The History of England from the First Invasion by the Romans to the Accession of King George the Fifth Part 43

acceptance;[1] but the queen-mother and the other counsellors were so unwilling to give the English a footing in France, that he acquiesced in their opinion, and a refusal was returned. Cromwell did not fail to resent the disappointment. By the facility which he afforded to the Spanish levies in Ireland, their army in Flanders was enabled to reduce Gravelines, and, soon afterwards, to invest[a] Dunkirk. That fortress was on the point of capitulating when a French flotilla of seven sail, carrying from twenty to thirty guns each, and laden with stores and provisions, was descried[b]

stealing along the sh.o.r.e to its relief. Blake, who had received secret orders from the council, gave chase; the whole squadron was captured, and the next day[c] Dunkirk opened its gates.[2] By the French court this action was p.r.o.nounced an unprovoked and unjustifiable injury; but Mazarin coolly calculated the probable consequences of a war, and, after some time, sent[d] over Bordeaux, under the pretence of claiming the captured s.h.i.+ps, but in reality to oppose the intrigues of the agents of Spain, of the prince of Conde, and of the city of Bordeaux, who laboured to obtain the support of the commonwealth in opposition to the French court.[3]

Bordeaux had been appointed[e] amba.s.sador to the parliament; after the inauguration of Cromwell, it became necessary to appoint him amba.s.sador to his

[Footnote 1: Here Louis XIV., to whom we are indebted for this anecdote observes; that it was the cardinal's maxim de pourvoir, a quelque prix qu'il fut, aux affaires presentes, persuade que les maux a venir, trouveroient leur remede dans l'avenir meme.--Oeuvres de Louis XIV. i.

170.]

[Footnote 2: Ibid. 168-170. See also Heath, 325; Thurloe, i. 214; Whitelock, 543.]

[Footnote 3: Journals, 14 Dec. 1652. Clar. Pap. iii. 105, 123, 132.

Thurloe, i. 436.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1652. May 8.]

[Sidenote b: A.D. 1652. Sept. 5.]

[Sidenote c: A.D. 1652. Sept. 6.]

[Sidenote d: A.D. 1652. Dec. 10.]

[Sidenote e: A.D. 1653. Feb. 21.]

highness the protector. But in what style was Louis to address the usurper by letter? "Mon cousin" was offered and refused; "mon frere," which Cromwell sought, was offensive to the pride of the monarch; and, as a temperament between the two, "monsieur le protecteur" was given and accepted. Bordeaux proposed a treaty of amity, by which all letters-of-marque should be recalled, and the damages suffered by the merchants of the two nations be referred to foreign arbitrators. To thwart the efforts of his rival, Don Alonzo, abandoning his former project, brought forward the proposal of a new commercial treaty between England and Spain. Cromwell was in no haste to conclude with either. He was aware that the war between them was the true cause of these applications; that he held the balance in his hand, and that it was in his power at any moment to incline it in favour of either of the two crowns. His determination, indeed, had long been taken; but it was not his purpose to let it transpire; and when he was asked the object of the two great armaments preparing in the English ports, he refused to give any satisfactory explanation.[1]

In this state of the treaty, its further progress was for a while suspended by the meeting[a] of the protector's first parliament. He had summoned it for the 3rd of September, his fortunate day, as he perhaps believed himself, as he certainly wished it to be believed by others. But the 3rd happened in that year to fall on a Sunday; and, that the Sabbath might not be profaned

[Footnote 1: Thurloe, i. 760; ii. 61, 113, 228, 559, 587. An obstacle was opposed to the progress of the treaty by the conduct of Le Baas, a dependant on Mazarin, and sent to aid Bordeaux with his advice. After some time, it was discovered that this man (whether by order of the minister, or at the solicitation of the royalists, is uncertain) was intriguing with the malcontents. Cromwell compelled him to return to France.--Thurloe, ii. 309, 351, 412, 437.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1654. Sept. 3.]

by the agitation of worldly business, he requested the members to meet him at sermon in Westminster Abbey on the following morning.[a] At ten the procession set out from Whitehall. It was opened by two troops of life-guards; then rode some hundreds of gentlemen and officers, bareheaded, and in splendid apparel; immediately before the carriage walked the pages and lackeys of the protector in rich liveries, and on each side a captain of the guard; behind it came Claypole, master of the horse, leading a charger magnificently caparisoned, and Claypole was followed by the great officers of state and the members of the council. The personal appearance of the protector formed a striking contrast with the parade of the procession. He was dressed in a plain suit, after the fas.h.i.+on of a country gentleman, and was chiefly distinguished from his attendants by his superior simplicity, and the privilege of wearing his hat. After sermon, he placed himself in the chair of state in the Painted Chamber, while the members seated themselves, uncovered on benches ranged along the walls. The protector then rose, took off his hat, and addressed them in a speech which lasted three hours. It was, after his usual style, verbose, involved, and obscure, sprinkled with quotations from Scripture to refresh the piety of the saints, and seasoned with an affectation of modesty to disarm the enmity of the republicans. He described the state of the nation at the close of the last parliament. It was agitated by the principles of the Levellers, tending to reduce all to an equality; by the doctrines of the Fifth-monarchy men, subversive of civil government; by religious theorists, the pretended champions of liberty of conscience, who condemned an established ministry as Babylonish and antichristian;

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1654. Sept. 4.]

and by swarms of Jesuits, who had settled in England an episcopal jurisdiction to pervert the people. At the same time the naval war with Holland absorbed all the pecuniary resources, while a commercial war with France and Portugal cramped the industry of the nation. He then bade them contrast this picture with the existing state of things. The taxes had been reduced; judges of talent and integrity had been placed upon the bench; the burthen of the commissioners of the great seal had been lightened by the removal of many descriptions of causes from the court of Chancery to the ordinary courts of law; and "a stop had been put to that heady way for every man, who pleased, to become a preacher." The war with Holland had terminated in an advantageous peace; treaties of commerce and amity had been concluded with Denmark and Sweden;[1] a similar treaty, which would place the British trader beyond the reach of the Inquisition, had been signed with Portugal, and another was in progress with the amba.s.sador of the French monarch. Thus had the government brought the three nations by hasty strides towards the land of promise; it was for the parliament to introduce them into it. The prospect was bright before them; let them not look

[Footnote 1: That with Sweden was negotiated by Whitelock, who had been sent on that mission against his will by the influence of Cromwell. The object was to detach Sweden from the interest of France, and engage it to maintain the liberty of trade in the Baltic, against Denmark, which was under the influence of Holland. It was concluded April 11. After the peace with Holland, the Danish monarch hastened to appease the protector; the treaty which, though said by Cromwell to be already concluded, was not signed till eleven days afterwards, stipulated that the English traders should pay no other customs or dues than the Dutch. Thus they were enabled to import naval stores on the same terms, while before, on account of the heavy duties, they bought them at second hand of the Dutch.--See the treaties in Dumont. v. part ii. p. 80, 92.]

back to the onions and flesh-pots of Egypt. He spoke not as their lord, but their fellow-servant, a labourer with them in the same good work; and would therefore detain them no longer, but desire them to repair to their own house, and to choose their speaker.[1]

To procure a parliament favourable to his designs, all the power of the government had been employed to influence the elections; the returns had been examined by a committee of the council, under the pretext of seeing that the provisions of the "instrument" were observed; and the consequence was, that the Lord Grey of Groby, Major Wildman, and some other noted republicans, had been excluded by command of the protector. Still he found himself unable to mould the house to his wishes. By the court, Lenthall was put in nomination for the office of speaker; by the opposition, Bradshaw, the boldest and most able of the opposite party. After a short debate, Lenthall was chosen, by the one, because they knew him to be a timid and a time-serving character; by the other, because they thought that, to place him in the chair, was one step towards the revival of the long parliament, of which he had been speaker. But no one ventured to propose that he should be offered, according to ancient custom, to the acceptance of the supreme magistrate. This was thought to savour too much of royalty.[2]

[Footnote 1: Compare the official copy printed by G. Sawbridge, 1654, with the abstract by Whitelock (599, 600), and by Bordeaux (Thurloe, ii. 518).

See also Journals, Sept. 3, 4.]

[Footnote 2: It appears from the Council Book (1654, Aug. 21), that, on that day, letters were despatched to the sheriffs, containing the names of the members who had been approved by the council, with orders to give them notice to attend. The letters to the more distant places were sent first, that they might all be received about the same time.]

It was not long before the relative strength of the parties was ascertained. After a sharp debate,[a] in which it was repeatedly asked why the members of the long parliament then present should not resume the authority of which they had been illegally deprived by force, and by what right, but that of the sword, one man presumed to "command his commanders,"

the question was put, that the house resolve itself into a committee, to determine whether or not the government shall be in a single person and a parliament; and, to the surprise and alarm of Cromwell, it was carried[b]

against the court by a majority of five voices.[1] The leaders of the opposition were Bradshaw, Hazlerig, and Scot, who now contended in the committee that the existing government emanated from an incompetent authority, and stood in opposition to the solemn determination of a legitimate parliament; while the protectorists, with equal warmth, maintained that, since it had been approved by the people, the only real source of power, it could not be subject to revision by the representatives of the people. The debate lasted several days,[c] during which the commonwealth party gradually increased in number. That the executive power might be profitably delegated to a single individual, was not disputed; but it was contended that, of right, the legislative authority belonged exclusively to the parliament. The officers and courtiers, finding that the sense of the house was against them, dropped[d] the question of right, and fled to that of expediency; in the existing circ.u.mstances, the public safety required a

[Footnote 1: Journals, Sept. 8. Many of those who voted in the majority did not object to the authority of the protector, but to the source from which it emanated,--a written instrument, the author of which was unknown. They wished it to be settled on him by act of parliament.--Thurloe, ii. 606.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1654. Sept. 7.]

[Sidenote b: A.D. 1654. Sept. 8.]

[Sidenote c: A.D. 1654. Sept. 9.]

[Sidenote d: A.D. 1654. Sept. 11.]

check on the otherwise unbounded power of parliament; that check could be no other than a co-ordinate authority, possessing a negative voice; and that authority was the protector, who had been pointed out to them by Providence, acknowledged by the people in their addresses, and confirmed by the conditions expressed in the indentures of the members. It was replied, that the inconveniency of such a check had induced the nation to abolish the kingly government; that the addresses of the people expressed their joy for their deliverance from the incapacity of the little parliament, not their approbation of the new government; that Providence often permits what it disapproves; and that the indentures were an artifice of the court, which could not have force to bind the supreme power. To reconcile the disputants, a compromise between the parties had been planned; but Cromwell would not suffer the experiment to be tried.[1] Having ordered[b] Harrison, whose partisans were collecting signatures to a pet.i.tion, to be taken into custody, he despatched three regiments to occupy the princ.i.p.al posts in the city, and commanded the attendance of the house in the Painted Chamber.

There, laying aside that tone of modesty which he had hitherto a.s.sumed, he frankly told the members that his calling was from G.o.d, his testimony from the people; and that no one but G.o.d and the people should ever take his office from him. It was not of his seeking; G.o.d knew that it was his utmost ambition to lead the life of a country gentleman; but imperious circ.u.mstances had imposed it upon him. The long parliament brought their dissolution upon themselves by despotism, the little parliament

[Footnote 1: See introduction to Burton's Diary, xxiv.-x.x.xii.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1654. Sept. 12.]

by imbecility.[1] On each occasion he found himself invested with absolute power over the military, and, through the military, over the three nations.

But on each occasion he was anxious to part with that power; and if, at last, he had acquiesced in the instrument of government, it was because it made the parliament a check on the protector, and the protector a check on the parliament. That he did not bring himself into his present situation, he had G.o.d for a witness above, his conscience for a witness within, and a cloud of witnesses without; he had the persons who attended when he took the oath of fidelity to "the instrument;" the officers of the army in the three nations, who testified their approbation by their signatures; the city of London, which feasted him, the counties, cities, and boroughs, that had sent him addresses; the judges, magistrates, and sheriffs, who acted by his commission; and the very men who now stood before him, for they came there in obedience to his writ, and under the express condition that "the persons so chosen should not

[Footnote 1: It is remarkable that, in noticing the despotism of the long parliament, he makes mention of the very same thing, which his enemy Lilburne urged against it: "by taking the judgment, both in capital and criminal things, to themselves, who in former times were not known to exercise such a judicature." He boldly maintains that they meant to perpetuate themselves by filling up vacancies as they occurred, and had made several applications to him to obtain his consent. He adds, "Poor men, under this arbitrary power, were driven like flocks of sheep by forty in a morning, to the confiscation of goods and estates, without any man being able to give a reason that two of them had deserved to forfeit a s.h.i.+lling.

I tell you the truth; and my soul, and many persons whose faces I see in this place, were exceedingly grieved at these things, and knew not which way to help it, but by their mournings, and giving their negatives when the occasion served." I notice this pa.s.sage, because since the discovery of the sequestrators' papers it has been thought, from the regularity with which their books were kept, and the seeming equity of their proceedings, as they are entered, that little injustice was done.]

have power to change the government as settled in one single person and the parliament." He would, therefore, have them to know, that four things were fundamental: 1. That the supreme power should be vested in a single person and parliament; 2. that the parliament should be successive, and not perpetual; 3. that neither protector nor parliament alone should possess the uncontrolled command of the military force; and 4. that liberty of conscience should be fenced round with such barriers as might exclude both profaneness and persecution. The other articles of the instrument were less essential; they might be altered with circ.u.mstances; and he should always be ready to agree to what was reasonable. But he would not permit them to sit, and yet disown the authority by which they sat. For this purpose he had prepared a recognition which he required them to sign. Those who refused would be excluded the house; the rest would find admission, and might exercise their legislative power without control, for his negative remained in force no longer than twenty days. Let them limit his authority if they pleased. He would cheerfully submit, provided he thought it for the interest of the people.[1]

The members, on their return, found a guard of soldiers at the door of the house, and a parchment for signatures lying on a table in the lobby. It contained the recognition of which the protector had spoken; a pledge that the subscribers would neither propose nor consent to alter the government, as it was settled in one person and a parliament. It was immediately signed by Lenthall, the speaker; his example was followed by the court party; and in the course of a few

[Footnote 1: Printed by G. Sawbridge, 1654.]

days almost three hundred names were subscribed. The Stanch republicans refused; yet the sequel showed that their exclusion did not give to the court that ascendancy in the house which had been antic.i.p.ated.[1]

About this time an extraordinary accident occurred. Among the presents which Cromwell had received from foreign princes, were six Friesland coach-horses from the duke of Oldenburg. One day,[a] after he had dined with Thurloe under the shade in the park, the fancy took him to try the mettle of the horses. The secretary was compelled to enter the carriage; the protector, forgetful of his station, mounted the box. The horses at first appeared obedient to the hand of the new coachman; but the too frequent application of the lash drove them into a gallop, and the protector was suddenly precipitated from his seat. At first, he lay suspended by the pole with his leg entangled in the harness; and the explosion of a loaded pistol in one of his pockets added to the fright and the rapidity of the horses; but a fortunate jerk extricated his foot from his shoe, and he fell under the body of the carriage without meeting with injury from the wheels. He was immediately taken up by his guards, who followed at full speed, and conveyed to Whitehall; Thurloe leaped from the door of the carriage, and escaped with a sprained ancle and some severe bruises. Both were confined to their chambers for a long time;

[Footnote 1: Thurloe, ii. 606. Whitelock, 605. Journals, Sept. 5-18.

Fleetwood, from Dublin, asks Thurloe, "How cam it to pa.s.se, that this last teste was not at the first sitting of the house?" (ii. 620). See in Archaeol. xxiv. 39, a letter showing that several, who refused to subscribe at first through motives of conscience, did so later. This was in consequence of a declaration that the recognition did not comprehend all the forty-two articles in "the instrument," but only what concerned the government by a single person and successive parliaments.--See Journals, Sept. 14.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1654. Sept. 24.]

but by many, their confinement was attributed as much to policy as to indisposition. The Cavaliers diverted themselves by prophesying that, as his first fall had been from a coach, the next would be from a cart: to the public, the explosion of the pistol revealed the secret terrors which haunted his mind, that sense of insecurity, those fears of a.s.sa.s.sination, which are the usual meed of inordinate and successful ambition.[1]

The force so lately put on the parliament, and the occasion of that force, had opened the eyes of the most devoted among his adherents. His protestations of disinterestedness, his solemn appeals to Heaven in testimony of his wish to lead the life of a private gentleman, were contrasted with his aspiring and arbitrary conduct; and the house, though deprived of one-fourth of its number, still contained a majority jealous of his designs and anxious to limit his authority. The accident which had placed his life in jeopardy naturally led to the consideration of the probable consequences of his death; and, to sound the disposition of the members, the question of the succession was repeatedly, though not formally, introduced. The remarks which it provoked afforded little encouragement to his hopes; yet, when the previous arrangements had been made, and all the dependants of the government had been mustered, Lambert, having in a long and studied speech detailed the evils of elective, the benefits of hereditary, succession, moved[a] that the office of protector should be limited to the family of Oliver Cromwell, according to the known law of inheritance. To the surprise and the mortification

[Footnote 1: Heath, 363. Thurloe, ii. 652, 653, 672. Ludlow, ii. 63.

Vaughan, i. 69.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1654. Oct. 13.]

of the party, the motion was negatived by a division of two hundred against eighty voices; and it was resolved that, on the death of the protector, his successor should be chosen by the parliament if it were sitting, and by the council in the absence of parliament.[1]

This experiment had sufficiently proved the feelings of the majority.

Aware, however, of their relative weakness, they were careful to give Cromwell no tangible cause of offence. If they appointed committees to revise the ordinances which he had published, they affected to consider them as merely provisional regulations, supplying the place of laws till the meeting of parliament. If they examined in detail the forty-two articles of "the instrument," rejecting some, and amending others, they still withheld their unhallowed hands from those subjects which _he_ had p.r.o.nounced sacred,--the four immovable pillars on which the new const.i.tution was built. Cromwell, on his part, betrayed no symptom of impatience; but waited quietly for the moment when he had resolved

[Footnote 1: Thurloe, i. 668, 681, 685. Whitelock, 607. Journals, Nov. 30.

Though the house was daily occupied with the important question of the government, it found leisure to inquire into the theological opinions of John Biddle, who may be styled the father of the English Unitarians. He had been thrice imprisoned by the long parliament, and was at last liberated by the act of oblivion in 1652. The republication of his opinions attracted the notice of the present parliament: to the questions put to him by the speaker, he replied, that he could nowhere find in Scripture that Christ or the Holy Ghost is called G.o.d; and it was resolved that he should be committed to the Gatehouse, and that a bill to punish him should be prepared. The dissolution saved his life; and by application to the Upper Bench, he recovered his liberty; but was again arrested in 1655, and sent to the isle of Scilly, to remain for life in the castle of St. Mary.