faults, and pretend not wholly to exculpate

truly not very ill beloved by them, nor very ill beloved then by the people, by the good people; and I believe I should have been more, if they had known the truth, as things were before God, and in themselves, and before divers of those gentlemen whom I but now mentioned unto you. I did at the intreaty of divers persons of honour and quality, at the intreaty of very many of the chief officers of the army then present, and at their request, I did accept of the place and title of protector; and was in the presence of the commissioners of the great seal, the judges, the lord mayor and aldermen of the city of London; the soldiery, divers gentlemen, citizens, and divers other people and persons of quality, &c. accompanied to Westminster Hall, where I took my oath to this government. This was not done in a corner; it was open and publick. This government hath been exercised by a council, with a desire to be faithful in all things; and, amongst other trusts, to be faithful in calling this parliament. This is a narrative that discovers to you the series of providence, and of transactions leading me into this condition wherein I now standa." In another of his speeches, he declares, "He undertook the protectorship, not so much out of hope of doing any good, as out of a desire to prevent mischief and evil: and he compares his station to that of a good constable, to keep the peace of the parish." This renders probable what Burnet relates concerning his speeches to the republican enthusiasts, with whom he had been closely connected, and of whom he had availed himself in his rise to greatness." It was no easy thing," says he, "for Cromwell to satisfy those, when he took the power into his own hands; since that looked like a step to kingship, which [John] Goodwin had long represented as the great Antichrist, that hindered Christ's being set on the throne. To these he said, and as some have told

him) yet certain it is he rivalled the greatest of

me, with many tears, that he would rather have taken a shepherd's staff than the protectorship, since nothing was more contrary to his genius than a shew of greatness: but he saw it was necessary at that time to keep the nation from falling into extream disorder, and from becoming open to the common enemy: and therefore he only stept in between the living and the dead, as he phrased it, in that interval, till God should direct them on what bottom they ought to settle: and he assured them, that then he would surrender the heavy load lying upon him, with a joy equal to the sorrow with which he was affected while under that shew of dignitya." This was all very artful, and probably had its intended effect.

-Cromwell in the foregoing speech talks of his having, on the dissolution of the parliament, power over the three nations, boundless and unlimited. This must suppose that he thought he had conquered all, or that all were subject to his rule and command. A strange doctrine! His country might well have cried out, "Are we then so unhappy as to be conquered by the person, whom we hired at a daily rate, like a labourer, to conquer others for us? Did we furnish him with arms only to draw and try upon our enemies, and keep them for ever sheathed in the bowels of his friends? Did we fight for liberty against our prince, that we might become slaves to our servant? The right of conquest can only be exercised upon those against whom the war is declared, and the victory obtained. So that no whole nation can be said to be conquered but by a foreign force. In all civil wars, men are so far from stating the quarrel against their country, that they do it only against a person or party which they really believe, or at least pretend to be pernicious to it; neither can there be any just cause for the destruction of a part of the body, but when it is done for the preservation and safety of the whole. "Tis our country that raises men in

Burnet, vol. I. p. 104.

the English monarchs in glory, and made himself

the quarrel, our country that arms, our country that pays them, our country that authorizes the undertaking, and that distinguishes it from rapine and murder. Lastly, 'tis our country that directs and commands the army, and is indeed their general. So that to say in civil wars that the prevailing party conquers their country, is to say the country conquers itself. And if the general only of that party be the conqueror, the army by which he is made so, is no less conquered than the army which is beaten, and have as little reason to triumph in that victory, by which they lose both their honour and liberty. So that if Cromwell conquered any party, it was only that against which he was sent, and what that was must appear by his commission." As to the distracted state of affairs, by reason of the dissolution of the government, and the tendency all things had to confusion, Mr. Cowley, with his usual spirit, says, "The government was broke; Who broke it? It was dissolved; Who dissolved it? It was extinguished; Who was it but Cromwell, who not only put out the light, but cast away even the very snuff of it? As if a man should murder a whole family, and then possess himself of the whole house, because 'tis better that he, than that only rats should live there b.". However, though Cromwell probably was blameworthy for turning out his masters and dissolving the government, yet as things were, there seems to have been hardly any remedy so ready at hand for the establishment of peace and order, as his assuming the sovereignty, and exerting the power he had got into his hands for the good and benefit of the three nations. All other power, through his means indeed, was extinguished; but there was a necessity for some sovereignty or other to be erected, that men might not be forced upon new civil wars. And who but Cromwell was capable of this? Who so fit, in his own eye at least, to exercise it? But let us attend to the reasons which were given by the protector's order, or at least approbation, for this new settlement. They are contained in a small tract, intitled "A true state of the case of the commonwealth of England, &c. in reference to the late established government, by a lord protector and parliament *."After having spoken concerning the various transactions during the war; the consequences thereof; the authority and government of the long parliament; the carriage and resignation of the next chosen; and severely censured many of the principles professed by some of its members: it goes on to say, "Wherefore upon these, and divers considerations, it was agreed to come to some such solid and certain course of settlement, as might hereafter bar up the way against those manifold inconveniences, which we have felt under other fleeting forms, and reduce us (as near as may be, with most convenience) to our antient way of government by supream magistrates and parliaments. And of this nature is the form now established, and already made publick. But to the end this may be made clear and manifest, we shall in the next place discourse somewhat concerning it in general, and then descend to particulars. In general, we say; that as this last change hath been made upon the same grounds of reason and equity, that necessitated all foregoing changes in the outward forms, and was admitted of absolute necessity to save a sinking nation out of the gulph of misery and confusion, caused by the changeable counsels and corrupt interest of other men, who violated their principles, and brake the trust committed to them: so none of those former alterations did so truly make good, or so fully provide for the security of those great ends of religion and liberty, which were as the blood and spirits running through every vein of the parliament and army's declarations; so that though the commonwealth may now appear with a new face in the outward form, yet it remains still the same in substance, and is of a better complexion and constitution than heretofore. And if we take a survey of the whole together, we find the

1

foundation of this government laid in the people. Who hath the power of altering old laws, or making new? The people in parliament; without them nothing of this nature can be done; they are to be governed only by such laws as they have chosen, or shall chuse, and not to have any imposed upon them. Then who is to administer or govern according to those laws, and see them put in execution? Not a person claiming an hereditary right of sovereignty, or power over the lives and liberties of the nation by birth, allowing the people neither right nor liberty, but what depends upon royal grant and pleasure, according to the tenor of that prerogative challenged heretofore by the kings of England; under whom, if the commonalty enjoyed any thing they might call their own, it was not to be so much esteemed a matter of right, as a boon and effect of grace and favour. But the government now is to be managed by a person that is elective, and that election must take its rise originally and virtually from the people, as we shall fully evince by and by, in particular, and shew that all power, both legislative and executive, doth flow from the community; than which there cannot be greater evidence of publick freedom".""We see our friends have taken in the good of all the three sorts of government, and bound them all in one. If war be, here is the unitive virtue (but nothing else) of monarchy to encounter it; and here is the admirable counsel of aristocrasie to manage it: if peace be, here is the industry and courage of democrasie to improve it. And whereas in the present constitution, the legislative and executive powers are seperated; the former being vested in a constant succession of parliaments elective by the people, the latter in an elective lord protector and his successors, assisted by a council; we conceive the state of this commonwealth reduced to so just a temper, that the ills either of successive parliaments, furnished with power both of executing and making laws, or of a perpetual parliament, (which are division, faction, and confusion) being

• Case of the Commonwealth, p. 27.