99 noes. The discussion on this day again occupied nearly all the sitting, and was only at last closed by the compromise of laying aside some clauses in which exception had been taken to parts of the Liturgy as savouring of superstition. Other changes, comprising some additions, were also assented to; and these, with the Declaration as amended thus far, were referred to "the "same committee that was appointed for penning of it, "and they are to bring it back to the house with all con"venient speed." A further concession to the Opposition was at the same time made, in the addition to that committee of the names of Culpeper and Falkland.

The two following days, Wednesday and Thursday, the 17th and 18th of November, were silent as to the Remonstrance, but filled with matters of grave import having a direct bearing upon it. Complaints had been made of unauthorised and exaggerated accounts sent abroad of the recent proceedings of the House, and after debate an order was issued for peremptory suppression of all present printing, "or venting in manuscript," of the Diurnal Occurrences of parliament. The examinations as to the new army plot were also completed, the evidence leaving little doubt as to the design having been known to the King; and Pym moved and carried a resolution, "that, in "the examinations now read unto us, we did conceive "there was sufficient evidence for us to believe that there was a second design to bring up the army to overawe "the deliberations of this House."

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On Friday the 19th, Secretary Nicholas wrote with unconcealed alarm and misgiving to his master. "The "worst in all that business is, that it reflects on your Majesty, as if you had given some instructions con"cerning the stirring up the army to petition the parlia66 ment. I hope it will appear that your Majesty's "intentions were only to retain the army in their duty After which, in the say, that there had

and dependance on your Majesty." same letter, Mr. Secretary went on to

been nothing done these two days by the Commons

touching the Declaration remonstrating the bad effects of ill counsels; but it was thought that the same would be finished that week. There were, he added, divers well affected servants of his Majesty in the house who had continued to oppose the Remonstrance with unanswerable arguments; but it was verily thought that it would pass notwithstanding, and that it would be "ordered to be "printed" without transmission to the Lords. Upon which it is to be observed as beyond question, that manifestly there was no longer any concealment of the ultimate design of the leaders of the House of Commons. Thus early, the destination of the Remonstrance was known. Strode had indeed publicly argued upon the assumption of its being printed and diffused among the people, as a thing to be admitted; and any subsequent complaint, therefore, of being taken by surprise when the proposition for the printing was formally made, could have been but a sheer pretence on the part of its opponents.

1

While Nicholas was writing to the King, it had been brought back to the house from the committee, pursuant to the last order; certain amendments to it had been violently debated, having reference to portions of the service-book; these ultimately, upon concession by the majority, had been read and assented to, and certain other verbal alterations made; and another lengthened debate had given further opportunity for the "unanswerable" arguments on the one side, and the quiet and resolved answers on the other, which had now occupied the House, with small intermission, since the 9th of November. Why should you pass this unnecessary and unseasonable Declara

tion? urged Hyde and his friends once more. It is unnecessary to detail grievances, most of which are already fully redressed; and it is unseasonable to welcome home from Scotland, with such a volume of reproaches, the very author of that redress, and to assail his Majesty the King for what others have done amiss, and for what he himself hath reformed. We propose to pass it, was the determined answer of Pym and his associates, because we hold it to be necessary for the preservation and maintenance of the concessions which have so been made. We believe ourselves in danger of being deprived of all the good acts we have gained, if great care and vigilance be not still used to disappoint malignant counsels. They who most exalt the grace and bounty of the King in regard to those good acts, have been most busy to pervert the affections of the people from ourselves in regard to the same matter. For our own acquittal, therefore, we would let the kingdom know in what state we found it at our first convention, what fruit it hath received by our counsels, wherein we think the securities obtained are not yet sufficient, and such further measures as in our consciences we believe to be called for. Because, though the prime evil counsellors have been removed, there are others growing up in their places like to do quite as much mischief. — To which last home thrust, reply could not have been very easy! It was late in the afternoon, when, at the close of this debate, the order was moved and carried that the Declaration should be duly engrossed, and again brought in at two o'clock the next day. All which having been accomplished, the House was about to pass to other business, when D'Ewes informs us that Mr. Speaker Lenthal made an appeal ad misericordiam for himself. He showed that he had been sitting very late yesterday (Thursday 18th), that it was now past four o'clock, and that he really could not hold out daily to sit seven or eight hours. Whereon the indefatigable Mr. Pym, admitting the appeal, suggested that the House should rise, and that a grand committee should presently sit.

On Saturday, the 20th of November, at two o'clock, the Remonstrance, engrossed and finished, was laid upon the table. Doubtless it was then expected by its supporters, and with some show of reason, that after having stood the brunt of so many prolonged debates, it might be voted without further resistance. A resolution was accordingly moved upon its introduction," that it be "read and finished to-night;" which was met, however, by such determined opposition, that Pym was obliged to yield, and the final debate was fixed for ten o'clock on the morning of Monday the 22d. "Why would you have it "still put off," asked Cromwell of Falkland, as they left the house; "for this day would quickly have determined "it." To which Falkland made reply that there would not have been time enough, for sure it would take some further debate. Oliver rejoined, "A very sorry one."

Cromwell was mistaken, no doubt. He was not in Hyde's confidence, and could not know of the desperate party-move to be attempted on the occasion of the last debate. But before this is described, and while the Remonstrance, ready engrossed, is lying on the table of the house, the time would seem to have arrived for the endeavour to present it to the reader, at once with sufficient fulness for accurate reflection of all its statements and in such form as to render justice to the striking narrative they embody, yet at the same time so

1 Hist. ii., 42. Clarendon tells the anecdote, however, in a sense quite different from that which it derives from an authentic statement of the circumstances. It was in the ordinary course of the business of the House that Pym had proposed at once to bring the matter to a conclusion, but Clarendon (ii. 41) would have us believe that he made that proposition in direct forfeiture of a previous engagement. "And by these and the "like arts, they promised themselves "that they should easily carry it; so "that, the day it was to be resumed, "they entertained the House all the

"morning with other debates, and to"wards noon called for the Remon"strance," &c. upon which they were forced to go back to the first understanding of giving an entire day to the debate. Accordingly, he continues, "the next morning, the debate being "entered upon about nine of the 'clock," &c. Now, no such incidents occurred. On the day fixed for the resumption of the debate, it was resumed, and at the hour precisely which before had been arrangednamely, twelve o'clock. Clarendon's statement is an entire misrepresentation.

compressed as to bring it within the limits of ordinary histories. There, it should long ago have had the place, from which it may hardly be too much to believe now, with some degree of confidence, that it never more can be excluded. In which expectation are here appended to it some notes of matters not lying on the surface of ordinary books, which will be found to illustrate and completely corroborate the most startling of its averments.

And so to modern readers is committed that great vindication of the rising of their ancestors against the sovereign in the seventeenth century, as to which one who opposed it eloquently through all its stages thus frankly confessed the secret of his opposition: "Sir, this "Remonstrance, whensoever it passeth, will make such an impression, and leave such a character behind, both of his Majesty, the People, and the Parliament, and of this present "Church and State, as no time shall ever eat it out, while “histories are written, and men have eyes to read them!"

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The Preamble, consisting of twenty not numbered clauses, and opening in the name of " the Commons in the present "Parliament assembled," begins by declaring that for the past twelve months they had been carrying on a struggle of which the object was to restore and establish the ancient honour, greatness, and security, of the Nation and the Crown. That during this time they had been called to wrestle with dangers and fears, with miseries and calamities, with distempers and disorders so various, great, and pressing, that for the time the entire liberty and prosperity of the kingdom had been extinguished by them, and the foundations of the throne undermined. And that now, finding great aspersions cast on what had been done. many difficulties raised for the hindrance of what remained to do, and jealousies everywhere busily fomented betwixt