CHAP. VII - Parliamentary sessions from, 1669 to 1671

Summary

Whilst this union with the Catholic world and the negotiations with France, which were as much religious as political, were being arranged and furthered through strange gradations of secrecy, the question about the dissolution of Parliament had been once more discussed in the Privy Council. Buckingham and the two Secretaries of State, Arlington and Trevor, were in favour of it; Albemarle, the Duke of York, and the Lord Keeper Bridgeman, were opposed to it. Bridgeman demonstrated that, in spite of all the promises of the Dissenters, a Parliament in which they had the majority offered no security either for the crown or for the peace of the country. This opinion was also shared by the King, who now already conceived the hope of approaching the matter better at some other time, after the conclusion of the agreement with France. As he now stood on better terms with his brother, he hoped to moderate the opposition by a personal understanding with its leaders. He entered into a formal negotiation with them, which was concerned principally with two points; on his side, that he should desist from his alliance with the Dissenters, on the side of the Parliament, that it should make an arrangement for the payment of the King's debts, and above all that it should not proceed to those direct attacks on the ministers which it had so long and so seriously threatened.