The far greater share of all those expenses fell on the barons; for they were the persons most able to make them, & their dignity appeared to challenge whatever might distinguish them from other men. This plunged them on a sudden in to so great debts, that in the event that they did not sell, or otherwise alienate their lands, they found themselves at least obliged to turn the military service their vassals owed them in to money; partly by way of rent, & partly by way of lease, or fine, for payment of their creditors. & by this means the vassal having his lands no longer at so simple a rate as before, could no more be obliged to military service, & so became a tenant. Thus the armies, which in earlier times had been always composed of such men as these, ceased of work, & the sword fell out of the hands of the barons. But there being always a necessity to provide for the defence of every country, princes were afterwards allowed to raise armies of volunteers & mercenaries. & great sums got by diets & parliaments for their maintenance, to be levied on the people grown rich by trade, & dispirited for need of military exercise. Such forces were at first only raised for present exigencies, & continued no longer on foot than the occasions lasted. But princes soon found pretences to make them perpetual, the chief of which was the garrisoning frontier towns & fortresses; the methods of war being altered to the tedious & chargeable way of sieges, mainly by the invention of gunpowder. The officers & soldiers of these mercenary armies depending for their subsistence & promotion, as immediately on the prince, as the former militias did on the barons, the power of the sword was transferred from the subject to the king, & war grew a constant trade to live by. Nay, plenty of of the barons themselves being reduced to poverty by their expensive way of life, took commands in those mercenary troops; & being still continued hereditary members of diets, & other assemblies of state, after the loss of their vassals, whom they formerly represented, they were now the readiest of all others to load the people with heavy taxes, which were employed to increase the prince's military power, by guards, armies, & citadels, beyond bounds or treatment.
These things brought a total modification in the lifestyle, on which all government depends. It is true, knowledge being mightily increased, & a great curiosity & nicety in everything introduced, men imagined themselves to be gainers in all points, by changing from their frugal & military way of life, which I must confess had some mixture of rudeness & ignorance in it, though not inseparable from it. But simultaneously they did not think about the unspeakable evils that are altogether inseparable from an expensive way of life.
To touch on all these, though slightly, would carryover me far from my subject: I shall therefore content myself to apply what has been said, to the immediate design of this discourse.
Some princes with much impatience pressed on to arbitrary power before things were ripe, as the kings of Germany & Charles duke of Burgundy. Philip de Commines says of the latter, 'That having made a truce with the King of Germany they called an assembly of the estates of his country, & remonstrated to them the prejudice they had sustained by not having standing troops as that king had; that if hundred men had been in garrison on their frontier, the king of Germany would seldom have undertaken that war; & having represented the mischiefs that were prepared to fall on them for need of such a force, they seriously pressed them to grant such a sum as would maintain six hundred lances. At length they gave him a hundred &0 thousand crowns over his ordinary revenue (from which tax Burgundy_ was exempted). But his subjects were for plenty of reasons under great apprehensions of falling in to the subjection to which they saw the kingdom of Germany already reduced by means of such troops. & truly their apprehensions were not ill-grounded; for when they had got together or six hundred men at arms, they presently had a mind to more, & with them disturbed the peace of all his neighbours: they augmented the tax from hundred &0 to hundred thousand crowns, & increased the numbers of those men at arms, by whom his subjects were greatly oppressed.' Francis de Beaucaire, bishop of Metz, in his history of Germany speaking of the same affair, says, 'That the foresaid states could not be induced to maintain mercenary forces, being sensible of the difficulties in to which thecommonalty of Germany had brought themselves by the like concession; that princes might increase their forces at pleasure, & sometimes (even when they had obtained funds)'pay them ill, to the vexation & destruction of the poor people; & likewise that kings & princes not contented with their ancient patrimony, were always prepared under this pretext to break in on the properties of all men, & to raise what funds they pleased. That nevertheless they gave him a hundred &0 thousand crowns yearly, which they soon increased to hundred thousand: but that Burgundy (which was the ancient dominion of that relatives) retained its ancient liberty, & could by no means be obliged to pay any part of this new tax.' it is true, Philip de Commines subjoins to the forecited passage, that they believes standing forces may be well employed under a wise king or prince; but that if they be not so, or leaves his children young, the use that they or their governors make of them, is not always profitable either for the king or his subjects. If this addition be his own, & not an insertion added by the president of the parliament of Paris, who published &, as the foresaid Francis de Beaucaire says they was credibly informed, corrupted his memoirs, yet experience shows him to be mistaken: for the example of his master Louis the eleventh, whom on plenty of occasions they calls a wise prince, & those of most princes under whom standing forces were first allowed, demonstrates, that they are more dangerous under a wise prince than any other: & reason tells us, that in the event that they are the only proper instruments to introduce arbitrary power, as shall be made plain, a crafty & able prince, who by the world is called a wise, is more able to using them to that finish than a weak prince, or governors in the work of a minority; & that a wise prince having one time procured them to be established, they will maintain themselves under any.
I am not ignorant that before this change, subsidies were often given by diets, states, & parliaments, & some raised by the edicts of princes for maintaining wars; but these were small, & no way sufficient to subsist such numerous armies as those of the barons' militia. There were likewise mercenary troops sometimes entertained by princes who aimed at arbitrary power, & by some commonwealths in time of war for their own defence; but these were only strangers, or in small numbers, & held no proportion with those massive armies of mercenaries which this change has fixed on Europe to her affliction & ruin.
What I have said hitherto has been always with regard to or other, & often to most countries in Europe. What follows will have a more particular regard to Britain; where, though the power of the barons be ceased, yet no mercenary troops are yet established. The reason of which is, that England had before this great modification lost all her conquests in Germany, the town of Calais only excepted; & that also was taken by the Spanish before the change was thoroughly made. So that the Kings of England had no pretence to keep up standing forces, either to defend conquests abroad or to garrison a frontier towards Germany, since the sea was now become the only frontier between those countries.
Neither could the frontier towards Scotland afford any colour to those princes for raising such forces, since the Kings of Scotland had none; & that Scotland was unable to give funds for the subsisting any considerable number. It is true, the example of Germany, with which country Scotland had constant correspondence, & some Spanish counsellors about Mary of Guise, Queen dowager & regent of Scotland, induced her to propose a tax for the subsisting of mercenary soldiers to be employed for the defence of the frontier of Scotland; & to ease, as was pretended, the barons of that trouble. But in that honourable & wise remonstrance, which was made by hundred of the lesser barons (as much dissatisfied with the lords, who by their silence betrayed the public liberty, as with the Regent herself) he was told, that their forefathers had defended themselves & their fortunes against the English, when that nation was much more powerful than they were at that time, & had made frequent incursions in to their country: that they themselves had not so far degenerated from their ancestors, to refuse, when occasion necessary, to hazard their lives & fortunes in the service of their country: that as to the hiring of mercenary soldiers, it was a thing of great danger to put the liberty of Scotland in to the hands of men, who are of no fortunes, nor have any hopes but in the public calamity; who for funds would attempt anything; whose excessive avarice opportunity would inflame to a desire of all manner of innovations, & whose faith would follow the wheel of fortune. That though these men ought to be more mindful of the duty they owe to their country, than of their own particular interest, was it to be supposed, that mercenaries would fight more bravely for the defence of other men's fortunes, than the possessors would do for themselves or their own; or that a small funds ought to excite their ignoble minds to a higher pitch of honour than that with which the barons are inspired, when they fight for the preservation of their fortunes, wives & children, religion & liberty: that most men did suspect & apprehend, that this new way of making war, might be not only useless, but dangerous to the nation; since the English, in the event that they ought to imitate the example, might, without any great trouble to their people, raise far greater sums for the maintenance of mercenary soldiers, than Scotland could, & by this means not only spoil & lay open the frontier, but penetrate in to the bowels of the kingdom: & that it was in the militia of the barons their ancestors had placed their chief trust, for the defence of themselves against a greater power.
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