The History of England from the First Invasion by the Romans to the Accession of King George the Fifth Part 23

It was resistance that made him a tyrant. The spirit of the people refused to yield to the encroachments of authority; and one act of oppression placed him under the necessity of committing another, till he had revived and enforced all those odious prerogatives, which, though usually claimed, were but sparingly exercised, by his predecessors. For some years his efforts seemed successful; but the Scottish insurrection revealed the delusion; he had parted with the real authority of a king, when he forfeited the confidence and affection of his subjects.

But while we blame the illegal measures of Charles, we ought not to screen from censure the subsequent conduct of his princ.i.p.al opponents. From the moment that war seemed inevitable, they acted as if they thought themselves absolved from all obligations of honour and honesty. They never ceased to inflame the pa.s.sions of the people by misrepresentation and calumny; they exercised a power far more arbitrary and formidable than had ever been claimed by the king; they punished summarily, on mere suspicion, and without attention to the forms of law; and by their committees they established in every county a knot of petty tyrants, who disposed at will of the liberty and property of the inhabitants. Such anomalies may, perhaps, be inseparable from the jealousies, the resentments, and the heart-burnings, which are engendered in civil commotions; but certain it is that right and justice had seldom been more wantonly outraged, than they were by those who professed to have drawn the sword in the defence of right and justice.

Neither should the death of Charles be attributed to the vengeance of the people. They, for the most part, declared themselves satisfied with their victory; they sought not the blood of the captive monarch; they were even, willing to replace him on the throne, under those limitations which they deemed necessary for the preservation of their rights. The men who hurried him to the scaffold were a small faction of bold and ambitious spirits, who had the address to guide the pa.s.sions and fanaticism of their followers, and were enabled through them to control the real sentiments of the nation.

Even of the commissioners appointed to sit in judgment on the king, scarcely one-half could be induced to attend at his trial; and many of those who concurred in his condemnation subscribed the sentence with feelings of shame and remorse. But so it always happens in revolutions: the most violent put themselves forward; their vigilance and activity seem to multiply their number; and the daring of the few wins the ascendancy over the indolence or the pusillanimity of the many.

CHAPTER IV.

THE COMMONWEALTH.

Establishment Of The Commonwealth--Punishment Of The Royalists--Mutiny And Suppression Of The Levellers--Charles Ii Proclaimed In Scotland--Ascendancy Of His Adherents In Ireland--Their Defeat At Rathmines--Success Of Cromwell In Ireland--Defeat Of Montrose, And Landing Of Charles In Scotland-Cromwell Is Sent Against Him--He Gains A Victory At Dunbar--The King Marches Into England--Loses The Battle Of Worcester--His Subsequent Adventures And Escape.

When the two houses first placed themselves in opposition to the sovereign, their demands were limited to the redress of existing grievances; now that the struggle was over, the triumphant party refused to be content with anything less than the abolition of the old, and the establishment of a new and more popular form of government. Some, indeed, still ventured to raise their voices in favour of monarchy, on the plea that it was an inst.i.tution the most congenial to the habits and feelings of Englishmen. By these it was proposed that the two elder sons of Charles should be pa.s.sed by, because their notions were already formed, and their resentments already kindled; that the young duke of Gloucester, or his sister Elizabeth, should be placed on the throne; and that, under the infant sovereign, the royal prerogative should be circ.u.mscribed by law, so as to secure from future encroachment the just liberties of the people. But the majority warmly contended for the establishment of a commonwealth. Why, they asked, should they spontaneously set up again the idol which it had cost them so much blood and treasure to pull down? Laws would prove but feeble restraints on the pa.s.sions of a proud and powerful monarch. If they sought an insuperable barrier to the restoration of despotism, it could be found only in some of those inst.i.tutions which lodge the supreme power with the representatives of the people. That they spoke their real sentiments is not improbable, though we are a.s.sured, by one who was present at their meetings, that personal interest had no small influence in their final determination. They had sinned too deeply against royalty to trust themselves to the mercy, or the moderation, of a king. A republic was their choice, because it promised to shelter them from the vengeance of their enemies, and offered to them the additional advantage of sharing among themselves all the power, the patronage, and the emoluments of office.[1]

In accordance with this decision, the moment the head of the royal victim fell[a] on the scaffold at Whitehall, a proclamation was read in Cheapside, declaring it treason to give to any person the t.i.tle of king without the authority of parliament; and at the same time was published the vote of the 4th of January, that the supreme authority in the nation resided in the representatives of the people. The peers, though aware of their approaching fate, continued to sit; but, after a pause of a few days, the Commons resolved: first,[b] that the House of Lords, and, next,[c] that the office of king, ought to be abolished. These votes, though the acts

[Footnote 1: Whitelock, 391.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1649. Jan. 30.]

[Sidenote b: A.D. 1649. Feb. 6.]

[Sidenote c: A.D. 1649. Feb. 7.]

to be ingrafted on them were postponed, proved sufficient; from that hour the kings.h.i.+p (the word by which the royal dignity was now designated), with the legislative and judicial authority of the peers, was considered extinct, and the lower house, under the name of the parliament of England, concentrated within itself all the powers of government.[1]

The next measure was the appointment, by the Commons, of a council of state, to consist of forty-one members, with powers limited in duration to twelve months. They were charged[a] with the preservation of domestic tranquillity, the care and disposal of the military and naval force, the superintendence of internal and external trade, and the negotiation of treaties with foreign powers. Of the persons selected[b] for this office, three-fourths possessed seats in the house; and they reckoned among them the heads of the law, the chief officers in the army, and five peers, the earls of Denbigh, Mulgrave, Pembroke, and Salisbury, with the Lord Grey of Werke, who condescended to accept the appointment, either through attachment to the cause, or as a compensation for the loss of their hereditary rights.[2] But at the very outset a schism appeared among the new counsellors. The oath required of them by the parliament contained an approval of the king's trial, of the vote against the Scots and their English a.s.sociates, and of the abolition of monarchy and of the House of Lords. By Cromwell and

[Footnote 1: Journals, 1649, Jan. 30, Feb. 6, 7. Cromwell voted in favour of the House of Lords.--Ludlow, i. 246. Could he be sincere? I think not.]

[Footnote 2: The earl of Pembroke had the meanness to solicit and accept the place of representative for Berks.h.i.+re; and his example was imitated by two other peers, the earl of Salisbury and Lord Howard of Escrick, who sat for Lynn and Carlisle.--Journals, April 16, May 5 Sept. 18. Leicester's Journal, 72.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1649. Feb. 13.]

[Sidenote b: A.D. 1649. Feb. 14.]

eighteen others, it was taken cheerfully, and without comment; by the remaining twenty-two, with Fairfax at their head, it was firmly but respectfully refused.[a] The peers alleged that it stood not with their honour to approve upon oath of that which had been done in opposition to their vote; the commoners, that it was not for them to p.r.o.nounce an opinion on judicial proceedings of which they had no official information. But their doubts respecting transactions that were past formed no objection to the authority of the existing government. The House of Commons was in actual possession of the supreme power. From that house they derived protection, to it they owed obedience, and with it they were ready to live and die. Cromwell and his friends had the wisdom to yield; the retrospective clauses were expunged,[b] and in their place was subst.i.tuted a general promise of adhesion to the parliament, both with respect to the existing form of public liberty, and the future government of the nation, "by way of a republic without king or house of peers."[1]

This important revolution drew with it several other alterations. A representation of the House of Commons superseded the royal effigy on the great seal, which was intrusted to three lords-commissioners, Lysle, Keble, and Whitelock; the writs no longer ran in the name of the king, but of "the keepers of the liberty of England by authority of parliament;" new commissions were issued to the judges, sheriffs, and magistrates; and in lieu of the oaths of allegiance and supremacy, was required an engagement to be true to the commonwealth of England. Of the

[Footnote 1: Journals, Feb. 7, 13, 14, 15, 19, 22. Whitelock, 378, 382, 383. The amended oath is in Walker, part ii. 130.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1649. Feb. 17.]

[Sidenote b: A.D. 1649. Feb. 22.]

judges, six resigned; the other six consented to retain their situations, if parliament would issue a proclamation declaratory of its intention to maintain the fundamental laws of the kingdom. The condition was accepted and fulfilled;[1] the courts proceeded to hear and determine causes after the ancient manner; and the great body of the people scarcely felt the important change which had been made in the government of the country. For several years past the supreme authority had been administered in the name of the king by the two houses at Westminster, with the aid of the committee at Derby House; now the same authority was equally administered in the name of the people by one house only, and with the advice of a council of state.

The merit or demerit of thus erecting a commonwealth on the ruins of the monarchy chiefly belongs to Cromwell, Ireton, Bradshaw, and Marten, who by their superior influence guided and controlled the opinions and pa.s.sions of their a.s.sociates in the senate and the army. After the king's death they derived much valuable aid from the talents of Vane,[2] Whitelock, and St.

John; and a feeble l.u.s.tre was shed on their cause by the accession of the five peers

[Footnote 1: Journals, Feb. 8. Yet neither this declaration nor the frequent remonstrances of the lawyers could prevent the house from usurping the office of the judges, or from inflicting illegal punishments. Thus, for example, on the report of a committee, detailing the discovery of a conspiracy to extort money by a false charge of delinquency, the house, without hearing the accused, or sending them before a court of justice, proceeded to inflict on some the penalties of the pillory, fine, and imprisonment, and adjudged Mrs. Samford, as the princ.i.p.al, to be whipped the next day from Newgate to the Old Exchange, and to be kept to hard labour for three months.--Journals, 1650, Feb. 2, Aug. 13.]

[Footnote 2: Immediately after Pride's purge, Vane, disgusted at the intolerance of his own party, left London, and retired to Raby Castle; he was now induced to rejoin them, and resumed his seat on Feb. 26.]

from the abolished House of Lords. But, after all, what right could this handful of men have to impose a new const.i.tution on the kingdom? Ought they not, in consistency with their own principles, to have ascertained the sense of the nation by calling a new parliament? The question was raised, but the leaders, aware that their power was based on the sword of the military, shrunk from the experiment; and, to elude the demands of their opponents, appointed a committee to regulate the succession of parliaments and the election of members; a committee, which repeatedly met and deliberated, but never brought the question to any definitive conclusion.

Still, when the new authorities looked around the house, and observed the empty benches, they were admonished of their own insignificance, and of the hollowness of their pretensions. They claimed the sovereign authority, as the representatives of the people; but the majority of those representatives had been excluded by successive acts of military violence; and the house had been reduced from more than five hundred members, to less than one-seventh of that number. For the credit and security of the government it was necessary both to supply the deficiency, and, at the same time, to oppose a bar to the introduction of men of opposite principles.

With this view, they resolved[a] to continue the exclusion of those who had on the 5th of December a.s.sented to the vote, that the king's "concessions were a sufficient ground to proceed to a settlement;" but to open the house to all others who should previously enter on the journals their dissent from that resolution.[1] By this expedient, and by occasional writs for elections in those places where

[Footnote 1: Journ. Feb. 1. Walker, part ii. 115. Whitelock, 376.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1649. Feb. 1.]

the influence of the party was irresistible, the number of members gradually rose to one hundred and fifty, though it was seldom that the attendance of one-half, or even of one-third, could be procured.

During the war, the dread of retaliation had taught the two parties to temper with moderation the license of victory. Little blood had been shed except in the field of battle. But now that check was removed. The fanatics, not satisfied with the death of the king, demanded, with the Bible in their hands, additional victims; and the politicians deemed it prudent by the display of punishment to restrain the machinations of their enemies. Among the royalists in custody were the duke of Hamilton (who was also earl of Cambridge in England), the earl of Holland, Goring, earl of Norwich, the Lord Capel, and Sir John Owen, all engaged in the last attempt for the restoration of Charles to the throne. By a resolution of the House of Commons in November, Hamilton had been adjudged to pay a fine of one hundred thousand pounds, and the other four to remain in perpetual imprisonment; but after the triumph of the Independents, this vote had been rescinded,[a] and a high court of justice was now established to try the same persons on a charge of high treason. It was in vain that Hamilton pleaded[b] the order of the Scottish parliament under which he had acted; that Capel demanded to be brought before his peers, or a jury of his countrymen, according to those fundamental laws which the parliament had promised to maintain; that all invoked the national faith in favour of that quarter which they had obtained at the time of their surrender. Bradshaw, the president, delivered the opinions of the court. To Hamilton, he replied,

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1649. Feb. 1.]

[Sidenote b: A.D. 1649. Feb. 10.]

that, as an English earl, he was amenable to the justice of the country; to Capel, that the court had been established by the parliament, the supreme authority to which all must submit; to each, that quarter given on the field of battle insured protection from the sword of the conqueror, but not from the vengeance of the law. All five were condemned[a] to lose their heads; but the rigour of the judgment was softened[b] by a reference to the mercy of parliament. The next day the wives of Holland and Capel, accompanied by a long train of females in mourning, appeared at the bar, to solicit the pardon of the condemned. Though their pet.i.tions were rejected, a respite for two days was granted. This favour awakened new hopes; recourse was had to flattery and entreaty; bribes were offered and accepted; and the following morning[c] new pet.i.tions were presented. The fate of Holland occupied a debate of considerable interest. Among the Independents he had many personal friends, and the Presbyterians exerted all their influence in his favour. But the saints expatiated on his repeated apostasy from the cause; and, after a sharp contest, Cromwell and Ireton obtained a majority of a single voice for his death. The case of Goring was next considered. No man during the war had treated his opponents with more bitter contumely, no one had inflicted on them deeper injuries; and yet, on an equal division, his life was saved by the casting voice of the speaker. The sentences of Hamilton and Capel were affirmed by the unanimous vote of the house; but, to the surprise of all men, Owen, a stranger, without friends or interest, had the good fortune to escape. His forlorn condition moved the pity of Colonel Hutchinson; the efforts of Hutchinson

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1649. March 6.]

[Sidenote b: A.D. 1649. March 7.]

[Sidenote c: A.D. 1649. March 8.]

were seconded by Ireton; and so powerful was their united influence, that they obtained a majority of five in his favour. Hamilton, Holland, and Capel died[a] on the scaffold, the first martyrs of loyalty after the establishment of the commonwealth.[1]

But, though the avowed enemies of the cause crouched before their conquerors, there was much in the internal state of the country to awaken apprehension in the b.r.e.a.s.t.s of Cromwell and his friends. There could be no doubt that the ancient royalists longed for the opportunity of avenging the blood of the king; or that the new royalists, the Presbyterians, who sought to re-establish the throne on the conditions stipulated by the treaty in the Isle of Wight, bore with impatience the superiority of their rivals.

Throughout the kingdom the lower cla.s.ses loudly complained of the burthen of taxation; in several parts they suffered under the pressure of penury and famine. In Lancas.h.i.+re and Westmoreland numbers perished through want; and it was certified by the magistrates of c.u.mberland that thirty thousand families in that county "had neither seed nor bread corn, nor the means of procuring either."[2] But that which chiefly created alarm was the progress made among the military by the "Levellers," men of consistent principles and uncompromising conduct under the guidance of Colonel John Lilburne, an officer distinguished by his talents, his eloquence, and

[Footnote 1: If the reader compares the detailed narrative of these proceedings by Clarendon (iii. 265-270), with the official account in the Journals (March 7, 8), he will be surprised at the numerous inaccuracies of the historian. See also the State Trials; England's b.l.o.o.d.y Tribunal; Whitelock, 386; Burnet's Hamiltons, 385; Leicester's Journal, 70; Ludlow, i. 247; and Hutchinson, 310.]

[Footnote 2: Whitelock, 398, 399.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1649. Mar. 9.]

his courage.[1] Lilburne, with his friends, had long cherished a suspicion that Cromwell, Ireton, and Harrison sought only their private aggrandizement under the mantle of patriotism; and the recent changes had converted this suspicion into conviction. They observed that the same men ruled without control in the general council of officers, in the parliament, and in the council of state. They contended that every question was first debated and settled in the council of officers, and that, if their determination was afterwards adopted by the house, it was only that it might go forth to the public under the pretended sanction of the representatives of the nation; that the council of state had been vested with powers more absolute and oppressive than had ever been exercised by the late king; and that the High Court of Justice had been established by the party for the purpose of depriving their victims of those remedies which would be afforded by the ordinary courts of law. In some of their publications they went further. They maintained that the council of state was employed as an experiment on the patience of the nation; that it was intended to pa.s.s from the tyranny of a few to the tyranny of one; and that Oliver Cromwell was the man who aspired to that high but dangerous pre-eminence.[2]

A plan of the intended const.i.tution, ent.i.tled "the

[Footnote 1: Lilburne in his youth had been a partisan of Bastwick, and had printed one of his tracts in Holland. Before the Star-chamber he refused to take the oath _ex officio_, or to answer interrogatories, and in consequence was condemned to stand in the pillory, was whipped from the Fleet-prison to Westminster, receiving five hundred lashes with knotted cords, and was imprisoned with double irons on his hands and legs. Three years later (1641), the House of Commons voted the punishment illegal, b.l.o.o.d.y, barbarous, and tyrannical.--Burton's Diary, iii. 503, note.]

[Footnote 2: See England's New Chains Discovered, and the Hunting of the Foxes, pa.s.sim; the King's Pamphlets, No. 411, xxi.; 414, xii. xvi.]

agreement of the people," had been sanctioned by the council of officers, and presented[a] by Fairfax to the House of Commons, that it might be transmitted to the several counties, and there receive the approbation of the inhabitants. As a sop to shut the mouth of Cerberus, the sum of three thousand pounds, to be raised from the estates of delinquents in the county of Durham, had been voted[b] to Lilburne; but the moment he returned from the north, he appeared at the bar of the house, and pet.i.tioned against "the agreement," objecting in particular to one of the provisions by which the parliament was to sit but six months, every two years, and the government of the nation during the other eighteen months was to be intrusted to the council of state. His example was quickly followed; and the table was covered with a succession of pet.i.tions from officers and soldiers, and "the well-affected" in different counties, who demanded that a new parliament should be holden every year; that during the intervals the supreme power should be exercised by a committee of the house; that no member of the last should sit in the succeeding parliament; that the self-denying ordinance should be enforced; that no officer should retain his command in the army for more than a certain period; that the High Court of Justice should be abolished as contrary to law, and the council of state, as likely to become an engine of tyranny; that the proceedings in the courts should be in the English language, the number of lawyers diminished, and their fees reduced; that the excise and customs should be taken away, and the lands of delinquents sold for compensation to the well-affected; that religion should be "reformed according to the mind of G.o.d;" that no one should be molested or incapacitated

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1649. Jan. 20.]