Scottish scholar and clergyman Gilbert Burnet sets before us a picture of a King who was something of a Solomon in his virtues and his vices.
In 1683, some of Gilbert Burnet’s friends were executed for complicity the Rye House Plot, and when James II came to the throne in 1685 he emigrated to Holland, a country he knew well and admired for its religious tolerance. Meanwhile, Burnet, a Scottish clergyman and distinguished scholar, had jotted down his impressions of James’s elder brother King Charles II, some of which are given here.