찰스 2세의 금서정책과 스코틀랜드 언약도

Abstract

The aim of this essay is to examine Charles Ⅱ’s banning policy of the anti-governmental literature and the responses of the Covenanters in the late 17th century. Immediately after the Restoration, Charles Ⅱ re-enforced the existing censorship on the anti-monarchical literature which had been widely spread in the period of the and the Cromwellian rule. In Scotland, the main target was the a few books of Covenanters which advocated the resistance theory. mostly written in the first half of the 17th century. Charles Ⅱ regarded the resistance theory as a fatal danger to the authority of the King and the Restoration settlement. During the first three years after the Restoration, the books by Gorge Buchanan, and Samuel Rutherford were banned and burned in the public places, and the printers of those books were harshly executed. Charles Ⅱ’s policy, however, faced an unexpected result. In order to avoid the persecution, the Covenanters found new printers in Netherlands, and began to write new books which contained the main argument of the early resistance and ‘tyrannicide’ theory. Accordingly, Charles Ⅱ instantly reinforced his banning policy by increasing the number of prohibited books, by widening the range of the writing and publishing activities of the Covenanters, and by strengthening the persecution of the offenders. Charles Ⅱ’s policy was not successful as the Covenanter writers developed and strengthened their resistance theory which was to disseminate throughout Britain. It is difficult to say what the exact point of influence of the resistance theory developed by the Covenanters on the Glorious Revolution. Yet, it is more than clear that their theory of resistance was widely used to justify the Glorious Revolution.