PART XXII THE BRITISH EMPIRE BOOK III. ENGLAND FROM 1642 TO 1791 BASED CHIEFLY UPON THE FOLLOWING AUTHORITIES W. H. S. AUBREY, H. T. BUCKLE, E. BURKE, G. BURNET, LORD CAMPBELL, WITH ADDITIONAL CITATIONS FROM 0. AIRY, T. ARNOLD, J. AUBREY, R. BAILLIE, J. BALFOUR, S. BANNISTER, J. DRYDEN, A. FANSHAWE, J. FORSTER, E. GIBBON, O. GOLDSMITH, T. GUMBLE, L. HUTCHINSON, T. HUTCHINSON, JAMES II, T. KEIGHTLEY, J. M. KEMBLE, LORD LONSDALE, E. LUDLOW, J. LYNCH, J. MACKINTOSH, J. RUSHWORTH, G. SAGREDO, DUC DE ST. SIMON, T. SMOLLETT, E. STILES, The Civil War, the outbreak of which was announced by the floating of Charles's standard on the hill at Nottingham, was rendered inevitable by the inadequacy of the intellectual methods of the day to effect a reconciliation between opposing moral and social forces, which derived their strength from the past development of the nation. The personal characters of the leaders might do much to shorten or prolong the time of open warfare, but no permanent restoration of harmony would be possible till some compromise, which would give security alike to the disciples of Hooker and to the disciples of Calvin, had been not only thought out by the few, but generally accepted by the many. On both sides the religious difficulty was complicated by a political difficulty; and, on the king's side at all events, it was from those who were least under the influence of religious motives that the loudest cry for war was heard.-S. R. GARDINER. LET us pause at this juncture, at which the public men of England are exhibiting the spirit of party in aspects so unusual and so portentous, and endeavouring to catch some faint glimpses of the life of the people immediately before the commencement of the Civil War. "Before the flame of the war broke out in the top of the chimneys, the smoke ascended in every country." So writes Lucy Hutchinsone a careful and honest observer of what was passing. She saw around her, in many places, "fierce contests and disputes, almost to blood, even at the first." The partisans of the king were carrying out his commissions of array. The partisans of the parliament were insisting upon obedi [1642 A.D.] ence to the ordinance for the militia. The king proclaimed Essex, the captaingeneral of the parliament, and his officers, as traitors. The parliament voted the king's commissioners of array to be traitors. Not only were the king and the parliament each struggling to obtain possession of the munitions of war by seizing the fortified places, but each barrel of gunpowder was contested for by opposite parties. Few of the members of parliament remained in London. The zealous men of influence in their several counties were in their own districts, raising volunteers, gathering subscriptions, drilling recruits, collecting arms. Each is subscribing largely "for defence of the kingdom." Fire-arms are scarce; and the old weapons of the long-bow and cross-bow are again put in use. Old armour, long since "hung by the wall," is brought down and furbished. The rustic, changed into a pikeman, puts on the iron skull-cap and greaves; and the young farmer becomes a dragoon, with his carbine and pistols. In the parliamentary army there is every variety of clothing. In some companies raised by gentlemen amongst their tenants, the old liveries of each family give the prevailing colour. Hampden's men are in green; Lord Brooke's in purple; others are in blue; others in red. The officers all wear an orange scarf, being the colour of their general. The buff doublet, "though not sword yet cudgel proof," is a substitute for armour. Haslerig's Lobsters, and Cromwell's Ironsides - each so called from their rough mail- are not formed as yet. Recruits are taken, at first, without much reference to their opinions. Cromwell, with his super-eminent sagacity, saw the danger of this course. In a later period of his life, when he had attained supreme power, he thus described his position at the commencement of the war: "I was a person who, from my first employment, was suddenly preferred and lifted up from lesser trust to greater; from my first being a captain of a troop of horse." He then relates that he "had a very worthy friend, a very noble person, Mr. John Hampden, and he thus spake to him: 'Your troops are most of them old decayed serving-men, and tapsters, and such kind of fellows; and their troops are gentlemen's sons, younger sons, and persons of quality: do you think that the spirits of such mean and base fellows will ever be able to encounter gentlemen that have honour, and courage, and resolution in them."" What Cromwell did to meet the ardour of the cavalier with a zeal equally enthusiastic, he goes on to tell: "I raised such men as had the fear of God before them, as made some conscience of what they did." Cromwell did justice to the principle upon which the honour and courage of the cavaliers was founded. He saw, beneath their essenced love-locks and gilded doublets, clear heads and bold hearts. The gay were not necessarily debauched; the health-drinkers were not necessarily drunkards. There were other men in the royalist ranks than "The bravoes of Alsatia, the pages of Whitehall.” There were great spirits in both armies ready to measure their swords for "The king," or for "The cause.' We can scarcely assume that the bulk of the population, or even the greater number of the richer and more educated classes, at once took their sides in this great argument. We know they did not. Many of the best gentlemen of England withdrew from the quarrel which promised to be fatal either to order or to liberty. John Evelyn, whose inclinations were royalist, was one. Mr. Kembled the editor of Twysden's "Government of England," from which we quote, says "Sir Roger Twysden was not the only gentleman [1642 A.D.] who, being unable to join either party, desired to leave England for a time." This learned student of our history adds, by way of accounting for the flight to other lands of some of the country gentlemen, that "they felt it was impossible to serve a king who never spoke a word of truth in his life; and yet could not arm against him, or remain neutral between the two parties." THE STATE OF SOCIETY AND LITERATURE AT THIS PERIOD From this period we cannot understand the causes and the events of the Civil War, without steadily keeping in mind that the zeal of the Puritans, in whatever sectarian differences it exhibited itself, was as much the sustaining principle of the great conflict, as the passionate desire for civil liberty. These two great elements of resistance to the Crown produced impressions upon the national character - for the most part salutary impressions which centuries have not obliterated. The strength of the Puritanical element in the parliament of 1642 led to bold interferences with popular habits. The parliamentary leaders knew that they would have the support of the most powerful of the community of London, and of many other great towns, if not of the majority of the nation, when they discouraged the ordinary amusements of the people, the bearbaitings, the cock-fights, the horse-races, the May-poles; appointed a fast on Christmas Day; and shut up the theatres. Bitter must have been the heartburnings amongst the actors when their vocation came to an end in London, in 1642. The five regular companies were dispersed. Their members became "vagabonds," under the old statutes, hanging about the camps of the cavaliers, or secretly performing in inns and private houses. London is the shop of war; it is the home of thought. Let us look at the vast city under the first of these aspects. It has always had its trained bands. It has now its volunteers of every rank. Many who had been in the Protestant armies of the continent, some who had fought under Gustavus Adolphus, were competent to become instructors. Such a man was Skippon, who had been appointed major-general of the London Militia. In the country the distractions of the time bore hard upon the richer families. Every manor-house was liable to attack by a royalist or a parliamentary band. Lady Brilliana Harley had to put her castle of Brompton, in Herefordshire, in a posture of defence, whilst her husband, Sir Robert Harley, was engaged in his parliamentary vocation. The courageous woman died at her post. Amidst such scenes as these, says Carlyle,e "in all quarters of English ground, with swords getting out of their scabbards," there is one neutral power not wholly cast down "the constable's baton still struggling to reign supreme." That power never ceased to assert itself amidst hostile armies. The judges went their usual circuits. The sessions and the county courts were regularly held. In 1623 Charles had heard in Ben Jonson's "Prince's Masque" allusions to a power which was then beginning to make itself formidable. The "press in a hollow tree," worked by "two ragged rascals," expressed the courtly contempt of that engine which was to give a new character to all political action. In 1642, wherever Charles moved, he had his own press with him. His state papers, for the most part written by Hyde [later Clarendon] were appeals to the reason and the affections of his people, in the place of the old assertions of |