632.
This policy is contrary to that which has ever been practised by all princes who studied the increase of their authority.

To allure the nobility to court; to engage them in expensive pleasures or employments which dissipate their fortune; to increase their subjection to ministers by attendance; to weaken their authority in the provinces by absence: these have been the common arts of arbitrary government.

But James, besides that he had certainly laid no plan for extending his power, had no money to support a splendid court, or bestow on a numerous retinue of gentry and nobility.

He thought too, that by their living together, they became more sensible of their own strength, and were apt to indulge too curious researches into matters of government.

To remedy the present evil, he was desirous of dispersing them into their country seats; where, he hoped, they would bear a more submissive reverence to his authority, and receive less support from each other.