The king, in his speech to the parliament, had ventured openly to demand a repeal of the triennial act; and he even went so far as to declare that, notwithstanding the law, he never would allow any parliament to be assembled by the methods prescribed in that statute. The parliament, without taking offence at this declaration, repealed the law; and in lieu of all the securities formerly provided, satisfied themselves with a general clause, “that parliament should not be interrupted above three years at the most.” As the English parliament had now raised itself to be a regular check and control upon royal power, it is evident that they ought still to have preserved a regular security for their meeting, and not have trusted entirely to the good will of the king, who, if ambitious or enterprising, had so little reason to be pleased with these assemblies. Before the end of Charles’s reign, the nation had occasion to feel very sensibly the effects of this repeal. By the act of uniformity, every clergyman who should officiate without being properly qualified, was punishable by fine and imprisonment: but this security was not thought sufficient for the church. It was now enacted, that, wherever five persons above those of the same household should assemble in a religious congregation, every one of them was liable, for the first offence, to be imprisoned three months, or pay five pounds; for the second, to be imprisoned six months, or pay ten pounds; and for the third, to be transported seven years, or pay a hundred pounds. The parliament had only in their eye the malignity of the sectaries; they should have carried their attention further, to the chief cause of that malignity, the restraint under which they labored. The commons likewise passed a vote, that the wrongs, dishonors, and indignities offered to the English by the subjects of the United Provinces, were the greatest obstructions to all foreign trade: and they promised to assist the king with their lives and fortunes in asserting the rights of his crown against all opposition whatsoever. This was the first open step towards a Dutch war. We must explain the causes and motives of this measure. That close union and confederacy which, during a course of near seventy years, has subsisted, almost without interruption or jealousy, between England and Holland, is not so much founded on the natural, unalterable interests of these states, as on their terror of the growing power of the French monarch, who, without their combination, it is apprehended, would soon extend his dominion over Europe. In the first years of Charles’s reign, when the ambitious genius of Lewis had not as yet displayed itself, and when the great force of his people was in some measure unknown even to themselves, the rival-ship of commerce, not checked by any other jealousy or apprehension, had in England begotten a violent enmity against the neighboring republic.