To show his
filial piety, he bade the hangman dishonour the corpses of some of
his father's judges, before whom, when alive, he ran like a
screaming hare; but permitted those who had lost their all in
supporting his father's cause, to pine in misery and want. He
would give to a painted harlot a thousand pounds for a loathsome
embrace, and to a player or buffoon a hundred for a trumpery pun,
but would refuse a penny to the widow or orphan of an old Royalist
soldier. He was the personification of selfishness; and as he
loved and cared for no one, so did no one love or care for him. So
little had he gained the respect or affection of those who
surrounded him, that after his body had undergone an after-death
examination, parts of it were thrown down the sinks of the palace,
to become eventually the prey of the swine and ducks of
Westminster.
His brother, who succeeded him, James the Second, was a Papist, but
sufficiently honest to acknowledge his Popery, but upon the whole,
he was a poor creature; though a tyrant, he was cowardly, had he
not been a coward he would never have lost his throne. There were
plenty of lovers of tyranny in England who would have stood by him,
provided he would have stood by them, and would, though not
Papists, have encouraged him in his attempt to bring back England
beneath the sway of Rome, and perhaps would eventually have become
Papists themselves; but the nation raising a cry against him, and
his son-in-law, the Prince of Orange, invading the country, he
forsook his friends, of whom he had a host, but for whom he cared
little--left his throne, for which he cared a great deal--and
Popery in England, for which he cared yet more, to their fate, and
escaped to France, from whence, after taking a little heart, he
repaired to Ireland, where he was speedily joined by a gallant army
of Papists whom he basely abandoned at the Boyne, running away in a
most lamentable condition, at the time when by showing a little
courage he might have enabled them to conquer.
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