_Army reduced._--Such, however, was the influence of what may be called the constitutional antipathy of the English in that age to a regular army, that the Commons, in the first session after the peace, voted that all troops raised since 1680 should be disbanded, reducing the forces to about 7000 men, which they were with difficulty prevailed upon to augment to 10,000.[205] They resolved at the same time that, "in a just sense and acknowledgment of what great things his majesty has done for these kingdoms, a sum not exceeding £700,000 be granted to his majesty during his life, for the support of the civil list." So ample a gift from an impoverished nation is the strongest testimony of their affection to the king.[206] But he was justly disappointed by the former vote, which, in the hazardous condition of Europe, prevented this country from wearing a countenance of preparation, more likely to avert than to bring on a second conflict. He permitted himself, however, to carry this resentment too far, and lost sight of that subordination to the law which is the duty of an English sovereign, when he evaded compliance with this resolution of the Commons, and took on himself the unconstitutional responsibility of leaving sealed orders, when he went to Holland, that 16,000 men should be kept up, without the knowledge of his ministers, which they as unconstitutionally obeyed. In the next session a new parliament having been elected, full of men strongly imbued with what the courtiers styled commonwealth principles, or an extreme jealousy of royal power,[207] it was found impossible to resist a diminution of the army to 7000 troops.[208] These too were voted to be natives of the British dominions; and the king incurred the severest mortification of his reign, in the necessity of sending back his regiments of Dutch guards and French refugees. The messages that passed between him and the parliament bear witness how deeply he felt, and how fruitlessly he deprecated, this act of unkindness and ingratitude, so strikingly in contrast with the deference that parliament has generally shown to the honours and prejudices of the Crown in matters of far higher moment.[209] The foreign troops were too numerous, and it would have been politic to conciliate the nationality of the multitude by reducing their number; yet they had claims which a grateful and generous people should not have forgotten: they were, many of them, the chivalry of protestantism, the Huguenot gentlemen who had lost all but their swords in a cause which we deemed our own; they were the men who had terrified James from Whitehall, and brought about a deliverance, which, to speak plainly, we had neither sense nor courage to achieve for ourselves, or which at least we could never have achieved without enduring the convulsive throes of anarchy.