might have excused him for some remission of his former warmth. But it made no other impression upon him, than to be quiet and contented, whilst they would let him alone, and, with the same cheerfulness, to obey the first summons when he was called out; which was quickly after. In a word, he was a man, that whoever shall, after him, deserve best of the English nation, he can never think himself undervalued, when he shall hear, that his courage, virtue, and fidelity, is laid in the balance with, and compared to, that of the lord Capel.

So ended the year one thousand six hundred forty-eight; a year of reproach and infamy above all years which had passed before it; a year of the

highest dissimulation and hypocrisy, of the deepest villainy and most bloody treasons, that any nation was ever cursed with, or under: a year, in which the memory of all the transactions ought to be rased out of all records, lest, by the success of it, atheism, infidelity, and rebellion, should be propagated in the world: a year, of which we may say, as the historian said of the time of Domitian, Sicut vetus ætas vidit, quid ultimum in libertate esset, ita nos quid in servitute, adempto per inquisitiones et loquendi audiendique commercio, &c.; or, as the same writer says of a time not altogether so wicked, is habitus animorum fuit, ut pessimum facinus auderent pauci, plures vellent, omnes paterentur.

END OF THE ELEVENTH BOOK.

THE

HISTORY OF THE REBELLION, &c.

BOOK XII.

2 CHRON. XXviii. 10. And now ye purpose to keep under the children of Judah and Jerusalem for bondmen and bondwomen unto you: but are there not with you, even with you, sins against the Lord your God? ISAIAH XVII. 12. Woe to the multitude of many people, which make a noise like the noise of the seas; and to the rushing of nations, that make a rushing like the rushing of mighty waters.-xxix. 10. For the Lord hath poured out upon you the spirit of deep sleep, and hath closed your eyes: the prophets and your rulers, the seers hath he covered.

WHILST these tragedies were acting in Eng- actors, as unworthy the name of Christians, as

land, and ordinances formed, as hath been said, to make it penal in the highest degree for any man to assume the title of king, or to acknowledge any man to be so, the king himself remained in a very disconsolate condition at the Hague. Though he had known the desperate state his father was long in, yet the barbarous stroke so surprised him, that he was in all the confusion imaginable, and all about him were almost bereft of their understanding. The truth is, it can hardly be conceived, with what a consternation this terrible news was received by all the common people of that country. There was a woman at the Hague, of the middling rank, who, being with child, with the horror of the mention of it, fell into travail, and in it died. There could not be more evidence of a general detestation, than there was, amongst all men of what quality soever. Within two or three days, which they gave to the king's recollection, the States presented themselves in a body to his majesty, to condole with him for the murder of his father, in terms of great sorrow and condolence, save that there was not bitterness enough against the rebels and murderers. The States of Holland, apart, performed the same civility towards his majesty; and the body of the clergy, in a very good Latin oration, delivered by the chief preacher of the Hague, lamented the misfortune, in terms of as much asperity, and detestation of the

could be expressed.

The desperateness of the king's condition could not excuse his sinking under the burden of his grief: but those who were about him besought him to resume so much courage as was necessary for his present state. He thereupon caused those of his father's council who had attended him to be sworn of his privy council, adding only Mr. Long his secretary: who, before, was not of the council. All which was done before he heard from the queen his mother; who, notwithstanding the great agony she was in, which without doubt was as great a passion of sorrow as she was able to sustain, wrote to the king, "that he could not "do better, than to repair into France as soon as

was possible, and, in the mean time, desired him "not to swear any persons to be of his council, till "she could speak with him." Whether it was, that she did not think those persons to be enough at her devotion; or that she would have them receive that honour upon her recommendation.

The king himself had no mind to go into France, where he thought he had not been treated with excess of courtesy; and he resolved to perform all filial respect towards the queen his mother, without such a condescension and resignation of himself, as she expected; and, to avoid all eclaircissements upon that subject, he heartily desired that any other course might be found more counsellable