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shed therein, but by the blood of him that shed it." He continues-" And, therefore, I could not consent to the counsels of those who were contented to leave the guilt of so much blood upon the nation, and thereby to draw down the just vengeance of God upon all; when it was most evident that the war had been occasioned by the invasion of our rights, and open breach of our laws and constitution on the King's part." Strange infatuation!

Charles fell a sacrifice at last, because Cromwell had lost his popularity by negociating with him, and wished to regain his credit with his army. He had found reason to suspect, in the course of the negociation, that Charles had no real intention of being reconciled with him, and that the democratic troops whom he commanded were ready to break out into mutiny in consequence of his supposed apostacy. His reconciliation was written in the King's blood. Machiavel, in a chapter in which he shows, "that a people accustomed to live under a prince, if by any accident it becomes free, with difficulty preserves its liberty," says that, "for the difficulties and evils which must be encountered, there is no

* Ludlow's Memoirs, i, 267.

more powerful, or more effectual, or more salutary, or more necessary remedy than to put to death the sons of Brutus," that is to say, to give a striking example of severity against those who would be the chiefs of a counter-revolution.*

By the nation at large, the capital punishment of the King was not demanded, and very soon lamented. When living, he was a baffled tyrant; when dead, he was a royal martyr.

C

Charles was an obstinate, prejudiced, and foolish man, exempt from most vices, and pos sessing but few virtues. In politics he was a spoiled child, and lost his temper when he was contradicted. Hence his conduct respecting the five members, and his early appeal to

arms.

The fate of the Parliament was much more important to the state than that of the King. From the moment they were obliged to raise an army, their independence was in danger. The exclusion of the eleven members was an act of force, destructive of all legal government. The diminution of their numbers, till at last they

* See note (E) at the end of the volume.

consisted only of eighty-six, their subordination to military members, and their taking refuge with the army, were the preludes to their final exclusion and dissolution. The minds of men, which had been led into the war by reverence and attachment to legal forms and established precedents, were now left without star or compass to guide them. Many, no doubt, had supposed that a war against Charles I. was, like a war against Henry III., a proper method of seeking a redress of grievances. But when they found all established authority subverted, all government made a matter of question and conjecture, they knew not where to look for liberty or for law. In their utter inability to remedy this confusion, they turned their eyes to the strongest, and sought protection for their property and their lives. Thus, the attempt to bring human institutions at once to perfection, to get all the protection, without any of the oppression of authority, and to make every law the expression of exact truth and justice, ended in a recurrence to the rudest invention of a warlike tribe.

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Cunctas nationes et urbes, populus, aut primores, aut singuli regunt; delecta ex his et constituta reipublicæ forma laudari facilius quàm evenire, vel, si evenit, haud diuturna esse potest. TACITUS.

SUCH was the deliberate judgment of Tacitus ; a judgment, indeed, contradicted by the event, but which nevertheless is marked with the utmost perfection of thought, to which speculative reasoning could reach. Indeed, the history of the English government, whilst it finally disproves, affords, in its course, ample justification for the opinion of Tacitus. Let us first consider what, in his profound mind, must have struck him as an obstacle to the success of a constitution made up of monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy. Was it the difficulty of forming a

balance between the three powers? Surely not. Any schemer may lay out the plan of a constitution, in which the three powers shall each possess the authority, which in theory it ought to have. Indeed, there is scarcely any constitution which a man of sense can draw up that will not appear more plausible in this respect than the English. What more absurd, à priori, than that the King should have the sole power of making peace and war, whilst the Commons have the sole power of granting money?

It is not then the difficulty of balancing powers which has been overcome by the successful refutation our history affords to the dictum of Tacitus. The grand problem which has been solved is, how the three powers shall come into action without disturbance or convulsion. Many a workman can make an automaton; but not every one can make him play at chess. More than one sculptor can form a beautiful statue; none but Prometheus could give it life. The first disturbance which is likely to occur in such a, constitution as ours, is a collision between the King, as sovereign, and Parliament formed of Lords and Commons, con

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