Defeat of Van Tromp-Character of the Little Parliament-Cromwell's Address to this Assembly -Its Provisional Constitution-Their proceedings and tendencies-Resignation of the Little Parliament-Oliver inaugurated as Protector-Social Condition of the Kingdom.

THE summons which Cromwell sent throughout the country for the assembling of a body of men that should, in some degree, though not wholly as a parliament, represent the interest of England, Scotland, and Ireland, was made public at a propitious season of national triumph. On the 4th of June, Blake and Monk had sent a despatch to Cromwell, announcing a great victory over the Dutch fleet. Monk and Dean were cruising, with a portion of the English fleet, between the North Foreland and Nieuport; Blake was on our northern coasts. Van Tromp decided to encounter the fleet thus separated from their great admiral. The engagement continued all through the day of the 2nd of June. Dean had been killed by a cannon-shot at the

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first broadside. Each of the fleets had been sorely crippled when night separated them. The action re-commenced on the 3rd. On that morning the sound of cannon from the north told the welcome news to Monk that the Sea-king was at hand. Blake's ships broke through the Dutch line. Van Tromp fought with desperation. His ship, the Brederode, was boarded by the crew of Penn's flag-ship, the James, after having repulsed Van Tromp's boarders. The Dutch admiral, resolved not to be a prisoner, threw a lighted match into his own powder-magazine. The explosion blew up the deck, but he himself escaped, to renew the battle in a frigate. He at last felt that he was beaten; retreated to his own coasts; and left with the triumphant English eleven vessels and thirteen hundred and fifty prisoners. The Council of State ordered a thanksgiving for the victory. Cromwell's Little Parliament met, on the 4th of July, under prosperous auspices.

The character of this Little Parliament has been studiously misrepresented. We are taught to believe, especially in histories addressed to the youthful understanding, that "the persons pitched upon for exercising this seemingly important trust were the lowest, meanest, and most ignorant among the citizens, and the very dregs of the fanatics."* Clarendon's statement, "there were among them divers of the quality and degree of gentlemen," is wholly suppressed in the usual narratives. Hume's chief objection to them is a characteristic one-" They began with seeking God by prayer." The great scandal of this Assembly was that amongst them " was Praise-God Barebones, a leather-seller of Fleet Street; as Clarendon mentions, to enable men to form a judgment of the rest. It has no great historical interest to discuss, as some have done, whether the leather-merchant was named Barebones, or Barbone. There he is, sitting by the side of Robert Blake, when Robert has no fighting on his hands; and with Francis Rouse, Provost of Eton, and sundry men, not altogether the lowest, meanest, and most ignorant, bearing the aristocratic names of Montagu, Howard, and Anthony Ashley Cooper. To Cromwell's Summons only two answered by non-attendance. Whitelocke, not at that exact time in good humour with Cromwell, expresses his surprise that "many of this Assembly being persons of fortune and knowledge" they would accept the supreme authority of the nation from such hands. The "persons of fortune and knowledge -even the leather-seller of Fleet Street-might justly think that it became them, at a crisis when most men perceived that it would have been dangerous to summon a regular Parliament, to accept a trust which might avert the two extreme evils of military despotism or popular outrage. And so, on the 4th of July, they came to the Council-Chamber at Whitehall; and sitting in chairs round a table, the Lord-General, surrounded by his officers, made a speech to the Assembly-"full of the same obscurity, confusion, embarrassment, and absurdity, which appear in almost all Oliver's productions," says Hume: "All glowing with intelligibility, with credibility; with the splendour of genuine veracity, and heroic depth and manfulness," says one who is not scandalised, as Hume is, at Cromwell's words of rejoicing that a body of men was there come to supreme authority upon the principle of "owning God and being owned by Him." That this principle was to involve the exercise

Goldsmith.

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of justice and mercy to the people, according to Oliver's notion, may be collected from a passage or two in his speech, which is characteristic enough of his style of oratory. "He was an entire stranger to oratorical art, to harmony of composition, and to elegance of language," says a great writer and orator; but he adds, "he impelled his auditors with resistless force towards the object which he wished to attain, by exciting in their minds, at every step, the impression which it was his object to produce." What, we ask, can the highest oratorical art effect beyond this?

After going through a narrative of the circumstances which preceded the dissolution of the Long Parliament, and accounted for his participation in that act, Cromwell says, "Having done that we have done upon such ground of necessity as we have declared, which was not a feigned necessity but a real,-it did behove us, to the end we might manifest to the world the singleness of our hearts and our integrity who did these things, not to grasp at the power ourselves, or keep it in military hands, no, not for a day; but, as far as God enabled us with strength and ability, to put it into the hands of proper persons that might be called from the several parts of the nation. This necessity, and I hope we may say for ourselves, this integrity of concluding to divest the Sword of all power in the Civil Administration,―hath been that that hath moved us to put you to the trouble of coming hither; and having done that, truly we think we cannot, with the discharge of our own consciences, but offer somewhat to you on the devolving of the burden on your shoulders. *

*

"I think, coming through our hands, though such as we are, it may not be ill taken if we do offer somewhat as to the discharge of the trust which is now incumbent upon you. And although I seem to speak of that which may have the face and interpretation of a charge, it's a very humble one; and if he that means to be a servant to you, who hath now called you to the exercise of the supreme authority, discharge what he conceives to be a duty to you, we hope you will take it in good part. And truly I shall not hold you long in it; because I hope it's written in your hearts to approve yourselves to God. *

"It's better to pray for you than to counsel you in that matter, that you may exercise the judgment of mercy and truth. It's better, I say, to pray for you than counsel you; to ask wisdom from Heaven for you; which I am confident many thousands of Saints do this day, and have done, and will do, through the permission of God and His assistance. I say it's better to pray than advise: yet truly I think of another Scripture, which is very useful, though it seems to be for a common application to every man as a Christian,— wherein he is counselled to ask wisdom; and he is told what that is. That's 'from above,' we are told; it's 'pure, peaceable, gentle, and easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits;' it's 'without partiality and without hypocrisy.' Truly my thoughts run much upon this place, that to the execution of judgment (the judgment of truth, for that's the judgment) you must have wisdom from above,' and that's 'pure.' That will teach you to exercise the judgment of truth; it's without partiality.' Purity, impartiality, sincerity: these are the effects of wisdom,' and these will help

Guizot, vol ii. p. 16.

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you to execute the judgment of truth. And then if God give you hearts to be easy to be entreated,' to be 'peaceably spirited,' to be full of good fruits,' bearing good fruits to the nation, to men as men, to the people of God, to all in their several stations,-this will teach you to execute the judgment of mercy and truth. And I have little more to say to this. I shall rather bend my prayers for you in that behalf, as I said; and many others will.

"Truly, the judgment of truth,' it will teach you to be as just towards an Unbeliever as towards a Believer; and it's our duty to do so. I confess I have said sometimes, foolishly it may be: I had rather miscarry to a Believer than an Unbeliever. This may seem a paradox; but let's take heed of doing that which is evil to either! Oh, if God fill your hearts with such a spirit as Moses had, and as Paul had,-which was not a spirit for Believers only, but for the whole people! Moses, he could die for them; wish himself 'blotted out of God's Book:' Paul could wish himself accursed for his countrymen after the flesh' so full of affection were their spirits unto all. And truly this would help you to execute the judgment of truth, and of mercy also.

* In my pilgrimage, and some exercises I have had abroad, I did read that Scripture often, forty-first of Isaiah; where God gave me, and some of my fellows, encouragement ' as to what He would do there and elsewhere; which He hath performed for us. He said, 'He would plant in the wilderness the cedar, the shittah-tree, and the myrtle and the oil-tree; and He would set in the desert the fir-tree, and the pine-tree, and the boxtree together.' For what end will the Lord do all this? That they may see, and know, and consider, and understand together, that the hand of the Lord hath done this;-that it is He who hath wrought all the salvations and deliverances we have received. For what end? To see, and know, and understand together, that he hath done and wrought all this for the good of the Whole Flock. Therefore, I beseech you, but I think I need not,—have a care of the Whole Flock! Love the sheep, love the lambs; love all, tender all, cherish and countenance all, in all things that are good. And if the poorest Christian, the most mistaken Christian, shall desire to live peaceably and quietly under you,-I say, if any shall desire but to lead a life of godliness and honesty, let him be protected."

We shall not often have occasion to introduce passages of this serious character into our text. It is necessary in this place to exhibit the sort of exhortations addressed by Cromwell to those described by Hume as "low mechanics, fifth monarchy men, anabaptists, antinomians, independents,— the very dregs of fanatics;" and although the style of oratory may differ from modern usage when parliaments are addressed, it may not be regarded as wholly inappropriate and ineffectual.

The constitution of Cromwell's Assembly was provisional. The supreme authority was devolved upon them by an instrument signed by the LordGeneral and his officers, but they were to engage not to retain it beyond the 3rd of November, 1654; three months before that time they were to choose their successors; and these were not to sit longer than a year, and then to determine upon a future constitution of government. This was an arrangement not altogether consistent with the theory that Cromwell aimed at an arbitrary government in his own person; and is only explained by the assertion that he adopted a temporary expedient which he knew could not stand

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in the way of his own ambitious designs. Upon this principle it is held that it was the deep policy of Cromwell to render himself the sole refuge of those who valued the laws, or the regular ecclesiastical ministry, or their own estates, all in peril from the mad enthusiasts who were in hopes to prevail"*—that he therefore chose the mad enthusiasts, "mingling them with a sufficient proportion of a superior class whom he could direct." A deep policy, no doubt, but also a policy of very uncertain result. When we look back upon the earnestness with which Cromwell had advocated the reform of the law; his zeal for amending the condition of the poor; his eager pleadings against the oppressions of prisoners for debt; his desires for the promotion of education,-it appears somewhat unlikely that if he meant these men to do nothing, and thus ultimately to throw the popularity of remedial measures into his hands, they should at once have applied themselves to these objects with a vigour that contrasted with the comparative torpor of the last days of the Long Parliament. They formed Committees to examine these questions, and others of political importance, such as Union with Scotland, the division of lands in Ireland, and the financial condition of the kingdom. They did, however, some things which gave offence to two powerful classes— the clergy and the lawyers. They abolished the Court of Chancery, and they decreed by a majority of two, that tithes should be abolished. The abolition

of tithes, before a maintenance by law should have been otherwise provided, was against a report of their own Committee. The more enthusiastic of the religious party had gained the ascendancy over those who despised this world's wisdom. Cromwell did not despise it; and he saw the real evils that had developed themselves in an authority of which the majority, led by Major-General Harrison, held that "the Saints shall take possession of the kingdom and keep it." + These extreme doctrines were preached in the meetings of sectaries. Two anabaptists, Feake and Powell, were most violent in urging great social changes, at which the more moderate became alarmed. The men of station and property began to regard Cromwell as the only power interposed between order and anarchy. In the next year, when he called a general Parliament, he spoke very clearly upon these dangers of the Commonwealth. He pointed to "the ranks and orders of men, whereby England hath been known for hundreds of years;-a nobleman, a gentleman, a yeoman-that is a good interest of the nation, and a great one. For the orders of men and ranks of men, did not that Levelling principle tend to the reducing of all to an equality? What was the purport of it but to make the tenant as liberal a fortune as the landlord-which, I think, if obtained, would not have lasted long. The men of that principle, after they had served their own turns, would then have cried up property and interest fast enough." With reference to the most fanatical of the sectaries, those who believed in the approach of the Fifth Monarchy, when the Saints of Christ should alone reign in the earth, Cromwell says, "When more fulness of the Spirit is poured forth to subdue iniquity, and bring in everlasting righteousness, then will the approach of that glory be. The carnal divisions and contentions among Christians, so common, are not the symptoms of that kingdom. But for men, on this principle, to betitle themselves, that they are the only men

* Hallam, "Constitutional History," Chap. x.

+ See Ludlow, "Memoirs," p. 565.