last? Why weaken the confidence of men, who were to be his most efficient instruments? On the other hand, if he were sincere, we meet with no corresponding difficulties. He was fearful of the authority of Parliament. He knew himself exposed to their hostility, and he felt that a union with the king would shield him, while it presented a favorable opportunity for a settlement of the affairs of the country, without an undue preponderance on the Parliament's side. We must be permitted to express our belief, that it was fortunate for him that no such union took place,-for with all his energy, his undertaking must have failed. There are only certain stages at which revolutions can be stopped. It was not long before Cromwell became himself aware of this, which accounts for his sudden change of conduct to open hostility. His only mode of keeping himself upon the surface, was to float for a time with the current that had set against the monarchy.

That Cromwell was usually influenced by mixed motives of action, after he became a military man, we do not doubt,but there is no satisfactory evidence, that before the brilliant victories of Dunbar and Worcester, he aspired to govern the state in his own person. Whatever projects he might have entertained, could never have done for him what his military career did, and this he could not long have foreseen. In all states convulsed by internal broils, or indeed generally in any states, it is the plainest and commonest of steps from the command of a victorious army, to the government of the whole nation. There is no truth more palpable in history.

We shall not enlarge upon the career of Cromwell as Protector. Had he only been one of the legitimate line, England's annals would not be able to boast of a more successful, a more vigorous and a more patriotic prince. Which of them ever did so much of his own free will, to give the country a free and liberal government? Which of them more honorably sustained such generous spirits as Blake and Hale and others, although he knew they were unfriendly to him? Which of them, with a powerful and enthusiastic army at his command, would have voluntarily called three Parliaments in three years, in each of which a majority thought, spoke and acted against himself? The leading and irremediable defect that frustrated all his exertions, was the want of title to the place he held. The English people would not admit his right to rule over them. It was his perpetual labor to avoid resting this right upon his sword,

and he was perpetually driven to it. We are rejoiced that he was. We are rejoiced that his usurpation was so glaring, that no subsequent age can mistake it, but while we condemn him as a usurper, we must accord him the praise of being a very moderate one.

On the whole, Mr. Vaughan's summary deserves consideration.

'It is a fact,' he says, 'that until a few months before the late king's death, Cromwell was an advocate of monarchy, and even hazarded his own life to save that of his sovereign. It is a fact, that the fragment of a Parliament, which his violence dissolved in 1653, was on the eve of adopting measures, which, whether they saw it or not, must have brought back Charles Stuart, and with him the return of oppression to a large portion of the people, along with the penalties of death and confiscation to the leaders of the army, and to many besides. It is a fact, also, that in all his subsequent experiments with regard to Parliaments, the Protector consulted the general feeling of the nation, and labored to restore the ancient constitution quite as far as was consistent with his personal safety; and it is not less certain, that the constitution which his last efforts were employed to establish, accorded more nearly with the claims of all the parties, included in the British dominions, than any thing that had preceded it, or than any thing which followed until the revolution of 1688. Cromwell insisted with all parties on the general equity of his plans; and hoped that self-interest would aid the greater number in discerning it; but all continued blind, and all, save one, were to be made captives in their blindness.'

No doubt, self-interest would have been served, by admitting the title and the authority of Cromwell; but with deference we would submit, whether there may not have been a higher motive of action in resisting them. The deep stain upon the character of that man is selfish ambition. Was it for those who had openly and honestly acted with him for other purposes, to sacrifice their principles, and bow the knee to him, who had frustrated those purposes? Neither will it do to blame them for being made captives to Charles the Second, in their blindness. Cromwell is far more responsible for the consequences that ensued. He knew that he was not the choice of the people of England. Why did he persist in forcing himself upon them? He thus prevented that settlement of the nation, which he might have materially aided in

producing, and wearied the feelings of every body to such a degree, that at last they were willing, for the sake of peace, to take back Charles Stuart, even without conditions. He had not that highest degree of greatness of mind which makes a man willing to descend, and to be little.

Cromwell has done even more mischief yet to the world. He has inflicted a serious injury upon the cause of liberty and religion. It is to his name that the enemies of popular rights will point, for a justification of their resistance, even to the most righteous demands. It is such men as he and Napoleon Bonaparte who do infinite harm, by attracting the admiration of men to talent, instead of virtue, and by confounding so skilfully good ends with bad means to reach them, that reason loses all its force in contending with the impetuosity of enthusiasm. He has injured religion, by connecting his practice in the minds of men with hypocrisy. After he began to follow the ignis fatuus of ambition, he was a hypocrite. Dissimulation became a necessary instrument for his advancement. In proportion as his enthusiasm gave way before the cooler judgment that was requisite to conduct his plans, the void was to be filled by an artificial emotion. His example has, therefore, been the perpetual theme of scoffers at religion, and has had the effect of spreading his disgrace over a whole sect of conscientious men, who had no similar motives to lead them astray.

Cromwell was a kind and generous friend to New England, and we have, therefore, been induced to give more space to an impartial view of his character, than we could well afford. To sum up all in a few words, we can only say, that he appears to us to have been one of those extraordinary beings, formed for turbulent times and yet moulded in a degree by such times. A deep-toned enthusiast at first, acting sincerely and violently in the cause he had espoused, the superiority of his abilities raised him above all his fellows, and placed the supreme power within his reach. The temptation was too great for his virtue, and, in yielding, like Macbeth before him, he was driven to make his face a vizard to his heart, disguising what that was.' There were many men in that day, who, in sternness of principle, were not unworthy of the ancient Roman character. These men had not resisted Charles, to favor Cromwell. It was tyranny under any shape that they opposed. But they had drawn their notions of government, not so much from an VOL. XXXVII.-NO. 80.

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accurate view of the condition of the people to be governed, as from the popular and dazzling examples of the ancient republics. England certainly was not then, (it may be doubted whether she ever was or will be), prepared for a democracy. Yet these men pressed on with so much inconsiderateness that they lost all influence, when that influence would have been of greatest use, at the moment of the Restoration. The great majority of the people, weary of change, were easily led by early prejudices to wish back their kings. A union of the two intolerant religious parties with those who had no religion, and the head of the army effected, without a struggle, the return of the Stuart dynasty. And never, during the eighty-five years that it ruled in England, was there a moment when it might have fixed itself so firmly in the hearts of the nation. Charles the Second wantonly trifled with their affections. But history has yielded a lesson from it, which should be often considered when we are led to doubt the soundness of popular institutions. That lesson is, that the people learn wisdom by suffering, faster than monarchs do. It was strikingly shown after the return of the Stuarts. It has been shown not less so in the late instance of the Bourbons. On the other hand, the English settlement of the Constitution in 1688, was a real improvement upon the experiments of 1640, and the French Government of 1830 manifests still greater progress since the days of the Convention. There is a strong analogy between these cases in many respects, in one, a difference which it is worth while here to point out. The recall of Charles was the spontaneous act of the nation,—the return of Louis touched no sympathies of the French. How much more criminal must have been the misconduct of the former!

The Royal Declaration issued at Breda confirmed little for which the people had been contending, and that little was not suffered to remain. The liberty for tender consciences which it guarantied, terminated in a complete re-establishment of the hierarchy and the enforcement of the act of uniformity. The indemnity for past offences was violated by a swelled list of exceptions. The record of twenty-four years is little else than a gradual retracing of steps to the point where the quarrel began, and this too, with a mixture of far more shame. Venality and prostitution ran riot in the court. Profligacy of every description infected the nation. The monarch himself set a glorious example. His father, arbitrary though he was,

never received the gold of a foreign prince to betray the interests of his people,-nor lavished their substance upon mistresses of every description. He did both. His father assumed the reins of government, under all the difficulties accumulated upon him by his predecessor. He thoroughly exhausted the greatest share of popularity that fell to the lot of any of his race.

We have left ourselves no room to enter into any detail upon the suffering which the act of uniformity, so unjustly forced upon the nation after it had confided in the king's honor, produced. It is probable that the sum of it was greater than that which produced the revolution. The refusal to conform to ceremonies has besides been made, throughout their history, a reproach to the Puritans. It has been represented as unreasonable obstinacy upon trifles,-as if any thing were a trifle which involves a principle. We shall not venture to add any views of our own to the following spirited defence by Mr. Vaughan.

'Men who are acquainted with the character of the non-conformists at this time, must often be surprised at the language adopted concerning them by certain writers, who would be thought particularly enlightened on these subjects. It is almost amusing to observe the airs of wisdom, with which these persons affect to deplore the weakness of so many well-meaning individuals, who, to escape kneeling at an altar or wearing a surplice, could expose themselves to so much suffering. But these persons should, perhaps, be reminded that the sum which Hampden was called to pay under the name of ship-money, was a very small sum; but inasmuch as that small sum was a tax, and a tax imposed by an authority which had no right to impose taxes, it was a trifle involving a momentous precedent,—an embryo from which the most extensive revolutions might proceed. And men who look on these things with the eye of common sense, have yet to learn, why false authorities in the Church are not to be resisted quite as steadfastly, as false authorities in the State. If a sickly acquiescence has often been found to make way for despotism on the part of the Crown, has it not often made way for the same thing on the part of the mitre? And who, with the history of the papal hierarchy before him, will pretend that there is less to fear from the usurpations of the priest than from those of the magistrate? The men who stood forth in 1662, waging the war of freedom against the powers of intolerance, were, in no small measure, the saviours of their country; and well would it be, if