186

HISTORY OP ENGLAND,

CHAP.

II.

vague suspicion that the King and .the Duke were not sincereProtestants sprang up in many quarters. Many persons toowho had been disgusted by the austerity and hypocrisy of thePharisees of the Commonwealth began to be still more dis-gusted by the open profligacy of the court and of the Cava-liers, and were disposed to doubt whether the sullen precise-ness of Praise God Barebone might not be preferable to theoutrageous profaneness and licentiousness of the Bucking-hams and Sedleys. Even immoral men, who were not utterlydestitute of sense and public spirit, complained that thegovernment treated the most serious matters as trifles, andmade trifles its serious business. A King might be pardonedfor amusing his leisure with wine, wit, and beauty. But it wasintolerable that he should sink into a mere saunterer and vo-luptuary, that the gravest affairs of state should be neglected,and that the public service should bo starved and the finan-ces deranged in order that harlots and parasites might growrich.

A large body of Royalists joined in these complaints, andadded many sharp reflections on the King’s ingratitude. Hiswhole revenue, indeed, would not have sufficed to rewardthem all in proportion to their own consciousness of desert.For to every distressed gentleman who had fought underRupert or Derby his own services seemed eminently merito-rious, and his own sufferings eminently severe. Every onehad flattered himself that, whatever became of the rest, heshould be largely recompensed for all that he had lost duringthe civil troubles, and that the restoration of the monarchywould be followed by the restoration of his own dilapidatedfortunes. None of these expectants could restrain his indig-nation, when he found that he was as poor under the King ashe had been under the Rump or the Protector. The negli-gence and extravagance of the court excited the bitter indig-nation of these loyal veterans. They justly said that one half