made him entirely dependent upon England: whereas his predecessors made one part of their territories subservient to the preservation of their authority in another, where it was endangered. Add to all these causes the personal character of the king, in which there was nothing uniform or sincere, and which introduced the like unsteadiness into all his government. He was indolent, yet restless, in his disposition; fond of working by violent methods, without any vigor; boastful, but continually betraying his fears; showing on all occasions such a desire of peace as hindered him from ever enjoying it. Having no spirit of order, he never looked forward,--content by any temporary expedient to extricate himself from a present difficulty. Rash, arrogant, perfidious, irreligious, unquiet, he made a tolerable head of a party, but a bad king, and had talents fit to disturb another's government, not to support his own. A most striking contrast presents itself between the conduct and fortune of John and his adversary Philip. Philip came to the crown when many of the provinces of Prance, by being in the hands of too powerful vassals, were in a manner dismembered from the kingdom; the royal authority was very low in what remained. He reunited to the crown a country as valuable as what belonged to it before; he reduced his subjects of all orders to a stricter obedience than they had given to his predecessors; he withstood the Papal usurpation, and yet used it as an instrument in his designs: whilst John, who inherited a great territory and an entire prerogative, by his vices and weakness gave up his independency to the Pope, his prerogative to his subjects, and a large part of his dominions to the King of France. FOOTNOTES: [82] A word of uncertain derivation, but which signifies some scandalous species of cowardice. CHAPTER IX. FRAGMENT.--AN ESSAY TOWARDS AN HISTORY OF THE LAWS OF ENGLAND.