Oliver Cromwell

Front matter

THE LIBRARY

OF

THE UNIVERSITY

Preface

If the historians, poets, novelists, biographers, essayists, reviewers and writers of school histories who wrote adversely to Oliver Cromwell between the years 1660 and 1860 were alive, the largest room in the British Museum Library would not hold them. For those who, between the years named, did partial justice to Oliver's memory a small alcove would suffice. In that alcove would be writers like Nathan Ben Saddi, who suggests that the Protector was both a '-'righteous man" and a " r.ogue ; " and Smollet, who says that he was a " compound of villainy and virtue." Within those two hundred years Macaulay, with one exception, was the only great writer who justly measured and fairly described the Protector. The exception was Thomas Carlyle.

Carlyle, by five years of patient and impatient toil, has made it possible for such books as the present one to be written; and yet, while making much use of the " Letters and Speeches," I have made but little use of the elucidations of this great biographer.

In the library of Trinity College, Hartford, is a

PREFACE.

remarkable collection of old folios relating to England's civil wars, in which may be found the Clarendon " Letters/*' the Clarendon '• State Papers,"' the Thurloe " State Papers,"' Dugdale, Rushworth, Xalson, etc. These six works contain a large part of the material from which the histories of the Commonwealth and the Protectorate have been made. It is noteworthy that within the twenty thousand folio pages of these volumes there is not to be found one charge adverse to Cromwell which is supported by credible evidence. The vilification of the Protector, with the exception of a few allegations, the most important of which are refuted in the following pages, is limited to the nicknames with which he was branded : such names as " Catiline," "Tiberius," "Nero," " Domitian," "Devil," etc.

It was natural that royalists who had been excluded from English politics for many years, and who had been in exile and in poverty, should resort to calumny after Oliver was dead ; but it is strange that with a few false statements and the use of opprobrious titles, they should have succeeded in making the greatest and the purest ruler of his country the most infamous of all on the pages of modern history. With the help, however, of David Hume they have done so.

It is to be remarked that the only documents tin-owing light on Cromwell were published, or were in ni;i nusi-ri j>t. prior to the year 17<N). Tarts of this old material, including Pepys's Diary, Mrs. Hutchinson's •■ Memoirs," and mosl til' 1 1 Let!

PREFACE.

and Speeches," are reoent acquisitions ; but all writings of authority relating to the Protector were either in print or in manuscript by the year 1G08, when Ludlow's " Memoirs " were published. Those who wrote after that date simply gave their opinions based on what they had read. This remark applies to all historians of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

It should also be remembered that outside of newspapers and pamphlets published during the lifetime of Cromwell, the poetry of a few writers, the praise of Maidstone and of Milton, there was almost nothing produced for half a century that was not condemnatory. After the restoration of Charles II. the name and memory of the Protector rested chiefly on the attestations of royalist enemies ; but not wholly, for two or three Republicans, incited by military or political disappointment, made the charge of duplicity.

Cromwell's best-known title, hypocrite, was so stamped on him, and so embodied in all kinds of English literature, that it was almost universally believed to be a just stigma, until the " Letters and Speeches " were produced by Carlyle in the year 1846. Since that date the real Cromwell, wise, true, pure, noble, has been recognized, and books wholly favorable to him have been written ; but to a large minority, if not to the majority of readers, he is still the "bad man," the "artful politician" and the "atrocious conspirator" depicted by Clarendon and other historians.

PREFACE.

" I hate Cromwell," said a friend to me. "Have you ever read his speeches and letters ? " I asked. " Xo, I wish to hate him."

To the present writer, Oliver is the most interesting man who has ever had connection with the English Government ; more competent judges have pronounced him the ablest ruler who has governed England.

My thanks are due to the Eev. Edward E. Hale, D. D. ; to Mr. Frank B. Gay, of the "Watkinson Library, Hartford ; to Charles J. Hoadley, LL. D. State Librarian of Connecticut ; to the Rev. Samuel Hart, D. D., Professor in Trinity College ; to the Eev. George Williamson Smith. President of Trinity College; to my brother, the Et. Eev. Thomas M. Clark, Bishop of Ehode Island, for courtesies rendered, and to the Et. Eev. Phillips Brooks, Bishop of Massachusetts, who has kindly allowed pictures from his collection to be reproduced in this book.

George H. Clark.

Hartford, Coxx., April 29, 1892.

Chapter I. Defamatory Writers

-r ** /i .'

Misapprehension of Cromwell's character. — True estimate of the man. — Walter Scott's picture of him in " Woodstock." — Disclosures of Pepys's Diary. — Dr. Dates on the " Late Troubles in England." — Silence of the Puritans in the reign of William III. — Inscription in Westminster Abbey suppressed. — John Banks's book in 1739. — James Heath's " Flagellum." — Waller, Dryden and South's change of base. — John Cleaveland's verses and subsequent career. — Cowley's ghostly visions. — Jeffrey's review in 180S. — Macaulay's boyish scrawls. — Mrs. Hutchinson's " Memoirs."— Ludlow's attack. — Hume's misrepresentations. — Carlyle's discovery of letters and speeches. — Guizot's view of Cromwell. — Change of public opinion.— Service appended to the English Prayer Book in 1837. — Recently expunged ....

Chapter II. Thomas Carlyle

Carlyle's rectification of the popular sentiment. — Froude's testimony. — Carlyle's fresh material and

CONTENTS.

change of design. — Emerson's discovery of Carlyle. — Taine's opinion of Cromwell. — Seventeenth century Puritans as usually depicted. — No faithful pictures of the royalists. — Lord Thurlow's remarkable statement ......... 30

Chapter III. Early Life

Oliver's boyhood. — Early offense and church discipline. — His family not obscure. — King James visits his godfather. — Oliver's father and mother. — His home training. — Style of talk. — Dr. Reard's influence. — .Marriages in the family. — Absurd stories of " Carrion Heath." — Education. — Sports. — His uncle's sumptuous house. — Funeral of his grandfather, Sir Henry Cromwell. — Second visit of James I. — Knights created.— Great display. — The host impoverished by the king's visit. — The brewery business. — Oliver's alienation from his uncle. — Return from Cambridge after his father's death. — Royalist slanders. — Studies law in London. — Marriage. — Return to farmer's life in Huntingdon. 41

Chapter IV. Farmer

Twenty years of farming life. — Influences of the region and associates. — Alva's butcheries. — Refugees change the style of agriculture and other industries. — Association with Dutch settlers. — The friend of the poor. — A tolerably successful farmer. — Nicknamed " Lord of the Fens." — Loses his temper. — Habits of life. — Ambition not yet kindled. — Sir John Elliot's

CONTENTS.

death in the Tower. — Cromwell a silent member of the Parliament of 162S. — Eleven years to reflect upon what he heard there. — Reappears in the Parliament of 1640. — Removal to Ely. — Dugdale's story. — Cromwell's letter to Mrs. St. John. — Carlyle's comments ......... 60

Chapter V. Warrior

The soldier as distinct from the statesman. — Real causes of the civil war. — No serious opposition under Henry VIII. and Elizabeth. — The Puritans in 1581. — Bill for a " Fast in the House," and " Sermons." — Froude's view as to the saving of the Church. — The day of vengeance. — Cromwell silent as yet. — Not prominent till he became a recruiting officer. — Gradual rise of the rebellion. — A war for prerogative. — The crisis precipitated.— Rally of the leaders. — Cromwell's appearance in the Commons. — Seizes a magazine. — Made captain of "Troup 67." — Enters upon his heroic career at the age of forty-three. — Edgehill battle.

— Reorganization of the army. — Series of successes.

— Elevation in military rank. — Narrow escape from death. — Marston Moor. — Battle of Newbury. — General in command charged with weakness. — " Self Denying Ordinance" and " New Model." — Cromwell not to be dispensed with. — Encounter at Naseby. — Cromwell free from limitations. — End of the first civil war. — Cromwell and the Scotch army. — Great Preston victory. — The Irish war. — Apology for Cromwell's severity. — Contest with the Scotch Presbyterians. — Fairfax declines to lead the army. — Cromwell made commander-in-chief. — Battle of Dunbar. — Letter to his wife. — Battle of Worcester. — Cromwell's last battle in the field 78

B

CONTENTS.

Chapter VI. Parliament And Kingship

Parliament of 162S. — Cromwell's speech. — Parliament ends and he goes back to his farm. — Sent to the Parliament of 1640 by the town of Cambridge. — The "Bishop's War." — Forced loans. — Scots and English not disposed to fight. — The Long Parliament. — Sent again by the town of Cambridge. — A member till its close in 1653. — Member of many committees. — Opposition to the Episcopal Church. — Archbishop Laud. — Beverning's letter to the States General. — Londoners petition for the restoration of the king. — Cromwell between 1646 and 1649. — Watching the course of events. — Negotiates with the king and gives him good advice. — The king plays a game of his own. — Escapes to the Isle of Wight. — Cromwell clings to the hope of a compromise. — Proofs of his want of ambition. — The Garter offered to him. — Danger of losing everything. — The one personal question in 1648. — Prayer meeting in Windsor Castle. — Polity of the Puritans. — Cromwell as a regicide. — England declared a Commonwealth. — Cromwell named Protector. — Returns to London. — Grand reception. — Hampton Court assigned as his residence. — Comments of Frederick Harrison. — Parliament tries to perpetuate itself. — Cromwell breaks up " The Rump" and sends the members home. — Things go on with a Constable at the head of affairs. — The new Parliament attempts many things and fails. — Cromwell becomes Usurper as a matter of necessity. — Plots against his life. — Protectorate Parliament called in 1654. — He takes strong ground. — Meanwhile he is engaged in getting up a navy. — Parliament ends with Cromwell's sending the members home. — Another

CONTENTS.

Parliament in 1656. — His fifth speech. — The kingship offered him. — Great spectacle at Whitehall. — Title of king declined. — Admiral Blake's achievements on the sea. — General recognition of Cromwell's ascendancy. — Cardinal Mazarin's attentions. — Order issued in the first year of Victoria's reign for anew service in the Book of Common Prayer. — Afterward rescinded by Act of Parliament- — Cromwell and William III. the men who deserve, thanks and praise . 107

Chapter VII. Foreign Policy

Position of England under Cromwell. — Sudden recognition by the great European powers. — Proposed alliance on the part of Spain and France. — Cardinal Mazarin's deference. — Cromwell's assertion of dignity in foreign courts. — The lame ambassador from the States General. — Lords of His Imperial Majesty of Russia must take off their hats. — The Czar gives a dinner to Prideaux. — Portugal, Tuscany, Venice, Genoa, Tunis and Algiers pay homage. — Great services of Blake and Thurloe, one at sea and the other on land. — John Thurloe's volumes of " State Papers." — Walter Scott's estimate of those papers in 1S31. — Cromwell's career for the commercial and material interests of England. — The great protector of Protestantism.— Treaties of peace with Denmark, Sweden and Holland. — Admiral Blake's wonderful career. — Atrocities of the Duke of Savoy stopped. — Interference in behalf of the Huguenots at Nismes. — Wm. Lockhart's treaty with Louis. — While England rejoices over the acquisition of Dunkirk, CrormVfell is at his daughter's bedside. — Effort to unite Protestant Europe. — The only English Protector the N. E. colonies ever

CONTENTS.

had. — Scheme to remove the colonists to a more congenial clime. — The year 1S99, should be recognized by Massachsuetts and Connecticut .... 157

Chapter VIII. Later Domestic Life

The family. — Carlyle's opinion of Richard, the elder son. — Cromwell always busy. — Life at Whitehall. — Dinner given to the Dutch ambassadors. — Singing of metrical Psalms. — Scene at Whitehall when peace was proclaimed. — A plot discovered to kill Cromwell.

— Contrast between Whitehall and other European courts. — Saintliness of Cromwell's life. — His charities.— His library. — Kindness to the medalist. — Dinner of clergymen at Whitehall. — Great time at Whitehall. — Interview with banished Jews. — Slips some of them into London. — Ludlow at Whitehall.

— Cromwell's domestic life disturbed. — Inauguration as Protector. — Plot of the royalists. — The Governor of the Tower marches with artillery into the city. — Victory follows victory. — The Puritan stands front to

the world. — Domestic afflictions. — Death . . 183

Chapter IX. Cromwell Letters

Letter to Mr. Downhall and Carlyle's comments. — Dr. Wells. — Mr. Benson. — Letterto Mrs. St. John, 1638. • — Letters to his son-in-law. — Letter to his wife. — Refutation of the charge of hypocrisy. — Letter to his wife after the battle of Dunbar. — The war letters. — Letters of comfort and conferring honors. — Re\ tions made by his correspondence. — Lettei oJ explanation to Anthony Hungerford, Esq. — Correspondence

CONTENTS.

as to his son's marrhge. — Remarkable letter to Mr. Mayor, 1650. — The government in Ireland. — The Oliver Cromwell medal. — Plea for the artist. — Cardinal Mazarin. — Breaking up of the Long Parliament and calling of the Little Parliament. — His modest speech. — Wishes to retire. — Policy asjProtector. — Toleration. — Letters to Am. Colonies. — Proposals to remove the colonists from N. E. — Eliot Warburton's conjecture . 208

Chapter X. Character

Only positive evidence adverse to Cromwell's character.

— Groundless charges. — Brought up a Low Churchman.— Laud's appointment as Archdeacon of Huntingdon.— Cromwell defamed. — Testimonials in his favor. — John Banks's book. — John Maidstone's letter to Governor Winthrop. — Rev. Mr. Hooke's letter. — Milton's testimony. — Gardiner's History. — Strong verdict for Cromwell. — Taine as contrasted with Guizot. — Buckle's opinion. — Cromwell's goodness.

— Benevolence. — Tenderness. — Sense of justice. — Righteous anger. — Richard Garnett's words. — Frederick Harrison's summary. — Dean Stanley's testimony. — Bishop Burnet's estimate. — Thurioe's reply to Charles II. — What Lord Clarendon said of Montrose. — Macaulay the champion of the Protector. — Indifference to his literary reputation. — Religion of Charles II. and of Cromwell. — The Boston Advertiser of 1846. — Slanders connected with the death of Charles. — Article in the last Encyclopaedia Britannica. — Justice beginning to be done to Cromwell's memory. — Carlyle's book not likely to be generallyread. — New materials. — Call for a new life of Cromwell. — Summing up of his character . . 235

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

OLIVER CROMWELL (from Sir Peter Lely's portrait) . Frontispiece

OLIVER CROMWELL (from Walker's portrait) . . . Facing page 38 JOHN HAMPDEN

GREAT SEAL OF PROTECTOR OLIVER CROM- WELL (obverse)

(IUEAT SEAL OF PROTECTOR OLIVER CROM- WELL (reverse)

SIR HARRY VANE

OLIVER CROMWELL (from Walker's portrait) . ,

j

HENRY IRETON

ADMIRAL BLAKE

THE MOTHER OF OLIVER CROMWELL . .

DEATH-MASK OF OLIVER CROMWELL . .

OLIVER CROMWELL (from contemporary Dutch engraving)

OLIVER CROMWELL (from a celebrated print) .

OLIVER CROMWELL.

Chapter I. Defamatory Writers

I purpose to tell, in a plain and simple way, the story of a hero who was neglected by the Puritans and defamed by royalists from the time of the restoration of Charles II. down to near the present age. The neglect on the Puritans' part is explained by history ; the malignity and falsehoods of writers devoted to the Stuarts requires no explanation. j_For nearly thirty years, from 1660 to 1688, no one in England dared to publish a history of the Protectoratej and after William III. came to the throne, though danger of imprisonment and death for a true life of the Protector no longer threatened, there was not a writer- — Milton and nearly all those who had known Oliver being dead — who cared to face the odium which was sure to follow a eulogy. Thurloe, one of the ablest ministers of the seventeenth century, had hidden in the garret above his rooms in Lincoln's Inn that vast collection of papers now preserved in more than six thousand folio pages ; a mine from which all late historians of England's Civil War have taken materials for their books. Forty years after Oliver's death a writer whose name is unknown, ventured to falsify Ludlow's fabrications ; but we now search in vain for any book written in England within half a century of the Protector's death in praise of him. I And through the eighteenth century and for forty-five years of the present century not a book was published which did justice to Cromwell. For nearly two hundred years he was the sport and derision of historians, poets and novelists; sometimes depicted in an elaborate, glaring picture, like that in Walter Scott's " Woodstock ; " sometimes branded with infamy in a single line, like that in Gray's "Elegy." Jlis letters, with a few exceptions, were not printed; and his speeches, full of thought, lay dormant through all that time. Not a man or woman in England or in this country read or could read them.

DEFAMATORY Wit ITERS. 6

/_Xhe only man who during- the long reign of Charles II. wrote favorably about Oliver was Pepys. Mr. Pepys was a man who was willing to sacrifice himself, both under the Protector and under the king. He was an officer in the Naval Department, and lived in London. He knew Oliver, and he often met Charles ; met him on business, and in the parks, and in Whitehall Palace. Mr. Pepys kept a diary. Pie wrote under a cipher which no one could read but himself. After his interviews with the king, he would go home and make pictures of him, and, for contrast, pictures of Oliver. If Charles could have got sight of Mr. Pepys's diary, and have found an interpreter of it in the year 1667, Mr. Pepys would not only have lost his place in the navy office, but he would have walked the streets of London without his ears, which would have been to him a great calamity. But Charles did not get hold of the diary. Mr. Pepys kept it concealed till his death. It then got, with Mr. Pepys's books, into Magdalene College library, Cambridge, and there it lay unread till about the year 1825. How strange that the only good words written about Oliver during a period of twenty-five years, should have come to the light in this present century.

Iii one passage Mr. Pepys contrasts the feeble administration of the king- with the strong administration of the Protector. " It is strange," he writes, " how everybody do nowadays reflect upon Oliver, and commend him, what brave things he did, and made all the neighbor princes fear him ; while here, a man come in with all the love and prayers and good liking of his people, hath lost all so soon, that it is a miracle what way a man could devise to lose so much in so little time." During the reign of James II. one would hardly have dared to praise Oliver even under a cipher.

Doctor George Bates, physician to Charles II., published, in 1685, a book on " The Late Troubles in England." This book is now in the library of Trinity College, Hartford. Carlyle docs not refer to it. and probably never saw it. Had he seen it he would have given Bates the same sort of immortality that he has given ••Carrion Heath," the author of " Flagellum," The loyalty of Doctor Bates to the Stuarts is clearly indicated in his book. lie speaks of the Star Chamber Court, and the Court of High Commission as "shining jewels in the imperial crown.*' and lie says that those who in the time of Charles I. saw things which needed to be amended in the government, could see "joynts in a bull rush." After alluding to this king as one who combined in his character the patience of Job, the piety of David, and the wisdom of Solomon, he became really poetical in the royal cause. He says he will "hoist sail " and " launch out into the ocean of Charles's virtues." He then changes his figure and says that he will "by a few, and those clouded beams " give " what sight he can of that Sun," " the great defender of the laws." He calls Cromwell a " Blade," and a " great master in hypocrisy and dissimulation." He becomes responsible for the most astounding, incredible lie ever told by a historian, and he gives the lie on the authority of eye-witnesses, who told him of the deed. He says that Cromwell " opened the coffin " which contained the dead king, and, "with his fingers severed the head from the body;" evidently supposing that his readers would believe such a surgical operation possible. He gives particulars of the condition of Cromwell's body after death, which are too disgusting to be repeated. B ut he corrects one error, for which he should have full credit. He says that Oliver "yielded up the ghost about three of the clock in the afternoon ; not (as was commonly reported) carried away by the Devil, at midnight, but in clear daylight." He speaks of the " mercenary pen of the son of a certain scrivener, one Milton, a man of " livid and malicious wit," "employed to publish a defense of the king's murder."

Carrion Heath and Buzzard Bates, the earliest literary champions of the Stuarts, whose books were once the delight of royalists, who gave inspiration to later historians, and gave to English history a color and gloss which lasted for two centuries, and which, but for such investigations as Macaulay's and Carlyle's, would have lasted for two centuries more, are now, as authorities, happily extinct. In their day they wei-e celebrated, particularly the doctor, who was " a learned and eminent physician of London," who had " an easy access to most of the grandees," and whose book, when " in writing," was looked over by persons high in position. But after all, everything was not bright with Doctor Bates. In an "epilogue," he says that "there is an insolent defamer, who pretends I have fathered another man's work." Poor doctor, accused of literary theft! charged with plagiarism! and such plagiarism! Peace to his ashes.

After William III. came to the throne, there was no danger of a Puritan's losing his life or liberty for anything he might publish in favor of the Protector ; but it required an amount of moral courage to defend him which no one seems to have possessed. And then it must be remembered that thirty years and more had passed since Oliver's death. A great deal is forgotten in that length of time. Those who knew him were nearly all in their graves. The materials for a history, or even of a biography, were limited ; but doubtless the strong prejudice against the Commonwealth, and against Oliver, prevented any attempt to publish eulogies. To indicate the prevailing feeling, a fact may be given. In the year 1710, an engraver was at work in Westminster Abbey on a Latin inscription to the memory of the poet John Phillips. He came to the words " Uni Miltono Secundus" — next to Milton. The Dean of the Abbey stopped the engraver. That hallowed building must not be desecrated even by the name of Milton on another man's monument. John Phillips, with his poetry, must go down to posterity without it.

Pour years later, however, Addison meanwhile having put into the " Spectator " some papers about John Milton and his "Paradise Lost," it was decided by another Dean (Atterbury, who though a loyalist seems to have had sense) that it would do no harm to the Abbey to have Milton's name on John Phillips's monument. Things sometimes go strangely in this world. Phillips the poet, had a claim on the Abbey, for he had once made an attack on Oliver in a " Satyr against Hypocrites ; ' but he was Milton's nephew, and in early life had written a defense of his uncle, whom Wood calls a "villanous leading incendiary." The canons and deans of Westminster, no doubt, talked a good deal over that "Uni Miltono Secunchis," the relatives and friends of the poet, no doubt, told them that they had better let the engraver insert the words into the epitaph, and so John Phillips survives in the memory of men.

Carlyle is usually rather limited in his praises of authors, and he is particularly so touching those who, before himself, wrote about Oliver : but lie might have said a kind word for John Banks who, in the year 1739, published a book, in the preface of which he asks, l> whether a character, so much declaimed against, might at the distance of almost a hundred years be suffered to stand tin' lest of a fail- examination?" It

needed courage then even to attempt to subject

the Protector to a " fair examination," and Banks

should have some credit for his book. And

Carlyle, too, might have spared Mark Noble, who put out his biography in 1787, the charge of "extreme imbecility," and "a judgment for the most part dead asleep ; " for Noble, as his preface indicates, had at least discovered what other writers have but lately learned ; that Cromwell " was the greatest man that had owed his existence to England."

The chief fountain of all the foolish lies that have been circulated about Oliver is the mournful, brown little book called " Flagellum " (a lash, whip, scourge), or the " Life and Death of Oliver Cromwell, the late Usurper," by James Heath. The book had on its title page a picture of the Protector with a halter about his neck. Five editions were published between 1663 and 1679 ; but now the book is not to be found in our libraries. It was not among the books which Carlyle bequeathed to Harvard University, and probably he used the copy which has been preserved in the British Museum Library. For nearly a hundred years royalist readers found consolation in "Flagellum ; " but when Hume appeared and put into eloquent language the fabrications which it contained, and added to them, Heath passed into oblivion.

There were writers of Oliver's day who praised bini while he was living-, or soon after his death, who afterward defamed him, and among those writers were Waller, Dryden and South. Waller, in the year 1643, was banished from England for engaging' in a plot which cost some men their lives. Ten years later, when Cromwell was in power, he kindly permitted liim to return from exile, and he then presented to the Protector, says George Craik, " one of the most graceful pieces of adulation ever offered by poetry to power ; " but when Charles II. returned Waller forgot or overlooked the generosity of Cromwell, and welcomed the king to his father's throne. The poem inspired by the restoration, however, was inferior to that which his release from banishment called forth ; and it is related that Charles told the poet that his panegyric was not so good as Cromwell's ; to which Waller replied that poets succeeded better in fiction than in writing truth.

Dryden. when Richard became Protector, wrote a long poem on Cromwell, in which are found the following lines :

■■ His grandeur he derived from heaven alone, For lie was -real ere furl line made him so,

And war.-, thai rise like mists against the sun. Made him inn greaterseem, not greater grow.

" His ashes in a peaceful urn shall rest, His name, a great example, stands to show

How strangely high endeavors may be blessed When piety and valor jointly go."

Dryden's changes and apostacies came easily and naturally to him, we believe ; but these verses were probably a true expression of his emotions at the time when he wrote them, soon after the death of the Protector. The lines are not mere poetry.

Oliver was by nature a grand man. He was great before success made him appear so. Wars did not make him greater grow, only made him seem greater to the common eye ; and in spite of the stigmas cast upon it, his name a great example stands, and will stand, to show how high endeavors may be blessed. England is reaping to-day fruits from the seed which he sowed. We in this country are reaping blessings from the changes which he and the Long Parliament secured.

Dryden greeted Charles on his return with his " Astraea Redux ;" but during the reign of this king he wrote, he says, only one play for himself ; all the rest, nearly thirty in number, were, he admits, " sacrifices to the vitiated taste of the age."

Robert South, a student at Oxford, wrote a eulogistic poem on Oliver telling him that he "only could the swelling waves restrain," and lay " fetters on the conquered main ; " but when South had become Doctor South, chaplain to royalty, he drew in a sermon a picture of Oliver which delighted the king and his court. " Who," he said, " that had beheld such a bankrupt, beggarly fellow as Cromwell first entering the Parliament House, with a threadbare, torn coat, and a greasy hat (and perhaps neither of them paid for), could have suspected that in course of so few years he should, by the murder of one king and the banishment of another, ascend the throne, be invested with royal robes, and want nothing of the state of a king but the changing of his hat into a crown."