MOVEMENT FOR SELF-GOVERNMENT IN IRELAND 487 manders were mediocre men; only two showed real merit : George Eliott, a Scotchman who commanded at Eliott and Gibraltar, and Admiral Rodney, who was reluc- Rodney. tantly given command in the navy. The year 1780 was a dark year in England; but it was still darker in America, where patriotism was growing weary of the interminable Reverses of war. This was the year of Gates' defeat at Camden the year 1780 and of the treason of Arnold. The next year brought the surrender of Yorktown and the end of the American phase of the war; but in Europe the conflict raged as before. Soon after the fall of Yorktown, the Spaniards took Minorca, while a French fleet in the West Indies seized all the British islands there except Jamaica and Barbados. In India, too, there were troubles Hyder Ali, an able native warrior, was attacking the British posts in southern India from the interior, while a French fleet was threatening the coast. When 1781 closed, it looked as if the British Empire was doomed. Agitation in 453. The Movement for Self-government in Ireland.2 At the same time, serious danger threatened in Ireland. For some time there had been much agitation in Ireland for the repeal of all laws that made Ireland dependent on England. In 1778, when France declared war Ireland. against England, the Protestants of the Irish parliament found it advisable to repeal the Irish Test Act and some of the more iniquitous of the Penal Laws.3 Later in the same year, the Irish leaders began to organize military bands, "the volunteers," ostensibly for the defense of the island. Before the close of the next year the volunteers numbered nearly 50,000; The "Volunteers." by the close of 1781 the number had risen to 80,000. During the same years, a strong party in the Irish parliament, led by the eloquent Henry Grattan, clamored for legislative independence. England dared not refuse; and in May, 1782, the English parliament passed the Act of Repeal by which Poynings' Law and the Sixth of George I, an act affirming 4 1 Gardiner, 792-793. 2 Ibid., 795-796. 3 Review sec. 403. 4 Review sec. 226. the right of the English parliament to legislate in Irish affairs, were both repealed. Ireland was now free to legislate without interference from Westminster. Saints. 1782. 454. English Victories. The Battle of "The Saints." The Act of Repeal was passed in the gloomiest hour of the war. Not Battle of The long afterwards came the cheering news that Rodney had dealt the allied enemies a stunning blow in the West Indies. De Grasse, the French admiral whose fleet had assisted at the investment of Yorktown, was now planning to seize Jamaica. But Rodney's fleet was in the West Indies, and in April the two forces met at "The Saints" a group of little islands near Guadaloupe. Rodney won the victory; he crippled the French fleet and took De Grasse prisoner. Jamaica was saved to Britain. In the autumn the English were still more cheered to learn that the attack of the allies on Gibraltar had been a complete failure. During the same year Hastings in (1782), Warren Hastings, the governor general of India. India, succeeded in pacifying the interior tribes that were on the war-path. Hyder Ali died and his successor made peace with the English. 455. Results of the American War. The American War was formally closed by the treaties of Paris and Versailles in SeptemPeace of ber, 1783. The English successes of the year before Paris. 1783. and the disposition of the Americans to make a separate peace convinced the Bourbon allies that it was not expedient to continue the war. The results of the American Revolution were far-reaching both for Europe and for America. 1. It ruined the party of "King's Friends" and discredited the political purposes of George III. During the first ten years * of his reign the king had tried six prime ministers. George III's political plans In 1770 he finally found the tool he sought for in discredited. Lord North whom he kept in nominal control for twelve years. George III now had an opportunity to try out his political plans. The result was the most disastrous war that England had ever fought. 2. It practically ruined the Whig party. Lord North re RESULTS OF THE AMERICAN WAR 489 ruined. signed in 1782, and the king had no choice but to recall the opposition Whigs to power with Lord Rockingham as Whig party prime minister. But the Whigs did not have the entire confidence of the nation. Their attitude during the war had not been wholly patriotic: they had tried to embarrass the government in every possible manner; one of their leaders, Charles James Fox, the son of Henry Fox who had served under Newcastle, even sat in the house of commons wearing the colors of the American uniform, buff and blue. There were two fac 1 tions in the party, the followers of Rockingham, now known as the Old Whigs who still emphasized the authority of parliament, and the New Whigs, or Chathamites, who believed in strengthening the authority of the central government. The Whigs were very unfortunate in their leaders. Chatham died in 1778 and the leadership of his faction fell to Lord Shelburne, a capable but peculiar politician, who seemed to be suspicious of all with whom he came in contact and in return Whig factions was regarded with universal distrust. Rocking- and leaders. ham had not grown wiser with the years; and soon after he became prime minister for the second time he died (1782). Shelburne who succeeded him could not hold his party together. Edmund Burke was a great orator and thinker, but not a practical statesman. The most brilliant of all the Whigs was Charles James Fox, who had entered the house of commons at the age of nineteen, but had already acquired a reputation for irregular living that clung to him to the close of his career. Fox was hostile to Shelburne and formed an alliance with his old political enemy, Lord North, to overthrow Shelburne and force themselves into the ministry as secretaries of state. The move succeeded and for nearly a year the "in- "Infamous famous coalition" controlled the government. But the nation was disgusted at the sight of a ministry that stood for nothing but spoils, and applauded George when by distinctly unconstitutional methods he overthrew the Fox-North cabinet and gave the premiership to the younger William Pitt. 1 Gardiner, 787. The Coalition." 3. It restored almost complete independence to the Irish Kingdom. The Act of Repeal was followed by the Act of Renunciation in 1783, by which England renounced Legislative independence all rights that she might still have to control Ireland. From that year to the close of the century, the bond uniting Ireland to Great Britain was a personal union only. for Ireland. Losses to the British Empire. 4. It seriously impaired the British Empire. England lost her oldest and her most highly developed colonies, the "thirteen" in America. To Spain she was obliged to surrender Minorca and Florida. To France she ceded two important posts in West Africa; otherwise France derived nothing from the war but a bankrupt treasury. REFERENCES GEORGE III. - Fletcher, Introductory History of England, II, i, 282-287; Green, William Pitt, 162–165; Innes, History of England, 636–637; Jenks, Parliamentary England, 178184; Oman, History of England, 532-534; Ransome, Advanced History of England, 804-806; Rosebery, Pitt, 10-14; Tout, Advanced History of Great Britain, 570–573. CAUSES OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION: GENERAL ACCOUNT. - Fletcher, II, i, 289–298; Innes, 658-661; Jenks, 230–234; Ransome, 821-823; Woodward, Expansion of the British Empire, 209-221. GRENVILLE AND THE STAMP ACT. — Green, 219-265; Harrison, Chatham, 158-168; Innes, 641-647; Jenks, 201-216; Oman, 539-542; Ransome, 811814. THE TOWNSHEND ACTS AND THE TEA TAX. - Innes, 650-652; Jenks, 218220; Tout, 577-580. THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION. - Fletcher, II, i, 300-319; Gardiner, 782794; Harrison, c. xii; Innes, 661-671; Oman, 545-553; Ransome, 823-833; Tout, 581-584; Woodward, 222–228. СНАТНАМ. - Green, c. x; Harrison, c. i. land's Story, 261-268; Lawless, Ireland, c. 1. Johnston and Spencer, Ire THE FOX-NORTH COALITION. - Innes, 683-687; Jenks, 260-274. CHAPTER XXIII THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY Changes in English society. 456. The Age of Common Sense. The eighteenth century was an age of great changes in almost every field of English life. The change in the nature of the government that came with the cabinet system has already been noted; but vast forces of change were also at work in the fields of intellect, of religion, and of industrial life. In some fields the development was gradual and slow: its full significance was not realized until the following century was well under way. But even at the time it was realized, though not always clearly, that English society was being completely transformed. Rationalism. The eighteenth century was preeminently an age of reason and common sense. The consuming religious strife that had endured for nearly two hundred years, first between Catholic and Protestant, then between Anglican and Puritan, finally ceased with the Toleration Act of 1689. This age of religious interest and conflict was followed by a long period of indifference to religious matters, which was particularly noticeable among the more cultivated classes. The details of religious belief were held to be unimportant. Revelation in the Scriptural sense was questioned. God had given mankind the gift of reason, and reason was a surer guide to truth than faith. The important thing was to test everything in the light of common sense. This emphasis on thought and reason was not peculiar to England: it was common to the intellectual classes of all western Europe; the eighteenth century was the "Age of Enlightenment.' It was the Age of Enperiod of Voltaire and the Encyclopedists in France, lightenment. of the "Illumination" in Germany, and of the "enlightened |