And from a trusted servant too; and one whom we 66 66 tery of the whole period of the Protectorate, to the the commendation of the Parliament for their pains and death of the Protector; including of course many style, told them of their injustice, delays of justice, selfcare of the public good; but afterwards he changed his letters, and the whole of Oliver's long orations. interest, and other faults,-rising higher and higher, He was not in general one of your reasoners and into a very aggravated style indeed. An honourable debaters. No rhetorician he he told what he Member, Sir Peter Wentworth by name, not known to wanted to be done, or what he had done, and that my readers, and by me better known than trusted, riscs pretty plainly, “unintelligible" as he is described; to order, as we phrase it; says, "It is a strange lanand all he had done was right. For this strong self-guage this; unusual within the walls of Parliament this! will, Mr. Carlyle likes him all the better. Such beseems the hero, the master, and leader of his kind. Mr. Carlyle chuckles so triumphantly over the dismissal of" the Rump" of the long Parliament, deeming it rare sport, that we should almost fear the same temperament might lead him to admire the "Iron Duke" and a handful of the Guards, turning Lord John and Sir Robert to the door, while "prating" with Mr. Cobden over questions about "provender." The dismissal of Parliaments, like the decapitation of kings, is not perhaps so far amiss, once in a thousand years, though the historian, even in the single instance, should either intimate caution, or enter his protest in form. The kicking out of the Rump, is justited by arguments or reasons drawn from Oliver's ng speech in vindication of that strong measure. Now, on this one point at least, Mr. Carlyle should have held "Oliver's" questionable authority. This passage in Cromwell's history, affords us a highly characteristic extract, and we should confess, in extenuation of Cromwell's act and our commentator's triumph in it, that the Rump had certainly displayed equivocal tendencies. Wednesday, 20th April, 1653. My Lord General socordingly is in his reception-room this morning, in in black clothes and gray worsted stockings; he, with many Officers: but few Members have yet come, though punctual Bulstrode and certain others are there. Some waiting; some impatience that the Members would come. The Members do not come: instead of Members, comes a notice that they are busy getting on with their Bil in the House; hurrying it double-quick through all the stages. Possible! New message that it will be Law in a little while, if no interposition take place! Bulstrode hastens off to the House: my Lord General, at first incredulous, does also now hasten off; ay, orders that a Company of Musketeers of his own gent attend him. Hastens off, with a very high expression of countenance, I think;-saying or feeling: Who would have believed it of them? It is not Lord General, the big hour is come! st; yea, it is contrary to common honesty! My have so highly honoured; and one -"Come, come!" " exclaims my Lord General in a very high key, we have had enough of this,"-and in fact my Lord General I will put an end to your prating," and steps forth now blazing all up into clear conflagration, exclaims, into the floor of the House, and clapping on his hat,' and occasionally stamping the floor with his feet,' begins a discourse which no man can report! He says Heavens! he is heard saying: "It is not fit that you should sit here any longer!' You have sat too long here for any good you have been doing lately. You shall now give place to better men!--Call them in!" adds he briefly, to Harrison, in word of command: and some twenty or thirty' grim musketeers enter, orders; and stand in some attitude of Carry-arms there. with bullets in their snapchances; grimly prompt for Veteran men: men of might and men of war, their faces are as the faces of lions, and their feet are swift as the roes upon the mountains;-not beautiful to honourable gentlemen at this moment! Lord General in clear blaze of conflagration: ""You "You call yourselves a Parliament," continues my are no Parliament; I say you are no Parliament ! Some of you are drunkards," and his eye flashes on poor Mr. Chaloner, an official man of some value, addicted to the bottle; "some of you are and he glares into Harry Marten, and the poor Sir Peter who ruse to order, lewd livers both; "living in open contempt of God's Commandments. Following your own greedy appetites, and the Devil's Commandments. Corrupt unjust persons,"" and here I think he glanced at Sir Bulstrode Whitlocke, one of the Commissioners of the Great Seal, giving him and others very sharp language, though he named them not: "Corrupt unjust persons; scandalous to the profession of the Gospel:' how can you be a Parliament for God's People? Depart, I say; and let us have done with you. God,--go!" In the name of The House is of course all on its feet,- uncertain almost whether not on its head: such a scene as was never seen before in any House of Commons. History reports with a shudder that my Lord General, lifting the sacred Mace itself, said, "What shall we do with this bauble? Take it away!"-and gave it to a musketeer. And now,"Fetch him down!" says he to Harrison, flashing on the Speaker. Speaker Lenthall, more an ancient Roman than any thing else, declares He will not come till forced. "Sir," said Harrison, “I will lend you a hand;" on which Speaker Lenthall came down, and gloomily vanished. They all vanished; flooding gloomily clamorously out, to their ulterior businesses, and respective places of abode: the Long Young Colonel Sidney, the celebrated Algernon, sat the House this morning; a House of some Fiftythree. Algernon has left distinct note of the affair, le stinct we have from Bulstrode, who was also there, who seems in some points to be even wilfully wrong. Solid Ludlow was far off in Ireland, but gathered many details in after-years; and faithfully wrote them down sought the Lord night and day, that he would rather Parliament is dissolved! "It's you that have forced me to this,' ""exclaims my Lord General: "I have slay me than put me upon the doing of this work.'" And so all was over, and the door locked,-not even "a dog barking at their going,"-and Mr. in the unappeasable indignation of his heart. It is said my Lord General did not, on his entrance Csed to do, in an ordinary place.' For some time he into the House, contemplate quite as a certainty this Estens to this interesting debate on the Bill; beckoning strong measure; but it came upon him like an irresisdubitatingly. Whereupon the Lord General sat still, mentary eloquence proceed. dubitatingirison, who came over to him, and answered tible impulse or inspiration, as he heard their Parlia Perceiving the Spirit of 66 r about a quarter of an hour longer. But now the God so strong upon me, I would no longer consult flesh gestion being to be put, That this bill do now pass, he and blood." He has done it, at all events; and is rebeckons again to Harrison, says, "This is the time; I sponsible for the results it may have. A responsibility must do it !"" and so rose up, put off his hat, and ake. At the first, and for a good while, he spake to FOL XIII-NO. CXLV. which he, as well as most of us, knows to be awful: but he fancies it was in answer to the English Nation and D The Spirit of the Lord," had in like manner inspired Oliver in setting forth to the wars in Scotland. He spoke of the good to be done, "by good brave men,"-and to Ludlow, whom he wished to go to Ireland, he talked for an hour together of the hundred-and-tenth psalm; and so, Says Mr. Carlyle — Before setting out on the Scotch Expedition, and just on the eve of doing it, we too will read that Psalm of Hebrew David's, which had become English Oliver's: we will fancy in our minds, not without reflections and emotions, the largest soul in England looking at this God's World with prophet's earnestness through that Hebrew word, two Divine Phenomena accurately correspondent for Oliver; the one accurately the prophetic symbol, and articulate interpretation of the other. As if the Silences had at length found utterance, and this was their Voice from out of old Eternity: "The Lord said unto my Lord: Sit thou at my right hand until I make thine enemies thy footstool. The Lord shall send the rod of thy strength out of Zion: rule thou in the midst of thine enemies," &c. &c. In such spirit goes Oliver Cromwell to the Wars. "A god-intoxicated man," as Novalis elsewhere phrases it. Oliver's Scottish Despatches, and Family Letters, and also his curious correspondence with the Edinburgh clergy on points of theology and policy, fill much space. There would be rare work here for Dr. M'Crie were he happily still alive; but he has, we believe, some, however unworthy, controversial successors. At the time Oliver held possession of Edinburgh, and was besieging its castle, he thus closes an account of the proceedings of the campaign, given to the President of the Council of State: : I thought I should have found in Scotland a conscientious People, and a barren country about Edinburgh, it is as fertile for corn as any part of England; but the People generally are so' given to the most impudent lying, and frequent swearing, as is incredible to be believed. 6 I rest, "Your Lordship's most humble servant,' OLIVER CROMWELL. One of "Oliver's" priests now regularly held forth in St. Giles on Sundays; "the Scots clergy," Mr. Carlyle remarks, still sitting sulky in their Castle, with Derby miners now operating on them. Many Scots expressed much affection at the Doctrine preached by Mr. Stapylton, in their usual way of groans,'- Hum-m-mrrh!and it's hoped a good work is wrought in some of their hearts.' I am sure I hope so. But to think of brother worshippers, partakers in a Gospel of this kind, cutting one another's throats for a Covenanted Charles Stuart, -Hum-m-mrrh! Cromwell's speeches-and very able speeches they are, when their object is kept in view, which is, in general, to vindicate his own conduct, to bear out foregone conclusions-are of great length: in fact, spoken pamphlets at the close or opening of a Parliament; vindicatory or apologetic, and occasionally rather mystifying than explanatory. Those who, with Mr. Carlyle, take the trouble to peruse them, will find the "Protector" a very fair Conservative of those times, and by no means the latitudinarian in the great matter of liberty of conscience for which he has with one party incurred odium, and with another obtained credit. "Our Oliver" Protector would not, assuredly, long have suffered the magistrate "to wear the sword in vain." Mr. Carlyle interpolates the speeches with nume rous quaint remarks, in the manner of the asides and stage directions in a dramatic scene; a liberty with "Oliver's" text which would hardly be tolerated in an ordinary editor, who must modestly have restricted his own fancies and illuminations to the margin or the foot of the page. At all events, we trust modern reporters will not adopt this new practice, as it would be an intolerable nuisance. In the assumed character of "a certain Commentator," whose remarks are of course given with marks of quotation, Mr. Carlyle throws in here and there passages in explanation or extenuation of the course of his hero in trying emergencies. In the preface to Cromwell's third Speech, at the opening of the first Parliament of the Protectorate, Mr. Carlyle treats, as very insignificant or impertinent, debates about "Governments" and "Constitutions," and about "Parliaments and Single Persons," and their distinct or co-ordinate power, and authority, and other "bottomless subjects;" but Cromwell, now "His Highness," was compelled to speak out about such trifles, and, in September 1654, to make the best defence possible for what he had done to the "Rump" in April, 1553. "But certainly," says Mr. Carlyle, "the Lord Protector's place that September Tuesday was not a bed of roses." His painful asseverations, appeals and assurances, have made the Modern part of his audience look, more than once, with questioning eyes. On this point, take from a certain Commentator sometimes above cited from, and far oftener suppressed, the following rough words: ""Divers persons who do know whether I lie in that," says the Lord Protector. What a position for a hero, to be reduced continually to say He does not lie ! Consider well, nevertheless, What else could Oliver do? To get on with this new Parliament was clearly his one chance of governing peaceably. To wrap himself up in stern pride, and refuse to give any explanation: would that have been the wise plan of dealing with them? Or the stately and not-so-wise plan? Alas, the wise plan, when all lay yet as an experiment, with so dread issues in it to yourself and the whole world, was not very stately plan, even if it had been discovered?' discoverable. Perhaps not quite reconcileable with the And again, with regard to the scheme of the Protectorship, which his Highness says was done by "the Gentlemen that undertook to frame this Government," after divers days' consulting, and without the least privity of his: You never guessed what they were doing, your Highness? Alas, his Highness guessed it, and yet must not say, or think, he guessed it. There is something sad in a brave man's being reduced to explain himself from a barrel-head in this manner! what, on the whole, will he do? Yet There is much more of this; and when all is concluded, we are forced to believe that great men, yea, Heroes, may shuffle and equivocate and lie very much like small men; but then it is for grand and godlike purposes, in fulfilment of their destinies as the appointed Rulers of men; every man being sent into the world, we presume, to strange that men of fortune and great estates [Lord Grey of Groby; he is in the Tower; he and others,] should will need no stretch of wit to make it evident, it being join with such a people. But if the fact be so, there so by demonstration. [His Highness still harps on the incredulity of a thickskinned public, naturally very provoking to him in these perilous, abstruse, and necessarily SECRET operations of his.] fulfil his one proper function, whether that shall be the office of a "flunkey" or of a "Lord Protector." This is Mr. Carlyle's fundamental principle; but men of plain understanding, who go some length with him, will require to see the rare men-children born into the world, with the letters HERO plainly charactered round the iris, before they can go much farther on this misty road. say, this people at the very time, they were pretty numerous, and do not despise them!. at the time Throughout his whole annotations, the Editor when the Cavaliers were risen, this very Party had prefinds hardly one word to say for Cromwell's fellow-pared a Declaration against all the things that had been workers, for the high-minded and truly great men, the noble band who, in the field and the council, had paved his way, or aided him, heart and hand, while his objects seemed pure, disinterested, and patriotic. Nay, there are even some gentle sneers pointed at them, as somewhat pragmatical persons, obstructing a Hero's path with their pribbles and prabbles. Even Mrs. Hutchinson, "the Heroine" of the period, has not altogether escaped. But some day or other, Mr. Carlyle may do justice to the patriot and republican Heroes of the Commonwealth. We would fain give a snatch of "Oliver's" Speeches; but where there is little space, selection is difficult. The Parliament which assembled in 1656, contained a strong leaven of men, having, as Mr. Carlyle phrases it, "stiff Republican ways." But the Protector was able for them. They were the Brissotins of that day; but he was in himself a "Mountain." The speech opens with a tirade against the avowed, "the natural enemy" of the nation, Spain; but glances, in side hits, at secret enemies at home. Getting over the Spanish part, after a very curious and truly Oliverian handling of it, the Lord Protector advances a stage, in which the reader sees both "Oliver” and his Elucidator, in their natural lineaments. We pass Cromwell's exposition of the late insurrectionary movements of Cavaliers and Jesuits, and come to another kind of danger : There is a generation of men in this Nation who cry ap nothing but righteousness, and justice, and liberty; Coming now to the Levellers and "Commonwealth's men."] and these are diversified into several sects, and sorts of men; and though they may be contemptible, in respect they are many, and so not like to make a solid Tow to do you mischief, yet they are apt to agree in aliquo tertio. They are known (Yea, well enough) to shake hands with, I should be loath to say with Cavaliers, but with all the scum and dirt of this Nation, Not loath to say that, your Highness!] to put you to trouble. And when I come to speak of the Remedies, I shall tell you what are the most apt and proper remedies in these respects. I speak now of the very time when there was an Insurrection at Salisbury, 'your Wagstaffs and Penruddocks openly in arms'- - [Sudden prick of anger stings his Highness at the thought of that great Peril, and how it was treated and scouted by the incredulous Thickskinned; and he plunges in this manner] – -I doubt whether it be believed there ever was any rising in North Wales at the same time;' at Shrewsbary; at Rufford Abbey, where were about Five-hundred horse; or at Marston Moor; or in Northumberland, and the other places, where all these Insurrections were at that very time! [Truly it is difficult to keep one's temper: sluggish mortals saved from destruction; and won't so much as admit it!] There was a party which was very proper to come between the Papists and Cavaliers; and that Levelling Party hath some accession lately, which goes under a finer name or notion! I think they would now be called "Commonwealth's-men," who perhaps have right to it little enough. And it is transacted by us; and called them by I know not the liberty of the subject ;" and cried out for "justice,” what' names,"" tyranny,"" oppression," things "against and "righteousness," and "liberty:"--and what was all this business for, but to join the Cavaliers to carry on that Design? And these are things, not words! That Declaration we got; and the penner of it we got and we have got intelligence also how the business was [Locked him fast in Chepstow; the unruly Wildman!]: laid and contrived; which was hatched in the time of the Sitting of that Parliament. I do not accuse anybody: but that was the time of it; an unhappy time! And a plausible Petition had been penned, which must come to me, forsooth [Through that obtuse Constitutioning Parliament, I fancy!] "To consider of these things, and to give redress and remedies." And this was so. Now indeed I must tell you plainly, we suspected a great deal of violence then; and we did hunt it out. Oliver proceeds to unfold the intrigues set on foot against himself and his government; and goes over much ground in a roundabout way, before he gets to LIBERTY OF CONSCIENCE :— As to those lesser Distempers of people that pretend Religion, yet which from the whole consideration of Religion, would fall under one of the heads of Reformation, less speak to it, because you have been so well spoken I had rather put these under this head; and I shall the to already to-day elsewhere.' I will tell you the truth: Our practice since the last Parliament hath been, To let all this Nation see that whatever pretensions to Religion would continue quiet, peaceable, they should enjoy conReligion a pretence for arms and blood. Truly we have science and liberty to themselves; and not to make suffered them, and that cheerfully, so to enjoy their own liberties. Whatsoever is contrary, and not peaceable,' let the pretence be never so specious, if it tend to combination, to interests and factions, we shall not care, by the grace of God, whom we meet withal, though never so specious, if they be not quiet! And truly I am against all "liberty of conscience" repugnant to this. If men will profess,-be they those under Baptism, be they those of the Independent judgment simply, or of the Presbyterian judgment,-in the name of God, encourage them, countenance them; so long as they do plainly continue to be thankful to God, and to make use of the liberty given them to enjoy their own consciences! For, as it was said to-day, undoubtedly "this is the peculiar Interest all this while contended for." [An excellent "Interest;" very indispensable in a state of genuine Protestantism, which latter has itself for some time been indispensable enough.] Men who believe in Jesus Christ-that is the Form that gives being to true religion, namely,' to Faith in Christ and walking in a profession answerable to that Faith;-men who believe the remission of sins through the blood of Christ, and free justification by the blood of Christ; who live upon the grace of God: those men who are certain they are so [Faith of assurance,]—' they' are members of Jesus Christ, and are to Him the apple of His eye. Whoever hath this Faith, let his Form be what it will; he walking peaceably, without prejudice to others under other Forms :-it is a debt due to God and Christ; and He will require it, if that Christian may not enjoy his liberty. [True Tolerance; a noble thing: patience, indifference as to the Unessential; liveliest impatience, inexorable INTOLERANCE for the Want of the Essential!] And who, Mr. Editor, is to determine the essential? If a man of one form will be trampling upon the heels of another form; if an Independent, for example, will despise him who is' under Baptism, and will revile him, and reproach and provoke him, I will not suffer it in him. If, on the other side, those of the Anabaptist judgment' shall be censuring the Godly Ministers of the Nation who profess under that of Independency; or if those that profess under Presbytery shall be reproaching or speaking evil of them, traducing and censuring of them, as I would not be willing to see the day when England shall be in the power of the Presbytery to impose upon the consciences of others that profess faith in Christ,- -so I will not endure any reproach to them. But God give us hearts and spirits to keep things equal Which, truly I must profess to you, hath been my temper. I have had some boxes on the ear,' and rebukes, on the one hand and on the other; some censuring me for Presbytery; others as an inletter to all the Sects and Heresies of the Nation. I have borne my reproach but I have, through God's mercy, not been unhappy in hindering any one Religion to impose upon another. If it shall be found to be the Civil Magistrate's real endeavour to keep all professing Christians in this relation to one another; not suffering any to say or do what will justly provoke the others;-I think he that would have more liberty than this, is not worthy of any. This therefore I think verily, if it may be under consideration for Reformation :-I say, if it please God to give you and me hearts to keep this straight, it may be a great means' in giving countenance to just Ministers, -In such semi-articulate uneasy way does his Highness hustle himself over into the discussion of a new Topic]in countenancing a just maintenance to them, by Tithes or otherwise. For my part I should think I were very treacherous if I took away Tithes, till I see the Legislative Power settle Maintenance to Ministers another way. But whoever they be that shall contend to destroy Tithes, it doth as surely cut their the Minister's' throats as it is a drift to take Tithes away before another mode of maintenance, or way of preparation towards such, be had. Truly I think all such practices and proceedings should be discountenanced. I have heard it from as gracious a Minister as any is in England; I have had it professed: That it would be a far greater satisfaction to them to have maintenance another way, if the State will provide it. [Sensation among the Voluntaries!--His Highness proceeds no farther in that direction at present. The next sentence suddenly drawing itself up into a heap; comprising both ideas, TITHES " and "EQUALITY," and in free-flowing half-articulate manner uttering them both at once, must be given precisely as it stands,-Grammar yielding place to something still needfuller, to TRANSPARENCY of Speech with or without grammar.]——Therefore I think, for the keeping of the Church and people of God and professors in their several forms in this liberty, I think as it, this of tithes, or some other maintenance,' hath been a thing that is the root of visible Profession [No public maintenance no regular priest,] the upholding of this-I think you will find a blessing in it :-if God keep your hearts to keep things in this posture and balance which is so honest and so necessary. [Better keep up Tithes, till we see!] 66 This gives but a very bald notion of Oliver's opinions as to liberty of conscience and the power of the civil magistrate in ecclesiastical matters. In the following year, no time being lost, previous to the opening of Parliament, a day of fasting and prayer was to be held, before the great question, already settled" of settling the nation," by giving Cromwell the title, with the authority of a King, and power to nominate his successor-was to be considered. "The petition and advice" to "his Highness" to this effect, had already been concocted : We can see, the Honourable House has a very good resentment of it.' The Lawyer-party is all zealous for it; certain of the Soldier-party have their jealousies. Already, notwithstanding the official reticence, it is plain to every clear-sighted man they mean to make his Highness King! On this, a subject very near the heart of "his Highness," he speaks a speech, a brief one this time, before taking the affair, in which he had diligently if secretly laboured, and which was now "cut and dry," into "prayerful consideration." There are hollownesses," "hypocrisies," "falsities," &c. &c. which Mr. Carlyle does not stop to denounce. The Protector had to seek and obtain an answer from the Most High before he could either consent to be a King, and have the substantial power of one, or refuse; and a very few days elapsed before Oliver was enabled to pronounce the kind of nay which all men read yea :— It is the nature of a Courtship withal: the young lady cannot answer on the first blush of the business; if you insist on her answering, why then she must even answer, No! The young lady said No; but the courtship was not broken off. Though long coquetting with the title, it was "the substance of the business" that Oliver looked after; but he would also submit to the name, "since the Parliament desired to have this title." And so he said, It hath stuck with me, and doth yet stick. And truly, as I hinted the other day, it seemed as if your arguments to me did partly give positive grounds for what was to be done, and partly comparative grounds; stating the matter as you were then pleased to do,- for which I gave no cause that I know of, that is, for comparing the effects of Kingship with those of such a Name as I at present bear, with those of' the Protectorship 'to wit.' I 66 say I hope it will not be understood that I contend for the name; or for any name, or any thing of a merely extraneous nature; but truly and plainly for the substance of the business,' if I speak as in the Lord's presence; ay, in all right things, as a person under the disposal of the Providence of God, neither naming" one thing nor other; but only endeavouring to give fit answer as to this proposed Name or Title. For I hope I do not desire to give a rule to any body— 'much less to the Parliament. I professed I had not been able, and I truly profess I have not yet been able,-to give a rule to myself in regard to your Proposal.' I would be understood in this. [Yes, your Highness. "That it is not doubt of the Parliament's wisdom; that it is not vain preference or postponence of one 'name' to another; but doubt as to the substantial expediency of the thing proposed, uncertainty as to God's will and monition in regard to it,—that has made and still makes me speak in this uncomfortable, haggling, struggling, and wriggling manner. It is no easy thing forcing one's way through a jungle of such depth! An affair of Courtship, moreover, which grows and has to grow by the very handling of it! I would not be misunderstood in this."] I am a man standing in the Place I am in [Clearly, out of hope of doing any good, as out of a desire to preyour Highness;] which Place I undertook not so much vent mischief and evil [Note this], which I did see was imminent on the Nation. I say, we were running headlong into confusion and disorder, and would necessarily have' run into blood; and I was passive to those have. [With tones, with a look of sorrow, solemnity and nobleness; the brave Oliver!] A Place, I say, not so much of doing good,-which a man lawfully may, if he deal deliberately with God and his own conscience,-a man may (I say) lawfully, if he deal deliberately with God and his own conscience; a man may lawfully, as the case may be (though it is a very tickle case,) desire a place to do good in! [Window one more into his Highness! "Tickle" is the old form of TICKLISH : a that desired me to undertake the Place which I now 66 tickle case indeed," his Highness candidly allows; yet a case which does occur, shame and woe to him, the poor cowardly Pedant, tied up in cobwebs and tapethrums, that neglects it when it does!] I profess I had not that apprehension, when I undertook the Place, that I could so much do good; but I did think I might prevent imminent evil. And therefore I am not contending for one "name" compared with another; and therefore have nothing to answer to any arguments that were used for preferring the name' Kingship to Protectorship. For I should almost think any "name" were better than myName;" and I should altogether think any person fitter than I am for such business; [Your Highness?But St. Paul too professed himself" the chief of sinners," -and has not been altogether thought to "cant" in doing so!]-and I compliment not, God knows it! But this I should say, That I do think, you, in the settling of the peace and liberties of this Nation, which cries as loud upon you as ever Nation did for somewhat that may beget a consistence, ought to attend to that; otherwise the Nation will fall in pieces! And in that, as far as I can, I am ready to serve not as a King but as Constable if you like! For truly I have, as before God, often thought that I could not tell what my business was, nor what I was in the place I stood in, save comparing myself to a good Constable set to keep the peace of the Parish. [Hear his Highness!] And truly this hath been my content and satisfaction in the troubles I have undergone, That you yet have peace. If I know, as indeed I do, that very generally good men do not swallow this Title, though really it is no part of their goodness to be unwilling to submit to what a Parliament shall settle over them, yet I must say, it is my duty and my conscience to beg of you that there. may be no hard things put upon me; things, I mean, hard to them, which they cannot swallow. The Young Lady will, and she will not !] These speeches about the Kingship are throughout highly illustrative of the character of Cromwell. He would, and he would not; he longed, yet was afraid; and finally leaves Mr. Carlyle in doubt of his real wishes, and, we should imagine, him alone. Some more of Cromwell's Opening Speeches, his "last speeches," as they proved, occur upon such topics, as "the state of the nation," and "our foreign relations." One paragraph is not inapt, is indeed very apt, to the present crisis: I say, I beseech you to look to your own affairs at home, how they stand! I am persuaded you are all, I apprehend you are all, honest and worthy good men; and that there is not a man of you but would desire to be found a good patriot. I know you would! We are apt to boast sometimes that we are Englishmen and truly it is no shame for us that we are Englishmen ;but it is a motive to us to do like Englishmen, and seek the real good of this Nation, and the interest of it. [Truly!]-But, I beseech you, what is our case at home profess I do not well know where to begin on this head, or where to end,—I do not. But I must needs say, Let a man begin where he will, he shall hardly be out of that drift I am speaking to you 'upon.' We are as full of calamities, and of divisions among us in respect of the spirits of men, 'as we could well be,'though, through a wonderful, admirable, and never-tobe-sufficiently-admired providence of God, still' in peace! And the fighting we have had, and the success we have had—yea, we that are here, we are an astonishment to the world! And take us in that temper we are in, or rather in that distemper, it is the greatest miracle that ever befell the sons of men, that we are got again to peace. And whoever shall seek to break it, God Almighty root that man out of this Nation! will do it, let the pretences be what they may! [ Privilege of Parliament, or whatever else, my peppery friends!] 'Peace-breakers, do they consider what it is they are 'driving towards! They should do it! He that con And He sidereth not the "woman with child," the sucking children of this Nation that know not the right hand from the left, of whom, for aught I know, it may be said this City is as full as Nineveh was said to be; he that considereth not these, and the fruit that is like to come of the bodies of those now living added to these; he that considereth not these, must have the heart of a Cain; who was marked, and made to be an enemy to all men, and all men enemies to him! For the wrath and justice of God will prosecute such a man to his grave, if not to Hell! Look to that, demagogues! And again: We I say, look on this Nation; look on it! Consider what are the varieties of Interests in this Nation,-if they be worthy the name of Interests. If God did not hinder, it would all but make up one confusion. should find there would be but one Cain in England, if God did not restrain! We should have another more bloody Civil War than ever we had in England. For, I beseech you, what is the general spirit of this Nation? Is it not that each sect of people, if I may call them sects, whether sects upon a Religious account, or upon a Civil account? Is not this Nation miserable in that respect? What is that which possesseth every sect? What is it? That every sect may be uppermost! That every sort of men may get the power into their hands, and "they would use it well;"-that every sect may get the power into their hands! [A reflection to make one wonder.-Let them thank God they have got a man able to bit and bridle them a little; the unfortunate, peppery, loud-babbling individuals,--with so much good in them, too, while 'bitted!'] . It were a happy thing if the Nation would be content with rule. Content with rule,' if it were but in Civil things, and with those that would rule worst;-because misrule is better than no rule; and an ill Government, a bad Government, is better than none !Neither is this all but we have an appetite to variety; to be not only making wounds, but widening those already made.' As if you should see one making wounds in a man's side, and eager only to be groping and grovelling with his fingers in those wounds! and makes one forgive in "Oliver" a multitude of But this whole speech is a noble and brave one, speechifying sins. And if farther reconcilement is wanted with him, before he goes hence, comes Mr. Carlyle's section of "The Death of the Protector;" and Oliver stands forth, not alone, the great man which he ever was, but a sore-tried, a humbled, and an afflicted man. His Speakings, and also his Actings, all his manifold Strugglings, more or less victorious, to utter the great God's-Message that was in him, have here what we call ended. This Summer of 1658, likewise victorious after struggle, is his last in our World of Time. Thenceforth he enters the Eternities; and rests upon his arms there. Oliver's look was yet strong; and young for his years, which were Fifty-nine last April. The Threescore and ten years,' the Psalmist's limit, which probably was often in Oliver's thoughts and those of others there, might have been anticipated for him: Ten Years more of Life;-which, we may compute, would have given another History to all the Centuries of England. But it was not to be so, it was to be otherwise. Oliver's health, as we might observe, was but uncertain in late times; often indisposed the spring before last. course of life had not been favourable to health! "A burden too heavy for man!" as he himself, with a sigh, would sometimes say. His These closing scenes, and the death of Cromwell's favourite daughter, Mrs. Claypole, are related in Mr. Carlyle's peculiar manner, and made effective and touching; but not more so than the simple of the Protector's household, who wrote down these narrative, which is borrowed from Maidston, one passages as they occurred: 'His time was come,' says Maidston; and neither |