DONALD HIGH SCHOOL. Alcove No. Shelf No. THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES ' v^C AND PARAGRAPHIC PENCILINGS. W. J. SCOTT, D.D., NORTH GEORGIA CONFERENCE. COPYRIGHT SECURED. CONSTITUTION PUBLISHING Co., ATLANTA, GA. 1892. PREFACE. CON This volume contains a part only of the literary work r^ ^* c/j z of the last two years. fc It is gratefully inscribed to friends both new and old OB ^ whose steadfast loyalty has been an inspiration to 2 c5 ^ THE AUTHOR. o January 1st, 1892. ui z HISTORIC ERAS. THE STORY OF MAGNA CHARTA, "England is the freest country in the world. Montesquieu.'' IT is a singular fact that Henry Hallam, in the main an astute and learned historian, should have commenced his "Constitutional History of England" with the acces sion of Henry VII. It is as though Von Hoist, or whoever else should undertake a constitutional history of the American government, should utterly ignore the administration of Jefferson and the "era of good feel ing" under the presidency of Monroe, and begin with the fatuous and fateful administration of Abraham Lin coln. For while it is true that Henry VII., by his vic tory on Bosworth field and his intermarriage with Eliza beth of York, united in his own person the rival claims of York and Lancaster, yet the Tudor dynasty that he founded was in many respects the most arbitrary known to English history. Indeed, the formative period of the British Constitu tion begins with the reign of Henry I., the youngest son of the Conqueror, and culminates in the reign of Edward III., of the house of York. Then it was that Parliament became a two-chambered legislative body, composed of Lords and Commons, the former consist- 8 HISTORIC ERAS. ing of the peers, temporal and spiritual, and the latter of the knights of the shire and the burgesses. If, however, we would rightly understand the story of the Magna Charta, we must needs go back to the era of the Norman conquest. That conquest involved the thorough subjugation of the Anglo-Saxon people. They were utterly impoverished by wholesale confisca tion. The records of the domesday-book show that in the aggregate not less than six hundred baronies and sixty thousand knightly fees were distributed among the followers of William of Normandy. Besides this im poverishment, there was both political and ecclesiastical disfranchisement. For one hundred years after the decisive battle of Hastings no man of English blood and birth was admitted to the ranks of the nobility. In the Church they were equally discounted by their Nor man masters. The prelates and other higher clergy were either born in foreign parts or descendants of those who came over with the Conqueror. The first notable break in this record of Saxon disqualification was made by Henry II. in his nomination of Thomas Becket for the see of Canterbury. The fact that Becket was born on English soil, although of Norman lineage, may have had somewhat to do with his subse quent brutal assassination by a party of Norman gentry. Beyond all else, however, was the thorough social degredation of the Saxons. Macaulay tells us that during several reigns a Norman could kick an English man with impunity and at will. In a word, they were a despised and downtrodden race. MAGNA CHARTA. 9 Henry I., surnamed Beauclerc because of his schol arly attainments, to whom reference has already been made, did much to remedy this social evil and to hasten the ultimate federation of the two races. He earnestly sought to- conciliate his English subjects. Some have suggested that he was moved to this by his dread of the rival claims of his eldest brother, Robert, Duke of Nor mandy, who had grown weary of his crusading advent ures. For this purpose it is thought that he espoused Maude, the daughter of Malcolm, king of Scotland, and of Matilda, the sister of Edgar Etheling, who was unquestionably the legal heir of Edward the Confessor. Whatever the motive, this marriage contributed greatly to the social uplifting of the English people. The Normans resented the alliance as an open insult to their race, and sought, says one historian, to retali ate by nick-naming Henry "Farmer Godric. " The English fully realized the significance of the event, and were jubilant when Archbishop Anselm placed the crown on the head of an English princess. "Hence forward," says the same historian (Green), "the blood of Cedric was intimately blended with the blood of Rolfe the ganger the first Duke of Normandy." Another long stride in the same direction was the issuance by Henry of a charter whose principal pro visions were the basis of the Great Charter of Runni- mede. Other influences operated to lessen the estrange ment between Norman and Saxon, but none nor all of these, including the whole administration of Henry II and the rapid growth of the burgher population, was IO HISTORIC ERAS. so effectual as when the two races stood shoulder to shoulder with hand linked in hand in the face of a com mon peril and in the establishment of a common liberty. This last-named event brings us to the era of Magna Charta. John, the seventh king of the Anglo-Norman dynasty, came to the throne at an evil juncture. A cloud of suspicion hung over him because of the mur der of his own nephew, Arthur of Brittany, which murder he is thought to have instigated. This promis ing young prince was greatly endeared to the English people, not only as the rightful heir to the throne through Geoffrey, the oldest son of the late King Rich ard, but because he bore the name of the great Keltic hero. The last reason was a mere sentiment, but sentiment is not to be lightly esteemed. In this in stance at least it led many to regard the coronation of John with pronounced disfavor. But he came to the throne at an evil juncture for other reasons: he had as a contemporary ruler Philip Augustus, the most chiv- alric sovereign that had occupied the French throne since the days of Charlemagne. Philip was the Boulanger of that period, and was intent on the solidarity of France. H e was not satis fied that Normandy and Anjou and other provinces should continue as appendages to the Norman kingdom in England, and was determined to expel John from the Continent. The new English sovereign was neither the "coward" nor the "trifler" that Macaulay and Hume have both affirmed. Whatever the defects of MAGNA CHARTA. I I his character (and these we do not seek to extenuate), he was neither lacking in courage or capacity. It has been justly said that he was the ablest of the Angevin kings, and that the awful lesson of his life is that it was no idle voluptuary, but the friend of Gerald and the student of Pliny "that lost Normandy, became the vassal of the pope, and died in a desperate fight against English liberty." The English people were greatly dissatisfied with his civil administration, because of exactions under the name of aids, benevolences, and similar unconstitutional levies in which he exceeded even his iather, the lion- hearted Richard. Nor could he inspire them with any zeal for his continental wars waged for the recovery or extension of his domains beyond the channel. But above all were they indignant at his slavish surrender of his crown and kingdom to Radulphe, the papal legate, and his solemn oath to hold England as a fief of the Holy See ; so that when he was driven from the Con tinent by the disastrous battle of Beauvais he found neither respect nor sympathy in his island kingdom. The statement that he was abandoned by the entire English nobility, except five faithful liegemen, is, per haps, too highly colored, but it is true that in this extremity he was confronted by "a nation in arms." We have already intimated that the Magna Chatta was no essential novelty, but was simply an elaboration and broader application of the principles of the charter promulgated by Henry I. This charter was confirmed by Henry II., but in the later reigns of Stephen of 12 HISTORIC ERAS. Blois and Richard I. it was overlooked, and gradually faded from public memory. Just as the book of the law was buried for long years in the rubbish of the tem ple, until its providential discovery during the reign of Hezekiah, so this priceless charter was afterward ex humed from the dust and debris of a monastery. Man kind are chiefly indebted for its resurrection to the researches of Stephen Langton, the Archbishop of Canterbury. In the mediaeval period of European history there was no lack of soldier priests and warrior bishops who, whether in broil or battle, oftentimes exhibited a per sonal daring worthy of the Spartan Leonidas. Lang- ton did not belong to this class of belligerent Church men, but to those cardinal statesmen like Wolsey and Richelieu of a later historic period. While Langton had been thrust upon the English Church and people by the arbitrary act of Innocent III., yet from the beginning he manifested his sympathy for the English people and his reverence for the traditions of Anglo- Saxonism. In an assembly of the barons at St. Paul's, London, he produced the charter of Henry I., and urged them to make it the basis of their contest with King John. They accepted Langton's counsels, and pledged them selves to its faithful observance. After divers evasions and subterfuges on the part of the king, with the details of which we are not at pres ent concerned, being hard pressed by the popular clamor and yet more by the primate, he decided to MAGNA CHARTA. 13 summon the barons and their retainers to a personal conference at Runnimede, an island in the Thames, between Staines and Windsor, henceforth to be es teemed the incunabula gentis nostrae ; or, as Henry Rogers has translated it, "the cradle of the British giant." Stephen Langton, with the advice and counsel of the barons, had drawn up the charter which was sub mitted to John in June, 1215, and after a brief discus sion, it was signed, sealed, and delivered and ordered to be published throughout the realm. As a guarantee for its execution, the king, for the time being thor oughly humbled, consented to surrender the city and Tower of London to the keeping of the barons. In addition he accepted the over-lordship of twenty-four of their number, who were empowered by the explicit terms of the Great Charter to levy war against John or any of his royal successors who should attempt its revo cation, or even its infringement. Against these obvi ously hard conditions John raved and gnashed his teeth in impotent rage. It is now in order to examine some of the leading stipulations of "this key-stone of English liberty." It is worthy of observation that all classes, clergy and laity, all sorts of men, from the greatest baron to the humblest rustic, were provided for in one or another of its articles. "The freedom of elections" says Hume, "was secured to the clergy, nor were they compelled to wait for a royal conge d 1 elite and subsequent confirmation of their 14 HISTORIC ERAS. choice. All checks upon appeals to Rome were re moved and the fines imposed on the clergy for any offense were to be proportional to their lay estates and not to their ecclesiastical benefices. Important restrictions were likewise imposed upon the king, touching the so-called aids exacted of his ten ants in chief. These were formally abolished, except in three notable instances ; the ransoming of the king in the event of his captivity, the knighting of his eldest son, and the marrying of his eldest daughter. Nor was he hereafter permitted to levy reliefs upon wards when they came to their majority, or to exact of widows any portion of their dower in their husbands' estates. They were also restrained in the matter of compulsory marriages, a royal franchise that had been greatly abused to the sore discomfort of the nobility. It was moreover stipulated that the greater barons should be summoned to the Great Council by special writ, and that the lesser barons should be summoned by the sher iff forty days before the holding of its sessions. The levying of all aids, except the three feudal aids already mentioned, was strictly forbidden without the consent of the Great Council first obtained. We note in this the germ of a great principle which is now fundamental to the British Constitution. As from a grain of mustard seed there springs a great tree in whose branches the fowls of heaven find shelter, so from this germinal principle has sprung that English law which requires that all money bills must originate in the House of Commons, and that a vote of MAGNA CHARTA. 15 supplies must be preceded by a redress of political grievances. The English race in both hemispheres have from time immemorial been exceedingly jealous of any encroachment on this line. Emerson has force fully said that the Englishman is no great stickler about mere abstractions, "but if you lay hands on his day's wages, or his cow, or his right of common, or his shop, he will fight to the judgment." So the American colonists, while yet a feeble folk, resented nothing so much as the policy of the mother country in the matter of parliamentary taxation. In this respect they occu pied common ground with John Hampden, who went to prison rather than submit to an unconstitutional levy of twenty shillings. Charles I., despite the abuses of the Star Chamber and of the High Commission court, would have died quietly in his bed, and not as a royal culprit on the scaffold, had he not violated this provi sion of Magna Charta. From it came Triennial Par liaments, Annual Mutiny bills, and eventually the over throw of the rotten borough system of parliamentary representation. Not a single pound sterling can be drawn from the royal exchequer, either for the civil list or the maintenance of the army or navy, without a vote of the Commons. Another striking feature of the Great Charter was the provision for a fair and regular administration of justice. Hitherto the court of common pleas was ambulatory following the king's person from place to place to the serious detriment of suitors and witnesses. Hereafter this important tribunal was required to sit at 1 6 HISTORIC ERAS. Westminster, and the judges of assize as well were compelled to make four circuits annually throughout the kingdom. It was likewise stipulated by the king for himself and his successors that justice should in no wise be sold, denied, or delayed a most valuable safeguard against judicial negligence and corruption. In behalf of the merchants and even itinerant trades men it was agreed that there should be one weight and one measure for the entire realm, and that this class should have liberty to go and come at will, and should be subjected to no unlawful tolls or imposts. In this connection it was further stipulated that the "ancient liberties" and "free customs" of London and other cities, and even of boroughs, should be conserved. Hume has well said that if the provisions of the Magna Charta had ceased with those already named there would have been little reason for popular rejoic ing. But the mailed barons, who wrested the charter from John, were fairly considerate of the welfare of the lower classes. Wherefore it was further ordained that "all the privileges and immunities above mentioned granted to the barons against the king should be ex tended by the barons to their inferior vassals." As an additional security to the masses it was likewise ordained that "the king should grant no writ empower ing a baron to levy aid from his vassals, except the three feudal aids." Likewise, in the 24th section, it was provided that in felonies there should be no forfeit ure of a villain cart or implements of husbandry, nor should the small tradesman forfeit "all his wares." In MAGNA CHARTA. I/ all such cases a sufficiency was left the offender to save him from utter impoverishment. But the chief section was that which furnished a guaranty for the per sonal liberty of the subject. This is numbered the 39th, and is of itself worth all the blood and treas ures that has been expended in its maintenance. This famous section is in the words following: "No free man" nullus homo liber "shall be taken or impris oned, or disseized, or outlawed, or banished, or any ways injured; nor will we pass upon him nor send upon him except by the legal judgment of his peers or by the law of the land." It is well understood that the constructions of this section have been exceedingly variant. Sir Edward Coke, the renowned jurist, says in his institutes that " this section involves presentment by a grand jury and subsequent conviction by a petit jury. 1 ' Thus interpreted it strikes a death-blow at all arbitrary arrests, and unlocks every prison door where a victim of tyranny is confined. For hundreds of years there have been frequent and flagrant violators of these provisions. Indeed, it was never adequately enforced until the great Writ of liberty was secured by the Habeas Corpus act in the thirty-first year of Charles II. It is not out of place to say that in the Bill of Rights prefixed to the Constitution of Georgia, that great popular tribune, Robert Toombs, caused to be inserted this clause : "That the writ of habeas corpus shall never be superseded." In the body of the Constitution, however, was inserted the usual exception, "unless in I 8 HISTORIC ERAS. times of invasion or insurrection the public safety may require it." In all cases, however, the party having custody of the prisoner must make some return to the magistrate issuing the writ. No greater tribute was ever paid to the majesty of this law, and the sacredness' of the writ based on it, than when Andrew Jackson, after refusing for urgent military reasons obedience to it, subsequently paid the fine of one thousand dollars imposed by the civil magistrates without any sort of compulsion. Such conduct was worthy the hero of New Orleans. But we here resume the thread of the story of the Magna Chart a. It is evident that King John yielded to the demands of the barons because there was, for the time being, no possibility of successful resistance. He embraced, however, the earliest opportunity to renew the struggle. For a time, with the help of Rome, he proved an overmatch for the barons and their allies. The English crown was tendered to Lewis, the son of Philip Augustus, and accepted. Upon the arrival of Lewis, the French followers of John deserted him, and after divers military disasters his kingly fortunes were again reduced to the lowest ebb. Feeble and sore broken, he died in a gluttonous debauch, abandoned of God and despised of men. Upon the king's death, the English patriots made haste to rid themselves of the royal supremacy of Lewis. By a sort of compromise he was induced to withdraw to the continent. Thereupon, Henry, a nat ural son of John, was crowned in his ninth year, with MAGNA CHARTA. 19 William Earl Mareschal as Regent, the earliest example of a regency in British history. The regent was distin guished for his devotion to the Great Charter, and one of the earliest acts of the new reign was its solemn con firmation by king and council. These confirmations were repeated oftentimes in future years. Indeed, so immense was the popularity of the charter that for sev eral centuries the sovereigns of England, when hard beseiged by popular clamor, were wont to pledge them selves in solemn form to its faithful observance. And yet it is but sheer candor to say that its wholesome restrictions were often trampled upon both by king and Parliament. Notwithstanding, it would again and again assert itself, so that after many bloody contests, even down to the "glorious revolution" of 1688, from which epochal event it has been futly recognized as the basis of the British Constitution. Nor does it savor of exaggeration to affirm that it is now thoroughly inter woven with every fibre of the body politic ; and we furthermore reverently say that its line has gone out into all the earth and its sound to the ends of the world. At the British Museum, in London, among other precious relics of an heroic past, there is one that rivets the gaze of every visitor. It is a tattered copy of the Magna Charta, This venerable parchment is yellowed by age and shriveled by fire, and from it depends the royal seal of King John. What the Palladium was to the countrymen of Priam is the Magna Charta to the compatriots Wolfe, Sidney and Wellington. By the illiterate English masses it may be reverenced as a sort 2O HISTORIC ERAS. of national fetich, but by the enlightened Britton it is regarded as the symbol and memorial of a gallant strug gle that laid broad and deep the foundation of British liberty. Through all the eight hundred years of England's matchless history, it has been the inspiration of her most illustrious leaders, whether in the arena of arms or in the forum of high debate. In the fourteenth century it nerved Henry V. at the gates of Harfleur, when he once more summoned his discomfited troops to the deadly breach, and gave them as their victorious battle-shout Now, God for Harry, England, and Saint George! The imperishable memory of Runnimede steadied the British infantry amid the storm and stress of Waterloo, when, in the crisis of the conflict, the great Napoleon hurled his "Old Guard" like a thousand catapults against their bristling and impregnable squares At a later day, even within the memory of men now living, it emboldened the immortal six hundred when they rode right into the "jaws of hell" at the dreadful pass of Balaklava. These same principles inspired England's great Com moner, the elder Pitt, when in the house of Peers he rebuked with the sternness of a Hebrew prophet the ministry of Lord North, and concluded his masterful Philippic by solemnly invoking the genius of the Brit ish Constitution. They tingled in the nerves of our own Henry when, standing in the old House of Bur gesses, at Williamsburg, he roused a young nation to MAGNA CHARTA. 21 arms by his eloquent denunciation of the Stamp Act and the Boston Port bill. Moreover, we take quite too narrow a view of the scope of the Magna Charta if we circumscribe its influ ence by any geographical limitations. Indeed, in some way it has prompted every manful endeavor for relig ious and political freedom that has signalized the onward march of universal humanity. Not only among English-speaking people, but among all liberty-loving races, even from old Thermopylae to New Gettysburg, the principles of that Great Charter have been the rally ing cry of downtrodden and yet defiant patriotism. William the Silent planted himself on these primal truths of government when he cut the dykes of the Ger man Ocean, and let loose the avenging sea on his coun try's invaders and despoilers. So William Tell, the hero of the Forest Cantons, felt their glow all uncon scious, it may be, of their mighty meaning, when he bearded "Gessler" at the gateway of Altorf, and when again he shouted in the ear of the Alpine storm, com pared with which "the storms of other lands are but summer flaws, 1 ' the memorable words: " Blow on, this is the land of liberty ! " Every intelligent reader will have observed in our hurried comment on the leading provisions of the Great Charter that it contains no dreamy philosophism like the "Utopia" of Sir Thomas Moore, or the "Contract Social" of Rousseau. They will have noticed, likewise, that its statements are more terse and exact than the 22 HISTORIC ERAS. glittering generalities of our own Declaration of Inde pendence. Rather it is a clear and yet concise embodi ment of the principles of statesmanship that must ulti mately work out the political redemption of mankind. We speak words of truth and soberness when we say that the enthronement of these principles among all nationalities is the necessary prelude to that golden age of which Isaiah prophesied and Virgil sung. Then, and only then will the story of the Magna Charta be ended amid the jubilee of humanity "redeemed, regenerated, and disenthralled by the irresistible spirit of universal emancipation." CROMWELL. 23 A LATE, distinguished writer has said that the horo loge of time seldom strikes the great eras of human his tory. In the main these great eras are unheralded whether by portent in earth or sky, and unannounced by prophecy whether human or divine. Not one of the four greater prophets of ancient Israel foretold the assembling of the States-general of France in October, 1789, nor the summoning of the Long Par liament of England in November, 1640. Yet these are the pivotal events of modern history. The former was the day dawn, or rather the night-dawn of the era of bloodshed, involving terrorism, Napoleonism, and what else relates to that stormy period of European history. The latter was the birth hour of the Cromwellian era, with its Rupert chivalries and its Ironside invincibilities, with its murder of one king and the precipitate flight of another. To this last named historic period we dvote this paper on Cromwell and his times. In the closing year of the sixteenth century, in the pretty village of Huntingdon, a man-child was born into the world, who five days thereafter in the parish church was christened "Oliver." This happening excited no interest beyond a narrow circle of village dames, and yet its remoter results have deeply impressed the civili- 24 HISTORIC ERAS. zation of the nineteenth century. Of the earlier years of Cromwell we obtain only an occasional glimpse. Pos sibly, as Greene or Carlyle suggests, he was like most English lads, fond of robbing birds' nests and raiding upon apple orchards. We believe it is Dickens who mentions an interview between Cromwell and Charles I., at the house of Sir Oliver Cromwell, the uncle of the future Protector, when they were both mere lads. As the story goes, young Oliver manifested some repug nance to his Royal Highness, and peremptorily refused to "pay his duty" to the forthcoming king. It is spoken to the credit of James I., who was pres ent at the interview, that he commended the sturdy independence of young Cromwell, and reminded his favorite son that the English people all had the same pluck with his boyish playmate. The whole statement is probably mythical, and was the after-thought of some later narrater. When about the age of seventeen, Cromwell came under the influence of the Puritan clergy, who were wont to harangue the village rabble at the foot of the town cross. In due time he embraced the Puritan the ology. This was shortly followed by his conversion, a phenomenal event that might be compared to that of John Bunyan, the tinker of Elstow. About this time he was troubled with those hypochondriac fancies of which Carlyle has preserved the account. Amongst other odd conceits was his sending to the village physi cian at midnight, fearing that he was about to die. By degrees, however, he emerged from this valley of the CROMWELL. 25 shadow of death, so that in his last days he desired neither refreshment nor sleep, but was in haste to be gone. Whether wisely or not, Cromwell, at an immature age, espoused Elizabeth, the daughter of Sir James Bourchier, who proved a faithful helpmate through all the vicissi tudes of an eventful life. For several years after this matrimonial alliance he devoted himself mainly to cattle husbandry, except that at frequent intervals he officiat ed both in prayer and exhortation in the religious assem blies of his native town. But little else is known of him during this period beyond the fact that he was returned to the Parliament of 1629, where, owing to his "inadequacy of speech," he made no considerable fig ure. This Parliament was noted for the "petition of right" which Charles I. assented to after many delays and attempted evasions. No sooner, however, was Parliament dissolved than he renewed his unconsti tutional levies under the names of loans and benevo lences. It is said that upon the dissolution of this Par liament Cromwell remarked in a significant way to his old teacher that they did not need him now, but they would want him hereafter. During the parliamentary interval of eleven years which followed, Cromwell removed to Cambridgeshire, where he became an expert in all kinds of husbandry. Meanwhile, Strafford had formulated a system of "Thorough,'' a euphemism for continental despotism. To this period belongs the story that Cromwell, Hamp- den, Pym, and other commonwealth celebrities secured 26 HISTORIC ERAS. passage for New England, but were stopped by a royal order in council. In November, 1640, the Long Parliament, memora ble for its political results, met at Westminster in response to the royal summons. In this Parliament Cromwell sat for Cambridgeshire, one of the aristocratic constituencies of the country. At the beginning of this session the House consisted of men of widely different views in politics and religion. Were we to classify according to the French method, we should say there was a center and a right and left wing. The center, which constituted the dominant faction, was composed of Presbyterians and moderate Church-men under the leadership of Falkland, Hyde, and Colepepper. They were supporters of reform, but opposed to all radical changes in the Constitution. The right wing was made up of pronounced Church-men and believers in the divine right of kingly rule. The left wing consisted of Independents, who had little sympathy with monarchy or Episcopacy They were Puritans in their religious faith, and not a few of them Levelers in their political views. This party, of whom Cromwell soon became the acknowledged head, was recruited in a very small degree from men of gentle birth, like Mampden, and some of nobler lineage, like Essex and Vane. The parliamentary majority addressed itself at once to reformatory measures The Star Chamber and high commission courts, whose procedure was inquisitorial and at utter variance with English tradition and senti ment, were straightway abolished. At the same time CROMWELL. 27 the Parliament voted the imprisonment of Laud and the attainder and subsequent execution of Strafford, whose betrayal of popular liberty could not be condoned and whose evil counsel to the King was the cause of the general discontent which pervaded the masses. These extreme measures aroused the resentment of Charles to such a degree that he committed the most fatal blunder of his reign. He demanded the surrender of Hampden, Pym, and Hollis, and upon the refusal of the House to comply with this demand he ventured on another step that precipitated an armed conflict. Followed by a file of soldiers, he suddenly appeared at the door of the House of Commons for the purpose of seizing five obnoxious members of that body. The House for the nonce behaved with a dignity like that of the Roman Senate when the Gauls invaded that venerable forum. Charles, followed by his henchmen, moved up the main aisle to the Speaker's desk, and found to his sore dis comfort that the game had flown. Mortified and crest fallen, he retraced his steps amidst cries of "Privilege! Privilege!" This grave, royal indiscretion was as decisive as Caesar's passage of the Rubicon. Hence forth the ill-starred monarch determined to stake his political fortunes on the issue of a plebiscitum to be rendered not by ballots, but by bullets. Even at that time the seemingly inevitable conflict might have been pre vented by a fusion of the Royalists and Presbyterians. But Charles was obstinate and impracticable, and with drew from his capitol only to return a doomed and defeated sovereign. 2C HISTORIC ERAS. At this point we drop the narrative and speak directly to the personal agency of Cromwell in the great affairs of this commonwealth era. The contest now impend ing was essentially the immemorial fight between ple beian and patrician, which began at Pharsalia and culmi nated amidst the disasters of Philippi. On the side of the king were found the principal nobility, the great body of the landed gentry, the clergy almost without a single break, and the two great universities, with their influence. On the side of Parliament were arrayed a small minority of the nobility, a very large majority of the yeomanry and of the merchants and shop-keepers of the realm. Cromwell was but little past forty when the struggle began He was without military training, never having set a squadron in the field, and yet was soon to develop into a commander no whit inferior to the greatest captains of ancient or modern times. In the beginning so little were his possibilities appreciated that he was assigned to no higher position than a cap tain of dragoons. At the same time such men as the Earl of Essex, as great a dotard as VVurm.ser, who con fronted the young Napoleon in the campaign of Italy, were invested with the chief command. It is not strange, therefore, that for the first two years of the war, the parliamentary forces achieved no brilliant success, and were even placed at serious disadvantage in the northern and western portion of the kingdom. No one was more dissatisfied with these results than Cromwell, who attributed them to a lack of inspiration on the part of the troops. CROMWELL. 29 In a conversation with his cousin, John Hampden, that genial and gallant English gentleman, he remarked that Parliament could not hope to succeed until the struggle was based on religion, and until there was greater thoroughness of drill and discipline. Upon this basis he organized his world-famed regi ment of Ironsides, everyone of whom was a freeholder, or the son of a freeholder. This regiment afterwards became the model of the whole army. The effects that soon followed this new military departure were known and read of all men. Heretofore Rupert, the dashing cavalier, had been victorious upon almost every field ; but at Naseby and Marston Moor Cromwell's Saints clove them down like so many thistles. The motives of Cromwell may not have been altogether patriotic when he suggested a self-denying ordinance that speed ily rid the army of many incapable general officers, and gave the control of military affairs to men like himself, such as Monk, Fleetwood, and his own son-in-law, Ire- ton, all of whom had that desperate courage which char acterized so many of the English leaders from the days of Caractacus. This remodeling of the army was the beginning of the downfall of the Royalist cause. It was not long until Charles I. was placed under mili tary supervision in the Island of Ely, Col. Hammond, a kinsman of Cromwell, having charge of the royal pris oner. It is well understood that at one time pending the conflict of arms there were negotiations between Crom well and Charles that, if successful, would have saved 3O HISTORIC ERAS. the king from the scaffold. These negotiations con templated the making of Cromwell an Earl of Essex, a title which some of his ancestors had worn. Whether the scheme was defeated by Cromwell's dread of the king's treachery or his fear of the Parliament is matter of conjecture. At any rate, the opportunity was lost and the monarchy plunged forward to overthrow, and Charles himself to death, if not disgrace. The crisis was not long delayed. A Presbyterian majority of the Parliament had through its commission ers secured what was known as the Newport treaty with the king, which they declared a proper basis of settle ment. Cromwell, who was absent from London conducting the siege of Pontefract, being informed of the state of affairs at Westminster, left the siege in the hands of a subaltern, and hurried to the capital. On his arrival he found things in a bad way for his party, and with his accustomed vigor he set about circumventing the par liamentary majority. He was not a man for rose-water remedies when vast interests were at stake. In this emergency he resorted to a plan that was thoroughly revolutionary. He caused the trained bands of London to be discharged from the custody of the king. At day-break next morning, Col. Rich, with his regiment of cavalry, was ranked in the palace yard for the safe keeping of his Majesty. Col. Pride, with his regiment of infantry, was stationed at Westminster so as to guard every avenue of approach to the House of Commons. Pride had instructions to exclude every member voting CROMWELL. 31 with the Presbyterian majority. This he did with such thoroughness that the Parliament was reduced in num ber to less than one hundred. By this direct method, more honest at least than Speaker Reed's later method of counting a quorum, he obtained a majority fully intent on the subversion of monarchy. The Parliament at this time consisted of less than one hundred members, seven-eighths of whom were read)' for extreme measures. A committee was appointed to prepare a sort of indictment against Charles Stuart, the King of England, setting forth that said Charles was guilty of high crimes and misdemeanors. With the merest bit of discussion the Parliament or dered a high court of justice to be organized, with Brad- shaw as President. This vehement tribunal convened in the hall of William Rufus, the place of the subsequent trial of Warren Hastings, Governor-general of India. In this hall, according to Macaulay, not less than thirty sovereigns were crowned at different periods of English history. The king was arraigned in due form, and challenged the jurisdiction of the court. Bradshaw replied that the court could not allow its authority to be questioned in that way. After this mock trial the deci sion was announced condemning Charles, the king, to suffer death on the 3Oth of January, 1640 (O. S.), in front of the palace of White Hall. Cromwell, who had been rarely present during the investigation, was the third to sign the death-warrant of the king. He has been greatly censured for failing to defeat the execution of the king. 32 HISTORIC ERAS. In the existing temper of the army and Parliament it is more than questionable whether his own personal intervention could have averted the blow. A majority, however, of the more conservative citizens of the realm remonstrated against a deed which they regarded as a sacrament of blood. The United Provinces of the Netherlands protested against the act, and the French court was equally emphatic in its condemnation of this proposed judicial murder. At the appointed time, how ever, the 3Oth of January, 1640, Charles I. was beheaded in the presence of a vast multitude. His royal demeanor in the presence of his enemies was not less dignified than that of Louis XVI. of France, who in the Place de la Revolution toward the close of the next century suffered the like penalty of decapita tion. There was a saying amongst the Greeks that the lightning sanctifies what it strikes ; so, likewise, death canonizes its least illustrious victim. How much more when it strikes down one in whose veins flowed the blood of the Plantagenets and the Tudors. The reac tion in public sentiment shook the realm from Berwick on the Tweed to Land's End. From that time forward there could be little enduring peace or abiding reconciliation between the contesting parties until the restoration of the Stuarts. Cromwell, who knew better than any man of his generation the perils of the existing crisis, with as brave a heart as when he stood at Worcester and Marston Moor, addressed himself to the task of reconstruction. Events, however, were not ripe for this reconstructive move- CROMWELL. 33 ment, for at this particular juncture Presbyterian Scot land entered the list as the champion of Charles II. As a precautionary measure, they exacted of him an oath to support the solemn League and Cove nant, and straightway mobilized an army for the inva sion of England. During this struggle, which resulted in the thorough subjugation of Scotland, occurred two notable battles that deserve special consideration. This brings us to the era of the battle of Dunbar, which illus trates better than Naseby or Marston Moor the superior generalship of Cromwell. The scene of the battle was distant only a few miles from Edinburg. Leslie had intrenched his army on the hill of Doon, confronting Cromwell and his troops, who by some misadventure were shut up in a cul de sac, from which there seemed no possibility of escape. Leslie, yielding to the solici tations of the lord commissioners who followed him in his campaigns, unexpectedly left his vantage-ground and descended to the foot of the hill. When Cromwell noticed this blunder of his adversary, he is reported to have said to Monk: "See how the Lord of hosts has delivered them into our hands." He resolved upon immediate attack, but was delayed by the non-arrival of Ireton. To be in readiness, however, he began "shag ging," as he quaintly styled it, his army toward the left. In the early twilight of the next day, it being the 3d of September according to the calendar, he set the battle in array, having previously spent a half-hour in devo tional exercises. As the sun rose over the blue German ocean he 34 HISTORIC ERAS. quoted the Psalmist's expression, "Let the Lord arise, and let his enemies be scattered," and the army, lifting up their voices in praise and invocation to the tune of "Dundee," which they rolled high and strong at the foot of Doon, they went forward to conflict and to sig nal victory. This battle was alike typical and decisive. It is hardly credible that the English army, consisting of twelve thousand men, should ha\e nearly destroyed the Scotch army of twenty-odd thousand without sustaining a greater loss than two or three hundred killed and wounded. Just twelve months thereafter the Scots ral lied at Worcester, where they again encountered an overwhelming defeat. It was from the field at Worces ter that Charles II. was fleeing, when, it is said, that he concealed himself in the branches of the Royal Oak while a surly Roundhead rode below droning a Hebrew psalm. The young king, after divers hairbreadth escapes, reached the Continent, where he remained until the Restoration. These memorable military successes placed Cromwell in a position that he could safely take up that plan of reconstruction which had been delayed by the Scotch flank movement. The Parliament, as already intimated, had degenerated into a mere handlul of sniveling fanat ics and psalm-singing hypocrits. The whole country was weary of their legislative incubation. Without formal notice, Cromwell, with a file of soldiers, entered the House of Commons and dispersed what has been very appropriately called the "Rump Parliament." Having cleared the House and locked the door, he put CROMWELL. 35 the key in his pocket. In the doing of this he was backed by an overwhelming sentiment, both in the army and country. In re-adjusting the machinery of the government, Cromwell speedily learned that it was one thing to conduct a military campaign and quite another to administer the affairs of a great nation. As one step toward the accomplishment of this purpose, he sum moned a new Parliament, in which many of the rotten boroughs of that period were disfranchised, and some of the larger cities which had been hitherto denied par liamentary representation were admitted by their repre sentatives to the great council of the realm. In this he anticipated the great parliamentary reform of 1832, and some others of later date. With this Parliament he had serious trouble, and it was dissolved after a brief ses sion. Cromwell had now reached the most critical juncture of his public life. Indeed, he had many reasons to fear a coalition between the Royalists and the disaffected Levelers of the army for his personal downfall. To forestall such a movement, he determined as far as practicable to restore the ancient forms and symbols of the British Constitution. He resolved to summon another Parliament and to reconstruct the House of Peers as a concession to the nobility, and even to the middle classes, who had become weary of the religious dogmas and the political methods of Puritanism. Accordingly, he invited the leading noblemen to seats in the Upper House, and, still further to strenghten his position, he created a number of new peers who were 36 HISTORIC ERAS. entitled to no such distinction whether on the score of birth or blood. A majority of them were plebeians who were brought to the surface by their military services in the field. The scheme proved abortive, because the old families were unwilling to sit with these parvenues, and the House of Commons itself strongly refused to recog nize these butchers and shop-keepers as part of the ancient peerage of the realm. The Commons, however, tempted him by the offer of the kingly title. He toyed for a season with the seductive bait, and then accepted the less odious title of Lord Protector. Henceforth he administered affairs in a way such as no English sover eign had attempted since the reign of that royal Blue beard, Henry VIII. He organized England into twelve military districts under the control of an equal number of Major-generals, who were directly responsible to him self. In the same despotic spirit he appointed eccle siastical " triers, "' who were as intolerant and prescrip tive as the High Commission Court under the manage ment of Laud and his minions. It is the veriest non sense to condone these flagrant wrongs on the ground that these prelatists and papists were political factions rather than religious sects. It is the merest logical make-shift to reply that Cromwell granted special exemptions to the Jews whilst he punished the reading of the liturgy or the saying of a mass with imprison ment and confiscation. His Puritan defenders never weary of telling us of his sturdy championship of Prot estantism on the Continent. Milton, his Latin Secre tary, in his sonnets, reminds us of how he demanded CROMWELL. 37 freedom of worship for the Piedmontise, and Carlyle tells us of how he threatened that the English guns should be heard in the castle of St. Angelo if the Vau- dois were molested in their simple worship Let all this and even more be allowed, yet it remains histori cally true that in the name of liberty he confiscated the property of the Establishment, robbed the clergy of their livings, and without the color of law ejected hun dreds of Presbyterians from their parishes. It is safe to assert that in the closing years of the protectorate he was chargeable with grosser infringements on constitu tional law than was Charles I., whom he himself rated guilty of high crimes and misdemeanors. Like Disraeli, of the present century, Cromwell sought to atone for the sins and short-comings of his home admin istration by the brilliancy of his foreign policy. He it was who secured Dunkirk as some compensation for the loss of Calias and by his admirals despoiled Spain of some of her best colonial possessions. As the ally of Lewis XIV , his soldiery were esteemed the best fighting troops of Europe, and everywhere throughout the Continent the name of Cromwell were a terror to those who would oppose the Protestant cause. It is not strange, therefore, that the character and career of Cromwell has been a perplexity to the historian. Hume stigmatizes him as "a canting hypocrit." Fors- ter, in his "Statesmen of the British Commonwealth," alleges that he was "wanting in truth." On the other hand, Macaulay applauds him to the echo, and Carlyle styles him "the most English of Englishmen." 443311 38 HISTORIC ERAS. There is a measure of truth in these different charac terizations, and the verdict of the ages will be that he was essentially a bundle of inconsistencies, if not down right contradictions. "In every death-chamber there is the fifth act of a tragedy." This generalization is strik ingly true of the last hours of the great Lord Protector. For years his health had been failing, especially from the period of his arduous Irish campaign and the death of his favorite daughter, Elizabeth. Some have sup posed that mortified vanity had been at work to under mine his originally vigorous constitution. He had cherished the hope that he might be the founder of a kingly dynasty, or else the head of a European Protest ant alliance. These lofty aims were largely frustrated. In the summer of 1658, he was prostrated by an incur able disease. His days, indeed, were numbered. There was in the manner of Cromwell's death more than a sem blance of poetic justice. It occurred on the 3d of Sep tember, 1658, the anniversary of the Scots' defeat at Dunbar, and also of what he esteemed his "crowning mercy," the decisive battle of Worcester. In front of the royal palace of White Hall, where he lay dying, had been exhibited nine years agone that most tragical pageant, the judicial murder of Charles I., the purest sovereign of the Stuart dynasty. Almost in the midst of his death-agony, a strong wind tempest swept over the sea and shook even the dry land. Weird lightning flashes, followed by crashing thunder peals, added to the terrible sublimity of the scene. This wild war of the elements without symbolized the fiercer con- CROMWELL. 39 flict which raged in the breast of the Lord Protector. For months and years he had moved about in hourly apprehension of assassination. Now that the end was nigh there was the absence of that imperial repose with which Caesar confronted the daggers of conspiracy. Nor was there the slightest token of that exhilaration of soul which the great Napoleon felt when, from his dying couch at Longwood, he seemed to watch the heady surges of some new Leipsic or Austerlitz, and with his parting breath shouted with the old time emphasis: "Tete d' atmee !" On the contrary, the vultures of remorse were preying on his vitals. In this supreme hour of his destiny his single solace was found in the Puritan dogma: "Once in grace always in grace. 1 ' A few spasmodic contortions of the face, and the once mailed hand was still and stark in death, and the eagle eye that had so often flashed in the forefront of the charging squadrons was quenched in the black ness of darkness forever. Whatever may be our estimate of Cromwell's states manship, there can be no room for disagreement as to the political consequences of his death. Beyond con troversy that death was the downfall of Puritanism in all its branches. He was its brain and its muscle, its blood and its bones. True, he had provided with much painstaking for the succession of his son Richard. But between sire and son there was a broader disparity than between Solomon and Rehoboam. Richard, a well- mannered gentleman, was a sovereign oi the Merovin gian type, ill-adapted to the existing emergency. His 4