Samuel Rawson Gardiner and Philip Chesney Yorke

“ Buckingham, impatient to begin the war as soon as possible, persuaded Charles, and the two together persuaded James to throw over the promises to the Commons, and to accept the French terms. It was no longer possible to summon parliament to vote supplies for the war till the marriage had been completed, when remonstrances to its conditions would be useless.
Buckingham, for Buckingham was now virtually the ruler of England, had thus to commence war without money. He prepared to throw 12,000 Englishmen, under a German adventurer, Count Mansfeld, through France into the Palatinate. ”

“ All England was talking of the revolution in Bohemia in the year before, and men’s sympathy with the continental Protestants was increased when it was known that James’s son-in-law had accepted the crown of Bohemia, and that in the summer of 1620 a Spanish force was preparing to invade the Palatinate. Buckingham at first had thrown himself into the popular movement. ”

“ BUCKINGHAM, GEORGE VILLIERS, 1st Duke of [1] (1592–1628) , English statesman, born in August 1592, [2] was a younger son of Sir George Villiers of Brooksby. His mother, Mary, daughter of Anthony Beaumont of Glenfield, Leicestershire, who was left a widow early, educated him for a courtier’s life, sending him to France with Sir John Eliot; and the lad, being “by nature contemplative,” took kindly to the training. He could dance well, fence well, and talk a little French, when in August 1614 he was brought before the king’s notice, in the hope that he would take a fancy to him. ”

“ For the moment Buckingham was the most popular man in England.
It was easier to overthrow one policy than to construct another. The Commons would have been content with sending some assistance to the Dutch, and with entering upon a privateering war with Spain. James, whose object was to regain the Palatinate, believed this could only be accomplished by a continental alliance, in which France took part. As soon as parliament was prorogued, negotiations were opened for a marriage between Charles and the sister of Louis XIII., Henrietta Maria. ”

“ But he himself never pretended to the virtues of an administrator, and he was too ready to fill up appointments with men who flattered him, and too reluctant to dismiss them, if they served their country ill, to effect any permanent change for the better. ”

“ Before they reassembled at Oxford on the 1st of August, the English ships had found their way into the hands of the French, to be used against La Rochelle. The Commons met in an ill-humour. They had no confidence in Buckingham, and they asked that persons whom they could trust should be admitted to the king’s council before they would vote a penny. ”