An Account of Denmark - 9780865978041

An Account of Denmark offers modern readers a detailed look at a country in decline, as seen and judged through the eyes of the late-seventeenth-century Irish ambassador Robert Molesworth. Known as the "patriot brave and sage," Molesworth (1650-1725) was a staunch defender of the Glorious Revolution of 1689 and a consistent critic of political and religious corruption. After being proscribed by James II in 1689, he fled to England where he began a long career as a diplomat and politician under William III and his successors, eventually being named Viscount of Swords in 1716. Through his writings, his political career, and his nurturance of young Whig intellectuals, he spread ideals of public liberty and responsibility in the English-speaking world.

As envoy to Denmark for three years, Molesworth trained an outsider's eye on the politics, economy, and customs of a country recently converted to an absolute hereditary monarchy. His descriptions range from an account of the tax system to details of royal sledding parties, lists of military armaments, and national culinary preferences. Tying the whole together is his assessment of the corrupting effect of tyranny on the national character and its detrimental effect on citizens' material well-being and liberties.

This volume also includes Molesworth's 1711 translation of Francogallia, a constitutional history of European liberty written by Calvinist Frantois Hotman in 1573. Molesworth's preface to the work, considered too controversial for publication in the first edition, was expanded in the second and later published independently as "The Principles of a Real Whig." In the final text in this volume, Some Considerations for the Promoting of Agriculture and Employing the Poor, Molesworth uses his experience running country estates and his keen observations of agricultural life to argue for public policy that would promote a more productive economy.

Liberty Fund presents the first modern edition of Molesworth's writings. Readers will find ample editorial apparatus for understanding the historical and contextual background.

This book is part of the Thomas Hollis Library series. As general editor David Womersley explains, Thomas Hollis (1720-1774) was a businessman and philanthropist who gathered books he thought were essential to the understanding of liberty and donated them to libraries in Europe and America in the years preceding the American Revolution.