Parties, Connections, and Parliamentary Politics, 1689-1714: Review and Revision

1966 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-69 ◽  
Author(s):  
Henry Horwitz
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Party System ◽  
Party Organization ◽  
Historical Methodology ◽  
The Many ◽  
William Iii ◽  
George Iii ◽  
Parliamentary Politics ◽  
Detailed Picture

The notion that parliamentary politics in the days of William III and Queen Anne revolved around the conflict of the Whig and Tory parties is deeply rooted in the historiography of the later seventeenth century. Nourished by the many contemporary references to the existence and activities of the Whig and Tory parties, the “two-party concept” had its first flowering in the nineteenth century and came to full blossom in the early decades of the twentieth in the works of W. C. Abbott, K. G. Feiling, W. T. Morgan, and G. M. Trevelyan.The canons of orthodoxy of one generation of historians, however, have often proved to be little more than the cannon fodder of their successors. In this case, it was one of Abbott's own students, Robert Walcott, who has led the way in the task of reinterpretation. As early as 1941, Walcott — remarking upon the obscurity enveloping accounts of party groupings in the period 1689 to 1714 — advanced the hypothesis that “the description of party organization under William and Anne which Trevelyan suggested in his Romanes Lecture on the two-party system is less applicable to our period than the detailed picture of eighteenth-century politics which emerges from Professor Namier's volumes on the Age of Newcastle.”Walcott's invocation of Sir Lewis's studies of mid-eighteenth-century politics was, of course, a testimony to the advance in historical methodology that had gained prominence with the appearance in 1929 of The Structure of Politics at the Accession of George III.

The Nonconformist Inheritance

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Isabel Rivers
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Church Of England ◽  
John Bunyan ◽  
John Wesley ◽  
Religious Attitudes ◽  
Pilgrim's Progress ◽  
The Many ◽  
John Owen

This chapter analyses the editions, abridgements, and recommendations of texts by seventeenth-century nonconformists that were made by eighteenth-century dissenters, Methodists, and Church of England evangelicals. The nonconformist writers they chose include Joseph Alleine, Richard Baxter, John Flavel, John Owen, and John Bunyan. The editors and recommenders include Philip Doddridge, John Wesley, Edward Williams, Benjamin Fawcett, George Burder, John Newton, William Mason, and Thomas Scott. Detailed accounts are provided of the large number of Baxter’s works that were edited, notably A Call to the Unconverted and The Saints Everlasting Rest, and a case study is devoted to the many annotated editions of Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress and the ways in which they were used. The editors took into account length, intelligibility, religious attitudes, and cost, and sometimes criticized their rivals’ versions on theological grounds.

Epilogue

Unfelt ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 191-196
Author(s):  
James Noggle
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Human Mind ◽  
Slow Mode ◽  
Political Dimension ◽  
Political Justice ◽  
The Many

This epilogue studies William Godwin's theory of ideology, assessing his book Enquiry concerning Political Justice (1796), which identifies unfelt and active forces holding humanity back from social happiness. The virtuality of feeling for Godwin is a potential menace. The very mechanism of the human mind perpetuates a tacit politics of nonconsciousness, a politics embedded in tacitness, and “it is this circumstance that constitutes the insensible empire of prejudice.” In the interaction between felt and unfelt, perceptible and imperceptible, lie the deepest roots of oppression. The many kinds of writing surveyed in this book that use the idiom of the insensible in some ways anticipate what must look to people now like Godwin's theory of ideology. What the writers discussed in this book—from the late seventeenth century onward—have treated as natural changes wrought by the slowness of time can be seen through Godwin's eyes as entailing a political dimension: an oppressively slow mode of acquired and reinforced beliefs that humanity is desperate to overcome. Beyond that, the four areas of eighteenth-century prose treated in this book's four chapters each employs the idiom to describe what could look like the basic components of an ideology of modern Western liberalism.

scholarly journals THE INNER LIVES OF EARLY MODERN TRAVEL

2018 ◽  
Vol 62 (2) ◽  
pp. 349-373 ◽  
Author(s):  
MARK R. F. WILLIAMS
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Material Objects ◽  
Grand Tour ◽  
Cultural Engagement ◽  
The Family ◽  
The Many ◽  
Long Eighteenth Century

AbstractThis article assesses the role of memory, interiority, and intergenerational relations in the framing of early modern experiences and narratives of travel. It adopts as its focus three generations of the Clerk family of Penicuik, Scotland, whose travels through Europe from the mid-seventeenth century onward proved formative in the creation of varied ‘cosmopolitan’ stances within the family. While such widely studied practices as the ‘Grand Tour’ have drawn on discourses of encounter and cultural engagement within the broader narratives of the ‘long’ eighteenth century, this article reveals a family made deeply anxious by the consequences of travel, both during and after the act. Using diaries, manuscript correspondence, memoirs, and material objects, this article reveals the many ways in which travel was fashioned before, during, and long after it was undertaken. By shifting focus away from the act of travel itself and towards its subsequent afterlives, it explores the ways in which these individuals internalized what they experienced in the course of travel, how they reconciled it with the familiar, quotidian world to which they returned, and how the ‘cosmopolitan’ worldviews they brought home were made to inform the generations that followed.

IV. The Civil List in Eighteenth-Century British Politics: Parliamentary Supremacy versus the Independence of the Crown

1966 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 318-337 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. A. Reitan
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Balance Of Power ◽  
Executive Power ◽  
British Politics ◽  
Parliamentary Government ◽  
Constitutional Evolution ◽  
Parliamentary Supremacy ◽  
The Right ◽  
George Iii

In the constitutional evolution of eighteenth-century Britain a major problem was the resolution of the tensions which arose between the executive powers vested in the Crown and the legislative supremacy of Parliament. Although the seventeenth-century conflicts of Crown and Parliament had settled the question of ultimate supremacy in favour of Parliament, eighteenth-century politics, by common consent, were confined to the level where a balance of power could be seen to operate, in which king, Lords, and Commons exercised agreed functions and powers and where the ultimate weapon—parliamentary supremacy—need not be used. The independence of the Crown—however it may have operated in practice—was a cardinal doctrine of the ‘mixed and balanced’ constitution. Although this doctrine was usually invoked to support the right of the king to choose his own ministers, it gave an important constitutional role to the Civil List, for by supplying the Crown with a financial provision not subject to parliamentary control the Civil List served the pur-pose of supporting the independence and the ‘influence’ of the Crown. The uncontrolled expenditure of the Civil List, with its large number of attractive places, pensions, and other benefits, was an important part of that ‘influence’ which some considered necessary for the effective exercise of executive power and which others decried as a threat to the independence of Parliament. The disputes and jealousies created by the Civil List developed in the reigns of George I and George II and came to a climax in the reign of George III. The result was an alteration of the constitutional foundation of the Civil List which further weakened the doctrine of the independence of the Crown and which marked an important step in the evolution of parliamentary government.

Henry Purcell's Dido and Aeneas

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ellen T. Harris
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Final Section ◽  
Performance History ◽  
Detailed Consideration ◽  
Thirtieth Anniversary ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Many

Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas stands as the greatest operatic achievement of seventeenth-century England, and yet the work remains cloaked in mystery. The date and place of its first performance cannot be fixed with precision, and the accuracy of the surviving scores cannot be assumed. In this thirtieth-anniversary new edition of her book, Ellen Harris provides a detailed consideration of the many theories that have been proposed for the opera’s origin and chronology. She re-evaluates the surviving sources for the various readings they offer and examines the work’s historical position in Restoration theater. She also offers a detailed discussion of Purcell’s musical declamation and use of ground bass. The final section of the book is devoted to the performance history of Dido and Aeneas from the eighteenth century to the present.

scholarly journals The Legality of Prisoner of War Labour In England, 1648–1655*

2020 ◽  
Vol 246 (1) ◽  
pp. 35-68
Author(s):  
Sonia Tycko
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Prisoners Of War ◽  
Board Members ◽  
Prisoner Of War ◽  
American Colonies ◽  
Distinct Category ◽  
Customary Laws ◽  
The Many ◽  
Council Of State

Abstract Prisoners of war formed a legally distinct category amongst the many thousands of people forcibly employed in England and the English American colonies in the mid-seventeenth century, but they have yet to be studied as such. Focusing on 1648 to 1655, this article explains how a succession of English governments sent their war captives into servitude with private masters despite the prohibition of hard labour for Christian prisoners in the customary laws of war. They instead operated under the logic of the English poor law, in which the indigent could meaningfully consent to serve a master even while under duress. The case of Scottish and Dutch prisoners of war in the Bedford Level fen drainage project shows how the Council of State and the drainage company board members conceptualized common prisoners as willing workmen. Prisoners, ambassadors, and a variety of English observers instead thought that war captives should not have to work for their subsistence or their captors' profit. Nevertheless, common prisoners continued to labour under the aegis of free contracts into the eighteenth century.

Scottish Philosophy in the Seventeenth Century

2020 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Large Measure ◽  
The Many ◽  
Scholastic Philosophy ◽  
To Receive ◽  
Philosophical Writings ◽  
Do So

During the seventeenth century Scots produced many philosophical writings of high quality, writings that were very much part of a wider European philosophical discourse. Yet today seventeenth-century Scottish philosophy is known to hardly anyone. The Scottish philosophy of the sixteenth century is now being investigated by many scholars, and the philosophy of the eighteenth is widely studied. But that of the seventeenth century is only now beginning to receive the attention it deserves. This book begins by placing the seventeenth-century Scottish philosophy in its political and religious contexts, and then investigates the writings of the philosophers in the areas of logic, metaphysics, politics, ethics, law, and religion. It is demonstrated that in a variety of ways the Scottish Reformation impacted on the teaching of philosophy in the Scottish universities. It is also demonstrated that until the second half of the century, and the arrival of Descartes on the Scottish philosophy curriculum, the Scots were teaching and developing a form of Reformed orthodox scholastic philosophy, a philosophy that shared many features with the scholastic Catholic philosophy of the medieval period. It also becomes clear that by the early eighteenth-century Scotland was well placed to give rise to the spectacular Enlightenment that then followed, and to do so in large measure on the basis of its own well-established intellectual resources. Among the many thinkers discussed are Reformed orthodox, Episcopalian, and Catholic philosophers including George Robertson, George Middleton, John Boyd, Robert Baron, Mark Duncan, Samuel Rutherford, James Dundas (first Lord Arniston), George Mackenzie, James Dalrymple (Viscount Stair), and William Chalmers.

Domesticating Amboyna

2020 ◽  
pp. 148-180
Author(s):  
Alison Games
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Print Culture ◽  
True Relation ◽  
The Many ◽  
English Culture ◽  
Political Disputes

Despite the resolution in the Treaty of Westminster (1654), the Amboyna massacre became entrenched in English culture as a familiar cultural touchstone. Three further wars with the Dutch led to new Amboyna pamphlets. Amboyna also became part of internal political disputes in which Tories wrote Amboyna pamphlets to attack Whig rivals. In a wide-ranging exploration of multiple genres of popular and print culture, including plays, advice manuals, fiction, and library catalogues, this chapter analyzes the many ways in which Amboyna became domesticated in English culture. By the end of the seventeenth century it had shed its political significance as a symbol of ingratitude and instead became a consummate tale of cruelty. It also endured as a tale of unrequited injury. British authors such as Dryden, Defoe, and Swift were part of this process. By the end of the eighteenth century, with a final True Relation, it had become a legend.

The Alternative for Germany from Breakthrough toward Consolidation?

2020 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 30-54
Author(s):  
E. Gene Frankland
Keyword(s):  
Party System ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Party Organization ◽  
System Transformation ◽  
New Parties ◽  
Populist Radical Right ◽  
Northern League ◽  
Radical Right Parties ◽  
Parliamentary Politics ◽  
Alternative For Germany

The emergence of new parties, especially of populist radical-right parties, has generated considerable scholarly as well as media attention in recent decades. German exceptionalism since the 1950s has come to an end with the electoral successes of the Alternative for Germany (AfD), formed in 2013. Comparative studies, however, provide caution about quick pronouncements of party system transformation. Party organization is an important factor in a new party’s coping with changing external circumstances. Accordingly, this article concerns itself first with the formative circumstances of the AfD compared to those of the Greens and the Pirates, earlier new parties that challenged the established parties. Second, the article focuses on the institutionalization of the AfD as a party organization since 2013. To what extent has it followed the design of successful populist radical-right parties, such as the Austrian Freedom Party (FPӦ) and the Italian Northern League (ln)? Third, the article considers the prospective relationships between the AfD and established parties. Such challenger parties have agency and may switch from government-mode to opposition-mode and back again without lasting electoral harm. In conclusion, the AfD seems likely to survive its first term in the Bundestag, but it seems unlikely soon to be mainstreamed by its participation in electoral and parliamentary politics.

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