Osmund Airy

“ Charles soon regretted the loss of Shaftesbury, and endeavoured, as did also Louis, to induce him to return, but in vain. He preferred now to become the great popular leader against all the measures of the court, and may be regarded as the intellectual chief of the opposition. At the meeting of parliament on the 8th of January 1674, he carried a motion for a proclamation banishing Catholics to a distance of 10 m. from London. During the whole session he organized and directed the opposition in their attacks on the king’s ministers. ”

“ In 1637 he went as a gentleman-commoner to Exeter College, Oxford, where he remained about a year. No record of his studies is to be found, but he has left an amusing account of his part in the wilder doings of the university life of that day, in which, in spite of his small stature, he was recognized by his fellows as their leader. At the age of eighteen, on the 25th of February 1639, he married Margaret, daughter of Lord Coventry, with whom he and his wife lived at Durham House in the Strand, and at Canonbury House in Islington. ”

“ Before the prorogation, however, he saw the invaluable Act of Habeas Corpus, which he had carried through parliament, receive the royal assent. In pursuance of his patronage of Monmouth, Shaftesbury now secured for him the command of the army sent to suppress the insurrection in Scotland, which he is supposed to have fomented. In October 1679, the circumstances which led Charles to desire to conciliate the opposition having ceased, Shaftesbury was dismissed from his presidency and from the privy council ”

“ This treaty, however, was kept from public knowledge, and Ashley helped Charles to hoodwink parliament by signing a similar treaty on the 2nd of February 1672, which was laid before them as the only one in existence. His approval of the attempt of the Lords to alter a money bill led to the loss of the supply to Charles and to the consequent displeasure of the king. His support to the Lord Roos Act, ascribed generally to his desire to ingratiate himself with Charles, was no doubt due in part to the fact that his son had married Lord Roos's sister. ”

“ SHAFTESBURY, ANTHONY ASHLEY COOPER, 1st Earl of (1621–1683) , son of Sir John Cooper of Rockbourne in Hampshire, and of Anne, the only child of Sir Anthony Ashley, Bart., and was born at Wimborne St Giles, Dorset, on the 22nd of July 1621. His parents died before he was ten years of age, and he inherited extensive estates in Hampshire, Wiltshire, Dorsetshire and Somersetshire, much reduced, however, by litigation in Chancery. He lived for some time with Sir Daniel Norton, one of his trustees, at Southwick, and upon his death in 1635 with Mr Tooker, an uncle by marriage, at Salisbury. ”

“ He was suspected, too, of doing all in his power to bring about a revolt in Scotland. By the advice of Temple, Charles now tried the experiment of forming a new privy council in which the chief members of the opposition were included, and Shaftesbury was made president, with a salary of £4000, being also a member of the committee for foreign affairs. He did not, however, in any way change either his opinions or his action. He opposed the compelling of Protestant Nonconformists to take the oath required of Roman Catholics. ”

“ He now steadily pursued the design of the Restoration, but without holding any private correspondence with the king, and only on terms similar to those proposed in 1648 to Charles I. at the Isle of Wight. In the Convention parliament he sat for Wiltshire. Monk cut short these deliberations and forced on the Restoration without condition. Cooper was one of the twelve commissioners who went to Charles at Breda to invite him to return. On his journey he was upset from his carriage, and the accident caused an internal abscess which was never cured. ”

“ He urged on the bill by which Catholics were prohibited from sitting in either House of Parliament, and was bitter in his expressions of disappointment when the Commons passed a proviso excepting James, against whom the bill was especially aimed, from its operation. A new parliament met on the 6th of March 1679. Shaftesbury had meanwhile ineffectually warned the king that unless he followed his advice there would be no peace with the people. ”

“ Cooper was again elected for Wiltshire for the parliament of 1656, but Cromwell refused to allow him, with many others of his opponents, to sit. He signed a letter of complaint, with sixty-five excluded members, to the speaker, as also a “Remonstrance” addressed to the people. In the parliament which met on the 20th of January 1658, he took his seat, and was active in opposition to the new constitution of the two Houses. ”