves, Ought not Shakspeare to have been born in their era? No! involved in revolutionary commotions, he would not have found leisure for the development of his varied genius. Perhaps even, becoming a political man, he would have produced nothing. Facts would have consumed his life. Great Britain owes to the race of Stuart two things, inestimable for any nation :-strength and liberty. James I in bringing the Scottish 324 WHAT England owes to the stUARTS. crown to England, united the people of the island into one body, and banished foreign war from the soil. The Scotch had continental alliances; almost every time that hostilities broke out between France and England, Scotland made a powerful diversion in favour of the former. If Scotland had not been united with England in 1792, the latter could not have sustained the long war of the Revolution. As for English liberty, the Stuarts established by attacking it-Charles I. paid for it with his head, and James II. with his race. |