The same principle which made Cromwell thus stand forth as the representative of Protestantism in Europe, plunged him into war with Spain, as the natural enemy of Protestant England. This is the express ground on which he himself defended the Spanish war. "The Spaniard is your enemy; and your enemy, as I tell you, naturally, by that antipathy which is in him, and also providentially, and this in divers respects." The armament which he fitted out against their West India possessions, while it failed in its substantial objects, took possession of Jamaica, which has ever since remained a British possession. This, at the time supposed to be a barren conquest, was the only trophy of an expedition which had evidently been one of great interest and hopes to him. It is the single failure of his career, and he resented it by throwing the commanders of the expedition into the Tower on their return home.

Strengthened by the reduction of his enemies at home, and by the glory of his power abroad, Cromwell was induced once more to summon a Parliament for the 17th of September 1656. After adressing them (as usual) in a lengthened speech† explaining the position of affairs, and the grounds on which he was

* Elsewhere, in the same speech: "Why, truly your great enemy is the Spaniard. He is a natural enemy. He is naturally so; he is naturally so throughout-by reason of that enmity that is in him against whatsoever is of God."

+ The conclusion of this speech is in his grandest strain; as, indeed, the whole is wonderful-"rude, massive, genuine, like a block of unbeaten gold." In the end he says, "If God give you a spirit of reformation, you will prevent this nation from turning again' to these fooleries ['horse-races, cock-fightings, and the like!' which had been abolished as having been made the occasion of Royalist plots, &c.]; and what will the end be?- Comfort and blessing. Then Mercy and Truth shall meet together. There is a great deal of 'truth' among professors, but very little mercy. They are ready to cut the throats

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prepared to maintain the government, he purged them according to a rule which had been agreed upon between him and his Council. A hundred members out of the four hundred were prevented from taking their seats. This violent act, only justifiable, like many others, by the necessities of his position, excited great indignation; but it was carried quietly through; and Haselrig (his old friend), and Ashley Cooper, and other disturbing spirits, sent back to their homes to nurse their discontent in private.

Parliament thus purged and approved, showed itself more subservient to his wishes. It wasted its time, indeed, in fruitless and absurd discussions as to the opinions of a poor wandering fanatic of the name of Naylor, and the punishment with which he should be visited-evidence enough how far it was from appreciating those noble expressions of the doctrine of toleration which he addressed to it. But at length, after some five months' work and many negotiations, it drew up a new “Instrument of Government," by which it provided for the Protector assuming the office of king, and appoint

of one another. But when we are brought into the right way, we shall be merciful as well as orthodox: and we know who it is that saith, 'If a man could speak with the tongues of men and angels, and yet want that, he is but sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal.'

"Therefore I beseech you, in the name of God, set your hearts to this work. And if you set your hearts to it, then will you sing Luther's Psalm [the 46th, of which Luther's hymn, Eine feste Burg ist unser Gott, is a paraphrase]. This is a rare psalm for a Christian ! -and if he set his heart open, and can approve it to God, we shall hear him say, 'God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in time of trouble.' If Pope and Spaniard, and devil and all, set themselves, though they should compass us like bees,' as it is in hundred-and-eighteenth psalm, yet in the name of the Lord we should destroy them. And, as it is in this psalm of Luther's, 'We will not fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the middle of the sea; though the waters thereof roar and be troubled; though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof.'"

ing his successor. The interviews and debates to which this proposal led, the strange and apparently inconsistent veerings in Cromwell's own mind, make a deeply interesting but perplexing study. Suffice it to say that they ended in his rejecting the proposal of Parliament. On the 8th of May 1657, he finally decided not to adopt the title of king; and the issue was, that he was again, and more formally, inaugurated as Protector, amid the joyful huzzas of the people. The same Parliament abolished the system of major-generals; and in the new instrument reconstituting the Protectorate, it provided for the institution of a House of Lords. Piece by piece, he would fain have surrounded himself with all the old machinery of the constitution.

After an adjournment of six months, Parliament reassembled, and of the fifty-three Peers nominated by Cromwell, forty appeared to take their place. Scarcely any of the old Peers, however-not even Lord Warwick -came. He declared that he could not sit in the same assembly with Hewson the cobbler and Pride the drayman. The Protector, by reason of some infirmities upon him," made them but a short speech; probably he was somewhat despondent and hopeless. The position of affairs was once more critical; his own health was failing the old factions were noisy and gathering strength again. The members excluded in the previous session now professed their willingness to take the oath of the new constitution, and there was no longer any valid reason for insisting upon their exclusion. Haselrig, one of the most persevering and violent, had been prudently nominated by Cromwell a Peer, but he declined to take his seat, except in the House of Commons. He insisted upon having the oath administered to him, and took his place in the Commons as the

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leader of the old Republicans. As may be conjectured, dissensions speedily sprang up in such an assembly. Only two days after the opening of the session, a message was sent from the House of Lords, inviting the Commons to unite with them in an address to his Highness to appoint a day of fasting and humiliation. This was enough to kindle the embers of unappeasable dissatisfaction. The Republicans fired at the title which the so-called Peers had given themselves. have no message to receive from them as Lords," they exclaimed-" they are but a swarm from ourselves." In vain Cromwell summoned them to attend him in the Banqueting Hall, at Whitehall, and addressed them in earnest and solemn words, as to the dangers that were threatening at home and abroad, and his determination to stand with them in the old cause-the interests of the Commonwealth which he had sworn to maintain. They returned, only to renew with more eagerness their faction fight as to the title under which they should recognise the other House; and after a five days' debate, they decided by a majority, not to recognise it under the name of the House of Lords.

This decision stirred the Protector to the very depths of his stormy nature. Without consulting with any one, he went, accompanied by only a few guards, to the House of Lords, and summoned the Commons to attend him. Fleetwood, his son-in-law, here joined him, and tried to dissuade him from his plans, which, he urged, would take even his friends by surprise. But laying his hand upon his breast, he swore by the living God, that he would do it, and that they should not sit another hour. His speech was short, and betrayed the depth of his emotion. We feel a noble pity for the giant bending beneath the pressure of his difficul

ties, resolute not to yield, and yet unable to bear solitary the heavy burden. "To be petitioned and advised by you to undertake such a government- a burden too heavy for any creature-certainly, I did hope that the same men who made the frame, should make it good unto me. I can say in the presence of God, in comparison with whom we are but poor creeping ants upon the earth, I would have been glad to have lived under my woodside, to have kept a flock of sheep, rather than undertake such a government as this." A magnanimous pathos, surely, in this thought of his old quiet former life at such a time! He reproached them with their moving the question of a "Republic," as opposed to the government already settled-with their tampering with the army-with their even, some of them, "listing persons by commission of Charles Stuart," to join with any insurrection that might be made. "And what is like to come upon this," he concluded," the enemy being ready to invade us, but even present blood and confusion? And if this be so, I do assign it to this cause-your not assenting to what you did invite me by your petition and advice, as that which might prove the settlement of the nation. And if this be the end of your sitting, and this be your carriage, I think it high time that an end be put to your sitting. AND I DO DISSOLVE THIS PARLIAMENT ! And let God be judge betwixt you and me."

Parliament was accordingly dismissed-its endless debatings suddenly stifled; but not sooner than necessary; for Royalist discontent was everywhere active, breaking out in ever-renewed flame. "If the session had lasted but two or three days longer," says Hartlib, Milton's friend (to whom his tractate on education was addressed), "all had been in blood, both in