a member of the family; and that at last, when he was compelled to utter the speech in its altered form, "he who of all men was esteemed the most ready in speaking was forced to desire Mr. Locke to stand at his elbow with the written copy to prompt him in case of failure in his repetition." 1

Which picture is more incongruous-Locke walking by the side of Lord Shaftesbury's coach and then attending him bareheaded into the house of lords-or Locke standing at Lord Shaftesbury's elbow in the house of lords, with the written speech in his hand, ready to prompt him if he forgot the exact words he was ordered to deliver by the king and the Duke of Buckingham ? 2

2

The great debates of this session, in both houses of parliament, were on the declaration of indulgence and the test bill. The king was forced to cancel the declaration of indulgence, and the test bill was passed.

This latter measure, to the surprise alike of the dissenters and of the court, Shaftesbury supported, and with

1 Notes and Queries, vol. iii. (1857), p. 99; Third Lord Shaftesbury to Le Clerc, 8 Feb., 1704-5.

2 Just before performing the latter service Locke must, if the story be true, have seen a characteristic specimen of the courtly manners of the time, and of Shaftesbury's audacious humour. To deliver his speech Shaftesbury had, according to precedent, to occupy the seat at the right hand of the throne, which was traditionally assigned, on ordinary occasions, to the Prince of Wales, but which, there being no Prince of Wales, was now appropriated by the Duke of York; and this seat had, before Shaftesbury's arrival, been taken by the duke. "The duke being unwilling to quit his seat," it is added, "Lord Shaftesbury told him he could not proceed upon business till the house was in form. At length the duke was obliged to submit, but said in a passion, 'My lord, you are a rascal and a villain!' He, with great composure, immediately replied, 'I am much obliged to your royal highness for not calling me likewise a coward and a papist.' Martyn, Life of the First Earl of Shaftesbury' (1836), vol. ii., p. 30.

fair excuse, if not good reason. It seems likely that he now for the first time had intimation of the secret treaty of Dover, and that thus a startling revelation of the real intentions of the king and his catholic advisers was made to him. At any rate he now began to see, as Locke had seen long before and had urged so forcibly in his 'Essay concerning Toleration,' that, while the fullest liberty ought to be allowed to every one in matters of religious opinion and forms of worship, no one ought to be allowed to use a cloak of religion for covering political opinions and actions that were evidently detrimental to the welfare of the state. The catholics of Stuart times clearly came under that category, and the test bill was only designed, albeit somewhat roughly and inadequately, to check the political action of the catholics. It was a bill "for preventing dangers which may happen from popish recusants, and quieting the minds of his majesty's good subjects," by requiring every one holding any civil or military office or public employment of any kind to take the oaths of supremacy and allegiance, to conform to the church of England, and solemnly to repudiate the doctrine of transubstantiation. It set no new burthens upon protestant dissenters, though it did add another link to the chain that parted them from free citizenship; but it struck an effective blow at all the treacherous catholics who were plotting the reestablishment of their religion in England. Therefore Shaftesbury cannot be blamed for helping to pass the measure. By so doing, however, he offended the king, and this was the turning-point in his fortunes.

The first practical issues of the test act were the resignations of the Duke of York, Lord Clifford, and other servants of the crown who were avowed catholics. As a later and more important issue Englishmen began, more

clearly than heretofore, to sink minor differences, and even such great differences as existed between tories and whigs, high-churchmen and puritans, and to divide themselves into anti-catholics and catholics. Shaftesbury became almost, if not quite, the leader of the anticatholic party.

The session of parliament which began on the 4th of February, 1672-3, was a short one. Pleased at the passing of the test bill, the house of commons readily made a grant for the Dutch war, and winked at the stop of the exchequer; and the king, fearing that some new measure against the catholics might be introduced, ordered an adjournment on the 29th of March, which was afterwards turned into a prorogation. In the interval the great topic that excited men's minds was the marriage then being contracted between the Duke of York, a widower of two years' standing, and Mary of Modena, which was regarded as the presage of new foreign leagues involving wars and other costly complications in the interests of popery. Shaftesbury was regarded as the chief promoter of the ineffectual opposition offered to this marriage when parliament met for another session, on the 7th of October, to be again prorogued, on account of its recalcitrant temper, on the 3rd of November; and on the 9th of the same month he was summarily dismissed from the lord chancellorship.

Locke, of course, lost his secretaryship of presentations at the same time. How much he had to do with Shaftesbury's political movements just then and afterwards does not appear; but, as a great number of the earl's papers referring to those movements bear his endorsements and annotations, and several are altogether in his handwriting, it seems only reasonable to infer that throughout this

. 40-42

period he was his intimate adviser on all subjects about which he chose to take advice, or thought himself justified in confiding so much private information as would make it possible for advice to be given. "When my grandfather quitted the court and began to be in danger from it," said the third Lord Shaftesbury moreover, "Mr. Locke now shared with him in dangers, as before in honours and advantages. He entrusted him with his secretest negotiations, and made use of his assistant pen in matters that nearly concerned the state and were fit to be made public."1

Early in Charles the Second's reign a council of trade had been somewhat irregularly established, and in July, 1670, apparently at the instigation of the Earl of Shaftesbury, then Lord Ashley and in the full tide of his prosperity, there had been appointed a council of foreign plantations, to co-operate with it, and generally to inquire into the actual condition of colonial trade and to act as an intermediary between the crown and the colonial governors. Of this latter council the Earl of Sandwich was president, and John Evelyn was, in February, 1670-1, appointed one of its ten members.3 Between it and the council of trade there seems, however, to have been some confusion, and in September, 1672, the two bodies were formally united, in compliance with Shaftesbury's recommendations, he himself being appointed president."

1 Notes and Queries, vol. iii. (1851), p. 98; Third Lord Shaftesbury to Le Clerc, 8 Feb., 1704-5.

2 Harleian MSS., no. 6394, in the British Museum.

3 Evelyn, Diary and Correspondence,' vol. ii., p. 55.

4 Colonial State Papers, Entry Book 93, in the Public Record Office.

With this new council Locke was connected from the beginning, though in what capacity at first is not clear. Numerous documents concerning both the trade and the government of all the West Indian and American colonies, in and after the autumn of 1672, are endorsed by him, thus showing that he was acting as a sort of secretary; but the actual secretary was Benjamin Worsley until the midsummer of 1673. On Worsley's death Locke was appointed to succeed him with a salary of 500l. a year, and he was sworn in on the 15th of October, 1673.1

That he should have succeeded to this post, as soon as Shaftesbury had it to dispose of, is only natural after all the services that he had rendered towards the establishment of the colony of Carolina. His duties were far more various and responsible than heretofore. He had to deal more especially with the crown colonies, which then were only Virginia, Jamaica, Barbados, and five smaller West Indian islands; but he had also to watch the affairs of all the other colonies. Four of them belonged to aristocratic proprietors, New York to the Duke of York, New Jersey to Sir George Carteret and others, Maryland to Lord Baltimore, and Carolina to Lord Shaftesbury and his associates. Hudson's Bay and the Bermudas were held by English trading companies; and the New England settlements, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Plymouth, and Massachusetts, were governed by local corporations.

Locke had to correspond and communicate with the chief officers of the crown in England and with the colonial governors and governments on all matters of interest, as well as with everybody in England and elsewhere whose colonial affairs needed protection or advance1 Colonial State Papers, Entry Book, 1670-1674, in the Public Record Office; Evelyn, vol. ii., p. 89.