No More Learning

They had won several battles, and had not sustained a
single serious or ignominious defeat. Among the Roundheads adversity had
begun to produce dissension and discontent. The Parliament was kept
in alarm, sometimes by plots, and sometimes by riots. It was thought
necessary to fortify London against the royal army, and to hang
some disaffected citizens at their own doors. Several of the most
distinguished peers who had hitherto remained at Westminster fled to the
court at Oxford; nor can it be doubted that, if the operations of the
Cavaliers had, at this season, been directed by a sagacious and powerful
mind, Charles would soon have marched in triumph to Whitehall.

But the King suffered the auspicious moment to pass away; and it never
returned. In August 1643 he sate down before the city of Gloucester.
That city was defended by the inhabitants and by the garrison, with a
determination such as had not, since the commencement of the war, been
shown by the adherents of the Parliament. The emulation of London was
excited. The trainbands of the City volunteered to march wherever their
services might be required. A great force was speedily collected,
and began to move westward. The siege of Gloucester was raised: the
Royalists in every part of the kingdom were disheartened: the spirit of
the parliamentary party revived: and the apostate Lords, who had
lately fled from Westminster to Oxford, hastened back from Oxford to
Westminster.

And now a new and alarming class of symptoms began to appear in the
distempered body politic. There had been, from the first, in the
parliamentary party, some men whose minds were set on objects from which
the majority of that party would have shrunk with horror. These men
were, in religion, Independents. They conceived that every Christian
congregation had, under Christ, supreme jurisdiction in things
spiritual; that appeals to provincial and national synods were scarcely
less unscriptural than appeals to the Court of Arches, or to the
Vatican; and that Popery, Prelacy, and Presbyterianism were merely three
forms of one great apostasy. In politics, the Independents were, to use
the phrase of their time, root and branch men, or, to use the kindred
phrase of our own time, radicals. Not content with limiting the power of
the monarch, they were desirous to erect a commonwealth on the ruins of
the old English polity. At first they had been inconsiderable, both
in numbers and in weight; but before the war had lasted two years they
became, not indeed the largest, but the most powerful faction in the
country. Some of the old parliamentary leaders had been removed by
death; and others had forfeited the public confidence. Pym had been
borne, with princely honours, to a grave among the Plantagenets. Hampden
had fallen, as became him, while vainly endeavouring, by his heroic
example, to inspire his followers with courage to face the fiery cavalry
of Rupert. Bedford had been untrue to the cause. Northumberland was
known to be lukewarm. Essex and his lieutenants had shown little vigour
and ability in the conduct of military operations. At such a conjuncture
it was that the Independent party, ardent, resolute, and uncompromising,
began to raise its head, both in the camp and in the House of Commons.

The soul of that party was Oliver Cromwell. Bred to peaceful
occupations, he had, at more than forty years of age, accepted a
commission in the parliamentary army. No sooner had he become a soldier
than he discerned, with the keen glance of genius, what Essex, and men
like Essex, with all their experience, were unable to perceive. He saw
precisely where the strength of the Royalists lay, and by what means
alone that strength could be overpowered. He saw that it was necessary
to reconstruct the army of the Parliament. He saw also that there were
abundant and excellent materials for the purpose, materials less showy,
indeed, but more solid, than those of which the gallant squadrons of the
King were composed. It was necessary to look for recruits who were not
mere mercenaries, for recruits of decent station and grave character,
fearing God and zealous for public liberty. With such men he filled his
own regiment, and, while he subjected them to a discipline more rigid
than had ever before been known in England, he administered to their
intellectual and moral nature stimulants of fearful potency.

The events of the year 1644 fully proved the superiority of his
abilities. In the south, where Essex held the command, the parliamentary
forces underwent a succession of shameful disasters; but in the north
the victory of Marston Moor fully compensated for all that had been lost
elsewhere. That victory was not a more serious blow to the Royalists
than to the party which had hitherto been dominant at Westminster, for
it was notorious that the day, disgracefully lost by the Presbyterians,
had been retrieved by the energy of Cromwell, and by the steady valour
of the warriors whom he had trained.

These events produced the Selfdenying Ordinance and the new model of the
army. Under decorous pretexts, and with every mark of respect, Essex and
most of those who had held high posts under him were removed; and the
conduct of the war was intrusted to very different hands. Fairfax, a
brave soldier, but of mean understanding and irresolute temper, was the
nominal Lord General of the forces; but Cromwell was their real head.

Cromwell made haste to organise the whole army on the same principles
on which he had organised his own regiment. As soon as this process was
complete, the event of the war was decided. The Cavaliers had now to
encounter natural courage equal to their own, enthusiasm stronger than
their own, and discipline such as was utterly wanting to them. It soon
became a proverb that the soldiers of Fairfax and Cromwell were men of
a different breed from the soldiers of Essex. At Naseby took place the
first great encounter between the Royalists and the remodelled army of
the Houses. The victory of the Roundheads was complete and decisive. It
was followed by other triumphs in rapid succession. In a few months
the authority of the Parliament was fully established over the whole
kingdom. Charles fled to the Scots, and was by them, in a manner which
did not much exalt their national character, delivered up to his English
subjects.

While the event of the war was still doubtful, the Houses had put the
Primate to death, had interdicted, within the sphere of their authority,
the use of the Liturgy, and had required all men to subscribe that
renowned instrument known by the name of the Solemn League and Covenant.
Covenanting work, as it was called, went on fast. Hundreds of thousands
affixed their names to the rolls, and, with hands lifted up towards
heaven, swore to endeavour, without respect of persons, the extirpation
of Popery and Prelacy, heresy and schism, and to bring to public
trial and condign punishment all who should hinder the reformation of
religion. When the struggle was over, the work of innovation and revenge
was pushed on with increased ardour. The ecclesiastical polity of the
kingdom was remodelled. Most of the old clergy were ejected from their
benefices. Fines, often of ruinous amount, were laid on the Royalists,
already impoverished by large aids furnished to the King. Many estates
were confiscated. Many proscribed Cavaliers found it expedient to
purchase, at an enormous cost, the projection of eminent members of the
victorious party. Large domains, belonging to the crown, to the bishops,
and to the chapters, were seized, and either granted away or put up to
auction. In consequence of these spoliations, a great part of the soil
of England was at once offered for sale. As money was scarce, as the
market was glutted, as the title was insecure and as the awe inspired
by powerful bidders prevented free competition, the prices were often
merely nominal. Thus many old and honourable families disappeared and
were heard of no more; and many new men rose rapidly to affluence.

But, while the Houses were employing their authority thus, it suddenly
passed out of their hands. It had been obtained by calling into
existence a power which could not be controlled. In the summer of
1647, about twelve months after the last fortress of the Cavaliers had
submitted to the Parliament, the Parliament was compelled to submit to
its own soldiers.

Thirteen years followed, during which England was, under various names
and forms, really governed by the sword. Never before that time,
or since that time, was the civil power in our country subjected to
military dictation.

The army which now became supreme in the state was an army very
different from any that has since been seen among us. At present the
pay of the common soldier is not such as can seduce any but the
humblest class of English labourers from their calling. A barrier
almost impassable separates him from the commissioned officer. The great
majority of those who rise high in the service rise by purchase. So
numerous and extensive are the remote dependencies of England, that
every man who enlists in the line must expect to pass many years in
exile, and some years in climates unfavourable to the health and vigour
of the European race. The army of the Long Parliament was raised for
home service. The pay of the private soldier was much above the wages
earned by the great body of the people; and, if he distinguished himself
by intelligence and courage, he might hope to attain high commands.
The ranks were accordingly composed of persons superior in station and
education to the multitude. These persons, sober, moral, diligent, and
accustomed to reflect, had been induced to take up arms, not by the
pressure of want, not by the love of novelty and license, not by the
arts of recruiting officers, but by religious and political zeal,
mingled with the desire of distinction and promotion. The boast of the
soldiers, as we find it recorded in their solemn resolutions, was that
they had not been forced into the service, nor had enlisted chiefly
for the sake of lucre. That they were no janissaries, but freeborn
Englishmen, who had, of their own accord, put their lives in jeopardy
for the liberties and religion of England, and whose right and duty it
was to watch over the welfare of the nation which they had saved.

A force thus composed might, without injury to its efficiency, be
indulged in some liberties which, if allowed to any other troops, would
have proved subversive of all discipline. In general, soldiers who
should form themselves into political clubs, elect delegates, and pass
resolutions on high questions of state, would soon break loose from all
control, would cease to form an army, and would become the worst and
most dangerous of mobs. Nor would it be safe, in our time, to tolerate
in any regiment religious meetings, at which a corporal versed in
Scripture should lead the devotions of his less gifted colonel, and
admonish a backsliding major. But such was the intelligence, the
gravity, and the selfcommand of the warriors whom Cromwell had trained,
that in their camp a political organisation and a religious organisation
could exist without destroying military organisation. The same men,
who, off duty, were noted as demagogues and field preachers, were
distinguished by steadiness, by the spirit of order, and by prompt
obedience on watch, on drill, and on the field of battle.

In war this strange force was irresistible. The stubborn courage
characteristic of the English people was, by the system of Cromwell, at
once regulated and stimulated. Other leaders have maintained orders as
strict. Other leaders have inspired their followers with zeal as ardent.
But in his camp alone the most rigid discipline was found in company
with the fiercest enthusiasm. His troops moved to victory with the
precision of machines, while burning with the wildest fanaticism of
Crusaders. From the time when the army was remodelled to the time when
it was disbanded, it never found, either in the British islands or on
the Continent, an enemy who could stand its onset. In England,
Scotland, Ireland, Flanders, the Puritan warriors, often surrounded
by difficulties, sometimes contending against threefold odds, not only
never failed to conquer, but never failed to destroy and break in pieces
whatever force was opposed to them. They at length came to regard the
day of battle as a day of certain triumph, and marched against the most
renowned battalions of Europe with disdainful confidence. Turenne was
startled by the shout of stern exultation with which his English allies
advanced to the combat, and expressed the delight of a true soldier,
when he learned that it was ever the fashion of Cromwell's pikemen to
rejoice greatly when they beheld the enemy; and the banished Cavaliers
felt an emotion of national pride, when they saw a brigade of their
countrymen, outnumbered by foes and abandoned by friends, drive before
it in headlong rout the finest infantry of Spain, and force a passage
into a counterscarp which had just been pronounced impregnable by the
ablest of the Marshals of France.

But that which chiefly distinguished the army of Cromwell from other
armies was the austere morality and the fear of God which pervaded all
ranks. It is acknowledged by the most zealous Royalists that, in that
singular camp, no oath was heard, no drunkenness or gambling was seen,
and that, during the long dominion of the soldiery, the property of the
peaceable citizen and the honour of woman were held sacred. If outrages
were committed, they were outrages of a very different kind from
those of which a victorious army is generally guilty. No servant girl
complained of the rough gallantry of the redcoats. Not an ounce of plate
was taken from the shops of the goldsmiths. But a Pelagian sermon, or
a window on which the Virgin and Child were painted, produced in the
Puritan ranks an excitement which it required the utmost exertions
of the officers to quell. One of Cromwell's chief difficulties was to
restrain his musketeers and dragoons from invading by main force the
pulpits of ministers whose discourses, to use the language of that time,
were not savoury; and too many of our cathedrals still bear the marks
of the hatred with which those stern spirits regarded every vestige of
Popery.

To keep down the English people was no light task even for that army. No
sooner was the first pressure of military tyranny felt, than the nation,
unbroken to such servitude, began to struggle fiercely. Insurrections
broke out even in those counties which, during the recent war, had been
the most submissive to the Parliament. Indeed, the Parliament itself
abhorred its old defenders more than its old enemies, and was desirous
to come to terms of accommodation with Charles at the expense of the
troops. In Scotland at the same time, a coalition was formed between the
Royalists and a large body of Presbyterians who regarded the doctrines
of the Independents with detestation. At length the storm burst. There
were risings in Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex, Kent, Wales. The fleet in the
Thames suddenly hoisted the royal colours, stood out to sea, and menaced
the southern coast. A great Scottish force crossed the frontier
and advanced into Lancashire. It might well be suspected that these
movements were contemplated with secret complacency by a majority both
of the Lords and of the Commons.

But the yoke of the army was not to be so shaken off. While Fairfax
suppressed the risings in the neighbourhood of the capital, Oliver
routed the Welsh insurgents, and, leaving their castles in ruins,
marched against the Scots. His troops were few, when compared with the
invaders; but he was little in the habit of counting his enemies. The
Scottish army was utterly destroyed. A change in the Scottish government
followed. An administration, hostile to the King, was formed at
Edinburgh; and Cromwell, more than ever the darling of his soldiers,
returned in triumph to London.

And now a design, to which, at the commencement of the civil war, no man
would have dared to allude, and which was not less inconsistent with the
Solemn League and Covenant than with the old law of England, began to
take a distinct form. The austere warriors who ruled the nation had,
during some months, meditated a fearful vengeance on the captive King.
When and how the scheme originated; whether it spread from the general
to the ranks, or from the ranks to the general; whether it is to be
ascribed to policy using fanaticism as a tool, or to fanaticism bearing
down policy with headlong impulse, are questions which, even at this
day, cannot be answered with perfect confidence. It seems, however,
on the whole, probable that he who seemed to lead was really forced to
follow, and that, on this occasion, as on another great occasion a few
years later, he sacrificed his own judgment and his own inclinations to
the wishes of the army. For the power which he had called into existence
was a power which even he could not always control; and, that he might
ordinarily command, it was necessary that he should sometimes obey. He
publicly protested that he was no mover in the matter, that the first
steps had been taken without his privity, that he could not advise the
Parliament to strike the blow, but that he submitted his own feelings to
the force of circumstances which seemed to him to indicate the purposes
of Providence. It has been the fashion to consider these professions as
instances of the hypocrisy which is vulgarly imputed to him. But even
those who pronounce him a hypocrite will scarcely venture to call him a
fool. They are therefore bound to show that he had some purpose to serve
by secretly stimulating the army to take that course which he did not
venture openly to recommend. It would be absurd to suppose that he who
was never by his respectable enemies represented as wantonly cruel or
implacably vindictive, would have taken the most important step of his
life under the influence of mere malevolence. He was far too wise a man
not to know, when he consented to shed that august blood, that he was
doing a deed which was inexpiable, and which would move the grief and
horror, not only of the Royalists, but of nine tenths of those who had
stood by the Parliament. Whatever visions may have deluded others, he
was assuredly dreaming neither of a republic on the antique pattern,
nor of the millennial reign of the Saints. If he already aspired to
be himself the founder of a new dynasty, it was plain that Charles the
First was a less formidable competitor than Charles the Second would
be. At the moment of the death of Charles the First the loyalty of
every Cavalier would be transferred, unimpaired, to Charles the Second.
Charles the First was a captive: Charles the Second would be at liberty.
Charles the First was an object of suspicion and dislike to a large
proportion of those who yet shuddered at the thought of slaying him:
Charles the Second would excite all the interest which belongs to
distressed youth and innocence. It is impossible to believe that
considerations so obvious, and so important, escaped the most profound
politician of that age. The truth is that Cromwell had, at one
time, meant to mediate between the throne and the Parliament, and to
reorganise the distracted State by the power of the sword, under the
sanction of the royal name. In this design he persisted till he was
compelled to abandon it by the refractory temper of the soldiers, and
by the incurable duplicity of the King. A party in the camp began to
clamour for the head of the traitor, who was for treating with Agag.
Conspiracies were formed. Threats of impeachment were loudly uttered.
A mutiny broke out, which all the vigour and resolution of Oliver
could hardly quell. And though, by a judicious mixture of severity and
kindness, he succeeded in restoring order, he saw that it would be in
the highest degree difficult and perilous to contend against the rage of
warriors, who regarded the fallen tyrant as their foe, and as the foe
of their God. At the same time it became more evident than ever that the
King could not be trusted. The vices of Charles had grown upon him. They
were, indeed, vices which difficulties and perplexities generally bring
out in the strongest light. Cunning is the natural defence of the weak.
A prince, therefore, who is habitually a deceiver when at the height of
power, is not likely to learn frankness in the midst of embarrassments
and distresses. Charles was not only a most unscrupulous but a most
unlucky dissembler. There never was a politician to whom so many frauds
and falsehoods were brought home by undeniable evidence. He publicly
recognised the Houses at Westminster as a legal Parliament, and, at the
same time, made a private minute in council declaring the recognition
null. He publicly disclaimed all thought of calling in foreign aid
against his people: he privately solicited aid from France, from
Denmark, and from Lorraine. He publicly denied that he employed Papists:
at the same time he privately sent to his generals directions to employ
every Papist that would serve. He publicly took the sacrament at Oxford,
as a pledge that he never would even connive at Popery. He privately
assured his wife, that he intended to tolerate Popery in England; and he
authorised Lord Glamorgan to promise that Popery should be established
in Ireland. Then he attempted to clear himself at his agent's expense.
Glamorgan received, in the Royal handwriting, reprimands intended to be
read by others, and eulogies which were to be seen only by himself. To
such an extent, indeed, had insincerity now tainted the King's whole
nature, that his most devoted friends could not refrain from complaining
to each other, with bitter grief and shame, of his crooked politics. His
defeats, they said, gave them less pain than his intrigues. Since he had
been a prisoner, there was no section of the victorious party which had
not been the object both of his flatteries and of his machinations; but
never was he more unfortunate than when he attempted at once to cajole
and to undermine Cromwell.

Cromwell had to determine whether he would put to hazard the attachment
of his party, the attachment of his army, his own greatness, nay his
own life, in an attempt which would probably have been vain, to save
a prince whom no engagement could bind. With many struggles and
misgivings, and probably not without many prayers, the decision was
made. Charles was left to his fate. The military saints resolved that,
in defiance of the old laws of the realm, and of the almost universal
sentiment of the nation, the King should expiate his crimes with
his blood. He for a time expected a death like that of his unhappy
predecessors, Edward the Second and Richard the Second. But he was in
no danger of such treason. Those who had him in their gripe were not
midnight stabbers. What they did they did in order that it might be a
spectacle to heaven and earth, and that it might be held in everlasting
remembrance. They enjoyed keenly the very scandal which they gave. That
the ancient constitution and the public opinion of England were directly
opposed to regicide made regicide seem strangely fascinating to a party
bent on effecting a complete political and social revolution. In order
to accomplish their purpose, it was necessary that they should first
break in pieces every part of the machinery of the government; and this
necessity was rather agreeable than painful to them. The Commons passed
a vote tending to accommodation with the King. The soldiers excluded the
majority by force. The Lords unanimously rejected the proposition that
the King should be brought to trial. Their house was instantly closed.
No court, known to the law, would take on itself the office of judging
the fountain of justice. A revolutionary tribunal was created. That
tribunal pronounced Charles a tyrant, a traitor, a murderer, and a
public enemy; and his head was severed from his shoulders, before
thousands of spectators, in front of the banqueting hall of his own
palace.

In no long time it became manifest that those political and religious
zealots, to whom this deed is to be ascribed, had committed, not only a
crime, but an error. They had given to a prince, hitherto known to his
people chiefly by his faults, an opportunity of displaying, on a great
theatre, before the eyes of all nations and all ages, some qualities
which irresistibly call forth the admiration and love of mankind, the
high spirit of a gallant gentleman, the patience and meekness of a
penitent Christian. Nay, they had so contrived their revenge that the
very man whose life had been a series of attacks on the liberties of
England now seemed to die a martyr in the cause of those liberties. No
demagogue ever produced such an impression on the public mind as the
captive King, who, retaining in that extremity all his regal dignity,
and confronting death with dauntless courage, gave utterance to the
feelings of his oppressed people, manfully refused to plead before
a court unknown to the law, appealed from military violence to the
principles of the constitution, asked by what right the House of Commons
had been purged of its most respectable members and the House of Lords
deprived of its legislative functions, and told his weeping hearers
that he was defending, not only his own cause, but theirs. His long
misgovernment, his innumerable perfidies, were forgotten. His memory
was, in the minds of the great majority of his subjects, associated with
those free institutions which he had, during many years, laboured to
destroy: for those free institutions had perished with him, and, amidst
the mournful silence of a community kept down by arms, had been defended
by his voice alone. From that day began a reaction in favour of monarchy
and of the exiled house, reaction which never ceased till the throne had
again been set up in all its old dignity.

At first, however, the slayers of the King seemed to have derived new
energy from that sacrament of blood by which they had bound themselves
closely together, and separated themselves for ever from the great body
of their countrymen. England was declared a commonwealth. The House of
Commons, reduced to a small number of members, was nominally the supreme
power in the state. In fact, the army and its great chief governed
everything. Oliver had made his choice. He had kept the hearts of his
soldiers, and had broken with almost every other class of his fellow
citizens. Beyond the limits of his camps and fortresses he could
scarcely be said to have a party. Those elements of force which, when
the civil war broke out, had appeared arrayed against each other, were
combined against him; all the Cavaliers, the great majority of the
Roundheads, the Anglican Church, the Presbyterian Church, the Roman
Catholic Church, England, Scotland, Ireland. Yet such, was his genius
and resolution that he was able to overpower and crush everything that
crossed his path, to make himself more absolute master of his country
than any of her legitimate Kings had been, and to make his country more
dreaded and respected than she had been during many generations under
the rule of her legitimate Kings.

England had already ceased to struggle. But the two other kingdoms which
had been governed by the Stuarts were hostile to the new republic. The
Independent party was equally odious to the Roman Catholics of Ireland
and to the Presbyterians of Scotland. Both those countries, lately in
rebellion against Charles the First, now acknowledged the authority of
Charles the Second.

But everything yielded to the vigour and ability of Cromwell. In a
few months he subjugated Ireland, as Ireland had never been subjugated
during the five centuries of slaughter which had elapsed since the
landing of the first Norman settlers. He resolved to put an end to that
conflict of races and religions which had so long distracted the island,
by making the English and Protestant population decidedly predominant.
For this end he gave the rein to the fierce enthusiasm of his followers,
waged war resembling that which Israel waged on the Canaanites, smote
the idolaters with the edge of the sword, so that great cities were left
without inhabitants, drove many thousands to the Continent, shipped off
many thousands to the West Indies, and supplied the void thus made by
pouring in numerous colonists, of Saxon blood, and of Calvinistic faith.
Strange to say, under that iron rule, the conquered country began to
wear an outward face of prosperity.
Districts, which had recently been
as wild as those where the first white settlers of Connecticut were
contending with the red men, were in a few years transformed into the
likeness of Kent and Norfolk. New buildings, roads, and plantations were
everywhere seen. The rent of estates rose fast; and soon the English
landowners began to complain that they were met in every market by the
products of Ireland, and to clamour for protecting laws.

From Ireland the victorious chief, who was now in name, as he had long
been in reality, Lord General of the armies of the Commonwealth, turned
to Scotland. The Young King was there. He had consented to profess
himself a Presbyterian, and to subscribe the Covenant; and, in return
for these concessions, the austere Puritans who bore sway at Edinburgh
had permitted him to assume the crown, and to hold, under their
inspection and control, a solemn and melancholy court. This mock royalty
was of short duration. In two great battles Cromwell annihilated the
military force of Scotland. Charles fled for his life, and, with extreme
difficulty, escaped the fate of his father. The ancient kingdom of the
Stuarts was reduced, for the first time, to profound submission. Of that
independence, so manfully defended against the mightiest and ablest of
the Plantagenets, no vestige was left. The English Parliament made
laws for Scotland. English judges held assizes in Scotland. Even that
stubborn Church, which has held its own against so many governments,
scarce dared to utter an audible murmur.

Thus far there had been at least the semblance of harmony between the
warriors who had subjugated Ireland and Scotland and the politicians who
sate at Westminster: but the alliance which had been cemented by danger
was dissolved by victory. The Parliament forgot that it was but the
creature of the army. The army was less disposed than ever to submit to
the dictation of the Parliament. Indeed the few members who made up what
was contemptuously called the Rump of the House of Commons had no more
claim than the military chiefs to be esteemed the representatives of
the nation. The dispute was soon brought to a decisive issue. Cromwell
filled the House with armed men. The Speaker was pulled out of his
chair, the mace taken from the table, the room cleared, and the door
locked. The nation, which loved neither of the contending parties,
but which was forced, in its own despite, to respect the capacity
and resolution of the General, looked on with patience, if not with
complacency.

King, Lords, and Commons, had now in turn been vanquished and destroyed;
and Cromwell seemed to be left the sole heir of the powers of all three.
Yet were certain limitations still imposed on him by the very army to
which he owed his immense authority. That singular body of men was, for
the most part, composed of zealous republicans. In the act of enslaving
their country, they had deceived themselves into the belief that they
were emancipating her. The book which they venerated furnished them with
a precedent which was frequently in their mouths. It was true that the
ignorant and ungrateful nation murmured against its deliverers. Even so
had another chosen nation murmured against the leader who brought it, by
painful and dreary paths, from the house of bondage to the land flowing
with milk and honey. Yet had that leader rescued his brethren in spite
of themselves; nor had he shrunk from making terrible examples of those
who contemned the proffered freedom, and pined for the fleshpots, the
taskmasters, and the idolatries of Egypt. The object of the warlike
saints who surrounded Cromwell was the settlement of a free and pious
commonwealth. For that end they were ready to employ, without scruple,
any means, however violent and lawless. It was not impossible,
therefore, to establish by their aid a dictatorship such as no King
had ever exercised: but it was probable that their aid would be at once
withdrawn from a ruler who, even under strict constitutional restraints,
should venture to assume the kingly name and dignity.

The sentiments of Cromwell were widely different. He was not what he had
been; nor would it be just to consider the change which his views had
undergone as the effect merely of selfish ambition. He had, when he
came up to the Long Parliament, brought with him from his rural retreat
little knowledge of books, no experience of great affairs, and a temper
galled by the long tyranny of the government and of the hierarchy. He
had, during the thirteen years which followed, gone through a political
education of no common kind. He had been a chief actor in a succession
of revolutions. He had been long the soul, and at last the head, of
a party. He had commanded armies, won battles, negotiated treaties,
subdued, pacified, and regulated kingdoms. It would have been strange
indeed if his notions had been still the same as in the days when his
mind was principally occupied by his fields and his religion, and when
the greatest events which diversified the course of his life were a
cattle fair or a prayer meeting at Huntingdon. He saw that some schemes
of innovation for which he had once been zealous, whether good or bad
in themselves, were opposed to the general feeling of the country, and
that, if he persevered in those schemes, he had nothing before him but
constant troubles, which must be suppressed by the constant use of the
sword. He therefore wished to restore, in all essentials, that ancient
constitution which the majority of the people had always loved, and for
which they now pined. The course afterwards taken by Monk was not open
to Cromwell. The memory of one terrible day separated the great regicide
for ever from the House of Stuart. What remained was that he should
mount the ancient English throne, and reign according to the ancient
English polity. If he could effect this, he might hope that the wounds
of the lacerated State would heal fast. Great numbers of honest
and quiet men would speedily rally round him. Those Royalists whose
attachment was rather to institutions than to persons, to the kingly
office than to King Charles the First or King Charles the Second, would
soon kiss the hand of King Oliver. The peers, who now remained sullenly
at their country houses, and refused to take any part in public affairs,
would, when summoned to their House by the writ of a King in possession,
gladly resume their ancient functions. Northumberland and Bedford,
Manchester and Pembroke, would be proud to bear the crown and the
spurs, the sceptre and the globe, before the restorer of aristocracy. A
sentiment of loyalty would gradually bind the people to the new dynasty;
and, on the decease of the founder of that dynasty, the royal dignity
might descend with general acquiescence to his posterity.

The ablest Royalists were of opinion that these views were correct, and
that, if Cromwell had been permitted to follow his own judgment, the
exiled line would never have been restored. But his plan was directly
opposed to the feelings of the only class which he dared not offend.
The name of King was hateful to the soldiers. Some of them were indeed
unwilling to see the administration in the hands of any single person.
The great majority, however, were disposed to support their general, as
elective first magistrate of a commonwealth, against all factions which
might resist his authority: but they would not consent that he should
assume the regal title, or that the dignity, which was the just reward
of his personal merit, should be declared hereditary in his family. All
that was left to him was to give to the new republic a constitution as
like the constitution of the old monarchy as the army would bear. That
his elevation to power might not seem to be merely his own act, he
convoked a council, composed partly of persons on whose support he could
depend, and partly of persons whose opposition he might safely defy.
This assembly, which he called a Parliament, and which the populace
nicknamed, from one of the most conspicuous members, Barebonesa's
Parliament, after exposing itself during a short time to the public
contempt, surrendered back to the General the powers which it
had received from him, and left him at liberty to frame a plan of
government.

His plan bore, from the first, a considerable resemblance to the old
English constitution: but, in a few years, he thought it safe to proceed
further, and to restore almost every part of the ancient system under
hew names and forms. The title of King was not revived; but the kingly
prerogatives were intrusted to a Lord High Protector. The sovereign
was called not His Majesty, but His Highness. He was not crowned and
anointed in Westminster Abbey, but was solemnly enthroned, girt with
a sword of state, clad in a robe of purple, and presented with a rich
Bible, in Westminster Hall. His office was not declared hereditary: but
he was permitted to name his successor; and none could doubt that he
would name his Son.

A House of Commons was a necessary part of the new polity. In
constituting this body, the Protector showed a wisdom and a public
spirit which were not duly appreciated by his contemporaries. The vices
of the old representative system, though by no means so serious as they
afterwards became, had already been remarked by farsighted men. Cromwell
reformed that system on the same principles on which Mr. Pitt, a hundred
and thirty years later, attempted to reform it, and on which it was at
length reformed in our own times. Small boroughs were disfranchised
even more unsparingly than in 1832; and the number of county members
was greatly increased. Very few unrepresented towns had yet grown into
importance. Of those towns the most considerable were Manchester, Leeds,
and Halifax. Representatives were given to all three. An addition
was made to the number of the members for the capital. The elective
franchise was placed on such a footing that every man of substance,
whether possessed of freehold estates in land or not, had a vote for
the county in which he resided. A few Scotchmen and a few of the English
colonists settled in Ireland were summoned to the assembly which was to
legislate, at Westminster, for every part of the British isles.

To create a House of Lords was a less easy task. Democracy does not
require the support of prescription. Monarchy has often stood without
that support. But a patrician order is the work of time. Oliver found
already existing a nobility, opulent, highly considered, and as popular
with the commonalty as any nobility has ever been. Had he, as King of
England, commanded the peers to meet him in Parliament according to the
old usage of the realm, many of them would undoubtedly have obeyed the
call. This he could not do; and it was to no purpose that he offered
to the chiefs of illustrious families seats in his new senate. They
conceived that they could not accept a nomination to an upstart assembly
without renouncing their birthright and betraying their order. The
Protector was, therefore, under the necessity of filling his Upper House
with new men who, during the late stirring times, had made themselves
conspicuous. This was the least happy of his contrivances, and
displeased all parties. The Levellers were angry with him for
instituting a privileged class. The multitude, which felt respect and
fondness for the great historical names of the land, laughed without
restraint at a House of Lords, in which lucky draymen and shoemakers
were seated, to which few of the old nobles were invited, and from which
almost all those old nobles who were invited turned disdainfully away.

How Oliver's Parliaments were constituted, however, was practically
of little moment: for he possessed the means of conducting the
administration without their support, and in defiance of their
opposition. His wish seems to have been to govern constitutionally, and
to substitute the empire of the laws for that of the sword. But he soon
found that, hated as he was, both by Royalists and Presbyterians, he
could be safe only by being absolute. The first House of Commons which
the people elected by his command, questioned his authority, and was
dissolved without having passed a single act. His second House of
Commons, though it recognised him as Protector, and would gladly have
made him King, obstinately refused to acknowledge his new Lords. He had
no course left but to dissolve the Parliament. "God," he exclaimed, at
parting, "be judge between you and me! "

Yet was the energy of the Protector's administration in nowise relaxed
by these dissensions. Those soldiers who would not suffer him to assume
the kingly title stood by him when he ventured on acts of power, as
high as any English King has ever attempted. The government, therefore,
though in form a republic, was in truth a despotism, moderated only by
the wisdom, the sobriety, and the magnanimity of the despot. The country
was divided into military districts. Those districts were placed under
the command of Major Generals. Every insurrectionary movement was
promptly put down and punished. The fear inspired by the power of the
sword, in so strong, steady, and expert a hand, quelled the spirit both
of Cavaliers and Levellers. The loyal gentry declared that they were
still as ready as ever to risk their lives for the old government and
the old dynasty, if there were the slightest hope of success: but to
rush, at the head of their serving men and tenants, on the pikes of
brigades victorious in a hundred battles and sieges, would be a frantic
waste of innocent and honourable blood. Both Royalists and Republicans,
having no hope in open resistance, began to revolve dark schemes of
assassination: but the Protector's intelligence was good: his vigilance
was unremitting; and, whenever he moved beyond the walls of his palace,
the drawn swords and cuirasses of his trusty bodyguards encompassed him
thick on every side.

Had he been a cruel, licentious, and rapacious prince, the nation might
have found courage in despair, and might have made a convulsive effort
to free itself from military domination. But the grievances which the
country suffered, though such as excited serious discontent, were by
no means such as impel great masses of men to stake their lives, their
fortunes, and the welfare of their families against fearful odds. The
taxation, though heavier than it had been under the Stuarts, was not
heavy when compared with that of the neighbouring states and with
the resources of England. Property was secure. Even the Cavalier, who
refrained from giving disturbance to the new settlement, enjoyed in
peace whatever the civil troubles had left hem. The laws were violated
only in cases where the safety of the Protector's person and government
was concerned. Justice was administered between man and man with an
exactness and purity not before known. Under no English government since
the Reformation, had there been so little religious persecution. The
unfortunate Roman Catholics, indeed, were held to be scarcely within the
pale of Christian charity. But the clergy of the fallen Anglican Church
were suffered to celebrate their worship on condition that they would
abstain from preaching about politics. Even the Jews, whose public
worship had, ever since the thirteenth century, been interdicted, were,
in spite of the strong opposition of jealous traders and fanatical
theologians, permitted to build a synagogue in London.

The Protector's foreign policy at the same time extorted the ungracious
approbation of those who most detested him. The Cavaliers could scarcely
refrain from wishing that one who had done so much to raise the fame of
the nation had been a legitimate King; and the Republicans were forced
to own that the tyrant suffered none but himself to wrong his country,
and that, if he had robbed her of liberty, he had at least given her
glory in exchange. After half a century during which England had been of
scarcely more weight in European politics than Venice or Saxony, she at
once became the most formidable power in the world, dictated terms
of peace to the United Provinces, avenged the common injuries of
Christendom on the pirates of Barbary, vanquished the Spaniards by land
and sea, seized one of the finest West Indian islands, and acquired on
the Flemish coast a fortress which consoled the national pride for the
loss of Calais. She was supreme on the ocean. She was the head of the
Protestant interest. All the reformed Churches scattered over Roman
Catholic kingdoms acknowledged Cromwell as their guardian. The Huguenots
of Languedoc, the shepherds who, in the hamlets of the Alps professed a
Protestantism older than that of Augsburg, were secured from oppression
by the mere terror of his great name The Pope himself was forced to
preach humanity and moderation to Popish princes. For a voice which
seldom threatened in vain had declared that, unless favour were shown
to the people of God, the English guns should be heard in the Castle of
Saint Angelo. In truth, there was nothing which Cromwell had, for his
own sake and that of his family, so much reason to desire as a general
religious war in Europe. In such a war he must have been the captain of
the Protestant armies. The heart of England would have been with him.
His victories would have been hailed with an unanimous enthusiasm
unknown in the country since the rout of the Armada, and would have
effaced the stain which one act, condemned by the general voice of
the nation, has left on his splendid fame. Unhappily for him he had no
opportunity of displaying his admirable military talents, except against
the inhabitants of the British isles.

While he lived his power stood firm, an object of mingled aversion,
admiration, and dread to his subjects. Few indeed loved his government;
but those who hated it most hated it less than they feared it. Had it
been a worse government, it might perhaps have been overthrown in spite
of all its strength. Had it been a weaker government, it would certainly
have been overthrown in spite of all its merits. But it had moderation
enough to abstain from those oppressions which drive men mad; and it
had a force and energy which none but men driven mad by oppression would
venture to encounter.

It has often been affirmed, but with little reason, that Oliver died
at a time fortunate for his renown, and that, if his life had been
prolonged, it would probably have closed amidst disgraces and disasters.
It is certain that he was, to the last, honoured by his soldiers, obeyed
by the whole population of the British islands, and dreaded by all
foreign powers, that he was laid among the ancient sovereigns of England
with funeral pomp such as London had never before seen, and that he
was succeeded by his son Richard as quietly as any King had ever been
succeeded by any Prince of Wales.

During five months, the administration of Richard Cromwell went on
so tranquilly and regularly that all Europe believed him to be firmly
established on the chair of state. In truth his situation was in some
respects much more advantageous than that of his father. The young
man had made no enemy. His hands were unstained by civil blood.
The Cavaliers themselves allowed him to be an honest, good-natured
gentleman. The Presbyterian party, powerful both in numbers and in
wealth, had been at deadly feud with the late Protector, but was
disposed to regard the present Protector with favour. That party had
always been desirous to see the old civil polity of the realm restored
with some clearer definitions and some stronger safeguards for public
liberty, but had many reasons for dreading the restoration of the old
family. Richard was the very man for politicians of this description.
His humanity, ingenuousness, and modesty, the mediocrity of his
abilities, and the docility with which he submitted to the guidance of
persons wiser than himself, admirably qualified him to be the head of a
limited monarchy.

For a time it seemed highly probable that he would, under the direction
of able advisers, effect what his father had attempted in vain. A
Parliament was called, and the writs were directed after the old
fashion. The small boroughs which had recently been disfranchised
regained their lost privilege: Manchester, Leeds, and Halifax ceased to
return members; and the county of York was again limited to two knights.
It may seem strange to a generation which has been excited almost to
madness by the question of parliamentary reform that great shires and
towns should have submitted with patience and even with complacency, to
this change: but though speculative men might, even in that age, discern
the vices of the old representative system, and predict that those vices
would, sooner or later, produce serious practical evil, the practical
evil had not yet been felt. Oliver's representative system, on the other
hand, though constructed on sound principles, was not popular. Both the
events in which it originated, and the effects which it had produced,
prejudiced men against it. It had sprung from military violence. It
had been fruitful of nothing but disputes. The whole nation was sick
of government by the sword, and pined for government by the law. The
restoration, therefore, even of anomalies and abuses, which were in
strict conformity with the law, and which had been destroyed by the
sword, gave general satisfaction.

Among the Commons there was a strong opposition, consisting partly of
avowed Republicans, and partly of concealed Royalists: but a large and
steady majority appeared to be favourable to the plan of reviving
the old civil constitution under a new dynasty. Richard was solemnly
recognised as first magistrate. The Commons not only consented to
transact business with Oliver's Lords, but passed a vote acknowledging
the right of those nobles who had, in the late troubles, taken the side
of public liberty, to sit in the Upper House of Parliament without any
new creation.

Thus far the statesmen by whose advice Richard acted had been
successful. Almost all the parts of the government were now constituted
as they had been constituted at the commencement of the civil war. Had
the Protector and the Parliament been suffered to proceed undisturbed,
there can be little doubt that an order of things similar to that which
was afterwards established under the House of Hanover would have been
established under the House of Cromwell. But there was in the state
a power more than sufficient to deal with Protector and Parliament
together. Over the soldiers Richard had no authority except that which
he derived from the great name which he had inherited. He had never led
them to victory. He had never even borne arms. All his tastes and habits
were pacific. Nor were his opinions and feelings on religious subjects
approved by the military saints. That he was a good man he evinced by
proofs more satisfactory than deep groans or long sermons, by humility
and suavity when he was at the height of human greatness, and by
cheerful resignation under cruel wrongs and misfortunes: but the cant
then common in every guardroom gave him a disgust which he had not
always the prudence to conceal. The officers who had the principal
influence among the troops stationed near London were not his friends.
They were men distinguished by valour and conduct in the field, but
destitute of the wisdom and civil courage which had been conspicuous
in their deceased leader. Some of them were honest, but fanatical,
Independents and Republicans. Of this class Fleetwood was the
representative. Others were impatient to be what Oliver had been. His
rapid elevation, his prosperity and glory, his inauguration in the Hall,
and his gorgeous obsequies in the Abbey, had inflamed their imagination.
They were as well born as he, and as well educated: they could not
understand why they were not as worthy to wear the purple robe, and to
wield the sword of state; and they pursued the objects of their wild
ambition, not, like him, with patience, vigilance, sagacity, and
determination, but with the restlessness and irresolution characteristic
of aspiring mediocrity. Among these feeble copies of a great original
the most conspicuous was Lambert.

On the very day of Richard's accession the officers began to conspire
against their new master. The good understanding which existed between
him and his Parliament hastened the crisis. Alarm and resentment spread
through the camp. Both the religious and the professional feelings of
the army were deeply wounded. It seemed that the Independents were to be
subjected to the Presbyterians, and that the men of the sword were to
be subjected to the men of the gown. A coalition was formed between
the military malecontents and the republican minority of the House of
Commons. It may well be doubted whether Richard could have triumphed
over that coalition, even if he had inherited his father's clear
judgment and iron courage. It is certain that simplicity and meekness
like his were not the qualities which the conjuncture required. He fell
ingloriously, and without a struggle. He was used by the army as an
instrument for the purpose of dissolving the Parliament, and was then
contemptuously thrown aside. The officers gratified their republican
allies by declaring that the expulsion of the Rump had been illegal, and
by inviting that assembly to resume its functions. The old Speaker and a
quorum of the old members came together, and were proclaimed, amidst
the scarcely stifled derision and execration of the whole nation, the
supreme power in the commonwealth. It was at the same time expressly
declared that there should be no first magistrate, and no House of
Lords.

But this state of things could not last. On the day on which the long
Parliament revived, revived also its old quarrel with the army. Again
the Rump forgot that it owed its existence to the pleasure of the
soldiers, and began to treat them as subjects. Again the doors of the
House of Commons were closed by military violence; and a provisional
government, named by the officers, assumed the direction of affairs.

Meanwhile the sense of great evils, and the strong apprehension of still
greater evils close at hand, had at length produced an alliance between
the Cavaliers and the Presbyterians. Some Presbyterians had, indeed,
been disposed to such an alliance even before the death of Charles the
First: but it was not till after the fall of Richard Cromwell that the
whole party became eager for the restoration of the royal house. There
was no longer any reasonable hope that the old constitution could be
reestablished under a new dynasty. One choice only was left, the Stuarts
or the army. The banished family had committed great faults; but it had
dearly expiated those faults, and had undergone a long, and, it might be
hoped, a salutary training in the school of adversity. It was probable
that Charles the Second would take warning by the fate of Charles
the First. But, be this as it might, the dangers which threatened the
country were such that, in order to avert them, some opinions might well
be compromised, and some risks might well be incurred. It seemed but too
likely that England would fall under the most odious and degrading of
all kinds of government, under a government uniting all the evils of
despotism to all the evils of anarchy.