CHARLES II—­1660-1685

467.  The Restoration of Monarchy; Accession of Charles; a New Standing Army, 1660.

The English army heard that Charles was coming, with sullen silence; the ex-members of the “Rump Parliament” (S465), with sullen dread; the rest of the nation, with a feeling of relief.  However much they had hated the despotism of the two Stuart Kings, James I and Charles I, four fifths of the people stood ready to welcome any change which promised to do away with a government maintained by bayonets.

Charles II was received at Dover with the wildest demonstrations of joy.  Bells pealed, flags waved, bonfires blazed all the way to London, and the King said, with characteristic irony, “It must have been my own fault that I did not come before, for I find no one but declares that he is glad to see me.”

The existence of the late Republic and the Protectorate (SS450, 455) was as far as possible ignored.  The House of Lords was restored (SS450, 455).  The new reign was dated, not when it actually began, but from the day of Charles I’s execution twelve years before.  The troops of the Commonwealth were speedily disbanded, but the King retained a picked guard of five thousand men, which became the nucleus of a new standing army.

468.  The King’s Character.

The sovereign who now ascended the throne was in every respect the opposite of Cromwell.  Charles II had no love of country, no sense of duty, no belief in man, no respect for woman.  Evil circumstances and evil companions had made him “a good-humored lad but hard-hearted voluptuary.”  For twelve years he had been a wanderer, and at times almost a beggar.  Now the sole aim of his life was enjoyment.  He desired to be King because he would then be able to accomplish that aim.

469.  Reaction from Puritanism.

In this purpose Charles had the sympathy of a considerable part of the people.  The Puritan faith (S378), represented by such men as Hampden (S436) and Milton (S450), was noble indeed; but unfortunately there were many in its ranks who had no like grandeur of soul, but who pushed Puritanism to its most injurious and offensive extreme.  That attempt to reduce the whole of life to a narrow system of sour self-denial had at last broken down.

Now, under the Restoration, the reaction set in, and the lower and earthly side of human nature—­none the less human because it is at the bottom and not at the top—­seemed determined to take its full revenge.  Butler ridiculed religious zeal in his poem of “Hudibras” (S457), which ever courtier had by heart.  Society was smitten with an epidemic of immorality.  Profligacy became the fashion in both speech and action, and much of the popular literature of that day will not bear the light.

470.  The Royal Favorites.

The King surrounded himself with men like himself.  This merry gang of revelers vied with each other in dissipation and in jests on each other.  Charles’s two chief favorites were the Earl of Rochester, a gifted but ribald poet, and Lord Shaftesbury, who became Lord Chancellor.  Both have left on record their estimate of their royal master.  The first wrote on the door of the King’s bedchamber: